Part 16 (1/2)

”'You would not dare!'

”'Wouldn't I, sausage-maker?' I fired the pistol, and down he sank on his chair. The others uttered shrieks. I put back my pistol in my pocket, and when I returned to the fortress, threw it among some weeds near the princ.i.p.al entrance.

”Inside the barracks I laid on my bed, and said to myself, 'I shall be taken away soon.' One hour pa.s.sed, then another, but I was not arrested.

”Towards evening I felt so sad, I went out at all hazards to see Luisa; I pa.s.sed before the house of the clockmaker's. There were a number of people there, including the police. I ran on to the old woman's and said:

”'Call Luisa!'

”I had only a moment to wait. She came immediately, and threw herself on my neck in tears.

”'It is my fault,' she said. 'I should not have listened to my aunt.'

”She then told me that her aunt, immediately after the scene, had gone back home. She was in such a fright that she fell and did not speak a word; she had uttered nothing. On the contrary, she ordered her niece to be as silent as herself.

”'No one has seen her since,' said Luisa.

”The clockmaker had previously sent his servant away, for he was afraid of her. She was jealous, and would have scratched his eyes out had she known that he wished to get married.

”There were no workmen in the house, he had sent them all away; he had himself prepared the coffee and collation. As for the relation, who had scarcely spoken a word all his life, he took his hat, and, without opening his mouth, went away.

”'He is quite sure to be silent,' added Luisa.

”So, indeed, he was. For two weeks no one arrested me nor suspected me the least in the world.

”You need not believe me unless you choose, Alexander Petrovitch.

”These two weeks were the happiest in my life. I saw Luisa every day.

And how much she had become attached to me!

”She said to me through her tears: 'If you are exiled, I will go with you. I will leave everything to follow you.'

”I thought of making away with myself, so much had she moved me; but after two weeks I was arrested. The old man and the aunt had agreed to denounce me.”

”But,” I interrupted, ”Baklouchin, for that they would only have given you from ten to twelve years' hard labour, and in the civil section; yet you are in the special section. How does that happen?”

”That is another affair,” said Baklouchin. ”When I was taken before the Council of War, the captain appointed to conduct the case began by insulting me, and calling me names before the Tribunal. I could not stand it, and shouted out to him: 'Why do you insult me? Don't you see, you scoundrel! that you are only looking at yourself in the gla.s.s?'

”This brought a new charge against me. I was tried a second time, and for the two things was condemned to four thousand strokes, and to the special section. When I was taken out to receive my punishment in the _Green Street_, the captain was at the same time sent away. He had been degraded from his rank, and was despatched to the Caucasus as a private soldier. Good-bye, Alexander Petrovitch. Don't fail to come to our performance.”

CHAPTER XI.

THE CHRISTMAS HOLIDAYS

The holidays were approaching. On the eve of the great day the convicts scarcely ever went to work. Those who had been a.s.signed to the sewing workshops, and a few others, went to work as usual; but they went back almost immediately to the convict prison, separately, or in parties.

After dinner no one worked. From the early morning the greater part of the convicts were occupied with their own affairs, and not with those of the administration. Some were making arrangements for bringing in spirits, while others were seeking permission to see their friends, or to collect small accounts due to them for the work they had already executed. Baklouchin, and the convicts who were to take part in the performance, were endeavouring to persuade some of their acquaintances, nearly all officers' servants, to procure for them the necessary costumes. Some of them came and went with a business-like air, solely because others were really occupied. They had no money to receive, and yet seemed to expect a payment. Every one, in short, seemed to be looking for a change of some kind. Towards evening the old soldiers, who executed the convicts' commissions, brought them all kinds of victuals--meat, sucking-pigs, and geese. Many prisoners, even the most simple and most economical, after saving up their kopecks throughout the year, thought they ought to spend some of them that day, so as to celebrate Christmas Eve in a worthy manner. The day afterwards was for the convicts a still greater festival, one to which they had a right, as it was recognised by law. The prisoners could not be sent to work that day. There were not three days like it in all the year.

And, moreover, what recollections must have been agitating the souls of those reprobates at the approach of such a solemn day! The common people from their childhood kept the great festival in their memory. They must have remembered with anguish and torments these days which, work being laid aside, are pa.s.sed in the bosom of the family. The respect of the convicts for that day had something imposing about it. The drunkards were not at all numerous; nearly every one was serious, and, so to say, preoccupied, though they had for the most part nothing to do. Even those who feasted most preserved a serious air. Laughter seemed to be forbidden. A sort of intolerant susceptibility reigned throughout the prison; and if any one interfered with the general repose, even involuntarily, he was soon put in his proper place, with cries and oaths. He was condemned as though he had been wanting in respect to the festival itself.

This disposition of the convicts was remarkable, and even touching.