Page:Andreyev - The Crushed Flower (Knopf, 1917).djvu/362

360 with this world was broken. Only I and my ferocious jailer, who watches every movement of mine with  mad suspicion, and the black grate which has caught  in its iron embrace and muzzled the infinite — this is my life. Silently accepting the low bows, in my cold estrangement from the people I am passing my last road. I am thinking of death ever more frequently, but even before death I do not bend my fearless look. "Whether it brings me eternal rest or a new unknown and terrible struggle, I am humbly prepared to accept it.

Farewell, my dear reader! Like a vague phantom you appeared before my eyes and passed, leaving me alone before the face of life and death. Do not be angry because at times I deceived you and lied—you, too, would have lied perhaps in my place. Nevertheless I loved you sincerely, and sincerely longed for your love; and the thought of your sympathy for me was quite a support to me in my moments and days of hardship. I am sending you my last farewell and my sincere advice. Forget about my existence, even as I shall henceforth forget about yours forever. Rh A deserted field, overgrown with high grass, devoid of an echo, extends like a deep carpet to the very fence of our prison, whose majestic outlines subdue my imagination and my mind. When the dying sun illumines it with its last rays, and our prison, all in red, stands like a queen, like a martyr, with the dark