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A.P. Chekhov
- The Grasshopper
I
II
III IV
V
VI
VII VIII
I
ALL Olga Ivanovna's friends and acquaintances
were at her wedding.
"Look at him; isn't it true that there is something in him?" she
said to her friends, with a nod towards her husband, as though
she wanted to explain why she was marrying a simple, very
ordinary, and in no way remarkable man.
Her husband, Osip Stepanitch Dymov, was a doctor, and only of
the rank of a titular councillor. He was on the staff of two
hospitals: in one a ward-surgeon and in the other a dissecting
demonstrator. Every day from nine to twelve he saw patients and
was busy in his ward, and after twelve o'clock he went by tram
to the other hospital, where he dissected. His private practice
was a small one, not worth more than five hundred roubles a
year. That was all. What more could one say about him?
Meanwhile, Olga Ivanovna and her friends and acquaintances were
not quite ordinary people. Every one of them was remarkable in
some way, and more or less famous; already had made a reputation
and was looked upon as a celebrity; or if not yet a celebrity,
gave brilliant promise of becoming one. There was an actor from
the Dramatic Theatre, who was a great talent of established
reputation, as well as an elegant, intelligent, and modest man,
and a capital elocutionist, and who taught Olga Ivanovna to
recite; there was a singer from the opera, a good-natured, fat
man who assured Olga Ivanovna, with a sigh, that she was ruining
herself, that if she would take herself in hand and not be lazy
she might make a remarkable singer; then there were several
artists, and chief among them Ryabovsky, a very handsome, fair
young man of five-and-twenty who painted genre pieces, animal
studies, and landscapes, was successful at exhibitions, and had
sold his last picture for five hundred roubles. He touched up
Olga Ivanovna's sketches, and used to say she might do
something. Then a violoncellist, whose instrument used to sob,
and who openly declared that of all the ladies of his
acquaintance the only one who could accompany him was Olga
Ivanovna; then there was a literary man, young but already well
known, who had written stories, novels, and plays. Who else?
Why, Vassily Vassilyitch, a landowner and amateur illustrator
and vignettist, with a great feeling for the old Russian style,
the old ballad and epic. On paper, on china, and on smoked
plates, he produced literally marvels. In the midst of this free
artistic company, spoiled by fortune, though refined and modest,
who recalled the existence of doctors only in times of illness,
and to whom the name of Dymov sounded in no way different from
Sidorov or Tarasov -- in the midst of this company Dymov seemed
strange, not wanted, and small, though he was tall and
broad-shouldered. He looked as though he had on somebody else's
coat, and his beard was like a shopman's. Though if he had been
a writer or an artist, they would have said that his beard
reminded them of Zola.
An artist said to Olga Ivanovna that with her flaxen hair and in
her wedding-dress she was very much like a graceful cherry-tree
when it is covered all over with delicate white blossoms in
spring.
"Oh, let me tell you," said Olga Ivanovna, taking his arm, "how
it was it all came to pass so suddenly. Listen, listen! . . . I
must tell you that my father was on the same staff at the
hospital as Dymov. When my poor father was taken ill, Dymov
watched for days and nights together at his bedside. Such
self-sacrifice! Listen, Ryabovsky! You, my writer, listen; it is
very interesting! Come nearer. Such self-sacrifice, such genuine
sympathy! I sat up with my father, and did not sleep for nights,
either. And all at once -- the princess had won the hero's heart
-- my Dymov fell head over ears in love. Really, fate is so
strange at times! Well, after my father's death he came to see
me sometimes, met me in the street, and one fine evening, all at
once he made me an offer . . . like snow upon my head. . . . I
lay awake all night, crying, and fell hellishly in love myself.
And here, as you see, I am his wife. There really is something
strong, powerful, bearlike about him, isn't there? Now his face
is turned three-quarters towards us in a bad light, but when he
turns round look at his forehead. Ryabovsky, what do you say to
that forehead? Dymov, we are talking about you!" she called to
her husband. "Come here; hold out your honest hand to Ryabovsky.
. . . That's right, be friends."
Dymov, with a nave and good-natured smile, held out his hand to
Ryabovsky, and said:
"Very glad to meet you. There was a Ryabovsky in my year at the
medical school. Was he a relation of yours?"
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