When she had been free, Musya had worn a silver ring, on which was the design of a skull, bones, and a crown of thorns about them.

Tanya Kovalchuk had often looked upon the ring as a symbol of doom, and she would ask Musya, now in jest, now in earnest, to remove the ring.
"Make me a present of it," she had begged.
"No, Tanechka, I will not give it to you.

But perhaps you will soon have another ring upon your finger." For some reason or other they all in turn had thought that she would doubtless soon marry, and this had offended her--she wanted no husband.
And recalling these half-jesting conversations with Musya, and the fact that now Musya was actually condemned to death, she choked with tears in her maternal pity.

And each time the clock struck she raised her tear-stained face and listened--how were they in the other cells receiving this drawn-out, persistent call of death?
But Musya was happy.
With her hands folded behind her back, dressed in a prisoner's garb which was much too large for her, and which made her look very much like a man--like a stripling dressed in some one else's clothes--she paced her cell evenly and tirelessly.

The sleeves of the coat were too long for her, and she turned them up, and her thin, almost childish, emaciated hands peeped out of the wide holes like a beautiful flower out of a coarse earthen jug.