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Peter Gerasimovitch began to dispute this, saying that since she did not take the money it followed naturally that she could not have had any intention of committing murder. "But I read the answer before going out," said the foreman, defending himself, "and nobody objected."

Peter Gerasimovitch spoke so irritably that the foreman became irritated too, and went on obstinately defending the opposite views; but Peter Gerasimovitch spoke so convincingly that the majority agreed with him, and decided that Maslova was not guilty of stealing the money and that the ring was given her.

The resolution was taken, not because everybody agreed upon it, but because the president, who had been summing up at such length, omitted to say what he always said on such occasions, that the answer might be, "Yes, guilty, but without the intent of taking life;" because the colonel had related the story of his brother-in-law's wife at such great length; because Nekhludoff was too excited to notice that the proviso "without intent to take life" had been omitted, and thought that the words "without intent" nullified the conviction; because Peter Gerasimovitch had retired from the room while the questions and answers were being read, and chiefly because, being tired, and wishing to get away as soon as possible, all were ready to agree with the decision which would bring matters to an end soonest.

"D'you know, sirs, we have made a shameful hash of it?" said Peter Gerasimovitch, approaching Nekhludoff, to whom the foreman was relating something. "Why, we've got her to Siberia." "What are you saying?" exclaimed Nekhludoff. This time he did not notice the teacher's familiarity.

He felt he could not allow things to go on without stating his objection; and, blushing and growing pale again, was about to speak when Peter Gerasimovitch, irritated by the authoritative manner of the foreman, began to raise his objections and said the very things Nekhludoff was about to say. "Allow me one moment," he said.

In the jurymen's room his feelings were hurt by disrespectful treatment. Among the jury there happened to be a man whom he knew, a former teacher of his sister's children, Peter Gerasimovitch. Nekhludoff never knew his surname, and even bragged a bit about this. This man was now a master at a public school.

And to-day Peter Gerasimovitch did not arouse any unpleasant feelings in Nekhludoff by his familiarity and his loud laughter. Nekhludoff would have liked to tell all the jurymen about his relations to yesterday's prisoner. "By rights," he thought, "I ought to have got up yesterday during the trial and disclosed my guilt."

"What a shameful mess we have made of it," said Peter Gerasimovitch, approaching Nekhludoff, to whom the foreman was telling a story. "Why, we have sentenced her to hard labor." "Is it possible?" exclaimed Nekhludoff, taking no notice at all this time of the unpleasant familiarity of the tutor. "Why, of course," he said.

"We have not inserted in the answer, 'Guilty, but without intent to cause death. The secretary has just told me that the law cited by the prosecutor provides fifteen years' hard labor." "But that was our verdict," said the foreman. Peter Gerasimovitch began to argue that it was self-evident that as she did not steal the money she could not have intended to take the merchant's life.

It just happened that in the jury-room Nekhludoff experienced this disagreeable feeling of being treated with disrespect. Among the jurymen there was an acquaintance of Nekhludoff. Peter Gerasimovitch was now teacher in a college. Nekhludoff could never bear his familiarity, his self-satisfied laughter in a word, his "communizing," as Nekhludoff's sister used to put it. "Ha, ha!