quick rush, and then the violent impact of my body struck him in the very centre, and he fell, forward and heavy, right upon me, and I felt his fearful weight crushing my arms, my chest, my head.…
“Sasha! Sashenka! What is the matter, golubchik?”20 I recognize the sweet, tender voice of my mother, sounding far away and strange, then coming closer and growing more soothing. I open my eyes. Mother is kneeling by the bed, her beautiful black eyes bathed in tears. Passionately she showers kisses upon my face and hands, entreating: “Golubchik, what is it?”
“Mamma, what happened to Uncle Maxim?” I ask, breathlessly watching her face.
Her sudden change of expression chills my heart with fear. She turns ghostly white, large drops of perspiration stand on her forehead, and her eyes grow large and round with terror. “Mamma!” I cry, throwing my arms around her. Her lips move, and I feel her warm breath on my cheek; but, without uttering a word, she bursts into vehement weeping.
“Who—told—you? You—know?” she whispers between sobs.
The pall of death seems to have descended upon our home. The house is oppressively silent. Everybody walks about in slippers, and the piano is kept locked. Only monosyllables, in undertone, are exchanged at the dinner-table. Mother’s seat remains vacant. She is very ill, the nurse informs us; no one is to see her.
The situation bewilders me. I keep wondering what has happened to Maxim. Was my vision of the palátch a presentiment, or the echo of an accomplished tragedy? Vaguely I feel guilty of mother’s illness. The shock of my question may be responsible for her condition. Yet there must be more to it, I try to persuade my troubled spirit. One afternoon, finding my eldest brother Maxim, named after mother’s favorite brother, in a very cheerful mood, I call him aside and ask, in a boldly assumed confidential manner: “Maximushka, tell me, what is a Nihilist?”
“Go to the devil, molokossoss21 you!” he cries, angrily. With a show of violence, quite inexplicable to me, Maxim throws his paper on the floor, jumps from his seat, upsetting the chair, and leaves the room.
The fate of Uncle Maxim remains a mystery, the question of Nihilism unsolved. I am absorbed in my studies. Yet a deep interest, curiosity about the mysterious and forbidden, slumbers in my consciousness, when quite unexpectedly it is roused into keen activity by a school incident. I am fifteen now, in the fourth grade of the classic gymnasium at Kovno.22 By direction of the Ministry of Education, compulsory religious instruction is being introduced in the State schools. Special classes have been opened at the gymnasium for the religious instruction of Jewish pupils. The parents of the latter resent the innovation; almost every Jewish child receives religious training at home or in cheidar.23 But the school authorities have ordered the gymnasiasts of Jewish faith to attend classes in religion.
The roll-call at the first session finds me missing. Summoned before the Director for an explanation, I state that I failed to attend because I have a private Jewish tutor at home, and,—anyway, I do not believe in religion. The prim Director looks inexpressibly shocked.
“Young man,” he addresses me in the artificial guttural voice he affects on solemn occasions. “Young man, when, permit me to ask, did you reach so profound a conclusion?”
His manner disconcerts me; but the sarcasm of his words and the offensive tone rouse my resentment. Impulsively, defiantly, I discover my cherished secret. “Since I wrote the essay, ‘There Is No God,’” I reply, with secret exultation. But the next instant I realize the recklessness of my confession. I have a fleeting sense of coming trouble, at school and at home. Yet somehow I feel I have acted like a man. Uncle Maxim, the Nihilist, would act so in my position. I know his reputation for uncompromising candor, and love him for his bold, frank ways.
“Oh, that is interesting,” I hear, as in a dream, the unpleasant guttural voice of the Director. “When did you write it?”
“Three years ago.”
“How old were you then?”
“Twelve.”
“Have you the essay?”
“Yes.”
“Where?”
“At home.”
“Bring it to me to-morrow. Without fail, remember.”
His voice grows stern. The words fall upon my ears with the harsh metallic sound of my sister’s piano that memorable evening of our musicale when, in a spirit of mischief, I hid a piece of gas pipe in the instrument tuned for the occasion.
“To-morrow, then. You are dismissed.”
The Educational Board, in conclave assembled, reads the essay. My disquisition is unanimously condemned. Exemplary punishment is to be visited upon me for “precocious godlessness, dangerous tendencies, and insubordination.” I am publicly reprimanded, and reduced to the third class. The peculiar sentence robs me of a year, and forces me to associate with the “children” my senior class looks down upon with undisguised contempt. I feel disgraced, humiliated.
Thus vision chases vision, memory succeeds memory, while the interminable hours creep towards the afternoon, and the station clock drones like an endless old woman.
III
Over at last. “All aboard!”
On and on rushes the engine, every moment bringing me nearer to my destination. The conductor drawling out the stations, the noisy going and coming produce almost no conscious impression on my senses. Seeing and hearing every detail of my surroundings, I am nevertheless oblivious to them. Faster than the train rushes my fancy, as if reviewing a panorama of vivid scenes, apparently without organic connection with each other, yet somehow intimately associated in my thoughts of the past. But how different is the present! I am speeding toward Pittsburgh, the very heart of the industrial struggle of America. America! I dwell wonderingly on the unuttered sound. Why in America? And again unfold pictures of old scenes.
I am walking in the garden of our well-appointed country place, in a fashionable suburb of St. Petersburg, where the family generally spends the summer months. As I pass the veranda, Dr. Semeonov, the celebrated physician of the resort, steps out of the house and beckons to me.
“Alexander Ossipovitch,” he addresses me in his courtly manner, “your mother is very ill. Are you alone with her?”
“We have servants, and two nurses are in attendance,” I reply.
“To be sure, to be sure,” the shadow of a smile hovers about the corners of his delicately chiseled lips. I mean of the family.”
“Oh, yes! I am alone here with my mother.”
“Your mother is rather restless to-day, Alexander Ossipovitch. Could you sit up with her to-night?”
“Certainly, certainly,” I quickly assent, wondering at the peculiar request. Mother has been improving, the nurses have assured me. My presence at her bedside may prove irksome to her. Our relations have been strained since the day when, in a fit of anger, she slapped Rose, our new chambermaid, whereupon I resented mother’s right to inflict physical punishment on the servants. I can see her now, erect and haughty, facing me across the dinner-table, her eyes ablaze with indignation.
“You forget you are speaking to your mother, Al-ex-an-der”; she pronounces the name in four distinct syllables, as is her habit when angry with me.
“You have no right to strike the girl,” I retort, defiantly.
“You forget yourself. My treatment of the menial is no concern of yours.”
I cannot suppress the sharp reply that springs to my lips: “The low servant girl is as good as you.”
I see mother’s long, slender fingers grasp the heavy ladle, and the next instant a sharp pain pierces my left hand. Our eyes meet. Her arm remains motionless, her gaze directed to the spreading blood stain on the white table-cloth. The ladle falls from her hand. She closes her eyes, and her body sinks limply to the chair.
Anger