The Enchanted Wanderer and Other Stories

“Well, so that’s it! And if I’d been rich and had brought you a dowry …”

“Oh, ho, ho! …”

That I couldn’t bear, and, in the words of the late poet Tolstoy,³ “having begun like a god, I ended like a swine.” I assumed an offended look—because I indeed felt myself unjustly offended—and, shaking my head, I turned and went to my study. But as I was closing the door behind me, I felt an invincible thirst for revenge—opened the door again and said:

“That’s swinishness!”

And she replies:

“Merci, husband dear.”

III

Devil knows, what a scene! And don’t forget—that was after four years of the happiest married life, never for a moment troubled by anything! … I was annoyed, offended—it was unbearable! What rubbish! And for what? … It was all my brother’s mischief-making. And what was it to me, that I was so upset and seething? Isn’t he in fact an adult, doesn’t he have the right to decide whom he likes and wishes to marry? … Lord—nowadays you can’t even guide your own son in these matters, so why on earth should a brother listen to his brother? … And by what right, finally? … And can I in fact be such a prophet as to firmly predict how this matchmaking will end? … Mashenka is indeed an excellent girl, and isn’t my wife a lovely woman? … And, thank God, no one has ever called me a scoundrel, and yet here we are, she and I, after four years of happy life, never troubled for a moment by anything, now squabbling like a tailor and his wife … And all over a trifle, over someone else’s clownish whim …

I was terribly ashamed of myself and terribly sorry for her, because I now took no account of her words and blamed myself for everything, and in this sad and displeased mood I fell asleep on the sofa in my study, wrapped in a soft quilted robe, made by my dear wife’s own hands …

It’s a winning thing—a comfortable piece of clothing, made for a husband by his wife’s own hands! It’s so good, so sweet, and such a reminder, timely or untimely, both of our faults and of those precious little hands, which one suddenly wants to kiss and ask forgiveness for something.

“Forgive me, my angel, that you have finally tried my patience. In future it won’t happen.”

And, I’ll confess, I wanted so much to go quickly with that request that I woke up, rose, and left my study.

I look—all through the house it’s dark and quiet.

I ask the maid:

“Where is the lady?”

“She went with your brother to see Marya Nikolaevna’s father,” she replied. “I’ll make your tea at once.”

“What a woman!” I think. “So she won’t give up her stubbornness—she really wants my brother to marry Mashenka … Well, let them do as they like, and let Mashenka’s father dupe them as he did his older sons-in-law. And even more, because they’re shysters themselves, and my brother—the embodiment of honesty and delicacy. So much the better—let him cheat them—both my brother and my wife. Let her get burnt by her first lesson in matchmaking!”

I received a glass of tea from the maid’s hand and sat down to read the case that was to begin the next day in our court and which presented me with no little difficulty.

This work occupied me long past midnight, and at two o’clock my wife and brother returned, both in the merriest spirits.

My wife says to me:

“Would you like some cold roast beef and a glass of water with wine? We had supper at the Vasilievs’.”

“No,” I say, “I humbly thank you.”

“Nikolai Ivanovich waxed generous and gave us an excellent meal.”

“Well now!”

“Yes—we passed the time most merrily and drank champagne.”

“Lucky you!” I say, while thinking to myself: “So that slyboots, Nikolai Ivanovich, saw through my mooncalf of a brother at once, and gave him some swill—not without reason. Now he’ll coddle him till the end of the engagement period, and then—a short tether.”

And my feeling against my wife became embittered again, and, being innocent, I did not ask her forgiveness. And even if I had been free and had had leisure to enter into all the details of the love game they had started, it would have been no surprise if again I had lost patience—had interfered in some way, and we’d have arrived at some sort of psychosis; but, fortunately, I had no time. The case I told you about occupied us so much at court that we had no hope of getting free of it even by the holiday, and therefore I came home only to eat and sleep, and spent all my days and part of my nights before the altar of Themis.⁴

But at home things did not wait for me, and when I appeared under my own roof on Christmas Eve, pleased to be free of my court duties, I was met by an invitation to examine a magnificent basket of expensive gifts that my brother was offering to Mashenka.

“What might this be?”

“These are the groom’s gifts to the bride,” explained my wife.

“Aha! So it’s come to that now! Congratulations.”