Part 8

“A little while after, when Gavrilo was away, some women of the parish began to bob up at Yelena’s and Budnikov received members of the consistory. Twice, toward evening, I saw Rogov leave Budnikov’s.... Then I thought: so that’s what my young fellow is after; I see now why he’s ruining Gavrilo; he’s fixing it so M. Budnikov can arrange the divorce....

“The whole situation seemed to me so disgraceful and hopeless that I began to think of moving and simply getting away from the whole thing.... I couldn’t sleep.... Again I began to walk around the garden. Once I found Yelena in it.... She was lying on that same bench where I sat that spring morning.... It was fall now.... Everything was dying and growing bare.... Autumn, you know, is a terrible cynic. The wind breaks off the leaves and laughs. They were lying on the muddy, damp earth. And a woman was lying on the damp bench with her face down and crying. Yes, she was crying bitterly.... Later I found out why: the arrangement of M. Budnikov was absolutely impersonal. When she heard this proposition she merely clasped her hands: ‘Let the earth swallow me up, let me dry up like a chip.’ ... And so on.... ‘You’d better bury me alive with Gavrilo Stepanich.’ ... And Gavrilo Stepanich didn’t spend the night at home. That former pure happiness had perished and she didn’t know what to do. A ticket ... two lines ... friends from the church, Budnikov, Rogov. She was stupid and obedient and afraid that something would be done against her will....

“I walked up to her ... wanted to comfort her. When I touched her and felt her body tremble beneath my touch ... it seemed to me such a stupid performance that I trembled, as if from impotent pity....

“I went away.... I forgot the whole thing and wanted to drop it and leave. If M. Budnikov passed ... let him pass.... If Rogov was engaged in dirty business, let him! If stupid Yelena wanted a drunken husband, let her have one.... What did I care? What difference did it make who got the ticket with the two lines, to whom those stupid lines gave rights?... Everything was incomplete, accidental, disconnected, senseless and disgusting....”

IX

Pavel Semenovich stopped and looked out of the window as if he had forgotten the story....

“Well, how did it end?” asked our new companion cautiously.

“End?” The narrator woke up. “Of course, everything on the earth ends some way. This ended stupidly and simply. One night ... my bell rang. Sharply, anxiously, nervously.... I jumped up in fright, put on my slippers ... went out on the steps ... there was no one there. But it occurred to me that Rogov was around the corner. I thought he must have been passing drunk and ugly and wanted to annoy me by coming at this time.... He remembered that I was asleep and he, Vanichka Rogov, my favorite pupil, was drunk on the street and wanted to inform me of it. I closed the door, went back to bed, and fell asleep. The bell rang again. I didn’t get up. Let him ring.... It rang again and again.... No, this must be something else. I put on my overcoat.... Opened the door. There stood the night watchman. His beard was covered with frost. ‘Please,’ he said.

“‘Where do you want me to go, brother?’ I asked.

“‘To Semen Nikolayevich, M. Budnikov.... They’ve had ... trouble....’

“Without understanding anything, I dressed mechanically and went. A clear cold night, and late.... There were lights in the windows of M. Budnikov, whistles along the street.... What a stir for night.... I went up the steps and entered. The first thing that caught my eye was the face of Semen Nikolayevich, M. Budnikov.... Absolutely different, not at all like what he was before. He was lying on his pillow and looking somewhere into space.... That was so strange.... I stopped at the door and thought: ‘What’s this? I used to know him but he’s suddenly changed.... This isn’t the man who came once a month and drank two glasses of tea. Who worried over Yelena’s divorce, but it’s some one with other thoughts. He lay immovable, important, but he didn’t look at us or any one, and he seemed so different.... He was afraid of no one and judged every one; himself, that is, the old Semen Nikolayevich, and Gavrilo, Yelena, Rogov, and ... yes, me too.... I suddenly understood....

“Then I saw Gavrilo. By the window, in a corner, grieved but quiet.... As I suddenly understood, I walked up to him and said:

“‘Did you do this?’

“‘Of course, Pavel Semenovich, I did.’

“‘Why?’

“‘I don’t know, Pavel Semenovich....’

“Then the doctor attracted my attention. He told me that there was no help.... People kept walking and driving up, coming in, sitting down, and writing statements.... It seemed so strange that the young prosecutor, such a careful and reliable man, should give orders not to let Gavrilo and Yelena go and to hold some sort of an investigation.... I remember his smile when I asked him the reason for it.... I’ll admit it was a strange question but I thought that this procedure was unnecessary.... When they started to take Gavrilo and Yelena away I involuntarily got up and asked if they were going to take me.... I later heard rumors that something was wrong with me. That was false. My head was never so clear.... The prosecutor was surprised. ‘If I may give you advice, you need to drink some water and go to bed.’ ‘But Yelena?’ I asked; ‘why her?’ ‘We will hope,’ he answered, ‘that everything will turn out in a way that’s best for her, but now ... at the first inquiry ... it is my painful duty.’ ... I still thought he was acting wrongly....

