The Duel (16 page)

And he took about three steps, as though demonstrating how to measure. Boyko counted steps as his companion unsheathed his saber and scratched the earth at the furthest ends to denote the barrier.

The opponents took their places in absolute silence.

“The moles,” recalled the deacon, sitting in the bushes.

Sheshkovsky was saying something, Boyko was again explaining something, but Laevsky didn’t hear them or, more likely, he heard them, but could not understand. When his time had come, he cocked the hammer and raised the heavy, cold barrel of the pistol. He had forgotten to unbutton his coat, and he felt tightly bound about his shoulder and beneath his armpit, and he raised his arm with such clumsiness, by the gesture it seemed as though his sleeve has been sewn to his coat. He recalled the hatred he had felt yesterday toward that swarthy face and woolly hair and
thought that even yesterday, in a moment of intense hatred and wrath, he could not shoot another man. Concerned that the bullet may somehow unexpectedly hit Von Koren, he raised his pistol higher and higher and felt that this was too ostentatious a display of magnanimity and not at all magnanimous or delicate, but he did not know how to behave otherwise nor could he. Looking at the pale face of Von Koren smiling mockingly, which showed, it was obvious now, he had known from the very start that his opponent would shoot into the air, Laevsky thought that right now, by the grace of God, everything will be over and that he need only squeeze the trigger a bit tighter.

There was a powerful recoil to his shoulder, the shot rang out and the mountains replied with an echo:
pakh–takh!

And Von Koren cocked his pistol and looked over to the side where Ustimovich was pacing as he had been earlier, his hands folded behind his back and paying attention to absolutely nothing.

“Doctor,” the zoologist said, “please be so kind as to not pace like a pendulum. You’re looming in my periphery.”

The doctor stopped. Von Koren began to take aim at Laevsky.

This is the end!
Laevsky thought.

The barrel of the pistol was aimed straight at his face, the expression of hatred and contempt in the pose and the entire figure of Von Koren, and this murder that was about to be committed by a respectable person in broad daylight and in the presence of respectable people, and this quiet, and the inexplicable power that forced Laevsky to stand
his ground, and to not run away—how mysterious this all was, and incomprehensible, and frightening! The time that it took for Von Koren to take aim seemed longer than the night had been to Laevsky. Pleadingly, he glanced over at the seconds; they did not stir and were pale.

Hurry up and shoot!
Laevsky thought, and felt that his pale, quivering, pathetic face must arise feelings of even greater hatred in Von Koren.

I’m going to kill him now
, Von Koren thought to himself, taking aim at the forehead and now sensing the trigger with his finger.
Yes, of course, I’ll kill him …

“He’s going to kill him!” everyone heard a desperate cry from somewhere close by.

Instantly, a shot rang out. Seeing that Laevsky was still standing, and had not fallen, all looked over in the direction that the cry had come from, and saw the deacon. He was pale, his wet hair sticking to his forehead and cheeks, he was totally wet and dirty, standing on the far bank there in the corn, smiling somewhat strangely and waving his wet hat about. Sheshkovsky burst into laughter from joy, began to cry and walked off to the side …

A little while later Von Koren and the deacon met up near a little bridge. The deacon was anxious, breathed heavily and avoided making eye contact. He was embarrassed not only by his fear but by his dirty, wet clothes.

“It seemed to me that you wanted to kill him …” he muttered. “How repugnant to human nature that is. What an absolute aberration it is!”

“By the way, how did you get here?” the zoologist inquired.

“Don’t ask!” The deacon waved him off. “The tainted one led me astray: go on, yes, go on … Well, I went, and nearly died in the corn from fear. But now, by the grace of God, the grace of God … I am rather pleased with you,” muttered the deacon. “And our old man the tarantula will be pleased … We’ll laugh and laugh! Only, I ask of you in all sincerity, tell no one that I was here, or else, I’m afraid, the higher-ups will have my hide. They’ll say: the deacon was a second.”

“Gentlemen!” Von Koren said. “The deacon requests that you tell no one that you saw him here. It may cause trouble.”

“How repugnant to human nature this is!” the Deacon sighed. Please magnanimously forgive me, but you had such an expression on your face that I thought you would kill him without fail.”

