A Father, Chekhov Anton

«I don’t deny it; I have had a drop too much. … Forgive me; the fact is I happened to pass by the public, and, all owing to the heat, I drank a couple of bottles. It’s hot, brother!»

Old Musatov took a rag from his pocket, and wiped the sweat from his clean-shaven, dissipated face.

«I have come to you, Borenka, angel mine, just for a minute,» he continued, looking at his son, «on very important business. Forgive me if I am in the way. Tell me, my soul … do you happen to have ten roubles to spare till Tuesday? You understand me … yesterday I ought to have paid for the rooms, but the money question … you understand. Not a kopeck!»

Young Musatov went out silently, and behind the door began a whispered consultation with his housekeeper and the colleagues in the Civil Service with whom he shared the villa. In a minute he returned, and silently handed his father a ten-rouble note. The old gentleman took it carelessly, and without looking at it thrust it into his pocket, and said:

«Merci! And how is the world using you? We haven’t met for ages.»

«Yes, it is a long time—since All Saints’ Day.»

«Five times I did my best to get over to you, but never could get time. First one matter, then another … simply ruination. But, Boris, I may confess it, I am not telling the truth…. I lie…. I always lie. Don’t believe me, Borenka. I promised to let you have the ten roubles back on Tuesday; don’t believe that either! Don’t believe a single word I say! I have no business matters at all, simply idleness, drink, and shame to show myself in the street in this get-up. But you, Borenka, will forgive me. Three times I sent the girl for money, and wrote you piteous letters. For the money, thanks! But don’t believe the letters…. I lied. It hurts me to plunder you in this way, angel mine; I know that you can hardly make both ends meet, and live—so to say—on locusts. But with impudence like mine you can do nothing. A rascal who only shows his face when he wants money!… Forgive me, Borenka, I tell you the plain truth, because I cannot look with indifference upon your angel face….»

A minute passed in silence. The old man sighed deeply, and began:

«Let us make the supposition, brother, that you were to treat me to a glass of beer.»

Without a word, Boris again went out and whispered outside the door. The beer was brought in. At the sight of the bottle Musatov enlivened, and suddenly changed his tone.

«The other day I was at the races,» he began, making frightened faces. «There were three of us, and together we put in the totalisator a three-rouble note on Shustri.[1] And good luck to Shustri! With the risk of one rouble we each got back thirty-two. It is a noble sport. The old woman always pitches into me about the races, but I go. I love it!»

[1] Rapid.

Boris, a young fair-haired man, with a sad, apathetic face, walked from corner to corner, and listened silently. When Musatov interrupted his story in order to cough, he went up to him and said:

«The other day, papa, I bought myself a new pair of boots, but they turned out too small. I wish you would take them off my hands. I will let you have them cheap!»

«I shall be charmed!» said the old man, with a grimace. «Only for the same price—without any reduction.»

«Very well…. We will regard that as a loan also.»

Boris stretched his arm under the bed, and pulled out the new boots. Old Musatov removed his own awkward brown shoes—plainly someone else’s—and tried the new boots on.

«Like a shot!» he exclaimed. «Your hand on it. … I’ll take them. On Tuesday, when I get my pension, I’ll send the money…. But I may as well confess, I lie.» He resumed his former piteous tone. «About the races I lied, and about the pension I lie. You are deceiving me, Borenka…. I see very well through your magnanimous pretext. I can see through you! The boots are too small for you because your heart is too large! Akh, Borya, Borya, I understand it … and I feel it!»

«You have gone to your new rooms?» asked Boris, with the object of changing the subject. «Yes, brother, into the new rooms…. Every month we shift. With a character like the old woman’s we cannot stay anywhere.»

«I have been at the old rooms. But now I want to ask you to come to the country. In your state of health it will do you good to be in the fresh air.» Musatov waved his hand. «The old woman wouldn’t let me go, and myself I don’t care to. A hundred times you have tried to drag me out of the pit…. I have tried to drag myself … but the devil an improvement! Give it up! In the pit I’ll die as I have lived. At this moment I sit in front of you and look at your angel face … yet I am being dragged down into the pit. It’s destiny, brother! You can’t get flies from a dunghill to a rose bush. No. … Well, I’m off … it’s getting dark.»

«If you wait a minute, well go together. I have business in town myself.»

Musatov and his son put on their coats, and went out. By the time they had found a droschky it was quite dark, and the windows were lighted up.

«I know I’m ruining you, Borenka,» stammered the father. «My poor, poor children! What an affliction to be cursed with such a father! Borenka, angel mine, I cannot lie when I see your face. Forgive me!… To what a pass, my God, has impudence brought me! This very minute I have taken your money, and shamed you with my drunken face; your brothers also I spunge on and put to shame. If you had seen me yesterday! I won’t hide anything, Borenka. Yesterday our neighbours—all the rascality, in short—came in to see the old woman. I drank with them, and actually abused you behind your back, and complained that you had neglected me. I tried, you understand, to get the drunken old women to pity me, and played the part of an unhappy father. That’s my besetting sin; when I want to hide my faults, I heap them on the heads of my innocent children…. But I cannot lie to you, Borenka, or hide things. I came to you in pride, but when I had felt your kindness and all-mercifulness, my tongue clove to the roof of my mouth, and all my conscience turned upside down.»

«Yes, father, but let us talk about something else.»

«Mother of God, what children I have!» continued the old man, paying no attention to his son, «What a glory the Lord has sent me! Such children should be sent not to me, a good-for-nothing, but to a real man with a soul and a heart. I am not worthy of it!»

Musatov took off his cap and crossed himself piously thrice.

«Glory be to Thee, O God!» he sighed, looking around as if seeking an ikon. «Astonishing, priceless children! Three sons I have, and all of them the same! Sober, serious, diligent—and what intellects! Cabman, what intellects! Gregory alone has as much brains as ten ordinary men. French … and German … he speaks both … and you never get tired of listening. Children, children mine, I cannot believe that you are mine at all! I don’t believe it! You, Borenka, are a very martyr! I am ruining you … before long I shall have mined you. You give me money without end, although you know very well that not a kopeck goes on necessaries. Only the other day I sent you a piteous letter about my illness…. But I lied; the money was wanted to buy rum. Yet you gave it to me sooner than offend your old father with a refusal. All this I know … and feel … Grisha also is a martyr. On Thursday, angel mine, I went to his office, drunk, dirty, ragged … smelling of vodka like a cellar. I went straight up to him and began in my usual vulgar slang, although he was with the other clerks, the head of the department—and petitioners all around! Disgraced him for his whole life!.. Yet he never got the least confused, only a little pale; he smiled, and got up from his desk as if nothing were wrong—even introduced me to his colleagues. And he brought me the whole way home, without a word of reproach! I spunge on him even worse than on you!

«Then take your brother, Sasha! There’s another martyr! Married to a colonel’s daughter, moving in a circle of aristocrats, with a dot … and everything else…. He, at any rate, you would think would have nothing to do with me. Well, brother, what does he do? When he gets married the very first thing after the wedding he comes to me with his young wife, and pays me the first visit … to my lair, to the lair … I swear to God!»

The old man began to sob, but soon laughed again.

«At the very moment, as the fates would have it, when we were eating scraped radishes and kvas, and frying fish, with a stench in the room enough to stink out the devil. I was lying drunk as usual, and the old woman jumps up and