“But what am I doing standing here?…Eh, eh!” he concluded, shaking his head, and meanwhile, with an uneasy, anguished feeling, even with fear, he began peering into the dim, moist distance, straining his vision with all his might, and trying with all his might to penetrate with his nearsighted gaze into the wet milieu spread before him.
However, there was nothing new, nothing special struck Mr. Goliadkin’s eye. It seemed that everything was in order, as it ought to be—that is, the snow poured down still heavier, bigger, and thicker; nothing could be seen beyond a distance of twenty paces; the streetlamps creaked ever more piercingly, and the wind seemed to drone its melancholy song still more plaintively and pitifully, like an importunate beggar pleading for a copper to feed himself. “Eh, eh! what’s the matter with me?” Mr. Goliadkin repeated, starting on his way again, and still looking around a little.
And yet some new sensation echoed in Mr. Goliadkin’s whole being: not really anguish, not really fear…a feverish trembling ran through his veins. It was an unbearably unpleasant moment! “Well, never mind,” he said to encourage himself, “never mind; maybe it’s nothing at all, and no stain on anyone’s honor. Maybe it had to be so,” he went on, not understanding what he was saying himself, “maybe it will all work out for the better in time, and there won’t be any claims to make, and everything will be justified.” Speaking thus, and relieving himself with words, Mr. Goliadkin shook himself slightly, shaking off the snowflakes that covered in a thick crust his hat, his collar, his overcoat, his tie, his boots, and everything—but he was still unable to push away, to shake off the strange feeling, the strange, dark anguish.
Somewhere in the distance a cannon shot rang out. “What weather,” thought our hero. “Listen, mightn’t there be a flood?17 The water must have risen very high.” Mr. Goliadkin had only just said or thought this, when he saw before him a passerby coming in the opposite direction, like him, probably, also out late by some chance.
It seemed to be a trifling, chance matter; but, no one knows why, Mr. Goliadkin became confused, and even frightened, slightly at a loss. Not that he feared he was a bad man, but just so, maybe…“And who knows about this late-night walker,” flashed in Mr. Goliadkin’s head, “maybe he’s one, too, maybe he’s the chief thing here, and not out walking for nothing, but with a purpose, crossing my path and brushing against me.” Maybe, however, Mr. Goliadkin did not think precisely that, but only felt momentarily something similar and highly disagreeable.
However, there was no time for thinking and feeling; the passerby was two steps away. Mr. Goliadkin hastened at once, as was his wont, to assume a completely special air, an air which showed clearly that he, Goliadkin, was his own man, that he was all right, that the way was wide enough for everybody, and that he, Goliadkin, was not offending anybody. Suddenly he stopped as if rooted, as if struck by lightning, and then quickly turned to look at the man who had just walked past him—turned as if something had pulled him from behind, as if the wind had whirled his weathervane.
The passerby was quickly vanishing into the snowy blizzard. He, too, was walking hastily, he, too, like Mr. Goliadkin, was dressed and wrapped from head to foot and, just like him, pattered and minced down the sidewalk of the Fontanka with scurrying little steps, trotting slightly. “What…what is this?” whispered Mr. Goliadkin, smiling mistrustfully—though he shuddered all over.
A chill ran down his spine. Meanwhile the passerby had vanished completely, even his footsteps were no longer heard, and Mr. Goliadkin still stood and looked after him. Finally, though, he began to recover his senses. “But what is this,” he thought with vexation, “have I really gone out of my mind, or what?”—turned and went on his way, hurrying, and quickening his pace more and more, and trying rather not to think about anything at all. He even finally closed his eyes for that purpose. Suddenly, through the howling of the wind and the noise of the storm, there again came to his ears the noise of someone’s footsteps quite close by. He gave a start and opened his eyes.
Before him again, some twenty paces away, was the black shape of a little man quickly approaching him. This man was hurrying, flurrying, scurrying; the distance was quickly diminishing. Mr. Goliadkin could even thoroughly examine his new late-night comrade—examined him and cried out in astonishment and terror; his legs gave way under him. This was that same walker he knew, the one whom he had let pass by some ten minutes earlier and who now had suddenly, quite unexpectedly, appeared before him again.
But this was not the only wonder that struck Mr. Goliadkin—and Mr. Goliadkin was so struck that he stopped, cried out, was about to say something—and started after the stranger, even shouted something to him, probably wishing to stop him the sooner.
The stranger actually stopped some ten paces from Mr. Goliadkin, and so that the light of a nearby streetlamp fell full on his whole figure—stopped, turned to Mr. Goliadkin, and, with an impatiently preoccupied air, waited for what he would say. “Excuse me, perhaps I’m mistaken,” our hero said in a trembling voice. The stranger said nothing, turned in vexation, and quickly went on his way, as if hurrying to make up the two seconds lost on Mr. Goliadkin.
As for Mr. Goliadkin, he trembled in every muscle, his knees gave way, grew weak, and he sank with a moan onto a hitching post. However, there actually was a cause for such bewilderment. The thing was that this stranger now seemed somehow familiar to him. That would still be nothing. But he recognized, he now almost fully recognized this man.
He had seen him often, this man, even used to see him quite recently; but where was it? was it not just yesterday? However, once again this was not the main thing, that Mr. Goliadkin had seen him often; and there was almost nothing special about this man—no one’s special attention would have been drawn to this man at first sight.
He was just a man like everybody else, a decent one, to be sure, like all decent people, and maybe had some merits, even rather significant ones—in short, he was his own man. Mr. Goliadkin did not even nurse any hatred, or hostility, or even the slightest animosity for this man, even the contrary, it would seem—yet (and the greatest force lay in this circumstance), yet he would not have wanted to meet him for all the treasures in the world and especially to meet him as he had now, for instance.
We will say more: Mr. Goliadkin knew this man perfectly well; he even knew what he was called, knew what the man’s last name was; yet not for anything, and again not for all the treasures in the world, would he have wanted to name him, to agree to recognize, say, that he was called such-and-such, that such-and-such was his patronymic, and such-and-such his last name.
Whether Mr. Goliadkin’s quandary lasted a long or a short time, whether he sat for precisely a long time on the hitching post, I cannot say, but only that finally, having recovered a little, he suddenly broke into a run without looking back, for all the strength that was in him; his breath kept failing; he stumbled twice, nearly fell—on this occasion Mr. Goliadkin’s other boot became orphaned, also abandoned by its galosh. Finally, Mr. Goliadkin slowed his pace a little, so as to catch his breath, hurriedly looked around, and saw that he had already run, without noticing it, the whole of his way along the Fontanka, crossed the Anichkov Bridge, gone partway down Nevsky, and was now standing at the corner of Liteinaya. Mr. Goliadkin turned onto Liteinaya.
His position at that moment was like the position of a man standing over a frightful precipice, when the earth breaks away under him, is rocking, shifting, sways for a last time, and falls, drawing him into the abyss, and meanwhile the unfortunate man has neither the strength nor the firmness of spirit to jump back, to take his eyes from the yawning chasm; the abyss draws him, and he finally leaps into it himself, himself hastening the moment of his own perdition.
Mr. Goliadkin knew, felt, and was completely certain that some further bad thing was bound to befall him on the way, that some further trouble would break over him, that, for instance, he would meet his stranger again; but—strange thing—he even wished for that meeting, considered it inevitable, and asked only for it all to be over, for his situation to be resolved at least somehow, only soon.
And meanwhile he went on running, running, as if moved by some outside force, for he felt some sort of weakening and numbness in his whole being; he was unable to think about anything, though his ideas kept catching at everything like thorns. Some forsaken little dog, all wet