“The two were taken away. I went back to my rooms and sat down on the steps. It was cold.... A clear, autumn, quiet night with a clear, white frost.... The stars were sparkling and whispering in the sky. They had such a special expression and meaning.... You could hear their mysterious whisper, though you couldn’t make out what they said.... It was both a distant tremor of alarm and also quiet and neighborly sympathy.

“I really wasn’t surprised when Rogov came up quietly and timidly sat down beside me on the steps. He sat a long time without saying a word.... I don’t remember whether he did say anything, but I knew the whole story.... He had no thoughts of murder. He wanted ‘to win Yelena’s case with M. Budnikov’ for himself. He had to get hold of the ticket, on which, as he supposed, was an endorsement.... This clever scheme pleased him: to get hold by illegal means of the proof of a legal right. He saw something humorous in it. The illegal procuring of legal proof in the form of a hypothetical endorsement.... That’s why he worked his way into Budnikov’s confidence through the business of the divorce.... He found out everything about the place and sent one of his obedient clients from the ‘Crags’ to take the proper box. Gavrilo was to open the door of M. Budnikov’s apartment with a second key, which Budnikov, through strange oversight, had failed to take back from him. Instead of waiting at the door, Gavrilo had gone upstairs. I could have sworn I had seen him walk along with his heavy tread, his dark head, and the deep hatred in his soul.... And how he reached the door and how M. Budnikov awoke and apparently was not even frightened but suddenly understood the whole situation.

“I still saw that moment in the past, when two students ran into my rooms on just such a bright night, and I faced them in my shame and weakness.... What a fire ... evil and sarcastic ... was blazing in the eyes of one....

“It seemed to me that I had discovered that which was the bond of union among all things: these lofty, flashing stars, the living murmur of the wind among the branches, my memories, and this deed.... When I was young I had often had this sensation.... When my fresh mind was trying to solve all questions and gain a larger truth. Another time you will seem to be right at the threshold and everything is about to be cleared up, when it all vanishes.

“We sat a long time. Finally Rogov got up.

“‘Where are you going now?’ I asked.

“‘I don’t know,’ was the answer, ‘what I must do.... I think I’ll have to join Gavrilo and Yelena....’

“There he stood. I understood so much more clearly than usual, and I suddenly realized that he was waiting for me to shake hands. I held out my hand and he suddenly seized it, and it was a long time before he let it go....

“He broke away and left ... straight down the street. I looked after him, as long as I could make out the slender figure of my former pupil....”

* * * * *

For some time the silence in the compartment was interrupted only by the rattling of the train and a long whistle. The door slammed, and a conductor walked along the corridor and called out:

“Station of N-sk. Ten minutes’ wait.”

Pavel Semenovich hurriedly got up, picked up a small valise, and, with a sad smile at his audience, he got out of the train. I began to make preparations to leave and so did the gentleman in the gold glasses. Petr Petrovich remained alone. He looked after Pavel Semenovich and, when the door was shut behind him, he smiled at the gentleman in the gold glasses, shook his head, and, running his finger around his forehead, he said:

“He always was a crank.... Now I think he’s not all there. I’ve heard that he threw up his position and now goes around and gives private lessons.”

The gentleman in the gold glasses looked steadily at him but said nothing.

We got out of the train.

* * * * *

From the point of view of a reporter the case was uninteresting. The jurors acquitted Gavrilo (Yelena was not tried); Rogov was convicted of being the instigator, but mercy was recommended. The judge several times had to stop the witness Pavel Semenovich Padorin, former teacher, who constantly wandered away from facts, in order to express opinions which were irrelevant and had nothing to do with the case....

“NECESSITY”

(AN EASTERN TALE)

“NECESSITY”

(AN EASTERN TALE)

I

One day, when the three good sages,—Ulaya, Darnu, and Purana,—were sitting at the door of their common home, young Kassapa, the son of the Rajah Lichava, came up to them and sat down on the earth which was piled around the house but he did not speak. The young man’s cheeks were pale and his eyes, which had lost the glow of youth, seemed weary.

The old men looked one at another, and good Ulaya said:

“Listen, Kassapa, tell to us, the three sages, who wish you nothing but good, what is oppressing your soul. Ever since you lay in the cradle, fate has showered its gifts upon you and you look as downcast as the meanest slave of your father, poor Jebaka, who yesterday felt the heavy hand of your steward....”

“Yes, poor Jebaka showed us the welts on his back,” said stern Darnu and kindly Purana added:

“We wished to call them to your attention, good Kassapa.”

