Resurrection
her shoulder, and looking straight before her. Her face looked calm
and determined. The fourth in the row was a young, lovely woman who was
walking along briskly, dressed in a short cloak, her kerchief tied in
peasant fashion. This was Theodosia.
Nekhludoff got down and approached the women, meaning to ask Maslova if
she had got the things he had sent her, and how she was feeling, but the
convoy sergeant, who was walking on that side, noticed him at once, and
ran towards him.
“You must not do that, sir. It is against the regulations to approach
the gang,” shouted the sergeant as he came up.
But when he recognised Nekhludoff (every one in the prison knew
Nekhludoff) the sergeant raised his fingers to his cap, and, stopping
in front of Nekhludoff, said: “Not now; wait till we get to the railway
station; here it is not allowed. Don’t lag behind; march!” he shouted to
the convicts, and putting on a brisk air, he ran back to his place at a
trot, in spite of the heat and the elegant new boots on his feet.
Nekhludoff went on to the pavement and told the isvostchik to follow
him; himself walking, so as to keep the convicts in sight. Wherever the
gang passed it attracted attention mixed with horror and compassion.
Those who drove past leaned out of the vehicles and followed the
prisoners with their eyes. Those on foot stopped and looked with fear
and surprise at the terrible sight. Some came up and gave alms to the
prisoners. The alms were received by the convoy. Some, as if they were
hypnotised, followed the gang, but then stopped, shook their heads, and
followed the prisoners only with their eyes. Everywhere the people
came out of the gates and doors, and called others to come out, too,
or leaned out of the windows looking, silent and immovable, at the
frightful procession. At a cross-road a fine carriage was stopped by the
gang. A fat coachman, with a shiny face and two rows of buttons on his
back, sat on the box; a married couple sat facing the horses, the wife,
a pale, thin woman, with a light-coloured bonnet on her head and a
bright sunshade in her hand, the husband with a top-hat and a well-cut
light-coloured overcoat. On the seat in front sat their children--a
well-dressed little girl, with loose, fair hair, and as fresh as a
flower, who also held a bright parasol, and an eight-year-old boy, with
a long, thin neck and sharp collarbones, a sailor hat with long ribbons
on his head.
The father was angrily scolding the coachman because he had not passed
in front of the gang when he had a chance, and the mother frowned and
half closed her eyes with a look of disgust, shielding herself from the
dust and the sun with her silk sunshade, which she held close to her
face.
The fat coachman frowned angrily at the unjust rebukes of his
master--who had himself given the order to drive along that street--and
with difficulty held in the glossy, black horses, foaming under their
harness and impatient to go on.
The policeman wished with all his soul to please the owner of the fine
equipage by stopping the gang, yet felt that the dismal solemnity of
the procession could not be broken even for so rich a gentleman. He only
raised his fingers to his cap to show his respect for riches, and looked
severely at the prisoners as if promising in any case to protect the
owners of the carriage from them. So the carriage had to wait till the
whole of the procession had passed, and could only move on when the last
of the carts, laden with sacks and prisoners, rattled by. The hysterical
woman who sat on one of the carts, and had grown calm, again began
shrieking and sobbing when she saw the elegant carriage. Then the
coachman tightened the reins with a slight touch, and the black
trotters, their shoes ringing against the paving stones, drew the
carriage, softly swaying on its rubber tires, towards the country
house where the husband, the wife, the girl, and the boy with the sharp
collar-bones were going to amuse themselves. Neither the father nor the
mother gave the girl and boy any explanation of what they had seen, so
that the children had themselves to find out the meaning of this curious
sight. The girl, taking the expression of her father’s and mother’s
faces into consideration, solved the problem by assuming that these
people were quite another kind of men and women than her father and
mother and their acquaintances, that they were bad people, and that they
had therefore to be treated in the manner they were being treated.
Therefore the girl felt nothing but fear, and was glad when she could no
longer see those people.
But the boy with the long, thin neck, who looked at the procession
of prisoners without taking his eyes off them, solved the question
differently.
He still knew, firmly and without any doubt, for he had it from God,
that these people were just the same kind of people as he was, and like
all other people, and therefore some one had done these people some
wrong, something that ought not to have been done, and he was sorry for
them, and felt no horror either of those who were shaved and chained or
of those who had shaved and chained them. And so the boy’s lips pouted
more and more, and he made greater and greater efforts not to cry,
thinking it a shame to cry in such a case.
CHAPTER XXXVI.
THE TENDER MERCIES OF THE LORD.
Nekhludoff kept up with the quick pace of the convicts. Though lightly
clothed he felt dreadfully hot, and it was hard to breathe in the
stifling, motionless, burning air filled with dust.
When he had walked about a quarter of a mile he again got into the trap,
but it felt still hotter in the middle of the street. He tried to recall
last night’s conversation with his brother-in-law, but the recollections
no longer excited him as they had done in the morning. They were dulled
by the impressions made by the starting and procession of the gang, and
chiefly by the intolerable heat.
