Page 1306 - the-brothers-karamazov

suggested he should give them to someone to hold for a
time. But he would not do this and seemed indeed sudden-
ly alarmed for his flowers, as though they wanted to take
them from him altogether. And after looking at the grave,
and as it were, satisfying himself that everything had been
done and the bread had been crumbled, he suddenly, to the
surprise of everyone, turned, quite composedly even, and
made his way homewards. But his steps became more and
more hurried, he almost ran. The boys and Alyosha kept up
with him.
‘The flowers are for mamma, the flowers are for mamma!
I was unkind to mamma,’ he began exclaiming suddenly.
Someone called to him to put on his hat as it was cold.
But he flung the hat in the snow as though he were angry
and kept repeating, ‘I won’t have the hat, I won’t have the
hat.’ Smurov picked it up and carried it after him. All the
boys were crying, and Kolya and the boy who discovered
about Troy most of all. Though Smurov, with the captain’s
hat in his hand, was crying bitterly too, he managed, as he
ran, to snatch up a piece of red brick that lay on the snow of
the path, to fling it at the flock of sparrows that was flying
by. He missed them, of course, and went on crying as he ran.
Half-way, Snegiryov suddenly stopped, stood still for half a
minute, as though struck by something, and suddenly turn-
ing back to the church, ran towards the deserted grave. But
the boys instantly overtook him and caught hold of him on
all sides. Then he fell helpless on the snow as though he had
been knocked down, and struggling, sobbing, and wail-
ing, he began crying out, ‘Ilusha, old man, dear old man!’

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