"I don't know," she answered with a sigh. "What can I do? I'll rest—till they catch me again."
"You ought to complain to the police," said Lunev, firmly. "Why should he torment you? Who has any right to torment any one like that?"
"He did the same to his first wife," said Masha. "He tied her to the bed by her hair—and pinched her—just the same—and once I was asleep and suddenly I felt a pain and woke and screamed—he'd burnt me with a lighted match."
Lunev sprang up and said fiercely and loudly that the very next morning she should go to the police and show her bruises and demand to have her husband condemned. She listened to him, shifting unceasingly to and fro, looked at him in terror, and said:
"Don't shout—don't shout, please! They'll hear you."
His words only distressed her. He soon perceived this little girl, once so cheerful and gay, had been beaten and crushed till all human spirit was tortured out of her.
"Very well," he said, and sat down again. "I'll see to it. I'll find a way. You'll stay here, Mashutka—d'you hear?"
"Yes. I hear," she answered softly, and looked round the room.
"You can have my bed, and I'll go into the shop—but to-morrow."
"I'll lie down at once, I think. I'm tired." He folded back the coverlet from the bed. She fell on it and tried to cover herself with the bedclothes, but could not manage it, and said with a dull smile: