CHAPTER XII

Soon after this my life changed entirely. Even while Grisha was here an ugly incident happened to me. Once I went into the ante-room and caught Misha in an act which gave the lie to his constant and disgusting denunciation of women as unclean. It was inexpressibly disgusting to me, for I remembered all the filth which he spoke about women; I remembered his hatred of them; and I spat and escaped to the bakery, trembling with wrath and shame and bitterness. He followed me, fell on his knees, and begged me not to tell.

"I know that she torments you at night, too. The power of the devil is strong."

"You lie," I said. "Go to all the devils, you pig. And you bake bread, you dog!"

I insulted him, for I could not contain myself.

If he had not soiled all womankind with his dirty words, I would not have minded it so much.

But he crawled before me and begged me not to tell.

"Well," I said, "can one speak about such things? It is too shameful. But I don't want to work with you. Tell them to give me other work."

I insisted on that.

At this time people were not yet alive or clear to me, and I strove only for one thing: to keep myself apart.

Misha became ill and lay in the hospital. I worked as of old and was given two assistants to help me.

Three weeks passed, when suddenly the steward called me and told me that Misha had recovered but did not want to work with me because of my obstinate nature; and therefore in the meantime I would be ordered to dig stumps out of the wood. This work was considered a punishment.

"Why?" I asked.

Suddenly the handsome monk, Father Anthony, entered the office, stood modestly aside and listened. The steward continued to explain to me:

"Because of your obstinate nature and your impudent opinions about the brothers. At your age and in your condition, it is foolish; unbearable; and you must be punished. But the Father Superior, in his goodness, said that we should take you over to the office for easy work. And that is how it may turn out."

He spoke for a long time, in a singsong voice and without feeling; and I saw that it did not come from his conscience, but that he dragged one word after another from duty.

Father Anthony leaned against a bench, looked at me, stroked his beard and smiled with his beautiful eyes as if he were joking with me about something.

I wished to show him my character and said to the steward:

"I don't seek to be raised, nor do I wish to accept humiliation, for I do not deserve it, as you know, but I want justice."

The steward grew red in the face and beat the ground with his stick.

"Keep silent, insolent one!"

Father Anthony bent to his ear and said something.

"It is impossible," answered the steward. "He is to take his punishment without a murmur."

Anthony shrugged his shoulders and turned toward me. His voice was low and warm:

"Submit, Matvei."

He conquered me with his two words and his caressing look. I bowed to the steward and to him, and then I asked the steward when I must go to the wood.

"In three days," he answered. "But these three days you must go to the dungeon--that's what."

If Anthony had not been there I certainly would have broken the steward's bones. But I took Anthony's words as a sign of the possibility to get near him, and for this I was ready to cut off my right arm--anything.

They sent me down to the dungeon. It was a hole underneath the office, in which it was impossible to stand or lie down; one had to sit. Straw was thrown on the floor, but it was wet from dampness. And it was quiet as a grave, not even mice were there; and such darkness that the hands disappeared. If you put your hands before your face they were not visible.

I sat there and was silent, and everything in me seemed poured from lead. I was heavy as stone, and cold as ice.

I clinched my teeth for I wished to hold back my thoughts; but they flamed up within me like coals and burned me. I could have bitten somebody, but there was no one to bite. I caught my hair with my hands, swayed back and forth like the tongue of a bell, and shrieked and raved and roared within:

"Where is Thy justice, O Lord? Do not the lawless play with it? And do not the strong trample it in their evil, drunken power? What am I before Thee? A lawless sacrifice or a keeper of Thy beauty and justice?"

I recalled the arrangement of the life in the monastery. It stood before me, ugly and cynical.

And why did they call the monks the servants of God? In what way were they holier than laymen? I knew the difficult peasant life in the villages. They lived starved and wretched. They drank, they fought, they stole, they committed every sin. But was not His path unseen? And they had no strength to struggle for righteousness; nor time. Each one was attached to the soil and tied to his house with a strong chain--the fear of starvation. What could one ask of them?

But here men lived free and satisfied. Here books and wisdom were open to them. But which one of them served God? Only the weak and the bloodless, like Grisha, remained faithful to God, who to the others was only a protector of sins and a source of lies. I remembered the evil lust of the monks for women and all their offenses of the flesh, which even the animals disdained--and their laziness and gluttony; their quarrels over the distribution of the funds, when they cawed maliciously at one another like ravens in a cemetery.

Grisha told me that no matter how much the peasants worked for the monastery, their indebtedness grew continually. I thought of myself: "Here I have already spent a long time and what has my soul profited? I have received only wounds and sores. How has my intelligence been enriched? Only by the knowledge of all kinds of baseness and of loathing for man."

Around me was silence. Even the sound of the bells, by which I could have measured time, did not reach me, and there was neither day nor night for me. Who dared to take away the sun from man?

The rank darkness oppressed me, and my soul was consumed by it. There was nothing left to light my path. The faith which was dear to my heart, the justice and omniscience of God, sank and melted away.

But like a bright star the face of Father Anthony flashed before me, and all my thoughts and feelings circled around it like a moth around a flame. I conversed with him, and complained to him, and asked him questions, and saw his two caressing eyes in the darkness.

I paid dearly for those three days and I went out of the hole blinded, my head feeling as if it were not my own, and my knees trembling. The monks laughed at me.

"What," they said, "you took a good soul-bath, eh?"

At night the Abbot called me, made me kneel before him, and gave me a long lecture.

"It is written that I shall crush the teeth of the sinner and bend his back in the yoke."

I was silent and controlled my heart. The peacemaker, Father Anthony, stood before me, and stilled my evil mouth with his affectionate look. Suddenly the Abbot softened.

"We value you, you fool," he said. "We think of you. We have noticed your zeal in work and wish to reward your intelligence. I even place before you a choice of two duties. Do you want to work in the office, or do you want to be a lay brother to Father Anthony?"

I felt as if I had been revived with warm water. I was stifled with joy and could hardly speak:

"Permit me to be a lay brother."

He frowned, became thoughtful, and looked at me curiously.

"If you go to the office," he said, "I will take away the stump digging; but if you go as a lay brother, I will increase the work in the woods."

"Permit me to be a lay brother."

He asked me sternly:

"Why, you fool! The work is easier in the office, and more respectable."

I insisted. He bowed his head and thought a while.

"I permit it. You are a strange fellow, and one should not lose sight of you. Who knows what fires you will light--who knows? Go in peace."

I went to the wood. It was spring then, cold April. The work was hard, the wood an ancient one. The main roots went deep into the earth; the side ones were big. I dug and dug, and chopped and chopped; tied the trunk and made the horse pull out the stump. He tried with all his strength, but only broke the harness. Already by noon my bones felt broken and my horse trembled and was covered with foam. He looked at me out of his round eyes, as if he wished to say: "I cannot, brother; it is hard."

I petted him and slapped his neck. "I see," I said. And again I dug and chopped and the horse looked at me, his hide trembling and his head nodding. Horses are intelligent, and I am sure that they perceive all the senseless actions of man.

At this time I had an encounter with Misha, which came near ending badly for both of us. Once I went to my work after the noon-day meal, and had already reached the wood when suddenly he overtook me, club in hand, his face wild, his teeth showing, and panting like a bear. What did it mean?

I stopped and waited for him. He did not say a word, but brandished his club at me. I bent in time, and struck him below the belt with my head. I threw him down, sat on his chest, and took away his club.

"What is the matter with you?" I asked him. "What's this for?"

He struggled underneath me and said hoarsely:

"Get out of the monastery!"

"Why?"

"I can't look at you. I'll kill you! Get out of here!"

His eyes were red. The tears that came out seemed red, and his lips were covered with foam. He tore at my clothes; he scratched and pinched me, anxious to reach my face. I shook him lightly and arose from his chest.

"You wear the garb of a monk," I said, "and yet you are capable of such vileness, you brute! Why?"

He sat in the mud and demanded, obstinately:

"Get out of here! Don't make me lose my soul!"

I did not understand him. Finally I made a guess, and asked him low:

"Perhaps, Misha, you think I told some one about your wretched sin? It is not so. I told no one about it."

He arose, swayed, held on to the tree and looked at me with his wild eyes.

"I wish you had told it to the whole world!" he roared. "It would be easier for me! I could repent before others and they would forgive me. But you, scoundrel, despise every one. I do not want to be under obligations to you, you proud heretic. Get out, or I'll have the sin of blood on me!"

"If that is the way it is," I said, "go away yourself, if you have to. I won't go--that is sure."

He again jumped on me, and we both fell into the mud, getting dirty like frogs. I proved to be the stronger, and arose, but he still lay there, weeping and miserable.

"Listen, Misha," I said. "I am going away a little later. Now I can't. I am not staying out of spite, but because I have to. I have got to be here."

"Go to your father, the devil," he groaned, and gnashed his teeth.

I went away from him, and a little while later he was ordered to go to the monastic inn in the city, and I never saw him again.