[Updater's note: pages appear to be missing from two locations in thisbook. Each location has been indicated with an updater's note. (January 17, 2009)]

THE COSSACKS

A Tale of 1852

By

Leo Tolstoy (1863)

Translated by Louise and Aylmer Maude

Chapter I

All is quiet in Moscow. The squeak of wheels is seldom heard in thesnow-covered street. There are no lights left in the windows and thestreet lamps have been extinguished. Only the sound of bells, borneover the city from the church towers, suggests the approach of morning. The streets are deserted. At rare intervals a night-cabman's sledgekneads up the snow and sand in the street as the driver makes his wayto another corner where he falls asleep while waiting for a fare. Anold woman passes by on her way to church, where a few wax candles burnwith a red light reflected on the gilt mountings of the icons. Workmenare already getting up after the long winter night and going to theirwork--but for the gentlefolk it is still evening. 

From a window in Chevalier's Restaurant a light--illegal at thathour--is still to be seen through a chink in the shutter. At theentrance a carriage, a sledge, and a cabman's sledge, stand closetogether with their backs to the curbstone. A three-horse sledge fromthe post-station is there also. A yard-porter muffled up and pinchedwith cold is sheltering behind the corner of the house. 

'And what's the good of all this jawing?' thinks the footman who sitsin the hall weary and haggard. 'This always happens when I'm on duty. 'From the adjoining room are heard the voices of three young men, sitting there at a table on which are wine and the remains of supper. One, a rather plain, thin, neat little man, sits looking with tiredkindly eyes at his friend, who is about to start on a journey. Another, a tall man, lies on a sofa beside a table on which are empty bottles, and plays with his watch-key. A third, wearing a short, fur-lined coat, is pacing up and down the room stopping now and then to crack an almondbetween his strong, rather thick, but well-tended fingers. He keepssmiling at something and his face and eyes are all aglow. He speakswarmly and gesticulates, but evidently does not find the words he wantsand those that occur to him seem to him inadequate to express what hasrisen to his heart. 

'Now I can speak out fully, ' said the traveller. 'I don't want todefend myself, but I should like you at least to understand me as Iunderstand myself, and not look at the matter superficially. You say Ihave treated her badly, ' he continued, addressing the man with thekindly eyes who was watching him. 

'Yes, you are to blame, ' said the latter, and his look seemed toexpress still more kindliness and weariness. 

'I know why you say that, ' rejoined the one who was leaving. 'To beloved is in your opinion as great a happiness as to love, and if a manobtains it, it is enough for his whole life. '

'Yes, quite enough, my dear fellow, more than enough!' confirmed theplain little man, opening and shutting his eyes. 

'But why shouldn't the man love too?' said the traveller thoughtfully, looking at his friend with something like pity. 'Why shouldn't onelove? Because love doesn't come . .. No, to be beloved is a misfortune. It is a misfortune to feel guilty because you do not give something youcannot give. O my God!' he added, with a gesture of his arm. 'If it allhappened reasonably, and not all topsy-turvy--not in our way but in away of its own! Why, it's as if I had stolen that love! You think sotoo, don't deny it. You must think so. But will you believe it, of allthe horrid and stupid things I have found time to do in my life--andthere are many--this is one I do not and cannot repent of. Neither atthe beginning nor afterwards did I lie to myself or to her. It seemedto me that I had at last fallen in love, but then I saw that it was aninvoluntary falsehood, and that that was not the way to love, and Icould not go on, but she did. Am I to blame that I couldn't? What was Ito do?'

'Well, it's ended now!' said his friend, lighting a cigar to master hissleepiness. 'The fact is that you have not yet loved and do not knowwhat love is. '

The man in the fur-lined coat was going to speak again, and put hishands to his head, but could not express what he wanted to say. 

'Never loved! . .. Yes, quite true, I never have! But after all, I havewithin me a desire to love, and nothing could be stronger than thatdesire! But then, again, does such love exist? There always remainssomething incomplete. Ah well! What's the use of talking? I've made anawful mess of life! But anyhow it's all over now; you are quite right. And I feel that I am beginning a new life. '

'Which you will again make a mess of, ' said the man who lay on the sofaplaying with his watch-key. But the traveller did not listen to him. 

'I am sad and yet glad to go, ' he continued. 'Why I am sad I don'tknow. '

And the traveller went on talking about himself, without noticing thatthis did not interest the others as much as it did him. A man is neversuch an egotist as at moments of spiritual ecstasy. At such times itseems to him that there is nothing on earth more splendid andinteresting than himself. 

'Dmitri Andreich! The coachman won't wait any longer!' said a youngserf, entering the room in a sheepskin coat, with a scarf tied roundhis head. 'The horses have been standing since twelve, and it's nowfour o'clock!'

Dmitri Andreich looked at his serf, Vanyusha. The scarf roundVanyusha's head, his felt boots and sleepy face, seemed to be callinghis master to a new life of labour, hardship, and activity. 

'True enough! Good-bye!' said he, feeling for the unfastened hook andeye on his coat. 

In spite of advice to mollify the coachman by another tip, he put onhis cap and stood in the middle of the room. The friends kissed once, then again, and after a pause, a third time. The man in the fur-linedcoat approached the table and emptied a champagne glass, then took theplain little man's hand and blushed. 

'Ah well, I will speak out all the same . .. I must and will be frankwith you because I am fond of you . .. Of course you love her--I alwaysthought so--don't you?'

'Yes, ' answered his friend, smiling still more gently. 

'And perhaps. .. '

'Please sir, I have orders to put out the candles, ' said the sleepyattendant, who had been listening to the last part of the conversationand wondering why gentlefolk always talk about one and the same thing. 'To whom shall I make out the bill? To you, sir?' he added, knowingwhom to address and turning to the tall man. 

'To me, ' replied the tall man. 'How much?'

'Twenty-six rubles. '

The tall man considered for a moment, but said nothing and put the billin his pocket. 

The other two continued their talk. 

'Good-bye, you are a capital fellow!' said the short plain man with themild eyes. Tears filled the eyes of both. They stepped into the porch. 

'Oh, by the by, ' said the traveller, turning with a blush to the tallman, 'will you settle Chevalier's bill and write and let me know?'

'All right, all right!' said the tall man, pulling on his gloves. 'HowI envy you!' he added quite unexpectedly when they were out in theporch. 

The traveller got into his sledge, wrapped his coat about him, andsaid: 'Well then, come along!' He even moved a little to make room inthe sledge for the man who said he envied him--his voice trembled. 

'Good-bye, Mitya! I hope that with God's help you. .. ' said the tallone. But his wish was that the other would go away quickly, and so hecould not finish the sentence. 

They were silent a moment. Then someone again said, 'Good-bye, ' and avoice cried, 'Ready, ' and the coachman touched up the horses. 

'Hy, Elisar!' One of the friends called out, and the other coachman andthe sledge-drivers began moving, clicking their tongues and pulling atthe reins. Then the stiffened carriage-wheels rolled squeaking over thefrozen snow. 

'A fine fellow, that Olenin!' said one of the friends. 'But what anidea to go to the Caucasus--as a cadet, too! I wouldn't do it foranything. . .. Are you dining at the club to-morrow?'

'Yes. '

They separated. 

The traveller felt warm, his fur coat seemed too hot. He sat on thebottom of the sledge and unfastened his coat, and the three shaggypost-horses dragged themselves out of one dark street into another, past houses he had never before seen. It seemed to Olenin that onlytravellers starting on a long journey went through those streets. Allwas dark and silent and dull around him, but his soul was full ofmemories, love, regrets, and a pleasant tearful feeling. 

Chapter II

'I'm fond of them, very fond! . .. First-rate fellows! . .. Fine!' hekept repeating, and felt ready to cry. But why he wanted to cry, whowere the first-rate fellows he was so fond of--was more than he quiteknew. Now and then he looked round at some house and wondered why itwas so curiously built; sometimes he began wondering why the post-boyand Vanyusha, who were so different from himself, sat so near, andtogether with him were being jerked about and swayed by the tugs theside-horses gave at the frozen traces, and again he repeated: 'Firstrate . .. Very fond!' and once he even said: 'And how it seizes one . .. Excellent!' and wondered what made him say it. 'Dear me, am I drunk?'he asked himself. He had had a couple of bottles of wine, but it wasnot the wine alone that was having this effect on Olenin. He rememberedall the words of friendship heartily, bashfully, spontaneously (as hebelieved) addressed to him on his departure. He remembered the clasp ofhands, glances, the moments of silence, and the sound of a voicesaying, 'Good-bye, Mitya!' when he was already in the sledge. Heremembered his own deliberate frankness. And all this had a touchingsignificance for him. Not only friends and relatives, not only peoplewho had been indifferent to him, but even those who did not like him, seemed to have agreed to become fonder of him, or to forgive him, before his departure, as people do before confession or death. 'PerhapsI shall not return from the Caucasus, ' he thought. And he felt that heloved his friends and some one besides. He was sorry for himself. Butit was not love for his friends that so stirred and uplifted his heartthat he could not repress the meaningless words that seemed to rise ofthemselves to his lips; nor was it love for a woman (he had never yetbeen in love) that had brought on this mood. Love for himself, lovefull of hope--warm young love for all that was good in his own soul(and at that moment it seemed to him that there was nothing but good init)--compelled him to weep and to mutter incoherent words. 

Olenin was a youth who had never completed his university course, neverserved anywhere (having only a nominal post in some government officeor other), who had squandered half his fortune and had reached the ageof twenty-four without having done anything or even chosen a career. Hewas what in Moscow society is termed un jeune homme. 

At the age of eighteen he was free--as only rich young Russians in the'forties who had lost their parents at an early age could be. Neitherphysical nor moral fetters of any kind existed for him; he could do ashe liked, lacking nothing and bound by nothing. Neither relatives, norfatherland, nor religion, nor wants, existed for him. He believed innothing and admitted nothing. But although he believed in nothing hewas not a morose or blase young man, nor self-opinionated, but on thecontrary continually let himself be carried away. He had come to theconclusion that there is no such thing as love, yet his heart alwaysoverflowed in the presence of any young and attractive woman. He hadlong been aware that honours and position were nonsense, yetinvoluntarily he felt pleased when at a ball Prince Sergius came up andspoke to him affably. But he yielded to his impulses only in so far asthey did not limit his freedom. As soon as he had yielded to anyinfluence and became conscious of its leading on to labour andstruggle, he instinctively hastened to free himself from the feeling oractivity into which he was being drawn and to regain his freedom. Inthis way he experimented with society-life, the civil service, farming, music--to which at one time he intended to devote his life--and evenwith the love of women in which he did not believe. He meditated on theuse to which he should devote that power of youth which is granted toman only once in a lifetime: that force which gives a man the power ofmaking himself, or even--as it seemed to him--of making the universe, into anything he wishes: should it be to art, to science, to love ofwoman, or to practical activities? It is true that some people aredevoid of this impulse, and on entering life at once place their necksunder the first yoke that offers itself and honestly labour under itfor the rest of their lives. But Olenin was too strongly conscious ofthe presence of that all-powerful God of Youth--of that capacity to beentirely transformed into an aspiration or idea--the capacity to wishand to do--to throw oneself headlong into a bottomless abyss withoutknowing why or wherefore. He bore this consciousness within himself, was proud of it and, without knowing it, was happy in thatconsciousness. Up to that time he had loved only himself, and could nothelp loving himself, for he expected nothing but good of himself andhad not yet had time to be disillusioned. On leaving Moscow he was inthat happy state of mind in which a young man, conscious of pastmistakes, suddenly says to himself, 'That was not the real thing. ' Allthat had gone before was accidental and unimportant. Till then he hadnot really tried to live, but now with his departure from Moscow a newlife was beginning--a life in which there would be no mistakes, noremorse, and certainly nothing but happiness. 

It is always the case on a long journey that till the first two orthree stages have been passed imagination continues to dwell on theplace left behind, but with the first morning on the road it leaps tothe end of the journey and there begins building castles in the air. Soit happened to Olenin. 

After leaving the town behind, he gazed at the snowy fields and feltglad to be alone in their midst. Wrapping himself in his fur coat, helay at the bottom of the sledge, became tranquil, and fell into a doze. The parting with his friends had touched him deeply, and memories ofthat last winter spent in Moscow and images of the past, mingled withvague thoughts and regrets, rose unbidden in his imagination. 

He remembered the friend who had seen him off and his relations withthe girl they had talked about. The girl was rich. "How could he loveher knowing that she loved me?" thought he, and evil suspicions crossedhis mind. "There is much dishonesty in men when one comes to reflect. "Then he was confronted by the question: "But really, how is it I havenever been in love? Every one tells me that I never have. Can it bethat I am a moral monstrosity?" And he began to recall all hisinfatuations. He recalled his entry into society, and a friend's sisterwith whom he spent several evenings at a table with a lamp on it whichlit up her slender fingers busy with needlework, and the lower part ofher pretty delicate face. He recalled their conversations that draggedon like the game in which one passes on a stick which one keeps alightas long as possible, and the general awkwardness and restraint and hiscontinual feeling of rebellion at all that conventionality. Some voicehad always whispered: "That's not it, that's not it, " and so it hadproved. Then he remembered a ball and the mazurka he danced with thebeautiful D----. "How much in love I was that night and how happy! Andhow hurt and vexed I was next morning when I woke and felt myself stillfree! Why does not love come and bind me hand and foot?" thought he. "No, there is no such thing as love! That neighbour who used to tellme, as she told Dubrovin and the Marshal, that she loved the stars, wasnot IT either. " And now his farming and work in the country recurred tohis mind, and in those recollections also there was nothing to dwell onwith pleasure. "Will they talk long of my departure?" came into hishead; but who "they" were he did not quite know. Next came a thoughtthat made him wince and mutter incoherently. It was the recollection ofM. Cappele the tailor, and the six hundred and seventy-eight rubles hestill owed him, and he recalled the words in which he had begged him towait another year, and the look of perplexity and resignation which hadappeared on the tailor's face. 'Oh, my God, my God!' he repeated, wincing and trying to drive away the intolerable thought. 'All the sameand in spite of everything she loved me, ' thought he of the girl theyhad talked about at the farewell supper. 'Yes, had I married her Ishould not now be owing anything, and as it is I am in debt toVasilyev. ' Then he remembered the last night he had played withVasilyev at the club (just after leaving her), and he recalled hishumiliating requests for another game and the other's cold refusal. 'Ayear's economizing and they will all be paid, and the devil takethem!'. .. But despite this assurance he again began calculating hisoutstanding debts, their dates, and when he could hope to pay them off. 'And I owe something to Morell as well as to Chevalier, ' thought he, recalling the night when he had run up so large a debt. It was at acarousel at the gipsies arranged by some fellows from Petersburg:Sashka B---, an aide-de-camp to the Tsar, Prince D---, and that pompousold----. 'How is it those gentlemen are so self-satisfied?' thought he, 'and by what right do they form a clique to which they think othersmust be highly flattered to be admitted? Can it be because they are onthe Emperor's staff? Why, it's awful what fools and scoundrels theyconsider other people to be! But I showed them that I at any rate, onthe contrary, do not at all want their intimacy. All the same, I fancyAndrew, the steward, would be amazed to know that I am on familiarterms with a man like Sashka B---, a colonel and an aide-de-camp to theTsar! Yes, and no one drank more than I did that evening, and I taughtthe gipsies a new song and everyone listened to it. Though I have donemany foolish things, all the same I am a very good fellow, ' thought he. 

Morning found him at the third post-stage. He drank tea, and himselfhelped Vanyusha to move his bundles and trunks and sat down among them, sensible, erect, and precise, knowing where all his belongings were, how much money he had and where it was, where he had put his passportand the post-horse requisition and toll-gate papers, and it all seemedto him so well arranged that he grew quite cheerful and the longjourney before him seemed an extended pleasure-trip. 

All that morning and noon he was deep in calculations of how manyversts he had travelled, how many remained to the next stage, how manyto the next town, to the place where he would dine, to the place wherehe would drink tea, and to Stavropol, and what fraction of the wholejourney was already accomplished. He also calculated how much money hehad with him, how much would be left over, how much would pay off allhis debts, and what proportion of his income he would spend each month. Towards evening, after tea, he calculated that to Stavropol there stillremained seven-elevenths of the whole journey, that his debts wouldrequire seven months' economy and one-eighth of his whole fortune; andthen, tranquillized, he wrapped himself up, lay down in the sledge, andagain dozed off. His imagination was now turned to the future: to theCaucasus. All his dreams of the future were mingled with pictures ofAmalat-Beks, Circassian women, mountains, precipices, terribletorrents, and perils. All these things were vague and dim, but the loveof fame and the danger of death furnished the interest of that future. Now, with unprecedented courage and a strength that amazed everyone, heslew and subdued an innumerable host of hillsmen; now he was himself ahillsman and with them was maintaining their independence against theRussians. As soon as he pictured anything definite, familiar Moscowfigures always appeared on the scene. Sashka B---fights with theRussians or the hillsmen against him. Even the tailor Cappele in somestrange way takes part in the conqueror's triumph. Amid all this heremembered his former humiliations, weaknesses, and mistakes, and therecollection was not disagreeable. It was clear that there among themountains, waterfalls, fair Circassians, and dangers, such mistakescould not recur. Having once made full confession to himself there wasan end of it all. One other vision, the sweetest of them all, mingledwith the young man's every thought of the future--the vision of a woman. 

And there, among the mountains, she appeared to his imagination as aCircassian slave, a fine figure with a long plait of hair and deepsubmissive eyes. He pictured a lonely hut in the mountains, and on thethreshold she stands awaiting him when, tired and covered with dust, blood, and fame, he returns to her. He is conscious of her kisses, hershoulders, her sweet voice, and her submissiveness. She is enchanting, but uneducated, wild, and rough. In the long winter evenings he beginsher education. She is clever and gifted and quickly acquires all theknowledge essential. Why not? She can quite easily learn foreignlanguages, read the French masterpieces and understand them: Notre Damede Paris, for instance, is sure to please her. She can also speakFrench. In a drawing-room she can show more innate dignity than a ladyof the highest society. She can sing, simply, powerfully, andpassionately. .. . 'Oh, what nonsense!' said he to himself. But here theyreached a post-station and he had to change into another sledge andgive some tips. But his fancy again began searching for the 'nonsense'he had relinquished, and again fair Circassians, glory, and his returnto Russia with an appointment as aide-de-camp and a lovely wife rosebefore his imagination. 'But there's no such thing as love, ' said he tohimself. 'Fame is all rubbish. But the six hundred and seventy-eightrubles? . .. And the conquered land that will bring me more wealth thanI need for a lifetime? It will not be right though to keep all thatwealth for myself. I shall have to distribute it. But to whom? Well, six hundred and seventy-eight rubles to Cappele and then we'll see. '. .. Quite vague visions now cloud his mind, and only Vanyusha's voiceand the interrupted motion of the sledge break his healthy youthfulslumber. Scarcely conscious, he changes into another sledge at the nextstage and continues his journey. 

Next morning everything goes on just the same: the same kind ofpost-stations and tea-drinking, the same moving horses' cruppers, thesame short talks with Vanyusha, the same vague dreams and drowsiness, and the same tired, healthy, youthful sleep at night. 

Chapter III

The farther Olenin travelled from Central Russia the farther he lefthis memories behind, and the nearer he drew to the Caucasus the lighterhis heart became. "I'll stay away for good and never return to showmyself in society, " was a thought that sometimes occurred to him. "These people whom I see here are NOT people. None of them know me andnone of them can ever enter the Moscow society I was in or find outabout my past. And no one in that society will ever know what I amdoing, living among these people. " And quite a new feeling of freedomfrom his whole past came over him among the rough beings he met on theroad whom he did not consider to be PEOPLE in the sense that his Moscowacquaintances were. The rougher the people and the fewer the signs ofcivilization the freer he felt. Stavropol, through which he had topass, irked him. The signboards, some of them even in French, ladies incarriages, cabs in the marketplace, and a gentleman wearing a fur cloakand tall hat who was walking along the boulevard and staring at thepassersby, quite upset him. "Perhaps these people know some of myacquaintances, " he thought; and the club, his tailor, cards, society. .. Came back to his mind. But after Stavropol everything wassatisfactory--wild and also beautiful and warlike, and Olenin felthappier and happier. All the Cossacks, post-boys, and post-stationmasters seemed to him simple folk with whom he could jest and conversesimply, without having to consider to what class they belonged. Theyall belonged to the human race which, without his thinking about it, all appeared dear to Olenin, and they all treated him in a friendly way. 

Already in the province of the Don Cossacks his sledge had beenexchanged for a cart, and beyond Stavropol it became so warm thatOlenin travelled without wearing his fur coat. It was alreadyspring--an unexpected joyous spring for Olenin. At night he was nolonger allowed to leave the Cossack villages, and they said it wasdangerous to travel in the evening. Vanyusha began to be uneasy, andthey carried a loaded gun in the cart. Olenin became still happier. Atone of the post-stations the post-master told of a terrible murder thathad been committed recently on the high road. They began to meet armedmen. "So this is where it begins!" thought Olenin, and kept expectingto see the snowy mountains of which mention was so often made. Once, towards evening, the Nogay driver pointed with his whip to themountains shrouded in clouds. Olenin looked eagerly, but it was dulland the mountains were almost hidden by the clouds. Olenin made outsomething grey and white and fleecy, but try as he would he could findnothing beautiful in the mountains of which he had so often read andheard. The mountains and the clouds appeared to him quite alike, and hethought the special beauty of the snow peaks, of which he had so oftenbeen told, was as much an invention as Bach's music and the love ofwomen, in which he did not believe. So he gave up looking forward toseeing the mountains. But early next morning, being awakened in hiscart by the freshness of the air, he glanced carelessly to the right. The morning was perfectly clear. Suddenly he saw, about twenty pacesaway as it seemed to him at first glance, pure white gigantic masseswith delicate contours, the distinct fantastic outlines of theirsummits showing sharply against the far-off sky. When he had realizedthe distance between himself and them and the sky and the wholeimmensity of the mountains, and felt the infinitude of all that beauty, he became afraid that it was but a phantasm or a dream. He gave himselfa shake to rouse himself, but the mountains were still the same. 

"What's that! What is it?" he said to the driver. 

"Why, the mountains, " answered the Nogay driver with indifference. 

"And I too have been looking at them for a long while, " said Vanyusha. "Aren't they fine? They won't believe it at home. "

The quick progress of the three-horsed cart along the smooth roadcaused the mountains to appear to be running along the horizon, whiletheir rosy crests glittered in the light of the rising sun. At firstOlenin was only astonished at the sight, then gladdened by it; butlater on, gazing more and more intently at that snow-peaked chain thatseemed to rise not from among other black mountains, but straight outof the plain, and to glide away into the distance, he began by slowdegrees to be penetrated by their beauty and at length to FEEL themountains. From that moment all he saw, all he thought, and all hefelt, acquired for him a new character, sternly majestic like themountains! All his Moscow reminiscences, shame, and repentance, and histrivial dreams about the Caucasus, vanished and did not return. 'Now ithas begun, ' a solemn voice seemed to say to him. The road and theTerek, just becoming visible in the distance, and the Cossack villagesand the people, all no longer appeared to him as a joke. He looked athimself or Vanyusha, and again thought of the mountains. . .. TwoCossacks ride by, their guns in their cases swinging rhythmicallybehind their backs, the white and bay legs of their horses minglingconfusedly . .. And the mountains! Beyond the Terek rises the smoke froma Tartar village. .. And the mountains! The sun has risen and glitterson the Terek, now visible beyond the reeds . .. And the mountains! Fromthe village comes a Tartar wagon, and women, beautiful young women, pass by. .. And the mountains! 'Abreks canter about the plain, and heream I driving along and do not fear them! I have a gun, and strength, and youth. .. And the mountains!'

Chapter IV

That whole part of the Terek line (about fifty miles) along which liethe villages of the Grebensk Cossacks is uniform in character both asto country and inhabitants. The Terek, which separates the Cossacksfrom the mountaineers, still flows turbid and rapid though alreadybroad and smooth, always depositing greyish sand on its low reedy rightbank and washing away the steep, though not high, left bank, with itsroots of century-old oaks, its rotting plane trees, and youngbrushwood. On the right bank lie the villages of pro-Russian, thoughstill somewhat restless, Tartars. Along the left bank, back half a milefrom the river and standing five or six miles apart from one another, are Cossack villages. In olden times most of these villages weresituated on the banks of the river; but the Terek, shifting northwardfrom the mountains year by year, washed away those banks, and now thereremain only the ruins of the old villages and of the gardens of pearand plum trees and poplars, all overgrown with blackberry bushes andwild vines. No one lives there now, and one only sees the tracks of thedeer, the wolves, the hares, and the pheasants, who have learned tolove these places. From village to village runs a road cut through theforest as a cannon-shot might fly. Along the roads are cordons ofCossacks and watch-towers with sentinels in them. Only a narrow stripabout seven hundred yards wide of fertile wooded soil belongs to theCossacks. To the north of it begin the sand-drifts of the Nogay orMozdok steppes, which fetch far to the north and run, Heaven knowswhere, into the Trukhmen, Astrakhan, and Kirghiz-Kaisatsk steppes. Tothe south, beyond the Terek, are the Great Chechnya river, theKochkalov range, the Black Mountains, yet another range, and at lastthe snowy mountains, which can just be seen but have never yet beenscaled. In this fertile wooded strip, rich in vegetation, has dwelt asfar back as memory runs the fine warlike and prosperous Russian tribebelonging to the sect of Old Believers, and called the GrebenskCossacks. 

Long long ago their Old Believer ancestors fled from Russia and settledbeyond the Terek among the Chechens on the Greben, the first range ofwooded mountains of Chechnya. Living among the Chechens the Cossacksintermarried with them and adopted the manners and customs of the hilltribes, though they still retained the Russian language in all itspurity, as well as their Old Faith. A tradition, still fresh amongthem, declares that Tsar Ivan the Terrible came to the Terek, sent fortheir Elders, and gave them the land on this side of the river, exhorting them to remain friendly to Russia and promising not toenforce his rule upon them nor oblige them to change their faith. Evennow the Cossack families claim relationship with the Chechens, and thelove of freedom, of leisure, of plunder and of war, still form theirchief characteristics. Only the harmful side of Russian influence showsitself--by interference at elections, by confiscation of church bells, and by the troops who are quartered in the country or march through it. A Cossack is inclined to hate less the dzhigit hillsman who maybe haskilled his brother, than the soldier quartered on him to defend hisvillage, but who has defiled his hut with tobacco-smoke. He respectshis enemy the hillsman and despises the soldier, who is in his eyes analien and an oppressor. In reality, from a Cossack's point of view aRussian peasant is a foreign, savage, despicable creature, of whom hesees a sample in the hawkers who come to the country and in theUkrainian immigrants whom the Cossack contemptuously calls'woolbeaters'. For him, to be smartly dressed means to be dressed likea Circassian. The best weapons are obtained from the hillsmen and thebest horses are bought, or stolen, from them. A dashing young Cossacklikes to show off his knowledge of Tartar, and when carousing talksTartar even to his fellow Cossack. In spite of all these things thissmall Christian clan stranded in a tiny comer of the earth, surroundedby half-savage Mohammedan tribes and by soldiers, considers itselfhighly advanced, acknowledges none but Cossacks as human beings, anddespises everybody else. The Cossack spends most of his time in thecordon, in action, or in hunting and fishing. He hardly ever works athome. When he stays in the village it is an exception to the generalrule and then he is holiday-making. All Cossacks make their own wine, and drunkenness is not so much a general tendency as a rite, thenon-fulfilment of which would be considered apostasy. The Cossack looksupon a woman as an instrument for his welfare; only the unmarried girlsare allowed to amuse themselves. A married woman has to work for herhusband from youth to very old age: his demands on her are the Orientalones of submission and labour. In consequence of this outlook women arestrongly developed both physically and mentally, and though theyare--as everywhere in the East--nominally in subjection, they possessfar greater influence and importance in family-life than Western women. Their exclusion from public life and inurement to heavy male labourgive the women all the more power and importance in the household. ACossack, who before strangers considers it improper to speakaffectionately or needlessly to his wife, when alone with her isinvoluntarily conscious of her superiority. His house and all hisproperty, in fact the entire homestead, has been acquired and is kepttogether solely by her labour and care. Though firmly convinced thatlabour is degrading to a Cossack and is only proper for a Nogaylabourer or a woman, he is vaguely aware of the fact that all he makesuse of and calls his own is the result of that toil, and that it is inthe power of the woman (his mother or his wife) whom he considers hisslave, to deprive him of all he possesses. Besides, the continuousperformance of man's heavy work and the responsibilities entrusted toher have endowed the Grebensk women with a peculiarly independentmasculine character and have remarkably developed their physicalpowers, common sense, resolution, and stability. The women are in mostcases stronger, more intelligent, more developed, and handsomer thanthe men. A striking feature of a Grebensk woman's beauty is thecombination of the purest Circassian type of face with the broad andpowerful build of Northern women. Cossack women wear the Circassiandress--a Tartar smock, beshmet, and soft slippers--but they tie theirkerchiefs round their heads in the Russian fashion. Smartness, cleanliness and elegance in dress and in the arrangement of their huts, are with them a custom and a necessity. In their relations with men thewomen, and especially the unmarried girls, enjoy perfect freedom. 

Novomlinsk village was considered the very heart of GrebenskCossackdom. In it more than elsewhere the customs of the old Grebenskpopulation have been preserved, and its women have from time immemorialbeen renowned all over the Caucasus for their beauty. A Cossack'slivelihood is derived from vineyards, fruit-gardens, water melon andpumpkin plantations, from fishing, hunting, maize and millet growing, and from war plunder. Novomlinsk village lies about two and a halfmiles away from the Terek, from which it is separated by a denseforest. On one side of the road which runs through the village is theriver; on the other, green vineyards and orchards, beyond which areseen the driftsands of the Nogay Steppe. The village is surrounded byearth-banks and prickly bramble hedges, and is entered by tall gateshung between posts and covered with little reed-thatched roofs. Besidethem on a wooden gun-carriage stands an unwieldy cannon captured by theCossacks at some time or other, and which has not been fired for ahundred years. A uniformed Cossack sentinel with dagger and gunsometimes stands, and sometimes does not stand, on guard beside thegates, and sometimes presents arms to a passing officer and sometimesdoes not. Below the roof of the gateway is written in black letters ona white board: 'Houses 266: male inhabitants 897: female 1012. ' TheCossacks' houses are all raised on pillars two and a half feet from theground. They are carefully thatched with reeds and have large carvedgables. If not new they are at least all straight and clean, with highporches of different shapes; and they are not built close together buthave ample space around them, and are all picturesquely placed alongbroad streets and lanes. In front of the large bright windows of manyof the houses, beyond the kitchen gardens, dark green poplars andacacias with their delicate pale verdure and scented white blossomsovertop the houses, and beside them grow flaunting yellow sunflowers, creepers, and grape vines. In the broad open square are three shopswhere drapery, sunflower and pumpkin seeds, locust beans andgingerbreads are sold; and surrounded by a tall fence, loftier andlarger than the other houses, stands the Regimental Commander'sdwelling with its casement windows, behind a row of tall poplars. Fewpeople are to be seen in the streets of the village on weekdays, especially in summer. The young men are on duty in the cordons or onmilitary expeditions; the old ones are fishing or helping the women inthe orchards and gardens. Only the very old, the sick, and thechildren, remain at home. 

Chapter V

It was one of those wonderful evenings that occur only in the Caucasus. The sun had sunk behind the mountains but it was still light. Theevening glow had spread over a third of the sky, and against itsbrilliancy the dull white immensity of the mountains was sharplydefined. The air was rarefied, motionless, and full of sound. Theshadow of the mountains reached for several miles over the steppe. Thesteppe, the opposite side of the river, and the roads, were alldeserted. If very occasionally mounted men appeared, the Cossacks inthe cordon and the Chechens in their aouls (villages) watched them withsurprised curiosity and tried to guess who those questionable men couldbe. At nightfall people from fear of one another flock to theirdwellings, and only birds and beasts fearless of man prowl in thosedeserted spaces. Talking merrily, the women who have been tying up thevines hurry away from the gardens before sunset. The vineyards, likeall the surrounding district, are deserted, but the villages becomevery animated at that time of the evening. From all sides, walking, riding, or driving in their creaking carts, people move towards thevillage. Girls with their smocks tucked up and twigs in their hands runchatting merrily to the village gates to meet the cattle that arecrowding together in a cloud of dust and mosquitoes which they bringwith them from the steppe. The well-fed cows and buffaloes disperse ata run all over the streets and Cossack women in coloured beshmets go toand fro among them. You can hear their merry laughter and shrieksmingling with the lowing of the cattle. There an armed and mountedCossack, on leave from the cordon, rides up to a hut and, leaningtowards the window, knocks. In answer to the knock the handsome head ofa young woman appears at the window and you can hear caressing, laughing voices. There a tattered Nogay labourer, with prominentcheekbones, brings a load of reeds from the steppes, turns his creakingcart into the Cossack captain's broad and clean courtyard, and liftsthe yoke off the oxen that stand tossing their heads while he and hismaster shout to one another in Tartar. Past a puddle that reachesnearly across the street, a barefooted Cossack woman with a bundle offirewood on her back makes her laborious way by clinging to the fences, holding her smock high and exposing her white legs. A Cossack returningfrom shooting calls out in jest: 'Lift it higher, shameless thing!' andpoints his gun at her. The woman lets down her smock and drops thewood. An old Cossack, returning home from fishing with his trouserstucked up and his hairy grey chest uncovered, has a net across hisshoulder containing silvery fish that are still struggling; and to takea short cut climbs over his neighbour's broken fence and gives a tug tohis coat which has caught on the fence. There a woman is dragging a drybranch along and from round the corner comes the sound of an axe. Cossack children, spinning their tops wherever there is a smooth placein the street, are shrieking; women are climbing over fences to avoidgoing round. From every chimney rises the odorous kisyak smoke. Fromevery homestead comes the sound of increased bustle, precursor to thestillness of night. 

