The Spy

"Ah, ah! Hit him on the head! Hey, hey!"

And a thin hysterical voice pealed in ecstasy:

"Tear him to pieces, my dear people. Choke him! Enough! Their time is past! Now we'll give it to them. Now our turn has come – "

All the cries were suddenly covered by a loud ejaculation full of mournful disdain:

"Idiots!"

Yevsey reeled from weakness in his legs. He walked to the platform, from which he saw a dark heap of people. With bent backs, swinging their arms and legs, groaning with the strain of excitement, uttering tired hoarse articulations, they stirred busily on the street, like large shaggy worms, as they dragged over the stones the body of the fair-haired youth, already crushed and torn. They kicked at it, tramped on its face and chest, pulled its hair, its legs and arms, and simultaneously tore him in different directions. Half bare, covered with blood, it flapped against the stones, soft as dough, with each blow losing more and more semblance of a human figure. These people worked over him industriously. The little lean muzhik trying to crush his skull, stepped on it with one foot, and sang out:

"Aha! Our time has come, too."

The work was accomplished. One after the other they left the middle of the street for the pavement. A pockmarked fellow wiped his hands on his short sheepskin overcoat, and asked with the air of a manager, or superintendent:

"Who took his pistol?"

Now the voices sounded weary, reluctant. But on the pavement a laugh was heard coming from a small group of people standing next to the lamp-post. An offended voice was discussing hotly:

"You lie! I was the first. The second he fell I gave him one on the jaw with my boot."

"Cabman Mikhailov pounced on him first, then I."

"Mikhailov got a bullet in his leg."

"If it didn't hit the bone, it's all right."

These people after tasting blood had apparently grown bolder. They looked around on all sides with unsatiated eyes, with greed, and assured expectation.

In the middle of the street lay a formless dark heap, from which blood was oozing into the hollows between the stones.

"That's the way – " Yevsey thought, looking at the red designs on the paving. In the dark red mist trembling before his eyes appeared the hairy face of Melnikov. His voice was tired and muffled.

"There, they've killed him!"

"Yes, how quickly!"

"They killed another one this morning."

"What for?"

"He was speaking. He was standing on the curb addressing the people. Chasin fired into his stomach."

"What for?" Yevsey repeated.

"Those speakers are deceivers – a spurious manifesto – there's no such thing – all a bluff!"

"Sasha thought that all out," said Yevsey quietly, with conviction.

Melnikov shook his head, and looked at his large hands.

"Somebody always deceives," he mumbled in a drunken voice.

He entered the car, and raised Zarubin lightly, placing him on the bench face up.

"He's dead. There's where it hit him – "

Yevsey sought the scar on Zarubin's face that the blow of the bottle had left. He did not find it. Now over the right eye was a little red hole from which Klimkov could not tear his eyes. It absorbed his entire attention, and aroused sharp pity for Yakov.

"Have you a pistol?" asked Melnikov.

"No."

"There, take Yakov's."

"I don't want to. I don't need it."

"Now everybody needs a pistol," said Melnikov simply, and slipped the revolver into Yevsey's overcoat pocket. "Yes, there was a Yakov, now there is no Yakov."

"It was I who marked him for death," thought Yevsey, looking at his comrade's face.

Zarubin's brows were sternly drawn. A look of serious preoccupation gleamed and died away in his dim eyes. His little black mustache bristled on his raised lip. He appeared to be annoyed. His half-open mouth seemed ready to pour forth a rapid torrent of irritated talk.

"Come," said Melnikov.

"And he – how about them?" asked Yevsey, tearing his eyes from Zarubin.

"The police will take them away. It's against the law to remove the killed. Let's go somewhere, and shake ourselves up. I haven't eaten to-day. I can't eat – the third day without food. No sleep either." He sighed painfully, and concluded with somber sang froid. "I should have been killed in Yakov's place."

"Sasha will ruin all," said Yevsey, through his teeth. "He'll ruin us all."

"Blindness of the soul."

They walked along the street without observing anything, and each spoke that with which his own mind was occupied. Both were like drunken men.

"Where's the truth?" asked Melnikov, putting his hand forward, as if to test the air.

"There, you see, two have been killed," said Yevsey, making an effort to catch an elusive thought.

"Many people have been killed to-day, I should think. All are blind."

"Why did Sasha arrange this?"

"I don't love him either."

"He's the one who ought to be killed," exclaimed Yevsey, with bitter vengefulness.

Melnikov was silent for a long time. Then he suddenly shook his fist in the air, and said resolutely: