initial commit of ebook 12144HEADmain

4 files changed, 28976 insertions, 0 deletions

diff --git a/old/12144-8.txt b/old/12144-8.txt
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..ad5c165
--- /dev/null
+++ b/old/12144-8.txt
@@ -0,0 +1,14488 @@
+The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Continental Classics, Volume XVIII.,
+Mystery Tales, by Various
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: The Continental Classics, Volume XVIII., Mystery Tales
+       Including Stories by Feodor Mikhailovitch Dostoyevsky, Jörgen Wilhelm
+       Bergsöe and Bernhard Severin Ingemann
+       
+
+Author: Various
+
+Release Date: April 25, 2004 [EBook #12144]
+[Date last updated: May 9, 2004]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MYSTERIES ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Charles Aldarondo, Project Manager; Keith M. Eckrich,
+Post-Proofer; the Online Distributed Proofreaders Team
+
+
+
+
+
+_THE CONTINENTAL CLASSICS_
+
+VOLUME XVIII
+
+MYSTERY TALES
+
+
+INCLUDING STORIES BY
+
+FEODOR MIKHAILOVITCH DOSTOYEVSKY
+
+JÖRGEN WILHELM BERGSÖE AND
+
+BERNHARD SEVERIN INGEMANN
+
+
+
+1909
+
+
+
+_TABLE OF CONTENTS_
+
+
+RUSSIAN MYSTERY STORIES:
+
+     ALEXANDER SERGEIEVITCH PUSHKIN - The Queen of Spades
+
+     VERA JELIHOVSKY - The General's Will
+
+     FEODOR MIKHAILOVITCH DOSTOYEVSKY - Crime and Punishment
+
+     ANTON CHEKHOFF - The Safety Match
+
+     VSEVOLOD VLADIMIROVITCH KRESTOVSKI - Knights of Industry
+
+     JÖRGEN WILHELM BERGSÖE - The Amputated Arms
+
+     OTTO LARSSEN - The Manuscript
+
+     BERNHARD SEVERIN INGEMANN - The Sealed Room
+
+     STEEN STEENSEN BLICHER - The Rector of Veilbye
+
+
+HUNGARIAN MYSTERY STORIES:
+
+     FERENCZ MOLNAR - The Living Death
+
+     MAURUS JOKAI - Thirteen at Table
+
+     ÉTIENNE BÁRSONY - The Dancing Bear
+
+     ARTHUR ELCK - The Tower Room
+
+
+
+
+_RUSSIAN MYSTERY STORIES_
+
+
+ALEXANDER SERGEIEVITCH PUSHKIN
+
+
+_THE QUEEN OF SPADES_
+
+
+I
+
+There was a card party at the rooms of Naroumoff, of the Horse
+Guards. The long winter night passed away imperceptibly, and it
+was five o'clock in the morning before the company sat down to
+supper. Those who had won ate with a good appetite; the others
+sat staring absently at their empty plates. When the champagne
+appeared, however, the conversation became more animated, and all
+took a part in it.
+
+"And how did you fare, Souirin?" asked the host.
+
+"Oh, I lost, as usual. I must confess that I am unlucky. I play
+mirandole, I always keep cool, I never allow anything to put me
+out, and yet I always lose!"
+
+"And you did not once allow yourself to be tempted to back the
+red? Your firmness astonishes me."
+
+"But what do you think of Hermann?" said one of the guests,
+pointing to a young engineer. "He has never had a card in his
+hand in his life, he has never in his life laid a wager; and yet
+he sits here till five o'clock in the morning watching our play."
+
+"Play interests me very much," said Hermann, "but I am not in the
+position to sacrifice the necessary in the hope of winning the
+superfluous."
+
+"Hermann is a German; he is economical--that is all!" observed
+Tomsky. "But if there is one person that I cannot understand, it
+is my grandmother, the Countess Anna Fedorovna!"
+
+"How so?" inquired the guests.
+
+"I cannot understand," continued Tomsky, "how it is that my
+grandmother does not punt."
+
+"Then you do not know the reason why?"
+
+"No, really; I haven't the faintest idea. But let me tell you the
+story. You must know that about sixty years ago my grandmother went to
+Paris, where she created quite a sensation. People used to run after
+her to catch a glimpse of the 'Muscovite Venus.' Richelieu made love
+to her, and my grandmother maintains that he almost blew out his
+brains in consequence of her cruelty. At that time ladies used to play
+at faro. On one occasion at the Court, she lost a very considerable
+sum to the Duke of Orleans. On returning home, my grandmother removed
+the patches from her face, took off her hoops, informed my grandfather
+of her loss at the gaming-table, and ordered him to pay the money. My
+deceased grandfather, as far as I remember, was a sort of
+house-steward to my grandmother. He dreaded her like fire; but, on
+hearing of such a heavy loss, he almost went out of his mind. He
+calculated the various sums she had lost, and pointed out to her that
+in six months she had spent half a million of francs; that neither
+their Moscow nor Saratoff estates were in Paris; and, finally, refused
+point-blank to pay the debt. My grandmother gave him a box on the ear
+and slept by herself as a sign of her displeasure. The next day she
+sent for her husband, hoping that this domestic punishment had
+produced an effect upon him, but she found him inflexible. For the
+first time in her life she entered into reasonings and explanations
+with him, thinking to be able to convince him by pointing out to him
+that there are debts and debts, and that there is a great difference
+between a prince and a coachmaker.
+
+"But it was all in vain, my grandfather still remained obdurate. But
+the matter did not rest there. My grandmother did not know what to do.
+She had shortly before become acquainted with a very remarkable man.
+You have heard of Count St. Germain, about whom so many marvelous
+stories are told. You know that he represented himself as the
+Wandering Jew, as the discoverer of the elixir of life, of the
+philosopher's stone, and so forth. Some laughed at him as a charlatan;
+but Casnova, in his memoirs, says that he was a spy. But be that as it
+may, St. Germain, in spite of the mystery surrounding him, was a very
+fascinating person, and was much sought after in the best circles of
+society. Even to this day my grandmother retains an affectionate
+recollection of him, and becomes quite angry if anyone speaks
+disrespectfully of him. My grandmother knew that St. Germain had large
+sums of money at his disposal.
+
+"She resolved to have recourse to him, and she wrote a letter to him
+asking him to come to her without delay. The queer old man immediately
+waited upon her, and found her overwhelmed with grief. She described
+to him in the blackest colors the barbarity of her husband, and ended
+by declaring that her whole hope depended upon his friendship and
+amiability.
+
+"St. Germain reflected.
+
+"'I could advance you the sum you want,' said he, 'but I know that you
+would not rest easy until you had paid me back, and I should not like
+to bring fresh troubles upon you. But there is another way of getting
+out of your difficulty: you can win back your money.'
+
+"'But, my dear Count,' replied my grandmother, 'I tell you that I
+haven't any money left!'
+
+"'Money is not necessary,' replied St. Germain, 'be pleased to listen
+to me.'
+
+"Then he revealed to her a secret, for which each of us would give a
+good deal."
+
+The young officers listened with increased attention. Tomsky lit his
+pipe, puffed away for a moment, and then continued:
+
+"That same evening my grandmother went to Versailles to the _jeu de la
+reine_. The Duke of Orleans kept the bank; my grandmother excused
+herself in an offhanded manner for not having yet paid her debt by
+inventing some little story, and then began to play against him. She
+chose three cards and played them one after the other; all three won
+sonika,[1] and my grandmother recovered every farthing that she lost."
+
+"Mere chance!" said one of the guests.
+
+"A tale!" observed Hermann.
+
+"Perhaps they were marked cards!" said a third.
+
+"I do not think so," replied Tomsky, gravely.
+
+"What!" said Naroumoff, "you have a grandmother who knows how to hit
+upon three lucky cards in succession, and you have never yet succeeded
+in getting the secret of it out of her?"
+
+"That's the deuce of it!" replied Tomsky, "she had four sons, one of
+whom was my father; all four were determined gamblers, and yet not to
+one of them did she ever reveal her secret, although it would not have
+been a bad thing either for them or for me. But this is what I heard
+from my uncle, Count Ivan Hitch, and he assured me, on his honor, that
+it was true. The late Chaplitsky--the same who died in poverty after
+having squandered millions--once lost, in his youth, about three
+hundred thousand roubles--to Zoritch, if I remember rightly. He was in
+despair. My grandmother, who was always very severe upon the
+extravagance of young men, took pity, however, upon Chaplitsky. She
+gave him three cards telling him to play them one after the other, at
+the same time exacting from him a solemn promise that he would never
+play at cards again as long as he lived. Chaplitsky then went to his
+victorious opponent, and they began a fresh game. On the first card he
+staked fifty thousand roubles, and won sonika; he doubled the stake,
+and won again; till at last, by pursuing the same tactics, he won back
+more than he had lost."
+
+"But it is time to go to bed, it is a quarter to six already." And,
+indeed, it was already beginning to dawn; the young men emptied their
+glasses and then took leave of each other.
+
+
+II
+
+The old Countess A---- was seated in her dressing-room in front of her
+looking-glass. Three waiting maids stood around her. One held a small
+pot of rouge, another a box of hairpins, and the third a tall cap with
+bright red ribbons. The Countess had no longer the slightest
+pretensions to beauty, but she still preserved the habits of her
+youth, dressed in strict accordance with the fashion of seventy years
+before, and made as long and as careful a toilette as she would have
+done sixty years previously. Near the window, at an embroidery frame,
+sat a young lady, her ward.
+
+"Good-morning, grandmamma," said a young officer, entering the room.
+"_Bonjour_, Mademoiselle Lise. Grandmamma, I want to ask you
+something."
+
+"What is it, Paul?"
+
+"I want you to let me introduce one of my friends to you, and to allow
+me to bring him to the ball on Friday."
+
+"Bring him direct to the ball and introduce him to me there. Were you
+at B----'s yesterday?"
+
+"Yes; everything went off very pleasantly, and dancing was kept up
+until five o'clock. How charming Eletskaia was!"
+
+"But, my dear, what is there charming about her? Isn't she like her
+grandmother, the Princess Daria Petrovna? By the way, she must be very
+old, the Princess Daria Petrovna?"
+
+"How do you mean, old?" cried Tomsky, thoughtlessly, "she died seven
+years ago."
+
+The young lady raised her head, and made a sign to the young officer.
+He then remembered that the old Countess was never to be informed of
+the death of her contemporaries, and he bit his lips. But the old
+Countess heard the news with the greatest indifference.
+
+"Dead!" said she, "and I did not know it. We were appointed maids of
+honor at the same time, and when we were presented to the Empress--"
+
+And the Countess for the hundredth time related to her grandson one of
+her anecdotes.
+
+"Come, Paul," said she, when she had finished her story, "help me to
+get up. Lizanka,[2] where is my snuffbox?"
+
+And the Countess with her three maids went behind a screen to finish
+her toilette. Tomsky was left alone with the young lady.
+
+"Who is the gentleman you wish to introduce to the Countess?" asked
+Lizaveta Ivanovna in a whisper.
+
+"Naroumoff. Do you know him?"
+
+"No. Is he a soldier or a civilian?"
+
+"A soldier."
+
+"Is he in the Engineers?"
+
+"No, in the Cavalry. What made you think that he was in the
+Engineers?"
+
+The young lady smiled, but made no reply.
+
+"Paul," cried the Countess from behind the screen, "send me some new
+novel, only pray don't let it be one of the present day style."
+
+"What do you mean, grandmother?"
+
+"That is, a novel, in which the hero strangles neither his father nor
+his mother, and in which there are no drowned bodies. I have a great
+horror of drowned persons."
+
+"There are no such novels nowadays. Would you like a Russian one?"
+
+"Are there any Russian novels? Send me one, my dear, pray send me
+one!"
+
+"Good-by, grandmother. I am in a hurry.... Good-by, Lizaveta Ivanovna.
+What made you think that Naroumoff was in the Engineers?"
+
+And Tomsky left the boudoir.
+
+Lizaveta Ivanovna was left alone. She laid aside her work, and began
+to look out of the window. A few moments afterwards, at a corner house
+on the other side of the street, a young officer appeared. A deep
+flush covered her cheeks; she took up her work again, and bent her
+head down over the frame. At the same moment the Countess returned,
+completely dressed.
+
+"Order the carriage, Lizaveta," said she, "we will go out for a
+drive."
+
+Lizaveta rose from the frame, and began to arrange her work.
+
+"What is the matter with you, my child, are you deaf?" cried the
+Countess. "Order the carriage to be got ready at once."
+
+"I will do so this moment," replied the young lady, hastening into the
+anteroom.
+
+A servant entered and gave the Countess some books from Prince Paul
+Alexandrovitch.
+
+"Tell him that I am much obliged to him," said the Countess.
+"Lizaveta! Lizaveta! where are you running to?"
+
+"I am going to dress."
+
+"There is plenty of time, my dear. Sit down here. Open the first
+volume and read to me aloud."
+
+Her companion took the book and read a few lines.
+
+"Louder," said the Countess. "What is the matter with you, my child?
+Have you lost your voice? Wait--Give me that footstool--a little
+nearer--that will do!"
+
+Lizaveta read two more pages. The Countess yawned.
+
+"Put the book down," said she, "what a lot of nonsense! Send it back
+to Prince Paul with my thanks.... But where is the carriage?"
+
+"The carriage is ready," said Lizaveta, looking out into the street.
+
+"How is it that you are not dressed?" said the Countess. "I must
+always wait for you. It is intolerable, my dear!"
+
+Liza hastened to her room. She had not been there two minutes before
+the Countess began to ring with all her might. The three waiting-maids
+came running in at one door, and the valet at another.
+
+"How is it that you cannot hear me when I ring for you?" said the
+Countess. "Tell Lizaveta Ivanovna that I am waiting for her."
+
+Lizaveta returned with her hat and cloak on.
+
+"At last you are here!" said the Countess. "But why such an elaborate
+toilette? Whom do you intend to captivate? What sort of weather is it?
+It seems rather windy."
+
+"No, your Ladyship, it is very calm," replied the valet.
+
+"You never think of what you are talking about. Open the window. So it
+is; windy and bitterly cold. Unharness the horses, Lizaveta, we won't
+go out--there was no need to deck yourself like that."
+
+"What a life is mine!" thought Lizaveta Ivanovna.
+
+And, in truth, Lizaveta Ivanovna was a very unfortunate creature. "The
+bread of the stranger is bitter," says Dante, "and his staircase hard
+to climb." But who can know what the bitterness of dependence is so
+well as the poor companion of an old lady of quality? The Countess
+A---- had by no means a bad heart, but she was capricious, like a
+woman who had been spoiled by the world, as well as being avaricious
+and egotistical, like all old people, who have seen their best days,
+and whose thoughts are with the past, and not the present. She
+participated in all the vanities of the great world, went to balls,
+where she sat in a corner, painted and dressed in old-fashioned style,
+like a deformed but indispensable ornament of the ballroom; all the
+guests on entering approached her and made a profound bow, as if in
+accordance with a set ceremony, but after that nobody took any further
+notice of her. She received the whole town at her house, and observed
+the strictest etiquette, although she could no longer recognize the
+faces of people. Her numerous domestics, growing fat and old in her
+antechamber and servants' hall, did just as they liked, and vied with
+each other in robbing the aged Countess in the most bare-faced manner.
+Lizaveta Ivanovna was the martyr of the household. She made tea, and
+was reproached with using too much sugar; she read novels aloud to the
+Countess, and the faults of the author were visited upon her head; she
+accompanied the Countess in her walks, and was held answerable for the
+weather or the state of the pavement. A salary was attached to the
+post, but she very rarely received it, although she was expected to
+dress like everybody else, that is to say, like very few indeed. In
+society she played the most pitiable role. Everybody knew her, and
+nobody paid her any attention. At balls she danced only when a partner
+was wanted, and ladies would only take hold of her arm when it was
+necessary to lead her out of the room to attend to their dresses. She
+was very self-conscious, and felt her position keenly, and she looked
+about her with impatience for a deliverer to come to her rescue; but
+the young men, calculating in their giddiness, honored her with but
+very little attention, although Lizaveta Ivanovna was a hundred times
+prettier than the bare-faced, cold-hearted marriageable girls around
+whom they hovered. Many a time did she quietly slink away from the
+glittering, but wearisome, drawing-room, to go and cry in her own poor
+little room, in which stood a screen, a chest of drawers, a
+looking-glass, and a painted bedstead, and where a tallow candle burnt
+feebly in a copper candle-stick.
+
+One morning--this was about two days after the evening party described
+at the beginning of this story, and a week previous to the scene at
+which we have just assisted--Lizaveta Ivanovna was seated near the
+window at her embroidery frame, when, happening to look out into the
+street, she caught sight of a young Engineer officer, standing
+motionless with his eyes fixed upon her window. She lowered her head,
+and went on again with her work. About five minutes afterwards she
+looked out again--the young officer was still standing in the same
+place. Not being in the habit of coquetting with passing officers, she
+did not continue to gaze out into the street, but went on sewing for a
+couple of hours, without raising her head. Dinner was announced. She
+rose up and began to put her embroidery away, but glancing casually
+out of the window, she perceived the officer again. This seemed to her
+very strange. After dinner she went to the window with a certain
+feeling of uneasiness, but the officer was no longer there--and she
+thought no more about him.
+
+A couple of days afterwards, just as she was stepping into the
+carriage with the Countess, she saw him again. He was standing close
+behind the door, with his face half-concealed by his fur collar, but
+his dark eyes sparkled beneath his cap. Lizaveta felt alarmed, though
+she knew not why, and she trembled as she seated herself in the
+carriage.
+
+On returning home, she hastened to the window--the officer was
+standing in his accustomed place, with his eyes fixed upon her. She
+drew back, a prey to curiosity, and agitated by a feeling which was
+quite new to her.
+
+From that time forward not a day passed without the young officer
+making his appearance under the window at the customary hour, and
+between him and her there was established a sort of mute acquaintance.
+Sitting in her place at work, she used to feel his approach, and,
+raising her head, she would look at him longer and longer each day.
+The young man seemed to be very grateful to her; she saw with the
+sharp eye of youth, how a sudden flush covered his pale cheeks each
+time that their glances met. After about a week she commenced to smile
+at him....
+
+When Tomsky asked permission of his grandmother, the Countess, to
+present one of his friends to her, the young girl's heart beat
+violently. But hearing that Naroumoff was not an Engineer, she
+regretted that by her thoughtless question, she had betrayed her
+secret to the volatile Tomsky.
+
+Hermann was the son of a German who had become a naturalized Russian,
+and from whom he had inherited a small capital. Being firmly convinced
+of the necessity of preserving his independence, Hermann did not touch
+his private income, but lived on his pay, without allowing himself the
+slightest luxury. Moreover, he was reserved and ambitious, and his
+companions rarely had an opportunity of making merry at the expense of
+his extreme parsimony. He had strong passions and an ardent
+imagination, but his firmness of disposition preserved him from the
+ordinary errors of young men. Thus, though a gamester at heart, he
+never touched a card, for he considered his position did not allow
+him--as he said--"to risk the necessary in the hope of winning the
+superfluous," yet he would sit for nights together at the card table
+and follow with feverish anxiety the different turns of the game.
+
+The story of the three cards had produced a powerful impression upon
+his imagination, and all night long he could think of nothing else.
+"If," he thought to himself the following evening, as he walked along
+the streets of St. Petersburg, "if the old Countess would not reveal
+her secret to me! If she would only tell me the names of the three
+winning cards. Why should I not try my fortune? I must get introduced
+to her and win her favor--become her lover.... But all that will take
+time, and she is eighty-seven years old. She might be dead in a week,
+in a couple of days even. But the story itself? Can it really be true?
+No! Economy, temperance, and industry; those are my three winning
+cards; by means of them I shall be able to double my capital--increase
+it sevenfold, and procure for myself ease and independence."
+
+Musing in this manner, he walked on until he found himself in one of
+the principal streets of St. Petersburg, in front of a house of
+antiquated architecture. The street was blocked with equipages;
+carriages one after the other drew up in front of the brilliantly
+illuminated doorway. At one moment there stepped out onto the pavement
+the well-shaped little foot of some young beauty, at another the heavy
+boot of a cavalry officer, and then the silk stockings and shoes of a
+member of the diplomatic world. Fur and cloaks passed in rapid
+succession before the gigantic porter at the entrance. Hermann
+stopped. "Whose house is this?" he asked of the watchman at the
+corner.
+
+"The Countess A----'s," replied the watchman.
+
+Hermann started. The strange story of the three cards again presented
+itself to his imagination. He began walking up and down before the
+house, thinking of its owner and her strange secret. Returning late to
+his modest lodging, he could not go to sleep for a long time, and when
+at last he did doze off, he could dream of nothing but cards, green
+tables, piles of banknotes, and heaps of ducats. He played one card
+after the other, winning uninterruptedly, and then he gathered up the
+gold and filled his pockets with the notes. When he woke up late the
+next morning, he sighed over the loss of his imaginary wealth, and
+then sallying out into the town, he found himself once more in front
+of the Countess's residence. Some unknown power seemed to have
+attracted him thither. He stopped and looked up at the windows. At one
+of these he saw a head with luxuriant black hair, which was bent down,
+probably over some book or an embroidery frame. The head was raised.
+Hermann saw a fresh complexion, and a pair of dark eyes. That moment
+decided his fate.
+
+
+III
+
+Lizaveta Ivanovna had scarcely taken off her hat and cloak, when the
+Countess sent for her, and again ordered her to get the carriage
+ready. The vehicle drew up before the door, and they prepared to take
+their seats. Just at the moment when two footmen were assisting the
+old lady to enter the carriage, Lizaveta saw her Engineer standing
+close beside the wheel; he grasped her hand; alarm caused her to lose
+her presence of mind, and the young man disappeared--but not before he
+had left a letter between her fingers. She concealed it in her glove,
+and during the whole of the drive she neither saw nor heard anything.
+It was the custom of the Countess, when out for an airing in her
+carriage, to be constantly asking such questions as "Who was that
+person that met us just now? What is the name of this bridge? What is
+written on that sign-board?" On this occasion, however, Lizaveta
+returned such vague and absurd answers, that the Countess became angry
+with her.
+
+"What is the matter with you, my dear?" she exclaimed. "Have you taken
+leave of your senses, or what is it? Do you not hear me or understand
+what I say? Heaven be thanked, I am still in my right mind and speak
+plainly enough!"
+
+Lizaveta Ivanovna did not hear her. On returning home she ran to her
+room, and drew the letter out of her glove: it was not sealed.
+Lizaveta read it. The letter contained a declaration of love; it was
+tender, respectful, and copied word for word from a German novel. But
+Lizaveta did not know anything of the German language, and she was
+quite delighted.
+
+For all that, the letter caused her to feel exceedingly uneasy. For
+the first time in her life she was entering into secret and
+confidential relations with a young man. His boldness alarmed her. She
+reproached herself for her imprudent behavior, and knew not what to
+do. Should she cease to sit at the window, and, by assuming an
+appearance of indifference towards him, put a check upon the young
+officer's desire for further acquaintance with her? Should she send
+his letter back to him, or should she answer him in a cold and decided
+manner? There was nobody to whom she could turn in her perplexity, for
+she had neither female friend nor adviser. At length she resolved to
+reply to him.
+
+She sat down at her little writing table, took pen and paper, and
+began to think. Several times she began her letter and then tore it
+up; the way she had expressed herself seemed to her either too
+inviting or too cold and decisive. At last she succeeded in writing a
+few lines with which she felt satisfied.
+
+"I am convinced," she wrote, "that your intentions are honorable, and
+that you do not wish to offend me by any imprudent behavior, but our
+acquaintance must not begin in such a manner. I return you your
+letter, and I hope that I shall never have any cause to complain of
+this undeserved slight."
+
+The next day, as soon as Hermann made his appearance, Lizaveta rose
+from her embroidery, went into the drawing-room, opened the
+ventilator, and threw the letter into the street, trusting that the
+young officer would have the perception to pick it up.
+
+Hermann hastened forward, picked it up, and then repaired to a
+confectioner's shop. Breaking the seal of the envelope, he found
+inside it his own letter and Lizaveta's reply. He had expected this,
+and he returned home, his mind deeply occupied with his intrigue.
+
+Three days afterwards a bright-eyed young girl from a milliner's
+establishment brought Lizaveta a letter. Lizaveta opened it with great
+uneasiness, fearing that it was a demand for money, when, suddenly,
+she recognized Hermann's handwriting.
+
+"You have made a mistake, my dear," said she. "This letter is not for
+me."
+
+"Oh, yes, it is for you," replied the girl, smiling very knowingly.
+"Have the goodness to read it."
+
+Lizaveta glanced at the letter. Hermann requested an interview.
+
+"It cannot be," she cried, alarmed at the audacious request and the
+manner in which it was made. "This letter is certainly not for me,"
+and she tore it into fragments.
+
+"If the letter was not for you, why have you torn it up?" said the
+girl. "I should have given it back to the person who sent it."
+
+"Be good enough, my dear," said Lizaveta, disconcerted by this remark,
+"not to bring me any more letters for the future, and tell the person
+who sent you that he ought to be ashamed."
+
+But Hermann was not the man to be thus put off. Every day Lizaveta
+received from him a letter, sent now in this way, now in that. They
+were no longer translated from the German. Hermann wrote them under
+the inspiration of passion, and spoke in his own language, and they
+bore full testimony to the inflexibility of his desire, and the
+disordered condition of his uncontrollable imagination. Lizaveta no
+longer thought of sending them back to him; she became intoxicated
+with them, and began to reply to them, and little by little her
+answers became longer and more affectionate. At last she threw out of
+the window to him the following letter:
+
+"This evening there is going to be a ball at the Embassy. The Countess
+will be there. We shall remain until two o'clock. You have now an
+opportunity of seeing me alone. As soon as the Countess is gone, the
+servants will very probably go out, and there will be nobody left but
+the Swiss, but he usually goes to sleep in his lodge. Come about
+half-past eleven. Walk straight upstairs. If you meet anybody in the
+anteroom, ask if the Countess is at home. You will be told 'No,' in
+which case there will be nothing left for you to do but to go away
+again. But it is most probable that you will meet nobody. The
+maidservants will all be together in one room. On leaving the
+anteroom, turn to the left, and walk straight on until you reach the
+Countess's bedroom. In the bedroom, behind a screen, you will find two
+doors: the one on the right leads to a cabinet, which the Countess
+never enters; the one on the left leads to a corridor, at the end of
+which is a little winding staircase; this leads to my room."
+
+Hermann trembled like a tiger as he waited for the appointed time to
+arrive. At ten o'clock in the evening he was already in front of the
+Countess's house. The weather was terrible; the wind blew with great
+violence, the sleety snow fell in large flakes, the lamps emitted a
+feeble light, the streets were deserted; from time to time a sledge
+drawn by a sorry-looking hack, passed by on the lookout for a belated
+passenger. Hermann was enveloped in a thick overcoat, and felt neither
+wind nor snow.
+
+At last the Countess's carriage drew up. Hermann saw two footmen carry
+out in their arms the bent form of the old lady, wrapped in sable fur,
+and immediately behind her, clad in a warm mantle, and with her head
+ornamented with a wreath of fresh flowers, followed Lizaveta. The door
+was closed. The carriage rolled heavily away through the yielding
+snow. The porter shut the street door, the windows became dark.
+
+Hermann began walking up and down near the deserted house; at length
+he stopped under a lamp, and glanced at his watch: it was twenty
+minutes past eleven. He remained standing under the lamp, his eyes
+fixed upon the watch impatiently waiting for the remaining minutes to
+pass. At half-past eleven precisely Hermann ascended the steps of the
+house and made his way into the brightly-illuminated vestibule. The
+porter was not there. Hermann hastily ascended the staircase, opened
+the door of the anteroom, and saw a footman sitting asleep in an
+antique chair by the side of a lamp. With a light, firm step Hermann
+passed by him. The drawing-room and dining-room were in darkness, but
+a feeble reflection penetrated thither from the lamp in the anteroom.
+
+Hermann reached the Countess's bedroom. Before a shrine, which was
+full of old images, a golden lamp was burning. Faded stuffed chairs
+and divans with soft cushions stood in melancholy symmetry around the
+room, the walls of which were hung with china silk. On one side of the
+room hung two portraits painted in Paris by Madame Lebrun. One of
+these represented a stout, red-faced man of about forty years of age,
+in a bright green uniform, and with a star upon his breast; the
+other--a beautiful young woman, with an aquiline nose, forehead curls,
+and a rose in her powdered hair. In the corner stood porcelain
+shepherds and shepherdesses, dining-room clocks from the workshop of
+the celebrated Lefroy, bandboxes, roulettes, fans, and the various
+playthings for the amusement of ladies that were in vogue at the end
+of the last century, when Montgolfier's balloons and Niesber's
+magnetism were the rage. Hermann stepped behind the screen. At the
+back of it stood a little iron bedstead; on the right was the door
+which led to the cabinet; on the left, the other which led to the
+corridor. He opened the latter, and saw the little winding staircase
+which led to the room of the poor companion. But he retraced his steps
+and entered the dark cabinet.
+
+The time passed slowly. All was still. The clock in the drawing-room
+struck twelve, the strokes echoed through the room one after the
+other, and everything was quiet again. Hermann stood leaning against
+the cold stove. He was calm, his heart beat regularly, like that of a
+man resolved upon a dangerous but inevitable undertaking. One o'clock
+in the morning struck; then two, and he heard the distant noise of
+carriage-wheels. An involuntary agitation took possession of him. The
+carriage drew near and stopped. He heard the sound of the carriage
+steps being let down. All was bustle within the house. The servants
+were running hither and thither, there was a confusion of voices, and
+the rooms were lit up. Three antiquated chambermaids entered the
+bedroom, and they were shortly afterwards followed by the Countess,
+who, more dead than alive, sank into a Voltaire armchair. Hermann
+peeped through a chink. Lizaveta Ivanovna passed close by him, and he
+heard her hurried steps as she hastened up the little spiral
+staircase. For a moment his heart was assailed by something like a
+pricking of conscience, but the emotion was only transitory, and his
+heart became petrified as before.
+
+The Countess began to undress before her looking-glass. Her
+rose-bedecked cap was taken off, and then her powdered wig was removed
+from off her white and closely cut hair. Hairpins fell in showers
+around her. Her yellow satin dress, brocaded with silver, fell down at
+her swollen feet.
+
+Hermann was a witness of the repugnant mysteries of her toilette; at
+last the Countess was in her night-cap and dressing-gown, and in this
+costume, more suitable to her age, she appeared less hideous and
+deformed.
+
+Like all old people, in general, the Countess suffered from
+sleeplessness. Having undressed, she seated herself at the window in a
+Voltaire armchair, and dismissed her maids. The candles were taken
+away, and once more the room was left with only one lamp burning in
+it. The Countess sat there looking quite yellow, mumbling with her
+flaccid lips and swaying to and fro. Her dull eyes expressed complete
+vacancy of mind, and, looking at her, one would have thought that the
+rocking of her body was not a voluntary action of her own, but was
+produced by the action of some concealed galvanic mechanism.
+
+Suddenly the death-like face assumed an inexplicable expression. The
+lips ceased to tremble, the eyes became animated: before the Countess
+stood an unknown man.
+
+"Do not be alarmed, for Heaven's sake, do not be alarmed!" said he in
+a low but distinct voice. "I have no intention of doing you any harm;
+I have only come to ask a favor of you."
+
+The old woman looked at him in silence, as if she had not heard what
+he had said. Hermann thought that she was deaf, and, bending down
+towards her ear, he repeated what he had said. The aged Countess
+remained silent as before.
+
+"You can insure the happiness of my life," continued Hermann, "and it
+will cost you nothing. I know that you can name three cards in
+order--"
+
+Hermann stopped. The Countess appeared now to understand what he
+wanted; she seemed as if seeking for words to reply.
+
+"It was a joke," she replied at last. "I assure you it was only a
+joke."
+
+"There is no joking about the matter," replied Hermann, angrily.
+"Remember Chaplitsky, whom you helped to win."
+
+The Countess became visibly uneasy. Her features expressed strong
+emotion, but they quickly resumed their former immobility.
+
+"Can you not name me these three winning cards?" continued Hermann.
+
+The Countess remained silent; Hermann continued:
+
+"For whom are you preserving your secret? For your grandsons? They are
+rich enough without it, they do not know the worth of money. Your
+cards would be of no use to a spendthrift. He who cannot preserve his
+paternal inheritance will die in want, even though he had a demon at
+his service. I am not a man of that sort. I know the value of money.
+Your three cards will not be thrown away upon me. Come!"
+
+He paused and tremblingly awaited her reply. The Countess remained
+silent. Hermann fell upon his knees.
+
+"If your heart has ever known the feeling of love," said he, "if you
+remember its rapture, if you have ever smiled at the cry of your
+new-born child, if any human feeling has ever entered into your
+breast, I entreat you by the feelings of a wife, a lover, a mother, by
+all that is most sacred in life, not to reject my prayer. Reveal to me
+your secret. Of what use is it to you? May be it is connected with
+some terrible sin, with the loss of eternal salvation, with some
+bargain with the devil. Reflect, you are old, you have not long to
+live--I am ready to take your sins upon my soul. Only reveal to me
+your secret. Remember that the happiness of a man is in your hands,
+that not only I, but my children and my grandchildren, will bless your
+memory and reverence you as a saint."
+
+The old Countess answered not a word.
+
+Hermann rose to his feet.
+
+"You old hag!" he exclaimed, grinding his teeth, "then I will make you
+answer!" With these words he drew a pistol from his pocket. At the
+sight of the pistol, the Countess for the second time exhibited strong
+emotions. She shook her head, and raised her hands as if to protect
+herself from the shot. Then she fell backwards, and remained
+motionless.
+
+"Come, an end to this childish nonsense!" said Hermann, taking hold of
+her hand. "I ask you for the last time: will you tell me the names of
+your three cards, or will you not?"
+
+The Countess made no reply. Hermann perceived that she was dead!
+
+
+IV
+
+Lizaveta Ivanovna was sitting in her room, still in her ball dress,
+lost in deep thought. On returning home, she had hastily dismissed the
+chambermaid, who very reluctantly came forward to assist her, saying
+that she would undress herself, and with a trembling heart had gone up
+to her own room, expecting to find Hermann there, but yet hoping not
+to find him. At the first glance he was not there, and she thanked her
+fate for having prevented him keeping the appointment. She sat down
+without undressing, and began to call to mind all the circumstances
+which in a short time had carried her so far. It was not three weeks
+since the time when she had first seen the young officer from the
+window--and yet she was already in correspondence with him, and he had
+succeeded in inducing her to grant him a nocturnal interview. She knew
+his name only through his having written it at the bottom of some of
+his letters; she had never spoken to him, had never heard his voice,
+and had never heard him spoken of until that evening. But, strange to
+say, that very evening at the ball, Tomsky, being piqued with the
+young Princess Pauline N----, who, contrary to her usual custom, did
+not flirt with him, wished to revenge himself by assuming an air of
+indifference: he therefore engaged Lizaveta Ivanovna, and danced an
+endless mazurka with her. During the whole of the time he kept teasing
+her about her partiality for Engineer officers, he assured her that he
+knew far more than she imagined, and some of his jests were so happily
+aimed, that Lizaveta thought several times that her secret was known
+to him.
+
+"From whom have you learned all this?" she asked, smiling.
+
+"From a friend of a person very well known to you," replied Tomsky,
+"from a very distinguished man."
+
+"And whom is this distinguished man?"
+
+"His name is Hermann." Lizaveta made no reply, but her hands and feet
+lost all sense of feeling.
+
+"This Hermann," continued Tomsky, "is a man of romantic personality.
+He has the profile of a Napoleon, and the soul of a Mephistopheles. I
+believe that he has at least three crimes upon his conscience. How
+pale you have become!"
+
+"I have a headache. But what did this Hermann, or whatever his name
+is, tell you?"
+
+"Hermann is very dissatisfied with his friend. He says that in his
+place he would act very differently. I even think that Hermann himself
+has designs upon you; at least, he listens very attentively to all
+that his friend has to say about you."
+
+"And where has he seen me?"
+
+"In church, perhaps; or on the parade. God alone knows where. It may
+have been in your room, while you were asleep, for there is nothing
+that he--"
+
+Three ladies approaching him with the question: "oubli ou regret?"
+interrupted the conversation, which had become so tantalizingly
+interesting to Lizaveta.
+
+The lady chosen by Tomsky was the Princess Pauline herself. She
+succeeded in effecting a reconciliation with him during the numerous
+turns of the dance, after which he conducted her to her chair. On
+returning to his place, Tomsky thought no more either of Hermann or
+Lizaveta. She longed to renew the interrupted conversation, but the
+mazurka came to an end, and shortly afterwards the old Countess took
+her departure.
+
+Tomsky's words were nothing more than the customary small talk of the
+dance, but they sank deep into the soul of the young dreamer. The
+portrait, sketched by Tomsky, coincided with the picture she had
+formed within her own mind, and, thanks to the latest romances, the
+ordinary countenance of her admirer became invested with attributes
+capable of alarming her and fascinating her imagination at the same
+time. She was now sitting with her bare arms crossed, and with her
+head, still adorned with flowers, sunk upon her uncovered bosom.
+Suddenly the door opened and Hermann entered. She shuddered.
+
+"Where were you?" she asked in a terrified whisper.
+
+"In the old Countess's bedroom," replied Hermann. "I have just left
+her. The Countess is dead."
+
+"My God! What do you say?"
+
+"And I am afraid," added Hermann, "that I am the cause of her death."
+
+Lizaveta looked at him, and Tomsky's words found an echo in her soul:
+"This man has at least three crimes upon his conscience!" Hermann sat
+down by the window near her, and related all that had happened.
+
+Lizaveta listened to him in terror. So all those passionate letters,
+those ardent desires, this bold, obstinate pursuit--all this was not
+love! Money--that was what his soul yearned for! She could not satisfy
+his desire and make him happy. The poor girl had been nothing but the
+blind tool of a robber, of the murderer of her aged benefactress! She
+wept bitter tears of agonized repentance. Hermann gazed at her in
+silence; his heart, too, was a prey to violent emotion, but neither
+the tears of the poor girl, nor the wonderful charm of her beauty,
+enhanced by her grief, could produce any impression upon his hardened
+soul. He felt no pricking of conscience at the thought of the dead old
+woman. One thing only grieved him: the irreparable loss of the secret
+from which he had expected to obtain great wealth.
+
+"You are a monster!" said Lizaveta at last.
+
+"I did not wish for her death," replied Hermann, "my pistol was not
+loaded." Both remained silent. The day began to dawn. Lizaveta
+extinguished her candle, a pale light illumined her room. She wiped
+her tear-stained eyes, and raised them towards Hermann. He was sitting
+near the window, with his arms crossed, and with a fierce frown upon
+his forehead. In this attitude he bore a striking resemblance to the
+portrait of Napoleon. This resemblance struck Lizaveta even.
+
+"How shall I get you out of the house?" said she at last. "I thought
+of conducting you down the secret staircase."
+
+"I will go alone," he answered.
+
+Lizaveta arose, took from her drawer a key, handed it to Hermann, and
+gave him the necessary instructions. Hermann pressed her cold, inert
+hand, kissed her bowed head, and left the room.
+
+He descended the winding staircase, and once more entered the
+Countess's bedroom. The dead old lady sat as if petrified, her face
+expressed profound tranquillity. Hermann stopped before her, and gazed
+long and earnestly at her, as if he wished to convince himself of the
+terrible reality. At last he entered the cabinet, felt behind the
+tapestry for the door, and then began to descend the dark staircase,
+filled with strange emotions. "Down this very staircase," thought he,
+"perhaps coming from the very same room, and at this very same hour
+sixty years ago, there may have glided, in an embroidered coat, with
+his hair dressed _a l'oiseau royal_, and pressing to his heart his
+three-cornered hat, some young gallant who has long been mouldering in
+the grave, but the heart of his aged mistress has only today ceased to
+beat."
+
+At the bottom of the staircase Hermann found a door, which he opened
+with a key, and then traversed a corridor which conducted him into the
+street.
+
+
+V
+
+Three days after the fatal night, at nine o'clock in the morning,
+Hermann repaired to the Convent of ----, where the last honors were to
+be paid to the mortal remains of the old Countess. Although feeling no
+remorse, he could not altogether stifle the voice of conscience, which
+said to him: "You are the murderer of the old woman!" In spite of his
+entertaining very little religious belief, he was exceedingly
+superstitious; and believing that the dead Countess might exercise an
+evil influence on his life, he resolved to be present at her obsequies
+in order to implore her pardon.
+
+The church was full. It was with difficulty that Hermann made his way
+through the crowd of people. The coffin was placed upon a rich
+catafalque beneath a velvet baldachin. The deceased Countess lay
+within it, with her hands crossed upon her breast, with a lace cap
+upon her head, and dressed in a white satin robe. Around the
+catafalque stood the members of her household; the servants in black
+caftans, with armorial ribbons upon their shoulders and candles in
+their hands; the relatives--children, grandchildren, and
+great-grandchildren--in deep mourning.
+
+Nobody wept, tears would have been an affectation. The Countess was so
+old that her death could have surprised nobody, and her relatives had
+long looked upon her as being out of the world. A famous preacher
+delivered the funeral sermon. In simple and touching words he
+described the peaceful passing away of the righteous, who had passed
+long years in calm preparation for a Christian end. "The angel of
+death found her," said the orator, "engaged in pious meditation and
+waiting for the midnight bridegroom."
+
+The service concluded amidst profound silence. The relatives went
+forward first to take a farewell of the corpse. Then followed the
+numerous guests, who had come to render the last homage to her who for
+so many years had been a participator in their frivolous amusements.
+After these followed the members of the Countess's household. The last
+of these an old woman of the same age as the deceased. Two young women
+led her forward by the hand. She had not strength enough to bow down
+to the ground--she merely shed a few tears, and kissed the cold hand
+of the mistress.
+
+Herman now resolved to approach the coffin. He knelt down upon the
+cold stones, and remained in that position for some minutes; at last
+he arose as pale as the deceased Countess herself; he ascended the
+steps of the catafalque and bent over the corpse.... At that moment it
+seemed to him that the dead woman darted a mocking look at him and
+winked with one eye. Hermann started back, took a false step, and fell
+to the ground. Several persons hurried forward and raised him up. At
+the same moment Lizaveta Ivanovna was borne fainting into the porch of
+the church. This episode disturbed for some minutes the solemnity of
+the gloomy ceremony. Among the congregation arose a deep murmur, and a
+tall, thin chamberlain, a near relative of the deceased, whispered in
+the ear of an Englishman, who was standing near him, that the young
+officer was a natural son of the Countess, to which the Englishman
+coldly replied "Oh!"
+
+During the whole of that day Hermann was strangely excited. Repairing
+to an out of the way restaurant to dine, he drank a great deal of
+wine, contrary to his usual custom, in the hope of deadening his
+inward agitation. But the wine only served to excite his imagination
+still more. On returning home he threw himself upon his bed without
+undressing, and fell into a deep sleep.
+
+When he woke up it was already night, and the moon was shining into
+the room. He looked at his watch: it was a quarter to three. Sleep had
+left him; he sat down upon his bed, and thought of the funeral of the
+old Countess.
+
+At that moment somebody in the street looked in at his window and
+immediately passed on again. Hermann paid no attention to this
+incident. A few moments afterwards he heard the door of his anteroom
+open. Hermann thought that it was his orderly, drunk as usual,
+returning from some nocturnal expedition, but presently he heard
+footsteps that were unknown to him: somebody was walking softly over
+the floor in slippers. The door opened, and a woman dressed in white
+entered the room. Hermann mistook her for his old nurse, and wondered
+what could bring her there at that hour of the night. But the white
+woman glided rapidly across the room and stood before him--and Hermann
+thought he recognized the Countess.
+
+"I have come to you against my wish," she said in a firm voice, "but I
+have been ordered to grant your request. Three, seven, ace, will win
+for you if played in succession, but only on these conditions: that
+you do not play more than one card in twenty-four-hours, and that you
+never play again during the rest of your life. I forgive you my death,
+on condition that you marry my companion, Lizaveta Ivanovna."
+
+With these words she turned round very quietly, walked with a
+shuffling gait towards the door, and disappeared. Hermann heard the
+street door open and shut, and again he saw someone look in at him
+through the window.
+
+For a long time Hermann could not recover himself. He then rose up and
+entered the next room. His orderly was lying asleep upon the floor,
+and he had much difficulty in waking him. The orderly was drunk as
+usual, and no information could be obtained from him. The street door
+was locked. Hermann returned to his room, lit his candle, and wrote
+down all the details of his vision.
+
+
+VI
+
+Two fixed ideas can no more exist together in the moral world than two
+bodies can occupy one and the same physical world. "Three, seven, ace"
+soon drove out of Hermann's mind the thought of the dead Countess.
+"Three, seven, ace" were perpetually running through his head, and
+continually being repeated by his lips. If he saw a young girl, he
+would say: "How slender she is; quite like the three of hearts." If
+anybody asked "What is the time?" he would reply: "Five minutes to
+seven." Every stout man that he saw reminded him of the ace. "Three,
+seven, ace" haunted him in his sleep, and assumed all possible shapes.
+The threes bloomed before him in the forms of magnificent flowers, the
+sevens were represented by Gothic portals, and the aces became
+transformed into gigantic spiders. One thought alone occupied his
+whole mind--to make a profitable use of the secret which he had
+purchased so dearly. He thought of applying for a furlough so as to
+travel abroad. He wanted to go to Paris and tempt fortune in some
+gambling houses that abounded there. Chance spared him all this
+trouble.
+
+There was in Moscow a society of rich gamesters, presided over by the
+celebrated Chekalinsky, who had passed all his life at the card table,
+and had amassed millions, accepting bills of exchange for his
+winnings, and paying his losses in ready money. His long experience
+secured for him the confidence of his companions, and his open house,
+his famous cook, and his agreeable and fascinating manners, gained for
+him the respect of the public. He came to St. Petersburg. The young
+men of the capital flocked to his rooms, forgetting balls for cards,
+and preferring the emotions of faro to the seductions of flirting.
+Naroumoff conducted Hermann to Chekalinsky's residence.
+
+They passed through a suite of rooms, filled with attentive domestics.
+The place was crowded. Generals and Privy Counsellors were playing at
+whist, young men were lolling carelessly upon the velvet-covered
+sofas, eating ices and smoking pipes. In the drawing-room, at the head
+of a long table, around which were assembled about a score of players,
+sat the master of the house keeping the bank. He was a man of about
+sixty years of age, of a very dignified appearance; his head was
+covered with silvery white hair; his full, florid countenance
+expressed good-nature, and his eyes twinkled with a perpetual smile.
+Naroumoff introduced Hermann to him. Chekalinsky shook him by the hand
+in a friendly manner, requested him not to stand on ceremony, and then
+went on dealing.
+
+The game occupied some time. On the table lay more than thirty cards.
+Chekalinsky paused after each throw, in order to give the players time
+to arrange their cards and note down their losses, listened politely
+to their requests, and more politely still, straightened the corners
+of cards that some player's hand had chanced to bend. At last the game
+was finished. Chekalinsky shuffled the cards, and prepared to deal
+again.
+
+"Will you allow me to take a card?" said Hermann, stretching out his
+hand from behind a stout gentleman who was punting.
+
+Chekalinsky smiled and bowed silently, as a sign of acquiescence.
+Naroumoff laughingly congratulated Hermann on his abjuration of that
+abstention from cards which he had practised for so long a period, and
+wished him a lucky beginning.
+
+"Stake!" said Hermann, writing some figures with chalk on the back of
+his card.
+
+"How much?" asked the banker, contracting the muscles of his eyes,
+"excuse me, I cannot see quite clearly."
+
+"Forty-seven thousand roubles," replied Hermann. At these words every
+head in the room turned suddenly round, and all eyes were fixed upon
+Hermann.
+
+"He has taken leave of his senses!" thought Naroumoff.
+
+"Allow me to inform you," said Chekalinsky, with his eternal smile,
+"that you are playing very high; nobody here has ever staked more than
+two hundred and seventy-five roubles at once."
+
+"Very well," replied Hermann, "but do you accept my card or not?"
+
+Chekalinsky bowed in token of consent.
+
+"I only wish to observe," said he, "that although I have the greatest
+confidence in my friends, I can only play against ready money. For my
+own part I am quite convinced that your word is sufficient, but for
+the sake of the order of the game, and to facilitate the reckoning up,
+I must ask you to put the money on your card."
+
+Hermann drew from his pocket a bank-note, and handed it to
+Chekalinsky, who, after examining it in a cursory manner, placed it on
+Hermann's card.
+
+He began to deal. On the right a nine turned up, and on the left a
+three.
+
+"I have won!" said Hermann, showing his card.
+
+A murmur of astonishment arose among the players. Chekalinsky frowned,
+but the smile quickly returned to his face. "Do you wish me to settle
+with you?" he said to Hermann.
+
+"If you please," replied the latter.
+
+Chekalinsky drew from his pocket a number of banknotes and paid at
+once. Hermann took up his money and left the table. Naroumoff could
+not recover from his astonishment. Hermann drank a glass of lemonade
+and returned home.
+
+The next evening he again repaired to Chekalinsky's. The host was
+dealing. Hermann walked up to the table; the punters immediately made
+room for him. Chekalinsky greeted him with a gracious bow.
+
+Hermann waited for the next deal, took a card and placed upon it his
+forty-seven thousand roubles, together with his winnings of the
+previous evening.
+
+Chekalinsky began to deal. A knave turned up on the right, a seven on
+the left.
+
+Hermann showed his seven.
+
+There was a general exclamation. Chekalinsky was evidently ill at
+ease, but he counted out the ninety-four thousand roubles and handed
+them over to Hermann, who pocketed them in the coolest manner
+possible, and immediately left the house.
+
+The next evening Hermann appeared again at the table. Everyone was
+expecting him. The generals and privy counsellors left their whist in
+order to watch such extraordinary play. The young officers quitted
+their sofas, and even the servants crowded into the room. All pressed
+round Hermann. The other players left off punting, impatient to see
+how it would end. Hermann stood at the table, and prepared to play
+alone against the pale, but still smiling Chekalinsky. Each opened a
+pack of cards. Chekalinsky shuffled. Hermann took a card and covered
+it with a pile of bank-notes. It was like a duel. Deep silence reigned
+around.
+
+Chekalinsky began to deal, his hands trembled. On the right a queen
+turned up, and on the left an ace.
+
+"Ace has won!" cried Hermann, showing his card.
+
+"Your queen has lost," said Chekalinsky, politely.
+
+Hermann started; instead of an ace, there lay before him the queen of
+spades! He could not believe his eyes, nor could he understand how he
+had made such a mistake.
+
+At that moment it seemed to him that the queen of spades smiled
+ironically, and winked her eye at him. He was struck by her remarkable
+resemblance....
+
+"The old Countess!" he exclaimed, seized with terror. Chekalinsky
+gathered up his winnings. For some time Hermann remained perfectly
+motionless. When at last he left the table, there was a general
+commotion in the room.
+
+"Splendidly punted!" said the players. Chekalinsky shuffled the cards
+afresh, and the game went on as usual.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Hermann went out of his mind, and is now confined in room number
+seventeen of the Oboukhoff Hospital. He never answers any questions,
+but he constantly mutters with unusual rapidity: "Three, seven, ace!
+Three, seven, queen!"
+
+Lizaveta Ivanovna has married a very amiable young man, a son of the
+former steward of the old Countess. He is in the service of the State
+somewhere, and is in receipt of a good income. Lizaveta is also
+supporting a poor relative.
+
+Tomsky has been promoted to the rank of captain, and has become the
+husband of the Princess Pauline.
+
+
+FOOTNOTES OF _THE QUEEN OF SPADES_:
+
+[1: Said of a card when it wins or loses in the quickest possible
+time.]
+
+[2: Diminutive of Lizaveta (Elizabeth).]
+
+
+
+VERA JELIHOVSKY
+
+
+_THE GENERAL'S WILL_
+
+
+I
+
+It happened in winter, just before the holidays. Ivan Feodorovitch
+Lobnitchenko, the lawyer, whose office is in one of the main streets
+of St. Petersburg, was called hurriedly to witness the last will and
+testament of one at the point of death. The sick man was not strictly
+a client of Ivan Feodorovitch; under other circumstances, he might
+have refused to make this late call, after a day's heavy toil ... but
+the dying man was an aristocrat and a millionaire, and such as he meet
+no refusals, whether in life, or, much more, at the moment of death.
+
+Lobnitchenko, taking a secretary and everything necessary, with a sigh
+scratched himself behind the ear, and thrusting aside the thought of
+the delightful evening at cards that awaited him, set out to go to the
+sick man.
+
+General Iuri Pavlovitch Nasimoff was far gone. Even the most
+compassionate doctors did not give him many days to live, when he
+finally decided to destroy the will which he had made long ago, not in
+St. Petersburg, but in the provincial city where he had played the
+Tsar for so many years. The general had come to the capital for a
+time, and had lain down--to rise no more.
+
+This was the opinion of the physicians, and of most of those about
+him; the sick man himself was unwilling to admit it. He was a
+stalwart-hearted and until recently a stalwart-bodied old man, tall,
+striking, with an energetic face, and a piercing, masterful glance,
+hard to forget, even if you saw him only once.
+
+He was lying on the sofa, in a richly furnished hotel suite,
+consisting of three of the best rooms. He received the lawyer gayly
+enough. He himself explained the circumstances to him, though every
+now and then compelled to stop by a paroxysm of pain, with difficulty
+repressing the groans which almost escaped him, in spite of all his
+efforts. During these heavy moments, Ivan Feodorovitch raised his eyes
+buried in fat to the sick man's face, and his plump little features
+were convulsed in sympathy with the sufferer's pain. As soon as the
+courageous old man, fighting hard with the paroxysms of pain, had got
+the better of them, taking his hands from his contorted face, and
+drawing a painful breath, he began anew to explain his will.
+Lobnitchenko dropped his eyes again and became all attention.
+
+The general explained in detail to the lawyer. He had been married
+twice, and had three children, a son and a daughter from his first
+marriage, who had long ago reached adultship, and a nine-year-old
+daughter from his second marriage. His second wife and daughter he
+expected every day; they were abroad, but would soon return. His elder
+daughter would also probably come.
+
+The lawyer was not acquainted with Nazimoff's family; indeed he had
+never before seen the general, though, like all Russia, he knew of him
+by repute. But judging from the tone of contempt or of pity with which
+he spoke of his second wife or her daughter, the lawyer guessed at
+once that the general's home life was not happy. The further
+explanations of the sick man convinced him of this. A new will was to
+be drawn up, directly contrary to the will signed six years before,
+which bequeathed to his second wife, Olga Vseslavovna, unlimited
+authority over their little daughter, and her husband's entire
+property. In the first will he had left nearly everything, with the
+exception of the family estate, which he did not feel justified in
+taking from his son, to his second wife and her daughter. Now he
+wished to restore to his elder children the rights which he had
+deprived them of, and especially to his eldest daughter, Anna Iurievna
+Borissova, who was not even mentioned in the first will. In the new
+will, with the exception of the seventh part, the widow's share, he
+divided the whole of his land and capital between his children
+equally; and he further appointed a strict guardianship over the
+property of his little daughter, Olga Iurievna.
+
+The will was duly arranged, drawn up and witnessed, and after the
+three witnesses had signed it, it was left, by the general's wish, in
+his own keeping.
+
+"I will send it to you to take care of," he said to the lawyer. "It
+will be safer in your hands than here, in my temporary quarters. But
+first I wish to read it to my wife, and ... to my eldest daughter ...
+if she arrives in time."
+
+The lawyer and the priest, who was one of the witnesses, were already
+preparing to take leave of the general, when voices and steps were
+heard in the corridor; a footman's head appeared through the door,
+calling the doctor hurriedly forth. It appeared that the general's
+lady had arrived suddenly, without letting anyone know by telegram
+that she was coming.
+
+The doctor hastily slipped out of the room; he feared the result of
+emotion on the sick man, and wished to warn the general's wife of his
+grave danger, but the sick man noticed the move, and it was impossible
+to guard him against disturbance.
+
+"What is going on there?" he asked. "What are you mumbling about,
+Edouard Vicentevitch? Tell me what is the matter? Is it my daughter?"
+
+"Your excellency, I beg of you to take care of yourself!" the doctor
+was beginning, evidently quite familiar with the general's family
+affairs, and therefore dreading the meeting of husband and wife. "It
+is not Anna Iurievna...."
+
+"Aha!" the sick man interrupted him; "she has come? Very well. Let her
+come in. Only the little one ... I don't wish her to come ... to-day."
+
+Suffering was visible in his eyes, this time not bodily suffering.
+
+The door opened, with the rustling of a silk dress. A tall,
+well-developed, and decidedly handsome woman appeared on the
+threshold. She glanced at the pain-stricken face, which smiled
+contemptuously toward her. In a moment she was beside the general,
+kneeling beside him on the carpet, bending close to him, and pressing
+his hand, as she repeated in a despairing whisper:
+
+"Oh, Georges! Georges! Is it really you, my poor friend?"
+
+It would be hard to define the expression of rapidly changing emotions
+which passed over the sick man's face, which made his breast heave,
+and his great heart quiver and tremble painfully. Displeasure and
+pity, sympathy and contempt, anger and grief, all were expressed in
+the short, sharp, bitter laugh, and the few words which escaped his
+lips when he saw his little daughter timidly following her mother into
+his room.
+
+"Do not teach her to lie!" and he nodded toward the child, and turned
+toward the wall, with an expression of pain and pity on his face. The
+lawyer and the priest hastened to take their leave and disappear.
+
+"Ah! Sinners! sinners!" muttered the latter, as he descended the
+stairs.
+
+"Things are not in good shape between them?" asked Lobnitchenko. "They
+don't get on well together?"
+
+"How should they be in good shape, when he came here to get a
+divorce?" whispered the priest, shaping his fur cap. "But God decided
+otherwise. Even without a divorce, he will be separated forever from
+his wife!"
+
+"I don't believe he is so very far gone. He is a stalwart old man.
+Perhaps he will pull through," went on the man of law.
+
+"God's hand is over all," answered the priest, shrugging his
+shoulders. And so they went their different ways.
+
+
+II
+
+"Olga!" cried the sick man, without turning round, and feeling near
+him the swift movement of his wife, he pushed her away with an
+impatient movement of his hand, and added, "Not you! my daughter
+Olga!"
+
+"Olga! Go, my child, papa is calling you," cried the general's wife in
+a soft voice, in French, to the little girl, who was standing
+undecidedly in the center of the room.
+
+"Can you not drop your foreign phrases?" angrily interrupted the
+general. "This is not a drawing-room! You might drop it, from a sense
+of decency."
+
+His voice became shrill, and made the child shudder and begin to cry.
+She went to him timidly.
+
+The general looked at her with an expression of pain. He drew her
+toward him with his left hand, raising the right to bless her.
+
+"In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit!" he
+whispered, making the sign of the cross over her. "God guard you from
+evil, from every bad influence.... Be kind ... honest ... most of all,
+be honest! Never tell lies. God guard you from falsehood, from lying,
+even more than from sorrow!"
+
+Tears filled the dying man's eyes. Little Olga shuddered from head to
+foot; she feared her father, and at the same time was so sorry for
+him. But pity got the upper hand. She clung to him, wetting him with
+her tears. Her father raised his hand, wishing to make the sign of the
+cross once more over the little head which lay on his breast, but
+could not complete the gesture. His hand fell heavily, his face was
+once more contorted with pain; he turned to those who stood near him,
+evidently avoiding meeting his wife's eyes, and whispered:
+
+"Take her away. It is enough. Christ be with her!" And for a moment he
+collected strength to place his hand on the child's head.
+
+The doctor took the little girl by the hand, but her mother moved
+quickly toward her.
+
+"Kiss him! Kiss papa's hand!" she whispered, "bid him good-by!"
+
+The general's wife sobbed, and covered her face with her handkerchief,
+with the grand gesture of a stage queen. The sick man did not see
+this. At the sound of her voice he frowned and closed his eyes tight,
+evidently trying not to listen. The doctor led the little girl away to
+another room and gave her to her governess.
+
+When he came back to the sick man the general, lying on the sofa,
+still in the same position, and without looking at his wife who stood
+beside his pillow, said to her:
+
+"I expect my poor daughter Anna, who has suffered so much injustice
+through you.... I have asked her to forgive me. I shall pray her to be
+a mother to her little sister.... I have appointed her the child's
+guardian. She is good and honest ... she will teach the child no evil.
+And this will be best for you also. You are provided for. You will
+find out from the new will. You could not have had any profit from
+being her guardian. If Anna does not consent to take little Olga to
+live with her, and to educate her with her own children, as I have
+asked her, Olga will be sent to a school. You will prefer liberty to
+your daughter; it will be pleasanter for you. Is it not so?"
+
+Contempt and bitter irony were perceptible in his voice. His wife did
+not utter a syllable. She remained so quiet that it might have been
+thought she did not even hear him, but for the convulsive movement of
+her lips, and of the fingers of her tightly clasped hands.
+
+The doctor once more made a movement to withdraw discreetly, but the
+general's voice stopped him. "Edouard Vicentevitch? Is he here?"
+
+"I am here, your excellency," answered the doctor, bending over the
+sick man. "Would not your excellency prefer to be carried to the bed?
+It will be more comfortable lying down."
+
+"More comfortable to die?" sharply interrupted the general. "Why do
+you drivel? You know I detest beds and blankets. Drop it! Here, take
+this," and he gave him a sheet of crested paper folded in four, which
+was lying beside him. "Read it, please. Aloud! so that she may know."
+
+He turned his eyes toward his wife. The doctor unwillingly began his
+unpleasant task. He was a man of fine feeling, and although he had no
+very high opinion of the general's wife, still she was a woman. And a
+beautiful woman. He would have preferred that she should learn from
+someone else how many of the pleasures of life were slipping away from
+her, in virtue of the new will. But there was nothing for it but to do
+as he was ordered. It was always hard to oppose Iuri Pavlovitch; now
+it was quite impossible.
+
+Olga Vseslavovna listened to the reading of the will with complete
+composure. She sat motionless, leaning back in an armchair, with
+downcast eyes, and only showing her emotion when her husband was no
+longer able to stifle a groan. Then she turned toward him her pale,
+beautiful face, with evident signs of heartfelt sympathy, and was even
+rising to come to his assistance. The sick man impatiently refused her
+services, significantly turning his eyes toward the doctor, who was
+reading his last will and testament, as though he would say: "Listen!
+Listen! It concerns you."
+
+It did concern her, without a doubt. General Nazimoff's wife learned
+that, instead of an income of a hundred thousand a year, which she had
+had a right to expect, she could count only on a sum sufficient to
+keep her from poverty; what in her opinion was a mere pittance.
+
+The doctor finished reading, coughing to hide his confusion, and
+slowly folded the document.
+
+"You have heard?" asked the general, in a faint, convulsive voice.
+
+"I have heard, my friend," quietly answered his wife.
+
+"You have nothing to say?"
+
+"What can I say? You have a right to dispose of what belongs to
+you.... But ... still I...."
+
+"Still you what?" sharply asked her husband.
+
+"Still, I hope, my friend, that this is not your last will...."
+
+General Nazimoff turned, and even made an effort to raise himself on
+his elbow.
+
+"God willing, you will recover. Perhaps you will decide more than once
+to make other dispositions of your property," calmly continued his
+wife.
+
+The sick man fell back on the pillows.
+
+"You are mistaken. Even if I do not die, you will not be able to
+deceive me again. This is my last will!" he replied convulsively.
+
+And with trembling hand he gave the doctor a bunch of keys.
+
+"There is the dispatch box. Please open it, and put the will in."
+
+The doctor obeyed his wish, without looking at Olga Vseslavovna. She,
+on her part, did not look at him. Shrugging her shoulders at her
+husband's last words, she remained motionless, noticing nothing except
+his sufferings. His sufferings, it seemed, tortured her.
+
+Meanwhile the dying man followed the doctor with anxious eyes, and as
+soon as the latter closed the large traveling dispatch box he
+stretched out his hand to him for the keys.
+
+"So long as I am alive, I will keep them!" he murmured, putting the
+bunch of keys away in his pocket. "And when I am dead, I intrust them
+to you, Edouard Vicentevitch. Take care of them, as a last service to
+me!" And he turned his face once more to the wall.
+
+"And now, leave me alone! The pain is less. Perhaps I shall go to
+sleep. Leave me!"
+
+"My friend! Permit me to remain near you," the general's wife began,
+bending tenderly over her husband.
+
+"Go!" he cried sharply. "Leave me in peace, I tell you!"
+
+She rose, trembling. The doctor hastily offered her his arm. She left
+the room, leaning heavily on him, and once more covering her face with
+her handkerchief, in tragic style.
+
+"Be calm, your excellency!" whispered the doctor sympathetically, only
+half conscious of what he was saying.
+
+"These rooms have been prepared for you. You also need to rest, after
+such a long journey."
+
+"Oh, I am not thinking about myself. I am so sorry for him. Poor,
+poor, senseless creature. How much I have suffered at his hands. He
+was always so suspicious, so hard to get on with. And whims and
+fantasies without end. You know, doctor, I have sometimes even thought
+he was not in full possession of his faculties."
+
+"Hm!" murmured the doctor, coughing in confusion.
+
+"Take this strange change of his will, for instance," the general's
+wife continued, not waiting for a clearer expression of sympathy.
+"Take his manner toward me. And for what reason?"
+
+"Yes, it is very sad," murmured the doctor.
+
+"Tell me, doctor, does he expect his son and daughter?"
+
+"Only his daughter, Anna Iurievna. She promised to come, with her
+oldest children. A telegram came yesterday. We have been expecting her
+all day."
+
+"What is the cause of this sudden tenderness? They have not seen each
+other for ten years. Does he expect her husband, too? His son-in-law,
+the pedagogue?" contemptuously asked the general's wife.
+
+"No! How could he come? He could not leave his service. And his son,
+too, Peter Iurevitch, he cannot come at once. He is on duty, in
+Transcaspia. It is a long way."
+
+"Yes, it is a long way!" assented the general's wife, evidently busy
+with other thoughts. "But tell me, Edouard Vicentevitch, this new
+will, has it been written long?"
+
+"It was drawn up only to-day. The draft was prepared last week, but
+the general kept putting it off. But when his pains began this
+morning...."
+
+"Is it the end? Is it dangerous?" interrupted Olga Vseslavovna.
+
+"Very--a very bad sign. When they began, Iuri Pavlovitch sent at once
+for the lawyer. He was still here when you arrived."
+
+"Yes. And the old will, which he made before, has been destroyed?"
+
+"I do not know for certain. But I think not. Oh, no, I forgot. The
+general was going to send a telegram."
+
+"Yes? to send a telegram?"
+
+The general's wife shrugged her shoulders, sadly shook her head, and
+added:
+
+"He is so changeable! so changeable! But I think it is all the same.
+According to law, only the last will is valid?"
+
+"Yes, without doubt; the last."
+
+The general's wife bowed her head.
+
+"What hurts me most," she whispered, with a bitter smile, bending
+close to the young doctor, and leaning heavily on his arm, "what hurts
+me most, is not the money. I am not avaricious. But why should he take
+my child away from me? Why should he pass over her own mother, and
+intrust her to her half-sister? A woman whom I do not know, who has
+not distinguished herself by any services or good actions, so far as I
+know. I shall not submit. I shall contest the will. The law must
+support the right of the mother. What do you think, doctor?"
+
+The doctor hastily assented, though, to tell the truth, he was not
+thinking of anything at the moment, except the strange manner in which
+the general's wife, while talking, pressed close to her companion.
+
+At that moment a bell rang, and the general's loud voice was heard:
+
+"Doctor! Edouard Vicentevitch!"
+
+"Coming!" answered the doctor.
+
+And leaving Olga Vseslavovna at the threshold of her room, he ran
+quickly to the sick man.
+
+"A vigorous voice--for a dying man! He shouts as he used to at the
+manoeuvers!" thought the general's wife.
+
+And her handsome face at once grew dark with the hate which stole over
+it. This was only a passing expression, however; it rapidly gave place
+to sorrow, when she saw the manservant coming from the sick man.
+
+"What is the matter with your master, Yakov? Is he worse?"
+
+"No, madam. God has been gracious. He told me to push the box nearer
+him, and ordered Edouard Vicentevitch to open it. He wants to send
+some telegram or other."
+
+"Thank God, he is not worse. Yakov, I am going to send a telegram to
+the station myself, in a few minutes, by my coachman. You can give him
+the general's telegram, too."
+
+"Very well, madam."
+
+"And another thing. I shall not go to bed. If there is any change in
+your master's condition, Yakov, come and knock at my door at once. I
+beg of you, tell me the very moment anything happens. Here is
+something for you, Yakov;--you have grown thin, waiting upon your
+master!"
+
+"I thank you most humbly, your excellency. We must not grudge our
+exertions," the man answered, putting a note of considerable value in
+his pocket.
+
+
+III
+
+Contrary to expectation, the night passed quietly enough. Emotion and
+weariness claimed their own; Olga Vseslavovna, in spite of all her
+efforts, fell into a sleep toward morning; and when she awoke, she
+started in dismay, noticing that the sun had already climbed high in
+the sky, and was pouring into her room.
+
+Her maid, a deft Viennese, who had remained with this accommodating
+mistress for five years, quieted her by telling her that the master
+was better, that he was still asleep, not having slept for the greater
+part of the night.
+
+"The doctor and Yakov were busy with him most of the night," she
+explained. "They were sorting all sorts of papers; some of them they
+tied up, writing something on them; others they tore up, or threw into
+the fire. The grate is full of ashes. Yakov told me."
+
+"And there were no more telegrams?"
+
+"No, madam, there were no more. Yakov and our Friedrich would have let
+me know at once; I was there in the anteroom; they both kept coming
+through on errands."
+
+"But there were no more telegrams, except the two that were sent
+last night."
+
+Olga Vseslavovna dressed, breakfasted, and went to her husband. But at
+the threshold of his room she was stopped by the direction of the sick
+man to admit no one without special permission except the doctor, or
+his eldest daughter, if she should come.
+
+"Tell Edouard Vicentevitch to come out to me," ordered the general's
+wife. The doctor was called, and in great confusion confirmed the
+general's orders.
+
+"But perhaps he did not think that such an order could apply to me?"
+she said, astonished.
+
+The doctor apologized, but had to admit that it was she who was
+intended, and that his excellency had sent word to her excellency that
+she should not give herself the trouble of visiting him.
+
+"He is out of his mind," declared the general's wife quietly, but with
+conviction, shrugging her shoulders. "Why should he hate me so--for
+all my love to him, an old man, who might have been my father?"
+
+And Olga Vseslavovna once more took refuge in her pocket handkerchief,
+this time, instead of tears, giving vent to sobs of vexation. The
+doctor, always shy in the presence of women, stood with hanging head
+and downcast eyes, as though he were to blame.
+
+"What is it they are saying about you burning papers all night?" Olga
+Vseslavovna asked, in a weak voice.
+
+"Oh, not nearly all night. Iuri Pavlovitch remembered that he ought to
+destroy some old letters and papers. There were some to be put in
+order. There, in the box, there is a packet addressed to your
+excellency. I was told to write the address."
+
+"Indeed! Could I not see it?"
+
+"Oh no, on no account. They are all locked up in the box along with
+the last will. And the general has the keys."
+
+A bitter smile of humiliation played about the young woman's lips.
+
+"So the new will has not been burned yet?" she asked.
+
+And to the startled negative of the doctor, who repeated that "it was
+lying on the top of the papers in the box," she added:
+
+"Well, it will be burned yet. Do not fear. Especially if God in His
+mercy prolongs my husband's life. You see, he has always had a
+mysterious passion for writing new documents, powers of attorney,
+deeds of gift, wills, whatever comes into his mind. He writes new
+ones, and burns the old ones. But what can you do? We must submit to
+each new fancy. We cannot contradict a sick man."
+
+Olga Vseslavovna went back to her room. She only left her bedroom for
+a few minutes that day, to hear the final word of the lights of the
+medical profession, who had come together for a general consultation
+in the afternoon; all the rest of the day she shut herself up. The
+conclusions of the physicians, though they differed completely in
+detail, were similar in the main, and far from comforting; the life
+and continued suffering of the sick man could not last more than a few
+days.
+
+In the evening a telegram came from Anna Iurievna; she informed her
+father that she would be with him on the following day, at five in the
+afternoon.
+
+"Shall I be able to hold out? Shall I last so long?" sighed the sick
+man, all day long. And the more he was disturbed in mind, the more
+threatening were his attacks of pain. He passed a bad night. Toward
+morning a violent attack, much worse than any that had gone before,
+almost carried him away. He could hardly breathe, owing to the sharp
+suffering. Hot baths for his hands and steam inhalations no longer had
+any beneficial effect, though they had alleviated his pain hitherto.
+
+The doctor, the Sister of Mercy, and the servant wore themselves out.
+But still, as before, his wife alone was not admitted to him. She
+raged with anger, trying, and not without success, to convince
+everyone that she was going mad with despair. Little Olga had been
+taken away on the previous day by a friend of the general's, to stay
+there "during this terrible time." That night Madame Nazimoff did not
+go to bed at all; and, as befitted a devoted wife, did not quit her
+husband's door. When the violent attack just before dawn quieted down,
+she made an attempt to go in to him; but no sooner did the sick man
+see her at the head of his couch, on which he had at last been
+persuaded to lie, than strong displeasure was expressed in his face,
+and, no longer able to speak, he made an angry motion of his hand
+toward her, and groaned heavily. The Sister of Mercy with great
+firmness asked the general's wife not to trouble the sick man with her
+presence.
+
+"And I am to put up with this. I am to submit to all this?" thought
+Olga Vseslavovna, writhing with wrath. "To endure all this from him,
+and after his death to suffer beggary? No, a thousand times no! Better
+death than penury and such insults." And she fell into gloomy thought.
+
+That gesture of displeasure at the sight of his wife was the last
+conscious act of Iuri Pavlovitch Nazimoff. At eight in the morning he
+lost consciousness, in the midst of violent suffering, which lasted
+until the end. By the early afternoon he was no more.
+
+During the last hour of his agony his wife knelt beside his couch
+without let or hindrance, and wept inconsolably. The formidable
+aristocrat and millionaire was dead.
+
+Everything went on along the usual lines. The customary stir and
+unceremonious bustle, instead of cautious whispering, rose around the
+dead body, in preparation for a fashionable funeral. No near relatives
+were present except his wife, and she was confined to her room,
+half-fainting, half-hysterical. All responsibility fell on the humble
+doctor, and he busied himself indefatigably, conscientiously, in the
+sweat of his brow, making every effort to omit nothing. But, as always
+happens, he omitted the most important thing of all. The early
+twilight was already descending on St. Petersburg, shrouded in chilly
+mist, when Edouard Vicentevitch Polesski struck his brow in despair;
+he had suddenly remembered the keys and the box, committed to his care
+by the dying man. At that moment, the body, dressed in full uniform,
+with all his regalia, was lying in the great, darkened room on a
+table, covered with brocade, awaiting the coffin and the customary
+wreaths. The doctor rushed into the empty bedroom. Everything in it
+was already in order; the bed stood there, without mattress or
+pillows. There was nothing on the dressing table, either.
+
+Where were the keys? Where was the box? The box was standing as
+before, untouched, locked. His heart at once felt lighter. But the
+keys? No doubt the police would come in a few minutes. It was
+astonishing that they had not come already. They would seal
+everything. Everything must be in order. Where was Yakov? Probably he
+had taken them. Or ... the general's wife?
+
+Polesski rushed to look for the manservant, but could not find him.
+There was so much to do; he had gone to buy something, to order
+something. "Oh Lord! And the announcement?" he suddenly remembered. It
+must be written at once, and sent to the newspapers. He must ask the
+general's wife, however, what words he should use. However much he
+might wish to avoid her, still she was now the most important person.
+And he could ask at the same time whether she had seen the keys.
+
+The doctor went to the rooms of the general's wife. She was lying
+down, suffering severely, but she came out to him. "What words was he
+to use? It was all the same to her. 'With deep regret,' 'with
+heartfelt sorrow,' what did she care? The keys? What keys? No! she had
+not seen any keys, and did not know where they were. But why should he
+be disturbed about them? The servants were trustworthy; nothing would
+go astray."
+
+"Yes, but we must have them ready for the police. They will come in a
+few minutes, to seal up the dead man's papers!"
+
+"To seal up the papers? Why?"
+
+"That is the law. So that everything should be intact, until after the
+last will and testament of the deceased has been read, according to
+his wishes."
+
+General Nazimoff's wife paled perceptibly. She knew nothing of such an
+obstacle, and had not expected it. The doctor was too busy to notice
+her pallor.
+
+"Very well; I shall write the announcement at once, and send it to the
+newspapers. I suppose 'Novoe Vremya' and 'Novosti' will be enough?"
+
+"Do as you think best. Write it here, in my room. Here is everything
+you require; pens, paper. Write, and then read it to me. I shall be
+back in a moment. I want to put a bandage round my head. It aches so.
+Wait for me here." And the general's wife went from the sitting-room
+to her bedroom.
+
+"Rita!" she whispered to her faithful maid, who was hurriedly sewing a
+mourning gown of crape for her. "Do not let the doctor go till I
+return. Do you understand? Do what you please, but do not let him go."
+The general's wife slipped from the bedroom into the passage through a
+small side door, and disappeared.
+
+The two rooms between hers and the chamber where the dead man lay were
+quite empty and nearly dark; there were no candles in them. From the
+chamber came the feeble glimmer of the tiny lamps burning before the
+icons.[Sacred images.] The tapers were not lit yet, as the deacon had
+not yet arrived. He was to come at the same time as the priest and the
+coffin. For the moment there was no one near the dead man; in the
+anteroom sat the Sister of Mercy.
+
+"You wish to pray?" she asked the general's wife.
+
+"Yes, I shall pray there, in his room."
+
+She slipped past the dead body without looking at it, to the room that
+had been the general's bedroom, and closed the door behind her. She
+was afraid to lock it, and after all, was it necessary? It would only
+take a moment. There it is, the box! She knows it of old! And she
+knows its key of old, too; it is not so long since her husband had no
+secrets from her.
+
+The key was quickly slipped into the lock, and the lid rose quickly.
+The paper? That new, detestable paper, which might deprive her of
+everything. Ah! there it is!
+
+To close the lid quickly, and turn the key in the lock; to hide the
+keys somewhere; here, between the seat and the back of the sofa, on
+which he lay. That's it!
+
+A sigh of relief from fear escaped the beautiful lips of the handsome
+woman, lips which were pale through those terrible days. She could
+feel secure at last!
+
+She must look at the document, the proof of his cruelty, his
+injustice, his stupidity! She must make sure that there was no
+mistake! Olga Vseslavovna went up to the window, and taking advantage
+of the last ray of the gray day, unfolded the will.
+
+"In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit!" she read.
+Yes, that is it, the will.
+
+"How he pronounced those same words, when he was blessing little
+Olga," she remembered. "Blessing her! And his hand did not tremble,
+when he signed this. To deprive her, to deprive them both, of
+everything, all on account of those hated people? But now--it should
+never be! On no account! Your down-at-the-heel pedagogue shall not
+strut about in peacock's feathers! Olga and I ... require the money
+more!"
+
+And the general's wife was tempted to snap her fingers in triumph in
+the direction of the dead man.
+
+Suddenly, quite close to the door, the sound of steps was heard. Good
+heavens! And she held the big sheet of crested paper in her hand!
+Where could she put it? She had no time to think of folding it up.
+There! they are coming in already! Who can it be?
+
+And the will lay on the floor, the general's wife kneeling on it, as
+on a prayer carpet, in an attitude of prayer, her clasped hands on the
+window sill, her wet eyes fixed on a faintly twinkling star, as though
+calling heaven to witness her inconsolable grief and bereavement.
+
+It was only the Sister of Mercy.
+
+"Madam, the people have come, bringing the coffin; and I think the
+police have also come."
+
+"Yes, in a moment. Tell them I am coming immediately."
+
+The Sister of Mercy went out.
+
+"See how she loved her husband. And why was he so unjust to her at the
+last?" she involuntarily reproached the dead general.
+
+Meanwhile the general's wife had risen hastily, folded the will as
+best she could, in four, in eight folds, and crushing it together in
+her hand, went quietly from the room, which now filled her with dread.
+
+She was so confused that she did not even think of looking for her
+pocket; she simply held her packet tight, and let her hand hang down,
+hiding it in the folds of her wide dressing-gown. There seemed to be
+so many people in the room which a moment before was empty, that she
+felt cowed. Her heart beat pitilessly, and the blood throbbed so
+violently in her temples that she could not understand what was said
+to her. They were asking her if they might place the body in the
+coffin, which had already been placed beside it. Her silence was taken
+as consent. The skilful undertakers easily lifted the already rigid
+body.
+
+Olga Vseslavovna stood at the head of the dead general. Among the
+crowd of undertakers and servants, she suddenly saw coming toward her,
+with outstretched hand, and with tears of compassion in her eyes, the
+Princess Ryadski, the same aristocratic kinswoman who had already
+taken little Olga to stay with her.
+
+"I must shake hands with her! And that horrible packet is in my hand!
+Where shall I put it? How can I hide it?" Before her eyes gleamed the
+brilliantly lighted, ashen forehead of the dead man, helplessly bent
+backward and sideways, as the whole body was suspended in the hands of
+the undertakers, over its last abode.
+
+A saving thought!
+
+The general's wife bent gently over the dead body. She gently
+supported the head of the corpse, gently laid it on the satin cushion,
+straightened the frills which surrounded the hard pillow, and,
+unperceived, left under it the twisted roll of paper.
+
+"It will be safer there!" The thought flashed through her mind. "He
+wanted to keep his will himself; well, keep it to eternity, now! What
+more can you ask?"
+
+And it even seemed ludicrous to her. She could hardly restrain a smile
+of triumph, changing it into a sad smile of grief, in reply to her
+kinswoman's condolences. The coffin was already lying in state on the
+bier; it was covered with brocade and flowers. The princess, as
+kinswoman of the late general, bent low, and first laid on the dead
+body the wreath she had brought with her.
+
+"The poor sufferer has entered into rest," she whispered, shaking her
+head. "Will the funeral service be soon? Where will it be? Where is
+Olga Vseslavovna?"
+
+"She will be here in a moment," the Sister of Mercy whispered, deeply
+affected; "she has gone to fix herself. They will begin the funeral
+service in a few minutes, and she is all in disorder. She is in great
+grief. Will you not take a seat?"
+
+"What? Sit down? Thank you," loftily replied the princess. And she
+went toward a dignified personage who was entering, adorned with many
+orders and an aristocratic beard.
+
+The general's wife soon came to herself. "Rita! I must wash and dress
+as quickly as possible. Ah! pray forgive me, doctor! They called me
+away to my husband. They were placing him in the coffin." She sighed
+deeply. "What is this? Oh, yes, the announcement of his death. Very
+good. Send it, please. But I must dress at once. The funeral service
+will begin immediately."
+
+"Doctor! Is the doctor here?" an anxious voice sounded in the
+corridor.
+
+"I am coming! What is it?"
+
+"Please come quick, Edouard Vicentevitch!" Yakov called him. "The lady
+is very ill downstairs; Anna Iurievna, the general's daughter! I was
+out to order the flowers; I come back, and see the lady lying in a
+faint in the entrance. She had just arrived, and asked; and they
+answered her that he was dead, without the slightest preparation! And
+she could not bear it, and fainted."
+
+Yakov said all this as they went.
+
+"Actress!" angrily thought Olga Vseslavovna. And immediately she added
+mentally, "Well, she may stand on her head now, it is all the same to
+me!"
+
+
+IV
+
+Whether it was all the same to her or not, the deep despair of the
+daughter, who had not been in time to bid her father farewell, had not
+been in time to receive his blessing, after many years of anger, which
+had borne heavily on the head of the blameless young woman, was so
+evidently sincere, and produced such a deep impression on everyone,
+that her stepmother also was moved.
+
+Anna Iurievna resembled her father, as much as a young, graceful,
+pretty woman can resemble an elderly man with strongly-marked features
+and athletic frame, such as was General Nazimoff. But in spite of the
+delicacy of her form, and the gentleness of her eyes, her glance
+sometimes flashed fire in a manner very like the flashing eyes of her
+father, and in her strong will, firm character, and inflexible
+adherence to what she believed to be necessary and right, Anna was
+exactly like her father.
+
+For nearly ten years his daughter had obediently borne his anger; from
+the day of her marriage to the man she loved, whom evil-minded people
+had succeeded in calumniating in the general's mind. Though writing
+incessantly to him, begging him to pardon her, to understand that he
+had made a mistake, that her husband was a man of honor, and that she
+would be fully and perfectly happy, but for the burden of her father's
+wrath, and of the separation from him, she had never until the last
+few weeks received a reply from him. But quite recently something
+mysterious had happened. Not only had her father written to her that
+he wished to see her and her children in St. Petersburg, whither he
+was just setting out, but a few days later he had written again, a
+long, tender letter, in which he had asked her forgiveness. Without
+giving any explanations, he said that he had received indubitable
+proofs of the innocence and chivalrous honor of her husband; that he
+felt himself deeply guilty toward him, and was miserable on account of
+the injustice he had committed. In the following letters, praying his
+daughter to hasten her coming, because he was dangerously ill, and the
+doctors thought could not last long, he filled her with astonishment
+by expressing his intention to make a new will, and his determination
+to separate his youngest daughter "from such a mother," and by his
+prayers to her and her husband not to refuse to take upon themselves
+little Olga's education.
+
+"What had happened? How could that light-minded woman have so deeply
+wounded my father?" Anna asked in bewilderment.
+
+"If she was merely light-minded!" her husband answered, shrugging his
+shoulders. "But she is so malicious, so crafty, and so daring that
+anything may be expected from her."
+
+"But in that case there would be an open scandal. We would know
+something for certain. Nowadays they even relate such stories in the
+newspapers, and my father is so well known, so noteworthy!"
+
+"That is just why they don't write about him!" answered Borisoff, her
+husband, smiling. He himself flatly refused to go to St. Petersburg.
+With horror he remembered the first year of his marriage, before he
+had succeeded in obtaining a transfer to another city, and was
+compelled to meet the woman he detested; compelled also to meet his
+father-in-law, a wise and honorable old man, who had fallen so
+completely into the toils of this crafty woman. Anna Iurievna knew
+that her husband despised her stepmother; that he detested her as the
+cause of all the grief which they had had to endure through her, and
+most of all, on account of the injustice she was guilty of toward her
+brother, the general's son.
+
+For six years Borisoff had lived with young Peter Nazimoff, as his
+tutor and teacher, and loved him sincerely. The boy had already
+reached the highest class at school, when his sister, two years older
+than he, finished her schooling, and returned to her father's house,
+about the time of the general's second marriage. What the young tutor
+tried not to notice and to endure, for love of his pupil, in the first
+year of the general's second marriage, became intolerable when the
+general's daughter returned home, and to all the burden of his
+difficult position was added the knowledge of their mutual love. He
+proceeded frankly, and the whole matter was soon settled. But the
+young man had never uttered a syllable as to the cause of Madame
+Nazimoff's hatred for him. For the sake of his father-in-law's peace
+of mind, he sincerely hoped that he would never know. Anna was
+convinced that the whole cause of her step-mother's hostility was her
+prejudice against what was in her opinion a _mesalliance_. In part she
+was right, but the chief reason of this hostility remained forever a
+secret to her. Unfortunately, it was not equally a secret to her
+father.
+
+Of late years he had gradually been losing faith in his second wife's
+character. It went so far that the general felt much more at ease when
+she was away. Before the last illness of Iuri Pavlovitch, which, to
+tell the truth, was almost his first, Olga Vseslavovna had gone abroad
+with her daughter, intending to travel for a year; but she had hardly
+been gone two months when the general unexpectedly determined to go to
+St. Petersburg to seek a divorce, to see his elder daughter, and
+change his will. Perhaps he would never have determined on such
+decisive measures had not something wholly unexpected taken place.
+
+Borisoff was quite mistaken in thinking that he had so carefully
+destroyed all the letters which the general's young wife had written
+to him, before his marriage to Anna, that no material evidence of Olga
+Vseslavovna's early design of treachery remained. Even before she
+married the general, she had had a confidential servant, who carried
+out many commissions for the beautiful young woman, whose fame had
+gone abroad through the three districts along the Volga, the arena of
+her early triumphs. Later, the young lady found a new favorite in
+foreign lands--the same Rita who was still with her. Martha, the
+Russian confidential servant, heartily detested the German girl, and
+such strife arose between them that not only the general's wife, but
+even the general himself, was deprived of peace and tranquillity.
+Martha was no fool; Olga Vseslavovna had to be careful with her; she
+did take care, but she herself did not know to what an extent she was
+in the woman's power. Foreseeing a black day of ingratitude, Martha,
+with wonderful forethought, had put on one side one or two letters
+from each series of her mistress' secret correspondence, which always
+passed through her hands. Perhaps she would not have made such a bad
+use of them but for her mistress' last, intolerable insult. Prizing in
+her servants, next to swift obedience, a knowledge of languages, her
+mistress did not make use of her when travelling abroad; but hitherto
+she had taken both servants with her. But on her last journey she was
+so heartily tired of Martha, and her perpetual tears and quarrels,
+that she determined to get on without her, the more so that her
+daughter's governess was also traveling with her. Her company was
+growing too numerous.
+
+There was no limit to Martha's wrath when she learned that she was
+going to be left behind. Her effrontery was so great that she advised
+her mistress "for her own sake" not to put such an affront upon her,
+since she would not submit to it without seeking revenge. But her
+mistress never dreamed of what Martha was planning, and what a risk
+she ran.
+
+Hardly had the general's wife departed when Martha asked the general
+to let her leave, saying she would find work elsewhere. The general
+saw no way of keeping her; and he did not even wish to do so, thinking
+her only a quarrelsome, ill-tempered woman. The confidential servant
+left the house, and even the city. And immediately her revenge and
+torture of the general began, cutting straight at the root of his
+happiness, his health, even his life. He began to receive, almost
+daily, letters from different parts of Russia, for Martha had plenty
+of friends and chums. With measureless cruelty Martha began by sending
+the less important documents, still signed with her mistress' maiden
+name; then two or three letters from the series of the most recent
+times, and finally there came a whole packet of those sent by the
+general's wife to the tutor, in the first year of her marriage with
+the general, before Borisoff had met Anna.
+
+The crafty Martha, knowing perfectly the whole state of affairs to
+which these letters referred, often copied out their contents, and
+kept the letters themselves concealed, saying to herself, "God knows
+what may turn up, some day!
+
+"If they are no use, I can burn them. But they may be useful. It is
+always a good thing to keep our masters in our power," argued the
+sagacious woman, and she was not mistaken in her calculations,
+although these letters served not for her profit, but only for a
+sanguinary revenge.
+
+These notes and letters, which finally opened his eyes to the true
+character of his wife, and his own crying injustice to his elder
+children, were now lying in the general's dispatch box, in a neatly
+tied packet, directed in the doctor's handwriting to "Her Excellency
+Olga Vseslavovna Nazimoff."
+
+As soon as she received her father's first letter Anna began to get
+ready to go to St. Petersburg, but unfortunately she was kept back by
+the sickness, first of one child, then of another. But for his last
+telegrams, she would not have started even now, because she did not
+realize the dangerous character of his illness. But now, finding that
+she had come too late, the unhappy woman could not forgive herself.
+
+Everyone was grieved to see her bitter sorrow, after the funeral
+service for her father. Princess Ryadski burst into tears, as she
+looked at her; and all the acquaintances and relations of the general
+were far more disturbed by her despair than by the general's death.
+Olga Vseslavovna was secretly scandalized at such lack of
+self-control, but outwardly she seemed greatly touched and troubled by
+the situation of her poor stepdaughter. But she did not venture to
+express her sympathy too openly in the presence of others, remembering
+the words of "the crazy creature" when she had come to herself after
+her fainting fit, and her stepmother had hurried up to embrace her.
+
+"Leave me!" Anna had cried, when she saw her. "I cannot bear to see
+you! You killed my father!"
+
+It was well that there were only servants in the ante-room. But the
+general's wife did not wish to risk another such scene, now that so
+many people were present. And besides she was extremely disturbed; the
+friends who had come to the funeral service had brought flowers; and
+the half-crazy princess, with the aid of two other ladies, had taken a
+fancy to decorate the coffin, and especially the head, with them. It
+is impossible to describe what Olga Vseslavovna suffered, as she
+watched all those hands moving about among the folds of the muslin,
+the frills, the covering, almost under the satin cushion even; a
+little more and she would have fainted in earnest.
+
+She had always boasted that she had strong nerves, and this was quite
+true; nevertheless, during these days, their strength was evidently
+giving way, as she could not get to sleep for a long time that night,
+and heaven only knows what fancies passed through her mind. It was
+almost morning before Olga Vseslavovna got to sleep, and even then it
+was not for long.
+
+She dreamed that she was descending endless stairs and dark corridors,
+with a heavy, shapeless burden on her shoulders. A bright,
+constantly-changing flame flickered before her; now red, now yellow,
+now green, it flitted before her from side to side. She knew that if
+she could reach it, the burden would fall from her. But the light
+seemed to be taunting her, now appearing, now disappearing, and
+suddenly going out altogether. And she found herself in the darkness,
+in a damp cellar, seemingly empty, but filled with something's
+invisible presence. What was it? She did not know. But this pervading
+something frightened her terribly, smothered her, pressing on her from
+all sides, depriving her of air. She was choking! Terror seized her at
+the thought that it ... was Death! Must she die? Was it possible? But
+that brightly shining light had just promised her life, gayety,
+brilliance! She must hurry to overtake it. And she tried to run. But
+her feet would not obey her; she could not move.
+
+"Heaven! Heaven!" she cried, "but what is it? Whence has such a
+disaster come? What is holding me? Let me go, or I shall be smothered
+in this stench, under this intolerable burden!"
+
+Suddenly Iuri Pavlovitch walked past her. She immediately recognized
+him, and joyfully caught at his cloak. "Iuri! Forgive me! Help me!"
+she cried.
+
+Her husband stopped, looked sadly at her, and answered: "I would
+gladly help you, but you yourself hinder me. Let me go; I must fulfill
+your directions."
+
+At that moment she awoke. She was bathed in a cold perspiration, and
+clutched wildly at the coverlet with both hands. There was no one near
+her, but she clearly felt someone's presence, and was convinced that
+she had really seen her husband a moment before. In her ears resounded
+his words: "I must fulfill your directions!" Directions? What
+directions?
+
+She sprang up, and began to feel about over the carpet with her bare
+feet, looking for her slippers. A terrible thought had come into her
+mind. She felt that she must settle it at once. She must take the
+will, take it away from there! burn it! destroy it! She feverishly
+drew on her dressing gown, and threw a shawl over her shoulders.
+
+"Rita! Get up quick! Quick! Come!"
+
+The frightened maid rose, still half asleep, and rubbed her eyes,
+understanding nothing. Her mistress' ice-cold hands clutched her, and
+dragged her somewhere.
+
+"Ach lieber Gott ... Gott in Himmel!" she muttered. "What has
+happened? What do you want?"
+
+"Hush! Come quick!" And Olga Vseslavovna, with a candle in her
+trembling hand, went forward, dragging the trembling Rita with her.
+She opened the door of her bedroom, and went out. All the doors were
+open _en suite_, and straight in front of her, in the center of the
+fourth, shone the coffin of her husband, covered with cloth of gold
+and lit up by the tall tapers standing round the bier.
+
+"What does it mean?" whispered the general's wife. "Why have they
+opened all the doors?"
+
+"I do not know ... they were all closed last night," murmured the maid
+in reply, her teeth chattering with fear. She longed to ask her
+mistress whither they were going, and what for? She wanted to stop,
+and not enter the funeral chamber; but she was afraid to speak.
+
+They passed quickly through the rooms; at the door of the last the
+general's wife set her candle down on a chair, and halted for a
+moment. The loud snoring of the reader startled them both.
+
+"It is the deacon!" whispered the general's wife reassuringly. Rita
+had hardly strength to nod assent. All the same, the healthy snoring
+of a living man comforted her. Without moving from where she stood,
+the maid tremblingly drew her woolen shawl closer about her, trying to
+see the sofa on which the deacon lay.
+
+Knitting her brows, and biting her lips till they were sore, Olga
+Vseslavovna went forward determinedly to the bier. She thrust both
+hands under the flowers on the pillow. The frill was untouched. The
+satin of the cushion was there, but where was ...? Her heart, that had
+been beating like a hammer, suddenly stopped and stood still. There
+was not a trace of the will!
+
+"Perhaps I have forgotten. Perhaps it was on the other side," thought
+Olga Vseslavovna, and went round to the left side of the coffin.
+
+No! It was not there, either! Where was it? Who could have taken it?
+Suddenly her heart failed her utterly, and she clutched at the edge of
+the coffin to keep herself from falling. It seemed to her that under
+the stiff, pallid, rigidly clasped hands of the dead general something
+gleamed white through the transparent muslin of the covering,
+something like a piece of paper.
+
+"Nonsense! Self-suggestion! It is impossible! Hallucination!" The
+thought flashed through her tortured brain. She forced herself to be
+calm, and to look again.
+
+Yes! She had not been mistaken. The white corner of a folded paper
+appeared clearly against the general's dark uniform. At the same
+moment a cold draught coming from somewhere set the tapers flickering.
+Shadows danced around the room, over the bier, across the dead man's
+face; and in the quick change of light and shadow it seemed to her
+that the rigid features became more living, that a mournful smile
+formed itself on the closed lips, that the tightly-shut eyelids
+quivered. A wild cry rang through the whole room. With a desperate
+shriek: "His eyes! He is looking at me!" the general's wife staggered
+forward and fell fainting to the floor, beside her husband's bier.
+
+
+V
+
+The deacon sprang from his sofa with a cry, and an answering cry came
+from the lips of the shivering Rita, as she fled from the room.
+Servants rushed in, rubbing their eyes, still half-asleep, questioning
+each other, running this way and that. The deacon, spurred by a
+feeling of guilt, was determined to conceal the fact that he was
+sleeping. "It was the lady!" he said. "She came in to pray; she told
+me to stop reading while she prayed. She knelt down. Then she prayed
+for a long time, and suddenly ... suddenly she cried out, and fainted.
+Grief, brothers! It is terrible! To lose such a husband!" and he set
+them to work with restoratives, himself rubbing the fallen woman's
+chilly hands.
+
+The general's wife opened her eyes after a few minutes.
+
+Looking wildly round in bewilderment, she seemed to be wondering where
+she was and how she had come there. Suddenly she remembered.
+
+"The will! In his hands! Take it!" she cried, and fainted again. By
+this time the whole household was awake. Anna Iurievna had come in,
+full of astonishment at the sudden disturbance, but with the same
+feeling of deep quiet and peace still filling her heart and giving her
+features an expression of joy and calm. She heard the cry of the
+general's wife, and the words were recorded in her mind, though she
+did not at first give them any meaning.
+
+She set herself, with all the tenderness of a good woman, to minister
+to the other's need, sending her own maid for sal volatile, chafing
+the fainting woman's hands, and giving orders that a bed should be
+prepared for her in another room, further away from the bier. As she
+spoke, quietly, gravely, with authority, the turmoil gradually
+subsided. The frightened servants recovered themselves, and moved
+about with the orderly obedience they ordinarily showed; and the
+deacon, above all anxious to cover his negligence, began intoning the
+liturgy, lending an atmosphere of solemnity to the whole room.
+
+The servants, returning to announce that the bedroom was ready, were
+ordered by Anna Iurievna to lift the fainting woman with all care and
+gentleness, and she herself went with them to see the general's wife
+safely bestowed in her room, and waited while the doctor did all in
+his power to make her more comfortable. Olga Vseslavovna did not at
+once recover consciousness. She seemed to pass from a faint into an
+uneasy slumber, which, however, gradually became more quiet.
+
+Only then, as she was leaving the room, did Anna Iurievna bethink her
+of the strange words that had fallen on her ears: "The will! In his
+hands! Take it!" And repeating them questioningly to herself, she
+walked slowly back toward the room in which lay her father's body.
+
+But she was even more occupied with her own thoughts. She no longer
+felt in her heart the bitter resentment toward Olga Vseslavovna that
+had filled it yesterday. She was conscious of a feeling of sorrow for
+the helpless woman, of compassion for her empty, shallow life, the
+fruit of an empty, shallow heart. And she was wondering why such
+empty, joyless lives should exist in a world where there was such deep
+happiness and joy.
+
+She came over to her father's coffin, close to which the deacon was
+still droning out his liturgy, and stood beside the dead body, looking
+down at the strong, quiet face, and vividly recalling her dream of the
+night before. Her eyes rested on the many stars and medals on his
+breast, and on his hands, quietly clasped in death. Then suddenly, and
+quite mechanically, Olga Vseslavovna's cry, as she returned to
+consciousness, came back into her mind:
+
+"The will! In his hands! Take it!" And bending down, she noted for the
+first time something white beneath the muslin canopy. As she
+scrutinized it wonderingly, she was conscious of an humble, apologetic
+voice murmuring something at her elbow:
+
+"Forgive me, Anna Iurievna. I humbly beg you, forgive me! It was I ...
+in the night ... the flowers fell .... I was putting them back ...
+fixing the head of your sainted papa .... It was under his head, the
+paper ... I thought he wanted to keep it .... I put it in his hands,
+to be safe! ... Forgive me, Anna Iurievna, if I have done any harm."
+
+It was the deacon, still oppressed by a feeling of guilt. Anna.
+Iurievna turned to him, and then turned back again, to her father's
+body, to the white object shining under the muslin canopy. And once
+more Olga Vseslavovna's words came into her mind:
+
+"The will! In his hands! Take it!"
+
+Gently raising the canopy, she softly drew the paper from beneath the
+general's clasped hands, and unfolded it. She read no more than the
+opening words, but she had read enough to realize that it was, indeed,
+her father's will.
+
+
+
+FEODOR MIKHAILOVITCH DOSTOYEVSKY
+
+
+_CRIME AND PUNISHMENT_[1]
+
+
+One sultry evening early in July a young man emerged from the small
+furnished lodging he occupied in a large five-storied house in the
+Pereoulok S----, and turned slowly, with an air of indecision, toward
+the K----bridge. He was fortunate enough not to meet his landlady on
+the stairs. She occupied the floor beneath him, and her kitchen, with
+its usually open door, was entered from the staircase. Thus, whenever
+the young man went out, he found himself obliged to pass under the
+enemy's fire, which always produced a morbid terror, humiliating him
+and making him knit his brows. He owed her some money and felt afraid
+of encountering her.
+
+It was not that he had been terrified or crushed by misfortune, but
+that for some time past he had fallen into a state of nervous
+depression akin to hypochondria. He had withdrawn from society and
+shut himself up, till he was ready to shun, not merely his landlady,
+but every human face. Poverty had once weighed him down, though, of
+late, he had lost his sensitiveness on that score. He had given up all
+his daily occupations. In his heart of hearts he laughed scornfully at
+his landlady and the extremities to which she might proceed. Still, to
+be waylaid on the stairs, to have to listen to all her jargon, hear
+her demands, threats, and complaints, and have to make excuses and
+subterfuges in return--no, he preferred to steal down without
+attracting notice. On this occasion, however, when he had gained the
+street, he felt surprised himself at this dread of meeting the woman
+to whom he was in debt.
+
+"Why should I be alarmed by these trifles when I am contemplating such
+a desperate deed?" thought he, and he gave a strange smile. "Ah, well,
+man holds the remedy in his own hands, and lets everything go its own
+way, simply through cowardice--that is an axiom. I should like to know
+what people fear most:--whatever is contrary to their usual habits, I
+imagine. But I am talking too much. I talk and so I do nothing, though
+I might just as well say, I do nothing and so I talk. I have acquired
+this habit of chattering during the last month, while I have been
+lying for days together in a corner, feeding my mind on trifles. Come,
+why am I taking this walk now? Am I capable of _that_? Can _that_
+really be serious? Not in the least. These are mere chimeras, idle
+fancies that flit across my brain!"
+
+The heat in the streets was stifling. The crowd, the sight of lime,
+bricks, scaffolding, and the peculiar odor so familiar to the nostrils
+of the inhabitant of St. Petersburg who has no means of escaping to
+the country for the summer, all contributed to irritate the young
+man's already excited nerves. The reeking fumes of the dram shops, so
+numerous in this part of the city, and the tipsy men to be seen at
+every point, although it was no holiday, completed the repulsive
+character of the scene. Our hero's refined features betrayed, for a
+moment, an expression of bitter disgust. We may observe casually that
+he was not destitute of personal attractions; he was above middle
+height, with a slender and well-proportioned figure, and he had dark
+auburn hair and fine dark eyes. In a little while he sank into a deep
+reverie, or rather into a sort of mental torpor. He walked on without
+noticing, or trying to notice, his surroundings. Occasionally he
+muttered a few words to himself; as if, as he himself had just
+perceived, this had become his habit. At this moment it dawned upon
+him that his ideas were becoming confused and that he was very feeble;
+he had eaten nothing worth mentioning for the last two days.
+
+His dress was so miserable that anyone else might have scrupled to go
+out in such rags during the daytime. This quarter of the city, indeed,
+was not particular as to dress. In the neighborhood of the Cyennaza or
+Haymarket, in those streets in the heart of St. Petersburg, occupied
+by the artisan classes, no vagaries in costume call forth the least
+surprise. Besides the young man's fierce disdain had reached such a
+pitch, that, notwithstanding his extreme sensitiveness, he felt no
+shame at exhibiting his tattered garments in the street. He would have
+felt differently had he come across anyone he knew, any of the old
+friends whom he usually avoided. Yet he stopped short on hearing the
+attention of passers-by directed to him by the thick voice of a tipsy
+man shouting: "Eh, look at the German hatter!" The exclamation came
+from an individual who, for some unknown reason, was being jolted away
+in a great wagon. The young man snatched off his hat and began to
+examine it. It was a high-crowned hat that had been originally bought
+at Zimmermann's, but had become worn and rusty, was covered with dents
+and stains, slit and short of a brim, a frightful object in short. Yet
+its owner, far from feeling his vanity wounded, was suffering rather
+from anxiety than humiliation.
+
+"I suspected this," muttered he, uneasily, "I foresaw it. That's the
+worst of it! Some wretched trifle like this might spoil it all. Yes,
+this hat is certainly too remarkable; it looks so ridiculous. I must
+get a cap to suit my rags; any old thing would be better than this
+horror. Hats like these are not worn; this one would be noticeable a
+_verst_[2] off; it would be remembered; people would think of it again
+some time after, and it might furnish a clew. I must attract as little
+attention as possible just now. Trifles become important, everything
+hinges on them."
+
+He had not far to go; he knew the exact distance between his lodging
+and present destination--just seven hundred and thirty paces. He had
+counted them when his plan only floated through his brain like a vague
+dream. At that time, he himself would not have believed it capable of
+realization; he merely dallied in fancy with a chimera which was both
+terrible and seductive. But a month had elapsed, and he had already
+begun to view it in a different light. Although he reproached himself
+throughout his soliloquies with irresolution and a want of energy, he
+had accustomed himself, little by little, and, indeed, in spite of
+himself, to consider the realization of his dream a possibility,
+though he doubted his own resolution. He was but just now rehearsing
+his enterprise, and his agitation was increasing at every step.
+
+His heart sank, and his limbs trembled nervously, as he came to an
+immense pile of building facing the canal on one side and the street
+on the other. This block was divided into a host of small tenements,
+tenanted by all sorts of trades. People were swarming in and out
+through the two doors. There were three or four _dvorniks_[3]
+belonging to the house, but the young man, to his great satisfaction,
+came across none of them, and, escaping notice as he entered, mounted
+at once the stairs on the right hand. He had already made acquaintance
+with this dark and narrow staircase, and its obscurity was grateful to
+him; it was gloomy enough to hide him from prying eyes. "If I feel so
+timid now, what will it be when I come to put my plan into execution?"
+thought he, as he reached the fourth floor. Here he found the passage
+blocked; some military porters were removing the furniture from a
+tenement recently occupied, as the young man knew, by a German
+official and his family. "Thanks to the departure of this German, for
+some time to come there will be no one on this landing but the old
+woman. It is as well to know this, at any rate," thought he to
+himself, as he rang the old woman's bell. It gave a faint sound, as if
+it were made of tin instead of copper. In houses of this sort, the
+smaller lodgings generally have such bells.
+
+He had forgotten this; the peculiar tinkling sound seemed to recall
+something to his memory, for he gave a shiver--his nerves were very
+weak. In another moment the door was opened part way, and the occupant
+of the rooms stood examining her visitor through the opening with
+evident suspicion, her small eyes glimmering through the darkness like
+luminous points. But when she saw the people on the landing, she
+seemed reassured, and flung the door open. The young man entered a
+gloomy ante-chamber, divided by a partition, behind which was a small
+kitchen. The old woman stood silently in front of him, eying him
+keenly. She was a thin little creature of sixty, with a small sharp
+nose, and eyes sparkling with malice. Her head was uncovered, and her
+grizzled locks shone with grease. A strip of flannel was wound round
+her long thin neck, and, in spite of the heat, she wore a shabby
+yellow fur tippet on her shoulders. She coughed incessantly. The young
+man was probably eying her strangely, for the look of mistrust
+suddenly reappeared on her face.
+
+"The Student Raskolnikoff. I called on you a month ago," said the
+visitor, hurriedly, with a slight bow. He had suddenly remembered that
+he must make himself more agreeable.
+
+"I remember, _batuchka_, I remember it well," returned the old woman,
+still fixing her eyes on him suspiciously.
+
+"Well, then, look here. I have come again on a similar errand,"
+continued Raskolnikoff, somewhat surprised and uneasy at being
+received with so much distrust. "After all, this may be her usual
+manner, though I did not notice it before," thought he, unpleasantly
+impressed.
+
+The old woman remained silent a while, and seemed to reflect. Then,
+pointing to the door of the inner room, she drew back for her visitor
+to pass, and said, "Come in, _batuchka._"[4]
+
+The small room into which the young man was ushered was papered with
+yellow; there were geraniums and muslin curtains in the windows, and
+the setting sun shed a flood of light on the interior. "The sun will
+shine on it just the same _then_!" said Raskolnikoff all at once to
+himself, as he glanced rapidly round to take in the various objects
+and engrave them on his memory. The room, however, contained nothing
+remarkable. The yellow wood furniture was all very old. A couch with a
+shelving back, opposite which stood an oval table, a toilet-table with
+a pier glass attached, chairs lining the walls, and two or three poor
+prints representing German girls with birds in their hands, completed
+the inventory. A lamp was burning in one corner in front of a small
+image. The floor and furniture were clean and well polished.
+"Elizabeth attends to that," thought the young man. It would have been
+difficult to find a speck of dust on anything. "It is only in the
+houses of these dreadful old widows that such order is to be seen,"
+continued Raskolnikoff to himself, looking with curiosity at the
+chintz curtain overhanging the door which led into a second small
+room, in which he had never set foot; it contained the old woman's bed
+and chest of drawers. The apartment consisted of these two rooms.
+
+"What is it you want?" asked the mistress of the house dryly; she had
+followed her visitor in, and planted herself in front of him to
+examine him more closely.
+
+"I have come to pawn something, that is all!" With this he drew from
+his pocket a flat old silver watch. A globe was engraved inside the
+lid, and the chain was of steel.
+
+"But you have not repaid the sum I lent you before. It was due two
+days ago."
+
+"I will pay you the interest for another month; have a little
+patience."
+
+"I may have patience or I may sell your pledge at once, _batuchka_,
+just whichever I like."
+
+"What will you give me on this watch, Alena Ivanovna?"
+
+"That is a wretched thing, _batuchka_, worth a mere nothing. Last time
+I lent you two small notes on your ring, when I could have bought a
+new one at the jeweler's for a ruble and a half."
+
+"Give me four rubles, and I will redeem it; it belonged to my father.
+I expect some money soon."
+
+"A ruble and a half! and I shall take the interest in advance."
+
+"A ruble and a half!" protested the young man.
+
+"Please yourself whether you take it or not." So saying, the old woman
+tendered back the watch. Her visitor took it and was about to depart
+in vexation, when he reflected that this money lender was his last
+resource--and, besides, he had another object in coming.
+
+"Come, fork out!" said he in a rough tone.
+
+The old woman fumbled in her pockets for her keys, and passed on into
+the adjoining room. The young man, left standing there alone, pricked
+up his ears and began to make various inductions. He heard this female
+usurer open her drawer. "It must be the top one," was his conclusion.
+"I know now that she carries her keys in her right pocket--they are
+all hung on a steel ring--one of them is three times as large as the
+rest, and has the wards toothed; that cannot be the key of her
+drawer--then she must have some strong box or safe. It is curious that
+the keys of strong boxes should be generally like that--but, after
+all, how ignoble!"
+
+The old woman reappeared. "See here, _batuchka_: if I take a
+ten-kopeck piece a month on each ruble, I ought to receive fifteen
+kopecks on a ruble and a half, the interest being payable in advance.
+Then, as you ask me to wait another month for the repayment of the two
+rubles I have already lent you, you owe me twenty kopecks more, which
+makes a total of five and thirty. What, therefore, I have to advance
+upon your watch is one ruble fifteen kopecks. Here it is."
+
+"What! Is one ruble fifteen kopecks all you mean to give me now?"
+
+"That is all that is due to you."
+
+The young man took the money without further discussion. He looked at
+the old woman and was in no haste to depart. He seemed anxious to say
+or do something more, but without knowing exactly what. "Perhaps I may
+be bringing you some other article soon, Alena Ivanovna, a very pretty
+cigar case--a silver one--when I get it back from the friend to whom I
+have lent it." These words were uttered with much embarrassment.
+
+"Well, we can talk about it then, _batuchka_."
+
+"Good-by. You are always alone--is your sister never with you?" asked
+he with as indifferent an air as he could assume, as he entered the
+anteroom.
+
+"What have you to do with my sister, _batuchka_?"
+
+"Nothing. I had no reason for asking. You will--well, good-by, Alena
+Ivanovna."
+
+Raskolnikoff made his exit in a perturbed state of mind. As he went
+downstairs, he stopped from time to time, as if overcome by violent
+emotion. When he had at length emerged upon the street, he exclaimed
+to himself: "How loathsome it all is! Can I, can I ever?--no, it is
+absurd, preposterous!" added he mentally. "How could such a horrible
+idea ever enter my head? Could I ever be capable of such infamy? It is
+odious, ignoble, repulsive! And yet for a whole month----"
+
+Words and exclamations, however, could not give full vent to his
+agitation. The loathing sense of disgust which had begun to oppress
+him on his way to the old woman's house had now become so intense that
+he longed to find some way of escape from the torture. He reeled along
+the pavement like a tipsy man, taking no notice of those who passed,
+but bumping against them. On looking round he saw a dram shop near at
+hand; steps led down from the footpath to the basement, and
+Raskolnikoff saw two drunkards coming out at that moment, leaning
+heavily on each other and exchanging abusive language. The young man
+barely paused before he descended the steps. He had never before
+entered such a place, but he felt dizzy and was also suffering from
+intense thirst. He had a craving for some beer, partly because he
+attributed his weakness to an empty stomach. Seating himself in a dark
+and dirty corner, in front of a filthy little table, he called for
+some beer, and eagerly drank off a glass.
+
+He felt instantly relieved, and his brain began to clear: "How absurd
+I have been!" said he to himself, "there was really nothing to make me
+uneasy! It was simply physical! A glass of beer and a mouthful of
+biscuit were all that was necessary to restore my strength of mind and
+make my thoughts clear and resolution fixed. How paltry all this is!"
+
+The next morning Raskolnikoff awoke late, after disturbed and
+unrefreshing slumbers. He felt very cross and glanced angrily round
+his room. It was a tiny place, not more than six feet in length, and
+its dirty buff paper hung in shreds, giving it a most miserable
+aspect; besides which, the ceiling was so low that a tall man would
+have felt in danger of bumping his head. The furniture was quite in
+harmony with the room, consisting of three old rickety chairs, a
+painted table in one corner, on which lay books and papers thick with
+dust (showing how long it was since they had been touched), and,
+finally, a large and very ugly sofa with ragged covers. This sofa,
+which filled nearly half the room, served Raskolnikoff as a bed. He
+often lay down on it in his clothes, without any sheets, covering
+himself with his old student's coat, and using instead of a pillow a
+little cushion, which he raised by keeping under it all his clean or
+dirty linen. Before the sofa stood a small table.
+
+Raskolnikoff's misanthropy did not take offense at the dirty state of
+his den. Human faces had grown so distasteful to him, that the very
+sight of the servant whose business it was to clean the rooms produced
+a feeling of exasperation.
+
+To such a condition may monomaniacs come by continually brooding over
+one idea. For the last fortnight, the landlady had ceased to supply
+her lodger with provisions, and he had not yet thought of demanding an
+explanation. Nastasia, who had to cook and clean for the whole house,
+was not sorry to see the lodger in this state of mind, as it
+diminished her labors: she had quite given up tidying and dusting his
+room; the utmost she did was to come and sweep it once a week. She it
+was who was arousing him at this moment.
+
+"Come, get up, why are you sleeping so late?" she exclaimed. "It is
+nine o'clock. I have brought up some tea, will you take a cup? How
+pale you look!"
+
+Raskolnikoff opened his eyes, shook himself, and recognized Nastasia.
+"Has the landlady sent me this tea?" asked he, making a painful effort
+to sit up.
+
+"Not much chance of that!" And the servant placed before him her own
+teapot, in which there was still some tea left, and laid two small
+lumps of brownish sugar on the table.
+
+"Here, Nastasia, take this, please," said Raskolnikoff, fumbling in
+his pocket and drawing out a handful of small change (for he had again
+lain down in his clothes), "and fetch me a white roll. Go to the pork
+shop as well, and buy me a bit of cheap sausage."
+
+"I will bring you the roll in a minute, but had you not better take
+some _shtchi_[5] instead of the sausage? We make it here, and it is
+capital. I kept some for you last night, but it was so late before you
+came in! You will find it very good." She went to fetch the _shtchi_,
+and, when Raskolnikoff had begun to eat, she seated herself on the
+sofa beside him and commenced to chatter, like a true country girl as
+she was. "Prascovia Paulovna means to report you to the police," said
+she.
+
+The young man's brow clouded. "To the police? Why?"
+
+"Because you don't pay and won't go. That's why."
+
+"The deuce!" growled he between his teeth, "that is the finishing
+stroke; it comes at a most unfortunate juncture. She is a fool," added
+he aloud. "I shall go and talk to her to-morrow."
+
+"She is, of course, just as much of a fool as I am; but why do you,
+who are so intelligent, lie here doing nothing? How is it you never
+seem to have money for anything now? You used to give lessons, I hear;
+how is it you do nothing now?"
+
+"I am engaged on something," returned Raskolnikoff dryly and half
+reluctantly.
+
+"On what?"
+
+"Some work--"
+
+"What sort of work?"
+
+"Thinking," replied he gravely, after a short silence.
+
+Nastasia was convulsed. She was of a merry disposition, but her
+laughter was always noiseless, an internal convulsion which made her
+actually writhe with pain. "And does your thinking bring you any
+money?" asked she, as soon as she could manage to speak.
+
+"Well! I can't give lessons when I have no boots to go out in?
+Besides, I despise them."
+
+"Take care lest you suffer for it."
+
+"There is so little to be made by giving lessons! What can one do with
+a few kopecks?" said he in an irritable tone, rather to himself than
+the servant.
+
+"So you wish to make your fortune at one stroke?"
+
+He looked at her rather strangely, and was silent for a moment. "Yes,
+my fortune," rejoined he impressively.
+
+"Hush! you frighten me, you look terrible. Shall I go and fetch you a
+roll?"
+
+"Just as you like."
+
+Later in the day, Raskolnikoff went out and wandered about the
+streets. At last he sat down under a tree to rest, and fell into a
+reverie. His limbs felt disjointed, and his mind was in darkness and
+confusion. He placed his elbows on his knees and held his head with
+his hands.
+
+"God! Am I to stand beating in her skull with a hatchet or something,
+wade in warm blood, break open the lock and rob and tremble, blood
+flowing all around, and hide myself, with the hatchet? O God! is this
+indeed possible, and must it be?" He trembled like a leaf as he said
+this.
+
+"What am I thinking of?" he cried in some astonishment. "I know well I
+could not endure that with which I have been torturing myself. I saw
+that clearly yesterday when I tried to rehearse it. Perfectly plain.
+Then what am I questioning? Did I not say yesterday as I went up the
+stairs how disgusting and mean and low it all was, and did not I run
+away in terror?"
+
+He stood up and looked all round, wondering how he got there, and
+moved off toward the T---- bridge. He was pale and his eyes were hot,
+and feebleness was in all his members, but he seemed to breathe
+easier. He felt that he had thrown off the old time which had been so
+oppressive; and in its place had come peace and light. "Lord!" he
+prayed, "show me my way, that I may renounce these horrid thoughts of
+mine!"
+
+Going across the bridge, he quietly gazed on the Neva, and the clear
+red sunset. He did not feel himself tired now, notwithstanding his
+weakness, and the load which had lain upon his heart seemed to be
+gone. Liberty! Liberty! he was free from those enchantments and all
+their vile instigations. In later times when he recalled this period
+of his existence, and all that happened to him in those days, minute
+by minute and point by point, he recollected how each circumstance,
+although in the main not very unusual, constantly appeared to his mind
+as an evidence of the predetermination of his fate, so superstitious
+was he. Especially he could never understand why he, weary and
+harassed as he was, could not have returned home by the shortest
+route, instead of across the Haymarket, which was quite out of the
+way. Certainly, a dozen times before, he had reached his lodgings by
+most circuitous routes, and never known through which streets he had
+come. But why (he always asked) should such a really fateful meeting
+have taken place in the market (through which there was no need to
+go), and happen, too, at exactly such a time and at a moment of his
+life when his mind was in the state it was, and the event, in these
+circumstances, could only produce the most definite and decided effect
+upon his fate? Surely he was the instrument of some purpose!
+
+It was about nine o'clock as he stood in the Haymarket. All the
+dealers had closed their establishments or cleared away their goods
+and gone home. About this place, with its tattered population, its
+dirty and nauseous courtyards and numerous alleys, Raskolnikoff dearly
+loved to roam in his aimless wanderings. He attracted no notice there.
+At the corner of K---- Lane were a dealer and his wife, who were
+engaged in packing up their wares, consisting of tapes, handkerchiefs,
+cotton, &c., preparatory to going home. They were lingering over their
+work, and conversing with an acquaintance. This was Elizabeth
+Ivanovna, or simple Elizabeth, as all called her, the younger sister
+of the old woman, Alena Ivanovna, to whose rooms Raskolnikoff went the
+day before for the purpose of pawning his watch to make his
+_rehearsal_. He knew all about this Elizabeth, as she knew also a
+little about him. She was a tall, awkward woman, about thirty-five
+years of age, timid and quiet, indeed almost an idiot, and was a
+regular slave to her sister, working for her day and night, trembling
+before her and enduring even blows. She was evidently hesitating about
+something, as she stood there with a bundle under her arm, and her
+friends were pressing some subject rather warmly. When Raskolnikoff
+recognized her he seemed struck with the greatest astonishment,
+although there was nothing strange about such a meeting.
+
+"You ought to decide yourself, Elizabeth Ivanovna," said the man.
+"Come to-morrow at seven o'clock."
+
+"To-morrow?" said Elizabeth slowly, as if undecided.
+
+"She is frightened of Alena Ivanovna," cried the wife, a brisk little
+woman. "You are like a little child, Elizabeth Ivanovna, and she's not
+your own sister, but a stepsister. She has too much her own way."
+
+"You say nothing to Alena Ivanovna," interrupted the man, "and come
+without asking, that's the way to do it, and your sister can manage
+herself."
+
+"When shall I come?"
+
+"At seven o'clock, to-morrow."
+
+"Very well, I will come," said Elizabeth, slowly and reluctantly. She
+then quitted them.
+
+Raskolnikoff also went away, and stayed to hear no more. His original
+amazement had changed gradually into a feeling of actual terror; a
+chill ran down his back. He had learned unexpectedly and positively,
+that, at seven o'clock the next evening, Elizabeth, the old woman's
+sister, the only person living with her, would not be at home, and
+that, therefore, the old woman, at seven o'clock to-morrow, _would be
+there alone_. It needed but a few steps to reach his room. He went
+along like one sentenced to death, with his reason clogged and numbed.
+He felt that now all liberty of action and free will were gone, and
+everything was irrevocably decided. A more convenient occasion than
+was thus unexpectedly offered to him now would never arise, and he
+might never learn again, beforehand, that, at a certain time on a
+certain day, she, on whom he was to make the attempt, would be
+entirely alone.
+
+Raskolnikoff learned subsequently what induced the man and his wife to
+invite Elizabeth to call on them. It was a very simple matter. A
+foreign family, finding themselves in straitened circumstances, were
+desirous of parting with various things, consisting for the most part
+in articles of female attire. They were anxious, therefore, to meet
+with a dealer in cast-off clothes, and this was one of Elizabeth's
+callings. She had a large connection, because she was very honest and
+always stuck to her price: there was no higgling to be done with her.
+She was a woman of few words and very shy and reserved. But
+Raskolnikoff was very superstitious, and traces of this remained in
+him long after. In all the events of this period of his life he was
+ever ready to detect something mysterious, and attribute every
+circumstance to the presence of some particular influence upon his
+destiny.
+
+The previous winter, a fellow student, Pokoreff by name, on leaving
+for Charkoff, had happened to communicate to him in conversation the
+address of Alena Ivanovna, in case he should ever require to pawn
+anything. For a long time he did not use it, as he was giving lessons,
+and managed somehow to get along, but six weeks before this time he
+had recollected the address. He had two things fit to pawn--an old
+silver watch, formerly his father's; and a small gold ring with three
+red stones, a souvenir from his sister on leaving home. He decided on
+getting rid of the latter, and went to the old woman's. At the first
+glance, and knowing nothing whatever of her personally, she inspired
+him with an unaccountable loathing. He took her two notes, and on
+leaving went into a poor _traktir_, or restaurant, and ordered some
+tea. He sat down musing, and strange thoughts flitted across his mind
+and became hatched in his brain. Close by, at another table, were
+seated a student, whom he did not knew, and a young officer. They had
+been playing billiards, and were now drinking tea. Suddenly
+Raskolnikoff heard the student give the officer the address of Alena
+Ivanovna, the widow of a professor, as one who lent money on pledges.
+This alone struck Raskolnikoff as very peculiar. They were talking of
+the same person he had just been to see. No doubt it was pure chance,
+but, at the moment he was struggling against an impression he could
+not overcome, this stranger's words came and gave extra force to it.
+The student went on talking, and began to give his companion some
+account of Alena Ivanovna.
+
+"She is well known," he said, "and always good for money. She is as
+rich as a Jew, and can advance five thousand rubles at a moment's
+notice; yet she will take in pledge objects worth as little as a
+ruble. She is quite a providence to many of our fellows--but such an
+old hag! I tell you what I would do. I would kill that damnable old
+hag, and take all she is possessed of, without any qualm of
+conscience," exclaimed the student excitedly. The officer laughed, but
+Raskolnikoff shuddered. The words just uttered so strongly echoed his
+own thoughts. "Let me put a serious question to you," resumed the
+student, more and more excited. "I have hitherto been joking, but now
+listen to this. On the one side here is a silly, flint-hearted,
+evil-minded, sulky old woman, necessary to no one--on the contrary,
+pernicious to all--and who does not know herself why she lives."
+
+"Well?" said the officer.
+
+"Hear me further. On the other hand, young fresh strength droops and
+is lost for want of sustenance; this is the case with thousands
+everywhere! A hundred, a thousand good deeds and enterprises could be
+carried out and upheld with the money this old woman has bequeathed to
+a monastery. A dozen families might be saved from hunger, want, ruin,
+crime, and misery, and all with her money! Kill her, I say, take it
+from her, and dedicate it to the service of humanity and the general
+good! What is your opinion? Shall not one little crime be effaced and
+atoned for by a thousand good deeds? For one useless life a thousand
+lives saved from decay and death. One death, and a hundred beings
+restored to existence! There's a calculation for you. What in
+proportion is the life of this miserable old woman? No more than the
+life of a flea, a beetle, nay, not even that, for she is pernicious.
+She preys on other lives. She lately bit Elizabeth's finger, in a fit
+of passion, and nearly bit it off!"
+
+"Certainly she does not deserve to live," observed the officer, "but
+nature----"
+
+"Ah, my friend, nature has to be governed and guided, or we should be
+drowned in prejudices. Without it there would never be one great man.
+They say 'duty is conscience.' Now I have nothing to say against duty
+and conscience, but let us see, how do we understand them? Let me put
+another question to you. Listen."
+
+"Stop a minute, I will give you one."
+
+"Well?"
+
+"After all you have said and declaimed, tell me--are you going to kill
+the old woman _yourself_, or not?"
+
+"Of course not. I only pointed out the inequality of things. As for
+the deed----"
+
+"Well, if you won't, it's my opinion that it would not be just to do
+so! Come, let's have another game!"
+
+Raskolnikoff was in the greatest agitation. Still, there was nothing
+extraordinary in this conversation; it was not the first time he had
+heard, only in other forms and on other topics, such ideas from the
+lips of the young and hot-headed. But why should he, of all men,
+happen to overhear such a conversation and such ideas, when the very
+same thoughts were being engendered in himself?--and why precisely
+_then_, immediately on his becoming possessed of them and on leaving
+the old woman? Strange, indeed, did this coincidence appear to him.
+This idle conversation was destined to have a fearful influence on his
+destiny, extending to the most trifling incident and causing him to
+feel sure he was the instrument of a fixed purpose.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+On his return from the market, he flung himself upon his couch and sat
+motionless for a whole hour. It became dark, he had no light, but sat
+on. He could never afterwards recollect his thoughts at the time. At
+last he felt cold, and a shiver ran through him. He recognized with
+delight that he was sitting on his couch and could lie down, and soon
+he fell into a deep, heavy sleep. He slept much longer than usual, and
+his slumbers were undisturbed by dreams. Nastasia, who came to his
+room the next morning at ten o'clock, had great difficulty in
+awakening him. The servant brought him some bread and, the same as the
+day before, what was left of her tea.
+
+"Not up yet!" exclaimed she indignantly. "How can you sleep so long?"
+
+Raskolnikoff raised himself with an effort; his head ached; he got
+upon his feet, took a few steps, and then dropped down again upon the
+couch.
+
+"What, again!" cried Nastasia, "but you must be ill then?" He did not
+answer. "Would you like some tea?"
+
+"By and by," he muttered painfully, after which he closed his eyes and
+turned his face to the wall. Nastasia, standing over him, remained
+watching him for a while.
+
+"After all, he's perhaps ill," said she, before withdrawing.
+
+At two o'clock she returned with some soup. Raskolnikoff was still
+lying on the couch. He had not touched the tea. The servant became
+angry and shook the lodger violently. "Whatever makes you sleep thus?"
+scolded she, eying him contemptuously.
+
+He sat up, but answered not a word, and remained with his eyes fixed
+on the floor.
+
+"Are you ill, or are you not?" asked Nastasia. This second question
+met with no more answer than the first. "You should go out," continued
+she, after a pause, "the fresh air would do you good. You'll eat
+something, will you not?"
+
+"By and by," answered he feebly. "Go away!" and he motioned her off.
+She remained a moment longer, watching him with an air of pity, and
+then left the room.
+
+After a few minutes he raised his eyes, gave a long look at the tea
+and soup, and then began to eat. He swallowed three or four spoonfuls
+without the least appetite--almost mechanically. His head felt better.
+When he had finished his light repast, he again lay down on the couch,
+but he could not sleep and remained motionless, flat on his stomach,
+his face buried in the pillow. His reverie kept conjuring up strange
+scenes. At one time he was in Africa, in Egypt, on some oasis, where
+palms were dotted about. The caravans were at rest, the camels lay
+quietly, and the travelers were eating their evening meal. They drank
+water direct from the stream which ran murmuring close by. How
+refreshing was the marvelously blue water, and how beautifully clear
+it looked as it ran over many-colored stones and mingled with the
+golden spangles of the sandy bottom! All at once he clearly heard the
+hour chiming. He shuddered, raised his head, looked at the window to
+calculate the time. He came to himself immediately and jumped up, and,
+going on tiptoe, silently opened the door and stood listening on the
+landing. His heart beat violently. But not a sound came from the
+staircase. It seemed as though the house was wrapped in sleep. He
+could not understand how he had been able to sleep away the time as he
+had done, while nothing was prepared for the enterprise. And yet it
+was, perhaps, six o'clock that had just struck.
+
+Then, he became excited as he felt what there was to be done, and he
+endeavored with all his might to keep his thoughts from wandering and
+concentrate his mind on his task. All the time his heart thumped and
+beat until he could hardly draw breath. In the first place it was
+necessary to make a loop and fasten to his coat. He went to his pillow
+and took from among the linen he kept there an old and dirty shirt and
+tore part of it into strips. He then fastened a couple of these
+together, and, taking off his coat--a stout cotton summer one--began
+to sew the loop inside, under the left arm. His hands shook violently,
+but he accomplished his task satisfactorily, and when he again put on
+his coat nothing was visible. Needle and thread had been procured long
+ago, and lay on the table in a piece of paper. The loop was provided
+for a hatchet. It would never have done to have appeared in the
+streets carrying a hatchet, and if he placed it under the coat, it
+would have been necessary to hold it with his hands; but with the loop
+all he had to do was to put the iron in it and it would hang of itself
+under the coat, and with his hands in his pockets he could keep it
+from shaking, and no one could suspect that he was carrying anything.
+He had thought over all this about a fortnight before.
+
+Having finished his task, Raskolnikoff inserted his finger in a small
+crevice in the floor under his couch, and brought out the _pledge_
+with which he had been careful to provide himself. This pledge was,
+however, only a sham--a thin smooth piece of wood about the size and
+thickness of a silver cigarette case, which he had found in a yard
+adjoining a carpenter's shop, and a thin piece of iron of about the
+same size, which he had picked up in the street. He fastened the two
+together firmly with thread, then proceeded to wrap them up neatly in
+a piece of clean white paper, and tie the parcel in such a manner that
+it would be difficult to undo it again. This was all done in order to
+occupy the attention of the old woman and to seize a favorable
+opportunity when she would be busy with the knot. The piece of iron
+was simply added for weight, in order that she might not immediately
+detect the fraud. He had just finished, and had put the packet in his
+pocket, when in the court below resounded the cry:
+
+"Six o'clock struck long ago!"
+
+"Long ago! Good heavens!"
+
+He ran to the door, listened, seized his hat, and went down the stairs
+cautiously and stealthily as a cat. He still had the most important
+thing to do--to steal the hatchet out of the kitchen. That a hatchet
+was the best instrument, he had long since decided. He had an old
+garden knife, but on a knife--especially on his own strength--he could
+not rely; he finally fixed on the hatchet. A peculiarity was to be
+noticed in all these resolutions of his; the more definitely they were
+settled, the more absurd and horrible they immediately appeared to his
+eyes, and never, for a moment, did he feel sure of the execution of
+his project. But even if every question had been settled, every doubt
+cleared away, every difficulty overcome, he would probably have
+renounced his design on the instant, as something absurd, monstrous,
+and impossible. But there were still a host of matters to arrange, of
+problems to solve. As to procuring the hatchet, this trifle did not
+trouble Raskolnikoff in the least, for nothing was easier. As a matter
+of fact Nastasia was scarcely ever at home, especially of an evening.
+She was constantly out gossiping with friends or tradespeople, and
+that was the reason of her mistress's constant complaints. When the
+time came, all he would have to do would be to quietly enter the
+kitchen and take the hatchet, and then to replace it an hour
+afterwards when all was over. But perhaps this would not be as easy as
+he fancied. "Suppose," said the young man to himself, "that when, in
+an hour's time, I come to replace the hatchet, Nastasia should have
+come in. Now, in that case, I could naturally not enter the kitchen
+until she had gone out again. But supposing during this time she
+notices the absence of the hatchet, she will grumble, perhaps kick up
+a shindy, and that will serve to denounce me, or at least might do
+so!"
+
+Before he had got to the bottom of the staircase, a trifling
+circumstance came and upset all his plans. On reaching his landlady's
+landing, he found the kitchen door wide open, as usual, and he peeped
+in, in order to make sure that, in the absence of Nastasia, her
+mistress was not there, and that the doors of the other rooms were
+closed. But great was his annoyance to find Nastasia there herself,
+engaged in hanging clothes on a line. Perceiving the young man, she
+stopped and turned to him inquiringly. He averted his eyes and went
+away without remark. But the affair was done for. There was no
+hatchet, he was frustrated entirely. He felt crushed, nay, humiliated,
+but a feeling of brutal vindictiveness at his disappointment soon
+ensued, and he continued down the stairs, smiling maliciously to
+himself. He stood hesitating at the gate. To walk about the streets or
+to go back were equally repugnant. "To think that I have missed such a
+splendid opportunity!" he murmured as he stood aimlessly at the
+entrance, leaning near the open door of the porter's lodge. Suddenly
+he started--something in the dark room attracted his eye. He looked
+quietly around. No one was near. He descended the two steps on tiptoe,
+and called for the porter. There was no reply, and he rushed headlong
+to the hatchet (it was a hatchet), secured it where it lay among some
+wood, and hurriedly fastened it to the loop as he made his way out
+into the street. No one saw him! "There's more of the devil in this
+than my design," he said smiling to himself. The occurrence gave him
+fresh courage.
+
+He went away quietly in order not to excite any suspicion, and walked
+along the street with his eyes studiously fixed on the ground,
+avoiding the faces of the passers-by. Suddenly he recollected his hat.
+"Good heavens! the day before yesterday I had money, and not to have
+thought of that! I could so easily have bought a cap!" and he began
+cursing himself. Glancing casually in a shop, he saw it was ten
+minutes past seven. He had yet a long way to go, as he was making a
+circuit, not wishing to walk direct to the house. He kept off, as much
+as he was able, all thought of his mission, and on the way reflected
+upon possible improvements of the public grounds, upon the
+desirability of fountains, and why people lived where there were
+neither parks nor fountains, but only mud, lime, and bricks, emitting
+horrid exhalations and every conceivable foulness. This reminded him
+of his own walks about the Cyennaza, and he came to himself.
+
+"How true it is that persons being led to execution interest
+themselves in anything that strikes them on the way!" was the thought
+that came into his head, but it passed away like lightning to be
+succeeded by some other. "Here we are--there is the gate." It struck
+half-past seven as he stood near the house.
+
+To his delight, he passed in without observation. As if on purpose, at
+the very same moment a load of hay was going in, and it completely
+screened him. On the other side of the load, a dispute or brawl was
+evidently taking place, and he gained the old woman's staircase in a
+second. Recovering his breath and pressing his hand to his beating
+heart, he commenced the ascent, though first feeling for the hatchet
+and arranging it. Every minute he stopped to listen. The stairs were
+quite deserted, and every door was closed. No one met him. On the
+second floor, indeed, the door of an empty lodging was wide open; some
+painters were working there, but they did not look up. He stopped a
+moment to think, and then continued the ascent: "No doubt it would be
+better if they were not there, but fortunately there are two more
+floors above them." At last he reached the fourth floor, and Alena
+Ivanovna's door; the lodging facing it was unoccupied. The lodging on
+the third floor, just beneath the old woman's, was also apparently
+empty. The card that used to be on the door had gone; the lodgers had,
+no doubt, moved. Raskolnikoff was stifling. He stood hesitating a
+moment: "Had I not better go away?" But without answering the
+question, he waited and listened. Not a sound issued from the old
+woman's apartments. The staircase was filled with the same silence.
+After listening for a long time, the young man cast a last glance
+around, and again felt his hatchet. "Do I not look too pale?" thought
+he. "Do I not appear too agitated? She is mistrustful. I should do
+well to wait a little, to give my emotion time to calm down."
+
+But instead of becoming quieter, his heart throbbed more violently. He
+could stand it no longer, and, raising his hand toward the bell rope,
+he pulled it toward him. After waiting half a minute, he rang
+again--this time a little louder. No answer. To ring like a deaf man
+would have been useless, stupid even. The old woman was certainly at
+home; but, suspicious by nature, she was likely to be so all the more
+then, as she happened to be alone. Raskolnikoff knew something of
+Alena Ivanovna's habits. He therefore placed his ear to the door. Had
+the circumstances amid which he was placed strangely developed his
+power of hearing, which, in general, is difficult to admit, or was the
+sound really easily perceptible? Anyhow, he suddenly became aware that
+a hand was being cautiously placed on the lock, and that a dress
+rustled against the door. Some one inside was going through exactly
+the same movements as he on the landing. Some one, standing up against
+the lock, was listening while trying to hide her presence, and had
+probably her ear also against the door.
+
+In order to avoid all idea of mystery, the young man purposely moved
+about rather noisily, and muttered something half aloud; then he rang
+a third time, but gently and coolly, without allowing the bell to
+betray the least sign of impatience. Raskolnikoff never forgot this
+moment of his life. When, in after days, he thought over it, he could
+never understand how he had been able to display such cunning,
+especially at a time when emotion was now and again depriving him of
+the free use of his intellectual and physical faculties. After a short
+while he heard the bolt withdrawn.
+
+The door, as before, was opened a little, and again the two eyes, with
+mistrustful glance, peeped out of the dark. Then Raskolnikoff lost his
+presence of mind and made a serious mistake. Fearing that the old
+woman would take alarm at finding they were alone, and knowing that
+his appearance would not reassure her, he took hold of the door and
+pulled it toward him in order to prevent her shutting it again if she
+should be thus minded. Seeing this, she held on to the lock, so that
+he almost drew her together with the door on to the staircase. She
+recovered herself, and stood to prevent his entrance, speechless with
+fright.
+
+"Good evening, Alena Ivanovna," he commenced, trying to speak with
+unconcern, but his voice did not obey him, and he faltered and
+trembled, "Good evening, I have brought you something, but we had
+better go into the light." He pushed past her and entered the room
+uninvited. The old woman followed and found her tongue.
+
+"What is it you want? Who are you?" she commenced.
+
+"Pardon me, Alena Ivanovna, your old acquaintance Raskolnikoff. I have
+brought a pledge, as I promised the other day," and he held out the
+packet to her.
+
+The old woman was about to examine it, when she raised her eyes and
+looked straight into those of the visitor who had entered so
+unceremoniously. She examined him attentively, distrustfully, for a
+minute. Raskolnikoff fancied there was a gleam of mockery in her look
+as if she guessed all. He felt he was changing color, and that if she
+kept her glance upon him much longer without saying a word he would be
+obliged to run away.
+
+"Why are you looking at me thus?" he said at last in anger. "Will you
+take it or not? or shall I take it elsewhere? I have no time to
+waste." He did not intend to say this, but the words came out. The
+tone seemed to quiet her suspicions.
+
+"Why were you so impatient, _batuchka_? What is it?" she asked,
+glancing at the pledge.
+
+"The silver cigarette case of which I spoke the other day."
+
+She held out her hand. "But why are you so pale, why do your hands
+shake? What is the matter with you, _batuchka_?"
+
+"Fever," replied he abruptly. "You would be pale too if you had
+nothing to eat." He could hardly speak the words and felt his strength
+falling. But there was some plausibility in his reply; and the old
+woman took the pledge.
+
+"What is it?" she asked once more, weighing it in her hand and looking
+straight at her visitor.
+
+"Cigarette case, silver, look at it."
+
+"It doesn't feel as though it were silver. Oh! what a dreadful knot!"
+
+She began to untie the packet and turned to the light (all the windows
+were closed in spite of the heat). Her back was turned toward
+Raskolnikoff, and for a few seconds she paid no further attention to
+him. He opened his coat, freed the hatchet from the loop, but did not
+yet take it from its hiding place; he held it with his right hand
+beneath the garment. His limbs were weak, each moment they grew more
+numbed and stiff. He feared his fingers would relax their hold of the
+hatchet. Then his head turned giddy.
+
+"What is this you bring me?" cried Alena Ivanovna, turning to him in a
+rage.
+
+There was not a moment to lose now. He pulled out the hatchet, raised
+it with both hands, and let it descend without force, almost
+mechanically, on the old woman's head. But directly he had struck the
+blow his strength returned. According to her usual habit, Alena
+Ivanovna was bareheaded. Her scanty gray locks, greasy with oil, were
+gathered in one thin plait, which was fixed to the back of her neck by
+means of a piece of horn comb. The hatchet struck her just on the
+sinciput, and this was partly owing to her small stature. She scarcely
+uttered a faint cry and collapsed at once all in a heap on the floor;
+she was dead.
+
+The murderer laid his hatchet down and at once began to search the
+corpse, taking the greatest precaution not to get stained with the
+blood; he remembered seeing Alena Ivanovna, on the occasion of his
+last visit, take her keys from the right-hand pocket of her dress. He
+was in full possession of his intellect; he felt neither giddy nor
+dazed, but his hands continued to shake. Later on, he recollected that
+he had been very prudent, very attentive, that he had taken every care
+not to soil himself. It did not take him long to find the keys; the
+same as the other day, they were all together on a steel ring. Having
+secured them, Raskolnikoff at once passed into the bedroom. It was a
+very small apartment; on one side was a large glass case full of holy
+images, on the other a great bed looking very clean with its
+quilted-silk patchwork coverlet. The third wall was occupied by a
+chest of drawers. Strange to say, the young man had no sooner
+attempted to open them, he had no sooner commenced to try the keys,
+than a kind of shudder ran through his frame. Again the idea came to
+him to give up his task and go away, but this weakness only lasted a
+second: it was now too late to draw back.
+
+He was even smiling at having for a moment entertained such a thought,
+when he was suddenly seized with a terrible anxiety: suppose the old
+woman were still alive, suppose she recovered consciousness. Leaving
+at once the keys and the drawers, he hastened to the corpse, seized
+the hatchet, and prepared to strike another blow at his victim, but he
+found there was no necessity to do so. Alena Ivanovna was dead beyond
+all doubt. Leaning over her again to examine her closer, Raskolnikoff
+saw that the skull was shattered. He was about to touch her with his
+fingers, but drew back, as it was quite unnecessary. There was a pool
+of blood upon the floor. Suddenly noticing a bit of cord round the old
+woman's neck, the young man gave it a tug, but the gory stuff was
+strong, and did not break. The murderer then tried to remove it by
+drawing it down the body. But this second attempt was no more
+successful than the first, the cord encountered some obstacle and
+became fixed. Burning with impatience, Raskolnikoff brandished the
+hatchet, ready to strike the corpse and sever the confounded string at
+the same blow. However, he could not make up his mind to proceed with
+such brutality. At last, after trying for two minutes, and staining
+his hands with blood, he succeeded in severing the cord with the blade
+of the hatchet without further disfiguring the dead body. As he had
+imagined, there was a purse suspended to the old woman's neck. Besides
+this there was also a small enameled medal and two crosses, one of
+cypress wood, the other of brass. The greasy purse, a little
+chamois-leather bag, was as full as it could hold. Raskolnikoff thrust
+it in his pocket without examining the contents. He then threw the
+crosses on his victim's breast, and hastily returned to the bedroom,
+taking the hatchet with him.
+
+His impatience was now intense, he seized the keys, and again set to
+work. But all his attempts to open the drawers were unavailing, and
+this was not so much owing to the shaking of his hands as to his
+continual misconceptions. He could see, for instance, that a certain
+key would not fit the lock, and yet he continued to try and insert it.
+All on a sudden he recalled a conjecture he had formed on the occasion
+of his preceding visit: the big key with the toothed wards, which was
+attached to the ring with the smaller ones, probably belonged, not to
+the drawers, but to some box in which the old woman, no doubt, hoarded
+up her valuables. Without further troubling about the drawers, he at
+once looked under the bed, aware that old women are in the habit of
+hiding their treasures in such places. And there indeed was a trunk
+with rounded lid, covered with red morocco and studded with steel
+nails. Raskolnikoff was able to insert the key in the lock without the
+least difficulty. When he opened the box he perceived a hareskin cloak
+trimmed with red lying on a white sheet; beneath the fur was a silk
+dress, and then a shawl, the rest of the contents appeared to be
+nothing but rags. The young man commenced by wiping his bloodstained
+hands on the red trimming. "It will not show so much on red." Then he
+suddenly seemed to change his mind: "Heavens! am I going mad?" thought
+he with fright.
+
+But scarcely had he touched these clothes than a gold watch rolled
+from under the fur. He then overhauled everything in the box. Among
+the rags were various gold trinkets, which had all probably been
+pledged with the old woman: bracelets, chains, earrings, scarf pins,
+&c. Some were in their cases, while the others were tied up with tape
+in pieces of newspaper folded in two. Raskolnikoff did not hesitate,
+he laid hands on these jewels, and stowed them away in the pockets of
+his coat and trousers, without opening the cases or untying the
+packets; but he was soon interrupted in his work------
+
+Footsteps resounded in the other room. He stopped short, frozen with
+terror. But the noise having ceased, he was already imagining he had
+been mistaken, when suddenly he distinctly heard a faint cry, or
+rather a kind of feeble interrupted moan. At the end of a minute or
+two, everything was again as silent as death. Raskolnikoff had seated
+himself on the floor beside the trunk and was waiting, scarcely daring
+to breathe; suddenly he bounded up, caught up the hatchet, and rushed
+from the bedroom. In the center of the apartment, Elizabeth, a huge
+bundle in her hands, stood gazing in a terror-stricken way at her dead
+sister; white as a sheet, she did not seem to have the strength to
+call out. On the sudden appearance of the murderer, she began to quake
+in every limb, and nervous twitches passed over her face; she tried to
+raise her arm, to open her mouth, but she was unable to utter the
+least cry, and, slowly retreating, her gaze still riveted on
+Raskolnikoff, she sought refuge in a corner. The poor woman drew back
+in perfect silence, as though she had no breath left in her body. The
+young man rushed upon her, brandishing the hatchet; the wretched
+creature's lips assumed the doleful expression peculiar to quite young
+children when, beginning to feel frightened of something, they gaze
+fixedly at the object which has raised their alarm, and are on the
+point of crying out. Terror had so completely stupefied this
+unfortunate Elizabeth, that, though threatened by the hatchet, she did
+not even think of protecting her face by holding her hands before her
+head, with that mechanical gesture which the instinct of
+self-preservation prompts on such occasions. She scarcely raised her
+left arm, and extended it slowly in the direction of the murderer, as
+thought to keep him off. The hatchet penetrated her skull, laying it
+open from the upper part of the forehead to the crown. Elizabeth fell
+down dead. No longer aware of what he did, Raskolnikoff took the
+bundle from his victim's hand, then dropped it and ran to the
+anteroom.
+
+He was more and more terrified, especially after this second murder,
+entirely unpremeditated by him. He was in a hurry to be gone; had he
+then been in a state to see things more clearly, had he only been able
+to form an idea of the difficulties besetting his position, to see how
+desperate, how hideous, how absurd it was, to understand how many
+obstacles there still remained for him to surmount, perhaps even
+crimes to commit, to escape from this house and return home, he would
+most likely have withdrawn from the struggle, and have gone at once
+and given himself up to justice; it was not cowardice which would have
+prompted him to do so, but the horror of what he had done. This last
+impression became more and more powerful every minute. Nothing in the
+world could now have made him return to the trunk, nor even reënter
+the room in which it lay. Little by little his mind became diverted by
+other thoughts, and he lapsed into a kind of reverie; at times the
+murderer seemed to forget his position, or rather the most important
+part of it, and to concentrate his attention on trifles. After a
+while, happening to glance in the kitchen, he observed a pail half
+full of water, standing on a bench, and that gave him the idea of
+washing his hands and the hatchet. The blood had made his hands
+sticky. After plunging the blade of the hatchet in the water, he took
+a small piece of soap which lay on the window sill, and commenced his
+ablutions. When he had washed his hands, he set to cleaning the iron
+part of his weapon; then he devoted three minutes to soaping the
+wooden handle, which was also stained with blood.
+
+After this he wiped it with a cloth which had been hung up to dry on a
+line stretched across the kitchen. This done, he drew near the window
+and carefully examined the hatchet for some minutes. The accusing
+stains had disappeared, but the handle was still damp. Raskolnikoff
+carefully hid the weapon under his coat by replacing it in the loop;
+after which, he minutely inspected his clothes, that is to say so far
+as the dim light of the kitchen allowed him to do so. He saw nothing
+suspicious about the coat and trousers, but there were bloodstains on
+the boots. He removed them with the aid of a damp rag. But these
+precautions only half reassured him, for he knew that he could not see
+properly and that certain stains had very likely escaped him. He stood
+irresolute in the middle of the room, a prey to a somber, agonizing
+thought, the thought that he was going mad, that at that moment he was
+not in a fit state to come to a determination and to watch over his
+security, that his way of going to work was probably not the one the
+circumstances demanded. "Good heavens! I ought to go, to go away at
+once!" murmured he, and he rushed to the anteroom where the greatest
+terror he had yet experienced awaited him.
+
+He stood stock-still, not daring to believe his eyes: the door of the
+lodging, the outer door which opened on to the landing, the same one
+at which he had rung a little while before and by which he had
+entered, was open; up till then it had remained ajar, the old woman
+had no doubt omitted to close it by way of precaution; it had been
+neither locked nor bolted! But he had seen Elizabeth after that. How
+was it that it had not occurred to him that she had come in by way of
+the door? She could not have entered the lodging through the wall. He
+shut the door and bolted it. "But no, that is not what I should do? I
+must go away, go away." He drew back the bolt and, after opening the
+door again, stood listening on the landing.
+
+He stood thus a long while. Down below, probably at the street door,
+two noisy voices were vociferating insults. "Who can those people be?"
