‘Get up and go to bed,’ he said, coming back to his mother’s side; and then, seeing that she did not move, but sat with head bowed as though asleep, he bent down to look more closely in her face and perceived that she was weeping silently.

‘Mother!’

‘No,’ she said, without moving, ‘I shall never mention this thing to you again, neither to you nor to anyone else. But I shall not stir from this place except to leave the presbytery and the village, never to return, unless you swear to me that you will never set foot in that house again.’

He raised himself from his bending position, overtaken again by that feeling of giddiness, and again superstition took hold of him, urging him to promise whatever his mother asked of him, since it was God Himself who was speaking by her mouth. And simultaneously a flood of bitter words rose to his lips, and he wanted to cry out upon his mother, to throw the blame on her and reproach her for having brought him from his native village, and set his feet upon a way that was not his. But what would be the use? She would not even understand. Well, well! … With one hand he made a gesture as though brushing away the shadows from before his eyes, then suddenly he stretched out this hand over his mother’s head, and in his imagination saw his opened fingers extend in luminous rays above her:

‘Mother, I swear to you that I will never enter that house again.’

And immediately he left the kitchen, feeling that here was the end of everything. He was saved. But as he crossed the adjoining dining-room he heard his mother weeping unrestrainedly, as though she were weeping for the dead.

Back in his room, the scent of roses and the sight of the various objects strewn about which were associated with his passion, impregnated and coloured by it, as it were, shook him afresh. He moved here and there without any reason, opened the window and thrust his head out into the wind, feeling as helpless as one of the million leaves whirled about in space, now in the dark shadow, now in the bright light of the moon, playthings of the winds and clouds. At last he drew himself up and closed the window, saying aloud as he did so:

‘Let us be men!’

He stood erect to his full height, numb as though all his body were cold and hard and enclosed in an armour of pride. He desired no more to feel the sensations of the flesh, nor the sorrow nor the joy of sacrifice, nor the sadness of his loneliness; he had no wish even to kneel before God and receive the word of approval granted to the willing servant. He asked nothing from anyone; he wanted only to go forward in the straight way, alone and hopeless. Yet he was afraid of going to bed and putting out the light, and instead he sat down and began to read St. Paul’s Epistle to the Corinthians: but the printed words fled his gaze, they swelled and shrank and danced up and down before his eyes. Why had his mother wept so bitterly, after he had sworn an oath to her? What could she have understood? Ah, yes, she understood; the mother’s heart understood only too well the mortal anguish of her son, his renunciation of life itself.