The Chorus Girl Page #30

"The Chorus Girl" is a poignant short story by Anton Pavlovich Chekhov that explores themes of love, ambition, and the complexities of human relationships. The narrative follows a young chorus girl who hopes for a better life and dreams of love, but finds herself confronting the harsh realities of her circumstances. Chekhov's insightful character portrayals and subtle social commentary reveal the emotional struggles and unfulfilled desires of the protagonist, ultimately offering a nuanced reflection on the fleeting nature of happiness and the often disillusioning pursuit of dreams.

								

enough to suffocate one. I took out two frames. We were not hungry, but
we sat down to supper.

"Go and wash your hands," said my wife; "you smell of putty."

She had brought some new illustrated papers from the town, and we looked
at them together after supper. There were supplements with fashion
plates and patterns. Masha looked through them casually, and was putting
them aside to examine them properly later on; but one dress, with a flat
skirt as full as a bell and large sleeves, interested her, and she
looked at it for a minute gravely and attentively.

"That's not bad," she said.

"Yes, that dress would suit you beautifully," I said, "beautifully."

And looking with emotion at the dress, admiring that patch of grey
simply because she liked it, I went on tenderly:

"A charming, exquisite dress! Splendid, glorious, Masha! My precious
Masha!"

And tears dropped on the fashion plate.

"Splendid Masha . . ." I muttered; "sweet, precious Masha. . . ."

She went to bed, while I sat another hour looking at the illustrations.

"It's a pity you took out the window frames," she said from the bedroom,
"I am afraid it may be cold. Oh, dear, what a draught there is!"

I read something out of the column of odds and ends, a receipt for
making cheap ink, and an account of the biggest diamond in the world. I
came again upon the fashion plate of the dress she liked, and I imagined
her at a ball, with a fan, bare shoulders, brilliant, splendid, with a
full understanding of painting, music, literature, and how small and how
brief my part seemed!

Our meeting, our marriage, had been only one of the episodes of which
there would be many more in the life of this vital, richly gifted woman.
All the best in the world, as I have said already, was at her service,
and she received it absolutely for nothing, and even ideas and the
intellectual movement in vogue served simply for her recreation, giving
variety to her life, and I was only the sledge-driver who drove her from
one entertainment to another. Now she did not need me. She would take
flight, and I should be alone.

And as though in response to my thought, there came a despairing scream
from the garden.

"He-e-elp!"

It was a shrill, womanish voice, and as though to mimic it the wind
whistled in the chimney on the same shrill note. Half a minute passed,
and again through the noise of the wind, but coming, it seemed, from the
other end of the yard:

"He-e-elp!"

"Misail, do you hear?" my wife asked me softly. "Do you hear?"

She came out from the bedroom in her nightgown, with her hair down, and
listened, looking at the dark window.

"Someone is being murdered," she said. "That is the last straw."

I took my gun and went out. It was very dark outside, the wind was high,
and it was difficult to stand. I went to the gate and listened, the
trees roared, the wind whistled and, probably at the feeble-minded
peasant's, a dog howled lazily. Outside the gates the darkness was
absolute, not a light on the railway-line. And near the lodge, which a
year before had been the office, suddenly sounded a smothered scream:

"He-e-elp!"

"Who's there?" I called.

There were two people struggling. One was thrusting the other out, while
the other was resisting, and both were breathing heavily.

"Leave go," said one, and I recognized Ivan Tcheprakov; it was he who
was shrieking in a shrill, womanish voice: "Let go, you damned brute, or
I'll bite your hand off."

The other I recognized as Moisey. I separated them, and as I did so I
could not resist hitting Moisey two blows in the face. He fell down,
then got up again, and I hit him once more.

"He tried to kill me," he muttered. "He was trying to get at his mamma's
chest. . . . I want to lock him up in the lodge for security."

Tcheprakov was drunk and did not recognize me; he kept drawing deep
breaths, as though he were just going to shout "help" again.

I left them and went back to the house; my wife was lying on her bed;
she had dressed. I told her what had happened in the yard, and did not
conceal the fact that I had hit Moisey.

"It's terrible to live in the country," she said.

"And what a long night it is. Oh dear, if only it were over!"

"He-e-elp!" we heard again, a little later.

"I'll go and stop them," I said.

"No, let them bite each other's throats," she said with an expression of
disgust.

She was looking up at the ceiling, listening, while I sat beside her,
not daring to speak to her, feeling as though I were to blame for their
shouting "help" in the yard and for the night's seeming so long.

We were silent, and I waited impatiently for a gleam of light at the
window, and Masha looked all the time as though she had awakened from a
trance and now was marvelling how she, so clever, and well-educated, so
elegant, had come into this pitiful, provincial, empty hole among a crew
of petty, insignificant people, and how she could have so far forgotten
herself as ever to be attracted by one of these people, and for more
than six months to have been his wife. It seemed to me that at that
moment it did not matter to her whether it was I, or Moisey, or
Tcheprakov; everything for her was merged in that savage drunken "help"-
I and our marriage, and our work together, and the mud and slush of
autumn, and when she sighed or moved into a more comfortable position I
read in her face: "Oh, that morning would come quickly!"

In the morning she went away. I spent another three days at Dubetchnya
expecting her, then I packed all our things in one room, locked it, and
walked to the town. It was already evening when I rang at the
engineer's, and the street lamps were burning in Great Dvoryansky
Street. Pavel told me there was no one at home; Viktor Ivanitch had gone
to Petersburg, and Mariya Viktorovna was probably at the rehearsal at
the Azhogins'. I remember with what emotion I went on to the Azhogins',
how my heart throbbed and fluttered as I mounted the stairs, and stood
waiting a long while on the landing at the top, not daring to enter that
temple of the muses! In the big room there were lighted candles
everywhere, on a little table, on the piano, and on the stage,
everywhere in threes; and the first performance was fixed for the
thirteenth, and now the first rehearsal was on a Monday, an unlucky day.
All part of the war against superstition! All the devotees of the scenic
art were gathered together; the eldest, the middle, and the youngest
sisters were walking about the stage, reading their parts in exercise
books. Apart from all the rest stood Radish, motionless, with the side
of his head pressed to the wall as he gazed with adoration at the stage,
waiting for the rehearsal to begin. Everything as it used to be.
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