+He waited patiently. At last the noise ceased, the brawlers had taken
+their departure. The young man was about to do the same, when a door
+on the floor immediately below was noisily opened and some one went
+downstairs, humming a tune. "Whatever are they all up to?" wondered
+Raskolnikoff, and closing the door again he waited a while. At length
+all became silent as before; but just as he was preparing to go down,
+he suddenly became aware of a fresh sound, footsteps as yet far off,
+at the bottom of the staircase; and he no sooner heard them than he
+guessed the truth:--some one was coming _there_, to the old woman's on
+the fourth floor. Whence came this presentiment? What was there so
+particularly significant in the sound of these footsteps? They were
+heavy, regular, and rather slow than hurried. _He_ has now reached the
+first floor, he still continues to ascend. The sound is becoming
+plainer and plainer. He pants as though with asthma at each step he
+takes. He has commenced the third flight. He will soon be on the
+fourth! And Raskolnikoff felt suddenly seized as with a general
+paralysis, the same as happens when a person has the nightmare and
+fancies himself pursued by enemies; they are on the point of catching
+him, they will kill him, and yet he remains spellbound, unable to move
+a limb.
+
+The stranger was now ascending the fourth flight. Raskolnikoff, who
+until then had been riveted to the landing with fright, was at length
+able to shake off his torpor, and hastily reentered the apartment,
+closing the door behind him. Then he bolted it, being careful to make
+as little noise as possible. Instinct rather than reason prompted him
+to do this. When he had finished, he remained close to the door,
+listening, scarcely daring to breathe. The visitor was now on the
+landing. Only the thickness of the door separated the two men. The
+unknown was in the same position toward Raskolnikoff as the latter had
+been a little while before toward the old woman. The visitor stood
+panting for some little time. "He must be stout and big," thought the
+young man as he clasped the hatchet firmly in his hand. It was all
+like a dream to him. The visitor gave a violent pull at the bell. He
+immediately fancied he heard something move inside. He listened
+attentively during a few seconds, then he gave another ring and again
+waited; suddenly losing patience, he began to shake the door handle
+with all his might. Raskolnikoff watched with terror the bolt
+trembling in the socket, expecting to see it shoot back at any moment,
+so violent were the jerks given to the door. It occurred to him to
+hold the bolt in its place with his hand, but the _man_ might have
+found it out. His head was turning quite dizzy again. "I shall betray
+myself!" thought he; but he suddenly recovered his presence of mind as
+the unknown broke the silence.
+
+"Are they both asleep, or has some one strangled them? The
+thrice-confounded creatures!" growled the visitor in a guttural voice.
+"Hi! Alena Ivanovna, you old sorceress! Elizabeth Ivanovna, you
+indescribable beauty!--open! Oh! the witches! can they be asleep?"
+
+In his exasperation he rang ten times running, and as loud as he
+possibly could. This man was evidently not a stranger there, and was
+in the habit of being obeyed. At the same moment some light and rapid
+footsteps resounded on the staircase. It was another person coming to
+the fourth floor. Raskolnikoff was not at first aware of the
+newcomer's arrival.
+
+"Is it possible that there's no one at home?" said the latter in a
+loud and hearty tone of voice, addressing the first visitor who was
+still tugging at the bell pull. "Good day, Koch!"
+
+"Judging by his voice, he must be quite a young man," immediately
+thought Raskolnikoff.
+
+"The devil only knows! I've almost smashed the lock," replied Koch.
+"But how is it you know me?"
+
+"What a question! The day before yesterday I played you at billiards,
+at Gambrinus's, and won three games right off."
+
+"Ah!"
+
+"So they're not at home? That's strange. I might almost say it's
+ridiculous. Where can the old woman have gone? I want to speak with
+her."
+
+"And I too, _batuchka_, I want to speak with her."
+
+"Well, what's to be done? I suppose we must go back to whence we came.
+I wanted to borrow some money of her!" exclaimed the young man.
+
+"Of course we must go back again; but why then did she make an
+appointment? She herself, the old witch, told me to come at this hour.
+And it's a long way to where I live. Where the deuce can she be? I
+don't understand it. She never stirs from one year's end to the other,
+the old witch; she quite rots in the place, her legs have always got
+something the matter with them, and now all on a sudden she goes
+gallivanting about!"
+
+"Suppose we question the porter?"
+
+"What for?"
+
+"To find out where she's gone and when she will be back."
+
+"Hum!--the deuce!--question!--but she never goes anywhere." And he
+again tugged at the door handle. "The devil take her! there's nothing
+to be done but to go."
+
+"Wait!" suddenly exclaimed the young man, "look!--do you notice how
+the door resists when we pull it?"
+
+"Well, what then?"
+
+"Why, that shows that it's not locked, but bolted! Hark how it
+clinks!"
+
+"Well?"
+
+"Don't you understand? That shows that one of them must be at home. If
+both were out, they would have locked the door after them, and not
+have bolted it inside. Listen, don't you hear the noise it makes?
+Well, to bolt one's door, one must be at home, you understand.
+Therefore it follows that they are at home, only for some reason or
+other they don't open the door!"
+
+"Why, yes, you're right!" exclaimed the astonished Koch. "So they're
+there, are they?" And he again shook the door violently.
+
+"Stay!" resumed the young man, "don't pull like that. There's
+something peculiar about this. You've rung, you've pulled at the door
+with all your might, and they haven't answered you; therefore, they've
+either both fainted away, or----"
+
+"What?"
+
+"This is what we had better do: have the porter up, so that he may
+find out what's the matter."
+
+"That's not a bad idea!"
+
+They both started downstairs.
+
+"Stop! you stay here; I'll fetch the porter."
+
+"Why stay here?"
+
+"Well, one never knows what might happen----"
+
+"All right."
+
+"You see, I might also pass for an examining magistrate! There's
+something very peculiar about all this, that's evident, e-vi-dent!"
+said the young man excitedly, and he hastily made his way down the
+stairs.
+
+Left alone, Koch rang again, but gently this time; then, with a
+thoughtful air, he began to play with the door handle, turning it
+first one way, then the other, so as to make sure the door was only
+bolted. After this, with a great deal of puffing and blowing, he
+stooped down to look through the keyhole, but the key was in the lock,
+and turned in such a way that one could not see through. Standing up
+on the other side of the door, Raskolnikoff still held the hatchet in
+his hands. He was almost in a state of delirium and was preparing to
+attack the two men the moment they forced an entrance. More than once,
+on hearing them knocking and planning together, he had felt inclined
+to put an end to the matter there and then by calling out to them. At
+times he experienced a desire to abuse and defy them, while awaiting
+their irruption. "The sooner it's over the better!" he kept thinking.
+
+"The devil take them!" The time passed; still no one came. Koch was
+beginning to lose patience. "The devil take them!" he muttered again,
+and, tired of waiting, he relinquished his watch to go and find the
+young man. By degrees the sound of his heavy boots echoing on the
+stairs ceased to be heard.
+
+"Heavens! What shall I do?"
+
+Raskolnikoff drew back the bolt and opened the door a few inches.
+Reassured by the silence which reigned in the house, and, moreover,
+scarcely in a fit state at the time to reflect on what he did, he went
+out on to the landing, shut the door behind him as securely as he
+could and turned to go downstairs. He had already descended several
+steps when suddenly a great uproar arose from one of the floors below.
+Where could he hide? Concealment was impossible, so he hastened
+upstairs again.
+
+"Hi there! hang it! stop!"
+
+He who uttered these cries had just burst out of one of the lodgings,
+and was rushing down the stairs as fast as his legs would carry him,
+yelling the while: "Dmitri! Dmitri! Dmitri! May the devil take the
+fool!"
+
+The rest died away in the distance; the man who was uttering these
+cries had already left the house far behind. All was once more silent;
+but scarcely was this alarm over than a fresh one succeeded it:
+several individuals talking together in a loud tone of voice were
+noisily coming up the stairs. There were three or four of them.
+Raskolnikoff recognized the young man's sonorous accents. "It is
+they!" No longer hoping to escape them, he advanced boldly to meet
+them: "Let happen what will!" said he to himself: "if they stop me,
+all is over; if they let me pass, all is over just the same: they will
+remember passing me on the stairs." They were about to encounter him,
+only one flight separated them--when suddenly he felt himself saved! A
+few steps from him, to the right, there was an empty lodging with the
+door wide open, it was that same one on the second floor where he had
+seen the painters working, but, by a happy chance, they had just left
+it. It was they, no doubt, who a few minutes before had gone off,
+uttering those shouts. The paint on the floors was quite fresh, the
+workmen had left their things in the middle of the room: a small tub,
+some paint in an earthenware crock, and a big brush. In the twinkling
+of an eye, Raskolnikoff glided into the deserted apartment and hid
+himself as best he could up against the wall. It was none too soon:
+his pursuers were already on the landing; they did not stop there,
+however, but went on up to the fourth floor, talking loudly among
+themselves. After waiting till they had got some distance off, he left
+the room on tiptoe and hurried down as fast as his legs would carry
+him. No one on the stairs! No one either at the street door! He
+stepped briskly outside, and, once in the street, turned to the left.
+
+He knew very well, he knew without a doubt, that they who were seeking
+him were at that moment in the old woman's lodging, and were amazed to
+find that the door, which a little while before had been shut so
+securely, was now open. "They're examining the corpses," thought he;
+"it won't take them a minute to come to the conclusion that the
+murderer managed to hide himself from them as they went up the stairs;
+perhaps they may even have a suspicion that he stowed himself away in
+the empty lodging on the second floor while they were hurrying to the
+upper part of the house." But, in spite of these reflections, he did
+not dare to increase his pace, though he still had a hundred steps or
+so to go before reaching the first turning. "Suppose I slipped into
+some doorway, in some out-of-the-way street, and waited there a few
+minutes? No, that would never do! I might throw my hatchet away
+somewhere? or take a cab? No good! no good!" At last he reached a
+narrow lane; he entered it more dead than alive. There, he was almost
+in safety, and he knew it: in such a place, suspicion could hardly be
+fixed upon him; while, on the other hand, it was easier for him to
+avoid notice by mingling with the crowd. But all these agonizing
+events had so enfeebled him that he could scarcely keep on his legs.
+Great drops of perspiration streamed down his face; his neck was quite
+wet. "I think you've had your fill!" shouted some one who took him for
+a drunken man as he reached the canal bank.
+
+He no longer knew what he was doing; the farther he went, the more
+obscure became his ideas. However, when he found himself on the quay,
+he became frightened at seeing so few people there, and, fearing that
+he might be noticed on so deserted a spot, he returned to the lane.
+Though he had hardly the strength to put one leg before the other, he
+nevertheless took the longest way to reach his home. He had scarcely
+recovered his presence of mind even when he crossed the threshold; at
+least the thought of the hatchet never came to him until he was on the
+stairs. Yet the question he had to solve was a most serious one: it
+consisted in returning the hatchet to the place he had taken it from,
+and in doing so without attracting the least attention. Had he been
+more capable of considering his position, he would certainly have
+understood that, instead of replacing the hatchet, it would be far
+safer to get rid of it by throwing it into the yard of some other
+house.
+
+Nevertheless he met with no mishap. The door of the porter's lodge was
+closed, though not locked; to all appearance, therefore, the porter
+was at home. But Raskolnikoff had so thoroughly lost all faculty of
+preparing any kind of plan, that he walked straight to the door and
+opened it. If the porter had asked him: "What do you want?" perhaps he
+would simply have handed him the hatchet. But, the same as on the
+previous occasion, the porter was absent, and this gave the young man
+every facility to replace the hatchet under the bench, exactly where
+he had found it. Then he went upstairs and reached his room without
+meeting a soul; the door of his landlady's apartments was shut. Once
+home again, he threw himself on his couch just as he was. He did not
+sleep, but lay in a sort of semiconsciousness. If anybody had then
+appeared before him, he would have sprung up and cried out. His head
+was swimming with a host of vague thoughts: do what he could, he was
+unable to follow the thread of one of them.
+
+Raskolnikoff lay on the couch a very long while. At times he seemed to
+rouse from this half sleep, and then he noticed that the night was
+very far advanced, but still it never entered his head to rise. Soon
+it began to brighten into day, and the dawn found him in a state of
+stupefaction, lying motionless on his back. A desperate clamor, and
+sounds of brawls from the streets below, rose to his ears. These
+awakened him thoroughly, although he heard them every morning early at
+the same hour. "Ah! two o'clock, drinking is over," and he started up
+as though some one had pulled him off the couch. "What! two o'clock
+already?" He sat on the edge of the couch and then recollected
+everything, in an instant it all came back! At first he thought he was
+going out of his mind, a strange chill pervaded his frame, but the
+cold arose from the fever which had seized upon him during his sleep.
+He shivered until his teeth chattered, and all his limbs fairly shook.
+He went to the door, opened it, and listened; all was silent in the
+house. With astonishment he turned and looked round the room. How
+could he have come home the night before, not bolted the door, and
+thrown himself on the couch just as he was, not only not undressed,
+but with his hat on? There it lay in the middle of the floor where it
+had rolled. "If anyone came in, what would he think? That I am drunk,
+of course."
+
+He went to the window--it was pretty light--and looked himself all
+over from head to foot, to see if there were any stains on his
+clothes. But he could not rely upon that sort of inspection; so, still
+shivering, he undressed and examined his clothes again, looking
+everywhere with the greatest care. To make quite sure, he went over
+them three times. He discovered nothing but a few drops of clotted
+blood on the ends of his trousers which were very much frayed. He took
+a big clasp-knife and cut off the frayed edges. Suddenly he remembered
+that the purse and the things he had abstracted from the old woman's
+chest, were still in his pockets! He had never thought of taking them
+out and hiding them! indeed, it had never crossed his mind that they
+were in his pockets while examining his clothes! Was it possible? In a
+second he emptied all out on to the table in a heap. Then, turning his
+pockets inside out to make sure there was nothing left in them, he
+carried the things to a corner of the room. Just there, the paper was
+hanging loose from the wall; he bent down and commenced to stuff all
+the things into a hole behind the paper. "There, it's all out of
+sight!" thought he gleefully, as he stood gazing stupidly at the spot
+where the paper bulged out more than ever. Suddenly he began to
+shudder from terror. "Good heavens!" murmured he in despair, "what is
+the matter with me? Is that hidden? Is that the way to hide anything?"
+
+Indeed, he had not reckoned on such spoil, he had only thought of
+taking the old woman's money; so he was not prepared with a hiding
+place for the jewels. "I have no cause to rejoice now," thought he.
+"Is that the way to hide anything? I must really be losing my senses!"
+He sunk on the couch again exhausted; another fit of intolerable
+shivering seized him, and he mechanically pulled his old student's
+cloak over him for warmth, as he fell into a delirious sleep. He lost
+all consciousness of himself. Not more than five minutes had elapsed
+before he woke up in intense excitement, and bent over his clothes in
+the deepest anguish. "How could I go to sleep again when nothing is
+done! For I have done nothing, the loop is still where I sewed it. I
+forgot all about that! What a convincing proof it would have been." He
+ripped it off and tore it into shreds which he placed among his
+underlinen under the pillow. "These rags cannot awaken any suspicions,
+I fancy; at least, so it seems to me," repeated he, standing up in the
+middle of the room, and, with an attempt rendered all the more painful
+by the effort it cost him, he looked all round, trying to make sure he
+had forgotten nothing. He suffered cruelly from this conviction, that
+everything, even memory, even the most elementary prudence, was
+abandoning him.
+
+"Can this be the punishment already beginning? Indeed! indeed! it is!"
+
+And indeed the frayed edges he had cut from the bottom of his trousers
+were lying on the floor, in the middle of the room, exposed to the
+view of the first comer. "But what can I be thinking of?" exclaimed he
+in utter bewilderment. Then a strange idea came into his head; he
+thought that perhaps all his clothes were saturated in blood, and that
+he could not see this because his senses were gone and his perception
+of things lost. Then he recollected that there would be traces on the
+purse, and his pockets would be wet with blood. It was so. "I am
+bereft of my reason, I know not what I am doing. Bah! not at all!--it
+is only weakness, delirium. I shall soon be better." He tore at the
+lining. At this moment the rays of the morning streamed in and shone
+on his left boot. There were plain traces, and all the point was
+covered. "I must have stepped in that pool. What shall I do now? Boot,
+lining, rags, where shall they go?" He rolled them up and stood
+thinking in the middle of the room. "Ah, the stove. Yes, burn them.
+No, I cannot, I have no match. Better throw them away. Yes, yes, that
+is the thing," said he, again sitting on the couch. "At once, and
+without delay too, quick." But, instead, his head fell back upon the
+pillow, and chilly shiverings again came over him. He covered himself
+with his cloak and slept again. It appeared hours to him, and many a
+time in his sleep he tried to rise to hasten to throw away his bundle,
+but he could not, he seemed chained to the bed. At last he awoke, as
+he heard a loud knock at his door.
+
+"Eh, open, will you?" cried Nastasia. "Don't lie there like a dog.
+It's eleven o'clock."
+
+"Perhaps he is not in," said a man's voice.
+
+"The porter's voice. What does he want?" Raskolnikoff rose, and sat on
+the couch listening. His heart throbbed violently. "Who has bolted the
+door then?" exclaimed the servant. "Open, will you?"
+
+"All must be discovered?" He rose a little and undid the bolt, and
+fell back again on his bed. There stood the porter and Nastasia. The
+servant looked strangely at Raskolnikoff, while he fixed a despairing
+glance upon the porter.
+
+"Here is a notice for you from the office," said the latter.
+
+"What office?"
+
+"The police office."
+
+"What for?"
+
+"I don't know. You are summoned there, go." The porter looked
+anxiously at the lodger, and turned to leave. Raskolnikoff made no
+observation, and held the paper unopened in his hand.
+
+"There, stay where you are," said Nastasia, seeing him fall back on
+the couch. "If you are ill, do not go. What is that in your hand?"
+
+He looked down; in his right hand were clutched the pieces of frayed
+cloth, his boot, and the lining of his pocket. He had evidently fallen
+asleep with them as they were; indeed he recollected how, thinking
+deeply about them, he had dozed away.
+
+"The idea of taking a lot of rags to bed and hugging them to you like
+a treasure!" laughed the servant in her sickly manner.
+
+In a second he hid all under his coat and looked at her attentively.
+Although little was capable of passing in his mind, he felt she would
+not talk thus to a man under arrest for a crime. But then, the police?
+
+"Is there anything you want? You stay here, I will bring it."
+
+"No, I will go. I am going at once," murmured he, rising to his feet.
+
+"Very well."
+
+She went out after the porter. As soon as she had disappeared, he
+rushed to the light to look at his boot. Yes, there were spots, but
+not very plain, all covered with mud. But who would distinguish them?
+Nastasia could know nothing, thank heavens! Then with trembling hand
+he tore open the notice, and began to read. At last he understood; it
+was simply the usual notice to report himself at the office of the
+district that day at half-past nine o'clock.
+
+"But why to-day?" cried he. "Lord, let it be over soon." He was about
+to fall down on his knees to pray, when a fit of laughter seized him.
+"I must trust to myself, not to prayers." He quickly dressed himself.
+"Shall I put the boot on?" he thought, "better throw it away, and hide
+all traces of it." Nevertheless he put it on, only, however, to throw
+it off again with an expression of horror. As, however, he recollected
+he had no other, a smile came to his face, and he drew it on once
+more. Again his face changed into deep despair, his limbs shook more
+and more. "This is not from exertion," thought he, "it is fear." His
+head spun round and round and his temples throbbed visibly.
+
+On the stairs he recollected that all the things were in the hole in
+the wall, and then where was his certificate of birth? He stopped to
+think. But such despair, and, if it may be so called, cynicism, took
+hold of him, that he simply shook his head and went out. The sooner
+over, the better. Once again in the open air, he encountered the same
+insufferable heat, the dust, and the people in drink rolling about the
+streets. The sun caught him full in the eyes and almost blinded him,
+while his head spun round and round, as is usual in fever. On reaching
+the turning into the street he had taken the day before, he glanced in
+great agitation in the direction of the house, but immediately averted
+his eyes again. "If they ask me, I should confess, perhaps," said he
+to himself, as he turned away and made for the office. This was not
+far distant, in a new house, on the fourth floor. As he entered the
+court, he saw to the right of him a staircase, ascending which was a
+man carrying some books. "It was evidently there." He did not think of
+asking.
+
+"I will go and fall on my knees and confess all," he murmured, and
+began to ascend the narrow and very steep stairs. On every floor the
+doors of the kitchens of the several apartments stood open to the
+staircase, and emitted a suffocating, sickening odor. The entrance to
+the office he was in search of was also wide open, and he walked in. A
+number of persons were waiting in the anteroom. The stench was simply
+intolerable, and was intensified by the smell of fresh paint. Pausing
+a little, he decided to advance farther into the small low room. He
+became impatient when he found no one took any notice of him. In an
+inner room were seated a number of clerks engaged in writing. He went
+up to one of these.
+
+"What do you want?" Raskolnikoff showed him the notice.
+
+"You are a student?" asked a clerk, glancing at the notice.
+
+"Yes;--that is, I used to be."
+
+The clerk glanced at him--without, however, any particular curiosity.
+He was a man with unkempt hair and an expressionless face.
+
+"There is nothing to be learned from him, evidently," thought
+Raskolnikoff.
+
+"Step in there to the head clerk," said the man, pointing to a farther
+room, which was quite full of people, among whom were two ladies.
+
+The assistant district officer, a man adorned with red whiskers
+standing out on either side of his face, and with extremely small
+features, looked up impatiently at Raskolnikoff, whose filthy attire
+was by no means prepossessing. The latter returned his glance calmly
+and straight in the face, and in such a manner as to give the officer
+offense.
+
+"What do you want here?" he cried, apparently surprised that such a
+ragged beggar was not knocked down by his thunder-bearing glance.
+
+"I am here because I was summoned," stammered Raskolnikoff.
+
+"It is for the recovery of money lent," said the head clerk. "Here!"
+and he threw a paper to Raskolnikoff, "Read!"
+
+"Money? What money? It cannot be that," thought the young man, and he
+trembled with joy. Everything became clear, and the load fell off his
+shoulders.
+
+"At what hour did you receive this, sir?" cried the lieutenant; "you
+were told to come at nine o'clock, and now it is nearly twelve!"
+
+"I received it a quarter of an hour ago," loudly replied Raskolnikoff,
+over his shoulder, suddenly angered, "and it is sufficient to say that
+I am ill with a fever."
+
+"Please not to bawl!"
+
+"I did not bawl, but spoke plainly; it is you that bawl. I am a
+student, and am not going to have you speak to me in that fashion."
+
+The officer became enraged, and fumed so that only splutters flew out
+of his mouth. He jumped up from his place. "Please keep silence. You
+are in court. Don't be insolent."
+
+"And so are you in court; and, besides bawling, you are smoking, so
+you are wanting in politeness to the whole company." As he said this,
+Raskolnikoff felt an inexpressible delight at his maliciousness. The
+clerk looked up with a smile. The choleric officer was clearly
+nonplused.
+
+"That is not your business, sir," he cried at last, unnaturally loud.
+"Make the necessary declaration. Show him, Alexander Gregorivitch.
+Complaints have been made about you! You don't pay your debts! You
+know how to fly the kite evidently!"
+
+Raskolnikoff did not listen, but greedily seized the paper. He read it
+through more than once, and could make nothing of it. "What is this?"
+he asked of the clerk.
+
+"It is a writ for recovery on a note of hand of yours. Please write,"
+said the clerk.
+
+"Write what?" asked he rudely.
+
+"As I dictate."
+
+The clerk stood near and dictated to him the usual form of
+declaration: that he was unable to pay, that he would not quit the
+capital, dispose of his goods in any way, etc., etc.
+
+"You cannot write, your pen is falling from your fingers," said the
+clerk, and he looked him in the face. "Are you ill?"
+
+"Yes, my head swims. Go on."
+
+"That is all. Now sign it."
+
+Raskolnikoff let fall the pen, and seemed as if about to rise and go;
+but, instead of doing so, he laid both elbows on the table and
+supported his head with his hands. A new idea formed in his mind: to
+rise immediately, go straight to Nicodemus Thomich the ward officer
+and tell him all that had occurred; then to accompany him to his room,
+and show him all the things hidden away in the wall behind the paper.
+His desire to do all this was of such strength that he got up from the
+table to carry his design into execution. "Reflect, reflect a moment!"
+ran in his head. "No, better not think, get it off my shoulders."
+Suddenly he stood still as if shot. Nicodemus Thomich was at this
+moment hotly discussing something with Elia Petrovitch, the inspector
+of police, and the words caught Raskolnikoff's anxious attention. He
+listened.
+
+"It cannot be, they will both be released. In the first place, all is
+contradictory. Consider. Why did they call the porter if it were their
+work? To denounce themselves? Or out of cunning? Not at all, that
+would be too much! Besides, did not the porter see the student
+Pestriakoff at the very gate just as he came in, and he stood there
+some time with three friends who had accompanied him. And Koch: was he
+not below in the silversmith's for half an hour before he went up to
+the old woman's? Now, consider."
+
+"But see what contradictions arise! They say they knocked and found
+the door closed; yet three minutes after, when they went back with the
+porter, it was open."
+
+"That's true. The murderer was inside, and had bolted the door, and
+certainly he would have been captured had not Koch foolishly run off
+to the porter. In the interval _he_, no doubt, had time to escape
+downstairs. Koch explains that, if he had remained, the man would have
+leaped out and killed him. He wanted to have a _Te Deum_ sung. Ha,
+ha!"
+
+"Did nobody see the murderer?"
+
+"How could they? The house is a perfect Noah's ark," put in the clerk,
+who had been listening.
+
+"The thing is clear, very clear," said Nicodemus Thomich decisively.
+
+"Not at all! Not at all!" cried Elia Petrovitch, in reply.
+
+Raskolnikoff took up his hat and made for the door, but he never
+reached it. When he came to himself he found he was sitting on a
+chair, supported on the right by some unknown man, while to his left
+stood another, holding some yellow water in a yellow glass. Nicodemus
+Thomich, standing before him, was looking at him fixedly. Raskolnikoff
+rose.
+
+"What is it? Are you ill?" asked the officer sharply.
+
+"He could hardly hold the pen to sign his name," the clerk explained,
+at the same time going back to his books.
+
+"Have you been ill very long?" cried Elia Petrovitch from his table;
+he had run to see the swoon and returned to his place.
+
+"Since yesterday," murmured Raskolnikoff in reply.
+
+"You went out yesterday?"
+
+"I did."
+
+"Ill?"
+
+"Ill!"
+
+"At what time?"
+
+"Eight o'clock in the evening."
+
+"Where did you go, allow me to ask?"
+
+"In the streets."
+
+"Concise and clear."
+
+Raskolnikoff had replied sharply, in a broken voice, his face as pale
+as a handkerchief, and with his black swollen eyes averted from Elia
+Petrovitch's scrutinizing glance.
+
+"He can hardly stand on his legs. Do you want to ask anything more?"
+said Nicodemus Thomich.
+
+"Nothing," replied Elia Petrovitch.
+
+Nicodemus Thomich evidently wished to say more, but, turning to the
+clerk, who in turn glanced expressively at him, the latter became
+silent, all suddenly stopped speaking. It was strange.
+
+Raskolnikoff went out. As he descended the stairs he could hear an
+animated discussion had broken out, and above all, the interrogative
+voice of Nicodemus Thomich. In the street he came to himself.
+
+"Search, search! they are going to search!" he cried. "The scoundrels,
+they suspect me!" The old dread seized him again, from head to foot.
+
+Here was the room. All was quiet, and no one had, apparently,
+disturbed it--not even Nastasia. But, heavens! how could he have left
+all those things where they were? He rushed to the corner, pushed his
+hands behind the paper, took out the things, and thrust them in his
+pockets. There were eight articles in all: two little boxes with
+earrings or something of that description, then four little morocco
+cases; a chain wrapped up in paper, and something else done up in a
+common piece of newspaper--possibly a decoration. Raskolnikoff
+distributed these, together with the purse, about his person, in order
+to make them less noticeable, and quitted the room again. All the time
+he had left the door wide open. He went away hurriedly, fearing
+pursuit. Perhaps in a few minutes orders would be issued to hunt him
+down, so he must hide all traces of his theft at once; and he would do
+so while he had strength and reason left him. But where should he go?
+
+This had been long decided. Throw the lot in the canal and the matter
+would be at an end! So he had resolved in that night of delirium, when
+he cried out, "Quick, quick! throw all away!" But this was not so
+easy. He wandered to the quays of the Catherine Canal, and lingered
+there for half an hour. Here a washing raft lay where he had thought
+of sinking his spoil, or there boats were moored, and everywhere
+people swarmed. Then, again, would the cases sink? Would they not
+rather float? No, this would not do. He would go to the Neva; there
+would be fewer people there and more room, and it would be more
+convenient. He recognized that he had been wandering about for fully
+half an hour, and in dangerous places. He must make haste. He made his
+way to the river, but soon came to another standstill. Why in the
+Neva? Why in the water at all? Better some solitary place in a wood,
+or under some bushes. Dig a hole and bury them! He felt he was not in
+a condition to deliberate clearly and soundly, but this idea appeared
+the best.
+
+This idea also, however, was not destined to be realized, and another
+took its place. As he passed the V---- Prospect, he suddenly noticed
+on the left an entrance into a court, which was surrounded entirely by
+high walls. On the right, a long way up the court, rose the side of a
+huge four-storied building. To the left, parallel with the walls of
+the house, and commencing immediately at the gate, there ran a wooden
+boarding of about twenty paces down the court. Then came a space where
+a lot of rubbish was deposited; while farther down, at the bottom of
+the court, was a shed, apparently part of some workshop, possibly that
+of a carpenter or coach builder. Everything appeared as black as coal
+dust. Here was the very place, he thought; and, after looking round,
+went up the court. Behind the door he espied a large unworked stone,
+weighing about fifty pounds, which lay close up against the hoarding.
+No one could see him where he stood; he was entirely free from
+observation. He bent down to the stone, managed to turn it over after
+considerable effort, and found underneath a small cavity. He threw in
+the cases, and then the purse on the top of all. The stone was not
+perceptibly higher when he had replaced it, and little traces of its
+having been moved could be noticed. So he pressed some earth against
+the edges with his foot, and made off.
+
+He laughed for joy when again in the street. All traces were gone, and
+who would think of looking there? And if they were found who would
+suspect him? All proofs were gone, and he laughed again. Yes, he
+recollected afterwards how he laughed--a long, nervous, lingering
+laugh, lasting all the time he was in that street.
+
+He reached home toward evening, perhaps at about eight o'clock--how,
+and by what particular way he never recollected--but, speedily
+undressing, he lay down on the couch, trembling like a beaten horse,
+and, drawing his overcoat over him, he fell immediately into a deep
+sleep. He awoke in a high fever and delirious. Some days later he came
+to himself, rose and went out. It was eight o'clock, and the sun had
+disappeared. The heat was as intolerable as before, but he inhaled the
+dusty, fetid, infected town air with greediness. And now his head
+began to spin round, and a wild expression of energy crept into his
+inflamed eyes and pale, meager, wan face. He did not know, did not
+even think, what he was going to do; he only knew that all was to be
+finished "today," at one blow, immediately, or he would never return
+home, because he had no desire to live thus. How to finish? By what
+means? No matter how, and he did not want to think. He drove away any
+thoughts which disturbed him, and only clung to the necessity of
+ending all, "no matter how," said he, with desperate self-confidence
+and decision. By force of habit he took his old walk, and set out in
+the direction of the Haymarket. Farther on, he came on a young man who
+was grinding some very feeling ballads upon a barrel organ. Near the
+man, on the footpath, was a young girl of about fifteen years of age,
+fashionably dressed, with crinoline, mantle, and gloves, and a straw
+hat trimmed with gaudy feathers, but all old and terribly worn out,
+who, in a loud and cracked though not altogether unpleasing voice, was
+singing before a shop in expectation of a couple of kopecks.
+Raskolnikoff stopped and joined one or two listeners, took out a
+five-kopeck piece, and gave it to the girl. The latter at once stopped
+on a very high note which she had just reached, and cried to the man,
+"Come along," and both immediately moved on to another place.
+
+"Do you like street music?" said Raskolnikoff to a middle-aged man
+standing near him. The latter looked at him in surprise, but smiled.
+"I love it," continued Raskolnikoff, "especially when they sing to the
+organ on a cold, dark, gray winter's evening, when all the passers-by
+seem to have pale, green, sickly-looking faces--when the snow is
+falling like a sleet, straight down and with no wind, you know, and
+while the lamps shine on it all."
+
+"I don't know. Excuse me," said the man, frightened at the question
+and Raskolnikoff's strange appearance, and hastily withdrawing to the
+other side of the street.
+
+Raskolnikoff went on, and came to the place in the Haymarket where he
+had met the trader and his wife and Elizabeth. No one was there at the
+moment. He stopped, and turned to a young fellow, in a red shirt, who
+was gaping at the entrance to a flour shop.
+
+"A man trades here at this corner, with his wife, eh?"
+
+"Everyone trades here," replied the lad, scanning his questioner from
+head to foot.
+
+"What is he called?"
+
+"What he was christened."
+
+"But you belong to Zaraisk, don't you? To what Government?"
+
+The boy stared at Raskolnikoff. "We have no governor, your highness,
+but districts. I stay at home, and know nothing about it, but my
+brother does; so pardon me, your most mighty highness."
+
+"Is that an eating house there?"
+
+"That's a dram shop; they have a billiard table."
+
+"There are newspapers here?" asked he, as he entered a room--one of a
+suite--rather empty. Two or three persons sat with tea before them,
+while in a farther room a group of men were seated, drinking
+champagne. Raskolnikoff thought he recognized Zametoff among them, but
+he could not be sure. "Never mind, if it is!" he muttered.
+
+"Brandy, sir?" asked the waiter.
+
+"No, tea; and bring me some newspapers--for about the last five days.
+I'll give you a drink."
+
+The papers and the tea appeared. Raskolnikoff sat and searched, and,
+at last, found what he wanted. "Ah, here it is!" he cried, as he began
+to read. The words danced before his eyes, but he read greedily to the
+end, and turned to others for later intelligence. His hands trembled
+with impatience, and the sheets shook again. Suddenly some one sat
+down near him. He looked up, and there was Zametoff--that same
+Zametoff, with his rings and chain, his oiled locks and fancy
+waistcoat and unclean linen. He seemed pleased, and his tanned face, a
+little inflamed by the champagne, wore a smile.
+
+"Ah! you here?" he commenced, in a tone as if he had known
+Raskolnikoff for an age. "Why Razoumikhin told me yesterday that you
+were lying unconscious. How strange! Then I was at your place----"
+
+Raskolnikoff laid down the paper and turned to Zametoff. On his lips
+was a slight provoking smile. "I know you were," he replied, "I heard
+so. You searched for my boot. To what agreeable places you resort. Who
+gives you champagne to drink?"
+
+"We were drinking together. What do you mean?"
+
+"Nothing, dear boy, nothing," said Raskolnikoff, with a smile and
+slapping Zametoff on the shoulders. "I am not in earnest, but simply
+in fun, as your workman said, when he wrestled with Dmitri, you know,
+in that murder case."
+
+"Do you know about that?"
+
+"Yes, and perhaps more than you do."
+
+"You are very peculiar. It is a pity you came out. You are ill."
+
+"Do I seem strange?"
+
+"Yes; what are you reading?"
+
+"The paper."
+
+"There are a number of fires."
+
+"I am not reading about them." He looked curiously at Zametoff, and a
+malicious smile distorted his lips. "No, fires are not in my line," he
+added, winking at Zametoff. "Now, I should like to know, sweet youth,
+what it signifies to you what I read?"
+
+"Nothing at all. I only asked. Perhaps I----"
+
+"Listen. You are a cultivated man--a literary man, are you not?"
+
+"I was in the sixth class at college," Zametoff answered, with a
+certain amount of dignity.
+
+"The sixth! Oh, my fine fellow! With rings and a chain--a rich man!
+You are a dear boy," and Raskolnikoff gave a short, nervous laugh,
+right in the face of Zametoff. The latter was very much taken aback,
+and, if not offended, seemed a good deal surprised.
+
+"How strange you are!" said Zametoff seriously. "You have the fever
+still on you; you are raving!"
+
+"Am I, my fine fellow--am I strange? Yes, but I am very interesting to
+you, am I not?"
+
+"Interesting?"
+
+"Yes. You ask me what I am reading, what I am looking for; then I am
+looking through a number of papers. Suspicious, isn't it? Well, I will
+explain to you, or rather confess--no, not that exactly. I will give
+testimony, and you shall take it down--that's it. So then, I swear
+that I was reading, and came here on purpose"--Raskolnikoff blinked
+his eyes and paused--"to read an account of the murder of the old
+woman." He finished almost in a whisper, eagerly watching Zametoff's
+face. The latter returned his glances without flinching. And it
+appeared strange to Zametoff that a full minute seemed to pass as they
+kept fixedly staring at each other in this manner.
+
+"Oh, so that's what you have been reading?" Zametoff at last cried
+impatiently. "What is there in that?" "She is the same woman,"
+continued Raskolnikoff, still in a whisper, and taking no notice of
+Zametoff's remark, "the very same woman you were talking about when I
+swooned in your office. You recollect--you surely recollect?"
+
+"Recollect what?" said Zametoff, almost alarmed.
+
+The serious expression on Raskolnikoff's face altered in an instant,
+and he again commenced his nervous laugh, and laughed as if he were
+quite unable to contain himself. There had recurred to his mind, with
+fearful clearness, the moment when he stood at the door with the
+hatchet in his hand. There he was, holding the bolt, and they were
+tugging and thumping away at the door. Oh, how he itched to shriek at
+them, open the door, thrust out his tongue at them, and frighten them
+away, and then laugh, "Ah, ah, ah, ah!"
+
+"You are insane, or else--" said Zametoff, and then paused as if a new
+thought had suddenly struck him.
+
+"Or what, or what? Now what? Tell me!"
+
+"Nonsense!" said Zametoff to himself, "it can't be." Both became
+silent. After this unexpected and fitful outburst of laughter,
+Raskolnikoff had become lost in thought and looked very sad. He leaned
+on the table with his elbows, buried his head in his hands, and seemed
+to have quite forgotten Zametoff. The silence continued a long time.
+"You do not drink your tea; it is getting cold," said the latter, at
+last.
+
+"What? Tea? Yes!" Raskolnikoff snatched at his glass, put a piece of
+bread in his mouth, and then, after looking at Zametoff, seemingly
+recollected and roused himself. His face at once resumed its previous
+smile, and he continued to sip his tea.
+
+"What a number of rogues there are about," Zametoff said. "I read not
+long ago, in the Moscow papers, that they had captured a whole gang of
+forgers in that city. Quite a colony."
+
+"That's old news. I read it a month ago," replied Raskolnikoff in a
+careless manner. "And you call such as these rogues?" he added,
+smiling.
+
+"Why not?"
+
+"Rogues indeed! Why, they are only children and babies. Fifty banded
+together for such purposes! Is it possible? Three would be quite
+sufficient, and then they should be sure of one another--not babble
+over their cups. The babies! Then to hire unreliable people to change
+the notes at the money changers', persons whose hands tremble as they
+receive the rubles. On such their lives depend! Far better to strangle
+yourself! The man goes in, receives the change, counts some over, the
+last portion he takes on faith, stuffs all in his pocket, rushes away
+and the murder is out. All is lost by one foolish man. Is it not
+ridiculous?"
+
+"That his hands should shake?" replied Zametoff. "No; that is quite
+likely. Yours would not, I suppose? I could not endure it, though. For
+a paltry reward of a hundred rubles to go on such a mission! And
+where? Into a banker's office with forged notes! I should certainly
+lose my head. Would not you?"
+
+Raskolnikoff felt again a strong impulse to make a face at him. A
+shiver ran down his back. "You would not catch me acting so
+foolishly," he commenced. "This is how I should do. I should count
+over the first thousand very carefully, perhaps four times, right to
+the end, carefully examine each note, and then only pass to the second
+thousand, count these as far as the middle of the bundle, take out a
+note, hold it to the light, turn it over, then hold it to the light
+again, and say, 'I fear this is a bad note,' and then begin to relate
+some story about a lost note. Then there would be a third thousand to
+count. Not yet, please, there is a mistake in the second thousand. No,
+it is correct. And so I should proceed until I had received all. At
+last I should turn to go, open the door, but, no, pardon me! I should
+return, ask some question, receive some explanation, and there it is
+all done."
+
+"What funny things you do say!" said Zametoff with a smile. "You are
+all very well theoretically, but try it and see. Look, for example, at
+the murder of the money lender, a case in point. There was a desperate
+villain who in broad daylight stopped at nothing, and yet his hand
+shook, did it not?--and he could not finish, and left all the spoil
+behind him. The deed evidently robbed him of his presence of mind."
+
+This language nettled Raskolnikoff. "You think so? Then lay your hand
+upon him," said he, maliciously delighted to tease him.
+
+"Never fear but we shall!"
+
+"You? Go to, you know nothing about it. All you think of inquiring is
+whether a man is flinging money about; he is--then, _ergo_ he is
+guilty."
+
+"That is exactly what they do," replied Zametoff, "they murder, risk
+their lives, and then rush to the public house and are caught. Their
+lavishness betrays them. You see they are not all so crafty as you
+are. You would not run there, I suppose?"
+
+Raskolnikoff frowned and looked steadily at Zametoff. "You seem
+anxious to know how I should act," he said with some displeasure.
+
+"I should very much like to know," replied Zametoff in a serious tone.
+He seemed, indeed, very anxious.
+
+"Very much?"
+
+"Very much."
+
+"Good. This would be my plan," Raskolnikoff said, as he again bent
+near to the face of his listener, and speaking in such a tragic
+whisper as almost to make the latter shudder. "I should take the money
+and all I could find, and make off, going, however, in no particular
+direction, but on and on until I came to some obscure and inclosed
+place, where no one was about--a market garden, or any such-like spot.
+I should then look about me for a stone, perhaps a pound and a half in
+weight, lying, it may be, in a corner against a partition, say a stone
+used for building purposes; this I should lift up and under it there
+would be a hole. In that hole I should deposit all the things I had
+got, roll back the stone, stamp it down with my feet, and be off. For
+a year I should let them lie--for two years, three years. Now then,
+search for them! Where are they?"
+
+"You are indeed mad," said Zametoff, also in a low tone, but turning
+away from Raskolnikoff. The latter's eyes glistened, he became paler
+than ever, while his upper lip trembled violently. He placed his face
+closer, if possible, to that of Zametoff, his lips moving as if he
+wished to speak, but no words escaped them--several moments
+elapsed--Raskolnikoff knew what he was doing, but felt utterly unable
+to control himself, that strange impulse was upon him as when he stood
+at the bolted door, to come forth and let all be known.
+
+"What if I killed the old woman and Elizabeth?" he asked suddenly, and
+then--came to himself.
+
+Zametoff turned quite pale; then his face changed to a smile. "Can it
+be so?" he muttered to himself.
+
+Raskolnikoff eyed him savagely. "Speak out. What do you think? Yes? Is
+it so?"
+
+"Of course not. I believe it now less than ever," replied Zametoff
+hastily.
+
+"Caught at last! caught, my fine fellow! What people believe less than
+ever, they must have believed once, eh?"
+
+"Not at all. You frightened me into the supposition," said Zametoff,
+visibly confused.
+
+"So you do not think this? Then why those questions in the office? Why
+did the lieutenant question me after my swoon? Waiter," he cried,
+seizing his cap, "here, how much?"
+
+"Thirty kopecks, sir," replied the man.
+
+"There you are, and twenty for yourself. Look, what a lot of money!"
+turning to Zametoff and thrusting forth his shaking hand filled with
+the twenty-five rubles, red and blue notes. "Whence comes all this?
+Where did I obtain these new clothes from? You know I had none. You
+have asked the landlady, I suppose? Well, no matter!--Enough! Adieu,
+most affectionately."
+
+He went out, shaking from some savage hysterical emotion, a mixture of
+delight, gloom, and weariness. His face was drawn as if he had just
+recovered from a fit; and, as his agitation of mind increased, so did
+his weakness.
+
+Meanwhile, Zametoff remained in the restaurant where Raskolnikoff had
+left him, deeply buried in thought, considering the different points
+Raskolnikoff had placed before him.
+
+His heart was empty and depressed, and he strove again to drive off
+thought. No feeling of anguish came, neither was there any trace of
+that fierce energy which moved him when he left the house to "put an
+end to it all."
+
+"What will be the end of it? The result lies in my own will. What kind
+of end? Ah, we are all alike, and accept the bit of ground for our
+feet and live. Must this be the end? Shall I say the word or not? Oh,
+how weary I feel! Oh, to lie down or sit anywhere! How foolish it is
+to strive against my illness! Bah! What thoughts run through my
+brain!" Thus he meditated as he went drowsily along the banks of the
+canal, until, turning to the right and then to the left, he reached
+the office building. He stopped short, however, and, turning down a
+lane, went on past two other streets, with no fixed purpose, simply,
+no doubt, to give himself a few moments longer for reflection. He went
+on, his eyes fixed on the ground, until all of a sudden he started, as
+if some one had whispered in his ear. Raising his eyes he saw that he
+stood before _the house_, at its very gates.
+
+Quick as lightning, an idea rushed into his head, and he marched
+through the yard and made his way up the well-known staircase to the
+fourth story. It was, as usual, very dark, and as he reached each
+landing he peered almost with caution. There was the room newly
+painted, where Dmitri and Mikola had worked. He reached the fourth
+landing and he paused before the murdered woman's room in doubt. The
+door was wide open and he could hear voices within; this he had not
+anticipated. However, after wavering a little, he went straight in.
+The room was being done up, and in it were some workmen. This
+astonished him--indeed, it would seem he had expected to find
+everything as he had left it, even to the dead bodies lying on the
+floor. But to see the place with bare walls and bereft of furniture
+was very strange! He walked up to the windows and sat on the sill. One
+of the workmen now saw him and cried:
+
+"What do you want here?"
+
+Instead of replying, Raskolnikoff walked to the outer door and,
+standing outside, began to pull at the bell. Yes, that was the bell,
+with its harsh sound. He pulled again and again three times, and
+remained there listening and thinking.
+
+"What is it you want?" again cried the workman as he went out to
+Raskolnikoff.
+
+"I wish to hire some rooms. I came to look at these."
+
+"People don't take lodgings in the night. Why don't you apply to the
+porter?"
+
+"The floor has been washed. Are you going to paint it?" remarked
+Raskolnikoff. "Where is the blood?"
+
+"What blood?"
+
+"The old woman's and her sister's. There was quite a pool."
+
+"Who are you?" cried the workman uneasily.
+
+"I am Rodion Romanovitch Raskolnikoff, ex-student. I live at the
+house Schilla, in a lane not far from here, No. 14. Ask the porter
+there--he knows me," Raskolnikoff replied indifferently, without
+turning to his questioner.
+
+"What were you doing in those rooms?"
+
+"Looking at them."
+
+"What for? Come, out you go then, if you won't explain yourself,"
+suddenly shouted the porter, a huge fellow in a smock frock, with a
+large bunch of keys round his waist; and he caught Raskolnikoff by the
+shoulder and pitched him into the street. The latter lurched forward,
+but recovered himself, and, giving one look at the spectators, went
+quietly away.
+
+"What shall I do now?" thought Raskolnikoff. He was standing on the
+bridge, near a crossing, and was looking around him as if expecting
+some one to speak. But no one spoke, and all was dark and dull, and
+dead--at least to him, and him alone.
+
+A few days later, Raskolnikoff heard from his friend Razoumikhin that
+those who had borrowed money from Alena Ivanovna were going to the
+police office to redeem their pledges. He went with Razoumikhin to the
+office where they were received by Porphyrius Petrovitch, the
+examining magistrate, who seemed to have expected them.
+
+"You have been expecting this visit? But how did you know that he had
+pledged anything with Alena Ivanovna?" cried Razoumikhin.
+
+Porphyrius Petrovitch, without any further reply, said to
+Raskolnikoff: "Your things, a ring and a watch, were at her place,
+wrapped up in a piece of paper, and on this paper your name was
+legibly written in pencil, with the date of the day she had received
+these things from you."
+
+"What a memory you must have got!" said Raskolnikoff, with a forced
+smile, doing his best to look the magistrate unflinchingly in the
+face. However, he could not help adding: "I say so, because, as the
+owners of the pledged articles are no doubt very numerous, you must, I
+should fancy, have some difficulty in remembering them all; but I see,
+on the contrary, that you do nothing of the kind. (Oh! fool! why add
+that?)"
+
+"But they have nearly all of them come here; you alone had not done
+so," answered Porphyrius, with an almost imperceptible sneer.
+
+"I happened to be rather unwell."
+
+"So I heard. I have been told that you have been in great pain. Even
+now you are pale."
+
+"Not at all. I am not pale. On the contrary, I am very well!" answered
+Raskolnikoff in a tone of voice which had all at once become brutal
+and violent. He felt rising within him uncontrollable anger. "Anger
+will make me say some foolish thing," he thought. "But why do they
+exasperate me?"
+
+"He was rather unwell! A pretty expression, to be sure!" exclaimed
+Razoumikhin. "The fact is that up to yesterday he has been almost
+unconscious. Would you believe it, Porphyrius? Yesterday, when he
+could hardly stand upright, he seized the moment when we had just left
+him, to dress, to be off by stealth, and to go loafing about, Heaven
+only knows where, till midnight, being, all the time, in a completely
+raving condition. Can you imagine such a thing? It is a most
+remarkable case!"
+
+"Indeed! In a completely raving state?" remarked Porphyrius, with the
+toss of the head peculiar to Russian rustics.
+
+"Absurd! Don't you believe a word of it! Besides, I need not urge you
+to that effect--of course you are convinced," observed Raskolnikoff,
+beside himself with passion. But Porphyrius Petrovitch did not seem to
+hear these singular words.
+
+"How could you have gone out if you had not been delirious?" asked
+Razoumikhin, getting angry in his turn. "Why have gone out at all?
+What was the object of it? And, above all, to go in that secret
+manner? Come, now, make a clean breast of it--you know you were out of
+your mind, were you not? Now that danger is gone by, I tell you so to
+your face."
+
+"I had been very much annoyed yesterday," said Raskolnikoff,
+addressing the magistrate, with more or less of insolence in his
+smile, "and, wishing to get rid of them, I went out to hire lodgings
+where I could be sure of privacy, to effect which I had taken a
+certain amount of money. Mr. Zametoff saw what I had by me, and
+perhaps he can say whether I was in my right senses yesterday or
+whether I was delirious? Perhaps he will judge as to our quarrel."
+Nothing would have pleased him better than there and then to have
+strangled that gentleman, whose taciturnity and equivocal facial
+expression irritated him.
+
+"In my opinion, you were talking very sensibly and even with
+considerable shrewdness; only I thought you too irritable," observed
+Zametoff off-handedly.
+
+"Do let us have some tea! We are as dry as fishes!" exclaimed
+Razoumikhin.
+
+"Good idea! But perhaps you would like something more substantial
+before tea, would you?"
+
+"Look alive, then!"
+
+Porphyrius Petrovitch went out to order tea. All kinds of thoughts
+were at work in Raskolnikoff's brain. He was excited. "They don't even
+take pains to dissemble; they certainly don't mince matters as far as
+I am concerned: that is something, at all events! Since Porphyrius
+knew next to nothing about me, why on earth should he have spoken with
+Nicodemus Thomich Zametoff at all? They even scorn to deny that they
+are on my track, almost like a pack of hounds! They certainly speak
+out plainly enough!" he said, trembling with rage. "Well, do so, as
+bluntly as you like, but don't play with me as the cat would with the
+mouse! That's not quite civil, Porphyrius Petrovitch; I won't quite
+allow that yet! I'll make a stand and tell you some plain truths to
+your faces, and then you shall find out my real opinion about you!" He
+had some difficulty in breathing. "But supposing that all this is pure
+fancy?--a kind of mirage? Suppose I had misunderstood? Let me try and
+keep up my nasty part, and not commit myself, like the fool, by blind
+anger! Ought I to give them credit for intentions they have not? Their
+words are, in themselves, not very extraordinary ones--so much must be
+allowed; but a double meaning may lurk beneath them. Why did
+Porphyrius, in speaking of the old woman, simply say 'At her place?'
+Why did Zametoff observe that I had spoken very sensibly? Why their
+peculiar manner?--yes, it is this manner of theirs. How is it possible
+that all this cannot have struck Razoumikhin? The booby never notices
+anything! But I seem to be feverish again! Did Porphyrius give me a
+kind of wink just now, or was I deceived in some way? The idea is
+absurd! Why should he wink at me? Perhaps they intend to upset my
+nervous organization, and, by so doing, drive me to extremes! Either
+the whole thing is a phantasmagoria, or--they know!"
+
+These thoughts flashed through his mind with the rapidity of
+lightning. Porphyrius Petrovitch came back a moment afterwards. He
+seemed in a very good temper. "When I left your place yesterday, old
+fellow, I was really not well," he commenced, addressing Razoumikhin
+with a cheeriness which was only just becoming apparent, "but that is
+all gone now."
+
+"Did you find the evening a pleasant one? I left you in the thick of
+the fun; who came off best?"
+
+"Nobody, of course. They caviled to their heart's content over their
+old arguments."
+
+"Fancy, Rodia, the discussion last evening turned on the question:
+'Does crime exist? Yes, or No.' And the nonsense they talked on the
+subject!"
+
+"What is there extraordinary in the query? It is the social question
+without the charm of novelty," answered Raskolnikoff abruptly.
+
+"Talking of crime," said Porphyrius Petrovitch, speaking to
+Raskolnikoff, "I remember a production of yours which greatly
+interested me. I am speaking about your article _on crime_. I don't
+very well remember the title. I was delighted in reading it two months
+ago in the _Periodical Word."_
+
+"But how do you know the article was mine? I only signed it with an
+initial."
+
+"I discovered it lately, quite by chance. The chief editor is a friend
+of mine; it was he who let out the secret of your authorship. The
+article has greatly interested me."
+
+"I was analyzing, if I remember rightly, the psychological condition
+of a criminal at the moment of his deed."
+
+"Yes, and you strove to prove that a criminal, at such a moment, is
+always, mentally, more or less unhinged. That point of view is a very
+original one, but it was not this part of your article which most
+interested me. I was particularly struck by an idea at the end of the
+article, and which, unfortunately, you have touched upon too
+cursorily. In a word, if you remember, you maintained that there are
+men in existence who can, or more accurately, who have an absolute
+right to commit all kinds of wicked and criminal acts--men for whom,
+to a certain extent, laws do not exist."
+
+"Is it not very likely that some coming Napoleon did for Alena
+Ivanovna last week?" suddenly blustered Zametoff from his corner.
+
+Without saying a word, Raskolnikoff fixed on Porphyrius a firm and
+penetrating glance. Raskolnikoff was beginning to look sullen. He
+seemed to have been suspecting something for some time past. He looked
+round him with an irritable air. For a moment there was an ominous
+silence. Raskolnikoff was getting ready to go.
+
+"What, are you off already?" asked Porphyrius, kindly offering the
+young man his hand with extreme affability. "I am delighted to have
+made your acquaintance. And as for your application, don't be uneasy
+about it. Write in the way I suggested. Or, perhaps, you had better do
+this. Come and see me before long--to-morrow, if you like. I shall be
+here without fail at eleven o'clock. We can make everything
+right--we'll have a chat--and as you were one of the last that went
+_there_, you might be able to give some further particulars?" he
+added, with his friendly smile.
+
+"Do you wish to examine me formally?" Raskolnikoff inquired, in an
+uncomfortable tone.
+
+"Why should I? Such a thing is out of the question. You have
+misunderstood me. I ought to tell you that I manage to make the most
+of every opportunity. I have already had a chat with every single
+person that has been in the habit of pledging things with the old
+woman--several have given me very useful information--and as you
+happen to be the last one--By the by," he exclaimed, with sudden
+pleasure, "how lucky I am thinking about it, I was really going to
+forget it!" (Saying which he turned to Razoumikhin.) "You were almost
+stunning my ears, the other day, talking about Mikolka. Well, I am
+certain, quite certain, as to his innocence," he went on, once more
+addressing himself to Raskolnikoff. "But what was to be done? It has
+been necessary to disturb Dmitri. Now, what I wanted to ask was: On
+going upstairs--was it not between seven and eight you entered the
+house?"
+
+"Yes," replied Raskolnikoff, and he immediately regretted an answer he
+ought to have avoided.
+
+"Well, in going upstairs, between seven and eight, did you not see on
+the second floor, in one of the rooms, when the door was wide
+open--you remember, I dare say?--did you not see two painters, or, at
+all events, one of the two? They were whitewashing the room, I
+believe; you must have seen them! The matter is of the utmost
+importance to them!"
+
+"Painters, you say? I saw none," replied Raskolnikoff slowly, trying
+to sound his memory: for a moment he violently strained it to
+discover, as quickly as he could, the trap concealed by the
+magistrate's question. "No, I did not see a single one; I did not even
+see any room standing open," he went on, delighted at having
+discovered the trap, "but on the fourth floor I remember noticing that
+the man lodging on the same landing as Alena Ivanovna was in the act
+of moving. I remember that very well, as I met a few soldiers carrying
+a sofa, and I was obliged to back against the wall; but, as for
+painters, I don't remember seeing a single one--I don't even remember
+a room that had its door open. No, I saw nothing."
+
+"But what are you talking about?" all at once exclaimed Razoumikhin,
+who, till that moment, had attentively listened; "it was on the very
+day of the murder that painters were busy in that room, while he came
+there two days previously! Why are you asking that question?"
+
+"Right! I have confused the dates!" cried Porphyrius, tapping his
+forehead. "Deuce take me! That job makes me lose my head!" he added by
+way of excuse, and speaking to Raskolnikoff. "It is very important
+that we should know if anybody saw them in that room between seven and
+eight. I thought I might have got that information from you without
+thinking any more about it. I had positively confused the days!"
+
+"You ought to be more attentive!" grumbled Razoumikhin.
+
+These last words were uttered in the anteroom, as Porphyrius very
+civilly led his visitors to the door. They were gloomy and morose on
+leaving the house, and had gone some distance before speaking.
+Raskolnikoff breathed like a man who had just been subjected to a
+severe trial.
+
+When, on the following day, precisely at eleven o'clock, Raskolnikoff
+called on the examining magistrate, he was astonished to have to dance
+attendance for a considerable time. According to his idea, he ought to
+have been admitted immediately; ten minutes, however, elapsed before
+he could see Porphyrius Petrovitch. In the outer room where he had
+been waiting, people came and went without heeding him in the least.
+In the next room, which was a kind of office, a few clerks were at
+work, and it was evident that not one of them had even an idea who
+Raskolnikoff might be. The young man cast a mistrustful look about
+him. "Was there not," thought he, "some spy, some mysterious myrmidon
+of the law, ordered to watch him, and, if necessary, to prevent his
+escape?" But he noticed nothing of the kind; the clerks were all hard
+at work, and the other people paid him no kind of attention. The
+visitor began to become reassured. "If," thought he, "this mysterious
+personage of yesterday, this specter which had risen from the bowels
+of the earth, knew all, and had seen all, would they, I should like to
+know, let me stand about like this? Would they not rather have
+arrested me, instead of waiting till I should come of my own accord?
+Hence this man has either made no kind of revelation as yet about me,
+or, more probably, he knows nothing, and has seen nothing (besides how
+could he have seen anything?): consequently I have misjudged, and all
+that happened yesterday was nothing but an illusion of my diseased
+imagination." This explanation, which had offered itself the day
+before to his mind, at the time he felt most fearful, he considered a
+more likely one.
+
+Whilst thinking about all this and getting ready for a new struggle,
+Raskolnikoff suddenly perceived that he was trembling; he became
+indignant at the very thought that it was fear of an interview with
+the hateful Porphyrius Petrovitch which led him to do so. The most
+terrible thing to him was to find himself once again in presence of
+this man. He hated him beyond all expression, and what he dreaded was
+lest he might show this hatred. His indignation was so great that it
+suddenly stopped this trembling; he therefore prepared himself to
+enter with a calm and self-possessed air, promised himself to speak as
+little as possible, to be very carefully on the watch in order to
+check, above all things, his irascible disposition. In the midst of
+these reflections, he was introduced to Porphyrius Petrovitch. The
+latter was alone in his office, a room of medium dimensions,
+containing a large table, facing a sofa covered with shiny leather, a
+bureau, a cupboard standing in a corner, and a few chairs: all this
+furniture, provided by the State, was of yellow wood. In the wall, or
+rather in the wainscoting of the other end, there was a closed door,
+which led one to think that there were other rooms behind it. As soon
+as Porphyrius Petrovitch had seen Raskolnikoff enter his office, he
+went to close the door which had given him admission, and both stood
+facing one another. The magistrate received his visitor to all
+appearances in a pleasant and affable manner, and it was only at the
+expiration of a few moments that the latter observed the magistrate's
+somewhat embarrassed manner--he seemed to have been disturbed in a
+more or less clandestine occupation.
+
+"Good! my respectable friend! Here you are then--in our latitudes!"
+commenced Porphyrius, holding out both hands. "Pray, be seated,
+_batuchka_! But, perhaps, you don't like being called respectable?
+Therefore, _batuchka_, for short! Pray, don't think me familiar. Sit
+down here on the sofa."
+
+Raskolnikoff did so without taking his eyes off the judge. "These
+words 'in our latitudes,' these excuses for his familiarity, this
+expression 'for short,' what could be the meaning of all this? He held
+out his hands to me without shaking mine, withdrawing them before I
+could do so," thought Raskolnikoff mistrustfully. Both watched each
+other, but no sooner did their eyes meet than they both turned them
+aside with the rapidity of a flash of lightning.
+
+"I have called with this paper--about the---- If you please. Is it
+correct, or must another form be drawn up?" "What, what paper? Oh,
+yes! Do not put yourself out. It is perfectly correct," answered
+Porphyrius somewhat hurriedly, before he had even examined it; then,
+after having cast a glance on it, he said, speaking very rapidly:
+"Quite right, that is all that is required," and placed the sheet on
+the table. A moment later he locked it up in his bureau, chattering
+about other things.
+
+"Yesterday," observed Raskolnikoff, "you had, I fancy, a wish to
+examine me formally--with reference to my dealings with--the victim?
+At least so it seemed to me!"
+
+"Why did I say, 'So it seemed?'" reflected the young man all of a
+sudden. "After all, what can be the harm of it? Why should I distress
+myself about that!" he added, mentally, a moment afterwards. The very
+fact of his proximity to Porphyrius, with whom he had scarcely as yet
+interchanged a word, had immeasurably increased his mistrust; he
+marked this in a moment, and concluded that such a mood was an
+exceedingly dangerous one, inasmuch as his agitation, his nervous
+irritation, would only increase. "That is bad! very bad! I shall be
+saying something thoughtless!"
+
+"Quite right. But do not put yourself out of the way, there is time,
+plenty of time," murmured Petrovitch, who, without apparent design,
+kept going to and fro, now approaching the window, now his bureau, to
+return a moment afterwards to the table. At times he would avoid
+Raskolnikoff's suspicious look, at times again he drew up sharp whilst
+looking his visitor straight in the face. The sight of this short
+chubby man, whose movements recalled those of a ball rebounding from
+wall to wall, was an extremely odd one. "No hurry, no hurry, I assure
+you! But you smoke, do you not! Have you any tobacco? Here is a
+cigarette!" he went on, offering his visitor a paquitos. "You notice
+that I am receiving you here, but my quarters are there behind the
+wainscoting. The State provides me with that. I am here as it were on
+the wing, because certain alterations are being made in my rooms.
+Everything is almost straight now. Do you know that quarters provided
+by the State are by no means to be despised?"
+
+"I believe you," answered Raskolnikoff, looking at him almost
+derisively.
+
+"Not to be despised, by any means," repeated Porphyrius Petrovitch,
+whose mind seemed to be preoccupied with something else--"not to be
+despised!" he continued in a very loud tone of voice, and drawing
+himself up close to Raskolnikoff, whom he stared out of countenance.
+The incessant repetition of the statement that quarters provided by
+the State were by no means to be despised contrasted singularly, by
+its platitude, with the serious, profound, enigmatical look he now
+cast on his visitor.
+
+Raskolnikoff's anger grew in consequence; he could hardly help
+returning the magistrate's look with an imprudently scornful glance,
+"Is it true?" the latter commenced, with a complacently insolent air,
+"is it true that it is a judicial maxim, a maxim resorted to by all
+magistrates, to begin an interview about trifling things, or even,
+occasionally, about more serious matter, foreign to the main question
+however, with a view to embolden, to distract, or even to lull the
+suspicion of a person under examination, and then all of a sudden to
+crush him with the main question, just as you strike a man a blow
+straight between the eyes?"
+
+"Such a custom, I believe, is religiously observed in your profession,
+is it not?"
+
+"Then you are of opinion that when I spoke to you about quarters
+provided by the State, I did so----" Saying which, Porphyrius
+Petrovitch blinked, his face assumed for a moment an expression of
+roguish gayety, the wrinkles on his brow became smoothed, his small
+eyes grew smaller still, his features expanded, and, looking
+Raskolnikoff straight in the face, he burst out into a prolonged fit
+of nervous laughter, which shook him from head to foot. The young man,
+on his part, laughed likewise, with more or less of an effort,
+however, at sight of which Porphyrius's hilarity increased to such an
+extent that his face grew nearly crimson. At this Raskolnikoff
+experienced more or less aversion, which led him to forget all
+caution; he ceased laughing, knitting his brows, and, whilst
+Porphyrius gave way to his hilarity, which seemed a somewhat feigned
+one, he fixed on him a look of hatred. In truth, they were both off
+their guard. Porphyrius had, in fact, laughed at his visitor, who had
+taken this in bad part; whereas the former seemed to care but little
+about Raskolnikoff's displeasure. This circumstance gave the young man
+much matter for thought. He fancied that his visit had in no kind of
+way discomposed the magistrate; on the contrary, it was Raskolnikoff
+who had been caught in a trap, a snare, an ambush of some kind or
+other. The mine was, perhaps, already charged, and might burst at any
+moment.
+
+Anxious to get straight to the point, Raskolnikoff rose and took up
+his cap. "Porphyrius Petrovitch," he cried, in a resolute tone of
+voice, betraying more or less irritation, "yesterday you expressed the
+desire to subject me to a judicial examination." (He laid special
+stress on this last word.) "I have called at your bidding; if you have
+questions to put, do so: if not, allow me to withdraw. I can't afford
+to waste my time here, as I have other things to attend to. In a word,
+I must go to the funeral of the official who has been run over, and of
+whom you have heard speak," he added, regretting, however, the last
+part of his sentence. Then, with increasing anger, he went on: "Let me
+tell you that all this worries me! The thing is hanging over much too
+long. It is that mainly that has made me ill. In one word,"--he
+continued, his voice seeming more and more irritable, for he felt that
+the remark about his illness was yet more out of place than the
+previous one--"in one word, either be good enough to cross-examine me,
+or let me go this very moment. If you do question me, do so in the
+usual formal way; otherwise, I shall object. In the meanwhile, adieu,
+since we have nothing more to do with one another."
+
+"Good gracious! What can you be talking about? Question you about
+what?" replied the magistrate, immediately ceasing his laugh. "Don't,
+I beg, disturb yourself." He requested Raskolnikoff to sit down once
+more, continuing, nevertheless, his tramp about the room. "There is
+time, plenty of time. The matter is not of such importance after all.
+On the contrary, I am delighted at your visit--for as such do I take
+your call. As for my horrid way of laughing, _batuchka_, Rodion
+Romanovitch, I must apologize. I am a nervous man, and the shrewdness
+of your observations has tickled me. There are times when I go up and
+down like an elastic ball, and that for half an hour at a time. I am
+fond of laughter. My temperament leads me to dread apoplexy. But,
+pray, do sit down--why remain standing? Do, I must request you,
+_batuchka_; otherwise I shall fancy that you are cross."
+
+His brows still knit, Raskolnikoff held his tongue, listened, and
+watched. In the meanwhile he sat down.
+
+"As far as I am concerned, _batuchka_, Rodion Romanovitch, I will tell
+you something which shall reveal to you my disposition," answered
+Porphyrius Petrovitch, continuing to fidget about the room, and, as
+before, avoiding his visitor's gaze. "I live alone, you must know,
+never go into society, and am, therefore, unknown; add to which, that
+I am a man on the shady side of forty, somewhat played out. You may
+have noticed, Rodion Romanovitch, that here--I mean in Russia, of
+course, and especially in St. Petersburg circles--that when two
+intelligent men happen to meet who, as yet, are not familiar, but who,
+however, have mutual esteem--as, for instance, you and I have at this
+moment--don't know what to talk about for half an hour at a time. They
+seem, both of them, as if petrified. Everyone else has a subject for
+conversation--ladies, for instance, people in society, the upper
+ten--all these sets have some topic or other. It is the thing, but
+somehow people of the middle-class, like you and I, seem constrained
+and taciturn. How does that come about, _batuchka_? Have we no social
+interests? Or is it, rather, owing to our being too straightforward to
+mislead one another? I don't know. What is your opinion, pray? But do,
+I beg, remove your cap; one would really fancy that you wanted to be
+off, and that pains me. I, you must know, am so contented."
+
+Raskolnikoff laid his cap down. He did not, however, become more
+loquacious; and, with knit brows, listened to Porphyrius's idle
+chatter. "I suppose," thought he, "he only doles out his small talk to
+distract my attention."
+
+"I don't offer you any coffee," went on the inexhaustible Porphyrius,
+"because this is not the place for it, but can you not spend a few
+minutes with a friend, by way of causing him some little distraction?
+You must know that all these professional obligations--don't be vexed,
+_batuchka_, if you see me walking about like this, I am sure you will
+excuse me, if I tell you how anxious I am not to do so, but movement
+is so indispensable to me! I am always seated--and, to me, it is quite
+a luxury to be able to move about for a minute or two. I purpose, in
+fact, to go through a course of calisthenics. The trapeze is said to
+stand in high favor amongst State counselors--counselors in office,
+even amongst privy counselors. Nowadays, in fact, gymnastics have
+become a positive science. As for these duties of our office, these
+examinations, all this formality--you yourself, you will remember,
+touched upon the topic just now, _batuchka_--these examinations, and
+so forth, sometimes perplex the magistrate much more than the man
+under suspicion. You said as much just now with as much sense as
+accuracy." (Raskolnikoff had made no statement of the kind.) "One gets
+confused, one loses the thread of the investigation. Yet, as far as
+our judicial customs go, I agree with you fully. Where, for instance,
+is there a man under suspicion of some kind or other, were it even the
+most thick-headed moujik, who does not know that the magistrate will
+commence by putting all sorts of out-of-the-way questions to take him
+off the scent (if I may be allowed to use your happy simile), and that
+then he suddenly gives him one between the eyes? A blow of the ax on
+his sinciput (if again I may be permitted to use your ingenious
+metaphor)? Hah, hah! And do you mean to say that when I spoke to you
+about quarters provided by the State, that--hah, hah! You are very
+caustic. But I won't revert to that again. By-and-by!--one remark
+produces another, one thought attracts another--but you were talking
+just now of the practice or form in vogue with the examining
+magistrate. But what is this form? You know as I do that in many cases
+the form means nothing at all. Occasionally a simple conversation, a
+friendly interview, brings about a more certain result. The practice
+or form will never die out--I can vouch for that; but what, after all,
+is the form, I ask once more? You can't compel an examining magistrate
+to be hampered or bound by it everlastingly. His duty or method is, in
+its way, one of the liberal professions or something very much like
+it."
+
+Porphyrius Petrovitch stopped a moment to take breath. He kept on
+talking, now uttering pure nonsense, now again introducing, in spite
+of this trash, an occasional enigmatical remark, after which he went
+on with his insipidities. His tramp about the room was more like a
+race--he moved his stout legs more and more quickly, without looking
+up; his right hand was thrust deep in the pocket of his coat, whilst
+with the left he unceasingly gesticulated in a way unconnected with
+his observations. Raskolnikoff noticed, or fancied he noticed, that,
+whilst running round and round the room, he had twice stopped near the
+door, seeming to listen. "Does he expect something?" he asked himself.
+
+"You're perfectly right," resumed Porphyrius cheerily, whilst looking
+at the young man with a kindliness which immediately awoke the
+latter's distrust. "Our judicial customs deserve your satire. Our
+proceedings, which are supposed to be inspired by a profound knowledge
+of psychology, are very ridiculous ones, and very often useless. Now,
+to return to our method or form: Suppose for a moment that I am
+deputed to investigate something or other, and that I know the guilty
+person to be a certain gentleman. Are you not yourself reading for the
+law, Rodion Romanovitch?"
+
+"I was some time ago."
+
+"Well, here is a kind of example which may be of use to you later on.
+Don't run away with the idea that I am setting up as your
+instructor--God forbid that I should presume to teach anything to a
+man who treats criminal questions in the public press! Oh, no!--all I
+am doing is to quote to you, by way of example, a trifling fact.
+Suppose that I fancy I am convinced of the guilt of a certain man,
+why, I ask you, should I frighten him prematurely, assuming me to have
+every evidence against him? Of course, in the case of another man of a
+different disposition, him I would have arrested forthwith; but, as to
+the former, why should I not permit him to hang about a little longer?
+I see you do not quite take me. I will, therefore, endeavor to explain
+myself more clearly! If, for instance, I should be too quick in
+issuing a writ, I provide him in doing so with a species of moral
+support or mainstay--I see you are laughing?" (Raskolnikoff, on the
+contrary, had no such desire; his lips were set, and his glaring look
+was not removed from Porphyrius's eyes.) "I assure you that in actual
+practice such is really the case; men vary much, although,
+unfortunately, our methods are the same for all. But you will ask me:
+Supposing you are certain of your proofs? Goodness me, _batuchka_! you
+know, perhaps as well as I do, what proofs are--half one's time,
+proofs may be taken either way; and I, a magistrate, am, after all,
+only a man liable to error.
+
+"Now, what I want is to give to my investigation the precision of a
+mathematical demonstration--I want my conclusions to be as plain, as
+indisputable, as that twice two are four. Now, supposing I have this
+gentleman arrested prematurely, though I may be positively certain
+that he is _the man,_ yet I deprive myself of all future means of
+proving his guilt. How is that? Because, so to say, I give him, to a
+certain extent, a definite status; for, by putting him in prison, I
+pacify him. I give him the chance of investigating his actual state of
+mind--he will escape me, for he will reflect. In a word, he knows that
+he is a prisoner, and nothing more. If, on the contrary, I take no
+kind of notice of the man I fancy guilty, if I do not have him
+arrested, if I in no way set him on his guard--but if the unfortunate
+creature is hourly, momentarily, possessed by the suspicion that I
+know all, that I do not lose sight of him either by night or by day,
+that he is the object of my indefatigable vigilance--what do you ask
+will take place under these circumstances? He will lose his
+self-possession, he will come of his own accord to me, he will provide
+me with ample evidence against himself, and will enable me to give to
+the conclusion of my inquiry the accuracy of mathematical proofs,
+which is not without its charm.
+
+"If such a course succeeds with an uncultured moujik, it is equally
+efficacious when it concerns an enlightened, intelligent, or even
+distinguished man. For the main thing, my dear friend, is to determine
+in what sense a man is developed. The man, I mean, is intelligent, but
+he has nerves which are _over_-strung. And as for bile--the bile you
+are forgetting, that plays no small part with similar folk! Believe
+me, here we have a very mine of information! And what is it to me
+whether such a man walk about the place in perfect liberty? Let him be
+at ease--I know him to be my prey, and that he won't escape me! Where,
+I ask you, could he go to? You may say abroad. A Pole may do so--but
+my man, never! especially as I watch him, and have taken steps in
+consequence. Is he likely to escape into the very heart of our
+country? Not he! for there dwell coarse moujiks, and primitive
+Russians, without any kind of civilization. My educated friend would
+prefer going to prison, rather than be in the midst of such
+surroundings. Besides, what I have been saying up to the present is
+not the main point--it is the exterior and accessory aspect of the
+question. He won't escape--not only because he won't know where to go
+to, but especially, and above all, because he is mine from the
+_psychological_ point of view. What do you think of this explanation?
+In virtue of a natural law, he will not escape, even if he could do
+so! Have you ever seen a butterfly close to the candle? My man will
+hover incessantly round me in the same way as the butterfly gyrates
+round the candle-light. Liberty will have no longer charms for him; he
+will grow more and more restless, more and more amazed--let me but
+give him plenty of time, and he will demean himself in a way to prove
+his guilt as plainly as that twice two our four! Yes, he will keep
+hovering about me, describing circles, smaller and smaller, till at
+last--bang! He has flown into my clutches, and I have got him. That is
+very nice. You don't think so, perhaps?"
+
+Raskolnikoff kept silent. Pale and immovable, he continued to watch
+Porphyrius's face with a labored effort of attention. "The lesson is a
+good one!" he reflected. "But it is not, as yesterday, a case of the
+cat playing with the mouse. Of course, he does not talk to me in this
+way for the mere pleasure of showing me his hand; he is much too
+intelligent for that. He must have something else in view--what can it
+be? Come, friend, what you do say is only to frighten me. You have no
+kind of evidence, and the man of yesterday does not exist! All you
+wish is to perplex me--to enrage me, so as to enable you to make your
+last move, should you catch me in such a mood, but you will not; all
+your pains will be in vain! But why should he speak in such covert
+terms? I presume he must be speculating on the excitability of my
+nervous system. But, dear friend, that won't go down, in spite of your
+machinations. We will try and find out what you really have been
+driving at."
+
+And he prepared to brave boldly the terrible catastrophe he
+anticipated. Occasionally the desire came upon him to rush on
+Porphyrius, and to strangle him there and then. From the first moment
+of having entered the magistrate's office what he had dreaded most
+was, lest he might lose his temper. He felt his heart beating
+violently, his lips become parched, his spittle congealed. He
+resolved, however, to hold his tongue, knowing that, under the
+circumstances, such would be the best tactics. By similar means, he
+felt sure that he would not only not become compromised, but that he
+might succeed in exasperating his enemy, in order to let him drop some
+imprudent observation. This, at all events, was Raskolnikoff's hope.
+
+"I see you don't believe, you think I am jesting," continued
+Porphyrius, more and more at his ease, without ceasing to indulge in
+his little laugh, whilst continuing his perambulation about the room.
+"You may be right. God has given me a face which only arouses comical
+thoughts in others. I'm a buffoon. But excuse an old man's cackle.
+You, Rodion Romanovitch, you are in your prime, and, like all young
+people, you appreciate, above all things, human intelligence.
+Intellectual smartness and abstract rational deductions entice you.
+But, to return to the _special case_ we were talking about just now. I
+must tell you that we have to deal with reality, with nature. This is
+a very important thing, and how admirably does she often foil the
+highest skill! Listen to an old man; I am speaking quite seriously,
+Rodion"--(on saying which Porphyrius Petrovitch, who was hardly
+thirty-five years of age, seemed all of a sudden to have aged, a
+sudden metamorphosis had taken place in the whole of his person, nay,
+in his very voice)--"to an old man who, however, is not wanting in
+candor. Am I or am I not candid? What do you think? It seems to me
+that a man could hardly be more so--for do I not reveal confidence,
+and that without the prospect of reward? But, to continue, acuteness
+of mind is, in my opinion, a very fine thing; it is to all intents and
+purposes an ornament of nature, one of the consolations of life by
+means of which it would appear a poor magistrate can be easily gulled,
+who, after all, is often misled by his own imagination, for he is only
+human. But nature comes to the aid of this human magistrate! There's
+the rub! And youth, so confident in its own intelligence, youth which
+tramples under foot every obstacle, forgets this!
+
+"Now, in the _special case_ under consideration, the guilty man, I
+will assume, lies hard and fast, but, when he fancies that all that is
+left him will be to reap the reward of his mendacity, behold, he will
+succumb in the very place where such an accident is likely to be most
+closely analyzed. Assuming even that he may be in a position to
+account for his syncope by illness or the stifling atmosphere of the
+locality, he has none the less given rise to suspicion! He has lied
+incomparably, but he has counted without nature. Here is the pitfall!
+Again, a man off his guard, from an unwary disposition, may delight in
+mystifying another who suspects him, and may wantonly pretend to be
+the very criminal wanted by the authorities; in such a case, he will
+represent the person in question a little too closely, he will place
+his foot a little too naturally. Here we have another token. For the
+nonce his interlocutor may be duped; but, being no fool, he will on
+the morrow have seen through the subterfuge. Then will our friend
+become compromised more and more! He will come of his own accord when
+he is not even called, he will use all kinds of impudent words,
+remarks, allegories, the meaning of which will be clear to everybody;
+he will even go so far as to come and ask why he has not been arrested
+as yet--hah! hah! And such a line of conduct may occur to a person of
+keen intellect, yes, even to a man of psychologic mind! Nature, my
+friend, is the most transparent of mirrors. To contemplate her is
+sufficient. But why do you grow pale, Rodion Romanovitch? Perhaps you
+are too hot; shall I open the window?"
+
+"By no means, I beg!" cried Raskolnikoff, bursting out laughing.
+"Don't heed me, pray!" Porphyrius stopped short, waited a moment, and
+burst out laughing himself. Raskolnikoff, whose hilarity had suddenly
+died out, rose. "Porphyrius Petrovitch," he shouted in a clear and
+loud voice, although he could scarcely stand on his trembling legs, "I
+can no longer doubt that you suspect me of having assassinated this
+old woman as well as her sister, Elizabeth. Let me tell you that for
+some time I have had enough of this. If you think you have the right
+to hunt me down, to have me arrested, hunt me down, have me arrested.
+But you shall not trifle with me, you shall not torture me." Suddenly
+his lips quivered, his eyes gleamed, and his voice, which up to that
+moment had been self-possessed, reached its highest diapason. "I will
+not permit it," he yelled hoarsely, whilst striking a violent blow on
+the table. "Do you hear me, Porphyrius Petrovitch, I shall not permit
+this!"
+
+"But, goodness gracious! what on earth is wrong with you?" asked the
+magistrate, disturbed to all appearances. "_Batuchka_! Rodion
+Romanovitch! My good friend! What on earth is the matter with you?"
+
+"I will not permit it!" repeated Raskolnikoff once again.
+
+"_Batuchka!_ not so loud, I must request! Someone will hear you,
+someone may come; and then, what shall we say? Just reflect one
+moment!" murmured Porphyrius Petrovitch, whose face had approached
+that of his visitor.
+
+"I will not permit it, I will not permit it!" mechanically pursued
+Raskolnikoff, but in a minor key, so as to be heard by Porphyrius
+only.
+
+The latter moved away to open the window. "Let us air the room!
+Supposing you were to drink some water, dear friend? You have had a
+slight fit!" He was on the point of going to the door to give his
+orders to a servant, when he saw a water bottle in a corner. "Drink,
+_batuchka_!" he murmured, whilst approaching the young man with the
+bottle, "that may do you some good."
+
+Porphyrius's fright seemed so natural that Raskolnikoff remained
+silent whilst examining him with curiosity. He refused, however, the
+proffered water.
+
+"Rodion Romanovitch! My dear friend! If you go on in this way, you
+will go mad, I am positive! Drink, pray, if only a few drops!" He
+almost forced the glass of water into his hand. Raskolnikoff raised it
+mechanically to his lips, when suddenly he thought better of it, and
+replaced it on the table with disgust. "Yes, yes, you have had a
+slight fit. One or two more, my friend, and you will have another
+attack of your malady," observed the magistrate in the kindest tone of
+voice, appearing greatly agitated. "Is it possible that people can
+take so little care of themselves? It was the same with Dmitri
+Prokofitch, who called here yesterday. I admit mine to be a caustic
+temperament, that mine is a horrid disposition, but that such a
+meaning could possibly be attributed to harmless remarks. He called
+here yesterday, when you had gone, and in the course of dinner he
+talked, talked. You had sent him, had you not? But do sit down,
+_batuchka!_ do sit down, for heaven's sake!"
+
+"I did not indeed!--although I knew that he had called, and his object
+in doing so!" replied Raskolnikoff dryly.
+
+"Did you really know why?"
+
+"I did. And what did you gather from it?"
+
+"I gathered from it, _batuchka!_ Rodion Romanovitch, the knowledge of
+a good many of your doings--in fact, I know all! I know that you went,
+towards nightfall, _to hire the lodgings._ I know that you pulled the
+bell, and that a question of yours in connection with bloodstains, as
+well as your manner, frightened both journeymen and dvorniks. I know
+what was your mood at the time. Excitement of such a kind will drive
+you out of your mind, be assured. A praiseworthy indignation is at
+work within you, complaining now as to destiny, now on the subject of
+police agents. You keep going here and there to induce people as far
+as possible to formulate their accusations. This stupid kind of
+tittle-tattle is hateful to you, and you are anxious to put a stop to
+it as soon as possible. Am I right? Have I laid finger on the
+sentiments which actuate you? But you are not satisfied by turning
+your own brain, you want to do, or rather do, the same thing to my
+good Razoumikhin. Really, it is a pity to upset so good a fellow! His
+kindness exposes him more than anyone else to suffer contagion from
+your own malady. But you shall know all as soon as you shall be
+calmer. Pray, therefore, once again sit down, _batuchka_! Try and
+recover your spirits--you seem quite unhinged."
+
+Raskolnikoff rose while looking at him with an air full of contempt.
+"Tell me once for all," asked the latter, "tell me one way or other,
+whether I am in your opinion an object for suspicion? Speak up,
+Porphyrius Petrovitch, and explain yourself without any more beating
+about the bush, and that forthwith!"
+
+"Just one word, Rodion Romanovitch. This affair will end as God knows
+best; but still, by way of form, I may have to ask you a few more
+questions. Hence we are certain to meet again!" And with a smile
+Porphyrius stopped before the young man. "Certain!" he repeated. One
+might have fancied that he wished to say something more. But he did
+not do so.
+
+"Forgive my strange manner just now, Porphyrius Petrovitch, I was
+hasty," began Raskolnikoff, who had regained all his self-possession,
+and who even experienced an irresistible wish to chaff the magistrate.
+
+"Don't say any more, it was nothing," replied Porphyrius in almost
+joyful tone. "Till we meet again!"
+
+"Till we meet again!"
+
+The young man forthwith went home. Having got there, he threw himself
+on his couch, and for a quarter of an hour he tried to arrange his
+ideas somewhat, inasmuch as they were very confused.
+
+Within a few days Raskolnikoff convinced himself that Porphyrius
+Petrovitch had no real proofs. Deciding to go out, in search of fresh
+air, he took up his cap and made for the door, deep in thought. For
+the first time he felt in the best of health, really well. He opened
+the door, and encountered Porphyrius face to face. The latter entered.
+
+Raskolnikoff staggered for a moment, but quickly recovered. The visit
+did not dismay him. "Perhaps this is the finale, but why does he come
+upon me like a cat, with muffled tread? Can he have been listening?"
+
+"I have been thinking for a long time of calling on you, and, as I was
+passing, I thought I might drop in for a few minutes. Where are you
+off to? I won't detain you long, only the time to smoke a cigarette,
+if you will allow me?"
+
+"Be seated, Porphyrius Petrovitch, be seated," said Raskolnikoff to
+his guest, assuming such an air of friendship that he himself could
+have been astonished at his own affability. Thus the victim, in fear
+and trembling for his life, at last does not feel the knife at his
+throat. He seated himself in front of Porphyrius, and gazed upon him
+without flinching. Porphyrius blinked a little, and commenced rolling
+his cigarette.
+
+"Speak! speak!" Raskolnikoff mutely cried in his heart. "What are you
+going to say?"
+
+"Oh, these cigarettes!" Porphyrius Petrovitch commenced at last,
+"they'll be the death of me, and yet I can't give them up! I am always
+coughing--a tickling in the throat is setting in, and I am
+asthmatical. I have been to consult Botkine of late; he examines every
+one of his patients at least half an hour at a time. After having
+thumped and bumped me about for ever so long, he told me, amongst
+other things: 'Tobacco is a bad thing for you--your lungs are
+affected.' That's all very well, but how am I to go without my
+tobacco? What am I to use as a substitute? Unfortunately, I can't
+drink, hah! hah! Everything is relative, I suppose, Rodion
+Romanovitch?"
+
+"There, he is beginning with some more of his silly palaver!"
+Raskolnikoff growled to himself. His late interview with the
+magistrate suddenly occurred to him, at which anger affected his mind.
+
+"Did you know, by-the-by, that I called on you the night before last?"
+continued Porphyrius, looking about. "I was in this very room. I
+happened to be coming this way, just as I am going to-day, and the
+idea struck me to drop in. Your door was open--I entered, hoping to
+see you in a few minutes, but went away again without leaving my name
+with your servant. Do you never shut your place?"
+
+Raskolnikoff's face grew gloomier and gloomier. Porphyrius Petrovitch
+evidently guessed what the latter was thinking about.
+
+"You did not expect visitors, Rodion Romanovitch?" said Porphyrius,
+smiling graciously.
+
+"I have called just to clear things up a bit. I owe you an
+explanation," he went on, smiling and gently slapping the young man on
+the knee; but almost at the self-same moment his face assumed a
+serious and even sad expression, to Raskolnikoff's great astonishment,
+to whom the magistrate appeared in quite a different light. "At our
+last interview, an unusual scene took place between us, Rodion. I
+somehow feel that I did not behave very well to you. You remember, I
+dare say, how we parted; we were both more or less excited. I fear we
+were wanting in the most common courtesy, and yet we are both of us
+gentlemen."
+
+"What can he be driving at now?" Raskolnikoff asked himself, looking
+inquiringly at Porphyrius.
+
+"I have come to the conclusion that it would be much better for us to
+be more candid to one another," continued the magistrate, turning his
+head gently aside and looking on the ground, as if he feared to annoy
+his former victim by his survey. "We must not have scenes of that kind
+again. If Mikolka had not turned up on that occasion, I really do not
+know how things would have ended. You are naturally, my dear Rodion,
+very irritable, and I must own that I had taken that into
+consideration, for, when driven in a corner, many a man lets out his
+secrets. 'If,' I said to myself, 'I could only squeeze some kind of
+evidence out of him, however trivial, provided it were real, tangible,
+and palpable, different from all my psychological inferences!' That
+was my idea. Sometimes we succeed by some such proceeding, but
+unfortunately that does not happen every day, as I conclusively
+discovered on the occasion in question, I had relied too much on your
+character."
+
+"But why tell me all this now?" stammered Raskolnikoff, without in any
+way understanding the object of his interlocutor's question. "Does he,
+perhaps, think me really innocent?"
+
+"You wish to know why I tell you this? Because I look upon it as a
+sacred duty to explain my line of action. Because I subjected you, as
+I now fully acknowledge, to cruel torture. I do not wish, my dear
+Rodion, that you should take me for an ogre. Hence, by way of
+justification, I purpose explaining to you what led up to it. I think
+it needless to account for the nature and origin of the reports which
+circulated originally, as also why you were connected with them. There
+was, however, one circumstance, a purely fortuitous one, and which
+need not now be mentioned, which aroused my suspicions. From these
+reports and accidental circumstances, the same conclusion became
+evolved for me. I make this statement in all sincerity, for it was I
+who first implicated you with the matter. I do not in any way notice
+the particulars notified on the articles found at the old woman's.
+That, and several others of a similar nature, are of no kind of
+importance. At the same time, I was aware of the incident which had
+happened at the police office. What occurred there has been told me
+with the utmost accuracy by some one who had been closely connected
+with it, and who, most unwittingly, had brought things to a head. Very
+well, then, how, under such circumstances, could a man help becoming
+biased? 'One swallow does not make a summer,' as the English proverb
+says: a hundred suppositions do not constitute one single proof.
+Reason speaks in that way, I admit, but let a man try to subject
+prejudice to reason. An examining magistrate, after all, is only a
+man--hence given to prejudice.
+
+"I also remembered, on the occasion in question, the article you had
+published in some review. That virgin effort of yours, I assure you, I
+greatly enjoyed--as an amateur, however, be it understood. It was
+redolent of sincere conviction, of genuine enthusiasm. The article was
+evidently written some sleepless night under feverish conditions. That
+author, I said to myself, while reading it, will do better things than
+that. How now, I ask you, could I avoid connecting that with what
+followed upon it? Such a tendency was but a natural one. Am I saying
+anything I should not? Am I at this moment committing myself to any
+definite statement? I do no more than give utterance to a thought
+which struck me at the time. What may I be thinking about now?
+Nothing--or, at all events, what is tantamount to it. For the time
+being, I have to deal with Mikolka; there are facts which implicate
+him--what are facts, after all? If I tell you all this now, as I am
+doing, I do so, I assure you, most emphatically, so that your mind and
+conscience may absolve me from my behavior on the day of our
+interview. 'Why,' you will ask, 'did you not come on that occasion and
+have my place searched?' I did so, hah! hah! I went when you were ill
+in bed--but, let me tell you, not officially, not in my magisterial
+capacity; but go I did. We had your rooms turned topsy-turvy at our
+very first suspicions, but _umsonst_! Then I said to myself: 'That man
+will make me a call, he will come of his own accord, and that before
+very long! If he is guilty, he will be bound to come. Other kinds of
+men would not do so, but this one will.'
+
+"And you remember, of course, Mr. Razoumikhin's chattering? We had
+purposely informed him of some of our suspicions, hoping that he might
+make you uneasy, for we knew perfectly well that Razoumikhin would not
+be able to contain his indignation. Zametoff, in particular, had been
+struck by your boldness, and it certainly was a bold thing for a
+person to exclaim all of a sudden in an open _traktir_: 'I am an
+assassin!' That was really too much of a good thing. Well, I waited
+for you with trusting patience, and, lo and behold, Providence sends
+you! How my heart did beat when I saw you coming! Now, I ask you,
+where was the need of your coming at that time at all? If you
+remember, you came in laughing immoderately. That laughter gave me
+food for thought, but, had I not been very prejudiced at the time, I
+should have taken no notice of it. And as for Mr. Razoumikhin on that
+occasion--ah! the stone, the stone, you will remember, under which the
+stolen things are hidden? I fancy I can see it from here; it is
+somewhere in a kitchen garden--it was a kitchen garden you mentioned
+to Zametoff, was it not? And then, when your article was broached, we
+fancied we discovered a latent thought beneath every word you uttered.
+That was the way, Rodion Romanovitch, that my conviction grew little
+by little. 'And yet,' said I to myself, 'all that may be explained in
+quite a different way, and perhaps more rationally. After all, a real
+proof, however slight, would be far more valuable.' But, when I heard
+all about the bell-ringing, my doubts vanished; I fancied I had the
+indispensable proof, and did not seem to care for further
+investigation.
+
+"We are face to face with a weird and gloomy case--a case of a
+contemporary character, if I may say so--a case possessing, in the
+fullest sense of the word, the hallmark of time, and circumstances
+pointing to a person and life of different surroundings. The real
+culprit is a theorist, a bookworm, who, in a tentative kind of way,
+has done a more than bold thing; but this boldness of his is of quite
+a peculiar and one-sided stamp; it is, after a fashion, like that of a
+man who hurls himself from the top of a mountain or church steeple.
+The man in question has forgotten to cut off evidence, and, in order
+to work out a theory, has killed two persons. He has committed a
+murder, and yet has not known how to take possession of the pelf; what
+he has taken he has hidden under a stone. The anguish he experienced
+while hearing knocking at the door and the continued ringing of the
+bell, was not enough for him; no, yielding to an irresistible desire
+of experiencing the same horror, he has positively revisited the empty
+place and once more pulled the bell. Let us, if you like, attribute
+the whole of this to disease--to a semidelirious condition--by all
+means; but there is yet another point to be considered: he has
+committed a murder, and yet continues to look upon himself as a
+righteous man!"
+
+Raskolnikoff trembled in every limb. "Then, who--who is it--that has
+committed the murder?" he stammered forth, in jerky accents.
+
+The examining magistrate sank back in his chair as though astonished
+at such a question. "Who committed the murder?" he retorted, as if he
+could not believe his own ears. "Why, you--you did, Rodion
+Romanovitch! You!--" he added, almost in a whisper, and in a tone of
+profound conviction.
+
+Raskolnikoff suddenly rose, waited for a few moments, and sat down
+again, without uttering a single word. All the muscles of his face
+were slightly convulsed.
+
+"Why, I see your lips tremble just as they did the other day,"
+observed Porphyrius Petrovitch, with an air of interest. "You have
+not, I think, thoroughly realized the object of my visit, Rodion
+Romanovitch," he pursued, after a moment's silence, "hence your great
+astonishment. I have called with the express intention of plain
+speaking, and to reveal the truth."
+
+"It was not I who committed the murder," stammered the young man,
+defending himself very much like a child caught in the act of doing
+wrong.
+
+"Yes, yes, it was you, Rodion Romanovitch, it was you, and you alone,"
+replied the magistrate with severity. "Confess or not, as you think
+best; for the time being, that is nothing to me. In either case, my
+conviction is arrived at."
+
+"If that is so, why have you called?" asked Raskolnikoff angrily. "I
+once more repeat the question I have put you: If you think me guilty,
+why not issue a warrant against me?"
+
+"What a question! But I will answer you categorically. To begin with,
+your arrest would not benefit me!"
+
+"It would not benefit you? How can that be? From the moment of being
+convinced, you ought to----"
+
+"What is the use of my conviction, after all? For the time being, it
+is only built on sand. And why should I have you placed _at rest?_ Of
+course, I purpose having you arrested--I have called to give you a
+hint to that effect--and yet I do not hesitate to tell you that I
+shall gain nothing by it. Considering, therefore, the interest I feel
+for you, I earnestly urge you to go and acknowledge your crime. I
+called before to give the same advice. It is by far the wisest thing
+you can do--for you as well as for myself, who will then wash my hands
+of the affair. Now, am I candid enough?"
+
+Raskolnikoff considered a moment. "Listen to me, Porphyrius
+Petrovitch! To use your own statement, you have against me nothing but
+psychological sentiments, and yet you aspire to mathematical evidence.
+Who has told you that you are absolutely right?"
+
+"Yes, Rodion Romanovitch, I am absolutely right. I hold a proof! And
+this proof I came in possession of the other day: God has sent it me!"
+
+"What is it?"
+
+"I shall not tell you, Rodion Romanovitch. But I have no right to
+procrastinate. I am going to have you arrested! Judge, therefore:
+whatever you purpose doing is not of much importance to me just now;
+all I say and have said has been solely done for your interest. The
+best alternative is the one I suggest, you may depend on it, Rodion
+Romanovitch! When I shall have had you arrested--at the expiration of
+a month or two, or even three, if you like--you will remember my
+words, and you will confess. You will be led to do so insensibly,
+almost without being conscious of it. I am even of opinion that, after
+careful consideration, you will make up your mind to make atonement.
+You do not believe me at this moment, but wait and see. In truth,
+Rodion Romanovitch, suffering is a grand thing. In the mouth of a
+coarse man, who deprives himself of nothing, such a statement might
+afford food for laughter. Never mind, however, but there lies a theory
+in suffering. Mikolka is right. You won't escape, Rodion Romanovitch."
+
+Raskolnikoff rose and took his cap. Porphyrius Petrovitch did the
+same. "Are you going for a walk? The night will be a fine one, as long
+as we get no storm. That would be all the better though, as it would
+clear the air."
+
+"Porphyrius Petrovitch," said the young man, in curt and hurried
+accents, "do not run away with the idea that I have been making a
+confession to-day. You are a strange man, and I have listened to you
+from pure curiosity. But remember, I have confessed to nothing. Pray
+do not forget that."
+
+"I shall not forget it, you may depend---- How he is trembling! Don't
+be uneasy, my friend--I shall not forget your advice. Take a little
+stroll, only do not go beyond certain limits. I must, however, at all
+costs," he added with lowered voice, "ask a small favor of you; it is
+a delicate one, but has an importance of its own; assuming, although I
+would view such a contingency as an improbable one--assuming, during
+the next forty-eight hours, the fancy were to come upon you to put an
+end to your life (excuse me my foolish supposition), would you mind
+leaving behind you something in the shape of a note--a line or
+so--pointing to the spot where the stone is?--that would be very
+considerate. Well, _au revoir_! May God send you good thoughts!"
+
+Porphyrius withdrew, avoiding Raskolnikoff's eye. The latter
+approached the window, and impatiently waited till, according to his
+calculation, the magistrate should be some distance from the house. He
+then passed out himself in great haste.
+
+A few days later, the prophecy of Porphyrius Petrovitch was fulfilled.
+Driven by the torment of uncertainty and doubt, Raskolnikoff made up
+his mind to confess his crime. Hastening through the streets, and
+stumbling up the narrow stairway, he presented himself at the police
+office.
+
+With pale lips and fixed gaze, Raskolnikoff slowly advanced toward
+Elia Petrovitch. Resting his head upon the table behind which the
+lieutenant was seated, he wished to speak, but could only give vent to
+a few unintelligible sounds.
+
+"You are in pain, a chair! Pray sit down! Some water!"
+
+Raskolnikoff allowed himself to sink on the chair that was offered
+him, but he could not take his eyes off Elia Petrovitch, whose face
+expressed a very unpleasant surprise. For a moment both men looked at
+one another in silence. Water was brought!
+
+"It was I--" commenced Raskolnikoff.
+
+"Drink."
+
+With a movement of his hand the young man pushed aside the glass which
+was offered him; then, in a low-toned but distinct voice he made, with
+several interruptions, the following statement:--
+
+"_It was I who killed, with a hatchet, the old moneylender and her
+sister, Elizabeth, and robbery was my motive_."
+
+Elia Petrovitch called for assistance. People rushed in from various
+directions. Raskolnikoff repeated his confession.
+
+FOOTNOTES TO _CRIME & PUNISHMENT_:
+
+[1]: (At the risk of shocking the reader, it has been decided that the
+real permanent detective stories of the world were ill represented
+without Dostoyevsky's terrible tale of what might be called
+"self-detection." If to sensitive readers the story seems so real as
+to be hideous, it is well to recall that Dostoyevsky in 1849
+under-went the agony of sentence to death as a revolutionist. Although
+the sentence was commuted to hard labor in Siberia, and although six
+years later he was freed and again took up his writing, his mind never
+rose from beneath the weight of horror and hopelessness that hangs
+over offenders against the Great White Czar. Dostoyevsky, sentenced as
+a criminal, herded with criminals, really _became_ a criminal in
+literary imagination. Add to this a minute observation, a marvelous
+memory, ardent political convictions--and we can understand why the
+story here, with others of his, is taken as a scientific text by
+criminologists.--EDITOR.)
+
+[2]: 1,000 yards.
+
+[3]: Janitors.
+
+[4]: little father
+
+[5]: Cabbage soup.
+
+
+
+ANTON CHEKHOFF
+
+
+_THE SAFETY MATCH_
+
+
+On the morning of October 6, 1885, in the office of the Inspector of
+Police of the second division of S---- District, there appeared a
+respectably dressed young man, who announced that his master, Marcus
+Ivanovitch Klausoff, a retired officer of the Horse Guards, separated
+from his wife, had been murdered. While making this announcement the
+young man was white and terribly agitated. His hands trembled and his
+eyes were full of terror.
+
+"Whom have I the honor of addressing?" asked the inspector.
+
+"Psyekoff, Lieutenant Klausoff's agent; agriculturist and
+mechanician!"
+
+The inspector and his deputy, on visiting the scene of the occurrence
+in company with Psyekoff, found the following: Near the wing in which
+Klausoff had lived was gathered a dense crowd. The news of the murder
+had sped swift as lightning through the neighborhood, and the
+peasantry, thanks to the fact that the day was a holiday, had hurried
+together from all the neighboring villages. There was much commotion
+and talk. Here and there, pale, tear-stained faces were seen. The door
+of Klausoff's bedroom was found locked. The key was inside.
+
+"It is quite clear that the scoundrels got in by the window!" said
+Psyekoff as they examined the door.
+
+They went to the garden, into which the bedroom window opened. The
+window looked dark and ominous. It was covered by a faded green
+curtain. One corner of the curtain was slightly turned up, which made
+it possible to look into the bedroom.
+
+"Did any of you look into the window?" asked the inspector.
+
+"Certainly not, your worship!" answered Ephraim, the gardener, a
+little gray-haired old man, who looked like a retired sergeant. "Who's
+going to look in, if all their bones are shaking?"
+
+"Ah, Marcus Ivanovitch, Marcus Ivanovitch!" sighed the inspector,
+looking at the window, "I told you you would come to a bad end! I told
+the dear man, but he wouldn't listen! Dissipation doesn't bring any
+good!"
+
+"Thanks to Ephraim," said Psyekoff; "but for him, we would never have
+guessed. He was the first to guess that something was wrong. He comes
+to me this morning, and says: 'Why is the master so long getting up?
+He hasn't left his bedroom for a whole week!' The moment he said that,
+it was just as if some one had hit me with an ax. The thought flashed
+through my mind, 'We haven't had a sight of him since last Saturday,
+and to-day is Sunday'! Seven whole days--not a doubt of it!"
+
+"Ay, poor fellow!" again sighed the inspector. "He was a clever
+fellow, finely educated, and kind-hearted at that! And in society,
+nobody could touch him! But he was a waster, God rest his soul! I was
+prepared for anything since he refused to live with Olga Petrovna.
+Poor thing, a good wife, but a sharp tongue! Stephen!" the inspector
+called to one of his deputies, "go over to my house this minute, and
+send Andrew to the captain to lodge an information with him! Tell him
+that Marcus Ivanovitch has been murdered. And run over to the orderly;
+why should he sit there, kicking his heels? Let him come here! And go
+as fast as you can to the examining magistrate, Nicholas
+Yermolaïyevitch. Tell him to come over here! Wait; I'll write him a
+note!"
+
+The inspector posted sentinels around the wing, wrote a letter to the
+examining magistrate, and then went over to the director's for a glass
+of tea. Ten minutes later he was sitting on a stool, carefully
+nibbling a lump of sugar, and swallowing the scalding tea.
+
+"There you are!" he was saying to Psyekoff; "there you are! A noble by
+birth! a rich man--a favorite of the gods, you may say, as Pushkin has
+it, and what did he come to? He drank and dissipated and--there you
+are--he's murdered."
+
+After a couple of hours the examining magistrate drove up. Nicholas
+Yermolaïyevitch Chubikoff--for that was the magistrate's name--was a
+tall, fleshy old man of sixty, who had been wrestling with the duties
+of his office for a quarter of a century. Everybody in the district
+knew him as an honest man, wise, energetic, and in love with his work.
+He was accompanied to the scene of the murder by his inveterate
+companion, fellow worker, and secretary, Dukovski, a tall young fellow
+of twenty-six.
+
+"Is it possible, gentlemen?" cried Chubikoff, entering Psyekoff's
+room, and quickly shaking hands with everyone. "Is it possible? Marcus
+Ivanovitch? Murdered? No! It is impossible! Im-poss-i-ble!"
+
+"Go in there!" sighed the inspector.
+
+"Lord, have mercy on us! Only last Friday I saw him at the fair in
+Farabankoff. I had a drink of vodka with him, save the mark!"
+
+"Go in there!" again sighed the inspector.
+
+They sighed, uttered exclamations of horror, drank a glass of tea
+each, and went to the wing.
+
+"Get back!" the orderly cried to the peasants.
+
+Going to the wing, the examining magistrate began his work by
+examining the bedroom door. The door proved to be of pine, painted
+yellow, and was uninjured. Nothing was found which could serve as a
+clew. They had to break in the door.
+
+"Everyone not here on business is requested to keep away!" said the
+magistrate, when, after much hammering and shaking, the door yielded
+to ax and chisel. "I request this, in the interest of the
+investigation. Orderly, don't let anyone in!"
+
+Chubikoff, his assistant, and the inspector opened the door, and
+hesitatingly, one after the other, entered the room. Their eyes met
+the following sight: Beside the single window stood the big wooden bed
+with a huge feather mattress. On the crumpled feather bed lay a
+tumbled, crumpled quilt. The pillow, in a cotton pillow-case, also
+much crumpled, was dragging on the floor. On the table beside the bed
+lay a silver watch and a silver twenty-kopeck piece. Beside them lay
+some sulphur matches. Beside the bed, the little table, and the single
+chair, there was no furniture in the room. Looking under the bed, the
+inspector saw a couple of dozen empty bottles, an old straw hat, and a
+quart of vodka. Under the table lay one top boot, covered with dust.
+Casting a glance around the room, the magistrate frowned and grew red
+in the face.
+
+"Scoundrels!" he muttered, clenching his fists.
+
+"And where is Marcus Ivanovitch?" asked Dukovski in a low voice.
+
+"Mind your own business!" Chubikoff answered roughly. "Be good enough
+to examine the floor! This is not the first case of the kind I have
+had to deal with! Eugraph Kuzmitch," he said, turning to the
+inspector, and lowering his voice, "in 1870 I had another case like
+this. But you must remember it--the murder of the merchant
+Portraitoff. It was just the same there. The scoundrels murdered him,
+and dragged the corpse out through the window----"
+
+Chubikoff went up to the window, pulled the curtain to one side, and
+carefully pushed the window. The window opened.
+
+"It opens, you see! It wasn't fastened. Hm! There are tracks under the
+window. Look! There is the track of a knee! Somebody got in there. We
+must examine the window thoroughly."
+
+"There is nothing special to be found on the floor," said
+Dukovski.
+"No stains or scratches. The only thing I found was a struck safety
+match. Here it is! So far as I remember, Marcus Ivanovitch did not
+smoke. And he always used sulphur matches, never safety matches.
+Perhaps this safety match may serve as a clew!"
+
+"Oh, do shut up!" cried the magistrate deprecatingly. "You go on about
+your match! I can't abide these dreamers! Instead of chasing matches,
+you had better examine the bed!"
+
+After a thorough examination of the bed, Dukovski reported:
+
+"There are no spots, either of blood or of anything else. There are
+likewise no new torn places. On the pillow there are signs of teeth.
+The quilt is stained with something which looks like beer and smells
+like beer. The general aspect of the bed gives grounds for thinking
+that a struggle took place on it."
+
+"I know there was a struggle, without your telling me! You are not
+being asked about a struggle. Instead of looking for struggles, you
+had better----"
+
+"Here is one top boot, but there is no sign of the other."
+
+"Well, and what of that?"
+
+"It proves that they strangled him, while he was taking his boots off.
+He hadn't time to take the second boot off when----"
+
+"There you go!--and how do you know they strangled him?"
+
+"There are marks of teeth on the pillow. The pillow itself is badly
+crumpled, and thrown a couple of yards from the bed."
+
+"Listen to his foolishness! Better come into the garden. You would be
+better employed examining the garden than digging around here. I can
+do that without you!"
+
+When they reached the garden they began by examining the grass. The
+grass under the window was crushed and trampled. A bushy burdock
+growing under the window close to the wall was also trampled. Dukovski
+succeeded in finding on it some broken twigs and a piece of cotton
+wool. On the upper branches were found some fine hairs of dark blue
+wool.
+
+"What color was his last suit?" Dukovski asked Psyekoff.
+
+"Yellow crash."
+
+"Excellent! You see they wore blue!"
+
+A few twigs of the burdock were cut off, and carefully wrapped in
+paper by the investigators. At this point Police Captain Artsuybasheff
+Svistakovski and Dr. Tyutyeff arrived. The captain bade them "Good
+day!" and immediately began to satisfy his curiosity. The doctor, a
+tall, very lean man, with dull eyes, a long nose, and a pointed chin,
+without greeting anyone or asking about anything, sat down on a log,
+sighed, and began:
+
+"The Servians are at war again! What in heaven's name can they want
+now? Austria, it's all your doing!"
+
+The examination of the window from the outside did not supply any
+conclusive data. The examination of the grass and the bushes nearest
+to the window yielded a series of useful clews. For example, Dukovski
+succeeded in discovering a long, dark streak, made up of spots, on the
+grass, which led some distance into the center of the garden. The
+streak ended under one of the lilac bushes in a dark brown stain.
+Under this same lilac bush was found a top boot, which turned out to
+be the fellow of the boot already found in the bedroom.
+
+"That is a blood stain made some time ago," said Dukovski, examining
+the spot.
+
+At the word "blood" the doctor rose, and going over lazily, looked at
+the spot.
+
+"Yes, it is blood!" he muttered.
+
+"That shows he wasn't strangled, if there was blood," said Chubikoff,
+looking sarcastically at Dukovski.
+
+"They strangled him in the bedroom; and here, fearing he might come
+round again, they struck him a blow with some sharp-pointed
+instrument. The stain under the bush proves that he lay there a
+considerable time, while they were looking about for some way of
+carrying him out of the garden.
+
+"Well, and how about the boot?"
+
+"The boot confirms completely my idea that they murdered him while he
+was taking his boots off before going to bed. He had already taken off
+one boot, and the other, this one here, he had only had time to take
+half off. The half-off boot came off of itself, while the body was
+dragged over, and fell----"
+
+"There's a lively imagination for you!" laughed Chubikoff. "He goes on
+and on like that! When will you learn enough to drop your deductions?
+Instead of arguing and deducing, it would be much better if you took
+some of the blood-stained grass for analysis!"
+
+When they had finished their examination, and drawn a plan of the
+locality, the investigators went to the director's office to write
+their report and have breakfast. While they were breakfasting they
+went on talking:
+
+"The watch, the money, and so on--all untouched--" Chubikoff began,
+leading off the talk, "show as clearly as that two and two are four
+that the murder was not committed for the purpose of robbery."
+
+"The murder was committed by an educated man!" insisted Dukovski.
+
+"What evidence have you of that?"
+
+"The safety match proves that to me, for the peasants hereabouts are
+not yet acquainted with safety matches. Only the landowners use them,
+and by no means all of them. And it is evident that there was not one
+murderer, but at least three. Two held him, while one killed him.
+Klausoff was strong, and the murderers must have known it!"
+
+"What good would his strength be, supposing he was asleep?"
+
+"The murderers came on him while he was taking off his boots. If he
+was taking off his boots, that proves that he wasn't asleep!"
+
+"Stop inventing your deductions! Better eat!"
+
+"In my opinion, your worship," said the gardener Ephraim, setting the
+samovar on the table, "it was nobody but Nicholas who did this dirty
+trick!"
+
+"Quite possible," said Psyekoff.
+
+"And who is Nicholas?"
+
+"The master's valet, your worship," answered Ephraim. "Who else could
+it be? He's a rascal, your worship! He's a drunkard and a blackguard,
+the like of which Heaven should not permit! He always took the master
+his vodka and put the master to bed. Who else could it be? And I also
+venture to point out to your worship, he once boasted at the public
+house that he would kill the master! It happened on account of
+Aquilina, the woman, you know. He was making up to a soldier's widow.
+She pleased the master; the master made friends with her himself, and
+Nicholas--naturally, he was mad! He is rolling about drunk in the
+kitchen now. He is crying, and telling lies, saying he is sorry for
+the master----"
+
+The examining magistrate ordered Nicholas to be brought. Nicholas, a
+lanky young fellow, with a long, freckled nose, narrow-chested, and
+wearing an old jacket of his master's, entered Psyekoff's room, and
+bowed low before the magistrate. His face was sleepy and tear-stained.
+He was tipsy and could hardly keep his feet.
+
+"Where is your master?" Chubikoff asked him.
+
+"Murdered! your worship!"
+
+As he said this, Nicholas blinked and began to weep.
+
+"We know he was murdered. But where is he now? Where is his body?"
+
+"They say he was dragged out of the window and buried in the garden!"
+
+"Hum! The results of the investigation are known in the kitchen
+already!--That's bad! Where were you, my good fellow, the night the
+master was murdered? Saturday night, that is."
+
+Nicholas raised his head, stretched his neck, and began to think.
+
+"I don't know, your worship," he said. "I was drunk and don't
+remember."
+
+"An alibi!" whispered Dukovski, smiling, and rubbing his hands.
+
+"So-o! And why is there blood under the master's window?"
+
+Nicholas jerked his head up and considered.
+
+"Hurry up!" said the Captain of Police.
+
+"Right away! That blood doesn't amount to anything, your worship! I
+was cutting a chicken's throat. I was doing it quite simply, in the
+usual way, when all of a sudden it broke away and started to run. That
+is where the blood came from."
+
+Ephraim declared that Nicholas did kill a chicken every evening, and
+always in some new place, but that nobody ever heard of a half-killed
+chicken running about the garden, though of course it wasn't
+impossible.
+
+"An alibi," sneered Dukovski; "and what an asinine alibi!"
+
+"Did you know Aquilina?"
+
+"Yes, your worship, I know her."
+
+"And the master cut you out with her?"
+
+"Not at all. _He_ cut me out--Mr. Psyekoff there, Ivan Mikhailovitch;
+and the master cut Ivan Mikhailovitch out. That is how it was."
+
+Psyekoff grew confused and began to scratch his left eye. Dukovski
+looked at him attentively, noted his confusion, and started. He
+noticed that the director had dark blue trousers, which he had not
+observed before. The trousers reminded him of the dark blue threads
+found on the burdock. Chubikoff in his turn glanced suspiciously at
+Psyekoff.
+
+"Go!" he said to Nicholas. "And now permit me to put a question to
+you, Mr. Psyekoff. Of course you were here last Saturday evening?"
+
+"Yes! I had supper with Marcus Ivanovitch about ten o'clock."
+
+"And afterwards?"
+
+"Afterwards--afterwards--Really, I do not remember," stammered
+Psyekoff. "I had a good deal to drink at supper. I don't remember when
+or where I went to sleep. Why are you all looking at me like that, as
+if I was the murderer?"
+
+"Where were you when you woke up?"
+
+"I was in the servants' kitchen, lying behind the stove! They can all
+confirm it. How I got behind the stove I don't know----"
+
+"Do not get agitated. Did you know Aquilina?"
+
+"There's nothing extraordinary about that----"
+
+"She first liked you and then preferred Klausoff?"
+
+"Yes. Ephraim, give us some more mushrooms! Do you want some more tea,
+Eugraph Kuzmitch?"
+
+A heavy, oppressive silence began and lasted fully five minutes.
+Dukoyski silently kept his piercing eyes fixed on Psyekoff's pale
+face. The silence was finally broken by the examining magistrate:
+
+"We must go to the house and talk with Maria Ivanovna, the sister of
+the deceased. Perhaps she may be able to supply some clews."
+
+Chubikoff and his assistant expressed their thanks for the breakfast,
+and went toward the house. They found Klausoff's sister, Maria
+Ivanovna, an old maid of forty-five, at prayer before the big case of
+family icons. When she saw the portfolios in her guests' hands, and
+their official caps, she grew pale.
+
+"Let me begin by apologizing for disturbing, so to speak, your
+devotions," began the gallant Chubikoff, bowing and scraping. "We have
+come to you with a request. Of course, you have heard already. There
+is a suspicion that your dear brother, in some way or other, has been
+murdered. The will of God, you know. No one can escape death, neither
+czar nor plowman. Could you not help us with some clew, some
+explanation----?"
+
+"Oh, don't ask me!" said Maria Ivanovna, growing still paler, and
+covering her face with her hands. "I can tell you nothing. Nothing! I
+beg you! I know nothing--What can I do? Oh, no! no!--not a word about
+my brother! If I die, I won't say anything!"
+
+Maria Ivanovna began to weep, and left the room. The investigators
+looked at each other, shrugged their shoulders, and beat a retreat.
+
+"Confound the woman!" scolded Dukovski, going out of the house. "It is
+clear she knows something, and is concealing it! And the chambermaid
+has a queer expression too! Wait, you wretches! We'll ferret it all
+out!"
+
+In the evening Chubikoff and his deputy, lit on their road by the pale
+moon, wended their way homeward. They sat in their carriage and
+thought over the results of the day. Both were tired and kept silent.
+Chubikoff was always unwilling to talk while traveling, and the
+talkative Dukovski remained silent, to fall in with the elder man's
+humor. But at the end of their journey the deputy could hold in no
+longer, and said:
+
+"It is quite certain," he said, "that Nicholas had something to do
+with the matter. _Non dubitandum est!_ You can see by his face what
+sort of a case he is! His alibi betrays him, body and bones. But it is
+also certain that he did not set the thing going. He was only the
+stupid hired tool. You agree? And the humble Psyekoff was not without
+some slight share in the matter. His dark blue breeches, his
+agitation, his lying behind the stove in terror after the murder, his
+alibi and--Aquilina----"
+
+"'Grind away, Emilian; it's your week!' So, according to you, whoever
+knew Aquilina is the murderer! Hot-head! You ought to be sucking a
+bottle, and not handling affairs! You were one of Aquilina's admirers
+yourself--does it follow that you are implicated too?"
+
+"Aquilina was cook in your house for a month. I am saying nothing
+about that! The night before that Saturday I was playing cards with
+you, and saw you, otherwise I should be after you too! It isn't the
+woman that matters, old chap! It is the mean, nasty, low spirit of
+jealousy that matters. The retiring young man was not pleased when
+they got the better of him, you see! His vanity, don't you see? He
+wanted revenge. Then, those thick lips of his suggest passion. So
+there you have it: wounded self-love and passion. That is quite enough
+motive for a murder. We have two of them in our hands; but who is the
+third? Nicholas and Psyekoff held him, but who smothered him? Psyekoff
+is shy, timid, an all-round coward. And Nicholas would not know how to
+smother with a pillow. His sort use an ax or a club. Some third person
+did the smothering; but who was it?"
+
+Dukovski crammed his hat down over his eyes and pondered. He remained
+silent until the carriage rolled up to the magistrate's door.
+
+"Eureka!" he said, entering the little house and throwing off his
+overcoat. "Eureka, Nicholas Yermolaïyevitch! The only thing I can't
+understand is, how it did not occur to me sooner! Do you know who the
+third person was?"
+
+"Oh, for goodness sake, shut up! There is supper! Sit down to your
+evening meal!"
+
+The magistrate and Dukovski sat down to supper. Dukovski poured
+himself out a glass of vodka, rose, drew himself up, and said, with
+sparkling eyes:
+
+"Well, learn that the third person, who acted in concert with that
+scoundrel Psyekoff, and did the smothering, was a woman! Yes-s! I
+mean--the murdered man's sister, Maria Ivanovna!"
+
+Chubikoff choked over his vodka, and fixed his eyes on Dukovski.
+
+"You aren't--what's-its-name? Your head isn't what-do-you-call-it? You
+haven't a pain in it?"
+
+"I am perfectly well! Very well, let us say that I am crazy; but how
+do you explain her confusion when we appeared? How do you explain her
+unwillingness to give us any information? Let us admit that these are
+trifles. Very well! All right! But remember their relations. She
+detested her brother. She never forgave him for living apart from his
+wife. She is of the Old Faith, while in her eyes he is a godless
+profligate. There is where the germ of her hate was hatched. They say
+he succeeded in making her believe that he was an angel of Satan. He
+even went in for spiritualism in her presence!"
+
+"Well, what of that?"
+
+"You don't understand? She, as a member of the Old Faith, murdered him
+through fanaticism. It was not only that she was putting to death a
+weed, a profligate--she was freeing the world of an antichrist!--and
+there, in her opinion, was her service, her religious achievement! Oh,
+you don't know those old maids of the Old Faith. Read Dostoyevsky! And
+what does Lyeskoff say about them, or Petcherski? It was she, and
+nobody else, even if you cut me open. She smothered him! O treacherous
+woman! wasn't that the reason why she was kneeling before the icons,
+when we came in, just to take our attention away? 'Let me kneel down
+and pray,' she said to herself, 'and they will think I am tranquil and
+did not expect them!' That is the plan of all novices in crime,
+Nicholas Yermolaïyevitch, old pal! My dear old man, won't you intrust
+this business to me? Let me personally bring it through! Friend, I
+began it and I will finish it!"
+
+Chubikoff shook his head and frowned.
+
+"We know how to manage difficult matters ourselves," he said; "and
+your business is not to push yourself in where you don't belong. Write
+from dictation when you are dictated to; that is your job!"
+
+Dukovski flared up, banged the door, and disappeared.
+
+"Clever rascal!" muttered Chubikoff, glancing after him. "Awfully
+clever! But too much of a hothead. I must buy him a cigar case at the
+fair as a present."
+
+The next day, early in the morning, a young man with a big head and a
+pursed-up mouth, who came from Klausoff's place, was introduced to the
+magistrate's office. He said he was the shepherd Daniel, and brought a
+very interesting piece of information.
+
+"I was a bit drunk," he said. "I was with my pal till midnight. On my
+way home, as I was drunk, I went into the river for a bath. I was
+taking a bath, when I looked up. Two men were walking along the dam,
+carrying something black. 'Shoo!' I cried at them. They got scared,
+and went off like the wind toward Makareff's cabbage garden. Strike me
+dead, if they weren't carrying away the master!"
+
+That same day, toward evening, Psyekoff and Nicholas were arrested and
+brought under guard to the district town. In the town they were
+committed to the cells of the prison.
+
+
+II
+
+A fortnight passed.
+
+It was morning. The magistrate Nicholas Yermolaïyevitch was sitting in
+his office before a green table, turning over the papers of the
+"Klausoff case"; Dukovski was striding restlessly up and down, like a
+wolf in a cage.
+
+"You are convinced of the guilt of Nicholas and Psyekoff," he said,
+nervously plucking at his young beard. "Why will you not believe in
+the guilt of Maria Ivanovna? Are there not proofs enough for you?"
+
+"I don't say I am not convinced. I am convinced, but somehow I don't
+believe it! There are no real proofs, but just a kind of
+philosophizing--fanaticism, this and that----"
+
+"You can't do without an ax and bloodstained sheets. Those jurists!
+Very well, I'll prove it to you! You will stop sneering at the
+psychological side of the affair! To Siberia with your Maria Ivanovna!
+I will prove it! If philosophy is not enough for you, I have something
+substantial for you. It will show you how correct my philosophy is.
+Just give me permission----"
+
+"What are you going on about?"
+
+"About the safety match! Have you forgotten it? I haven't! I am going
+to find out who struck it in the murdered man's room. It was not
+Nicholas that struck it; it was not Psyekoff, for neither of them had
+any matches when they were examined; it was the third person, Maria
+Ivanovna. I will prove it to you. Just give me permission to go
+through the district to find out."
+
+"That's enough! Sit down. Let us go on with the examination."
+
+Dukovski sat down at a little table, and plunged his long nose in a
+bundle of papers.
+
+"Bring in Nicholas Tetekhoff!" cried the examining magistrate.
+
+They brought Nicholas in. Nicholas was pale and thin as a rail. He was
+trembling.
+
+"Tetekhoff!" began Chubikoff. "In 1879 you were tried in the Court of
+the First Division, convicted of theft, and sentenced to imprisonment.
+In 1882 you were tried a second time for theft, and were again
+imprisoned. We know all----"
+
+Astonishment was depicted on Nicholas's face. The examining
+magistrate's omniscience startled him. But soon his expression of
+astonishment changed to extreme indignation. He began to cry and
+requested permission to go and wash his face and quiet down. They led
+him away.
+
+"Bring in Psyekoff!" ordered the examining magistrate.
+
+They brought in Psyekoff. The young man had changed greatly during the
+last few days. He had grown thin and pale, and looked haggard. His
+eyes had an apathetic expression.
+
+"Sit down, Psyekoff," said Chubikoff. "I hope that to-day you are
+going to be reasonable, and will not tell lies, as you did before. All
+these days you have denied that you had anything to do with the murder
+of Klausoff, in spite of all the proofs that testify against you. That
+is foolish. Confession will lighten your guilt. This is the last time
+I am going to talk to you. If you do not confess to-day, to-morrow it
+will be too late. Come, tell me all----"
+
+"I know nothing about it. I know nothing about your proofs," answered
+Psyekoff, almost inaudibly.
+
+"It's no use! Well, let me relate to you how the matter took place. On
+Saturday evening you were sitting in Klausoff's sleeping room, and
+drinking vodka and beer with him." (Dukovski fixed his eyes on
+Psyekoff's face, and kept them there all through the examination.)
+"Nicholas was waiting on you. At one o'clock, Marcus Ivanovitch
+announced his intention of going to bed. He always went to bed at one
+o'clock. When he was taking off his boots, and was giving you
+directions about details of management, you and Nicholas, at a given
+signal, seized your drunken master and threw him on the bed. One of
+you sat on his legs, the other on his head. Then a third person came
+in from the passage--a woman in a black dress, whom you know well, and
+who had previously arranged with you as to her share in your criminal
+deed. She seized a pillow and began to smother him. While the struggle
+was going on the candle went out. The woman took a box of safety
+matches from her pocket, and lit the candle. Was it not so? I see by
+your face that I am speaking the truth. But to go on. After you had
+smothered him, and saw that he had ceased breathing, you and Nicholas
+pulled him out through the window and laid him down near the burdock.
+Fearing that he might come round again, you struck him with something
+sharp. Then you carried him away, and laid him down under a lilac bush
+for a short time. After resting awhile and considering, you carried
+him across the fence. Then you entered the road. After that comes the
+dam. Near the dam, a peasant frightened you. Well, what is the matter
+with you?"
+
+"I am suffocating!" replied Psyekoff. "Very well--have it so. Only let
+me go out, please!"
+
+They led Psyekoff away.
+
+"At last! He has confessed!" cried Chubikoff, stretching himself
+luxuriously. "He has betrayed himself! And didn't I get round him
+cleverly! Regularly caught him napping----"
+
+"And he doesn't deny the woman in the black dress!" exulted Dukovski.
+"But all the same, that safety match is tormenting me frightfully. I
+can't stand it any longer. Good-by! I am off!"
+
+Dukovski put on his cap and drove off. Chubikoff began to examine
+Aquilina. Aquilina declared that she knew nothing whatever about it.
+
+At six that evening Dukovski returned. He was more agitated than he
+had ever been before. His hands trembled so that he could not even
+unbutton his greatcoat. His cheeks glowed. It was clear that he did
+not come empty handed.
+
+"_Veni, vidi, vici!_" he cried, rushing into Chubikoff's room, and
+falling into an armchair. "I swear to you on my honor, I begin to
+believe that I am a genius! Listen, devil take us all! It is funny,
+and it is sad. We have caught three already--isn't that so? Well, I
+have found the fourth, and a woman at that. You will never believe who
+it is! But listen. I went to Klausoff's village, and began to make a
+spiral round it. I visited all the little shops, public houses, dram
+shops on the road, everywhere asking for safety matches. Everywhere
+they said they hadn't any. I made a wide round. Twenty times I lost
+faith, and twenty times I got it back again. I knocked about the whole
+day, and only an hour ago I got on the track. Three versts from here.
+They gave me a packet of ten boxes. One box was missing. Immediately:
+'Who bought the other box?' 'Such-a-one! She was pleased with them!'
+Old man! Nicholas Yermolaïyevitch! See what a fellow who was expelled
+from the seminary and who has read Gaboriau can do! From to-day on I
+begin to respect myself! Oof! Well, come!"
+
+"Come where?"
+
+"To her, to number four! We must hurry, otherwise--otherwise I'll
+burst with impatience! Do you know who she is? You'll never guess!
+Olga Petrovna, Marcus Ivanovitch's wife--his own wife--that's who it
+is! She is the person who bought the matchbox!"
+
+"You--you--you are out of your mind!"
+
+"It's quite simple! To begin with, she smokes. Secondly, she was head
+and ears in love with Klausoff, even after he refused to live in the
+same house with her, because she was always scolding his head off.
+Why, they say she used to beat him because she loved him so much. And
+then he positively refused to stay in the same house. Love turned
+sour. 'Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned.' But come along! Quick,
+or it will be dark. Come!"
+
+"I am not yet sufficiently crazy to go and disturb a respectable
+honorable woman in the middle of the night for a crazy boy!"
+
+"Respectable, honorable! Do honorable women murder their husbands?
+After that you are a rag, and not an examining magistrate! I never
+ventured to call you names before, but now you compel me to. Rag!
+Dressing-gown!--Dear Nicholas Yermolaïyevitch, do come, I beg of
+you----!"
+
+The magistrate made a deprecating motion with his hand.
+
+"I beg of you! I ask, not for myself, but in the interests of justice.
+I beg you! I implore you! Do what I ask you to, just this once!"
+
+Dukovski went down on his knees.
+
+"Nicholas Yermolaïyevitch! Be kind! Call me a blackguard, a
+ne'er-do-weel, if I am mistaken about this woman. You see what an
+affair it is. What a case it is. A romance! A woman murdering her own
+husband for love! The fame of it will go all over Russia. They will
+make you investigator in all important cases. Understand, O foolish
+old man!"
+
+The magistrate frowned, and undecidedly stretched his hand toward his
+cap.
+
+"Oh, the devil take you!" he said. "Let us go!"
+
+It was dark when the magistrate's carriage rolled up to the porch of
+the old country house in which Olga Petrovna had taken refuge with her
+brother.
+
+"What pigs we are," said Chubikoff, taking hold of the bell, "to
+disturb a poor woman like this!"
+
+"It's all right! It's all right! Don't get frightened! We can say that
+we have broken a spring."
+
+Chubikoff and Dukovski were met at the threshold by a tall buxom woman
+of three and twenty, with pitch-black brows and juicy red lips. It was
+Olga Petrovna herself, apparently not the least distressed by the
+recent tragedy.
+
+"Oh, what a pleasant surprise!" she said, smiling broadly. "You are
+just in time for supper. Kuzma Petrovitch is not at home. He is
+visiting the priest, and has stayed late. But we'll get on without
+him! Be seated. You have come from the examination?"
+
+"Yes. We broke a spring, you know," began Chubikoff, entering the
+sitting room and sinking into an armchair.
+
+"Take her unawares--at once!" whispered Dukovski; "take her unawares!"
+
+"A spring--hum--yes--so we came in."
+
+"Take her unawares, I tell you! She will guess what the matter is if
+you drag things out like that."
+
+"Well, do it yourself as you want. But let me get out of it," muttered
+Chubikoff, rising and going to the window.
+
+"Yes, a spring," began Dukovski, going close to Olga Petrovna and
+wrinkling his long nose. "We did not drive over here--to take supper
+with you or--to see Kuzma Petrovitch. We came here to ask you,
+respected madam, where Marcus Ivanovitch is, whom you murdered!"
+
+"What? Marcus Ivanovitch murdered?" stammered Olga Petrovna, and her
+broad face suddenly and instantaneously flushed bright scarlet. "I
+don't--understand!"
+
+"I ask you in the name of the law! Where is Klausoff? We know all!"
+
+"Who told you?" Olga Petrovna asked in a low voice, unable to endure
+Dukovski's glance.
+
+"Be so good as to show us where he is!"
+
+"But how did you find out? Who told you?"
+
+"We know all! I demand it in the name of the law!"
+
+The examining magistrate, emboldened by her confusion, came forward
+and said:
+
+"Show us, and we will go away. Otherwise, we----"
+
+"What do you want with him?"
+
+"Madam, what is the use of these questions? We ask you to show us! You
+tremble, you are agitated. Yes, he has been murdered, and, if you must
+have it, murdered by you! Your accomplices have betrayed you!"
+
+Olga Petrovna grew pale.
+
+"Come!" she said in a low voice, wringing her hands. "I have
+him--hid--in the bath house! Only for heaven's sake, do not tell Kuzma
+Petrovitch. I beg and implore you! He will never forgive me!"
+
+Olga Petrovna took down a big key from the wall, and led her guests
+through the kitchen and passage to the courtyard. The courtyard was in
+darkness. Fine rain was falling. Olga Petrovna walked in advance of
+them. Chubikoff and Dukovski strode behind her through the long grass,
+as the odor of wild hemp and dishwater splashing under their feet
+reached them. The courtyard was wide. Soon the dishwater ceased, and
+they felt freshly broken earth under their feet. In the darkness
+appeared the shadowy outlines of trees, and among the trees a little
+house with a crooked chimney.
+
+"That is the bath house," said Olga Petrovna. "But I implore you, do
+not tell my brother! If you do, I'll never hear the end of it!"
+
+Going up to the bath house, Chubikoff and Dukovski saw a huge padlock
+on the door.
+
+"Get your candle and matches ready," whispered the examining
+magistrate to his deputy.
+
+Olga Petrovna unfastened the padlock, and let her guests into the bath
+house. Dukovski struck a match and lit up the anteroom. In the middle
+of the anteroom stood a table. On the table, beside a sturdy little
+samovar, stood a soup tureen with cold cabbage soup and a plate with
+the remnants of some sauce.
+
+"Forward!"
+
+They went into the next room, where the bath was. There was a table
+there also. On the table was a dish with some ham, a bottle of vodka,
+plates, knives, forks.
+
+"But where is it--where is the murdered man?" asked the examining
+magistrate.
+
+"On the top tier," whispered Olga Petrovna, still pale and trembling.
+
+Dukovski took the candle in his hand and climbed up to the top tier of
+the sweating frame. There he saw a long human body lying motionless on
+a large feather bed. A slight snore came from the body.
+
+"You are making fun of us, devil take it!" cried Dukovski. "That is
+not the murdered man! Some live fool is lying here. Here, whoever you
+are, the devil take you!"
+
+The body drew in a quick breath and stirred. Dukovski stuck his elbow
+into it. It raised a hand, stretched itself, and lifted its head.
+
+"Who is sneaking in here?" asked a hoarse, heavy bass. "What do you
+want?"
+
+Dukovski raised the candle to the face of the unknown, and cried out.
+In the red nose, disheveled, unkempt hair, the pitch-black mustaches,
+one of which was jauntily twisted and pointed insolently toward the
+ceiling, he recognized the gallant cavalryman Klausoff.
+
+"You--Marcus--Ivanovitch? Is it possible?"
+
+The examining magistrate glanced sharply up at him, and stood
+spellbound.
+
+"Yes, it is I. That's you, Dukovski? What the devil do you want here?
+And who's that other mug down there? Great snakes! It is the examining
+magistrate! What fate has brought him here?"
+
+Klausoff rushed down and threw his arms round Chubikoff in a cordial
+embrace. Olga Petrovna slipped through the door.
+
+"How did you come here? Let's have a drink, devil take it!
+Tra-ta-ti-to-tum--let us drink! But who brought you here? How did you
+find out that I was here? But it doesn't matter! Let's have a drink!"
+
+Klausoff lit the lamp and poured out three glasses of vodka.
+
+"That is--I don't understand you," said the examining magistrate,
+running his hands over him. "Is this you or not you!"
+
+"Oh, shut up! You want to preach me a sermon? Don't trouble yourself!
+Young Dukovski, empty your glass! Friends, let us bring this--What are
+you looking at? Drink!"
+
+"All the same, I do not understand!" said the examining magistrate,
+mechanically drinking off the vodka. "What are you here for?"
+
+"Why shouldn't I be here, if I am all right here?"
+
+Klausoff drained his glass and took a bite of ham.
+
+"I am in captivity here, as you see. In solitude, in a cavern, like a
+ghost or a bogey. Drink! She carried me off and locked me up,
+and--well, I am living here, in the deserted bath house, like a
+hermit. I am fed. Next week I think I'll try to get out. I'm tired of
+it here!"
+
+"Incomprehensible!" said Dukovski.
+
+"What is incomprehensible about it?"
+
+"Incomprehensible! For Heaven's sake, how did your boot get into the
+garden?"
+
+"What boot?"
+
+"We found one boot in the sleeping room and the other in the garden."
+
+"And what do you want to know that for? It's none of your business!
+Why don't you drink, devil take you? If you wakened me, then drink
+with me! It is an interesting tale, brother, that of the boot! I
+didn't want to go with Olga. I don't like to be bossed. She came under
+the window and began to abuse me. She always was a termagant. You know
+what women are like, all of them. I was a bit drunk, so I took a boot
+and heaved it at her. Ha-ha-ha! Teach her not to scold another time!
+But it didn't! Not a bit of it! She climbed in at the window, lit the
+lamp, and began to hammer poor tipsy me. She thrashed me, dragged me
+over here, and locked me in. She feeds me now--on love, vodka, and
+ham! But where are you off to, Chubikoff? Where are you going?"
+
+The examining magistrate swore, and left the bath house. Dukovski
+followed him, crestfallen. They silently took their seats in the
+carriage and drove off. The road never seemed to them so long and
+disagreeable as it did that time. Both remained silent. Chubikoff
+trembled with rage all the way. Dukovski hid his nose in the collar of
+his overcoat, as if he was afraid that the darkness and the drizzling
+rain might read the shame in his face.
+
+When they reached home, the examining magistrate found Dr. Tyutyeff
+awaiting him. The doctor was sitting at the table, and, sighing
+deeply, was turning over the pages of the _Neva_.
+
+"Such goings-on there are in the world!" he said, meeting the
+examining magistrate with a sad smile, "Austria is at it again! And
+Gladstone also to some extent----"
+
+Chubikoff threw his cap under the table, and shook himself.
+
+"Devils' skeletons! Don't plague me! A thousand times I have told you
+not to bother me with your politics! This is no question of politics!
+And you," said Chubikoff, turning to Dukovski and shaking his fist, "I
+won't forget this in a thousand years!"
+
+"But the safety match? How could I know?"
+
+"Choke yourself with your safety match! Get out of my way! Don't make
+me mad, or the devil only knows what I'll do to you! Don't let me see
+a trace of you!"
+
+Dukovski sighed, took his hat, and went out.
+
+"I'll go and get drunk," he decided, going through the door, and
+gloomily wending his way to the public house.
+
+
+
+VSEVOLOD VLADIMIROVITCH KRESTOVSKI
+
+
+_KNIGHTS OF INDUSTRY_
+
+
+I
+
+THE LAST WILL OF THE PRINCESS
+
+
+Princess Anna Chechevinski for the last time looked at the home of her
+girlhood, over which the St. Petersburg twilight was descending.
+Defying the commands of her mother, the traditions of her family, she
+had decided to elope with the man of her choice. With a last word of
+farewell to her maid, she wrapped her cloak round her and disappeared
+into the darkness.
+
+The maid's fate had been a strange one. In one of the districts beyond
+the Volga lived a noble, a bachelor, luxuriously, caring only for his
+own amusement. He fished, hunted, and petted the pretty little
+daughter of his housekeeper, one of his serfs, whom he vaguely
+intended to set free. He passed hours playing with the pretty child,
+and even had an old French governess come to give her lessons. She
+taught little Natasha to dance, to play the piano, to put on the airs
+and graces of a little lady. So the years passed, and the old nobleman
+obeyed the girl's every whim, and his serfs bowed before her and
+kissed her hands. Gracefully and willfully she queened it over the
+whole household.
+
+Then one fine day the old noble took thought and died. He had
+forgotten to liberate his housekeeper and her daughter, and, as he was
+a bachelor, his estate went to his next of kin, the elder Princess
+Chechevinski. Between the brother and sister a cordial hatred had
+existed, and they had not seen one another for years.
+
+Coming to take possession of the estate, Princess Chechevinski carried
+things with a high hand. She ordered the housekeeper to the cow house,
+and carried off the girl Natasha, as her daughter's maid, to St.
+Petersburg, from the first hour letting her feel the lash of her
+bitter tongue and despotic will. Natasha had tried in vain to dry her
+mother's tears. With growing anger and sorrow she watched the old
+house as they drove away, and looking at the old princess she said to
+herself, "I hate her! I hate her! I will never forgive her!"
+
+Princess Anna, bidding her maid good-by, disappeared into the night.
+The next morning the old princess learned of the flight. Already ill,
+she fell fainting to the floor, and for a long time her condition was
+critical. She regained consciousness, tried to find words to express
+her anger, and again swooned away. Day and night, three women watched
+over her, her son's old nurse, her maid, and Natasha, who took turns
+in waiting on her. Things continued thus for forty-eight hours.
+Finally, on the night of the third day she came to herself. It was
+Natasha's watch.
+
+"And you knew? You knew she was going?" the old princess asked her
+fiercely.
+
+The girl started, unable at first to collect her thoughts, and looked
+up frightened. The dim flicker of the night light lit her pale face
+and golden hair, and fell also on the grim, emaciated face of the old
+princess, whose eyes glittered feverishly under her thick brows.
+
+"You knew my daughter was going to run away?" repeated the old woman,
+fixing her keen eyes on Natasha's face, trying to raise herself from
+among the lace-fringed pillows.
+
+"I knew," the girl answered in a half whisper, lowering her eyes in
+confusion, and trying to throw off her first impression of terror.
+
+"Why did you not tell me before?" the old woman continued, even more
+fiercely.
+
+Natasha had now recovered her composure, and raising her eyes with an
+expression of innocent distress, she answered:
+
+"Princess Anna hid everything from me also, until the very last. How
+dare I tell you? Would you have believed me? It was not my business,
+your excellency!"
+
+The old princess shook her head, smiling bitterly and incredulously.
+
+"Snake!" she hissed fiercely, looking at the girl; and then she added
+quickly:
+
+"Did any of the others know?"
+
+"No one but myself!" answered Natasha.
+
+"Never dare to speak of her again! Never dare!" cried the old
+princess, and once more she sank back unconscious on the pillows.
+
+About noon the next day she again came to herself, and ordered her son
+to be called. He came in quietly, and affectionately approached his
+mother.
+
+The princess dismissed her maid, and remained alone with her son.
+
+"You have no longer a sister!" she cried, turning to her son, with the
+nervous spasm which returned each time she spoke of her daughter. "She
+is dead for us! She has disgraced us! I curse her! You, you alone are
+my heir!"
+
+At these words the young prince pricked up his ears and bent even more
+attentively toward his mother. The news of his sole heirship was so
+pleasant and unexpected that he did not even think of asking how his
+sister had disgraced them, and only said with a deep sigh:
+
+"Oh, mamma, she was always opposed to you. She never loved you!"
+
+"I shall make a will in your favor," continued the princess, telling
+him as briefly as possible of Princess Anna's flight. "Yes, in your
+favor--only on one condition: that you will never recognize your
+sister. That is my last wish!"
+
+"Your wish is sacred to me," murmured her son, tenderly kissing her
+hand. He had always been jealous and envious of his sister, and was
+besides in immediate need of money.
+
+The princess signed her will that same day, to the no small
+satisfaction of her dear son, who, in his heart, was wondering how
+soon his beloved parent would pass away, so that he might get his eyes
+on her long-hoarded wealth.
+
+
+II
+
+THE LITHOGRAPHER'S APPRENTICE
+
+
+Later on the same day, in a little narrow chamber of one of the huge,
+dirty tenements on Vosnesenski Prospekt, sat a young man of ruddy
+complexion. He was sitting at a table, bending toward the one dusty
+window, and attentively examining a white twenty-five ruble note.
+
+The room, dusty and dark, was wretched enough. Two rickety chairs, a
+torn haircloth sofa, with a greasy pillow, and the bare table at the
+window, were its entire furniture. Several scattered lithographs, two
+or three engravings, two slabs of lithographer's stone on the table,
+and engraver's tools sufficiently showed the occupation of the young
+man. He was florid, with red hair; of Polish descent, and his name was
+Kasimir Bodlevski. On the wall, over the sofa, between the overcoat
+and the cloak hanging on the wall, was a pencil drawing of a young
+girl. It was the portrait of Natasha.
+
+The young man was so absorbed in his examination of the twenty-five
+ruble note that when a gentle knock sounded on the door he started
+nervously, as if coming back to himself, and even grew pale, and
+hurriedly crushed the banknote into his pocket.
+
+The knock was repeated--and this time Bodlevski's face lit up. It was
+evidently a well-known and expected knock, for he sprang up and opened
+the door with a welcoming smile.
+
+Natasha entered the room.
+
+"What were you dreaming about that you didn't open the door for me?"
+she asked caressingly, throwing aside her hat and cloak, and taking a
+seat on the tumble-down sofa. "What were you busy at?"
+
+"You know, yourself."
+
+And instead of explaining further, he drew the banknote from his
+pocket and showed it to Natasha.
+
+"This morning the master paid me, and I am keeping the money," he
+continued in a low voice, tilting back his chair. "I pay neither for
+my rooms nor my shop, but sit here and study all the time."
+
+"It's so well worth while, isn't it?" smiled Natasha with a
+contemptuous grimace.
+
+"You don't think it is worth while?" said the young man. "Wait! I'll
+learn. We'll be rich!"
+
+"Yes, if we aren't sent to Siberia!" the girl laughed, "What kind of
+wealth is that?" she went on. "The game is not worth the candle. I'll
+be rich before you are."
+
+"All right, go ahead!"
+
+"Go ahead? I didn't come to talk nonsense, I came on business. You
+help me, and, on my word of honor, we'll be in clover!"
+
+Bodlevski looked at his companion in astonishment.
+
+"I told you my Princess Anna was going to run away. She's gone! And
+her mother has cut her off from the inheritance," Natasha continued
+with an exultant smile. "I looked through the scrap basket, and have
+brought some papers with me."
+
+"What sort of papers?"
+
+"Oh, letters and notes. They are all in Princess Anna's handwriting.
+Shall I give them to you?" jested Natasha. "Have a good look at them,
+examine them, learn her handwriting, so that you can imitate every
+letter. That kind of thing is just in your line; you are a first-class
+copyist, so this is just the job for you."
+
+The engraver listened, and only shrugged his shoulders.
+
+"No, joking aside," she continued seriously, drawing nearer Bodlevski,
+"I have thought of something out of the common; you will be grateful.
+I have no time to explain it all now. You will know later on. The main
+thing is--learn her handwriting."
+
+"But what is it all for?" said Bodlevski wonderingly.
+
+"So that you may be able to write a few words in the handwriting of
+Princess Anna; what you have to write I'll dictate to you."
+
+"And then?"
+
+"Then hurry up and get me a passport in some one else's name, and have
+your own ready. But learn her handwriting. Everything depends on
+that!"
+
+"It won't be easy. I'll hardly be able to!" muttered Bodlevski,
+scratching his head.
+
+Natasha flared up.
+
+"You say you love me?" she cried energetically, with a glance of
+anger. "Well, then, do it. Unless you are telling lies, you can learn
+to do banknotes."
+
+The young man strode up and down his den, perplexed.
+
+"How soon do you want it?" he asked, after a minute's thought. "In a
+couple of days?"
+
+"Yes, in about two days, not longer, or the whole thing is done for!"
+the girl replied decisively. "In two days I'll come for the writing,
+and be sure my passport is ready!"
+
+"Very well. I'll do it," consented Bodlevski. And Natasha began to
+dictate to him the wording of the letter.
+
+As soon as she was gone the engraver got to work. All the evening and
+a great part of the night he bent over the papers she had brought,
+examining the handwriting, studying the letters, and practicing every
+stroke with the utmost care, copying and repeating it a hundred times,
+until at last he had reached the required clearness. At last he
+mastered the writing. It only remained to give it the needed lightness
+and naturalness. His head rang from the concentration of blood in his
+temples, but he still worked on.
+
+Finally, when it was almost morning, the note was written, and the
+name of Princess Anna was signed to it. The work was a masterpiece,
+and even exceeded Bodlevski's expectations. Its lightness and
+clearness were remarkable. The engraver, examining the writing of
+Princess Anna, compared it with his own work, and was astonished, so
+perfect was the resemblance.
+
+And long he admired his handiwork, with the parental pride known to
+every creator, and as he looked at this note he for the first time
+fully realized that he was an artist.
+
+
+III
+
+THE CAVE
+
+
+"Half the work is done!" he cried, jumping from the tumble-down sofa.
+"But the passport? There's where the shoe pinches," continued the
+engraver, remembering the second half of Natasha's commission. "The
+passport--yes--that's where the shoe pinches!" he muttered to himself
+in perplexity, resting his head on his hands and his elbows on his
+knees. Thinking over all kinds of possible and impossible plans, he
+suddenly remembered a fellow countryman of his, a shoemaker named
+Yuzitch, who had once confessed in a moment of intoxication that "he
+would rather hook a watch than patch a shoe." Bodlevski remembered
+that three months before he had met Yuzitch in the street, and they
+had gone together to a wine shop, where, over a bottle generously
+ordered by Yuzitch, Bodlevski had lamented over the hardships of
+mankind in general, and his own in particular. He had not taken
+advantage of Yuzitch's offer to introduce him to "the gang," only
+because he had already determined to take up one of the higher
+branches of the "profession," namely, to metamorphose white paper into
+banknotes. When they were parting, Yuzitch had warmly wrung his hand,
+saying:
+
+"Whenever you want anything, dear friend, or if you just want to see
+me, come to the Cave; come to Razyeziy Street and ask for the Cave,
+and at the Cave anyone will show you where to find Yuzitch. If the
+barkeeper makes difficulties just whisper to him that 'Secret' sent
+you, and he'll show you at once."
+
+As this memory suddenly flashed into his mind, Bodlevski caught up his
+hat and coat and hurried downstairs into the street. Making his way
+through the narrow, dirty streets to the Five Points, he stopped
+perplexed. Happily he noticed a sleepy watchman leaning leisurely
+against a wall, and going up to him he said:
+
+"Tell me, where is the Cave?"
+
+"The what?" asked the watchman impatiently.
+
+"The Cave."
+
+"The Cave? There is no such place!" he replied, looking suspiciously
+at Bodlevski.
+
+Bodlevski put his hand in his pocket and pulled out some small change:
+"If you tell me----"
+
+The watchman brightened up. "Why didn't you say so before?" he asked,
+grinning. "You see that house, the second from the corner? The wooden
+one? That's the Cave."
+
+Bodlevski crossed the street in the direction indicated, and looked
+for the sign over the door. To his astonishment he did not find it and
+only later he knew that the name was strictly "unofficial," only used
+by members of "the gang."
+
+Opening the door cautiously, Bodlevski made his way into the low,
+dirty barroom. Behind the bar stood a tall, handsome man with an open
+countenance and a bald head. Politely bowing to Bodlevski, with his
+eyes rather than his head, he invited him to enter the inner room. But
+Bodlevski explained that he wanted, not the inner room, but his friend
+Yuzitch.
+
+"Yuzitch?" said the barkeeper thoughtfully. "We don't know anyone of
+that name."
