Page:The Bet and Other Stories.djvu/136

124 "How dare the snow fall in this street?" thought Vassiliev. "A curse on these houses."

Because of his headlong rush down the staircase his feet failed him from weariness; he was out of breath as if he had climbed a mountain. His heart beat so loud that he could hear it. A longing came over him to get out of this street as soon as possible and go home; but still stronger was his desire to wait for his friends and to vent upon them his feeling of heaviness.

He had not understood many things in the houses. The souls of the perishing women were to him a mystery as before; but it was clear to him that the business was much worse than one would have thought. If the guilty woman who poisoned herself was called a prostitute, then it was hard to find a suitable name for all these creatures, who danced to the muddling music and said long, disgusting phrases. They were not perishing; they were already done for.

"Vice is here," he thought; "but there is neither confession of sin nor hope of salvation. They are bought and sold, drowned in wine and torpor, and they are dull and indifferent as sheep and do not understand. My God, my God!"

It was so clear to him that all that which is called human dignity, individuality, the image and likeness of God, was here dragged down to the gutter, as they say of drunkards, and that not only the street and the stupid women were to blame for it.

A crowd of students white with snow, talking