Chapter 4 Fall short

Fall short Ilya Sergeyitch Piplov and his wife Kleopatra Petrovna were standing outside the door listening greedily.Behind the door, in the small drawing room, there seemed to be a confession of love between their daughter Natashenka and the district school teacher Shupkin. "There is hope!" whispered Piplov, shaking with anxiety and rubbing his hands together. "Be careful, Petrovna, as soon as they talk about affection, you take down the icon from the wall, and we'll go in and bless them. . . . We'll catch him on the spot. . . . The blessing of icons is a sacred and inviolable matter... At that time, even if he goes to the court to file a lawsuit, he will not be able to deny it."

The following conversation was going on at the door: "Don't be petty," said Shupkin, striking a match on his plaid trousers. "I never wrote to you at all!" "Well, yes! It's as if I don't recognize your handwriting!" The girl said with a giggle, biting her throat pretentiously, and looking in the mirror from time to time. "I recognized it at a glance! How strange you are! You are a calligraphy teacher, but your handwriting crawls like spiders! If you can't write well yourself, how can you teach others to write?" "Oh! ... It doesn't matter. In calligraphy class, the main thing is not to write well or not, the main thing is to control the students not to mess around. Hit this student's head with a ruler and send another student to kneel as a punishment. ... Besides, what's so important about good handwriting! It doesn't matter! Nekrasov is a writer, but his handwriting is ashamed to look at. His handwriting is printed in his collection. "

"That's Nekrasov, and this is you . . . " she said, sighing. "I'd love to marry a writer. Then he'll write me poems every now and then as a souvenir!" "I can write you poems, too, if you like." "But what can you write?" "Write about love, ... about feeling, ... about your eyes. . . . You will be swept away by it. . . . You will be moved to tears! But if I write you a poem full of emotion , can you let me kiss your little hand?" "What's the big deal! . . . Even now you can kiss!" Shupkin jumped up, stared wide-eyed, and bent his head close to her chubby little hand, which smelled of egg soap.

"Take down the icon," said Piplov hastily, nudging his wife, pale with emotion, and buttoning his coat. "Let's go in! Quick!" Piplov opened the door without delay. "Children..." he murmured, throwing up his hands and tearing up his eyes. "God blesses you, my children. . . . I wish you a happy life, . . . raising children, . . . many children and grandchildren. . . . " "I . . . cry. "Happiness to you, my dears! Ah, you have taken away my only baby!" he said to Shupkin. "Then you will love my daughter... love her..." Shupkin opened his mouth in surprise, terrified.The attack of the two parents was so sudden and bold that he could not utter a word.

"I've been tricked! They're forcing me to marry!" he thought to himself, frozen with horror. "Now you're doomed, old man! You can't escape!" He lowered his head obediently, as if he wanted to say: "You arrest me, I have been conquered!" "I... I bless you..." Dad went on, crying too. "Natashenka, my daughter. . . stand beside him. . . . Bring the icon, Petrovna. . . . " But at that moment the parents stopped crying, and the father's face grew pale with indignation. Change. "Stupid!" he said angrily to his wife, "you fool! Is this an icon?"

"Oh, saint!" What happened?The calligraphy teacher raised his eyes timidly, and saw that he had been saved: it turned out that what mother had taken down from the wall in haste was not an icon, but a photo of the writer Razhechnikov.The old man Piplov and his wife Kleopatra Petrovna stood with the picture in their hands, embarrassed, not knowing what to do or what to say.Taking advantage of their panic, the calligraphy teacher ran away. fledgling story The lawyer's assistant, Pyaterkin, went to a county town to defend a shopkeeper accused of arson, and returned in an ordinary peasant cart.Never had he been in such a bad mood.He felt humiliated, frustrated, reviled.It seemed to him that this past day, the day of his first court appearance, which he had longed for and given him so much hope for, seemed to wipe out his future, to overturn his faith in man and his faith in the world. the opinion of.

First, the accused shamelessly and cruelly deceived him.Before the court session, the shop owner always rolled his eyes so sincerely, always told his grievances honestly with a clear conscience, so all the evidence collected to convict him, after a psychologist and In the eyes of the physiognomist (as this young defender considers himself to be), there are unscrupulous far-fetched, fault-finding, and preconceived prejudices.But in court, the shopkeeper showed himself to be a cunning and cunning villain, and the defense's poor psychology suffered. Secondly, Piatelkin felt that his behavior in court was very unseemly: he stuttered, asked questions inconsequentially, stood up before the witnesses, blushed stupidly.He couldn't control his tongue at all, and he couldn't even speak simple words clearly, just like tongue twisters.When it came time for him to speak, he spoke weakly, as if in a fog, and his eyes did not dare to look at the jurors, but looked over their heads behind them.He was talking, but at any moment he felt that the jurors were looking at him mockingly and contemptuously.

