They refused me books at first, and the police-magistrate declared that it was against the rules for me to get books from home. I then proposed to buy some. “I suppose you mean some serious book—a grammar of some kind, I dare say? Well, I should not object to that; for other books, higher authority must be obtained.” Though the suggestion that I should study grammar to relieve boredom was exceedingly comic, yet I caught at it eagerly and asked him to buy me an Italian grammar and dictionary. I had two ten-rouble notes on me, and I gave him one. He sent at once to buy the books, and despatched by the same messenger a letter to the Chief Commissioner, in which, taking my stand on the article I had read, I asked him to explain the cause of my arrest or to release me.
The magistrate, in whose presence I wrote the letter, urged me not to send it. “It’s no good, I swear it’s no good your bothering His Excellency. They don’t like people who give them trouble. It can’t result in anything, and it may hurt you.”
A policeman turned up in the evening with a reply: His Excellency sent me a verbal message, to the effect that I should learn in good time why I was arrested. The messenger then produced a greasy Italian grammar from his pocket, and added with a smile, “By good luck it happens that there is a vocabulary here; so you need not buy one.” The question of change out of my note was not alluded to. I was inclined to write again to His Excellency; but to play the part of a little Hampden seemed to me rather too absurd in my present quarters.
§2
I had been in prison ten days, when a short policeman with a swarthy, pock-marked face came to my room at ten in the evening, bringing an order that I was to dress and present myself before the Commission of Enquiry.
While I was dressing, a serio-comic incident occurred. My dinner was sent me every day from home; our servant delivered it to the corporal on duty, and he sent a private upstairs with it. A bottle of wine from outside was allowed daily, and a friend had taken advantage of this permission to send me a bottle of excellent hock. The private and I contrived to uncork the bottle with a couple of nails; the bouquet of the wine was perceptible at a distance, and I looked forward to the pleasure of drinking it for some days to come.
There is nothing like prison life for revealing the childishness in a grown man and the consolation he finds in trifles, from a bottle of wine to a trick played on a turnkey.
Well, the pock-marked policeman found out my bottle, and, turning to me, asked if he might have a taste. Though I was vexed, I said I should be very glad. I had no glass. The wretch took a cup, filled it to the very brim, and emptied it into himself without drawing breath. No one but a Russian or a Pole can pour down strong drink in this fashion: I have never in any part of Europe seen a glass or cup of spirits disposed of with equal rapidity. To add to my sorrow at the loss of this cupful, my friend wiped his lips with a blue tobacco-stained handkerchief, and said as he thanked me, “Something like Madeira, that is!” I hated the sight of him and felt a cruel joy that his parents had not vaccinated him and nature had not spared him the small-pox.
§3
This judge of wine went with me to the Chief Commissioner’s house on the Tver Boulevard, where he took me to a side room and left me alone. Half an hour later, a fat man with a lazy, good-natured expression came in, carrying papers in a wallet; he threw the wallet on a chair and sent the policeman who was standing at the door off on some errand.