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+*****The Project Gutenberg Etext of Mother, by Maxim Gorky*****
+#4 in our series by Maxim Gorky
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+Title: Mother
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+Author: Maxim Gorky
+
+Release Date: February, 2003  [Etext #3783]
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+[The actual date this file first posted = 09/04/01]
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+Edition: 10
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+Language: English
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+******The Project Gutenberg Etext of Mother, by Maxim Gorky*****
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+
+
+MOTHER
+
+by Maxim Gorky
+
+
+
+
+
+PART I
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+
+Every day the factory whistle bellowed forth its shrill, roaring,
+trembling noises into the smoke-begrimed and greasy atmosphere of
+the workingmen's suburb; and obedient to the summons of the power of
+steam, people poured out of little gray houses into the street.
+With somber faces they hastened forward like frightened roaches,
+their muscles stiff from insufficient sleep.  In the chill morning
+twilight they walked through the narrow, unpaved street to the tall
+stone cage that waited for them with cold assurance, illumining
+their muddy road with scores of greasy, yellow, square eyes.  The
+mud plashed under their feet as if in mocking commiseration.  Hoarse
+exclamations of sleepy voices were heard; irritated, peevish,
+abusive language rent the air with malice; and, to welcome the
+people, deafening sounds floated about--the heavy whir of machinery,
+the dissatisfied snort of steam.  Stern and somber, the black
+chimneys stretched their huge, thick sticks high above the village.
+
+In the evening, when the sun was setting, and red rays languidly
+glimmered upon the windows of the houses, the factory ejected its
+people like burned-out ashes, and again they walked through the
+streets, with black, smoke-covered faces, radiating the sticky odor
+of machine oil, and showing the gleam of hungry teeth.  But now
+there was animation in their voices, and even gladness.  The
+servitude of hard toil was over for the day.  Supper awaited them
+at home, and respite.
+
+The day was swallowed up by the factory; the machine sucked out of
+men's muscles as much vigor as it needed.  The day was blotted out
+from life, not a trace of it left.  Man made another imperceptible
+step toward his grave; but he saw close before him the delights of
+rest, the joys of the odorous tavern, and he was satisfied.
+
+On holidays the workers slept until about ten o'clock.  Then the
+staid and married people dressed themselves in their best clothes
+and, after duly scolding the young folks for their indifference to
+church, went to hear mass.  When they returned from church, they
+ate pirogs, the Russian national pastry, and again lay down to
+sleep until the evening.  The accumulated exhaustion of years had
+robbed them of their appetites, and to be able to eat they drank,
+long and deep, goading on their feeble stomachs with the biting,
+burning lash of vodka.
+
+In the evening they amused themselves idly on the street; and those
+who had overshoes put them on, even if it was dry, and those who had
+umbrellas carried them, even if the sun was shining.  Not everybody
+has overshoes and an umbrella, but everybody desires in some way,
+however small, to appear more important than his neighbor.
+
+Meeting one another they spoke about the factory and the machines,
+had their fling against their foreman, conversed and thought only of
+matters closely and manifestly connected with their work.  Only
+rarely, and then but faintly, did solitary sparks of impotent
+thought glimmer in the wearisome monotony of their talk.  Returning
+home they quarreled with their wives, and often beat them, unsparing
+of their fists.  The young people sat in the taverns, or enjoyed
+evening parties at one another's houses, played the accordion, sang
+vulgar songs devoid of beauty, danced, talked ribaldry, and drank.
+
+Exhausted with toil, men drank swiftly, and in every heart there
+awoke and grew an incomprehensible, sickly irritation.  It demanded
+an outlet.  Clutching tenaciously at every pretext for unloading
+themselves of this disquieting sensation, they fell on one another
+for mere trifles, with the spiteful ferocity of beasts, breaking
+into bloody quarrels which sometimes ended in serious injury and on
+rare occasions even in murder.
+
+This lurking malice steadily increased, inveterate as the incurable
+weariness in their muscles.  They were born with this disease of the
+soul inherited from their fathers.  Like a black shadow it
+accompanied them to their graves, spurring on their lives to crime,
+hideous in its aimless cruelty and brutality.
+
+On holidays the young people came home late at night, dirty and
+dusty, their clothes torn, their faces bruised, boasting maliciously
+of the blows they had struck their companions, or the insults they
+had inflicted upon them; enraged or in tears over the indignities
+they themselves had suffered; drunken and piteous, unfortunate and
+repulsive.  Sometimes the boys would be brought home by the mother
+or the father, who had picked them up in the street or in a tavern,
+drunk to insensibility.  The parents scolded and swore at them
+peevishly, and beat their spongelike bodies, soaked with liquor;
+then more or less systematically put them to bed, in order to rouse
+them to work early next morning, when the bellow of the whistle
+should sullenly course through the air.
+
+They scolded and beat the children soundly, notwithstanding the fact
+that drunkenness and brawls among young folk appeared perfectly
+legitimate to the old people.  When they were young they, too, had
+drunk and fought; they, too, had been beaten by their mothers and
+fathers.  Life had always been like that.  It flowed on monotonously
+and slowly somewhere down the muddy, turbid stream, year after year;
+and it was all bound up in strong ancient customs and habits that
+led them to do one and the same thing day in and day out.  None of
+them, it seemed, had either the time or the desire to attempt to
+change this state of life.
+
+Once in a long while a stranger would come to the village.  At first
+he attracted attention merely because he was a stranger.  Then he
+aroused a light, superficial interest by the stories of the places
+where he had worked.  Afterwards the novelty wore off, the people
+got used to him, and he remained unnoticed.  From his stories it was
+clear that the life of the workingmen was the same everywhere.  And
+if so, then what was there to talk about?
+
+Occasionally, however, some stranger spoke curious things never
+heard of in the suburb.  The men did not argue with him, but
+listened to his odd speeches with incredulity.  His words aroused
+blind irritation in some, perplexed alarm in others, while still
+others were disturbed by a feeble, shadowy glimmer of the hope of
+something, they knew not what.  And they all began to drink more in
+order to drive away the unnecessary, meddlesome excitement.
+
+Noticing in the stranger something unusual, the villagers cherished
+it long against him and treated the man who was not like them with
+unaccountable apprehension.  It was as if they feared he would throw
+something into their life which would disturb its straight, dismal
+course.  Sad and difficult, it was yet even in its tenor.  People
+were accustomed to the fact that life always oppressed them with the
+same power.  Unhopeful of any turn for the better, they regarded
+every change as capable only of increasing their burden.
+
+And the workingmen of the suburb tacitly avoided people who spoke
+unusual things to them.  Then these people disappeared again, going
+off elsewhere, and those who remained in the factory lived apart, if
+they could not blend and make one whole with the monotonous mass in
+the village.
+
+Living a life like that for some fifty years, a workman died.
+
+
+Thus also lived Michael Vlasov, a gloomy, sullen man, with little
+eyes which looked at everybody from under his thick eyebrows
+suspiciously, with a mistrustful, evil smile.  He was the best
+locksmith in the factory, and the strongest man in the village.  But
+he was insolent and disrespectful toward the foreman and the
+superintendent, and therefore earned little; every holiday he beat
+somebody, and everyone disliked and feared him.
+
+More than one attempt was made to beat him in turn, but without
+success.  When Vlasov found himself threatened with attack, he
+caught a stone in his hand, or a piece of wood or iron, and
+spreading out his legs stood waiting in silence for the enemy.  His
+face overgrown with a dark beard from his eyes to his neck, and his
+hands thickly covered with woolly hair, inspired everybody with
+fear.  People were especially afraid of his eyes.  Small and keen,
+they seemed to bore through a man like steel gimlets, and everyone
+who met their gaze felt he was confronting a beast, a savage power,
+inaccessible to fear, ready to strike unmercifully.
+
+"Well, pack off, dirty vermin!" he said gruffly.  His coarse, yellow
+teeth glistened terribly through the thick hair on his face.  The
+men walked off uttering coward abuse.
+
+"Dirty vermin!" he snapped at them, and his eyes gleamed with a smile
+sharp as an awl.  Then holding his head in an attitude of direct
+challenge, with a short, thick pipe between his teeth, he walked
+behind them, and now and then called out:  "Well, who wants death?"
+
+No one wanted it.
+
+He spoke little, and "dirty vermin" was his favorite expression.
+It was the name he used for the authorities of the factory, and
+the police, and it was the epithet with which he addressed his wife:
+"Look, you dirty vermin, don't you see my clothes are torn?"
+
+When Pavel, his son, was a boy of fourteen, Vlasov was one day
+seized with the desire to pull him by the hair once more.  But Pavel
+grasped a heavy hammer, and said curtly:
+
+"Don't touch me!"
+
+"What!" demanded his father, bending over the tall, slender figure
+of his son like a shadow on a birch tree.
+
+"Enough!" said Pavel.  "I am not going to give myself up any more."
+
+And opening his dark eyes wide, he waved the hammer in the air.
+
+His father looked at him, folded his shaggy hands on his back, and,
+smiling, said:
+
+"All right."  Then he drew a heavy breath and added:  "Ah, you
+dirty vermin!"
+
+Shortly after this he said to his wife:
+
+"Don't ask me for money any more.  Pasha will feed you now."
+
+"And you will drink up everything?" she ventured to ask.
+
+"None of your business, dirty vermin!"  From that time, for three
+years, until his death, he did not notice, and did not speak to his son.
+
+Vlasov had a dog as big and shaggy as himself.  She accompanied him
+to the factory every morning, and every evening she waited for him
+at the gate.  On holidays Vlasov started off on his round of the
+taverns.  He walked in silence, and stared into people's faces as if
+looking for somebody.  His dog trotted after him the whole day long.
+Returning home drunk he sat down to supper, and gave his dog to eat
+from his own bowl.  He never beat her, never scolded, and never
+petted her.  After supper he flung the dishes from the table--if his
+wife was not quick enough to remove them in time--put a bottle of
+whisky before him, and leaning his back against the wall, began in a
+hoarse voice that spread anguish about him to bawl a song, his mouth
+wide open and his eyes closed.  The doleful sounds got entangled in
+his mustache, knocking off the crumbs of bread.  He smoothed down
+the hair of his beard and mustache with his thick fingers and sang--
+sang unintelligible words, long drawn out.  The melody recalled the
+wintry howl of wolves.  He sang as long as there was whisky in the
+bottle, then he dropped on his side upon the bench, or let his head
+sink on the table, and slept in this way until the whistle began to
+blow.  The dog lay at his side.
+
+When he died, he died hard.  For five days, turned all black, he
+rolled in his bed, gnashing his teeth, his eyes tightly closed.
+Sometimes he would say to his wife:  "Give me arsenic.  Poison me."
+
+She called a physician.  He ordered hot poultices, but said an
+operation was necessary and the patient must be taken at once to
+the hospital.
+
+"Go to the devil!  I will die by myself, dirty vermin!" said Michael.
+
+And when the physician had left, and his wife with tears in her
+eyes began to insist on an operation, he clenched his fists and
+announced threateningly:
+
+"Don't you dare!  It will be worse for you if I get well."
+
+He died in the morning at the moment when the whistle called the
+men to work.  He lay in the coffin with open mouth, his eyebrows
+knit as if in a scowl.  He was buried by his wife, his son, the dog,
+an old drunkard and thief, Daniel Vyesovshchikov, a discharged
+smelter, and a few beggars of the suburb.  His wife wept a little
+and quietly; Pavel did not weep at all.  The villagers who met the
+funeral in the street stopped, crossed themselves, and said to one
+another:  "Guess Pelagueya is glad he died!"  And some corrected:
+"He didn't die; he rotted away like a beast."
+
+When the body was put in the ground, the people went away, but the
+dog remained for a long time, and sitting silently on the fresh
+soil, she sniffed at the grave.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+
+Two weeks after the death of his father, on a Sunday, Pavel came
+home very drunk.  Staggering he crawled to a corner in the front
+of the room, and striking his fist on the table as his father used
+to do, shouted to his mother:
+
+"Supper!"
+
+The mother walked up to him, sat down at his side, and with her
+arm around her son, drew his head upon her breast.  With his hand
+on her shoulder he pushed her away and shouted:
+
+"Mother, quick!"
+
+"You foolish boy!" said the mother in a sad and affectionate voice,
+trying to overcome his resistance.
+
+"I am going to smoke, too.  Give me father's pipe," mumbled Pavel
+indistinctly, wagging his tongue heavily.
+
+It was the first time he had been drunk.  The alcohol weakened his
+body, but it did not quench his consciousness, and the question
+knocked at his brain:  "Drunk?  Drunk?"
+
+The fondling of his mother troubled him, and he was touched by the
+sadness in her eyes.  He wanted to weep, and in order to overcome
+this desire he endeavored to appear more drunk than he actually was.
+
+The mother stroked his tangled hair, and said in a low voice:
+
+"Why did you do it?  You oughtn't to have done it."
+
+He began to feel sick, and after a violent attack of nausea the
+mother put him to bed, and laid a wet towel over his pale forehead.
+He sobered a little, but under and around him everything seemed to
+be rocking; his eyelids grew heavy; he felt a bad, sour taste in his
+mouth; he looked through his eyelashes on his mother's large face,
+and thought disjointedly:
+
+"It seems it's too early for me.  Others drink and nothing happens--
+and I feel sick."
+
+Somewhere from a distance came the mother's soft voice:
+
+"What sort of a breadgiver will you be to me if you begin to drink?"
+
+He shut his eyes tightly and answered:
+
+"Everybody drinks."
+
+The mother sighed.  He was right.  She herself knew that besides
+the tavern there was no place where people could enjoy themselves;
+besides the taste of whisky there was no other gratification.
+Nevertheless she said:
+
+"But don't you drink.  Your father drank for both of you.  And he made
+enough misery for me.  Take pity on your mother, then, will you not?"
+
+Listening to the soft, pitiful words of his mother, Pavel remembered
+that in his father's lifetime she had remained unnoticed in the
+house.  She had been silent and had always lived in anxious
+expectation of blows.  Desiring to avoid his father, he had been
+home very little of late; he had become almost unaccustomed to his
+mother, and now, as he gradually sobered up, he looked at her fixedly.
+
+She was tall and somewhat stooping.  Her heavy body, broken down
+with long years of toil and the beatings of her husband, moved about
+noiselessly and inclined to one side, as if she were in constant
+fear of knocking up against something.  Her broad oval face, wrinkled
+and puffy, was lighted up with a pair of dark eyes, troubled and
+melancholy as those of most of the women in the village.  On her
+right eyebrow was a deep scar, which turned the eyebrow upward
+a little; her right ear, too, seemed to be higher than the left,
+which gave her face the appearance of alarmed listening.  Gray locks
+glistened in her thick, dark hair, like the imprints of heavy blows.
+Altogether she was soft, melancholy, and submissive.
+
+Tears slowly trickled down her cheeks.
+
+"Wait, don't cry!" begged the son in a soft voice.  "Give me a drink."
+
+She rose and said:
+
+"I'll give you some ice water."
+
+But when she returned he was already asleep.  She stood over him for
+a minute, trying to breathe lightly.  The cup in her hand trembled,
+and the ice knocked against the tin.  Then, setting the cup on the
+table, she knelt before the sacred image upon the wall, and began
+to pray in silence.  The sounds of dark, drunken life beat against
+the window panes; an accordion screeched in the misty darkness of
+the autumn night; some one sang a loud song; some one was swearing
+with ugly, vile oaths, and the excited sounds of women's irritated,
+weary voices cut the air.
+
+
+Life in the little house of the Vlasovs flowed on monotonously,
+but more calmly and undisturbed than before, and somewhat different
+from everywhere else in the suburb.
+
+The house stood at the edge of the village, by a low but steep and
+muddy declivity.  A third of the house was occupied by the kitchen
+and a small room used for the mother's bedroom, separated from the
+kitchen by a partition reaching partially to the ceiling.  The other
+two thirds formed a square room with two windows.  In one corner
+stood Pavel's bed, in front a table and two benches.  Some chairs,
+a washstand with a small looking-glass over it, a trunk with clothes,
+a clock on the wall, and two ikons--this was the entire outfit of
+the household.
+
+Pavel tried to live like the rest.  He did all a young lad should
+do--bought himself an accordion, a shirt with a starched front, a
+loud-colored necktie, overshoes, and a cane.  Externally he became
+like all the other youths of his age.  He went to evening parties
+and learned to dance a quadrille and a polka.  On holidays he came
+home drunk, and always suffered greatly from the effects of liquor.
+In the morning his head ached, he was tormented by heartburns,
+his face was pale and dull.
+
+Once his mother asked him:
+
+"Well, did you have a good time yesterday?"
+
+He answered dismally and with irritation:
+
+"Oh, dreary as a graveyard!  Everybody is like a machine.  I'd better
+go fishing or buy myself a gun."
+
+He worked faithfully, without intermission and without incurring
+fines.  He was taciturn, and his eyes, blue and large like his
+mother's, looked out discontentedly.  He did not buy a gun, nor did
+he go a-fishing; but he gradually began to avoid the beaten path
+trodden by all.  His attendance at parties became less and less
+frequent, and although he went out somewhere on holidays, he always
+returned home sober.  His mother watched him unobtrusively but
+closely, and saw the tawny face of her son grow keener and keener,
+and his eyes more serious.  She noticed that his lips were compressed
+in a peculiar manner, imparting an odd expression of austerity to
+his face.  It seemed as if he were always angry at something or
+as if a canker gnawed at him.  At first his friends came to visit him,
+but never finding him at home, they remained away.
+
+The mother was glad to see her son turning out different from all
+the other factory youth; but a feeling of anxiety and apprehension
+stirred in her heart when she observed that he was obstinately and
+resolutely directing his life into obscure paths leading away from
+the routine existence about him--that he turned in his career
+neither to the right nor the left.
+
+He began to bring books home with him.  At first he tried to escape
+attention when reading them; and after he had finished a book, he
+hid it.  Sometimes he copied a passage on a piece of paper, and
+hid that also.
+
+"Aren't you well, Pavlusha?" the mother asked once.
+
+"I'm all right," he answered.
+
+"You are so thin," said the mother with a sigh.
+
+He was silent.
+
+They spoke infrequently, and saw each other very little.  In the
+morning he drank tea in silence, and went off to work; at noon he
+came for dinner, a few insignificant remarks were passed at the
+table, and he again disappeared until the evening.  And in the
+evening, the day's work ended, he washed himself, took supper, and
+then fell to his books, and read for a long time.  On holidays he
+left home in the morning and returned late at night.  She knew he
+went to the city and the theater; but nobody from the city ever
+came to visit him.  It seemed to her that with the lapse of time
+her son spoke less and less; and at the same time she noticed that
+occasionally and with increasing frequency he used new words
+unintelligible to her, and that the coarse, rude, and hard expressions
+dropped from his speech.  In his general conduct, also, certain
+traits appeared, forcing themselves upon his mother's attention.
+He ceased to affect the dandy, but became more attentive to the
+cleanliness of his body and dress, and moved more freely and alertly.
+The increasing softness and simplicity of his manner aroused a
+disquieting interest in his mother.
+
+Once he brought a picture and hung it on the wall.  It represented
+three persons walking lightly and boldly, and conversing.
+
+"This is Christ risen from the dead, and going to Emmaus," explained Pavel.
+
+The mother liked the picture, but she thought:
+
+"You respect Christ, and yet you do not go to church."
+
+Then more pictures appeared on the walls, and the number of books
+increased on the shelves neatly made for him by one of his carpenter
+friends.  The room began to look like a home.
+
+He addressed his mother with the reverential plural "you," and
+called her "mother" instead of "mamma."  But sometimes he turned
+to her suddenly, and briefly used the simple and familiar form of
+the singular:  "Mamma, please be not thou disturbed if I come home
+late to-night."
+
+This pleased her; in such words she felt something serious and strong.
+
+But her uneasiness increased.  Since her son's strangeness was not
+clarified with time, her heart became more and more sharply troubled
+with a foreboding of something unusual.  Every now and then she felt
+a certain dissatisfaction with him, and she thought:  "All people
+are like people, and he is like a monk.  He is so stern.  It's not
+according to his years."  At other times she thought:  "Maybe he
+has become interested in some of a girl down there."
+
+But to go about with girls, money is needed, and he gave almost
+all his earnings to her.
+
+Thus weeks and months elapsed; and imperceptibly two years slipped
+by, two years of a strange, silent life, full of disquieting
+thoughts and anxieties that kept continually increasing.
+
+Once, when after supper Pavel drew the curtain over the window,
+sat down in a corner, and began to read, his tin lamp hanging on
+the wall over his head, the mother, after removing the dishes, came
+out from the kitchen and carefully walked up to him.  He raised his
+head, and without speaking looked at her with a questioning expression.
+
+"Nothing, Pasha, just so!" she said hastily, and walked away, moving
+her eyebrows agitatedly.  But after standing in the kitchen for a
+moment, motionless, thoughtful, deeply preoccupied, she washed her
+hands and approached her son again.
+
+"I want to ask you," she said in a low, soft voice, "what you read
+all the time."
+
+He put his book aside and said to her:  "Sit down, mother."
+
+The mother sat down heavily at his side, and straightening herself
+into an attitude of intense, painful expectation waited for
+something momentous.
+
+Without looking at her, Pavel spoke, not loudly, but for some reason
+very sternly:
+
+"I am reading forbidden books.  They are forbidden to be read because
+they tell the truth about our--about the workingmen's life.  They
+are printed in secret, and if I am found with them I will be put in
+prison--I will be put in prison because I want to know the truth."
+
+Breathing suddenly became difficult for her.  Opening her eyes wide
+she looked at her son, and he seemed to her new, as if a stranger.
+His voice was different, lower, deeper, more sonorous.  He pinched
+his thin, downy mustache, and looked oddly askance into the corner.
+She grew anxious for her son and pitied him.
+
+"Why do you do this, Pasha?"
+
+He raised his head, looked at her, and said in a low, calm voice:
+
+"I want to know the truth."
+
+His voice sounded placid, but firm; and his eyes flashed resolution.
+She understood with her heart that her son had consecrated himself
+forever to something mysterious and awful.  Everything in life had
+always appeared to her inevitable; she was accustomed to submit
+without thought, and now, too, she only wept softly, finding no
+words, but in her heart she was oppressed with sorrow and distress.
+
+"Don't cry," said Pavel, kindly and softly; and it seemed to her
+that he was bidding her farewell.
+
+"Think what kind of a life you are leading.  You are forty years
+old, and have you lived?  Father beat you.  I understand now that he
+avenged his wretchedness on your body, the wretchedness of his life.
+It pressed upon him, and he did not know whence it came.  He worked
+for thirty years; he began to work when the whole factory occupied
+but two buildings; now there are seven of them.  The mills grow, and
+people die, working for them."
+
+She listened to him eagerly and awestruck.  His eyes burned with a
+beautiful radiance.  Leaning forward on the table he moved nearer to
+his mother, and looking straight into her face, wet with tears, he
+delivered his first speech to her about the truth which he had now
+come to understand.  With the naivete of youth, and the ardor of a
+young student proud of his knowledge, religiously confiding in its
+truth, he spoke about everything that was clear to him, and spoke
+not so much for his mother as to verify and strengthen his own
+opinions.  At times he halted, finding no words, and then he saw
+before him a disturbed face, in which dimly shone a pair of kind
+eyes clouded with tears.  They looked on with awe and perplexity.
+He was sorry for his mother, and began to speak again, about herself
+and her life.
+
+"What joys did you know?" he asked.  "What sort of a past can you recall?"
+
+She listened and shook her head dolefully, feeling something new,
+unknown to her, both sorrowful and gladsome, like a caress to her
+troubled and aching heart.  It was the first time she had heard such
+language about herself, her own life.  It awakened in her misty, dim
+thoughts, long dormant; gently roused an almost extinct feeling of
+rebellion, perplexed dissatisfaction--thoughts and feelings of a
+remote youth.  She often discussed life with her neighbors, spoke a
+great deal about everything; but all, herself included, only
+complained; no one explained why life was so hard and burdensome.
+
+And now her son sat before her; and what he said about her--his eyes,
+his face, his words--it all clutched at her heart, filling her with
+a sense of pride for her son, who truly understood the life of his
+mother, and spoke the truth about her and her sufferings, and
+pitied her.
+
+Mothers are not pitied.  She knew it.  She did not understand Pavel
+when speaking about matters not pertaining to herself, but all he
+said about her own woman's existence was bitterly familiar and true.
+Hence it seemed to her that every word of his was perfectly true,
+and her bosom throbbed with a gentle sensation which warmed it more
+and more with an unknown, kindly caress.
+
+"What do you want to do, then?" she asked, interrupting his speech.
+
+"Study and then teach others.  We workingmen must study.  We must
+learn, we must understand why life is so hard for us."
+
+It was sweet to her to see that his blue eyes, always so serious and
+stern, now glowed with warmth, softly illuminating something new
+within him.  A soft, contented smile played around her lips,
+although the tears still trembled in the wrinkles of her face.  She
+wavered between two feelings:  pride in her son who desired the good
+of all people, had pity for all, and understood the sorrow and
+affliction of life; and the involuntary regret for his youth,
+because he did not speak like everybody else, because he resolved to
+enter alone into a fight against the life to which all, including
+herself, were accustomed.
+
+She wanted to say to him:  "My dear, what can you do?  People will
+crush you.  You will perish."
+
+But it was pleasant to her to listen to his speeches, and she feared
+to disturb her delight in her son, who suddenly revealed himself so
+new and wise, even if somewhat strange.
+
+Pavel saw the smile around his mother's lips, the attention in her
+face, the love in her eyes; and it seemed to him that he compelled
+her to understand his truth; and youthful pride in the power of his
+word heightened his faith in himself.  Seized with enthusiasm, he
+continued to talk, now smiling, now frowning.  Occasionally hatred
+sounded in his words; and when his mother heard its bitter, harsh
+accents she shook her head, frightened, and asked in a low voice:
+
+"Is it so, Pasha?"
+
+"It is so!" he answered firmly.  And he told her about people who
+wanted the good of men, and who sowed truth among them; and because
+of this the enemies of life hunted them down like beasts, thrust
+them into prisons, and exiled them, and set them to hard labor.
+
+"I have seen such people!" he exclaimed passionately.  "They are the
+best people on earth!"
+
+These people filled the mother with terror, and she wanted to ask
+her son:  "Is it so, Pasha?"
+
+But she hesitated, and leaning back she listened to the stories of
+people incomprehensible to her, who taught her son to speak and
+think words and thoughts so dangerous to him.  Finally she said:
+
+"It will soon be daylight.  You ought to go to bed.  You've got
+to go to work."
+
+"Yes, I'll go to bed at once," he assented.  "Did you understand me?"
+
+"I did," she said, drawing a deep breath.  Tears rolled down from
+her eyes again, and breaking into sobs she added:  "You will perish,
+my son!"
+
+Pavel walked up and down the room.
+
+"Well, now you know what I am doing and where I am going.  I told
+you all.  I beg of you, mother, if you love me, do not hinder me!"
+
+"My darling, my beloved!" she cried, "maybe it would be better for
+me not to have known anything!"
+
+He took her hand and pressed it firmly in his.  The word "mother,"
+pronounced by him with feverish emphasis, and that clasp of the hand
+so new and strange, moved her.
+
+"I will do nothing!" she said in a broken voice.  "Only be on your
+guard!  Be on your guard!"  Not knowing what he should be on his
+guard against, nor how to warn him, she added mournfully:  "You are
+getting so thin."
+
+And with a look of affectionate warmth, which seemed to embrace his
+firm, well-shaped body, she said hastily, and in a low voice:
+
+"God be with you!  Live as you want to.  I will not hinder you.
+One thing only I beg of you--do not speak to people unguardedly!
+You must be on the watch with people; they all hate one another.
+They live in greed and envy; all are glad to do injury; people
+persecute out of sheer amusement.  When you begin to accuse them and
+to judge them, they will hate you, and will hound you to destruction!"
+
+Pavel stood in the doorway listening to the melancholy speech, and
+when the mother had finished he said with a smile:
+
+"Yes, people are sorry creatures; but when I came to recognize that
+there is truth in the world, people became better."  He smiled again
+and added:  "I do not know how it happened myself!  From childhood
+I feared everybody; as I grew up I began to hate everybody, some
+for their meanness, others--well, I do not know why--just so!  And
+now I see all the people in a different way.  I am grieved for
+them all!  I cannot understand it; but my heart turned softer when
+I recognized that there is truth in men, and  that not all are to
+blame for their foulness and filth."
+
+He was silent as if listening to something within himself.  Then
+he said in a low voice and thoughtfully:
+
+"That's how truth lives."
+
+She looked at him tenderly.
+
+"May God protect you!" she sighed.  "It is a dangerous change that
+has come upon you."
+
+When he had fallen asleep, the mother rose carefully from her bed
+and came gently into her son's room.  Pavel's swarthy, resolute,
+stern face was clearly outlined against the white pillow.  Pressing
+her hand to her bosom, the mother stood at his bedside.  Her lips
+moved mutely, and great tears rolled down her cheeks.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+
+Again they lived in silence, distant and yet near to each other.
+Once, in the middle of the week, on a holiday, as he was preparing
+to leave the house he said to his mother:
+
+"I expect some people here on Saturday."
+
+"What people?" she asked.
+
+"Some people from our village, and others from the city."
+
+"From the city?" repeated the mother, shaking her head.  And
+suddenly she broke into sobs.
+
+"Now, mother, why this?" cried Pavel resentfully.  "What for?"
+
+Drying her face with her apron, she answered quietly:
+
+"I don't know, but it is the way I feel."
+
+He paced up and down the room, then halting before her, said:
+
+"Are you afraid?"
+
+"I am afraid," she acknowledged.  "Those people from the city--
+who knows them?"
+
+He bent down to look in her face, and said in an offended tone,
+and, it seemed to her, angrily, like his father:
+
+"This fear is what is the ruin of us all.  And some dominate us;
+they take advantage of our fear and frighten us still more.  Mark
+this:  as long as people are afraid, they will rot like the birches
+in the marsh.  We must grow bold; it is time!
+
+"It's all the same," he said, as he turned from her; "they'll meet
+in my house, anyway."
+
+"Don't be angry with me!" the mother begged sadly.  "How can I help
+being afraid?  All my life I have lived in fear!"
+
+"Forgive me!" was his gentler reply, "but I cannot do otherwise,"
+and he walked away.
+
+For three days her heart was in a tremble, sinking in fright each
+time she remembered that strange people were soon to come to her
+house.  She could not picture them to herself, but it seemed to her
+they were terrible people.  It was they who had shown her son the
+road he was going.
+
+On Saturday night Pavel came from the factory, washed himself, put
+on clean clothes, and when walking out of the house said to his
+mother without looking at her:
+
+"When they come, tell them I'll be back soon.  Let them wait a while.
+And please don't be afraid.  They are people like all other people."
+
+She sank into her seat almost fainting.
+
+Her son looked at her soberly.  "Maybe you'd better go away somewhere,"
+he suggested.
+
+The thought offended her.  Shaking her head in dissent, she said:
+
+"No, it's all the same.  What for?"
+
+It was the end of November.  During the day a dry, fine snow had
+fallen upon the frozen earth, and now she heard it crunching outside
+the window under her son's feet as he walked away.  A dense crust of
+darkness settled immovably upon the window panes, and seemed to lie
+in hostile watch for something.  Supporting herself on the bench,
+the mother sat and waited, looking at the door.
+
+It seemed to her that people were stealthily and watchfully walking
+about the house in the darkness, stooping and looking about on all
+sides, strangely attired and silent.  There around the house some
+one was already coming, fumbling with his hands along the wall.
+
+A whistle was heard.  It circled around like the notes of a fine
+chord, sad and melodious, wandered musingly into the wilderness of
+darkness, and seemed to be searching for something.  It came nearer.
+Suddenly it died away under the window, as if it had entered into the
+wood of the wall.  The noise of feet was heard on the porch.  The
+mother started, and rose with a strained, frightened look in her eyes.
+
+The door opened.  At first a head with a big, shaggy hat thrust
+itself into the room; then a slender, bending body crawled in,
+straightened itself out, and deliberately raised its right hand.
+
+"Good evening!" said the man, in a thick, bass voice, breathing heavily.
+
+The mother bowed in silence.
+
+"Pavel is not at home yet?"
+
+The stranger leisurely removed his short fur jacket, raised one
+foot, whipped the snow from his boot with his hat, then did the same
+with the other foot, flung his hat into a corner, and rocking on his
+thin legs walked into the room, looking back at the imprints he left
+on the floor.  He approached the table, examined it as if to satisfy
+himself of its solidity, and finally sat down and, covering his
+mouth with his hand, yawned.  His head was perfectly round and
+close-cropped, his face shaven except for a thin mustache, the ends
+of which pointed downward.
+
+After carefully scrutinizing the room with his large, gray,
+protuberant eyes, he crossed his legs, and, leaning his head over
+the table, inquired:
+
+"Is this your own house, or do you rent it?"
+
+The mother, sitting opposite him, answered:
+
+"We rent it."
+
+"Not a very fine house," he remarked.
+
+"Pasha will soon be here; wait," said the mother quietly.
+
+"Why, yes, I am waiting," said the man.
+
+His calmness, his deep, sympathetic voice, and the candor and
+simplicity of his face encouraged the mother.  He looked at her
+openly and kindly, and a merry sparkle played in the depths of his
+transparent eyes.  In the entire angular, stooping figure, with its
+thin legs, there was something comical, yet winning.  He was dressed
+in a blue shirt, and dark, loose trousers thrust into his boots.
+She was seized with the desire to ask him who he was, whence he came,
+and whether he had known her son long.  But suddenly he himself
+put a question, leaning forward with a swing of his whole body.
+
+"Who made that hole in your forehead, mother?"
+
+His question was uttered in a kind voice and with a noticeable
+smile in his eyes; but the woman was offended by the sally.  She
+pressed her lips together tightly, and after a pause rejoined with
+cold civility:
+
+"And what business is it of yours, sir?"
+
+With the same swing of his whole body toward her, he said:
+
+"Now, don't get angry!  I ask because my foster mother had her head
+smashed just exactly like yours.  It was her man who did it for
+her once, with a last--he was a shoemaker, you see.  She was a
+washerwoman and he was a shoemaker.  It was after she had taken me
+as her son that she found him somewhere, a drunkard, and married
+him, to her great misfortune.  He beat her--I tell you, my skin
+almost burst with terror."
+
+The mother felt herself disarmed by his openness.  Moreover, it
+occurred to her that perhaps her son would be displeased with her
+harsh reply to this odd personage.  Smiling guiltily she said:
+
+"I am not angry, but--you see--you asked so very soon.  It was
+my good man, God rest his soul! who treated me to the cut.  Are
+you a Tartar?"
+
+The stranger stretched out his feet, and smiled so broad a smile
+that the ends of his mustache traveled to the nape of his neck.
+Then he said seriously:
+
+"Not yet.  I'm not a Tartar yet."
+
+"I asked because I rather thought the way you spoke was not exactly
+Russian," she explained, catching his joke.
+
+"I am better than a Russian, I am!" said the guest laughingly.
+"I am a Little Russian from the city of Kanyev."
+
+"And have you been here long?"
+
+"I lived in the city about a month, and I came to your factory about
+a month ago.  I found some good people, your son and a few others.
+I will live here for a while," he said, twirling his mustache.
+
+The man pleased the mother, and, yielding to the impulse to repay him
+in some way for his kind words about her son, she questioned again:
+
+"Maybe you'd like to have a glass of tea?"
+
+"What!  An entertainment all to myself!" he answered, raising his
+shoulders.  "I'll wait for the honor until we are all here."
+
+This allusion to the coming of others recalled her fear to her.
+
+"If they all are only like this one!" was her ardent wish.
+
+Again steps were heard on the porch.  The door opened quickly, and
+the mother rose.  This time she was taken completely aback by the
+newcomer in her kitchen--a poorly and lightly dressed girl of
+medium height, with the simple face of a peasant woman, and a head
+of thick, dark hair.  Smiling she said in a low voice:
+
+"Am I late?"
+
+"Why, no!" answered the Little Russian, looking out of the living
+room.  "Come on foot?"
+
+"Of course!  Are you the mother of Pavel Vlasov?  Good evening!
+My name is Natasha."
+
+"And your other name?" inquired the mother.
+
+"Vasilyevna.  And yours?"
+
+"Pelagueya Nilovna."
+
+"So here we are all acquainted."
+
+"Yes," said the mother, breathing more easily, as if relieved, and
+looking at the girl with a smile.
+
+The Little Russian helped her off with her cloak, and inquired:
+
+"Is it cold?"
+
+"Out in the open, very!  The wind--goodness!"
+
+Her voice was musical and clear, her mouth small and smiling, her
+body round and vigorous.  Removing her wraps, she rubbed her ruddy
+cheeks briskly with her little hands, red with the cold, and walking
+lightly and quickly she passed into the room, the heels of her shoes
+rapping sharply on the floor.
+
+"She goes without overshoes," the mother noted silently.
+
+"Indeed it is cold," repeated the girl.  "I'm frozen through--ooh!"
+
+"I'll warm up the samovar for you!" the mother said, bustling and
+solicitous.  "Ready in a moment," she called from the kitchen.
+
+Somehow it seemed to her she had known the girl long, and even loved
+her with the tender, compassionate love of a mother.  She was glad
+to see her; and recalling her guest's bright blue eyes, she smiled
+contentedly, as she prepared the samovar and listened to the
+conversation in the room.
+
+"Why so gloomy, Nakhodka?" asked the girl.
+
+"The widow has good eyes," answered the Little Russian.  "I was
+thinking maybe my mother has such eyes.  You know, I keep thinking
+of her as alive."
+
+"You said she was dead?"
+
+"That's my adopted mother.  I am speaking now of my real mother.
+It seems to me that perhaps she may be somewhere in Kiev begging
+alms and drinking whisky."
+
+"Why do you think such awful things?"
+
+"I don't know.  And the policemen pick her up on the street drunk
+and beat her."
+
+"Oh, you poor soul," thought the mother, and sighed.
+
+Natasha muttered something hotly and rapidly; and again the sonorous
+voice of the Little Russian was heard.
+
+"Ah, you are young yet, comrade," he said.  "You haven't eaten
+enough onions yet.  Everyone has a mother, none the less people are
+bad.  For although it is hard to rear children, it is still harder
+to teach a man to be good."
+
+"What strange ideas he has," the mother thought, and for a moment
+she felt like contradicting the Little Russian and telling him that
+here was she who would have been glad to teach her son good, but
+knew nothing herself.  The door, however, opened and in came Nikolay
+Vyesovshchikov, the son of the old thief Daniel, known in the
+village as a misanthrope.  He always kept at a sullen distance from
+people, who retaliated by making sport of him.
+
+"You, Nikolay!  How's that?" she asked in surprise.
+
+Without replying he merely looked at the mother with his little
+gray eyes, and wiped his pockmarked, high-cheeked face with the
+broad palm of his hand.
+
+"Is Pavel at home?" he asked hoarsely.
+
+"No."
+
+He looked into the room and said:
+
+"Good evening, comrades."
+
+"He, too.  Is it possible?" wondered the mother resentfully, and
+was greatly surprised to see Natasha put her hand out to him in
+a kind, glad welcome.
+
+The next to come were two young men, scarcely more than boys.
+One of them the mother knew.  He was Yakob, the son of the factory
+watchman, Somov.  The other, with a sharp-featured face, high forehead,
+and curly hair, was unknown to her; but he, too, was not terrible.
+
+Finally Pavel appeared, and with him two men, both of whose faces
+she recognized as those of workmen in the factory.
+
+"You've prepared the samovar!  That's fine.  Thank you!" said Pavel
+as he saw what his mother had done.
+
+"Perhaps I should get some vodka," she suggested, not knowing how
+to express her gratitude to him for something which as yet she did
+not understand.
+
+"No, we don't need it!" he responded, removing his coat and smiling
+affectionately at her.
+
+It suddenly occurred to her that her son, by way of jest, had
+purposely exaggerated the danger of the gathering.
+
+"Are these the ones they call illegal people?" she whispered.
+
+"The very ones!" answered Pavel, and passed into the room.
+
+She looked lovingly after him and thought to herself condescendingly:
+
+"Mere children!"
+
+When the samovar boiled, and she brought it into the room, she found
+the guests sitting in a close circle around the table, and Natasha
+installed in the corner under the lamp with a book in her hands.
+
+"In order to understand why people live so badly," said Natasha.
+
+"And why they are themselves so bad," put in the Little Russian.
+
+"It is necessary to see how they began to live----"
+
+"See, my dears, see!" mumbled the mother, making the tea.
+
+They all stopped talking.
+
+"What is the matter, mother?" asked Pavel, knitting his brows.
+
+"What?"  She looked around, and seeing the eyes of all upon her
+she explained with embarrassment, "I was just speaking to myself."
+
+Natasha laughed and Pavel smiled, but the Little Russian said:
+"Thank you for the tea, mother."
+
+"Hasn't drunk it yet and thanks me already," she commented inwardly.
+Looking at her son, she asked: "I am not in your way?"
+
+"How can the hostess in her own home be in the way of her guests?"
+replied Natasha, and then continuing with childish plaintiveness:
+"Mother dear, give me tea quick!  I am shivering with cold; my feet
+are all frozen."
+
+"In a moment, in a moment!" exclaimed the mother, hurrying.
+
+Having drunk a cup of tea, Natasha drew a long breath, brushed
+her hair back from her forehead, and began to read from a large
+yellow-covered book with pictures.  The mother, careful not to make
+a noise with the dishes, poured tea into the glasses, and strained
+her untrained mind to listen to the girl's fluent reading.  The
+melodious voice blended with the thin, musical hum of the samovar.
+The clear, simple narrative of savage people who lived in caves and
+killed the beasts with stones floated and quivered like a dainty
+ribbon in the room.  It sounded like a tale, and the mother looked
+up to her son occasionally, wishing to ask him what was illegal in
+the story about wild men.  But she soon ceased to follow the narrative
+and began to scrutinize the guests, unnoticed by them or her son.
+
+Pavel sat at Natasha's side.  He was the handsomest of them all.
+Natasha bent down, very low over the book.  At times she tossed back
+the thin curls that kept running down over her forehead, and lowered
+her voice to say something not in the book, with a kind look at the
+faces of her auditors.  The Little Russian bent his broad chest over
+a corner of the table, and squinted his eyes in the effort to see
+the worn ends of his mustache, which he constantly twirled.
+Vyesovshchikov sat on his chair straight as a pole, his palms resting
+on his knees, and his pockmarked face, browless and thin-lipped,
+immobile as a mask.  He kept his narrow-eyed gaze stubbornly fixed
+upon the reflection of his face in the glittering brass of the
+samovar.  He seemed not even to breathe.  Little Somov moved his
+lips mutely, as if repeating to himself the words in the book; and
+his curly-haired companion, with bent body, elbows on knees, his
+face supported on his hands, smiled abstractedly.  One of the men
+who had entered at the same time as Pavel, a slender young chap with
+red, curly hair and merry green eyes, apparently wanted to say
+something; for he kept turning around impatiently.  The other,
+light-haired and closely cropped, stroked his head with his hand
+and looked down on the floor so that his face remained invisible.
+
+It was warm in the room, and the atmosphere was genial.  The mother
+responded to this peculiar charm, which she had never before felt.
+She was affected by the purling of Natasha's voice, mingled with
+the quavering hum of the samovar, and recalled the noisy evening
+parties of her youth--the coarseness of the young men, whose breath
+always smelled of vodka--their cynical jokes.  She remembered all
+this, and an oppressive sense of pity for her own self gently stirred
+her worn, outraged heart.
+
+Before her rose the scene of the wooing of her husband.  At one of
+the parties he had seized her in a dark porch, and pressing her with
+his whole body to the wall asked in a gruff, vexed voice:
+
+"Will you marry me?"
+
+She had been pained and had felt offended; but he rudely dug his
+fingers into her flesh, snorted heavily, and breathed his hot, humid
+breath into her face.  She struggled to tear herself out of his grasp.
+
+"Hold on!" he roared.  "Answer me!  Well?"
+
+Out of breath, shamed and insulted, she remained silent.
+
+"Don't put on airs now, you fool!  I know your kind.  You are
+mighty pleased."
+
+Some one opened the door.  He let her go leisurely, saying:
+
+"I will send a matchmaker to you next Sunday."
+
+And he did.
+
+The mother covered her eyes and heaved a deep sigh.
+
+
+"I do not want to know how people used to live, but how they ought
+to live!"  The dull, dissatisfied voice of Vyesovshchikov was heard
+in the room.
+
+"That's it!" corroborated the red-headed man, rising.
+
+"And I disagree!" cried Somov.  "If we are to go forward, we must
+know everything."
+
+"True, true!" said the curly-headed youth in a low tone.
+
+A heated discussion ensued; and the words flashed like tongues of
+fire in a wood pile.  The mother did not understand what they were
+shouting about.  All faces glowed in an aureole of animation, but
+none grew angry, no one spoke the harsh, offensive words so familiar
+to her.
+
+"They restrain themselves on account of a woman's presence," she concluded.
+
+The serious face of Natasha pleased her.  The young woman looked at
+all these young men so considerately, with the air of an elder
+person toward children.
+
+"Wait, comrades," she broke out suddenly.  And they all grew silent
+and turned their eyes upon her.
+
+"Those who say that we ought to know everything are right.  We ought
+to illumine ourselves with the light of reason, so that the people
+in the dark may see us; we ought to be able to answer every question
+honestly and truly.  We must know all the truth, all the falsehood."
+
+The Little Russian listened and nodded his head in accompaniment to
+her words.  Vyesovshchikov, the red-haired fellow, and the other
+factory worker, who had come with Pavel, stood in a close circle of
+three.  For some reason the mother did not like them.
+
+When Natasha ceased talking, Pavel arose and asked calmly:
+
+"Is filling our stomachs the only thing we want?"
+
+"No!" he answered himself, looking hard in the direction of the
+three.  "We want to be people.  We must show those who sit on our
+necks, and cover up our eyes, that we see everything, that we are
+not foolish, we are not animals, and that we do not want merely to
+eat, but also to live like decent human beings.  We must show our
+enemies that our life of servitude, of hard toil which they impose
+upon us, does not hinder us from measuring up to them in intellect,
+and as to spirit, that we rise far above them!"
+
+The mother listened to his words, and a feeling of pride in her son
+stirred her bosom--how eloquently he spoke!
+
+"People with well-filled stomachs are, after all, not a few, but
+honest people there are none," said the little Russian.  "We ought
+to build a bridge across the bog of this rotten life to a future
+of soulful goodness.  That's our task, that's what we have to do,
+comrades!"
+
+"When the time is come to fight, it's not the time to cure the
+finger," said Vyesovshchikov dully.
+
+"There will be enough breaking of our bones before we get to
+fighting!" the Little Russian put in merrily.
+
+It was already past midnight when the group began to break up.
+The first to go were Vyesovshchikov and the red-haired man--which
+again displeased the mother.
+
+"Hm!  How they hurry!" she thought, nodding them a not very friendly
+farewell.
+
+"Will you see me home, Nakhodka?" asked Natasha.
+
+"Why, of course," answered the Little Russian.
+
+When Natasha put on her wraps in the kitchen, the mother said to
+her:  "Your stockings are too thin for this time of the year.  Let
+me knit some woolen ones for you, will you, please?"
+
+"Thank you, Pelagueya Nilovna.  Woolen stockings scratch," Natasha
+answered, smiling.
+
+"I'll make them so they won't scratch."
+
+Natasha looked at her rather perplexedly, and her fixed serious
+glance hurt the mother.
+
+"Pardon me my stupidity; like my good will, it's from my heart,
+you know," she added in a low voice.
+
+"How kind you are!" Natasha answered in the same voice, giving her
+a hasty pressure of the hand and walking out.
+
+"Good night, mother!" said the Little Russian, looking into her
+eyes.  His bending body followed Natasha out to the porch.
+
+The mother looked at her son.  He stood in the room at the door
+and smiled.
+
+"The evening was fine," he declared, nodding his head energetically.
+"It was fine!  But now I think you'd better go to bed; it's time."
+
+"And it's time for you, too.  I'm going in a minute."
+
+She busied herself about the table gathering the dishes together,
+satisfied and even glowing with a pleasurable agitation.  She was
+glad that everything had gone so well and had ended peaceably.
+
+"You arranged it nicely, Pavlusha.  They certainly are good people.
+The Little Russian is such a hearty fellow.  And the young lady,
+what a bright, wise girl she is!  Who is she?"
+
+"A teacher," answered Pavel, pacing up and down the room.
+
+"Ah!  Such a poor thing!  Dressed so poorly!  Ah, so poorly!  It
+doesn't take long to catch a cold.  And where are her relatives?"
+
+"In Moscow," said Pavel, stopping before his mother.  "Look! her
+father is a rich man; he is in the hardware business, and owns much
+property.  He drove her out of the house because she got into this
+movement.  She grew up in comfort and warmth, she was coddled and
+indulged in everything she desired--and now she walks four miles
+at night all by herself."
+
+The mother was shocked.  She stood in the middle of the room, and
+looked mutely at her son.  Then she asked quietly:
+
+"Is she going to the city?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"And is she not afraid?"
+
+"No," said Pavel smiling.
+
+"Why did she go?  She could have stayed here overnight, and slept
+with me."
+
+"That wouldn't do.  She might have been seen here to-morrow morning,
+and we don't want that; nor does she."
+
+The mother recollected her previous anxieties, looked thoughtfully
+through the window, and asked:
+
+"I cannot understand, Pasha, what there is dangerous in all this,
+or illegal.  Why, you are not doing anything bad, are you?"
+
+She was not quite assured of the safety and propriety of his
+conduct, and was eager for a confirmation from her son.  But he
+looked calmly into her eyes, and declared in a firm voice:
+
+"There is nothing bad in what we're doing, and there's not going
+to be.  And yet the prison is awaiting us all.  You may as well
+know it."
+
+Her hands trembled.  "Maybe God will grant you escape somehow,"
+she said with sunken voice.
+
+"No," said the son kindly, but decidedly.  "I cannot lie to you.
+We will not escape."  He smiled.  "Now go to bed.  You are tired.
+Good night."
+
+Left alone, she walked up to the window, and stood there looking
+into the street.  Outside it was cold and cheerless.  The wind
+howled, blowing the snow from the roofs of the little sleeping
+houses.  Striking against the walls and whispering something,
+quickly it fell upon the ground and drifted the white clouds of
+dry snowflakes across the street.
+
+"O Christ in heaven, have mercy upon us!" prayed the mother.
+
+The tears began to gather in her eyes, as fear returned persistently
+to her heart, and like a moth in the night she seemed to see fluttering
+the woe of which her son spoke with such composure and assurance.
+
+Before her eyes as she gazed a smooth plain of snow spread out in
+the distance.  The wind, carrying white, shaggy masses, raced over
+the plain, piping cold, shrill whistles.  Across the snowy expanse
+moved a girl's figure, dark and solitary, rocking to and fro.  The
+wind fluttered her dress, clogged her footsteps, and drove pricking
+snowflakes into her face.  Walking was difficult; the little feet
+sank into the snow.  Cold and fearful the girl bent forward, like a
+blade of grass, the sport of the wanton wind.  To the right of her
+on the marsh stood the dark wall of the forest; the bare birches
+and aspens quivered and rustled with a mournful cry.  Yonder in
+the distance, before her, the lights of the city glimmered dimly.
+
+"Lord in heaven, have mercy!" the mother muttered again, shuddering
+with the cold and horror of an unformed fear.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+
+The days glided by one after the other, like the beads of a rosary,
+and grew into weeks and months.  Every Saturday Pavel's friends
+gathered in his house; and each meeting formed a step up a long
+stairway, which led somewhere into the distance, gradually lifting
+the people higher and higher.  But its top remained invisible.
+
+New people kept coming.  The small room of the Vlasovs became
+crowded and close.  Natasha arrived every Saturday night, cold and
+tired, but always fresh and lively, in inexhaustible good spirits.
+The mother made stockings, and herself put them on the little feet.
+Natasha laughed at first; but suddenly grew silent and thoughtful,
+and said in a low voice to the mother:
+
+"I had a nurse who was also ever so kind.  How strange, Pelagueya
+Nilovna!  The workingmen live such a hard, outraged life, and yet
+there is more heart, more goodness in them than in--those!"  And
+she waved her hand, pointing somewhere far, very far from herself.
+
+"See what sort of a person you are," the older woman answered.  "You
+have left your own family and everything--"  She was unable to
+finish her thought, and heaving a sigh looked silently into Natasha's
+face with a feeling of gratitude to the girl for she knew not what.
+She sat on the floor before Natasha, who smiled and fell to musing.
+
+"I have abandoned my family?" she repeated, bending her head down.
+"That's nothing.  My father is a stupid, coarse man--my brother
+also--and a drunkard, besides.  My oldest sister--unhappy, wretched
+thing--married a man much older than herself, very rich, a bore and
+greedy.  But my mother I am sorry for!  She's a simple woman like
+you, a beaten-down, frightened creature, so tiny, like a little
+mouse--she runs so quickly and is afraid of everybody.  And sometimes
+I want to see her so--my mother!"
+
+"My poor thing!" said the mother sadly, shaking her head.
+
+The girl quickly threw up her head and cried out:
+
+"Oh, no!  At times I feel such joy, such happiness!"
+
+Her face paled and her blue eyes gleamed.  Placing her hands on the
+mother's shoulders she said with a deep voice issuing from her very
+heart, quietly as if in an ecstasy:
+
+"If you knew--if you but understood what a great, joyous work we
+are doing!  You will come to feel it!" she exclaimed with conviction.
+
+A feeling akin to envy touched the heart of the mother.  Rising
+from the floor she said plaintively:
+
+"I am too old for that--ignorant and old."
+
+Pavel spoke more and more often and at greater length, discussed
+more and more hotly, and--grew thinner and thinner.  It seemed to
+his mother that when he spoke to Natasha or looked at her his eyes
+turned softer, his voice sounded fonder, and his entire bearing
+became simpler.
+
+"Heaven grant!" she thought; and imagining Natasha as her
+daughter-in-law, she smiled inwardly.
+
+Whenever at the meetings the disputes waxed too hot and stormy,
+the Little Russian stood up, and rocking himself to and fro like
+the tongue of a bell, he spoke in his sonorous, resonant voice
+simple and good words which allayed their excitement and recalled
+them to their purpose.  Vyesovshchikov always kept hurrying everybody
+on somewhere.  He and the red-haired youth called Samoylov were the
+first to begin all disputes.  On their side were always Ivan Bukin,
+with the round head and the white eyebrows and lashes, who looked
+as if he had been hung out to dry, or washed out with lye; and the
+curly-headed, lofty-browed Fedya Mazin.  Modest Yakob Somov, always
+smoothly combed and clean, spoke little and briefly, with a quiet,
+serious voice, and always took sides with Pavel and the Little Russian.
+
+Sometimes, instead of Natasha, Alexey Ivanovich, a native of some
+remote government, came from the city.  He wore eyeglasses, his
+beard was shiny, and he spoke with a peculiar singing voice.  He
+produced the impression of a stranger from a far-distant land.
+He spoke about simple matters--about family life, about children,
+about commerce, the police, the price of bread and meat--about
+everything by which people live from day to day; and in everything
+he discovered fraud, confusion, and stupidity, sometimes setting
+these matters in a humorous light, but always showing their decided
+disadvantage to the people.
+
+To the mother, too, it seemed that he had come from far away, from
+another country, where all the people lived a simple, honest, easy
+life; and that here everything was strange to him, that he could not
+get accustomed to this life and accept it as inevitable, that it
+displeased him, and that it aroused in him a calm determination to
+rearrange it after his own model.  His face was yellowish, with
+thin, radiate wrinkles around his eyes, his voice low, and his hands
+always warm.  In greeting the mother he would enfold her entire hand
+in his long, powerful fingers, and after such a vigorous hand clasp
+she felt more at ease and lighter of heart.
+
+Other people came from the city, oftenest among them a tall,
+well-built young girl with large eyes set in a thin, pale face.
+She was called Sashenka.  There was something manly in her walk
+and movements; she knit her thick, dark eyebrows in a frown, and
+when she spoke the thin nostrils of her straight nose quivered.
+
+She was the first to say, "We are socialists!"  Her voice when she
+said it was loud and strident.
+
+When the mother heard this word, she stared in dumb fright into
+the girl's face.  But Sashenka, half closing her eyes, said sternly
+and resolutely:  "We must give up all our forces to the cause of
+the regeneration of life; we must realize that we will receive no
+recompense."
+
+The mother understood that the socialists had killed the Czar.  It
+had happened in the days of her youth; and people had then said
+that the landlords, wishing to revenge themselves on the Czar for
+liberating the peasant serfs, had vowed not to cut their hair until
+the Czar should be killed.  These were the persons who had been
+called socialists.  And now she could not understand why it was
+that her son and his friends were socialists.
+
+When they had all departed, she asked Pavel:
+
+"Pavlusha, are you a socialist?"
+
+"Yes," he said, standing before her, straight and stalwart as
+always.  "Why?"
+
+The mother heaved a heavy sigh, and lowering her eyes, said:
+
+"So, Pavlusha?  Why, they are against the Czar; they killed one."
+
+Pavel walked up and down the room, ran his hand across his face,
+and, smiling, said:
+
+"We don't need to do that!"
+
+He spoke to her for a long while in a low, serious voice.  She
+looked into his face and thought:
+
+"He will do nothing bad; he is incapable of doing bad!"
+
+And thereafter the terrible word was repeated with increasing
+frequency; its sharpness wore off, and it became as familiar to
+her ear as scores of other words unintelligible to her.  But Sashenka
+did not please her, and when she came the mother felt troubled and
+ill at ease.
+
+Once she said to the Little Russian, with an expression of
+dissatisfaction about the mouth:
+
+"What a stern person this Sashenka is!  Flings her commands around!
+--You must do this and you must do that!"
+
+The Little Russian laughed aloud.
+
+"Well said, mother!  You struck the nail right on the head!  Hey, Pavel?"
+
+And with a wink to the mother, he said with a jovial gleam in his eyes:
+
+"You can't drain the blue blood out of a person even with a pump!"
+
+Pavel remarked dryly:
+
+"She is a good woman!"  His face glowered.
+
+"And that's true, too!" the Little Russian corroborated.  "Only she
+does not understand that she ought to----"
+
+They started up an argument about something the mother did not
+understand.  The mother noticed, also, that Sashenka was most stern
+with Pavel, and that sometimes she even scolded him.  Pavel smiled,
+was silent, and looked in the girl's face with that soft look he
+had formerly given Natasha.  This likewise displeased the mother.
+
+The gatherings increased in number, and began to be held twice a
+week; and when the mother observed with what avidity the young
+people listened to the speeches of her son and the Little Russian,
+to the interesting stories of Sashenka, Natasha, Alexey Ivanovich,
+and the other people from the city, she forgot her fears and shook
+her head sadly as she recalled the days of her youth.
+
+Sometimes they sang songs, the simple, familiar melodies, aloud and
+merrily.  But often they sang new songs, the words and music in
+perfect accord, sad and quaint in tune.  These they sang in an
+undertone, pensively and seriously as church hymns are chanted.
+Their faces grew pale, yet hot, and a mighty force made itself felt
+in their ringing words.
+
+"It is time for us to sing these songs in the street," said
+Vyesovshchikov somberly.
+
+And sometimes the mother was struck by the spirit of lively,
+boisterous hilarity that took sudden possession of them.  It was
+incomprehensible to her.  It usually happened on the evenings when
+they read in the papers about the working people in other countries.
+Then their eyes sparkled with bold, animated joy; they became
+strangely, childishly happy; the room rang with merry peals of
+laughter, and they struck one another on the shoulder affectionately.
+
+"Capital fellows, our comrades the French!" cried some one, as if
+intoxicated with his own mirth.
+
+"Long live our comrades, the workingmen of Italy!" they shouted
+another time.
+
+And sending these calls into the remote distance to friends who
+did not know them, who could not have understood their language,
+they seemed to feel confident that these people unknown to them
+heard and comprehended their enthusiasm and their ecstasy.
+
+The Little Russian spoke, his eyes beaming, his love larger than
+the love of the others:
+
+"Comrades, it would be well to write to them over there!  Let them
+know that they have friends living in far-away Russia, workingmen
+who confess and believe in the same religion as they, comrades who
+pursue the same aims as they, and who rejoice in their victories!"
+
+And all, with smiles on their faces dreamily spoke at length of
+the Germans, the Italians, the Englishmen, and the Swedes, of the
+working people of all countries, as of their friends, as of people
+near to their hearts, whom without seeing they loved and respected,
+whose joys they shared, whose pain they felt.
+
+In the small room a vast feeling was born of the universal kinship
+of the workers of the world, at the same time its masters and its
+slaves, who had already been freed from the bondage of prejudice
+and who felt themselves the new masters of life.  This feeling
+blended all into a single soul; it moved the mother, and, although
+inaccessible to her, it straightened and emboldened her, as it were,
+with its force, with its joys, with its triumphant, youthful vigor,
+intoxicating, caressing, full of hope.
+
+"What queer people you are!" said the mother to the Little Russian
+one day.  "All are your comrades--the Armenians and the Jews and
+the Austrians.  You speak about all as of your friends; you grieve
+for all, and you rejoice for all!"
+
+"For all, mother dear, for all!  The world is ours!  The world is
+for the workers!  For us there is no nation, no race.  For us there
+are only comrades and foes.  All the workingmen are our comrades;
+all the rich, all the authorities are our foes.  When you see how
+numerous we workingmen are, how tremendous the power of the spirit
+in us, then your heart is seized with such joy, such happiness, such
+a great holiday sings in your bosom!  And, mother, the Frenchman
+and the German feel the same way when they look upon life, and the
+Italian also.  We are all children of one mother--the great,
+invincible idea of the brotherhood of the workers of all countries
+over all the earth.  This idea grows, it warms us like the sun;
+it is a second sun in the heaven of justice, and this heaven resides
+in the workingman's heart.  Whoever he be, whatever his name, a
+socialist is our brother in spirit now and always, and through all
+the ages forever and ever!"
+
+This intoxicated and childish joy, this bright and firm faith came
+over the company more and more frequently; and it grew ever stronger,
+ever mightier.
+
+And when the mother saw this, she felt that in very truth a great
+dazzling light had been born into the world like the sun in the sky
+and visible to her eyes.
+
+On occasions when his father had stolen something again and was in
+prison, Nikolay would announce to his comrades:  "Now we can hold
+our meetings at our house.  The police will think us thieves, and
+they love thieves!"
+
+Almost every evening after work one of Pavel's comrades came to his
+house, read with him, and copied something from the books.  So greatly
+occupied were they that they hardly even took the time to wash.
+They ate their supper and drank tea with the books in their hands;
+and their talks became less and less intelligible to the mother.
+
+"We must have a newspaper!" Pavel said frequently.
+
+Life grew ever more hurried and feverish; there was a constant
+rushing from house to house, a passing from one book to another,
+like the flirting of bees from flower to flower.
+
+"They are talking about us!" said Vyesovshchikov once.  "We must
+get away soon."
+
+"What's a quail for but to be caught in the snare?" retorted the
+Little Russian.
+
+Vlasova liked the Little Russian more and more.  When he called
+her "mother," it was like a child's hand patting her on the cheek.
+On Sunday, if Pavel had no time, he chopped wood for her; once he
+came with a board on his shoulder, and quickly and skillfully
+replaced the rotten step on the porch.  Another time he repaired
+the tottering fence with just as little ado.  He whistled as he
+worked.  It was a beautifully sad and wistful whistle.
+
+Once the mother said to the son:
+
+"Suppose we take the Little Russian in as a boarder.  It will be
+better for both of you.  You won't have to run to each other so much!"
+
+"Why need you trouble and crowd yourself?" asked Pavel, shrugging
+his shoulders.
+
+"There you have it!  All my life I've had trouble for I don't know
+what.  For a good person it's worth the while."
+
+"Do as you please.  If he comes I'll be glad."
+
+And the Little Russian moved into their home.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+
+The little house at the edge of the village aroused attention.
+Its walls already felt the regard of scores of suspecting eyes.
+The motley wings of rumor hovered restlessly above them.
+
+People tried to surprise the secret hidden within the house by the
+ravine.  They peeped into the windows at night.  Now and then somebody
+would rap on the pane, and quickly take to his heels in fright.
+
+Once the tavern keeper stopped Vlasova on the street.  He was a
+dapper old man, who always wore a black silk neckerchief around his
+red, flabby neck, and a thick, lilac-colored waistcoat of velvet
+around his body.  On his sharp, glistening nose there always sat a
+pair of glasses with tortoise-shell rims, which secured him the
+sobriquet of "bony eyes."
+
+In a single breath and without awaiting an answer, he plied Vlasova
+with dry, crackling words:
+
+"How are you, Pelagueya Nilovna, how are you?  How is your son?
+Thinking of marrying him off, hey?  He's a youth full ripe for
+matrimony.  The sooner a son is married off, the safer it is for his
+folks.  A man with a family preserves himself better both in the
+spirit and the flesh.  With a family he is like mushrooms in
+vinegar.  If I were in your place I would marry him off.  Our times
+require a strict watch over the animal called man; people are
+beginning to live in their brains.  Men have run amuck with their
+thoughts, and they do things that are positively criminal.  The
+church of God is avoided by the young folk; they shun the public
+places, and assemble in secret in out-of-the-way corners.  They
+speak in whispers.  Why speak in whispers, pray?  All this they
+don't dare say before people in the tavern, for example.  What is
+it, I ask?  A secret?  The secret place is our holy church, as old
+as the apostles.  All the other secrets hatched in the corners are
+the offspring of delusions.  I wish you good health."
+
+Raising his hand in an affected manner, he lifted his cap, and waving
+it in the air, walked away, leaving the mother to her perplexity.
+
+Vlasova's neighbor, Marya Korsunova, the blacksmith's widow, who
+sold food at the factory, on meeting the mother in the market place
+also said to her:
+
+"Look out for your son, Pelagueya!"
+
+"What's the matter?"
+
+"They're talking!"  Marya tendered the information in a hushed
+voice.  "And they don't say any good, mother of mine!  They speak
+as if he's getting up a sort of union, something like those
+Flagellants--sects, that's the name!  They'll whip one another like
+the Flagellants----"
+
+"Stop babbling nonsense, Marya!  Enough!"
+
+"I'm not babbling nonsense!  I talk because I know."
+
+The mother communicated all these conversations to her son.  He
+shrugged his shoulders in silence, and the Little Russian laughed
+with his thick, soft laugh.
+
+"The girls also have a crow to pick with you!" she said.  "You'd
+make enviable bridegrooms for any of them; you're all good workers,
+and you don't drink--but you don't pay any attention to them.
+Besides, people are saying that girls of questionable character come
+to you."
+
+"Well, of course!" exclaimed Pavel, his brow contracting in a frown
+of disgust.
+
+"In the bog everything smells of rottenness!" said the Little Russian
+with a sigh.  "Why don't you, mother, explain to the foolish girls
+what it is to be married, so that they shouldn't be in such a hurry
+to get their bones broken?"
+
+"Oh, well," said the mother, "they see the misery in store for them,
+they understand, but what can they do?  They have no other choice!"
+
+"It's a queer way they have of understanding, else they'd find a
+choice," observed Pavel.
+
+The mother looked into his austere face.
+
+"Why don't you teach them?  Why don't you invite some of the
+cleverer ones?"
+
+"That won't do!" the son replied dryly.
+
+"Suppose we try?" said the Little Russian.
+
+After a short silence Pavel said:
+
+"Couples will be formed; couples will walk together; then some will
+get married, and that's all."
+
+The mother became thoughtful.  Pavel's austerity worried her.  She
+saw that his advice was taken even by his older comrades, such as
+the Little Russian; but it seemed to her that all were afraid of
+him, and no one loved him because he was so stern.
+
+Once when she had lain down to sleep, and her son and the Little
+Russian were still reading, she overheard their low conversation
+through the thin partition.
+
+"You know I like Natasha," suddenly ejaculated the Little Russian
+in an undertone.
+
+"I know," answered Pavel after a pause.
+
+"Yes!"
+
+The mother heard the Little Russian rise and begin to walk.  The
+tread of his bare feet sounded on the floor, and a low, mournful
+whistle was heard.  Then he spoke again:
+
+"And does she notice it?"
+
+Pavel was silent.
+
+"What do you think?" the Little Russian asked, lowering his voice.
+
+"She does," replied Pavel.  "That's why she has refused to attend
+our meetings."
+
+The Little Russian dragged his feet heavily over the floor, and
+again his low whistle quivered in the room.  Then he asked:
+
+"And if I tell her?"
+
+"What?"  The brief question shot from Pavel like the discharge of a gun.
+
+"That I am--" began the Little Russian in a subdued voice.
+
+"Why?" Pavel interrupted.
+
+The mother heard the Little Russian stop, and she felt that he smiled.
+
+"Yes, you see, I consider that if you love a girl you must tell her
+about it; else there'll be no sense to it!"
+
+Pavel clapped the book shut with a bang.
+
+"And what sense do you expect?"
+
+Both were silent for a long while.
+
+"Well?" asked the Little Russian.
+
+"You must be clear in your mind, Andrey, as to what you want to do,"
+said Pavel slowly.  "Let us assume that she loves you, too--I do
+not think so, but let us assume it.  Well, you get married.  An
+interesting union--the intellectual with the workingman!  Children
+come along; you will have to work all by yourself and very hard.
+Your life will become the ordinary life of a struggle for a piece
+of bread and a shelter for yourself and children.  For the cause,
+you will become nonexistent, both of you!"
+
+Silence ensued.  Then Pavel began to speak again in a voice that
+sounded softer:
+
+"You had better drop all this, Andrey.  Keep quiet, and don't worry
+her.  That's the more honest way."
+
+"And do you remember what Alexey Ivanovich said about the necessity
+for a man to live a complete life--with all the power of his soul
+and body--do you remember?"
+
+"That's not for us!  How can you attain completion?  It does not
+exist for you.  If you love the future you must renounce everything
+in the present--everything, brother!"
+
+"That's hard for a man!" said the Little Russian in a lowered voice.
+
+"What else can be done?  Think!"
+
+The indifferent pendulum of the clock kept chopping off the seconds
+of life, calmly and precisely.  At last the Little Russian said:
+
+"Half the heart loves, and the other half hates!  Is that a heart?"
+
+"I ask you, what else can we do?"
+
+The pages of a book rustled.  Apparently Pavel had begun to read
+again.  The mother lay with closed eyes, and was afraid to stir.
+She was ready to weep with pity for the Little Russian; but she
+was grieved still more for her son.
+
+"My dear son!  My consecrated one!" she thought.
+
+Suddenly the Little Russian asked:
+
+"So I am to keep quiet?"
+
+"That's more honest, Andrey," answered Pavel softly.
+
+"All right!  That's the road we will travel."  And in a few seconds
+he added, in a sad and subdued voice:  "It will be hard for you,
+Pasha, when you get to that yourself."
+
+"It is hard for me already."
+
+"Yes?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+The wind brushed along the walls of the house, and the pendulum
+marked the passing time.
+
+"Um," said the Little Russian leisurely, at last.  "That's too bad."
+
+The mother buried her head in the pillow and wept inaudibly.
+
+In the morning Andrey seemed to her to be lower in stature and
+all the more winning.  But her son towered thin, straight, and
+taciturn as ever.  She had always called the Little Russian Andrey 
+Stepanovich, in formal address, but now, all at once, involuntarily
+and unconsciously she said to him:
+
+"Say, Andriusha, you had better get your boots mended.  You are apt
+to catch cold."
+
+"On pay day, mother, I'll buy myself a new pair," he answered,
+smiling.  Then suddenly placing his long hand on her shoulder, he
+added:  "You know, you are my real mother.  Only you don't want to
+acknowledge it to people because I am so ugly."
+
+She patted him on the hand without speaking.  She would have liked
+to say many endearing things, but her heart was wrung with pity, and
+the words would not leave her tongue.
+
+
+They spoke in the village about the socialists who distributed
+broadcast leaflets in blue ink.  In these leaflets the conditions
+prevailing in the factory were trenchantly and pointedly depicted,
+as well as the strikes in St. Petersburg and southern Russia; and
+the workingmen were called upon to unite and fight for their interests.
+
+The staid people who earned good pay waxed wroth as they read the
+literature, and said abusively:  "Breeders of rebellion!  For such
+business they ought to get their eyes blacked."  And they carried
+the pamphlets to the office.
+
+The young people read the proclamations eagerly, and said excitedly:
+"It's all true!"
+
+The majority, broken down with their work, and indifferent to
+everything, said lazily:  "Nothing will come of it.  It is impossible!"
+
+But the leaflets made a stir among the people, and when a week
+passed without their getting any, they said to one another:
+
+"None again to-day!  It seems the printing must have stopped."
+
+Then on Monday the leaflets appeared again; and again there was a
+dull buzz of talk among the workingmen.
+
+In the taverns and the factory strangers were noticed, men whom
+no one knew.  They asked questions, scrutinized everything and
+everybody; looked around, ferreted about, and at once attracted
+universal attention, some by their suspicious watchfulness, others
+by their excessive obtrusiveness.
+
+The mother knew that all this commotion was due to the work of her
+son Pavel.  She saw how all the people were drawn together about
+him.  He was not alone, and therefore it was not so dangerous.  But
+pride in her son mingled with her apprehension for his fate; it was
+his secret labors that discharged themselves in fresh currents into
+the narrow, turbid stream of life.
+
+One evening Marya Korsunova rapped at the window from the street,
+and when the mother opened it, she said in a loud whisper:
+
+"Now, take care, Pelagueya; the boys have gotten themselves into
+a nice mess!  It's been decided to make a search to-night in your
+house, and Mazin's and Vyesovshchikov's----"
+
+The mother heard only the beginning of the woman's talk; all the
+rest of the words flowed together in one stream of ill-boding,
+hoarse sounds.
+
+Marya's thick lips flapped hastily one against the other.  Snorts
+issued from her fleshy nose, her eyes blinked and turned from side
+to side as if on the lookout for somebody in the street.
+
+"And, mark you, I do not know anything, and I did not say anything
+to you, mother dear, and did not even see you to-day, you understand?"
+
+Then she disappeared.
+
+The mother closed the window and slowly dropped on a chair, her
+strength gone from her, her brain a desolate void.  But the
+consciousness of the danger threatening her son quickly brought
+her to her feet again.  She dressed hastily, for some reason wrapped
+her shawl tightly around her head, and ran to Fedya Mazin, who,
+she knew, was sick and not working.  She found him sitting at the
+window reading a book, and moving his right hand to and fro with
+his left, his thumb spread out.  On learning the news he jumped up
+nervously, his lips trembled, and his face paled.
+
+"There you are!  And I have an abscess on my finger!" he mumbled.
+
+"What are we to do?" asked Vlasova, wiping the perspiration from
+her face with a hand that trembled nervously.
+
+"Wait a while!  Don't be afraid," answered Fedya, running his sound
+hand through his curly hair.
+
+"But you are afraid yourself!"
+
+"I?"  He reddened and smiled in embarrassment.  "Yes--h-m--  I had
+a fit of cowardice, the devil take it!  We must let Pavel know.
+I'll send my little sister to him.  You go home.  Never mind!
+They're not going to beat us."
+
+On returning home she gathered together all the books, and pressing
+them to her bosom walked about the house for a long time, looking
+into the oven, under the oven, into the pipe of the samovar, and
+even into the water vat.  She thought Pavel would at once drop work
+and come home; but he did not come.  Finally she sat down exhausted
+on the bench in the kitchen, putting the books under her; and she
+remained in that position, afraid to rise, until Pavel and the
+Little Russian returned from the factory.
+
+"Do you know?" she exclaimed without rising.
+
+"We know!" said Pavel with a composed smile.  "Are you afraid?"
+
+"Oh, I'm so afraid, so afraid!"
+
+"You needn't be afraid," said the Little Russian.  "That won't
+help anybody."
+
+"Didn't even prepare the samovar," remarked Pavel.
+
+The mother rose, and pointed to the books with a guilty air.
+
+"You see, it was on account of them--all the time--I was----"
+
+The son and the Little Russian burst into laughter; and this
+relieved her.  Then Pavel picked out some books and carried them
+out into the yard to hide them, while the Little Russian remained
+to prepare the samovar.
+
+"There's nothing terrible at all in this, mother.  It's only a
+shame for people to occupy themselves with such nonsense.  Grown-up
+men in gray come in with sabers at their sides, with spurs on their
+feet, and rummage around, and dig up and search everything.  They
+look under the bed, and climb up to the garret; if there is a cellar
+they crawl down into it.  The cobwebs get on their faces, and they
+puff and snort.  They are bored and ashamed.  That's why they put
+on the appearance of being very wicked and very mad with us.  It's
+dirty work, and they understand it, of course they do!  Once they
+turned everything topsy-turvy in my place, and went away abashed,
+that's all.  Another time they took me along with them.  Well, they
+put me in prison, and I stayed there with them for about four months.
+You sit and sit, then you're called out, taken to the street under
+an escort of soldiers, and you're asked certain questions.  They're
+stupid people, they talk such incoherent stuff.  When they're done
+with you, they tell the soldiers to take you back to prison.  So
+they lead you here, and they lead you there--they've got to justify
+their salaries somehow.  And then they let you go free.  That's all."
+
+"How you always do speak, Andriusha!" exclaimed the mother involuntarily.
+
+Kneeling before the samovar he diligently blew into the pipe; but
+presently he turned his face, red with exertion, toward her, and
+smoothing his mustache with both hands inquired:
+
+"And how do I speak, pray?"
+
+"As if nobody had ever done you any wrong."
+
+He rose, approached her, and shaking his head, said:
+
+"Is there an unwronged soul anywhere in the wide world?  But I have
+been wronged so much that I have ceased to feel wronged.  What's
+to be done if people cannot help acting as they do?  The wrongs I
+undergo hinder me greatly in my work.  It is impossible to avoid
+them.  But to stop and pay attention to them is useless waste of
+time.  Such a life!  Formerly I would occasionally get angry--but
+I thought to myself:  all around me I see people broken in heart.
+It seemed as if each one were afraid that his neighbor would strike
+him, and so he tried to get ahead and strike the other first.  Such
+a life it is, mother dear."
+
+His speech flowed on serenely.  He resolutely distracted her mind
+from alarm at the expected police search.  His luminous, protuberant
+eyes smiled sadly.  Though ungainly, he seemed made of stuff that
+bends but never breaks.
+
+The mother sighed and uttered the warm wish:
+
+"May God grant you happiness, Andriusha!"
+
+The Little Russian stalked to the samovar with long strides, sat in
+front of it again on his heels, and mumbled:
+
+"If he gives me happiness, I will not decline it; ask for it I won't,
+to seek it I have no time."
+
+And he began to whistle.
+
+Pavel came in from the yard and said confidently:
+
+"They won't find them!"  He started to wash himself.  Then carefully
+rubbing his hands dry, he added: "If you show them, mother, that
+you are frightened, they will think there must be something in this
+house because you tremble.  And we have done nothing as yet, nothing!
+You know that we don't want anything bad; on our side is truth,
+and we will work for it all our lives.  This is our entire guilt.
+Why, then, need we fear?"
+
+"I will pull myself together, Pasha!" she assured him.  And the
+next moment, unable to repress her anxiety, she exclaimed:  "I wish
+they'd come soon, and it would all be over!"
+
+But they did not come that night, and in the morning, in anticipation
+of the fun that would probably be poked at her for her alarm, the
+mother began to joke at herself.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+
+The searchers appeared at the very time they were not expected,
+nearly a month after this anxious night.  Nikolay Vyesovshchikov was
+at Pavel's house talking with him and Andrey about their newspaper.
+It was late, about midnight.  The mother was already in bed.  Half
+awake, half asleep, she listened to the low, busy voices.  Presently
+Andrey got up and carefully picked his way through and out of the
+kitchen, quietly shutting the door after him.  The noise of the iron
+bucket was heard on the porch.  Suddenly the door was flung wide
+open; the Little Russian entered the kitchen, and announced in a
+loud whisper:
+
+"I hear the jingling of spurs in the street!"
+
+The mother jumped out of bed, catching at her dress with a trembling
+hand; but Pavel came to the door and said calmly:
+
+"You stay in bed; you're not feeling well."
+
+A cautious, stealthy sound was heard on the porch.  Pavel went to
+the door and knocking at it with his hand asked:
+
+"Who's there?"
+
+A tall, gray figure tumultuously precipitated itself through the
+doorway; after it another; two gendarmes pushed Pavel back, and
+stationed themselves on either side of him, and a loud mocking voice
+called out:
+
+"No one you expect, eh?"
+
+The words came from a tall, lank officer, with a thin, black mustache.
+The village policeman, Fedyakin, appeared at the bedside of the
+mother, and, raising one hand to his cap, pointed the other at her
+face and, making terrible eyes, said:
+
+"This is his mother, your honor!"  Then, waving his hand toward
+Pavel:  "And this is he himself."
+
+"Pavel Vlasov?" inquired the officer, screwing up his eyes; and when
+Pavel silently nodded his head, he announced, twirling his mustache:
+
+"I have to make a search in your house.  Get up, old woman!"
+
+"Who is there?" he asked, turning suddenly and making a dash for
+the door.
+
+"Your name?"  His voice was heard from the other room.
+
+Two other men came in from the porch:  the old smelter Tveryakov
+and his lodger, the stoker Rybin, a staid, dark-colored peasant.
+He said in a thick, loud voice:
+
+"Good evening, Nilovna."
+
+She dressed herself, all the while speaking to herself in a low
+voice, so as to give herself courage:
+
+"What sort of a thing is this?  They come at night.  People are
+asleep and they come----"
+
+The room was close, and for some reason smelled strongly of shoe
+blacking.  Two gendarmes and the village police commissioner,
+Ryskin, their heavy tread resounding on the floor, removed the books
+from the shelves and put them on the table before the officer.  Two
+others rapped on the walls with their fists, and looked under the
+chairs.  One man clumsily clambered up on the stove in the corner.
+Nikolay's pockmarked face became covered with red patches, and his
+little gray eyes were steadfastly fixed upon the officer.  The
+Little Russian curled his mustache, and when the mother entered the
+room, he smiled and gave her an affectionate nod of the head.
+
+Striving to suppress her fear, she walked, not sideways as always,
+but erect, her chest thrown out, which gave her figure a droll,
+stilted air of importance.  Her shoes made a knocking sound on the
+floor, and her brows trembled.
+
+The officer quickly seized the books with the long fingers of his
+white hand, turned over the pages, shook them, and with a dexterous
+movement of the wrist flung them aside.  Sometimes a book fell to
+the floor with a light thud.  All were silent.  The heavy breathing
+of the perspiring gendarmes was audible; the spurs clanked, and
+sometimes the low question was heard:  "Did you look here?"
+
+The mother stood by Pavel's side against the wall.  She folded her
+arms over her bosom, like her son, and both regarded the officer.
+The mother felt her knees trembling, and her eyes became covered
+with a dry mist.
+
+Suddenly the piercing voice of Nikolay cut into the silence:
+
+"Why is it necessary to throw the books on the floor?"
+
+The mother trembled.  Tveryakov rocked his head as if he had been
+struck on the back.  Rybin uttered a peculiar cluck, and regarded
+Nikolay attentively.
+
+The officer threw up his head, screwed up his eyes, and fixed them
+for a second upon the pockmarked, mottled, immobile face.  His
+fingers began to turn the leaves of the books still more rapidly.
+His face was yellow and pale; he twisted his lips continually.  At
+times he opened his large gray eyes wide, as if he suffered from an
+intolerable pain, and was ready to scream out in impotent anguish.
+
+"Soldier!" Vyesovshchikov called out again.  "Pick the books up!"
+
+All the gendarmes turned their eyes on him, then looked at the
+officer.  He again raised his head, and taking in the broad figure
+of Nikolay with a searching stare, he drawled:
+
+"Well, well, pick up the books."
+
+One gendarme bent down, and, looking slantwise at Vyesovshchikov,
+began to collect the books scattered on the floor.
+
+"Why doesn't Nikolay keep quiet?" the mother whispered to Pavel.
+He shrugged his shoulders.  The Little Russian drooped his head.
+
+"What's the whispering there?  Silence, please!  Who reads the Bible?"
+
+"I!" said Pavel.
+
+"Aha!  And whose books are all these?"
+
+"Mine!" answered Pavel.
+
+"So!" exclaimed the officer, throwing himself on the back of the
+chair.  He made the bones of his slender hand crack, stretched his
+legs under the table, and adjusting his mustache, asked Nikolay:
+"Are you Andrey Nakhodka?"
+
+"Yes!" answered Nikolay, moving forward.  The Little Russian put
+out his hand, took him by the shoulder, and pulled him back.
+
+"He made a mistake; I am Andrey!"
+
+The officer raised his hand, and threatening Vyesovshchikov with
+his little finger, said:
+
+"Take care!"
+
+He began to search among his papers.  From the street the bright,
+moonlit night looked on through the window with soulless eyes.
+Some one was loafing about outside the window, and the snow crunched
+under his tread.
+
+"You, Nakhodka, you have been searched for political offenses
+before?" asked the officer.
+
+"Yes, I was searched in Rostov and Saratov.  Only there the
+gendarmes addressed me as 'Mr.'"
+
+The officer winked his right eye, rubbed it, and showing his fine
+teeth, said:
+
+"And do you happen to know, MR. Nakhodka--yes, you, MR. Nakhodka--
+who those scoundrels are who distribute criminal proclamations and
+books in the factory, eh?"
+
+The Little Russian swayed his body, and with a broad smile on his
+face was about to say something, when the irritating voice of
+Nikolay again rang out:
+
+"This is the first time we have seen scoundrels here!"
+
+Silence ensued.  There was a moment of breathless suspense.  The
+scar on the mother's face whitened, and her right eyebrow traveled
+upward.  Rybin's black beard quivered strangely.  He dropped his
+eyes, and slowly scratched one hand with the other.
+
+"Take this dog out of here!" said the officer.
+
+Two gendarmes seized Nikolay under the arm and rudely pulled him
+into the kitchen.  There he planted his feet firmly on the floor
+and shouted:
+
+"Stop!  I am going to put my coat on."
+
+The police commissioner came in from the yard and said:
+
+"There is nothing out there.  We searched everywhere!"
+
+"Well, of course!" exclaimed the officer, laughing.  "I knew it!
+There's an experienced man here, it goes without saying."
+
+The mother listened to his thin, dry voice, and looking with terror
+into the yellow face, felt an enemy in this man, an enemy without
+pity, with a heart full of aristocratic disdain of the people.
+Formerly she had but rarely seen such persons, and now she had
+almost forgotten they existed.
+
+"Then this is the man whom Pavel and his friends have provoked,"
+she thought.
+
+"I place you, MR. Andrey Onisimov Nakhodka, under arrest."
+
+"What for?" asked the Little Russian composedly.
+
+"I will tell you later!" answered the officer with spiteful civility,
+and turning to Vlasova, he shouted:
+
+"Say, can you read or write?"
+
+"No!" answered Pavel.
+
+"I didn't ask you!" said the officer sternly, and repeated:  "Say,
+old woman, can you read or write?"
+
+The mother involuntarily gave way to a feeling of hatred for the
+man.  She was seized with a sudden fit of trembling, as if she had
+jumped into cold water.  She straightened herself, her scar turned
+purple, and her brow drooped low.
