Chapter 14 fourteen

fourteen The doctor walked, visited, ate, drank, but he had only one feeling: he hated Mikhail Averyanitch.He would have liked to rest by himself, to leave him, to hide, but the friend felt it his duty to follow him every step of the way, and to arrange for him every possible entertainment.When there was nothing to see, he entertained him with small talk.Andrey Yefimitch endured for two days.But on the third day he declared to his friends that he was ill and he wanted to rest at home for a day.The friend said that in this case, he also stayed.You really should take a break, or you won't be able to move your legs.Andrey Yefimitch lay down on the couch, with his face against the wall, and listened to his friend with his teeth gritted.He asserted vehemently that France would sooner or later destroy Germany, that Moscow was full of swindlers, that horses could not be judged by their looks, etc., etc.The doctor felt tinnitus and palpitations, but out of politeness he was ashamed to tell his friend to go away or shut up.Fortunately Mihail Averyanitch himself felt bored sitting in the hotel, and went out after dinner to wander alone.

Andrey Yefimitch was left alone, and only then did he experience a feeling of rest.How pleasant it is to lie motionless on the couch and realize that you are alone in the room!True happiness cannot lack loneliness.The reason why the fallen angel rebelled against God is probably because he longed for a loneliness that the angels did not experience.Andrey Yefimitch wanted to sort out what he had seen and heard during the past few days, but Mikhail Averyanitch could not get rid of his mind. "You must know that he asked for leave and accompanied me on a trip originally out of friendship and kindness," the doctor thought annoyedly, "but there is nothing worse than this kind of friendly protection. He seems kind and magnanimous." , merry, it's really boring. It's unbearably boring. Likewise, there are some people who always say only smart and kind things, but you think they're really stupid."

For the next few days Andrey Yefimitch continued to pretend that he was ill, and never left his hotel room.He lay face down on the couch, and sometimes his friends entertained him with gossip, and he became very distressed, and sometimes he rested when his friends were out.He complained that he shouldn't be traveling and that his friends were becoming more and more nagging and wanton.He has the heart to think about some serious and noble subjects, but he can't do it anyway. "As Ivan Dmitry said, this is real life berating me," he thought, annoyed at his pettiness, "but it's all nonsense... When I get home, everything will be the same of……"

It was the same in Petersburg: he was out of the hotel all day, lying on the sofa, and only got up when he drank beer. Mihail Averyanitch was always urging him to go to Warsaw. "My dear, what am I doing there?" Andrey Yefimitch begged him. "Go alone, let me go home! I beg you!" "You can't say anything!" protested Mihail Averyanitch. "It's an incomparable city. I spent five of the happiest years of my life there." Andrey Yefimitch lacked that insistence of his own character, and he had to follow reluctantly to Warsaw.When he got there, he stayed out of the hotel as before, lying on the sofa, angry with himself, with his friends, and with the servants who couldn't understand Russian at all.Mihail Averlianitch, however, was still strong, vigorous, and merry, and from morning till night he wandered about the city, looking for old friends, and several times he did not return all night.Once, he spent the night somewhere and returned to the hotel early in the morning with an agitated expression, flushed face and disheveled hair.He walked up and down for a long time, muttering to himself, then stopped and said:

"Reputation matters!" He walked on for a while, put his head in his arms, and said in a tragic tone: "Yes, reputation matters! Damn it, I shouldn't have come to this Babylon in the first place! My dear," he said to the doctor, "you despise me: I lost the bet! Lend me five hundred rubles! " ①The capital of the ancient kingdom of Babylon.As a metaphor for a chaotic city, it is referenced in "Old Testament Genesis". Andrey Yefimitch counted out five hundred rubles and silently handed the money over to his friend.That one was still flushed with shame and anger, cast an unnecessary curse without thinking, put on his hat, and went out.After about two hours he came back, threw himself in the armchair, sighed loudly, and said:

"Honor at last! Let's go, my friend! I don't want to stay a minute longer in this damned city. Liars everywhere! Austrian spies!" When the two friends returned to their city, it was already November, and the streets were covered with thick snow.Andrey Yefimitch had been replaced by Dr. Hobotov, but he was still living in the old house until Andrey Yefimitch returned to vacate the hospital lodgings.The ugly woman he called the cook was already living in a wing. Rumors about the hospital were spreading in the city again. It was said that the ugly woman had quarreled with the chief purser, and that the chief purser seemed to be begging her for mercy.

On the first day of his return Andrey Yefimitch had to look for a house and move. "My friend," said the postmaster timidly to him, "forgive me for my impolite question: how much savings do you have?" said Andrey Yefimitch, after counting the money in silence. "Eighty-six rubles." "That's not what I'm asking," said Mikhail Averyanitch, embarrassed, not understanding the doctor's words. "I'm asking how much money you have in total?" "I told you just now: eighty-six rubles . . . and no more money." Mikhail Averyanitch had always regarded the doctor as a man of integrity and dignity, but he had always suspected that he had at least twenty thousand in savings.Now when he learned that Andrey Yefimitch had become a beggar and had nothing to live on, he burst into tears for some reason, and hugged his friend.