THIS is what generally follows a grand loss at cards
or a drinking-bout, when his indigestion begins to
make itself felt. Stepan Jilin wakes up in an
uncommonly gloomy frame of mind. He looks sour, ruffled, and peevish, and his grey face wears an expression partly discontented, partly offended, and partly sneering. He dresses deliberately, slowly drinks his vichy water, and begins roaming about the house.
"I wish to goodness I knew what br—rute goes through
here leaving all the doors open ! " he growls angrily, wrapping his dressing-gown about him and noisily clearing his throat. "Take this paper away ! What is it lying here for? Though we keep twenty servants, this house is more untidy than a hovel ! Who rang the bell.? Who's there.?"
"Aunty Anfisa, who nursed our Fedia," answers his wife.
"Yes, loafing about, eating the bread of idleness!"
"I don't understand you, Stepan; you invited her
here yourself and now you are abusing her !"
"I'm not abusing her. I'm talking ! And you ought
to find something to do, too, good woman, instead of
sitting there with your hands folded, picking quarrels
with your husband ! I don't understand a woman like
you, upon my word I don't ! How can you let day
after day go by without working ? Here's your husband
toiling and moiling like an ox, like a beast of burden, and there you are, his wife, his life's companion, sitting about like a doll without ever turning your hand to a thing, so bored that you must seize every opportunity of quarrelling with him. It's high time for you to drop those schoolgirlish airs, madam ! You're not a child nor a young miss any longer. You're a woman, a mother ! You turn away, eh? Aha ! You don't like disagreeable truths, do you?"
"It's odd you only speak disagreeable truths when
you have indigestion ! "
"That's right, let's have a scene; go ahead !"
"Did you go to town yesterday or did you play
cards somewhere?"
"Well, and what if I did? Whose business is it? Am I accountable to any one ? Don't I lose my own money ? All that I spend and all that is spent in this house is mine, do you hear that? Mine!"
And so he persists in the same strain. But Jilin is
never so crotchety, so stern, so bristling with virtue
and justice, as he is when sitting at dinner with his
household gathered about him. It generally begins
with the soup. Having swallowed his first spoonful, Jilin suddenly scowls and stops eating.
"What the devil—" he mutters. "So I'll have to
go to the cafe for lunch—"
"What is it?" asks his anxious wife. "Isn't the soup good?"
"I can't conceive the swinish tastes a person must
have to swallow this mess ! It is too salty, it smells of
rags, it is flavoured with bugs and not onions ! Anfisa
Pavlovna!" he cries to his guest. "It is shocking! I
give them oceans of money every day to buy food
with, I deny myself everything, and this is what they
give me to eat ! No doubt they would like me to
retire from business into the kitchen and do the cooking myself!"
"The soup is good to-day," the governess timidly
ventures.
"Is it? Do you find it so?" inquires Jilin scowling
angrily at her. "Every one to his taste, but I must
confess that yours and mine differ widely, Varvara
Vasilievna. You, for instance, admire the behavior
of that child there (Jilin points a tragic forefinger at
his son). You are in ecstasies over him, but I—I am
shocked! Yes, I am!"
Fedia, a boy of seven with a delicate, pale face, stops eating and lowers his eyes. His cheeks grow paler than ever.
"Yes, you are in ecstasies, and I am shocked. I
don't know which of us is right, but I venture to think
that I, as his father, know my own son better than
you do. Look at the way he is sitting ! Is that how
well-behaved children should hold themselves? Sit up!"
Fedia raises his chin and sticks out his neck and
thinks he is sitting up straighter. His eyes are filling
with tears.
"Eat your dinner ! Hold your spoon properly ! Don't dare to snuffle! Look me in the face!"
Fedia tries to look at him, but his lips are
quivering and the tears are trickling down his cheeks.
"Aha, so you're crying? You're naughty and that
makes you cry, eh? Leave the table and go and
stand in the corner, puppy ! "
"But—do let him finish his dinner first!" his wife
intercedes for the boy.