Granny Ulitka, the wife of the Cossack cornet who is also teacher inthe regimental school, goes out to the gates of her yard like the otherwomen, and waits for the cattle which her daughter Maryanka is drivingalong the street. Before she has had time fully to open the wattle gatein the fence, an enormous buffalo cow surrounded by mosquitoes rushesup bellowing and squeezes in. Several well-fed cows slowly follow her, their large eyes gazing with recognition at their mistress as theyswish their sides with their tails. The beautiful and shapely Maryankaenters at the gate and throwing away her switch quickly slams the gateto and rushes with all the speed of her nimble feet to separate anddrive the cattle into their sheds. 'Take off your slippers, you devil'swench!' shouts her mother, 'you've worn them into holes!' Maryanka isnot at all offended at being called a 'devil's wench', but accepting itas a term of endearment cheerfully goes on with her task. Her face iscovered with a kerchief tied round her head. She is wearing a pinksmock and a green beshmet. She disappears inside the lean-to shed inthe yard, following the big fat cattle; and from the shed comes hervoice as she speaks gently and persuasively to the buffalo: 'Won't shestand still? What a creature! Come now, come old dear!' Soon the girland the old woman pass from the shed to the dairy carrying two largepots of milk, the day's yield. From the dairy chimney rises a thincloud of kisyak smoke: the milk is being used to make into clottedcream. The girl makes up the fire while her mother goes to the gate. Twilight has fallen on the village. The air is full of the smell ofvegetables, cattle, and scented kisyak smoke. From the gates and alongthe streets Cossack women come running, carrying lighted rags. From theyards one hears the snorting and quiet chewing of the cattle eased oftheir milk, while in the street only the voices of women and childrensound as they call to one another. It is rare on a week-day to hear thedrunken voice of a man. 

One of the Cossack wives, a tall, masculine old woman, approachesGranny Ulitka from the homestead opposite and asks her for a light. Inher hand she holds a rag. 

'Have you cleared up. Granny?'

'The girl is lighting the fire. Is it fire you want?' says GrannyUlitka, proud of being able to oblige her neighbour. 

Both women enter the hut, and coarse hands unused to dealing with smallarticles tremblingly lift the lid of a matchbox, which is a rarity inthe Caucasus. The masculine-looking new-comer sits down on the doorstepwith the evident intention of having a chat. 

'And is your man at the school. Mother?' she asked. 

'He's always teaching the youngsters. Mother. But he writes that he'llcome home for the holidays, ' said the cornet's wife. 

'Yes, he's a clever man, one sees; it all comes useful. '

'Of course it does. '

'And my Lukashka is at the cordon; they won't let him come home, ' saidthe visitor, though the cornet's wife had known all this long ago. Shewanted to talk about her Lukashka whom she had lately fitted out forservice in the Cossack regiment, and whom she wished to marry to thecornet's daughter, Maryanka. 

'So he's at the cordon?'

'He is. Mother. He's not been home since last holidays. The other day Isent him some shirts by Fomushkin. He says he's all right, and that hissuperiors are satisfied. He says they are looking out for abreks again. Lukashka is quite happy, he says. '

'Ah well, thank God, ' said the cornet's wife. ' "Snatcher" is certainlythe only word for him. ' Lukashka was surnamed 'the Snatcher' because ofhis bravery in snatching a boy from a watery grave, and the cornet'swife alluded to this, wishing in her turn to say something agreeable toLukashka's mother. 

'I thank God, Mother, that he's a good son! He's a fine fellow, everyone praises him, ' says Lukashka's mother. 'All I wish is to gethim married; then I could die in peace. '

'Well, aren't there plenty of young women in the village?' answered thecornet's wife slyly as she carefully replaced the lid of the matchboxwith her horny hands. 

'Plenty, Mother, plenty, ' remarked Lukashka's mother, shaking her head. 'There's your girl now, your Maryanka--that's the sort of girl! You'dhave to search through the whole place to find such another!' Thecornet's wife knows what Lukashka's mother is after, but though shebelieves him to be a good Cossack she hangs back: first because she isa cornet's wife and rich, while Lukashka is the son of a simple Cossackand fatherless, secondly because she does not want to part with herdaughter yet, but chiefly because propriety demands it. 

'Well, when Maryanka grows up she'll be marriageable too, ' she answerssoberly and modestly. 

'I'll send the matchmakers to you--I'll send them! Only let me get thevineyard done and then we'll come and make our bows to you, ' saysLukashka's mother. 'And we'll make our bows to Elias Vasilich too. '

'Elias, indeed!' says the cornet's wife proudly. 'It's to me you mustspeak! All in its own good time. '

Lukashka's mother sees by the stern face of the cornet's wife that itis not the time to say anything more just now, so she lights her ragwith the match and says, rising: 'Don't refuse us, think of my words. I'll go, it is time to light the fire. '

As she crosses the road swinging the burning rag, she meets Maryanka, who bows. 

'Ah, she's a regular queen, a splendid worker, that girl!' she thinks, looking at the beautiful maiden. 'What need for her to grow any more?It's time she was married and to a good home; married to Lukashka!'

But Granny Ulitka had her own cares and she remained sitting on thethreshold thinking hard about something, till the girl called her. 

Chapter VI

The male population of the village spend their time on militaryexpeditions and in the cordon--or 'at their posts', as the Cossackssay. Towards evening, that same Lukashka the Snatcher, about whom theold women had been talking, was standing on a watch-tower of theNizhni-Prototsk post situated on the very banks of the Terek. Leaningon the railing of the tower and screwing up his eyes, he looked now farinto the distance beyond the Terek, now down at his fellow Cossacks, and occasionally he addressed the latter. The sun was alreadyapproaching the snowy range that gleamed white above the fleecy clouds. The clouds undulating at the base of the mountains grew darker anddarker. The clearness of evening was noticeable in the air. A sense offreshness came from the woods, though round the post it was still hot. The voices of the talking Cossacks vibrated more sonorously thanbefore. The moving mass of the Terek's rapid brown waters contrastedmore vividly with its motionless banks. The waters were beginning tosubside and here and there the wet sands gleamed drab on the banks andin the shallows. The other side of the river, just opposite the cordon, was deserted; only an immense waste of low-growing reeds stretched faraway to the very foot of the mountains. On the low bank, a little toone side, could be seen the flat-roofed clay houses and thefunnel-shaped chimneys of a Chechen village. The sharp eyes of theCossack who stood on the watch-tower followed, through the eveningsmoke of the pro-Russian village, the tiny moving figures of theChechen women visible in the distance in their red and blue garments. 

Although the Cossacks expected abreks to cross over and attack themfrom the Tartar side at any moment, especially as it was May when thewoods by the Terek are so dense that it is difficult to pass throughthem on foot and the river is shallow enough in places for a horsemanto ford it, and despite the fact that a couple of days before a Cossackhad arrived with a circular from the commander of the regimentannouncing that spies had reported the intention of a party of someeight men to cross the Terek, and ordering special vigilance--nospecial vigilance was being observed in the cordon. The Cossacks, unarmed and with their horses unsaddled just as if they were at home, spent their time some in fishing, some in drinking, and some inhunting. Only the horse of the man on duty was saddled, and with itsfeet hobbled was moving about by the brambles near the wood, and onlythe sentinel had his Circassian coat on and carried a gun and sword. The corporal, a tall thin Cossack with an exceptionally long back andsmall hands and feet, was sitting on the earth-bank of a hut with hisbeshmet unbuttoned. On his face was the lazy, bored expression of asuperior, and having shut his eyes he dropped his head upon the palmfirst of one hand and then of the other. An elderly Cossack with abroad greyish-black beard was lying in his shirt, girdled with a blackstrap, close to the river and gazing lazily at the waves of the Terekas they monotonously foamed and swirled. Others, also overcome by theheat and half naked, were rinsing clothes in the Terek, plaiting afishing line, or humming tunes as they lay on the hot sand of the riverbank. One Cossack, with a thin face much burnt by the sun, lay near thehut evidently dead drunk, by a wall which though it had been in shadowsome two hours previously was now exposed to the sun's fierce slantingrays. 

Lukashka, who stood on the watch-tower, was a tall handsome lad abouttwenty years old and very like his mother. His face and whole build, inspite of the angularity of youth, indicated great strength, bothphysical and moral. Though he had only lately joined the Cossacks atthe front, it was evident from the expression of his face and the calmassurance of his attitude that he had already acquired the somewhatproud and warlike bearing peculiar to Cossacks and to men generally whocontinually carry arms, and that he felt he was a Cossack and fullyknew his own value. His ample Circassian coat was torn in some places, his cap was on the back of his head Chechen fashion, and his leggingshad slipped below his knees. His clothing was not rich, but he wore itwith that peculiar Cossack foppishness which consists in imitating theChechen brave. Everything on a real brave is ample, ragged, andneglected, only his weapons are costly. But these ragged clothes andthese weapons are belted and worn with a certain air and matched in acertain manner, neither of which can be acquired by everybody and whichat once strike the eye of a Cossack or a hillsman. Lukashka had thisresemblance to a brave. With his hands folded under his sword, and hiseyes nearly closed, he kept looking at the distant Tartar village. Taken separately his features were not beautiful, but anyone who sawhis stately carriage and his dark-browed intelligent face wouldinvoluntarily say, 'What a fine fellow!'

'Look at the women, what a lot of them are walking about in thevillage, ' said he in a sharp voice, languidly showing his brilliantwhite teeth and not addressing anyone in particular. 

Nazarka who was lying below immediately lifted his head and remarked:

'They must be going for water. '

'Supposing one scared them with a gun?' said Lukashka, laughing, 'Wouldn't they be frightened?'

'It wouldn't reach. '

'What! Mine would carry beyond. Just wait a bit, and when their feastcomes round I'll go and visit Girey Khan and drink buza there, ' saidLukashka, angrily swishing away the mosquitoes which attachedthemselves to him. 

A rustling in the thicket drew the Cossack's attention. A pied mongrelhalf-setter, searching for a scent and violently wagging its scantilyfurred tail, came running to the cordon. Lukashka recognized the dog asone belonging to his neighbour, Uncle Eroshka, a hunter, and saw, following it through the thicket, the approaching figure of the hunterhimself. 

Uncle Eroshka was a gigantic Cossack with a broad, snow-white beard andsuch broad shoulders and chest that in the wood, where there was no oneto compare him with, he did not look particularly tall, so wellproportioned were his powerful limbs. He wore a tattered coat and, overthe bands with which his legs were swathed, sandals made of undresseddeer's hide tied on with strings; while on his head he had a roughlittle white cap. He carried over one shoulder a screen to hide behindwhen shooting pheasants, and a bag containing a hen for luring hawks, and a small falcon; over the other shoulder, attached by a strap, was awild cat he had killed; and stuck in his belt behind were some littlebags containing bullets, gunpowder, and bread, a horse's tail to swishaway the mosquitoes, a large dagger in a torn scabbard smeared with oldbloodstains, and two dead pheasants. Having glanced at the cordon hestopped. 

'Hy, Lyam!' he called to the dog in such a ringing bass that it awokean echo far away in the wood; and throwing over his shoulder his biggun, of the kind the Cossacks call a 'flint', he raised his cap. 

'Had a good day, good people, eh?' he said, addressing the Cossacks inthe same strong and cheerful voice, quite without effort, but as loudlyas if he were shouting to someone on the other bank of the river. 

'Yes, yes. Uncle!' answered from all sides the voices of the youngCossacks. 

'What have you seen? Tell us!' shouted Uncle Eroshka, wiping the sweatfrom his broad red face with the sleeve of his coat. 

'Ah, there's a vulture living in the plane tree here, Uncle. As soon asnight comes he begins hovering round, ' said Nazarka, winking andjerking his shoulder and leg. 

'Come, come!' said the old man incredulously. 

'Really, Uncle! You must keep watch, ' replied Nazarka with a laugh. 

The other Cossacks began laughing. 

The wag had not seen any vulture at all, but it had long been thecustom of the young Cossacks in the cordon to tease and mislead UncleEroshka every time he came to them. 

'Eh, you fool, always lying!' exclaimed Lukashka from the tower toNazarka. 

Nazarka was immediately silenced. 

'It must be watched. I'll watch, ' answered the old man to the greatdelight of all the Cossacks. 'But have you seen any boars?'

'Watching for boars, are you?' said the corporal, bending forward andscratching his back with both hands, very pleased at the chance of somedistraction. 'It's abreks one has to hunt here and not boars! You'venot heard anything, Uncle, have you?' he added, needlessly screwing uphis eyes and showing his close-set white teeth. 

'Abreks, ' said the old man. 'No, I haven't. I say, have you anychikhir? Let me have a drink, there's a good man. I'm really quite doneup. When the time comes I'll bring you some fresh meat, I really will. Give me a drink!' he added. 

'Well, and are you going to watch?' inquired the corporal, as though hehad not heard what the other said. 

'I did mean to watch tonight, ' replied Uncle Eroshka. 'Maybe, withGod's help, I shall kill something for the holiday. Then you shall havea share, you shall indeed!'

'Uncle! Hallo, Uncle!' called out Lukashka sharply from above, attracting everybody's attention. All the Cossacks looked up at him. 'Just go to the upper water-course, there's a fine herd of boars there. I'm not inventing, really! The other day one of our Cossacks shot onethere. I'm telling you the truth, ' added he, readjusting the musket athis back and in a tone that showed he was not joking. 

'Ah! Lukashka the Snatcher is here!' said the old man, looking up. 'Where has he been shooting?'

'Haven't you seen? I suppose you're too young!' said Lukashka. 'Closeby the ditch, ' he went on seriously with a shake of the head. 'We werejust going along the ditch when all at once we heard somethingcrackling, but my gun was in its case. Elias fired suddenly . .. ButI'll show you the place, it's not far. You just wait a bit. I knowevery one of their footpaths . .. Daddy Mosev, ' said he, turningresolutely and almost commandingly to the corporal, 'it's time torelieve guard!' and holding aloft his gun he began to descend from thewatch-tower without waiting for the order. 

'Come down!' said the corporal, after Lukashka had started, and glancedround. 'Is it your turn, Gurka? Then go . .. True enough your Lukashkahas become very skilful, ' he went on, addressing the old man. 'He keepsgoing about just like you, he doesn't stay at home. The other day hekilled a boar. '

Chapter VII

The sun had already set and the shades of night were rapidly spreadingfrom the edge of the wood. The Cossacks finished their task round thecordon and gathered in the hut for supper. Only the old man stillstayed under the plane tree watching for the vulture and pulling thestring tied to the falcon's leg, but though a vulture was reallyperching on the plane tree it declined to swoop down on the lure. Lukashka, singing one song after another, was leisurely placing netsamong the very thickest brambles to trap pheasants. In spite of histall stature and big hands every kind of work, both rough and delicate, prospered under Lukashka's fingers. 

'Hallo, Luke!' came Nazarka's shrill, sharp voice calling him from thethicket close by. 'The Cossacks have gone in to supper. '

Nazarka, with a live pheasant under his arm, forced his way through thebrambles and emerged on the footpath. 

'Oh!' said Lukashka, breaking off in his song, 'where did you get thatcock pheasant? I suppose it was in my trap?'

Nazarka was of the same age as Lukashka and had also only been at thefront since the previous spring. 

