Berezovo: A Revolutionary Russian Epic

Madame Tolkachaya watched and despaired as her husband happily pocketed not only the 75 roubles but also the extra two hundred, at the same time diminishing the size of the hospital he was charged to administer. Suspecting that the future held nothing for her except disgrace, ruin and, in all probability, imprisonment, she attempted to run away and was brought back. Tolkach beat her again, but it was no use. She began to starve herself and to pray for her release. When it did not come, she attempted to take her life by cutting her wrists with her husband’s razor and had been saved only by Tolkach’s prompt action and the skill of Dr. Tortsov. Carried unconscious from her home, she had been taken to one of the upper rooms in the hospital where she lay for three days, refusing to either eat or drink. No form of protection was overlooked to ensure her safety. By day, her arms were kept by her side in thick restraining straps, to prevent her tearing off the bandages; by night, a nurse was hired to watch over her as she slept. When, on the fourth day, she still refused to take any sustenance, Tolkach ordered the doctor to feed her by force.

For five days she had endured this enforced feeding before relenting. She called weakly for her husband, whom she had previously refused to see. Only Tolkach would know what she had said in their last conversation. How she had begged him for a divorce and was told that such a thing was out of the question; a woman did not leave a man of Tolkach’s stature. How she had threatened that if he would not give her her freedom, she would expose him for the swindler he was or die in the attempt. He in turn had promised her that if she did not change her mind, that she either would never leave the hospital or, if she did leave, it would be under an order of confinement to the Provincial Mental Asylum at Tiumen.

Later one of the orderlies remembered hearing the sound of a blow and Tolkach’s raised voice. Another orderly recalled how the administrator had seemed dazed and preoccupied as he gave the order to remove the straps and dismiss the evening nurse. His wife was to be left alone, the door of her room was to remain locked at all times. No one was to excite her with conversation. She was to remain in solitary confinement in order to allow her to rest and her mind to heal. Later, as he was leaving for Dresnyakov’s party at the hotel, he told one of the orderlies to check to see if his wife was asleep. On being informed that she was standing in the corner of her room weeping copiously, he had shrugged and had left the hospital. Later that night Madame Tolkachaya had taken her own life.

At the inquest, nobody could remember how the store cupboard in the room had come to be unlocked; nor could Dr. Tortsov be certain as to how much carbolic acid she had swallowed. The contusions on her upper arms were consistent with the pressure caused by the restraining straps. Besides these and the burns around her lips, there were no other external injuries or signs of violence. The deceased had left no note.

Such, then, was the true history of how Tolkach’s wife met her end, and the origin of the sinister reputation that the hospital and its administrator had gained amongst the townsfolk. Technically innocent, he was shunned wherever he went. People felt uncomfortable meeting his gaze. Amongst the business class, his new profit-making schemes found no takers. Indeed, he was being judged as vaguely financially unsound; which was perhaps the unkindest cut of all.

As the months passed, Modest Tolkach became used to evenings empty of callers; the nervousness of the bank teller as he counted out his money; the way conversation faltered when he entered a shop. The hospital administrator had bided his time. He knew small towns; he had been brought up in one. Soon there would be another scandal and the tragic circumstances of his wife’s suicide would be forgotten. All he had to do was to keep his head and wait. He knew that one day the call would come; an awkwardly phrased invitation to have a drink at the hotel, perhaps, or a letter inviting him to a social event in aid of the Church of the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary. All the same, he had been surprised to receive without preamble the engraved card requesting his company for dinner at the Pobednyevs’ that evening. Turning the matter over in his mind, he had reached no useful conclusion as to what service the Mayor believed he could offer. When the time for him to leave his house, he noted that the Mayor had not sent his sleigh to fetch him. With a characteristic shrug of his shoulders he told himself that it was still early days. Neither had the desultory conversation during the meal itself yielded any clues. As the sole guest, trapped between the disapproving mien of Madame Pobednyeva and the gross eating habits of her husband, the Mayor, Tolkach waited patiently for the uncomfortable meal to finish.