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Page 36
"Yes; for you it must be a relief all the same," said I, for the sake of
saying something,--"your acquaintance with the adjutant. He is a very
good man, I have heard."
"Yes," replied the cashiered officer, "he is a kind man; but he can't
help being what he is, with his education, and it is useless to expect
it."
A flush seemed suddenly to cross his face. "You remarked his coarse jest
this evening about the ambuscade;" and Guskof, though I tried several
times to interrupt him, began to justify himself before me, and to show
that he had not run away from the ambuscade, and that he was not a
coward as the adjutant and Capt. S. tried to make him out.
"As I was telling you," he went on to say, wiping his hands on his
jacket, "such people can't show any delicacy toward a man, a common
soldier, who hasn't much money either. That's beyond their strength. And
here recently, while I haven't received anything at all from my sister,
I have been conscious that they have changed toward me. This sheepskin
jacket, which I bought of a soldier, and which hasn't any warmth in it,
because it's all worn off" (and here he showed me where the wool was
gone from the inside), "it doesn't arouse in him any sympathy or
consideration for my unhappiness, but scorn, which he does not take
pains to hide. Whatever my necessities may be, as now when I have
nothing to eat except soldiers' gruel, and nothing to wear," he
continued, casting down his eyes, and pouring out for himself still
another glass of liquor, "he does not even offer to lend me some money,
though he knows perfectly well that I would give it back to him; but he
waits till I am obliged to ask him for it. But you appreciate how it is
for me to go to him. In your case I should say, square and fair, vous
etes audessus de cela, mon cher, je n'ai pas le sou. And you know," said
he, looking straight into my eyes with an expression of desperation, "I
am going to tell you, square and fair, I am in a terrible situation:
pouvez-vous me preter dix rubles argent? My sister ought to send me some
by the mail, et mon pere--"
"Why, most willingly," said I, although, on the contrary, it was trying
and unpleasant, especially because the evening before, having lost at
cards, I had left only about five rubles in Nikita's care. "In a
moment," said I, arising, "I will go and get it at the tent."
"No, by and by: ne vous derangez pas."
Nevertheless, not heeding him, I hastened to the closed tent, where
stood my bed, and where the captain was sleeping.
"Aleksei Ivanuitch, let me have ten rubles, please, for rations," said I
to the captain, shaking him.
"What! have you been losing again? But this very evening, you were not
going to play any more," murmured the captain, still half asleep.
"No, I have not been playing; but I want the money; let me have it,
please."
"Makatiuk!" shouted the captain to his servant, [Footnote: Denshchik.]
"hand me my bag with the money."
"Hush, hush!" said I, hearing Guskof's measured steps near the tent.
"What? Why hush?"
"Because that cashiered fellow has asked to borrow it of me. He's right
there."
"Well, if you knew him, you wouldn't let him have it," remarked the
captain. "I have heard about him. He's a dirty, low-lived fellow."
Nevertheless, the captain gave me the money, ordered his man to put away
the bag, pulled the flap of the tent neatly to, and, again saying, "If
you only knew him, you wouldn't let him have it," drew his head down
under the coverlet. "Now you owe me thirty-two, remember," he shouted
after me.
When I came out of the tent, Guskof was walking near the settees; and
his slight figure, with his crooked legs, his shapeless cap, his long
white hair, kept appearing and disappearing in the darkness, as he
passed in and out of the light of the candles. He made believe not to
see me.
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