"I don't want it, and I won't have it!" Then she went out angrily.
Ludmilla also could not make up her mind to take the money, and this made Valek jeer the more. I was going away without obtaining the money when grandmother came along" and, being told all about it, took the ruble, saying to me softly:
"Put on your overcoat and take a blanket with you, for it grows cold toward morning."
Her words raised my hopes that nothing terrible would happen to me.
Valek laid it down on a condition that I should either lie or sit on the coffin until it was light, not leaving it, whatever happened, even if the coffin shook when the old man Kalinin began to climb out of the tomb. If I jumped to the ground I had lost.
"And remember," said Valek, "that I shall be watching you all night."
When I set out for the cemetery grandmother made the sign of the cross over me and kissed me.
"If you should see a glimpse of anything, don't move, but just say, 'Hail, Mary.'"
I went along quickly, my one desire being to begin and finish the whole thing. Valek, Kostrom, and another youth escorted me thither. As I was getting over the brick wall I got mixed up in the blanket, and fell down, but was up in the same moment, as if the earth had ejected me. There was a chuckle from the other side of the wall. My heart contracted; a cold chill ran down my back.
I went stumblingly on to the black coffin, against one side of which the sand had drifted, while on the other side could be seen the short, thick legs. It looked as if some one had tried to lift it up, and had succeeded only in making it totter. I sat on the edge of the coffin and looked around. The hilly cemetery was simply packed with gray crosses; quivering shadows fell upon the graves.