In the middle of the winter everything suddenly trembled and shook.
People anxiously opened their eyes, gesticulated, disputed furiously,
and swore. As though severely wounded and blinded by a blow, they all
stampeded to one place.
It began in this way. One evening on reaching the Department of Safety
to hand in a hurried report of his investigations, Klimkov found
something unusual and incomprehensible in the place. The officials,
agents, and clerks appeared to have put on new faces. All seemed
strangely unlike themselves. They wore an air of astonishment and
rejoicing. They spoke now in very low tones and mysteriously, now aloud
and angrily. There was a senseless running from room to room, a
listening to one another's words, a suspicious screwing-up of anxious
eyes, a shaking of heads and sighing, a sudden cessation of talk, and an
equally sudden burst of disputing. A whirlwind of fear and perplexity
swept the room in broad circles. Playing with the people's impotence it
drove them about like dust, first blowing them into a pile, then
scattering them on all sides. Klimkov stationed in a corner looked with
vacant eyes upon this state of consternation, and listened to the
conversation with strained attention.
He saw Melnikov with his powerful neck bent and his head stuck forward
place his hairy hands on different persons' shoulders and demand in his
low hollow voice:
"Why did the people do it?"
"What of it? The people must live. Hundreds were killed, eh? Wounded!"
shouted Solovyov.
From somewhere came the repulsive voice of Sasha, cutting the ear.
"The priest ought to have been caught. That before everything else. The
idiots!"
Krasavin walked about with his hands folded behind his back, biting his
lips and rolling his eyes in every direction.
Quiet Viekov took up his stand beside Yevsey, and picked at the buttons
of his vest.
"So this is the point we've reached," he said. "My God! Bloodshed! What
do you think, eh?"
"What happened?" Yevsey asked.
Viekov looked around warily, took Klimkov by the hand, and whispered:
"This morning the people in St. Petersburg with a priest and sacred
banners marched to the Czar Emperor. You understand? But they were not
admitted. The soldiers were stationed about, and blood was spilled."
A handsome staid gentleman, Leontyev, ran past them, glanced back at
Viekov through his pince nez, and asked:
"Where is Filip Filippovich?"
But he disappeared without waiting for the information he wanted, and
Viekov ran after him.
Yevsey closed his eyes for a minute, in order to try in the darkness to
get at the meaning of what had been told him. He could easily represent
to himself a mass of people walking through the streets in a sacred
procession, but since he could not understand why the soldiers had shot
at them, he was skeptical about the affair. However, the general
agitation seized him, too, and he felt disturbed and ill at ease. He
wanted to bustle about with the spies, but unable to make up his mind to
approach those he knew, he merely retreated still farther into his
corner.
Many persons passed by him, all of whom, he fancied, were quickly
searching for a little cosy corner where they might stand to collect
their thoughts.
Maklakov appeared. He remained near the door with his hands thrust into
his pockets, and looked sidewise at everybody. Melnikov approached him.
"Did they do it on account of the war?"
"I don't know."
"For what else? If it was the people. But maybe it was simply some
mistake. Eh? What did they ask for, do you know?"
"A constitution," replied Maklakov.
The sullen spy shook his head.
"I don't believe it."
"As you please."
Then Melnikov turned heavily, like a bear, and walked away grumbling:
"No one understands anything. They stir about, make a big noise--"
Yevsey went up to Maklakov, who was looking at him.
"What is it?"
"I have a report."
Maklakov waved him aside.
"Who wants to bother about reports to-day."
Yevsey drew still nearer, and asked:
"Timofey Vasilyevich, what does 'constitution' mean?"
"A different order of life," answered the spy in a low voice.
Solovyov, perspiring and red, came running up.
"Have you heard whether they are going to send us to St. Petersburg?"
"No, I haven't."
"I think they probably will. Such an event! Why, it's a revolt, a real
revolt."
"To-morrow we will know."
"How much blood has been shed! What is it?"
Maklakov's eye ran about uneasily. To-day his shoulders seemed more
stooping than ever, and the ends of his mustache dropped downward.
Something seemed to be revolting in Yevsey's brain, and Maklakov's grim
words kept repeating themselves.
"A different order of life--different."
They gripped at his heart, arousing a sharp desire to extract their
meaning. But everything around him turned and darted hither and thither.
