my uncle was not equal to answering him. With open mouth and staring eyes he gazed at Foma, alarmed and annihilated.
“Merciful heavens! What passions!” hissed Miss Perepelitsyn.
“Do you understand, Colonel,” Foma went on, “that you had better let me go now, simply without asking questions? In your house even I, a man of years and understanding, begin to feel the purity of my morals gravely endangered. Believe me, that your questions can lead to nothing but putting you to shame.”
“Foma! Foma!” cried my uncle, and a cold perspiration came out on his forehead.
“And so allow me without further explanation to say a few farewell words at parting, my last words in your house, Yegor Ilyitch. The thing is done and there is no undoing it! I hope that you understand to what I am referring. But I implore you on my knees: if one spark of moral feeling is left in your heart, curb your unbridled passions! And if the noxious poison has not yet caught the whole edifice, then, as far as possible, extinguish the fire!”
“Foma, I assure you that you are in error!” cried my uncle, recovering himself little by little and foreseeing with horror the climax.
“Moderate your passions,” Foma continued in the same solemn voice, as though he had not heard my uncle’s exclamation, “conquer yourself. ‘If thou would’st conquer all the world —conquer thyself.’ That is my invariable rule. You are a landowner; you ought to shine like a diamond in your estate, and what a vile example of unbridled passion you set your inferiors! I have been praying for you the whole night, and trembled as I sought for your happiness. I did not find it, for happiness lies in virtue....”
“But this is impossible, Foma!” my uncle interrupted him again. “You have misunderstood and what you say is quite wrong.”
“And so remember you are a landowner,” Foma went on, still regardless of my uncle’s exclamations. “Do not imagine that repose and sensuality are the destined vocation of the landowning class. Fatal thought! Not repose, but zealous work, zealous towards God, towards your sovereign, and towards your country! Hard work, hard work is the duty of the landowner, he should work as hard as the poorest of his peasants!”
“What, am I to plough for the peasant, or what?” growled Bahtcheyev. “Why, I am a landowner, too....”
“I turn to you now, servants of the house,” Foma went on, addressing Gavrila and Falaley, who had appeared in the doorway. “Love your master and his family, and obey them humbly and meekly, and they will reward you with their love. And you, Colonel, be just and compassionate to them. A fellow-man—the image of God—like a child of tender years, so to say, is entrusted to you by your sovereign and your country. Great is the duty, but great also is the merit.”
“Foma Fomitch, my dear man, what notion is this?” cried Madame la Générale in despair, almost swooning with horror.
“Well, that is enough, I think,” Foma concluded, paying no attention even to Madame la Générale. “Now to lesser things; they may be small, but they are essential, Yegor Ilyitch. Your hay on the Harinsky waste has not been cut yet. Do not be too late with it: mow it and mow it quickly. That is my advice....”
“But, Foma...”
“You meant to cut down the Zyryanovsky copse, I know; don’t cut it—that’s a second piece of advice. Preserve forest land, for trees retain humidity on the surface of the earth. It is a pity that you have sown the spring com so late; it’s amazing how late you have been in sowing the spring corn!...”
“But, Foma...”
“But enough! One cannot convey everything, and indeed there is not time. I will send you written instructions in a special book. Well, good-bye, good-bye all, God be with you, and the Lord bless you. I bless you too, my child,” he went on, turning to Ilyusha; “and may God keep you from the noxious poison of your passions. I bless you too, Falaley; forget the Komarinsky!... And all of you... Remember Foma.... Well, let us go, Gavrila! Come and help me in, old man.”
And Foma turned towards the door. Madame la Générale gave a piercing shriek and flew after him.
“No, Foma, I will not let you go like this,” cried my uncle, and overtaking him, he seized him by the hand.
“So you mean to have resort to force?” Foma asked haughtily.
“Yes, Foma... even to force,” answered my uncle, quivering with emotion. “You have said too much, and must explain your words! You have misunderstood my letter, Foma!...”
“Your letter!” squealed Foma, instantly flaring up as though he had been awaiting that minute for an explosion; “your letter! Here it is, your letter! Here it is. I tear this letter, I spit upon it! I trample your letter under my foot, and in doing so fulfil the most sacred duty of humanity. That is what I will do if you compel me by force to an explanation! Look! Look! Look!....”
And scraps of paper flew about the room.
“I repeat, Foma, you have misunderstood it,” cried my uncle, turning paler and paler. “I am making an offer of marriage, Foma, I am seeking my happiness.”
“Marriage! You have seduced this young girl, and are trying to deceive me by offering her marriage, for I saw you with her last night in the garden, under the bushes.”
Madame la Générale uttered a scream and fell fainting into an arm-chair. A fearful hubbub arose. Poor Nastenka sat deathly pale. Sasha, frightened, clutched Ilyusha and trembled as though she were in a fever.
“Foma!” cried my uncle in a frenzy, “if you divulge that secret you are guilty of the meanest action on earth!”
“I do divulge that secret,” squealed Foma, “and I am performing the most honourable action! I am sent by God Himself to unmask your villainies to all the world. I am ready to clamber on some peasant’s thatched roof and from there to proclaim your vile conduct to all the gentlemen of the neighbourhood and all the passers-by...Yes, let me tell you all, all of you, that yesterday in the night I found him in the garden, under the bushes with this young girl whose appearance is so innocent....”
“Oh, what a disgrace!” piped Miss Perepelitsyn.
“Foma! Don’t be your own destruction!” cried my uncle, with clenched fists and flashing eyes.
“He,” squealed Foma, “he, alarmed at my having seen him, had the audacity to try with a lying letter to persuade me into conniving at his crime—yes, crime!... for you have turned a hitherto innocent young girl into a...”
“Another insulting word to her and I will kill you, Foma, I swear!...”
“I say that word, since you have succeeded in turning the most innocent young girl into a most depraved girl.”
Foma had hardly uttered this last word when my uncle seized him by the shoulder, turned him round like a straw, and flung him violently at the glass door, which led from the study into the courtyard. The shock was so violent that the closed door burst open, and Foma, flying head over heels down the stone steps, fell full length in the yard. Bits of broken glass were scattered tinkling about the steps.
“Gavrila, pick him up!” cried my uncle, as pale as a corpse. “Put him in the cart, and within two minutes let there be no trace of him in Stepantchikovo!”
