His servant, so he thought, was the only man in the world who sympathized with him, yet that kindlier feeling towards him was speedily extinguished by the intolerable consciousness that his serving-man had cause to pity him.
Almost in tears, the soldier blinked his eyes and, going out, sat down on the steps leading to the garden. Fawning upon him, the dog thrust its pretty nose against his knee and looked up at him gravely with dark, questioning eyes. He gently stroked its soft, wavy coat. Overhead shone the silent stars. A sense of fear came over him, as the presage of some great, inevitable mischance.
“Life’s a sad thing!” he thought bitterly, remembering for a moment his own native village.
Sarudine turned hastily over on the sofa and lay motionless, without noticing that the compress, now grown warm, had slipped off his face.
“Now all is at an end!” he murmured hysterically, “What is at an end? Everything! My whole life—done for! Why? Because I’ve been insulted— struck like a dog! My face struck with the fist! I can never remain in the regiment, never!”
He could clearly see himself there, in the avenue, hobbling on all fours, cowed and ridiculous, as he uttered feeble, senseless threats. Again and again he mentally rehearsed that awful incident with ever increasing torture, and, as if illuminated, all the details stood out vividly before his eyes. That which most irritated him was his recollection of Sina Karsavina’s white dress, of which he caught a glimpse at the very moment when he was vowing futile vengeance.
“Who was it that lifted me up?” He tried to turn his thoughts into another channel. “Was it Tanaroff? Or that Jew boy who was with them! It must have been Tanaroff. Anyhow, it doesn’t matter in the least. What matters is that my whole life is ruined, and that I shall have to leave the regiment. And the duel? What about that? He won’t fight. I shall have to leave the regiment.”
Sarudine recollected how a regimental committee had forced two brother- officers, married men, to resign because they had refused to fight a duel.
“I shall be asked to resign in the same way. Quite civilly, without shaking hands … the very fellows that…. Nobody will feel flattered now to be seen walking arm-in-arm with me in the boulevard, or envy me, or imitate my manner. But, after all, that’s nothing. It’s the shame, the dishonour of it. Why? Because I was struck in the face? It has happened to me before when I was a cadet. That big fellow, Schwartz, gave me a hiding, and knocked out one of my teeth. Nobody thought anything about it, but we shook hands afterwards, and became the best of friends. Nobody despised me then. Why should it be different now? Surely it is just the same thing! On that occasion, too, blood was spilt, and I fell down. So that …”
To these despairing questions Sarudine could find no answer.