She was pushed in the chest. She saw through the mist in her eyes before her the little officer; his face was red and strained, and he was shouting at her:
“Be off, woman!”
She looked at him from head to toe and saw at his feet the staff of the banner, broken in two, and on one part a piece of red material was still intact. Bending down, she picked it up. The officer ripped the pole from her hands, threw it aside and, stamping his feet, shouted:
“Be off, I say!”
From among the soldiers a song flared up and began to flow:
“Stand up now, arise, working people…”
Everything was spinning, swaying, shuddering. There was a deep, alarming noise in the air, like the dull noise of telegraph wires. The officer leapt back, screaming in irritation:
“Stop that singing! Sergeant-Major Krainov…”
Staggering, the mother went up to the fragment of staff he had thrown down and picked it up once again.
“Shut their mouths for them!…”
The song faltered, quavered, broke off, died away. Someone took the mother by the shoulders, turned her around and pushed her in the back…
“Go on, go on…”
“Clear the street!” cried the officer.
A dozen paces away from her the mother saw a crowd of people, dense once again. They were growling, grumbling, whistling and, slowly retreating into the depths of the street, spilling away into yards.
“Go on, you devil!” a young soldier with a moustache shouted right in her ear as he drew level with her, and he pushed her onto the pavement.
She set off, leaning on the staff and with her legs buckling. So as not to fall, she clutched with her other hand at walls and fences. In front of her people were backing away, beside her and behind her marched soldiers, shouting:
“Go on, go on…”
The soldiers overtook her, and she stopped and looked back. They were standing in a sparse chain at the end of the street too, soldiers, blocking the way out into the square. The square was empty. Grey figures swayed up ahead as well, moving slowly towards the people…
She meant to turn back, but unaccountably went forward once more and, on reaching a side street, narrow and deserted, turned into it.
She stopped once more. She heaved a heavy sigh and listened. Somewhere up ahead there was the hum of people.
Leaning on the staff, she began striding forward, suddenly sweating, twitching her eyebrows, moving her lips, waving an arm, and some words flared up like sparks in her heart, flared up, jostling, igniting an insistent, powerful desire to say them, to shout out…
The lane turned sharply to the left, and around the corner the mother caught sight of a large, tight knot of people; someone’s voice, loud and powerful, was saying:
“You don’t keep going towards bayonets, brothers, not for the sake of a bit of mischief!”
“How about them, eh? Soldiers coming towards them, but they just stand there! Stand there, my brothers, without fear…”
“That’s Pasha Vlasov for you!…”
“And what about the Ukrainian?”
“Hands behind his back and smiling, the devil…”
“My dears! People!” the mother cried, squeezing into the crowd. They stepped aside respectfully before her. Someone laughed.
“Look, she’s got the flag! That’s the flag in her hand!”
“Be quiet!” said another voice sternly.
The mother spread her arms wide…
“Listen, for Christ’s sake! All of you are dear… all of you are warm-hearted… look without fear – what’s happened? The children are marching through the world, our own blood marching for the truth… for everyone! For all of you, for your babies, they have condemned themselves to the Way of the Cross…* they seek bright days… They want another life in truth, in justice… they want goodness for all!”
Her heart was bursting, her breast was tight, her throat was dry and hot. Being born deep inside her were words of great love that embraced everything and everyone, and they were burning her tongue, moving it ever more powerfully, ever more freely.
She saw they were listening to her, they were all silent; she sensed the people tightly packed around her were thinking, and a desire grew within her – now already clear to her – a desire to push people in that direction, after her son, after Andrei, after all who had been handed over to the soldiers and left on their own.
Scanning the glum, attentive faces around her, she continued with gentle power:
“Our children are marching through the world towards joy, they’ve set off for the sake of everyone and for the sake of Christ’s truth against everything that our vicious, false and greedy people have used to take us captive, bind and crush us! My warm-hearted men, it’s for the entire people that our young blood has risen, you know, it’s for the entire world, for all working people that they’ve set off!… So don’t draw back from them, don’t renounce them, don’t leave your children on a lonely path. Take pity on yourselves… have faith in the hearts of your sons – they’ve given birth to the truth, and for the truth’s sake they’re perishing. Have faith in them!”
Her voice broke and, grown weak, she swayed, but someone held her up by the arms…
“It’s God’s word she’s talking!” someone cried in an agitated, muffled voice. “God’s word, good people! Listen!”
Another felt sorry for her:
“Dear me, how she’s beating herself up!”
He met with disagreement and a reproof:
“She’s not beating herself up, she’s battering us fools – get that clear!”
A high, tremulous voice soared up above the crowd:
“Christians! My Mitya, an innocent soul, what did he do? He followed his comrades, those he loved… What she says is true – why are we abandoning the children? What harm have they done us?”
The mother started to tremble at these words and responded with quiet tears.
“Go home, Nilovna! Go on, Mother! You’re worn out!” said Sizov loudly.
He was pale, his beard was dishevelled and shaking. Suddenly, knitting his brows, he cast a stern gaze over everyone, straightened his entire body and said distinctly:
“My son Matvei was crushed at the factory, you know that. But if he’d been alive, I’d have sent him to join their ranks myself, I’d have said: ‘You go too, Matvei! Go on, it’s right, it’s the honest thing to do!’”
He broke off, fell silent, and all were gloomily silent, powerfully gripped by something huge, new, but no longer frightening for them. Sizov raised a hand, shook it and continued:
“This is an old man talking – you know me! I’ve worked here for thirty-nine years, and I’ve lived on this earth for fifty-three. My nephew, an innocent boy, a good lad, has been taken away again today. He was marching at the front too, next to Vlasov, right by the banner…”
He flapped an arm, sank into himself and, taking the mother’s hand, said:
“This woman spoke the truth. Our children want to live according to honour and reason, and we went and abandoned them, we left, yes! Go, Nilovna…”
“My dear ones!” she said, casting her tear-stained eyes over all of them. “Life is for the children, the earth is for them!…”
“Go, Nilovna. Here, take the pole,” said Sizov, handing her the fragment of the staff.
The mother was watched with sadness, with respect, and a hum of sympathy followed her. Sizov silently moved people aside from her path, they made way and, obedient to some obscure force that drew them after the mother, unhurriedly went after her, exchanging brief words in low voices.
By the gates of her house, leaning on the fragment of the banner, she turned to them, bowed and, gratefully, quietly, said:
“Thank you…”
And once again remembering her idea, the new idea to which, as it seemed to her, her heart had given birth, she said:
“Our Lord Jesus Christ wouldn’t exist if people hadn’t died for His glory…”
The crowd looked at her in silence.
She bowed to the people again and went into her house, and Sizov, bowing his head, went in with her.
The people stood by the gates talking about something.
And they dispersed without haste.