第137章

"I have just come from my wife," he went on."Do you understand what the word 'wife' means? When I went out, the children called to me, 'Good-bye, father, make haste back to read The Children's Magazine with us.' No, you don't understand that! No one is wise from another man's woe."His eyes were glittering, his lips were twitching.Suddenly he struck the table with his fist so that everything on it danced- it was the first time he had done such a thing, he was such a mild man.

"But need I?" he exclaimed, "must I? No one has been condemned, no one has been sent to Siberia in my place, the man died of fever.And I've been punished by my sufferings for the blood I shed.And I shan't be believed, they won't believe my proofs.Need I confess, need I? Iam ready to go on suffering all my life for the blood I have shed, if only my wife and children may be spared.Will it be just to ruin them with me? Aren't we making a mistake? What is right in this case? And will people recognise it, will they appreciate it, will they respect it?""Good Lord!" I thought to myself, "he is thinking of other people's respect at such a moment!" And I felt so sorry for him then, that I believe I would have shared his fate if it could have comforted him.I saw he was beside himself.I was aghast, realising with my heart as well as my mind what such a resolution meant.

"Decide my fate!" he exclaimed again.

"Go and confess," I whispered to him.My voice failed me, but Iwhispered it firmly.I took up the New Testament from the table, the Russian translation, and showed him the Gospel of St.John, chapter 12, verse 24:

"Verily, verily, I say unto you, except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone:

but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit."I had just been reading that verse when he came in.He read it.

"That's true," he said, he smiled bitterly."It's terrible the things you find in those books," he said, after a pause."It's easy enough to thrust them upon one.And who wrote them? Can they have been written by men?""The Holy Spirit wrote them," said I.

"It's easy for you to prate," he smiled again, this time almost with hatred.

I took the book again, opened it in another place and showed him the Epistle to the Hebrews, chapter 10, verse 31.He read:

"It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God."He read it and simply flung down the book.He was trembling all over.

"An awful text," he said."There's no denying you've picked out fitting ones." He rose from the chair."Well!" he said, "good-bye, perhaps I shan't come again...we shall meet in heaven.So I have been for fourteen years 'in the hands of the living God,' that's how one must think of those fourteen years.To-morrow I will beseech those hands to let me go."I wanted to take him in my arms and kiss him, but I did not dare- his face was contorted add sombre.He went away.

"Good God," I thought, "what has he gone to face!" I fell on my knees before the ikon and wept for him before the Holy Mother of God, our swift defender and helper.I was half an hour praying in tears, and it was late, about midnight.Suddenly I saw the door open and he came in again.I was surprised.

Where have you been?" I asked him.

"I think," he said, "I've forgotten something...my handkerchief, I think....Well, even if I've not forgotten anything, let me stay a little."He sat down.I stood over him.

"You sit down, too," said he.

I sat down.We sat still for two minutes; he looked intently at me and suddenly smiled.I remembered that- then he got up, embraced me warmly and kissed me.

"Remember," he said, "how I came to you a second time.Do you hear, remember it!"And he went out.

"To-morrow," I thought.

And so it was.I did not know that evening that the next day was his birthday.I had not been out for the last few days, so I had no chance of hearing it from anyone.On that day he always had a great gathering, everyone in the town went to it.It was the same this time.

After dinner he walked into the middle of the room, with a paper in his hand- a formal declaration to the chief of his department who was present.This declaration he read aloud to the whole assembly.

It contained a full account of the crime, in every detail.

"I cut myself off from men as a monster.God has visited me," he said in conclusion."I want to suffer for my sin!"Then he brought out and laid on the table all the things he had been keeping for fourteen years, that he thought would prove his crime, the jewels belonging to the murdered woman which he had stolen to divert suspicion, a cross and a locket taken from her neck with a portrait of her betrothed in the locket, her notebook and two letters; one from her betrothed, telling her that he would soon be with her, and her unfinished answer left on the table to be sent off next day.He carried off these two letters- what for? Why had he kept them for fourteen years afterwards instead of destroying them as evidence against him?

And this is what happened: everyone was amazed and horrified, everyone refused to believe it and thought that he was deranged, though all listened with intense curiosity.A few days later it was fully decided and agreed in every house that the unhappy man was mad.The legal authorities could not refuse to take the case up, but they too dropped it.Though the trinkets and letters made them ponder, they decided that even if they did turn out to be authentic, no charge could be based on those alone.Besides, she might have given him those things as a friend, or asked him to take care of them for her.I heard afterwards, however, that the genuineness of the things was proved by the friends and relations of the murdered woman, and that there was no doubt about them.Yet nothing was destined to come of it, after all.