like Alyosha the saddlemaker; he bought a floor mat from us and would not pay because it had a small smell. I am not sorrowing because of his death but only because of the more trouble it brought upon us. Seryozha was a long time away, watching the drinking game, and at home my old husband would not eat, though the soup became cold—waiting, waiting—for a poor man he never thinks of feeding in his life before. So Seryozha comes running to say, ‘Alyosha is dead.’ ‘
Sht boy,’ I say, ‘
shsht—he will hear,’ but my old husband has already heard. Oi, what folly begins at once. My husband runs to Alyosha’s house and I runs after him—though the dinner would spoil and spoil—and there were Chinese policemen asking and examining in Alyosha’s house and Alyosha himself lying on the floor with his tongue out all crookedly and a bluely red swollen face. My old Sergei pushed away the police, saying, this man is of my race, he is mine to bury. Oi! what a curse are these drunkard dead that they must be made so honorable. Two friends helped to carry Alexei Vassileievitch’s body to our house; the Chinese police did not stop them, though they talked much, thinking perhaps Alyosha had been murdered, so they followed behind, talking angrily to my old fool, saying, ‘Always you interfere with Chinese police officers doing their duties.’ … My husband made Alyosha be carried in our house and all my nice dinner be swept off the table and the body be laid down on it, all red and dirty and dead, and no friend of ours,
Mrs. Butters—just a drunken saddlemaker, God forgive him. I tell you he smelled of leather and horses, but he was on our table, like a joint of meat that was no meat, so all day we ate our meals on the bed, though the goodness of the dinner I had prepared was all gone. And in the evening my husband buried that poor damn man in the open green space behind our house—after dark, that thieves might not know. Because he had it fixed in his thoughts that the Chinese would again try to open the grave. So all night long he lay on a blanket outside, against the wall of our yard. Three times—four times—five times—I went out and said, ‘Come in, stupid man; you will have rheumatism again; tomorrow you will not have power to bend,’ but he is stubborn like a goat, and early in the morning, as the sun rose up, I heard him scream, high like a child—like this—‘
E‑e‑e‑e! Oi! I am blind!’ … It was when he felt the sun on his cheek, then he knew it was day and he was blind. He says it was the sparrows’ droppings from the top of the wall, but the Japanese doctor says no, it cannot be. The Japanese doctor says it is a nervous—a hysteric. I do not know—but
sparrows I do not blame. So now my poor old fool he sits there all the time sorrowing. There is no amusement or interest he can do—only feel with his hands things that are alive, and that makes him cry, but he always loves being made to cry. He was in love with dead men when he could see—but now that he must sit at home, the dead do not come to him. … So now he cries over alive things that he can feel—it is all the same really—he only seeks tears. He feels Seryozha’s ankle, and the cat, and puppies, and Seryozha found some little small young birds in a nest—anything that moves he must feel, that he may think the sad thoughts he wants to think.”
“It is all very sad,” said Mrs. Butters. “It must make life very difficult for you, Mrs. Malinin.”
“Oh, not so difficult. Seryozha works—not every day, but sometimes—on the new bridge. Our nephew, Andrei Malinin—that engineer who I told you is friend to the new Tao-yin—he helps us a little. I think he arranged, too, so that my old husband was not attacked by the Chinese policemen for taking Alyosha’s body. And I come and sew—oi! but how bad I sew—for you and the other mission families.”
“You certainly have known a great deal of trouble,” said Mrs. Butters, who had been punctuating the story with clickings of her tongue and low abstracted moans. Then she remembered the Christian duty of reassurance. “Oh, but I think you sew very nicely.”
“Hemstitching all down the baby’s ribs—oh yes—very nice,” mourned Anna. The imperfection made a sore place in her self-esteem. “How easy it would have been to think before—not to pull those threads out. Never, never do I think before. All my life is full of being sorry for not thinking before.”
“Oh, please don’t worry yourself,” said Mrs. Butters, almost irritated by this extreme remorse.
One of the Butters children came in, talking in the aggrieved whine peculiar to the children of missionaries.
“Mah-mah!”
“It is so difficult for our finite minds to understand,” said Mrs. Butters, “the omnipotent wisdom which sometimes sees fit—”
“Mah-mah.”
“—to load so many grievous burdens on one—”
“Mah-mah.”
“—shrinking sinner’s shoulders. All we can do is—”
“Mah-mah.”
“—to feel that behind it all shines—”
“Mah-mah.”
“—a love that—”
“Mah-mah.”
“Surely your child wishes to speak with you,” said Anna, with difficulty restraining her hands from boxing the ears of both mother and child. A conflict of noises could always crack her temper as, it is said, some discords can crack a glass.
“Mah-mah’s busy, lovey,” said Mrs. Butters. “What does mah-mah’s lovey want to ask mah-mah?”
“Mah-mah … it won’t eat no ackles.”
“Won’t it, darling? … And it seems to me, Mrs. Malinin, that if—”
“But, mah-mah.”
“—we could only learn to cast all our troub—”
“Mah-mah.”
“—bles on that great heart that is so ready to bear them, we could turn and face the world with a perfect—”
“Mah-mah.”
“Your child seems still to have some matter on its mind,” said Anna between ground teeth.
“What is it, mah-mah’s prettybird?”
“Mah-mah, it won’t eat no ackles.”
“No, darling, just fancy
