Chapter 5 - Page 2

He stretched out his white, thin hand and said loudly:

"How do you do, Sergey?"

Behind him Sergey's mother entered with short steps, smiling strangely. But she also pressed his hands and repeated loudly:

"How do you do, Seryozhenka?"

She kissed him on the lips and sat down silently. She did not rush over to him; she did not burst into tears; she did not break into a sob; she did not do any of the terrible things which Sergey had feared. She just kissed him and silently sat down. And with her trembling hands she even adjusted her black silk dress.

Sergey did not know that the colonel, having locked himself all the previous night in his little study, had deliberated upon this ritual with all his power. "We must not aggravate, but ease the last moments of our son," resolved the colonel firmly, and he carefully weighed every possible phase of the conversation, every act and movement that might take place on the following day. But somehow he became confused, forgetting what he had prepared, and he wept bitterly in the corner of the oilcloth-covered couch. In the morning he explained to his wife how she should behave at the meeting.

"The main thing is, kiss-and say nothing!" he taught her. "Later you may speak-after a while-but when you kiss him, be silent. Don't speak right after the kiss, do you understand? Or you will say what you should not say."

"I understand, Nikolay Sergeyevich," answered the mother, weeping.

"And you must not weep. For God's sake, do not weep! You will kill him if you weep, old woman!"

"Why do you weep?"

"With women one cannot help weeping. But you must not weep, do you hear?"

"Very well, Nikolay Sergeyevich."

Riding in the drozhky, he had intended to school her in the instructions again, but he forgot. And so they rode in silence, bent, both gray and old, and they were lost in thought, while the city was gay and noisy. It was Shrovetide, and the streets were crowded.

They sat down. Then the colonel stood up, assumed a studied pose, placing his right hand upon the border of his coat. Sergey sat for an instant, looked closely upon the wrinkled face of his mother and then jumped up.

"Be seated, Seryozhenka," begged the mother.

"Sit down, Sergey," repeated the father.

They became silent. The mother smiled.

"How we have petitioned for you, Seryozhenka! Father--"

"You should not have done that, mother----"

The colonel spoke firmly:

"We had to do it, Sergey, so that you should not think your parents had forsaken you."

They became silent again. It was terrible for them to utter even a word, as though each word in the language had lost its individual meaning and