The woman was as pale as linen; her comely, delicate features expressed grief and humility, and in her large eyes were tears which afterward flowed down her cheeks.
Repa was going in boldly, with head thrown back; but when he saw the whole court, he lost his attitude at once, and, in rather a low voice, said,—
"May He be praised!"
"For the ages of ages!" answered the councilmen, in a chorus.
"And what are ye here for?" asked the mayor, threateningly. The mayor was confused at first, but he recovered himself, "What business have ye? Have ye been fighting, or what?"
"Great, mighty court," began Repa. "But let the most serene—"
"Be quiet! be quiet!" interrupted the woman; "let me speak, and do thou sit quietly."
Then she wiped the tears and her nose with her apron, and began to tell the whole story, with a trembling voice. Ah! but to whom had she come? She had come with a complaint against the mayor and the secretary, to the mayor and the secretary.
"They took him," said she; "they promised him timber if he would write his name; then he wrote his name. They gave him fifty rubles; but he was drunk, and he didn't know that he was selling his life and mine and the little boy's. He was drunk, great, mighty court, as drunk as if he were not a creature of God," continued she, now in tears. "Of course a drunken man does not know what he is doing; so in the court, if any one writes anything when he is drunk, they spare him, for they say that he did not know what he was doing. In God's name, mercy! A sober man would not sell his life for fifty rubles! Have pity on me, and on him, and on the innocent child! What will become of me, the unfortunate, alone, and alone in the world, without him, without my poor fellow! God give you happiness for this, and reward you in the name of the unfortunate!"
Here sobbing interrupted her words. Repa cried, too, and from time to time wiped his nose with his finger. The faces of the councilmen grew long; they looked one at another, and then at the secretary and the mayor, without knowing what to do, until the woman recovered her voice, and began to speak again,—