September 2, 2025 • 41 mins
Step into the mesmerizing world crafted by world-renowned Russian author Ivan Turgenev, as he presents a captivating collection of stories that delve into dreams, lost love, fleeting specters, and ominous premonitions. This anthology also features a selection of sketches and prose poems, all penned in Turgenevs deceptively simple but profoundly articulate style. These aren‚t your typical tales of romance and nature; instead, Turgenev intertwines a thread of cynicism and melancholy that enriches his poetic language, inviting readers to explore the deeper complexities of the human experience. (Summary by Ben Tucker)
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Section five of dream Tales and Prose Poems by Ivan Turgenev.
This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Read by
Ben Tucker the Dream. I was living at that time
with my mother in a little sea side town. I
was in my seventeenth year, while my mother was not
quite five and thirty. She had married very young. When
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my father died, I was only seven years old, but
I remember him well. My mother was a fair haired woman,
not very tall, with a charming but always sad looking face,
a soft, tired voice, and timid gestures. In her youth,
she had been reputed a beauty, and to the end
she remained attractive and pretty. I had never seen deeper,
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tenderer and sadder eyes, finer and softer hair. I never
saw hands so exquisite. I adored her, and she loved me.
But our life was not a bright one. A secret, hopeless,
undeserved sorrow seemed forever gnawing at the very root of
her being. The sorrow could not be accounted for by
the loss of my father, simply great as that loss
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was to her, passionately as my mother had loved him,
and devoutly as she had cherished his memory, no, something
more lay hidden in it, which I did not understand,
but of which I was aware, dimly and yet intensely
aware whenever I looked into those soft and unchanging eyes,
at those lips unchanging too, not compressed in bitterness, but
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as it were, forever set in one expression. I have
said that my mother loved me, but there were moments
when she repulsed me, when my presence was oppressive to her, unendurable.
At such times she felt a sort of involuntary aversion
for me, and was horrified afterwards, blamed herself with tears,
pressed me to her heart. I used to ascribe these
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momentary outbreaks of dislike to the derangement of her health,
to her unhappiness. These antagonistic feelings might, indeed, to some extent,
have been invoked by certain strange outbursts of wicked and
criminal passions which arose from time to time in me,
though I could not myself account for them. But these
evil outbursts were never coincident with the moments of aversion.
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My mother always wore black, as though in mourning we
were in fairly good circumstances, but we hardly knew any
one Two. My mother concentrated her every thought, her every
care upon me. Her life was wrapped up in my life.
That sort of relation between parents and children is not
always good for the children. It is rather apt to
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be harmful to them. Besides, I was my mother's only son,
and only children generally grow up in a one sided way.
In bringing them up, the parents think as much of
themselves as of them. That's not the right way. I
was neither spoiled nor made hard by it. One or
other is apt to be the fate of only children.
But my nerves were unhinged for a time. Moreover, I
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was rather delicate in health, taking after my mother, whom
I was very like in face. I avoided the companionship
of boys of my own age. I held aloof from
people altogether. Even with my mother, I talked very little.
I liked best reading solitary walks and dreaming. Dreaming what
my dreams were about, it would be hard to say. Sometimes, indeed,
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I seemed to stand at a half open door beyond
which lay unknown mysteries, to stand and wait, half dead
with emotion, and not to step over the threshold, but
still pondering what lay beyond, Still to wait till I
turned faint or fell asleep. If there had been a
vein of poetry in me, I should probably have taken
to writing verses. If I had felt an inclination for religion,
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I should perhaps have gone into a monastery. But I
had no tendency of the sort, and I went on
dreaming and waiting. Three. I have just mentioned that I
used sometimes to fall asleep under the influence of vague
dreams and reveries. I used to sleep a great deal
at all times, and dreams played an important part in
my life. I used to have dreams almost every night.
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I did not forget them. I attributed a significance to them,
regarded them as forewarnings, tried to divine their secret meaning.
Some of them were repeated from time to time, which
always struck me as strange and marvelous. I was particularly
perplexed by one dream. I dreamed. I was going along
a narrow, ill paved street of an old fashioned town,
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between stone houses of many stories with pointed roofs. I
was looking for my father, who was not dead, but
for some reason or other, hiding away from us and
living in one of these very houses. And so I
entered a low, dark gateway crossed a long courtyard, lumbered
up with planks and beams, and made my way at
last into a little room with two round windows. In
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the middle of the room stood my father in a
dressing gown, smoking a pipe. He was not in the
least like my real father. He was tall and thin,
with black hair, a hook nose, with sullen and piercing eyes.
He looked about forty. He was displeased at my having
found him, and I too, was far from being delighted
at our meeting, and stood still in perplexity. He turned
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a little away, began muttering something and walking up and
down with short steps. Then he gradually got farther away,
never ceasing his muttering and continually looking back over his shoulder.
The room grew larger and was lost in fog. I
felt all at once horrified at the idea that I
was losing my father again, and rushed after him. But
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I could no longer see him. I could only hear
his angry muttering, like a bear growling. My heart sank
with dread. I woke up and could not, for a
long while get to sleep again. All the following day
I pondered on this dream, and naturally could make nothing
of it. Four the month of June had come. The
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town in which I was living with my mother became
exceptionally lively. About that time, a number of ships were
in the harbor, a number of new faces were to
be seen in the streets. I liked at such times
to wander along the sea front by cafes and hotels,
to stare at the widely differing figures of the sailors
and other people sitting under linen awnings, at small white
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tables with pewter pots of beer before them. As I
passed one day before a cafe, I caught sight of
a man who at once riveted my whole attention. Dressed
in a long black full coat with a straw hat
pulled right down over his eyes, he was sitting perfectly still,
his arms folded across his chest. The straggling curls of
his black hair fell almost down to his nose, his
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thin lips held tight the mouthpiece of a short pipe.
This man struck me as so familiar. Every feature of
his swarthy yellow face were so unmistakably imprinted in my
memory that I could not help stopping short before him.
I could not help asking myself who is that man?
Where have I seen him? Becoming aware, probably of my
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intense stare, he raised his black piercing eyes upon me.
I uttered an involuntary ah. The man was the father
I had been looking for, the father I had beheld
in my dream. There was no possibility of mistake. The
resemblance was too striking. The very coat, even that wrapped
his spare limbs in its long skirts and hue and cut,
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recalled the dressing gown in which my father had appeared
in the dream. Am I not asleep now? I wondered? No.
It was daytime about me. Crowds of people were bustling,
the sun was shining brightly in the blue sky, and
before me was no phantom, but a living man. I
went up to an empty table, asked for a pot
of beer in a newspaper, and sat down not far
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off from this enigmatical being five. Putting the sheet of
newspaper on a level with my face, I continued my
scrutiny of the stranger. He scarcely stirred at all, only
from time to time, raising his bowed head. He was
obviously expecting some one. I gazed and gazed. Sometimes I
fancied I must have imagined it all. There could be
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really no resemblance that I had given away to a
half unconscious trick of the imagination. But the stranger would
suddenly turn round a little in his seat, or slightly
raise his hand, and again I all but cried out again.
I saw my dream father before me. He at last
noticed my uncalled for attention, and, glancing at first with
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surprise and then with annoyance in my direction, was on
the point of getting up and knocked down a small
walking stick he had stood against the table. I instantly
jumped up, picked it up, and handed it to him.
My heart was beating violently. He gave a constrained smile,
thanked me, and as his face drew closer to my face,
he lifted his eyebrows and opened his mouth a little,
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as though struck by something. You hurry, Very polite, young man,
he began, all at once, in a dry, incisive nasal voice.
That's something out of the common nowadays. Let me congratulate you. You
must have been well brought up. I don't remember precisely
what answer I made, but a conversation soon sprang up
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between us. I learned that he was a fellow countryman,
that he had not long returned from America, where he
had spent many years, and was shortly going back there.
He called himself Baron, the name I could not make
out distinctly. He, just like my dream father, ended every
remark with a sort of indistinct inward mutter. He desired
to learn my surname. On hearing it, he seemed again astonished,
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then asked me if I had lived long enough in
the town and with whom I was living. I told
him I was living with my mother and your father.
