“How could I help it? we are no longer masters of our actions. I have a wife and children.” murmured Father Matthew, with the despairing thought, “this is a good beginning!”
“Away, get away from me, blockhead!” exclaimed the Tsarevitch in a fury. “You slave of the Russian Tsar! Sold, sold, all of you, down to the last man! You were once eagles, you have become as oxen bowed under the yoke! You have delivered the Church over to Antichrist! I will die unconfessed, and I will receive no sacrament from your hands. You viper’s brood! You incarnations of Satan!”
Father Matthew recoiled in horror. His hands trembled so violently that he almost dropped the vessel which contained the Host.
The Tsarevitch glanced at it and repeated the words of the Raskolnik monk:—
“Do you know what your Lamb can be likened unto? It can be likened unto a dead dog which has been cast into the streets of the city. If you receive the Host you will die. Your Eucharist has the same effect as arsenic or sublimate: it permeates bone and marrow, the very soul itself! Afterwards you will lie and groan in the Gehenna of fire, like Cain the fratricide, the hardened sinner—— You would like to poison me, but I will not give you the chance!”
Father Matthew fled from the room.
The black were-wolf leapt upon the neck of Alexis, and began to strangle him, and to pluck at his heart with its claws.
“My God, my God, why hast Thou forsaken me?” he moaned in mortal anguish.
All at once he felt that near his bed, on the spot occupied a moment ago by Father Matthew, another person was now seated. He opened his eyes to see.