The Devil Page 6

  “Capital! Oh, scoundrel! No, if someone must die it should be Stepanida. If she were to die, how good it would be.

  “Yes, that is how men come to poison or kill their wives or lovers. Take a revolver and go and call her, and instead of embracing her, shoot her in the breast and have done with it.

  “Really she is—a devil. Simply a devil. She has possessed herself of me against my own will.

  “Kill? Yes. There are only two ways out: to kill my wife or her. For it is impossible to live like this.

  [At this place the alternative ending, printed at the end of the story, begins.]

  “It is impossible! I must consider the matter and look ahead. If things remain as they are what will happen? I shall again be saying to myself that I do not wish it and that I will throw her off, but it will be merely words; in the evening I shall be at her back yard, and she will know it and will come out. And if people know of it and tell my wife, or if I tell her myself—for I can’t lie —I shall not be able to live so. I cannot! People will know. They will all know—Parasha and the blacksmith. Well, is it possible to live so?

  “Impossible! There are only two ways out: to kill my wife, or to kill her. yes, or else … Ah, yes, there is a third way: to kill myself,” said he softly, and suddenly a shudder ran over his skin. “Yes, kill myself, then I shall not need to kill them.” He became frightened, for he felt that only that way was possible. He had a revolver. “Shall I really kill myself? It is something I never thought of—how strange it will be …”

  He returned to his study and at once opened the cupboard where the revolver lay, but before he had taken it out of its case his wife entered the room.

  XXI

  He threw a newspaper over the revolver.

  “Again the same!” said she aghast when she had looked at him.

  “What is the same?”

  “The same terrible expression that you had before and would not explain to me. Zhenya, dear one, tell me about it. I see that you are suffering. Tell me and you will feel easier. Whatever it may be, it will be better than for you to suffer so. Don’t I know that it is nothing bad?”

  “You know? While …”

  “Tell me, tell me, tell me. I won’t let you go.”

  He smiled a piteous smile.

  “Shall I?—No, it is impossible. And there is nothing to tell.”

  Perhaps he might have told her, but at that moment the wet-nurse entered to ask if she should go for a walk. Liza went out to dress the baby.

  “Then you will tell me? I will be back directly.”

  “Yes, perhaps …”

  She never could forget the piteous smile with which he said this. She went out.

  Hurriedly, stealthily like a robber, he seized the revolver and took it out of its case. It was loaded, yes, but long ago, and one cartridge was missing.

  “Well, how will it be?” He put it to his temple and hesitated a little, but as soon as he remembered Stepanida—his decision not to see her, his struggle, temptation, fall, and renewed struggle—he shuddered with horror. “No, this is better,” and he pulled the trigger …

  When Liza ran into the room—she had only had time to step down from the balcony—he was lying face downwards on the floor: black, warm blood was gushing from the wound, and his corpse was twitching.

  There was an inquest. No one could understand or explain the suicide. It never even entered his uncle’s head that its cause could be anything in common with the confession Yevgeny had made to him two months previously.

  Varvara Alexeevna assured them that she had always foreseen it. It had been evident from his way of disputing. Neither Liza nor Marya Pavlovna could at all understand why it had happened, but still they did not believe what the doctors said, namely, that he was mentally deranged—a psychopath. They were quite unable to accept this, for they knew he was saner than hundreds of their acquaintances.

  And indeed if Yevgeny Irtenev was mentally deranged everyone is in the same case; the most mentally deranged people are certainly those who see in others indications of insanity they do not notice in themselves.

  VARIATION OF THE CONCLUSION TO THE DEVIL

  “To kill, yes. There are only two ways out: to kill my wife, or to kill her. For it is impossible to live like this,” said he to himself, and going up to the table he took from it a revolver and, having examined it—one cartridge was wanting—he put it in his trouser pocket.

  “My God! What am I doing?” he suddenly exclaimed, and folding his hands he began to pray.

  “O God, help me and deliver me! Thou knowest that I do not desire evil, but by myself am powerless. Help me,” said he, making the sign of the cross on his breast before the icon.

  “Yes, I can control myself. I will go out, walk about and think things over.”

  He went to the entrance-hall, put on his overcoat and went out onto the porch. Unconsciously his steps took him past the garden along the field path to the outlying farmstead. There the threshing machine was still droning and the cries of the driver lads were heard. He entered the barn. She was there. He saw her at once. She was raking up the corn, and on seeing him she ran briskly and merrily about, with laughing eyes, raking up the scattered corn with agility. Yevgeny could not help watching her though he did not wish to do so. He only recollected himself when she was no longer in sight. The clerk informed him that they were now finishing threshing the corn that had been beaten down—that was why it was going slower and the output was less. Yevgeny went up to the drum, which occasionally gave a knock as sheaves not evenly fed in passed under it, and he asked the clerk if there were many such sheaves of beaten-down corn.

  “There will be five cartloads of it.”

  “Then look here …” began Yevgeny, but he did not finish the sentence. She had gone close up to the drum and was raking the corn from under it, and she scorched him with her laughing eyes. That look spoke of a merry, careless love between them, of the fact that she knew he wanted her and had come to her shed, and that she as always was ready to live and be merry with him regardless of all conditions or consequences. Yevgeny felt himself to be in her power but did not wish to yield.

  He remembered his prayer and tried to repeat it. He began saying it to himself, but at once felt that it was useless. A single thought now engrossed him entirely: how to arrange a meeting with her so that the others should not notice it.

