“Can they have split open?” thought Mr. Goliadkin. Soon, however, Mr. Goliadkin discovered that his excellency’s boots were not split open at all, but only had bright reflections—a phenomenon explained completely by the fact that the boots were of patent leather and shone brightly.
“That’s called a highlight,” thought our hero. “The term is used especially in artists’ studios; elsewhere this reflection is called a bright gleam.” Here Mr. Goliadkin raised his eyes and saw that it was time to speak, otherwise the affair might take a bad turn…Our hero stepped forward.
“I say, thus and so, Your Excellency,” he said, “but imposture doesn’t get anywhere in our age.”
The general did not reply, but tugged strongly on the bell-pull. Our hero took another step forward.
“He’s a mean and depraved man, Your Excellency,” said our hero, forgetting himself, sinking with fear, and, for all that, pointing boldly and resolutely at his unworthy twin, who at that moment was mincing around his excellency, “thus and so, say, but I’m alluding to a certain person.”
Mr. Goliadkin’s words were followed by a general stir. Andrei Filippovich and the unknown figure nodded their heads; his excellency was impatiently tugging at the bell-pull with all his might, summoning people. Here Mr. Goliadkin Jr. stepped forward in his turn.
“Your Excellency,” he said, “I humbly ask your permission to speak.” There was something extremely resolute in Mr. Goliadkin Jr.’s voice; everything about him showed that he felt himself completely within his rights.
“Permit me to ask you,” he began, in his zeal forestalling his excellency’s reply and this time addressing Mr. Goliadkin, “permit me to ask you, in whose presence are you making such comments? before whom are you standing? whose study are you in?…” Mr. Goliadkin Jr. was all in extraordinary agitation, all red and flushed with indignation and wrath; tears even showed in his eyes.
“Mr. and Mrs. Bassavriukov!”29 a footman bellowed at the top of his lungs, appearing in the doorway of the study. “A good noble family, of Little Russian extraction,” thought Mr. Goliadkin, and just then he felt someone lay a hand on his back in a highly friendly manner; then another hand was laid on his back; Mr. Goliadkin’s mean twin was bustling ahead of them, showing the way, and our hero saw clearly that he was being steered towards the big doors of the study. “Just as at Olsufy Ivanovich’s,” he thought, and found himself in the front hall. Looking around, he saw his excellency’s two footmen and one twin.
“Overcoat, overcoat, overcoat, my friend’s overcoat! my best friend’s overcoat!” the depraved man chirped, tearing the overcoat from one of the men’s hands and flinging it, in mean and unpleasant mockery, right over Mr. Goliadkin’s head. Struggling out from under his overcoat, Mr. Goliadkin Sr. clearly heard the laughter of the two footmen. But, not listening or paying attention to anything extraneous, he was already leaving the front hall and found himself on the lighted stairway. Mr. Goliadkin Jr. followed him out.
“Good-bye, Your Excellency!” he called after Mr. Goliadkin Sr.
“Scoundrel!” said our hero, beside himself.
“Well, yes, a scoundrel…”
“Depraved man!”
“Well, yes, a depraved man…” Thus the unworthy adversary responded to the worthy Mr. Goliadkin and, with a meanness all his own, looked from the top of the stairs, directly and without batting an eye, into the eyes of Mr. Goliadkin, as if asking him to go on. Our hero spat in indignation and ran out to the porch; he was so crushed that he simply did not remember by whom and how he was put into the carriage. Coming to his senses, he saw that he was being driven along the Fontanka.
“So we’re going to the Izmailovsky Bridge?” thought Mr. Goliadkin…Here Mr. Goliadkin wanted to think of something else as well, but it was impossible; it was something so terrible that there was no way to explain it…“Well, never mind!” our hero concluded and drove to the Izmailovsky Bridge.
Chapter XIII
…IT SEEMED THAT the weather wanted to change for the better. Indeed, the wet snow that had been pouring down till then in great heaps gradually began to thin out, thin out, and finally ceased almost entirely. The sky became visible, and little stars sparkled on it here and there.
Only it was wet, dirty, damp, and suffocating, especially for Mr. Goliadkin, who even without that could barely catch his breath. From his wet and heavy overcoat some unpleasantly warm dampness penetrated all his limbs, and its weight bent his legs, which were badly weakened without that.