He was plain, thin and puny, with a shrill voice that rang in one'sears. They were neighbours and comrades. Lukashka was sitting on thegrass crosslegged like a Tartar, adjusting his nets. 

'I don't know whose it was--yours, I expect. '

'Was it beyond the pit by the plane tree? Then it is mine! I set thenets last night. '

Lukashka rose and examined the captured pheasant. After stroking thedark burnished head of the bird, which rolled its eyes and stretchedout its neck in terror, Lukashka took the pheasant in his hands. 

'We'll have it in a pilau tonight. You go and kill and pluck it. '

'And shall we eat it ourselves or give it to the corporal?'

'He has plenty!'

'I don't like killing them, ' said Nazarka. 

'Give it here!'

Lukashka drew a little knife from under his dagger and gave it a swiftjerk. The bird fluttered, but before it could spread its wings thebleeding head bent and quivered. 

'That's how one should do it!' said Lukashka, throwing down thepheasant. 'It will make a fat pilau. '

Nazarka shuddered as he looked at the bird. 

'I say, Lukashka, that fiend will be sending us to the ambush againtonight, ' he said, taking up the bird. (He was alluding to thecorporal. ) 'He has sent Fomushkin to get wine, and it ought to be histurn. He always puts it on us. '

Lukashka went whistling along the cordon. 

'Take the string with you, ' he shouted. 

Nazirka obeyed. 

'I'll give him a bit of my mind today, I really will, ' continuedNazarka. 'Let's say we won't go; we're tired out and there's an end ofit! No, really, you tell him, he'll listen to you. It's too bad!'

'Get along with you! What a thing to make a fuss about!' said Lukashka, evidently thinking of something else. 'What bosh! If he made us turnout of the village at night now, that would be annoying: there one canhave some fun, but here what is there? It's all one whether we're inthe cordon or in ambush. What a fellow you are!'

'And are you going to the village?'

'I'll go for the holidays. '

'Gurka says your Dunayka is carrying on with Fomushkin, ' said Nazarkasuddenly. 

'Well, let her go to the devil, ' said Lukashka, showing his regularwhite teeth, though he did not laugh. 'As if I couldn't find another!'

'Gurka says he went to her house. Her husband was out and there wasFomushkin sitting and eating pie. Gurka stopped awhile and then wentaway, and passing by the window he heard her say, "He's gone, thefiend. .. . Why don't you eat your pie, my own? You needn't go home forthe night, " she says. And Gurka under the window says to himself, "That's fine!"'

'You're making it up. '

'No, quite true, by Heaven!'

'Well, if she's found another let her go to the devil, ' said Lukashka, after a pause. 'There's no lack of girls and I was sick of her anyway. '

'Well, see what a devil you are!' said Nazarka. 'You should make up tothe cornet's girl, Maryanka. Why doesn't she walk out with any one?'

Lukashka frowned. 'What of Maryanka? They're all alike, ' said he. 

'Well, you just try. .. '

'What do you think? Are girls so scarce in the village?'

And Lukashka recommenced whistling, and went along the cordon pullingleaves and branches from the bushes as he went. Suddenly, catchingsight of a smooth sapling, he drew the knife from the handle of hisdagger and cut it down. 'What a ramrod it will make, ' he said, swingingthe sapling till it whistled through the air. 

The Cossacks were sitting round a low Tartar table on the earthen floorof the clay-plastered outer room of the hut, when the question of whoseturn it was to lie in ambush was raised. 'Who is to go tonight?'shouted one of the Cossacks through the open door to the corporal inthe next room. 

'Who is to go?' the corporal shouted back. 'Uncle Burlak has been andFomushkin too, ' said he, not quite confidently. 'You two had better go, you and Nazarka, ' he went on, addressing Lukashka. 'And Ergushov mustgo too; surely he has slept it off?'

'You don't sleep it off yourself so why should he?' said Nazarka in asubdued voice. 

The Cossacks laughed. 

Ergushov was the Cossack who had been lying drunk and asleep near thehut. He had only that moment staggered into the room rubbing his eyes. 

Lukashka had already risen and was getting his gun ready. 

'Be quick and go! Finish your supper and go!' said the corporal; andwithout waiting for an expression of consent he shut the door, evidently not expecting the Cossack to obey. 'Of course, ' thought he, 'if I hadn't been ordered to I wouldn't send anyone, but an officermight turn up at any moment. As it is, they say eight abreks havecrossed over. '

'Well, I suppose I must go, ' remarked Ergushov, 'it's the regulation. Can't be helped! The times are such. I say, we must go. '

Meanwhile Lukashka, holding a big piece of pheasant to his mouth withboth hands and glancing now at Nazarka, now at Ergushov, seemed quiteindifferent to what passed and only laughed at them both. Before theCossacks were ready to go into ambush. Uncle Eroshka, who had beenvainly waiting under the plane tree till night fell, entered the darkouter room. 

'Well, lads, ' his loud bass resounded through the low-roofed roomdrowning all the other voices, 'I'm going with you. You'll watch forChechens and I for boars!'

Chapter VIII

It was quite dark when Uncle Eroshka and the three Cossacks, in theircloaks and shouldering their guns, left the cordon and went towards theplace on the Terek where they were to lie in ambush. Nazarka did notwant to go at all, but Lukashka shouted at him and they soon started. After they had gone a few steps in silence the Cossacks turned asidefrom the ditch and went along a path almost hidden by reeds till theyreached the river. On its bank lay a thick black log cast up by thewater. The reeds around it had been recently beaten down. 

'Shall we lie here?' asked Nazarka. 

'Why not?' answered Lukashka. 'Sit down here and I'll be back in aminute. I'll only show Daddy where to go. '

'This is the best place; here we can see and not be seen, ' saidErgushov, 'so it's here we'll lie. It's a first-rate place!'

Nazarka and Ergushov spread out their cloaks and settled down behindthe log, while Lukashka went on with Uncle Eroshka. 

'It's not far from here. Daddy, ' said Lukashka, stepping softly infront of the old man; 'I'll show you where they've been--I'm the onlyone that knows. Daddy. '

'Show me! You're a fine fellow, a regular Snatcher!' replied the oldman, also whispering. 

Having gone a few steps Lukashka stopped, stooped down over a puddle, and whistled. 'That's where they come to drink, d'you see?' He spoke ina scarcely audible voice, pointing to fresh hoof-prints. 

'Christ bless you, ' answered the old man. 'The boar will be in thehollow beyond the ditch, ' he added. Til watch, and you can go. '

Lukashka pulled his cloak up higher and walked back alone, throwingswift glances now to the left at the wall of reeds, now to the Terekrushing by below the bank. 'I daresay he's watching or creeping alongsomewhere, ' thought he of a possible Chechen hillsman. Suddenly a loudrustling and a splash in the water made him start and seize his musket. From under the bank a boar leapt up--his dark outline showing for amoment against the glassy surface of the water and then disappearingamong the reeds. Lukashka pulled out his gun and aimed, but before hecould fire the boar had disappeared in the thicket. Lukashka spat withvexation and went on. On approaching the ambuscade he halted again andwhistled softly. His whistle was answered and he stepped up to hiscomrades. 

Nazarka, all curled up, was already asleep. Ergushov sat with his legscrossed and moved slightly to make room for Lukashka. 

'How jolly it is to sit here! It's really a good place, ' said he. 'Didyou take him there?'

'Showed him where, ' answered Lukashka, spreading out his cloak. 'Butwhat a big boar I roused just now close to the water! I expect it wasthe very one! You must have heard the crash?'

'I did hear a beast crashing through. I knew at once it was a beast. Ithought to myself: "Lukashka has roused a beast, "' Ergushov said, wrapping himself up in his cloak. 'Now I'll go to sleep, ' he added. 'Wake me when the cocks crow. We must have discipline. I'll lie downand have a nap, and then you will have a nap and I'll watch--that's theway. '

'Luckily I don't want to sleep, ' answered Lukashka. 

The night was dark, warm, and still. Only on one side of the sky thestars were shining, the other and greater part was overcast by one hugecloud stretching from the mountaintops. The black cloud, blending inthe absence of any wind with the mountains, moved slowly onwards, itscurved edges sharply denned against the deep starry sky. Only in frontof him could the Cossack discern the Terek and the distance beyond. Behind and on both sides he was surrounded by a wall of reeds. Occasionally the reeds would sway and rustle against one anotherapparently without cause. Seen from down below, against the clear partof the sky, their waving tufts looked like the feathery branches oftrees. Close in front at his very feet was the bank, and at its basethe rushing torrent. A little farther on was the moving mass of glassybrown water which eddied rhythmically along the bank and round theshallows. Farther still, water, banks, and cloud all merged together inimpenetrable gloom. Along the surface of the water floated blackshadows, in which the experienced eyes of the Cossack detected treescarried down by the current. Only very rarely sheet-lightning, mirroredin the water as in a black glass, disclosed the sloping bank opposite. The rhythmic sounds of night--the rustling of the reeds, the snoring ofthe Cossacks, the hum of mosquitoes, and the rushing water, were everynow and then broken by a shot fired in the distance, or by the gurglingof water when a piece of bank slipped down, the splash of a big fish, or the crashing of an animal breaking through the thick undergrowth inthe wood. Once an owl flew past along the Terek, flapping one wingagainst the other rhythmically at every second beat. Just above theCossack's head it turned towards the wood and then, striking its wingsno longer after every other flap but at every flap, it flew to an oldplane tree where it rustled about for a long time before settling downamong the branches. At every one of these unexpected sounds thewatching Cossack listened intently, straining his hearing, and screwingup his eyes while he deliberately felt for his musket. 

The greater part of the night was past. The black cloud that had movedwestward revealed the clear starry sky from under its torn edge, andthe golden upturned crescent of the moon shone above the mountains witha reddish light. The cold began to be penetrating. Nazarka awoke, spokea little, and fell asleep again. Lukashka feeling bored got up, drewthe knife from his dagger-handle and began to fashion his stick into aramrod. His head was full of the Chechens who lived over there in themountains, and of how their brave lads came across and were not afraidof the Cossacks, and might even now be crossing the river at some otherspot. He thrust himself out of his hiding-place and looked along theriver but could see nothing. And as he continued looking out atintervals upon the river and at the opposite bank, now dimlydistinguishable from the water in the faint moonlight, he no longerthought about the Chechens but only of when it would be time to wakehis comrades, and of going home to the village. In the village heimagined Dunayka, his 'little soul', as the Cossacks call a man'smistress, and thought of her with vexation. Silvery mists, a sign ofcoming morning, glittered white above the water, and not far from himyoung eagles were whistling and flapping their wings. At last thecrowing of a cock reached him from the distant village, followed by thelong-sustained note of another, which was again answered by yet othervoices. 

'Time to wake them, ' thought Lukashka, who had finished his ramrod andfelt his eyes growing heavy. Turning to his comrades he managed to makeout which pair of legs belonged to whom, when it suddenly seemed to himthat he heard something splash on the other side of the Terek. Heturned again towards the horizon beyond the hills, where day wasbreaking under the upturned crescent, glanced at the outline of theopposite bank, at the Terek, and at the now distinctly visibledriftwood upon it. For one instant it seemed to him that he was movingand that the Terek with the drifting wood remained stationary. Again hepeered out. One large black log with a branch particularly attractedhis attention. The tree was floating in a strange way right down themiddle of the stream, neither rocking nor whirling. It even appearednot to be floating altogether with the current, but to be crossing itin the direction of the shallows. Lukashka stretching out his neckwatched it intently. The tree floated to the shallows, stopped, andshifted in a peculiar manner. Lukashka thought he saw an arm stretchedout from beneath the tree. 'Supposing I killed an abrek all by myself!'he thought, and seized his gun with a swift, unhurried movement, putting up his gun-rest, placing the gun upon it, and holding itnoiselessly in position. Cocking the trigger, with bated breath he tookaim, still peering out intently. 'I won't wake them, ' he thought. Buthis heart began beating so fast that he remained motionless, listening. Suddenly the trunk gave a plunge and again began to float across thestream towards our bank. 'Only not to miss . .. ' thought he, and now bythe faint light of the moon he caught a glimpse of a Tartar's head infront of the floating wood. He aimed straight at the head whichappeared to be quite near--just at the end of his rifle's barrel. Heglanced cross. 'Right enough it is an abrek! he thought joyfully, andsuddenly rising to his knees he again took aim. Having found the sight, barely visible at the end of the long gun, he said: 'In the name of theFather and of the Son, ' in the Cossack way learnt in his childhood, andpulled the trigger. A flash of lightning lit up for an instant thereeds and the water, and the sharp, abrupt report of the shot wascarried across the river, changing into a prolonged roll somewhere inthe far distance. The piece of driftwood now floated not across, butwith the current, rocking and whirling. 

'Stop, I say!' exclaimed Ergushov, seizing his musket and raisinghimself behind the log near which he was lying. 

'Shut up, you devil!' whispered Lukashka, grinding his teeth. 'abreks!'

'Whom have you shot?' asked Nazarka. 'Who was it, Lukashka?'

Lukashka did not answer. He was reloading his gun and watching thefloating wood. A little way off it stopped on a sand-bank, and frombehind it something large that rocked in the water came into view. 

'What did you shoot? Why don't you speak?' insisted the Cossacks. 

'Abreks, I tell you!' said Lukashka. 

'Don't humbug! Did the gun go off? . .. '

'I've killed an abrek, that's what I fired at, ' muttered Lukashka in avoice choked by emotion, as he jumped to his feet. 'A man wasswimming. .. ' he said, pointing to the sandbank. 'I killed him. Justlook there. '

'Have done with your humbugging!' said Ergushov again, rubbing his eyes. 

'Have done with what? Look there, ' said Lukashka, seizing him by theshoulders and pulling him with such force that Ergushov groaned. 

He looked in the direction in which Lukashka pointed, and discerning abody immediately changed his tone. 

'O Lord! But I say, more will come! I tell you the truth, ' said hesoftly, and began examining his musket. 'That was a scout swimmingacross: either the others are here already or are not far off on theother side--I tell you for sure!' Lukashka was unfastening his belt andtaking off his Circassian coat. 

'What are you up to, you idiot?' exclaimed Ergushov. 'Only showyourself and you've lost all for nothing, I tell you true! If you'vekilled him he won't escape. Let me have a little powder for mymusket-pan--you have some? Nazarka, you go back to the cordon and lookalive; but don't go along the bank or you'll be killed--I tell youtrue. '

'Catch me going alone! Go yourself!' said Nazarka angrily. 

Having taken off his coat, Lukashka went down to the bank. 

'Don't go in, I tell you!' said Ergushov, putting some powder on thepan. 'Look, he's not moving. I can see. It's nearly morning; wait tillthey come from the cordon. You go, Nazarka. You're afraid! Don't beafraid, I tell you. '

'Luke, I say, Lukashka! Tell us how you did it!' said Nazarka. 

Lukashka changed his mind about going into the water just then. 'Goquick to the cordon and I will watch. Tell the Cossacks to send out thepatrol. If the ABREKS are on this side they must be caught, ' said he. 

'That's what I say. They'll get off, ' said Ergushov, rising. 'True, they must be caught!'

Ergushov and Nazarka rose and, crossing themselves, started off for thecordon--not along the riverbank but breaking their way through thebrambles to reach a path in the wood. 

'Now mind, Lukashka--they may cut you down here, so you'd best keep asharp look-out, I tell you!'

'Go along; I know, ' muttered Lukashka; and having examined his gunagain he sat down behind the log. 

He remained alone and sat gazing at the shallows and listening for theCossacks; but it was some distance to the cordon and he was tormentedby impatience. He kept thinking that the other ABREKS who were with theone he had killed would escape. He was vexed with the ABREKS who weregoing to escape just as he had been with the boar that had escaped theevening before. He glanced round and at the opposite bank, expectingevery moment to see a man, and having arranged his gun-rest he wasready to fire. The idea that he might himself be killed never enteredhis head. 

Chapter IX

It was growing light. The Chechen's body which was gently rocking inthe shallow water was now clearly visible. Suddenly the reeds rustlednot far from Luke and he heard steps and saw the feathery tops of thereeds moving. He set his gun at full cock and muttered: 'In the name ofthe Father and of the Son, ' but when the cock clicked the sound ofsteps ceased. 

'Hallo, Cossacks! Don't kill your Daddy!' said a deep bass voicecalmly; and moving the reeds apart Daddy Eroshka came up close to Luke. 

'I very nearly killed you, by God I did!' said Lukashka. 

'What have you shot?' asked the old man. 

His sonorous voice resounded through the wood and downward along theriver, suddenly dispelling the mysterious quiet of night around theCossack. It was as if everything had suddenly become lighter and moredistinct. 