+
+"Why, he's here all the time," cried Bodlevski, in astonishment.
+
+"Don't know him," retorted the barkeeper imperturbably.
+
+"'Secret' sent me!" Bodlevski suddenly exclaimed, without lowering his
+voice.
+
+The barkeeper looked at him sharply and suspiciously, and then asked,
+with a smile:
+
+"Who did you say?"
+
+"'Secret,'" repeated Bodlevski.
+
+After a while the barkeeper said, "And did your--friend make an
+appointment?"
+
+"Yes, an appointment!" Bodlevski replied, beginning to lose patience.
+
+"Well, take a seat in the inner room," again said the barkeeper slyly.
+"Perhaps your friend will come in, or perhaps he is there already."
+
+Bodlevski made his way into a roomy saloon, with five windows with
+faded red curtains. The ceiling was black from the smoke of hanging
+lamps; little square tables were dotted about the floor; their covers
+were coarse and not above reproach on the score of cleanliness. The
+air was pungent with the odor of cheap tobacco and cheaper cigars. On
+the walls were faded oleographs of generals and archbishops, flyblown
+and stained.
+
+Bodlevski, little as he was used to refined surroundings, found his
+gorge rising. At some of the little tables furtive, impudent,
+tattered, sleek men were drinking.
+
+Presently Yuzitch made his appearance from a low door at the other end
+of the room. The meeting of the two friends was cordial, especially on
+Bodlevski's side. Presently they were seated at a table, with a flask
+of wine between them, and Bodlevski began to explain what he wanted to
+his friend.
+
+As soon as he heard what was wanted, Yuzitch took on an air of
+importance, knit his brows, hemmed, and hawed.
+
+"I can manage it," he said finally. "Yes, we can manage it. I must see
+one of my friends about it. But it's difficult. It will cost money."
+
+Bodlevski immediately assented. Yuzitch at once rose and went over to
+a red-nosed individual in undress uniform, who was poring over the
+_Police News_.
+
+"Friend Borisovitch," said Yuzitch, holding out his hand to him,
+"something doing!"
+
+"Fair or foul?" asked the man with the red nose. "Hang your cheek!"
+laughed Yuzitch; "if I say it, of course it's fair." After a whispered
+conference, Yuzitch returned to Bodlevski and told him that it was all
+right; that the passport for Natasha would be ready by the next
+evening. Bodlevski paid him something in advance and went home
+triumphantly.
+
+At eleven o'clock the next evening Bodlevski once more entered the
+large room at the Cave, now all lit up and full of an animated crowd
+of men and women, all with the same furtive, predatory faces.
+Bodlevski felt nervous. He had no fears while turning white paper into
+banknotes in the seclusion of his own workshop, but he was full of
+apprehensions concerning his present guest, because several people had
+to be let into the secret.
+
+Yuzitch presently appeared through the same low door and, coming up to
+Bodlevski, explained that the passport would cost twenty rubles.
+Bodlevski paid the money over in advance, and Yuzitch led him into a
+back room. On the table burned a tallow candle, which hardly lit up
+the faces of seven people who were grouped round it, one of them being
+the red-nosed man who was reading the _Police News._ The seven men
+were all from the districts of Vilna and Vitebsk, and were specialists
+in the art of fabricating passports.
+
+The red-nosed man approached Bodlevski: "We must get acquainted with
+each other," he said amiably. "I have the honor to present myself!"
+and he bowed low; "Former District Secretary Pacomius Borisovitch
+Prakkin. Let me request you first of all to order some vodka; my hand
+shakes, you know," he added apologetically. "I don't want it so much
+for myself as for my hand--to steady it."
+
+Bodlevski gave him some change, which the red-nosed man put in his
+pocket and at once went to the sideboard for a flask of vodka which he
+had already bought. "Let us give thanks! And now to business!" he
+said, smacking his lips after a glass of vodka.
+
+A big, red-haired man, one of the group of seven, drew from his pocket
+two vials. In one was a sticky black fluid; in the other, something as
+clear as water.
+
+"We are chemists, you see," the red-nosed man explained to Bodlevski
+with a grin, and then added:
+
+"Finch! on guard!"
+
+A young man, who had been lolling on a couch in the corner, rose and
+took up a position outside the door.
+
+"Now, brothers, close up!" cried the red-nosed man, and all stood in
+close order, elbow to elbow, round the table. "And now we take a
+newspaper and have it handy on the table! That is in case," he
+explained to Bodlevski, "any outsider happened in on us--which Heaven
+prevent! We aren't up to anything at all; simply reading the political
+news! You catch on?"
+
+"How could I help catching on?"
+
+"Very well. And now let us make everything as clear as in a
+looking-glass. What class do you wish to make the person belong to?
+The commercial or the nobility?"
+
+"I think the nobility would be best," said Bodlevski.
+
+"Certainly! At least that will give the right of free passage through
+all the towns and districts of the Russian Empire. Let us see. Have we
+not something that will suit?"
+
+And Pacomius Borisovitch, opening his portfolio, filled with all kinds
+of passports, certificates, and papers of identification, began to
+turn them over, but without taking any out of the portfolio. All with
+the same thought--that some stranger might come in.
+
+"Ha! here's a new one! Where did it come from?" he cried.
+
+"I got it out of a new arrival," muttered the red-headed man.
+
+"Well done! Just what we want! And a noble's passport, too! It is
+evident that Heaven is helping us. See what a blessing brings!
+
+"'This passport is issued by the District of Yaroslav,'" he continued
+reading, "'to the college assessor's widow, Maria Solontseva, with
+permission to travel,'" and so on in due form. "Did you get it here?"
+he added, turning to the red-headed man.
+
+"Came from Moscow!"
+
+"Pinched?"
+
+"Knocked on the head!" briefly replied the red-headed man.
+
+"Knocked on the head?" repeated Pacomius Borisovitch. "Serious
+business. Comes under sections 332 and 727 of the Penal Code."
+
+"Driveling again!" cried the red-headed man. "I'll teach you to talk
+about the Penal Code!" and rising deliberately, he dealt Pacomius
+Borisovitch a well-directed blow on the head, which sent him rolling
+into the corner. Pacomius picked himself up, blinking with
+indignation.
+
+"What is the meaning of such conduct?" he asked loftily.
+
+"It means," said the red-headed man, "that if you mention the Penal
+Code again I'll knock your head off!"
+
+"Brothers, brothers!" cried Yuzitch in a good-humored tone; "we are
+losing precious time! Forgive him!" he added, turning to Pacomius.
+"You must forgive him!"
+
+"I--forgive him," answered Pacomius, but the light in his eye showed
+that he was deeply offended.
+
+"Well," he went on, addressing Bodlevski, "will it suit you to have
+the person pass as Maria Solontseva, widow of a college assessor?"
+
+
+IV
+
+THE CAPTAIN OF THE GOLDEN BAND
+
+
+Bodlevski had not time to nod his head in assent, when suddenly the
+outer door was pushed quickly open and a tall man, well built and
+fair-haired, stepped swiftly into the room. He wore a military uniform
+and gold-rimmed eyeglasses.
+
+The company turned their faces toward him in startled surprise, but no
+one moved. All continued to stand in close order round the table.
+
+"Health to you, eaglets! honorable men of Vilna! What are you up to?
+What are you busy at?" cried the newcomer, swiftly approaching the
+table and taking the chair that Pacomius Borisovitch had just been
+knocked out of.
+
+"What is all this?" he continued, with one hand seizing the vial of
+colorless liquid and with the other the photograph of the college
+assessor's widow. "So this is hydrochloric acid for erasing ink? Very
+good! And this is a photo! So we are fabricating passports? Very fine!
+Business is business! Hey! Witnesses!"
+
+And the fair-haired man whistled sharply. From the outer door appeared
+two faces, set on shoulders of formidable proportions.
+
+The red-headed man silently went up to the newcomer and fiercely
+seized him by the collar. At the same moment the rest seized chairs or
+logs or bars to defend themselves.
+
+The fair-haired man meanwhile, not in the least changing his
+expression of cool self-confidence, quickly slipped his hands into his
+pockets and pulled out a pair of small double-barreled pistols. In the
+profound silence in which this scene took place they could distinctly
+hear the click of the hammers as he cocked them. He raised his right
+hand and pointed the muzzle at the breast of his opponent.
+
+The red-headed man let go his collar, and glancing contemptuously at
+him, with an expression of hate and wrath, silently stepped aside.
+
+"How much must we pay?" he asked sullenly.
+
+"Oho! that's better. You should have begun by asking that!" answered
+the newcomer, settling himself comfortably on his chair and toying
+with his pistols. "How much do you earn?"
+
+"We get little enough! Just five rubles," answered the red-headed man.
+
+"That's too little. I need a great deal more. But you are lying,
+brother! You would not stir for less than twenty rubles!"
+
+"Thanks for the compliment!" interrupted Pacomius Borisovitch.
+
+The fair-haired man nodded to him satirically. "I need a lot more," he
+repeated firmly and impressively; "and if you don't give me at least
+twenty-five rubles I'll denounce you this very minute to the
+police--and you see I have my witnesses ready."
+
+"Sergei Antonitch! Mr. Kovroff! Have mercy on us! Where can we get so
+much from? I tell you as in the presence of the Creator! There are ten
+of us, as you see. And there are three of you. And I, Yuzitch, and
+Gretcka deserve double shares!" added Pacomius Borisovitch
+persuasively.
+
+"Gretcka deserves nothing at all for catching me by the throat,"
+decided Sergei Antonitch Kovroff.
+
+"Mr. Kovroff!" began Pacomius again. "You and I are gentlemen----"
+
+"What! What did you say?" Kovroff contemptuously interrupted him. "You
+put yourself on my level? Ha! ha! ha! No, brother; I am still in the
+Czar's service and wear my honor with my uniform! I, brother, have
+never stained myself with theft or crime, Heaven be praised. But what
+are you?"
+
+"Hm! And the Golden Band? Who is its captain?" muttered Gretcka
+angrily, half to himself.
+
+"Who is its captain? I am--I, Lieutenant Sergei Antonitch Kovroff, of
+the Chernovarski Dragoons! Do you hear? I am captain of the Golden
+Band," he said proudly and haughtily, scrutinizing the company with
+his confident gaze. "And you haven't yet got as far as the Golden
+Band, because you are _cowards_! Chuproff," he cried to one of his
+men, "go and take the mask off Finch, or the poor boy will suffocate,
+and untie his arms--and give him a good crack on the head to teach him
+to keep watch better."
+
+The "mask" that Kovroff employed on such occasions was nothing but a
+piece of oilcloth cut the size of a person's face, and smeared on one
+side with a thick paste. Kovroff's "boys" employed this "instrument"
+with wonderful dexterity; one of them generally stole up behind the
+unconscious victim and skillfully slapped the mask in his face; the
+victim at once became dumb and blind, and panted from lack of breath;
+at the same time, if necessary, his hands were tied behind him and he
+was leisurely robbed, or held, as the case might be.
+
+The Golden Band was formed in the middle of the thirties, when the
+first Nicholas had been about ten years on the throne. Its first
+founders were three Polish nobles. It was never distinguished by the
+number of its members, but everyone of them could honestly call
+himself an accomplished knave, never stopping at anything that stood
+in the way of a "job." The present head of the band was Lieutenant
+Kovroff, who was a thorough-paced rascal, in the full sense of the
+word. Daring, brave, self-confident, he also possessed a handsome
+presence, good manners, and the worldly finish known as education.
+Before the members of the Golden Band, and especially before Kovroff,
+the small rascals stood in fear and trembling. He had his secret
+agents everywhere, following every move of the crooks quietly but
+pertinaciously. At the moment when some big job was being pulled off,
+Kovroff suddenly appeared unexpectedly, with some of his "boys," and
+demanded a contribution, threatening instantly to inform the police if
+he did not get it--and the rogues, in order to "keep him quiet," had
+to give him whatever share of their plunder he graciously deigned to
+indicate. Acting with extraordinary skill and acumen in all his
+undertakings he always managed so that not a shadow of suspicion could
+fall on himself and so he got a double share of the plunder: robbing
+the honest folk and the rogues at the same time. Kovroff escaped the
+contempt of the crooks because he did things on such a big scale and
+embarked with his Golden Band on the most desperate and dangerous
+enterprises that the rest of roguedom did not even dare to consider.
+
+The rogues, whatever their rank, have a great respect for daring,
+skill, and force--and therefore they respected Kovroff, at the same
+time fearing and detesting him.
+
+"Who are you getting that passport for?" he asked, calmly taking the
+paper from the table and slipping it into his pocket. Gretcka nodded
+toward Bodlevski.
+
+"Aha! for you, is it? Very glad to hear it!" said Kovroff, measuring
+him with his eyes. "And so, gentlemen, twenty-five rubles, or
+good-by--to our happy meeting in the police court!"
+
+"Mr. Kovroff! Allow me to speak to you as a man of honor!" Pacomius
+Borisovitch again interrupted. "We are only getting twenty rubles for
+the job. The whole gang will pledge their words of honor to that. Do
+you think we would lie to you and stain the honor of the gang for
+twenty measly rubles?"
+
+"That is business. That was well said. I love a good speech, and am
+always ready to respect it," remarked Sergei Antonitch approvingly.
+
+"Very well, then, see for yourself," went on the red-nosed Pacomius,
+"see for yourself. If we give you everything, we are doing our work
+and not getting a kopeck!"
+
+"Let him pay," answered Kovroff, turning his eyes toward Bodlevski.
+
+Bodlevski took out his gold watch, his only inheritance from his
+father, and laid it down on the table before Kovroff, with the five
+rubles that remained.
+
+Kovroff again measured him with his eyes and smiled.
+
+"You are a worthy young man!" he said. "Give me your hand! I see that
+you will go far."
+
+And he warmly pressed the engraver's hand. "But you must know for the
+future," he added in a friendly but impressive way, "that I never take
+anything but money when I am dealing with these fellows. Ho, you!" he
+went on, turning to the company, "some one go to uncle's and get cash
+for this watch; tell him to pay conscientiously at least two thirds of
+what it is worth; it is a good watch. It would cost sixty rubles to
+buy. And have a bottle of champagne got ready for me at the bar,
+quick! And if you don't, it will be the worse for you!" he called
+after the departing Yuzitch, who came back a few minutes later, and
+gave Kovroff forty rubles. Kovroff counted them, and put twenty in his
+pocket, returning the remainder in silence, but with a gentlemanly
+smile, to Bodlevski.
+
+"Fair exchange is no robbery," he said, giving Bodlevski the passport
+of the college assessor's widow. "Now that old rascal Pacomius may get
+to work."
+
+"What is there to do?" laughed Pacomius; "the passport will do very
+well. So let us have a little glass, and then a little game of cards."
+
+"We are going to know each other better; I like your face, so I hope
+we shall make friends," said Kovroff, again shaking hands with
+Bodlevski. "Now let us go and have some wine. You will tell me over
+our glasses what you want the passport for, and on account of your
+frankness about the watch, I am well disposed to you. Lieutenant
+Sergei Kovroff gives you his word of honor on that. I also can be
+magnanimous," he concluded, and the new friends accompanied by the
+whole gang went out to the large hall.
+
+There began a scene of revelry that lasted till long after midnight.
+Bodlevski, feeling his side pocket to see if the passport was still
+there, at last left the hall, bewildered, as though under a spell. He
+felt a kind of gloomy satisfaction; he was possessed by this
+satisfaction, by the uncertainty of what Natasha could have thought
+out, by the question how it would all turn out, and by the conviction
+that his first crime had already been committed. All these feelings
+lay like lead on his heart, while in his ears resounded the wild songs
+of the Cave.
+
+
+V
+
+THE KEYS OF THE OLD PRINCESS
+
+
+It was nine o'clock in the evening. Natasha lit the night lamp in the
+bedroom of the old Princess Chechevinski, and went silently into the
+dressing room to prepare the soothing powders which the doctors had
+prescribed for her, before going to sleep.
+
+The old princess was still very weak. Although her periods of
+unconsciousness had not returned, she was still subject to paroxysms
+of hysteria. At times she sank into forgetfulness, then started
+nervously, sometimes trembling in every limb. The thought of the blow
+of her daughter's flight never left her for a moment.
+
+Natasha had just taken the place of the day nurse. It was her turn to
+wait on the patient until midnight. Silence always reigned in the
+house of the princess, and now that she was ill the silence was
+intensified tenfold. Everyone walked on tiptoe, and spoke in whispers,
+afraid even of coughing or of clinking a teaspoon on the sideboard.
+The doorbells were tied in towels, and the whole street in front of
+the house was thickly strewn with straw. At ten the household was
+already dispersed, and preparing for sleep. Only the nurse sat
+silently at the head of the old lady's bed.
+
+Pouring out half a glass of water, Natasha sprinkled the powder in it,
+and took from the medicine chest a phial with a yellowish liquid. It
+was chloral. Looking carefully round, she slowly brought the lip of
+the phial down to the edge of the glass and let ten drops fall into
+it. "That will be enough," she said to herself, and smiled. Her face,
+as always, was coldly quiet, and not the slightest shade of any
+feeling was visible on it at that moment.
+
+Natasha propped the old lady up with her arm. She drank the medicine
+given to her and lay down again, and in a few minutes the chloral
+began to have its effect. With an occasional convulsive movement of
+her lower lip, she sank into a deep and heavy sleep. Natasha watched
+her face following the symptoms of unconsciousness, and when she was
+convinced that sleep had finally taken complete possession of her, and
+that for several hours the old woman was deprived of the power to hear
+anything or to wake up, she slowly moved her chair nearer the
+bedstead, and without taking her quietly observant eyes from the old
+woman's face, softly slipped her hand under the lower pillow. Moving
+forward with the utmost care, not more than an inch or so at a time,
+her hand stopped instantly, as soon as there was the slightest nervous
+movement of the old woman's face, on which Natasha's eyes were fixed
+immovably. But the old woman slept profoundly, and the hand again
+moved forward half an inch or so under the pillow. About half an hour
+passed, and the girl's eyes were still fastened on the sleeping face,
+and her hand was still slipping forward under the pillow, moving
+occasionally a little to one side, and feeling about for something.
+Natasha's expression was in the highest degree quiet and concentrated,
+but under this quietness was at the same time concealed something
+else, which gave the impression that if--which Heaven forbid!--the old
+woman should at that moment awake, the other free hand would instantly
+seize her by the throat.
+
+At last the finger-ends felt something hard. "That is it!" thought
+Natasha, and she held her breath. In a moment, seizing its treasure,
+her hand began quietly to withdraw. Ten minutes more passed, and
+Natasha finally drew out a little bag of various colored silks, in
+which the old princess always kept her keys, and from which she never
+parted, carrying it by day in her pocket, and by night keeping it
+under her pillow. One of the keys was an ordinary one, that of her
+wardrobe. The other was smaller and finely made; it was the key of her
+strong box.
+
+About an hour later, the same keys, in the same order, and with the
+same precautions, found their way back to their accustomed place under
+the old lady's pillow.
+
+Natasha carefully wiped the glass with her handkerchief, in order that
+not the least odor of chloral might remain in it, and with her usual
+stillness sat out the remaining hours of her watch.
+
+
+VI
+
+REVENGED
+
+
+The old princess awoke at one o'clock the next day. The doctor was
+very pleased at her long and sound sleep, the like of which the old
+lady had not enjoyed since her first collapse, and which, in his view,
+was certain to presage a turn for the better.
+
+The princess had long ago formed a habit of looking over her financial
+documents, and verifying the accounts of income and expenditure. This
+deep-seated habit, which had become a second nature, did not leave
+her, now she was ill; at any rate, every morning, as soon as
+consciousness and tranquillity returned to her, she took out the key
+of her wardrobe, ordered the strong box to be brought to her, and,
+sending the day nurse out of the room, gave herself up in solitude to
+her beloved occupation, which had by this time become something like a
+childish amusement. She drew out her bank securities, signed and
+unsigned, now admiring the colored engravings on them, now sorting and
+rearranging them, fingering the packets to feel their thickness,
+counting them over, and several thousands in banknotes, kept in the
+house in case of need, and finally carefully replaced them in the
+strong box. The girl, recalled to the bedroom by the sound of the
+bell, restored the strong box to its former place, and the old
+princess, after this amusement, felt herself for some time quiet and
+happy.
+
+The nurses had had the opportunity to get pretty well used to this
+foible; so that the daily examination of the strong box seemed to them
+a part of the order of things, something consecrated by custom.
+
+After taking her medicine, and having her hands and face wiped with a
+towel moistened with toilet water, the princess ordered certain
+prayers to be read out to her, or the chapter of the Gospel appointed
+for the day, and then received her son. From the time of her
+illness--that is, from the day when she signed the will making him her
+sole heir--he had laid it on himself as a not altogether pleasant duty
+to put in an appearance for five minutes in his mother's room, where
+he showed himself a dutiful son by never mentioning his sister, but
+asking tenderly after his mother's health, and finally, with a deep
+sigh, gently kissing her hand, taking his departure forthwith, to sup
+with some actress or to meet his companions in a wine shop.
+
+When he soon went away, the old lady, as was her habit, ordered her
+strong box to be brought, and sent the nurse out of the room. It was a
+very handsome box of ebony, with beautiful inlaid work.
+
+The key clicked in the lock, the spring lid sprang up, and the eyes of
+the old princess became set in their sockets, full of bewilderment and
+terror. Twenty-four thousand rubles in bills, which she herself with
+her own hands had yesterday laid on the top of the other securities,
+were no longer in the strong box. All the unsigned bank securities
+were also gone. The securities in the name of her daughter Anna had
+likewise disappeared. There remained only the signed securities in the
+name of the old princess and her son, and a few shares of stock. In
+the place of all that was gone, there lay a note directed "to Princess
+Chechevinski."
+
+The old lady's fingers trembled so that for a long time she could not
+unfold this paper. Her staring eyes wandered hither and thither as if
+she had lost her senses. At last she managed somehow to unfold the
+note, and began to read:
+
+"You cursed me, forced me to flee, and unjustly deprived me of my
+inheritance. I am taking my money by force. You may inform the police,
+but when you read this note, I myself and he who carried out this act
+by my directions, will have left St. Petersburg forever.
+
+"Your daughter,
+
+"PRINCESS ANNA CHECHEVINSKI."
+
+The old lady's hands did not fall at her sides, but shifted about on
+her lap as if they did not belong to her. Her wandering, senseless
+eyes stopped their movements, and in them suddenly appeared an
+expression of deep meaning. The old princess made a terrible,
+superhuman effort to recover her presence of mind and regain command
+over herself. A single faint groan broke from her breast, and her
+teeth chattered. She began to look about the room for a light, but the
+lamp had been extinguished; the dull gray daylight filtering through
+the Venetian blinds sufficiently lit the room. Then the old lady, with
+a strange, irregular movement, crushed the note together in her hand,
+placed it in her mouth, and with a convulsive movement of her jaws
+chewed it, trying to swallow it as quickly as possible.
+
+A minute passed, and the note had disappeared. The old princess closed
+the strong box and rang for the day nurse. Giving her the usual order
+in a quiet voice, she had still strength enough to support herself on
+her elbow and watch the nurse closing the wardrobe, and then to put
+the little bag with the keys back under her pillow, in its accustomed
+place. Then she again ordered the nurse to go.
+
+When, two hours later, the doctor, coming for the third time, wished
+to see his patient and entered her bedroom, he found only the old
+woman's lifeless body. The blow had been too much--the daughter of the
+ancient and ever honorable line of Chechevinski a fugitive and a
+thief!
+
+Natasha had had her revenge.
+
+
+VII
+
+BEYOND THE FRONTIER
+
+
+On the morning of that same day, at nine o'clock, a well-dressed lady
+presented at the Bank of Commerce a number of unsigned bank shares. At
+the same time a young man, also elegantly dressed, presented a series
+of signed shares, made out in the name of "Princess Anna
+Chechevinski." They were properly indorsed, the signature
+corresponding to that in the bank books.
+
+After a short interval the cashier of the bank paid over to the
+well-dressed lady a hundred and fifty thousand rubles in bills, and to
+the elegantly dressed young man seventy thousand rubles. The lady
+signed her receipt in French, Teresa Dore; the young man signed his
+name, Ivan Afonasieff, son of a merchant of Kostroma.
+
+A little later on the same day--namely, about two o'clock--a light
+carriage carried two passengers along the Pargoloff road: a quietly
+dressed young woman and a quietly dressed young man. Toward evening
+these same young people were traveling in a Finnish coach by the stony
+mountain road in the direction of Abo.
+
+Four days later the old Princess Chechevinski was buried in the Nevski
+monastery.
+
+On his return from the monastery, young Prince Chechevinski went
+straight for the strong box, which he had hitherto seen only at a
+distance, and even then only rarely. He expected to find a great deal
+more money in it than he found--some hundred and fifty thousand
+rubles; a hundred thousand in his late mother's name, and fifty
+thousand in his own. This was the personal property of the old
+princess, a part of her dowry. The young prince made a wry face--the
+money might last him two or three years, not more. During the lifetime
+of the old princess no one had known accurately how much she
+possessed, so that it never even entered the young prince's head to
+ask whether she had not had more. He was so unmethodical that he never
+even looked into her account book, deciding that it was uninteresting
+and not worth while.
+
+That same day the janitor of one of the huge, dirty tenements in
+Vosnesenski Prospekt brought to the police office notice of the fact
+that the Pole, Kasimir Bodlevski, had left the city; and the
+housekeeper of the late Princess Chechevinski informed the police that
+the serf girl Natalia Pavlovna (Natasha) had disappeared without
+leaving a trace, which the housekeeper now announced, as the three
+days' limit had elapsed.
+
+At that same hour the little ship of a certain Finnish captain was
+gliding down the Gulf of Bothnia. The Finn stood at the helm and his
+young son handled the sails. On the deck sat a young man and a young
+woman. The young woman carried, in a little bag hung round her neck,
+two hundred and forty-four thousand rubles in bills, and she and her
+companion carried pistols in their pockets for use in case of need.
+Their passports declared that the young woman belonged to the noble
+class, and was the widow of a college assessor, her name being Maria
+Solontseva, while the young man was a Pole, Kasimir Bodlevski.
+
+The little ship was crossing the Gulf of Bothnia toward the coast of
+Sweden.
+
+
+
+VIII
+
+BACK TO RUSSIA
+
+
+In the year 1858, in the month of September, the "Report of the St.
+Petersburg City Police" among the names of "Arrivals" included the
+following:
+
+     _Baroness van Döring, Hanoverian subject.
+     Ian Vladislav Karozitch, Austrian subject_.
+
+The persons above described might have been recognized among the
+fashionable crowds which thronged the St. Petersburg terminus of
+the Warsaw railway a few days before: A lady who looked not
+more than thirty, though she was really thirty-eight, dressed
+with simple elegance, tall and slender, admirably developed,
+with beautifully clear complexion, piercing, intelligent gray eyes,
+under finely outlined brows, thick chestnut hair, and a firm
+mouth--almost a beauty, and with an expression of power, subtlety and
+decision. "She is either a queen or a criminal," a physiognomist would
+have said after observing her face. A gentleman with a red beard, whom
+the lady addressed as "brother," not less elegantly dressed, and with
+the same expression of subtlety and decision. They left the station in
+a hired carriage, and drove to Demuth's Hotel.
+
+Before narrating the adventures of these distinguished persons, let us
+go back twenty years, and ask what became of Natasha and Bodlevski.
+When last we saw them the ship that carried them away from Russia was
+gliding across the Gulf of Bothnia toward the Swedish coast. Late in
+the evening it slipped into the port of Stockholm, and the worthy
+Finn, winding in and out among the heavy hulls in the harbor--he was
+well used to the job--landed his passengers on the wharf at a lonely
+spot near a lonely inn, where the customs officers rarely showed their
+noses. Bodlevski, who had beforehand got ready the very modest sum to
+pay for their passage, with pitiable looks and gestures and the few
+Russian phrases the good Finn could understand, assured him that he
+was a very poor man, and could not even pay the sum agreed on in full.
+The deficit was inconsiderable, some two rubles in all, and the good
+Finn was magnanimous; he slapped his passenger on the shoulder, called
+him a "good comrade," declared that he would not press a poor man, and
+would always be ready to do him a service. He even found quarters for
+Bodlevski and Natasha in the inn, under his protection. The Finn was
+indeed a very honest smuggler. On the next morning, bidding a final
+farewell to their nautical friend, our couple made their way to the
+office of the British Consul, and asked for an opportunity to speak
+with him. At this point Natasha played the principal rôle.
+
+"My husband is a Pole," said the handsome girl, taking a seat opposite
+the consul in his private office, "and I myself am Russian on the
+father's side, but my mother was English. My husband is involved in a
+political enterprise; he was liable to transportation to Siberia, but
+a chance made it possible for us to escape while the police were on
+their way to arrest him. We are now political fugitives, and we
+intrust our lives to the protection of English law. Be generous,
+protect us, and send us to England!"
+
+The ruse, skillfully planned and admirably presented, was completely
+successful, and two or three days later the first passenger ship under
+the English flag carried the happy couple to London.
+
+Bodlevski destroyed his own passport and that of the college
+assessor's widow, Maria Solontseva, which Natasha had needed as a
+precaution while still on Russian soil. When they got to England, it
+would be much handier to take new names. But with their new position
+and these new names a great difficulty presented itself: they could
+find no suitable outlet for their capital without arousing very
+dangerous suspicions. The many-sided art of the London rogues is known
+to all the world; in their club, Bodlevski, who had lost no time in
+making certain pleasant and indispensable acquaintances there, soon
+succeeded in getting for himself and Natasha admirably counterfeited
+new passports, once more with new names and occupations. With these,
+in a short time, they found their way to the Continent. They both felt
+the full force of youth and a passionate desire to live and enjoy
+life; in their hot heads hummed many a golden hope and plan; they
+wished, to begin with, to invest their main capital somewhere, and
+then to travel over Europe, and to choose a quiet corner somewhere
+where they could settle down to a happy life.
+
+Perhaps all this might have happened if it had not been for cards and
+roulette and the perpetual desire of increasing their capital--for the
+worthy couple fell into the hands of a talented company, whose agents
+robbed them at Frascati's in Paris, and again in Hamburg and various
+health resorts, so that hardly a year had passed when Bodlevski one
+fine night woke up to the fact that they no longer possessed a ruble.
+But they had passed a brilliant year, their arrival in the great
+cities had had its effect, and especially since Natasha had become a
+person of title; in the course of the year she succeeded in purchasing
+an Austrian barony at a very reasonable figure--a barony which, of
+course, only existed on paper.
+
+When all his money was gone, there was nothing left for Bodlevski but
+to enroll himself a member of the company which had so successfully
+accomplished the transfer of his funds to their own pockets. Natasha's
+beauty and Bodlevski's brains were such strong arguments that the
+company willingly accepted them as new recruits. The two paid dear for
+their knowledge, it is true, but their knowledge presently began to
+bear fruit in considerable abundance. Day followed day, and year
+succeeded year, a long series of horribly anxious nights, violent
+feelings, mental perturbations, crafty and subtle schemes, a complete
+cycle of rascalities, an entire science of covering up tracks, and the
+perpetual shadow of justice, prison, and perhaps the scaffold.
+Bodlevski, with his obstinate, persistent, and concentrated character,
+reached the highest skill in card-sharping and the allied wiles. All
+games of "chance" were for him games of skill. At thirty he looked at
+least ten years older. The life he led, with its ceaseless effort,
+endless mental work, perpetual anxiety, had made of him a fanatical
+worshiper at the shrine of trickery. He dried up visibly in body and
+grew old in mind, mastering all the difficult arts of his profession,
+and only gained confidence and serenity when he had reached the
+highest possible skill in every branch of his "work." From that moment
+he took a new lease of life; he grew younger, he became gay and
+self-confident, his health even visibly improved, and he assumed the
+air and manner of a perfect gentleman.
+
+As for Natasha, her life and efforts in concert with Bodlevski by no
+means had the same wearing effect on her as on him. Her proud, decided
+nature received all these impressions quite differently. She continued
+to blossom out, to grow handsomer, to enjoy life, to take hearts
+captive. All the events which aroused so keen a mental struggle in her
+companion she met with entire equanimity. The reason was this: When
+she made up her mind to anything, she always decided at once and with
+unusual completeness; a very short time given to keen and accurate
+consideration, a rapid weighing of the gains and losses of the matter
+in hand, and then she went forward coldly and unswervingly on her
+chosen path. Her first aim in life had been revenge, then a brilliant
+and luxurious life--and she knew that they would cost dear. Therefore,
+once embarked on her undertaking, Natasha remained calm and
+indifferent, brilliantly distinguished, and ensnaring the just and the
+unjust alike. Her intellect, education, skill, resource, and innate
+tact made it possible for her everywhere to gain a footing in select
+aristocratic society, and to play by no means the least rôle there.
+Many beauties envied her, detested her, spoke evil of her, and yet
+sought her friendship, because she almost always queened it in
+society. Her friendship and sympathy always seemed so cordial, so
+sincere and tender, and her epigrams were so pointed and poisonous,
+that every hostile criticism seemed to shrivel up in that glittering
+fire, and there seemed to be nothing left but to seek her friendship
+and good will. For instance, if things went well in Baden, one could
+confidently foretell that at the end of the summer season Natasha
+would be found in Nice or Geneva, queen of the winter season, the
+lioness of the day, and the arbiter of fashion. She and Bodlevski
+always behaved with such propriety and watchful care that not a shadow
+ever fell on Natasha's fame. It is true that Bodlevski had to change
+his name once or twice and to seek a new field for his talents, and to
+make sudden excursions to distant corners of Europe--sometimes in
+pursuit of a promising "job," sometimes to evade the too persistent
+attentions of the police. So far everything had turned out favorably,
+and his name "had remained unstained," when suddenly a slight mishap
+befell. The matter was a trifling one, but the misfortune was that it
+happened in Paris. There was a chance that it might find issue in the
+courts and the hulks, so that there ensued a more than ordinarily
+rapid change of passports and a new excursion--this time to Russia,
+back to their native land again, after an absence of twenty years.
+Thus it happened that the papers announced the arrival in St.
+Petersburg of Baroness von Döring and Ian Vladislav Karozitch.
+
+
+
+IX
+
+THE CONCERT OF THE POWERS
+
+
+A few days after there was a brilliant reunion at Princess
+Shadursky's. All the beauty and fashion of St. Petersburg were
+invited, and few who were invited failed to come. It happened that
+Prince Shadursky was an admirer of the fair sex, and also that he had
+had the pleasure of meeting the brilliant Baroness von Döring at
+Hamburg, and again in Paris. It was, therefore, to be expected that
+Baroness von Döring should be found in the midst of an admiring throng
+at Princess Shadursky's reception. Her brother, Ian Karozitch, was
+also there, suave, alert, dignified, losing no opportunity to make
+friends with the distinguished company that thronged the prince's
+rooms.
+
+Late in the evening the baroness and her brother might have been seen
+engaged in a _tête-à-tête_, seated in two comfortable armchairs, and
+anyone who was near enough might have heard the following
+conversation:
+
+"How goes it?" Karozitch asked in a low tone.
+
+"As you see, I am making a hit," answered the baroness in the same
+quiet tone. But her manner was so detached and indifferent that no one
+could have guessed her remark was of the least significance. It should
+be noted that this was her first official presentation to St.
+Petersburg society. And in truth her beauty, united with her lively
+intellect, her amiability, and her perfect taste in dress, had
+produced a general and even remarkable effect. People talked about her
+and became interested in her, and her first evening won her several
+admirers among those well placed in society.
+
+"I have been paying attention to the solid capitalists," replied
+Karozitch; "we have made our _début_ in the _rôle_ of practical
+actors. Well, what about him?" he continued, indicating Prince
+Shadursky with his eyes.
+
+"In the web," she replied, with a subtle smile.
+
+"Then we can soon suck his brains?"
+
+"Soon--but he must be tied tighter first. But we must not talk here."
+A moment later Karozitch and the baroness were in the midst of the
+brilliant groups of guests.
+
+A few late comers were still arriving. "Count Kallash!" announced the
+footman, who stood at the chief entrance to the large hall.
+
+At this new and almost unknown but high-sounding name, many eyes were
+turned toward the door through which the newcomer must enter. A hum of
+talk spread among the guests:
+
+"Count Kallash----"
+
+"Who is he----?"
+
+"It is a Hungarian name--I think I heard of him somewhere."
+
+"Is this his first appearance?"
+
+"Who is this Kallash? Oh, yes, one of the old Hungarian families----"
+
+"How interesting----"
+
+Such questions and answers crossed each other in a running fire among
+the various groups of guests who filled the hall, when a young man
+appeared in the doorway.
+
+He lingered a moment to glance round the rooms and the company; then,
+as if conscious of the remarks and glances directed toward him, but
+completely "ignoring" them, and without the least shyness or
+awkwardness, he walked quietly through the hall to the host and
+hostess of the evening.
+
+People of experience, accustomed to society and the ways of the great
+world, can often decide from the first minute the _rôle_ which anyone
+is likely to play among them. People of experience, at the first view
+of this young man, at his first entrance, merely by the way he entered
+the hall, decided that his _rôle_ in society would be brilliant--that
+more than one feminine heart would beat faster for his presence, that
+more than one dandy's wrath would be kindled by his successes.
+
+"How handsome he is!" a whisper went round among the ladies. The men
+for the most part remained silent. A few twisted the ends of their
+mustache and made as though they had not noticed him. This was already
+enough to foreshadow a brilliant career.
+
+And indeed Count Kallash could not have passed unnoticed, even among a
+thousand young men of his class. Tall and vigorous, wonderfully well
+proportioned, he challenged comparison with Antinoüs. His pale face,
+tanned by the sun, had an expression almost of weariness. His high
+forehead, with clustering black hair and sharply marked brows, bore
+the impress of passionate feeling and turbulent thought strongly
+repressed. It was difficult to define the color of his deep-set,
+somewhat sunken eyes, which now flashed with southern fire, and were
+now veiled, so that one seemed to be looking into an abyss. A slight
+mustache and pointed beard partly concealed the ironical smile that
+played on his passionate lips. The natural grace of good manners and
+quiet but admirably cut clothes completed the young man's exterior,
+behind which, in spite of all his reticence, could be divined a
+haughty and exceptional nature. A more profound psychologist would
+have seen in him an obstinately passionate, ungrateful nature, which
+takes from others everything it desires, demanding it from them as a
+right and without even a nod of acknowledgment. Such was Count
+Nicholas Kallash.
+
+A few days after the reception at Prince Shadursky's Baroness von
+Döring was installed in a handsome apartment on Mokhovoi Street, at
+which her "brother," Ian Karozitch, or, to give him his former name,
+Bodlevski, was a frequent visitor. By a "lucky accident" he had met on
+the day following the reception our old friend Sergei Antonovitch
+Kovroff, the "captain of the Golden Band." Their recognition was
+mutual, and, after a more or less faithful recital of the events of
+the intervening years, they had entered into an offensive and
+defensive alliance.
+
+When Baroness von Döring was comfortably settled in her new quarters,
+Sergei Antonovitch brought a visitor to Bodlevski: none other than the
+Hungarian nobleman, Count Nicholas Kallash.
+
+"_Gentlemen, you are strangers_; let me introduce you to each other,"
+said Kovroff, presenting Count Kallash to Bodlevski.
+
+"Very glad to know you," answered the Hungarian count, to Bodlevski's
+astonishment in Russian; "very glad, indeed! I have several times had
+the honor of hearing of you. Was it not you who had some trouble about
+forged notes in Paris?"
+
+"Oh, no! You are mistaken, dear count!" answered Bodlevski, with a
+pleasant smile. "The matter was not of the slightest importance. The
+amount was a trifle and I was unwilling even to appear in court!"
+
+"You preferred a little journey to Russia, didn't you?" Kovroff
+remarked with a smile.
+
+"Little vexations of that kind may happen to anyone," said Bodlevski,
+ignoring Kovroff's interruption. "You yourself, dear count, had some
+trouble about some bonds, if I am not mistaken?"
+
+"You are mistaken," the count interrupted him sharply. "I have had
+various troubles, but I prefer not to talk about them."
+
+"Gentlemen," interrupted Kovroff, "we did not come here to quarrel,
+but to talk business. Our good friend, Count Kallash," he went on,
+turning to Bodlevski, "wishes to have the pleasure of cooperating in
+our common undertaking, and--I can recommend him very highly."
+
+"Ah!" said Bodlevski, after a searching study of the count's face. "I
+understand! the baroness will return in a few minutes and then we can
+discuss matters at our leisure."
+
+But in spite of this understanding it was evident that Bodlevski and
+Count Kallash had not impressed each other very favorably. This,
+however, did not prevent the concert of the powers from working
+vigorously together.
+
+
+X
+
+AN UNEXPECTED REUNION
+
+
+On the wharf of the Fontauka, not far from Simeonovski Bridge, a crowd
+was gathered. In the midst of the crowd a dispute raged between an old
+woman, tattered, disheveled, miserable, and an impudent-looking youth.
+The old woman was evidently stupid from misery and destitution.
+
+While the quarrel raged a new observer approached the crowd. He was
+walking leisurely, evidently without an aim and merely to pass the
+time, so it is not to be wondered at that the loud dispute arrested
+his attention.
+
+"Who are you, anyway, you old hag? What is your name?" cried the
+impudent youth.
+
+"My name? My name?" muttered the old woman in confusion. "I am a--I am
+a princess," and she blinked at the crowd.
+
+Everyone burst out laughing. "Her Excellency, the Princess! Make way
+for the Princess!" cried the youth.
+
+The old woman burst into sudden anger.
+
+"Yes, I tell you, I am a princess by birth!" and her eyes flashed as
+she tried to draw herself up and impose on the bantering crowd.
+
+"Princess What? Princess Which? Princess How?" cried the impudent
+youth, and all laughed loudly.
+
+"No! Not Princess How!" answered the old woman, losing the last shred
+of self-restraint; "but Princess Che-che-vin-ski! Princess Anna
+Chechevinski!"
+
+When he heard this name Count Kallash started and his whole expression
+changed. He grew suddenly pale, and with a vigorous effort pushed his
+way through the crowd to the miserable old woman's side.
+
+"Come!" he said, taking her by the arm. "Come with me! I have
+something for you!"
+
+"Something for me?" answered the old woman, looking up with stupid
+inquiry and already forgetting the existence of the impudent youth.
+"Yes, I'll come! What have you got for me?"
+
+Count Kallash led her by the arm out of the crowd, which began to
+disperse, abashed by his appearance and air of determination.
+Presently he hailed a carriage, and putting the old woman in, ordered
+the coachman to drive to his rooms.
+
+There he did his best to make the miserable old woman comfortable, and
+his housekeeper presently saw that she was washed and fed, and soon
+the old woman was sleeping in the housekeeper's room.
+
+To explain this extraordinary event we must go back twenty years.
+
+In 1838 Princess Anna Chechevinski, then in her twenty-sixth year, had
+defied her parents, thrown to the winds the traditions of her princely
+race, and fled with the man of her choice, followed by her mother's
+curses and the ironical congratulations of her brother, who thus
+became sole heir.
+
+After a year or two she was left alone by the death of her companion,
+and step by step she learned all the lessons of sorrow. From one stage
+of misfortune to another she gradually fell into the deepest misery,
+and had become a poor old beggar in the streets when Count Kallash
+came so unexpectedly to her rescue.
+
+It will be remembered that, as a result of Natasha's act of vengeance,
+the elder Princess Chechevinski left behind her only a fraction of the
+money her son expected to inherit. And this fraction he by no means
+hoarded, but with cynical disregard of the future he poured money out
+like water, gambling, drinking, plunging into every form of
+dissipation. Within a few months his entire inheritance was
+squandered.
+
+Several years earlier Prince Chechevinski had taken a deep interest in
+conjuring and had devoted time and care to the study of various forms
+of parlor magic. He had even paid considerable sums to traveling
+conjurers in exchange for their secrets. Naturally gifted, he had
+mastered some of the most difficult tricks, and his skill in card
+conjuring would not have done discredit even to a professional
+magician.
+
+The evening when his capital had almost melted away and the shadow of
+ruin lay heavy upon him, he happened to be present at a reception
+where card play was going on and considerable sums were staked.
+
+A vacancy at one of the tables could not be filled, and, in spite of
+his weak protest of unwillingness, Prince Chechevinski was pressed
+into service. He won for the first few rounds, and then began to lose,
+till the amount of his losses far exceeded the slender remainder of
+his capital. A chance occurred where, by the simple expedient of
+neutralizing the cut, mere child's play for one so skilled in
+conjuring, he was able to turn the scale in his favor, winning back in
+a single game all that he had already lost. He had hesitated for a
+moment, feeling the abyss yawning beneath him; then he had falsed,
+made the pass, and won the game. That night he swore to himself that
+he would never cheat again, never again be tempted to dishonor his
+birth; and he kept his oath till his next run of bad luck, when he
+once more neutralized the cut and turned the "luck" in his direction.
+
+The result was almost a certainty from the outset, Prince Chechevinski
+became a habitual card sharper.
+
+For a long time fortune favored him. His mother's reputation for
+wealth, the knowledge that he was her sole heir, the high position of
+the family, shielded him from suspicion. Then came the thunderclap. He
+was caught in the act of "dealing a second" in the English Club, and
+driven from the club as a blackleg. Other reverses followed: a public
+refusal on the part of an officer to play cards with him, followed by
+a like refusal to give him satisfaction in a duel; a second occasion
+in which he was caught redhanded; a criminal trial; six years in
+Siberia. After two years he escaped by way of the Chinese frontier,
+and months after returned to Europe. For two years he practiced his
+skill at Constantinople. Then he made his way to Buda-Pesth, then to
+Vienna. While in the dual monarchy, he had come across a
+poverty-stricken Magyar noble, named Kallash, whom he had sheltered in
+a fit of generous pity, and who had died in his room at the Golden
+Eagle Inn. Prince Chechevinski, who had already borne many aliases,
+showed his grief at the old Magyar's death by adopting his name and
+title; hence it was that he presented himself in St. Petersburg in the
+season of 1858 under the high-sounding title of Count Kallash.
+
+An extraordinary coincidence, already described, had brought him face
+to face with his sister Anna, whom he had never even heard of in all
+the years since her flight. He found her now, poverty-stricken,
+prematurely old, almost demented, and, though he had hated her
+cordially in days gone by, his pity was aroused by her wretchedness,
+and he took her to his home, clothed and fed her, and surrounded her
+with such comforts as his bachelor apartment offered.
+
+In the days that followed, every doubt he might have had as to her
+identity was dispelled. She talked freely of their early childhood, of
+their father's death, of their mother; she even spoke of her brother's
+coldness and hostility in terms which drove away the last shadow of
+doubt whether she was really his sister. But at first he made no
+corresponding revelations, remaining for her only Count Kallash.
+
+
+XI
+
+THE PHOTOGRAPH ALBUM
+
+
+Little by little, however, as the poor old woman recovered something
+of health and strength, his heart went out toward her. Telling her
+only certain incidents of his life, he gradually brought the narrative
+back to the period, twenty years before, immediately after their
+mother's death, and at last revealed himself to his sister, after
+making her promise secrecy as to his true name. Thus matters went on
+for nearly two years.
+
+The broken-down old woman lived in his rooms in something like
+comfort, and took pleasure in dusting and arranging his things. One
+day, when she was tidying the sitting room, her brother was startled
+by a sudden exclamation, almost a cry, which broke from his sister's
+lips.
+
+"Oh, heaven, it is she!" she cried, her eyes fixed on a page of the
+photograph album she had been dusting. "Brother, come here; for
+heaven's sake, who is this?"
+
+"Baroness von Döring," curtly answered Kallash, glancing quickly at
+the photograph. "What do you find interesting in her?"
+
+"It is either she or her double! Do you know who she looks like?"
+
+"Lord only knows! Herself, perhaps!"
+
+"No, she has a double! I am sure of it! Do you remember, at mother's,
+my maid Natasha?"
+
+"Natasha?" the count considered, knitting his brows in the effort to
+recollect.
+
+"Yes, Natasha, my maid. A tall, fair girl. A thick tress of chestnut
+hair. She had such beautiful hair! And her lips had just the same
+proud expression. Her eyes were piercing and intelligent, her brows
+were clearly marked and joined together--in a word, the very original
+of this photograph!"
+
+"Ah," slowly and quietly commented the count, pressing his hand to his
+brow. "Exactly. Now I remember! Yes, it is a striking likeness."
+
+"But look closely," cried the old woman excitedly; "it is the living
+image of Natasha! Of course she is more matured, completely developed.
+How old is the baroness?"
+
+"She must be approaching forty. But she doesn't look her age; you
+would imagine her to be about thirty-two from her appearance."
+
+"There! And Natasha would be just forty by now!"
+
+"The ages correspond," answered her brother.
+
+"Yes." Princess Anna sighed sadly. "Twenty-two years have passed since
+then. But if I met her face to face I think I would recognize her at
+once. Tell me, who is she?"
+
+"The baroness? How shall I tell you? She has been abroad for twenty
+years, and for the last two years she has lived here. In society she
+says she is a foreigner, but with me she is franker, and I know that
+she speaks Russian perfectly. She declares that her husband is
+somewhere in Germany, and that she lives here with her brother."
+
+"Who is the 'brother'?" asked the old princess curiously.
+
+"The deuce knows! He is also a bit shady. Oh, yes! Sergei Kovroff
+knows him; he told me something about their history; he came here with
+a forged passport, under the name of Vladislav Karozitch, but his real
+name is Kasimir Bodlevski."
+
+"Kasimir Bodlevski," muttered the old woman, knitting her brows. "Was
+he not once a lithographer or an engraver, or something of the sort?"
+
+"I think he was. I think Kovroff said something about it. He is a fine
+engraver still."
+
+"He was? Well, there you are!" and Princess Anna rose quickly from her
+seat. "It is she--it is Natasha! She used to tell me she had a
+sweetheart, a Polish hero, Bodlevski. And I think his name was
+Kasimir. She often got my permission to slip out to visit him; she
+said he worked for a lithographer, and always begged me to persuade
+mother to liberate her from serfdom, so that she could marry him."
+
+This unexpected discovery meant much to Kallash. Circumstances,
+hitherto slight and isolated, suddenly gained a new meaning, and were
+lit up in a way that made him almost certain of the truth. He now
+remembered that Kovroff had once told him of his first acquaintance
+with Bodlevski, when he came on the Pole at the Cave, arranging for a
+false passport; he remembered that Natasha had disappeared immediately
+before the death of the elder Princess Chechevinski, and he also
+remembered how, returning from the cemetery, he had been cruelly
+disappointed in his expectations when he had found in the strong box a
+sum very much smaller than he had always counted on, and with some
+foundation; and before him, with almost complete certainty, appeared
+the conclusion that the maid's disappearance was connected with the
+theft of his mother's money, and especially of the securities in his
+sister's name, and that all this was nothing but the doing of Natasha
+and her companion Bodlevski.
+
+"Very good! Perhaps this information will come in handy!" he said to
+himself, thinking over his future measures and plans. "Let us see--let
+us feel our way--perhaps it is really so! But I must go carefully and
+keep on my guard, and the whole thing is in my hands, dear baroness!
+We will spin a thread from you before all is over."
+
+
+XII
+
+THE BARONESS AT HOME
+
+
+Every Wednesday Baroness von Döring received her intimate friends. She
+did not care for rivals, and therefore ladies were not invited to
+these evenings. The intimate circle of the baroness consisted of our
+Knights of Industry and the "pigeons" of the bureaucracy, the world of
+finance, the aristocracy, which were the objects of the knights'
+desires.
+
+It often happened, however, that the number of guests at these
+intimate evenings went as high as fifty, and sometimes even more.
+
+The baroness was passionately fond of games of chance, and always sat
+down to the card table with enthusiasm. But as this was done
+conspicuously, in sight of all her guests, the latter could not fail
+to note that fortune obstinately turned away from the baroness. She
+almost never won on the green cloth; sometimes Kovroff won, sometimes
+Kallash, sometimes Karozitch, but with the slight difference that the
+last won more seldom and less than the other two.
+
+Thus every Wednesday a considerable sum found its way from the
+pocketbook of the baroness into that of one of her colleagues, to find
+its way back again the next morning. The purpose of this clever scheme
+was that the "pigeons" who visited the luxurious salons of the
+baroness, and whose money paid the expenses of these salons, should
+not have the smallest grounds for suspicion that the dear baroness's
+apartment was nothing but a den of sharpers. Her guests all considered
+her charming, to begin with, and also rich and independent and
+passionate by nature. This explained her love of play and the
+excitement it brought, and which she would not give up, in spite of
+her repeated heavy losses.
+
+Her colleagues, the Knights of Industry, acted on a carefully devised
+and rigidly followed plan. They were far from putting their uncanny
+skill in motion every Wednesday. So long as they had no big game in
+sight, the game remained clean and honest. In this way the band might
+lose two or three thousand rubles, but such a loss had no great
+importance, and was soon made up when some fat "pigeon" appeared.
+
+It sometimes happened that this wily scheme of honest play went on for
+five or six weeks in succession, so that the small fry, winning the
+band's money, remained entirely convinced that it was playing in an
+honorable and respectable private house, and very naturally spread
+abroad the fame of it throughout the whole city. But when the fat
+pigeon at last appeared, the band put forth all its forces, all the
+wiles of the black art, and in a few hours made up for the generous
+losses of a month of honorable and irreproachable play on the green
+cloth.
+
+Midnight was approaching.
+
+The baroness's rooms were brilliantly lit up, but, thanks to the thick
+curtains which covered the windows, the lights could not be seen from
+the street, though several carriages were drawn up along the sidewalk.
+
+Opening into the elegant drawing-room was a not less elegant card
+room, appreciatively nicknamed the Inferno by the band. In it stood a
+large table with a green cloth, on which lay a heap of bank notes and
+two little piles of gold, before which sat Sergei Antonovitch Kovroff,
+presiding over the bank with the composure of a true gentleman.
+
+What Homeric, Jovine calm rested on every feature of his face! What
+charming, fearless self-assurance, what noble self-confidence in his
+smile, in his glance! What grace, what distinction in his pose, and
+especially in the hand which dealt the cards! Sergei Kovroff's hands
+were decidedly worthy of attention. They were almost always clad in
+new gloves, which he only took off on special occasions, at dinner, or
+when he had some writing to do, or when he sat down to a game of
+cards. As a result, his hands were almost feminine in their delicacy,
+the sensibility of the finger tips had reached an extraordinary degree
+of development, equal to that of one born blind. And those fingers
+were skillful, adroit, alert, their every movement carried out with
+that smooth, indefinable grace which is almost always possessed by the
+really high-class card sharper. His fingers were adorned with numerous
+rings, in which sparkled diamonds and other precious stones. And it
+was not for nothing that Sergei Kovroff took pride in them! This
+glitter of diamonds, scattering rainbow rays, dazzled the eyes of his
+fellow players. When Sergei Kovroff sat down to preside over the bank,
+the sparkling of the diamonds admirably masked those motions of his
+fingers which needed to be masked; they almost insensibly drew away
+the eyes of the players from his fingers, and this was most of all
+what Sergei Kovroff desired.
+
+Round the table about thirty guests were gathered. Some of them sat,
+but most of them played standing, with anxious faces, feverishly
+sparkling eyes, and breathing heavily and unevenly. Some were pale,
+some flushed, and all watched with passionate eagerness the fall of
+the cards. There were also some who had perfect command of themselves,
+distinguished by extraordinary coolness, and jesting lightly whether
+they lost or won. But such happily constituted natures are always a
+minority when high play is going on.
+
+Silence reigned in the Inferno. There was almost no conversation; only
+once in a while was heard a remark, in a whisper or an undertone,
+addressed by a player to his neighbor; the only sound was that short,
+dry rustle of the cards and the crackling of new bank notes, or the
+tinkle of gold coins making their way round the table from the bank to
+the players, and from the players back to the bank.
+
+The two Princes Shadursky, father and son, both lost heavily. They sat
+opposite Sergei Kovroff, and between them sat Baroness von Döring, who
+played in alliance with them. The clever Natasha egged them on,
+kindling their excitement with all the skill and calculation possible
+to one whose blood was as cold as the blood of a fish, and both the
+Shadurskys had lost their heads, no longer knowing how much they were
+losing.
+
+
+XIII
+
+AN EXPLANATION
+
+
+Count Kallash and his sister had just breakfasted when the count's
+French footman entered the study.
+
+"Madame la baronne von Döring!" he announced obsequiously.
+
+Brother and sister exchanged a rapid glance.
+
+"Now is our opportunity to make sure," said Kallash, with a smile.
+
+"If it is she, I shall recognize her by her voice," whispered Princess
+Anna. "Shall I remain here or go?"
+
+"Remain in the meantime; it will be a curious experience. _Faites
+entrer_!" he added to the footman.
+
+A moment later light, rapid footsteps were heard in the entrance hall,
+and the rustling of a silk skirt.
+
+"How do you do, count! I have come to see you for a moment. I came in
+all haste, on purpose. I have come _in person_, you must be duly
+appreciative! Vladislav is too busy, and the matter is an important
+one. I wanted to see you at the earliest opportunity. Well, we may all
+congratulate ourselves. Fate and fortune are decidedly on our side!"
+said the baroness, speaking rapidly, as she entered the count's study.
+
+"What has happened? What is the news?" asked the count, going forward
+to meet her.
+
+"We have learned that the Shadurskys have just received a large sum of
+money; they have sold an estate, and the purchaser has paid them in
+cash. Our opportunity has come. Heaven forbid that we should lose it!
+We must devise a plan to make the most of it."
+
+The baroness suddenly stopped short in the middle of the sentence, and
+became greatly confused, noticing that there was a third person
+present.
+
+"Forgive me! I did not give you warning," said the count, shrugging
+his shoulders and smiling; "permit me! _Princess Anna Chechevinski!_"
+he continued with emphasis, indicating his poor, decrepit sister. "Of
+course you would not have recognized her, baroness."
+
+"But _I_ recognized Natasha immediately," said the old woman quietly,
+her eyes still fixed on Natasha's face.
+
+The baroness suddenly turned as white as a sheet, and with trembling
+hands caught the back of a heavy armchair.
+
+Kallash with extreme politeness assisted her to a seat.
+
+"You didn't expect to meet me, Natasha?" said the old woman gently and
+almost caressingly, approaching her.
+
+"I do not know you. Who are you?" the baroness managed to whisper, by
+a supreme effort.
+
+"No wonder; I am so changed," replied Princess Anna. "But _you_ are
+just the same. There is hardly any change at all."
+
+Natasha began to recover her composure.
+
+"I don't understand you," she said coldly, contracting her brows.
+
+"But I understand _you_ perfectly."
+
+"Allow me, princess," Kallash interrupted her, "permit me to have an
+explanation with the baroness; she and I know each other well. And if
+you will pardon me, I shall ask you in the meantime to withdraw."
+
+And he courteously conducted his sister to the massive oak doors,
+which closed solidly after her.
+
+"What does this mean?" said the baroness, rising angrily, her gray
+eyes flashing at the count from under her broad brows.
+
+"A coincidence," answered Kallash, shrugging his shoulders with an
+ironical smile.
+
+"How a coincidence? Speak clearly!"
+
+"The former mistress has recognized her former maid--that is all."
+
+"How does this woman come to be here? Who is she?"
+
+"I have told you already; Princess Anna Chechevinski. And as to how
+she came here, that was also a coincidence, and a strange one."
+
+"Impossible!" exclaimed the baroness.
+
+"Why impossible? They say the dead sometimes return from the tomb, and
+the princess is still alive. And why should the matter not have
+happened thus, for instance? Princess Anna Chechevinski's maid Natasha
+took advantage of the confidence and illness of the elder princess to
+steal from her strong box, with the aid of her sweetheart, Kasimir
+Bodlevski, money and securities--mark this, baroness--securities in
+the name of Princess Anna. And might it not happen that this same
+lithographer Bodlevski should get false passports at the Cave, for
+himself and his sweetheart, and flee with her across the frontier, and
+might not this same maid, twenty years later, return to Russia under
+the name of Baroness von Döring? You must admit that there is nothing
+fantastic in all this! What is the use of concealing? You see I know
+everything!"
+
+"And what follows from all this?" replied the baroness with a forced
+smile of contempt.
+
+"Much _may_ follow from it," significantly but quietly replied
+Kallash. "But at present the only important matter is, that I know
+all. I repeat it--_all_."
+
+"Where are your facts?" asked the baroness.
+
+"Facts? Hm!" laughed Kallash. "If facts are needed, they will be
+forthcoming. Believe me, dear baroness, that if I had not legally
+sufficient facts in my hands, I would not have spoken to you of this."
+
+Kallash lied, but lied with the most complete appearance of
+probability.
+
+The baroness again grew confused and turned white.
+
+"Where are your facts? Put them in my hands!" she said at last, after
+a prolonged silence.
+
+"Oh, this is too much! Get hold of them yourself!" the count replied,
+with the same smile. "The facts are generally set forth to the
+prisoner by the court; but it is enough for you in the meantime to
+know that the facts exist, and that they are in my possession.
+Believe, if you wish. If you do not wish, do not believe. I will
+neither persuade you nor dissuade you."
+
+"And this means that I am in your power? she said slowly, raising her
+piercing glance to his face.
+
+"Yes; it means that you are in my power," quietly and confidently
+answered Count Kallash.
+
+"But you forget that you and I are in the same boat."
+
+"You mean that I am a sharper, like you and Bodlevski? Well, you are
+right. We are all berries of the same bunch--except _her_" (and he
+indicated the folding doors). "She, thanks to many things, has tasted
+misery, but she is honest. But we are all rascals, and I first of all.
+You are perfectly right in that. If you wish to get me in your
+power--try to find some facts against me. Then we shall be quits!"
+
+"And what is it you wish?"
+
+"It is too late for justice, at least so far as she is concerned,"
+replied the count, with a touch of sadness; "but it is not too late
+for a measure of reparation. But we can discuss that later," he went
+on more lightly, as if throwing aside the heavy impression produced by
+the thought of Princess Anna's misery. "And now, dear baroness, let us
+return to business, the business of Prince Shadursky! I will think the
+matter over, and see whether anything suggests itself."
+
+He courteously conducted the baroness to the carriage, and they
+parted, to all appearance, friends. But there were dangerous elements
+for both in that seeming friendship.
+
+
+XIV
+
+GOLD MINING
+
+
+A wonderful scheme was hatched in Count Kallash's fertile brain.
+Inspired by the thought of Prince Shadursky's newly replenished
+millions, he devised a plan for the gang which promised brilliant
+results, and only needed the aid of a discreet and skillful
+confederate. And what confederate could be more trustworthy than
+Sergei Antonovitch Kovroff? So the two friends were presently to be
+found in secret consultation in the count's handsome study, with a
+bottle of good Rhine wine before them, fine cigars between their lips,
+and the memory of a well-served breakfast lingering pleasantly in
+their minds. They were talking about the new resources of the
+Shadurskys.
+
+"To take their money at cards--what a wretched business--and so
+infernally commonplace," said Count Kallash. "To tell you the truth, I
+have for a long time been sick of cards! And, besides, time is money!
+Why should we waste several weeks, or even months, over something that
+could be done in a few days?"
+
+Kovroff agreed completely, but at the same time put the question, if
+not cards, what plan was available?
+
+"That is it exactly!" cried Kallash, warming up. "I have thought it
+all over. The problem is this: we must think up something that would
+surprise Satan himself, something that would make all Hades smile and
+blow us hot kisses. But what of Hades?--that's all nonsense. We must
+do something that will make the whole Golden Band throw up their caps.
+That is what we have to do!"
+
+"Quite a problem," lazily answered Kovroff, chewing the end of his
+cigar. "But you are asking too much."
+
+"But that is not all," the count interrupted him; "listen! This is
+what my problem demands. We must think of some project that unites two
+precious qualities: first, a rapid and huge profit; second, entire
+absence of risk."
+
+"Conditions not altogether easy to fulfill," remarked Kovroff
+doubtfully.
+
+"So it seems. And daring plans are not to be picked up in the street,
+but are the result of inspiration. It is what is called a 'heavenly
+gift,' my dear friend."
+
+"And you have had an inspiration?" smiled Sergei Antonovitch, with a
+slightly ironical shade of friendly skepticism.
+
+"I have had an inspiration," replied the supposititious Hungarian
+nobleman, falling into the other's tone.
+
+"And your muse is----?"
+
+"The tenth of the muses," the count interrupted him: "another name is
+Industry."
+
+"She is the muse of all of us."
+
+"And mine in particular. But we are not concerned with her, but with
+her prophetic revelations."
+
+"Oh, dear count! Circumlocutions apart! This Rhine wine evidently
+carries you to misty Germany. Tell me simply what the matter is."
+
+"The matter is simply this: we must institute a society of 'gold
+miners,' and we must find gold in places where the geological
+indications are dead against it. That is the problem. The Russian
+laws, under threat of arrest and punishment, sternly forbid the
+citizens of the Russian Empire, and likewise the citizens of other
+lands within the empire, to buy or sell the noble metals in their
+crude form, that is, in nuggets, ore, or dust. For example, if you
+bought gold in the rough from me--gold dust, for example--we should
+both, according to law, have to take a pleasant little trip beyond the
+Ural Mountains to Siberia, and there we should have to engage in
+mining the precious metal ourselves. A worthy occupation, no doubt,
+but not a very profitable one for us."
+
+"Our luxuries would be strictly limited," jested Kovroff, with a wry
+smile.
+
+"There it is! You won't find many volunteers for that occupation, and
+that is the fulcrum of my whole plan. You must understand that gold
+dust in the mass is practically indistinguishable in appearance from
+brass filings. Let us suppose that we secretly sell some perfectly
+pure brass filings for gold dust, and that they are readily bought of
+us, because we sell considerably below the market rate. It goes
+without saying that the purchaser will presently discover that we have
+done him brown. But, I ask you, will he go and accuse us knowing that,
+as the penalty for his purchase, he will have to accompany us along
+the Siberian road?"
+
+"No man is his own enemy," sententiously replied Kovroff, beginning to
+take a vivid interest in what his companion was saying. "But how are
+you going to work it?"
+
+"You will know at the proper time. The chief thing is, that our
+problem is solved in the most decisive manner. You and I are pretty
+fair judges of human nature, so we may be pretty sure that we shall
+always find purchasers, and I suggest that we make a beginning on
+young Prince Shadursky. How we shall get him into it is my business.
+I'll tell you later on. But how do you like the general idea of my
+plan?"
+
+"It's clever enough!" cried Kovroff, pressing his hand with the gay
+enthusiasm of genuine interest.
+
+"For this truth much thanks!" cried Kallash, clinking glasses with
+him. "It is clever--that is the best praise I could receive from you.
+Let us drink to the success of my scheme!"
+
+
+XV
+
+THE FISH BITES
+
+
+Three days after this conversation the younger prince Shadursky dined
+with Sergei Antonovitch Kovroff.
+
+That morning he received a note from Kovroff, in which the worthy
+Sergei complained of ill health and begged the prince to come and dine
+with him and cheer him up.
+
+The prince complied with his request, and appearing at the appointed
+time found Count Kallash alone with his host.
+
+Among other gossip, the prince announced that he expected shortly to
+go to Switzerland, as he had bad reports of the health of his mother,
+who was in Geneva.
+
+At this news Kallash glanced significantly toward Kovroff.
+
+Passing from topic to topic, the conversation finally turned to the
+financial position of Russia. Sergei Antonovitch, according to his
+expression, "went to the root of the matter," and indicated the
+"source of the evil," very frankly attacking the policy of the
+government, which did everything to discourage gold mining, hedging
+round this most important industry with all kinds of difficulties, and
+practically prohibiting the free production of the precious metals by
+laying on it a dead weight of costly formalities.
+
+"I have facts ready to hand," he went on, summing up his argument. "I
+have an acquaintance here, an employee of one of the best-known men in
+the gold-mining industry." Here Kovroff mentioned a well-known name.
+"He is now in St. Petersburg. Well, a few days ago he suddenly came to
+me as if he had something weighing on his mind. And I have had
+business relations with him in times past. Well, what do you think? He
+suddenly made me a proposal, secretly of course; would I not take some
+gold dust off his hands? You must know that these trusted employees
+every year bring several hundred pounds of gold from Asia, and of
+course it stands to reason that they cannot get rid of it in the
+ordinary way, but smuggle it through private individuals. It is
+uncommonly profitable for the purchasers, because they buy far below
+the market rates. So there are plenty of purchasers. Several of the
+leading jewelers" (and here he named three or four of the best-known
+firms) "never refuse such a deal, and last year a banking house in
+Berlin bought a hundred pounds' weight of gold through agents here.
+Well, this same employee, my acquaintance, is looking for an
+opportunity to get rid of his wares. And he tells me he managed to
+bring in about forty pounds of gold, if not more. I introduce this
+fact to illustrate the difficulties put in the way of enterprise by
+our intelligent government."
+
+Shadursky did not greatly occupy himself with serious questions and he
+was totally ignorant of all details of financial undertakings. It was,
+therefore, perfectly easy for Sergei Antonovitch to assume a tone of
+solid, practical sense, which imposed completely on the young prince.
+Young Shadursky, from politeness, and to prove his worldly wisdom,
+assented to Kovroff's statements with equal decision. All the same,
+from this conversation, he quite clearly seized on the idea that under
+certain circumstances it would be possible to buy gold at a much lower
+price than that demanded by the Imperial Bank. And this was just the
+thought which Kallash and Kovroff wished to sow in the young prince's
+mind.
+
+"Of course, I myself do not go in for that kind of business," went on
+Kovroff carelessly, "and so I could not give my friend any help. But
+if some one were going abroad, for instance, he might well risk such
+an operation, which would pay him a very handsome profit."
+
+"How so? In what way?" asked Shadursky.
+
+"Very simply. You buy the goods here, as I already said, much below
+the government price. So that to begin with you make a very profitable
+bargain. Then you go abroad with your wares and there, as soon as the
+exchange value of gold goes up, you can sell it at the nearest bank. I
+know, for instance, that the agent of the ---- Bank" (and he mentioned
+a name well known in St. Petersburg) "made many a pretty penny for
+himself by just such a deal. This is how it was: He bought gold dust
+for forty thousand rubles, and six weeks later got rid of it in
+Hamburg for sixty thousand. Whatever you may say, fifty per cent on
+your capital in a month and a half is pretty good business."
+
+"Deuce take it! A pretty profitable bargain, without a doubt!" cried
+Shadursky, jumping from his chair. "It would just suit me! I could get
+rid of it in Geneva or Paris," he went on in a jesting tone.
+
+"What do you think? Of course!" Sergei Antonovitch took him up, but in
+a serious tone. "You or some one else--in any case it would be a good
+bargain. For my acquaintance has to go back to Asia, and has only a
+few days to spare. He doesn't know where to turn and rather than take
+his gold back with him, he would willingly let it go at an even lower
+rate than the smugglers generally ask. If I had enough free cash I
+would go in for it myself."
+
+"It looks a good proposition," commented Count Kallash.
+
+"It is certainly very enticing; what do you think?" said Prince
+Shadursky interrogatively, folding his arms.
+
+"Hm--yes! very enticing," answered Kovroff. "A fine chance for anyone
+who has the money."
+
+"I would not object! I would not object!" protested Shadursky.
+"Suppose you let me become acquainted with your friend."
+
+"You? Well--" And Kovroff considered; "if you wish. Why not? Only I
+warn you, first, if you are going to buy, buy quickly, for my friend
+can't wait; and secondly, keep the matter a complete secret, for very
+unpleasant results might follow."
+
+"That goes without saying. That stands to reason," assented Shadursky.
+"I can get the money at once and I am just going abroad, in a day or
+two at the latest. So it would be foolish to miss such a chance. So it
+is a bargain?" And he held out his hand to Kovroff.
+
+"How a bargain?" objected the cautious Sergei Antonovitch. "I am not
+personally concerned in the matter, and you must admit, my dear
+prince, that I can make no promises for my acquaintance."
+
+"I don't mean that!" cried Shadursky. "I only ask you to arrange for
+me to meet him. Bring us together--and drop him a hint that I do not
+object to buying his wares. You will confer a great obligation on me."
+
+"Oh, that is quite a different matter. That I can always do; the more
+so, because we are such good friends. Why should I not do you such a
+trifling service? As far as an introduction is concerned, you may
+count on it." And they cordially shook each other by the hand.
+
+
+XVI
+
+GOLD DUST
+
+
+Both Kallash and Kovroff were too cautious to take an immediate,
+personal part in the gold-dust sale. There was a certain underling,
+Mr. Escrocevitch by name, at Sergei Kovroff's beck and call--a shady
+person, rather dirty in aspect, and who was, therefore, only admitted
+to Sergei's presence by the back door and through the kitchen, and
+even then only at times when there were no outsiders present.
+
+Mr. Escrocevitch was a person of general utility and was especially
+good at all kinds of conjuring tricks. Watches, snuff-boxes,
+cigar-cases, silver spoons, and even heavy bronze paper-weights
+acquired the property of suddenly vanishing from under his hands, and
+of suddenly reappearing in a quite unexpected quarter. This valuable
+gift had been acquired by Mr. Escrocevitch in his early years, when he
+used to wander among the Polish fairs, swallowing burning flax for the
+delectation of the public and disgorging endless yards of ribbon and
+paper.
+
+Mr. Escrocevitch was a precious and invaluable person also owing to
+his capacity of assuming any _rôle_, turning himself into any given
+character, and taking on the corresponding tone, manners, and
+appearance, and he was, further, a pretty fair actor.
+
+He it was who was chosen to play the part of the Siberian employee.
+
+Not more than forty-eight hours had passed since the previous
+conversation. Prince Shadursky was just up, when his footman announced
+to him that a Mr. Valyajnikoff wished to see him.
+
+The prince put on his dressing gown and went into the drawing-room,
+where the tolerably presentable but strangely dressed person of Mr.
+Escrocevitch presented itself to him.
+
+"Permit me to have the honor of introducing myself," he began, bowing
+to Prince Shadursky; "I am Ivanovitch Valyajnikoff. Mr. Sergei
+Antonovitch Kovroff was so good as to inform me of a certain intention
+of yours about the dust. So, if your excellency has not changed your
+mind, I am ready to sell it to you with pleasure."
+
+"Very good of you," answered Prince Shadursky, smiling gayly, and
+giving him a chair.
+
+"To lose no time over trifles," continued Mr. Escrocevitch, "let me
+invite you to my quarters. I am staying at a hotel; you can see the
+goods there; you can make tests, and, if you are satisfied, I shall be
+very happy to oblige your excellency."
+
+Prince Shadursky immediately finished dressing, ordered his carriage,
+and went out with the supposititious Valyajnikoff. They drove to a
+shabby hotel and went to a dingy room.
+
+"This is my poor abode. I am only here on the wing, so to speak. I
+humbly request you to be seated," Mr. Escrocevitch said obsequiously.
+"Not to lose precious time, perhaps your excellency would like to look
+at my wares? Here they are--and I am most willing to show them."
+
+And he dragged from under the bed a big trunk, in which were five
+canvas bags of various sizes, packed full and tied tightly.
+
+"Here, here it is! This is our Siberian dust," he said, smiling and
+bowing, indicating the trunk with a wave of his hand, as if
+introducing it to Prince Shadursky.
+
+"Would not your excellency be so good as to choose one of these bags
+to make a test? It will be much better if you see yourself that the
+business is above board, with no swindle about it. Choose whichever
+you wish!"
+
+Shadursky lifted one of the bags from the trunk, and when Mr.
+Escrocevitch untied it before the young prince's eyes appeared a mass
+of metallic grains, at which he gazed not without inward pleasure.
+
+"How are you going to make a test?" he asked. "We have no blow-pipes
+nor test-tubes here?"
+
+"Make your mind easy, your excellency! We shall find everything we
+require--blow-pipes and test-tubes and nitric acid, and even a decimal
+weighing machine. In our business we arrange matters in such a way
+that we need not disturb outsiders. Only charcoal we haven't got, but
+we can easily send for some."
+
+And going to the door, he gave the servant in the passage an order,
+and a few minutes later the latter returned with a dish of charcoal.
+
+"First class! Now everything is ready," cried Mr. Escrocevitch,
+rubbing his hands; and for greater security he turned the key in the
+door.
+
+"Take whichever piece of charcoal you please, your excellency; but,
+not to soil your hands, you had better let me take it myself, and you
+sprinkle some of the dust on it," and he humbled himself before the
+prince. "Forgive me for asking you to do it all yourself, since it is
+not from any lack of politeness on my part, but simply in order that
+your excellency should be fully convinced that there is no deception."
+Saying this, he got his implements ready and lit the lamp.
+
+The blow-pipe came into action. Valyajnikoff made the experiment, and
+Shadursky attentively followed every movement. The charcoal glowed
+white hot, the dust ran together and disappeared, and in its place,
+when the charcoal had cooled a little, and the amateur chemist
+presented it to Prince Shadursky, the prince saw a little ball of gold
+lying in a crevice of the charcoal, such as might easily have formed
+under the heat of the blow-pipe.
+
+"Take the globule, your excellency, and place it, for greater
+security, in your pocketbook," said Escrocevitch; "you may even wrap
+it up in a bit of paper; and keep the sack of gold dust yourself, so
+that there can be no mistake."
+
+Shadursky gladly followed this last piece of advice.
+
+"And now, your excellency, I should like you kindly to select another
+bag; we shall make two or three more tests in the same way."
+
+The prince consented to this also.
+
+Escrocevitch handed him a new piece of charcoal to sprinkle dust on,
+and once more brought the blow-pipe into operation. And again the
+brass filings disappeared and in the crevice appeared a new globule of
+gold.
+
+"Well, perhaps these two tests will be sufficient. What is your
+excellency good enough to think on that score?" asked the supposed
+Valyajnikoff.
+
+"What is the need of further tests? The matter is clear enough,"
+assented the prince.
+
+"If it is satisfactory, we shall proceed to make it even more
+satisfactory. Here we have a touch-stone, and here we have some nitric
+acid. Try the globules on the touch-stone physically, and, so to
+speak, with the nitric acid chemically. And if you wish to make even
+more certain, this is what we shall do. What quantity of gold does
+your excellency wish to take?"
+
+"The more the better. I am ready to buy all these bags."
+
+"_Very_ much obliged to your excellency, as this will suit me
+admirably," said Escrocevitch, bowing low. "And so, if your excellency
+is ready, then I humbly beg you to take each bag, examine it, and seal
+it with your excellency's own seal. Then let us take one of the
+globules and go to one of the best jewelers in St. Petersburg. Let him
+tell us the value of the gold and in this way the business will be
+exact; there will be no room for complaint on either side, since
+everything will be fair and above board."
+
+The prince was charmed with the honesty and frankness of Mr.
+Valyajnikoff.
+
+They went together to one of the best-known jewelers, who, in their
+presence, made a test and announced that the gold was chemically pure,
+without any alloy, and therefore of the highest value.
+
+On their return to the hotel, Mr. Escrocevitch weighed the bags, which
+turned out to weigh forty-eight pounds. Allowing three pounds for the
+weight of the bags, this left forty-five pounds of pure gold.
+
+"How much a pound do you want?" Shadursky asked him.
+
+"A pretty low price, your excellency," answered the Siberian, with a
+shrug of his shoulders, "as I am selling from extreme necessity,
+because I have to leave for Siberia; I've spent too much time and
+money in St. Petersburg already; and if I cannot sell my wares, I
+shall not be able to go at all. I assume that the government price is
+known to your excellency?"
+
+"But I am willing to take two hundred rubles a pound."
+
+I can't take a kopeck less, and even so I am making a reduction of
+nearly a hundred rubles the pound."
+
+"All right!" assented Shadursky. "That will amount to--" he went on,
+knitting his brows, "forty-five pounds at two hundred rubles a
+pound----"
+
+"It will make exactly nine thousand, your excellency. Just exactly
+nine," Escrocevitch obsequiously helped him out. The prince, cutting
+the matter short, immediately gave him a check, and taking the trunk
+with the coveted bags, drove with the Siberian employee to his
+father's house, where the elder Prince Shadursky, at his son's
+pressing demand, though very unwillingly, exchanged the check for nine
+thousand rubles in bills, for which Ivan Ivanovitch Valyajnikoff
+forthwith gave a receipt. The prince was delighted with his purchase,
+and he did not utter a syllable about it to anyone except Kovroff.
+
+Sergei Antonovitch gave him a friendly counsel not to waste any time,
+but to go abroad at once, as, according to the _Exchange Gazette_,
+gold was at that moment very high, so that he had an admirable
+opportunity to get rid of his wares on very favorable terms.
+
+The prince, in fact, without wasting time got his traveling passport,
+concealed his purchase with the utmost care, and set out for the
+frontier, announcing that he was on his way to his mother, whose
+health imperatively demanded his presence.
+
+The success of the whole business depended on the fact that brass
+filings, which bear a strong external resemblance to gold dust, are
+dissipated in the strong heat of the blow-pipe. The charcoal was
+prepared beforehand, a slight hollow being cut in it with a penknife,
+in the bottom of which is placed a globule of pure gold, the top of
+which is just below the level of the charcoal, and the hollow is
+filled up with powdered charcoal mixed with a little bees-wax. The
+"chemist" who makes the experiments must make himself familiar with
+the distinctive appearance of the charcoal, so as to pick it out from
+among several pieces, and must remember exactly where the crevice is.
+
+On this first occasion, Escrocevitch had prepared all four pieces of
+charcoal, which were brought by the servant in the passage. He chose
+as his temporary abode a hotel whose proprietor was an old ally of
+his, and the servant was also a confederate.
+
+Thus was founded the famous "Gold Products Company," which is still in
+very successful operation, and is constantly widening its sphere of
+activity.
+
+
+XVII
+
+THE DELUGE
+
+
+Count Kallash finally decided on his course of action. It was too late
+to seek justice for his sister, but not too late for a tardy
+reparation. The gang had prospered greatly, and the share of Baroness
+von Döring and Bodlevski already amounted to a very large figure.
+Count Kallash determined to demand for his sister a sum equal to that
+of the securities in her name which Natasha had stolen, calculating
+that this would be enough to maintain his sister in peace and comfort
+to the end of her days. His own life was too stormy, too full of risks
+for him to allow his sister's fate to depend on his, so he had decided
+to settle her in some quiet nook where, free from danger, she might
+dream away her few remaining years.
+
+To his surprise Baroness von Döring flatly refused to be put under
+contribution.
+
+"Your demand is outrageous," she said. "I am not going to be the
+victim of any such plot!"
+
+"Very well, I will compel you to unmask?"
+
+"To unmask? What do you mean, count? You forget yourself!"
+
+"Well, then, I shall try to make you remember me!" And Kallash turned
+his back on her and strode from the room. A moment later, and she
+heard the door close loudly behind him.
+
+The baroness had already told Bodlevski of her meeting with Princess
+Anna, and she now hurried to him for counsel. They agreed that their
+present position, with Kallash's threats hanging over their heads, was
+intolerable. But what was to be done?
+
+Bodlevski paced up and down the room, biting his lips, and seeking
+some decisive plan.
+
+"We must act in such a way," he said, coming to a stand before the
+baroness, "as to get rid of this fellow once for all. I think he is
+dangerous, and it never does any harm to take proper precautions. Get
+the money ready, Natasha; we must give it to him."
+
+"What! give him the money!" and the baroness threw up her hands. "Will
+that get us out of his power? Can we feel secure? It will only last
+till something new happens. At the first occasion----"
+
+"Which will also be the last!" interrupted Bodlevski. "Suppose we do
+give him the money to-day; does that mean that we give it for good?
+Not at all! It will be back in my pocket to-morrow! Let us think it
+out properly!" and he gave her a friendly pat on the shoulder, and sat
+down in an easy chair in front of her.
+
+The result of their deliberations was a little note addressed to Count
+Kallash:
+
+"DEAR COUNT," it ran, "I was guilty of an act of folly toward you
+to-day. I am ashamed of it, and wish to make amends as soon as
+possible. We have always been good friends, so let us forget our
+little difference, the more so that an alliance is much more
+advantageous to us both than a quarrel. Come this evening to receive
+the money you spoke of, and to clasp in amity the hand of your devoted
+friend, VON D."
+
+Kallash came about ten o'clock in the evening, and received from
+Bodlevski the sum of fifty thousand rubles in notes. The baroness was
+very amiable, and persuaded him to have some tea. There was not a
+suggestion of future difficulties, and everything seemed to promise
+perfect harmony for the future. Bodlevski talked over plans of future
+undertakings, and told him, with evident satisfaction, that they had
+just heard of the arrest of the younger Prince Shadursky, in Paris,
+for attempting to defraud a bank by a pretended sale of gold dust.
+Count Kallash was also gay, and a certain satisfaction filled his mind
+at the thought of his sister's security, as he felt the heavy packet
+of notes in his pocket. He smoked his cigar with evident satisfaction,
+sipping the fragrant tea from time to time. The conversation was gay
+and animated, and for some reason or other turned to the subject of
+clubs.
+
+"Ah, yes," interposed Bodlevski, "_a propos_! I expect to be a member
+of the Yacht Club this summer. Let me recommend to you a new field of
+action. They will disport themselves on the green water, and we on the
+green cloth! By the way, I forgot to speak of it--I bought a boat the
+other day, a mere rowboat. It is on the Fontauka Canal, at the
+Simeonovski bridge. We must come for a row some day."
+
+"Delightful," exclaimed the baroness. "But why some day? Why not
+to-night? The moon is beautiful, and, indeed, it is hardly dark at
+midnight. Your speaking of boats has filled me with a sudden desire to
+go rowing. What do you say, dear count?" and she turned amiably to
+Kallash.
+
+Count Kallash at once consented, considering the baroness's idea an
+admirable one, and they were soon on their way toward the Simeonovski
+bridge.
+
+"How delightful it is!" cried the baroness, some half hour later, as
+they were gliding over the quiet water. "Count, do you like strong
+sensations?" she asked suddenly.
+
+"I am fond of strong sensations of every kind," he replied, taking up
+her challenge.
+
+"Well, I am going to offer you a little sensation, though it always
+greatly affects me. Everything is just right for it, and I am in the
+humor, too."
+
+"What is it to be?" asked Count Kallash indifferently.
+
+"You will see in a moment. Do you know that there are underground
+canals in St. Petersburg?"
+
+"In St. Petersburg?" asked Kallash in astonishment.
+
+"Yes, in St. Petersburg! A whole series of underground rivers, wide
+enough for a boat to pass through. I have rowed along them several
+times. Does not that offer a new sensation, something quite unlike St.
+Petersburg?"
+
+"Yes, it is certainly novel," answered Count Kallash, now interested.
+"Where are they? Pray show them to me."
+
+"There is one a few yards off. Shall we enter? You are not afraid?"
+she said with a smile of challenge.
+
+"By no means--unless you command me to be afraid," Kallash replied in
+the same tone. "Let us enter at once!"
+
+"Kasimir, turn under the arch!" and the boat cut across the canal
+toward a half circle of darkness. A moment more and the darkness
+engulfed them completely. They were somewhere under the Admiralty, not
+far from St. Isaac's Cathedral. Away ahead of them was a tiny half
+circle of light, where the canal joined the swiftly flowing Neva.
+Carriages rumbled like distant thunder above their heads.
+
+"Deuce take it! it is really rather fine!" cried the count, with
+evident pleasure. "A meeting of pirates is all we need to make it
+perfect. It is a pity that we cannot see where we are!"
+
+"Light a match. Have you any?" said the baroness.
+
+"I have, and wax matches, too." The count took out a match and lit it,
+and the underground stream was lit by a faint ruddy glow. The channel,
+covered by a semi-circular arch, was just wide enough for one boat to
+pass through, with oars out. The black water flowed silently by in a
+sluggish, Stygian stream. Bats, startled by the light, fluttered in
+their faces, and then disappeared in the darkness.
+
+As the boat glided on, the match burned out in Count Kallash's
+fingers. He threw it into the water, and opened his matchbox to take
+another.
+
+At the same moment he felt a sharp blow on the head, followed by a
+second, and he sank senseless in the bottom of the boat.
+
+"Where is the money?" cried Bodlevski, who had struck him with the
+handle of the oar. "Get his coat open!" and the baroness deftly drew
+the thick packet from the breast pocket of his coat. "Here it is! I
+have it!" she replied quickly.
+
+"Now, overboard with him! Keep the body steady!" A dull splash, and
+then silence. "To-night we shall sleep secure!"
+
+They counted without their host. Princess Anna had also her scheme of
+vengeance, and had worked it out, without a word to her brother. When
+Natasha and Bodlevski entered their apartment, they found the police
+in possession, and a few minutes later both were under arrest.
+Abundant evidence of fraud and forgery was found in their dwelling,
+and the vast Siberian solitudes avenged the death of their last
+victim.
+
+
+
+JÖRGEN WILHELM BERGSÖE
+
+
+_THE AMPUTATED ARMS_
+
+
+It happened when I was about eighteen or nineteen years old (began Dr.
+Simsen). I was studying at the University, and being coached in
+anatomy by my old friend Sölling. He was an amusing fellow, this
+Sölling. Full of jokes and whimsical ideas, and equally merry, whether
+he was working at the dissecting table or brewing a punch for a jovial
+crowd.
+
+He had but one fault--if one might call it so--and that was his
+exaggerated idea of punctuality. He grumbled if you were late two
+minutes; any longer delay would spoil the entire evening for him. He
+himself was never known to be late. At least not during the entire
+years of my studying.
+
+One Wednesday evening our little circle of friends met as usual in my
+room at seven o'clock. I had made the customary preparations for the
+meeting, had borrowed three chairs--I had but one myself--had cleaned
+all my pipes, and had persuaded Hans to take the breakfast dishes from
+the sofa and carry them downstairs. One by one my friends arrived, the
+clock struck seven, and to our great astonishment, Sölling had not yet
+appeared. One, two, even five minutes passed before we heard him run
+upstairs and knock at the door with his characteristic short blows.
+
+When he entered the room he looked so angry and at the same time so
+upset that I cried out: "What's the matter, Sölling? You look as if
+you had been robbed."
+
+"That's exactly what has happened," replied Sölling angrily. "But it
+was no ordinary sneak thief," he added, hanging his overcoat behind
+the door.
+
+"What have you lost?" asked my neighbor Nansen.
+
+"Both arms from the new skeleton I've just recently received from the
+hospital," said Sölling with an expression as if his last cent had
+been taken from him. "It's vandalism!"
+
+We burst out into loud laughter at this remarkable answer, but Sölling
+continued: "Can you imagine it? Both arms are gone, cut off at the
+shoulder joint;--and the strangest part of it is that the same thing
+has been done to my shabby old skeleton which stands in my bedroom,
+There wasn't an arm on either of them."
+
+"That's too bad," I remarked. "For we were just going to study the
+_anatomy_ of the arm to-night."
+
+"Osteology," corrected Sölling gravely. "Get out your skeleton, little
+Simsen. It isn't as good as mine, but it will do for this
+evening."
+
+I went to the corner where my anatomical treasures were hidden behind
+a green curtain--"the Museum," was what Sölling called it--but my
+astonishment was great when I found my skeleton in its accustomed
+place and wearing as usual my student's uniform--but without arms.
+
+"The devil!" cried Sölling. "That was done by the same person who
+robbed me; the arms are taken off at the shoulder joint in exactly the
+same manner. You did it, Simsen!"
+
+I declared my innocence, very angry at the abuse of my fine skeleton,
+while Nansen cried: "Wait a moment, I'll bring in mine. There hasn't
+been a soul in my room since this morning, I can swear to that. I'll
+be back in an instant."
+
+He hurried into his room, but returned in a few moments greatly
+depressed and somewhat ashamed. The skeleton was in its usual place,
+but the arms were gone, cut off at the shoulder in exactly the same
+manner as mine.
+
+The affair, mysterious in itself, had now come to be a serious matter.
+We lost ourselves in suggestions and explanations, none of which
+seemed to throw any light on the subject. Finally we sent a messenger
+to the other side of the house where, as I happened to know, was a new
+skeleton which the young student Ravn had recently received from the
+janitor of the hospital.
+
+Ravn had gone out and taken the key with him. The messenger whom we
+had sent to the rooms of the Iceland students returned with the
+information that one of them had used the only skeleton they possessed
+to pummel the other with, and that consequently only the thigh bones
+were left unbroken.
+
+What were we to do? We couldn't understand the matter at all. Sölling
+scolded and cursed and the company was about to break up when we heard
+some one coming noisily upstairs. The door was thrown open and a tall,
+thin figure appeared on the threshold--our good friend Niels Daae.
+
+He was a strange chap, this Niels Daae, the true type of a species
+seldom found nowadays. He was no longer young, and by reason of a
+queer chain of circumstances, as he expressed it, he had been through
+nearly all the professions and could produce papers proving that he
+had been on the point of passing not one but three examinations.
+
+He had begun with theology; but the story of the quarrel between Jacob
+and Esau had led him to take up the study of law. As a law student he
+had come across an interesting poisoning case, which had proved to him
+that a study of medicine was extremely necessary for lawyers; and he
+had taken up the study of medicine with such energy that he had
+forgotten all his law and was about to take his last examinations at
+the age of forty.
+
+Niels Daae took the story of our troubles very seriously. "Every pot
+has two handles," he began. "Every sausage two ends, every question
+two sides, except this one--this has three." (Applause.) "When we look
+at it from the legal point of view there can be no doubt that it
+belongs in the category of ordinary theft. But from the fact that the
+thief took only the arms when he might have taken the entire skeleton,
+we must conclude that he is not in a responsible condition of mind,
+which therefore introduces a medical side to the affair. From a legal
+point of view, the thief must be convicted for robbery, or at least
+for the illegal appropriation of the property of others; but from the
+medical point of view, we must acquit him, because he is not
+responsible for his acts. Here we have two professions quarreling with
+one another, and who shall say which is right? But now I will
+introduce the theological point of view, and raise the entire affair
+up to a higher plane. Providence, in the material shape of a patron of
+mine in the country, whose children I have inoculated with the juice
+of wisdom, has sent me two fat geese and two first-class ducks. These
+animals are to be cooked and eaten this evening in Mathiesen's
+establishment, and I invite this honored company to join me there.
+Personally I look upon the disappearance of these arms as an all-wise
+intervention of Providence, which sets its own inscrutable wisdom up
+against the wisdom which we would otherwise have heard from the lips
+of my venerable friend Sölling."
+
+Daae's confused speech was received with laughter and applause, and
+Sölling's weak protests were lost in the general delight at the
+invitation. I have often noticed that such improvised festivities are
+usually the most enjoyable, and so it was for us that evening. Niels
+Daae treated us to his ducks and to his most amusing jokes, Sölling
+sang his best songs, our jovial host Mathiesen told his wittiest
+stories, and the merriment was in full swing when we heard cries in
+the street, and then a rush of confused noises broken by screams of
+pain.
+
+"There's been an accident," cried Sölling, running out to the door.
+
+We all followed him and discovered that a pair of run-away horses had
+thrown a carriage against a tree, hurling the driver from his box,
+under the wheels. His right arm had been broken near the shoulder. In
+the twinkling of an eye the hall of festivities was transformed into
+an emergency hospital. Sölling shook his head as he examined the
+injury, and ordered the transport of the patient to the city hospital.
+It was his belief that the arm would have to be amputated, cut off at
+the shoulder joint, just as had been the case with our skeleton.
+"Damned odd coincidence, isn't it?" he remarked to me.
+
+Our merry mood had vanished and we took our way, quiet and depressed,
+through the old avenues toward our home. For the first time in its
+existence possibly, our venerable "barracks," as we called the
+dormitory, saw its occupants returning home from an evening's bout
+just as the night watchman intoned his eleven o'clock verse.
+
+"Just eleven," exclaimed Sölling. "It's too early to go to bed, and
+too late to go anywhere else. We'll go up to your room, little Simsen,
+and see if we can't have some sort of a lesson this evening. You have
+your colored plates and we'll try to get along with them. It's a
+nuisance that we should have lost those arms just this evening."
+
+"The Doctor can have all the arms and legs he wants," grinned Hans,
+who came out of the doorway just in time to hear Sölling's last word.
+
+"What do you mean, Hans?" asked Sölling in astonishment.
+
+"It'll be easy enough to get them," said Hans. "They've torn down the
+planking around the Holy Trinity churchyard, and dug up the earth to
+build a new wall. I saw it myself, as I came past the church. Lord,
+what a lot of bones they've dug out there! There's arms and legs and
+heads, many more than the Doctor could possibly need."
+
+"Much good that does us," answered Sölling. "They shut the gates at
+seven o'clock and it's after eleven already."
+
+"Oh, yes, they shut them," grinned Hans again. "But there's another
+way to get in. If you go through the gate of the porcelain factory and
+over the courtyard, and through the mill in the fourth courtyard that
+leads out into Spring Street, there you will see where the planking is
+torn down and you can get into the churchyard easily."
+
+"Hans, you're a genius!" exclaimed Sölling in delight. "Here, Simsen,
+you know that factory inside and out, you're so friendly with that
+fellow Outzen who lives there. Run along to him and let him give you
+the key of the mill. It will be easy to find an arm that isn't too
+much decayed. Hurry along, now; the rest of us will wait for you
+upstairs."
+
+To be quite candid I must confess that I was not particularly eager to
+fulfill Sölling's command. I was at an age to have still a sufficient
+amount of reverence for death and the grave, and the mysterious
+occurrence of the stolen arms still ran through my mind. But I was
+still more afraid of Sölling's irony and of the laughter of my
+comrades, so I trotted off as carelessly as if I had been sent to buy
+a package of cigarettes.
+
+It was some time before I could arouse the old janitor of the factory
+from his peaceful slumbers. I told him that I had an important message
+from Outzen, and hurried upstairs to the latter's room. Outzen was a
+strictly moral character; knowing this, I was prepared to have him
+refuse me the key which would let me into the fourth courtyard and
+from there into the cemetery. As I expected, Outzen took the matter
+very seriously. He closed the Hebrew Bible which he had been studying
+as I entered, turned up his lamp and looked at me in astonishment as I
+made my request.
+
+"Why, my dear Simsen, it is a most sinful deed that you are about to
+do," he said gravely. "Take my advice and desist. You will get no key
+from me for any such cause. The peace of the grave is sacred. No man
+dare disturb it."
+
+"And how about the gravedigger? He puts the newly dead down beside the
+old corpses, and lives as peacefully as anyone else."
+
+"He is doing his duty," answered Outzen calmly. "But to disturb the
+peace of the grave from sheer daring, with the fumes of the punch
+still in your head,--that is a different matter,--that will surely be
+punished!"
+
+His words irritated me. It is not very flattering, particularly if one
+is not yet twenty, to be told that you are about to perform a daring
+deed simply because you are drunk. Without any further reply to his
+protests I took the key from its place on the wall and ran downstairs
+two steps at a time, vowing to myself that I would take home an arm
+let cost what it would. I would show Outzen, and Sölling, and all the
+rest, what a devil of a fellow I was.
+
+My heart beat rapidly as I stole through the long dark corridor, past
+the ruins of the old convent of St. Clara, into the so-called third
+courtyard. Here I took a lantern from the hall, lit it and crossed to
+the mill where the clay was prepared for the factory. The tall wheels
+and cylinders, with their straps and bolts, looked like weird
+creatures of the night in the dim light of my tallow candle. I felt my
+courage sinking even here, but I pulled myself together, opened the
+last door with my key and stepped out into the fourth courtyard. A
+moment later I stood on the dividing line between the cemetery and the
+factory.
+
+The entire length of the tall blackened planking had been torn down.
+The pieces of it lay about, and the earth had been dug up to
+considerable depth, to make a foundation for a new wall between Life
+and Death. The uncanny emptiness of the place seized upon me. I halted
+involuntarily as if to harden myself against it. It was a raw, cold,
+stormy evening. The clouds flew past the moon in jagged fragments, so
+that the churchyard, with its white crosses and stones, lay now in
+full light, now in dim shadow. Now and then a rush of wind rattled
+over the graves, roared through the leafless trees, bent the
+complaining bushes, and caught itself in the little eddy at the corner
+of the church, only to escape again over the roofs, turning the old
+weather vane with a sharp scream of the rusty iron.
+
+I looked toward the left--there I saw several weird white shapes
+moving gently in the moonlight. "White sheets," I said to myself,
+"it's nothing but white sheets! This drying of linen in the churchyard
+ought to be stopped."
+
+I turned in the opposite direction and saw a heap of bones scarce two
+paces distant from me. Holding my lantern lower, I approached them and
+stretched out my hand--there was a rattling in the heap; something
+warm and soft touched my fingers.
+
+I started and shivered. Then I exclaimed: "The rats! nothing but the
+rats in the churchyard! I must not get frightened. It will be so
+foolish--they would laugh at me. Where the devil is that arm? I can't
+find one that isn't broken!"
+
+With trembling knees and in feverish haste I examined one heap after
+another. The light in my lantern flickered in the wind and suddenly
+went out. The foul smell of the smoking wick rose to my face and I
+felt as if I were about to faint. It took all my energy to recover my
+control. I walked two or three steps ahead, and saw at a little
+distance a coffin which had been still in good shape when taken out of
+the earth.
+
+I approached it and saw that it was of old-fashioned shape, made of
+heavy oaken boards that were already rotting. On its cover was a metal
+plate with an illegible inscription. The old wood was so brittle that
+it would have been very easy for me to open the coffin with any sort
+of a tool. I looked about me and saw a hatchet and a couple of spades
+lying near the fence. I took one of the latter, put its flat end
+between the boards--the old coffin fell apart with a dull crackling
+protest.
+
+I turned my head aside, put my hand in through the opening, felt
+about, and taking a firm hold on one arm of the skeleton, I loosened
+it from the body with a quick jerk. The movement loosened the head as
+well, and it rolled out through the opening right to my very feet. I
+took up the skull to lay it in the coffin again--and then I saw a
+greenish phosphorescent glimmer in its empty eye sockets, a glimmer
+which came and went. Mad terror shook me at the sight. I looked up at
+the houses in the distance, then back again to the skull; the empty
+sockets shone more brightly than before. I felt that I must have some
+natural explanation for this appearance or I would go mad. I took up
+the head again--and never in my life have I had so overpowering an
+impression of the might of death and decay than in this moment.
+Myriads of disgusting clammy insects poured out of every opening of
+the skull, and a couple of shining, wormlike centipedes--_Geophiles_,
+the scientists call them--crawled about in the eye sockets. I threw
+the skull back into the coffin, sprang over the heaps of bones without
+even taking time to pick up my lantern, and ran like a hunted thing
+through the dark mill, over the factory courtyards, until I reached
+the outer gate. Here I washed the arm at the fountain, and smoothed my
+disarranged clothing. I hid my booty under my overcoat, nodded to the
+sleepy old janitor as he opened the door to me, and a few moments
+later I entered my own room with an expression which I had attempted
+to make quite calm and careless.
+
+"What the devil is the matter with you, Simsen?" cried Sölling as he
+saw me. "Have you seen a ghost? Or is the punch wearing off already?
+We thought you'd never come; why, it's nearly twelve o'clock!"
+
+Without a word I drew back my overcoat and laid my booty on the table.
+
+"By all the devils," exclaimed Sölling in anatomical enthusiasm,
+"where did you find that superb arm? Simsen knows what he's about all
+right. It's a girl's arm; isn't it beautiful? Just look at the
+hand--how fine and delicate it is! Must have worn a No. 6 glove.
+There's a pretty hand to caress and kiss!"
+
+The arm passed from one to the other amid general admiration. Every
+word that was said increased my disgust for myself and for what I had
+done. It was a woman's arm, then--what sort of a woman might she have
+been? Young and beautiful possibly--her brothers' pride, her parents'
+joy. She had faded away in her youth, cared for by loving hands and
+tender thoughts. She had fallen asleep gently, and those who loved her
+had desired to give her in death the peace she had enjoyed throughout
+her lifetime. For this they had made her coffin of thick, heavy oaken
+boards. And this hand, loved and missed by so many--it lay there now
+on an anatomical table, encircled by clouds of tobacco smoke, stared
+at by curious glances, and made the object of coarse jokes. O God! how
+terrible it was!
+
+"I must have that arm," exclaimed Sölling, when the first burst of
+admiration had passed. "When I bleach it and touch it up with varnish,
+it will be a superb specimen. I'll take it home with me."
+
+"No," I exclaimed, "I can't permit it. It was wrong of me to bring it
+away from the churchyard. I'm going right back to put the arm in its
+place."
+
+"Well, will you listen to that?" cried Sölling, amid the hearty
+laughter of the others. "Simsen's so lyric, he certainly must be
+drunk. I must have that arm at any cost."
+
+"Not much," cut in Niels Daae; "you have no right to it. It was buried
+in the earth and dug out again; it is a find, and all the rest of us
+have just as much right to it as you have."
+
+"Yes, every one of us has some share in it," said some one else.
+
+"But what are you going to do about it?" remarked Sölling. "It would
+be vandalism to break up that arm. What God has joined together let no
+man put asunder," he concluded with pathos.
+
+"Let's auction it off," exclaimed Daae. "I will be the auctioneer, and
+this key to the graveyard will serve me for a hammer."
+
+The laughter broke out anew as Daae took his place solemnly at the
+head of the table and began to whine out the following announcement:
+"I hereby notify all present that on the 25th of November, at twelve
+o'clock at midnight, in corridor No. 5 of the student barracks, a
+lady's arm in excellent condition, with all its appurtenances of wrist
+bones, joints, and finger tips, is to be offered at public auction.
+The buyer can have possession of his purchase immediately after the
+auction, and a credit of six weeks will be given to any reliable
+customer. I bid a Danish shilling."
+
+"One mark," cried Sölling mockingly.
+
+"Two," cried somebody else.
+
+"Four," exclaimed Sölling. "It's worth it. Why don't you join in,
+Simsen? You look as if you were sitting in a hornet's nest."
+
+I bid one mark more, and Sölling raised me a thaler. There were no
+more bids, the hammer fell, and the arm belonged to Sölling.
+
+"Here, take this," he said, handing me a mark piece; "it's part of
+your commission as grave robber. You shall have the rest later, unless
+you prefer that I should turn it over to the drinking fund." With
+these words Sölling wrapped the arm in a newspaper, and the gay crowd
+ran noisily down the stairs and through the streets, until their
+singing and laughter were lost in the distance.
+
+I stood alone, still dazed and bewildered, staring at the piece of
+money in my hand. My thoughts were far too much excited that I should
+hope to sleep. I turned up my lamp and took out one of my books to try
+and study myself into a quieter mood. But without success.
+
+Suddenly I heard a sound like that of a swinging pendulum. I raised my
+head and listened attentively. There was no clock either in my room or
+in the neighboring ones--but I could still hear the sound. At the same
+moment my lamp began to flicker. The oil was apparently exhausted. I
+was about to rise to fill it again, when my eyes fell upon the door,
+and I saw the graveyard key, which I had hung there, moving slowly
+back and forth with a rhythmic swing. Just as its motion seemed about
+to die away, it would receive a gentle push as from an unseen hand,
+and would swing back and forth more than ever. I stood there with open
+mouth and staring eyes, ice-cold chills ran down my back, and drops of
+perspiration stood out on my forehead. Finally, I could endure it no
+longer. I sprang to the door, seized the key with both hands and put
+it on my desk under a pile of heavy books. Then I breathed a sigh of
+relief.
+
+My lamp was about to go out and I discovered that I had no more oil.
+With feverish haste I threw my clothes off, blew out the light and
+sprang into bed as if to smother my fears.
+
+But once alone in the darkness the fears grew worse than ever. They
+grew into dreams and visions. It seemed to me as if I were out in the
+graveyard again, and heard the screaming of the rusty weather vane as
+the wind turned it. Then I was in the mill again; the wheels were
+turning and stretching out ghostly hands to draw me into the yawning
+maw of the machine. Then again, I found myself in a long, low,
+pitch-black corridor, followed by Something I could not see--Something
+that drove me to the mouth of a bottomless abyss. I would start up out
+of my half sleep, listen and look about me, then fall back again into
+an uneasy slumber.
+
+Suddenly something fell from the ceiling onto the bed, and
+"buzz--buzz--buzz" sounded about my head. It was a huge fly which had
+been sleeping in a corner of my room and had been roused by the heat
+of the stove. It flew about in great circles, now around the bed, now
+in all four corners of the chamber--"buzz--buzz--buzz"--it was
+unendurable! At last I heard it creep into a bag of sugar which had
+been left on the window sill. I sprang up and closed the bag tight.
+The fly buzzed worse than ever, but I went back to bed and attempted
+to sleep again, feeling that I had conquered the enemy.
+
+I began to count: I counted slowly to one hundred, two hundred,
+finally up to one thousand, and then at last I experienced that
+pleasant weakness which is the forerunner of true sleep. I seemed to
+be in a beautiful garden, bright with many flowers and odorous with
+all the perfumes of spring. At my side walked a beautiful young girl.
+I seemed to know her well, and yet it was not possible for me to
+remember her name, or even to know how we came to be wandering there
+together. As we walked slowly through the paths she would stop to pick
+a flower or to admire a brilliant butterfly swaying in the air.
+Suddenly a cold wind blew through the garden. The young girl trembled
+and her cheeks grew pale. "I am cold," she said to me, "do you not
+see? It is Death who is approaching us."
+
+I would have answered, but in the same moment another stronger and
+still more icy gust roared through the garden. The leaves turned pale
+on the trees, the flowerets bent their heads, and the bees and
+butterflies fell lifeless to the earth. "That is Death," whispered my
+companion, trembling.
+
+A third icy gust blew the last leaves from the bushes, white crosses
+and gravestones appeared between the bare twigs--and I was in the
+churchyard again and heard the screaming of the rusty weather vane.
+Beside me stood a heavy brass-bound coffin with a metal plate on the
+cover. I bent down to read the inscription, the cover rolled off
+suddenly, and from out the coffin rose the form of the young girl who
+had been with me in the garden. I stretched out my arms to clasp her
+to my breast--then, oh horror! I saw the greenish-gleaming, empty eye
+sockets of the skull. I felt bony arms around me, dragging me back
+into the coffin. I screamed aloud for help and woke up.
+
+My room seemed unusually light; but I remembered that it was a
+moonlight night and thought no more of it. I tried to explain the
+visions of my dream with various natural noises about me. The
+imprisoned fly buzzed as loudly as a whole swarm of bees; one half of
+my window had blown open, and the cold night air rushed in gusts into
+my room.
+
+I sprang up to close the window, and then I saw that the strong white
+light that filled my room did not come from the moon, but seemed to
+shine out from the church opposite. I heard the chiming of the bells,
+soft at first, as if in far distance, then stronger and stronger
+until, mingled with the rolling notes of the organ, a mighty rush of
+sound struck against my windows. I stared out into the street and
+could scarcely believe my eyes. The houses in the market place just
+beyond were all little one-story buildings with bow windows and wooden
+eave troughs ending in carved dragon heads. Most of them had balconies
+of carved woodwork, and high stone stoops with gleaming brass rails.
+
+But it was the church most of all that aroused my astonishment. Its
+position was completely changed. Its front turned toward our house
+where usually the side had stood. The church was brilliantly lighted,
+and now I perceived that it was this light which filled my room. I
+stood speechless amid the chiming of the bells and the roaring of the
+organ, and I saw a long wedding procession moving slowly up the center
+aisle of the church toward the altar. The light was so brilliant that
+I could distinguish each one of the figures. They were all in strange
+old-time costumes; the ladies in brocades and satins with strings of
+pearls in their powdered hair, the gentlemen in uniform with knee
+breeches, swords, and cocked hats held under their arms. But it was
+the bride who drew my attention most strongly. She was clothed in
+white satin, and a faded myrtle wreath was twisted through the
+powdered locks beneath her sweeping veil. The bridegroom at her side
+wore a red uniform and many decorations. Slowly they approached the
+altar, where an old man in black vestments and a heavy white wig was
+awaiting them. They stood before him, and I could see that he was
+reading the ritual from a gold-lettered book.
+
+One of the train stepped forward and unbuckled the bridegroom's sword,
+that his right hand might be free to take that of the bride. She
+seemed about to raise her own hand to his, when she suddenly sank
+fainting at his feet. The guests hurried toward the altar, the lights
+went out, the music stopped, and the figures floated together like
+pale white mists.
+
+But outside in the square it was still brighter than before, and I
+suddenly saw the side portal of the church burst open and the wedding
+procession move out across the market place.
+
+I turned as if to flee, but could not move a muscle. Quiet, as if
+turned to stone, I stood and watched the ghostly figures that came
+nearer and nearer. The clergyman led the train, then came the
+bridegroom and the bride, and as the latter raised her eyes to me I
+saw that it was the young girl of the garden. Her eyes were so full of
+pain, so full of sad entreaty that I could scarce endure them; but how
+shall I explain the feeling that shot through me as I suddenly
+discovered that the right sleeve of her white satin gown hung empty at
+her side? The train disappeared, and the tone of the church bells
+changed to a strange, dry, creaking sound, and the gate below me
+complained as it turned on its rusty hinges. I faced toward my own
+door. I knew that it was shut and locked, but I knew that the ghostly
+procession were coming to call me to account, and I felt that no walls
+could keep them out. My door flew open, there was a rustling as of
+silken gowns, but the figures seemed to float in in the changing forms
+of swaying white mists. Closer and closer they gathered around me,
+robbing me of breath, robbing me of the power to move. There was a
+silence as of the grave--and then I saw before me the old priest with
+his gold-lettered book. He raised his hand and spoke with a soft, deep
+voice: "The grave is sacred! Let no one dare to disturb the peace of
+the dead."
+
+"The grave is sacred!" an echo rolled through the room as the swaying
+figures moved like reeds in the wind.
+
+"What do you want? What do you demand?" I gasped in the grip of a
+deathly fear.
+
+"Give back to the grave that which belongs to it," said the deep voice
+again.
+
+"Give back to the grave that which belongs to it," repeated the echo
+as the swaying forms pressed closer to me.
+
+"But it's impossible--I can't--I have sold it--sold it at auction!" I
+screamed in despair. "It was buried and found in the earth--and sold
+for five marks eight shillings----"
+
+A hideous scream came from the ghostly ranks. They threw themselves
+upon me as the white fog rolls in from the sea, they pressed upon me
+until I could no longer breathe. Beside myself, I threw open the window
+and attempted to spring out, screaming aloud: "Help! help! murder!
+they are murdering me!"
+
+The sound of my own voice awoke me. I found myself in my night clothes
+on the window sill, one leg already out of the window and both hands
+clutching at the center post. On the street below me stood the night
+watchman, staring up at me in astonishment, while faint white clouds
+of mist rolled out of my window like smoke. All around outside lay the
+November fog, gray and moist, and as the fresh air of the early dawn
+blew cool on my face I felt my senses returning to me. I looked down
+at the night watchman--God bless him! He was a big, strong,
+comfortably fat fellow made of real flesh and blood, and no ghost
+shape of the night. I looked at the round tower of the church--how
+massive and venerable it stood there, gray in the gray of the morning
+mists. I looked over at the market place. There was a light in the
+baker shop and a farmer stood before it, tying his horse to a post.
+Back in my own room everything was in its usual place. Even the little
+paper bag with the sugar lay there on the window sill, and the
+imprisoned fly buzzed louder than ever. I knew that I was really awake
+and that the day was coming. I sprang back hastily from the window and
+was about to jump into bed, when my foot touched something hard and
+sharp.
+
+I stooped to see what it was, felt about on the floor in the half
+light, and touched a long, dry, skeleton arm which held a tiny roll of
+paper in its bony fingers. I felt about again, and found still another
+arm, also holding a roll of paper. Then I began to think that my
+reason must be going. What I had seen thus far was only an unusually
+vivid dream--a vision of my heated imagination. But I knew that I was
+awake now, and yet here lay two--no, three (for there was still
+another arm)--hard, undeniable, material proofs that what I had
+thought was hallucination, might have been reality. Trembling in the
+thought that madness was threatening me, I tore open the first roll of
+paper. On it was written the name: "Sölling." I caught at the second
+and opened it. There stood the word: "Nansen."
+
+I had just strength enough left to catch the third paper and open
+it--there was my own name: "Simsen."
+
+Then I sank fainting to the floor.
+
+When I came to myself again, Niels Daae stood beside me with an empty
+water bottle, the contents of which were dripping off my person and
+off the sofa upon which I was lying. "Here, drink this," he said in a
+soothing tone. "It will make you feel better."
+
+I looked about me wildly, as I sipped at the glass of brandy which put
+new life into me once more. "What has happened?" I asked weakly.
+
+"Oh, nothing of importance," answered Niels. "You were just about to
+commit suicide by means of charcoal gas. Those are mighty bad
+ventilators on your old stove there. The wind must have blown them
+shut, unless you were fool enough to close them yourself before you
+went to bed. If you had not opened the window, you would have already
+been too far along the path to Paradise to be called back by a glass
+of brandy. Take another."
+
+"How did you get up here?" I asked, sitting upright on the sofa.
+
+"Through the door in the usual simple manner," answered Niels Daae. "I
+was on watch last night in the hospital; but Mathiesen's punch is
+heavy and my watching was more like sleeping, so I thought it better
+to come away in the early morning. As I passed your barracks here, I
+saw you sitting in the window in your nightshirt and calling down to
+the night watchman that some one was murdering you. I managed to wake
+up Jansen down below you, and got into the house through his window.
+Do you usually sleep on the bare floor?"
+
+"But where did the arms come from?" I asked, still half bewildered.
+
+"Oh, the devil take those arms," cried Niels. "Just see if you can
+stand up all right now. Oh, those arms there? Why, those are the arms
+I cut off your skeletons. Clever idea, wasn't it? You know how grumpy
+Sölling gets if anything interferes with his tutoring. You see, I'd
+had the geese sent me, and I wanted you to all come with me to
+Mathiesen's place. I knew you were going to read the osteology of the
+arm, so I went up into Sölling's room, opened it with his own keys and
+took the arms from his skeleton. I did the same here while you were
+downstairs in the reading room. Have you been stupid enough to take
+them down off their frames, and take away their tickets? I had marked
+them so carefully, that each man should get his own again."
+
+I dressed hastily and went out with Niels into the fresh, cool morning
+air. A few minutes later we separated, and I turned toward the street
+where Sölling lived. Without heeding the protest of his old landlady,
+I entered the room where he still slept the sleep of the just. The
+arm, still wrapped in newspaper, lay on his desk. I took it up, put
+the mark piece in its place and hastened with all speed to the
+churchyard.
+
+How different it looked in the early dawn! The fog had risen and
+shining frost pearls hung in the bare twigs of the tall trees where
+the sparrows were already twittering their morning song. There was no
+one to be seen. The churchyard lay quiet and peaceful. I stepped over
+the heaps of bones to where the heavy oaken coffin lay under a tree.
+Cautiously I pushed the arm back into its interior, and hammered the
+rusty nails into their places again, just as the first rays of the
+pale November sun touched a gleam of light from the metal plate on the
+cover.--Then the weight was lifted from my soul.
+
+
+
+OTTO LARSSEN
+
+
+_THE MANUSCRIPT_
+
+
+Two gentlemen sat chatting together one evening.
+
+Their daily business was to occupy themselves with literature. At the
+present moment they were engaged in drinking whisky,--an occupation
+both agreeable and useful,--and in chatting about books, the theater,
+women and many other things. Finally they came around to that
+inexhaustible subject for conversation, the mysterious life of the
+soul, the hidden things, the Unknown, that theme for which Shakespeare
+has given us an oft-quoted and oft-abused device, which one of them,
+Mr. X., now used to point his remarks. Raising his glass, he looked at
+himself meditatively in a mirror opposite, and, in a good imitation of
+the manner of his favourite actor, he quoted:
+
+     "There are more things in heaven and earth than are
+     dreamt of in thy philosophy, Horatio."
+
+Mr. Y. arranged a fresh glass for himself, and answered:
+
+"I believe it. I believe also that it is given but to a few chosen
+ones to see these things. It never fell to my lot, I know. Fortunately
+for me, perhaps. For,--at least so it appears to me,--these chosen
+ones appear on closer investigation to be individuals of an abnormal
+condition of brain. As far as I personally am concerned, I know of
+nothing more strange than the usual logical and natural sequence of
+events on our globe. I confess things do sometimes happen outside of
+this orderly sequence; but for the cold-blooded and thoughtful person
+the Strange, the apparently Inexplicable, usually turns out to be a
+sum of Chance, that Chance we will never be quite clever enough to
+fully take into our calculations.
+
+"As an instance I would like to tell you the story of what happened
+several years back to a friend of mine, a young French writer. He had
+a good, sincere mind, but he had also a strong leaning toward
+mysticism,--something which was just then in danger of becoming as
+much of a fashion in France as it is here now. The event of which I am
+about to tell you threw him into what was almost a delirium, which
+came near to robbing him of his normal intelligence, and therefore
+came near to robbing French readers of a few excellent books.
+
+"This was the way it happened:
+
+"It was about ten years back, and I was spending the spring and summer
+in Paris. I had a room with the family of a _concierge_ on the left
+bank, rue de Vaugirard, near the Luxembourg Gardens.
+
+"A few steps from my modest domicile lived my friend Lucien F. We had
+become acquainted through a chain of circumstances which do not belong
+to this story, but these circumstances had made firm friends of us, a
+friendship which was a source of great pleasure and also of assistance
+to me in my study of Paris conditions. This friendship also enabled me
+to enjoy better and cheaper whisky than one can usually meet with in
+the city by the Seine, a real good 'Jameson Highland.'
+
+"Lucien F. had already published several books which had aroused
+attention through the oddity of their themes, and their gratifying
+success had made it possible for him to establish himself in a
+comfortably furnished bachelor apartment on the corner of the rue de
+Vaugirard and the rue de Condé.
+
+"The apartment had a corridor and three rooms; a dining room, a
+bedroom, and a charming study with an inclosed balcony, the three
+windows of which,--a large one in the center and two smaller ones at
+the side,--sent a flood of light in over the great writing table which
+filled nearly the entire balcony. Inside the room, near the balcony,
+stood a divan covered with a bearskin rug. Upon this divan I spent
+many of my hours in Paris, occupied in the smoking of my friend's
+excellent cigars, and the sampling of his superlatively good whisky.
+At the same time I could lie staring up at the tops of the trees in
+the Luxembourg Gardens, while Lucien worked at his desk. For, unlike
+most writers, he could work best when he was not alone.
+
+"If I remained away several days, he would invariably ring my bell
+early some morning, and drag me out of bed with the remark: 'The
+whisky is ready. I can't write if you are not there.'
+
+"During the particular days of which I shall tell you, he was engaged
+in the writing of a fantastic novelette, 'The Force of the Wind,' a
+work which interested him greatly, and which he would interrupt
+unwillingly at intervals to furnish copy for the well-known newspaper
+that numbered him among the members of its staff. His books were
+printed by the same house that did the printing for the paper.
+
+"Often, as I lay in my favorite position on the divan, the bell would
+ring and we would be honored by a visit from the printer's boy
+Adolphe, a little fellow in a blue blouse, the true type of Paris
+gamin. Adolphe rejoiced in a broken nose, a pair of crafty eyes, and
+had his fists always full of manuscripts which he treated with a
+carelessness that would have driven a literary novice to despair. The
+long rolls of yellow paper would hang out of his trousers pockets as
+if ready to fall apart at his next movement. And the disrespectful
+manner in which he crammed my friend Lucien's scarcely dried essay
+into the breast of his blouse would have certainly called forth
+remarks from a journalist of more self-conceit.
+
+"But his eyes were so full of sly cunning, and there was such an
+atmosphere of Paris about the stocky little fourteen-year-old chap,
+that we would often keep him longer with us, and treat him to a glass
+of anisette to hear his opinion of the writers whose work he handled.
+He was an amusing cross between a tricky little Paris gamin and a real
+child, and he hit off the characteristics of the various writers with
+as keen a touch of actuality as he could put into his stories of how
+many centimes he had won that morning at 'craps' from his friend
+Pierre. Pierre was another employee of the printing house, Adolphe's
+comrade in his study of the mysteries of Paris streets, and now his
+rival. They were both in love with the same girl, the fifteen-year-old
+daughter of the keeper of 'La Prunelle' Café, and her favor was often
+the prize of the morning's game.
+
+"Now and then this rivalry between the two young Parisians would drop
+into a hand-to-hand fight. I myself was witness to such a skirmish one
+day, in front of 'La Prunelle.' The rivals pulled each other's hair
+mightily while the manuscripts flew about over the pavement, and
+Virginie, in her short skirts, stood at the door of the café and
+laughed until she seemed about to shake to pieces.
+
+"Pierre was the strongest, and Adolphe came off with a bloody nose. He
+gathered up his manuscripts in grim silence and left the battlefield
+and the still laughing Virginie with an expression of deep anger on
+his wounded face.
+
+"The following day, when I teased him a little because of his defeat,
+he smiled a sly smile and remarked:
+
+"'Yes, but I won a franc from him, the big stupid animal. And so it
+was I, after all, who took Virginie out that evening. We went to the
+Café "Néant," where I let them put me in the coffin and pretend to be
+decaying, to amuse her. She thought it was lots of fun.'
+
+"One morning Lucien had come for me as usual, put me on the divan, and
+seated himself at his writing table. He was just putting the last
+words to his novel, and the table was entirely covered with the
+scattered leaves, closely written. I could just see his neck as he sat
+there, a thin-sinewed, expressive neck. He bent over his work, blind
+and deaf for anything else. I lay there and gazed out over the tops of
+the trees in the park up into the blue summer sky. The window on the
+left side of the desk stood wide open, for it was a warm and sultry
+day. I sipped my whisky slowly. The air was heavy, and thunder
+threatened in the distance. After a little while the clouds gathered
+together, heavy, low-hanging, copper-hued, real thunder clouds, and
+the trees in the park rustled softly. The air was stifling, and lay
+heavy as lead on my breast.
+
+"'Lucien!'
+
+"Lucien did not hear or see anything, his pen flew over the paper.
+
+"I fell back lazily on my divan.
+
+"Then suddenly, there was a mighty tumult. A strong gust of wind swept
+through the street, bending the trees in the gardens quite out of my
+horizon. With a crash the right-hand window in the balcony flew wide
+open, and like a cyclone, the wind swept through, clearing the table
+in an instant of all the loose sheets of paper that had lain scattered
+about it.
+
+"'The devil! Why don't you shut the window!' I cried, springing up
+from the sofa.
+
+"'Spare your energy, it's too late,' said Lucien with a gentle mockery
+in his soft voice. 'Look there!'--he pointed out into the street,
+where his sheets of paper went swirling about in the heavy air like
+white doves.
+
+"A second later came the rain, a veritable cloud-burst. We shut the
+windows and gave ourselves up to melancholy thoughts about the lost
+manuscript, the recovery of which now seemed utterly hopeless.
+
+"'That's one thousand francs, at least, that the wind has robbed me
+of,' sighed Lucien. 'Well, _elfin_, that doesn't matter so much. But
+do you know anything more tiresome than to work over the same subject
+a second time? I can't think of doing it. It would fairly make me sick
+to try it.'
+
+"We were in a sad mood that morning. When we went out to breakfast at
+about two o'clock, we looked about for some traces of the lost
+manuscript.
+
+"There was nothing to be seen. It had vanished completely, whirled off
+to all four corners of the earth probably, this manuscript from which
+Lucien had expected so much. Truly it was 'The Force of the Wind.'"
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+"Now comes the strange part of the story. One morning, two weeks
+later, Lucien stood in the door of my little room, pale as a ghost. He
+had a bundle of printer's proofs in his hand, and held them out to me
+without a word.
+
+"I looked at it and read:
+
+"'"The Force of the Wind," by Lucien F.'
+
+"It was a good bundle of proofs, the entire first proofs of Lucien's
+novel, that novel the manuscript of which we had seen blown out of the
+balcony window and whirled away by the winds.
+
+"'My dear man,' I exclaimed, as I handed him back the proofs. 'You
+_have_ been industrious indeed, to write your entire novel over again
+in so short a time--and to have proofs already----'
+
+"Lucien did not answer. He stood silent, staring at me with a weird
+look in his otherwise so sensible eyes. After a moment he stammered:
+
+"'I did not write the novel over again. I have not touched a pen since
+the day the manuscript blew out of the window.'
+
+"'Are you a sleep-walker, Lucien?'
+
+"'Why do you ask?'
+
+"'Why, that would be the only natural explanation. They say we can do
+a great many things in sleep, of which we know nothing when we wake.
+I've heard queer stories of that. Men have committed murders in their
+sleep. It happens quite often that sleep-walkers write letters in a
+handwriting they do not recognize when awake.'
+
+"'I have never been a sleep-walker,' answered Lucien.
+
+"'Oh, you never can tell,' I remarked. 'Would you rather explain it as
+magic? Or as the work of fairies? Or do you believe in ghosts? Your
+muse has fascinated you, you mystic!' And I laughed and trilled a line
+from 'The Mascot,' which we had seen the evening before at the Lyric.
+
+"But my merriment did not seem to strike an answering note in Lucien.
+He turned from me in silence, and with an offended expression took his
+hat and his proofs, and--humorist and skeptic as he was ordinarily, he
+parted from me with the words, uttered in a theatrical tone:
+
+"'There are more things in heaven and earth than are dreamed of in thy
+philosophy.'
+
+"He turned on his heel and left the room.
+
+"To be candid, I was unpleasantly affected by the little scene. I
+could not for an instant doubt Lucien's honesty,--he was so pale, so
+frightened almost--so touching in the alarm and excitement of his
+soul. Of course the only explanation that I could see was that he had
+written his novel in a sleep-walking state.
+
+"For certainly no printer could set up type from a manuscript that did
+not exist,--to say nothing of printing it and sending out proofs.
+
+"Several days passed, but Lucien did not come near me. I went to his
+place once or twice, but the door was locked. Had the devil carried
+him off bodily? Or had this strange and inexplicable occurrence robbed
+him of his sanity, and robbed me of his friendship and his excellent
+whisky?
+
+"After three useless attempts to find him at home, and after writing
+him a letter which he did not answer, I gave up Lucien without any
+further attempt to understand his enigmatical behavior. A short time
+after, I left for my home without having seen or heard anything more
+of him.
+
+"Months passed. I remained at home, and one evening when, during the
+course of a gay party, the conversation came around to the subject of
+mysticism and occult occurrences, I dished up my story of the
+enigmatical manuscript. The Unknown, the Occult, was the rage just
+then, and my story was received with great applause and called forth
+numerous quotations as to 'more things in heaven and earth.' I came to
+think so much of it myself that I wrote it out and sent it to
+Professor Flammarion, who was just then making a study of the Unknown,
+which he preserved in his later book 'L'Inconnu.'
+
+"The occupying myself with the story brought my mind around again to
+memories of Lucien. One day, I saw a notice in _Le Figaro_ to the
+effect that his book, 'The Force of the Wind,' had appeared in a
+second large edition, and had aroused much attention, particularly in
+spiritualistic circles. I seemed to see him again before me, with his
+long nervous neck, which was so expressive. The vision of this neck
+rose up before me whenever I drank the same sort of whisky that I had
+drunk so often with him, and the longing to hear something more of my
+lost friend came over me. I sat down one evening when in a sentimental
+mood, and wrote to him, asking him to tell me something of himself and
+to send me his book.
+
+"A week later I received the little book and the following letter
+which I have here in my pocket. It is somewhat crumpled, for I have
+read it several times. But no matter. I will read it to you now, if
+you will pardon my awkward translating of the French original.
+
+"Here it is:
+
+"DEAR FRIEND:
+
+"Many thanks for your letter. Here is the book. I have to thank you
+also that you did not lay my behavior of your last days in Paris up
+against me. It must have seemed strange to you. I will try to explain
+it.
+
+"I have been nervous from childhood. The fact that most of my books
+have treated of fantastic subjects,--somewhat in the manner of Edgar
+Allan Poe--has made me more susceptible for all that world which lies
+beyond and about the world of every-day life. I have sought
+after,--and yet feared--the mystical; cool and lucid as I can be at
+times, I have always had an inclination for the enigmatical, the
+Unknown.
+
+"But the first thing that ever happened in my life that I could not
+explain or understand was the affair of the manuscript. You remember
+the day I stood in your room? I must have looked the picture of
+misery. The affair had played more havoc with my nerves than you can
+very well understand. Your mockery hurt me, and yet under all I felt
+ashamed of my own thoughts concerning this foolish occurrence. I could
+not explain the phenomenon, and I shivered at the things that it
+suggested to me. In this condition, which lasted several weeks, I
+could not bear to see you or anyone else, and I was impolite enough
+even to leave your letter unanswered.
+
+"The book appeared and made a hit, since that sort of thing was the
+center of interest just then. But almost a month passed before I could
+arouse myself from that condition of fear and--I had almost said,
+softening of the brain--which prevented my enjoyment of my success.
+
+"Then the explanation came. Thanks to this occurrence I know now that
+I shall never again be in danger of being 'haunted.'
+
+"And I know now that Chance can bring about stranger happenings than
+can any fancied visitations from the spirit world. Here you have the
+story of this 'mystic' occurrence, which came near endangering my
+sanity, and which turns out to be a chance combination of a gust of
+wind, a sudden downpour of rain, and the strange elements in the
+character of our little friend Adolphe the printer's boy.
+
+"You remember that funny little chap with the crafty eye, his talent
+for gambling, and his admiration for the girl of 'La Prunelle'? A
+queer little mixture this child who has himself alone to look to for
+livelihood and care, the typical race of the Paris streets, the
+modified gamin from 'Les Miserables.'
+
+"About a month after the appearance of my book I lay on the divan one
+day,--your favorite place, you remember?--and lost myself in idle
+reasonings on the same old subject that never left my mind day or
+night, when the bell rang and Adolphe appeared, to call for the essay
+on 'Le Boulevarde.' There was an unusually nervous gleam in his eyes
+that day. I gave him an anisette and tried to find out what his
+trouble was. I did find it out, and I found out a good deal more
+besides.
+
+"Thanks to his good fortune as a gambler, Virginie came to look upon
+him with favor. Pierre was quite out of the race and Adolphe's
+affection was reciprocated as much as his heart could desire. But with
+his good fortune in love came all the suffering, all the torture, the
+suspicions that tear the hearts of us men when we set our hopes upon a
+woman's truth. Young as he was he went through them all, and now he
+was torturing himself with the thought that she did not really love
+him and was only pretending, while she gave her heart to another.
+Perhaps he was right--why not?
+
+"I talked to Adolphe as man to man, and managed to bring back a gleam
+of his usual jollity and sly humor. He took another glass of anisette,
+and said suddenly:
+
+"'M. Lucien--I did something----'
+
+"'Did what?' I asked.
+
+"'Something I should have told you long ago--it was wrong, and you've
+always been so nice to me----'
+
+"You remember the day, two months ago, when we had such a sudden wind
+and rain storm, a regular cloud-burst? I was down here in this
+neighborhood fetching manuscripts from M. Labouchère and M. Laroy. I
+was to have come up here for copy from you, too. But then--you'll
+understand after all I've been telling you,--I came around past 'La
+Prunelle' and Virginie stood in the doorway, and she'd promised to go
+out with me that evening. So I ran up to speak to her. And then when I
+went on again, I saw a sheet with your writing lying in the street.
+You know I know all the gentlemen's writing, whose copy I fetch. Then
+I was frightened. I thought to myself, 'The devil,' I thought, 'here
+I've lost M. Lucien's manuscript.' I couldn't remember calling for it,
+but I thought I must have done so before I got M. Laroy's. I can't
+remember much except Virginie these days. I took up the sheet and saw
+three others a little further on. And I saw a lot more shining just
+behind the railing of the Luxembourg Garden. You know how hard it
+rained. The water held the paper down, so the wind couldn't carry it
+any further. I ran into the Garden and picked up all the sheets,
+thirty-two of them. All of them, except the first four I found in the
+street, had blown in behind the railing. And I can tell you I was
+precious glad that I had them all together. I ran back to the office,
+told them I had dropped the manuscript in the street, but asked them
+not to say anything to you about it. But the sheets were all
+there,--you always number them so clearly, and 'handsome August,' the
+compositor, promised he wouldn't tell on me. I knew if the foreman
+heard of it, he'd put me out, for he had a grudge against me. So
+nobody knew anything about it. But I thought I ought to tell you,
+'cause you've been so nice to me. Maybe you'll understand how one gets
+queer at times, when a girl like Virginie tells you she likes you
+better than Pierre, and yet you think she might deceive you for his
+sake--that big, stupid animal--But now I'll be going. Much obliged for
+your kindness, M. Lucien, and for the anisette--' And he left me.
+
+"There you have the explanation, the very simple and natural
+explanation of the phenomenon that almost drove me crazy.
+
+"The entire 'supernatural' occurrence was caused by a careless boy's
+love affairs, by a gust of southwest wind, by a sudden heavy rain, and
+by the chance that I had used English ink, the kind that water cannot
+blur. All these simple natural things made me act so foolishly toward
+a good friend, the sort of friend I have always known you to be. Let
+me hear from you, and tell me what you people up North think of my
+book. I give you my word that the 'Unknown Powers' shall never again
+make me foolish enough to risk losing your friendship!
+
+"Yours
+
+"LUCIEN."
+
+"So this is my story. Yes, 'there are more things in heaven and
+earth--' But the workings of Chance are the strangest of all. And this
+whisky is really very good. Here's to you."
+
+
+
+BERNHARD SEVERIN INGEMANN
+
+
+_THE SEALED ROOM_
+
+
+For many years there stood in a side street in Kiel an unpretentious
+old frame house which had a forbidding, almost sinister appearance,
+with its old-fashioned balcony and its overhanging upper stories. For
+the last twenty years the house had been occupied by a greatly
+respected widow, Madame Wolff, to whom the dwelling had come by
+inheritance. She lived there quietly with her one daughter, in
+somewhat straitened circumstances.
+
+What gave the house a mysterious notoriety, augmenting the sinister
+quality in its appearance, was the fact that one of its rooms, a
+corner room on the main floor, had not been opened for generations.
+The door was firmly fastened and sealed with plaster, as well as the
+window looking out upon the street. Above the door was an old
+inscription, dated 1603, which threatened sudden death and eternal
+damnation to any human being who dared to open the door or efface the
+inscription. Neither door nor window had been opened in the two
+hundred years that had passed since the inscription was put up. But
+for a generation back or more, the partition wall and the sealed door
+had been covered with wall paper, and the inscription had been almost
+forgotten.
+
+The room adjoining the sealed chamber was a large hall, utilized only
+for rare important events. Such an occasion arose with the wedding of
+the only daughter of the house. For that evening the great hall, as it
+was called, was brilliantly decorated and illuminated for a ball. The
+building had deep cellars and the old floors were elastic. Madame
+Wolff had in vain endeavored to avoid using the great hall at all, for
+the foolish old legend of the sealed chamber aroused a certain
+superstitious dread in her heart, and she rarely if ever entered the
+hall herself. But merry Miss Elizabeth, her pretty young daughter, was
+passionately fond of dancing, and her mother had promised that she
+should have a ball on her wedding day. Her betrothed, Secretary
+Winther, was also a good dancer, and the two young people combated the
+mother's prejudice against the hall and laughed at her fear of the
+sealed room. They thought it would be wiser to appear to ignore the
+stupid legend altogether, and thus to force the world to forget it. In
+spite of secret misgivings Madame Wolff yielded to their arguments.
+And for the first time in many years the merry strains of dance music
+were heard in the great hall that lay next the mysterious sealed
+chamber.
+
+The bridal couple, as well as the wedding guests, were in the gayest
+mood, and the ball was an undoubted success. The dancing was
+interrupted for an hour while supper was served in an adjoining room.
+After the repast the guests returned to the hall, and it was several
+hours more before the last dance was called. The season was early
+autumn and the weather still balmy. The windows had been opened to
+freshen the air. But the walls retained their dampness and suddenly
+the dancers noticed that the old wall paper which covered the
+partition wall between the hall and the sealed chamber had been
+loosened through the jarring of the building, and had fallen away from
+the sealed door with its mysterious inscription.
+
+The story of the sealed chamber had been almost forgotten by most of
+those present, forgotten with many other old legends heard in
+childhood. The inscription thus suddenly revealed naturally aroused
+great interest, and there was a general curiosity to know what the
+mysterious closed room might hide. Conjectures flew from mouth to
+mouth. Some insisted that the closed door must hide the traces of a
+hideous murder, or some other equally terrible crime. Others suggested
+that perhaps the room had been used as a hiding place for garments and
+other articles belonging to some person who had died of a pestilence,
+and that the room had been sealed for fear of spreading the disease.
+Still others thought that in the sealed chamber there might be found a
+secret entrance from the cellars, which had made the room available as
+a hiding place for robbers or smugglers. The guests had quite
+forgotten their dancing in the interest awakened by the sight of the
+mysterious door.
+
+"For mercy's sake, don't let's go too near it!" exclaimed some of the
+young ladies. But the majority thought it would be great fun to see
+what was hidden there. Most of the men said that they considered it
+foolish not to have opened the door long ago, and examined the room.
+The young bridegroom did not join in this opinion, however. He upheld
+the decision of his mother-in-law not to allow any attempt to effect
+an entrance into the room. He knew that there was a clause in the
+title deeds to the house which made the express stipulation that no
+owner should ever permit the corner room to be opened. There was
+discussion among the guests as to whether such a clause in a title
+deed could be binding for several hundred years, and many doubted its
+validity at any time. But most of them understood why Madame Wolff did
+not wish any investigation, even should any of those present have
+sufficient courage to dare the curse and break open the door.
+
+"Nonsense! What great courage is necessary for that?" exclaimed
+Lieutenant Flemming Wolff, a cousin of the bride of the evening. This
+gentleman had a reputation that was not of the best. He was known to
+live mostly on debt and pawn tickets, and was of a most quarrelsome
+disposition. As a duelist he was feared because of his specialty. This
+was the ability, and the inclination, through a trick in the use of
+the foils, to disfigure his opponent's face badly, without at all
+endangering his life. In this manner he had already sadly mutilated
+several brave officers and students, who had had the bad luck to stand
+up against him. He himself was anything but pleasant to look upon, his
+natural plainness having been rendering repellent by a life of low
+debauchery. He cherished a secret grudge against the bridegroom and
+bitter feelings toward the bride, because the latter had so plainly
+shown her aversion for him when he had ventured to pay suit to her.
+
+The family had not desired any open break with this disagreeable
+relative, and had therefore sent him an invitation to the wedding.
+They had taken it for granted that, under the circumstances, he would
+prefer to stay away. But he had appeared at the ball, and, perhaps to
+conceal his resentment, he had been the most indefatigable dancer of
+the evening. At supper he had partaken freely of the strongest wines,
+and was plainly showing the effect of them by this time. His eyes
+rolled wildly, and those who knew him took care not to contradict him,
+or to have anything to say to him at all.
+
+With a boastful laugh he repeated his assertion that it didn't take
+much courage to open a sealed door, especially when there might be a
+fortune concealed behind it. In his opinion it was cowardly to let
+oneself be frightened by a century-old legend. _He_ wouldn't let that
+bother him if _he_ had influence enough in the family to win the
+daughter and induce the mother to give a ball in the haunted hall.
+With this last hit he hoped to arouse the young husband's ire. But the
+latter merely shrugged his shoulders and turned away with a smile of
+contempt.
+
+Lieutenant Wolff fired up at this, and demanded to know whether the
+other intended to call his, the lieutenant's, courage into question by
+his behavior.
+
+"Not in the slightest, when it is a matter of obtaining a loan, or of
+mutilating an adversary with a trick at fencing," answered the
+bridegroom angrily, taking care, however, that neither the bride nor
+any of the other ladies should hear his words. Then he continued in a
+whisper: "But I don't believe you'd have the courage to remain here
+alone and in darkness, before this closed door, for a single hour. If
+you wish to challenge me for this doubt, I am at your disposal as soon
+as you have proven me in the wrong. But I choose the weapons."
+
+"They must be chosen by lot, sir cousin," replied the lieutenant, his
+cheek pale and his jaws set. "I will expect you to breakfast to-morrow
+morning at eight o'clock."
+
+The bridegroom nodded, and took the other's cold dry hand for an
+instant. The men who had overheard the short conversation looked upon
+it as a meaningless incident, the memory of which would disappear from
+the lieutenant's brain with the vanishing wine fumes.
+
+The ball was now over. The bride left the hall with her husband and
+several of the guests who were to accompany the young couple to their
+new home. The lights went out in the old house. The door of the
+dancing hall had been locked from the outside. Lieutenant Flemming
+Wolff remained alone in the room, having hidden himself in a dark
+corner where he had not been seen by the servants, who had
+extinguished the lights and locked the door. The night watchman had
+just called out two o'clock when the solitary guest found himself,
+still giddy from the heavy wine, alone in the great dark hall in front
+of the mysterious door.
+
+The windows were at only a slight elevation from the street, and a
+spring would take him to safety should his desire to remain there, or
+to solve the mystery of the sealed room, vanish. But next morning all
+the windows in the great hall were found closed, just as the servants
+had left them the night before. The night watchman reported that he
+had heard a hollow-sounding crash in that unoccupied part of the house
+during the night. But that was nothing unusual, as there was a general
+belief in the neighborhood that the house was haunted.
+
+For hollow noises were often heard there, and sounds as of money
+falling on the floor, and rattling and clinking as of a factory
+machine. Enlightened people, it is true, explained these sounds as
+echoes of the stamping and other natural noises from a large stable
+just behind the old house. But in spite of these explanations and
+their eminent feasibility, the dread of the unoccupied portion of the
+house was so great that not even the most reckless man servant could
+be persuaded to enter it alone after nightfall.
+
+Next morning at eight o'clock Winther appeared at his mother-in-law's
+door, saying that he had forgotten something of importance in the
+great hall the night before. Madame Wolff had not yet arisen, but the
+maid who let in the early visitor noticed with surprise that he had a
+large pistol sticking out of one of his pockets.
+
+Winther had been to his cousin's apartment and found it locked. He now
+entered the great hall, and at first glance thought it empty. To his
+alarm and astonishment, however, he saw that the sealed door had been
+broken open. He approached it with anxiety, and found his wife's
+cousin, the doughty duelist, lying pale and lifeless on the threshold.
+Beside him lay a large stone which had struck his head in falling and
+must have killed him at once. Over the door was a hole in the wall,
+just the size of the stone. The latter had evidently rested on the
+upper edge of the door, and must certainly have fallen on its opening.
+The unfortunate man lay half in the mysterious chamber and half in the
+hall, just as he must have fallen when the stone struck him.
+
+The formal investigation of the closed room was made in the presence
+of the police authorities. It contained nothing but a small safe which
+was built into the wall. When the safe had been opened by force, an
+inner chamber, which had to be broken open by itself, was found to
+contain a number of rolls of gold pieces, many jewels and numerous
+notes and I.O.U.'s. The treasure was covered by an old document. From
+this latter it was learned that the owner of the house two hundred
+years ago had been a silk weaver by the name of Flemming Ambrosius
+Wolff. He was said to have lent money on security for many years, but
+had died apparently a poor man, because he had so carefully hidden his
+riches that little of it was found after his death.
+
+With a niggardliness that bordered on madness, he had believed that he
+could hide his treasure forever by shutting it up in the sealed room.
+The curse over the door was to frighten away any venturesome mortal,
+and further security was given by the clause in the title deed.
+
+The universally disliked Lieutenant Flamming Wolff must have had many
+characteristics in common with this disagreeable old ancestor, to
+whose treasure he would have fallen heir had he not lost his life in
+the discovering of it. The old miser had not hidden his wealth for all
+eternity, as he had hoped, but had only brought about the inheriting
+of it by Madame Wolff, the owner of the house, and the next of kin.
+The first use to which this lady put the money was to tear down the
+uncanny old building and to erect in its stead a beautiful new home
+for her daughter and son-in-law.
+
+
+
+STEEN STEENSEN BLICHER
+
+
+_THE RECTOR OF VEILBYE_
+
+
+These extracts from the diary of Erik Sorensen, District Judge,
+followed by two written statements by the rector of Aalsö, give a
+complete picture of the terrible events that took place in the parish
+of Veilbye during Judge Sorensen's first year of office. Should anyone
+be inclined to doubt the authenticity of these documents let him at
+least have no doubt about the story, which is, alas! only too sadly
+true. The memory of these events is still fresh in the district, and
+the events themselves have been the direct cause of a change in the
+method of criminal trials. A suspected murderer is now tried through
+all the courts before his conviction can be determined. Readers versed
+in the history of law will doubtless know by this during what epoch
+the story is laid.
+
+
+
+I
+
+[_From the Diary of District Judge Erik Sörensen_.]
+
+
+Now am I, unworthy one, by the grace of God made judge over this
+district. May the Great Judge above give me wisdom and uprightness
+that I may fulfill my difficult task in all humility! From the Lord
+alone cometh judgment.
+
+It is not good that man should live alone. Now that I am able to
+support a wife I will look about me for a help-meet. I hear much good
+said about the daughter of the Rector of Veilbye. Since her mother's
+death she has been a wise and economical keeper of her father's house.
+And as she and her brother the student are the only children, she will
+inherit a tidy sum when the old man dies.
+
+Morten Bruus of Ingvorstrup was here to-day and wanted to make me a
+present of a fat calf. But I answered him in the words of Moses,
+"Cursed be he who taketh gifts." He is of a very quarrelsome nature, a
+sharp bargainer, and a boastful talker. I do not want to have any
+dealings with him, except through my office as judge.
+
+I have prayed to God for wisdom and I have consulted with my own
+heart, and I believe that Mistress Mette Quist is the only woman with
+whom I could live and die. But I will watch her for a time in secret.
+Beauty is deceptive and charm is a dangerous thing. But I must say
+that she is the most beautiful woman I have yet seen.
+
+I think that Morten Bruus a very disagreeable person--I scarcely know
+why myself. But whenever I see him something comes over me, something
+that is like the memory of an evil dream. And yet it is so vague and
+so faint, that I could not say whether I had really ever seen the man
+in my dreams or not. It may be a sort of presentiment of evil; who
+knows?
+
+He was here again and offered me a pair of horses--beautiful
+animals--at a ridiculously low price. It looked queer to me. I know
+that he paid seventy thalers for them, and he wanted to let me have
+them for the same price. They are at the least worth one hundred
+thalers, if not more. Was it intended for a bribe? He may have another
+lawsuit pending. I do not want his horses.
+
+I paid a visit to the Rector of Veilbye to-day. He is a fine,
+God-fearing man, but somewhat quick-tempered and dictatorial. And he
+is close with his money, too, as I could see. Just as I arrived a
+peasant was with him trying to be let off the payment of part of his
+tithe. The man is surely a rogue, for the sum is not large. But the
+rector talked to him as I wouldn't have talked to a dog, and the more
+he talked the more violent he became.
+
+Well, we all have our faults. The rector meant well in spite of his
+violence, for later on he told his daughter to give the man a sandwich
+and a good glass of beer. She is certainly a charming and sensible
+girl. She greeted me in a modest and friendly manner, and my heart
+beat so that I could scarcely say a word in reply. My head farm hand
+served in the rectory three years. I will question him,--one often
+hears a straight and true statement from servants.
+
+A surprise! My farm hand Rasmus tells me that Morten Bruus came
+a-wooing to the rectory at Veilbye some years back, but was sent away
+with a refusal. The rector seemed to be pleased with him, for the man
+is rich. But his daughter would not hear to it at all. Pastor Sören
+may have tried hard to persuade her to consent at first. But when he
+saw how much she disliked the man he let her do as she would. It was
+not pride on her part, Rasmus said, for she is as simple and modest as
+she is good and beautiful. And she knows that her own father is
+peasant-born as well as Bruus.
+
+Now I know what the Ingvorstrup horses were intended for. They were to
+blind the judge and to lead him aside from the narrow path of
+righteousness. The rich Morten Bruus covets poor Ole Andersen's peat
+moor and pasture land. It would have been a good bargain for Morten
+even at seventy thalers. But no indeed, my good fellow, you don't know
+Erik Sörensen!
+
+Rector Sören Quist of Veilbye came to see me this morning. He has a
+new coachman, Niels Bruus, brother to the owner of Ingvorstrup. Niels
+is lazy and impertinent. The rector wanted him arrested, but he had no
+witnesses to back up his complaint. I advised him to get rid of the
+man somehow, or else to get along with him the best he could until the
+latter's time was up. The rector was somewhat hasty at first, but
+later on he listened calmly and thanked me for my good advice. He is
+inclined to be violent at times, but can always be brought to listen
+to reason. We parted good friends.
+
+I spent a charming day in Veilbye yesterday. The rector was not at
+home, but Mistress Mette received me with great friendliness. She sat
+by the door spinning when I arrived, and it seemed to me that she
+blushed. It was hardly polite for me to wait so long before speaking.
+When I sit in judgement I never lack for words, but in the presence of
+this innocent maiden I am as stupid as the veriest simpleton of a
+chicken thief. But I finally found my voice and the time passed
+quickly until the rector's return. Then Mistress Mette left us and did
+not return until she brought in our supper.
+
+Just as she stepped through the doorway the rector was saying to me,
+"Isn't it about time that you should think of entering into the holy
+estate of matrimony?" (We had just been speaking of a recent very fine
+wedding in the neighborhood.) Mistress Mette heard the words and
+flushed a deep red. Her father laughed and said to her, "I can see, my
+dear daughter, that you have been standing before the fire."
+
+I shall take the good man's advice and will very soon try my fate with
+her. For I think I may take the rector's words to be a secret hint
+that he would not object to me as a son-in-law. And the daughter? Was
+her blush a favorable sign?
+
+Poor Ole Anderson keeps his peat moor and his pasture land, but rich
+Morten Bruus is angry at me because of it. When he heard the decision
+he closed his eyes and set his lips tight, and his face was as pale as
+a whitewashed wall. But he controlled himself and as he went out he
+called back to his adversary, "Wish you joy of the bargain Ole
+Anderson. The peat bog won't beggar me, and the cattle at Ingvorstrup
+have all the hay they can eat." I could hear his loud laughter outside
+and the cracking of his whip. It is not easy to have to sit in
+judgment. Every decision makes but one enemy the more.
