Part 20

“Forgive me, I again do not understand,” and Kamyshev smiled: “If you find that the inquest led to a mistake, and even, if I understand you right, to a premeditated mistake, it would be interesting to know your point of view. Who was the murderer in your opinion?”

“You!”

Kamyshev looked at me with astonishment, almost with terror, grew very red and stepped back. Then turning away, he went to the window and began to laugh.

“Here's a nice go!” he muttered, breathing on the glass and nervously drawing figures on it.

I watched his hand as he drew, and it appeared to me that I recognized in it the only iron, muscular hand that, with a single effort, would have been able to strangle sleeping Kuz'ma, or mangle Olga's frail body. The thought that I saw before me a murderer filled my soul with unwonted feelings of horror and fear. . . . not for myself—no!—but for him, for this handsome and graceful giant. . . . in general for man. . . .

“You murdered them!” I repeated.

“If you are not joking, allow me to congratulate you on the discovery,” Kamyshev said laughing, but still not looking at me: “However, judging by your trembling voice, and your paleness, it is difficult to suppose that you are joking. What a nervous man you are!”

Kamyshev turned his flushed face towards me and, forcing himself to smile, he continued:

“It is interesting how such an idea could have come into your head! Have I written something like that in my novel? By God, that's interesting. . . . Tell me, please! It really is interesting once in a lifetime to try what it feels like to be looked upon as a murderer.”

“You are a murderer,” I said, “and you are not able to hide it. In the novel you lied, and now you are proving yourself but a poor actor.”

“This is really quite interesting; upon my word, it would be curious to hear. . . .”

“If you are curious, then listen.”

I jumped up and began walking about the room in great agitation. Kamyshev looked out of the door and closed it tight. By this precaution he gave himself away.

“What are you afraid of?” I asked.

Kamyshev became confused, coughed and shrugged his shoulders.

“I'm not afraid of anything, I only. . . . only looked—looked out of the door. So you wanted this too! Well, now tell me!”

“May I put you some questions?”

“As many as you like.”

“I warn you that I am no magistrate, and I am no master in cross-examination; do not expect order or system, and therefore please do not disconcert or puzzle me. First tell me where you disappeared after you had left the clearing on which the shooting party was feasting?”

“In the novel it is mentioned: I went home.”

“In the novel the description of the way you went is carefully effaced. Did you not go through the forest?”

“Yes.”

“Consequently, you could have met Olga?”

“Yes, I could,” Kamyshev said smiling.

“And you met her.”

“No, I did not meet her.”

“In your investigations you forgot to question one very important witness, and that was yourself. . . . Did you hear the shriek of the victim?”

“No. . . . Well, baten'ka,* you don't know how to cross-examine at all.”

* The diminutive of otets—father, a very familiar form of address.

This familiar baten'ka jarred on me; it accorded but ill with the apologies and the disconcertion with which our conversation had begun. Soon I noticed that Kamyshev looked upon me with condescension,—from above—and almost with admiration of my inexperience in extricating myself from the number of questions that were troubling me.

“Let us admit that you did not meet Olga in the forest,” I continued, “though it was more difficult for Urbenin to meet Olga than for you, as Urbenin did not know she was in the forest, and, therefore, did not look for her, while you, being drunk and maddened would probably have looked for her. You certainly did look for her, otherwise what would be your object in going home through the forest instead of by the road? . . . But let us admit that you did not meet her. . . . How is your gloomy, your almost mad frame of mind, in the evening of the ill-fated day, to be explained? What induced you to kill the parrot, who cried out about the husband who killed his wife? I think he reminded you of your own evil deed. That night you were summoned to the Count's house, and instead of beginning your investigations at once, you delayed until the police arrived almost four and twenty hours later, and you yourself probably never noticed it. . . . Only those magistrates who already know who the criminal is can delay in that way. . . . The criminal was known to you. . . . Further,—Olga did not mention the name of the murderer because he was dear to her. . . . If her husband had been the murderer she would have named him. If she had been capable of informing against him to her lover the Count, it would not have cost her anything to accuse him of murder: she did not love him, and he was not dear to her. . . . She loved you, and it was just you, who were dear to her . . . she wanted to spare you. . . . Allow me to ask why did you delay asking her a straight question when she regained consciousness for a moment? Why did you ask her all sorts of questions that had nothing to do with the matter? Allow me to think you did this only to mark time, in order to prevent her from naming you. Then Olga dies. . . . In your novel you do not say a word about the impression that her death made on you . . . In this I see caution: you do not forget to write about the number of glasses you emptied, but such an important event as the death of “the girl in red” passes in the novel without leaving any traces. . . . Why?”