“I was tempted to finish that miscreant off,” Von Koren said, “but your cry threw off my aim, and I missed. These proceedings have been, simultaneously, repulsive in that I’m not accustomed to them and exhausting to me, Deacon. I feel terribly weak. Let’s go …”

“No, allow me to walk back. I need to dry off, I’m soaked and feel chilly.”

“Well, you know best,” the drained zoologist said in a
languorous voice, taking a seat in the carriage and closing his eyes. “You know best …”

As they walked about the carriage situating themselves, Kerbalay stood by the road and, taking his belly in both hands, bowed low and revealed his teeth; he thought that the gentlemen had arrived to enjoy the natural world and drink tea, and he could not understand why they were taking their seats in the carriage. All were silent as the train left the station, and the deacon alone was left standing near the dukhan.

“I go dukhan, drink tea,” he said to Kerbalay. “Me want eat.”

Kerbalay spoke Russian well, but the deacon thought that the Tartar would understand him better if he spoke to him in broken Russian.

“Fry omelet, give cheese …”

“Go on, go on, Pope,” Kerbalay said, bowing in greeting. “I’ll serve up anything you want … We have cheese, we have wine … Eat up, whatever you want.”

“What is ‘God’ in Tartar?” the deacon asked, entering the dukhan.

“Your God, my God, it’s all the same,” Kerbalay said, not understanding him. “Everyone has the same God, it’s the people who are different. Some are Russian, some are Turks, while others are English—there are many kinds of people, but only one God.”

“All right, sir. If all nationalities worship the same one God, then why do you Muslims see Christians as your eternal enemies?”

“Why are you getting upset?” Kerbalay said, grabbing his belly with both hands. “You’re a pope, I’m a Muslim, you said you were hungry, I’m about to serve you … Only the wealthy sort out which God is yours, and which is mine, but for the poor, it’s all the same. Please, eat.”

While conversations about divinity were taking place at the dukhan, Laevsky was on his way home and suddenly remembered how macabre he had felt traveling at daybreak, when the road, the cliffs and mountains were wet and dark and the unknown future seemed frightening like an abyss, the bottom of which could not be seen, but now the rain drops, suspended from the grass and the rocks, sparkled in the sun like diamonds, nature joyfully smiled, and the frightful past was left behind. He gazed upon the sullen, lachrymose face of Sheshkovsky and ahead at the two carriages, where Von Koren, his seconds and the doctor sat, and it seemed to him that they were all returning from a cemetery, where they had just buried an onerous, unbearable man who had complicated all of their lives.

It’s over
, he thought of his recent past, carefully stroking his fingers along his neck.

On the right side of his neck, near his collar, a small lesion was swelling, about the length and width of his little finger, and he felt pain, as though someone had dragged an iron across his neck. This was a contusion from the bullet.

That’s why, when he arrived home, his day unfurled before him long, strange, sweet, misty, as a half dream. Like someone just released from prison or hospital, he gazed upon long familiar objects and was amazed that the tables,
windows, chairs, the light and the sea aroused an animate, child-like joy in him, a kind that he had not experienced in a very, very long time. The pale Nadezhda Fyodorovna, now grown gaunt, could not understand his meek voice and strange mannerisms; she rushed to tell him everything that had happened to her … It seemed to her that he very likely was hard of hearing and could not understand her and that if he’d find everything out for himself, then he would curse her and kill her, but he listened to her, smoothing her face and hair, looked into her eyes and said:

“I have no one but you …”

Later they sat in the small front garden, pressed against one another, and were silent, or would think aloud of their future happy life, speaking in short, abrupt phrases, and it seemed to him that he had never spoken so extensively or eloquently before.

Three months or more passed.

The day appointed for Von Koren’s departure had arrived. Since early morning, heavy, cold rain had been falling, northeaster winds had been blowing, creating enormous waves out at sea. Word was, it’s unlikely a steamship would set sail in such weather. According to schedule, it was supposed to come at nine in the morning, but as Von Koren walked out onto the embankment at noon, having dined, he could see nothing through his
binoculars except for the gray waves and the rain obscuring the horizon.

