18 - One Autumn Night, Maxim Gorky.

18 - One Autumn Night, Maxim Gorky.  
In this collection of Russian stories, editor and compiler Thomas Seltzer selects from a range of the best examples of 19th and early 20th century Russian literature. As a survey of famous authors at the height of the powers, as well as some writers who have been unjustly neglected, this anthology is indispensable.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Chapter eighteen of Best Russian Short Stories. This is a
LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain.
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o r G recording by Mark Penfold. Best Russian Short Stories,

(00:21):
edited and compiled by Thomas Seltzer. One Autumn Night by
Maxim Gorky. Once in the autumn, I happened to be
in a very unpleasant and inconvenient position in the town
where I had just arrived, and where I knew not
a soul. I found myself without a farthing in my

(00:42):
pocket and without a night's lodging, Having sold during the
first few days every part of my costume, without which
it was still possible to go about, I passed from
the town into the quarter called Yiste, where were the
steamship wharves, a quarter which during the navigation season fermented
with boisterous, laborious life, but now was silent and deserted.

(01:04):
For we were in the last days of October, dragging
my feet along the moist sand and obstinately scrutinizing it
with a desire to discover in it any sort of
fragment of food. I wandered alone among the deserted buildings
and warehouses, and thought, how good it would be to
get a full meal. In our present state of culture,

(01:24):
hunger of the mind is more quickly satisfied than hunger
of the body. You wander about the streets, you are
surrounded by buildings not bad looking from the outside, and
you may safely say it not so badly furnished inside,
And the sight of them may excite within you stimulating
ideas about architecture, hygiene, and many other wise and high

(01:45):
flying subjects. You may meet warmly and neatly dressed folks,
all very polite and turning away from you tactfully, not
wishing offensively to notice the lamentable fact of your existence. Well, well,
the mind of a hungry man is always better nourished
and healthier than the mind of the well fed man.
And there you have a situation from which you may

(02:06):
draw a very ingenious conclusion in favor of the ill fed.
The evening was approaching, the rain was falling, and the
wind blew violently from the north. It whistled in the
empty booths and shops, blew into the plastered window panes
of the taverns, and whipped into foam. The wavelets of
the river, which splashed noisily on the sandy shore, casting

(02:27):
high their white crests, racing one after another into the
dim distance and leaping impetuously over one another's shoulders. It
seemed as if the river felt the proximity of winter
and was running at random away from the fetters of
ice which the north wind might well have flung upon her.
That very night, the sky was heavy and dark. Down
from it swept incessantly, scarcely visible drops of rain, and

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the melancholy elegy in nature all around me was emphasized
by a couple of battered and misshapen willow trees, and
a boat bottom upwards that was fast and to their roots,
the overturned canoe with its battered keel, and the miserable
old trees rifled by the cold wind. Everything around me
was bankrupt, barren and dead, and the sky flowed with

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undryable tears. Everything around was waste and gloomy. It seemed
as if everything were dead, leaving me alone among the living,
and for me also a cold death waited. I was
then eighteen years old. A good time I walked and
walked along the cold wet sand, making my chattering teeth
warble in honor of cold and hunger. When suddenly, as

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I was carefully searching for something to eat behind one
of the empty crates, I perceived behind it, crouching on
the ground, a figure in woman's clothes, dank with the rain,
and clinging fast to her stooping shoulders. Standing over her,
I watched to see what she was doing. It appeared
that she was digging a trench in the sand with
her hands, digging away under one of the crates. Why

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are you doing that, I asked, crouching down on my heels,
quite close to her. She gave a little scream and
was quickly on her legs again. Now that she stood
there staring at me with her wide open gray eyes
full of terror, I perceived that it was a girl
of my own age, with a very pleasant face, embellished,
unfortunately by three large blue marks. This spoiled her. Although

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these blue marks had been distributed with a remarkable sense
of proportion, one at a time, and all were of
equal size, two under the eyes and one a little
bigger on the forehead, just over the bridge of the nose,
this symmetry was evidently the work of an artist well
inured to the business of spoiling the human physiognomy. The
girl looked at me, and the terror in her eyes

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gradually died out. She shook the sand from her hands,
adjusted her cotton head gear, cowered down, and said, I
suppose you two want something to eat. Dig away, then
my hands are tired. Over there. She nodded her head
in the direction of a booth. There is bread for certain,
and sausages too. That booth is still carrying on business.

