Pashenka had already long ceased to be Pashenka and had become old, withered¹, wrinkled Praskovya Mikhaylovna, mother-in-law of that failure, the drunken official Mavrikyev. She was living in the country town where he had had his last appointment, and there she was supporting the family: her daughter, her ailing² neurasthenic son-in-law, and her five grandchildren. She did this by giving music lessons to tradesmen’s daughters, giving four and sometimes five lessons a day of an hour each, and earning in this way some sixty rubles (6 pounds) a month. So they lived for the present, in expectation of another appointment. She had sent letters to all her relations and acquaintances asking them to obtain a post for her son-in-law, and among the rest she had written to Sergius, but that letter had not reached him.  
It was a Saturday, and Praskovya Mikhaylovna was herself mixing dough³ for currant bread such as the serf-cook on her father’s estate used to make so well. She wished to give her grandchildren a treat on the Sunday.
 
Masha, her daughter, was nursing her youngest child, the eldest⁴ boy and girl were at school, and her son-in-law was asleep, not having slept during the night. Praskovya Mikhaylovna had remained awake too for a great part of the night, trying to soften⁵ her daughter’s anger against her husband.
 
She saw that it was impossible for her son-in-law, a weak creature, to be other than he was, and realized that his wife’s reproaches could do no good—so she used all her efforts to soften those reproaches and to avoid recrimination and anger. Unkindly relations between people caused her actual physical suffering. It was so clear to her that bitter feelings do not make anything better, but only make everything worse. She did not in fact think about this: she simply suffered at the sight of anger as she would from a bad smell, a harsh noise, or from blows on her body.
 
She had—with a feeling of self-satisfaction—just taught Lukerya how to mix the dough, when her six-year-old grandson Misha, wearing an apron⁶ and with darned stockings on his crooked⁷ little legs, ran into the kitchen with a frightened face.
 
‘Grandma, a dreadful old man wants to see you.’
 
Lukerya looked out at the door.
 
‘There is a pilgrim of some kind, a man...’
 
Praskovya Mikhaylovna rubbed her thin elbows against one another, wiped her hands on her apron and went upstairs to get a five-kopek piece [about a penny] out of her purse for him, but remembering that she had nothing less than a ten-kopek piece she decided⁸ to give him some bread instead. She returned to the cupboard, but suddenly blushed at the thought of having grudged⁹ the ten-kopek piece, and telling Lukerya to cut a slice of bread, went upstairs again to fetch it. ‘It serves you right,’ she said to herself. ‘You must now give twice over.’
 
She gave both the bread and the money to the pilgrim, and when doing so—far from being proud of her generosity—she excused herself for giving so little. The man had such an imposing¹⁰ appearance.
 
Though he had tramped two hundred versts as a beggar, though he was tattered¹¹ and had grown thin and weatherbeaten, though he had cropped his long hair and was wearing a peasant’s cap and boots, and though he bowed very humbly¹², Sergius still had the impressive appearance that made him so attractive. But Praskovya Mikhaylovna did not recognize him. She could hardly do so, not having seen him for almost twenty years.
 
‘Don’t think ill of me, Father. Perhaps you want something to eat?’
 
He took the bread and the money, and Praskovya Mikhaylovna was surprised that he did not go, but stood looking at her.
 
‘Pashenka, I have come to you! Take me in...’
 
His beautiful black eyes, shining with the tears that started in them, were fixed¹³ on her with imploring¹⁴ insistence¹⁵. And under his greyish moustache his lips quivered piteously.
 
Praskovya Mikhaylovna pressed her hands to her withered breast, opened her mouth, and stood petrified¹⁶, staring at the pilgrim with dilated¹⁷ eyes.
 
‘It can’t be! Stepa! Sergey! Father Sergius!’
 
‘Yes, it is I,’ said Sergius in a low voice. ‘Only not Sergius, or Father Sergius, but a great sinner, Stepan Kasatsky—a great and lost sinner. Take me in and help me!’
 
‘It’s impossible! How have you so humbled¹⁸ yourself? But come in.’
 
She reached out her hand, but he did not take it and only followed her in.
 
But where was she to take him? The lodging¹⁹ was a small one. Formerly²⁰ she had had a tiny room, almost a closet, for herself, but later she had given it up to her daughter, and Masha was now sitting there rocking the baby.
 
‘Sit here for the present,’ she said to Sergius, pointing to a bench in the kitchen.
 
He sat down at once, and with an evidently accustomed movement slipped the straps²¹ of his wallet first off one shoulder and then off the other.
 
‘My God, my God! How you have humbled yourself, Father! Such great fame, and now like this...’
 
Sergius did not reply, but only smiled meekly²², placing his wallet under the bench on which he sat.
 
‘Masha, do you know who this is?’—And in a whisper Praskovya Mikhaylovna told her daughter who he was, and together they then carried the bed and the cradle out of the tiny room and cleared it for Sergius.
 
Praskovya Mikhaylovna led him into it.
 
‘Here you can rest. Don’t take offence... but I must go out.’
 
‘Where to?’
 
‘I have to go to a lesson. I am ashamed to tell you, but I teach music!’
 
‘Music? But that is good. Only just one thing, Praskovya Mikhaylovna, I have come to you with a definite object. When can I have a talk with you?’
 
‘I shall be very glad. Will this evening do?’
 
‘Yes. But one thing more. Don’t speak about me, or say who I am. I have revealed myself only to you. No one knows where I have gone to. It must be so.’
 
‘Oh, but I have told my daughter.’
 
‘Well, ask her not to mention it.’
 
And Sergius took off his boots, lay down, and at once fell asleep after a sleepless²³ night and a walk of nearly thirty miles.
 
When Praskovya Mikhaylovna returned, Sergius was sitting in the little room waiting for her. He did not come out for dinner, but had some soup and gruel²⁴ which Lukerya brought him.
 
‘How is it that you have come back earlier than you said?’ asked Sergius. ‘Can I speak to you now?’
 
‘How is it that I have the happiness to receive such a guest? I have missed one of my lessons. That can wait... I had always been planning to go to see you. I wrote to you, and now this good fortune has come.’
 
‘Pashenka, please listen to what I am going to tell you as to a confession²⁵ made to God at my last hour. Pashenka, I am not a holy man, I am not even as good as a simple ordinary man; I am a loathsome²⁶, vile²⁷, and proud sinner who has gone astray, and who, if not worse than everyone else, is at least worse than most very bad people.’
 
Pashenka looked at him at first with staring eyes. But she believed what he said, and when she had quite grasped it she touched his hand, smiling pityingly, and said:
 
‘Perhaps you exaggerate, Stiva?’
 
‘No, Pashenka. I am an adulterer, a murderer, a blasphemer, and a deceiver.’
 
‘My God! How is that?’ exclaimed Praskovya Mikhaylovna.
 
‘But I must go on living. And I, who thought I knew everything, who taught others how to live—I know nothing and ask you to teach me.’
 
‘What are you saying, Stiva? You are laughing at me. Why do you always make fun of me?’
 
‘Well, if you think I am jesting you must have it as you please. But tell me all the same how you live, and how you have lived your life.’
 
‘I? I have lived a very nasty, horrible life, and now God is punishing me as I deserve. I live so wretchedly, so wretchedly...’
 
‘How was it with your marriage? How did you live with your husband?’
 
‘It was all bad. I married because I fell in love in the nastiest way. Papa did not approve. But I would not listen to anything and just got married. Then instead of helping²⁸ my husband I tormented²⁹ him by my jealousy³⁰, which I could not restrain.’
 
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