+
+Yesterday was the happiest day of my life. We celebrated our betrothal
+in the Rectory of Veilbye. My future father-in-law spoke to the text,
+"I gave my handmaid into thy bosom" (Genesis xvi, 5). His words
+touched my heart. I had not believed that this serious and sometimes
+brusque man could talk so sweetly. When the solemnity was over, I
+received the first kiss from my sweet betrothed, and the assurance of
+her great love for me.
+
+At supper and later on we were very merry. Many of the dead mother's
+kin were present. The rector's family were too far away. After supper
+we danced until day-break and there was no expense spared in the food
+and wine. My future father-in-law was the strongest man present, and
+could easily drink all the others under the table. The wedding is to
+take place in six weeks. God grant us rich blessings.
+
+It is not good that my future father-in-law should have this Niels
+Bruus in his service. He is a defiant fellow, a worthy brother of him
+of Ingvorstrup. If it were I, he should have his wages and be turned
+off, the sooner the better. But the good rector is stubborn and
+insists that Niels shall serve out his time. The other day he gave the
+fellow a box on the ear, at which Niels cried out that he would make
+him pay for it. The rector told me of this himself, for no one else
+had been present. I talked to Niels, but he would scarcely answer me.
+I fear he has a stubborn and evil nature. My sweet betrothed also
+entreats her father to send the fellow away, but the rector will not
+listen to reason. I do not know what the old man will do when his
+daughter leaves his home for mine. She saves him much worry and knows
+how to make all things smooth and easy. She will be a sweet wife for
+me.
+
+As I thought, it turned out badly. But there is one good thing about
+it, Niels has now run off of himself. The rector is greatly angered,
+but I rejoice in secret that he is rid of that dangerous man. Bruus
+will probably seek retaliation, but we have law and justice in the
+land to order such matters.
+
+This was the way of it: The rector had ordered Niels to dig up a bit
+of soil in the garden. After a time when he went out himself to look
+at the work, he found Niels leaning on his spade eating nuts. He had
+not even begun to dig. The rector scolded him, but the fellow answered
+that he had not taken service as a gardener. He received a good box on
+the ear for that. At this he threw away his spade and swore valiantly
+at his master. The old rector lost his temper entirely, seized the
+spade and struck at the man several times. He should not have done
+this, for a spade is a dangerous weapon, especially in the hands of a
+man as strong as is the pastor in spite of his years. Niels fell to
+the ground as if dead. But when the pastor bent over him in alarm, he
+sprang up suddenly, jumped the hedge and ran away to the woods.
+
+This is the story of the unfortunate affair as my father-in-law tells
+it to me. My beloved Mette is much worried about it. She fears the man
+may do harm to the cattle, or set fire to the house, or in some such
+way take his revenge. But I tell her there is little fear of that.
+
+Three weeks more and my beloved leaves her father's house for mine.
+She has been here and has gone over the house and the farm. She is
+much pleased with everything and praises our orderliness. She is an
+angel, and all who know her say that I am indeed a fortunate man. To
+God be the praise!
+
+Strange, where that fellow Niels went to! Could he have left the
+country altogether? It is an unpleasant affair in any case, and there
+are murmurings and secret gossip among the peasants. The talk has
+doubtless started in Ingvorstrup. It would not be well to have the
+rector hear it. He had better have taken my advice, but it is not my
+province to school a servant of God, and a man so much older than I.
+The idle gossip may blow over ere long. I will go to Veilbye to-morrow
+and find out if he has heard anything.
+
+The bracelet the goldsmith has made for me is very beautiful. I am
+sure it will please my sweet Mette.
+
+My honored father-in-law is much distressed and down-hearted.
+Malicious tongues have repeated to him the stupid gossip that is going
+about in the district. Morten Bruus is reported to have said that "he
+would force the rector to bring back his brother, if he had to dig him
+out of the earth." The fellow may be in hiding somewhere, possibly at
+Ingvorstrup. He has certainly disappeared completely, and no one seems
+to know where he is. My poor betrothed is much grieved and worried.
+She is alarmed by bad dreams and by presentiments of evil to come.
+
+God have mercy on us all! I am so overcome by shock and horror that I
+can scarcely hold the pen. It has all come in one terrible moment,
+like a clap of thunder. I take no account of time, night and morning
+are the same to me and the day is but a sudden flash of lightning
+destroying the proud castle of my hopes and desires. A venerable man
+of God--the father of my betrothed--is in prison! And as a suspected
+murderer! There is still hope that he may be innocent. But this hope
+is but as a straw to a drowning man. A terrible suspicion rests upon
+him----And I, unhappy man that I am, must be his judge. And his
+daughter is my betrothed bride! May the Saviour have pity on us!
+
+It was yesterday that this horrible thing came. About half an hour
+before sunrise Morten Bruus came to my house and had with him the
+cotter Jens Larsen of Veilbye, and the widow and daughter of the
+shepherd of that parish. Morten Bruus said to me that he had the
+Rector of Veilbye under suspicion of having killed his brother Niels.
+I answered that I had heard some such talk but had regarded it as idle
+and malicious gossip, for the rector himself had assured me that the
+fellow had run away. "If that was so," said Morten, "if Niels had
+really intended to run away, he would surely at first come to me to
+tell me of it. But it is not so, as these good people can prove to
+you, and I demand that you shall hear them as an officer of the law."
+
+"Think well of what you are doing," I said. "Think it over well,
+Morten Bruus, and you, my good people. You are bringing a terrible
+accusation against a respected and unspotted priest and man of God. If
+you can prove nothing, as I strongly suspect, your accusations may
+cost you dear."
+
+"Priest or no priest," cried Bruus, "it is written, 'thou shalt not
+kill!' And also is it written, that the authorities bear the sword of
+justice for all men. We have law and order in the land, and the
+murderer shall not escape his punishment, even if he have the district
+judge for a son-in-law."
+
+I pretended not to notice his thrust and began, "It shall be as you
+say. Kirsten Mads' daughter, what is it that you know of this matter
+in which Morten Bruus accuses your rector? Tell the truth, and the
+truth only, as you would tell it before the judgment seat of the
+Almighty. The law will demand from you that you shall later repeat
+your testimony under oath."
+
+The woman told the following story: The day on which Niels Bruus was
+said to have run away from the rectory, she and her daughter were
+passing along the road near the rectory garden a little after the noon
+hour. She heard some one calling and saw that it was Niels Bruus
+looking out through the garden hedge. He asked the daughter if she did
+not want some nuts and told the women that the rector had ordered him
+to dig in the garden, but that he did not take the command very
+seriously and would much rather eat nuts. At that moment they heard a
+door open in the house and Niels said, "Now I'm in for a scolding." He
+dropped back behind the hedge and the women heard a quarrel in the
+garden. They could hear the words distinctly but they could see
+nothing, as the hedge was too high. They heard the rector cry, "I'll
+punish you, you dog. I'll strike you dead at my feet!" Then they heard
+several sounding slaps, and they heard Niels curse back at the rector
+and call him evil names. The rector did not answer this, but the women
+heard two dull blows and saw the head of a spade and part of the
+handle rise and fall twice over the hedge. Then it was very quiet in
+the garden, and the widow and her daughter were frightened and hurried
+on to their cattle in the field. The daughter gave the same testimony,
+word for word. I asked them if they had not seen Niels Bruus coming
+out of the garden. But they said they had not, although they had
+turned back several times to look.
+
+This accorded perfectly with what the rector had told me. It was not
+strange that the women had not seen the man run out of the garden, for
+he had gone toward the wood which is on the opposite side of the
+garden from the highroad. I told Morten Bruus that this testimony was
+no proof of the supposed murder, especially as the rector himself had
+narrated the entire occurrence to me exactly as the women had
+described it. But he smiled bitterly and asked me to examine the third
+witness, which I proceeded to do.
+
+Jens Larsen testified that he was returning late one evening from
+Tolstrup (as he remembered, it was not the evening of Niels Bruus's
+disappearance, but the evening of the following day), and was passing
+the rectory garden on the easterly side by the usual footpath. From
+the garden he heard a noise as of some one digging in the earth. He
+was frightened at first for it was very late, but the moon shone
+brightly and he thought he would see who it was that was at work in
+the garden at that hour. He put off his wooden shoes and pushed aside
+the twigs of the hedge until he had made a peep hole. In the garden he
+saw the rector in his usual house coat, a white woolen nightcap on his
+head. He was busily smoothing down the earth with the flat of his
+spade. There was nothing else to be seen. Just then the rector had
+started and partly turned toward the hedge, and the witness, fearing
+he might be discovered, slipped down and ran home hastily.
+
+Although I was rather surprised that the rector should be working in
+his garden at so late an hour, I still saw nothing in this statement
+that could arouse suspicion of murder. I gave the complainant a solemn
+warning and advised him not only to let fall his accusation, but to
+put an end to the talk in the parish. He replied, "Not until I see
+what it is that the rector buried in his garden."
+
+"That will be too late," I said. "You are playing a dangerous game.
+Dangerous to your own honor and welfare."
+
+"I owe it to my brother," he replied, "and I demand that the
+authorities shall not refuse me assistance."
+
+My office compelled me to accede to his demands. Accompanied by the
+accuser and his witnesses I took my way to Veilbye. My heart was very
+heavy, not so much because of any fear that we might find the missing
+man buried in the garden, but because of the surprise and distress I
+must cause the rector and my beloved. As we went on our way I thought
+over how severely the law would allow me to punish the calumniators.
+But alas, Merciful Heavens! What a terrible discovery was in store for
+me!
+
+I had wished to have a moment alone with the rector to prepare him for
+what was coming. But as I drove through the gate Morten Bruus spurred
+his horse past me and galloped up to the very door of the house just
+as the rector opened it. Bruus cried out in his very face, "People say
+that you have killed my brother and buried him in your garden. I am
+come with the district judge to seek for him."
+
+The poor rector was so shocked and astounded that he could not find a
+word to answer. I sprang from my wagon and addressed him: "You have
+now heard the accusation. I am forced by my office to fulfill this
+man's demands. But your own honor demands that the truth shall be
+known and the mouth of slander silenced."
+
+"It is hard enough," began the rector finally, "for a man in my
+position to have to clear himself from such a suspicion. But come with
+me. My garden and my entire house are open to you."
+
+We went through the house to the garden. On the way we met my
+betrothed, who was startled at seeing Bruus. I managed to whisper
+hastily to her, "Do not be alarmed, dear heart. Your enemies are going
+to their own destruction." Morten Bruus led the way to the eastern
+side of the garden near the hedge. We others followed with the
+rector's farm hands, whom he himself had ordered to join us with
+spades.
+
+The accuser stood and looked about him until we approached. Then he
+pointed to one spot. "This looks as if the earth had been disturbed
+lately. Let us begin here."
+
+"Go to work at once," commanded the rector angrily.
+
+The men set to work, but they were not eager enough to suit Bruus, who
+seized a spade himself to fire them on. A few strokes only sufficed to
+show that the firm earth of this particular spot had not been touched
+for many years. We all rejoiced--except Bruus--and the rector was very
+happy. He triumphed openly over his accuser, and laughed at him,
+"Can't you find anything, you libeler?"
+
+Bruus did not answer. He pondered for a few moments, then called out,
+"Jens Larsen, where was it you saw the rector digging?"
+
+Jens Larsen had been standing to one side with his hands folded,
+watching the work. At Bruus's words he aroused himself as if from a
+dream, looked around him and pointed to a corner of the garden several
+yards from where we stood. "I think it was over there."
+
+"What's that, Jens!" cried the rector angrily. "When did I dig here?"
+
+Paying no heed to his, Morten Bruus called the men to the corner in
+question. The earth here was covered by some withered cabbage stalks,
+broken twigs, and other brush which he pushed aside hurriedly. The
+work began anew.
+
+I stood by the rector talking calmly with him about the punishment we
+could mete out to the dastardly accuser, when one of the men suddenly
+cried out with an oath. We looked toward them; there lay a hat half
+buried in the loose earth. "We have found him," cried Bruus. "That is
+Niels's hat; I would know it anywhere."
+
+My blood seemed turned to ice. All my hopes dashed to the ground.
+"Dig! Dig!" cried the bloodthirsty accuser, working himself with all
+his might. I looked at the rector. He was ghastly pale, staring with
+wide-open eyes at the horrible spot.
+
+Another shot! A hand was stretched up through the earth as if to greet
+the workers. "See there!" screamed Bruus. "He is holding out his hand
+to me. Wait a little, Brother Niels! You will soon be avenged!"
+
+The entire corpse was soon uncovered. It was the missing man. His face
+was not recognizable, as decomposition had begun, and the nose was
+broken and laid flat by a blow. But all the garments, even to the
+shirt with his name woven into it, were known to those who stood
+there. In one ear was a leaden ring, which, as we all knew, Niels
+Bruus had worn for many years.
+
+"Now, priest," cried Morten Bruus, "come and lay your hand on this
+dead man if you dare to!"
+
+"Almighty God!" sighed the rector, looking up to heaven, "Thou art my
+witness that I am innocent. I struck him, that I confess, and I am
+bitterly sorry for it. But he ran away. God Almighty alone knows who
+buried him here."
+
+"Jens Larsen knows also," cried Bruus, "and I may find more witnesses.
+Judge! You will come with me to examine his servants. But first of all
+I demand that you shall arrest this wolf in sheep's clothing."
+
+Merciful God, how could I doubt any longer? The truth was clear to all
+of us. But I was ready to sink into the earth in my shock and horror.
+I was about to say to the rector that he must prepare to follow me,
+when he himself spoke to me, pale and trembling like an aspen leaf.
+"Appearances are against me," he said, "but this is the work of the
+devil and his angels. There is One above who will bring my innocence
+to light. Come, judge, I will await my fate in fetters. Comfort my
+daughter. Remember that she is your betrothed bride."
+
+He had scarcely uttered the words when I heard a scream and a fall
+behind us. It was my beloved who lay unconscious on the ground. I
+thought at first that she was dead, and God knows I wished that I
+could lie there dead beside her. I raised her in my arms, but her
+father took her from me and carried her into the house. I was called
+to examine the wound on the dead man's head. The cut was not deep, but
+it had evidently fractured the skull, and had plainly been made by a
+blow from a spade or some similar blunt instrument.
+
+Then we all entered the house. My beloved had revived again. She fell
+on my neck and implored me, in the name of God, to help her father in
+his terrible need. She begged me by the memory of our mutual love to
+let her follow him to prison, to which I consented. I myself
+accompanied him to Grenaa, but with a mournful heart. None of us spoke
+a word on the sad journey. I parted from them in deep distress. The
+corpse was laid in a coffin and will be buried decently to-morrow in
+Veilbye churchyard.
+
+To-morrow I must give a formal hearing to the witnesses. God be
+merciful to me, unfortunate man!
+
+Would that I had never obtained this position for which I--fool that I
+am--strove so hard.
+
+As the venerable man of God was brought before me, fettered hand and
+foot, I felt as Pilate must have felt as they brought Christ before
+him. It was to me as if my beloved--God grant her comfort, she lies
+ill in Grenaa--had whispered to me, "Do nothing against that good
+man!"
+
+Oh, if he only were innocent, but I see no hope!
+
+The three first witnesses repeated their testimony under oath, word
+for word. Then came statements by the rector's two farm hands and the
+dairy maid. The men had been in the kitchen on the fatal day, and as
+the windows were open they had heard the quarrel between the rector
+and Niels. As the widow had stated, these men had also heard the
+rector say, "I will strike you dead at my feet!" They further
+testified that the rector was very quick-tempered, and that when
+angered he did not hesitate to strike out with whatever came into his
+hand. He had struck a former hand once with a heavy maul.
+
+The girl testified that on the night Jens Larsen claimed to have seen
+the rector in the garden, she had lain awake and heard the creaking of
+the garden door. When she looked out of the window she had seen the
+rector in his dressing gown and nightcap go into the garden. She could
+not see what he was doing there. But she heard the door creak again
+about an hour later.
+
+When the witnesses had been heard, I asked the unfortunate man whether
+he would make a confession, or else, if he had anything to say in his
+own defense. He crossed his hands over his breast and said, "So help
+me God, I will tell the truth. I have nothing more to say than what I
+have said already. I struck the dead man with my spade. He fell down,
+but jumped up in a moment and ran away from the garden out into the
+woods. What may have happened to him there, or how he came to be
+buried in my garden, this I do not know. When Jens Larsen and my
+servant testify that they saw me at night in the garden, either they
+are lying, or Satan has blinded them. I can see this--unhappy man that
+I am--that I have no one to turn to for help here on earth. Will He
+who is in heaven be silent also, then must I bow to His inscrutable
+will." He bowed his head with a deep sigh.
+
+Some of those present began to weep, and a murmur arose that he might
+possibly be innocent. But this was only the effect of the momentary
+sympathy called out by his attitude. My own heart indeed spoke for
+him. But the judge's heart may not dare to dictate to his brain or to
+his conscience. My conviction forced me to declare that the rector had
+killed Niels Bruus, but certainly without any premeditation or
+intention to do so. It is true that Niels Bruus had often been heard
+to declare that he would "get even with the rector when the latter
+least expected it." But it is not known that he had fulfilled his
+threat in any way. Every man clings to life and honor as long as he
+can. Therefore the rector persists in his denial. My poor, dear Mette!
+She is lost to me for this life at least, just as I had learned to
+love her so dearly.
+
+I have had a hard fight to fight to-day. As I sat alone, pondering
+over this terrible affair in which it is my sad lot to have to give
+judgment, the door opened and the rector's daughter--I may no longer
+call her my betrothed--rushed in and threw herself at my feet. I
+raised her up, clasped her in my arms and we wept together in silence.
+I was first to control myself. "I know what you would say, dear heart.
+You want me to save your father. Alas, God help us poor mortals, I
+cannot do it! Tell me, dearest one, tell me truly, do you yourself
+believe your father to be innocent?"
+
+She crossed her hands on her heart and sobbed, "I do not know!" Then
+she burst into tears again. "But he did not bury him in the garden,"
+she continued after a few moments. "The man may have died in the wood
+from the blow. That may have happened----"
+
+"But, dearest heart," I said, "Jen Larsen and the girl saw your father
+in the garden that night."
+
+She shook her head slowly and answered, "The evil one blinded their
+eyes." She wept bitterly again.
+
+"Tell me, beloved," she began again, after a while, "tell me frankly
+this much. If God sends us no further enlightenment in this
+unfortunate affair, what sentence must you give?"
+
+She gazed anxiously at me, her lips trembling.
+
+"If I did not believe," I began slowly, "that anyone else in my place
+would be more severe than I, then I would gladly give up my position
+at once and refuse to speak the verdict. But I dare not conceal from
+you that the mildest sentence that God, our king, and our laws demand
+is, a life for a life."
+
+She sank to her knees, then sprang up again, fell back several steps
+as if afraid of me, and cried out: "Would you murder my father? Would
+you murder your betrothed bride? See here! See this!" She came nearer
+and held up her hand with my ring on it before my eyes. "Do you see
+this betrothal ring? What was it my father said when you put this ring
+upon my finger? 'I have given my maid unto thy bosom!' But you, you
+thrust the steel deep into my bosom!"
+
+Alas, every one of her words cut deep into my own heart. "Dearest
+love," I cried, "do not speak so. You thrust burning irons into my
+heart. What would you have me do? Acquit him, when the laws of God and
+man condemn?"
+
+She was silent, sobbing desperately.
+
+"One thing I can do," I continued. "If it be wrong may God forgive me.
+If the trial goes on to an end his life is forfeited, there is no hope
+except in flight. If you can arrange an escape I will close my eyes. I
+will not see or hear anything. As soon as your father was imprisoned,
+I wrote to your brother in Copenhagen. He can arrive any moment now.
+Talk to him, make friends with the jailer. If you lack money, all I
+have is yours."
+
+When I had finished her face flushed with joy, and she threw her arms
+about my neck. "God bless you for these words. Were my brother but
+here, he will know what to do. But where shall we go?" her tone
+changed suddenly and her arms dropped. "Even should we find a refuge
+in a foreign country I could never see you again!" Her tone was so sad
+that my heart was near to breaking.
+
+"Beloved," I exclaimed, "I will find you wherever you may hide
+yourself! Should our money not be sufficient to support us I can work
+for us all. I have learned to use the ax and the hoe."
+
+She rejoiced again and kissed me many times. We prayed to God to bless
+our undertaking and parted with glad hearts. I also hoped for the
+best. Doubts assail me, but God will find for us some light in this
+darkness.
+
+Two more new witnesses. They bring nothing good, I fear, for Bruus
+announced them with an expression I did not like. He has a heart of
+stone, which can feel nothing but malice and bitterness. I give them a
+hearing to-morrow. I feel as if they had come to bear witness against
+me myself. May God strengthen my heart.
+
+All is over. He has confessed.
+
+The court was in session and the prisoner had been brought in to hear
+the testimony of the new witnesses. These men stated as follows: On
+the night in question they were walking along the path that led
+between the woods and the rectory garden. A man with a large sack on
+his back came out of the woods and walked ahead of them toward the
+garden. They could not see his face, but in the bright moonlight his
+figure was clearly visible, and they could see that he wore a loose
+green garment, like a dressing gown, and a white nightcap. The man
+disappeared through an opening in the rectory garden fence.
+
+Scarcely had the first witness ended his statement when the rector
+turned ghastly pale, and gasped, in a voice that could scarcely be
+heard, "I am ill." They gave him a chair.
+
+Bruus turned to his neighbor and exclaimed audibly, "That helped the
+rector's memory."
+
+The prisoner did not hear the words, but motioned to me and said,
+"Lead me back to my prison. I will talk to you there." They did as he
+demanded.
+
+We set out at once for Grenaa. The rector was in the wagon with the
+jailer and the gendarme, and I rode beside them.
+
+When the door of the cell was opened my beloved was making up her
+father's bed, and over a chair by the bedside hung the fatal green
+dressing gown. My dear betrothed greeted me with a cry of joy, as she
+believed that I was come to set her father free. She hung about the
+old man's neck, kissing away the tears that rolled unhindered down his
+cheeks. I had not the heart to undeceive her, and I sent her out into
+the town to buy some things for us.
+
+"Sit down, dear friend," said the rector, when we were alone. He
+seated himself on the bed, staring at the ground with eyes that did
+not see. Finally he turned toward me where I sat trembling, as if it
+were my own sentence I was to hear, as in a manner it was. "I am a
+great sinner," he sighed, "God only knows how great. His punishment
+crushes me here that I may enter into His mercy hereafter."
+
+He grew gradually calmer and began:
+
+"Since my childhood I have been hot-tempered and violent. I could
+never endure contradiction, and was always ready to give a blow. But I
+have seldom let the sun go down upon my wrath, and I have never borne
+hatred toward any man. As a half-grown boy I killed our good, kind
+watchdog in one of my fits of rage for some trifling offense, and I
+have never ceased to regret it. Later, as a student in Leipzig, I let
+myself be carried away sufficiently to wound seriously my adversary in
+one of our fencing bouts. A merciful fate alone saved me from becoming
+a murderer then. It is for these earlier sins that I am now being
+punished, but the punishment falls doubly hard, now that I am an old
+man, a priest, a servant of the Lord of Peace, and a father! Ah, that
+is the deepest wound!" He sprang up and wrung his hands in deep
+despair. I would have said something to comfort him, but I could find
+no words for such sorrow.
+
+When he had controlled himself somewhat he sat down again and
+continued: "To you, once my friend and now my judge, I will confess
+this crime, which it seems beyond a doubt that I have committed,
+although I am not conscious cf having done so." (I was startled at
+this, as I had expected a remorseful confession.) "Listen well to what
+I shall now tell you. That I struck the unfortunate man with the
+spade, that he fell down and then ran away, this is all that I know
+with full consciousness.... What followed then? Four witnesses have
+seen that I fetched the body and buried it in my garden--and now at
+last I am forced to believe that it must be true. These are my reasons
+for the belief. Three or four times in my life I have walked in my
+sleep. The last time--it may have been nine or ten years ago--I was to
+have held a funeral service on the following day, over the body of a
+man who had died a sudden and terrible death. I could not find a
+suitable text, until suddenly there came to me the words of an old
+Greek philosopher, 'Call no man fortunate until his death.' It was in
+my mind that the same idea was expressed in different words in the
+Holy Scriptures. I sought and sought, but could not find it. At last I
+went to bed much fatigued, and slept soundly. Next morning, when I sat
+down at my desk, to my great astonishment I saw there a piece of
+paper, on which was written, 'Call no man happy until his end hath
+come' (Sirach xi. 34), and following it was a funeral sermon, short,
+but as good in construction as any I have ever written. And all this
+was in my own handwriting. It was quite out of the question that
+anyone could have entered the room during the night, as I had locked
+it myself, and it had not been opened until I entered next day. I knew
+what had happened, as I could remember one or two such occurrences in
+my life before.
+
+"Therefore, dear friend, when the last witnesses gave their testimony
+to-day, I suddenly remembered my sleep-walking exploits, and I also
+remembered, what had slipped my mind before, that on the morning after
+the night the body was buried I had found my dressing gown in the hall
+outside of my bedroom. This had surprised me, as I always hung it over
+a chair near my bed. The unfortunate victim of my violence must have
+died in the woods from his wound, and in my dream consciousness I must
+have seen this and gone to fetch the body. It must be so. I know no
+other explanation. God have mercy on my sinful soul." He was silent
+again, covering his face with his hands and weeping bitterly.
+
+I was stuck dumb with astonishment and uncertainty. I had always
+suspected that the victim had died on the spot where he was buried,
+although I could not quite understand how the rector had managed to
+bury the body by day without being seen. But I thought that he might
+have covered it lightly with earth and twigs and finished his work at
+night. He was a man of sufficient strength of mind to have done this.
+When the latest witnesses were telling their story, I noted the
+possible contradiction, and hoped it might prove a loophole of escape.
+But, alas, it was all only too true, and the guilt of the rector
+proven beyond a doubt. It was not at all impossible for a man to do
+such things in his sleep. Just as it was quite possible that a man
+with a fractured skull could run some distance before he fell to die.
+The rector's story bore the stamp of truth, although the doubt _will_
+come that he desired thus to save a shred of honor for his name.
+
+The prisoner walked up and down the room several times, then stopping
+before me he said gravely: "You have now heard my confession, here in
+my prison walls. It is your mouth that must speak my sentence. But
+what says your heart?"
+
+I could scarcely utter the words, "My heart suffers beyond expression.
+I would willingly see it break if I could but save you from a shameful
+death." (I dared not mention to him my last hope of escape in flight.)
+
+"That is impossible," he answered. "My life is forfeited. My death is
+just, and shall serve as a warning to others. But promise me that you
+will not desert my poor daughter. I had thought to lay her in your
+arms"--tears choked his voice--"but, alas, that fond hope is vanished.
+You cannot marry the daughter of a sentenced murderer. But promise me
+that you will watch over her as her second father." In deep sorrow and
+in tears I held his hand in mine. "Have you any news from my son?" he
+began again. "I hope it will be possible to keep him in ignorance of
+this terrible affair until--until it is all over. I could not bear to
+see him now. And now, dear friend, let us part, not to meet again
+except in the hall of justice. Grant me of your friendship one last
+service, let it end soon. I long for death. Go now, my kind,
+sympathetic judge. Send for me to-morrow to speak my sentence, and
+send to-day for my brother in God, the pastor in Aalsö. He shall
+prepare me for death. God be with you."
+
+He gave me his hand with his eyes averted. I staggered from the
+prison, hardly conscious of what I was doing. I would have ridden home
+without seeing his daughter had she not met me by the prison door. She
+must have seen the truth in my face, for she paled and caught at my
+arm. She gazed at me with her soul in her eyes, but could not speak.
+"Flee! Save your father in flight!" was all I could say.
+
+I set spurs to my horse and rode home somehow.
+
+To-morrow, then!
+
+The sentence is spoken.
+
+The accused was calmer than the judge. All those present, except his
+bitter enemy, were affected almost to tears. Some whispered that the
+punishment was too severe.
+
+May God be a milder judge to me than I, poor sinner, am forced to be
+to my fellow men.
+
+She has been here. She found me ill in bed. There is no escape
+possible. He will not flee. Everything was arranged and the jailer was
+ready to help. But he refuses, he longs for death. God be merciful to
+the poor girl. How will she survive the terrible day? I am ill in body
+and soul, I can neither aid nor comfort her. There is no word from the
+brother.
+
+I feel that I am near death myself, as near perhaps as he is, whom I
+sent to his doom. Farewell, my own beloved bride.... What will she do?
+she is so strangely calm--the calm of wordless despair. Her brother
+has not yet come, and to-morrow--on the Ravenshill----!
+
+Here the diary of Erik Sörensen stopped suddenly. What followed can be
+learned from the written and witnessed statements of the pastor of
+Aalsö, the neighboring parish to Veilbye.
+
+
+II
+
+It was during the seventeenth year of my term of office that the
+terrible event happened in the neighborhood which filled all who heard
+of it with shock and horror, and brought shame and disgrace upon our
+holy calling. The venerable Sören Quist, Rector of Veilbye, killed his
+servant in a fit of rage and buried the body in his garden.
+
+He was found guilty at the official trial, through the testimony of
+many witnesses, as well as through his own confession. He was
+condemned to death, and the sentence was carried out in the presence
+of several thousand people on the little hill known as Ravenshill,
+here in the field of Aalsö.
+
+The condemned man had asked that I might visit him in his prison. I
+must state that I have never given the holy sacrament to a better
+prepared or more truly repentant Christian. He was calm to the last,
+full of remorse for his great sin. On the field of death he spoke to
+the people in words of great wisdom and power, preaching to the text
+from the Lamentations of Jeremiah, chap. ii., verse 6: "He hath
+despised the priest in the indignation of his anger." He spoke of his
+violence and of its terrible results, and of his deep remorse. He
+exhorted his hearers to let his sin and his fate be an example to
+them, and a warning not to give way to anger. Then he commended his
+soul to the Lord, removed his upper garments, bound up his eyes with
+his own hand, then folded his hands in prayer. When I had spoken the
+words, "Brother, be of good cheer. This day shalt thou be with thy
+Saviour in Paradise," his head fell by the ax.
+
+The one thing that made death bitter for him was the thought of his
+children. The son had been sent for from Copenhagen, but as we
+afterwards learned, he had been absent from the city, and therefore
+did not arrive until shortly after his father had paid the penalty for
+his crime.
+
+I took the daughter into my home, where she was brought, half
+fainting, after they had led her father from the prison. She had been
+tending him lovingly all the days of his trial. What made even greater
+sorrow for the poor girl, and for the district judge who spoke the
+sentence, was that these two young people had solemnly plighted their
+troth but a few short weeks before, in the rectory of Veilbye. The son
+arrived just as the body of the executed criminal was brought into my
+house. It had been permitted to us to bury the body with Christian
+rites, if we could do it in secret. The young man threw himself over
+the lifeless body. Then, clasping his sister in his arms, the two wept
+together in silence for some while. At midnight we held a quiet
+service over the remains of the Rector of Veilbye, and the body was
+buried near the door of Aalsö church. A simple stone, upon which I
+have carved a cross, still stands to remind the passer-by of the sin
+of a most unfortunate man.
+
+The next morning his two children had disappeared. They have never
+been heard of since. God knows to what far-away corner of the world
+they have fled, to hide their shame and their sorrow. The district
+judge is very ill, and it is not believed that he will recover.
+
+May God deal with us all after His wisdom and His mercy!
+
+O Lord, inscrutable are thy ways!
+
+In the thirty-eighth year of my service, and twenty-one years after my
+unfortunate brother in office, the Rector of Veilbye had been beheaded
+for the murder of his servant, it happened one day that a beggar came
+to my door. He was an elderly man, with gray hair, and walked with a
+crutch. He looked sad and needy. None of the servants were about, so I
+myself went into the kitchen and gave him a piece of bread. I asked
+him where he came from. He sighed and answered:
+
+"From nowhere in particular."
+
+Then I asked him his name. He sighed still deeper, looked about him as
+if in fear, and said, "They once called me Niels Bruus."
+
+I was startled, and said, "God have mercy on us! That is a bad name.
+That is the name of a man who was killed many years back."
+
+Whereat the man sighed still deeper and replied: "It would have been
+better for me had I died then. It has gone ill with me since I left
+the country."
+
+At this the hair rose on my head, and I trembled in every limb. For it
+seemed to me that I could recognize him, and also it seemed to me that
+I saw Morten Bruus before me in the flesh, and yet I had laid the
+earth over him three years before. I stepped back and made the sign of
+the cross, for verily I thought it was a ghost I saw before me.
+
+But the man sat down in the chimney corner and continued to speak.
+"Reverend father, they tell me my brother Morten is dead. I have been
+to Ingvorstrup, but the new owner chased me away. Is my old master,
+the Rector of Veilbye, still alive?" Then it was that the scales fell
+from my eyes and I saw into the very truth of this whole terrible
+affair. But the shock stunned me so that I could not speak. The man
+bit into his bread greedily and went on. "Yes, that was all Brother
+Morten's fault. Did the old rector have much trouble about it?"
+
+"Niels! Niels!" I cried from out the horror of my soul, "you have a
+monstrous black sin upon your conscience! For your sake that
+unfortunate man fell by the ax of the executioner!"
+
+The bread and the crutch fell from his hand, and he himself was near
+to falling into the fire. "May God forgive you, Morten!" he groaned.
+"God knows I didn't mean anything like that. May my sin be forgiven
+me! But surely you only mean to frighten me! I come from far away, and
+have heard nothing. No one but you, reverend father, has recognized
+me. I have told my name to no one. When I asked them in Veilbye if the
+rector was still there, they said that he was."
+
+"That is the new rector," I replied. "Not he whom you and your sinful
+brother have slain."
+
+He wrung his hands and cried aloud, and then I knew that he had been
+but a tool in the hands of that devil, Morten. Therefore I set to work
+to comfort him, and took him into my study that he might calm himself
+sufficiently to tell me the detail of this Satan's work.
+
+This was the story as he tells it: His brother Morten--truly a son of
+Belial--cherished a deadly hatred toward pastor Sören Quist since the
+day the latter had refused him the hand of his daughter. As soon as he
+heard that the pastor's coachman had left him, he persuaded Niels to
+take the place.
+
+"Watch your chance well," he had said, "we'll play the black coat a
+trick some day, and you will be no loser by it."
+
+Niels, who was rough and defiant by nature, soon came to a quarrel
+with his master, and when he had received his first chastisement, he
+ran at once to Ingvorstrup to report it. "Let him strike you just once
+again," said Morten. "Then come to me, and we will pay him for it."
+
+Then came the quarrel in the garden, and Niels ran off to Ingvorstrup.
+He met his brother in the woods and told him what had occurred.
+
+"Did anyone see you on the way here?" asked Morten.
+
+Niels thought not. "Good," said Morten; "now we'll give him a fright
+that he will not forget for a week or so."
+
+He led Niels carefully to the house, and kept him hidden there the
+rest of the day. When all the household else had gone to sleep the two
+brothers crept out, and went to a field where several days before they
+had buried the body of a man of about Niels' age, size, and general
+appearance. (He had hanged himself, some said because of ill-treatment
+from Morten, in whose service he was. Others said it was because of
+unhappy love.) They dug up the corpse, although Niels did not like the
+work, and protested. But Morten was the stronger, and Niels had to do
+as he was ordered. They carried the body back with them into the
+house.
+
+Then Niels was ordered to take off all his clothes, piece by piece,
+even to his shirt, and dress the dead man in them. Even his leaden
+earring, which he had worn for many years, was put in the ear of the
+corpse. After this was done, Morten took a spade and gave the head of
+the corpse two crashing blows, one over the nose, the other on the
+temple. The body was hidden in a sack and kept in the house during the
+next day. At night the day following, they carried it out to the wood
+near Veilbye.
+
+Several times Niels had asked of his brother what all this preparation
+boded. But Morten answered only, "That is my affair. Do as I tell you,
+and don't ask questions."
+
+When they neared the edge of the wood by Veilbye, Morten said, "Now
+fetch me one of the coats the pastor wears most. If you can, get the
+green dressing gown I have often seen him wear mornings."
+
+"I don't dare," said Niels, "he keeps it in his bed chamber."
+
+"Well, then, I'll dare it myself," said Morten. "And now, go your way,
+and never show yourself here again. Here is a bag with one hundred
+thalers. They will last you until you can take service somewhere in
+another country. Go where no one has ever seen you, and take another
+name. Never come back to Denmark again. Travel by night, and hide in
+the woods by day until you are well away from here. Here are
+provisions enough to last you for several days. And remember, never
+show yourself here again, as you value your life."
+
+Niels obeyed, and has never seen his brother since that day. He had
+had much trouble, had been a soldier and lost his health in the war,
+and finally, after great trials and sufferings, had managed to get
+back to the land of his birth. This was the story as told me by the
+miserable man, and I could not doubt its truth.
+
+It was now only too clear to me that my unfortunate brother in the
+Lord had fallen a victim to the hatred of his fiendish enemy, to the
+delusion of his judge and the witnesses, and to his own credulous
+imagination.
+
+Oh, what is man that he shall dare to sit in judgment over his
+fellows! God alone is the Judge. He who gives life may alone give
+death!
+
+I did not feel it my duty to give official information against this
+crushed and broken sinner, particularly as the district judge is still
+alive, and it would have been cruelty to let him know of his terrible
+error.
+
+Instead, I gave what comfort my office permitted to the poor man, and
+recommended him not to reveal his name or tell his story to anyone in
+the district. On these conditions I would give him a home until I
+could arrange for a permanent refuge for him in my brother's house, a
+good distance from these parts.
+
+The day following was a Sunday. When I returned from evening service
+at my branch parish, the beggar had disappeared. But by the evening of
+the next day the story was known throughout the neighborhood.
+
+Goaded by the pangs of conscience, Niels had gone to Rosmer and made
+himself known to the judge as the true Niels Bruus. Upon the hearing
+of the terrible truth, the judge was taken with a stroke and died
+before the week was out. But on Tuesday morning they found Niels Bruus
+dead on the grave of the late rector Sören Quist of Veilbye, by the
+door of Aalsö church.
+
+
+
+_HUNGARIAN MYSTERY STORIES_
+
+
+
+FERENCZ MOLNAR
+
+
+_THE LIVING DEATH_
+
+
+There is a very serious reason, my dear sisters, why at last, after an
+absence of twenty years in America, I am confiding to you this strange
+secret in the life of our beloved and lamented father, and of the old
+house where we were children together. The truth is, if I read rightly
+the countenances of my physicians as they whisper to each other by the
+window of the chamber in which I am lying, that only a few days of
+this life remain to me.
+
+It is not right that this secret should die with me, my dear sisters.
+Though it will seem terrible to you, as it has to me, it will enable
+you to better understand our blessed father, help you to account for
+what must have seemed to you to be strange inconsistencies in his
+character. That this secret was revealed to me was due to my indolence
+and childish curiosity.
+
+For the first, and the last, time in my life I listened at a keyhole.
+With shame and a hotly chiding conscience I yielded to that insatiable
+curiosity--and when you have read these lines you will understand why
+I do not regret that inexcusable, furtive act.
+
+I was only a lad when we went to live in that odd little house. You
+remember it stood in the outskirts of Rakos, near the new cemetery. It
+stood on a deep lot, and was roughly boarded on the side which looked
+on the highway. You remember that on the first floor, next the street,
+were the room of our father, the dining room, and the children's room.
+In the rear of the house was the sculpture studio. There we had the
+large white hall with big windows, where white-clothed laborers
+worked. They mixed the plaster, made forms, chiseled, scratched, and
+sawed. Here in this large hall had our father worked for thirty years.
+
+When I arrived, in the holidays, I noted a change in our father's
+countenance. His beard was white, even when he did not work with the
+plaster. Through his strong spectacles his eyes glittered peculiarly.
+He was less calm than formerly. And he did not speak much, but all the
+more did he read.
+
+Why, we all knew that after the passing away of our mother he became a
+bookworm, reading very often by candlelight until morning.
+
+Then did it happen, about the fourth day after my arrival. I spent my
+leisure hours in the studio; I carved little figures, formed little
+pillar heads from the white plaster. In the corner a big barrel stood
+filled with water. It was noon; the laborers went to lunch.
+
+I sat down close to the barrel and carved a Corinthian pillar. Father
+came into the studio and did not notice me. He carried in his hands
+two plates of soup. When he came into the studio he closed the door
+behind him and looked around in the shop, as though to make sure he
+was not observed. As I have said, he did not notice me. I was
+astonished. Holding my breath, I listened. Father went through the
+large hall, and then opened a small door, of which I knew only so much
+that it led into a chamber three steps lower than the studio.
+
+I was full of expectation. I listened. I did not hear a word of
+conversation. Presently father came back with the empty plates in his
+hand. Somebody bolted the chamber's door behind him.
+
+Father went out of the studio, and I, much embarrassed, crept from
+behind the barrel.
+
+I knew that the chamber had a window, which looked back toward the
+plowed fields. I ran out of the studio and around the house. Much to
+my astonishment, the chamber's window was curtained inside. A large
+yellow plaid curtain hid everything from view. But I had to go,
+anyway, for I heard Irma's voice calling from the yard:
+
+"Antal, to lunch!"
+
+I sat down to the table with you, my sisters, and looked at father. He
+was sitting at the head of the table, and ate without saying a word.
+
+Day after day I troubled my head about this mystery in the chamber,
+but said not a word to anybody. I went into the studio, as usual, but
+I did not notice anything peculiar. Not a sound came from the chamber,
+and when our father worked in the shop with his ten laborers he passed
+by the small door as if beyond it there was nothing out of the
+ordinary.
+
+On Thursday I had to go back to Germany. On Tuesday night curiosity
+seized me again. Suddenly I felt that perhaps never would I know what
+was going on in my father's house. That night, when the working people
+were gone, I went into the studio. For a long time I was lost in my
+thoughts. All kinds of romantic ideas passed through my head, while my
+gaze rested on that small mysterious chamber door.
+
+In the studio it was dark already, and from under the small door in a
+thin border a yellow radiance poured out. Suddenly I regained my
+courage. I went to the door and listened. Somebody was speaking. It
+was a man's voice, but I did not understand what he was saying. I was
+putting my ear close to the door, when I heard steps at the front of
+the studio. Father came.
+
+I quickly withdrew myself behind the barrel. Father walked through the
+hall and knocked on the door softly. The bolt clicked and the door
+opened. Father went into the chamber and closed the door immediately
+and locked it.
+
+Now all discretion and sense of honor in me came to an end. Curiosity
+mastered me. I knew that last year one part of this small room had
+been partitioned off and was used as a woodhouse. And I knew that
+there was a possibility of going into the woodhouse through the yard.
+
+I went out, therefore, but found the woodhouse was closed. Driven by
+trembling curiosity, I ran into the house, took the key of the
+woodhouse from its nail, and in a minute, through the crevice between
+two planks, I was looking into that mysterious little room.
+
+There was a table in the middle of the room, and beside the wall were
+two straw mattresses. On the table a lighted candle stood. A bottle of
+wine was beside it, and around the table were sitting father and two
+strangers. Both the strangers were all in black. Something in their
+appearance froze me with terror.
+
+I fled in a panic of unreasoning fear, but returned soon, devoured by
+curiosity.
+
+You, my sister Irma, must remember how I found you there, gazing with
+starting eyeballs on the same mysteriously terrifying scene--and how I
+drew you away with a laugh and a trifling explanation, so that I might
+return and resume my ghastly vigil alone.
+
+One of the strangers wore a frock coat and had a sunburned, brown
+face. He was not old yet, not more than forty-five or forty-eight. He
+seemed to be a tradesman in his Sunday clothes. That did not interest
+me much.
+
+I looked at the other old man, and then a shiver of cold went through
+me. He was a famous physician, a professor, Mr. H----. I desire to lay
+stress upon it that he it was, for I had read two weeks before in the
+papers that he had died and was buried!
+
+And now he was sitting, in evening dress, in the chamber of a poor
+plaster sculptor, in the chamber of my father behind a bolted door!
+
+I was aware of the fact that the physician knew father. Why, you can
+recall that when father had asthma he consulted Mr. H----. Moreover,
+the professor visited us very frequently. The papers said he was dead,
+yet here he was!
+
+With beating heart and in terror, I looked and listened.
+
+The professor put some shining little thing on the table.
+
+"Here is my diamond shirt stud," he said to my father, "It is yours."
+
+Father pushed the jewel aside, refusing the gift.
+
+"Why, you are spending money on me," said the professor.
+
+"It makes no difference," replied father; "I shan't take the diamond."
+
+Then they were silent for a long while. At length the professor smiled
+and said:
+
+"The pair of cuff buttons which I had from Prince Eugene I presented
+to the watchman in the cemetery. They are worth a thousand guldens."
+
+And he showed his cuffs, from which the buttons were missing. Then he
+turned to the sunburned man:
+
+"What did you give him, General Gardener?"
+
+The tall, strong man unbuttoned his frock coat.
+
+"Everything I had--my gold chain, my scarf pin, and my ring."
+
+I did not understand all that. What was it? Where did they come from?
+A horrible presentiment arose in me. They came from the cemetery! They
+wore the very clothes in which they were buried!
+
+What had happened to them? Were they only apparently dead? Did they
+awake? Did they rise from the dead? What are they seeking here?
+
+They had a very low-voiced conversation with father. I listened in
+vain. Only later on, when they got warmed with their subject and spoke
+more audibly, did I understand them.
+
+"There is no other way," said the professor. "Put it in your will that
+the coroner shall pierce your heart through with a knife."
+
+Do you remember, my sisters, the last will of our father, which was
+thus executed?
+
+Father did not say a word. Then the professor went on, saying:
+
+"That would be a splendid invention. Had I been living till now I
+would have published a book about it. Nobody takes the Indian fakir
+seriously here in Europe. But, despite this, the buried fakirs, who
+are two months under ground and then come back into life, are very
+serious men. Perhaps they are more serious than ourselves, with all
+our scientific knowledge. There are strange, new, dreadful things for
+which we are not yet matured enough.
+
+"I died upon their methods; I can state that now. The mental state
+which they reach systematically I reached accidentally. The solitude,
+the absorbedness, the lying in a bed month by month, the gazing upon a
+fixed point hour by hour--these are all self-evident facts with me, a
+deserted misanthrope.
+
+"I died as the Indian fakirs do, and were I not a descendant of an old
+noble family, who have a tomb in this country, I would have died
+really.
+
+"God knows how it happened. I don't think there is any use of worrying
+ourselves about it. I have still four days. Then we go for good and
+all. But not back, no, no, not back to life!"
+
+He pointed with his hand toward the city. His face was burning from
+fever, and he knitted his brows. His countenance was horrible at this
+moment. Then he looked at the man with the sunburned face.
+
+"The case of Mr. Gardener is quite different. This is an ordinary
+physician's error. But he has less than four days. He will be gone
+to-morrow or positively day after to-morrow."
+
+He grasped the pulse of the sunburned man.
+
+"At this minute his pulse beats a hundred and twelve. You have a day
+left, Mr. Gardener. But not back. We don't go back. Never!"
+
+Father said nothing. He looked at the professor with seriousness, and
+fondly. The professor drank a glass of wine, and then turned toward
+father.
+
+"Go to bed. You have to get up early; you still live; you have
+children. We shall sleep if we can do so. It is very likely that
+General Gardener won't see another morning. You must not witness
+that."
+
+Now father began to speak, slowly, reverently.
+
+"If you, professor, have to send word--or perhaps Mr.
+Gardener--somebody we must take care of--a command, if you have--"
+
+The professor looked at him sternly, saying but one word:
+
+"Nothing."
+
+Father was still waiting.
+
+"Absolutely nothing," repeated the professor. "I have died, but I have
+four days yet. I live those here, my dear old friend, with you. But I
+don't go back any more. I don't even turn my face backward. I don't
+want to know where the others live. I don't want life, old man. It is
+not honorable to go back. Go, my friend--go to bed."
+
+Father shook hands with them and disappeared. General Gardener sat
+stiffly on his chair. The professor gazed into the air.
+
+I began to be aware of all that had happened here. These two
+apparently dead men had come back from the cemetery, but how, in what
+manner, by what means? I don't understand it perfectly even now.
+There, in the small room, near to the cemetery, they were living their
+few remaining days. They did not want to go back again into life.
+
+I shuddered. During these few minutes I seemed to have learned the
+meaning of life and of death. Now I myself felt that the life of the
+city was at a vast distance. I had a feeling that the professor was
+right. It was not worth while. I, too, felt tired, tired of life, like
+the professor, the feverish, clever, serious old man who came from the
+coffin and was sitting there in his grave clothes waiting for the
+final death.
+
+They did not speak a word to each other. They were simply waiting. I
+did not have power to move away from the crack in the wall through
+which I saw them.
+
+And now there happened the awful thing that drove me away from our
+home, never to return.
+
+It was about half-past one when someone tapped on the window. The
+professor took alarm and looked at Mr. Gardener a warning to take no
+notice. But the tapping grew louder. The professor got up and went to
+the window.
+
+He lifted the yellow curtain and looked out into the night. Quickly he
+returned and spoke to General Gardener, and then both went to the
+window and spoke with the person who had knocked. After a long
+conversation they lifted the man through the window.
+
+On this terrible day nothing could happen that would surprise me. I
+was benumbed. The man who was lifted through the window was clad in
+white linen to his feet. He was a Hebrew, a poor, thin, weak, pale
+Hebrew. He wore his white funeral dress. He shivered from cold,
+trembled, seemed almost unconscious. The professor gave him some wine.
+The Hebrew stammered:
+
+"Terrible! Oh, horrible!"
+
+I learned from his broken language that he had not been buried yet,
+like the professor. He had not yet known the smell of the earth. He
+had come from his bier.
+
+"I was laid out a corpse," he whimpered. "My God, they would have
+buried me by to-morrow!"
+
+The professor gave him wine again.
+
+"I saw a light here," he went on. "I beg you will give me some
+clothes--some soup, if you please--and I am going back again." Then he
+said in German:
+
+"Meine gute, theure Frau! Meine Kinder!" (My good wife, my children.)
+
+He began to weep. The professor's countenance changed to a devilish
+expression when he heard this lament. He despised the lamenting
+Hebrew.
+
+"You are going back?" he thundered. "But you won't go back! Don't
+shame yourself!"
+
+The Hebrew gazed at him stupidly.
+
+"I live in Rottenbiller Street," he stammered. "My name is Joseph
+Braun."
+
+He bit his nails in his nervous agitation. Tears filled his eyes. "Ich
+muss zu meine Kinder," he said in German again. (I must go to my
+children.)
+
+"No!" exclaimed the professor. "You'll never go back!"
+
+"But why?"
+
+"I will not permit it!"
+
+The Hebrew looked around. He felt that something was wrong here. His
+startled manner seemed to ask: "Am I in a lunatic asylum?" He dropped
+his head and said to the professor simply:
+
+"I am tired."
+
+The professor pointed to the straw mattress.
+
+"Go to sleep. We will speak further in the morning."
+
+Fever blazed in the professor's face. On the other straw mattress
+General Gardener now slept with his face to the wall.
+
+The Hebrew staggered to the straw mattress, threw himself down, and
+wept. The weeping shook him terribly. The professor sat at the table
+and smiled.
+
+Finally the Hebrew fell asleep. Hours passed in silence. I stood
+motionless looking at the professor, who gazed into the candlelight.
+There was not much left of it. Presently he sighed and blew it out.
+For a little while there was dark, and then I saw the dawn penetrating
+the yellow curtain at the window. The professor leaned back in his
+chair, stretched out his feet, and closed his eyes.
+
+All at once the Hebrew got up silently and went to the window. He
+believed the professor was asleep. He opened the window carefully and
+started to creep out. The professor leaped from his chair, shouting:
+
+"No!"
+
+He caught the Hebrew by his shroud and held him back. There was a long
+knife in his hand. Without another word, the professor pierced the
+Hebrew through the heart.
+
+He put the limp body on the straw mattress, then went out of the
+chamber toward the studio. In a few minutes he came back with father.
+Father was pale and did not speak. They covered the dead Hebrew with a
+rug, and then, one after the other, crept out through the window,
+lifted the corpse out, and carried it away. In a quarter of an hour
+they came back. They exchanged a few words, from which I learned that
+they had succeeded in putting the dead Hebrew back on his bier without
+having been observed.
+
+They shut the window. The professor drank a glass of wine and again
+stretched out his legs on the chair.
+
+"It is impossible to go back," he said. "It is not allowed."
+
+Father went away. I did not see him any more. I staggered up to my
+room, went to bed, and slept immediately. The next day I got up at ten
+o'clock. I left the city at noon.
+
+Since that time, my dear sisters, you have not seen me. I don't know
+anything more. At this minute I say to myself that what I know, what I
+have set down here, is not true. Maybe it never happened, maybe I have
+dreamed it all. I am not clear in my mind. I have a fever.
+
+But I am not afraid of death. Here, on my hospital bed, I see the
+professor's feverish but calm and wise face. When he grasped the
+Hebrew by the throat he looked like a lover of Death, like one who has
+a secret relation with the passing of life, who advocates the claims
+of Death, and who punishes him who would cheat Death.
+
+Now Death urges his claim upon me. I have no desire to cheat him--I am
+so tired, so very tired.
+
+God be with you, my dear sisters.
+
+
+
+MAURUS JOKAI
+
+
+_THIRTEEN AT TABLE_
+
+
+We are far amidst the snow-clad mountains of Transylvania.
+
+The scenery is magnificent. In clear weather, the plains of Hungary as
+far as the Rez promontory may be seen from the summit of the
+mountains. Groups of hills rise one above the other, covered with
+thick forest, which, at the period when our tale commences, had just
+begun to assume the first light green of spring.
+
+Toward sunset, a slight purple mist overspread the farther pinnacles,
+leaving their ridges still tinged with gold. On the side of one of
+these hills the white turrets of an ancient family mansion gleamed
+from amid the trees.
+
+Its situation was peculiarly romantic. A steep rock descended on one
+side, on whose pinnacle rose a simple cross. In the depth of the
+valley beneath lay a scattered village, whose evening bells
+melodiously broke the stillness of nature.
+
+Farther off, some broken roofs arose among the trees, from whence the
+sound of the mill, and the yellow-tinted stream, betrayed the miners'
+dwellings.
+
+Through the meadows in the valley beneath a serpentine rivulet wound
+its silvery way, interrupted by numerous falls and huge blocks of
+stone, which had been carried down in bygone ages from the mountains
+during the melting of the snows.
+
+A little path, cut in the side of the rock, ascended to the castle;
+while higher up, a broad road, somewhat broken by the mountain
+streams, conducted across the hills to more distant regions.
+
+The castle itself was an old family mansion, which had received many
+additions at different periods, as the wealth or necessities of the
+family suggested.
+
+It was surrounded by groups of ancient chestnut trees, and the terrace
+before the court was laid out in gardens, which were now filled with
+anemones, hyacinths, and other early flowers. Now and then the head of
+a joyous child appeared at the windows, which were opened to admit the
+evening breeze; while various members of the household retinue were
+seen hastening through the corridors, or standing at the doors in
+their embroidered liveries.
+
+The castle was completely surrounded by a strong railwork of iron, the
+stone pillars were overgrown by the evergreen leaves of the gobea and
+epomoea.
+
+It was the early spring of 1848.
+
+A party, consisting of thirteen persons, had assembled in the
+dining-room. They were all members of one family, and all bore the
+name of Bardy.
+
+At the head of the board sat the grandmother, an old lady of eighty
+years of age, whose snow-white hair was dressed according to the
+fashion of her times beneath her high white cap. Her face was pale and
+much wrinkled, and the eyes turned constantly upwards, as is the case
+with persons who have lost their sight. Her hand and voice trembled
+with age, and there was something peculiarly striking in the thick
+snow-white eyebrows.
+
+On her right hand sat her eldest son, Thomas Bardy, a man of between
+fifty and sixty. With a haughty and commanding countenance,
+penetrating glance, lofty figure, and noble mien, he was a true type
+of that ancient aristocracy which is now beginning to die out.
+
+Opposite to him, at the old lady's left hand, sat the darling of the
+family--a lovely girl of about fifteen. Her golden hair fell in
+luxuriant tresses round a countenance of singular beauty and
+sweetness. The large and lustrous deep-blue eyes were shaded by long
+dark lashes, and her complexion was pale as the lily, excepting when
+she smiled or spoke, and a slight flush like the dawn of morning
+overspread her cheeks.
+
+Jolanka was the orphan child of a distant relative, whom the Bardys
+had adopted. They could not allow one who bore their name to suffer
+want; and it seemed as if each member of the family had united to heap
+affection and endearment on the orphan girl, and thus prevented her
+from feeling herself a stranger among them.
+
+There were still two other female members of the family: Katalin, the
+old lady's daughter, who had been for many years a widow; and the wife
+of one of her sons, a pretty young woman, who was trying to teach a
+little prattler at her side to use the golden spoon which she had
+placed in his small, fat hand, while he laughed and crowed, and the
+family did their best to guess what he said, or what he most
+preferred.
+
+Opposite to them there sat two gentlemen. One of them was the husband
+of the young mother, Jozsef Bardy--a handsome man of about
+thirty-five, with regular features, and black hair and beard; a
+constant smile beamed on his gay countenance, while he playfully
+addressed his little son and gentle wife across the table. The other
+was his brother, Barnabas--a man of herculean form and strength. His
+face was marked by smallpox; he wore neither beard or mustache, and
+his hair was combed smoothly back, like a peasant's. His disposition
+was melancholy and taciturn; but he seemed constantly striving to
+atone, by the amiability of his manners, for an unprepossessing
+exterior.
+
+Next to him sat a little cripple, whose pale countenance bore that
+expression of suffering sweetness so peculiar to the deformed, while
+his lank hair, bony hands, and misshapen shoulders awakened the
+beholder's pity. He, too, was an orphan--a grandchild of the old
+lady's; his parents had died some years before.
+
+Two little boys of about five years old sat opposite to him. They were
+dressed alike, and the resemblance between them was so striking that
+they were constantly mistaken. They were twin-children of the young
+couple.
+
+At the lower end of the table sat Imre Bardy, a young man of twenty,
+whose handsome countenance was full of life and intelligence, his
+figure manly and graceful, and his manner courteous and agreeable. A
+slight moustache was beginning to shade his upper lip, and his dark
+hair fell in natural ringlets around his head. He was the only son of
+the _majoresco_, Tamas Bardy, and resembled him much in form and
+feature.
+
+Beside him sat an old gentleman, with white hair and ruddy complexion.
+This was Simon Bardy, an ancient relative, who had grown old with the
+grandmother of the family.
+
+The same peculiarity characterized every countenance in the Bardy
+family--namely the lofty forehead and marked brows, and the large
+deep-blue eyes, shaded by their heavy dark lashes.[1]
+
+"How singular!" exclaimed one of the party; "we are thirteen at table
+to-day."
+
+"One of us will surely die," said the old lady; and there was a
+mournful conviction in the faint, trembling tones.
+
+"Oh, no, grandmother, we are only twelve and a half!" exclaimed the
+young mother, taking the little one on her knee.
+
+"This little fellow only counts half on the railroad."
+
+All the party laughed at this remark, even the little cripple's
+countenance relaxed into a sickly smile.
+
+"Ay, ay," continued the old lady, "the trees are now putting forth
+their verdure, but at the fall of the leaf who knows if all of us, or
+any of us, may still be sitting here?"
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Several months had passed since this slight incident.
+
+In one of the apartments of the castle, the eldest Bardy and his son
+were engaged in earnest conversation.
+
+The father paced hastily up and down the apartment, now and then
+stopping short to address his son, who stood in the embrasure of one
+of the windows. The latter wore the dress of the Matyas Hussars[2]--a
+gray dolmany, with crimson cord; he held a crimson csako, with a
+tricolored cockade, in his hand.
+
+"Go," said the father, speaking in broken accents; "the sooner the
+better; let me not see you! Do not think I speak in anger, but I
+cannot bear to look at you, and think where you are going. You are my
+only son, and you know how I have loved you--how all my hopes have
+been concentrated in you. But do not think that these tears, which you
+see me shed for the first time, are on your account; for if I knew I
+should lose you,--if your blood were to flow at the next battle,--I
+should only bow my head in dust and say, 'The Lord gave, and the Lord
+takes away, blessed be His holy name!' Yes, if I heard that you and
+your infatuated companions were cut to pieces, I could stifle the
+burning tears; but to know that your blood, when it flows, will be a
+curse upon the earth, and your death will be the death of two
+kingdoms--"
+
+"They may die now; but they will regenerate----"
+
+"This is not true; you only deceive yourselves with the idea that you
+can build up a new edifice when you have overthrown the old one. Great
+God, what sacrilege! Who had intrusted you with the fate of our
+country, to tempt the Almighty? Who authorized you to lose all there
+is for the hope of what may be? For centuries past have so many
+honorable men fought in vain to uphold the old tottering constitution,
+as you call it? Or were they not true patriots and heroes? Your
+companions have hissed their persecuted countrymen in the Diet; but do
+they love their country better than we do, who have shed our blood and
+sacrificed our interests for her from generation to generation, and
+even suffered disgrace, if necessary, to keep her in life?--for though
+that life has been gradually weakened, still it is life. You promise
+her glory; but the name of glory is death!"
+
+"It may be so, father; we may lose our country as regards ourselves,
+but we give one instead of ten millions, who were hitherto our own
+people, and yet strangers in their native land."
+
+"Chimera! The people will not understand you. They never even dreamt
+of what you wish to give them. The true way to seek the people's
+welfare is to give them what they need.
+
+"Ask my dependents! Is there one among them whom I have allowed to
+suffer want or ruin, whom I have not assisted in times of need?--or
+have I ever treated them unjustly? You will not hear a murmur. Tell
+them that I am unjust notwithstanding, because I do not call the
+peasant from his plow to give his opinions on forming the laws, and
+constitution,--and what will be the consequence? They will stare at
+you in astonishment; and yet, in their mistaken wrath, they will come
+down some night and burn this house over my head."
+
+"That is the unnatural state of the times. It is all the fault of the
+past bad management, if the people have no better idea. But let the
+peasant once be free, let him be a man, and he will understand all
+that is now strange to him."
+
+"But that freedom will cost the lives of thousands!"
+
+"I do not deny it. Indeed, I believe that neither I nor any of the
+present generation will reap the fruits of this movement. I think it
+probable that in a few years not one of those whose names we now hear
+spoken of may still be living; and what is more, disgrace and curses
+may be heaped upon their dust. But a time will come when the great
+institutions of which they have laid the foundation will arise and
+render justice to the memory of those who sacrificed themselves for
+the happiness of future generations. To die for our country is a
+glorious death, but to carry with us the curses of thousands, to die
+despised and hated for the salvation of future millions, oh! that is
+sublime--it is Messiah-like!"
+
+"My son--my only son!" cried his father, throwing himself passionately
+on the young man's neck and sobbing bitterly. "Do you see these
+tears?"
+
+"For the first time in my life I see them, father--I see you weep; my
+heart can scarcely bear the weight of these tears--and yet I go! You
+have reason to weep, for I bring neither joy nor glory on your
+head--and yet I go! A feeling stronger than the desire of glory,
+stronger than the love of my country, inspires my soul; and it is a
+proof of the strength of my faith that I see your tears, my
+father--and yet I go!"
+
+"Go!" murmured his father, in a voice of despair. "You may never
+return again, or, when you do, you may find neither your father's
+house nor the grave in which he is laid! But know, even then, in the
+hour of your death, or in the hour of mine, I do not curse you--and
+now, leave me." With these words he turned away and motioned to his
+son to depart.
+
+Imre silently left the apartment, and as soon as he had closed the
+door the tears streamed from his eyes; but before his sword had struck
+the last step his countenance had regained its former determination,
+and the fire of enthusiasm had kindled in his eye.
+
+He then went to take leave of his Uncle Jozsef, whom he found
+surrounded by his family. The twins were sitting at his feet, while
+his wife was playing bo-peep with the little one, who laughed and
+shouted, while his mother hid herself behind his father's armchair.
+
+Imre's entrance interrupted the general mirth. The little boy ran over
+to examine the sword and golden tassels, while the little one began to
+cry in alarm at the sight of the strange dress.
+
+"Csitt, baba!" said his mother, taking him from his father's arms;
+"your cousin is going to wars, and will bring you a golden horse."
+
+Jozsef wrung his nephew's hand. "God be with you!" he exclaimed, and
+added in a lower voice, "You are the noblest of us all--you have done
+well!"
+
+They then all embraced him in turns, and Imre left them, amidst
+clamors of the little ones, and proceeded to his grandmother's
+apartments.
+
+On the way, he met his Uncle Barnabas, who embraced him again and
+again in silence, and then tore himself away without saying a word.
+
+The old lady sat in her great armchair, which she seldom quitted, and
+as she heard the clash of Imre's sword, she looked up and asked who
+was coming.
+
+"It is Imre!" said the fair-haired maiden, blushing, and her heart
+beat quickly as she pronounced his name.
+
+Jolanka felt that Imre was more than a brother to her, and the feeling
+with which she had learnt to return his affection was warmer than even
+a sister's love.
+
+The widow lady and the cripple were also in the grandmother's
+apartment; the child sat on a stool at the old lady's feet, and smiled
+sadly as the young man entered.
+
+"Why that sword at your side, Imre?" asked the old lady in a feeble
+voice. "Ah, this is no good world--no good world! But if God is
+against us, who can resist His hand? I have spoken with the dead again
+in dreams. I thought they all came around me and beckoned me to follow
+them; but I am ready to go, and place my life with gratitude and
+confidence in the hands of the Lord. Last night I saw the year 1848
+written in the skies in letters of fire. Who knows what may come over
+us yet? This is no good world--no good world!"
+
+Imre bent silently over the old lady's hand and kissed it.
+
+"And so you are going? Well, God bless and speed you, if you go
+beneath the cross, and never forget in life or in death to raise your
+heart to the Lord;" and the old lady placed her withered hand upon her
+grandson's head, and murmured, "God Almighty bless you!"
+
+"My husband was just such a handsome youth when I lost him," sighed
+the widow lady as she embraced her nephew. "God bless you!"
+
+The little cripple threw his arms around his cousin's knees and,
+sobbing, entreated him not to stay long away.
+
+The last who bade farewell was Jolanka. She approached with downcast
+eyes, holding in her small white hands an embroidered cockade, which
+she placed on his breast. It was composed of five colors--blue and
+gold, red, white, and green.[3]
+
+"I understand," said the young man, in a tone of joyful surprise, as
+he pressed the sweet girl to his heart, "Erdely[4] and Hungary united!
+I shall win glory for your colors!"
+
+The maiden yielded to his warm embrace, murmuring, as he released her,
+"Remember me!"
+
+"When I cease to remember you, I shall be no more," replied the youth
+fervently.
+
+And then he kissed the young girl's brow, and once more bidding
+farewell, he hurried from the apartment.
+
+Old Simon Bardy lived on the first floor: Imre did not forget him.
+
+"Well, nephew," said the old man cheerfully, "God speed you, and give
+you strength to cut down many Turks!"
+
+"It is not with the Turks that we shall have to do," replied the young
+man, smiling.
+
+"Well, with the French," said the old soldier of the past century,
+correcting himself.
+
+A page waited at the gate with two horses saddled and bridled.
+
+"I shall not require you--you may remain at home," said Imre, as,
+taking the bridle of one of the horses, vaulting lightly into the
+saddle, he pressed his csako over his brow and galloped from the
+castle.
+
+As he rode under the cross, he checked his horse and looked back. Was
+it of his grandmother's words, or of the golden-haired Jolanka that he
+thought?
+
+A white handkerchief waved from the window.
+
+"Farewell, light of my soul!" murmured the youth; and kissing his
+hand, he once more dashed his spurs into his horse's flank, and turned
+down the steep hill.
+
+Those were strange times. All at once the villages began to be
+depopulated; the inhabitants disappeared, none knew whither. The doors
+of the houses were closed.
+
+The bells were no longer heard in the evening, nor the maiden's song
+as she returned from her work. The barking of dogs which had lost
+their masters alone interrupted the silence of the streets, where the
+grass began to grow.
+
+Imre Bardy rode through the streets of the village without meeting a
+soul; few of the chimneys had smoke, and no fires gleamed through the
+kitchen windows.
+
+Evening was drawing on, and a slight transparent mist had overspread
+the valley. Imre was desirous of reaching Kolozsvar[5] early on the
+next morning, and continued his route all night.
+
+About midnight the moon rose behind the trees, shedding her silvery
+light over the forest. All was still, excepting the echo of the
+miner's hammer, and the monotonous sound of his horse's step along the
+rocky path. He rode on, lost in thought; when suddenly the horse
+stopped short, and pricked his ears.
+
+"Come, come," said Imre, stroking his neck, "you have not heard the
+cannon yet."
+
+The animal at last proceeded, turning his head impatiently from side
+to side, and snorting and neighing with fear.
+
+The road now led through a narrow pass between two rocks, whose
+summits almost met, and a slight bridge, formed of one or two rotten
+planks, was thrown across the dry channel of a mountain stream which
+cut up the path.
+
+As Imre reached the bridge, the horse backed, and no spurring could
+induce him to cross. Imre at last pressed his knee angrily against the
+trembling animal, striking him at the same time across the neck with
+the bridle, on which the horse suddenly cleared the chasm at one bound
+and then again turned and began to back.
+
+At that instant a fearful cry arose from beneath, which was echoed
+from the rocks around, and ten or fifteen savage-looking beings
+climbed from under the bridge, with lances formed of upright scythes.
+
+Even then there would have been time for the horseman to turn back,
+and dash through a handful of men behind him, but either he was
+ashamed of turning from the first conflict, or he was desirous, at any
+risk, to reach Kolozsvar at the appointed time, and instead of
+retreating by the bridge, he galloped towards the other end of the
+pass, where the enemy rushed upon him from every side, yelling
+hideously.
+
+"Back, Wallachian dogs!" cried Imre, cutting two of them down, while
+several others sprang forward with the scythes.
+
+Two shots whistled by, and Imre, letting go the bridle, cut right and
+left, his sword gleaming rapidly among the awkward weapons; and taking
+advantage of a moment in which the enemy's charge began to slacken, he
+suddenly dashed through the crowd towards the outlet of the rock,
+without perceiving that another party awaited him above the rocks with
+great stones, with which they prepared to crush him as he passed.
+
+He was only a few paces from the spot, when a gigantic figure, armed
+with a short broad-axe, and with a Roman helmet on his head, descended
+from the rock in front of him, and seizing the reins of the horse
+forced him to halt. The young man aimed a blow at his enemy's head,
+and the helmet fell back, cut through the middle, but the force of the
+blow had broken his sword in two; and the horse lifted by his giant
+foe, reared, so that the rider, losing his balance, was thrown against
+the side of the rock, and fell senseless to the ground.
+
+At the same instant a shot was fired toward them from the top of the
+rock.
+
+"Who fired there?" cried the giant, in a voice of thunder. The
+bloodthirsty Wallachians would have rushed madly on their defenseless
+prey, had not the giant stood between him and them.
+
+"Who fired on me?" he sternly exclaimed. The Wallachians stood back in
+terror.
+
+"It was not on you, Decurio, that I fired, but on the hussar,"
+stammered out one of the men, on whom the giant had fixed his eye.
+
+"You lie, traitor! Your ball struck my armor, and had I not worn a
+shirt of mail, it would have pierced my heart."
+
+The man turned deadly pale, trembling from head to foot.
+
+"My enemies have paid you to murder me?" The savage tried to speak,
+but words died upon his lips.
+
+"Hang him instantly--he is a traitor!"
+
+The rest of the gang immediately seized the culprit and carried him to
+the nearest tree, from whence his shrieks soon testified that his
+sentence was being put in execution.
+
+The Decurio remained alone with the young man; and hastily lifting
+him, still senseless, from the ground, he mounted his horse, and
+placing him before him ere the savage horde had returned, he had
+galloped some distance along the road from whence the youth had come,
+covering him with his mantle as he passed the bridge, to conceal him
+from several of the gang who stood there, and exclaiming, "Follow me
+to the Topanfalvo."
+
+As soon as they were out of sight, he suddenly turned to the left,
+down a steep, hilly path, and struck into the depth of the forest.
+
+The morning sun had just shot its first beams across the hills,
+tinting with golden hue the reddening autumn leaves, when the young
+hussar began to move in his fevered dreams, and murmured the name
+"Jolanka."
+
+In a few moments he opened his eyes. He was lying in a small chamber,
+through the only window of which the sunbeams shone upon his face.
+
+The bed on which he lay was made of lime-boughs, simply woven
+together, and covered with wolves' skins. A gigantic form was leaning
+against the foot of the bed with his arms folded, and as the young man
+awoke, he turned round. It was the Decurio.
+
+"Where am I?" asked the young man, vaguely endeavoring to recall the
+events of the past night.
+
+"In my house," replied Decurio.
+
+"And who are you?"
+
+"I am Numa, Decurio of the Roumin[6] Legion, your foe in battle, but
+now your host and protector."
+
+"And why did you save me from your men?" asked the young man, after a
+short silence.
+
+"Because the strife was unequal--a hundred against one."
+
+"But had it not been for you, I could have freed myself from them."
+
+"Without me you had been lost. Ten paces from where I stopped your
+horse, you would inevitably have been dashed to pieces by huge stones
+which they were preparing to throw down upon you from the rock."
+
+"And you did not desire my death?"
+
+"No, because it would have reflected dishonor on the Roumin name."
+
+"You are a chivalrous man, Decurio!"
+
+"I am what you are; I know your character, and the same feeling
+inspires us both. You love your nation, as I do mine. Your nation is
+great and cultivated; mine is despised and neglected, and my love is
+more bitterly devoted. Your love for your country makes you happy;
+mine deprives me of peace. You have taken up arms to defend your
+country without knowing your own strength, or the number of the foe; I
+have done the same. Either of us may lose, or we may both be blotted
+out; but though the arms may be buried in the earth, rust will not eat
+them."
+
+"I do not understand your grievances."
+
+"You do not understand? Know, then, that although fourteen centuries
+have passed since the Roman eagle overthrew Diurbanus, there are still
+those among us--the now barbarous people--who can trace their descent
+from generation to generation, up to the times of its past glory. We
+have still our traditions, if we have nothing more; and can point out
+what forest stands in the place of the ancient Sarmisaegethusa, and
+what town is built where one Decebalus overthrew the far-famed troops
+of the Consulate. And alas for that town! if the graves over which its
+houses are built should once more open, and turn the populous streets
+into a field of battle! What is become of the nation, the heir of so
+much glory?--the proud Dacians, the descendants of the far-famed
+legions? I do not reproach any nation for having brought us to what we
+now are; but let none reproach me if I desire to restore my people to
+what they once were."
+
+"And do you believe that this is the time?"
+
+"We have no prophets to point out the hour, but it seems yours do not
+see more clearly. We shall attempt it now, and if we fail our
+grandchildren will attempt it again. We have nothing to lose but a few
+lives; you risk much that is worth losing, and yet you assemble
+beneath the banner of war. Then war. Then what would you do if you
+were like us?--a people who possess nothing in this world among whom
+there is not one able or one instructed head; for although every third
+man bears the name of Papa, it is not every hundredth who can read! A
+people excluded from every employment; who live a miserable life in
+the severest manual labor; who have not one noble city in their
+country, the home of three-fourths of their people. Why should we seek
+to know the signs of the times in which we are to die, or be
+regenerated! We have nothing but our wretchedness, and if we are
+conquered we lose nothing. Oh! you did wrong for your own peace to
+leave a nation to such utter neglect!"
+
+"We do not take up arms for our nation alone, but for freedom in
+general."
+
+"You do wrong. It is all the same to us who our sovereign may be; only
+let him be just towards us, and raise up our fallen people; but you
+will destroy your nation--its power, its influence, and
+privileges--merely that you may live in a country without a head."
+
+A loud uproar interrupted the conversation. A disorderly troop of
+Wallachians approached the Decurio's house, triumphantly bearing the
+hussar's csako on a pole before them.
+
+"Had I left you there last night, they would now have exhibited your
+head instead of your csako."
+
+The crowd halted before the Decurio's window, greeting him with loud
+vociferations.
+
+The Decurio spoke a few words in the Wallachian language, on which
+they replied more vehemently than before, at the same time thrusting
+forward the kalpag on the pole.
+
+The Decurio turned hastily round. "Was your name written on your
+kalpag?" he asked the young man, in evident embarrassment.
+
+"It was."
+
+"Unhappy youth! The people, furious at not having found you, are
+determined to attack your father's house."
+
+"And you will permit them?" asked the youth, starting from bed.
+
+"I dare not contradict them, unless I would lose their confidence. I
+can prevent nothing."
+
+"Give me up--let them wreak their bloody vengeance on my head!"
+
+"I should only betray myself for having concealed you; and it would
+not save your father's house."
+
+"And if they murder the innocent and unprotected, on whom will the
+ignominy of their blood fall?"
+
+"On me; but I will give you the means of preventing this disgrace. Do
+you accept it?"
+
+"Speak!"
+
+"I will give you a disguise; hasten to Kolozsvar and assemble your
+comrades,--then return and protect your house. I will wait you there,
+and man to man, in open honorable combat, the strife will no longer be
+ignominious."
+
+"Thanks, thanks!" murmured the youth, pressing the Decurio's hand.
+
+"There is not a moment to lose; here is a peasant's mantle--if you
+should be interrogated, you have only to show this paszura,[7] and
+mention my name. Your not knowing the language is of no consequence;
+my men are accustomed to, see Hungarian gentlemen visit me in
+disguise, and having only seen you by night, they will not recognize
+you."
+
+Imre hastily took the dress, while Decurio spoke to the people, made
+arrangements for the execution of their plans, and pointed out the way
+to the castle, promising to follow them immediately.
+
+"Accept my horse as a remembrance," said the young man, turning to the
+Decurio.
+
+"I accept it, as it would only raise suspicion were you to mount it;
+but you may recover it again in the field. Haste, and lose no time! If
+you delay you will bring mourning on your own head and disgrace on
+mine!"
+
+In a few minutes the young man, disguised as a Wallachian peasant, was
+hastening on foot across the hills of Kolozsvar.
+
+It was past midnight.
+
+The inhabitants of the Bardy castle had all retired to rest.
+
+The iron gate was locked and the windows barred, when suddenly the
+sound of demoniac cries roused the slumberers from their dreams.
+
+"What is that noise?" cried Jozsef Bardy, springing from his bed, and
+rushing to the window.
+
+"The Olahok!"[8] cried a hussar, who had rushed to his master's
+apartments on hearing the sounds.
+
+"The Olah! the Olah!" was echoed through the corridors by the
+terrified servants.
+
+By the light of a few torches, a hideous crowd was seen before the
+windows, armed with scythes and axes, which they were brandishing with
+fearful menaces.
+
+"Lock all the doors!" cried Jozsef Bardy, with calm presence of mind.
+"Barricade the great entrance, and take the ladies and children to the
+back rooms. You must not lose your heads, but all assemble together in
+the turret-chamber, from whence the whole building may be protected.
+And taking down two good rifles from over his bed, he hastened to his
+elder brother Tamas's apartments, and overlooked the court.
+
+"Have you heard the noise?" asked his brother as he entered.
+
+"I knew it would come," he replied, and coolly continued to pace the
+room.
+
+"And are you not preparing for defense?"
+
+"To what purpose?--they will kill us all. I am quite prepared for what
+must inevitably happen."
+
+"But it will not happen if we defend ourselves courageously. We are
+eight men--the walls of the castle are strong--the besiegers have no
+guns, and no place to protect them; we may hold out for days until
+assistance comes from Kolozsvar."
+
+"We shall lose," replied Tamas coldly, and without the slightest
+change of countenance.
+
+"Then I shall defend the castle myself. I have a wife and children,
+our old grandmother and our sisters are here, and I shall protect
+them, if I remain alone."
+
+At that instant Barnabas and old Simon entered with the widowed
+sister.
+
+Barnabas had a huge twenty-pound iron club in his hand; grinding his
+teeth, and with eyes darting fire, he seemed capable of meeting
+single-handed the whole troop.
+
+He was followed by the widow, with two loaded pistols in her hand, and
+old Simon, who entreated them not to use violence or exasperate the
+enemy.
+
+"Conduct yourselves bravely!" replied the widow dryly; "let us not die
+in vain."
+
+"Come with me--we shall send them all to hell!" cried Barnabas,
+swinging his club in his herculean arm as if it had been a reed.
+
+"Let us not be too hasty," interrupted Jozsef; we will stand here in
+the tower, from whence we can shoot every one that approaches, and if
+they break in, we can meet them on the stairs."
+
+"For Heaven's sake!" cried Simon, "what are you going to do? If you
+kill one of them they will massacre us all. Speak to them
+peaceably--promise them wine--take them to the cellar--give them
+money--try to pacify them! Nephew Tamas, you will speak to them?"
+continued the old man, turning to Tamas, who still paced up and down,
+without the slightest visible emotion.
+
+"Pacification and resistance are equally vain," he replied coldly; "we
+are inevitably lost!"
+
+"We have no time for delay," said Jozsef impatiently; "take the arms
+from the wall, Barnabas, give one to each servant--let them stand at
+the back windows of the house, we two are enough here. Sister, stand
+between the windows, that the stones may not hit you; and when you
+load, do not strike the balls too far in, that our aim may be the more
+secure!"
+
+"No! no!--I cannot let you fire," exclaimed the old man, endeavoring
+to drag Jozsef from the window. "You must not fire yet--only remain
+quiet."
+
+"Go to the hurricane, old man! would you have us use holy water
+against a shower of stones?"
+
+At that instant several large stones were dashed through the windows,
+breaking the furniture against which they fell.
+
+"Only wait," said Simon, "until I speak with them. I am sure I shall
+pacify them. I can speak their language and I know them all--just let
+me go to them."
+
+"A vain idea! If you sue for mercy they will certainly kill you, but
+if you show courage, you may bring them to their senses. You had
+better stay and take a gun."
+
+But the old man was already out of hearing, and hurrying downstairs,
+he went out of a back door into the court, which the Wallachians had
+not yet taken possession of.
+
+They were endeavoring to break down one of the stone pillars of the
+iron gate with their axes and hammers, and had already succeeded in
+making an aperture, through which one of the gang now climbed.
+
+Old Simon recognized him. "Lupey, my son, what do you want here?" said
+the old man. "Have we ever offended you? Do you forget all that I have
+done for you?--how I cured your wife when she was so ill, and got you
+off from the military; and how, when your ox died, I gave you two fine
+bullocks to replace it? Do you not know me, my son Lupey?"
+
+"I am not your son Lupey now; I am a 'malcontent!'" cried the
+Wallachian, aiming a blow with a heavy hammer at the old man's head.
+
+Uttering a deep groan, Simon fell lifeless to the ground.
+
+The rest of the party saw the scene from the tower.
+
+Barnabas rushed from the room like a maddened tiger, while Jozsef,
+retiring cautiously behind the embrasure of the window, aimed his gun
+as they were placing his uncle's head upon a spike, and shot the first
+who raised it. Another seized it, and the next instant he, too, fell
+to the earth; another and another, as many as attempted to raise the
+head, till, finally, none dared approach.
+
+The widow loaded the guns while Tamas sat quietly in an armchair.
+
+Meanwhile Barnabas had hurried to the attic, where several large
+fragments of iron had been stowed away, and dragging them to a window
+which overlooked the entrance, he waited until the gang had assembled
+round the door, and were trying to break in; when lifting an enormous
+piece with gigantic strength, he dropped it on the heads of the
+besiegers.
+
+Fearful cries arose and the gang, who were at the door, fled right and
+left, leaving four or five of their number crushed beneath the
+ponderous mass.
+
+The next moment they returned with redoubled fury, dashing stones
+against the windows and the roof, while the door resounded with the
+blows of their clubs.
+
+Notwithstanding the stones which were flying round him, Barnabas stood
+at the window dashing heavy iron masses, and killing two or three men
+every time.
+
+His brother meanwhile continued firing from the tower, and not a ball
+was aimed in vain. The besiegers had lost a great number, and began to
+fall back, after fruitless efforts to break in the door, when a
+footman entered breathless to inform Barnabas that the Wallachians
+were beginning to scale the opposite side of the castle with ladders,
+and that the servants were unable to resist them.
+
+Barnabas rushed to the spot.
+
+Two servants lay mortally wounded in one of the back rooms, through
+the windows of which the Wallachians were already beginning to enter,
+while another ladder had been placed against the opposite window,
+which they were beginning to scale as Barnabas entered.
+
+"Here, wretches!" he roared furiously, and, seizing the ladder with
+both hands, shook it so violently that the men were precipitated from
+it, and then lifting it with supernatural strength, he dashed it
+against the opposite one, which broke with the force of the weight
+thrown against it, the upper part falling backwards with the men upon
+it, while one of the party remained hanging from the window-sill, and,
+after immense exertions to gain a footing, he too fell to the earth.
+
+Barnabas rushed into the next room grinding his teeth, his lips
+foaming, and his face of a livid hue; so appalling was his appearance;
+that one of the gang, who had been the first to enter by the window,
+turned pale with terror, and dropped his axe.
+
+Taking advantage of this, Barnabas darted on his enemy, and dragging
+him with irresistible force to the window, he dashed him from it.
+
+"On here! as many as you are!" he shouted furiously, the blood gushing
+from his mouth from the blow of a stone. "On! all who wish a fearful
+death!"
+
+At that instant, a shriek of terror rose within the house.
+
+The Wallachians had discovered the little back door which Simon had
+left open, and, stealing through it, were already inside the house,
+when the shrieks of a servant girl gave the besieged notice of their
+danger.
+
+Barnabas, seizing his club, hurried in the direction of the sounds; he
+met his brother on the stairs, who had likewise heard the cry, and
+hastened thither with his gun in his hand, accompanied by the widow.
+
+"Go, sister!" said Jozsef, "take my wife and children to the attics;
+we will try to guard the staircase step by step. Kiss them all for me.
+If we die, the villains will put us all in one grave--we shall meet
+again!"
+
+The widow retired.
+
+The two brothers silently pressed hands, and then, standing on the
+steps, awaited their enemies. They did not wait long.
+
+The bloodhounds with shouts of vengeance rushed on the narrow stone
+stairs.
+
+"Hah! thus near I love to have you, dogs of hell!" cried Barnabas,
+raising his iron club with both hands, and dealing such blows right
+and left, that none whom it reached rose again. The stairs were
+covered with the dead and wounded, while their death cries, and the
+sound of the heavy club, echoed fearfully through the vaulted
+building.
+
+The foremost of the gang retreated as precipitately as they had
+advanced, but were continually pressed forward again by the members
+from behind, while Barnabas drove them back unweariedly, cutting an
+opening through them with the blows of his club.
+
+He had already beaten them back nearly to the bottom of the stairs,
+when one of the gang, who had concealed himself in a niche, pierced
+him through the back with a spike.
+
+Dashing his club amongst the retreating crowd, he turned with a cry of
+rage, and seizing his murderer by the shoulders, dragged him down with
+him to the ground.
+
+The first four who rushed to help the murderer were shot dead by
+Jozsef Bardy, who, when he had fired off both his muskets, still
+defended his prostrated brother with the butt-end of one, until he was
+overpowered and disarmed; after which a party of them carried him out
+to the iron cross, and crucified him on it amidst the most shocking
+tortures.
+
+On trying to separate the other brother from his murderer, they found
+them both dead. With his last strength Barnabas had choked his enemy,
+whom he still held firmly in his deadly grip, and they were obliged to
+cut off his hand in order to disengage the Wallachian's body.
+
+Tamas, the eldest brother, now alone survived. Seated in his armchair
+he calmly awaited his enemies, with a large silver chandelier burning
+on the table before him.
+
+As the noise approached his chamber, he drew from its jeweled sheath
+his broad curved sword, and, placing it on the table before him,
+proceeded coolly to examine the ancient blade, which was inscribed
+with unknown characters.
+
+At last the steps were at the door; the handle was turned--it had not
+even been locked.
+
+The magnate rose, and, taking his sword from the table, he stood
+silently and calmly before the enemies, who rushed upon him with
+fearful oaths, brandishing their weapons still reeking with the blood
+of his brothers.
+
+The nobleman stood motionless as a statue until they came within two
+paces of him, when suddenly the bright black steel gleamed above his
+head, and the foremost man fell at his feet with his skull split to
+the chin. The next received a deep gash in the shoulder of his
+outstretched arm, but not a word escaped the magnate's lips, his
+countenance retained its cold and stern expression as he looked at his
+enemies in calm disdain, as if to say, "Even in combat a nobleman is
+worth ten boors."
+
+Warding off with the skill of a professed swordsman every blow aimed
+at him, he coolly measured his own thrusts, inflicting severe wounds
+on his enemies' faces and heads; but the more he evaded them the more
+furious they became. At last he received a severe wound in the leg
+from a scythe, and feel on one knee; but without evincing the
+slightest pain, he still continued fighting with the savage mob,
+until, after a long and obstinate struggle, he fell without a murmur,
+or even a death-groan.
+
+The enraged gang cut his body to pieces, and in a few minutes they had
+hoisted his head on his own sword. Even then the features retained
+their haughty, contemptuous expression.
+
+He was the last man of the family with whom they had to combat, but
+more than a hundred of their own band lay stretched in the court and
+before the windows, covering the stairs and rooms with heaps of
+bodies, and when the shouts of triumph ceased for an instant, the
+groans of the wounded and the dying were heard from every side.
+
+None now remained but women and children. When the Wallachians broke
+into the castle, the widow had taken them all to the attics, leaving
+the door open, that her brothers might find refuge in case they were
+forced to retreat; and here the weaker members of the family awaited
+the issue of the combat which was to bring them life or death,
+listening breathlessly to the uproar, and endeavoring, from its
+confused sounds, to determine good or evil.
+
+At last the voices died away, and the hideous cries of the besiegers
+ceased. The trembling women believed that the Wallachians had been
+driven out, and, breathing more freely, each awaited with impatience
+the approach of brother--husband--sons.
+
+At last a heavy step was heard on the stairs leading to the garret.
+
+"This is Barnabas's step!" cried the widow, joyfully, and still
+holding the pistols in her hand, she ran to the door of the garret.
+
+Instead of her expected brother, a savage form, drunken with blood,
+strode towards her, his countenance burning with rage and triumph.
+
+The widow started back, uttering a shriek of terror, and then with
+that unaccountable courage of desperation, she aimed one of the
+pistols at the Wallachian's breast, who instantly fell backwards on
+one of his comrades, who followed close behind. The other pistol she
+discharged into her own bosom.
+
+And now we must draw a veil over the scene that followed. What
+happened there must not be witnessed by human eyes.
+
+Suffice it to say, they murdered every one, women and children, with
+the most refined and brutal cruelty, and then threw their dead bodies
+out of the window from which Barnabas had dashed down the iron
+fragments on the besiegers' heads.
+
+They left the old grandmother to the last, that she might witness the
+extermination of her whole family. Happily for her, her eyes had
+ceased to distinguish the light of sun, and ere long the light of an
+eternal glory had risen upon them.
+
+The Wallachians then dug a common grave for the bodies, and threw them
+all in together. The little one, whom his parents loved so well, they
+cast in alive, his nurse having escaped from the attics and carried
+him downstairs, where they had been overtaken by the savages.
+
+"There are only eleven here!" cried one of the gang, who had counted
+the bodies, "one of them must be still alive somewhere--there ought to
+be twelve!" And then they once more rushed through the empty rooms,
+overturning all the furniture, and cutting up and breaking everything
+they met with. They searched the garrets and every corner of the
+cellars, but without success.
+
+At last a yell of triumph was heard. One of them had discovered a door
+which, being painted of the same color as the walls, had hitherto
+escaped their observation. It concealed a small apartment in the
+turret. With a few blows of their axes it was broken open, and they
+rushed in.
+
+"Ah! a rare booty!" cried the foremost of the ruffians, while, with
+bloodthirsty curiosity, the others pressed round to see the new
+victim.
+
+There lay the little orphan with the golden hair; her eyes were closed
+and a death-like hue had overspread her beautiful features.
+
+Her aunt; with an instinctive foreboding, had concealed her here when
+she took the others to the attic.
+
+The orphan grasped a sharp knife in her hand, with which she had
+attempted to kill herself; and when her fainting hands refused the
+fearful service, she had swooned in despair.
+
+"Ah!" cried the Wallachians, in savage admiration, their bloodthirsty
+countenances assuming a still more hellish expression.
+
+"This is a common booty!" cried several voices together.
+
+"A beautiful girl! A noble lady! ha, ha! She will just suit the
+tattered Wallachians!" And with their foul and bloody hands, they
+seized the young girl by her fair slight arms.
+
+"Ha! what is going on here?" thundered a voice from behind.
+
+The Wallachians looked round.
+
+A figure stood among them fully a head taller than all the rest. He
+wore a brass helmet, in which a deep cleft was visible, and held in
+his left hand a Roman sword. His features bore the ancient Roman
+character.
+
+"The Decurio!" they murmured, making way for him.
+
+"What is going on here?" he repeated; and seizing the fainting girl in
+the arms of a Wallachian, he ordered him to lay her down.
+
+"She is one of our enemies," replied the savage insolently.
+
+"Silence, knave! Does one of the Roumin nation seek enemies in women?
+Lay her down instantly."
+
+"Not so, leader," interrupted Lupey; "our laws entitle us to a
+division of the spoil. This girl is our booty; she belongs to us after
+the victory."
+
+"I know our laws better than you do, churl! Due division of spoil is
+just and fair; but we cast lots for what cannot be divided."
+
+"True, leader: a horse or an ox cannot be divided, and for them we
+cast lots, but in this case--"
+
+"I have said it cannot, and I should like to know who dares to say it
+can!"
+
+Lupey knew the Decurio too well to proffer another syllable, and the
+rest turned silently from the girl; one voice alone was heard to
+exclaim, "It can!"
+
+"Who dares to say that?" cried the Decurio; "let him come forward!"
+
+A young Wallachian, with long plaited hair, confronted the Decurio. He
+was evidently intoxicated, and replied, striking his breast with his
+fist: "I said so."
+
+Scarcely had the words escaped his lips, than the Decurio, raising his
+left hand, severed the contradictor's head at one stroke from his
+body; and as it fell back, the lifeless trunk dropped on its knees
+before the Decurio, with its arms around him, as if in supplication.
+
+"Dare anyone still say it can?" asked Numa, with merciless rigor.
+
+The Wallachians turned silently away.
+
+"Put the horses immediately to the carriage; the girl must be placed
+in it, and brought to Topanfalvo. Whoever has the good fortune of
+winning her, has a right to receive her as I confide her to you; but
+if anyone of you should dare to offend her in the slightest degree,
+even by a look or a smile, remember this and take example from it,"
+continued the Decurio, pointing with his sword to the headless body of
+the young man. "And now you may go--destroy and pillage."
+
+At these words the band scattered right and left, the Decurio with the
+fainting girl, whom he lifted into the carriage and confided to some
+faithful retainers cf the family, pointing out the road across the
+hills.
+
+In half an hour the castle was in flames and the Wallachians,
+descending into the cellars, had knocked out the bottoms of the casks,
+and bathed in the sea of flowing wine and brandy, singing wild songs,
+while the fire burst from every window enveloping the blackened walls;
+after which the revelers departed, leaving their dead, and those who
+were too helplessly intoxicated to follow them.
+
+Meanwhile they brought the young girl to the Decurio's house, and as
+each man considered that he had an equal right to the prize, they kept
+a vigilant eye upon her, and none dared offend her so much as by a
+look.
+
+When the Decurio arrived, they all crowded into the house with him,
+filling the rooms, as well as the entrance and porch.
+
+Having laid out the spoil before them on the ground, the leader
+proceeded to divide it into equal shares, retaining for himself a
+portion of ten men, after which most of the band dispersed to their
+homes; but a good many remained, greedily eyeing their still
+unappropriated victim, who lay pale and motionless as the dead on the
+couch of lime-boughs where they had laid her.
+
+"You are waiting, I suppose, to cast lots for the girl?" said Numa
+dryly.
+
+"Certainly," replied Lupey, with an insolent leer; "and his she will
+be who casts highest. If two, or ten, or twenty of us should cast the
+same, we have an equal right to her."
+
+"I tell you only one can have her," interrupted Numa sternly.
+
+"Then those who win must cast again among each other."
+
+"Casting the die will not do; we may throw all day long, and two may
+remain at the end."
+
+"Well, let us play cards for her."
+
+"I cannot allow that, the more cunning will deceive the simpler."
+
+"Well, write our names upon bricks, and throw them all into a barrel;
+and whichever name you draw will take away the girl."
+
+"I can say what name I please, for none of you can read."
+
+The Wallachian shook his head impatiently.
+
+"Well, propose something yourself, Decurio."
+
+"I will. Let us try which of us can give the best proof of courage and
+daring; and whoever can do that, shall have the girl, for he best
+deserves her."
+
+"Well said!" cried the men unanimously. "Let us each relate what we
+have done, and then you can judge which among us is the boldest."
+
+"I killed the first Bardy in the court in sight of his family."
+
+"I broke in the door, when that terrible man was dashing down the iron
+on our heads."
+
+"But it was I who pierced his heart."
+
+"I mounted the stairs first."
+
+"I fought nearly half an hour with the noble in the cloth of gold."
+
+And thus they continued. Each man, according to his own account, was
+the first and the bravest--each had performed miracles of valor.
+
+"You have all behaved with great daring, but it is impossible now to
+prove what has happened. The proof must be given here, by all of us
+together, before my eyes, indisputably."
+
+"Well, tell us how," said Lupey impatiently, always fearing that the
+Decurio was going to deceive them.
+
+"Look here," said Numa, drawing a small cask from beneath the bed--and
+in doing so he observed that the young girl half opened her eyes, as
+she glanced at him, and then closed them. She was awake, and had heard
+all.
+
+As he stooped down, Numa whispered gently in her ear: "Fear nothing,"
+and then drew the cask into the middle of the room.
+
+The Wallachians stared with impatient curiosity as he knocked out the
+bottom of the cask with a hatchet.
+
+"This cask contains gunpowder," continued Decurio. "We will light a
+match and place it in the middle of the cask, and whoever remains
+longest in the room is undoubtedly the most courageous; for there is
+enough here to blow up not only this house, but the whole of the
+neighboring village."
+
+At this proposition several of the men began to murmur.
+
+"If any are afraid they are not obliged to remain," said the Decurio
+dryly.
+
+"I agree," said Lupey doggedly. "I will remain here; and perhaps,
+after all, it is poppy-seeds you have got there--it looks very much
+like them."
+
+The Decurio stooped down, and taking a small quantity between his
+fingers, threw it into the Wallachian's pipe, which immediately
+exploded, causing him to stagger backwards, and the next instant he
+stood with a blackened visage, sans beard and moustache, amidst the
+jeers and laughter of his comrades.
+
+This only exasperated him the more.
+
+"I will stay for all that!" he exclaimed; and lifting up the pipe
+which he had dropped, he walked over and lit it at the burning match
+which the Decurio was placing in the cask.
+
+Upon this, two-thirds of the men left the room.
+
+The rest assembled around the cask with much noise and bravado,
+swearing by heaven and earth that they would stay until the match
+burned out; but the more they swore, the more they looked at the
+burning match, the flame of which was slowly approaching the
+gunpowder.
+
+For some minutes their courage remained unshaken, but after that they
+ceased to boast, and began to look at each other in silent
+consternation, while their faces grew paler every instant. At last one
+or two rose and stood aloof; the others followed their example, and
+some grinding their teeth with rage, others chattering with terror,
+they all began to leave the room.
+
+Only two remained beside the cask; Numa, who stood with his arms
+folded leaning against the foot of the bed; and Lupey, who was sitting
+on the iron of the cask with his back turned to the danger, and
+smoking furiously.
+
+As soon as they were alone, the latter glanced behind him and saw the
+flame was within an inch of the powder.
+
+"I'll tell you what, Decurio," he said, springing up, "we are only two
+left, don't let us make food of each other; let us come to an
+understanding on this matter."
+
+"If you are tired of waiting, I can press the match lower."
+
+"This is no jest, Numa; you are risking your own life. How can you
+wish to send us both to hell for the sake of a pale girl? But I'll
+tell you what--I'll give her up to you if you will only promise that
+she shall be mine when you are tired of her."
+
+"Remain here and win her--if you dare."
+
+"To what purpose?" said the Wallachian, in a whining voice, and in his
+impatience he began to tear his clothes and stamp with his feet, like
+a petted child.
+
+"What I have said stands good," said the Decurio; "whoever remains
+longest has the sole right to the lady."
+
+"Well, I will stay, of course; but what do I gain by it? I know you
+will stay, too, and then the devil will have us both; and I speak not
+only for myself when I say I do not wish that."
+
+"If you do not wish it, you had better be gone."
+
+"Well, I don't care--if you will give me a golden mark."
+
+"Not the half; stay if you like it."
+
+"Decurio, this is madness! The flame will reach the powder
+immediately."
+
+"I see it."
+
+"Well, say a dollar."
+
+"Not a whit."
+
+"May the seventy-seven limited thunder-bolt strike you on St.
+Michael's Day!" roared the Wallachian fiercely, as he rushed to the
+door; but after he had gone out, he once more thrust his head in and
+cried: "Will you give even a florin? I am not gone yet."
+
+"Nor have I removed the match; you may come back." The Wallachian
+slammed the door, and ran for his life, till exhausted and breathless
+he sank under a tree, where he lay with his tunic over his head, and
+his ears covered with his hands, only now and then raising his head
+nervously, to listen for the awful explosion which was to blow up the
+world.
+
+Meanwhile Numa coolly removed the match, which was entirely burnt
+down; and throwing it into the grate, he stepped over to the bed and
+whispered into the young girl's ear: "You are free!"
+
+Trembling, she raised herself in the bed and taking the Decurio's
+large, sinewy hands within her own, she murmured: "Be merciful! O hear
+my prayer, and kill me!"
+
+The Decurio stroked the fair hair of the lovely suppliant.
+
+"Poor child!" he replied gently; "you have nothing to fear; nobody
+will hurt you now."
+
+"You have saved me from these fearful people--now save me from
+yourself!"
+
+"You have nothing to fear from me," replied the Dacian, proudly; "I
+fight for liberty alone, and you may rest as securely within my
+threshold as on the steps of the altar. When I am absent you need have
+no anxiety, for these walls are impregnable, and if anyone should dare
+offend you by the slightest look, that moment shall be the last of his
+mortal career. And when I am at home you have nothing to fear, for
+woman's image never dwelt within my heart. Accept my poor couch, and
+may your rest be sweet!--Imre Bardy slept on it last night."
+
+"Imre!" exclaimed the starting girl. "You have seen him, then?--oh!
+where is he!"
+
+The Decurio hesitated. "He should not have delayed so long," he
+murmured, pressing his hand against his brow; "all would have been
+otherwise."
+
+"Oh! let me go to him; if you know where he is."
+
+"I do not know, but I am certain he will come here if he is
+alive--indeed he must come."
+
+"Why do you think that?"
+
+"Because he will seek you."
+
+"Did he then speak--before you?"
+
+"As he lay wounded on that couch, he pronounced your name in his
+dreams. Are you not that Jolanka Bardy whom they call 'The Angel'? I
+knew you by your golden locks."
+
+The young girl cast down her eyes. "Then you think he will come?" she
+said in a low voice. "And my relations?"
+
+"He will come as soon as possible; and now you must take some food and
+rest. Do not think about your relations now; they are all in a safe
+place--nobody can hurt them more."
+
+The Decurio brought some refreshment, laid a small prayer-book on the
+pillow, and left the orphan by herself.
+
+The poor girl opened the prayer-book, and her tears fell like
+rain-drops on the blessed page; but, overcome by the fatigue and
+terror she had undergone, her head ere long sank gently back, and she
+slept calmly and sweetly the sleep of exhausted innocence.
+
+As evening closed, the Decurio returned, and softly approaching the
+bed, looked long and earnestly at the fair sleeper's face, until two
+large tears stood unconsciously in his eyes.
+
+The Roumin hastily brushed away the unwonted moisture, and as if
+afraid of the feeling which had stolen into his breast, he hastened
+from the room, and laid himself upon his woolen rug before the open
+door.
+
+The deserted castle still burned on, shedding a ghastly light on the
+surrounding landscape, while the deepest silence reigned around, only
+broken now and then by an expiring groan, or the hoarse song of a
+drunken reveler.
+
+Day was beginning to dawn as a troop of horsemen galloped furiously
+towards the castle from the direction of Kolozsvar.
+
+They were Imre and his comrades.
+
+Silently and anxiously they pursued their course, their eyes fixed
+upon one point, as they seemed to fly rather than gallop along the
+road. "We are too late!" exclaimed one of the party at last, pointing
+to a dim red smoke along the horizon. "Your castle is burning!"
+
+Without returning an answer, Imre spurred his panting horse to a
+swifter pace. A turn in the road suddenly brought the castle to their
+view, its blackened walls still burning, while red smoke rose high
+against the side of the hill.
+
+The young man uttered a fierce cry of despair, and galloped madly down
+the declivity. In less than a quarter of an hour he stood before the
+ruined walls.
+
+"Where is my father? where are my family? where is my bride?" he
+shrieked in frantic despair, brandishing his sword over the head of a
+half-drunken Wallachian, who was leaning against the ruined portico.
+
+The latter fell to his knees, imploring mercy, and declaring that it
+was not he who killed them.
+
+"Then they are dead!" exclaimed the unhappy youth, as, half-choked by
+his sobs, he fell forward on his horse's neck.
+
+Meanwhile his companions had ridden up, and immediately sounded the
+Wallachian, whom, but for Imre's interference, they would have cut
+down.
+
+"Lead us to where you have buried them. Are they all dead?" he
+continued; "have you not left one alive? Accursed be the sun that
+rises after such a night!"
+
+The Wallachian pointed to a large heap of fresh-raised mould. "They
+are all there!" he said.
+
+Imre fell from his horse without another word, as if struck down.
+
+His companions removed him to a little distance, where the grass was
+least red.
+
+They then began to dig twelve graves with their swords.
+
+Imre watched them in silence. He seemed unconscious what they were
+about.
+
+When they had finished the graves they proceeded to open the large
+pit, but the sight was too horrible, and they carried Imre away by
+force. He could not have looked on what was there and still retain his
+senses.
+
+In a short time, one of his comrades approached and told him that
+there were only eleven bodies in the grave.
+
+"Then one of them must be alive!" cried Imre, a slight gleam of hope
+passing over his pale features; "which is it?--speak! Is there not a
+young girl with golden locks among them?"
+
+"I know not," stammered his comrade, in great embarrassment.
+
+"You do not know?--go and look again." His friend hesitated.
+
+"Let me go--I must know," said Imre impatiently, as the young man
+endeavored to detain him.
+
+"O stay, Imre, you cannot look on them; they are all headless!"
+
+"My God!" exclaimed the young man, covering his face with both hands,
+and, bursting into tears he threw himself down with his face upon the
+earth.
+
+His comrades questioned the Wallachian closely as to what he knew
+about the young girl. First he returned no answer, pretending to be
+drunk and not to understand:
+
+But on their promising to spare his life, on the sole condition that
+he would speak the truth, he confessed that she had been carried away
+to the mountains, where the band were to cast lots for her.
+
+"I must go!" said Imre, starting as if in a trance.
+
+"Whither?" inquired his comrades.
+
+"To seek her! Take off your dress," he continued, turning to the
+Wallachian, "you may have mine in exchange," and, hastily putting on
+the tunic, he concealed his pistols in the girdle beneath it.
+
+"We will follow you," said his comrades, taking up their arms; "we
+will seek her from village to village."
+
+"No, no, I must go alone! I shall find her more easily alone. If I do
+not return, avenge this for me," he said, pointing to the moat; then,
+turning to the Wallachian, he added sternly: "I have found beneath
+your girdle a gold medallion, which my grandmother wore suspended from
+her neck, and by which I know you to be one of her murderers, and, had
+I not promised to spare your life, you should now receive the
+punishment that you deserve. Keep him here," he said to his comrades,
+"until I have crossed the hills, and then let him go."
+
+And taking leave of his friends, he cast one glance at the eleven
+heaps, and at the burning castle of his ancestors, and hastened toward
+the mountains.
+
+The hoary autumn nights had dyed the leaves of the forest. The whole
+country looked as if it had been washed in blood.
+
+Deep amidst the wildest forest the path suddenly descends into a
+narrow valley, surrounded by steep rocks at the foot of which lies a
+little village half concealed among the trees.
+
+It seemed as if the settlers there had only cleared sufficient ground
+to build their dwellings, leaving all the rest a dense forest. Apart
+from the rest, on the top of a rock, stood a cottage, which, unlike
+others, was constructed entirely of large blocks of stone, and only
+approachable by a small path cut in the rock.
+
+A young man ascended this path. He was attired in a peasant's garb and
+although he evidently had traveled far, his step was light and fleet.
+When he had ascended about halfway, he was suddenly stopped by an
+armed Wallachian, who had been kneeling before a shrine in the rock,
+and seeing the stranger, rose and stood in his path.
+
+The latter pronounced the Decurio's name, and produced his paszura.
+
+The Wallachian examined it on every side, and then stepped back to let
+the stranger pass, after which he once more laid down his scythe and
+cap, and knelt before the shrine.
+
+The stranger knocked at the Decurio's door, which was locked, and an
+armed Wallachian appeared from behind the rocks, and informed him that
+the Decurio was not at home, only his wife.
+
+"His wife?" exclaimed the stranger in surprise.
+
+"Yes, that pale girl who fell to him by lot."
+
+"And she is his wife."
+
+"He told us so himself, and swore that if any of us dared so much as
+lift his eye upon her, he would send him to St. Nicholas in paradise."
+
+"Can I not see her?"
+
+"I would not advise you; for if the Decurio hears of it, he will make
+halves of you; but you may go around to the window if you like--only
+let me get out of the way first, that the Decurio may not find me
+here."
+
+The stranger hastened to the window, and looking in, he saw the young
+girl seated on an armchair made of rough birch boughs, with a little
+prayer-book on her knee; her fair arm supporting her head, while a
+mass of golden ringlets half veiled her face, which was as pale as an
+alabaster statue; the extreme sadness of its expression rendering her
+beauty still more touching.
+
+"Jolanka!" exclaimed the stranger passionately.
+
+She started at the well-known voice, and, uttering a cry of joy,
+rushed to the window.
+
+"Oh, Imre!" she murmured, "are you come at last!"
+
+"Can I not enter? can I not speak with you?"
+
+The young girl hastened to unbar the door, which was locked on the
+inside, and as Imre entered she threw herself into his arms, while he
+pressed her fondly to his heart.
+
+The Wallachian, who had stolen to the window, stood aghast with terror
+and, soon as the Decurio arrived, he ran to meet him, and related,
+with vehement gesticulations, how the girl had thrown herself into the
+peasant's arms.
+
+"And how did you know that?" asked Numa coldly.
+
+"I saw them through the window."
+
+"And dared you look through my window? Did I not forbid you? Down on
+your knees, and pray!"
+
+The Wallachian fell on his knees, and clasped his hands.
+
+"Rebel! you deserve your punishment of death for having disobeyed my
+commands; and if you ever dare to open your lips on the subject,
+depend upon it, you shall not escape!" And with these words he strode
+away, leaving the astonished informer on his knees, in which posture
+he remained for some time afterwards, not daring to raise his head
+until the Decurio's steps had died away.
+
+As Numa entered the house, the lovers hastened to meet him. For an
+instant or two he stood at the threshold, regarding the young man with
+a look of silent reproach. "Why did you come so late?" he asked.
+
+Imre held out his hand, but the Decurio did not accept it.
+
+"The blood of your family is on my hand," he whispered. "You have let
+dishonor come on me, and mourning on yourself."
+
+The young man's head sunk on his breast in silent anguish.
+
+"Take his hand," said Jolanka, in her low, sweet accents; and then
+turning to Imre, "He saved your life--he saved us both, and he will
+rescue our family, too."
+
+Imre looked at her in astonishment.
+
+The Decurio seized his arms and drew him aside. "She does not know
+that they are dead," he whispered; "she was not with them, and knows
+nothing of their fate; and I have consoled her with the idea that they
+are all prisoners, she must never know the horrors of that fearful
+night."
+
+"But sooner or later she will hear it."
+
+"Never! you must leave the place and the kingdom. You must go to
+Turkey."
+
+"My way lies towards Hungary."
+
+"You must not think of it. Evil days await that country; your prophets
+do not see them, but I know, and see them clearly. Go to Turkey; I
+will give you letters by which you may pass in security through
+Wallachia and Moldavia; and here is a purse of gold--do not scruple to
+accept it, for it is your own, it belonged to _them_. Promise me, for
+her sake," he continued earnestly, pointing to Jolanka, "that you will
+not go to Hungary."
+
+Imre hesitated. "I cannot promise what I am not sure I shall fulfill;
+but I shall remember your advice."
+
+Numa took the hands of the two lovers, and, gazing long and earnestly
+on their faces, he said, in a voice of deep feeling, "You love one
+another?"
+
+They pressed his hand in silence.
+
+"You will be happy--you will forget your misfortunes. God bless and
+guide you on your way! Take these letters, and keep the direct road to
+Brasso,[9] by the Saxon-land.[10] You will find free passage
+everywhere, and never look behind until the last pinnacles of the
+snowy mountains are beyond your sight. Go! we will not take leave, not
+a word, let us forget each other!"
+
+The Decurio watched the lovers until they were out of sight; and
+called to them, even when they could hear him no longer: "Do not go
+towards Hungary."
+
+He then entered his house. The prayer-book lay open as the young girl
+had left it; the page was still damp with her tears. Numa's hand
+trembled, as he kissed the volume fervently and placed it in his
+bosom.
+
+When night came on, the Roumin lay down on his wolf-skin couch, where
+the golden-haired maiden, and her lover before her, had slept, but it
+seemed as if they had stolen his rest--he could not close his eyes
+there, so he rose and went out on the porch, where he spread his rug
+before the open door; but it was long ere he could sleep--there was an
+unwonted feeling at his heart, something like happiness, yet
+inexpressibly sad; and, buried in deep reverie, he lay with his eyes
+fixed on the dark blue starry vault above him till past midnight.
+Suddenly he thought he heard the report of some fire-arms at a great
+distance, and at the same moment two stars sank beneath the horizon.
+Numa thought of the travelers, and a voice seemed to whisper, "They
+are now happy!"
+
+The moon had risen high in the heavens, when the Decurio was roused
+from his sleep by heavy footsteps, and five or six Wallachians, among
+whom was Lupey, stood before him.
+
+"We have brought two enemies' heads," said the latter, with a dark
+look at the Decurio; "pay us their worth!" and taking two heads from
+his pouch he laid them on Numa's mat.
+
+The Wallachians watched their leader's countenance with sharp,
+suspicious glances.
+
+Numa recognized the two heads by the light of the moon. They were
+those of Imre and Jolanka, but his features did not betray the
+slightest emotion.
+
+"You will know them probably," continued Lupey. "The young magnate,
+who escaped us at the pass, came for the girl in your absence, and at
+the same time stole your money, and, what is more, we found your
+paszura upon him also."
+
+"Who killed them?" asked the Decurio, in his usual calm voice.
+
+"None of us," replied the Wallachian; "as we rushed upon them, the
+young magnate drew two pistols from his girdle, and shot the girl
+through the head first, and himself afterwards."
+
+"Were you all there?"
+
+"And more of us besides."
+
+"Go back and bring the rest. I will divide the money you have found on
+them among you. Make haste; and should one of you remain behind, his
+share will be divided among the rest."
+
+The Wallachians hastened to seek their comrades with cries of joy.
+
+The Decurio then locked the door, and, throwing himself upon the
+ground beside the two heads, he kissed them a hundred times, and
+sobbed like a child.
+
+"I warned you not to go toward Hungary!" he said bitterly. "Why did
+you not hear me, unhappy children? why did you not take my word?" and
+he wept over his enemies' heads as if he had been their father.
+
+He then rose, his eyes darting fire, and, shaking his terrible fist,
+he cried, in a voice hoarse with rage: "Czine mintye!"[11]
+
+In a few hours, the Wallachians had assembled before the Decurio's
+house. They were about fifty or sixty, all wild, fearful-looking men.
+
+Numa covered the two heads with a cloth, and laid them on the bed,
+after which he opened the door.
+
+Lupey entered last.
+
+"Lock the door," said Numa, when they were all in; "we must not be
+interrupted;" and, making them stand in a circle, he looked around at
+them all, one by one.
+
+"Are you all here?" he asked at last.
+
+"Not one is absent."
+
+"Do you consider yourselves all equally deserving of sharing _the
+booty_?"
+
+"All of us."
+
+"It was you," he continued to Lupey, "who struck down the old man?"
+
+"It was."
+
+"And you who pierced the magnate with a spike?"
+
+"You are right, leader."
+
+"And you really killed all the women in the castle?" turning to a
+third.
+
+"With my own hand."
+
+"And one and all of you can boast of having massacred, and plundered,
+and set on fire?"
+
+"All! all!" they cried, striking their breasts.
+
+"Do not lie before Heaven. See! your wives are listening at the window
+to what you say, and will betray you if you do not speak the truth."
+
+"We speak the truth!"
+
+"It is well!" said the leader, as he calmly approached the bed; and,
+seating himself on it, uncovered the two heads and placed them on his
+knee. "Where did you put their bodies?" he asked.
+
+"We cut them in pieces and strewed them on the highroad."
+
+There was a short silence. Numa's breathing became more and more
+oppressed, and his large chest heaved convulsively. "Have you prayed
+yet?" he asked in an altered voice.
+
+"Not yet, leader. What should we pray for?" said Lupey.
+
+"Fall down on your knees and pray, for this is the last morning which
+will dawn on any of you again."
+
+"Are you in your senses, leader? What are you going to do?"
+
+"I am going to purge the Roumin nation of a set of ruthless murderers
+and brigands. Miserable wretches; instead of glory, you have brought
+dishonor and disgrace upon our arms wherever you have appeared. While
+the brave fought on the field of battle, you slaughtered their wives
+and children; while they risked their lives before the cannon's mouth
+you attacked the house of the sleepers and robbed and massacred the
+helpless and the innocent. Fall down on your knees and pray for your
+souls, for the angel of death stands over you, to blot out your memory
+from among the Roumin people!"
+
+The last words were pronounced in a fearful tone. Numa was no longer
+the cold unmoved statue he had hitherto appeared, he was like a fiery
+genius of wrath, whose very breath was destruction.
+
+The Wallachians fell upon their knees in silent awe, while the women
+who had been standing outside, rushed shrieking down the rocks.
+
+The Decurio drew a pistol from his breast, and approached the cask of
+gunpowder.
+
+With a fearful howl, they rushed upon him; the shriek of despair was
+heard for an instant, then the terrible explosion which caused the
+rocks to tremble, while the flames rose with a momentary flash amidst
+clouds of dust and smoke, scaring the beasts of the forest, and
+scattering stones and beams, and hundreds of dismembered limbs, far
+through the valley, and over the houses of the terrified inhabitants!
+
+When the smoke had dissipated, a heap of ruins stood in the place of
+Numa's dwelling.
+
+The sun rose and smiled upon the earth, which was strewed with the
+last leaves of autumn, but where were those who had assembled at the
+spring-time of the year?
+
+The evening breezes whispered mournfully through the ruined walls, and
+strewed the faded leaves upon eleven grassy mounds.
+
+The pen trembles in my hand--my heart sickens at the recital of such
+misery.
+
+Would that I could believe it an imagination--the ghostly horror of a
+fevered brain!
+
+Would that I could bid my gentle readers check the falling tear or
+tell them: "Start not with horror; it is but romance--the creation of
+some fearful dream--let us awake and see it no more!"
+
+FOOTNOTES TO _THIRTEEN AT TABLE_:
+
+[1: There is a race of the Hungarians in the Carpath who, unlike the
+Hungarians of the plain, have blue eyes and often fair hair.]
+
+[2: Part of the free corps raised in 1848.]
+
+[3: Blue and gold are the colors of Transylvania.]
+
+[4: Transylvania.]
+
+[5: Klausenburg.]
+
+[6: The Wallachians were, in the days of Trajan, subdued by the
+Romans, with whom they became intermixed, and are also called Roumi.]
+
+[7: Everything on which a double-headed eagle--the emblem of the
+Austrian Government--was painted, engraved or sculptured, the
+Wallachians called paszura.]
+
+[8: Olah, Wallachian--ok, plural.]
+
+[9: Brasso, or Kyonstadt, a town in the southeast of Transylvania, on
+the frontier of Wallachia.]
+
+[10: A district inhabited by a colony of Saxons.]
+
+[11: Czine mintye!--A Wallachian term signifying revenge.]
+
+
+
+ÉTIENNE BÁRSONY
+
+
+_THE DANCING BEAR_
+
+
+Fife and drum were heard from the big market-place.
+
+People went running towards it. In a village the slightest unusual
+bustle makes a riot. Everybody is curious to know the cause of the
+alarm, and whether the wheels of the world are running out of their
+orbit. In the middle of the great dusty market-place some stunted
+locust trees were hanging their faint, dried foliage, and from far off
+one could already see that underneath these miserable trees a tall,
+handsome, young man and a huge, plump dark-brown, growling bear were
+hugging each other.
+
+Joco, the bear-leader, was giving a performance. His voice rang like a
+bugle-horn, and, singing his melancholy songs, he from time to time
+interrupted himself and hurrahed, whereupon the bear began to spring
+and roar angrily. The two stamped their feet, holding close together,
+like two tipsy comrades. But the iron-weighted stick in the young
+man's hand made it evident that the gigantic beast was quite capable
+of causing trouble, and was only restrained from doing so because it
+had learnt from experience that the least outbreak never failed to
+bring down vengeance upon its back. The bear was a very powerful
+specimen from Bosnia, with thick brown fur and a head as broad as a
+bull's. When he lifted himself up on his hind legs he was half a head
+taller than Joco, his master.
+
+The villagers stood round them with anxious delight, and animated the
+bear with shouts of "Jump, Ibrahim! Hop, Ibrahim!" but nobody ventured
+to go near. Joco was no stranger to these people. After every harvest
+he visited the rich villages of Bánát with his bear. They knew that he
+was a native of the frontier of Slavonia, and they were not
+particularly keen to know anything else about him. A man who leads
+such a vagrant life does not stay long in any one place, and has
+neither friends nor foes anywhere. They supposed that he spent part of
+the year in Bosnia, perhaps the winter, visiting, one after the other,
+the Servian monasteries. Now, in midsummer, when he was least to be
+expected, they suddenly hear his fife and drum.
+
+Ibrahim, the big old bear, roused the whole village in less than a
+quarter of an hour with his far-reaching growls. The dogs crouched
+horror-struck, their hair standing on end, barking at him in fear and
+trembling.
+
+When Joco stopped at some street corner, or in the market-place, and
+began to beat his rattling drum, the bear lifted himself with heavy
+groans on his hind legs, and then the great play began, the cruel
+amusement, the uncanny, fearful embracings which one could never be
+sure would not end fatally. For Joco is not satisfied to let Ibrahim
+jump and dance, but, whistling and singing, grasps the wild beast's
+skin, and squeezes his paws; and so the two dance together, the one
+roaring and groaning, the other singing with monotonous voice a
+melancholy song.
+
+The company of soldiers stationed in the village was just returning
+from drill, and Captain Winter, Ritter von Wallishausen, turned in
+curiosity his horse's head towards the crowd, and made a sign to
+Lieutenant Vig to lead the men on. His fiery half-blood Graditz horse
+snuffed the disgusting odor of the wild beast, and would go no nearer.
+
+The Captain called a hussar from the last line that passed him, and
+confided the stubborn horse to his charge. Then he bent his steps
+towards the swaying crowd. The villagers opened out a way for him, and
+soon the Captain stood close behind the bear-leader. But before he
+could fix his eyes on Ibrahim they were taken captive by something
+else.
+
+A few steps away from Joco a young girl sat upon the ground, gently
+stroking a light-colored little bear. They were both so huddled up
+together that the villagers scarcely noticed them, and the Captain was
+therefore all the better able to observe the young woman, who appeared
+to be withdrawing herself as much as possible from public gaze. And
+really she seemed to be an admirable young creature. She was slight of
+build, perhaps not yet fully developed, with the early ripeness of the
+Eastern beauty expressed in face and figure--a black cherry, at sight
+of which the mouth of such a gourmand as the Ritter von Wallishausen
+would naturally water! Her fine face seemed meant only to be the
+setting of her two black eyes. She wore a shirt of coarse linen, a
+frock of many-colored material, and a belt around her waist. Her
+beautifully formed bosom, covered only by the shirt, rose and fell in
+goddesslike shamelessness. A string of glass beads hung round her
+neck, and two long earrings tapped her cheeks at every movement. She
+made no effort to hide her bare feet, but now and then put back her
+untidy but beautiful black hair from her forehead and eyes; for it was
+so thick that if she did not do so she could not see.
+
+The girl felt that the Captain's fiery gaze was meant for her and not
+for the little bear. She became embarrassed, and instinctively turned
+her head away. Just at this moment Joco turned round with Ibrahim. The
+tall Servian peasant let the whistle fall from his hand, and the wild
+dance came to an end. Ibrahim understood that the performance was
+over, and, putting down his front paws on the ground, licked, as he
+panted, the strong iron bars of his muzzle.
+
+The Captain and Joco looked at each other. The powerful young
+bear-leader was as pale as death. He trembled as if something terrible
+had befallen him. Captain Winter looked at him searchingly. Where, he
+asked himself, had he met this man?
+
+The villagers did not understand what was going on, and began to
+shout, "Zorka! Now, Zorka, it is your turn with Mariska." The cries of
+the villagers brought Joco to himself, and with a motion worthy of a
+player he roused the little bear to its feet. Then he made signs to
+the girl. Being too excited to blow his whistle, he started singing
+and beating the drum; but his voice trembled so much that by and by he
+left off singing and let the girl go through her performance alone.
+
+Then the Captain saw something that wrought him up to ecstasy. Zorka
+was singing a sad Bosnian song in her tender, crooning voice, and
+dancing with graceful steps round the little bear, who, to tell the
+truth, also danced more lightly than the heavy Ibrahim, and was very
+amusing when he lifted his paw to his head as Hungarians do when they
+are in high spirits and break forth in hurrahs.
+
+Captain Winter, however, saw nothing but the fair maid, whose pearly
+white teeth shone out from between her red lips. He felt he would like
+to slip a silk ribbon round her waist, which swayed as lightly as a
+reed waving to and fro in the wind, and lead her off as if she were a
+beautiful colored butterfly.
+
+Zorka grew tired of the sad, melancholy song, and began to dance
+wildly and passionately. Perhaps her natural feminine vanity was
+roused within her, and she wanted to show off at her best before the
+handsome soldier. Her eyes sparkled; a flush spread from time to time
+over her face; with her sweet voice she animated the little bear,
+crying, "Mariska, Mariska, jump!" But after a while she seemed to
+forget the growling little creature altogether, and went on dancing a
+kind of graceful fandango of her own invention. As she swayed, it
+seemed as if the motion and excitement caused every fiber of her body
+to flash out a sort of electric glow. By the time the girl flung
+herself, quite exhausted, in the dust at his feet, Captain Winter was
+absolutely beside himself. Such a morsel of heavenly daintiness did
+not often drop in his path now that he was fasting in this purgatory
+of a village. His stay there had been one long Lent, during which joys
+and pleasures had been rare indeed.
+
+It began to grow dark. At the other end of the market-place several
+officers were on their way to supper at the village inn where they
+always messed. The Captain turned to the man and woman in possession
+of the bears and ordered them in no friendly tone to go with him to
+the inn as his guests. Joco bowed humbly like a culprit, and gloomily
+led on his comrade Ibrahim. Zorka, on the contrary, looked gay as she
+walked along beside the light-colored bear.
+
+The Captain looked again and again at the bear-leader walking in front
+of him. "Where have I seen this fellow before?" he kept asking
+himself. His uncertainty did not last long. His face brightened. "Oh,
+yes; I remember!" he inwardly exclaimed. Now he felt sure that this
+black cherry of Bosnia, this girl with the waist of a dragonfly, was
+his.
+
+The inn, once a gentleman's country-house, was built of stone. The
+bears were lodged in a little room which used to serve the former
+owner of the house as pantry, and were chained to the strong iron
+lattice of the window. In one corner of this little room the landlord
+ordered one of his servants to make a good bed of straw. "The Captain
+will pay for it," he said.
+
+When everything was ready in the little room, the Captain called Joco
+and took him there. He knew that what he was going to do was not
+chivalrous; but he had already worked himself up to a blaze of
+excitement over the game he meant to play, and this fellow was too
+stupid to understand what a hazardous piece of play it was. When they
+were alone he stood erect before the bear-leader and looked fixedly
+into his eyes.
+
+"You are Joco Hics," he said; "two years ago you deserted from my
+regiment."
+
+The strong, tall, young peasant began to tremble so that his knees
+knocked together, but could not answer a single word. Fritz Winter,
+Ritter von Wallishausen, whispered into Joco's ear, his speech
+agitated and stuttering: "You have a woman with you," he said, "who
+surely is not your wife. Set her free. I will buy her from you for any
+price you ask. You can go away with your bears and pluck yourself
+another such flower where you found this one."
+
+Joco stood motionless for a while as if turned into stone.
+
+He did not tremble any longer: the crisis was over. He had only been
+frightened as long as he was uncertain whether or not he would be
+instantly hanged if he were found out.
+
+"In all Bosnia," he answered gloomily, "there was only one such flower
+and that I stole."
+
+Before a man who was willing to share his guilt, he dared acknowledge
+his crime. In truth, this man was no better than himself. He only wore
+finer clothes.
+
+The Captain became impatient. "Are you going to give her up, or not?"
+he asked. "I do not want to harm you; but I could put you in prison
+and in chains, and what would become of your sweetheart then?"
+
+Joco answered proudly: "She would cry her eyes out for me; otherwise
+she would not have run away from her rich father's house for my sake."
+
+Ah! thought the Captain, if it were only that! By degrees I could win
+her to me.
+
+But it was not advisable to make a fuss, whether for the sake of his
+position or because of his wife, who lived in town.
+
+"Joco, I tell you what," said the Captain, suddenly becoming calm. "I
+am going away now for a short time. I shall be gone about an hour. By
+that time everybody will be in bed. The officers who sup with me, and
+the innkeeper and his servants, will all be sound asleep. I give you
+this time to think it over. When I come back you will either hold out
+your hand to be chained or to receive a pile of gold in it. In the
+meantime I shall lock you in there, because I know how very apt you
+are to disappear." He went out, and turned the key twice in the lock.
+Joco was left alone.
+
+When the hour had expired Captain Winter noisily opened the door. His
+eyes sparkled from the strong wine he had taken during supper, as well
+as from the exquisite expectation which made his blood boil.
+
+Joco stood smiling submissively before him. "I have thought it over,
+sir," he said. "I will speak with the little Zorka about it."
+
+Ritter Winter now forgot that he was speaking with a deserter, whom it
+was his duty to arrest. He held out his hand joyfully to the Bosnian
+peasant, and said encouragingly: "Go speak with her; but make haste.
+Go instantly."
+
+They crept together to the pantry where the girl slept near the
+chained bears. Joco opened the door without making a sound, and
+slipped in. It seemed to the Captain that he heard whispering inside.
+These few moments seemed an eternity to him. At last the bear-leader
+reappeared and, nodding to the Captain, said: "Sir, you are expected."
+
+Captain Winter had undoubtedly taken too much wine. He staggered as he
+entered the pantry, the door of which the bear-leader shut and locked
+directly he had entered. He then listened with such an expression on
+his face as belongs only to a born bandit. Almost immediately a
+growling was heard, and directly afterwards some terrible swearing and
+a fall. The growling grew stronger and stronger. At last it ended in a
+wild roar. A desperate cry disturbed the stillness of the night:
+"Help! help!"
+
+In the yard and round about it the dogs woke up, and with terrible
+yelping ran towards the pantry, where the roaring of the bear grew
+ever wilder and more powerful. The rattling of the chain and the cries
+of the girl mingled with Ibrahim's growling. The neighbors began to
+wake up. Human voices, confused questionings, were heard. The
+inn-keeper and his servants appeared on the scene in their night
+clothes, but, hearing the terrible roaring, fled again into security.
+The Captain's cries for help became weaker and weaker. And now Joco
+took his iron stake, which he always kept by him, opened the door, and
+at one bound was at the side of the wild beast. His voice sounded
+again like thunder, and the iron stick fell with a thud on the bear's
+back. Ibrahim had smelt blood. Beneath his paws a man's mangled body
+was writhing. The beast could hardly be made to let go his prey. In
+the light that came through the small window, Joco soon found the
+chain from which not long before he had freed Ibrahim, and with a
+swift turn he put the muzzle over the beast's jaws. It was done in a
+twinkling. During this time Zorka had been running up and down the
+empty yard, crying in vain for help. Nobody had dared come near.
+
+The following day Captain Fritz Winter, Ritter von Wallishausen, was
+lying between burning wax candles upon his bier. Nobody could be made
+responsible for the terrible accident. Why did he go to the bears when
+he was not sober?
+
+But that very day the siren of Bosnia danced her wild dance again in
+the next village, and with her sweet, melodious voice urged the
+light-colored little bear: "Mariska, jump, jump!"
+
+
+
+ARTHUR ELCK
+
+
+_THE TOWER ROOM_
+
+
+There were many wonderful things that aroused our childish fantasy,
+when Balint Orzo and I were boys, but none so much as the old tower
+that stands a few feet from the castle, shadowy and mysterious. It is
+an old, curious, square tower, and at the brink of its notched edge
+there is a shingled helmet which was erected by one of the late Orzos.
+
+There is many and many a legend told about this old tower. A rumor
+exists that it has a secret chamber into which none is permitted to
+enter, except the head of the family. Some great secret is concealed
+in the tower-room, and when the first-born son of the Orzo family
+becomes of age his father takes him there and reveals it. And the
+effect of the revelation is such that every young man who enters that
+room comes out with gray hair.
+
+As to what the secret might be, there was much conjecturing. One
+legend had it that once some Orzo imprisoned his enemies in the tower
+and starved them until the unfortunates ate each other in their crazed
+suffering.
+
+According to another story Kelemen Orzo ordered his faithless wife
+Krisztina Olaszi to be plastered into the wall of the room. Every
+night since, sobbing is heard from the tower.
+
+Another runs that every hundred years a child with a dog's face is
+born in the Orzo family and that this little monster has to perish in
+the tower-room, so as to hide the disgrace of the family.
+
+Another conjecture was that once the notorious Menyhart Orzo, who was
+supreme under King Rudolph in the castle, played a game of checkers
+with his neighbor, Boldizsar Zomolnoky. They commenced to play on a
+Monday and continued the game and drank all week until Sunday morning
+dawned upon them. Then Menyhart Orzo's confessor came and pleaded with
+the gamblers. He begged them to stop the game on the holy day of
+Sunday, when all true Christians are in church praising the Lord. But
+Menyhart, bringing his fist down on the table in such rage that all
+the wine glasses and bottles danced, cried: "And if we have to sit
+here till the world comes to an end, we won't stop till we have
+finished this game!"
+
+Scarcely had he uttered his vow when, somewhere from the earth, or
+from the wall, a thundering voice was heard promising to take him at
+his word--that they would continue playing till the end of the world.
+And ever since, the checkers are heard rattling, and the two damned
+souls are still playing the game in the tower-room.
+
+When we were boys, the secret did not give us any rest, and we were
+always discussing and plotting as to how we could discover it. We made
+at least a hundred various plans, but all failed. It was an
+impossibility to get into the tower, because of a heavy iron-barred
+oaken door. The windows were too high to be reached. We had to satisfy
+ourselves with throwing a well-aimed stone, which hit the room through
+the window. Such an achievement was somewhat of a success, for
+oftentimes we drove out an alarmed flock of birds.
+
+One day I decided that the best way would be to find out the secret of
+the tower from Balint's father himself. "He is the head of the
+family," I thought, "and if any light is to be had on the mystery, it
+is through him." But Balint didn't like the idea of approaching the
+old man; he knew his father's temper.
+
+However, once he ventured the question, but he was sorry for it
+afterwards, for the older Orzo flew into a passion, and scolded and
+raged, ending by telling him that he must not listen to such
+nursery-tales; that the tower was moldering and decaying with age;
+that the floor timbers and staircase were so infirm that it would fall
+to pieces should anyone approach it; and that this was why no one
+could gain admittance.
+
+For a long time afterwards neither of us spoke of it.
+
+But curiosity was incessantly working within us, and one evening
+Balint solemnly vowed to me that as soon as he became of age and had
+looked into the room, he would call for me, should I be even at the
+end of the world, and would let me into the secret. In order to make
+it more solemn, we called this a "blood-contract."
+
+With this vow we parted. My parents sent me to college; Balint had a
+private tutor and was kept at home in the castle. After that we only
+met at vacation time.
+
+Eight years passed before I saw the Orzo home again. At Balint's
+urgent, sudden invitation I had hurriedly journeyed back to my rocky
+fatherland.
+
+I had scarcely stepped on the wide stone stairway leading from the
+terrace in the front of the castle, when someone shouted that the
+honorable master was near! He came galloping in on a foaming horse. I
+looked at him and started, as if I had seen a ghost, for this thin,
+tall rider was the perfect resemblance of his father. The same knotty
+hair and bearded head, the same densely furrowed face, the same deep,
+calm, gray eyes. And his hair and beard were almost as white as his
+father's!
+
+He came galloping through the gate, pulled the bridle with a sudden
+jerk, and the next moment was on the paving; then with one bound he
+reached the terrace, and had me in his strong arms. With wild
+eagerness he showed me into the castle and at the same time kept
+talking and questioning me without ceasing. Then he thrust me into my
+room and declared that he gave me fifteen minutes--no more--to dress.
+
+The time had not even expired, when he came, like a whirlwind,
+embraced me again and carried me into the dining-room. There
+chandeliers and lamps were already lit; the table was elaborately
+decorated, and bore plenty of wine.
+
+At the meal he spoke again. Nervously jerking out his words, he was
+continually questioning me on one subject and then another, without
+waiting for the answer. He laughed often and harshly. When we came to
+the drinking, he winked to the servants, and immediately five Czigany
+musicians entered the room. Balint noticed the astonishment on my
+face, and half evasively said:
+
+"I have sent to Iglo for them in honor of you. Let the music sound,
+and the wine flow; who knows when we will see each other again?"
+
+He put his face into his palm. The Cziganys played old Magyar songs.
+Balint glanced at me now and then, and filled the glasses; we clinked
+them together, but he always seemed to be worried.
+
+It was dawning. The soft sound of a church bell rose to us. Balint put
+his hand on my shoulder and bent to my ear.
+
+"Do you know how my father died?" he asked in a husky voice. "He
+killed himself."
+
+I looked at him with amazement; I wanted to speak, but he shook his
+head, and grasped my hand.
+
+"Do you remember my father?" he asked me. Of course; while I looked at
+him it seemed as if his father were standing before me. The very
+fibrous, skinny figure, the muscles and flesh seeming peeled off. Even
+through his coat arm I felt the naked, unveiled nerves.
+
+"I always admired and honored my father, but we were never true
+intimates; I knew that he loved me, but I felt as if it was not for my
+own sake; as if he loved something in my soul that was strange to me.
+I never saw him smile; sometimes he was so harsh that I was afraid of
+him; at another time he was unmanageable."
+
+"I did not understand him, but the older I became the better did I
+feel that there was a sad secret germinating in the bottom of his
+soul, where it grew like a spreading tree, the branches of which crept
+up to the castle and covered the walls, little by little overshadowed
+the sunlight, absorbed the air, and darkened everyone's heart. I
+gritted my teeth in vain; I could not work; I could not start to
+accomplish anything. I struggled with hundreds and hundreds of
+determinations; to-day I prepared for this or that; to-morrow for
+something else; ambition pressed me within; I could not make up my
+mind. Behind every resolution I made, I noticed my father's
+countenance, like a note of interrogation. The old fables that we
+heard together in our childhood were renewed in my memory. Little by
+little the thought grew within me, like a fixed delusion, that my
+father's fatal secret was locked up in the tower room. After that I
+lived by the calendar and dwelt on the passing of time on the clock.
+And when the sun that shone on me when I was born arose the
+twenty-fourth time, I pressed my hand on my heart and entered my
+father's room--this very room.
+
+"'Father,' I said, 'I became of age to-day, everything may be opened
+before me, and I am at liberty to know everything.' Father looked at
+me and pondered over this.
+
+"'Oh, yes!' he whispered, 'this is the day.'
+
+"'I may know everything now,' continued I; 'I am not afraid of any
+secrets. In the name of our family tradition, I beg of you, please
+open the tower-room.'
+
+"Father raised his hand, as if he wanted to make me become silent. His
+face was as white as a ghost.
+
+"'Very well,' he murmured, 'I will open the tower-room for you.'
+
+"And then he pulled off his coat, tore his shirt on his breast, and
+pointed to his heart.
+
+"'Here is the tower-room, my boy!' did he whisper in a husky voice.
+'Here is the tower-room, and within our family secret. Do you see it?'
+
+"That is all he said, but when I looked at him I immediately perceived
+the secret; everything was clear before me and I had a presentiment
+that something was nearing its end, something about to break.
+
+"Father walked up and down; and then he stopped and pointed to this
+picture; to this very picture.
+
+"'Did you ever thoroughly look at your ancestors? They are all from
+the Orzos. If you scrutinize their faces you will recognize in them
+your father, yourself, and your grandfather; and if you ever read
+their documents, which were left to us--there they are in the
+box--then you will know that they are just the same material as we
+are. Their way of thinking was the same as ours and so were their
+desires, their wills, their lives, and deaths. We had among them
+soldiers, clergymen, scientists, but not even one great, celebrated
+man, although their talent, their strength almost tore them asunder.
+
+"'In every one of them the family curse took root: not one of them
+could be a great man, neither my father nor yours.'
+
+"Then I felt as if something horrible was coming from his lips. My
+breath almost ceased. Father did not finish what he was going to say,
+but stopped and listened for a minute.
+
+"'I was my father's only hope,' he went on after a while; 'I too was
+born talented and prepared for great things, but the Orzos' destiny
+overtook me, and you see now what became of me. I looked into the
+tower-room. You know what it contains? You know what the name of our
+secret is? He who saw this secret lost faith in himself. For him it
+would have been better not to have come into this world at all. But I
+loved to live and did not want to abandon all my hopes. I married your
+mother; she consoled me until you were born, and then I regained my
+delight in life. I knew what I had to keep before my eyes to bring up
+my son to be such a man as his father could not be.
+
+"'I acquiesced when you left for the foreign countries; then your
+letters came. I made a special study of every sentence and of every
+word of it, for I did not want to trust my reason. I thought the first
+time that the fault was in me; that I saw unnecessary phantoms. But it
+wasn't so, for what I read out of your words was our destiny, the
+curse of the Orzos; from the way of your thinking, I found out that
+everything is in vain; you too turned your head backward, you too
+looked into yourself and noticed there the thing that makes the
+perceiver sterile forever. You did not even notice what you have done;
+you could not grasp it with your reason, but the poison is already
+within you.'
+
+"'It cannot be, father!' I broke out, terrified.
+
+"But he sadly shook his head. 'I am old; I cannot believe in anything
+now. I wish you were right, and would never come to know what I know.
+God bless you, my son; it is getting late, and I am getting tired.'
+
+"It struck me that he was trying to cover his disbelief with sarcasm.
+Both of us were without sleep that night. At dawn there was silence in
+his room. I bitterly thought, 'When will I go to rest?' When I went
+into his room in the morning he was lying in his bed. All was over. He
+had taken poison, and written his farewell on a piece of paper. His
+last wish was that no one should ever know under what circumstances he
+died."
+
+Balint left off speaking and gazed with outstretched eyes toward the
+window in the darkness. I slowly went to him and put my hand upon his
+shoulder. He started at my touch.
+
+"I more than once thought of the woman who could be the mother of my
+son. How many times have I been tempted to fulfill my father's last
+wish! But at such a time it has always come to my mind that I too
+might have such a son, who would cast into his father's teeth that he
+was a coward and a selfish man; that he sacrificed a life for his
+illusive hopes.
+
+"No! I won't do it. I won't do it. I am the last of the Orzos. With me
+this damned family will die out. My fathers were cowards and rascals.
+I do not want anybody to curse my memory."
+
+I kissed Balint's wet forehead; I knew that this was the last time I
+would see him. The next day I left the castle, and the day after, his
+death was made public. He committed suicide, like his father. He was
+the last Orzo, and I turned about the coat of arms above his head.
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Continental Classics, Volume
+XVIII., Mystery Tales, by Various
+
+*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MYSTERIES ***
+
+***** This file should be named 12144-8.txt or 12144-8.zip *****
+This and all associated files of various formats will be found in:
+        https://www.gutenberg.org/1/2/1/4/12144/
+
+Produced by Charles Aldarondo, Project Manager; Keith M. Eckrich,
+Post-Proofer; the Online Distributed Proofreaders Team
+
+
+Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions
+will be renamed.
+
+Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no
+one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation
+(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without
+permission and without paying copyright royalties.  Special rules,
+set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to
+copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to
+protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark.  Project
+Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you
+charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission.  If you
+do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the
+rules is very easy.  You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose
+such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and
+research.  They may be modified and printed and given away--you may do
+practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks.  Redistribution is
+subject to the trademark license, especially commercial
+redistribution.
+
+
+
+*** START: FULL LICENSE ***
+
+THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE
+PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK
+
+To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free
+distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work
+(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project
+Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project
+Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at
+https://gutenberg.org/license).
+
+
+Section 1.  General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm
+electronic works
+
+1.A.  By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm
+electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to
+and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property
+(trademark/copyright) agreement.  If you do not agree to abide by all
+the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy
+all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession.
+If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project
+Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the
+terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or
+entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8.
+
+1.B.  "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark.  It may only be
+used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who
+agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement.  There are a few
+things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works
+even without complying with the full terms of this agreement.  See
+paragraph 1.C below.  There are a lot of things you can do with Project
+Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement
+and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic
+works.  See paragraph 1.E below.
+
+1.C.  The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the Foundation"
+or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project
+Gutenberg-tm electronic works.  Nearly all the individual works in the
+collection are in the public domain in the United States.  If an
+individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you are
+located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent you from
+copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative
+works based on the work as long as all references to Project Gutenberg
+are removed.  Of course, we hope that you will support the Project
+Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic works by
+freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with the terms of
+this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with
+the work.  You can easily comply with the terms of this agreement by
+keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project
+Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with others.
+
+1.D.  The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern
+what you can do with this work.  Copyright laws in most countries are in
+a constant state of change.  If you are outside the United States, check
+the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement
+before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing or
+creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project
+Gutenberg-tm work.  The Foundation makes no representations concerning
+the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United
+States.
+
+1.E.  Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg:
+
+1.E.1.  The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate
+access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently
+whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the
+phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the phrase "Project
+Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed,
+copied or distributed:
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+1.E.2.  If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived
+from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is
+posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied
+and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees
+or charges.  If you are redistributing or providing access to a work
+with the phrase "Project Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the
+work, you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1
+through 1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the
+Project Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or
+1.E.9.
+
+1.E.3.  If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted
+with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution
+must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional
+terms imposed by the copyright holder.  Additional terms will be linked
+to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the
+permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work.
+
+1.E.4.  Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm
+License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this
+work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm.
+
+1.E.5.  Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this
+electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without
+prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with
+active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project
+Gutenberg-tm License.
+
+1.E.6.  You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary,
+compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any
+word processing or hypertext form.  However, if you provide access to or
+distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other than
+"Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official version
+posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site (www.gutenberg.org),
+you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense to the user, provide a
+copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of obtaining a copy upon
+request, of the work in its original "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other
+form.  Any alternate format must include the full Project Gutenberg-tm
+License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1.
+
+1.E.7.  Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying,
+performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works
+unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9.
+
+1.E.8.  You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing
+access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided
+that
+
+- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from
+     the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method
+     you already use to calculate your applicable taxes.  The fee is
+     owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he
+     has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the
+     Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation.  Royalty payments
+     must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you
+     prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax
+     returns.  Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and
+     sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the
+     address specified in Section 4, "Information about donations to
+     the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation."
+
+- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies
+     you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he
+     does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm
+     License.  You must require such a user to return or
+     destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium
+     and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of
+     Project Gutenberg-tm works.
+
+- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any
+     money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the
+     electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days
+     of receipt of the work.
+
+- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free
+     distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works.
+
+1.E.9.  If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm
+electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set
+forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from
+both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael
+Hart, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark.  Contact the
+Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below.
+
+1.F.
+
+1.F.1.  Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable
+effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread
+public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm
+collection.  Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic
+works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may contain
+"Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or
+corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other intellectual
+property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or other medium, a
+computer virus, or computer codes that damage or cannot be read by
+your equipment.
+
+1.F.2.  LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right
+of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project
+Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project
+Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project
+Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all
+liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal
+fees.  YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT
+LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE
+PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH F3.  YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE
+TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE
+LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR
+INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH
+DAMAGE.
+
+1.F.3.  LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a
+defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can
+receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a
+written explanation to the person you received the work from.  If you
+received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with
+your written explanation.  The person or entity that provided you with
+the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a
+refund.  If you received the work electronically, the person or entity
+providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to
+receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund.  If the second copy
+is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further
+opportunities to fix the problem.
+
+1.F.4.  Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth
+in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS' WITH NO OTHER
+WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO
+WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTIBILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE.
+
+1.F.5.  Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied
+warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages.
+If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the
+law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be
+interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by
+the applicable state law.  The invalidity or unenforceability of any
+provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions.
+
+1.F.6.  INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the
+trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone
+providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance
+with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production,
+promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works,
+harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees,
+that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do
+or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm
+work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any
+Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause.
+
+
+Section  2.  Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm
+
+Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of
+electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers
+including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers.  It exists
+because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from
+people in all walks of life.
+
+Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the
+assistance they need, is critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's
+goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will
+remain freely available for generations to come.  In 2001, the Project
+Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure
+and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations.
+To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation
+and how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4
+and the Foundation web page at https://www.pglaf.org.
+
+
+Section 3.  Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive
+Foundation
+
+The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit
+501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the
+state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal
+Revenue Service.  The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification
+number is 64-6221541.  Its 501(c)(3) letter is posted at
+https://pglaf.org/fundraising.  Contributions to the Project Gutenberg
+Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent
+permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state's laws.
+
+The Foundation's principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S.
+Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered
+throughout numerous locations.  Its business office is located at
+809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887, email
+business@pglaf.org.  Email contact links and up to date contact
+information can be found at the Foundation's web site and official
+page at https://pglaf.org
+
+For additional contact information:
+     Dr. Gregory B. Newby
+     Chief Executive and Director
+     gbnewby@pglaf.org
+
+Section 4.  Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg
+Literary Archive Foundation
+
+Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide
+spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of
+increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be
+freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest
+array of equipment including outdated equipment.  Many small donations
+($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt
+status with the IRS.
+
+The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating
+charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United
+States.  Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a
+considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up
+with these requirements.  We do not solicit donations in locations
+where we have not received written confirmation of compliance.  To
+SEND DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any
+particular state visit https://pglaf.org
+
+While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we
+have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition
+against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who
+approach us with offers to donate.
+
+International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make
+any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from
+outside the United States.  U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff.
+
+Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation
+methods and addresses.  Donations are accepted in a number of other
+ways including including checks, online payments and credit card
+donations.  To donate, please visit: https://pglaf.org/donate
+
+
+Section 5.  General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic
+works.
+
+Professor Michael S. Hart was the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm
+concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared
+with anyone.  For thirty years, he produced and distributed Project
+Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support.
+
+Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed
+editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S.
+unless a copyright notice is included.  Thus, we do not necessarily
+keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition.
+
+Each eBook is in a subdirectory of the same number as the eBook's
+eBook number, often in several formats including plain vanilla ASCII,
+compressed (zipped), HTML and others.
+
+Corrected EDITIONS of our eBooks replace the old file and take over
+the old filename and etext number.  The replaced older file is renamed.
+VERSIONS based on separate sources are treated as new eBooks receiving
+new filenames and etext numbers.
+
+Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility:
+
+     https://www.gutenberg.org
+
+This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm,
+including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary
+Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to
+subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks.
+
+EBooks posted prior to November 2003, with eBook numbers BELOW #10000,
+are filed in directories based on their release date.  If you want to
+download any of these eBooks directly, rather than using the regular
+search system you may utilize the following addresses and just
+download by the etext year.
+
+     https://www.gutenberg.org/etext06
+
+    (Or /etext 05, 04, 03, 02, 01, 00, 99,
+     98, 97, 96, 95, 94, 93, 92, 92, 91 or 90)
+
+EBooks posted since November 2003, with etext numbers OVER #10000, are
+filed in a different way.  The year of a release date is no longer part
+of the directory path.  The path is based on the etext number (which is
+identical to the filename).  The path to the file is made up of single
+digits corresponding to all but the last digit in the filename.  For
+example an eBook of filename 10234 would be found at:
+
+     https://www.gutenberg.org/1/0/2/3/10234
+
+or filename 24689 would be found at:
+     https://www.gutenberg.org/2/4/6/8/24689
+
+An alternative method of locating eBooks:
+     https://www.gutenberg.org/GUTINDEX.ALL
+
+
diff --git a/old/12144-8.zip b/old/12144-8.zip
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..b76ea94
--- /dev/null
+++ b/old/12144-8.zip
diff --git a/old/12144.txt b/old/12144.txt
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..15c64dd
--- /dev/null
+++ b/old/12144.txt
@@ -0,0 +1,14488 @@
+The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Continental Classics, Volume XVIII.,
+Mystery Tales, by Various
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: The Continental Classics, Volume XVIII., Mystery Tales
+       Including Stories by Feodor Mikhailovitch Dostoyevsky, Joergen Wilhelm
+       Bergsoee and Bernhard Severin Ingemann, and Others.