+
+"Don't shout!" she said, flinging out her hand toward him.  "You
+are a young man still; you don't know misery or sorrow----"
+
+"Calm yourself, mother!" Pavel intervened.
+
+"In this business, mother, you've got to take your heart between
+your teeth and hold it there tight," said the Little Russian.
+
+"Wait a moment, Pasha!" cried the mother, rushing to the table and
+then addressing the officer:  "Why do you snatch people away thus?"
+
+"That does not concern you.  Silence!" shouted the officer, rising.
+
+"Bring in the prisoner Vyesovshchikov!" he commanded, and began
+to read aloud a document which he raised to his face.
+
+Nikolay was brought into the room.
+
+"Hats off!" shouted the officer, interrupting his reading.
+
+Rybin went up to Vlasova, and patting her on the back, said in an
+undertone:
+
+"Don't get excited, mother!"
+
+"How can I take my hat off if they hold my hands?" asked Nikolay,
+drowning the reading.
+
+The officer flung the paper on the table.
+
+"Sign!" he said curtly.
+
+The mother saw how everyone signed the document, and her excitement
+died down, a softer feeling taking possession of her heart.  Her
+eyes filled with tears--burning tears of insult and impotence--such
+tears she had wept for twenty years of her married life, but lately
+she had almost forgotten their acid, heart-corroding taste.
+
+The officer regarded her contemptuously.  He scowled and remarked:
+
+"You bawl ahead of time, my lady!  Look out, or you won't have tears
+left for the future!"
+
+"A mother has enough tears for everything, everything!  If you have
+a mother, she knows it!"
+
+The officer hastily put the papers into his new portfolio with its
+shining lock.
+
+"How independent they all are in your place!"  He turned to the
+police commissioner.
+
+"An impudent pack!" mumbled the commissioner.
+
+"March!" commanded the officer.
+
+"Good-by, Andrey!  Good-by, Nikolay!" said Pavel warmly and softly,
+pressing his comrades' hands.
+
+"That's it!  Until we meet again!" the officer scoffed.
+
+Vyesovshchikov silently pressed Pavel's hands with his short fingers
+and breathed heavily.  The blood mounted to his thick neck; his eyes
+flashed with rancor.  The Little Russian's face beamed with a sunny
+smile.  He nodded his head, and said something to the mother; she
+made the sign of the cross over him.
+
+"God sees the righteous," she murmured.
+
+At length the throng of people in the gray coats tumbled out on
+the porch, and their spurs jingled as they disappeared.  Rybin went
+last.  He regarded Pavel with an attentive look of his dark eyes
+and said thoughtfully:  "Well, well--good-by!" and coughing in his
+beard he leisurely walked out on the porch.
+
+Folding his hands behind his back, Pavel slowly paced up and down
+the room, stepping over the books and clothes tumbled about on the
+floor.  At last he said somberly:
+
+"You see how it's done!  With insult--disgustingly--yes!  They
+left me behind."
+
+Looking perplexedly at the disorder in the room, the mother
+whispered sadly:
+
+"They will take you, too, be sure they will.  Why did Nikolay speak
+to them the way he did?"
+
+"He got frightened, I suppose," said Pavel quietly.  "Yes--It's
+impossible to speak to them, absolutely impossible!  They cannot
+understand!"
+
+"They came, snatched, and carried off!" mumbled the mother, waving
+her hands.  As her son remained at home, her heart began to beat
+more lightly.  Her mind stubbornly halted before one fact and
+refused to be moved.  "How he scoffs at us, that yellow ruffian!
+How he threatens us!"
+
+"All right, mamma!" Pavel suddenly said with resolution.  "Let us
+pick all this up!"
+
+He called her "mamma," the word he used only when he came nearer to
+her.  She approached him, looked into his face, and asked softly:
+
+"Did they insult you?"
+
+"Yes," he answered.  "That's--hard!  I would rather have gone with them."
+
+It seemed to her that she saw tears in his eyes, and wishing to soothe
+him, with an indistinct sense of his pain, she said with a sigh:
+
+"Wait a while--they'll take you, too!"
+
+"They will!" he replied.
+
+After a pause the mother remarked sorrowfully:
+
+"How hard you are, Pasha!  If you'd only reassure me once in a while!
+But you don't.  When I say something horrible, you say something worse."
+
+He looked at her, moved closer to her, and said gently:
+
+"I cannot, mamma!  I cannot lie!  You have to get used to it."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+
+The next day they knew that Bukin, Samoylov, Somov, and five more had
+been arrested.  In the evening Fedya Mazin came running in upon them.
+A search had been made in his house also.  He felt himself a hero.
+
+"Were you afraid, Fedya?" asked the mother.
+
+He turned pale, his face sharpened, and his nostrils quivered.
+
+"I was afraid the officer might strike me.  He has a black beard,
+he's stout, his fingers are hairy, and he wears dark glasses, so
+that he looks as if he were without eyes.  He shouted and stamped
+his feet.  He said I'd rot in prison.  And I've never been beaten
+either by my father or mother; they love me because I'm their only
+son.  Everyone gets beaten everywhere, but I never!"
+
+He closed his eyes for a moment, compressed his lips, tossed his
+hair back with a quick gesture of both hands, and looking at Pavel
+with reddening eyes, said:
+
+"If anybody ever strikes me, I will thrust my whole body into him
+like a knife--I will bite my teeth into him--I'd rather he'd kill
+me at once and be done!"
+
+"To defend yourself is your right," said Pavel.  "But take care not
+to attack!"
+
+"You are delicate and thin," observed the mother.  "What do you
+want with fighting?"
+
+"I WILL fight!" answered Fedya in a low voice.
+
+When he left, the mother said to Pavel:
+
+"This young man will go down sooner than all the rest."
+
+Pavel was silent.
+
+A few minutes later the kitchen door opened slowly and Rybin entered.
+
+"Good evening!" he said, smiling.  "Here I am again.  Yesterday
+they brought me here; to-day I come of my own accord.  Yes, yes!"
+He gave Pavel a vigorous handshake, then put his hand on the mother's
+shoulder, and asked:  "Will you give me tea?"
+
+Pavel silently regarded his swarthy, broad countenance, his thick,
+black beard, and dark, intelligent eyes.  A certain gravity spoke
+out of their calm gaze; his stalwart figure inspired confidence.
+
+The mother went into the kitchen to prepare the samovar.  Rybin sat
+down, stroked his beard, and placing his elbows on the table,
+scanned Pavel with his dark look.
+
+"That's the way it is," he said, as if continuing an interrupted
+conversation.  "I must have a frank talk with you.  I observed you
+long before I came.  We live almost next door to each other.  I see
+many people come to you, and no drunkenness, no carrying on.  That's
+the main thing.  If people don't raise the devil, they immediately
+attract attention.  What's that?  There you are!  That's why all
+eyes are on me, because I live apart and give no offense."
+
+His speech flowed along evenly and freely.  It had a ring that won
+him confidence.
+
+"So.  Everybody prates about you.  My masters call you a heretic;
+you don't go to church.  I don't, either.  Then the papers appeared,
+those leaflets.  Was it you that thought them out?"
+
+"Yes, I!" answered Pavel, without taking his eyes off Rybin's face.
+Rybin also looked steadily into Pavel's eyes.
+
+"You alone!" exclaimed the mother, coming into the room.  "It wasn't
+you alone."
+
+Pavel smiled; Rybin also.
+
+The mother sniffed, and walked away, somewhat offended because they
+did not pay attention to her words.
+
+"Those leaflets are well thought out.  They stir the people up.
+There were twelve of them, weren't there?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"I have read them all!  Yes, yes.  Sometimes they are not clear,
+and some things are superfluous.  But when a man speaks a great deal,
+it's natural he should occasionally say things out of the way."
+
+Rybin smiled.  His teeth were white and strong.
+
+"Then the search.  That won me over to you more than anything else.
+You and the Little Russian and Nikolay, you all got caught!"  He
+paused for the right word and looked at the window, rapping the
+table with his fingers.  "They discovered your resolve.  You attend
+to your business, your honor, you say, and we'll attend to ours.
+The Little Russian's a fine fellow, too.  The other day I heard how
+he speaks in the factory, and thinks I to myself:  that man isn't
+going to be vanquished; it's only one thing will knock him out,
+and that's death!  A sturdy chap!  Do you trust me, Pavel?"
+
+"Yes, I trust you!" said Pavel, nodding.
+
+"That's right.  Look!  I am forty years old; I am twice as old as
+you, and I've seen twenty times as much as you.  For three years
+long I wore my feet to the bone marching in the army.  I have been
+married twice.  I've been in the Caucasus, I know the Dukhobors.
+They're not masters of life, no, they aren't!"
+
+The mother listened eagerly to his direct speech.  It pleased her to
+have an older man come to her son and speak to him just as if he
+were confessing to him.  But Pavel seemed to treat the guest too
+curtly, and the mother, to introduce a softer element, asked Rybin:
+
+"Maybe you'll have something to eat."
+
+"Thank you, mother!  I've had my supper already.  So then, Pavel,
+you think that life does not go as it should?"
+
+Pavel arose and began to pace the room, folding his hands behind
+his back.
+
+"It goes all right," he said.  "Just now, for instance, it has
+brought you here to me with an open heart.  We who work our whole
+life long--it unites us gradually and more and more every day.  The
+time will come when we shall all be united.  Life is arranged
+unjustly for us and is made a burden.  At the same time, however,
+life itself is opening our eyes to its bitter meaning and is itself
+showing man the way to accelerate its pace.  We all of us think just
+as we live."
+
+"True.  But wait!"  Rybin stopped him.  "Man ought to be renovated--
+that's what I think!  When a man grows scabby, take him to the bath,
+give him a thorough cleaning, put clean clothes on him--and he will
+get well.  Isn't it so?  And if the heart grows scabby, take its
+skin off, even if it bleeds, wash it, and dress it up all afresh.
+Isn't it so?  How else can you clean the inner man?  There now!"
+
+Pavel began to speak hotly and bitterly about God, about the Czar,
+about the government authorities, about the factory, and how in
+foreign countries the workingmen stand up for their rights.  Rybin
+smiled occasionally; sometimes he struck a finger on the table as
+if punctuating a period.  Now and then he cried out briefly:  "So!"
+And once, laughing out, he said quietly:  "You're young.  You know
+people but little!"
+
+Pavel stopping before him said seriously:
+
+"Let's not talk of being old or being young.  Let us rather see
+whose thoughts are truer."
+
+"That is, according to you, we've been fooled about God also.  So!
+I, too, think that our religion is false and injurious to us."
+
+Here the mother intervened.  When her son spoke about God and about
+everything that she connected with her faith in him, which was dear
+and sacred to her, she sought to meet his eyes, she wanted to ask
+her son mutely not to chafe her heart with the sharp, bitter words
+of his unbelief.  And she felt that Rybin, an older man, would also
+be displeased and offended.  But when Rybin calmly put his question
+to Pavel, she could no longer contain herself, and said firmly:
+"When you speak of God, I wish you were more careful.  You can do
+whatever you like.  You have your compensation in your work."
+Catching her breath she continued with still greater vehemence:
+"But I, an old woman, I will have nothing to lean upon in my distress
+if you take my God away from me."
+
+Her eyes filled with tears.  She was washing the dishes, and her
+fingers trembled.
+
+"You did not understand us, mother!" Pavel said softly and kindly.
+
+"Beg your pardon, mother!" Rybin added in a slow, thick voice.  He
+looked at Pavel and smiled.  "I forgot that you're too old to cut
+out your warts."
+
+"I did not speak," continued Pavel, "about that good and gracious
+God in whom you believe, but about the God with whom the priests
+threaten us as with a stick, about the God in whose name they want
+to force all of us to the evil will of the few."
+
+"That's it, right you are!" exclaimed Rybin, striking his fingers
+upon the table.  "They have mutilated even our God for us, they have
+turned everything in their hands against us.  Mark you, mother, God
+created man in his own image and after his own likeness.  Therefore
+he is like man if man is like him.  But we have become, not like
+God, but like wild beasts!  In the churches they set up a scarecrow
+before us.  We have got to change our God, mother; we must cleanse
+him!  They have dressed him up in falsehood and calumny; they have
+distorted his face in order to destroy our souls!"
+
+He talked composedly and very distinctly and intelligibly.  Every
+word of his speech fell upon the mother's ears like a blow.  And his
+face set in the frame of his black beard, his broad face attired, as
+it were, in mourning, frightened her.  The dark gleam of his eyes
+was insupportable to her.  He aroused in her a sense of anguish, and
+filled her heart with terror.
+
+"No, I'd better go away," she said, shaking her head in negation.
+"It's not in my power to listen to this.  I cannot!"
+
+And she quickly walked into the kitchen followed by the words of
+Rybin:
+
+"There you have it, Pavel!  It begins not in the head, but in the
+heart.  The heart is such a place that nothing else will grow in it."
+
+"Only reason," said Pavel firmly, "only reason will free mankind."
+
+"Reason does not give strength!" retorted Rybin emphatically.  "The
+heart gives strength, and not the head, I tell you."
+
+The mother undressed and lay down in bed without saying her prayer.
+She felt cold and miserable.  And Rybin, who at first seemed such a
+staid, wise man, now aroused in her a blind hostility.
+
+"Heretic!  Sedition-maker!" she thought, listening to his even voice
+flowing resonantly from his deep chest.  He, too, had come--he was
+indispensable.
+
+He spoke confidently and composedly:
+
+"The holy place must not be empty.  The spot where God dwells is a 
+place of pain; and if he drops out from the heart, there will be a
+wound in it, mark my word!  It is necessary, Pavel, to invent a new
+faith; it is necessary to create a God for all.  Not a judge, not a
+warrior, but a God who shall be the friend of the people."
+
+"You had one!  There was Christ!"
+
+"Wait a moment!  Christ was not strong in spirit.  'Let the cup pass
+from me,' he said.  And he recognized Caesar.  God cannot recognize
+human powers.  He himself is the whole of power.  He does not divide
+his soul saying:  so much for the godly, so much for the human.  If
+Christ came to affirm the divine he had no need for anything human.
+But he recognized trade, and he recognized marriage.  And it was
+unjust of him to condemn the fig tree.  Was it of its own will that
+it was barren of fruit?  Neither is the soul barren of good of its
+own accord.  Have I sown the evil in it myself?  Of course not!"
+
+The two voices hummed continuously in the room, as if clutching at
+each other and wrestling in exciting play.  Pavel walked hurriedly
+up and down the room; the floor cracked under his feet.  When he
+spoke all other sounds were drowned by his voice; but above the
+slow, calm flow of Rybin's dull utterance were heard the strokes of
+the pendulum and the low creaking of the frost, as of sharp claws
+scratching the walls of the house.
+
+"I will speak to you in my own way, in the words of a stoker.  God
+is like fire.  He does not strengthen anything.  He cannot.  He
+merely burns and fuses when he gives light.  He burns down churches,
+he does not raise them.  He lives in the heart."
+
+"And in the mind!" insisted Pavel.
+
+"That's it!  In the heart and in the mind.  There's the rub.  It's
+this that makes all the trouble and misery and misfortune.  We have
+severed ourselves from our own selves.  The heart was severed from
+the mind, and the mind has disappeared.  Man is not a unit.  It is
+God that makes him a unit, that makes him a round, circular thing.
+God always makes things round.  Such is the earth and all the stars
+and everything visible to the eye.  The sharp, angular things are
+the work of men."
+
+The mother fell asleep and did not hear Rybin depart.
+
+But he began to come often, and if any of Pavel's comrades were
+present, Rybin sat in a corner and was silent, only occasionally
+interjecting:  "That's so!"
+
+And once looking at everybody from his corner with his dark glance
+he said somberly:
+
+"We must speak about that which is; that which will be is unknown
+to us.  When the people have freed themselves, they will see for
+themselves what is best.  Enough, quite enough of what they do not
+want at all has been knocked into their heads.  Let there be an end
+of this!  Let them contrive for themselves.  Maybe they will want to
+reject everything, all life, and all knowledge; maybe they will see
+that everything is arranged against them.  You just deliver all the
+books into their hands, and they will find an answer for themselves,
+depend upon it!  Only let them remember that the tighter the collar
+round the horse's neck, the worse the work."
+
+But when Pavel was alone with Rybin they at once began an endless
+but always calm disputation, to which the mother listened anxiously,
+following their words in silence, and endeavoring to understand.
+Sometimes it seemed to her as if the broad-shouldered, black-bearded
+peasant and her well-built, sturdy son had both gone blind.  In that
+little room, in the darkness, they seemed to be knocking about from
+side to side in search of light and an outlet, to be grasping out
+with powerful but blind hands; they seemed to fall upon the floor,
+and having fallen, to scrape and fumble with their feet.  They hit
+against everything, groped about for everything, and flung it away,
+calm and composed, losing neither faith nor hope.
+
+They got her accustomed to listen to a great many words, terrible in
+their directness and boldness; and these words had now ceased to
+weigh down on her so heavily as at first.  She learned to push them
+away from her ears.  And although Rybin still displeased her as
+before, he no longer inspired her with hostility.
+
+Once a week she carried underwear and books to the Little Russian
+in prison.  On one occasion they allowed her to see him and talk to
+him; and on returning home she related enthusiastically:
+
+"He is as if he were at home there, too!  He is good and kind to
+everybody; everybody jokes with him; just as if there were a holiday
+in his heart all the time.  His lot is hard and heavy, but he does
+not want to show it."
+
+"That's right!  That's the way one should act," observed Rybin.
+"We are all enveloped in misery as in our skins.  We breathe misery,
+we wear misery.  But that's nothing to brag about.  Not all people
+are blind; some close their eyes of their own accord, indeed!  And
+if you are stupid you have to suffer for it."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+
+The little old gray house of the Vlasovs attracted the attention of
+the village more and more; and although there was much suspicious
+chariness and unconscious hostility in this notice, yet at the same
+time a confiding curiosity grew up also.  Now and then some one
+would come over, and looking carefully about him would say to Pavel:
+"Well, brother, you are reading books here, and you know the laws.
+Explain to me, then----"
+
+And he would tell Pavel about some injustice of the police or the
+factory administration.  In complicated cases Pavel would give the
+man a note to a lawyer friend in the city, and when he could, he
+would explain the case himself.
+
+Gradually people began to look with respect upon this young, serious
+man, who spoke about everything simply and boldly, and almost never
+laughed, who looked at everybody and listened to everybody with an
+attention which searched stubbornly into every circumstance, and
+always found a certain general and endless thread binding people
+together by a thousand tightly drawn knots.
+
+Vlasova saw how her son had grown up; she strove to understand his
+work, and when she succeeded, she rejoiced with a childlike joy.
+
+Pavel rose particularly in the esteem of the people after the
+appearance of his story about the "Muddy Penny."
+
+Back of the factory, almost encircling it with a ring of putrescence,
+stretched a vast marsh grown over with fir trees and birches.  In
+the summer it was covered with thick yellow and green scum, and
+swarms of mosquitoes flew from it over the village, spreading fever
+in their course.  The marsh belonged to the factory, and the new
+manager, wishing to extract profit from it, conceived the plan of
+draining it and incidentally gathering in a fine harvest of peat.
+Representing to the workingmen how much this measure would contribute
+to the sanitation of the locality and the improvement of the general
+condition of all, the manager gave orders to deduct a kopeck from
+every ruble of their earnings, in order to cover the expense of
+draining the marsh.  The workingmen rebelled; they especially resented
+the fact that the office clerks were exempted from paying the new tax.
+
+Pavel was ill on the Saturday when posters were hung up announcing
+the manager's order in regard to the toll.  He had not gone to work
+and he knew nothing about it.  The next day, after mass, a dapper
+old man, the smelter Sizov, and the tall, vicious-looking locksmith
+Makhotin, came to him and told him of the manager's decision.
+
+"A few of us older ones got together," said Sizov, speaking
+sedately, "talked the matter over, and our comrades, you see, sent
+us over to you, as you are a knowing man among us.  Is there such a
+law as gives our manager the right to make war upon mosquitoes with
+our kopecks?"
+
+"Think!" said Makhotin, with a glimmer in his narrow eyes.  "Three
+years ago these sharpers collected a tax to build a bath house.
+Three thousand eight hundred rubles is what they gathered in.  Where
+are those rubles?  And where is the bath house?"
+
+Pavel explained the injustice of the tax, and the obvious advantage
+of such a procedure to the factory owners; and both of his visitors
+went away in a surly mood.
+
+The mother, who had gone with them to the door, said, laughing:
+
+"Now, Pasha, the old people have also begun to come to seek wisdom
+from you."
+
+Without replying, Pavel sat down at the table with a busy air and
+began to write.  In a few minutes he said to her:  "Please go to the
+city immediately and deliver this note."
+
+"Is it dangerous?" she asked.
+
+"Yes!  A newspaper is being published for us down there!  That
+'Muddy Penny' story must go into the next issue."
+
+"I'll go at once," she replied, beginning hurriedly to put on her wraps.
+
+This was the first commission her son had given her.  She was happy
+that he spoke to her so openly about the matter, and that she might
+be useful to him in his work.
+
+"I understand all about it, Pasha," she said.  "It's a piece of
+robbery.  What's the name of the man?  Yegor Ivanovich?"
+
+"Yes," said Pavel, smiling kindly.
+
+She returned late in the evening, exhausted but contented.
+
+"I saw Sashenka," she told her son.  "She sends you her regards.
+And this Yegor Ivanovich is such a simple fellow, such a joker!
+He speaks so comically."
+
+"I'm glad you like them," said Pavel softly.
+
+"They are simple people, Pasha.  It's good when people are simple.
+And they all respect you."
+
+Again, Monday, Pavel did not go to work.  His head ached.  But at
+dinner time Fedya Mazin came running in, excited, out of breath,
+happy, and tired.
+
+"Come!  The whole factory has arisen!  They've sent for you.  Sizov
+and Makhotin say you can explain better than anybody else.  My!
+What a hullabaloo!"
+
+Pavel began to dress himself silently.
+
+"A crowd of women are gathered there; they are screaming!"
+
+"I'll go, too," declared the mother.  "You're not well, and--what
+are they doing?  I'm going, too."
+
+"Come," Pavel said briefly.
+
+They walked along the street quickly and silently.  The mother panted
+with the exertion of the rapid gait and her excitement.  She felt that
+something big was happening.  At the factory gates a throng of women
+were discussing the affair in shrill voices.  When the three pushed
+into the yard, they found themselves in the thick of a crowd buzzing
+and humming in excitement.  The mother saw that all heads were turned
+in the same direction, toward the blacksmith's wall, where Sizov,
+Makhotin, Vyalov, and five or six influential, solid workingmen were
+standing on a high pile of old iron heaped on the red brick paving of
+the court, and waving their hands.
+
+"Vlasov is coming!" somebody shouted.
+
+"Vlasov?  Bring him along!"
+
+Pavel was seized and pushed forward, and the mother was left alone.
+
+"Silence!" came the shout from various directions.  Near by the
+even voice of Rybin was heard:
+
+"We must make a stand, not for the kopeck, but for justice.  What
+is dear to us is not our kopeck, because it's no rounder than any
+other kopeck; it's only heavier; there's more human blood in it
+than in the manager's ruble.  That's the truth!"
+
+The words fell forcibly on the crowd and stirred the men to hot
+responses:
+
+"That's right!  Good, Rybin!"
+
+"Silence!  The devil take you!"
+
+"Vlasov's come!"
+
+The voices mingled in a confused uproar, drowning the ponderous whir
+of the machinery, the sharp snorts of the steam, and the flapping
+of the leather belts.  From all sides people came running, waving
+their hands; they fell into arguments, and excited one another with
+burning, stinging words.  The irritation that had found no vent,
+that had always lain dormant in tired breasts, had awakened, demanded
+an outlet, and burst from their mouths in a volley of words.  It
+soared into the air like a great bird spreading its motley wings
+ever wider and wider, clutching people and dragging them after it,
+and striking them against one another.  It lived anew, transformed
+into flaming wrath.  A cloud of dust and soot hung over the crowd;
+their faces were all afire, and black drops of sweat trickled down
+their cheeks.  Their eyes gleamed from darkened countenances;
+their teeth glistened.
+
+Pavel appeared on the spot where Sizov and Makhotin were standing,
+and his voice rang out:
+
+"Comrades!"
+
+The mother saw that his face paled and his lips trembled; she
+involuntarily pushed forward, shoving her way through the crowd.
+
+"Where are you going, old woman?"
+
+She heard the angry question, and the people pushed her, but she
+would not stop, thrusting the crowd aside with her shoulders and
+elbows.  She slowly forced her way nearer to her son, yielding to
+the desire to stand by his side.  When Pavel had thrown out the word
+to which he was wont to attach a deep and significant meaning, his
+throat contracted in a sharp spasm of the joy of fight.  He was
+seized with an invincible desire to give himself up to the strength
+of his faith; to throw his heart to the people.  His heart kindled
+with the dream of truth.
+
+"Comrades!" he repeated, extracting power and rapture from the word.
+"We are the people who build churches and factories, forge chains
+and coin money, make toys and machines.  We are that living force
+which feeds and amuses the world from the cradle to the grave."
+
+"There!" Rybin exclaimed.
+
+"Always and everywhere we are first in work but last in life.  Who
+cares for us?  Who wishes us good?  Who regards us as human beings?
+No one!"
+
+"No one!" echoed from the crowd.
+
+Pavel, mastering himself, began to talk more simply and calmly;
+the crowd slowly drew about him, blending into one dark, thick,
+thousand-headed body.  It looked into his face with hundreds of
+attentive eyes; it sucked in his words in silent, strained attention.
+
+"We will not attain to a better life until we feel ourselves as
+comrades, as one family of friends firmly bound together by one
+desire--the desire to fight for our rights."
+
+"Get down to business!" somebody standing near the mother shouted rudely.
+
+"Don't interrupt!"  "Shut up!"  The two muffled exclamations were
+heard in different places.  The soot-covered faces frowned in sulky
+incredulity; scores of eyes looked into Pavel's face thoughtfully
+and seriously.
+
+"A socialist, but no fool!" somebody observed.
+
+"I say, he does speak boldly!" said a tall, crippled workingman,
+tapping the mother on the shoulder.
+
+"It is time, comrades, to take a stand against the greedy power that
+lives by our labor.  It is time to defend ourselves; we must all
+understand that no one except ourselves will help us.  One for all
+and all for one--this is our law, if we want to crush the foe!"
+
+"He's right, boys!" Makhotin shouted.  "Listen to the truth!"  And,
+with a broad sweep of his arm, he shook his fist in the air.
+
+"We must call out the manager at once," said Pavel.  "We must ask him."
+
+As if struck by a tornado, the crowd rocked to and fro; scores of
+voices shouted:
+
+"The manager!  The manager!  Let him come!  Let him explain!"
+
+"Send delegates for him!  Bring him here!"
+
+"No, don't; it's not necessary!"
+
+The mother pushed her way to the front and looked up at her son.
+She was filled with pride.  Her son stood among the old, respected
+workingmen; all listened to him and agreed with him!  She was
+pleased that he was so calm and talked so simply; not angrily, not
+swearing, like the others.  Broken exclamations, wrathful words and
+oaths descended like hail on iron.  Pavel looked down on the people
+from his elevation, and with wide-open eyes seemed to be seeking
+something among them.
+
+"Delegates!"
+
+"Let Sizov speak!"
+
+"Vlasov!"
+
+"Rybin!  He has a terrible tongue!"
+
+Finally Sizov, Rybin, and Pavel were chosen for the interview with
+the manager.  When just about to send for the manager, suddenly low
+exclamations were heard in the crowd:
+
+"Here he comes himself!"
+
+"The manager?"
+
+"Ah!"
+
+The crowd opened to make way for a tall, spare man with a pointed
+beard, an elongated face and blinking eyes.
+
+"Permit me," he said, as he pushed the people aside with a short
+motion of his hand, without touching them.  With the experienced
+look of a ruler of people, he scanned the workingmen's faces with a
+searching gaze.  They took their hats off and bowed to him.  He
+walked past them without acknowledging their greetings.  His
+presence silenced and confused the crowd, and evoked embarrassed
+smiles and low exclamations, as of repentant children who had
+already come to regret their prank.
+
+Now he passed, by the mother, casting a stern glance at her face,
+and stopped before the pile of iron.  Somebody from above extended a
+hand to him; he did not take it, but with an easy, powerful movement
+of his body he clambered up and stationed himself in front of Pavel
+and Sizov.  Looking around the silent crowd, he asked:
+
+"What's the meaning of this crowd?  Why have you dropped your work?"
+
+For a few seconds silence reigned.  Sizov waved his cap in the air,
+shrugged his shoulders, and dropped his head.
+
+"I am asking you a question!" continued the manager.
+
+Pavel moved alongside of him and said in a low voice, pointing to
+Sizov and Rybin:
+
+"We three are authorized by all the comrades to ask you to revoke
+your order about the kopeck discount."
+
+"Why?" asked the manager, without looking at Pavel.
+
+"We do not consider such a tax just!" Pavel replied loudly.
+
+"So, in my plan to drain the marsh you see only a desire to exploit the
+workingmen and not a desire to better their conditions; is that it?"
+
+"Yes!" Pavel replied.
+
+"And you, also?" the manager asked Rybin.
+
+"The very same!"
+
+"How about you, my worthy friend?"  The manager turned to Sizov.
+
+"I, too, want to ask you to let us keep our kopecks."  And drooping
+his head again, Sizov smiled guiltily.  The manager slowly bent his
+look upon the crowd again, shrugged his shoulders, and then,
+regarding Pavel searchingly, observed:
+
+"You appear to be a fairly intelligent man.  Do you not understand
+the usefulness of this measure?"
+
+Pavel replied loudly:
+
+"If the factory should drain the marsh at its own expense, we would
+all understand it!"
+
+"This factory is not in the philanthropy business!" remarked the
+manager dryly.  "I order you all to start work at once!"
+
+And he began to descend, cautiously feeling the iron with his feet,
+and without looking at anyone.
+
+A dissatisfied hum was heard in the crowd.
+
+"What!" asked the manager, halting.
+
+All were silent; then from the distance came a solitary voice:
+
+"You go to work yourself!"
+
+"If in fifteen minutes you do not start work, I'll order every single
+one of you to be discharged!" the manager announced dryly and distinctly.
+
+He again proceeded through the crowd, but now an indistinct murmur
+followed him, and the shouting grew louder as his figure receded.
+
+"Speak to him!"
+
+"That's what you call justice!  Worse luck!"
+
+Some turned to Pavel and shouted:
+
+"Say, you great lawyer, you, what's to be done now?  You talked and
+talked, but the moment he came it all went up in the air!"
+
+"Well, Vlasov, what now?"
+
+When the shouts became more insistent, Pavel raised his hand and said:
+
+"Comrades, I propose that we quit work until he gives up that kopeck!"
+
+Excited voices burst out:
+
+"He thinks we're fools!"
+
+"We ought to do it!"
+
+"A strike?"
+
+"For one kopeck?"
+
+"Why not?  Why not strike?"
+
+"We'll all be discharged!"
+
+"And who is going to do the work?"
+
+"There are others!"
+
+"Who?  Judases?"
+
+"Every year I would have to give three rubles and sixty kopecks
+to the mosquitoes!"
+
+"All of us would have to give it!"
+
+Pavel walked down and stood at the side of his mother.  No one paid
+any attention to him now.  They were all yelling and debating hotly
+with one another.
+
+"You cannot get them to strike!" said Rybin, coming up to Pavel.
+"Greedy as these people are for a penny, they are too cowardly.
+You may, perhaps, induce about three hundred of them to follow you,
+no more.  It's a heap of dung you won't lift with one toss of the
+pitchfork, I tell you!"
+
+Pavel was silent.  In front of him the huge black face of the crowd
+was rocking wildly, and fixed on him an importunate stare.  His
+heart beat in alarm.  It seemed to him as if all the words he had
+spoken vanished in the crowd without leaving any trace, like
+scattered drops of rain falling on parched soil.  One after the
+other, workmen approached him praising his speech, but doubting the
+success of a strike, and complaining how little the people
+understood their own interests and realized their own strength.
+
+Pavel had a sense of injury and disappointment as to his own power.
+His head ached; he felt desolate.  Hitherto, whenever he pictured
+the triumph of his truth, he wanted to cry with the delight that
+seized his heart.  But here he had spoken his truth to the people,
+and behold! when clothed in words it appeared so pale, so powerless,
+so incapable of affecting anyone.  He blamed himself; it seemed to
+him that he had concealed his dream in a poor, disfiguring garment,
+and no one could, therefore, detect its beauty.
+
+He went home, tired and moody.  He was followed by his mother and
+Sizov, while Rybin walked alongside, buzzing into his ear:
+
+"You speak well, but you don't speak to the heart!  That's the trouble!
+The spark must be thrown into the heart, into its very depths!"
+
+"It's time we lived and were guided by reason," Pavel said in a low voice.
+
+"The boot does not fit the foot; it's too thin and narrow!  The
+foot won't get in!  And if it does, it will wear the boot out mighty
+quick.  That is the trouble."
+
+Sizov, meanwhile, talked to the mother.
+
+"It's time for us old folks to get into our graves.  Nilovna!  A new
+people is coming.  What sort of a life have we lived?  We crawled
+on our knees, and always crouched on the ground!  But here are the
+new people.  They have either come to their senses, or else are
+blundering worse than we; but they are not like us, anyway.  Just
+look at those youngsters talking to the manager as to their equal!
+Yes, ma'am!  Oh, if only my son Matvey were alive!  Good-by, Pavel
+Vlasov!  You stand up for the people all right, brother.  God grant
+you his favor!  Perhaps you'll find a way out.  God grant it!"  And
+he walked away.
+
+"Yes, you may as well die straight off!" murmured Rybin.  "You are
+no men, now.  You are only putty--good to fill cracks with, that's
+all!  Did you see, Pavel, who it was that shouted to make you a
+delegate?  It was those who call you socialist--agitator--yes!--
+thinking you'd be discharged, and it would serve you right!"
+
+"They are right, according to their lights!" said Pavel.
+
+"So are wolves when they tear one another to pieces!"  Rybin's face
+was sullen, his voice unusually tremulous.
+
+The whole day Pavel felt ill at ease, as if he had lost something,
+he did not know what, and anticipated a further loss.
+
+At night when the mother was asleep and he was reading in bed,
+gendarmes appeared and began to search everywhere--in the yard, in
+the attic.  They were sullen; the yellow-faced officer conducted
+himself as on the first occasion, insultingly, derisively, delighting
+in abuse, endeavoring to cut down to the very heart.  The mother,
+in a corner, maintained silence, never removing her eyes from her
+son's face.  He made every effort not to betray his emotion; but
+whenever the officer laughed, his fingers twitched strangely, and
+the old woman felt how hard it was for him not to reply, and to bear
+the jesting.  This time the affair was not so terrorizing to her
+as at the first search.  She felt a greater hatred to these gray,
+spurred night callers, and her hatred swallowed up her alarm.
+
+Pavel managed to whisper:
+
+"They'll arrest me."
+
+Inclining her head, she quietly replied:
+
+"I understand."
+
+She did understand--they would put him in jail for what he had said to
+the workingmen that day.  But since all agreed with what he had said,
+and all ought to stand up for him, he would not be detained long.
+
+She longed to embrace him and cry over him; but there stood the
+officer, watching her with a malevolent squint of his eyes.  His
+lips trembled, his mustache twitched.  It seemed to Vlasova that
+the officer was but waiting for her tears, complaints, and
+supplications.  With a supreme effort endeavoring to say as little
+as possible, she pressed her son's hand, and holding her breath
+said slowly, in a low tone:
+
+"Good-by, Pasha.  Did you take everything you need?"
+
+"Everything.  Don't worry!"
+
+"Christ be with you!"
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+
+When the police had led Pavel away, the mother sat down on the
+bench, and closing her eyes began to weep quietly.  She leaned her
+back against the wall, as her husband used to do, her head thrown
+backward.  Bound up in her grief and the injured sense of her
+impotence, she cried long, gently, and monotonously, pouring out all
+the pain of her wounded heart in her sobs.  And before her, like an
+irremovable stain, hung that yellow face with the scant mustache, and
+the squinting eyes staring at her with malicious pleasure.  Resentment
+and bitterness were winding themselves about her breast like black
+threads on a spool; resentment and bitterness toward those who tear
+a son away from his mother because he is seeking truth.
+
+It was cold; the rain pattered against the window panes; something
+seemed to be creeping along the walls.  She thought she heard,
+walking watchfully around the house, gray, heavy figures, with
+broad, red faces, without eyes, and with long arms.  It seemed to
+her that she almost heard the jingling of their spurs.
+
+"I wish they had taken me, too!" she thought.
+
+The whistle blew, calling the people to work.  This time its sounds
+were low, indistinct, uncertain.  The door opened and Rybin entered.
+He stood before her, wiping the raindrops from his beard.
+
+"They snatched him away, did they?" he asked.
+
+"Yes, they did, the dogs!" she replied, sighing.
+
+"That's how it is," said Rybin, with a smile; "they searched me,
+too; went all through me--yes!  Abused me to their heart's content,
+but did me no harm beyond that.  So they carried off Pavel, did
+they?  The manager tipped the wink, the gendarme said 'Amen!' and
+lo! a man has disappeared.  They certainly are thick together.  One
+goes through the people's pockets while the other holds the gun."
+
+"You ought to stand up for Pavel!" cried the mother, rising to her
+feet.  "It's for you all that he's gone!"
+
+"Who ought to stand up for him?" asked Rybin.
+
+"All of you!"
+
+"You want too much!  We'll do nothing of the kind!  Our masters
+have been gathering strength for thousands of years; they have
+driven our hearts full of nails.  We cannot unite at once.  We
+must first extract from ourselves, each from the other, the iron
+spikes that prevent us from standing close to one another."
+
+And thus he departed, with his heavy gait, leaving the mother to
+her grief, aggravated by the stern hopelessness of his words.
+
+The day passed in a thick mist of empty, senseless longing.  She 
+made no fire, cooked no dinner, drank no tea, and only late in the
+evening ate a piece of bread.  When she went to bed it occurred to
+her that her life had never yet been so humiliating, so lonely and
+void.  During the last years she had become accustomed to live
+constantly in the expectation of something momentous, something
+good.  Young people were circling around her, noisy, vigorous, full
+of life.  Her son's thoughtful and earnest face was always before
+her, and he seemed to be the master and creator of this thrilling
+and noble life.  Now he was gone, everything was gone.  In the whole
+day, no one except the disagreeable Rybin had called.
+
+Beyond the window, the dense, cold rain was sighing and knocking
+at the panes.  The rain and the drippings from the roof filled the
+air with a doleful, wailing melody.  The whole house appeared to be
+rocking gently to and fro, and everything around her seemed aimless
+and unnecessary.
+
+A gentle rap was heard at the door.  It came once, and then a second
+time.  She had grown accustomed to these noises; they no longer
+frightened her.  A soft, joyous sensation thrilled her heart, and a
+vague hope quickly brought her to her feet.  Throwing a shawl over
+her shoulders, she hurried to the door and opened it.
+
+Samoylov walked in, followed by another man with his face hidden
+behind the collar of his overcoat and under a hat thrust over his
+eyebrows.
+
+"Did we wake you?" asked Samoylov, without greeting the mother, his
+face gloomy and thoughtful, contrary to his wont.
+
+"I was not asleep," she said, looking at them with expectant eyes.
+
+Samoylov's companion took off his hat, and breathing heavily and
+hoarsely said in a friendly basso, like an old acquaintance, giving
+her his broad, short-fingered hand:
+
+"Good evening, granny!  You don't recognize me?"
+
+"Is it you?" exclaimed Nilovna, with a sudden access of delight.
+"Yegor Ivanovich?"
+
+"The very same identical one!" replied he, bowing his large head
+with its long hair.  There was a good-natured smile on his face, and
+a clear, caressing look in his small gray eyes.  He was like a
+samovar--rotund, short, with thick neck and short arms.  His face
+was shiny and glossy, with high cheek bones.  He breathed noisily,
+and his chest kept up a continuous low wheeze.
+
+"Step into the room.  I'll be dressed in a minute," the mother said.
+
+"We have come to you on business," said Samoylov thoughtfully,
+looking at her out of the corner of his eyes.
+
+Yegor Ivanovich passed into the room, and from there said:
+
+"Nikolay got out of jail this morning, granny.  You know him?"
+
+"How long was he there?" she asked.
+
+"Five months and eleven days.  He saw the Little Russian there, who
+sends you his regards, and Pavel, who also sends you his regards and
+begs you not to be alarmed.  As a man travels on his way, he says,
+the jails constitute his resting places, established and maintained
+by the solicitous authorities!  Now, granny, let us get to the point.
+Do you know how many people were arrested yesterday?"
+
+"I do not.  Why, were there any others arrested besides Pavel?"
+she exclaimed.
+
+"He was the forty-ninth!" calmly interjected Yegor Ivanovich.  "And
+we may expect about ten more to be taken!  This gentleman here,
+for example."
+
+"Yes; me, too!" said Samoylov with a frown.
+
+Nilovna somehow felt relieved.
+
+"He isn't there alone," she thought.
+
+When she had dressed herself, she entered the room and, smiling
+bravely, said:
+
+"I guess they won't detain them long, if they arrested so many."
+
+"You are right," assented Yegor Ivanovich; "and if we can manage
+to spoil this mess for them, we can make them look altogether like
+fools.  This is the way it is, granny.  If we were now to cease
+smuggling our literature into the factory, the gendarmes would take
+advantage of such a regrettable circumstance, and would use it
+against Pavel and his comrades in jail."
+
+"How is that?  Why should they?" the mother cried in alarm.
+
+"It's very plain, granny," said Yegor Ivanovich softly.  "Sometimes
+even gendarmes reason correctly.  Just think!  Pavel was, and there
+were books and there were papers; Pavel is not, and no books and no
+papers!  Ergo, it was Pavel who distributed these books!  Aha!  Then
+they'll begin to eat them all alive.  Those gendarmes dearly love so
+to unman a man that what remains of him is only a shred of himself,
+and a touching memory."
+
+"I see, I see," said the mother dejectedly.  "O God!  What's to be
+done, then?"
+
+"They have trapped them all, the devil take them!" came Samoylov's
+voice from the kitchen.  "Now we must continue our work the same as
+before, and not only for the cause itself, but also to save our comrades!"
+
+"And there is no one to do the work," added Yegor, smiling.  "We
+have first-rate literature.  I saw to that myself.  But how to get
+it into the factory, that's the question!"
+
+"They search everybody at the gates now," said Samoylov.
+
+The mother divined that something was expected of her.  She understood
+that she could be useful to her son, and she hastened to ask:
+
+"Well, now?  What are we to do?"
+
+Samoylov stood in the doorway to answer.
+
+"Pelagueya Nilovna, you know Marya Korsunova, the peddler."
+
+"I do.  Well?"
+
+"Speak to her; see if you can't get her to smuggle in our wares."
+
+"We could pay her, you know," interjected Yegor.
+
+The mother waved her hands in negation.
+
+"Oh, no!  The woman is a chatterbox.  No!  If they find out it comes
+from me, from this house--oh, no!"
+
+Then, inspired by a sudden idea, she began gladly and in a low voice:
+
+"Give it to me, give it to me.  I'll manage it myself.  I'll find a
+way.  I will ask Marya to make me her assistant.  I have to earn my
+living, I have to work.  Don't I?  Well, then, I'll carry dinners to
+the factory.  Yes, I'll manage it!"
+
+Pressing her hands to her bosom, she gave hurried assurances that
+she would carry out her mission well and escape detection.  Finally
+she exclaimed in triumph:  "They'll find out--Pavel Vlasov is away,
+but his arm reaches out even from jail.  They'll find out!"
+
+All three became animated.  Briskly rubbing his hands, Yegor smiled
+and said:
+
+"It's wonderful, stupendous!  I say, granny, it's superb--simply
+magnificent!"
+
+"I'll sit in jail as in an armchair, if this succeeds," said 
+Samoylov, laughing and rubbing his hands.
+
+"You are fine, granny!" Yegor hoarsely cried.
+
+The mother smiled.  It was evident to her that if the leaflets
+should continue to appear in the factory, the authorities would be
+forced to recognize that it was not her son who distributed them.
+And feeling assured of success, she began to quiver all over with joy.
+
+"When you go to see Pavel," said Yegor, "tell him he has a good mother."
+
+"I'll see him very soon, I assure you," said Samoylov, smiling.
+
+The mother grasped his hand and said earnestly:
+
+"Tell him that I'll do everything, everything necessary.  I want
+him to know it."
+
+"And suppose they don't put him in prison?" asked Yegor, pointing
+at Samoylov.
+
+The mother sighed and said sadly:
+
+"Well, then, it can't be helped!"
+
+Both of them burst out laughing.  And when she realized her ridiculous
+blunder, she also began to laugh in embarrassment, and lowering
+her eyes said somewhat slyly:
+
+"Bothering about your own folk keeps you from seeing other people
+straight."
+
+"That's natural!" exclaimed Yegor.  "And as to Pavel, you need not
+worry about him.  He'll come out of prison a still better man.  The
+prison is our place of rest and study--things we have no time for
+when we are at large.  I was in prison three times, and each time,
+although I got scant pleasure, I certainly derived benefit for my
+heart and mind."
+
+"You breathe with difficulty," she said, looking affectionately at
+his open face.
+
+"There are special reasons for that," he replied, raising his finger.
+"So the matter's settled, granny?  Yes?  To-morrow we'll deliver the
+matter to you--and the wheels that grind the centuried darkness to
+destruction will again start a-rolling.  Long live free speech!  And
+long live a mother's heart!  And in the meantime, good-by."
+
+"Good-by," said Samoylov, giving her a vigorous handshake.  "To my
+mother, I don't dare even hint about such matters.  Oh, no!"
+
+"Everybody will understand in time," said Nilovna, wishing to please
+him.  "Everybody will understand."
+
+When they left, she locked the door, and kneeling in the middle of
+the room began to pray, to the accompaniment of the patter of the
+rain.  It was a prayer without words, one great thought of men, of
+all those people whom Pavel introduced into her life.  It was as if
+they passed between her, and the ikons upon which she held her eyes
+riveted.  And they all looked so simple, so strangely near to one
+another, yet so lone in life.
+
+Early next morning the mother went to Marya Korsunova.  The peddler,
+noisy and greasy as usual, greeted her with friendly sympathy.
+
+"You are grieving?" Marya asked, patting the mother on the back.
+"Now, don't.  They just took him, carried him off.  Where is the
+calamity?  There is no harm in it.  It used to be that men were
+thrown into dungeons for stealing, now they are there for telling
+the truth.  Pavel may have said something wrong, but he stood up for
+all, and they all know it.  Don't worry!  They don't all say so, but
+they all know a good man when they see, him.  I was going to call on
+you right along, but had no time.  I am always cooking and selling,
+but will end my days a beggar, I guess, all the same.  My needs get
+the best of me, confound them!  They keep nibbling and nibbling like
+mice at a piece of cheese.  No sooner do I manage to scrape together
+ten rubles or so, when along comes some heathen, and makes away with
+all my money.  Yes.  It's hard to be a woman!  It's a wretched
+business!  To live alone is hard, to live with anyone, still harder!"
+
+"And I came to ask you to take me as your assistant," Vlasova broke
+in, interrupting her prattle.
+
+"How is that?" asked Marya.  And after hearing her friend's
+explanation, she nodded her head assentingly.
+
+"That's possible!  You remember how you used to hide me from my
+husband?  Well, now I am going to hide you from want.  Everyone
+ought to help you, for your son is perishing for the public cause.
+He is a fine chap, your son is!  They all say so, every blessed
+soul of them.  And they all pity him.  I'll tell you something.  No
+good is going to come to the authorities from these arrests, mark my
+word!  Look what's going on in the factory!  Hear them talk!  They
+are in an ugly mood, my dear!  The officials imagine that when
+they've bitten at a man's heel, he won't be able to go far.  But it
+turns out that when ten men are hit, a hundred men get angry.  A
+workman must be handled with care!  He may go on patiently enduring
+and suffering everything that's heaped upon him for a long, long
+time, but then he can also explode all of a sudden!"
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X
+
+
+The upshot of the conversation was that the next day at noon the
+mother was seen in factory yard with two pots of eatables from
+Marya's culinary establishment, while Marya herself transferred
+her base of operations to the market place.
+
+The workmen immediately noticed their new caterer.  Some of them
+approached her and said approvingly:
+
+"Gone into business, Nilovna?"
+
+They comforted her, arguing that Pavel would certainly be released
+soon because his cause was a good one.  Others filled her sad heart
+with alarm by their cautious condolence, while still others awoke
+a responsive echo in her by openly and bitterly abusing the manager
+and the gendarmes.  Some there were who looked at her with a
+vindictive expression, among them Isay Gorbov, who, speaking through
+his teeth, said:
+
+"If I were the governor, I would have your son hanged!  Let him not
+mislead the people!"
+
+This vicious threat went through her like the chill blast of death.
+She made no reply, glanced at his small, freckled face, and with a
+sigh cast down her eyes.
+
+She observed considerable agitation in the factory; the workmen
+gathered in small groups and talked in an undertone, with great
+animation; the foremen walked about with careworn faces, poking
+their noses into everything; here and there were heard angry oaths
+and irritated laughter.
+
+Two policemen escorted Samoylov past her.  He walked with one hand
+in his pocket, the other smoothing his red hair.
+
+A crowd of about a hundred workmen followed him, and plied the
+policemen with oaths and banter.
+
+"Going to take a promenade, Grisha?" shouted one.
+
+"They do honor to us fellows!" chimed in another.
+
+"When we go to promenading, we have a bodyguard to escort us," said
+a third, and uttered a harsh oath.
+
+"It does not seem to pay any longer to catch thieves!" exclaimed
+a tall, one-eyed workingman in a loud, bitter voice.  "So they take
+to arresting honest people."
+
+"They don't even do it at night!" broke in another.  "They come
+and drag them away in broad daylight, without shame, the impudent
+scoundrels!"
+
+The policemen walked on rapidly and sullenly, trying to avoid the
+sight of the crowd, and feigning not to hear the angry exclamations
+showered upon them from all sides.  Three workmen carrying a big
+iron bar happened to come in front of them, and thrusting the bar
+against them, shouted:
+
+"Look out there, fishermen!"
+
+As he passed Nilovna, Samoylov nodded to her, and smiling, said:
+
+"Behold, this is Gregory, the servant of God, being arrested."
+
+She made a low bow to him in silence.  These men, so young, sober,
+and clever, who went to jail with a smile, moved her, and she
+unconsciously felt for them the pitying affection of a mother.  It
+pleased her to hear the sharp comments leveled against the authorities.
+She saw therein her son's influence.
+
+Leaving the factory, she passed the remainder of the day at Marya's
+house, assisting her in her work, and listening to her chatter.
+Late in the evening she returned home and found it bare, chilly and
+disagreeable.  She moved about from corner to corner, unable to find
+a resting place, and not knowing what to do with herself.  Night was
+fast approaching, and she grew worried, because Yegor Ivanovich had
+not yet come and brought her the literature which he had promised.
+
+Behind the window, gray, heavy flakes of spring snow fluttered and
+settled softly and noiselessly upon the pane.  Sliding down and
+melting, they left a watery track in their course.  The mother
+thought of her son.
+
+A cautious rap was heard.  She rushed to the door, lifted the latch,
+and admitted Sashenka.  She had not seen her for a long while, and
+the first thing that caught her eye was the girl's unnatural stoutness.
+
+"Good evening!" she said, happy to have a visitor at such a time,
+to relieve her solitude for a part of the night.  "You haven't been
+around for a long while!  Were you away?"
+
+"No, I was in prison," replied the girl, smiling, "with Nikolay
+Ivanovich.  Do you remember him?"
+
+"I should think I do!" exclaimed the mother.  "Yegor Ivanovich told
+me yesterday that he had been released, but I knew nothing about
+you.  Nobody told me that you were there."
+
+"What's the good of telling?  I should like to change my dress
+before Yegor Ivanovich comes!" said the girl, looking around.
+
+"You are all wet."
+
+"I've brought the booklets."
+
+"Give them here, give them to me!" cried the mother impatiently.
+
+"Directly," replied the girl.  She untied her skirt and shook it,
+and like leaves from a tree, down fluttered a lot of thin paper
+parcels on the floor around her.  The mother picked them up,
+laughing, and said:
+
+"I was wondering what made you so stout.  Oh, what a heap of them
+you have brought!  Did you come on foot?"
+
+"Yes," said Sashenka.  She was again her graceful, slender self.
+The mother noticed that her cheeks were shrunken, and that dark
+rings were under her unnaturally large eyes.
+
+"You are just out of prison.  You ought to rest, and there you are
+carrying a load like that for seven versts!" said the mother,
+sighing and shaking her head.
+
+"It's got to be done!" said the girl.  "Tell me, how is Pavel?
+Did he stand it all right?  He wasn't very much worried, was he?"
+Sashenka asked the question without looking at the mother.  She
+bent her head and her fingers trembled as she arranged her hair.
+
+"All right," replied the mother.  "You can rest assured he won't
+betray himself."
+
+"How strong he is!" murmured the girl quietly.
+
+"He has never been sick," replied the mother.  "Why, you are all
+in a shiver!  I'll get you some tea, and some raspberry jam."
+
+"That's fine!" exclaimed the girl with a faint smile.  "But don't
+you trouble!  It's too late.  Let me do it myself."
+
+"What!  Tired as you are?" the mother reproached her, hurrying into
+the kitchen, where she busied herself with the samovar.  The girl
+followed into the kitchen, sat down on the bench, and folded her
+hands behind her head before she replied:
+
+"Yes, I'm very tired!  After all, the prison makes one weak.  The
+awful thing about it is the enforced inactivity.  There is nothing
+more tormenting.  We stay a week, five weeks.  We know how much
+there is to be done.  The people are waiting for knowledge.  We're
+in a position to satisfy their wants, and there we are locked up
+in a cage like animals!  That's what is so trying, that's what
+dries up the heart!"
+
+"Who will reward you for all this?" asked the mother; and with a
+sigh she answered the question herself.  "No one but God!  Of course
+you don't believe in Him either?"
+
+"No!" said the girl briefly, shaking her head.
+
+"And I don't believe you!" the mother ejaculated in a sudden burst
+of excitement.  Quickly wiping her charcoal-blackened hands on her
+apron she continued, with deep conviction in her voice:
+
+"You don't understand your own faith!  How could you live the kind
+of life you are living, without faith in God?"
+
+A loud stamping of feet and a murmur of voices were heard on the
+porch.  The mother started; the girl quickly rose to her feet, and
+whispered hurriedly:
+
+"Don't open the door!  If it's the gendarmes, you don't know me.
+I walked into the wrong house, came here by accident, fainted away,
+you undressed me, and found the books around me.  You understand?"
+
+"Why, my dear, what for?" asked the mother tenderly.
+
+"Wait a while!" said Sashenka listening.  "I think it's Yegor."
+
+It was Yegor, wet and out of breath.
+
+"Aha!  The samovar!" he cried.  "That's the best thing in life,
+granny!  You here already, Sashenka ?"
+
+His hoarse voice filled the little kitchen.  He slowly removed his
+heavy ulster, talking all the time.
+
+"Here, granny, is a girl who is a thorn in the flesh of the police!
+Insulted by the overseer of the prison, she declared that she would
+starve herself to death if he did not ask her pardon.  And for eight
+days she went without eating, and came within a hair's breadth of
+dying.  It's not bad!  She must have a mighty strong little stomach."
+
+"Is it possible you took no food for eight days in succession?"
+asked the mother in amazement.
+
+"I had to get him to beg my pardon," answered the girl with a
+stoical shrug of her shoulders.  Her composure and her stern
+persistence seemed almost like a reproach to the mother.
+
+"And suppose you had died?" she asked again.
+
+"Well, what can one do?" the girl said quietly.  "He did beg my
+pardon after all.  One ought never to forgive an insult, never!"
+
+"Ye-es!" responded the mother slowly.  "Here are we women who are
+insulted all our lives long."
+
+"I have unloaded myself!" announced Yegor from the other room.
+"Is the samovar ready?  Let me take it in!"
+
+He lifted the samovar and talked as he carried it.
+
+"My own father used to drink not less than twenty glasses of tea a
+day, wherefor his days upon earth were long, peaceful, and strong;
+for he lived to be seventy-three years old, never having suffered
+from any ailment whatsoever.  In weight he reached the respectable
+figure of three hundred and twenty pounds, and by profession he was
+a sexton in the village of Voskesensk."
+
+"Are you Ivan's son?" exclaimed the mother.
+
+"I am that very mortal.  How did you know his name?"
+
+"Why, I am a Voskresenskian myself!"
+
+"A fellow countrywoman!  Who were your people?"
+
+"Your neighbors.  I am a Sereguin."
+
+"Are you a daughter of Nil the Lame?  I thought your face was
+familiar!  Why, I had my ears pulled by him many and many a time!"
+
+They stood face to face plying each other with questions and
+laughing.  Sashenka looked at them and smiled, and began to prepare
+the tea.  The clatter of the dishes recalled the mother to the
+realities of the present.
+
+"Oh, excuse me!  I quite forgot myself, talking about old times.  It
+is so sweet to recall your youth."
+
+"It's I who ought to beg your pardon for carrying on like this in
+your house!" said Sashenka.  "But it is eleven o'clock already, and
+I have so far to go."
+
+"Go where?  To the city?" the mother asked in surprise.
+
+"Yes."
+
+"What are you talking about!  It's dark and wet, and you are so
+tired.  Stay here overnight.  Yegor Ivanovich will sleep in the
+kitchen, and you and I here."
+
+"No, I must go," said the girl simply.
+
+"Yes, countrywoman, she must go.  The young lady must disappear.
+It would be bad if she were to be seen on the street to-morrow."
+
+"But how can she go?  By herself?"
+
+"By herself," said Yegor, laughing.
+
+The girl poured tea for herself, took a piece of rye bread, salted
+it, and started to eat, looking at the mother contemplatively.
+
+"How can you go that way?  Both you and Natasha.  I wouldn't.  I'm afraid!"
+
+"She's afraid, too," said Yegor.  "Aren't you afraid, Sasha?"
+
+"Of course!"
+
+The mother looked at her, then at Yegor, and said in a low voice,
+"What strange----"
+
+"Give me a glass of tea, granny," Yegor interrupted her.
+
+When Sashenka had drunk her glass of tea, she pressed Yegor's hand
+in silence, and walked out into the kitchen.  The mother followed
+her.  In the kitchen Sashenka said:
+
+"When you see Pavel, give him my regards, please."  And taking hold
+of the latch, she suddenly turned around, and asked in a low voice:
+"May I kiss you?"
+
+The mother embraced her in silence, and kissed her warmly.
+
+"Thank you!" said the girl, and nodding her head, walked out.
+
+Returning to the room, the mother peered anxiously through the window.
+Wet flakes of snow fluttered through the dense, moist darkness.
+
+"And do you remember Prozorov, the storekeeper?" asked Yegor.  "He
+used to sit with his feet sprawling, and blow noisily into his glass
+of tea.  He had a red, satisfied, sweet-covered face."
+
+"I remember, I remember," said the mother, coming back to the table.
+She sat down, and looking at Yegor with a mournful expression in her
+eyes, she spoke pityingly:  "Poor Sashenka!  How will she ever get
+to the city?"
+
+"She will be very much worn out," Yegor agreed.  "The prison has
+shaken her health badly.  She was stronger before.  Besides, she
+has had a delicate bringing up.  It seems to me she has already
+ruined her lungs.  There is something in her face that reminds one
+of consumption."
+
+"Who is she?"
+
+"The daughter of a landlord.  Her father is a rich man and a big
+scoundrel, according to what she says.  I suppose you know, granny,
+that they want to marry?"
+
+"Who?"
+
+"She and Pavel.  Yes, indeed!  But so far they have not yet been able.
+When he is free, she is in prison, and vice versa."  Yegor laughed.
+
+"I didn't know it!" the mother replied after a pause.  "Pasha never
+speaks about himself."
+
+Now she felt a still greater pity for the girl, and looking at her
+guest with involuntary hostility, she said:
+
+"You ought to have seen her home."
+
+"Impossible!" Yegor answered calmly.  "I have a heap of work to do
+here, and the whole day to-morrow, from early morning, I shall have
+to walk and walk and walk.  No easy job, considering my asthma."
+
+"She's a fine girl!" said the mother, vaguely thinking of what Yegor
+had told her.  She felt hurt that the news should have come to her,
+not from her son, but from a stranger, and she pressed her lips
+together tightly, and lowered her eyebrows.
+
+"Yes, a fine girl!"  Yegor nodded assent.  "There's a bit of the
+noblewoman in her yet, but it's growing less and less all the time.
+You are sorry for her, I see.  What's the use?  You won't find heart
+enough, if you start to grieve for all of us rebels, granny dear.
+Life is not made very easy for us, I admit.  There, for instance, is
+the case of a friend of mine who returned a short while ago from
+exile.  When he went through Novgorod, his wife and child awaited
+him in Smolensk, and when he arrived in Smolensk, they were already
+in prison in Moscow.  Now it's the wife's turn to go to Siberia.  To
+be a revolutionary and to be married is a very inconvenient arrangement
+--inconvenient for the husband, inconvenient for the wife and in the
+end for the cause also!  I, too, had a wife, an excellent woman, but
+five years of this kind of life landed her in the grave."
+
+He emptied the glass of tea at one gulp, and continued his narrative.
+He enumerated the years and months he had passed in prison and in
+exile, told of various accidents and misfortunes, of the slaughters
+in prisons, and of hunger in Siberia.  The mother looked at him,
+listened with wonderment to the simple way in which he spoke of this
+life, so full of suffering, of persecution, of wrong, and abuse of men.
+
+"Well, let's get down to business!"
+
+His voice changed, and his face grew more serious.  He asked
+questions about the way in which the mother intended to smuggle
+the literature into the factory, and she marveled at his clear
+knowledge of all the details.
+
+Then they returned to reminiscences of their native village.  He
+joked, and her mind roved thoughtfully through her past.  It seemed
+to her strangely like a quagmire uniformly strewn with hillocks,
+which were covered with poplars trembling in constant fear; with low
+firs, and with white birches straying between the hillocks.  The
+birches grew slowly, and after standing for five years on the unstable, 
+putrescent soil, they dried up, fell down, and rotted away.  She
+looked at this picture, and a vague feeling of insufferable sadness
+overcame her.  The figure of a girl with a sharp, determined face
+stood before her.  Now the figure walks somewhere in the darkness
+amid the snowflakes, solitary, weary.  And her son sits in a little
+cell, with iron gratings over the window.  Perhaps he is not yet
+asleep, and is thinking.  But he is thinking not of his mother.
+He has one nearer to him than herself.  Heavy, chaotic thoughts,
+like a tangled mass of clouds, crept over her, and encompassed her
+and oppressed her bosom.
+
+"You are tired, granny!  Let's go to bed!" said Yegor, smiling.
+
+She bade him good night, and sidled carefully into the kitchen,
+carrying away a bitter, caustic feeling in her heart.
+
+In the morning, after breakfast, Yegor asked her:
+
+"Suppose they catch you and ask you where you got all these
+heretical books from.  What will you say?"
+
+"I'll say, 'It's none of your business!'" she answered, smiling.
+
+"You'll never convince them of that!" Yegor replied confidently.
+"On the contrary, they are profoundly convinced that this is
+precisely their business.  They will question you very, very
+diligently, and very, very long!"
+
+"I won't tell, though!"
+
+"They'll put you in prison!"
+
+"Well, what of it?  Thank God that I am good at least for that,"
+she said with a sigh.  "Thank God!  Who needs me?  Nobody!"
+
+"H'm!" said Yegor, fixing his look upon her.  "A good person ought
+to take care of himself."
+
+"I couldn't learn that from you, even if I were good," the mother
+replied, laughing.
+
+Yegor was silent, and paced up and down the room; then he walked
+up to her and said:  "This is hard, countrywoman!  I feel it, it's
+very hard for you!"
+
+"It's hard for everybody," she answered, with a wave of her hand.
+"Maybe only for those who understand, it's easier.  But I understand
+a little, too.  I understand what it is the good people want."
+
+"If you do understand, granny, then it means that everybody needs
+you, everybody!" said Yegor earnestly and solemnly.
+
+She looked at him and laughed without saying anything.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI
+
+
+At noon, calmly and in a businesslike way she put the books around
+her bosom, and so skillfully and snugly that Yegor announced,
+smacking his lips with satisfaction:
+
+"Sehr gut! as the German says when he has drunk a keg of beer.
+Literature has not changed you, granny.  You still remain the good,
+tall, portly, elderly woman.  May all the numberless gods grant you
+their blessings on your enterprise!"
+
+Within half an hour she stood at the factory gate, bent with the
+weight of her burden, calm and assured.  Two guards, irritated by
+the oaths and raillery of the workingmen, examined all who entered
+the gate, handling them roughly and swearing at them.  A policeman
+and a thin-legged man with a red face and alert eyes stood at one
+side.  The mother, shifting the rod resting on her shoulders, with a
+pail suspended from either end of it, watched the man from the
+corner of her eye.  She divined that he was a spy.
+
+A tall, curly-headed fellow with his hat thrown back over his neck,
+cried to the guardsmen who searched him:
+
+"Search the head and not the pockets, you devils!"
+
+"There is nothing but lice on your head," retorted one of the guardsmen.
+
+"Catching lice is an occupation more suited to you than hunting
+human game!" rejoined the workman.  The spy scanned him with a
+rapid glance.
+
+"Will you let me in?" asked the mother.  "See, I'm bent double with
+my heavy load.  My back is almost breaking."
+
+"Go in!  Go in!" cried the guard sullenly.  "She comes with
+arguments, too."
+
+The mother walked to her place, set her pails on the ground, and
+wiping the perspiration from her face looked around her.
+
+The Gusev brothers, the locksmiths, instantly came up to her, and
+the older of them, Vasily, asked aloud, knitting his eyebrows:
+
+"Got any pirogs?"
+
+"I'll bring them to-morrow," she answered.
+
+This was the password agreed upon.  The faces of the brothers
+brightened.  Ivan, unable to restrain himself, exclaimed:
+
+"Oh, you jewel of a mother!"
+
+Vasily squatted down on his heels, looked into the pot, and a
+bundle of books disappeared into his bosom.
+
+"Ivan!" he said aloud.  "Let's not go home, let's get our dinner
+here from her!"  And he quickly shoved the books into the legs of his
+boots.  "We must give our new peddler a lift, don't you think so?"
+
+"Yes, indeed!" Ivan assented, and laughed aloud.
+
+The mother looked carefully about her, and called out:
+
+"Sour cabbage soup!  Hot vermicelli soup!  Roast meat!"
+
+Then deftly and secretly taking out one package of books after the
+other, she shoved them into the hands of the brothers.  Each time
+a bundle disappeared from her hands, the sickly, sneering face of
+the officer of gendarmes flashed up before her like a yellow stain,
+like the flame of a match in a dark room, and she said to him in
+her mind, with a feeling of malicious pleasure:
+
+"Take this, sir!"  And when she handed over the last package she
+added with an air of satisfaction:  "And here is some more, take it!"
+
+Workmen came up to her with cups in their hands, and when they were
+near Ivan and Vasily, they began to laugh aloud.  The mother calmly
+suspended the transfer of the books, and poured sour soup and
+vermicelli soup, while the Gusevs joked her.
+
+"How cleverly Nilovna does her work!"
+
+"Necessity drives one even to catching mice," remarked a stoker
+somberly.  "They have snatched away your breadgiver, the scoundrels!
+Well, give us three cents' worth of vermicelli.  Never mind, mother!
+You'll pull through!"
+
+"Thanks for the good word!" she returned, smiling.
+
+He walked off to one side and mumbled, "It doesn't cost me much to
+say a good word!"
+
+"But there's no one to say it to!" observed a blacksmith, with a
+smile, and shrugging his shoulders in surprise added:  "There's a
+life for you, fellows!  There's no one to say a good word to; no one
+is worth it.  Yes, sir!"
+
+Vasily Gusev rose, wrapped his coat tightly around him, and exclaimed:
+
+"What I ate was hot, and yet I feel cold."
+
+Then he walked away.  Ivan also rose, and ran off whistling merrily.
+
+Cheerful and smiling, Nilovna kept on calling her wares:
+
+"Hot!  Hot!  Sour soup!  Vermicelli soup!  Porridge!"
+
+She thought of how she would tell her son about her first experience;
+and the yellow face of the officer was still standing before her,
+perplexed and spiteful.  His black mustache twitched uneasily, and
+his upper lip turned up nervously, showing the gleaming white enamel
+of his clenched teeth.  A keen joy beat and sang in her heart like
+a bird, her eyebrows quivered, and continuing deftly to serve her
+customers she muttered to herself:
+
+"There's more!  There's more!"
+
+Through the whole day she felt a sensation of delightful newness
+which embraced her heart as with a fondling caress.  And in the
+evening, when she had concluded her work at Marya's house, and was
+drinking tea, the splash of horses' hoofs in the mud was heard,
+and the call of a familiar voice.  She jumped up, hurried into the
+kitchen, and made straight for the door.  Somebody walked quickly
+through the porch; her eyes grew dim, and leaning against the
+doorpost, she pushed the door open with her foot.
+
+"Good evening, mother!" a familiar, melodious voice rang out, and a
+pair of dry, long hands were laid on her shoulders.
+
+The joy of seeing Andrey was mingled in her bosom with the sadness
+of disappointment; and the two contrary feelings blended into one
+burning sensation which embraced her like a hot wave.  She buried
+her face in Andrey's bosom.  He pressed her tightly to himself,
+his hands trembled.  The mother wept quietly without speaking,
+while he stroked her hair, and spoke in his musical voice:
+
+"Don't cry, mother.  Don't wring my heart.  Upon my honest word,
+they will let him out soon!  They haven't a thing against him;
+all the boys will keep quiet as cooked fish."
+
+Putting his long arm around the mother's shoulders he led her into
+the room, and nestling up against him with the quick  gesture of a
+squirrel, she wiped the tears from her face, while her heart
+greedily drank in his tender words.
+
+"Pavel sends you his love.  He is as well and cheerful as can be.
+It's very crowded in the prison.  They have thrown in more than a
+hundred of our people, both from here and from the city.  Three and
+four persons have been put into one cell.  The prison officials are
+rather a good set.  They are exhausted with the quantity of work the
+gendarmes have been giving them.  The prison authorities are not
+extremely rigorous, they don't order you about roughly.  They simply
+say:  'Be quiet as you can, gentlemen.  Don't put us in an awkward
+position!'  So everything goes well.  We talk with one another, we
+give books to one another, and we share our food.  It's a good
+prison!  Old and dirty, but so soft and so light.  The criminals are
+also nice people; they help us a good deal.  Bukin, four others, and
+myself were released.  It got too crowded.  They'll let Pavel go
+soon, too.  I'm telling you the truth, believe me.  Vyesovshchikov
+will be detained the longest.  They are very angry at him.  He
+scolds and swears at everybody all the time.  The gendarmes can't
+bear to look at him.  I guess he'll get himself into court, or
+receive a sound thrashing some day.  Pavel tries to dissuade him.
+'Stop, Nikolay!' he says to him.  'Your swearing won't reform them.'
+But he bawls:  'Wipe them off the face of the earth like a pest!'
+Pavel conducts himself finely out there; he treats all alike, and
+is as firm as a rock!  They'll soon let him go."
+
+"Soon?" said the mother, relieved now and smiling.  "I know he'll
+be let out soon!"
+
+"Well, if you know, it's all right!  Give me tea, mother.  Tell me
+how you've been, how you've passed your time."
+
+He looked at her, smiling all over, and seemed so near to her, such
+a splendid fellow.  A loving, somewhat melancholy gleam flashed from
+the depths of his round, blue eyes.
+
+"I love you dearly, Andriusha!" the mother said, heaving a deep
+sigh, as she looked at his thin face grotesquely covered with tufts
+of hair.
+
+"People are satisfied with little from me!  I know you love me;
+you are capable of loving everybody; you have a great heart," said
+the Little Russian, rocking in his chair, his eyes straying about
+the room.
+
+"No, I love you very differently!" insisted the mother.  "If you
+had a mother, people would envy her because she had such a son."
+
+The Little Russian swayed his head, and rubbed it vigorously with
+both hands.
+
+"I have a mother, somewhere!" he said in a low voice.
+
+"Do you know what I did to-day?" she exclaimed, and reddening a
+little, her voice choking with satisfaction, she quickly recounted
+how she had smuggled literature into the factory.
+
+For a moment he looked at her in amazement with his eyes wide open;
+then he burst out into a loud guffaw, stamped his feet, thumped his
+head with his fingers, and cried joyously:
+
+"Oho!  That's no joke any more!  That's business!  Won't Pavel be
+glad, though!  Oh, you're a trump.  That's good, mother!  You have
+no idea HOW good it is!  Both for Pavel and all who were arrested
+with him!"
+
+He snapped his fingers in ecstasy, whistled, and fairly doubled
+over, all radiant with joy.  His delight evoked a vigorous response
+from the mother.
+
+"My dear, my Andriusha!" she began, as if her heart had burst open,
+and gushed over merrily with a limpid stream of living words full of
+serene joy.  "I've thought all my life, 'Lord Christ in heaven! what
+did I live for?'  Beatings, work!  I saw nothing except my husband.
+I knew nothing but fear!  And how Pasha grew I did not see, and I
+hardly know whether I loved him when my husband was alive.  All my
+concerns, all my thoughts were centered upon one thing--to feed my
+beast, to propitiate the master of my life with enough food, pleasing
+to his palate, and served on time, so as not to incur his displeasure,
+so as to escape the terrors of a beating, to get him to spare me
+but once!  But I do not remember that he ever did spare me.  He beat
+me so--not as a wife is beaten, but as one whom you hate and detest.
+Twenty years I lived like that, and what was up to the time of my
+marriage I do not recall.  I remember certain things, but I see
+nothing!  I am as a blind person.  Yegor Ivanovich was here--we are
+from the same village--and he spoke about this and about that.  I
+remember the houses, the people, but how they lived, what they spoke
+about, what happened to this one and what to that one--I forget,
+I do not see!  I remember fires--two fires.  It seems that everything
+has been beaten out of me, that my soul has been locked up and
+sealed tight.  It's grown blind, it does not hear!"
+
+Her quick-drawn breath was almost a sob.  She bent forward, and
+continued in a lowered voice:  "When my husband died I turned to my
+son; but he went into this business, and I was seized with a pity
+for him, such a yearning pity--for if he should perish, how was I
+to live alone?  What dread, what fright I have undergone!  My heart
+was rent when I thought of his fate.
+
+"Our woman's love is not a pure love!  We love that which we need.
+And here are you!  You are grieving about your mother.  What do you
+want her for?  And all the others go and suffer for the people, they
+go to prison, to Siberia, they die for them, many are hung.  Young
+girls walk alone at night, in the snow, in the mud, in the rain.
+They walk seven versts from the city to our place.  Who drives them?
+Who pursues them?  They love!  You see, theirs is pure love!  They
+believe!  Yes, indeed, they believe, Andriusha!  But here am I--
+I can't love like that!  I love my own, the near ones!"
+
+"Yes, you can!" said the Little Russian, and turning away his face
+from her, he rubbed his head, face, and eyes vigorously as was his
+wont.  "Everybody loves those who are near," he continued.  "To a
+large heart, what is far is also near.  You, mother, are capable
+of a great deal.  You have a large capacity of motherliness!"
+
+"God grant it!" she said quietly.  "I feel that it is good to live
+like that!  Here are you, for instance, whom I love.  Maybe I love
+you better than I do Pasha.  He is always so silent.  Here he wants
+to get married to Sashenka, for example, and he never told me, his
+mother, a thing about it."
+
+"That's not true," the Little Russian retorted abruptly.  "I know it
+isn't true.  It's true he loves her, and she loves him.  But marry?
+No, they are not going to marry!  She'd want to, but Pavel--he can't!
+He doesn't want to!"
+
+"See how you are!" said the mother quietly, and she fixed her eyes
+sadly and musingly on the Little Russian's face.  "You see how you
+are!  You offer up your own selves!"
+
+"Pavel is a rare man!" the Little Russian uttered in a low voice.
+"He is a man of iron!"
+
+"Now he sits in prison," continued the mother reflectively.  "It's
+awful, it's terrible!  It's not as it used to be before!  Life
+altogether is not as it used to be, and the terror is different from
+the old terror.  You feel a pity for everybody, and you are alarmed
+for everybody!  And the heart is different.  The soul has opened its
+eyes, it looks on, and is sad and glad at the same time.  There's
+much I do not understand, and I feel so bitter and hurt that you do
+not believe in the Lord God.  Well, I guess I can't help that!  But
+I see and know that you are good people.  And you have consecrated
+yourselves to a stern life for the sake of the people, to a life of
+hardship for the sake of truth.  The truth you stand for, I comprehend:
+as long as there will be the rich, the people will get nothing,
+neither truth nor happiness, nothing!  Indeed, that's so, Andriusha!
+Here am I living among you, while all this is going on.  Sometimes
+at night my thoughts wander off to my past.  I think of my youthful
+strength trampled under foot, of my young heart torn and beaten,
+and I feel sorry for myself and embittered.  But for all that I
+live better now, I see myself more and more, I feel myself more."
+
+The Little Russian arose, and trying not to scrape with his feet,
+began to walk carefully up and down the room, tall, lean, absorbed
+in thought.
+
+"Well said!" he exclaimed in a low voice.  "Very well!  There was
+a young Jew in Kerch who wrote verses, and once he wrote:
+
+     "And the innocently slain,
+      Truth will raise to life again."
+
+"He himself was killed by the police in Kerch, but that's not the
+point.  He knew the truth and did a great deal to spread it among
+the people.  So here you are one of the innocently slain.  He spoke
+the truth!"
+
+"There, I am talking now," the mother continued.  "I talk and do not
+hear myself, don't believe my own ears!  All my life I was silent, I
+always thought of one thing--how to live through the day apart, how
+to pass it without being noticed, so that nobody should touch me!
+And now I think about everything.  Maybe I don't understand your
+affairs so very well; but all are near me, I feel sorry for all, and
+I wish well to all.  And to you, Andriusha, more than all the rest."
+
+He took her hand in his, pressed it tightly, and quickly turned
+aside.  Fatigued with emotion and agitation, the mother leisurely
+and silently washed the cups; and her breast gently glowed with a
+bold feeling that warmed her heart.
+
+Walking up and down the room the Little Russian said:
+
+"Mother, why don't you sometimes try to befriend Vyesovshchikov and
+be kind to him?  He is a fellow that needs it.  His father sits in
+prison--a nasty little old man.  Nikolay sometimes catches sight of
+him through the window and he begins to swear at him.  That's bad,
+you know.  He is a good fellow, Nikolay is.  He is fond of dogs,
+mice, and all sorts of animals, but he does not like people.  That's
+the pass to which a man can be brought."
+
+"His mother disappeared without a trace, his father is a thief and
+a drunkard," said Nilovna pensively.
+
+When Andrey left to go to bed, the mother, without being noticed,
+made the sign of the cross over him, and after about half an hour,
+she asked quietly, "Are you asleep, Andriusha?"
+
+"No.  Why?"
+
+"Nothing!  Good night!"
+
+"Thank you, mother, thank you!" he answered gently.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII
+
+
+The next day when Nilovna came up to the gates of the factory with
+her load, the guides stopped her roughly, and ordering her to put
+the pails down on the ground, made a careful examination.
+
+"My eatables will get cold," she observed calmly, as they felt
+around her dress.
+
+"Shut up!" said a guard sullenly.
+
+Another one, tapping her lightly on the shoulder, said with
+assurance:
+
+"Those books are thrown across the fence, I say!"
+
+Old man Sizov came up to her and looking around said in an undertone:
+
+"Did you hear, mother?"
+
+"What?"
+
+"About the pamphlets.  They've appeared again.  They've just
+scattered them all over like salt over bread.  Much good those
+arrests and searches have done!  My nephew Mazin has been hauled
+away to prison, your son's been taken.  Now it's plain it isn't he!"
+And stroking his beard Sizov concluded, "It's not people, but
+thoughts, and thoughts are not fleas; you can't catch them!"
+
+He gathered his beard in his hand, looked at her, and said as he
+walked away:
+
+"Why don't you come to see me some time?  I guess you are lonely
+all by yourself."
+
+She thanked him, and calling her wares, she sharply observed the
+unusual animation in the factory.  The workmen were all elated, they
+formed little circles, then parted, and ran from one group to 
+another.  Animated voices and happy, satisfied faces all around!
+The soot-filled atmosphere was astir and palpitating with something
+bold and daring.  Now here, now there, approving ejaculations were
+heard, mockery, and sometimes threats.
+
+"Aha!  It seems truth doesn't agree with them," she heard one say.
+
+The younger men were in especially good spirits, while the elder
+workmen had cautious smiles on their faces.  The authorities walked
+about with a troubled expression, and the police ran from place to
+place.  When the workingmen saw them, they dispersed, and walked
+away slowly, or if they remained standing, they stopped their
+conversation, looking silently at the agitated, angry faces.
+
+The workingmen seemed for some reason to be all washed and clean.
+The figure of Gusev loomed high, and his brother stalked about like
+a drake, and roared with laughter.  The joiner's foreman, Vavilov,
+and the record clerk, Isay, walked slowly past the mother.  The
+little, wizened clerk, throwing up his head and turning his neck to
+the left, looked at the frowning face of the foreman, and said
+quickly, shaking his reddish beard:
+
+"They laugh, Ivan Ivanovich.  It's fun to them.  They are pleased,
+although it's no less a matter than the destruction of the
+government, as the manager said.  What must be done here, Ivan
+Ivanovich, is not merely to weed but to plow!"
+
+Vavilov walked with his hands folded behind his back, and his
+fingers tightly clasped.
+
+"You print there what you please, you blackguards!" he cried aloud.
+"But don't you dare say a word about me!"
+
+Vasily Gusev came up to Nilovna and declared:
+
+"I am going to eat with you again.  Is it good today?"  And lowering
+his head and screwing up his eyes, he added in an undertone:  "You
+see?  It hit exactly!  Good!  Oh, mother, very good!"
+
+She nodded her head affably to him, flattered that Gusev, the
+sauciest fellow in the village, addressed her with a respectful
+plural "you," as he talked to her in secret.  The general stir and
+animation in the factory also pleased her, and she thought to
+herself:  "What would they do without me?"
+
+Three common laborers stopped at a short distance from her, and
+one of them said with disappointment in his voice:  "I couldn't
+find any anywhere!"
+
+Another remarked:  "I'd like to hear it, though.  I can't read
+myself, but I understand it hits them just in the right place."
+
+The third man looked around him, and said:  "Let's go into the
+boiler room.  I'll read it for you there!"
+
+"It works!" Gusev whispered, a wink lurking in his eye.
+
+Nilovna came home in gay spirits.  She had now seen for herself how
+people are moved by books.
+
+"The people down there are sorry they can't read," she said to Andrey,
+"and here am I who could when I was young, but have forgotten."
+
+"Learn over again, then," suggested the Little Russian.
+
+"At my age?  What do you want to make fun of me for?"
+
+Andrey, however, took a book from the shelf and pointing with the
+tip of a knife at a letter on the cover, asked:  "What's this?"
+
+"R," she answered, laughing.
+
+"And this?"
+
+"A."
+
+She felt awkward, hurt, and offended.  It seemed to her that Andrey's
+eyes were laughing at her, and she avoided their look.  But his
+voice sounded soft and calm in her ears.  She looked askance at
+his face, once, and a second time.  It was earnest and serious.
+
+"Do you really wish to teach me to read?" she asked with an
+involuntary smile.
+
+"Why not?" he responded.  "Try!  If you once knew how to read, it
+will come back to you easily.  'If no miracle it's no ill, and if
+a miracle better still!'"
+
+"But they say that one does not become a saint by looking at a
+sacred image!"
+
+"Eh," said the Little Russian, nodding his head.  "There are
+proverbs galore!  For example:  'The less you know, the better you
+sleep'--isn't that it?  Proverbs are the material the stomach thinks
+with; it makes bridles for the soul, to be able to control it
+better.  What the stomach needs is a rest, and the soul needs
+freedom.  What letter is this?"
+
+"M."
+
+"Yes, see how it sprawls.  And this?"
+
+Straining her eyes and moving her eyebrows heavily, she recalled
+with an effort the forgotten letters, and unconsciously yielding to
+the force of her exertions, she was carried away by them, and forgot
+herself.  But soon her eyes grew tired.  At first they became moist
+with tears of fatigue; and then tears of sorrow rapidly dropped down
+on the page.
+
+"I'm learning to read," she said, sobbing.  "It's time for me to
+die, and I'm just learning to read!"
+
+"You mustn't cry," said the Little Russian gently.  "It wasn't your
+fault you lived the way you did; and yet you understand that you
+lived badly.  There are thousands of people who could live better
+than you, but who live like cattle and then boast of how well they
+live.  But what is good in their lives?  To-day, their day's work
+over, they eat, and to-morrow, their day's work over, they eat, and
+so on through all their years--work and eat, work and eat!  Along
+with this they bring forth children, and at first amuse themselves
+with them, but when they, too, begin to eat much, they grow surly
+and scold:  'Come on, you gluttons!  Hurry along!  Grow up quick!
+It's time you get to work!' and they would like to make beasts of
+burden of their children.  But the children begin to work for their
+own stomachs, and drag their lives along as a thief drags a worthless
+stolen mop.  Their souls are never stirred with joy, never quickened
+with a thought that melts the heart.  Some live like mendicants--
+always begging; some like thieves--always snatching out of the hands
+of others.  They've made thieves' laws, placed men with sticks over
+the people, and said to them: 'Guard our laws; they are very convenient
+laws; they permit us to suck the blood out of the people!'  They
+try to squeeze the people from the outside, but the people resist,
+and so they drive the rules inside so as to crush the reason, too."
+
+Leaning his elbows on the table and looking into the mother's face
+with pensive eyes, he continued in an even, flowing voice:
+
+"Only those are men who strike the chains from off man's body and
+from off his reason.  And now you, too, are going into this work
+according to the best of your ability."
+
+"I?  Now, now!  How can I?"
+
+"Why not?  It's just like rain.  Every drop goes to nourish the
+seed!  And when you are able to read, then--"  He stopped and began
+to laugh; then rose and paced up and down the room.
+
+"Yes, you must learn to read!  And when Pavel gets back, won't you
+surprise him, eh?"
+
+"Oh, Andriusha!  For a young man everything is simple and easy!
+But when you have lived to my age, you have lots of trouble, little
+strength, and no mind at all left."
+
+In the evening the Little Russian went out.  The mother lit a lamp
+and sat down at a table to knit stockings.  But soon she rose again,
+walked irresolutely into the kitchen, bolted the outer door, and
+straining her eyebrows walked back into the living room.  She pulled
+down the window curtains, and taking a book from the shelf, sat down
+at the table again, looked around, bent down over the book, and
+began to move her lips.  When she heard a noise on the street, she
+started, clapped the book shut with the palm of her hand, and
+listened intently.  And again, now closing, now opening her eyes,
+she whispered:
+
+"E--z--a."
+
+With even precision and stern regularity the dull tick of the
+pendulum marked the dying seconds.
