Short Fiction - Vladimir Korolenko (easy books to read in english txt) 📗

thousand and shoots himself! Another lives as he likes, so to speak, healthy and ruddy.⁠ ⁠… A quiet soul.⁠ ⁠… Safe.⁠ ⁠… Is that strange?⁠ ⁠… By heavens, it’s impossible.⁠ ⁠… Good night.⁠ ⁠… It’s time to go to sleep. Nothing, nothing!⁠ ⁠… You won’t disturb me by talking.⁠ ⁠… I won’t listen.⁠ ⁠…”

He turned to the wall.

Pavel Semenovich modestly and questioningly looked at me with his naive gray eyes, and began in a lower tone:

“There’s a street in Tikhodol called Bolotnaya.65 They built a house on it near me.⁠ ⁠… New and of fresh wood.⁠ ⁠… The first year it shone so, and then it lost its freshness. It got covered with that especial dirt and weathering and rubbish. Then it got the same color as the old stables and sheds and you couldn’t tell it from them. Now they say it’s haunted.⁠ ⁠… The people suddenly said that Budnikov had robbed a woman.”

“That’s absolute nonsense,” called the mathematician. “I’ll never believe that Budnikov was a robber. That’s some stupid rumor.”

Pavel Semenovich smiled sadly and rather distractedly:

“That’s what he was. A robber!⁠ ⁠… A robber is the word,⁠ ⁠… precisely! But it was just a little personal⁠ ⁠… tangle with rather vague outlines.⁠ ⁠… You see.⁠ ⁠… I must tell you that since your time a mother and daughter moved in.⁠ ⁠… The women were simple and very poor and M. Budnikov was their protector and friend. They ran in debt for a long time, and he⁠—always so strict in affairs of this kind⁠—stood it, and even gave them money. For the doctor or for better food, when one was sick. Finally the old woman died and Yelena became an orphan. M. Budnikov became very sympathetic, gave her a pleasant little home, and got her work; she sewed⁠—got along somehow.⁠ ⁠… Then she became a sort of housekeeper for M. Budnikov, and then⁠—people began to say that their relations became more intimate.⁠ ⁠…”

“Oh, oh!” yawned the mathematician. “They didn’t need me for that.⁠ ⁠… Was she pretty?”

“Yes, rather pretty; fat, with flowing graceful movements and mild eyes. They said she was stupid. But, if she was, a woman’s stupidity is often very peculiar.⁠ ⁠… A naive and sleeping innocence of soul. She felt her situation very keenly. As is said in Uspensky, she was all shame.⁠ ⁠… M. Budnikov tried to teach her and lift her up, so to speak, to his level. She seemed incapable of it. She sat usually with a book, spelled it out with her fingers, and her face was interested like a child’s. She seemed to become dull and stupid when Budnikov was around. He got sick of her actions and then of Yelena, especially as other things took up his attention. But there was a time when he almost loved her. At least there were indications of it. In a word, the breach was not easy for him⁠—his conscience troubled him and he wanted to silence it. He finally decided to give her a ticket of the domestic lottery.⁠ ⁠… He called her, took out three tickets, put them on the table, placed his hand on them, and said:

“ ‘Look here, Yelena. One of these tickets may win you two hundred thousand. Do you understand?’

“Of course she didn’t understand well. She couldn’t imagine so large a sum, but he went on:

“ ‘Now, I’ll give you one. This paper is worth 365 rubles, but don’t sell it.⁠ ⁠… Take it and may you be lucky.⁠ ⁠…’

“She didn’t take it, but huddled up, as if she were afraid. ‘All right,’ said M. Budnikov. ‘Give me your hand and take this paper.’ He took one of the tickets and guided her hand in making two pencil strokes sharply and heavily. His mind was clearly made up.⁠ ⁠… He gave it outright with all the results, we may say. ‘You see,’ he said, ‘this is yours, and if you win two hundred thousand, they’ll be yours too.’ He placed it back on the table. She reached out her hand and put in her bosom a paper with the number of the ticket.”

“Really?” asked the mathematician.

“Yes.⁠ ⁠… It had to happen so.⁠ ⁠… That machine was working in Petersburg, throwing out one number after another.⁠ ⁠… Children’s hands pick them up.⁠ ⁠… And one of these tickets won.”

“Two hundred thousand?” asked the mathematician, with great interest; apparently he had forgotten about sleeping.

“Not two hundred, but seventy-five.⁠ ⁠… During March, M. Budnikov looked at the list of drawings and saw that his number had won a large prize. Zero, again zero⁠ ⁠… 318 and 32. Suddenly he remembered that he had given one ticket to Yelena.⁠ ⁠… He also remembered that there were two lines on the first. He had three in a row: 317, 318 and 319. That means 317.⁠ ⁠… He got out the tickets and looked: there were two lines on 317. Yelena had won.⁠ ⁠…”

“The devil,” exclaimed the mathematician, raising himself a little. “That’s luck!”

“Yes, it was. And she was so stupid. The lines were on that number, when he thought that he would give her another.⁠ ⁠… A mistake, a mechanical wave of the hand, mere chance.⁠ ⁠… And, because of this chance, Yelena, a stupid woman who understood nothing and did not know what to do with money, would take from him⁠ ⁠… him, M. Budnikov, take away, so to speak, a large sum of money. That was foolish, wasn’t it? He was educated, had an aim in his life, or had had.⁠ ⁠… He might again. He would perhaps have used the money for some good cause. He would write again to his friend and ask his advice.⁠ ⁠… But she⁠ ⁠… she? A beast with a round form and beautiful eyes, which didn’t even show clearly what was in them: the stupidity of a calf or the innocence of a youth who had not yet grown to conscious life.⁠ ⁠… Do you understand?⁠ ⁠… It was so natural.⁠ ⁠… Anyone in Budnikov’s place, you⁠ ⁠… I⁠ ⁠… even Petr Petrovich, would have felt the same way.⁠ ⁠…”

Petr Petrovich made some sort of an indistinct sound, which was susceptible of different interpretations.

“No?” said Pavel Semenovich. “Excuse me.⁠ ⁠… I’m speaking about myself.⁠ ⁠… My thoughts or rather my inclinations would have