“But they’ve let you out, and I suppose you’re going home.”
“Home? Yes, I’m going home, but I keep thinking about the flogging; the secretary spoke of it, I am sure I heard him.”
I was really quite puzzled. At last I asked him if he had a written discharge of any kind. He handed it to me. I read there the original sentence at full length, and then a postscript, that he was to be flogged within the prison walls by sentence of the court and then to be discharged, in possession of this certificate.
I burst out laughing. “You see, you’ve been flogged already.”
“No, bátyushka, I’ve not.”
“Well, if you’re not content, go back and ask them to flog you; perhaps the police will take pity upon you.”
Seeing me laugh, he too smiled, but he shook his head doubtfully and said, “It’s a very queer business.”
A very irregular business, many will say; but let them reflect that it is this kind of irregularity alone which makes life possible in Russia.