+
+A knock at the door was heard; the mother jumped quickly to her feet,
+thrust the book on the shelf, and walking up to the door asked anxiously:
+
+"Who's there?"
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII
+
+
+Rybin came in, greeted her, and stroking his beard in a dignified
+manner and peeping into the room with his dark eyes, remarked:
+
+"You used to let people into your house before, without inquiring
+who they were.  Are you alone?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"You are?  I thought the Little Russian was here.  I saw him to-day.
+The prison doesn't spoil a man.  Stupidity, that's what spoils most
+of all."
+
+He walked into the room, sat down and said to the mother:
+
+"Let's have a talk together.  I have something to tell you.  I have
+a theory!"  There was a significant and mysterious expression in his
+face as he said this.  It filled the mother with a sense of foreboding.
+She sat down opposite him and waited in mute anxiety for him to speak.
+
+"Everything costs money!" he began in his gruff, heavy voice.  "It
+takes money to be born; it takes money to die.  Books and leaflets
+cost money, too.  Now, then, do you know where all this money for
+the books comes from?"
+
+"No, I don't know," replied the mother in a low voice, anticipating danger.
+
+"Nor do I!  Another question I've got to ask is:  Who writes those
+books?  The educated folks.  The masters!"  Rybin spoke curtly and
+decisively, his voice grew gruffer and gruffer, and his bearded face
+reddened as with the strain of exertion.  "Now, then, the masters
+write the books and distribute them.  But the writings in the books
+are against these very masters.  Now, tell me, why do they spend their
+money and their time to stir up the people against themselves?  Eh?"
+
+Nilovna blinked, then opened her eyes wide and exclaimed in fright:
+
+"What do you think?  Tell me."
+
+"Aha!" exclaimed Rybin, turning in his chair like a bear.  "There you
+are!  When I reached that thought I was seized with a cold shiver, too."
+
+"Now what is it?  Tell me!  Did you find out anything?"
+
+"Deception!  Fraud!  I feel it.  It's deception.  I know nothing,
+but I feel sure there's deception in it.  Yes!  The masters are up
+to some clever trick, and I want nothing of it.  I want the truth.
+I understand what it is; I understand it.  But I will not go hand
+in hand with the masters.  They'll push me to the front when it
+suits them, and then walk over my bones as over a bridge to get
+where they want to."
+
+At the sound of his morose words, uttered in a stubborn, thick,
+and forceful voice, the mother's heart contracted in pain.
+
+"Good Lord!" she exclaimed in anguish.  "Where is the truth?  Can
+it be that Pavel does not understand?  And all those who come here
+from the city--is it possible that they don't understand?"  The
+serious, honest faces of Yegor, Nikolay Ivanovich, and Sashenka
+passed before her mind, and her heart fluttered.
+
+"No, no!" she said, shaking her head as if to dismiss the thought.
+"I can't believe it.  They are for truth and honor and conscience;
+they have no evil designs; oh, no!"
+
+"Whom are you talking about?" asked Rybin thoughtfully.
+
+"About all of them!  Every single one I met.  They are not the
+people who will traffic in human blood, oh, no!"  Perspiration
+burst out on her face, and her fingers trembled.
+
+"You are not looking in the right place, mother; look farther back,"
+said Rybin, drooping his head.  "Those who are directly working in
+the movement may not know anything about it themselves.  They think
+it must be so; they have the truth at heart.  But there may be
+people behind them who are looking out only for their own selfish
+interests.  Men won't go against themselves."  And with the firm
+conviction of a peasant fed on centuries of distrust, he added:  "No
+good will ever come from the masters!  Take my word for it!"
+
+"What concoction has your brain put together?" the mother asked,
+again seized with anxious misgiving.
+
+"I?"  Rybin looked at her, was silent for a while, then repeated:
+"Keep away from the masters!  That's what!"  He grew morosely silent
+again, and seemed to shrink within himself.
+
+"I'll go away, mother," he said after a pause.  "I wanted to join the
+fellows, to work along with them.  I'm fit for the work.  I can read
+and write.  I'm persevering and not a fool.  And the main thing is, I
+know what to say to people.  But now I will go.  I can't believe, and
+therefore I must go.  I know,  mother, that the people's souls are
+foul and besmirched.  All live on envy, all want to gorge themselves;
+and since there's little to eat, each seeks to eat the other up."
+
+He let his head droop, and remained absorbed in thought for a while.
+Finally he said:
+
+"I'll go all by myself through village and hamlet and stir the
+people up.  It's necessary that the people should take the matter
+in their own hands and get to work themselves.  Let them but
+understand--they'll find a way themselves.  And so, I'm going to
+try to make them understand.  There is no hope for them except in
+themselves; there's no understanding for them except in their own
+understanding!  And that's the truth!"
+
+"They will seize you!" said the mother in a low voice.
+
+"They will seize me, and let me out again.  And then I'll go ahead again!"
+
+"The peasants themselves will bind you, and you will be thrown into jail."
+
+"Well, I'll stay in jail for a time, then be released, and I'll go
+on again.  As for the peasants, they'll bind me once, twice, and
+then they will understand that they ought not to bind me, but listen
+to me.  I'll tell them:  'I don't ask you to believe me; I want you
+just to listen to me!'  And if they listen, they will believe."
+
+Both the mother and Rybin spoke slowly, as if testing every word
+before uttering it.
+
+"There's little joy for me in this, mother," said Rybin.  "I have
+lived here of late, and gobbled up a deal of stuff.  Yes; I understand
+some, too!  And now I feel as if I were burying a child."
+
+"You'll perish, Mikhail Ivanych!" said the mother, shaking her head sadly.
+
+His dark, deep eyes looked at her with a questioning, expectant
+look.  His powerful body bent forward, propped by his hands resting
+on the seat of the chair, and his swarthy face seemed pale in the
+black frame of his beard.
+
+"Did you hear what Christ said about the seed?  'Thou shalt not die,
+but rise to life again in the new ear.'  I don't regard myself as
+near death at all.  I am shrewd.  I follow a straighter course than
+the others.  You can get further that way.  Only, you see, I feel
+sorry--I don't know why."  He fidgeted on his chair, then slowly
+rose.  "I'll go to the tavern and be with the people a while.  The
+Little Russian is not coming.  Has he gotten busy already?"
+
+"Yes!"  The mother smiled.  "No sooner out of prison than they rush
+to their work."
+
+"That's the way it should be.  Tell him about me."
+
+They walked together slowly into the kitchen, and without looking
+at each other exchanged brief remarks:
+
+"I'll tell him," she promised.
+
+"Well, good-by!"
+
+"Good-by!  When do you quit your job?"
+
+"I have already."
+
+"When are you going?"
+
+"To-morrow, early in the morning.  Good-by!"
+
+He bent his head and crawled off the porch reluctantly, it seemed,
+and clumsily.  The mother stood for a moment at the door listening
+to the heavy departing footsteps and to the doubts that stirred in
+her heart.  Then she noiselessly turned away into the room, and
+drawing the curtain peered through the window.  Black darkness stood
+behind, motionless, waiting, gaping, with its flat, abysmal mouth.
+
+"I live in the night!" she thought.  "In the night forever!"  She
+felt a pity for the black-bearded, sedate peasant.  He was so broad
+and strong--and yet there was a certain helplessness about him,
+as about all the people.
+
+Presently Andrey came in gay and vivacious.  When the mother told
+him about Rybin, he exclaimed:
+
+"Going, is he?  Well, let him go through the villages.  Let him
+ring forth the word of truth.  Let him arouse the people.  It's
+hard for him here with us."
+
+"He was talking about the masters.  Is there anything in it?"
+she inquired circumspectly.  "Isn't it possible that they want
+to deceive you?"
+
+"It bothers you, mother, doesn't it?"  The Little Russian laughed.
+"Oh, mother dear--money!  If we only had money!  We are still
+living on charity.  Take, for instance, Nikolay Ivanych.  He earns
+seventy-five rubles a month, and gives us fifty!  And others do
+the same.  And the hungry students send us money sometimes, which
+they collect penny by penny.  And as to the masters, of course
+there are different kinds among them.  Some of them will deceive us,
+and some will leave us; but the best will stay with us and march
+with us up to our holiday."  He clapped his hands, and rubbing them
+vigorously against each other continued:  "But not even the flight
+of an eagle's wings will enable anyone to reach that holiday, so
+we'll make a little one for the first of May.  It will be jolly."
+
+His words and his vivacity dispelled the alarm excited in the
+mother's heart by Rybin.  The Little Russian walked up and down the
+room, his feet sounding on the floor.  He rubbed his head with one
+hand and his chest with the other, and spoke looking at the floor:
+
+"You know, sometimes you have a wonderful feeling living in your
+heart.  It seems to you that wherever you go, all men are comrades;
+all burn with one and the same fire; all are merry; all are good.
+Without words they all understand one another; and no one wants to
+hinder or insult the other.  No one feels the need of it.  All live
+in unison, but each heart sings its own song.  And the songs flow
+like brooks into one stream, swelling into a huge river of bright
+joys, rolling free and wide down its course.  And when you think
+that this will be--that it cannot help being if we so wish it--then
+the wonderstruck heart melts with joy.  You feel like weeping--you
+feel so happy."
+
+He spoke and looked as if he were searching something within
+himself.  The mother listened and tried not to stir, so as not to
+disturb him and interrupt his speech.  She always listened to him
+with more attention than to anybody else.  He spoke more simply
+than all the rest, and his words gripped her heart more powerfully.
+Pavel, too, was probably looking to the future.  How could it be
+otherwise, when one is following such a course of life?  But when
+he looked into the remote future it was always by himself; he never
+spoke of what he saw.  This Little Russian, however, it seemed to
+her, was always there with a part of his heart; the legend of the
+future holiday for all upon earth, always sounded in his speech.
+This legend rendered the meaning of her son's life, of his work,
+and that of all of his comrades, clear to the mother.
+
+"And when you wake up," continued the Little Russian, tossing his
+head and letting his hands drop alongside his body, "and look around,
+you see it's all filthy and cold.  All are tired and angry; human
+life is all churned up like mud on a busy highway, and trodden underfoot!"
+
+He stopped in front of the mother, and with deep sorrow in his eyes,
+and shaking his head, added in a low, sad voice:
+
+"Yes, it hurts, but you must--you must distrust man; you must fear
+him, and even hate him!  Man is divided, he is cut in two by life.
+You'd like only to love him; but how is it possible?  How can you
+forgive a man if he goes against you like a wild beast, does not
+recognize that there is a living soul in you, and kicks your face--
+a human face!  You must not forgive.  It's not for yourself that
+you mustn't.  I'd stand all the insults as far as I myself am
+concerned; but I don't want to show indulgence for insults.  I don't
+want to let them learn on my back how to beat others!"
+
+His eyes now sparkled with a cold gleam; he inclined his head
+doggedly, and continued in a more resolute tone:
+
+"I must not forgive anything that is noxious, even though it does
+not hurt!  I'm not alone in the world.  If I allow myself to be
+insulted to-day--maybe I can afford to laugh at the insult, maybe
+it doesn't sting me at all--but, having tested his strength on me,
+the offender will proceed to flay some one else the next day!  That's
+why one is compelled to discriminate between people, to keep a firm
+grip on one's heart, and to classify mankind--these belong to me,
+those are strangers."
+
+The mother thought of the officer and Sashenka, and said with a sigh:
+
+"What sort of bread can you expect from unbolted meal?"
+
+"That's it; that's the trouble!" the Little Russian exclaimed.
+"You must look with two kinds of eyes; two hearts throb in your
+bosom.  The one loves all; the other says:  'Halt!  You mustn't!'"
+
+The figure of her husband, somber and ponderous, like a huge
+moss-covered stone, now rose in her memory.  She made a mental
+image for herself of the Little Russian as married to Natasha,
+and her son as the husband of Sashenka.
+
+"And why?" asked the Little Russian, warming up.  "It's so plainly
+evident that it's downright ridiculous--simply because men don't
+stand on an equal footing.  Then let's equalize them, put them all
+in one row!  Let's divide equally all that's produced by the brains
+and all that's made by the hands.  Let's not keep one another in the
+slavery of fear and envy, in the thraldom of greed and stupidity!"
+
+The mother and the Little Russian now began to carry on such
+conversations with each other frequently.  He was again taken into
+the factory.  He turned over all his earnings to the mother, and
+she took the money from him with as little fuss as from Pavel.
+Sometimes Andrey would suggest with a twinkle in his eyes:
+
+"Shall we read a little, mother, eh?"
+
+She would invariably refuse, playfully but resolutely.  The twinkle
+in his eyes discomfited her, and she thought to herself, with a
+slight feeling of offense:  "If you laugh at me, then why do you
+ask me to read with you?"
+
+He noticed that the mother began to ask him with increasing
+frequency for the meaning of this or that book word.  She always
+looked aside when asking for such information, and spoke in a
+monotonous tone of indifference.  He divined that she was studying
+by herself in secret, understood her bashfulness, and ceased to
+invite her to read with him.  Shortly afterwards she said to him:
+
+"My eyes are getting weak, Andriusha.  I guess I need glasses."
+
+"All right!  Next Sunday I'll take you to a physician in the city,
+a friend of mine, and you shall have glasses!"
+
+She, had already been three times in the prison to ask for a meeting
+with Pavel, and each time the general of the gendarmes, a gray old
+man with purple cheeks and a huge nose, turned her gently away.
+
+"In about a week, little mother, not before!  A week from now we
+shall see, but at present it's impossible!"
+
+He was a round, well-fed creature, and somehow reminded her of a
+ripe plum, somewhat spoiled by too long keeping, and already covered
+with a downy mold.  He kept constantly picking his small, white teeth
+with a sharp yellow toothpick.  There was a little smile in his
+small greenish eyes, and his voice had a friendly, caressing sound.
+
+"Polite!" said the mother to the Little Russian with a thoughtful air.
+"Always with a smile on him.  I don't think it's right.  When a man
+is tending to affairs like these, I don't think he ought to grin."
+
+"Yes, yes.  They are so gentle, always smiling.  If they should be
+told:  'Look here, this man is honest and wise, he is dangerous to us;
+hang him!' they would still smile and hang him, and keep on smiling."
+
+"The one who made the search in our place is the better of the two;
+he is simpler.  You can see at once that he is a dog."
+
+"None of them are human beings; they are used to stun the people
+and render them insensible.  They are tools, the means wherewith
+our kind is rendered more convenient to the state.  They themselves
+have already been so fixed that they have become convenient
+instruments in the hand that governs us.  They can do whatever they 
+are told to do without thought, without asking why it is necessary
+to do it."
+
+At last Vlasova got permission to see her son, and one Sunday she
+was sitting modestly in a corner of the prison office, a low,
+narrow, dingy apartment, where a few more people were sitting and
+waiting for permission to see their relatives and friends.  Evidently
+it was not the first time they were here, for they knew one another
+and in a low voice kept up a lazy, languid conversation.
+
+"Have you heard?" said a stout woman with a wizened face and a
+traveling bag on her lap.  "At early mass to-day the church regent
+again ripped up the ear of one of the choir boys."
+
+An elderly man in the uniform of a retired soldier coughed aloud
+and remarked:
+
+"These choir boys are such loafers!"
+
+A short, bald, little man with short legs, long arms, and protruding
+jaw, ran officiously up and down the room.  Without stopping he said
+in a cracked, agitated voice:
+
+"The cost of living is getting higher and higher.  An inferior
+quality of beef, fourteen cents; bread has again risen to two
+and a half."
+
+Now and then prisoners came into the room--gray, monotonous, with
+coarse, heavy, leather shoes.  They blinked as they entered; iron
+chains rattled at the feet of one of them.  The quiet and calm and
+simplicity all around produced a strange, uncouth impression.  It
+seemed as if all had grown accustomed to their situation.  Some sat
+there quietly, others looked on idly, while still others seemed to
+pay their regular visits with a sense of weariness.  The mother's
+heart quivered with impatience, and she looked with a puzzled air at
+everything around her, amazed at the oppressive simplicity of life
+in this corner of the world.
+
+Next to Vlasova sat a little old woman with a wrinkled face, but
+youthful eyes.  She kept her thin neck turned to listen to the
+conversation, and looked about on all sides with a strange
+expression of eagerness in her face.
+
+"Whom have you here?" Vlasova asked softly.
+
+"A son, a student," answered the old woman in a loud, brusque voice.
+"And you?"
+
+"A son, also.  A workingman."
+
+"What's the name?"
+
+"Vlasov."
+
+"Never heard of him.  How long has he been in prison?"
+
+"Seven weeks."
+
+"And mine has been in for ten months," said the old woman, with a
+strange note of pride in her voice which did not escape the notice
+of the mother.
+
+A tall lady dressed in black, with a thin, pale face, said lingeringly:
+
+"They'll soon put all the decent people in prison.  They can't
+endure them, they loathe them!"
+
+"Yes, yes!" said the little old bald man, speaking rapidly.  "All
+patience is disappearing.  Everybody is excited; everybody is
+clamoring, and prices are mounting higher and higher.  As a consequence
+the value of men is depreciating.  And there is not a single,
+conciliatory voice heard, not one!"
+
+"Perfectly true!" said the retired military man.  "It's monstrous!
+What's wanted is a voice, a firm voice to cry, 'Silence!'  Yes,
+that's what we want--a firm voice!"
+
+The conversation became more general and animated.  Everybody was
+in a hurry to give his opinion about life; but all spoke in a
+half-subdued voice, and the mother noticed a tone of hostility in
+all, which was new to her.  At home they spoke differently, more
+intelligibly, more simply, and more loudly.
+
+The fat warden with a square red beard called out her name, looked
+her over from head to foot, and telling her to follow him, walked
+off limping.  She followed him, and felt like pushing him to make
+him go faster.  Pavel stood in a small room, and on seeing his
+mother smiled and put out his hand to her.  She grasped it, laughed,
+blinked swiftly, and at a loss for words merely asked softly:
+
+"How are you?  How are you?"
+
+"Compose yourself, mother."  Pavel pressed her hand.
+
+"It's all right!  It's all right!"
+
+"Mother," said the warden, fetching a sigh, "suppose you move away
+from each other a bit.  Let there be some distance between you."
+He yawned aloud.
+
+Pavel asked the mother about her health and about home.  She waited
+for some other questions, sought them in her son's eyes, but could
+not find them.  He was calm as usual, although his face had grown
+paler, and his eyes seemed larger.
+
+"Sasha sends you her regards," she said.  Pavel's eyelids quivered
+and fell.  His face became softer and brightened with a clear, open
+smile.  A poignant bitterness smote the mother's heart.
+
+"Will they let you out soon?" she inquired in a tone of sudden
+injury and agitation.  "Why have they put you in prison?  Those
+papers and pamphlets have appeared in the factory again, anyway."
+
+Pavel's eyes flashed with delight.
+
+"Have they?  When?  Many of them?"
+
+"It is forbidden to talk about this subject!" the warden lazily
+announced.  "You may talk only of family matters."
+
+"And isn't this a family matter?" retorted the mother.
+
+"I don't know.  I only know it's forbidden.  You may talk about his
+wash and underwear and food, but nothing else!" insisted the warden,
+his voice, however, expressing utter indifference.
+
+"All right," said Pavel.  "Keep to domestic affairs, mother.  What
+are you doing?"
+
+She answered boldly, seized with youthful ardor:
+
+"I carry all this to the factory."  She paused with a smile and
+continued:  "Sour soup, gruel, all Marya's cookery, and other stuff."
+
+Pavel understood.  The muscles of his face quivered with restrained
+laughter.  He ran his fingers through his hair and said in a tender
+tone, such as she had never heard him use:
+
+"My own dear mother!  That's good!  It's good you've found something
+to do, so it isn't tedious for you.  You don't feel lonesome, do
+you, mother?"
+
+"When the leaflets appeared, they searched me, too," she said,
+not without a certain pride.
+
+"Again on this subject!" said the warden in an offended tone.  "I
+tell you it's forbidden, it's not allowed.  They have deprived him
+of liberty so that he shouldn't know anything about it; and here
+you are with your news.  You ought to know it's forbidden!"
+
+"Well, leave it, mother," said Pavel.  "Matvey Ivanovich is a good
+man.  You mustn't do anything to provoke him.  We get along together
+very well.  It's by chance he's here to-day with us.  Usually, it's
+the assistant superintendent who is present on such occasions.
+That's why Matvey Ivanovich is afraid you will say something you
+oughtn't to."
+
+"Time's up!" announced the warden looking at his watch.  "Take your leave!"
+
+"Well, thank you," said Pavel.  "Thank you, my darling mother!
+Don't worry now.  They'll let me out soon."
+
+He embraced her, pressed her warmly to his bosom, and kissed her.
+Touched by his endearments, and happy, she burst into tears.
+
+"Now separate!" said the warden, and as he walked off with the
+mother he mumbled:
+
+"Don't cry!  They'll let him out; they'll let everybody out.  It's
+too crowded here."
+
+At home the mother told the Little Russian of her conversation with
+Pavel, and her face wore a broad smile.
+
+"I told him!  Yes, indeed!  And cleverly, too.  He understood!"
+and, heaving a melancholy sigh:  "Oh, yes, he understood; otherwise
+he wouldn't have been so tender and affectionate.  He has never
+been that way before."
+
+"Oh, mother!" the Little Russian laughed.  "No matter what other
+people may want, a mother always wants affection.  You certainly
+have a heart plenty big enough for one man!"
+
+"But those people!  Just think, Andriusha!" she suddenly exclaimed,
+amazement in her tone.  "How used they get to all this!  Their
+children are taken away from them, are thrown into dungeons, and,
+mind you, it's as nothing to them!  They come, sit about, wait,
+and talk.  What do you think of that?  If intelligent people are
+that way, if they can so easily get accustomed to a thing like that,
+then what's to be said about the common people?"
+
+"That's natural," said the Little Russian with his usual smile.
+"The law after all is not so harsh toward them as toward us.  And
+they need the law more than we do.  So that when the law hits them
+on the head, although they cry out they do not cry very loud.
+Your own stick does not fall upon you so heavily.  For them the
+laws are to some extent a protection, but for us they are only
+chains to keep us bound so we can't kick."
+
+Three days afterwards in the evening, when the mother sat at the
+table knitting stockings and the Little Russian was reading to her
+from a book about the revolt of the Roman slaves, a loud knock was
+heard at the door.  The Little Russian went to open it and admitted
+Vyesovshchikov with a bundle under his arm, his hat pushed back on
+his head, and mud up to his knees.
+
+"I was passing by, and seeing a light in your house, I dropped in to
+ask you how you are.  I've come straight from the prison."
+
+He spoke in a strange voice.  He seized Vlasov's hand and wrung it
+violently as he added:  "Pavel sends you his regards."  Irresolutely
+seating himself in a chair he scanned the room with his gloomy,
+suspicious look.
+
+The mother was not fond of him.  There was something in his angular,
+close-cropped head and in his small eyes that always scared her;
+but now she was glad to see him, and with a broad smile lighting
+her face she said in a tender, animated voice:
+
+"How thin you've become!  Say, Andriusha, let's dose him with tea."
+
+"I'm putting up the samovar already!" the Little Russian called
+from the kitchen.
+
+"How is Pavel?  Have they let anybody else out besides yourself?"
+
+Nikolay bent his head and answered:
+
+"I'm the only one they've let go."  He raised his eyes to the
+mother's face and said slowly, speaking through his teeth with
+ponderous emphasis:  "I told them:  'Enough!  Let me go!  Else
+I'll kill some one here, and myself, too!'  So they let me go!"
+
+"Hm, hm--ye-es," said the mother, recoiling from him and involuntarily
+blinking when her gaze met his sharp, narrow eyes.
+
+"And how is Fedya Mazin?" shouted the Little Russian from the
+kitchen.  "Writing poetry, is he?"
+
+"Yes!  I don't understand it," said Nikolay, shaking his head.
+"They've put him in a cage and he sings.  There's only one thing
+I'm sure about, and that is I have no desire to go home."
+
+"Why should you want to go home?  What's there to attract you?"
+said the mother pensively.  "It's empty, there's no fire burning,
+and it's chilly all over."
+
+Vyesovshchikov sat silent, his eyes screwed up.  Taking a box of
+cigarettes from his pocket he leisurely lit one of them, and looking
+at the gray curl of smoke dissolve before him he grinned like a
+big, surly dog.
+
+"Yes, I guess it's cold.  And the floor is filled with frozen
+cockroaches, and even the mice are frozen, too, I suppose.
+Pelagueya Nilovna, will you let me sleep here to-night, please?"
+he asked hoarsely without looking at her.
+
+"Why, of course, Nikolay!  You needn't even ask it!" the mother
+quickly replied.  She felt embarrassed and ill at ease in Nikolay's
+presence, and did not know what to speak to him about.  But he
+himself went on to talk in a strangely broken voice.
+
+"We live in a time when children are ashamed of their own parents."
+
+"What!" exclaimed the mother, starting.
+
+He glanced up at her and closed his eyes.  His pockmarked face
+looked like that of a blind man.
+
+"I say that children have to be ashamed of their parents," he
+repeated, sighing aloud.  "Now, don't you be afraid.  It's not
+meant for you.  Pavel will never be ashamed of you.  But I am
+ashamed of my father, and shall never enter his house again.  I
+have no father, no home!  They have put me under the surveillance
+of the police, else I'd go to Siberia.  I think a man who won't
+spare himself could do a great deal in Siberia.  I would free
+convicts there and arrange for their escape."
+
+The mother understood, with her ready feelings, what agony this man
+must be undergoing, but his pain awoke no sympathetic response in her.
+
+"Well, of course, if that's the case, then it's better for you to
+go," she said, in order not to offend him by silence.
+
+Andrey came in from the kitchen, and said, smiling:
+
+"Well, are you sermonizing, eh?"
+
+The mother rose and walked away, saying:
+
+"I'm going to get something to eat."
+
+Vyesovshchikov looked at the Little Russian fixedly and suddenly declared:
+
+"I think that some people ought to be killed off!"
+
+"Oho!  And pray what for?" asked the Little Russian calmly.
+
+"So they cease to be."
+
+"Ahem!  And have you the right to make corpses out of living people?"
+
+"Yes, I have."
+
+"Where did you get it from?"
+
+"The people themselves gave it to me."
+
+The Little Russian stood in the middle of the room, tall and spare,
+swaying on his legs, with his hands thrust in his pockets, and
+looked down on Nikolay.  Nikolay sat firmly in his chair, enveloped
+in clouds of smoke, with red spots on his face showing through.
+
+"The people gave it to me!" he repeated clenching his fist.  "If
+they kick me I have the right to strike them and punch their eyes
+out!  Don't touch me, and I won't touch you!  Let me live as I
+please, and I'll live in peace and not touch anybody.  Maybe I'd
+prefer to live in the woods.  I'd build myself a cabin in the
+ravine by the brook and live there.  At any rate, I'd live alone."
+
+"Well, go and live that way, if it pleases you," said the Little
+Russian, shrugging his shoulders.
+
+"Now?" asked Nikolay.  He shook his head in negation and replied,
+striking his fist on his knee:
+
+"Now it's impossible!"
+
+"Who's in your way?"
+
+"The people!" Vyesovshchikov retorted brusquely.  "I'm hitched to
+them even unto death.  They've hedged my heart around with hatred
+and tied me to themselves with evil.  That's a strong tie!  I hate
+them, and I will not go away; no, never!  I'll be in their way.
+I'll harass their lives.  They are in my way, I'll be in theirs.
+I'll answer only for myself, only for myself, and for no one else.
+And if my father is a thief----"
+
+"Oh!" said the Little Russian in a low voice, moving up to Nikolay.
+
+"And as for Isay Gorbov, I'll wring his head off!  You shall see!"
+
+"What for?" asked the Little Russian in a quiet, earnest voice.
+
+"He shouldn't be a spy; he shouldn't go about denouncing people.
+It's through him my father's gone to the dogs, and it's owing to
+him that he now is aiming to become a spy," said Vyesovshchikov,
+looking at Andrey with a dark, hostile scowl.
+
+"Oh, that's it!" exclaimed the Little Russian.  "And pray, who'd
+blame you for that?  Fools!"
+
+"Both the fools and the wise are smeared with the same oil!" said
+Nikolay heavily.  "Here are you a wise fellow, and Pavel, too.
+And do you mean to say that I am the same to you as Fedya Mazin or
+Samoylov, or as you two are to each other?  Don't lie!  I won't
+believe you, anyway.  You all push me aside to a place apart, all
+by myself."
+
+"Your heart is aching, Nikolay!" said the Little Russian softly and
+tenderly sitting down beside him.
+
+"Yes, it's aching, and so is your heart.  But your aches seem nobler
+to you than mine.  We are all scoundrels toward one another, that's
+what I say.  And what have you to say to that?"
+
+He fixed his sharp gaze on Andrey, and waited with set teeth.  His
+mottled face remained immobile, and a quiver passed over his thick
+lips, as if scorched by a flame.
+
+"I have nothing to say!" said the Little Russian, meeting Vyesovshchikov's
+hostile glance with a bright, warm, yet melancholy look of his blue
+eyes.  "I know that to argue with a man at a time when all the wounds
+of his heart are bleeding, is only to insult him.  I know it, brother."
+
+"It's impossible to argue with me; I can't," mumbled Nikolay,
+lowering his eyes.
+
+"I think," continued the Little Russian, "that each of us has gone
+through that, each of us has walked with bare feet over broken glass,
+each of us in his dark hour has gasped for breath as you are now."
+
+"You have nothing to tell me!" said Vyesovshchikov slowly.  "Nothing!
+My heart is so--it seems to me as if wolves were howling there!"
+
+"And I don't want to say anything to you.  Only I know that you'll
+get over this, perhaps not entirely, but you'll get over it!"  He
+smiled, and added, tapping Nikolay on the back:  "Why, man, this is
+a children's disease, something like measles!  We all suffer from
+it, the strong less, the weak more.  It comes upon a man at the
+period when he has found himself, but does not yet understand life,
+and his own place in life.  And when you do not see your place, and
+are unable to appraise your own value, it seems that you are the
+only, the inimitable cucumber on the face of the earth, and that no
+one can measure, no one can fathom your worth, and that all are
+eager only to eat you up.  After a while you'll find out that the
+hearts in other people's breasts are no worse than a good part of
+your own heart, and you'll begin to feel better.  And somewhat
+ashamed, too!  Why should you climb up to the belfry tower, when
+your bell is so small that it can't be heard in the great peal of
+the holiday bells?  Moreover, you'll see that in chorus the sound of
+your bell will be heard, too, but by itself the old church bells
+will drown it in their rumble as a fly is drowned in oil.  Do you
+understand what I am saying?"
+
+"Maybe I understand," Nikolay said, nodding his head.  "Only I
+don't believe it."
+
+The Little Russian broke into a laugh, jumped to his feet, and
+began to run noisily up and down the room.
+
+"I didn't believe it either.  Ah, you--wagonload!"
+
+"Why a wagonload?" Nikolay asked with a sad smile, looking at the
+Little Russian.
+
+"Because there's a resemblance!"
+
+Suddenly Nikolay broke into a loud guffaw, his mouth opening wide.
+
+"What is it?" the Little Russian asked in surprise, stopping in
+front of him.
+
+"It struck me that he'd be a fool who'd want to insult you!" Nikolay
+declared, shaking his head.
+
+"Why, how can you insult me?" asked the Little Russian, shrugging
+his shoulders.
+
+"I don't know," said Vyesovshchikov, grinning good-naturedly or
+perhaps condescendingly.  "I only wanted to say that a man must
+feel mighty ashamed of himself after he'd insulted you."
+
+"There now!  See where you got to!" laughed the Little Russian.
+
+"Andriusha!" the mother called from the kitchen.  "Come get the
+samovar.  It's ready!"
+
+Andrey walked out of the room, and Vyesovshchikov, left alone,
+looked about, stretched out his foot sheathed in a coarse, heavy
+boot, looked at it, bent down, and felt the stout calf of his legs.
+Then he raised one hand to his face, carefully examined the palm,
+and turned it around.  His short-fingered hand was thick, and
+covered with yellowish hair.  He waved it in the air, and arose.
+
+When Andrey brought in the samovar, Vyesovshchikov was standing
+before the mirror, and greeted him with these words:
+
+"It's a long time since I've seen my face."  Then he laughed and
+added:  "It's an ugly face I have!"
+
+"What's that to you?" asked Andrey, turning a curious look upon him.
+
+"Sashenka says the face is the mirror of the heart!" Nikolay
+replied, bringing out the words slowly.
+
+"It's not true, though!" the little Russian ejaculated.  "She has
+a nose like a mushroom, cheek bones like a pair of scissors; yet
+her heart is like a bright little star."
+
+They sat down to drink tea.
+
+Vyesovshchikov took a big potato, heavily salted a slice of bread,
+and began to chew slowly and deliberately, like an ox.
+
+"And how are matters here?" he asked, with his mouth full.
+
+When Andrey cheerfully recounted to him the growth the socialist
+propaganda in the factory, he again grew morose and remarked dully:
+
+"It takes too long!  Too long, entirely!  It ought go faster!"
+
+The mother regarded him, and was seized with a feeling of hostility
+toward this man.
+
+"Life is not a horse; you can't set it galloping with a whip," said Andrey.
+
+But Vyesovshchikov stubbornly shook his head, and proceeded:
+
+"It's slow!  I haven't the patience.  What am I to do?"  He opened
+his arms in a gesture of helplessness, and waited for a response.
+
+"We all must learn and teach others.  That's our business!" said
+Andrey, bending his head.
+
+Vyesovshchikov asked:
+
+"And when are we going to fight?"
+
+"There'll be more than one butchery of us up to that time, that I
+know!" answered the Little Russian with a smile.  "But when we shall
+be called on to fight, that I don't know!  First, you see, we must
+equip the head, and then the hand.  That's what I think."
+
+"The heart!" said Nikolay laconically.
+
+"And the heart, too."
+
+Nikolay became silent, and began to eat again.  From the corner of
+her eye the mother stealthily regarded his broad, pockmarked face,
+endeavoring to find something in it to reconcile her to the
+unwieldy, square figure of Vyesovshchikov.  Her eyebrows fluttered
+whenever she encountered the shooting glance of his little eyes.
+Andrey held his head in his hands; he became restless--he suddenly
+laughed, and then abruptly stopped, and began to whistle.
+
+It seemed to the mother that she understood his disquietude.
+Nikolay sat at the table without saying anything; and when the
+Little Russian addressed a question to him, he answered briefly,
+with evident reluctance.
+
+The little room became too narrow and stifling for its two occupants,
+and they glanced, now the one, now the other, at their guest.
+
+At length Nikolay rose and said:  "I'd like to go to bed.  I sat
+and sat in prison--suddenly they let me go; I'm off!--I'm tired!"
+
+He went into the kitchen and stirred about for a while.  Then a
+sudden stillness settled down.  The mother listened for a sound,
+and whispered to Andrey:  "He has something terrible in his mind!"
+
+"Yes, he's hard to understand!" the Little Russian assented, shaking
+his head.  "But you go to bed, mother, I am going to stay and read
+a while."
+
+She went to the corner where the bed was hidden from view by chintz
+curtains.  Andrey, sitting at the table, for a long while listened
+to the warm murmur of her prayers and sighs.  Quickly turning the
+pages of the book Andrey nervously rubbed his lips, twitched his
+mustache with his long fingers, and scraped his feet on the floor.
+Ticktock, ticktock went the pendulum of the clock; and the wind
+moaned as it swept past the window.
+
+Then the mother's low voice was heard:
+
+"Oh, God!  How many people there are in the world, and each one
+wails in his own way.  Where, then, are those who feel rejoiced?"
+
+"Soon there will be such, too, soon!" announced the Little Russian.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV
+
+
+Life flowed on swiftly.  The days were diversified and full of
+color.  Each one brought with it something new, and the new ceased
+to alarm the mother.  Strangers came to the house in the evening
+more and more frequently, and they talked with Andrey in subdued
+voices with an engrossed air.  Late at night they went out into the
+darkness, their collars up, their hats thrust low over their faces,
+noiselessly, cautiously.  All seemed to feel a feverish excitement,
+which they kept under restraint, and had the air of wanting to sing
+and laugh if they only had the time.  They were all in a perpetual
+hurry.  All of them--the mocking and the serious, the frank, jovial
+youth with effervescing strength, the thoughtful and quiet--all of
+them in the eyes of the mother were identical in the persistent
+faith that characterized them; and although each had his own peculiar
+cast of countenance, for her all their faces blended into one thin,
+composed, resolute face with a profound expression in its dark eyes,
+kind yet stern, like the look in Christ's eyes on his way to Emmaus.
+
+The mother counted them, and mentally gathered them together into a
+group around Pavel.  In that throng he became invisible to the eyes
+of the enemy.
+
+One day a vivacious, curly-haired girl appeared from the city,
+bringing some parcel for Andrey; and on leaving she said to Vlasova,
+with a gleam in her merry eyes:
+
+"Good-by, comrade!"
+
+"Good-by!" the mother answered, restraining a smile.  After seeing
+the girl to the door, she walked to the window and, smiling, looked 
+out on the street to watch her comrade as she trotted away, nimbly
+raising and dropping her little feet, fresh as a spring flower and
+light as a butterfly.
+
+"Comrade!" said the mother when her guest had disappeared from her
+view.  "Oh, you dear!  God grant you a comrade for all your life!"
+
+She often noticed in all the people from the city a certain
+childishness, for which she had the indulgent smile of an elderly
+person; but at the same time she was touched and joyously surprised
+by their faith, the profundity of which she began to realize more
+and more clearly.  Their visions of the triumph of justice captivated
+her and warmed her heart.  As she listened to their recital of
+future victories, she involuntarily sighed with an unknown sorrow.
+But what touched her above all was their simplicity, their beautiful,
+grand, generous unconcern for themselves.
+
+She had already come to understand a great deal of what was said
+about life.  She felt they had in reality discovered the true source
+of the people's misfortune, and it became a habit with her to agree
+with their thoughts.  But at the bottom of her heart she did not
+believe that they could remake the whole of life according to their
+idea, or that they would have strength enough to gather all the
+working people about their fire.  Everyone, she knew, wants to fill
+his stomach to-day, and no one wants to put his dinner off even for
+a week, if he can eat it up at once.  Not many would consent to
+travel the long and difficult road; and not all eyes could see at
+the end the promised kingdom where all men are brothers.  That's why
+all these good people, despite their beards and worn faces, seemed
+to her mere children.
+
+"My dear ones!" she thought, shaking her head.
+
+But they all now lived a good, earnest, and sensible life; they all
+spoke of the common weal; and in their desire to teach other people
+what they knew, they did not spare themselves.  She understood that
+it was possible to love such a life, despite its dangers; and with
+a sigh she looked back to bygone days in which her past dragged along
+flatly and monotonously, a thin, black thread.  Imperceptibly she
+grew conscious of her usefulness in this new life--a consciousness
+that gave her poise and assurance.  She had never before felt herself 
+necessary to anybody.  When she had lived with her husband, she knew
+that if she died he would marry another woman.  It was all the same
+to him whether a dark-haired or a red-haired woman lived with him
+and prepared his meals.  When Pavel grew up and began to run about
+in the street, she saw that she was not needed by him.  But now she
+felt that she was helping a good work.  It was new to her and
+pleasant.  It set her head erect on her shoulders.
+
+She considered it her duty to carry the books regularly to the
+factory.  Indeed, she elaborated a number of devices for escaping
+detection.  The spies, grown accustomed to her presence on the
+factory premises, ceased to pay attention to her.  She was searched
+several times, but always the day after the appearance of the
+leaflets in the factory.  When she had no literature about her, she
+knew how to arouse the suspicion of the guards and spies.  They
+would halt her, and she would pretend to feel insulted, and would
+remonstrate with them, and then walk off blushing, proud of her
+clever ruse.  She began to enjoy the fun of the game.
+
+Vyesovshchikov was not taken back to the factory, and went to work
+for a lumberman.  The whole day long he drove about the village
+with a pair of black horses pulling planks and beams after them.
+The mother saw him almost daily with the horses as they plodded
+along the road, their feet trembling under the strain and dropping
+heavily upon the ground.  They were both old and bare-boned, their
+heads shook wearily and sadly, and their dull, jaded eyes blinked
+heavily.  Behind them jerkingly trailed a long beam, or a pile of
+boards clattering loudly.  And by their side Nikolay trudged along,
+holding the slackened reins in his hand, ragged, dirty, with heavy
+boots, his hat thrust back, uncouth as a stump just turned up from
+the ground.  He, too, shook his head and looked down at his feet,
+refusing to see anything.  His horses blindly ran into the people
+and wagons going the opposite direction.  Angry oaths buzzed about
+him like hornets, and sinister shouts rent the air.  He did not
+raise his head, did not answer them, but went on, whistling a sharp,
+shrill whistle, mumbling dully to the horses.
+
+Every time that Andrey's comrades gathered at the mother's house to
+read pamphlets or the new issue of the foreign papers, Nikolay came
+also, sat down in a corner, and listened in silence for an hour or
+two.  When the reading was over the young people entered into long
+discussions; but Vyesovshchikov took no part in the arguments.  He
+remained longer than the rest, and when alone, face to face with
+Andrey, he glumly put to him the question:
+
+"And who is the most to blame?  The Czar?"
+
+"The one to blame is he who first said:  'This is mine.'  That man
+has now been dead some several thousand years, and it's not worth
+the while to bear him a grudge," said the Little Russian, jesting.
+His eyes, however, had a perturbed expression.
+
+"And how about the rich, and those who stand up for them?  Are they right?"
+
+The Little Russian clapped his hands to his head; then pulled his
+mustache, and spoke for a long time in simple language about life
+and about the people.  But from his talk it always appeared as if
+all the people were to blame, and this did not satisfy Nikolay.
+Compressing his thick lips tightly, he shook his head in demur, and
+declared that he could not believe it was so, and that he did not
+understand it.  He left dissatisfied and gloomy.  Once he said:
+
+"No, there must be people to blame!  I'm sure there are!  I tell
+you, we must plow over the whole of life like a weedy field, showing
+no mercy!"
+
+"That's what Isay, the record clerk, once said about us!" the mother
+said.  For a while the two were silent.
+
+"Isay?"
+
+"Yes, he's a bad man.  He spies after everybody, fishes about
+everywhere for information.  He has begun to frequent this street,
+and peers into our windows."
+
+"Peers into your windows?"
+
+The mother was already in bed and did not see his face.  But she
+understood that she had said too much, because the Little Russian
+hastened to interpose in order to conciliate Nikolay.
+
+"Let him peer!  He has leisure.  That's his way of killing time."
+
+"No hold on!" said Nikolay.  "THERE!  He is to blame!"
+
+"To blame for what?" the Little Russian asked brusquely.  "Because
+he's a fool?"
+
+But Vyesovshchikov did not stop to answer and walked away.
+
+The Little Russian began to pace up and down the room, slowly and
+languidly.  He had taken off his boots as he always did when the
+mother was in bed in order not to disturb her.  But she was not
+asleep, and when Nikolay had left she said anxiously:
+
+"I'm so afraid of that man.  He's just like an overheated oven.
+He does not warm things, but scorches them."
+
+"Yes, yes!" the Little Russian drawled.  "He's an irascible boy.
+I wouldn't talk to him about Isay, mother.  That fellow Isay is
+really spying and getting paid for it, too."
+
+"What's so strange in that?  His godfather is a gendarme," observed
+the mother.
+
+"Well, Nikolay will give him a dressing.  What of it?" the Little
+Russian continued uneasily.  "See what hard feelings the rulers of
+our life have produced in the rank and file?  When such people as
+Nikolay come to recognize their wrong and lose their patience, what
+will happen then?  The sky will be sprinkled with blood, and the
+earth will froth and foam with it like the suds of soap water."
+
+"It's terrible, Andriusha!" the mother exclaimed in a low voice.
+
+"They have swallowed flies, and have to vomit them now!" said Andrey
+after a pause.  "And after all, mother, every drop of their blood
+that may be shed will have been washed in seas of the people's tears."
+
+Suddenly he broke into a low laugh and added:
+
+"That's true; but it's no comfort!"
+
+Once on a holiday the mother, on returning home from a store, opened
+the door of the porch, and remained fixed to the spot, suddenly
+bathed in the sunshine of joy.  From the room she heard the sound
+of Pavel's voice.
+
+"There she is!" cried the Little Russian.
+
+The mother saw Pavel turn about quickly, and saw how his face
+lighted up with a feeling that held out the promise of something 
+great to her.
+
+"There you are--come home!" she mumbled, staggered by the unexpectedness
+of the event.  She sat down.
+
+He bent down to her with a pale face, little tears glistened
+brightly in the corners of his eyes, and his lips trembled.  For a
+moment he was silent.  The mother looked at him, and was silent also.
+
+The Little Russian, whistling softly, passed by them with bent head
+and walked out into the yard.
+
+"Thank you, mother," said Pavel in a deep, low voice, pressing her
+hand with his trembling fingers.  "Thank you, my dear, my own
+mother!"
+
+Rejoiced at the agitated expression of her son's face and the
+touching sound of his voice, she stroked his hair and tried to
+restrain the palpitation of her heart.  She murmured softly:
+
+"Christ be with you!  What have I done for you?  It isn't I who
+have made you what you are.  It's you yourself----"
+
+"Thank you for helping our great cause!" he said.  "When a man can
+call his mother his own in spirit also--that's rare fortune!"
+
+She said nothing, and greedily swallowed his words.  She admired
+her son as he stood before her so radiant and so near.
+
+"I was silent, mother dear.  I saw that many things in my life hurt
+you.  I was sorry for you, and yet I could not help it.  I was
+powerless!  I thought you could never get reconciled to us, that you
+could never adopt our ideas as yours, but that you would suffer in
+silence as you had suffered all your life long.  It was hard."
+
+"Andriusha made me understand many things!" she declared, in her
+desire to turn her son's attention to his comrade.
+
+"Yes, he told me about you," said Pavel, laughing.
+
+"And Yegor, too!  He is a countryman of mine, you know.  Andriusha
+wanted to teach me to read, also."
+
+"And you got offended, and began to study by yourself in secret."
+
+"Oh, so he found me out!" she exclaimed in embarrassment.  Then
+troubled by this abundance of joy which filled her heart she again
+suggested to Pavel:
+
+"Shan't we call him in?  He went out on purpose, so as not to
+disturb us.  He has no mother."
+
+"Andrey!" shouted Pavel, opening the door to the porch.  "Where are you?"
+
+"Here.  I want to chop some wood."
+
+"Never mind!  There's time enough!  Come here!"
+
+"All right!  I'm coming!"
+
+But he did not come at once; and on entering the kitchen he said
+in a housekeeper-like fashion:
+
+"We must tell Nikolay to bring us wood.  We have very little wood
+left.  You see, mother, how well Pavel looks?  Instead of punishing
+the rebels, the government only fattens them."
+
+The mother laughed.  Her heart was still leaping with joy.  She was
+fairly intoxicated with happiness.  But a certain, cautious, chary
+feeling already called forth in her the wish to see her son calm as
+he always was.  She wanted this first joy in her life to remain
+fixed in her heart forever as live and strong as at first.  In order
+to guard against the diminution of her happiness; she hastened to
+hide it, as a fowler secrets some rare bird that has happened to
+fall into his hands.
+
+"Let's have dinner!  Pasha, haven't you had anything to eat yet?"
+she asked with anxious haste.
+
+"No.  I learned yesterday from the warden that I was to be released,
+and I couldn't eat or drink anything to-day."
+
+"The first person I met here was Sizov," Pavel communicated to
+Andrey.  "He caught sight of me and crossed the street to greet me.
+I told him that he ought to be more careful now, as I was a
+dangerous man under the surveillance of the police.  But he said:
+'Never mind!' and you ought to have heard him inquire about his
+nephew!  'Did Fedor conduct himself properly in prison?'  I wanted
+to know what is meant by proper behavior in prison, and he declared:
+'Well, did he blab anything he shouldn't have against his comrades?'
+And when I told him that Fedya was an honest and wise young man, he
+stroked his beard and declared proudly:  'We, the Sizovs, have no
+trash in our family.'"
+
+"He's a brainy old man!" said the Little Russian, nodding his head.
+"We often have talks with him.  He's a fine peasant.  Will they
+let Fedya out soon?"
+
+"Yes, one of these days, I suppose.  They'll let out all, I think.
+They have no evidence except Isay's, and what can he say?"
+
+The mother walked up and down the room, and looked at her son.
+Andrey stood at the window with his hands clasped behind his back,
+listening to Pavel's narrative.  Pavel also paced up and down the
+room.  His beard had grown, and small ringlets of thin, dark hair
+curled in a dense growth around his cheeks, softening the swarthy
+color of his face.  His dark eyes had their stern expression.
+
+"Sit down!" said the mother, serving a hot dish.
+
+At dinner Andrey told Pavel about Rybin.  When he had concluded
+Pavel exclaimed regretfully:
+
+"If I had been home, I would not have let him go that way.  What
+did he take along with him?  A feeling of discontent and a muddle
+in his head!"
+
+"Well," said Andrey, laughing, "when a man's grown to the age of
+forty and has fought so long with the bears in his heart, it's hard
+to make him over."
+
+Pavel looked at him sternly and asked:
+
+"Do you think it's impossible for enlightenment to destroy all the
+rubbish that's been crammed into a man's brains?"
+
+"Don't fly up into the air at once, Pavel!  Your flight will knock
+you up against the belfry tower and break your wings," said the
+Little Russian in admonition.
+
+And they started one of those discussions in which words were used
+that were unintelligible to the mother.  The dinner was already at
+an end, but they still continued a vehement debate, flinging at each
+other veritable rattling hailstones of big words.  Sometimes their
+language was simpler:
+
+"We must keep straight on our path, turning neither to the right
+nor to the left!" Pavel asserted firmly.
+
+"And run headlong into millions of people who will regard us as
+their enemies!"
+
+"You can't avoid that!"
+
+"And what, my dear sir, becomes of your enlightenment?"
+
+The mother listened to the dispute, and understood that Pavel did
+not care for the peasants, but that the Little Russian stood up for
+them, and tried to show that the peasants, too, must be taught to
+comprehend the good.  She understood Andrey better, and he seemed to
+her to be in the right; but every time he spoke she waited with
+strained ears and bated breath for her son's answer to find out
+whether the Little Russian had offended Pavel.  But although they
+shouted at the top of their voices, they gave each other no offense.
+
+Occasionally the mother asked:
+
+"Is it so, Pavel?"
+
+And he answered with a smile:
+
+"Yes, it's so."
+
+"Say, my dear sir," the Little Russian said with a good-natured
+sneer, "you have eaten well, but you have chewed your food up badly,
+and a piece has remained sticking in your throat.  You had better
+gargle."
+
+"Don't go fooling now!" said Pavel.
+
+"I am as solemn as a funeral."
+
+The mother laughed quietly and shook her head.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV
+
+
+Spring was rapidly drawing near; the snow melted and laid bare the
+mud and the soot of the factory chimneys.  Mud, mud!  Wherever the
+villagers looked--mud!  Every day more mud!  The entire village
+seemed unwashed and dressed in rags and tatters.  During the day the
+water dripped monotonously from the roofs, and damp, weary exhalations
+emanated from the gray walls of the houses.  Toward night whitish
+icicles glistened everywhere in dim outline.  The sun appeared in
+the heavens more frequently, and the brooks began to murmur hesitatingly
+on their way to the marsh.  At noon the throbbing song of spring
+hopes hung tremblingly and caressingly over the village.
+
+They were preparing to celebrate the first of May.  Leaflets
+appeared in the factory explaining the significance of this holiday,
+and even the young men not affected by the propaganda said, as they
+read them:
+
+"Yes, we must arrange a holiday!"
+
+Vyesovshchikov exclaimed with a sullen grin:
+
+"It's time!  Time we stopped playing hide and seek!"
+
+Fedya Mazin was in high spirits.  He had grown very thin.  With his
+nervous, jerky gestures, and the trepidation in his speech, he was
+like a caged lark.  He was always with Yakob Somov, taciturn and
+serious beyond his years.
+
+Samoylov, who had grown still redder in prison, Vasily Gusev,
+curly-haired Dragunov, and a number of others argued that it was
+necessary to come out armed, but Pavel and the Little Russian, Somov,
+and others said it was not.
+
+Yegor always came tired, perspiring, short of breath, but always joking.
+
+"The work of changing the present order of things, comrades, is a
+great work, but in order to advance it more rapidly, I must buy
+myself a pair of boots!" he said, pointing to his wet, torn shoes.
+"My overshoes, too, are torn beyond the hope of redemption, and I
+get my feet wet every day.  I have no intention of migrating from
+the earth even to the nearest planet before we have publicly and
+openly renounced the old order of things; and I am therefore
+absolutely opposed to comrade Samoylov's motion for an armed
+demonstration.  I amend the motion to read that I be armed with a
+pair of strong boots, inasmuch as I am profoundly convinced that
+this will be of greater service for the ultimate triumph of
+socialism than even a grand exhibition of fisticuffs and black eyes!"
+
+In the same playfully pretentious language, he told the workingmen
+the story of how in various foreign countries the people strove to
+lighten the burden of their lives.  The mother loved to listen to
+his tales, and carried away a strange impression from them.  She
+conceived the shrewdest enemies of the people, those who deceived
+them most frequently and most cruelly, as little, big-bellied,
+red-faced creatures, unprincipled and greedy, cunning and heartless.
+When life was hard for them under the domination of the czars, they
+would incite the common people against the ruler; and when the
+people arose and wrested the power from him, these little creatures
+got it into their own hands by deceit, and drove the people off to
+their holes; and if the people remonstrated, they killed them by the
+hundreds and thousands.
+
+Once she summoned up courage and told him of the picture she had
+formed of life from his tales, and asked him:
+
+"Is it so, Yegor Ivanovich?"
+
+He burst into a guffaw, turned up his eyes, gasped for breath, and
+rubbed his chest.
+
+"Exactly, granny!  You caught the idea to a dot!  Yes, yes!  You've
+placed some ornaments on the canvas of history, you've added some
+flourishes, but that does not interfere with the correctness of the
+whole.  It's these very little, pot-bellied creatures who are the
+chief sinners and deceivers and the most poisonous insects that
+harass the human race.  The Frenchmen call them 'bourgeois.'
+Remember that word, dear granny--bourgeois!  Brr!  How they chew
+us and grind us and suck the life out of us!"
+
+"The rich, you mean?"
+
+"Yes, the rich.  And that's their misfortune.  You see, if you keep
+adding copper bit by bit to a child's food, you prevent the growth
+of its bones, and he'll be a dwarf; and if from his youth up you
+poison a man with gold, you deaden his soul."
+
+Once, speaking about Yegor, Pavel said:
+
+"Do you know, Andrey, the people whose hearts are always aching
+are the ones who joke most?"
+
+The Little Russian was silent a while, and then answered, blinking
+his eyes:
+
+"No, that's not true.  If it were, then the whole of Russia would
+split its sides with laughter."
+
+Natasha made her appearance again.  She, too, had been in prison,
+in another city, but she had not changed.  The mother noticed that
+in her presence the Little Russian grew more cheerful, was full of
+jokes, poked fun at everybody, and kept her laughing merrily.  But
+after she had left he would whistle his endless songs sadly, and
+pace up and down the room for a long time, wearily dragging his feet
+along the floor.
+
+Sashenka came running in frequently, always gloomy, always in haste,
+and for some reason more and more angular and stiff.  Once when
+Pavel accompanied her out onto the porch, the mother overheard their
+abrupt conversation.
+
+"Will you carry the banner?" the girl asked in a low voice.
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Is it settled?"
+
+"Yes, it's my right."
+
+"To prison again?"  Pavel was silent.  "Is it not possible for you--"
+She stopped.
+
+"What?"
+
+"To give it up to somebody else?"
+
+"No!" he said aloud.
+
+"Think of it!  You're a man of such influence; you are so much liked
+--you and Nakhodka are the two foremost revolutionary workers here.
+Think how much you could accomplish for the cause of freedom!  You
+know that for this they'll send you off far, far, and for a long time!"
+
+Nilovna thought she heard in the girl's voice the familiar sound of
+fear and anguish, and her words fell upon the mother's heart like
+heavy, icy drops of water.
+
+"No, I have made up my mind.  Nothing can make me give it up!"
+
+"Not even if I beg you--if I----"
+
+Pavel suddenly began to speak rapidly with a peculiar sternness.
+
+"You ought not to speak that way.  Why you?  You ought not!"
+
+"I am a human being!" she said in an undertone.
+
+"A good human being, too!" he said also in an undertone, and in a
+peculiar voice, as if unable to catch his breath.  "You are a dear
+human being to me, yes!  And that's why--why you mustn't talk that way!"
+
+"Good-by!" said the girl.
+
+The mother heard the sound of her departing footsteps, and knew that
+she was walking away very fast, nay, almost running.  Pavel followed
+her into the yard.
+
+A heavy oppressive fear fell like a load on the mother's breast.
+She did not understand what they had been talking about, but she
+felt that a new misfortune was in store for her, a great and sad
+misfortune.  And her thoughts halted at the question, "What does
+he want to do?"  Her thoughts halted, and were driven into her
+brain like a nail.  She stood in the kitchen by the oven, and
+looked through the window into the profound, starry heaven.
+
+Pavel walked in from the yard with Andrey, and the Little Russian
+said, shaking his head:
+
+"Oh, Isay, Isay!  What's to be done with him?"
+
+"We must advise him to give up his project," said Pavel glumly.
+
+"Then he'll hand over those who speak to him to the authorities,"
+said the Little Russian, flinging his hat away in a corner.
+
+"Pasha, what do you want to do?" asked the mother, drooping her head.
+
+"When?  Now?"
+
+"The first of May--the first of May."
+
+"Aha!" exclaimed Pavel, lowering his voice.  "You heard!  I am
+going to carry our banner.  I will march with it at the head of
+the procession.  I suppose they'll put me in prison for it again."
+
+The mother's eyes began to burn.  An unpleasant, dry feeling came
+into her mouth.  Pavel took her hand and stroked it.
+
+"I must do it!  Please understand me!  It is my happiness!"
+
+"I'm not saying anything," she answered, slowly raising her head;
+but when her eyes met the resolute gleam in his, she again lowered
+it.  He released her hand, and with a sigh said reproachfully:
+
+"You oughtn't to be grieved.  You ought to feel rejoiced.  When are
+we going to have mothers who will rejoice in sending their children
+even to death?"
+
+"Hopp!  Hopp!" mumbled the Little Russian.  "How you gallop away!"
+
+"Why; do I say anything to you?" the mother repeated.  "I don't
+interfere with you.  And if I'm sorry for you--well, that's a
+mother's way."
+
+Pavel drew away from her, and she heard his sharp, harsh words:
+
+"There is a love that interferes with a man's very life."
+
+She began to tremble, and fearing that he might deal another blow
+at her heart by saying something stern, she rejoined quickly:
+
+"Don't, Pasha!  Why should you?  I understand.  You can't act
+otherwise, you must do it for your comrades."
+
+"No!" he replied.  "I am doing it for myself.  For their sake I can
+go without carrying the banner, but I'm going to do it!"
+
+Andrey stationed himself in the doorway.  It was too low for him,
+and he had to bend his knees oddly.  He stood there as in a frame,
+one shoulder leaning against the jamb, his head and other shoulder
+thrust forward.
+
+"I wish you would stop palavering, my dear sir," he said with a
+frown, fixing his protuberant eyes on Pavel's face.  He looked
+like a lizard in the crevice of a stone wall.
+
+The mother was overcome with a desire to weep, but she did not
+want her son to see her tears, and suddenly mumbled:  "Oh, dear!--
+I forgot--" and walked out to the porch.  There, her head in a
+corner, she wept noiselessly; and her copious tears weakened her,
+as though blood oozed from her heart along with them.
+
+Through the door standing ajar the hollow sound of disputing voices
+reached her ear.
+
+"Well, do you admire yourself for having tortured her?"
+
+"You have no right to speak like that!" shouted Pavel.
+
+"A fine comrade I'd be to you if I kept quiet when I see you making
+a fool of yourself.  Why did you say all that to your mother?"
+
+"A man must always speak firmly and without equivocation.  He must
+be clear and definite when he says 'Yes.'  He must be clear and
+definite when he says 'No.'"
+
+"To her--to her must you speak that way?"
+
+"To everybody!  I want no love, I want no friendship which gets
+between my feet and holds me back."
+
+"Bravo!  You're a hero!  Go say all this to Sashenka.  You should
+have said that to her."
+
+"I have!"
+
+"You have!  The way you spoke to your mother?  You have not!  To her
+you spoke softly; you spoke gently and tenderly to her.  I did not
+hear you, but I know it!  But you trot out your heroism before your
+mother.  Of course!  Your heroism is not worth a cent."
+
+Vlasova began to wipe the tears from her face in haste.  For fear
+a serious quarrel should break out between the Little Russian and
+Pavel, she quickly opened the door and entered the kitchen, shivering,
+terrified, and distressed.
+
+"Ugh!  How cold!  And it's spring, too!"
+
+She aimlessly removed various things in the kitchen from one place
+to another, and in order to drown the subdued voices in the room,
+she continued in a louder voice:
+
+"Everything's changed.  People have grown hotter and the weather
+colder.  At this time of the year it used to get warm; the sky would
+clear, and the sun would be out."
+
+Silence ensued in the room.  The mother stood waiting in the middle
+of the floor.
+
+"Did you hear?" came the low sound of the Little Russian's voice.
+"You must understand it, the devil take it!  That's richer than yours."
+
+"Will you have some tea?" the mother called with a trembling voice,
+and without waiting for an answer she exclaimed, in order to excuse
+the tremor in her voice:
+
+"How cold I am!"
+
+Pavel came up slowly to her, looking at her from the corners of his
+eyes, a guilty smile quivering on his lips.
+
+"Forgive me, mother!" he said softly.  "I am still a boy, a fool."
+
+"You mustn't hurt me!" she cried in a sorrowful voice, pressing his
+head to her bosom.  "Say nothing!  God be with you.  Your life is
+your own!  But don't wound my heart.  How can a mother help sorrowing
+for her son?  Impossible!  I am sorry for all of you.  You are all
+dear to me as my own flesh and blood; you are all such good people!
+And who will be sorry for you if I am not?  You go and others follow
+you.  They have all left everything behind them, Pasha, and gone
+into this thing.  It's just like a sacred procession."
+
+A great ardent thought burned in her bosom, animating her heart with
+an exalted feeling of sad, tormenting joy; but she could find no
+words, and she waved her hands with the pang of muteness.  She
+looked into her son's face with eyes in which a bright, sharp pain
+had lit its fires.
+
+"Very well, mother!  Forgive me.  I see all now!" he muttered,
+lowering his head.  Glancing at her with a light smile, he added,
+embarrassed but happy:  "I will not forget this, mother, upon my word."
+
+She pushed him from her, and looking into the room she said to
+Andrey in a good-natured tone of entreaty:
+
+"Andriusha, please don't you shout at him so!  Of course, you are
+older than he, and so you----"
+
+The Little Russian was standing with his back toward her.  He sang
+out drolly without turning around to face her:
+
+"Oh, oh, oh!  I'll bawl at him, be sure!  And I'll beat him some day, too."
+
+She walked up slowly to him, with outstretched hand, and said:
+
+"My dear, dear man!"
+
+The Little Russian turned around, bent his head like an ox, and
+folding his hands behind his back walked past her into the kitchen.
+Thence his voice issued in a tone of mock sullenness:
+
+"You had better go away, Pavel, so I shan't bite your head off!
+I am only joking, mother; don't believe it!  I want to prepare
+the samovar.  What coals these are!  Wet, the devil take them!"
+
+He became silent, and when the mother walked into the kitchen he was
+sitting on the floor, blowing the coals in the samovar.  Without
+looking at her the Little Russian began again:
+
+"Yes, mother, don't be afraid.  I won't touch him.  You know, I'm a
+good-natured chap, soft as a stewed turnip.  And then--you hero out
+there, don't listen--I love him!  But I don't like the waistcoat he
+wears.  You see, he has put on a new waistcoat, and he likes it very
+much, so he goes strutting about, and pushes everybody, crying:
+'See, see what a waistcoat I have on!'  It's true, it's a fine
+waistcoat.  But what's the use of pushing people?  It's hot enough
+for us without it."
+
+Pavel smiled and asked:
+
+"How long do you mean to keep up your jabbering?  You gave me one
+thrashing with your tongue.  That's enough!"
+
+Sitting on the floor, the Little Russian spread his legs around the
+samovar, and regarded Pavel.  The mother stood at the door, and fixed
+a sad, affectionate gaze at Andrey's long, bent neck and the round
+back of his head.  He threw his body back, supporting himself with
+his hands on the floor, looked at the mother and at the son with his
+slightly reddened and blinking eyes, and said in a low, hearty voice:
+
+"You are good people, yes, you are!"
+
+Pavel bent down and grasped his hand.
+
+"Don't pull my hand," said the Little Russian gruffly.  "You'll let
+go and I'll fall.  Go away!"
+
+"Why are you so shy?" the mother said pensively.  "You'd better
+embrace and kiss.  Press hard, hard!"
+
+"Do you want to?" asked Pavel softly.
+
+"We--ell, why not?" answered the Little Russian, rising.
+
+Pavel dropped on his knees, and grasping each other firmly, they
+sank for a moment into each other's embrace--two bodies and one soul
+passionately and evenly burning with a profound feeling of friendship.
+
+Tears ran down the mother's face, but this time they were easy tears.
+Drying them she said in embarrassment:
+
+"A woman likes to cry.  She cries when she is in sorrow,; she cries
+when she is in joy!"
+
+The Little Russian pushed Pavel away, and with a light movement,
+also wiping his eyes with his fingers, he said:
+
+"Enough!  When the calves have had their frolic, they must go to
+the shambles.  What beastly coal this is!  I blew and blew on it,
+and got some of the dust in my eyes."
+
+Pavel sat at the window with bent head, and said mildly:
+
+"You needn't be ashamed of such tears."
+
+The mother walked up to him, and sat down beside him.  Her heart
+was wrapped in a soft, warm, daring feeling.  She felt sad, but
+pleasant and at ease.
+
+"It's all the same!" she thought, stroking her son's hand.  "It
+can't be helped; it must be so!"
+
+She recalled other such commonplace words, to which she had been
+accustomed for a long time; but they did not give adequate expression
+to all she had lived through that moment.
+
+"I'll put the dishes on the table; you stay where you are, mother,"
+said the Little Russian, rising from the floor, and going into the
+room.  "Rest a while.  Your heart has been worn out with such blows!"
+
+And from the room his singing voice, raised to a higher pitch, was heard.
+
+"It's not a nice thing to boast of, yet I must say we tasted the
+right life just now, real, human, loving life.  It does us good."
+
+"Yes," said Pavel, looking at the mother.
+
+"It's all different now," she returned.  "The sorrow is different,
+and the joy is different.  I do not know anything, of course!  I
+do not understand what it is I live by--and I can't express my
+feelings in words!"
+
+"This is the way it ought to be!" said the Little Russian, returning.
+"Because, mark you, mother dear, a new heart is coming into existence,
+a new heart is growing up in life.  All hearts are smitten in the
+conflict of interests, all are consumed with a blind greed, eaten up
+with envy, stricken, wounded, and dripping with filth, falsehood,
+and cowardice.  All people are sick; they are afraid to live; they
+wander about as in a mist.  Everyone feels only his own toothache.
+But lo, and behold!  Here is a Man coming and illuminating life with
+the light of reason, and he shouts:  'Oh, ho! you straying roaches!
+It's time, high time, for you to understand that all your interests
+are one, that everyone has the need to live, everyone has the desire
+to grow!'  The Man who shouts this is alone, and therefore he cries
+aloud; he needs comrades, he feels dreary in his loneliness, dreary
+and cold.  And at his call the stanch hearts unite into one great,
+strong heart, deep and sensitive as a silver bell not yet cast.
+And hark!  This bell rings forth the message:  'Men of all countries,
+unite into one family!  Love is the mother of life, not hate!'  My
+brothers!  I hear this message sounding through the world!"
+
+"And I do, too!" cried Pavel.
+
+The mother compressed her lips to keep them from trembling, and shut
+her eyes tight so as not to cry.
+
+"When I lie in bed at night or am out walking alone--everywhere I
+hear this sound, and my heart rejoices.  And the earth, too--I know
+it--weary of injustice and sorrow, rings out like a bell, responding
+to the call, and trembles benignly, greeting the new sun arising in
+the breast of Man."
+
+Pavel rose, lifted his hand, and was about to say something, but the
+mother took his other hand, and pulling him down whispered in his ear:
+
+"Don't disturb him!"
+
+"Do you know?" said the Little Russian, standing in the doorway,
+his eyes aglow with a bright flame, "there is still much suffering
+in store for the people, much of their blood will yet flow, squeezed
+out by the hands of greed; but all that--all my suffering, all my
+blood, is a small price for that which is already stirring in my
+breast, in my mind, in the marrow of my bones!  I am already rich,
+as a star is rich in golden rays.  And I will bear all, I will
+suffer all, because there is within me a joy which no one, which
+nothing can ever stifle!  In this joy there is a world of strength!"
+
+They drank tea and sat around the table until midnight, and
+conversed heart to heart and harmoniously about life, about people,
+and about the future.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI
+
+
+Whenever a thought was clear to the mother, she would find confirmation
+of the idea by drawing upon some of her rude, coarse experiences.
+She now felt as on that day when her father said to her roughly:
+
+"What are you making a wry face about?  A fool has been found who
+wants to marry you.  Marry him!  All girls must get husbands; all
+women must bear children, and all children become a burden to their
+parents!"
+
+After these words she saw before her an unavoidable path running for
+some inexplicable reason through a dark, dreary waste.  Thus it was
+at the present moment.  In anticipation of a new approaching misfortune,
+she uttered speechless words, addressing some imaginary person.
+
+This lightened her mute pain, which reverberated in her heart like
+a tight chord.
+
+The next day, early in the morning, very soon after Pavel and Andrey
+had left, Korsunova knocked at the door alarmingly, and called out hastily:
+
+"Isay is killed!  Come, quick!"
+
+The mother trembled; the name of the assassin flashed through her mind.
+
+"Who did it?" she asked curtly, throwing a shawl over her shoulders.
+
+"The man's not sitting out there mourning over Isay.  He knocked
+him down and fled!"
+
+On the street Marya said:
+
+"Now they'll begin to rummage about again and look for the murderer.
+It's a good thing your folks were at home last night.  I can bear
+witness to that.  I walked past here after midnight and glanced into
+the window, and saw all of you sitting around the table."
+
+"What are you talking about, Marya?  Why, who could dream of such
+a thing about them?" the other ejaculated in fright.
+
+"Well, who killed him?  Some one from among your people, of course!"
+said Korsunova, regarding the idea as a matter to be taken for
+granted.  "Everybody knows he spied on them."
+
+The mother stopped to fetch breath, and put her hand to her bosom.
+
+"What are you going on that way for?  Don't be afraid!  Whoever it
+is will reap the harvest of his own rashness.  Let's go quick, or
+else they'll take him away!"
+
+The mother walked on without asking herself why she went, and shaken
+by the thought of Vyesovshchikov.
+
+"There--he's done it!"  Her mind was held fast by the one idea.
+
+Not far from the factory walls, on the grounds of a building
+recently burned down, a crowd was gathered, tramping down the coal
+and stirring up ash dust.  It hummed and buzzed like a swarm of
+bees.  There were many women in the crowd, even more children, and
+storekeepers, tavern waiters, policemen, and the gendarme Petlin, a
+tall old man with a woolly, silvery beard, and decorations on his breast.
+
+Isay half reclined on the ground, his back resting against a
+burned joist, his bare head hanging over his right shoulder, his
+right hand in his trousers' pocket, and the fingers of his left
+hand clutching the soil.
+
+The mother looked at Isay's face.  One eye, wide open, had its dim
+glance fixed upon his hat lying between his lazily outstretched legs.
+His mouth was half open in astonishment, his little shriveled body,
+with its pointed head and bony face, seemed to be resting.  The
+mother crossed herself and heaved a sigh.  He had been repulsive
+to her when alive, but now she felt a mild pity for him.
+
+"No blood!" some one remarked in an undertone.  "He was evidently
+knocked down with a fist blow."
+
+A stout woman, tugging at the gendarme's hand, asked:
+
+"Maybe he is still alive?"
+
+"Go away!" the gendarme shouted not very loudly, withdrawing his hand.
+
+"The doctor was here and said it was all over," somebody said to
+the woman.
+
+A sarcastic, malicious voice cried aloud:
+
+"They've choked up a denouncer's mouth.  Serves him right!"
+
+The gendarme pushed aside the women, who were crowded close about
+him, and asked in a threatening tone:
+
+"Who was that?  Who made that remark?"
+
+The people scattered before him as he thrust them aside.  A number
+took quickly to their heels, and some one in the crowd broke into
+a mocking laugh.
+
+The mother went home.
+
+"No one is sorry," she thought.  The broad figure of Nikolay stood
+before her like a shadow, his narrow eyes had a cold, cruel look,
+and he wrung his right hand as if it had been hurt.
+
+When Pavel and Andrey came to dinner, her first question was:
+
+"Well?  Did they arrest anybody for Isay's murder?"
+
+"We haven't heard anything about it," answered the Little Russian.
+
+She saw that they were both downhearted and sullen.  "Nothing is
+said about Nikolay?" the mother questioned again in a low voice.
+
+Pavel fixed his stern eyes on the mother, and said distinctly:
+
+"No, there is no talk of him.  He is not even thought of in connection
+with this affair.  He is away.  He went off on the river yesterday,
+and hasn't returned yet.  I inquired for him."
+
+"Thank God!" said the mother with a sigh of relief.  "Thank God!"
+
+The Little Russian looked at her, and drooped his head.
+
+"He lies there," the mother recounted pensively.  "and looks as
+though he were surprised; that's the way his face looks.  And no one
+pities him; no one bestows a good word on him.  He is such a tiny
+bit of a fellow, such a wretched-looking thing, like a bit of broken
+china.  It seems as if he had slipped on something and fallen, and
+there he lies!"
+
+At dinner Pavel suddenly dropped his spoon and exclaimed:
+
+"That's what I don't understand!"
+
+"What?" asked the Little Russian, who had been sitting at the table
+dismal and silent.
+
+"To kill anything living because one wants to eat, that's ugly
+enough.  To kill a beast--a beast of prey--that I can understand.
+I think I myself could kill a man who had turned into a beast preying
+upon mankind.  But to kill such a disgusting, pitiful creature--I
+don't understand how anyone could lift his hand for an act like that!"
+
+The Little Russian raised his shoulders and dropped them again;
+then said:
+
+"He was no less noxious than a beast."
+
+"I know."
+
+"We kill a mosquito for sucking just a tiny bit of our blood," the
+Little Russian added in a low voice.
+
+"Well, yes, I am not saying anything about that.  I only mean  to
+say it's so disgusting."
+
+"What can you do?" returned Andrey with another shrug of his shoulders.
+
+After a long pause Pavel asked:
+
+"Could you kill a fellow like that?"
+
+The Little Russian regarded him with his round eyes, threw a glance
+at the mother, and said sadly, but firmly:
+
+"For myself, I wouldn't touch a living thing.  But for comrades,
+for the cause, I am capable of everything.  I'd even kill.  I'd
+kill my own son."
+
+"Oh, Andriusha!" the mother exclaimed under her breath.
+
+He smiled and said:
+
+"It can't be helped!  Such is our life!"
+
+"Ye-es," Pavel drawled.  "Such is our life."
+
+With sudden excitation, as if obeying some impulse from within,
+Andrey arose, waved his hands, and said:
+
+"How can a man help it?  It so happens that we sometimes must abhor
+a certain person in order to hasten the time when it will be possible
+only to take delight in one another.  You must destroy those who
+hinder the progress of life, who sell human beings for money in order
+to buy quiet or esteem for themselves.  If a Judas stands in the way
+of honest people, lying in wait to betray them, I should be a Judas
+myself if I did not destroy him.  It's sinful, you say?  And do they,
+these masters of life, do they have the right to keep soldiers and
+executioners, public houses and prisons, places of penal servitude,
+and all that vile abomination by which they hold themselves in quiet
+security and in comfort?  If it happens sometimes that I am compelled
+to take their stick into my own hands, what am I to do then?  Why,
+I am going to take it, of course.  I will not decline.  They kill
+us out by the tens and hundreds.  That gives me the right to raise
+my hand and level it against one of the enemy, against that one of
+their number who comes closest to me, and makes himself more directly
+noxious to the work of my life than the others.  This is logic; but
+I go against logic for once.  I do not need your logic now.  I know
+that their blood can bring no results, I know that their blood is
+barren, fruitless!  Truth grows well only on the soil irrigated with
+the copious rain of our own blood, and their putrid blood goes to
+waste, without a trace left.  I know it!  But I take the sin upon
+myself.  I'll kill, if I see a need for it!  I speak only for myself,
+mind you.  My crime dies with me.  It will not remain a blot upon
+the future.  It will sully no one but myself--no one but myself."
+
+He walked to and fro in the room, waving his hands in front of him,
+as if he were cutting something in the air out of his way.  The
+mother looked at him with an expression of melancholy and alarm.
+She felt as though something had hit him; and that he was pained.
+The dangerous thoughts about murder left her.  If Vyesovshchikov
+had not killed Isay, none of Pavel's comrades could have done the
+deed.  Pavel listened to the Little Russian with drooping head, and
+Andrey stubbornly continued in a forceful tone:
+
+"In your forward march it sometimes chances that you must go against
+your very own self.  You must be able to give up everything--your
+heart and all.  To give your life, to die for the cause--that's
+simple.  Give more!  Give that which is dearer to you than your
+life!  Then you will see that grow with a vigorous growth which
+is dearest to you--your truth!"
+
+He stopped in the middle of the room, his face grown pale and his
+eyes half closed.  Raising his hand and shaking it, he began slowly
+in a solemn tone of assurance with faith and with strength:
+
+"There will come a time, I know, when people will take delight in
+one another, when each will be like a star to the other, and when
+each will listen to his fellow as to music.  The free men will walk
+upon the earth, men great in their freedom.  They will walk with
+open hearts, and the heart of each will be pure of envy and greed,
+and therefore all mankind will be without malice, and there will be
+nothing to divorce the heart from reason.  Then life will be one
+great service to man!  His figure will be raised to lofty heights--
+for to free men all heights are attainable.  Then we shall live in
+truth and freedom and in beauty, and those will be accounted the
+best who will the more widely embrace the world with their hearts,
+and whose love of it will be the profoundest; those will be the best
+who will be the freest; for in them is the greatest beauty.  Then
+will life be great, and the people will be great who live that life."
+
+He ceased and straightened himself.  Then swinging to and fro like
+the tongue of a bell, he added in a resonant voice that seemed to
+issue from the depths of his breast:
+
+"So for the sake of this life I am prepared for everything!  I will
+tear my heart out, if necessary, and will trample it with my own feet!"
+
+His face quivered and stiffened with excitement, and great, heavy
+tears rolled down one after the other.
+
+Pavel raised his head and looked at him with a pale face and
+wide-open eyes.  The mother raised herself a little over the table
+with a feeling that something great was growing and impending.
+
+"What is the matter with you, Andrey?" Pavel asked softly.
+
+The Little Russian shook his head, stretched himself like a violin
+string, and said, looking at the mother:
+
+"I struck Isay."
+
+She rose, and quickly walked up to him, all in a tremble, and seized
+his hands.  He tried to free his right hand, but she held it firmly
+in her grasp and whispered hotly:
+
+"My dear, my own, hush!  It's nothing--it's nothing--nothing, Pasha!
+Andriushenka--oh, what a calamity!  You sufferer!  My darling heart!"
+
+"Wait, mother," the Little Russian muttered hoarsely.  "I'll tell
+you how it happened."
+
+"Don't!" she whispered, looking at him with tears in her eyes.
+"Don't, Andriusha!  It isn't our business.  It's God's affair!"
+
+Pavel came up to him slowly, looking at his comrade with moist eyes.
+He was pale, and his lips trembled.  With a strange smile he said
+softly and slowly:
+
+"Come, give me your hand, Andrey.  I want to shake hands with you.
+Upon my word, I understand how hard it is for you!"
+
+"Wait!" said the Little Russian without looking at them, shaking
+his head, and tearing himself away from their grasp.  When he
+succeeded in freeing his right hand from the mother's, Pavel caught
+it, pressing it vigorously and wringing it.
+
+"And you mean to tell me you killed that man?" said the mother.
+"No, YOU didn't do it!  If I saw it with my own eyes I wouldn't
+believe it."
+
+"Stop, Andrey!  Mother is right.  This thing is beyond our judgment."
+
+With one hand pressing Andrey's, Pavel laid the other on his
+shoulder, as if wishing to stop the tremor in his tall body.
+The Little Russian bent his head down toward him, and said in
+a broken, mournful voice:
+
+"I didn't want to do it, you know, Pavel.  It happened when you
+walked ahead, and I remained behind with Ivan Gusev.  Isay came
+from around a corner and stopped to look at us, and smiled at us.
+Ivan walked off home, and I went on toward the factory--Isay at
+my side!"  Andrey stopped, heaved a deep sigh, and continued:
+"No one ever insulted me in such an ugly way as that dog!"
+
+The mother pulled the Little Russian by the hand toward the table,
+gave him a shove, and finally succeeded in seating him on a chair.
+She sat down at his side close to him, shoulder to shoulder.  Pavel
+stood in front of them, holding Andrey's hand in his and pressing it.
+
+"I understand how hard it is for you," he said.
+
+"He told me that they know us all, that we are all on the gendarme's
+record, and that we are going to be dragged in before the first of
+May.  I didn't answer, I laughed, but my blood boiled.  He began to
+tell me that I was a clever fellow, and that I oughtn't to go on the
+way I was going, but that I should rather----"
+
+The Little Russian stopped, wiped his face with his right hand,
+shook his head, and a dry gleam flashed in his eyes.
+
+"I understand!" said Pavel.
+
+"Yes," he said, "I should rather enter the service of the law."
+The Little Russian waved his hand, and swung his clenched fist.
+"The law!--curse his soul!" he hissed between his teeth.  "It would
+have been better if he had struck me in the face.  It would have
+been easier for me, and better for him, perhaps, too!  But when he
+spit his dirty thought into my heart that way, I could not bear it."
+
+Andrey pulled his hand convulsively from Pavel's, and said more
+hoarsely with disgust in his face:
+
+"I dealt him a back-hand blow like that, downward and aslant, and
+walked away.  I didn't even stop to look at him; I heard him fall.
+He dropped and was silent.  I didn't dream of anything serious.  I
+walked on peacefully, just as if I had done no more than kick a frog
+with my foot.  And then--what's all this?  I started to work, and I
+heard them shouting:  'Isay is killed!'  I didn't even believe it,
+but my hand grew numb--and I felt awkward in working with it.  It
+didn't hurt me, but it seemed to have grown shorter."
+
+He looked at his hand obliquely and said:
+
+"All my life, I suppose, I won't be able to wash off that dirty
+stain from it."
+
+"If only your heart is pure, my dear boy!" the mother said softly,
+bursting into tears.
+
+"I don't regard myself as guilty; no, I don't!" said the Little
+Russian firmly.  "But it's disgust.  It disgusts me to carry such
+dirt inside of me.  I had no need of it.  It wasn't called for."
+
+"What do you think of doing?" asked Pavel, giving him a suspicious look.
+
+"What am I going to do?" the Little Russian repeated thoughtfully,
+drooping his head.  Then raising it again he said with a smile:
+"I am not afraid, of course, to say that it was I who struck him.
+But I am ashamed to say it.  I am ashamed to go to prison, and even
+to hard labor, maybe, for such a--nothing.  If some one else is
+accused, then I'll go and confess.  But otherwise, go all of my own
+accord--I cannot!"
+
+He waved his hands, rose, and repeated:
+
+"I cannot!  I am ashamed!"
+
+The whistle blew.  The Little Russian, bending his head to one side,
+listened to the powerful roar, and shaking himself, said:
+
+"I am not going to work."
+
+"Nor I," said Pavel.
+
+"I'll go to the bath house," said the Little Russian, smiling.  He
+got ready in silence and walked off, sullen and low-spirited.
+
+The mother followed him with a compassionate look.
+
+"Say what you please, Pasha, I cannot believe him!  And even if I
+did believe him, I wouldn't lay any blame on him.  No, I would not.
+I know it's sinful to kill a man; I believe in God and in the Lord
+Jesus Christ, but still I don't think Andrey guilty.  I'm sorry for
+Isay.  He's such a tiny bit of a manikin.  He lies there in astonishment.
+When I looked at him I remembered how he threatened to have you
+hanged.  And yet I neither felt hatred toward him nor joy because
+he was dead.  I simply felt sorry.  But now that I know by whose
+hand he fell I am not even sorry for him."
+
+She suddenly became silent, reflected a while, and with a smile of
+surprise, exclaimed:
+
+"Lord Jesus Christ!  Do you hear what I am saying, Pasha?"
+
+Pavel apparently had not heard her.  Slowly pacing up and down the
+room with drooping head, he said pensively and with exasperation:
+
+"Andrey won't forgive himself soon, if he'll forgive himself at all!
+There is life for you, mother.  You see the position in which people
+are placed toward one another.  You don't want to, but you must
+strike!  And strike whom?  Such a helpless being.  He is more
+wretched even than you because he is stupid.  The police, the
+gendarmes, the soldiers, the spies--they are all our enemies, and
+yet they are all such people as we are.  Their blood is sucked out
+of them just as ours is, and they are no more regarded as human
+beings than we are.  That's the way it is.  But they have set one
+part of the people against the other, blinded them with fear, bound
+them all hand and foot, squeezed them, and drained their blood, and
+used some as clubs against the others.  They've turned men into
+weapons, into sticks and stones, and called it civilization, government."
+
+He walked up to his mother and said to her firmly:
+
+"That's crime, mother!  The heinous crime of killing millions of
+people, the murder of millions of souls!  You understand--they kill
+the soul!  You see the difference between them and us.  He killed a
+man unwittingly.  He feels disgusted, ashamed, sick--the main thing
+is he feels disgusted!  But they kill off thousands calmly, without
+a qualm, without pity, without a shudder of the heart.  They kill
+with pleasure and with delight.  And why?  They stifle everybody and
+everything to death merely to keep the timber of their houses
+secure, their furniture, their silver, their gold, their worthless
+papers--all that cheap trash which gives them control over the
+people.  Think, it's not for their own selves, for their persons,
+that they protect themselves thus, using murder and the mutilation
+of souls as a means--it's not for themselves they do it, but for the
+sake of their possessions.  They do not guard themselves from
+within, but from without."
+
+He bent over to her, took her hands, and shaking them said:
+
+"If you felt the abomination of it all, the disgrace and rottenness,
+you would understand our truth; you would then perceive how great it
+is, how glorious!"
+
+The mother arose agitated, full of a desire to sink her heart into
+the heart of her son, and to join them in one burning, flaming torch.
+
+"Wait, Pasha, wait!" she muttered, panting for breath.  "I am a
+human being.  I feel.  Wait."
+
+There was a loud noise of some one entering the porch.  Both of them
+started and looked at each other.
+
+"If it's the police coming for Andrey--" Pavel whispered.