My father died long ago. He inquired my mother's Christian name,
and immediately gave an awkward laugh, but apologized, saying that
he picked up some American ways and was rather a
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queer fellow altogether. Then he was curious to know what
was our dress. I told him six. The excitement which
had possessed me at the beginning of our conversation gradually
calmed down. I felt our meeting rather strange, and nothing more.
I did not like the little smile with which the
Baron Cross examined me. I did not like the expression
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of his eyes when he as it were, stuck them
like pins, and to me there was something in them rapacious, patronizing.
Something unnerving those eyes I had not seen in the dream.
A strange face was the baron's, faded, fatigued, and at
the same time young looking, unpleasantly young looking. My dream
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father had not the deep scar either, which ran slanting
right across my new acquaintance's forehead, and which I had
not noticed till I came closer to him. I had
hardly told the baron the name of the street and
the number of the house in which we were living,
when a tall negro swathed to the eyebrows and a cloak,
came up to him from behind and softly tapped him
on the shoulder. The baron turned round, ejaculated, aha at least,
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and with a slight nod to me, went with the
negro into the cafe. I was left under the awning.
I meant to await the baron's return, not so much
with the object of entering into conversation with him again.
I really did not know what to talk about to him,
as to verify once more my first impression. But half
an hour passed, an hour passed, the baron did not appear.
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I went into the cafe, passed through all the rooms,
but could see nowhere the baron or the negro. They
must both have gone out by a back door. My
head ached a little, and to get a little fresh air,
I walked along the sea front to a large park
outside the town, which had been laid out two hundred
years ago. After strolling for a couple of hours in
the shade of the immense oaks and plane trees, I
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returned home seven. Our maid servant rushed all excitement to
meet me directly. I appeared in the hall. I guessed
at once from the expression of her face that during
my absence something had gone wrong in our house, and
in fact I learned that an hour before, a fearful
shriek had suddenly been heard in my mother's bedroom. The
maid running in had found her on the floor in
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a fainting fit, which had lasted several moments. My mother
had at last regained consciousness, but had been obliged to
lie down and looked strange and scared. She had not
uttered a word, had not answered inquiries. She had done
nothing but look about her and shudder. The maid had
sent the gardener for a doctor. The doctor came and
prescribed soothing treatment, but my mother would say nothing even
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to him. The gardener maintained that a few instants after
the shriek was heard in my mother's room, he had
seen a man unknown to him, running through the bushes
and the garden to the gate into the street. We
live in a house of one story, with windows opening
on to a rather large garden. The gardener had not
time to get a look at the men's face, but
he was tall and was wearing a low straw hat
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and long coat with full skirts. Baron's costume at once
crossed my mind. The gardener could not overtake him, besides,
he had been immediately called into the house and sent
for the doctor. I went in to my mother. She
was lying on the bed, whiter than the pillow on
which her head was ready. Recognizing me, she smiled faintly
and held out her hand to me. I sat down
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beside her and began to question her. At first she
said no to everything. At last she admitted, however, that
she had seen something which had greatly terrified her. Did
some one come in here? I asked, no. She hurriedly replied,
no one came in. It was my fancy, an apparition.
She ceased and hid her face in her hands. I
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was on the point of telling her what I had
learned from the gardener, and incidentally describing my meeting with
the baron, But for some reason or other, the words
died away on my lips. I ventured, however, to observe
to my mother that apparitions do not usually appear in
the daytime. Stop, she whispered, Please do not torture me.
Now you will know some time. She was silent again.
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Her hands were cold, and her pulse beat fast and unevenly.
I gave her some medicine and moved a little away
so as not to disturb her. She did not get up.
The whole day she lay perfectly still and wuiat and
now and then, heaving a deep sigh and timorously opening
her eyes. Every one in the house was at a
loss what to think. Eight towards night, my mother became
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a little feverish, and she sent me away. I did, not, however,
go to my own room, but lay down in the
next room on the sofa. Every quarter of an hour
I got up, went on tiptoe to the door, listened.
Everything was still, but my mother hardly slept at night.
When I went in to her early in the morning,
her face looked hollow, her eyes shone with an unnatural brightness.
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In the course of the day she got a little better,
but towards evening the feverishness increased again. Up till then
she had been obstinately silent, but all of a sudden
she began talking in a hurried, broken voice. She was
not wandering. There was a meaning in her words, but
no sort of connection. Just upon midnight, she suddenly, with
a convulsive movement, raised herself in bed. I was sitting
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beside her, and in the same hurryorried voice, continually taking
SIPs of water from a glass beside her, feebly gesticulating
with her hands, and never once looking at me. She
began to tell her story. She would stop, make an
effort to control herself, and go on again. It was
all so strange, just as though she were doing it
all in a dream, as though she herself were absent
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and some one else were speaking by her lips or
forcing her to speak. Nine, listen to what I am
going to tell you, she began. You are not a
little boy. Now you ought to know all. I had
a friend, a girl. She married a man she loved
with all her heart, and she was very happy with
her husband. During the first year of their married life,
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they went together to the capital to spend a few
weeks there and enjoy themselves. They stayed at a good
hotel and went out a great deal to theaters and parties.
My friend was very pretty. Every one noticed her. Young
men paid her attentions, but there was among them one
an officer. He followed her about incessantly, and wherever she
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was she always saw his cruel black eyes. He was
not introduced to her, and never once spoke to her,
only perpetually stared at her so insolently and strangely, all
the pleasures of the capital were poisoned by his presence.
She began persuading her husband to hasten their departure, and
they had already made all the preparations for the journey.
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One evening, her husband went out to a club he
had been invited by the officers of the same regiment
as that officer to play cards. She was for the
very first time left alone. Her husband did not return
for a long while. She dismissed her maid and went
to bed, and suddenly she felt overcome by terror, so
that she was quite cold and shivering. She fancied. She
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heard a slight sound on the other side of the wall,
like a dog scratching, and she began watching the wall.
In the corner, a lamp was burning. The room was
all hung with tapestry. Suddenly something stirred. There rose opened,
and straight out of the wall a black, long figure
came that awful man with the cruel eyes. She tried
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to scream, but could not. She was utterly numb with terror.
He went up to her rapidly, like some beast of prey,
flung something on her head, something strong, smelling heavy white.
What happened then I don't remember. I don't remember. It
was like death, like a murder. When at last that
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fearful darkness began to pass away, When I when my
friend came to herself, there was no one in the
room again, and for a long time she had not
the strength to scream. She screamed at last. Then again
everything was confusion. Then she saw her husband by her side.
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He had been kept at the club till two o'clock
at night. He looked scared and white. He began questioning her,
but she told him nothing. Then she swooned away again.
I remember, though, when she was left alone in the room,
she examined the place in the wall under the tapestry hangings.
It turned out there was a secret door, and her
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betrothal ring had gone from off her hand. This ring
was of an unusual pattern, seven little gold stars alternated
on it with seven silver stars. It was an old
family heirloom. Her husband asked her what had become of
the ring. She could give him no answer. Her husband
supposed she had dropped it somewhere, searched everywhere, but could
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not find it. He felt uneasy and distressed. He decided
to go home as soon as possible, and directly the
doctor allowed it. They left the capital. But imagine, on
the very day of their departure they happened suddenly to
meet a stretcher being carried away along the street. On
the stretcher lay a man who had just been killed,
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with his head cut open. And imagine the man was
that fearful apparition of the night with the evil eyes.
He had been killed over some gambling dispute. Then my
friend went away into the country, became a mother for
the first time, and lived several years with her husband.
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He never knew anything. Indeed, what could she have told him?
She knew nothing herself, but her former happiness had vanished.
A gloom had come over their lives, and never again
did that gloom pass out of it. They had no
other children, either before or after, And that son, my
mother trembled all over and hid her face in her hands.
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But say now she went on with redoubled energy. Was
my friend to blame in any way? What had she
to reproach herself with? She was punished. But had she
not the right to declare before God himself that the
punishment that overtook her was unjust? Then? Why is it that,
like a criminal tortured by sting of conscience? Why is
it she is confronted with the past in such a
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fearful shape after so many years, mac best sleupuanquo, so
no wonder that he could be haunted. But I but
here my mother's words became so mixed and confused that
I ceased to follow her. I no longer doubted that
she was in delirium. Ten the agitating effect of my
mother's recital on me, any one may easily conceive. I
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guessed from her first word that she was talking of herself,
and not any friend of hers. Her slip of the
tongue confirmed my conjecture. Then this really was my father
whom I was seeking in my dream, whom I had
seen awake by daylight. He had not been killed, as
my mother supposed, but only wounded, and he had come
to see her and had run away alarmed by her alarm.
