The Brothers Karamazov (99 page)

“Where . . . where is Juchka?”Ilyusha asked in a breaking voice.

“Ah, that’s something I don’t know, old man. It looks as if Juchka’s vanished!”

Ilyusha said nothing. He just gave Kolya another intent look. Alyosha caught Kolya’s eye and started signaling to him vigorously, but Kolya ignored him and looked elsewhere.

“I bet Juchka must have hidden somewhere and then died there, for it seems very unlikely that he could have lived after such a snack,” Kolya said mercilessly, although he himself was finding it rather difficult to breathe now. “But, instead, I have my Perezvon. It’s a nice Slav name as I said, and I’ve brought him to meet you.”

“I don’t want to!” Ilyusha said suddenly.

“Yes, yes, you do. You must have a look at him . . . it’ll amuse you. I brought him specially . . . He’s just as shaggy as the other . . . Will you allow me, madam, to call my dog in here?” he said, turning suddenly to Mrs. Snegirev, by now in an altogether incomprehensible state of excitement.

“No, no, I don’t want to!” Ilyusha cried bitterly, and his eyes looked at Kolya in deep reproach.

“I wonder whether . . . Perhaps some other time . . .” Snegirev suddenly tore himself from the trunk by the wall where he had been sitting. “Please, any other time,” he muttered.

But, ignoring him, Kolya suddenly turned to Smurov:

“Now, Smurov, open the door!”

As soon as Smurov did so, Kolya whistled. Perezvon came rushing into the room.

“Here! Jump, jump! Now beg, Perezvon, beg!” Kolya yelled, getting up, and the dog stood on his hind legs right in front of Ilyusha’s bed.

Then something quite unexpected happened. Ilyusha started trembling all over and suddenly leaned violently forward toward Perezvon, staring at him as if in a trance.

“But this is . . . this is Juchka!” Ilyusha cried in a voice trembling with pain and joy.

“Sure, who else?” Kolya cried in a resounding, happy voice and, leaning down, he picked up the dog and held him up to Ilyusha.

“See, old man, see this blind eye, and this ear split in two—aren’t those the special marks you told me about? It was thanks to those marks that I was able to find him. And it didn’t take me long either. You see, this dog didn’t belong to anyone really,” he explained, looking in turn first at Ilyusha’s mother, then at his father, then at Alyosha, and then back at Ilyusha himself. “He lived in the back of the Fedotovs’ yard, but he didn’t belong to them; I guess he came from some outlying village. The Fedotovs didn’t feed him. But anyhow, it was there that I found him. So you see, old man, it turns out that he didn’t swallow that snack you gave him, for if he had he certainly wouldn’t be here! He must have managed to spit it out somehow or other, without your noticing it. But he still must have pricked his tongue, since you say he squealed as he ran away. He must have squealed an awful lot because the skin inside a dog’s mouth is, as you know, extremely tender, in fact, much tenderer than the skin in a human mouth, beyond comparison!”

Kolya was shouting at the top of his voice and beaming with delight.

Ilyusha was speechless. He stared at Kolya. His eyes were huge and now seemed strangely prominent. His mouth was open. His face was as white as the sheets of his bed. If Kolya Krasotkin had understood how bad, even fatal, such emotion could be for the sick boy, he would never have thought of playing such a trick on him. But of all those present, no one understood it, except possibly Alyosha. As to Snegirev, he seemed to have been suddenly transformed into a little boy himself.

“Juchka! So this is Juchka, then!” he kept exclaiming blissfully. “Look Ilyusha, this is Juchka, your own Juchka! Look, mother, see, Juchka is here!” The man was on the verge of tears.

“I never guessed it!” Smurov cried ruefully. “Ah, that Krasotkin! But I was sure from the very beginning that if anyone could find Juchka, he’d be the one, and you see, he found him all right!”

“He sure did!” a boy shouted.

“That’s great, Krasotkin!” another boy put in.

“Great! Marvelous! Good boy, Krasotkin!” other voices resounded.

“Keep quiet, now, that’s enough!” Kolya was trying to outshout them all. “Let me tell you how it happened, because that’s what’s so curious about it. You see, I found him, took him home, and locked him up without letting anyone see him until the last day. Smurov was the only one to find out about him being hidden in my house, but then I managed to convince him that it was Perezvon. In the meantime, I had taught him all those tricks so that Smurov agreed that it couldn’t possibly be Juchka. Ah, you should see all the tricks he can perform! And do you know why I trained him, Ilyusha, old man? It was to bring him to you already smart and well-trained, so you could admire how great your Juchka had become. Tell me, don’t you have a little piece of meat? Because if so, he could show you a trick that’ll make you split your sides laughing! Can’t you really find a little piece of meat in the house?”

