I asked him to tell me how people took communion, what words the priest said, and what I ought to have done.
The young fellow shook me roughly and roared out in a terrifying voice:
“You have played the truant from communion, you heretic!
Well, I am not going to tell you anything. Let your father skin you for it!”
I ran home expecting to be questioned, and certain that they would discover that I had not been to communion; but after congratulating me, the old woman asked only one question:
“How much did you give to the clerk? Much?”
“Five copecks,” I answered, without turning a hair.
“And three copecks for himself; that would leave you seven copecks, animal!”
It was springtime.
Each succeeding spring was clothed differently, and seemed brighter and pleasanter than the preceding one. The young grass and the fresh green birch gave forth an intoxicating odor. I had an uncontrollable desire to loiter in the fields and listen to the lark, lying face downward on the warm earth; but I had to clean the winter coats and help to put them away in the trunks, to cut up leaf tobacco, and dust the furniture, and to occupy myself from morning till night with duties which were to me both unpleasant and needless.
In my free hours I had absolutely nothing to live for. In our wretched street there was nothing, and beyond that I was not allowed to go. The yard was full of cross, tired workmen, untidy cooks, and washer-women, and every evening I saw disgusting sights so offensive to me that I wished that I was blind.
I went up into the attic, taking some scissors and some colored paper with me, and cut out some lace-like designs with which I ornamented the rafters.
It was, at any rate, something on which my sorrow could feed.
I longed with all my heart to go to some place where people slept less, quarreled less, and did not so wearisomely beset God with complaints, and did not so frequently offend people with their harsh judgments.
On the Saturday after Easter they brought the miraculous icon of Our Lady of Vlandimirski from the Oranski Monastery to the town. The image became the guest of the town for half of the month of June, and blessed all the dwellings of those who attended the church.
It was brought to my employers’ house on a weekday. I was cleaning the copper things in the kitchen when the young mistress cried out in a scared voice from her room:
“Open the front door. They are bringing the Oranski icon here.”
I rushed down, very dirty, and with greasy hands as rough as a brick opened the door. A young man with a lamp in one hand and a thurible in the other grumbled gently:
“Are you all asleep?
Give a hand here!”
Two of the inhabitants carried the heavy icon-case up the narrow staircase. I helped them by supporting the edge, of it with my dirty hands and my shoulder. The monk came heavily behind me, chanting unwillingly with his thick voice:
“Holy Mother of God, pray for us!”
I thought, with sorrowful conviction:
“She is angry with me because I have touched her with dirty hands, and she will cause my hands to wither.”
They placed the icon in the corner of the anti-chamber on two chairs, which were covered with a clean sheet, and on each side of it stood two monks, young and beautiful like angels. They had bright eyes, joyful expressions, and lovely hair.
Prayers were said.
“O, Mother Renowned,” the big priest chanted, and all the while he was feeling the swollen lobe of his ear, which was hidden in his luxuriant hair.
“Holy Mother of God, pray for u-u-us!” sang the monks, wearily.
I loved the Holy Virgin. According to grandmother’s stories it was she who sowed on the earth, for the consolation of the poor, all the flowers, all the joys, every blessing and beauty.
And when the time came to salute her, without observing how the adults conducted themselves toward her, I kissed the icon palpitatingly on the face, the lips.
Some one with pow — erful hands hurled me to the door.
I do not remem — ber seeing the monks go away, carrying the icon, but I remember very well how my employers sat on the floor around me and debated with much fear and anxiety what would become of me.
“We shall have to speak to the priest about him and have him taught,” said the master, who scolded me without rancor.
“Ignoramus! How is it that you did not know that you should not kiss the lips?
You must have been taught that at school.”
For several days I waited, resigned, wondering what actually would happen to me.
I had touched the icon with dirty hands; I had saluted it in a forbidden manner; I should not be allowed to go unpunished.
But apparently the Mother of God forgave the involuntary sin which had been prompted by sheer love, or else her punishment was so light that I did not notice it among the frequent punishments meted out to me by these good people.
Sometimes, to annoy the old mistress, I said compunctiously:
“But the Holy Virgin has evidently forgotten to punish me.”
“You wait,” answered the old woman, maliciously.
“We shall see.”
While I decorated the rafters of the attic with pink tea-wrappers, silver paper, leaves from trees, and all kinds of things, I used to sing anything that came into my head, setting the words to church melodies, as the Kalmucks do on the roads.
“I am sitting in the attic With scissors in my hand, Cutting paper — paper.
A dunce am I, and dull.
If I were a dog, I could run where’er I wished; But now they all cry out to me:
‘Sit down! Be silent, rogue, While your skin is whole!’ ”
The old woman came to look at my work, and burst out laughing.
“You should decorate the kitchen like that.”
One day the master came up to the attic, looked at my performance, and said, with a sigh: