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What happened to me I am utterly unable to describe. I was some steps from David when he leapt off the parapet … but I don’t even remember whether I cried out; I don’t think that I was even frightened: I was stunned, stupefied. I could not stir hand or foot. People were running and hustling round me; some of them seemed to be people I knew. I had a sudden glimpse of Trofimitch, the soldier with the pike dashed off somewhere, the horses and the waggons passed by quickly, tossing up their noses covered with string. Then everything was green before my eyes and someone gave me a violent shove on my head and all down my back … I fell fainting.

I remember that I came to myself afterwards and seeing that no one was paying any attention to me went up to the parapet but not on the side that David had jumped. It seemed terrible to me to approach it, and as I began gazing into the dark blue muddy swollen river, I remember that I noticed a boat moored to the bridge not far from the bank, and several people in the boat, and one of these, who was drenched all over and sparkling in the sun, bending over the edge of the boat was pulling something out of the water, something not very big, oblong, a dark thing which at first I took to be a portmanteau or a basket; but when I looked more intently I saw that the thing was–David. Then in violent excitement I shouted at the top of my voice and ran towards the boat, pushing my way through the people, but when I had run down to it I was overcome with timidity and began looking about me. Among the people who were crowding about it I recognised Trankvillitatin, the cook Agapit with a boot in his hand, Yushka, Vassily … the wet and shining man held David’s body under the arms, drew him out of the boat and laid him on his back on the mud of the bank. Both David’s hands were raised to the level of his face as though he were trying to hide himself from strange eyes; he did not stir but lay as though standing at attention, with his heels together and his stomach out. His face was greenish–his eyes were staring and water was dripping from his hair. The wet man who had pulled him out, a factory hand, judging by his clothes, began describing how he had done it, shivering with cold and continually throwing back his hair from his forehead as he talked. He told his story in a very proper and painstaking way.

“What do I see, friends? This young lad go flying from the bridge…. Well! … I ran down at once the way of the current for I knew he had fallen into mid-stream and it would carry him under the bridge and there … talk of the devil! … I looked: something like a fur cap was floating and it was his head. Well, quick as thought, I was in the water and caught hold of him…. It didn’t need much cleverness for that!”

Two or three words of approval were audible in the crowd.

“You ought to have something to warm you now. Come along and we will have a drink,” said someone.

But at this point all at once somebody pushed forward abruptly: it was Vassily.

“What are you doing, good Christians?” he cried, tearfully. “We must bring him to by rolling him; it’s our young gentleman!”

“Roll him, roll him,” shouted the crowd, which was continually growing.

“Hang him up by the feet! it’s the best way!”

“Lay him with his stomach on the barrel and roll him backwards and forwards…. Take him, lads.”

“Don’t dare to touch him,” put in the soldier with the pike. “He must be taken to the police station.”