  “If we finish this lot today, are we to start on a fresh stack or leave it till tomorrow?” asked the clerk.

  “Yes, yes,” replied Yevgeny, involuntarily following her to the heap to which with the other women she was raking the corn.

  “But can I really not master myself?” said he to himself. “Have I really perished? O God! But there is not God. There is only a devil. And it is she. She has possessed me. But I won’t, I won’t! A devil, yes, a devil.”

  Again he went up to her, drew the revolver from his pocket and shot her, once, twice, thrice, in the back. She ran a few steps and fell on the heap of corn.

  “My God, my God! What is that?” cried the women.

  “No, it was not an accident. I killed her on purpose,” cried Yevgeny. “Send for the police officer.”

  He went home and went to his study and locked himself in, without speaking to his wife.

  “Do not come to me,” he cried to her through the door. “You will know all about it.”

  An hour later he rang, and bade the man-servant who answered the bell: “Go and find out whether Stepanida is alive.”

  The servant already knew all about it, and told him she had died an hour ago.

  “Well, all right. Now leave me alone. When the police officer or the magistrate comes, let me know.”

  The police officer and magistrate arrived next morning, and Yevgeny, having bidden his wife and baby farewell, was taken to prison.

  He was tried. It was during the early days of trial by jury, and the verdict was one of temporary insanity, and he was sentenced only to perform church penance.

&n
bsp; He had been kept in prison for nine months and was then confined in a monastery for one month.

  He had begun to drink while still in prison, continued to do so in the monastery, and returned home an enfeebled, irresponsible drunkard.

  Varvara Alexeevna assured them that she had always predicted this. It was, she said, evident from the way he disputed. Neither Liza nor Marya Pavlovna could understand how the affair had happened, but for all that, they did not believe what the doctors said, namely, that he was mentally deranged—a psychopath. They could not accept that, for they knew that he was saner than hundreds of their acquaintances.

  And indeed, if Yevgeny Irtenev was mentally deranged when he committed this crime, then everyone is similarly insane. The most mentally deranged people are certainly those who see in others indications of insanity they do not notice in themselves.

  OTHER TITLES IN THE ART OF THE NOVELLA SERIES

  BARTLEBY THE SCRIVENER

  HERMAN MELVILLE

  THE LESSON OF THE MASTER

  HENRY JAMES

  MY LIFE

  ANTON CHEKHOV

  THE DEVIL

  LEO TOLSTOY

  THE TOUCHSTONE

  EDITH WHARTON

  THE HOUND OF THE

  BASKERVILLES

  ARTHUR CONAN DOYLE

  THE DEAD

  JAMES JOYCE

  FIRST LOVE

  IVAN TURGENEV

  A SIMPLE HEART

  GUSTAVE FLAUBERT

  THE MAN WHO WOULD BE KING

  RUDYARD KIPLING

  MICHAEL KOHLHAAS

  HEINRICH VON KLEIST

  THE BEACH OF FALESÁ

  ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON

  THE HORLA

  GUY DE MAUPASSANT

  THE ETERNAL HUSBAND

  FYODOR DOSTOEVSKY

  THE MAN THAT CORRUPTED

  HADLEYBURG

  MARK TWAIN

  THE LIFTED VEIL

  GEORGE ELIOT

  THE GIRL WITH THE

  GOLDEN EYES

  HONORÉ DE BALZAC

  A SLEEP AND A FORGETTING

  WILLIAM DEAN HOWELLS

  BENITO CERENO

  HERMAN MELVILLE

  MATHILDA

  MARY SHELLEY

  STEMPENYU: A JEWISH ROMANCE

  SHOLEM ALEICHEM

  FREYA OF THE SEVEN ISLES

  JOSEPH CONRAD

  HOW THE TWO IVANS

  QUARRELLED

  NIKOLAI GOGOL

  MAY DAY

  F. SCOTT FITZGERALD

  RASSELAS, PRINCE ABYSSINIA

  SAMUEL JOHNSON

  THE DIALOGUE OF THE DOGS

  MIGUEL DE CERVANTES

  THE LEMOINE AFFAIR

  MARCEL PROUST

  THE COXON FUND

  HENRY JAMES

  THE DEATH OF IVAN ILYICH

  LEO TOLSTOY

  TALES OF BELKIN

  ALEXANDER PUSHKIN

  THE AWAKENING

  KATE CHOPIN

  ADOLPHE

  BENJAMIN CONSTANT

  THE COUNTRY OF

  THE POINTED FIRS

  SARAH ORNE JEWETT

  PARNASSUS ON WHEELS

  CHRISTOPHER MORLEY

  THE NICE OLD MAN

  AND THE PRETTY GIRL

  ITALO SVEVO

  LADY SUSAN

  JANE AUSTEN

  JACOB’S ROOM

  VIRGINIA WOOLF

  THE DUEL

  GIACOMO CASANOVA

  THE DUEL

  ANTON CHEKHOV

  THE DUEL

  JOSEPH CONRAD

  THE DUEL

  HEINRICH VON KLEIST

  THE DUEL

  ALEXANDER KUPRIN

  THE ALIENIST

  MACHADO DE ASSIS

  ALEXANDER’S BRIDGE

  WILLA CATHER

  FANFARLO

  CHARLES BAUDELAIRE

  THE DISTRACTED PREACHER

  THOMAS HARDY

  THE ENCHANTED WANDERER

  NIKOLAI LESKOV