"Shut the door!" he whispered. "_Bozhe moi! Bozhe moi_.... Shut the
door."
She recognised him then. He was the policeman from the corner of their
street, a man whom they knew well. He had always been a pompous little
man, stout and short of figure, kindly so far as they knew, although
they had heard of him as cruel in the pursuit of his official duties.
They had once talked to him a little and he explained: "I wouldn't hurt
a fly, God knows," he had said, "of myself, but a man likes to do his
work efficiently--and there are so many lazy fellows about here."
He prided himself, they saw, on a punctilious attention to duty. When he
had to come there for some paper or other he was always extremely
polite, and if they were going away he helped them about their
passports. He told them on another occasion that "he was pleased with
life--although one never knew of course when it might come down upon
one--"
Well, it had come down on him now. A more pitiful object Vera had never
seen. He was dressed in a dirty black suit and wore a shabby fur cap,
his padded overcoat was torn.
But the overwhelming effect of him was terror.
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