I had no longer faith in my purity nor did I know what I really was. It did not matter with Christa, but with the other my self-doubt had the power to interfere. Why, I do not know, but it had that power.
I said good-by to Christa. She wept a little and asked me to write to her; said she would want to let me know when she was with child, and I gave her an address. Soon after I wrote her. She answered with a letter of good news, and I wrote her again. She was silent.
About a year and a half later, in Zadona, I received a letter. It had lain a long time in the post-office. She told me that she gave birth to a child, a son; that she called him Matvei; that he was happy and healthy; that she lived with her aunt, and that her uncle was dead. He had drunk himself to death.
"Now," she wrote, "I am my own mistress, and if you will come you will be received with joy."
I had a desire to see my son and my accidental wife, but by this time I had found a true road for myself and I did not go to her.
"I cannot now," I wrote. "I will come later."
Afterward she married a merchant who sold books and engravings, and went to live in Ribinsk.
In Christa I saw for the first time a person who had no fear in her soul and who was ready to fight for herself with all her strength. But at that time I did not appreciate the great value of this trait.
After the incident with Christa I went to work in the city; but life there was distasteful to me. It was narrow and oppressive. I did not like the artisans. They gave their souls nakedly and openly into the power of the masters. Each one seemed to cry out by his action:
"Here, devour my body! Drink my blood! I have no room on this earth for myself!"