e touched with an imperceptible movement
of her fingers the circular mark on the middle finger of her right hand,
the mark of a ring which had been recently removed.

She gazed at the sky without caressing kindness or joyous
recollections--she looked at it simply because in all the filthy,
official hall the blue bit of sky was the most beautiful, the purest,
the most truthful object, and the only one that did not try to search
hidden depths in her eyes.

The judges pitied Sergey Golovin; her they despised.

Her neighbor, known only by the name of Werner, sat also motionless, in
a somewhat affected pose, his hands folded between his knees. If a face
may be said to look like a false door, this unknown man closed his
face like an iron door and bolted it with an iron lock. He stared
motionlessly at the dirty wooden floor, and it was impossible to tell
whether he was calm or whether he was intensely agitated, whether he was
thinking of something, or whether he was listening to the testimony of
the detectives as presented to the court. He was not tall in stature.
His features were refined and delicate. Tender and handsome, so that he
reminded you of a moonlit night in the South near the seashore, where
the cypress trees throw their dark shadows, he at the same time gave the
impression of tremendous, calm power, of invincible firmness, of cold
and audacious courage. The very politeness with which he gave brief and
precise answers seemed dangerous, on his lips, in his half bow. And if
the prison garb looked upon the others like the ridiculous costume of
a buffoon, upon him it was not noticeable, so foreign was it to his
personality. And although the other terrorists had been seized with
bombs and infernal machines upon them, and Werner had had but a black
revolver, the judges for some reason regarded him as the leader of the
others and treated him with a certain deference, although succinctly and
in a business--like manner.

The next man, Vasily Kashirin, was torn between a terrible, dominating
fear of death and a desperate desire to restrain the fear and not betray
it to the judges. From early morning, from the time they had been led
into court, he had been suffocating from an intolerable palpitation of
his heart. Perspiration came out in drops all along his forehead; his
hands were also perspiring and cold, and his cold, sweat-covered shirt
clung to his body, interfering with the freedom of his movements. With a
supernatu