The Spy

"On account of that – sneak, I fell into this pit of an infernal life. All on account of him!"

He took a full bottle of beer into his hands, filled a glass for himself, drank it out, and without letting go of the bottle, rose from his seat.

"The money is mine, not yours, you skunk!"

"What of it? We are comrades!"

Zarubin's black head, cropped and prickly, fell back. Yevsey saw the sharp gleaming little eyes on the swarthy face, saw the set teeth.

"You wait. Sit down."

Klimkov waved the bottle, and hit him in the face, aiming at his eyes. The ruddy blood gleamed oily and moist, awakening a ferocious joy in Klimkov. He swung his hand once again, pouring the beer over himself. Everybody began to cry "Oh, oh!" to scream, and rock. Somebody's nails drove themselves into Klimkov's face. He was seized by the arms and legs, lifted from the floor, and carried off. Somebody spat warm sticky saliva into his face, squeezed his throat, and tore his hair.

He came to his senses in the police station, all in tatters, scratched, and wet. He at once remembered everything.

"What will happen now?" was his first thought, though unaccompanied by alarm.

A police officer whom he knew advised him to wash his face and ride home.

"Are they going to try me?"

"I don't know," said the police officer, who sighed, and added enviously, "Hardly. Your department is a power. It is permitted everything. So they'll take care of you."

Yevsey smiled.

After several days of a sort of even indistinct life without impressions and excitement, Yevsey was summoned to the presence of Filip Filippovich, who shouted shrilly a long time.

"You, idiot, you ought to set other people an example of good conduct. You ought not to make scandals. Please remember that. If I learn anything of the same kind about you, I'll place you under arrest for a month. Do you hear?"

Klimkov was frightened. He shrank within himself, and began to live quietly, silently, unobserved, trying to exhaust himself as much as possible, in order to escape thought.

When he met Yakov Zarubin, he saw a small red scar over his right eye; which new feature on the mobile face was pleasant to him. The consciousness that he had found the courage and the power to strike a person raised him in his own eyes.

"Why did you do it to me?" asked Yakov.

"So," said Yevsey. "I was drunk."

"Oh, you devil! You know what a face means in our service. We can't afford to spoil it."

Zarubin demanded a treat for a good dinner from Yevsey.

CHAPTER XXIV

Klimkov did not succeed in hiding himself from the power of hostile thoughts. They appeared again.

The news spread among the spies that some of the ministers had also been bribed by the enemies of the Czar and Russia. They had formed a cabal to take his power from him, and replace the existing good Russian order of life by another order borrowed from foreign governments, which of course would be pernicious to the Russian people. Now these ministers issued a manifesto in which they claimed that with the will and consent of the Czar they announced that soon freedom would be given to the people to assemble wherever they pleased, to speak about whatever interested them, and to write and publish everything they needed to in newspapers. Moreover, they would even be granted the liberty not to believe in God.

The authorities, dismal and demoralized, again began to rush about anxiously. They again spoke kindly to the spies; and though they did not demand anything of the agents, nor advise them what to do, it was apparent that preparations were being made for the disclosure of something significant and important. For whole hours Filip Filippovich would consult secretly with Krasavin, Sasha, Solovyov, and other experienced agents; after which they all went about gloomy and preoccupied, and gave brief, unintelligible responses to the questions of their comrades.

Once the voice of Sasha, virulent and breaking with excitement leaked through the door standing slightly ajar between the outer office and the cabinet of Filip Filippovich.

"It's not about the constitution, not about politics that we ought to speak to them. We must tell them that the new order would destroy them – the quiet among them would die of starvation, the more forward would rot in prison. What sort of men have we in our service? Hybrids, degenerates, the psychically sick, stupid animals."

"You talk God knows what," Filip Filippovich piped aloud.

The mournful voice of Yasnogursky was heard next.

"What a scheme you have! My good man, I can't understand what you're driving at."

Piotr, Grokhotov, Yevsey, and two new spies were sitting in the office. One of the novices was a reddish, hook-nosed man with large freckles on his face and gold glasses; the other shaven, bald, and red-cheeked with a broad nose and a purple birthmark on his neck near his left ear. They listened attentively to Sasha's talk, glancing at each other sidewise. All kept silent. Piotr rose a number of times, and walked to the door. Finally he coughed aloud near it, upon which an invisible hand immediately closed it. The bald spy carefully felt his nose with his thick fingers, and asked quietly:

"Who was it he called hybrids?"

At first nobody responded, then Grokhotov sighing humbly said:

"He calls everybody hybrid."

"A smart beast!" exclaimed Piotr smiling dreamily. "Rotten to the core, but just see how his power keeps rising! That's what education will do for you."

The bald-headed spy looked at everybody with his mole eyes, and again asked hesitatingly:

"What does he mean – eh, eh – does he mean us?"

"Politics," said Grokhotov. "Politics is a wise business. It's not squeamish."

"If I had received an education, I too, would have turned up trumps," declared Piotr.

The red-headed spy carelessly swung himself on his chair, his mouth frequently gaping in a wide yawn.

Sasha emerged from the cabinet, livid and dishevelled. He stopped at the door, and looked at everybody.

"Eavesdropping, eh?" he asked sarcastically.

The rest of the spies dropped into the office one by one, wearily and dismally, flinging various remarks at one another. Maklakov came in an ill humor. The look in his eyes was sharp and insulting. He passed quickly into the cabinet, and banged the door behind him.

"Tables are going to be turned," Sasha said to Piotr. "We'll be the secret society, and they'll remain patent fools. That's what's going to happen. Hey," he shouted, "no one is to leave the office. There's going to be a meeting."

All grew still. Yasnogursky came out from the cabinet with a broad smile widening his large mouth. His protuberant fleshy ears reached to the back of his neck. All sleek and slippery, he produced the impression of a large piece of soap. He walked among the crowd of spies pressing their hands and kindly and humbly nodding his head. Suddenly he walked off into a corner, and began to address the agents in a lachrymose voice:

"Good servants of the Czar, it is with a heart penetrated by grief that I address myself to you – to you, men without fear, men without reproach, true children of the Czar, your father, and of the true Orthodox Church, your mother, – to you I speak."

"Look at him howling!" somebody whispered near Yevsey, who thought he heard Yasnogursky utter an ugly oath.

"You already know of the fresh cunning of the enemy, of the new and baneful plot. You read the proclamation of Minister Bulygin, in which it is said that our Czar wishes to renounce the power entrusted to him by our Lord God over Russia and the Russian people. All this, dear comrades and brothers, is the infernal game of people who have delivered over their souls to foreign capitalists. It is a new attempt to ruin our sacred Russia. What do they want to attain with the Duma they have promised? What do they want to attain by this very constitution and liberty?"

The spies moved closer together.

"In the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, let us examine the snares of the devils in the light of truth. Let us look at them with our simple Russian mind, and we'll see how they scatter like dust before our eyes. Just look! They want to deprive the Czar of his divine power, his liberty to rule the country according to the dictates from on High. They want to arrange popular elections, so that the people should send to the Czar their representatives, who would promulgate laws abridging his power. They hope that our people, ignorant and drunk, will permit themselves to be bought with wine and money, and will bring into the Czar's palace those who are pointed out to them by the traitors, liberals and revolutionists. And whom will they point out? Jews, Poles, Armenians, Germans, and other strangers, enemies of Russia."