"Don't touch me; I feel bad enough without that. I feel very sick." Afterward, when I was put behind the stove as a punishment, she said to grandmother: "That boy has no feeling; he does n't love any one." It hurt me to hear that. When my mother punished me I was sorry for her. I felt uncomfortable for her sake, because she seldom punished me deservedly or justly. On the whole, I had received a great deal of ill treatment in my life. Those people on the other side of the fence, for example, must know that I was frightened of being alone in the cemetery, yet they wanted to frighten me more. Why? I should like to have shouted to them, "Go to the devil!" but that might have been disastrous. Who knew what the devil would think of it, for no doubt he was somewhere near? There was a lot of mica in the sand, and it gleamed faintly in the moonlight, which reminded me how, lying one day on a raft on the Oka, gazing into the water, a bream suddenly swam almost in my face, turned on its side, looking like a human cheek, and, looking at me with its round, bird-like eyes, dived to the bottom, fluttering like a leaf falling from a maple-tree. My memory worked with increasing effort, recalling different episodes of my life, as if it were striving to protect itself against the imaginations evoked by terror. A hedgehog came rolling along, tapping on the sand with its strong paws. It reminded me of a hobgoblin; it was just as little and as disheveled-looking. I remembered how grandmother, squatting down beside the stove, said, "Kind master of the house, take away the beetles." Far away over the town, which I could not see, it grew lighter. The cold morning air blew against my cheeks and into my eyes. I wrapped myself in my blanket. Let come what would! Grandmother awoke me. Standing beside me and pulling off the blanket, she said: "Get up! Aren't you chilled? Well, were you frightened?" "I was frightened, but don't tell any one; don't tell the other boys." "But why not?" she asked in amazement. "If you were not afraid, you have nothing to be proud about." As he went home she said to me gently: "You have to experience things for yourself in this world, dear heart. If you can't teach yourself, no one else can teach you." By the evening I was the "hero" of the street, and every one asked me, "Is it possible that you were not afraid?" And when I answered, "I was afraid," they shook their heads and exclaimed, "Aha! you see!" The shopkeeper went about saying loudly: "It may be that they talked nonsense when they said that Kalinin walked. But if he did, do you think he would have frightened that boy? No, he would have driven him out of the cemetery, and no one would know where he went." Ludmilla looked at me with tender astonishment. Even grandfather was obviously pleased with me. They all made much of me. Only Tchurka said gruffly: "It was easy enough for him; his grandmother is a witch!" CHAPTER III