THE rent for that studio in which Antek Svyatetski and I lived and painted, was unpaid, first, because we had about five rubles joint capital, and, second, because we felt a sincere repugnance to paying house-rent.
People call us artists squanderers; as for me, I would rather drink away my money than waste it in paying a house-owner.
Our house-owner was not a bad fellow though, and, moreover, we found means of defence against him.
When he came to dun us, which was usually in the morning, Antek, who slept on a straw bed on the floor, and covered himself with a Turkish curtain used by us as a background for portraits, would rise to a sitting posture, and say in sepulchral tones,—
“It is well that I see you, for I dreamed that you were dead.”
The house-owner, who was superstitious, and dreaded death evidently, was confused at once and beyond measure. Antek would throw himself back on the straw bed, stretch his legs, fold his hands across his breast, and continue,—
“You were just like this; you had white gloves on your hands, the fingers were too long; on your feet patent-leather boots; for the rest, you were not changed much.”
Then I would add, “Sometimes those dreams come true.”
It seems that this “sometimes” brought the man to despair. At last he would fall into a rage, slam the door after him; and we could hear him rush downstairs four steps at a time, swearing by what the world stands on. Still the honest soul did not like to send the house-bailiff to us. In truth, there was not much to take; and he had calculated that were he to bring other artists to that studio, and the kitchen adjoining, the story would be the same, or still worse.
Our sharp method grew dull in time, however. The house-owner became accustomed to the thought of death. Antek had the idea to finish three pictures in the style of Würtz, “Death,” “Burial,” and “Waking from Lethargy.” Naturally our man was to figure in all of them.
Such funereal subjects became a specialty for Antek, who, as he says himself, paints “corpses big, medium, and small size.” This is the reason, of course, why no one buys his pictures; for, subjects aside, he has talent. He has sent to the Paris Salon two “corpses,” and as I also sent my “Jews on the Vistula,” which in the catalogue of the Salon are christened “Jews on the Babylon,” we were both waiting impatiently for the decision of the jury.
Of course Antek foresaw that the worst would happen, that the jury would be made up of perfect idiots, and even if not made up of idiots, I am an idiot, he is an idiot, our pictures are idiotic, and reward for them would be the summit of idiocy!
How much blood that monkey has spoiled in me during the two years that we have lived in one studio, I cannot tell.
Antek’s whole ambition is to pass for a moral “corpse.” In company he poses as a drunkard, which he is not. He will pour down two or three tiny glasses of vodka, and turn to see if we are looking; if not sure that we are, he will punch one of us with his elbow frown and say, in subterranean tones,—
“Yes, how low I have fallen, that far! Is it possible?”
We answer that he is a fool. He falls into a rage then; nothing can bring him into worse humor than to show disbelief in his moral fall. Still, he is an honest fellow to the marrow of his bones.
Once he and I went astray in the mountains of Salzkammergut, near Zell am See. Since night had come it was easy to break one’s neck.
“Dost hear,” said Antek to me, “thou hast more talent than I, therefore life is a greater loss to thee. I will go ahead. If I fall, thou wilt stay on the spot till morning, and in the morning thou canst save thyself somehow.”
“Thou wilt not go ahead; I will go, because I can see better.”
“If I don’t break my neck to-day,” said Antek, “I’ll finish in the canal—it’s all one to me.”
We fall to disputing. Meanwhile it has become as dark as in a cellar. In the end of ends we conclude to go at hazard. We advance cautiously.
The place is wide enough at first, but afterward narrower and narrower. As far as we can see, on the right and left are abysses, probably bottomless.
The ridge grows still narrower, and, what is more, pieces of stone, loosened by the wind, fall away from under our feet.
“I will go on my hands and knees; ‘tis impossible to go any other way!” said Antek.
In truth, ‘tis impossible to go any other way, so we go on our hands and knees, advancing like two chimpanzees.
But soon it appears that that too is impossible. The back of the cliff becomes as narrow as a horse’s back. Antek sits astride of it, I also, and leaning on our hands put down before us we pushed forward with uncommon damage to our clothing. After a certain time I hear the voice of my comrade,—
“Vladek?”
“What is it?”
“The ridge has come to an end.”
“And what is there beyond?”
“Emptiness—there must be a precipice.”
“Take a stone and throw it, we will listen to hear if it is a long time falling.”
In the darkness I hear Antek feeling to find a fragment of crumbling rock.
“I am throwing,” said he, “listen.”
I open both ears.
Silence!
“Haven’t you heard anything?”
“No!”
“We have ended up nicely! The place must be a hundred fathoms deep.”
“Throw once more.”
Antek finds a larger stone, throws it.
No sound!
“What does this mean, no bottom, or what?” asked Antek.
“Hard to help it! We will sit here till morning.”
We are sitting there. Antek throws a couple of stones more; all in vain. An hour passes, a second, at last I hear my friend’s voice,—
“Vladek, but don’t go to sleep—hast a cigarette?”