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I began to dig. She, after waiting a little and
looking at me, sat down beside me and began to
help me. We worked in silence. I cannot say now
whether I thought at that moment of the criminal code,
of morality, of proprietorship, and all the other things about which,
in the opinion of many experienced persons, one ought to
think every moment of one's life, wishing to keep as

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close to the truth as possible. I must confess that
apparently I was so deeply engaged in digging under the
crate that I completely forgot about everything else except this
one thing. What could be inside that crate? The evening
drew on the gray, moldy, cold fog grew thicker and
thicker around us. The waves roared with a hollower sound
than before, and the rain pattered down on the boards

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of that crate more loudly and more frequently. Somewhere or other,
the night watchman began springing his rattle. Has it got
a bottom or not? Softly, inquired my assistant. I did
not understand what she was talking about, and I kept silence.
I say, has the crate got a bottom? If it has,
we shall try in vain to break into it. Here

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we are digging a trench, and we may, after all
come upon nothing but solid boards. How should we take
them off? Better? Smash the lock? It is a wretched lock.
Good ideas rarely visit the heads of women, but as
you see, they do visit them sometimes. I have always
valued good ideas and have always tried to utilize them
as far as possible. Having found the lock, I tugged

(06:26):
at it and wrenched off the whole thing. My accomplice
immediately stooped down and riggled like a serpent into the gaping, open,
four cornered cover of the crate. Whence, she called to
me approvingly, in a low tone, you're a brick. Nowadays,
a little crumb of praise from a woman is dearer
to me than a whole diffy ram from a man,
even though he be more eloquent than all the ancient
and modern orators. But together, then, however, I was less

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amiably disposed than I am now, And paying no attention
to the compliment of my comrade, I asked her curtly
and anxiously, is there anything? In a monotonous tone, she
set about calculating our discoveries. A basketful of bottles, thick furs,
a sunshade, an iron pale. All this was uneatable. I

(07:10):
felt that my hopes had vanished. But suddenly she exclaimed, vivaciously, Aha,
here it is what bread? A loaf? It's only wet.
Take it. A loaf flew to my feet, and after
it herself. My valiant comrade, I had already bitten off
a morsel, stuffed it in my mouth, and was chewing it.
Come give me some two, and we mustn't stay here.

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Where shall we go? She looked inquiringly about. On all
sides it was dark, wet, and boisterous. Look, there's an
upset canoe yonder. Let us go there, Let us go. Then,
and off we set, demolishing our booty as we went,
and filling our mouths with large portions of it. The
rain grew more violent, the river roared from somewhere or

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other resounded a prolonged mocking whistle, just as if someone
great who feared no buddy, was whistling down all earthly institutions,
and along with them this horrid autumnal wind and us
its heroes. This whistling made my heart throb painfully, in
spite of which I greedily went on eating. And in
this respect, the girl walking on my left hand kept

(08:15):
even pace with me. What do they call you? I
asked her? Why I know? Not Natasha, she answered, shortly,
munching loudly. I stared at her. My heart ached within me,
and then I stared into the mist before me, and
it seemed to me as if the inimical countenance of
my destiny was smiling at me enigmatically and coldly. The

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rain scourged the timbers of the skiff incessantly, and its
soft patter induced melancholy thoughts, and the wind whistled as
it flew down into the boat's battered bottom through a
rift where some loose splinters of wood were rattling together
a disquieting and depressing sound. The waves of the river
were splashing on the shore and sounded so monotonous and hopeless,

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just as if they were telling something unbearably dull and heavy,
which was boring them into utter disgust, something from which
they wanted to run away, and yet were obliged to
talk about all the same. The sound of the rain
blended with their splashing, and a long, drawn sigh seemed
to be floating above the overturned skiff, the endless, laboring

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sigh of the earth, injured and exhausted by the eternal
changes from the bright and warm summer to the cold,
misty and damp autumn. The wind blew continually over the
desolate shore, and the foaming river blew and sang its
melancholy songs. Our position beneath the shelter of the skiff
was utterly devoid of comfort. It was narrow and damp.

