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And I have an abscess on my finger!" he mumbled. "What are we to do?" asked Vlasova, wiping the perspiration from her face with a hand that trembled nervously. "Wait a while! Don't be afraid," answered Fedya, running his sound hand through his curly hair. "But you are afraid yourself!" "I?" He reddened and smiled in embarrassment. "Yes h-m I had a fit of cowardice, the devil take it!
"Whom have you here?" Vlasova asked softly. "A son, a student," answered the old woman in a loud, brusque voice. "And you?" "A son, also. A workingman." "What's the name?" "Vlasov." "Never heard of him. How long has he been in prison?" "Seven weeks." "And mine has been in for ten months," said the old woman, with a strange note of pride in her voice which did not escape the notice of the mother.
At last Vlasova got permission to see her son, and one Sunday she was sitting modestly in a corner of the prison office, a low, narrow, dingy apartment, where a few more people were sitting and waiting for permission to see their relatives and friends. Evidently it was not the first time they were here, for they knew one another and in a low voice kept up a lazy, languid conversation.
On his sharp, glistening nose there always sat a pair of glasses with tortoise-shell rims, which secured him the sobriquet of "bony eyes." In a single breath and without awaiting an answer, he plied Vlasova with dry, crackling words: "How are you, Pelagueya Nilovna, how are you? How is your son? Thinking of marrying him off, hey? He's a youth full ripe for matrimony.
She vigorously seized Vlasova by the hand, with perfect good nature, however, and led her out of the door. "You mustn't be offended," she said softly, "because I dismiss you so abruptly. I know it's rude; but it's harmful for him to speak, and I still have hopes of his recovery." She pressed her hands together until the bones cracked. Her eyelids drooped wearily over her eyes.
It's hard to be a woman! It's a wretched business! To live alone is hard, to live with anyone, still harder!" "And I came to ask you to take me as your assistant," Vlasova broke in, interrupting her prattle. "How is that?" asked Marya. And after hearing her friend's explanation, she nodded her head assentingly. "That's possible! You remember how you used to hide me from my husband?
Then waving his spoon in the air, he continued: "So Vlasova the mother, as I was telling you she, too, got into the party after that. They say she's a wonder of an old woman." The mother smiled broadly. It was pleasant for her to hear the boy's enthusiastic praise pleasant, yet embarrassing.
"I will tell you later!" answered the officer with spiteful civility, and turning to Vlasova, he shouted: "Say, can you read or write?" "No!" answered Pavel. "I didn't ask you!" said the officer sternly, and repeated: "Say, old woman, can you read or write?" The mother involuntarily gave way to a feeling of hatred for the man.
But the main thing is, a true comradely feeling has been born in him, a broad, loving comradeship, which smiles in the face of every difficulty in life." Vlasova listened to Sasha attentively. She was glad to see this girl, always so stern, now softened, cheerful, and happy. Yet from some deeps of her soul arose the jealous thought: "And how about Pasha?"
Life grew ever more hurried and feverish; there was a constant rushing from house to house, a passing from one book to another, like the flirting of bees from flower to flower. "They are talking about us!" said Vyesovshchikov once. "We must get away soon." "What's a quail for but to be caught in the snare?" retorted the Little Russian. Vlasova liked the Little Russian more and more.
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