Yama (The Pit) Part 19

Having received the money and counted it over painstakingly, Horizon had the brazenness to extend his hand in addition, and to shake the hand of the sub-lieutenant, who did not dare to lift up his eyes to him; and, having left him on the platform, went back into the pa.s.sageway of the car, as though nothing had happened.

This was an unusually communicative man. On the way to his COUPE he came to a stop before a beautiful little girl of three years, with whom he had for some time been flirting at a distance and making all sorts of funny grimaces at. He squatted down on his heels before her, began to imitate a nanny goat for her, and questioned her in a lisping voice:

"May I athk where the young lady ith going? OI, OI, OI! Thuch a big girl! Travelling alone, without mamma? Bought a ticket all by herthelf and travelth alone! AI! What a howwid girl! And where ith the girl'th mamma?" At this moment a tall, handsome, self-a.s.sured woman appeared from the COUPE and said calmly:

"Get away from the child. What a despicable thing to annoy strange children!"

Horizon jumped up on his feet and began to bustle:

"Madam! I could not restrain myself ... Such a wonderful, such a magnificent and swell child! A regular cupid! You must understand, madam, I am a father myself--I have children of my own ... I could not restrain myself from delight! ..."

But the lady turned her back upon him, took the girl by the hand and went with her into the COUPE, leaving Horizon shuffling his feet and muttering his compliments and apologies.

Several times during the twenty-four hours Horizon would go into the third cla.s.s, of two cars, separated from each other by almost the entire train. In one care were sitting three handsome women, in the society of a black-bearded, taciturn, morose man. Horizon and he would exchange strange phrases in some special jargon. The women looked at him uneasily, as though wishing, yet not daring, to ask him about something. Only once, toward noon, did one of them allow herself to utter:

"Then that's the truth? That which you said about the place? ... You understand--I'm somewhat uneasy at heart!"

"Ah, what do you mean, Margarita Ivanovna? If I said it, then it's right, just like by the National Bank. Listen, Lazer," he turned to him of the beard. "There will be a station right away. Buy the girls all sorts of sandwiches, whichever they may desire. The train stops here for twenty-five minutes."

"I'd like to have bouillon," hesitatingly uttered a little blonde, with hair like ripened rye, and with eyes like corn-flowers.

"My dear Bella, anything you please! At the station I'll go and see that they bring you bouillon with meat and even stuffed dumplings.

Don't you trouble yourself, Lazer, I'll do all that myself."

In another car he had a whole nursery garden of women, twelve or fifteen people, under the leadership of an old, stout woman, with enormous, awesome, black eyebrows. She spoke in a ba.s.s, while her fat chins, b.r.e.a.s.t.s, and stomachs swayed under a broad morning dress in time to the shaking of the car, just like apple jelly. Neither the old woman nor the young women left the least doubts as to their profession.

The women were lolling on the benches, smoking, playing cards--at "sixty-six,"--drinking beer. Frequently the male public of the car provoked them, and they swore back in unceremonious language, in hoa.r.s.e voices. The young people treated them with wine and cigarettes.

Horizon was here altogether unrecognizable; he was majestically negligent and condescendingly jocose. On the other hand, cringing ingratiation sounded in every word addressed to him by his female clients. But he, having looked over all of them--this strange mixture of Roumanians, Jewesses, Poles and Russians--and having a.s.sured himself that all was in order, gave orders about the sandwiches and majestically withdrew. At these moments he very much resembled a drover, who is transporting by railroad cattle for slaughter, and at a station drops in to look it over and to feed it. After that he would return to his COUPE and again begin to toy with his wife, and Hebrew anecdotes just poured from his mouth.

At the long stops he would go out to the buffet only to see about his lady clients. But he himself said to his neighbours:

"You know, it's all the same to me if it's TREIF or KOSHER. I don't recognize any difference. But what can I do with my stomach! The devil knows what stuff they'll feed you sometimes at these stations. You'll pay some three or four roubles, and then you'll spend a hundred roubles on the doctors curing yourself. But maybe you, now, Sarochka"--he would turn to his wife--"maybe you'll get off at the station to eat something? Or shall I send it up to you here?"

Sarochka, happy over his attention, would turn red, beam upon him with grateful eyes, and refuse.

"You're very kind, Senya, only I don't want to. I'm full."

Then Horizon would reach out of a travelling hamper a chicken, boiled meat, cuc.u.mbers, and a bottle of Palestine wine; have a snack, without hurrying, with appet.i.te; regale his wife, who ate very genteelly, sticking out the little fingers of her magnificent white hands; then painstakingly wrap up the remnants in paper and, without hurrying, lay them away accurately in the hamper.

In the distance, far ahead of the locomotive, the cupolas and belfries were already beginning to sparkle with fires of gold. Through the COUPE pa.s.sed the conductor and made some imperceptible sign to Horizon. He immediately followed the conductor out to the platform.

"The inspector will pa.s.s through right away," said the conductor, "so you'll please be so kind as to stand for a while here on the platform of the third cla.s.s with your spouse."

"NU, NU, NU!" concurred Horizon.

"And the money as agreed, if you please."

"How much is coming to you, then?"

"Well, just as we agreed; half the extra charge, two roubles eighty kopecks."

"What?" Horizon suddenly boiled over. "Two roubles eighty kopecks? You think you got it a crazy one in me, what? Here's a rouble for you and thank G.o.d for that!"

"Pardon me, sir. This is even absurd--didn't you and I agree?"

"Agree, agree! ... Here's a half more, and not a thing besides. What impudence! I'll tell the inspector yet that you carry people without tickets. Don't you think it, brother--you ain't found one of that sort here!"

The conductor's eyes suddenly widened, became blood-shot.

"O-oh! You sheeny!" he began to roar. "I ought to take a skunk like you and under the train with you!"

But Horizon at once flew at him like a c.o.c.k.

"What? Under the train? But do you know what's done for words like that? A threat by action! Here, I'll go right away and will yell 'help!' and will turn the signal handle," and he seized the door-k.n.o.b with such an air of resolution that the conductor just made a gesture of despair with his hand and spat.

"May you choke with my money, you mangy sheeny!"

Horizon called his wife out of the COUPE:

"Sarochka! Let's go out on the platform for a look; one can see better there. Well, it's so beautiful--just like on a picture!"

Sarah obediently went after him, holding up with an unskilled hand the new dress, in all probability put on for the first time, bending out and as though afraid of touching the door or the wall.

In the distance, in the rosy gala haze of the evening glow, shone the golden cupolas and crosses. High up on the hill the white, graceful churches seemed to float in this flowery, magic mirage. Curly woods and coppices had run down from above and had pushed on over the very ravine. And the sheer, white precipice which bathed its foot in the blue river, was all furrowed over with occasional young woods, just like green little veins and warts. Beautiful as in a fairy tale, the ancient town appeared as though it were itself coming to meet the train.

When the train stopped, Horizon ordered three porters to carry the things into the first cla.s.s, and told his wife to follow him. But he himself lingered at the exit in order to let through both his parties.

To the old woman looking after the dozen women he threw briefly in pa.s.sing:

"So remember, madam Berman! Hotel America, Ivanukovskaya, twenty-two!"

While to the black-bearded man he said:

"Don't forget, Lazer, to feed the girls at dinner and to bring them somewhere to a movie show. About eleven o'clock at night wait for me.

I'll come for a talk. But if some one will be calling for me extra, then you know my address--The Hermitage. Ring me up. But if I'm not there for some reason, then run into Reiman's cafe, or opposite, into the Hebrew dining room. I'll be eating GEFILTEH FISCH there. Well, a lucky journey!"

CHAPTER III.

