Godson-08

The Godson
by Leo Tolstoy

VIII

For the whole of that day he pressed on, until he came to the forest in which stood the hermit’s cell. He approached the cell and knocked at the door, whereupon a voice from within called out to him: "Who is there?"

"A great sinner," replied the godson, "who has come hither to atone for the sins of another."

Then an old man came out and asked him further: "What sins of another are those which have been laid upon you?"

So the godson told him all – about his godfather, and the bear and her young, and the throne in the sealed room, and the command which his godfather had given him, and the peasants whom he had seen in the field, and their trampling of the corn, and the calf running to the old woman of its own accord.

"It was then," said the godson, "that I understood that evil cannot be removed by evil. Yet still know not how to remove it. I pray you, teach me."

And the old man said: "Yet tell me first what else you have seen by the wayside as you came."

So the godson told him about the woman and the washing of the table, as also about the peasants who were bending felloes and the drovers who were lighting a fire. The old man heard him out, and then, turning back into the cell, brought out thence a little notched axe.

"Come with me," he said. He went across the clearing from the cell, and pointed to a tree. "Cut that down," he said.

So the godson applied the axe until the tree fell.

"Now split it into three."

The godson did so. Then the old man went back to the cell, and returned thence with a lighted torch.

"Set fire," he said, "to those three logs." So the godson took the torch, and set fire to the three logs, until there remained of them only three charred stumps.

"Now, bury them half their length in the ground. So."

The godson buried them as directed.

"Under that hill," went on the old man, "there runs a river. Go and bring thence some water in your mouth, and sprinkle these stumps with it. Sprinkle the first stump even as you taught the woman in the hut. Sprinkle the second one even as you taught the felloes-makers. And sprinkle the third one even as you taught the drovers. When all these three stumps shall sprout, and change from stumps to apple trees, then shall you know how evil may be removed from among men, and then also will you have atoned for your sins."

Thus spoke the old man, and retreated to his cell again, while the godson pondered and pondered, and yet could not understand what the old man had said to him. Nevertheless, he set about doing as he had been bidden.

Going to the river, and taking a full mouthful of water, he returned and sprinkled the first stump. Again, and yet again, he went, and sprinkled the other two. Now he began to feel tired and hungry, so he went to the cell to beg bite and sup of the old man; yet, hardly had he opened the door, when he saw the old man lying dead across his praying-stool. The godson looked about until he found some dry biscuits, which he ate. Then he found also a spade, and began to dig a grave for the old man. By night he brought water and sprinkled the stumps, and by day he went on digging the grave. Just when he had finished it and was about to bury the old man, some peasants from a neighbouring village arrived with presents of food for the aged hermit.

Learning that the old man was dead, and believing that he had blessed the godson as his successor, they helped to inter the body, left the food for the godson’s use, and departed after promising to bring him some more.

So the godson lived in the old man’s cell, subsisting upon food brought him by the people, and doing as he had been bidden – that is to say, bringing water in his mouth from the river and sprinkling with it the stumps.

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