“Go on, go on. . . .”

“You made all your investigations in a most slovenly way. . . . It is hard to admit, that you, a clever and very cunning man, did not do so purposely. All your investigations remind one of a letter that is purposely written with grammatical errors. The exaggeration gives you away. . . . Why did you not examine the scene of the crime? Not because you forgot to do so, or considered it unimportant, but because you waited for the rain to wash away your traces. You write little about the examination of the servants. Consequently, Kuz'ma was not examined by you until he was caught washing his poddevka. . . . You evidently had no cause to mix him up in the affair. Why did you not question any of the guests, who had been feasting with you on the clearing? They had seen the blood stains on Urbenin, and had heard Olga's shriek,—they ought to have been examined. But you did not do it, because one of them might have remembered at his examination, that shortly before the murder you had suddenly gone into the forest and been lost. Afterwards they probably were questioned, but this circumstance had already been forgotten by them. . . .”

“Cute!” Kamyshev said, rubbing his hands; “go on, go on!”

“Is it possible that what has already been said is not enough for you? To prove conclusively that Olga was murdered by you, and no other, I must remind you that you were her lover, whom she had jilted for a man you despised! A husband can kill from jealousy. I presume a lover can do so, too. . . . Now let us advert to Kuz'ma. . . . To judge by his last interrogation, that took place on the eve of his death, he had you in his mind; you had wiped your hands on his poddevka, and you had called him a swine. . . . If it had not been you, why did you interrupt your examination at the most interesting point? Why did you not ask about the colour of the murderer's necktie, when Kuz'ma had informed you he had remembered what the colour of the necktie was? Why did you give Urbenin liberty just when Kuz'ma remembered the name of the murderer? Why not before or after? It was evident you required a man who might walk about the corridors at night. . . . And so you killed Kuz'ma, fearing that he would denounce you.”

“Well, enough!” Kamyshev said laughing. “That will do! You are in such a passion, and have grown so pale that it seems as if at any moment you might faint. Do not continue. You are right. I really did kill them.”

This was followed by a silence. I paced the room from corner to corner. Kamyshev did the same.

“I killed them!” Kamyshev continued. “You have caught the secret by the tail,—it's your good luck. Not many will have that success. Most of your readers will abuse Urbenin, and be amazed at my magisterial cleverness and acumen.”

At that moment my assistant came into my office and interrupted our conversation. Noticing that I was occupied and excited he hovered for a moment around my writing-table, looked at Kamyshev, and left the room. When he had gone Kamyshev went to the window and began to breathe on the glass.

“Eight years have passed since then,” he began again, after a short silence, “and for eight years I have borne this secret within me. But such a secret and live blood are incompatible in the same organism; it is impossible to know without punishment what the rest of mankind does not know. For all these eight years I have felt myself a martyr. It was not my conscience that tormented me, no! Conscience is a thing apart . . . and I don't pay much attention to it. It can easily be stifled by reasoning about its expansibility. When reason does not work, I smother it with wine and women. With women I have my former success,—this I only mention by the way. But I was tormented by something else. The whole time I thought it strange that people should look upon me as an ordinary man. During all these eight years not a single living soul has looked at me searchingly; it appeared strange to me that I had not to hide. A terrible secret is concealed in me, and still I walk about the streets. I go to dinner-parties. I flirt with women! For a criminal man such a position is unnatural and painful. I would not be tormented if I had to hide and dissemble. Psychosis, baten'ka! At last I was seized by a kind of passion. . . . I suddenly wanted to pour myself out in some way on everybody, to shout my secret at them all, though nobody is worth a sneeze . . . to do something like that . . . something extraordinary. And so I wrote this novel—indictment, in which only the witless will have any difficulty in recognizing me as a man with a secret. . . . There is not a page that does not give the key to the puzzle. Is that not true? You doubtless understood it at once. When I wrote it I took into consideration the standard of the average reader. . . .”

