. From the top of
the dome broad sunbeams descended to the ground. In both choirs the
boys sang softly:

"Christ has arisen from the dead."

"Arrest them!" the priest suddenly cried, standing up in the middle of
the church. His vestments vanished from his body, and a gray, stern
mustache appeared on his face. All the people started to run, and the
deacon, flinging the censer aside, rushed forward, seizing his head in
his hands like the Little Russian. The mother dropped the infant on
the ground at the feet of the people. They ran to the side of her,
timidly regarding the naked little body. She fell on her knees and
shouted to them: "Don't abandon the child! Take it with you!"

"Christ has arisen from the dead," the Little Russian sang, holding his
hands behind his back, and smiling. He bent down, took the child, and
put it on the wagon loaded with timber, at the side of which Nikolay
was walking slowly, shaking with laughter. He said:

"They have given me hard work."

The street was muddy, the people thrust their faces from the windows of
the houses, and whistled, shouted, waved their hands. The day was
clear, the sun shone brightly, and there was not a single shadow
anywhere.

"Sing, mother!" said the Little Russian. "Oh, what a life!"

And he sang, drowning all the other sounds with his kind, laughing
voice. The mother walked behind him, and complained:

"Why does he make fun of me?"

But suddenly she stumbled and fell in a bottomless abyss. Fearful
shrieks met her in her descent.

She awoke, shivering and yet perspiring. She put her ear, as it were,
to her own breast, and marveled at the emptiness that prevailed there.
The whistle blew insistently. From its sound she realized that it was
already the second summons. The room was all in disorder; the books
and clothes lay about in confusion; everything was turned upside down,
and dirt was trampled over the entire floor.

She arose, and without washing or praying began to set the room in
order. In the kitchen she caught sight of the stick with the piece of
red cloth. She seized it angrily, and was about to throw it away under
the oven, but instead, with a sigh, removed the remnant of the flag
from the pole, folded it carefully, and put it in her pocket. Then she
began to wash the windows with cold water, next the floor, and finally
herself; then dressed herself and prepared the samovar. She sat down at
the window in the kitchen, and onc