The Karamazov Brothers Page 8

  The arrival of his two brothers, whom he had not known at all before then, seemed to make a very strong impression on Alyosha. He got to know his half-brother, Dmitry Fyodorovich, more quickly and more closely, despite the fact that he arrived after his full brother, Ivan Fyodorovich. He very much wished to get to know Ivan, but although the latter had already been living in his father’s house for two months and they had met quite frequently, they had not been drawn to each other in any way; Alyosha himself was uncommunicative and seemed to be waiting for something, as if he were embarrassed, while Ivan, although initially casting long and curious looks at Alyosha, soon ceased to give him any thought at all. This somewhat confused Alyosha. He attributed Ivan’s aloofness to the difference in their ages and especially in their education. But Alyosha also thought of another interpretation: perhaps Ivan’s lack of interest in him was due to something quite unknown to him. It seemed to him that Ivan was preoccupied with something profound within himself, that he was striving towards some goal, perhaps one very difficult to attain, so that he had no time for Alyosha, and that this was the sole reason why he was so abstracted in his presence. Alyosha also wondered whether the learned atheist might not feel disdain for him, a foolish novice. He knew for certain that his brother was an atheist. He could not take offence at this disdain, if disdain it was, but waited in a state of anxious confusion, which he himself did not quite understand, for his brother to approach him. Dmitry Fyodorovich spoke of his brother Ivan with the deepest respect and sympathy. It was from him that Alyosha learned all the details of the important matter that had recently forged such a remarkably close bond between the two elder brothers. Dmitry’s ecstatic references to his brother Ivan were all the more natural in Alyosha’s eyes since, compared with Ivan, Dmitry was almost uneducated, and indeed, seen together, they presented such a striking contrast of personality and character that it would have been almost impossible to imagine two men more dissimilar.

  It was just at this time that a meeting, or rather gathering, of all the members of this discordant family was held in the starets’s cell, which was to have an enormous influence on Alyosha. This gathering actually took place under a false pretext. By this time the disagreement between Dmitry Fyodorovich and his father Fyodor Pavlovich over the matter of the inheritance and the estate had reached an impossible pitch. Relations between them had become strained to breaking point. It would seem to have been Fyodor Pavlovich who, apparently in jest, had first proposed that they all meet in Starets Zosima’s cell, if not to seek his direct mediation, then at least to come to some sort of reasonable understanding, to which the starets’s dignity and standing might contribute something by way of inspiration and reconciliation. Dmitry Fyodorovich, who had never visited the starets or even seen him, naturally thought that his father wanted to embarrass him, but as he secretly reproached himself for having recently behaved reprehensibly in the course of the dispute with his father, he accepted the invitation. We must note, incidentally, that he lived not in his father’s house, like Ivan Fyodorovich, but by himself on the other side of town. Pyotr Aleksandrovich Miusov, who at that time happened to be living in our neighbourhood, was especially taken with Fyodor Pavlovich’s suggestion. A liberal of the ‘forties and ‘fifties, a freethinker and atheist, he took a very great interest in this matter, out of ennui perhaps, or a taste for levity. He had a sudden urge to take a look at the monastery and the ‘holy man’. Since his old quarrel with the monastery was still unresolved, and the legal wrangles about boundaries, claims to the standing timber, fishing-rights on the river, and so forth were still dragging on, he hastened to avail himself of this opportunity, under the pretext of wishing to try to reach an agreement with the Abbot to see whether they could somehow settle their dispute amicably. Of course, a petitioner with such genuine motives would be received at the monastery with more consideration and courtesy than someone who visited merely out of curiosity. The combination of all these considerations may have influenced the monks to prevail upon the ailing starets to grant an audience, since of late he had hardly left his cell because of his illness, refusing to meet even his regular visitors. In the end the starets gave his consent to the meeting, and a day was appointed. With a smile to Alyosha, he said only, ‘Who made me a judge over them?’*