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I suddenly understood everything, the feeling of involuntary aversion for
me which arose at times in my mother and her
perpetual melancholy in our secluded life. I remember my head
seemed going, and I clutched it in both hands as
though to hold it still. But one idea, as it were,
nailed me down. I resolved, I must come, what may
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find that man again? What for with what aim? I
could not give myself a clear answer, but to find him,
find him that had become a question of life and
death for me. The next morning, my mother at last
grew calmer, the fever left her. She fell asleep. Confiding
her to the care of the servants and people of
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the house, I set out on my quest eleven. First
of all, I made my way, of course, to the
cafe where I had met the baron, But no one
in the cafe knew him or had even noticed him.
He had been a chance customer there, the Negro. The
people there had observed his figure was so striking, But
who he was and where he was staying, no one knew.
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Leaving my address and in case at the cafe, I
fell to wandering about the streets and sea front by
the harbor, along the boulevards, peeped into all the places
of public resort, but could find no one like the
baron or his companion. Not having caught the baron's surname,
I was deprived of the resource of applying to the police.
I did, however, privately let two or three guardians of
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the public safety know. They stared at me in bewilderment,
and did not altogether believe in me that I would
reward them liberally if they could trace out two persons
whose exterior I tried to describe as exactly as possible.
After wandering about in this way till dinner time, I
returned home exhausted. My mother had got up, but to
her usual melancholy there was added something new, a sort
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of dreamy blankness, which cut me to the heart like
a knife. I spent the evening with her, we scarcely
spoke at all. She played patience. I looked at her
cards in silence. She never made a single reference to
what she had told me, nor to what had happened
the preceding evening. It was as though we had made
a secret compact not to touch on any of these
harrowing and strange incidents. She seemed angry with herself and
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ashamed of what had broken from her unawares, though possibly
she did not remember quite what she had said in
her half delirious feverishness, and hoped I should spare her.
And indeed this was it. I spared her, and she
felt it as on the previous day. She avoided my eyes.
I could not get to sleep all night. Outside, A
fearful storm suddenly came on. The wind howled and darted
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furiously hither and thither. The window panes rattled and rang.
Despairing shrieks and groans sounded in the air, as though
something had been torn to Shreds up aloft and were
flying with frenzied wailing over the shaken houses. Before dawn,
I dropped off into a doze. Suddenly, I fancied some
one came into my room and called me uttered my
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name in a voice not loud but resolute. I raised
my head and saw no one but strange to say.
I was not only not afraid, I was glad. I
suddenly felt a conviction that now I should certainly attain
my object. I dressed her and went out of the house. Twelve.
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The storm had abated, but its last struggles could still
be felt. It was very early. There were no people
in the streets. Many places were strewn with broken chimney
pots and tiles, pieces of wrecked fencing, and branches of trees.
What was it like last night at sea? I could
not help wondering at the sight of the traces left
by the storm. I intended to go to the harbor,
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but my legs, as though in obedience to some irresistible attraction,
carried me in another direction. Ten minutes had not gone
by before I found myself in a part of the
town I had never visited till then. I walked, not rapidly,
but without halting, step by step, with a strange sensation
at my heart. I expected something extraordinary, impossible, and at
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the same time I was convinced that this extraordinary thing
would come to pass. Thirteen and behold it came to pass,
this extraordinary thing, this unexpected thing. Suddenly twenty paces before me,
I saw the very negro who had addressed the baron
in the cafe, muffled in the same cloak as I
had noticed on him there. He seemed to spring out
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of the earth, and when his back turned to me,
walked with rapid strides along the narrow pavement of the
winding street. I promptly flew to overtake him, but he
too redoubled his pace, though he did not look round,
and all of a sudden turned sharply round the corner
of a projecting house. I ran up to this corner,
turned round it as quickly as the negro. Wonderful to relate.
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I faced a long, narrow, perfectly empty street. The fog
of early morning reeled it with its leaden dullness. But
my eye reached to its very end. I could scan
all the buildings in it, and not a living creature
stirring anywhere. The tall negro in the cloak had vanished
as suddenly as he had appeared. I was bewildered, but
only for one instant. Another feeling at once took possession
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of me. The street, which stretched its length, dum and
as it were dead for my eyes, I knew it.
It was the street of my dream. I started shivered.
The morning was so fresh and promptly without the least hesitation.
With a sort of shudder of conviction went on. I
began looking about. Yes, here it was here. To the right,
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standing cornerwise to the street was the house of my dream.
Here too, the old fashioned gateway, with scroll work and
stone on both sides. It is true the windows of
the house were not round, but rectangular, but that was
not important. I knocked at the gate, knocked twice or
three times, louder and louder. The gate was opened slowly,
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with a heavy groan, as though yawning. I was confronted
by a young servant girl with disheveled hair and sleepy eyes.
She was apparently only just awake. Does the Baron live here?
I asked, and took in with a rapid glance the deep,
narrow courtyard. Yes, it was all there. There were the
planks and beams I had seen in my dream. No,
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the servant girl answered, the Baron's not living here. Not impossible.
He's not here now. He left yesterday. Where's he gone to? America?
To America, I repealed, involuntarily. But he will come back.
The servant looked at me suspiciously. We don't know about that.
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Maybe he won't come back at all. And has he
been living here long? Not long a week? He's not
here now? And what was his surname? The Barons? The
girl stared at me. You don't know his name. We'd
simply call him the baron Hi pyetor, she shouted, Seeing
I was pushing in. Come here. Here's a stranger keeps
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asking questions. From the house came the clumsy figure of
a sturdy workman. What is it you want, he asked
in a sleepy voice, and having heard me sullenly, he
repeated what the girl had told me. But who does
live here? I asked, Oh, master? Who is he? A carpenter?
They're all carpenters in this street. Can I see him?
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You can't now he's asleep. But can't I go into
the house? No, go away? Well, but can I see
your master later on? What for? Of course you can
always see him, to be sure, he's always at his
business here, only going now such a time in the morning.
Upon my soul. Well, but that negro, I asked, Suddenly
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the workman looked in perplexity, first at me, then at
the servant girl. What negro? He said, At last, go away, sir,
you can come later, you can talk to the master.
I went out into the street. The gate slammed at
once behind me, sharply and heavily, with no groan. This
time I carefully noted the street and the house, and
went away, but not home. I was conscious of a
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sort of disillusionment. Everything that had happened to me was
so strange, so unexpected, And meanwhile, what a stupid conclusion
to it. I had been persuaded. I had been convinced
that I should see in that house, the room I
knew in the middle of it my father, the baron,
in the dressing gown and with a pipe. And instead
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of that, the master of the house was a carpenter,
and I could go and see him as much as
I liked, in order furniture of him. I dare say,
my father had gone to America. And what was left
for me to do to tell my mother everything, or
to bury forever the very memory of that meeting. I
positively could not resign myself to the idea that such
a supernatural mysterious beginning should end in such a senseless,
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ordinary conclusion. I did not want to return home, and
walked at random away from the town fourteen. I walked
with downcast head, without thought, almost without sensation, but utterly
buried in myself. A rhythmic, hollow and angry noise raised
me from my numbness. I left my head. It was
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the sea, roaring and moaning. Fifty paces from me, I saw.
I was walking along the sand of the dunes. The sea,
set in violent commotion by the storm in the night,
was white with foam to the very horizon, and the
sharp crests of the long billows rolled one after another
and broke on the flat shore. I went nearer to
it and walked along the line left by the ebb
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and flow of the tides, on the yellow furrowed sand,
strewn with fragments of trailing seaweed, broken shells, and snakelike
ribbons of sea grass. Gulls with pointed wings flying with
a plaintive cry on the wind out of the remote
depths of the air soared up white as snow against
the gray cloudy sky, fell abruptly and seemed to leap
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from wave to wave vanished again and were lost like
gleams of silver in the streaks of frothing foam. Several
of them I noticed hovered persistently over a big rock,
which stood up alone in the midst of the level
uniformity of the sandy shore. Coarse sea weed was growing
in irregular masses on one side of the rock, and
where its matted tangles rose above the yellow line was
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something black, something longish, curved, not very large. I looked attentively.
