“BUT if we can admit the possibility of the supernatural, the possibility of its intervention in real life,—then allow me to inquire, what rôle is sound judgment bound to play after this?”—shouted Antón Stepánitch, crossing his arms on his stomach.
Antón Stepánitch had held the rank of State Councillor,[35] had served in some wonderful department, and, as his speech was interlarded with pauses and was slow and uttered in a bass voice, he enjoyed universal respect. Not long before the date of our story, “the good-for-nothing little Order of St. Stanislas had been stuck on him,” as those who envied him expressed it.
“That is perfectly just,”—remarked Skvorévitch.
“No one will dispute that,”—added Kinarévitch.
“I assent also,”—chimed in, in falsetto, from a corner the master of the house, Mr. Finopléntoff.
“But I, I must confess, cannot assent, because something supernatural has happened to me,”—said a man of medium stature and middle age, with a protruding abdomen and a bald spot, who had been sitting silent before the stove up to that moment. The glances of all present in the room were turned upon him with curiosity and surprise—and silence reigned.
This man was a landed proprietor of Kalúga, not wealthy, who had recently come to Petersburg. He had once served in the hussars, had gambled away his property, resigned from the service and settled down in the country. The recent agricultural changes had cut off his revenues, and he had betaken himself to the capital in search of a snug little position. He possessed no abilities, and had no influential connections; but he placed great reliance on the friendship of an old comrade in the service, who had suddenly, without rhyme or reason, become a person of importance, and whom he had once aided to administer a sound thrashing to a card-sharper. Over and above that he counted upon his own luck—and it had not betrayed him; several days later he obtained the post of inspector of government storehouses, a profitable, even honourable position which did not require extraordinary talents: the storehouses themselves existed only in contemplation, and no one even knew with certainty what they were to contain,—but they had been devised as a measure of governmental economy.
Antón Stepánitch was the first to break the general silence.
“What, my dear sir?”—he began. “Do you seriously assert that something supernatural—I mean to say, incompatible with the laws of nature—has happened to you?”