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“Go away!”

“Forgive me, brother: I was tempted by the devil . . .” continued Gavrilo, trembling and kissing Tchelkache’s hand.

“Go, go away!” growled the other.

“Absolve my sin! Friend . . . forgive me!”

“Go, go to the devil!” suddenly cried out Tchelkache, sitting up on the sand. His face was pale, threatening; his clouded eyes closed as though he were very sleepy . . . “What do you want, now? You’ve finished your business . . . go! Off with you!”

He tried to kick Gavrilo, prostrated by grief, but failed, and would have fallen if Gavrilo hadn’t supported him with his shoulders. Tchelkache’s face was now on a level with Gavrilo’s. Both were pale, wretched and terrifying.

“Fie!”

Tchelkache spat in the wide opened eyes of his employe.

The other humbly wiped them with his sleeve, and murmured:

“Do what you will . . . I’ll not say one word. Pardon me, in the name of Heaven!”

“Fool, you don’t even know how to steal!” cried Tchelkache, contemptuously. He tore his shirt under his waistcoat and, gritting his teeth in silence, began to bandage his head.

“Have you taken the money?” he asked, at last.

“I haven’t taken it, brother; I don’t want it! It brings bad luck!”

Tchelkache thrust his hand into his waistcoat pocket, withdrew the package of bills, put one of them in his pocket and threw all the rest at Gavrilo.

“Take that and be off!”

“I cannot take it . . . I cannot! Forgive me!”

“Take it, I tell you!” roared Tchelkache, rolling his eyes frightfully.

“Pardon me! When you have forgiven me I’ll take it,” timidly said Gavrilo, falling on the wet sand at Tchelkache’s feet.

“You lie, fool, you’ll take it at once!” said Tchelkache, confidently, and raising his head, by a painful effort, he thrust the money before his face. “Take it, take it! You haven’t worked for nothing! Don’t be ashamed of having failed to assassinate a man! No one will claim anyone like me. You’ll be thanked, on the contrary, when it’s learned what you’ve done. There, take it! No one’ll know what you’ve done and yet it deserves some reward! Here it is!”

Gavrilo saw that Tchelkache was laughing, and he felt relieved. He held the money tightly in his hand.

“Brother! Will you forgive me? Won’t you do it? Say?” he supplicated tearfully.

“Little brother!” mimicked Tchelkache, rising on his tottering limbs. “Why should I pardon you? There’s no occasion for it. To-day it’s you, to-morrow it’ll be me . . .”

“Ah! brother, brother!” sighed Gavrilo, sorrowfully, shaking his head.

Tchelkache was standing before him, smiling strangely; the cloth wrapped around his head, gradually reddening, resembled a Turkish head-dress.

The rain fell in torrents. The sea complained dully and the waves beat angrily against the beach.

The two men were silent.

“Good-bye!” said Tchelkache, with cold irony.

He staggered, his legs trembled, and he carried his head oddly, as though he was afraid of losing it.

“Pardon me, brother!” again repeated Gavrilo.

“It’s nothing!” drily replied Tchelkache, as he supported his head with his left hand and gently pulled his moustache with his right.

Gavrilo stood gazing after him until he had disappeared in the rain that still fell in fine, close drops, enveloping the steppe in a mist as impenetrable and gray as steel.

Then Gavrilo took off his wet cap, made the sign of the cross, looked at the money pressed tightly in his hand and drew a long, deep sigh; he concealed his booty in his blouse and began to walk, taking long strides, in the opposite direction to that in which Tchelkache had gone.

The sea thundered, threw great heavy waves upon the sand and broke them into foam and spray. The rain lashed the sea and land pitilessly; the wind roared. All the air around was filled with plaints, cries and dull sounds. The rain masked sea and sky. . .

The rain and the breaking waves soon washed away the red spot where Tchelkache had been struck to the ground; they soon effaced his footprints and those of the lad on the sand, and the lonely beach was left without the slightest trace of the little drama that had been played between these two men.