Leo Tolstoy Archive
Written: 1852
Source: Original Text from WikiSource.org
Transcription/Markup: Andy Carloff
Online Source: RevoltLib.com; 2021
" Davydka the White asked for grain and posts," it said in the note-book after Yukhvanka.
After passing several huts, Nekhlyudov, in turning into a lane, met his steward, Yakov Alpatych, who, upon noticing his master at a distance, doffed his oilcloth cap, and, taking out his fulled handkerchief, began to wipe his fat, red face.
" Put it on, Yakov ! Yakov, put it on, I tell you — "
" Where have you been, your Grace ? " asked Yakov, protecting himself with his cap against the sun, but not donning it.
" I have been at Yukhvanka the Shrewd' s. Tell me, if you please, what has made him so bad," said the master, continuing on his way.
" Why so, your Grace ? " replied the manager, following the master at a respectful distance. He had put on his cap and was twirling his mustache.
" Why ? He is a thorough scamp, a lazy man, a thief, a liar ; he torments his mother, and, so far as I can see, he is such a confirmed good-for-nothing that he will never reform."
" I do not know, your Grace, why he has displeased you so much — "
"And his wife," the master interrupted his manager, " seems to be a worthless wench. The old woman is clad worse than a mendicant, and has nothing to eat, but she is all dressed up, and so is he. I really do not know what to do with them."
Yakov was obviously embarrassed when Nekblyudov spoke of Yukhvanka's wife.
" Well, if he has acted like that, your Grace," he began, " we must find means. It is true he is indigent, like all peasants who are aloue, but he is taking some care of himself, not like the others. He is a clever and intelligent peasant, and passably honest. He always comes when the capitation tax is collected. And he has been elder for three years, during my administration, and no fault was found with him. In the third year it pleased the guardian to depose him, and then he attended properly to his farm. It is true, when he lived at the post in town, he used to drink a bit, — and measures must be taken. When he went on a spree, we threatened him, and he came back to his senses : he was then all right, and in his family there was peace ; but if you are not pleased to take these measures, I really do not know what to do with him. Well, he has got very low. He is not fit to be sent into the army again because, as you may have noticed, he lacks two teeth. But he is not the only one, I take the liberty of reporting to you, who is not in the least afraid — "
" Let this alone, Yakov," answered Nekhlyudov, softly smiling ; " we have talked it over often enough. You know what I think of it, and I shall not change my mind, whatever you may tell me."
" Of course, your Grace, all this is known to you," said Yakov, shrugging his shoulders and gazing at the master's back, as though what he saw did not promise anything good. " But as to your troubling yourself about the old woman, it is all in vain," he continued. " It is true she has brought up the orphans, has raised and married off Yukhvanka, and all that. But it is a common rule with the peasants that when a father or mother transfers the farm to the son, the son and daughter-in-law become the masters, and the old woman has to earn her bread as best she can. Of course they have not any tender feelings, but that is the common rule among peasants. And I take the liberty of informing you that the old woman has troubled you in vain. She is a clever old woman and a good housekeeper ; but why should she trouble the master for everything ? I will admit she may have quarreled with her daughter-in-law, and the daughter-in-law may have pushed her, — those are women's affairs. They might have made up again, without her troubling you. You deign to take it too much to heart," said the manager, looking with a certain gentleness and condescension at the master, who was silently walking, with long steps, up the street in front of him.
" Homeward bound, sir ? " he asked.
" No, to Davydka the White, or Kozlov : is not that his name ? "
" He, too, is a good-for-nothing, permit me to inform you. The whole tribe of the Kozlovs is like that. No matter what you may do with them, it has no effect. I drove yesterday over the peasant field, and I saw he had not sowed any buckwheat ; what are we to do with such a lot ? If only the old man taught the son, but he is just such a good-for-nothing : he bungles everything, whether he works for himself or for the manor. The guardian and I have tried everything with him : we have sent him to the commissary's office, and have punished him at home, — but you do not like that — "
" Whom, the old man ? "
" The old man, sir. The guardian has punished him often, and at the full gatherings of the Commune ; but will you believe it, your Grace, it had no effect : he just shook himself, and went away, and did the same. And I must say, Davydka is a peaceful peasant, and not at all stupid : he does not smoke, nor drink, that is," explained Yakov, " he does something worse than drink. All there is left to do is to send him to the army, or to Siberia, and nothing else. The whole tribe of the Kozlovs is like that. Matryushka, who lives in that hovel, also belongs to their family, and is the same kind of an accursed good-for-nothing. So you do not need me, your Grace ? " added the manager, noticing that the master was not listening to him.
" No, you may go," Nekhlyiidov answered, absent- mindedly, and directed his steps to Davydka the White.