It appears that I have cigarettes, but we have used up our matches. Despair! The hour may be one in the morning, or not even so late. Very fine rain begins to fall. Around us, darkness impenetrable. I come to the conclusion that people who live in towns or in villages have no idea of what silence is,—silence like that which surrounds us, silence which rings in our ears. I almost hear the blood coursing in my veins; I hear the beating of my own heart perfectly. At first the position interests me. To sit in the midst of the silent night on the back of a cliff, as on a horse, and right over a bottomless abyss, that could not be done by some shopkeeper of the city; but soon the air becomes cold, and, to crown everything, Antek begins to philosophize,—
“What is life? Life is just swinishness. People talk about art! art! May I and art be ——. Art is pure monkeying with nature, and meanness besides. Twice I have seen the Salon. Painters sent in so many pictures that one might have made canvas beds of them for all the Jews living; and what were these pictures? The lowest possible pandering to shopkeepers’ tastes, painted for money, or the stuffing of stomachs. A chaos of art, nothing more! Were that art, I would that paralysis had struck it; luckily there is no real art upon earth—there is only nature. Maybe nature is swinishness also. The best would be to jump down here—and end everything quickly. I would do so if I had vodka; but as I have no vodka, I will not, for I have made a vow not to die sober.”
I was used to this gabbling of Antek’s; still, in that silence and bewilderment, in cold, in darkness, at the edge of a precipice, his words made even me gloomy. Fortunately he talked himself out and stopped. He threw a couple of stones more, repeated a couple of times more, “Not a sound,” and then for three hours we were silent.
It seemed to me that daybreak would come before long, when suddenly we heard a calling and the sound of wings.
It was dark yet, and I could see nothing; I was certain, however, that eagles were beginning to circle over the precipice. “Kra! kra!” was heard with greater force above and in the darkness. It astonished me to hear such a multitude of voices, just as if whole legions of eagles were passing. But, happen what might, they were heralding daylight.
After a while, I saw my hands resting on the rocky edge; then Antek’s shoulders were outlined in front of me, precisely like a dark object on a ground somewhat less dark. That ground grew paler each instant. Then a rich, light silver tone began to shine in on the rocks and on Antek’s shoulders. This color filled the darkness more and more, just as if into that darkness some one were pouring a silver liquid which permeated it, mixed with it, and from black made it gray, from gray pearl-color. There was also a certain severity and dampness about us; not only the cliff but the air too seemed moist.
Now more light comes every moment. I am looking, trying to fix in my mind those changes in tone, and am painting a little in my soul, when all at once Antek’s cry interrupts me,—
“Tfu! idiots!”
And his shoulders vanish from my eyes.
“Antek!” I cry, “what are thou doing?”
“Don’t howl! look here!”
I bend over, look—what appears? I am sitting on a rocky cliff which slopes down to a meadow, lying perhaps a yard and a half below me. The moss deadened the sound of the stones, for the meadow is very level; at a distance the road is visible, and on it crows, which I took for eagles. To walk home with the greatest comfort it was merely necessary to take our legs off the rock.
Meanwhile, we had been sitting on that rock, our teeth chattering, through the whole of God’s night.
I know not why, but while waiting in the studio with Antek for the house-owner, that adventure of a year and a half before came to my mind, as if it had happened the previous day. That recollection gave me great solace; therefore I said at once,—
“Dost remember, Antek, how we thought ourselves sitting on the edge of a precipice, and it turned out that there was a level road right before us? It may be the same to-day. We are as poor as church mice, as thou knowest; the house-owner wants to turn us out of the studio; meanwhile all things may change. Let some sluice of glory and money open out to us.”
Antek was sitting just then on the straw bed, pulling on his boots, grumbling the while that life was made up of pulling boots on in the morning and pulling them off at night; that only the man had sense who had courage to hang himself, which, if he, Antek, had not done hitherto, it was simply because he was not only a supreme fool, but a low coward besides.
My outburst of optimism interrupted his meditation; so he raised his fishy eyes and said,—
“Thou, beyond all men, hast something to rejoice at; the other day Suslovski drove thee from his house and the heart of his daughter; to-day the house-owner will drive thee from the studio.”
Alas! Antek told the truth. Three days before I was the betrothed of Kazia Suslovski, but on Tuesday morning—yes, on Tuesday, I received from her father the following letter:—
DEAR SIR ,—Our daughter, yielding to the persuasion of her parents, has consented to break the tie which for her would have been a misfortune. She may find a refuge at all times on the bosom of her mother and under the roof of her father; but it pertains specially to us, her parents, to avoid this extremity. Not only your material position, but your frivolous character, which, in spite of every effort, you are unable to conceal, inclines us and our daughter to return you your word, and to break with you further relations, which, however, does not change our good will toward you.
With esteem,
HELIODOR SUSLOVSKI.