+
+
+Author: Various
+
+Release Date: April 25, 2004 [EBook #12144]
+[Date last updated: May 9, 2004]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MYSTERIES ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Charles Aldarondo, Project Manager; Keith M. Eckrich,
+Post-Proofer; the Online Distributed Proofreaders Team
+
+
+
+
+
+_THE CONTINENTAL CLASSICS_
+
+VOLUME XVIII
+
+MYSTERY TALES
+
+
+INCLUDING STORIES BY
+
+FEODOR MIKHAILOVITCH DOSTOYEVSKY
+
+JOeRGEN WILHELM BERGSOeE AND
+
+BERNHARD SEVERIN INGEMANN
+
+
+
+1909
+
+
+
+_TABLE OF CONTENTS_
+
+
+RUSSIAN MYSTERY STORIES:
+
+     ALEXANDER SERGEIEVITCH PUSHKIN - The Queen of Spades
+
+     VERA JELIHOVSKY - The General's Will
+
+     FEODOR MIKHAILOVITCH DOSTOYEVSKY - Crime and Punishment
+
+     ANTON CHEKHOFF - The Safety Match
+
+     VSEVOLOD VLADIMIROVITCH KRESTOVSKI - Knights of Industry
+
+     JOeRGEN WILHELM BERGSOeE - The Amputated Arms
+
+     OTTO LARSSEN - The Manuscript
+
+     BERNHARD SEVERIN INGEMANN - The Sealed Room
+
+     STEEN STEENSEN BLICHER - The Rector of Veilbye
+
+
+HUNGARIAN MYSTERY STORIES:
+
+     FERENCZ MOLNAR - The Living Death
+
+     MAURUS JOKAI - Thirteen at Table
+
+     ETIENNE BARSONY - The Dancing Bear
+
+     ARTHUR ELCK - The Tower Room
+
+
+
+
+_RUSSIAN MYSTERY STORIES_
+
+
+ALEXANDER SERGEIEVITCH PUSHKIN
+
+
+_THE QUEEN OF SPADES_
+
+
+I
+
+There was a card party at the rooms of Naroumoff, of the Horse
+Guards. The long winter night passed away imperceptibly, and it
+was five o'clock in the morning before the company sat down to
+supper. Those who had won ate with a good appetite; the others
+sat staring absently at their empty plates. When the champagne
+appeared, however, the conversation became more animated, and all
+took a part in it.
+
+"And how did you fare, Souirin?" asked the host.
+
+"Oh, I lost, as usual. I must confess that I am unlucky. I play
+mirandole, I always keep cool, I never allow anything to put me
+out, and yet I always lose!"
+
+"And you did not once allow yourself to be tempted to back the
+red? Your firmness astonishes me."
+
+"But what do you think of Hermann?" said one of the guests,
+pointing to a young engineer. "He has never had a card in his
+hand in his life, he has never in his life laid a wager; and yet
+he sits here till five o'clock in the morning watching our play."
+
+"Play interests me very much," said Hermann, "but I am not in the
+position to sacrifice the necessary in the hope of winning the
+superfluous."
+
+"Hermann is a German; he is economical--that is all!" observed
+Tomsky. "But if there is one person that I cannot understand, it
+is my grandmother, the Countess Anna Fedorovna!"
+
+"How so?" inquired the guests.
+
+"I cannot understand," continued Tomsky, "how it is that my
+grandmother does not punt."
+
+"Then you do not know the reason why?"
+
+"No, really; I haven't the faintest idea. But let me tell you the
+story. You must know that about sixty years ago my grandmother went to
+Paris, where she created quite a sensation. People used to run after
+her to catch a glimpse of the 'Muscovite Venus.' Richelieu made love
+to her, and my grandmother maintains that he almost blew out his
+brains in consequence of her cruelty. At that time ladies used to play
+at faro. On one occasion at the Court, she lost a very considerable
+sum to the Duke of Orleans. On returning home, my grandmother removed
+the patches from her face, took off her hoops, informed my grandfather
+of her loss at the gaming-table, and ordered him to pay the money. My
+deceased grandfather, as far as I remember, was a sort of
+house-steward to my grandmother. He dreaded her like fire; but, on
+hearing of such a heavy loss, he almost went out of his mind. He
+calculated the various sums she had lost, and pointed out to her that
+in six months she had spent half a million of francs; that neither
+their Moscow nor Saratoff estates were in Paris; and, finally, refused
+point-blank to pay the debt. My grandmother gave him a box on the ear
+and slept by herself as a sign of her displeasure. The next day she
+sent for her husband, hoping that this domestic punishment had
+produced an effect upon him, but she found him inflexible. For the
+first time in her life she entered into reasonings and explanations
+with him, thinking to be able to convince him by pointing out to him
+that there are debts and debts, and that there is a great difference
+between a prince and a coachmaker.
+
+"But it was all in vain, my grandfather still remained obdurate. But
+the matter did not rest there. My grandmother did not know what to do.
+She had shortly before become acquainted with a very remarkable man.
+You have heard of Count St. Germain, about whom so many marvelous
+stories are told. You know that he represented himself as the
+Wandering Jew, as the discoverer of the elixir of life, of the
+philosopher's stone, and so forth. Some laughed at him as a charlatan;
+but Casnova, in his memoirs, says that he was a spy. But be that as it
+may, St. Germain, in spite of the mystery surrounding him, was a very
+fascinating person, and was much sought after in the best circles of
+society. Even to this day my grandmother retains an affectionate
+recollection of him, and becomes quite angry if anyone speaks
+disrespectfully of him. My grandmother knew that St. Germain had large
+sums of money at his disposal.
+
+"She resolved to have recourse to him, and she wrote a letter to him
+asking him to come to her without delay. The queer old man immediately
+waited upon her, and found her overwhelmed with grief. She described
+to him in the blackest colors the barbarity of her husband, and ended
+by declaring that her whole hope depended upon his friendship and
+amiability.
+
+"St. Germain reflected.
+
+"'I could advance you the sum you want,' said he, 'but I know that you
+would not rest easy until you had paid me back, and I should not like
+to bring fresh troubles upon you. But there is another way of getting
+out of your difficulty: you can win back your money.'
+
+"'But, my dear Count,' replied my grandmother, 'I tell you that I
+haven't any money left!'
+
+"'Money is not necessary,' replied St. Germain, 'be pleased to listen
+to me.'
+
+"Then he revealed to her a secret, for which each of us would give a
+good deal."
+
+The young officers listened with increased attention. Tomsky lit his
+pipe, puffed away for a moment, and then continued:
+
+"That same evening my grandmother went to Versailles to the _jeu de la
+reine_. The Duke of Orleans kept the bank; my grandmother excused
+herself in an offhanded manner for not having yet paid her debt by
+inventing some little story, and then began to play against him. She
+chose three cards and played them one after the other; all three won
+sonika,[1] and my grandmother recovered every farthing that she lost."
+
+"Mere chance!" said one of the guests.
+
+"A tale!" observed Hermann.
+
+"Perhaps they were marked cards!" said a third.
+
+"I do not think so," replied Tomsky, gravely.
+
+"What!" said Naroumoff, "you have a grandmother who knows how to hit
+upon three lucky cards in succession, and you have never yet succeeded
+in getting the secret of it out of her?"
+
+"That's the deuce of it!" replied Tomsky, "she had four sons, one of
+whom was my father; all four were determined gamblers, and yet not to
+one of them did she ever reveal her secret, although it would not have
+been a bad thing either for them or for me. But this is what I heard
+from my uncle, Count Ivan Hitch, and he assured me, on his honor, that
+it was true. The late Chaplitsky--the same who died in poverty after
+having squandered millions--once lost, in his youth, about three
+hundred thousand roubles--to Zoritch, if I remember rightly. He was in
+despair. My grandmother, who was always very severe upon the
+extravagance of young men, took pity, however, upon Chaplitsky. She
+gave him three cards telling him to play them one after the other, at
+the same time exacting from him a solemn promise that he would never
+play at cards again as long as he lived. Chaplitsky then went to his
+victorious opponent, and they began a fresh game. On the first card he
+staked fifty thousand roubles, and won sonika; he doubled the stake,
+and won again; till at last, by pursuing the same tactics, he won back
+more than he had lost."
+
+"But it is time to go to bed, it is a quarter to six already." And,
+indeed, it was already beginning to dawn; the young men emptied their
+glasses and then took leave of each other.
+
+
+II
+
+The old Countess A---- was seated in her dressing-room in front of her
+looking-glass. Three waiting maids stood around her. One held a small
+pot of rouge, another a box of hairpins, and the third a tall cap with
+bright red ribbons. The Countess had no longer the slightest
+pretensions to beauty, but she still preserved the habits of her
+youth, dressed in strict accordance with the fashion of seventy years
+before, and made as long and as careful a toilette as she would have
+done sixty years previously. Near the window, at an embroidery frame,
+sat a young lady, her ward.
+
+"Good-morning, grandmamma," said a young officer, entering the room.
+"_Bonjour_, Mademoiselle Lise. Grandmamma, I want to ask you
+something."
+
+"What is it, Paul?"
+
+"I want you to let me introduce one of my friends to you, and to allow
+me to bring him to the ball on Friday."
+
+"Bring him direct to the ball and introduce him to me there. Were you
+at B----'s yesterday?"
+
+"Yes; everything went off very pleasantly, and dancing was kept up
+until five o'clock. How charming Eletskaia was!"
+
+"But, my dear, what is there charming about her? Isn't she like her
+grandmother, the Princess Daria Petrovna? By the way, she must be very
+old, the Princess Daria Petrovna?"
+
+"How do you mean, old?" cried Tomsky, thoughtlessly, "she died seven
+years ago."
+
+The young lady raised her head, and made a sign to the young officer.
+He then remembered that the old Countess was never to be informed of
+the death of her contemporaries, and he bit his lips. But the old
+Countess heard the news with the greatest indifference.
+
+"Dead!" said she, "and I did not know it. We were appointed maids of
+honor at the same time, and when we were presented to the Empress--"
+
+And the Countess for the hundredth time related to her grandson one of
+her anecdotes.
+
+"Come, Paul," said she, when she had finished her story, "help me to
+get up. Lizanka,[2] where is my snuffbox?"
+
+And the Countess with her three maids went behind a screen to finish
+her toilette. Tomsky was left alone with the young lady.
+
+"Who is the gentleman you wish to introduce to the Countess?" asked
+Lizaveta Ivanovna in a whisper.
+
+"Naroumoff. Do you know him?"
+
+"No. Is he a soldier or a civilian?"
+
+"A soldier."
+
+"Is he in the Engineers?"
+
+"No, in the Cavalry. What made you think that he was in the
+Engineers?"
+
+The young lady smiled, but made no reply.
+
+"Paul," cried the Countess from behind the screen, "send me some new
+novel, only pray don't let it be one of the present day style."
+
+"What do you mean, grandmother?"
+
+"That is, a novel, in which the hero strangles neither his father nor
+his mother, and in which there are no drowned bodies. I have a great
+horror of drowned persons."
+
+"There are no such novels nowadays. Would you like a Russian one?"
+
+"Are there any Russian novels? Send me one, my dear, pray send me
+one!"
+
+"Good-by, grandmother. I am in a hurry.... Good-by, Lizaveta Ivanovna.
+What made you think that Naroumoff was in the Engineers?"
+
+And Tomsky left the boudoir.
+
+Lizaveta Ivanovna was left alone. She laid aside her work, and began
+to look out of the window. A few moments afterwards, at a corner house
+on the other side of the street, a young officer appeared. A deep
+flush covered her cheeks; she took up her work again, and bent her
+head down over the frame. At the same moment the Countess returned,
+completely dressed.
+
+"Order the carriage, Lizaveta," said she, "we will go out for a
+drive."
+
+Lizaveta rose from the frame, and began to arrange her work.
+
+"What is the matter with you, my child, are you deaf?" cried the
+Countess. "Order the carriage to be got ready at once."
+
+"I will do so this moment," replied the young lady, hastening into the
+anteroom.
+
+A servant entered and gave the Countess some books from Prince Paul
+Alexandrovitch.
+
+"Tell him that I am much obliged to him," said the Countess.
+"Lizaveta! Lizaveta! where are you running to?"
+
+"I am going to dress."
+
+"There is plenty of time, my dear. Sit down here. Open the first
+volume and read to me aloud."
+
+Her companion took the book and read a few lines.
+
+"Louder," said the Countess. "What is the matter with you, my child?
+Have you lost your voice? Wait--Give me that footstool--a little
+nearer--that will do!"
+
+Lizaveta read two more pages. The Countess yawned.
+
+"Put the book down," said she, "what a lot of nonsense! Send it back
+to Prince Paul with my thanks.... But where is the carriage?"
+
+"The carriage is ready," said Lizaveta, looking out into the street.
+
+"How is it that you are not dressed?" said the Countess. "I must
+always wait for you. It is intolerable, my dear!"
+
+Liza hastened to her room. She had not been there two minutes before
+the Countess began to ring with all her might. The three waiting-maids
+came running in at one door, and the valet at another.
+
+"How is it that you cannot hear me when I ring for you?" said the
+Countess. "Tell Lizaveta Ivanovna that I am waiting for her."
+
+Lizaveta returned with her hat and cloak on.
+
+"At last you are here!" said the Countess. "But why such an elaborate
+toilette? Whom do you intend to captivate? What sort of weather is it?
+It seems rather windy."
+
+"No, your Ladyship, it is very calm," replied the valet.
+
+"You never think of what you are talking about. Open the window. So it
+is; windy and bitterly cold. Unharness the horses, Lizaveta, we won't
+go out--there was no need to deck yourself like that."
+
+"What a life is mine!" thought Lizaveta Ivanovna.
+
+And, in truth, Lizaveta Ivanovna was a very unfortunate creature. "The
+bread of the stranger is bitter," says Dante, "and his staircase hard
+to climb." But who can know what the bitterness of dependence is so
+well as the poor companion of an old lady of quality? The Countess
+A---- had by no means a bad heart, but she was capricious, like a
+woman who had been spoiled by the world, as well as being avaricious
+and egotistical, like all old people, who have seen their best days,
+and whose thoughts are with the past, and not the present. She
+participated in all the vanities of the great world, went to balls,
+where she sat in a corner, painted and dressed in old-fashioned style,
+like a deformed but indispensable ornament of the ballroom; all the
+guests on entering approached her and made a profound bow, as if in
+accordance with a set ceremony, but after that nobody took any further
+notice of her. She received the whole town at her house, and observed
+the strictest etiquette, although she could no longer recognize the
+faces of people. Her numerous domestics, growing fat and old in her
+antechamber and servants' hall, did just as they liked, and vied with
+each other in robbing the aged Countess in the most bare-faced manner.
+Lizaveta Ivanovna was the martyr of the household. She made tea, and
+was reproached with using too much sugar; she read novels aloud to the
+Countess, and the faults of the author were visited upon her head; she
+accompanied the Countess in her walks, and was held answerable for the
+weather or the state of the pavement. A salary was attached to the
+post, but she very rarely received it, although she was expected to
+dress like everybody else, that is to say, like very few indeed. In
+society she played the most pitiable role. Everybody knew her, and
+nobody paid her any attention. At balls she danced only when a partner
+was wanted, and ladies would only take hold of her arm when it was
+necessary to lead her out of the room to attend to their dresses. She
+was very self-conscious, and felt her position keenly, and she looked
+about her with impatience for a deliverer to come to her rescue; but
+the young men, calculating in their giddiness, honored her with but
+very little attention, although Lizaveta Ivanovna was a hundred times
+prettier than the bare-faced, cold-hearted marriageable girls around
+whom they hovered. Many a time did she quietly slink away from the
+glittering, but wearisome, drawing-room, to go and cry in her own poor
+little room, in which stood a screen, a chest of drawers, a
+looking-glass, and a painted bedstead, and where a tallow candle burnt
+feebly in a copper candle-stick.
+
+One morning--this was about two days after the evening party described
+at the beginning of this story, and a week previous to the scene at
+which we have just assisted--Lizaveta Ivanovna was seated near the
+window at her embroidery frame, when, happening to look out into the
+street, she caught sight of a young Engineer officer, standing
+motionless with his eyes fixed upon her window. She lowered her head,
+and went on again with her work. About five minutes afterwards she
+looked out again--the young officer was still standing in the same
+place. Not being in the habit of coquetting with passing officers, she
+did not continue to gaze out into the street, but went on sewing for a
+couple of hours, without raising her head. Dinner was announced. She
+rose up and began to put her embroidery away, but glancing casually
+out of the window, she perceived the officer again. This seemed to her
+very strange. After dinner she went to the window with a certain
+feeling of uneasiness, but the officer was no longer there--and she
+thought no more about him.
+
+A couple of days afterwards, just as she was stepping into the
+carriage with the Countess, she saw him again. He was standing close
+behind the door, with his face half-concealed by his fur collar, but
+his dark eyes sparkled beneath his cap. Lizaveta felt alarmed, though
+she knew not why, and she trembled as she seated herself in the
+carriage.
+
+On returning home, she hastened to the window--the officer was
+standing in his accustomed place, with his eyes fixed upon her. She
+drew back, a prey to curiosity, and agitated by a feeling which was
+quite new to her.
+
+From that time forward not a day passed without the young officer
+making his appearance under the window at the customary hour, and
+between him and her there was established a sort of mute acquaintance.
+Sitting in her place at work, she used to feel his approach, and,
+raising her head, she would look at him longer and longer each day.
+The young man seemed to be very grateful to her; she saw with the
+sharp eye of youth, how a sudden flush covered his pale cheeks each
+time that their glances met. After about a week she commenced to smile
+at him....
+
+When Tomsky asked permission of his grandmother, the Countess, to
+present one of his friends to her, the young girl's heart beat
+violently. But hearing that Naroumoff was not an Engineer, she
+regretted that by her thoughtless question, she had betrayed her
+secret to the volatile Tomsky.
+
+Hermann was the son of a German who had become a naturalized Russian,
+and from whom he had inherited a small capital. Being firmly convinced
+of the necessity of preserving his independence, Hermann did not touch
+his private income, but lived on his pay, without allowing himself the
+slightest luxury. Moreover, he was reserved and ambitious, and his
+companions rarely had an opportunity of making merry at the expense of
+his extreme parsimony. He had strong passions and an ardent
+imagination, but his firmness of disposition preserved him from the
+ordinary errors of young men. Thus, though a gamester at heart, he
+never touched a card, for he considered his position did not allow
+him--as he said--"to risk the necessary in the hope of winning the
+superfluous," yet he would sit for nights together at the card table
+and follow with feverish anxiety the different turns of the game.
+
+The story of the three cards had produced a powerful impression upon
+his imagination, and all night long he could think of nothing else.
+"If," he thought to himself the following evening, as he walked along
+the streets of St. Petersburg, "if the old Countess would not reveal
+her secret to me! If she would only tell me the names of the three
+winning cards. Why should I not try my fortune? I must get introduced
+to her and win her favor--become her lover.... But all that will take
+time, and she is eighty-seven years old. She might be dead in a week,
+in a couple of days even. But the story itself? Can it really be true?
+No! Economy, temperance, and industry; those are my three winning
+cards; by means of them I shall be able to double my capital--increase
+it sevenfold, and procure for myself ease and independence."
+
+Musing in this manner, he walked on until he found himself in one of
+the principal streets of St. Petersburg, in front of a house of
+antiquated architecture. The street was blocked with equipages;
+carriages one after the other drew up in front of the brilliantly
+illuminated doorway. At one moment there stepped out onto the pavement
+the well-shaped little foot of some young beauty, at another the heavy
+boot of a cavalry officer, and then the silk stockings and shoes of a
+member of the diplomatic world. Fur and cloaks passed in rapid
+succession before the gigantic porter at the entrance. Hermann
+stopped. "Whose house is this?" he asked of the watchman at the
+corner.
+
+"The Countess A----'s," replied the watchman.
+
+Hermann started. The strange story of the three cards again presented
+itself to his imagination. He began walking up and down before the
+house, thinking of its owner and her strange secret. Returning late to
+his modest lodging, he could not go to sleep for a long time, and when
+at last he did doze off, he could dream of nothing but cards, green
+tables, piles of banknotes, and heaps of ducats. He played one card
+after the other, winning uninterruptedly, and then he gathered up the
+gold and filled his pockets with the notes. When he woke up late the
+next morning, he sighed over the loss of his imaginary wealth, and
+then sallying out into the town, he found himself once more in front
+of the Countess's residence. Some unknown power seemed to have
+attracted him thither. He stopped and looked up at the windows. At one
+of these he saw a head with luxuriant black hair, which was bent down,
+probably over some book or an embroidery frame. The head was raised.
+Hermann saw a fresh complexion, and a pair of dark eyes. That moment
+decided his fate.
+
+
+III
+
+Lizaveta Ivanovna had scarcely taken off her hat and cloak, when the
+Countess sent for her, and again ordered her to get the carriage
+ready. The vehicle drew up before the door, and they prepared to take
+their seats. Just at the moment when two footmen were assisting the
+old lady to enter the carriage, Lizaveta saw her Engineer standing
+close beside the wheel; he grasped her hand; alarm caused her to lose
+her presence of mind, and the young man disappeared--but not before he
+had left a letter between her fingers. She concealed it in her glove,
+and during the whole of the drive she neither saw nor heard anything.
+It was the custom of the Countess, when out for an airing in her
+carriage, to be constantly asking such questions as "Who was that
+person that met us just now? What is the name of this bridge? What is
+written on that sign-board?" On this occasion, however, Lizaveta
+returned such vague and absurd answers, that the Countess became angry
+with her.
+
+"What is the matter with you, my dear?" she exclaimed. "Have you taken
+leave of your senses, or what is it? Do you not hear me or understand
+what I say? Heaven be thanked, I am still in my right mind and speak
+plainly enough!"
+
+Lizaveta Ivanovna did not hear her. On returning home she ran to her
+room, and drew the letter out of her glove: it was not sealed.
+Lizaveta read it. The letter contained a declaration of love; it was
+tender, respectful, and copied word for word from a German novel. But
+Lizaveta did not know anything of the German language, and she was
+quite delighted.
+
+For all that, the letter caused her to feel exceedingly uneasy. For
+the first time in her life she was entering into secret and
+confidential relations with a young man. His boldness alarmed her. She
+reproached herself for her imprudent behavior, and knew not what to
+do. Should she cease to sit at the window, and, by assuming an
+appearance of indifference towards him, put a check upon the young
+officer's desire for further acquaintance with her? Should she send
+his letter back to him, or should she answer him in a cold and decided
+manner? There was nobody to whom she could turn in her perplexity, for
+she had neither female friend nor adviser. At length she resolved to
+reply to him.
+
+She sat down at her little writing table, took pen and paper, and
+began to think. Several times she began her letter and then tore it
+up; the way she had expressed herself seemed to her either too
+inviting or too cold and decisive. At last she succeeded in writing a
+few lines with which she felt satisfied.
+
+"I am convinced," she wrote, "that your intentions are honorable, and
+that you do not wish to offend me by any imprudent behavior, but our
+acquaintance must not begin in such a manner. I return you your
+letter, and I hope that I shall never have any cause to complain of
+this undeserved slight."
+
+The next day, as soon as Hermann made his appearance, Lizaveta rose
+from her embroidery, went into the drawing-room, opened the
+ventilator, and threw the letter into the street, trusting that the
+young officer would have the perception to pick it up.
+
+Hermann hastened forward, picked it up, and then repaired to a
+confectioner's shop. Breaking the seal of the envelope, he found
+inside it his own letter and Lizaveta's reply. He had expected this,
+and he returned home, his mind deeply occupied with his intrigue.
+
+Three days afterwards a bright-eyed young girl from a milliner's
+establishment brought Lizaveta a letter. Lizaveta opened it with great
+uneasiness, fearing that it was a demand for money, when, suddenly,
+she recognized Hermann's handwriting.
+
+"You have made a mistake, my dear," said she. "This letter is not for
+me."
+
+"Oh, yes, it is for you," replied the girl, smiling very knowingly.
+"Have the goodness to read it."
+
+Lizaveta glanced at the letter. Hermann requested an interview.
+
+"It cannot be," she cried, alarmed at the audacious request and the
+manner in which it was made. "This letter is certainly not for me,"
+and she tore it into fragments.
+
+"If the letter was not for you, why have you torn it up?" said the
+girl. "I should have given it back to the person who sent it."
+
+"Be good enough, my dear," said Lizaveta, disconcerted by this remark,
+"not to bring me any more letters for the future, and tell the person
+who sent you that he ought to be ashamed."
+
+But Hermann was not the man to be thus put off. Every day Lizaveta
+received from him a letter, sent now in this way, now in that. They
+were no longer translated from the German. Hermann wrote them under
+the inspiration of passion, and spoke in his own language, and they
+bore full testimony to the inflexibility of his desire, and the
+disordered condition of his uncontrollable imagination. Lizaveta no
+longer thought of sending them back to him; she became intoxicated
+with them, and began to reply to them, and little by little her
+answers became longer and more affectionate. At last she threw out of
+the window to him the following letter:
+
+"This evening there is going to be a ball at the Embassy. The Countess
+will be there. We shall remain until two o'clock. You have now an
+opportunity of seeing me alone. As soon as the Countess is gone, the
+servants will very probably go out, and there will be nobody left but
+the Swiss, but he usually goes to sleep in his lodge. Come about
+half-past eleven. Walk straight upstairs. If you meet anybody in the
+anteroom, ask if the Countess is at home. You will be told 'No,' in
+which case there will be nothing left for you to do but to go away
+again. But it is most probable that you will meet nobody. The
+maidservants will all be together in one room. On leaving the
+anteroom, turn to the left, and walk straight on until you reach the
+Countess's bedroom. In the bedroom, behind a screen, you will find two
+doors: the one on the right leads to a cabinet, which the Countess
+never enters; the one on the left leads to a corridor, at the end of
+which is a little winding staircase; this leads to my room."
+
+Hermann trembled like a tiger as he waited for the appointed time to
+arrive. At ten o'clock in the evening he was already in front of the
+Countess's house. The weather was terrible; the wind blew with great
+violence, the sleety snow fell in large flakes, the lamps emitted a
+feeble light, the streets were deserted; from time to time a sledge
+drawn by a sorry-looking hack, passed by on the lookout for a belated
+passenger. Hermann was enveloped in a thick overcoat, and felt neither
+wind nor snow.
+
+At last the Countess's carriage drew up. Hermann saw two footmen carry
+out in their arms the bent form of the old lady, wrapped in sable fur,
+and immediately behind her, clad in a warm mantle, and with her head
+ornamented with a wreath of fresh flowers, followed Lizaveta. The door
+was closed. The carriage rolled heavily away through the yielding
+snow. The porter shut the street door, the windows became dark.
+
+Hermann began walking up and down near the deserted house; at length
+he stopped under a lamp, and glanced at his watch: it was twenty
+minutes past eleven. He remained standing under the lamp, his eyes
+fixed upon the watch impatiently waiting for the remaining minutes to
+pass. At half-past eleven precisely Hermann ascended the steps of the
+house and made his way into the brightly-illuminated vestibule. The
+porter was not there. Hermann hastily ascended the staircase, opened
+the door of the anteroom, and saw a footman sitting asleep in an
+antique chair by the side of a lamp. With a light, firm step Hermann
+passed by him. The drawing-room and dining-room were in darkness, but
+a feeble reflection penetrated thither from the lamp in the anteroom.
+
+Hermann reached the Countess's bedroom. Before a shrine, which was
+full of old images, a golden lamp was burning. Faded stuffed chairs
+and divans with soft cushions stood in melancholy symmetry around the
+room, the walls of which were hung with china silk. On one side of the
+room hung two portraits painted in Paris by Madame Lebrun. One of
+these represented a stout, red-faced man of about forty years of age,
+in a bright green uniform, and with a star upon his breast; the
+other--a beautiful young woman, with an aquiline nose, forehead curls,
+and a rose in her powdered hair. In the corner stood porcelain
+shepherds and shepherdesses, dining-room clocks from the workshop of
+the celebrated Lefroy, bandboxes, roulettes, fans, and the various
+playthings for the amusement of ladies that were in vogue at the end
+of the last century, when Montgolfier's balloons and Niesber's
+magnetism were the rage. Hermann stepped behind the screen. At the
+back of it stood a little iron bedstead; on the right was the door
+which led to the cabinet; on the left, the other which led to the
+corridor. He opened the latter, and saw the little winding staircase
+which led to the room of the poor companion. But he retraced his steps
+and entered the dark cabinet.
+
+The time passed slowly. All was still. The clock in the drawing-room
+struck twelve, the strokes echoed through the room one after the
+other, and everything was quiet again. Hermann stood leaning against
+the cold stove. He was calm, his heart beat regularly, like that of a
+man resolved upon a dangerous but inevitable undertaking. One o'clock
+in the morning struck; then two, and he heard the distant noise of
+carriage-wheels. An involuntary agitation took possession of him. The
+carriage drew near and stopped. He heard the sound of the carriage
+steps being let down. All was bustle within the house. The servants
+were running hither and thither, there was a confusion of voices, and
+the rooms were lit up. Three antiquated chambermaids entered the
+bedroom, and they were shortly afterwards followed by the Countess,
+who, more dead than alive, sank into a Voltaire armchair. Hermann
+peeped through a chink. Lizaveta Ivanovna passed close by him, and he
+heard her hurried steps as she hastened up the little spiral
+staircase. For a moment his heart was assailed by something like a
+pricking of conscience, but the emotion was only transitory, and his
+heart became petrified as before.
+
+The Countess began to undress before her looking-glass. Her
+rose-bedecked cap was taken off, and then her powdered wig was removed
+from off her white and closely cut hair. Hairpins fell in showers
+around her. Her yellow satin dress, brocaded with silver, fell down at
+her swollen feet.
+
+Hermann was a witness of the repugnant mysteries of her toilette; at
+last the Countess was in her night-cap and dressing-gown, and in this
+costume, more suitable to her age, she appeared less hideous and
+deformed.
+
+Like all old people, in general, the Countess suffered from
+sleeplessness. Having undressed, she seated herself at the window in a
+Voltaire armchair, and dismissed her maids. The candles were taken
+away, and once more the room was left with only one lamp burning in
+it. The Countess sat there looking quite yellow, mumbling with her
+flaccid lips and swaying to and fro. Her dull eyes expressed complete
+vacancy of mind, and, looking at her, one would have thought that the
+rocking of her body was not a voluntary action of her own, but was
+produced by the action of some concealed galvanic mechanism.
+
+Suddenly the death-like face assumed an inexplicable expression. The
+lips ceased to tremble, the eyes became animated: before the Countess
+stood an unknown man.
+
+"Do not be alarmed, for Heaven's sake, do not be alarmed!" said he in
+a low but distinct voice. "I have no intention of doing you any harm;
+I have only come to ask a favor of you."
+
+The old woman looked at him in silence, as if she had not heard what
+he had said. Hermann thought that she was deaf, and, bending down
+towards her ear, he repeated what he had said. The aged Countess
+remained silent as before.
+
+"You can insure the happiness of my life," continued Hermann, "and it
+will cost you nothing. I know that you can name three cards in
+order--"
+
+Hermann stopped. The Countess appeared now to understand what he
+wanted; she seemed as if seeking for words to reply.
+
+"It was a joke," she replied at last. "I assure you it was only a
+joke."
+
+"There is no joking about the matter," replied Hermann, angrily.
+"Remember Chaplitsky, whom you helped to win."
+
+The Countess became visibly uneasy. Her features expressed strong
+emotion, but they quickly resumed their former immobility.
+
+"Can you not name me these three winning cards?" continued Hermann.
+
+The Countess remained silent; Hermann continued:
+
+"For whom are you preserving your secret? For your grandsons? They are
+rich enough without it, they do not know the worth of money. Your
+cards would be of no use to a spendthrift. He who cannot preserve his
+paternal inheritance will die in want, even though he had a demon at
+his service. I am not a man of that sort. I know the value of money.
+Your three cards will not be thrown away upon me. Come!"
+
+He paused and tremblingly awaited her reply. The Countess remained
+silent. Hermann fell upon his knees.
+
+"If your heart has ever known the feeling of love," said he, "if you
+remember its rapture, if you have ever smiled at the cry of your
+new-born child, if any human feeling has ever entered into your
+breast, I entreat you by the feelings of a wife, a lover, a mother, by
+all that is most sacred in life, not to reject my prayer. Reveal to me
+your secret. Of what use is it to you? May be it is connected with
+some terrible sin, with the loss of eternal salvation, with some
+bargain with the devil. Reflect, you are old, you have not long to
+live--I am ready to take your sins upon my soul. Only reveal to me
+your secret. Remember that the happiness of a man is in your hands,
+that not only I, but my children and my grandchildren, will bless your
+memory and reverence you as a saint."
+
+The old Countess answered not a word.
+
+Hermann rose to his feet.
+
+"You old hag!" he exclaimed, grinding his teeth, "then I will make you
+answer!" With these words he drew a pistol from his pocket. At the
+sight of the pistol, the Countess for the second time exhibited strong
+emotions. She shook her head, and raised her hands as if to protect
+herself from the shot. Then she fell backwards, and remained
+motionless.
+
+"Come, an end to this childish nonsense!" said Hermann, taking hold of
+her hand. "I ask you for the last time: will you tell me the names of
+your three cards, or will you not?"
+
+The Countess made no reply. Hermann perceived that she was dead!
+
+
+IV
+
+Lizaveta Ivanovna was sitting in her room, still in her ball dress,
+lost in deep thought. On returning home, she had hastily dismissed the
+chambermaid, who very reluctantly came forward to assist her, saying
+that she would undress herself, and with a trembling heart had gone up
+to her own room, expecting to find Hermann there, but yet hoping not
+to find him. At the first glance he was not there, and she thanked her
+fate for having prevented him keeping the appointment. She sat down
+without undressing, and began to call to mind all the circumstances
+which in a short time had carried her so far. It was not three weeks
+since the time when she had first seen the young officer from the
+window--and yet she was already in correspondence with him, and he had
+succeeded in inducing her to grant him a nocturnal interview. She knew
+his name only through his having written it at the bottom of some of
+his letters; she had never spoken to him, had never heard his voice,
+and had never heard him spoken of until that evening. But, strange to
+say, that very evening at the ball, Tomsky, being piqued with the
+young Princess Pauline N----, who, contrary to her usual custom, did
+not flirt with him, wished to revenge himself by assuming an air of
+indifference: he therefore engaged Lizaveta Ivanovna, and danced an
+endless mazurka with her. During the whole of the time he kept teasing
+her about her partiality for Engineer officers, he assured her that he
+knew far more than she imagined, and some of his jests were so happily
+aimed, that Lizaveta thought several times that her secret was known
+to him.
+
+"From whom have you learned all this?" she asked, smiling.
+
+"From a friend of a person very well known to you," replied Tomsky,
+"from a very distinguished man."
+
+"And whom is this distinguished man?"
+
+"His name is Hermann." Lizaveta made no reply, but her hands and feet
+lost all sense of feeling.
+
+"This Hermann," continued Tomsky, "is a man of romantic personality.
+He has the profile of a Napoleon, and the soul of a Mephistopheles. I
+believe that he has at least three crimes upon his conscience. How
+pale you have become!"
+
+"I have a headache. But what did this Hermann, or whatever his name
+is, tell you?"
+
+"Hermann is very dissatisfied with his friend. He says that in his
+place he would act very differently. I even think that Hermann himself
+has designs upon you; at least, he listens very attentively to all
+that his friend has to say about you."
+
+"And where has he seen me?"
+
+"In church, perhaps; or on the parade. God alone knows where. It may
+have been in your room, while you were asleep, for there is nothing
+that he--"
+
+Three ladies approaching him with the question: "oubli ou regret?"
+interrupted the conversation, which had become so tantalizingly
+interesting to Lizaveta.
+
+The lady chosen by Tomsky was the Princess Pauline herself. She
+succeeded in effecting a reconciliation with him during the numerous
+turns of the dance, after which he conducted her to her chair. On
+returning to his place, Tomsky thought no more either of Hermann or
+Lizaveta. She longed to renew the interrupted conversation, but the
+mazurka came to an end, and shortly afterwards the old Countess took
+her departure.
+
+Tomsky's words were nothing more than the customary small talk of the
+dance, but they sank deep into the soul of the young dreamer. The
+portrait, sketched by Tomsky, coincided with the picture she had
+formed within her own mind, and, thanks to the latest romances, the
+ordinary countenance of her admirer became invested with attributes
+capable of alarming her and fascinating her imagination at the same
+time. She was now sitting with her bare arms crossed, and with her
+head, still adorned with flowers, sunk upon her uncovered bosom.
+Suddenly the door opened and Hermann entered. She shuddered.
+
+"Where were you?" she asked in a terrified whisper.
+
+"In the old Countess's bedroom," replied Hermann. "I have just left
+her. The Countess is dead."
+
+"My God! What do you say?"
+
+"And I am afraid," added Hermann, "that I am the cause of her death."
+
+Lizaveta looked at him, and Tomsky's words found an echo in her soul:
+"This man has at least three crimes upon his conscience!" Hermann sat
+down by the window near her, and related all that had happened.
+
+Lizaveta listened to him in terror. So all those passionate letters,
+those ardent desires, this bold, obstinate pursuit--all this was not
+love! Money--that was what his soul yearned for! She could not satisfy
+his desire and make him happy. The poor girl had been nothing but the
+blind tool of a robber, of the murderer of her aged benefactress! She
+wept bitter tears of agonized repentance. Hermann gazed at her in
+silence; his heart, too, was a prey to violent emotion, but neither
+the tears of the poor girl, nor the wonderful charm of her beauty,
+enhanced by her grief, could produce any impression upon his hardened
+soul. He felt no pricking of conscience at the thought of the dead old
+woman. One thing only grieved him: the irreparable loss of the secret
+from which he had expected to obtain great wealth.
+
+"You are a monster!" said Lizaveta at last.
+
+"I did not wish for her death," replied Hermann, "my pistol was not
+loaded." Both remained silent. The day began to dawn. Lizaveta
+extinguished her candle, a pale light illumined her room. She wiped
+her tear-stained eyes, and raised them towards Hermann. He was sitting
+near the window, with his arms crossed, and with a fierce frown upon
+his forehead. In this attitude he bore a striking resemblance to the
+portrait of Napoleon. This resemblance struck Lizaveta even.
+
+"How shall I get you out of the house?" said she at last. "I thought
+of conducting you down the secret staircase."
+
+"I will go alone," he answered.
+
+Lizaveta arose, took from her drawer a key, handed it to Hermann, and
+gave him the necessary instructions. Hermann pressed her cold, inert
+hand, kissed her bowed head, and left the room.
+
+He descended the winding staircase, and once more entered the
+Countess's bedroom. The dead old lady sat as if petrified, her face
+expressed profound tranquillity. Hermann stopped before her, and gazed
+long and earnestly at her, as if he wished to convince himself of the
+terrible reality. At last he entered the cabinet, felt behind the
+tapestry for the door, and then began to descend the dark staircase,
+filled with strange emotions. "Down this very staircase," thought he,
+"perhaps coming from the very same room, and at this very same hour
+sixty years ago, there may have glided, in an embroidered coat, with
+his hair dressed _a l'oiseau royal_, and pressing to his heart his
+three-cornered hat, some young gallant who has long been mouldering in
+the grave, but the heart of his aged mistress has only today ceased to
+beat."
+
+At the bottom of the staircase Hermann found a door, which he opened
+with a key, and then traversed a corridor which conducted him into the
+street.
+
+
+V
+
+Three days after the fatal night, at nine o'clock in the morning,
+Hermann repaired to the Convent of ----, where the last honors were to
+be paid to the mortal remains of the old Countess. Although feeling no
+remorse, he could not altogether stifle the voice of conscience, which
+said to him: "You are the murderer of the old woman!" In spite of his
+entertaining very little religious belief, he was exceedingly
+superstitious; and believing that the dead Countess might exercise an
+evil influence on his life, he resolved to be present at her obsequies
+in order to implore her pardon.
+
+The church was full. It was with difficulty that Hermann made his way
+through the crowd of people. The coffin was placed upon a rich
+catafalque beneath a velvet baldachin. The deceased Countess lay
+within it, with her hands crossed upon her breast, with a lace cap
+upon her head, and dressed in a white satin robe. Around the
+catafalque stood the members of her household; the servants in black
+caftans, with armorial ribbons upon their shoulders and candles in
+their hands; the relatives--children, grandchildren, and
+great-grandchildren--in deep mourning.
+
+Nobody wept, tears would have been an affectation. The Countess was so
+old that her death could have surprised nobody, and her relatives had
+long looked upon her as being out of the world. A famous preacher
+delivered the funeral sermon. In simple and touching words he
+described the peaceful passing away of the righteous, who had passed
+long years in calm preparation for a Christian end. "The angel of
+death found her," said the orator, "engaged in pious meditation and
+waiting for the midnight bridegroom."
+
+The service concluded amidst profound silence. The relatives went
+forward first to take a farewell of the corpse. Then followed the
+numerous guests, who had come to render the last homage to her who for
+so many years had been a participator in their frivolous amusements.
+After these followed the members of the Countess's household. The last
+of these an old woman of the same age as the deceased. Two young women
+led her forward by the hand. She had not strength enough to bow down
+to the ground--she merely shed a few tears, and kissed the cold hand
+of the mistress.
+
+Herman now resolved to approach the coffin. He knelt down upon the
+cold stones, and remained in that position for some minutes; at last
+he arose as pale as the deceased Countess herself; he ascended the
+steps of the catafalque and bent over the corpse.... At that moment it
+seemed to him that the dead woman darted a mocking look at him and
+winked with one eye. Hermann started back, took a false step, and fell
+to the ground. Several persons hurried forward and raised him up. At
+the same moment Lizaveta Ivanovna was borne fainting into the porch of
+the church. This episode disturbed for some minutes the solemnity of
+the gloomy ceremony. Among the congregation arose a deep murmur, and a
+tall, thin chamberlain, a near relative of the deceased, whispered in
+the ear of an Englishman, who was standing near him, that the young
+officer was a natural son of the Countess, to which the Englishman
+coldly replied "Oh!"
+
+During the whole of that day Hermann was strangely excited. Repairing
+to an out of the way restaurant to dine, he drank a great deal of
+wine, contrary to his usual custom, in the hope of deadening his
+inward agitation. But the wine only served to excite his imagination
+still more. On returning home he threw himself upon his bed without
+undressing, and fell into a deep sleep.
+
+When he woke up it was already night, and the moon was shining into
+the room. He looked at his watch: it was a quarter to three. Sleep had
+left him; he sat down upon his bed, and thought of the funeral of the
+old Countess.
+
+At that moment somebody in the street looked in at his window and
+immediately passed on again. Hermann paid no attention to this
+incident. A few moments afterwards he heard the door of his anteroom
+open. Hermann thought that it was his orderly, drunk as usual,
+returning from some nocturnal expedition, but presently he heard
+footsteps that were unknown to him: somebody was walking softly over
+the floor in slippers. The door opened, and a woman dressed in white
+entered the room. Hermann mistook her for his old nurse, and wondered
+what could bring her there at that hour of the night. But the white
+woman glided rapidly across the room and stood before him--and Hermann
+thought he recognized the Countess.
+
+"I have come to you against my wish," she said in a firm voice, "but I
+have been ordered to grant your request. Three, seven, ace, will win
+for you if played in succession, but only on these conditions: that
+you do not play more than one card in twenty-four-hours, and that you
+never play again during the rest of your life. I forgive you my death,
+on condition that you marry my companion, Lizaveta Ivanovna."
+
+With these words she turned round very quietly, walked with a
+shuffling gait towards the door, and disappeared. Hermann heard the
+street door open and shut, and again he saw someone look in at him
+through the window.
+
+For a long time Hermann could not recover himself. He then rose up and
+entered the next room. His orderly was lying asleep upon the floor,
+and he had much difficulty in waking him. The orderly was drunk as
+usual, and no information could be obtained from him. The street door
+was locked. Hermann returned to his room, lit his candle, and wrote
+down all the details of his vision.
+
+
+VI
+
+Two fixed ideas can no more exist together in the moral world than two
+bodies can occupy one and the same physical world. "Three, seven, ace"
+soon drove out of Hermann's mind the thought of the dead Countess.
+"Three, seven, ace" were perpetually running through his head, and
+continually being repeated by his lips. If he saw a young girl, he
+would say: "How slender she is; quite like the three of hearts." If
+anybody asked "What is the time?" he would reply: "Five minutes to
+seven." Every stout man that he saw reminded him of the ace. "Three,
+seven, ace" haunted him in his sleep, and assumed all possible shapes.
+The threes bloomed before him in the forms of magnificent flowers, the
+sevens were represented by Gothic portals, and the aces became
+transformed into gigantic spiders. One thought alone occupied his
+whole mind--to make a profitable use of the secret which he had
+purchased so dearly. He thought of applying for a furlough so as to
+travel abroad. He wanted to go to Paris and tempt fortune in some
+gambling houses that abounded there. Chance spared him all this
+trouble.
+
+There was in Moscow a society of rich gamesters, presided over by the
+celebrated Chekalinsky, who had passed all his life at the card table,
+and had amassed millions, accepting bills of exchange for his
+winnings, and paying his losses in ready money. His long experience
+secured for him the confidence of his companions, and his open house,
+his famous cook, and his agreeable and fascinating manners, gained for
+him the respect of the public. He came to St. Petersburg. The young
+men of the capital flocked to his rooms, forgetting balls for cards,
+and preferring the emotions of faro to the seductions of flirting.
+Naroumoff conducted Hermann to Chekalinsky's residence.
+
+They passed through a suite of rooms, filled with attentive domestics.
+The place was crowded. Generals and Privy Counsellors were playing at
+whist, young men were lolling carelessly upon the velvet-covered
+sofas, eating ices and smoking pipes. In the drawing-room, at the head
+of a long table, around which were assembled about a score of players,
+sat the master of the house keeping the bank. He was a man of about
+sixty years of age, of a very dignified appearance; his head was
+covered with silvery white hair; his full, florid countenance
+expressed good-nature, and his eyes twinkled with a perpetual smile.
+Naroumoff introduced Hermann to him. Chekalinsky shook him by the hand
+in a friendly manner, requested him not to stand on ceremony, and then
+went on dealing.
+
+The game occupied some time. On the table lay more than thirty cards.
+Chekalinsky paused after each throw, in order to give the players time
+to arrange their cards and note down their losses, listened politely
+to their requests, and more politely still, straightened the corners
+of cards that some player's hand had chanced to bend. At last the game
+was finished. Chekalinsky shuffled the cards, and prepared to deal
+again.
+
+"Will you allow me to take a card?" said Hermann, stretching out his
+hand from behind a stout gentleman who was punting.
+
+Chekalinsky smiled and bowed silently, as a sign of acquiescence.
+Naroumoff laughingly congratulated Hermann on his abjuration of that
+abstention from cards which he had practised for so long a period, and
+wished him a lucky beginning.
+
+"Stake!" said Hermann, writing some figures with chalk on the back of
+his card.
+
+"How much?" asked the banker, contracting the muscles of his eyes,
+"excuse me, I cannot see quite clearly."
+
+"Forty-seven thousand roubles," replied Hermann. At these words every
+head in the room turned suddenly round, and all eyes were fixed upon
+Hermann.
+
+"He has taken leave of his senses!" thought Naroumoff.
+
+"Allow me to inform you," said Chekalinsky, with his eternal smile,
+"that you are playing very high; nobody here has ever staked more than
+two hundred and seventy-five roubles at once."
+
+"Very well," replied Hermann, "but do you accept my card or not?"
+
+Chekalinsky bowed in token of consent.
+
+"I only wish to observe," said he, "that although I have the greatest
+confidence in my friends, I can only play against ready money. For my
+own part I am quite convinced that your word is sufficient, but for
+the sake of the order of the game, and to facilitate the reckoning up,
+I must ask you to put the money on your card."
+
+Hermann drew from his pocket a bank-note, and handed it to
+Chekalinsky, who, after examining it in a cursory manner, placed it on
+Hermann's card.
+
+He began to deal. On the right a nine turned up, and on the left a
+three.
+
+"I have won!" said Hermann, showing his card.
+
+A murmur of astonishment arose among the players. Chekalinsky frowned,
+but the smile quickly returned to his face. "Do you wish me to settle
+with you?" he said to Hermann.
+
+"If you please," replied the latter.
+
+Chekalinsky drew from his pocket a number of banknotes and paid at
+once. Hermann took up his money and left the table. Naroumoff could
+not recover from his astonishment. Hermann drank a glass of lemonade
+and returned home.
+
+The next evening he again repaired to Chekalinsky's. The host was
+dealing. Hermann walked up to the table; the punters immediately made
+room for him. Chekalinsky greeted him with a gracious bow.
+
+Hermann waited for the next deal, took a card and placed upon it his
+forty-seven thousand roubles, together with his winnings of the
+previous evening.
+
+Chekalinsky began to deal. A knave turned up on the right, a seven on
+the left.
+
+Hermann showed his seven.
+
+There was a general exclamation. Chekalinsky was evidently ill at
+ease, but he counted out the ninety-four thousand roubles and handed
+them over to Hermann, who pocketed them in the coolest manner
+possible, and immediately left the house.
+
+The next evening Hermann appeared again at the table. Everyone was
+expecting him. The generals and privy counsellors left their whist in
+order to watch such extraordinary play. The young officers quitted
+their sofas, and even the servants crowded into the room. All pressed
+round Hermann. The other players left off punting, impatient to see
+how it would end. Hermann stood at the table, and prepared to play
+alone against the pale, but still smiling Chekalinsky. Each opened a
+pack of cards. Chekalinsky shuffled. Hermann took a card and covered
+it with a pile of bank-notes. It was like a duel. Deep silence reigned
+around.
+
+Chekalinsky began to deal, his hands trembled. On the right a queen
+turned up, and on the left an ace.
+
+"Ace has won!" cried Hermann, showing his card.
+
+"Your queen has lost," said Chekalinsky, politely.
+
+Hermann started; instead of an ace, there lay before him the queen of
+spades! He could not believe his eyes, nor could he understand how he
+had made such a mistake.
+
+At that moment it seemed to him that the queen of spades smiled
+ironically, and winked her eye at him. He was struck by her remarkable
+resemblance....
+
+"The old Countess!" he exclaimed, seized with terror. Chekalinsky
+gathered up his winnings. For some time Hermann remained perfectly
+motionless. When at last he left the table, there was a general
+commotion in the room.
+
+"Splendidly punted!" said the players. Chekalinsky shuffled the cards
+afresh, and the game went on as usual.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Hermann went out of his mind, and is now confined in room number
+seventeen of the Oboukhoff Hospital. He never answers any questions,
+but he constantly mutters with unusual rapidity: "Three, seven, ace!
+Three, seven, queen!"
+
+Lizaveta Ivanovna has married a very amiable young man, a son of the
+former steward of the old Countess. He is in the service of the State
+somewhere, and is in receipt of a good income. Lizaveta is also
+supporting a poor relative.
+
+Tomsky has been promoted to the rank of captain, and has become the
+husband of the Princess Pauline.
+
+
+FOOTNOTES OF _THE QUEEN OF SPADES_:
+
+[1: Said of a card when it wins or loses in the quickest possible
+time.]
+
+[2: Diminutive of Lizaveta (Elizabeth).]
+
+
+
+VERA JELIHOVSKY
+
+
+_THE GENERAL'S WILL_
+
+
+I
+
+It happened in winter, just before the holidays. Ivan Feodorovitch
+Lobnitchenko, the lawyer, whose office is in one of the main streets
+of St. Petersburg, was called hurriedly to witness the last will and
+testament of one at the point of death. The sick man was not strictly
+a client of Ivan Feodorovitch; under other circumstances, he might
+have refused to make this late call, after a day's heavy toil ... but
+the dying man was an aristocrat and a millionaire, and such as he meet
+no refusals, whether in life, or, much more, at the moment of death.
+
+Lobnitchenko, taking a secretary and everything necessary, with a sigh
+scratched himself behind the ear, and thrusting aside the thought of
+the delightful evening at cards that awaited him, set out to go to the
+sick man.
+
+General Iuri Pavlovitch Nasimoff was far gone. Even the most
+compassionate doctors did not give him many days to live, when he
+finally decided to destroy the will which he had made long ago, not in
+St. Petersburg, but in the provincial city where he had played the
+Tsar for so many years. The general had come to the capital for a
+time, and had lain down--to rise no more.
+
+This was the opinion of the physicians, and of most of those about
+him; the sick man himself was unwilling to admit it. He was a
+stalwart-hearted and until recently a stalwart-bodied old man, tall,
+striking, with an energetic face, and a piercing, masterful glance,
+hard to forget, even if you saw him only once.
+
+He was lying on the sofa, in a richly furnished hotel suite,
+consisting of three of the best rooms. He received the lawyer gayly
+enough. He himself explained the circumstances to him, though every
+now and then compelled to stop by a paroxysm of pain, with difficulty
+repressing the groans which almost escaped him, in spite of all his
+efforts. During these heavy moments, Ivan Feodorovitch raised his eyes
+buried in fat to the sick man's face, and his plump little features
+were convulsed in sympathy with the sufferer's pain. As soon as the
+courageous old man, fighting hard with the paroxysms of pain, had got
+the better of them, taking his hands from his contorted face, and
+drawing a painful breath, he began anew to explain his will.
+Lobnitchenko dropped his eyes again and became all attention.
+
+The general explained in detail to the lawyer. He had been married
+twice, and had three children, a son and a daughter from his first
+marriage, who had long ago reached adultship, and a nine-year-old
+daughter from his second marriage. His second wife and daughter he
+expected every day; they were abroad, but would soon return. His elder
+daughter would also probably come.
+
+The lawyer was not acquainted with Nazimoff's family; indeed he had
+never before seen the general, though, like all Russia, he knew of him
+by repute. But judging from the tone of contempt or of pity with which
+he spoke of his second wife or her daughter, the lawyer guessed at
+once that the general's home life was not happy. The further
+explanations of the sick man convinced him of this. A new will was to
+be drawn up, directly contrary to the will signed six years before,
+which bequeathed to his second wife, Olga Vseslavovna, unlimited
+authority over their little daughter, and her husband's entire
+property. In the first will he had left nearly everything, with the
+exception of the family estate, which he did not feel justified in
+taking from his son, to his second wife and her daughter. Now he
+wished to restore to his elder children the rights which he had
+deprived them of, and especially to his eldest daughter, Anna Iurievna
+Borissova, who was not even mentioned in the first will. In the new
+will, with the exception of the seventh part, the widow's share, he
+divided the whole of his land and capital between his children
+equally; and he further appointed a strict guardianship over the
+property of his little daughter, Olga Iurievna.
+
+The will was duly arranged, drawn up and witnessed, and after the
+three witnesses had signed it, it was left, by the general's wish, in
+his own keeping.
+
+"I will send it to you to take care of," he said to the lawyer. "It
+will be safer in your hands than here, in my temporary quarters. But
+first I wish to read it to my wife, and ... to my eldest daughter ...
+if she arrives in time."
+
+The lawyer and the priest, who was one of the witnesses, were already
+preparing to take leave of the general, when voices and steps were
+heard in the corridor; a footman's head appeared through the door,
+calling the doctor hurriedly forth. It appeared that the general's
+lady had arrived suddenly, without letting anyone know by telegram
+that she was coming.
+
+The doctor hastily slipped out of the room; he feared the result of
+emotion on the sick man, and wished to warn the general's wife of his
+grave danger, but the sick man noticed the move, and it was impossible
+to guard him against disturbance.
+
+"What is going on there?" he asked. "What are you mumbling about,
+Edouard Vicentevitch? Tell me what is the matter? Is it my daughter?"
+
+"Your excellency, I beg of you to take care of yourself!" the doctor
+was beginning, evidently quite familiar with the general's family
+affairs, and therefore dreading the meeting of husband and wife. "It
+is not Anna Iurievna...."
+
+"Aha!" the sick man interrupted him; "she has come? Very well. Let her
+come in. Only the little one ... I don't wish her to come ... to-day."
+
+Suffering was visible in his eyes, this time not bodily suffering.
+
+The door opened, with the rustling of a silk dress. A tall,
+well-developed, and decidedly handsome woman appeared on the
+threshold. She glanced at the pain-stricken face, which smiled
+contemptuously toward her. In a moment she was beside the general,
+kneeling beside him on the carpet, bending close to him, and pressing
+his hand, as she repeated in a despairing whisper:
+
+"Oh, Georges! Georges! Is it really you, my poor friend?"
+
+It would be hard to define the expression of rapidly changing emotions
+which passed over the sick man's face, which made his breast heave,
+and his great heart quiver and tremble painfully. Displeasure and
+pity, sympathy and contempt, anger and grief, all were expressed in
+the short, sharp, bitter laugh, and the few words which escaped his
+lips when he saw his little daughter timidly following her mother into
+his room.
+
+"Do not teach her to lie!" and he nodded toward the child, and turned
+toward the wall, with an expression of pain and pity on his face. The
+lawyer and the priest hastened to take their leave and disappear.
+
+"Ah! Sinners! sinners!" muttered the latter, as he descended the
+stairs.
+
+"Things are not in good shape between them?" asked Lobnitchenko. "They
+don't get on well together?"
+
+"How should they be in good shape, when he came here to get a
+divorce?" whispered the priest, shaping his fur cap. "But God decided
+otherwise. Even without a divorce, he will be separated forever from
+his wife!"
+
+"I don't believe he is so very far gone. He is a stalwart old man.
+Perhaps he will pull through," went on the man of law.
+
+"God's hand is over all," answered the priest, shrugging his
+shoulders. And so they went their different ways.
+
+
+II
+
+"Olga!" cried the sick man, without turning round, and feeling near
+him the swift movement of his wife, he pushed her away with an
+impatient movement of his hand, and added, "Not you! my daughter
+Olga!"
+
+"Olga! Go, my child, papa is calling you," cried the general's wife in
+a soft voice, in French, to the little girl, who was standing
+undecidedly in the center of the room.
+
+"Can you not drop your foreign phrases?" angrily interrupted the
+general. "This is not a drawing-room! You might drop it, from a sense
+of decency."
+
+His voice became shrill, and made the child shudder and begin to cry.
+She went to him timidly.
+
+The general looked at her with an expression of pain. He drew her
+toward him with his left hand, raising the right to bless her.
+
+"In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit!" he
+whispered, making the sign of the cross over her. "God guard you from
+evil, from every bad influence.... Be kind ... honest ... most of all,
+be honest! Never tell lies. God guard you from falsehood, from lying,
+even more than from sorrow!"
+
+Tears filled the dying man's eyes. Little Olga shuddered from head to
+foot; she feared her father, and at the same time was so sorry for
+him. But pity got the upper hand. She clung to him, wetting him with
+her tears. Her father raised his hand, wishing to make the sign of the
+cross once more over the little head which lay on his breast, but
+could not complete the gesture. His hand fell heavily, his face was
+once more contorted with pain; he turned to those who stood near him,
+evidently avoiding meeting his wife's eyes, and whispered:
+
+"Take her away. It is enough. Christ be with her!" And for a moment he
+collected strength to place his hand on the child's head.
+
+The doctor took the little girl by the hand, but her mother moved
+quickly toward her.
+
+"Kiss him! Kiss papa's hand!" she whispered, "bid him good-by!"
+
+The general's wife sobbed, and covered her face with her handkerchief,
+with the grand gesture of a stage queen. The sick man did not see
+this. At the sound of her voice he frowned and closed his eyes tight,
+evidently trying not to listen. The doctor led the little girl away to
+another room and gave her to her governess.
+
+When he came back to the sick man the general, lying on the sofa,
+still in the same position, and without looking at his wife who stood
+beside his pillow, said to her:
+
+"I expect my poor daughter Anna, who has suffered so much injustice
+through you.... I have asked her to forgive me. I shall pray her to be
+a mother to her little sister.... I have appointed her the child's
+guardian. She is good and honest ... she will teach the child no evil.
+And this will be best for you also. You are provided for. You will
+find out from the new will. You could not have had any profit from
+being her guardian. If Anna does not consent to take little Olga to
+live with her, and to educate her with her own children, as I have
+asked her, Olga will be sent to a school. You will prefer liberty to
+your daughter; it will be pleasanter for you. Is it not so?"
+
+Contempt and bitter irony were perceptible in his voice. His wife did
+not utter a syllable. She remained so quiet that it might have been
+thought she did not even hear him, but for the convulsive movement of
+her lips, and of the fingers of her tightly clasped hands.
+
+The doctor once more made a movement to withdraw discreetly, but the
+general's voice stopped him. "Edouard Vicentevitch? Is he here?"
+
+"I am here, your excellency," answered the doctor, bending over the
+sick man. "Would not your excellency prefer to be carried to the bed?
+It will be more comfortable lying down."
+
+"More comfortable to die?" sharply interrupted the general. "Why do
+you drivel? You know I detest beds and blankets. Drop it! Here, take
+this," and he gave him a sheet of crested paper folded in four, which
+was lying beside him. "Read it, please. Aloud! so that she may know."
+
+He turned his eyes toward his wife. The doctor unwillingly began his
+unpleasant task. He was a man of fine feeling, and although he had no
+very high opinion of the general's wife, still she was a woman. And a
+beautiful woman. He would have preferred that she should learn from
+someone else how many of the pleasures of life were slipping away from
+her, in virtue of the new will. But there was nothing for it but to do
+as he was ordered. It was always hard to oppose Iuri Pavlovitch; now
+it was quite impossible.
+
+Olga Vseslavovna listened to the reading of the will with complete
+composure. She sat motionless, leaning back in an armchair, with
+downcast eyes, and only showing her emotion when her husband was no
+longer able to stifle a groan. Then she turned toward him her pale,
+beautiful face, with evident signs of heartfelt sympathy, and was even
+rising to come to his assistance. The sick man impatiently refused her
+services, significantly turning his eyes toward the doctor, who was
+reading his last will and testament, as though he would say: "Listen!
+Listen! It concerns you."
+
+It did concern her, without a doubt. General Nazimoff's wife learned
+that, instead of an income of a hundred thousand a year, which she had
+had a right to expect, she could count only on a sum sufficient to
+keep her from poverty; what in her opinion was a mere pittance.
+
+The doctor finished reading, coughing to hide his confusion, and
+slowly folded the document.
+
+"You have heard?" asked the general, in a faint, convulsive voice.
+
+"I have heard, my friend," quietly answered his wife.
+
+"You have nothing to say?"
+
+"What can I say? You have a right to dispose of what belongs to
+you.... But ... still I...."
+
+"Still you what?" sharply asked her husband.
+
+"Still, I hope, my friend, that this is not your last will...."
+
+General Nazimoff turned, and even made an effort to raise himself on
+his elbow.
+
+"God willing, you will recover. Perhaps you will decide more than once
+to make other dispositions of your property," calmly continued his
+wife.
+
+The sick man fell back on the pillows.
+
+"You are mistaken. Even if I do not die, you will not be able to
+deceive me again. This is my last will!" he replied convulsively.
+
+And with trembling hand he gave the doctor a bunch of keys.
+
+"There is the dispatch box. Please open it, and put the will in."
+
+The doctor obeyed his wish, without looking at Olga Vseslavovna. She,
+on her part, did not look at him. Shrugging her shoulders at her
+husband's last words, she remained motionless, noticing nothing except
+his sufferings. His sufferings, it seemed, tortured her.
+
+Meanwhile the dying man followed the doctor with anxious eyes, and as
+soon as the latter closed the large traveling dispatch box he
+stretched out his hand to him for the keys.
+
+"So long as I am alive, I will keep them!" he murmured, putting the
+bunch of keys away in his pocket. "And when I am dead, I intrust them
+to you, Edouard Vicentevitch. Take care of them, as a last service to
+me!" And he turned his face once more to the wall.
+
+"And now, leave me alone! The pain is less. Perhaps I shall go to
+sleep. Leave me!"
+
+"My friend! Permit me to remain near you," the general's wife began,
+bending tenderly over her husband.
+
+"Go!" he cried sharply. "Leave me in peace, I tell you!"
+
+She rose, trembling. The doctor hastily offered her his arm. She left
+the room, leaning heavily on him, and once more covering her face with
+her handkerchief, in tragic style.
+
+"Be calm, your excellency!" whispered the doctor sympathetically, only
+half conscious of what he was saying.
+
+"These rooms have been prepared for you. You also need to rest, after
+such a long journey."
+
+"Oh, I am not thinking about myself. I am so sorry for him. Poor,
+poor, senseless creature. How much I have suffered at his hands. He
+was always so suspicious, so hard to get on with. And whims and
+fantasies without end. You know, doctor, I have sometimes even thought
+he was not in full possession of his faculties."
+
+"Hm!" murmured the doctor, coughing in confusion.
+
+"Take this strange change of his will, for instance," the general's
+wife continued, not waiting for a clearer expression of sympathy.
+"Take his manner toward me. And for what reason?"
+
+"Yes, it is very sad," murmured the doctor.
+
+"Tell me, doctor, does he expect his son and daughter?"
+
+"Only his daughter, Anna Iurievna. She promised to come, with her
+oldest children. A telegram came yesterday. We have been expecting her
+all day."
+
+"What is the cause of this sudden tenderness? They have not seen each
+other for ten years. Does he expect her husband, too? His son-in-law,
+the pedagogue?" contemptuously asked the general's wife.
+
+"No! How could he come? He could not leave his service. And his son,
+too, Peter Iurevitch, he cannot come at once. He is on duty, in
+Transcaspia. It is a long way."
+
+"Yes, it is a long way!" assented the general's wife, evidently busy
+with other thoughts. "But tell me, Edouard Vicentevitch, this new
+will, has it been written long?"
+
+"It was drawn up only to-day. The draft was prepared last week, but
+the general kept putting it off. But when his pains began this
+morning...."
+
+"Is it the end? Is it dangerous?" interrupted Olga Vseslavovna.
+
+"Very--a very bad sign. When they began, Iuri Pavlovitch sent at once
+for the lawyer. He was still here when you arrived."
+
+"Yes. And the old will, which he made before, has been destroyed?"
+
+"I do not know for certain. But I think not. Oh, no, I forgot. The
+general was going to send a telegram."
+
+"Yes? to send a telegram?"
+
+The general's wife shrugged her shoulders, sadly shook her head, and
+added:
+
+"He is so changeable! so changeable! But I think it is all the same.
+According to law, only the last will is valid?"
+
+"Yes, without doubt; the last."
+
+The general's wife bowed her head.
+
+"What hurts me most," she whispered, with a bitter smile, bending
+close to the young doctor, and leaning heavily on his arm, "what hurts
+me most, is not the money. I am not avaricious. But why should he take
+my child away from me? Why should he pass over her own mother, and
+intrust her to her half-sister? A woman whom I do not know, who has
+not distinguished herself by any services or good actions, so far as I
+know. I shall not submit. I shall contest the will. The law must
+support the right of the mother. What do you think, doctor?"
+
+The doctor hastily assented, though, to tell the truth, he was not
+thinking of anything at the moment, except the strange manner in which
+the general's wife, while talking, pressed close to her companion.
+
+At that moment a bell rang, and the general's loud voice was heard:
+
+"Doctor! Edouard Vicentevitch!"
+
+"Coming!" answered the doctor.
+
+And leaving Olga Vseslavovna at the threshold of her room, he ran
+quickly to the sick man.
+
+"A vigorous voice--for a dying man! He shouts as he used to at the
+manoeuvers!" thought the general's wife.
+
+And her handsome face at once grew dark with the hate which stole over
+it. This was only a passing expression, however; it rapidly gave place
+to sorrow, when she saw the manservant coming from the sick man.
+
+"What is the matter with your master, Yakov? Is he worse?"
+
+"No, madam. God has been gracious. He told me to push the box nearer
+him, and ordered Edouard Vicentevitch to open it. He wants to send
+some telegram or other."
+
+"Thank God, he is not worse. Yakov, I am going to send a telegram to
+the station myself, in a few minutes, by my coachman. You can give him
+the general's telegram, too."
+
+"Very well, madam."
+
+"And another thing. I shall not go to bed. If there is any change in
+your master's condition, Yakov, come and knock at my door at once. I
+beg of you, tell me the very moment anything happens. Here is
+something for you, Yakov;--you have grown thin, waiting upon your
+master!"
+
+"I thank you most humbly, your excellency. We must not grudge our
+exertions," the man answered, putting a note of considerable value in
+his pocket.
+
+
+III
+
+Contrary to expectation, the night passed quietly enough. Emotion and
+weariness claimed their own; Olga Vseslavovna, in spite of all her
+efforts, fell into a sleep toward morning; and when she awoke, she
+started in dismay, noticing that the sun had already climbed high in
+the sky, and was pouring into her room.
+
+Her maid, a deft Viennese, who had remained with this accommodating
+mistress for five years, quieted her by telling her that the master
+was better, that he was still asleep, not having slept for the greater
+part of the night.
+
+"The doctor and Yakov were busy with him most of the night," she
+explained. "They were sorting all sorts of papers; some of them they
+tied up, writing something on them; others they tore up, or threw into
+the fire. The grate is full of ashes. Yakov told me."
+
+"And there were no more telegrams?"
+
+"No, madam, there were no more. Yakov and our Friedrich would have let
+me know at once; I was there in the anteroom; they both kept coming
+through on errands."
+
+"But there were no more telegrams, except the two that were sent
+last night."
+
+Olga Vseslavovna dressed, breakfasted, and went to her husband. But at
+the threshold of his room she was stopped by the direction of the sick
+man to admit no one without special permission except the doctor, or
+his eldest daughter, if she should come.
+
+"Tell Edouard Vicentevitch to come out to me," ordered the general's
+wife. The doctor was called, and in great confusion confirmed the
+general's orders.
+
+"But perhaps he did not think that such an order could apply to me?"
+she said, astonished.
+
+The doctor apologized, but had to admit that it was she who was
+intended, and that his excellency had sent word to her excellency that
+she should not give herself the trouble of visiting him.
+
+"He is out of his mind," declared the general's wife quietly, but with
+conviction, shrugging her shoulders. "Why should he hate me so--for
+all my love to him, an old man, who might have been my father?"
+
+And Olga Vseslavovna once more took refuge in her pocket handkerchief,
+this time, instead of tears, giving vent to sobs of vexation. The
+doctor, always shy in the presence of women, stood with hanging head
+and downcast eyes, as though he were to blame.
+
+"What is it they are saying about you burning papers all night?" Olga
+Vseslavovna asked, in a weak voice.
+
+"Oh, not nearly all night. Iuri Pavlovitch remembered that he ought to
+destroy some old letters and papers. There were some to be put in
+order. There, in the box, there is a packet addressed to your
+excellency. I was told to write the address."
+
+"Indeed! Could I not see it?"
+
+"Oh no, on no account. They are all locked up in the box along with
+the last will. And the general has the keys."
+
+A bitter smile of humiliation played about the young woman's lips.
+
+"So the new will has not been burned yet?" she asked.
+
+And to the startled negative of the doctor, who repeated that "it was
+lying on the top of the papers in the box," she added:
+
+"Well, it will be burned yet. Do not fear. Especially if God in His
+mercy prolongs my husband's life. You see, he has always had a
+mysterious passion for writing new documents, powers of attorney,
+deeds of gift, wills, whatever comes into his mind. He writes new
+ones, and burns the old ones. But what can you do? We must submit to
+each new fancy. We cannot contradict a sick man."
+
+Olga Vseslavovna went back to her room. She only left her bedroom for
+a few minutes that day, to hear the final word of the lights of the
+medical profession, who had come together for a general consultation
+in the afternoon; all the rest of the day she shut herself up. The
+conclusions of the physicians, though they differed completely in
+detail, were similar in the main, and far from comforting; the life
+and continued suffering of the sick man could not last more than a few
+days.
+
+In the evening a telegram came from Anna Iurievna; she informed her
+father that she would be with him on the following day, at five in the
+afternoon.
+
+"Shall I be able to hold out? Shall I last so long?" sighed the sick
+man, all day long. And the more he was disturbed in mind, the more
+threatening were his attacks of pain. He passed a bad night. Toward
+morning a violent attack, much worse than any that had gone before,
+almost carried him away. He could hardly breathe, owing to the sharp
+suffering. Hot baths for his hands and steam inhalations no longer had
+any beneficial effect, though they had alleviated his pain hitherto.
+
+The doctor, the Sister of Mercy, and the servant wore themselves out.
+But still, as before, his wife alone was not admitted to him. She
+raged with anger, trying, and not without success, to convince
+everyone that she was going mad with despair. Little Olga had been
+taken away on the previous day by a friend of the general's, to stay
+there "during this terrible time." That night Madame Nazimoff did not
+go to bed at all; and, as befitted a devoted wife, did not quit her
+husband's door. When the violent attack just before dawn quieted down,
+she made an attempt to go in to him; but no sooner did the sick man
+see her at the head of his couch, on which he had at last been
+persuaded to lie, than strong displeasure was expressed in his face,
+and, no longer able to speak, he made an angry motion of his hand
+toward her, and groaned heavily. The Sister of Mercy with great
+firmness asked the general's wife not to trouble the sick man with her
+presence.
+
+"And I am to put up with this. I am to submit to all this?" thought
+Olga Vseslavovna, writhing with wrath. "To endure all this from him,
+and after his death to suffer beggary? No, a thousand times no! Better
+death than penury and such insults." And she fell into gloomy thought.
+
+That gesture of displeasure at the sight of his wife was the last
+conscious act of Iuri Pavlovitch Nazimoff. At eight in the morning he
+lost consciousness, in the midst of violent suffering, which lasted
+until the end. By the early afternoon he was no more.
+
+During the last hour of his agony his wife knelt beside his couch
+without let or hindrance, and wept inconsolably. The formidable
+aristocrat and millionaire was dead.
+
+Everything went on along the usual lines. The customary stir and
+unceremonious bustle, instead of cautious whispering, rose around the
+dead body, in preparation for a fashionable funeral. No near relatives
+were present except his wife, and she was confined to her room,
+half-fainting, half-hysterical. All responsibility fell on the humble
+doctor, and he busied himself indefatigably, conscientiously, in the
+sweat of his brow, making every effort to omit nothing. But, as always
+happens, he omitted the most important thing of all. The early
+twilight was already descending on St. Petersburg, shrouded in chilly
+mist, when Edouard Vicentevitch Polesski struck his brow in despair;
+he had suddenly remembered the keys and the box, committed to his care
+by the dying man. At that moment, the body, dressed in full uniform,
+with all his regalia, was lying in the great, darkened room on a
+table, covered with brocade, awaiting the coffin and the customary
+wreaths. The doctor rushed into the empty bedroom. Everything in it
+was already in order; the bed stood there, without mattress or
+pillows. There was nothing on the dressing table, either.
+
+Where were the keys? Where was the box? The box was standing as
+before, untouched, locked. His heart at once felt lighter. But the
+keys? No doubt the police would come in a few minutes. It was
+astonishing that they had not come already. They would seal
+everything. Everything must be in order. Where was Yakov? Probably he
+had taken them. Or ... the general's wife?
+
+Polesski rushed to look for the manservant, but could not find him.
+There was so much to do; he had gone to buy something, to order
+something. "Oh Lord! And the announcement?" he suddenly remembered. It
+must be written at once, and sent to the newspapers. He must ask the
+general's wife, however, what words he should use. However much he
+might wish to avoid her, still she was now the most important person.
+And he could ask at the same time whether she had seen the keys.
+
+The doctor went to the rooms of the general's wife. She was lying
+down, suffering severely, but she came out to him. "What words was he
+to use? It was all the same to her. 'With deep regret,' 'with
+heartfelt sorrow,' what did she care? The keys? What keys? No! she had
+not seen any keys, and did not know where they were. But why should he
+be disturbed about them? The servants were trustworthy; nothing would
+go astray."
+
+"Yes, but we must have them ready for the police. They will come in a
+few minutes, to seal up the dead man's papers!"
+
+"To seal up the papers? Why?"
+
+"That is the law. So that everything should be intact, until after the
+last will and testament of the deceased has been read, according to
+his wishes."
+
+General Nazimoff's wife paled perceptibly. She knew nothing of such an
+obstacle, and had not expected it. The doctor was too busy to notice
+her pallor.
+
+"Very well; I shall write the announcement at once, and send it to the
+newspapers. I suppose 'Novoe Vremya' and 'Novosti' will be enough?"
+
+"Do as you think best. Write it here, in my room. Here is everything
+you require; pens, paper. Write, and then read it to me. I shall be
+back in a moment. I want to put a bandage round my head. It aches so.
+Wait for me here." And the general's wife went from the sitting-room
+to her bedroom.
+
+"Rita!" she whispered to her faithful maid, who was hurriedly sewing a
+mourning gown of crape for her. "Do not let the doctor go till I
+return. Do you understand? Do what you please, but do not let him go."
+The general's wife slipped from the bedroom into the passage through a
+small side door, and disappeared.
+
+The two rooms between hers and the chamber where the dead man lay were
+quite empty and nearly dark; there were no candles in them. From the
+chamber came the feeble glimmer of the tiny lamps burning before the
+icons.[Sacred images.] The tapers were not lit yet, as the deacon had
+not yet arrived. He was to come at the same time as the priest and the
+coffin. For the moment there was no one near the dead man; in the
+anteroom sat the Sister of Mercy.
+
+"You wish to pray?" she asked the general's wife.
+
+"Yes, I shall pray there, in his room."
+
+She slipped past the dead body without looking at it, to the room that
+had been the general's bedroom, and closed the door behind her. She
+was afraid to lock it, and after all, was it necessary? It would only
+take a moment. There it is, the box! She knows it of old! And she
+knows its key of old, too; it is not so long since her husband had no
+secrets from her.
+
+The key was quickly slipped into the lock, and the lid rose quickly.
+The paper? That new, detestable paper, which might deprive her of
+everything. Ah! there it is!
+
+To close the lid quickly, and turn the key in the lock; to hide the
+keys somewhere; here, between the seat and the back of the sofa, on
+which he lay. That's it!
+
+A sigh of relief from fear escaped the beautiful lips of the handsome
+woman, lips which were pale through those terrible days. She could
+feel secure at last!
+
+She must look at the document, the proof of his cruelty, his
+injustice, his stupidity! She must make sure that there was no
+mistake! Olga Vseslavovna went up to the window, and taking advantage
+of the last ray of the gray day, unfolded the will.
+
+"In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit!" she read.
+Yes, that is it, the will.
+
+"How he pronounced those same words, when he was blessing little
+Olga," she remembered. "Blessing her! And his hand did not tremble,
+when he signed this. To deprive her, to deprive them both, of
+everything, all on account of those hated people? But now--it should
+never be! On no account! Your down-at-the-heel pedagogue shall not
+strut about in peacock's feathers! Olga and I ... require the money
+more!"
+
+And the general's wife was tempted to snap her fingers in triumph in
+the direction of the dead man.
+
+Suddenly, quite close to the door, the sound of steps was heard. Good
+heavens! And she held the big sheet of crested paper in her hand!
+Where could she put it? She had no time to think of folding it up.
+There! they are coming in already! Who can it be?
+
+And the will lay on the floor, the general's wife kneeling on it, as
+on a prayer carpet, in an attitude of prayer, her clasped hands on the
+window sill, her wet eyes fixed on a faintly twinkling star, as though
+calling heaven to witness her inconsolable grief and bereavement.
+
+It was only the Sister of Mercy.
+
+"Madam, the people have come, bringing the coffin; and I think the
+police have also come."
+
+"Yes, in a moment. Tell them I am coming immediately."
+
+The Sister of Mercy went out.
+
+"See how she loved her husband. And why was he so unjust to her at the
+last?" she involuntarily reproached the dead general.
+
+Meanwhile the general's wife had risen hastily, folded the will as
+best she could, in four, in eight folds, and crushing it together in
+her hand, went quietly from the room, which now filled her with dread.
+
+She was so confused that she did not even think of looking for her
+pocket; she simply held her packet tight, and let her hand hang down,
+hiding it in the folds of her wide dressing-gown. There seemed to be
+so many people in the room which a moment before was empty, that she
+felt cowed. Her heart beat pitilessly, and the blood throbbed so
+violently in her temples that she could not understand what was said
+to her. They were asking her if they might place the body in the
+coffin, which had already been placed beside it. Her silence was taken
+as consent. The skilful undertakers easily lifted the already rigid
+body.
+
+Olga Vseslavovna stood at the head of the dead general. Among the
+crowd of undertakers and servants, she suddenly saw coming toward her,
+with outstretched hand, and with tears of compassion in her eyes, the
+Princess Ryadski, the same aristocratic kinswoman who had already
+taken little Olga to stay with her.
+
+"I must shake hands with her! And that horrible packet is in my hand!
+Where shall I put it? How can I hide it?" Before her eyes gleamed the
+brilliantly lighted, ashen forehead of the dead man, helplessly bent
+backward and sideways, as the whole body was suspended in the hands of
+the undertakers, over its last abode.
+
+A saving thought!
+
+The general's wife bent gently over the dead body. She gently
+supported the head of the corpse, gently laid it on the satin cushion,
+straightened the frills which surrounded the hard pillow, and,
+unperceived, left under it the twisted roll of paper.
+
+"It will be safer there!" The thought flashed through her mind. "He
+wanted to keep his will himself; well, keep it to eternity, now! What
+more can you ask?"
+
+And it even seemed ludicrous to her. She could hardly restrain a smile
+of triumph, changing it into a sad smile of grief, in reply to her
+kinswoman's condolences. The coffin was already lying in state on the
+bier; it was covered with brocade and flowers. The princess, as
+kinswoman of the late general, bent low, and first laid on the dead
+body the wreath she had brought with her.
+
+"The poor sufferer has entered into rest," she whispered, shaking her
+head. "Will the funeral service be soon? Where will it be? Where is
+Olga Vseslavovna?"
+
+"She will be here in a moment," the Sister of Mercy whispered, deeply
+affected; "she has gone to fix herself. They will begin the funeral
+service in a few minutes, and she is all in disorder. She is in great
+grief. Will you not take a seat?"
+
+"What? Sit down? Thank you," loftily replied the princess. And she
+went toward a dignified personage who was entering, adorned with many
+orders and an aristocratic beard.
+
+The general's wife soon came to herself. "Rita! I must wash and dress
+as quickly as possible. Ah! pray forgive me, doctor! They called me
+away to my husband. They were placing him in the coffin." She sighed
+deeply. "What is this? Oh, yes, the announcement of his death. Very
+good. Send it, please. But I must dress at once. The funeral service
+will begin immediately."
+
+"Doctor! Is the doctor here?" an anxious voice sounded in the
+corridor.
+
+"I am coming! What is it?"
+
+"Please come quick, Edouard Vicentevitch!" Yakov called him. "The lady
+is very ill downstairs; Anna Iurievna, the general's daughter! I was
+out to order the flowers; I come back, and see the lady lying in a
+faint in the entrance. She had just arrived, and asked; and they
+answered her that he was dead, without the slightest preparation! And
+she could not bear it, and fainted."
+
+Yakov said all this as they went.
+
+"Actress!" angrily thought Olga Vseslavovna. And immediately she added
+mentally, "Well, she may stand on her head now, it is all the same to
+me!"
+
+
+IV
+
+Whether it was all the same to her or not, the deep despair of the
+daughter, who had not been in time to bid her father farewell, had not
+been in time to receive his blessing, after many years of anger, which
+had borne heavily on the head of the blameless young woman, was so
+evidently sincere, and produced such a deep impression on everyone,
+that her stepmother also was moved.
+
+Anna Iurievna resembled her father, as much as a young, graceful,
+pretty woman can resemble an elderly man with strongly-marked features
+and athletic frame, such as was General Nazimoff. But in spite of the
+delicacy of her form, and the gentleness of her eyes, her glance
+sometimes flashed fire in a manner very like the flashing eyes of her
+father, and in her strong will, firm character, and inflexible
+adherence to what she believed to be necessary and right, Anna was
+exactly like her father.
+
+For nearly ten years his daughter had obediently borne his anger; from
+the day of her marriage to the man she loved, whom evil-minded people
+had succeeded in calumniating in the general's mind. Though writing
+incessantly to him, begging him to pardon her, to understand that he
+had made a mistake, that her husband was a man of honor, and that she
+would be fully and perfectly happy, but for the burden of her father's
+wrath, and of the separation from him, she had never until the last
+few weeks received a reply from him. But quite recently something
+mysterious had happened. Not only had her father written to her that
+he wished to see her and her children in St. Petersburg, whither he
+was just setting out, but a few days later he had written again, a
+long, tender letter, in which he had asked her forgiveness. Without
+giving any explanations, he said that he had received indubitable
+proofs of the innocence and chivalrous honor of her husband; that he
+felt himself deeply guilty toward him, and was miserable on account of
+the injustice he had committed. In the following letters, praying his
+daughter to hasten her coming, because he was dangerously ill, and the
+doctors thought could not last long, he filled her with astonishment
+by expressing his intention to make a new will, and his determination
+to separate his youngest daughter "from such a mother," and by his
+prayers to her and her husband not to refuse to take upon themselves
+little Olga's education.
+
+"What had happened? How could that light-minded woman have so deeply
+wounded my father?" Anna asked in bewilderment.
+
+"If she was merely light-minded!" her husband answered, shrugging his
+shoulders. "But she is so malicious, so crafty, and so daring that
+anything may be expected from her."
+
+"But in that case there would be an open scandal. We would know
+something for certain. Nowadays they even relate such stories in the
+newspapers, and my father is so well known, so noteworthy!"
+
+"That is just why they don't write about him!" answered Borisoff, her
+husband, smiling. He himself flatly refused to go to St. Petersburg.
+With horror he remembered the first year of his marriage, before he
+had succeeded in obtaining a transfer to another city, and was
+compelled to meet the woman he detested; compelled also to meet his
+father-in-law, a wise and honorable old man, who had fallen so
+completely into the toils of this crafty woman. Anna Iurievna knew
+that her husband despised her stepmother; that he detested her as the
+cause of all the grief which they had had to endure through her, and
+most of all, on account of the injustice she was guilty of toward her
+brother, the general's son.
+
+For six years Borisoff had lived with young Peter Nazimoff, as his
+tutor and teacher, and loved him sincerely. The boy had already
+reached the highest class at school, when his sister, two years older
+than he, finished her schooling, and returned to her father's house,
+about the time of the general's second marriage. What the young tutor
+tried not to notice and to endure, for love of his pupil, in the first
+year of the general's second marriage, became intolerable when the
+general's daughter returned home, and to all the burden of his
+difficult position was added the knowledge of their mutual love. He
+proceeded frankly, and the whole matter was soon settled. But the
+young man had never uttered a syllable as to the cause of Madame
+Nazimoff's hatred for him. For the sake of his father-in-law's peace
+of mind, he sincerely hoped that he would never know. Anna was
+convinced that the whole cause of her step-mother's hostility was her
+prejudice against what was in her opinion a _mesalliance_. In part she
+was right, but the chief reason of this hostility remained forever a
+secret to her. Unfortunately, it was not equally a secret to her
+father.
+
+Of late years he had gradually been losing faith in his second wife's
+character. It went so far that the general felt much more at ease when
+she was away. Before the last illness of Iuri Pavlovitch, which, to
+tell the truth, was almost his first, Olga Vseslavovna had gone abroad
+with her daughter, intending to travel for a year; but she had hardly
+been gone two months when the general unexpectedly determined to go to
+St. Petersburg to seek a divorce, to see his elder daughter, and
+change his will. Perhaps he would never have determined on such
+decisive measures had not something wholly unexpected taken place.
+
+Borisoff was quite mistaken in thinking that he had so carefully
+destroyed all the letters which the general's young wife had written
+to him, before his marriage to Anna, that no material evidence of Olga
+Vseslavovna's early design of treachery remained. Even before she
+married the general, she had had a confidential servant, who carried
+out many commissions for the beautiful young woman, whose fame had
+gone abroad through the three districts along the Volga, the arena of
+her early triumphs. Later, the young lady found a new favorite in
+foreign lands--the same Rita who was still with her. Martha, the
+Russian confidential servant, heartily detested the German girl, and
+such strife arose between them that not only the general's wife, but
+even the general himself, was deprived of peace and tranquillity.
+Martha was no fool; Olga Vseslavovna had to be careful with her; she
+did take care, but she herself did not know to what an extent she was
+in the woman's power. Foreseeing a black day of ingratitude, Martha,
+with wonderful forethought, had put on one side one or two letters
+from each series of her mistress' secret correspondence, which always
+passed through her hands. Perhaps she would not have made such a bad
+use of them but for her mistress' last, intolerable insult. Prizing in
+her servants, next to swift obedience, a knowledge of languages, her
+mistress did not make use of her when travelling abroad; but hitherto
+she had taken both servants with her. But on her last journey she was
+so heartily tired of Martha, and her perpetual tears and quarrels,
+that she determined to get on without her, the more so that her
+daughter's governess was also traveling with her. Her company was
+growing too numerous.
+
+There was no limit to Martha's wrath when she learned that she was
+going to be left behind. Her effrontery was so great that she advised
+her mistress "for her own sake" not to put such an affront upon her,
+since she would not submit to it without seeking revenge. But her
+mistress never dreamed of what Martha was planning, and what a risk
+she ran.
+
+Hardly had the general's wife departed when Martha asked the general
+to let her leave, saying she would find work elsewhere. The general
+saw no way of keeping her; and he did not even wish to do so, thinking
+her only a quarrelsome, ill-tempered woman. The confidential servant
+left the house, and even the city. And immediately her revenge and
+torture of the general began, cutting straight at the root of his
+happiness, his health, even his life. He began to receive, almost
+daily, letters from different parts of Russia, for Martha had plenty
+of friends and chums. With measureless cruelty Martha began by sending
+the less important documents, still signed with her mistress' maiden
+name; then two or three letters from the series of the most recent
+times, and finally there came a whole packet of those sent by the
+general's wife to the tutor, in the first year of her marriage with
+the general, before Borisoff had met Anna.
+
+The crafty Martha, knowing perfectly the whole state of affairs to
+which these letters referred, often copied out their contents, and
+kept the letters themselves concealed, saying to herself, "God knows
+what may turn up, some day!
+
+"If they are no use, I can burn them. But they may be useful. It is
+always a good thing to keep our masters in our power," argued the
+sagacious woman, and she was not mistaken in her calculations,
+although these letters served not for her profit, but only for a
+sanguinary revenge.
+
+These notes and letters, which finally opened his eyes to the true
+character of his wife, and his own crying injustice to his elder
+children, were now lying in the general's dispatch box, in a neatly
+tied packet, directed in the doctor's handwriting to "Her Excellency
+Olga Vseslavovna Nazimoff."
+
+As soon as she received her father's first letter Anna began to get
+ready to go to St. Petersburg, but unfortunately she was kept back by
+the sickness, first of one child, then of another. But for his last
+telegrams, she would not have started even now, because she did not
+realize the dangerous character of his illness. But now, finding that
+she had come too late, the unhappy woman could not forgive herself.
+
+Everyone was grieved to see her bitter sorrow, after the funeral
+service for her father. Princess Ryadski burst into tears, as she
+looked at her; and all the acquaintances and relations of the general
+were far more disturbed by her despair than by the general's death.
+Olga Vseslavovna was secretly scandalized at such lack of
+self-control, but outwardly she seemed greatly touched and troubled by
+the situation of her poor stepdaughter. But she did not venture to
+express her sympathy too openly in the presence of others, remembering
+the words of "the crazy creature" when she had come to herself after
+her fainting fit, and her stepmother had hurried up to embrace her.
+
+"Leave me!" Anna had cried, when she saw her. "I cannot bear to see
+you! You killed my father!"
+
+It was well that there were only servants in the ante-room. But the
+general's wife did not wish to risk another such scene, now that so
+many people were present. And besides she was extremely disturbed; the
+friends who had come to the funeral service had brought flowers; and
+the half-crazy princess, with the aid of two other ladies, had taken a
+fancy to decorate the coffin, and especially the head, with them. It
+is impossible to describe what Olga Vseslavovna suffered, as she
+watched all those hands moving about among the folds of the muslin,
+the frills, the covering, almost under the satin cushion even; a
+little more and she would have fainted in earnest.
+
+She had always boasted that she had strong nerves, and this was quite
+true; nevertheless, during these days, their strength was evidently
+giving way, as she could not get to sleep for a long time that night,
+and heaven only knows what fancies passed through her mind. It was
+almost morning before Olga Vseslavovna got to sleep, and even then it
+was not for long.
+
+She dreamed that she was descending endless stairs and dark corridors,
+with a heavy, shapeless burden on her shoulders. A bright,
+constantly-changing flame flickered before her; now red, now yellow,
+now green, it flitted before her from side to side. She knew that if
+she could reach it, the burden would fall from her. But the light
+seemed to be taunting her, now appearing, now disappearing, and
+suddenly going out altogether. And she found herself in the darkness,
+in a damp cellar, seemingly empty, but filled with something's
+invisible presence. What was it? She did not know. But this pervading
+something frightened her terribly, smothered her, pressing on her from
+all sides, depriving her of air. She was choking! Terror seized her at
+the thought that it ... was Death! Must she die? Was it possible? But
+that brightly shining light had just promised her life, gayety,
+brilliance! She must hurry to overtake it. And she tried to run. But
+her feet would not obey her; she could not move.
+
+"Heaven! Heaven!" she cried, "but what is it? Whence has such a
+disaster come? What is holding me? Let me go, or I shall be smothered
+in this stench, under this intolerable burden!"
+
+Suddenly Iuri Pavlovitch walked past her. She immediately recognized
+him, and joyfully caught at his cloak. "Iuri! Forgive me! Help me!"
+she cried.
+
+Her husband stopped, looked sadly at her, and answered: "I would
+gladly help you, but you yourself hinder me. Let me go; I must fulfill
+your directions."
+
+At that moment she awoke. She was bathed in a cold perspiration, and
+clutched wildly at the coverlet with both hands. There was no one near
+her, but she clearly felt someone's presence, and was convinced that
+she had really seen her husband a moment before. In her ears resounded
+his words: "I must fulfill your directions!" Directions? What
+directions?
+
+She sprang up, and began to feel about over the carpet with her bare
+feet, looking for her slippers. A terrible thought had come into her
+mind. She felt that she must settle it at once. She must take the
+will, take it away from there! burn it! destroy it! She feverishly
+drew on her dressing gown, and threw a shawl over her shoulders.
+
+"Rita! Get up quick! Quick! Come!"
+
+The frightened maid rose, still half asleep, and rubbed her eyes,
+understanding nothing. Her mistress' ice-cold hands clutched her, and
+dragged her somewhere.
+
+"Ach lieber Gott ... Gott in Himmel!" she muttered. "What has
+happened? What do you want?"
+
+"Hush! Come quick!" And Olga Vseslavovna, with a candle in her
+trembling hand, went forward, dragging the trembling Rita with her.
+She opened the door of her bedroom, and went out. All the doors were
+open _en suite_, and straight in front of her, in the center of the
+fourth, shone the coffin of her husband, covered with cloth of gold
+and lit up by the tall tapers standing round the bier.
+
+"What does it mean?" whispered the general's wife. "Why have they
+opened all the doors?"
+
+"I do not know ... they were all closed last night," murmured the maid
+in reply, her teeth chattering with fear. She longed to ask her
+mistress whither they were going, and what for? She wanted to stop,
+and not enter the funeral chamber; but she was afraid to speak.
+
+They passed quickly through the rooms; at the door of the last the
+general's wife set her candle down on a chair, and halted for a
+moment. The loud snoring of the reader startled them both.
+
+"It is the deacon!" whispered the general's wife reassuringly. Rita
+had hardly strength to nod assent. All the same, the healthy snoring
+of a living man comforted her. Without moving from where she stood,
+the maid tremblingly drew her woolen shawl closer about her, trying to
+see the sofa on which the deacon lay.
+
+Knitting her brows, and biting her lips till they were sore, Olga
+Vseslavovna went forward determinedly to the bier. She thrust both
+hands under the flowers on the pillow. The frill was untouched. The
+satin of the cushion was there, but where was ...? Her heart, that had
+been beating like a hammer, suddenly stopped and stood still. There
+was not a trace of the will!
+
+"Perhaps I have forgotten. Perhaps it was on the other side," thought
+Olga Vseslavovna, and went round to the left side of the coffin.
+
+No! It was not there, either! Where was it? Who could have taken it?
+Suddenly her heart failed her utterly, and she clutched at the edge of
+the coffin to keep herself from falling. It seemed to her that under
+the stiff, pallid, rigidly clasped hands of the dead general something
+gleamed white through the transparent muslin of the covering,
+something like a piece of paper.
+
+"Nonsense! Self-suggestion! It is impossible! Hallucination!" The
+thought flashed through her tortured brain. She forced herself to be
+calm, and to look again.
+
+Yes! She had not been mistaken. The white corner of a folded paper
+appeared clearly against the general's dark uniform. At the same
+moment a cold draught coming from somewhere set the tapers flickering.
+Shadows danced around the room, over the bier, across the dead man's
+face; and in the quick change of light and shadow it seemed to her
+that the rigid features became more living, that a mournful smile
+formed itself on the closed lips, that the tightly-shut eyelids
+quivered. A wild cry rang through the whole room. With a desperate
+shriek: "His eyes! He is looking at me!" the general's wife staggered
+forward and fell fainting to the floor, beside her husband's bier.
+
+
+V
+
+The deacon sprang from his sofa with a cry, and an answering cry came
+from the lips of the shivering Rita, as she fled from the room.
+Servants rushed in, rubbing their eyes, still half-asleep, questioning
+each other, running this way and that. The deacon, spurred by a
+feeling of guilt, was determined to conceal the fact that he was
+sleeping. "It was the lady!" he said. "She came in to pray; she told
+me to stop reading while she prayed. She knelt down. Then she prayed
+for a long time, and suddenly ... suddenly she cried out, and fainted.
+Grief, brothers! It is terrible! To lose such a husband!" and he set
+them to work with restoratives, himself rubbing the fallen woman's
+chilly hands.
+
+The general's wife opened her eyes after a few minutes.
+
+Looking wildly round in bewilderment, she seemed to be wondering where
+she was and how she had come there. Suddenly she remembered.
+
+"The will! In his hands! Take it!" she cried, and fainted again. By
+this time the whole household was awake. Anna Iurievna had come in,
+full of astonishment at the sudden disturbance, but with the same
+feeling of deep quiet and peace still filling her heart and giving her
+features an expression of joy and calm. She heard the cry of the
+general's wife, and the words were recorded in her mind, though she
+did not at first give them any meaning.
+
+She set herself, with all the tenderness of a good woman, to minister
+to the other's need, sending her own maid for sal volatile, chafing
+the fainting woman's hands, and giving orders that a bed should be
+prepared for her in another room, further away from the bier. As she
+spoke, quietly, gravely, with authority, the turmoil gradually
+subsided. The frightened servants recovered themselves, and moved
+about with the orderly obedience they ordinarily showed; and the
+deacon, above all anxious to cover his negligence, began intoning the
+liturgy, lending an atmosphere of solemnity to the whole room.
+
+The servants, returning to announce that the bedroom was ready, were
+ordered by Anna Iurievna to lift the fainting woman with all care and
+gentleness, and she herself went with them to see the general's wife
+safely bestowed in her room, and waited while the doctor did all in
+his power to make her more comfortable. Olga Vseslavovna did not at
+once recover consciousness. She seemed to pass from a faint into an
+uneasy slumber, which, however, gradually became more quiet.
+
+Only then, as she was leaving the room, did Anna Iurievna bethink her
+of the strange words that had fallen on her ears: "The will! In his
+hands! Take it!" And repeating them questioningly to herself, she
+walked slowly back toward the room in which lay her father's body.
+
+But she was even more occupied with her own thoughts. She no longer
+felt in her heart the bitter resentment toward Olga Vseslavovna that
+had filled it yesterday. She was conscious of a feeling of sorrow for
+the helpless woman, of compassion for her empty, shallow life, the
+fruit of an empty, shallow heart. And she was wondering why such
+empty, joyless lives should exist in a world where there was such deep
+happiness and joy.
+
+She came over to her father's coffin, close to which the deacon was
+still droning out his liturgy, and stood beside the dead body, looking
+down at the strong, quiet face, and vividly recalling her dream of the
+night before. Her eyes rested on the many stars and medals on his
+breast, and on his hands, quietly clasped in death. Then suddenly, and
+quite mechanically, Olga Vseslavovna's cry, as she returned to
+consciousness, came back into her mind:
+
+"The will! In his hands! Take it!" And bending down, she noted for the
+first time something white beneath the muslin canopy. As she
+scrutinized it wonderingly, she was conscious of an humble, apologetic
+voice murmuring something at her elbow:
+
+"Forgive me, Anna Iurievna. I humbly beg you, forgive me! It was I ...
+in the night ... the flowers fell .... I was putting them back ...
+fixing the head of your sainted papa .... It was under his head, the
+paper ... I thought he wanted to keep it .... I put it in his hands,
+to be safe! ... Forgive me, Anna Iurievna, if I have done any harm."
+
+It was the deacon, still oppressed by a feeling of guilt. Anna.
+Iurievna turned to him, and then turned back again, to her father's
+body, to the white object shining under the muslin canopy. And once
+more Olga Vseslavovna's words came into her mind:
+
+"The will! In his hands! Take it!"
+
+Gently raising the canopy, she softly drew the paper from beneath the
+general's clasped hands, and unfolded it. She read no more than the
+opening words, but she had read enough to realize that it was, indeed,
+her father's will.
+
+
+
+FEODOR MIKHAILOVITCH DOSTOYEVSKY
+
+
+_CRIME AND PUNISHMENT_[1]
+
+
+One sultry evening early in July a young man emerged from the small
+furnished lodging he occupied in a large five-storied house in the
+Pereoulok S----, and turned slowly, with an air of indecision, toward
+the K----bridge. He was fortunate enough not to meet his landlady on
+the stairs. She occupied the floor beneath him, and her kitchen, with
+its usually open door, was entered from the staircase. Thus, whenever
+the young man went out, he found himself obliged to pass under the
+enemy's fire, which always produced a morbid terror, humiliating him
+and making him knit his brows. He owed her some money and felt afraid
+of encountering her.
+
+It was not that he had been terrified or crushed by misfortune, but
+that for some time past he had fallen into a state of nervous
+depression akin to hypochondria. He had withdrawn from society and
+shut himself up, till he was ready to shun, not merely his landlady,
+but every human face. Poverty had once weighed him down, though, of
+late, he had lost his sensitiveness on that score. He had given up all
+his daily occupations. In his heart of hearts he laughed scornfully at
+his landlady and the extremities to which she might proceed. Still, to
+be waylaid on the stairs, to have to listen to all her jargon, hear
+her demands, threats, and complaints, and have to make excuses and
+subterfuges in return--no, he preferred to steal down without
+attracting notice. On this occasion, however, when he had gained the
+street, he felt surprised himself at this dread of meeting the woman
+to whom he was in debt.
+
+"Why should I be alarmed by these trifles when I am contemplating such
+a desperate deed?" thought he, and he gave a strange smile. "Ah, well,
+man holds the remedy in his own hands, and lets everything go its own
+way, simply through cowardice--that is an axiom. I should like to know
+what people fear most:--whatever is contrary to their usual habits, I
+imagine. But I am talking too much. I talk and so I do nothing, though
+I might just as well say, I do nothing and so I talk. I have acquired
+this habit of chattering during the last month, while I have been
+lying for days together in a corner, feeding my mind on trifles. Come,
+why am I taking this walk now? Am I capable of _that_? Can _that_
+really be serious? Not in the least. These are mere chimeras, idle
+fancies that flit across my brain!"
+
+The heat in the streets was stifling. The crowd, the sight of lime,
+bricks, scaffolding, and the peculiar odor so familiar to the nostrils
+of the inhabitant of St. Petersburg who has no means of escaping to
+the country for the summer, all contributed to irritate the young
+man's already excited nerves. The reeking fumes of the dram shops, so
+numerous in this part of the city, and the tipsy men to be seen at
+every point, although it was no holiday, completed the repulsive
+character of the scene. Our hero's refined features betrayed, for a
+moment, an expression of bitter disgust. We may observe casually that
+he was not destitute of personal attractions; he was above middle
+height, with a slender and well-proportioned figure, and he had dark
+auburn hair and fine dark eyes. In a little while he sank into a deep
+reverie, or rather into a sort of mental torpor. He walked on without
+noticing, or trying to notice, his surroundings. Occasionally he
+muttered a few words to himself; as if, as he himself had just
+perceived, this had become his habit. At this moment it dawned upon
+him that his ideas were becoming confused and that he was very feeble;
+he had eaten nothing worth mentioning for the last two days.
+
+His dress was so miserable that anyone else might have scrupled to go
+out in such rags during the daytime. This quarter of the city, indeed,
+was not particular as to dress. In the neighborhood of the Cyennaza or
+Haymarket, in those streets in the heart of St. Petersburg, occupied
+by the artisan classes, no vagaries in costume call forth the least
+surprise. Besides the young man's fierce disdain had reached such a
+pitch, that, notwithstanding his extreme sensitiveness, he felt no
+shame at exhibiting his tattered garments in the street. He would have
+felt differently had he come across anyone he knew, any of the old
+friends whom he usually avoided. Yet he stopped short on hearing the
+attention of passers-by directed to him by the thick voice of a tipsy
+man shouting: "Eh, look at the German hatter!" The exclamation came
+from an individual who, for some unknown reason, was being jolted away
+in a great wagon. The young man snatched off his hat and began to
+examine it. It was a high-crowned hat that had been originally bought
+at Zimmermann's, but had become worn and rusty, was covered with dents
+and stains, slit and short of a brim, a frightful object in short. Yet
+its owner, far from feeling his vanity wounded, was suffering rather
+from anxiety than humiliation.
+
+"I suspected this," muttered he, uneasily, "I foresaw it. That's the
+worst of it! Some wretched trifle like this might spoil it all. Yes,
+this hat is certainly too remarkable; it looks so ridiculous. I must
+get a cap to suit my rags; any old thing would be better than this
+horror. Hats like these are not worn; this one would be noticeable a
+_verst_[2] off; it would be remembered; people would think of it again
+some time after, and it might furnish a clew. I must attract as little
+attention as possible just now. Trifles become important, everything
+hinges on them."
+
+He had not far to go; he knew the exact distance between his lodging
+and present destination--just seven hundred and thirty paces. He had
+counted them when his plan only floated through his brain like a vague
+dream. At that time, he himself would not have believed it capable of
+realization; he merely dallied in fancy with a chimera which was both
+terrible and seductive. But a month had elapsed, and he had already
+begun to view it in a different light. Although he reproached himself
+throughout his soliloquies with irresolution and a want of energy, he
+had accustomed himself, little by little, and, indeed, in spite of
+himself, to consider the realization of his dream a possibility,
+though he doubted his own resolution. He was but just now rehearsing
+his enterprise, and his agitation was increasing at every step.
+
+His heart sank, and his limbs trembled nervously, as he came to an
+immense pile of building facing the canal on one side and the street
+on the other. This block was divided into a host of small tenements,
+tenanted by all sorts of trades. People were swarming in and out
+through the two doors. There were three or four _dvorniks_[3]
+belonging to the house, but the young man, to his great satisfaction,
+came across none of them, and, escaping notice as he entered, mounted
+at once the stairs on the right hand. He had already made acquaintance
+with this dark and narrow staircase, and its obscurity was grateful to
+him; it was gloomy enough to hide him from prying eyes. "If I feel so
+timid now, what will it be when I come to put my plan into execution?"
+thought he, as he reached the fourth floor. Here he found the passage
+blocked; some military porters were removing the furniture from a
+tenement recently occupied, as the young man knew, by a German
+official and his family. "Thanks to the departure of this German, for
+some time to come there will be no one on this landing but the old
+woman. It is as well to know this, at any rate," thought he to
+himself, as he rang the old woman's bell. It gave a faint sound, as if
+it were made of tin instead of copper. In houses of this sort, the
+smaller lodgings generally have such bells.
+
+He had forgotten this; the peculiar tinkling sound seemed to recall
+something to his memory, for he gave a shiver--his nerves were very
+weak. In another moment the door was opened part way, and the occupant
+of the rooms stood examining her visitor through the opening with
+evident suspicion, her small eyes glimmering through the darkness like
+luminous points. But when she saw the people on the landing, she
+seemed reassured, and flung the door open. The young man entered a
+gloomy ante-chamber, divided by a partition, behind which was a small
+kitchen. The old woman stood silently in front of him, eying him
+keenly. She was a thin little creature of sixty, with a small sharp
+nose, and eyes sparkling with malice. Her head was uncovered, and her
+grizzled locks shone with grease. A strip of flannel was wound round
+her long thin neck, and, in spite of the heat, she wore a shabby
+yellow fur tippet on her shoulders. She coughed incessantly. The young
+man was probably eying her strangely, for the look of mistrust
+suddenly reappeared on her face.
+
+"The Student Raskolnikoff. I called on you a month ago," said the
+visitor, hurriedly, with a slight bow. He had suddenly remembered that
+he must make himself more agreeable.
+
+"I remember, _batuchka_, I remember it well," returned the old woman,
+still fixing her eyes on him suspiciously.
+
+"Well, then, look here. I have come again on a similar errand,"
+continued Raskolnikoff, somewhat surprised and uneasy at being
+received with so much distrust. "After all, this may be her usual
+manner, though I did not notice it before," thought he, unpleasantly
+impressed.
+
+The old woman remained silent a while, and seemed to reflect. Then,
+pointing to the door of the inner room, she drew back for her visitor
+to pass, and said, "Come in, _batuchka._"[4]
+
+The small room into which the young man was ushered was papered with
+yellow; there were geraniums and muslin curtains in the windows, and
+the setting sun shed a flood of light on the interior. "The sun will
+shine on it just the same _then_!" said Raskolnikoff all at once to
+himself, as he glanced rapidly round to take in the various objects
+and engrave them on his memory. The room, however, contained nothing
+remarkable. The yellow wood furniture was all very old. A couch with a
+shelving back, opposite which stood an oval table, a toilet-table with
+a pier glass attached, chairs lining the walls, and two or three poor
+prints representing German girls with birds in their hands, completed
+the inventory. A lamp was burning in one corner in front of a small
+image. The floor and furniture were clean and well polished.
+"Elizabeth attends to that," thought the young man. It would have been
+difficult to find a speck of dust on anything. "It is only in the
+houses of these dreadful old widows that such order is to be seen,"
+continued Raskolnikoff to himself, looking with curiosity at the
+chintz curtain overhanging the door which led into a second small
+room, in which he had never set foot; it contained the old woman's bed
+and chest of drawers. The apartment consisted of these two rooms.
+
+"What is it you want?" asked the mistress of the house dryly; she had
+followed her visitor in, and planted herself in front of him to
+examine him more closely.
+
+"I have come to pawn something, that is all!" With this he drew from
+his pocket a flat old silver watch. A globe was engraved inside the
+lid, and the chain was of steel.
+
+"But you have not repaid the sum I lent you before. It was due two
+days ago."
+
+"I will pay you the interest for another month; have a little
+patience."
+
+"I may have patience or I may sell your pledge at once, _batuchka_,
+just whichever I like."
+
+"What will you give me on this watch, Alena Ivanovna?"
+
+"That is a wretched thing, _batuchka_, worth a mere nothing. Last time
+I lent you two small notes on your ring, when I could have bought a
+new one at the jeweler's for a ruble and a half."
+
+"Give me four rubles, and I will redeem it; it belonged to my father.
+I expect some money soon."
+
+"A ruble and a half! and I shall take the interest in advance."
+
+"A ruble and a half!" protested the young man.
+
+"Please yourself whether you take it or not." So saying, the old woman
+tendered back the watch. Her visitor took it and was about to depart
+in vexation, when he reflected that this money lender was his last
+resource--and, besides, he had another object in coming.
+
+"Come, fork out!" said he in a rough tone.
+
+The old woman fumbled in her pockets for her keys, and passed on into
+the adjoining room. The young man, left standing there alone, pricked
+up his ears and began to make various inductions. He heard this female
+usurer open her drawer. "It must be the top one," was his conclusion.
+"I know now that she carries her keys in her right pocket--they are
+all hung on a steel ring--one of them is three times as large as the
+rest, and has the wards toothed; that cannot be the key of her
+drawer--then she must have some strong box or safe. It is curious that
+the keys of strong boxes should be generally like that--but, after
+all, how ignoble!"
+
+The old woman reappeared. "See here, _batuchka_: if I take a
+ten-kopeck piece a month on each ruble, I ought to receive fifteen
+kopecks on a ruble and a half, the interest being payable in advance.
+Then, as you ask me to wait another month for the repayment of the two
+rubles I have already lent you, you owe me twenty kopecks more, which
+makes a total of five and thirty. What, therefore, I have to advance
+upon your watch is one ruble fifteen kopecks. Here it is."
+
+"What! Is one ruble fifteen kopecks all you mean to give me now?"
+
+"That is all that is due to you."
+
+The young man took the money without further discussion. He looked at
+the old woman and was in no haste to depart. He seemed anxious to say
+or do something more, but without knowing exactly what. "Perhaps I may
+be bringing you some other article soon, Alena Ivanovna, a very pretty
+cigar case--a silver one--when I get it back from the friend to whom I
+have lent it." These words were uttered with much embarrassment.
+
+"Well, we can talk about it then, _batuchka_."
+
+"Good-by. You are always alone--is your sister never with you?" asked
+he with as indifferent an air as he could assume, as he entered the
+anteroom.
+
+"What have you to do with my sister, _batuchka_?"
+
+"Nothing. I had no reason for asking. You will--well, good-by, Alena
+Ivanovna."
+
+Raskolnikoff made his exit in a perturbed state of mind. As he went
+downstairs, he stopped from time to time, as if overcome by violent
+emotion. When he had at length emerged upon the street, he exclaimed
+to himself: "How loathsome it all is! Can I, can I ever?--no, it is
+absurd, preposterous!" added he mentally. "How could such a horrible
+idea ever enter my head? Could I ever be capable of such infamy? It is
+odious, ignoble, repulsive! And yet for a whole month----"
+
+Words and exclamations, however, could not give full vent to his
+agitation. The loathing sense of disgust which had begun to oppress
+him on his way to the old woman's house had now become so intense that
+he longed to find some way of escape from the torture. He reeled along
+the pavement like a tipsy man, taking no notice of those who passed,
+but bumping against them. On looking round he saw a dram shop near at
+hand; steps led down from the footpath to the basement, and
+Raskolnikoff saw two drunkards coming out at that moment, leaning
+heavily on each other and exchanging abusive language. The young man
+barely paused before he descended the steps. He had never before
+entered such a place, but he felt dizzy and was also suffering from
+intense thirst. He had a craving for some beer, partly because he
+attributed his weakness to an empty stomach. Seating himself in a dark
+and dirty corner, in front of a filthy little table, he called for
+some beer, and eagerly drank off a glass.
+
+He felt instantly relieved, and his brain began to clear: "How absurd
+I have been!" said he to himself, "there was really nothing to make me
+uneasy! It was simply physical! A glass of beer and a mouthful of
+biscuit were all that was necessary to restore my strength of mind and
+make my thoughts clear and resolution fixed. How paltry all this is!"
+
+The next morning Raskolnikoff awoke late, after disturbed and
+unrefreshing slumbers. He felt very cross and glanced angrily round
+his room. It was a tiny place, not more than six feet in length, and
+its dirty buff paper hung in shreds, giving it a most miserable
+aspect; besides which, the ceiling was so low that a tall man would
+have felt in danger of bumping his head. The furniture was quite in
+harmony with the room, consisting of three old rickety chairs, a
+painted table in one corner, on which lay books and papers thick with
+dust (showing how long it was since they had been touched), and,
+finally, a large and very ugly sofa with ragged covers. This sofa,
+which filled nearly half the room, served Raskolnikoff as a bed. He
+often lay down on it in his clothes, without any sheets, covering
+himself with his old student's coat, and using instead of a pillow a
+little cushion, which he raised by keeping under it all his clean or
+dirty linen. Before the sofa stood a small table.
+
+Raskolnikoff's misanthropy did not take offense at the dirty state of
+his den. Human faces had grown so distasteful to him, that the very
+sight of the servant whose business it was to clean the rooms produced
+a feeling of exasperation.
+
+To such a condition may monomaniacs come by continually brooding over
+one idea. For the last fortnight, the landlady had ceased to supply
+her lodger with provisions, and he had not yet thought of demanding an
+explanation. Nastasia, who had to cook and clean for the whole house,
+was not sorry to see the lodger in this state of mind, as it
+diminished her labors: she had quite given up tidying and dusting his
+room; the utmost she did was to come and sweep it once a week. She it
+was who was arousing him at this moment.
+
+"Come, get up, why are you sleeping so late?" she exclaimed. "It is
+nine o'clock. I have brought up some tea, will you take a cup? How
+pale you look!"
+
+Raskolnikoff opened his eyes, shook himself, and recognized Nastasia.
+"Has the landlady sent me this tea?" asked he, making a painful effort
+to sit up.
+
+"Not much chance of that!" And the servant placed before him her own
+teapot, in which there was still some tea left, and laid two small
+lumps of brownish sugar on the table.
+
+"Here, Nastasia, take this, please," said Raskolnikoff, fumbling in
+his pocket and drawing out a handful of small change (for he had again
+lain down in his clothes), "and fetch me a white roll. Go to the pork
+shop as well, and buy me a bit of cheap sausage."
+
+"I will bring you the roll in a minute, but had you not better take
+some _shtchi_[5] instead of the sausage? We make it here, and it is
+capital. I kept some for you last night, but it was so late before you
+came in! You will find it very good." She went to fetch the _shtchi_,
+and, when Raskolnikoff had begun to eat, she seated herself on the
+sofa beside him and commenced to chatter, like a true country girl as
+she was. "Prascovia Paulovna means to report you to the police," said
+she.
+
+The young man's brow clouded. "To the police? Why?"
+
+"Because you don't pay and won't go. That's why."
+
+"The deuce!" growled he between his teeth, "that is the finishing
+stroke; it comes at a most unfortunate juncture. She is a fool," added
+he aloud. "I shall go and talk to her to-morrow."
+
+"She is, of course, just as much of a fool as I am; but why do you,
+who are so intelligent, lie here doing nothing? How is it you never
+seem to have money for anything now? You used to give lessons, I hear;
+how is it you do nothing now?"
+
+"I am engaged on something," returned Raskolnikoff dryly and half
+reluctantly.
+
+"On what?"
+
+"Some work--"
+
+"What sort of work?"
+
+"Thinking," replied he gravely, after a short silence.
+
+Nastasia was convulsed. She was of a merry disposition, but her
+laughter was always noiseless, an internal convulsion which made her
+actually writhe with pain. "And does your thinking bring you any
+money?" asked she, as soon as she could manage to speak.
+
+"Well! I can't give lessons when I have no boots to go out in?
+Besides, I despise them."
+
+"Take care lest you suffer for it."
+
+"There is so little to be made by giving lessons! What can one do with
+a few kopecks?" said he in an irritable tone, rather to himself than
+the servant.
+
+"So you wish to make your fortune at one stroke?"
+
+He looked at her rather strangely, and was silent for a moment. "Yes,
+my fortune," rejoined he impressively.
+
+"Hush! you frighten me, you look terrible. Shall I go and fetch you a
+roll?"
+
+"Just as you like."
+
+Later in the day, Raskolnikoff went out and wandered about the
+streets. At last he sat down under a tree to rest, and fell into a
+reverie. His limbs felt disjointed, and his mind was in darkness and
+confusion. He placed his elbows on his knees and held his head with
+his hands.
+
+"God! Am I to stand beating in her skull with a hatchet or something,
+wade in warm blood, break open the lock and rob and tremble, blood
+flowing all around, and hide myself, with the hatchet? O God! is this
+indeed possible, and must it be?" He trembled like a leaf as he said
+this.
+
+"What am I thinking of?" he cried in some astonishment. "I know well I
+could not endure that with which I have been torturing myself. I saw
+that clearly yesterday when I tried to rehearse it. Perfectly plain.
+Then what am I questioning? Did I not say yesterday as I went up the
+stairs how disgusting and mean and low it all was, and did not I run
+away in terror?"
+
+He stood up and looked all round, wondering how he got there, and
+moved off toward the T---- bridge. He was pale and his eyes were hot,
+and feebleness was in all his members, but he seemed to breathe
+easier. He felt that he had thrown off the old time which had been so
+oppressive; and in its place had come peace and light. "Lord!" he
+prayed, "show me my way, that I may renounce these horrid thoughts of
+mine!"
+
+Going across the bridge, he quietly gazed on the Neva, and the clear
+red sunset. He did not feel himself tired now, notwithstanding his
+weakness, and the load which had lain upon his heart seemed to be
+gone. Liberty! Liberty! he was free from those enchantments and all
+their vile instigations. In later times when he recalled this period
+of his existence, and all that happened to him in those days, minute
+by minute and point by point, he recollected how each circumstance,
+although in the main not very unusual, constantly appeared to his mind
+as an evidence of the predetermination of his fate, so superstitious
+was he. Especially he could never understand why he, weary and
+harassed as he was, could not have returned home by the shortest
+route, instead of across the Haymarket, which was quite out of the
+way. Certainly, a dozen times before, he had reached his lodgings by
+most circuitous routes, and never known through which streets he had
+come. But why (he always asked) should such a really fateful meeting
+have taken place in the market (through which there was no need to
+go), and happen, too, at exactly such a time and at a moment of his
+life when his mind was in the state it was, and the event, in these
+circumstances, could only produce the most definite and decided effect
+upon his fate? Surely he was the instrument of some purpose!
+
+It was about nine o'clock as he stood in the Haymarket. All the
+dealers had closed their establishments or cleared away their goods
+and gone home. About this place, with its tattered population, its
+dirty and nauseous courtyards and numerous alleys, Raskolnikoff dearly
+loved to roam in his aimless wanderings. He attracted no notice there.
+At the corner of K---- Lane were a dealer and his wife, who were
+engaged in packing up their wares, consisting of tapes, handkerchiefs,
+cotton, &c., preparatory to going home. They were lingering over their
+work, and conversing with an acquaintance. This was Elizabeth
+Ivanovna, or simple Elizabeth, as all called her, the younger sister
+of the old woman, Alena Ivanovna, to whose rooms Raskolnikoff went the
+day before for the purpose of pawning his watch to make his
+_rehearsal_. He knew all about this Elizabeth, as she knew also a
+little about him. She was a tall, awkward woman, about thirty-five
+years of age, timid and quiet, indeed almost an idiot, and was a
+regular slave to her sister, working for her day and night, trembling
+before her and enduring even blows. She was evidently hesitating about
+something, as she stood there with a bundle under her arm, and her
+friends were pressing some subject rather warmly. When Raskolnikoff
+recognized her he seemed struck with the greatest astonishment,
+although there was nothing strange about such a meeting.
+
+"You ought to decide yourself, Elizabeth Ivanovna," said the man.
+"Come to-morrow at seven o'clock."
+
+"To-morrow?" said Elizabeth slowly, as if undecided.
+
+"She is frightened of Alena Ivanovna," cried the wife, a brisk little
+woman. "You are like a little child, Elizabeth Ivanovna, and she's not
+your own sister, but a stepsister. She has too much her own way."
+
+"You say nothing to Alena Ivanovna," interrupted the man, "and come
+without asking, that's the way to do it, and your sister can manage
+herself."
+
+"When shall I come?"
+
+"At seven o'clock, to-morrow."
+
+"Very well, I will come," said Elizabeth, slowly and reluctantly. She
+then quitted them.
+
+Raskolnikoff also went away, and stayed to hear no more. His original
+amazement had changed gradually into a feeling of actual terror; a
+chill ran down his back. He had learned unexpectedly and positively,
+that, at seven o'clock the next evening, Elizabeth, the old woman's
+sister, the only person living with her, would not be at home, and
+that, therefore, the old woman, at seven o'clock to-morrow, _would be
+there alone_. It needed but a few steps to reach his room. He went
+along like one sentenced to death, with his reason clogged and numbed.
+He felt that now all liberty of action and free will were gone, and
+everything was irrevocably decided. A more convenient occasion than
+was thus unexpectedly offered to him now would never arise, and he
+might never learn again, beforehand, that, at a certain time on a
+certain day, she, on whom he was to make the attempt, would be
+entirely alone.
+
+Raskolnikoff learned subsequently what induced the man and his wife to
+invite Elizabeth to call on them. It was a very simple matter. A
+foreign family, finding themselves in straitened circumstances, were
+desirous of parting with various things, consisting for the most part
+in articles of female attire. They were anxious, therefore, to meet
+with a dealer in cast-off clothes, and this was one of Elizabeth's
+callings. She had a large connection, because she was very honest and
+always stuck to her price: there was no higgling to be done with her.
+She was a woman of few words and very shy and reserved. But
+Raskolnikoff was very superstitious, and traces of this remained in
+him long after. In all the events of this period of his life he was
+ever ready to detect something mysterious, and attribute every
+circumstance to the presence of some particular influence upon his
+destiny.
+
+The previous winter, a fellow student, Pokoreff by name, on leaving
+for Charkoff, had happened to communicate to him in conversation the
+address of Alena Ivanovna, in case he should ever require to pawn
+anything. For a long time he did not use it, as he was giving lessons,
+and managed somehow to get along, but six weeks before this time he
+had recollected the address. He had two things fit to pawn--an old
+silver watch, formerly his father's; and a small gold ring with three
+red stones, a souvenir from his sister on leaving home. He decided on
+getting rid of the latter, and went to the old woman's. At the first
+glance, and knowing nothing whatever of her personally, she inspired
+him with an unaccountable loathing. He took her two notes, and on
+leaving went into a poor _traktir_, or restaurant, and ordered some
+tea. He sat down musing, and strange thoughts flitted across his mind
+and became hatched in his brain. Close by, at another table, were
+seated a student, whom he did not knew, and a young officer. They had
+been playing billiards, and were now drinking tea. Suddenly
+Raskolnikoff heard the student give the officer the address of Alena
+Ivanovna, the widow of a professor, as one who lent money on pledges.
+This alone struck Raskolnikoff as very peculiar. They were talking of
+the same person he had just been to see. No doubt it was pure chance,
+but, at the moment he was struggling against an impression he could
+not overcome, this stranger's words came and gave extra force to it.
+The student went on talking, and began to give his companion some
+account of Alena Ivanovna.
+
+"She is well known," he said, "and always good for money. She is as
+rich as a Jew, and can advance five thousand rubles at a moment's
+notice; yet she will take in pledge objects worth as little as a
+ruble. She is quite a providence to many of our fellows--but such an
+old hag! I tell you what I would do. I would kill that damnable old
+hag, and take all she is possessed of, without any qualm of
+conscience," exclaimed the student excitedly. The officer laughed, but
+Raskolnikoff shuddered. The words just uttered so strongly echoed his
+own thoughts. "Let me put a serious question to you," resumed the
+student, more and more excited. "I have hitherto been joking, but now
+listen to this. On the one side here is a silly, flint-hearted,
+evil-minded, sulky old woman, necessary to no one--on the contrary,
+pernicious to all--and who does not know herself why she lives."
+
+"Well?" said the officer.
+
+"Hear me further. On the other hand, young fresh strength droops and
+is lost for want of sustenance; this is the case with thousands
+everywhere! A hundred, a thousand good deeds and enterprises could be
+carried out and upheld with the money this old woman has bequeathed to
+a monastery. A dozen families might be saved from hunger, want, ruin,
+crime, and misery, and all with her money! Kill her, I say, take it
+from her, and dedicate it to the service of humanity and the general
+good! What is your opinion? Shall not one little crime be effaced and
+atoned for by a thousand good deeds? For one useless life a thousand
+lives saved from decay and death. One death, and a hundred beings
+restored to existence! There's a calculation for you. What in
+proportion is the life of this miserable old woman? No more than the
+life of a flea, a beetle, nay, not even that, for she is pernicious.
+She preys on other lives. She lately bit Elizabeth's finger, in a fit
+of passion, and nearly bit it off!"
+
+"Certainly she does not deserve to live," observed the officer, "but
+nature----"
+
+"Ah, my friend, nature has to be governed and guided, or we should be
+drowned in prejudices. Without it there would never be one great man.
+They say 'duty is conscience.' Now I have nothing to say against duty
+and conscience, but let us see, how do we understand them? Let me put
+another question to you. Listen."
+
+"Stop a minute, I will give you one."
+
+"Well?"
+
+"After all you have said and declaimed, tell me--are you going to kill
+the old woman _yourself_, or not?"
+
+"Of course not. I only pointed out the inequality of things. As for
+the deed----"
+
+"Well, if you won't, it's my opinion that it would not be just to do
+so! Come, let's have another game!"
+
+Raskolnikoff was in the greatest agitation. Still, there was nothing
+extraordinary in this conversation; it was not the first time he had
+heard, only in other forms and on other topics, such ideas from the
+lips of the young and hot-headed. But why should he, of all men,
+happen to overhear such a conversation and such ideas, when the very
+same thoughts were being engendered in himself?--and why precisely
+_then_, immediately on his becoming possessed of them and on leaving
+the old woman? Strange, indeed, did this coincidence appear to him.
+This idle conversation was destined to have a fearful influence on his
+destiny, extending to the most trifling incident and causing him to
+feel sure he was the instrument of a fixed purpose.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+On his return from the market, he flung himself upon his couch and sat
+motionless for a whole hour. It became dark, he had no light, but sat
+on. He could never afterwards recollect his thoughts at the time. At
+last he felt cold, and a shiver ran through him. He recognized with
+delight that he was sitting on his couch and could lie down, and soon
+he fell into a deep, heavy sleep. He slept much longer than usual, and
+his slumbers were undisturbed by dreams. Nastasia, who came to his
+room the next morning at ten o'clock, had great difficulty in
+awakening him. The servant brought him some bread and, the same as the
+day before, what was left of her tea.
+
+"Not up yet!" exclaimed she indignantly. "How can you sleep so long?"
+
+Raskolnikoff raised himself with an effort; his head ached; he got
+upon his feet, took a few steps, and then dropped down again upon the
+couch.
+
+"What, again!" cried Nastasia, "but you must be ill then?" He did not
+answer. "Would you like some tea?"
+
+"By and by," he muttered painfully, after which he closed his eyes and
+turned his face to the wall. Nastasia, standing over him, remained
+watching him for a while.
+
+"After all, he's perhaps ill," said she, before withdrawing.
+
+At two o'clock she returned with some soup. Raskolnikoff was still
+lying on the couch. He had not touched the tea. The servant became
+angry and shook the lodger violently. "Whatever makes you sleep thus?"
+scolded she, eying him contemptuously.
+
+He sat up, but answered not a word, and remained with his eyes fixed
+on the floor.
+
+"Are you ill, or are you not?" asked Nastasia. This second question
+met with no more answer than the first. "You should go out," continued
+she, after a pause, "the fresh air would do you good. You'll eat
+something, will you not?"
+
+"By and by," answered he feebly. "Go away!" and he motioned her off.
+She remained a moment longer, watching him with an air of pity, and
+then left the room.
+
+After a few minutes he raised his eyes, gave a long look at the tea
+and soup, and then began to eat. He swallowed three or four spoonfuls
+without the least appetite--almost mechanically. His head felt better.
+When he had finished his light repast, he again lay down on the couch,
+but he could not sleep and remained motionless, flat on his stomach,
+his face buried in the pillow. His reverie kept conjuring up strange
+scenes. At one time he was in Africa, in Egypt, on some oasis, where
+palms were dotted about. The caravans were at rest, the camels lay
+quietly, and the travelers were eating their evening meal. They drank
+water direct from the stream which ran murmuring close by. How
+refreshing was the marvelously blue water, and how beautifully clear
+it looked as it ran over many-colored stones and mingled with the
+golden spangles of the sandy bottom! All at once he clearly heard the
+hour chiming. He shuddered, raised his head, looked at the window to
+calculate the time. He came to himself immediately and jumped up, and,
+going on tiptoe, silently opened the door and stood listening on the
+landing. His heart beat violently. But not a sound came from the
+staircase. It seemed as though the house was wrapped in sleep. He
+could not understand how he had been able to sleep away the time as he
+had done, while nothing was prepared for the enterprise. And yet it
+was, perhaps, six o'clock that had just struck.
+
+Then, he became excited as he felt what there was to be done, and he
+endeavored with all his might to keep his thoughts from wandering and
+concentrate his mind on his task. All the time his heart thumped and
+beat until he could hardly draw breath. In the first place it was
+necessary to make a loop and fasten to his coat. He went to his pillow
+and took from among the linen he kept there an old and dirty shirt and
+tore part of it into strips. He then fastened a couple of these
+together, and, taking off his coat--a stout cotton summer one--began
+to sew the loop inside, under the left arm. His hands shook violently,
+but he accomplished his task satisfactorily, and when he again put on
+his coat nothing was visible. Needle and thread had been procured long
+ago, and lay on the table in a piece of paper. The loop was provided
+for a hatchet. It would never have done to have appeared in the
+streets carrying a hatchet, and if he placed it under the coat, it
+would have been necessary to hold it with his hands; but with the loop
+all he had to do was to put the iron in it and it would hang of itself
+under the coat, and with his hands in his pockets he could keep it
+from shaking, and no one could suspect that he was carrying anything.
+He had thought over all this about a fortnight before.
+
+Having finished his task, Raskolnikoff inserted his finger in a small
+crevice in the floor under his couch, and brought out the _pledge_
+with which he had been careful to provide himself. This pledge was,
+however, only a sham--a thin smooth piece of wood about the size and
+thickness of a silver cigarette case, which he had found in a yard
+adjoining a carpenter's shop, and a thin piece of iron of about the
+same size, which he had picked up in the street. He fastened the two
+together firmly with thread, then proceeded to wrap them up neatly in
+a piece of clean white paper, and tie the parcel in such a manner that
+it would be difficult to undo it again. This was all done in order to
+occupy the attention of the old woman and to seize a favorable
+opportunity when she would be busy with the knot. The piece of iron
+was simply added for weight, in order that she might not immediately
+detect the fraud. He had just finished, and had put the packet in his
+pocket, when in the court below resounded the cry:
+
+"Six o'clock struck long ago!"
+
+"Long ago! Good heavens!"
+
+He ran to the door, listened, seized his hat, and went down the stairs
+cautiously and stealthily as a cat. He still had the most important
+thing to do--to steal the hatchet out of the kitchen. That a hatchet
+was the best instrument, he had long since decided. He had an old
+garden knife, but on a knife--especially on his own strength--he could
+not rely; he finally fixed on the hatchet. A peculiarity was to be
+noticed in all these resolutions of his; the more definitely they were
+settled, the more absurd and horrible they immediately appeared to his
+eyes, and never, for a moment, did he feel sure of the execution of
+his project. But even if every question had been settled, every doubt
+cleared away, every difficulty overcome, he would probably have
+renounced his design on the instant, as something absurd, monstrous,
+and impossible. But there were still a host of matters to arrange, of
+problems to solve. As to procuring the hatchet, this trifle did not
+trouble Raskolnikoff in the least, for nothing was easier. As a matter
+of fact Nastasia was scarcely ever at home, especially of an evening.
+She was constantly out gossiping with friends or tradespeople, and
+that was the reason of her mistress's constant complaints. When the
+time came, all he would have to do would be to quietly enter the
+kitchen and take the hatchet, and then to replace it an hour
+afterwards when all was over. But perhaps this would not be as easy as
+he fancied. "Suppose," said the young man to himself, "that when, in
+an hour's time, I come to replace the hatchet, Nastasia should have
+come in. Now, in that case, I could naturally not enter the kitchen
+until she had gone out again. But supposing during this time she
+notices the absence of the hatchet, she will grumble, perhaps kick up
+a shindy, and that will serve to denounce me, or at least might do
+so!"
+
+Before he had got to the bottom of the staircase, a trifling
+circumstance came and upset all his plans. On reaching his landlady's
+landing, he found the kitchen door wide open, as usual, and he peeped
+in, in order to make sure that, in the absence of Nastasia, her
+mistress was not there, and that the doors of the other rooms were
+closed. But great was his annoyance to find Nastasia there herself,
+engaged in hanging clothes on a line. Perceiving the young man, she
+stopped and turned to him inquiringly. He averted his eyes and went
+away without remark. But the affair was done for. There was no
+hatchet, he was frustrated entirely. He felt crushed, nay, humiliated,
+but a feeling of brutal vindictiveness at his disappointment soon
+ensued, and he continued down the stairs, smiling maliciously to
+himself. He stood hesitating at the gate. To walk about the streets or
+to go back were equally repugnant. "To think that I have missed such a
+splendid opportunity!" he murmured as he stood aimlessly at the
+entrance, leaning near the open door of the porter's lodge. Suddenly
+he started--something in the dark room attracted his eye. He looked
+quietly around. No one was near. He descended the two steps on tiptoe,
+and called for the porter. There was no reply, and he rushed headlong
+to the hatchet (it was a hatchet), secured it where it lay among some
+wood, and hurriedly fastened it to the loop as he made his way out
+into the street. No one saw him! "There's more of the devil in this
+than my design," he said smiling to himself. The occurrence gave him
+fresh courage.
+
+He went away quietly in order not to excite any suspicion, and walked
+along the street with his eyes studiously fixed on the ground,
+avoiding the faces of the passers-by. Suddenly he recollected his hat.
+"Good heavens! the day before yesterday I had money, and not to have
+thought of that! I could so easily have bought a cap!" and he began
+cursing himself. Glancing casually in a shop, he saw it was ten
+minutes past seven. He had yet a long way to go, as he was making a
+circuit, not wishing to walk direct to the house. He kept off, as much
+as he was able, all thought of his mission, and on the way reflected
+upon possible improvements of the public grounds, upon the
+desirability of fountains, and why people lived where there were
+neither parks nor fountains, but only mud, lime, and bricks, emitting
+horrid exhalations and every conceivable foulness. This reminded him
+of his own walks about the Cyennaza, and he came to himself.
+
+"How true it is that persons being led to execution interest
+themselves in anything that strikes them on the way!" was the thought
+that came into his head, but it passed away like lightning to be
+succeeded by some other. "Here we are--there is the gate." It struck
+half-past seven as he stood near the house.
+
+To his delight, he passed in without observation. As if on purpose, at
+the very same moment a load of hay was going in, and it completely
+screened him. On the other side of the load, a dispute or brawl was
+evidently taking place, and he gained the old woman's staircase in a
+second. Recovering his breath and pressing his hand to his beating
+heart, he commenced the ascent, though first feeling for the hatchet
+and arranging it. Every minute he stopped to listen. The stairs were
+quite deserted, and every door was closed. No one met him. On the
+second floor, indeed, the door of an empty lodging was wide open; some
+painters were working there, but they did not look up. He stopped a
+moment to think, and then continued the ascent: "No doubt it would be
+better if they were not there, but fortunately there are two more
+floors above them." At last he reached the fourth floor, and Alena
+Ivanovna's door; the lodging facing it was unoccupied. The lodging on
+the third floor, just beneath the old woman's, was also apparently
+empty. The card that used to be on the door had gone; the lodgers had,
+no doubt, moved. Raskolnikoff was stifling. He stood hesitating a
+moment: "Had I not better go away?" But without answering the
+question, he waited and listened. Not a sound issued from the old
+woman's apartments. The staircase was filled with the same silence.
+After listening for a long time, the young man cast a last glance
+around, and again felt his hatchet. "Do I not look too pale?" thought
+he. "Do I not appear too agitated? She is mistrustful. I should do
+well to wait a little, to give my emotion time to calm down."
+
+But instead of becoming quieter, his heart throbbed more violently. He
+could stand it no longer, and, raising his hand toward the bell rope,
+he pulled it toward him. After waiting half a minute, he rang
+again--this time a little louder. No answer. To ring like a deaf man
+would have been useless, stupid even. The old woman was certainly at
+home; but, suspicious by nature, she was likely to be so all the more
+then, as she happened to be alone. Raskolnikoff knew something of
+Alena Ivanovna's habits. He therefore placed his ear to the door. Had
+the circumstances amid which he was placed strangely developed his
+power of hearing, which, in general, is difficult to admit, or was the
+sound really easily perceptible? Anyhow, he suddenly became aware that
+a hand was being cautiously placed on the lock, and that a dress
+rustled against the door. Some one inside was going through exactly
+the same movements as he on the landing. Some one, standing up against
+the lock, was listening while trying to hide her presence, and had
+probably her ear also against the door.
+
+In order to avoid all idea of mystery, the young man purposely moved
+about rather noisily, and muttered something half aloud; then he rang
+a third time, but gently and coolly, without allowing the bell to
+betray the least sign of impatience. Raskolnikoff never forgot this
+moment of his life. When, in after days, he thought over it, he could
+never understand how he had been able to display such cunning,
+especially at a time when emotion was now and again depriving him of
+the free use of his intellectual and physical faculties. After a short
+while he heard the bolt withdrawn.
+
+The door, as before, was opened a little, and again the two eyes, with
+mistrustful glance, peeped out of the dark. Then Raskolnikoff lost his
+presence of mind and made a serious mistake. Fearing that the old
+woman would take alarm at finding they were alone, and knowing that
+his appearance would not reassure her, he took hold of the door and
+pulled it toward him in order to prevent her shutting it again if she
+should be thus minded. Seeing this, she held on to the lock, so that
+he almost drew her together with the door on to the staircase. She
+recovered herself, and stood to prevent his entrance, speechless with
+fright.
+
+"Good evening, Alena Ivanovna," he commenced, trying to speak with
+unconcern, but his voice did not obey him, and he faltered and
+trembled, "Good evening, I have brought you something, but we had
+better go into the light." He pushed past her and entered the room
+uninvited. The old woman followed and found her tongue.
+
+"What is it you want? Who are you?" she commenced.
+
+"Pardon me, Alena Ivanovna, your old acquaintance Raskolnikoff. I have
+brought a pledge, as I promised the other day," and he held out the
+packet to her.
+
+The old woman was about to examine it, when she raised her eyes and
+looked straight into those of the visitor who had entered so
+unceremoniously. She examined him attentively, distrustfully, for a
+minute. Raskolnikoff fancied there was a gleam of mockery in her look
+as if she guessed all. He felt he was changing color, and that if she
+kept her glance upon him much longer without saying a word he would be
+obliged to run away.
+
+"Why are you looking at me thus?" he said at last in anger. "Will you
+take it or not? or shall I take it elsewhere? I have no time to
+waste." He did not intend to say this, but the words came out. The
+tone seemed to quiet her suspicions.
+
+"Why were you so impatient, _batuchka_? What is it?" she asked,
+glancing at the pledge.
+
+"The silver cigarette case of which I spoke the other day."
+
+She held out her hand. "But why are you so pale, why do your hands
+shake? What is the matter with you, _batuchka_?"
+
+"Fever," replied he abruptly. "You would be pale too if you had
+nothing to eat." He could hardly speak the words and felt his strength
+falling. But there was some plausibility in his reply; and the old
+woman took the pledge.
+
+"What is it?" she asked once more, weighing it in her hand and looking
+straight at her visitor.
+
+"Cigarette case, silver, look at it."
+
+"It doesn't feel as though it were silver. Oh! what a dreadful knot!"
+
+She began to untie the packet and turned to the light (all the windows
+were closed in spite of the heat). Her back was turned toward
+Raskolnikoff, and for a few seconds she paid no further attention to
+him. He opened his coat, freed the hatchet from the loop, but did not
+yet take it from its hiding place; he held it with his right hand
+beneath the garment. His limbs were weak, each moment they grew more
+numbed and stiff. He feared his fingers would relax their hold of the
+hatchet. Then his head turned giddy.
+
+"What is this you bring me?" cried Alena Ivanovna, turning to him in a
+rage.
+
+There was not a moment to lose now. He pulled out the hatchet, raised
+it with both hands, and let it descend without force, almost
+mechanically, on the old woman's head. But directly he had struck the
+blow his strength returned. According to her usual habit, Alena
+Ivanovna was bareheaded. Her scanty gray locks, greasy with oil, were
+gathered in one thin plait, which was fixed to the back of her neck by
+means of a piece of horn comb. The hatchet struck her just on the
+sinciput, and this was partly owing to her small stature. She scarcely
+uttered a faint cry and collapsed at once all in a heap on the floor;
+she was dead.
+
+The murderer laid his hatchet down and at once began to search the
+corpse, taking the greatest precaution not to get stained with the
+blood; he remembered seeing Alena Ivanovna, on the occasion of his
+last visit, take her keys from the right-hand pocket of her dress. He
+was in full possession of his intellect; he felt neither giddy nor
+dazed, but his hands continued to shake. Later on, he recollected that
+he had been very prudent, very attentive, that he had taken every care
+not to soil himself. It did not take him long to find the keys; the
+same as the other day, they were all together on a steel ring. Having
+secured them, Raskolnikoff at once passed into the bedroom. It was a
+very small apartment; on one side was a large glass case full of holy
+images, on the other a great bed looking very clean with its
+quilted-silk patchwork coverlet. The third wall was occupied by a
+chest of drawers. Strange to say, the young man had no sooner
+attempted to open them, he had no sooner commenced to try the keys,
+than a kind of shudder ran through his frame. Again the idea came to
+him to give up his task and go away, but this weakness only lasted a
+second: it was now too late to draw back.
+
+He was even smiling at having for a moment entertained such a thought,
+when he was suddenly seized with a terrible anxiety: suppose the old
+woman were still alive, suppose she recovered consciousness. Leaving
+at once the keys and the drawers, he hastened to the corpse, seized
+the hatchet, and prepared to strike another blow at his victim, but he
+found there was no necessity to do so. Alena Ivanovna was dead beyond
+all doubt. Leaning over her again to examine her closer, Raskolnikoff
+saw that the skull was shattered. He was about to touch her with his
+fingers, but drew back, as it was quite unnecessary. There was a pool
+of blood upon the floor. Suddenly noticing a bit of cord round the old
+woman's neck, the young man gave it a tug, but the gory stuff was
+strong, and did not break. The murderer then tried to remove it by
+drawing it down the body. But this second attempt was no more
+successful than the first, the cord encountered some obstacle and
+became fixed. Burning with impatience, Raskolnikoff brandished the
+hatchet, ready to strike the corpse and sever the confounded string at
+the same blow. However, he could not make up his mind to proceed with
+such brutality. At last, after trying for two minutes, and staining
+his hands with blood, he succeeded in severing the cord with the blade
+of the hatchet without further disfiguring the dead body. As he had
+imagined, there was a purse suspended to the old woman's neck. Besides
+this there was also a small enameled medal and two crosses, one of
+cypress wood, the other of brass. The greasy purse, a little
+chamois-leather bag, was as full as it could hold. Raskolnikoff thrust
+it in his pocket without examining the contents. He then threw the
+crosses on his victim's breast, and hastily returned to the bedroom,
+taking the hatchet with him.
+
+His impatience was now intense, he seized the keys, and again set to
+work. But all his attempts to open the drawers were unavailing, and
+this was not so much owing to the shaking of his hands as to his
+continual misconceptions. He could see, for instance, that a certain
+key would not fit the lock, and yet he continued to try and insert it.
+All on a sudden he recalled a conjecture he had formed on the occasion
+of his preceding visit: the big key with the toothed wards, which was
+attached to the ring with the smaller ones, probably belonged, not to
+the drawers, but to some box in which the old woman, no doubt, hoarded
+up her valuables. Without further troubling about the drawers, he at
+once looked under the bed, aware that old women are in the habit of
+hiding their treasures in such places. And there indeed was a trunk
+with rounded lid, covered with red morocco and studded with steel
+nails. Raskolnikoff was able to insert the key in the lock without the
+least difficulty. When he opened the box he perceived a hareskin cloak
+trimmed with red lying on a white sheet; beneath the fur was a silk
+dress, and then a shawl, the rest of the contents appeared to be
+nothing but rags. The young man commenced by wiping his bloodstained
+hands on the red trimming. "It will not show so much on red." Then he
+suddenly seemed to change his mind: "Heavens! am I going mad?" thought
+he with fright.
+
+But scarcely had he touched these clothes than a gold watch rolled
+from under the fur. He then overhauled everything in the box. Among
+the rags were various gold trinkets, which had all probably been
+pledged with the old woman: bracelets, chains, earrings, scarf pins,
+&c. Some were in their cases, while the others were tied up with tape
+in pieces of newspaper folded in two. Raskolnikoff did not hesitate,
+he laid hands on these jewels, and stowed them away in the pockets of
+his coat and trousers, without opening the cases or untying the
+packets; but he was soon interrupted in his work------
+
+Footsteps resounded in the other room. He stopped short, frozen with
+terror. But the noise having ceased, he was already imagining he had
+been mistaken, when suddenly he distinctly heard a faint cry, or
+rather a kind of feeble interrupted moan. At the end of a minute or
+two, everything was again as silent as death. Raskolnikoff had seated
+himself on the floor beside the trunk and was waiting, scarcely daring
+to breathe; suddenly he bounded up, caught up the hatchet, and rushed
+from the bedroom. In the center of the apartment, Elizabeth, a huge
+bundle in her hands, stood gazing in a terror-stricken way at her dead
+sister; white as a sheet, she did not seem to have the strength to
+call out. On the sudden appearance of the murderer, she began to quake
+in every limb, and nervous twitches passed over her face; she tried to
+raise her arm, to open her mouth, but she was unable to utter the
+least cry, and, slowly retreating, her gaze still riveted on
+Raskolnikoff, she sought refuge in a corner. The poor woman drew back
+in perfect silence, as though she had no breath left in her body. The
+young man rushed upon her, brandishing the hatchet; the wretched
+creature's lips assumed the doleful expression peculiar to quite young
+children when, beginning to feel frightened of something, they gaze
+fixedly at the object which has raised their alarm, and are on the
+point of crying out. Terror had so completely stupefied this
+unfortunate Elizabeth, that, though threatened by the hatchet, she did
+not even think of protecting her face by holding her hands before her
+head, with that mechanical gesture which the instinct of
+self-preservation prompts on such occasions. She scarcely raised her
+left arm, and extended it slowly in the direction of the murderer, as
+thought to keep him off. The hatchet penetrated her skull, laying it
+open from the upper part of the forehead to the crown. Elizabeth fell
+down dead. No longer aware of what he did, Raskolnikoff took the
+bundle from his victim's hand, then dropped it and ran to the
+anteroom.
+
+He was more and more terrified, especially after this second murder,
+entirely unpremeditated by him. He was in a hurry to be gone; had he
+then been in a state to see things more clearly, had he only been able
+to form an idea of the difficulties besetting his position, to see how
+desperate, how hideous, how absurd it was, to understand how many
+obstacles there still remained for him to surmount, perhaps even
+crimes to commit, to escape from this house and return home, he would
+most likely have withdrawn from the struggle, and have gone at once
+and given himself up to justice; it was not cowardice which would have
+prompted him to do so, but the horror of what he had done. This last
+impression became more and more powerful every minute. Nothing in the
+world could now have made him return to the trunk, nor even reenter
+the room in which it lay. Little by little his mind became diverted by
+other thoughts, and he lapsed into a kind of reverie; at times the
+murderer seemed to forget his position, or rather the most important
+part of it, and to concentrate his attention on trifles. After a
+while, happening to glance in the kitchen, he observed a pail half
+full of water, standing on a bench, and that gave him the idea of
+washing his hands and the hatchet. The blood had made his hands
+sticky. After plunging the blade of the hatchet in the water, he took
+a small piece of soap which lay on the window sill, and commenced his
+ablutions. When he had washed his hands, he set to cleaning the iron
+part of his weapon; then he devoted three minutes to soaping the
+wooden handle, which was also stained with blood.
+
+After this he wiped it with a cloth which had been hung up to dry on a
+line stretched across the kitchen. This done, he drew near the window
+and carefully examined the hatchet for some minutes. The accusing
+stains had disappeared, but the handle was still damp. Raskolnikoff
+carefully hid the weapon under his coat by replacing it in the loop;
+after which, he minutely inspected his clothes, that is to say so far
+as the dim light of the kitchen allowed him to do so. He saw nothing
+suspicious about the coat and trousers, but there were bloodstains on
+the boots. He removed them with the aid of a damp rag. But these
+precautions only half reassured him, for he knew that he could not see
+properly and that certain stains had very likely escaped him. He stood
+irresolute in the middle of the room, a prey to a somber, agonizing
+thought, the thought that he was going mad, that at that moment he was
+not in a fit state to come to a determination and to watch over his
+security, that his way of going to work was probably not the one the
+circumstances demanded. "Good heavens! I ought to go, to go away at
+once!" murmured he, and he rushed to the anteroom where the greatest
+terror he had yet experienced awaited him.
+
+He stood stock-still, not daring to believe his eyes: the door of the
+lodging, the outer door which opened on to the landing, the same one
+at which he had rung a little while before and by which he had
+entered, was open; up till then it had remained ajar, the old woman
+had no doubt omitted to close it by way of precaution; it had been
+neither locked nor bolted! But he had seen Elizabeth after that. How
+was it that it had not occurred to him that she had come in by way of
+the door? She could not have entered the lodging through the wall. He
+shut the door and bolted it. "But no, that is not what I should do? I
+must go away, go away." He drew back the bolt and, after opening the
+door again, stood listening on the landing.
+
+He stood thus a long while. Down below, probably at the street door,
+two noisy voices were vociferating insults. "Who can those people be?"
