CHAPTER XVIII

THE FORWARDING PRISON

AT last they reached the forwarding prison, where they had to await the arrival of the convict-barge which was to take them up the Volga. Here the fathers were to join their families, and occupy the family kamera, or ward set apart for those prisoners whose wives had chosen to accompany them into exile. Through filthy corridors, the women and children were conducted to a still more filthy kamera. It was a long and narrow room, with two windows which would not open. No furniture was in it, except two parallel wooden platforms, each about twelve feet wide, raised a few inches in the middle, thus giving to them sloping sides. This was to be their bed, where the whole party was to lie as closely packed as possible, with heads touching one another in the middle, from the opposite slopes. There were no pillows, no mattresses, no bed-clothing of any kind. Russian peasants are a hardy race, not accustomed to comforts, but this absolute bareness filled the women with dismay for themselves and their children. Every limb, every bone, every muscle was aching from their long journey, and these bare planks formed their only resting-place. There was not even a bench for them to sit down upon.

Michael found Katerina, the young mother, sobbing bitterly over her baby.

"What is the matter, Katerina?" he asked pityingly.

"Look at it!" she cried, putting the baby in his arms. "I haven't been able to wash it for five days. And oh, Michael, it's covered with horrid things, and so am I."

The tiny creature's skin was blotched and smeared, and its little face was terribly disfigured. Michael could hardly find voice to comfort Katerina.

"It will be better now," he said at last. "One of the convoy men told me we were sure to stay here five days or a week. We shall have time to rest. And, Katerina dear, God knows all about it."

"Does He?" she asked doubtingly.

But before he could answer the prisoners came in. Michael flew to his father and flung his arms round his neck, holding him in a close embrace; for he could not bear yet to look into his dear, disfigured face. Khariton met his wife and children in speechless delight, too happy to find even words of endearment. Michael saw Katerina hanging on her young husband's arm, no longer sobbing. All the Stundists had their heads half shaved, like the worst criminals. Sergius and Marfa turned their eyes away from their father's grief-worn face, but Tatiania kissed the poor dishonoured head tenderly.

"We're all together, Khariton!" she cried. "Not one of us is missing. If we all get through to the end, we shall have a home again."

"If God wills it!" said Khariton, taking little Clava into his arms.

Marfa ventured to look at her father, and stole to his side, though she said nothing. They felt happier than they could have imagined it possible to be a few hours before. The cramped limbs and aching heads were almost forgotten. They were together again, with no fear of separation in the future.

Alexis and Michael sat hand in hand on the foot of the sleeping-platform, not able to utter more than a few disjointed sentences. Alexis had been almost utterly cast down by the discovery of the clean sweep which had been made of the Stundists in Knishi. They were all here, with the exception of Nicolas the renegade, and the children who had been taken from their parents to be brought up in the Orthodox Church. Whether they were all to be sent to the same place of exile as himself, or scattered hither and thither in Siberia, he did not know. Just now he was as much worn-out in mind as in body, and he could hardly think of his fellow-prisoners. He could only think feebly of God. From time to time, he muttered absently, "'Persecuted, but not forsaken; cast down, but not destroyed.'"

Michael sat beside him, stiff and weary in body, but with his mind in a tumult. This going into exile, on étape, was very different from what he had imagined. It had seemed beforehand a much lighter experience, mingled indeed with some elements of adventures and pleasures in the long march. But to be pent up in railway waggons like cattle trucks, and be conveyed like cattle from place to place, was quite a different thing. The cries of little children, the wailing of babies, the sobs and prayers and curses of women during the long journey, had entered like iron into his very soul. Hunger and thirst, plank beds and bitter cold, he had been prepared for, but not for the degradation and the untold misery and the wickedness that surrounded him. His father was no longer chained to the brutal murderer who had been his comrade on the march from Kovylsk, for that man's family had abandoned him. But there were men and boys in the kamera so evil and depraved that they did not open their lips without uttering words so vile as to appal him. How could they hinder the girls and children from hearing the common conversation around them? He thanked God again that Velia was not there.

There were women there of the lowest class, degraded to the deepest corruption, not worthy of the name of women. In the corner near Katerina and Tatiania, a young lady sat on the edge of the nari, gazing round with terrified eyes. She was a political prisoner, going into exile as a suspected person. Children of all ages crawled about the filthy floor. There was still light enough to see them—unwashed, weary little ones, with matted hair hanging about their begrimed faces. There had been no chance of washing for any of them; and some of these children were too much accustomed to such a condition to be consciously affected by it. But the Stundists were used to cleanliness, and they suffered from enforced defilement. They felt degraded and injured by it. Clava's sweet little face was soiled with dust and tears. Michael shook himself as if in a rage, as he felt the indescribable offensiveness of the surroundings.

Was it possible the archbishop could think he was doing God service by dooming men and women and children to such a state of misery? Father Cyril said the archbishop was an eminent servant of the Lord Jesus Christ, and only desired their salvation. It could not be true. Either he was quite ignorant of what was being done in his name, or he belonged to the synagogue of Satan—that terrible congregation of devil-worshippers, the very name of which made him shudder when he read the words, "'Behold, I will make them of the synagogue of Satan, which say they are Jews, and are not, but do lie.'"

His father was falling into a troubled sleep beside him, and Michael heard him muttering in an undertone, "'My God! My God!'" It was the only prayer his weary, worn-out brain could form. Michael bent over him and kissed his shaven head reverently.