Resurrection - Leo Nikoleyevich Tolstoy (interesting novels in english .TXT) 📗

raft; one could hear nothing but the tramp

of the ferryman’s boots and the horses changing from foot to

foot.

 

CHAPTER XXI.

 

“JUST A WORTHLESS TRAMP.”

 

Nekhludoff stood on the edge of the raft looking at the broad

river. Two pictures kept rising up in his mind. One, that of

Kryltzoff, unprepared for death and dying, made a heavy,

sorrowful impression on him. The other, that of Katusha, full of

energy, having gained the love of such a man as Simonson, and

found a true and solid path towards righteousness, should have

been pleasant, yet it also created a heavy impression on

Nekhludoff’s mind, and he could not conquer this impression.

 

The vibrating sounds of a big brass bell reached them from the

town. Nekhludoff’s driver, who stood by his side, and the other

men on the raft raised their caps and crossed themselves, all

except a short, dishevelled old man, who stood close to the

railway and whom Nekhludoff had not noticed before. He did not

cross himself, but raised his head and looked at Nekhludoff. This

old man wore a patched coat, cloth trousers and worn and patched

shoes. He had a small wallet on his back, and a high fur cap with

the fur much rubbed on his head.

 

“Why don’t you pray, old chap?” asked Nekhludoff’s driver as he

replaced and straightened his cap. “Are you unbaptized?”

 

“Who’s one to pray to?” asked the old man quickly, in a

determinately aggressive tone.

 

“To whom? To God, of course,” said the driver sarcastically.

 

“And you just show me where he is, that god.” There was something

so serious and firm in the expression of the old man, that the

driver felt that he had to do with a strong-minded man, and was a

bit abashed. And trying not to show this, not to be silenced, and

not to be put to shame before the crowd that was observing them,

he answered quickly.

 

“Where? In heaven, of course.”

 

“And have you been up there?”

 

“Whether I’ve been or not, every one knows that you must pray to

God.”

 

“No one has ever seen God at any time. The only begotten Son who

is in the bosom of the Father he hath declared him,” said the old

man in the same rapid manner, and with a severe frown on his

brow.

 

“It’s clear you are not a Christian, but a hole worshipper. You

pray to a hole,” said the driver, shoving the handle of his whip

into his girdle, pulling straight the harness on one of the

horses.

 

Some one laughed.

 

“What is your faith, Dad?” asked a middleaged man, who stood by

his cart on the same side of the raft.

 

“I have no kind of faith, because I believe no one—no one but

myself,” said the old man as quickly and decidedly as before.

 

“How can you believe yourself?” Nekhludoff asked, entering into a

conversation with him. “You might make a mistake.”

 

“Never in your life,” the old man said decidedly, with a toss of

his head.

 

“Then why are there different faiths?” Nekhludoff asked.

 

“It’s just because men believe others and do not believe

themselves that there are different faiths. I also believed

others, and lost myself as in a swamp,—lost myself so that I had

no hope of finding my way out. Old believers and new believers

and Judaisers and Khlysty and Popovitzy, and Bespopovitzy and

Avstriaks and Molokans and Skoptzy—every faith praises itself

only, and so they all creep about like blind puppies. There are

many faiths, but the spirit is one—in me and in you and in him.

So that if every one believes himself all will he united. Every

one he himself, and all will be as one.”

 

The old man spoke loudly and often looked round, evidently

wishing that as many as possible should hear him.

 

“And have you long held this faith?”

 

“I? A long time. This is the twenty-third year that they

persecute me.”

 

“Persecute you? How?”

 

“As they persecuted Christ, so they persecute me. They seize me,

and take me before the courts and before the priests, the Scribes

and the Pharisees. Once they put me into a madhouse; but they can

do nothing because I am free. They say, ‘What is your name?’

thinking I shall name myself. But I do not give myself a name. I

have given up everything: I have no name, no place, no country,

nor anything. I am just myself. ‘What is your name?’ ‘Man.’ ‘How

old are you?’ I say, ‘I do not count my years and cannot count

them, because I always was, I always shall be.’ ‘Who are your

parents?’ ‘I have no parents except God and Mother Earth. God is

my father.’ ‘And the Tsar? Do you recognise the Tsar?’ they say.

I say, ‘Why not? He is his own Tsar, and I am my own Tsar.’

‘Where’s the good of talking to him,’ they say, and I say, ‘I do

not ask you to talk to me.’ And so they begin tormenting me.”

 

“And where are you going now?” asked Nekhludoff.

 

“Where God will lead me. I work when I can find work, and when I

can’t I beg.” The old man noticed that the raft was approaching

the bank and stopped, looking round at the bystanders with a look

of triumph.

 

Nekhludoff got out his purse and offered some money to the old

man, but he refused, saying:

 

“I do not accept this sort of thing—bread I do accept.”

 

“Well, then, excuse me.”

