The Darling Page #2

"The Darling" is a poignant short story by Anton Pavlovich Chekhov that explores themes of identity, dependence, and the nature of love. The narrative follows the life of Olga Semyonovna, a woman who effortlessly adapts her identity to fit the men in her life, from her first husband to her subsequent lovers. As she loses herself in their passions and dreams, her own individuality becomes increasingly obscured. Chekhov's subtle yet sharp commentary reveals the emotional cost of such self-abnegation and raises questions about the complexities of human relationships and the search for genuine selfhood. Through rich characterization and a delicate touch, the story unveils the fragility of both love and personal identity.

								


Olenka had received telegrams from her husband before, but this time for
some reason she felt numb with terror. With shaking hands she opened the
telegram and read as follows:

"IVAN PETROVITCH DIED SUDDENLY TO-DAY. AWAITING IMMATE INSTRUCTIONS
FUFUNERAL TUESDAY."

That was how it was written in the telegram--"fufuneral," and the
utterly incomprehensible word "immate." It was signed by the stage
manager of the operatic company.

"My darling!" sobbed Olenka. "Vanka, my precious, my darling! Why did I
ever meet you! Why did I know you and love you! Your poor heart-broken
Olenka is alone without you!"

Kukin's funeral took place on Tuesday in Moscow, Olenka returned home on
Wednesday, and as soon as she got indoors, she threw herself on her bed
and sobbed so loudly that it could be heard next door, and in the
street.

"Poor darling!" the neighbours said, as they crossed themselves. "Olga
Semyonovna, poor darling! How she does take on!"

Three months later Olenka was coming home from mass, melancholy and in
deep mourning. It happened that one of her neighbours, Vassily Andreitch
Pustovalov, returning home from church, walked back beside her. He was
the manager at Babakayev's, the timber merchant's. He wore a straw hat,
a white waistcoat, and a gold watch-chain, and looked more a country
gentleman than a man in trade.

"Everything happens as it is ordained, Olga Semyonovna," he said
gravely, with a sympathetic note in his voice; "and if any of our dear
ones die, it must be because it is the will of God, so we ought have
fortitude and bear it submissively."

After seeing Olenka to her gate, he said good-bye and went on. All day
afterwards she heard his sedately dignified voice, and whenever she shut
her eyes she saw his dark beard. She liked him very much. And apparently
she had made an impression on him too, for not long afterwards an
elderly lady, with whom she was only slightly acquainted, came to drink
coffee with her, and as soon as she was seated at table began to talk
about Pustovalov, saying that he was an excellent man whom one could
thoroughly depend upon, and that any girl would be glad to marry him.
Three days later Pustovalov came himself. He did not stay long, only
about ten minutes, and he did not say much, but when he left, Olenka
loved him--loved him so much that she lay awake all night in a perfect
fever, and in the morning she sent for the elderly lady. The match was
quickly arranged, and then came the wedding.

Pustovalov and Olenka got on very well together when they were married.

Usually he sat in the office till dinner-time, then he went out on
business, while Olenka took his place, and sat in the office till
evening, making up accounts and booking orders.

"Timber gets dearer every year; the price rises twenty per cent," she
would say to her customers and friends. "Only fancy we used to sell
local timber, and now Vassitchka always has to go for wood to the
Mogilev district. And the freight!" she would add, covering her cheeks
with her hands in horror. "The freight!"

It seemed to her that she had been in the timber trade for ages and
ages, and that the most important and necessary thing in life was
timber; and there was something intimate and touching to her in the very
sound of words such as "baulk," "post," "beam," "pole," "scantling,"
"batten," "lath," "plank," etc.

At night when she was asleep she dreamed of perfect mountains of planks
and boards, and long strings of wagons, carting timber somewhere far
away. She dreamed that a whole regiment of six-inch beams forty feet
high, standing on end, was marching upon the timber-yard; that logs,
beams, and boards knocked together with the resounding crash of dry
wood, kept falling and getting up again, piling themselves on each
other. Olenka cried out in her sleep, and Pustovalov said to her
tenderly: "Olenka, what's the matter, darling? Cross yourself!"

Her husband's ideas were hers. If he thought the room was too hot, or
that business was slack, she thought the same. Her husband did not care
for entertainments, and on holidays he stayed at home. She did likewise.

"You are always at home or in the office," her friends said to her. "You
should go to the theatre, darling, or to the circus."

"Vassitchka and I have no time to go to theatres," she would answer
sedately. "We have no time for nonsense. What's the use of these
theatres?"

On Saturdays Pustovalov and she used to go to the evening service; on
holidays to early mass, and they walked side by side with softened faces
as they came home from church. There was a pleasant fragrance about them
both, and her silk dress rustled agreeably. At home they drank tea, with
fancy bread and jams of various kinds, and afterwards they ate pie.
Every day at twelve o'clock there was a savoury smell of beet-root soup
and of mutton or duck in their yard, and on fast-days of fish, and no
one could pass the gate without feeling hungry. In the office the
samovar was always boiling, and customers were regaled with tea and
cracknels. Once a week the couple went to the baths and returned side by
side, both red in the face.

"Yes, we have nothing to complain of, thank God," Olenka used to say to
her acquaintances. "I wish every one were as well off as Vassitchka and
I."

When Pustovalov went away to buy wood in the Mogilev district, she
missed him dreadfully, lay awake and cried. A young veterinary surgeon
in the army, called Smirnin, to whom they had let their lodge, used
sometimes to come in in the evening. He used to talk to her and play
cards with her, and this entertained her in her husband's absence. She
was particularly interested in what he told her of his home life. He was
married and had a little boy, but was separated from his wife because
she had been unfaithful to him, and now he hated her and used to send
her forty roubles a month for the maintenance of their son. And hearing
of all this, Olenka sighed and shook her head. She was sorry for him.

"Well, God keep you," she used to say to him at parting, as she lighted
him down the stairs with a candle. "Thank you for coming to cheer me up,
and may the Mother of God give you health."

And she always expressed herself with the same sedateness and dignity,
the same reasonableness, in imitation of her husband. As the veterinary
surgeon was disappearing behind the door below, she would say:

"You know, Vladimir Platonitch, you'd better make it up with your wife.
You should forgive her for the sake of your son. You may be sure the
little fellow understands."

And when Pustovalov came back, she told him in a low voice about the
veterinary surgeon and his unhappy home life, and both sighed and shook
their heads and talked about the boy, who, no doubt, missed his father,
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