We were again disturbed. Andrey entered the room bringing two glasses of tea on a tray. . . . I hastened to send him away.

“Now it appears to be easier for me,” Kamyshev said smiling, “now you look upon me not as an ordinary man, but as a man with a secret,—and I feel myself in a natural position. . . . But. . . . However, it is already three o'clock, and somebody is waiting for me in the cab . . .”

“Stay, put down your hat. . . . You have told me what made you take up authorship, now tell me how you murdered.”

“Do you want to know that as a supplement of what you have read? Very well. I killed in a state of aberration. Nowadays people even smoke and drink tea under the influence of aberration. In your excitement you have taken up my glass instead of your own, and you smoke more than usual. . . . Life is all aberration . . . so it appears to me. . . . When I went into the wood my thoughts were far away from murder; I went there with only one object: to find Olga and to continue to sting her. . . . When I am drunk I always feel the necessity to sting. . . . I met her about two hundred paces from the clearing. . . . She was standing under a tree and looking pensively at the sky. . . . I called to her. . . . When she saw me she smiled and stretched out her arms to me. . . .

“Don't scold me, I'm so unhappy!” she said.

That evening she looked so beautiful, that I, drunk as I was, forgot everything in the world and pressed her in my arms. . . . She swore to me that she had never loved anybody but me . . . and that was true . . . she really loved me . . . and in the very midst of her assurances she suddenly took it into her head to say a horrible phrase: “How unhappy I am! If I had not got married to Urbenin, I might now have married the Count!” This phrase was like a pail of cold water for me. . . . All that was boiling in my breast bubbled over. I seized the vile little creature by the shoulder and threw her to the ground as you throw a ball. My rage reached its maximum. . . . Well. . . . I finished her. . . . I just finished her. . . . Kuz'ma's case, you understand. . . .”

I glanced at Kamyshev. On his face I could neither read repentance nor regret. “I just finished her” was said as easily as “I just had a smoke.” In my turn I also experienced a feeling of wrath and loathing. . . . I turned away.

“And Urbenin is in penal servitude?” I asked quietly.

“Yes. . . . I heard he had died on the way, but that is not certain. . . . What then?”

“What then? An innocent man is suffering and you ask ‘What then?’”

“But what am I to do? To go and confess?”

“I should think so.”

“Well, let us suppose it! . . . I have nothing against taking Urbenin's place, but I won't yield without a fight. . . . Let them take me if they want, but I won't go to them. Why did they not take me when I was in their hands? At Olga's funeral I squalled so long, and had such hysterics that even the blind must have seen the truth. . . . It's not my fault that they are stupid.”

“You are odious to me,” I said.

“That is natural. . . . I am odious to myself. . . .”

There was silence again. . . . I opened the cash-book and began mechanically to count up the numbers. . . . Kamyshev took up his hat.

“I see you are stifled while I am here,” he said. “By-the-by, don't you want to see Count Karnéev. There he is sitting in the cab!”

I went up to the window and glanced at him. . . . Sitting in the cab with his back towards us sat a small stooping figure, in a shabby hat and a faded collar. It was difficult to recognize in him one of the actors of the drama!

“I heard that Urbenin's son is living here in Moscow in the Andréev Chambers,” Kamyshev said. “I want to arrange that the Count should receive alms from him. . . . Let at least one be punished! However, I must say adieu!”

Kamyshev nodded and hastened out of the room. I sat down at the table and gave myself up to bitter thoughts.

I felt stifled.

Transcriber’s Note

This transcription follows the text of the English translation published in 1926 by Stanley Paul & Co. Ltd. (The original novel was published serially in 1884 under the title “Драма на охоте”.) The following alterations have been made to correct what are believed to be unambiguous printer’s errors.

* “household gods” has been changed to “household goods” (Ch. I). * “The doctor, loved her” has been changed to “The doctor loved her” (Ch. VIII). * “Federovich” has been changed to “Fedorovich” (Ch. X). * “necesary” has been changed to “necessary” (Ch. XVI).

Additionally, nine cases of unmatched quotation marks have been restored. All other seeming errors have been left unchanged.