The Duel - Aleksandr Kuprin (best summer reads of all time TXT) 📗

a day that began so happily as this ever end sadly and sorrowfully? Yes, I don’t know yet how the problem is to be solved, but an inward voice has told me that all will go well. Captain Duvernois? No, Duvernois is a skinflint, and, besides, he can’t bear me. I know that.”

In this way he went through all the officers of his company, from the first to the sixteenth, without getting a step nearer his goal. He was just about to despair altogether when suddenly a new name sprang up in his head⁠—Lieutenant-Colonel Rafalski.

“Rafalski! What an ass I am! Hainán, my coat, gloves, cap. Make haste!”

Lieutenant-Colonel Rafalski, commander of the 4th Battalion, was an incorrigible old bachelor, and, in addition, a most eccentric character, who was called by his comrades “Colonel Brehm.” He associated with no one, was seen among the circle of his brother officers only on occasions of ceremony, i.e. at Easter and on New Year’s Day, and he neglected his duties to such a degree that at drill he was the constant object of furious invectives on the part of the higher authorities. All his time, all his attention, and all his unconsumed funds of love and tenderness, which he really possessed, were devoted to his idolized protégés, his wild creatures⁠—brutes, birds, and fishes, of which he owned almost an entire menagerie. The ladies of the regiment, who in the depths of their hearts were highly incensed with Rafalski for his unconcealed contempt of women, used to say of him: “Such a dreadful man, and what dreadful animals he keeps! Such dirtiness in his house, and, pardon the expression, what a nasty smell he carries with him wherever he goes.”

All his savings went to the menagerie. This most eccentric individual had succeeded in reducing his temporal needs to a minimum. He wore a cap and uniform that dated from prehistoric times, he slept and dwelt God knows how, he shared the soldiers’ fare, and he ate in the 15th Company’s kitchen, towards the staff of which he displayed a certain liberality. To his comrades⁠—particularly the younger of them⁠—he seldom refused a small loan if he was in funds, but to remain in debt to “Colonel Brehm” was not regarded as comme il faut, and he who did so was inevitably exposed to his comrades’ ridicule and contempt.

Frivolous and impudent individuals as, e.g. Lbov, were occasionally not averse from extracting a few silver roubles from Rafalski, and they always introduced the business by a request to be allowed to see the menagerie. This was generally an infallible way to the old hermit’s heart and cashbox. “Good morning, Ivan Antonovich, have you got any fresh animals? Oh, how interesting! Come and show us them,” etc., in the same style. After this the loan was a simple matter.

Romashov had many times visited Rafalski, but never up to then with an ulterior motive. He too was particularly fond of animals, and when he was a cadet at Moscow, nay, even when he was a lad, he much preferred a circus to a theatre, and the zoological gardens or some menagerie to either. In his dreams as a child there always hovered a St. Bernard. Now his secret dream was to be appointed Adjutant to a battalion⁠—so that he might become the possessor of a horse. But neither of his dreams was fulfilled.

The poverty of his parents proved an insuperable obstacle to the realization of the former, and, as far as his adjutancy was concerned, his prospects were exceedingly small, as Romashov lacked the most important qualifications for it, viz. a fine figure and carriage.

Romashov went into the street. A warm spring breeze caressed his cheeks, and the ground that had just dried after the rain gave to his steps, through its elasticity, a pleasant feeling of buoyancy and power. Hagberry and lilac pointed and nodded at him with their rich-scented bunches of blossom over the street fences. A suddenly awakened joy of life expanded his chest, and he felt as if he was about to fly. After he had looked round the street and convinced himself that he was alone, he took Shurochka’s letter out of his pocket, read it through once more, and then pressed her signature passionately to his lips.

“Oh, lovely sky! Beautiful trees!” he whispered with moist eyes.

“Colonel Brehm” lived at the far end of a great enclosure hedged round by a green lattice-like hedge. Over the gate might be read: “Ring the bell. Beware of the dogs!”

Romashov pulled the bell. The servant’s sallow, sleepy face appeared at the wicket.

“Is the Colonel at home?”

“Yes. Please step in, your Honour.”

“No. Go and take in my name first.”

“It is not necessary. Walk in.” The servant sleepily scratched his thigh. “The Colonel does not like standing on ceremony, you know.”

Romashov strode on, and followed a sort of path of bricks which led across the yard to the house. A couple of enormous, mouse-coloured young bulldogs ran out of a corner, and one of them greeted him with a rough but not unfriendly bark. Romashov snapped his fingers at it, which was answered in delight by awkward, frolicsome leaps and still noisier barking. The other bulldog followed closely on Romashov’s heels, and sniffed with curiosity between the folds of his cape. Far away in the court, where the tender, light green grass had already sprouted up, stood a little donkey philosophizing, blinking in delight at the sun, and lazily twitching its long ears. Here and there waddled ducks of variegated hues, fowls and Chinese geese with large excrescences over their bills. A bevy of peacocks made their earsplitting cluck heard, and a huge turkey-cock with trailing wings and tail-feathers high in the air was courting the favourite sultana of his harem. A massive pink sow of genuine Yorkshire breed wallowed majestically in a hole.

“Colonel Brehm,” dressed in a Swedish leather jacket, stood at a window with his back to the door, and he did not notice Romashov as