The Spy

"Listen!"

Yevsey turned back noiselessly, and stood beside Maklakov.

"Let's walk together."

"He must be very drunk," thought Yevsey.

"Do you know who lives in that house?" asked Maklakov, looking back.

"No."

"Mironov, the writer. Do you remember him?"

"I do."

"Well, I should think you would. He made you out a fool so simply."

"Yes," agreed Yevsey.

They walked slowly with noiseless tread. The narrow street was quiet, deserted, and cold.

"Let's go back," continued Maklakov. Then he adjusted his hat on his head, buttoned his overcoat, and declared thoughtfully, "Brother, I am going away – to Argentine. That's in America."

Klimkov heard something hopeless, dismal in his words, and he, too, began to feel gloomy and awkward.

"Why – so far?"

"I must."

Maklakov again stopped opposite the illuminated window, and looked up to it silently. Like a huge, solitary eye on the black face of the house, it cast a peaceful beam of light into the darkness – a small island amid black and heavy waters.

"That's his window, Mironov's," said Maklakov quietly. "That's the way he sits at night all by himself and writes. Come."

Some people advanced toward them singing softly:

"It comes, it comes, the last decisive fight!"

"We ought to cross to the other side," Yevsey proposed in a whisper.

"Are you afraid?" asked Maklakov, though he was the first to step from the pavement to cross the frozen dirt of the middle of the street. "No reason to be afraid. These fellows with their songs of war and all such things are peaceful people. The wild beasts are not among them, no. It would be good to sit down now in some warm place, in a café, but everything is closed, everything is suspended, brother."

"Come home," Klimkov suggested.

"Home? No thank you. You can go if you want to."

Yevsey remained, submissively yielding to the sad expectation of something inevitable. From the other side of the street came the sound of the people's talk.

"Misha, is it possible you don't believe?" one asked in a ringing, joyous voice.

A soft bass answered:

"I do believe, but I say it won't happen so soon."

"Listen! What the devil of a spy are you, eh?" Maklakov suddenly demanded nudging Yevsey with his elbow. "I've been watching you a long time. Your face always looks as if you had just taken an emetic."

Yevsey grew glad at the possibility of speaking about himself openly.

"I am going away, Timofey Vasilyevich," he quickly mumbled. "Just as soon as everything is arranged, I am going away. I'll gradually settle myself in business, and I'm going to live quietly by myself – "

"As soon as what is arranged?"

"Why, all this about the new life. When the people start out all for themselves."

"Eh, eh," drawled the spy, waving his hand and smiling. His smile robbed Yevsey of the desire to speak about himself.

They walked in silence again, and turned again. Both were gloomy.

"There, now," Maklakov exclaimed with unexpected roughness and acerbity as they once more approached the author's house. "I'm really going away, forever, entirely from Russia. Do you understand? And I must hand over some papers to this – this author. You see this package?"

He waved a white parcel before Yevsey's face, and continued quickly, in a low growl. "I won't go to him myself. This is the second day I've been on the watch for him, waiting for him to come out. But he's sick, and he won't come out. I would have given it to him in the street. I can't send it by mail. His letters are opened and stolen in the Post Office and given over to the Department of Safety. And it's absolutely impossible for me to go to him myself. Do you understand?"

The spy pressing the package to his breast bent his head to look into Yevsey's eyes.

"My life is in this package. I have written about myself – my story – who I am, and why. I want him to read it – he loves people."

Taking Yevsey's shoulder in a vigorous clutch the spy shook him, and commanded:

"You go and give it to him, into his own hands – go, tell him that one – " Maklakov broke off, and continued after a pause – "tell him that a certain agent of the Department of Safety sent him these papers, and begs him most humbly – tell him that way, 'begs him most humbly' to read them. I'll wait here for you, on the street. Go. But look out, don't tell him I'm here. If he asks, say I've escaped, went to Argentine. Repeat what I've told you."

"Went to Argentine."

"And don't forget, 'begs most humbly.'"

"No, I won't."

"Go on, quick!"

Giving Klimkov a gentle shove on the back he escorted him to the door of the house, walked away, and stopped to observe him.

Yevsey agitated and seized with a fine tremor, lost consciousness of his own personality crushed by the commanding words of Maklakov. He pushed the electric button, and felt ready to crawl through the door in the desire to hide himself from the spy as quickly as possible. He struck it with his knee, and it opened. A dark figure loomed in the light, a voice asked testily:

"What do you want?"

"The writer, Mr. Mironov – him personally. I have been told to deliver a package into his own hands. Please, quick!" said Yevsey, involuntarily imitating the rapid and incoherent talk of Maklakov. Everything became confused in his brain. But the words of the spy lay there, white and cold as dead bones. And when a somewhat dull voice reached him, "What can I do for you, young man?" Yevsey said in an apathetic voice, like an automaton, "A certain agent of the Department of Safety sent you these papers, and begs you most humbly to read them. He has gone off to Argentine." The strange name embarrassed Yevsey, and he added in a lower voice, "Argentine, which is in America."

"Yes, but where are the papers?"

The voice sounded kind. Yevsey raised his head, and recognized the soldierly face with the reddish mustache. He pulled the package from his pocket, and handed it to him.