There was a roar of laughter.
«Only would you believe it, gentlemen, I have never taken bribes?» said Polzunkov, looking round at the whole company distrustfully.
A prolonged burst of Homeric laughter drowned Polzunkov’s words in guffaws.
«It really is so, gentlemen….»
But here he stopped, still looking round at every one with a strange expression of face; perhaps—who knows?—at that moment the thought came into his mind that he was more honest than many of all that honourable company…. Anyway, the serious expression of his face did not pass away till the general merriment was quite over.
«And so,» Polzunkov began again when all was still, «though I never did take bribes, yet that time I transgressed; I put in my pocket a bribe … from a bribe-taker … that is, there were certain papers in my hands which, if I had cared to send to a certain person, it would have gone ill with Fedosey Nikolaitch.»
«So then he bought them from you?»
«He did.»
«Did he give much?»
«He gave as much as many a man nowadays would sell his conscience for complete, with all its variations … if only he could get anything for it. But I felt as though I were scalded when I put the money in my pocket. I really don’t understand what always comes over me, gentlemen—but I was more dead than alive, my lips twitched and my legs trembled; well, I was to blame, to blame, entirely to blame. I was utterly conscience-stricken; I was ready to beg Fedosey Nikolaitch’s forgiveness.»
«Well, what did he do—did he forgive you?»
«But I didn’t ask his forgiveness…. I only mean that that is how I felt. Then I have a sensitive heart, you know. I saw he was looking me straight in the face. ‘Have you no fear of God, Osip Mihailitch?’ said he. Well, what could I do? From a feeling of propriety I put my head on one side and I flung up my hands. ‘In what way,’ said I, ‘have I no fear of God, Fedosey Nikolaitch?’ But I just said that from a feeling of propriety…. I was ready to sink into the earth. ‘After being so long a friend of our family, after being, I may say, like a son—and who knows what Heaven had in store for us, Osip Mihailitch?—and all of a sudden to inform against me—to think of that now!… What am I to think of mankind after that, Osip Mihailitch?’ Yes, gentlemen, he did read me a lecture! ‘Come,’ he said, ‘you tell me what I am to think of mankind after that, Osip Mihailitch.’ ‘What is he to think?’ I thought; and do you know, there was a lump in my throat, and my voice was quivering, and knowing my hateful weakness, I snatched up my hat. ‘Where are you off to, Osip Mihailitch? Surely on the eve of such a day you cannot bear malice against me? What wrong have I done you?…’ ‘Fedosey Nikolaitch,’ I said, ‘Fedosey Nikolaitch….’ In fact, I melted, gentlemen, I melted like a sugar-stick. And the roll of notes that was lying in my pocket, that, too, seemed screaming out: ‘You ungrateful brigand, you accursed thief!’ It seemed to weigh a hundredweight … (if only it had weighed a hundredweight!)…. ‘I see,’ says Fedosey Nikolaitch, ‘I see your penitence … you know to-morrow….’ ‘St. Mary of Egypt’s day….’ ‘Well, don’t weep,’ said Fedosey Nikolaitch, ‘that’s enough: you’ve erred, and you are penitent! Come along! Maybe I may succeed in bringing you back again into the true path,’ says he … ‘maybe, my modest Penates’ (yes,’Penates,’ I remember he used that expression, the rascal) ‘will warm,’ says he, ‘your harden … I will not say hardened, but erring heart….’ He took me by the arm, gentlemen, and led me to his family circle. A cold shiver ran down my back; I shuddered! I thought with what eyes shall I present myself—you must know, gentlemen … eh, what shall I say?—a delicate position had arisen here.»
«Not Madame Polzunkov?»
«Marya Fedosyevna, only she was not destined, you know, to bear the name you have given her; she did not attain that honour. Fedosey Nikolaitch was right, you see, when he said that I was almost looked upon as a son in the house; it had been so, indeed, six months before, when a certain retired junker called Mihailo Maximitch Dvigailov, was still living. But by God’s will he died, and he put off settling his affairs till death settled his business for him.»
«Ough!»
«Well, never mind, gentlemen, forgive me, it was a slip of the tongue. It’s a bad pun, but it doesn’t matter it’s being bad—what happened was far worse, when I was left, so to say, with nothing in prospect but a bullet through the brain, for that junker, though he would not admit me into his house (he lived in grand style, for he had always known how to feather his nest), yet perhaps correctly he believed me to be his son.»
«Aha!»
«Yes, that was how it was! So they began to cold-shoulder me at Fedosey Nikolaitch’s. I noticed things, I kept quiet; but all at once, unluckily for me (or perhaps luckily!), a cavalry officer galloped into our little town like snow on our head. His business—buying horses for the army—was light and active, in cavalry style, but he settled himself solidly at Fedosey Nikolaitch’s, as though he were laying siege to it! I approached the subject in a roundabout way, as my nasty habit is; I said one thing and another, asking him what I had done to be treated so, saying that I was almost like a son to him, and when might I expect him to behave more like a father…. Well, he began answering me. And when he begins to speak you are in for a regular epic in twelve cantos, and all you can do is to listen, lick your lips and throw up your hands in delight. And not a ha’p’orth of sense, at least there’s no making out the sense. You stand puzzled like a fool—he puts you in a fog, he twists about like an eel and wriggles away from you. It’s a special gift, a real gift—it’s enough to frighten people even if it is no concern of theirs. I tried one thing and another, and went hither and thither. I took the lady songs and presented her with sweets and thought of witty things to say to her. I tried sighing and groaning. ‘My heart aches,’ I said, ‘it aches from love.’ And I went in for tears and secret explanations. Man is foolish, you know…. I never reminded myself that I was thirty … not a bit of it! I tried all my arts. It was no go. It was a failure, and I gained nothing but jeers and gibes. I was indignant, I was choking with anger. I slunk off and would not set foot in the house. I thought and thought and made up my mind to denounce him. Well, of course, it was a shabby thing—I meant to give away a friend, I confess. I had heaps of material and splendid material—a grand case. It brought me fifteen hundred roubles when I changed it and my report on it for bank notes!»
«Ah, so that was the bribe!»
«Yes, sir, that was the bribe—and it was a bribe-taker who had to pay it—and I didn’t do wrong, I can assure you! Well, now I will go on: he drew me, if you will kindly remember, more dead than alive into the room where they were having tea. They all met me, seeming as it were offended, that is, not exactly offended, but hurt—so hurt that it was simply…. They seemed shattered, absolutely shattered, and at the same time there was a look of becoming dignity on their faces, a gravity in their expression, something fatherly, parental … the prodigal son had come back to them—that’s what it had come to! They made me sit down to tea, but there was no need to do that: I felt as though a samovar was toiling in my bosom and my feet were like ice. I was humbled, I was cowed. Marya Fominishna, his wife, addressed me familiarly from the first word.
«‘How is it you have grown so thin, my boy?’
«‘I’ve not been very well, Marya Fominishna,’ I said. My wretched voice shook.
«And then quite suddenly—she must have been waiting for a chance to get a dig at me, the old snake—she said—
«‘I suppose your conscience felt ill at ease, Osip Mihalitch, my dear! Our fatherly hospitality was a reproach to you! You have been punished for the tears I have shed.’
«Yes, upon my word, she really said that—she had the conscience to say it. Why, that was nothing to her, she was a terror! She did nothing but sit there and pour out tea. But if you were in the market, my darling, I thought you’d shout louder than any fishwife there…. That’s the kind of woman she was. And then, to my undoing, the daughter, Marya Fedosyevna, came in, in all her innocence, a little pale and her eyes red as though she had been weeping. I was bowled over on the spot like a fool. But it turned out afterwards that the tears were a tribute to the