+
+"I know nothing--nothing!" the mother whispered back.  "Oh, God!"
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII
+
+
+The door opened slowly, and bending to pass through, Rybin strode in
+heavily.
+
+"Here I am!" he said, raising his head and smiling.
+
+He wore a short fur overcoat, all stained with tar, a pair of
+dark mittens stuck from his belt, and his head was covered with
+a shaggy fur cap.
+
+"Are you well?  Have they let you out of prison, Pavel?  So, how
+are you, Nilovna?"
+
+"Why, you?  How glad I am to see you!"
+
+Slowly removing his overclothes, Rybin said:
+
+"Yes, I've turned muzhik again.  You're gradually turning gentlemen,
+and I am turning the other way.  That's it!"
+
+Pulling his ticking shirt straight, he passed through the room,
+examined it attentively, and remarked:
+
+"You can see your property has not increased, but you've grown
+richer in books.  So!  That's the dearest possession, books are,
+it's true.  Well, tell me how things are going with you."
+
+"Things are going forward," said Pavel.
+
+"Yes," said Rybin.
+
+     "We plow and we sow,
+      All high and low,
+      Boasting is cheap,
+      But the harvest we reap,
+      A feast we'll make,
+      And a rest we'll take."
+
+"Will you have some tea?" asked the mother.
+
+"Yes, I'll have some tea, and I'll take a sip of vodka, too; and
+if you'll give me something to eat, I won't decline it, either.
+I am glad to see you--that's what!"
+
+"How's the world wagging with you, Mikhail Ivanych?" Pavel inquired,
+taking a seat opposite Rybin.
+
+"So, so.  Fairly well.  I settled at Edilgeyev.  Have you ever heard
+of Edilgeyev?  It's a fine village.  There are two fairs a year
+there; over two thousand inhabitants.  The people are an evil pack.
+There's no land.  It's leased out in lots.  Poor soil!"
+
+"Do you talk to them?" asked Pavel, becoming animated.
+
+"I don't keep mum.  You know I have all your leaflets with me.  I
+grabbed them away from here--thirty-four of them.  But I carry on
+my propaganda chiefly with the Bible.  You can get something out of
+it.  It's a thick book.  It's a government book.  It's published by
+the Holy Synod.  It's easy to believe!"  He gave Pavel a wink, and
+continued with a laugh:  "But that's not enough!  I have come here
+to you to get books.  Yefim is here, too.  We are transporting tar;
+and so we turned aside to stop at your house.  You stock me up with
+books before Yefim comes.  He doesn't have to know too much!"
+
+"Mother," said Pavel, "go get some books!  They'll know what to
+give you.  Tell them it's for the country."
+
+"All right.  The samovar will be ready in a moment, and then I'll go."
+
+"You have gone into this movement, too, Nilovna?" asked Rybin with
+a smile.  "Very well.  We have lots of eager candidates for books.
+There's a teacher there who creates a desire for them.  He's a fine
+fellow, they say, although he belongs to the clergy.  We have a
+woman teacher, too, about seven versts from the village.  But they
+don't work with illegal books; they're a 'law and order' crowd out
+there; they're afraid.  But I want forbidden books--sharp, pointed
+books.  I'll slip them through their fingers.  When the police
+commissioners or the priest see that they are illegal books, they'll
+think it's the teachers who circulate them.  And in the meantime
+I'll remain in the background."
+
+Well content with his hard, practical sense, he grinned merrily.
+
+"Hm!" thought the mother.  "He looks like a bear and behaves like a fox."
+
+Pavel rose, and pacing up and down the room with even steps, said
+reproachfully:
+
+"We'll let you have the books, but what you want to do is not right,
+Mikhail Ivanovich."
+
+"Why is it not right?" asked Rybin, opening his eyes in astonishment.
+
+"You yourself ought to answer for what you do.  It is not right to
+manage matters so that others should suffer for what you do."  Pavel
+spoke sternly.
+
+Rybin looked at the floor, shook his head, and said:
+
+"I don't understand you."
+
+"If the teachers are suspected," said Pavel, stationing himself in
+front of Rybin, "of distributing illegal books, don't you think
+they'll be put in jail for it?"
+
+"Yes.  Well, what if they are?"
+
+"But it's you who distribute the books, not they.  Then it's you
+that ought to go to prison."
+
+"What a strange fellow you are!" said Rybin with a smile, striking
+his hand on his knee.  "Who would suspect me, a muzhik, of occupying
+myself with such matters?  Why, does such a thing happen?  Books are
+affairs of the masters, and it's for them to answer for them."
+
+The mother felt that Pavel did not understand Rybin, and she saw
+that he was screwing up his eyes--a sign of anger.  So she interjected
+in a cautious, soft voice:
+
+"Mikhail Ivanovich wants to fix it so that he should be able to go
+on with his work, and that others should take the punishment for it."
+
+"That's it!" said Rybin, stroking his beard.
+
+"Mother," Pavel asked dryly, "suppose some of our people, Andrey,
+for example, did something behind my back, and I were put in prison
+for it, what would you say to that?"
+
+The mother started, looked at her son in perplexity, and said,
+shaking her head in negation:
+
+"Why, is it possible to act that way toward a comrade?"
+
+"Aha!  Yes!" Rybin drawled.  "I understand you, Pavel."  And with
+a comical wink toward the mother, he added:  "This is a delicate
+matter, mother."  And again turning to Pavel he held forth in a
+didactic manner:  "Your ideas on this subject are very green,
+brother.  In secret work there is no honor.  Think!  In the first
+place, they'll put those persons in prison on whom they find the
+books, and not the teachers.  That's number one!  Secondly, even
+though the teachers give the people only legal books to read, you
+know that they contain prohibited things just the same as in the
+forbidden books; only they are put in a different language.  The
+truths are fewer.  That's number two.  I mean to say, they want the
+same thing that I do; only they proceed by side paths, while I
+travel on the broad highway.  And thirdly, brother, what business
+have I with them?  How can a traveler on foot strike up friendship
+with a man on horseback?  Toward a muzhik, maybe, I wouldn't want
+to act that way.  But these people, one a clergyman, the other the
+daughter of a land proprietor, why they want to uplift the people, I
+cannot understand.  Their ideas, the ideas of the masters, are
+unintelligible to me, a muzhik.  What I do myself, I know, but what
+they are after I cannot tell.  For thousands of years they have
+punctiliously and consistently pursued the business of being masters,
+and have fleeced and flayed the skins of the muzhiks; and all of
+a sudden they wake up and want to open the muzhik's eyes.  I am not
+a man for fairy tales, brother, and that's in the nature of a fairy
+tale.  That's why I can't get interested in them.  The ways of
+the masters are strange to me.  You travel in winter, and you see
+some living creature in front of you.  But what it is--a wolf, a
+fox, or just a plain dog--you don't know."
+
+The mother glanced at her son.  His face wore a gloomy expression.
+
+Rybin's eyes sparkled with a dark gleam.  He looked at Pavel,
+combing down his beard with his fingers.  His air was at once
+complacent and excited.
+
+"I have no time to flirt," he said.  "Life is a stern matter.  We
+live in dog houses, not in sheep pens, and every pack barks after
+its own fashion."
+
+"There are some masters," said the mother, recalling certain
+familiar faces, "who die for the people, and let themselves be
+tortured all their lives in prison."
+
+"Their calculations are different, and their deserts are different,"
+said Rybin.  "The muzhik grown rich turns into a gentleman, and the
+gentleman grown poor goes to the muzhik.  Willy-nilly, he must have
+a pure soul, if his purse is empty.  Do you remember, Pavel, you
+explained to me that as a man lives, so he also thinks, and that
+if the workingman says 'Yes,' the master must say 'No,' and if the
+workingman says 'No,' the master, because of the nature of the
+beast, is bound to cry 'Yes.'  So you see, their natures are
+different one from the other.  The muzhik has his nature, and the
+gentleman has his.  When the peasant has a full stomach, the
+gentleman passes sleepless nights.  Of course, every fold has its
+black sheep, and I have no desire to defend the peasants wholesale."
+
+Rybin rose to his feet somber and powerful.  His face darkened, his
+beard quivered as if he ground his teeth inaudibly, and he continued
+in a lowered voice:
+
+"For five years I beat about from factory to factory, and got
+unaccustomed to the village.  Then I went to the village again,
+looked around, and I found I could not live like that any more!
+You understand?  I CAN'T.  You live here, you don't know hunger,
+you don't see such outrages.  There hunger stalks after a man all
+his life like a shadow, and he has no hope for bread--no hope!
+Hunger destroys the soul of the people; the very image of man is
+effaced from their countenances.  They do not live, they rot in
+dire unavoidable want.  And around them the government authorities
+watch like ravens to see if a crumb is not left over.  And if they
+do find a crumb, they snatch that away, too, and give you a punch
+in the face besides."
+
+Rybin looked around, bent down to Pavel, his hand resting on the table:
+
+"I even got sick and faint when I saw that life again.  I looked
+around me--but I couldn't!  However, I conquered my repulsion.
+'Fiddlesticks!' I said.  'I won't let my feelings get the better of
+me.  I'll stay here.  I won't get your bread for you; but I'll cook
+you a pretty mess, I will.'  I carry within me the wrongs of my
+people and hatred of the oppressor.  I feel these wrongs like a
+knife constantly cutting at my heart."
+
+Perspiration broke out on his forehead; he shrugged his shoulders and
+slowly bent toward Pavel, laying a tremulous hand on his shoulder:
+
+"Give me your help!  Let me have books--such books that when a man
+has read them he will not be able to rest.  Put a prickly hedgehog
+to his brains.  Tell those city folks who write for you to write for
+the villagers also.  Let them write such hot truth that it will
+scald the village, that the people will even rush to their death."
+
+He raised his hand, and laying emphasis on each word, he said hoarsely:
+
+"Let death make amends for death.  That is, die so that the people
+should arise to life again.  And let thousands die in order that
+hosts of people all over the earth may arise to life again.  That's
+it!  It's easy to die--but let the people rise to life again!
+That's a different thing!  Let them rise up in rebellion!"
+
+The mother brought in the samovar, looking askance at Rybin.  His
+strong, heavy words oppressed her.  Something in him reminded her
+of her husband.  He, too, showed his teeth, waved his hands, and
+rolled up his sleeves; in him, too, there was that impatient wrath,
+impatient but dumb.  Rybin was not dumb; he was not silent; he
+spoke, and therefore was less terrible.
+
+"That's necessary," said Pavel, nodding his head.  "We need a
+newspaper for the villages, too.  Give us material, and we'll
+print you a newspaper."
+
+The mother looked at her son with a smile, and shook her head.
+She had quietly put on her wraps and now went out of the house.
+
+"Yes, do it.  We'll give you everything.  Write as simply as
+possible, so that even calves could understand," Rybin cried.  Then,
+suddenly stepping back from Pavel, he said, as he shook his head:
+
+"Ah, me, if I were a Jew!  The Jew, my dear boy, is the most
+believing man in the world!  Isaiah, the prophet, or Job, the
+patient, believed more strongly than Christ's apostles.  They could
+say words to make a man's hair stand on end.  But the apostles, you
+see, Pavel, couldn't.  The prophets believed not in the church, but
+in themselves; they had their God in themselves.  The apostles--they
+built churches; and the church is law.  Man must believe in himself,
+not in law.  Man carries the truth of God in his soul; he is not a
+police captain on earth, nor a slave!  All the laws are in myself."
+
+The kitchen door opened, and somebody walked in.
+
+"It's Yefim," said Rybin, looking into the kitchen.  "Come here,
+Yefim.  As for you, Pavel, think!  Think a whole lot.  There is a
+great deal to think about.  This is Yefim.  And this man's name is
+Pavel.  I told you about him."
+
+A light-haired, broad-faced young fellow in a short fur overcoat,
+well built and evidently strong, stood before Pavel, holding his cap
+in both hands and looking at him from the corners of his gray eyes.
+
+"How do you do?" he said hoarsely, as he shook hands with Pavel,
+and stroked his curly hair with both hands.  He looked around the
+room, immediately spied the bookshelf, and walked over to it slowly.
+
+"Went straight to them!" Rybin said, winking to Pavel.
+
+Yefim started to examine the books, and said:
+
+"A whole lot of reading here!  But I suppose you haven't much time
+for it.  Down in the village they have more time for reading."
+
+"But less desire?" Pavel asked.
+
+"Why?  They have the desire, too," answered the fellow, rubbing his
+chin.  "The times are so now that if you don't think, you might as
+well lie down and die.  But the people don't want to die; and so
+they've begun to make their brains work.  'Geology'--what's that?"
+
+Pavel explained.
+
+"We don't need it!" Yefim said, replacing the book on the shelf.
+
+Rybin sighed noisily, and said:
+
+"The peasant is not so much interested to know where the land came
+from as where it's gone to, how it's been snatched from underneath
+his feet by the gentry.  It doesn't matter to him whether it's fixed
+or whether it revolves--that's of no importance--you can hang it on
+a rope, if you want to, provided it feeds him; you can nail it to
+the skies, provided it gives him enough to eat."
+
+"'The History of Slavery,'" Yefim read out again, and asked Pavel:
+"Is it about us?"
+
+"Here's an account of Russian serfdom, too," said Pavel, giving him
+another book.  Yefim took it, turned it in his hands, and putting
+it aside, said calmly:
+
+"That's out of date."
+
+"Have you an apportionment of land for yourself?" inquired Pavel.
+
+"We?  Yes, we have.  We are three brothers, and our portion is about
+ten acres and a half--all sand--good for polishing brass, but poor
+for making bread."  After a pause he continued:  "I've freed myself
+from the soil.  What's the use?  It does not feed; it ties one's
+hands.  This is the fourth year that I'm working as a hired man.
+I've got to become a soldier this fall.  Uncle Mikhail says:  'Don't
+go.  Now,' he says, 'the soldiers are being sent to beat the people.'
+However, I think I'll go.  The army existed at the time of Stepan
+Timofeyevich Razin and Pugachev.  The time has come to make an end
+of it.  Don't you think so?" he asked, looking firmly at Pavel.
+
+"Yes, the tine has come."  The answer was accompanied by a smile.  "But
+it's hard.  You must know what to say to soldiers, and how to say it."
+
+"We'll learn; we'll know how," Yefim said.
+
+"And if the superiors catch you at it, they may shoot you down,"
+Pavel concluded, looking curiously at Yefim.
+
+"They will show no mercy," the peasant assented calmly, and resumed
+his examination of the books.
+
+"Drink your tea, Yefim; we've got to leave soon," said Rybin.
+
+"Directly."  And Yefim asked again:  "Revolution is an uprising,
+isn't it?"
+
+Andrey came, red, perspiring, and dejected.  He shook Yefim's hand
+without saying anything, sat down by Rybin's side, and smiled as he
+looked at him.
+
+"What's the trouble?  Why so blue?" Rybin asked, tapping his knee.
+
+"Nothing."
+
+"Are you a workingman, too?" asked Yefim, nodding his head toward
+the Little Russian.
+
+"Yes," Andrey answered.  "Why?"
+
+"This is the first time he's seen factory workmen," explained Rybin.
+"He says they're different from others."
+
+"How so?" Pavel asked.
+
+Yefim looked carefully at Andrey and said:
+
+"You have sharp bones; peasants' bones are rounder."
+
+"The peasant stands more firmly on his feet," Rybin supplemented.
+"He feels the ground under him although he does not possess it.
+Yet he feels the earth.  But the factory workingman is something
+like a bird.  He has no home.  To-day he's here, to-morrow there.
+Even his wife can't attach him to the same spot.  At the least
+provocation--farewell, my dear! and off he goes to look for something
+better.  But the peasant wants to improve himself just where he is
+without moving off the spot.  There's your mother!"  And Rybin went
+out into the kitchen.
+
+Yefim approached Pavel, and with embarrassment asked:
+
+"Perhaps you will give me a book?"
+
+"Certainly."
+
+The peasant's eyes flashed, and he said rapidly:
+
+"I'll return it.  Some of our folks bring tar not far from here.
+They will return it for me.  Thank you!  Nowadays a book is like
+a candle in the night to us."
+
+Rybin, already dressed and tightly girt, came in and said to Yefim:
+
+"Come, it's time for us to go."
+
+"Now, I have something to read!" exclaimed Yefim, pointing to the
+book and smiling inwardly.  When he had gone, Pavel animatedly said,
+turning to Andrey:
+
+"Did you notice those fellows?"
+
+"Y-yes!" slowly uttered the Little Russian.  "Like clouds in the
+sunset--thick, dark clouds, moving slowly."
+
+"Mikhail!" exclaimed the mother.  "He looks as if he had never been
+in a factory!  A peasant again.  And how formidable he looks!"
+
+"I'm sorry you weren't here," said Pavel to Andrey, who was sitting
+at the table, staring gloomily into his glass of tea.  "You could
+have seen the play of hearts.  You always talk about the heart.
+Rybin got up a lot of steam; he upset me, crushed me.  I couldn't
+even reply to him.  How distrustful he is of people, and how cheaply
+he values them!  Mother is right.  That man has a formidable power
+in him."
+
+"I noticed it," the Little Russian replied glumly.  "They have
+poisoned people.  When the peasants rise up, they'll overturn
+absolutely everything!  They need bare land, and they will lay it
+bare, tear down everything."  He spoke slowly, and it was evident
+that his mind was on something else.  The mother cautiously tapped
+him on the shoulder.
+
+"Pull yourself together, Andriusha."
+
+"Wait a little, my dear mother, my own!" he begged softly and
+kindly.  "All this is so ugly--although I didn't mean to do any
+harm.  Wait!"  And suddenly rousing himself, he said, striking
+the table with his hand: "Yes, Pavel, the peasant will lay the
+land bare for himself when he rises to his feet.  He will burn
+everything up, as if after a plague, so that all traces of his
+wrongs will vanish in ashes."
+
+"And then he will get in our way," Pavel observed softly.
+
+"It's our business to prevent that.  We are nearer to him; he trusts
+us; he will follow us."
+
+"Do you know, Rybin proposes that we should publish a newspaper
+for the village?"
+
+"We must do it, too.  As soon as possible."
+
+Pavel laughed and said:
+
+"I feel bad I didn't argue with him."
+
+"We'll have a chance to argue with him still," the Little Russian
+rejoined.  "You keep on playing your flute; whoever has gay feet,
+if they haven't grown into the ground, will dance to your tune.
+Rybin would probably have said that we don't feel the ground under
+us, and need not, either.  Therefore it's our business to shake it.
+Shake it once, and the people will be loosened from it; shake it once
+more, and they'll tear themselves away."
+
+The mother smiled.
+
+"Everything seems to be simple to you, Andriusha."
+
+"Yes, yes, it's simple," said the Little Russian, and added gloomily:
+"Like life."  A few minutes later he said:  "I'll go take a walk in
+the field."
+
+"After the bath?  The wind will blow through you," the mother warned.
+
+"Well, I need a good airing."
+
+"Look out, you'll catch a cold," Pavel said affectionately.  "You'd
+better lie down and try to sleep."
+
+"No, I'm going."  He put on his wraps, and went out without speaking.
+
+"It's hard for him," the mother sighed.
+
+"You know what?" Pavel observed to her.  "It's very good that you
+started to say 'thou' to him after that."
+
+She looked at him in astonishment, and after reflecting a moment, said:
+
+"Um, I didn't even notice how it came.  It came all of itself.  He
+has grown so near to me.  I can't tell you in words just how I feel.
+Oh, such a misfortune!"
+
+"You have a good heart, mamma," Pavel said softly.
+
+"I'm very glad if I have.  If I could only help you in some way,
+all of you.  If I only could!"
+
+"Don't fear, you will."
+
+She laughed softly:
+
+"I can't help fearing; that's exactly what I can't help.  But thank
+you for the good word, my dear son."
+
+"All right, mother; don't let's talk about it any more.  Know that
+I love you; and I thank you most heartily."
+
+She walked into the kitchen in order not to annoy him with her tears.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII
+
+
+Several days later Vyesovshchikov came in, as shabby, untidy, and
+disgruntled as ever.
+
+"Haven't you heard who killed Isay?"  He stopped in his clumsy
+pacing of the room to turn to Pavel.
+
+"No!" Pavel answered briefly.
+
+"There you got a man who wasn't squeamish about the job!  And I'd
+always been preparing to do it myself.  It was my job--just the
+thing for me!"
+
+"Don't talk nonsense, Nikolay," Pavel said in a friendly manner.
+
+"Now, really, what's the matter with you?" interposed the mother
+kindly.  "You have a soft heart, and yet you keep barking like a
+vicious dog.  What do you go on that way for?"
+
+At this moment she was actually pleased to see Nikolay.  Even his
+pockmarked face looked more agreeable to her.  She pitied him as
+never before.
+
+"Well, I'm not fit for anything but jobs like that!" said Nikolay
+dully, shrugging his shoulders.  "I keep thinking, and thinking
+where my place in the world is.  There is no place for me!  The
+people require to be spoken to, and I cannot.  I see everything; I
+feel all the people's wrongs; but I cannot express myself:  I have a
+dumb soul."  He went over to Pavel with drooping head; and scraping
+his fingers on the table, he said plaintively, and so unlike
+himself, childishly, sadly:  "Give me some hard work to do, comrade.
+I can't live this life any longer.  It's so senseless, so useless.
+You are all working in the movement, and I see that it is growing,
+and I'm outside of it all.  I haul boards and beams.  Is it possible
+to live for the sake of hauling timber?  Give me some hard work."
+
+Pavel clasped his hand, pulling him toward himself.
+
+"We will!"
+
+From behind the curtains resounded the Little Russian's voice:
+
+"Nikolay, I'll teach you typesetting, and you'll work as a
+compositor for us.  Yes?"
+
+Nikolay went over to him and said:
+
+"If you'll teach me that, I'll give you my knife."
+
+"To the devil with your knife!" exclaimed the Little Russian and
+burst out laughing.
+
+"It's a good knife," Nikolay insisted.  Pavel laughed, too.
+
+Vyesovshchikov stopped in the middle of the room and asked:
+
+"Are you laughing at me?"
+
+"Of course," replied the Little Russian, jumping out of bed.  "I'll
+tell you what!  Let's take a walk in the fields!  The night is fine;
+there's bright moonshine.  Let's go!"
+
+"All right," said Pavel.
+
+"And I'll go with you, too!" declared Nikolay.  "I like to hear you
+laugh, Little Russian."
+
+"And I like to hear you promise presents," answered the Little
+Russian, smiling.
+
+While Andrey was dressing in the kitchen, the mother scolded him:
+
+"Dress warmer!  You'll get sick."  And when they all had left, she
+watched them through the window; then looked at the ikon, and said
+softly:  "God help them!"
+
+She turned off the lamp and began to pray alone in the moonlit room.
+
+
+The days flew by in such rapid succession that the mother could not
+give much thought to the first of May.  Only at night, when,
+exhausted by the noise and the exciting bustle of the day, she went
+to bed, tired and worn out, her heart would begin to ache.
+
+"Oh, dear, if it would only be over soon!"
+
+At dawn, when the factory whistle blew, the son and the Little
+Russian, after hastily drinking tea and snatching a bite, would go,
+leaving a dozen or so small commissions for the mother.  The whole
+day long she would move around like a squirrel in a wheel, cook
+dinner, and boil lilac-colored gelatin and glue for the proclamations.
+Some people would come, leave notes with her to deliver to Pavel,
+and disappear, infecting her with their excitement.
+
+The leaflets appealing to the working people to celebrate the first
+of May flooded the village and the factory.  Every night they were
+posted on the fences, even on the doors of the police station; and
+every day they were found in the factory.  In the mornings the
+police would go around, swearing, tearing down and scraping off the
+lilac-covered bills from the fences.  At noon, however, these bills
+would fly over the streets again, rolling to the feet of the
+passers-by.  Spies were sent from the city to stand at the street
+corners and carefully scan the working people on their gay passages
+from and to the factory at dinner time.  Everybody was pleased to
+see the impotence of the police, and even the elder workingmen would
+smile at one another:
+
+"Things are happening, aren't they?"
+
+All over, people would cluster into groups hotly discussing the
+stirring appeals.  Life was at boiling point.  This spring it held
+more of interest to everybody, it brought forth something new to
+all; for some it was a good excuse to excite themselves--they could
+pour out their malicious oaths on the agitators; to others, it
+brought perplexed anxiety as well as hope; to others again, the
+minority, an acute delight in the consciousness of being the power
+that set the village astir.
+
+Pavel and Andrey scarcely ever went to bed.  They came home just
+before the morning whistle sounded, tired, hoarse, and pale.  The
+mother knew that they held meetings in the woods and the marsh; that
+squads of mounted police galloped around the village, that spies
+were crawling all over, holding up and searching single workingmen,
+dispersing groups, and sometimes making an arrest.  She understood
+that her son and Andrey might be arrested any night.  Sometimes she
+thought that this would be the best thing for them.
+
+Strangely enough, the investigation of the murder of Isay, the
+record clerk, suddenly ceased.  For two days the local police
+questioned the people in regard to the matter, examining about ten
+men or so, and finally lost interest in the affair.
+
+Marya Korsunova, in a chat with the mother, reflected the opinion of
+the police, with whom she associated as amicably as with everybody:
+
+"How is it possible to find the guilty man?  That morning some hundred
+people met Isay, and ninety of them, if not more, might have given
+him the blow.  During these eight years he has galled everybody."
+
+The Little Russian changed considerably.  His face became hollow-cheeked;
+his eyelids got heavy and drooped over his round eyes, half covering
+them.  His smiles were wrung from him unwillingly, and two thin wrinkles
+were drawn from his nostrils to the corners of his lips.  He talked
+less about everyday matters; on the other hand, he was more frequently
+enkindled with a passionate fire; and he intoxicated his listeners
+with his ecstatic words about the future, about the bright, beautiful
+holiday, when they would celebrate the triumph of freedom and reason.
+Listening to his words, the mother felt that he had gone further than
+anybody else toward the great, glorious day, and that he saw the joys
+of that future more vividly than the rest.  When the investigations of
+Isay's murder ceased, he said in disgust and smiling sadly:
+
+"It's not only the people they treat like trash, but even the very
+men whom they set on the people like dogs.  They have no concern for
+their faithful Judases, they care only for their shekels--only for
+them."  And after a sullen silence, he added:  "And I pity that man
+the more I think of him.  I didn't intend to kill him--didn't want to!"
+
+"Enough, Andrey," said Pavel severely.
+
+"You happened to knock against something rotten, and it fell to
+pieces," added the mother in a low voice.
+
+"You're right--but that's no consolation."
+
+He often spoke in this way.  In his mouth the words assumed a
+peculiar, universal significance, bitter and corrosive.
+
+At last, it was the first of May!  The whistle shrilled as usual,
+powerful and peremptory.  The mother, who hadn't slept a minute
+during the night, jumped out of bed, made a fire in the samovar,
+which had been prepared the evening before, and was about, as
+always, to knock at the door of her son's and Andrey's room, when,
+with a wave of her hand she recollected the day, and went to seat
+herself at the window, leaning her cheek on her hand.
+
+Clusters of light clouds, white and rosy, sailed swiftly across the
+pale blue sky, like huge birds frightened by the piercing shriek of
+the escaping steam.  The mother watched the clouds, absorbed in
+herself.  Her head was heavy, her eyes dry and inflamed from the
+sleepless night.  A strange calm possessed her breast, her heart was
+beating evenly, and her mind dwelt on only common, everyday things.
+
+"I prepared the samovar too early; it will boil away.  Let them
+sleep longer to-day; they've worn themselves out, both of them."
+
+A cheerful ray of sun looked into the room.  She held her hand out
+to it, and with the other gently patted the bright young beam,
+smiling kindly and thoughtfully.  Then she rose, removed the pipe
+from the samovar, trying not to make a noise, washed herself, and
+began to pray, crossing herself piously, and noiselessly moving her
+lips.  Her face was radiant, and her right eyebrow kept rising
+gradually and suddenly dropping.
+
+The second whistle blew more softly with less assurance, a tremor
+in its thick and mellow sound.  It seemed to the mother that the
+whistle lasted longer to-day than ever.  The clear, musical voice
+of the Little Russian sounded in the room:
+
+"Pavel, do you hear?  They're calling."
+
+The mother heard the patter of bare feet on the floor and some one
+yawn with gusto.
+
+"The samovar is ready," she cried.
+
+"We're getting up," Pavel answered merrily.
+
+"The sun is rising," said the Little Russian.  "The clouds are
+racing; they're out of place to-day."  He went into the kitchen all
+disheveled but jolly after his sleep.  "Good morning, mother dear;
+how did you sleep?"
+
+The mother went to him and whispered:
+
+"Andriusha, keep close to him."
+
+"Certainly.  As long as it depends on us, we'll always stick to
+each other, you may be sure."
+
+"What's that whispering about?" Pavel asked.
+
+"Nothing.  She told me to wash myself better, so the girls will
+look at me," replied the Little Russian, going out on the porch
+to wash himself.
+
+"'Rise up, awake, you workingmen,'" Pavel sang softly.
+
+As the day grew, the clouds dispersed, chased by the wind.  The
+mother got the dishes ready for the tea, shaking her head over the
+thought of how strange it was for both of them to be joking and
+smiling all the time on this morning, when who knew what would
+befall them in the afternoon.  Yet, curiously enough, she felt
+herself calm, almost happy.
+
+They sat a long time over the tea to while away the hours of
+expectation.  Pavel, as was his wont, slowly and scrupulously mixed
+the sugar in the glass with his spoon, and accurately salted his
+favorite crust from the end of the loaf.  The Little Russian moved
+his feet under the table--he never could at once settle his feet
+comfortably--and looked at the rays of sunlight playing on the wall
+and ceiling.
+
+"When I was a youngster of ten years," he recounted, "I wanted to
+catch the sun in a glass.  So I took the glass, stole to the wall,
+and bang!  I cut my hand and got a licking to boot.  After the
+licking I went out in the yard and saw the sun in a puddle.  So I
+started to trample the mud with my feet.  I covered myself with mud,
+and got another drubbing.  What was I to do?  I screamed to the sun:
+'It doesn't hurt me, you red devil; it doesn't hurt me!' and stuck
+out my tongue at him.  And I felt comforted."
+
+"Why did the sun seem red to you?" Pavel asked, laughing.
+
+"There was a blacksmith opposite our house, with fine red cheeks,
+and a huge red beard.  I thought the sun resembled him."
+
+The mother lost patience and said:
+
+"You'd better talk about your arrangements for the procession."
+
+"Everything's been arranged," said Pavel.
+
+"No use talking of things once decided upon.  It only confuses the
+mind," the Little Russian added.  "If we are all arrested, Nikolay
+Ivanovich will come and tell you what to do.  He will help you in
+every way."
+
+"All right," said the mother with a heavy sigh.
+
+"Let's go out," said Pavel dreamily.
+
+"No, rather stay indoors," replied Andrey.  "No need to annoy the
+eyes of the police so often.  They know you well enough."
+
+Fedya Mazin came running in, all aglow, with red spots on his cheeks,
+quivering with youthful joy.  His animation dispelled the tedium of
+expectation for them.
+
+"It's begun!" he reported.  "The people are all out on the street,
+their faces sharp as the edge of an ax.  Vyesovshchikov, the Gusevs,
+and Samoylov have been standing at the factory gates all the time,
+and have been making speeches.  Most of the people went back from
+the factory, and returned home.  Let's go!  It's just time!  It's
+ten o'clock already."
+
+"I'm going!" said Pavel decidedly.
+
+"You'll see," Fedya assured them, "the whole factory will rise up
+after dinner."
+
+And he hurried away, followed by the quiet words of the mother:
+
+"Burning like a wax candle in the wind."
+
+She rose and went into the kitchen to dress.
+
+"Where are you going, mother?"
+
+"With you," she said.
+
+Andrey looked at Pavel pulling his mustache.  Pavel arranged his
+hair with a quick gesture, and went to his mother.
+
+"Mother, I will not tell you anything; and don't you tell me
+anything, either.  Right, mother?"
+
+"All right, all right!  God bless you!" she murmured.
+
+When she went out and heard the holiday hum of the people's voices--
+an anxious and expectant hum--when she saw everywhere, at the gates
+and windows, crowds of people staring at Andrey and her son, a blur
+quivered before her eyes, changes from a transparent green to a
+muddy gray.
+
+People greeted them--there was something peculiar in their greetings.
+She caught whispered, broken remarks:
+
+"Here they are, the leaders!"
+
+"We don't know who the leaders are!"
+
+"Why, I didn't say anything wrong."
+
+At another place some one in a yard shouted excitedly:
+
+"The police will get them, and that'll be the end them!"
+
+"What if they do?" retorted another voice.
+
+Farther on a crying woman's voice leaped frightened the window to
+the street:
+
+"Consider!  Are you a single man, are you?  They are bachelors and
+don't care!"
+
+When they passed the house of Zosimov, the man without legs, who
+received a monthly allowance from the factory because of his
+mutilation, he stuck his head through, the window and cried out:
+
+"Pavel, you scoundrel, they'll wring your head off for your doings,
+you'll see!"
+
+The mother trembled and stopped.  The exclamation aroused in her a
+sharp sensation of anger.  She looked up at the thick, bloated face
+of the cripple, and he hid himself, cursing.  Then she quickened her
+pace, overtook her son, and tried not to fall behind again.  He and
+Andrey seemed not to notice anything; not to hear the outcries that
+pursued them.  They moved calmly, without haste, and talked loudly
+about commonplaces.  They were stopped by Mironov, a modest, elderly
+man, respected by everybody for his clean, sober life.
+
+"Not working either, Daniil Ivanovich?" Pavel asked.
+
+"My wife is going to be confined.  Well, and such an exciting day,
+too," Mironov responded, staring fixedly at the comrades.  He said
+to them in an undertone:
+
+"Boys, I hear you're going to make an awful row--smash the
+superintendent's windows."
+
+"Why, are we drunk?" exclaimed Pavel.
+
+"We are simply going to march along the streets with flags, and sing
+songs," said the Little Russian.  "You'll have a chance to hear our
+songs.  They're our confession of faith."
+
+"I know your confession of faith," said Mironov thoughtfully.  "I
+read your papers.  You, Nilovna," he exclaimed, smiling at the
+mother with knowing eyes, "are you going to revolt, too?"
+
+"Well, even if it's only before death, I want to walk shoulder to
+shoulder with the truth."
+
+"I declare!" said Mironov.  "I guess they were telling the truth
+when they said you carried forbidden books to the factory."
+
+"Who said so?" asked Pavel.
+
+"Oh, people.  Well, good-by!  Behave yourselves!"
+
+The mother laughed softly; she was pleased to hear that such things
+were said of her.  Pavel smilingly turned to her:
+
+"Oh, you'll get into prison, mother!"
+
+"I don't mind," she murmured.
+
+The sun rose higher, pouring warmth into the bracing freshness of
+the spring day.  The clouds floated more slowly, their shadows grew
+thinner and more transparent, and crawled gently over the streets
+and roofs.  The bright sunlight seemed to clean the village, to wipe
+the dust and dirt from the walls and the tedium from the faces.
+Everything assumed a more cheerful aspect; the voices sounded louder,
+drowning the far-off rumble and heavings of the factory machines.
+
+Again, from all sides, from the windows and the yards, different
+words and voices, now uneasy and malicious, now thoughtful and gay,
+found their way to the mother's ears.  But this time she felt a
+desire to retort, to thank, to explain, to participate in the
+strangely variegated life of the day.
+
+Off a corner of the main thoroughfare, in a narrow by-street, a
+crowd of about a hundred people had gathered, and from its depths
+resounded Vyesovshchikov's voice:
+
+"They squeeze our blood like juice from huckleberries."  His words
+fell like hammer blows on the people.
+
+"That's true!" the resonant cry rang out simultaneously from a
+number of throats.
+
+"The boy is doing his best," said the Little Russian.  "I'll go help
+him."  He bent low and before Pavel had time to stop him he twisted
+his tall, flexible body into the crowd like a corkscrew into a cork,
+and soon his singing voice rang out:
+
+"Comrades!  They say there are various races on the earth--Jews and
+Germans, English and Tartars.  But I don't believe it.  There are
+only two nations, two irreconcilable tribes--the rich and the poor.
+People dress differently and speak differently; but look at the rich
+Frenchman, the rich German, or the rich Englishman, you'll see that
+they are all Tartars in the way they treat their workingman--a
+plague on them!"
+
+A laugh broke out in the crowd.
+
+"On the other hand, we can see the French workingmen, the Tartar
+workingmen, the Turkish workingmen, all lead the same dog's life,
+as we--we, the Russian workingmen."
+
+More and more people joined the crowd; one after the other they
+thronged into the by-street, silent, stepping on tiptoe, and craning
+their necks.  Andrey raised his voice:
+
+"The workingmen of foreign countries have already learned this
+simple truth, and to-day, on this bright first of May, the foreign
+working people fraternize with one another.  They quit their work,
+and go out into the streets to look at themselves, to take stock of
+their immense power.  On this day, the workingmen out there throb
+with one heart; for all hearts are lighted with the consciousness of
+the might of the working people; all hearts beat with comradeship,
+each and every one of them is ready to lay down his life in the war
+for the happiness of all, for freedom and truth to all--comrades!"
+
+"The police!" some one shouted.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX
+
+
+From the main street four mounted policemen flourishing their knouts
+came riding into the by-street directly at the crowd.
+
+"Disperse!"
+
+"What sort of talking is going on?"
+
+"Who's speaking?"
+
+The people scowled, giving way to the horses unwillingly.  Some
+climbed up on fences; raillery was heard here and there.
+
+"They put pigs on horses; they grunt:  'Here we are, leaders, too!'"
+resounded a sonorous, provoking voice.
+
+The Little Russian was left alone in the middle of the street;
+two horses shaking their manes pressed at him.  He stepped aside,
+and at the same time the mother grasped his hand, pulling him away
+grumbling:
+
+"You promised to stick to Pasha; and here you are running up against
+the edge of a knife all by yourself."
+
+"I plead guilty," said the Little Russian, smiling at Pavel.  "Ugh!
+What a force of police there is in the world!"
+
+"All right," murmured the mother.
+
+An alarming, crushing exhaustion came over her.  It rose from within
+her and made her dizzy.  There was a strange alternation of sadness
+and joy in her heart.  She wished the afternoon whistle would sound.
+
+They reached the square where the church stood.  Around the church
+within the paling a thick crowd was sitting and standing.  There
+were some five hundred gay youth and bustling women with children
+darting around the groups like butterflies.  The crowd swung from
+side to side.  The people raised their heads and looked into the
+distance in different directions, waiting impatiently.
+
+"Mitenka!" softly vibrated a woman's voice.  "Have pity on yourself!"
+
+"Stop!" rang out the response.
+
+And the grave Sizov spoke calmly, persuasively:
+
+"No, we mustn't abandon our children.  They have grown wiser than
+ourselves; they live more boldly.  Who saved our cent for the marshes?
+They did.  We must remember that.  For doing it they were dragged to
+prison; but we derived the benefit.  The benefit was for all."
+
+The whistle blew, drowning the talk of the crowd.  The people started.
+Those sitting rose to their feet.  For a moment the silence of death
+prevailed; all became watchful, and many faces grew pale.
+
+"Comrades!" resounded Pavel's voice, ringing and firm.
+
+A dry, hot haze burned the mother's eyes, and with a single movement
+of her body, suddenly strengthened, she stood behind her son.  All
+turned toward Pavel, and drew up to him, like iron filings attracted
+by a magnet.
+
+"Brothers!  The hour has come to give up this life of ours, this
+life of greed, hatred, and darkness, this life of violence and
+falsehood, this life where there is no place for us, where we are
+no human beings."
+
+He stopped, and everybody maintained silence, moving still closer
+to him.  The mother stared at her son.  She saw only his eyes, his
+proud, brave, burning eyes.
+
+"Comrades!  We have decided to declare openly who we are; we raise
+our banner to-day, the banner of reason, of truth, of liberty!  And
+now I raise it!"
+
+A flag pole, white and slender, flashed in the air, bent down,
+cleaving the crowd.  For a moment it was lost from sight; then over
+the uplifted faces the broad canvas of the working people's flag
+spread its wings like a red bird.
+
+Pavel raised his hand--the pole swung, and a dozen hands caught
+the smooth white rod.  Among them was the mother's hand.
+
+"Long live the working people!" he shouted.  Hundreds of voices
+responded to his sonorous call.  "Long live the Social Democratic
+Workingmen's Party, our party, comrades, our spiritual mother."
+
+The crowd seethed and hummed.  Those who understood the meaning of
+the flag squeezed their way up to it.  Mazin, Samoylov, and the
+Gusevs stood close at Pavel's side.  Nikolay with bent head pushed
+his way through the crowd.  Some other people unknown to the mother,
+young and with burning eyes, jostled her.
+
+"Long live the working people of all countries!" shouted Pavel.
+
+And ever increasing in force and joy, a thousand-mouthed echo
+responded in a soul-stirring acclaim.
+
+The mother clasped Pavel's hand, and somebody else's, too.  She was
+breathless with tears, yet refrained from shedding them.  Her legs
+trembled, and with quivering lips she cried:
+
+"Oh, my dear boys, that's true.  There you are now----"
+
+A broad smile spread over Nikolay's pockmarked face; he stared at
+the flag and, stretching his hand toward it, roared out something;
+then caught the mother around the neck with the same hand, kissed
+her, and laughed.
+
+"Comrades!" sang out the Little Russian, subduing the noise of the
+crowd with his mellow voice.  "Comrades!  We have now started a holy
+procession in the name of the new God, the God of Truth and Light,
+the God of Reason and Goodness.  We march in this holy procession,
+comrades, over a long and hard road.  Our goal is far, far away, and
+the crown of thorns is near!  Those who don't believe in the might
+of truth, who have not the courage to stand up for it even unto
+death, who do not believe in themselves and are afraid of suffering
+--such of you, step aside!  We call upon those only who believe in
+our triumph.  Those who cannot see our goal, let them not walk with
+us; only misery is in store for them!  Fall into line, comrades!
+Long live the first of May, the holiday of freemen!"
+
+The crowd drew closer.  Pavel waved the flag.  It spread out in the
+air and sailed forward, sunlit, smiling, red, and glowing.
+
+"Let us renounce the old world!" resounded Fedya Mazin's ringing
+voice; and scores of voices took up the cry.  It floated as on a
+mighty wave.
+
+"Let us shake its dust from our feet."
+
+The mother marched behind Mazin with a smile on her dry lips, and
+looked over his head at her son and the flag.  Everywhere, around
+her, was the sparkle of fresh young cheerful faces, the glimmer of
+many-colored eyes; and at the head of all--her son and Andrey.  She
+heard their voices, Andrey's, soft and humid, mingled in friendly
+accord with the heavy bass of her son:
+
+     "Rise up, awake, you workingmen!
+      On, on, to war, you hungry hosts!"
+
+Men ran toward the red flag, raising a clamor; then joining the
+others, they marched along, their shouts lost in the broad sounds
+of the song of the revolution.
+
+The mother had heard that song before.  It had often been sung in a
+subdued tone; and the Little Russian had often whistled it.  But now
+she seemed for the first time to hear this appeal to unite in the
+struggle.
+
+     "We march to join our suffering mates."
+
+The song flowed on, embracing the people.
+
+Some one's face, alarmed yet joyous, moved along beside the
+mother's, and a trembling voice spoke, sobbing:
+
+"Mitya!  Where are you going?"
+
+The mother interfered without stopping:
+
+"Let him go!  Don't be alarmed!  Don't fear!  I myself was afraid
+at first, too.  Mine is right at the head--he who bears the standard
+--that's my son!"
+
+"Murderers!  Where are you going?  There are soldiers over there!"
+And suddenly clasping the mother's hand in her bony hands, the tall,
+thin woman exclaimed:  "My dear!  How they sing!  Oh, the sectarians!
+And Mitya is singing!"
+
+"Don't be troubled!" murmured the mother.  "It's a sacred thing.
+Think of it!  Christ would not have been, either, if men hadn't
+perished for his sake."
+
+This thought had flashed across the mother's mind all of a sudden
+and struck her by its simple, clear truth.  She stared at the woman,
+who held her hand firmly in her clasp, and repeated, smiling:
+
+"Christ would not have been, either, if men hadn't suffered for his
+sake."
+
+Sizov appeared at her side.  He took off his hat and waving it to
+the measure of the song, said:
+
+"They're marching openly, eh, mother?  And composed a song, too!
+What a song, mother, eh?"
+
+     "The Czar for the army soldiers must have,
+      Then give him your sons----"
+
+"They're not afraid of anything," said Sizov.  "And my son is in the
+grave.  The factory crushed him to death, yes!"
+
+The mother's heart beat rapidly, and she began to lag behind.  She
+was soon pushed aside hard against a fence, and the close-packed
+crowd went streaming past her.  She saw that there were many people,
+and she was pleased.
+
+     "Rise up, awake, you workingmen!"
+
+It seemed as if the blare of a mighty brass trumpet were rousing
+men and stirring in some hearts the willingness to fight, in other
+hearts a vague joy, a premonition of something new, and a burning
+curiosity; in still others a confused tremor of hope and curiosity.
+The song was an outlet, too, for the stinging bitterness accumulated
+during years.
+
+The people looked ahead, where the red banner was swinging and
+streaming in the air.  All were saying something and shouting; but
+the individual voice was lost in the song--the new song, in which
+the old note of mournful meditation was absent.  It was not the
+utterance of a soul wandering in solitude along the dark paths of
+melancholy perplexity, of a soul beaten down by want, burdened with
+fear, deprived of individuality, and colorless.  It breathed no
+sighs of a strength hungering for space; it shouted no provoking
+cries of irritated courage ready to crush both the good and the bad
+indiscriminately.  It did not voice the elemental instinct of the
+animal to snatch freedom for freedom's sake, nor the feeling of
+wrong or vengeance capable of destroying everything and powerless
+to build up anything.  In this song there was nothing from the old,
+slavish world.  It floated along directly, evenly; it proclaimed an
+iron virility, a calm threat.  Simple, clear, it swept the people
+after it along an endless path leading to the far distant future;
+and it spoke frankly about the hardships of the way.  In its steady
+fire a heavy clod seemed to burn and melt--the sufferings they had
+endured, the dark load of their habitual feelings, their cursed
+dread of what was coming.
+
+"They all join in!" somebody roared exultantly.  "Well done, boys!"
+
+Apparently the man felt something vast, to which he could not give
+expression in ordinary words, so he uttered a stiff oath.  Yet the
+malice, the blind dark malice of a slave also streamed hotly through
+his teeth.  Disturbed by the light shed upon it, it hissed like a
+snake, writhing in venomous words.
+
+"Heretics!" a man with a broken voice shouted from a window, shaking
+his fist threateningly.
+
+A piercing scream importunately bored into the mother's ears--
+"Rioting against the emperor, against his Majesty the Czar?  No, no?"
+
+Agitated people flashed quickly past her, a dark lava stream of men
+and women, carried along by this song, which cleared every obstacle
+out of its path.
+
+Growing in the mother's breast was the mighty desire to shout to the
+crowd:
+
+"Oh, my dear people!"
+
+There, far away from her, was the red banner--she saw her son without
+seeing him--his bronzed forehead, his eyes burning with the bright
+fire of faith.  Now she was in the tail of the crowd among the people
+who walked without hurrying, indifferent, looking ahead with the cold 
+curiosity of spectators who know beforehand how the show will end.
+They spoke softly with confidence.
+
+"One company of infantry is near the school, and the other near
+the factory."
+
+"The governor has come."
+
+"Is that so?"
+
+"I saw him myself.  He's here."
+
+Some one swore jovially and said:
+
+"They've begun to fear our fellows, after all, haven't they?  The
+soldiers have come and the governor----"
+
+"Dear boys!" throbbed in the breast of the mother.  But the words
+around her sounded dead and cold.  She hastened her steps to get
+away from these people, and it was not difficult for her to outstrip
+their lurching gait.
+
+Suddenly the head of the crowd, as it were, bumped against something;
+its body swung backward with an alarming, low hum.  The song trembled,
+then flowed on more rapidly and louder; but again the dense wave of
+sounds hesitated in its forward course.  Voices fell out of the chorus
+one after the other.  Here and there a voice was raised in the effort
+to bring the song to its previous height, to push it forward:
+
+     "Rise up, awake, you workingmen!
+      On, on, to war, you hungry hosts!"
+
+Though she saw nothing and was ignorant of what was happening
+there in front, the mother divined, and elbowed her way rapidly
+through the crowd.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX
+
+
+"Comrades!" the voice of Pavel was heard.  "Soldiers are people the
+same as ourselves.  They will not strike us!  Why should they beat
+us?  Because we bear the truth necessary for all?  This our truth is
+necessary to them, too.  Just now they do not understand this; but
+the time is nearing when they will rise with us, when they will
+march, not under the banner of robbers and murderers, the banner
+which the liars and beasts order them to call the banner of glory
+and honor, but under our banner of freedom and goodness!  We ought
+to go forward so that they should understand our truth the sooner.
+Forward, comrades!  Ever forward!"
+
+Pavel's voice sounded firm, the words rang in the air distinctly.
+But the crowd fell asunder; one after the other the people dropped
+off to the right or to the left, going toward their homes, or
+leaning against the fences.  Now the crowd had the shape of a wedge,
+and its point was Pavel, over whose head the banner of the laboring
+people was burning red.
+
+At the end of the street, closing the exit to the square, the mother
+saw a low, gray wall of men, one just like the other, without faces.
+On the shoulder of each a bayonet was smiling its thin, chill smile;
+and from this entire immobile wall a cold gust blew down on the
+workmen, striking the breast of the mother and penetrating her heart.
+
+She forced her way into the crowd among people familiar to her, and,
+as it were, leaned on them.
+
+She pressed closely against a tall, lame man with a clean-shaven
+face.  In order to look at her, he had to turn his head stiffly.
+
+"What do you want?  Who are you?" he asked her.
+
+"The mother of Pavel Vlasov," she answered, her knees trembling
+beneath her, her lower lip involuntarily dropping.
+
+"Ha-ha!" said the lame man.  "Very well!"
+
+"Comrades!" Pavel cried.  "Onward all your lives.  There is no
+other way for us!  Sing!"
+
+The atmosphere grew tense.  The flag rose and rocked and waved over
+the heads of the people, gliding toward the gray wall of soldiers.
+The mother trembled.  She closed her eyes; and cried:  "Oh--oh!"
+
+None but Pavel, Andrey, Samoylov, and Mazin advanced beyond the crowd.
+
+The limpid voice of Fedya Mazin slowly quivered in the air.
+
+"'In mortal strife--'" he began the song.
+
+"'You victims fell--'" answered thick, subdued voices.  The words
+dropped in two heavy sighs.  People stepped forward, each footfall
+audible.  A new song, determined and resolute, burst out:
+
+     "You yielded up your lives for them."
+
+Fedya's voice wreathed and curled like a bright ribbon.
+
+"A-ha-ha-ha!" some one exclaimed derisively.  "They've struck up a
+funeral song, the dirty dogs!"
+
+"Beat him!" came the angry response.
+
+The mother clasped her hands to her breast, looked about and saw
+that the crowd, before so dense, was now standing irresolute,
+watching the comrades walk away from them with the banner, followed
+by about a dozen people, one of whom, however, at every forward
+move, jumped aside as if the path in the middle of the street were
+red hot and burned his soles.
+
+"The tyranny will fall--" sounded the prophetic song from the
+lips of Fedya.
+
+"And the people will rise!" the chorus of powerful voices seconded
+confidently and menacingly.
+
+But the harmonious flow of the song was broken by the quiet words:
+
+"He is giving orders."
+
+"Charge bayonets!" came the piercing order from the front.
+
+The bayonets curved in the air, and glittered sharply; then fell
+and stretched out to confront the banner.
+
+"Ma-arch!"
+
+"They're coming!" said the lame man, and thrusting his hands into
+his pockets made a long step to one side.
+
+The mother, without blinking, looked on.  The gray line of soldiers
+tossed to and fro, and spread out over the entire width of the
+street.  It moved on evenly, coolly, carrying in front of itself a
+fine-toothed comb of sparkling bayonets.  Then it came to a stand.
+The mother took long steps to get nearer to her son.  She saw how
+Andrey strode ahead of Pavel and fenced him off with his long body.
+"Get alongside of me!" Pavel shouted sharply.  Andrey was singing,
+his hands clasped behind his back, his head uplifted.  Pavel pushed
+him with his shoulder, and again cried:
+
+"At my side!  Let the banner be in front!"
+
+"Disperse!" called a little officer in a thin voice, brandishing
+a white saber.  He lifted his feet high, and without bending his
+knees struck his soles on the ground irritably.  The high polish
+on his boots caught the eyes of the mother.
+
+To one side and somewhat behind him walked a tall, clean-shaven man,
+with a thick, gray mustache.  He wore a long gray overcoat with a
+red underlining, and yellow stripes on his trousers.  His gait was
+heavy, and like the Little Russian, he clasped his hands behind his
+back.  He regarded Pavel, raising his thick gray eyebrows.
+
+The mother seemed to be looking into infinity.  At each breath her
+breast was ready to burst with a loud cry.  It choked her, but for
+some reason she restrained it.  Her hands clutched at her bosom.
+She staggered from repeated thrusts.  She walked onward without
+thought, almost without consciousness.  She felt that behind her
+the crowd was getting thinner; a cold wind had blown on them and
+scattered them like autumn leaves.
+
+The men around the red banner moved closer and closer together.
+The faces of the soldiers were clearly seen across the entire width
+of the street, monstrously flattened, stretched out in a dirty
+yellowish band.  In it were unevenly set variously colored eyes,
+and in front the sharp bayonets glittered crudely.  Directed against
+the breasts of the people, although not yet touching them, they
+drove them apart, pushing one man after the other away from the
+crowd and breaking it up.
+
+Behind her the mother heard the trampling noise of those who were
+running away.  Suppressed, excited voices cried:
+
+"Disperse, boys!"
+
+"Vlasov, run!"
+
+"Back, Pavel!"
+
+"Drop the banner, Pavel!" Vyesovshchikov said glumly.  "Give it to
+me!  I'll hide it!"
+
+He grabbed the pole with his hand; the flag rocked backward.
+
+"Let go!" thundered Pavel.
+
+Nikolay drew his hand back as if it had been burned.  The song died
+away.  Some persons crowded solidly around Pavel; but he cut through
+to the front.  A sudden silence fell.
+
+Around the banner some twenty men were grouped, not more, but they
+stood firmly.  The mother felt drawn to them by awe and by a
+confused desire to say something to them.
+
+"Take this thing away from him, lieutenant."  The even voice of the
+tall old man was heard.  He pointed to the banner.  A little officer
+jumped up to Pavel, snatched at the flag pole, and shouted shrilly:
+
+"Drop it!"
+
+The red flag trembled in the air, moving to the right and to the
+left, then rose again.  The little officer jumped back and sat down.
+Nikolay darted by the mother, shaking his outstretched fist.
+
+"Seize them!" the old man roared, stamping his feet.  A few soldiers
+jumped to the front, one of them flourishing the butt end of his
+gun.  The banner trembled, dropped, and disappeared in a gray mass
+of soldiers.
+
+"Oh!" somebody groaned aloud.  And the mother yelled like a wild
+animal.  But the clear voice of Pavel answered her from out of the
+crowd of soldiers:
+
+"Good-by, mother!  Good-by, dear!"
+
+"He's alive!  He remembered!" were the two strokes at the mother's heart.
+
+"Good-by, mother dear!" came from Andrey.
+
+Waving her bands, she raised herself on tiptoe, and tried to see
+them.  There was the round face of Andrey above the soldiers' heads.
+He was smiling and bowing to her.
+
+"Oh, my dear ones!  Andriusha!  Pasha!" she shouted.
+
+"Good-by, comrades!" they called from among the soldiers.
+
+A broken, manifold echo responded to them.  It resounded from the
+windows and the roofs.
+
+The mother felt some one pushing her breast.  Through the mist in
+her eyes she saw the little officer.  His face was red and strained,
+and he was shouting to her:
+
+"Clear out of here, old woman!"
+
+She looked down on him, and at his feet saw the flag pole broken in
+two parts, a piece of red cloth on one of them.  She bent down and
+picked it up.  The officer snatched it out of her hands, threw it
+aside, and shouted again, stamping his feet:
+
+"Clear out of here, I tell you!"
+
+A song sprang up and floated from among the soldiers:
+
+     "Arise, awake, you workingmen!"
+
+Everything was whirling, rocking, trembling.  A thick, alarming
+noise, resembling the dull hum of telegraph wires, filled the air.
+The officer jumped back, screaming angrily:
+
+"Stop the singing, Sergeant Kraynov!"
+
+The mother staggered to the fragment of the pole, which he had
+thrown down, and picked it up again.
+
+"Gag them!"
+
+The song became confused, trembled, expired.  Somebody took the mother
+by the shoulders, turned her around, and shoved her from the back.
+
+"Go, go!  Clear the street!" shouted the officer.
+
+About ten paces from her, the mother again saw a thick crowd of
+people.  They were howling, grumbling, whistling, as they backed
+down the street.  The yards were drawing in a number of them.
+
+"Go, you devil!" a young soldier with a big mustache shouted right
+into the mother's ear.  He brushed against her and shoved her onto
+the sidewalk.  She moved away, leaning on the flag pole.  She went
+quickly and lightly, but her legs bent under her.  In order not to
+fall she clung to walls and fences.  People in front were falling back
+alongside of her, and behind her were soldiers, shouting:  "Go, go!"
+
+The soldiers got ahead of her; she stopped and looked around.  Down
+the end of the street she saw them again scattered in a thin chain,
+blocking the entrance to the square, which was empty.  Farther down
+were more gray figures slowly moving against the people.  She wanted
+to go back; but uncalculatingly went forward again, and came to a
+narrow, empty by-street into which she turned.  She stopped again.
+She sighed painfully, and listened.  Somewhere ahead she heard the
+hum of voices.  Leaning on the pole she resumed her walk.  Her
+eyebrows moved up and down, and she suddenly broke into a sweat; her
+lips quivered; she waved her hands, and certain words flashed up in
+her heart like sparks, kindling in her a strong, stubborn desire to
+speak them, to shout them.
+
+The by-street turned abruptly to the left; and around the corner the
+mother saw a large, dense crowd of people.  Somebody's voice was
+speaking loudly and firmly:
+
+"They don't go to meet the bayonets from sheer audacity.  Remember that!"
+
+"Just look at them.  Soldiers advance against them, and they stand
+before them without fear.  Y-yes!"
+
+"Think of Pasha Vlasov!"
+
+"And how about the Little Russian?"
+
+"Hands behind his back and smiling, the devil!"
+
+"My dear ones!  My people!" the mother shouted, pushing into the crowd.
+They cleared the way for her respectfully.  Somebody laughed:
+
+"Look at her with the flag in her hand!"
+
+"Shut up!" said another man sternly.
+
+The mother with a broad sweep of her arms cried out:
+
+"Listen for the sake of Christ!  You are all dear people, you are
+all good people.  Open up your hearts.  Look around without fear,
+without terror.  Our children are going into the world.  Our children
+are going, our blood is going for the truth; with honesty in their
+hearts they open the gates of the new road--a straight, wide road
+for all.  For all of you, for the sake of your young ones, they have
+devoted themselves to the sacred cause.  They seek the sun of new
+days that shall always be bright.  They want another life, the life
+of truth and justice, of goodness for all."
+
+Her heart was rent asunder, her breast contracted, her throat was
+hot and dry.  Deep inside of her, words were being born, words of a
+great, all-embracing love.  They burned her tongue, moving it more
+powerfully and more freely.  She saw that the people were listening
+to her words.  All were silent.  She felt that they were thinking as
+they surrounded her closely; and the desire grew in her, now a clear
+desire, to drive these people to follow her son, to follow Andrey,
+to follow all those who had fallen into the soldiers' hands, all
+those who were left entirely alone, all those who were abandoned.
+Looking at the sullen, attentive faces around her, she resumed with
+soft force:
+
+"Our children are going in the world toward happiness.  They went
+for the sake of all, and for Christ's truth--against all with which
+our malicious, false, avaricious ones have captured, tied, and
+crushed us.  My dear ones--why it is for you that our young blood
+rose--for all the people, for all the world, for all the workingmen,
+they went!  Then don't go away from them, don't renounce, don't forsake
+them, don't leave your children on a lonely path--they went just for
+the purpose of showing you all the path to truth, to take all on that
+path!  Pity yourselves!  Love them!  Understand the children's hearts.
+Believe your sons' hearts; they have brought forth the truth; it
+burns in them; they perish for it.  Believe them!"
+
+Her voice broke down, she staggered, her strength gone.  Somebody
+seized her under the arms.
+
+"She is speaking God's words!" a man shouted hoarsely and excitedly.
+"God's words, good people!  Listen to her!"
+
+Another man said in pity of her:
+
+"Look how she's hurting herself!"
+
+"She's not hurting herself, but hitting us, fools, understand that!"
+was the reproachful reply.
+
+A high-pitched, quavering voice rose up over the crowd:
+
+"Oh, people of the true faith!  My Mitya, pure soul, what has he
+done?  He went after his dear comrades.  She speaks truth--why did
+we forsake our children?  What harm have they done us?"
+
+The mother trembled at these words and replied with tears.
+
+"Go home, Nilovna!  Go, mother!  You're all worn out," said Sizov loudly.
+
+He was pale, his disheveled beard shook.  Suddenly knitting his
+brows he threw a stern glance about him on all, drew himself up to
+his full height, and said distinctly:
+
+"My son Matvey was crushed in the factory.  You know it!  But were
+he alive, I myself would have sent him into the lines of those--
+along with them.  I myself would have told him:  'Go you, too,
+Matvey!  That's the right cause, that's the honest cause!'"
+
+He stopped abruptly, and a sullen silence fell on all, in the
+powerful grip of something huge and new, but something that no
+longer frightened them.  Sizov lifted his hand, shook it, and
+continued:
+
+"It's an old man who is speaking to you.  You know me!  I've been
+working here thirty-nine years, and I've been alive fifty-three
+years.  To-day they've arrested my nephew, a pure and intelligent
+boy.  He, too, was in the front, side by side with Vlasov; right at
+the banner."  Sizov made a motion with his hand, shrank together,
+and said as he took the mother's hand:  "This woman spoke the truth.
+Our children want to live honorably, according to reason, and we
+have abandoned them; we walked away, yes!  Go, Nilovna!"
+
+"My dear ones!" she said, looking at them all with tearful eyes.
+"The life is for our children and the earth is for them."
+
+"Go, Nilovna, take this staff and lean upon it!" said Sizov, giving
+her the fragment of the flag pole.
+
+All looked at the mother with sadness and respect.  A hum of
+sympathy accompanied her.  Sizov silently put the people out of her
+way, and they silently moved aside, obeying a blind impulse to
+follow her.  They walked after her slowly, exchanging brief, subdued
+remarks on the way.  Arrived at the gate of her house, she turned to
+them, leaning on the fragment of the flag pole, and bowed in gratitude.
+
+"Thank you!" she said softly.  And recalling the thought which she
+fancied had been born in her heart, she said:  "Our Lord Jesus Christ
+would not have been, either, if people had not perished for his sake."
+
+The crowd looked at her in silence.
+
+She bowed to the people again, and went into her house, and Sizov,
+drooping his head, went in with her.
+
+The people stood at the gates and talked.  Then they began to depart
+slowly and quietly.
+
+
+
+
+
+PART II
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+
+The day passed in a motley blur of recollections, in a depressing
+state of exhaustion, which tightly clutched at the mother's body and
+soul.  The faces of the young men flashed before her mental vision,
+the banner blazed, the songs clamored at her ear, the little officer
+skipped about, a gray stain before her eyes, and through the
+whirlwind of the procession she saw the gleam of Pavel's bronzed
+face and the smiling sky-blue eyes of Andrey.
+
+She walked up and down the room, sat at the window, looked out into
+the street, and walked away again with lowered eyebrows.  Every now
+and then she started, and looked about in an aimless search for
+something.  She drank water, but could not slake her thirst, nor
+quench the smoldering fire of anguish and injury in her bosom.
+The day was chopped in two.  It began full of meaning and content,
+but now it dribbled away into a dismal waste, which stretched before
+her endlessly.  The question swung to and fro in her barren, perplexed
+mind:
+
+"What now?"
+
+Korsunova came in.  Waving her hands, she shouted, wept, and went
+into raptures; stamped her feet, suggested this and that, made
+promises, and threw out threats against somebody.  All this failed
+to impress the mother.
+
+"Aha!" she heard the squeaking voice of Marya.  "So the people have
+been stirred up!  At last the whole factory has arisen!  All have arisen!"
+
+"Yes, yes!" said the mother in a low voice, shaking her head.  Her
+eyes were fixed on something that had already fallen into the past,
+had departed from her along with Andrey and Pavel.  She was unable
+to weep.  Her heart was dried up, her lips, too, were dry, and her
+mouth was parched.  Her hands shook, and a cold, fine shiver ran
+down her back, setting her skin aquiver.
+
+In the evening the gendarmes came.  She met them without surprise
+and without fear.  They entered noisily, with a peculiarly jaunty
+air, and with a look of gayety and satisfaction in their faces.  The
+yellow-faced officer said, displaying his teeth:
+
+"Well, how are you?  The third time I have the honor, eh?"
+
+She was silent, passing her dry tongue along her lips.  The officer
+talked a great deal, delivering a homily to her.  The mother realized
+what pleasure he derived from his words.  But they did not reach her;
+they did not disturb her; they were like the insistent chirp of a
+cricket.  It was only when he said:  "It's your own fault, little
+mother, that you weren't able to inspire your son with reverence
+for God and the Czar," that she answered dully, standing at the door
+and looking at him:  "Yes, our children are our judges.  They visit
+just punishment upon us for abandoning them on such a road."
+
+"Wha-at?" shouted the officer.  "Louder!"
+
+"I say, the children are our judges," the mother repeated with a sigh.
+
+He said something quickly and angrily, but his words buzzed around her
+without touching her.  Marya Korsunova was a witness.  She stood beside
+the mother, but did not look at her; and when the officer turned to her
+with a question, she invariably answered with a hasty, low bow:  "I
+don't know, your Honor.  I am just a simple, ignorant woman.  I make
+my living by peddling, stupid as I am, and I know nothing."
+
+"Shut up, then!" commanded the officer.
+
+She was ordered to search Vlasova.  She blinked her eyes, then
+opened them wide on the officer, and said in fright:
+
+"I can't, your Honor!"
+
+The officer stamped his feet and began to shout.  Marya lowered her
+eyes, and pleaded with the mother softly:
+
+"Well, what can be done?  You have to submit, Pelagueya Nilovna."
+
+As she searched and felt the mother's dress, the blood mounting to
+her face, she murmured:
+
+"Oh, the dogs!"
+
+"What are you jabbering about there?" the officer cried rudely,
+looking into the corner where she was making the search.
+
+"It's about women's affairs, your Honor," mumbled Marya, terrorized.
+
+On his order to sign the search warrant the mother, with unskilled
+hand, traced on the paper in printed shining letters:
+
+"Pelagueya Nilovna, widow of a workingman."
+
+They went away, and the mother remained standing at the window.
+With her hands folded over her breast, she gazed into vacancy
+without winking, her eyebrows raised.  Her lips were compressed,
+her jaws so tightly set that her teeth began to pain her.  The oil
+burned down in the lamp, the light flared up for a moment, and then
+went out.  She blew on it, and remained in the dark.  She felt no
+malice, she harbored no sense of injury in her heart.  A dark, cold
+cloud of melancholy settled on her breast, and impeded the beating
+of her heart.  Her mind was a void.  She stood at the window a long
+time; her feet and eyes grew weary.  She heard Marya stop at the
+window, and shout:  "Are you asleep, Pelagueya?  You unfortunate,
+suffering woman, sleep!  They abuse everybody, the heretics!"  At
+last she dropped into bed without undressing, and quickly fell into
+a heavy sleep, as if she had plunged into a deep abyss.
+
+She dreamed she saw a yellow sandy mound beyond the marsh on the
+road to the city.  At the edge, which descended perpendicularly to
+the ditch, from which sand was being taken, stood Pavel singing
+softly and sonorously with the voice of Andrey:
+
+"Rise up, awake, you workingmen!"
+
+She walked past the mound along the road to the city, and putting
+her hand to her forehead looked at her son.  His figure was clearly
+and sharply outlined against the sky.  She could not make up her
+mind to go up to him.  She was ashamed because she was pregnant.
+And she held an infant in her arms, besides.  She walked farther on.
+Children were playing ball in the field.  There were many of them,
+and the ball was a red one.  The infant threw himself forward out of
+her arms toward them, and began to cry aloud.  She gave him the
+breast, and turned back.  Now soldiers were already at the mound,
+and they turned the bayonets against her.  She ran quickly to the
+church standing in the middle of the field, the white, light church
+that seemed to be constructed out of clouds, and was immeasurably
+high.  A funeral was going on there.  The coffin was wide, black,
+and tightly covered with a lid.  The priest and deacon walked around
+in white canonicals and sang:
+
+"Christ has arisen from the dead."
+
+The deacon carried the incense, bowed to her, and smiled.  His hair
+was glaringly red, and his face jovial, like Samoylov's.  From the
+top of the dome broad sunbeams descended to the ground.  In both
+choirs the boys sang softly:
+
+"Christ has arisen from the dead."
+
+"Arrest them!" the priest suddenly cried, standing up in the middle
+of the church.  His vestments vanished from his body, and a gray,
+stern mustache appeared on his face.  All the people started to run,
+and the deacon, flinging the censer aside, rushed forward, seizing
+his head in his hands like the Little Russian.  The mother dropped
+the infant on the ground at the feet of the people.  They ran to the
+side of her, timidly regarding the naked little body.  She fell on
+her knees and shouted to them:  "Don't abandon the child!  Take it
+with you!"
+
+"Christ has arisen from the dead," the Little Russian sang, holding
+his hands behind his back, and smiling.  He bent down, took the
+child, and put it on the wagon loaded with timber, at the side of
+which Nikolay was walking slowly, shaking with laughter.  He said:
+
+"They have given me hard work."
+
+The street was muddy, the people thrust their faces from the windows
+of the houses, and whistled, shouted, waved their hands.  The day
+was clear, the sun shone brightly, and there was not a single shadow
+anywhere.
+
+"Sing, mother!" said the Little Russian.  "Oh, what a life!"
+
+And he sang, drowning all the other sounds with his kind, laughing
+voice.  The mother walked behind him, and complained:
+
+"Why does he make fun of me?"
+
+But suddenly she stumbled and fell in a bottomless abyss.  Fearful
+shrieks met her in her descent.
+
+She awoke, shivering and yet perspiring.  She put her ear, as it
+were, to her own breast, and marveled at the emptiness that
+prevailed there.  The whistle blew insistently.  From its sound she
+realized that it was already the second summons.  The room was all
+in disorder; the books and clothes lay about in confusion;
+everything was turned upside down, and dirt was trampled over the
+entire floor.
+
+She arose, and without washing or praying began to set the room in
+order.  In the kitchen she caught sight of the stick with the piece
+of red cloth.  She seized it angrily, and was about to throw it away
+under the oven, but instead, with a sigh, removed the remnant of the
+flag from the pole, folded it carefully, and put it in her pocket.
+Then she began to wash the windows with cold water, next the floor,
+and finally herself; then dressed herself and prepared the samovar.
+She sat down at the window in the kitchen, and once more the question
+came to her:
+
+"What now?  What am I to do now?"
+
+Recollecting that she had not yet said her prayers, she walked up
+to the images, and after standing before them for a few seconds,
+she sat down again.  Her heart was empty.
+
+The pendulum, which always beat with an energy seeming to say:  "I
+must get to the goal!  I must get to the goal!" slackened its hasty
+ticking.  The flies buzzed irresolutely, as if pondering a certain
+plan of action.
+
+Suddenly she recalled a picture she had once seen in the days of
+her youth.  In the old park of the Zansaylovs, there was a large
+pond densely overgrown with water lilies.  One gray day in the fall,
+while walking along the pond, she had seen a boat in the middle of
+it.  The pond was dark and calm, and the boat seemed glued to the
+black water, thickly strewn with yellow leaves.  Profound sadness
+and a vague sense of misfortune were wafted from that boat without a
+rower and without oars, standing alone and motionless out there on
+the dull water amid the dead leaves.  The mother had stood a long
+time at the edge of the pond meditating as to who had pushed the
+boat from the shore and why.  Now it seemed to her that she herself
+was like that boat, which at the time had reminded her of a coffin
+waiting for its dead.  In the evening of the same day she had
+learned that the wife of one of Zansaylov's clerks had been drowned
+in the pond--a little woman with black disheveled hair, who always
+walked at a brisk gait.
+
+The mother passed her hands over her eyes as if to rub her
+reminiscences away, and her thoughts fluttered like a varicolored
+ribbon.  Overcome by her impressions of the day before, she sat for
+a long time, her eyes fixed upon the cup of tea grown cold.  Gradually
+the desire came to see some wise, simple person, speak to him, and
+ask him many things.
+
+As if in answer to her wish, Nikolay Ivanovich came in after dinner.
+When she saw him, however, she was suddenly seized with alarm, and
+failed to respond to his greeting.
+
+"Oh, my friend," she said softly, "there was no use for you to come
+here.  If they arrest you here, too, then that will be the end of
+Pasha altogether.  It's very careless of you!  They'll take you
+without fail if they see you here."
+
+He clasped her hand tightly, adjusted his glasses on his nose, and
+bending his face close to her, explained to her in haste:
+
+"I made an agreement with Pavel and Andrey, that if they were
+arrested, I must see that you move over to the city the very next
+day."  He spoke kindly, but with a troubled air.  "Did they make a
+search in your house?"
+
+"They did.  They rummaged, searched, and nosed around.  Those people
+have no shame, no conscience!" exclaimed the mother indignantly.
+
+"What do they need shame for?" said Nikolay with a shrug of his
+shoulders, and explained to her the necessity of her going to the city.
+
+His friendly, solicitous talk moved and agitated her.  She looked
+at him with a pale smile, and wondered at the kindly feeling of
+confidence he inspired in her.
+
+"If Pasha wants it, and I'll be no inconvenience to you----"
+
+"Don't be uneasy on that score.  I live all alone; my sister comes
+over only rarely."
+
+"I'm not going to eat my head off for nothing," she said, thinking aloud.
+
+"If you want to work, you'll find something to do."  Her conception
+of work was now indissolubly connected with the work that her son,
+Andrey, and their comrades were doing.  She moved a little toward
+Nikolay, and looking in his eyes, asked:
+
+"Yes?  You say work will be found for me?"
+
+"My household is a small one, I am a bachelor----"
+
+"I'm not talking about that, not about housework," she said quietly.
+"I mean world work."
+
+And she heaved a melancholy sigh, stung and repelled by his failure
+to understand her.  He rose, and bending toward her, with a smile in
+his nearsighted eyes, he said thoughtfully, "You'll find a place for
+yourself in the work world, too, if you want it."
+
+Her mind quickly formulated the simple and clear thought:  "Once I
+was able to help Pavel; perhaps I will succeed again.  The greater
+the number of those who work for his cause, the clearer will his
+truth come out before the people."
+
+But these thoughts did not fully express the whole force and
+complexity of her desire.
+
+"What could I do?" she asked quietly.
+
+He thought a while, and then began to explain the technical details
+of the revolutionary work.  Among other things, he said:
+
+"If, when you go to see Pavel in prison, you tried to find out from
+him the address of the peasant who asked for a newspaper----"
+
+"I know it!" exclaimed the mother in delight.  "I know where they
+are, and who they are.  Give me the papers, I'll deliver them.  I'll
+find the peasants, and do everything just as you say.  Who will
+think that I carry illegal books?  I carried books to the factory.
+I smuggled in more than a hundred pounds, Heaven be praised!"
+
+The desire came upon her to travel along the road, through forests
+and villages, with a birch-bark sack over her shoulders, and a
+staff in her hand.
+
+"Now, you dear, dear man, you just arrange it for me, arrange it so
+that I can work in this movement.  I'll go everywhere for you!  I'll
+keep going summer and winter, down to my very grave, a pilgrim for
+the sake of truth.  Why, isn't that a splendid lot for a woman like
+me?  The wanderer's life is a good life.  He goes about through the
+world, he has nothing, he needs nothing except bread, no one abuses
+him, and so quietly, unnoticed, he roves over the earth.  And so
+I'll go, too; I'll go to Andrey, to Pasha, wherever they live."
+
+She was seized with sadness when she saw herself homeless, begging
+for alms, in the name of Christ, at the windows of the village cottages.
+
+Nikolay took her hand gently, and stroked it with his warm hand.
+Then, looking at the watch, he said:
+
+"We'll speak about that later.  You are taking a dangerous burden
+upon your shoulders.  You must consider very carefully what you
+intend doing."
+
+"My dear man, what have I to consider?  What have I to live for
+if not for this cause?  Of what use am I to anybody?  A tree grows,
+it gives shade; it's split into wood, and it warms people.  Even
+a mere dumb tree is helpful to life, and I am a human being.  The
+children, the best blood of man, the best there is of our hearts,
+give up their liberty and their lives, perish without pity for
+themselves!  And I, a mother--am I to stand by and do nothing?"
+
+The picture of her son marching at the head of the crowd with the
+banner in his hands flashed before her mind.
+
+"Why should I lie idle when my son gives up his life for the sake
+of truth?  I know now--I know that he is working for the truth.
+It's the fifth year now that I live beside the woodpile.  My heart
+has melted and begun to burn.  I understand what you are striving
+for.  I see what a burden you all carry on your shoulders.  Take me
+to you, too, for the sake of Christ, that I may be able to help
+my son!  Take me to you!"
+
+Nikolay's face grew pale; he heaved a deep sigh, and smiling, said,
+looking at her with sympathetic attention:
+
+"This is the first time I've heard such words."
+
+"What can I say?" she replied, shaking her head sadly, and spreading
+her hands in a gesture of impotence.  "If I had the words to express
+my mother's heart--"  She arose, lifted by the power that waxed in
+her breast, intoxicated her, and gave her the words to express her
+indignation.  "Then many and many a one would weep, and even the
+wicked, the men without conscience would tremble!  I would make them
+taste gall, even as they made Christ drink of the cup of bitterness,
+and as they now do our children.  They have bruised a mother's heart!"
+
+Nikolay rose, and pulling his little beard with trembling fingers,
+he said slowly in an unfamiliar tone of voice:
+
+"Some day you will speak to them, I think!"
+
+He started, looked at his watch again, and asked in a hurry:
+
+"So it's settled?  You'll come over to me in the city?"
+
+She silently nodded her head.
+
+"When?  Try to do it as soon as possible."  And he added in a tender
+voice:  "I'll be anxious for you; yes, indeed!"
+
+She looked at him in surprise.  What was she to him?  With bent
+head, smiling in embarrassment, he stood before her, dressed in a
+simple black jacket, stooping, nearsighted.
+
+"Have you money?" he asked, dropping his eyes.
+
+"No."
+
+He quickly whipped his purse out of his pocket, opened it, and
+handed it to her.
+
+"Here, please take some."
+
+She smiled involuntarily, and shaking her head, observed:
+
+"Everything about all of you is different from other people.  Even
+money has no value for you.  People do anything to get money; they
+kill their souls for it.  But for you money is so many little pieces
+of paper, little bits of copper.  You seem to keep it by you just
+out of kindness to people."
+
+Nikolay Ivanovich laughed softly.
+
+"It's an awfully bothersome article, money is.  Both to take it
+and to give it is embarrassing."
+
+He caught her hand, pressed it warmly, and asked again:
+
+"So you will try to come soon, won't you?"
+
+And he walked away quietly, as was his wont.
+
+She got herself ready to go to him on the fourth day after his
+visit.  When the cart with her two trunks rolled out of the village
+into the open country, she turned her head back, and suddenly had
+the feeling that she was leaving the place forever--the place where
+she had passed the darkest and most burdensome period of her life,
+the place where that other varied life had begun, in which the next
+day swallowed up the day before, and each was filled by an abundance
+of new sorrows and new joys, new thoughts and new feelings.
+
+The factory spread itself like a huge, clumsy, dark-red, spider,
+raising its lofty smokestacks high up into the sky.  The small
+one-storied houses pressed against it, gray, flattened out on the
+soot-covered ground, and crowded up in close clusters on the edge
+of the marsh.  They looked sorrowfully at one another with their
+little dull windows.  Above them rose the church, also dark red
+like the factory.  The belfry, it seemed to her, was lower than
+the factory chimneys.
+
+The mother sighed, and adjusted the collar of her dress, which
+choked her.  She felt sad, but it was a dry sadness like the dust
+of the hot day.
+
+"Gee!" mumbled the driver, shaking the reins over the horse.  He was
+a bow-legged man of uncertain height, with sparse, faded hair on his
+face and head, and faded eyes.  Swinging from side to side he walked
+alongside the wagon.  It was evidently a matter of indifference to
+him whether he went to the right or the left.
+
+"Gee!" he called in a colorless voice, with a comical forward stride
+of his crooked legs clothed in heavy boots, to which clods of mud
+were clinging.  The mother looked around.  The country was as bleak
+and dreary as her soul.
+
+"You'll never escape want, no matter where you go, auntie," the
+driver said dully.  "There's no road leading away from poverty;
+all roads lead to it, and none out of it."
+
+Shaking its head dejectedly the horse sank its feet heavily into the
+deep sun-dried sand, which crackled softly under its tread.  The
+rickety wagon creaked for lack of greasing.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+
+Nikolay Ivanovich lived on a quiet, deserted street, in a little
+green wing annexed to a black two-storied structure swollen with
+age.  In front of the wing was a thickly grown little garden, and
+branches of lilac bushes, acacias, and silvery young poplars looked
+benignly and freshly into the windows of the three rooms occupied by
+Nikolay.  It was quiet and tidy in his place.  The shadows trembled
+mutely on the floor, shelves closely set with books stretched across
+the walls, and portraits of stern, serious persons hung over them.
+
+"Do you think you'll find it convenient here?" asked Nikolay,
+leading the mother into a little room with one window giving on the
+garden and another on the grass-grown yard.  In this room, too, the
+walls were lined with bookcases and bookshelves.
+
+"I'd rather be in the kitchen," she said.  "The little kitchen is
+bright and clean."
+
+It seemed to her that he grew rather frightened.  And when she
+yielded to his awkward and embarrassed persuasions to take the
+room, he immediately cheered up.
+
+There was a peculiar atmosphere pervading all the three rooms.  It
+was easy and pleasant to breathe in them; but one's voice involuntarily
+dropped a note in the wish not to speak aloud and intrude upon the
+peaceful thoughtfulness of the people who sent down a concentrated
+look from the walls.
+
+"The flowers need watering," said the mother, feeling the earth in
+the flowerpots in the windows.
+
+"Yes, yes," said the master guiltily.  "I love them very much, but
+I have no time to take care of them."
+
+The mother noticed that Nikolay walked about in his own comfortable
+quarters just as carefully and as noiselessly as if he were a
+stranger, and as if all that surrounded him were remote from him.
+He would pick up and examine some small article, such as a bust,
+bring it close to his face, and scrutinize it minutely, adjusting
+his glasses with the thin finger of his right hand, and screwing up
+his eyes.  He had the appearance of just having entered the rooms
+for the first time, and everything seemed as unfamiliar and strange
+to him as to the mother.  Consequently, the mother at once felt
+herself at home.  She followed Nikolay, observing where each thing
+stood, and inquiring about his ways and habits of life.  He answered
+with the guilty air of a man who knows he is all the time doing
+things as they ought not to be done, but cannot help himself.
+
+After she had watered the flowers and arranged the sheets of music
+scattered in disorder over the piano, she looked at the samovar,
+and remarked, "It needs polishing."
+
+Nikolay ran his finger over the dull metal, then stuck the finger
+close to his nose.  He looked at the mother so seriously that she
+could not restrain a good-natured smile.
+
+When she lay down to sleep and thought of the day just past, she
+raised her head from the pillow in astonishment and looked around.
+For the first time in her life she was in the house of a stranger,
+and she did not experience the least constraint.  Her mind dwelt
+solicitously on Nikolay.  She had a distinct desire to do the best
+she could for him, and to introduce more warmth into his lonely life.
+She was stirred and affected by his embarrassed awkwardness and droll
+ignorance, and smiled to herself with a sigh.  Then her thoughts
+leaped to her son and to Andrey.  She recalled the high-pitched,
+sparkling voice of Fedya, and gradually the whole day of the first
+of May unrolled itself before her, clothed in new sounds, reflecting
+new thoughts.  The trials of the day were peculiar as the day itself.
+They did not bring her head to the ground as with the dull, stunning
+blow of the fist.  They stabbed the heart with a thousand pricks, and
+called forth in her a quiet wrath, opening her eyes and straightening
+her backbone.
+
+"Children go in the world," she thought as she listened to the
+unfamiliar nocturnal sounds of the city.  They crept through the
+open window like a sigh from afar, stirring the leaves in the garden
+and faintly expiring in the room.
+
+Early in the morning she polished up the samovar, made a fire in it,
+and filled it with water, and noiselessly placed the dishes on the
+table.  Then she sat down in the kitchen and waited for Nikolay to
+rise.  Presently she heard him cough.  He appeared at the door,
+holding his glasses in one hand, the other hand at his throat.  She
+responded to his greeting, and brought the samovar into the room.  He
+began to wash himself, splashing the water on the floor, dropping the
+soap and his toothbrush, and grumbling in dissatisfaction at himself.
+
+When they sat down to drink tea, he said to the mother:
+
+"I am employed in the Zemstvo board--a very sad occupation.  I see
+the way our peasants are going to ruin."
+
+And smiling he repeated guiltily:  "It's literally so--I see!
+People go hungry, they lie down in their graves prematurely, starved
+to death, children are born feeble and sick, and drop like flies in
+autumn--we know all this, we know the causes of this wretchedness,
+and for observing it we receive a good salary.  But that's all we
+do, really; truly all we do."
+
+"And what are you, a student?"
+
+"No.  I'm a village teacher.  My father was superintendent in a mill
+in Vyatka, and I became a teacher.  But I began to give books to the
+peasants in the village, and was put in prison for it.  When I came
+out of prison I became clerk in a bookstore, but not behaving
+carefully enough I got myself into prison again, and was then exiled
+to Archangel.  There I also got into trouble with the governor, and
+they sent me to the White Sea coast, where I lived for five years."
+
+His talk sounded calm and even in the bright room flooded with
+sunlight.  The mother had already heard many such stories; but she
+could never understand why they were related with such composure,
+why no blame was laid on anybody for the suffering the people had
+gone through, why these sufferings were regarded as so inevitable.
+
+"My sister is coming to-day," he announced.
+
+"Is she married?"
+
+"She's a widow.  Her husband was exiled to Siberia; but he escaped,
+caught a severe cold on the way, and died abroad two years ago."
+
+"Is she younger than you?"
+
+"Six years older.  I owe a great deal to her.  Wait, and you'll
+hear how she plays.  That's her piano.  There are a whole lot of
+her things here, my books----"
+
+"Where does she live?"
+
+"Everywhere," he answered with a smile.  "Wherever a brave soul is
+needed, there's where you'll find her."
+
+"Also in this movement?"
+
+"Yes, of course."