+He waited patiently. At last the noise ceased, the brawlers had taken
+their departure. The young man was about to do the same, when a door
+on the floor immediately below was noisily opened and some one went
+downstairs, humming a tune. "Whatever are they all up to?" wondered
+Raskolnikoff, and closing the door again he waited a while. At length
+all became silent as before; but just as he was preparing to go down,
+he suddenly became aware of a fresh sound, footsteps as yet far off,
+at the bottom of the staircase; and he no sooner heard them than he
+guessed the truth:--some one was coming _there_, to the old woman's on
+the fourth floor. Whence came this presentiment? What was there so
+particularly significant in the sound of these footsteps? They were
+heavy, regular, and rather slow than hurried. _He_ has now reached the
+first floor, he still continues to ascend. The sound is becoming
+plainer and plainer. He pants as though with asthma at each step he
+takes. He has commenced the third flight. He will soon be on the
+fourth! And Raskolnikoff felt suddenly seized as with a general
+paralysis, the same as happens when a person has the nightmare and
+fancies himself pursued by enemies; they are on the point of catching
+him, they will kill him, and yet he remains spellbound, unable to move
+a limb.
+
+The stranger was now ascending the fourth flight. Raskolnikoff, who
+until then had been riveted to the landing with fright, was at length
+able to shake off his torpor, and hastily reentered the apartment,
+closing the door behind him. Then he bolted it, being careful to make
+as little noise as possible. Instinct rather than reason prompted him
+to do this. When he had finished, he remained close to the door,
+listening, scarcely daring to breathe. The visitor was now on the
+landing. Only the thickness of the door separated the two men. The
+unknown was in the same position toward Raskolnikoff as the latter had
+been a little while before toward the old woman. The visitor stood
+panting for some little time. "He must be stout and big," thought the
+young man as he clasped the hatchet firmly in his hand. It was all
+like a dream to him. The visitor gave a violent pull at the bell. He
+immediately fancied he heard something move inside. He listened
+attentively during a few seconds, then he gave another ring and again
+waited; suddenly losing patience, he began to shake the door handle
+with all his might. Raskolnikoff watched with terror the bolt
+trembling in the socket, expecting to see it shoot back at any moment,
+so violent were the jerks given to the door. It occurred to him to
+hold the bolt in its place with his hand, but the _man_ might have
+found it out. His head was turning quite dizzy again. "I shall betray
+myself!" thought he; but he suddenly recovered his presence of mind as
+the unknown broke the silence.
+
+"Are they both asleep, or has some one strangled them? The
+thrice-confounded creatures!" growled the visitor in a guttural voice.
+"Hi! Alena Ivanovna, you old sorceress! Elizabeth Ivanovna, you
+indescribable beauty!--open! Oh! the witches! can they be asleep?"
+
+In his exasperation he rang ten times running, and as loud as he
+possibly could. This man was evidently not a stranger there, and was
+in the habit of being obeyed. At the same moment some light and rapid
+footsteps resounded on the staircase. It was another person coming to
+the fourth floor. Raskolnikoff was not at first aware of the
+newcomer's arrival.
+
+"Is it possible that there's no one at home?" said the latter in a
+loud and hearty tone of voice, addressing the first visitor who was
+still tugging at the bell pull. "Good day, Koch!"
+
+"Judging by his voice, he must be quite a young man," immediately
+thought Raskolnikoff.
+
+"The devil only knows! I've almost smashed the lock," replied Koch.
+"But how is it you know me?"
+
+"What a question! The day before yesterday I played you at billiards,
+at Gambrinus's, and won three games right off."
+
+"Ah!"
+
+"So they're not at home? That's strange. I might almost say it's
+ridiculous. Where can the old woman have gone? I want to speak with
+her."
+
+"And I too, _batuchka_, I want to speak with her."
+
+"Well, what's to be done? I suppose we must go back to whence we came.
+I wanted to borrow some money of her!" exclaimed the young man.
+
+"Of course we must go back again; but why then did she make an
+appointment? She herself, the old witch, told me to come at this hour.
+And it's a long way to where I live. Where the deuce can she be? I
+don't understand it. She never stirs from one year's end to the other,
+the old witch; she quite rots in the place, her legs have always got
+something the matter with them, and now all on a sudden she goes
+gallivanting about!"
+
+"Suppose we question the porter?"
+
+"What for?"
+
+"To find out where she's gone and when she will be back."
+
+"Hum!--the deuce!--question!--but she never goes anywhere." And he
+again tugged at the door handle. "The devil take her! there's nothing
+to be done but to go."
+
+"Wait!" suddenly exclaimed the young man, "look!--do you notice how
+the door resists when we pull it?"
+
+"Well, what then?"
+
+"Why, that shows that it's not locked, but bolted! Hark how it
+clinks!"
+
+"Well?"
+
+"Don't you understand? That shows that one of them must be at home. If
+both were out, they would have locked the door after them, and not
+have bolted it inside. Listen, don't you hear the noise it makes?
+Well, to bolt one's door, one must be at home, you understand.
+Therefore it follows that they are at home, only for some reason or
+other they don't open the door!"
+
+"Why, yes, you're right!" exclaimed the astonished Koch. "So they're
+there, are they?" And he again shook the door violently.
+
+"Stay!" resumed the young man, "don't pull like that. There's
+something peculiar about this. You've rung, you've pulled at the door
+with all your might, and they haven't answered you; therefore, they've
+either both fainted away, or----"
+
+"What?"
+
+"This is what we had better do: have the porter up, so that he may
+find out what's the matter."
+
+"That's not a bad idea!"
+
+They both started downstairs.
+
+"Stop! you stay here; I'll fetch the porter."
+
+"Why stay here?"
+
+"Well, one never knows what might happen----"
+
+"All right."
+
+"You see, I might also pass for an examining magistrate! There's
+something very peculiar about all this, that's evident, e-vi-dent!"
+said the young man excitedly, and he hastily made his way down the
+stairs.
+
+Left alone, Koch rang again, but gently this time; then, with a
+thoughtful air, he began to play with the door handle, turning it
+first one way, then the other, so as to make sure the door was only
+bolted. After this, with a great deal of puffing and blowing, he
+stooped down to look through the keyhole, but the key was in the lock,
+and turned in such a way that one could not see through. Standing up
+on the other side of the door, Raskolnikoff still held the hatchet in
+his hands. He was almost in a state of delirium and was preparing to
+attack the two men the moment they forced an entrance. More than once,
+on hearing them knocking and planning together, he had felt inclined
+to put an end to the matter there and then by calling out to them. At
+times he experienced a desire to abuse and defy them, while awaiting
+their irruption. "The sooner it's over the better!" he kept thinking.
+
+"The devil take them!" The time passed; still no one came. Koch was
+beginning to lose patience. "The devil take them!" he muttered again,
+and, tired of waiting, he relinquished his watch to go and find the
+young man. By degrees the sound of his heavy boots echoing on the
+stairs ceased to be heard.
+
+"Heavens! What shall I do?"
+
+Raskolnikoff drew back the bolt and opened the door a few inches.
+Reassured by the silence which reigned in the house, and, moreover,
+scarcely in a fit state at the time to reflect on what he did, he went
+out on to the landing, shut the door behind him as securely as he
+could and turned to go downstairs. He had already descended several
+steps when suddenly a great uproar arose from one of the floors below.
+Where could he hide? Concealment was impossible, so he hastened
+upstairs again.
+
+"Hi there! hang it! stop!"
+
+He who uttered these cries had just burst out of one of the lodgings,
+and was rushing down the stairs as fast as his legs would carry him,
+yelling the while: "Dmitri! Dmitri! Dmitri! May the devil take the
+fool!"
+
+The rest died away in the distance; the man who was uttering these
+cries had already left the house far behind. All was once more silent;
+but scarcely was this alarm over than a fresh one succeeded it:
+several individuals talking together in a loud tone of voice were
+noisily coming up the stairs. There were three or four of them.
+Raskolnikoff recognized the young man's sonorous accents. "It is
+they!" No longer hoping to escape them, he advanced boldly to meet
+them: "Let happen what will!" said he to himself: "if they stop me,
+all is over; if they let me pass, all is over just the same: they will
+remember passing me on the stairs." They were about to encounter him,
+only one flight separated them--when suddenly he felt himself saved! A
+few steps from him, to the right, there was an empty lodging with the
+door wide open, it was that same one on the second floor where he had
+seen the painters working, but, by a happy chance, they had just left
+it. It was they, no doubt, who a few minutes before had gone off,
+uttering those shouts. The paint on the floors was quite fresh, the
+workmen had left their things in the middle of the room: a small tub,
+some paint in an earthenware crock, and a big brush. In the twinkling
+of an eye, Raskolnikoff glided into the deserted apartment and hid
+himself as best he could up against the wall. It was none too soon:
+his pursuers were already on the landing; they did not stop there,
+however, but went on up to the fourth floor, talking loudly among
+themselves. After waiting till they had got some distance off, he left
+the room on tiptoe and hurried down as fast as his legs would carry
+him. No one on the stairs! No one either at the street door! He
+stepped briskly outside, and, once in the street, turned to the left.
+
+He knew very well, he knew without a doubt, that they who were seeking
+him were at that moment in the old woman's lodging, and were amazed to
+find that the door, which a little while before had been shut so
+securely, was now open. "They're examining the corpses," thought he;
+"it won't take them a minute to come to the conclusion that the
+murderer managed to hide himself from them as they went up the stairs;
+perhaps they may even have a suspicion that he stowed himself away in
+the empty lodging on the second floor while they were hurrying to the
+upper part of the house." But, in spite of these reflections, he did
+not dare to increase his pace, though he still had a hundred steps or
+so to go before reaching the first turning. "Suppose I slipped into
+some doorway, in some out-of-the-way street, and waited there a few
+minutes? No, that would never do! I might throw my hatchet away
+somewhere? or take a cab? No good! no good!" At last he reached a
+narrow lane; he entered it more dead than alive. There, he was almost
+in safety, and he knew it: in such a place, suspicion could hardly be
+fixed upon him; while, on the other hand, it was easier for him to
+avoid notice by mingling with the crowd. But all these agonizing
+events had so enfeebled him that he could scarcely keep on his legs.
+Great drops of perspiration streamed down his face; his neck was quite
+wet. "I think you've had your fill!" shouted some one who took him for
+a drunken man as he reached the canal bank.
+
+He no longer knew what he was doing; the farther he went, the more
+obscure became his ideas. However, when he found himself on the quay,
+he became frightened at seeing so few people there, and, fearing that
+he might be noticed on so deserted a spot, he returned to the lane.
+Though he had hardly the strength to put one leg before the other, he
+nevertheless took the longest way to reach his home. He had scarcely
+recovered his presence of mind even when he crossed the threshold; at
+least the thought of the hatchet never came to him until he was on the
+stairs. Yet the question he had to solve was a most serious one: it
+consisted in returning the hatchet to the place he had taken it from,
+and in doing so without attracting the least attention. Had he been
+more capable of considering his position, he would certainly have
+understood that, instead of replacing the hatchet, it would be far
+safer to get rid of it by throwing it into the yard of some other
+house.
+
+Nevertheless he met with no mishap. The door of the porter's lodge was
+closed, though not locked; to all appearance, therefore, the porter
+was at home. But Raskolnikoff had so thoroughly lost all faculty of
+preparing any kind of plan, that he walked straight to the door and
+opened it. If the porter had asked him: "What do you want?" perhaps he
+would simply have handed him the hatchet. But, the same as on the
+previous occasion, the porter was absent, and this gave the young man
+every facility to replace the hatchet under the bench, exactly where
+he had found it. Then he went upstairs and reached his room without
+meeting a soul; the door of his landlady's apartments was shut. Once
+home again, he threw himself on his couch just as he was. He did not
+sleep, but lay in a sort of semiconsciousness. If anybody had then
+appeared before him, he would have sprung up and cried out. His head
+was swimming with a host of vague thoughts: do what he could, he was
+unable to follow the thread of one of them.
+
+Raskolnikoff lay on the couch a very long while. At times he seemed to
+rouse from this half sleep, and then he noticed that the night was
+very far advanced, but still it never entered his head to rise. Soon
+it began to brighten into day, and the dawn found him in a state of
+stupefaction, lying motionless on his back. A desperate clamor, and
+sounds of brawls from the streets below, rose to his ears. These
+awakened him thoroughly, although he heard them every morning early at
+the same hour. "Ah! two o'clock, drinking is over," and he started up
+as though some one had pulled him off the couch. "What! two o'clock
+already?" He sat on the edge of the couch and then recollected
+everything, in an instant it all came back! At first he thought he was
+going out of his mind, a strange chill pervaded his frame, but the
+cold arose from the fever which had seized upon him during his sleep.
+He shivered until his teeth chattered, and all his limbs fairly shook.
+He went to the door, opened it, and listened; all was silent in the
+house. With astonishment he turned and looked round the room. How
+could he have come home the night before, not bolted the door, and
+thrown himself on the couch just as he was, not only not undressed,
+but with his hat on? There it lay in the middle of the floor where it
+had rolled. "If anyone came in, what would he think? That I am drunk,
+of course."
+
+He went to the window--it was pretty light--and looked himself all
+over from head to foot, to see if there were any stains on his
+clothes. But he could not rely upon that sort of inspection; so, still
+shivering, he undressed and examined his clothes again, looking
+everywhere with the greatest care. To make quite sure, he went over
+them three times. He discovered nothing but a few drops of clotted
+blood on the ends of his trousers which were very much frayed. He took
+a big clasp-knife and cut off the frayed edges. Suddenly he remembered
+that the purse and the things he had abstracted from the old woman's
+chest, were still in his pockets! He had never thought of taking them
+out and hiding them! indeed, it had never crossed his mind that they
+were in his pockets while examining his clothes! Was it possible? In a
+second he emptied all out on to the table in a heap. Then, turning his
+pockets inside out to make sure there was nothing left in them, he
+carried the things to a corner of the room. Just there, the paper was
+hanging loose from the wall; he bent down and commenced to stuff all
+the things into a hole behind the paper. "There, it's all out of
+sight!" thought he gleefully, as he stood gazing stupidly at the spot
+where the paper bulged out more than ever. Suddenly he began to
+shudder from terror. "Good heavens!" murmured he in despair, "what is
+the matter with me? Is that hidden? Is that the way to hide anything?"
+
+Indeed, he had not reckoned on such spoil, he had only thought of
+taking the old woman's money; so he was not prepared with a hiding
+place for the jewels. "I have no cause to rejoice now," thought he.
+"Is that the way to hide anything? I must really be losing my senses!"
+He sunk on the couch again exhausted; another fit of intolerable
+shivering seized him, and he mechanically pulled his old student's
+cloak over him for warmth, as he fell into a delirious sleep. He lost
+all consciousness of himself. Not more than five minutes had elapsed
+before he woke up in intense excitement, and bent over his clothes in
+the deepest anguish. "How could I go to sleep again when nothing is
+done! For I have done nothing, the loop is still where I sewed it. I
+forgot all about that! What a convincing proof it would have been." He
+ripped it off and tore it into shreds which he placed among his
+underlinen under the pillow. "These rags cannot awaken any suspicions,
+I fancy; at least, so it seems to me," repeated he, standing up in the
+middle of the room, and, with an attempt rendered all the more painful
+by the effort it cost him, he looked all round, trying to make sure he
+had forgotten nothing. He suffered cruelly from this conviction, that
+everything, even memory, even the most elementary prudence, was
+abandoning him.
+
+"Can this be the punishment already beginning? Indeed! indeed! it is!"
+
+And indeed the frayed edges he had cut from the bottom of his trousers
+were lying on the floor, in the middle of the room, exposed to the
+view of the first comer. "But what can I be thinking of?" exclaimed he
+in utter bewilderment. Then a strange idea came into his head; he
+thought that perhaps all his clothes were saturated in blood, and that
+he could not see this because his senses were gone and his perception
+of things lost. Then he recollected that there would be traces on the
+purse, and his pockets would be wet with blood. It was so. "I am
+bereft of my reason, I know not what I am doing. Bah! not at all!--it
+is only weakness, delirium. I shall soon be better." He tore at the
+lining. At this moment the rays of the morning streamed in and shone
+on his left boot. There were plain traces, and all the point was
+covered. "I must have stepped in that pool. What shall I do now? Boot,
+lining, rags, where shall they go?" He rolled them up and stood
+thinking in the middle of the room. "Ah, the stove. Yes, burn them.
+No, I cannot, I have no match. Better throw them away. Yes, yes, that
+is the thing," said he, again sitting on the couch. "At once, and
+without delay too, quick." But, instead, his head fell back upon the
+pillow, and chilly shiverings again came over him. He covered himself
+with his cloak and slept again. It appeared hours to him, and many a
+time in his sleep he tried to rise to hasten to throw away his bundle,
+but he could not, he seemed chained to the bed. At last he awoke, as
+he heard a loud knock at his door.
+
+"Eh, open, will you?" cried Nastasia. "Don't lie there like a dog.
+It's eleven o'clock."
+
+"Perhaps he is not in," said a man's voice.
+
+"The porter's voice. What does he want?" Raskolnikoff rose, and sat on
+the couch listening. His heart throbbed violently. "Who has bolted the
+door then?" exclaimed the servant. "Open, will you?"
+
+"All must be discovered?" He rose a little and undid the bolt, and
+fell back again on his bed. There stood the porter and Nastasia. The
+servant looked strangely at Raskolnikoff, while he fixed a despairing
+glance upon the porter.
+
+"Here is a notice for you from the office," said the latter.
+
+"What office?"
+
+"The police office."
+
+"What for?"
+
+"I don't know. You are summoned there, go." The porter looked
+anxiously at the lodger, and turned to leave. Raskolnikoff made no
+observation, and held the paper unopened in his hand.
+
+"There, stay where you are," said Nastasia, seeing him fall back on
+the couch. "If you are ill, do not go. What is that in your hand?"
+
+He looked down; in his right hand were clutched the pieces of frayed
+cloth, his boot, and the lining of his pocket. He had evidently fallen
+asleep with them as they were; indeed he recollected how, thinking
+deeply about them, he had dozed away.
+
+"The idea of taking a lot of rags to bed and hugging them to you like
+a treasure!" laughed the servant in her sickly manner.
+
+In a second he hid all under his coat and looked at her attentively.
+Although little was capable of passing in his mind, he felt she would
+not talk thus to a man under arrest for a crime. But then, the police?
+
+"Is there anything you want? You stay here, I will bring it."
+
+"No, I will go. I am going at once," murmured he, rising to his feet.
+
+"Very well."
+
+She went out after the porter. As soon as she had disappeared, he
+rushed to the light to look at his boot. Yes, there were spots, but
+not very plain, all covered with mud. But who would distinguish them?
+Nastasia could know nothing, thank heavens! Then with trembling hand
+he tore open the notice, and began to read. At last he understood; it
+was simply the usual notice to report himself at the office of the
+district that day at half-past nine o'clock.
+
+"But why to-day?" cried he. "Lord, let it be over soon." He was about
+to fall down on his knees to pray, when a fit of laughter seized him.
+"I must trust to myself, not to prayers." He quickly dressed himself.
+"Shall I put the boot on?" he thought, "better throw it away, and hide
+all traces of it." Nevertheless he put it on, only, however, to throw
+it off again with an expression of horror. As, however, he recollected
+he had no other, a smile came to his face, and he drew it on once
+more. Again his face changed into deep despair, his limbs shook more
+and more. "This is not from exertion," thought he, "it is fear." His
+head spun round and round and his temples throbbed visibly.
+
+On the stairs he recollected that all the things were in the hole in
+the wall, and then where was his certificate of birth? He stopped to
+think. But such despair, and, if it may be so called, cynicism, took
+hold of him, that he simply shook his head and went out. The sooner
+over, the better. Once again in the open air, he encountered the same
+insufferable heat, the dust, and the people in drink rolling about the
+streets. The sun caught him full in the eyes and almost blinded him,
+while his head spun round and round, as is usual in fever. On reaching
+the turning into the street he had taken the day before, he glanced in
+great agitation in the direction of the house, but immediately averted
+his eyes again. "If they ask me, I should confess, perhaps," said he
+to himself, as he turned away and made for the office. This was not
+far distant, in a new house, on the fourth floor. As he entered the
+court, he saw to the right of him a staircase, ascending which was a
+man carrying some books. "It was evidently there." He did not think of
+asking.
+
+"I will go and fall on my knees and confess all," he murmured, and
+began to ascend the narrow and very steep stairs. On every floor the
+doors of the kitchens of the several apartments stood open to the
+staircase, and emitted a suffocating, sickening odor. The entrance to
+the office he was in search of was also wide open, and he walked in. A
+number of persons were waiting in the anteroom. The stench was simply
+intolerable, and was intensified by the smell of fresh paint. Pausing
+a little, he decided to advance farther into the small low room. He
+became impatient when he found no one took any notice of him. In an
+inner room were seated a number of clerks engaged in writing. He went
+up to one of these.
+
+"What do you want?" Raskolnikoff showed him the notice.
+
+"You are a student?" asked a clerk, glancing at the notice.
+
+"Yes;--that is, I used to be."
+
+The clerk glanced at him--without, however, any particular curiosity.
+He was a man with unkempt hair and an expressionless face.
+
+"There is nothing to be learned from him, evidently," thought
+Raskolnikoff.
+
+"Step in there to the head clerk," said the man, pointing to a farther
+room, which was quite full of people, among whom were two ladies.
+
+The assistant district officer, a man adorned with red whiskers
+standing out on either side of his face, and with extremely small
+features, looked up impatiently at Raskolnikoff, whose filthy attire
+was by no means prepossessing. The latter returned his glance calmly
+and straight in the face, and in such a manner as to give the officer
+offense.
+
+"What do you want here?" he cried, apparently surprised that such a
+ragged beggar was not knocked down by his thunder-bearing glance.
+
+"I am here because I was summoned," stammered Raskolnikoff.
+
+"It is for the recovery of money lent," said the head clerk. "Here!"
+and he threw a paper to Raskolnikoff, "Read!"
+
+"Money? What money? It cannot be that," thought the young man, and he
+trembled with joy. Everything became clear, and the load fell off his
+shoulders.
+
+"At what hour did you receive this, sir?" cried the lieutenant; "you
+were told to come at nine o'clock, and now it is nearly twelve!"
+
+"I received it a quarter of an hour ago," loudly replied Raskolnikoff,
+over his shoulder, suddenly angered, "and it is sufficient to say that
+I am ill with a fever."
+
+"Please not to bawl!"
+
+"I did not bawl, but spoke plainly; it is you that bawl. I am a
+student, and am not going to have you speak to me in that fashion."
+
+The officer became enraged, and fumed so that only splutters flew out
+of his mouth. He jumped up from his place. "Please keep silence. You
+are in court. Don't be insolent."
+
+"And so are you in court; and, besides bawling, you are smoking, so
+you are wanting in politeness to the whole company." As he said this,
+Raskolnikoff felt an inexpressible delight at his maliciousness. The
+clerk looked up with a smile. The choleric officer was clearly
+nonplused.
+
+"That is not your business, sir," he cried at last, unnaturally loud.
+"Make the necessary declaration. Show him, Alexander Gregorivitch.
+Complaints have been made about you! You don't pay your debts! You
+know how to fly the kite evidently!"
+
+Raskolnikoff did not listen, but greedily seized the paper. He read it
+through more than once, and could make nothing of it. "What is this?"
+he asked of the clerk.
+
+"It is a writ for recovery on a note of hand of yours. Please write,"
+said the clerk.
+
+"Write what?" asked he rudely.
+
+"As I dictate."
+
+The clerk stood near and dictated to him the usual form of
+declaration: that he was unable to pay, that he would not quit the
+capital, dispose of his goods in any way, etc., etc.
+
+"You cannot write, your pen is falling from your fingers," said the
+clerk, and he looked him in the face. "Are you ill?"
+
+"Yes, my head swims. Go on."
+
+"That is all. Now sign it."
+
+Raskolnikoff let fall the pen, and seemed as if about to rise and go;
+but, instead of doing so, he laid both elbows on the table and
+supported his head with his hands. A new idea formed in his mind: to
+rise immediately, go straight to Nicodemus Thomich the ward officer
+and tell him all that had occurred; then to accompany him to his room,
+and show him all the things hidden away in the wall behind the paper.
+His desire to do all this was of such strength that he got up from the
+table to carry his design into execution. "Reflect, reflect a moment!"
+ran in his head. "No, better not think, get it off my shoulders."
+Suddenly he stood still as if shot. Nicodemus Thomich was at this
+moment hotly discussing something with Elia Petrovitch, the inspector
+of police, and the words caught Raskolnikoff's anxious attention. He
+listened.
+
+"It cannot be, they will both be released. In the first place, all is
+contradictory. Consider. Why did they call the porter if it were their
+work? To denounce themselves? Or out of cunning? Not at all, that
+would be too much! Besides, did not the porter see the student
+Pestriakoff at the very gate just as he came in, and he stood there
+some time with three friends who had accompanied him. And Koch: was he
+not below in the silversmith's for half an hour before he went up to
+the old woman's? Now, consider."
+
+"But see what contradictions arise! They say they knocked and found
+the door closed; yet three minutes after, when they went back with the
+porter, it was open."
+
+"That's true. The murderer was inside, and had bolted the door, and
+certainly he would have been captured had not Koch foolishly run off
+to the porter. In the interval _he_, no doubt, had time to escape
+downstairs. Koch explains that, if he had remained, the man would have
+leaped out and killed him. He wanted to have a _Te Deum_ sung. Ha,
+ha!"
+
+"Did nobody see the murderer?"
+
+"How could they? The house is a perfect Noah's ark," put in the clerk,
+who had been listening.
+
+"The thing is clear, very clear," said Nicodemus Thomich decisively.
+
+"Not at all! Not at all!" cried Elia Petrovitch, in reply.
+
+Raskolnikoff took up his hat and made for the door, but he never
+reached it. When he came to himself he found he was sitting on a
+chair, supported on the right by some unknown man, while to his left
+stood another, holding some yellow water in a yellow glass. Nicodemus
+Thomich, standing before him, was looking at him fixedly. Raskolnikoff
+rose.
+
+"What is it? Are you ill?" asked the officer sharply.
+
+"He could hardly hold the pen to sign his name," the clerk explained,
+at the same time going back to his books.
+
+"Have you been ill very long?" cried Elia Petrovitch from his table;
+he had run to see the swoon and returned to his place.
+
+"Since yesterday," murmured Raskolnikoff in reply.
+
+"You went out yesterday?"
+
+"I did."
+
+"Ill?"
+
+"Ill!"
+
+"At what time?"
+
+"Eight o'clock in the evening."
+
+"Where did you go, allow me to ask?"
+
+"In the streets."
+
+"Concise and clear."
+
+Raskolnikoff had replied sharply, in a broken voice, his face as pale
+as a handkerchief, and with his black swollen eyes averted from Elia
+Petrovitch's scrutinizing glance.
+
+"He can hardly stand on his legs. Do you want to ask anything more?"
+said Nicodemus Thomich.
+
+"Nothing," replied Elia Petrovitch.
+
+Nicodemus Thomich evidently wished to say more, but, turning to the
+clerk, who in turn glanced expressively at him, the latter became
+silent, all suddenly stopped speaking. It was strange.
+
+Raskolnikoff went out. As he descended the stairs he could hear an
+animated discussion had broken out, and above all, the interrogative
+voice of Nicodemus Thomich. In the street he came to himself.
+
+"Search, search! they are going to search!" he cried. "The scoundrels,
+they suspect me!" The old dread seized him again, from head to foot.
+
+Here was the room. All was quiet, and no one had, apparently,
+disturbed it--not even Nastasia. But, heavens! how could he have left
+all those things where they were? He rushed to the corner, pushed his
+hands behind the paper, took out the things, and thrust them in his
+pockets. There were eight articles in all: two little boxes with
+earrings or something of that description, then four little morocco
+cases; a chain wrapped up in paper, and something else done up in a
+common piece of newspaper--possibly a decoration. Raskolnikoff
+distributed these, together with the purse, about his person, in order
+to make them less noticeable, and quitted the room again. All the time
+he had left the door wide open. He went away hurriedly, fearing
+pursuit. Perhaps in a few minutes orders would be issued to hunt him
+down, so he must hide all traces of his theft at once; and he would do
+so while he had strength and reason left him. But where should he go?
+
+This had been long decided. Throw the lot in the canal and the matter
+would be at an end! So he had resolved in that night of delirium, when
+he cried out, "Quick, quick! throw all away!" But this was not so
+easy. He wandered to the quays of the Catherine Canal, and lingered
+there for half an hour. Here a washing raft lay where he had thought
+of sinking his spoil, or there boats were moored, and everywhere
+people swarmed. Then, again, would the cases sink? Would they not
+rather float? No, this would not do. He would go to the Neva; there
+would be fewer people there and more room, and it would be more
+convenient. He recognized that he had been wandering about for fully
+half an hour, and in dangerous places. He must make haste. He made his
+way to the river, but soon came to another standstill. Why in the
+Neva? Why in the water at all? Better some solitary place in a wood,
+or under some bushes. Dig a hole and bury them! He felt he was not in
+a condition to deliberate clearly and soundly, but this idea appeared
+the best.
+
+This idea also, however, was not destined to be realized, and another
+took its place. As he passed the V---- Prospect, he suddenly noticed
+on the left an entrance into a court, which was surrounded entirely by
+high walls. On the right, a long way up the court, rose the side of a
+huge four-storied building. To the left, parallel with the walls of
+the house, and commencing immediately at the gate, there ran a wooden
+boarding of about twenty paces down the court. Then came a space where
+a lot of rubbish was deposited; while farther down, at the bottom of
+the court, was a shed, apparently part of some workshop, possibly that
+of a carpenter or coach builder. Everything appeared as black as coal
+dust. Here was the very place, he thought; and, after looking round,
+went up the court. Behind the door he espied a large unworked stone,
+weighing about fifty pounds, which lay close up against the hoarding.
+No one could see him where he stood; he was entirely free from
+observation. He bent down to the stone, managed to turn it over after
+considerable effort, and found underneath a small cavity. He threw in
+the cases, and then the purse on the top of all. The stone was not
+perceptibly higher when he had replaced it, and little traces of its
+having been moved could be noticed. So he pressed some earth against
+the edges with his foot, and made off.
+
+He laughed for joy when again in the street. All traces were gone, and
+who would think of looking there? And if they were found who would
+suspect him? All proofs were gone, and he laughed again. Yes, he
+recollected afterwards how he laughed--a long, nervous, lingering
+laugh, lasting all the time he was in that street.
+
+He reached home toward evening, perhaps at about eight o'clock--how,
+and by what particular way he never recollected--but, speedily
+undressing, he lay down on the couch, trembling like a beaten horse,
+and, drawing his overcoat over him, he fell immediately into a deep
+sleep. He awoke in a high fever and delirious. Some days later he came
+to himself, rose and went out. It was eight o'clock, and the sun had
+disappeared. The heat was as intolerable as before, but he inhaled the
+dusty, fetid, infected town air with greediness. And now his head
+began to spin round, and a wild expression of energy crept into his
+inflamed eyes and pale, meager, wan face. He did not know, did not
+even think, what he was going to do; he only knew that all was to be
+finished "today," at one blow, immediately, or he would never return
+home, because he had no desire to live thus. How to finish? By what
+means? No matter how, and he did not want to think. He drove away any
+thoughts which disturbed him, and only clung to the necessity of
+ending all, "no matter how," said he, with desperate self-confidence
+and decision. By force of habit he took his old walk, and set out in
+the direction of the Haymarket. Farther on, he came on a young man who
+was grinding some very feeling ballads upon a barrel organ. Near the
+man, on the footpath, was a young girl of about fifteen years of age,
+fashionably dressed, with crinoline, mantle, and gloves, and a straw
+hat trimmed with gaudy feathers, but all old and terribly worn out,
+who, in a loud and cracked though not altogether unpleasing voice, was
+singing before a shop in expectation of a couple of kopecks.
+Raskolnikoff stopped and joined one or two listeners, took out a
+five-kopeck piece, and gave it to the girl. The latter at once stopped
+on a very high note which she had just reached, and cried to the man,
+"Come along," and both immediately moved on to another place.
+
+"Do you like street music?" said Raskolnikoff to a middle-aged man
+standing near him. The latter looked at him in surprise, but smiled.
+"I love it," continued Raskolnikoff, "especially when they sing to the
+organ on a cold, dark, gray winter's evening, when all the passers-by
+seem to have pale, green, sickly-looking faces--when the snow is
+falling like a sleet, straight down and with no wind, you know, and
+while the lamps shine on it all."
+
+"I don't know. Excuse me," said the man, frightened at the question
+and Raskolnikoff's strange appearance, and hastily withdrawing to the
+other side of the street.
+
+Raskolnikoff went on, and came to the place in the Haymarket where he
+had met the trader and his wife and Elizabeth. No one was there at the
+moment. He stopped, and turned to a young fellow, in a red shirt, who
+was gaping at the entrance to a flour shop.
+
+"A man trades here at this corner, with his wife, eh?"
+
+"Everyone trades here," replied the lad, scanning his questioner from
+head to foot.
+
+"What is he called?"
+
+"What he was christened."
+
+"But you belong to Zaraisk, don't you? To what Government?"
+
+The boy stared at Raskolnikoff. "We have no governor, your highness,
+but districts. I stay at home, and know nothing about it, but my
+brother does; so pardon me, your most mighty highness."
+
+"Is that an eating house there?"
+
+"That's a dram shop; they have a billiard table."
+
+"There are newspapers here?" asked he, as he entered a room--one of a
+suite--rather empty. Two or three persons sat with tea before them,
+while in a farther room a group of men were seated, drinking
+champagne. Raskolnikoff thought he recognized Zametoff among them, but
+he could not be sure. "Never mind, if it is!" he muttered.
+
+"Brandy, sir?" asked the waiter.
+
+"No, tea; and bring me some newspapers--for about the last five days.
+I'll give you a drink."
+
+The papers and the tea appeared. Raskolnikoff sat and searched, and,
+at last, found what he wanted. "Ah, here it is!" he cried, as he began
+to read. The words danced before his eyes, but he read greedily to the
+end, and turned to others for later intelligence. His hands trembled
+with impatience, and the sheets shook again. Suddenly some one sat
+down near him. He looked up, and there was Zametoff--that same
+Zametoff, with his rings and chain, his oiled locks and fancy
+waistcoat and unclean linen. He seemed pleased, and his tanned face, a
+little inflamed by the champagne, wore a smile.
+
+"Ah! you here?" he commenced, in a tone as if he had known
+Raskolnikoff for an age. "Why Razoumikhin told me yesterday that you
+were lying unconscious. How strange! Then I was at your place----"
+
+Raskolnikoff laid down the paper and turned to Zametoff. On his lips
+was a slight provoking smile. "I know you were," he replied, "I heard
+so. You searched for my boot. To what agreeable places you resort. Who
+gives you champagne to drink?"
+
+"We were drinking together. What do you mean?"
+
+"Nothing, dear boy, nothing," said Raskolnikoff, with a smile and
+slapping Zametoff on the shoulders. "I am not in earnest, but simply
+in fun, as your workman said, when he wrestled with Dmitri, you know,
+in that murder case."
+
+"Do you know about that?"
+
+"Yes, and perhaps more than you do."
+
+"You are very peculiar. It is a pity you came out. You are ill."
+
+"Do I seem strange?"
+
+"Yes; what are you reading?"
+
+"The paper."
+
+"There are a number of fires."
+
+"I am not reading about them." He looked curiously at Zametoff, and a
+malicious smile distorted his lips. "No, fires are not in my line," he
+added, winking at Zametoff. "Now, I should like to know, sweet youth,
+what it signifies to you what I read?"
+
+"Nothing at all. I only asked. Perhaps I----"
+
+"Listen. You are a cultivated man--a literary man, are you not?"
+
+"I was in the sixth class at college," Zametoff answered, with a
+certain amount of dignity.
+
+"The sixth! Oh, my fine fellow! With rings and a chain--a rich man!
+You are a dear boy," and Raskolnikoff gave a short, nervous laugh,
+right in the face of Zametoff. The latter was very much taken aback,
+and, if not offended, seemed a good deal surprised.
+
+"How strange you are!" said Zametoff seriously. "You have the fever
+still on you; you are raving!"
+
+"Am I, my fine fellow--am I strange? Yes, but I am very interesting to
+you, am I not?"
+
+"Interesting?"
+
+"Yes. You ask me what I am reading, what I am looking for; then I am
+looking through a number of papers. Suspicious, isn't it? Well, I will
+explain to you, or rather confess--no, not that exactly. I will give
+testimony, and you shall take it down--that's it. So then, I swear
+that I was reading, and came here on purpose"--Raskolnikoff blinked
+his eyes and paused--"to read an account of the murder of the old
+woman." He finished almost in a whisper, eagerly watching Zametoff's
+face. The latter returned his glances without flinching. And it
+appeared strange to Zametoff that a full minute seemed to pass as they
+kept fixedly staring at each other in this manner.
+
+"Oh, so that's what you have been reading?" Zametoff at last cried
+impatiently. "What is there in that?" "She is the same woman,"
+continued Raskolnikoff, still in a whisper, and taking no notice of
+Zametoff's remark, "the very same woman you were talking about when I
+swooned in your office. You recollect--you surely recollect?"
+
+"Recollect what?" said Zametoff, almost alarmed.
+
+The serious expression on Raskolnikoff's face altered in an instant,
+and he again commenced his nervous laugh, and laughed as if he were
+quite unable to contain himself. There had recurred to his mind, with
+fearful clearness, the moment when he stood at the door with the
+hatchet in his hand. There he was, holding the bolt, and they were
+tugging and thumping away at the door. Oh, how he itched to shriek at
+them, open the door, thrust out his tongue at them, and frighten them
+away, and then laugh, "Ah, ah, ah, ah!"
+
+"You are insane, or else--" said Zametoff, and then paused as if a new
+thought had suddenly struck him.
+
+"Or what, or what? Now what? Tell me!"
+
+"Nonsense!" said Zametoff to himself, "it can't be." Both became
+silent. After this unexpected and fitful outburst of laughter,
+Raskolnikoff had become lost in thought and looked very sad. He leaned
+on the table with his elbows, buried his head in his hands, and seemed
+to have quite forgotten Zametoff. The silence continued a long time.
+"You do not drink your tea; it is getting cold," said the latter, at
+last.
+
+"What? Tea? Yes!" Raskolnikoff snatched at his glass, put a piece of
+bread in his mouth, and then, after looking at Zametoff, seemingly
+recollected and roused himself. His face at once resumed its previous
+smile, and he continued to sip his tea.
+
+"What a number of rogues there are about," Zametoff said. "I read not
+long ago, in the Moscow papers, that they had captured a whole gang of
+forgers in that city. Quite a colony."
+
+"That's old news. I read it a month ago," replied Raskolnikoff in a
+careless manner. "And you call such as these rogues?" he added,
+smiling.
+
+"Why not?"
+
+"Rogues indeed! Why, they are only children and babies. Fifty banded
+together for such purposes! Is it possible? Three would be quite
+sufficient, and then they should be sure of one another--not babble
+over their cups. The babies! Then to hire unreliable people to change
+the notes at the money changers', persons whose hands tremble as they
+receive the rubles. On such their lives depend! Far better to strangle
+yourself! The man goes in, receives the change, counts some over, the
+last portion he takes on faith, stuffs all in his pocket, rushes away
+and the murder is out. All is lost by one foolish man. Is it not
+ridiculous?"
+
+"That his hands should shake?" replied Zametoff. "No; that is quite
+likely. Yours would not, I suppose? I could not endure it, though. For
+a paltry reward of a hundred rubles to go on such a mission! And
+where? Into a banker's office with forged notes! I should certainly
+lose my head. Would not you?"
+
+Raskolnikoff felt again a strong impulse to make a face at him. A
+shiver ran down his back. "You would not catch me acting so
+foolishly," he commenced. "This is how I should do. I should count
+over the first thousand very carefully, perhaps four times, right to
+the end, carefully examine each note, and then only pass to the second
+thousand, count these as far as the middle of the bundle, take out a
+note, hold it to the light, turn it over, then hold it to the light
+again, and say, 'I fear this is a bad note,' and then begin to relate
+some story about a lost note. Then there would be a third thousand to
+count. Not yet, please, there is a mistake in the second thousand. No,
+it is correct. And so I should proceed until I had received all. At
+last I should turn to go, open the door, but, no, pardon me! I should
+return, ask some question, receive some explanation, and there it is
+all done."
+
+"What funny things you do say!" said Zametoff with a smile. "You are
+all very well theoretically, but try it and see. Look, for example, at
+the murder of the money lender, a case in point. There was a desperate
+villain who in broad daylight stopped at nothing, and yet his hand
+shook, did it not?--and he could not finish, and left all the spoil
+behind him. The deed evidently robbed him of his presence of mind."
+
+This language nettled Raskolnikoff. "You think so? Then lay your hand
+upon him," said he, maliciously delighted to tease him.
+
+"Never fear but we shall!"
+
+"You? Go to, you know nothing about it. All you think of inquiring is
+whether a man is flinging money about; he is--then, _ergo_ he is
+guilty."
+
+"That is exactly what they do," replied Zametoff, "they murder, risk
+their lives, and then rush to the public house and are caught. Their
+lavishness betrays them. You see they are not all so crafty as you
+are. You would not run there, I suppose?"
+
+Raskolnikoff frowned and looked steadily at Zametoff. "You seem
+anxious to know how I should act," he said with some displeasure.
+
+"I should very much like to know," replied Zametoff in a serious tone.
+He seemed, indeed, very anxious.
+
+"Very much?"
+
+"Very much."
+
+"Good. This would be my plan," Raskolnikoff said, as he again bent
+near to the face of his listener, and speaking in such a tragic
+whisper as almost to make the latter shudder. "I should take the money
+and all I could find, and make off, going, however, in no particular
+direction, but on and on until I came to some obscure and inclosed
+place, where no one was about--a market garden, or any such-like spot.
+I should then look about me for a stone, perhaps a pound and a half in
+weight, lying, it may be, in a corner against a partition, say a stone
+used for building purposes; this I should lift up and under it there
+would be a hole. In that hole I should deposit all the things I had
+got, roll back the stone, stamp it down with my feet, and be off. For
+a year I should let them lie--for two years, three years. Now then,
+search for them! Where are they?"
+
+"You are indeed mad," said Zametoff, also in a low tone, but turning
+away from Raskolnikoff. The latter's eyes glistened, he became paler
+than ever, while his upper lip trembled violently. He placed his face
+closer, if possible, to that of Zametoff, his lips moving as if he
+wished to speak, but no words escaped them--several moments
+elapsed--Raskolnikoff knew what he was doing, but felt utterly unable
+to control himself, that strange impulse was upon him as when he stood
+at the bolted door, to come forth and let all be known.
+
+"What if I killed the old woman and Elizabeth?" he asked suddenly, and
+then--came to himself.
+
+Zametoff turned quite pale; then his face changed to a smile. "Can it
+be so?" he muttered to himself.
+
+Raskolnikoff eyed him savagely. "Speak out. What do you think? Yes? Is
+it so?"
+
+"Of course not. I believe it now less than ever," replied Zametoff
+hastily.
+
+"Caught at last! caught, my fine fellow! What people believe less than
+ever, they must have believed once, eh?"
+
+"Not at all. You frightened me into the supposition," said Zametoff,
+visibly confused.
+
+"So you do not think this? Then why those questions in the office? Why
+did the lieutenant question me after my swoon? Waiter," he cried,
+seizing his cap, "here, how much?"
+
+"Thirty kopecks, sir," replied the man.
+
+"There you are, and twenty for yourself. Look, what a lot of money!"
+turning to Zametoff and thrusting forth his shaking hand filled with
+the twenty-five rubles, red and blue notes. "Whence comes all this?
+Where did I obtain these new clothes from? You know I had none. You
+have asked the landlady, I suppose? Well, no matter!--Enough! Adieu,
+most affectionately."
+
+He went out, shaking from some savage hysterical emotion, a mixture of
+delight, gloom, and weariness. His face was drawn as if he had just
+recovered from a fit; and, as his agitation of mind increased, so did
+his weakness.
+
+Meanwhile, Zametoff remained in the restaurant where Raskolnikoff had
+left him, deeply buried in thought, considering the different points
+Raskolnikoff had placed before him.
+
+His heart was empty and depressed, and he strove again to drive off
+thought. No feeling of anguish came, neither was there any trace of
+that fierce energy which moved him when he left the house to "put an
+end to it all."
+
+"What will be the end of it? The result lies in my own will. What kind
+of end? Ah, we are all alike, and accept the bit of ground for our
+feet and live. Must this be the end? Shall I say the word or not? Oh,
+how weary I feel! Oh, to lie down or sit anywhere! How foolish it is
+to strive against my illness! Bah! What thoughts run through my
+brain!" Thus he meditated as he went drowsily along the banks of the
+canal, until, turning to the right and then to the left, he reached
+the office building. He stopped short, however, and, turning down a
+lane, went on past two other streets, with no fixed purpose, simply,
+no doubt, to give himself a few moments longer for reflection. He went
+on, his eyes fixed on the ground, until all of a sudden he started, as
+if some one had whispered in his ear. Raising his eyes he saw that he
+stood before _the house_, at its very gates.
+
+Quick as lightning, an idea rushed into his head, and he marched
+through the yard and made his way up the well-known staircase to the
+fourth story. It was, as usual, very dark, and as he reached each
+landing he peered almost with caution. There was the room newly
+painted, where Dmitri and Mikola had worked. He reached the fourth
+landing and he paused before the murdered woman's room in doubt. The
+door was wide open and he could hear voices within; this he had not
+anticipated. However, after wavering a little, he went straight in.
+The room was being done up, and in it were some workmen. This
+astonished him--indeed, it would seem he had expected to find
+everything as he had left it, even to the dead bodies lying on the
+floor. But to see the place with bare walls and bereft of furniture
+was very strange! He walked up to the windows and sat on the sill. One
+of the workmen now saw him and cried:
+
+"What do you want here?"
+
+Instead of replying, Raskolnikoff walked to the outer door and,
+standing outside, began to pull at the bell. Yes, that was the bell,
+with its harsh sound. He pulled again and again three times, and
+remained there listening and thinking.
+
+"What is it you want?" again cried the workman as he went out to
+Raskolnikoff.
+
+"I wish to hire some rooms. I came to look at these."
+
+"People don't take lodgings in the night. Why don't you apply to the
+porter?"
+
+"The floor has been washed. Are you going to paint it?" remarked
+Raskolnikoff. "Where is the blood?"
+
+"What blood?"
+
+"The old woman's and her sister's. There was quite a pool."
+
+"Who are you?" cried the workman uneasily.
+
+"I am Rodion Romanovitch Raskolnikoff, ex-student. I live at the
+house Schilla, in a lane not far from here, No. 14. Ask the porter
+there--he knows me," Raskolnikoff replied indifferently, without
+turning to his questioner.
+
+"What were you doing in those rooms?"
+
+"Looking at them."
+
+"What for? Come, out you go then, if you won't explain yourself,"
+suddenly shouted the porter, a huge fellow in a smock frock, with a
+large bunch of keys round his waist; and he caught Raskolnikoff by the
+shoulder and pitched him into the street. The latter lurched forward,
+but recovered himself, and, giving one look at the spectators, went
+quietly away.
+
+"What shall I do now?" thought Raskolnikoff. He was standing on the
+bridge, near a crossing, and was looking around him as if expecting
+some one to speak. But no one spoke, and all was dark and dull, and
+dead--at least to him, and him alone.
+
+A few days later, Raskolnikoff heard from his friend Razoumikhin that
+those who had borrowed money from Alena Ivanovna were going to the
+police office to redeem their pledges. He went with Razoumikhin to the
+office where they were received by Porphyrius Petrovitch, the
+examining magistrate, who seemed to have expected them.
+
+"You have been expecting this visit? But how did you know that he had
+pledged anything with Alena Ivanovna?" cried Razoumikhin.
+
+Porphyrius Petrovitch, without any further reply, said to
+Raskolnikoff: "Your things, a ring and a watch, were at her place,
+wrapped up in a piece of paper, and on this paper your name was
+legibly written in pencil, with the date of the day she had received
+these things from you."
+
+"What a memory you must have got!" said Raskolnikoff, with a forced
+smile, doing his best to look the magistrate unflinchingly in the
+face. However, he could not help adding: "I say so, because, as the
+owners of the pledged articles are no doubt very numerous, you must, I
+should fancy, have some difficulty in remembering them all; but I see,
+on the contrary, that you do nothing of the kind. (Oh! fool! why add
+that?)"
+
+"But they have nearly all of them come here; you alone had not done
+so," answered Porphyrius, with an almost imperceptible sneer.
+
+"I happened to be rather unwell."
+
+"So I heard. I have been told that you have been in great pain. Even
+now you are pale."
+
+"Not at all. I am not pale. On the contrary, I am very well!" answered
+Raskolnikoff in a tone of voice which had all at once become brutal
+and violent. He felt rising within him uncontrollable anger. "Anger
+will make me say some foolish thing," he thought. "But why do they
+exasperate me?"
+
+"He was rather unwell! A pretty expression, to be sure!" exclaimed
+Razoumikhin. "The fact is that up to yesterday he has been almost
+unconscious. Would you believe it, Porphyrius? Yesterday, when he
+could hardly stand upright, he seized the moment when we had just left
+him, to dress, to be off by stealth, and to go loafing about, Heaven
+only knows where, till midnight, being, all the time, in a completely
+raving condition. Can you imagine such a thing? It is a most
+remarkable case!"
+
+"Indeed! In a completely raving state?" remarked Porphyrius, with the
+toss of the head peculiar to Russian rustics.
+
+"Absurd! Don't you believe a word of it! Besides, I need not urge you
+to that effect--of course you are convinced," observed Raskolnikoff,
+beside himself with passion. But Porphyrius Petrovitch did not seem to
+hear these singular words.
+
+"How could you have gone out if you had not been delirious?" asked
+Razoumikhin, getting angry in his turn. "Why have gone out at all?
+What was the object of it? And, above all, to go in that secret
+manner? Come, now, make a clean breast of it--you know you were out of
+your mind, were you not? Now that danger is gone by, I tell you so to
+your face."
+
+"I had been very much annoyed yesterday," said Raskolnikoff,
+addressing the magistrate, with more or less of insolence in his
+smile, "and, wishing to get rid of them, I went out to hire lodgings
+where I could be sure of privacy, to effect which I had taken a
+certain amount of money. Mr. Zametoff saw what I had by me, and
+perhaps he can say whether I was in my right senses yesterday or
+whether I was delirious? Perhaps he will judge as to our quarrel."
+Nothing would have pleased him better than there and then to have
+strangled that gentleman, whose taciturnity and equivocal facial
+expression irritated him.
+
+"In my opinion, you were talking very sensibly and even with
+considerable shrewdness; only I thought you too irritable," observed
+Zametoff off-handedly.
+
+"Do let us have some tea! We are as dry as fishes!" exclaimed
+Razoumikhin.
+
+"Good idea! But perhaps you would like something more substantial
+before tea, would you?"
+
+"Look alive, then!"
+
+Porphyrius Petrovitch went out to order tea. All kinds of thoughts
+were at work in Raskolnikoff's brain. He was excited. "They don't even
+take pains to dissemble; they certainly don't mince matters as far as
+I am concerned: that is something, at all events! Since Porphyrius
+knew next to nothing about me, why on earth should he have spoken with
+Nicodemus Thomich Zametoff at all? They even scorn to deny that they
+are on my track, almost like a pack of hounds! They certainly speak
+out plainly enough!" he said, trembling with rage. "Well, do so, as
+bluntly as you like, but don't play with me as the cat would with the
+mouse! That's not quite civil, Porphyrius Petrovitch; I won't quite
+allow that yet! I'll make a stand and tell you some plain truths to
+your faces, and then you shall find out my real opinion about you!" He
+had some difficulty in breathing. "But supposing that all this is pure
+fancy?--a kind of mirage? Suppose I had misunderstood? Let me try and
+keep up my nasty part, and not commit myself, like the fool, by blind
+anger! Ought I to give them credit for intentions they have not? Their
+words are, in themselves, not very extraordinary ones--so much must be
+allowed; but a double meaning may lurk beneath them. Why did
+Porphyrius, in speaking of the old woman, simply say 'At her place?'
+Why did Zametoff observe that I had spoken very sensibly? Why their
+peculiar manner?--yes, it is this manner of theirs. How is it possible
+that all this cannot have struck Razoumikhin? The booby never notices
+anything! But I seem to be feverish again! Did Porphyrius give me a
+kind of wink just now, or was I deceived in some way? The idea is
+absurd! Why should he wink at me? Perhaps they intend to upset my
+nervous organization, and, by so doing, drive me to extremes! Either
+the whole thing is a phantasmagoria, or--they know!"
+
+These thoughts flashed through his mind with the rapidity of
+lightning. Porphyrius Petrovitch came back a moment afterwards. He
+seemed in a very good temper. "When I left your place yesterday, old
+fellow, I was really not well," he commenced, addressing Razoumikhin
+with a cheeriness which was only just becoming apparent, "but that is
+all gone now."
+
+"Did you find the evening a pleasant one? I left you in the thick of
+the fun; who came off best?"
+
+"Nobody, of course. They caviled to their heart's content over their
+old arguments."
+
+"Fancy, Rodia, the discussion last evening turned on the question:
+'Does crime exist? Yes, or No.' And the nonsense they talked on the
+subject!"
+
+"What is there extraordinary in the query? It is the social question
+without the charm of novelty," answered Raskolnikoff abruptly.
+
+"Talking of crime," said Porphyrius Petrovitch, speaking to
+Raskolnikoff, "I remember a production of yours which greatly
+interested me. I am speaking about your article _on crime_. I don't
+very well remember the title. I was delighted in reading it two months
+ago in the _Periodical Word."_
+
+"But how do you know the article was mine? I only signed it with an
+initial."
+
+"I discovered it lately, quite by chance. The chief editor is a friend
+of mine; it was he who let out the secret of your authorship. The
+article has greatly interested me."
+
+"I was analyzing, if I remember rightly, the psychological condition
+of a criminal at the moment of his deed."
+
+"Yes, and you strove to prove that a criminal, at such a moment, is
+always, mentally, more or less unhinged. That point of view is a very
+original one, but it was not this part of your article which most
+interested me. I was particularly struck by an idea at the end of the
+article, and which, unfortunately, you have touched upon too
+cursorily. In a word, if you remember, you maintained that there are
+men in existence who can, or more accurately, who have an absolute
+right to commit all kinds of wicked and criminal acts--men for whom,
+to a certain extent, laws do not exist."
+
+"Is it not very likely that some coming Napoleon did for Alena
+Ivanovna last week?" suddenly blustered Zametoff from his corner.
+
+Without saying a word, Raskolnikoff fixed on Porphyrius a firm and
+penetrating glance. Raskolnikoff was beginning to look sullen. He
+seemed to have been suspecting something for some time past. He looked
+round him with an irritable air. For a moment there was an ominous
+silence. Raskolnikoff was getting ready to go.
+
+"What, are you off already?" asked Porphyrius, kindly offering the
+young man his hand with extreme affability. "I am delighted to have
+made your acquaintance. And as for your application, don't be uneasy
+about it. Write in the way I suggested. Or, perhaps, you had better do
+this. Come and see me before long--to-morrow, if you like. I shall be
+here without fail at eleven o'clock. We can make everything
+right--we'll have a chat--and as you were one of the last that went
+_there_, you might be able to give some further particulars?" he
+added, with his friendly smile.
+
+"Do you wish to examine me formally?" Raskolnikoff inquired, in an
+uncomfortable tone.
+
+"Why should I? Such a thing is out of the question. You have
+misunderstood me. I ought to tell you that I manage to make the most
+of every opportunity. I have already had a chat with every single
+person that has been in the habit of pledging things with the old
+woman--several have given me very useful information--and as you
+happen to be the last one--By the by," he exclaimed, with sudden
+pleasure, "how lucky I am thinking about it, I was really going to
+forget it!" (Saying which he turned to Razoumikhin.) "You were almost
+stunning my ears, the other day, talking about Mikolka. Well, I am
+certain, quite certain, as to his innocence," he went on, once more
+addressing himself to Raskolnikoff. "But what was to be done? It has
+been necessary to disturb Dmitri. Now, what I wanted to ask was: On
+going upstairs--was it not between seven and eight you entered the
+house?"
+
+"Yes," replied Raskolnikoff, and he immediately regretted an answer he
+ought to have avoided.
+
+"Well, in going upstairs, between seven and eight, did you not see on
+the second floor, in one of the rooms, when the door was wide
+open--you remember, I dare say?--did you not see two painters, or, at
+all events, one of the two? They were whitewashing the room, I
+believe; you must have seen them! The matter is of the utmost
+importance to them!"
+
+"Painters, you say? I saw none," replied Raskolnikoff slowly, trying
+to sound his memory: for a moment he violently strained it to
+discover, as quickly as he could, the trap concealed by the
+magistrate's question. "No, I did not see a single one; I did not even
+see any room standing open," he went on, delighted at having
+discovered the trap, "but on the fourth floor I remember noticing that
+the man lodging on the same landing as Alena Ivanovna was in the act
+of moving. I remember that very well, as I met a few soldiers carrying
+a sofa, and I was obliged to back against the wall; but, as for
+painters, I don't remember seeing a single one--I don't even remember
+a room that had its door open. No, I saw nothing."
+
+"But what are you talking about?" all at once exclaimed Razoumikhin,
+who, till that moment, had attentively listened; "it was on the very
+day of the murder that painters were busy in that room, while he came
+there two days previously! Why are you asking that question?"
+
+"Right! I have confused the dates!" cried Porphyrius, tapping his
+forehead. "Deuce take me! That job makes me lose my head!" he added by
+way of excuse, and speaking to Raskolnikoff. "It is very important
+that we should know if anybody saw them in that room between seven and
+eight. I thought I might have got that information from you without
+thinking any more about it. I had positively confused the days!"
+
+"You ought to be more attentive!" grumbled Razoumikhin.
+
+These last words were uttered in the anteroom, as Porphyrius very
+civilly led his visitors to the door. They were gloomy and morose on
+leaving the house, and had gone some distance before speaking.
+Raskolnikoff breathed like a man who had just been subjected to a
+severe trial.
+
+When, on the following day, precisely at eleven o'clock, Raskolnikoff
+called on the examining magistrate, he was astonished to have to dance
+attendance for a considerable time. According to his idea, he ought to
+have been admitted immediately; ten minutes, however, elapsed before
+he could see Porphyrius Petrovitch. In the outer room where he had
+been waiting, people came and went without heeding him in the least.
+In the next room, which was a kind of office, a few clerks were at
+work, and it was evident that not one of them had even an idea who
+Raskolnikoff might be. The young man cast a mistrustful look about
+him. "Was there not," thought he, "some spy, some mysterious myrmidon
+of the law, ordered to watch him, and, if necessary, to prevent his
+escape?" But he noticed nothing of the kind; the clerks were all hard
+at work, and the other people paid him no kind of attention. The
+visitor began to become reassured. "If," thought he, "this mysterious
+personage of yesterday, this specter which had risen from the bowels
+of the earth, knew all, and had seen all, would they, I should like to
+know, let me stand about like this? Would they not rather have
+arrested me, instead of waiting till I should come of my own accord?
+Hence this man has either made no kind of revelation as yet about me,
+or, more probably, he knows nothing, and has seen nothing (besides how
+could he have seen anything?): consequently I have misjudged, and all
+that happened yesterday was nothing but an illusion of my diseased
+imagination." This explanation, which had offered itself the day
+before to his mind, at the time he felt most fearful, he considered a
+more likely one.
+
+Whilst thinking about all this and getting ready for a new struggle,
+Raskolnikoff suddenly perceived that he was trembling; he became
+indignant at the very thought that it was fear of an interview with
+the hateful Porphyrius Petrovitch which led him to do so. The most
+terrible thing to him was to find himself once again in presence of
+this man. He hated him beyond all expression, and what he dreaded was
+lest he might show this hatred. His indignation was so great that it
+suddenly stopped this trembling; he therefore prepared himself to
+enter with a calm and self-possessed air, promised himself to speak as
+little as possible, to be very carefully on the watch in order to
+check, above all things, his irascible disposition. In the midst of
+these reflections, he was introduced to Porphyrius Petrovitch. The
+latter was alone in his office, a room of medium dimensions,
+containing a large table, facing a sofa covered with shiny leather, a
+bureau, a cupboard standing in a corner, and a few chairs: all this
+furniture, provided by the State, was of yellow wood. In the wall, or
+rather in the wainscoting of the other end, there was a closed door,
+which led one to think that there were other rooms behind it. As soon
+as Porphyrius Petrovitch had seen Raskolnikoff enter his office, he
+went to close the door which had given him admission, and both stood
+facing one another. The magistrate received his visitor to all
+appearances in a pleasant and affable manner, and it was only at the
+expiration of a few moments that the latter observed the magistrate's
+somewhat embarrassed manner--he seemed to have been disturbed in a
+more or less clandestine occupation.
+
+"Good! my respectable friend! Here you are then--in our latitudes!"
+commenced Porphyrius, holding out both hands. "Pray, be seated,
+_batuchka_! But, perhaps, you don't like being called respectable?
+Therefore, _batuchka_, for short! Pray, don't think me familiar. Sit
+down here on the sofa."
+
+Raskolnikoff did so without taking his eyes off the judge. "These
+words 'in our latitudes,' these excuses for his familiarity, this
+expression 'for short,' what could be the meaning of all this? He held
+out his hands to me without shaking mine, withdrawing them before I
+could do so," thought Raskolnikoff mistrustfully. Both watched each
+other, but no sooner did their eyes meet than they both turned them
+aside with the rapidity of a flash of lightning.
+
+"I have called with this paper--about the---- If you please. Is it
+correct, or must another form be drawn up?" "What, what paper? Oh,
+yes! Do not put yourself out. It is perfectly correct," answered
+Porphyrius somewhat hurriedly, before he had even examined it; then,
+after having cast a glance on it, he said, speaking very rapidly:
+"Quite right, that is all that is required," and placed the sheet on
+the table. A moment later he locked it up in his bureau, chattering
+about other things.
+
+"Yesterday," observed Raskolnikoff, "you had, I fancy, a wish to
+examine me formally--with reference to my dealings with--the victim?
+At least so it seemed to me!"
+
+"Why did I say, 'So it seemed?'" reflected the young man all of a
+sudden. "After all, what can be the harm of it? Why should I distress
+myself about that!" he added, mentally, a moment afterwards. The very
+fact of his proximity to Porphyrius, with whom he had scarcely as yet
+interchanged a word, had immeasurably increased his mistrust; he
+marked this in a moment, and concluded that such a mood was an
+exceedingly dangerous one, inasmuch as his agitation, his nervous
+irritation, would only increase. "That is bad! very bad! I shall be
+saying something thoughtless!"
+
+"Quite right. But do not put yourself out of the way, there is time,
+plenty of time," murmured Petrovitch, who, without apparent design,
+kept going to and fro, now approaching the window, now his bureau, to
+return a moment afterwards to the table. At times he would avoid
+Raskolnikoff's suspicious look, at times again he drew up sharp whilst
+looking his visitor straight in the face. The sight of this short
+chubby man, whose movements recalled those of a ball rebounding from
+wall to wall, was an extremely odd one. "No hurry, no hurry, I assure
+you! But you smoke, do you not! Have you any tobacco? Here is a
+cigarette!" he went on, offering his visitor a paquitos. "You notice
+that I am receiving you here, but my quarters are there behind the
+wainscoting. The State provides me with that. I am here as it were on
+the wing, because certain alterations are being made in my rooms.
+Everything is almost straight now. Do you know that quarters provided
+by the State are by no means to be despised?"
+
+"I believe you," answered Raskolnikoff, looking at him almost
+derisively.
+
+"Not to be despised, by any means," repeated Porphyrius Petrovitch,
+whose mind seemed to be preoccupied with something else--"not to be
+despised!" he continued in a very loud tone of voice, and drawing
+himself up close to Raskolnikoff, whom he stared out of countenance.
+The incessant repetition of the statement that quarters provided by
+the State were by no means to be despised contrasted singularly, by
+its platitude, with the serious, profound, enigmatical look he now
+cast on his visitor.
+
+Raskolnikoff's anger grew in consequence; he could hardly help
+returning the magistrate's look with an imprudently scornful glance,
+"Is it true?" the latter commenced, with a complacently insolent air,
+"is it true that it is a judicial maxim, a maxim resorted to by all
+magistrates, to begin an interview about trifling things, or even,
+occasionally, about more serious matter, foreign to the main question
+however, with a view to embolden, to distract, or even to lull the
+suspicion of a person under examination, and then all of a sudden to
+crush him with the main question, just as you strike a man a blow
+straight between the eyes?"
+
+"Such a custom, I believe, is religiously observed in your profession,
+is it not?"
+
+"Then you are of opinion that when I spoke to you about quarters
+provided by the State, I did so----" Saying which, Porphyrius
+Petrovitch blinked, his face assumed for a moment an expression of
+roguish gayety, the wrinkles on his brow became smoothed, his small
+eyes grew smaller still, his features expanded, and, looking
+Raskolnikoff straight in the face, he burst out into a prolonged fit
+of nervous laughter, which shook him from head to foot. The young man,
+on his part, laughed likewise, with more or less of an effort,
+however, at sight of which Porphyrius's hilarity increased to such an
+extent that his face grew nearly crimson. At this Raskolnikoff
+experienced more or less aversion, which led him to forget all
+caution; he ceased laughing, knitting his brows, and, whilst
+Porphyrius gave way to his hilarity, which seemed a somewhat feigned
+one, he fixed on him a look of hatred. In truth, they were both off
+their guard. Porphyrius had, in fact, laughed at his visitor, who had
+taken this in bad part; whereas the former seemed to care but little
+about Raskolnikoff's displeasure. This circumstance gave the young man
+much matter for thought. He fancied that his visit had in no kind of
+way discomposed the magistrate; on the contrary, it was Raskolnikoff
+who had been caught in a trap, a snare, an ambush of some kind or
+other. The mine was, perhaps, already charged, and might burst at any
+moment.
+
+Anxious to get straight to the point, Raskolnikoff rose and took up
+his cap. "Porphyrius Petrovitch," he cried, in a resolute tone of
+voice, betraying more or less irritation, "yesterday you expressed the
+desire to subject me to a judicial examination." (He laid special
+stress on this last word.) "I have called at your bidding; if you have
+questions to put, do so: if not, allow me to withdraw. I can't afford
+to waste my time here, as I have other things to attend to. In a word,
+I must go to the funeral of the official who has been run over, and of
+whom you have heard speak," he added, regretting, however, the last
+part of his sentence. Then, with increasing anger, he went on: "Let me
+tell you that all this worries me! The thing is hanging over much too
+long. It is that mainly that has made me ill. In one word,"--he
+continued, his voice seeming more and more irritable, for he felt that
+the remark about his illness was yet more out of place than the
+previous one--"in one word, either be good enough to cross-examine me,
+or let me go this very moment. If you do question me, do so in the
+usual formal way; otherwise, I shall object. In the meanwhile, adieu,
+since we have nothing more to do with one another."
+
+"Good gracious! What can you be talking about? Question you about
+what?" replied the magistrate, immediately ceasing his laugh. "Don't,
+I beg, disturb yourself." He requested Raskolnikoff to sit down once
+more, continuing, nevertheless, his tramp about the room. "There is
+time, plenty of time. The matter is not of such importance after all.
+On the contrary, I am delighted at your visit--for as such do I take
+your call. As for my horrid way of laughing, _batuchka_, Rodion
+Romanovitch, I must apologize. I am a nervous man, and the shrewdness
+of your observations has tickled me. There are times when I go up and
+down like an elastic ball, and that for half an hour at a time. I am
+fond of laughter. My temperament leads me to dread apoplexy. But,
+pray, do sit down--why remain standing? Do, I must request you,
+_batuchka_; otherwise I shall fancy that you are cross."
+
+His brows still knit, Raskolnikoff held his tongue, listened, and
+watched. In the meanwhile he sat down.
+
+"As far as I am concerned, _batuchka_, Rodion Romanovitch, I will tell
+you something which shall reveal to you my disposition," answered
+Porphyrius Petrovitch, continuing to fidget about the room, and, as
+before, avoiding his visitor's gaze. "I live alone, you must know,
+never go into society, and am, therefore, unknown; add to which, that
+I am a man on the shady side of forty, somewhat played out. You may
+have noticed, Rodion Romanovitch, that here--I mean in Russia, of
+course, and especially in St. Petersburg circles--that when two
+intelligent men happen to meet who, as yet, are not familiar, but who,
+however, have mutual esteem--as, for instance, you and I have at this
+moment--don't know what to talk about for half an hour at a time. They
+seem, both of them, as if petrified. Everyone else has a subject for
+conversation--ladies, for instance, people in society, the upper
+ten--all these sets have some topic or other. It is the thing, but
+somehow people of the middle-class, like you and I, seem constrained
+and taciturn. How does that come about, _batuchka_? Have we no social
+interests? Or is it, rather, owing to our being too straightforward to
+mislead one another? I don't know. What is your opinion, pray? But do,
+I beg, remove your cap; one would really fancy that you wanted to be
+off, and that pains me. I, you must know, am so contented."
+
+Raskolnikoff laid his cap down. He did not, however, become more
+loquacious; and, with knit brows, listened to Porphyrius's idle
+chatter. "I suppose," thought he, "he only doles out his small talk to
+distract my attention."
+
+"I don't offer you any coffee," went on the inexhaustible Porphyrius,
+"because this is not the place for it, but can you not spend a few
+minutes with a friend, by way of causing him some little distraction?
+You must know that all these professional obligations--don't be vexed,
+_batuchka_, if you see me walking about like this, I am sure you will
+excuse me, if I tell you how anxious I am not to do so, but movement
+is so indispensable to me! I am always seated--and, to me, it is quite
+a luxury to be able to move about for a minute or two. I purpose, in
+fact, to go through a course of calisthenics. The trapeze is said to
+stand in high favor amongst State counselors--counselors in office,
+even amongst privy counselors. Nowadays, in fact, gymnastics have
+become a positive science. As for these duties of our office, these
+examinations, all this formality--you yourself, you will remember,
+touched upon the topic just now, _batuchka_--these examinations, and
+so forth, sometimes perplex the magistrate much more than the man
+under suspicion. You said as much just now with as much sense as
+accuracy." (Raskolnikoff had made no statement of the kind.) "One gets
+confused, one loses the thread of the investigation. Yet, as far as
+our judicial customs go, I agree with you fully. Where, for instance,
+is there a man under suspicion of some kind or other, were it even the
+most thick-headed moujik, who does not know that the magistrate will
+commence by putting all sorts of out-of-the-way questions to take him
+off the scent (if I may be allowed to use your happy simile), and that
+then he suddenly gives him one between the eyes? A blow of the ax on
+his sinciput (if again I may be permitted to use your ingenious
+metaphor)? Hah, hah! And do you mean to say that when I spoke to you
+about quarters provided by the State, that--hah, hah! You are very
+caustic. But I won't revert to that again. By-and-by!--one remark
+produces another, one thought attracts another--but you were talking
+just now of the practice or form in vogue with the examining
+magistrate. But what is this form? You know as I do that in many cases
+the form means nothing at all. Occasionally a simple conversation, a
+friendly interview, brings about a more certain result. The practice
+or form will never die out--I can vouch for that; but what, after all,
+is the form, I ask once more? You can't compel an examining magistrate
+to be hampered or bound by it everlastingly. His duty or method is, in
+its way, one of the liberal professions or something very much like
+it."
+
+Porphyrius Petrovitch stopped a moment to take breath. He kept on
+talking, now uttering pure nonsense, now again introducing, in spite
+of this trash, an occasional enigmatical remark, after which he went
+on with his insipidities. His tramp about the room was more like a
+race--he moved his stout legs more and more quickly, without looking
+up; his right hand was thrust deep in the pocket of his coat, whilst
+with the left he unceasingly gesticulated in a way unconnected with
+his observations. Raskolnikoff noticed, or fancied he noticed, that,
+whilst running round and round the room, he had twice stopped near the
+door, seeming to listen. "Does he expect something?" he asked himself.
+
+"You're perfectly right," resumed Porphyrius cheerily, whilst looking
+at the young man with a kindliness which immediately awoke the
+latter's distrust. "Our judicial customs deserve your satire. Our
+proceedings, which are supposed to be inspired by a profound knowledge
+of psychology, are very ridiculous ones, and very often useless. Now,
+to return to our method or form: Suppose for a moment that I am
+deputed to investigate something or other, and that I know the guilty
+person to be a certain gentleman. Are you not yourself reading for the
+law, Rodion Romanovitch?"
+
+"I was some time ago."
+
+"Well, here is a kind of example which may be of use to you later on.
+Don't run away with the idea that I am setting up as your
+instructor--God forbid that I should presume to teach anything to a
+man who treats criminal questions in the public press! Oh, no!--all I
+am doing is to quote to you, by way of example, a trifling fact.
+Suppose that I fancy I am convinced of the guilt of a certain man,
+why, I ask you, should I frighten him prematurely, assuming me to have
+every evidence against him? Of course, in the case of another man of a
+different disposition, him I would have arrested forthwith; but, as to
+the former, why should I not permit him to hang about a little longer?
+I see you do not quite take me. I will, therefore, endeavor to explain
+myself more clearly! If, for instance, I should be too quick in
+issuing a writ, I provide him in doing so with a species of moral
+support or mainstay--I see you are laughing?" (Raskolnikoff, on the
+contrary, had no such desire; his lips were set, and his glaring look
+was not removed from Porphyrius's eyes.) "I assure you that in actual
+practice such is really the case; men vary much, although,
+unfortunately, our methods are the same for all. But you will ask me:
+Supposing you are certain of your proofs? Goodness me, _batuchka_! you
+know, perhaps as well as I do, what proofs are--half one's time,
+proofs may be taken either way; and I, a magistrate, am, after all,
+only a man liable to error.
+
+"Now, what I want is to give to my investigation the precision of a
+mathematical demonstration--I want my conclusions to be as plain, as
+indisputable, as that twice two are four. Now, supposing I have this
+gentleman arrested prematurely, though I may be positively certain
+that he is _the man,_ yet I deprive myself of all future means of
+proving his guilt. How is that? Because, so to say, I give him, to a
+certain extent, a definite status; for, by putting him in prison, I
+pacify him. I give him the chance of investigating his actual state of
+mind--he will escape me, for he will reflect. In a word, he knows that
+he is a prisoner, and nothing more. If, on the contrary, I take no
+kind of notice of the man I fancy guilty, if I do not have him
+arrested, if I in no way set him on his guard--but if the unfortunate
+creature is hourly, momentarily, possessed by the suspicion that I
+know all, that I do not lose sight of him either by night or by day,
+that he is the object of my indefatigable vigilance--what do you ask
+will take place under these circumstances? He will lose his
+self-possession, he will come of his own accord to me, he will provide
+me with ample evidence against himself, and will enable me to give to
+the conclusion of my inquiry the accuracy of mathematical proofs,
+which is not without its charm.
+
+"If such a course succeeds with an uncultured moujik, it is equally
+efficacious when it concerns an enlightened, intelligent, or even
+distinguished man. For the main thing, my dear friend, is to determine
+in what sense a man is developed. The man, I mean, is intelligent, but
+he has nerves which are _over_-strung. And as for bile--the bile you
+are forgetting, that plays no small part with similar folk! Believe
+me, here we have a very mine of information! And what is it to me
+whether such a man walk about the place in perfect liberty? Let him be
+at ease--I know him to be my prey, and that he won't escape me! Where,
+I ask you, could he go to? You may say abroad. A Pole may do so--but
+my man, never! especially as I watch him, and have taken steps in
+consequence. Is he likely to escape into the very heart of our
+country? Not he! for there dwell coarse moujiks, and primitive
+Russians, without any kind of civilization. My educated friend would
+prefer going to prison, rather than be in the midst of such
+surroundings. Besides, what I have been saying up to the present is
+not the main point--it is the exterior and accessory aspect of the
+question. He won't escape--not only because he won't know where to go
+to, but especially, and above all, because he is mine from the
+_psychological_ point of view. What do you think of this explanation?
+In virtue of a natural law, he will not escape, even if he could do
+so! Have you ever seen a butterfly close to the candle? My man will
+hover incessantly round me in the same way as the butterfly gyrates
+round the candle-light. Liberty will have no longer charms for him; he
+will grow more and more restless, more and more amazed--let me but
+give him plenty of time, and he will demean himself in a way to prove
+his guilt as plainly as that twice two our four! Yes, he will keep
+hovering about me, describing circles, smaller and smaller, till at
+last--bang! He has flown into my clutches, and I have got him. That is
+very nice. You don't think so, perhaps?"
+
+Raskolnikoff kept silent. Pale and immovable, he continued to watch
+Porphyrius's face with a labored effort of attention. "The lesson is a
+good one!" he reflected. "But it is not, as yesterday, a case of the
+cat playing with the mouse. Of course, he does not talk to me in this
+way for the mere pleasure of showing me his hand; he is much too
+intelligent for that. He must have something else in view--what can it
+be? Come, friend, what you do say is only to frighten me. You have no
+kind of evidence, and the man of yesterday does not exist! All you
+wish is to perplex me--to enrage me, so as to enable you to make your
+last move, should you catch me in such a mood, but you will not; all
+your pains will be in vain! But why should he speak in such covert
+terms? I presume he must be speculating on the excitability of my
+nervous system. But, dear friend, that won't go down, in spite of your
+machinations. We will try and find out what you really have been
+driving at."
+
+And he prepared to brave boldly the terrible catastrophe he
+anticipated. Occasionally the desire came upon him to rush on
+Porphyrius, and to strangle him there and then. From the first moment
+of having entered the magistrate's office what he had dreaded most
+was, lest he might lose his temper. He felt his heart beating
+violently, his lips become parched, his spittle congealed. He
+resolved, however, to hold his tongue, knowing that, under the
+circumstances, such would be the best tactics. By similar means, he
+felt sure that he would not only not become compromised, but that he
+might succeed in exasperating his enemy, in order to let him drop some
+imprudent observation. This, at all events, was Raskolnikoff's hope.
+
+"I see you don't believe, you think I am jesting," continued
+Porphyrius, more and more at his ease, without ceasing to indulge in
+his little laugh, whilst continuing his perambulation about the room.
+"You may be right. God has given me a face which only arouses comical
+thoughts in others. I'm a buffoon. But excuse an old man's cackle.
+You, Rodion Romanovitch, you are in your prime, and, like all young
+people, you appreciate, above all things, human intelligence.
+Intellectual smartness and abstract rational deductions entice you.
+But, to return to the _special case_ we were talking about just now. I
+must tell you that we have to deal with reality, with nature. This is
+a very important thing, and how admirably does she often foil the
+highest skill! Listen to an old man; I am speaking quite seriously,
+Rodion"--(on saying which Porphyrius Petrovitch, who was hardly
+thirty-five years of age, seemed all of a sudden to have aged, a
+sudden metamorphosis had taken place in the whole of his person, nay,
+in his very voice)--"to an old man who, however, is not wanting in
+candor. Am I or am I not candid? What do you think? It seems to me
+that a man could hardly be more so--for do I not reveal confidence,
+and that without the prospect of reward? But, to continue, acuteness
+of mind is, in my opinion, a very fine thing; it is to all intents and
+purposes an ornament of nature, one of the consolations of life by
+means of which it would appear a poor magistrate can be easily gulled,
+who, after all, is often misled by his own imagination, for he is only
+human. But nature comes to the aid of this human magistrate! There's
+the rub! And youth, so confident in its own intelligence, youth which
+tramples under foot every obstacle, forgets this!
+
+"Now, in the _special case_ under consideration, the guilty man, I
+will assume, lies hard and fast, but, when he fancies that all that is
+left him will be to reap the reward of his mendacity, behold, he will
+succumb in the very place where such an accident is likely to be most
+closely analyzed. Assuming even that he may be in a position to
+account for his syncope by illness or the stifling atmosphere of the
+locality, he has none the less given rise to suspicion! He has lied
+incomparably, but he has counted without nature. Here is the pitfall!
+Again, a man off his guard, from an unwary disposition, may delight in
+mystifying another who suspects him, and may wantonly pretend to be
+the very criminal wanted by the authorities; in such a case, he will
+represent the person in question a little too closely, he will place
+his foot a little too naturally. Here we have another token. For the
+nonce his interlocutor may be duped; but, being no fool, he will on
+the morrow have seen through the subterfuge. Then will our friend
+become compromised more and more! He will come of his own accord when
+he is not even called, he will use all kinds of impudent words,
+remarks, allegories, the meaning of which will be clear to everybody;
+he will even go so far as to come and ask why he has not been arrested
+as yet--hah! hah! And such a line of conduct may occur to a person of
+keen intellect, yes, even to a man of psychologic mind! Nature, my
+friend, is the most transparent of mirrors. To contemplate her is
+sufficient. But why do you grow pale, Rodion Romanovitch? Perhaps you
+are too hot; shall I open the window?"
+
+"By no means, I beg!" cried Raskolnikoff, bursting out laughing.
+"Don't heed me, pray!" Porphyrius stopped short, waited a moment, and
+burst out laughing himself. Raskolnikoff, whose hilarity had suddenly
+died out, rose. "Porphyrius Petrovitch," he shouted in a clear and
+loud voice, although he could scarcely stand on his trembling legs, "I
+can no longer doubt that you suspect me of having assassinated this
+old woman as well as her sister, Elizabeth. Let me tell you that for
+some time I have had enough of this. If you think you have the right
+to hunt me down, to have me arrested, hunt me down, have me arrested.
+But you shall not trifle with me, you shall not torture me." Suddenly
+his lips quivered, his eyes gleamed, and his voice, which up to that
+moment had been self-possessed, reached its highest diapason. "I will
+not permit it," he yelled hoarsely, whilst striking a violent blow on
+the table. "Do you hear me, Porphyrius Petrovitch, I shall not permit
+this!"
+
+"But, goodness gracious! what on earth is wrong with you?" asked the
+magistrate, disturbed to all appearances. "_Batuchka_! Rodion
+Romanovitch! My good friend! What on earth is the matter with you?"
+
+"I will not permit it!" repeated Raskolnikoff once again.
+
+"_Batuchka!_ not so loud, I must request! Someone will hear you,
+someone may come; and then, what shall we say? Just reflect one
+moment!" murmured Porphyrius Petrovitch, whose face had approached
+that of his visitor.
+
+"I will not permit it, I will not permit it!" mechanically pursued
+Raskolnikoff, but in a minor key, so as to be heard by Porphyrius
+only.
+
+The latter moved away to open the window. "Let us air the room!
+Supposing you were to drink some water, dear friend? You have had a
+slight fit!" He was on the point of going to the door to give his
+orders to a servant, when he saw a water bottle in a corner. "Drink,
+_batuchka_!" he murmured, whilst approaching the young man with the
+bottle, "that may do you some good."
+
+Porphyrius's fright seemed so natural that Raskolnikoff remained
+silent whilst examining him with curiosity. He refused, however, the
+proffered water.
+
+"Rodion Romanovitch! My dear friend! If you go on in this way, you
+will go mad, I am positive! Drink, pray, if only a few drops!" He
+almost forced the glass of water into his hand. Raskolnikoff raised it
+mechanically to his lips, when suddenly he thought better of it, and
+replaced it on the table with disgust. "Yes, yes, you have had a
+slight fit. One or two more, my friend, and you will have another
+attack of your malady," observed the magistrate in the kindest tone of
+voice, appearing greatly agitated. "Is it possible that people can
+take so little care of themselves? It was the same with Dmitri
+Prokofitch, who called here yesterday. I admit mine to be a caustic
+temperament, that mine is a horrid disposition, but that such a
+meaning could possibly be attributed to harmless remarks. He called
+here yesterday, when you had gone, and in the course of dinner he
+talked, talked. You had sent him, had you not? But do sit down,
+_batuchka!_ do sit down, for heaven's sake!"
+
+"I did not indeed!--although I knew that he had called, and his object
+in doing so!" replied Raskolnikoff dryly.
+
+"Did you really know why?"
+
+"I did. And what did you gather from it?"
+
+"I gathered from it, _batuchka!_ Rodion Romanovitch, the knowledge of
+a good many of your doings--in fact, I know all! I know that you went,
+towards nightfall, _to hire the lodgings._ I know that you pulled the
+bell, and that a question of yours in connection with bloodstains, as
+well as your manner, frightened both journeymen and dvorniks. I know
+what was your mood at the time. Excitement of such a kind will drive
+you out of your mind, be assured. A praiseworthy indignation is at
+work within you, complaining now as to destiny, now on the subject of
+police agents. You keep going here and there to induce people as far
+as possible to formulate their accusations. This stupid kind of
+tittle-tattle is hateful to you, and you are anxious to put a stop to
+it as soon as possible. Am I right? Have I laid finger on the
+sentiments which actuate you? But you are not satisfied by turning
+your own brain, you want to do, or rather do, the same thing to my
+good Razoumikhin. Really, it is a pity to upset so good a fellow! His
+kindness exposes him more than anyone else to suffer contagion from
+your own malady. But you shall know all as soon as you shall be
+calmer. Pray, therefore, once again sit down, _batuchka_! Try and
+recover your spirits--you seem quite unhinged."
+
+Raskolnikoff rose while looking at him with an air full of contempt.
+"Tell me once for all," asked the latter, "tell me one way or other,
+whether I am in your opinion an object for suspicion? Speak up,
+Porphyrius Petrovitch, and explain yourself without any more beating
+about the bush, and that forthwith!"
+
+"Just one word, Rodion Romanovitch. This affair will end as God knows
+best; but still, by way of form, I may have to ask you a few more
+questions. Hence we are certain to meet again!" And with a smile
+Porphyrius stopped before the young man. "Certain!" he repeated. One
+might have fancied that he wished to say something more. But he did
+not do so.
+
+"Forgive my strange manner just now, Porphyrius Petrovitch, I was
+hasty," began Raskolnikoff, who had regained all his self-possession,
+and who even experienced an irresistible wish to chaff the magistrate.
+
+"Don't say any more, it was nothing," replied Porphyrius in almost
+joyful tone. "Till we meet again!"
+
+"Till we meet again!"
+
+The young man forthwith went home. Having got there, he threw himself
+on his couch, and for a quarter of an hour he tried to arrange his
+ideas somewhat, inasmuch as they were very confused.
+
+Within a few days Raskolnikoff convinced himself that Porphyrius
+Petrovitch had no real proofs. Deciding to go out, in search of fresh
+air, he took up his cap and made for the door, deep in thought. For
+the first time he felt in the best of health, really well. He opened
+the door, and encountered Porphyrius face to face. The latter entered.
+
+Raskolnikoff staggered for a moment, but quickly recovered. The visit
+did not dismay him. "Perhaps this is the finale, but why does he come
+upon me like a cat, with muffled tread? Can he have been listening?"
+
+"I have been thinking for a long time of calling on you, and, as I was
+passing, I thought I might drop in for a few minutes. Where are you
+off to? I won't detain you long, only the time to smoke a cigarette,
+if you will allow me?"
+
+"Be seated, Porphyrius Petrovitch, be seated," said Raskolnikoff to
+his guest, assuming such an air of friendship that he himself could
+have been astonished at his own affability. Thus the victim, in fear
+and trembling for his life, at last does not feel the knife at his
+throat. He seated himself in front of Porphyrius, and gazed upon him
+without flinching. Porphyrius blinked a little, and commenced rolling
+his cigarette.
+
+"Speak! speak!" Raskolnikoff mutely cried in his heart. "What are you
+going to say?"
+
+"Oh, these cigarettes!" Porphyrius Petrovitch commenced at last,
+"they'll be the death of me, and yet I can't give them up! I am always
+coughing--a tickling in the throat is setting in, and I am
+asthmatical. I have been to consult Botkine of late; he examines every
+one of his patients at least half an hour at a time. After having
+thumped and bumped me about for ever so long, he told me, amongst
+other things: 'Tobacco is a bad thing for you--your lungs are
+affected.' That's all very well, but how am I to go without my
+tobacco? What am I to use as a substitute? Unfortunately, I can't
+drink, hah! hah! Everything is relative, I suppose, Rodion
+Romanovitch?"
+
+"There, he is beginning with some more of his silly palaver!"
+Raskolnikoff growled to himself. His late interview with the
+magistrate suddenly occurred to him, at which anger affected his mind.
+
+"Did you know, by-the-by, that I called on you the night before last?"
+continued Porphyrius, looking about. "I was in this very room. I
+happened to be coming this way, just as I am going to-day, and the
+idea struck me to drop in. Your door was open--I entered, hoping to
+see you in a few minutes, but went away again without leaving my name
+with your servant. Do you never shut your place?"
+
+Raskolnikoff's face grew gloomier and gloomier. Porphyrius Petrovitch
+evidently guessed what the latter was thinking about.
+
+"You did not expect visitors, Rodion Romanovitch?" said Porphyrius,
+smiling graciously.
+
+"I have called just to clear things up a bit. I owe you an
+explanation," he went on, smiling and gently slapping the young man on
+the knee; but almost at the self-same moment his face assumed a
+serious and even sad expression, to Raskolnikoff's great astonishment,
+to whom the magistrate appeared in quite a different light. "At our
+last interview, an unusual scene took place between us, Rodion. I
+somehow feel that I did not behave very well to you. You remember, I
+dare say, how we parted; we were both more or less excited. I fear we
+were wanting in the most common courtesy, and yet we are both of us
+gentlemen."
+
+"What can he be driving at now?" Raskolnikoff asked himself, looking
+inquiringly at Porphyrius.
+
+"I have come to the conclusion that it would be much better for us to
+be more candid to one another," continued the magistrate, turning his
+head gently aside and looking on the ground, as if he feared to annoy
+his former victim by his survey. "We must not have scenes of that kind
+again. If Mikolka had not turned up on that occasion, I really do not
+know how things would have ended. You are naturally, my dear Rodion,
+very irritable, and I must own that I had taken that into
+consideration, for, when driven in a corner, many a man lets out his
+secrets. 'If,' I said to myself, 'I could only squeeze some kind of
+evidence out of him, however trivial, provided it were real, tangible,
+and palpable, different from all my psychological inferences!' That
+was my idea. Sometimes we succeed by some such proceeding, but
+unfortunately that does not happen every day, as I conclusively
+discovered on the occasion in question, I had relied too much on your
+character."
+
+"But why tell me all this now?" stammered Raskolnikoff, without in any
+way understanding the object of his interlocutor's question. "Does he,
+perhaps, think me really innocent?"
+
+"You wish to know why I tell you this? Because I look upon it as a
+sacred duty to explain my line of action. Because I subjected you, as
+I now fully acknowledge, to cruel torture. I do not wish, my dear
+Rodion, that you should take me for an ogre. Hence, by way of
+justification, I purpose explaining to you what led up to it. I think
+it needless to account for the nature and origin of the reports which
+circulated originally, as also why you were connected with them. There
+was, however, one circumstance, a purely fortuitous one, and which
+need not now be mentioned, which aroused my suspicions. From these
+reports and accidental circumstances, the same conclusion became
+evolved for me. I make this statement in all sincerity, for it was I
+who first implicated you with the matter. I do not in any way notice
+the particulars notified on the articles found at the old woman's.
+That, and several others of a similar nature, are of no kind of
+importance. At the same time, I was aware of the incident which had
+happened at the police office. What occurred there has been told me
+with the utmost accuracy by some one who had been closely connected
+with it, and who, most unwittingly, had brought things to a head. Very
+well, then, how, under such circumstances, could a man help becoming
+biased? 'One swallow does not make a summer,' as the English proverb
+says: a hundred suppositions do not constitute one single proof.
+Reason speaks in that way, I admit, but let a man try to subject
+prejudice to reason. An examining magistrate, after all, is only a
+man--hence given to prejudice.
+
+"I also remembered, on the occasion in question, the article you had
+published in some review. That virgin effort of yours, I assure you, I
+greatly enjoyed--as an amateur, however, be it understood. It was
+redolent of sincere conviction, of genuine enthusiasm. The article was
+evidently written some sleepless night under feverish conditions. That
+author, I said to myself, while reading it, will do better things than
+that. How now, I ask you, could I avoid connecting that with what
+followed upon it? Such a tendency was but a natural one. Am I saying
+anything I should not? Am I at this moment committing myself to any
+definite statement? I do no more than give utterance to a thought
+which struck me at the time. What may I be thinking about now?
+Nothing--or, at all events, what is tantamount to it. For the time
+being, I have to deal with Mikolka; there are facts which implicate
+him--what are facts, after all? If I tell you all this now, as I am
+doing, I do so, I assure you, most emphatically, so that your mind and
+conscience may absolve me from my behavior on the day of our
+interview. 'Why,' you will ask, 'did you not come on that occasion and
+have my place searched?' I did so, hah! hah! I went when you were ill
+in bed--but, let me tell you, not officially, not in my magisterial
+capacity; but go I did. We had your rooms turned topsy-turvy at our
+very first suspicions, but _umsonst_! Then I said to myself: 'That man
+will make me a call, he will come of his own accord, and that before
+very long! If he is guilty, he will be bound to come. Other kinds of
+men would not do so, but this one will.'
+
+"And you remember, of course, Mr. Razoumikhin's chattering? We had
+purposely informed him of some of our suspicions, hoping that he might
+make you uneasy, for we knew perfectly well that Razoumikhin would not
+be able to contain his indignation. Zametoff, in particular, had been
+struck by your boldness, and it certainly was a bold thing for a
+person to exclaim all of a sudden in an open _traktir_: 'I am an
+assassin!' That was really too much of a good thing. Well, I waited
+for you with trusting patience, and, lo and behold, Providence sends
+you! How my heart did beat when I saw you coming! Now, I ask you,
+where was the need of your coming at that time at all? If you
+remember, you came in laughing immoderately. That laughter gave me
+food for thought, but, had I not been very prejudiced at the time, I
+should have taken no notice of it. And as for Mr. Razoumikhin on that
+occasion--ah! the stone, the stone, you will remember, under which the
+stolen things are hidden? I fancy I can see it from here; it is
+somewhere in a kitchen garden--it was a kitchen garden you mentioned
+to Zametoff, was it not? And then, when your article was broached, we
+fancied we discovered a latent thought beneath every word you uttered.
+That was the way, Rodion Romanovitch, that my conviction grew little
+by little. 'And yet,' said I to myself, 'all that may be explained in
+quite a different way, and perhaps more rationally. After all, a real
+proof, however slight, would be far more valuable.' But, when I heard
+all about the bell-ringing, my doubts vanished; I fancied I had the
+indispensable proof, and did not seem to care for further
+investigation.
+
+"We are face to face with a weird and gloomy case--a case of a
+contemporary character, if I may say so--a case possessing, in the
+fullest sense of the word, the hallmark of time, and circumstances
+pointing to a person and life of different surroundings. The real
+culprit is a theorist, a bookworm, who, in a tentative kind of way,
+has done a more than bold thing; but this boldness of his is of quite
+a peculiar and one-sided stamp; it is, after a fashion, like that of a
+man who hurls himself from the top of a mountain or church steeple.
+The man in question has forgotten to cut off evidence, and, in order
+to work out a theory, has killed two persons. He has committed a
+murder, and yet has not known how to take possession of the pelf; what
+he has taken he has hidden under a stone. The anguish he experienced
+while hearing knocking at the door and the continued ringing of the
+bell, was not enough for him; no, yielding to an irresistible desire
+of experiencing the same horror, he has positively revisited the empty
+place and once more pulled the bell. Let us, if you like, attribute
+the whole of this to disease--to a semidelirious condition--by all
+means; but there is yet another point to be considered: he has
+committed a murder, and yet continues to look upon himself as a
+righteous man!"
+
+Raskolnikoff trembled in every limb. "Then, who--who is it--that has
+committed the murder?" he stammered forth, in jerky accents.
+
+The examining magistrate sank back in his chair as though astonished
+at such a question. "Who committed the murder?" he retorted, as if he
+could not believe his own ears. "Why, you--you did, Rodion
+Romanovitch! You!--" he added, almost in a whisper, and in a tone of
+profound conviction.
+
+Raskolnikoff suddenly rose, waited for a few moments, and sat down
+again, without uttering a single word. All the muscles of his face
+were slightly convulsed.
+
+"Why, I see your lips tremble just as they did the other day,"
+observed Porphyrius Petrovitch, with an air of interest. "You have
+not, I think, thoroughly realized the object of my visit, Rodion
+Romanovitch," he pursued, after a moment's silence, "hence your great
+astonishment. I have called with the express intention of plain
+speaking, and to reveal the truth."
+
+"It was not I who committed the murder," stammered the young man,
+defending himself very much like a child caught in the act of doing
+wrong.
+
+"Yes, yes, it was you, Rodion Romanovitch, it was you, and you alone,"
+replied the magistrate with severity. "Confess or not, as you think
+best; for the time being, that is nothing to me. In either case, my
+conviction is arrived at."
+
+"If that is so, why have you called?" asked Raskolnikoff angrily. "I
+once more repeat the question I have put you: If you think me guilty,
+why not issue a warrant against me?"
+
+"What a question! But I will answer you categorically. To begin with,
+your arrest would not benefit me!"
+
+"It would not benefit you? How can that be? From the moment of being
+convinced, you ought to----"
+
+"What is the use of my conviction, after all? For the time being, it
+is only built on sand. And why should I have you placed _at rest?_ Of
+course, I purpose having you arrested--I have called to give you a
+hint to that effect--and yet I do not hesitate to tell you that I
+shall gain nothing by it. Considering, therefore, the interest I feel
+for you, I earnestly urge you to go and acknowledge your crime. I
+called before to give the same advice. It is by far the wisest thing
+you can do--for you as well as for myself, who will then wash my hands
+of the affair. Now, am I candid enough?"
+
+Raskolnikoff considered a moment. "Listen to me, Porphyrius
+Petrovitch! To use your own statement, you have against me nothing but
+psychological sentiments, and yet you aspire to mathematical evidence.
+Who has told you that you are absolutely right?"
+
+"Yes, Rodion Romanovitch, I am absolutely right. I hold a proof! And
+this proof I came in possession of the other day: God has sent it me!"
+
+"What is it?"
+
+"I shall not tell you, Rodion Romanovitch. But I have no right to
+procrastinate. I am going to have you arrested! Judge, therefore:
+whatever you purpose doing is not of much importance to me just now;
+all I say and have said has been solely done for your interest. The
+best alternative is the one I suggest, you may depend on it, Rodion
+Romanovitch! When I shall have had you arrested--at the expiration of
+a month or two, or even three, if you like--you will remember my
+words, and you will confess. You will be led to do so insensibly,
+almost without being conscious of it. I am even of opinion that, after
+careful consideration, you will make up your mind to make atonement.
+You do not believe me at this moment, but wait and see. In truth,
+Rodion Romanovitch, suffering is a grand thing. In the mouth of a
+coarse man, who deprives himself of nothing, such a statement might
+afford food for laughter. Never mind, however, but there lies a theory
+in suffering. Mikolka is right. You won't escape, Rodion Romanovitch."
+
+Raskolnikoff rose and took his cap. Porphyrius Petrovitch did the
+same. "Are you going for a walk? The night will be a fine one, as long
+as we get no storm. That would be all the better though, as it would
+clear the air."
+
+"Porphyrius Petrovitch," said the young man, in curt and hurried
+accents, "do not run away with the idea that I have been making a
+confession to-day. You are a strange man, and I have listened to you
+from pure curiosity. But remember, I have confessed to nothing. Pray
+do not forget that."
+
+"I shall not forget it, you may depend---- How he is trembling! Don't
+be uneasy, my friend--I shall not forget your advice. Take a little
+stroll, only do not go beyond certain limits. I must, however, at all
+costs," he added with lowered voice, "ask a small favor of you; it is
+a delicate one, but has an importance of its own; assuming, although I
+would view such a contingency as an improbable one--assuming, during
+the next forty-eight hours, the fancy were to come upon you to put an
+end to your life (excuse me my foolish supposition), would you mind
+leaving behind you something in the shape of a note--a line or
+so--pointing to the spot where the stone is?--that would be very
+considerate. Well, _au revoir_! May God send you good thoughts!"
+
+Porphyrius withdrew, avoiding Raskolnikoff's eye. The latter
+approached the window, and impatiently waited till, according to his
+calculation, the magistrate should be some distance from the house. He
+then passed out himself in great haste.
+
+A few days later, the prophecy of Porphyrius Petrovitch was fulfilled.
+Driven by the torment of uncertainty and doubt, Raskolnikoff made up
+his mind to confess his crime. Hastening through the streets, and
+stumbling up the narrow stairway, he presented himself at the police
+office.
+
+With pale lips and fixed gaze, Raskolnikoff slowly advanced toward
+Elia Petrovitch. Resting his head upon the table behind which the
+lieutenant was seated, he wished to speak, but could only give vent to
+a few unintelligible sounds.
+
+"You are in pain, a chair! Pray sit down! Some water!"
+
+Raskolnikoff allowed himself to sink on the chair that was offered
+him, but he could not take his eyes off Elia Petrovitch, whose face
+expressed a very unpleasant surprise. For a moment both men looked at
+one another in silence. Water was brought!
+
+"It was I--" commenced Raskolnikoff.
+
+"Drink."
+
+With a movement of his hand the young man pushed aside the glass which
+was offered him; then, in a low-toned but distinct voice he made, with
+several interruptions, the following statement:--
+
+"_It was I who killed, with a hatchet, the old moneylender and her
+sister, Elizabeth, and robbery was my motive_."
+
+Elia Petrovitch called for assistance. People rushed in from various
+directions. Raskolnikoff repeated his confession.
+
+FOOTNOTES TO _CRIME & PUNISHMENT_:
+
+[1]: (At the risk of shocking the reader, it has been decided that the
+real permanent detective stories of the world were ill represented
+without Dostoyevsky's terrible tale of what might be called
+"self-detection." If to sensitive readers the story seems so real as
+to be hideous, it is well to recall that Dostoyevsky in 1849
+under-went the agony of sentence to death as a revolutionist. Although
+the sentence was commuted to hard labor in Siberia, and although six
+years later he was freed and again took up his writing, his mind never
+rose from beneath the weight of horror and hopelessness that hangs
+over offenders against the Great White Czar. Dostoyevsky, sentenced as
+a criminal, herded with criminals, really _became_ a criminal in
+literary imagination. Add to this a minute observation, a marvelous
+memory, ardent political convictions--and we can understand why the
+story here, with others of his, is taken as a scientific text by
+criminologists.--EDITOR.)
+
+[2]: 1,000 yards.
+
+[3]: Janitors.
+
+[4]: little father
+
+[5]: Cabbage soup.
+
+
+
+ANTON CHEKHOFF
+
+
+_THE SAFETY MATCH_
+
+
+On the morning of October 6, 1885, in the office of the Inspector of
+Police of the second division of S---- District, there appeared a
+respectably dressed young man, who announced that his master, Marcus
+Ivanovitch Klausoff, a retired officer of the Horse Guards, separated
+from his wife, had been murdered. While making this announcement the
+young man was white and terribly agitated. His hands trembled and his
+eyes were full of terror.
+
+"Whom have I the honor of addressing?" asked the inspector.
+
+"Psyekoff, Lieutenant Klausoff's agent; agriculturist and
+mechanician!"
+
+The inspector and his deputy, on visiting the scene of the occurrence
+in company with Psyekoff, found the following: Near the wing in which
+Klausoff had lived was gathered a dense crowd. The news of the murder
+had sped swift as lightning through the neighborhood, and the
+peasantry, thanks to the fact that the day was a holiday, had hurried
+together from all the neighboring villages. There was much commotion
+and talk. Here and there, pale, tear-stained faces were seen. The door
+of Klausoff's bedroom was found locked. The key was inside.
+
+"It is quite clear that the scoundrels got in by the window!" said
+Psyekoff as they examined the door.
+
+They went to the garden, into which the bedroom window opened. The
+window looked dark and ominous. It was covered by a faded green
+curtain. One corner of the curtain was slightly turned up, which made
+it possible to look into the bedroom.
+
+"Did any of you look into the window?" asked the inspector.
+
+"Certainly not, your worship!" answered Ephraim, the gardener, a
+little gray-haired old man, who looked like a retired sergeant. "Who's
+going to look in, if all their bones are shaking?"
+
+"Ah, Marcus Ivanovitch, Marcus Ivanovitch!" sighed the inspector,
+looking at the window, "I told you you would come to a bad end! I told
+the dear man, but he wouldn't listen! Dissipation doesn't bring any
+good!"
+
+"Thanks to Ephraim," said Psyekoff; "but for him, we would never have
+guessed. He was the first to guess that something was wrong. He comes
+to me this morning, and says: 'Why is the master so long getting up?
+He hasn't left his bedroom for a whole week!' The moment he said that,
+it was just as if some one had hit me with an ax. The thought flashed
+through my mind, 'We haven't had a sight of him since last Saturday,
+and to-day is Sunday'! Seven whole days--not a doubt of it!"
+
+"Ay, poor fellow!" again sighed the inspector. "He was a clever
+fellow, finely educated, and kind-hearted at that! And in society,
+nobody could touch him! But he was a waster, God rest his soul! I was
+prepared for anything since he refused to live with Olga Petrovna.
+Poor thing, a good wife, but a sharp tongue! Stephen!" the inspector
+called to one of his deputies, "go over to my house this minute, and
+send Andrew to the captain to lodge an information with him! Tell him
+that Marcus Ivanovitch has been murdered. And run over to the orderly;
+why should he sit there, kicking his heels? Let him come here! And go
+as fast as you can to the examining magistrate, Nicholas
+Yermolaiyevitch. Tell him to come over here! Wait; I'll write him a
+note!"
+
+The inspector posted sentinels around the wing, wrote a letter to the
+examining magistrate, and then went over to the director's for a glass
+of tea. Ten minutes later he was sitting on a stool, carefully
+nibbling a lump of sugar, and swallowing the scalding tea.
+
+"There you are!" he was saying to Psyekoff; "there you are! A noble by
+birth! a rich man--a favorite of the gods, you may say, as Pushkin has
+it, and what did he come to? He drank and dissipated and--there you
+are--he's murdered."
+
+After a couple of hours the examining magistrate drove up. Nicholas
+Yermolaiyevitch Chubikoff--for that was the magistrate's name--was a
+tall, fleshy old man of sixty, who had been wrestling with the duties
+of his office for a quarter of a century. Everybody in the district
+knew him as an honest man, wise, energetic, and in love with his work.
+He was accompanied to the scene of the murder by his inveterate
+companion, fellow worker, and secretary, Dukovski, a tall young fellow
+of twenty-six.
+
+"Is it possible, gentlemen?" cried Chubikoff, entering Psyekoff's
+room, and quickly shaking hands with everyone. "Is it possible? Marcus
+Ivanovitch? Murdered? No! It is impossible! Im-poss-i-ble!"
+
+"Go in there!" sighed the inspector.
+
+"Lord, have mercy on us! Only last Friday I saw him at the fair in
+Farabankoff. I had a drink of vodka with him, save the mark!"
+
+"Go in there!" again sighed the inspector.
+
+They sighed, uttered exclamations of horror, drank a glass of tea
+each, and went to the wing.
+
+"Get back!" the orderly cried to the peasants.
+
+Going to the wing, the examining magistrate began his work by
+examining the bedroom door. The door proved to be of pine, painted
+yellow, and was uninjured. Nothing was found which could serve as a
+clew. They had to break in the door.
+
+"Everyone not here on business is requested to keep away!" said the
+magistrate, when, after much hammering and shaking, the door yielded
+to ax and chisel. "I request this, in the interest of the
+investigation. Orderly, don't let anyone in!"
+
+Chubikoff, his assistant, and the inspector opened the door, and
+hesitatingly, one after the other, entered the room. Their eyes met
+the following sight: Beside the single window stood the big wooden bed
+with a huge feather mattress. On the crumpled feather bed lay a
+tumbled, crumpled quilt. The pillow, in a cotton pillow-case, also
+much crumpled, was dragging on the floor. On the table beside the bed
+lay a silver watch and a silver twenty-kopeck piece. Beside them lay
+some sulphur matches. Beside the bed, the little table, and the single
+chair, there was no furniture in the room. Looking under the bed, the
+inspector saw a couple of dozen empty bottles, an old straw hat, and a
+quart of vodka. Under the table lay one top boot, covered with dust.
+Casting a glance around the room, the magistrate frowned and grew red
+in the face.
+
+"Scoundrels!" he muttered, clenching his fists.
+
+"And where is Marcus Ivanovitch?" asked Dukovski in a low voice.
+
+"Mind your own business!" Chubikoff answered roughly. "Be good enough
+to examine the floor! This is not the first case of the kind I have
+had to deal with! Eugraph Kuzmitch," he said, turning to the
+inspector, and lowering his voice, "in 1870 I had another case like
+this. But you must remember it--the murder of the merchant
+Portraitoff. It was just the same there. The scoundrels murdered him,
+and dragged the corpse out through the window----"
+
+Chubikoff went up to the window, pulled the curtain to one side, and
+carefully pushed the window. The window opened.
+
+"It opens, you see! It wasn't fastened. Hm! There are tracks under the
+window. Look! There is the track of a knee! Somebody got in there. We
+must examine the window thoroughly."
+
+"There is nothing special to be found on the floor," said
+Dukovski.
+"No stains or scratches. The only thing I found was a struck safety
+match. Here it is! So far as I remember, Marcus Ivanovitch did not
+smoke. And he always used sulphur matches, never safety matches.
+Perhaps this safety match may serve as a clew!"
+
+"Oh, do shut up!" cried the magistrate deprecatingly. "You go on about
+your match! I can't abide these dreamers! Instead of chasing matches,
+you had better examine the bed!"
+
+After a thorough examination of the bed, Dukovski reported:
+
+"There are no spots, either of blood or of anything else. There are
+likewise no new torn places. On the pillow there are signs of teeth.
+The quilt is stained with something which looks like beer and smells
+like beer. The general aspect of the bed gives grounds for thinking
+that a struggle took place on it."
+
+"I know there was a struggle, without your telling me! You are not
+being asked about a struggle. Instead of looking for struggles, you
+had better----"
+
+"Here is one top boot, but there is no sign of the other."
+
+"Well, and what of that?"
+
+"It proves that they strangled him, while he was taking his boots off.
+He hadn't time to take the second boot off when----"
+
+"There you go!--and how do you know they strangled him?"
+
+"There are marks of teeth on the pillow. The pillow itself is badly
+crumpled, and thrown a couple of yards from the bed."
+
+"Listen to his foolishness! Better come into the garden. You would be
+better employed examining the garden than digging around here. I can
+do that without you!"
+
+When they reached the garden they began by examining the grass. The
+grass under the window was crushed and trampled. A bushy burdock
+growing under the window close to the wall was also trampled. Dukovski
+succeeded in finding on it some broken twigs and a piece of cotton
+wool. On the upper branches were found some fine hairs of dark blue
+wool.
+
+"What color was his last suit?" Dukovski asked Psyekoff.
+
+"Yellow crash."
+
+"Excellent! You see they wore blue!"
+
+A few twigs of the burdock were cut off, and carefully wrapped in
+paper by the investigators. At this point Police Captain Artsuybasheff
+Svistakovski and Dr. Tyutyeff arrived. The captain bade them "Good
+day!" and immediately began to satisfy his curiosity. The doctor, a
+tall, very lean man, with dull eyes, a long nose, and a pointed chin,
+without greeting anyone or asking about anything, sat down on a log,
+sighed, and began:
+
+"The Servians are at war again! What in heaven's name can they want
+now? Austria, it's all your doing!"
+
+The examination of the window from the outside did not supply any
+conclusive data. The examination of the grass and the bushes nearest
+to the window yielded a series of useful clews. For example, Dukovski
+succeeded in discovering a long, dark streak, made up of spots, on the
+grass, which led some distance into the center of the garden. The
+streak ended under one of the lilac bushes in a dark brown stain.
+Under this same lilac bush was found a top boot, which turned out to
+be the fellow of the boot already found in the bedroom.
+
+"That is a blood stain made some time ago," said Dukovski, examining
+the spot.
+
+At the word "blood" the doctor rose, and going over lazily, looked at
+the spot.
+
+"Yes, it is blood!" he muttered.
+
+"That shows he wasn't strangled, if there was blood," said Chubikoff,
+looking sarcastically at Dukovski.
+
+"They strangled him in the bedroom; and here, fearing he might come
+round again, they struck him a blow with some sharp-pointed
+instrument. The stain under the bush proves that he lay there a
+considerable time, while they were looking about for some way of
+carrying him out of the garden.
+
+"Well, and how about the boot?"
+
+"The boot confirms completely my idea that they murdered him while he
+was taking his boots off before going to bed. He had already taken off
+one boot, and the other, this one here, he had only had time to take
+half off. The half-off boot came off of itself, while the body was
+dragged over, and fell----"
+
+"There's a lively imagination for you!" laughed Chubikoff. "He goes on
+and on like that! When will you learn enough to drop your deductions?
+Instead of arguing and deducing, it would be much better if you took
+some of the blood-stained grass for analysis!"
+
+When they had finished their examination, and drawn a plan of the
+locality, the investigators went to the director's office to write
+their report and have breakfast. While they were breakfasting they
+went on talking:
+
+"The watch, the money, and so on--all untouched--" Chubikoff began,
+leading off the talk, "show as clearly as that two and two are four
+that the murder was not committed for the purpose of robbery."
+
+"The murder was committed by an educated man!" insisted Dukovski.
+
+"What evidence have you of that?"
+
+"The safety match proves that to me, for the peasants hereabouts are
+not yet acquainted with safety matches. Only the landowners use them,
+and by no means all of them. And it is evident that there was not one
+murderer, but at least three. Two held him, while one killed him.
+Klausoff was strong, and the murderers must have known it!"
+
+"What good would his strength be, supposing he was asleep?"
+
+"The murderers came on him while he was taking off his boots. If he
+was taking off his boots, that proves that he wasn't asleep!"
+
+"Stop inventing your deductions! Better eat!"
+
+"In my opinion, your worship," said the gardener Ephraim, setting the
+samovar on the table, "it was nobody but Nicholas who did this dirty
+trick!"
+
+"Quite possible," said Psyekoff.
+
+"And who is Nicholas?"
+
+"The master's valet, your worship," answered Ephraim. "Who else could
+it be? He's a rascal, your worship! He's a drunkard and a blackguard,
+the like of which Heaven should not permit! He always took the master
+his vodka and put the master to bed. Who else could it be? And I also
+venture to point out to your worship, he once boasted at the public
+house that he would kill the master! It happened on account of
+Aquilina, the woman, you know. He was making up to a soldier's widow.
+She pleased the master; the master made friends with her himself, and
+Nicholas--naturally, he was mad! He is rolling about drunk in the
+kitchen now. He is crying, and telling lies, saying he is sorry for
+the master----"
+
+The examining magistrate ordered Nicholas to be brought. Nicholas, a
+lanky young fellow, with a long, freckled nose, narrow-chested, and
+wearing an old jacket of his master's, entered Psyekoff's room, and
+bowed low before the magistrate. His face was sleepy and tear-stained.
+He was tipsy and could hardly keep his feet.
+
+"Where is your master?" Chubikoff asked him.
+
+"Murdered! your worship!"
+
+As he said this, Nicholas blinked and began to weep.
+
+"We know he was murdered. But where is he now? Where is his body?"
+
+"They say he was dragged out of the window and buried in the garden!"
+
+"Hum! The results of the investigation are known in the kitchen
+already!--That's bad! Where were you, my good fellow, the night the
+master was murdered? Saturday night, that is."
+
+Nicholas raised his head, stretched his neck, and began to think.
+
+"I don't know, your worship," he said. "I was drunk and don't
+remember."
+
+"An alibi!" whispered Dukovski, smiling, and rubbing his hands.
+
+"So-o! And why is there blood under the master's window?"
+
+Nicholas jerked his head up and considered.
+
+"Hurry up!" said the Captain of Police.
+
+"Right away! That blood doesn't amount to anything, your worship! I
+was cutting a chicken's throat. I was doing it quite simply, in the
+usual way, when all of a sudden it broke away and started to run. That
+is where the blood came from."
+
+Ephraim declared that Nicholas did kill a chicken every evening, and
+always in some new place, but that nobody ever heard of a half-killed
+chicken running about the garden, though of course it wasn't
+impossible.
+
+"An alibi," sneered Dukovski; "and what an asinine alibi!"
+
+"Did you know Aquilina?"
+
+"Yes, your worship, I know her."
+
+"And the master cut you out with her?"
+
+"Not at all. _He_ cut me out--Mr. Psyekoff there, Ivan Mikhailovitch;
+and the master cut Ivan Mikhailovitch out. That is how it was."
+
+Psyekoff grew confused and began to scratch his left eye. Dukovski
+looked at him attentively, noted his confusion, and started. He
+noticed that the director had dark blue trousers, which he had not
+observed before. The trousers reminded him of the dark blue threads
+found on the burdock. Chubikoff in his turn glanced suspiciously at
+Psyekoff.
+
+"Go!" he said to Nicholas. "And now permit me to put a question to
+you, Mr. Psyekoff. Of course you were here last Saturday evening?"
+
+"Yes! I had supper with Marcus Ivanovitch about ten o'clock."
+
+"And afterwards?"
+
+"Afterwards--afterwards--Really, I do not remember," stammered
+Psyekoff. "I had a good deal to drink at supper. I don't remember when
+or where I went to sleep. Why are you all looking at me like that, as
+if I was the murderer?"
+
+"Where were you when you woke up?"
+
+"I was in the servants' kitchen, lying behind the stove! They can all
+confirm it. How I got behind the stove I don't know----"
+
+"Do not get agitated. Did you know Aquilina?"
+
+"There's nothing extraordinary about that----"
+
+"She first liked you and then preferred Klausoff?"
+
+"Yes. Ephraim, give us some more mushrooms! Do you want some more tea,
+Eugraph Kuzmitch?"
+
+A heavy, oppressive silence began and lasted fully five minutes.
+Dukoyski silently kept his piercing eyes fixed on Psyekoff's pale
+face. The silence was finally broken by the examining magistrate:
+
+"We must go to the house and talk with Maria Ivanovna, the sister of
+the deceased. Perhaps she may be able to supply some clews."
+
+Chubikoff and his assistant expressed their thanks for the breakfast,
+and went toward the house. They found Klausoff's sister, Maria
+Ivanovna, an old maid of forty-five, at prayer before the big case of
+family icons. When she saw the portfolios in her guests' hands, and
+their official caps, she grew pale.
+
+"Let me begin by apologizing for disturbing, so to speak, your
+devotions," began the gallant Chubikoff, bowing and scraping. "We have
+come to you with a request. Of course, you have heard already. There
+is a suspicion that your dear brother, in some way or other, has been
+murdered. The will of God, you know. No one can escape death, neither
+czar nor plowman. Could you not help us with some clew, some
+explanation----?"
+
+"Oh, don't ask me!" said Maria Ivanovna, growing still paler, and
+covering her face with her hands. "I can tell you nothing. Nothing! I
+beg you! I know nothing--What can I do? Oh, no! no!--not a word about
+my brother! If I die, I won't say anything!"
+
+Maria Ivanovna began to weep, and left the room. The investigators
+looked at each other, shrugged their shoulders, and beat a retreat.
+
+"Confound the woman!" scolded Dukovski, going out of the house. "It is
+clear she knows something, and is concealing it! And the chambermaid
+has a queer expression too! Wait, you wretches! We'll ferret it all
+out!"
+
+In the evening Chubikoff and his deputy, lit on their road by the pale
+moon, wended their way homeward. They sat in their carriage and
+thought over the results of the day. Both were tired and kept silent.
+Chubikoff was always unwilling to talk while traveling, and the
+talkative Dukovski remained silent, to fall in with the elder man's
+humor. But at the end of their journey the deputy could hold in no
+longer, and said:
+
+"It is quite certain," he said, "that Nicholas had something to do
+with the matter. _Non dubitandum est!_ You can see by his face what
+sort of a case he is! His alibi betrays him, body and bones. But it is
+also certain that he did not set the thing going. He was only the
+stupid hired tool. You agree? And the humble Psyekoff was not without
+some slight share in the matter. His dark blue breeches, his
+agitation, his lying behind the stove in terror after the murder, his
+alibi and--Aquilina----"
+
+"'Grind away, Emilian; it's your week!' So, according to you, whoever
+knew Aquilina is the murderer! Hot-head! You ought to be sucking a
+bottle, and not handling affairs! You were one of Aquilina's admirers
+yourself--does it follow that you are implicated too?"
+
+"Aquilina was cook in your house for a month. I am saying nothing
+about that! The night before that Saturday I was playing cards with
+you, and saw you, otherwise I should be after you too! It isn't the
+woman that matters, old chap! It is the mean, nasty, low spirit of
+jealousy that matters. The retiring young man was not pleased when
+they got the better of him, you see! His vanity, don't you see? He
+wanted revenge. Then, those thick lips of his suggest passion. So
+there you have it: wounded self-love and passion. That is quite enough
+motive for a murder. We have two of them in our hands; but who is the
+third? Nicholas and Psyekoff held him, but who smothered him? Psyekoff
+is shy, timid, an all-round coward. And Nicholas would not know how to
+smother with a pillow. His sort use an ax or a club. Some third person
+did the smothering; but who was it?"
+
+Dukovski crammed his hat down over his eyes and pondered. He remained
+silent until the carriage rolled up to the magistrate's door.
+
+"Eureka!" he said, entering the little house and throwing off his
+overcoat. "Eureka, Nicholas Yermolaiyevitch! The only thing I can't
+understand is, how it did not occur to me sooner! Do you know who the
+third person was?"
+
+"Oh, for goodness sake, shut up! There is supper! Sit down to your
+evening meal!"
+
+The magistrate and Dukovski sat down to supper. Dukovski poured
+himself out a glass of vodka, rose, drew himself up, and said, with
+sparkling eyes:
+
+"Well, learn that the third person, who acted in concert with that
+scoundrel Psyekoff, and did the smothering, was a woman! Yes-s! I
+mean--the murdered man's sister, Maria Ivanovna!"
+
+Chubikoff choked over his vodka, and fixed his eyes on Dukovski.
+
+"You aren't--what's-its-name? Your head isn't what-do-you-call-it? You
+haven't a pain in it?"
+
+"I am perfectly well! Very well, let us say that I am crazy; but how
+do you explain her confusion when we appeared? How do you explain her
+unwillingness to give us any information? Let us admit that these are
+trifles. Very well! All right! But remember their relations. She
+detested her brother. She never forgave him for living apart from his
+wife. She is of the Old Faith, while in her eyes he is a godless
+profligate. There is where the germ of her hate was hatched. They say
+he succeeded in making her believe that he was an angel of Satan. He
+even went in for spiritualism in her presence!"
+
+"Well, what of that?"
+
+"You don't understand? She, as a member of the Old Faith, murdered him
+through fanaticism. It was not only that she was putting to death a
+weed, a profligate--she was freeing the world of an antichrist!--and
+there, in her opinion, was her service, her religious achievement! Oh,
+you don't know those old maids of the Old Faith. Read Dostoyevsky! And
+what does Lyeskoff say about them, or Petcherski? It was she, and
+nobody else, even if you cut me open. She smothered him! O treacherous
+woman! wasn't that the reason why she was kneeling before the icons,
+when we came in, just to take our attention away? 'Let me kneel down
+and pray,' she said to herself, 'and they will think I am tranquil and
+did not expect them!' That is the plan of all novices in crime,
+Nicholas Yermolaiyevitch, old pal! My dear old man, won't you intrust
+this business to me? Let me personally bring it through! Friend, I
+began it and I will finish it!"
+
+Chubikoff shook his head and frowned.
+
+"We know how to manage difficult matters ourselves," he said; "and
+your business is not to push yourself in where you don't belong. Write
+from dictation when you are dictated to; that is your job!"
+
+Dukovski flared up, banged the door, and disappeared.
+
+"Clever rascal!" muttered Chubikoff, glancing after him. "Awfully
+clever! But too much of a hothead. I must buy him a cigar case at the
+fair as a present."
+
+The next day, early in the morning, a young man with a big head and a
+pursed-up mouth, who came from Klausoff's place, was introduced to the
+magistrate's office. He said he was the shepherd Daniel, and brought a
+very interesting piece of information.
+
+"I was a bit drunk," he said. "I was with my pal till midnight. On my
+way home, as I was drunk, I went into the river for a bath. I was
+taking a bath, when I looked up. Two men were walking along the dam,
+carrying something black. 'Shoo!' I cried at them. They got scared,
+and went off like the wind toward Makareff's cabbage garden. Strike me
+dead, if they weren't carrying away the master!"
+
+That same day, toward evening, Psyekoff and Nicholas were arrested and
+brought under guard to the district town. In the town they were
+committed to the cells of the prison.
+
+
+II
+
+A fortnight passed.
+
+It was morning. The magistrate Nicholas Yermolaiyevitch was sitting in
+his office before a green table, turning over the papers of the
+"Klausoff case"; Dukovski was striding restlessly up and down, like a
+wolf in a cage.
+
+"You are convinced of the guilt of Nicholas and Psyekoff," he said,
+nervously plucking at his young beard. "Why will you not believe in
+the guilt of Maria Ivanovna? Are there not proofs enough for you?"
+
+"I don't say I am not convinced. I am convinced, but somehow I don't
+believe it! There are no real proofs, but just a kind of
+philosophizing--fanaticism, this and that----"
+
+"You can't do without an ax and bloodstained sheets. Those jurists!
+Very well, I'll prove it to you! You will stop sneering at the
+psychological side of the affair! To Siberia with your Maria Ivanovna!
+I will prove it! If philosophy is not enough for you, I have something
+substantial for you. It will show you how correct my philosophy is.
+Just give me permission----"
+
+"What are you going on about?"
+
+"About the safety match! Have you forgotten it? I haven't! I am going
+to find out who struck it in the murdered man's room. It was not
+Nicholas that struck it; it was not Psyekoff, for neither of them had
+any matches when they were examined; it was the third person, Maria
+Ivanovna. I will prove it to you. Just give me permission to go
+through the district to find out."
+
+"That's enough! Sit down. Let us go on with the examination."
+
+Dukovski sat down at a little table, and plunged his long nose in a
+bundle of papers.
+
+"Bring in Nicholas Tetekhoff!" cried the examining magistrate.
+
+They brought Nicholas in. Nicholas was pale and thin as a rail. He was
+trembling.
+
+"Tetekhoff!" began Chubikoff. "In 1879 you were tried in the Court of
+the First Division, convicted of theft, and sentenced to imprisonment.
+In 1882 you were tried a second time for theft, and were again
+imprisoned. We know all----"
+
+Astonishment was depicted on Nicholas's face. The examining
+magistrate's omniscience startled him. But soon his expression of
+astonishment changed to extreme indignation. He began to cry and
+requested permission to go and wash his face and quiet down. They led
+him away.
+
+"Bring in Psyekoff!" ordered the examining magistrate.
+
+They brought in Psyekoff. The young man had changed greatly during the
+last few days. He had grown thin and pale, and looked haggard. His
+eyes had an apathetic expression.
+
+"Sit down, Psyekoff," said Chubikoff. "I hope that to-day you are
+going to be reasonable, and will not tell lies, as you did before. All
+these days you have denied that you had anything to do with the murder
+of Klausoff, in spite of all the proofs that testify against you. That
+is foolish. Confession will lighten your guilt. This is the last time
+I am going to talk to you. If you do not confess to-day, to-morrow it
+will be too late. Come, tell me all----"
+
+"I know nothing about it. I know nothing about your proofs," answered
+Psyekoff, almost inaudibly.
+
+"It's no use! Well, let me relate to you how the matter took place. On
+Saturday evening you were sitting in Klausoff's sleeping room, and
+drinking vodka and beer with him." (Dukovski fixed his eyes on
+Psyekoff's face, and kept them there all through the examination.)
+"Nicholas was waiting on you. At one o'clock, Marcus Ivanovitch
+announced his intention of going to bed. He always went to bed at one
+o'clock. When he was taking off his boots, and was giving you
+directions about details of management, you and Nicholas, at a given
+signal, seized your drunken master and threw him on the bed. One of
+you sat on his legs, the other on his head. Then a third person came
+in from the passage--a woman in a black dress, whom you know well, and
+who had previously arranged with you as to her share in your criminal
+deed. She seized a pillow and began to smother him. While the struggle
+was going on the candle went out. The woman took a box of safety
+matches from her pocket, and lit the candle. Was it not so? I see by
+your face that I am speaking the truth. But to go on. After you had
+smothered him, and saw that he had ceased breathing, you and Nicholas
+pulled him out through the window and laid him down near the burdock.
+Fearing that he might come round again, you struck him with something
+sharp. Then you carried him away, and laid him down under a lilac bush
+for a short time. After resting awhile and considering, you carried
+him across the fence. Then you entered the road. After that comes the
+dam. Near the dam, a peasant frightened you. Well, what is the matter
+with you?"
+
+"I am suffocating!" replied Psyekoff. "Very well--have it so. Only let
+me go out, please!"
+
+They led Psyekoff away.
+
+"At last! He has confessed!" cried Chubikoff, stretching himself
+luxuriously. "He has betrayed himself! And didn't I get round him
+cleverly! Regularly caught him napping----"
+
+"And he doesn't deny the woman in the black dress!" exulted Dukovski.
+"But all the same, that safety match is tormenting me frightfully. I
+can't stand it any longer. Good-by! I am off!"
+
+Dukovski put on his cap and drove off. Chubikoff began to examine
+Aquilina. Aquilina declared that she knew nothing whatever about it.
+
+At six that evening Dukovski returned. He was more agitated than he
+had ever been before. His hands trembled so that he could not even
+unbutton his greatcoat. His cheeks glowed. It was clear that he did
+not come empty handed.
+
+"_Veni, vidi, vici!_" he cried, rushing into Chubikoff's room, and
+falling into an armchair. "I swear to you on my honor, I begin to
+believe that I am a genius! Listen, devil take us all! It is funny,
+and it is sad. We have caught three already--isn't that so? Well, I
+have found the fourth, and a woman at that. You will never believe who
+it is! But listen. I went to Klausoff's village, and began to make a
+spiral round it. I visited all the little shops, public houses, dram
+shops on the road, everywhere asking for safety matches. Everywhere
+they said they hadn't any. I made a wide round. Twenty times I lost
+faith, and twenty times I got it back again. I knocked about the whole
+day, and only an hour ago I got on the track. Three versts from here.
+They gave me a packet of ten boxes. One box was missing. Immediately:
+'Who bought the other box?' 'Such-a-one! She was pleased with them!'
+Old man! Nicholas Yermolaiyevitch! See what a fellow who was expelled
+from the seminary and who has read Gaboriau can do! From to-day on I
+begin to respect myself! Oof! Well, come!"
+
+"Come where?"
+
+"To her, to number four! We must hurry, otherwise--otherwise I'll
+burst with impatience! Do you know who she is? You'll never guess!
+Olga Petrovna, Marcus Ivanovitch's wife--his own wife--that's who it
+is! She is the person who bought the matchbox!"
+
+"You--you--you are out of your mind!"
+
+"It's quite simple! To begin with, she smokes. Secondly, she was head
+and ears in love with Klausoff, even after he refused to live in the
+same house with her, because she was always scolding his head off.
+Why, they say she used to beat him because she loved him so much. And
+then he positively refused to stay in the same house. Love turned
+sour. 'Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned.' But come along! Quick,
+or it will be dark. Come!"
+
+"I am not yet sufficiently crazy to go and disturb a respectable
+honorable woman in the middle of the night for a crazy boy!"
+
+"Respectable, honorable! Do honorable women murder their husbands?
+After that you are a rag, and not an examining magistrate! I never
+ventured to call you names before, but now you compel me to. Rag!
+Dressing-gown!--Dear Nicholas Yermolaiyevitch, do come, I beg of
+you----!"
+
+The magistrate made a deprecating motion with his hand.
+
+"I beg of you! I ask, not for myself, but in the interests of justice.
+I beg you! I implore you! Do what I ask you to, just this once!"
+
+Dukovski went down on his knees.
+
+"Nicholas Yermolaiyevitch! Be kind! Call me a blackguard, a
+ne'er-do-weel, if I am mistaken about this woman. You see what an
+affair it is. What a case it is. A romance! A woman murdering her own
+husband for love! The fame of it will go all over Russia. They will
+make you investigator in all important cases. Understand, O foolish
+old man!"
+
+The magistrate frowned, and undecidedly stretched his hand toward his
+cap.
+
+"Oh, the devil take you!" he said. "Let us go!"
+
+It was dark when the magistrate's carriage rolled up to the porch of
+the old country house in which Olga Petrovna had taken refuge with her
+brother.
+
+"What pigs we are," said Chubikoff, taking hold of the bell, "to
+disturb a poor woman like this!"
+
+"It's all right! It's all right! Don't get frightened! We can say that
+we have broken a spring."
+
+Chubikoff and Dukovski were met at the threshold by a tall buxom woman
+of three and twenty, with pitch-black brows and juicy red lips. It was
+Olga Petrovna herself, apparently not the least distressed by the
+recent tragedy.
+
+"Oh, what a pleasant surprise!" she said, smiling broadly. "You are
+just in time for supper. Kuzma Petrovitch is not at home. He is
+visiting the priest, and has stayed late. But we'll get on without
+him! Be seated. You have come from the examination?"
+
+"Yes. We broke a spring, you know," began Chubikoff, entering the
+sitting room and sinking into an armchair.
+
+"Take her unawares--at once!" whispered Dukovski; "take her unawares!"
+
+"A spring--hum--yes--so we came in."
+
+"Take her unawares, I tell you! She will guess what the matter is if
+you drag things out like that."
+
+"Well, do it yourself as you want. But let me get out of it," muttered
+Chubikoff, rising and going to the window.
+
+"Yes, a spring," began Dukovski, going close to Olga Petrovna and
+wrinkling his long nose. "We did not drive over here--to take supper
+with you or--to see Kuzma Petrovitch. We came here to ask you,
+respected madam, where Marcus Ivanovitch is, whom you murdered!"
+
+"What? Marcus Ivanovitch murdered?" stammered Olga Petrovna, and her
+broad face suddenly and instantaneously flushed bright scarlet. "I
+don't--understand!"
+
+"I ask you in the name of the law! Where is Klausoff? We know all!"
+
+"Who told you?" Olga Petrovna asked in a low voice, unable to endure
+Dukovski's glance.
+
+"Be so good as to show us where he is!"
+
+"But how did you find out? Who told you?"
+
+"We know all! I demand it in the name of the law!"
+
+The examining magistrate, emboldened by her confusion, came forward
+and said:
+
+"Show us, and we will go away. Otherwise, we----"
+
+"What do you want with him?"
+
+"Madam, what is the use of these questions? We ask you to show us! You
+tremble, you are agitated. Yes, he has been murdered, and, if you must
+have it, murdered by you! Your accomplices have betrayed you!"
+
+Olga Petrovna grew pale.
+
+"Come!" she said in a low voice, wringing her hands. "I have
+him--hid--in the bath house! Only for heaven's sake, do not tell Kuzma
+Petrovitch. I beg and implore you! He will never forgive me!"
+
+Olga Petrovna took down a big key from the wall, and led her guests
+through the kitchen and passage to the courtyard. The courtyard was in
+darkness. Fine rain was falling. Olga Petrovna walked in advance of
+them. Chubikoff and Dukovski strode behind her through the long grass,
+as the odor of wild hemp and dishwater splashing under their feet
+reached them. The courtyard was wide. Soon the dishwater ceased, and
+they felt freshly broken earth under their feet. In the darkness
+appeared the shadowy outlines of trees, and among the trees a little
+house with a crooked chimney.
+
+"That is the bath house," said Olga Petrovna. "But I implore you, do
+not tell my brother! If you do, I'll never hear the end of it!"
+
+Going up to the bath house, Chubikoff and Dukovski saw a huge padlock
+on the door.
+
+"Get your candle and matches ready," whispered the examining
+magistrate to his deputy.
+
+Olga Petrovna unfastened the padlock, and let her guests into the bath
+house. Dukovski struck a match and lit up the anteroom. In the middle
+of the anteroom stood a table. On the table, beside a sturdy little
+samovar, stood a soup tureen with cold cabbage soup and a plate with
+the remnants of some sauce.
+
+"Forward!"
+
+They went into the next room, where the bath was. There was a table
+there also. On the table was a dish with some ham, a bottle of vodka,
+plates, knives, forks.
+
+"But where is it--where is the murdered man?" asked the examining
+magistrate.
+
+"On the top tier," whispered Olga Petrovna, still pale and trembling.
+
+Dukovski took the candle in his hand and climbed up to the top tier of
+the sweating frame. There he saw a long human body lying motionless on
+a large feather bed. A slight snore came from the body.
+
+"You are making fun of us, devil take it!" cried Dukovski. "That is
+not the murdered man! Some live fool is lying here. Here, whoever you
+are, the devil take you!"
+
+The body drew in a quick breath and stirred. Dukovski stuck his elbow
+into it. It raised a hand, stretched itself, and lifted its head.
+
+"Who is sneaking in here?" asked a hoarse, heavy bass. "What do you
+want?"
+
+Dukovski raised the candle to the face of the unknown, and cried out.
+In the red nose, disheveled, unkempt hair, the pitch-black mustaches,
+one of which was jauntily twisted and pointed insolently toward the
+ceiling, he recognized the gallant cavalryman Klausoff.
+
+"You--Marcus--Ivanovitch? Is it possible?"
+
+The examining magistrate glanced sharply up at him, and stood
+spellbound.
+
+"Yes, it is I. That's you, Dukovski? What the devil do you want here?
+And who's that other mug down there? Great snakes! It is the examining
+magistrate! What fate has brought him here?"
+
+Klausoff rushed down and threw his arms round Chubikoff in a cordial
+embrace. Olga Petrovna slipped through the door.
+
+"How did you come here? Let's have a drink, devil take it!
+Tra-ta-ti-to-tum--let us drink! But who brought you here? How did you
+find out that I was here? But it doesn't matter! Let's have a drink!"
+
+Klausoff lit the lamp and poured out three glasses of vodka.
+
+"That is--I don't understand you," said the examining magistrate,
+running his hands over him. "Is this you or not you!"
+
+"Oh, shut up! You want to preach me a sermon? Don't trouble yourself!
+Young Dukovski, empty your glass! Friends, let us bring this--What are
+you looking at? Drink!"
+
+"All the same, I do not understand!" said the examining magistrate,
+mechanically drinking off the vodka. "What are you here for?"
+
+"Why shouldn't I be here, if I am all right here?"
+
+Klausoff drained his glass and took a bite of ham.
+
+"I am in captivity here, as you see. In solitude, in a cavern, like a
+ghost or a bogey. Drink! She carried me off and locked me up,
+and--well, I am living here, in the deserted bath house, like a
+hermit. I am fed. Next week I think I'll try to get out. I'm tired of
+it here!"
+
+"Incomprehensible!" said Dukovski.
+
+"What is incomprehensible about it?"
+
+"Incomprehensible! For Heaven's sake, how did your boot get into the
+garden?"
+
+"What boot?"
+
+"We found one boot in the sleeping room and the other in the garden."
+
+"And what do you want to know that for? It's none of your business!
+Why don't you drink, devil take you? If you wakened me, then drink
+with me! It is an interesting tale, brother, that of the boot! I
+didn't want to go with Olga. I don't like to be bossed. She came under
+the window and began to abuse me. She always was a termagant. You know
+what women are like, all of them. I was a bit drunk, so I took a boot
+and heaved it at her. Ha-ha-ha! Teach her not to scold another time!
+But it didn't! Not a bit of it! She climbed in at the window, lit the
+lamp, and began to hammer poor tipsy me. She thrashed me, dragged me
+over here, and locked me in. She feeds me now--on love, vodka, and
+ham! But where are you off to, Chubikoff? Where are you going?"
+
+The examining magistrate swore, and left the bath house. Dukovski
+followed him, crestfallen. They silently took their seats in the
+carriage and drove off. The road never seemed to them so long and
+disagreeable as it did that time. Both remained silent. Chubikoff
+trembled with rage all the way. Dukovski hid his nose in the collar of
+his overcoat, as if he was afraid that the darkness and the drizzling
+rain might read the shame in his face.
+
+When they reached home, the examining magistrate found Dr. Tyutyeff
+awaiting him. The doctor was sitting at the table, and, sighing
+deeply, was turning over the pages of the _Neva_.
+
+"Such goings-on there are in the world!" he said, meeting the
+examining magistrate with a sad smile, "Austria is at it again! And
+Gladstone also to some extent----"
+
+Chubikoff threw his cap under the table, and shook himself.
+
+"Devils' skeletons! Don't plague me! A thousand times I have told you
+not to bother me with your politics! This is no question of politics!
+And you," said Chubikoff, turning to Dukovski and shaking his fist, "I
+won't forget this in a thousand years!"
+
+"But the safety match? How could I know?"
+
+"Choke yourself with your safety match! Get out of my way! Don't make
+me mad, or the devil only knows what I'll do to you! Don't let me see
+a trace of you!"
+
+Dukovski sighed, took his hat, and went out.
+
+"I'll go and get drunk," he decided, going through the door, and
+gloomily wending his way to the public house.
+
+
+
+VSEVOLOD VLADIMIROVITCH KRESTOVSKI
+
+
+_KNIGHTS OF INDUSTRY_
+
+
+I
+
+THE LAST WILL OF THE PRINCESS
+
+
+Princess Anna Chechevinski for the last time looked at the home of her
+girlhood, over which the St. Petersburg twilight was descending.
+Defying the commands of her mother, the traditions of her family, she
+had decided to elope with the man of her choice. With a last word of
+farewell to her maid, she wrapped her cloak round her and disappeared
+into the darkness.
+
+The maid's fate had been a strange one. In one of the districts beyond
+the Volga lived a noble, a bachelor, luxuriously, caring only for his
+own amusement. He fished, hunted, and petted the pretty little
+daughter of his housekeeper, one of his serfs, whom he vaguely
+intended to set free. He passed hours playing with the pretty child,
+and even had an old French governess come to give her lessons. She
+taught little Natasha to dance, to play the piano, to put on the airs
+and graces of a little lady. So the years passed, and the old nobleman
+obeyed the girl's every whim, and his serfs bowed before her and
+kissed her hands. Gracefully and willfully she queened it over the
+whole household.
+
+Then one fine day the old noble took thought and died. He had
+forgotten to liberate his housekeeper and her daughter, and, as he was
+a bachelor, his estate went to his next of kin, the elder Princess
+Chechevinski. Between the brother and sister a cordial hatred had
+existed, and they had not seen one another for years.
+
+Coming to take possession of the estate, Princess Chechevinski carried
+things with a high hand. She ordered the housekeeper to the cow house,
+and carried off the girl Natasha, as her daughter's maid, to St.
+Petersburg, from the first hour letting her feel the lash of her
+bitter tongue and despotic will. Natasha had tried in vain to dry her
+mother's tears. With growing anger and sorrow she watched the old
+house as they drove away, and looking at the old princess she said to
+herself, "I hate her! I hate her! I will never forgive her!"
+
+Princess Anna, bidding her maid good-by, disappeared into the night.
+The next morning the old princess learned of the flight. Already ill,
+she fell fainting to the floor, and for a long time her condition was
+critical. She regained consciousness, tried to find words to express
+her anger, and again swooned away. Day and night, three women watched
+over her, her son's old nurse, her maid, and Natasha, who took turns
+in waiting on her. Things continued thus for forty-eight hours.
+Finally, on the night of the third day she came to herself. It was
+Natasha's watch.
+
+"And you knew? You knew she was going?" the old princess asked her
+fiercely.
+
+The girl started, unable at first to collect her thoughts, and looked
+up frightened. The dim flicker of the night light lit her pale face
+and golden hair, and fell also on the grim, emaciated face of the old
+princess, whose eyes glittered feverishly under her thick brows.
+
+"You knew my daughter was going to run away?" repeated the old woman,
+fixing her keen eyes on Natasha's face, trying to raise herself from
+among the lace-fringed pillows.
+
+"I knew," the girl answered in a half whisper, lowering her eyes in
+confusion, and trying to throw off her first impression of terror.
+
+"Why did you not tell me before?" the old woman continued, even more
+fiercely.
+
+Natasha had now recovered her composure, and raising her eyes with an
+expression of innocent distress, she answered:
+
+"Princess Anna hid everything from me also, until the very last. How
+dare I tell you? Would you have believed me? It was not my business,
+your excellency!"
+
+The old princess shook her head, smiling bitterly and incredulously.
+
+"Snake!" she hissed fiercely, looking at the girl; and then she added
+quickly:
+
+"Did any of the others know?"
+
+"No one but myself!" answered Natasha.
+
+"Never dare to speak of her again! Never dare!" cried the old
+princess, and once more she sank back unconscious on the pillows.
+
+About noon the next day she again came to herself, and ordered her son
+to be called. He came in quietly, and affectionately approached his
+mother.
+
+The princess dismissed her maid, and remained alone with her son.
+
+"You have no longer a sister!" she cried, turning to her son, with the
+nervous spasm which returned each time she spoke of her daughter. "She
+is dead for us! She has disgraced us! I curse her! You, you alone are
+my heir!"
+
+At these words the young prince pricked up his ears and bent even more
+attentively toward his mother. The news of his sole heirship was so
+pleasant and unexpected that he did not even think of asking how his
+sister had disgraced them, and only said with a deep sigh:
+
+"Oh, mamma, she was always opposed to you. She never loved you!"
+
+"I shall make a will in your favor," continued the princess, telling
+him as briefly as possible of Princess Anna's flight. "Yes, in your
+favor--only on one condition: that you will never recognize your
+sister. That is my last wish!"
+
+"Your wish is sacred to me," murmured her son, tenderly kissing her
+hand. He had always been jealous and envious of his sister, and was
+besides in immediate need of money.
+
+The princess signed her will that same day, to the no small
+satisfaction of her dear son, who, in his heart, was wondering how
+soon his beloved parent would pass away, so that he might get his eyes
+on her long-hoarded wealth.
+
+
+II
+
+THE LITHOGRAPHER'S APPRENTICE
+
+
+Later on the same day, in a little narrow chamber of one of the huge,
+dirty tenements on Vosnesenski Prospekt, sat a young man of ruddy
+complexion. He was sitting at a table, bending toward the one dusty
+window, and attentively examining a white twenty-five ruble note.
+
+The room, dusty and dark, was wretched enough. Two rickety chairs, a
+torn haircloth sofa, with a greasy pillow, and the bare table at the
+window, were its entire furniture. Several scattered lithographs, two
+or three engravings, two slabs of lithographer's stone on the table,
+and engraver's tools sufficiently showed the occupation of the young
+man. He was florid, with red hair; of Polish descent, and his name was
+Kasimir Bodlevski. On the wall, over the sofa, between the overcoat
+and the cloak hanging on the wall, was a pencil drawing of a young
+girl. It was the portrait of Natasha.
+
+The young man was so absorbed in his examination of the twenty-five
+ruble note that when a gentle knock sounded on the door he started
+nervously, as if coming back to himself, and even grew pale, and
+hurriedly crushed the banknote into his pocket.
+
+The knock was repeated--and this time Bodlevski's face lit up. It was
+evidently a well-known and expected knock, for he sprang up and opened
+the door with a welcoming smile.
+
+Natasha entered the room.
+
+"What were you dreaming about that you didn't open the door for me?"
+she asked caressingly, throwing aside her hat and cloak, and taking a
+seat on the tumble-down sofa. "What were you busy at?"
+
+"You know, yourself."
+
+And instead of explaining further, he drew the banknote from his
+pocket and showed it to Natasha.
+
+"This morning the master paid me, and I am keeping the money," he
+continued in a low voice, tilting back his chair. "I pay neither for
+my rooms nor my shop, but sit here and study all the time."
+
+"It's so well worth while, isn't it?" smiled Natasha with a
+contemptuous grimace.
+
+"You don't think it is worth while?" said the young man. "Wait! I'll
+learn. We'll be rich!"
+
+"Yes, if we aren't sent to Siberia!" the girl laughed, "What kind of
+wealth is that?" she went on. "The game is not worth the candle. I'll
+be rich before you are."
+
+"All right, go ahead!"
+
+"Go ahead? I didn't come to talk nonsense, I came on business. You
+help me, and, on my word of honor, we'll be in clover!"
+
+Bodlevski looked at his companion in astonishment.
+
+"I told you my Princess Anna was going to run away. She's gone! And
+her mother has cut her off from the inheritance," Natasha continued
+with an exultant smile. "I looked through the scrap basket, and have
+brought some papers with me."
+
+"What sort of papers?"
+
+"Oh, letters and notes. They are all in Princess Anna's handwriting.
+Shall I give them to you?" jested Natasha. "Have a good look at them,
+examine them, learn her handwriting, so that you can imitate every
+letter. That kind of thing is just in your line; you are a first-class
+copyist, so this is just the job for you."
+
+The engraver listened, and only shrugged his shoulders.
+
+"No, joking aside," she continued seriously, drawing nearer Bodlevski,
+"I have thought of something out of the common; you will be grateful.
+I have no time to explain it all now. You will know later on. The main
+thing is--learn her handwriting."
+
+"But what is it all for?" said Bodlevski wonderingly.
+
+"So that you may be able to write a few words in the handwriting of
+Princess Anna; what you have to write I'll dictate to you."
+
+"And then?"
+
+"Then hurry up and get me a passport in some one else's name, and have
+your own ready. But learn her handwriting. Everything depends on
+that!"
+
+"It won't be easy. I'll hardly be able to!" muttered Bodlevski,
+scratching his head.
+
+Natasha flared up.
+
+"You say you love me?" she cried energetically, with a glance of
+anger. "Well, then, do it. Unless you are telling lies, you can learn
+to do banknotes."
+
+The young man strode up and down his den, perplexed.
+
+"How soon do you want it?" he asked, after a minute's thought. "In a
+couple of days?"
+
+"Yes, in about two days, not longer, or the whole thing is done for!"
+the girl replied decisively. "In two days I'll come for the writing,
+and be sure my passport is ready!"
+
+"Very well. I'll do it," consented Bodlevski. And Natasha began to
+dictate to him the wording of the letter.
+
+As soon as she was gone the engraver got to work. All the evening and
+a great part of the night he bent over the papers she had brought,
+examining the handwriting, studying the letters, and practicing every
+stroke with the utmost care, copying and repeating it a hundred times,
+until at last he had reached the required clearness. At last he
+mastered the writing. It only remained to give it the needed lightness
+and naturalness. His head rang from the concentration of blood in his
+temples, but he still worked on.
+
+Finally, when it was almost morning, the note was written, and the
+name of Princess Anna was signed to it. The work was a masterpiece,
+and even exceeded Bodlevski's expectations. Its lightness and
+clearness were remarkable. The engraver, examining the writing of
+Princess Anna, compared it with his own work, and was astonished, so
+perfect was the resemblance.
+
+And long he admired his handiwork, with the parental pride known to
+every creator, and as he looked at this note he for the first time
+fully realized that he was an artist.
+
+
+III
+
+THE CAVE
+
+
+"Half the work is done!" he cried, jumping from the tumble-down sofa.
+"But the passport? There's where the shoe pinches," continued the
+engraver, remembering the second half of Natasha's commission. "The
+passport--yes--that's where the shoe pinches!" he muttered to himself
+in perplexity, resting his head on his hands and his elbows on his
+knees. Thinking over all kinds of possible and impossible plans, he
+suddenly remembered a fellow countryman of his, a shoemaker named
+Yuzitch, who had once confessed in a moment of intoxication that "he
+would rather hook a watch than patch a shoe." Bodlevski remembered
+that three months before he had met Yuzitch in the street, and they
+had gone together to a wine shop, where, over a bottle generously
+ordered by Yuzitch, Bodlevski had lamented over the hardships of
+mankind in general, and his own in particular. He had not taken
+advantage of Yuzitch's offer to introduce him to "the gang," only
+because he had already determined to take up one of the higher
+branches of the "profession," namely, to metamorphose white paper into
+banknotes. When they were parting, Yuzitch had warmly wrung his hand,
+saying:
+
+"Whenever you want anything, dear friend, or if you just want to see
+me, come to the Cave; come to Razyeziy Street and ask for the Cave,
+and at the Cave anyone will show you where to find Yuzitch. If the
+barkeeper makes difficulties just whisper to him that 'Secret' sent
+you, and he'll show you at once."
+
+As this memory suddenly flashed into his mind, Bodlevski caught up his
+hat and coat and hurried downstairs into the street. Making his way
+through the narrow, dirty streets to the Five Points, he stopped
+perplexed. Happily he noticed a sleepy watchman leaning leisurely
+against a wall, and going up to him he said:
+
+"Tell me, where is the Cave?"
+
+"The what?" asked the watchman impatiently.
+
+"The Cave."
+
+"The Cave? There is no such place!" he replied, looking suspiciously
+at Bodlevski.
+
+Bodlevski put his hand in his pocket and pulled out some small change:
+"If you tell me----"
+
+The watchman brightened up. "Why didn't you say so before?" he asked,
+grinning. "You see that house, the second from the corner? The wooden
+one? That's the Cave."
+
+Bodlevski crossed the street in the direction indicated, and looked
+for the sign over the door. To his astonishment he did not find it and
+only later he knew that the name was strictly "unofficial," only used
+by members of "the gang."
+
+Opening the door cautiously, Bodlevski made his way into the low,
+dirty barroom. Behind the bar stood a tall, handsome man with an open
+countenance and a bald head. Politely bowing to Bodlevski, with his
+eyes rather than his head, he invited him to enter the inner room. But
+Bodlevski explained that he wanted, not the inner room, but his friend
+Yuzitch.
+
+"Yuzitch?" said the barkeeper thoughtfully. "We don't know anyone of
+that name."
+
+"Why, he's here all the time," cried Bodlevski, in astonishment.
+
+"Don't know him," retorted the barkeeper imperturbably.
+
+"'Secret' sent me!" Bodlevski suddenly exclaimed, without lowering his
+voice.
+
+The barkeeper looked at him sharply and suspiciously, and then asked,
+with a smile:
+
+"Who did you say?"
+
+"'Secret,'" repeated Bodlevski.
+
+After a while the barkeeper said, "And did your--friend make an
+appointment?"
+
+"Yes, an appointment!" Bodlevski replied, beginning to lose patience.
+
+"Well, take a seat in the inner room," again said the barkeeper slyly.
+"Perhaps your friend will come in, or perhaps he is there already."
+
+Bodlevski made his way into a roomy saloon, with five windows with
+faded red curtains. The ceiling was black from the smoke of hanging
+lamps; little square tables were dotted about the floor; their covers
+were coarse and not above reproach on the score of cleanliness. The
+air was pungent with the odor of cheap tobacco and cheaper cigars. On
+the walls were faded oleographs of generals and archbishops, flyblown
+and stained.
+
+Bodlevski, little as he was used to refined surroundings, found his
+gorge rising. At some of the little tables furtive, impudent,
+tattered, sleek men were drinking.
+
+Presently Yuzitch made his appearance from a low door at the other end
+of the room. The meeting of the two friends was cordial, especially on
+Bodlevski's side. Presently they were seated at a table, with a flask
+of wine between them, and Bodlevski began to explain what he wanted to
+his friend.
+
+As soon as he heard what was wanted, Yuzitch took on an air of
+importance, knit his brows, hemmed, and hawed.
+
+"I can manage it," he said finally. "Yes, we can manage it. I must see
+one of my friends about it. But it's difficult. It will cost money."
+
+Bodlevski immediately assented. Yuzitch at once rose and went over to
+a red-nosed individual in undress uniform, who was poring over the
+_Police News_.
+
+"Friend Borisovitch," said Yuzitch, holding out his hand to him,
+"something doing!"
+
+"Fair or foul?" asked the man with the red nose. "Hang your cheek!"
+laughed Yuzitch; "if I say it, of course it's fair." After a whispered
+conference, Yuzitch returned to Bodlevski and told him that it was all
+right; that the passport for Natasha would be ready by the next
+evening. Bodlevski paid him something in advance and went home
+triumphantly.
+
+At eleven o'clock the next evening Bodlevski once more entered the
+large room at the Cave, now all lit up and full of an animated crowd
+of men and women, all with the same furtive, predatory faces.
+Bodlevski felt nervous. He had no fears while turning white paper into
+banknotes in the seclusion of his own workshop, but he was full of
+apprehensions concerning his present guest, because several people had
+to be let into the secret.
+
+Yuzitch presently appeared through the same low door and, coming up to
+Bodlevski, explained that the passport would cost twenty rubles.
+Bodlevski paid the money over in advance, and Yuzitch led him into a
+back room. On the table burned a tallow candle, which hardly lit up
+the faces of seven people who were grouped round it, one of them being
+the red-nosed man who was reading the _Police News._ The seven men
+were all from the districts of Vilna and Vitebsk, and were specialists
+in the art of fabricating passports.
+
+The red-nosed man approached Bodlevski: "We must get acquainted with
+each other," he said amiably. "I have the honor to present myself!"
+and he bowed low; "Former District Secretary Pacomius Borisovitch
+Prakkin. Let me request you first of all to order some vodka; my hand
+shakes, you know," he added apologetically. "I don't want it so much
+for myself as for my hand--to steady it."
+
+Bodlevski gave him some change, which the red-nosed man put in his
+pocket and at once went to the sideboard for a flask of vodka which he
+had already bought. "Let us give thanks! And now to business!" he
+said, smacking his lips after a glass of vodka.
+
+A big, red-haired man, one of the group of seven, drew from his pocket
+two vials. In one was a sticky black fluid; in the other, something as
+clear as water.
+
+"We are chemists, you see," the red-nosed man explained to Bodlevski
+with a grin, and then added:
+
+"Finch! on guard!"
+
+A young man, who had been lolling on a couch in the corner, rose and
+took up a position outside the door.
+
+"Now, brothers, close up!" cried the red-nosed man, and all stood in
+close order, elbow to elbow, round the table. "And now we take a
+newspaper and have it handy on the table! That is in case," he
+explained to Bodlevski, "any outsider happened in on us--which Heaven
+prevent! We aren't up to anything at all; simply reading the political
+news! You catch on?"
+
+"How could I help catching on?"
+
+"Very well. And now let us make everything as clear as in a
+looking-glass. What class do you wish to make the person belong to?
+The commercial or the nobility?"
+
+"I think the nobility would be best," said Bodlevski.
+
+"Certainly! At least that will give the right of free passage through
+all the towns and districts of the Russian Empire. Let us see. Have we
+not something that will suit?"
+
+And Pacomius Borisovitch, opening his portfolio, filled with all kinds
+of passports, certificates, and papers of identification, began to
+turn them over, but without taking any out of the portfolio. All with
+the same thought--that some stranger might come in.
+
+"Ha! here's a new one! Where did it come from?" he cried.
+
+"I got it out of a new arrival," muttered the red-headed man.
+
+"Well done! Just what we want! And a noble's passport, too! It is
+evident that Heaven is helping us. See what a blessing brings!
+
+"'This passport is issued by the District of Yaroslav,'" he continued
+reading, "'to the college assessor's widow, Maria Solontseva, with
+permission to travel,'" and so on in due form. "Did you get it here?"
+he added, turning to the red-headed man.
+
+"Came from Moscow!"
+
+"Pinched?"
+
+"Knocked on the head!" briefly replied the red-headed man.
+
+"Knocked on the head?" repeated Pacomius Borisovitch. "Serious
+business. Comes under sections 332 and 727 of the Penal Code."
+
+"Driveling again!" cried the red-headed man. "I'll teach you to talk
+about the Penal Code!" and rising deliberately, he dealt Pacomius
+Borisovitch a well-directed blow on the head, which sent him rolling
+into the corner. Pacomius picked himself up, blinking with
+indignation.
+
+"What is the meaning of such conduct?" he asked loftily.
+
+"It means," said the red-headed man, "that if you mention the Penal
+Code again I'll knock your head off!"
+
+"Brothers, brothers!" cried Yuzitch in a good-humored tone; "we are
+losing precious time! Forgive him!" he added, turning to Pacomius.
+"You must forgive him!"
+
+"I--forgive him," answered Pacomius, but the light in his eye showed
+that he was deeply offended.
+
+"Well," he went on, addressing Bodlevski, "will it suit you to have
+the person pass as Maria Solontseva, widow of a college assessor?"
+
+
+IV
+
+THE CAPTAIN OF THE GOLDEN BAND
+
+
+Bodlevski had not time to nod his head in assent, when suddenly the
+outer door was pushed quickly open and a tall man, well built and
+fair-haired, stepped swiftly into the room. He wore a military uniform
+and gold-rimmed eyeglasses.
+
+The company turned their faces toward him in startled surprise, but no
+one moved. All continued to stand in close order round the table.
+
+"Health to you, eaglets! honorable men of Vilna! What are you up to?
+What are you busy at?" cried the newcomer, swiftly approaching the
+table and taking the chair that Pacomius Borisovitch had just been
+knocked out of.
+
+"What is all this?" he continued, with one hand seizing the vial of
+colorless liquid and with the other the photograph of the college
+assessor's widow. "So this is hydrochloric acid for erasing ink? Very
+good! And this is a photo! So we are fabricating passports? Very fine!
+Business is business! Hey! Witnesses!"
+
+And the fair-haired man whistled sharply. From the outer door appeared
+two faces, set on shoulders of formidable proportions.
+
+The red-headed man silently went up to the newcomer and fiercely
+seized him by the collar. At the same moment the rest seized chairs or
+logs or bars to defend themselves.
+
+The fair-haired man meanwhile, not in the least changing his
+expression of cool self-confidence, quickly slipped his hands into his
+pockets and pulled out a pair of small double-barreled pistols. In the
+profound silence in which this scene took place they could distinctly
+hear the click of the hammers as he cocked them. He raised his right
+hand and pointed the muzzle at the breast of his opponent.
+
+The red-headed man let go his collar, and glancing contemptuously at
+him, with an expression of hate and wrath, silently stepped aside.
+
+"How much must we pay?" he asked sullenly.
+
+"Oho! that's better. You should have begun by asking that!" answered
+the newcomer, settling himself comfortably on his chair and toying
+with his pistols. "How much do you earn?"
+
+"We get little enough! Just five rubles," answered the red-headed man.
+
+"That's too little. I need a great deal more. But you are lying,
+brother! You would not stir for less than twenty rubles!"
+
+"Thanks for the compliment!" interrupted Pacomius Borisovitch.
+
+The fair-haired man nodded to him satirically. "I need a lot more," he
+repeated firmly and impressively; "and if you don't give me at least
+twenty-five rubles I'll denounce you this very minute to the
+police--and you see I have my witnesses ready."
+
+"Sergei Antonitch! Mr. Kovroff! Have mercy on us! Where can we get so
+much from? I tell you as in the presence of the Creator! There are ten
+of us, as you see. And there are three of you. And I, Yuzitch, and
+Gretcka deserve double shares!" added Pacomius Borisovitch
+persuasively.
+
+"Gretcka deserves nothing at all for catching me by the throat,"
+decided Sergei Antonitch Kovroff.
+
+"Mr. Kovroff!" began Pacomius again. "You and I are gentlemen----"
+
+"What! What did you say?" Kovroff contemptuously interrupted him. "You
+put yourself on my level? Ha! ha! ha! No, brother; I am still in the
+Czar's service and wear my honor with my uniform! I, brother, have
+never stained myself with theft or crime, Heaven be praised. But what
+are you?"
+
+"Hm! And the Golden Band? Who is its captain?" muttered Gretcka
+angrily, half to himself.
+
+"Who is its captain? I am--I, Lieutenant Sergei Antonitch Kovroff, of
+the Chernovarski Dragoons! Do you hear? I am captain of the Golden
+Band," he said proudly and haughtily, scrutinizing the company with
+his confident gaze. "And you haven't yet got as far as the Golden
+Band, because you are _cowards_! Chuproff," he cried to one of his
+men, "go and take the mask off Finch, or the poor boy will suffocate,
+and untie his arms--and give him a good crack on the head to teach him
+to keep watch better."
+
+The "mask" that Kovroff employed on such occasions was nothing but a
+piece of oilcloth cut the size of a person's face, and smeared on one
+side with a thick paste. Kovroff's "boys" employed this "instrument"
+with wonderful dexterity; one of them generally stole up behind the
+unconscious victim and skillfully slapped the mask in his face; the
+victim at once became dumb and blind, and panted from lack of breath;
+at the same time, if necessary, his hands were tied behind him and he
+was leisurely robbed, or held, as the case might be.
+
+The Golden Band was formed in the middle of the thirties, when the
+first Nicholas had been about ten years on the throne. Its first
+founders were three Polish nobles. It was never distinguished by the
+number of its members, but everyone of them could honestly call
+himself an accomplished knave, never stopping at anything that stood
+in the way of a "job." The present head of the band was Lieutenant
+Kovroff, who was a thorough-paced rascal, in the full sense of the
+word. Daring, brave, self-confident, he also possessed a handsome
+presence, good manners, and the worldly finish known as education.
+Before the members of the Golden Band, and especially before Kovroff,
+the small rascals stood in fear and trembling. He had his secret
+agents everywhere, following every move of the crooks quietly but
+pertinaciously. At the moment when some big job was being pulled off,
+Kovroff suddenly appeared unexpectedly, with some of his "boys," and
+demanded a contribution, threatening instantly to inform the police if
+he did not get it--and the rogues, in order to "keep him quiet," had
+to give him whatever share of their plunder he graciously deigned to
+indicate. Acting with extraordinary skill and acumen in all his
+undertakings he always managed so that not a shadow of suspicion could
+fall on himself and so he got a double share of the plunder: robbing
+the honest folk and the rogues at the same time. Kovroff escaped the
+contempt of the crooks because he did things on such a big scale and
+embarked with his Golden Band on the most desperate and dangerous
+enterprises that the rest of roguedom did not even dare to consider.
+
+The rogues, whatever their rank, have a great respect for daring,
+skill, and force--and therefore they respected Kovroff, at the same
+time fearing and detesting him.
+
+"Who are you getting that passport for?" he asked, calmly taking the
+paper from the table and slipping it into his pocket. Gretcka nodded
+toward Bodlevski.
+
+"Aha! for you, is it? Very glad to hear it!" said Kovroff, measuring
+him with his eyes. "And so, gentlemen, twenty-five rubles, or
+good-by--to our happy meeting in the police court!"
+
+"Mr. Kovroff! Allow me to speak to you as a man of honor!" Pacomius
+Borisovitch again interrupted. "We are only getting twenty rubles for
+the job. The whole gang will pledge their words of honor to that. Do
+you think we would lie to you and stain the honor of the gang for
+twenty measly rubles?"
+
+"That is business. That was well said. I love a good speech, and am
+always ready to respect it," remarked Sergei Antonitch approvingly.
+
+"Very well, then, see for yourself," went on the red-nosed Pacomius,
+"see for yourself. If we give you everything, we are doing our work
+and not getting a kopeck!"
+
+"Let him pay," answered Kovroff, turning his eyes toward Bodlevski.
+
+Bodlevski took out his gold watch, his only inheritance from his
+father, and laid it down on the table before Kovroff, with the five
+rubles that remained.
+
+Kovroff again measured him with his eyes and smiled.
+
+"You are a worthy young man!" he said. "Give me your hand! I see that
+you will go far."
+
+And he warmly pressed the engraver's hand. "But you must know for the
+future," he added in a friendly but impressive way, "that I never take
+anything but money when I am dealing with these fellows. Ho, you!" he
+went on, turning to the company, "some one go to uncle's and get cash
+for this watch; tell him to pay conscientiously at least two thirds of
+what it is worth; it is a good watch. It would cost sixty rubles to
+buy. And have a bottle of champagne got ready for me at the bar,
+quick! And if you don't, it will be the worse for you!" he called
+after the departing Yuzitch, who came back a few minutes later, and
+gave Kovroff forty rubles. Kovroff counted them, and put twenty in his
+pocket, returning the remainder in silence, but with a gentlemanly
+smile, to Bodlevski.
+
+"Fair exchange is no robbery," he said, giving Bodlevski the passport
+of the college assessor's widow. "Now that old rascal Pacomius may get
+to work."
+
+"What is there to do?" laughed Pacomius; "the passport will do very
+well. So let us have a little glass, and then a little game of cards."
+
+"We are going to know each other better; I like your face, so I hope
+we shall make friends," said Kovroff, again shaking hands with
+Bodlevski. "Now let us go and have some wine. You will tell me over
+our glasses what you want the passport for, and on account of your
+frankness about the watch, I am well disposed to you. Lieutenant
+Sergei Kovroff gives you his word of honor on that. I also can be
+magnanimous," he concluded, and the new friends accompanied by the
+whole gang went out to the large hall.
+
+There began a scene of revelry that lasted till long after midnight.
+Bodlevski, feeling his side pocket to see if the passport was still
+there, at last left the hall, bewildered, as though under a spell. He
+felt a kind of gloomy satisfaction; he was possessed by this
+satisfaction, by the uncertainty of what Natasha could have thought
+out, by the question how it would all turn out, and by the conviction
+that his first crime had already been committed. All these feelings
+lay like lead on his heart, while in his ears resounded the wild songs
+of the Cave.
+
+
+V
+
+THE KEYS OF THE OLD PRINCESS
+
+
+It was nine o'clock in the evening. Natasha lit the night lamp in the
+bedroom of the old Princess Chechevinski, and went silently into the
+dressing room to prepare the soothing powders which the doctors had
+prescribed for her, before going to sleep.
+
+The old princess was still very weak. Although her periods of
+unconsciousness had not returned, she was still subject to paroxysms
+of hysteria. At times she sank into forgetfulness, then started
+nervously, sometimes trembling in every limb. The thought of the blow
+of her daughter's flight never left her for a moment.
+
+Natasha had just taken the place of the day nurse. It was her turn to
+wait on the patient until midnight. Silence always reigned in the
+house of the princess, and now that she was ill the silence was
+intensified tenfold. Everyone walked on tiptoe, and spoke in whispers,
+afraid even of coughing or of clinking a teaspoon on the sideboard.
+The doorbells were tied in towels, and the whole street in front of
+the house was thickly strewn with straw. At ten the household was
+already dispersed, and preparing for sleep. Only the nurse sat
+silently at the head of the old lady's bed.
+
+Pouring out half a glass of water, Natasha sprinkled the powder in it,
+and took from the medicine chest a phial with a yellowish liquid. It
+was chloral. Looking carefully round, she slowly brought the lip of
+the phial down to the edge of the glass and let ten drops fall into
+it. "That will be enough," she said to herself, and smiled. Her face,
+as always, was coldly quiet, and not the slightest shade of any
+feeling was visible on it at that moment.
+
+Natasha propped the old lady up with her arm. She drank the medicine
+given to her and lay down again, and in a few minutes the chloral
+began to have its effect. With an occasional convulsive movement of
+her lower lip, she sank into a deep and heavy sleep. Natasha watched
+her face following the symptoms of unconsciousness, and when she was
+convinced that sleep had finally taken complete possession of her, and
+that for several hours the old woman was deprived of the power to hear
+anything or to wake up, she slowly moved her chair nearer the
+bedstead, and without taking her quietly observant eyes from the old
+woman's face, softly slipped her hand under the lower pillow. Moving
+forward with the utmost care, not more than an inch or so at a time,
+her hand stopped instantly, as soon as there was the slightest nervous
+movement of the old woman's face, on which Natasha's eyes were fixed
+immovably. But the old woman slept profoundly, and the hand again
+moved forward half an inch or so under the pillow. About half an hour
+passed, and the girl's eyes were still fastened on the sleeping face,
+and her hand was still slipping forward under the pillow, moving
+occasionally a little to one side, and feeling about for something.
+Natasha's expression was in the highest degree quiet and concentrated,
+but under this quietness was at the same time concealed something
+else, which gave the impression that if--which Heaven forbid!--the old
+woman should at that moment awake, the other free hand would instantly
+seize her by the throat.
+
+At last the finger-ends felt something hard. "That is it!" thought
+Natasha, and she held her breath. In a moment, seizing its treasure,
+her hand began quietly to withdraw. Ten minutes more passed, and
+Natasha finally drew out a little bag of various colored silks, in
+which the old princess always kept her keys, and from which she never
+parted, carrying it by day in her pocket, and by night keeping it
+under her pillow. One of the keys was an ordinary one, that of her
+wardrobe. The other was smaller and finely made; it was the key of her
+strong box.
+
+About an hour later, the same keys, in the same order, and with the
+same precautions, found their way back to their accustomed place under
+the old lady's pillow.
+
+Natasha carefully wiped the glass with her handkerchief, in order that
+not the least odor of chloral might remain in it, and with her usual
+stillness sat out the remaining hours of her watch.
+
+
+VI
+
+REVENGED
+
+
+The old princess awoke at one o'clock the next day. The doctor was
+very pleased at her long and sound sleep, the like of which the old
+lady had not enjoyed since her first collapse, and which, in his view,
+was certain to presage a turn for the better.
+
+The princess had long ago formed a habit of looking over her financial
+documents, and verifying the accounts of income and expenditure. This
+deep-seated habit, which had become a second nature, did not leave
+her, now she was ill; at any rate, every morning, as soon as
+consciousness and tranquillity returned to her, she took out the key
+of her wardrobe, ordered the strong box to be brought to her, and,
+sending the day nurse out of the room, gave herself up in solitude to
+her beloved occupation, which had by this time become something like a
+childish amusement. She drew out her bank securities, signed and
+unsigned, now admiring the colored engravings on them, now sorting and
+rearranging them, fingering the packets to feel their thickness,
+counting them over, and several thousands in banknotes, kept in the
+house in case of need, and finally carefully replaced them in the
+strong box. The girl, recalled to the bedroom by the sound of the
+bell, restored the strong box to its former place, and the old
+princess, after this amusement, felt herself for some time quiet and
+happy.
+
+The nurses had had the opportunity to get pretty well used to this
+foible; so that the daily examination of the strong box seemed to them
+a part of the order of things, something consecrated by custom.
+
+After taking her medicine, and having her hands and face wiped with a
+towel moistened with toilet water, the princess ordered certain
+prayers to be read out to her, or the chapter of the Gospel appointed
+for the day, and then received her son. From the time of her
+illness--that is, from the day when she signed the will making him her
+sole heir--he had laid it on himself as a not altogether pleasant duty
+to put in an appearance for five minutes in his mother's room, where
+he showed himself a dutiful son by never mentioning his sister, but
+asking tenderly after his mother's health, and finally, with a deep
+sigh, gently kissing her hand, taking his departure forthwith, to sup
+with some actress or to meet his companions in a wine shop.
+
+When he soon went away, the old lady, as was her habit, ordered her
+strong box to be brought, and sent the nurse out of the room. It was a
+very handsome box of ebony, with beautiful inlaid work.
+
+The key clicked in the lock, the spring lid sprang up, and the eyes of
+the old princess became set in their sockets, full of bewilderment and
+terror. Twenty-four thousand rubles in bills, which she herself with
+her own hands had yesterday laid on the top of the other securities,
+were no longer in the strong box. All the unsigned bank securities
+were also gone. The securities in the name of her daughter Anna had
+likewise disappeared. There remained only the signed securities in the
+name of the old princess and her son, and a few shares of stock. In
+the place of all that was gone, there lay a note directed "to Princess
+Chechevinski."
+
+The old lady's fingers trembled so that for a long time she could not
+unfold this paper. Her staring eyes wandered hither and thither as if
+she had lost her senses. At last she managed somehow to unfold the
+note, and began to read:
+
+"You cursed me, forced me to flee, and unjustly deprived me of my
+inheritance. I am taking my money by force. You may inform the police,
+but when you read this note, I myself and he who carried out this act
+by my directions, will have left St. Petersburg forever.
+
+"Your daughter,
+
+"PRINCESS ANNA CHECHEVINSKI."
+
+The old lady's hands did not fall at her sides, but shifted about on
+her lap as if they did not belong to her. Her wandering, senseless
+eyes stopped their movements, and in them suddenly appeared an
+expression of deep meaning. The old princess made a terrible,
+superhuman effort to recover her presence of mind and regain command
+over herself. A single faint groan broke from her breast, and her
+teeth chattered. She began to look about the room for a light, but the
+lamp had been extinguished; the dull gray daylight filtering through
+the Venetian blinds sufficiently lit the room. Then the old lady, with
+a strange, irregular movement, crushed the note together in her hand,
+placed it in her mouth, and with a convulsive movement of her jaws
+chewed it, trying to swallow it as quickly as possible.
+
+A minute passed, and the note had disappeared. The old princess closed
+the strong box and rang for the day nurse. Giving her the usual order
+in a quiet voice, she had still strength enough to support herself on
+her elbow and watch the nurse closing the wardrobe, and then to put
+the little bag with the keys back under her pillow, in its accustomed
+place. Then she again ordered the nurse to go.
+
+When, two hours later, the doctor, coming for the third time, wished
+to see his patient and entered her bedroom, he found only the old
+woman's lifeless body. The blow had been too much--the daughter of the
+ancient and ever honorable line of Chechevinski a fugitive and a
+thief!
+
+Natasha had had her revenge.
+
+
+VII
+
+BEYOND THE FRONTIER
+
+
+On the morning of that same day, at nine o'clock, a well-dressed lady
+presented at the Bank of Commerce a number of unsigned bank shares. At
+the same time a young man, also elegantly dressed, presented a series
+of signed shares, made out in the name of "Princess Anna
+Chechevinski." They were properly indorsed, the signature
+corresponding to that in the bank books.
+
+After a short interval the cashier of the bank paid over to the
+well-dressed lady a hundred and fifty thousand rubles in bills, and to
+the elegantly dressed young man seventy thousand rubles. The lady
+signed her receipt in French, Teresa Dore; the young man signed his
+name, Ivan Afonasieff, son of a merchant of Kostroma.
+
+A little later on the same day--namely, about two o'clock--a light
+carriage carried two passengers along the Pargoloff road: a quietly
+dressed young woman and a quietly dressed young man. Toward evening
+these same young people were traveling in a Finnish coach by the stony
+mountain road in the direction of Abo.
+
+Four days later the old Princess Chechevinski was buried in the Nevski
+monastery.
+
+On his return from the monastery, young Prince Chechevinski went
+straight for the strong box, which he had hitherto seen only at a
+distance, and even then only rarely. He expected to find a great deal
+more money in it than he found--some hundred and fifty thousand
+rubles; a hundred thousand in his late mother's name, and fifty
+thousand in his own. This was the personal property of the old
+princess, a part of her dowry. The young prince made a wry face--the
+money might last him two or three years, not more. During the lifetime
+of the old princess no one had known accurately how much she
+possessed, so that it never even entered the young prince's head to
+ask whether she had not had more. He was so unmethodical that he never
+even looked into her account book, deciding that it was uninteresting
+and not worth while.
+
+That same day the janitor of one of the huge, dirty tenements in
+Vosnesenski Prospekt brought to the police office notice of the fact
+that the Pole, Kasimir Bodlevski, had left the city; and the
+housekeeper of the late Princess Chechevinski informed the police that
+the serf girl Natalia Pavlovna (Natasha) had disappeared without
+leaving a trace, which the housekeeper now announced, as the three
+days' limit had elapsed.
+
+At that same hour the little ship of a certain Finnish captain was
+gliding down the Gulf of Bothnia. The Finn stood at the helm and his
+young son handled the sails. On the deck sat a young man and a young
+woman. The young woman carried, in a little bag hung round her neck,
+two hundred and forty-four thousand rubles in bills, and she and her
+companion carried pistols in their pockets for use in case of need.
+Their passports declared that the young woman belonged to the noble
+class, and was the widow of a college assessor, her name being Maria
+Solontseva, while the young man was a Pole, Kasimir Bodlevski.
+
+The little ship was crossing the Gulf of Bothnia toward the coast of
+Sweden.
+
+
+
+VIII
+
+BACK TO RUSSIA
+
+
+In the year 1858, in the month of September, the "Report of the St.
+Petersburg City Police" among the names of "Arrivals" included the
+following:
+
+     _Baroness van Doering, Hanoverian subject.
+     Ian Vladislav Karozitch, Austrian subject_.
+
+The persons above described might have been recognized among the
+fashionable crowds which thronged the St. Petersburg terminus of
+the Warsaw railway a few days before: A lady who looked not
+more than thirty, though she was really thirty-eight, dressed
+with simple elegance, tall and slender, admirably developed,
+with beautifully clear complexion, piercing, intelligent gray eyes,
+under finely outlined brows, thick chestnut hair, and a firm
+mouth--almost a beauty, and with an expression of power, subtlety and
+decision. "She is either a queen or a criminal," a physiognomist would
+have said after observing her face. A gentleman with a red beard, whom
+the lady addressed as "brother," not less elegantly dressed, and with
+the same expression of subtlety and decision. They left the station in
+a hired carriage, and drove to Demuth's Hotel.
+
+Before narrating the adventures of these distinguished persons, let us
+go back twenty years, and ask what became of Natasha and Bodlevski.
+When last we saw them the ship that carried them away from Russia was
+gliding across the Gulf of Bothnia toward the Swedish coast. Late in
+the evening it slipped into the port of Stockholm, and the worthy
+Finn, winding in and out among the heavy hulls in the harbor--he was
+well used to the job--landed his passengers on the wharf at a lonely
+spot near a lonely inn, where the customs officers rarely showed their
+noses. Bodlevski, who had beforehand got ready the very modest sum to
+pay for their passage, with pitiable looks and gestures and the few
+Russian phrases the good Finn could understand, assured him that he
+was a very poor man, and could not even pay the sum agreed on in full.
+The deficit was inconsiderable, some two rubles in all, and the good
+Finn was magnanimous; he slapped his passenger on the shoulder, called
+him a "good comrade," declared that he would not press a poor man, and
+would always be ready to do him a service. He even found quarters for
+Bodlevski and Natasha in the inn, under his protection. The Finn was
+indeed a very honest smuggler. On the next morning, bidding a final
+farewell to their nautical friend, our couple made their way to the
+office of the British Consul, and asked for an opportunity to speak
+with him. At this point Natasha played the principal role.
+
+"My husband is a Pole," said the handsome girl, taking a seat opposite
+the consul in his private office, "and I myself am Russian on the
+father's side, but my mother was English. My husband is involved in a
+political enterprise; he was liable to transportation to Siberia, but
+a chance made it possible for us to escape while the police were on
+their way to arrest him. We are now political fugitives, and we
+intrust our lives to the protection of English law. Be generous,
+protect us, and send us to England!"
+
+The ruse, skillfully planned and admirably presented, was completely
+successful, and two or three days later the first passenger ship under
+the English flag carried the happy couple to London.
+
+Bodlevski destroyed his own passport and that of the college
+assessor's widow, Maria Solontseva, which Natasha had needed as a
+precaution while still on Russian soil. When they got to England, it
+would be much handier to take new names. But with their new position
+and these new names a great difficulty presented itself: they could
+find no suitable outlet for their capital without arousing very
+dangerous suspicions. The many-sided art of the London rogues is known
+to all the world; in their club, Bodlevski, who had lost no time in
+making certain pleasant and indispensable acquaintances there, soon
+succeeded in getting for himself and Natasha admirably counterfeited
+new passports, once more with new names and occupations. With these,
+in a short time, they found their way to the Continent. They both felt
+the full force of youth and a passionate desire to live and enjoy
+life; in their hot heads hummed many a golden hope and plan; they
+wished, to begin with, to invest their main capital somewhere, and
+then to travel over Europe, and to choose a quiet corner somewhere
+where they could settle down to a happy life.
+
+Perhaps all this might have happened if it had not been for cards and
+roulette and the perpetual desire of increasing their capital--for the
+worthy couple fell into the hands of a talented company, whose agents
+robbed them at Frascati's in Paris, and again in Hamburg and various
+health resorts, so that hardly a year had passed when Bodlevski one
+fine night woke up to the fact that they no longer possessed a ruble.
+But they had passed a brilliant year, their arrival in the great
+cities had had its effect, and especially since Natasha had become a
+person of title; in the course of the year she succeeded in purchasing
+an Austrian barony at a very reasonable figure--a barony which, of
+course, only existed on paper.
+
+When all his money was gone, there was nothing left for Bodlevski but
+to enroll himself a member of the company which had so successfully
+accomplished the transfer of his funds to their own pockets. Natasha's
+beauty and Bodlevski's brains were such strong arguments that the
+company willingly accepted them as new recruits. The two paid dear for
+their knowledge, it is true, but their knowledge presently began to
+bear fruit in considerable abundance. Day followed day, and year
+succeeded year, a long series of horribly anxious nights, violent
+feelings, mental perturbations, crafty and subtle schemes, a complete
+cycle of rascalities, an entire science of covering up tracks, and the
+perpetual shadow of justice, prison, and perhaps the scaffold.
+Bodlevski, with his obstinate, persistent, and concentrated character,
+reached the highest skill in card-sharping and the allied wiles. All
+games of "chance" were for him games of skill. At thirty he looked at
+least ten years older. The life he led, with its ceaseless effort,
+endless mental work, perpetual anxiety, had made of him a fanatical
+worshiper at the shrine of trickery. He dried up visibly in body and
+grew old in mind, mastering all the difficult arts of his profession,
+and only gained confidence and serenity when he had reached the
+highest possible skill in every branch of his "work." From that moment
+he took a new lease of life; he grew younger, he became gay and
+self-confident, his health even visibly improved, and he assumed the
+air and manner of a perfect gentleman.
+
+As for Natasha, her life and efforts in concert with Bodlevski by no
+means had the same wearing effect on her as on him. Her proud, decided
+nature received all these impressions quite differently. She continued
+to blossom out, to grow handsomer, to enjoy life, to take hearts
+captive. All the events which aroused so keen a mental struggle in her
+companion she met with entire equanimity. The reason was this: When
+she made up her mind to anything, she always decided at once and with
+unusual completeness; a very short time given to keen and accurate
+consideration, a rapid weighing of the gains and losses of the matter
+in hand, and then she went forward coldly and unswervingly on her
+chosen path. Her first aim in life had been revenge, then a brilliant
+and luxurious life--and she knew that they would cost dear. Therefore,
+once embarked on her undertaking, Natasha remained calm and
+indifferent, brilliantly distinguished, and ensnaring the just and the
+unjust alike. Her intellect, education, skill, resource, and innate
+tact made it possible for her everywhere to gain a footing in select
+aristocratic society, and to play by no means the least role there.
+Many beauties envied her, detested her, spoke evil of her, and yet
+sought her friendship, because she almost always queened it in
+society. Her friendship and sympathy always seemed so cordial, so
+sincere and tender, and her epigrams were so pointed and poisonous,
+that every hostile criticism seemed to shrivel up in that glittering
+fire, and there seemed to be nothing left but to seek her friendship
+and good will. For instance, if things went well in Baden, one could
+confidently foretell that at the end of the summer season Natasha
+would be found in Nice or Geneva, queen of the winter season, the
+lioness of the day, and the arbiter of fashion. She and Bodlevski
+always behaved with such propriety and watchful care that not a shadow
+ever fell on Natasha's fame. It is true that Bodlevski had to change
+his name once or twice and to seek a new field for his talents, and to
+make sudden excursions to distant corners of Europe--sometimes in
+pursuit of a promising "job," sometimes to evade the too persistent
+attentions of the police. So far everything had turned out favorably,
+and his name "had remained unstained," when suddenly a slight mishap
+befell. The matter was a trifling one, but the misfortune was that it
+happened in Paris. There was a chance that it might find issue in the
+courts and the hulks, so that there ensued a more than ordinarily
+rapid change of passports and a new excursion--this time to Russia,
+back to their native land again, after an absence of twenty years.
+Thus it happened that the papers announced the arrival in St.
+Petersburg of Baroness von Doering and Ian Vladislav Karozitch.
+
+
+
+IX
+
+THE CONCERT OF THE POWERS
+
+
+A few days after there was a brilliant reunion at Princess
+Shadursky's. All the beauty and fashion of St. Petersburg were
+invited, and few who were invited failed to come. It happened that
+Prince Shadursky was an admirer of the fair sex, and also that he had
+had the pleasure of meeting the brilliant Baroness von Doering at
+Hamburg, and again in Paris. It was, therefore, to be expected that
+Baroness von Doering should be found in the midst of an admiring throng
+at Princess Shadursky's reception. Her brother, Ian Karozitch, was
+also there, suave, alert, dignified, losing no opportunity to make
+friends with the distinguished company that thronged the prince's
+rooms.
+
+Late in the evening the baroness and her brother might have been seen
+engaged in a _tete-a-tete_, seated in two comfortable armchairs, and
+anyone who was near enough might have heard the following
+conversation:
+
+"How goes it?" Karozitch asked in a low tone.
+
+"As you see, I am making a hit," answered the baroness in the same
+quiet tone. But her manner was so detached and indifferent that no one
+could have guessed her remark was of the least significance. It should
+be noted that this was her first official presentation to St.
+Petersburg society. And in truth her beauty, united with her lively
+intellect, her amiability, and her perfect taste in dress, had
+produced a general and even remarkable effect. People talked about her
+and became interested in her, and her first evening won her several
+admirers among those well placed in society.
+
+"I have been paying attention to the solid capitalists," replied
+Karozitch; "we have made our _debut_ in the _role_ of practical
+actors. Well, what about him?" he continued, indicating Prince
+Shadursky with his eyes.
+
+"In the web," she replied, with a subtle smile.
+
+"Then we can soon suck his brains?"
+
+"Soon--but he must be tied tighter first. But we must not talk here."
+A moment later Karozitch and the baroness were in the midst of the
+brilliant groups of guests.
+
+A few late comers were still arriving. "Count Kallash!" announced the
+footman, who stood at the chief entrance to the large hall.
+
+At this new and almost unknown but high-sounding name, many eyes were
+turned toward the door through which the newcomer must enter. A hum of
+talk spread among the guests:
+
+"Count Kallash----"
+
+"Who is he----?"
+
+"It is a Hungarian name--I think I heard of him somewhere."
+
+"Is this his first appearance?"
+
+"Who is this Kallash? Oh, yes, one of the old Hungarian families----"
+
+"How interesting----"
+
+Such questions and answers crossed each other in a running fire among
+the various groups of guests who filled the hall, when a young man
+appeared in the doorway.
+
+He lingered a moment to glance round the rooms and the company; then,
+as if conscious of the remarks and glances directed toward him, but
+completely "ignoring" them, and without the least shyness or
+awkwardness, he walked quietly through the hall to the host and
+hostess of the evening.
+
+People of experience, accustomed to society and the ways of the great
+world, can often decide from the first minute the _role_ which anyone
+is likely to play among them. People of experience, at the first view
+of this young man, at his first entrance, merely by the way he entered
+the hall, decided that his _role_ in society would be brilliant--that
+more than one feminine heart would beat faster for his presence, that
+more than one dandy's wrath would be kindled by his successes.
+
+"How handsome he is!" a whisper went round among the ladies. The men
+for the most part remained silent. A few twisted the ends of their
+mustache and made as though they had not noticed him. This was already
+enough to foreshadow a brilliant career.
+
+And indeed Count Kallash could not have passed unnoticed, even among a
+thousand young men of his class. Tall and vigorous, wonderfully well
+proportioned, he challenged comparison with Antinoues. His pale face,
+tanned by the sun, had an expression almost of weariness. His high
+forehead, with clustering black hair and sharply marked brows, bore
+the impress of passionate feeling and turbulent thought strongly
+repressed. It was difficult to define the color of his deep-set,
+somewhat sunken eyes, which now flashed with southern fire, and were
+now veiled, so that one seemed to be looking into an abyss. A slight
+mustache and pointed beard partly concealed the ironical smile that
+played on his passionate lips. The natural grace of good manners and
+quiet but admirably cut clothes completed the young man's exterior,
+behind which, in spite of all his reticence, could be divined a
+haughty and exceptional nature. A more profound psychologist would
+have seen in him an obstinately passionate, ungrateful nature, which
+takes from others everything it desires, demanding it from them as a
+right and without even a nod of acknowledgment. Such was Count
+Nicholas Kallash.
+
+A few days after the reception at Prince Shadursky's Baroness von
+Doering was installed in a handsome apartment on Mokhovoi Street, at
+which her "brother," Ian Karozitch, or, to give him his former name,
+Bodlevski, was a frequent visitor. By a "lucky accident" he had met on
+the day following the reception our old friend Sergei Antonovitch
+Kovroff, the "captain of the Golden Band." Their recognition was
+mutual, and, after a more or less faithful recital of the events of
+the intervening years, they had entered into an offensive and
+defensive alliance.
+
+When Baroness von Doering was comfortably settled in her new quarters,
+Sergei Antonovitch brought a visitor to Bodlevski: none other than the
+Hungarian nobleman, Count Nicholas Kallash.
+
+"_Gentlemen, you are strangers_; let me introduce you to each other,"
+said Kovroff, presenting Count Kallash to Bodlevski.
+
+"Very glad to know you," answered the Hungarian count, to Bodlevski's
+astonishment in Russian; "very glad, indeed! I have several times had
+the honor of hearing of you. Was it not you who had some trouble about
+forged notes in Paris?"
+
+"Oh, no! You are mistaken, dear count!" answered Bodlevski, with a
+pleasant smile. "The matter was not of the slightest importance. The
+amount was a trifle and I was unwilling even to appear in court!"
+
+"You preferred a little journey to Russia, didn't you?" Kovroff
+remarked with a smile.
+
+"Little vexations of that kind may happen to anyone," said Bodlevski,
+ignoring Kovroff's interruption. "You yourself, dear count, had some
+trouble about some bonds, if I am not mistaken?"
+
+"You are mistaken," the count interrupted him sharply. "I have had
+various troubles, but I prefer not to talk about them."
+
+"Gentlemen," interrupted Kovroff, "we did not come here to quarrel,
+but to talk business. Our good friend, Count Kallash," he went on,
+turning to Bodlevski, "wishes to have the pleasure of cooperating in
+our common undertaking, and--I can recommend him very highly."
+
+"Ah!" said Bodlevski, after a searching study of the count's face. "I
+understand! the baroness will return in a few minutes and then we can
+discuss matters at our leisure."
+
+But in spite of this understanding it was evident that Bodlevski and
+Count Kallash had not impressed each other very favorably. This,
+however, did not prevent the concert of the powers from working
+vigorously together.
+
+
+X
+
+AN UNEXPECTED REUNION
+
+
+On the wharf of the Fontauka, not far from Simeonovski Bridge, a crowd
+was gathered. In the midst of the crowd a dispute raged between an old
+woman, tattered, disheveled, miserable, and an impudent-looking youth.
+The old woman was evidently stupid from misery and destitution.
+
+While the quarrel raged a new observer approached the crowd. He was
+walking leisurely, evidently without an aim and merely to pass the
+time, so it is not to be wondered at that the loud dispute arrested
+his attention.
+
+"Who are you, anyway, you old hag? What is your name?" cried the
+impudent youth.
+
+"My name? My name?" muttered the old woman in confusion. "I am a--I am
+a princess," and she blinked at the crowd.
+
+Everyone burst out laughing. "Her Excellency, the Princess! Make way
+for the Princess!" cried the youth.
+
+The old woman burst into sudden anger.
+
+"Yes, I tell you, I am a princess by birth!" and her eyes flashed as
+she tried to draw herself up and impose on the bantering crowd.
+
+"Princess What? Princess Which? Princess How?" cried the impudent
+youth, and all laughed loudly.
+
+"No! Not Princess How!" answered the old woman, losing the last shred
+of self-restraint; "but Princess Che-che-vin-ski! Princess Anna
+Chechevinski!"
+
+When he heard this name Count Kallash started and his whole expression
+changed. He grew suddenly pale, and with a vigorous effort pushed his
+way through the crowd to the miserable old woman's side.
+
+"Come!" he said, taking her by the arm. "Come with me! I have
+something for you!"
+
+"Something for me?" answered the old woman, looking up with stupid
+inquiry and already forgetting the existence of the impudent youth.
+"Yes, I'll come! What have you got for me?"
+
+Count Kallash led her by the arm out of the crowd, which began to
+disperse, abashed by his appearance and air of determination.
+Presently he hailed a carriage, and putting the old woman in, ordered
+the coachman to drive to his rooms.
+
+There he did his best to make the miserable old woman comfortable, and
+his housekeeper presently saw that she was washed and fed, and soon
+the old woman was sleeping in the housekeeper's room.
+
+To explain this extraordinary event we must go back twenty years.
+
+In 1838 Princess Anna Chechevinski, then in her twenty-sixth year, had
+defied her parents, thrown to the winds the traditions of her princely
+race, and fled with the man of her choice, followed by her mother's
+curses and the ironical congratulations of her brother, who thus
+became sole heir.
+
+After a year or two she was left alone by the death of her companion,
+and step by step she learned all the lessons of sorrow. From one stage
+of misfortune to another she gradually fell into the deepest misery,
+and had become a poor old beggar in the streets when Count Kallash
+came so unexpectedly to her rescue.
+
+It will be remembered that, as a result of Natasha's act of vengeance,
+the elder Princess Chechevinski left behind her only a fraction of the
+money her son expected to inherit. And this fraction he by no means
+hoarded, but with cynical disregard of the future he poured money out
+like water, gambling, drinking, plunging into every form of
+dissipation. Within a few months his entire inheritance was
+squandered.
+
+Several years earlier Prince Chechevinski had taken a deep interest in
+conjuring and had devoted time and care to the study of various forms
+of parlor magic. He had even paid considerable sums to traveling
+conjurers in exchange for their secrets. Naturally gifted, he had
+mastered some of the most difficult tricks, and his skill in card
+conjuring would not have done discredit even to a professional
+magician.
+
+The evening when his capital had almost melted away and the shadow of
+ruin lay heavy upon him, he happened to be present at a reception
+where card play was going on and considerable sums were staked.
+
+A vacancy at one of the tables could not be filled, and, in spite of
+his weak protest of unwillingness, Prince Chechevinski was pressed
+into service. He won for the first few rounds, and then began to lose,
+till the amount of his losses far exceeded the slender remainder of
+his capital. A chance occurred where, by the simple expedient of
+neutralizing the cut, mere child's play for one so skilled in
+conjuring, he was able to turn the scale in his favor, winning back in
+a single game all that he had already lost. He had hesitated for a
+moment, feeling the abyss yawning beneath him; then he had falsed,
+made the pass, and won the game. That night he swore to himself that
+he would never cheat again, never again be tempted to dishonor his
+birth; and he kept his oath till his next run of bad luck, when he
+once more neutralized the cut and turned the "luck" in his direction.
+
+The result was almost a certainty from the outset, Prince Chechevinski
+became a habitual card sharper.
+
+For a long time fortune favored him. His mother's reputation for
+wealth, the knowledge that he was her sole heir, the high position of
+the family, shielded him from suspicion. Then came the thunderclap. He
+was caught in the act of "dealing a second" in the English Club, and
+driven from the club as a blackleg. Other reverses followed: a public
+refusal on the part of an officer to play cards with him, followed by
+a like refusal to give him satisfaction in a duel; a second occasion
+in which he was caught redhanded; a criminal trial; six years in
+Siberia. After two years he escaped by way of the Chinese frontier,
+and months after returned to Europe. For two years he practiced his
+skill at Constantinople. Then he made his way to Buda-Pesth, then to
+Vienna. While in the dual monarchy, he had come across a
+poverty-stricken Magyar noble, named Kallash, whom he had sheltered in
+a fit of generous pity, and who had died in his room at the Golden
+Eagle Inn. Prince Chechevinski, who had already borne many aliases,
+showed his grief at the old Magyar's death by adopting his name and
+title; hence it was that he presented himself in St. Petersburg in the
+season of 1858 under the high-sounding title of Count Kallash.
+
+An extraordinary coincidence, already described, had brought him face
+to face with his sister Anna, whom he had never even heard of in all
+the years since her flight. He found her now, poverty-stricken,
+prematurely old, almost demented, and, though he had hated her
+cordially in days gone by, his pity was aroused by her wretchedness,
+and he took her to his home, clothed and fed her, and surrounded her
+with such comforts as his bachelor apartment offered.
+
+In the days that followed, every doubt he might have had as to her
+identity was dispelled. She talked freely of their early childhood, of
+their father's death, of their mother; she even spoke of her brother's
+coldness and hostility in terms which drove away the last shadow of
+doubt whether she was really his sister. But at first he made no
+corresponding revelations, remaining for her only Count Kallash.
+
+
+XI
+
+THE PHOTOGRAPH ALBUM
+
+
+Little by little, however, as the poor old woman recovered something
+of health and strength, his heart went out toward her. Telling her
+only certain incidents of his life, he gradually brought the narrative
+back to the period, twenty years before, immediately after their
+mother's death, and at last revealed himself to his sister, after
+making her promise secrecy as to his true name. Thus matters went on
+for nearly two years.
+
+The broken-down old woman lived in his rooms in something like
+comfort, and took pleasure in dusting and arranging his things. One
+day, when she was tidying the sitting room, her brother was startled
+by a sudden exclamation, almost a cry, which broke from his sister's
+lips.
+
+"Oh, heaven, it is she!" she cried, her eyes fixed on a page of the
+photograph album she had been dusting. "Brother, come here; for
+heaven's sake, who is this?"
+
+"Baroness von Doering," curtly answered Kallash, glancing quickly at
+the photograph. "What do you find interesting in her?"
+
+"It is either she or her double! Do you know who she looks like?"
+
+"Lord only knows! Herself, perhaps!"
+
+"No, she has a double! I am sure of it! Do you remember, at mother's,
+my maid Natasha?"
+
+"Natasha?" the count considered, knitting his brows in the effort to
+recollect.
+
+"Yes, Natasha, my maid. A tall, fair girl. A thick tress of chestnut
+hair. She had such beautiful hair! And her lips had just the same
+proud expression. Her eyes were piercing and intelligent, her brows
+were clearly marked and joined together--in a word, the very original
+of this photograph!"
+
+"Ah," slowly and quietly commented the count, pressing his hand to his
+brow. "Exactly. Now I remember! Yes, it is a striking likeness."
+
+"But look closely," cried the old woman excitedly; "it is the living
+image of Natasha! Of course she is more matured, completely developed.
+How old is the baroness?"
+
+"She must be approaching forty. But she doesn't look her age; you
+would imagine her to be about thirty-two from her appearance."
+
+"There! And Natasha would be just forty by now!"
+
+"The ages correspond," answered her brother.
+
+"Yes." Princess Anna sighed sadly. "Twenty-two years have passed since
+then. But if I met her face to face I think I would recognize her at
+once. Tell me, who is she?"
+
+"The baroness? How shall I tell you? She has been abroad for twenty
+years, and for the last two years she has lived here. In society she
+says she is a foreigner, but with me she is franker, and I know that
+she speaks Russian perfectly. She declares that her husband is
+somewhere in Germany, and that she lives here with her brother."
+
+"Who is the 'brother'?" asked the old princess curiously.
+
+"The deuce knows! He is also a bit shady. Oh, yes! Sergei Kovroff
+knows him; he told me something about their history; he came here with
+a forged passport, under the name of Vladislav Karozitch, but his real
+name is Kasimir Bodlevski."
+
+"Kasimir Bodlevski," muttered the old woman, knitting her brows. "Was
+he not once a lithographer or an engraver, or something of the sort?"
+
+"I think he was. I think Kovroff said something about it. He is a fine
+engraver still."
+
+"He was? Well, there you are!" and Princess Anna rose quickly from her
+seat. "It is she--it is Natasha! She used to tell me she had a
+sweetheart, a Polish hero, Bodlevski. And I think his name was
+Kasimir. She often got my permission to slip out to visit him; she
+said he worked for a lithographer, and always begged me to persuade
+mother to liberate her from serfdom, so that she could marry him."
+
+This unexpected discovery meant much to Kallash. Circumstances,
+hitherto slight and isolated, suddenly gained a new meaning, and were
+lit up in a way that made him almost certain of the truth. He now
+remembered that Kovroff had once told him of his first acquaintance
+with Bodlevski, when he came on the Pole at the Cave, arranging for a
+false passport; he remembered that Natasha had disappeared immediately
+before the death of the elder Princess Chechevinski, and he also
+remembered how, returning from the cemetery, he had been cruelly
+disappointed in his expectations when he had found in the strong box a
+sum very much smaller than he had always counted on, and with some
+foundation; and before him, with almost complete certainty, appeared
+the conclusion that the maid's disappearance was connected with the
+theft of his mother's money, and especially of the securities in his
+sister's name, and that all this was nothing but the doing of Natasha
+and her companion Bodlevski.
+
+"Very good! Perhaps this information will come in handy!" he said to
+himself, thinking over his future measures and plans. "Let us see--let
+us feel our way--perhaps it is really so! But I must go carefully and
+keep on my guard, and the whole thing is in my hands, dear baroness!
+We will spin a thread from you before all is over."
+
+
+XII
+
+THE BARONESS AT HOME
+
+
+Every Wednesday Baroness von Doering received her intimate friends. She
+did not care for rivals, and therefore ladies were not invited to
+these evenings. The intimate circle of the baroness consisted of our
+Knights of Industry and the "pigeons" of the bureaucracy, the world of
+finance, the aristocracy, which were the objects of the knights'
+desires.
+
+It often happened, however, that the number of guests at these
+intimate evenings went as high as fifty, and sometimes even more.
+
+The baroness was passionately fond of games of chance, and always sat
+down to the card table with enthusiasm. But as this was done
+conspicuously, in sight of all her guests, the latter could not fail
+to note that fortune obstinately turned away from the baroness. She
+almost never won on the green cloth; sometimes Kovroff won, sometimes
+Kallash, sometimes Karozitch, but with the slight difference that the
+last won more seldom and less than the other two.
+
+Thus every Wednesday a considerable sum found its way from the
+pocketbook of the baroness into that of one of her colleagues, to find
+its way back again the next morning. The purpose of this clever scheme
+was that the "pigeons" who visited the luxurious salons of the
+baroness, and whose money paid the expenses of these salons, should
+not have the smallest grounds for suspicion that the dear baroness's
+apartment was nothing but a den of sharpers. Her guests all considered
+her charming, to begin with, and also rich and independent and
+passionate by nature. This explained her love of play and the
+excitement it brought, and which she would not give up, in spite of
+her repeated heavy losses.
+
+Her colleagues, the Knights of Industry, acted on a carefully devised
+and rigidly followed plan. They were far from putting their uncanny
+skill in motion every Wednesday. So long as they had no big game in
+sight, the game remained clean and honest. In this way the band might
+lose two or three thousand rubles, but such a loss had no great
+importance, and was soon made up when some fat "pigeon" appeared.
+
+It sometimes happened that this wily scheme of honest play went on for
+five or six weeks in succession, so that the small fry, winning the
+band's money, remained entirely convinced that it was playing in an
+honorable and respectable private house, and very naturally spread
+abroad the fame of it throughout the whole city. But when the fat
+pigeon at last appeared, the band put forth all its forces, all the
+wiles of the black art, and in a few hours made up for the generous
+losses of a month of honorable and irreproachable play on the green
+cloth.
+
+Midnight was approaching.
+
+The baroness's rooms were brilliantly lit up, but, thanks to the thick
+curtains which covered the windows, the lights could not be seen from
+the street, though several carriages were drawn up along the sidewalk.
+
+Opening into the elegant drawing-room was a not less elegant card
+room, appreciatively nicknamed the Inferno by the band. In it stood a
+large table with a green cloth, on which lay a heap of bank notes and
+two little piles of gold, before which sat Sergei Antonovitch Kovroff,
+presiding over the bank with the composure of a true gentleman.
+
+What Homeric, Jovine calm rested on every feature of his face! What
+charming, fearless self-assurance, what noble self-confidence in his
+smile, in his glance! What grace, what distinction in his pose, and
+especially in the hand which dealt the cards! Sergei Kovroff's hands
+were decidedly worthy of attention. They were almost always clad in
+new gloves, which he only took off on special occasions, at dinner, or
+when he had some writing to do, or when he sat down to a game of
+cards. As a result, his hands were almost feminine in their delicacy,
+the sensibility of the finger tips had reached an extraordinary degree
+of development, equal to that of one born blind. And those fingers
+were skillful, adroit, alert, their every movement carried out with
+that smooth, indefinable grace which is almost always possessed by the
+really high-class card sharper. His fingers were adorned with numerous
+rings, in which sparkled diamonds and other precious stones. And it
+was not for nothing that Sergei Kovroff took pride in them! This
+glitter of diamonds, scattering rainbow rays, dazzled the eyes of his
+fellow players. When Sergei Kovroff sat down to preside over the bank,
+the sparkling of the diamonds admirably masked those motions of his
+fingers which needed to be masked; they almost insensibly drew away
+the eyes of the players from his fingers, and this was most of all
+what Sergei Kovroff desired.
+
+Round the table about thirty guests were gathered. Some of them sat,
+but most of them played standing, with anxious faces, feverishly
+sparkling eyes, and breathing heavily and unevenly. Some were pale,
+some flushed, and all watched with passionate eagerness the fall of
+the cards. There were also some who had perfect command of themselves,
+distinguished by extraordinary coolness, and jesting lightly whether
+they lost or won. But such happily constituted natures are always a
+minority when high play is going on.
+
+Silence reigned in the Inferno. There was almost no conversation; only
+once in a while was heard a remark, in a whisper or an undertone,
+addressed by a player to his neighbor; the only sound was that short,
+dry rustle of the cards and the crackling of new bank notes, or the
+tinkle of gold coins making their way round the table from the bank to
+the players, and from the players back to the bank.
+
+The two Princes Shadursky, father and son, both lost heavily. They sat
+opposite Sergei Kovroff, and between them sat Baroness von Doering, who
+played in alliance with them. The clever Natasha egged them on,
+kindling their excitement with all the skill and calculation possible
+to one whose blood was as cold as the blood of a fish, and both the
+Shadurskys had lost their heads, no longer knowing how much they were
+losing.
+
+
+XIII
+
+AN EXPLANATION
+
+
+Count Kallash and his sister had just breakfasted when the count's
+French footman entered the study.
+
+"Madame la baronne von Doering!" he announced obsequiously.
+
+Brother and sister exchanged a rapid glance.
+
+"Now is our opportunity to make sure," said Kallash, with a smile.
+
+"If it is she, I shall recognize her by her voice," whispered Princess
+Anna. "Shall I remain here or go?"
+
+"Remain in the meantime; it will be a curious experience. _Faites
+entrer_!" he added to the footman.
+
+A moment later light, rapid footsteps were heard in the entrance hall,
+and the rustling of a silk skirt.
+
+"How do you do, count! I have come to see you for a moment. I came in
+all haste, on purpose. I have come _in person_, you must be duly
+appreciative! Vladislav is too busy, and the matter is an important
+one. I wanted to see you at the earliest opportunity. Well, we may all
+congratulate ourselves. Fate and fortune are decidedly on our side!"
+said the baroness, speaking rapidly, as she entered the count's study.
+
+"What has happened? What is the news?" asked the count, going forward
+to meet her.
+
+"We have learned that the Shadurskys have just received a large sum of
+money; they have sold an estate, and the purchaser has paid them in
+cash. Our opportunity has come. Heaven forbid that we should lose it!
+We must devise a plan to make the most of it."
+
+The baroness suddenly stopped short in the middle of the sentence, and
+became greatly confused, noticing that there was a third person
+present.
+
+"Forgive me! I did not give you warning," said the count, shrugging
+his shoulders and smiling; "permit me! _Princess Anna Chechevinski!_"
+he continued with emphasis, indicating his poor, decrepit sister. "Of
+course you would not have recognized her, baroness."
+
+"But _I_ recognized Natasha immediately," said the old woman quietly,
+her eyes still fixed on Natasha's face.
+
+The baroness suddenly turned as white as a sheet, and with trembling
+hands caught the back of a heavy armchair.
+
+Kallash with extreme politeness assisted her to a seat.
+
+"You didn't expect to meet me, Natasha?" said the old woman gently and
+almost caressingly, approaching her.
+
+"I do not know you. Who are you?" the baroness managed to whisper, by
+a supreme effort.
+
+"No wonder; I am so changed," replied Princess Anna. "But _you_ are
+just the same. There is hardly any change at all."
+
+Natasha began to recover her composure.
+
+"I don't understand you," she said coldly, contracting her brows.
+
+"But I understand _you_ perfectly."
+
+"Allow me, princess," Kallash interrupted her, "permit me to have an
+explanation with the baroness; she and I know each other well. And if
+you will pardon me, I shall ask you in the meantime to withdraw."
+
+And he courteously conducted his sister to the massive oak doors,
+which closed solidly after her.
+
+"What does this mean?" said the baroness, rising angrily, her gray
+eyes flashing at the count from under her broad brows.
+
+"A coincidence," answered Kallash, shrugging his shoulders with an
+ironical smile.
+
+"How a coincidence? Speak clearly!"
+
+"The former mistress has recognized her former maid--that is all."
+
+"How does this woman come to be here? Who is she?"
+
+"I have told you already; Princess Anna Chechevinski. And as to how
+she came here, that was also a coincidence, and a strange one."
+
+"Impossible!" exclaimed the baroness.
+
+"Why impossible? They say the dead sometimes return from the tomb, and
+the princess is still alive. And why should the matter not have
+happened thus, for instance? Princess Anna Chechevinski's maid Natasha
+took advantage of the confidence and illness of the elder princess to
+steal from her strong box, with the aid of her sweetheart, Kasimir
+Bodlevski, money and securities--mark this, baroness--securities in
+the name of Princess Anna. And might it not happen that this same
+lithographer Bodlevski should get false passports at the Cave, for
+himself and his sweetheart, and flee with her across the frontier, and
+might not this same maid, twenty years later, return to Russia under
+the name of Baroness von Doering? You must admit that there is nothing
+fantastic in all this! What is the use of concealing? You see I know
+everything!"
+
+"And what follows from all this?" replied the baroness with a forced
+smile of contempt.
+
+"Much _may_ follow from it," significantly but quietly replied
+Kallash. "But at present the only important matter is, that I know
+all. I repeat it--_all_."
+
+"Where are your facts?" asked the baroness.
+
+"Facts? Hm!" laughed Kallash. "If facts are needed, they will be
+forthcoming. Believe me, dear baroness, that if I had not legally
+sufficient facts in my hands, I would not have spoken to you of this."
+
+Kallash lied, but lied with the most complete appearance of
+probability.
+
+The baroness again grew confused and turned white.
+
+"Where are your facts? Put them in my hands!" she said at last, after
+a prolonged silence.
+
+"Oh, this is too much! Get hold of them yourself!" the count replied,
+with the same smile. "The facts are generally set forth to the
+prisoner by the court; but it is enough for you in the meantime to
+know that the facts exist, and that they are in my possession.
+Believe, if you wish. If you do not wish, do not believe. I will
+neither persuade you nor dissuade you."
+
+"And this means that I am in your power? she said slowly, raising her
+piercing glance to his face.
+
+"Yes; it means that you are in my power," quietly and confidently
+answered Count Kallash.
+
+"But you forget that you and I are in the same boat."
+
+"You mean that I am a sharper, like you and Bodlevski? Well, you are
+right. We are all berries of the same bunch--except _her_" (and he
+indicated the folding doors). "She, thanks to many things, has tasted
+misery, but she is honest. But we are all rascals, and I first of all.
+You are perfectly right in that. If you wish to get me in your
+power--try to find some facts against me. Then we shall be quits!"
+
+"And what is it you wish?"
+
+"It is too late for justice, at least so far as she is concerned,"
+replied the count, with a touch of sadness; "but it is not too late
+for a measure of reparation. But we can discuss that later," he went
+on more lightly, as if throwing aside the heavy impression produced by
+the thought of Princess Anna's misery. "And now, dear baroness, let us
+return to business, the business of Prince Shadursky! I will think the
+matter over, and see whether anything suggests itself."
+
+He courteously conducted the baroness to the carriage, and they
+parted, to all appearance, friends. But there were dangerous elements
+for both in that seeming friendship.
+
+
+XIV
+
+GOLD MINING
+
+
+A wonderful scheme was hatched in Count Kallash's fertile brain.
+Inspired by the thought of Prince Shadursky's newly replenished
+millions, he devised a plan for the gang which promised brilliant
+results, and only needed the aid of a discreet and skillful
+confederate. And what confederate could be more trustworthy than
+Sergei Antonovitch Kovroff? So the two friends were presently to be
+found in secret consultation in the count's handsome study, with a
+bottle of good Rhine wine before them, fine cigars between their lips,
+and the memory of a well-served breakfast lingering pleasantly in
+their minds. They were talking about the new resources of the
+Shadurskys.
+
+"To take their money at cards--what a wretched business--and so
+infernally commonplace," said Count Kallash. "To tell you the truth, I
+have for a long time been sick of cards! And, besides, time is money!
+Why should we waste several weeks, or even months, over something that
+could be done in a few days?"
+
+Kovroff agreed completely, but at the same time put the question, if
+not cards, what plan was available?
+
+"That is it exactly!" cried Kallash, warming up. "I have thought it
+all over. The problem is this: we must think up something that would
+surprise Satan himself, something that would make all Hades smile and
+blow us hot kisses. But what of Hades?--that's all nonsense. We must
+do something that will make the whole Golden Band throw up their caps.
+That is what we have to do!"
+
+"Quite a problem," lazily answered Kovroff, chewing the end of his
+cigar. "But you are asking too much."
+
+"But that is not all," the count interrupted him; "listen! This is
+what my problem demands. We must think of some project that unites two
+precious qualities: first, a rapid and huge profit; second, entire
+absence of risk."
+
+"Conditions not altogether easy to fulfill," remarked Kovroff
+doubtfully.
+
+"So it seems. And daring plans are not to be picked up in the street,
+but are the result of inspiration. It is what is called a 'heavenly
+gift,' my dear friend."
+
+"And you have had an inspiration?" smiled Sergei Antonovitch, with a
+slightly ironical shade of friendly skepticism.
+
+"I have had an inspiration," replied the supposititious Hungarian
+nobleman, falling into the other's tone.
+
+"And your muse is----?"
+
+"The tenth of the muses," the count interrupted him: "another name is
+Industry."
+
+"She is the muse of all of us."
+
+"And mine in particular. But we are not concerned with her, but with
+her prophetic revelations."
+
+"Oh, dear count! Circumlocutions apart! This Rhine wine evidently
+carries you to misty Germany. Tell me simply what the matter is."
+
+"The matter is simply this: we must institute a society of 'gold
+miners,' and we must find gold in places where the geological
+indications are dead against it. That is the problem. The Russian
+laws, under threat of arrest and punishment, sternly forbid the
+citizens of the Russian Empire, and likewise the citizens of other
+lands within the empire, to buy or sell the noble metals in their
+crude form, that is, in nuggets, ore, or dust. For example, if you
+bought gold in the rough from me--gold dust, for example--we should
+both, according to law, have to take a pleasant little trip beyond the
+Ural Mountains to Siberia, and there we should have to engage in
+mining the precious metal ourselves. A worthy occupation, no doubt,
+but not a very profitable one for us."
+
+"Our luxuries would be strictly limited," jested Kovroff, with a wry
+smile.
+
+"There it is! You won't find many volunteers for that occupation, and
+that is the fulcrum of my whole plan. You must understand that gold
+dust in the mass is practically indistinguishable in appearance from
+brass filings. Let us suppose that we secretly sell some perfectly
+pure brass filings for gold dust, and that they are readily bought of
+us, because we sell considerably below the market rate. It goes
+without saying that the purchaser will presently discover that we have
+done him brown. But, I ask you, will he go and accuse us knowing that,
+as the penalty for his purchase, he will have to accompany us along
+the Siberian road?"
+
+"No man is his own enemy," sententiously replied Kovroff, beginning to
+take a vivid interest in what his companion was saying. "But how are
+you going to work it?"
+
+"You will know at the proper time. The chief thing is, that our
+problem is solved in the most decisive manner. You and I are pretty
+fair judges of human nature, so we may be pretty sure that we shall
+always find purchasers, and I suggest that we make a beginning on
+young Prince Shadursky. How we shall get him into it is my business.
+I'll tell you later on. But how do you like the general idea of my
+plan?"
+
+"It's clever enough!" cried Kovroff, pressing his hand with the gay
+enthusiasm of genuine interest.
+
+"For this truth much thanks!" cried Kallash, clinking glasses with
+him. "It is clever--that is the best praise I could receive from you.
+Let us drink to the success of my scheme!"
+
+
+XV
+
+THE FISH BITES
+
+
+Three days after this conversation the younger prince Shadursky dined
+with Sergei Antonovitch Kovroff.
+
+That morning he received a note from Kovroff, in which the worthy
+Sergei complained of ill health and begged the prince to come and dine
+with him and cheer him up.
+
+The prince complied with his request, and appearing at the appointed
+time found Count Kallash alone with his host.
+
+Among other gossip, the prince announced that he expected shortly to
+go to Switzerland, as he had bad reports of the health of his mother,
+who was in Geneva.
+
+At this news Kallash glanced significantly toward Kovroff.
+
+Passing from topic to topic, the conversation finally turned to the
+financial position of Russia. Sergei Antonovitch, according to his
+expression, "went to the root of the matter," and indicated the
+"source of the evil," very frankly attacking the policy of the
+government, which did everything to discourage gold mining, hedging
+round this most important industry with all kinds of difficulties, and
+practically prohibiting the free production of the precious metals by
+laying on it a dead weight of costly formalities.
+
+"I have facts ready to hand," he went on, summing up his argument. "I
+have an acquaintance here, an employee of one of the best-known men in
+the gold-mining industry." Here Kovroff mentioned a well-known name.
+"He is now in St. Petersburg. Well, a few days ago he suddenly came to
+me as if he had something weighing on his mind. And I have had
+business relations with him in times past. Well, what do you think? He
+suddenly made me a proposal, secretly of course; would I not take some
+gold dust off his hands? You must know that these trusted employees
+every year bring several hundred pounds of gold from Asia, and of
+course it stands to reason that they cannot get rid of it in the
+ordinary way, but smuggle it through private individuals. It is
+uncommonly profitable for the purchasers, because they buy far below
+the market rates. So there are plenty of purchasers. Several of the
+leading jewelers" (and here he named three or four of the best-known
+firms) "never refuse such a deal, and last year a banking house in
+Berlin bought a hundred pounds' weight of gold through agents here.
+Well, this same employee, my acquaintance, is looking for an
+opportunity to get rid of his wares. And he tells me he managed to
+bring in about forty pounds of gold, if not more. I introduce this
+fact to illustrate the difficulties put in the way of enterprise by
+our intelligent government."
+
+Shadursky did not greatly occupy himself with serious questions and he
+was totally ignorant of all details of financial undertakings. It was,
+therefore, perfectly easy for Sergei Antonovitch to assume a tone of
+solid, practical sense, which imposed completely on the young prince.
+Young Shadursky, from politeness, and to prove his worldly wisdom,
+assented to Kovroff's statements with equal decision. All the same,
+from this conversation, he quite clearly seized on the idea that under
+certain circumstances it would be possible to buy gold at a much lower
+price than that demanded by the Imperial Bank. And this was just the
+thought which Kallash and Kovroff wished to sow in the young prince's
+mind.
+
+"Of course, I myself do not go in for that kind of business," went on
+Kovroff carelessly, "and so I could not give my friend any help. But
+if some one were going abroad, for instance, he might well risk such
+an operation, which would pay him a very handsome profit."
+
+"How so? In what way?" asked Shadursky.
+
+"Very simply. You buy the goods here, as I already said, much below
+the government price. So that to begin with you make a very profitable
+bargain. Then you go abroad with your wares and there, as soon as the
+exchange value of gold goes up, you can sell it at the nearest bank. I
+know, for instance, that the agent of the ---- Bank" (and he mentioned
+a name well known in St. Petersburg) "made many a pretty penny for
+himself by just such a deal. This is how it was: He bought gold dust
+for forty thousand rubles, and six weeks later got rid of it in
+Hamburg for sixty thousand. Whatever you may say, fifty per cent on
+your capital in a month and a half is pretty good business."
+
+"Deuce take it! A pretty profitable bargain, without a doubt!" cried
+Shadursky, jumping from his chair. "It would just suit me! I could get
+rid of it in Geneva or Paris," he went on in a jesting tone.
+
+"What do you think? Of course!" Sergei Antonovitch took him up, but in
+a serious tone. "You or some one else--in any case it would be a good
+bargain. For my acquaintance has to go back to Asia, and has only a
+few days to spare. He doesn't know where to turn and rather than take
+his gold back with him, he would willingly let it go at an even lower
+rate than the smugglers generally ask. If I had enough free cash I
+would go in for it myself."
+
+"It looks a good proposition," commented Count Kallash.
+
+"It is certainly very enticing; what do you think?" said Prince
+Shadursky interrogatively, folding his arms.
+
+"Hm--yes! very enticing," answered Kovroff. "A fine chance for anyone
+who has the money."
+
+"I would not object! I would not object!" protested Shadursky.
+"Suppose you let me become acquainted with your friend."
+
+"You? Well--" And Kovroff considered; "if you wish. Why not? Only I
+warn you, first, if you are going to buy, buy quickly, for my friend
+can't wait; and secondly, keep the matter a complete secret, for very
+unpleasant results might follow."
+
+"That goes without saying. That stands to reason," assented Shadursky.
+"I can get the money at once and I am just going abroad, in a day or
+two at the latest. So it would be foolish to miss such a chance. So it
+is a bargain?" And he held out his hand to Kovroff.
+
+"How a bargain?" objected the cautious Sergei Antonovitch. "I am not
+personally concerned in the matter, and you must admit, my dear
+prince, that I can make no promises for my acquaintance."
+
+"I don't mean that!" cried Shadursky. "I only ask you to arrange for
+me to meet him. Bring us together--and drop him a hint that I do not
+object to buying his wares. You will confer a great obligation on me."
+
+"Oh, that is quite a different matter. That I can always do; the more
+so, because we are such good friends. Why should I not do you such a
+trifling service? As far as an introduction is concerned, you may
+count on it." And they cordially shook each other by the hand.
+
+
+XVI
+
+GOLD DUST
+
+
+Both Kallash and Kovroff were too cautious to take an immediate,
+personal part in the gold-dust sale. There was a certain underling,
+Mr. Escrocevitch by name, at Sergei Kovroff's beck and call--a shady
+person, rather dirty in aspect, and who was, therefore, only admitted
+to Sergei's presence by the back door and through the kitchen, and
+even then only at times when there were no outsiders present.
+
+Mr. Escrocevitch was a person of general utility and was especially
+good at all kinds of conjuring tricks. Watches, snuff-boxes,
+cigar-cases, silver spoons, and even heavy bronze paper-weights
+acquired the property of suddenly vanishing from under his hands, and
+of suddenly reappearing in a quite unexpected quarter. This valuable
+gift had been acquired by Mr. Escrocevitch in his early years, when he
+used to wander among the Polish fairs, swallowing burning flax for the
+delectation of the public and disgorging endless yards of ribbon and
+paper.
+
+Mr. Escrocevitch was a precious and invaluable person also owing to
+his capacity of assuming any _role_, turning himself into any given
+character, and taking on the corresponding tone, manners, and
+appearance, and he was, further, a pretty fair actor.
+
+He it was who was chosen to play the part of the Siberian employee.
+
+Not more than forty-eight hours had passed since the previous
+conversation. Prince Shadursky was just up, when his footman announced
+to him that a Mr. Valyajnikoff wished to see him.
+
+The prince put on his dressing gown and went into the drawing-room,
+where the tolerably presentable but strangely dressed person of Mr.
+Escrocevitch presented itself to him.
+
+"Permit me to have the honor of introducing myself," he began, bowing
+to Prince Shadursky; "I am Ivanovitch Valyajnikoff. Mr. Sergei
+Antonovitch Kovroff was so good as to inform me of a certain intention
+of yours about the dust. So, if your excellency has not changed your
+mind, I am ready to sell it to you with pleasure."
+
+"Very good of you," answered Prince Shadursky, smiling gayly, and
+giving him a chair.
+
+"To lose no time over trifles," continued Mr. Escrocevitch, "let me
+invite you to my quarters. I am staying at a hotel; you can see the
+goods there; you can make tests, and, if you are satisfied, I shall be
+very happy to oblige your excellency."
+
+Prince Shadursky immediately finished dressing, ordered his carriage,
+and went out with the supposititious Valyajnikoff. They drove to a
+shabby hotel and went to a dingy room.
+
+"This is my poor abode. I am only here on the wing, so to speak. I
+humbly request you to be seated," Mr. Escrocevitch said obsequiously.
+"Not to lose precious time, perhaps your excellency would like to look
+at my wares? Here they are--and I am most willing to show them."
+
+And he dragged from under the bed a big trunk, in which were five
+canvas bags of various sizes, packed full and tied tightly.
+
+"Here, here it is! This is our Siberian dust," he said, smiling and
+bowing, indicating the trunk with a wave of his hand, as if
+introducing it to Prince Shadursky.
+
+"Would not your excellency be so good as to choose one of these bags
+to make a test? It will be much better if you see yourself that the
+business is above board, with no swindle about it. Choose whichever
+you wish!"
+
+Shadursky lifted one of the bags from the trunk, and when Mr.
+Escrocevitch untied it before the young prince's eyes appeared a mass
+of metallic grains, at which he gazed not without inward pleasure.
+
+"How are you going to make a test?" he asked. "We have no blow-pipes
+nor test-tubes here?"
+
+"Make your mind easy, your excellency! We shall find everything we
+require--blow-pipes and test-tubes and nitric acid, and even a decimal
+weighing machine. In our business we arrange matters in such a way
+that we need not disturb outsiders. Only charcoal we haven't got, but
+we can easily send for some."
+
+And going to the door, he gave the servant in the passage an order,
+and a few minutes later the latter returned with a dish of charcoal.
+
+"First class! Now everything is ready," cried Mr. Escrocevitch,
+rubbing his hands; and for greater security he turned the key in the
+door.
+
+"Take whichever piece of charcoal you please, your excellency; but,
+not to soil your hands, you had better let me take it myself, and you
+sprinkle some of the dust on it," and he humbled himself before the
+prince. "Forgive me for asking you to do it all yourself, since it is
+not from any lack of politeness on my part, but simply in order that
+your excellency should be fully convinced that there is no deception."
+Saying this, he got his implements ready and lit the lamp.
+
+The blow-pipe came into action. Valyajnikoff made the experiment, and
+Shadursky attentively followed every movement. The charcoal glowed
+white hot, the dust ran together and disappeared, and in its place,
+when the charcoal had cooled a little, and the amateur chemist
+presented it to Prince Shadursky, the prince saw a little ball of gold
+lying in a crevice of the charcoal, such as might easily have formed
+under the heat of the blow-pipe.
+
+"Take the globule, your excellency, and place it, for greater
+security, in your pocketbook," said Escrocevitch; "you may even wrap
+it up in a bit of paper; and keep the sack of gold dust yourself, so
+that there can be no mistake."
+
+Shadursky gladly followed this last piece of advice.
+
+"And now, your excellency, I should like you kindly to select another
+bag; we shall make two or three more tests in the same way."
+
+The prince consented to this also.
+
+Escrocevitch handed him a new piece of charcoal to sprinkle dust on,
+and once more brought the blow-pipe into operation. And again the
+brass filings disappeared and in the crevice appeared a new globule of
+gold.
+
+"Well, perhaps these two tests will be sufficient. What is your
+excellency good enough to think on that score?" asked the supposed
+Valyajnikoff.
+
+"What is the need of further tests? The matter is clear enough,"
+assented the prince.
+
+"If it is satisfactory, we shall proceed to make it even more
+satisfactory. Here we have a touch-stone, and here we have some nitric
+acid. Try the globules on the touch-stone physically, and, so to
+speak, with the nitric acid chemically. And if you wish to make even
+more certain, this is what we shall do. What quantity of gold does
+your excellency wish to take?"
+
+"The more the better. I am ready to buy all these bags."
+
+"_Very_ much obliged to your excellency, as this will suit me
+admirably," said Escrocevitch, bowing low. "And so, if your excellency
+is ready, then I humbly beg you to take each bag, examine it, and seal
+it with your excellency's own seal. Then let us take one of the
+globules and go to one of the best jewelers in St. Petersburg. Let him
+tell us the value of the gold and in this way the business will be
+exact; there will be no room for complaint on either side, since
+everything will be fair and above board."
+
+The prince was charmed with the honesty and frankness of Mr.
+Valyajnikoff.
+
+They went together to one of the best-known jewelers, who, in their
+presence, made a test and announced that the gold was chemically pure,
+without any alloy, and therefore of the highest value.
+
+On their return to the hotel, Mr. Escrocevitch weighed the bags, which
+turned out to weigh forty-eight pounds. Allowing three pounds for the
+weight of the bags, this left forty-five pounds of pure gold.
+
+"How much a pound do you want?" Shadursky asked him.
+
+"A pretty low price, your excellency," answered the Siberian, with a
+shrug of his shoulders, "as I am selling from extreme necessity,
+because I have to leave for Siberia; I've spent too much time and
+money in St. Petersburg already; and if I cannot sell my wares, I
+shall not be able to go at all. I assume that the government price is
+known to your excellency?"
+
+"But I am willing to take two hundred rubles a pound."
+
+I can't take a kopeck less, and even so I am making a reduction of
+nearly a hundred rubles the pound."
+
+"All right!" assented Shadursky. "That will amount to--" he went on,
+knitting his brows, "forty-five pounds at two hundred rubles a
+pound----"
+
+"It will make exactly nine thousand, your excellency. Just exactly
+nine," Escrocevitch obsequiously helped him out. The prince, cutting
+the matter short, immediately gave him a check, and taking the trunk
+with the coveted bags, drove with the Siberian employee to his
+father's house, where the elder Prince Shadursky, at his son's
+pressing demand, though very unwillingly, exchanged the check for nine
+thousand rubles in bills, for which Ivan Ivanovitch Valyajnikoff
+forthwith gave a receipt. The prince was delighted with his purchase,
+and he did not utter a syllable about it to anyone except Kovroff.
+
+Sergei Antonovitch gave him a friendly counsel not to waste any time,
+but to go abroad at once, as, according to the _Exchange Gazette_,
+gold was at that moment very high, so that he had an admirable
+opportunity to get rid of his wares on very favorable terms.
+
+The prince, in fact, without wasting time got his traveling passport,
+concealed his purchase with the utmost care, and set out for the
+frontier, announcing that he was on his way to his mother, whose
+health imperatively demanded his presence.
+
+The success of the whole business depended on the fact that brass
+filings, which bear a strong external resemblance to gold dust, are
+dissipated in the strong heat of the blow-pipe. The charcoal was
+prepared beforehand, a slight hollow being cut in it with a penknife,
+in the bottom of which is placed a globule of pure gold, the top of
+which is just below the level of the charcoal, and the hollow is
+filled up with powdered charcoal mixed with a little bees-wax. The
+"chemist" who makes the experiments must make himself familiar with
+the distinctive appearance of the charcoal, so as to pick it out from
+among several pieces, and must remember exactly where the crevice is.
+
+On this first occasion, Escrocevitch had prepared all four pieces of
+charcoal, which were brought by the servant in the passage. He chose
+as his temporary abode a hotel whose proprietor was an old ally of
+his, and the servant was also a confederate.
+
+Thus was founded the famous "Gold Products Company," which is still in
+very successful operation, and is constantly widening its sphere of
+activity.
+
+
+XVII
+
+THE DELUGE
+
+
+Count Kallash finally decided on his course of action. It was too late
+to seek justice for his sister, but not too late for a tardy
+reparation. The gang had prospered greatly, and the share of Baroness
+von Doering and Bodlevski already amounted to a very large figure.
+Count Kallash determined to demand for his sister a sum equal to that
+of the securities in her name which Natasha had stolen, calculating
+that this would be enough to maintain his sister in peace and comfort
+to the end of her days. His own life was too stormy, too full of risks
+for him to allow his sister's fate to depend on his, so he had decided
+to settle her in some quiet nook where, free from danger, she might
+dream away her few remaining years.
+
+To his surprise Baroness von Doering flatly refused to be put under
+contribution.
+
+"Your demand is outrageous," she said. "I am not going to be the
+victim of any such plot!"
+
+"Very well, I will compel you to unmask?"
+
+"To unmask? What do you mean, count? You forget yourself!"
+
+"Well, then, I shall try to make you remember me!" And Kallash turned
+his back on her and strode from the room. A moment later, and she
+heard the door close loudly behind him.
+
+The baroness had already told Bodlevski of her meeting with Princess
+Anna, and she now hurried to him for counsel. They agreed that their
+present position, with Kallash's threats hanging over their heads, was
+intolerable. But what was to be done?
+
+Bodlevski paced up and down the room, biting his lips, and seeking
+some decisive plan.
+
+"We must act in such a way," he said, coming to a stand before the
+baroness, "as to get rid of this fellow once for all. I think he is
+dangerous, and it never does any harm to take proper precautions. Get
+the money ready, Natasha; we must give it to him."
+
+"What! give him the money!" and the baroness threw up her hands. "Will
+that get us out of his power? Can we feel secure? It will only last
+till something new happens. At the first occasion----"
+
+"Which will also be the last!" interrupted Bodlevski. "Suppose we do
+give him the money to-day; does that mean that we give it for good?
+Not at all! It will be back in my pocket to-morrow! Let us think it
+out properly!" and he gave her a friendly pat on the shoulder, and sat
+down in an easy chair in front of her.
+
+The result of their deliberations was a little note addressed to Count
+Kallash:
+
+"DEAR COUNT," it ran, "I was guilty of an act of folly toward you
+to-day. I am ashamed of it, and wish to make amends as soon as
+possible. We have always been good friends, so let us forget our
+little difference, the more so that an alliance is much more
+advantageous to us both than a quarrel. Come this evening to receive
+the money you spoke of, and to clasp in amity the hand of your devoted
+friend, VON D."
+
+Kallash came about ten o'clock in the evening, and received from
+Bodlevski the sum of fifty thousand rubles in notes. The baroness was
+very amiable, and persuaded him to have some tea. There was not a
+suggestion of future difficulties, and everything seemed to promise
+perfect harmony for the future. Bodlevski talked over plans of future
+undertakings, and told him, with evident satisfaction, that they had
+just heard of the arrest of the younger Prince Shadursky, in Paris,
+for attempting to defraud a bank by a pretended sale of gold dust.
+Count Kallash was also gay, and a certain satisfaction filled his mind
+at the thought of his sister's security, as he felt the heavy packet
+of notes in his pocket. He smoked his cigar with evident satisfaction,
+sipping the fragrant tea from time to time. The conversation was gay
+and animated, and for some reason or other turned to the subject of
+clubs.
+
+"Ah, yes," interposed Bodlevski, "_a propos_! I expect to be a member
+of the Yacht Club this summer. Let me recommend to you a new field of
+action. They will disport themselves on the green water, and we on the
+green cloth! By the way, I forgot to speak of it--I bought a boat the
+other day, a mere rowboat. It is on the Fontauka Canal, at the
+Simeonovski bridge. We must come for a row some day."
+
+"Delightful," exclaimed the baroness. "But why some day? Why not
+to-night? The moon is beautiful, and, indeed, it is hardly dark at
+midnight. Your speaking of boats has filled me with a sudden desire to
+go rowing. What do you say, dear count?" and she turned amiably to
+Kallash.
+
+Count Kallash at once consented, considering the baroness's idea an
+admirable one, and they were soon on their way toward the Simeonovski
+bridge.
+
+"How delightful it is!" cried the baroness, some half hour later, as
+they were gliding over the quiet water. "Count, do you like strong
+sensations?" she asked suddenly.
+
+"I am fond of strong sensations of every kind," he replied, taking up
+her challenge.
+
+"Well, I am going to offer you a little sensation, though it always
+greatly affects me. Everything is just right for it, and I am in the
+humor, too."
+
+"What is it to be?" asked Count Kallash indifferently.
+
+"You will see in a moment. Do you know that there are underground
+canals in St. Petersburg?"
+
+"In St. Petersburg?" asked Kallash in astonishment.
+
+"Yes, in St. Petersburg! A whole series of underground rivers, wide
+enough for a boat to pass through. I have rowed along them several
+times. Does not that offer a new sensation, something quite unlike St.
+Petersburg?"
+
+"Yes, it is certainly novel," answered Count Kallash, now interested.
+"Where are they? Pray show them to me."
+
+"There is one a few yards off. Shall we enter? You are not afraid?"
+she said with a smile of challenge.
+
+"By no means--unless you command me to be afraid," Kallash replied in
+the same tone. "Let us enter at once!"
+
+"Kasimir, turn under the arch!" and the boat cut across the canal
+toward a half circle of darkness. A moment more and the darkness
+engulfed them completely. They were somewhere under the Admiralty, not
+far from St. Isaac's Cathedral. Away ahead of them was a tiny half
+circle of light, where the canal joined the swiftly flowing Neva.
+Carriages rumbled like distant thunder above their heads.
+
+"Deuce take it! it is really rather fine!" cried the count, with
+evident pleasure. "A meeting of pirates is all we need to make it
+perfect. It is a pity that we cannot see where we are!"
+
+"Light a match. Have you any?" said the baroness.
+
+"I have, and wax matches, too." The count took out a match and lit it,
+and the underground stream was lit by a faint ruddy glow. The channel,
+covered by a semi-circular arch, was just wide enough for one boat to
+pass through, with oars out. The black water flowed silently by in a
+sluggish, Stygian stream. Bats, startled by the light, fluttered in
+their faces, and then disappeared in the darkness.
+
+As the boat glided on, the match burned out in Count Kallash's
+fingers. He threw it into the water, and opened his matchbox to take
+another.
+
+At the same moment he felt a sharp blow on the head, followed by a
+second, and he sank senseless in the bottom of the boat.
+
+"Where is the money?" cried Bodlevski, who had struck him with the
+handle of the oar. "Get his coat open!" and the baroness deftly drew
+the thick packet from the breast pocket of his coat. "Here it is! I
+have it!" she replied quickly.
+
+"Now, overboard with him! Keep the body steady!" A dull splash, and
+then silence. "To-night we shall sleep secure!"
+
+They counted without their host. Princess Anna had also her scheme of
+vengeance, and had worked it out, without a word to her brother. When
+Natasha and Bodlevski entered their apartment, they found the police
+in possession, and a few minutes later both were under arrest.
+Abundant evidence of fraud and forgery was found in their dwelling,
+and the vast Siberian solitudes avenged the death of their last
+victim.
+
+
+
+JOeRGEN WILHELM BERGSOeE
+
+
+_THE AMPUTATED ARMS_
+
+
+It happened when I was about eighteen or nineteen years old (began Dr.
+Simsen). I was studying at the University, and being coached in
+anatomy by my old friend Soelling. He was an amusing fellow, this
+Solling. Full of jokes and whimsical ideas, and equally merry, whether
+he was working at the dissecting table or brewing a punch for a jovial
+crowd.
+
+He had but one fault--if one might call it so--and that was his
+exaggerated idea of punctuality. He grumbled if you were late two
+minutes; any longer delay would spoil the entire evening for him. He
+himself was never known to be late. At least not during the entire
+years of my studying.
+
+One Wednesday evening our little circle of friends met as usual in my
+room at seven o'clock. I had made the customary preparations for the
+meeting, had borrowed three chairs--I had but one myself--had cleaned
+all my pipes, and had persuaded Hans to take the breakfast dishes from
+the sofa and carry them downstairs. One by one my friends arrived, the
+clock struck seven, and to our great astonishment, Solling had not yet
+appeared. One, two, even five minutes passed before we heard him run
+upstairs and knock at the door with his characteristic short blows.
+
+When he entered the room he looked so angry and at the same time so
+upset that I cried out: "What's the matter, Solling? You look as if
+you had been robbed."
+
+"That's exactly what has happened," replied Solling angrily. "But it
+was no ordinary sneak thief," he added, hanging his overcoat behind
+the door.
+
+"What have you lost?" asked my neighbor Nansen.
+
+"Both arms from the new skeleton I've just recently received from the
+hospital," said Soelling with an expression as if his last cent had
+been taken from him. "It's vandalism!"
+
+We burst out into loud laughter at this remarkable answer, but Soelling
+continued: "Can you imagine it? Both arms are gone, cut off at the
+shoulder joint;--and the strangest part of it is that the same thing
+has been done to my shabby old skeleton which stands in my bedroom,
+There wasn't an arm on either of them."
+
+"That's too bad," I remarked. "For we were just going to study the
+_anatomy_ of the arm to-night."
+
+"Osteology," corrected Soelling gravely. "Get out your skeleton, little
+Simsen. It isn't as good as mine, but it will do for this
+evening."
+
+I went to the corner where my anatomical treasures were hidden behind
+a green curtain--"the Museum," was what Soelling called it--but my
+astonishment was great when I found my skeleton in its accustomed
+place and wearing as usual my student's uniform--but without arms.
+
+"The devil!" cried Soelling. "That was done by the same person who
+robbed me; the arms are taken off at the shoulder joint in exactly the
+same manner. You did it, Simsen!"
+
+I declared my innocence, very angry at the abuse of my fine skeleton,
+while Nansen cried: "Wait a moment, I'll bring in mine. There hasn't
+been a soul in my room since this morning, I can swear to that. I'll
+be back in an instant."
+
+He hurried into his room, but returned in a few moments greatly
+depressed and somewhat ashamed. The skeleton was in its usual place,
+but the arms were gone, cut off at the shoulder in exactly the same
+manner as mine.
+
+The affair, mysterious in itself, had now come to be a serious matter.
+We lost ourselves in suggestions and explanations, none of which
+seemed to throw any light on the subject. Finally we sent a messenger
+to the other side of the house where, as I happened to know, was a new
+skeleton which the young student Ravn had recently received from the
+janitor of the hospital.
+
+Ravn had gone out and taken the key with him. The messenger whom we
+had sent to the rooms of the Iceland students returned with the
+information that one of them had used the only skeleton they possessed
+to pummel the other with, and that consequently only the thigh bones
+were left unbroken.
+
+What were we to do? We couldn't understand the matter at all. Soelling
+scolded and cursed and the company was about to break up when we heard
+some one coming noisily upstairs. The door was thrown open and a tall,
+thin figure appeared on the threshold--our good friend Niels Daae.
+
+He was a strange chap, this Niels Daae, the true type of a species
+seldom found nowadays. He was no longer young, and by reason of a
+queer chain of circumstances, as he expressed it, he had been through
+nearly all the professions and could produce papers proving that he
+had been on the point of passing not one but three examinations.
+
+He had begun with theology; but the story of the quarrel between Jacob
+and Esau had led him to take up the study of law. As a law student he
+had come across an interesting poisoning case, which had proved to him
+that a study of medicine was extremely necessary for lawyers; and he
+had taken up the study of medicine with such energy that he had
+forgotten all his law and was about to take his last examinations at
+the age of forty.
+
+Niels Daae took the story of our troubles very seriously. "Every pot
+has two handles," he began. "Every sausage two ends, every question
+two sides, except this one--this has three." (Applause.) "When we look
+at it from the legal point of view there can be no doubt that it
+belongs in the category of ordinary theft. But from the fact that the
+thief took only the arms when he might have taken the entire skeleton,
+we must conclude that he is not in a responsible condition of mind,
+which therefore introduces a medical side to the affair. From a legal
+point of view, the thief must be convicted for robbery, or at least
+for the illegal appropriation of the property of others; but from the
+medical point of view, we must acquit him, because he is not
+responsible for his acts. Here we have two professions quarreling with
+one another, and who shall say which is right? But now I will
+introduce the theological point of view, and raise the entire affair
+up to a higher plane. Providence, in the material shape of a patron of
+mine in the country, whose children I have inoculated with the juice
+of wisdom, has sent me two fat geese and two first-class ducks. These
+animals are to be cooked and eaten this evening in Mathiesen's
+establishment, and I invite this honored company to join me there.
+Personally I look upon the disappearance of these arms as an all-wise
+intervention of Providence, which sets its own inscrutable wisdom up
+against the wisdom which we would otherwise have heard from the lips
+of my venerable friend Soelling."
+
+Daae's confused speech was received with laughter and applause, and
+Soelling's weak protests were lost in the general delight at the
+invitation. I have often noticed that such improvised festivities are
+usually the most enjoyable, and so it was for us that evening. Niels
+Daae treated us to his ducks and to his most amusing jokes, Soelling
+sang his best songs, our jovial host Mathiesen told his wittiest
+stories, and the merriment was in full swing when we heard cries in
+the street, and then a rush of confused noises broken by screams of
+pain.
+
+"There's been an accident," cried Soelling, running out to the door.
+
+We all followed him and discovered that a pair of run-away horses had
+thrown a carriage against a tree, hurling the driver from his box,
+under the wheels. His right arm had been broken near the shoulder. In
+the twinkling of an eye the hall of festivities was transformed into
+an emergency hospital. Soelling shook his head as he examined the
+injury, and ordered the transport of the patient to the city hospital.
+It was his belief that the arm would have to be amputated, cut off at
+the shoulder joint, just as had been the case with our skeleton.
+"Damned odd coincidence, isn't it?" he remarked to me.
+
+Our merry mood had vanished and we took our way, quiet and depressed,
+through the old avenues toward our home. For the first time in its
+existence possibly, our venerable "barracks," as we called the
+dormitory, saw its occupants returning home from an evening's bout
+just as the night watchman intoned his eleven o'clock verse.
+
+"Just eleven," exclaimed Soelling. "It's too early to go to bed, and
+too late to go anywhere else. We'll go up to your room, little Simsen,
+and see if we can't have some sort of a lesson this evening. You have
+your colored plates and we'll try to get along with them. It's a
+nuisance that we should have lost those arms just this evening."
+
+"The Doctor can have all the arms and legs he wants," grinned Hans,
+who came out of the doorway just in time to hear Soelling's last word.
+
+"What do you mean, Hans?" asked Soelling in astonishment.
+
+"It'll be easy enough to get them," said Hans. "They've torn down the
+planking around the Holy Trinity churchyard, and dug up the earth to
+build a new wall. I saw it myself, as I came past the church. Lord,
+what a lot of bones they've dug out there! There's arms and legs and
+heads, many more than the Doctor could possibly need."
+
+"Much good that does us," answered Soelling. "They shut the gates at
+seven o'clock and it's after eleven already."
+
+"Oh, yes, they shut them," grinned Hans again. "But there's another
+way to get in. If you go through the gate of the porcelain factory and
+over the courtyard, and through the mill in the fourth courtyard that
+leads out into Spring Street, there you will see where the planking is
+torn down and you can get into the churchyard easily."
+
+"Hans, you're a genius!" exclaimed Soelling in delight. "Here, Simsen,
+you know that factory inside and out, you're so friendly with that
+fellow Outzen who lives there. Run along to him and let him give you
+the key of the mill. It will be easy to find an arm that isn't too
+much decayed. Hurry along, now; the rest of us will wait for you
+upstairs."
+
+To be quite candid I must confess that I was not particularly eager to
+fulfill Soelling's command. I was at an age to have still a sufficient
+amount of reverence for death and the grave, and the mysterious
+occurrence of the stolen arms still ran through my mind. But I was
+still more afraid of Soelling's irony and of the laughter of my
+comrades, so I trotted off as carelessly as if I had been sent to buy
+a package of cigarettes.
+
+It was some time before I could arouse the old janitor of the factory
+from his peaceful slumbers. I told him that I had an important message
+from Outzen, and hurried upstairs to the latter's room. Outzen was a
+strictly moral character; knowing this, I was prepared to have him
+refuse me the key which would let me into the fourth courtyard and
+from there into the cemetery. As I expected, Outzen took the matter
+very seriously. He closed the Hebrew Bible which he had been studying
+as I entered, turned up his lamp and looked at me in astonishment as I
+made my request.
+
+"Why, my dear Simsen, it is a most sinful deed that you are about to
+do," he said gravely. "Take my advice and desist. You will get no key
+from me for any such cause. The peace of the grave is sacred. No man
+dare disturb it."
+
+"And how about the gravedigger? He puts the newly dead down beside the
+old corpses, and lives as peacefully as anyone else."
+
+"He is doing his duty," answered Outzen calmly. "But to disturb the
+peace of the grave from sheer daring, with the fumes of the punch
+still in your head,--that is a different matter,--that will surely be
+punished!"
+
+His words irritated me. It is not very flattering, particularly if one
+is not yet twenty, to be told that you are about to perform a daring
+deed simply because you are drunk. Without any further reply to his
+protests I took the key from its place on the wall and ran downstairs
+two steps at a time, vowing to myself that I would take home an arm
+let cost what it would. I would show Outzen, and Soelling, and all the
+rest, what a devil of a fellow I was.
+
+My heart beat rapidly as I stole through the long dark corridor, past
+the ruins of the old convent of St. Clara, into the so-called third
+courtyard. Here I took a lantern from the hall, lit it and crossed to
+the mill where the clay was prepared for the factory. The tall wheels
+and cylinders, with their straps and bolts, looked like weird
+creatures of the night in the dim light of my tallow candle. I felt my
+courage sinking even here, but I pulled myself together, opened the
+last door with my key and stepped out into the fourth courtyard. A
+moment later I stood on the dividing line between the cemetery and the
+factory.
+
+The entire length of the tall blackened planking had been torn down.
+The pieces of it lay about, and the earth had been dug up to
+considerable depth, to make a foundation for a new wall between Life
+and Death. The uncanny emptiness of the place seized upon me. I halted
+involuntarily as if to harden myself against it. It was a raw, cold,
+stormy evening. The clouds flew past the moon in jagged fragments, so
+that the churchyard, with its white crosses and stones, lay now in
+full light, now in dim shadow. Now and then a rush of wind rattled
+over the graves, roared through the leafless trees, bent the
+complaining bushes, and caught itself in the little eddy at the corner
+of the church, only to escape again over the roofs, turning the old
+weather vane with a sharp scream of the rusty iron.
+
+I looked toward the left--there I saw several weird white shapes
+moving gently in the moonlight. "White sheets," I said to myself,
+"it's nothing but white sheets! This drying of linen in the churchyard
+ought to be stopped."
+
+I turned in the opposite direction and saw a heap of bones scarce two
+paces distant from me. Holding my lantern lower, I approached them and
+stretched out my hand--there was a rattling in the heap; something
+warm and soft touched my fingers.
+
+I started and shivered. Then I exclaimed: "The rats! nothing but the
+rats in the churchyard! I must not get frightened. It will be so
+foolish--they would laugh at me. Where the devil is that arm? I can't
+find one that isn't broken!"
+
+With trembling knees and in feverish haste I examined one heap after
+another. The light in my lantern flickered in the wind and suddenly
+went out. The foul smell of the smoking wick rose to my face and I
+felt as if I were about to faint. It took all my energy to recover my
+control. I walked two or three steps ahead, and saw at a little
+distance a coffin which had been still in good shape when taken out of
+the earth.
+
+I approached it and saw that it was of old-fashioned shape, made of
+heavy oaken boards that were already rotting. On its cover was a metal
+plate with an illegible inscription. The old wood was so brittle that
+it would have been very easy for me to open the coffin with any sort
+of a tool. I looked about me and saw a hatchet and a couple of spades
+lying near the fence. I took one of the latter, put its flat end
+between the boards--the old coffin fell apart with a dull crackling
+protest.
+
+I turned my head aside, put my hand in through the opening, felt
+about, and taking a firm hold on one arm of the skeleton, I loosened
+it from the body with a quick jerk. The movement loosened the head as
+well, and it rolled out through the opening right to my very feet. I
+took up the skull to lay it in the coffin again--and then I saw a
+greenish phosphorescent glimmer in its empty eye sockets, a glimmer
+which came and went. Mad terror shook me at the sight. I looked up at
+the houses in the distance, then back again to the skull; the empty
+sockets shone more brightly than before. I felt that I must have some
+natural explanation for this appearance or I would go mad. I took up
+the head again--and never in my life have I had so overpowering an
+impression of the might of death and decay than in this moment.
+Myriads of disgusting clammy insects poured out of every opening of
+the skull, and a couple of shining, wormlike centipedes--_Geophiles_,
+the scientists call them--crawled about in the eye sockets. I threw
+the skull back into the coffin, sprang over the heaps of bones without
+even taking time to pick up my lantern, and ran like a hunted thing
+through the dark mill, over the factory courtyards, until I reached
+the outer gate. Here I washed the arm at the fountain, and smoothed my
+disarranged clothing. I hid my booty under my overcoat, nodded to the
+sleepy old janitor as he opened the door to me, and a few moments
+later I entered my own room with an expression which I had attempted
+to make quite calm and careless.
+
+"What the devil is the matter with you, Simsen?" cried Soelling as he
+saw me. "Have you seen a ghost? Or is the punch wearing off already?
+We thought you'd never come; why, it's nearly twelve o'clock!"
+
+Without a word I drew back my overcoat and laid my booty on the table.
+
+"By all the devils," exclaimed Soelling in anatomical enthusiasm,
+"where did you find that superb arm? Simsen knows what he's about all
+right. It's a girl's arm; isn't it beautiful? Just look at the
+hand--how fine and delicate it is! Must have worn a No. 6 glove.
+There's a pretty hand to caress and kiss!"
+
+The arm passed from one to the other amid general admiration. Every
+word that was said increased my disgust for myself and for what I had
+done. It was a woman's arm, then--what sort of a woman might she have
+been? Young and beautiful possibly--her brothers' pride, her parents'
+joy. She had faded away in her youth, cared for by loving hands and
+tender thoughts. She had fallen asleep gently, and those who loved her
+had desired to give her in death the peace she had enjoyed throughout
+her lifetime. For this they had made her coffin of thick, heavy oaken
+boards. And this hand, loved and missed by so many--it lay there now
+on an anatomical table, encircled by clouds of tobacco smoke, stared
+at by curious glances, and made the object of coarse jokes. O God! how
+terrible it was!
+
+"I must have that arm," exclaimed Soelling, when the first burst of
+admiration had passed. "When I bleach it and touch it up with varnish,
+it will be a superb specimen. I'll take it home with me."
+
+"No," I exclaimed, "I can't permit it. It was wrong of me to bring it
+away from the churchyard. I'm going right back to put the arm in its
+place."
+
+"Well, will you listen to that?" cried Soelling, amid the hearty
+laughter of the others. "Simsen's so lyric, he certainly must be
+drunk. I must have that arm at any cost."
+
+"Not much," cut in Niels Daae; "you have no right to it. It was buried
+in the earth and dug out again; it is a find, and all the rest of us
+have just as much right to it as you have."
+
+"Yes, every one of us has some share in it," said some one else.
+
+"But what are you going to do about it?" remarked Soelling. "It would
+be vandalism to break up that arm. What God has joined together let no
+man put asunder," he concluded with pathos.
+
+"Let's auction it off," exclaimed Daae. "I will be the auctioneer, and
+this key to the graveyard will serve me for a hammer."
+
+The laughter broke out anew as Daae took his place solemnly at the
+head of the table and began to whine out the following announcement:
+"I hereby notify all present that on the 25th of November, at twelve
+o'clock at midnight, in corridor No. 5 of the student barracks, a
+lady's arm in excellent condition, with all its appurtenances of wrist
+bones, joints, and finger tips, is to be offered at public auction.
+The buyer can have possession of his purchase immediately after the
+auction, and a credit of six weeks will be given to any reliable
+customer. I bid a Danish shilling."
+
+"One mark," cried Soelling mockingly.
+
+"Two," cried somebody else.
+
+"Four," exclaimed Soelling. "It's worth it. Why don't you join in,
+Simsen? You look as if you were sitting in a hornet's nest."
+
+I bid one mark more, and Soelling raised me a thaler. There were no
+more bids, the hammer fell, and the arm belonged to Soelling.
+
+"Here, take this," he said, handing me a mark piece; "it's part of
+your commission as grave robber. You shall have the rest later, unless
+you prefer that I should turn it over to the drinking fund." With
+these words Soelling wrapped the arm in a newspaper, and the gay crowd
+ran noisily down the stairs and through the streets, until their
+singing and laughter were lost in the distance.
+
+I stood alone, still dazed and bewildered, staring at the piece of
+money in my hand. My thoughts were far too much excited that I should
+hope to sleep. I turned up my lamp and took out one of my books to try
+and study myself into a quieter mood. But without success.
+
+Suddenly I heard a sound like that of a swinging pendulum. I raised my
+head and listened attentively. There was no clock either in my room or
+in the neighboring ones--but I could still hear the sound. At the same
+moment my lamp began to flicker. The oil was apparently exhausted. I
+was about to rise to fill it again, when my eyes fell upon the door,
+and I saw the graveyard key, which I had hung there, moving slowly
+back and forth with a rhythmic swing. Just as its motion seemed about
+to die away, it would receive a gentle push as from an unseen hand,
+and would swing back and forth more than ever. I stood there with open
+mouth and staring eyes, ice-cold chills ran down my back, and drops of
+perspiration stood out on my forehead. Finally, I could endure it no
+longer. I sprang to the door, seized the key with both hands and put
+it on my desk under a pile of heavy books. Then I breathed a sigh of
+relief.
+
+My lamp was about to go out and I discovered that I had no more oil.
+With feverish haste I threw my clothes off, blew out the light and
+sprang into bed as if to smother my fears.
+
+But once alone in the darkness the fears grew worse than ever. They
+grew into dreams and visions. It seemed to me as if I were out in the
+graveyard again, and heard the screaming of the rusty weather vane as
+the wind turned it. Then I was in the mill again; the wheels were
+turning and stretching out ghostly hands to draw me into the yawning
+maw of the machine. Then again, I found myself in a long, low,
+pitch-black corridor, followed by Something I could not see--Something
+that drove me to the mouth of a bottomless abyss. I would start up out
+of my half sleep, listen and look about me, then fall back again into
+an uneasy slumber.
+
+Suddenly something fell from the ceiling onto the bed, and
+"buzz--buzz--buzz" sounded about my head. It was a huge fly which had
+been sleeping in a corner of my room and had been roused by the heat
+of the stove. It flew about in great circles, now around the bed, now
+in all four corners of the chamber--"buzz--buzz--buzz"--it was
+unendurable! At last I heard it creep into a bag of sugar which had
+been left on the window sill. I sprang up and closed the bag tight.
+The fly buzzed worse than ever, but I went back to bed and attempted
+to sleep again, feeling that I had conquered the enemy.
+
+I began to count: I counted slowly to one hundred, two hundred,
+finally up to one thousand, and then at last I experienced that
+pleasant weakness which is the forerunner of true sleep. I seemed to
+be in a beautiful garden, bright with many flowers and odorous with
+all the perfumes of spring. At my side walked a beautiful young girl.
+I seemed to know her well, and yet it was not possible for me to
+remember her name, or even to know how we came to be wandering there
+together. As we walked slowly through the paths she would stop to pick
+a flower or to admire a brilliant butterfly swaying in the air.
+Suddenly a cold wind blew through the garden. The young girl trembled
+and her cheeks grew pale. "I am cold," she said to me, "do you not
+see? It is Death who is approaching us."
+
+I would have answered, but in the same moment another stronger and
+still more icy gust roared through the garden. The leaves turned pale
+on the trees, the flowerets bent their heads, and the bees and
+butterflies fell lifeless to the earth. "That is Death," whispered my
+companion, trembling.
+
+A third icy gust blew the last leaves from the bushes, white crosses
+and gravestones appeared between the bare twigs--and I was in the
+churchyard again and heard the screaming of the rusty weather vane.
+Beside me stood a heavy brass-bound coffin with a metal plate on the
+cover. I bent down to read the inscription, the cover rolled off
+suddenly, and from out the coffin rose the form of the young girl who
+had been with me in the garden. I stretched out my arms to clasp her
+to my breast--then, oh horror! I saw the greenish-gleaming, empty eye
+sockets of the skull. I felt bony arms around me, dragging me back
+into the coffin. I screamed aloud for help and woke up.
+
+My room seemed unusually light; but I remembered that it was a
+moonlight night and thought no more of it. I tried to explain the
+visions of my dream with various natural noises about me. The
+imprisoned fly buzzed as loudly as a whole swarm of bees; one half of
+my window had blown open, and the cold night air rushed in gusts into
+my room.
+
+I sprang up to close the window, and then I saw that the strong white
+light that filled my room did not come from the moon, but seemed to
+shine out from the church opposite. I heard the chiming of the bells,
+soft at first, as if in far distance, then stronger and stronger
+until, mingled with the rolling notes of the organ, a mighty rush of
+sound struck against my windows. I stared out into the street and
+could scarcely believe my eyes. The houses in the market place just
+beyond were all little one-story buildings with bow windows and wooden
+eave troughs ending in carved dragon heads. Most of them had balconies
+of carved woodwork, and high stone stoops with gleaming brass rails.
+
+But it was the church most of all that aroused my astonishment. Its
+position was completely changed. Its front turned toward our house
+where usually the side had stood. The church was brilliantly lighted,
+and now I perceived that it was this light which filled my room. I
+stood speechless amid the chiming of the bells and the roaring of the
+organ, and I saw a long wedding procession moving slowly up the center
+aisle of the church toward the altar. The light was so brilliant that
+I could distinguish each one of the figures. They were all in strange
+old-time costumes; the ladies in brocades and satins with strings of
+pearls in their powdered hair, the gentlemen in uniform with knee
+breeches, swords, and cocked hats held under their arms. But it was
+the bride who drew my attention most strongly. She was clothed in
+white satin, and a faded myrtle wreath was twisted through the
+powdered locks beneath her sweeping veil. The bridegroom at her side
+wore a red uniform and many decorations. Slowly they approached the
+altar, where an old man in black vestments and a heavy white wig was
+awaiting them. They stood before him, and I could see that he was
+reading the ritual from a gold-lettered book.
+
+One of the train stepped forward and unbuckled the bridegroom's sword,
+that his right hand might be free to take that of the bride. She
+seemed about to raise her own hand to his, when she suddenly sank
+fainting at his feet. The guests hurried toward the altar, the lights
+went out, the music stopped, and the figures floated together like
+pale white mists.
+
+But outside in the square it was still brighter than before, and I
+suddenly saw the side portal of the church burst open and the wedding
+procession move out across the market place.
+
+I turned as if to flee, but could not move a muscle. Quiet, as if
+turned to stone, I stood and watched the ghostly figures that came
+nearer and nearer. The clergyman led the train, then came the
+bridegroom and the bride, and as the latter raised her eyes to me I
+saw that it was the young girl of the garden. Her eyes were so full of
+pain, so full of sad entreaty that I could scarce endure them; but how
+shall I explain the feeling that shot through me as I suddenly
+discovered that the right sleeve of her white satin gown hung empty at
+her side? The train disappeared, and the tone of the church bells
+changed to a strange, dry, creaking sound, and the gate below me
+complained as it turned on its rusty hinges. I faced toward my own
+door. I knew that it was shut and locked, but I knew that the ghostly
+procession were coming to call me to account, and I felt that no walls
+could keep them out. My door flew open, there was a rustling as of
+silken gowns, but the figures seemed to float in in the changing forms
+of swaying white mists. Closer and closer they gathered around me,
+robbing me of breath, robbing me of the power to move. There was a
+silence as of the grave--and then I saw before me the old priest with
+his gold-lettered book. He raised his hand and spoke with a soft, deep
+voice: "The grave is sacred! Let no one dare to disturb the peace of
+the dead."
+
+"The grave is sacred!" an echo rolled through the room as the swaying
+figures moved like reeds in the wind.
+
+"What do you want? What do you demand?" I gasped in the grip of a
+deathly fear.
+
+"Give back to the grave that which belongs to it," said the deep voice
+again.
+
+"Give back to the grave that which belongs to it," repeated the echo
+as the swaying forms pressed closer to me.
+
+"But it's impossible--I can't--I have sold it--sold it at auction!" I
+screamed in despair. "It was buried and found in the earth--and sold
+for five marks eight shillings----"
+
+A hideous scream came from the ghostly ranks. They threw themselves
+upon me as the white fog rolls in from the sea, they pressed upon me
+until I could no longer breathe. Beside myself, I threw open the window
+and attempted to spring out, screaming aloud: "Help! help! murder!
+they are murdering me!"
+
+The sound of my own voice awoke me. I found myself in my night clothes
+on the window sill, one leg already out of the window and both hands
+clutching at the center post. On the street below me stood the night
+watchman, staring up at me in astonishment, while faint white clouds
+of mist rolled out of my window like smoke. All around outside lay the
+November fog, gray and moist, and as the fresh air of the early dawn
+blew cool on my face I felt my senses returning to me. I looked down
+at the night watchman--God bless him! He was a big, strong,
+comfortably fat fellow made of real flesh and blood, and no ghost
+shape of the night. I looked at the round tower of the church--how
+massive and venerable it stood there, gray in the gray of the morning
+mists. I looked over at the market place. There was a light in the
+baker shop and a farmer stood before it, tying his horse to a post.
+Back in my own room everything was in its usual place. Even the little
+paper bag with the sugar lay there on the window sill, and the
+imprisoned fly buzzed louder than ever. I knew that I was really awake
+and that the day was coming. I sprang back hastily from the window and
+was about to jump into bed, when my foot touched something hard and
+sharp.
+
+I stooped to see what it was, felt about on the floor in the half
+light, and touched a long, dry, skeleton arm which held a tiny roll of
+paper in its bony fingers. I felt about again, and found still another
+arm, also holding a roll of paper. Then I began to think that my
+reason must be going. What I had seen thus far was only an unusually
+vivid dream--a vision of my heated imagination. But I knew that I was
+awake now, and yet here lay two--no, three (for there was still
+another arm)--hard, undeniable, material proofs that what I had
+thought was hallucination, might have been reality. Trembling in the
+thought that madness was threatening me, I tore open the first roll of
+paper. On it was written the name: "Soelling." I caught at the second
+and opened it. There stood the word: "Nansen."
+
+I had just strength enough left to catch the third paper and open
+it--there was my own name: "Simsen."
+
+Then I sank fainting to the floor.
+
+When I came to myself again, Niels Daae stood beside me with an empty
+water bottle, the contents of which were dripping off my person and
+off the sofa upon which I was lying. "Here, drink this," he said in a
+soothing tone. "It will make you feel better."
+
+I looked about me wildly, as I sipped at the glass of brandy which put
+new life into me once more. "What has happened?" I asked weakly.
+
+"Oh, nothing of importance," answered Niels. "You were just about to
+commit suicide by means of charcoal gas. Those are mighty bad
+ventilators on your old stove there. The wind must have blown them
+shut, unless you were fool enough to close them yourself before you
+went to bed. If you had not opened the window, you would have already
+been too far along the path to Paradise to be called back by a glass
+of brandy. Take another."
+
+"How did you get up here?" I asked, sitting upright on the sofa.
+
+"Through the door in the usual simple manner," answered Niels Daae. "I
+was on watch last night in the hospital; but Mathiesen's punch is
+heavy and my watching was more like sleeping, so I thought it better
+to come away in the early morning. As I passed your barracks here, I
+saw you sitting in the window in your nightshirt and calling down to
+the night watchman that some one was murdering you. I managed to wake
+up Jansen down below you, and got into the house through his window.
+Do you usually sleep on the bare floor?"
+
+"But where did the arms come from?" I asked, still half bewildered.
+
+"Oh, the devil take those arms," cried Niels. "Just see if you can
+stand up all right now. Oh, those arms there? Why, those are the arms
+I cut off your skeletons. Clever idea, wasn't it? You know how grumpy
+Soelling gets if anything interferes with his tutoring. You see, I'd
+had the geese sent me, and I wanted you to all come with me to
+Mathiesen's place. I knew you were going to read the osteology of the
+arm, so I went up into Soelling's room, opened it with his own keys and
+took the arms from his skeleton. I did the same here while you were
+downstairs in the reading room. Have you been stupid enough to take
+them down off their frames, and take away their tickets? I had marked
+them so carefully, that each man should get his own again."
+
+I dressed hastily and went out with Niels into the fresh, cool morning
+air. A few minutes later we separated, and I turned toward the street
+where Soelling lived. Without heeding the protest of his old landlady,
+I entered the room where he still slept the sleep of the just. The
+arm, still wrapped in newspaper, lay on his desk. I took it up, put
+the mark piece in its place and hastened with all speed to the
+churchyard.
+
+How different it looked in the early dawn! The fog had risen and
+shining frost pearls hung in the bare twigs of the tall trees where
+the sparrows were already twittering their morning song. There was no
+one to be seen. The churchyard lay quiet and peaceful. I stepped over
+the heaps of bones to where the heavy oaken coffin lay under a tree.
+Cautiously I pushed the arm back into its interior, and hammered the
+rusty nails into their places again, just as the first rays of the
+pale November sun touched a gleam of light from the metal plate on the
+cover.--Then the weight was lifted from my soul.
+
+
+
+OTTO LARSSEN
+
+
+_THE MANUSCRIPT_
+
+
+Two gentlemen sat chatting together one evening.
+
+Their daily business was to occupy themselves with literature. At the
+present moment they were engaged in drinking whisky,--an occupation
+both agreeable and useful,--and in chatting about books, the theater,
+women and many other things. Finally they came around to that
+inexhaustible subject for conversation, the mysterious life of the
+soul, the hidden things, the Unknown, that theme for which Shakespeare
+has given us an oft-quoted and oft-abused device, which one of them,
+Mr. X., now used to point his remarks. Raising his glass, he looked at
+himself meditatively in a mirror opposite, and, in a good imitation of
+the manner of his favourite actor, he quoted:
+
+     "There are more things in heaven and earth than are
+     dreamt of in thy philosophy, Horatio."
+
+Mr. Y. arranged a fresh glass for himself, and answered:
+
+"I believe it. I believe also that it is given but to a few chosen
+ones to see these things. It never fell to my lot, I know. Fortunately
+for me, perhaps. For,--at least so it appears to me,--these chosen
+ones appear on closer investigation to be individuals of an abnormal
+condition of brain. As far as I personally am concerned, I know of
+nothing more strange than the usual logical and natural sequence of
+events on our globe. I confess things do sometimes happen outside of
+this orderly sequence; but for the cold-blooded and thoughtful person
+the Strange, the apparently Inexplicable, usually turns out to be a
+sum of Chance, that Chance we will never be quite clever enough to
+fully take into our calculations.
+
+"As an instance I would like to tell you the story of what happened
+several years back to a friend of mine, a young French writer. He had
+a good, sincere mind, but he had also a strong leaning toward
+mysticism,--something which was just then in danger of becoming as
+much of a fashion in France as it is here now. The event of which I am
+about to tell you threw him into what was almost a delirium, which
+came near to robbing him of his normal intelligence, and therefore
+came near to robbing French readers of a few excellent books.
+
+"This was the way it happened:
+
+"It was about ten years back, and I was spending the spring and summer
+in Paris. I had a room with the family of a _concierge_ on the left
+bank, rue de Vaugirard, near the Luxembourg Gardens.
+
+"A few steps from my modest domicile lived my friend Lucien F. We had
+become acquainted through a chain of circumstances which do not belong
+to this story, but these circumstances had made firm friends of us, a
+friendship which was a source of great pleasure and also of assistance
+to me in my study of Paris conditions. This friendship also enabled me
+to enjoy better and cheaper whisky than one can usually meet with in
+the city by the Seine, a real good 'Jameson Highland.'
+
+"Lucien F. had already published several books which had aroused
+attention through the oddity of their themes, and their gratifying
+success had made it possible for him to establish himself in a
+comfortably furnished bachelor apartment on the corner of the rue de
+Vaugirard and the rue de Conde.
+
+"The apartment had a corridor and three rooms; a dining room, a
+bedroom, and a charming study with an inclosed balcony, the three
+windows of which,--a large one in the center and two smaller ones at
+the side,--sent a flood of light in over the great writing table which
+filled nearly the entire balcony. Inside the room, near the balcony,
+stood a divan covered with a bearskin rug. Upon this divan I spent
+many of my hours in Paris, occupied in the smoking of my friend's
+excellent cigars, and the sampling of his superlatively good whisky.
+At the same time I could lie staring up at the tops of the trees in
+the Luxembourg Gardens, while Lucien worked at his desk. For, unlike
+most writers, he could work best when he was not alone.
+
+"If I remained away several days, he would invariably ring my bell
+early some morning, and drag me out of bed with the remark: 'The
+whisky is ready. I can't write if you are not there.'
+
+"During the particular days of which I shall tell you, he was engaged
+in the writing of a fantastic novelette, 'The Force of the Wind,' a
+work which interested him greatly, and which he would interrupt
+unwillingly at intervals to furnish copy for the well-known newspaper
+that numbered him among the members of its staff. His books were
+printed by the same house that did the printing for the paper.
+
+"Often, as I lay in my favorite position on the divan, the bell would
+ring and we would be honored by a visit from the printer's boy
+Adolphe, a little fellow in a blue blouse, the true type of Paris
+gamin. Adolphe rejoiced in a broken nose, a pair of crafty eyes, and
+had his fists always full of manuscripts which he treated with a
+carelessness that would have driven a literary novice to despair. The
+long rolls of yellow paper would hang out of his trousers pockets as
+if ready to fall apart at his next movement. And the disrespectful
+manner in which he crammed my friend Lucien's scarcely dried essay
+into the breast of his blouse would have certainly called forth
+remarks from a journalist of more self-conceit.
+
+"But his eyes were so full of sly cunning, and there was such an
+atmosphere of Paris about the stocky little fourteen-year-old chap,
+that we would often keep him longer with us, and treat him to a glass
+of anisette to hear his opinion of the writers whose work he handled.
+He was an amusing cross between a tricky little Paris gamin and a real
+child, and he hit off the characteristics of the various writers with
+as keen a touch of actuality as he could put into his stories of how
+many centimes he had won that morning at 'craps' from his friend
+Pierre. Pierre was another employee of the printing house, Adolphe's
+comrade in his study of the mysteries of Paris streets, and now his
+rival. They were both in love with the same girl, the fifteen-year-old
+daughter of the keeper of 'La Prunelle' Cafe, and her favor was often
+the prize of the morning's game.
+
+"Now and then this rivalry between the two young Parisians would drop
+into a hand-to-hand fight. I myself was witness to such a skirmish one
+day, in front of 'La Prunelle.' The rivals pulled each other's hair
+mightily while the manuscripts flew about over the pavement, and
+Virginie, in her short skirts, stood at the door of the cafe and
+laughed until she seemed about to shake to pieces.
+
+"Pierre was the strongest, and Adolphe came off with a bloody nose. He
+gathered up his manuscripts in grim silence and left the battlefield
+and the still laughing Virginie with an expression of deep anger on
+his wounded face.
+
+"The following day, when I teased him a little because of his defeat,
+he smiled a sly smile and remarked:
+
+"'Yes, but I won a franc from him, the big stupid animal. And so it
+was I, after all, who took Virginie out that evening. We went to the
+Cafe "Neant," where I let them put me in the coffin and pretend to be
+decaying, to amuse her. She thought it was lots of fun.'
+
+"One morning Lucien had come for me as usual, put me on the divan, and
+seated himself at his writing table. He was just putting the last
+words to his novel, and the table was entirely covered with the
+scattered leaves, closely written. I could just see his neck as he sat
+there, a thin-sinewed, expressive neck. He bent over his work, blind
+and deaf for anything else. I lay there and gazed out over the tops of
+the trees in the park up into the blue summer sky. The window on the
+left side of the desk stood wide open, for it was a warm and sultry
+day. I sipped my whisky slowly. The air was heavy, and thunder
+threatened in the distance. After a little while the clouds gathered
+together, heavy, low-hanging, copper-hued, real thunder clouds, and
+the trees in the park rustled softly. The air was stifling, and lay
+heavy as lead on my breast.
+
+"'Lucien!'
+
+"Lucien did not hear or see anything, his pen flew over the paper.
+
+"I fell back lazily on my divan.
+
+"Then suddenly, there was a mighty tumult. A strong gust of wind swept
+through the street, bending the trees in the gardens quite out of my
+horizon. With a crash the right-hand window in the balcony flew wide
+open, and like a cyclone, the wind swept through, clearing the table
+in an instant of all the loose sheets of paper that had lain scattered
+about it.
+
+"'The devil! Why don't you shut the window!' I cried, springing up
+from the sofa.
+
+"'Spare your energy, it's too late,' said Lucien with a gentle mockery
+in his soft voice. 'Look there!'--he pointed out into the street,
+where his sheets of paper went swirling about in the heavy air like
+white doves.
+
+"A second later came the rain, a veritable cloud-burst. We shut the
+windows and gave ourselves up to melancholy thoughts about the lost
+manuscript, the recovery of which now seemed utterly hopeless.
+
+"'That's one thousand francs, at least, that the wind has robbed me
+of,' sighed Lucien. 'Well, _elfin_, that doesn't matter so much. But
+do you know anything more tiresome than to work over the same subject
+a second time? I can't think of doing it. It would fairly make me sick
+to try it.'
+
+"We were in a sad mood that morning. When we went out to breakfast at
+about two o'clock, we looked about for some traces of the lost
+manuscript.
+
+"There was nothing to be seen. It had vanished completely, whirled off
+to all four corners of the earth probably, this manuscript from which
+Lucien had expected so much. Truly it was 'The Force of the Wind.'"
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+"Now comes the strange part of the story. One morning, two weeks
+later, Lucien stood in the door of my little room, pale as a ghost. He
+had a bundle of printer's proofs in his hand, and held them out to me
+without a word.
+
+"I looked at it and read:
+
+"'"The Force of the Wind," by Lucien F.'
+
+"It was a good bundle of proofs, the entire first proofs of Lucien's
+novel, that novel the manuscript of which we had seen blown out of the
+balcony window and whirled away by the winds.
+
+"'My dear man,' I exclaimed, as I handed him back the proofs. 'You
+_have_ been industrious indeed, to write your entire novel over again
+in so short a time--and to have proofs already----'
+
+"Lucien did not answer. He stood silent, staring at me with a weird
+look in his otherwise so sensible eyes. After a moment he stammered:
+
+"'I did not write the novel over again. I have not touched a pen since
+the day the manuscript blew out of the window.'
+
+"'Are you a sleep-walker, Lucien?'
+
+"'Why do you ask?'
+
+"'Why, that would be the only natural explanation. They say we can do
+a great many things in sleep, of which we know nothing when we wake.
+I've heard queer stories of that. Men have committed murders in their
+sleep. It happens quite often that sleep-walkers write letters in a
+handwriting they do not recognize when awake.'
+
+"'I have never been a sleep-walker,' answered Lucien.
+
+"'Oh, you never can tell,' I remarked. 'Would you rather explain it as
+magic? Or as the work of fairies? Or do you believe in ghosts? Your
+muse has fascinated you, you mystic!' And I laughed and trilled a line
+from 'The Mascot,' which we had seen the evening before at the Lyric.
+
+"But my merriment did not seem to strike an answering note in Lucien.
+He turned from me in silence, and with an offended expression took his
+hat and his proofs, and--humorist and skeptic as he was ordinarily, he
+parted from me with the words, uttered in a theatrical tone:
+
+"'There are more things in heaven and earth than are dreamed of in thy
+philosophy.'
+
+"He turned on his heel and left the room.
+
+"To be candid, I was unpleasantly affected by the little scene. I
+could not for an instant doubt Lucien's honesty,--he was so pale, so
+frightened almost--so touching in the alarm and excitement of his
+soul. Of course the only explanation that I could see was that he had
+written his novel in a sleep-walking state.
+
+"For certainly no printer could set up type from a manuscript that did
+not exist,--to say nothing of printing it and sending out proofs.
+
+"Several days passed, but Lucien did not come near me. I went to his
+place once or twice, but the door was locked. Had the devil carried
+him off bodily? Or had this strange and inexplicable occurrence robbed
+him of his sanity, and robbed me of his friendship and his excellent
+whisky?
+
+"After three useless attempts to find him at home, and after writing
+him a letter which he did not answer, I gave up Lucien without any
+further attempt to understand his enigmatical behavior. A short time
+after, I left for my home without having seen or heard anything more
+of him.
+
+"Months passed. I remained at home, and one evening when, during the
+course of a gay party, the conversation came around to the subject of
+mysticism and occult occurrences, I dished up my story of the
+enigmatical manuscript. The Unknown, the Occult, was the rage just
+then, and my story was received with great applause and called forth
+numerous quotations as to 'more things in heaven and earth.' I came to
+think so much of it myself that I wrote it out and sent it to
+Professor Flammarion, who was just then making a study of the Unknown,
+which he preserved in his later book 'L'Inconnu.'
+
+"The occupying myself with the story brought my mind around again to
+memories of Lucien. One day, I saw a notice in _Le Figaro_ to the
+effect that his book, 'The Force of the Wind,' had appeared in a
+second large edition, and had aroused much attention, particularly in
+spiritualistic circles. I seemed to see him again before me, with his
+long nervous neck, which was so expressive. The vision of this neck
+rose up before me whenever I drank the same sort of whisky that I had
+drunk so often with him, and the longing to hear something more of my
+lost friend came over me. I sat down one evening when in a sentimental
+mood, and wrote to him, asking him to tell me something of himself and
+to send me his book.
+
+"A week later I received the little book and the following letter
+which I have here in my pocket. It is somewhat crumpled, for I have
+read it several times. But no matter. I will read it to you now, if
+you will pardon my awkward translating of the French original.
+
+"Here it is:
+
+"DEAR FRIEND:
+
+"Many thanks for your letter. Here is the book. I have to thank you
+also that you did not lay my behavior of your last days in Paris up
+against me. It must have seemed strange to you. I will try to explain
+it.
+
+"I have been nervous from childhood. The fact that most of my books
+have treated of fantastic subjects,--somewhat in the manner of Edgar
+Allan Poe--has made me more susceptible for all that world which lies
+beyond and about the world of every-day life. I have sought
+after,--and yet feared--the mystical; cool and lucid as I can be at
+times, I have always had an inclination for the enigmatical, the
+Unknown.
+
+"But the first thing that ever happened in my life that I could not
+explain or understand was the affair of the manuscript. You remember
+the day I stood in your room? I must have looked the picture of
+misery. The affair had played more havoc with my nerves than you can
+very well understand. Your mockery hurt me, and yet under all I felt
+ashamed of my own thoughts concerning this foolish occurrence. I could
+not explain the phenomenon, and I shivered at the things that it
+suggested to me. In this condition, which lasted several weeks, I
+could not bear to see you or anyone else, and I was impolite enough
+even to leave your letter unanswered.
+
+"The book appeared and made a hit, since that sort of thing was the
+center of interest just then. But almost a month passed before I could
+arouse myself from that condition of fear and--I had almost said,
+softening of the brain--which prevented my enjoyment of my success.
+
+"Then the explanation came. Thanks to this occurrence I know now that
+I shall never again be in danger of being 'haunted.'
+
+"And I know now that Chance can bring about stranger happenings than
+can any fancied visitations from the spirit world. Here you have the
+story of this 'mystic' occurrence, which came near endangering my
+sanity, and which turns out to be a chance combination of a gust of
+wind, a sudden downpour of rain, and the strange elements in the
+character of our little friend Adolphe the printer's boy.
+
+"You remember that funny little chap with the crafty eye, his talent
+for gambling, and his admiration for the girl of 'La Prunelle'? A
+queer little mixture this child who has himself alone to look to for
+livelihood and care, the typical race of the Paris streets, the
+modified gamin from 'Les Miserables.'
+
+"About a month after the appearance of my book I lay on the divan one
+day,--your favorite place, you remember?--and lost myself in idle
+reasonings on the same old subject that never left my mind day or
+night, when the bell rang and Adolphe appeared, to call for the essay
+on 'Le Boulevarde.' There was an unusually nervous gleam in his eyes
+that day. I gave him an anisette and tried to find out what his
+trouble was. I did find it out, and I found out a good deal more
+besides.
+
+"Thanks to his good fortune as a gambler, Virginie came to look upon
+him with favor. Pierre was quite out of the race and Adolphe's
+affection was reciprocated as much as his heart could desire. But with
+his good fortune in love came all the suffering, all the torture, the
+suspicions that tear the hearts of us men when we set our hopes upon a
+woman's truth. Young as he was he went through them all, and now he
+was torturing himself with the thought that she did not really love
+him and was only pretending, while she gave her heart to another.
+Perhaps he was right--why not?
+
+"I talked to Adolphe as man to man, and managed to bring back a gleam
+of his usual jollity and sly humor. He took another glass of anisette,
+and said suddenly:
+
+"'M. Lucien--I did something----'
+
+"'Did what?' I asked.
+
+"'Something I should have told you long ago--it was wrong, and you've
+always been so nice to me----'
+
+"You remember the day, two months ago, when we had such a sudden wind
+and rain storm, a regular cloud-burst? I was down here in this
+neighborhood fetching manuscripts from M. Labouchere and M. Laroy. I
+was to have come up here for copy from you, too. But then--you'll
+understand after all I've been telling you,--I came around past 'La
+Prunelle' and Virginie stood in the doorway, and she'd promised to go
+out with me that evening. So I ran up to speak to her. And then when I
+went on again, I saw a sheet with your writing lying in the street.
+You know I know all the gentlemen's writing, whose copy I fetch. Then
+I was frightened. I thought to myself, 'The devil,' I thought, 'here
+I've lost M. Lucien's manuscript.' I couldn't remember calling for it,
+but I thought I must have done so before I got M. Laroy's. I can't
+remember much except Virginie these days. I took up the sheet and saw
+three others a little further on. And I saw a lot more shining just
+behind the railing of the Luxembourg Garden. You know how hard it
+rained. The water held the paper down, so the wind couldn't carry it
+any further. I ran into the Garden and picked up all the sheets,
+thirty-two of them. All of them, except the first four I found in the
+street, had blown in behind the railing. And I can tell you I was
+precious glad that I had them all together. I ran back to the office,
+told them I had dropped the manuscript in the street, but asked them
+not to say anything to you about it. But the sheets were all
+there,--you always number them so clearly, and 'handsome August,' the
+compositor, promised he wouldn't tell on me. I knew if the foreman
+heard of it, he'd put me out, for he had a grudge against me. So
+nobody knew anything about it. But I thought I ought to tell you,
+'cause you've been so nice to me. Maybe you'll understand how one gets
+queer at times, when a girl like Virginie tells you she likes you
+better than Pierre, and yet you think she might deceive you for his
+sake--that big, stupid animal--But now I'll be going. Much obliged for
+your kindness, M. Lucien, and for the anisette--' And he left me.
+
+"There you have the explanation, the very simple and natural
+explanation of the phenomenon that almost drove me crazy.
+
+"The entire 'supernatural' occurrence was caused by a careless boy's
+love affairs, by a gust of southwest wind, by a sudden heavy rain, and
+by the chance that I had used English ink, the kind that water cannot
+blur. All these simple natural things made me act so foolishly toward
+a good friend, the sort of friend I have always known you to be. Let
+me hear from you, and tell me what you people up North think of my
+book. I give you my word that the 'Unknown Powers' shall never again
+make me foolish enough to risk losing your friendship!
+
+"Yours
+
+"LUCIEN."
+
+"So this is my story. Yes, 'there are more things in heaven and
+earth--' But the workings of Chance are the strangest of all. And this
+whisky is really very good. Here's to you."
+
+
+
+BERNHARD SEVERIN INGEMANN
+
+
+_THE SEALED ROOM_
+
+
+For many years there stood in a side street in Kiel an unpretentious
+old frame house which had a forbidding, almost sinister appearance,
+with its old-fashioned balcony and its overhanging upper stories. For
+the last twenty years the house had been occupied by a greatly
+respected widow, Madame Wolff, to whom the dwelling had come by
+inheritance. She lived there quietly with her one daughter, in
+somewhat straitened circumstances.
+
+What gave the house a mysterious notoriety, augmenting the sinister
+quality in its appearance, was the fact that one of its rooms, a
+corner room on the main floor, had not been opened for generations.
+The door was firmly fastened and sealed with plaster, as well as the
+window looking out upon the street. Above the door was an old
+inscription, dated 1603, which threatened sudden death and eternal
+damnation to any human being who dared to open the door or efface the
+inscription. Neither door nor window had been opened in the two
+hundred years that had passed since the inscription was put up. But
+for a generation back or more, the partition wall and the sealed door
+had been covered with wall paper, and the inscription had been almost
+forgotten.
+
+The room adjoining the sealed chamber was a large hall, utilized only
+for rare important events. Such an occasion arose with the wedding of
+the only daughter of the house. For that evening the great hall, as it
+was called, was brilliantly decorated and illuminated for a ball. The
+building had deep cellars and the old floors were elastic. Madame
+Wolff had in vain endeavored to avoid using the great hall at all, for
+the foolish old legend of the sealed chamber aroused a certain
+superstitious dread in her heart, and she rarely if ever entered the
+hall herself. But merry Miss Elizabeth, her pretty young daughter, was
+passionately fond of dancing, and her mother had promised that she
+should have a ball on her wedding day. Her betrothed, Secretary
+Winther, was also a good dancer, and the two young people combated the
+mother's prejudice against the hall and laughed at her fear of the
+sealed room. They thought it would be wiser to appear to ignore the
+stupid legend altogether, and thus to force the world to forget it. In
+spite of secret misgivings Madame Wolff yielded to their arguments.
+And for the first time in many years the merry strains of dance music
+were heard in the great hall that lay next the mysterious sealed
+chamber.
+
+The bridal couple, as well as the wedding guests, were in the gayest
+mood, and the ball was an undoubted success. The dancing was
+interrupted for an hour while supper was served in an adjoining room.
+After the repast the guests returned to the hall, and it was several
+hours more before the last dance was called. The season was early
+autumn and the weather still balmy. The windows had been opened to
+freshen the air. But the walls retained their dampness and suddenly
+the dancers noticed that the old wall paper which covered the
+partition wall between the hall and the sealed chamber had been
+loosened through the jarring of the building, and had fallen away from
+the sealed door with its mysterious inscription.
+
+The story of the sealed chamber had been almost forgotten by most of
+those present, forgotten with many other old legends heard in
+childhood. The inscription thus suddenly revealed naturally aroused
+great interest, and there was a general curiosity to know what the
+mysterious closed room might hide. Conjectures flew from mouth to
+mouth. Some insisted that the closed door must hide the traces of a
+hideous murder, or some other equally terrible crime. Others suggested
+that perhaps the room had been used as a hiding place for garments and
+other articles belonging to some person who had died of a pestilence,
+and that the room had been sealed for fear of spreading the disease.
+Still others thought that in the sealed chamber there might be found a
+secret entrance from the cellars, which had made the room available as
+a hiding place for robbers or smugglers. The guests had quite
+forgotten their dancing in the interest awakened by the sight of the
+mysterious door.
+
+"For mercy's sake, don't let's go too near it!" exclaimed some of the
+young ladies. But the majority thought it would be great fun to see
+what was hidden there. Most of the men said that they considered it
+foolish not to have opened the door long ago, and examined the room.
+The young bridegroom did not join in this opinion, however. He upheld
+the decision of his mother-in-law not to allow any attempt to effect
+an entrance into the room. He knew that there was a clause in the
+title deeds to the house which made the express stipulation that no
+owner should ever permit the corner room to be opened. There was
+discussion among the guests as to whether such a clause in a title
+deed could be binding for several hundred years, and many doubted its
+validity at any time. But most of them understood why Madame Wolff did
+not wish any investigation, even should any of those present have
+sufficient courage to dare the curse and break open the door.
+
+"Nonsense! What great courage is necessary for that?" exclaimed
+Lieutenant Flemming Wolff, a cousin of the bride of the evening. This
+gentleman had a reputation that was not of the best. He was known to
+live mostly on debt and pawn tickets, and was of a most quarrelsome
+disposition. As a duelist he was feared because of his specialty. This
+was the ability, and the inclination, through a trick in the use of
+the foils, to disfigure his opponent's face badly, without at all
+endangering his life. In this manner he had already sadly mutilated
+several brave officers and students, who had had the bad luck to stand
+up against him. He himself was anything but pleasant to look upon, his
+natural plainness having been rendering repellent by a life of low
+debauchery. He cherished a secret grudge against the bridegroom and
+bitter feelings toward the bride, because the latter had so plainly
+shown her aversion for him when he had ventured to pay suit to her.
+
+The family had not desired any open break with this disagreeable
+relative, and had therefore sent him an invitation to the wedding.
+They had taken it for granted that, under the circumstances, he would
+prefer to stay away. But he had appeared at the ball, and, perhaps to
+conceal his resentment, he had been the most indefatigable dancer of
+the evening. At supper he had partaken freely of the strongest wines,
+and was plainly showing the effect of them by this time. His eyes
+rolled wildly, and those who knew him took care not to contradict him,
+or to have anything to say to him at all.
+
+With a boastful laugh he repeated his assertion that it didn't take
+much courage to open a sealed door, especially when there might be a
+fortune concealed behind it. In his opinion it was cowardly to let
+oneself be frightened by a century-old legend. _He_ wouldn't let that
+bother him if _he_ had influence enough in the family to win the
+daughter and induce the mother to give a ball in the haunted hall.
+With this last hit he hoped to arouse the young husband's ire. But the
+latter merely shrugged his shoulders and turned away with a smile of
+contempt.
+
+Lieutenant Wolff fired up at this, and demanded to know whether the
+other intended to call his, the lieutenant's, courage into question by
+his behavior.
+
+"Not in the slightest, when it is a matter of obtaining a loan, or of
+mutilating an adversary with a trick at fencing," answered the
+bridegroom angrily, taking care, however, that neither the bride nor
+any of the other ladies should hear his words. Then he continued in a
+whisper: "But I don't believe you'd have the courage to remain here
+alone and in darkness, before this closed door, for a single hour. If
+you wish to challenge me for this doubt, I am at your disposal as soon
+as you have proven me in the wrong. But I choose the weapons."
+
+"They must be chosen by lot, sir cousin," replied the lieutenant, his
+cheek pale and his jaws set. "I will expect you to breakfast to-morrow
+morning at eight o'clock."
+
+The bridegroom nodded, and took the other's cold dry hand for an
+instant. The men who had overheard the short conversation looked upon
+it as a meaningless incident, the memory of which would disappear from
+the lieutenant's brain with the vanishing wine fumes.
+
+The ball was now over. The bride left the hall with her husband and
+several of the guests who were to accompany the young couple to their
+new home. The lights went out in the old house. The door of the
+dancing hall had been locked from the outside. Lieutenant Flemming
+Wolff remained alone in the room, having hidden himself in a dark
+corner where he had not been seen by the servants, who had
+extinguished the lights and locked the door. The night watchman had
+just called out two o'clock when the solitary guest found himself,
+still giddy from the heavy wine, alone in the great dark hall in front
+of the mysterious door.
+
+The windows were at only a slight elevation from the street, and a
+spring would take him to safety should his desire to remain there, or
+to solve the mystery of the sealed room, vanish. But next morning all
+the windows in the great hall were found closed, just as the servants
+had left them the night before. The night watchman reported that he
+had heard a hollow-sounding crash in that unoccupied part of the house
+during the night. But that was nothing unusual, as there was a general
+belief in the neighborhood that the house was haunted.
+
+For hollow noises were often heard there, and sounds as of money
+falling on the floor, and rattling and clinking as of a factory
+machine. Enlightened people, it is true, explained these sounds as
+echoes of the stamping and other natural noises from a large stable
+just behind the old house. But in spite of these explanations and
+their eminent feasibility, the dread of the unoccupied portion of the
+house was so great that not even the most reckless man servant could
+be persuaded to enter it alone after nightfall.
+
+Next morning at eight o'clock Winther appeared at his mother-in-law's
+door, saying that he had forgotten something of importance in the
+great hall the night before. Madame Wolff had not yet arisen, but the
+maid who let in the early visitor noticed with surprise that he had a
+large pistol sticking out of one of his pockets.
+
+Winther had been to his cousin's apartment and found it locked. He now
+entered the great hall, and at first glance thought it empty. To his
+alarm and astonishment, however, he saw that the sealed door had been
+broken open. He approached it with anxiety, and found his wife's
+cousin, the doughty duelist, lying pale and lifeless on the threshold.
+Beside him lay a large stone which had struck his head in falling and
+must have killed him at once. Over the door was a hole in the wall,
+just the size of the stone. The latter had evidently rested on the
+upper edge of the door, and must certainly have fallen on its opening.
+The unfortunate man lay half in the mysterious chamber and half in the
+hall, just as he must have fallen when the stone struck him.
+
+The formal investigation of the closed room was made in the presence
+of the police authorities. It contained nothing but a small safe which
+was built into the wall. When the safe had been opened by force, an
+inner chamber, which had to be broken open by itself, was found to
+contain a number of rolls of gold pieces, many jewels and numerous
+notes and I.O.U.'s. The treasure was covered by an old document. From
+this latter it was learned that the owner of the house two hundred
+years ago had been a silk weaver by the name of Flemming Ambrosius
+Wolff. He was said to have lent money on security for many years, but
+had died apparently a poor man, because he had so carefully hidden his
+riches that little of it was found after his death.
+
+With a niggardliness that bordered on madness, he had believed that he
+could hide his treasure forever by shutting it up in the sealed room.
+The curse over the door was to frighten away any venturesome mortal,
+and further security was given by the clause in the title deed.
+
+The universally disliked Lieutenant Flamming Wolff must have had many
+characteristics in common with this disagreeable old ancestor, to
+whose treasure he would have fallen heir had he not lost his life in
+the discovering of it. The old miser had not hidden his wealth for all
+eternity, as he had hoped, but had only brought about the inheriting
+of it by Madame Wolff, the owner of the house, and the next of kin.
+The first use to which this lady put the money was to tear down the
+uncanny old building and to erect in its stead a beautiful new home
+for her daughter and son-in-law.
+
+
+
+STEEN STEENSEN BLICHER
+
+
+_THE RECTOR OF VEILBYE_
+
+
+These extracts from the diary of Erik Sorensen, District Judge,
+followed by two written statements by the rector of Aalsoe, give a
+complete picture of the terrible events that took place in the parish
+of Veilbye during Judge Sorensen's first year of office. Should anyone
+be inclined to doubt the authenticity of these documents let him at
+least have no doubt about the story, which is, alas! only too sadly
+true. The memory of these events is still fresh in the district, and
+the events themselves have been the direct cause of a change in the
+method of criminal trials. A suspected murderer is now tried through
+all the courts before his conviction can be determined. Readers versed
+in the history of law will doubtless know by this during what epoch
+the story is laid.
+
+
+
+I
+
+[_From the Diary of District Judge Erik Soerensen_.]
+
+
+Now am I, unworthy one, by the grace of God made judge over this
+district. May the Great Judge above give me wisdom and uprightness
+that I may fulfill my difficult task in all humility! From the Lord
+alone cometh judgment.
+
+It is not good that man should live alone. Now that I am able to
+support a wife I will look about me for a help-meet. I hear much good
+said about the daughter of the Rector of Veilbye. Since her mother's
+death she has been a wise and economical keeper of her father's house.
+And as she and her brother the student are the only children, she will
+inherit a tidy sum when the old man dies.
+
+Morten Bruus of Ingvorstrup was here to-day and wanted to make me a
+present of a fat calf. But I answered him in the words of Moses,
+"Cursed be he who taketh gifts." He is of a very quarrelsome nature, a
+sharp bargainer, and a boastful talker. I do not want to have any
+dealings with him, except through my office as judge.
+
+I have prayed to God for wisdom and I have consulted with my own
+heart, and I believe that Mistress Mette Quist is the only woman with
+whom I could live and die. But I will watch her for a time in secret.
+Beauty is deceptive and charm is a dangerous thing. But I must say
+that she is the most beautiful woman I have yet seen.
+
+I think that Morten Bruus a very disagreeable person--I scarcely know
+why myself. But whenever I see him something comes over me, something
+that is like the memory of an evil dream. And yet it is so vague and
+so faint, that I could not say whether I had really ever seen the man
+in my dreams or not. It may be a sort of presentiment of evil; who
+knows?
+
+He was here again and offered me a pair of horses--beautiful
+animals--at a ridiculously low price. It looked queer to me. I know
+that he paid seventy thalers for them, and he wanted to let me have
+them for the same price. They are at the least worth one hundred
+thalers, if not more. Was it intended for a bribe? He may have another
+lawsuit pending. I do not want his horses.
+
+I paid a visit to the Rector of Veilbye to-day. He is a fine,
+God-fearing man, but somewhat quick-tempered and dictatorial. And he
+is close with his money, too, as I could see. Just as I arrived a
+peasant was with him trying to be let off the payment of part of his
+tithe. The man is surely a rogue, for the sum is not large. But the
+rector talked to him as I wouldn't have talked to a dog, and the more
+he talked the more violent he became.
+
+Well, we all have our faults. The rector meant well in spite of his
+violence, for later on he told his daughter to give the man a sandwich
+and a good glass of beer. She is certainly a charming and sensible
+girl. She greeted me in a modest and friendly manner, and my heart
+beat so that I could scarcely say a word in reply. My head farm hand
+served in the rectory three years. I will question him,--one often
+hears a straight and true statement from servants.
+
+A surprise! My farm hand Rasmus tells me that Morten Bruus came
+a-wooing to the rectory at Veilbye some years back, but was sent away
+with a refusal. The rector seemed to be pleased with him, for the man
+is rich. But his daughter would not hear to it at all. Pastor Soeren
+may have tried hard to persuade her to consent at first. But when he
+saw how much she disliked the man he let her do as she would. It was
+not pride on her part, Rasmus said, for she is as simple and modest as
+she is good and beautiful. And she knows that her own father is
+peasant-born as well as Bruus.
+
+Now I know what the Ingvorstrup horses were intended for. They were to
+blind the judge and to lead him aside from the narrow path of
+righteousness. The rich Morten Bruus covets poor Ole Andersen's peat
+moor and pasture land. It would have been a good bargain for Morten
+even at seventy thalers. But no indeed, my good fellow, you don't know
+Erik Soerensen!
+
+Rector Soeren Quist of Veilbye came to see me this morning. He has a
+new coachman, Niels Bruus, brother to the owner of Ingvorstrup. Niels
+is lazy and impertinent. The rector wanted him arrested, but he had no
+witnesses to back up his complaint. I advised him to get rid of the
+man somehow, or else to get along with him the best he could until the
+latter's time was up. The rector was somewhat hasty at first, but
+later on he listened calmly and thanked me for my good advice. He is
+inclined to be violent at times, but can always be brought to listen
+to reason. We parted good friends.
+
+I spent a charming day in Veilbye yesterday. The rector was not at
+home, but Mistress Mette received me with great friendliness. She sat
+by the door spinning when I arrived, and it seemed to me that she
+blushed. It was hardly polite for me to wait so long before speaking.
+When I sit in judgement I never lack for words, but in the presence of
+this innocent maiden I am as stupid as the veriest simpleton of a
+chicken thief. But I finally found my voice and the time passed
+quickly until the rector's return. Then Mistress Mette left us and did
+not return until she brought in our supper.
+
+Just as she stepped through the doorway the rector was saying to me,
+"Isn't it about time that you should think of entering into the holy
+estate of matrimony?" (We had just been speaking of a recent very fine
+wedding in the neighborhood.) Mistress Mette heard the words and
+flushed a deep red. Her father laughed and said to her, "I can see, my
+dear daughter, that you have been standing before the fire."
+
+I shall take the good man's advice and will very soon try my fate with
+her. For I think I may take the rector's words to be a secret hint
+that he would not object to me as a son-in-law. And the daughter? Was
+her blush a favorable sign?
+
+Poor Ole Anderson keeps his peat moor and his pasture land, but rich
+Morten Bruus is angry at me because of it. When he heard the decision
+he closed his eyes and set his lips tight, and his face was as pale as
+a whitewashed wall. But he controlled himself and as he went out he
+called back to his adversary, "Wish you joy of the bargain Ole
+Anderson. The peat bog won't beggar me, and the cattle at Ingvorstrup
+have all the hay they can eat." I could hear his loud laughter outside
+and the cracking of his whip. It is not easy to have to sit in
+judgment. Every decision makes but one enemy the more.
