Gratschev turned away and walked quickly to one side. Ilya looked at him with the sensation that Pavel had rubbed an open wound. Burning sorrow possessed him, and an envious, evil feeling to see his friend in a good new overcoat, looking, too, healthier, clearer in the face. Gavrik's sister sat on the same bench with Pavel; he said something to her, and she turned her head quickly to Lunev. When he saw her expressive, eager face, he turned away and his soul was wrapped more firmly and densely in dark feelings of injury, enmity and inability to understand. His thoughts stormed giddily in his head like a whirlwind, one tangled in another; suddenly they stopped—vanished; he felt a void in his brain, and everything outside seemed to move against him malevolently—and he ceased to follow the course of events.
Vyera had already been brought in. She stood behind the railing in a grey dress, reaching to her heels like a night-gown, with a white kerchief. A strand of yellow hair lay against her left temple, her cheeks were pale, her lips compressed, and her eyes, widely opened, rested earnestly and immovably on Gromov.
"Yes—yes—no—yes," her voice rang in Ilya's ears, as though muffled.
Gromov looked at her kindly, and spoke in a subdued low voice like a cat purring.
"And do you plead guilty, Kapitanovna, that on that night——" his insinuating voice glided on.
Lunev looked at Pavel; he sat bent forward, his head down, twisting his fur cap in his hands. His neighbour, however, sat straight and upright, and looked as though she were sitting in judgment on every one there, Vyera and the judges and the public. Her head turned often from side to side, her lips were compressed scornfully, and her proud eyes glanced coldly and sternly from under her wrinkled brows.
"I plead guilty," said Vyera. Her voice broke and the sound was like the ring of a cup that is cracked.
Two of the jury, Dodonov and his neighbour, a red-haired, clean-shaven man, bent their heads together, moved their lips silently, and their eyes, that rested on the girl, smiled. Petrusha, holding with both hands to his chair, bent his whole body forward; his face was even redder than usual and the ends of his moustache twitched; others of the jury looked at Vyera, all with the same definite attentiveness, which Lunev understood but hated furiously.
"They sit in judgment, and every one of them looks at her lustfully!" he thought, and clenched his teeth; he longed to call out to Petrusha:
"You rascal! what are you thinking? Where are you? What is your duty?"