Some dark object was lying there, lying motionless, beside the rock.
This object grew clearer, more defined the nearer I got
to it. There was only a distance of thirty paces
left between me and the rock. Why it was the
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outline of a human form. It was a corpse. It
was a drowned man, thrown up by the sea. I
went right up to the rock. The corpse was the
barren my father. I stood as though turned a stone.
Only then I realized that I had been led since
early morning by some unknown forces, that I was in
their power, and for some instance, there was nothing in
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my soul but the never ceasing crash of the sea
and dumb horror at the fate that had possession of
me fifteen. He lay on his back, turned a little
to one side, with his left arm behind his head.
The right was thrust under his bent body. The toe
of his feet in high sailor's boots had been sucked
into the slimy sea mud. The short blue jacket, drenched
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through with brine, was still closely buttoned. A red scarf
was fastened, and a tight knot about his neck. The
dark face turned to the sky, looked as if it
were laughing. The small, close set teeth could be seen
under the lifted upper lip. The dim pupils of the
half closed eyes were scarcely discernible in the darkened eyeballs.
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The clotted hair, covered with bubbles of foam, lay disheveled
on the ground and bared the smooth brow with the
purple line of the scar The narrow nose rose a
sharp white line between the sunken cheeks. The storm of
the previous night had done its work. He would never
see America again. The man who had outraged my mother,
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who had spoiled and soiled her life. My father, yes,
my father, of that I could no doubt. Lay helplessly
outstretched in the mud. At my feet. I experienced a
sensation of satisfied revenge, and of pity and revulsion, and
horror more than all, a double horror at what I
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saw and at what had happened. The wicked, criminal feelings
of which I have spoken, those uncomprehended impulses of rage
rose up in me, choked me. A ah, I thought, so,
that is why I am like this, That is how
my blood shows itself. I stood beside the corpse and
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stared in suspense. Would not those dead eyes move, would
not those stiff lips quiver? No? All was still. The
very sea weed seemed lifeless, for the breakers had flung it,
even the gulls had flown. Not a broken spar anywhere,
not a fragment of wood, nor a bit of rigging
on all sides. Emptiness. Only he and I, and in
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the distance the sounding sea. I looked back, the same emptiness. There,
a ridge of lifeless downs on the horizon. That was all.
My heart revolted against, leaving this luckless wretch in this solitude,
on the briny sand of the sea shore, to be
devoured by fishes and birds. An inner voice told me,
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I ought to find people, call them, If not to help,
what help could there be now at least to lift
him up, to carry him into some living habitation. But
an indescribable panic suddenly seized on me. It seemed to
me that this dead man knew I had come here,
that he had himself planned this last meeting. I even
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fancied I heard the indistinct mutter I knew so well.
I ran away, looked back once something glittering caught my eye.
It brought me to a halt. It was a hoop
of gold on the hand of the corpse. I knew
it from my mother's betrothal ring. I remember how I
forced myself to turn back, to go up, to bend down.
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I remember the clammy touch of the chill fingers. I
remember how I held my breath and half closed my
eyes and set my teeth, tearing off the obstinate ring.
At last it was off, and I was running, running
away at full speed, with something flying behind me upon
my heels, overtaking me. Sixteen. All I had felt and
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gone through was probably written on my face. When I
got home, my mother abruptly drew herself up directly. I
went into her room and looked with such urgent inquiry
at me that after an unsuccessful attempt to explain, I
ended by holding out the ring to her in silence.
She turned fearfully white, her eyes opened extraordinarily and looked
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dead like those eyes. She uttered a faint cry, snatched
the ring, reeled, fell on my breast, and fairly swooned away,
her head falling back in her blank wide open and
eyes staring at me. I threw both my arms about her, and,
standing where I was, without moving, told her slowly in
a subdued voice, everything, without the slightest concealment, my dream
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and the meeting and everything everything. She heard me to
the end, without uttering a single word. Only her bosom
heaved more and more violently, and her eyes suddenly flashed
and sank. Then she put the ring on her third
finger and moved away a little, began getting her cape
and hat. I asked her where she was going. She
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lifted eyes full of surprise upon me and tried to answer,
but her voice failed her. She shuddered several times, rubbed
her hands as though she were trying to warm them,
and at last said, let us go there at once,
where mother, where he is lying. I want to see,
I want to know, I will know. I endeavored to
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persuade her not to go, but she almost fell into
a nervous attack. I saw it was impossible to oppose
her wish, and we set off seventeen And now I
was again walking along the sand, but this time not alone.
I had my mother on my arm. The sea had
ebbed away, had retreated farther. Still it was calmer, but
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its roar, though fainter, was still menacing and malignant. There
at last rose the solitary rock before us. There was
the sea weed too. I looked intently. I tried to
distinguish that curved object lying on the ground, but I
saw nothing. We went closer. Instinctively, I slackened my pace.
But where was the black still object. Only the tangles
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of seaweed rose black against the sand, which had dried
up by now. We went right up to the rock.
There was no corpse to be seen, and only where
it had been lying there was still a hollow place,
and one could see where the arms and where the
legs had lain. The seaweed around looked as it were crushed,
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and prince were visible of one man's feet. They crossed
the doune, then were lost as they reached the heaped
up shingle. My mother and I looked at each other
and were frightened at what we saw on each other's faces.
Surely he had not got up of himself and gone away.
You are sure you saw him dead, she asked in
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a whisper. I could only nod in assent. Three hours
had not passed since I had come upon the baron's corpse.
Some one had discovered and removed it. I must find
out who had done it and what had become of it.
But first I had to look after my mother eighteen.
While she had been walking to the fatal spot, she
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had been in a fever, but she controlled herself. The
disappearance of the dead body came upon her as a
final blow. She was struck dumb. I feared for her reason,
with great difficulty, I got her home. I made her
lie down again on her bed again. I sent for
the But as soon as my mother had recovered herself
a little, she had once desired me to set off
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without delay to find out that man. I obeyed, But
in spite of every possible effort, I discovered nothing. I
went several times to the police, visited several villages in
the neighborhood, put several advertisements in the papers, collected information
in all directions, and all in vain. I received information, indeed,
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that the corpse of a drowned man had been picked
up in one of the seaside villages near I had
once hastened off there, But from all I could hear,
the body had no resemblance to the baron. I found
out in what ship he had set sail for America.
At first everyone was positive that ship had gone down
in the storm, but a few months later there were
rumors that it had been seen riding at anchor in
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New York Harbor. Not knowing what steps to take, I
began seeking out the negro I had seen, offering him
in the papers a considerable sum of money if he
would call at our house. Some tall negro in cloak
did actually call on us in my absence, but after
questioning the maid, he abruptly departed and never came back again.
So all traces were lost of my my father. So
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he vanished into silence and darkness, never to return. My
mother and I never spoke of him. Only one day,
I remember she expressed surprise that I had never told
her before of my strange dream, and added it must
mean he really, but did not utter all her thought.
My mother was ill a long while, and even after
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her recovery, our former close relations never returned. She was
ill at ease with me to the day of her death.
Ill at ease was just what she was. And that
is a trouble. There is no cure for anything may
be smoothed over. Memories of even the most tragic domestic
incidents gradually lose their strength and bitterness. But if once
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a sense of being ill at ease installs itself between
two closely united persons, it can never be dislodged. I
never again had the dream that had once so agitated me.
I no longer look for my father, But sometimes I fancied,
and even now I fancy that I hear, as it
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were distant wails, as it were, never silent, mournful plaints.
They seem to sound somewhere behind a high wall which
cannot be crossed. They wring my heart, and I weep
with closed eyes, and am never able to tell what
it is, whether it is a living man moaning, or
whether I am listening to the wild, long drawn out
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howl of the troubled sea. And then it passes again
into the muttering of some beast, and I fall asleep,
with anguish and horror in my heart. Into Section five,
The Dream
Section five of dream Tales and Prose Poems by Ivan Turgenev.