 

“There is nothing to excuse, you have not offended me. And it is

not possible to offend me.” And the old man put the wallet he had

taken off again on his back. Meanwhile, the postcart had been

landed and the horses harnessed.

 

“I wonder you should care to talk to him, sir,” said the driver,

when Nekhludoff, having tipped the bowing ferryman, got into the

cart again. “He is just a worthless tramp.”

 

CHAPTER XXII.

 

NEKHLUDOFF SEES THE GENERAL.

 

When they got to the top of the hill bank the driver turned to

Nekhludoff.

 

“Which hotel am I to drive to?”

 

“Which is the best?”

 

“Nothing could be better than the Siberian, but Dukeoff’s is also

good.”

 

“Drive to whichever you like.”

 

The driver again seated himself sideways and drove faster. The

town was like all such towns. The same kind of houses with attic

windows and green roofs, the same kind of cathedral, the same

kind of shops and stores in the principal street, and even the

same kind of policemen. Only the houses were almost all of them

wooden, and the streets were not paved. In one of the chief

streets the driver stopped at the door of an hotel, but there was

no room to be had, so he drove to another. And here Nekhludoff,

after two months, found himself once again in surroundings such

as he had been accustomed to as far as comfort and cleanliness

went. Though the room he was shown to was simple enough, yet

Nekhludoff felt greatly relieved to be there after two months of

postcarts, country inns and halting stations. His first business

was to clean himself of the lice which he had never been able to

get thoroughly rid of after visiting a halting station. When he

had unpacked he went to the Russian bath, after which he made

himself fit to be seen in a town, put on a starched shirt,

trousers that had got rather creased along the seams, a

frock-coat and an overcoat, and drove to the Governor of the

district. The hotel-keeper called an isvostchik, whose well-fed

Kirghiz horse and vibrating trap soon brought Nekhludoff to the

large porch of a big building, in front of which stood sentinels

and a policeman. The house had a garden in front, and at the

back, among the naked branches of aspen and birch trees, there

grew thick and dark green pines and firs. The General was not

well, and did not receive; but Nekhludoff asked the footman to

hand in his card all the same, and the footman came back with a

favourable reply.

 

“You are asked to come in.”

 

The hall, the footman, the orderly, the staircase, the

dancing-room, with its well-polished floor, were very much the

same as in Petersburg, only more imposing and rather dirtier.

Nekhludoff was shown into the cabinet.

 

The General, a bloated, potato-nosed man, with a sanguine

disposition, large bumps on his forehead, bald head, and puffs

under his eyes, sat wrapped in a Tartar silk dressing-gown

smoking a cigarette and sipping his tea out of a tumbler in a

silver holder.

 

“How do you do, sir? Excuse my dressing-gown; it is better so

than if I had not received you at all,” he said, pulling up his

dressing-gown over his fat neck with its deep folds at the nape.

“I am not quite well, and do not go out. What has brought you to

our remote region?”

 

“I am accompanying a gang of prisoners, among whom there is a

person closely connected with me, said Nekhludoff, and now I have

come to see your Excellency partly in behalf of this person, and

partly about another business.” The General took a whiff and a

sip of tea, put his cigarette into a malachite ashpan, with his

narrow eyes fixed on Nekhludoff, listening seriously. He only

interrupted him once to offer him a cigarette.

 

The General belonged to the learned type of military men who

believed that liberal and humane views can be reconciled with

their profession. But being by nature a kind and intelligent man,

he soon felt the impossibility of such a reconciliation; so as

not to feel the inner discord in which he was living, he gave

himself up more and more to the habit of drinking, which is so

widely spread among military men, and was now suffering from what

doctors term alcoholism. He was imbued with alcohol, and if he

drank any kind of liquor it made him tipsy. Yet strong drink was

an absolute necessity to him, he could not live without it, so he

was quite drunk every evening; but had grown so used to this

state that he did not reel nor talk any special nonsense. And if

he did talk nonsense, it was accepted as words of wisdom because

of the important and high position which he occupied. Only in

the morning, just at the time Nekhludoff came to see him, he was

like a reasonable being, could understand what was said to him,

and fulfil more or less aptly a proverb he was fond of repeating:

“He’s tipsy, but he’s wise, so he’s pleasant in two ways.”

 

The higher authorities knew he was a drunkard, but he was more

educated than the rest, though his education had stopped at the

spot where drunkenness had got hold of him. He was bold, adroit,

of imposing appearance, and showed tact even when tipsy;

therefore, he was appointed, and was allowed to retain so public

and responsible an office.

 

Nekhludoff told him that the person he was interested in was a

woman, that she was sentenced, though innocent, and that a

petition had been sent to the Emperor in her behalf.

 

“Yes, well?” said the General.

 

“I was promised in Petersburg that the news concerning her fate

should be sent to me not later than this month and to this

place-”

 

The General stretched his hand with its stumpy fingers towards

the table, and rang a bell, still looking at Nekhludoff and

puffing at his cigarette.

 

“So I would like to ask you that this woman