The Forged Coupon: Chapter 2

Chapter 2

DURING the first month in prison Stepan suffered from the same agonising
vision. He saw the grey wall of his cell, he heard the sounds of the
prison; the noise of the cell below him, where a number of convicts were
confined together; the striking of the prison clock; the steps of the
sentry in the passage; but at the same time he saw HER with that kindly
face which conquered his heart the very first time he met her in the
street, with that thin, strongly-marked neck, and he heard her soft,
lisping, pathetic voice: "To destroy somebody's soul . . . and, worst of
all, your own. . . . How can you? . . ."

After a while her voice would die away, and then black faces would
appear. They would appear whether he had his eyes open or shut. With his
closed eyes he saw them more distinctly. When he opened his eyes they
vanished for a moment, melting away into the walls and the door; but
after a while they reappeared and surrounded him from three sides,
grinning at him and saying over and over: "Make an end! Make an end!
Hang yourself! Set yourself on fire!" Stepan shook all over when he
heard that, and tried to say all the prayers he knew: "Our Lady" or "Our
Father." At first this seemed to help. In saying his prayers he began to
recollect his whole life; his father, his mother, the village, the dog
"Wolf," the old grandfather lying on the stove, the bench on which the
children used to play; then the girls in the village with their songs,
his horses and how they had been stolen, and how the thief was caught
and how he killed him with a stone. He recollected also the first prison
he was in and his leaving it, and the fat innkeeper, the carter's wife
and the children. Then again SHE came to his mind and again he was
terrified. Throwing his prison overcoat off his shoulders, he jumped out
of bed, and, like a wild animal in a cage, began pacing up and down his
tiny cell, hastily turning round when he had reached the damp walls.
Once more he tried to pray, but it was of no use now.

The autumn came with its long nights. One evening when the wind whistled
and howled in the pipes, Stepan, after he had paced up and down his cell
for a long time, sat down on his bed. He felt he could not struggle any
more; the black demons had overpowered him, and he had to submit. For
some time he had been looking at the funnel of the oven. If he could fix
on the knob of its lid a loop made of thin shreds of narrow linen straps
it would hold. . . . But he would have to manage it very cleverly. He
set to work, and spent two days in making straps out of the linen bag
on which he slept. When the guard came into the cell he covered the
bed with his overcoat. He tied the straps with big knots and made them
double, in order that they might be strong enough to hold his weight.
During these preparations he was free from tormenting visions. When the
straps were ready he made a slip-knot out of them, and put it round his
neck, stood up in his bed, and hanged himself. But at the very moment
that his tongue began to protrude the straps got loose, and he fell
down. The guard rushed in at the noise. The doctor was called in, Stepan
was brought to the infirmary. The next day he recovered, and was removed
from the infirmary, no more to solitary confinement, but to share the
common cell with other prisoners.

In the common cell he lived in the company of twenty men, but felt as if
he were quite alone. He did not notice the presence of the rest; did not
speak to anybody, and was tormented by the old agony. He felt it most of
all when the men were sleeping and he alone could not get one moment of
sleep. Continually he saw HER before his eyes, heard her voice, and then
again the black devils with their horrible eyes came and tortured him in
the usual way.

He again tried to say his prayers, but, just as before, it did not help
him. One day when, after his prayers, she was again before his eyes, he
began to implore her dear soul to forgive him his sin, and release him.
Towards morning, when he fell down quite exhausted on his crushed linen
bag, he fell asleep at once, and in his dream she came to him with her
thin, wrinkled, and severed neck. "Will you forgive me?" he asked. She
looked at him with her mild eyes and did not answer. "Will you forgive
me?" And so he asked her three times. But she did not say a word, and
he awoke. From that time onwards he suffered less, and seemed to come to
his senses, looked around him, and began for the first time to talk to
the other men in the cell.

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