Third, and worst of all, the Deputy Attorney and Civil Complainant, an experienced veteran attorney, treated him like no fellow.It seemed to him that they had conspired to ignore the defender, and if they looked up at him, it was only to show him their presumptuousness, to mock him, to contradict him with grandiose words.Sarcasm and arrogance can be heard in their speech.They talked on and on, as if to ask everyone to forgive the defender for being a complete fool and a lamb.At last Piatelkin could bear it no longer.During the break, he ran up to the civil complainant, shaking all over, and said a lot of contradictory things.When the interrogation was over, he chased the deputy prosecutor up the stairs and said some nasty things to him too.

Fourth... However, if I enumerate one by one the causes of my hero's pain and troubles at present, then I have to mention the fifth, sixth, ... until the hundredth point. … “Shame, . "It's all over! The career of a lawyer is over! I'll just go to some remote place and live in seclusion behind closed doors,...to avoid those gentlemen,...to avoid those troubles." "Go away quickly, to hell with you!" he scolded the coachman. "What are you driving? It's as if you're sending a dead man to a wedding! Go away!" "Hurry up,... hurry up,..." the coachman retorted. "Don't you see what kind of weather this is? Even if you drive the devil away, the devil will be tired to death. This is not the weather, but the Lord's punishment."

The weather was terrible.The weather seemed to be indignant, hated, bitter with Piatelkin.It was pitch black all around, and a damp cold wind was blowing, screaming in various tones.It rained non-stop.The snow under the wheels mingled with the clay, making whimpering noises.There are puddles, mud pools, and washed-out bridges everywhere. "It's so dark you can't see anything," continued the coachman. "As it is, we won't be able to get there tomorrow morning. We'll have to spend the night at Luca's." "Which Luca?" "Here, on the edge of the road, in the woods, lives an old man. He guards the woods. Here, that's his cabin."

