She was a gifted student, well able to memorize the contents of lectures and to pass examinations without much effort, and in addition she devoured enormous quantities of the most recently published books. She was sure that her vocation lay not in bearing and bringing up children – in fact she regarded such a vocation with disgust and contempt – but in destroying the present order of things which fettered the fine potential of the common people, and in pointing out to men and women the new path of life revealed to her by the most recent European writers. Full in figure, pale of skin, rosy-cheeked and attractive, with dark flashing eyes and a thick plait of dark hair, she aroused in men feelings which she had no desire to arouse and could not possibly share, utterly absorbed as she was by her task of agitation and argument. But all the same she found it pleasant to arouse such feelings, and for that reason although she did not deliberately dress to show herself off, neither did she neglect her appearance. She enjoyed being attractive, and indeed it gave her the chance of showing how much she looked down on that which other women held to be so important. In her views on the possible means of struggle against the existing order she went further than most of her associates, her friend Tyurin among them, and took it as read that all methods in the struggle were valid and to be used, up to and including murder. Yet Katya Turchaninova the revolutionary was still at heart a kind and unselfish woman, forever spontaneously putting the interests, enjoyment and well-being of other people before her own, and always glad of the chance to do something to make someone else happy, whether it was a child, an old person, or an animal.
Turchaninova spent the summer vacation period in a district town in the Volga province staying with a friend of hers who was a village schoolmistress. Tyurin was living in the same district, in his father’s house. The three young people, and the local doctor too, met together frequently, lent each other books, argued, and fed one another’s shared sense of social indignation. The Tyurins’ property adjoined the Livyentsov estate where Pyotr Nikolayevich Sventitsky was now working as the steward. As soon as Pyotr Nikolayevich had arrived there and set about restoring order, young Tyurin, noting that the Livyentsovs’ peasants had a spirit of independence and a firm resolve to stand up for their rights, began to take an interest in them and often walked over to the village to talk to the peasants, explaining to them the principles of socialism in general and of the nationalization of the land in particular.
When Pyotr Nikolayevich was murdered and the court case began, the trial gave the group of revolutionaries in the district town a powerful cause for agitation, and they denounced it outspokenly. Tyurin’s visits to the village and his conversations with the peasants were referred to in the court proceedings. Tyurin’s house was searched and some revolutionary pamphlets discovered, and he was arrested and taken away to Petersburg.
Turchaninova travelled to Petersburg after him and went to the prison to try to see him, but they would not permit her to see him on just any day, but only on a public visiting-day, and even then she was only allowed to talk to Tyurin through a double iron grille. This visit strengthened her feelings of moral outrage still further. Her indignation finally reached its climax when she was faced with a young and handsome officer of the gendarmes who was obviously ready to grant her some concessions, provided she would agree to certain proposals of his. This incident drove her to the highest pitch of fury and hatred against all representatives of authority. She went to the chief of police in order to lodge a complaint. The chief of police echoed the words of the gendarme: that there was nothing they could do, and that the matter was under the jurisdiction of the Minister. She sent in a written memorandum to the Minister requesting an interview; it was refused. Then she decided that a desperate act was called for, and she bought a revolver.
XXII
The Minister was receiving visitors at his usual hour. After passing over three petitioners and talking for a while with a provincial governor, he went up to a pretty dark-eyed young woman in black who was standing there holding a piece of paper in her left hand. A lecherous glint appeared in the Minister’s eyes at the sight of this charming petitioner, but remembering his position the Minister adopted a serious expression.
‘And what can I do for you?’ he asked, advancing towards her.
She made no reply, but swiftly drew out the revolver from beneath her cape, aimed it at the Minister’s chest and fired, but she missed.
