hat he had the lues, he went home and shot
himself...And in the note that he wrote there were amazing things,
something like this: I supposed all the meaning of life to be in the
triumph of mind, beauty and good; with this disease I am not a man, but
junk, rottenness, carrion; a candidate for a progressive paralytic. My
human dignity cannot reconcile itself to this. But guilty in all that
has happened, and therefore in my death as well, am I alone; for that
I, obeying a momentary bestial inclination, took a woman without love,
for money. For that reason have I earned the punishment which I myself
lay upon me..."

"I am sorry for him..." added Platonov quietly.

Jennka dilated her nostrils.

"But I, now, not the very least bit."

"That's wrong...You go away now, young fellow. When I'll need you I'll
call out," said Platonov to the serving-man "Absolutely wrong,
Jennechka! This was an unusually big and forceful man. Such come only
one to the hundreds of thousands. I don't respect suicides. Most
frequent of all, these are little boys, who shoot and hang themselves
over trifles, like a child that has not been given a piece of candy,
and hits itself against the wall to spite those around it. But before
his death I reverently and with sorrow bow my head. He was a wise,
generous, kindly man, attentive to all; and, as you see, too strict to
himself."

"But to me this is absolutely all one," obstinately contradicted
Jennka, "wise or foolish, honest or dishonest, old or young--I have
come to hate them all. Because--look upon me--what am I? Some sort of
universal spittoon, cesspool, privy. Think of it, Platonov; why,
thousands, thousands of people have taken me, clutched me; grunted,
snorted over me; and all those who were, and all those who might yet
have been on my bed--oh, how I hate them all! If I only could, I would
sentence them to torture by fire and iron! ... I would order..."

"You are malicious and proud, Jennie," said Platonov quietly.

"I was neither malicious nor proud...It's only now. I wasn't ten yet
when my own mother sold me; and since that time I've been travelling
from hand to hand... If only some one had seen a human being in me! No!
... I am vermin, refuse, worse than a beggar, worse than a thief, worse
than a murderer! ... Even a hangman...we have even such coming to the
establishment--and even he would have treated me loftily, with
loathing: I am nothing; I am a public wench! Do you understand, Serge