“It is so hard, Vera, to speak. Pray, and understand your Grandmother even when she is silent.”
“I have tried to pray, and cannot. What have I to pray for, except that I should die the sooner. I shall die I know; only let it come quickly, for like this it is impossible to live.”
“It is possible,” said Tatiana Markovna, drawing a deep sigh.
“You don’t know, Grandmother,” said Vera with a hopeless sigh. “You have not been a woman like me.”
Tatiana Markovna stooped down to Vera, and whispered in a hardy audible voice, “A woman like you.”
Vera looked at her in amazement, then let her head fall back on the pillow and said wearily, “You were never in my position. You are a saint.”
“We are all sinners, but not a sinner of that kind.”
Vera seized Tatiana Markovna’s dress with both hands, and pressed her face to hers. The words that came from her troubled breast sounded like hisses. “Why do you slander yourself? Is it in order to calm and help me? Grandmother, do not lie!”
“I never lie and you know it, and how should I begin to do so now. I am a sinner, and myself need forgiveness,” she said, throwing herself on her knees and bowing her grey head.
“Why do you say these things to me?” said Vera, staring at the kneeling woman, and pressing her head to her breast. “Take your words back again. I have not heard them or will forget them; will regard them as the product of a dream. Do not torture yourself for my sake. Rise, Grandmother.” Tatiana Markovna lay on her breast, sobbing like a child. “Why did you tell me this?” said Vera.
“It was God’s wish that I should humble myself to ask you, my child, for forgiveness. If you grant me your forgiveness, Vera, I, too, can forgive you. I had hoped to keep my secret until I died, and now my sin has plunged you into ruin.”
“You rescue me, Grandmother, from despair.”
“And myself, Vera. God forgives, but he demands cleansing. I thought my sin was forgotten and forgiven. Because of my silence I seemed to men to be virtuous, but my virtue was a lie. God has punished my sin. Forgive me from your heart.”
“Does one forgive one’s Mother? You are a saint, a Mother without a peer in the whole wide world. If I had known you, as you really are, how could I have acted contrary to your will?”