Some feverish trembling went through his whole body with sharp and biting prickles; weariness made him break into a cold, sickly sweat, so that Mr. Goliadkin forgot to make use of this good opportunity to repeat, with his characteristic firmness and resolution, his favorite phrase, that perhaps all of this might somehow, certainly and unfailingly, work out and be settled for the best.
“However, so far it’s all not so bad,” our sturdy and undaunted hero added, wiping from his face the drops of cold water that ran in all directions from the brim of his round hat, which was so sodden that it no longer repelled any water.
Adding that it was all nothing, our hero tried to seat himself on a rather thick block of wood that lay near the pile of firewood in Olsufy Ivanovich’s courtyard. Of course, there was no point in thinking about Spanish serenades and silk ladders; but he did have to think about a cosy nook, maybe not very warm, but at least comfortable and concealed.
He was strongly tempted, be it said in passing, by that same nook on the landing of Olsufy Ivanovich’s apartment where previously, almost at the beginning of this truthful story, our hero had stood through his two hours between the wardrobe and the old screens, among all sorts of useless household trash, litter, and junk. The thing was that now, too, Mr. Goliadkin had already been standing and waiting for a whole two hours in Olsufy Ivanovich’s courtyard.
But with regard to that former cosy and comfortable nook there now existed certain inconveniences which had not existed previously. The first inconvenience was that this place had probably been spotted and certain preventive measures taken about it since the time of the incident at Olsufy Ivanovich’s last ball; and second, he had to wait for the prearranged signal from Klara Olsufyevna, because there certainly must have existed some such prearranged signal. It was always done that way, and “we’re not the first and we won’t be the last.”
Just then Mr. Goliadkin incidentally had a fleeting recollection of some novel he had read long ago, in which the heroine gave a prearranged signal to Alfred in exactly the same circumstances by tying a pink ribbon to the window.
But a pink ribbon now, at night, and in the St. Petersburg climate, known for its dampness and unreliability, could not enter the picture and, in short, was quite impossible. “No, it won’t come to silk ladders,” thought our hero. “I’d better stand here, just so, cosily and quietly…I’d better stand here, for instance,” and he chose a place in the courtyard, across from the windows, by the pile of stacked firewood.
Of course, there were many other people walking about the courtyard, postilions, coachmen; besides, there was the rattling of wheels and the snorting of horses, and so on; but even so, the place was convenient; whether they noticed him or not, for the time being there was this advantage, that the thing was going on in the shadows, and nobody could see Mr. Goliadkin, while he himself could see decidedly everything.
The windows were brightly lit; there was some solemn gathering at Olsufy Ivanovich’s. However, there was no music to be heard yet. “So it’s not a ball, and they’ve just gathered on some other occasion,” our hero thought with a partly sinking heart.
“Was it today, though?” raced through his head. “Did I get the date wrong? It’s possible, anything’s possible…That’s just it, that anything’s possible…It’s possible that the letter was written yesterday and didn’t reach me, and it didn’t reach me because that rogue Petrushka got mixed up in it! Or it was written tomorrow, meaning that I…that it was all to be done tomorrow, that is, the waiting with the carriage…” Here our hero turned definitively cold and went to his pocket for the letter, so as to check. But, to his surprise, the letter was not in his pocket. “How’s that?” whispered the half-dead Mr. Goliadkin. “Where did I leave it?
So I’ve lost it? Just what I needed!” he finally moaned in conclusion. “And what if it now falls into unfriendly hands? (And maybe it already has!) Lord! what will come of it! It will be something that…Ah, my detestable fate!” Here Mr. Goliadkin trembled like a leaf at the thought that maybe his indecent twin, as he threw the overcoat over his head, had precisely the aim of stealing the letter, which he had somehow gotten wind of from Mr. Goliadkin’s enemies. “What’s more, he intercepted it,” thought our hero, “and the evidence…but who cares about the evidence!…” After the first fit and stupefaction of terror, the blood rushed to Mr. Goliadkin’s head.
With a moan and a gnashing of teeth, he clutched his hot head, sank onto his chunk of wood, and began thinking about something…But the thoughts somehow did not connect in his head. Some faces flashed in his memory, now vaguely, now sharply, some long-forgotten events, the melodies of some stupid songs kept coming into his
