“Here, Finashka!” she called, and breaking a piece from the roll thrust it toward the boy, who gazed at her open-mouthed.

Korableva, meanwhile, brought the flask of wine.  Maslova offered some to Korableva and Miss Dandy.  These three prisoners constituted the aristocracy of the cell, because they had money and divided among themselves what they had.

In a few minutes Maslova became brighter and energetically began to relate what had transpired at the court, mockingly imitating the prosecutor and rehearsing such parts as had appealed to her most.  She was particularly impressed by the fact that the men paid considerable attention to her wherever she went.  In the court-room every one looked at her, she said, and for that purpose constantly came into the prisoners’ room.

“Even the guard said:  ‘It is to look at you that they come here.’  Some one would come and ask for some document or something, but I saw that it was not for the document that he came.  He would devour me with his eyes,” she said, smiling and shaking her head as if perplexed.  “They are good ones!”

“Yes, that is how it is,” chimed in the watch-woman in her melodious voice.  “They are like flies on sugar.  If you needed them for any other purpose, be sure they would not come so quickly.  They know a good thing when they see it.”

“It was the same here,” interrupted Maslova.  “As soon as I was brought here I met with a party coming from the depot.  They gave me no rest, and I could hardly get rid of them.  Luckily the warden drove them off.  One of them bothered me particularly.”

“How did he look?” asked Miss Dandy.

“He had a dark complexion, and wore a mustache.”

“It is he.”

“Who?”

“Stchegloff.  He passed here just now.”

“Who is Stchegloff?”

“She don’t know Stchegloff!  He twice escaped from Siberia.  Now he has been caught, but he will escape again.  Even the officers fear him,” said Miss Dandy, who delivered notes to prisoners, and knew everything that transpired in the jail.  “He will surely escape.”

“If he does he won’t take either of us with him,” said Korableva.  “You’d better tell me this:  What did the lawyer say to you about a petition—­you must send one now.”

Maslova said that she did not know anything about a petition.

At this moment the red-haired woman, burying her two freckled hands into her tangled, thick hair, and scratching her head with her nails, approached the wine-drinking aristocrats.

“I will tell you, Katherine, everything,” she began.  “First of all, you must write on paper:  ‘I am not satisfied with the trial,’ and then hand it to the prosecutor.”

“What do you want here?” Korableva turned to her, speaking in an angry basso.  “You have smelled the wine!  We know you.  We don’t need your advice; we know what we have to do.”

“Who is talking to you?”