'There now. Uncle, you have not seen anything, but I've killed abeast, ' said Lukashka, uncocking his gun and getting up with unnaturalcalmness. 

The old man was staring intently at the white back, now clearlyvisible, against which the Terek rippled. 

'He was swimming with a log on his back. I spied him out! . .. Lookthere. There! He's got blue trousers, and a gun I think. .. . Do yousee?' inquired Luke. 

 'How can one help seeing?' said the old man angrily, and aserious and stern expression appeared on his face. 'You've killed abrave, ' he said, apparently with regret. 

'Well, I sat here and suddenly saw something dark on the other side. Ispied him when he was still over there. It was as if a man had comethere and fallen in. Strange! And a piece of driftwood, a good-sizedpiece, comes floating, not with the stream but across it; and what do Isee but a head appearing from under it! Strange! I stretched out of thereeds but could see nothing; then I rose and he must have heard, thebeast, and crept out into the shallow and looked about. "No, youdon't!" I said, as soon as he landed and looked round, "you won't getaway!" Oh, there was something choking me! I got my gun ready but didnot stir, and looked out. He waited a little and then swam out again;and when he came into the moonlight I could see his whole back. "In thename of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost". .. And throughthe smoke I see him struggling. He moaned, or so it seemed to me. "Ah, "I thought, "the Lord be thanked, I've killed him!" And when he driftedonto the sand-bank I could see him distinctly: he tried to get up butcouldn't. He struggled a bit and then lay down. Everything could beseen. Look, he does not move--he must be dead! The Cossacks have goneback to the cordon in case there should be any more of them. '

'And so you got him!' said the old man. 'He is far away now, my lad!. .. ' And again he shook his head sadly. 

Just then the sound reached them of breaking bushes and the loud voicesof Cossacks approaching along the bank on horseback and on foot. 'Areyou bringing the skiff?' shouted Lukashka. 

'You're a trump, Luke! Lug it to the bank!' shouted one of the Cossacks. 

Without waiting for the skiff Lukashka began to undress, keeping an eyeall the while on his prey. 

'Wait a bit, Nazarka is bringing the skiff, ' shouted the corporal. 

'You fool! Maybe he is alive and only pretending! Take your dagger withyou!' shouted another Cossack. 

'Get along, ' cried Luke, pulling off his trousers. He quickly undressedand, crossing himself, jumped, plunging with a splash into the river. Then with long strokes of his white arms, lifting his back high out ofthe water and breathing deeply, he swam across the current of the Terektowards the shallows. A crowd of Cossacks stood on the bank talkingloudly. Three horsemen rode off to patrol. The skiff appeared round abend. Lukashka stood up on the sandbank, leaned over the body, and gaveit a couple of shakes. 

'Quite dead!' he shouted in a shrill voice. 

The Chechen had been shot in the head. He had on a pair of bluetrousers, a shirt, and a Circassian coat, and a gun and dagger weretied to his back. Above all these a large branch was tied, and it wasthis which at first had misled Lukashka. 

'What a carp you've landed!' cried one of the Cossacks who hadassembled in a circle, as the body, lifted out of the skiff, was laidon the bank, pressing down the grass. 

'How yellow he is!' said another. 

'Where have our fellows gone to search? I expect the rest of them areon the other bank. If this one had not been a scout he would not haveswum that way. Why else should he swim alone?' said a third. 

'Must have been a smart one to offer himself before the others; aregular brave!' said Lukashka mockingly, shivering as he wrung out hisclothes that had got wet on the bank. 

'His beard is dyed and cropped. '

'And he has tied a bag with a coat in it to his back. '

'That would make it easier for him to swim, ' said some one. 

'I say, Lukashka, ' said the corporal, who was holding the dagger andgun taken from the dead man. 'Keep the dagger for yourself and the coattoo; but I'll give you three rubles for the gun. You see it has a holein it, ' said he, blowing into the muzzle. 'I want it just for asouvenir. '

Lukashka did not answer. Evidently this sort of begging vexed him buthe knew it could not be avoided. 

'See, what a devil!' said he, frowning and throwing down the Chechen'scoat. 'If at least it were a good coat, but it's a mere rag. '

'It'll do to fetch firewood in, ' said one of the Cossacks. 

'Mosev, I'll go home, ' said Lukashka, evidently forgetting his vexationand wishing to get some advantage out of having to give a present tohis superior. 

'All right, you may go!'

'Take the body beyond the cordon, lads, ' said the corporal, stillexamining the gun, 'and put a shelter over him from the sun. Perhapsthey'll send from the mountains to ransom it. '

'It isn't hot yet, ' said someone. 

'And supposing a jackal tears him? Would that be well?' remarkedanother Cossack. 

'We'll set a watch; if they should come to ransom him it won't do forhim to have been torn. '

'Well, Lukashka, whatever you do you must stand a pail of vodka for thelads, ' said the corporal gaily. 

'Of course! That's the custom, ' chimed in the Cossacks. 'See what luckGod has sent you! Without ever having seen anything of the kind before, you've killed a brave!'

'Buy the dagger and coat and don't be stingy, and I'll let you have thetrousers too, ' said Lukashka. 'They're too tight for me; he was a thindevil. '

One Cossack bought the coat for a ruble and another gave the price oftwo pails of vodka for the dagger. 

'Drink, lads! I'll stand you a pail!' said Luke. 'I'll bring it myselffrom the village. '

'And cut up the trousers into kerchiefs for the girls!' said Nazarka. 

The Cossacks burst out laughing. 

'Have done laughing!' said the corporal. 'And take the body away. Whyhave you put the nasty thing by the hut?'

'What are you standing there for? Haul him along, lads!' shoutedLukashka in a commanding voice to the Cossacks, who reluctantly tookhold of the body, obeying him as though he were their chief. Afterdragging the body along for a few steps the Cossacks let fall the legs, which dropped with a lifeless jerk, and stepping apart they then stoodsilent for a few moments. Nazarka came up and straightened the head, which was turned to one side so that the round wound above the templeand the whole of the dead man's face were visible. 'See what a mark hehas made right in the brain, ' he said. 'He won't get lost. His ownerswill always know him!' No one answered, and again the Angel of Silenceflew over the Cossacks. 

The sun had risen high and its diverging beams were lighting up thedewy grass. Near by, the Terek murmured in the awakened wood and, greeting the morning, the pheasants called to one another. The Cossacksstood still and silent around the dead man, gazing at him. The brownbody, with nothing on but the wet blue trousers held by a girdle overthe sunken stomach, was well shaped and handsome. The muscular arms laystretched straight out by his sides; the blue, freshly shaven, roundhead with the clotted wound on one side of it was thrown back. Thesmooth tanned forehead contrasted sharply with the shaven part of thehead. The open glassy eyes with lowered pupils stared upwards, seemingto gaze past everything. Under the red trimmed moustache the fine lips, drawn at the corners, seemed stiffened into a smile of good-naturedsubtle raillery. The fingers of the small hands covered with red hairswere bent inward, and the nails were dyed red. 

Lukashka had not yet dressed. He was wet. His neck was redder and hiseyes brighter than usual, his broad jaws twitched, and from his healthybody a hardly perceptible steam rose in the fresh morning air. 

'He too was a man!' he muttered, evidently admiring the corpse. 

'Yes, if you had fallen into his hands you would have had shortshrift, ' said one of the Cossacks. 

The Angel of Silence had taken wing. The Cossacks began bustling aboutand talking. Two of them went to cut brushwood for a shelter, othersstrolled towards the cordon. Luke and Nazarka ran to get ready to go tothe village. 

Half an hour later they were both on their way homewards, talkingincessantly and almost running through the dense woods which separatedthe Terek from the village. 

'Mind, don't tell her I sent you, but just go and find out if herhusband is at home, ' Luke was saying in his shrill voice. 

'And I'll go round to Yamka too, ' said the devoted Nazarka. 'We'll havea spree, shall we?'

'When should we have one if not to-day?' replied Luke. 

When they reached the village the two Cossacks drank, and lay down tosleep till evening. 

Chapter X

On the third day after the events above described, two companies of aCaucasian infantry regiment arrived at the Cossack village ofNovomlinsk. The horses had been unharnessed and the companies' wagonswere standing in the square. The cooks had dug a pit, and with logsgathered from various yards (where they had not been sufficientlysecurely stored) were now cooking the food; the pay-sergeants weresettling accounts with the soldiers. The Service Corps men were drivingpiles in the ground to which to tie the horses, and the quartermasterswere going about the streets just as if they were at home, showingofficers and men to their quarters. Here were green ammunition boxes ina line, the company's carts, horses, and cauldrons in which buckwheatporridge was being cooked. Here were the captain and the lieutenant andthe sergeant-major, Onisim Mikhaylovich, and all this was in theCossack village where it was reported that the companies were orderedto take up their quarters: therefore they were at home here. But whythey were stationed there, who the Cossacks were, and whether theywanted the troops to be there, and whether they were Old Believers ornot--was all quite immaterial. Having received their pay and beendismissed, tired out and covered with dust, the soldiers noisily and indisorder, like a swarm of bees about to settle, spread over the squaresand streets; quite regardless of the Cossacks' ill will, chatteringmerrily and with their muskets clinking, by twos and threes theyentered the huts and hung up their accoutrements, unpacked their bags, and bantered the women. At their favourite spot, round theporridge-cauldrons, a large group of soldiers assembled and with littlepipes between their teeth they gazed, now at the smoke which rose intothe hot sky, becoming visible when it thickened into white clouds as itrose, and now at the camp fires which were quivering in the pure airlike molten glass, and bantered and made fun of the Cossack men andwomen because they do not live at all like Russians. In all the yardsone could see soldiers and hear their laughter and the exasperated andshrill cries of Cossack women defending their houses and refusing togive the soldiers water or cooking utensils. Little boys and girls, clinging to their mothers and to each other, followed all the movementsof the troopers (never before seen by them) with frightened curiosity, or ran after them at a respectful distance. The old Cossacks came outsilently and dismally and sat on the earthen embankments of their huts, and watched the soldiers' activity with an air of leaving it all to thewill of God without understanding what would come of it. 

Olenin, who had joined the Caucasian Army as a cadet three monthsbefore, was quartered in one of the best houses in the village, thehouse of the cornet, Elias Vasilich--that is to say at Granny Ulitka's. 

'Goodness knows what it will be like, Dmitri Andreich, ' said thepanting Vanyusha to Olenin, who, dressed in a Circassian coat andmounted on a Kabarda horse which he had bought in Groznoe, was after afive-hours' march gaily entering the yard of the quarters assigned tohim. 

'Why, what's the matter?' he asked, caressing his horse and lookingmerrily at the perspiring, dishevelled, and worried Vanyusha, who hadarrived with the baggage wagons and was unpacking. 

Olenin looked quite a different man. In place of his clean-shaven lipsand chin he had a youthful moustache and a small beard. Instead of asallow complexion, the result of nights turned into day, his cheeks, his forehead, and the skin behind his ears were now red with healthysunburn. In place of a clean new black suit he wore a dirty whiteCircassian coat with a deeply pleated skirt, and he bore arms. Insteadof a freshly starched collar, his neck was tightly clasped by the redband of his silk BESHMET. He wore Circassian dress but did not wear itwell, and anyone would have known him for a Russian and not a Tartarbrave. It was the thing--but not the real thing. But for all that, hiswhole person breathed health, joy, and satisfaction. 

'Yes, it seems funny to you, ' said Vanyusha, 'but just try to talk tothese people yourself: they set themselves against one and there's anend of it. You can't get as much as a word out of them. ' Vanyushaangrily threw down a pail on the threshold. 'Somehow they don't seemlike Russians. '

'You should speak to the Chief of the Village!'

'But I don't know where he lives, ' said Vanyusha in an offended tone. 

'Who has upset you so?' asked Olenin, looking round. 

'The devil only knows. Faugh! There is no real master here. They say hehas gone to some kind of KRIGA, and the old woman is a real devil. Godpreserve us!' answered Vanyusha, putting his hands to his head. 'How weshall live here I don't know. They are worse than Tartars, I dodeclare--though they consider themselves Christians! A Tartar is badenough, but all the same he is more noble. Gone to the KRIGA indeed!What this KRIGA they have invented is, I don't know!' concludedVanyusha, and turned aside. 

'It's not as it is in the serfs' quarters at home, eh?' chaffed Oleninwithout dismounting. 

'Please sir, may I have your horse?' said Vanyusha, evidently perplexedby this new order of things but resigning himself to his fate. 

'So a Tartar is more noble, eh, Vanyusha?' repeated Olenin, dismountingand slapping the saddle. 

'Yes, you're laughing! You think it funny, ' muttered Vanyusha angrily. 

'Come, don't be angry, Vanyusha, ' replied Olenin, still smiling. 'Waita minute, I'll go and speak to the people of the house; you'll see Ishall arrange everything. You don't know what a jolly life we shallhave here. Only don't get upset. '

Vanyusha did not answer. Screwing up his eyes he looked contemptuouslyafter his master, and shook his head. Vanyusha regarded Olenin as onlyhis master, and Olenin regarded Vanyusha as only his servant; and theywould both have been much surprised if anyone had told them that theywere friends, as they really were without knowing it themselves. Vanyusha had been taken into his proprietor's house when he was onlyeleven and when Olenin was the same age. When Olenin was fifteen hegave Vanyusha lessons for a time and taught him to read French, ofwhich the latter was inordinately proud; and when in specially goodspirits he still let off French words, always laughing stupidly when hedid so. 

Olenin ran up the steps of the porch and pushed open the door of thehut. Maryanka, wearing nothing but a pink smock, as all Cossack womendo in the house, jumped away from the door, frightened, and pressingherself against the wall covered the lower part of her face with thebroad sleeve of her Tartar smock. Having opened the door wider, Oleninin the semi-darkness of the passage saw the whole tall, shapely figureof the young Cossack girl. With the quick and eager curiosity of youthhe involuntarily noticed the firm maidenly form revealed by the fineprint smock, and the beautiful black eyes fixed on him with childliketerror and wild curiosity. 'This is SHE, ' thought Olenin. 'But therewill be many others like her' came at once into his head, and he openedthe inner door. Old Granny Ulitka, also dressed only in a smock, wasstooping with her back turned to him, sweeping the floor. 

'Good-day to you. Mother! I've come about my lodgings, ' he began. 

The Cossack woman, without unbending, turned her severe but stillhandsome face towards him. 

'What have you come here for? Want to mock at us, eh? I'll teach you tomock; may the black plague seize you!' she shouted, looking askancefrom under her frowning brow at the new-comer. 

Olenin had at first imagined that the way-worn, gallant Caucasian Army(of which he was a member) would be everywhere received joyfully, andespecially by the Cossacks, our comrades in the war; and he thereforefelt perplexed by this reception. Without losing presence of mindhowever he tried to explain that he meant to pay for his lodgings, butthe old woman would not give him a hearing. 

'What have you come for? Who wants a pest like you, with your scrapedface? You just wait a bit; when the master returns he'll show you yourplace. I don't want your dirty money! A likely thing--just as if we hadnever seen any! You'll stink the house out with your beastly tobaccoand want to put it right with money! Think we've never seen a pest! Mayyou be shot in your bowels and your heart!' shrieked the old woman in apiercing voice, interrupting Olenin. 

'It seems Vanyusha was right!' thought Olenin. "A Tartar would benobler", ' and followed by Granny Ulitka's abuse he went out of the hut. As he was leaving, Maryanka, still wearing only her pink smock, butwith her forehead covered down to her eyes by a white kerchief, suddenly slipped out from the passage past him. Pattering rapidly downthe steps with her bare feet she ran from the porch, stopped, andlooking round hastily with laughing eyes at the young man, vanishedround the corner of the hut. 

Her firm youthful step, the untamed look of the eyes glistening fromunder the white kerchief, and the firm stately build of the youngbeauty, struck Olenin even more powerfully than before. 'Yes, it mustbe SHE, ' he thought, and troubling his head still less about thelodgings, he kept looking round at Maryanka as he approached Vanyusha. 

'There you see, the girl too is quite savage, just like a wild filly!'said Vanyusha, who though still busy with the luggage wagon had nowcheered up a bit. 'LA FAME!' he added in a loud triumphant voice andburst out laughing. 

Chapter XI

Towards evening the master of the house returned from his fishing, andhaving learnt that the cadet would pay for the lodging, pacified theold woman and satisfied Vanyusha's demands. 