This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Read by
Ben Tucker the Dream. I was living at that time
with my mother in a little sea side town. I
was in my seventeenth year, while my mother was not
quite five and thirty. She had married very young. When
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my father died, I was only seven years old, but
I remember him well. My mother was a fair haired woman,
not very tall, with a charming but always sad looking face,
a soft, tired voice, and timid gestures. In her youth,
she had been reputed a beauty, and to the end
she remained attractive and pretty. I had never seen deeper,
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tenderer and sadder eyes, finer and softer hair. I never
saw hands so exquisite. I adored her, and she loved me.
But our life was not a bright one. A secret, hopeless,
undeserved sorrow seemed forever gnawing at the very root of
her being. The sorrow could not be accounted for by
the loss of my father, simply great as that loss
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was to her, passionately as my mother had loved him,
and devoutly as she had cherished his memory, no, something
more lay hidden in it, which I did not understand,
but of which I was aware, dimly and yet intensely
aware whenever I looked into those soft and unchanging eyes,
at those lips unchanging too, not compressed in bitterness, but
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as it were, forever set in one expression. I have
said that my mother loved me, but there were moments
when she repulsed me, when my presence was oppressive to her, unendurable.
At such times she felt a sort of involuntary aversion
for me, and was horrified afterwards, blamed herself with tears,
pressed me to her heart. I used to ascribe these
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momentary outbreaks of dislike to the derangement of her health,
to her unhappiness. These antagonistic feelings might, indeed, to some extent,
have been invoked by certain strange outbursts of wicked and
criminal passions which arose from time to time in me,
though I could not myself account for them. But these
evil outbursts were never coincident with the moments of aversion.
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My mother always wore black, as though in mourning we
were in fairly good circumstances, but we hardly knew any
one Two. My mother concentrated her every thought, her every
care upon me. Her life was wrapped up in my life.
That sort of relation between parents and children is not
always good for the children. It is rather apt to
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be harmful to them. Besides, I was my mother's only son,
and only children generally grow up in a one sided way.
In bringing them up, the parents think as much of
themselves as of them. That's not the right way. I
was neither spoiled nor made hard by it. One or
other is apt to be the fate of only children.
But my nerves were unhinged for a time. Moreover, I
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was rather delicate in health, taking after my mother, whom
I was very like in face. I avoided the companionship
of boys of my own age. I held aloof from
people altogether. Even with my mother, I talked very little.
I liked best reading solitary walks and dreaming. Dreaming what
my dreams were about, it would be hard to say. Sometimes, indeed,
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I seemed to stand at a half open door beyond
which lay unknown mysteries, to stand and wait, half dead
with emotion, and not to step over the threshold, but
still pondering what lay beyond, Still to wait till I
turned faint or fell asleep. If there had been a
vein of poetry in me, I should probably have taken
to writing verses. If I had felt an inclination for religion,
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I should perhaps have gone into a monastery. But I
had no tendency of the sort, and I went on
dreaming and waiting. Three. I have just mentioned that I
used sometimes to fall asleep under the influence of vague
dreams and reveries. I used to sleep a great deal
at all times, and dreams played an important part in
my life. I used to have dreams almost every night.
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I did not forget them. I attributed a significance to them,
regarded them as forewarnings, tried to divine their secret meaning.
Some of them were repeated from time to time, which
always struck me as strange and marvelous. I was particularly
perplexed by one dream. I dreamed. I was going along
a narrow, ill paved street of an old fashioned town,
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between stone houses of many stories with pointed roofs. I
was looking for my father, who was not dead, but
for some reason or other, hiding away from us and
living in one of these very houses. And so I
entered a low, dark gateway crossed a long courtyard, lumbered
up with planks and beams, and made my way at
last into a little room with two round windows. In
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the middle of the room stood my father in a
dressing gown, smoking a pipe. He was not in the
least like my real father. He was tall and thin,
with black hair, a hook nose, with sullen and piercing eyes.
He looked about forty. He was displeased at my having
found him, and I too, was far from being delighted
at our meeting, and stood still in perplexity. He turned
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a little away, began muttering something and walking up and
down with short steps. Then he gradually got farther away,
never ceasing his muttering and continually looking back over his shoulder.
The room grew larger and was lost in fog. I
felt all at once horrified at the idea that I
was losing my father again, and rushed after him. But
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I could no longer see him. I could only hear
his angry muttering, like a bear growling. My heart sank
with dread. I woke up and could not, for a
long while get to sleep again. All the following day
I pondered on this dream, and naturally could make nothing
of it. Four the month of June had come. The
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town in which I was living with my mother became
exceptionally lively. About that time, a number of ships were
in the harbor, a number of new faces were to
be seen in the streets. I liked at such times
to wander along the sea front by cafes and hotels,
to stare at the widely differing figures of the sailors
and other people sitting under linen awnings, at small white
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tables with pewter pots of beer before them. As I
passed one day before a cafe, I caught sight of
a man who at once riveted my whole attention. Dressed
in a long black full coat with a straw hat
pulled right down over his eyes, he was sitting perfectly still,
his arms folded across his chest. The straggling curls of
his black hair fell almost down to his nose, his
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thin lips held tight the mouthpiece of a short pipe.
This man struck me as so familiar. Every feature of
his swarthy yellow face were so unmistakably imprinted in my
memory that I could not help stopping short before him.
I could not help asking myself who is that man?
Where have I seen him? Becoming aware, probably of my
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intense stare, he raised his black piercing eyes upon me.
I uttered an involuntary ah. The man was the father
I had been looking for, the father I had beheld
in my dream. There was no possibility of mistake. The
resemblance was too striking. The very coat, even that wrapped
his spare limbs in its long skirts and hue and cut,
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recalled the dressing gown in which my father had appeared
in the dream. Am I not asleep now? I wondered? No.
It was daytime about me. Crowds of people were bustling,
the sun was shining brightly in the blue sky, and
before me was no phantom, but a living man. I
went up to an empty table, asked for a pot
of beer in a newspaper, and sat down not far
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off from this enigmatical being five. Putting the sheet of
newspaper on a level with my face, I continued my
scrutiny of the stranger. He scarcely stirred at all, only
from time to time, raising his bowed head. He was
obviously expecting some one. I gazed and gazed. Sometimes I
fancied I must have imagined it all. There could be
(08:05):
really no resemblance that I had given away to a
half unconscious trick of the imagination. But the stranger would
suddenly turn round a little in his seat, or slightly
raise his hand, and again I all but cried out again.
I saw my dream father before me. He at last
noticed my uncalled for attention, and, glancing at first with
(08:25):
surprise and then with annoyance in my direction, was on
the point of getting up and knocked down a small
walking stick he had stood against the table. I instantly
jumped up, picked it up, and handed it to him.
My heart was beating violently. He gave a constrained smile,
thanked me, and as his face drew closer to my face,
he lifted his eyebrows and opened his mouth a little,
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as though struck by something. You hurry, Very polite, young man,
he began, all at once, in a dry, incisive nasal voice.
That's something out of the common nowadays. Let me congratulate you. You
must have been well brought up. I don't remember precisely
what answer I made, but a conversation soon sprang up
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between us. I learned that he was a fellow countryman,
that he had not long returned from America, where he
had spent many years, and was shortly going back there.
He called himself Baron, the name I could not make
out distinctly. He, just like my dream father, ended every
remark with a sort of indistinct inward mutter. He desired
to learn my surname. On hearing it, he seemed again astonished,
(09:30):
then asked me if I had lived long enough in
the town and with whom I was living. I told
him I was living with my mother and your father.
My father died long ago. He inquired my mother's Christian name,
and immediately gave an awkward laugh, but apologized, saying that
he picked up some American ways and was rather a
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queer fellow altogether. Then he was curious to know what
was our dress. I told him six. The excitement which
had possessed me at the beginning of our conversation gradually
calmed down. I felt our meeting rather strange, and nothing more.
I did not like the little smile with which the
Baron Cross examined me. I did not like the expression
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of his eyes when he as it were, stuck them
like pins, and to me there was something in them rapacious, patronizing.
Something unnerving those eyes I had not seen in the dream.
A strange face was the baron's, faded, fatigued, and at
the same time young looking, unpleasantly young looking. My dream
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father had not the deep scar either, which ran slanting
right across my new acquaintance's forehead, and which I had
not noticed till I came closer to him. I had
hardly told the baron the name of the street and
the number of the house in which we were living,
when a tall negro swathed to the eyebrows and a cloak,
came up to him from behind and softly tapped him
on the shoulder. The baron turned round, ejaculated, aha at least,
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and with a slight nod to me, went with the
negro into the cafe. I was left under the awning.
I meant to await the baron's return, not so much
with the object of entering into conversation with him again.
I really did not know what to talk about to him,
as to verify once more my first impression. But half
an hour passed, an hour passed, the baron did not appear.
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I went into the cafe, passed through all the rooms,
but could see nowhere the baron or the negro. They
must both have gone out by a back door. My
head ached a little, and to get a little fresh air,
I walked along the sea front to a large park
outside the town, which had been laid out two hundred
years ago. After strolling for a couple of hours in
the shade of the immense oaks and plane trees, I
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returned home seven. Our maid servant rushed all excitement to
meet me directly. I appeared in the hall. I guessed
at once from the expression of her face that during
my absence something had gone wrong in our house, and
in fact I learned that an hour before, a fearful
shriek had suddenly been heard in my mother's bedroom. The
maid running in had found her on the floor in
(12:00):
a fainting fit, which had lasted several moments. My mother
had at last regained consciousness, but had been obliged to
lie down and looked strange and scared. She had not
uttered a word, had not answered inquiries. She had done
nothing but look about her and shudder. The maid had
sent the gardener for a doctor. The doctor came and
prescribed soothing treatment, but my mother would say nothing even
(12:22):
to him. The gardener maintained that a few instants after
the shriek was heard in my mother's room, he had
seen a man unknown to him, running through the bushes
and the garden to the gate into the street. We
live in a house of one story, with windows opening
on to a rather large garden. The gardener had not
time to get a look at the men's face, but
he was tall and was wearing a low straw hat
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and long coat with full skirts. Baron's costume at once
crossed my mind. The gardener could not overtake him, besides,
he had been immediately called into the house and sent
for the doctor. I went in to my mother. She
was lying on the bed, whiter than the pillow on
which her head was ready. Recognizing me, she smiled faintly
and held out her hand to me. I sat down
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beside her and began to question her. At first she
said no to everything. At last she admitted, however, that
she had seen something which had greatly terrified her. Did
some one come in here? I asked, no. She hurriedly replied,
no one came in. It was my fancy, an apparition.
She ceased and hid her face in her hands. I
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was on the point of telling her what I had
learned from the gardener, and incidentally describing my meeting with
the baron, But for some reason or other, the words
died away on my lips. I ventured, however, to observe
to my mother that apparitions do not usually appear in
the daytime. Stop, she whispered, Please do not torture me.
Now you will know some time. She was silent again.
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Her hands were cold, and her pulse beat fast and unevenly.
I gave her some medicine and moved a little away
so as not to disturb her. She did not get up.
The whole day she lay perfectly still and wuiat and
now and then, heaving a deep sigh and timorously opening
her eyes. Every one in the house was at a
loss what to think. Eight towards night, my mother became
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a little feverish, and she sent me away. I did, not, however,
go to my own room, but lay down in the
next room on the sofa. Every quarter of an hour
I got up, went on tiptoe to the door, listened.
Everything was still, but my mother hardly slept at night.
When I went in to her early in the morning,
her face looked hollow, her eyes shone with an unnatural brightness.
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In the course of the day she got a little better,
but towards evening the feverishness increased again. Up till then
she had been obstinately silent, but all of a sudden
she began talking in a hurried, broken voice. She was
not wandering. There was a meaning in her words, but
no sort of connection. Just upon midnight, she suddenly, with
a convulsive movement, raised herself in bed. I was sitting
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beside her, and in the same hurryorried voice, continually taking
SIPs of water from a glass beside her, feebly gesticulating
with her hands, and never once looking at me. She
began to tell her story. She would stop, make an
effort to control herself, and go on again. It was
all so strange, just as though she were doing it
all in a dream, as though she herself were absent
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and some one else were speaking by her lips or
forcing her to speak. Nine, listen to what I am
going to tell you, she began. You are not a
little boy. Now you ought to know all. I had
a friend, a girl. She married a man she loved
with all her heart, and she was very happy with
her husband. During the first year of their married life,
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they went together to the capital to spend a few
weeks there and enjoy themselves. They stayed at a good
hotel and went out a great deal to theaters and parties.
My friend was very pretty. Every one noticed her. Young
men paid her attentions, but there was among them one
an officer. He followed her about incessantly, and wherever she
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was she always saw his cruel black eyes. He was
not introduced to her, and never once spoke to her,
only perpetually stared at her so insolently and strangely, all
the pleasures of the capital were poisoned by his presence.
She began persuading her husband to hasten their departure, and
they had already made all the preparations for the journey.
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One evening, her husband went out to a club he
had been invited by the officers of the same regiment
as that officer to play cards. She was for the
very first time left alone. Her husband did not return
for a long while. She dismissed her maid and went
to bed, and suddenly she felt overcome by terror, so
that she was quite cold and shivering. She fancied. She
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heard a slight sound on the other side of the wall,
like a dog scratching, and she began watching the wall.
In the corner, a lamp was burning. The room was
all hung with tapestry. Suddenly something stirred. There rose opened,
and straight out of the wall a black, long figure
came that awful man with the cruel eyes. She tried
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to scream, but could not. She was utterly numb with terror.
He went up to her rapidly, like some beast of prey,
flung something on her head, something strong, smelling heavy white.
What happened then I don't remember. I don't remember. It
was like death, like a murder. When at last that
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fearful darkness began to pass away, When I when my
friend came to herself, there was no one in the
room again, and for a long time she had not
the strength to scream. She screamed at last. Then again
everything was confusion. Then she saw her husband by her side.
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He had been kept at the club till two o'clock
at night. He looked scared and white. He began questioning her,
but she told him nothing. Then she swooned away again.
I remember, though, when she was left alone in the room,
she examined the place in the wall under the tapestry hangings.
It turned out there was a secret door, and her
(18:15):
betrothal ring had gone from off her hand. This ring
was of an unusual pattern, seven little gold stars alternated
on it with seven silver stars. It was an old
family heirloom. Her husband asked her what had become of
the ring. She could give him no answer. Her husband
supposed she had dropped it somewhere, searched everywhere, but could
(18:37):
not find it. He felt uneasy and distressed. He decided
to go home as soon as possible, and directly the
doctor allowed it. They left the capital. But imagine, on
the very day of their departure they happened suddenly to
meet a stretcher being carried away along the street. On
the stretcher lay a man who had just been killed,
(18:59):
with his head cut open. And imagine the man was
that fearful apparition of the night with the evil eyes.
He had been killed over some gambling dispute. Then my
friend went away into the country, became a mother for
the first time, and lived several years with her husband.
(19:19):
He never knew anything. Indeed, what could she have told him?
She knew nothing herself, but her former happiness had vanished.
A gloom had come over their lives, and never again
did that gloom pass out of it. They had no
other children, either before or after, And that son, my
mother trembled all over and hid her face in her hands.
(19:41):
But say now she went on with redoubled energy. Was
my friend to blame in any way? What had she
to reproach herself with? She was punished. But had she
not the right to declare before God himself that the
punishment that overtook her was unjust? Then? Why is it that,
like a criminal tortured by sting of conscience? Why is
it she is confronted with the past in such a
(20:04):
fearful shape after so many years, mac best sleupuanquo, so
no wonder that he could be haunted. But I but
here my mother's words became so mixed and confused that
I ceased to follow her. I no longer doubted that
she was in delirium. Ten the agitating effect of my
mother's recital on me, any one may easily conceive. I
(20:26):
guessed from her first word that she was talking of herself,
and not any friend of hers. Her slip of the
tongue confirmed my conjecture. Then this really was my father
whom I was seeking in my dream, whom I had
seen awake by daylight. He had not been killed, as
my mother supposed, but only wounded, and he had come
to see her and had run away alarmed by her alarm.
