“Some evil will happen, some evil,” they all repeated.
“Petersburg will perish—and not only Petersburg, but the whole world is coming to an end. The day of judgment! Antichrist!”
Frightened by these tales, a little boy, dragged along by his mother in the crowd, suddenly broke into sobs and screamed with fright. A woman in rags with a half crazy look, began shrieking in an inhuman voice. She was hurriedly taken to a neighbouring house. The Tsar did not dally with these hysterical women whom the people thought were possessed; he flogged the devil out of them. “The tail of the knout reaches further than the devil’s tail,” he used to remark when informed of the pranks of Satan.
Many of the senators and nobles showed terror in their faces.
Prior to the procession starting, Shafiroff had handed to the Tsar the letters of Tolstoi and the Tsarevitch, brought by messenger from Naples.
The Tsar had them unopened in his pocket; he probably did not want to read them in public. Shafiroff, however, from a short note received by him from Tolstoi knew already the amazing news; it spread like wildfire.
“The Tsarevitch is returning!”
“Peter Tolstoi, the Judas, has lured him! it is not the first he has led to perdition!”
“It is said the father has promised to marry him to Afrossinia!”
“Marry him? What next, fool! The block, not marriage, is in store for him.”