less and holy. Mikheyevna said that Natasha was now just like an angel, and Kolya was envious.
"And I? How about me?" he insistently questioned the nurse.
"You are without sin, anyway. You are little still. What sins can you have committed, you little boy?"
"Then I am holy, too?" Kolya demanded categorically.
"What sins can you have committed?"
"No, tell me, am I holy?"
"Well, yes, you are holy."
"And how about what happened yesterday? Do you remember?"
"What, my boy?"
"About the jam, do you remember?" Kolya whispered, and added, "You said it was a sin."
"Of course, it's a sin. How can one do such a thing without asking permission. You must obey your mother, and you mustn't do anything on the sly. Besides you stuck your fingers into it."
"Well, then I've sinned, haven't I?"
Kolya now began to search his conscience. Remembering the days just passed he discovered several n ore sins. He had called Natasha naughty—that was one sin—he had upset the ink on his father's desk—two—he had fooled his mother. She had set him on his knees, and when she left the room he had seated himself on his heels, but when she returned he had risen to his knees again. That was three, and there were many more.
Kolya had already counted six sins when his mother passed by.
"Still fooling with the spider?" she remarked.
"I want to kill it, mama," Kolya said thoughtfully.
"That's right," the mother, who was preoccupied, dropped in passing, and walked into another room.
Kolya opened the box again. The spider scurried quickly on all sides. Kolya shook it to the floor.
"Forgive me in the next world. I would have set you free if" Kolya muttered thoughtfully while he crushed the spider under his foot.
Having accomplished the bloody deed, Kolya sat himself on the floor and began to examine the remains of the murdered insect. The only-thing left of it was a moist blotch and the legs.
"Ah, you shameless good-for-nothing! On a dirty floor! Get up!" cried the mother, appearing unexpectedly.
Kolya rose from the floor.
"Just look! Made his pants dirty again!" the mother exclaimed in vexation, brushing the dust from Kolya's knees. She gave him a slap, and pushed him into the room.
"Go in there, you shameless fellow."
Here was a strange, sudden, and unexpected conclusion to the question of sin and to Kolya's inner conflict in regard to the murder of the spider. Kolya did not feel at all pained, but he felt so offended, so offended that he couldn't say how much. He wanted to cry, and would have done so, had not the landlord's daughter come down from the upper floor to Natasha her schoolmate. Kolya was ashamed to cry in her presence. He ran off to the nursery, and hid himself in the wardrobe. He shut the closet door behind him, and crept into the farthest corner. Here it was altogether dark, and he did not have to feel ashamed. He wept quietly, and then grew silent. He did not want to cry any more. He sat on his heels and listened to what was going on in the dining room. The conversation of Mikheyevna, Natasha, and the landlord's daughter, as Kolya called Natasha's friend, reached his ear. Kolya was convinced that they were speaking about the sad end of the history of the spider. And in fact:
"Where is he now?"
"He ran away somewhere," Kolya heard Natasha reply.
"Koyla put the box under Natasha's very nose and opened the lid."
"Yes, I slapped him," explained the mother. "I put all fresh clothes on him this morning, and now he's dirty again. Where did he run to?"
Kolya held his breath, and dropped to the floor of the wardrobe.
"Kolya, Kolya!"
Kolya was silent.
"I won't creep out," he resolved, insulted and humiliated. But his mother's fur cloak, behind which the little sinner concealed himself, was very warm, and he felt stifled and hot. In a few minutes he opened the door slightly and peeped through the crack. It was light and cheerful there and not hot. He suddenly grew tired of sitting in the wardrobe, and wanted to join Natasha and Mikheyevna and the landlord's daughter. But it was necessary to wait.
He must choose an opportune moment for escaping unnoticed from the wardrobe, else the instant he was seen everybody would surely remember that his mother had slapped him; and this would make him very much ashamed, especially before the landlord's daughter. He must suffer in patience. Out of ennui Kolya began to pull hair from his mother's fur cloak. He looked through the door and listened. There was no danger—he could creep out quietly, go across me room through his mother's chamber, through his father's study and the parlor into the dining room, where they all were He stuck out one foot, but immediately withdrew it because at that instant Natasha entered the nursery. It was too late, Natasha had noticed Kolya's leg.
"Come out. I'll tell mama. The wardrobe is not meant for you to sit in. You'll soil my new dress. Come out."
"I won't."
"Mikheyevna, why is Kolya soiling my new dress? He's gotten into the wardrobe, and I don't know what he's doing there."
All was lost; both Mikheyevna and the land-
(Continued on page 14)