The young man did not allow him to finish. He jumped up from his seat and exclaimed with an impatience which he had never before displayed:

“Stop, kindly sages, with your sly reproaches! You seem to think that I must give you account for every welt inflicted by the steward on the back of the slave Jebaka. I greatly doubt whether I am bound to give account even of my own acts.”

The sages glanced again one at another and Ulaya said:

“Continue, my son, if you so desire.”

“Desire?” interrupted the young man with a bitter laugh. “The fact is, I don’t know whether I desire anything or not. And whether I like what I wish or what another wishes for me.”

He stopped. It was almost perfectly quiet but a breeze stirred the tops of the trees, and a leaf fell at the feet of Purana. While the sad gaze of Kassapa was directed upon this, a stone broke off from the heated cliff and rolled down to the bank of a brook, where a large lizard was resting at this moment.... Every day at the same hour it crawled to this spot. Straightening its front legs and closing its protruding eyes, it apparently listened to the discourse of the sages. It was easy to imagine that its green body contained the soul of some wise Brahmin. But this day that stone released this soul from its green envelope, so that it might enter upon new transformations....

A bitter smile spread over Kassapa’s face.

“Come now, ye kindly sages,” he said, “ask this leaf, if it wished to fall from the tree, or the stone, if it wished to break off from the cliff, or the lizard, if it wished to be crushed by the stone. The hour came, the leaf fell, the lizard heard the last of your conversations. For all that we know could not be otherwise. Or do ye say that it should and could have been otherwise than it was?”

“It could not,” answered the sages. “What has been had to be in the great chain of events.”

“Ye have spoken. Therefore, the welts on the back of Jebaka had to be in the great chain of events, and every one of them has been written since eternity in the book of necessity. And you wish me, the same kind of a stone, the same kind of a lizard, the same kind of a leaf on the great tree of life, the same kind of an insignificant stream as this brook which is driven by an unknown power from source to mouth.... You wish me to struggle against the current which is carrying me onward....”

He kicked the bloody stone which fell into the water and he again sank back on the earth beside the good sages. The eyes of Kassapa again became dull and sad.

Old Darnu said nothing; old Purana shook his head; but the cheerful Ulaya merely laughed and said:

“In the book of necessity, it is also manifestly written, Kassapa, that I should tell to you what happened once to the two sages, Darnu and Purana, whom you see before you.... And in the same book it is written that you shall listen to the tale.”

Then he told the following strange story about his companions and they listened smilingly, but neither confirmed or denied a word.

II

“In the land,” he said, “where blooms the lotus and the sacred stream flows upon its course,—there were no Brahmins more wise than Darnu and Purana. No one had learned the Shastras better and no one had dipped more deeply into the ancient wisdom of the Vedas. But when both approached the end of the mortal span of life and the storms of approaching winter had touched their hair with snow, both were still dissatisfied. The years were passing, the grave was coming nearer and nearer, and truth seemed to recede further and further....”

Both then, well aware that it was impossible to escape the grave, decided to draw truth nearer to themselves. Darnu was the first to put on a wanderer’s robe, to hang a gourd of water on his belt, to take a staff in his hand and to set out. After two years of difficult traveling, he came to the foot of a lofty mountain and on one of its peaks, at an altitude where the clouds love to pass the night, he saw the ruins of a temple. In a meadow near the road shepherds were watching their flocks, and Darnu asked them what sort of a temple it was, what people had built it, and to what god they had offered sacrifices.

The shepherds merely looked at the mountain and then at Darnu, their questioner, for they did not know what answer to make. Finally they said:

“We inhabitants of the valleys, do not know how to answer you. There is among our number an old shepherd Anuruja, who ages ago used to pasture his flocks on these heights. He may know.”

They called this old man.

“I cannot tell you,” he said, “what people built it, when they did it, and to what god they here sacrificed. But my father heard from his father and told me that my great grandfather had said that there once lived a tribe of sages on the slopes of these mountains and that they have all perished, since they have erected this temple. The name of the deity was ‘Necessity.’”

“Necessity?” exclaimed Darnu, greatly interested. “Don’t you know, good father, what form this deity had and whether or not it still resides in this temple?”

“We are simple people,” answered the old man, “and it is hard for us to answer your wise questions. When I was young,—and that was years and years ago,—I used to pasture my flock on these mountain sides. At that time there stood in the temple an idol wrought out of a gleaming black stone. At rare intervals, when a storm overtook me in the vicinity,—and storms are very terrible among these crags,—I used to drive my flock into the old temple for shelter. Rarely, too, Angapali, a shepherdess from a neighboring hillside, would run in, trembling and frightened. I warmed her in my arms and the old god looked down at us with a strange smile. But he never did us any evil, perchance because Angapali always adorned him with flowers. But they say....”

The shepherd stopped with a doubtful look at Darnu and was apparently ashamed to tell him more.

“Say what? My good man, tell me the whole story,” requested the sage.