Everything was arranged in the new quarters. Their hosts moved into thewinter hut and let their summer hut to the cadet for three rubles amonth. Olenin had something to eat and went to sleep. Towards eveninghe woke up, washed and made himself tidy, dined, and having lit acigarette sat down by the window that looked onto the street. It wascooler. The slanting shadow of the hut with its ornamental gables fellacross the dusty road and even bent upwards at the base of the wall ofthe house opposite. The steep reed-thatched roof of that house shone inthe rays of the setting sun. The air grew fresher. Everything waspeaceful in the village. The soldiers had settled down and becomequiet. The herds had not yet been driven home and the people had notreturned from their work. 

Olenin's lodging was situated almost at the end of the village. At rareintervals, from somewhere far beyond the Terek in those parts whenceOlenin had just come (the Chechen or the Kumytsk plain), came muffledsounds of firing. Olenin was feeling very well contented after threemonths of bivouac life. His newly washed face was fresh and hispowerful body clean (an unaccustomed sensation after the campaign) andin all his rested limbs he was conscious of a feeling of tranquillityand strength. His mind, too, felt fresh and clear. He thought of thecampaign and of past dangers. He remembered that he had faced them noworse than other men, and that he was accepted as a comrade amongvaliant Caucasians. His Moscow recollections were left behind Heavenknows how far! The old life was wiped out and a quite new life hadbegun in which there were as yet no mistakes. Here as a new man amongnew men he could gain a new and good reputation. He was conscious of ayouthful and unreasoning joy of life. Looking now out of the window atthe boys spinning their tops in the shadow of the house, now round hisneat new lodging, he thought how pleasantly he would settle down tothis new Cossack village life. Now and then he glanced at the mountainsand the blue sky, and an appreciation of the solemn grandeur of naturemingled with his reminiscences and dreams. His new life had begun, notas he imagined it would when he left Moscow, but unexpectedly well. 'The mountains, the mountains, the mountains!' they permeated all histhoughts and feelings. 

'He's kissed his dog and licked the jug! . .. Daddy Eroshka has kissedhis dog!' suddenly the little Cossacks who had been spinning their topsunder the window shouted, looking towards the side street. 'He's drunkhis bitch, and his dagger!' shouted the boys, crowding together andstepping backwards. 

These shouts were addressed to Daddy Eroshka, who with his gun on hisshoulder and some pheasants hanging at his girdle was returning fromhis shooting expedition. 

'I have done wrong, lads, I have!' he said, vigorously swinging hisarms and looking up at the windows on both sides of the street. 'I havedrunk the bitch; it was wrong, ' he repeated, evidently vexed butpretending not to care. 

Olenin was surprised by the boys' behavior towards the old hunter, butwas still more struck by the expressive, intelligent face and thepowerful build of the man whom they called Daddy Eroshka. 

'Here Daddy, here Cossack!' he called. 'Come here!'

The old man looked into the window and stopped. 

'Good evening, good man, ' he said, lifting his little cap off hiscropped head. 

'Good evening, good man, ' replied Olenin. 'What is it the youngstersare shouting at you?'

Daddy Eroshka came up to the window. 'Why, they're teasing the old man. No matter, I like it. Let them joke about their old daddy, ' he saidwith those firm musical intonations with which old and venerable peoplespeak. 'Are you an army commander?' he added. 

'No, I am a cadet. But where did you kill those pheasants?' askedOlenin. 

'I dispatched these three hens in the forest, ' answered the old man, turning his broad back towards the window to show the hen pheasantswhich were hanging with their heads tucked into his belt and staininghis coat with blood. 'Haven't you seen any?' he asked. 'Take a brace ifyou like! Here you are, ' and he handed two of the pheasants in at thewindow. 'Are you a sportsman yourself?' he asked. 

'I am. During the campaign I killed four myself. '

'Four? What a lot!' said the old man sarcastically. 'And are you adrinker? Do you drink CHIKHIR?'

'Why not? I like a drink. '

'Ah, I see you are a trump! We shall be KUNAKS, you and I, ' said DaddyEroshka. 

'Step in, ' said Olenin. 'We'll have a drop of CHIKHIR. '

'I might as well, ' said the old man, 'but take the pheasants. ' The oldman's face showed that he liked the cadet. He had seen at once that hecould get free drinks from him, and that therefore it would be allright to give him a brace of pheasants. 

Soon Daddy Eroshka's figure appeared in the doorway of the hut, and itwas only then that Olenin became fully conscious of the enormous sizeand sturdy build of this man, whose red-brown face with its perfectlywhite broad beard was all furrowed by deep lines produced by age andtoil. For an old man, the muscles of his legs, arms, and shoulders werequite exceptionally large and prominent. There were deep scars on hishead under the short-cropped hair. His thick sinewy neck was coveredwith deep intersecting folds like a bull's. His horny hands werebruised and scratched. He stepped lightly and easily over thethreshold, unslung his gun and placed it in a corner, and casting arapid glance round the room noted the value of the goods and chattelsdeposited in the hut, and with out-turned toes stepped softly, in hissandals of raw hide, into the middle of the room. He brought with him apenetrating but not unpleasant smell of CHIKHIR wine, vodka, gunpowder, and congealed blood. 

Daddy Eroshka bowed down before the icons, smoothed his beard, andapproaching Olenin held out his thick brown hand. 'Koshkildy, ' said he;That is Tartar for "Good-day"--"Peace be unto you, " it means in theirtongue. '

'Koshkildy, I know, ' answered Olenin, shaking hands. 

'Eh, but you don't, you won't know the right order! Fool!' said DaddyEroshka, shaking his head reproachfully. 'If anyone says "Koshkildy" toyou, you must say "Allah rasi bo sun, " that is, "God save you. " That'sthe way, my dear fellow, and not "Koshkildy. " But I'll teach you allabout it. We had a fellow here, Elias Mosevich, one of your Russians, he and I were kunaks. He was a trump, a drunkard, a thief, asportsman--and what a sportsman! I taught him everything. '

'And what will you teach me?' asked Olenin, who was becoming more andmore interested in the old man. 

'I'll take you hunting and teach you to fish. I'll show you Chechensand find a girl for you, if you like--even that! That's the sort I am!I'm a wag!'--and the old man laughed. 'I'll sit down. I'm tired. Karga?' he added inquiringly. 

'And what does "Karga" mean?' asked Olenin. 

'Why, that means "All right" in Georgian. But I say it just so. It is away I have, it's my favourite word. Karga, Karga. I say it just so; infun I mean. Well, lad, won't you order the chikhir? You've got anorderly, haven't you? Hey, Ivan!' shouted the old man. 'All yoursoldiers are Ivans. Is yours Ivan?'

'True enough, his name is Ivan--Vanyusha. Here Vanyusha! Please getsome chikhir from our landlady and bring it here. '

'Ivan or Vanyusha, that's all one. Why are all your soldiers Ivans?Ivan, old fellow, ' said the old man, 'you tell them to give you somefrom the barrel they have begun. They have the best chikhir in thevillage. But don't give more than thirty kopeks for the quart, mind, because that witch would be only too glad. .. . Our people are anathemapeople; stupid people, ' Daddy Eroshka continued in a confidential toneafter Vanyusha had gone out. 'They do not look upon you as on men, youare worse than a Tartar in their eyes. "Worldly Russians" they say. Butas for me, though you are a soldier you are still a man, and have asoul in you. Isn't that right? Elias Mosevich was a soldier, yet what atreasure of a man he was! Isn't that so, my dear fellow? That's why ourpeople don't like me; but I don't care! I'm a merry fellow, and I likeeverybody. I'm Eroshka; yes, my dear fellow. '

And the old Cossack patted the young man affectionately on the shoulder. 

Chapter XII

Vanyusha, who meanwhile had finished his housekeeping arrangements andhad even been shaved by the company's barber and had pulled histrousers out of his high boots as a sign that the company was stationedin comfortable quarters, was in excellent spirits. He lookedattentively but not benevolently at Eroshka, as at a wild beast he hadnever seen before, shook his head at the floor which the old man haddirtied and, having taken two bottles from under a bench, went to thelandlady. 

'Good evening, kind people, ' he said, having made up his mind to bevery gentle. 'My master has sent me to get some chikhir. Will you drawsome for me, good folk?'

The old woman gave no answer. The girl, who was arranging the kerchiefon her head before a little Tartar mirror, looked round at Vanyusha insilence. 

'I'll pay money for it, honoured people, ' said Vanyusha, jingling thecoppers in his pocket. 'Be kind to us and we, too will be kind to you, 'he added. 

'How much?' asked the old woman abruptly. 'A quart. '

'Go, my own, draw some for them, ' said Granny Ulitka to her daughter. 'Take it from the cask that's begun, my precious. '

The girl took the keys and a decanter and went out of the hut withVanyusha. 

'Tell me, who is that young woman?' asked Olenin, pointing to Maryanka, who was passing the window. The old man winked and nudged the young manwith his elbow. 

'Wait a bit, ' said he and reached out of the window. 'Khm, ' he coughed, and bellowed, 'Maryanka dear. Hallo, Maryanka, my girlie, won't youlove me, darling? I'm a wag, ' he added in a whisper to Olenin. Thegirl, not turning her head and swinging her arms regularly andvigorously, passed the window with the peculiarly smart and bold gaitof a Cossack woman and only turned her dark shaded eyes slowly towardsthe old man. 

'Love me and you'll be happy, ' shouted Eroshka, winking, and he lookedquestioningly at the cadet. 

'I'm a fine fellow, I'm a wag!' he added. 'She's a regular queen, thatgirl. Eh?'

'She is lovely, ' said Olenin. 'Call her here!'

'No, no, ' said the old man. 'For that one a match is being arrangedwith Lukashka, Luke, a fine Cossack, a brave, who killed an abrek theother day. I'll find you a better one. I'll find you one that will beall dressed up in silk and silver. Once I've said it I'll do it. I'llget you a regular beauty!'

'You, an old man--and say such things, ' replied Olenin. 'Why, it's asin!'

'A sin? Where's the sin?' said the old man emphatically. 'A sin to lookat a nice girl? A sin to have some fun with her? Or is it a sin to loveher? Is that so in your parts? . .. No, my dear fellow, it's not a sin, it's salvation! God made you and God made the girl too. He made it all;so it is no sin to look at a nice girl. That's what she was made for;to be loved and to give joy. That's how I judge it, my good fellow. '

Having crossed the yard and entered a cool dark storeroom filled withbarrels, Maryanka went up to one of them and repeating the usual prayerplunged a dipper into it. Vanyusha standing in the doorway smiled as helooked at her. He thought it very funny that she had only a smock on, close-fitting behind and tucked up in front, and still funnier that shewore a necklace of silver coins. He thought this quite un-Russian andthat they would all laugh in the serfs' quarters at home if they saw agirl like that. 'La fille comme c'est tres bien, for a change, ' hethought. 'I'll tell that to my master. '

'What are you standing in the light for, you devil!' the girl suddenlyshouted. 'Why don't you pass me the decanter!'

Having filled the decanter with cool red wine, Maryanka handed it toVanyusha. 

'Give the money to Mother, ' she said, pushing away the hand in which heheld the money. 

Vanyusha laughed. 

'Why are you so cross, little dear?' he said good-naturedly, irresolutely shuffling with his feet while the girl was covering thebarrel. 

She began to laugh. 

'And you! Are you kind?'

'We, my master and I, are very kind, ' Vanyusha answered decidedly. 'Weare so kind that wherever we have stayed our hosts were always verygrateful. It's because he's generous. '

The girl stood listening. 

'And is your master married?' she asked. 

'No. The master is young and unmarried, because noble gentlemen cannever marry young, ' said Vanyusha didactically. 

'A likely thing! See what a fed-up buffalo he is--and too young tomarry! Is he the chief of you all?' she asked. 

'My master is a cadet; that means he's not yet an officer, but he'smore important than a general--he's an important man! Because not onlyour colonel, but the Tsar himself, knows him, ' proudly explainedVanyusha. 'We are not like those other beggars in the line regiment, and our papa himself was a Senator. He had more than a thousand serfs, all his own, and they send us a thousand rubles at a time. That's whyeveryone likes us. Another may be a captain but have no money. What'sthe use of that?'

'Go away. I'll lock up, ' said the girl, interrupting him. 

Vanyusha brought Olenin the wine and announced that 'La fille c'esttres joulie, ' and, laughing stupidly, at once went out. 

Chapter XIII

Meanwhile the tattoo had sounded in the village square. The people hadreturned from their work. The herd lowed as in clouds of golden dust itcrowded at the village gate. The girls and the women hurried throughthe streets and yards, turning in their cattle. The sun had quitehidden itself behind the distant snowy peaks. One pale bluish shadowspread over land and sky. Above the darkened gardens stars justdiscernible were kindling, and the sounds were gradually hushed in thevillage. The cattle having been attended to and left for the night, thewomen came out and gathered at the corners of the streets and, crackingsunflower seeds with their teeth, settled down on the earthenembankments of the houses. Later on Maryanka, having finished milkingthe buffalo and the other two cows, also joined one of these groups. 

The group consisted of several women and girls and one old Cossack man. 

They were talking about the abrek who had been killed. 

The Cossack was narrating and the women questioning him. 

'I expect he'll get a handsome reward, ' said one of the women. 

'Of course. It's said that they'll send him a cross. '

'Mosev did try to wrong him. Took the gun away from him, but theauthorities at Kizlyar heard of it. '

'A mean creature that Mosev is!'

'They say Lukashka has come home, ' remarked one of the girls. 

'He and Nazarka are merry-making at Yamka's. ' (Yamka was an unmarried, disreputable Cossack woman who kept an illicit pot-house. ) 'I heard saythey had drunk half a pailful. '

'What luck that Snatcher has, ' somebody remarked. 'A real snatcher. Butthere's no denying he's a fine lad, smart enough for anything, aright-minded lad! His father was just such another. Daddy Kiryak was:he takes after his father. When he was killed the whole village howled. Look, there they are, ' added the speaker, pointing to the Cossacks whowere coming down the street towards them. 

'And Ergushov has managed to come along with them too! The drunkard!'

Lukashka, Nazarka, and Ergushov, having emptied half a pail of vodka, were coming towards the girls. The faces of all three, but especiallythat of the old Cossack, were redder than usual. Ergushov was reelingand kept laughing and nudging Nazarka in the ribs. 

'Why are you not singing?' he shouted to the girls. 'Sing to ourmerry-making, I tell you!'

They were welcomed with the words, 'Had a good day? Had a good day?'

'Why sing? It's not a holiday, ' said one of the women. 'You're tight, so you go and sing. '

Ergushov roared with laughter and nudged Nazarka. 'You'd better sing. And I'll begin too. I'm clever, I tell you. '

'Are you asleep, fair ones?' said Nazarka. 'We've come from the cordonto drink your health. We've already drunk Lukashka's health. '

Lukashka, when he reached the group, slowly raised his cap and stoppedin front of the girls. His broad cheekbones and neck were red. He stoodand spoke softly and sedately, but in his tranquillity and sedatenessthere was more of animation and strength than in all Nazarka'sloquacity and bustle. He reminded one of a playful colt that with asnort and a flourish of its tail suddenly stops short and stands asthough nailed to the ground with all four feet. Lukashka stood quietlyin front of the girls, his eyes laughed, and he spoke but little as heglanced now at his drunken companions and now at the girls. WhenMaryanka joined the group he raised his cap with a firm deliberatemovement, moved out of her way and then stepped in front of her withone foot a little forward and with his thumbs in his belt, fingeringhis dagger. Maryanka answered his greeting with a leisurely bow of herhead, settled down on the earth-bank, and took some seeds out of thebosom of her smock. Lukashka, keeping his eyes fixed on Maryanka, slowly cracked seeds and spat out the shells. All were quiet whenMaryanka joined the group. 

'Have you come for long?' asked a woman, breaking the silence. 

'Till to-morrow morning, ' quietly replied Lukashka. 

'Well, God grant you get something good, ' said the Cossack; 'I'm gladof it, as I've just been saying. '

'And I say so too, ' put in the tipsy Ergushov, laughing. 'What a lot ofvisitors have come, ' he added, pointing to a soldier who was passingby. 'The soldiers' vodka is good--I like it. '

'They've sent three of the devils to us, ' said one of the women. 'Grandad went to the village Elders, but they say nothing can be done. '

'Ah, ha! Have you met with trouble?' said Ergushov. 

'I expect they have smoked you out with their tobacco?' asked anotherwoman. 'Smoke as much as you like in the yard, I say, but we won'tallow it inside the hut. Not if the Elder himself comes, I won't allowit. Besides, they may rob you. He's not quartered any of them onhimself, no fear, that devil's son of an Elder. '

'You don't like it?' Ergushov began again. 