  Alyosha was very disconcerted when he heard about the meeting. Undoubtedly, the only person from the litigant and contending parties who could regard this conference seriously was Dmitry; the others would all be there for frivolous reasons, which could well be offensive to the starets. Alyosha understood this. Ivan and Miusov would come out of curiosity, possibly of the worst possible kind, and his father perhaps to engage in some kind of buffoonery and histrionics. Indeed, although he kept his silence, Alyosha knew his father through and through. I repeat, this boy was not as ingenuous as everyone considered him to be. He awaited the appointed day with a heavy heart. Undoubtedly, he very much wished that all this family feuding would come to an end. All the same, he was worried most of all about the starets. He was fearful for him, for his reputation; he feared he would be insulted, especially by Miusov’s subtle, polite mockery and the supercilious innuendos of the learned Ivan; that is how he pictured the situation. It even occurred to him to forewarn the starets, to say something about these expected visitors, but he thought better of it and held his tongue. He simply let Dmitry know, through an acquaintance, on the eve of the appointed day that he loved him very much and expected him to keep his promise. Dmitry, puzzled because he could in no way recall that he had promised anything, simply replied by letter that he would do his very best to control himself ‘in the face of baseness’, and that though he deeply respected both the starets and his brother Ivan, he was convinced that there was either some kind of trap for him or some unseemly comedy in prospect. ‘All the same, I would rather cut off my tongue than show lack of respect towards the holy man whom you revere so much,’ Dmitry ended his note. It gave little cheer to Alyosha.

  BOOK TWO

  An Unseemly Encounter

  1

  THEY ARRIVE AT THE MONASTERY

  THE day turned out to be wonderfully warm and bright. It was the end of August. The meeting with the starets had been arranged for just after the late morning service, at about half past eleven. Our visitors, however, did not arrive for the service, but shortly after it had ended. They drove up in two separate carriages; Pyotr Aleksandrovich Miusov with a distant relative of his, Pyotr Fomich Kalganov, a young man of about twenty, arrived in the first, an elegant calash drawn by a fine pair of horses. This young man was planning to go to university; Miusov, however, with whom he was staying for some reason at the time, was trying to persuade him to accompany him on a visit abroad, to Zurich or Jena, and to study at a university there. The young man was still undecided. He was of a reflective disposition and somewhat absent-minded. He had a pleasant face, was well built and rather tall. His gaze was apt to lapse into a strange immobility; like all absent-minded people, he would sometimes stare at you long and hard without seeing you at all. He was taciturn and a little clumsy, though there were times—but only if he was alone with someone—when he would become extremely talkative, excitable, and jocular, sometimes laughing at God only knows what. But his elation would dry up as quickly and suddenly as it had erupted. He was always well, even exquisitely, dressed; he already enjoyed a certain private income and was expecting a far greater one. He was a friend of Alyosha’s.

  Fyodor Pavlovich and his son Ivan Fyodorovich rolled up in an ancient, rickety, but large hackney cab drawn by a pair of old reddish-grey horses, trailing a long way behind Miusov’s calash. Dmitry Fyodorovich, although he had been informed of the time and date the day before, was late. The visitors left their carriages outside the monastery at an inn, and passed through the entrance gate on foot. Apart from Fyodor Pavlovich, it is possible that none of them had ever been in a monastery in their lives before, and as for Miusov, he had perhaps not been to church for nigh on thirty years. He kept looking ar
ound with a curiosity not devoid of a certain affected jauntiness. But all that met his questing gaze within the monastery’s precincts were some nondescript monastic and domestic buildings, nothing out of the ordinary. The last of the congregation were leaving the church, doffing their caps and crossing themselves. Among the common folk could be seen some members of the upper classes, two or three ladies, and a very aged general, all of whom were staying at the inn. The visitors were immediately surrounded by beggars, but nobody gave them anything. Only young Kalganov, in embarrassment and haste, heaven only knows why, took from his purse a ten-kopeck coin and hurriedly thrust it into the hands of a peasant woman, adding quickly, ‘To be divided equally.’ None of his companions passed any comment, so there was really no need for him to be embarrassed; noticing this, he became even more embarrassed.

