The Thief’s SonВоров сын

In a certain town a jury met. The jurors were peasants, and gentry, and merchants. The foreman of the jury was a worthy merchant, Ivan Akimovich Belov. Everyone respected this merchant for his good life: he dealt honestly, he cheated no one, he shortchanged no one, and he helped people. He was an old man, close to 70. The jurors gathered, took the oath, and sat down in their places, and they brought before them the accused, a horse thief, for having driven off a peasant’s horse. They were just about to begin judging when Ivan Akimovich stood up and said to the judge: “Forgive me, Your Honor, I cannot judge.”

The judge was surprised. “How so?” he said. “Why?”

“I just cannot. Let me go.”

And suddenly Ivan Akimovich’s voice trembled, and he began to cry. He cried and cried, so that he could not even speak. Then he recovered himself and said to the judge:

“I cannot judge, Your Honor, because I and my father may be much worse than this thief; how then can I judge someone just the same as I am? I cannot; let me go, I beg you.”

The judge let Ivan Akimovich go, and then in the evening he called him to his house and began to ask him: “Why is it,” he said, “that you refuse to judge?”

“Here is why,” said Ivan Akimovich, and he told the judge this story about himself.

“You think,” he said, “that I am a merchant’s son and that I was born in your town. That isn’t true. I am a peasant’s son; my father was a peasant, the biggest thief in those parts, and he died in jail. He was a kind man, only he drank, and when he was drunk he would beat my mother, and brawl, and he was ready for any bad deed, and then afterward he would repent of it himself. One time he took me, too, along with him to steal. And that very time was the making of my good fortune.

“This is how it was. My father was in a tavern in company with some thieves, and they began talking about where they might make a haul. And my father says to them: ‘Look here, lads. You know,’ he says, ‘merchant Belov’s storehouse, the one that fronts on the street. Well, there’s no counting the goods in that storehouse. Only it’s tricky getting in there. But I’ve thought of a way. And here’s the way I’ve thought of. There’s a little window in that storehouse, only it’s high up, and narrow besides; a grown man can’t squeeze through. So here’s what I’ve hit on. I’ve got,’ he says, ‘a youngster, a nimble little boy’ — that meant me — ‘so we’ll take him with us,’ he says, ‘tie a rope around him, boost him up to the window, he’ll climb in, we’ll let him down on the rope, and we’ll give him another rope in his hands, and on that very rope he’ll tie the goods from the storehouse for us, and we’ll pull them up. And when we’ve got as much as we need, we’ll haul him back out.’

“And the thieves liked the idea, and they say: ‘Well, all right, bring your boy.’

“So my father came home and calls for me. My mother says, ‘What do you want him for?’ ‘I need him, if I’m calling him.’ My mother says, ‘He’s out in the street.’ ‘Call him.’ My mother knows that when he’s drunk there’s no talking to him; he’ll beat her black and blue. She ran out after me and called me. And my father says to me, ‘Vanka! Are you any good at climbing?’ ‘I can get in anywhere you like.’ ‘Well,’ he says, ‘come along with me.’ My mother started to talk him out of it; he raised his hand to her, and she fell silent. My father took me, dressed me, and led me off with him. He led me off with him, brought me to the tavern; they gave me tea with sugar and something to eat, and we sat there till evening. When it grew dark, they all set out — there were three of them in all — and took me along.

“We came to that very house of merchant Belov’s. Right away they tied one rope around me, put the other in my hands, and lifted me up. ‘Aren’t you scared?’ they say. ‘What’s there to be scared of? I’m not scared of anything.’ ‘Climb in at the window, and mind you fetch out the best things in there: furs, mostly, and tie them on with the rope, the one in your hands. And mind you tie them not to the end of the rope but to the middle of the rope, so that when we pull it out you’ll still have the end. Understand?’ they say. ‘Why wouldn’t I understand? I understand.’

“So they boosted me up to the little window, I squeezed through it, and they began letting me down on the rope. My feet touched something solid, and right away I began feeling about with my little hands. As for seeing, I can’t see a thing — it’s dark — I just feel. As soon as I feel something furry, straight to the rope with it: I tie it on, not to the end but to the middle, and they pull. I pull the rope back to me again and tie on again. They pulled out three or so of these things, whatever they were, drew the whole rope up to themselves, meaning that was enough, and started pulling me up again. I’m holding on to the rope with my little hands, and they’re pulling. They’d only pulled me halfway: snap! the rope broke, and down I fell. Good thing I landed on pillows; I didn’t hurt myself.

“Only at that very moment, as I found out afterward, the watchman saw them and raised the alarm, and they took to their heels with what they had stolen.

“They ran off, and I was left; they were gone. I’m lying alone in the dark, and fear has come over me; I’m crying and calling: Mama, Mama! Mama, Mama! And I was so worn out, from fright and from tears, and I’d had no sleep that night besides, that I never even noticed how I fell asleep on the pillows. Suddenly I wake up: there in front of me, with a lantern, stands that very merchant Belov, and a policeman with him. The policeman began asking me who I had been with. I said: with my father. ‘And who is your father?’ And I began to cry again. And old Belov says to the policeman: ‘Let him be. A child is a soul of God. It isn’t right for him to testify against his father; and what’s lost is lost.’

“He was a good man, the departed, God rest his soul. And his old lady was more tender-hearted still. She took me with her into the parlor, gave me treats, and I stopped crying: a child, everyone knows, is glad of anything. Next morning the mistress asks me: ‘Do you want to go home?’ I don’t even know what to say. I say: yes, I do. ‘And do you want to stay with me?’ she says. I say: I do. ‘Well then, stay.’

“So I stayed. I stayed and stayed, and so I lived on with them. And they got papers made out for me, as for a foundling, and made me their adopted child. At first I lived there as an errand boy; then, as I began to grow up, they made me a clerk, and I was in charge of the shop. I must have served them not too badly. And they were kind people besides; they grew so fond of me that they even gave me their daughter in marriage. And they made me a son to them. And when the old man died, all the property came to me.

“So that is who I am. A thief myself, and a thief’s son; how can I judge people? And besides, it isn’t a Christian thing to do, Your Honor. We must forgive and love all people, and if he, the thief, has made a mistake, we must not punish him but pity him. Remember what Christ said.”

So said Ivan Akimovich.

And the judge stopped asking questions, and himself fell to thinking about whether, by the Christian law, one may judge people.