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Tiny cold drops of rain dribbled through the damaged bottom.
Gusts of wind penetrated it. We sat in silence and
shivered with cold. I remembered that I wanted to go
to sleep. Natasha leaned her back against the whole of
the boat and curled herself up into a t any ball,
embracing her knees with her hands and resting her chin

(10:04):
upon them. She stared doggedly at the river with wide
open eyes. On the pale patch of her face. They
seemed immense because of the blue marks below them. She
never moved, and this immobility, in silence, I felt it
gradually produced within me a terror of my neighbor. I
wanted to talk to her, but I knew not how

(10:24):
to begin. It was she herself who spoke, What a
cursed thing life is, she exclaimed, plainly, abstractly, and in
a tone of deep conviction. But this was no complaint
in these words. There was too much of indifference for
a complaint. This simple soul thought, according to her understanding, thought,
and proceeded to form a certain conclusion, which she expressed aloud,

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and which I could not confute for fear of contradicting myself.
Therefore I was silent, and she, as if she had
not noticed me, continued to sit there, immovable, even if
we crouched what Then Natasha began again, this time quietly
and reflectively, and still there was not one note of
complaint in her words. It was plain that this person,

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in the course of her reflections on life, was regarding
her own case and had arrived at the conviction that,
in order to preserve herself from the mockeries of life,
she was not in a position to do anything else
but simply croak to use her own expression. The clearness
of this line of thought was inexpressibly sad and painful
to me, and I felt that if I kept silence

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any longer, I was really bound to weep, and it
would have been shameful to have done this before a woman,
especially as she was not weeping herself. I resolved to
speak to her. Who was it that knocked you about?
I asked. For the moment, I could not think of
anything more sensible or more delicate. Pashka did it all,

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she answered, in a dull and level tone. And who
is he? My lover? He was a baker? Did he
beat you often whenever he was drunk? He beat me often?
And suddenly turning towards me, she began to talk about herself,
Pashka and their mutual relations. He was a baker with

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red mustaches and played very well on the banjo. He
came to see her and greatly pleased her, for he
was a merry chap and wore nice, clean clothes. He
had a vest which cost fifteen roubles, and boots with
dress tops. For these reasons she had fallen in love
with him, and he became her creditor. And when he
became her creditor, he made it his business to take

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away from her the money which her other friends gave
to her for bon bonds, and getting drunk on this money,
he would fall to beating her. But that would have
been nothing if he hadn't also begun to run after
other girls before her very eyes. Now, wasn't that an insult?
I am not worse than the others. Of course, that
meant that he was laughing at me the Blackguard. The

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day before yesterday, I asked leave of my mistress to
go out for a bit. Went to him, and there
I found Dimka sitting beside him drunk, and he too
was half seas over. I said, you scoundrel, you, and
he gave me a thorough hiding. He kicked me and
dragged me by the hair. But that was nothing to
what came after. He spoiled everything I had on left

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me just as I am? Now? How could I appear
before my mistress? He spoiled everything, my dress and my
jacket too, It was quite a new one. I gave
a fiver for it, and tore my kerchief from my hand.
Oh Lord, what will become of me now? She suddenly
whined in a lamentable, overstrained voice. The wind howled and

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became ever colder and more boisterous. Again. My teeth began
to dance up and down, and she huddled up to
avoid the cold, pressed as closely to me as she could,
so that I could see the gleam of her eyes
through the darkness. What wretches all you men are? I'd
burn you all in an oven. I'd cut you in pieces.
If any one of you was dying, I'd spit in

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his mouth and not pity him a bit. Mean skunks,
you wheedle and wheedle, you wag your tails like cringing dogs,
and we fools give ourselves up to you, and it's
all up with us. Immediately you trample us under foot,
miserable loafers. She cursed us up and down, but there
was no vigor, no malice, no hatred of these miserable

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loafers in her cursing that I could hear the tone
of her language by no means corresponded with its subject matter,
for it was calm enough, and the gamut of her
voice was terribly poor. Yet all this made a stronger
impression on me than the most eloquent and convincing pessimistic
books and speeches of which I had read a good many,
and which I still read to this day. And this,

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you see, was because the agony of a dying person
is much more natural and violent than the most minute
and picturesque descriptions of death. I felt really wretched, more
from cold than from the words of my neighbor. I
groaned softly and ground my teeth. Almost at the same moment,
I felt two little arms about me. One of them
touched my neck, and the other lay upon my face.

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And at the same time, an anxious, gentle, friendly voice
uttered the question, what ales you. I was ready to
believe that some one else was asking me this, and
not Natasha, who had just declared that all men were
scoundrels and expressed a wish for their destruction. But she
it was, and now she began speaking quickly, hurriedly, what

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ails you? Eh? Are you cold? Are you frozen? Ah?
What a one? You are? Sitting there so silent like
a little owl. Why you should have told me long
ago that you were cold. Come lie on the ground,
stretch yourself out, and I will lie there. How's that? Now?
Put your arms round me tighter? How's that? You shall
be warm very soon now? And then will lie back

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to back. The night will pass so quickly, See if
it won't, I say, have you two been drinking? Turned
out of your place? Eh? It doesn't matter? And she
comforted me, she encouraged me. May I be throt vice accursed?
What a world of irony was in this single fact
for me? Just imagine, here was I seriously occupied at
this very time with a destiny of humanity, thinking of

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the reorganization of the social system, of political revolutions, reading
all sorts of devilishly wise books whose abysmal profundity was
certainly unfathomable by their very authors. At this very time,
I say, I was trying with all my might to
make of myself a potent, active social force. It even
seemed to me that I had partially accomplished my object. Anyhow,

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at this time in my ideas about myself. I had
got so far as to recognize that I had an
exclusive right to exist, that I had the necessary greatness
to deserve to live my life, and that I was
fully competent to play a great historical part therein. And
a woman was now worming me with her body, a wretched, battered,
hunted creature who had no place and no value in life,

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and whom I had never thought of helping till she
helped me herself, and whom I really would not have
known how to help in any way, even if the
thought of it had occurred to me. Ah, I was
ready to think that this was all happening to me
in a dream, in a disagreeable and oppressive dream. But ugh,
it was impossible for me to think that, For cold
drops of rain were dripping down upon me, the woman

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was pressing close to me, Her warm breath was fanning
my face, and despite a slight odor of vodka, it
did me good. The wind howled and raged, the rains
smote upon the skiff, the waves splashed, and both of us,
embracing each other convulsively, nevertheless shivered with cold. All this
was only too real, And I am certain that nobody
ever dreamed such an oppressive and horrid dream as that reality.

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But Natasha was talking all the time of something or other,
talking kindly and sympathetically as only women can talk. Beneath
the influence of her voice and kindly words, a little
fire began to burn up within me, and something inside
my heart thawed in consequence. Then tears poured from my
eyes like a hailstorm, washing away from my heart much
that was evil, much that was stupid, much sorrow and

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dirt which had fastened upon it before that night. Natasha
comforted me, Come, come, that will do, little one, don't
take on that'll do. God will give you another chance.
You will right yourself and stand in your proper place again,
and it will be all right. And she kept kissing me.
Many kisses did she give me, burning kisses, and all

(18:19):
for nothing. Those were the first kisses from a woman
that had ever been bestowed upon me, and they were
the best kisses too, For all the subsequent kisses cost
me frightfully, dear, and really gave me nothing at all
in exchange. Come, don't take on so funny one. I'll
manage for you tomorrow. If you cannot find a place
her quiet, pervasive whispering sounded in my ears as if

(18:41):
it came through a dream. There we lay till dawn,
and when the dawn came, we crept from behind the
skiff and went into the town. Then we took friendly
leave of each other, and never met again, although for
half a year I searched in every hole and corner
for that kind Natasha with whom I spent the autumn
night just described. If she be already dead and well

(19:03):
for her. If it were so, may she rest in peace.
And if she be alive still, I say peace to
her soul. And may the consciousness of her fall never
enter her soul, for that would be a superfluous and
fruitless suffering if life is to be lived. The End
of One Autumn Night by Maxim Gorky, recording by Mark Penfold, Lincoln, Nebraska,