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She rushed to the door, lifted the latch, and admitted Sashenka. She had not seen her for a long while, and the first thing that caught her eye was the girl's unnatural stoutness. "Good evening!" she said, happy to have a visitor at such a time, to relieve her solitude for a part of the night. "You haven't been around for a long while! Were you away?"
The mother thought of the officer and Sashenka, and said with a sigh: "What sort of bread can you expect from unbolted meal?" "That's it; that's the trouble!" the Little Russian exclaimed. "You must look with two kinds of eyes; two hearts throb in your bosom. The one loves all; the other says: 'Halt! You mustn't!"
In the kitchen Sashenka said: "When you see Pavel, give him my regards, please." And taking hold of the latch, she suddenly turned around, and asked in a low voice: "May I kiss you?" The mother embraced her in silence, and kissed her warmly. "Thank you!" said the girl, and nodding her head, walked out. Returning to the room, the mother peered anxiously through the window.
She was happy that he spoke to her so openly about the matter, and that she might be useful to him in his work. "I understand all about it, Pasha," she said. "It's a piece of robbery. What's the name of the man? Yegor Ivanovich?" "Yes," said Pavel, smiling kindly. She returned late in the evening, exhausted but contented. "I saw Sashenka," she told her son. "She sends you her regards.
And for six months Sasha had lived in the lodge with her. Every morning Olenka came into his bedroom and found him fast asleep, sleeping noiselessly with his hand under his cheek. She was sorry to wake him. "Sashenka," she would say mournfully, "get up, darling. It's time for school."
I want no love, I want no friendship which gets between my feet and holds me back." "Bravo! You're a hero! Go say all this to Sashenka. You should have said that to her." "I have!" "You have! The way you spoke to your mother? You have not! To her you spoke softly; you spoke gently and tenderly to her. I did not hear you, but I know it! But you trot out your heroism before your mother. Of course!
You have a large capacity of motherliness!" "God grant it!" she said quietly. "I feel that it is good to live like that! Here are you, for instance, whom I love. Maybe I love you better than I do Pasha. He is always so silent. Here he wants to get married to Sashenka, for example, and he never told me, his mother, a thing about it." "That's not true," the Little Russian retorted abruptly.
Sashenka came running in frequently, always gloomy, always in haste, and for some reason more and more angular and stiff. Once when Pavel accompanied her out onto the porch, the mother overheard their abrupt conversation. "Will you carry the banner?" the girl asked in a low voice. "Yes." "Is it settled?" "Yes, it's my right." "To prison again?" Pavel was silent.
Oh, what a heap of them you have brought! Did you come on foot?" "Yes," said Sashenka. She was again her graceful, slender self. The mother noticed that her cheeks were shrunken, and that dark rings were under her unnaturally large eyes. "You are just out of prison. You ought to rest, and there you are carrying a load like that for seven versts!" said the mother, sighing and shaking her head.
They stood face to face plying each other with questions and laughing. Sashenka looked at them and smiled, and began to prepare the tea. The clatter of the dishes recalled the mother to the realities of the present. "Oh, excuse me! I quite forgot myself, talking about old times. It is so sweet to recall your youth."
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