+
+He soon left to go to work, and the mother fell to thinking of
+"that movement" for which the people worked, day in, day out,
+calmly and resolutely.  When confronting them she seemed to stand
+before a mountain looming in the dark.
+
+About noon a tall, well-built lady came.  When the mother opened the
+door for her she threw a little yellow valise on the floor, and
+quickly seizing Vlasova's hand, asked:
+
+"Are you the mother of Pavel Mikhaylovich?"
+
+"Yes, I am," the mother replied, embarrassed by the lady's rich appearance.
+
+"That's the way I imagined you," said the lady, removing her hat in
+front of the mirror.  "We have been friends of Pavel Mikhaylovich a
+long time.  He spoke about you often."
+
+Her voice was somewhat dull, and she spoke slowly; but her movements
+were quick and vigorous.  Her large, limpid gray eyes smiled
+youthfully; on her temples, however, thin radiate wrinkles were
+already limned, and silver hairs glistened over her ears.
+
+"I'm hungry; can I have a cup of coffee?"
+
+"I'll make it for you at once."  The mother took down the coffee
+apparatus from the shelf and quietly asked:
+
+"DID Pasha speak about me?"
+
+"Yes, indeed, a great deal."  The lady took out a little leather
+cigarette case, lighted a cigarette, and inquired:  "You're
+extremely uneasy about him, aren't you?"
+
+The mother smiled, watching the blue, quivering flame of the spirit
+lamp.  Her embarrassment at the presence of the lady vanished in the
+depths of her joy.
+
+"So he talks about me, my dear son!" she thought.
+
+"You asked me whether I'm uneasy?  Of course, it's not easy for me.
+But it would have been worse some time ago; now I know that he's not
+alone, and that even I am not alone."  Looking into the lady's face,
+she asked: "What is your name?"
+
+"Sofya," the lady answered, and began to speak in a businesslike way.
+"The most important thing is that they should not stay in prison long,
+but that the trial should come off very soon.  The moment they are
+exiled, we'll arrange an escape for Pavel Mikhaylovich.  There's
+nothing for him to do in Siberia, and he's indispensable here."
+
+The mother incredulously regarded Sofya, who was searching about for
+a place into which to drop her cigarette stump, and finally threw it
+in a flowerpot.
+
+"That'll spoil the flowers," the mother remarked mechanically.
+
+"Excuse me," said Sofya simply.  "Nikolay always tells me the same
+thing."  She picked up the stump and threw it out of the window.
+The mother looked at her in embarrassment, and said guiltily:
+
+"You must excuse me.  I said it without thinking.  Is it in my place
+to teach you?"
+
+"Why not?  Why not teach me, if I'm a sloven?"  Sofya calmly queried
+with a shrug.  "I know it; but I always forget--the worse for me.
+It's an ugly habit--to throw cigarette stumps any and everywhere,
+and to litter up places with ashes--particularly in a woman.
+Cleanliness in a room is the result of work, and all work ought to
+be respected.  Is the coffee ready?  Thank you!  Why one cup?  Won't
+you have any?"  Suddenly seizing the mother by the shoulder, she
+drew her to herself, and looking into her eyes asked in surprise:
+"Why, are you embarrassed?"
+
+The mother answered with a smile:
+
+"I just blamed you for throwing the cigarette stump away--does that
+look as if I were embarrassed?"  Her surprise was unconcealed.  "I
+came to your house only yesterday, but I behave as if I were at
+home, and as if I had known you a long time.  I'm afraid of nothing;
+I say anything.  I even find fault."
+
+"That's the way it ought to be."
+
+"My head's in a whirl.  I seem to be a stranger to myself.  Formerly
+I didn't dare speak out from my heart until I'd been with a person a
+long, long time.  And now my heart is always open, and I at once say
+things I wouldn't have dreamed of before, and a lot of things, too."
+Sofya lit another cigarette, turning the kind glance of her gray
+eyes on the mother.  "Yes, you speak of arranging an escape.  But
+how will he be able to live as a fugitive?"  The mother finally gave
+expression to the thought that was agitating her.
+
+"That's a trifle," Sofya remarked, pouring out a cup of coffee for
+herself.  "He'll live as scores of other fugitives live.  I just met
+one, and saw him off.  Another very valuable man, who worked for the
+movement in the south.  He was exiled for five years, but remained
+only three and a half months.  That's why I look such a grande dame.
+Do you think I always dress this way?  I can't bear this fine toggery,
+this sumptuous rustle.  A human being is simple by nature, and should
+dress simply--beautifully but simply."
+
+The mother looked at her fixedly, smiled, and shaking her head
+meditatively said:
+
+"No, it seems that day, the first of May, has changed me.  I feel
+awkward somehow or other, as if I were walking on two roads at the
+same time.  At one moment I understand everything; the next moment I
+am plunged into a mist.  Here are you!  I see you a lady; you occupy
+yourself with this movement, you know Pasha, and you esteem him.
+Thank you!"
+
+"Why, you ought to be thanked!" Sofya laughed.
+
+"I?  I didn't teach him about the movement," the mother said with a
+sigh.  "As I speak now," she continued stubbornly, "everything seems
+simple and near.  Then, all of a sudden, I cannot understand this
+simplicity.  Again, I'm calm.  In a second I grow fearful, because I
+AM calm.  I always used to be afraid, my whole life long; but now
+that there's a great deal to be afraid of, I have very little fear.
+Why is it?  I cannot understand."  She stopped, at a loss for words.
+Sofya looked at her seriously, and waited; but seeing that the
+mother was agitated, unable to find the expression she wanted, she
+herself took up the conversation.
+
+"A time will come when you'll understand everything.  The chief
+thing that gives a person power and faith in himself is when he
+begins to love a certain cause with all his heart, and knows it is
+a good cause of use to everybody.  There IS such a love.  There's
+everything.  There's no human being too mean to love.  But it's time
+for me to be getting out of all this magnificence."
+
+Putting the stump of her cigarette in the saucer, she shook her
+head.  Her golden hair fell back in thick waves.  She walked away
+smiling.  The mother followed her with her eyes, sighed, and looked
+around.  Her thoughts came to a halt, and in a half-drowsy,
+oppressive condition of quiet, she began to get the dishes together.
+
+At four o'clock Nikolay appeared.  Then they dined.  Sofya, laughing
+at times, told how she met and concealed the fugitive, how she
+feared the spies, and saw one in every person she met, and how
+comically the fugitive conducted himself.  Something in her tone
+reminded the mother of the boasting of a workingman who had
+completed a difficult piece of work to his own satisfaction.  She
+was now dressed in a flowing, dove-colored robe, which fell from her
+shoulders to her feet in warm waves.  The effect was soft and
+noiseless.  She appeared to be taller in this dress; her eyes seemed
+darker, and her movements less nervous.
+
+"Now, Sofya," said Nikolay after dinner, "here's another job for
+you.  You know we undertook to publish a newspaper for the village.
+But our connection with the people there was broken, thanks to the
+latest arrests.  No one but Pelagueya Nilovna can show us the man
+who will undertake the distribution of the newspapers.  You go with
+her.  Do it as soon as possible."
+
+"Very well," said Sofya.  "We'll go, Pelagueya Nilovna."
+
+"Yes, we'll go."
+
+"Is it far?"
+
+"About fifty miles."
+
+"Splendid!  And now I'm going to play a little.  Do you mind
+listening to music, Pelagueya Nilovna?"
+
+"Don't bother about me.  Act as if I weren't here," said the mother,
+seating herself in the corner of the sofa.  She saw that the brother
+and the sister went on with their affairs without giving heed to her;
+yet, at the same time, she seemed involuntarily to mix in their
+conversation, imperceptibly drawn into it by them.
+
+"Listen to this, Nikolay.  It's by Grieg.  I brought it to-day.
+Shut the window."
+
+She opened the piano, and struck the keys lightly with her left
+hand.  The strings sang out a thick, juicy melody.  Another note,
+breathing a deep, full breath, joined itself to the first, and
+together they formed a vast fullness of sound that trembled beneath
+its own weight.  Strange, limpid notes rang out from under the
+fingers of her right hand, and darted off in an alarming flight,
+swaying and rocking and beating against one another like a swarm of
+frightened birds.  And in the dark background the low notes sang in
+measured, harmonious cadence like the waves of the sea exhausted by
+the storm.  Some one cried out, a loud, agitated, woeful cry of
+rebellion, questioned and appealed in impotent anguish, and, losing
+hope, grew silent; and then again sang his rueful plaints, now
+resonant and clear, now subdued and dejected.  In response to this
+song came the thick waves of dark sound, broad and resonant,
+indifferent and hopeless.  They drowned by their depth and force the
+swarm of ringing wails; questions, appeals, groans blended in the
+alarming song.  At times the music seemed to take a desperate upward
+flight, sobbing and lamenting, and again precipitated itself, crept
+low, swung hither and thither on the dense, vibratory current of
+bass notes, foundered, and disappeared in them; and once more
+breaking through to an even cadence, in a hopeless, calm rumble, it
+grew in volume, pealed forth, and melted and dissolved in the broad
+flourish of humid notes--which continued to sigh with equal force
+and calmness, never wearying.
+
+At first the sounds failed to touch the mother.  They were
+incomprehensible to her, nothing but a ringing chaos.  Her ear
+could not gather a melody from the intricate mass of notes.  Half
+asleep she looked at Nikolay sitting with his feet crossed under
+him at the other end of the long sofa, and at the severe profile
+of Sofya with her head enveloped in a mass of golden hair.  The
+sun shone into the room.  A single ray, trembling pensively, at
+first lighted up her hair and shoulder, then settled upon the keys
+of the piano, and quivered under the pressure of her fingers.  The
+branches of the acacia rocked to and fro outside the window.  The
+room became music-filled, and unawares to her, the mother's heart
+was stirred.  Three notes of nearly the same pitch, resonant as the
+voice of Fedya Mazin, sparkled in the stream of sounds, like three
+silvery fish in a brook.  At times another note united with these
+in a simple song, which enfolded the heart in a kind yet sad caress.
+She began to watch for them, to await their warble, and she heard
+only their music, distinguished from the tumultuous chaos of sound,
+to which her ears gradually became deaf.
+
+And for some reason there rose before her out of the obscure depths
+of her past, wrongs long forgotten.
+
+Once her husband came home late, extremely intoxicated.  He grasped
+her hand, threw her from the bed to the floor, kicked her in the
+side with his foot, and said:
+
+"Get out!  I'm sick of you!  Get out!"
+
+In order to protect herself from his blows, she quickly gathered
+her two-year-old son into her arms, and kneeling covered herself
+with his body as with a shield.  He cried, struggled in her arms,
+frightened, naked, and warm.
+
+"Get out!" bellowed her husband.
+
+She jumped to her feet, rushed into the kitchen, threw a jacket
+over her shoulders, wrapped the baby in a shawl, and silently,
+without outcries or complaints, barefoot, in nothing but a shirt
+under her jacket, walked out into the street.  It was in the month
+of May, and the night was fresh.  The cold, damp dust of the street
+stuck to her feet, and got between her toes.  The child wept and
+struggled.  She opened her breast, pressed her son to her body, and
+pursued by fear walked down the street, quietly lulling the baby.
+
+It began to grow light.  She was afraid and ashamed lest some one
+come out on the street and see her half naked.  She turned toward
+the marsh, and sat down on the ground under a thick group of aspens.
+She sat there for a long time, embraced by the night, motionless,
+looking into the darkness with wide-open eyes, and timidly wailing
+a lullaby--a lullaby for her baby, which had fallen asleep, and a
+lullaby for her outraged heart.
+
+A gray bird darted over her head, and flew far away.  It awakened
+her, and brought her to her feet.  Then, shivering with cold, she
+walked home to confront the horror of blows and new insults.
+
+For the last time a heavy and resonant chord heaved a deep breath,
+indifferent and cold; it sighed and died away.
+
+Sofya turned around, and asked her brother softly:
+
+"Did you like it?"
+
+"Very much," he said, nodding his head.  "Very much."
+
+Sofya looked at the mother's face, but said nothing.
+
+"They say," said Nikolay thoughtfully, throwing himself deeper
+back on the sofa, "that you should listen to music without thinking.
+But I can't."
+
+"Nor can I," said Sofya, striking a melodious chord.
+
+"I listened, and it seemed to me that people were putting their
+questions to nature, that they grieved and groaned, and protested
+angrily, and shouted, 'Why?'  Nature does not answer, but goes on
+calmly creating, incessantly, forever.  In her silence is heard her
+answer:  'I do not know.'"
+
+The mother listened to Nikolay's quiet words without understanding
+them, and without desiring to understand.  Her bosom echoed with her
+reminiscences, and she wanted more music.  Side by side with her
+memories the thought unfolded itself before her:  "Here live people,
+a brother and sister, in friendship; they live peacefully and calmly
+--they have music and books--they don't swear at each other--they
+don't drink whisky--they don't quarrel for a relish--they have no
+desire to insult each other, the way all the people at the bottom do."
+
+Sofya quickly lighted a cigarette; she smoked almost without intermission.
+
+"This used to be the favorite piece of Kostya," she said, as a veil
+of smoke quickly enveloped her.  She again struck a low mournful
+chord.  "How I used to love to play for him!  You remember how well
+he translated music into language?"  She paused and smiled.  "How
+sensitive he was!  What fine feelings he had--so responsive to
+everything--so fully a man!"
+
+"She must be recalling memories of her husband," the mother noted,
+"and she smiles!"
+
+"How much happiness that man gave me!" said Sofya in a low voice,
+accompanying her words with light sounds on the keys.  "What a
+capacity he had for living!  He was always aglow with joy, buoyant,
+childlike joy!"
+
+"Childlike," repeated the mother to herself, and shook her head as
+if agreeing with something.
+
+"Ye-es," said Nikolay, pulling his beard, "his soul was always singing."
+
+"When I played this piece for him the first time, he put it in these
+words."  Sofya turned her face to her brother, and slowly stretched
+out her arms.  Encircled with blue streaks of smoke, she spoke in a
+low, rapturous voice.  "In a barren sea of the far north, under the
+gray canopy of the cold heavens, stands a lonely black island, an
+unpeopled rock, covered with ice; the smoothly polished shore
+descends abruptly into the gray, foaming billows.  The transparently
+blue blocks of ice inhospitably float on the shaking cold water and
+press against the dark rock of the island.  Their knocking resounds
+mournfully in the dead stillness of the barren sea.  They have been
+floating a long time on the bottomless depths, and the waves
+splashing about them have quietly borne them toward the lonely rock
+in the midst of the sea.  The sound is grewsome as they break
+against the shore and against one another, sadly inquiring:  'Why?'"
+
+Sofya flung away the cigarette she had begun to smoke, turned to the
+piano, and again began to play the ringing plaints, the plaints of
+the lonely blocks of ice by the shore of the barren island in the
+sea of the far north.
+
+The mother was overcome with unendurable sadness as she listened to
+the simple sketch.  It blended strangely with her past, into which
+her recollections kept boring deeper and deeper.
+
+"In music one can hear everything," said Nikolay quietly.
+
+Sofya turned toward the mother, and asked:
+
+"Do you mind my noise?"
+
+The mother was unable to restrain her slight irritation.
+
+"I told you not to pay any attention to me.  I sit here and listen
+and think about myself."
+
+"No, you ought to understand," said Sofya.  "A woman can't help
+understanding music, especially when in grief."
+
+She struck the keys powerfully, and a loud shout went forth, as if
+some one had suddenly heard horrible news, which pierced him to the
+heart, and wrenched from him this troubled sound.  Young voices
+trembled in affright, people rushed about in haste, pellmell.  Again
+a loud, angry voice shouted out, drowning all other sounds.  Apparently
+a catastrophe had occurred, in which the chief source of pain was
+an affront offered to some one.  It evoked not complaints, but wrath.
+Then some kindly and powerful person appeared, who began to sing,
+just like Andrey, a simple beautiful song, a song of exhortation
+and summons to himself.  The voices of the bass notes grumbled in
+a dull, offended tone.
+
+Sofya played a long time.  The music disquieted the mother, and
+aroused in her a desire to ask of what it was speaking.  Indistinct
+sensations and thoughts passed through her mind in quick succession.
+Sadness and anxiety gave place to moments of calm joy.  A swarm of
+unseen birds seemed to be flying about in the room, penetrating
+everywhere, touching the heart with caressing wings, soothing and at
+the same time alarming it.  The feelings in the mother's breast
+could not be fixed in words.  They emboldened her heart with
+perplexed hopes, they fondled it in a fresh and firm embrace.
+
+A kindly impulse came to her to say something good both to these two
+persons and to all people in general.  She smiled softly,
+intoxicated by the music, feeling herself capable of doing work
+helpful to the brother and sister.  Her eyes roved about in search
+of something to do for them.  She saw nothing but to walk out into
+the kitchen quietly, and prepare the samovar.  But this did not
+satisfy her desire.  It struggled stubbornly in her breast, and as
+she poured out the tea she began to speak excitedly with an agitated
+smile.  She seemed to bestow the words as a warm caress impartially
+on Sofya and Nikolay and on herself.
+
+"We people at the bottom feel everything; but it is hard for us to
+speak out our hearts.  Our thoughts float about in us.  We are
+ashamed because, although we understand, we are not able to express
+them; and often from shame we are angry at our thoughts, and at
+those who inspire them.  We drive them away from ourselves.  For
+life, you see, is so troublesome.  From all sides we get blows and
+beatings; we want rest, and there come the thoughts that rouse our
+souls and demand things of us."
+
+Nikolay listened, and nodded his head, rubbing his eyeglasses
+briskly, while Sofya looked at her, her large eyes wide open and the
+forgotten cigarette burning to ashes.  She sat half turned from the
+piano, supple and shapely, at times touching the keys lightly with
+the slender fingers of her right hand.  The pensive chord blended
+delicately with the speech of the mother, as she quickly invested
+her new feelings and thoughts in simple, hearty words.
+
+"Now I am able to say something about myself, about my people,
+because I understand life.  I began to understand it when I was
+able to make comparisons.  Before that time there was nobody to
+compare myself with.  In our state, you see, all lead the same
+life, and now that I see how others live, I look back at my life,
+and the recollection is hard and bitter.  But it is impossible to
+return, and even if you could, you wouldn't find your youth again.
+And I think I understand a great deal.  Here, I am looking at you,
+and I recollect all your people whom I've seen."  She lowered her
+voice and continued:  "Maybe I don't say things right, and I needn't
+say them, because you know them yourself; but I'm just speaking for
+myself.  You at once set me alongside of you.  You don't need anything
+of me; you can't make use of me; you can't get any enjoyment out of
+me, I know it.  And day after day my heart grows, thank God!  It
+grows in goodness, and I wish good for everybody.  This is my thanks
+that I'm saying to you."  Tears of happy gratitude affected her voice,
+and looking at them with a smile in her eyes, she went on:  "I want to
+open my heart before you, so that you may see how I wish your welfare."
+
+"We see it," said Nikolay in a low voice.  "You're making a holiday
+for us."
+
+"What do you think I imagined?" the mother asked with a smile and
+lowering her voice.  "I imagined I found a treasure, and became
+rich, and I could endow everybody.  Maybe it's only my stupidity
+that's run away with me."
+
+"Don't speak like that," said Sofya seriously.  "You mustn't be ashamed."
+
+The mother began to speak again, telling Sofya and Nikolay of
+herself, her poor life, her wrongs, and patient sufferings.
+Suddenly she stopped in her narrative.  It seemed to her that she
+was turning aside, away from herself, and speaking about somebody
+else.  In simple words, without malice, with a sad smile on her
+lips, she drew the monotonous gray sketch of sorrowful days.  She
+enumerated the beatings she had received from her husband; and
+herself marveled at the trifling causes that led to them and her own
+inability to avert them.
+
+The brother and sister listened to her in attentive silence, impressed
+by the deep significance of the unadorned story of a human being,
+who was regarded as cattle are regarded, and who, without a murmur,
+for a long time felt herself to be that which she was held to be.
+It seemed to them as if thousands, nay millions, of lives spoke
+through her mouth.  Her existence had been commonplace and simple;
+but such is the simple, ordinary existence of multitudes, and her
+story, assuming ever larger proportions in their eyes, took on the
+significance of a symbol.  Nikolay, his elbows on the table, and
+his head leaning on his hands, looked at her through his glasses
+without moving, his eyes screwed up intently.  Sofya flung herself
+back on her chair.  Sometimes she trembled, and at times muttered
+to herself, shaking her head in disapproval.  Her face grew paler.
+Her eyes deepened.
+
+"Once I thought myself unhappy.  My life seemed a fever," said
+Sofya, inclining her head.  "That was when I was in exile.  It was
+in a small district town.  There was nothing to do, nothing to think
+about except myself.  I swept all my misfortunes together into one
+heap, and weighed them, from lack of anything better to do.  Then I
+quarreled with my father, whom I loved.  I was expelled from the
+gymnasium, and insulted--the prison, the treachery of a comrade near
+to me, the arrest of my husband, again prison and exile, the death
+of my husband.  But all my misfortunes, and ten times their number,
+are not worth a month of your life, Pelagueya Nilovna.  Your torture
+continued daily through years.  From where do the people draw their
+power to suffer?"
+
+"They get used to it," responded the mother with a sigh.
+
+"I thought I knew that life," said Nikolay softly.  "But when I
+hear it spoken of--not when my books, not when my incomplete
+impressions speak about it, but she herself with a living tongue--
+it is horrible.  And the details are horrible, the inanities, the
+seconds of which the years are made."
+
+The conversation sped along, thoughtfully and quietly.  It branched
+out and embraced the whole of common life on all sides.  The mother
+became absorbed in her recollections.  From her dim past she drew to
+light each daily wrong, and gave a massive picture of the huge, dumb
+horror in which her youth had been sunk.  Finally she said:
+
+"Oh!  How I've been chattering to you!  It's time for you to rest.
+I'll never be able to tell you all."
+
+The brother and sister took leave of her in silence.  Nikolay seemed
+to the mother to bow lower to her than ever before and to press her
+hand more firmly.  Sofya accompanied her to her room, and stopping
+at the door said softly:  "Now rest.  I hope you have a good night."
+
+Her voice blew a warm breath on the mother, and her gray eyes
+embraced the mother's face in a caress.  She took Sofya's hand and
+pressing it in hers, answered:  "Thank you!  You are good people."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+
+Three days passed in incessant conversations with Sofya and Nikolay.
+The mother continued to recount tales of the past, which stubbornly
+arose from the depths of her awakened soul, and disturbed even
+herself.  Her past demanded an explanation.  The attention with
+which the brother and sister listened to her opened her heart more
+and more widely, freeing her from the narrow, dark cage of her
+former life.
+
+On the fourth day, early in the morning, she and Sofya appeared
+before Nikolay as burgher women, poorly clad in worn chintz skirts
+and blouses, with birchbark sacks on their shoulders, and canes in
+their hands.  This costume reduced Sofya's height and gave a yet
+sterner appearance to her pale face.
+
+"You look as if you had walked about monasteries all your life,"
+observed Nikolay on taking leave of his sister, and pressed her hand
+warmly.  The mother again remarked the simplicity and calmness of
+their relation to each other.  It was hard for her to get used to
+it.  No kissing, no affectionate words passed between them; but they
+behaved so sincerely, so amicably and solicitously toward each
+other.  In the life she had been accustomed to, people kissed a
+great deal and uttered many sentimental words, but always bit at one
+another like hungry dogs.
+
+The women walked down the street in silence, reached the open
+country, and strode on side by side along the wide beaten road
+between a double row of birches.
+
+"Won't you get tired?" the mother asked.
+
+"Do you think I haven't done much walking?  All this is an old
+story to me."
+
+With a merry smile, as if speaking of some glorious childhood
+frolics, Sofya began to tell the mother of her revolutionary work.
+She had had to live under a changed name, use counterfeit documents,
+disguise herself in various costumes in order to hide from spies,
+carry hundreds and hundreds of pounds of illegal books through
+various cities, arrange escapes for comrades in exile, and escort
+them abroad.  She had had a printing press fixed up in her quarters,
+and when on learning of it the gendarmes appeared to make a search,
+she succeeded in a minute's time before their arrival in dressing
+as a servant, and walking out of the house just as her guests were
+entering at the gate.  She met them there.  Without an outer wrap,
+a light kerchief on her head, a tin kerosene can in her hand, she
+traversed the city from one end to the other in the biting cold of
+a winter's day.  Another time she had just arrived in a strange city
+to pay a visit to friends.  When she was already on the stairs
+leading to their quarters, she noticed that a search was being
+conducted in their apartments.  To turn back was too late.  Without
+a second's hesitation she boldly rang the bell at the door of a
+lower floor, and walked in with her traveling bag to unknown people.
+She frankly explained the position she was in.
+
+"You can hand me over to the gendarmes if you want to; but I don't
+think you will," she said confidently.
+
+The people were greatly frightened, and did not sleep the whole
+night.  Every minute they expected the sound of the gendarmes
+knocking at the door.  Nevertheless, they could not make up their
+minds to deliver her over to them, and the next morning they had a
+hearty laugh with her over the gendarmes.
+
+And once, dressed as a nun, she traveled in the same railroad coach,
+in fact, sat on the very same seat, with a spy, then in search of her.
+He boasted of his skill, and told her how he was conducting his
+search.  He was certain she was riding on the same train as himself,
+in a second-class coach; but at every stop, after walking out, he
+came back saying:  "Not to be seen.  She must have gone to bed.
+They, too, get tired.  Their life is a hard one, just like ours."
+
+The mother listening to her stories laughed, and regarded her
+affectionately.  Tall and dry, Sofya strode along the road lightly
+and firmly, at an even gait.  In her walk, her words, and the very
+sound of her voice--although a bit dull, it was yet bold--in all her
+straight and stolid figure, there was much of robust strength,
+jovial daring, and thirst for space and freedom.  Her eyes looked at
+everything with a youthful glance.  She constantly spied something
+that gladdened her heart with childlike joy.
+
+"See what a splendid pine!" she exclaimed, pointing out a tree
+to the mother.
+
+The mother looked and stopped.  It was a pine neither higher nor
+thicker than others.
+
+"Ye-es, ye-es, a good tree," she said, smiling.
+
+"Do you hear?  A lark!"  Sofya raised her head, and looked into
+the blue expanse of the sky for the merry songster.  Her gray eyes
+flashed with a fond glance, and her body seemed to rise from the
+ground to meet the music ringing from an unseen source in the
+far-distant height.  At times bending over, she plucked a field
+flower, and with light touches of her slender, agile fingers, she
+fondly stroked the quivering petals and hummed quietly and prettily.
+
+Over them burned the kindly spring sun.  The blue depths flashed
+softly.  At the sides of the road stretched a dark pine forest.  The
+fields were verdant, birds sang, and the thick, resinous atmosphere
+stroked the face warmly and tenderly.
+
+All this moved the mother's heart nearer to the woman with the
+bright eyes and the bright soul; and, trying to keep even pace with
+her, she involuntarily pressed close to Sofya, as if desiring to
+draw into herself her hearty boldness and freshness.
+
+"How young you are!" the mother sighed.
+
+"I'm thirty-two years old already!"
+
+Vlasova smiled.  "I'm not talking about that.  To judge by your
+face, one would say you're older; but one wonders that your eyes,
+your voice are so fresh, so springlike, as if you were a young girl.
+Your life is so bard and troubled, yet your heart is smiling."
+
+"The heart is smiling," repeated Sofya thoughtfully.  "How well you
+speak--simple and good.  A hard life, you say?  But I don't feel
+that it is hard, and I cannot imagine a better, a more interesting
+life than this."
+
+"What pleases me more than anything else is to see how you all know
+the roads to a human being's heart.  Everything in a person opens
+itself out to you without fear or caution--just so, all of itself,
+the heart throws itself open to meet you.  I'm thinking of all of
+you.  You overcome the evil in the world--overcome it absolutely."
+
+"We shall be victorious, because we are with the working people,"
+said Sofya with assurance.  "Our power to work, our faith in the
+victory of truth we obtain from you, from the people; and the people
+is the inexhaustible source of spiritual and physical strength.  In
+the people are vested all possibilities, and with them everything is
+attainable.  It's necessary only to arouse their consciousness,
+their soul, the great soul of a child, who is not given the liberty
+to grow."  She spoke softly and simply, and looked pensively before
+her down the winding depths of the road, where a bright haze was
+quivering.
+
+Sofya's words awakened a complex feeling in the mother's heart.  For
+some reason she felt sorry for her.  Her pity, however, was not
+offensive; not bred of familiarity.  She marveled that here was a
+lady walking on foot and carrying a dangerous burden on her back.
+
+"Who's going to reward you for your labors?"
+
+Sofya answered the mother's thought with pride:
+
+"We are already rewarded for everything.  We have found a life that
+satisfies us; we live broadly and fully, with all the power of our
+souls.  What else can we desire?"
+
+Filling their lungs with the aromatic air, they paced along, not
+swiftly, but at a good, round gait.  The mother felt she was on a
+pilgrimage.  She recollected her childhood, the fine joy with which
+she used to leave the village on holidays to go to a distant
+monastery, where there was a wonder-working icon.
+
+Sometimes Sofya would hum some new unfamiliar songs about the sky
+and about love, or suddenly she would begin to recite poems about
+the fields and forests and the Volga.  The mother listened, a smile
+on her swinging her head to the measure of the tune or involuntarily
+yielding to the music.  Her breast was pervaded by a soft, melancholy
+warmth, like the atmosphere in a little old garden on a summer night.
+
+On the third day they arrived at the village, and the mother inquired
+of a peasant at work in the field where the tar works were.  Soon
+they were descending a steep woody path, on which the exposed roots
+of the trees formed steps through a small, round glade, which was
+choked up with coal and chips of wood caked with tar.
+
+Outside a shack built of poles and branches, at a table formed
+simply of three unplaned boards laid on a trestle stuck firmly into
+the ground, sat Rybin, all blackened, his shirt open at his breast,
+Yefim, and two other young men.  They were just dining.  Rybin was
+the first to notice the women.  Shading his eyes with his hand, he
+waited in silence.
+
+"How do you do, brother Mikhail?" shouted the mother from afar.
+
+He arose and leisurely walked to meet them.  When he recognized
+the mother, he stopped and smiled and stroked his beard with his
+black hand.
+
+"We are on a pilgrimage," said the mother, approaching him.  "And so
+I thought I would stop in and see my brother.  This is my friend Anna."
+
+Proud of her resourcefulness she looked askance at Sofya's serious,
+stern face.
+
+"How are you?" said Rybin, smiling grimly.  He shook her hand,
+bowed to Sofya, and continued:  "Don't lie.  This isn't the city.
+No need of lies.  These are all our own people, good people."
+
+Yefim, sitting at the table, looked sharply at the pilgrims, and
+whispered something to his comrades.  When the women walked up to
+the table, he arose and silently bowed to them.  His comrades didn't
+stir, seeming to take no notice of the guests.
+
+"We live here like monks," said Rybin, tapping the mother lightly
+on the shoulder.  "No one comes to us; our master is not in the
+village; the mistress was taken to the hospital.  And now I'm a sort
+of superintendent.  Sit down at the table.  Maybe you're hungry.
+Yefim, bring some milk."
+
+Without hurrying, Yefim walked into the shack.  The travelers
+removed the sacks from their shoulders, and one of the men, a
+tall, lank fellow, rose from the table to help them.  Another
+one, resting his elbows thoughtfully on the table, looked at them,
+scratching his head and quietly humming a song.
+
+The pungent odor of the fresh tar blended with the stifling smell
+of decaying leaves dizzied the newcomers.
+
+"This fellow is Yakob," said Rybin, pointing to the tall man, "and
+that one Ignaty.  Well, how's your son?"
+
+"He's in prison," the mother sighed.
+
+"In prison again?  He likes it, I suppose."
+
+Ignaty stopped humming; Yakob took the staff from the mother's hand,
+and said:
+
+"Sit down, little mother."
+
+"Yes, why don't you sit down?" Rybin extended the invitation to Sofya.
+
+She sat down on the stump of a tree, scrutinizing Rybin seriously
+and attentively.
+
+"When did they take him?" asked Rybin, sitting down opposite the
+mother, and shaking his head.  "You've bad luck, Nilovna."
+
+"Oh, well!"
+
+"You're getting used to it?"
+
+"I'm not used to it, but I see it's not to be helped."
+
+"That's right.  Well, tell us the story."
+
+Yefim brought a pitcher of milk, took a cup from the table, rinsed it
+with water, and after filling it shoved it across the table to Sofya.
+He moved about noiselessly, listening to the mother's narrative.
+When the mother had concluded her short account, all were silent
+for a moment, looking at one another.  Ignaty, sitting at the table,
+drew a pattern with his nails on the boards.  Yefim stood behind
+Rybin, resting his elbows on his shoulders.  Yakob leaned against
+the trunk of a tree, his hands folded over his chest, his head
+inclined.  Sofya observed the peasants from the corner of her eye.
+
+"Yes," Rybin drawled sullenly.  "That's the course of action they've
+decided on--to go out openly."
+
+"If we were to arrange such a parade here," said Yefim, with a surly
+smile, "they'd hack the peasants to death."
+
+"They certainly would," Ignaty assented, nodding his head.  "No,
+I'll go to the factory.  It's better there."
+
+"You say Pavel's going to be tried?" asked Rybin.
+
+"Yes.  They've decided on a trial."
+
+"Well, what'll he get?  Have you heard?"
+
+"Hard labor, or exile to Siberia for life," answered the mother
+softly.  The three young men simultaneously turned their look on
+her, and Rybin, lowering his head, asked slowly:
+
+"And when he got this affair up, did he know what was in store for him?"
+
+"I don't know.  I suppose he did."
+
+"He did," said Sofya aloud.
+
+All were silent, motionless, as if congealed by one cold thought.
+
+"So," continued Rybin slowly and gravely.  "I, too, think he knew.
+A serious man looks before he leaps.  There, boys, you see, the man
+knew that he might be struck with a bayonet, or exiled to hard labor;
+but he went.  He felt it was necessary for him to go, and he went.
+If his mother had lain across his path, he would have stepped over
+her body and gone his way.  Wouldn't he have stepped over you, Nilovna?"
+
+"He would," said the mother shuddering and looking around.  She
+heaved a heavy sigh.  Sofya silently stroked her hand.
+
+"There's a man for you!" said Rybin in a subdued voice, his dark
+eyes roving about the company.  They all became silent again.  The
+thin rays of the sun trembled like golden ribbons in the thick,
+odorous atmosphere.  Somewhere a crow cawed with bold assurance.
+The mother looked around, troubled by her recollections of the first
+of May, and grieving for her son and Andrey.
+
+Broken barrels lay about in confusion in the small, crowded glade.
+Uprooted stumps stretched out their dead, scraggy roots, and chips
+of wood littered the ground.  Dense oaks and birches encircled the
+clearing, and drooped over it slightly on all sides as if desiring
+to sweep away and destroy this offensive rubbish and dirt.
+
+Suddenly Yakob moved forward from the tree, stepped to one side,
+stopped, and shaking his head observed dryly:
+
+"So, when we're in the army with Yefim, it's on such men as Pavel
+Mikhaylovich that they'll set us."
+
+"Against whom did you think they'd make you go?" retorted Rybin
+glumly.  "They choke us with our own hands.  That's where the
+jugglery comes in."
+
+"I'll join the army all the same," announced Yefim obstinately.
+
+"Who's trying to dissuade you?" exclaimed Ignaty.  "Go!"  He looked
+Yefim straight in the face, and said with a smile:  "If you're going
+to shoot at me, aim at the head.  Don't just wound me; kill me at once."
+
+"I hear what you're saying," Yefim replied sharply.
+
+"Listen, boys," said Rybin, letting his glance stray about the little
+assembly with a deliberate, grave gesture of his raised hand.  "Here's
+a woman," pointing to the mother, "whose son is surely done for now."
+
+"Why are you saying this?" the mother asked in a low, sorrowful voice.
+
+"It's necessary," he answered sullenly.  "It's necessary that your
+hair shouldn't turn gray in vain, that your heart shouldn't ache for
+nothing.  Behold, boys!  She's lost her son, but what of it?  Has it
+killed her?  Nilovna, did you bring books?"
+
+The mother looked at him, and after a pause said:
+
+"I did."
+
+"That's it," said Rybin, striking the table with the palm of his hand.
+"I knew it at once when I saw you.  Why need you have come here, if
+not for that?"  He again measured the young men with his eyes, and
+continued, solemnly knitting his eyebrows:  "Do you see?  They thrust
+the son out of the ranks, and the mother drops into his place."
+
+He suddenly struck the table with both hands, and straightening
+himself said with an air that seemed to augur ill:
+
+"Those----" --here he flung out a terrible oath-- "those people
+don't know what their blind hands are sowing.  They WILL know when
+our power is complete and we begin to mow down their cursed grass.
+They'll know it then!"
+
+The mother was frightened.  She looked at him, and saw that Mikhail's
+face had changed greatly.  He had grown thinner; his beard was
+roughened, and his cheek bones seemed to have sharpened.  The bluish
+whites of his eyes were threaded with thin red fibers, as if he had
+gone without sleep for a long time.  His nose, less fleshy than
+formerly, had acquired a rapacious crook.  His open, tar-saturated
+collar, attached to a shirt that had once been red, exposed his dry
+collar bones and the thick black hair on his breast.  About his whole
+figure there was something more tragic than before.  Red sparks
+seemed to fly from his inflamed eyes and light the lean, dark face
+with the fire of unconquerable, melancholy rage.  Sofya paled and
+was silent, her gaze riveted on the peasant.  Ignaty shook his head
+and screwed up his eyes, and Yakob, standing at the wall again,
+angrily tore splinters from the boards with his blackened fingers.
+Yefim, behind the mother, slowly paced up and down along the length
+of the table.
+
+"The other day," continued Rybin, "a government official called me
+up, and, says he, 'You blackguard, what did you say to the priest?'
+'Why am I a blackguard?' I say.  'I earn my bread in the sweat of my
+brow, and I don't do anything bad to people.'  That's what I said.
+He bawled out at me, and hit me in the face.  For three days and
+three nights I sat in the lockup."  Rybin grew infuriated.  "That's
+the way you speak to the people, is it?" he cried.  "Don't expect
+pardon, you devils.  My wrong will be avenged, if not by me, then by
+another, if not on you, then on your children.  Remember!  The greed
+in your breasts has harrowed the people with iron claws.  You have
+sowed malice; don't expect mercy!"
+
+The wrath in Rybin seethed and bubbled; his voice shook with sounds
+that frightened the mother.
+
+"And what had I said to the priest?" he continued in a lighter tone.
+"After the village assembly he sits with the peasants in the street,
+and tells them something.  'The people are a flock,' says he, 'and
+they always need a shepherd.'  And I joke.  'If,' I say, 'they make
+the fox the chief in the forest, there'll be lots of feathers but no
+birds.'  He looks at me sidewise and speaks about how the people
+ought to be patient and pray more to God to give them the power to
+be patient.  And I say that the people pray, but evidently God has
+no time, because he doesn't listen to them.  The priest begins to
+cavil with me as to what prayers I pray.  I tell him I use one
+prayer, like all the people, 'O Lord, teach the masters to carry
+bricks, eat stones, and spit wood.'  He wouldn't even let me finish
+my sentence.  --Are you a lady?" Rybin asked Sofya, suddenly
+breaking off his story.
+
+"Why do you think I'm a lady?" she asked quickly, startled by the
+unexpectedness of his question.
+
+"Why?" laughed Rybin.  "That's the star under which you were born.
+That's why.  You think a chintz kerchief can conceal the blot of the
+nobleman from the eyes of the people?  We'll recognize a priest even
+if he's wrapped in sackcloth.  Here, for instance, you put your
+elbows on a wet table, and you started and frowned.  Besides, your
+back is too straight for a working woman."
+
+Fearing he would insult Sofya with his heavy voice and his raillery,
+the mother said quickly and sternly:
+
+"She's my friend, Mikhail Ivanovich.  She's a good woman.  Working
+in this movement has turned her hair gray.  You're not very----"
+
+Rybin fetched a deep breath.
+
+"Why, was what I said insulting?"
+
+Sofya looked at him dryly and queried:
+
+"You wanted to say something to me?"
+
+"I?  Not long ago a new man came here, a cousin of Yakob.  He's
+sick with consumption; but he's learned a thing or two.  Shall
+we call him?"
+
+"Call him!  Why not?" answered Sofya.
+
+Rybin looked at her, screwing up his eyes.
+
+"Yefim," he said in a lowered voice, "you go over to him, and tell
+him to come here in the evening."
+
+Yefim went into the shack to get his cap; then silently, without
+looking at anybody, he walked off at a leisurely pace and
+disappeared in the woods.  Rybin nodded his bead in the direction he
+was going, saying dully:
+
+"He's suffering torments.  He's stubborn.  He has to go into the
+army, he and Yakob, here.  Yakob simply says, 'I can't.'  And that
+fellow can't either; but he wants to; he has an object in view.  He
+thinks he can stir the soldiers.  My opinion is, you can't break
+through a wall with your forehead.  Bayonets in their hands, off
+they go--where?  They don't see--they're going against themselves.
+Yes, he's suffering.  And Ignaty worries him uselessly."
+
+"No, not at all!" said Ignaty.  He knit his eyebrows, and kept his
+eyes turned away from Rybin.  "They'll change him, and he'll become
+just like all the other soldiers."
+
+"No, hardly," Rybin answered meditatively.  "But, of course, it's
+better to run away from the army.  Russia is large.  Where will you
+find the fellow?  He gets himself a passport, and goes from village
+to village."
+
+"That's what I'm going to do, too," remarked Yakob, tapping his foot
+with a chip of wood.  "Once you've made up your mind to go against
+the government, go straight."
+
+The conversation dropped off.  The bees and wasps circled busily
+around humming in the stifling atmosphere.  The birds chirped, and
+somewhere at a distance a song was heard straying through the
+fields.  After a pause Rybin said:
+
+"Well, we've got to get to work.  Do you want to rest?  There are
+boards inside the shanty.  Pick up some dry leaves for them, Yakob.
+And you, mother, give us the books.  Where are they?"
+
+The mother and Sofya began to untie their sacks.  Rybin bent down
+over them, and said with satisfaction:
+
+"That's it!  Well, well--not a few, I see.  Have you been in this
+business a long time?  What's your name?" he turned toward Sofya.
+
+"Anna Ivanovna.  Twelve years.  Why?"
+
+"Nothing."
+
+"Have you been in prison?"
+
+"I have."
+
+He was silent, taking a pile of books in his hand, and said to her,
+showing his teeth:
+
+"Don't take offense at the way I speak.  A peasant and a nobleman
+are like tar and water.  It's hard for them to mix.  They jump away
+from each other."
+
+"I'm not a lady.  I'm a human being," Sofya retorted with a quiet laugh.
+
+"That may be.  It's hard for me to believe it; but they say it happens.
+They say that a dog was once a wolf.  Now I'll hide these books."
+
+Ignaty and Yakob walked up to him, and both stretched out their hands.
+
+"Give us some."
+
+"Are they all the same?" Rybin asked of Sofya.
+
+"No, they're different.  There's a newspaper here, too."
+
+"Oh!"
+
+The three men quickly walked into the shack.
+
+"The peasant is on fire," said the mother in a low voice, looking
+after Rybin thoughtfully.
+
+"Yes," answered Sofya.  "I've never seen such a face as his--such a
+martyrlike face.  Let's go inside, too.  I want to look at them."
+
+When the women reached the door they found the men already engrossed
+in the newspapers.  Ignaty was sitting on the board, the newspaper
+spread on his knees, and his fingers run through his hair.  He
+raised his head, gave the women a rapid glance, and bent over his
+paper again.  Rybin was standing to let the ray of sun that penetrated
+a chink in the roof fall on his paper.  He moved his lips as he read.
+Ignaty read kneeling, with his breast against the edge of the board.
+
+Sofya felt the eagerness of the men for the word of truth.  Her face
+brightened with a joyful smile.  Walking carefully over to a corner,
+she sat down next to the mother, her arm on the mother's shoulder,
+and gazed about silently.
+
+"Uncle Mikhail, they're rough on us peasants," muttered Yakob
+without turning.
+
+Rybin looked around at him, and answered with a smile:
+
+"For love of us.  He who loves does not insult, no matter what he says."
+
+Ignaty drew a deep breath, raised his head, smiled satirically, and
+closing his eyes said with a scowl:
+
+"Here it says:  'The peasant has ceased to be a human being.'  Of
+course he has."  Over his simple, open face glided a shadow of offense.
+"Well, try to wear my skin for a day or so, and turn around in it,
+and then we'll see what you'll be like, you wiseacre, you!"
+
+"I'm going to lie down," said the mother quietly.  "I got tired,
+after all.  My head is going around.  And you?" she asked Sofya.
+
+"I don't want to."
+
+The mother stretched herself on the board and soon fell asleep.
+Sofya sat over her looking at the people reading.  When the bees
+buzzed about the mother's face, she solicitously drove them away.
+
+Rybin came up and asked:
+
+"Is she asleep?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+He was silent for a moment, looked fixedly at the calm sleeping face,
+and said softly:
+
+"She is probably the first mother who has followed in the footsteps
+of her son--the first."
+
+"Let's not disturb her; let's go away," suggested Sofya.
+
+"Well, we have to work.  I'd like to have a chat with you; but we'll
+put it off until evening.  Come, boys."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+
+The three men walked away, leaving Sofya in the cabin.  Then from
+a distance came the sound of the ax blows, the echo straying through
+the foliage.  In a half-dreamy condition of repose, intoxicated with
+the spicy odor of the forest, Sofya sat just outside the door,
+humming a song, and watching the approach of evening, which gradually
+enfolded the forest.  Her gray eyes smiled softly at some one.  The
+reddening rays of the sun fell more and more aslant.  The busy
+chirping of the birds died away.  The forest darkened, and seemed
+to grow denser.  The trees moved in more closely about the choked-up
+glade, and gave it a more friendly embrace, covering it with shadows.
+Cows were lowing in the distance.  The tar men came, all four together,
+content that the work was ended.
+
+Awakened by their voices the mother walked out from the cabin,
+yawning and smiling.  Rybin was calmer and less gloomy.  The surplus
+of his excitement was drowned in exhaustion.
+
+"Ignaty," he said, "let's have our tea.  We do housekeeping here by
+turns.  To-day Ignaty provides us with food and drink."
+
+"To-day I'd be glad to yield my turn," remarked Ignaty, gathering up
+pieces of wood and branches for an open-air fire.
+
+"We're all interested in our guests," said Yefim, sitting down by
+Sofya's side.
+
+"I'll help you," said Yakob softly.
+
+He brought out a big loaf of bread baked in hot ashes, and began
+to cut it and place the pieces on the table.
+
+"Listen!" exclaimed Yefim.  "Do you hear that cough?"
+
+Rybin listened, and nodded.
+
+"Yes, he's coming," he said to Sofya.  "The witness is coming.  I
+would lead him through cities, put him in public squares, for the
+people to hear him.  He always says the same thing.  But everybody
+ought to hear it."
+
+The shadows grew closer, the twilight thickened, and the voices
+sounded softer.  Sofya and the mother watched the actions of the
+peasants.  They all moved slowly and heavily with a strange sort
+of cautiousness.  They, too, constantly followed the women with
+their eyes, listening attentively to their conversation.
+
+A tall, stooping man came out of the woods into the glade, and
+walked slowly, firmly supporting himself on a cane.  His heavy,
+raucous breathing was audible.
+
+"There is Savely!" exclaimed Yakob.
+
+"Here I am," said the man hoarsely.  He stopped, and began to cough.
+
+A shabby coat hung over him down to his very heels.  From under his
+round, crumpled hat straggled thin, limp tufts of dry, straight,
+yellowish hair.  His light, sparse beard grew unevenly upon his
+yellow, bony face; his mouth stood half-open; his eyes were sunk
+deep beneath his forehead, and glittered feverishly in their dark
+hollows.
+
+When Rybin introduced him to Sofya he said to her:
+
+"I heard you brought books for the people."
+
+"I did."
+
+"Thank you in the name of the people.  They themselves cannot yet
+understand the book of truth.  They cannot yet thank; so I, who
+have learned to understand it, render you thanks in their behalf."
+He breathed quickly, with short, eager breaths, strangely drawing in
+the air through his dry lips.  His voice broke.  The bony fingers of
+his feeble hands crept along his breast trying to button his coat.
+
+"It's bad for you to be in the woods so late; it's damp and close
+here," remarked Sofya.
+
+"Nothing is good for me any more," he answered, out of breath.
+"Only death!"
+
+It was painful to listen to him.  His entire figure inspired a
+futile pity that recognized its own powerlessness, and gave way
+to a sullen feeling of discomfort.
+
+The wood pile blazed up; everything round about trembled and shook;
+the scorched shadows flung themselves into the woods in fright.  The
+round face of Ignaty with its inflated cheeks shone over the fire.
+The flames died down, and the air began to smell of smoke.  Again
+the trees seemed to draw close and unite with the mist on the glade,
+listening in strained attention to the hoarse words of the sick man.
+
+"But as a witness of the crime, I can still bring good to the people.
+Look at me!  I'm twenty-eight years old; but I'm dying.  About ten
+years ago I could lift five hundred pounds on my shoulders without an
+effort.  With such strength I thought I could go on for seventy years
+without dropping into the grave, and I've lived for only ten years,
+and can't go on any more.  The masters have robbed me; they've torn
+forty years of my life from me; they've stolen forty years from me."
+
+"There, that's his song," said Rybin dully.
+
+The fire blazed up again, but now it was stronger and more vivid.
+Again the shadows leaped into the woods, and again darted back to
+the fire, quivering about it in a mute, astonished dance.  The wood
+crackled, and the leaves of the trees rustled softly.  Alarmed by
+the waves of the heated atmosphere, the merry, vivacious tongues of
+fire, yellow and red, in sportive embrace, soared aloft, sowing
+sparks.  The burning leaves flew, and the stars in the sky smiled to
+the sparks, luring them up to themselves.
+
+"That's not MY song.  Thousands of people sing it.  But they sing
+it to themselves, not realizing what a salutary lesson their
+unfortunate lives hold for all.  How many men, tormented to death by
+work, miserable cripples, maimed, die silently from  hunger!  It is
+necessary to shout it aloud, brothers, it is necessary to shout it
+aloud!"  He fell into a fit of coughing, bending and all a-shiver.
+
+"Why?" asked Yefim.  "My misery is my own affair.  Just look at my joy."
+
+"Don't interrupt," Rybin admonished.
+
+"You yourself said a man mustn't boast of his misfortune," observed
+Yefim with a frown.
+
+"That's a different thing.  Savely's misfortune is a general affair,
+not merely his own.  It's very different," said Rybin solemnly.  "Here
+you have a man who has gone down to the depths and been suffocated.
+Now he shouts to the world, 'Look out, don't go there!'"
+
+Yakob put a pail of cider on the table, dropped a bundle of green
+branches, and said to the sick man:
+
+"Come, Savely, I've brought you some milk."
+
+Savely shook his head in declination, but Yakob took him under the
+arm, lifted him, and made him walk to the table.
+
+"Listen," said Sofya softly to Rybin.  She was troubled and reproached
+him.  "Why did you invite him here?  He may die any minute."
+
+"He may," retorted Rybin.  "Let him die among people.  That's easier
+than to die alone.  In the meantime let him speak.  He lost his life
+for trifles.  Let him suffer a little longer for the sake of the
+people.  It's all right!"
+
+"You seem to take particular delight in it," exclaimed Sofya.
+
+"It's the masters who take pleasure in Christ as he groans on the
+cross.  But what we want is to learn from a man, and make you learn
+something, too."
+
+At the table the sick man began to speak again:
+
+"They destroy lives with work.  What for?  They rob men of their
+lives.  What for, I ask?  My master--I lost my life in the textile
+mill of Nefidov--my master presented one prima donna with a golden
+wash basin.  Every one of her toilet articles was gold.  That basin
+holds my life-blood, my very life.  That's for what my life went!  A
+man killed me with work in order to comfort his mistress with my
+blood.  He bought her a gold wash basin with my blood."
+
+"Man is created in the image of God," said Yefim, smiling.  "And
+that's the use to which they put the image.  Fine!"
+
+"Well, then don't be silent!" exclaimed Rybin, striking his palm on
+the table.
+
+"Don't suffer it," added Yakob softly.
+
+Ignaty laughed.  The mother observed that all three spoke little,
+but listened with the insatiable attention of hungry souls, and
+every time that Rybin spoke they looked into his face with watchful
+eyes.  Savely's talk produced a strange, sharp smile on their faces.
+No feeling of pity for the sick man was to be detected in their manner.
+
+Bending toward Sofya the mother whispered:
+
+"Is it possible that what he says is true?"
+
+Sofya answered aloud:
+
+"Yes, it's true.  The newspapers tell about such gifts.  It happened
+in Moscow."
+
+"And the man wasn't executed for it?" asked Rybin dully.  "But he
+should have been executed, he should have been led out before the
+people and torn to pieces.  His vile, dirty flesh should have been
+thrown to the dogs.  The people will perform great executions when
+once they arise.  They'll shed much blood to wash away their wrongs.
+This blood is theirs; it has been drained from their veins; they
+are its masters."
+
+"It's cold," said the sick man.  Yakob helped him to rise, and led
+him to the fire.
+
+The wood pile burned evenly and glaringly, and the faceless shadows
+quivered around it.  Savely sat down on a stump, and stretched his
+dry, transparent hands toward the fire, coughing.  Rybin nodded his
+head to one side, and said to Sofya in an undertone:
+
+"That's sharper than books.  That ought to be known.  When they tear
+a workingman's hand in a machine or kill him, you can understand--
+the workingman himself is at fault.  But in a case like this, when
+they suck a man's blood out of him and throw him away like a carcass
+--that can't be explained in any way.  I can comprehend every
+murder; but torturing for mere sport I can't comprehend.  And why do
+they torture the people?  To what purpose do they torture us all?
+For fun, for mere amusement, so that they can live pleasantly on the
+earth; so that they can buy everything with the blood of the people, a
+prima donna, horses, silver knives, golden dishes, expensive toys for
+their children.  YOU work, work, work, work more and more, and I'LL
+hoard money by your labor and give my mistress a golden wash basin."
+
+The mother listened, looked, and once again, before her in the
+darkness, stretched the bright streak of the road that Pavel was
+going, and all those with whom he walked.
+
+When they had concluded their supper, they sat around the fire,
+which consumed the wood quickly.  Behind them hung the darkness,
+embracing forest and sky.  The sick man with wide-open eyes looked
+into the fire, coughed incessantly, and shivered all over.  The
+remnants of his life seemed to be tearing themselves from his bosom
+impatiently, hastening to forsake the dry body, drained by sickness.
+
+"Maybe you'd better go into the shanty, Savely?" Yakob asked,
+bending over him.
+
+"Why?" he answered with an effort.  "I'll sit here.  I haven't much
+time left to stay with people, very little time."  He paused, let
+his eyes rove about the entire group, then with a pale smile,
+continued:  "I feel good when I'm with you.  I look at you, and
+think, 'Maybe you will avenge the wrongs of all who were robbed,
+of all the people destroyed because of greed.'"
+
+No one replied, and he soon fell into a doze, his head limply hanging
+over his chest.  Rybin looked at him, and said in a dull voice:
+
+"He comes to us, sits here, and always speaks of the same thing, of
+this mockery of man.  This is his entire soul; he feels nothing else."
+
+"What more do you want?" said the mother thoughtfully.  "If people
+are killed by the thousands day after day working so that their
+masters may throw money away for sport, what else do you want?"
+
+"It's endlessly wearying to listen to him," said Ignaty in a low
+voice.  "When you hear this sort of thing once, you never forget it,
+and he keeps harping on it all the time."
+
+"But everything is crowded into this one thing.  It's his entire
+life, remember," remarked Rybin sullenly.
+
+The sick man turned, opened his eyes, and lay down on the ground.
+Yakob rose noiselessly, walked into the cabin, brought out two
+short overcoats, and wrapped them about his cousin.  Then he sat
+down beside Sofya.
+
+The merry, ruddy face of the fire smiled irritatingly as it
+illumined the dark figures about it; and the voices blended
+mournfully with the soft rustle and crackle of the flames.
+
+Sofya began to tell about the universal struggle of the people for the
+right to life, about the conflicts of the German peasants in the olden
+times, about the misfortunes of the Irish, about the great exploits
+of the workingmen of France in their frequent battling for freedom.
+
+In the forest clothed in the velvet of night, in the little glade
+bounded by the dumb trees, before the sportive face of the fire, the
+events that shook the world rose to life again; one nation of the
+earth after the other passed in review, drained of its blood,
+exhausted by combats; the names of the great soldiers for freedom
+and truth were recalled.
+
+The somewhat dull voice of the woman seemed to echo softly from the
+remoteness of the past.  It aroused hope, it carried conviction; and
+the company listened in silence to its music, to the great story of
+their brethren in spirit.  They looked into her face, lean and pale,
+and smiled in response to the smile of her gray eyes.  Before them
+the cause of all the people of the world, the endless war for
+freedom and equality, became more vivid and assumed a greater
+holiness.  They saw their desires and thoughts in the distance,
+overhung with the dark, bloody curtain of the past, amid strangers
+unknown to them; and inwardly, both in mind and heart, they became
+united with the world, seeing in it friends even in olden times,
+friends who had unanimously resolved to obtain right upon the earth,
+and had consecrated their resolve with measureless suffering, and
+shed rivers of their own blood.  With this blood, mankind dedicated
+itself to a new life, bright and cheerful.  A feeling arose and grew
+of the spiritual nearness of each unto each.  A new heart was born
+on the earth, full of hot striving to embrace all and to unite all
+in itself.
+
+"A day is coming when the workingmen of all countries will raise
+their heads, and firmly declare, 'Enough!  We want no more of this
+life.'"  Sofya's low but powerful voice rang with assurance.  "And
+then the fantastic power of those who are mighty by their greed will
+crumble; the earth will vanish from under their feet, and their
+support will be gone."
+
+"That's how it will be," said Rybin, bending his head.  "Don't pity
+yourselves, and you will conquer everything."
+
+The men listened in silence, motionless, endeavoring in no way to
+break the even flow of the narrative, fearing to cut the bright
+thread that bound them to the world.  Only occasionally some one
+would carefully put a piece of wood in the fire, and when a stream
+of sparks and smoke rose from the pile he would drive them away from
+the woman with a wave of his hand.
+
+Once Yakob rose and said:
+
+"Wait a moment, please."  He ran into the shack and brought out
+wraps.  With Ignaty's help he folded them about the shoulders and
+feet of the women.
+
+And again Sofya spoke, picturing the day of victory, inspiring
+people with faith in their power, arousing in them a consciousness
+of their oneness with all who give away their lives to barren toil
+for the amusement of the satiated.
+
+At break of dawn, exhausted, she grew silent, and smiling she looked
+around at the thoughtful, illumined faces.
+
+"It's time for us to go," said the mother.
+
+"Yes, it's time," said Sofya wearily.
+
+Some one breathed a noisy sigh.
+
+"I am sorry you're going," said Rybin in an unusually mild tone.
+"You speak well.  This great cause will unite people.  When you know
+that millions want the same as you do, your heart becomes better,
+and in goodness there is great power."
+
+"You offer goodness, and get the stake in return," said Yefim with
+a low laugh, and quickly jumped to his feet.  "But they ought to go,
+Uncle Mikhail, before anybody sees them.  We'll distribute the books
+among the people; the authorities will begin to wonder where they came
+from; then some one will remember having seen the pilgrims here."
+
+"Well, thank you, mother, for your trouble," said Rybin, interrupting
+Yefim.  "I always think of Pavel when I look at you, and you've
+gone the right way."
+
+He stood before the mother, softened, with a broad, good-natured
+smile on his face.  The atmosphere was raw, but he wore only one
+shirt, his collar was unbuttoned, and his breast was bared low.  The
+mother looked at his large figure, and smiling also, advised:
+
+"You'd better put on something; it's cold."
+
+"There's a fire inside of me."
+
+The three young men standing at the burning pile conversed in a low
+voice.  At their feet the sick man lay as if dead, covered with the
+short fur coats.  The sky paled, the shadows dissolved, the leaves
+shivered softly, awaiting the sun.
+
+"Well, then, we must say good-by," said Rybin, pressing Sofya's
+hand.  "How are you to be found in the city?"
+
+"You must look for me," said the mother.
+
+The young men in a close group walked up to Sofya, and silently
+pressed her hand with awkward kindness.  In each of them was evident
+grateful and friendly satisfaction, though they attempted to conceal
+the feeling which apparently embarrassed them by its novelty.
+Smiling with eyes dry with the sleepless night, they looked in
+silence into Sofya's eyes, shifting from one foot to the other.
+
+"Won't you drink some milk before you go?" asked Yakob.
+
+"Is there any?" queried Yefim.
+
+"There's a little."
+
+Ignaty, stroking his hair in confusion, announced:
+
+"No, there isn't; I spilled it."
+
+All three laughed.  They spoke about milk, but the mother and Sofya
+felt that they were thinking of something else, and without words
+were wishing them well.  This touched Sofya, and produced in her,
+too, embarrassment and modest reserve, which prevented her from
+saying anything more than a quiet and warm "Thank you, comrades."
+
+They exchanged glances, as if the word "comrade" had given them a
+mild shock.  The dull cough of the sick man was heard.  The embers
+of the burning woodpile died out.
+
+"Good-by," the peasants said in subdued tones; and the sad word rang
+in the women's ears a long time.
+
+They walked without haste, in the twilight of the dawn, along the
+wood path.  The mother striding behind Sofya said:
+
+"All this is good, just as in a dream--so good!  People want to know
+the truth, my dear; yes, they want to know the truth.  It's like
+being in a church on the morning of a great holiday, when the priest
+has not yet arrived, and it's dark and quiet; then it's raw, and the
+people are already gathering.  Here the candles are lighted before
+the images, and there the lamps are lighted; and little by little,
+they drive away the darkness, illumining the House of God."
+
+"True," answered Sofya.  "Only here the House of God is the whole earth."
+
+"The whole earth," the mother repeated, shaking her head thoughtfully.
+"It's so good that it's hard to believe."
+
+They walked and talked about Rybin, about the sick man, about the
+young peasants who were so attentively silent, and who so awkwardly
+but eloquently expressed a feeling of grateful friendship by little
+attentions to the women.  They came out into the open field; the sun
+rose to meet them.  As yet invisible, he spread out over the sky a
+transparent fan of rosy rays, and the dewdrops in the grass
+glittered with the many-colored gems of brave spring joy.  The birds
+awoke fresh from their slumber, vivifying the morning with their
+merry, impetuous voices.  The crows flew about croaking, and
+flapping their wings heavily.  The black rooks jumped about in the
+winter wheat, conversing in abrupt accents.  Somewhere the orioles
+whistled mournfully, a note of alarm in their song.  The larks sang,
+soaring up to meet the sun.  The distance opened up, the nocturnal
+shadows lifting from the hills.
+
+"Sometimes a man will speak and speak to you, and you won't
+understand him until he succeeds in telling you some simple word;
+and this one word will suddenly lighten up everything," the mother
+said thoughtfully.  "There's that sick man, for instance; I've heard
+and known myself how the workingmen in the factories and everywhere
+are squeezed; but you get used to it from childhood on, and it
+doesn't touch your heart much.  But he suddenly tells you such an
+outrageous, vile thing!  O Lord!  Can it be that people give their
+whole lives away to work in order that the masters may permit
+themselves pleasure?  That's without justification."
+
+The thoughts of the mother were arrested by this fact.  Its dull,
+impudent gleam threw light upon a series of similar facts, at one
+time known to her, but now forgotten.
+
+"It's evident that they are satiated with everything.  I know one
+country officer who compelled the peasants to salute his horse when
+it was led through the village; and he arrested everyone who failed
+to salute it.  Now, what need had he of that?  It's impossible to
+understand."  After a pause she sighed:  "The poor people are stupid
+from poverty, and the rich from greed."
+
+Sofya began to hum a song bold as the morning.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+
+The life of Nilovna flowed on with strange placidity.  This calmness
+sometimes astonished her.  There was her son immured in prison.  She
+knew that a severe sentence awaited him, yet every time the idea of
+it came to her mind her thoughts strayed to Andrey, Fedya, and an
+endless series of other people she had never seen, but only heard
+of.  The figure of her son appeared to her absorbing all the people
+into his own destiny.  The contemplative feeling aroused in her
+involuntarily and unnoticeably diverted her inward gaze away from
+him to all sides.  Like thin, uneven rays it touched upon everything,
+tried to throw light everywhere, and make one picture of the whole.
+Her mind was hindered from dwelling upon some one thing.
+
+Sofya soon went off somewhere, and reappeared in about five days,
+merry and vivacious.  Then, in a few hours, she vanished again, and
+returned within a couple of weeks.  It seemed as if she were borne
+along in life in wide circles.
+
+Nikolay, always occupied, lived a monotonous, methodical existence.
+At eight o'clock in the morning he drank tea, read the newspapers,
+and recounted the news to the mother.  He repeated the speeches of
+the merchants in the Douma without malice, and clearly depicted the
+life in the city.
+
+Listening to him the mother saw with transparent dearness the
+mechanism of this life pitilessly grinding the people in the
+millstones of money.  At nine o'clock he went off to the office.
+
+She tidied the rooms, prepared dinner, washed herself, put on a
+clean dress, and then sat in her room to examine the pictures and
+the books.  She had already learned to read, but the effort of
+reading quickly exhausted her; and she ceased to understand the
+meaning of the words.  But the pictures were a constant astonishment
+to her.  They opened up before her a clear, almost tangible world of
+new and marvelous things.  Huge cities arose before her, beautiful
+structures, machines, ships, monuments, and infinite wealth, created
+by the people, overwhelming the mind by the variety of nature's
+products.  Life widened endlessly; each day brought some new, huge
+wonders.  The awakened hungry soul of the woman was more and more
+strongly aroused to the multitude of riches in the world, its
+countless beauties.  She especially loved to look through the great
+folios of the zoological atlas, and although the text was written in
+a foreign language, it gave her the clearest conception of the
+beauty, wealth, and vastness of the earth.
+
+"It's an immense world," she said to Nikolay at dinner.
+
+"Yes, and yet the people are crowded for space."
+
+The insects, particularly the butterflies, astonished her most.
+
+"What beauty, Nikolay Ivanovich," she observed.  "And how much of
+this fascinating beauty there is everywhere, but all covered up
+from us; it all flies by without our seeing it.  People toss about,
+they know nothing, they are unable to take delight in anything, they
+have no inclination for it.  How many could take happiness to
+themselves if they knew how rich the earth is, how many wonderful
+things live in it!"
+
+Nikolay listened to her raptures, smiled, and brought her new
+illustrated books.
+
+In the evening visitors often gathered in his house--Alexey
+Vasilyevich, a handsome man, pale-faced, black-bearded, sedate,
+and taciturn; Roman Petrovich, a pimply, round-headed individual
+always smacking his lips regretfully; Ivan Danilovich, a short, lean
+fellow with a pointed beard and thin hair, impetuous, vociferous,
+and sharp as an awl, and Yegor, always joking with his comrades
+about his sickness.  Sometimes other people were present who had
+come from various distant cities.  The long conversations always
+turned on one and the same thing, on the working people of the world.
+The comrades discussed the workingmen, got into arguments about them,
+became heated, waved their hands, and drank much tea; while Nikolay,
+in the noise of the conversation, silently composed proclamations.
+Then he read them to the comrades, who copied them on the spot in
+printed letters.  The mother carefully collected the pieces of the
+torn, rough copies, and burned them.
+
+She poured, out tea for them, and wondered at the warmth with which
+they discussed life and the workingpeople, the means whereby to sow
+truth among them the sooner and the better, and how to elevate their
+spirit.  These problems were always agitating the comrades; their
+lives revolved about them.  Often they angrily disagreed, blamed one
+another for something, got offended, and again discussed.
+
+The mother felt that she knew the life of the workingmen better than
+these people, and saw more clearly than they the enormity of the
+task they assumed.  She could look upon them with the somewhat
+melancholy indulgence of a grown-up person toward children who play
+man and wife without understanding the drama of the relation.
+
+Sometimes Sashenka came.  She never stayed long, and always spoke
+in a businesslike way without smiling.  She did not once fail to
+ask on leaving how Pavel Mikhaylovich was.
+
+"Is he well?" she would ask.
+
+"Thank God!  So, so.  He's in good spirits."
+
+"Give him my regards," the girl would request, and then disappear.
+
+Sometimes the mother complained to Sashenka because Pavel was
+detained so long and no date was yet set for his trial.  Sashenka
+looked gloomy, and maintained silence, her fingers twitching.
+Nilovna was tempted to say to her:  "My dear girl, why, I know you
+love him, I know."  But Sashenka's austere face, her compressed
+lips, and her dry, businesslike manner, which seemed to betoken a
+desire for silence as soon as possible, forbade any demonstration
+of sentiment.  With a sigh the mother mutely clasped the hand that
+the girl extended to her, and thought:  "My unhappy girl!"
+
+Once Natasha came.  She showed great delight at seeing the mother,
+kissed her, and among other things announced to her quietly, as if
+she had just thought of the thing:
+
+"My mother died.  Poor woman, she's dead!"  She wiped her eyes with
+a rapid gesture of her hands, and continued:  "I'm sorry for her.
+She was not yet fifty.  She had a long life before her still.  But
+when you look at it from the other side you can't help thinking
+that death is easier than such a life--always alone, a stranger to
+everybody, needed by no one, scared by the shouts of my father.
+Can you call that living?  People live waiting for something good,
+and she had nothing to expect except insults."
+
+"You're right, Natasha," said the mother musingly.  "People live
+expecting some good, and if there's nothing to expect, what sort
+of a life is it?"  Kindly stroking Natasha's hand, she asked:  "So
+you're alone now?"
+
+"Alone!" the girl rejoined lightly.
+
+The mother was silent, then suddenly remarked with a smile:
+
+"Never mind!  A good person does not live alone.  People will always
+attach themselves to a good person."
+
+Natasha was now a teacher in a little town where there was a textile
+mill, and Nilovna occasionally procured illegal books, proclamations,
+and newspapers for her.  The distribution of literature, in fact,
+became the mother's occupation.  Several times a month, dressed as
+a nun or as a peddler of laces or small linen articles, as a rich
+merchant's wife or a religious pilgrim, she rode or walked about
+with a sack on her back, or a valise in her hand.  Everywhere, in
+the train, in the steamers, in hotels and inns, she behaved simply
+and unobtrusively.  She was the first to enter into conversations
+with strangers, fearlessly drawing attention to herself by her kind,
+sociable talk and the confident manner of an experienced person who
+has seen and heard much.
+
+She liked to speak to people, liked to listen to their stories of
+life, their complaints, their perplexities, and lamentations.  Her
+heart was bathed in joy each time she noticed in anybody poignant
+discontent with life, that discontent which, protesting against the
+blows of fate, earnestly seeks to find an answer to its questions.
+Before her the picture of human life unrolled itself ever wider and
+more varicolored, that restless, anxious life passed in the struggle
+to fill the stomach.  Everywhere she clearly saw the coarse, bare
+striving, insolent in its openness, deceiving man, robbing him,
+pressing out of him as much sap as possible, draining him of his
+very lifeblood.  She realized that there was plenty of everything
+upon earth, but that the people were in want, and lived half
+starved, surrounded by inexhaustible wealth.  In the cities stood
+churches filled with gold and silver, not needed by God, and at the
+entrance to the churches shivered the beggars vainly awaiting a
+little copper coin to be thrust into their hands.  Formerly she had
+seen this, too--rich churches, priestly vestments sewed with gold
+threads, and the hovels of the poor, their ignominious rags.  But at
+that time the thing had seemed natural; now the contrast was
+irreconcilable and insulting to the poor, to whom, she knew, the
+churches were both nearer and more necessary than to the rich.
+
+From the pictures and stories of Christ, she knew also that he was
+a friend of the poor, that he dressed simply.  But in the churches,
+where poverty came to him for consolation, she saw him nailed to
+the cross with insolent gold, she saw silks and satins flaunting
+in the fact of want.  The words of Rybin occurred to her:  "They
+have mutilated even our God for us, they have turned everything in
+their hands against us.  In the churches they set up a scarecrow
+before us.  They have dressed God up in falsehood and calumny;
+they have distorted His face in order to destroy our souls!"
+
+Without being herself aware of it, she prayed less; yet, at the same
+time, she meditated more and more upon Christ and the people who,
+without mentioning his name, as though ignorant of him, lived, it
+seemed to her, according to his will, and, like him, regarded the
+earth as the kingdom of the poor, and wanted to divide all the
+wealth of the earth among the poor.  Her reflections grew in her
+soul, deepening and embracing everything she saw and heard.  They
+grew and assumed the bright aspect of a prayer, suffusing an even
+glow over the entire dark world, the whole of life, and all people.
+
+And it seemed to her that Christ himself, whom she had always loved
+with a perplexed love, with a complicated feeling in which fear was
+closely bound up with hope, and joyful emotion with melancholy, now
+came nearer to her, and was different from what he had been.  His
+position was loftier, and he was more clearly visible to her.  His
+aspect turned brighter and more cheerful.  Now his eyes smiled on
+her with assurance, and with a live inward power, as if he had in
+reality risen to life for mankind, washed and vivified by the hot
+blood lavishly shed in his name.  Yet those who had lost their blood
+modestly refrained from mentioning the name of the unfortunate
+friend of the people.
+
+The mother always returned to Nikolay from her travels delightfully
+exhilarated by what she had seen and heard on the road, bold and
+satisfied with the work she had accomplished.
+
+"It's good to go everywhere, and to see much," she said to Nikolay
+in the evening.  "You understand how life is arranged.  They brush
+the people aside and fling them to the edge.  The people, hurt and
+wounded, keep moving about, even though they don't want to, and
+though they keep thinking:  'What for?  Why do they drive us away?
+Why must we go hungry when there is so much of everything?  And
+how much intellect there is everywhere!  Nevertheless, we must remain
+in stupidity and darkness.  And where is He, the merciful God, in
+whose eyes there are no rich nor poor, but all are children dear to
+His heart.'  The people are gradually revolting against this life.
+They feel that untruth will stifle them if they don't take thought
+of themselves."
+
+And in her leisure hours she sat down to the books, and again looked
+over the pictures, each time finding something new, ever widening
+the panorama of life before her eyes, unfolding the beauties of
+nature and the vigorous creative capacity of man.  Nikolay often
+found her poring over the pictures.  He would smile and always tell
+her something wonderful.  Struck by man's daring, she would ask him
+incredulously, "Is it possible?"
+
+Quietly, with unshakable confidence in the truth of his prophecies,
+Nikolay peered with his kind eyes through his glasses into the
+mother's face, and told her stories of the future.
+
+"There is no measure to the desires of man; and his power is
+inexhaustible," he said.  "But the world, after all, is still very
+slow in acquiring spiritual wealth.  Because nowadays everyone
+desiring to free himself from dependence is compelled to hoard,
+not knowledge but money.  However, when the people will have
+exterminated greed and will have freed themselves from the bondage
+of enslaving labor--"
+
+She listened to him with strained attention.  Though she but rarely
+understood the meaning of his words, yet the calm faith animating
+them penetrated her more and more deeply.
+
+"There are extremely few free men in the world--that's its
+misfortune," he said.
+
+This the mother understood.  She knew men who had emancipated
+themselves from greed and evil; she understood that if there were
+more such people, the dark, incomprehensible, and awful face of
+life would become more kindly and simple, better and brighter.
+
+"A man must perforce be cruel," said Nikolay dismally.
+
+The mother nodded her head in confirmation.  She recalled the
+sayings of the Little Russian.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+
+Once Nikolay, usually so punctual, came from his work much later than
+was his wont, and said, excitedly rubbing his hands:  "Do you know,
+Nilovna, to-day at the visiting hour one of our comrades disappeared
+from prison?  But we have not succeeded in finding out who."
+
+The mother's body swayed, overpowered by excitement.  She sat down
+on a chair and asked with forced quiet:
+
+"Maybe it's Pasha?"
+
+"Possibly.  But the question is how to find him, how to help him
+keep in concealment.  Just now I was walking about the streets to
+see if I couldn't detect him.  It was a stupid thing of me to do,
+but I had to do something.  I'm going out again."
+
+"I'll go, too," said the mother, rising.
+
+"You go to Yegor, and see if he doesn't know anything about it,"
+Nikolay suggested, and quickly walked away.
+
+She threw a kerchief on her head, and, seized with hope, swiftly
+sped along the streets.  Her eyes dimmed and her heart beat faster.
+Her head drooped; she saw nothing about her.  It was hot.  The
+mother lost breath, and when she reached the stairway leading to
+Yegor's quarters, she stopped, too faint to proceed farther.  She
+turned around and uttered an amazed, low cry, closing her eyes for
+a second.  It seemed to her that Nikolay Vyesovshchikov was standing
+at the gate, his hands thrust into his pockets, regarding her with
+a smile.  But when she looked again nobody was there.
+
+"I imagined I saw him," she said to herself, slowly walking up
+the steps and listening.  She caught the sound of slow steps, and
+stopping at a turn in the stairway she bent over to look below;
+and again saw the face smiling up at her.
+
+"Nikolay!  Nikolay!" she whispered, and ran meet him.  Her heart,
+stung by disappointment, ached for her son.
+
+"Go, go!" he answered in an undertone, waving his hand.
+
+She quickly ran up the stairs, walked into Yegor's room, and found
+him lying on the sofa.  She gasped in a whisper:
+
+"Nikolay is out of prison!"
+
+"Which Nikolay?" asked Yegor, raising his head from the pillow.
+"There are two there."
+
+"Vyesovshchikov.  He's coming here!"
+
+"Fine!  But I can't rise to meet him."
+
+Vyesovshchikov had already come into the room.  He locked the door
+after him, and taking off his hat laughed quietly, stroking his
+hair.  Yegor raised himself on his elbows.
+
+"Please, signor, make yourself at home," he said with a nod.
+
+Without saying anything, a broad smile on his face, Nikolay walked
+up to the mother and grasped her hand.
+
+"If I had not seen you I might as well have returned to prison.
+I know nobody in the city.  If I had gone to the suburbs they would
+have seized me at once.  So I walked about, and thought what a fool
+I was--why had I escaped?  Suddenly I see Nilovna running; off I am,
+after you."
+
+"How did you make your escape?"
+
+Vyesovshchikov sat down awkwardly on the edge of the sofa and
+pressed Yegor's hand.
+
+"I don't know how," he said in an embarrassed manner.  "Simply a
+chance.  I was taking my airing, and the prisoners began to beat
+the overseer of the jail.  There's one overseer there who was
+expelled from the gendarmerie for stealing.  He's a spy, an informer,
+and tortures the life out of everybody.  They gave him a drubbing,
+there was a hubbub, the overseers got frightened and blew their
+whistles.  I noticed the gates open.  I walked up and saw an open
+square and the city.  It drew me forward and I went away without
+haste, as if in sleep.  I walked a little and bethought myself:
+'Where am I to go?'  I looked around and the gates of the prison
+were already closed.  I began to feel awkward.  I was sorry for
+the comrades in general.  It was stupid somehow.  I hadn't thought
+of going away."
+
+"Hm!" said Yegor.  "Why, sir, you should have turned back, respectfully
+knocked at the prison door, and begged for admission.  'Excuse me,'
+you should have said, 'I was tempted; but here I am.'"
+
+"Yes," continued Nikolay, smiling; "that would have been stupid, too,
+I understand.  But for all that, it's not nice to the other comrades.
+I walk away without saying anything to anybody.  Well, I kept on
+going, and I came across a child's funeral.  I followed the hearse
+with my head bent down, looking at nobody.  I sat down in the cemetery
+and enjoyed the fresh air.  One thought came into my head----"
+
+"One?" asked Yegor.  Fetching breath, he added: "I suppose it won't
+feel crowded there."
+
+Vyesovshchikov laughed without taking offense, and shook his head.
+
+"Well, my brain's not so empty now as it used to be.  And you, Yegor
+Ivanovich, still sick?"
+
+"Each one does what he can.  No one has a right to interfere with
+him."  Yegor evaded an answer; he coughed hoarsely.  "Continue."
+
+"Then I went to a public museum.  I walked about there, looked
+around, and kept thinking all the time: 'Where am I to go next?'
+I even began to get angry with myself.  Besides, I got dreadfully
+hungry.  I walked into the street and kept on trotting.  I felt
+very down in the mouth.  And then I saw police officers looking at
+everybody closely.  'Well,' thinks I to myself, 'with my face I'll
+arrive at God's judgment seat pretty soon.'  Suddenly Nilovna came
+running opposite me.  I turned about, and off I went after her.
+That's all."
+
+"And I didn't even see you," said the mother guiltily.
+
+"The comrades are probably uneasy about me.  They must be wondering
+where I am," said Nikolay, scratching his head.
+
+"Aren't you sorry for the officials?  I guess they're uneasy, too,"
+teased Yegor.  He moved heavily on the sofa, and said seriously and
+solicitously:  "However, jokes aside, we must hide you--by no means
+as easy as pleasant.  If I could get up--"  His breath gave out.
+He clapped his hand to his breast, and with a weak movement began
+to rub it.
+
+"You've gotten very sick, Yegor Ivanovich," said Nikolay gloomily,
+drooping his head.  The mother sighed and cast an anxious glance
+about the little, crowded room.
+
+"That's my own affair.  Granny, you ask about Pavel.  No reason to
+feign indifference," said Yegor.
+
+Vyesovshchikov smiled broadly.
+
+"Pavel's all right; he's strong; he's like an elder among us; he
+converses with the officials and gives commands; he's respected.
+There's good reason for it."
+
+Vlasova nodded her head, listening, and looked sidewise at the
+swollen, bluish face of Yegor, congealed to immobility, devoid of
+expression.  It seemed strangely flat, only the eyes flashed with
+animation and cheerfulness.
+
+"I wish you'd give me something to eat.  I'm frightfully hungry,"
+Nikolay cried out unexpectedly, and smiled sheepishly.
+
+"Granny, there's bread on the shelf--give it to him.  Then go out
+in the corridor, to the second door on the left, and knock.  A woman
+will open it, and you'll tell her to snatch up everything she has
+to eat and come here."
+
+"Why everything?" protested Nikolay.
+
+"Don't get excited.  It's not much--maybe nothing at all."
+
+The mother went out and rapped at the door.  She strained her ears
+for an answering sound, while thinking of Yegor with dread and
+grief.  He was dying, she knew.
+
+"Who is it?" somebody asked on the other side of the door.
+
+"It's from Yegor Ivanovich," the mother whispered.  "He asked you
+to come to him."
+
+"I'll come at once," the woman answered without opening the door.
+The mother waited a moment, and knocked again.  This time the door
+opened quickly, and a tall woman wearing glasses stepped out into
+the hall, rapidly tidying the ruffled sleeves of her waist.  She
+asked the mother harshly:
+
+"What do you want?"
+
+"I'm from Yegor Ivanovich."
+
+"Aha!  Come!  Oh, yes, I know you!" the woman exclaimed in a low
+voice.  "How do you do?  It's dark here."
+
+Nilovna looked at her and remembered that this woman had come to
+Nikolay's home on rare occasions.
+
+"All comrades!" flashed through her mind.
+
+The woman compelled Nilovna to walk in front.
+
+"Is he feeling bad?"
+
+"Yes; he's lying down.  He asked you to bring something to eat."
+
+"Well, he doesn't need anything to eat."
+
+When they walked into Yegor's room they were met by the words:
+
+"I'm preparing to join my forefathers, my friend.  Liudmila Vasilyevna,
+this man walked away from prison without the permission of the
+authorities--a bit of shameless audacity.  Before all, feed him, then
+hide him somewhere for a day or two."
+
+The woman nodded her head and looked carefully at the sick man's face.
+
+"Stop your chattering, Yegor," she said sternly.  "You know it's bad
+for you.  You ought to have sent for me at once, as soon as they
+came.  And I see you didn't take your medicine.  What do you mean by
+such negligence?  You yourself say it's easier for you to breathe
+after a dose.  Comrade, come to my place.  They'll soon call for
+Yegor from the hospital."
+
+"So I'm to go to the hospital, after all?" asked Yegor, puckering
+up his face.
+
+"Yes, I'll be there with you."
+
+"There, too?"
+
+"Hush!"
+
+As she talked she adjusted the blanket on Yegor's breast, looked
+fixedly at Nikolay, and with her eyes measured the quantity of
+medicine in the bottle.  She spoke evenly, not loud, but in a
+resonant voice.  Her movements were easy, her face was pale, with
+large blue circles around her eyes.  Her black eyebrows almost met
+at the bridge of the nose, deepening the setting of her dark, stern
+eyes.  Her face did not please the mother; it seemed haughty in its
+sternness and immobility, and her eyes were rayless.  She always
+spoke in a tone of command.
+
+"We are going away," she continued.  "I'll return soon.  Give Yegor
+a tablespoon of this medicine."
+
+"Very well," said the mother.
+
+"And don't let him speak."  She walked away, taking Nikolay with her.
+
+"Admirable woman!" said Yegor with a sigh.  "Magnificent woman!  You
+ought to be working with her, granny.  You see, she gets very much
+worn out.  It's she that does all the printing for us."
+
+"Don't speak.  Here, you'd better take this medicine," the mother
+said gently.
+
+He swallowed the medicine and continued, for some reason screwing
+up one eye:
+
+"I'll die all the same, even if I don't speak."
+
+He looked into the mother's face with his other eye, and his lips
+slowly formed themselves into a smile.  The mother bent her head, a
+sharp sensation of pity bringing tears into her eyes.
+
+"Never mind, granny.  It's natural.  The pleasure of living carries
+with it the obligation to die."
+
+The mother put her hand on his, and again said softly:
+
+"Keep quiet, please!"
+
+He shut his eyes as if listening to the rattle in his breast, and
+went on stubbornly.
+
+"It's senseless to keep quiet, granny.  What'll I gain by keeping
+quiet?  A few superfluous seconds of agony.  And I'll lose the great
+pleasure of chattering with a good person.  I think that in the next
+world there aren't such good people as here."
+
+The mother uneasily interrupted him.
+
+"The lady will come, and she'll scold me because you talk."
+
+"She's no lady.  She's a revolutionist, the daughter of a village
+scribe, a teacher.  She is sure to scold you anyhow, granny.  She
+scolds everybody always."  And, slowly moving his lips with an
+effort, Yegor began to relate the life history of his neighbor.
+His eyes smiled.  The mother saw that he was bantering her purposely.
+As she regarded his face, covered with a moist blueness, she thought
+distressfully that he was near to death.
+
+Liudmila entered, and carefully closing the door after her, said,
+turning to Vlasova:
+
+"Your friend ought to change his clothes without fail, and leave here
+as soon as possible.  So go at once; get him some clothes, and bring
+them here.  I'm sorry Sofya's not here.  Hiding people is her specialty."
+
+"She's coming to-morrow," remarked Vlasova, throwing her shawl over
+her shoulders.  Every time she was given a commission the strong
+desire seized her to accomplish it promptly and well, and she was
+unable to think of anything but the task before her.  Now, lowering
+her brows with an air of preoccupation, she asked zealously:
+
+"How should we dress him, do you think?"
+
+"It's all the same.  It's night, you know."
+
+"At night it's worse.  There are less people on the street, and the
+police spy around more; and, you know, he's rather awkward."
