"Will there ever be an end?" said a tall, stout, red-faced captain of the convoy, incessantly smoking a cigarette and blowing the smoke through the moustache which covered his mouth. "I am exhausted. Where have you taken so many? How many more are there?"
The clerk consulted the books.
"Twenty-four men and the women."
"Why are you standing there? Come forward!" shouted the captain to the crowding convicts.
The convicts had already been standing three hours in a broiling sun, waiting their turn.
All this was taking place in the court-yard of the prison, while without the prison stood the usual armed soldier, about two dozen trucks for the baggage, and the infirm convicts, and on the corner a crowd of relatives and friends of the convicts, waiting for a chance to see the exiles as they emerged from the prison, and, if possible, to have a last few words with them, or deliver some things they had brought for them. Nekhludoff joined this crowd.
He stood there about an hour. At the end of the hour, from behind the gates came the clatter of chains, the tramping of feet, voices of command, coughing and the low conversation of a large crowd. This lasted about five minutes, during which time prison officers flitted in and out through the wicket. Finally there was heard a sharp command.
The gates were noisily flung open, the clatter of the chains became more distinct, and a detachment of guardsmen in white blouses and shouldering guns marched forth and arranged themselves, evidently as a customary manœuvre, in a large semi-circle before the gates. Again a command was heard, and the hard-labor convicts, in pairs, began to pour out. With pancake-shaped caps on their shaved heads, and sacks on their shoulders, they dragged their fettered legs, holding up the sacks with one hand and waving the other. First came the men convicts, all in gray trousers and long coats with diamond aces on their backs. All of them—young, old, slim, stout, pale, and red-faced, dark-haired, moustached, bearded and beardless, Russians, Tartars, Jews—came, clanging their chains and briskly waving their hands as though going on a long journey; but after making about ten steps they stopped and humbly arranged themselves in rows of four. Immediately behind these came another contingent, also with shaved heads and similarly dressed, without leg-fetters, but handcuffed to each other. These were exiles. They walked as briskly as the others, stopped, and formed in rows of four. Then came the women in the same order, in gray coats and 'kerchiefs, those sentenced to hard labor coming first; then the exiles, and finally those voluntarily following their husbands, in their native costumes. Some of the women carried infants under the skirts of their coats.
Children—boys and girls—followed them on foot, hanging on to the skirts of their mothers. The men stood silently, coughing now and then, or exchanging remarks, while the women carried on incessant conversation. Nekhludoff thought that he saw Maslova as she was coming out, but she was soon lost in the large crowd, and he only saw a lot of gray creatures almost deprived of all womanly features, with their children and sacks, grouping themselves behind the men.
Although the convicts had been counted within the walls of the prison, the guard began to count them over again. This counting took a long time, because the convicts, moving from one place to another, confused the count of the officers. The officers cursed and pushed the humbly but angrily compliant convicts and counted them again. When the counting was finally over, the officer of the guard gave some command, and suddenly all became confusion in the crowd. Infirm men, women and children hastened to the trucks, on which they first placed their sacks, then climbed in themselves, the infants crying in their mothers' arms, the children quarreling about the places, the men looking gloomy and despondent.