THE FORWARDING PRISON
AT last they reached the forwarding prison, where they had to await
the arrival of the convict-barge which was to take them up the Volga.
Here the fathers were to join their families, and occupy the family
kamera, or ward set apart for those prisoners whose wives had chosen
to accompany them into exile. Through filthy corridors, the women and
children were conducted to a still more filthy kamera. It was a long
and narrow room, with two windows which would not open. No furniture
was in it, except two parallel wooden platforms, each about twelve feet
wide, raised a few inches in the middle, thus giving to them sloping
sides. This was to be their bed, where the whole party was to lie as
closely packed as possible, with heads touching one another in the
middle, from the opposite slopes. There were no pillows, no mattresses,
no bed-clothing of any kind. Russian peasants are a hardy race, not
accustomed to comforts, but this absolute bareness filled the women
with dismay for themselves and their children. Every limb, every bone,
every muscle was aching from their long journey, and these bare planks
formed their only resting-place. There was not even a bench for them to
sit down upon.
Michael found Katerina, the young mother, sobbing bitterly over her
baby.
"What is the matter, Katerina?" he asked pityingly.
"Look at it!" she cried, putting the baby in his arms. "I haven't been
able to wash it for five days. And oh, Michael, it's covered with
horrid things, and so am I."
The tiny creature's skin was blotched and smeared, and its little face
was terribly disfigured. Michael could hardly find voice to comfort
Katerina.
"It will be better now," he said at last. "One of the convoy men told
me we were sure to stay here five days or a week. We shall have time to
rest. And, Katerina dear, God knows all about it."
"Does He?" she asked doubtingly.
But before he could answer the prisoners came in. Michael flew to
his father and flung his arms round his neck, holding him in a close
embrace; for he could not bear yet to look into his dear, disfigured
face. Khariton met his wife and children in speechless delight, too
happy to find even words of endearment. Michael saw Katerina hanging on
her young husband's arm, no longer sobbing. All the Stundists had their
heads half shaved, like the worst criminals. Sergius and Marfa turned
their eyes away from their father's grief-worn face, but Tatiania
kissed the poor dishonoured head tenderly.
"We're all together, Khariton!" she cried. "Not one of us is missing.
If we all get through to the end, we shall have a home again."
"If God wills it!" said Khariton, taking little Clava into his arms.
Marfa ventured to look at her father, and stole to his side, though
she said nothing. They felt happier than they could have imagined it
possible to be a few hours before. The cramped limbs and aching heads
were almost forgotten. They were together again, with no fear of
separation in the future.
Alexis and Michael sat hand in hand on the foot of the
sleeping-platform, not able to utter more than a few disjointed
sentences. Alexis had been almost utterly cast down by the discovery of
the clean sweep which had been made of the Stundists in Knishi. They
were all here, with the exception of Nicolas the renegade, and the
children who had been taken from their parents to be brought up in the
Orthodox Church. Whether they were all to be sent to the same place of
exile as himself, or scattered hither and thither in Siberia, he did
not know. Just now he was as much worn-out in mind as in body, and he
could hardly think of his fellow-prisoners. He could only think feebly
of God. From time to time, he muttered absently, "'Persecuted, but not
forsaken; cast down, but not destroyed.'"
Michael sat beside him, stiff and weary in body, but with his mind in a
tumult. This going into exile, on étape, was very different from what
he had imagined. It had seemed beforehand a much lighter experience,
mingled indeed with some elements of adventures and pleasures in the
long march. But to be pent up in railway waggons like cattle trucks,
and be conveyed like cattle from place to place, was quite a different
thing. The cries of little children, the wailing of babies, the sobs
and prayers and curses of women during the long journey, had entered
like iron into his very soul. Hunger and thirst, plank beds and bitter
cold, he had been prepared for, but not for the degradation and the
untold misery and the wickedness that surrounded him. His father was
no longer chained to the brutal murderer who had been his comrade on
the march from Kovylsk, for that man's family had abandoned him. But
there were men and boys in the kamera so evil and depraved that they
did not open their lips without uttering words so vile as to appal him.
How could they hinder the girls and children from hearing the common
conversation around them? He thanked God again that Velia was not there.
There were women there of the lowest class, degraded to the deepest
corruption, not worthy of the name of women. In the corner near
Katerina and Tatiania, a young lady sat on the edge of the nari, gazing
round with terrified eyes. She was a political prisoner, going into
exile as a suspected person. Children of all ages crawled about the
filthy floor. There was still light enough to see them—unwashed, weary
little ones, with matted hair hanging about their begrimed faces.
There had been no chance of washing for any of them; and some of these
children were too much accustomed to such a condition to be consciously
affected by it. But the Stundists were used to cleanliness, and they
suffered from enforced defilement. They felt degraded and injured
by it. Clava's sweet little face was soiled with dust and tears.
Michael shook himself as if in a rage, as he felt the indescribable
offensiveness of the surroundings.
Was it possible the archbishop could think he was doing God service
by dooming men and women and children to such a state of misery?
Father Cyril said the archbishop was an eminent servant of the Lord
Jesus Christ, and only desired their salvation. It could not be true.
Either he was quite ignorant of what was being done in his name, or
he belonged to the synagogue of Satan—that terrible congregation of
devil-worshippers, the very name of which made him shudder when he read
the words, "'Behold, I will make them of the synagogue of Satan, which
say they are Jews, and are not, but do lie.'"
His father was falling into a troubled sleep beside him, and Michael
heard him muttering in an undertone, "'My God! My God!'" It was the
only prayer his weary, worn-out brain could form. Michael bent over him
and kissed his shaven head reverently.