This respectable, intelligent man’s hatred likely harbored a sound cause. It humiliated him, weakened him, and he, not having enough strength to resist, said in a tone meant to curry favor:

“I love nature passionately and regret that I am not a naturalist. I envy you.”

“Well, I neither feel regret, nor do I envy you,” Nadezhda Fyodorovna said. “I don’t understand how anyone can seriously occupy their time with insects and bugs while people are suffering.”

Laevsky shared her opinion. He was totally unfamiliar with the natural sciences and could never sympathize with the authoritative and educated tone of people who thought profoundly about ant antennae and cockroach paws, and he was always annoyed that those people, on the basis of antennae, paws and some kind of proto-plasma (which he always imagined as an oyster), take it upon themselves to answer questions that factor into the origin and life of man. But he heard nothing but lies in the words of Nadezhda Fyodorovna, and, for no other reason than to contradict her, he said:

“The point is not the bugs, the point is research!”

VIII

They began taking their seats in the carriages for the ride home, late, somewhere in the eleventh hour. Everyone was seated, the only ones missing were Nadezhda Fyodorovna and Achmianov, who were chasing each other on the other side of the river and laughing.

“Ladies and gentlemen, hurry up!” Samoylenko yelled to them.

“Perhaps ladies ought not to be given wine,” Von Koren said quietly.

Exhausted by the picnic, Von Koren’s hatred and his own thoughts, Laevsky walked in Nadezhda Fyodorovna’s direction, and when she, cheerful, happy, feeling light as a feather, breathless and giddy, grabbed him by both hands and placed her head on his chest, he took a step back and sternly said:

“You are behaving like … a coquette.”

It came out rather harshly, so that even he began to take pity on her. She could read the pity, the hatred, the vexation on his angry, exhausted face, and her spirits suddenly plummeted. She understood that she’d overdone it, that she had conducted herself too loosely, and, saddened, began to feel weighed down, fat, vulgar and drunk. She took the first available seat in the carriage, together with Achmianov. Laevsky sat with Kirilin, the zoologist with Samoylenko, the deacon with the ladies, and the train left the station.

“There go the macaques for you …” Von Koren began, wrapping himself up in his raincoat and closing his eyes. “Did you hear, she doesn’t want to study insects and bugs because people are suffering. That’s how we brothers are judged by all macaques. A race of slaves, cunning, taught fear by ten generations of the lash and the fist. It trembles, is adoring and burns incense only in the face of violence, but you release a macaque into open territory where there is no one to grab it by the scruff of its neck, that’s where it unfurls and makes a name for itself. Just look at the audacity she displays at art exhibitions, in the museums, in the theaters or drawing conclusions about science: she bristles, rears, argues, criticizes … And will criticize without fail—it’s a slavish trait! You heed what I say: people belonging to the liberal professions are berated more often than swindlers—that’s because three quarters of society are made up of slaves, of these very same macaques. It’s unheard of for a slave to extend his hand and to say in all sincerity ‘Thank you for the work that you do.’ ”

“I don’t know what you want!” Samoylenko said, yawning. “In her naïveté, the poor little thing just wanted to chat with you about intelligent matters, but you pass judgment. You’re angry at him for some reason, and with her by association. And she’s an excellent woman!”

“Hey, enough already! She’s a typical kept woman, debauched and crass. Listen to me, Alexander Davidich, if you encounter a simple broad, one who’s not living with her husband, who does nothing except hee-hees, agrees, and haa-haas, you’d tell her: ‘Get to work.’ Why are you being so timid about this, afraid of speaking the truth? It’s only that Nadezhda Fyodorovna is kept not by some sailor, but by a civil servant.”

Samoylenko grew angry. “What would you have me do? Would you have me beat her?”

“Don’t pander to her vices. We curse vice only when it is out of sight, but that’s just flipping it the bird without removing your hand from your pocket. I am a zoologist, or a sociologist, they’re one and the same, you—you’re a doctor. Society trusts in us. We are obligated to point out that frightful detriment that menaces it, and future generations to come, the likes of ladies like Nadezhda Ivanovna.”

“Fyodorovna,” Samoylenko corrected. “And what is society to do about this?”

“Do? That’s society’s business. In my opinion, the most direct and reliable path is force. Manu militari*, she should be sent back to her husband, and if her husband won’t have her, then give her over to hard labor or some sort of correctional facility.”

“Oofff!” Samoylenko sighed. He was silent, then inquired quietly: “Some days ago you spoke of how those kinds of people, like Laevsky, must be annihilated … Tell me, if it were the case … for argument’s sake, that government or society entrusted you with the task of annihilating him, would you then … resolve the matter?”

“My hand would be steady.”

* By military aid.

IX

Arriving home, Laevsky and Nadezhda Fyodorovna entered their dark, stuffy, boring rooms.