Melnikov's angry, resonant voice sounded sickeningly:
"The thing is, to know what people did it. The working-people are one
thing, simply residents another. This differentiation must be made."
And Krasavin spoke distinctly:
"If even the people begin to revolt against the Czar, then there are no
people any more, only rebels."
"Wait, and suppose there's deception here."
"Hey, you old devil," whispered Zarubin, hastening up to Yevsey. "I've
struck a vein of business. Come on, I'll tell you."
Klimkov followed him in silence for a space, then stopped.
"Where shall I go?"
"To a beer saloon. You understand? There's a girl there, Margarita. She
has an acquaintance, a milliner. At the milliner's lodging they read
books on Saturdays--students and various other people like that. So I'm
going to cut them up. Ugh!"
"I won't go," said Yevsey.
"Oh, you! Ugh!"
The long ribbon of strange impressions quickly enmeshed Yevsey's heart,
hindering him from an understanding of what was happening. He walked off
home unobserved, carrying away with him the premonition of impending
misfortune, a misfortune that already lay in hiding and was stretching
out irresistible arms to clutch him. It filled his heart with new fear
and grief. In expectation of this misfortune he endeavored to walk in
the obscurity close against the houses. He recalled the agitated faces
and excited voices, the disconnected talk about death, about blood,
about the huge graves, into which dozens of bodies had been flung like
rubbish.
At home he stood at the window a long time looking at the yellow light
of the street-lamp. The pedestrians quickly walked into the circle of
its light, then plunged into the darkness again. So in Yevsey's head a
faint timid light was casting a pale illumination upon a narrow circle,
into which ignorant, cautious grey thoughts, helplessly holding on to
one another like blind people, were slowly creeping. Small and lame they
gathered into a shy group driven into one place like a swarm of
mosquitoes. But suddenly, losing hold of the bond uniting them, they
disappeared without leaving a trace, and his soul devoid of them
remained like a desert illuminated by a solitary ray from a sorrowful
moon.
The days passed as in a delirium, filled with terrible tales of the
fierce destruction of people. For Yevsey these days crawled slowly over
the earth like black eyeless monsters, swollen with the blood they had
devoured. They crawled with their huge jaws wide open, poisoning the air
with their stifling, salty odor. People ran and fell, shouted and wept,
mingling their tears with their blood. And the blind monster destroyed
them, crushed old and young, women and children. They were pushed
forward to their destruction by the ruler of their life, fear,--fear
leaden-grey as a storm-cloud, powerful as the current of a broad stream.
Though the thing had happened far away, in a strange city, Yevsey knew
that fear was alive everywhere. He felt it all over, round about him.
No one understood the event, no one was able to explain it. It stood
before the people like a huge riddle and frightened them. The spies
stuck in their meeting places from morning until night, and did much
reading of newspapers and drinking of whiskey. They also crowded into
the Department of Safety, where they disputed, and pressed close against
one another. They were impatiently awaiting something.
"Can anybody explain the truth?" Melnikov kept asking.
One evening a few weeks after the event there was a meeting of the spies
in the Department of Safety at which Sasha delivered a speech.
"Stop this nonsensical talk," he said sharply. "It's a scheme of the
Japs. The Japs gave 18,000,000 rubles to Father Gapon to stir the people
up to revolt. You understand? The people were made drunk on the road to
the palace; the revolutionists had ordered a few wine shops to be broken
into. You understand?" He let his red eyes rove about the company as if
seeking those of his listeners who disagreed with him. "They thought the
Czar, loving the people, would come out to them. And at that time it was
decided to kill him. Is it clear to you?"
"Yes, it's clear," shouted Yakov Zarubin, and began to jot something
down in his note-book.
"Jackass!" shouted Sasha in a surly voice. "I'm not asking you.
Melnikov, do you understand?"
Melnikov was sitting in a corner, clutching his head with both hands and
swaying to and fro as if he had the toothache. Without changing his
position he answered:
"A deception!" His voice struck the floor dully, as if something soft
yet heavy had fallen.
"Yes, a deception," repeated Sasha, and began again to speak quickly and
fluently. Sometimes he carefully touched his forehead, then looked at
his fingers and wiped them on his knee. Yevsey had the sensation that
even his words reeked with a putrid odor. He listened wrinkling his
forehead painfully. He understood everything the spy said, but he felt
that his speech did not efface, in fact, could not efface, from his mind
the black picture of the bloody holiday.
All were silent, now and then shaking their heads, and refraining from
looking at one another. It was quiet and gloomy. Sasha's words floated a
long time over his auditors' heads touching nobody.
"If it was known that the people had been deceived, then why were they
killed?" the unexpected question suddenly burst from Melnikov.
"Fool!" screamed Sasha. "Suppose you had been told that I was your
wife's paramour, and you got drunk and came at me with a knife, what
should I do? Should I tell you 'Strike!' even though you had been duped,
and I was not guilty?"
Melnikov started to his feet, stretched himself, and bawled:
"Don't bark, you dog!"
A tremor ran through Yevsey at his words, and Viekov thin and nerveless,
who sat beside him, whispered in fright:
"Oh, God! Hold him!"
Sasha clenched his teeth, thrust one hand into his pocket, and drew
back. All the spies--there were many in the room--sat silent and
motionless, and waited watching Sasha's hand. Melnikov waved his hat and
walked slowly to the door.
"I'm not afraid of your pistol."
He slammed the door after him noisily. Viekov went to lock it, and said
as he returned to his place:
"What a dangerous man!"
"So," continued Sasha, pulling a revolver from his pocket and examining
it. "To-morrow morning you are each of you to get down to business, do
you hear? And bear in mind that now you will all have more to do than
before. Part of us will have to go to St. Petersburg. That's number one.
Secondly, this is the very time that you'll have to keep your eyes and
ears particularly wide open, because people will begin to babble all
sorts of nonsense in regard to this affair. The revolutionists will not
be so careful now, you understand?"
Handsome Grokhotov drew a loud breath and said:
"We understand, never mind! If it's true that the Japs gave such large
sums of money, that explains it, of course."
"Without any explanation it's very hard," said someone.
"Ye-e-e-s."
"People cry, 'What does it mean?' And they give you poisonous talk, and
you don't know how to answer back."
"The people are very much interested in this revolt."
All these remarks were made in an indolent, bloodless fashion and with
an air of constraint.
"Well, now you know what you are about, and how you should reply to the
fools," said Sasha angrily. "And if some donkey should begin to bray,
take him by the neck, whistle for a policeman, and off with him to the
police station. There they have instructions as to what's to be done
with such people. Ho, Viekov, or somebody, ring the bell and order some
Selters."
Yakov Zarubin rushed to the bell.
Sasha looked at him, and said showing his teeth:
"Say, puppy, don't be mad with me for having cut you off."
"I'm not mad, Aleksandr Nikitich."
"Ye-e-s," Grokhotov drawled pensively. "Still they are a power, after
all! Consider what they accomplished--raised a hundred thousand people."
"Stupidity is light, it's easy to raise," Sasha interrupted him. "They
had the means to raise a hundred thousand people; they had the money.
Just you give me such a sum of money, and I'll show you how to make
history." Sasha uttered an ugly oath, lifted himself slightly from the
sofa, stretched out the thin yellow hand which held the revolver,
screwed up his eyes, and aiming at the ceiling, cried through his teeth
in a yearning whine, "I would show you!"
All these things--Sasha's words and gestures, his eyes and his
smiles--were familiar to Yevsey, but now they seemed impotent, useless
as infrequent drops of rain in extinguishing a conflagration. They did
not extinguish fear, and were powerless to stop the quiet growth of a
premonition of misfortune.
At this time a new view of the life of the people unconsciously
developed in Yevsey's mind. He learned that on the one hand some people
might gather in the streets by the tens of thousands in order to go to
the rich and powerful Czar and ask him for help, while others might kill
these tens of thousands for doing so. He recalled everything the
Smokestack had said about the poverty of the people and the wealth of
the Czar, and was convinced that both sides acted in the manner they did
from fear.
Nevertheless the people astonished him by their desperate bravery, and
aroused in him a feeling with which he had hitherto been unfamiliar.
Now as before when walking the streets with the box of goods on his
breast, he carefully stepped aside for the passersby, either taking to
the middle of the street, or pressing against the walls of the houses.
However, he began to look into the people's faces more attentively, with
a feeling akin to respect, and his fear of them seemed to have
diminished slightly. Men's faces had suddenly changed, acquiring more
variety and significance of expression. All began to talk with one
another more willingly and simply, and to walk the streets more briskly,
with a firmer tread.