+
+Yegor laughed hoarsely.
+
+"You're a young girl yet, granny."
+
+"May I visit you in the hospital?"
+
+He nodded his head, coughing.  Liudmila glanced at the mother with
+her dark eyes and suggested:
+
+"Do you want to take turns with me in attending him?  Yes?  Very
+well.  And now go quickly."
+
+She vigorously seized Vlasova by the hand, with perfect good nature,
+however, and led her out of the door.
+
+"You mustn't be offended," she said softly, "because I dismiss you so
+abruptly.  I know it's rude; but it's harmful for him to speak, and
+I still have hopes of his recovery."  She pressed her hands together
+until the bones cracked.  Her eyelids drooped wearily over her eyes.
+
+The explanation disturbed the mother.  She murmured:
+
+"Don't talk that way.  The idea!  Who thought of rudeness?  I'm
+going; good-by."
+
+"Look out for the spies!" whispered the woman.
+
+"I know," the mother answered with some pride.
+
+She stopped for a minute outside the gate to look around sharply
+under the pretext of adjusting her kerchief.  She was already able
+to distinguish spies in a street crowd almost immediately.  She
+recognized the exaggerated carelessness of their gait, their
+strained attempt to be free in their gestures, the expression of
+tedium on their faces, the wary, guilty glimmer of their restless,
+unpleasantly sharp gaze badly hidden behind their feigned candor.
+
+This time she did not notice any familiar faces, and walked along
+the street without hastening.  She took a cab, and gave orders to
+be driven to the market place.  When buying the clothes for Nikolay
+she bargained vigorously with the salespeople, all the while scolding
+at her drunken husband whom she had to dress anew every month.  The
+tradespeople paid little attention to her talk, but she herself was
+greatly pleased with her ruse.  On the road she had calculated that
+the police would, of course, understand the necessity for Nikolay to
+change his clothes, and would send spies to the market.  With such
+naive precautions, she returned to Yegor's quarters; then she had to
+escort Nikolay to the outskirts of the city.  They took different
+sides of the street, and it was amusing to the mother to see how
+Vyesovshchikov strode along heavily, with bent head, his legs
+getting tangled in the long flaps of his russet-colored coat, his
+hat falling over his nose.  In one of the deserted streets, Sashenka
+met them, and the mother, taking leave of Vyesovshchikov with a nod
+of her head, turned toward home with a sigh of relief.
+
+"And Pasha is in prison with Andriusha!" she thought sadly.
+
+Nikolay met her with an anxious exclamation:
+
+"You know that Yegor is in a very bad way, very bad!  He was taken to
+the hospital.  Liudmila was here.  She asks you to come to her there."
+
+"At the hospital?"
+
+Adjusting his eyeglasses with a nervous gesture, Nikolay helped her
+on with her jacket and pressed her hand in a dry, hot grasp.  His
+voice was low and tremulous.  "Yes.  Take this package with you.
+Have you disposed of Vyesovshchikov all right?"
+
+"Yes, all right."
+
+"I'll come to Yegor, too!"
+
+The mother's head was in a whirl with fatigue, and Nikolay's emotion
+aroused in her a sad premonition of the drama's end.
+
+"So he's dying--he's dying!"  The dark thought knocked at her brain
+heavily and dully.
+
+But when she entered the bright, tidy little room of the hospital
+and saw Yegor sitting on the pallet propped against the wide bosom
+of the pillow, and heard him laugh with zest, she was at once
+relieved.  She paused at the door, smiling, and listened to Yegor
+talk with the physician in a hoarse but lively voice.
+
+"A cure is a reform."
+
+"Don't talk nonsense!" the physician cried officiously in a thin voice.
+
+"And I'm a revolutionist!  I detest reforms!"
+
+The physician, thoughtfully pulling his beard, felt the dropsical
+swelling on Yegor's face.  The mother knew him well.  He was Ivan
+Danilovich, one of the close comrades of Nikolay.  She walked up to
+Yegor, who thrust forth his tongue by way of welcome to her.  The
+physician turned around.
+
+"Ah, Nilovna!  How are you?  Sit down.  What have you in your hand?"
+
+"It must be books."
+
+"He mustn't read."
+
+"The doctor wants to make an idiot of me," Yegor complained.
+
+"Keep quiet!" the physician commanded, and began to write in a
+little book.
+
+The short, heavy breaths, accompanied by rattling in his throat,
+fairly tore themselves from Yegor's breast, and his face became
+covered with thin perspiration.  Slowly raising his swollen hand, he
+wiped his forehead with the palm.  The strange immobility of his
+swollen cheeks denaturalized his broad, good face, all the features
+of which disappeared under the dead, bluish mask.  Only his eyes,
+deeply sunk beneath the swellings, looked out clear and smiling
+benevolently.
+
+"Oh, Science, I'm tired!  May I lie down?"
+
+"No, you mayn't."
+
+"But I'm going to lie down after you go."
+
+"Nilovna, please don't let him.  It's bad for him."
+
+The mother nodded.  The physician hurried off with short steps.
+Yegor threw back his head, closed his eyes and sank into a torpor,
+motionless save for the twitching of his fingers.  The white walls
+of the little room seemed to radiate a dry coldness and a pale,
+faceless sadness.  Through the large window peered the tufted tops
+of the lime trees, amid whose dark, dusty foliage yellow stains
+were blazing, the cold touches of approaching autumn.
+
+"Death is coming to me slowly, reluctantly," said Yegor without
+moving and without opening his eyes.  "He seems to be a little
+sorry for me.  I was such a fine, sociable chap."
+
+"You'd better keep quiet, Yegor Ivanovich!" the mother bade, quietly
+stroking his hand.
+
+"Wait, granny, I'll be silent soon."
+
+Losing breath every once in a while, enunciating the words with a
+mighty effort, he continued his talk, interrupted by long spells
+of faintness.
+
+"It's splendid to have you with me.  It's pleasant to see your face,
+granny, and your eyes so alert, and your naivete.  'How will it
+end?' I ask myself.  It's sad to think that the prison, exile, and
+all sorts of vile outrages await you as everybody else.  Are you
+afraid of prison?"
+
+"No," answered the mother softly.
+
+"But after all the prison is a mean place.  It's the prison that
+knocked me up.  To tell you the truth, I don't want to die."
+
+"Maybe you won't die yet," the mother was about to say, but a look
+at his face froze the words on her lips.
+
+"If I hadn't gotten sick I could have worked yet, not badly; but if
+you can't work there's nothing to live for, and it's stupid to live."
+
+"That's true, but it's no consolation."  Andrey's words flashed into
+the mother's mind, and she heaved a deep sigh.  She was greatly
+fatigued by the day, and hungry.  The monotonous, humid, hoarse
+whisper of the sick man filled the room and crept helplessly along
+the smooth, cold, shining walls.  At the windows the dark tops of
+the lime trees trembled quietly.  It was growing dusk, and Yegor's
+face on the pillow turned dark.
+
+"How bad I feel," he said.  He closed his eyes and became silent.
+The mother listened to his breathing, looked around, and sat for a
+few minutes motionless, seized by a cold sensation of sadness.
+Finally she dozed off.
+
+The muffled sound of a door being carefully shut awakened her, and
+she saw the kind, open eyes of Yegor.
+
+"I fell asleep; excuse me," she said quietly.
+
+"And you excuse me," he answered, also quietly.  At the door was
+heard a rustle and Liudmila's voice.
+
+"They sit in the darkness and whisper.  Where is the knob?"
+
+The room trembled and suddenly became filled with a white, unfriendly
+light.  In the middle of the room stood Liudmila, all black, tall,
+straight, and serious.  Yegor transferred his glance to her, and
+making a great effort to move his body, raised his hand to his breast.
+
+"What's the matter?" exclaimed Liudmila, running up to him.  He
+looked at the mother with fixed eyes, and now they seemed large
+and strangely bright.
+
+"Wait!" he whispered.
+
+Opening his mouth wide, he raised his head and stretched his hand
+forward.  The mother carefully held it up and caught her breath as
+she looked into his face.  With a convulsive and powerful movement
+of his neck he flung his head back, and said aloud:
+
+"Give me air!"
+
+A quiver ran through his body; his head dropped limply on his
+shoulder, and in his wide open eyes the cold light of the lamp
+burning over the bed was reflected dully.
+
+"My darling!" whispered the mother, firmly pressing his hand,
+which suddenly grew heavy.
+
+Liudmila slowly walked away from the bed, stopped at the window
+and stared into space.
+
+"He's dead!" she said in an unusually loud voice unfamiliar to
+Vlasova.  She bent down, put her elbows on the window sill, and
+repeated in dry, startled tones: "He's dead!  He died calmly, like
+a man, without complaint."  And suddenly, as if struck a blow on
+the head, she dropped faintly on her knees, covered her face, and
+gave vent to dull, stifled groans.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+
+The mother folded Yegor's hands over his breast and adjusted his
+head, which was strangely warm, on the pillow.  Then silently wiping
+her eyes, she went to Liudmila, bent over her, and quietly stroked
+her thick hair.  The woman slowly turned around to her, her dull
+eyes widened in a sickly way.  She rose to her feet, and with
+trembling lips whispered:
+
+"I've known him for a long time.  We were in exile together.  We
+went there together on foot, we sat in prison together; at times it
+was intolerable, disgusting; many fell in spirit."
+
+Her dry, loud groans stuck in her throat.  She overcame them with an
+effort, and bringing her face nearer to the mother's she continued
+in a quick whisper, moaning without tears:
+
+"Yet he was unconquerably jolly.  He joked and laughed, and covered
+up his suffering in a manly way, always striving to encourage the
+weak.  He was always good, alert, kind.  There, in Siberia, idleness
+depraves people, and often calls forth ugly feelings toward life.
+How he mastered such feelings!  What a comrade he was!  If you only
+knew.  His own life was hard and tormented; but I know that nobody
+ever heard him complain, not a soul--never!  Here was I, nearer to
+him than others.  I'm greatly indebted to his heart, to his mind.
+He gave me all he could of it; and though exhausted, he never asked
+either kindness or attention in return."
+
+She walked up to Yegor, bent down and kissed him.  Her voice was
+husky as she said mournfully:
+
+"Comrade, my dear, dear friend, I thank you with all my heart!
+Good-by.  I shall work as you worked--unassailed by doubt--all my
+life--good-by!"
+
+The dry, sharp groans shook her body, and gasping for breath she
+laid her head on the bed at Yegor's feet.  The mother wept silent
+tears which seared her cheeks.  For some reason she tried to restrain
+them.  She wanted to fondle Liudmila, and wanted to speak about
+Yegor with words of love and grief.  She looked through her tears
+at his swollen face, at his eyes calmly covered by his drooping
+eyelids as in sleep, and at his dark lips set in a light, serene
+smile.  It was quiet, and a bleak brightness pervaded the room.
+
+Ivan Danilovich entered, as always, with short, hasty steps.  He
+suddenly stopped in the middle of the room, and thrust his hands
+into his pockets with a quick gesture.
+
+"Did it happen long ago?"  His voice was loud and nervous.
+
+Neither woman replied.  He quietly swung about, and wiping his
+forehead went to Yegor, pressed his hand, and stepped to one side.
+
+"It's not strange--with his heart.  It might have happened six months ago."
+
+His voice, high-pitched and jarringly loud for the occasion,
+suddenly broke off.  Leaning his back against the wall, he twisted
+his beard with nimble fingers, and winking his eyes, rapidly looked
+at the group by the bed.
+
+"One more!" he muttered.
+
+Liudmila rose and walked over to the window.  The mother raised her
+head and glanced around with a sigh.  A minute afterwards they all
+three stood at the open window, pressing close against one another,
+and looked at the dusky face of the autumn night.  On the black tops
+of the trees glittered the stars, endlessly deepening the distance
+of the sky.
+
+Liudmila took the mother by the hand, and silently pressed her head
+to her shoulders.  The physician nervously bit his lips and wiped
+his eyeglasses with his handkerchief.  In the stillness beyond the
+window the nocturnal noise of the city heaved wearily, and cold air
+blew on their faces and shoulders.  Liudmila trembled; the mother
+saw tears running down her cheeks.  From the corridor of the
+hospital floated confused, dismal sounds.  The three stood
+motionless at the window, looking silently into the darkness.
+
+The mother felt herself not needed, and carefully freeing her hand,
+went to the door, bowing to Yegor.
+
+"Are you going?" the physician asked softly without looking around.
+
+"Yes."
+
+In the street she thought with pity of Liudmila, remembering her
+scant tears.  She couldn't even have a good cry.  Then she pictured
+to herself Liudmila and the physician in the extremely light white
+room, the dead eyes of Yegor behind them.  A compassion for all
+people oppressed her.  She sighed heavily, and hastened her pace,
+driven along by her tumultuous feelings.
+
+"I must hurry," she thought in obedience to a sad but encouraging
+power that jostled her from within.
+
+The whole of the following day the mother was busy with preparations
+for the funeral.  In the evening when she, Nikolay, and Sofya were
+drinking tea, quietly talking about Yegor, Sashenka appeared,
+strangely brimming over with good spirits, her cheeks brilliantly
+red, her eyes beaming happily.  She seemed to be filled with some
+joyous hope.  Her animation contrasted sharply with the mournful
+gloom of the others.  The discordant note disturbed them and dazzled
+them like a fire that suddenly flashes in the darkness.  Nikolay
+thoughtfully struck his fingers on the table and smiled quietly.
+
+"You're not like yourself to-day, Sasha."
+
+"Perhaps," she laughed happily.
+
+The mother looked at her in mute remonstrance, and Sofya observed
+in a tone of admonishment:
+
+"And we were talking about Yegor Ivanovich."
+
+"What a wonderful fellow, isn't he?" she exclaimed.  "Modest, proof
+against doubt, he probably never yielded to sorrow.  I have never
+seen him without a joke on his lips; and what a worker!  He is an
+artist of the revolution, a great master, who skillfully manipulates
+revolutionary thoughts.  With what simplicity and power he always
+draws his pictures of falsehood, violence and untruth!  And what a
+capacity he has for tempering the horrible with his gay humor which
+does not diminish the force of facts but only the more brightly
+illumines his inner thought!  Always droll!  I am greatly indebted
+to him, and I shall never forget his merry eyes, his fun.  And I
+shall always feel the effect of his ideas upon me in the time of my
+doubts--I love him!"
+
+She spoke in a moderated voice, with a melancholy smile in her eyes.
+But the incomprehensible fire of her gaze was not extinguished; her
+exultation was apparent to everybody.
+
+People love their own feelings--sometimes the very feelings that are
+harmful to them--are enamored of them, and often derive keen pleasure
+even from grief, a pleasure that corrodes the heart.  Nikolay, the
+mother, and Sofya were unwilling to let the sorrowful mood produced
+by the death of their comrade give way to the joy brought in by Sasha.
+Unconsciously defending their melancholy right to feed on their
+sadness, they tried to impose their feelings on the girl.
+
+"And now he's dead," announced Sofya, watching her carefully.
+
+Sasha glanced around quickly, with a questioning look.  She knit
+her eyebrows and lowered her head.  She was silent for a short time,
+smoothing her hair with slow strokes of her hand.
+
+"He's dead?"  She again cast a searching glance into their faces.
+"It's hard for me to reconcile myself to the idea."
+
+"But it's a fact," said Nikolay with a smile.
+
+Sasha arose, walked up and down the room, and suddenly stopping,
+said in a strange voice:
+
+"What does 'to die' signify?  What died?  Did my respect for Yegor
+die?  My love for him, a comrade?  The memory of his mind's labor?
+Did that labor die?  Did all our impressions of him as of a hero
+disappear without leaving a trace?  Did all this die?  This best in
+him will never die out of me, I know.  It seems to me we're in too
+great a hurry to say of a man 'he's dead.'  That's the reason we too
+soon forget that a man never dies if we don't wish our impressions
+of his manhood, his self-denying toil for the triumph of truth and
+happiness to disappear.  We forget that everything should always be
+alive in living hearts.  Don't be in a hurry to bury the eternally
+alive, the ever luminous, along with a man's body.  The church is
+destroyed, but God is immortal."
+
+Carried away by her emotions she sat down, leaning her elbows on
+the table, and continued more thoughtfully in a lower voice, looking
+smilingly through mist-covered eyes at the faces of the comrades:
+
+"Maybe I'm talking nonsense.  But life intoxicates me by its wonderful
+complexity, by the variety of its phenomena, which at times seem like
+a miracle to me.  Perhaps we are too sparing in the expenditure of our
+feelings.  We live a great deal in our thoughts, and that spoils us
+to a certain extent.  We estimate, but we don't feel."
+
+"Did anything good happen to you?" asked Sofya with a smile.
+
+"Yes," said Sasha, nodding her head.  "I had a whole night's talk
+with Vyesovshchikov.  I didn't use to like him.  He seemed rude and
+dull.  Undoubtedly that's what he was.  A dark, immovable irritation
+at everybody lived in him.  He always used to place himself, as it
+were, like a dead weight in the center of things, and wrathfully
+say, 'I, I, I.'  There was something bourgeois in this, low, and
+exasperating."  She smiled, and again took in everybody with her
+burning look.
+
+"Now he says:  'Comrades'--and you ought to hear how he says it,
+with what a stirring, tender love.  He has grown marvelously simple
+and open-hearted, and possessed with a desire to work.  He has found
+himself, he has measured his power, and knows what he is not.  But
+the main thing is, a true comradely feeling has been born in him, a
+broad, loving comradeship, which smiles in the face of every
+difficulty in life."
+
+Vlasova listened to Sasha attentively.  She was glad to see this girl,
+always so stern, now softened, cheerful, and happy.  Yet from some
+deeps of her soul arose the jealous thought:  "And how about Pasha?"
+
+"He's entirely absorbed in thoughts of the comrades," continued Sasha.
+"And do you know of what he assures me?  Of the necessity of arranging
+an escape for them.  He says it's a very simple, easy matter."
+
+Sofya raised her head, and said animatedly:
+
+"And what do YOU think, Sasha?  Is it feasible?"
+
+The mother trembled as she set a cup of tea on the table.  Sasha
+knit her brows, her animation gone from her.  After a moment's
+silence, she said in a serious voice, but smiling in joyous confusion:
+
+"HE'S convinced.  If everything is really as he says, we ought to
+try.  It's our duty."  She blushed, dropped into a chair, and lapsed
+into silence.
+
+"My dear, dear girl!" the mother thought, smiling.  Sofya also
+smiled, and Nikolay, looking tenderly into Sasha's face, laughed
+quietly.  The girl raised her head with a stern glance for all.
+Then she paled, and her eyes flashed, and she said dryly, the
+offense she felt evident in her voice:
+
+"You're laughing.  I understand you.  You consider me personally
+interested in the case, don't you?"
+
+"Why, Sasha?" asked Sofya, rising and going over to her.
+
+Agitated, pale, the girl continued:
+
+"But I decline.  I'll not take any part in deciding the question
+if you consider it."
+
+"Stop, Sasha," said Nikolay calmly.
+
+The mother understood the girl.  She went to her and kissed her
+silently on her head.  Sasha seized her hand, leaned her cheek on
+it, and raised her reddened face, looking into the mother's eyes,
+troubled and happy.  The mother silently stroked her hair.  She
+felt sad at heart.  Sofya seated herself at Sasha's side, her arm
+over her shoulder, and said, smiling into the girl's eyes:
+
+"You're a strange person."
+
+"Yes, I think I've grown foolish," Sasha acknowledged.  "But I
+don't like shadows."
+
+"That'll do," said Nikolay seriously, but immediately followed up the
+admonition by the businesslike remark:  "There can't be two opinions
+as to the escape, if it's possible to arrange it.  But before
+everything, we must know whether the comrades in prison want it."
+
+Sasha drooped her head.  Sofya, lighting a cigarette, looked at
+her brother, and with a broad sweep of her arm dropped the match
+in a corner.
+
+"How is it possible they should not want it?" asked the mother
+with a sigh.  Sofya nodded to her, smiling, and walked over to the
+window.  The mother could not understand the failure of the others
+to respond, and looked at them in perplexity.  She wanted so much
+to hear more about the possibility of an escape.
+
+"I must see Vyesovshchikov," said Nikolay.
+
+"All right.  To-morrow I'll tell you when and where," replied Sasha.
+
+"What is he going to do?" asked Sofya, pacing through the room.
+
+"It's been decided to make him compositor in a new printing place.
+Until then he'll stay with the forester."
+
+Sasha's brow lowered.  Her face assumed its usual severe expression.
+Her voice sounded caustic.  Nikolay walked up to the mother, who was
+washing cups, and said to her:
+
+"You'll see Pasha day after to-morrow.  Hand him a note when you're
+there.  Do you understand?  We must know."
+
+"I understand.  I understand," the mother answered quickly.  "I'll
+deliver it to him all right.  That's my business."
+
+"I'm going," Sasha announced, and silently shook hands with
+everybody.  She strode away, straight and dry-eyed, with a
+peculiarly heavy tread.
+
+"Poor girl!" said Sofya softly.
+
+"Ye-es," Nikolay drawled.  Sofya put her hand on the mother's
+shoulder and gave her a gentle little shake as she sat in the chair.
+
+"Would you love such a daughter?" and Sofya looked into the mother's face.
+
+"Oh!  If I could see them together, if only for one day!" exclaimed
+Nilovna, ready to weep.
+
+"Yes, a bit of happiness is good for everybody."
+
+"But there are no people who want only a bit of happiness," remarked
+Nikolay; "and when there's much of it, it becomes cheap."
+
+Sofya sat herself at the piano, and began to play something
+low and doleful.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+
+The next morning a number of men and women stood at the gate of the
+hospital waiting for the coffin of their comrade to be carried out
+to the street.  Spies watchfully circled about, their ears alert to
+catch each sound, noting faces, manners, and words.  From the other
+side of the street a group of policemen with revolvers at their
+belts looked on.  The impudence of the spies, the mocking smiles of
+the police ready to show their power, were strong provocatives to
+the crowd.  Some joked to cover their excitement; others looked down
+on the ground sullenly, trying not to notice the affronts; still
+others, unable to restrain their wrath, laughed in sarcasm at the
+government, which feared people armed with nothing but words.  The
+pale blue sky of autumn gleamed upon the round, gray paving stones
+of the streets, strewn with yellow leaves, which the wind kept
+whirling about under the people's feet.
+
+The mother stood in the crowd.  She looked around at the familiar
+faces and thought with sadness:  "There aren't many of you, not many."
+
+The gate opened, and the coffin, decorated with wreaths tied with
+red ribbons, was carried out.  The people, as if inspired with one
+will, silently raised their hats.  A tall officer of police with a
+thick black mustache on a red face unceremoniously jostled his way
+through the crowd, followed by the soldiers, whose heavy boots
+trampled loudly on the stones.  They made a cordon around the
+coffin, and the officer said in a hoarse, commanding voice:
+
+"Remove the ribbons, please!"
+
+The men and women pressed closely about him.  They called to him,
+waving their hands excitedly and trying to push past one another.
+The mother caught the flash of pale, agitated countenances, some
+of them with quivering lips and tears.
+
+"Down with violence!" a young voice shouted nervously.  But the
+lonely outcry was lost in the general clamor.
+
+The mother also felt bitterness in her heart.  She turned in
+indignation to her neighbor, a poorly dressed young man.
+
+"They don't permit a man's comrades even to bury him as they want
+to.  What do they mean by it?"
+
+The hubbub increased and hostility waxed strong.  The coffin rocked
+over the heads of the people.  The silken rustling of the ribbons
+fluttering in the wind about the heads and faces of the carriers
+could be heard amid the noise of the strife.
+
+The mother was seized with a shuddering dread of the possible
+collision, and she quickly spoke in an undertone to her neighbors
+on the right and on the left:
+
+"Why not let them have their way if they're like that?  The comrades
+ought to yield and remove the ribbons.  What else can they do?"
+
+A loud, sharp voice subdued all the other noises:
+
+"We demand not to be disturbed in accompanying on his last journey
+one whom you tortured to death!"
+
+Somebody--apparently a girl--sang out in a high, piping voice:
+
+     "In mortal strife your victims fell."
+
+"Remove the ribbons, please, Yakovlev!  Cut them off!"  A saber
+was heard issuing from its scabbard.  The mother closed her eyes,
+awaiting shouts; but it grew quieter.
+
+The people growled like wolves at bay; then silently drooping their
+heads, crushed by the consciousness of impotence, they moved forward,
+filling the street with the noise of their tramping.  Before them
+swayed the stripped cover of the coffin with the crumpled wreaths,
+and swinging from side to side rode the mounted police.  The mother
+walked on the pavement; she was unable to see the coffin through the
+dense crowd surrounding it, which imperceptibly grew and filled the
+whole breadth of the street.  Back of the crowd also rose the gray
+figures of the mounted police; at their sides, holding their hands
+on their sabers, marched the policemen on foot, and everywhere were
+the sharp eyes of the spies, familiar to the mother, carefully
+scanning the faces of the people.
+
+"Good-by, comrade, good-by!" plaintively sang two beautiful voices.
+
+"Don't!" a shout was heard.  "We will be silent, comrades--
+for the present."
+
+The shout was stern and imposing; it carried an assuring threat,
+and it subdued the crowd.  The sad songs broke off; the talking
+became lower; only the noise of heavy tramping on the stones filled
+the street with its dull, even sound.  Over the heads of the people,
+into the transparent sky, and through the air it rose like the first
+peal of distant thunder.  People silently bore grief and revolt in
+their breasts.  Was it possible to carry on the war for freedom
+peacefully?  A vain illusion!  Hatred of violence, love of freedom
+blazed up and burned the last remnants of the illusion to ashes in
+the hearts that still cherished it.  The steps became heavier, heads
+were raised, eyes looked cold and firm, and feeling, outstripping
+thought, brought forth resolve.  The cold wind, waxing stronger and
+stronger, carried an unfriendly cloud of dust and street litter in
+front of the people.  It, blew through their garments and their
+hair, blinded their eyes and struck against their breasts.
+
+The mother was pained by these silent funerals without priests and
+heart-oppressing chants, with thoughtful faces, frowning brows, and
+the heavy tramp of the feet.  Her slowly circling thoughts
+formulated her impression in the melancholy phrase:
+
+"There are not many of you who stand up for the truth, not many;
+and yet they fear you, they fear you!"
+
+Her head bent, she strode along without looking around.  It seemed
+to her that they were burying, not Yegor, but something else unknown
+and incomprehensible to her.
+
+At the cemetery the procession for a long time moved in and out
+along the narrow paths amid the tombs until an open space was
+reached, which was sprinkled with wretched little crosses.  The
+people gathered about the graves in silence.  This austere silence
+of the living among the dead promised something strange, which
+caused the mother's heart to tremble and sink with expectation.
+The wind whistled and sighed among the graves.  The flowers trembled
+on the lid of the coffin.
+
+The police, stretching out in a line, assumed an attitude of guard,
+their eyes on their captain.  A tall, long-haired, black-browed,
+pale young man without a hat stood over the fresh grave.  At the
+same time the hoarse voice of the captain was heard:
+
+"Ladies and gentlemen!"
+
+"Comrades!" began the black-browed man sonorously.
+
+"Permit me!" shouted the police captain.  "In pursuance of the order
+of the chief of police I announce to you that I cannot permit a speech!"
+
+"I will say only a few words," the young man said calmly.  "Comrades!
+Over the grave of our teacher and friend let us vow in silence never
+to forget his will; let each one of us continue without ceasing to
+dig the grave for the source of our country's misfortune, the evil
+power that crushes it--the autocracy!"
+
+"Arrest him!" shouted the police captain.  But his voice was drowned
+in the confused outburst of shouts.
+
+"Down with the autocracy!"
+
+The police rushed through the crowd toward the orator, who, closely
+surrounded on all sides, shouted, waving his hand:
+
+"Long live liberty!  We will live and die for it!"
+
+The mother shut her eyes in momentary fear.  The boisterous tempest
+of confused sounds deafened her.  The earth rocked under her feet;
+terror impeded her breathing.  The startling whistles of the
+policemen pierced the air.  The rude, commanding voice of the
+captain was heard; the women cried hysterically.  The wooden fences
+cracked, and the heavy tread of many feet sounded dully on the dry
+ground.  A sonorous voice, subduing all the other voices, blared
+like a war trumpet:
+
+"Comrades!  Calm yourselves!  Have more respect for yourselves!
+Let me go!  Comrades, I insist, let me go!"
+
+The mother looked up, and uttered a low exclamation.  A blind impulse
+carried her forward with outstretched hands.  Not far from her, on
+a worn path between the graves, the policemen were surrounding the
+long-haired man and repelling the crowd that fell upon them from all
+sides.  The unsheathed bayonets flashed white and cold in the air,
+flying over the heads of the people, and falling quickly again with
+a spiteful hiss.  Broken bits of the fence were brandished; the
+baleful shouts of the struggling people rose wildly.
+
+The young man lifted his pale face, and his firm, calm voice sounded
+above the storm of irritated outcries:
+
+"Comrades!  Why do you spend your strength?  Our task is to arm the heads."
+
+He conquered.  Throwing away their sticks, the people dropped out
+of the throng one after the other; and the mother pushed forward.
+She saw how Nikolay, with his hat fallen back on his neck, thrust
+aside the people, intoxicated with the commotion, and heard his
+reproachful voice:
+
+"Have you lost your senses?  Calm yourselves!"
+
+It seemed to her that one of his hands was red.
+
+"Nikolay Ivanovich, go away!" she shouted, rushing toward him.
+
+"Where are you going?  They'll strike you there!"
+
+She stopped.  Seizing her by the shoulder, Sofya stood at her side,
+hatless, her jacket open, her other hand grasping a young, light-haired
+man, almost a boy.  He held his hands to his bruised face, and he
+muttered with tremulous lips:  "Let me go!  It's nothing."
+
+"Take care of him!  Take him home to us!  Here's a handkerchief.
+Bandage his face!"  Sofya gave the rapid orders, and putting his
+hand into the mother's ran away, saying:
+
+"Get out of this place quickly, else they'll arrest you!"
+
+The people scattered all over the cemetery.  After them the
+policemen strode heavily among the graves, clumsily entangling
+themselves in the flaps of their military coats, cursing, and
+brandishing their bayonets.
+
+"Let's hurry!" said the mother, wiping the boy's face with the
+handkerchief.  "What's your name?"
+
+"Ivan."  Blood spurted from his mouth.  "Don't be worried; I don't
+feel hurt.  He hit me over the head with the handle of his saber,
+and I gave him such a blow with a stick that he howled," the boy
+concluded, shaking his blood-stained fist.  "Wait--it'll be different.
+We'll choke you without a fight, when we arise, all the working people."
+
+"Quick--hurry!"  The mother urged him on, walking swiftly toward the
+little wicket gate.  It seemed to her that there, behind the fence
+in the field, the police were lying in wait for them, ready to
+pounce on them and beat them as soon as they went out.  But on
+carefully opening the gate, and looking out over the field clothed
+in the gray garb of autumn dusk, its stillness and solitude at once
+gave her composure.
+
+"Let me bandage your face."
+
+"Never mind.  I'm not ashamed to be seen with it as it is.  The
+fight was honorable--he hit me--I hit him----"
+
+The mother hurriedly bandaged his wound.  The sight of fresh,
+flowing blood filled her breast with terror and pity.  Its humid
+warmth on her fingers sent a cold, fine tremor through her body.
+Then, holding his hand, she silently and quickly conducted the
+wounded youth through the field.  Freeing his mouth of the bandage,
+he said with a smile:
+
+"But where are you taking me, comrade?  I can go by myself."
+
+But the mother perceived that he was reeling with faintness, that
+his legs were unsteady, and his hands twitched.  He spoke to her
+in a weak voice, and questioned her without waiting for an answer:
+
+"I'm a tinsmith, and who are you?  There were three of us in Yegor
+Ivanovich's circle--three tinsmiths--and there were twelve men in
+all.  We loved him very much--may he have eternal life!--although
+I don't believe in God--it's they, the dogs, that dupe us with God,
+so that we should obey the authorities and suffer life patiently
+without kicking."
+
+In one of the streets the mother hailed a cab and put Ivan into it.
+She whispered, "Now be silent," and carefully wrapped his face up
+in the handkerchief.  He raised his hand to his face, but was no
+longer able to free his mouth.  His hand fell feebly on his knees;
+nevertheless he continued to mutter through the bandages:
+
+"I won't forget those blows; I'll score them against you, my dear sirs!
+With Yegor there was another student, Titovich, who taught us political
+economy--he was a very stern, tedious fellow--he was arrested."
+
+The mother, drawing the boy to her, put his head on her bosom in
+order to muffle his voice.  It was not necessary, however, for he
+suddenly grew heavy and silent.  In awful fear, she looked about
+sidewise out of the corners of her eyes.  She felt that the policemen
+would issue from some corner, would see Ivan's bandaged head, would
+seize him and kill him.
+
+"Been drinking?" asked the driver, turning on the box with a
+benignant smile.
+
+"Pretty full."
+
+"Your son?"
+
+"Yes, a shoemaker.  I'm a cook."
+
+Shaking the whip over the horse, the driver again turned, and
+continued in a lowered voice:
+
+"I heard there was a row in the cemetery just now.  You see, they
+were burying one of the politicals, one of those who are against the
+authorities.  They have a crow to pick with the authorities.  He was
+buried by fellows like him, his friends, it must be; and they up and
+begin to shout:  'Down with the authorities!  They ruin the people.'
+The police began to beat them.  It's said some were hewed down and
+killed.  But the police got it, too."  He was silent, shaking his
+head as if afflicted by some sorrow, and uttered in a strange voice:
+"They don't even let the dead alone; they even bother people in
+their graves."
+
+The cab rattled over the stones.  Ivan's head jostled softly against
+the mother's bosom.  The driver, sitting half-turned from his horse,
+mumbled thoughtfully:
+
+"The people are beginning to boil.  Every now and then some disorder
+crops out.  Yes!  Last night the gendarmes came to our neighbors,
+and kept up an ado till morning, and in the morning they led away
+a blacksmith.  It's said they'll take him to the river at night and
+drown him.  And the blacksmith--well--he was a wise man--he understood
+a great deal--and to understand, it seems, is forbidden.  He used
+to come to us and say:  'What sort of life is the cabman's life?'
+'It's true,' we say, 'the life of a cabman is worse than a dog's.'"
+
+"Stop!" the mother said.
+
+Ivan awoke from the shock of the sudden halt, and groaned softly.
+
+"It shook him up!" remarked the driver.  "Oh, whisky, whisky!"
+
+Ivan shifted his feet about with difficulty.  His whole body
+swaying, he walked through the entrance, and said:
+
+"Nothing--comrade, I can get along."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+
+Sofya was already at home when they reached the house.  She met the
+mother with a cigarette in her teeth.  She was somewhat ruffled,
+but, as usual, bold and assured of manner.  Putting the wounded man
+on the sofa, she deftly unbound his head, giving orders and screwing
+up her eyes from the smoke of her cigarette.
+
+"Ivan Danilovich!" she called out.  "He's been brought here.  You
+are tired, Nilovna.  You've had enough fright, haven't, you?  Well,
+rest now.  Nikolay, quick, give Nilovna some tea and a glass of port."
+
+Dizzied by her experience, the mother breathing heavily and feeling
+a sickly pricking in her breast, said: "Don't bother about me."
+
+But her entire anxious being begged for attention and kindnesses.
+
+From the next room entered Nikolay with a bandaged hand, and the
+doctor, Ivan Danilovich, all disheveled, his hair standing on end
+like the spines of a hedgehog.  He quickly stepped to Ivan, bent
+over him, and said:
+
+"Water, Sofya Ivanovich, more water, clean linen strips, and cotton."
+
+The mother walked toward the kitchen; but Nikolay took her by the
+arm with his left hand, and led her into the dining room.
+
+"He didn't speak to you; he was speaking to Sofya.  You've had
+enough suffering, my dear woman, haven't you?"
+
+The mother met Nikolay's fixed, sympathetic glance, and, pressing
+his head, exclaimed with a groan she could not restrain:
+
+"Oh, my darling, how fearful it was!  They mowed the comrades down!
+They mowed them down!"
+
+"I saw it," said Nikolay, giving her a glass of wine, and nodding
+his head.  "Both sides grew a little heated.  But don't be uneasy;
+they used the flats of their swords, and it seems only one was
+seriously wounded.  I saw him struck, and I myself carried him out
+of the crowd."
+
+His face and voice, and the warmth and brightness of the room
+quieted Vlasova.  Looking gratefully at him, she asked:
+
+"Did they hit you, too?"
+
+"It seems to me that I myself through carelessness knocked my hand
+against something and tore off the skin.  Drink some tea.  The
+weather is cold and you're dressed lightly."
+
+She stretched out her hand for the cup and saw that her fingers were
+stained with dark clots of blood.  She instinctively dropped her
+hands on her knees.  Her skirt was damp.  Ivan Danilovich came in in
+his vest, his shirt sleeves rolled up, and in response to Nikolay's
+mute question, said in his thin voice:
+
+"The wound on his face is slight.  His skull, however, is fractured,
+but not very badly.  He's a strong fellow, but he's lost a lot of
+blood.  We'll take him over to the hospital."
+
+"Why?  Let him stay here!" exclaimed Nikolay.
+
+"To-day he may; and--well--to-morrow, too; but after that it'll be
+more convenient for us to have him at the hospital.  I have no time
+to pay visits.  You'll write a leaflet about the affair at the
+cemetery, won't you?"
+
+"Of course!"
+
+The mother rose quietly and walked into the kitchen.
+
+"Where are you going, Nilovna?"  Nikolay stopped her with solicitude.
+"Sofya can get along by herself."
+
+She looked at him and started and smiled strangely.
+
+"I'm all covered with blood."
+
+While changing her dress she once again thought of the calmness of
+these people, of their ability to recover from the horrible, an
+ability which clearly testified to their manly readiness to meet
+any demand made on them for work in the cause of truth.  This
+thought, steadying the mother, drove fear from her heart.
+
+When she returned to the room where the sick man lay, she heard
+Sofya say, as she bent over him:
+
+"That's nonsense, comrade!"
+
+"Yes, I'll incommode you," he said faintly.
+
+"You keep still.  That's better for you."
+
+The mother stood back of Sofya, and puffing her hand on her shoulders
+peered with a smile into the face of the sick man.  She related how
+he had raved in the presence of the cabman and frightened her by his
+lack of caution.  Ivan heard her; his eyes turned feverishly, he
+smacked his lips, and at times exclaimed in a confused low voice:
+"Oh, what a fool I am!"
+
+"We'll leave you here," Sofya said, straightening out the blanket.  "Rest."
+
+The mother and Sofya went to the dining room and conversed there in
+subdued voices about the events of the day.  They already regarded
+the drama of the burial as something remote, and looked with assurance
+toward the future in deliberating on the work of the morrow.  Their
+faces wore a weary expression, but their thoughts were bold.
+
+They spoke of their dissatisfaction with themselves.  Nervously
+moving in his chair and gesticulating animatedly the physician,
+dulling his thin, sharp voice with an effort, said:
+
+"Propaganda! propaganda!  There's too little of it now.  The young
+workingmen are right.  We must extend the field of agitation.  The
+workingmen are right, I say."
+
+Nikolay answered somberly:
+
+"From everywhere come complaints of not enough literature, and
+we still cannot get a good printing establishment.  Liudmila is
+wearing herself out.  She'll get sick if we don't see that she
+gets assistance."
+
+"And Vyesovshchikov?" asked Sofya.
+
+"He cannot live in the city.  He won't be able to go to work until
+he can enter the new printing establishment.  And one man is still
+needed for it."
+
+"Won't I do?" the mother asked quietly.
+
+All three looked at her in silence for a short while.
+
+"No, it's too hard for you, Nilovna," said Nikolay.  "You'll have to
+live outside the city and stop your visits to Pavel, and in general----"
+
+With a sigh the mother said:
+
+"For Pasha it won't be a great loss.  And so far as I am concerned
+these visits, too, are a torment; they tear out my heart.  I'm not
+allowed to speak of anything; I stand opposite my son like a fool.
+And they look into my mouth and wait to see something come out that
+oughtn't."
+
+Sofya groped for the mother's hand under the table and pressed it
+warmly with her thin fingers.  Nikolay looked at the mother fixedly
+while explaining to her that she would have to serve in the new
+printing establishment as a protection to the workers.
+
+"I understand," she said.  "I'll be a cook.  I'll be able to do it;
+I can imagine what's needed."
+
+"How persistent you are!" remarked Sofya.
+
+The events of the last few days had exhausted the mother; and now as
+she heard of the possibility of living outside the city, away from
+its bustle, she greedily grasped at the chance.
+
+But Nikolay changed the subject of conversation.
+
+"What are you thinking about, Ivan?"  He turned to the physician.
+
+Raising his head from the table, the physician answered sullenly:
+
+"There are too few of us.  That's what I'm thinking of.  We positively
+must begin to work more energetically, and we must persuade Pavel and
+Andrey to escape.  They are both too invaluable to be sitting there idle."
+
+Nikolay lowered his brows and shook his head in doubt, darting a
+glance at the mother.
+
+As she realized the embarrassment they must feel in speaking of her
+son in her presence, she walked out into her own room.
+
+There, lying in bed with open eyes, the murmur of low talking in her
+ears, she gave herself up to anxious thoughts.  She wanted to see
+her son at liberty, but at the same time the idea of freeing him
+frightened her.  She felt that the struggle around her was growing
+keener and that a sharp collision was threatening.  The silent
+patience of the people was wearing away, yielding to a strained
+expectation of something new.  The excitement was growing perceptibly.
+Bitter words were tossed about.  Something novel and stirring was
+wafted from all quarters; every proclamation evoked lively discussions
+in the market place, in the shops, among servants, among workingmen.
+Every arrest aroused a timid, uncomprehending, and sometimes unconscious
+sympathy when judgment regarding the causes of the arrest was expressed.
+She heard the words that had once frightened her--riot, socialism,
+politics--uttered more and more frequently among the simple folk,
+though accompanied by derision.  However, behind their ridicule it
+was impossible to conceal an eagerness to understand, mingled with
+fear and hope, with hatred of the masters and threats against them.
+
+Agitation disturbed the settled, dark life of the people in slow but
+wide circles.  Dormant thoughts awoke, and men were shaken from their
+usual forced calm attitude toward daily events.  All this the mother
+saw more clearly than others, because she, better than they, knew the
+dismal, dead face of existence; she stood nearer to it, and now saw
+upon it the wrinkles of hesitation and turmoil, the vague hunger for
+the new.  She both rejoiced over the change and feared it.  She
+rejoiced because she regarded this as the cause of her son; she feared
+because she knew that if he emerged from prison he would stand at
+the head of all, in the most dangerous place, and--he would perish.
+
+She often felt great thoughts needful to everybody stirring in her
+bosom, but scarcely ever was able to make them live in words; and
+they oppressed her heart with a dumb, heavy sadness.  Sometimes the
+image of her son grew before her until it assumed the proportions of
+a giant in the old fairy tales.  He united within himself all the
+honest thoughts she had heard spoken, all the people that she liked,
+everything heroic of which she knew.  Then, moved with delight in
+him, she exulted in quiet rapture.  An indistinct hope filled her.
+"Everything will be well--everything!"  Her love, the love of a
+mother, was fanned into a flame, a veritable pain to her heart.
+Then the motherly affection hindered the growth of the broader human
+feeling, burned it; and in place of a great sentiment a small,
+dismal thought beat faint-heartedly in the gray ashes of alarm:
+"He will perish; he will fall!"
+
+Late that night the mother sank into a heavy sleep, but rose early,
+her bones stiff, her head aching.  At mid-day she was sitting in the
+prison office opposite Pavel and looking through a mist in her eyes
+at his bearded, swarthy face.  She was watching for a chance to
+deliver to him the note she held tightly in her hand.
+
+"I am well and all are well," said Pavel in a moderated voice.
+"And how are you?"
+
+"So so.  Yegor Ivanovich died," she said mechanically.
+
+"Yes?" exclaimed Pavel, and dropped his head.
+
+"At the funeral the police got up a fight and arrested one man,"
+the mother continued in her simple-hearted way.
+
+The thin-lipped assistant overseer of the prison jumped from his
+chair and mumbled quickly:
+
+"Cut that out; it's forbidden!  Why don't you understand?  You know
+politics are prohibited."
+
+The mother also rose from her chair, and as if failing to comprehend
+him, she said guiltily:
+
+"I wasn't discussing politics.  I was telling about a fight--and
+they did fight; that's true.  They even broke one fellow's head."
+
+"All the same, please keep quiet--that is to say, keep quiet about
+everything that doesn't concern you personally--your family; in
+general, your home."
+
+Aware that his speech was confused, he sat down in his chair and
+arranged papers.
+
+"I'm responsible for what you say," he said sadly and wearily.
+
+The mother looked around and quickly thrust the note into Pavel's
+hand.  She breathed a deep sigh of relief.
+
+"I don't know what to speak about."
+
+Pavel smiled:
+
+"I don't know either."
+
+"Then why pay visits?" said the overseer excitedly.  "They have
+nothing to say, but they come here anyhow and bother me."
+
+"Will the trial take place soon?" asked the mother after a pause.
+
+"The procurator was here the other day, and he said it will come off soon."
+
+"You've been in prison half a year already!"
+
+They spoke to each other about matters of no significance to either.
+The mother saw Pavel's eyes look into her face softly and lovingly.
+Even and calm as before, he had not changed, save that his wrists
+were whiter, and his beard, grown long, made him look older.  The
+mother experienced a strong desire to do something pleasant for
+him--tell him about Vyesovshchikov, for instance.  So, without
+changing her tone, she continued in the same voice in which she
+spoke of the needless and uninteresting things.
+
+"I saw your godchild."  Pavel fixed a silent questioning look on her
+eyes.  She tapped her fingers on her cheeks to picture to him the
+pockmarked face of Vyesovshchikov.
+
+"He's all right!  The boy is alive and well.  He'll soon get his
+position--you remember how he always asked for hard work?"
+
+Pavel understood, and gratefully nodded his head.  "Why, of course
+I remember!" he answered, with a cheery smile in his eyes.
+
+"Very well!" the mother uttered in a satisfied tone, content with
+herself and moved by his joy.
+
+On parting with her he held her hand in a firm clasp.
+
+"Thank you, mamma!"  The joyous feeling of hearty nearness to him
+mounted to her head like a strong drink.  Powerless to answer in
+words, she merely pressed his hand.
+
+At home she found Sasha.  The girl usually came to Nilovna on the
+days when the mother had visited Pavel.
+
+"Well, how is he?"
+
+"He's well."
+
+"Did you hand him the note?"
+
+"Of course!  I stuck it into his hands very cleverly."
+
+"Did he read it?"
+
+"On the spot?  How could he?"
+
+"Oh, yes; I forgot!  Let us wait another week, one week longer.
+Do you think he'll agree to it?"
+
+"I don't know--I think he will," the mother deliberated.  "Why
+shouldn't he if he can do so without danger?"
+
+Sasha shook her head.
+
+"Do you know what the sick man is allowed to eat?  He's asked for
+some food."
+
+"Anything at all.  I'll get him something at once."  The mother
+walked into the kitchen, slowly followed by Sasha.
+
+"Can I help you?"
+
+"Thank you!  Why should you?"
+
+The mother bent at the oven to get a pot.  The girl said in a low
+voice:
+
+"Wait!"
+
+Her face paled, her eyes opened sadly and her quivering lips
+whispered hotly with an effort:
+
+"I want to beg you--I know he will not agree--try to persuade him.
+He's needed.  Tell him he's essential, absolutely necessary for the
+cause--tell him I fear he'll get sick.  You see the date of the trial
+hasn't been set yet, and six months have already passed--I beg of you!"
+
+It was apparent that she spoke with difficulty.  She stood up straight,
+in a tense attitude, and looked aside.  Her voice sounded uneven,
+like the snapping of a taut string.  Her eyelids drooping wearily,
+she bit her lips, and the fingers of her compressed hand cracked.
+
+The mother was ruffled by her outburst; but she understood it, and
+a sad emotion took possession of her.  Softly embracing Sasha, she
+answered:
+
+"My dear, he will never listen to anybody except himself--never!"
+
+For a short while they were both silent in a close embrace.  Then
+Sasha carefully removed the mother's hands from her shoulders.
+
+"Yes, you're right," she said in a tremble.  "It's all stupidity and
+nerves.  One gets so tired."  And, suddenly growing serious, she
+concluded:  "Anyway, let's give the sick man something to eat."
+
+In an instant she was sitting at Ivan's bed, kindly and solicitously
+inquiring, "Does your head ache badly?"
+
+"Not very.  Only everything is muddled up, and I'm weak," answered
+Ivan in embarrassment.  He pulled the blanket up to his chin, and
+screwed up his eyes as if dazzled by too brilliant a light.
+Noticing that she embarrassed him by her presence and that he could
+not make up his mind to eat, Sasha rose and walked away.  Then Ivan
+sat up in bed and looked at the door through which she had left.
+
+"Be-au-tiful!" he murmured.
+
+His eyes were bright and merry; his teeth fine and compact; his
+young voice was not yet steady as an adult's.
+
+"How old are you?" the mother asked thoughtfully.
+
+"Seventeen years."
+
+"Where are your parents?"
+
+"In the village.  I've been here since I was ten years old.  I got
+through school and came here.  And what is your name, comrade?"
+
+This word, when applied to her, always brought a smile to the
+mother's face and touched her.
+
+"Why do you want to know?"
+
+The youth, after an embarrassed pause, explained:
+
+"You see, a student of our circle, that is, a fellow who used to
+read to us, told us about Pavel's mother--a workingman, you know--
+and about the first of May demonstration."
+
+She nodded her head and pricked up her ears.
+
+"He was the first one who openly displayed the banner of our party,"
+the youth declared with pride--a pride which found a response in
+the mother's heart.
+
+"I wasn't present; we were then thinking of making our own demonstration
+here in the city, but it fizzled out; we were too few of us then.
+But this year we will--you'll see!"
+
+He choked from agitation, having a foretaste of the future event.
+Then waving his spoon in the air, he continued:
+
+"So Vlasova--the mother, as I was telling you--she, too, got into
+the party after that.  They say she's a wonder of an old woman."
+
+The mother smiled broadly.  It was pleasant for her to hear the
+boy's enthusiastic praise--pleasant, yet embarrassing.  She  even
+had to restrain herself from telling him that she was Vlasova, and
+she thought sadly, in derision of herself:  "Oh, you old fool!"
+
+"Eat more!  Get well sooner for the sake of the cause!"  She burst
+out all of a sudden, in agitation, bending toward him:  "It awaits
+powerful young hands, clean hearts, honest minds.  It lives by these
+forces!  With them it holds aloof everything evil, everything mean!"
+
+The door opened, admitting a cold, damp, autumn draught.  Sofya
+entered, bold, a smile on her face, reddened by the cold.
+
+"Upon my word, the spies are as attentive to me as a bridegroom
+to a rich bride!  I must leave this place.  Well, how are you,
+Vanya?  All right?  How's Pavel, Nilovna?  What! is Sasha here?"
+
+Lighting a cigarette, she showered questions without waiting for
+answers, caressing the mother and the youth with merry glances of
+her gray eyes.  The mother looked at her and smiled inwardly.  "What
+good people I'm among!" she thought.  She bent over Ivan again and
+gave him back his kindness twofold:
+
+"Get well!  Now I must give you wine."  She rose and walked into
+the dining room, where Sofya was saying to Sasha:
+
+"She has three hundred copies prepared already.  She'll kill herself
+working so hard.  There's heroism for you!  Unseen, unnoticed, it
+finds its reward and its praise in itself.  Do you know, Sasha,
+it's the greatest happiness to live among such people, to be their
+comrade, to work with them?"
+
+"Yes," answered the girl softly.
+
+In the evening at tea Sofya said to the mother:
+
+"Nilovna, you have to go to the village again."
+
+"Well, what of it?  When?"
+
+"It would be good if you could go to-morrow.  Can you?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Ride there," advised Nikolay.  "Hire post horses, and please take
+a different route from before--across the district of Nikolsk."
+Nikolay's somber expression was alarming.
+
+"The way by Nikolsk is long, and it's expensive if you hire horses."
+
+"You see, I'm against this expedition in general.  It's already
+begun to be unquiet there--some arrests have been made, a teacher
+was taken.  Rybin escaped, that's certain.  But we must be more
+careful.  We ought to have waited a little while still."
+
+"That can't be avoided," said Nilovna.
+
+Sofya, tapping her fingers on the table, remarked:
+
+"It's important for us to keep spreading literature all the time.
+You're not afraid to go, are you, Nilovna?"
+
+The mother felt offended.  "When have I ever been afraid?  I was
+without fear even the first time.  And now all of a sudden--"  She
+drooped her head.  Each time she was asked whether she was afraid,
+whether the thing was convenient for her, whether she could do this
+or that--she detected an appeal to her which placed her apart from
+the comrades, who seemed to behave differently toward her than
+toward one another.  Moreover, when fuller days came, although at
+first disquieted by the commotion, by the rapidity of events, she
+soon grew accustomed to the bustle and responded, as it were, to the
+jolts she received from her impressions.  She became filled with a
+zealous greed for work.  This was her condition to-day; and, therefore,
+Sofya's question was all the more displeasing to her.
+
+"There's no use for you to ask me whether or not I'm afraid and
+various other things," she sighed.  "I've nothing to be afraid of.
+Those people are afraid who have something.  What have I?  Only a
+son.  I used to be afraid for him, and I used to fear torture for
+his sake.  And if there is no torture--well, then?"
+
+"Are you offended?" exclaimed Sofya.
+
+"No.  Only you don't ask each other whether you're afraid."
+
+Nikolay removed his glasses, adjusted them to his nose again, and
+looked fixedly at his sister's face.  The embarrassed silence that
+followed disturbed the mother.  She rose guiltily from her seat,
+wishing to say something to them, but Sofya stroked her hand, and
+said quietly: 
+
+"Forgive me!  I won't do it any more."
+
+The mother had to laugh, and in a few minutes the three were
+speaking busily and amicably about the trip to the village.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X
+
+
+The next day, early in the morning, the mother was seated in the
+post chaise, jolting along the road washed by the autumn rain.  A
+damp wind blew on her face, the mud splashed, and the coachman on
+the box, half-turned toward her, complained in a meditative snuffle:
+
+"I say to him--my brother, that is--let's go halves.  We began to
+divide"--he suddenly whipped the left horse and shouted angrily:
+"Well, well, play, your mother is a witch."
+
+The stout autumn crows strode with a businesslike air through the
+bare fields.  The wind whistled coldly, and the birds caught its
+buffets on their backs.  It blew their feathers apart, and even
+lifted them off their feet, and, yielding to its force, they lazily
+flapped their wings and flew to a new spot.
+
+"But he cheated me; I see I have nothing----"
+
+The mother listened to the coachman's words as in a dream.  A dumb
+thought grew in her heart.  Memory brought before her a long series
+of events through which she had lived in the last years.  On an
+examination of each event, she found she had actively participated
+in it.  Formerly, life used to happen somewhere in the distance,
+remote from where she was, uncertain for whom and for what.  Now,
+many things were accomplished before her eyes, with her help.  The
+result in her was a confused feeling, compounded of distrust of
+herself, complacency, perplexity, and sadness.
+
+The scenery about her seemed to be slowly moving.  Gray clouds
+floated in the sky, chasing each other heavily; wet trees flashed
+along the sides of the road, swinging their bare tops; little hills
+appeared and swam asunder.  The whole turbid day seemed to be
+hastening to meet the sun--to be seeking it.
+
+The drawling voice of the coachman, the sound of the bells, the
+humid rustle and whistle of the wind, blended in a trembling,
+tortuous stream, which flowed on with a monotonous force, and
+roused the wind.
+
+"The rich man feels crowded, even in Paradise.  That's the way it
+is.  Once he begins to oppress, the government authorities are his
+friends," quoth the coachman, swaying on his seat.
+
+While unhitching the horses at the station he said to the mother
+in a hopeless voice:
+
+"If you gave me only enough for a drink----"
+
+She gave him a coin, and tossing it in the palm of his hand, he
+informed her in the same hopeless tone:
+
+"I'll take a drink for three coppers, and buy myself bread for two."
+
+In the afternoon the mother, shaken up by the ride and chilled,
+reached the large village of Nikolsk.  She went to a tavern and
+asked for tea.  After placing her heavy valise under the bench, she
+sat at a window and looked out into an open square, covered with
+yellow, trampled grass, and into the town hall, a long, old building
+with an overhanging roof.  Swine were straggling about in the square,
+and on the steps of the town hail sat a bald, thin-bearded peasant
+smoking a pipe.  The clouds swam overhead in dark masses, and piled
+up, one absorbing the other.  It was dark, gloomy, and tedious.
+Life seemed to be in hiding.
+
+Suddenly the village sergeant galloped up to the square, stopped his
+sorrel at the steps of the town hall, and waving his whip in the
+air, shouted to the peasant.  The shouts rattled against the window
+panes, but the words were indistinguishable.  The peasant rose and
+stretched his hand, pointing to something.  The sergeant jumped to
+the ground, reeled, threw the reins to the peasant, and seizing the
+rails with his hands, lifted himself heavily up the steps, and
+disappeared behind the doors of the town hall.
+
+Quiet reigned again.  Only the horse struck the soft earth with the
+iron of his shoes.
+
+A girl came into the room.  A short yellow braid lay on her neck,
+her face was round, and her eyes kind.  She bit her lips with the
+effort of carrying a ragged-edged tray, with dishes, in her
+outstretched hands.  She bowed, nodding her head.
+
+"How do you do, my good girl?" said the mother kindly.
+
+"How do you do?"
+
+Putting the plates and the china dishes on the table, she announced
+with animation:
+
+"They've just caught a thief.  They're bringing him here."
+
+"Indeed?  What sort of a thief?"
+
+"I don't know."
+
+"What did he do?"
+
+"I don't know.  I only heard that they caught him.  The watchman
+of the town hall ran off for the police commissioner, and shouted:
+'They've caught him.  They're bringing him here.'"
+
+The mother looked through the window.  Peasants gathered in the
+square; some walked slowly, some quickly, while buttoning their
+overcoats.  They stopped at the steps of the town hall, and all
+looked to the left.  It was strangely quiet.  The girl also went to
+the window to see the street, and then silently ran from the room,
+banging the door after her.  The mother trembled, pushed her valise
+farther under the bench, and throwing her shawl over her head,
+hurried to the door.  She had to restrain a sudden, incomprehensible
+desire to run.
+
+When she walked up the steps of the town hall a sharp cold struck
+her face and breast.  She lost breath, and her legs stiffened.
+There, in the middle of the square, walked Rybin!  His hands were
+bound behind his back, and on each side of him a policeman,
+rhythmically striking the ground with his club.  At the steps stood
+a crowd waiting in silence.
+
+Unconscious of the bearing of the thing, the mother's gaze was,
+riveted on Rybin.  He said something; she heard his voice, but
+the words did not reach the dark emptiness of her heart.
+
+She recovered her senses, and took a deep breath.  A peasant with
+a broad light beard was standing at the steps looking fixedly into
+her face with his, blue eyes.  Coughing and rubbing her throat with
+her hands, weak with fear, she asked him with an effort:
+
+"What's the matter?"
+
+"Well, look."  The peasant turned away.  Another peasant came up
+to her side.
+
+"Oh, thief!  How horrible you look!" shouted a woman's voice.
+
+The policemen stepped in front of the crowd, which increased in size.
+Rybin's voice sounded thick:
+
+"Peasants, I'm not a thief; I don't steal; I don't set things on
+fire.  I only fight against falsehood.  That's why they seized me.
+Have you heard of the true books in which the truth is written about
+our peasant life?  Well, it's because of these writings that I
+suffer.  It's I who distributed them among the people."
+
+The crowd surrounded Rybin more closely.  His voice steadied the mother.
+
+"Did you hear?" said a peasant in a low voice, nudging a blue-eyed
+neighbor, who did not answer but raised his head and again looked
+into the mother's face.  The other peasant also looked at her.  He
+was younger than he of the blue eyes, with a dark, sparse beard,
+and a lean freckled face.  Then both of them turned away to the
+side of the steps.
+
+"They're afraid," the mother involuntarily noted.  Her attention
+grew keener.  From the elevation of the stoop she clearly saw the
+dark face of Rybin, distinguished the hot gleam of his eyes.  She
+wanted that he, too, should see her, and raised herself on tiptoe
+and craned her neck.
+
+The people looked at him sullenly, distrustfully, and were silent.
+Only in the rear of the crowd subdued conversation was heard.
+
+"Peasants!" said Rybin aloud, in a peculiar full voice.  "Believe
+these papers!  I shall now, perhaps, get death on account of them.
+The authorities beat me, they tortured me, they wanted to find out
+from where I got them, and they're going to beat me more.  For in
+these writings the truth is laid down.  An honest world and the
+truth ought to be dearer to us than bread.  That's what I say."
+
+"Why is he doing this?" softly exclaimed one of the peasants near
+the steps.  He of the blue eyes answered:
+
+"Now it's all the same.  He won't escape death, anyhow.  And a man
+can't die twice."
+
+The sergeant suddenly appeared on the steps of the town hall,
+roaring in a drunken voice:
+
+"What is this crowd?  Who's the fellow speaking?"
+
+Suddenly precipitating himself down the steps, he seized Rybin by
+the hair, and pulled his head backward and forward.  "Is it you
+speaking, you damned scoundrel?  Is it you?"
+
+The crowd, giving way, still maintained silence.  The mother, in
+impotent grief, bowed her head; one of the peasants sighed.  Rybin
+spoke again:
+
+"There!  Look, good people!"
+
+"Silence!" and the sergeant struck his face.
+
+Rybin reeled.
+
+"They bind a man's hands and then torment him, and do with him
+whatever they please."
+
+"Policemen, take him!  Disperse, people!"  The sergeant, jumping and
+swinging in front of Rybin, struck him in his face, breast, and stomach.
+
+"Don't beat him!" some one shouted dully.
+
+"Why do you beat him?" another voice upheld the first.
+
+"Lazy, good-for-nothing beast!"
+
+"Come!" said the blue-eyed peasant, motioning with his head; and
+without hastening, the two walked toward the town hall, accompanied
+by a kind look from the mother.  She sighed with relief.  The
+sergeant again ran heavily up the steps, and shaking his fists in
+menace, bawled from his height vehemently:
+
+"Bring him here, officers, I say!  I say----"
+
+"Don't!" a strong voice resounded in the crowd, and the mother knew
+it came from the blue-eyed peasant.  "Boys! don't permit it!  They'll
+take him in there and beat him to death, and then they'll say we
+killed him.  Don't permit it!"
+
+"Peasants!" the powerful voice of Rybin roared, drowning the shouts
+of the sergeant.  "Don't you understand your life?  Don't you
+understand how they rob you--how they cheat you--how they drink your
+blood?  You keep everything up; everything rests on you; you are all
+the power that is at the bottom of everything on earth--its whole
+power.  And what rights have you?  You have the right to starve--
+it's your only right!"
+
+"He's speaking the truth, I tell YOU!"
+
+Some men shouted:
+
+"Call the commissioner of police!  Where is the commissioner of police?"
+
+"The sergeant has ridden away for him!"
+
+"It's not our business to call the authorities!"
+
+The noise increased as the crowd grew louder and louder.
+
+"Speak!  We won't let them beat you!"
+
+"Officers, untie his hands!"
+
+"No, brothers; that's not necessary!"
+
+"Untie him!"
+
+"Look out you don't do something you'll, be sorry for!"
+
+"I am sorry for my hands!" Rybin said evenly and resonantly, making
+himself heard above all the other voices.  "I'll not escape, peasants.
+I cannot hide from my truth; it lives inside of me!"
+
+Several men walked away from the crowd, formed different circles,
+and with earnest faces and shaking their heads carried on
+conversations.  Some smiled.  More and more people came running
+up--excited, bearing marks of having dressed quickly.  They seethed
+like black foam about Rybin, and he rocked to and fro in their midst.
+Raising his hands over his head and shaking them, he called into
+the crowd, which responded now by loud shouts, now by silent, greedy
+attention, to the unfamiliar, daring words:
+
+"Thank you, good people!  Thank you!  I stood up for you, for your
+lives!"  He wiped his beard and again raised his blood-covered hand.
+"There's my blood!  It flows for the sake of truth!"
+
+The mother, without considering, walked down the steps, but immediately
+returned, since on the ground she couldn't see Mikhail, hidden by
+the close-packed crowd.  Something indistinctly joyous trembled in
+her bosom and warmed it.
+
+"Peasants!  Keep your eyes open for those writings; read them.
+Don't believe the authorities and the priests when they tell you
+those people who carry truth to us are godless rioters.  The truth
+travels over the earth secretly; it seeks a nest among the people.
+To the authorities it's like a knife in the fire.  They cannot accept
+it.  It will cut them and burn them.  Truth is your good friend and
+a sworn enemy of the authorities--that's why it hides itself."
+
+"That's so; he's speaking the gospel!" shouted the blue-eyed peasant.
+
+"Ah, brother!  You will perish--and soon, too!"
+
+"Who betrayed you?"
+
+"The priest!" said one of the police.
+
+Two peasants gave vent to hard oaths.
+
+"Look out, boys!" a somewhat subdued cry was heard in warning.
+
+The commissioner of police walked into the crowd--a tall, compact
+man, with a round, red face.  His cap was cocked to one side; his
+mustache with one end turned up the other drooping made his face
+seem crooked, and it was disfigured by a dull, dead grin.  His left
+hand held a saber, his right waved broadly in the air.  His heavy,
+firm tramp was audible.  The crowd gave way before him.  Something
+sullen and crushed appeared in their faces, and the noise died away
+as if it had sunk into the ground.
+
+"What's the trouble?" asked the police commissioner, stopping in
+front of Rybin and measuring him with his eyes.  "Why are his hands
+not bound?  Officers, why?  Bind them!"  His voice was high and
+resonant, but colorless.
+
+"They were tied, but the people unbound them," answered one of
+the policemen.
+
+"The people!  What people?"  The police commissioner looked at the
+crowd standing in a half-circle before him.  In the same monotonous,
+blank voice, neither elevating nor lowering it, he continued:
+"Who are the people?"
+
+With a back stroke he thrust the handle of his saber against the
+breast of the blue-eyed peasant.
+
+"Are you the people, Chumakov?  Well, who else?  You, Mishin?" and
+he pulled somebody's beard with his right hand.
+
+"Disperse, you curs!"
+
+Neither his voice nor face displayed the least agitation or threat.
+He spoke mechanically, with a dead calm, and with even movements of
+his strong, long hands, pushed the people back.  The semicircle
+before him widened.  Heads drooped, faces were turned aside.
+
+"Well," he addressed the policeman, "what's the matter with you?
+Bind him!"  He uttered a cynical oath and again looked at Rybin,
+and said nonchalantly:  "Your hands behind your back, you!"
+
+"I don't want my hands to be bound," said Rybin.  "I'm not going
+to run away, and I'm not fighting.  Why should my hands be bound?"
+
+"What?" exclaimed the police commissioner, striding up to him.
+
+"It's enough that you torture the people, you beasts!" continued
+Rybin in an elevated voice.  "The red day will soon come for you,
+too.  You'll be paid back for everything."
+
+The police commissioner stood before him, his mustached upper lip
+twitching.  Then he drew back a step, and with a whistling voice
+sang out in surprise:
+
+"Um! you damned scoundrel!  Wha-at?  What do you mean by your words?
+People, you say?  A-a----"
+
+Suddenly he dealt Rybin a quick, sharp blow in the face.
+
+"You won't kill the truth with your fist!" shouted Rybin, drawing
+on him.  "And you have no right to beat me, you dog!"
+
+"I won't dare, I suppose?" the police commissioner drawled.
+
+Again he waved his hand, aiming at Rybin's head; Rybin ducked;
+the blow missed, and the police commissioner almost toppled over.
+Some one in the crowd gave a jeering snort, and the angry shout
+of Mikhail was heard:
+
+"Don't you dare to beat me, I say, you infernal devil!  I'm no
+weaker than you!  Look out!"
+
+The police commissioner looked around.  The people shut down on him
+in a narrower circle, advancing sullenly.
+
+"Nikita!" the police commissioner called out, looking around.
+"Nikita, hey!"  A squat peasant in a short fur overcoat emerged
+from the crowd.  He looked on the ground, with his large disheveled
+head drooping.
+
+"Nikita," the police commissioner said deliberately, twirling his
+mustache, "give him a box on the ear--a good one!"
+
+The peasant stepped forward, stopped in front of Rybin and raised his
+hand.  Staring him straight in the face, Rybin stammered out heavily:
+
+"Now look, people, how the beasts choke you with your own hands!
+Look!  Look!  Think!  Why does he want to beat me--why?  I ask."
+
+The peasant raised his hand and lazily struck Mikhail's face.
+
+"Ah, Nikita! don't forget God!" subdued shouts came from the crowd.
+
+"Strike, I say!" shouted the police commissioner, pushing the
+peasant on the back of his neck.
+
+The peasant stepped aside, and inclining his head, said sullenly:
+
+"I won't do it again."
+
+"What?"  The face of the police commissioner quivered.  He stamped
+his feet, and, cursing, suddenly flung himself upon Rybin.  The blow
+whizzed through the air; Rybin staggered and waved his arms; with
+the second blow the police commissioner felled him to the ground,
+and, jumping around with a growl, he began to kick him on his breast,
+his side, and his head.
+
+The crowd set up a hostile hum, rocked, and advanced upon the police
+commissioner.  He noticed it and jumped away, snatching his saber
+from its scabbard.
+
+"So that's what you're up to!  You're rioting, are you?"
+
+His voice trembled and broke; it had grown husky.  And he lost his
+composure along with his voice.  He drew his shoulders up about his
+head, bent over, and turning his blank, bright eyes on all sides, he
+fell back, carefully feeling the ground behind him with his feet.
+As he withdrew he shouted hoarsely in great excitement:
+
+"All right; take him!  I'm leaving!  But now, do you know, you cursed
+dogs, that he is a political criminal; that he is going against our
+Czar; that he stirs up riots--do you know it?--against the Emperor,
+the Czar?  And you protect him; you, too, are rebels.  Aha--a----"
+
+Without budging, without moving her eyes, the strength of reason
+gone from her, the mother stood as if in a heavy sleep, overwhelmed
+by fear and pity.  The outraged, sullen, wrathful shouts of the
+people buzzed like bees in her head.
+
+"If he has done something wrong, lead him to court."
+
+"And don't beat him!"
+
+"Forgive him, your Honor!"
+
+"Now, really, what does it mean?  Without any law whatever!"
+
+"Why, is it possible?  If they begin to beat everybody that way,
+what'll happen then?"
+
+"The devils!  Our torturers!"
+
+The people fell into two groups--the one surrounding the police
+commissioner shouted and exhorted him; the other, less numerous,
+remained about the beaten man, humming and sullen.  Several men
+lifted him from the ground.  The policemen again wanted to bind
+his bands.
+
+"Wait a little while, you devils!" the people shouted.
+
+Rybin wiped the blood from his face and beard and looked about in
+silence.  His gaze glided by the face of the mother.  She started,
+stretched herself out to him, and instinctively waved her hand.  He
+turned away; but in a few minutes his eyes again rested on her face.
+It seemed to her that he straightened himself and raised his head,
+that his blood-covered cheeks quivered.
+
+"Did he recognize me?  I wonder if he did?"
+
+She nodded her head to him and started with a sorrowful, painful
+joy.  But the next moment she saw that the blue-eyed peasant was
+standing near him and also looking at her.  His gaze awakened her
+to the consciousness of the risk she was running.
+
+"What am I doing?  They'll take me, too."
+
+The peasant said something to Rybin, who shook his head.
+
+"Never mind!" he exclaimed, his voice tremulous, but clear and bold.
+"I'm not alone in the world.  They'll not capture all the truth.
+In the place where I was the memory of me will remain.  That's it!
+Even though they destroy the nest, aren't there more friends and
+comrades there?"
+
+"He's saying this for me," the mother decided quickly.
+
+"The people will build other nests for the truth; and a day will
+come when the eagles will fly from them into freedom.  The people
+will emancipate themselves."
+
+A woman brought a pail of water and, wailing and groaning, began
+to wash Rybin's face.  Her thin, piteous voice mixed with Mikhail's
+words and hindered the mother from understanding them.  A throng
+of peasants came up with the police commissioner in front of them.
+Some one shouted aloud:
+
+"Come; I'm going to make an arrest!  Who's next?"
+
+Then the voice of the police commissioner was heard.  It had changed--
+mortification now evident in its altered tone.
+
+"I may strike you, but you mayn't strike me.  Don't you dare, you dunce!"
+
+"Is that so?  And who are you, pray?  A god?"
+
+A confused but subdued clamor drowned Rybin's voice.
+
+"Don't argue, uncle.  You're up against the authorities."
+
+"Don't be angry, your Honor.  The man's out of his wits."
+
+"Keep still, you funny fellow!"
+
+"Here, they'll soon take you to the city!"
+
+"There's more law there!"
+
+The shouts of the crowd sounded pacificatory, entreating; they
+blended into a thick, indistinct babel, in which there was something
+hopeless and pitiful.  The policemen led Rybin up the steps of the
+town hall and disappeared with him behind the doors.  People began
+to depart in a hurry.  The mother saw the blue-eyed peasant go
+across the square and look at her sidewise.  Her legs trembled under
+her knees.  A dismal feeling of impotence and loneliness gnawed at
+her heart sickeningly.
+
+"I mustn't go away," she thought.  "I mustn't!" and holding on to
+the rails firmly, she waited.
+
+The police commissioner walked up the steps of the town hall and
+said in a rebuking voice, which had assumed its former blankness
+and soullessness:
+
+"You're fools, you damned scoundrels!  You don't understand a thing,
+and poke your noses into an affair like this--a government affair.
+Cattle!  You ought to thank me, fall on your knees before me for my
+goodness!  If I were to say so, you would all be put to hard labor."
+
+About a score of peasants stood with bared heads and listened in
+silence.  It began to grow dusk; the clouds lowered.  The blue-eyed
+peasant walked up to the steps, and said with a sigh:
+
+"That's the kind of business we have here!"
+
+"Ye-es," the mother rejoined quietly.
+
+He looked at her with an open gaze.
+
+"What's your occupation?" he asked after a pause.
+
+"I buy lace from the women, and linen, too."
+
+The peasant slowly stroked his beard.  Then looking up at the town
+hall he said gloomily and softly:
+
+"You won't, find anything of that kind here."
+
+The mother looked down on him, and waited for a more suitable moment
+to depart for the tavern.  The peasant's face was thoughtful and
+handsome and his eyes were sad.  Broad-shouldered and tall, he was
+dressed in a patched-up coat, in a clean chintz shirt, and reddish
+homespun trousers.  His feet were stockingless.
+
+The mother for some reason drew a sigh of relief, and suddenly
+obeying an impulse from within, yielding to an instinct that got
+the better of her reason, she surprised herself by asking him:
+
+"Can I stay in your house overnight?"
+
+At the question everything in her muscles, her bones, tightened
+stiffly.  She straightened herself, holding her breath, and fixed
+her eyes on the peasant.  Pricking thoughts quickly flashed through
+her mind:  "I'll ruin everybody--Nikolay Ivanovich, Sonyushka--I'll
+not see Pasha for a long time--they'll kill him----"
+
+Looking on the ground, the peasant answered deliberately, folding
+his coat over his breast:
+
+"Stay overnight?  Yes, you can.  Why not?  Only my home is very poor!"
+
+"Never mind; I'm not used to luxury," the mother answered uncalculatingly.
+
+"You can stay with me overnight," the peasant repeated, measuring
+her with a searching glance.
+
+It had already grown dark, and in the twilight his eyes shone cold,
+his face seemed very pale.  The mother looked around, and as if
+dropping under distress, she said in an undertone:
+
+"Then I'll go at once, and you'll take my valise."
+
+"All right!"  He shrugged his shoulders, again folded his coat
+and said softly:
+
+"There goes the wagon!"
+
+In a few moments, after the crowd had begun to disperse, Rybin
+appeared again on the steps of the town hall.  His hands were bound;
+his head and face were wrapped up in a gray cloth, and he was pushed
+into a waiting wagon.
+
+"Farewell, good people!" his voice rang out in the cold evening
+twilight.  "Search for the truth.  Guard it!  Believe the man who
+will bring you the clean word; cherish him.  Don't spare yourselves
+in the cause of truth!"
+
+"Silence, you dog!" shouted the voice of the police commissioner.
+"Policeman, start the horses up, you fool!"
+
+"What have you to be sorry for?  What sort of life have you?"
+
+The wagon started.  Sitting in it with a policeman on either side,
+Rybin shouted dully:
+
+"For the sake of what are you perishing--in hunger?  Strive for
+freedom--it'll give you bread and--truth.  Farewell, good people!"
+
+The hasty rumble of the wheels, the tramp of the horses, the shout
+of the police officer, enveloped his speech and muffled it.
+
+"It's done!" said the peasant, shaking his head.  "You wait at the
+station a little while, and I'll come soon."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI
+
+
+The mother went to the room in the tavern, sat herself at the table
+in front of the samovar, took a piece of bread in her hand, looked
+at it, and slowly put it back on the plate.  She was not hungry; the
+feeling in her breast rose again and flushed her with nausea.  She
+grew faint and dizzy; the blood was sucked from her heart.  Before
+her stood the face of the blue-eyed peasant.  It was a face that
+expressed nothing and failed to arouse confidence.  For some reason
+the mother did not want to tell herself in so many words that he
+would betray her.  The suspicion lay deep in her breast--a dead
+weight, dull and motionless.
+
+"He scented me!" she thought idly and faintly.  "He noticed--he
+guessed."  Further than this her thoughts would not go, and she
+sank into an oppressive despondency.  The nausea, the spiritless
+stillness beyond the window that replaced the noise, disclosed
+something huge, but subdued, something frightening, which sharpened
+her feeling of solitude, her consciousness of powerlessness, and
+filled her heart with ashen gloom.
+
+The young girl came in and stopped at the door.
+
+"Shall I bring you an omelette?"
+
+"No, thank you, I don't want it; the shouts frightened me."
+
+The girl walked up to the table and began to speak excitedly in
+hasty, terror-stricken tones:
+
+"How the police commissioner beat him!  I stood near and could see.
+All his teeth were broken.  He spit out and his teeth fell on the
+ground.  The blood came thick--thick and dark.  You couldn't see his
+eyes at all; they were swollen up.  He's a tar man.  The sergeant is
+in there in our place drunk, but he keeps on calling for whisky.
+They say there was a whole band of them, and that this bearded man
+was their elder, the hetman.  Three were captured and one escaped.
+They seized a teacher, too; he was also with them.  They don't
+believe in God, and they try to persuade others to rob all the
+churches.  That's the kind of people they are; and our peasants,
+some of them pitied him--that fellow--and others say they should
+have settled him for good and all.  We have such mean peasants here!
+Oh, my!  oh, my!"
+
+The mother, by giving the girl's disconnected, rapid talk her fixed
+attention, tried to stifle her uneasiness, to dissipate her dismal
+forebodings.  As for the girl, she must have rejoiced in an auditor.
+Her words fairly choked her and she babbled on in lowered voice with
+greater and greater animation:
+
+"Papa says it all comes from the poor crop.  This is the second year
+we've had a bad harvest.  The people are exhausted.  That's the
+reason we have such peasants springing up now.  What a shame!  You
+ought to hear them shout and fight at the village assemblies.  The
+other day when Vosynkov was sold out for arrears he dealt the
+starosta (bailiff) a cracking blow on the face.  'There are my
+arrears for you!' he says."
+
+Heavy steps were heard at the door.  The mother rose to her feet
+with difficulty.  The blue-eyed peasant came in, and taking off
+his hat asked:
+
+"Where is the baggage?"
+
+He lifted the valise lightly, shook it, and said:
+
+"Why, it's empty!  Marya, show the guest the way to my house," and
+he walked off without looking around.
+
+"Are you going to stay here overnight?" asked the girl.
+
+"Yes.  I'm after lace; I buy lace."
+
+"They don't make lace here.  They make lace in Tinkov and in
+Daryina, but not among us."
+
+"I'm going there to-morrow; I'm tired."
+
+On paying for the tea she made the girl very happy by handing her
+three kopecks.  On the road the girl's feet splashed quickly in the mud.
+
+"If you want to, I'll run over to Daryina, and I'll tell the women
+to bring their lace here.  That'll save your going there.  It's
+about eight miles."
+
+"That's not necessary, my dear."
+
+The cold air refreshed the mother as she stepped along beside the
+girl.  A resolution slowly formulated itself in her mind--confused,
+but fraught with a promise.  She wished to hasten its growth, and
+asked herself persistently:  "How shall I behave?  Suppose I come
+straight out with the truth?"
+
+It was dark, damp, and cold.  The windows of the peasants' huts shone
+dimly with a motionless reddish light; the cattle lowed drowsily in
+the stillness, and short halloos reverberated through the fields.
+The village was clothed in darkness and an oppressive melancholy.
+
+"Here!" said the girl, "you've chosen a poor lodging for yourself.
+This peasant is very poor."  She opened the door and shouted briskly
+into the hut:  "Aunt Tatyana, a lodger has come!"  She ran away,
+her "Good-by!" flying back from the darkness.
+
+The mother stopped at the threshold and peered about with her palm
+above her eyes.  The hut was very small, but its cleanness and
+neatness caught the eye at once.  From behind the stove a young
+woman bowed silently and disappeared.  On a table in a corner toward
+the front of the room burned a lamp.  The master of the hut sat at
+the table, tapping his fingers on its edge.  He fixed his glance on
+the mother's eyes.
+
+"Come in!" he said, after a deliberate pause.
+
+"Tatyana, go call Pyotr.  Quick!"
+
+The woman hastened away without looking at her guest.  The mother
+seated herself on the bench opposite the peasant and looked around--
+her valise was not in sight.  An oppressive stillness filled the hut,
+broken only by the scarcely audible sputtering of the lamplight.
+The face of the peasant, preoccupied and gloomy wavered in vague
+outline before the eyes of the mother, and for some reason caused
+her dismal annoyance.
+
+"Well, why doesn't he say something?  Quick!"
+
+"Where's my valise?"  Her loud, stern question coming suddenly was
+a surprise to herself.  The peasant shrugged his shoulders and
+thoughtfully gave the indefinite answer:
+
+"It's safe."  He lowered his voice and continued gloomily:  "Just
+now, in front of the girl, I said on purpose that it was empty.
+No, it's not empty.  It's very heavily loaded."
+
+"Well, what of it?"
+
+The peasant rose, approached her, bent over her, and whispered:
+"Do you know that man?"
+
+The mother started, but answered firmly:
+
+"I do."
+
+Her laconic reply, as it were, kindled a light within her which
+rendered everything outside clear.  She sighed in relief.  Shifting
+her position on the bench, she settled herself more firmly on it,
+while the peasant laughed broadly.
+
+"I guessed it--when you made the sign--and he, too.  I asked him,
+whispering in his ear, whether he knows the woman standing on the steps."
+
+"And what did he say?"
+
+"He?  He says 'there are a great many of us.'  Yes--'there are a
+great many of us,' he says."
+
+The peasant looked into the eyes of his guest questioningly, and,
+smiling again, he continued:
+
+"He's a man of great force, he is brave, he speaks straight out.
+They beat him, and he keeps on his own way."
+
+The peasant's uncertain, weak voice, his unfinished, but clear face,
+his open eyes, inspired the mother with more and more confidence.
+Instead of alarm and despondency, a sharp, shooting pity for Rybin
+filled her bosom.  Overwhelmed by her feelings, unable to restrain
+herself, she suddenly burst out in bitter malice:
+
+"Robbers, bigots!" and she broke into sobs.
+
+The peasant walked away from her, sullenly nodding his head.
+
+"The authorities have hired a whole lot of assistants to do their
+dirty work for them.  Yes, yes."  He turned abruptly toward the
+mother again and said softly:  "Here's what I guessed--that you have
+papers in the valise.  Is that true?"
+
+"Yes," answered the mother simply, wiping away her tears.  "I was
+bringing them to him."
+
+He lowered his brows, gathered his beard into his hand, and looking
+on the floor was silent for a time.
+
+"The papers reached us, too; some books, also.  We need them all.
+They are so true.  I can do very little reading myself, but I have
+a friend--he can.  My wife also reads to me."  The peasant pondered
+for a moment.  "Now, then, what are you going to do with them--
+with the valise?"
+
+The mother looked at him.
+
+"I'll leave it to you."
+
+He was not surprised, did not protest, but only said curtly, "To us,"
+and nodded his head in assent.  He let go of his beard, but continued
+to comb it with his fingers as he sat down.
+
+With inexorable, stubborn persistency the mother's memory held up
+before her eyes the scene of Rybin's torture.  His image extinguished
+all thoughts in her mind.  The pain and injury she felt for the man
+obscured every other sensation.  Forgotten was the valise with the
+books and newspapers.  She had feelings only for Rybin.  Tears flowed
+constantly; her face was gloomy; but her voice did not tremble when
+she said to her host:
+
+"They rob a man, they choke him, they trample him in the mud--the
+accursed!  And when he says, 'What are you doing, you godless men?'
+they beat and torture him."
+
+"Power," returned the peasant.  "They have great power."
+
+"From where do they get it?" exclaimed the mother, thoroughly
+aroused.  "From us, from the people--they get everything from us."
+
+"Ye-es," drawled the peasant.  "It's a wheel."  He bent his head toward
+the door, listening attentively.  "They're coming," he said softly.
+
+"Who?"
+
+"Our people, I suppose."
+
+His wife entered.  A freckled peasant, stooping, strode into the
+hut after her.  He threw his cap into a corner, and quickly went
+up to their host.
+
+"Well?"
+
+The host nodded in confirmation.
+
+"Stepan," said the wife, standing at the oven, "maybe our guest
+wants to eat something."
+
+"No, thank you, my dear."
+
+The freckled peasant moved toward the mother and said quietly,
+in a broken voice:
+
+"Now, then, permit me to introduce myself to you.  My name is Pyotr
+Yegorov Ryabinin, nicknamed Shilo--the Awl.  I understand something
+about your affairs.  I can read and write.  I'm no fool, so to speak."
+He grasped the hand the mother extended to him, and wringing it,
+turned to the master of the house.
+
+"There, Stepan, see, Varvara Nikolayevna is a good lady, true.  But
+in regard to all this, she says it is nonsense, nothing but dreams.
+Boys and different students, she says, muddle the people's mind with
+absurdities.  However, you saw just now a sober, steady man, as he
+ought to be, a peasant, arrested.  Now, here is she, an elderly
+woman, and as to be seen, not of blue blood.  Don't be offended--
+what's your station in life?"
+
+He spoke quickly and distinctly, without taking breath.  His little
+beard shook nervously, and his dark eyes, which he screwed up,
+rapidly scanned the mother's face and figure.  Ragged, crumpled, his
+hair disheveled, he seemed just to have come from a fight, in which
+he had vanquished his opponent, and still to be flushed with the joy
+of victory.  He pleased the mother with his sprightliness and his
+simple talk, which at once went straight to the point.  She gave him
+a kind look as she answered his question.  He once more shook her
+hand vigorously, and laughed softly.
