Resurrection Leo Tolstoy (ebook reader for pc .txt) 📖

snub-nosed, yellow-faced woman flew into the room. It was the advocate’s wife, who did not seem to be in the least bit troubled by her ugliness. She was attired in the most original manner; she seemed enveloped in something made of velvet and silk, something yellow and green, and her thin hair was crimped.

She stepped out triumphantly into the anteroom, followed by a tall, smiling man, with a greenish complexion, dressed in a coat with silk facings, and a white tie. This was an author. Nekhlúdoff knew him by sight.

She opened the cabinet door and said, “Anatole, you must come to me. Here is Simeon Ivánovitch, who will read his poems, and you must absolutely come and read about Garshin.”

Nekhlúdoff noticed that she whispered something to her husband, and, thinking it was something concerning him, wished to go away, but she caught him up and said: “I beg your pardon, Prince, I know you, and, thinking an introduction superfluous, I beg you to stay and take part in our literary matinee. It will be most interesting. M. Fanárin will read.”

“You see what a lot I have to do,” said Fanárin, spreading out his hands and smilingly pointing to his wife, as if to show how impossible it was to resist so charming a creature.

Nekhlúdoff thanked the advocate’s wife with extreme politeness for the honour she did him in inviting him, but refused the invitation with a sad and solemn look, and left the room.

“What an affected fellow!” said the advocate’s wife, when he had gone out.

In the anteroom the assistant handed him a ready-written petition, and said that the fees, including the business with the Senate and the commission, would come to 1,000 roubles, and explained that M. Fanárin did not usually undertake this kind of business, but did it only to oblige Nekhlúdoff.

“And about this petition. Who is to sign it?”

“The prisoner may do it herself, or if this is inconvenient, M. Fanárin can, if he gets a power of attorney from her.”

“Oh, no. I shall take the petition to her and get her to sign it,” said Nekhlúdoff, glad of the opportunity of seeing her before the appointed day.

XLVI

At the usual time the jailer’s whistle sounded in the corridors of the prison, the iron doors of the cells rattled, bare feet pattered, heels clattered, and the prisoners who acted as scavengers passed along the corridors, filling the air with disgusting smells. The prisoners washed, dressed, and came out for inspection, then went to get boiling water for their tea.

The conversation at breakfast in all the cells was very lively. It was all about two prisoners who were to be flogged that day. One, Vasíliev, was a young man of some education, a clerk, who had killed his mistress in a fit of jealousy. His fellow-prisoners liked him because he was merry and generous and firm in his behaviour with the prison authorities. He knew the laws and insisted on their being carried out. Therefore he was disliked by the authorities. Three weeks before a jailer struck one of the scavengers who had spilt some soup over his new uniform. Vasíliev took the part of the scavenger, saying that it was not lawful to strike a prisoner.

“I’ll teach you the law,” said the jailer, and gave Vasíliev a scolding. Vasíliev replied in like manner, and the jailer was going to hit him, but Vasíliev seized the jailer’s hands, held them fast for about three minutes, and, after giving the hands a twist, pushed the jailer out of the door. The jailer complained to the inspector, who ordered Vasíliev to be put into a solitary cell.

The solitary cells were a row of dark closets, locked from outside, and there were neither beds, nor chairs, nor tables in them, so that the inmates had to sit or lie on the dirty floor, while the rats, of which there were a great many in those cells, ran across them. The rats were so bold that they stole the bread from the prisoners, and even attacked them if they stopped moving. Vasíliev said he would not go into the solitary cell, because he had not done anything wrong; but they used force. Then he began struggling, and two other prisoners helped him to free himself from the jailers. All the jailers assembled, and among them was Petróv, who was distinguished for his strength. The prisoners got thrown down and pushed into the solitary cells.

The governor was immediately informed that something very like a rebellion had taken place. And he sent back an order to flog the two chief offenders, Vasíliev and the tramp, Nepómnishy, giving each thirty strokes with a birch rod. The flogging was appointed to take place in the women’s interviewing-room.

All this was known in the prison since the evening, and it was being talked about with animation in all the cells.

Korabléva, Khoroshávka, Theodosia, and Máslova sat together in their corner, drinking tea, all of them flushed and animated by the vodka they had drunk, for Máslova, who now had a constant supply of vodka, freely treated her companions to it.

“He’s not been a-rioting, or anything,” Korabléva said, referring to Vasíliev, as she bit tiny pieces off a lump of sugar with her strong teeth. “He only stuck up for a chum, because it’s not lawful to strike prisoners nowadays.”

“And he’s a fine fellow, I’ve heard say,” said Theodosia, who sat bareheaded, with her long plaits round her head, on a log of wood opposite the shelf bedstead on which the teapot stood.

“There, now, if you were to ask him,” the watchman’s wife said to Máslova (by him she meant Nekhlúdoff).

“I shall tell him. He’ll do anything for me,” Máslova said, tossing her head, and smiling.

“Yes, but when is he coming? and they’ve already gone to fetch them,” said Theodosia. “It is terrible,” she added, with a sigh.

“I once did see how they flogged a peasant in the village. Father-in-law, he sent me once to the village elder. Well, I