eaming how, when I am grown up, I will buy
goloshes exactly like them. I certainly will! The lady shudders and
goes behind the screen. It is her turn.

In the crack, between the two panels of the screen, I can see the
lady go up to the lectern and bow down to the ground, then get up,
and, without looking at the priest, bow her head in anticipation.
The priest stands with his back to the screen, and so I can only
see his grey curly head, the chain of the cross on his chest, and
his broad back. His face is not visible. Heaving a sigh, and not
looking at the lady, he begins speaking rapidly, shaking his head,
alternately raising and dropping his whispering voice. The lady
listens meekly as though conscious of guilt, answers meekly, and
looks at the floor.

"In what way can she be sinful?" I wonder, looking reverently at
her gentle, beautiful face. "God forgive her sins, God send her
happiness." But now the priest covers her head with the stole. "And
I, unworthy priest . . ." I hear his voice, ". . . by His power
given unto me, do forgive and absolve thee from all thy sins. . . ."

The lady bows down to the ground, kisses the cross, and comes back.
Both her cheeks are flushed now, but her face is calm and serene
and cheerful.

"She is happy now," I think to myself, looking first at her and
then at the priest who had forgiven her sins. "But how happy the
man must be who has the right to forgive sins!"

Now it is Mitka's turn, but a feeling of hatred for that young
ruffian suddenly boils up in me. I want to go behind the screen
before him, I want to be the first. Noticing my movement he hits
me on the head with his candle, I respond by doing the same, and,
for half a minute, there is a sound of panting, and, as it were,
of someone breaking candles. . . . We are separated. My foe goes
timidly up to the lectern, and bows down to the floor without bending
his knees, but I do not see what happens after that; the thought
that my turn is coming after Mitka's makes everything grow blurred
and confused before my eyes; Mitka's protruding ears grow large,
and melt into his dark head, the priest sways, the floor seems to
be undulating. . . .

The priest's voice is audible: "And I, unworthy priest . . ."

Now I too move behind the screen. I do not feel the ground under
my feet, it is as though I were walking on air. . . . I go up to
the lectern which is taller than I am. For a minute I have a glimpse
of the indifferent, exhaust