All the stories of Horizon about his commercial travelling were simply brazen and glib lying. All the samples of drapers' goods, suspenders gloire and b.u.t.tons helios, the artificial teeth and insertible eyes, served only as a shield, screening his real activity--to wit, the traffic in the body of woman. True, at one time, some ten years ago, he had travelled over Russia as the representative for the dubious wines of some unknown firm; and this activity had imparted to his tongue that free-and-easy unconstraint for which, in general, travelling salesmen are distinguished. This former activity had, as well, brought him up against his real profession. In some way, while going to Rostov-on-the-Don, he had contrived to make a very young sempstress fall in love with him. This girl had not as yet succeeded in getting on the official lists of the police, but upon love and her body she looked without any lofty prejudices. Horizon, at that time altogether a green youth, amorous and light-minded, dragged the sempstress after him on his wanderings, full of adventures and unexpected things. After half a year she palled upon him dreadfully. She, just like a heavy burden, like a millstone, hung around the neck of this man of energy, motion and aggressiveness. In addition to that, there were the eternal scenes of jealousy, mistrust, the constant control and tears ... the inevitable consequences of long living together ... Then he began little by little to beat his mate. At the first time she was amazed, but from the second time quieted down, became tractable. It is known, that "women of love" never know a mean in love relations. They are either hysterical liars, deceivers, dissemblers, with a coolly-perverted mind and a sinuous dark soul; or else unboundedly self-denying, blindly devoted, foolish, naive animals, who know no bounds either in concessions or loss of self-esteem. The sempstress belonged to the second category, and Horizon was soon successful, without great effort, in persuading her to go out on the street to traffic in herself. And from that very evening, when his mistress submitted to him and brought home the first five roubles earned, Horizon experienced an unbounded loathing toward her. It is remarkable, that no matter how many women Horizon met after this--and several hundred of them had pa.s.sed through his hands--this feeling of loathing and masculine contempt toward them would never forsake him. He derided the poor woman in every way, and tortured her morally, seeking out the most painful spots. She would only keep silent, sigh, weep, and getting down on her knees before him, kiss his hands. And this wordless submission irritated Horizon still more. He drove her away from him.

She would not go away. He would push her out into the street; but she, after an hour or two, would come back shivering from cold, in a soaked hat, in the turned-up brims of which the rain-water splashed as in waterspouts. Finally, some shady friend gave Simon Yakovlevich the harsh and crafty counsel which laid a mark on all the rest of his life activity--to sell his mistress into a brothel. To tell the truth, in going into this enterprise, Horizon almost disbelieved at soul in its success. But contrary to his expectation, the business could not have adjusted itself better. The proprietress of an establishment (this was in Kharkov) willingly met his proposition half-way. She had known long and well Simon Yakovlevich, who played amusingly on the piano, danced splendidly, and set the whole drawing room laughing with his pranks; but chiefly, could, with unusually unabashed dexterity, make any carousing party "sh.e.l.l out the coin." It only remained to convince the mate of his life, and this proved the most difficult of all. She did not want to detach herself from her beloved for anything; threatened suicide, swore that she would burn his eyes out with sulphuric acid, promised to go and complain to the chief of police--and she really did know a few dirty little transactions of Simon Yakovlevich's that smacked of capital punishment. Thereupon Horizon changed his tactics.

He suddenly became a tender, attentive friend, an indefatigable lover.

Then suddenly he fell into black melancholy. The uneasy questionings of the woman he let pa.s.s in silence; at first let drop a word as though by chance; hinted in pa.s.sing at some mistake of his life; and then began to lie desperately and with inspiration. He said that the police were watching him; that he could not get by the jail, and, perhaps, even hard labour and the gallows; that it was necessary for him to disappear abroad for several months. But mainly, what he persisted in especially strongly, was some tremendous fantastic business, in which he stood to make several hundred thousands of roubles. The sempstress believed and became alarmed with that disinterested, womanly, almost holy alarm, in which, with every woman, there is so much of something maternal. It was not at all difficult now to convince her that for Horizon to travel together with her presented a great danger for him; and that it would be better for her to remain here and to bide the time until the affairs of her lover would adjust themselves fortuitously. After that to talk her into hiding, as in the most trustworthy retreat, in a brothel, where she would be in full safety from the police and the detectives, was a mere nothing. One morning Horizon ordered her to dress a little better, curl her hair, powder herself, put a little rouge on her cheeks, and carried her off to a den, to his acquaintance. The girl made a favourable impression there, and that same day her pa.s.sport was changed by the police to a so-called yellow ticket. Having parted with her, after long embraces and tears, Horizon went into the room of the proprietress and received his payment, fifty roubles (although he had asked for two hundred). But he did not grieve especially over the low price; the main thing was, that he had found his calling at last, all by himself, and had laid the cornerstone of his future welfare.

Of course, the woman sold by him just remained forever so in the tenacious hands of the brothel. Horizon forgot her so thoroughly that after only a year he could not even recall her face. But who knows ...

perhaps he merely pretended?