In the distance came the hoarse barking of a dog, and a dim light flickered among the bare branches.No matter how much you hate humans, if you see a small light in the woods late at night when it's stormy, you're bound to long to be with people.Piatelkin was in the same mood.When the big cart stopped in front of the small wooden house and shone light timidly and courteously from the single small window, he felt much more at ease. "Hello, old man!" he said kindly to Luca, who was standing in the doorway scratching his stomach with both hands. "Can I stay with you overnight?" "Yes... yes," Luca muttered. "There are already two people in the room. . . . Please go into the lighted room. . . . " Piatelkin bowed his head and went into the small lighted room, and then . . . his hatred of humanity He raised his head vigorously again.There were already two persons sitting at a small table by the light of an oil candle, and it was these two persons who had affected his state of mind so strongly today: Deputy Public Prosecutor von Bach and Civil Complaint Thank you Michkin.Like Piatelkin, they also returned from the county town and stopped at Luka's house.They both jumped up in pleasant surprise when they saw the Advocate enter the door. "Colleague! What brought you here?" they said. "You brought this rainy day here too? Welcome! Sit down, please." Piatelkin expected that they would look away, embarrassed, and say nothing when they saw him, so this friendly reception seemed to him at least shameless. "I don't understand, ..." he murmured, shrugging his shoulders dignifiedly. "Since something like that has already happened between us, I... I'm even surprised!" Von Bach looked at Piaterkin in amazement, shrugged his shoulders, then, turning to Semychkin, continued what had been interrupted: "Well, I'll just read the investigative report. . . . In the investigative report, my friend, there are contradictions one after another. . . . For example, the police chief wrote that the dead peasant woman Ivanova came back from a visit drunk and walked three versts. Dead. How could she walk three versts if she was drunk? Well, isn't that a contradiction? Huh?" While von Bach was eloquent in this way, Piatelkin sat down on a bench and began to inspect his temporary lodgings. ... The lights in the woods are poetic only when seen from a distance, but they become poor prose when viewed close up. ... Here it illuminates a small gray room with sloping walls and a ceiling blackened with smoke.In the right corner hung a black icon.On the left is an unsightly stove that looks like a spooky cave.Along the beams of the ceiling was a long pole that was used to hang a cradle.An old small table and two narrow and unstable benches are the whole hall furniture.The room was dark and stuffy and cold.The air was filled with the smell of decay and oily smoke. "These stupid pigs..." Piaterkin thought to himself, squinting at his enemy. "They insulted people, they trampled people in the mud, and now they talk like nothing happened." "Listen," he said to Luca, "do you have another room here? I can't stay here." "There's an antechamber, but it's cold in there, sir." "It's very cold . . . " muttered Semychkin. "If I'd known, I'd have brought the wine and the cards. How about some tea? Make a samovar, my lord!" Half an hour later Luca brought a dirty samovar, a teapot with a spout missing, and three cups. "I have tea, . . . " said von Bach. "Now there is only a shortage of sugar....Grandpa, please give me some sugar!" "Hey! Candy,..." Luca laughed in the front hall. "Looking for sugar in the woods! This ain't the city." "What can we do? Then we'll drink tea without sugar," decided von Bach. Xie Meiqijin made tea and filled three cups. "He actually poured me tea . . . " thought Piatelkin. "I don't care! They spit all over your face and then buy you tea. These people are so shameless. I'm going to ask Luca for another teacup, just drink water. I just rewinded It's sugar." But Luca didn't have a fourth teacup.Pyaterkin poured out the tea in the third cup, filled it with boiling water, and drank it with a piece of sugar.Hearing the sound of gnawing candy, his enemies looked at each other and burst out laughing. "Honestly, this is wonderful!" began von Bach in a low voice. "We have no sugar, and he has no tea. . . . Haha. . . . Interesting! Why, he is still a child! Such a big man, but still so childish, he can pout his lips and pout, just like a noblewoman Girls at the secondary school... colleagues!" he said, turning to Piatelkin. "You shouldn't despise our tea....This is not the kind of cheap tea....But, if you don't want to drink it out of face, you can always give us some sugar as compensation for the tea!" Pyaterkin said nothing. "Old cheek..." he thought to himself. "They insulted you, spit on you, and now they still have the face to talk! This group of people is like this! It can be seen that they didn't care about the contradictory words I said to them in the court earlier. ... I ignored them . . . I lie down and sleep. . . . " A leather jacket was spread on the floor beside the stove. ...beside the head there was a pillow stuffed with hay. ...Pieterkin lay down on the fur coat, put his feverish head on the pillow, and covered himself with his fur coat. "How boring!" said Semychkin, yawning. "It's too cold and dark here to read, and there's no place to sleep. . . . Terrible! . . . Tell me, Osip Osipecchi, for example, if Luca ate in a restaurant." , but did not pay, so what kind of crime is it: theft, or fraud?" "Neither. . . It constitutes grounds for civil action only. ..." Then they argued, which lasted an hour and a half.Piatelkin listened, trembling with rage. … Five times he was going to jump up and join the argument. "Nonsense!" he thought bitterly, listening to their quarrel. "How outdated and illogical these words are!" The argument was not over until von Bach lay down beside Piatelkin, covered himself with his fur coat, and said: "Come, don't quarrel. . . . Sleeping. Lie down. . . . " "He seems to have fallen asleep . . . " said Semychkin, lying down on Piaterkin's other side. "Colleague, are you asleep?" "They're pestering again . . . " thought Piatelkin. "These stupid pigs. ..." "He doesn't speak, obviously he's asleep..." murmured von Bach. "He is really capable, and he can sleep in this pigsty....People say that the life of a judicial worker is a life in a study....Actually, this is not a life in a study, but a life of a pig.... Look where the devil has sent us! Guess what, I kinda like our neighbor... what's his last name? ... Is it Sesterkin?He was fierce, like a ball of fire. " "Well, yes . . . in five years he'll be a fine lawyer. ...the kid is very personable. ... The milk on his mouth is not yet dry, but he is already speaking clearly and clearly, and he likes to hit the nail on the head. . . . Only he should not have brought Hamlet into his speech. ... "The closeness of the enemies, and the cold, haughty tone of their speech, overwhelmed Piatelkin. He was so shy and angry that his lungs would explode. "And about the sugar..." said von Bach, with a grim smile. "He's a pure schoolgirl! Why is he mad at us? Do you know?" "The devil knows what's going on with him..." Pyaterkin could bear it no longer.He jumped up, opened his mouth, and wanted to say something, but the pain of the past day was too strong, so what came out of his chest was not words, but hysterical crying. "What's the matter with him?" said von Bach, startled. "Good friend, what's the matter with you?" "Are you... are you ill?" said Semychkin, jumping up. "What's the matter with you? Are you short of money?what is the problem? " "This is vile, . . . abominable! All day, . . . "My darling, what's so vile and despicable? Osip Osipecchi, bring me some water! My angel, what's the matter? Why are you so angry today? Probably, it's the first time you've done it today." Defense work, right? Oh, that's no wonder! Then you cry, my dear. . . . I even wanted to hang myself, and it's better to cry than to hang myself. You cry, it'll be easier!" "Damn,... despicable!" "Nothing horrible happened at all! Everything is normal. You speak well yourself, and everyone listens to you. It's paranoia, brother! I still remember my first defense. .I borrowed a pair of faded trousers and a musician's gown. I sat there and everyone seemed to be laughing at my trousers. It seemed to me that the defendant lied to me, the prosecutor tricked me, and I was dumb I'm afraid you've made up your mind never to be a lawyer again? It's happened to everybody! You're not the first, and you ain't the last. It costs a fortune, my boy!" "Then who is laughing at me? Who is... playing with me?" "Nobody ever did that! You just think so! Don't you think the jurors are looking at you with open contempt? Don't you? Well, that's it. Drink some water, my friend. Put your Put your fur coat back on." The two enemies brought Pieterkin with a fur coat, covered him up, and looked after him all night like a child.The pain of the past day turned out to be a false alarm. "Notes" ①The hero in the tragedy of the same name by the British playwright Shakespeare.