Davydka's hut stood crooked and alone at the edge of the village. Near it was no yard, no kiln, no barn ; only a few dirty stalls clung to one side of it : on the other were heaped in a pile wattles and timber that were to be used for the lyard. Tall, green steppe-grass grew in the place where formerly had been the yard. There was not a living being near the hut, except a pig that lay in the mud in front of the threshold, and squealed.
Nekhlyudov knocked at the broken window; but, as nobody answered him, he walked up to the vestibule and shouted : " Ho there ! " Nobody replied. He walked through the vestibule, looked into the empty stalls, and walked through the open door into the hut.
An old red cock and two hens promenaded over the floor and benches, jerking their crops, and clattering with their claws. When they saw a man, they fluttered with wide-spread wings against the walls with a clucking of despair, and one of them flew upon the oven.
The eighteen-foot hut was all occupied by the oven with a broken pipe, a weaver's loom which had not been removed in spite of summer, and a begrimed table with a warped and cracked board. Though it was dry without, there was a dirty puddle near the threshold which had been formed at a previous rain by a leak in the ceiling and roof. There were no beds. It was hard to believe that this was an inhabited place, there was such a decided aspect of neglect and disorder, both inside and outside the hut ; and yet Davydka the White lived in it with his whole family. At that particular moment, in spite of the heat of the June day, Davydka lay, his head wrapped in a sheepskin half-coat, on the corner of the oven, fast asleep. The frightened hen, which had alighted on the oven and had not yet calmed down, was walking over Davydka's back, without waking him.
Not finding any one in the hut, Nekhlyudov was on the point of leaving, when a protracted, humid sigh betrayed the peasant.
" Oh, who is there ? " cried the master.
On the oven was heard another protracted sigh.
" Who is there ? Come here ! "
Another sigh, a growl, and a loud yawn were the answer to the master's call.
" Well, will you come ? "
Something stirred on the oven. There appeared the flap of a worn-out sheepskin ; a big foot in a torn bast shoe came down, then another, and finally the whole form of Davydka the White sat up on the oven, and lazily and discontentedly rubbed his eyes with his large fist. He slowly bent his head, yawned, gazed at the hut, and, when he espied the master, began to turn around a little faster than before, but still so leisurely that Nekhlyudov had sufficient time to pace three times the distance from the puddle to the loom, before Davydka got off the oven.
Davydka the White was actually white ; his hair, his body, and face, — everything was exceedingly white. He was tall and very stout, that is, stout like a peasant, with his whole body, and not merely with his belly ; but it was a flabby, unhealthy obesity. His fairly handsome face, with its dark blue, calm eyes and broad, long beard, bore the imprint of infirmity. There was neither tan nor ruddiness in his face ; it was of a pale, sallow complexion, with a light violet shade under his eyes, and looked suffused with fat, and swollen. His hands were swollen and sallow, like those of people who suffer with the dropsy, and were covered with fine white hair. He was so sleepy that he could not open his eyes wide, nor stand still, without tottering and yawning.
" Are you not ashamed," began Nekhlyiidov, " to sleep in bright daylight, when you ought to build a yard, and when you have no grain ? "
As soon as Davydka came to his senses, and began to understand that the master was standing before him, he folded his hands over his abdomen, lowered his head, turning it a little to one side, and did not stir a limb. He was silent ; but the expression of his face and the attitude of his whole form said, " I know, I know, it is not the first time I hear that. Beat me if you must, — I will bear it."
It looked as though he wanted the master to stop talking and to start beating him at once ; to strike him hard on his cheeks, but to leave him in peace as soon as possible.
When Nekhlyudov noticed that Davydka did not understand him, he tried with various questions to rouse the peasant from his servile and patient silence.
" Why did you ask me for timber when you have had some lying here for a month, and that, too, when you have most time your own, eh ? "
Davydka kept stubborn silence, and did not stir.
" Well, answer ! "
Davydka muttered something, and blinked with his white eyelashes.
" But you must work, my dear : what will happen without work ? Now, you have no grain, and why ? Because your land is badly plowed, and has not been harrowed, and was sowed in too late, — all on account of laziness. You ask me for grain : suppose I give it to you, because you must not starve ! It will not do to act in this way. Whose grain am I giving you ? What do you think, whose ? Answer me : whose grain am I giving you ? " Nekhlyudov stubbornly repeated his question.
" The manorial," mumbled Davydka, timidly and ques- tioningly raising his eyes.
" And where does the manorial grain come from ? Think of it : who has plowed the field ? Who has harrowed it ? Who has sowed it in, and garnered it ? The peasants ? Is it not so ? So you see, if I am to give the manorial grain to the peasants, I ought to give more to those who have worked more for it ; but you have worked less, and they complain of you at the manor ; you have worked less, and you ask more. Why should I give to you, and not to others ? If all were lying on their sides and sleeping, as you are doing, we should all have starved long ago. We must work, my friend, but this is bad, — do you hear, Davyd ? "
" I hear, sir," he slowly muttered through his teeth.