+
+Yesterday was the happiest day of my life. We celebrated our betrothal
+in the Rectory of Veilbye. My future father-in-law spoke to the text,
+"I gave my handmaid into thy bosom" (Genesis xvi, 5). His words
+touched my heart. I had not believed that this serious and sometimes
+brusque man could talk so sweetly. When the solemnity was over, I
+received the first kiss from my sweet betrothed, and the assurance of
+her great love for me.
+
+At supper and later on we were very merry. Many of the dead mother's
+kin were present. The rector's family were too far away. After supper
+we danced until day-break and there was no expense spared in the food
+and wine. My future father-in-law was the strongest man present, and
+could easily drink all the others under the table. The wedding is to
+take place in six weeks. God grant us rich blessings.
+
+It is not good that my future father-in-law should have this Niels
+Bruus in his service. He is a defiant fellow, a worthy brother of him
+of Ingvorstrup. If it were I, he should have his wages and be turned
+off, the sooner the better. But the good rector is stubborn and
+insists that Niels shall serve out his time. The other day he gave the
+fellow a box on the ear, at which Niels cried out that he would make
+him pay for it. The rector told me of this himself, for no one else
+had been present. I talked to Niels, but he would scarcely answer me.
+I fear he has a stubborn and evil nature. My sweet betrothed also
+entreats her father to send the fellow away, but the rector will not
+listen to reason. I do not know what the old man will do when his
+daughter leaves his home for mine. She saves him much worry and knows
+how to make all things smooth and easy. She will be a sweet wife for
+me.
+
+As I thought, it turned out badly. But there is one good thing about
+it, Niels has now run off of himself. The rector is greatly angered,
+but I rejoice in secret that he is rid of that dangerous man. Bruus
+will probably seek retaliation, but we have law and justice in the
+land to order such matters.
+
+This was the way of it: The rector had ordered Niels to dig up a bit
+of soil in the garden. After a time when he went out himself to look
+at the work, he found Niels leaning on his spade eating nuts. He had
+not even begun to dig. The rector scolded him, but the fellow answered
+that he had not taken service as a gardener. He received a good box on
+the ear for that. At this he threw away his spade and swore valiantly
+at his master. The old rector lost his temper entirely, seized the
+spade and struck at the man several times. He should not have done
+this, for a spade is a dangerous weapon, especially in the hands of a
+man as strong as is the pastor in spite of his years. Niels fell to
+the ground as if dead. But when the pastor bent over him in alarm, he
+sprang up suddenly, jumped the hedge and ran away to the woods.
+
+This is the story of the unfortunate affair as my father-in-law tells
+it to me. My beloved Mette is much worried about it. She fears the man
+may do harm to the cattle, or set fire to the house, or in some such
+way take his revenge. But I tell her there is little fear of that.
+
+Three weeks more and my beloved leaves her father's house for mine.
+She has been here and has gone over the house and the farm. She is
+much pleased with everything and praises our orderliness. She is an
+angel, and all who know her say that I am indeed a fortunate man. To
+God be the praise!
+
+Strange, where that fellow Niels went to! Could he have left the
+country altogether? It is an unpleasant affair in any case, and there
+are murmurings and secret gossip among the peasants. The talk has
+doubtless started in Ingvorstrup. It would not be well to have the
+rector hear it. He had better have taken my advice, but it is not my
+province to school a servant of God, and a man so much older than I.
+The idle gossip may blow over ere long. I will go to Veilbye to-morrow
+and find out if he has heard anything.
+
+The bracelet the goldsmith has made for me is very beautiful. I am
+sure it will please my sweet Mette.
+
+My honored father-in-law is much distressed and down-hearted.
+Malicious tongues have repeated to him the stupid gossip that is going
+about in the district. Morten Bruus is reported to have said that "he
+would force the rector to bring back his brother, if he had to dig him
+out of the earth." The fellow may be in hiding somewhere, possibly at
+Ingvorstrup. He has certainly disappeared completely, and no one seems
+to know where he is. My poor betrothed is much grieved and worried.
+She is alarmed by bad dreams and by presentiments of evil to come.
+
+God have mercy on us all! I am so overcome by shock and horror that I
+can scarcely hold the pen. It has all come in one terrible moment,
+like a clap of thunder. I take no account of time, night and morning
+are the same to me and the day is but a sudden flash of lightning
+destroying the proud castle of my hopes and desires. A venerable man
+of God--the father of my betrothed--is in prison! And as a suspected
+murderer! There is still hope that he may be innocent. But this hope
+is but as a straw to a drowning man. A terrible suspicion rests upon
+him----And I, unhappy man that I am, must be his judge. And his
+daughter is my betrothed bride! May the Saviour have pity on us!
+
+It was yesterday that this horrible thing came. About half an hour
+before sunrise Morten Bruus came to my house and had with him the
+cotter Jens Larsen of Veilbye, and the widow and daughter of the
+shepherd of that parish. Morten Bruus said to me that he had the
+Rector of Veilbye under suspicion of having killed his brother Niels.
+I answered that I had heard some such talk but had regarded it as idle
+and malicious gossip, for the rector himself had assured me that the
+fellow had run away. "If that was so," said Morten, "if Niels had
+really intended to run away, he would surely at first come to me to
+tell me of it. But it is not so, as these good people can prove to
+you, and I demand that you shall hear them as an officer of the law."
+
+"Think well of what you are doing," I said. "Think it over well,
+Morten Bruus, and you, my good people. You are bringing a terrible
+accusation against a respected and unspotted priest and man of God. If
+you can prove nothing, as I strongly suspect, your accusations may
+cost you dear."
+
+"Priest or no priest," cried Bruus, "it is written, 'thou shalt not
+kill!' And also is it written, that the authorities bear the sword of
+justice for all men. We have law and order in the land, and the
+murderer shall not escape his punishment, even if he have the district
+judge for a son-in-law."
+
+I pretended not to notice his thrust and began, "It shall be as you
+say. Kirsten Mads' daughter, what is it that you know of this matter
+in which Morten Bruus accuses your rector? Tell the truth, and the
+truth only, as you would tell it before the judgment seat of the
+Almighty. The law will demand from you that you shall later repeat
+your testimony under oath."
+
+The woman told the following story: The day on which Niels Bruus was
+said to have run away from the rectory, she and her daughter were
+passing along the road near the rectory garden a little after the noon
+hour. She heard some one calling and saw that it was Niels Bruus
+looking out through the garden hedge. He asked the daughter if she did
+not want some nuts and told the women that the rector had ordered him
+to dig in the garden, but that he did not take the command very
+seriously and would much rather eat nuts. At that moment they heard a
+door open in the house and Niels said, "Now I'm in for a scolding." He
+dropped back behind the hedge and the women heard a quarrel in the
+garden. They could hear the words distinctly but they could see
+nothing, as the hedge was too high. They heard the rector cry, "I'll
+punish you, you dog. I'll strike you dead at my feet!" Then they heard
+several sounding slaps, and they heard Niels curse back at the rector
+and call him evil names. The rector did not answer this, but the women
+heard two dull blows and saw the head of a spade and part of the
+handle rise and fall twice over the hedge. Then it was very quiet in
+the garden, and the widow and her daughter were frightened and hurried
+on to their cattle in the field. The daughter gave the same testimony,
+word for word. I asked them if they had not seen Niels Bruus coming
+out of the garden. But they said they had not, although they had
+turned back several times to look.
+
+This accorded perfectly with what the rector had told me. It was not
+strange that the women had not seen the man run out of the garden, for
+he had gone toward the wood which is on the opposite side of the
+garden from the highroad. I told Morten Bruus that this testimony was
+no proof of the supposed murder, especially as the rector himself had
+narrated the entire occurrence to me exactly as the women had
+described it. But he smiled bitterly and asked me to examine the third
+witness, which I proceeded to do.
+
+Jens Larsen testified that he was returning late one evening from
+Tolstrup (as he remembered, it was not the evening of Niels Bruus's
+disappearance, but the evening of the following day), and was passing
+the rectory garden on the easterly side by the usual footpath. From
+the garden he heard a noise as of some one digging in the earth. He
+was frightened at first for it was very late, but the moon shone
+brightly and he thought he would see who it was that was at work in
+the garden at that hour. He put off his wooden shoes and pushed aside
+the twigs of the hedge until he had made a peep hole. In the garden he
+saw the rector in his usual house coat, a white woolen nightcap on his
+head. He was busily smoothing down the earth with the flat of his
+spade. There was nothing else to be seen. Just then the rector had
+started and partly turned toward the hedge, and the witness, fearing
+he might be discovered, slipped down and ran home hastily.
+
+Although I was rather surprised that the rector should be working in
+his garden at so late an hour, I still saw nothing in this statement
+that could arouse suspicion of murder. I gave the complainant a solemn
+warning and advised him not only to let fall his accusation, but to
+put an end to the talk in the parish. He replied, "Not until I see
+what it is that the rector buried in his garden."
+
+"That will be too late," I said. "You are playing a dangerous game.
+Dangerous to your own honor and welfare."
+
+"I owe it to my brother," he replied, "and I demand that the
+authorities shall not refuse me assistance."
+
+My office compelled me to accede to his demands. Accompanied by the
+accuser and his witnesses I took my way to Veilbye. My heart was very
+heavy, not so much because of any fear that we might find the missing
+man buried in the garden, but because of the surprise and distress I
+must cause the rector and my beloved. As we went on our way I thought
+over how severely the law would allow me to punish the calumniators.
+But alas, Merciful Heavens! What a terrible discovery was in store for
+me!
+
+I had wished to have a moment alone with the rector to prepare him for
+what was coming. But as I drove through the gate Morten Bruus spurred
+his horse past me and galloped up to the very door of the house just
+as the rector opened it. Bruus cried out in his very face, "People say
+that you have killed my brother and buried him in your garden. I am
+come with the district judge to seek for him."
+
+The poor rector was so shocked and astounded that he could not find a
+word to answer. I sprang from my wagon and addressed him: "You have
+now heard the accusation. I am forced by my office to fulfill this
+man's demands. But your own honor demands that the truth shall be
+known and the mouth of slander silenced."
+
+"It is hard enough," began the rector finally, "for a man in my
+position to have to clear himself from such a suspicion. But come with
+me. My garden and my entire house are open to you."
+
+We went through the house to the garden. On the way we met my
+betrothed, who was startled at seeing Bruus. I managed to whisper
+hastily to her, "Do not be alarmed, dear heart. Your enemies are going
+to their own destruction." Morten Bruus led the way to the eastern
+side of the garden near the hedge. We others followed with the
+rector's farm hands, whom he himself had ordered to join us with
+spades.
+
+The accuser stood and looked about him until we approached. Then he
+pointed to one spot. "This looks as if the earth had been disturbed
+lately. Let us begin here."
+
+"Go to work at once," commanded the rector angrily.
+
+The men set to work, but they were not eager enough to suit Bruus, who
+seized a spade himself to fire them on. A few strokes only sufficed to
+show that the firm earth of this particular spot had not been touched
+for many years. We all rejoiced--except Bruus--and the rector was very
+happy. He triumphed openly over his accuser, and laughed at him,
+"Can't you find anything, you libeler?"
+
+Bruus did not answer. He pondered for a few moments, then called out,
+"Jens Larsen, where was it you saw the rector digging?"
+
+Jens Larsen had been standing to one side with his hands folded,
+watching the work. At Bruus's words he aroused himself as if from a
+dream, looked around him and pointed to a corner of the garden several
+yards from where we stood. "I think it was over there."
+
+"What's that, Jens!" cried the rector angrily. "When did I dig here?"
+
+Paying no heed to his, Morten Bruus called the men to the corner in
+question. The earth here was covered by some withered cabbage stalks,
+broken twigs, and other brush which he pushed aside hurriedly. The
+work began anew.
+
+I stood by the rector talking calmly with him about the punishment we
+could mete out to the dastardly accuser, when one of the men suddenly
+cried out with an oath. We looked toward them; there lay a hat half
+buried in the loose earth. "We have found him," cried Bruus. "That is
+Niels's hat; I would know it anywhere."
+
+My blood seemed turned to ice. All my hopes dashed to the ground.
+"Dig! Dig!" cried the bloodthirsty accuser, working himself with all
+his might. I looked at the rector. He was ghastly pale, staring with
+wide-open eyes at the horrible spot.
+
+Another shot! A hand was stretched up through the earth as if to greet
+the workers. "See there!" screamed Bruus. "He is holding out his hand
+to me. Wait a little, Brother Niels! You will soon be avenged!"
+
+The entire corpse was soon uncovered. It was the missing man. His face
+was not recognizable, as decomposition had begun, and the nose was
+broken and laid flat by a blow. But all the garments, even to the
+shirt with his name woven into it, were known to those who stood
+there. In one ear was a leaden ring, which, as we all knew, Niels
+Bruus had worn for many years.
+
+"Now, priest," cried Morten Bruus, "come and lay your hand on this
+dead man if you dare to!"
+
+"Almighty God!" sighed the rector, looking up to heaven, "Thou art my
+witness that I am innocent. I struck him, that I confess, and I am
+bitterly sorry for it. But he ran away. God Almighty alone knows who
+buried him here."
+
+"Jens Larsen knows also," cried Bruus, "and I may find more witnesses.
+Judge! You will come with me to examine his servants. But first of all
+I demand that you shall arrest this wolf in sheep's clothing."
+
+Merciful God, how could I doubt any longer? The truth was clear to all
+of us. But I was ready to sink into the earth in my shock and horror.
+I was about to say to the rector that he must prepare to follow me,
+when he himself spoke to me, pale and trembling like an aspen leaf.
+"Appearances are against me," he said, "but this is the work of the
+devil and his angels. There is One above who will bring my innocence
+to light. Come, judge, I will await my fate in fetters. Comfort my
+daughter. Remember that she is your betrothed bride."
+
+He had scarcely uttered the words when I heard a scream and a fall
+behind us. It was my beloved who lay unconscious on the ground. I
+thought at first that she was dead, and God knows I wished that I
+could lie there dead beside her. I raised her in my arms, but her
+father took her from me and carried her into the house. I was called
+to examine the wound on the dead man's head. The cut was not deep, but
+it had evidently fractured the skull, and had plainly been made by a
+blow from a spade or some similar blunt instrument.
+
+Then we all entered the house. My beloved had revived again. She fell
+on my neck and implored me, in the name of God, to help her father in
+his terrible need. She begged me by the memory of our mutual love to
+let her follow him to prison, to which I consented. I myself
+accompanied him to Grenaa, but with a mournful heart. None of us spoke
+a word on the sad journey. I parted from them in deep distress. The
+corpse was laid in a coffin and will be buried decently to-morrow in
+Veilbye churchyard.
+
+To-morrow I must give a formal hearing to the witnesses. God be
+merciful to me, unfortunate man!
+
+Would that I had never obtained this position for which I--fool that I
+am--strove so hard.
+
+As the venerable man of God was brought before me, fettered hand and
+foot, I felt as Pilate must have felt as they brought Christ before
+him. It was to me as if my beloved--God grant her comfort, she lies
+ill in Grenaa--had whispered to me, "Do nothing against that good
+man!"
+
+Oh, if he only were innocent, but I see no hope!
+
+The three first witnesses repeated their testimony under oath, word
+for word. Then came statements by the rector's two farm hands and the
+dairy maid. The men had been in the kitchen on the fatal day, and as
+the windows were open they had heard the quarrel between the rector
+and Niels. As the widow had stated, these men had also heard the
+rector say, "I will strike you dead at my feet!" They further
+testified that the rector was very quick-tempered, and that when
+angered he did not hesitate to strike out with whatever came into his
+hand. He had struck a former hand once with a heavy maul.
+
+The girl testified that on the night Jens Larsen claimed to have seen
+the rector in the garden, she had lain awake and heard the creaking of
+the garden door. When she looked out of the window she had seen the
+rector in his dressing gown and nightcap go into the garden. She could
+not see what he was doing there. But she heard the door creak again
+about an hour later.
+
+When the witnesses had been heard, I asked the unfortunate man whether
+he would make a confession, or else, if he had anything to say in his
+own defense. He crossed his hands over his breast and said, "So help
+me God, I will tell the truth. I have nothing more to say than what I
+have said already. I struck the dead man with my spade. He fell down,
+but jumped up in a moment and ran away from the garden out into the
+woods. What may have happened to him there, or how he came to be
+buried in my garden, this I do not know. When Jens Larsen and my
+servant testify that they saw me at night in the garden, either they
+are lying, or Satan has blinded them. I can see this--unhappy man that
+I am--that I have no one to turn to for help here on earth. Will He
+who is in heaven be silent also, then must I bow to His inscrutable
+will." He bowed his head with a deep sigh.
+
+Some of those present began to weep, and a murmur arose that he might
+possibly be innocent. But this was only the effect of the momentary
+sympathy called out by his attitude. My own heart indeed spoke for
+him. But the judge's heart may not dare to dictate to his brain or to
+his conscience. My conviction forced me to declare that the rector had
+killed Niels Bruus, but certainly without any premeditation or
+intention to do so. It is true that Niels Bruus had often been heard
+to declare that he would "get even with the rector when the latter
+least expected it." But it is not known that he had fulfilled his
+threat in any way. Every man clings to life and honor as long as he
+can. Therefore the rector persists in his denial. My poor, dear Mette!
+She is lost to me for this life at least, just as I had learned to
+love her so dearly.
+
+I have had a hard fight to fight to-day. As I sat alone, pondering
+over this terrible affair in which it is my sad lot to have to give
+judgment, the door opened and the rector's daughter--I may no longer
+call her my betrothed--rushed in and threw herself at my feet. I
+raised her up, clasped her in my arms and we wept together in silence.
+I was first to control myself. "I know what you would say, dear heart.
+You want me to save your father. Alas, God help us poor mortals, I
+cannot do it! Tell me, dearest one, tell me truly, do you yourself
+believe your father to be innocent?"
+
+She crossed her hands on her heart and sobbed, "I do not know!" Then
+she burst into tears again. "But he did not bury him in the garden,"
+she continued after a few moments. "The man may have died in the wood
+from the blow. That may have happened----"
+
+"But, dearest heart," I said, "Jen Larsen and the girl saw your father
+in the garden that night."
+
+She shook her head slowly and answered, "The evil one blinded their
+eyes." She wept bitterly again.
+
+"Tell me, beloved," she began again, after a while, "tell me frankly
+this much. If God sends us no further enlightenment in this
+unfortunate affair, what sentence must you give?"
+
+She gazed anxiously at me, her lips trembling.
+
+"If I did not believe," I began slowly, "that anyone else in my place
+would be more severe than I, then I would gladly give up my position
+at once and refuse to speak the verdict. But I dare not conceal from
+you that the mildest sentence that God, our king, and our laws demand
+is, a life for a life."
+
+She sank to her knees, then sprang up again, fell back several steps
+as if afraid of me, and cried out: "Would you murder my father? Would
+you murder your betrothed bride? See here! See this!" She came nearer
+and held up her hand with my ring on it before my eyes. "Do you see
+this betrothal ring? What was it my father said when you put this ring
+upon my finger? 'I have given my maid unto thy bosom!' But you, you
+thrust the steel deep into my bosom!"
+
+Alas, every one of her words cut deep into my own heart. "Dearest
+love," I cried, "do not speak so. You thrust burning irons into my
+heart. What would you have me do? Acquit him, when the laws of God and
+man condemn?"
+
+She was silent, sobbing desperately.
+
+"One thing I can do," I continued. "If it be wrong may God forgive me.
+If the trial goes on to an end his life is forfeited, there is no hope
+except in flight. If you can arrange an escape I will close my eyes. I
+will not see or hear anything. As soon as your father was imprisoned,
+I wrote to your brother in Copenhagen. He can arrive any moment now.
+Talk to him, make friends with the jailer. If you lack money, all I
+have is yours."
+
+When I had finished her face flushed with joy, and she threw her arms
+about my neck. "God bless you for these words. Were my brother but
+here, he will know what to do. But where shall we go?" her tone
+changed suddenly and her arms dropped. "Even should we find a refuge
+in a foreign country I could never see you again!" Her tone was so sad
+that my heart was near to breaking.
+
+"Beloved," I exclaimed, "I will find you wherever you may hide
+yourself! Should our money not be sufficient to support us I can work
+for us all. I have learned to use the ax and the hoe."
+
+She rejoiced again and kissed me many times. We prayed to God to bless
+our undertaking and parted with glad hearts. I also hoped for the
+best. Doubts assail me, but God will find for us some light in this
+darkness.
+
+Two more new witnesses. They bring nothing good, I fear, for Bruus
+announced them with an expression I did not like. He has a heart of
+stone, which can feel nothing but malice and bitterness. I give them a
+hearing to-morrow. I feel as if they had come to bear witness against
+me myself. May God strengthen my heart.
+
+All is over. He has confessed.
+
+The court was in session and the prisoner had been brought in to hear
+the testimony of the new witnesses. These men stated as follows: On
+the night in question they were walking along the path that led
+between the woods and the rectory garden. A man with a large sack on
+his back came out of the woods and walked ahead of them toward the
+garden. They could not see his face, but in the bright moonlight his
+figure was clearly visible, and they could see that he wore a loose
+green garment, like a dressing gown, and a white nightcap. The man
+disappeared through an opening in the rectory garden fence.
+
+Scarcely had the first witness ended his statement when the rector
+turned ghastly pale, and gasped, in a voice that could scarcely be
+heard, "I am ill." They gave him a chair.
+
+Bruus turned to his neighbor and exclaimed audibly, "That helped the
+rector's memory."
+
+The prisoner did not hear the words, but motioned to me and said,
+"Lead me back to my prison. I will talk to you there." They did as he
+demanded.
+
+We set out at once for Grenaa. The rector was in the wagon with the
+jailer and the gendarme, and I rode beside them.
+
+When the door of the cell was opened my beloved was making up her
+father's bed, and over a chair by the bedside hung the fatal green
+dressing gown. My dear betrothed greeted me with a cry of joy, as she
+believed that I was come to set her father free. She hung about the
+old man's neck, kissing away the tears that rolled unhindered down his
+cheeks. I had not the heart to undeceive her, and I sent her out into
+the town to buy some things for us.
+
+"Sit down, dear friend," said the rector, when we were alone. He
+seated himself on the bed, staring at the ground with eyes that did
+not see. Finally he turned toward me where I sat trembling, as if it
+were my own sentence I was to hear, as in a manner it was. "I am a
+great sinner," he sighed, "God only knows how great. His punishment
+crushes me here that I may enter into His mercy hereafter."
+
+He grew gradually calmer and began:
+
+"Since my childhood I have been hot-tempered and violent. I could
+never endure contradiction, and was always ready to give a blow. But I
+have seldom let the sun go down upon my wrath, and I have never borne
+hatred toward any man. As a half-grown boy I killed our good, kind
+watchdog in one of my fits of rage for some trifling offense, and I
+have never ceased to regret it. Later, as a student in Leipzig, I let
+myself be carried away sufficiently to wound seriously my adversary in
+one of our fencing bouts. A merciful fate alone saved me from becoming
+a murderer then. It is for these earlier sins that I am now being
+punished, but the punishment falls doubly hard, now that I am an old
+man, a priest, a servant of the Lord of Peace, and a father! Ah, that
+is the deepest wound!" He sprang up and wrung his hands in deep
+despair. I would have said something to comfort him, but I could find
+no words for such sorrow.
+
+When he had controlled himself somewhat he sat down again and
+continued: "To you, once my friend and now my judge, I will confess
+this crime, which it seems beyond a doubt that I have committed,
+although I am not conscious cf having done so." (I was startled at
+this, as I had expected a remorseful confession.) "Listen well to what
+I shall now tell you. That I struck the unfortunate man with the
+spade, that he fell down and then ran away, this is all that I know
+with full consciousness.... What followed then? Four witnesses have
+seen that I fetched the body and buried it in my garden--and now at
+last I am forced to believe that it must be true. These are my reasons
+for the belief. Three or four times in my life I have walked in my
+sleep. The last time--it may have been nine or ten years ago--I was to
+have held a funeral service on the following day, over the body of a
+man who had died a sudden and terrible death. I could not find a
+suitable text, until suddenly there came to me the words of an old
+Greek philosopher, 'Call no man fortunate until his death.' It was in
+my mind that the same idea was expressed in different words in the
+Holy Scriptures. I sought and sought, but could not find it. At last I
+went to bed much fatigued, and slept soundly. Next morning, when I sat
+down at my desk, to my great astonishment I saw there a piece of
+paper, on which was written, 'Call no man happy until his end hath
+come' (Sirach xi. 34), and following it was a funeral sermon, short,
+but as good in construction as any I have ever written. And all this
+was in my own handwriting. It was quite out of the question that
+anyone could have entered the room during the night, as I had locked
+it myself, and it had not been opened until I entered next day. I knew
+what had happened, as I could remember one or two such occurrences in
+my life before.
+
+"Therefore, dear friend, when the last witnesses gave their testimony
+to-day, I suddenly remembered my sleep-walking exploits, and I also
+remembered, what had slipped my mind before, that on the morning after
+the night the body was buried I had found my dressing gown in the hall
+outside of my bedroom. This had surprised me, as I always hung it over
+a chair near my bed. The unfortunate victim of my violence must have
+died in the woods from his wound, and in my dream consciousness I must
+have seen this and gone to fetch the body. It must be so. I know no
+other explanation. God have mercy on my sinful soul." He was silent
+again, covering his face with his hands and weeping bitterly.
+
+I was stuck dumb with astonishment and uncertainty. I had always
+suspected that the victim had died on the spot where he was buried,
+although I could not quite understand how the rector had managed to
+bury the body by day without being seen. But I thought that he might
+have covered it lightly with earth and twigs and finished his work at
+night. He was a man of sufficient strength of mind to have done this.
+When the latest witnesses were telling their story, I noted the
+possible contradiction, and hoped it might prove a loophole of escape.
+But, alas, it was all only too true, and the guilt of the rector
+proven beyond a doubt. It was not at all impossible for a man to do
+such things in his sleep. Just as it was quite possible that a man
+with a fractured skull could run some distance before he fell to die.
+The rector's story bore the stamp of truth, although the doubt _will_
+come that he desired thus to save a shred of honor for his name.
+
+The prisoner walked up and down the room several times, then stopping
+before me he said gravely: "You have now heard my confession, here in
+my prison walls. It is your mouth that must speak my sentence. But
+what says your heart?"
+
+I could scarcely utter the words, "My heart suffers beyond expression.
+I would willingly see it break if I could but save you from a shameful
+death." (I dared not mention to him my last hope of escape in flight.)
+
+"That is impossible," he answered. "My life is forfeited. My death is
+just, and shall serve as a warning to others. But promise me that you
+will not desert my poor daughter. I had thought to lay her in your
+arms"--tears choked his voice--"but, alas, that fond hope is vanished.
+You cannot marry the daughter of a sentenced murderer. But promise me
+that you will watch over her as her second father." In deep sorrow and
+in tears I held his hand in mine. "Have you any news from my son?" he
+began again. "I hope it will be possible to keep him in ignorance of
+this terrible affair until--until it is all over. I could not bear to
+see him now. And now, dear friend, let us part, not to meet again
+except in the hall of justice. Grant me of your friendship one last
+service, let it end soon. I long for death. Go now, my kind,
+sympathetic judge. Send for me to-morrow to speak my sentence, and
+send to-day for my brother in God, the pastor in Aalsoe. He shall
+prepare me for death. God be with you."
+
+He gave me his hand with his eyes averted. I staggered from the
+prison, hardly conscious of what I was doing. I would have ridden home
+without seeing his daughter had she not met me by the prison door. She
+must have seen the truth in my face, for she paled and caught at my
+arm. She gazed at me with her soul in her eyes, but could not speak.
+"Flee! Save your father in flight!" was all I could say.
+
+I set spurs to my horse and rode home somehow.
+
+To-morrow, then!
+
+The sentence is spoken.
+
+The accused was calmer than the judge. All those present, except his
+bitter enemy, were affected almost to tears. Some whispered that the
+punishment was too severe.
+
+May God be a milder judge to me than I, poor sinner, am forced to be
+to my fellow men.
+
+She has been here. She found me ill in bed. There is no escape
+possible. He will not flee. Everything was arranged and the jailer was
+ready to help. But he refuses, he longs for death. God be merciful to
+the poor girl. How will she survive the terrible day? I am ill in body
+and soul, I can neither aid nor comfort her. There is no word from the
+brother.
+
+I feel that I am near death myself, as near perhaps as he is, whom I
+sent to his doom. Farewell, my own beloved bride.... What will she do?
+she is so strangely calm--the calm of wordless despair. Her brother
+has not yet come, and to-morrow--on the Ravenshill----!
+
+Here the diary of Erik Soerensen stopped suddenly. What followed can be
+learned from the written and witnessed statements of the pastor of
+Aalsoe, the neighboring parish to Veilbye.
+
+
+II
+
+It was during the seventeenth year of my term of office that the
+terrible event happened in the neighborhood which filled all who heard
+of it with shock and horror, and brought shame and disgrace upon our
+holy calling. The venerable Soeren Quist, Rector of Veilbye, killed his
+servant in a fit of rage and buried the body in his garden.
+
+He was found guilty at the official trial, through the testimony of
+many witnesses, as well as through his own confession. He was
+condemned to death, and the sentence was carried out in the presence
+of several thousand people on the little hill known as Ravenshill,
+here in the field of Aalsoe.
+
+The condemned man had asked that I might visit him in his prison. I
+must state that I have never given the holy sacrament to a better
+prepared or more truly repentant Christian. He was calm to the last,
+full of remorse for his great sin. On the field of death he spoke to
+the people in words of great wisdom and power, preaching to the text
+from the Lamentations of Jeremiah, chap. ii., verse 6: "He hath
+despised the priest in the indignation of his anger." He spoke of his
+violence and of its terrible results, and of his deep remorse. He
+exhorted his hearers to let his sin and his fate be an example to
+them, and a warning not to give way to anger. Then he commended his
+soul to the Lord, removed his upper garments, bound up his eyes with
+his own hand, then folded his hands in prayer. When I had spoken the
+words, "Brother, be of good cheer. This day shalt thou be with thy
+Saviour in Paradise," his head fell by the ax.
+
+The one thing that made death bitter for him was the thought of his
+children. The son had been sent for from Copenhagen, but as we
+afterwards learned, he had been absent from the city, and therefore
+did not arrive until shortly after his father had paid the penalty for
+his crime.
+
+I took the daughter into my home, where she was brought, half
+fainting, after they had led her father from the prison. She had been
+tending him lovingly all the days of his trial. What made even greater
+sorrow for the poor girl, and for the district judge who spoke the
+sentence, was that these two young people had solemnly plighted their
+troth but a few short weeks before, in the rectory of Veilbye. The son
+arrived just as the body of the executed criminal was brought into my
+house. It had been permitted to us to bury the body with Christian
+rites, if we could do it in secret. The young man threw himself over
+the lifeless body. Then, clasping his sister in his arms, the two wept
+together in silence for some while. At midnight we held a quiet
+service over the remains of the Rector of Veilbye, and the body was
+buried near the door of Aalsoe church. A simple stone, upon which I
+have carved a cross, still stands to remind the passer-by of the sin
+of a most unfortunate man.
+
+The next morning his two children had disappeared. They have never
+been heard of since. God knows to what far-away corner of the world
+they have fled, to hide their shame and their sorrow. The district
+judge is very ill, and it is not believed that he will recover.
+
+May God deal with us all after His wisdom and His mercy!
+
+O Lord, inscrutable are thy ways!
+
+In the thirty-eighth year of my service, and twenty-one years after my
+unfortunate brother in office, the Rector of Veilbye had been beheaded
+for the murder of his servant, it happened one day that a beggar came
+to my door. He was an elderly man, with gray hair, and walked with a
+crutch. He looked sad and needy. None of the servants were about, so I
+myself went into the kitchen and gave him a piece of bread. I asked
+him where he came from. He sighed and answered:
+
+"From nowhere in particular."
+
+Then I asked him his name. He sighed still deeper, looked about him as
+if in fear, and said, "They once called me Niels Bruus."
+
+I was startled, and said, "God have mercy on us! That is a bad name.
+That is the name of a man who was killed many years back."
+
+Whereat the man sighed still deeper and replied: "It would have been
+better for me had I died then. It has gone ill with me since I left
+the country."
+
+At this the hair rose on my head, and I trembled in every limb. For it
+seemed to me that I could recognize him, and also it seemed to me that
+I saw Morten Bruus before me in the flesh, and yet I had laid the
+earth over him three years before. I stepped back and made the sign of
+the cross, for verily I thought it was a ghost I saw before me.
+
+But the man sat down in the chimney corner and continued to speak.
+"Reverend father, they tell me my brother Morten is dead. I have been
+to Ingvorstrup, but the new owner chased me away. Is my old master,
+the Rector of Veilbye, still alive?" Then it was that the scales fell
+from my eyes and I saw into the very truth of this whole terrible
+affair. But the shock stunned me so that I could not speak. The man
+bit into his bread greedily and went on. "Yes, that was all Brother
+Morten's fault. Did the old rector have much trouble about it?"
+
+"Niels! Niels!" I cried from out the horror of my soul, "you have a
+monstrous black sin upon your conscience! For your sake that
+unfortunate man fell by the ax of the executioner!"
+
+The bread and the crutch fell from his hand, and he himself was near
+to falling into the fire. "May God forgive you, Morten!" he groaned.
+"God knows I didn't mean anything like that. May my sin be forgiven
+me! But surely you only mean to frighten me! I come from far away, and
+have heard nothing. No one but you, reverend father, has recognized
+me. I have told my name to no one. When I asked them in Veilbye if the
+rector was still there, they said that he was."
+
+"That is the new rector," I replied. "Not he whom you and your sinful
+brother have slain."
+
+He wrung his hands and cried aloud, and then I knew that he had been
+but a tool in the hands of that devil, Morten. Therefore I set to work
+to comfort him, and took him into my study that he might calm himself
+sufficiently to tell me the detail of this Satan's work.
+
+This was the story as he tells it: His brother Morten--truly a son of
+Belial--cherished a deadly hatred toward pastor Soeren Quist since the
+day the latter had refused him the hand of his daughter. As soon as he
+heard that the pastor's coachman had left him, he persuaded Niels to
+take the place.
+
+"Watch your chance well," he had said, "we'll play the black coat a
+trick some day, and you will be no loser by it."
+
+Niels, who was rough and defiant by nature, soon came to a quarrel
+with his master, and when he had received his first chastisement, he
+ran at once to Ingvorstrup to report it. "Let him strike you just once
+again," said Morten. "Then come to me, and we will pay him for it."
+
+Then came the quarrel in the garden, and Niels ran off to Ingvorstrup.
+He met his brother in the woods and told him what had occurred.
+
+"Did anyone see you on the way here?" asked Morten.
+
+Niels thought not. "Good," said Morten; "now we'll give him a fright
+that he will not forget for a week or so."
+
+He led Niels carefully to the house, and kept him hidden there the
+rest of the day. When all the household else had gone to sleep the two
+brothers crept out, and went to a field where several days before they
+had buried the body of a man of about Niels' age, size, and general
+appearance. (He had hanged himself, some said because of ill-treatment
+from Morten, in whose service he was. Others said it was because of
+unhappy love.) They dug up the corpse, although Niels did not like the
+work, and protested. But Morten was the stronger, and Niels had to do
+as he was ordered. They carried the body back with them into the
+house.
+
+Then Niels was ordered to take off all his clothes, piece by piece,
+even to his shirt, and dress the dead man in them. Even his leaden
+earring, which he had worn for many years, was put in the ear of the
+corpse. After this was done, Morten took a spade and gave the head of
+the corpse two crashing blows, one over the nose, the other on the
+temple. The body was hidden in a sack and kept in the house during the
+next day. At night the day following, they carried it out to the wood
+near Veilbye.
+
+Several times Niels had asked of his brother what all this preparation
+boded. But Morten answered only, "That is my affair. Do as I tell you,
+and don't ask questions."
+
+When they neared the edge of the wood by Veilbye, Morten said, "Now
+fetch me one of the coats the pastor wears most. If you can, get the
+green dressing gown I have often seen him wear mornings."
+
+"I don't dare," said Niels, "he keeps it in his bed chamber."
+
+"Well, then, I'll dare it myself," said Morten. "And now, go your way,
+and never show yourself here again. Here is a bag with one hundred
+thalers. They will last you until you can take service somewhere in
+another country. Go where no one has ever seen you, and take another
+name. Never come back to Denmark again. Travel by night, and hide in
+the woods by day until you are well away from here. Here are
+provisions enough to last you for several days. And remember, never
+show yourself here again, as you value your life."
+
+Niels obeyed, and has never seen his brother since that day. He had
+had much trouble, had been a soldier and lost his health in the war,
+and finally, after great trials and sufferings, had managed to get
+back to the land of his birth. This was the story as told me by the
+miserable man, and I could not doubt its truth.
+
+It was now only too clear to me that my unfortunate brother in the
+Lord had fallen a victim to the hatred of his fiendish enemy, to the
+delusion of his judge and the witnesses, and to his own credulous
+imagination.
+
+Oh, what is man that he shall dare to sit in judgment over his
+fellows! God alone is the Judge. He who gives life may alone give
+death!
+
+I did not feel it my duty to give official information against this
+crushed and broken sinner, particularly as the district judge is still
+alive, and it would have been cruelty to let him know of his terrible
+error.
+
+Instead, I gave what comfort my office permitted to the poor man, and
+recommended him not to reveal his name or tell his story to anyone in
+the district. On these conditions I would give him a home until I
+could arrange for a permanent refuge for him in my brother's house, a
+good distance from these parts.
+
+The day following was a Sunday. When I returned from evening service
+at my branch parish, the beggar had disappeared. But by the evening of
+the next day the story was known throughout the neighborhood.
+
+Goaded by the pangs of conscience, Niels had gone to Rosmer and made
+himself known to the judge as the true Niels Bruus. Upon the hearing
+of the terrible truth, the judge was taken with a stroke and died
+before the week was out. But on Tuesday morning they found Niels Bruus
+dead on the grave of the late rector Soeren Quist of Veilbye, by the
+door of Aalsoe church.
+
+
+
+_HUNGARIAN MYSTERY STORIES_
+
+
+
+FERENCZ MOLNAR
+
+
+_THE LIVING DEATH_
+
+
+There is a very serious reason, my dear sisters, why at last, after an
+absence of twenty years in America, I am confiding to you this strange
+secret in the life of our beloved and lamented father, and of the old
+house where we were children together. The truth is, if I read rightly
+the countenances of my physicians as they whisper to each other by the
+window of the chamber in which I am lying, that only a few days of
+this life remain to me.
+
+It is not right that this secret should die with me, my dear sisters.
+Though it will seem terrible to you, as it has to me, it will enable
+you to better understand our blessed father, help you to account for
+what must have seemed to you to be strange inconsistencies in his
+character. That this secret was revealed to me was due to my indolence
+and childish curiosity.
+
+For the first, and the last, time in my life I listened at a keyhole.
+With shame and a hotly chiding conscience I yielded to that insatiable
+curiosity--and when you have read these lines you will understand why
+I do not regret that inexcusable, furtive act.
+
+I was only a lad when we went to live in that odd little house. You
+remember it stood in the outskirts of Rakos, near the new cemetery. It
+stood on a deep lot, and was roughly boarded on the side which looked
+on the highway. You remember that on the first floor, next the street,
+were the room of our father, the dining room, and the children's room.
+In the rear of the house was the sculpture studio. There we had the
+large white hall with big windows, where white-clothed laborers
+worked. They mixed the plaster, made forms, chiseled, scratched, and
+sawed. Here in this large hall had our father worked for thirty years.
+
+When I arrived, in the holidays, I noted a change in our father's
+countenance. His beard was white, even when he did not work with the
+plaster. Through his strong spectacles his eyes glittered peculiarly.
+He was less calm than formerly. And he did not speak much, but all the
+more did he read.
+
+Why, we all knew that after the passing away of our mother he became a
+bookworm, reading very often by candlelight until morning.
+
+Then did it happen, about the fourth day after my arrival. I spent my
+leisure hours in the studio; I carved little figures, formed little
+pillar heads from the white plaster. In the corner a big barrel stood
+filled with water. It was noon; the laborers went to lunch.
+
+I sat down close to the barrel and carved a Corinthian pillar. Father
+came into the studio and did not notice me. He carried in his hands
+two plates of soup. When he came into the studio he closed the door
+behind him and looked around in the shop, as though to make sure he
+was not observed. As I have said, he did not notice me. I was
+astonished. Holding my breath, I listened. Father went through the
+large hall, and then opened a small door, of which I knew only so much
+that it led into a chamber three steps lower than the studio.
+
+I was full of expectation. I listened. I did not hear a word of
+conversation. Presently father came back with the empty plates in his
+hand. Somebody bolted the chamber's door behind him.
+
+Father went out of the studio, and I, much embarrassed, crept from
+behind the barrel.
+
+I knew that the chamber had a window, which looked back toward the
+plowed fields. I ran out of the studio and around the house. Much to
+my astonishment, the chamber's window was curtained inside. A large
+yellow plaid curtain hid everything from view. But I had to go,
+anyway, for I heard Irma's voice calling from the yard:
+
+"Antal, to lunch!"
+
+I sat down to the table with you, my sisters, and looked at father. He
+was sitting at the head of the table, and ate without saying a word.
+
+Day after day I troubled my head about this mystery in the chamber,
+but said not a word to anybody. I went into the studio, as usual, but
+I did not notice anything peculiar. Not a sound came from the chamber,
+and when our father worked in the shop with his ten laborers he passed
+by the small door as if beyond it there was nothing out of the
+ordinary.
+
+On Thursday I had to go back to Germany. On Tuesday night curiosity
+seized me again. Suddenly I felt that perhaps never would I know what
+was going on in my father's house. That night, when the working people
+were gone, I went into the studio. For a long time I was lost in my
+thoughts. All kinds of romantic ideas passed through my head, while my
+gaze rested on that small mysterious chamber door.
+
+In the studio it was dark already, and from under the small door in a
+thin border a yellow radiance poured out. Suddenly I regained my
+courage. I went to the door and listened. Somebody was speaking. It
+was a man's voice, but I did not understand what he was saying. I was
+putting my ear close to the door, when I heard steps at the front of
+the studio. Father came.
+
+I quickly withdrew myself behind the barrel. Father walked through the
+hall and knocked on the door softly. The bolt clicked and the door
+opened. Father went into the chamber and closed the door immediately
+and locked it.
+
+Now all discretion and sense of honor in me came to an end. Curiosity
+mastered me. I knew that last year one part of this small room had
+been partitioned off and was used as a woodhouse. And I knew that
+there was a possibility of going into the woodhouse through the yard.
+
+I went out, therefore, but found the woodhouse was closed. Driven by
+trembling curiosity, I ran into the house, took the key of the
+woodhouse from its nail, and in a minute, through the crevice between
+two planks, I was looking into that mysterious little room.
+
+There was a table in the middle of the room, and beside the wall were
+two straw mattresses. On the table a lighted candle stood. A bottle of
+wine was beside it, and around the table were sitting father and two
+strangers. Both the strangers were all in black. Something in their
+appearance froze me with terror.
+
+I fled in a panic of unreasoning fear, but returned soon, devoured by
+curiosity.
+
+You, my sister Irma, must remember how I found you there, gazing with
+starting eyeballs on the same mysteriously terrifying scene--and how I
+drew you away with a laugh and a trifling explanation, so that I might
+return and resume my ghastly vigil alone.
+
+One of the strangers wore a frock coat and had a sunburned, brown
+face. He was not old yet, not more than forty-five or forty-eight. He
+seemed to be a tradesman in his Sunday clothes. That did not interest
+me much.
+
+I looked at the other old man, and then a shiver of cold went through
+me. He was a famous physician, a professor, Mr. H----. I desire to lay
+stress upon it that he it was, for I had read two weeks before in the
+papers that he had died and was buried!
+
+And now he was sitting, in evening dress, in the chamber of a poor
+plaster sculptor, in the chamber of my father behind a bolted door!
+
+I was aware of the fact that the physician knew father. Why, you can
+recall that when father had asthma he consulted Mr. H----. Moreover,
+the professor visited us very frequently. The papers said he was dead,
+yet here he was!
+
+With beating heart and in terror, I looked and listened.
+
+The professor put some shining little thing on the table.
+
+"Here is my diamond shirt stud," he said to my father, "It is yours."
+
+Father pushed the jewel aside, refusing the gift.
+
+"Why, you are spending money on me," said the professor.
+
+"It makes no difference," replied father; "I shan't take the diamond."
+
+Then they were silent for a long while. At length the professor smiled
+and said:
+
+"The pair of cuff buttons which I had from Prince Eugene I presented
+to the watchman in the cemetery. They are worth a thousand guldens."
+
+And he showed his cuffs, from which the buttons were missing. Then he
+turned to the sunburned man:
+
+"What did you give him, General Gardener?"
+
+The tall, strong man unbuttoned his frock coat.
+
+"Everything I had--my gold chain, my scarf pin, and my ring."
+
+I did not understand all that. What was it? Where did they come from?
+A horrible presentiment arose in me. They came from the cemetery! They
+wore the very clothes in which they were buried!
+
+What had happened to them? Were they only apparently dead? Did they
+awake? Did they rise from the dead? What are they seeking here?
+
+They had a very low-voiced conversation with father. I listened in
+vain. Only later on, when they got warmed with their subject and spoke
+more audibly, did I understand them.
+
+"There is no other way," said the professor. "Put it in your will that
+the coroner shall pierce your heart through with a knife."
+
+Do you remember, my sisters, the last will of our father, which was
+thus executed?
+
+Father did not say a word. Then the professor went on, saying:
+
+"That would be a splendid invention. Had I been living till now I
+would have published a book about it. Nobody takes the Indian fakir
+seriously here in Europe. But, despite this, the buried fakirs, who
+are two months under ground and then come back into life, are very
+serious men. Perhaps they are more serious than ourselves, with all
+our scientific knowledge. There are strange, new, dreadful things for
+which we are not yet matured enough.
+
+"I died upon their methods; I can state that now. The mental state
+which they reach systematically I reached accidentally. The solitude,
+the absorbedness, the lying in a bed month by month, the gazing upon a
+fixed point hour by hour--these are all self-evident facts with me, a
+deserted misanthrope.
+
+"I died as the Indian fakirs do, and were I not a descendant of an old
+noble family, who have a tomb in this country, I would have died
+really.
+
+"God knows how it happened. I don't think there is any use of worrying
+ourselves about it. I have still four days. Then we go for good and
+all. But not back, no, no, not back to life!"
+
+He pointed with his hand toward the city. His face was burning from
+fever, and he knitted his brows. His countenance was horrible at this
+moment. Then he looked at the man with the sunburned face.
+
+"The case of Mr. Gardener is quite different. This is an ordinary
+physician's error. But he has less than four days. He will be gone
+to-morrow or positively day after to-morrow."
+
+He grasped the pulse of the sunburned man.
+
+"At this minute his pulse beats a hundred and twelve. You have a day
+left, Mr. Gardener. But not back. We don't go back. Never!"
+
+Father said nothing. He looked at the professor with seriousness, and
+fondly. The professor drank a glass of wine, and then turned toward
+father.
+
+"Go to bed. You have to get up early; you still live; you have
+children. We shall sleep if we can do so. It is very likely that
+General Gardener won't see another morning. You must not witness
+that."
+
+Now father began to speak, slowly, reverently.
+
+"If you, professor, have to send word--or perhaps Mr.
+Gardener--somebody we must take care of--a command, if you have--"
+
+The professor looked at him sternly, saying but one word:
+
+"Nothing."
+
+Father was still waiting.
+
+"Absolutely nothing," repeated the professor. "I have died, but I have
+four days yet. I live those here, my dear old friend, with you. But I
+don't go back any more. I don't even turn my face backward. I don't
+want to know where the others live. I don't want life, old man. It is
+not honorable to go back. Go, my friend--go to bed."
+
+Father shook hands with them and disappeared. General Gardener sat
+stiffly on his chair. The professor gazed into the air.
+
+I began to be aware of all that had happened here. These two
+apparently dead men had come back from the cemetery, but how, in what
+manner, by what means? I don't understand it perfectly even now.
+There, in the small room, near to the cemetery, they were living their
+few remaining days. They did not want to go back again into life.
+
+I shuddered. During these few minutes I seemed to have learned the
+meaning of life and of death. Now I myself felt that the life of the
+city was at a vast distance. I had a feeling that the professor was
+right. It was not worth while. I, too, felt tired, tired of life, like
+the professor, the feverish, clever, serious old man who came from the
+coffin and was sitting there in his grave clothes waiting for the
+final death.
+
+They did not speak a word to each other. They were simply waiting. I
+did not have power to move away from the crack in the wall through
+which I saw them.
+
+And now there happened the awful thing that drove me away from our
+home, never to return.
+
+It was about half-past one when someone tapped on the window. The
+professor took alarm and looked at Mr. Gardener a warning to take no
+notice. But the tapping grew louder. The professor got up and went to
+the window.
+
+He lifted the yellow curtain and looked out into the night. Quickly he
+returned and spoke to General Gardener, and then both went to the
+window and spoke with the person who had knocked. After a long
+conversation they lifted the man through the window.
+
+On this terrible day nothing could happen that would surprise me. I
+was benumbed. The man who was lifted through the window was clad in
+white linen to his feet. He was a Hebrew, a poor, thin, weak, pale
+Hebrew. He wore his white funeral dress. He shivered from cold,
+trembled, seemed almost unconscious. The professor gave him some wine.
+The Hebrew stammered:
+
+"Terrible! Oh, horrible!"
+
+I learned from his broken language that he had not been buried yet,
+like the professor. He had not yet known the smell of the earth. He
+had come from his bier.
+
+"I was laid out a corpse," he whimpered. "My God, they would have
+buried me by to-morrow!"
+
+The professor gave him wine again.
+
+"I saw a light here," he went on. "I beg you will give me some
+clothes--some soup, if you please--and I am going back again." Then he
+said in German:
+
+"Meine gute, theure Frau! Meine Kinder!" (My good wife, my children.)
+
+He began to weep. The professor's countenance changed to a devilish
+expression when he heard this lament. He despised the lamenting
+Hebrew.
+
+"You are going back?" he thundered. "But you won't go back! Don't
+shame yourself!"
+
+The Hebrew gazed at him stupidly.
+
+"I live in Rottenbiller Street," he stammered. "My name is Joseph
+Braun."
+
+He bit his nails in his nervous agitation. Tears filled his eyes. "Ich
+muss zu meine Kinder," he said in German again. (I must go to my
+children.)
+
+"No!" exclaimed the professor. "You'll never go back!"
+
+"But why?"
+
+"I will not permit it!"
+
+The Hebrew looked around. He felt that something was wrong here. His
+startled manner seemed to ask: "Am I in a lunatic asylum?" He dropped
+his head and said to the professor simply:
+
+"I am tired."
+
+The professor pointed to the straw mattress.
+
+"Go to sleep. We will speak further in the morning."
+
+Fever blazed in the professor's face. On the other straw mattress
+General Gardener now slept with his face to the wall.
+
+The Hebrew staggered to the straw mattress, threw himself down, and
+wept. The weeping shook him terribly. The professor sat at the table
+and smiled.
+
+Finally the Hebrew fell asleep. Hours passed in silence. I stood
+motionless looking at the professor, who gazed into the candlelight.
+There was not much left of it. Presently he sighed and blew it out.
+For a little while there was dark, and then I saw the dawn penetrating
+the yellow curtain at the window. The professor leaned back in his
+chair, stretched out his feet, and closed his eyes.
+
+All at once the Hebrew got up silently and went to the window. He
+believed the professor was asleep. He opened the window carefully and
+started to creep out. The professor leaped from his chair, shouting:
+
+"No!"
+
+He caught the Hebrew by his shroud and held him back. There was a long
+knife in his hand. Without another word, the professor pierced the
+Hebrew through the heart.
+
+He put the limp body on the straw mattress, then went out of the
+chamber toward the studio. In a few minutes he came back with father.
+Father was pale and did not speak. They covered the dead Hebrew with a
+rug, and then, one after the other, crept out through the window,
+lifted the corpse out, and carried it away. In a quarter of an hour
+they came back. They exchanged a few words, from which I learned that
+they had succeeded in putting the dead Hebrew back on his bier without
+having been observed.
+
+They shut the window. The professor drank a glass of wine and again
+stretched out his legs on the chair.
+
+"It is impossible to go back," he said. "It is not allowed."
+
+Father went away. I did not see him any more. I staggered up to my
+room, went to bed, and slept immediately. The next day I got up at ten
+o'clock. I left the city at noon.
+
+Since that time, my dear sisters, you have not seen me. I don't know
+anything more. At this minute I say to myself that what I know, what I
+have set down here, is not true. Maybe it never happened, maybe I have
+dreamed it all. I am not clear in my mind. I have a fever.
+
+But I am not afraid of death. Here, on my hospital bed, I see the
+professor's feverish but calm and wise face. When he grasped the
+Hebrew by the throat he looked like a lover of Death, like one who has
+a secret relation with the passing of life, who advocates the claims
+of Death, and who punishes him who would cheat Death.
+
+Now Death urges his claim upon me. I have no desire to cheat him--I am
+so tired, so very tired.
+
+God be with you, my dear sisters.
+
+
+
+MAURUS JOKAI
+
+
+_THIRTEEN AT TABLE_
+
+
+We are far amidst the snow-clad mountains of Transylvania.
+
+The scenery is magnificent. In clear weather, the plains of Hungary as
+far as the Rez promontory may be seen from the summit of the
+mountains. Groups of hills rise one above the other, covered with
+thick forest, which, at the period when our tale commences, had just
+begun to assume the first light green of spring.
+
+Toward sunset, a slight purple mist overspread the farther pinnacles,
+leaving their ridges still tinged with gold. On the side of one of
+these hills the white turrets of an ancient family mansion gleamed
+from amid the trees.
+
+Its situation was peculiarly romantic. A steep rock descended on one
+side, on whose pinnacle rose a simple cross. In the depth of the
+valley beneath lay a scattered village, whose evening bells
+melodiously broke the stillness of nature.
+
+Farther off, some broken roofs arose among the trees, from whence the
+sound of the mill, and the yellow-tinted stream, betrayed the miners'
+dwellings.
+
+Through the meadows in the valley beneath a serpentine rivulet wound
+its silvery way, interrupted by numerous falls and huge blocks of
+stone, which had been carried down in bygone ages from the mountains
+during the melting of the snows.
+
+A little path, cut in the side of the rock, ascended to the castle;
+while higher up, a broad road, somewhat broken by the mountain
+streams, conducted across the hills to more distant regions.
+
+The castle itself was an old family mansion, which had received many
+additions at different periods, as the wealth or necessities of the
+family suggested.
+
+It was surrounded by groups of ancient chestnut trees, and the terrace
+before the court was laid out in gardens, which were now filled with
+anemones, hyacinths, and other early flowers. Now and then the head of
+a joyous child appeared at the windows, which were opened to admit the
+evening breeze; while various members of the household retinue were
+seen hastening through the corridors, or standing at the doors in
+their embroidered liveries.
+
+The castle was completely surrounded by a strong railwork of iron, the
+stone pillars were overgrown by the evergreen leaves of the gobea and
+epomoea.
+
+It was the early spring of 1848.
+
+A party, consisting of thirteen persons, had assembled in the
+dining-room. They were all members of one family, and all bore the
+name of Bardy.
+
+At the head of the board sat the grandmother, an old lady of eighty
+years of age, whose snow-white hair was dressed according to the
+fashion of her times beneath her high white cap. Her face was pale and
+much wrinkled, and the eyes turned constantly upwards, as is the case
+with persons who have lost their sight. Her hand and voice trembled
+with age, and there was something peculiarly striking in the thick
+snow-white eyebrows.
+
+On her right hand sat her eldest son, Thomas Bardy, a man of between
+fifty and sixty. With a haughty and commanding countenance,
+penetrating glance, lofty figure, and noble mien, he was a true type
+of that ancient aristocracy which is now beginning to die out.
+
+Opposite to him, at the old lady's left hand, sat the darling of the
+family--a lovely girl of about fifteen. Her golden hair fell in
+luxuriant tresses round a countenance of singular beauty and
+sweetness. The large and lustrous deep-blue eyes were shaded by long
+dark lashes, and her complexion was pale as the lily, excepting when
+she smiled or spoke, and a slight flush like the dawn of morning
+overspread her cheeks.
+
+Jolanka was the orphan child of a distant relative, whom the Bardys
+had adopted. They could not allow one who bore their name to suffer
+want; and it seemed as if each member of the family had united to heap
+affection and endearment on the orphan girl, and thus prevented her
+from feeling herself a stranger among them.
+
+There were still two other female members of the family: Katalin, the
+old lady's daughter, who had been for many years a widow; and the wife
+of one of her sons, a pretty young woman, who was trying to teach a
+little prattler at her side to use the golden spoon which she had
+placed in his small, fat hand, while he laughed and crowed, and the
+family did their best to guess what he said, or what he most
+preferred.
+
+Opposite to them there sat two gentlemen. One of them was the husband
+of the young mother, Jozsef Bardy--a handsome man of about
+thirty-five, with regular features, and black hair and beard; a
+constant smile beamed on his gay countenance, while he playfully
+addressed his little son and gentle wife across the table. The other
+was his brother, Barnabas--a man of herculean form and strength. His
+face was marked by smallpox; he wore neither beard or mustache, and
+his hair was combed smoothly back, like a peasant's. His disposition
+was melancholy and taciturn; but he seemed constantly striving to
+atone, by the amiability of his manners, for an unprepossessing
+exterior.
+
+Next to him sat a little cripple, whose pale countenance bore that
+expression of suffering sweetness so peculiar to the deformed, while
+his lank hair, bony hands, and misshapen shoulders awakened the
+beholder's pity. He, too, was an orphan--a grandchild of the old
+lady's; his parents had died some years before.
+
+Two little boys of about five years old sat opposite to him. They were
+dressed alike, and the resemblance between them was so striking that
+they were constantly mistaken. They were twin-children of the young
+couple.
+
+At the lower end of the table sat Imre Bardy, a young man of twenty,
+whose handsome countenance was full of life and intelligence, his
+figure manly and graceful, and his manner courteous and agreeable. A
+slight moustache was beginning to shade his upper lip, and his dark
+hair fell in natural ringlets around his head. He was the only son of
+the _majoresco_, Tamas Bardy, and resembled him much in form and
+feature.
+
+Beside him sat an old gentleman, with white hair and ruddy complexion.
+This was Simon Bardy, an ancient relative, who had grown old with the
+grandmother of the family.
+
+The same peculiarity characterized every countenance in the Bardy
+family--namely the lofty forehead and marked brows, and the large
+deep-blue eyes, shaded by their heavy dark lashes.[1]
+
+"How singular!" exclaimed one of the party; "we are thirteen at table
+to-day."
+
+"One of us will surely die," said the old lady; and there was a
+mournful conviction in the faint, trembling tones.
+
+"Oh, no, grandmother, we are only twelve and a half!" exclaimed the
+young mother, taking the little one on her knee.
+
+"This little fellow only counts half on the railroad."
+
+All the party laughed at this remark, even the little cripple's
+countenance relaxed into a sickly smile.
+
+"Ay, ay," continued the old lady, "the trees are now putting forth
+their verdure, but at the fall of the leaf who knows if all of us, or
+any of us, may still be sitting here?"
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+Several months had passed since this slight incident.
+
+In one of the apartments of the castle, the eldest Bardy and his son
+were engaged in earnest conversation.
+
+The father paced hastily up and down the apartment, now and then
+stopping short to address his son, who stood in the embrasure of one
+of the windows. The latter wore the dress of the Matyas Hussars[2]--a
+gray dolmany, with crimson cord; he held a crimson csako, with a
+tricolored cockade, in his hand.
+
+"Go," said the father, speaking in broken accents; "the sooner the
+better; let me not see you! Do not think I speak in anger, but I
+cannot bear to look at you, and think where you are going. You are my
+only son, and you know how I have loved you--how all my hopes have
+been concentrated in you. But do not think that these tears, which you
+see me shed for the first time, are on your account; for if I knew I
+should lose you,--if your blood were to flow at the next battle,--I
+should only bow my head in dust and say, 'The Lord gave, and the Lord
+takes away, blessed be His holy name!' Yes, if I heard that you and
+your infatuated companions were cut to pieces, I could stifle the
+burning tears; but to know that your blood, when it flows, will be a
+curse upon the earth, and your death will be the death of two
+kingdoms--"
+
+"They may die now; but they will regenerate----"
+
+"This is not true; you only deceive yourselves with the idea that you
+can build up a new edifice when you have overthrown the old one. Great
+God, what sacrilege! Who had intrusted you with the fate of our
+country, to tempt the Almighty? Who authorized you to lose all there
+is for the hope of what may be? For centuries past have so many
+honorable men fought in vain to uphold the old tottering constitution,
+as you call it? Or were they not true patriots and heroes? Your
+companions have hissed their persecuted countrymen in the Diet; but do
+they love their country better than we do, who have shed our blood and
+sacrificed our interests for her from generation to generation, and
+even suffered disgrace, if necessary, to keep her in life?--for though
+that life has been gradually weakened, still it is life. You promise
+her glory; but the name of glory is death!"
+
+"It may be so, father; we may lose our country as regards ourselves,
+but we give one instead of ten millions, who were hitherto our own
+people, and yet strangers in their native land."
+
+"Chimera! The people will not understand you. They never even dreamt
+of what you wish to give them. The true way to seek the people's
+welfare is to give them what they need.
+
+"Ask my dependents! Is there one among them whom I have allowed to
+suffer want or ruin, whom I have not assisted in times of need?--or
+have I ever treated them unjustly? You will not hear a murmur. Tell
+them that I am unjust notwithstanding, because I do not call the
+peasant from his plow to give his opinions on forming the laws, and
+constitution,--and what will be the consequence? They will stare at
+you in astonishment; and yet, in their mistaken wrath, they will come
+down some night and burn this house over my head."
+
+"That is the unnatural state of the times. It is all the fault of the
+past bad management, if the people have no better idea. But let the
+peasant once be free, let him be a man, and he will understand all
+that is now strange to him."
+
+"But that freedom will cost the lives of thousands!"
+
+"I do not deny it. Indeed, I believe that neither I nor any of the
+present generation will reap the fruits of this movement. I think it
+probable that in a few years not one of those whose names we now hear
+spoken of may still be living; and what is more, disgrace and curses
+may be heaped upon their dust. But a time will come when the great
+institutions of which they have laid the foundation will arise and
+render justice to the memory of those who sacrificed themselves for
+the happiness of future generations. To die for our country is a
+glorious death, but to carry with us the curses of thousands, to die
+despised and hated for the salvation of future millions, oh! that is
+sublime--it is Messiah-like!"
+
+"My son--my only son!" cried his father, throwing himself passionately
+on the young man's neck and sobbing bitterly. "Do you see these
+tears?"
+
+"For the first time in my life I see them, father--I see you weep; my
+heart can scarcely bear the weight of these tears--and yet I go! You
+have reason to weep, for I bring neither joy nor glory on your
+head--and yet I go! A feeling stronger than the desire of glory,
+stronger than the love of my country, inspires my soul; and it is a
+proof of the strength of my faith that I see your tears, my
+father--and yet I go!"
+
+"Go!" murmured his father, in a voice of despair. "You may never
+return again, or, when you do, you may find neither your father's
+house nor the grave in which he is laid! But know, even then, in the
+hour of your death, or in the hour of mine, I do not curse you--and
+now, leave me." With these words he turned away and motioned to his
+son to depart.
+
+Imre silently left the apartment, and as soon as he had closed the
+door the tears streamed from his eyes; but before his sword had struck
+the last step his countenance had regained its former determination,
+and the fire of enthusiasm had kindled in his eye.
+
+He then went to take leave of his Uncle Jozsef, whom he found
+surrounded by his family. The twins were sitting at his feet, while
+his wife was playing bo-peep with the little one, who laughed and
+shouted, while his mother hid herself behind his father's armchair.
+
+Imre's entrance interrupted the general mirth. The little boy ran over
+to examine the sword and golden tassels, while the little one began to
+cry in alarm at the sight of the strange dress.
+
+"Csitt, baba!" said his mother, taking him from his father's arms;
+"your cousin is going to wars, and will bring you a golden horse."
+
+Jozsef wrung his nephew's hand. "God be with you!" he exclaimed, and
+added in a lower voice, "You are the noblest of us all--you have done
+well!"
+
+They then all embraced him in turns, and Imre left them, amidst
+clamors of the little ones, and proceeded to his grandmother's
+apartments.
+
+On the way, he met his Uncle Barnabas, who embraced him again and
+again in silence, and then tore himself away without saying a word.
+
+The old lady sat in her great armchair, which she seldom quitted, and
+as she heard the clash of Imre's sword, she looked up and asked who
+was coming.
+
+"It is Imre!" said the fair-haired maiden, blushing, and her heart
+beat quickly as she pronounced his name.
+
+Jolanka felt that Imre was more than a brother to her, and the feeling
+with which she had learnt to return his affection was warmer than even
+a sister's love.
+
+The widow lady and the cripple were also in the grandmother's
+apartment; the child sat on a stool at the old lady's feet, and smiled
+sadly as the young man entered.
+
+"Why that sword at your side, Imre?" asked the old lady in a feeble
+voice. "Ah, this is no good world--no good world! But if God is
+against us, who can resist His hand? I have spoken with the dead again
+in dreams. I thought they all came around me and beckoned me to follow
+them; but I am ready to go, and place my life with gratitude and
+confidence in the hands of the Lord. Last night I saw the year 1848
+written in the skies in letters of fire. Who knows what may come over
+us yet? This is no good world--no good world!"
+
+Imre bent silently over the old lady's hand and kissed it.
+
+"And so you are going? Well, God bless and speed you, if you go
+beneath the cross, and never forget in life or in death to raise your
+heart to the Lord;" and the old lady placed her withered hand upon her
+grandson's head, and murmured, "God Almighty bless you!"
+
+"My husband was just such a handsome youth when I lost him," sighed
+the widow lady as she embraced her nephew. "God bless you!"
+
+The little cripple threw his arms around his cousin's knees and,
+sobbing, entreated him not to stay long away.
+
+The last who bade farewell was Jolanka. She approached with downcast
+eyes, holding in her small white hands an embroidered cockade, which
+she placed on his breast. It was composed of five colors--blue and
+gold, red, white, and green.[3]
+
+"I understand," said the young man, in a tone of joyful surprise, as
+he pressed the sweet girl to his heart, "Erdely[4] and Hungary united!
+I shall win glory for your colors!"
+
+The maiden yielded to his warm embrace, murmuring, as he released her,
+"Remember me!"
+
+"When I cease to remember you, I shall be no more," replied the youth
+fervently.
+
+And then he kissed the young girl's brow, and once more bidding
+farewell, he hurried from the apartment.
+
+Old Simon Bardy lived on the first floor: Imre did not forget him.
+
+"Well, nephew," said the old man cheerfully, "God speed you, and give
+you strength to cut down many Turks!"
+
+"It is not with the Turks that we shall have to do," replied the young
+man, smiling.
+
+"Well, with the French," said the old soldier of the past century,
+correcting himself.
+
+A page waited at the gate with two horses saddled and bridled.
+
+"I shall not require you--you may remain at home," said Imre, as,
+taking the bridle of one of the horses, vaulting lightly into the
+saddle, he pressed his csako over his brow and galloped from the
+castle.
+
+As he rode under the cross, he checked his horse and looked back. Was
+it of his grandmother's words, or of the golden-haired Jolanka that he
+thought?
+
+A white handkerchief waved from the window.
+
+"Farewell, light of my soul!" murmured the youth; and kissing his
+hand, he once more dashed his spurs into his horse's flank, and turned
+down the steep hill.
+
+Those were strange times. All at once the villages began to be
+depopulated; the inhabitants disappeared, none knew whither. The doors
+of the houses were closed.
+
+The bells were no longer heard in the evening, nor the maiden's song
+as she returned from her work. The barking of dogs which had lost
+their masters alone interrupted the silence of the streets, where the
+grass began to grow.
+
+Imre Bardy rode through the streets of the village without meeting a
+soul; few of the chimneys had smoke, and no fires gleamed through the
+kitchen windows.
+
+Evening was drawing on, and a slight transparent mist had overspread
+the valley. Imre was desirous of reaching Kolozsvar[5] early on the
+next morning, and continued his route all night.
+
+About midnight the moon rose behind the trees, shedding her silvery
+light over the forest. All was still, excepting the echo of the
+miner's hammer, and the monotonous sound of his horse's step along the
+rocky path. He rode on, lost in thought; when suddenly the horse
+stopped short, and pricked his ears.
+
+"Come, come," said Imre, stroking his neck, "you have not heard the
+cannon yet."
+
+The animal at last proceeded, turning his head impatiently from side
+to side, and snorting and neighing with fear.
+
+The road now led through a narrow pass between two rocks, whose
+summits almost met, and a slight bridge, formed of one or two rotten
+planks, was thrown across the dry channel of a mountain stream which
+cut up the path.
+
+As Imre reached the bridge, the horse backed, and no spurring could
+induce him to cross. Imre at last pressed his knee angrily against the
+trembling animal, striking him at the same time across the neck with
+the bridle, on which the horse suddenly cleared the chasm at one bound
+and then again turned and began to back.
+
+At that instant a fearful cry arose from beneath, which was echoed
+from the rocks around, and ten or fifteen savage-looking beings
+climbed from under the bridge, with lances formed of upright scythes.
+
+Even then there would have been time for the horseman to turn back,
+and dash through a handful of men behind him, but either he was
+ashamed of turning from the first conflict, or he was desirous, at any
+risk, to reach Kolozsvar at the appointed time, and instead of
+retreating by the bridge, he galloped towards the other end of the
+pass, where the enemy rushed upon him from every side, yelling
+hideously.
+
+"Back, Wallachian dogs!" cried Imre, cutting two of them down, while
+several others sprang forward with the scythes.
+
+Two shots whistled by, and Imre, letting go the bridle, cut right and
+left, his sword gleaming rapidly among the awkward weapons; and taking
+advantage of a moment in which the enemy's charge began to slacken, he
+suddenly dashed through the crowd towards the outlet of the rock,
+without perceiving that another party awaited him above the rocks with
+great stones, with which they prepared to crush him as he passed.
+
+He was only a few paces from the spot, when a gigantic figure, armed
+with a short broad-axe, and with a Roman helmet on his head, descended
+from the rock in front of him, and seizing the reins of the horse
+forced him to halt. The young man aimed a blow at his enemy's head,
+and the helmet fell back, cut through the middle, but the force of the
+blow had broken his sword in two; and the horse lifted by his giant
+foe, reared, so that the rider, losing his balance, was thrown against
+the side of the rock, and fell senseless to the ground.
+
+At the same instant a shot was fired toward them from the top of the
+rock.
+
+"Who fired there?" cried the giant, in a voice of thunder. The
+bloodthirsty Wallachians would have rushed madly on their defenseless
+prey, had not the giant stood between him and them.
+
+"Who fired on me?" he sternly exclaimed. The Wallachians stood back in
+terror.
+
+"It was not on you, Decurio, that I fired, but on the hussar,"
+stammered out one of the men, on whom the giant had fixed his eye.
+
+"You lie, traitor! Your ball struck my armor, and had I not worn a
+shirt of mail, it would have pierced my heart."
+
+The man turned deadly pale, trembling from head to foot.
+
+"My enemies have paid you to murder me?" The savage tried to speak,
+but words died upon his lips.
+
+"Hang him instantly--he is a traitor!"
+
+The rest of the gang immediately seized the culprit and carried him to
+the nearest tree, from whence his shrieks soon testified that his
+sentence was being put in execution.
+
+The Decurio remained alone with the young man; and hastily lifting
+him, still senseless, from the ground, he mounted his horse, and
+placing him before him ere the savage horde had returned, he had
+galloped some distance along the road from whence the youth had come,
+covering him with his mantle as he passed the bridge, to conceal him
+from several of the gang who stood there, and exclaiming, "Follow me
+to the Topanfalvo."
+
+As soon as they were out of sight, he suddenly turned to the left,
+down a steep, hilly path, and struck into the depth of the forest.
+
+The morning sun had just shot its first beams across the hills,
+tinting with golden hue the reddening autumn leaves, when the young
+hussar began to move in his fevered dreams, and murmured the name
+"Jolanka."
+
+In a few moments he opened his eyes. He was lying in a small chamber,
+through the only window of which the sunbeams shone upon his face.
+
+The bed on which he lay was made of lime-boughs, simply woven
+together, and covered with wolves' skins. A gigantic form was leaning
+against the foot of the bed with his arms folded, and as the young man
+awoke, he turned round. It was the Decurio.
+
+"Where am I?" asked the young man, vaguely endeavoring to recall the
+events of the past night.
+
+"In my house," replied Decurio.
+
+"And who are you?"
+
+"I am Numa, Decurio of the Roumin[6] Legion, your foe in battle, but
+now your host and protector."
+
+"And why did you save me from your men?" asked the young man, after a
+short silence.
+
+"Because the strife was unequal--a hundred against one."
+
+"But had it not been for you, I could have freed myself from them."
+
+"Without me you had been lost. Ten paces from where I stopped your
+horse, you would inevitably have been dashed to pieces by huge stones
+which they were preparing to throw down upon you from the rock."
+
+"And you did not desire my death?"
+
+"No, because it would have reflected dishonor on the Roumin name."
+
+"You are a chivalrous man, Decurio!"
+
+"I am what you are; I know your character, and the same feeling
+inspires us both. You love your nation, as I do mine. Your nation is
+great and cultivated; mine is despised and neglected, and my love is
+more bitterly devoted. Your love for your country makes you happy;
+mine deprives me of peace. You have taken up arms to defend your
+country without knowing your own strength, or the number of the foe; I
+have done the same. Either of us may lose, or we may both be blotted
+out; but though the arms may be buried in the earth, rust will not eat
+them."
+
+"I do not understand your grievances."
+
+"You do not understand? Know, then, that although fourteen centuries
+have passed since the Roman eagle overthrew Diurbanus, there are still
+those among us--the now barbarous people--who can trace their descent
+from generation to generation, up to the times of its past glory. We
+have still our traditions, if we have nothing more; and can point out
+what forest stands in the place of the ancient Sarmisaegethusa, and
+what town is built where one Decebalus overthrew the far-famed troops
+of the Consulate. And alas for that town! if the graves over which its
+houses are built should once more open, and turn the populous streets
+into a field of battle! What is become of the nation, the heir of so
+much glory?--the proud Dacians, the descendants of the far-famed
+legions? I do not reproach any nation for having brought us to what we
+now are; but let none reproach me if I desire to restore my people to
+what they once were."
+
+"And do you believe that this is the time?"
+
+"We have no prophets to point out the hour, but it seems yours do not
+see more clearly. We shall attempt it now, and if we fail our
+grandchildren will attempt it again. We have nothing to lose but a few
+lives; you risk much that is worth losing, and yet you assemble
+beneath the banner of war. Then war. Then what would you do if you
+were like us?--a people who possess nothing in this world among whom
+there is not one able or one instructed head; for although every third
+man bears the name of Papa, it is not every hundredth who can read! A
+people excluded from every employment; who live a miserable life in
+the severest manual labor; who have not one noble city in their
+country, the home of three-fourths of their people. Why should we seek
+to know the signs of the times in which we are to die, or be
+regenerated! We have nothing but our wretchedness, and if we are
+conquered we lose nothing. Oh! you did wrong for your own peace to
+leave a nation to such utter neglect!"
+
+"We do not take up arms for our nation alone, but for freedom in
+general."
+
+"You do wrong. It is all the same to us who our sovereign may be; only
+let him be just towards us, and raise up our fallen people; but you
+will destroy your nation--its power, its influence, and
+privileges--merely that you may live in a country without a head."
+
+A loud uproar interrupted the conversation. A disorderly troop of
+Wallachians approached the Decurio's house, triumphantly bearing the
+hussar's csako on a pole before them.
+
+"Had I left you there last night, they would now have exhibited your
+head instead of your csako."
+
+The crowd halted before the Decurio's window, greeting him with loud
+vociferations.
+
+The Decurio spoke a few words in the Wallachian language, on which
+they replied more vehemently than before, at the same time thrusting
+forward the kalpag on the pole.
+
+The Decurio turned hastily round. "Was your name written on your
+kalpag?" he asked the young man, in evident embarrassment.
+
+"It was."
+
+"Unhappy youth! The people, furious at not having found you, are
+determined to attack your father's house."
+
+"And you will permit them?" asked the youth, starting from bed.
+
+"I dare not contradict them, unless I would lose their confidence. I
+can prevent nothing."
+
+"Give me up--let them wreak their bloody vengeance on my head!"
+
+"I should only betray myself for having concealed you; and it would
+not save your father's house."
+
+"And if they murder the innocent and unprotected, on whom will the
+ignominy of their blood fall?"
+
+"On me; but I will give you the means of preventing this disgrace. Do
+you accept it?"
+
+"Speak!"
+
+"I will give you a disguise; hasten to Kolozsvar and assemble your
+comrades,--then return and protect your house. I will wait you there,
+and man to man, in open honorable combat, the strife will no longer be
+ignominious."
+
+"Thanks, thanks!" murmured the youth, pressing the Decurio's hand.
+
+"There is not a moment to lose; here is a peasant's mantle--if you
+should be interrogated, you have only to show this paszura,[7] and
+mention my name. Your not knowing the language is of no consequence;
+my men are accustomed to, see Hungarian gentlemen visit me in
+disguise, and having only seen you by night, they will not recognize
+you."
+
+Imre hastily took the dress, while Decurio spoke to the people, made
+arrangements for the execution of their plans, and pointed out the way
+to the castle, promising to follow them immediately.
+
+"Accept my horse as a remembrance," said the young man, turning to the
+Decurio.
+
+"I accept it, as it would only raise suspicion were you to mount it;
+but you may recover it again in the field. Haste, and lose no time! If
+you delay you will bring mourning on your own head and disgrace on
+mine!"
+
+In a few minutes the young man, disguised as a Wallachian peasant, was
+hastening on foot across the hills of Kolozsvar.
+
+It was past midnight.
+
+The inhabitants of the Bardy castle had all retired to rest.
+
+The iron gate was locked and the windows barred, when suddenly the
+sound of demoniac cries roused the slumberers from their dreams.
+
+"What is that noise?" cried Jozsef Bardy, springing from his bed, and
+rushing to the window.
+
+"The Olahok!"[8] cried a hussar, who had rushed to his master's
+apartments on hearing the sounds.
+
+"The Olah! the Olah!" was echoed through the corridors by the
+terrified servants.
+
+By the light of a few torches, a hideous crowd was seen before the
+windows, armed with scythes and axes, which they were brandishing with
+fearful menaces.
+
+"Lock all the doors!" cried Jozsef Bardy, with calm presence of mind.
+"Barricade the great entrance, and take the ladies and children to the
+back rooms. You must not lose your heads, but all assemble together in
+the turret-chamber, from whence the whole building may be protected.
+And taking down two good rifles from over his bed, he hastened to his
+elder brother Tamas's apartments, and overlooked the court.
+
+"Have you heard the noise?" asked his brother as he entered.
+
+"I knew it would come," he replied, and coolly continued to pace the
+room.
+
+"And are you not preparing for defense?"
+
+"To what purpose?--they will kill us all. I am quite prepared for what
+must inevitably happen."
+
+"But it will not happen if we defend ourselves courageously. We are
+eight men--the walls of the castle are strong--the besiegers have no
+guns, and no place to protect them; we may hold out for days until
+assistance comes from Kolozsvar."
+
+"We shall lose," replied Tamas coldly, and without the slightest
+change of countenance.
+
+"Then I shall defend the castle myself. I have a wife and children,
+our old grandmother and our sisters are here, and I shall protect
+them, if I remain alone."
+
+At that instant Barnabas and old Simon entered with the widowed
+sister.
+
+Barnabas had a huge twenty-pound iron club in his hand; grinding his
+teeth, and with eyes darting fire, he seemed capable of meeting
+single-handed the whole troop.
+
+He was followed by the widow, with two loaded pistols in her hand, and
+old Simon, who entreated them not to use violence or exasperate the
+enemy.
+
+"Conduct yourselves bravely!" replied the widow dryly; "let us not die
+in vain."
+
+"Come with me--we shall send them all to hell!" cried Barnabas,
+swinging his club in his herculean arm as if it had been a reed.
+
+"Let us not be too hasty," interrupted Jozsef; we will stand here in
+the tower, from whence we can shoot every one that approaches, and if
+they break in, we can meet them on the stairs."
+
+"For Heaven's sake!" cried Simon, "what are you going to do? If you
+kill one of them they will massacre us all. Speak to them
+peaceably--promise them wine--take them to the cellar--give them
+money--try to pacify them! Nephew Tamas, you will speak to them?"
+continued the old man, turning to Tamas, who still paced up and down,
+without the slightest visible emotion.
+
+"Pacification and resistance are equally vain," he replied coldly; "we
+are inevitably lost!"
+
+"We have no time for delay," said Jozsef impatiently; "take the arms
+from the wall, Barnabas, give one to each servant--let them stand at
+the back windows of the house, we two are enough here. Sister, stand
+between the windows, that the stones may not hit you; and when you
+load, do not strike the balls too far in, that our aim may be the more
+secure!"
+
+"No! no!--I cannot let you fire," exclaimed the old man, endeavoring
+to drag Jozsef from the window. "You must not fire yet--only remain
+quiet."
+
+"Go to the hurricane, old man! would you have us use holy water
+against a shower of stones?"
+
+At that instant several large stones were dashed through the windows,
+breaking the furniture against which they fell.
+
+"Only wait," said Simon, "until I speak with them. I am sure I shall
+pacify them. I can speak their language and I know them all--just let
+me go to them."
+
+"A vain idea! If you sue for mercy they will certainly kill you, but
+if you show courage, you may bring them to their senses. You had
+better stay and take a gun."
+
+But the old man was already out of hearing, and hurrying downstairs,
+he went out of a back door into the court, which the Wallachians had
+not yet taken possession of.
+
+They were endeavoring to break down one of the stone pillars of the
+iron gate with their axes and hammers, and had already succeeded in
+making an aperture, through which one of the gang now climbed.
+
+Old Simon recognized him. "Lupey, my son, what do you want here?" said
+the old man. "Have we ever offended you? Do you forget all that I have
+done for you?--how I cured your wife when she was so ill, and got you
+off from the military; and how, when your ox died, I gave you two fine
+bullocks to replace it? Do you not know me, my son Lupey?"
+
+"I am not your son Lupey now; I am a 'malcontent!'" cried the
+Wallachian, aiming a blow with a heavy hammer at the old man's head.
+
+Uttering a deep groan, Simon fell lifeless to the ground.
+
+The rest of the party saw the scene from the tower.
+
+Barnabas rushed from the room like a maddened tiger, while Jozsef,
+retiring cautiously behind the embrasure of the window, aimed his gun
+as they were placing his uncle's head upon a spike, and shot the first
+who raised it. Another seized it, and the next instant he, too, fell
+to the earth; another and another, as many as attempted to raise the
+head, till, finally, none dared approach.
+
+The widow loaded the guns while Tamas sat quietly in an armchair.
+
+Meanwhile Barnabas had hurried to the attic, where several large
+fragments of iron had been stowed away, and dragging them to a window
+which overlooked the entrance, he waited until the gang had assembled
+round the door, and were trying to break in; when lifting an enormous
+piece with gigantic strength, he dropped it on the heads of the
+besiegers.
+
+Fearful cries arose and the gang, who were at the door, fled right and
+left, leaving four or five of their number crushed beneath the
+ponderous mass.
+
+The next moment they returned with redoubled fury, dashing stones
+against the windows and the roof, while the door resounded with the
+blows of their clubs.
+
+Notwithstanding the stones which were flying round him, Barnabas stood
+at the window dashing heavy iron masses, and killing two or three men
+every time.
+
+His brother meanwhile continued firing from the tower, and not a ball
+was aimed in vain. The besiegers had lost a great number, and began to
+fall back, after fruitless efforts to break in the door, when a
+footman entered breathless to inform Barnabas that the Wallachians
+were beginning to scale the opposite side of the castle with ladders,
+and that the servants were unable to resist them.
+
+Barnabas rushed to the spot.
+
+Two servants lay mortally wounded in one of the back rooms, through
+the windows of which the Wallachians were already beginning to enter,
+while another ladder had been placed against the opposite window,
+which they were beginning to scale as Barnabas entered.
+
+"Here, wretches!" he roared furiously, and, seizing the ladder with
+both hands, shook it so violently that the men were precipitated from
+it, and then lifting it with supernatural strength, he dashed it
+against the opposite one, which broke with the force of the weight
+thrown against it, the upper part falling backwards with the men upon
+it, while one of the party remained hanging from the window-sill, and,
+after immense exertions to gain a footing, he too fell to the earth.
+
+Barnabas rushed into the next room grinding his teeth, his lips
+foaming, and his face of a livid hue; so appalling was his appearance;
+that one of the gang, who had been the first to enter by the window,
+turned pale with terror, and dropped his axe.
+
+Taking advantage of this, Barnabas darted on his enemy, and dragging
+him with irresistible force to the window, he dashed him from it.
+
+"On here! as many as you are!" he shouted furiously, the blood gushing
+from his mouth from the blow of a stone. "On! all who wish a fearful
+death!"
+
+At that instant, a shriek of terror rose within the house.
+
+The Wallachians had discovered the little back door which Simon had
+left open, and, stealing through it, were already inside the house,
+when the shrieks of a servant girl gave the besieged notice of their
+danger.
+
+Barnabas, seizing his club, hurried in the direction of the sounds; he
+met his brother on the stairs, who had likewise heard the cry, and
+hastened thither with his gun in his hand, accompanied by the widow.
+
+"Go, sister!" said Jozsef, "take my wife and children to the attics;
+we will try to guard the staircase step by step. Kiss them all for me.
+If we die, the villains will put us all in one grave--we shall meet
+again!"
+
+The widow retired.
+
+The two brothers silently pressed hands, and then, standing on the
+steps, awaited their enemies. They did not wait long.
+
+The bloodhounds with shouts of vengeance rushed on the narrow stone
+stairs.
+
+"Hah! thus near I love to have you, dogs of hell!" cried Barnabas,
+raising his iron club with both hands, and dealing such blows right
+and left, that none whom it reached rose again. The stairs were
+covered with the dead and wounded, while their death cries, and the
+sound of the heavy club, echoed fearfully through the vaulted
+building.
+
+The foremost of the gang retreated as precipitately as they had
+advanced, but were continually pressed forward again by the members
+from behind, while Barnabas drove them back unweariedly, cutting an
+opening through them with the blows of his club.
+
+He had already beaten them back nearly to the bottom of the stairs,
+when one of the gang, who had concealed himself in a niche, pierced
+him through the back with a spike.
+
+Dashing his club amongst the retreating crowd, he turned with a cry of
+rage, and seizing his murderer by the shoulders, dragged him down with
+him to the ground.
+
+The first four who rushed to help the murderer were shot dead by
+Jozsef Bardy, who, when he had fired off both his muskets, still
+defended his prostrated brother with the butt-end of one, until he was
+overpowered and disarmed; after which a party of them carried him out
+to the iron cross, and crucified him on it amidst the most shocking
+tortures.
+
+On trying to separate the other brother from his murderer, they found
+them both dead. With his last strength Barnabas had choked his enemy,
+whom he still held firmly in his deadly grip, and they were obliged to
+cut off his hand in order to disengage the Wallachian's body.
+
+Tamas, the eldest brother, now alone survived. Seated in his armchair
+he calmly awaited his enemies, with a large silver chandelier burning
+on the table before him.
+
+As the noise approached his chamber, he drew from its jeweled sheath
+his broad curved sword, and, placing it on the table before him,
+proceeded coolly to examine the ancient blade, which was inscribed
+with unknown characters.
+
+At last the steps were at the door; the handle was turned--it had not
+even been locked.
+
+The magnate rose, and, taking his sword from the table, he stood
+silently and calmly before the enemies, who rushed upon him with
+fearful oaths, brandishing their weapons still reeking with the blood
+of his brothers.
+
+The nobleman stood motionless as a statue until they came within two
+paces of him, when suddenly the bright black steel gleamed above his
+head, and the foremost man fell at his feet with his skull split to
+the chin. The next received a deep gash in the shoulder of his
+outstretched arm, but not a word escaped the magnate's lips, his
+countenance retained its cold and stern expression as he looked at his
+enemies in calm disdain, as if to say, "Even in combat a nobleman is
+worth ten boors."
+
+Warding off with the skill of a professed swordsman every blow aimed
+at him, he coolly measured his own thrusts, inflicting severe wounds
+on his enemies' faces and heads; but the more he evaded them the more
+furious they became. At last he received a severe wound in the leg
+from a scythe, and feel on one knee; but without evincing the
+slightest pain, he still continued fighting with the savage mob,
+until, after a long and obstinate struggle, he fell without a murmur,
+or even a death-groan.
+
+The enraged gang cut his body to pieces, and in a few minutes they had
+hoisted his head on his own sword. Even then the features retained
+their haughty, contemptuous expression.
+
+He was the last man of the family with whom they had to combat, but
+more than a hundred of their own band lay stretched in the court and
+before the windows, covering the stairs and rooms with heaps of
+bodies, and when the shouts of triumph ceased for an instant, the
+groans of the wounded and the dying were heard from every side.
+
+None now remained but women and children. When the Wallachians broke
+into the castle, the widow had taken them all to the attics, leaving
+the door open, that her brothers might find refuge in case they were
+forced to retreat; and here the weaker members of the family awaited
+the issue of the combat which was to bring them life or death,
+listening breathlessly to the uproar, and endeavoring, from its
+confused sounds, to determine good or evil.
+
+At last the voices died away, and the hideous cries of the besiegers
+ceased. The trembling women believed that the Wallachians had been
+driven out, and, breathing more freely, each awaited with impatience
+the approach of brother--husband--sons.
+
+At last a heavy step was heard on the stairs leading to the garret.
+
+"This is Barnabas's step!" cried the widow, joyfully, and still
+holding the pistols in her hand, she ran to the door of the garret.
+
+Instead of her expected brother, a savage form, drunken with blood,
+strode towards her, his countenance burning with rage and triumph.
+
+The widow started back, uttering a shriek of terror, and then with
+that unaccountable courage of desperation, she aimed one of the
+pistols at the Wallachian's breast, who instantly fell backwards on
+one of his comrades, who followed close behind. The other pistol she
+discharged into her own bosom.
+
+And now we must draw a veil over the scene that followed. What
+happened there must not be witnessed by human eyes.
+
+Suffice it to say, they murdered every one, women and children, with
+the most refined and brutal cruelty, and then threw their dead bodies
+out of the window from which Barnabas had dashed down the iron
+fragments on the besiegers' heads.
+
+They left the old grandmother to the last, that she might witness the
+extermination of her whole family. Happily for her, her eyes had
+ceased to distinguish the light of sun, and ere long the light of an
+eternal glory had risen upon them.
+
+The Wallachians then dug a common grave for the bodies, and threw them
+all in together. The little one, whom his parents loved so well, they
+cast in alive, his nurse having escaped from the attics and carried
+him downstairs, where they had been overtaken by the savages.
+
+"There are only eleven here!" cried one of the gang, who had counted
+the bodies, "one of them must be still alive somewhere--there ought to
+be twelve!" And then they once more rushed through the empty rooms,
+overturning all the furniture, and cutting up and breaking everything
+they met with. They searched the garrets and every corner of the
+cellars, but without success.
+
+At last a yell of triumph was heard. One of them had discovered a door
+which, being painted of the same color as the walls, had hitherto
+escaped their observation. It concealed a small apartment in the
+turret. With a few blows of their axes it was broken open, and they
+rushed in.
+
+"Ah! a rare booty!" cried the foremost of the ruffians, while, with
+bloodthirsty curiosity, the others pressed round to see the new
+victim.
+
+There lay the little orphan with the golden hair; her eyes were closed
+and a death-like hue had overspread her beautiful features.
+
+Her aunt; with an instinctive foreboding, had concealed her here when
+she took the others to the attic.
+
+The orphan grasped a sharp knife in her hand, with which she had
+attempted to kill herself; and when her fainting hands refused the
+fearful service, she had swooned in despair.
+
+"Ah!" cried the Wallachians, in savage admiration, their bloodthirsty
+countenances assuming a still more hellish expression.
+
+"This is a common booty!" cried several voices together.
+
+"A beautiful girl! A noble lady! ha, ha! She will just suit the
+tattered Wallachians!" And with their foul and bloody hands, they
+seized the young girl by her fair slight arms.
+
+"Ha! what is going on here?" thundered a voice from behind.
+
+The Wallachians looked round.
+
+A figure stood among them fully a head taller than all the rest. He
+wore a brass helmet, in which a deep cleft was visible, and held in
+his left hand a Roman sword. His features bore the ancient Roman
+character.
+
+"The Decurio!" they murmured, making way for him.
+
+"What is going on here?" he repeated; and seizing the fainting girl in
+the arms of a Wallachian, he ordered him to lay her down.
+
+"She is one of our enemies," replied the savage insolently.
+
+"Silence, knave! Does one of the Roumin nation seek enemies in women?
+Lay her down instantly."
+
+"Not so, leader," interrupted Lupey; "our laws entitle us to a
+division of the spoil. This girl is our booty; she belongs to us after
+the victory."
+
+"I know our laws better than you do, churl! Due division of spoil is
+just and fair; but we cast lots for what cannot be divided."
+
+"True, leader: a horse or an ox cannot be divided, and for them we
+cast lots, but in this case--"
+
+"I have said it cannot, and I should like to know who dares to say it
+can!"
+
+Lupey knew the Decurio too well to proffer another syllable, and the
+rest turned silently from the girl; one voice alone was heard to
+exclaim, "It can!"
+
+"Who dares to say that?" cried the Decurio; "let him come forward!"
+
+A young Wallachian, with long plaited hair, confronted the Decurio. He
+was evidently intoxicated, and replied, striking his breast with his
+fist: "I said so."
+
+Scarcely had the words escaped his lips, than the Decurio, raising his
+left hand, severed the contradictor's head at one stroke from his
+body; and as it fell back, the lifeless trunk dropped on its knees
+before the Decurio, with its arms around him, as if in supplication.
+
+"Dare anyone still say it can?" asked Numa, with merciless rigor.
+
+The Wallachians turned silently away.
+
+"Put the horses immediately to the carriage; the girl must be placed
+in it, and brought to Topanfalvo. Whoever has the good fortune of
+winning her, has a right to receive her as I confide her to you; but
+if anyone of you should dare to offend her in the slightest degree,
+even by a look or a smile, remember this and take example from it,"
+continued the Decurio, pointing with his sword to the headless body of
+the young man. "And now you may go--destroy and pillage."
+
+At these words the band scattered right and left, the Decurio with the
+fainting girl, whom he lifted into the carriage and confided to some
+faithful retainers cf the family, pointing out the road across the
+hills.
+
+In half an hour the castle was in flames and the Wallachians,
+descending into the cellars, had knocked out the bottoms of the casks,
+and bathed in the sea of flowing wine and brandy, singing wild songs,
+while the fire burst from every window enveloping the blackened walls;
+after which the revelers departed, leaving their dead, and those who
+were too helplessly intoxicated to follow them.
+
+Meanwhile they brought the young girl to the Decurio's house, and as
+each man considered that he had an equal right to the prize, they kept
+a vigilant eye upon her, and none dared offend her so much as by a
+look.
+
+When the Decurio arrived, they all crowded into the house with him,
+filling the rooms, as well as the entrance and porch.
+
+Having laid out the spoil before them on the ground, the leader
+proceeded to divide it into equal shares, retaining for himself a
+portion of ten men, after which most of the band dispersed to their
+homes; but a good many remained, greedily eyeing their still
+unappropriated victim, who lay pale and motionless as the dead on the
+couch of lime-boughs where they had laid her.
+
+"You are waiting, I suppose, to cast lots for the girl?" said Numa
+dryly.
+
+"Certainly," replied Lupey, with an insolent leer; "and his she will
+be who casts highest. If two, or ten, or twenty of us should cast the
+same, we have an equal right to her."
+
+"I tell you only one can have her," interrupted Numa sternly.
+
+"Then those who win must cast again among each other."
+
+"Casting the die will not do; we may throw all day long, and two may
+remain at the end."
+
+"Well, let us play cards for her."
+
+"I cannot allow that, the more cunning will deceive the simpler."
+
+"Well, write our names upon bricks, and throw them all into a barrel;
+and whichever name you draw will take away the girl."
+
+"I can say what name I please, for none of you can read."
+
+The Wallachian shook his head impatiently.
+
+"Well, propose something yourself, Decurio."
+
+"I will. Let us try which of us can give the best proof of courage and
+daring; and whoever can do that, shall have the girl, for he best
+deserves her."
+
+"Well said!" cried the men unanimously. "Let us each relate what we
+have done, and then you can judge which among us is the boldest."
+
+"I killed the first Bardy in the court in sight of his family."
+
+"I broke in the door, when that terrible man was dashing down the iron
+on our heads."
+
+"But it was I who pierced his heart."
+
+"I mounted the stairs first."
+
+"I fought nearly half an hour with the noble in the cloth of gold."
+
+And thus they continued. Each man, according to his own account, was
+the first and the bravest--each had performed miracles of valor.
+
+"You have all behaved with great daring, but it is impossible now to
+prove what has happened. The proof must be given here, by all of us
+together, before my eyes, indisputably."
+
+"Well, tell us how," said Lupey impatiently, always fearing that the
+Decurio was going to deceive them.
+
+"Look here," said Numa, drawing a small cask from beneath the bed--and
+in doing so he observed that the young girl half opened her eyes, as
+she glanced at him, and then closed them. She was awake, and had heard
+all.
+
+As he stooped down, Numa whispered gently in her ear: "Fear nothing,"
+and then drew the cask into the middle of the room.
+
+The Wallachians stared with impatient curiosity as he knocked out the
+bottom of the cask with a hatchet.
+
+"This cask contains gunpowder," continued Decurio. "We will light a
+match and place it in the middle of the cask, and whoever remains
+longest in the room is undoubtedly the most courageous; for there is
+enough here to blow up not only this house, but the whole of the
+neighboring village."
+
+At this proposition several of the men began to murmur.
+
+"If any are afraid they are not obliged to remain," said the Decurio
+dryly.
+
+"I agree," said Lupey doggedly. "I will remain here; and perhaps,
+after all, it is poppy-seeds you have got there--it looks very much
+like them."
+
+The Decurio stooped down, and taking a small quantity between his
+fingers, threw it into the Wallachian's pipe, which immediately
+exploded, causing him to stagger backwards, and the next instant he
+stood with a blackened visage, sans beard and moustache, amidst the
+jeers and laughter of his comrades.
+
+This only exasperated him the more.
+
+"I will stay for all that!" he exclaimed; and lifting up the pipe
+which he had dropped, he walked over and lit it at the burning match
+which the Decurio was placing in the cask.
+
+Upon this, two-thirds of the men left the room.
+
+The rest assembled around the cask with much noise and bravado,
+swearing by heaven and earth that they would stay until the match
+burned out; but the more they swore, the more they looked at the
+burning match, the flame of which was slowly approaching the
+gunpowder.
+
+For some minutes their courage remained unshaken, but after that they
+ceased to boast, and began to look at each other in silent
+consternation, while their faces grew paler every instant. At last one
+or two rose and stood aloof; the others followed their example, and
+some grinding their teeth with rage, others chattering with terror,
+they all began to leave the room.
+
+Only two remained beside the cask; Numa, who stood with his arms
+folded leaning against the foot of the bed; and Lupey, who was sitting
+on the iron of the cask with his back turned to the danger, and
+smoking furiously.
+
+As soon as they were alone, the latter glanced behind him and saw the
+flame was within an inch of the powder.
+
+"I'll tell you what, Decurio," he said, springing up, "we are only two
+left, don't let us make food of each other; let us come to an
+understanding on this matter."
+
+"If you are tired of waiting, I can press the match lower."
+
+"This is no jest, Numa; you are risking your own life. How can you
+wish to send us both to hell for the sake of a pale girl? But I'll
+tell you what--I'll give her up to you if you will only promise that
+she shall be mine when you are tired of her."
+
+"Remain here and win her--if you dare."
+
+"To what purpose?" said the Wallachian, in a whining voice, and in his
+impatience he began to tear his clothes and stamp with his feet, like
+a petted child.
+
+"What I have said stands good," said the Decurio; "whoever remains
+longest has the sole right to the lady."
+
+"Well, I will stay, of course; but what do I gain by it? I know you
+will stay, too, and then the devil will have us both; and I speak not
+only for myself when I say I do not wish that."
+
+"If you do not wish it, you had better be gone."
+
+"Well, I don't care--if you will give me a golden mark."
+
+"Not the half; stay if you like it."
+
+"Decurio, this is madness! The flame will reach the powder
+immediately."
+
+"I see it."
+
+"Well, say a dollar."
+
+"Not a whit."
+
+"May the seventy-seven limited thunder-bolt strike you on St.
+Michael's Day!" roared the Wallachian fiercely, as he rushed to the
+door; but after he had gone out, he once more thrust his head in and
+cried: "Will you give even a florin? I am not gone yet."
+
+"Nor have I removed the match; you may come back." The Wallachian
+slammed the door, and ran for his life, till exhausted and breathless
+he sank under a tree, where he lay with his tunic over his head, and
+his ears covered with his hands, only now and then raising his head
+nervously, to listen for the awful explosion which was to blow up the
+world.
+
+Meanwhile Numa coolly removed the match, which was entirely burnt
+down; and throwing it into the grate, he stepped over to the bed and
+whispered into the young girl's ear: "You are free!"
+
+Trembling, she raised herself in the bed and taking the Decurio's
+large, sinewy hands within her own, she murmured: "Be merciful! O hear
+my prayer, and kill me!"
+
+The Decurio stroked the fair hair of the lovely suppliant.
+
+"Poor child!" he replied gently; "you have nothing to fear; nobody
+will hurt you now."
+
+"You have saved me from these fearful people--now save me from
+yourself!"
+
+"You have nothing to fear from me," replied the Dacian, proudly; "I
+fight for liberty alone, and you may rest as securely within my
+threshold as on the steps of the altar. When I am absent you need have
+no anxiety, for these walls are impregnable, and if anyone should dare
+offend you by the slightest look, that moment shall be the last of his
+mortal career. And when I am at home you have nothing to fear, for
+woman's image never dwelt within my heart. Accept my poor couch, and
+may your rest be sweet!--Imre Bardy slept on it last night."
+
+"Imre!" exclaimed the starting girl. "You have seen him, then?--oh!
+where is he!"
+
+The Decurio hesitated. "He should not have delayed so long," he
+murmured, pressing his hand against his brow; "all would have been
+otherwise."
+
+"Oh! let me go to him; if you know where he is."
+
+"I do not know, but I am certain he will come here if he is
+alive--indeed he must come."
+
+"Why do you think that?"
+
+"Because he will seek you."
+
+"Did he then speak--before you?"
+
+"As he lay wounded on that couch, he pronounced your name in his
+dreams. Are you not that Jolanka Bardy whom they call 'The Angel'? I
+knew you by your golden locks."
+
+The young girl cast down her eyes. "Then you think he will come?" she
+said in a low voice. "And my relations?"
+
+"He will come as soon as possible; and now you must take some food and
+rest. Do not think about your relations now; they are all in a safe
+place--nobody can hurt them more."
+
+The Decurio brought some refreshment, laid a small prayer-book on the
+pillow, and left the orphan by herself.
+
+The poor girl opened the prayer-book, and her tears fell like
+rain-drops on the blessed page; but, overcome by the fatigue and
+terror she had undergone, her head ere long sank gently back, and she
+slept calmly and sweetly the sleep of exhausted innocence.
+
+As evening closed, the Decurio returned, and softly approaching the
+bed, looked long and earnestly at the fair sleeper's face, until two
+large tears stood unconsciously in his eyes.
+
+The Roumin hastily brushed away the unwonted moisture, and as if
+afraid of the feeling which had stolen into his breast, he hastened
+from the room, and laid himself upon his woolen rug before the open
+door.
+
+The deserted castle still burned on, shedding a ghastly light on the
+surrounding landscape, while the deepest silence reigned around, only
+broken now and then by an expiring groan, or the hoarse song of a
+drunken reveler.
+
+Day was beginning to dawn as a troop of horsemen galloped furiously
+towards the castle from the direction of Kolozsvar.
+
+They were Imre and his comrades.
+
+Silently and anxiously they pursued their course, their eyes fixed
+upon one point, as they seemed to fly rather than gallop along the
+road. "We are too late!" exclaimed one of the party at last, pointing
+to a dim red smoke along the horizon. "Your castle is burning!"
+
+Without returning an answer, Imre spurred his panting horse to a
+swifter pace. A turn in the road suddenly brought the castle to their
+view, its blackened walls still burning, while red smoke rose high
+against the side of the hill.
+
+The young man uttered a fierce cry of despair, and galloped madly down
+the declivity. In less than a quarter of an hour he stood before the
+ruined walls.
+
+"Where is my father? where are my family? where is my bride?" he
+shrieked in frantic despair, brandishing his sword over the head of a
+half-drunken Wallachian, who was leaning against the ruined portico.
+
+The latter fell to his knees, imploring mercy, and declaring that it
+was not he who killed them.
+
+"Then they are dead!" exclaimed the unhappy youth, as, half-choked by
+his sobs, he fell forward on his horse's neck.
+
+Meanwhile his companions had ridden up, and immediately sounded the
+Wallachian, whom, but for Imre's interference, they would have cut
+down.
+
+"Lead us to where you have buried them. Are they all dead?" he
+continued; "have you not left one alive? Accursed be the sun that
+rises after such a night!"
+
+The Wallachian pointed to a large heap of fresh-raised mould. "They
+are all there!" he said.
+
+Imre fell from his horse without another word, as if struck down.
+
+His companions removed him to a little distance, where the grass was
+least red.
+
+They then began to dig twelve graves with their swords.
+
+Imre watched them in silence. He seemed unconscious what they were
+about.
+
+When they had finished the graves they proceeded to open the large
+pit, but the sight was too horrible, and they carried Imre away by
+force. He could not have looked on what was there and still retain his
+senses.
+
+In a short time, one of his comrades approached and told him that
+there were only eleven bodies in the grave.
+
+"Then one of them must be alive!" cried Imre, a slight gleam of hope
+passing over his pale features; "which is it?--speak! Is there not a
+young girl with golden locks among them?"
+
+"I know not," stammered his comrade, in great embarrassment.
+
+"You do not know?--go and look again." His friend hesitated.
+
+"Let me go--I must know," said Imre impatiently, as the young man
+endeavored to detain him.
+
+"O stay, Imre, you cannot look on them; they are all headless!"
+
+"My God!" exclaimed the young man, covering his face with both hands,
+and, bursting into tears he threw himself down with his face upon the
+earth.
+
+His comrades questioned the Wallachian closely as to what he knew
+about the young girl. First he returned no answer, pretending to be
+drunk and not to understand:
+
+But on their promising to spare his life, on the sole condition that
+he would speak the truth, he confessed that she had been carried away
+to the mountains, where the band were to cast lots for her.
+
+"I must go!" said Imre, starting as if in a trance.
+
+"Whither?" inquired his comrades.
+
+"To seek her! Take off your dress," he continued, turning to the
+Wallachian, "you may have mine in exchange," and, hastily putting on
+the tunic, he concealed his pistols in the girdle beneath it.
+
+"We will follow you," said his comrades, taking up their arms; "we
+will seek her from village to village."
+
+"No, no, I must go alone! I shall find her more easily alone. If I do
+not return, avenge this for me," he said, pointing to the moat; then,
+turning to the Wallachian, he added sternly: "I have found beneath
+your girdle a gold medallion, which my grandmother wore suspended from
+her neck, and by which I know you to be one of her murderers, and, had
+I not promised to spare your life, you should now receive the
+punishment that you deserve. Keep him here," he said to his comrades,
+"until I have crossed the hills, and then let him go."
+
+And taking leave of his friends, he cast one glance at the eleven
+heaps, and at the burning castle of his ancestors, and hastened toward
+the mountains.
+
+The hoary autumn nights had dyed the leaves of the forest. The whole
+country looked as if it had been washed in blood.
+
+Deep amidst the wildest forest the path suddenly descends into a
+narrow valley, surrounded by steep rocks at the foot of which lies a
+little village half concealed among the trees.
+
+It seemed as if the settlers there had only cleared sufficient ground
+to build their dwellings, leaving all the rest a dense forest. Apart
+from the rest, on the top of a rock, stood a cottage, which, unlike
+others, was constructed entirely of large blocks of stone, and only
+approachable by a small path cut in the rock.
+
+A young man ascended this path. He was attired in a peasant's garb and
+although he evidently had traveled far, his step was light and fleet.
+When he had ascended about halfway, he was suddenly stopped by an
+armed Wallachian, who had been kneeling before a shrine in the rock,
+and seeing the stranger, rose and stood in his path.
+
+The latter pronounced the Decurio's name, and produced his paszura.
+
+The Wallachian examined it on every side, and then stepped back to let
+the stranger pass, after which he once more laid down his scythe and
+cap, and knelt before the shrine.
+
+The stranger knocked at the Decurio's door, which was locked, and an
+armed Wallachian appeared from behind the rocks, and informed him that
+the Decurio was not at home, only his wife.
+
+"His wife?" exclaimed the stranger in surprise.
+
+"Yes, that pale girl who fell to him by lot."
+
+"And she is his wife."
+
+"He told us so himself, and swore that if any of us dared so much as
+lift his eye upon her, he would send him to St. Nicholas in paradise."
+
+"Can I not see her?"
+
+"I would not advise you; for if the Decurio hears of it, he will make
+halves of you; but you may go around to the window if you like--only
+let me get out of the way first, that the Decurio may not find me
+here."
+
+The stranger hastened to the window, and looking in, he saw the young
+girl seated on an armchair made of rough birch boughs, with a little
+prayer-book on her knee; her fair arm supporting her head, while a
+mass of golden ringlets half veiled her face, which was as pale as an
+alabaster statue; the extreme sadness of its expression rendering her
+beauty still more touching.
+
+"Jolanka!" exclaimed the stranger passionately.
+
+She started at the well-known voice, and, uttering a cry of joy,
+rushed to the window.
+
+"Oh, Imre!" she murmured, "are you come at last!"
+
+"Can I not enter? can I not speak with you?"
+
+The young girl hastened to unbar the door, which was locked on the
+inside, and as Imre entered she threw herself into his arms, while he
+pressed her fondly to his heart.
+
+The Wallachian, who had stolen to the window, stood aghast with terror
+and, soon as the Decurio arrived, he ran to meet him, and related,
+with vehement gesticulations, how the girl had thrown herself into the
+peasant's arms.
+
+"And how did you know that?" asked Numa coldly.
+
+"I saw them through the window."
+
+"And dared you look through my window? Did I not forbid you? Down on
+your knees, and pray!"
+
+The Wallachian fell on his knees, and clasped his hands.
+
+"Rebel! you deserve your punishment of death for having disobeyed my
+commands; and if you ever dare to open your lips on the subject,
+depend upon it, you shall not escape!" And with these words he strode
+away, leaving the astonished informer on his knees, in which posture
+he remained for some time afterwards, not daring to raise his head
+until the Decurio's steps had died away.
+
+As Numa entered the house, the lovers hastened to meet him. For an
+instant or two he stood at the threshold, regarding the young man with
+a look of silent reproach. "Why did you come so late?" he asked.
+
+Imre held out his hand, but the Decurio did not accept it.
+
+"The blood of your family is on my hand," he whispered. "You have let
+dishonor come on me, and mourning on yourself."
+
+The young man's head sunk on his breast in silent anguish.
+
+"Take his hand," said Jolanka, in her low, sweet accents; and then
+turning to Imre, "He saved your life--he saved us both, and he will
+rescue our family, too."
+
+Imre looked at her in astonishment.
+
+The Decurio seized his arms and drew him aside. "She does not know
+that they are dead," he whispered; "she was not with them, and knows
+nothing of their fate; and I have consoled her with the idea that they
+are all prisoners, she must never know the horrors of that fearful
+night."
+
+"But sooner or later she will hear it."
+
+"Never! you must leave the place and the kingdom. You must go to
+Turkey."
+
+"My way lies towards Hungary."
+
+"You must not think of it. Evil days await that country; your prophets
+do not see them, but I know, and see them clearly. Go to Turkey; I
+will give you letters by which you may pass in security through
+Wallachia and Moldavia; and here is a purse of gold--do not scruple to
+accept it, for it is your own, it belonged to _them_. Promise me, for
+her sake," he continued earnestly, pointing to Jolanka, "that you will
+not go to Hungary."
+
+Imre hesitated. "I cannot promise what I am not sure I shall fulfill;
+but I shall remember your advice."
+
+Numa took the hands of the two lovers, and, gazing long and earnestly
+on their faces, he said, in a voice of deep feeling, "You love one
+another?"
+
+They pressed his hand in silence.
+
+"You will be happy--you will forget your misfortunes. God bless and
+guide you on your way! Take these letters, and keep the direct road to
+Brasso,[9] by the Saxon-land.[10] You will find free passage
+everywhere, and never look behind until the last pinnacles of the
+snowy mountains are beyond your sight. Go! we will not take leave, not
+a word, let us forget each other!"
+
+The Decurio watched the lovers until they were out of sight; and
+called to them, even when they could hear him no longer: "Do not go
+towards Hungary."
+
+He then entered his house. The prayer-book lay open as the young girl
+had left it; the page was still damp with her tears. Numa's hand
+trembled, as he kissed the volume fervently and placed it in his
+bosom.
+
+When night came on, the Roumin lay down on his wolf-skin couch, where
+the golden-haired maiden, and her lover before her, had slept, but it
+seemed as if they had stolen his rest--he could not close his eyes
+there, so he rose and went out on the porch, where he spread his rug
+before the open door; but it was long ere he could sleep--there was an
+unwonted feeling at his heart, something like happiness, yet
+inexpressibly sad; and, buried in deep reverie, he lay with his eyes
+fixed on the dark blue starry vault above him till past midnight.
+Suddenly he thought he heard the report of some fire-arms at a great
+distance, and at the same moment two stars sank beneath the horizon.
+Numa thought of the travelers, and a voice seemed to whisper, "They
+are now happy!"
+
+The moon had risen high in the heavens, when the Decurio was roused
+from his sleep by heavy footsteps, and five or six Wallachians, among
+whom was Lupey, stood before him.
+
+"We have brought two enemies' heads," said the latter, with a dark
+look at the Decurio; "pay us their worth!" and taking two heads from
+his pouch he laid them on Numa's mat.
+
+The Wallachians watched their leader's countenance with sharp,
+suspicious glances.
+
+Numa recognized the two heads by the light of the moon. They were
+those of Imre and Jolanka, but his features did not betray the
+slightest emotion.
+
+"You will know them probably," continued Lupey. "The young magnate,
+who escaped us at the pass, came for the girl in your absence, and at
+the same time stole your money, and, what is more, we found your
+paszura upon him also."
+
+"Who killed them?" asked the Decurio, in his usual calm voice.
+
+"None of us," replied the Wallachian; "as we rushed upon them, the
+young magnate drew two pistols from his girdle, and shot the girl
+through the head first, and himself afterwards."
+
+"Were you all there?"
+
+"And more of us besides."
+
+"Go back and bring the rest. I will divide the money you have found on
+them among you. Make haste; and should one of you remain behind, his
+share will be divided among the rest."
+
+The Wallachians hastened to seek their comrades with cries of joy.
+
+The Decurio then locked the door, and, throwing himself upon the
+ground beside the two heads, he kissed them a hundred times, and
+sobbed like a child.
+
+"I warned you not to go toward Hungary!" he said bitterly. "Why did
+you not hear me, unhappy children? why did you not take my word?" and
+he wept over his enemies' heads as if he had been their father.
+
+He then rose, his eyes darting fire, and, shaking his terrible fist,
+he cried, in a voice hoarse with rage: "Czine mintye!"[11]
+
+In a few hours, the Wallachians had assembled before the Decurio's
+house. They were about fifty or sixty, all wild, fearful-looking men.
+
+Numa covered the two heads with a cloth, and laid them on the bed,
+after which he opened the door.
+
+Lupey entered last.
+
+"Lock the door," said Numa, when they were all in; "we must not be
+interrupted;" and, making them stand in a circle, he looked around at
+them all, one by one.
+
+"Are you all here?" he asked at last.
+
+"Not one is absent."
+
+"Do you consider yourselves all equally deserving of sharing _the
+booty_?"
+
+"All of us."
+
+"It was you," he continued to Lupey, "who struck down the old man?"
+
+"It was."
+
+"And you who pierced the magnate with a spike?"
+
+"You are right, leader."
+
+"And you really killed all the women in the castle?" turning to a
+third.
+
+"With my own hand."
+
+"And one and all of you can boast of having massacred, and plundered,
+and set on fire?"
+
+"All! all!" they cried, striking their breasts.
+
+"Do not lie before Heaven. See! your wives are listening at the window
+to what you say, and will betray you if you do not speak the truth."
+
+"We speak the truth!"
+
+"It is well!" said the leader, as he calmly approached the bed; and,
+seating himself on it, uncovered the two heads and placed them on his
+knee. "Where did you put their bodies?" he asked.
+
+"We cut them in pieces and strewed them on the highroad."
+
+There was a short silence. Numa's breathing became more and more
+oppressed, and his large chest heaved convulsively. "Have you prayed
+yet?" he asked in an altered voice.
+
+"Not yet, leader. What should we pray for?" said Lupey.
+
+"Fall down on your knees and pray, for this is the last morning which
+will dawn on any of you again."
+
+"Are you in your senses, leader? What are you going to do?"
+
+"I am going to purge the Roumin nation of a set of ruthless murderers
+and brigands. Miserable wretches; instead of glory, you have brought
+dishonor and disgrace upon our arms wherever you have appeared. While
+the brave fought on the field of battle, you slaughtered their wives
+and children; while they risked their lives before the cannon's mouth
+you attacked the house of the sleepers and robbed and massacred the
+helpless and the innocent. Fall down on your knees and pray for your
+souls, for the angel of death stands over you, to blot out your memory
+from among the Roumin people!"
+
+The last words were pronounced in a fearful tone. Numa was no longer
+the cold unmoved statue he had hitherto appeared, he was like a fiery
+genius of wrath, whose very breath was destruction.
+
+The Wallachians fell upon their knees in silent awe, while the women
+who had been standing outside, rushed shrieking down the rocks.
+
+The Decurio drew a pistol from his breast, and approached the cask of
+gunpowder.
+
+With a fearful howl, they rushed upon him; the shriek of despair was
+heard for an instant, then the terrible explosion which caused the
+rocks to tremble, while the flames rose with a momentary flash amidst
+clouds of dust and smoke, scaring the beasts of the forest, and
+scattering stones and beams, and hundreds of dismembered limbs, far
+through the valley, and over the houses of the terrified inhabitants!
+
+When the smoke had dissipated, a heap of ruins stood in the place of
+Numa's dwelling.
+
+The sun rose and smiled upon the earth, which was strewed with the
+last leaves of autumn, but where were those who had assembled at the
+spring-time of the year?
+
+The evening breezes whispered mournfully through the ruined walls, and
+strewed the faded leaves upon eleven grassy mounds.
+
+The pen trembles in my hand--my heart sickens at the recital of such
+misery.
+
+Would that I could believe it an imagination--the ghostly horror of a
+fevered brain!
+
+Would that I could bid my gentle readers check the falling tear or
+tell them: "Start not with horror; it is but romance--the creation of
+some fearful dream--let us awake and see it no more!"
+
+FOOTNOTES TO _THIRTEEN AT TABLE_:
+
+[1: There is a race of the Hungarians in the Carpath who, unlike the
+Hungarians of the plain, have blue eyes and often fair hair.]
+
+[2: Part of the free corps raised in 1848.]
+
+[3: Blue and gold are the colors of Transylvania.]
+
+[4: Transylvania.]
+
+[5: Klausenburg.]
+
+[6: The Wallachians were, in the days of Trajan, subdued by the
+Romans, with whom they became intermixed, and are also called Roumi.]
+
+[7: Everything on which a double-headed eagle--the emblem of the
+Austrian Government--was painted, engraved or sculptured, the
+Wallachians called paszura.]
+
+[8: Olah, Wallachian--ok, plural.]
+
+[9: Brasso, or Kyonstadt, a town in the southeast of Transylvania, on
+the frontier of Wallachia.]
+
+[10: A district inhabited by a colony of Saxons.]
+
+[11: Czine mintye!--A Wallachian term signifying revenge.]
+
+
+
+ETIENNE BARSONY
+
+
+_THE DANCING BEAR_
+
+
+Fife and drum were heard from the big market-place.
+
+People went running towards it. In a village the slightest unusual
+bustle makes a riot. Everybody is curious to know the cause of the
+alarm, and whether the wheels of the world are running out of their
+orbit. In the middle of the great dusty market-place some stunted
+locust trees were hanging their faint, dried foliage, and from far off
+one could already see that underneath these miserable trees a tall,
+handsome, young man and a huge, plump dark-brown, growling bear were
+hugging each other.
+
+Joco, the bear-leader, was giving a performance. His voice rang like a
+bugle-horn, and, singing his melancholy songs, he from time to time
+interrupted himself and hurrahed, whereupon the bear began to spring
+and roar angrily. The two stamped their feet, holding close together,
+like two tipsy comrades. But the iron-weighted stick in the young
+man's hand made it evident that the gigantic beast was quite capable
+of causing trouble, and was only restrained from doing so because it
+had learnt from experience that the least outbreak never failed to
+bring down vengeance upon its back. The bear was a very powerful
+specimen from Bosnia, with thick brown fur and a head as broad as a
+bull's. When he lifted himself up on his hind legs he was half a head
+taller than Joco, his master.
+
+The villagers stood round them with anxious delight, and animated the
+bear with shouts of "Jump, Ibrahim! Hop, Ibrahim!" but nobody ventured
+to go near. Joco was no stranger to these people. After every harvest
+he visited the rich villages of Banat with his bear. They knew that he
+was a native of the frontier of Slavonia, and they were not
+particularly keen to know anything else about him. A man who leads
+such a vagrant life does not stay long in any one place, and has
+neither friends nor foes anywhere. They supposed that he spent part of
+the year in Bosnia, perhaps the winter, visiting, one after the other,
+the Servian monasteries. Now, in midsummer, when he was least to be
+expected, they suddenly hear his fife and drum.
+
+Ibrahim, the big old bear, roused the whole village in less than a
+quarter of an hour with his far-reaching growls. The dogs crouched
+horror-struck, their hair standing on end, barking at him in fear and
+trembling.
+
+When Joco stopped at some street corner, or in the market-place, and
+began to beat his rattling drum, the bear lifted himself with heavy
+groans on his hind legs, and then the great play began, the cruel
+amusement, the uncanny, fearful embracings which one could never be
+sure would not end fatally. For Joco is not satisfied to let Ibrahim
+jump and dance, but, whistling and singing, grasps the wild beast's
+skin, and squeezes his paws; and so the two dance together, the one
+roaring and groaning, the other singing with monotonous voice a
+melancholy song.
+
+The company of soldiers stationed in the village was just returning
+from drill, and Captain Winter, Ritter von Wallishausen, turned in
+curiosity his horse's head towards the crowd, and made a sign to
+Lieutenant Vig to lead the men on. His fiery half-blood Graditz horse
+snuffed the disgusting odor of the wild beast, and would go no nearer.
+
+The Captain called a hussar from the last line that passed him, and
+confided the stubborn horse to his charge. Then he bent his steps
+towards the swaying crowd. The villagers opened out a way for him, and
+soon the Captain stood close behind the bear-leader. But before he
+could fix his eyes on Ibrahim they were taken captive by something
+else.
+
+A few steps away from Joco a young girl sat upon the ground, gently
+stroking a light-colored little bear. They were both so huddled up
+together that the villagers scarcely noticed them, and the Captain was
+therefore all the better able to observe the young woman, who appeared
+to be withdrawing herself as much as possible from public gaze. And
+really she seemed to be an admirable young creature. She was slight of
+build, perhaps not yet fully developed, with the early ripeness of the
+Eastern beauty expressed in face and figure--a black cherry, at sight
+of which the mouth of such a gourmand as the Ritter von Wallishausen
+would naturally water! Her fine face seemed meant only to be the
+setting of her two black eyes. She wore a shirt of coarse linen, a
+frock of many-colored material, and a belt around her waist. Her
+beautifully formed bosom, covered only by the shirt, rose and fell in
+goddesslike shamelessness. A string of glass beads hung round her
+neck, and two long earrings tapped her cheeks at every movement. She
+made no effort to hide her bare feet, but now and then put back her
+untidy but beautiful black hair from her forehead and eyes; for it was
+so thick that if she did not do so she could not see.
+
+The girl felt that the Captain's fiery gaze was meant for her and not
+for the little bear. She became embarrassed, and instinctively turned
+her head away. Just at this moment Joco turned round with Ibrahim. The
+tall Servian peasant let the whistle fall from his hand, and the wild
+dance came to an end. Ibrahim understood that the performance was
+over, and, putting down his front paws on the ground, licked, as he
+panted, the strong iron bars of his muzzle.
+
+The Captain and Joco looked at each other. The powerful young
+bear-leader was as pale as death. He trembled as if something terrible
+had befallen him. Captain Winter looked at him searchingly. Where, he
+asked himself, had he met this man?
+
+The villagers did not understand what was going on, and began to
+shout, "Zorka! Now, Zorka, it is your turn with Mariska." The cries of
+the villagers brought Joco to himself, and with a motion worthy of a
+player he roused the little bear to its feet. Then he made signs to
+the girl. Being too excited to blow his whistle, he started singing
+and beating the drum; but his voice trembled so much that by and by he
+left off singing and let the girl go through her performance alone.
+
+Then the Captain saw something that wrought him up to ecstasy. Zorka
+was singing a sad Bosnian song in her tender, crooning voice, and
+dancing with graceful steps round the little bear, who, to tell the
+truth, also danced more lightly than the heavy Ibrahim, and was very
+amusing when he lifted his paw to his head as Hungarians do when they
+are in high spirits and break forth in hurrahs.
+
+Captain Winter, however, saw nothing but the fair maid, whose pearly
+white teeth shone out from between her red lips. He felt he would like
+to slip a silk ribbon round her waist, which swayed as lightly as a
+reed waving to and fro in the wind, and lead her off as if she were a
+beautiful colored butterfly.
+
+Zorka grew tired of the sad, melancholy song, and began to dance
+wildly and passionately. Perhaps her natural feminine vanity was
+roused within her, and she wanted to show off at her best before the
+handsome soldier. Her eyes sparkled; a flush spread from time to time
+over her face; with her sweet voice she animated the little bear,
+crying, "Mariska, Mariska, jump!" But after a while she seemed to
+forget the growling little creature altogether, and went on dancing a
+kind of graceful fandango of her own invention. As she swayed, it
+seemed as if the motion and excitement caused every fiber of her body
+to flash out a sort of electric glow. By the time the girl flung
+herself, quite exhausted, in the dust at his feet, Captain Winter was
+absolutely beside himself. Such a morsel of heavenly daintiness did
+not often drop in his path now that he was fasting in this purgatory
+of a village. His stay there had been one long Lent, during which joys
+and pleasures had been rare indeed.
+
+It began to grow dark. At the other end of the market-place several
+officers were on their way to supper at the village inn where they
+always messed. The Captain turned to the man and woman in possession
+of the bears and ordered them in no friendly tone to go with him to
+the inn as his guests. Joco bowed humbly like a culprit, and gloomily
+led on his comrade Ibrahim. Zorka, on the contrary, looked gay as she
+walked along beside the light-colored bear.
+
+The Captain looked again and again at the bear-leader walking in front
+of him. "Where have I seen this fellow before?" he kept asking
+himself. His uncertainty did not last long. His face brightened. "Oh,
+yes; I remember!" he inwardly exclaimed. Now he felt sure that this
+black cherry of Bosnia, this girl with the waist of a dragonfly, was
+his.
+
+The inn, once a gentleman's country-house, was built of stone. The
+bears were lodged in a little room which used to serve the former
+owner of the house as pantry, and were chained to the strong iron
+lattice of the window. In one corner of this little room the landlord
+ordered one of his servants to make a good bed of straw. "The Captain
+will pay for it," he said.
+
+When everything was ready in the little room, the Captain called Joco
+and took him there. He knew that what he was going to do was not
+chivalrous; but he had already worked himself up to a blaze of
+excitement over the game he meant to play, and this fellow was too
+stupid to understand what a hazardous piece of play it was. When they
+were alone he stood erect before the bear-leader and looked fixedly
+into his eyes.
+
+"You are Joco Hics," he said; "two years ago you deserted from my
+regiment."
+
+The strong, tall, young peasant began to tremble so that his knees
+knocked together, but could not answer a single word. Fritz Winter,
+Ritter von Wallishausen, whispered into Joco's ear, his speech
+agitated and stuttering: "You have a woman with you," he said, "who
+surely is not your wife. Set her free. I will buy her from you for any
+price you ask. You can go away with your bears and pluck yourself
+another such flower where you found this one."
+
+Joco stood motionless for a while as if turned into stone.
+
+He did not tremble any longer: the crisis was over. He had only been
+frightened as long as he was uncertain whether or not he would be
+instantly hanged if he were found out.
+
+"In all Bosnia," he answered gloomily, "there was only one such flower
+and that I stole."
+
+Before a man who was willing to share his guilt, he dared acknowledge
+his crime. In truth, this man was no better than himself. He only wore
+finer clothes.
+
+The Captain became impatient. "Are you going to give her up, or not?"
+he asked. "I do not want to harm you; but I could put you in prison
+and in chains, and what would become of your sweetheart then?"
+
+Joco answered proudly: "She would cry her eyes out for me; otherwise
+she would not have run away from her rich father's house for my sake."
+
+Ah! thought the Captain, if it were only that! By degrees I could win
+her to me.
+
+But it was not advisable to make a fuss, whether for the sake of his
+position or because of his wife, who lived in town.
+
+"Joco, I tell you what," said the Captain, suddenly becoming calm. "I
+am going away now for a short time. I shall be gone about an hour. By
+that time everybody will be in bed. The officers who sup with me, and
+the innkeeper and his servants, will all be sound asleep. I give you
+this time to think it over. When I come back you will either hold out
+your hand to be chained or to receive a pile of gold in it. In the
+meantime I shall lock you in there, because I know how very apt you
+are to disappear." He went out, and turned the key twice in the lock.
+Joco was left alone.
+
+When the hour had expired Captain Winter noisily opened the door. His
+eyes sparkled from the strong wine he had taken during supper, as well
+as from the exquisite expectation which made his blood boil.
+
+Joco stood smiling submissively before him. "I have thought it over,
+sir," he said. "I will speak with the little Zorka about it."
+
+Ritter Winter now forgot that he was speaking with a deserter, whom it
+was his duty to arrest. He held out his hand joyfully to the Bosnian
+peasant, and said encouragingly: "Go speak with her; but make haste.
+Go instantly."
+
+They crept together to the pantry where the girl slept near the
+chained bears. Joco opened the door without making a sound, and
+slipped in. It seemed to the Captain that he heard whispering inside.
+These few moments seemed an eternity to him. At last the bear-leader
+reappeared and, nodding to the Captain, said: "Sir, you are expected."
+
+Captain Winter had undoubtedly taken too much wine. He staggered as he
+entered the pantry, the door of which the bear-leader shut and locked
+directly he had entered. He then listened with such an expression on
+his face as belongs only to a born bandit. Almost immediately a
+growling was heard, and directly afterwards some terrible swearing and
+a fall. The growling grew stronger and stronger. At last it ended in a
+wild roar. A desperate cry disturbed the stillness of the night:
+"Help! help!"
+
+In the yard and round about it the dogs woke up, and with terrible
+yelping ran towards the pantry, where the roaring of the bear grew
+ever wilder and more powerful. The rattling of the chain and the cries
+of the girl mingled with Ibrahim's growling. The neighbors began to
+wake up. Human voices, confused questionings, were heard. The
+inn-keeper and his servants appeared on the scene in their night
+clothes, but, hearing the terrible roaring, fled again into security.
+The Captain's cries for help became weaker and weaker. And now Joco
+took his iron stake, which he always kept by him, opened the door, and
+at one bound was at the side of the wild beast. His voice sounded
+again like thunder, and the iron stick fell with a thud on the bear's
+back. Ibrahim had smelt blood. Beneath his paws a man's mangled body
+was writhing. The beast could hardly be made to let go his prey. In
+the light that came through the small window, Joco soon found the
+chain from which not long before he had freed Ibrahim, and with a
+swift turn he put the muzzle over the beast's jaws. It was done in a
+twinkling. During this time Zorka had been running up and down the
+empty yard, crying in vain for help. Nobody had dared come near.
+
+The following day Captain Fritz Winter, Ritter von Wallishausen, was
+lying between burning wax candles upon his bier. Nobody could be made
+responsible for the terrible accident. Why did he go to the bears when
+he was not sober?
+
+But that very day the siren of Bosnia danced her wild dance again in
+the next village, and with her sweet, melodious voice urged the
+light-colored little bear: "Mariska, jump, jump!"
+
+
+
+ARTHUR ELCK
+
+
+_THE TOWER ROOM_
+
+
+There were many wonderful things that aroused our childish fantasy,
+when Balint Orzo and I were boys, but none so much as the old tower
+that stands a few feet from the castle, shadowy and mysterious. It is
+an old, curious, square tower, and at the brink of its notched edge
+there is a shingled helmet which was erected by one of the late Orzos.
+
+There is many and many a legend told about this old tower. A rumor
+exists that it has a secret chamber into which none is permitted to
+enter, except the head of the family. Some great secret is concealed
+in the tower-room, and when the first-born son of the Orzo family
+becomes of age his father takes him there and reveals it. And the
+effect of the revelation is such that every young man who enters that
+room comes out with gray hair.
+
+As to what the secret might be, there was much conjecturing. One
+legend had it that once some Orzo imprisoned his enemies in the tower
+and starved them until the unfortunates ate each other in their crazed
+suffering.
+
+According to another story Kelemen Orzo ordered his faithless wife
+Krisztina Olaszi to be plastered into the wall of the room. Every
+night since, sobbing is heard from the tower.
+
+Another runs that every hundred years a child with a dog's face is
+born in the Orzo family and that this little monster has to perish in
+the tower-room, so as to hide the disgrace of the family.
+
+Another conjecture was that once the notorious Menyhart Orzo, who was
+supreme under King Rudolph in the castle, played a game of checkers
+with his neighbor, Boldizsar Zomolnoky. They commenced to play on a
+Monday and continued the game and drank all week until Sunday morning
+dawned upon them. Then Menyhart Orzo's confessor came and pleaded with
+the gamblers. He begged them to stop the game on the holy day of
+Sunday, when all true Christians are in church praising the Lord. But
+Menyhart, bringing his fist down on the table in such rage that all
+the wine glasses and bottles danced, cried: "And if we have to sit
+here till the world comes to an end, we won't stop till we have
+finished this game!"
+
+Scarcely had he uttered his vow when, somewhere from the earth, or
+from the wall, a thundering voice was heard promising to take him at
+his word--that they would continue playing till the end of the world.
+And ever since, the checkers are heard rattling, and the two damned
+souls are still playing the game in the tower-room.
+
+When we were boys, the secret did not give us any rest, and we were
+always discussing and plotting as to how we could discover it. We made
+at least a hundred various plans, but all failed. It was an
+impossibility to get into the tower, because of a heavy iron-barred
+oaken door. The windows were too high to be reached. We had to satisfy
+ourselves with throwing a well-aimed stone, which hit the room through
+the window. Such an achievement was somewhat of a success, for
+oftentimes we drove out an alarmed flock of birds.
+
+One day I decided that the best way would be to find out the secret of
+the tower from Balint's father himself. "He is the head of the
+family," I thought, "and if any light is to be had on the mystery, it
+is through him." But Balint didn't like the idea of approaching the
+old man; he knew his father's temper.
+
+However, once he ventured the question, but he was sorry for it
+afterwards, for the older Orzo flew into a passion, and scolded and
+raged, ending by telling him that he must not listen to such
+nursery-tales; that the tower was moldering and decaying with age;
+that the floor timbers and staircase were so infirm that it would fall
+to pieces should anyone approach it; and that this was why no one
+could gain admittance.
+
+For a long time afterwards neither of us spoke of it.
+
+But curiosity was incessantly working within us, and one evening
+Balint solemnly vowed to me that as soon as he became of age and had
+looked into the room, he would call for me, should I be even at the
+end of the world, and would let me into the secret. In order to make
+it more solemn, we called this a "blood-contract."
+
+With this vow we parted. My parents sent me to college; Balint had a
+private tutor and was kept at home in the castle. After that we only
+met at vacation time.
+
+Eight years passed before I saw the Orzo home again. At Balint's
+urgent, sudden invitation I had hurriedly journeyed back to my rocky
+fatherland.
+
+I had scarcely stepped on the wide stone stairway leading from the
+terrace in the front of the castle, when someone shouted that the
+honorable master was near! He came galloping in on a foaming horse. I
+looked at him and started, as if I had seen a ghost, for this thin,
+tall rider was the perfect resemblance of his father. The same knotty
+hair and bearded head, the same densely furrowed face, the same deep,
+calm, gray eyes. And his hair and beard were almost as white as his
+father's!
+
+He came galloping through the gate, pulled the bridle with a sudden
+jerk, and the next moment was on the paving; then with one bound he
+reached the terrace, and had me in his strong arms. With wild
+eagerness he showed me into the castle and at the same time kept
+talking and questioning me without ceasing. Then he thrust me into my
+room and declared that he gave me fifteen minutes--no more--to dress.
+
+The time had not even expired, when he came, like a whirlwind,
+embraced me again and carried me into the dining-room. There
+chandeliers and lamps were already lit; the table was elaborately
+decorated, and bore plenty of wine.
+
+At the meal he spoke again. Nervously jerking out his words, he was
+continually questioning me on one subject and then another, without
+waiting for the answer. He laughed often and harshly. When we came to
+the drinking, he winked to the servants, and immediately five Czigany
+musicians entered the room. Balint noticed the astonishment on my
+face, and half evasively said:
+
+"I have sent to Iglo for them in honor of you. Let the music sound,
+and the wine flow; who knows when we will see each other again?"
+
+He put his face into his palm. The Cziganys played old Magyar songs.
+Balint glanced at me now and then, and filled the glasses; we clinked
+them together, but he always seemed to be worried.
+
+It was dawning. The soft sound of a church bell rose to us. Balint put
+his hand on my shoulder and bent to my ear.
+
+"Do you know how my father died?" he asked in a husky voice. "He
+killed himself."
+
+I looked at him with amazement; I wanted to speak, but he shook his
+head, and grasped my hand.
+
+"Do you remember my father?" he asked me. Of course; while I looked at
+him it seemed as if his father were standing before me. The very
+fibrous, skinny figure, the muscles and flesh seeming peeled off. Even
+through his coat arm I felt the naked, unveiled nerves.
+
+"I always admired and honored my father, but we were never true
+intimates; I knew that he loved me, but I felt as if it was not for my
+own sake; as if he loved something in my soul that was strange to me.
+I never saw him smile; sometimes he was so harsh that I was afraid of
+him; at another time he was unmanageable."
+
+"I did not understand him, but the older I became the better did I
+feel that there was a sad secret germinating in the bottom of his
+soul, where it grew like a spreading tree, the branches of which crept
+up to the castle and covered the walls, little by little overshadowed
+the sunlight, absorbed the air, and darkened everyone's heart. I
+gritted my teeth in vain; I could not work; I could not start to
+accomplish anything. I struggled with hundreds and hundreds of
+determinations; to-day I prepared for this or that; to-morrow for
+something else; ambition pressed me within; I could not make up my
+mind. Behind every resolution I made, I noticed my father's
+countenance, like a note of interrogation. The old fables that we
+heard together in our childhood were renewed in my memory. Little by
+little the thought grew within me, like a fixed delusion, that my
+father's fatal secret was locked up in the tower room. After that I
+lived by the calendar and dwelt on the passing of time on the clock.
+And when the sun that shone on me when I was born arose the
+twenty-fourth time, I pressed my hand on my heart and entered my
+father's room--this very room.
+
+"'Father,' I said, 'I became of age to-day, everything may be opened
+before me, and I am at liberty to know everything.' Father looked at
+me and pondered over this.
+
+"'Oh, yes!' he whispered, 'this is the day.'
+
+"'I may know everything now,' continued I; 'I am not afraid of any
+secrets. In the name of our family tradition, I beg of you, please
+open the tower-room.'
+
+"Father raised his hand, as if he wanted to make me become silent. His
+face was as white as a ghost.
+
+"'Very well,' he murmured, 'I will open the tower-room for you.'
+
+"And then he pulled off his coat, tore his shirt on his breast, and
+pointed to his heart.
+
+"'Here is the tower-room, my boy!' did he whisper in a husky voice.
+'Here is the tower-room, and within our family secret. Do you see it?'
+
+"That is all he said, but when I looked at him I immediately perceived
+the secret; everything was clear before me and I had a presentiment
+that something was nearing its end, something about to break.
+
+"Father walked up and down; and then he stopped and pointed to this
+picture; to this very picture.
+
+"'Did you ever thoroughly look at your ancestors? They are all from
+the Orzos. If you scrutinize their faces you will recognize in them
+your father, yourself, and your grandfather; and if you ever read
+their documents, which were left to us--there they are in the
+box--then you will know that they are just the same material as we
+are. Their way of thinking was the same as ours and so were their
+desires, their wills, their lives, and deaths. We had among them
+soldiers, clergymen, scientists, but not even one great, celebrated
+man, although their talent, their strength almost tore them asunder.
+
+"'In every one of them the family curse took root: not one of them
+could be a great man, neither my father nor yours.'
+
+"Then I felt as if something horrible was coming from his lips. My
+breath almost ceased. Father did not finish what he was going to say,
+but stopped and listened for a minute.
+
+"'I was my father's only hope,' he went on after a while; 'I too was
+born talented and prepared for great things, but the Orzos' destiny
+overtook me, and you see now what became of me. I looked into the
+tower-room. You know what it contains? You know what the name of our
+secret is? He who saw this secret lost faith in himself. For him it
+would have been better not to have come into this world at all. But I
+loved to live and did not want to abandon all my hopes. I married your
+mother; she consoled me until you were born, and then I regained my
+delight in life. I knew what I had to keep before my eyes to bring up
+my son to be such a man as his father could not be.
+
+"'I acquiesced when you left for the foreign countries; then your
+letters came. I made a special study of every sentence and of every
+word of it, for I did not want to trust my reason. I thought the first
+time that the fault was in me; that I saw unnecessary phantoms. But it
+wasn't so, for what I read out of your words was our destiny, the
+curse of the Orzos; from the way of your thinking, I found out that
+everything is in vain; you too turned your head backward, you too
+looked into yourself and noticed there the thing that makes the
+perceiver sterile forever. You did not even notice what you have done;
+you could not grasp it with your reason, but the poison is already
+within you.'
+
+"'It cannot be, father!' I broke out, terrified.
+
+"But he sadly shook his head. 'I am old; I cannot believe in anything
+now. I wish you were right, and would never come to know what I know.
+God bless you, my son; it is getting late, and I am getting tired.'
+
+"It struck me that he was trying to cover his disbelief with sarcasm.
+Both of us were without sleep that night. At dawn there was silence in
+his room. I bitterly thought, 'When will I go to rest?' When I went
+into his room in the morning he was lying in his bed. All was over. He
+had taken poison, and written his farewell on a piece of paper. His
+last wish was that no one should ever know under what circumstances he
+died."
+
+Balint left off speaking and gazed with outstretched eyes toward the
+window in the darkness. I slowly went to him and put my hand upon his
+shoulder. He started at my touch.
+
+"I more than once thought of the woman who could be the mother of my
+son. How many times have I been tempted to fulfill my father's last
+wish! But at such a time it has always come to my mind that I too
+might have such a son, who would cast into his father's teeth that he
+was a coward and a selfish man; that he sacrificed a life for his
+illusive hopes.
+
+"No! I won't do it. I won't do it. I am the last of the Orzos. With me
+this damned family will die out. My fathers were cowards and rascals.
+I do not want anybody to curse my memory."
+
+I kissed Balint's wet forehead; I knew that this was the last time I
+would see him. The next day I left the castle, and the day after, his
+death was made public. He committed suicide, like his father. He was
+the last Orzo, and I turned about the coat of arms above his head.
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Continental Classics, Volume
+XVIII., Mystery Tales, by Various
+
+*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MYSTERIES ***
+
+***** This file should be named 12144.txt or 12144.zip *****
+This and all associated files of various formats will be found in:
+        https://www.gutenberg.org/1/2/1/4/12144/
+
+Produced by Charles Aldarondo, Project Manager; Keith M. Eckrich,
+Post-Proofer; the Online Distributed Proofreaders Team
+
+
+Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions
+will be renamed.
+
+Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no
+one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation
+(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without
+permission and without paying copyright royalties.  Special rules,
+set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to
+copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to
+protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark.  Project
+Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you
+charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission.  If you
+do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the
+rules is very easy.  You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose
+such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and
+research.  They may be modified and printed and given away--you may do
+practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks.  Redistribution is
+subject to the trademark license, especially commercial
+redistribution.
+
+
+
+*** START: FULL LICENSE ***
+
+THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE
+PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK
+
+To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free
+distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work
+(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project
+Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project
+Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at
+https://gutenberg.org/license).
+
+
+Section 1.  General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm
+electronic works
+
+1.A.  By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm
+electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to
+and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property
+(trademark/copyright) agreement.  If you do not agree to abide by all
+the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy
+all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession.
+If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project
+Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the
+terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or
+entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8.
+
+1.B.  "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark.  It may only be
+used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who
+agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement.  There are a few
+things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works
+even without complying with the full terms of this agreement.  See
+paragraph 1.C below.  There are a lot of things you can do with Project
+Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement
+and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic
+works.  See paragraph 1.E below.
+
+1.C.  The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the Foundation"
+or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project
+Gutenberg-tm electronic works.  Nearly all the individual works in the
+collection are in the public domain in the United States.  If an
+individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you are
+located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent you from
+copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative
+works based on the work as long as all references to Project Gutenberg
+are removed.  Of course, we hope that you will support the Project
+Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic works by
+freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with the terms of
+this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with
+the work.  You can easily comply with the terms of this agreement by
+keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project
+Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with others.
+
+1.D.  The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern
+what you can do with this work.  Copyright laws in most countries are in
+a constant state of change.  If you are outside the United States, check
+the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement
+before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing or
+creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project
+Gutenberg-tm work.  The Foundation makes no representations concerning
+the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United
+States.
+
+1.E.  Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg:
+
+1.E.1.  The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate
+access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently
+whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the
+phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the phrase "Project
+Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed,
+copied or distributed:
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+1.E.2.  If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived
+from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is
+posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied
+and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees
+or charges.  If you are redistributing or providing access to a work
+with the phrase "Project Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the
+work, you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1
+through 1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the
+Project Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or
+1.E.9.
+
+1.E.3.  If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted
+with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution
+must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional
+terms imposed by the copyright holder.  Additional terms will be linked
+to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the
+permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work.
+
+1.E.4.  Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm
+License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this
+work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm.
+
+1.E.5.  Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this
+electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without
+prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with
+active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project
+Gutenberg-tm License.
+
+1.E.6.  You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary,
+compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any
+word processing or hypertext form.  However, if you provide access to or
+distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other than
+"Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official version
+posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site (www.gutenberg.org),
+you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense to the user, provide a
+copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of obtaining a copy upon
+request, of the work in its original "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other
+form.  Any alternate format must include the full Project Gutenberg-tm
+License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1.
+
+1.E.7.  Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying,
+performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works
+unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9.
+
+1.E.8.  You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing
+access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided
+that
+
+- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from
+     the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method
+     you already use to calculate your applicable taxes.  The fee is
+     owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he
+     has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the
+     Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation.  Royalty payments
+     must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you
+     prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax
+     returns.  Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and
+     sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the
+     address specified in Section 4, "Information about donations to
+     the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation."
+
+- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies
+     you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he
+     does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm
+     License.  You must require such a user to return or
+     destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium
+     and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of
+     Project Gutenberg-tm works.
+
+- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any
+     money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the
+     electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days
+     of receipt of the work.
+
+- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free
+     distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works.
+
+1.E.9.  If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm
+electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set
+forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from
+both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael
+Hart, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark.  Contact the
+Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below.
+
+1.F.
+
+1.F.1.  Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable
+effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread
+public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm
+collection.  Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic
+works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may contain
+"Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or
+corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other intellectual
+property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or other medium, a
+computer virus, or computer codes that damage or cannot be read by
+your equipment.
+
+1.F.2.  LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right
+of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project
+Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project
+Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project
+Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all
+liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal
+fees.  YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT
+LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE
+PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH F3.  YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE
+TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE
+LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR
+INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH
+DAMAGE.
+
+1.F.3.  LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a
+defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can
+receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a
+written explanation to the person you received the work from.  If you
+received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with
+your written explanation.  The person or entity that provided you with
+the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a
+refund.  If you received the work electronically, the person or entity
+providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to
+receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund.  If the second copy
+is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further
+opportunities to fix the problem.
+
+1.F.4.  Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth
+in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS' WITH NO OTHER
+WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO
+WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTIBILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE.
+
+1.F.5.  Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied
+warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages.
+If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the
+law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be
+interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by
+the applicable state law.  The invalidity or unenforceability of any
+provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions.
+
+1.F.6.  INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the
+trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone
+providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance
+with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production,
+promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works,
+harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees,
+that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do
+or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm
+work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any
+Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause.
+
+
+Section  2.  Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm
+
+Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of
+electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers
+including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers.  It exists
+because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from
+people in all walks of life.
+
+Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the
+assistance they need, is critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's
+goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will
+remain freely available for generations to come.  In 2001, the Project
+Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure
+and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations.
+To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation
+and how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4
+and the Foundation web page at https://www.pglaf.org.
+
+
+Section 3.  Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive
+Foundation
+
+The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit
+501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the
+state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal
+Revenue Service.  The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification
+number is 64-6221541.  Its 501(c)(3) letter is posted at
+https://pglaf.org/fundraising.  Contributions to the Project Gutenberg
+Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent
+permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state's laws.
+
+The Foundation's principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S.
+Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered
+throughout numerous locations.  Its business office is located at
+809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887, email
+business@pglaf.org.  Email contact links and up to date contact
+information can be found at the Foundation's web site and official
+page at https://pglaf.org
+
+For additional contact information:
+     Dr. Gregory B. Newby
+     Chief Executive and Director
+     gbnewby@pglaf.org
+
+Section 4.  Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg
+Literary Archive Foundation
+
+Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide
+spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of
+increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be
+freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest
+array of equipment including outdated equipment.  Many small donations
+($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt
+status with the IRS.
+
+The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating
+charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United
+States.  Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a
+considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up
+with these requirements.  We do not solicit donations in locations
+where we have not received written confirmation of compliance.  To
+SEND DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any
+particular state visit https://pglaf.org
+
+While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we
+have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition
+against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who
+approach us with offers to donate.
+
+International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make
+any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from
+outside the United States.  U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff.
+
+Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation
+methods and addresses.  Donations are accepted in a number of other
+ways including including checks, online payments and credit card
+donations.  To donate, please visit: https://pglaf.org/donate
+
+
+Section 5.  General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic
+works.
+
+Professor Michael S. Hart was the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm
+concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared
+with anyone.  For thirty years, he produced and distributed Project
+Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support.
+
+Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed
+editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S.
+unless a copyright notice is included.  Thus, we do not necessarily
+keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition.
+
+Each eBook is in a subdirectory of the same number as the eBook's
+eBook number, often in several formats including plain vanilla ASCII,
+compressed (zipped), HTML and others.
+
+Corrected EDITIONS of our eBooks replace the old file and take over
+the old filename and etext number.  The replaced older file is renamed.
+VERSIONS based on separate sources are treated as new eBooks receiving
+new filenames and etext numbers.
+
+Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility:
+
+     https://www.gutenberg.org
+
+This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm,
+including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary
+Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to
+subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks.
+
+EBooks posted prior to November 2003, with eBook numbers BELOW #10000,
+are filed in directories based on their release date.  If you want to
+download any of these eBooks directly, rather than using the regular
+search system you may utilize the following addresses and just
+download by the etext year.
+
+     https://www.gutenberg.org/etext06
+
+    (Or /etext 05, 04, 03, 02, 01, 00, 99,
+     98, 97, 96, 95, 94, 93, 92, 92, 91 or 90)
+
+EBooks posted since November 2003, with etext numbers OVER #10000, are
+filed in a different way.  The year of a release date is no longer part
+of the directory path.  The path is based on the etext number (which is
+identical to the filename).  The path to the file is made up of single
+digits corresponding to all but the last digit in the filename.  For
+example an eBook of filename 10234 would be found at:
+
+     https://www.gutenberg.org/1/0/2/3/10234
+
+or filename 24689 would be found at:
+     https://www.gutenberg.org/2/4/6/8/24689
+
+An alternative method of locating eBooks:
+     https://www.gutenberg.org/GUTINDEX.ALL
+
+
diff --git a/old/12144.zip b/old/12144.zip
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..e77f2f8
--- /dev/null
+++ b/old/12144.zip