These two men, who were both at an advanced age, had been exiled to Siberia since the rebellion of Pougatcheff, in which their youthful passions had engaged them. Lopouloff’s closer acquaintance with them, was dated only from the time that his daughter entered on her pilgrimage. Of all his acquaintance, they alone had manifested a sincere interest for her. Afterwards, they often conversed together of Prascovia, and formed conjectures on the issue of her enterprise. Hope and fear succeeded each other upon these occasions. Lopouloff finding himself now in a situation to show them his friendship, offered to divide with them the money he had received; but they refused to accept anything. “I need nothing,” said one of them, “for I have yet the piece of money I offered to your daughter.”
Dejection bordering on despair, was probably the cause of their refusal. They were about parting with their only friend. They remembered that Prascovia had promised them, to interest herself in their favour: and believing the exaggerated accounts which reached Ischim, of the reception she had met with at court, they were unwilling to let her father know the extent of their disappointment.
In order to avoid the pain of witnessing his departure, they went the evening before to take their leave of him, and they returned home with feelings of the deepest anguish.
When they had gone, Lopouloff and his wife lamented the fate of their unfortunate friends. “Prascovia surely has not forgotten them,” said they.—“Perhaps she may yet obtain their freedom.”—“We will beg her to renew her intercession in their favour.” After some farther observations of this sort, they retired, to be ready, early the next morning, for their departure.
They had scarcely closed their eyes, when they heard a noise at their door. Lopouloff rose, and met the messenger with the despatches for the two prisoners. He had searched in vain for the Captain-Ispravnik or head commissary, to whom he intended to deliver the despatch; and returned now to learn from Lopouloff, the lodging of the two exiles. They had gone home, in deep silence, and seated themselves on a bench, neglecting in their feeling of despair, even to light a candle: of what could they converse in these mournful moments? what consolation could they find in each other’s countenance? all hope for them, as they thought, had vanished, and an eternal exile seemed now their only and certain prospect.
They thus sat brooding for two hours, over their present misery, and their woeful futurity, when the glimmering of a lantern suddenly threw light into the room, through its little lattice. They heard steps near the door; one knocks;—and the well-known voice of a friend cries: “Open, open! your pardon! your pardon! open.”
It would be vain to attempt to describe the scene that now occurred. At first, some broken expressions could alone be heard: “Pardon!”—“The Emperor: God bless him! God bless him!”—“Thousand benedictions to Prascovia! no, no, she has not forgotten us!” Seldom had the transition from profound despair to the greatest earthly bliss, been so sudden and so unexpected: never, perhaps, had a good turn of fortune been more deeply felt.
The Captain-Ispravnik, having been informed that a messenger was searching for him, ran after him, and in the presence of the two prisoners, opened the packet, which contained a passport for each of them, and a letter from Prascovia to her father. Among other things, she mentioned, that she would have solicited a pecuniary assistance for her two friends, had not God given her the means to make them herself a present, in return for the generous offer they had made her, at her departure from Siberia. The present consisted of two hundred roubles.
Prascovia anxiously waited for an answer from her parents. In taking the veil at Kiev, she was, nevertheless, determined to fulfil the promise she had given to the Abbess at Niejeni.29 She wrote to her, after having finished her devotions, and shortly afterwards determined to depart for Niejeni.
The Abbess, in the expectation of seeing her soon, did not write to inform her of the arrival of her parents at Niejeni. She went to meet Prascovia at the gate of the convent, with all the nuns. Prascovia threw herself at the Abbess’s feet, and her first enquiry was for news from her parents. “Come, my child,” said the old lady, “into my room, we have good tidings for you;” and she conducted her through the galleries and aisles of the monastery. The silence of the nuns might have awakened her fears, had their countenances not been expressive of joy.
In entering the Abbess’s closet, she saw her parents. They had heard nothing of her arrival; they knew not that she had taken the veil, and they threw themselves at her feet, overwhelmed by mingled feelings of gratitude, admiration, and grief. “What are you doing?” shrieked Prascovia, and gasping with her emotions, and falling on her knees, she added: “to God, to God alone we owe our felicity. Let us thank Him for His miraculous interposition.” The nuns, deeply moved by this affecting scene, joined in the thanksgiving of the happy family, who, after this first burst of gratitude to their merciful Creator, exchanged demonstrations of love and tenderness, in the midst of which the mother, pointing to Prascovia’s veil, gave way to her feelings and sobbed aloud.
The pleasure they found in their meeting, they knew, would be of short duration, and was therefore not unmingled with regret. Prascovia, in taking the veil, deprived her parents of the happiness they would