+
+"You see, Stepan, it's a clean business, an excellent business.  I
+told you so.  This is the way it is:  the people, so to speak, are
+beginning to take things into their own hands.  And as to the lady--
+she won't tell you the truth; it's harmful to her.  I respect her,
+I must say; she's a good person, and wishes us well--well, a little
+bit, and provided it won't harm her any.  But the people want to go
+straight, and they fear no loss and no harm--you see ?--all life is
+harmful to them; they have no place to turn to; they have nothing
+all around except 'Stop!' which is shouted at them from all sides."
+
+"I see," said Stepan, nodding and immediately adding:  "She's uneasy
+about her baggage."
+
+Pyotr gave the mother a shrewd wink, and again reassured her:
+
+"Don't be uneasy; it's all right.  Everything will be all right,
+mother.  Your valise is in my house.  Just now when he told me about
+you--that you also participate in this work and that you know that
+man--I said to him:  'Take care, Stepan!  In such a serious business
+you must keep your mouth shut.'  Well, and you, too, mother, seem to
+have scented us when we stood near you.  The faces of honest people
+can be told at once.  Not many of them walk the streets, to speak
+frankly.  Your valise is in my house."  He sat down alongside of her
+and looked entreatingly into her eyes.  "If you wish to empty it
+we'll help you, with pleasure.  We need books."
+
+"She wants to give us everything," remarked Stepan.
+
+"First rate, mother!  We'll find a place for all of it."  He jumped
+to his feet, burst into a laugh, and quickly pacing up and down the
+room said contentedly:  "The matter is perfectly simple:  in one
+place it snaps, and in another it is tied up.  Very well!  And the
+newspaper, mother, is a good one, and does its work--it peels the
+people's eyes open; it's unpleasant to the masters.  I do carpentry
+work for a lady about five miles from here--a good woman, I must
+admit.  She gives me various books, sometimes very simple books.
+I read them over--I might as well fall asleep.  In general we're
+thankful to her.  But I showed her one book and a number of a
+newspaper; she was somewhat offended.  'Drop it, Pyotr!' she said.
+'Yes, this,' she says, 'is the work of senseless youngsters; from
+such a business your troubles can only increase; prison and Siberia
+for this,' she says."
+
+He grew abruptly silent, reflected for a moment, and asked:  "Tell
+me, mother, this man--is he a relative of yours?"
+
+"A stranger."
+
+Pyotr threw his head back and laughed noiselessly, very well
+satisfied with something.  To the mother, however, it seemed the
+very next instant that, in reference to Rybin, the word "stranger"
+was not in place; it jarred upon her.
+
+"I'm not a relative of his; but I've known him for a long time, and
+I look up to him as to an elder brother."
+
+She was pained and displeased not to find the word she wanted, and
+she could not suppress a quiet groan.  A sad stillness pervaded the
+hut.  Pyotr leaned his head upon one shoulder; his little beard,
+narrow and sharp, stuck out comically on one side, and gave his
+shadow swinging on the wall the appearance of a man sticking out his
+tongue teasingly.  Stepan sat with his elbows on the table, and beat
+a tattoo on the boards.  His wife stood at the oven without stirring;
+the mother felt her look riveted upon herself and often glanced at the
+woman's face--oval, swarthy, with a straight nose, and a chin cut off
+short; her dark and thick eyebrows joined sternly, her eyelids drooped,
+and from under them her greenish eyes shone sharply and intently.
+
+"A friend, that is to say," said Pyotr quietly.  "He has character,
+indeed he has; he esteems himself highly, as he ought to; he has put
+a high price on himself, as he ought to.  There's a man, Tatyana!
+You say----"
+
+"Is he married?" Tatyana interposed, and compressed the thin lips
+of her small mouth.
+
+"He's a widower," answered the mother sadly.
+
+"That's why he's so brave," remarked Tatyana.  Her utterance was low
+and difficult.  "A married man like him wouldn't go--he'd be afraid."
+
+"And I?  I'm married and everything, and yet--" exclaimed Pyotr.
+
+"Enough!" she said without looking at him and twisting her lips.
+"Well, what are you?  You only talk a whole lot, and on rare
+occasions you read a book.  It doesn't do people much good for you
+and Stepan to whisper to each other on the corners."
+
+"Why, sister, many people hear me," quietly retorted the peasant,
+offended.  "I act as a sort of yeast here.  It isn't fair in you
+to speak that way."
+
+Stepan looked at his wife silently and again drooped his head.
+
+"And why should a peasant marry?" asked Tatyana.  "He needs a
+worker, they say.  What work?"
+
+"You haven't enough?  You want more?" Stepan interjected dully.
+
+"But what sense is there in the work we do?  We go half-hungry from
+day to day anyhow.  Children are born; there's no time to look after
+them on account of the work that doesn't give us bread."  She walked
+up to the mother, sat down next to her, and spoke on stubbornly, no
+plaint nor mourning in her voice.  "I had two children; one, when he
+was two years old, was boiled to death in hot water; the other was
+born dead--from this thrice-accursed work.  Such a happy life!  I
+say a peasant has no business to marry.  He only binds his hands.
+If he were free he would work up to a system of life needed by
+everybody.  He would come out directly and openly for the truth.
+Am I right, mother?"
+
+"You are.  You're right, my dear.  Otherwise we can't conquer life."
+
+"Have you a husband?"
+
+"He died.  I have a son."
+
+"And where is he?  Does he live with you?"
+
+"He's in prison."  The mother suddenly felt a calm pride in these
+words, usually painful to her.  "This is the second time--all
+because he came to understand God's truth and sowed it openly
+without sparing himself.  He's a young man, handsome, intelligent;
+he planned a newspaper, and gave Mikhail Ivanovich a start on his
+way, although he's only half of Mikhail's age.  Now they're going
+to try my son for all this, and sentence him; and he'll escape from
+Siberia and continue with his work."
+
+Her pride waxed as she spoke.  It created the image of a hero, and
+demanded expression in words.  The mother needed an offset--
+something fine and bright--to balance the gloomy incident she had
+witnessed that day, with its senseless horror and shameless cruelty.
+Instinctively yielding to this demand of a healthy soul, she reached
+out for everything she had seen that was pure and shining and heaped
+it into one dazzling, cleansing fire.
+
+"Many such people have already been born, more and more are being
+born, and they will all stand up for the freedom of the people,
+for the truth, to the very end of their lives."
+
+She forgot precaution, and although she did not mention names, she
+told everything known to her of the secret work for the emancipation
+of the people from the chains of greed.  In depicting the personalities
+she put all her force into her words, all the abundance of love
+awakened in her so late by her rousing experiences.  And she herself
+became warmly enamored of the images rising up in her memory, illumined
+and beautified by her feeling.
+
+"The common cause advances throughout the world in all the cities.
+There's no measuring the power of the good people.  It keeps growing
+and growing, and it will grow until the hour of our victory, until
+the resurrection of truth."
+
+Her voice flowed on evenly, the words came to her readily, and she
+quickly strung them, like bright, varicolored beads, on strong
+threads of her desire to cleanse her heart of the blood and filth
+of that day.  She saw that the three people were as if rooted to
+the spot where her speech found them, and that they looked at her
+without stirring.  She heard the intermittent breathing of the woman
+sitting by her side, and all this magnified the power of her faith
+in what she said, and in what she promised these people.
+
+"All those who have a hard life, whom want and injustice crush--it's
+the rich and the servitors of the rich who have overpowered them.
+The whole people ought to go out to meet those who perish in the
+dungeons for them, and endure mortal torture.  Without gain to
+themselves they show where the road to happiness for all people
+lies.  They frankly admit it is a hard road, and they force no one
+to follow them.  But once you take your position by their side you
+will never leave them.  You will see it is the true, the right road.
+With such persons the people may travel.  Such persons will not be
+reconciled to small achievements; they will not stop until they will
+vanquish all deceit, all evil and greed.  They will not fold their
+hands until the people are welded into one soul, until the people
+will say in one voice:  'I am the ruler, and I myself will make
+the laws equal for all.'"
+
+She ceased from exhaustion, and looked about.  Her words would not
+be wasted here, she felt assured.  The silence lasted for a minute,
+while the peasants regarded her as if expecting more.  Pyotr stood
+in the middle of the hut, his hands clasped behind his back, his
+eyes screwed up, a smile quivering on his freckled face.  Stepan was
+leaning one hand on the table; with his neck and entire body forward,
+he seemed still to be listening.  A shadow on his face gave it more
+finish.  His wife, sitting beside the mother, bent over, her elbows
+on her knees, and studied her feet.
+
+"That's how it is," whispered Pyotr, and carefully sat on the bench,
+shaking his head.
+
+Stepan slowly straightened himself, looked at his wife, and threw
+his hands in the air, as if grasping for something.
+
+"If a man takes up this work," he began thoughtfully in a moderated
+voice, "then his entire soul is needed."
+
+Pyotr timidly assented:
+
+"Yes, he mustn't look back."
+
+"The work has spread very widely," continued Stepan.
+
+"Over the whole earth," added Pyotr.
+
+They both spoke like men walking in darkness, groping for the way
+with their feet.  The mother leaned against the wall, and throwing
+back her head listened to their careful utterances.  Tatyana arose,
+looked around, and sat down again.  Her green eyes gleamed dryly as
+she looked into the peasants' faces with dissatisfaction and contempt.
+
+"It seems you've been through a lot of misery," she said, suddenly
+turning to the mother.
+
+"I have."
+
+"You speak well.  You draw--you draw the heart after your talk.
+It makes me think, it makes me think, 'God!  If I could only take
+a peep at such people and at life through a chink!'  How does one
+live?  What life has one?  The life of sheep.  Here am I; I can
+read and write; I read books, I think a whole lot.  Sometimes I
+don't even sleep the entire night because I think.  And what sense
+is there in it?  If I don't think, my existence is a purposeless
+existence; and if I do, it is also purposeless.  And everything
+seems purposeless.  There are the peasants, who work and tremble
+over a piece of bread for their homes, and they have nothing.  It
+hurts them, enrages them; they drink, fight, and work again--work,
+work, work.  But what comes of it?  Nothing."
+
+She spoke with scorn in her eyes and in her voice, which was low and
+even, but at times broke off like a taut thread overstrained.  The
+peasants were silent,, the wind glided by the window panes, buzzed
+through the straw of the roofs, and at times whined softly down the
+chimney.  A dog barked, and occasional drops of rain pattered on the
+window.  Suddenly the light flared in the lamp, dimmed, but in a
+second sprang up again even and bright.
+
+"I listened to your talk, and I see what people live for now.  It's
+so strange--I hear you, and I think, 'Why, I know all this.'  And
+yet, until you said it, I hadn't heard such things, and I had no
+such thoughts.  Yes."
+
+"I think we ought to take something to eat, and put out the lamp,"
+said Stepan, somberly and slowly.  "People will notice that at the
+Chumakovs' the light burned late.  It's nothing for us, but, it
+might turn out bad for the guest."
+
+Tatyana arose and walked to the oven.
+
+"Ye-es," Pyotr said softly, with a smile.  "Now, friend, keep your
+ears pricked.  When the papers appear among the people----"
+
+"I'm not speaking of myself.  If they arrest me, it's no great matter."
+
+The wife came up to the table and asked Stepan to make room.
+
+He arose and watched her spread the table as he stood to one side.
+
+"The price of fellows of our kind is a nickel a bundle, a hundred
+in a bundle," he said with a smile.
+
+The mother suddenly pitied him.  He now pleased her more.
+
+"You don't judge right, host," she said.  "A man mustn't agree to
+the price put upon him by people from the outside, who need nothing
+of him except his blood.  You, knowing yourself within, must put
+your own estimate on yourself--your price, not for your enemies,
+but for your friends."
+
+"What friends have we?" the peasant exclaimed softly.  "Up to the
+first piece of bread."
+
+"And I say that the people have friends."
+
+"Yes, they have, but not here--that's the trouble," Stepan deliberated.
+
+"Well, then create them here."
+
+Stepan reflected a while.  "We'll try."
+
+"Sit down at the table," Tatyana invited her.
+
+At supper, Pyotr, who had been subdued by the talk of the mother and
+appeared to be at a loss, began to speak again with animation:
+
+"Mother, you ought to get out of here as soon as possible, to escape
+notice.  Go to the next station, not to the city--hire the post horses."
+
+"Why?  I'm going to see her off!" said Stepan.
+
+"You mustn't.  In case anything happens and they ask you whether
+she slept in your house--'She did.'  'When did she go?'  'I saw her
+off.'  'Aha!  You did?  Please come to prison!'  Do you understand?
+And no one ought to be in a hurry to get into prison; everybody's
+turn will come.  'Even the Czar will die,' as the saying goes.  But
+the other way:  she simply spent the night in your house, hired
+horses, and went away.  And what of it?  Somebody passing through the
+village sleeps with somebody in the village.  There's nothing in that."
+
+"Where did you learn to be afraid, Pyotr?" Tatyana scoffed.
+
+"A man must know everything, friend!" Pyotr exclaimed, striking his
+knee--"know how to fear, know how to be brave.  You remember how a
+policeman lashed Vaganov for that newspaper?  Now you'll not persuade
+Vaganov for any amount of money to take a book in his hand.  Yes;
+you believe me, mother, I'm a sharp fellow for every sort of a trick
+--everybody knows it.  I'm going to scatter these books and papers
+for you in the best shape and form, as much as you please.  Of course,
+the people here are not educated; they've been intimidated.  However,
+the times squeeze a man and wide open go his eyes, 'What's the matter?'
+And the book answers him in a perfectly simple way:  'That's what's
+the matter--Think!  Unite!  Nothing else is left for you to do!'
+There are examples of men who can't read or write and can understand
+more than the educated ones--especially if the educated ones have
+their stomachs full.  I go about here everywhere; I see much.  Well?
+It's possible to live; but you want brains and a lot of cleverness
+in order not to sit down in the cesspool at once.  The authorities,
+too, smell a rat, as though a cold wind were blowing on them from
+the peasants.  They see the peasant smiles very little, and altogether
+is not very kindly disposed and wants to disaccustom himself to the
+authorities.  The other day in Smolyakov, a village not far from here,
+they came to extort the taxes; and your peasants got stubborn and
+flew into a passion.  The police commissioner said straight out:
+'Oh, you damned scoundrels! why, this is disobedience to the Czar!'
+There was one little peasant there, Spivakin, and says he:  'Off
+with you to the  evil mother with your Czar!  What kind of a Czar
+is he if he pulls the last shirt off your body?'  That's how far
+it went, mother.  Of course, they snatched Spivakin off to prison.
+But the word remained, and even the little boys know it.  It lives!
+It shouts!  And perhaps in our days the word is worth more than a
+man.  People are stupefied and deadened by their absorption in
+breadwinning.  Yes."
+
+Pyotr did not eat, but kept on talking in a quick whisper, his dark,
+roguish eyes gleaming merrily.  He lavishly scattered before the
+mother innumerable little observations on the village life--they
+rolled from him like copper coins from a full purse.
+
+Stepan several times reminded him:  "Why don't you eat?"  Pyotr
+would then seize a piece of bread and a spoon and fall to talking
+and sputtering again like a goldfinch.  Finally, after the meal, he
+jumped to his feet and announced:
+
+"Well, it's time for me to go home.  Good-by, mother!" and he shook
+her hand and nodded his head.  "Maybe we shall never see each other
+again.  I must say to you that all this is very good--to meet you
+and hear your speeches--very good!  Is there anything in your valise
+beside the printed matter?  A shawl?  Excellent!  A shawl, remember,
+Stepan.  He'll bring you the valise at once.  Come, Stepan.  Good-by.
+I wish everything good to you."
+
+After he had gone the crawling sound of the roaches became audible
+in the hut, the blowing of the wind over the roof and its knocking
+against the door in the chimney.  A fine rain dripped monotonously
+on the window.  Tatyana prepared a bed for the mother on the bench
+with clothing brought from the oven and the storeroom.
+
+"A lively man!" remarked the mother.
+
+The hostess looked at her sidewise.
+
+"A light fellow," she answered.  "He rattles on and rattles on;
+you can't but hear the rattling at a great distance."
+
+"And how is your husband?" asked the mother.
+
+"So so.  A good peasant; he doesn't drink; we live peacefully.
+So so.  Only he has a weak character."  She straightened herself,
+and after a pause asked:
+
+"Why, what is it that's wanted nowadays?  What's wanted is that the
+people should be stirred up to revolt.  Of course!  Everybody thinks
+about it, but privately, for himself.  And what's necessary is that he
+should speak out aloud.  Some one person must be the first to decide
+to do it."  She sat down on the bench and suddenly asked:  "Tell me,
+do young ladies also occupy themselves with this?  Do they go about
+with the workingmen and read?  Aren't they squeamish and afraid?"  She
+listened attentively to the mother's reply and fetched a deep sigh;
+then drooping her eyelids and inclining her head, she said:  "In one
+book I read the words 'senseless life.'  I understood them very well
+at once.  I know such a life.  Thoughts there are, but they're not
+connected, and they stray like stupid sheep without a shepherd.  They
+stray and stray, with no one to bring them together.  There's no
+understanding in people of what must be done.  That's what a
+senseless life is.  I'd like to run away from it without even looking
+around--such a severe pang one suffers when one understands something!"
+
+The mother perceived the pang in the dry gleam of the woman's green eyes,
+in her wizened face, in her voice.  She wanted to pet and soothe her.
+
+"You understand, my dear, what to do----"
+
+Tatyana interrupted her softly:
+
+"A person must be able--  The bed's ready for you.  Lie down and sleep."
+
+She went over to the oven and remained standing there erect, in
+silence, sternly centered in herself.  The mother lay down without
+undressing.  She began to feel the weariness in her bones and
+groaned softly.  Tatyana walked up to the table, extinguished the
+lamp, and when darkness descended on the hut she resumed speech in
+her low, even voice, which seemed to erase something from the flat
+face of the oppressive darkness.
+
+"You do not pray?  I, too, think there is no God, there are no miracles.
+All these things were contrived to frighten us, to make us stupid."
+
+The mother turned about on the bench uneasily; the dense darkness
+looked straight at her from the window, and the scarcely audible
+crawling of the roaches persistently disturbed the quiet.  She began
+to speak almost in a whisper and fearfully:
+
+"In regard to God, I don't know; but I do believe in Christ, in
+the Little Father.  I believe in his words, 'Love thy neighbor as
+thyself.'  Yes, I believe in them."  And suddenly she asked in
+perplexity:  "But if there is a God, why did He withdraw his good
+power from us?  Why did He allow the division of people into two
+worlds?  Why, if He is merciful, does He permit human torture--the
+mockery of one man by another, all kinds of evil and beastliness?"
+
+Tatyana was silent.  In the darkness the mother saw the faint
+outline of her straight figure--gray on the black background.  She
+stood motionless.  The mother closed her eyes in anguish.  Then
+the groaning, cold voice sullenly broke in upon the stillness again:
+
+"The death of my children I will never forgive, neither God nor man--
+I will never forgive--NEVER!"
+
+Nilovna uneasily rose from her bed; her heart understood the mightiness
+of the pain that evoked such words.
+
+"You are young; you will still have children," she said kindly.
+
+The woman did not answer immediately.  Then she whispered:
+
+"No, no.  I'm spoiled.  The doctor says I'll never be able to have
+a child again."
+
+A mouse ran across the floor, something cracked--a flash of sound
+flaring up in the noiselessness.  The autumn rain again rustled on
+the thatch like light thin fingers running over the roof.  Large
+drops of water dismally fell to the ground, marking the slow course
+of the autumn night.  Hollow steps on the street, then on the porch,
+awoke the mother from a heavy slumber.  The door opened carefully.
+
+"Tatyana!" came the low call.  "Are you in bed already?"
+
+"No."
+
+"Is she asleep?"
+
+"It seems she is."
+
+A light flared up, trembled, and sank into the darkness.
+
+The peasant walked over to the mother's bed, adjusted the sheepskin
+over her, and wrapped up her feet.  The attention touched the mother
+in its simplicity.  She closed her eyes again and smiled.  Stepan
+undressed in silence, crept up to the loft, and all became quiet.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII
+
+
+The mother lay motionless, with ears strained in the drowsy
+stillness, and before her in the darkness wavered Rybin's face
+covered with blood.  In the loft a dry whisper could be heard.
+
+"You see what sort of people go into this work?  Even elderly people
+who have drunk the cup of misery to the bottom, who have worked, and
+for whom it is time to rest.  And there they are!  But you are young,
+sensible! Ah, Stepan!"
+
+The thick, moist voice of the peasant responded:
+
+"Such an affair--you mustn't take it up without thinking over it.
+Just wait a little while!"
+
+"I've heard you say so before."  The sounds dropped, and rose again.
+The voice of Stepan rang out:
+
+"You must do it this way--at first you must take each peasant aside
+and speak to him by himself--for instance, to Makov Alesha, a lively
+man--can read and write--was wronged by the police; Shorin Sergey,
+also a sensible peasant; Knyazev, an honest, bold man, and that'll
+do to begin with.  Then we'll get a group together, we look about
+us--yes.  We must learn how to find her; and we ourselves must take
+a look at the people about whom she spoke.  I'll shoulder my ax and
+go off to the city myself, making out I'm going there to earn money
+by splitting wood.  You must proceed carefully in this matter.  She's
+right when she says that the price a man has is according to his own
+estimate of himself--and this is an affair in which you must set a
+high value on yourself when once you take it up.  There's  that
+peasant!  See!  You can put him even before God, not to speak of
+before a police commissioner.  He won't yield.  He stands for his own
+firmly--up to his knees in it.  And Nikita, why his honor was suddenly
+pricked--a marvel?  No.  If the people will set out in a friendly
+way to do something together, they'll draw everybody after them."
+
+"Friendly!  They beat a man in front of your eyes, and you stand
+with your mouths wide open."
+
+"You just wait a little while.  He ought to thank God we didn't beat
+him ourselves, that man.  Yes, indeed.  Sometimes the authorities
+compel you to beat, and you do beat.  Maybe you weep inside yourself
+with pity, but still you beat.  People don't dare to decline from
+beastliness--they'll be killed themselves for it.  They command you,
+'Be what I want you to be--a wolf, a pig'--but to be a man is
+prohibited.  And a bold man they'll get rid of--send to the next
+world.  No.  You must contrive for many to get bold at once, and
+for all to arise suddenly."
+
+He whispered for a long time, now lowering his voice so that the
+mother scarcely could hear, and now bursting forth powerfully.
+Then the woman would stop him.  "S-sh, you'll wake her."
+
+The mother fell into a heavy dreamless sleep.
+
+Tatyana awakened her in the early twilight, when the dusk still
+peered through the window with blank eyes, and when brazen sounds
+of the church bell floated and melted over the village in the gray,
+cold stillness.
+
+"I have prepared the samovar.  Take some tea or you'll be cold if
+you go out immediately after getting up."
+
+Stepan, combing his tangled beard, asked the mother solicitously
+how to find her in the city.  To-day the peasant's face seemed
+more finished to her.  While they drank tea he remarked, smiling:
+
+"How wonderfully things happen!"
+
+"What?" asked Tatyana.
+
+"Why, this acquaintance--so simply."
+
+The mother said thoughtfully, but confidently:
+
+"In this affair there's a marvelous simplicity in everything."
+
+The host and hostess restrained themselves from demonstrativeness
+in parting with her; they were sparing of words, but lavish in little
+attentions for her comfort.
+
+Sitting in the post, the mother reflected that this peasant would
+begin to work carefully, noiselessly, like a mole, without cease,
+and that at his side the discontented voice of his wife would always
+sound, and the dry burning gleam in her green eyes would never die
+out of her so long as she cherished the revengeful wolfish anguish
+of a mother for lost children.
+
+The mother recalled Rybin--his blood, his face, his burning eyes,
+his words.  Her heart was compressed again with a bitter feeling
+of impotence; and along the entire road to the city the powerful
+figure of black-bearded Mikhail with his torn shirt, his hands
+bound behind his back, his disheveled head, clothed in wrath and
+faith in his truth, stood out before her on the drab background of
+the gray day.  And as she regarded the figure, she thought of the
+numberless villages timidly pressed to the ground; of the people,
+faint-heartedly and secretly awaiting the coming of truth; and of
+the thousands of people who senselessly and silently work their
+whole lifetime without awaiting the coming of anything.
+
+Life represented itself to her as an unplowed, hilly field which
+mutely awaits the workers and promises a harvest to free and honest
+hands:  "Fertilize me with seeds of reason and truth; I will return
+them to you a hundredfold."
+
+When from afar she saw the roofs and spires of the city, a warm joy
+animated and eased her perturbed, worn heart.  The preoccupied faces
+of those people flashed up in her memory who, from day to day,
+without cease, in perfect confidence kindle the fire of thought
+and scatter the sparks over the whole earth.  Her soul was flooded
+by the serene desire to give these people her entire force, and--
+doubly the love of a mother, awakened and animated by their thoughts.
+
+At home Nikolay opened the door for the mother.  He was disheveled
+and held a book in his hand.
+
+"Already?" he exclaimed joyfully.  "You've returned very quickly.
+Well, I'm glad, very glad."
+
+His eyes blinked kindly and briskly behind his glasses.  He quickly
+helped her off with her wraps, and said with an affectionate smile:
+
+"And here in my place, as you see, there was a search last night.
+And I wondered what the reason for it could possibly be--whether
+something hadn't happened to you.  But you were not arrested.  If
+they had arrested you they wouldn't have let me go either."
+
+He led her into the dining room, and continued with animation:
+"However, they suggested that I should be discharged from my
+position.  That doesn't distress me.  I was sick, anyway, of
+counting the number of horseless peasants, and ashamed to receive
+money for it, too; for the money actually comes from them.  It
+would have been awkward for me to leave the position of my own
+accord.  I am under obligations to the comrades in regard to work.
+And now the matter has found its own solution.  I'm satisfied!"
+
+The mother sat down and looked around.  One would have supposed
+that some powerful man in a stupid fit of insolence had knocked
+the walls of the house from the outside until everything inside
+had been jolted down.  The portraits were scattered on the floor;
+the wall paper was torn away and stuck out in tufts; a board was
+pulled out of the flooring; a window sill was ripped away; the
+floor by the oven was strewn with ashes.  The mother shook her
+head at the sight of this familiar picture.
+
+"They wanted to show that they don't get money for nothing,"
+remarked Nikolay.
+
+On the table stood a cold samovar, unwashed dishes, sausages, and
+cheese on paper, along with plates, crumbs of bread, books, and
+coals from the samovar.  The mother smiled.  Nikolay also laughed
+in embarrassment, following the look of her eyes.
+
+"It was I who didn't waste time in completing the picture of the
+upset.  But never mind, Nilovna, never mind!  I think they're going
+to come again.  That's the reason I didn't pick it all up.  Well,
+how was your trip?"
+
+The mother started at the question.  Rybin arose before her; she felt
+guilty at not having told of him immediately.  Bending over a chair,
+she moved up to Nikolay and began her narrative.  She tried to preserve
+her calm in order not to omit something as a result of excitement.
+
+"They caught him!"
+
+A quiver shot across Nikolay's face.
+
+"They did?  How?"
+
+The mother stopped his questions with a gesture of her hand, and
+continued as if she were sitting before the very face of justice
+and bringing in a complaint regarding the torture of a man.  Nikolay
+threw himself back in his chair, grew pale, and listened, biting
+his lips.  He slowly removed his glasses, put them on the table,
+and ran his hand over his face as if wiping away invisible cobwebs.
+The mother had never seen him wear so austere an expression.
+
+When she concluded he arose, and for a minute paced the floor in
+silence, his fists thrust deep into his pockets.  Conquering his
+agitation he looked almost calmly with a hard gleam in his eyes
+into the face of the mother, which was covered with silent tears.
+
+"Nilovna, we mustn't waste time!  Let us try, dear comrade, to take
+ourselves in hand."  Then he remarked through his teeth:
+
+"He must be a remarkable fellow--such nobility!  It'll be hard for
+him in prison.  Men like him feel unhappy there."  Stepping in front
+of the mother he exclaimed in a ringing voice:  "Of course, all the
+commissioners and sergeants are nothings.  They are sticks in the
+hands of a clever villain, a trainer of animals.  But I would kill
+an animal for allowing itself to be turned into a brute!"  He
+restrained his excitement, which, however, made itself felt to the
+mother's perceptions.  Again he strode through the room, and spoke
+in wrath:  "See what horror!  A gang of stupid people, protesting
+their pernicious power over the people, beat, stifle, oppress
+everybody.  Savagery grows apace; cruelty becomes the law of life.
+A whole nation is depraved.  Think of it!  One part beats and turns
+brute; from immunity to punishment, sickens itself with a voluptuous
+greed of torture--that disgusting disease of slaves licensed to
+display all the power of slavish feelings and cattle habits.  Others
+are poisoned with the desire for vengeance.  Still others, beaten
+down to stupidity, become dumb and blind.  They deprave the nation,
+the whole nation!"  He stopped, leaning his elbows against the
+doorpost.  He clasped his head in both hands, and was silent,
+his teeth set.
+
+"You involuntarily turn a beast yourself in this beastly life!"
+
+Smiling sadly, he walked up to her, and bending over her asked,
+pressing her hand:  "Where is your valise?"
+
+"In the kitchen."
+
+"A spy is standing at our gate.  We won't be able to get such a big
+mass of papers out of the way unnoticed.  There's no place to hide
+them in and I think they'll come again to-night.  I don't want you
+to be arrested.  So, however sorry we may be for the lost labor,
+let's burn the papers."
+
+"What?"
+
+"Everything in the valise!"
+
+She finally understood; and though sad, her pride in her success
+brought a complacent smile to her face.
+
+"There's nothing in it--no leaflets."  With gradually increasing
+animation she told how she had placed them in the hands of sympathetic
+peasants after Rybin's departure.  Nikolay listened, at first with
+an uneasy frown, then in surprise, and finally exclaimed, interrupting
+her story:
+
+"Say, that's capital!  Nilovna, do you know--"  He stammered,
+embarrassed, and pressing her hand, exclaimed quietly:  "You touch
+me so by your faith in people, by your faith in the cause of their
+emancipation!  You have such a good soul!  I simply love you as I
+didn't love my own mother!"
+
+Embracing his neck, she burst into happy sobs, and pressed his head
+to her lips.
+
+"Maybe," he muttered, agitated and embarrassed by the newness of
+his feeling, "maybe I'm speaking nonsense; but, upon my honest word,
+you are a beautiful person, Nilovna--yes!"
+
+"My darling, I love you, too; and I love you all with my whole soul,
+every drop of my blood!" she said, choking with a wave of hot joy.
+
+The two voices blended into one throbbing speech, subdued and
+pulsating with the great feeling that was seizing the people.
+
+"Such a large, soft power is in you; it draws the heart toward you
+imperceptibly.  How brightly you describe people!  How well you see them!"
+
+"I see your life; I understand it, my dear!"
+
+"One loves you.  And it's such a marvelous thing to love a person--
+it's so good, you know!"
+
+"It is you, you who raise the people from the dead to life again;
+you!" the mother whispered hotly, stroking his head.  "My dear, I
+think I see there's much work for you, much patience needed.  Your
+power must not be wasted.  It's so necessary for life.  Listen to what
+else happened:  there was a woman there, the wife of that man----"
+
+Nikolay sat near her, his happy face bent aside in embarrassment,
+and stroked his hair.  But soon he turned around again, and looking
+at the mother, listened greedily to her simple and clear story.
+
+"A miracle!  Every possibility of your getting into prison and
+suddenly--  Yes, it's evident that the peasants, too, are beginning
+to stir.  After all, it's natural.  We ought to get special people
+for the villages.  People!  We haven't enough--nowhere.  Life demands
+hundreds of hands!"
+
+"Now, if Pasha could be free--and Andriusha," said the mother softly.
+Nikolay looked at her and drooped his head.
+
+"You see, Nilovna, it'll be hard for you to hear; but I'll say it,
+anyway--I know Pavel well; he won't leave prison.  He wants to be
+tried; he wants to rise in all his height.  He won't give up a
+trial, and he needn't either.  He will escape from Siberia."
+
+The mother sighed and answered softly:
+
+"Well, he knows what's best for the cause."
+
+Nikolay quickly jumped to his feet, suddenly seized with joy again.
+
+"Thank you, Nilovna!  I've just lived through a magnificent moment--
+maybe the best moment of my life.  Thank you!  Now, come, let's give
+each other a good, strong kiss!"
+
+They embraced, looking into each other's eyes.  And they gave each
+other firm, comradely kisses.
+
+"That's good!" he said softly.
+
+The mother unclasped her hands from about his neck and laughed
+quietly and happily.
+
+"Um!" said Nikolay the next minute.  "If your peasant there would
+hurry up and come here!  You see, we must be sure to write a leaflet
+about Rybin for the village.  It won't hurt him once he's come out
+so boldly, and it will help the cause.  I'll surely do it to-day.
+Liudmila will print it quickly.  But then arises the question--how
+will it get to the village?"
+
+"I'll take it!"
+
+"No, thank you!" Nikolay exclaimed quietly.  "I'm wondering whether
+Vyesovshchikov won't do for it.  Shall I speak to him?"
+
+"Yes; suppose you try and instruct him."
+
+"What'll I do then?"
+
+"Don't worry!"
+
+Nikolay sat down to write, while the mother put the table in order,
+from time to time casting a look at him.  She saw how his pen
+trembled in his hand.  It traveled along the paper in straight
+lines.  Sometimes the skin on his neck quivered; he threw back his
+head and shut his eyes.  All this moved her.
+
+"Execute them!" she muttered under her breath.  "Don't pity the villains!"
+
+"There!  It's ready!" he said, rising.  "Hide the paper somewhere on your
+body.  But know that when the gendarmes come they'll search you, too!"
+
+"The dogs take them!" she answered calmly.
+
+In the evening Dr. Ivan Danilovich came.
+
+"What's gotten into the authorities all of a sudden?" he said,
+running about the room.  "There were seven searches last night.
+Where's the patient?"
+
+"He left yesterday.  To-day, you see, Saturday, he reads to working
+people.  He couldn't bring it over himself to omit the reading."
+
+"That's stupid--to sit at readings with a fractured skull!"
+
+"I tried to prove it to him, but unsuccessfully."
+
+"He wanted to do a bit of boasting before the comrades," observed
+the mother.  "Look!  I've already shed my blood!"
+
+The physician looked at her, made a fierce face, and said with set teeth:
+
+"Ugh! ugh! you bloodthirsty person!"
+
+"Well, Ivan, you've nothing to do here, and we're expecting guests.
+Go away!  Nilovna, give him the paper."
+
+"Another paper?"
+
+"There, take it and give it to the printer."
+
+"I've taken it; I'll deliver it.  Is that all?"
+
+"That's all.  There's a spy at the gate."
+
+"I noticed.  At my door, too.  Good-by!  Good-by, you fierce woman!
+And do you know, friends, a squabble in a cemetery is a fine thing
+after all!  The whole city's talking about it.  It stirs the people
+up and compels them to think.  Your article on that subject was
+excellent, and it came in time.  I always said that a good fight
+is better than a bad peace."
+
+"All right.  Go away now!"
+
+"You're polite!  Let's shake hands, Nilovna.  And that fellow--
+he certainly behaved stupidly.  Do you know where he lives?"
+
+Nikolay gave him the address.
+
+"I must go to him to-morrow.  He's a fine fellow, eh?"
+
+"Very!"
+
+"We must keep him alive; he has good brains.  It's from just such
+fellows that the real proletarian intellectuals ought to grow up--
+men to take our places when we leave for the region where evidently
+there are no class antagonisms.  But, after all, who knows?"
+
+"You've taken to chattering, Ivan."
+
+"I feel happy, that's why.  Well, I'm going!  So you're expecting
+prison?  I hope you get a good rest there!"
+
+"Thank you, I'm not tired!"
+
+The mother listened to their conversation.  Their solicitude in
+regard to the workingmen was pleasant to her; and, as always, the
+calm activity of these people which did not forsake them even before
+the gates of the prison, astonished her.
+
+After the physician left, Nikolay and the mother conversed quietly
+while awaiting their evening visitors.  Then Nikolay told her at
+length of his comrades living in exile; of those who had already
+escaped and continued their work under assumed names.  The bare
+walls of the room echoed the low sounds of his voice, as if listening
+in incredulous amazement to the stories of modest heroes who
+disinterestedly devoted all their powers to the great cause of liberty.
+
+A shadow kindly enveloped the woman, warming her heart with love
+for the unseen people, who in her imagination united into one huge
+person, full of inexhaustible, manly force.  This giant slowly but
+incessantly strides over the earth, cleansing it, laying bare before
+the eyes of the people the simple and clear truth of life--the great
+truth that raises humanity from the dead, welcomes all equally, and
+promises all alike freedom from greed, from wickedness, and
+falsehood, the three monsters which enslaved and intimidated the
+whole world.  The image evoked in the mother's soul a feeling
+similar to that with which she used to stand before an ikon.  After
+she had offered her joyful, grateful prayer, the day had then seemed
+lighter than the other days of her life.  Now she forgot those days.
+But the feeling left by them had broadened, had become brighter and
+better, had grown more deeply into her soul.  It was more keenly
+alive and burned more luminously.
+
+"But the gendarmes aren't coming!" Nikolay exclaimed suddenly,
+interrupting his story.
+
+The mother looked at him, and after a pause answered in vexation:
+
+"Oh, well, let them go to the dogs!"
+
+"Of course!  But it's time for you to go to bed, Nilovna.  You must
+be desperately tired.  You're wonderfully strong, I must say.  So much
+commotion and disturbance, and you live through it all so lightly.
+Only your hair is turning gray very quickly.  Now go and rest."
+
+They pressed each other's hand and parted.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII
+
+
+The mother fell quickly into a calm sleep, and rose early in the
+morning, awakened by a subdued tap at the kitchen door.  The knock
+was incessant and patiently persistent.  It was still dark and
+quiet, and the rapping broke in alarmingly on the stillness.
+Dressing herself rapidly, she walked out into the kitchen, and
+standing at the door asked:
+
+"Who's there?"
+
+"I," answered an unfamiliar voice.
+
+"Who?"
+
+"Open."  The quiet word was spoken in entreaty.
+
+The mother lifted the hook, pushed the door with her foot, and
+Ignaty entered, saying cheerfully:
+
+"Well, so I'm not mistaken.  I'm at the right place."
+
+He was spattered with mud up to his belt.  His face was gray, his
+eyes fallen.
+
+"We've gotten into trouble in our place," he whispered, locking
+the door behind him.
+
+"I know it."
+
+The reply astonished the young man.  He blinked and asked:
+
+"How?  Where from?"
+
+She explained in a few rapid words, and asked:
+
+"Did they take the other comrades, too?"
+
+"They weren't there.  They had gone off to be recruited.  Five
+were captured, including Rybin."
+
+He snuffled and said, smiling:
+
+"And I was left over.  I guess they're looking for me.  Let them
+look.  I'm not going back there again, not for anything.  There
+are other people there yet, some seven young men and a girl.  Never
+mind!  They're all reliable."
+
+"How did you find this place?"  The mother smiled.
+
+The door from the room opened quietly.
+
+"I?"  Seating himself on a bench and looking around, Ignaty exclaimed:
+"They crawled up at night, straight to the tar works.  Well, a minute
+before they came the forester ran up to us and knocked on the window.
+'Look out, boys,' says he, 'they're coming on you.'"
+
+He laughed softly, wiped his face with the flap of his coat, and
+continued:
+
+"Well, they can't stun Uncle Mikhail even with a hammer.  At once
+he says to me, 'Ignaty, run away to the city, quick!  You remember
+the elderly woman.'  And he himself writes a note.  'There, go!
+Good-by, brother.'  He pushed me in the back.  I flung out of the
+hut.  I scrambled along on all fours through the bushes, and I hear
+them coming.  There must have been a lot of them.  You could hear
+the rustling on all sides, the devils--like a moose around the tar
+works.  I lay in the bushes.  They passed by me.  Then I rose and
+off I went; and for two nights and a whole day I walked without
+stopping.  My feet'll ache for a week."
+
+He was evidently satisfied with himself.  A smile shone in his hazel
+eyes.  His full red lips quivered.
+
+"I'll set you up with some tea soon.  You wash yourself while I get
+the samovar ready."
+
+"I'll give you the note."  He raised his leg with difficulty, and
+frowning and groaning put his foot on the bench and began to untie
+the leg wrappings.
+
+"I got frightened.  'Well,' thinks I, 'I'm a goner.'"
+
+Nikolay appeared at the door.  Ignaty in embarrassment dropped his
+foot to the floor and wanted to rise, but staggered and fell heavily
+on the bench, catching himself with his hands.
+
+"You sit still!" exclaimed the mother.
+
+"How do you do, comrade?" said Nikolay, screwing up his eyes
+good-naturedly and nodding his head.  "Allow me, I'll help you."
+
+Kneeling on the floor in front of the peasant, he quickly unwound
+the dirty, damp wrappings.
+
+"Well!" the fellow exclaimed quietly, pulling back his foot and
+blinking in astonishment.  He regarded the mother, who said, without
+paying attention to his look:
+
+"His legs ought to be rubbed down with alcohol."
+
+"Of course!" said Nikolay.
+
+Ignaty snorted in embarrassment.  Nikolay found the note, straightened
+it out, looked at it, and handed the gray, crumpled piece of paper
+to the mother.
+
+"For you."
+
+"Read it."
+
+"'Mother, don't let the affair go without your attention.  Tell
+the tall lady not to forget to have them write more for our cause,
+I beg of you.  Good-by.  Rybin.'"
+
+"My darling!" said the mother sadly.  "They've already seized him by
+the throat, and he----"
+
+Nikolay slowly dropped his hand holding the note.
+
+"That's magnificent!" he said slowly and respectfully.  "It both
+touches and teaches."
+
+Ignaty looked at them, and quietly shook his bared feet with his
+dirty hands.  The mother, covering her tearful face, walked up to
+him with a basin of water, sat down on the floor, and stretched out
+her hands to his feet.  But he quickly thrust them under the bench,
+exclaiming in fright:
+
+"What are you going to do?"
+
+"Give me your foot, quick!"
+
+"I'll bring the alcohol at once," said Nikolay.
+
+The young man shoved his foot still farther under the bench and mumbled:
+
+"What ARE you going to do?  It's not proper."
+
+Then the mother silently unbared his other foot.  Ignaty's round
+face lengthened in amazement.  He looked around helplessly with
+his wide-open eyes.
+
+"Why, it's going to tickle me!"
+
+"You'll be able to bear it," answered the mother, beginning to wash
+his feet.
+
+Ignaty snorted aloud, and moving his neck awkwardly looked down
+at her, comically drooping his under lip.
+
+"And do you know," she said tremulously, "that they beat Mikhail
+Ivanovich?"
+
+"What?" the peasant exclaimed in fright.
+
+"Yes; he had been beaten when they led him to the village, and in
+Nikolsk the sergeant beat him, the police commissioner beat him in
+the face and kicked him till he bled."  The mother became silent,
+overwhelmed by her recollections.
+
+"They can do it," said the peasant, lowering his brows sullenly.
+His shoulders shook.  "That is, I fear them like the devils.  And
+the peasants--didn't the peasants beat him?"
+
+"One beat him.  The police commissioner ordered him to.  All the
+others were so so--they even took his part.  'You mustn't beat him!'
+they said."
+
+"Um!  Yes, yes!  The peasants are beginning to realize where a man
+stands, and for what he stands."
+
+"There are sensible people there, too."
+
+"Where can't you find sensible people?  Necessity!  They're everywhere;
+but it's hard to get at them.  They hide themselves in chinks and
+crevices, and suck their hearts out each one for himself.  Their
+resolution isn't strong enough to make them gather into a group."
+
+Nikolay brought a bottle of alcohol, put coals in the samovar, and
+walked away silently.  Ignaty accompanied him with a curious look.
+
+"A gentleman?"
+
+"In this business there are no masters; they're all comrades!"
+
+"It's strange to me," said Ignaty with a skeptical but embarrassed smile.
+
+"What's strange?"
+
+"This:  at one end they beat you in the face; at the other they wash
+your feet.  Is there a middle of any kind?"
+
+The door of the room was flung open and Nikolay, standing on the
+threshold, said:
+
+"And in the middle stand the people who lick the hands of those who
+beat you in the face and suck the blood of those whose faces are
+beaten.  That's the middle!"
+
+Ignaty looked at him respectfully, and after a pause said:  "That's it!"
+
+The mother sighed.  "Mikhail Ivanovich also always used to say,
+'That's it!' like an ax blow."
+
+"Nilovna, you're evidently tired.  Permit me--I----"
+
+The peasant pulled his feet uneasily.
+
+"That'll do;" said the mother, rising.  "Well, Ignaty, now wash yourself."
+
+The young man arose, shifted his feet about, and stepped firmly
+on the floor.
+
+"They seem like new feet.  Thank you!  Many, many thanks!"
+
+He drew a wry face, his lips trembled, and his eyes reddened.  After
+a pause, during which he regarded the basin of black water, he
+whispered softly:
+
+"I don't even know how to thank you!"
+
+Then they sat down to the table to drink tea.  And Ignaty soberly began:
+
+"I was the distributor of literature, a very strong fellow at walking.
+Uncle Mikhail gave me the job.  'Distribute!' says he; 'and if you
+get caught you're alone.'"
+
+"Do many people read?" asked Nikolay.
+
+"All who can.  Even some of the rich read.  Of course, they don't
+get it from us.  They'd clap us right into chains if they did!  They
+understand that this is a slipknot for them in all ages."
+
+"Why a slipknot?"
+
+"What else!" exclaimed Ignaty in amazement.  "Why, the peasants are
+themselves going to take the land from everyone else.  They'll wash
+it out with their blood from under the gentry and the rich; that is
+to say, they themselves are going to divide it, and divide it so
+that there won't be masters or workingmen anymore.  How then?
+What's the use of getting into a scrap if not for that?"
+
+Ignaty even seemed to be offended.  He looked at Nikolay
+mistrustfully and skeptically.  Nikolay smiled.
+
+"Don't get angry," said the mother jokingly.
+
+Nikolay thoughtfully exclaimed:
+
+"How shall we get the leaflets about Rybin's arrest to the village?"
+Ignaty grew attentive.
+
+"I'll speak to Vyesovshchikov to-day."
+
+"Is there a leaflet already?" asked Ignaty.
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Give it to me.  I'll take it."  Ignaty rubbed his hands at the
+suggestion, his eyes flashing.  "I know where and how.  Let me."
+
+The mother laughed quietly, without looking at him.
+
+"Why, you're tired and afraid, and you said you'd never go there again!"
+
+Ignaty smacked his lips and stroked his curly hair with his broad palm.
+
+"I'm tired; I'll rest; and of course I'm afraid!"  His manner was
+businesslike and calm.  "They beat a man until the blood comes, as
+you yourself say--then who wants to be mutilated?  But I'll pull
+through somehow at night.  Never mind!  Give me the leaflets; this
+evening I'll get on the go."  He was silent, thought a while, his
+eyebrows working.  "I'll go to the forest; I'll hide the literature,
+and then I'll notify our fellows:  'Go get it.'  That's better.  If
+I myself should distribute them I might fall into the hands of the
+police, and it would be a pity for the leaflets.  You must act
+carefully here.  There are not many such leaflets!"
+
+"And how about your fear?" the mother observed again with a smile.
+This curly-haired, robust fellow put her into a good humor by his
+sincerity, which sounded in his every word, and shone from his
+round, determined face.
+
+"Fear is fear, and business is business!" he answered with a grin.
+"Why are you laughing at me, eh?  You, too!  Why, isn't it natural
+to be afraid in this matter?  Well, and if it's necessary a man'll
+go into a fire.  Such an affair, it requires it."
+
+"Ah, you, my child!"
+
+Ignaty, embarrassed, smiled.  "Well, there you are--child!" he said.
+
+Nikolay began to speak, all the time looking good-naturedly with
+screwed-up eyes at the young peasant.
+
+"You're not going there!"
+
+"Then what'll I do?  Where am I to be?" Ignaty asked uneasily.
+
+"Another fellow will go in place of you.  And you'll tell him in
+detail what to do and how to do it."
+
+"All right!" said Ignaty.  But his consent was not given at once,
+and then only reluctantly.
+
+"And for you we'll obtain a good passport and make you a forester."
+
+The young fellow quickly threw back his head and asked uneasily:
+
+"But if the peasants come there for wood, or there--in general--
+what'll I do?  Bind them?  That doesn't suit me."
+
+The mother laughed, and Nikolay, too.  This again confused and
+vexed Ignaty.
+
+"Don't be uneasy!" Nikolay soothed him.  "You won't have to bind
+peasants.  You trust us."
+
+"Well, well," said Ignaty, set at ease, smiling at Nikolay with
+confidence and merriness in his eyes.  "If you could get me to
+the factory.  There, they say, the fellows are mighty smart."
+
+A fire seemed to be ever burning in his broad chest, unsteady as
+yet, not confident in its own power.  It flashed brightly in his
+eyes, forced out from within; but suddenly it would nearly expire
+in fright and flicker behind the smoke of perplexed alarm and
+embarrassment.
+
+The mother rose from behind the table, and looking through the
+window reflected:
+
+"Ah, life!  Five times in the day you laugh and five times you weep.
+All right.  Well, are you through, Ignaty?  Go to bed and sleep."
+
+"But I don't want to."
+
+"Go on, go on!"
+
+"You're stern in this place.  Thank you for the tea, for the sugar,
+for the kindness."
+
+Lying down in the mother's bed he mumbled, scratching his head:
+
+"Now everything'll smell of tar in your place.  Ah, it's all for
+nothing all this--plain coddling!  I don't want to sleep.  You're
+good people, yes.  It's more than I can understand--as if I'd gotten
+a hundred thousand miles away from the village--how he hit it off
+about the middle--and in the middle are the people who lick the
+hands--of those who beat the faces--um, yes."
+
+And suddenly he gave a loud short snore and dropped off to sleep,
+with eyebrows raised high and half-open mouth.
+
+
+Late at night he sat in a little room of a basement at a table
+opposite Vyesovshchikov.  He said in a subdued tone, knitting his brows:
+
+"On the middle window, four times."
+
+"Four."
+
+"At first three times like this"--he counted aloud as he tapped thrice
+on the table with his forefinger.  "Then waiting a little, once again."
+
+"I understand."
+
+"A red-haired peasant will open the door for you, and will ask you
+for the midwife.  You'll tell him, 'Yes, from the boss.'  Nothing
+else.  He'll understand your business."
+
+They sat with heads bent toward each other, both robust fellows,
+conversing in half tones.  The mother, with her arms folded on her
+bosom, stood at the table looking at them.  All the secret tricks
+and passwords compelled her to smile inwardly as she thought, "Mere
+children still."
+
+A lamp burned on the wall, illuminating a dark spot of dampness and
+pictures from journals.  On the floor old pails were lying around,
+fragments of slate iron.  A large, bright star out in the high
+darkness shone into the window.  The odor of mildew, paint, and damp
+earth filled the room.
+
+Ignaty was dressed in a thick autumn overcoat of shaggy material.
+It pleased him; the mother observed how he stroked it admiringly
+with the palm of his hand, how he looked at himself, clumsily
+turning his powerful neck.  Her bosom beat tenderly with, "My dears,
+my children, my own."
+
+"There!" said Ignaty, rising.  "You'll remember, then?  First you
+go to Muratov and ask for grandfather."
+
+"I remember."
+
+But Ignaty was still distrustful of Nikolay's memory, and reiterated
+all the instructions, words, and signs, and finally extended his
+hand to him, saying:
+
+"That's all now.  Good-by, comrade.  Give my regards to them.  I'm
+alive and strong.  The people there are good--you'll see."  He cast
+a satisfied glance down at himself, stroked the overcoat, and asked
+the mother, "Shall I go?"
+
+"Can you find the way?"
+
+"Yes.  Good-by, then, dear comrades."
+
+He walked off, raising his shoulders high, thrusting out his chest,
+with his new hat cocked to one side, and his hands deep in his
+pockets in most dignified fashion.  On his forehead and temples his
+bright, boyish curls danced gayly.
+
+"There, now, I have work, too," said Vyesovshchikov, going over to
+the mother quietly.  "I'm bored already--jumped out of prison--what
+for?  My only occupation is hiding--and there I was learning.  Pavel
+so pressed your brains--it was one pure delight.  And Andrey, too,
+polished us fellows zealously.  Well, Nilovna, did you hear how they
+decided in regard to the escape?  Will they arrange it?"
+
+"They'll find out day after to-morrow," she repeated, sighing
+involuntarily.  "One day still--day after to-morrow."
+
+Laying his heavy hand on her shoulder, and bringing his face close
+to hers, Nikolay said animatedly:
+
+"You tell them, the older ones there--they'll listen to you.  Why,
+it's very easy.  You just see for yourself.  There's the wall of the
+prison near the lamp-post; opposite is an empty lot, on the left
+the cemetery, on the right the streets--the city.  The lamplighter
+goes to the lamppost; by day he cleans the lamp; he puts the ladder
+against the wall, climbs up, screws hooks for a rope ladder onto the
+top of the wall, lets the rope ladder down into the prison yard, and
+off he goes.  There inside the walls they know the time when this
+will be done, and will ask the criminals to arrange an uproar, or
+they'll arrange it themselves, and those who need it will go up the
+ladder over the wall--one, two, it's done.  And they calmly proceed
+to the city because the chase throws itself first of all on the
+vacant lot and the cemetery."
+
+He gesticulated rapidly in front of the mother's face, drawing his
+plan, the details of which were clear, simple, and clever.  She had
+known him as a clumsy fellow, and it was strange to her to see the
+pockmarked face with the high cheek bones, usually so gloomy, now
+lively and alert.  The narrow gray eyes, formerly harsh and cold,
+looking at the world sullenly with malice and distrust, seemed to
+be chiseled anew, assuming an oval form and shining with an even,
+warm light that convinced and moved the mother.
+
+"You think of it--by day, without fail by day.  To whom would it
+occur that a prisoner would make up his mind to escape by day in
+the eyes of the whole prison?"
+
+"And they'll shoot him down," the woman said trembling.
+
+"Who?  There are no soldiers, and the overseers of the prison use
+their revolvers to drive nails in."
+
+"Why, it's very simple--all this."
+
+"And you'll see it'll all come out all right.  No.  You speak to
+them.  I have everything prepared already--the rope ladder, the
+screw hooks; I spoke to my host, he'll be the lamplighter."
+
+Somebody stirred noisily at the door and coughed, and iron clanked.
+
+"There he is!" exclaimed Nikolay.
+
+At the open door a tin bathtub was thrust in, and a hoarse voice said:
+
+"Get in, you devil."
+
+Then a round, gray, hatless head appeared.  It had protruding eyes
+and a mustache, and wore a good-natured expression.  Nikolay helped
+the man in with the tub.  A tall, stooping figure strode through the
+door.  The man coughed, his shaven cheeks puffing up; he spat out
+and greeted hoarsely:
+
+"Good health to you!"
+
+"There!  Ask him!"
+
+"Me?  What about?"
+
+"About the escape."
+
+"Ah, ah!" said the host, wiping his mustache with black fingers.
+
+"There, Yakob Vasilyevich!  She doesn't believe it's a simple matter!"
+
+"Hm! she doesn't believe!  Not to believe means not to want to
+believe.  You and I want to, and so we believe."  The old man
+suddenly bent over and coughed hoarsely, rubbed his breast for a
+long time, while he stood in the middle of the room panting for
+breath and scanning the mother with wide-open eyes.
+
+"I'm not the one to decide, Nikolay."
+
+"But, mother, you talk with them.  Tell them everything is ready.
+Ah, if I could only see them!  I'd force them!"  He threw out his
+hands with a broad gesture and pressed them together as if embracing
+something firmly, and his voice rang with hot feeling that astounded
+the mother by its power.
+
+"Hm! what a fellow you are!" she thought; but said aloud:  "It's for
+Pasha and the comrades to decide."
+
+Nikolay thoughtfully inclined his head.
+
+"Who's this Pasha?" asked the host, seating himself.
+
+"My son."
+
+"What's the family?"
+
+"Vlasov."
+
+He nodded his head, got his tobacco pouch, whipped out his pipe and
+filled it with tobacco.  He spoke brokenly:
+
+"I've heard of him.  My nephew knows him.  He, too, is in prison--
+my nephew Yevchenko.  Have you heard of him?  And my family is Godun.
+They'll soon shut all the young people in prison, and then there'll
+be plenty and comfort for us old folks.  The gendarme assures me that
+my nephew will even be sent to Siberia.  They'll exile him--the dogs!"
+
+Lighting his pipe, he turned to Nikolay, spitting frequently on the floor:
+
+"So she doesn't want to?  Well, that's her affair!  A person is free
+to feel as he wants to.  Are you tired of sitting in prison?  Go.
+Are you tired of going?  Sit.  They robbed you?  Keep still.  They
+beat you?  Bear it.  They have killed you?  Stay dead.  That's
+certain.  And I'll carry off Savka; I'll carry him off!"  His curt,
+barking phrases, full of good-natured irony, perplexed the mother.
+But his last words aroused envy in her.
+
+While walking along the street in the face of a cold wind and rain;
+she thought of Nikolay, "What a man he's become!  Think of it!"  And
+remembering Godun, she almost prayerfully reflected, "It seems I'm
+not the only one who lives for the new.  It's a big fire if it so
+cleanses and burns all who see it."  Then she thought of her son,
+"If he only agreed!"
+
+On Sunday, taking leave of Pavel in the waiting room of the prison,
+she felt a little lump of paper in her hand.  She started as if it
+burned her skin, and cast a look of question and entreaty into her
+son's face.  But she found no answer there.  Pavel's blue eyes
+smiled with the usual composed smile familiar to her.
+
+"Good-by!" she sighed.
+
+The son again put out his hand to her, and a certain kindness and
+tenderness for her quivered on his face.  "Good-by, mamma!"
+
+She waited without letting go of his hand.  "Don't be uneasy--
+don't be angry," he said.
+
+These words and the stubborn folds between his brows answered her
+question.  "Well, what do you mean?" she muttered, drooping her
+head.  "What of it?"  And she quickly walked away without looking
+at him, in order not to betray her feelings by the tears in her eyes
+and the quiver of her lips.  On the road she thought that the bones
+of the hand which had pressed her son's hand ached and grew heavy,
+as if she had been struck on the shoulder.
+
+At home, after thrusting the note into Nikolay's hand, she stood
+before him, and waited while he smoothed out the tight little roll.
+She felt a tremor of hope again; but Nikolay said:
+
+"Of course, this is what he writes:  'We will not go away, comrade;
+we cannot, not one of us.  We should lose respect for ourselves.
+Take into consideration the peasant recently arrested.  He has
+merited your solicitude; he deserves that you expend much time and
+energy on him.  It's very hard for him here--daily collisions with
+the authorities.  He's already had the twenty-four hours of the dark
+cell.  They torture him to death.  We all intercede for him.  Soothe
+and be kind to my mother; tell her; she'll understand all.  Pavel.'"
+
+The mother straightened herself easily, and proudly tossed her head.
+
+"Well, what is there to tell me?" she said firmly.  "I understand--
+they want to go straight at the authorities again--'there! condemn
+the truth!'"
+
+Nikolay quickly turned aside, took out his handkerchief, blew his
+nose aloud, and mumbled:  "I've caught a cold, you see!"  Covering
+his eyes with his hands, under the pretext of adjusting his glasses,
+he paced up and down the room, and said:  "We shouldn't have been
+successful anyway."
+
+"Never mind; let the trial come off!" said the mother frowning.
+
+"Here, I've received a letter from a comrade in St. Petersburg----"
+
+"He can escape from Siberia, too, can't he?"
+
+"Of course!  The comrade writes:  'The trial is appointed for the
+near future; the sentence is certain--exile for everybody!'  You
+see, these petty cheats convert their court into the most trivial
+comedy.  You understand?  Sentence is pronounced in St.  Petersburg
+before the trial."
+
+"Stop!" the mother said resolutely.  "You needn't comfort me or
+explain to me.  Pasha won't do what isn't right--he won't torture
+himself for nothing."  She paused to catch breath.  "Nor will he
+torture others, and he loves me, yes.  You see, he thinks of me.
+'Explain to her,' he writes; 'soothe her and comfort her,' eh?"
+
+Her heart beat quickly but boldly, and her head whirled slightly
+from excitement.
+
+"Your son's a splendid man!  I respect and love him very much."
+
+"I tell you what--let's think of something in regard to Rybin,"
+she suggested.
+
+She wanted to do something forthwith--go somewhere, walk till she
+dropped from exhaustion, and then fall asleep, content with the
+day's work.
+
+"Yes--very well!" said Nikolay, pacing through the room.  "Why not?
+We ought to have Sashenka here!"
+
+"She'll be here soon.  She always comes on my visiting day to Pasha."
+
+Thoughtfully drooping his head, biting his lips and twisting his
+beard, Nikolay sat on the sofa by the mother's side.
+
+"I'm sorry my sister isn't here.  She ought to occupy herself with
+Rybin's case."
+
+"It would be well to arrange it at once, while Pasha is there.  It
+would be pleasant for him."
+
+The bell rang.  They looked at each other.
+
+"That's Sasha," Nikolay whispered.
+
+"How will you tell her?" the mother whispered back.
+
+"Yes--um!--it's hard!"
+
+"I pity her very much."
+
+The bell rang again, not so loud, as if the person on the other side
+of the door had also fallen to thinking and hesitated.  Nikolay and
+the mother rose simultaneously, but at the kitchen door Nikolay
+turned aside.
+
+"You'd better do it," he said.
+
+"He's not willing?" the girl asked the moment the mother opened the door.
+
+"No."
+
+"I knew it!"  Sasha's face paled.  She unbuttoned her coat, fastened
+two buttons again, then tried to remove her coat, unsuccessfully, of
+course.  "Dreadful weather--rain, wind; it's disgusting!  Is he well?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Well and happy; always the same, and only this--"  Her tone was
+disconsolate, and she regarded her hands.
+
+"He writes that Rybin ought to be freed."  The mother kept her eyes
+turned from the girl.
+
+"Yes?  It seems to me we ought to make use of this plan."
+
+"I think so, too," said Nikolay, appearing at the door.  "How do
+you do, Sasha?"
+
+The girl asked, extending her hand to him:
+
+"What's the question about?  Aren't all agreed that the plan is
+practicable?  I know they are."
+
+"And who'll organize it?  Everybody's occupied."
+
+"Give it to me," said Sasha, quickly jumping to her feet.  "I have time!"
+
+"Take it.  But you must ask others."
+
+"Very well, I will.  I'll go at once."
+
+She began to button up her coat again with sure, thin fingers.
+
+"You ought to rest a little," the mother advised.
+
+Sasha smiled and answered in a softer voice:
+
+"Don't worry about me.  I'm not tired."  And silently pressing their
+hands, she left once more, cold and stern.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV
+
+
+The mother and Nikolay, walking up to the window, watched the girl
+pass through the yard and disappear beyond the gate.  Nikolay
+whistled quietly, sat down at the table and began to write.
+
+"She'll occupy herself with this affair, and it'll be easier for
+her," the mother reflected.
+
+"Yes, of course!" responded Nikolay, and turning around to the
+mother with a kind smile on his face, asked:  "And how about you,
+Nilovna--did this cup of bitterness escape you?  Did you never know
+the pangs for a beloved person?"
+
+"Well!" exclaimed the mother with a wave of her hand.  "What sort
+of a pang?  The fear they had whether they won't marry me off to
+this man or that man?"
+
+"And you liked no one?"
+
+She thought a little, and answered:
+
+"I don't recall, my dear!  How can it be that I didn't like anybody?
+I suppose there was somebody I was fond of, but I don't remember."
+
+She looked at him, and concluded simply, with sad composure:  "My
+husband beat me a lot; and everything that was before him was
+effaced from my soul."
+
+Nikolay turned back to the table; the mother walked out of the room
+for a minute.  On her return Nikolay looked at her kindly and began to
+speak softly and lovingly.  His reminiscences stroked her like a caress.
+
+"And I, you see, was like Sashenka.  I loved a girl:  a marvelous
+being, a wonder, a--guiding star; she was gentle and bright for me.
+I met her about twenty years ago, and from that time on I loved her.
+And I love her now, too, to speak the truth.  I love her all so--
+with my whole soul--gratefully--forever!"
+
+Standing by his side the mother saw his eyes lighted from within by
+a clear, warm light.  His hands folded over the back of the chair,
+and his head leaning on them, he looked into the distance; his whole
+body, lean and slender, but powerful, seemed to strive upward, like
+the stalk of a plant toward the sun.
+
+"Why didn't you marry?  You should have!"
+
+"Oh, she's been married five years!"
+
+"And before that--what was the matter?  Didn't she love you?"
+
+He thought a while, and answered:
+
+"Yes, apparently she loved me; I'm certain she did.  But, you see,
+it was always this way:  I was in prison, she was free; I was free,
+she was in prison or in exile.  That's very much like Sasha's position,
+really.  Finally they exiled her to Siberia for ten years.  I wanted
+to follow her, but I was ashamed and she was ashamed, and I remained
+here.  Then she met another man--a comrade of mine, a very good
+fellow, and they escaped together.  Now they live abroad.  Yes----"
+
+Nikolay took off his glasses, wiped them, held them up to the light
+and began to wipe them again.
+
+"Ah, you, my dear!" the mother exclaimed lovingly, shaking her head.
+She was sorry for him; at the same time something compelled her to
+smile a warm, motherly smile.  He changed his pose, took the pen in
+his hand, and said, punctuating the rhythm of his speed with waves
+of his hand:
+
+"Family life always diminishes the energy of a revolutionist.
+Children must be maintained in security, and there's the need to
+work a great deal for one's bread.  The revolutionist ought without
+cease to develop every iota of his energy; he must deepen and
+broaden it; but this demands time.  He must always be at the head,
+because we--the workingmen--are called by the logic of history to
+destroy the old world, to create the new life; and if we stop, if we
+yield to exhaustion, or are attracted by the possibility of a little
+immediate conquest, it's bad--it's almost treachery to the cause.
+No revolutionist can adhere closely to an individual--walk through
+life side by side with another individual--without distorting his
+faith; and we must never forget that our aim is not little
+conquests, but only complete victory!"
+
+His voice became firm, his face paled, and his eyes kindled with the
+force that characterized him.  The bell sounded again.  It was
+Liudmila.  She wore an overcoat too light for the season, her cheeks
+were purple with the cold.  Removing her torn overshoes, she said in
+a vexed voice:
+
+"The date of the trial is appointed--in a week!"
+
+"Really?" shouted Nikolay from the room.
+
+The mother quickly walked up to him, not understanding whether
+fright or joy agitated her.  Liudmila, keeping step with her, said,
+with irony in her low voice:
+
+"Yes, really!  The assistant prosecuting attorney, Shostak, just
+now brought the incriminating acts.  In the court they say, quite
+openly, that the sentence has already been fixed.  What does it
+mean?  Do the authorities fear that the judges will deal too
+mercifully with the enemies of the government?  Having so long and
+so assiduously kept corrupting their servants, is the government
+still unassured of their readiness to be scoundrels?"
+
+Liudmila sat on the sofa, rubbing her lean cheeks with her palms;
+her dull eyes burned contemptuous scorn, and her voice filled with
+growing wrath.
+
+"You waste your powder for nothing, Liudmila!"  Nikolay tried to
+soothe her.  "They don't hear you."
+
+"Some day I'll compel them to hear me!"
+
+The black circles under her eyes trembled and threw an ominous
+shadow on her face.  She bit her lips.
+
+"You go against me--that's your right; I'm your enemy.  But in
+defending your power don't corrupt people; don't compel me to have
+instinctive contempt for them; don't dare to poison my soul with
+your cynicism!"
+
+Nikolay looked at her through his glasses, and screwing up his eyes,
+shook his head sadly.  But she continued to speak as if those whom
+she detested stood before her.  The mother listened with strained
+attention, understanding nothing, and instinctively repeating to
+herself one and the same words, "The trial--the trial will come off
+in a week!"
+
+She could not picture to herself what it would be like; how the
+judges would behave toward Pavel.  Her thoughts muddled her brain,
+covered her eyes with a gray mist, and plunged her into something
+sticky, viscid, chilling and paining her body.  The feeling grew,
+entered her blood, took possession of her heart, and weighed it
+down heavily, poisoning in it all that was alive and bold.
+
+Thus, in a cloud of perplexity and despondency under the load of
+painful expectations, she lived through one day, and a second day;
+but on the third day Sasha appeared and said to Nikolay:
+
+"Everything is ready--to-day, in an hour!"
+
+"Everything ready?  So soon?"  He was astonished.
+
+"Why shouldn't everything be ready?  The only thing I had to do was
+to get a hiding place and clothes for Rybin.  All the rest Godun
+took on himself.  Rybin will have to go through only one ward of the
+city.  Vyesovshchikov will meet him on the street, all disguised, of
+course.  He'll throw an overcoat over him, give him a hat, and show
+him the way.  I'll wait for him, change his clothes and lead him off."
+
+"Not bad!  And who's this Godun?"
+
+"You've seen him!  You gave talks to the locksmiths in his place."
+
+"Oh, I remember!  A droll old man."
+
+"He's a soldier who served his time--a roofer, a man of little
+education, but with an inexhaustible fund of hatred for every kind
+of violence and for all men of violence.  A bit of a philosopher!"
+
+The mother listened in silence to her, and something indistinct
+slowly dawned upon her.
+
+"Godun wants to free his nephew--you remember him?  You liked
+Yevchenko, a blacksmith, quite a dude."  Nikolay nodded his head.
+"Godun has arranged everything all right.  But I'm beginning to
+doubt his success.  The passages in the prison are used by all the
+inmates, and I think when the prisoners see the ladder many will
+want to run--"  She closed her eyes and was silent for a while.
+The mother moved nearer to her.  "They'll hinder one another."
+
+They all three stood before the window, the mother behind Nikolay
+and Sasha.  Their rapid conversation roused in her a still stronger
+sense of uneasiness and anxiety.
+
+"I'm going there," the mother said suddenly.
+
+"Why?" asked Sasha.
+
+"Don't go, darling!  Maybe you'll get caught.  You mustn't!"
+Nikolay advised.
+
+The mother looked at them and softly, but persistently, repeated:
+"No; I'm going!  I'm going!"
+
+They quickly exchanged glances, and Sasha, shrugging her shoulders, said:
+
+"Of course--hope is tenacious!"
+
+Turning to the mother she took her by the hand, leaned her head
+on her shoulder, and said in a new, simple voice, near to the
+heart of the mother:
+
+"But I'll tell you after all, mamma, you're waiting in vain--he
+won't try to escape!"
+
+"My dear darling!" exclaimed the mother, pressing Sasha to her
+tremulously.  "Take me; I won't interfere with you; I don't believe
+it is possible--to escape!"
+
+"She'll go," said the girl simply to Nikolay.
+
+"That's your affair!" he answered, bowing his head.
+
+"We mustn't be together, mamma.  You go to the garden in the lot.
+From there you can see the wall of the prison.  But suppose they
+ask you what you are doing there?"
+
+Rejoiced, the mother answered confidently:
+
+"I'll think of what to say."
+
+"Don't forget that the overseers of the prison know you," said
+Sasha; "and if they see you there----"
+
+"They won't see me!" the mother laughed softly.
+
+An hour later she was in the lot by the prison.  A sharp wind blew
+about her, pulled her dress, and beat against the frozen earth,
+rocked the old fence of the garden past which the woman walked, and
+rattled against the low wall of the prison; it flung up somebody's
+shouts from the court, scattered them in the air, and carried them
+up to the sky.  There the clouds were racing quickly, little rifts
+opening in the blue height.
+
+Behind the mother lay the city; in front the cemetery; to the right,
+about seventy feet from her, the prison.  Near the cemetery a soldier
+was leading a horse by a rein, and another soldier tramped noisily
+alongside him, shouted, whistled, and laughed.  There was no one
+else near the prison.  On the impulse of the moment the mother
+walked straight up to them.  As she came near she shouted:
+
+"Soldiers! didn't you see a goat anywhere around here?"
+
+One of them answered:
+
+"No."
+
+She walked slowly past them, toward the fence of the cemetery,
+looking slantwise to the right and the back.  Suddenly she felt her
+feet tremble and grow heavy, as if frozen to the ground.  From the
+corner of the prison a man came along, walking quickly, like a
+lamplighter.  He was a stooping man, with a little ladder on his
+shoulder.  The mother, blinking in fright, quickly glanced at the
+soldiers; they were stamping their feet on one spot, and the horse
+was running around them.  She looked at the ladder--he had already
+placed it against the wall and was climbing up without haste.  He
+waved his hand in the courtyard, quickly let himself down, and
+disappeared around the corner.  That very second the black head of
+Mikhail appeared on the wall, followed by his entire body.  Another
+head, with a shaggy hat, emerged alongside of his.  Two black lumps
+rolled to the ground; one disappeared around the corner; Mikhail
+straightened himself up and looked about.
+
+"Run, run!" whispered the mother, treading impatiently.  Her ears
+were humming.  Loud shouts were wafted to her.  There on the wall
+appeared a third head.  She clasped her hands in faintness.  A
+light-haired head, without a beard, shook as if it wanted to tear
+itself away, but it suddenly disappeared behind the wall.  The
+shouts came louder and louder, more and more boisterous.  The wind
+scattered the thin trills of the whistles through the air.  Mikhail
+walked along the wall--there! he was already beyond it, and
+traversed the open space between the prison and the houses of the
+city.  It seemed to her as if he were walking very, very slowly,
+that he raised his head to no purpose.  "Everyone who sees his face
+will remember it forever," and she whispered, "Faster! faster!"
+Behind the wall of the prison something slammed, the thin sound of
+broken glass was heard.  One of the soldiers, planting his feet
+firmly on the ground, drew the horse to him, and the horse jumped.
+The other one, his fist at his mouth, shouted something in the
+direction of the prison, and as he shouted he turned his head
+sidewise, with his ear cocked.
+
+All attention, the mother turned her head in all directions, her
+eyes seeing everything, believing nothing.  This thing which she
+had pictured as terrible and intricate was accomplished with extreme
+simplicity and rapidity, and the simpleness of the happenings
+stupefied her.  Rybin was no longer to be seen--a tall man in a thin
+overcoat was walking there--a girl was running along.  Three wardens
+jumped out from a corner of the prison; they ran side by side,
+stretching out their right hands.  One of the soldiers rushed in
+front of them; the other ran around the horse, unsuccessfully trying
+to vault on the refractory animal, which kept jumping about.  The
+whistles incessantly cut the air, their alarming, desperate shrieks
+aroused a consciousness of danger in the woman.  Trembling, she
+walked along the fence of the cemetery, following the wardens; but
+they and the soldiers ran around the other corner of the prison and
+disappeared.  They were followed at a run by the assistant overseer
+of the prison, whom she knew; his coat was unbuttoned.  From
+somewhere policemen appeared, and people came running.
+
+The wind whistled, leaped about as if rejoicing, and carried the
+broken, confused shouts to the mother's ears.
+
+"It stands here all the time."
+
+"The ladder?"
+
+"What's the matter with you then?  The devil take you!"
+
+"Arrest the soldiers!"
+
+"Policeman!"
+
+Whistles again.  This hubbub delighted her and she strode on more
+boldly, thinking, "So, it's possible--HE could have done it!"
+
+But now pain for her son no longer entered her heart without pride
+in him also.  And only fear for him weighed and oppressed her to
+stupefaction as before.
+
+From the corner of the fence opposite her a constable with a black,
+curly beard, and two policemen emerged.
+
+"Stop!" shouted the constable, breathing heavily.  "Did you see--
+a man--with a beard--didn't he run by here?"
+
+She pointed to the garden and answered calmly:
+
+"He went that way!"
+
+"Yegorov, run!  Whistle!  Is it long ago?"
+
+"Yes--I should say--about a minute!"
+
+But the whistle drowned her voice.  The constable, without waiting
+for an answer, precipitated himself in a gallop along the hillocky
+ground, waving his hands in the direction of the garden.  After
+him, with bent head, and whistling, the policemen darted off.
+
+The mother nodded her head after them, and, satisfied with herself,
+went home.  When she walked out of the field into the street a cab
+crossed her way.  Raising her head she saw in the vehicle a young
+man with light mustache and a pale, worn face.  He, too, regarded
+her.  He sat slantwise.  It must have been due to his position that
+his right shoulder was higher than his left.
+
+At home Nikolay met her joyously.
+
+"Alive?  How did it go?"
+
+"It seems everything's been successful!"
+
+And slowly trying to reinstate all the details in her memory, she
+began to tell of the escape.  Nikolay, too, was amazed at the success.
+
+"You see, we're lucky!" said Nikolay, rubbing his hands.  "But how
+frightened I was on your account only God knows.  You know what,
+Nilovna, take my friendly advice:  don't be afraid of the trial.
+The sooner it's over and done with the sooner Pavel will be free.
+Believe me.  I've already written to my sister to try to think what
+can be done for Pavel.  Maybe he'll even escape on the road.  And
+the trial is approximately like this."  He began to describe to her
+the session of the court.  She listened, and understood that he was
+afraid of something--that he wanted to inspirit her.
+
+"Maybe you think I'll say something to the judges?" she suddenly
+inquired.  "That I'll beg them for something?"
+
+He jumped up, waved his hands at her, and said in an offended tone:
+
+"What are you talking about?  You're insulting me!"
+
+"Excuse me, please; excuse me!  I really AM afraid--of what I don't know."
+
+She was silent, letting her eyes wander about the room.
+
+"Sometimes it seems to me that they'll insult Pasha--scoff at him.
+'Ah, you peasant!' they'll say.  'You son of a peasant!  What's this
+mess you've cooked up?'  And Pasha, proud as he is, he'll answer
+them so----!  Or Andrey will laugh at them--and all the comrades
+there are hot-headed and honest.  So I can't help thinking that
+something will suddenly happen.  One of them will lose his patience,
+the others will support him, and the sentence will be so severe--
+you'll never see them again."
+
+Nikolay was silent, pulling his beard glumly as the mother continued:
+
+"It's impossible to drive this thought from my head.  The trial is
+terrible to me.  When they'll begin to take everything apart and
+weigh it--it's awful!  It's not the sentence that's terrible, but
+the trial--I can't express it."  She felt that Nikolay didn't
+understand her fear; and his inability to comprehend kept her from
+further analysis of her timidities, which, however, only increased
+and broadened during the three following days.  Finally, on the day
+of the trial, she carried into the hall of the session a heavy dark
+load that bent her back and neck.
+
+In the street, acquaintances from the suburbs had greeted her.  She
+had bowed in silence, rapidly making her way through the dense,
+crowd in the corridor of the courthouse.  In the hall she was met by
+relatives of the defendants, who also spoke to her in undertones.
+All the words seemed needless; she didn't understand them.  Yet all
+the people were sullen, filled with the same mournful feeling which
+infected the mother and weighed her down.
+
+"Let's sit next to each other," suggested Sizov, going to a bench.
+
+She sat down obediently, settled her dress, and looked around.
+Green and crimson specks, with thin yellow threads between, slowly
+swam before her eyes.
+
+"Your son has ruined our Vasya," a woman sitting beside her said quietly.
+
+"You keep still, Natalya!" Sizov chided her angrily.
+
+Nilovna looked at the woman; it was the mother of Samoylov.  Farther
+along sat her husband--bald-headed, bony-faced, dapper, with a
+large, bushy, reddish beard which trembled as he sat looking in
+front of himself, his eyes screwed up.
+
+A dull, immobile light entered through the high windows of the hall,
+outside of which snow glided and fell lingeringly on the ground.
+Between the windows hung a large portrait of the Czar in a massive
+frame of glaring gilt.  Straight, austere folds of the heavy crimson
+window drapery dropped over either side of it.  Before the portrait,
+across almost the entire breadth of the hall, stretched the table
+covered with green cloth.  To the right of the wall, behind the
+grill, stood two wooden benches; to the left two rows of crimson
+armchairs.  Attendants with green collars and yellow buttons on
+their abdomens ran noiselessly about the hall.  A soft whisper
+hummed in the turbid atmosphere, and the odor was a composite of
+many odors as in a drug shop.  All this--the colors, the glitter,
+the sounds and odors--pressed on the eyes and invaded the breast
+with each inhalation.  It forced out live sensations, and filled
+the desolate heart with motionless, dismal awe.
+
+Suddenly one of the people said something aloud.  The mother
+trembled.  All arose; she, too, rose, seizing Sizov's hand.
+
+In the left corner of the hall a high door opened and an old man
+emerged, swinging to and fro.  On his gray little face shook white,
+sparse whiskers; he wore eyeglasses; the upper lip, which was
+shaven, sank into his mouth as by suction; his sharp jawbones and
+his chin were supported by the high collar of his uniform; apparently
+there was no neck under the collar.  He was supported under the arm
+from behind by a tall young man with a porcelain face, red and round.  
+Following him three more men in uniforms embroidered in gold, and
+three garbed in civilian wear, moved in slowly.  They stirred about
+the table for a long time and finally took seats in the armchairs.
+When they had sat down, one of them in unbuttoned uniform, with a
+sleepy, clean-shaven face, began to say something to the little old
+man, moving his puffy lips heavily and soundlessly.  The old man
+listened, sitting strangely erect and immobile.  Behind the glasses
+of his pince-nez the mother saw two little colorless specks.
+
+At the end of the table, at the desk, stood a tall, bald man, who
+coughed and shoved papers about.
+
+The little old man swung forward and began to speak.  He pronounced
+clearly the first words, but what followed seemed to creep without
+sound from his thin, gray lips.
+
+"I open----"
+
+"See!" whispered Sizov, nudging the mother softly and arising.
+
+In the wall behind the grill the door opened, a soldier came out
+with a bared saber on his shoulder; behind him appeared Pavel,
+Andrey, Fedya Mazin, the two Gusevs, Samoylov, Bukin, Somov, and
+five more young men whose names were unknown to the mother.  Pavel
+smiled kindly; Andrey also, showing his teeth as he nodded to her.
+The hall, as it were, became lighter and simpler from their smile;
+the strained, unnatural silence was enlivened by their faces and
+movements.  The greasy glitter of gold on the uniforms dimmed and
+softened.  A waft of bold assurance, the breath of living power,
+reached the mother's heart and roused it.  On the benches behind
+her, where up to that time the people had been waiting in crushed
+silence, a responsive, subdued hum was audible.
+
+"They're not trembling!" she heard Sizov whisper; and at her right
+side Samoylov's mother burst into soft sobs.
+
+"Silence!" came a stern shout.
+
+"I warn you beforehand," said the old man, "I shall have to----"
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV
+
+
+Pavel and Andrey sat side by side; along with them on the first
+bench were Mazin, Samoylov, and the Gusevs.  Andrey had shaved his
+beard, but his mustache had grown and hung down, and gave his round
+head the appearance of a seacow or walrus.  Something new lay on his
+face; something sharp and biting in the folds about his mouth;
+something black in his eyes.  On Mazin's upper lip two black streaks
+were limned, his face was fuller.  Samoylov was just as curly-haired
+as before; and Ivan Gusev smiled just as broadly.
+
+"Ah, Fedka, Fedka!" whispered Sizov, drooping his head.
+
+The mother felt she could breathe more freely.  She heard the
+indistinct questions of the old man, which he put without looking
+at the prisoners; and his head rested motionless on the collar of
+his uniform.  She heard the calm, brief answers of her son.  It
+seemed to her that the oldest judge and his associates could be
+neither evil nor cruel people.  Looking carefully at their faces
+she tried to guess something, softly listening to the growth of a
+new hope in her breast.
+
+The porcelain-faced man read a paper indifferently; his even voice
+filled the hall with weariness, and the people, enfolded by it, sat
+motionless as if benumbed.  Four lawyers softly but animatedly
+conversed with the prisoners.  They all moved powerfully, briskly,
+and called to mind large blackbirds.
+
+On one side of the old man a judge with small, bleared eyes filled
+the armchair with his fat, bloated body.  On the other side sat a
+stooping man with reddish mustache on his pale face.  His head was
+wearily thrown on the back of the chair, his eyes, half-closed, he
+seemed to be reflecting over something.  The face of the prosecuting
+attorney was also worn, bored, and unexpectant.  Behind the judge
+sat the mayor of the city, a portly man, who meditatively stroked
+his cheek; the marshal of the nobility, a gray-haired, large-bearded,
+ruddy-faced man, with large, kind eyes; and the district elder,
+who wore a sleeveless peasant overcoat, and possessed a huge belly
+which apparently embarrassed him; he endeavored to cover it with
+the folds of his overcoat, but it always slid down and showed again.
+
+"There are no criminals here and no judges," Pavel's vigorous voice
+was heard.  "There are only captives here, and conquerors!"
+
+Silence fell.  For a few seconds the mother's ears heard only the thin,
+hasty scratch of the pen on the paper and the beating of her own heart.
+
+The oldest judge also seemed to be listening to something from afar.
+His associates stirred.  Then he said:
+
+"Hm!  yes--Andrey Nakhodka, do you admit----"
+
+Somebody whispered, "Rise!"
+
+Andrey slowly rose, straightened himself, and pulling his mustache
+looked at the old man from the corners of his eyes.
+
+"Yes!  To what can I confess myself guilty?" said the Little Russian
+in his slow, surging voice, shrugging his shoulders.  "I did not
+murder nor steal; I simply am not in agreement with an order of
+life in which people are compelled to rob and kill one another."
+
+"Answer briefly--yes or no?" the old man said with an effort,
+but distinctly.
+
+On the benches back of her the mother felt there was animation; the
+people began to whisper to one another about something and stirred,
+sighing as if freeing themselves from the cobweb spun about them by
+the gray words of the porcelain-faced man.
+
+"Do you hear how they speak?" whispered Sizov.
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Fedor Mazin, answer!"
+
+"I don't want to!" said Fedya clearly, jumping to his feet.  His
+face reddened with excitation, his eyes sparkled.  For some reason
+he hid his hands behind his back.
+
+Sizov groaned softly, and the mother opened her eyes wide in astonishment.
+
+"I declined a defense--I'm not going to say anything--I don't regard
+your court as legal!  Who are you?  Did the people give you the
+right to judge us?  No, they did not!  I don't know you."  He sat
+down and concealed his heated face behind Andrey's shoulders.
+
+The fat judge inclined his head to the old judge and whispered
+something.  The old judge, pale-faced, raised his eyelids and
+slanted his eyes at the prisoners, then extended his hand on the
+table, and wrote something in pencil on a piece of paper lying
+before him.  The district elder swung his head, carefully shifting
+his feet, rested his abdomen on his knees, and his hands on his
+abdomen.  Without moving his head the old judge turned his body to
+the red-mustached judge, and began to speak to him quickly.  The
+red-mustached judge inclined his head to listen.  The marshal of
+the nobility conversed with the prosecuting attorney; the mayor of
+the city listened and smiled, rubbing his cheek.  Again the dull
+speech of the old judge was heard.  All four lawyers listened
+attentively.  The prisoners exchanged whispers with one another,
+and Fedya, smiling in confusion, hid his face.
+
+"How he cut them off!  Straight, downright, better than all!" Sizov
+whispered in amazement in the ear of the mother.  "Ah, you little boy!"
