Resurrection - Leo Nikoleyevich Tolstoy (interesting novels in english .TXT) 📗

the wind off.”

 

“They should have been examined by a doctor, and the weak ones

left behind,” said the clerk, showing off his knowledge of the

law.

 

The policeman, having undone the tapes of the shirt, rose and

looked round.

 

“Move on, I tell you. It is not your business, is it? What’s

there to stare at?” he said, and turned to Nekhludoff for

sympathy, but not finding any in his face he turned to the convoy

soldier.

 

But the soldier stood aside, examining the trodden-down heel of

his boot, and was quite indifferent to the policeman’s

perplexity.

 

“Those whose business it is don’t care. Is it right to do men to

death like this? A convict is a convict, but still he is a man,”

different voices were heard saying in the crowd.

 

“Put his head up higher, and give him some water,” said

Nekhludoff.

 

“Water has been sent for,” said the policeman, and taking the

prisoner under the arms he with difficulty pulled his body a

little higher up.

 

“What’s this gathering here?” said a decided, authoritative

voice, and a police officer, with a wonderfully clean, shiny

blouse, and still more shiny top-boots, came up to the assembled

crowd.

 

“Move on. No standing about here,” he shouted to the crowd,

before he knew what had attracted it.

 

When he came near and saw the dying convict, he made a sign of

approval with his head, just as if he had quite expected it, and,

turning to the policeman, said, “How is this?”

 

The policeman said that, as a gang of prisoners was passing, one

of the convicts had fallen down, and the convoy officer had

ordered him to be left behind.

 

“Well, that’s all right. He must be taken to the police station.

Call an isvostchik.”

 

“A porter has gone for one,” said the policeman, with his fingers

raised to his cap.

 

The shopman began something about the heat.

 

“Is it your business, eh? Move on,” said the police officer, and

looked so severely at him that the clerk was silenced.

 

“He ought to have a little water,” said Nekhludoff. The police

officer looked severely at Nekhludoff also, but said nothing.

When the porter brought a mug full of water, he told the

policeman to offer some to the convict. The policeman raised the

drooping head, and tried to pour a little water down the mouth;

but the prisoner could not swallow it, and it ran down his beard,

wetting his jacket and his coarse, dirty linen shirt.

 

“Pour it on his head,” ordered the officer; and the policeman

took off the pancake-shaped cap and poured the water over the red

curls and bald part of the prisoner’s head. His eyes opened wide

as if in fear, but his position remained unchanged.

 

Streams of dirt trickled down his dusty face, but the mouth

continued to gasp in the same regular way, and his whole body

shook.

 

“And what’s this? Take this one,” said the police officer,

pointing to Nekhludoff’s isvostchik. “You, there, drive up.”

 

“I am engaged,” said the isvostchik, dismally, and without

looking up.

 

“It is my isvostchik; but take him. I will pay you,” said

Nekhludoff, turning to the isvostchik.

 

“Well, what are you waiting for?” shouted the officer. “Catch

hold.”

 

The policeman, the porter, and the convoy soldier lifted the

dying man and carried him to the trap, and put him on the seat.

But he could not sit up; his head fell back, and the whole of his

body glided off the seat.

 

“Make him lie down,” ordered the officer.

 

“It’s all right, your honour; I’ll manage him like this,” said

the policeman, sitting down by the dying man, and clasping his

strong, right arm round the body under the arms. The convoy

soldier lifted the stockingless feet, in prison shoes, and put

them into the trap.

 

The police officer looked around, and noticing the pancake-shaped

hat of the convict lifted it up and put it on the wet, drooping

head.

 

“Go on,” he ordered.

 

The isvostchik looked angrily round, shook his head, and,

accompanied by the convoy soldier, drove back to the police

station. The policeman, sitting beside the convict, kept dragging

up the body that was continually sliding down from the seat,

while the head swung from side to side.

 

The convoy soldier, who was walking by the side of the trap, kept

putting the legs in their place. Nekhludoff followed the trap.

 

CHAPTER XXXVII.

 

SPILLED LIKE WATER ON THE GROUND.

 

The trap passed the fireman who stood sentinel at the entrance,

[the headquarters of the fire brigade and the police stations are

generally together in Moscow] drove into the yard of the police

station, and stopped at one of the doors. In the yard several

firemen with their sleeves tucked up were washing some kind of

cart and talking loudly. When the trap stopped, several policemen

surrounded it, and taking the lifeless body of the convict under

the arms, took him out of the trap, which creaked under him. The

policeman who had brought the body got down, shook his numbed

arm, took off his cap, and crossed himself. The body was carried

through the door and up the stairs. Nekhludoff followed. In the

small, dirty room where the body was taken there stood four beds.

On two of them sat a couple of sick men in dressing-gowns, one

with a crooked mouth, whose neck was bandaged, the other one in

consumption. Two of the beds were empty; the convict was laid on

one of them. A little man, wish glistening eyes and continually

moving brows, with only his underclothes and stockings on, came

up with quick, soft steps, looked at the convict and then at

Nekhludoff, and burst into loud laughter. This was a madman who

was being kept in the police hospital.

 

“They wish to frighten me, but no, they won’t succeed,” he said.

 

The policemen who carried the corpse were followed by a police

officer and a medical assistant. The medical assistant came up to

the body and touched the freckled hand, already growing cold,

which, though still soft, was deadly pale. He held it for a

moment, and then let it go. It fell lifelessly on the stomach of

the dead man.

 

“He’s ready,” said the medical assistant, but, evidently to be

quite in order, he undid the wet, brown shirt, and tossing back

the curls from his ear, put it to the yellowish, broad, immovable

chest of the convict. All were silent. The medical assistant

raised himself again, shook his head, and touched with his

fingers first one and then the other lid over the open, fixed

blue eyes.

 

“I’m not frightened, I’m not frightened.” The madman kept

repeating these words, and spitting in the direction of the

medical assistant.

 

“Well?” asked the police officer.

 

“Well! He must he put into the mortuary.”

 

“Are you sure? Mind,” said the police officer.

 

“It’s time I should know,” said the medical assistant, drawing

the shirt over the body’s chest. “However, I will send for

Mathew Ivanovitch. Let him have a look. Petrov, call him,” and

the medical assistant stepped away from the body.

 

“Take him to the mortuary,” said the police officer. “And then

you must come into the office and sign,” he added to the convoy

soldier, who had not left the convict for a moment.

 

“Yes, sir,” said the soldier.

 

The policemen lifted the body and carried it down again.

Nekhludoff wished to follow, but the madman kept him back.

 

“You are not in the plot! Well, then, give me a cigarette,” he

said. Nekhludoff got out his cigarette case and gave him one.

 

The madman, quickly moving his brows all the time, began relating

how they tormented him by thought suggestion.

 

“Why, they are all against me, and torment and torture me through

their mediums.”

 

“I beg your pardon,” said Nekhludoff, and without listening any

further he left the room and went out into the yard, wishing to

know where the body would be put.

 

The policemen with their burden had already crossed the yard, and

were coming to the door of a cellar. Nekhludoff wished to go up

to them, but the police officer stopped him.

 

“What do you want?”

 

“Nothing.”

 

“Nothing? Then go away.”

 

Nekhludoff obeyed, and went back to his isvostchik, who was

dozing. He awoke him, and they drove back towards the railway

station.

 

They had not made a hundred steps when they met a cart

accompanied by a convoy soldier with a gun. On the cart lay

another convict, who was already dead. The convict lay on his

back in the cart, his shaved head, from which the pancake-shaped

cap had slid over the black-bearded face down to the nose,

shaking and thumping at every jolt. The driver, in his heavy

boots, walked by the side of the cart, holding the reins; a

policeman followed on foot. Nekhludoff touched his isvostchik’s

shoulder.

 

“Just look what they are doing,” said the isvostchik, stopping

his horse.

 

Nekhludoff got down and, following the cart, again passed the

sentinel and entered the gate of the police station. By this time

the firemen had finished washing the cart, and a tall, bony man,

the chief of the fire brigade, with a coloured band round his

cap, stood in their place, and, with his hands in his pockets,

was severely looking at a fat-necked, well-fed, bay stallion that

was being led up and down before him by a fireman. The stallion

was lame on one of his fore feet, and the chief of the firemen

was angrily saying something to a veterinary who stood by.

 

The police officer was also present. When he saw the cart he went

up to the convoy soldier.

 

“Where did you bring him from?” he asked, shaking his head

disapprovingly.

 

“From the Gorbatovskaya,” answered the policeman.

 

“A prisoner?” asked the chief of the fire brigade.

 

“Yes. It’s the second to-day.”

 

“Well, I must say they’ve got some queer arrangements. Though of

course it’s a broiling day,” said the chief of the fire brigade;

then, turning to the fireman who was leading the lame stallion,

he shouted: “Put him into the corner stall. And as to you, you

hound, I’ll teach you how to cripple horses which are worth more

than you are, you scoundrel.”

 

The dead man was taken from the cart by the policemen just in the

same way as the first had been, and carried upstairs into the

hospital. Nekhludoff followed them as if he were hypnotised.

 

“What do you want?” asked one of the policemen. But Nekhludoff

did not answer, and followed where the body was being carried.

The madman, sitting on a bed, was smoking greedily the cigarette

Nekhludoff had given him.

 

“Ah, you’ve come back,” he said, and laughed. When he saw the

body he made a face, and said, “Again! I am sick of it. I am not

a boy, am I, eh?” and he turned to Nekhludoff with a questioning

smile.

 

Nekhludoff was looking at the dead man, whose face, which had

been hidden by his cap, was now visible. This convict was as

handsome in face and body as the other was hideous. He was a man

in the full bloom of life. Notwithstanding that he was disfigured

by the half of his head being shaved, the straight, rather low

forehead, raised a bit over the black, lifeless eyes, was very

fine, and so was the nose above the thin, black moustaches. There

was a smile on the lips that were already growing blue, a small

beard outlined