'And I've also heard say that the girls will have to make the soldiers'beds and offer them chikhir and honey, ' said Nazarka, putting one footforward and tilting his cap like Lukashka. 

Ergushov burst into a roar of laughter, and seizing the girl nearest tohim, he embraced her. 'I tell you true. '

'Now then, you black pitch!' squealed the girl, 'I'll tell your oldwoman. '

'Tell her, ' shouted he. 'That's quite right what Nazarka says; acircular has been sent round. He can read, you know. Quite true!' Andhe began embracing the next girl. 

'What are you up to, you beast?' squealed the rosy, round-facedUstenka, laughing and lifting her arm to hit him. 

The Cossack stepped aside and nearly fell. 

'There, they say girls have no strength, and you nearly killed me. '

'Get away, you black pitch, what devil has brought you from thecordon?' said Ustenka, and turning away from him she again burst outlaughing. 'You were asleep and missed the abrek, didn't you? Suppose hehad done for you it would have been all the better. '

'You'd have howled, I expect, ' said Nazarka, laughing. 

'Howled! A likely thing. '

'Just look, she doesn't care. She'd howl, Nazarka, eh? Would she?' saidErgushov. 

Lukishka all this time had stood silently looking at Maryanka. His gazeevidently confused the girl. 

'Well, Maryanka! I hear they've quartered one of the chiefs on you?' hesaid, drawing nearer. 

Maryanka, as was her wont, waited before she replied, and slowlyraising her eyes looked at the Cossack. Lukashka's eyes were laughingas if something special, apart from what was said, was taking placebetween himself and the girl. 

'Yes, it's all right for them as they have two huts, ' replied an oldwoman on Maryanka's behalf, 'but at Fomushkin's now they also have oneof the chiefs quartered on them and they say one whole corner is packedfull with his things, and the family have no room left. Was such athing ever heard of as that they should turn a whole horde loose in thevillage?' she said. 'And what the plague are they going to do here?'

'I've heard say they'll build a bridge across the Terek, ' said one ofthe girls. 

'And I've been told that they will dig a pit to put the girls inbecause they don't love the lads, ' said Nazarka, approaching Ustenka;and he again made a whimsical gesture which set everybody laughing, andErgushov, passing by Maryanka, who was next in turn, began to embracean old woman. 

'Why don't you hug Maryanka? You should do it to each in turn, ' saidNazarka. 

'No, my old one is sweeter, ' shouted the Cossack, kissing thestruggling old woman. 

'You'll throttle me, ' she screamed, laughing. 

The tramp of regular footsteps at the other end of the streetinterrupted their laughter. Three soldiers in their cloaks, with theirmuskets on their shoulders, were marching in step to relieve guard bythe ammunition wagon. 

The corporal, an old cavalry man, looked angrily at the Cossacks andled his men straight along the road where Lukashka and Nazarka werestanding, so that they should have to get out of the way. Nazarkamoved, but Lukashka only screwed up his eyes and turned his broad backwithout moving from his place. 

'People are standing here, so you go round, ' he muttered, half turninghis head and tossing it contemptuously in the direction of the soldiers. 

The soldiers passed by in silence, keeping step regularly along thedusty road. 

Maryanka began laughing and all the other girls chimed in. 

'What swells!' said Nazarka, 'Just like long-skirted choristers, ' andhe walked a few steps down the road imitating the soldiers. 

Again everyone broke into peals of laughter. 

Lukashka came slowly up to Maryanka. 

'And where have you put up the chief?' he asked. 

Maryanka thought for a moment. 

'We've let him have the new hut, ' she said. 

'And is he old or young, ' asked Lukashka, sitting down beside her. 

'Do you think I've asked?' answered the girl. 'I went to get him somechikhir and saw him sitting at the window with Daddy Eroshka. Red-headed he seemed. They've brought a whole cartload of things. '

And she dropped her eyes. 

'Oh, how glad I am that I got leave from the cordon!' said Lukashka, moving closer to the girl and looking straight in her eyes all the time. 

'And have you come for long?' asked Maryanka, smiling slightly. 

'Till the morning. Give me some sunflower seeds, ' he said, holding outhis hand. 

Maryanka now smiled outright and unfastened the neckband of her smock. 

'Don't take them all, ' she said. 

'Really I felt so dull all the time without you, I swear I did, ' hesaid in a calm, restrained whisper, helping himself to some seeds outof the bosom of the girl's smock, and stooping still closer over her hecontinued with laughing eyes to talk to her in low tones. 

'I won't come, I tell you, ' Maryanka suddenly said aloud, leaning awayfrom him. 

'No really . .. What I wanted to say to you, . .. ' whispered Lukashka. 'By the Heavens! Do come!'

Maryanka shook her head, but did so with a smile. 

'Nursey Maryanka! Hallo Nursey! Mammy is calling! Supper time!' shoutedMaryanka's little brother, running towards the group. 

'I'm coming, ' replied the girl. 'Go, my dear, go alone--I'll come in aminute. '

Lukashka rose and raised his cap. 

'I expect I had better go home too, that will be best, ' he said, tryingto appear unconcerned but hardly able to repress a smile, and hedisappeared behind the corner of the house. 

Meanwhile night had entirely enveloped the village. Bright stars werescattered over the dark sky. The streets became dark and empty. Nazarkaremained with the women on the earth-bank and their laughter was stillheard, but Lukashka, having slowly moved away from the girls, croucheddown like a cat and then suddenly started running lightly, holding hisdagger to steady it: not homeward, however, but towards the cornet'shouse. Having passed two streets he turned into a lane and lifting theskirt of his coat sat down on the ground in the shadow of a fence. 'Aregular cornet's daughter!' he thought about Maryanka. 'Won't even havea lark--the devil! But just wait a bit. '

The approaching footsteps of a woman attracted his attention. He beganlistening, and laughed all by himself. Maryanka with bowed head, striking the pales of the fences with a switch, was walking with rapidregular strides straight towards him. Lukashka rose. Maryanka startedand stopped. 

'What an accursed devil! You frightened me! So you have not gone home?'she said, and laughed aloud. 

Lukashka put one arm round her and with the other hand raised her face. 'What I wanted to tell you, by Heaven!' his voice trembled and broke. 

'What are you talking of, at night time!' answered Maryanka. 'Mother iswaiting for me, and you'd better go to your sweetheart. '

And freeing herself from his arms she ran away a few steps. When shehad reached the wattle fence of her home she stopped and turned to theCossack who was running beside her and still trying to persuade her tostay a while with him. 

'Well, what do you want to say, midnight-gadabout?' and she again beganlaughing. 

'Don't laugh at me, Maryanka! By the Heaven! Well, what if I have asweetheart? May the devil take her! Only say the word and now I'll loveyou--I'll do anything you wish. Here they are!' and he jingled themoney in his pocket. 'Now we can live splendidly. Others havepleasures, and I? I get no pleasure from you, Maryanka dear!'

The girl did not answer. She stood before him breaking her switch intolittle bits with a rapid movement of her fingers. 

Lukashka suddenly clenched his teeth and fists. 

'And why keep waiting and waiting? Don't I love you, darling? You cando what you like with me, ' said he suddenly, frowning angrily andseizing both her hands. 

The calm expression of Maryanka's face and voice did not change. 

'Don't bluster, Lukashka, but listen to me, ' she answered, not pullingaway her hands but holding the Cossack at arm's length. 'It's true I ama girl, but you listen to me! It does not depend on me, but if you loveme I'll tell you this. Let go my hands, I'll tell you without. --I'llmarry you, but you'll never get any nonsense from me, ' said Maryankawithout turning her face. 

'What, you'll marry me? Marriage does not depend on us. Love meyourself, Maryanka dear, ' said Lukashka, from sullen and furiousbecoming again gentle, submissive, and tender, and smiling as he lookedclosely into her eyes. 

Maryanka clung to him and kissed him firmly on the lips. 

'Brother dear!' she whispered, pressing him convulsively to her. Then, suddenly tearing herself away, she ran into the gate of her housewithout looking round. 

In spite of the Cossack's entreaties to wait another minute to hearwhat he had to say, Maryanka did not stop. 

'Go, ' she cried, 'you'll be seen! I do believe that devil, our lodger, is walking about the yard. '

'Cornet's daughter, ' thought Lukashka. 'She will marry me. Marriage isall very well, but you just love me!'

He found Nazarka at Yamka's house, and after having a spree with himwent to Dunayka's house, where, in spite of her not being faithful tohim, he spent the night. 

Chapter XIV

It was quite true that Olenin had been walking about the yard whenMaryanka entered the gate, and had heard her say, 'That devil, ourlodger, is walking about. ' He had spent that evening with Daddy Eroshkain the porch of his new lodging. He had had a table, a samovar, wine, and a candle brought out, and over a cup of tea and a cigar he listenedto the tales the old man told seated on the threshold at his feet. Though the air was still, the candle dripped and flickered: nowlighting up the post of the porch, now the table and crockery, now thecropped white head of the old man. Moths circled round the flame and, shedding the dust of their wings, fluttered on the table and in theglasses, flew into the candle flame, and disappeared in the black spacebeyond. Olenin and Eroshka had emptied five bottles of chikhir. Eroshkafilled the glasses every time, offering one to Olenin, drinking hishealth, and talking untiringly. He told of Cossack life in the olddays: of his rather, 'The Broad', who alone had carried on his back aboar's carcass weighing three hundredweight, and drank two pails ofchikhir at one sitting. He told of his own days and his chum Girchik, with whom during the plague he used to smuggle felt cloaks across theTerek. He told how one morning he had killed two deer, and about his'little soul' who used to run to him at the cordon at night. He toldall this so eloquently and picturesquely that Olenin did not notice howtime passed. 'Ah yes, my dear fellow, you did not know me in my goldendays; then I'd have shown you things. Today it's "Eroshka licks thejug", but then Eroshka was famous in the whole regiment. Whose was thefinest horse? Who had a Gurda sword? To whom should one go to get adrink? With whom go on the spree? Who should be sent to the mountainsto kill Ahmet Khan? Why, always Eroshka! Whom did the girls love?Always Eroshka had to answer for it. Because I was a real brave: adrinker, a thief (I used to seize herds of horses in the mountains), asinger; I was a master of every art! There are no Cossacks like thatnowadays. It's disgusting to look at them. When they're that high[Eroshka held his hand three feet from the ground] they put on idioticboots and keep looking at them--that's all the pleasure they know. Orthey'll drink themselves foolish, not like men but all wrong. And whowas I? I was Eroshka, the thief; they knew me not only in this villagebut up in the mountains. Tartar princes, my kunaks, used to come to seeme! I used to be everybody's kunak. If he was a Tartar--with a Tartar;an Armenian--with an Armenian; a soldier--with a soldier; anofficer--with an officer! I didn't care as long as he was a drinker. Hesays you should cleanse yourself from intercourse with the world, notdrink with soldiers, not eat with a Tartar. '

'Who says all that?' asked Olenin. 

'Why, our teacher! But listen to a Mullah or a Tartar Cadi. He says, "You unbelieving Giaours, why do you eat pig?" That shows that everyonehas his own law. But I think it's all one. God has made everything forthe joy of man. There is no sin in any of it. Take example from ananimal. It lives in the Tartar's reeds or in ours. Wherever it happensto go, there is its home! Whatever God gives it, that it eats! But ourpeople say we have to lick red-hot plates in hell for that. And I thinkit's all a fraud, ' he added after a pause. 

'What is a fraud?' asked Olenin. 

'Why, what the preachers say. We had an army captain in Chervlena whowas my kunak: a fine fellow just like me. He was killed in Chechnya. Well, he used to say that the preachers invent all that out of theirown heads. "When you die the grass will grow on your grave and that'sall!"' The old man laughed. 'He was a desperate fellow. '

'And how old are you?' asked Olenin. 

'The Lord only knows! I must be about seventy. When a Tsaritsa reignedin Russia I was no longer very small. So you can reckon it out. I mustbe seventy. '

'Yes you must, but you are still a fine fellow. '

'Well, thank Heaven I am healthy, quite healthy, except that a woman, awitch, has harmed me. .. . '

'How?'

'Oh, just harmed me. '

'And so when you die the grass will grow?' repeated Olenin. 

Eroshka evidently did not wish to express his thought clearly. He wassilent for a while. 

'And what did you think? Drink!' he shouted suddenly, smiling andhanding Olenin some wine. 

Chapter XV

'Well, what was I saying?' he continued, trying to remember. 'Yes, that's the sort of man I am. I am a hunter. There is no hunter to equalme in the whole army. I will find and show you any animal and any bird, and what and where. I know it all! I have dogs, and two guns, and nets, and a screen and a hawk. I have everything, thank the Lord! If you arenot bragging but are a real sportsman, I'll show you everything. Do youknow what a man I am? When I have found a track--I know the animal. Iknow where he will lie down and where he'll drink or wallow. I makemyself a perch and sit there all night watching. What's the good ofstaying at home? One only gets into mischief, gets drunk. And herewomen come and chatter, and boys shout at me--enough to drive one mad. It's a different matter when you go out at nightfall, choose yourself aplace, press down the reeds and sit there and stay waiting, like ajolly fellow. One knows everything that goes on in the woods. One looksup at the sky: the stars move, you look at them and find out from themhow the time goes. One looks round--the wood is rustling; one goes onwaiting, now there comes a crackling--a boar comes to rub himself; onelistens to hear the young eaglets screech and then the cocks give voicein the village, or the geese. When you hear the geese you know it isnot yet midnight. And I know all about it! Or when a gun is firedsomewhere far away, thoughts come to me. One thinks, who is thatfiring? Is it another Cossack like myself who has been watching forsome animal? And has he killed it? Or only wounded it so that now thepoor thing goes through the reeds smearing them with its blood all fornothing? I don't like that! Oh, how I dislike it! Why injure a beast?You fool, you fool! Or one thinks, "Maybe an abrek has killed somesilly little Cossack. " All this passes through one's mind. And once asI sat watching by the river I saw a cradle floating down. It was soundexcept for one corner which was broken off. Thoughts did come thattime! I thought some of your soldiers, the devils, must have got into aTartar village and seized the Chechen women, and one of the devils haskilled the little one: taken it by its legs, and hit its head against awall. Don't they do such things? Ah! Men have no souls! And thoughtscame to me that filled me with pity. I thought: they've thrown away thecradle and driven the wife out, and her brave has taken his gun andcome across to our side to rob us. One watches and thinks. And when onehears a litter breaking through the thicket, something begins to knockinside one. Dear one, come this way! "They'll scent me, " one thinks;and one sits and does not stir while one's heart goes dun! dun! dun!and simply lifts you. Once this spring a fine litter came near me, Isaw something black. "In the name of the Father and of the Son, " and Iwas just about to fire when she grunts to her pigs: "Danger, children, "she says, "there's a man here, " and off they all ran, breaking throughthe bushes. And she had been so close I could almost have bitten her. '

'How could a sow tell her brood that a man was there?' asked Olenin. 

'What do you think? You think the beast's a fool? No, he is wiser thana man though you do call him a pig! He knows everything. Take this forinstance. A man will pass along your track and not notice it; but a pigas soon as it gets onto your track turns and runs at once: that showsthere is wisdom in him, since he scents your smell and you don't. Andthere is this to be said too: you wish to kill it and it wishes to goabout the woods alive. You have one law and it has another. It is apig, but it is no worse than you--it too is God's creature. Ah, dear!Man is foolish, foolish, foolish!' The old man repeated this severaltimes and then, letting his head drop, he sat thinking. 

Olenin also became thoughtful, and descending from the porch with hishands behind his back began pacing up and down the yard. 

Eroshka, rousing himself, raised his head and began gazing intently atthe moths circling round the flickering flame of the candle and burningthemselves in it. 

'Fool, fool!' he said. 'Where are you flying to? Fool, fool!' He roseand with his thick fingers began to drive away the moths. 

'You'll burn, little fool! Fly this way, there's plenty of room. ' Hespoke tenderly, trying to catch them delicately by their wings with histhick ringers and then letting them fly again. 'You are killingyourself and I am sorry for you!'

He sat a long time chattering and sipping out of the bottle. Oleninpaced up and down the yard. Suddenly he was struck by the sound ofwhispering outside the gate. Involuntarily holding his breath, he hearda woman's laughter, a man's voice, and the sound of a kiss. Intentionally rustling the grass under his feet he crossed to theopposite side of the yard, but after a while the wattle fence creaked. A Cossack in a dark Circassian coat and a white sheepskin cap passedalong the other side of the fence (it was Luke), and a tall woman witha white kerchief on her head went past Olenin. 'You and I have nothingto do with one another' was what Maryanka's firm step gave him tounderstand. He followed her with his eyes to the porch of the hut, andhe even saw her through the window take off her kerchief and sit down. And suddenly a feeling of lonely depression and some vague longings andhopes, and envy of someone or other, overcame the young man's soul. 

