They ran up to Harlov, rolled the beam off him, turned him over on his
back. His face was lifeless, there was blood about his mouth; he did
not seem to breathe. ‘The breath is gone out of him,’ muttered the
peasants, standing about him. They ran to the well for water, brought a
whole bucketful, and drenched Harlov’s head. The mud and dust ran off
his face, but he looked as lifeless as ever. They dragged up a bench,
set it in the house itself, and with difficulty raising the huge body
of Martin Petrovitch, laid it there with the head to the wall. The page
Maximka approached, fell on one knee, and, his other leg stretched far
behind him, in a theatrical way, supported his former master’s arm.
Evlampia, pale as death, stood directly facing her father, her great
eyes fastened immovably upon him. Anna and Sletkin did not come near
him. All were silent, all, as it were, waited for something. At last
we heard broken, smacking noises in Harlov’s throat, as though he
were swallowing.… Then he feebly moved one, his right, hand (Maximka
supported the left), opened one, the right eye, and slowly gazing
about him, as though drunken with some fearful drunkenness, groaned,
articulated, stammering, ‘I’m sma-ashed …’ and as though after a
moment’s thought, added, ‘here it is, the ra … aven co … olt!’ The
blood suddenly gushed thickly from his mouth … his whole body began to
quiver.…
‘The end!’ I thought.… But once more Harlov opened the same eye (the
left eyelid lay as motionless as on a dead man’s face), and fixing it
on Evlampia, he articulated, hardly above a breath, ‘Well, daugh … ter
… you, I do not.…’
Kvitsinsky, with a sharp motion of his hand, beckoned to the priest,
who was still standing on the step.… The old man came up, his narrow
cassock clinging about his feeble knees. But suddenly there was a sort
of horrible twitching in Harlov’s legs and in his stomach too; an
irregular contraction passed upwards over his face. Evlampia’s face
seemed quivering and working in the same way. Maximka began crossing
himself.… I was seized with horror; I ran out to the gates, squeezed
myself close to them, not looking round. A minute later a soft murmur
ran through the crowd, behind my back, and I understood that Martin
Petrovitch was no more.
His skull had been fractured by the beam and his ribs injured, as it
appeared at the post-mortem examination.