Such was the letter; I agree more or less with this, that out of my material position dog’s boots might be made; but what that pathetic gorilla knows of my character I, in truth, do not understand.
Kazia’s head brings to mind types from the time of the Directory; and it would be finer if she would dress her hair, not in the fashion of to-day, but of that time. I tried even to beg her to do so, but in vain, since she has no mind for such things. But she has a complexion as warm as if Fortuni had painted it.
For that very reason I loved her sincerely; and the first day, after receiving the letter from her father, I went about as if poisoned. Only on the second day, and that in the evening, did I feel a little easier, and say to myself, “If not, then not.” It helped me most to bear the blow that I had my head filled with the Salon and with my “Jews.” I was convinced that the picture was a good one, though Antek predicted that it would be thrown, not only out of the Salon, but out of the antechamber. I began the picture the year before in this way: It is evening. I am walking alone for amusement by the Vistula. I look; I see a basket of apples lost in the river; street Arabs are fishing the apples out of the water; and on the bank are sitting a whole Jewish family in such despair that they are not even lamenting, they are clasping their hands, and looking into the water, as dumb as statues. There is an old Jew there, a patriarch, a poor devil; an old Jewess; a young Jew, a colossal creature as big as Judas Maccabæus; a maiden, freckled somewhat, but with immense character in the outline of her nose and mouth; finally two little Jews. Twilight is coming; the river has a bronze reflection which is simply miraculous. The trees on Saxon Island are all in the light of evening; beyond the island is water, widely spread, tones purple, ultra-marine, tones almost steel, then again tones passing into purple and violet. The aërial perspective, splendid! The transition from some tones to others so subtile and marvellous that the soul just pipes in a man; round about it is quiet, bright calm. Melancholy over all things so that there is a wish to weep; and that group in mourning, sitting as if each person in it had been posing in studios.
In a moment the thought flashed into my head: That is my picture!
I had my portfolio with me, and colors, for I never go walking without them; I begin to sketch on the spot, but I say to the Jews,—
“Sit as you are, don’t move!—a ruble to each one at dark.”
My Jews see the point, in a twinkle, and, as it were, grow to the ground. I sketch and sketch. The street Arabs crawl out of the water, and soon I hear behind me,—
“Painter! painter! When a man steals a thing, he says that he found it.”
But I answer them in their jargon, and win them at once; they even stop throwing chips at the Jews, so as not to injure my work. But, as an offset, my group fall unexpectedly into good humor.
“Jews,” cry I, “be sorrowful;” but the old woman answers,—
“With permission, Pan artist, how can we be sorrowful when you promise us each one a ruble? Let him be sad who has no profit.”
I have to threaten them that I will not pay.
I sketched for two evenings; then they posed for me two months in the studio. Let Antek say what he pleases, the picture is good, for there is nothing cold in it; it has pure truth and a tremendous lot of nature. I left even the freckles on the young Jewess. The faces might be more beautiful; but they could not be truer or have greater character.
I thought so much of this picture that I bore the loss of Kazia more easily. When Antek reminded me of her, the subject seemed one of long ago. Meanwhile, my comrade pulled on his other boot, and I heated the samovar. Old Antonia came with cakes; Antek had been persuading this woman in vain for a year to hang herself. We sat down to tea.
“Why art thou so glad?” asked Antek, peevishly.
“Because I know that thou wilt see something of uncommon interest to-day.”
At this moment we hear steps approaching the studio.
“Thy house-owner! There is thy ‘something uncommon’!”
Saying this, Antek gulps down his tea, which is so hot that tears fill his eyes. Up he springs; and since our little kitchen is in the passage, he hides in the studio behind the costumes, and from his hiding-place cries, with a panting voice,—
“Thou! he loves thee immensely, talk thou to him.”
“He is dying for thee!” answer I, flying to the costumes, “talk thou to him!”
Meanwhile the door opens, and who comes in? Not the house-owner, but the watchman of the house in which the Suslovskis are living.
We rush out from behind the costumes.
“I have a letter for you,” says the watchman.
I take the letter. By Hermes! it is from Kazia! I tear open the envelope, and read as follows,—
I am certain that my parents will forgive us. Come at once; never mind the early hour. We have just returned from the waters in the garden.
KAZIA.
I have no idea what the parents really have to forgive me, but neither have I time to think of it, for I am losing my head from amazement. Only after a while do I give the letter to Antek, and say to the watchman,—
“Friend, tell the young lady that I will come right away—wait, I have no small money, but here are three rubles [all I have] change the bill, take a ruble for yourself, and bring me the rest.”
Speaking in parenthesis, the monster took the three rubles, and did not show himself again. He knew, the abortion, that I would not raise a scandal at Suslovski’s, and took advantage of the position most dishonorably. But at the time I didn’t even notice it.
“Well, Antek, what?” ask I.
“Nothing! Every calf will find its butcher.”
The haste with which I was dressing did not permit me to find an answer befitting this insult from Antek.