On the pavement, in the shade of some trees overhanging a fence, he saw
two schoolboys standing over a kneeling man who sold ices. One of the
boys was already sucking a pink spoon and enjoying his ices, the other
was waiting for a glass that was being filled with something yellowish.
“Where could I get a drink?” Nekhludoff asked his isvostchik, feeling an
insurmountable desire for some refreshment.
“There is a good eating-house close by,” the isvostchik answered, and
turning a corner, drove up to a door with a large signboard. The plump
clerk in a Russian shirt, who stood behind the counter, and the waiters
in their once white clothing who sat at the tables (there being hardly
any customers) looked with curiosity at the unusual visitor and offered
him their services. Nekhludoff asked for a bottle of seltzer water and
sat down some way from the window at a small table covered with a dirty
cloth. Two men sat at another table with tea-things and a white bottle
in front of them, mopping their foreheads, and calculating something in
a friendly manner. One of them was dark and bald, and had just such a
border of hair at the back as Rogozhinsky. This sight again reminded
Nekhludoff of yesterday’s talk with his brother-in-law and his wish to
see him and Nathalie.
“I shall hardly be able to do it before the train starts,” he thought;
“I’d better write.” He asked for paper, an envelope, and a stamp, and as
he was sipping the cool, effervescent water he considered what he should
say. But his thoughts wandered, and he could not manage to compose a
letter.
“My dear Nathalie,--I cannot go away with the heavy impression that
yesterday’s talk with your husband has left,” he began. “What next?
Shall I ask him to forgive me what I said yesterday? But I only said
what I felt, and he will think that I am taking it back. Besides, this
interference of his in my private matters. . . . No, I cannot,” and
again he felt hatred rising in his heart towards that man so foreign
to him. He folded the unfinished letter and put it in his pocket, paid,
went out, and again got into the trap to catch up the gang. It had grown
still hotter. The stones and the walls seemed to be breathing out hot
air. The pavement seemed to scorch the feet, and Nekhludoff felt a
burning sensation in his hand when he touched the lacquered splashguard
of his trap.
The horse was jogging along at a weary trot, beating the uneven, dusty
road monotonously with its hoofs, the isvostchik kept falling into a
doze, Nekhludoff sat without thinking of anything.
At the bottom of a street, in front of a large house, a group of people
had collected, and a convoy soldier stood by.
“What has happened?” Nekhludoff asked of a porter.
“Something the matter with a convict.”
Nekhludoff got down and came up to the group. On the rough stones,
where the pavement slanted down to the gutter, lay a broadly-built,
red-bearded, elderly convict, with his head lower than his feet, and
very red in the face. He had a grey cloak and grey trousers on, and lay
on his back with the palms of his freckled hands downwards, and at
long intervals his broad, high chest heaved, and he groaned, while
his bloodshot eyes were fixed on the sky. By him stood a cross-looking
policeman, a pedlar, a postman, a clerk, an old woman with a parasol,
and a short-haired boy with an empty basket.
“They are weak. Having been locked up in prison they’ve got weak, and
then they lead them through the most broiling heat,” said the clerk,
addressing Nekhludoff, who had just come up.
“He’ll die, most likely,” said the woman with the parasol, in a doleful
tone.
“His shirt should be untied,” said the postman.
The policeman began, with his thick, trembling fingers, clumsily to
untie the tapes that fastened the shirt round the red, sinewy neck. He
was evidently excited and confused, but still thought it necessary to
address the crowd.
“What have you collected here for? It is hot enough without your keeping
the wind off.”
“They should have been examined by a doctor, and the weak ones left
behind,” said the clerk, showing off his knowledge of the law.
The policeman, having undone the tapes of the shirt, rose and looked
round.
“Move on, I tell you. It is not your business, is it? What’s there
to stare at?” he said, and turned to Nekhludoff for sympathy, but not
finding any in his face he turned to the convoy soldier.
But the soldier stood aside, examining the trodden-down heel of his
boot, and was quite indifferent to the policeman’s perplexity.
“Those whose business it is don’t care. Is it right to do men to death
like this? A convict is a convict, but still he is a man,” different
voices were heard saying in the crowd.
“Put his head up higher, and give him some water,” said Nekhludoff.
“Water has been sent for,” said the policeman, and taking the prisoner
under the arms he with difficulty pulled his body a little higher up.
“What’s this gathering here?” said a decided, authoritative voice, and
a police officer, with a wonderfully clean, shiny blouse, and still more
shiny top-boots, came up to the assembled crowd.
“Move on. No standing about here,” he shouted to the crowd, before he
knew what had attracted it.
When he came near and saw the dying convict, he made a sign of approval
with his head, just as if he had quite expected it, and, turning to the
policeman, said, “How is this?”
The policeman said that, as a gang of prisoners was passing, one of the
convicts had fallen down, and the convoy officer had ordered him to be
left behind.
“Well, that’s all right. He must be taken to the police station. Call an
isvostchik.”
“A porter has gone for one,” said the policeman, with his fingers raised
to his cap.
The shopman began something about the heat.
“Is it your business, eh? Move on,” said the police officer, and looked