(20:48):
I suddenly understood everything, the feeling of involuntary aversion for
me which arose at times in my mother and her
perpetual melancholy in our secluded life. I remember my head
seemed going, and I clutched it in both hands as
though to hold it still. But one idea, as it were,
nailed me down. I resolved, I must come, what may
(21:09):
find that man again? What for with what aim? I
could not give myself a clear answer, but to find him,
find him that had become a question of life and
death for me. The next morning, my mother at last
grew calmer, the fever left her. She fell asleep. Confiding
her to the care of the servants and people of
(21:30):
the house, I set out on my quest eleven. First
of all, I made my way, of course, to the
cafe where I had met the baron, But no one
in the cafe knew him or had even noticed him.
He had been a chance customer there, the Negro. The
people there had observed his figure was so striking, But
who he was and where he was staying, no one knew.
(21:51):
Leaving my address and in case at the cafe, I
fell to wandering about the streets and sea front by
the harbor, along the boulevards, peeped into all the places
of public resort, but could find no one like the
baron or his companion. Not having caught the baron's surname,
I was deprived of the resource of applying to the police.
I did, however, privately let two or three guardians of
(22:12):
the public safety know. They stared at me in bewilderment,
and did not altogether believe in me that I would
reward them liberally if they could trace out two persons
whose exterior I tried to describe as exactly as possible.
After wandering about in this way till dinner time, I
returned home exhausted. My mother had got up, but to
her usual melancholy there was added something new, a sort
(22:35):
of dreamy blankness, which cut me to the heart like
a knife. I spent the evening with her, we scarcely
spoke at all. She played patience. I looked at her
cards in silence. She never made a single reference to
what she had told me, nor to what had happened
the preceding evening. It was as though we had made
a secret compact not to touch on any of these
harrowing and strange incidents. She seemed angry with herself and
(22:59):
ashamed of what had broken from her unawares, though possibly
she did not remember quite what she had said in
her half delirious feverishness, and hoped I should spare her.
And indeed this was it. I spared her, and she
felt it as on the previous day. She avoided my eyes.
I could not get to sleep all night. Outside, A
fearful storm suddenly came on. The wind howled and darted
(23:22):
furiously hither and thither. The window panes rattled and rang.
Despairing shrieks and groans sounded in the air, as though
something had been torn to Shreds up aloft and were
flying with frenzied wailing over the shaken houses. Before dawn,
I dropped off into a doze. Suddenly, I fancied some
one came into my room and called me uttered my
(23:42):
name in a voice not loud but resolute. I raised
my head and saw no one but strange to say.
I was not only not afraid, I was glad. I
suddenly felt a conviction that now I should certainly attain
my object. I dressed her and went out of the house. Twelve.
(24:04):
The storm had abated, but its last struggles could still
be felt. It was very early. There were no people
in the streets. Many places were strewn with broken chimney
pots and tiles, pieces of wrecked fencing, and branches of trees.
What was it like last night at sea? I could
not help wondering at the sight of the traces left
by the storm. I intended to go to the harbor,
(24:26):
but my legs, as though in obedience to some irresistible attraction,
carried me in another direction. Ten minutes had not gone
by before I found myself in a part of the
town I had never visited till then. I walked, not rapidly,
but without halting, step by step, with a strange sensation
at my heart. I expected something extraordinary, impossible, and at
(24:50):
the same time I was convinced that this extraordinary thing
would come to pass. Thirteen and behold it came to pass,
this extraordinary thing, this unexpected thing. Suddenly twenty paces before me,
I saw the very negro who had addressed the baron
in the cafe, muffled in the same cloak as I
had noticed on him there. He seemed to spring out
(25:11):
of the earth, and when his back turned to me,
walked with rapid strides along the narrow pavement of the
winding street. I promptly flew to overtake him, but he
too redoubled his pace, though he did not look round,
and all of a sudden turned sharply round the corner
of a projecting house. I ran up to this corner,
turned round it as quickly as the negro. Wonderful to relate.
(25:33):
I faced a long, narrow, perfectly empty street. The fog
of early morning reeled it with its leaden dullness. But
my eye reached to its very end. I could scan
all the buildings in it, and not a living creature
stirring anywhere. The tall negro in the cloak had vanished
as suddenly as he had appeared. I was bewildered, but
only for one instant. Another feeling at once took possession
(25:55):
of me. The street, which stretched its length, dum and
as it were dead for my eyes, I knew it.
It was the street of my dream. I started shivered.
The morning was so fresh and promptly without the least hesitation.
With a sort of shudder of conviction went on. I
began looking about. Yes, here it was here. To the right,
(26:17):
standing cornerwise to the street was the house of my dream.
Here too, the old fashioned gateway, with scroll work and
stone on both sides. It is true the windows of
the house were not round, but rectangular, but that was
not important. I knocked at the gate, knocked twice or
three times, louder and louder. The gate was opened slowly,
(26:39):
with a heavy groan, as though yawning. I was confronted
by a young servant girl with disheveled hair and sleepy eyes.
She was apparently only just awake. Does the Baron live here?
I asked, and took in with a rapid glance the deep,
narrow courtyard. Yes, it was all there. There were the
planks and beams I had seen in my dream. No,
(27:00):
the servant girl answered, the Baron's not living here. Not impossible.
He's not here now. He left yesterday. Where's he gone to? America?
To America, I repealed, involuntarily. But he will come back.
The servant looked at me suspiciously. We don't know about that.
(27:24):
Maybe he won't come back at all. And has he
been living here long? Not long a week? He's not
here now? And what was his surname? The Barons? The
girl stared at me. You don't know his name. We'd
simply call him the baron Hi pyetor, she shouted, Seeing
I was pushing in. Come here. Here's a stranger keeps
(27:47):
asking questions. From the house came the clumsy figure of
a sturdy workman. What is it you want, he asked
in a sleepy voice, and having heard me sullenly, he
repeated what the girl had told me. But who does
live here? I asked, Oh, master? Who is he? A carpenter?
They're all carpenters in this street. Can I see him?
(28:11):
You can't now he's asleep. But can't I go into
the house? No, go away? Well, but can I see
your master later on? What for? Of course you can
always see him, to be sure, he's always at his
business here, only going now such a time in the morning.
Upon my soul. Well, but that negro, I asked, Suddenly
(28:35):
the workman looked in perplexity, first at me, then at
the servant girl. What negro? He said, At last, go away, sir,
you can come later, you can talk to the master.
I went out into the street. The gate slammed at
once behind me, sharply and heavily, with no groan. This
time I carefully noted the street and the house, and
went away, but not home. I was conscious of a
(28:56):
sort of disillusionment. Everything that had happened to me was
so strange, so unexpected, And meanwhile, what a stupid conclusion
to it. I had been persuaded. I had been convinced
that I should see in that house, the room I
knew in the middle of it my father, the baron,
in the dressing gown and with a pipe. And instead
(29:17):
of that, the master of the house was a carpenter,
and I could go and see him as much as
I liked, in order furniture of him. I dare say,
my father had gone to America. And what was left
for me to do to tell my mother everything, or
to bury forever the very memory of that meeting. I
positively could not resign myself to the idea that such
a supernatural mysterious beginning should end in such a senseless,
(29:41):
ordinary conclusion. I did not want to return home, and
walked at random away from the town fourteen. I walked
with downcast head, without thought, almost without sensation, but utterly
buried in myself. A rhythmic, hollow and angry noise raised
me from my numbness. I left my head. It was
(30:01):
the sea, roaring and moaning. Fifty paces from me, I saw.
I was walking along the sand of the dunes. The sea,
set in violent commotion by the storm in the night,
was white with foam to the very horizon, and the
sharp crests of the long billows rolled one after another
and broke on the flat shore. I went nearer to
it and walked along the line left by the ebb
(30:22):
and flow of the tides, on the yellow furrowed sand,
strewn with fragments of trailing seaweed, broken shells, and snakelike
ribbons of sea grass. Gulls with pointed wings flying with
a plaintive cry on the wind out of the remote
depths of the air soared up white as snow against
the gray cloudy sky, fell abruptly and seemed to leap
(30:42):
from wave to wave vanished again and were lost like
gleams of silver in the streaks of frothing foam. Several
of them I noticed hovered persistently over a big rock,
which stood up alone in the midst of the level
uniformity of the sandy shore. Coarse sea weed was growing
in irregular masses on one side of the rock, and
where its matted tangles rose above the yellow line was
(31:05):
something black, something longish, curved, not very large. I looked attentively.
Some dark object was lying there, lying motionless, beside the rock.
This object grew clearer, more defined the nearer I got
to it. There was only a distance of thirty paces
left between me and the rock. Why it was the
(31:26):
outline of a human form. It was a corpse. It
was a drowned man, thrown up by the sea. I
went right up to the rock. The corpse was the
barren my father. I stood as though turned a stone.
Only then I realized that I had been led since
early morning by some unknown forces, that I was in
their power, and for some instance, there was nothing in
(31:49):
my soul but the never ceasing crash of the sea
and dumb horror at the fate that had possession of
me fifteen. He lay on his back, turned a little
to one side, with his left arm behind his head.
The right was thrust under his bent body. The toe
of his feet in high sailor's boots had been sucked
into the slimy sea mud. The short blue jacket, drenched
(32:12):
through with brine, was still closely buttoned. A red scarf
was fastened, and a tight knot about his neck. The
dark face turned to the sky, looked as if it
were laughing. The small, close set teeth could be seen
under the lifted upper lip. The dim pupils of the
half closed eyes were scarcely discernible in the darkened eyeballs.
(32:33):
The clotted hair, covered with bubbles of foam, lay disheveled
on the ground and bared the smooth brow with the
purple line of the scar The narrow nose rose a
sharp white line between the sunken cheeks. The storm of
the previous night had done its work. He would never
see America again. The man who had outraged my mother,
(32:53):
who had spoiled and soiled her life. My father, yes,
my father, of that I could no doubt. Lay helplessly
outstretched in the mud. At my feet. I experienced a
sensation of satisfied revenge, and of pity and revulsion, and
horror more than all, a double horror at what I
(33:13):
saw and at what had happened. The wicked, criminal feelings
of which I have spoken, those uncomprehended impulses of rage
rose up in me, choked me. A ah, I thought, so,
that is why I am like this, That is how
my blood shows itself. I stood beside the corpse and
(33:34):
stared in suspense. Would not those dead eyes move, would
not those stiff lips quiver? No? All was still. The
very sea weed seemed lifeless, for the breakers had flung it,
even the gulls had flown. Not a broken spar anywhere,
not a fragment of wood, nor a bit of rigging
on all sides. Emptiness. Only he and I, and in
(33:58):
the distance the sounding sea. I looked back, the same emptiness. There,
a ridge of lifeless downs on the horizon. That was all.
My heart revolted against, leaving this luckless wretch in this solitude,
on the briny sand of the sea shore, to be
devoured by fishes and birds. An inner voice told me,
(34:18):
I ought to find people, call them, If not to help,
what help could there be now at least to lift
him up, to carry him into some living habitation. But
an indescribable panic suddenly seized on me. It seemed to
me that this dead man knew I had come here,
that he had himself planned this last meeting. I even
(34:40):
fancied I heard the indistinct mutter I knew so well.
I ran away, looked back once something glittering caught my eye.
It brought me to a halt. It was a hoop
of gold on the hand of the corpse. I knew
it from my mother's betrothal ring. I remember how I
forced myself to turn back, to go up, to bend down.
(35:02):
I remember the clammy touch of the chill fingers. I
remember how I held my breath and half closed my
eyes and set my teeth, tearing off the obstinate ring.
At last it was off, and I was running, running
away at full speed, with something flying behind me upon
my heels, overtaking me. Sixteen. All I had felt and
(35:28):
gone through was probably written on my face. When I
got home, my mother abruptly drew herself up directly. I
went into her room and looked with such urgent inquiry
at me that after an unsuccessful attempt to explain, I
ended by holding out the ring to her in silence.
She turned fearfully white, her eyes opened extraordinarily and looked
(35:48):
dead like those eyes. She uttered a faint cry, snatched
the ring, reeled, fell on my breast, and fairly swooned away,
her head falling back in her blank wide open and
eyes staring at me. I threw both my arms about her, and,
standing where I was, without moving, told her slowly in
a subdued voice, everything, without the slightest concealment, my dream
(36:12):
and the meeting and everything everything. She heard me to
the end, without uttering a single word. Only her bosom
heaved more and more violently, and her eyes suddenly flashed
and sank. Then she put the ring on her third
finger and moved away a little, began getting her cape
and hat. I asked her where she was going. She
(36:35):
lifted eyes full of surprise upon me and tried to answer,
but her voice failed her. She shuddered several times, rubbed
her hands as though she were trying to warm them,
and at last said, let us go there at once,
where mother, where he is lying. I want to see,
I want to know, I will know. I endeavored to
(36:57):
persuade her not to go, but she almost fell into
a nervous attack. I saw it was impossible to oppose
her wish, and we set off seventeen And now I
was again walking along the sand, but this time not alone.
I had my mother on my arm. The sea had
ebbed away, had retreated farther. Still it was calmer, but
(37:19):
its roar, though fainter, was still menacing and malignant. There
at last rose the solitary rock before us. There was
the sea weed too. I looked intently. I tried to
distinguish that curved object lying on the ground, but I
saw nothing. We went closer. Instinctively, I slackened my pace.
But where was the black still object. Only the tangles
(37:42):
of seaweed rose black against the sand, which had dried
up by now. We went right up to the rock.
There was no corpse to be seen, and only where
it had been lying there was still a hollow place,
and one could see where the arms and where the
legs had lain. The seaweed around looked as it were crushed,
(38:02):
and prince were visible of one man's feet. They crossed
the doune, then were lost as they reached the heaped
up shingle. My mother and I looked at each other
and were frightened at what we saw on each other's faces.
Surely he had not got up of himself and gone away.
You are sure you saw him dead, she asked in
(38:23):
a whisper. I could only nod in assent. Three hours
had not passed since I had come upon the baron's corpse.
Some one had discovered and removed it. I must find
out who had done it and what had become of it.
But first I had to look after my mother eighteen.
While she had been walking to the fatal spot, she
(38:44):
had been in a fever, but she controlled herself. The
disappearance of the dead body came upon her as a
final blow. She was struck dumb. I feared for her reason,
with great difficulty, I got her home. I made her
lie down again on her bed again. I sent for
the But as soon as my mother had recovered herself
a little, she had once desired me to set off
(39:04):
without delay to find out that man. I obeyed, But
in spite of every possible effort, I discovered nothing. I
went several times to the police, visited several villages in
the neighborhood, put several advertisements in the papers, collected information
in all directions, and all in vain. I received information, indeed,
(39:27):
that the corpse of a drowned man had been picked
up in one of the seaside villages near I had
once hastened off there, But from all I could hear,
the body had no resemblance to the baron. I found
out in what ship he had set sail for America.
At first everyone was positive that ship had gone down
in the storm, but a few months later there were
rumors that it had been seen riding at anchor in
(39:48):
New York Harbor. Not knowing what steps to take, I
began seeking out the negro I had seen, offering him
in the papers a considerable sum of money if he
would call at our house. Some tall negro in cloak
did actually call on us in my absence, but after
questioning the maid, he abruptly departed and never came back again.
So all traces were lost of my my father. So
(40:11):
he vanished into silence and darkness, never to return. My
mother and I never spoke of him. Only one day,
I remember she expressed surprise that I had never told
her before of my strange dream, and added it must
mean he really, but did not utter all her thought.
My mother was ill a long while, and even after
(40:34):
her recovery, our former close relations never returned. She was
ill at ease with me to the day of her death.
Ill at ease was just what she was. And that
is a trouble. There is no cure for anything may
be smoothed over. Memories of even the most tragic domestic
incidents gradually lose their strength and bitterness. But if once
(40:56):
a sense of being ill at ease installs itself between
two closely united persons, it can never be dislodged. I
never again had the dream that had once so agitated me.
I no longer look for my father, But sometimes I fancied,
and even now I fancy that I hear, as it
(41:17):
were distant wails, as it were, never silent, mournful plaints.
They seem to sound somewhere behind a high wall which
cannot be crossed. They wring my heart, and I weep
with closed eyes, and am never able to tell what
it is, whether it is a living man moaning, or
whether I am listening to the wild, long drawn out
(41:39):
howl of the troubled sea. And then it passes again
into the muttering of some beast, and I fall asleep,
with anguish and horror in my heart. Into Section five,
The Dream
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