By the end of the day the rain had stopped and the wind was beginning to die down noticeably. Von Koren had made peace with the notion that he would not be leaving today and settled down to a game of chess with Samoylenko; but when it had begun to grow dark, the valet announced that lights could be seen out at sea and that they had seen the rocket-boat.

Von Koren began to hurry it up. He hung his little handbag on his shoulder, kissed Samoylenko and the deacon farewell, unnecessarily checked all the rooms, bid the valet and scullery maid farewell and walked out onto the street with a feeling that he had forgotten something either at the doctor’s or in his own apartments. He walked down the street alongside Samoylenko, behind them was the deacon with the trunk, and behind everyone was the valet with two suitcases. Only Samoylenko and the valet could discern the dim lights out at sea; the others looked out into the darkness and saw nothing. The steamship had dropped anchor far from shore.

“Hurry, hurry,” Von Koren rushed. “I’m afraid that it’ll sail away!”

Walking past a house with three windows that Laevsky had moved into soon after the duel, Von Koren could not resist and peered in through the window. Laevsky was sitting hunched over the table, his back to the window and writing.

“I’m amazed,” the zoologist said quietly, “by how he’s turned himself around!”

“Yes, it merits amazement,” Samoylenko sighed. “He sits like that morning to night, just sits there and works. He wants to settle his debts. And he lives, brother, worse off than a pauper.”

Half a minute passed in silence. The zoologist, the doctor and the Deacon all stood at the window and stared at Laevsky.

“He didn’t leave this place after all, poor little guy,” Samoylenko said. “Remember how he railed?”

“Yes, he’s really turned himself around,” Von Koren repeated. “His wedding, this round-the-clock work of his for a crust of bread, there’s some new expression on his face and even his gait is different—all of this is so extremely unusual that I don’t even know what to call it.” The zoologist took Samoylenko by the sleeve and continued in an agitated voice: “You tell him and his wife that as I was leaving, I was amazed by them, wished them the very best … and ask him that he, if at all possible, not regard me with scorn. He knows me. He knows that if I could have foreseen this change in him, then I would have become his best friend.”

“Go drop in on him, say goodbye.”

“No. That would be inconvenient.”

“Why not? God only knows if you’ll ever see him again.”

The zoologist thought for a moment, then said:

“That’s true.”

Samoylenko quietly tapped his fingers on the window. Laevsky started and looked behind him.

“Vanya, Nikolai Vasilievich wishes to say goodbye to you,” Samoylenko said. “He’s leaving right now.”

Laevsky rose from the table and walked to the vestibule to open the door. Samoylenko, Von Koren and the deacon entered the house.

“I’ll only be just a minute,” the zoologist began, removing his galoshes in the vestibule and immediately wishing that he had not yielded to desire and entered this home uninvited.
I feel as though I’m imposing
, he thought,
but that’s foolish
. “Please pardon me for disturbing you,” he said, following Laevsky into his room, “but I’m leaving right now, and I was drawn here to you. God only knows if we’ll ever see each other again.”

“I’m very glad … Please, allow me,” Laevsky said, and awkwardly arranged chairs for his guests, as though wishing to obstruct their paths, then stopped in the center of the room, rubbing his hands.

It was wrong of me to not leave the witnesses in the street
, Von Koren thought, and said definitively: “Do not remember me with scorn, Ivan Andreich. To forget the past, of course, can’t be done, it is too sad, and I didn’t come here for that, to make excuses or to assure you that it wasn’t my fault. I acted sincerely and have not changed my convictions since then … It’s true, as I see to my great joy, that I was wrong concerning you, it’s possible to get tripped up even if the road is straight, and that is the fate of mankind after all: if you don’t make major mistakes, then you’ll make mistakes in the details. No one knows the real truth.”

“Yes, no one knows the truth …” Laevsky said.

“Well, goodbye … May all good things come to you, God willing.”

Von Koren offered his hand to Laevsky, who took it and bowed.

“Do not remember me with scorn,” Von Koren said. “Give my regards to your wife and tell her that I deeply regret I could not say goodbye to her in person.”

“She’s home.”

Laevsky went to the door and spoke into the next room:

“Nadya, Nikolai Vasilievich wishes to say goodbye to you.”