  It was, however, rather strange; by rights, they should have been met and perhaps even accorded a certain respect, since one of them had recently made a donation of a thousand roubles, and the other was one of the wealthiest and most highly educated landowners, a man in whose hands, one might say, the monastery’s future to some extent rested, in view of the pending lawsuit regarding fishing-rights on the river. And yet no dignitary came out to meet them. Miusov distractedly regarded the gravestones around the church and was about to remark that the right to bury their dead in such a ‘holy’ place must have cost the relatives a pretty penny, but he refrained. His usual liberal irony was brewing into something like anger.

  ‘Confound it, isn’t there anybody in this madhouse we could ask?… We should find out what’s happening, because time’s getting on,’ he burst out, as though speaking to himself.

  Suddenly they were approached by an elderly, balding gentleman with ingratiating eyes, wearing a capacious summer coat. Raising his hat and speaking in a honeyed lisp, he introduced himself to the company at large as Maksimov, a landowner from Tula. He immediately concerned himself with our visitors’ problem.

  ‘Starets Zosima lives all alone in the hermitage, not quite half a verst from the monastery, through the wood, you go through the wood—’

  ‘I know it’s through the wood,’ Fyodor Pavlovich replied, ‘but we can’t quite remember the way, it’s a long time since we’ve been here.’

  ‘Out through this gate and just keep on through the wood… straight through the wood. Come along. If you don’t mind… I too… I myself… follow me, follow me…’

  They went through the gate and set off through the wood. The landowner Maksimov, a man of about sixty, did not so much walk as run alongside the others, scrutinizing them all with eager, almost insatiable curiosity. He was quite wide-eyed.

  ‘We’ve come to see the starets on a private matter,’ Miusov remarked sternly. ‘We have been granted, you might say, an audience with “his holiness”, and so, thank you all the same for showing us the way, but we can’t invite you to come with us.’

  ‘I’ve been to see him, I’ve been, I’ve already been to see him… Un chevalier parfait!’* and the landowner snapped his fingers in the air.

  ‘What chevalier?’ Miusov enquired.

  ‘Why, the starets, the illustrious starets, the starets… the pride and glory of the monastery. Zosima. There’s a holy man for you…’

  But his confused explanation was interrupted by a cowled monk, short of stature, very pale and hollow-cheeked, who had caught up with the visitors. Fyodor Pavlovich and Miusov stopped. Bowing from the waist in extreme deference, the monk addressed them.

  ‘The reverend abbot extends his humble invitation to all you gentlemen to have luncheon with him after your visit to the hermitage. One o’clock sharp… And you too,’ he said, turning to Maksimov.

  ‘I shall be delighted,’ exclaimed Fyodor Pavlovich, overjoyed at the invitation, ‘one o’clock without fail. And I’d like you to know, we’ve all given our word to be on our best behaviour here… and what about you, Pyotr Aleksandrovich, are you coming?’

  ‘Why ever not! What do you think I came for, if not to see what they get up to here? The only fly in the ointment as far as I’m concerned is that you’re going to be there, Fyodor Pavlovich…’

  ‘No sign of Dmitry Fyodorovich yet.’

  ‘I wish he weren’t coming. Do you think I care for all this ridiculous nonsense of yours, with you as company into the bargain? We’ll be there,’ he said, turning to the little monk, ‘please thank the reverend abbot.’

  ‘I wish I could, but I’ve been told to take you directly to the starets himself,’ replied the monk.

  ‘In that case, I’ll go to the reverend abbot, I’ll go straight to him,’ burbled the landowner Maksimov.

  ‘The reverend abbot is occupied at present, but, as you please…’, the monk said uncertainly.

