Forty Stories

At the Post Office

A FEW days ago we attended the funeral of the beautiful young wife of our postmaster, Sladkopertsov. According to traditions handed down from our forefathers, the burial was followed by the “commemoration,” which took place at the post office.

While the pancakes were being offered round, the old widower was weeping bitterly.

“Those pancakes are just as pink as my poor darling,” he said. “So beautiful she was. Indeed she was …”

“Well, that’s true enough,” we all chanted in unison. “She really was beautiful—no doubt about it.”

“True, true. Everyone was amazed when they saw her. Oh, but, gentlemen, I did not love her for her beauty or her gentle disposition alone. It’s natural for women to have these qualities, and many times one finds them in this world below. I loved her for another quality entirely. The truth is I loved my poor darling—may God grant her to enter the Kingdom of Heaven—because in spite of her playfulness and joie de vivre she was always faithful to her husband. She was faithful to me though she was only twenty, and I shall soon be past sixty. She was faithful to her old man!”

The deacon, who was sharing our meal, expressed his disbelief by means of an eloquent, bellowlike cough.

“Why, don’t you believe me?” The widower turned in his direction.

“It’s not that I don’t believe you,” the deacon said in some confusion. “But you know … young wives nowadays … what is it called?… rendezvous … sauce provençale …”

“Then you don’t believe me! Well, I’ll prove it! I kept her faithful to me by means of certain strategical efforts on my part—you might call them fortifications. Because of what I did, and because I am a very cunning man, it was absolutely impossible for my wife to be unfaithful to me. I employed craft to protect my marriage bed. I know some magic words. I have only to say these words, and—basta!—I can sleep in peace as far as unfaithfulness goes.”

“What were the words?”

“Very simple. I spread a terrible rumor round the town. I am sure you know the rumor. I told everyone: ‘My wife Alyona is sleeping with Ivan Alexeyevich Zalikhvatsky, the Chief of Police.’ These words were enough. Not a single man dared to make love to Alyona for fear of the wrath of the Chief of Police. And if anyone so much as caught a glimpse of her, he would soon be running away for dear life, for fear of what Zalikhvatsky might think of him. Hee-hee-hee. Try having anything to do with that whiskered pisspot! You’ll get no satisfaction from him! He’ll write out five official reports about your sanitation, and if he so much as saw your cat wandering about in the street, he would write a report which would make it look as though a herd of cattle were wandering abroad.”

“So your wife didn’t live with Ivan Alexeyevich?” we said in amazement, the truth slowly dawning on us.

“No, of course not! That was where I was clever! Hee-hee. I played the fool with you, eh? Clever, wasn’t I?”

Three minutes passed in silence. We sat and said not a word, and we felt insulted and ashamed for having been so successfully cheated by that fat, red-nosed old man.

“May God grant you to marry again,” the deacon said.

October 1883