+
+The mother smiled in perplexity.  The proceedings seemed to be
+nothing but the necessary preliminary to something terrible, which
+would appear and at once stifle everybody with its cold horror.  But
+the calm words of Pavel and Andrey had sounded so fearless and firm,
+as if uttered in the little house of the suburb, and not in the
+presence of the court.  Fedya's hot, youthful sally amused her;
+something bold and fresh grew up in the hall, and she guessed from
+the movement of the people back of her that she was not the only
+one who felt this.
+
+"Your opinion," said the old judge.
+
+The bald-headed prosecuting attorney arose, and, steadying himself
+on the desk with one hand, began to speak rapidly, quoting figures.
+In his voice nothing terrible was heard.
+
+At the same time, however, a sudden dry, shooting attack disturbed
+the heart of the mother.  It was an uneasy suspicion of something
+hostile to her, which did not threaten, did not shout, but unfolded
+itself unseen, soundless, intangible.  It swung lazily and dully
+about the judges, as if enveloping them with an impervious cloud,
+through which nothing from the outside could reach them.  She looked
+at them.  They were incomprehensible to her.  They were not angry at
+Pavel or at Fedya; they did not shout at the young men, as she had
+expected; they did not abuse them in words, but put all their
+questions reluctantly, with the air of "What's the use?".  It cost
+them an effort to hear the answers to the end.  Apparently they
+lacked interest because they knew everything beforehand.
+
+There before her stood the gendarme, and spoke in a bass voice:
+
+"Pavel Vlasov was named as the ringleader."
+
+"And Nakhodka?" asked the fat judge in his lazy undertone.
+
+"He, too."
+
+"May I----"
+
+The old judge asked a question of somebody:
+
+"You have nothing?"
+
+All the judges seemed to the mother to be worn out and ill.  A
+sickened weariness marked their poses and voices, a sickened
+weariness and a bored, gray ennui.  It was an evident nuisance to
+them, all this--the uniforms, the hall, the gendarmes, the lawyers,
+the obligation to sit in armchairs, and to put questions concerning
+things perforce already known to them.  The mother in general was
+but little acquainted with the masters; she had scarcely ever seen
+them; and now she regarded the faces of the judges as something
+altogether new and incomprehensible, deserving pity, however, rather
+than inspiring horror.
+
+The familiar, yellow-faced officer stood before them, and told about
+Pavel and Andrey, stretching the words with an air of importance.
+The mother involuntarily laughed, and thought:  "You don't know
+much, my little father."
+
+And now, as she looked at the people behind the grill, she ceased
+to feel dread for them; they did not evoke alarm, pity was not for
+them; they one and all called forth in her only admiration and love,
+which warmly embraced her heart; the admiration was calm, the love
+joyously distinct.  There they sat to one side, by the wall, young,
+sturdy, scarcely taking any part in the monotonous talk of the
+witnesses and judges, or in the disputes of the lawyers with the
+prosecuting attorney.  They behaved as if the talk did not concern
+them in the least.  Sometimes somebody would laugh contemptuously,
+and say something to the comrades, across whose faces, then, a
+sarcastic smile would also quickly pass.  Andrey and Pavel conversed
+almost the entire time with one of their lawyers, whom the mother had
+seen the day before at Nikolay's, and had heard Nikolay address as
+comrade.  Mazin, brisker and more animated than the others, listened
+to the conversation.  Now and then Samoylov said something to Ivan
+Gusev; and the mother noticed that each time Ivan gave a slight
+elbow nudge to a comrade, he could scarcely restrain a laugh; his
+face would grow red, his cheeks would puff up, and he would have to
+incline his head.  He had already sniffed a couple of times, and for
+several minutes afterward sat with blown cheeks trying to be serious.
+Thus, in each comrade his youth played and sparkled after his fashion,
+lightly bursting the restraint he endeavored to put upon its lively
+effervescence.  She looked, compared, and reflected.  She was unable
+to understand or express in words her uneasy feeling of hostility.
+
+Sizov touched her lightly with his elbow; she turned to him, and
+found a look of contentment and slight preoccupation on his face.
+
+"Just see how they've intrenched themselves in their defiance!  Fine
+stuff in 'em!  Eh?  Barons, eh?  Well, and yet they're going to
+be sentenced!"
+
+The mother listened, unconsciously repeating to herself:
+
+"Who will pass the sentence?  Whom will they sentence?"
+
+The witnesses spoke quickly, in their colorless voices, the judges
+reluctantly and listlessly.  Their bloodless, worn-out faces stared
+into space unconcernedly.  They did not expect to see or hear
+anything new.  At times the fat judge yawned, covering his smile
+with his puffy hand, while the red-mustached judge grew still paler,
+and sometimes raised his hand to press his finger tightly on the
+bone of his temple, as he looked up to the ceiling with sorrowful,
+widened eyes.  The prosecuting attorney infrequently scribbled on
+his paper, and then resumed his soundless conversation with the
+marshal of the nobility, who stroked his gray beard, rolled his
+large, beautiful eyes, and smiled, nodding his head with importance.
+The city mayor sat with crossed legs, and beat a noiseless tattoo
+on his knee, giving the play of his fingers concentrated attention.
+The only one who listened to the monotonous murmur of the voices
+seemed to be the district elder, who sat with inclined head,
+supporting his abdomen on his knees and solicitously holding it up
+with his hands.  The old judge, deep in his armchair, stuck there
+immovably.  The proceedings continued to drag on in this way for a
+long, long time; and ennui again numbed the people with its heavy,
+sticky embrace.
+
+The mother saw that this large hall was not yet pervaded by that
+cold, threatening justice which sternly uncovers the soul, examines
+it, and seeing everything estimates its value with incorruptible
+eyes, weighing it rigorously with honest hands.  Here was nothing to
+frighten her by its power or majesty.
+
+"I declare--" said the old judge clearly, and arose as he crushed
+the following words with his thin lips.
+
+The noise of sighs and low exclamations, of coughing and scraping
+of feet, filled the hall as the court retired for a recess.  The
+prisoners were led away.  As they walked out, they nodded their
+heads to their relatives and familiars with a smile, and Ivan Gusev
+shouted to somebody in a modulated voice:
+
+"Don't lose courage, Yegor."
+
+The mother and Sizov walked out into the corridor.
+
+"Will you go to the tavern with me to take some tea?" the old man
+asked her solicitously.  "We have an hour and a half's time."
+
+"I don't want to."
+
+"Well, then I won't go, either.  No, say!  What fellows those are!
+They act as if they were the only real people, and the rest nothing
+at all.  They'll all go scot-free, I'm sure.  Look at Fedka, eh?"
+
+Samoylov's father came up to them holding his hat in his hand.
+He smiled sullenly and said:
+
+"My Vasily!  He declined a defense, and doesn't want to palaver.
+He was the first to have the idea.  Yours, Pelagueya, stood for
+lawyers; and mine said:  'I don't want one.'  And four declined
+after him.  Hm, ye-es."
+
+At his side stood his wife.  She blinked frequently, and wiped her
+nose with the end of her handkerchief.  Samoylov took his beard in
+his hand, and continued looking at the floor.
+
+"Now, this is the queer thing about it:  you look at them, those
+devils, and you think they got up all this at random--they're ruining
+themselves for nothing.  And suddenly you begin to think:  'And maybe
+they're right!'  You remember that in the factory more like them
+keep on coming, keep on coming.  They always get caught; but they're
+not destroyed, no more than common fish in the river get destroyed.
+No.  And again you think, 'And maybe power is with them, too.'"
+
+"It's hard for us, Stepan Petrov, to understand this affair," said Sizov.
+
+"It's hard, yes," agreed Samoylov.
+
+His wife noisily drawing in air through her nose remarked:
+
+"They're all strong, those imps!"  With an unrestrained smile on
+her broad, wizened face, she continued:  "You, Nilovna, don't be
+angry with me because I just now slapped you, when I said that your
+son is to blame.  A dog can tell who's the more to blame, to tell
+you the truth.  Look at the gendarmes and the spies, what they said
+about our Vasily!  He has shown what he can do too!"
+
+She apparently was proud of her son, perhaps even without understanding
+her feeling; but the mother did understand her feeling, and answered
+with a kind smile and quiet words:
+
+"A young heart is always nearer to the truth."
+
+People rambled about the corridor, gathered into groups, speaking
+excitedly and thoughtfully in hollow voices.  Scarcely anybody stood
+alone; all faces bore evidence of a desire to speak, to ask, to
+listen.  In the narrow white passageway the people coiled about in
+sinuous curves, like dust carried in circles before a powerful wind.
+Everybody seemed to be seeking something hard and firm to stand upon.
+
+The older brother of Bukin, a tall, red-faced fellow, waved his
+hands and turned about rapidly in all directions.
+
+"The district elder Klepanov has no place in this case," he declared aloud.
+
+"Keep still, Konstantin!" his father, a little old man, tried to
+dissuade him, and looked around cautiously.
+
+"No; I'm going to speak out!  There's a rumor afloat about him that
+last year he killed a clerk of his on account of the clerk's wife.
+What kind of a judge is he? permit me to ask.  He lives with the
+wife of his clerk--what have you got to say to that?  Besides, he's
+a well-known thief!"
+
+"Oh, my little father--Konstantin!"
+
+"True!" said Samoylov.  "True, the court is not a very just one."
+
+Bukin heard his voice and quickly walked up to him, drawing the whole
+crowd after him.  Red with excitement, he waved his hands and said:
+
+"For thievery, for murder, jurymen do the trying.  They're common
+people, peasants, merchants, if you please; but for going against
+the authorities you're tried by the authorities.  How's that?"
+
+"Konstantin!  Why are they against the authorities?  Ah, you!  They----"
+
+"No, wait!  Fedor Mazin said the truth.  If you insult me, and I land
+you one on your jaw, and you try me for it, of course I'm going to turn
+out guilty.  But the first offender--who was it?  You?  Of course, you!"
+
+The watchman, a gray man with a hooked nose and medals on his chest,
+pushed the crowd apart, and said to Bukin, shaking his finger at him:
+
+"Hey! don't shout!  Don't you know where you are?  Do you think this
+is a saloon?"
+
+"Permit me, my cavalier, I know where I am.  Listen!  If I strike
+you and you me, and I go and try you, what would you think?"
+
+"And I'll order you out," said the watchman sternly.
+
+"Where to?  What for?"
+
+"Into the street, so that you shan't bawl."
+
+"The chief thing for them is that people should keep their mouths shut."
+
+"And what do you think?" the old man bawled.  Bukin threw out his
+hands, and again measuring the public with his eyes, began to speak
+in a lower voice:
+
+"And again--why are the people not permitted to be at the trial, but
+only the relatives?  If you judge righteously, then judge in front
+of everybody.  What is there to be afraid of?"
+
+Samoylov repeated, but this time in a louder tone:
+
+"The trial is not altogether just, that's true."
+
+The mother wanted to say to him that she had heard from Nikolay of
+the dishonesty of the court; but she had not wholly comprehended
+Nikolay, and had forgotten some of his words.  While trying to
+recall them she moved aside from the people, and noticed that
+somebody was looking at her--a young man with a light mustache.
+He held his right hand in the pocket of his trousers, which made
+his left shoulder seem lower than the right, and this peculiarity
+of his figure seemed familiar to the mother.  But he turned from her,
+and she again lost herself in the endeavor to recollect, and forgot
+about him immediately.  In a minute, however, her ear was caught by
+the low question:
+
+"This woman on the left?"
+
+And somebody in a louder voice cheerfully answered:
+
+"Yes."
+
+She looked around.  The man with the uneven shoulders stood sidewise
+toward her, and said something to his neighbor, a black-bearded
+fellow with a short overcoat and boots up to his knees.
+
+Again her memory stirred uneasily, but did not yield any distinct results.
+
+The watchman opened the door of the hall, and shouted:
+
+"Relatives, enter; show your tickets!"
+
+A sullen voice said lazily:
+
+"Tickets!  Like a circus!"
+
+All the people now showed signs of a dull excitement, an uneasy
+passion.  They began to behave more freely, and hummed and disputed
+with the watchman.
+
+Sitting down on the bench, Sizov mumbled something to the mother.
+
+"What is it?" asked the mother.
+
+"Oh, nothing--the people are fools!  They know nothing; they live
+groping about and groping about."
+
+The bellman rang; somebody announced indifferently:
+
+"The session has begun!"
+
+Again all arose, and again, in the same order, the judges filed in
+and sat down; then the prisoners were led in.
+
+"Pay attention!" whispered Sizov; "the prosecuting attorney is going
+to speak."
+
+The mother craned her neck and extended her whole body.  She yielded
+anew to expectation of the horrible.
+
+Standing sidewise toward the judges, his head turned to them,
+leaning his elbow on the desk, the prosecuting attorney sighed,
+and abruptly waving his right hand in the air, began to speak:
+
+The mother could not make out the first words.  The prosecuting
+attorney's voice was fluent, thick; it sped on unevenly, now a bit
+slower, now a bit faster.  His words stretched out in a thin line,
+like a gray seam; suddenly they burst out quickly and whirled like
+a flock of black flies around a piece of sugar.  But she did not
+find anything horrible in them, nothing threatening.  Cold as snow,
+gray as ashes, they fell and fell, filling the hall with something
+which recalled a slushy day in early autumn.  Scant in feeling,
+rich in words, the speech seemed not to reach Pavel and his comrade.
+Apparently it touched none of them; they all sat there quite composed,
+smiling at times as before, and conversed without sound. At times
+they frowned to cover up their smiles.
+
+"He lies!" whispered Sizov.
+
+She could not have said it.  She understood that the prosecuting
+attorney charged all the comrades with guilt, not singling out any
+one of them.  After having spoken about Pavel, he spoke about Fedya,
+and having put him side by side with Pavel, he persistently thrust
+Bukin up against them.  It seemed as if he packed and sewed them
+into a sack, piling them up on top of one another.  But the external
+sense of his words did not satisfy, did not touch, did not frighten
+her.  She still waited for the horrible, and rigorously sought
+something beyond his words--something in his face, his eyes, his
+voice, in his white hand, which slowly glided in the air.  Something
+terrible must be there; she felt it, but it was impalpable; it did
+not yield to her consciousness, which again covered her heart with
+a dry, pricking dust.
+
+She looked at the judges.  There was no gainsaying that they were
+bored at having to listen to this speech.  The lifeless, yellow
+faces expressed nothing.  The sickly, the fat, or the extremely
+lean, motionless dead spots all grew dimmer and dimmer in the dull
+ennui that filled the hall.  The words of the prosecuting attorney
+spurted into the air like a haze imperceptible to the eye, growing
+and thickening around the judges, enveloping them more closely in
+a cloud of dry indifference, of weary waiting.  At times one of
+them changed his pose; but the lazy movement of the tired body did
+not rouse their drowsy souls.  The oldest judge did not stir at all;
+he was congealed in his erect position, and the gray blots behind
+the eyeglasses at times disappeared, seeming to spread over his
+whole face.  The mother realized this dead indifference, this
+unconcern without malice in it, and asked herself in perplexity,
+"Are they judging?"
+
+The question pressed her heart, and gradually squeezed out of it her
+expectation of the horrible.  It pinched her throat with a sharp
+feeling of wrong.
+
+The speech of the prosecuting attorney snapped off unexpectedly.
+He made a few quick, short steps, bowed to the judges, and sat down,
+rubbing his hands.  The marshal of the nobility nodded his head to
+him, rolling his eyes; the city mayor extended his hand, and the
+district elder stroked his belly and smiled.
+
+But the judges apparently were not delighted by the speech, and
+did not stir.
+
+"The scabby devil!" Sizov whispered the oath.
+
+"Next," said the old judge, bringing the paper to his face, "lawyers
+for the defendants, Fedoseyev, Markov, Zagarov."
+
+The lawyer whom the mother had seen at Nikolay's arose.  His face
+was broad and good-natured; his little eyes smiled radiantly and
+seemed to thrust out from under his eyebrows two sharp blades, which
+cut the air like scissors.  He spoke without haste, resonantly,
+and clearly; but the mother was unable to listen to his speech.
+Sizov whispered in her ear:
+
+"Did you understand what he said?  Did you understand?  'People,'
+he says, 'are poor, they are all upset, insensate.'  Is that Fedor?
+He says they don't understand anything; they're savages."
+
+The feeling of wrong grew, and passed into revolt.  Along with the
+quick, loud voice of the lawyer, time also passed more quickly.
+
+"A live, strong man having in his breast a sensitive, honest heart
+cannot help rebelling with all his force against this life so full
+of open cynicism, corruption, falsehood, and so blunted by vapidity.
+The eyes of honest people cannot help seeing such glaring
+contradictions----"
+
+The judge with the green face bent toward the president and whispered
+something to him; then the old man said dryly:
+
+"Please be more careful!"
+
+"Ha!" Sizov exclaimed softly.
+
+"Are they judging?" thought the mother, and the word seemed hollow
+and empty as an earthen vessel.  It seemed to make sport of her
+fear of the terrible.
+
+"They're a sort of dead body," she answered the old man.
+
+"Don't fear; they're livening up."
+
+She looked at them, and she actually saw something like a shadow
+of uneasiness on the faces of the judges.  Another man was already
+speaking, a little lawyer with a sharp, pale, satiric face.  He
+spoke very respectfully:
+
+"With all due respect, I permit myself to call the attention of the
+court to the solid manner of the honorable prosecuting attorney, to
+the conduct of the safety department, or, as such people are called
+in common parlance, spies----"
+
+The judge with the green face again began to whisper something to
+the president.  The prosecuting attorney jumped up.  The lawyer
+continued without changing his voice:
+
+"The spy Gyman tells us about the witness:  'I frightened him.'
+The prosecuting attorney also, as the court has heard, frightened
+witnesses; as a result of which act, at the insistence of the
+defense, he called forth a rebuke from the presiding judge."
+
+The prosecuting attorney began to speak quickly and angrily; the
+old judge followed suit; the lawyer listened to them respectfully,
+inclining his head.  Then he said:
+
+"I can even change the position of my words if the prosecuting
+attorney deems it is not in the right place; but that will not
+change the plan of my defense.  However, I cannot understand the
+excitement of the prosecuting attorney."
+
+"Go for him!" said Sizov.  "Go for him, tooth and nail!  Pick him
+open down to his soul, wherever that may be!"
+
+The hall became animated; a fighting passion flared up; the defense
+attacked from all sides, provoking and disturbing the judges,
+driving away the cold haze that enveloped them, pricking the old
+skin of the judges with sharp words.  The judges had the air of
+moving more closely to one another, or suddenly they would puff and
+swell, repulsing the sharp, caustic raps with the mass of their
+soft, mellow bodies.  They acted as if they feared that the blow of
+the opponent might call forth an echo in their empty bosoms, might
+shake their resolution, which sprang not from their own will but
+from a will strange to them.  Feeling this conflict, the people on
+the benches back of the mother sighed and whispered.
+
+But suddenly Pavel arose; tense quiet prevailed.  The mother
+stretched her entire body forward.
+
+"A party man, I recognize only the court of my party and will not
+speak in my defense.  According to the desire of my comrades, I,
+too, declined a defense.  I will merely try to explain to you what
+you don't understand.  The prosecuting attorney designated our
+coming out under the banner of the Social Democracy as an uprising
+against the superior power, and regarded us as nothing but rebels
+against the Czar.  I must declare to you that to us the Czar is not
+the only chain that fetters the body of the country.  We are obliged
+to tear off only the first and nearest chain from the people."
+
+The stillness deepened under the sound of the firm voice; it seemed
+to widen the space between the walls of the hall.  Pavel, by his
+words, removed the people to a distance from himself, and thereby
+grew in the eyes of the mother.  His stony, calm, proud face with
+the beard, his high forehead, and blue eyes, somewhat stern, all
+became more dazzling and more prominent.
+
+The judges began to stir heavily and uneasily; the marshal of the
+nobility was the first to whisper something to the judge with the
+indolent face.  The judge nodded his head and turned to the old man;
+on the other side of him the sick judge was talking.  Rocking back
+and forth in the armchair, the old judge spoke to Pavel, but his
+voice was drowned in the even, broad current of the young man's speech.
+
+"We are Socialists!  That means we are enemies to private property,
+which separates people, arms them against one another, and brings
+forth an irreconcilable hostility of interests; brings forth lies
+that endeavor to cover up, or to justify, this conflict of interests,
+and corrupt all with falsehood, hypocrisy and malice.  We maintain
+that a society that regards man only as a tool for its enrichment
+is anti-human; it is hostile to us; we cannot be reconciled to its
+morality; its double-faced and lying cynicism.  Its cruel relation to
+individuals is repugnant to us.  We want to fight, and will fight,
+every form of the physical and moral enslavement of man by such a
+society; we will fight every measure calculated to disintegrate
+society for the gratification of the interests of gain.  We are
+workers--men by whose labor everything is created, from gigantic
+machines to childish toys.  We are people devoid of the right to
+fight for our human dignity.  Everyone strives to utilize us, and
+may utilize us, as tools for the attainment of his ends.  Now we
+want to have as much freedom as will give us the possibility in
+time to come to conquer all the power.  Our slogan is simple:
+'All the power for the people; all the means of production for the
+people; work obligatory on all.  Down with private property!'  You
+see, we are not rebels."
+
+Pavel smiled, and the kindly fire of his blue eyes blazed forth
+more brilliantly.
+
+"Please, more to the point!" said the presiding judge distinctly
+and aloud.  He turned his chest to Pavel, and regarded him.  It
+seemed to the mother that his dim left eye began to burn with a
+sinister, greedy fire.  The look all the judges cast on her son
+made her uneasy for him.  She fancied that their eyes clung to his
+face, stuck to his body, thirsted for his blood, by which they might
+reanimate their own worn-out bodies.  And he, erect and tall,
+standing firmly and vigorously, stretched out his hand to them while
+he spoke distinctly:
+
+"We are revolutionists, and will be such as long as private property
+exists, as long as some merely command, and as long as others merely
+work.  We take stand against the society whose interests you are
+bidden to protect as your irreconcilable enemies, and reconciliation
+between us is impossible until we shall have been victorious.  We
+will conquer--we workingmen!  Your society is not at all so powerful
+as it thinks itself.  That very property, for the production and
+preservation of which it sacrifices millions of people enslaved by
+it--that very force which gives it the power over us--stirs up
+discord within its own ranks, destroys them physically and morally.
+Property requires extremely great efforts for its protection; and in
+reality all of you, our rulers, are greater slaves than we--you are
+enslaved spiritually, we only physically.  YOU cannot withdraw from
+under the weight of your prejudices and habits, the weight which
+deadens you spiritually; nothing hinders US from being inwardly free.
+The poisons with which you poison us are weaker than the antidote you
+unwittingly administer to our consciences.  This antidote penetrates
+deeper and deeper into the body of workingmen; the flames mount
+higher and higher, sucking in the best forces, the spiritual powers,
+the healthy elements even from among you.  Look!  Not one of you
+can any longer fight for your power as an ideal!  You have already
+expended all the arguments capable of guarding you against the
+pressure of historic justice.  You can create nothing new in the
+domain of ideas; you are spiritually barren.  Our ideas grow; they
+flare up ever more dazzling; they seize hold of the mass of the
+people, organizing them for the war of freedom.  The consciousness
+of their great role unites all the workingmen of the world into
+one soul.  You have no means whereby to hinder this renovating
+process in life except cruelty and cynicism.  But your cynicism
+is very evident, your cruelty exasperates, and the hands with which
+you stifle us to-day will press our hands in comradeship to-morrow.
+Your energy, the mechanical energy of the increase of gold, separates
+you, too, into groups destined to devour one another.  Our energy
+is a living power, founded on the ever-growing consciousness of the
+solidarity of all workingmen.  Everything you do is criminal, for
+it is directed toward the enslavement of the people.  Our work frees
+the world from the delusions and monsters which are produced by your
+malice and greed, and which intimidate the people.  You have torn
+man away from life and disintegrated him.  Socialism will unite the
+world, rent asunder by you, into one huge whole.  And this will be!"
+
+Pavel stopped for a second, and repeated in a lower tone, with
+greater emphasis, "This will be!"
+
+The judges whispered to one another, making strange grimaces.  And
+still their greedy looks were fastened on the body of Nilovna's son.
+The mother felt that their gaze tarnished this supple, vigorous
+body; that they envied its strength, power, freshness.  The
+prisoners listened attentively to the speech of their comrade; their
+faces whitened, their eyes flashed joy.  The mother drank in her
+son's words, which cut themselves into her memory in regular rows.
+The old judge stopped Pavel several times and explained something
+to him.  Once he even smiled sadly.  Pavel listened to him silently,
+and again began to speak in an austere but calm voice, compelling
+everybody to listen to him, subordinating the will of the judges to
+his will.  This lasted for a long time.  Finally, however, the old
+man shouted, extending his hand to Pavel, whose voice in response
+flowed on calmly, somewhat sarcastically.
+
+"I am reaching my conclusion.  To insult you personally was not my
+desire; on the contrary, as an involuntary witness to this comedy
+which you call a court trial, I feel almost compassion for you, I
+may say.  You are human beings after all; and it is saddening to
+see human beings, even our enemies, so shamefully debased in the
+service of violence, debased to such a degree that they lose
+consciousness of their human dignity."
+
+He sat down without looking at the judges.
+
+Andrey, all radiant with joy, pressed his hand firmly; Samoylov,
+Mazin, and the rest animatedly stretched toward him.  He smiled,
+a bit embarrassed by the transport of his comrades.  He looked
+toward his mother, and nodded his head as if asking, "Is it so?"
+
+She answered him all a-tremble, all suffused with warm joy.
+
+"There, now the trial has begun!" whispered Sizov.  "How he gave
+it to them!  Eh, mother?"
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI
+
+
+She silently nodded her head and smiled, satisfied that her son had
+spoken so bravely, perhaps still more satisfied that he had finished.
+The thought darted through her mind that the speech was likely to
+increase the dangers threatening Pavel; but her heart palpitated
+with pride, and his words seemed to settle in her bosom.
+
+Andrey arose, swung his body forward, looked at the judges sidewise,
+and said:
+
+"Gentlemen of the defense----"
+
+"The court is before you, and not the defense!" observed the judge
+of the sickly face angrily and loudly.  By Andrey's expression the
+mother perceived that he wanted to tease them.  His mustache
+quivered.  A cunning, feline smirk familiar to her lighted up his
+eyes.  He stroked his head with his long hands, and fetched a breath.
+
+"Is that so?" he said, swinging his head.  "I think not.  That you
+are not the judges, but only the defendants----"
+
+"I request you to adhere to what directly pertains to the case,"
+remarked the old man dryly.
+
+"To what directly pertains to the case?  Very well!  I've already
+compelled myself to think that you are in reality judges, independent
+people, honest----"
+
+"The court has no need of your characterization."
+
+"It has no need of SUCH a characterization?  Hey?  Well, but after
+all I'm going to continue.  You are men who make no distinction
+between your own and strangers.  You are free people.  Now, here two
+parties stand before you; one complains, 'He robbed me and did me up
+completely'; and the other answers, 'I have a right to rob and to do
+up because I have arms'----"
+
+"Please don't tell anecdotes."
+
+"Why, I've heard that old people like anecdotes--naughty ones in
+particular."
+
+"I'll prohibit you from speaking.  You may say something about what
+directly pertains to the case.  Speak, but without buffoonery,
+without unbecoming sallies."
+
+The Little Russian looked at the judges, silently rubbing his head.
+
+"About what directly pertains to the case?" he asked seriously.
+"Yes; but why should I speak to you about what directly pertains
+to the case?  What you need to know my comrade has told you.  The
+rest will be told you; the time will come, by others----"
+
+The old judge rose and declared:
+
+"I forbid you to speak.  Vasily Samoylov!"
+
+Pressing his lips together firmly the Little Russian dropped down
+lazily on the bench, and Samoylov arose alongside of him, shaking
+his curly hair.
+
+"The prosecuting attorney called my comrades and me 'savages,'
+'enemies of civilization'----"
+
+"You must speak only about that which pertains to your case."
+
+"This pertains to the case.  There's nothing which does not pertain
+to honest men, and I ask you not to interrupt me.  I ask you what
+sort of a thing is your civilization?"
+
+"We are not here for discussions with you.  To the point!" said
+the old judge, showing his teeth.
+
+Andrey's demeanor had evidently changed the conduct of the judges;
+his words seemed to have wiped something away from them.  Stains
+appeared on their gray faces.  Cold, green sparks burned in their
+eyes.  Pavel's speech had excited but subdued them; it restrained
+their agitation by its force, which involuntarily inspired respect.
+The Little Russian broke away this restraint and easily bared what
+lay underneath.  They looked at Samoylov, and whispered to one
+another with strange, wry faces.  They also began to move extremely
+quickly for them.  They gave the impression of desiring to seize
+him and howl while torturing his body with voluptuous ecstasy.
+
+"You rear spies, you deprave women and girls, you put men in the
+position which forces them to thievery and murder; you corrupt them
+with whisky--international butchery, universal falsehood, depravity,
+and savagery--that's your civilization!  Yes, we are enemies of
+this civilization!"
+
+"Please!" shouted the old judge, shaking his chin; but Samoylov,
+all red, his eyes flashing, also shouted:
+
+"But we respect and esteem another civilization, the creators of
+which you have persecuted, you have allowed to rot in dungeons,
+you have driven mad----"
+
+"I forbid you to speak!  Hm--  Fedor Mazin!"
+
+Little Mazin popped up like a cork from a champagne bottle, and said
+in a staccato voice:
+
+"I--I swear!--I know you have convicted me----"
+
+He lost breath and paled; his eyes seemed to devour his entire face.
+He stretched out his hand and shouted:
+
+"I--upon my honest word!  Wherever you send me--I'll escape--I'll
+return--I'll work always--all my life!  Upon my honest word!"
+
+Sizov quacked aloud.  The entire public, overcome by the mounting
+wave of excitement, hummed strangely and dully.  One woman cried,
+some one choked and coughed.  The gendarmes regarded the prisoners
+with dull surprise, the public with a sinister look.  The judges
+shook, the old man shouted in a thin voice:
+
+"Ivan Gusev!"
+
+"I don't want to speak."
+
+"Vasily Gusev!"
+
+"Don't want to."
+
+"Fedor Bukin!"
+
+The whitish, faded fellow lifted himself heavily, and shaking his
+head slowly said in a thick voice:
+
+"You ought to be ashamed.  I am a heavy man, and yet I understand--
+justice!"  He raised his hand higher than his head and was silent,
+half-closing his eyes as if looking at something at a distance.
+
+"What is it?" shouted the old judge in excited astonishment,
+dropping back in his armchair.
+
+"Oh, well, what's the use?"
+
+Bukin sullenly let himself down on the bench.  There was something
+big and serious in his dark eyes, something somberly reproachful
+and naive.  Everybody felt it; even the judges listened, as if
+waiting for an echo clearer than his words.  On the public benches
+all commotion died down immediately; only a low weeping swung in
+the air.  Then the prosecuting attorney, shrugging his shoulders,
+grinned and said something to the marshal of the nobility, and
+whispers gradually buzzed again excitedly through the hall.
+
+Weariness enveloped the mother's body with a stifling faintness.
+Small drops of perspiration stood on her forehead.  Samoylov's
+mother stirred on the bench, nudging her with her shoulder and
+elbow, and said to her husband in a subdued whisper:
+
+"How is this, now?  Is it possible?"
+
+"You see, it's possible."
+
+"But what is going to happen to him, to Vasily?"
+
+"Keep still.  Stop."
+
+The public was jarred by something it did not understand.  All
+blinked in perplexity with blinded eyes, as if dazzled by the sudden
+blazing up of an object, indistinct in outline, of unknown meaning,
+but with horrible drawing power.  And since the people did not
+comprehend this great thing dawning on them, they contracted its
+significance into something small, the meaning of which was, evident
+and clear to them.  The elder Bukin, therefore, whispered aloud
+without constraint:
+
+"Say, please, why don't they permit them to talk?  The prosecuting
+attorney can say everything, and as much as he wants to----"
+
+A functionary stood at the benches, and waving his hands at the
+people, said in a half voice:
+
+"Quiet, quiet!"
+
+The father of Samoylov threw himself back, and ejaculated broken
+words behind his wife's ear:
+
+"Of course--let us say they are guilty--but you'll let them explain.
+What is it they have gone against?  Against everything--I wish to
+understand--I, too, have my interest."  And suddenly:  "Pavel says
+the truth, hey?  I want to understand.  Let them speak."
+
+"Keep still!" exclaimed the functionary, shaking his finger at him.
+
+Sizov nodded his head sullenly.
+
+But the mother kept her gaze fastened unwaveringly on the judges,
+and saw that they got more and more excited, conversing with one
+another in indistinct voices.  The sound of their words, cold and
+tickling, touched her face, puckering the skin on it, and filling
+her mouth with a sickly, disgusting taste.  The mother somehow
+conceived that they were all speaking of the bodies of her son and
+his comrades, their vigorous bare bodies, their muscles, their
+youthful limbs full of hot blood, of living force.  These bodies
+kindled in the judges the sinister, impotent envy of the rich by the
+poor, the unwholesome greed felt by wasted and sick people for the
+strength of the healthy.  Their mouths watered regretfully for these
+bodies, capable of working and enriching, of rejoicing and creating.
+The youths produced in the old judges the revengeful, painful excitement
+of an enfeebled beast which sees the fresh prey, but no longer has
+the power to seize it, and howls dismally at its powerlessness.
+
+This thought, rude and strange, grew more vivid the more attentively
+the mother scrutinized the judges.  They seemed not to conceal their
+excited greed--the impotent vexation of the hungry who at one time
+had been able to consume in abundance.  To her, a woman and a
+mother, to whom after all the body of her son is always dearer than
+that in him which is called a soul, to her it was horrible to see
+how these sticky, lightless eyes crept over his face, felt his
+chest, shoulders, hands, tore at the hot skin, as if seeking the
+possibility of taking fire, of warming the blood in their hardened
+brains and fatigued muscles--the brains and muscles of people
+already half dead, but now to some degree reanimated by the pricks
+of greed and envy of a young life that they presumed to sentence and
+remove to a distance from themselves.  It seemed to her that her
+son, too, felt this damp, unpleasant tickling contact, and,
+shuddering, looked at her.
+
+He looked into the mother's face with somewhat fatigued eyes, but
+calmly, kindly, and warmly.  At times he nodded his head to her,
+and smiled--she understood the smile.
+
+"Now quick!" she said.
+
+Resting his hand on the table the oldest judge arose.  His head sunk
+in the collar of his uniform, standing motionless, he began to read
+a paper in a droning voice.
+
+"He's reading the sentence," said Sizov, listening.
+
+It became quiet again, and everybody looked at the old man, small,
+dry, straight, resembling the stick held in his unseen hand.  The
+other judges also stood up.  The district elder inclined his head
+on one shoulder, and looked up to the ceiling; the mayor of the
+city crossed his hands over his chest; the marshal of the nobility
+stroked his beard.  The judge with the sickly face, his puffy
+neighbor, and the prosecuting attorney regarded the prisoners
+sidewise.  And behind the judges the Czar in a red military coat,
+with an indifferent white face looked down from his portrait over
+their heads.  On his face some insect was creeping, or a cobweb was
+trembling.
+
+"Exile!" Sizov said with a sigh of relief, dropping back on the
+bench.  "Well, of course!  Thank God!  I heard that they were going
+to get hard labor.  Never mind, mother, that's nothing."
+
+Fatigued by her thoughts and her immobility, she understood the
+joy of the old man, which boldly raised the soul dragged down by
+hopelessness.  But it didn't enliven her much.
+
+"Why, I knew it," she answered.
+
+"But, after all, it's certain now.  Who could have told beforehand
+what the authorities would do?  But Fedya is a fine fellow, dear soul."
+
+They walked to the grill; the mother shed tears as she pressed the
+hand of her son.  He and Fedya spoke words, smiled, and joked.  All
+were excited, but light and cheerful.  The women wept; but, like
+Vlasova, more from habit than grief.  They did not experience the
+stunning pain produced by an unexpected blow on the head, but only
+the sad consciousness that they must part with the children.  But
+even this consciousness was dimmed by the impressions of the day.
+The fathers and the mothers looked at their children with mingled
+sensations, in which the skepticism of parents toward their children
+and the habitual sense of the superiority of elders over youth
+blended strangely with the feeling of sheer respect for them, with
+the persistent melancholy thought that life had now become dull,
+and with the curiosity aroused by the young men who so bravely and
+fearlessly spoke of the possibility of a new life, which the elders
+did not comprehend but which seemed to promise something good.  The
+very novelty and unusualness of the feeling rendered expression
+impossible.  Words were spoken in plenty, but they referred only
+to common matters.  The relatives spoke of linen and clothes, and
+begged the comrades to take care of their health, and not to provoke
+the authorities uselessly.
+
+"Everybody, brother, will grow weary, both we and they," said
+Samoylov to his son.
+
+And Bukin's brother, waving his hand, assured the younger brother:
+
+"Merely justice, and nothing else!  That they cannot admit."
+
+The younger Bukin answered:
+
+"You look out for the starling.  I love him."
+
+"Come back home, and you'll find him in perfect trim."
+
+"I've nothing to do there."
+
+And Sizov held his nephew's hand, and slowly said:
+
+"So, Fedor; so you've started on your trip.  So."
+
+Fedya bent over, and whispered something in his ear, smiling
+roguishly.  The convoy soldier also smiled; but he immediately
+assumed a stern expression, and shouted, "Go!"
+
+The mother spoke to Pavel, like the others, about the same things,
+about clothes, about his health, yet her breast was choked by a
+hundred questions concerning Sasha, concerning himself, and herself.
+Underneath all these emotions an almost burdensome feeling was
+slowly growing of the fullness of her love for her son--a strained
+desire to please him, to be near to his heart.  The expectation of
+the terrible had died away, leaving behind it only a tremor at the
+recollection of the judges, and somewhere in a corner a dark
+impersonal thought regarding them.
+
+"Young people ought to be tried by young judges, and not by old
+ones," she said to her son.
+
+"It would be better to arrange life so that it should not force
+people to crime," answered Pavel.
+
+The mother, seeing the Little Russian converse with everybody and
+realizing that he needed affection more than Pavel, spoke to him.
+Andrey answered her gratefully, smiling, joking kindly, as always
+a bit droll, supple, sinewy.  Around her the talk went on, crossing
+and intertwining.  She heard everything, understood everybody, and
+secretly marveled at the vastness of her own heart, which took in
+everything with an even joy, and gave back a clear reflection of
+it, like a bright image on a deep, placid lake.
+
+Finally the prisoners were led away.  The mother walked out of the
+court, and was surprised to see that night already hung over the
+city, with the lanterns alight in the streets, and the stars shining
+in the sky.  Groups composed mainly of young men were crowding near
+the courthouse.  The snow crunched in the frozen atmosphere; voices
+sounded.  A man in a gray Caucasian cowl looked into Sizov's face
+and asked quickly:
+
+"What was the sentence?"
+
+"Exile."
+
+"For all?"
+
+"All."
+
+"Thank you."
+
+The man walked away.
+
+"You see," said Sizov.  "They inquire."
+
+Suddenly they were surrounded by about ten men, youths, and girls,
+and explanations rained down, attracting still more people.  The
+mother and Sizov stopped.  They were questioned in regard to the
+sentence, as to how the prisoners behaved, who delivered the
+speeches, and what the speeches were about.  All the voices rang
+with the same eager curiosity, sincere and warm, which aroused the
+desire to satisfy it.
+
+"People!  This is the mother of Pavel Vlasov!" somebody shouted, and
+presently all became silent.
+
+"Permit me to shake your hand."
+
+Somebody's firm hand pressed the mother's fingers, somebody's voice
+said excitedly:
+
+"Your son will be an example of manhood for all of us."
+
+"Long live the Russian workingman!" a resonant voice rang out.
+
+"Long live the proletariat!"
+
+"Long live the revolution!"
+
+The shouts grew louder and increased in number, rising up on all
+sides.  The people ran from every direction, pushing into the crowd
+around the mother and Sizov.  The whistles of the police leaped
+through the air, but did not deafen the shouts.  The old man smiled;
+and to the mother all this seemed like a pleasant dream.  She smilingly
+pressed the hands extended to her and bowed, with joyous tears choking
+her throat.  Near her somebody's clear voice said nervously:
+
+"Comrades, friends, the autocracy, the monster which devours the
+Russian people to-day again gulped into its bottomless, greedy mouth----"
+
+"However, mother, let's go," said Sizov.  And at the same time Sasha
+appeared, caught the mother under her arm, and quickly dragged her
+away to the other side of the street.
+
+"Come!  They're going to make arrests.  What?  Exile?  To Siberia?"
+
+"Yes, yes."
+
+"And how did he speak?  I know without your telling me.  He was more
+powerful than any of the others, and more simple.  And of course,
+sterner than all the rest.  He's sensitive and soft, only he's ashamed
+to expose himself.  And he's direct, clear, firm, like truth itself.
+He's very great, and there's everything in him, everything!  But he
+often constrains himself for nothing, lest he might hinder the cause.
+I know it."  Her hot half-whisper, the words of her love, calmed the
+mother's agitation, and restored her exhausted strength.
+
+"When will you go to him?" she asked Sasha, pressing her hand to her
+body.  Looking confidently before her the girl answered:
+
+"As soon as I find somebody to take over my work.  I have the money
+already, but I might go per etappe.  You know I am also awaiting a
+sentence.  Evidently they are going to send me to Siberia, too.  I
+will then declare that I desire to be exiled to the same locality
+that he will be."
+
+Behind them was heard the voice of Sizov:
+
+"Then give him regards from me, from Sizov.  He will know.  I'm
+Fedya Mazin's uncle."
+
+Sasha stopped, turned around, extending her hand.  "I'm acquainted
+with Fedya.  My name is Alexandra."
+
+"And your patronymic?"
+
+She looked at him and answered:
+
+"I have no father."
+
+"He's dead, you mean?"
+
+"No, he's alive."  Something stubborn, persistent, sounded in the
+girl's voice and appeared in her face.  "He's a landowner, a chief
+of a country district.  He robs the peasants and beats them.  I
+cannot recognize him as my father."
+
+"S-s-o-o!"  Sizov was taken aback.  After a pause he said, looking
+at the girl sidewise:
+
+"Well, mother, good-by.  I'm going off to the left.  Stop in sometimes
+for a talk and a glass of tea.  Good evening, lady.  You're pretty
+hard on your father--of course, that's your business."
+
+"If your son were an ugly man, obnoxious to people, disgusting to
+you, wouldn't you say the same about him?" Sasha shouted terribly.
+
+"Well, I would," the old man answered after some hesitation.
+
+"That is to say that justice is dearer to you than your son; and to
+me it's dearer than my father."
+
+Sizov smiled, shaking his head; then he said with a sigh:
+
+"Well, well, you're clever.  Good-by.  I wish you all good things,
+and be better to people.  Hey?  Well, God be with you.  Good-by,
+Nilovna.  When you see Pavel tell him I heard his speech.  I
+couldn't understand every bit of it; some things even seemed
+horrible; but tell him it's true.  They've found the truth, yes."
+
+He raised his hat, and sedately turned around the corner of the street.
+
+"He seems to be a good man," remarked Sasha, accompanying him with
+a smile of her large eyes.  "Such people can be useful to the cause.
+It would be good to hide literature with them, for instance."
+
+It seemed to the mother that to-day the girl's face was softer and
+kinder than usual, and hearing her remarks about Sizov, she thought:
+
+"Always about the cause.  Even to-day.  It's burned into her heart."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII
+
+
+At home they sat on the sofa closely pressed together, and the
+mother resting in the quiet again began to speak about Sasha's
+going to Pavel.  Thoughtfully raising her thick eyebrows, the girl
+looked into the distance with her large, dreamy eyes.  A contemplative
+expression rested on her pale face.
+
+"Then, when children will be born to you, I will come to you and
+dandle them.  We'll begin to live there no worse than here.  Pasha
+will find work.  He has golden hands."
+
+"Yes," answered Sasha thoughtfully.  "That's good--"  And suddenly
+starting, as if throwing something away, she began to speak simply
+in a modulated voice.  "He won't commence to live there.  He'll go
+away, of course."
+
+"And how will that be?  Suppose, in case of children?"
+
+"I don't know.  We'll see when we are there.  In such a case he
+oughtn't to reckon with me, and I cannot constrain him.  He's free
+at any moment.  I am his comrade--a wife, of course.  But the
+conditions of his work are such that for years and years I cannot
+regard our bond as a usual one, like that of others.  It will be
+hard, I know it, to part with him; but, of course, I'll manage to.
+He knows that I'm not capable of regarding a man as my possession.
+I'm not going to constrain him, no."
+
+The mother understood her, felt that she believed what she said,
+that she was capable of carrying it out; and she was sorry for her.
+She embraced her.
+
+"My dear girl, it will be hard for you."
+
+Sasha smiled softly, nestling her body up to the mother's.  Her
+voice sounded mild, but powerful.  Red mounted to her face.
+
+"It's a long time till then; but don't think that I--that it is
+hard for me now.  I'm making no sacrifices.  I know what I'm doing,
+I know what I may expect.  I'll be happy if I can make him happy.
+My aim, my desire is to increase his energy, to give him as much
+happiness and love as I can--a great deal.  I love him very much
+and he me--I know it--what I bring to him, he will give back to me--
+we will enrich each other by all in our power; and, if necessary,
+we will part as friends."
+
+Sasha remained silent for a long time, during which the mother and
+the young woman sat in a corner of the room, tightly pressed against
+each other, thinking of the man whom they loved.  It was quiet,
+melancholy, and warm.
+
+Nikolay entered, exhausted, but brisk.  He immediately announced:
+
+"Well, Sashenka, betake yourself away from here, as long as you are
+sound.  Two spies have been after me since this morning, and the
+attempt at concealment is so evident that it savors of an arrest.
+I feel it in my bones--somewhere something has happened.  By the
+way, here I have the speech of Pavel.  It's been decided to publish
+it at once.  Take it to Liudmila.  Pavel spoke well, Nilovna; and
+his speech will play a part.  Look out for spies, Sasha.  Wait a
+little while--hide these papers, too.  You might give them to Ivan,
+for example."
+
+While he spoke, he vigorously rubbed his frozen hands, and quickly
+pulled out the drawers of his table, picking out papers, some of
+which he tore up, others he laid aside.  His manner was absorbed,
+and his appearance all upset.
+
+"Do you suppose it was long ago that this place was cleared out?
+And look at this mass of stuff accumulated already!  The devil!
+You see, Nilovna, it would be better for you, too, not to sleep
+here to-night.  It's a sorry spectacle to witness, and they may
+arrest you, too.  And you'll be needed for carrying Pavel's speech
+about from place to place."
+
+"Hm, what do they want me for?  Maybe you're mistaken."
+
+Nikolay waved his forearm in front of his eyes, and said, with conviction:
+
+"I have a keen scent.  Besides, you can be of great help to Liudmila.
+Flee far from evil."
+
+The possibility of taking a part in the printing of her son's speech
+was pleasant to her, and she answered:
+
+"If so, I'll go.  But don't think I'm afraid."
+
+"Very well.  Now, tell me where my valise and my linen are.  You've
+grabbed up everything into your rapacious hands, and I'm completely
+robbed of the possibility of disposing of my own private property.
+I'm making complete preparations--this will be unpleasant to them."
+
+Sasha burned the papers in silence, and carefully mixed their ashes
+with the other cinders in the stove.
+
+"Sasha, go," said Nikolay, putting out his hand to her.  "Good-by.
+Don't forget books--if anything new and interesting appears.  Well,
+good-by, dear comrade.  Be more careful."
+
+"Do you think it's for long?" asked Sasha.
+
+"The devil knows them!  Evidently.  There's something against me.
+Nilovna, are you going with her?  It's harder to track two people--
+all right?"
+
+"I'm going."  The mother went to dress herself, and it occurred to
+her how little these people who were striving for the freedom of
+all cared for their personal freedom.  The simplicity and the
+businesslike manner of Nikolay in expecting the arrest both astonished
+and touched her.  She tried to observe his face carefully; she
+detected nothing but his air of absorption, overshadowing the usual
+kindly soft expression of his eyes.  There was no sign of agitation
+in this man, dearer to her than the others; he made no fuss.  Equally
+attentive to all, alike kind to all, always calmly the same, he
+seemed to her just as much a stranger as before to everybody and
+everything except his cause.  He seemed remote, living a secret life
+within himself and somewhere ahead of people.  Yet she felt that he
+resembled her more than any of the others, and she loved him with a
+love that was carefully observing and, as it were, did not believe in
+itself.  Now she felt painfully sorry for him; but she restrained her
+feelings, knowing that to show them would disconcert Nikolay, that he
+would become, as always under such circumstances, somewhat ridiculous.
+
+When she returned to the room she found him pressing Sasha's hand
+and saying:
+
+"Admirable!  I'm convinced of it.  It's very good for him and for
+you.  A little personal happiness does not do any harm; but--a
+little, you know, so as not to make him lose his value.  Are you
+ready, Nilovna?"  He walked up to her, smiling and adjusting his
+glasses.  "Well, good-by.  I want to think that for three months,
+four months--well, at most half a year--half a year is a great deal
+of a man's life.  In half a year one can do a lot of things.  Take
+care of yourself, please, eh?  Come, let's embrace."  Lean and thin
+he clasped her neck in his powerful arms, looked into her eyes, and
+smiled.  "It seems to me I've fallen in love with you.  I keep
+embracing you all the time."
+
+She was silent, kissing his forehead and cheeks, and her hands
+quivered.  For fear he might notice it, she unclasped them.
+
+"Go.  Very well.  Be careful to-morrow.  This is what you should
+do--send the boy in the morning--Liudmila has a boy for the purpose--
+let him go to the house porter and ask him whether I'm home or not.
+I'll forewarn the porter; he's a good fellow, and I'm a friend of
+his.  Well, good-by, comrades.  I wish you all good."
+
+On the street Sasha said quietly to the mother:
+
+"He'll go as simply as this to his death, if necessary.  And
+apparently he'll hurry up a little in just the same way; when
+death stares him in the face he'll adjust his eyeglasses, and
+will say 'admirable,' and will die."
+
+"I love him," whispered the mother.
+
+"I'm filled with astonishment; but love him--no.  I respect him
+highly.  He's sort of dry, although good and even, if you please,
+sometimes soft; but not sufficiently human--it seems to me we're
+being followed.  Come, let's part.  Don't enter Liudmila's place
+if you think a spy is after you."
+
+"I know," said the mother.  Sasha, however, persistently added:
+"Don't enter.  In that case, come to me.  Good-by for the present."
+
+She quickly turned around and walked back.  The mother called
+"Good-by" after her.
+
+Within a few minutes she sat all frozen through at the stove in
+Liudmila's little room.  Her hostess, Liudmila, in a black dress
+girded up with a strap, slowly paced up and down the room, filling
+it with a rustle and the sound of her commanding voice.  A fire
+was crackling in the stove and drawing in the air from the room.
+The woman's voice sounded evenly.
+
+"People are a great deal more stupid than bad.  They can see only
+what's near to them, what it's possible to grasp immediately; but
+everything that's near is cheap; what's distant is dear.  Why, in
+reality, it would be more convenient and pleasanter for all if life
+were different, were lighter, and the people were more sensible.
+But to attain the distant you must disturb yourself for the
+immediate present----"
+
+Nilovna tried to guess where this woman did her printing.  The room
+had three windows facing the street; there was a sofa and a bookcase,
+a table, chairs, a bed at the wall, in the corner near it a wash
+basin, in the other corner a stove; on the walls photographs and
+pictures.  All was new, solid, clean; and over all the austere
+monastic figure of the mistress threw a cold shadow.  Something
+concealed, something hidden, made itself felt; but where it lurked
+was incomprehensible.  The mother looked at the doors; through one
+of them she had entered from the little antechamber.  Near the stove
+was another door, narrow and high.
+
+"I have come to you on business," she said in embarrassment,
+noticing that the hostess was regarding her.
+
+"I know.  Nobody comes to me for any other reason."
+
+Something strange seemed to be in Liudmila's voice.  The mother
+looked in her face.  Liudmila smiled with the corners of her thin
+lips, her dull eyes gleamed behind her glasses.  Turning her glance
+aside, the mother handed her the speech of Pavel.
+
+"Here.  They ask you to print it at once."
+
+And she began to tell of Nikolay's preparations for the arrest.
+
+Liudmila silently thrust the manuscript into her belt and sat down
+on a chair.  A red gleam of the fire was reflected on her spectacles;
+its hot smile played on her motionless face.
+
+"When they come to me I'm going to shoot at them," she said with
+determination in her moderated voice.  "I have the right to protect
+myself against violence; and I must fight with them if I call upon
+others to fight.  I cannot understand calmness; I don't like it."
+
+The reflection of the fire glided across her face, and she again
+became austere, somewhat haughty.
+
+"Your life is not very pleasant," the mother thought kindly.
+
+Liudmila began to read Pavel's speech, at first reluctantly; then
+she bent lower and lower over the paper, quickly throwing aside
+the pages as she read them.  When she had finished she rose,
+straightened herself, and walked up to the mother.
+
+"That's good.  That's what I like; although here, too, there's
+calmness.  But the speech is the sepulchral beat of a drum, and
+the drummer is a powerful man."
+
+She reflected a little while, lowering her head for a minute:
+
+"I didn't want to speak with you about your son; I have never met
+him, and I don't like sad subjects of conversation.  I know what
+it means to have a near one go into exile.  But I want to say to
+you, nevertheless, that your son must be a splendid man.  He's
+young--that's evident; but he is a great soul.  It must be good
+and terrible to have such a son."
+
+"Yes, it's good.  And now it's no longer terrible."
+
+Liudmila settled her smoothly combed hair with her tawny hand and
+sighed softly.  A light, warm shadow trembled on her cheeks, the
+shadow of a suppressed smile.
+
+"We are going to print it.  Will you help me?"
+
+"Of course."
+
+"I'll set it up quickly.  You lie down; you had a hard day; you're
+tired.  Lie down here on the bed; I'm not going to sleep; and at
+night maybe I'll wake you up to help me.  When you have lain down,
+put out the lamp."
+
+She threw two logs of wood into the stove, straightened herself, and
+passed through the narrow door near the stove, firmly closing it
+after her.  The mother followed her with her eyes, and began to
+undress herself, thinking reluctantly of her hostess:  "A stern
+person; and yet her heart burns.  She can't conceal it.  Everyone
+loves.  If you don't love you can't live."
+
+Fatigue dizzied her brain; but her soul was strangely calm, and
+everything was illumined from within by a soft, kind light which
+quietly and evenly filled her breast.  She was already acquainted
+with this calm; it had come to her after great agitation.  At first
+it had slightly disturbed her; but now it only broadened her soul,
+strengthening it with a certain powerful but impalpable thought.
+Before her all the time appeared and disappeared the faces of her
+son, Andrey, Nikolay, Sasha.  She took delight in them; they passed
+by without arousing thought, and only lightly and sadly touching her
+heart.  Then she extinguished the lamp, lay down in the cold bed,
+shriveled up under the bed coverings, and suddenly sank into a
+heavy sleep.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII
+
+
+When she opened her eyes the room was filled by the cold, white
+glimmer of a clear wintry day.  The hostess, with a book in her hand,
+lay on the sofa, and smiling unlike herself looked into her face.
+
+"Oh, father!" the mother exclaimed, for some reason embarrassed.
+"Just look!  Have I been asleep a long time?"
+
+"Good morning!" answered Liudmila.  "It'll soon be ten o'clock.
+Get up and we'll have tea."
+
+"Why didn't you wake me up?"
+
+"I wanted to.  I walked up to you; but you were so fast asleep and
+smiled so in your sleep!"
+
+With a supple, powerful movement of her whole body she rose from the
+sofa, walked up to the bed, bent toward the face of the mother, and in
+her dull eyes the mother saw something dear, near, and comprehensible.
+
+"I was sorry to disturb you.  Maybe you were seeing a happy vision."
+
+"I didn't see anything."
+
+"All the same--but your smile pleased me.  It was so calm, so good--
+so great."  Liudmila laughed, and her laugh sounded velvety.  "I
+thought of you, of your life--your life is a hard one, isn't it?"
+
+The mother, moving her eyebrows, was silent and thoughtful.
+
+"Of course it's hard!" exclaimed Liudmila.
+
+"I don't know," said the mother carefully.  "Sometimes it seems sort
+of hard; there's so much of all, it's all so serious, marvelous, and
+it moves along so quickly, one thing after the other--so quickly----"
+
+The wave of bold excitement familiar to her overflowed her breast,
+filling her heart with images and thoughts.  She sat up in bed,
+quickly clothing her thoughts in words.
+
+"It goes, it goes, it goes all to one thing, to one side, and like a
+fire, when a house begins to burn, upward!  Here it shoots forth,
+there it blazes out, ever brighter, ever more powerful.  There's a
+great deal, of hardship, you know.  People suffer; they are beaten,
+cruelly beaten; and everyone is oppressed and watched.  They hide,
+live like monks, and many joys are closed to them; it's very hard.
+And when you look at them well you see that the hard things, the
+evil and difficult, are around them, on the outside, and not within."
+
+Liudmila quickly threw up her head, looked at her with a deep,
+embracing look.  The mother felt that her words did not exhaust
+her thoughts, which vexed and offended her.
+
+"You're not speaking about yourself," said her hostess softly.
+
+The mother looked at her, arose from the bed, and dressing asked:
+
+"Not about myself?  Yes; you see in this, in all that I live now,
+it's hard to think of oneself; how can you withdraw into yourself
+when you love this thing, and that thing is dear to you, and you
+are afraid for everybody and are sorry for everybody?  Everything
+crowds into your heart and draws you to all people.  How can you
+step to one side?  It's hard."
+
+Liudmila laughed, saying softly:
+
+"And maybe it's not necessary."
+
+"I don't know whether it's necessary or not; but this I do know--that
+people are becoming stronger than life, wiser than life; that's evident."
+
+Standing in the middle of the room, half-dressed, she fell to
+reflecting for a moment.  Her real self suddenly appeared not to
+exist--the one who lived in anxiety and fear for her son, in thoughts
+for the safekeeping of his body.  Such a person in herself was no
+longer; she had gone off to a great distance, and perhaps was
+altogether burned up by the fire of agitation.  This had lightened
+and cleansed her soul, and had renovated her heart with a new power.
+She communed with herself, desiring to take a look into her own
+heart, and fearing lest she awaken some anxiety there.
+
+"What are you thinking about?" Liudmila asked kindly, walking up to her.
+
+"I don't know."
+
+The two women were silent, looking at each other.  Both smiled; then
+Liudmila walked out of the room, saying:
+
+"What is my samovar doing?"
+
+The mother looked through the window.  A cold, bracing day shone
+in the street; her breast, too, shone bright, but hot.  She wanted
+to speak much about everything, joyfully, with a confused feeling
+of gratitude to somebody--she did not know whom--for all that came
+into her soul, and lighted it with a ruddy evening light.  A desire
+to pray, which she had not felt for a long time, arose in her breast.
+Somebody's young face came to her memory, somebody's resonant voice
+shouted, "That's the mother of Pavel Vlasov!"  Sasha's eyes flashed
+joyously and tenderly.  Rybin's dark, tall figure loomed up, the
+bronzed, firm face of her son smiled.  Nikolay blinked in embarrassment;
+and suddenly everything was stirred with a deep but light breath.
+
+"Nikolay was right," said Liudmila, entering again.  "He must surely
+have been arrested.  I sent the boy there, as you told me to.  He
+said policemen are hiding in the yard; he did not see the house
+porter; but he saw the policeman who was hiding behind the gates.
+And spies are sauntering about; the boy knows them."
+
+"So?"  The mother nodded her head.  "Ah, poor fellow!"
+
+And she sighed, but without sadness, and was quietly surprised at herself.
+
+"Lately he's been reading a great deal to the city workingmen; and
+in general it was time for him to disappear," Liudmila said with a
+frown.  "The comrades told him to go, but he didn't obey them.  I
+think that in such cases you must compel and not try to persuade."
+
+A dark-haired, red-faced boy with beautiful eyes and a hooked nose
+appeared in the doorway.
+
+"Shall I bring in the samovar?" he asked in a ringing voice.
+
+"Yes, please, Seryozha.  This is my pupil; have you never met him before?"
+
+"No."
+
+"He used to go to Nikolay sometimes; I sent him."
+
+Liudmila seemed to the mother to be different to-day--simpler and
+nearer to her.  In the supple swaying of her stately figure there
+was much beauty and power; her sternness had mildened; the circles
+under her eyes had grown larger during the night, her face paler
+and leaner; her large eyes had deepened.  One perceived a strained
+exertion in her, a tightly drawn chord in her soul.
+
+The boy brought in the samovar.
+
+"Let me introduce you:  Seryozha--Pelagueya Nilovna, the mother of
+the workingman whom they sentenced yesterday."
+
+Seryozha bowed silently and pressed the mother's hand.  Then he
+brought in bread, and sat down to the table.  Liudmila persuaded
+the mother not to go home until they found out whom the police
+were waiting for there.
+
+"Maybe they are waiting for you.  I'm sure they'll examine you."
+
+"Let them.  And if they arrest me, no great harm.  Only I'd like
+to have Pasha's speech sent off."
+
+"It's already in type.  To-morrow it'll be possible to have it for
+the city and the suburb.  We'll have some for the districts, too.
+Do you know Natasha?"
+
+"Of course!"
+
+"Then take it to her."
+
+The boy read the newspaper, and seemed not to be listening to the
+conversation; but at times his eyes looked from the pages of the
+newspaper into the face of the mother; and when she met their
+animated glance she felt pleased and smiled.  She reproached herself
+for these smiles.  Liudmila again mentioned Nikolay without any
+expression of regret for his arrest and, to the mother, it seemed
+in perfectly natural tones.  The time passed more quickly than on
+the other days.  When they had done drinking tea it was already
+near midday.
+
+"However!" exclaimed Liudmila, and at the same time a knock at the
+door was heard.  The boy rose, looked inquiringly at Liudmila,
+prettily screwing up his eyes.
+
+"Open the door, Seryozha.  Who do you suppose it is?"  And with a
+composed gesture she let her hand into the pocket of the skirt,
+saying to the mother:  "If it is the gendarmes, you, Pelagueya
+Nilovna, stand here in this corner, and you, Ser----"
+
+"I know.  The dark passage," the little boy answered softly, disappearing.
+
+The mother smiled.  These preparations did not disturb her; she had
+no premonition of a misfortune.
+
+The little physician walked in.  He quickly said:
+
+"First of all, Nikolay is arrested.  Aha!  You here, Nilovna?  They're
+interested in you, too.  Weren't you there when he was arrested?"
+
+"He packed me off, and told me to come here."
+
+"Hm!  I don't think it will be of any use to you.  Secondly, last
+night several young people made about five hundred hektograph copies
+of Pavel's speech--not badly done, plain and clear.  They want to
+scatter them throughout the city at night.  I'm against it.  Printed
+sheets are better for the city, and the hektograph copies ought to
+be sent off somewhere."
+
+"Here, I'll carry them to Natasha!" the mother exclaimed animatedly.
+"Give them to me."
+
+She was seized with a great desire to sow them broadcast, to spread
+Pavel's speech as soon as possible.  She would have bestrewn the
+whole earth with the words of her son, and she looked into the
+doctor's face with eyes ready to beg.
+
+"The devil knows whether at this time you ought to take up this
+matter," the physician said irresolutely, and took out his watch.
+"It's now twelve minutes of twelve.  The train leaves at 2.05,
+arrives there 5.15.  You'll get there in the evening, but not
+sufficiently late--and that's not the point!"
+
+"That's not the point," repeated Liudmila, frowning.
+
+"What then?" asked the mother, drawing up to them.  "The point is
+to do it well; and I'll do it all right."
+
+Liudmila looked fixedly at her, and chafing her forehead, remarked:
+
+"It's dangerous for you."
+
+"Why?" the mother challenged hotly.
+
+"That's why!" said the physician quickly and brokenly.  "You
+disappeared from home an hour before Nikolay's arrest.  You went
+away to the mill, where you are known as the teacher's aunt; after
+your arrival at the mill the naughty leaflets appear.  All this
+will tie itself into a noose around your neck."
+
+"They won't notice me there," the mother assured them, warming to
+her desire.  "When I return they'll arrest me, and ask me where I
+was."  After a moment's pause she exclaimed:  "I know what I'll say.
+From there I'll go straight to the suburb; I have a friend there--
+Sizov.  So I'll say that I went there straight from the trial; grief
+took me there; and he, too, had the same misfortune, his nephew was
+sentenced; and I spent the whole time with him.  He'll uphold me,
+too.  Do you see?"
+
+The mother was aware that they were succumbing to the strength of
+her desire, and strove to induce them to give in as quickly as
+possible.  She spoke more and more persistently, joy arising within
+her.  And they yielded.
+
+"Well, go," the physician reluctantly assented.
+
+Liudmila was silent, pacing thoughtfully up and down the room.  Her
+face clouded over and her cheeks fell in.  The muscles of her neck
+stretched noticeably as if her head had suddenly grown heavy; it
+involuntarily dropped on her breast.  The mother observed this.
+The physician's reluctant assent forced a sigh from her.
+
+"You all take care of me," the mother said, smiling.  "You don't take
+care of yourselves."  And the wave of joy mounted higher and higher.
+
+"It isn't true.  We look out for ourselves.  We ought to; and we
+very much upbraid those who uselessly waste their power.  Ye-es.
+Now, this is the way you are to do.  You will receive the speeches
+at the station."  He explained to her how the matter would be
+arranged; then looking into her face, he said:  "Well, I wish you
+success.  You're happy, aren't you?"  And he walked away still
+gloomy and dissatisfied.  When the door closed behind him Liudmila
+walked up to the mother, smiling quietly.
+
+"You're a fine woman!  I understand you."  Taking her by the arm,
+she again walked up and down the room.  "I have a son, too.  He's
+already thirteen years old; but he lives with his father.  My
+husband is an assistant prosecuting attorney.  Maybe he's already
+prosecuting attorney.  And the boy's with him.  What is he going
+to be? I often think."  Her humid, powerful voice trembled.  Then
+her speech flowed on again thoughtfully and quietly.  "He's being
+brought up by a professed enemy of those people who are near me,
+whom I regard as the best people on earth; and maybe the boy will
+grow up to be my enemy.  He cannot live with me; I live under a
+strange name.  I have not seen him for eight years.  That's a long
+time--eight years!"
+
+Stopping at the window, she looked up at the pale, bleak sky, and
+continued:  "If he were with me I would be stronger; I would not
+have this wound in my heart, the wound that always pains.  And even
+if he were dead it would be easier for me--"  She paused again, and
+added more firmly and loudly:  "Then I would know he's merely dead,
+but not an enemy of that which is higher than the feeling of a
+mother, dearer and more necessary than life."
+
+"My darling," said the mother quietly, feeling as if something
+powerful were burning her heart.
+
+"Yes, you are happy," Liudmila said with a smile.  "It's magnificent
+--the mother and the son side by side.  It's rare!"
+
+The mother unexpectedly to herself exclaimed:
+
+"Yes, it is good!" and as if disclosing a secret, she continued in a
+lowered voice:  "It is another life.  All of you--Nikolay Ivanovich,
+all the people of the cause of truth--are also side by side.
+Suddenly people have become kin--I understand all--the words I don't
+understand; but everything else I understand, everything!"
+
+"That's how it is," Liudmila said.  "That's how."
+
+The mother put her hand on Liudmila's breast, pressing her; she spoke
+almost in a whisper, as if herself meditating upon the words she spoke.
+
+"Children go through the world; that's what I understand; children
+go into the world, over all the earth, from everywhere toward one
+thing.  The best hearts go; people of honest minds; they relentlessly
+attack all evil, all darkness.  They go, they trample falsehood with
+heavy feet, understanding everything, justifying everybody--justifying
+everybody, they go.  Young, strong, they carry their power, their
+invincible power, all toward one thing--toward justice.  They go to
+conquer all human misery, they arm themselves to wipe away misfortune
+from the face of the earth; they go to subdue what is monstrous, and
+they will subdue it.  We will kindle a new sun, somebody told me; and
+they will kindle it.  We will create one heart in life, we will unite
+all the severed hearts into one--and they will unite them.  We will
+cleanse the whole of life--and they will cleanse it."
+
+She waved her hand toward the sky.
+
+"There's the sun."
+
+And she struck her bosom.
+
+"Here the most glorious heavenly sun of human happiness will be
+kindled, and it will light up the earth forever--the whole of it,
+and all that live upon it--with the light of love, the love of every
+man toward all, and toward everything."
+
+The words of forgotten prayers recurred to her mind, inspiring a
+new faith.  She threw them from her heart like sparks.
+
+"The children walking along the road of truth and reason carry love
+to all; and they clothe everything in new skies; they illumine
+everything with an incorruptible fire issuing from the depths of the
+soul.  Thus, a new life comes into being, born of the children's
+love for the entire world; and who will extinguish this love--who?
+What power is higher than this?  Who will subdue it?  The earth has
+brought it forth; and all life desires its victory--all life.  Shed
+rivers of blood, nay, seas of blood, you'll never extinguish it."
+
+She shook herself away from Liudmila, fatigued by her exaltation,
+and sat down, breathing heavily.  Liudmila also withdrew from her,
+noiselessly, carefully, as if afraid of destroying something.  With
+supple movement she walked about the room and looked in front of her
+with the deep gaze of her dim eyes.  She seemed still taller,
+straighter, and thinner; her lean, stern face wore a concentrated
+expression, and her lips were nervously compressed.  The stillness
+in the room soon calmed the mother, and noticing Liudmila's mood she
+asked guiltily and softly:
+
+"Maybe I said something that wasn't quite right?"
+
+Liudmila quickly turned around and looked at her as if in fright.
+
+"It's all right," she said rapidly, stretching out her hand to the
+mother as if desiring to arrest something.  "But we'll not speak
+about it any more.  Let it remain as it was said; let it remain.
+Yes."  And in a calmer tone she continued:  "It's time for you to
+start soon; it's far."
+
+"Yes, presently.  I'm glad!  Oh, how glad I am!  If you only knew!
+I'm going to carry the word of my son, the word of my blood.  Why,
+it's like one's own soul!"
+
+She smiled; but her smile did not find a clear reflection in the
+face of Liudmila.  The mother felt that Liudmila chilled her joy
+by her restraint; and the stubborn desire suddenly arose in her to
+pour into that obstinate soul enveloped in misery her own fire, to
+burn her, too, let her, too, sound in unison with her own heart full
+of joy.  She took Liudmila's hands and pressed them powerfully.
+
+"My dear, how good it is when you know that light for all the people
+already exists in life, and that there will be a time when they will
+begin to see it, when they will bathe their souls in it, and all,
+all, will take fire in its unquenchable flames."
+
+Her good, large face quivered; her eyes smiled radiantly; and her
+eyebrows trembled over them as if pinioning their flash.  The great
+thoughts intoxicated her; she put into them everything that burned
+her heart, everything she had lived through; and she compressed the
+thoughts into firm, capacious crystals of luminous words.  They grew
+up ever more powerful in the autumn heart, illuminated by the
+creative force of the spring sun; they blossomed and reddened in it
+ever more brightly.
+
+"Why, this is like a new god that's born to us, the people.
+Everything for all; all for everything; the whole of life in one,
+and the whole of life for everyone, and everyone for the whole of
+life!  Thus I understand all of you; it is for this that you are
+on this earth, I see.  You are in truth comrades all, kinsmen all,
+for you are all children of one mother, of truth.  Truth has brought
+you forth; and by her power you live!"
+
+Again overcome by the wave of agitation, she stopped, fetched
+breath, and spread out her arms as if for an embrace.
+
+"And if I pronounce to myself that word 'comrades' then I hear with
+my heart--they are going!  They are going from everywhere, the great
+multitude, all to one thing.  I hear such a roaring, resonant and
+joyous, like the festive peal of the bells of all the churches of
+the world."
+
+She had arrived at what she desired.  Liudmila's face flashed in
+amazement.  Her lips quivered; and one after the other large
+transparent tears dropped from her dull eyes and rolled down
+her cheeks.
+
+The mother embraced her vigorously and laughed softly, lightly taking
+pride in the victory of her heart.  When they took leave of each
+other Liudmila looked into the mother's face, and asked her softly:
+
+"Do you know that it is well with you?"  And herself supplied the
+answer:  "Very well.  Like a morning on a high mountain."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX
+
+
+In the street the frozen atmosphere enveloped her body invigoratingly,
+penetrated into her throat, tickled her nose, and for a second
+suppressed the breathing in her bosom.  The mother stopped and
+looked around.  Near to her, at the corner of the empty street,
+stood a cabman in a shaggy hat; at a slight distance a man was
+walking, bent, his head sunk in his shoulders; and in front of
+him a soldier was running in a jump, rubbing his ears.
+
+"The soldier must have been sent to the store," she thought, and
+walked off listening with satisfaction to the youthful crunching
+of the snow under her feet.  She arrived at the station early; her
+train was not yet ready; but in the dirty waiting room of the third
+class, blackened with smoke, there were numerous people already.
+The cold drove in the railroad workmen; cabmen and some poorly
+dressed, homeless people came in to warm themselves; there were
+passengers, also a few peasants, a stout merchant in a raccoon
+overcoat, a priest and his daughter, a pockmarked girl, some five
+soldiers, and bustling tradesmen.  The men smoked, talked, drank
+tea and whisky at the buffet; some one laughed boisterously; a wave
+of smoke was wafted overhead; the door squeaked as it opened, the
+windows rattled when the door was jammed to; the odor of tobacco,
+machine oil, and salt fish thickly beat into the nostrils.
+
+The mother sat near the entrance and waited.  When the door opened
+a whiff of fresh air struck her, which was pleasant to her, and
+she took in deep breaths.  Heavily dressed people came in with
+bundles in their hands; they clumsily pushed through the door,
+swore, mumbled, threw their things on the bench or on the floor,
+shook off the dry rime from the collars of their overcoats and
+their sleeves and wiped it off their beards and mustaches, all the
+time puffing and blowing.
+
+A young man entered with a yellow valise in his hand, quickly looked
+around, and walked straight to the mother.
+
+"To Moscow, to your niece?" he asked in a low voice.
+
+"Yes, to Tanya."
+
+"Very well."
+
+He put the valise on the bench near her, quickly whipped out a
+cigarette, lighted it, and raising his hat, silently walked toward
+the other door.  The mother stroked the cold skin of the valise,
+leaned her elbows on it, and, satisfied, began again to look around
+at the people.  In a few moments she arose and walked over to the
+other bench, nearer to the exit to the platform.  She held the
+valise lightly in her hand; it was not large, and she walked with
+raised head, scanning the faces that flashed before her.
+
+One man in a short overcoat and its collar raised jostled against
+her and jumped back, silently waving his hand toward his head.
+Something familiar about him struck her; she glanced around and saw
+that he was looking at her with one eye gleaming out of his collar.
+This attentive eye pricked her; the hand in which she held the
+valise trembled; she felt a dull pain in her shoulder, and the load
+suddenly grew heavy.
+
+"I've seen him somewhere," she thought, and with the thought
+suppressed the unpleasant, confused feeling in her breast.  She
+would not permit herself to define the cold sensation that already
+pressed her heart quietly but powerfully.  It grew and rose in her
+throat, filling her mouth with a dry, bitter taste, and compelling
+her to turn around and look once more.  As she turned he carefully
+shifted from one foot to the other, standing on the same spot; it
+seemed he wanted something, but could not decide what.  His right
+hand was thrust between the buttons of his coat, the other he kept
+in his pocket.  On account of this the right shoulder seemed higher
+than the left.
+
+Without hastening, she walked to the bench and sat down carefully,
+slowly, as if afraid of tearing something in herself or on herself.
+Her memory, aroused by a sharp premonition of misfortune, quickly
+presented this man twice to her imagination--once in the field
+outside the city, after the escape of Rybin; a second time in the
+evening in the court.  There at his side stood the constable to
+whom she had pointed out the false way taken by Rybin.  They knew
+her; they were tracking her--this was evident.
+
+"Am I caught?" she asked, and in the following second answered
+herself, starting:  "Maybe there is still--" and immediately forcing
+herself with a great effort, she said sternly:  "I'm caught.  No use."
+
+She looked around, and her thoughts flashed up in sparks and expired
+in her brain one after the other.
+
+"Leave the valise?  Go away?"
+
+But at the same time another spark darted up more glaringly:  "How
+much will be lost?  Drop the son's word in such hands?"
+
+She pressed the valise to herself trembling.  "And to go away with
+it?  Where?  To run?"
+
+These thoughts seemed to her those of a stranger, somebody from the
+outside, who was pushing them on her by main force.  They burned
+her, and their burns chopped her brain painfully, lashed her heart
+like fiery whipcords.  They were an insult to the mother; they
+seemed to be driving her away from her own self, from Pavel, and
+everything which had grown to her heart.  She felt that a stubborn,
+hostile force oppressed her, squeezed her shoulder and breast,
+lowered her stature, plunging her into a fatal fear.  The veins on
+her temples began to pulsate vigorously, and the roots of her hair
+grew warm.
+
+Then with one great and sharp effort of her heart, which seemed
+to shake her entire being, she quenched all these cunning, petty,
+feeble little fires, saying sternly to herself:  "Enough!"
+
+She at once began to feel better, and she grew strengthened
+altogether, adding:  "Don't disgrace your son.  Nobody's afraid."
+
+Several seconds of wavering seemed to have the effect of joining
+everything in her; her heart began to beat calmly.
+
+"What's going to happen now?  How will they go about it with me?"
+she thought, her senses strung to a keener observation.
+
+The spy called a station guard, and whispered something to him,
+directing his look toward her.  The guard glanced at him and moved
+back.  Another guard came, listened, grinned, and lowered his brows.
+He was an old man, coarse-built, gray, unshaven.  He nodded his head
+to the spy, and walked up to the bench where the mother sat.  The
+spy quickly disappeared.
+
+The old man strode leisurely toward the mother, intently thrusting
+his angry eyes into the mother's face.  She sat farther back on the
+bench, trembling.  "If they only don't beat me, if they only don't
+beat me!"
+
+He stopped at her side; she raised her eyes to his face.
+
+"What are you looking at?" he asked in a moderated voice.
+
+"Nothing."
+
+"Hm!  Thief!  So old and yet----"
+
+It seemed to her that his words struck her face once, twice, rough
+and hoarse; they wounded her, as if they tore her cheeks, ripped
+out her eyes.
+
+"I'm not a thief!  You lie!" she shouted with all the power of her
+chest; and everything before her jumped and began to whirl in a
+whirlwind of revolt, intoxicating her heart with the bitterness of
+insult.  She jerked the valise, and it opened.
+
+"Look! look!  All you people!" she shouted, standing up and waving
+the bundle of the proclamations she had quickly seized over her
+head.  Through the noise in her ears she heard the exclamations of
+the people who came running up, and she saw them pouring in quickly
+from all directions.
+
+"What is it?"
+
+"There's a spy!"
+
+"What's the matter?"
+
+"She's a thief, they say!"
+
+"She?"
+
+"Would a thief shout?"
+
+"Such a respectable one!  My, my, my!"
+
+"Whom did they catch?"
+
+"I'm not a thief," said the mother in a full voice, somewhat calmed
+at the sight of the people who pressed closely upon her from all sides.
+
+"Yesterday they tried the political prisoners; my son was one of
+them, Vlasov.  He made a speech.  Here it is.  I'm carrying it to
+the people in order that they should read, think about the truth."
+
+One paper was carefully pulled from her hands.  She waved the papers
+in the air and flung them into the crowd.
+
+"She won't get any praise for that, either!" somebody exclaimed
+in a frightened voice.
+
+"Whee-ee-w!" was the response.
+
+The mother saw that the papers were being snatched up, were being
+hidden in breasts and pockets.  This again put her firmly on her
+feet; more composed than forceful, straining herself to her utmost,
+and feeling how agitated pride grew in her raising her high above
+the people, how subdued joy flamed up in her, she spoke, snatching
+bundles of papers from the valise and throwing them right and left
+into some person's quick, greedy hands.
+
+"For this they sentenced my son and all with him.  Do you know?  I
+will tell you, and you believe the heart of a mother; believe her
+gray hair.  Yesterday they sentenced them because they carried to
+you, to all the people, the honest, sacred truth.  How do you live?"
+
+The crowd grew silent in amazement, and noiselessly increased in
+size, pressing closer and closer together, surrounding the woman
+with a ring of living bodies.
+
+"Poverty, hunger, and sickness--that's what work gives to the poor
+people.  This order of things pushes us to theft and to corruption;
+and over us, satiated and calm, live the rich.  In order that we
+should obey the police, the authorities, the soldiers, all are in
+their hands, all are against us, everything is against us.  We
+perish all our lives day after day in toil, always in filth, in
+deceit.  And others enjoy themselves and gormandize themselves with
+our labor; and they hold us like dogs on chains, in ignorance.  We
+know nothing, and in terror we fear everything.  Our life is night,
+a dark night; it is a terrible dream.  They have poisoned us with
+strong intoxicating poison, and they drink our blood.  They glut
+themselves to corpulence, to vomiting--the servants of the devil of
+greed.  Is it not so?"
+
+"It's so!" came a dull answer.
+
+Back of the crowd the mother noticed the spy and two gendarmes.
+She hastened to give away the last bundles; but when her hand
+let itself down into the valise it met another strange hand.
+
+"Take it, take it all!" she said, bending down.
+
+A dirty face raised itself to hers, and a low whisper reached her:
+
+"Whom shall I tell?  Whom inform?"
+
+She did not answer.
+
+"In order to change this life, in order to free all the people,
+to raise them from the dead, as I have been raised, some persons
+have already come who secretly saw the truth in life; secretly,
+because, you know, no one can say the truth aloud.  They hunt you
+down, they stifle you; they make you rot in prison, they mutilate
+you.  Wealth is a force, not a friend to truth.  Thus far truth is
+the sworn enemy to the power of the rich, an irreconcilable enemy
+forever!  Our children are carrying the truth into the world.
+Bright people, clean people are carrying it to you. Thus far there
+are few of them; they are not powerful; but they grow in number
+every day.  They put their young hearts into free truth, they are
+making it an invincible power.  Along the route of their hearts
+it will enter into our hard life; it will warm us, enliven us,
+emancipate us from the oppression of the rich and from all who
+have sold their souls.  Believe this."
+
+"Out of the way here!" shouted the gendarmes, pushing the people.
+They gave way to the jostling unwillingly, pressed the gendarmes
+with their mass, hindered them perhaps without desiring to do so.
+The gray-haired woman with the large, honest eyes in her kind face
+attracted them powerfully; and those whom life held asunder, whom it
+tore from one another, now blended into a whole, warmed by the fire
+of the fearless words which, perhaps, they had long been seeking and
+thirsting for in their hearts--their hearts insulted and revolted by
+the injustice of their severe life.  Those who were near stood in
+silence.  The mother saw their gloomy faces, their frowning brows,
+their eyes, and felt their warm breath on her face.
+
+"Get up on the bench," they said.
+
+"I'll be arrested immediately.  It's not necessary."
+
+"Speak quicker!  They're coming!"
+
+"Go to meet the honest people.  Seek those who advise all the poor
+disinherited.  Don't be reconciled, comrades, don't!  Don't yield
+to the power of the powerful.  Arise, you working people! you are
+the masters of life!  All live by your labor; and only for your
+labor do they untie your hands.  Behold! you are bound, and they
+have killed, robbed your soul.  Unite with your heart and your mind
+into one power.  It will overcome everything.  You have no friends
+except yourselves.  That's what their only friends say to the working
+people, their friends who go to them and perish on the road to
+prison.  Not so would dishonest people speak, not so deceivers."
+
+"Out of the way!  Disperse!" the shouts of the gendarmes came nearer
+and nearer.  There were more of them already; they pushed more
+forcibly; and the people in front of the mother swayed, catching
+hold of one another.
+
+"Is that all you have in the valise?" whispered somebody.
+
+"Take it!  Take all!" said the mother aloud, feeling that the words
+disposed themselves into a song in her breast, and noticing with
+pain that her voice did not hold out, that it was hoarse, trembled,
+and broke.
+
+"The word of my son is the honest word of a workingman, of an unsold
+soul.  You will recognize its incorruptibility by its boldness.  It
+is fearless, and if necessary it goes even against itself to meet
+the truth.  It goes to you, working people, incorruptible, wise,
+fearless.  Receive it with an open heart, feed on it; it will give
+you the power to understand everything, to fight against everything
+for the truth, for the freedom of mankind.  Receive it, believe it,
+go with it toward the happiness of all the people, to a new life
+with great joy!"
+
+She received a blow on the chest; she staggered and fell on the
+bench.  The gendarmes' hands darted over the heads of the people,
+and seizing collars and shoulders, threw them aside, tore off hats,
+flung them far away.  Everything grew dark and began to whirl before
+the eyes of the mother.  But overcoming her fatigue, she again
+shouted with the remnants of her power:
+
+"People, gather up your forces into one single force!"
+
+A large gendarme caught her collar with his red hand and shook her.
+
+"Keep quiet!"
+
+The nape of her neck struck the wall; her heart was enveloped for
+a second in the stifling smoke of terror; but it blazed forth again
+clearly, dispelling the smoke.
+
+"Go!" said the gendarme.
+
+"Fear nothing!  There are no tortures worse than those which you
+endure all your lives!"
+
+"Silence, I say!"  The gendarme took her by the arm and pulled her;
+another seized her by the other arm, and taking long steps, they
+led her away.
+
+"There are no tortures more bitter than those which quietly gnaw
+at your heart every day, waste your breast, and drain your power."
+
+The spy came running up, and shaking his fist in her face, shouted:
+
+"Silence, you old hag!"
+
+Her eyes widened, sparkled; her jaws quivered.  Planting her feet
+firmly on the slippery stones of the floor, she shouted, gathering
+the last remnants of her strength:
+
+"The resuscitated soul they will not kill."
+
+"Dog!"
+
+The spy struck her face with a short swing of his hand.
+
+Something black and red blinded her eyes for a second.  The salty
+taste of blood filled her mouth.
+
+A clear outburst of shouts animated her:
+
+"Don't dare to beat her!"
+
+"Boys!"
+
+"What is it?"
+
+"Oh, you scoundrel!"
+
+"Give it to him!"
+
+"They will not drown reason in blood; they will not extinguish its truth!"
+
+She was pushed in the neck and the back, beaten about the shoulders,
+on the head.  Everything began to turn around, grow giddy in a dark
+whirlwind of shouts, howls, whistles.  Something thick and deafening
+crept into her ear, beat in her throat, choked her.  The floor under
+her feet began to shake, giving way.  Her legs bent, her body
+trembled, burned with pain, grew heavy, and staggered powerless.
+But her eyes were not extinguished, and they saw many other eyes
+which flashed and gleamed with the bold sharp fire known to her,
+with the fire dear to her heart.
+
+She was pushed somewhere into a door.
+
+She snatched her hand away from the gendarmes and caught hold of
+the doorpost.
+
+"You will not drown the truth in seas of blood----"
+
+They struck her hand.
+
+"You heap up only malice on yourself, you unwise ones!  It will fall
+on you----"
+
+Somebody seized her neck and began to choke her.  There was a rattle
+in her throat.
+
+"You poor, sorry creatures----"
+
+
+
+
+
+End of this Project Gutenberg Etext of Mother, by Maxim Gorky
+