  ‘What a tiresome old fellow,’ Miusov remarked out loud after Maksimov had hurried off back to the monastery.

  ‘Reminds me of von Sohn,’* Fyodor Pavlovich exclaimed suddenly.

  ‘Not von Sohn again!… What’s he got to do with it? Have you ever seen von Sohn?’

  ‘I’ve seen his picture. It’s not so much what he looks like, it’s something else, but I can’t quite put my finger on it. The spitting image of von Sohn, though. I can always tell a face.’

  ‘Well, you’re the expert. Only one thing, Fyodor Pavlovich, you said yourself just now that we promised to behave ourselves, remember? So there, control yourself. If you start acting the clown, I’ve no intention of being dragged into it… You see what he’s like,’ he turned to the monk, ‘I’m afraid to visit decent people in his company.’

  The subtle ghost of a smile, not devoid of a certain cunning, flitted across the pale, bloodless lips of the little monk, but he said nothing and it was only too evident that his silence stemmed from a sense of his own dignity. Miusov’s frown deepened.

  ‘To hell with the lot of them! It’s all a façade, this, in fact it’s all sham and nonsense,’ the thought flashed through his mind.

  ‘Here’s the hermitage, we’re here!’ Fyodor Pavlovich called out. ‘Here’s the wall, but the gate’s locked.’

  And he started to make sweeping signs of the cross before the images of saints painted above and on either side of the gate.

  ‘Rule of the house,’ he remarked. ‘A total of twenty-five holy men saving their souls in this monastery sitting opposite one another and munching pickled cabbage. And not a single woman comes through these gates, that’s the most remarkable thing of all. It’s a fact. But,’ he turned suddenly to the monk, ‘what’s this I hear about the starets seeing ladies now?’

  ‘Yes, there are peasant women here now, resting over there by the veranda, waiting. And for ladies, two rooms have been built over the veranda, but on the outer side of the wall—you can see the windows—and the starets, when his health permits, reaches them through an internal passageway; oh yes, they’re well outside the wall. There’s a lady there now from Kharkov, a Mrs Khokhlakova, she’s waiting with her sick daughter to see him. He must have promised to talk to them, though he’s been very poorly lately and has hardly even been able to go out to see the peasants.’

  ‘So there’s a tiny exit from the hermitage to the ladies, after all. Don’t think, reverend father, that I’m suggesting anything; I was just observing. But I don’t know if you’re aware that on Mount Athos no women visitors or any women at all are allowed, nor any female creatures of any kind, such as hens, turkey-hens, heifers…’

  ‘Fyodor Pavlovich, if you’re not careful, I’ll leave you here, and then you’ll be politely asked to leave, so be warned!’

  ‘Have I said anything to upset you, Pyotr Aleksandrovich? I say,’ he exclaimed suddenly, stepping through the hermitage gate, ‘what a vale of roses they live in!’

  It was true; although there were no longer any roses, a large variety of rare and exotic autumn flowers grew wherever there was room to plant them. They were clearly tended by expert hands. The flower-beds were laid out around the walls of the monastic buildings and between the gr
aves. Zosima’s cell was in a small, single-storey wooden house which had a veranda in front of the entrance and was also surrounded by flowers.

  ‘I wonder if it was like this in Varsonophy’s time? They say he wasn’t known for his delicacy of approach, and when he was the starets here he’d jump up and hit people with his stick, women and all,’ remarked Fyodor Pavlovich, mounting the steps.

  ‘The starets Varsonophy did sometimes seem like a holy fool, but people do say some foolish things,’ the monk replied. ‘He never used to hit anybody with a stick, though. Now, gentlemen, please wait here a moment and I’ll let him know you’re here.’

  ‘Fyodor Pavlovich, for the last time, do you hear me? Remember your promise,’ Miusov spluttered once more. ‘Behave yourself, or there’ll be trouble.’