CHAPTER X

MOTHERS AND CHILDREN

BUT to get little Clava away from her mother, Tatiania, was a hard task, almost an impossible one. The other parents recognised the absolute impossibility of evading the order of the consistory, and they listened submissively to the arrangements made for their children by the Batoushka, who was supported by Alexis Ivanoff. But Tatiania would listen to no reasoning or persuasion. Her husband had been in prison for nine months, and but for Sergius and Marfa, who had done all the work on their land, and with their beehives, the family would have fallen into dire poverty. They were, of course, much poorer than they had been in former years. But she would not give up her darling, she declared—no, not if the archbishop himself came to take her away. The Matoushka came to entreat her to trust little Clava to her, but in vain.

"Oh, foolish woman!" cried Paraska to her. "You'd know where she was, and how kind they were to her, and you'd see her in the street, and watch her growing up and changing into a girl. And I shouldn't know my boys now if I saw them. They were babies when they took them from me eight years ago, and now—! No, I'd pass them in the road and not know them for my own sons."

It was not until a letter came from Khariton Kondraty, written in his prison cell in Kovylsk, bidding his wife give up the child, that Tatiania yielded, and little Clava went to the church-house, where Velia was already settled.

Profound grief, underneath which lay a presentiment of still heavier calamities, if that were possible, took possession of the little community of Stundists. Every house had lost one or two of its children. Several of the mothers, with their hungry love for their little ones, could not keep aloof from the village church, where alone they could see them and be for a short time under the same roof. Paraska told them they were highly favoured; she did not even know if her boys were living. Alexis Ivanoff in his great pity did not reproach the women for their stolen attendances at the parish church. Velia had returned to him for two or three days before he was compelled to resign her to the care of Father Cyril and the sweet-tempered Matoushka. They had been days of unutterable anguish, the Gethsemane of his soul. After this sacrifice to his faith, no trial could be too bitter.

The old Matoushka, Father Vasili's widow, took care that a report of the return of the heretic mothers to the Orthodox Church should reach Father Paissy's ears. He heard it with a smile of self-satisfaction. At last, then, he had discovered a way of dealing with the Stundists of the diocese.

Michael's spirit in those days was hot and mutinous within him. Not so much on account of Velia, whom he could visit frequently, but for the sake of his father and little Clava's mother, who could hold no intercourse with their children, and who were visibly aged by their grief. Why could not the Stundists do as the Scottish Covenanters had done before them, set up the standard of revolt, and defend themselves until the right cause triumphed? Why should not they strike a blow for freedom—at any rate, for freedom to serve and worship God according to their conscience? Alexis listened to his boy with a melancholy smile.

"First of all," he answered, "because we remember that our Lord suffered His enemies to take Him and crucify Him, though He might have had a legion of angels to take vengeance on them. He said to Simon Peter, 'Put up thy sword into its place: for all they that take the sword shall perish with the sword.' 'The cup that My Father hath given Me, shall not I drink it?' Yes, Lord, we must drink the cup that Thou givest us! Cannot God save us, if that be best for us and for our country?"

"Yes," replied the boy.

"That is the chief point," pursued Alexis, "but to revolt would be utter madness. It would mean our extermination. Scotland is a small country, and the Covenanters could easily band together. Besides, the people were mostly in their favour. But Russia is vast, and the people are our enemies, and will be as long as superstition and drink have the upper hand. Here in Knishi, with nearly a hundred parishioners—that is, heads of families—only nine of us are Stundists. Our nearest sister church is in Kovylsk, a day's journey from us; there are some thousands of inhabitants, and not more than a hundred brethren who are quite sound in the faith. Our little churches are feeble in themselves, and lie miles apart. Truly, if we took the sword, we should quickly perish with the sword. We could not combine for resistance; we can only do so for mutual sympathy and help. No, my boy, it is God's will, and we must submit to it."

The Russian people, like all Eastern nations, are fatalists; and Alexis Ivanoff was not without this strain in his temperament. There is an element of peace in it, but not much element of progress. Boy as he was, Michael chafed against it with all the love of freedom, and a desire to strike a blow for it, which he had inherited from his Scottish ancestors. God's will was ever for the right, and this persecution was wrong.

The children over ten years of age were suffering in many ways, besides having their younger brothers and sisters ruthlessly separated from them. They could not pass along the village street, or drive their parents' oxen to water at the village well, without having stones or clods thrown at them. If they went out in numbers for mutual protection, the Orthodox children formed bands which lay in ambush to attack them. At a lonely cottage, left in charge of two girls whilst their parents were working in the communal lands, the door was locked, and the young persecutors gathered a quantity of reeds and ill-smelling weeds, and set fire to them under the unglazed window, until the noisome smoke almost suffocated the terrified girls. It was useless to complain to the Starosta, and Father Cyril found himself powerless to prevent such outrages.

The women dared not send their girls to the shop; and only big boys like Michael and Sergius could water the cattle, or fill the buckets for home use. They did it under a constant shower of abuse, occasionally accompanied by skilfully aimed missiles. But on the whole the village boys were afraid of Michael.

One day, as Michael was going down to the river to look after some wicker fish-traps he had hidden in the water, he saw a girl standing in the track leading to the washing-place, with a big boy brandishing a whip over her. Before he could reach them, the long lash was falling upon the girl's bowed shoulders and bare ankles in rapid stinging stripes. She stood motionless, protecting her face with her hands, and uttering no cry. The clothes she had been washing lay trampled in the mud. It was Marfa, and the boy who was flogging her was Okhrim's grandson, and a bully and a coward. Michael had just been reading how Moses in Egypt saw one of his brethren suffer wrong, and forthwith avenged him that was oppressed, and smote the Egyptian. He considered the example of Moses was to be followed.

"Stop that!" he cried, seizing the whip, and breaking the handle of it in two. "You coward! Come on and fight me, if you dare, you mean, skulking, miserable coward!"

But the boy dared not fight. He stood still for a moment glaring at them; then, spitting at Marfa, turned away, running as fast as he could. Michael was for pursuing him, but Marfa held him fast by the arm.

"Oh, Michael, you shouldn't, you shouldn't!" she sobbed, lifting up her tear-stained face. "I could have borne it. Oh yes, I was bearing it. I was saying to myself, 'This is for Jesus Christ's sake.' I didn't cry out, did I, Michael?"

"No," he answered; "you were quite dumb. But I couldn't stand by and see a girl flogged like that. No, no, Marfa! I did right, and I should do it again."

"It will bring us both into trouble," said Marfa, picking up the soiled clothes, and carrying them back to the washing-stage.

Michael lingered about till she was ready to go home. And after seeing her there safely, he went on to his father's house, carefully avoiding the village street. Alexis looked greatly troubled when Michael told him what had happened.

"I will go and tell Father Cyril after dark," he said. "If anyone can help us, he can and will. You did right, but no one knows what the issue may be. Tell me, my son, did you feel angry with the boy?"

Michael flung back his head, and his face grew crimson.

"I felt as savage as a wild beast," he cried; "if I had not broken the whip and flung it away the first moment, I should have flogged him."

"Thank God you didn't!" answered Alexis. "But oh, Michael, my boy, you must learn to 'love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them that despitefully use you and persecute you.' It is our Lord's command."

"It is too hard for me yet, father," said Michael frankly. "I could forgive them gladly and make friends again, if they wanted it. But they delight in being enemies. It's as much fun to some of them to lurk round corners and throw stones at us from behind, as it used to be to play games with us. But I'll try to keep our Lord's commands; I'll try my utmost. A boy can't be perfect all at once."

"Nor a man either," said Alexis, with a smile and a sigh. "It is a hard saying, but He who said it will give us grace to obey it. Only love Him, Michael, and, presently we shall learn to love all for whom He died."

In the dusk Alexis went to the church-house. It was somewhat larger than his own, and possessed a slate roof, and glass in every casement. It stood near the church, and not far from the cemetery, where, until the last few years, all the village comrades in life had found their last resting-place for their toil-worn and wearied bodies. But now the Stundists were forbidden to bury their dead beside their forefathers. Any unconsecrated hole was good enough for their unhallowed corpses. Father Cyril was sitting alone, but the voices of the Matoushka and the children could be heard in the kitchen, where supper was being prepared. Alexis heard Velia's beloved voice singing an evening hymn with the other little ones. Father Cyril was reading by the light of a lamp with three wicks. Through the uncurtained window could be seen the dim, great plain, which lay like a sea round the little island of Knishi. The first slight veil of snow was lying softly upon it, for the autumn was already over.

Father Cyril invited Alexis to sit down. The former Batoushka had zealously testified to his religion by not permitting a heretic to take a seat in his house. Alexis sat down by the window, gazing out at the white wilderness on which the moon was shining softly. He told his story simply, without looking at the Batoushka.

"Would to God I had been there instead of Michael!" exclaimed Father Cyril. "I always suspected that young rascal was the ringleader in this persecution of children by children. If I could but have laid my hand upon him! Then I would have sent a report to the archbishop. Surely no servant of God could wink at such an evil. It frustrates all my efforts to teach them mercy and loving-kindness. It is making them more savage and cruel than their parents were before them."

Father Cyril's voice faltered, and Alexis turned to see why he ceased speaking. He had buried his face in his hands, and the lamplight shone upon tears trickling through his interlaced fingers.

"Father, forgive them! They know not what they do," murmured Alexis.

"Amen!" said the Batoushka.

Before them both, the Orthodox priest and the heretical Stundist, there rose a vision of their crucified Lord, in the hour of His bodily anguish, when rude, rough hands were nailing Him to His cross on Calvary. Both thought of that hour with profound pity and love, but the remembrance brought more strength and comfort to Alexis than to Father Cyril.

"Amen!" he repeated. "Our Lord said it. And He also said, 'Blessed are you when men shall revile you, and persecute you, for My sake. Rejoice, and be exceeding glad.' Father Cyril, we are ready to follow where the Lord leads."

"But what about the persecutors?" said Father Cyril. "And I am on their side. Alexis, it will break my heart!"

They were silent for some minutes.

"I fear this will bring fresh trouble," said the Batoushka, "but I will send a report at once to the archbishop. You are sure Michael did not strike the Starosta's grandson?"

"He confesses he would have done it," replied Alexis, "if he had not broken the whip and thrown it away the first moment. But who will believe him?"

"I will go and see Marfa first thing in the morning," said Father Cyril. "Little Clava and your Velia are in there," he added, nodding towards the kitchen; "they are dear children to us."

The children had just finished singing, and pattering steps came towards the door to fetch Father Cyril to supper. He hastened to intercept them and send them back; for no heretic parents were permitted to hold any intercourse with the children taken from them.