Snegirev dashed out of the cottage and ran over to the landlord’s house, where the meals for the Snegirev family were now prepared. While he was away, Kolya, not wishing to waste a second, suddenly shouted, “Pretend you’re dead, Perezvon!” and the dog spun around a few times, then lay on his back with all four paws sticking up in the air. The boys roared with laughter, while Ilyusha watched the animal with the same pained smile. But the most delighted of all was Mrs. Snegirev; she kept giggling and snapping her fingers and shouting:

“Perezvon, Perezvon!”

“Nothing doing! He won’t stir!” Krasotkin cried with well-earned pride. “The whole world can call him, it won’t make any difference. But if I tell him, he’ll jump up at once. Watch now: ‘Here, Perezvon!’ ”

The dog leaped up squealing with joy, as Snegirev appeared with a piece of meat.

“It’s not too hot, I hope?” Kolya inquired in a business-like tone, holding the meat in his hand for a moment. “No, I guess it’s fine. You see, dogs don’t like hot food. And now, everybody watch this! Hey, watch, Ilyusha, why aren’t you watching? I brought him here for you and you won’t even watch him perform!”

The new trick consisted in making the dog stand on his hindlegs with his head in the air and his nose stretched forward and then placing the appetizing morsel on the very tip of the poor beast’s nose. And Perezvon was supposed to remain like this without moving for any length of time—as long as half an hour, Kolya claimed—until his master ordered him to move.

This time, however, the dog’s patience was tested for only a few seconds:

“Catch it!” Kolya cried, and the piece of meat at once flew from the tip of Perezvon’s nose right into his mouth. The boys exclaimed in admiration and wonder.

“I can’t believe you didn’t come all this time just because you wanted to finish training your dog,” Alyosha said with a note of reproach in his voice.

“That was exactly the reason, though!” Kolya cried innocently. “I wanted to present Perezvon in all his glory!”

“Perezvon, Perezvon!” Ilyusha suddenly called the dog, snapping his brittle fingers.

“What do you want? You want him to pay you a visit in your bed? Here, Perezvon!” Kolya slapped his hand on the blanket and Perezvon was there beside Ilyusha. The boy threw his arms around the dog’s neck and at once his entire cheek was thoroughly licked by the animal. Ilyusha hugged the dog hard, stretched himself out, and buried his face in the shaggy fur.

“Oh, my God, my God!” Snegirev kept repeating.

Kolya sat on the bed beside Ilyusha and said:

“I’d like to show you something else now. I’ve brought you a little cannon. Remember, I told you about it before and you said you’d very much like to have a look at it. Well, I’ve brought it with me.”

And Kolya hurriedly pulled his little brass cannon out of his satchel. He was in such a great hurry because he was feeling quite overwhelmed with joy himself. On another occasion he would have waited until the effect produced by Perezvon had worn off. But now he threw his usual self-control to the winds, as if thinking: “Here, people, I’m aware that you’re already quite happy, but I have even more for you!” He was delighted with it all himself.

“I saw this thing long ago at Mr. Morozov’s, old man, and I got it for you. It was just gathering dust there and I swapped it for a book of my father’s, 
A Kinsman of Mahomet or Therapeutic Buffoonery
. It was published in Moscow a hundred years ago when there was still no censorship and it’s full of that kind of thing, you know . . . Well, Mr. Morozov seems to love that sort of stuff and he was glad to give me the cannon for it. He even thanked me afterward.”

Kolya held the cannon up so that they could all see and admire it. Ilyusha raised himself and looked admiringly at the toy with his arm still around Perezvon’s neck. The effect Kolya produced reached its highest point when he declared that he had some gunpowder with him and that he could fire the gun if he was certain that it would not inconvenience the ladies. Mrs. Snegirev demanded to be allowed to have a closer look at the cannon and Kolya immediately complied with her wish. She was absolutely delighted with the shiny little gun and started rolling it up and down on her knee. When asked for her permission to fire the cannon, she granted it enthusiastically, although she did not really understand what she had been asked. Captain Snegirev, as a former soldier, was entrusted with the loading of the gun. He took the smallest amount of powder, but asked Kolya to postpone the firing with shot until some other time. The cannon was placed on the floor, the barrel trained away from the spectators. Three grains of powder were placed in the touch hole and a match was put to it. A brilliant report followed. Mrs. Snegirev shuddered but at once recovered and giggled happily. The boys looked on in silent admiration. But the happiest of them all was Snegirev, who looked blissfuly at his son. Kolya then picked up the cannon from the floor and presented it to Ilyusha, together with the supply of powder and the shot.

“This is all yours! I prepared it for you long ago,” Kolya repeated, wallowing in his own happiness.

“Oh, why don’t you give it to me instead? Yes, you’d better give it to me!” Mrs. Snegirev suddenly cried out. Her face expressed infinite anxiety lest they refuse her the toy. The Captain, looking terribly worried, began to fuss over her.

“Mother, mother dear, please!” he said, hurrying to her. “It is yours, yours, but let Ilyusha have it for a little while, because it was really meant to be a present for him. But you understand that it’s just the same as if it were yours, for he’ll always let you play with it. Say, what about the two of you owning it in common?”

“No, no, no! I don’t want to own it in common with him. I want it all to myself—it cannot be Ilyusha’s!” Mrs. Snegirev said, ready to cry.

“Mamma, please, you can have it. It’s yours!” Ilyusha suddenly said. “Is it all right with you, Krasotkin, if I give it to my mother?” he said, looking beseechingly at Krasotkin and obviously worried that Kolya might be offended at his giving away his present.

“Of course, it’s all right!” Kolya at once agreed. He took the gun from Ilyusha’s hands, and handed it to the boy’s mother with a graceful bow. The woman burst into tears of sheer joy.

“Ah, Ilyusha, my darling, you’re a nice, nice boy who really loves his mamma!” she cried, and began to roll the cannon up and down on her knee.

“Allow me to kiss your hand, mother dear!” her husband said, hurrying to her and doing so.

“And do you know who is the nicest of all? It’s that young man over there. He’s the kindest of all the boys!” the grateful lady said, pointing to Kolya.

“And I’ll be able to bring you as much gunpowder as you want. We’re making gunpowder ourselves now. You see, Borovikov has discovered the ingredients that go into it: twenty-four parts of saltpeter, ten of sulphur, and six of birchwood charcoal. You have to pound it all together, add some water so it forms a kind of a paste, and then pass it through a very fine strainer, like sheepskin—and there you have your powder!”

“Smurov told me about it. But my father says it isn’t real gunpowder,” Ilyusha said.

“What do you mean, it isn’t real?” Kolya said, turning very red. “Ours burns all right. But, after all, I don’t know . . .”

“No, no, I didn’t mean it quite that way,” Snegirev said, looking guilty and contrite. “I simply said that that isn’t the way they make real gunpowder. But I’m sure this way is fine too.”

“Well, I’m sure you know more about it than I do, sir. We burned some of our stuff in a stone jar and it burned beautifully, burned all up, and there was only very little ash left. And that was only the paste, so if we’d strained it properly . . . But I really don’t know much about it . . . And did you hear, Ilyusha? Bulkin’s father gave him a hiding because of our powder.”

“Yes, I heard about it,” Ilyusha said, listening to Kolya with endless joy.

“It was because we’d prepared a whole bottle of powder and Bulkin was keeping it under his bed. His father found it. ‘You’ll blow us all up!’ he said to him and gave him a hiding then and there. At first, he wanted to complain to the school principal, but he finally decided not to allow Bulkin to play with me anymore. And you know, Smurov’s parents won’t allow him to have anything to do with me either. I’ve really got myself quite a reputation around here! They all say I’m a ‘desperado,’ ” Kolya added with a scornful snort, “and it all dates from that time on the railroad track.”

“Oh, we heard about that exploit of yours!” Snegirev cried. “I can just imagine how it must have felt lying there. Wasn’t it frightening, though, having that train pass over your head? I bet it must have been!”

Snegirev was trying desperately to please Kolya.

“N-no . . . no, not all that bad, really!” Kolya replied casually. “But you know who really did the most damage to my reputation here?” he said, turning again to Ilyusha. “It was that damned goose!”

Although he tried to assume a careless and casual air, Kolya could not control his excitement and kept slipping out of what seemed to him the right tone.

“Ah, I heard about the goose too!” Ilyusha cried laughing. “But I didn’t quite understand—did they really take you to court for it, before a judge?”