“They say, all the worshippers of the old god have not perished.... Some are wandering around the world.... And, sometimes, of course rarely, they come here and ask like you the road to the temple and they go there to question the old god. These he turns to stone. Old men have often seen in the temple columns or statues in the form of seated men, richly covered with morning-glories and other vines. Birds have built their nests on some. Later on they gradually turn to dust.”

Darnu pondered deeply over the story. “Am I now near the goal?” he thought. For it is well known that “he, who like a blind man sees naught, like a deaf man, hears naught, like a tree is immovable and insensible, has attained unto rest and knowledge.”

He turned to the shepherd.

“My friend, where is the road to the temple?”

The shepherd pointed it out, and when Darnu commenced to ascend the overgrown path, he watched the sage a long time and then said to his young companions:

“Call me not the oldest of shepherds, but the youngest of suckling lambs if the old god is not soon going to have a new sacrifice. Yoke me like an ox or burden me like an ass with various loads, if another stone column is not to take its place in the old temple!...”

The shepherds respectfully hearkened to the old man and scattered over the pasture. And once more the herds grazed peacefully in the valley, the ploughman followed his plough, the sun shone, night fell, and men were occupied with their own cares and thought no more of wise Darnu. Soon,—in a few days or so,—another wanderer came to the foot of the mountain and he, too, asked about the temple. When he followed the directions of the shepherd and began to ascend the mountain cheerfully, the old man shook his head and said:

“There goes another.”

This was Purana, following in the steps of wise Darnu and thinking:

“It will never be said that Darnu found truth which Purana could not seek.”

III

Darnu ascended the mountain.

It was a hard climb. It was very evident that a human foot rarely passed over the neglected path, but Darnu cheerfully defied all obstacles and finally reached the half-ruined gates, above which was the ancient inscription: “I am Necessity, the mistress of every movement.” The walls had no other sculptures or decorations save fragments of some numbers and mysterious calculations.

Darnu entered the sanctuary. The old walls spread abroad the peace of destruction and death. But this destruction apparently had grown weary and left undisturbed the ruins of walls which had witnessed the march of centuries. In one wall there was a broad recess; several steps led up to an altar, on which was an idol of a gleaming black stone; the deity smiled strangely as it gazed upon this picture of ruin. From beneath it bubbled a brook which filled the wondrous silence with the murmur of its water. Several palms stretched their roots into its course and towered up to the blue sky, which freely looked down through the ruined roof....

Darnu involuntarily submitted to the wondrous spell of this place and decided to question the mysterious deity, whose spirit still seemed to fill the ruined temple. The sage scooped up some water out of the cold brook and gathered some fruit which an old fig-tree had shed and then he began his preparations according to all the rules in the books on contemplation. First of all he sat down facing the idol, drew up his legs, and looked at the image a long time, for he wanted to impress it upon his mind. Then he bared his abdomen and gazed upon that spot where he was bound to his mother before his earthly birth. For it is well known that all knowledge lies between being and not being and hence must come the revelations of contemplation....

In such a posture he saw the end of the first day and the beginning of the second. The heat of noon several times replaced the cool of evening and the shadows of night gave place to the light of the sun,—but Darnu remained in the same position, rarely plunging his gourd into the water or absent-mindedly picking up some fruit. The eyes of the sage grew dull and fixed; his limbs dried up. At first he felt the inconvenience and pain of immobility. Later on these sensations passed into complete unconsciousness, and before the stony gaze of the sage another world, the world of contemplation, began to unroll its strange apparitions and shapes. They no longer bore any relationship to the experiences of the meditating sage. They were disinterested, disconnected, and concerned only themselves, and that meant that they were the preludes to a revelation of the truth.

It was hard to say how long this state continued. The water in the gourd dried up, the palms quietly rustled, the ripening fruits broke off and fell at the sage’s feet, but he let them lie on the ground. He was almost freed from thirst and hunger. He was not warmed by the noontide sun nor chilled by the cool freshness of the night. Finally he ceased to distinguish the light of day and the darkness of night.

Then the inner eye of Darnu saw the long expected vision. Out of his abdomen grew a green trunk of bamboo tipped with a knot like an ordinary stem. From the knot grew another section and thus, rising ever higher, the trunk grew to consist of fifty joints, a number corresponding to the years of the sage. At the top, instead of leaves and blossoms, grew a something resembling the idol in the temple. This something looked down on Darnu with an evil smile.

“Poor Darnu,” it said finally. “Why did you come here and take so much trouble? What do you want, poor Darnu?”

“I seek the truth,” answered the sage.

“Then look on me, for I am what you sought. But I see that I am unpleasant and disagreeable to your sight.”

“You are incomprehensible,” answered Darnu.

“Listen, Darnu. Do you see the fifty joints of the reed?”

“The fifty joints of the reed are my years,” said the sage.