The last lights had been put out in the huts. The last sounds had diedaway in the village. The wattle fences and the cattle gleaming white inthe yards, the roofs of the houses and the stately poplars, all seemedto be sleeping the labourers' healthy peaceful sleep. Only theincessant ringing voices of frogs from the damp distance reached theyoung man. In the east the stars were growing fewer and fewer andseemed to be melting in the increasing light, but overhead they weredenser and deeper than before. The old man was dozing with his head onhis hand. A cock crowed in the yard opposite, but Olenin still paced upand down thinking of something. The sound of a song sung by severalvoices reached him and he stepped up to the fence and listened. Thevoices of several young Cossacks carolled a merry song, and one voicewas distinguishable among them all by its firm strength. 

'Do you know who is singing there?' said the old man, rousing himself. 'It is the Brave, Lukashka. He has killed a Chechen and now herejoices. And what is there to rejoice at? . .. The fool, the fool!'

'And have you ever killed people?' asked Olenin. 

'You devil!' shouted the old man. 'What are you asking? One must nottalk so. It is a serious thing to destroy a human being . .. Ah, a veryserious thing! Good-bye, my dear fellow. I've eaten my fill and amdrunk, ' he said rising. 'Shall I come to-morrow to go shooting?'

'Yes, come!'

'Mind, get up early; if you oversleep you will be fined!'

'Never fear, I'll be up before you, ' answered Olenin. 

The old man left. The song ceased, but one could hear footsteps andmerry talk. A little later the singing broke out again but fartheraway, and Eroshka's loud voice chimed in with the other. 'What people, what a life!' thought Olenin with a sigh as he returned alone to hishut. 

Chapter XVI

Daddy Eroshka was a superannuated and solitary Cossack: twenty yearsago his wife had gone over to the Orthodox Church and run away from himand married a Russian sergeant-major, and he had no children. He wasnot bragging when he spoke of himself as having been the boldestdare-devil in the village when he was young. Everybody in the regimentknew of his old-time prowess. The death of more than one Russian, aswell as Chechen, lay on his conscience. He used to go plundering in themountains, and robbed the Russians too; and he had twice been inprison. The greater part of his life was spent in the forests, hunting. There he lived for days on a crust of bread and drank nothing butwater. But on the other hand, when he was in the village he made merryfrom morning to night. After leaving Olenin he slept for a couple ofhours and awoke before it was light. He lay on his bed thinking of theman he had become acquainted with the evening before. Olenin's'simplicity' (simplicity in the sense of not grudging him a drink)pleased him very much, and so did Olenin himself. He wondered why theRussians were all 'simple' and so rich, and why they were educated, andyet knew nothing. He pondered on these questions and also consideredwhat he might get out of Olenin. 

Daddy Eroshka's hut was of a good size and not old, but the absence ofa woman was very noticeable in it. Contrary to the usual cleanliness ofthe Cossacks, the whole of this hut was filthy and exceedingly untidy. A blood-stained coat had been thrown on the table, half a dough-cakelay beside a plucked and mangled crow with which to feed the hawk. Sandals of raw hide, a gun, a dagger, a little bag, wet clothes, andsundry rags lay scattered on the benches. In a comer stood a tub withstinking water, in which another pair of sandals were being steeped, and near by was a gun and a hunting-screen. On the floor a net had beenthrown down and several dead pheasants lay there, while a hen tied byits leg was walking about near the table pecking among the dirt. In theunheated oven stood a broken pot with some kind of milky liquid. On thetop of the oven a falcon was screeching and trying to break the cord bywhich it was tied, and a moulting hawk sat quietly on the edge of theoven, looking askance at the hen and occasionally bowing its head toright and left. Daddy Eroshka himself, in his shirt, lay on his back ona short bed rigged up between the wall and the oven, with his stronglegs raised and his feet on the oven. He was picking with his thickfingers at the scratches left on his hands by the hawk, which he wasaccustomed to carry without wearing gloves. The whole room, especiallynear the old man, was filled with that strong but not unpleasantmixture of smells that he always carried about with him. 

'Uyde-ma, Daddy?' (Is Daddy in?) came through the window in a sharpvoice, which he at once recognized as Lukashka's. 

'Uyde, Uyde, Uyde. I am in!' shouted the old man. 'Come in, neighbourMark, Luke Mark. Come to see Daddy? On your way to the cordon?'

At the sound of his master's shout the hawk flapped his wings andpulled at his cord. 

The old man was fond of Lukashka, who was the only man he excepted fromhis general contempt for the younger generation of Cossacks. Besidesthat, Lukashka and his mother, as near neighbours, often gave the oldman wine, clotted cream, and other home produce which Eroshka did notpossess. Daddy Eroshka, who all his life had allowed himself to getcarried away, always explained his infatuations from a practical pointof view. 'Well, why not?' he used to say to himself. 'I'll give themsome fresh meat, or a bird, and they won't forget Daddy: they'llsometimes bring a cake or a piece of pie. '

'Good morning. Mark! I am glad to see you, ' shouted the old mancheerfully, and quickly putting down his bare feet he jumped off hisbed and walked a step or two along the creaking floor, looked down athis out-turned toes, and suddenly, amused by the appearance of hisfeet, smiled, stamped with his bare heel on the ground, stamped again, and then performed a funny dance-step. 'That's clever, eh?' he asked, his small eyes glistening. Lukashka smiled faintly. 'Going back to thecordon?' asked the old man. 

'I have brought the chikhir I promised you when we were at the cordon. '

'May Christ save you!' said the old man, and he took up the extremelywide trousers that were lying on the floor, and his beshmet, put themon, fastened a strap round his waist, poured some water from anearthenware pot over his hands, wiped them on the old trousers, smoothed his beard with a bit of comb, and stopped in front ofLukashka. 'Ready, ' he said. 

Lukashka fetched a cup, wiped it and filled it with wine, and thenhanded it to the old man. 

'Your health! To the Father and the Son!' said the old man, acceptingthe wine with solemnity. 'May you have what you desire, may you alwaysbe a hero, and obtain a cross. '

Lukashka also drank a little after repeating a prayer, and then put thewine on the table. The old man rose and brought out some dried fishwhich he laid on the threshold, where he beat it with a stick to makeit tender; then, having put it with his horny hands on a blue plate(his only one), he placed it on the table. 

'I have all I want. I have victuals, thank God!' he said proudly. 'Well, and what of Mosev?' he added. 

Lukashka, evidently wishing to know the old man's opinion, told him howthe officer had taken the gun from him. 

'Never mind the gun, ' said the old man. 'If you don't give the gun youwill get no reward. '

'But they say. Daddy, it's little reward a fellow gets when he is notyet a mounted Cossack; and the gun is a fine one, a Crimean, wortheighty rubles. '

'Eh, let it go! I had a dispute like that with an officer, he wanted myhorse. "Give it me and you'll be made a cornet, " says he. I wouldn't, and I got nothing!'

'Yes, Daddy, but you see I have to buy a horse; and they say you can'tget one the other side of the river under fifty rubles, and mother hasnot yet sold our wine. '

'Eh, we didn't bother, ' said the old man; 'when Daddy Eroshka was yourage he already stole herds of horses from the Nogay folk and drove themacross the Terek. Sometimes we'd give a fine horse for a quart of vodkaor a cloak. '

'Why so cheap?' asked Lukashka. 

'You're a fool, a fool, Mark, ' said the old man contemptuously. 'Why, that's what one steals for, so as not to be stingy! As for you, Isuppose you haven't so much as seen how one drives off a herd ofhorses? Why don't you speak?'

'What's one to say. Daddy?' replied Lukashka. 'It seems we are not thesame sort of men as you were. '

'You're a fool. Mark, a fool! "Not the same sort of men!"' retorted theold man, mimicking the Cossack lad. 'I was not that sort of Cossack atyour age. '

'How's that?' asked Lukashka. 

The old man shook his head contemptuously. 

'Daddy Eroshka was simple; he did not grudge anything! That's why I waskunak with all Chechnya. A kunak would come to visit me and I'd makehim drunk with vodka and make him happy and put him to sleep with me, and when I went to see him I'd take him a present--a dagger! That's theway it is done, and not as you do nowadays: the only amusement ladshave now is to crack seeds and spit out the shells!' the old manfinished contemptuously, imitating the present-day Cossacks crackingseeds and spitting out the shells. 

'Yes, I know, ' said Lukashka; 'that's so!'

'If you wish to be a fellow of the right sort, be a brave and not apeasant! Because even a peasant can buy a horse--pay the money and takethe horse. '

They were silent for a while. 

'Well, of course it's dull both in the village and the cordon, Daddy:but there's nowhere one can go for a bit of sport. All our fellows areso timid. Take Nazarka. The other day when we went to the Tartarvillage, Girey Khan asked us to come to Nogay to take some horses, butno one went, and how was I to go alone?'

'And what of Daddy? Do you think I am quite dried up? . .. No, I'm notdried up. Let me have a horse and I'll be off to Nogay at once. '

'What's the good of talking nonsense!' said Luke. 'You'd better tell mewhat to do about Girey Khan. He says, "Only bring horses to the Terek, and then even if you bring a whole stud I'll find a place for them. "You see he's also a shaven-headed Tartar--how's one to believe him?'

'You may trust Girey Khan, all his kin were good people. His father toowas a faithful kunak. But listen to Daddy and I won't teach you wrong:make him take an oath, then it will be all right. And if you go withhim, have your pistol ready all the same, especially when it comes todividing up the horses. I was nearly killed that way once by a Chechen. I wanted ten rubles from him for a horse. Trusting is all right, butdon't go to sleep without a gun. ' Lukashka listened attentively to theold man. 

'I say. Daddy, have you any stone-break grass?' he asked after a pause. 

'No, I haven't any, but I'll teach you how to get it. You're a good ladand won't forget the old man. .. . Shall I tell you?'

'Tell me, Daddy. '

'You know a tortoise? She's a devil, the tortoise is!'

'Of course I know!'

'Find her nest and fence it round so that she can't get in. Well, she'll come, go round it, and then will go off to find the stone-breakgrass and will bring some along and destroy the fence. Anyhow nextmorning come in good time, and where the fence is broken there you'llfind the stone-break grass lying. Take it wherever you like. No lockand no bar will be able to stop you. '

'Have you tried it yourself. Daddy?'

'As for trying, I have not tried it, but I was told of it by goodpeople. I used only one charm: that was to repeat the Pilgrim rhymewhen mounting my horse; and no one ever killed me!'

'What is the Pilgrim rhyme. Daddy?'

'What, don't you know it? Oh, what people! You're right to ask Daddy. Well, listen, and repeat after me:

'Hail! Ye, living in Sion, This is your King, Our steeds we shall siton, Sophonius is weeping. Zacharias is speaking, Father Pilgrim, Mankind ever loving. '

'Kind ever loving, ' the old man repeated. 'Do you know it now? Try it. '

Lukashka laughed. 

'Come, Daddy, was it that that hindered their killing you? Maybe itjust happened so!'

'You've grown too clever! You learn it all, and say it. It will do youno harm. Well, suppose you have sung "Pilgrim", it's all right, ' andthe old man himself began laughing. 'But just one thing, Luke, don'tyou go to Nogay!'

'Why?'

'Times have changed. You are not the same men. You've become rubbishyCossacks! And see how many Russians have come down on us! You'd get toprison. Really, give it up! Just as if you could! Now Girchik and I, weused. .. '

And the old man was about to begin one of his endless tales, butLukashka glanced at the window and interrupted him. 

'It is quite light. Daddy. It's time to be off. Look us up some day. '

'May Christ save you! I'll go to the officer; I promised to take himout shooting. He seems a good fellow. '

Chapter XVII

From Eroshka's hut Lukashka went home. As he returned, the dewy mistswere rising from the ground and enveloped the village. In variousplaces the cattle, though out of sight, could be heard beginning tostir. The cocks called to one another with increasing frequency andinsistence. The air was becoming more transparent, and the villagerswere getting up. Not till he was close to it could Lukishka discern thefence of his yard, all wet with dew, the porch of the hut, and the openshed. From the misty yard he heard the sound of an axe chopping wood. Lukashka entered the hut. His mother was up, and stood at the oventhrowing wood into it. His little sister was still lying in bed asleep. 

'Well, Lukashka, had enough holiday-making?' asked his mother softly. 'Where did you spend the night?'

'I was in the village, ' replied her son reluctantly, reaching for hismusket, which he drew from its cover and examined carefully. 

His mother swayed her head. 

Lukashka poured a little gunpowder onto the pan, took out a little bagfrom which he drew some empty cartridge cases which he began filling, carefully plugging each one with a ball wrapped in a rag. Then, havingtested the loaded cartridges with his teeth and examined them, he putdown the bag. 

'I say, Mother, I told you the bags wanted mending; have they beendone?' he asked. 

'Oh yes, our dumb girl was mending something last night. Why, is ittime for you to be going back to the cordon? I haven't seen anything ofyou!'

'Yes, as soon as I have got ready I shall have to go, ' answeredLukashka, tying up the gunpowder. 'And where is our dumb one? Outside?'

'Chopping wood, I expect. She kept fretting for you. "I shall not seehim at all!" she said. She puts her hand to her face like this, andclicks her tongue and presses her hands to her heart as much as tosay--"sorry. " Shall I call her in? She understood all about the abrek. '

'Call her, ' said Lukashka. 'And I had some tallow there; bring it: Imust grease my sword. '

The old woman went out, and a few minutes later Lukashka's dumb sistercame up the creaking steps and entered the hut. She was six years olderthan her brother and would have been extremely like him had it not beenfor the dull and coarsely changeable expression (common to all deaf anddumb people) of her face. She wore a coarse smock all patched; her feetwere bare and muddy, and on her head she had an old blue kerchief. Herneck, arms, and face were sinewy like a peasant's. Her clothing and herwhole appearance indicated that she always did the hard work of a man. She brought in a heap of logs which she threw down by the oven. Thenshe went up to her brother, and with a joyful smile which made herwhole face pucker up, touched him on the shoulder and began makingrapid signs to him with her hands, her face, and whole body. 

'That's right, that's right, Stepka is a trump!' answered the brother, nodding. 'She's fetched everything and mended everything, she's atrump! Here, take this for it!' He brought out two pieces ofgingerbread from his pocket and gave them to her. 

The dumb woman's face flushed with pleasure, and she began making aweird noise for joy. Having seized the gingerbread she began togesticulate still more rapidly, frequently pointing in one directionand passing her thick finger over her eyebrows and her face. Lukashkaunderstood her and kept nodding, while he smiled slightly. She wastelling him to give the girls dainties, and that the girls liked him, and that one girl, Maryanka--the best of them all--loved him. Sheindicated Maryanka by rapidly pointing in the direction of Maryanka'shome and to her own eyebrows and face, and by smacking her lips andswaying her head. 'Loves' she expressed by pressing her hands to herbreast, kissing her hand, and pretending to embrace someone. Theirmother returned to the hut, and seeing what her dumb daughter wassaying, smiled and shook her head. Her daughter showed her thegingerbread and again made the noise which expressed joy. 

'I told Ulitka the other day that I'd send a matchmaker to them, ' saidthe mother. 'She took my words well. '

Lukashka looked silently at his mother. 

'But how about selling the wine, mother? I need a horse. '

'I'll cart it when I have time. I must get the barrels ready, ' said themother, evidently not wishing her son to meddle in domestic matters. 'When you go out you'll find a bag in the passage. I borrowed from theneighbours and got something for you to take back to the cordon; orshall I put it in your saddle-bag?'

'All right, ' answered Lukashka. 'And if Girey Khan should come acrossthe river send him to me at the cordon, for I shan't get leave againfor a long time now; I have some business with him. '

He began to get ready to start. 

'I will send him on, ' said the old woman. 'It seems you have beenspreeing at Yamka's all the time. I went out in the night to see thecattle, and I think it was your voice I heard singing songs. '

Lukashka did not reply, but went out into the passage, threw the bagsover his shoulder, tucked up the skirts of his coat, took his musket, and then stopped for a moment on the threshold. 

'Good-bye, mother!' he said as he closed the gate behind him. 'Send mea small barrel with Nazarka. I promised it to the lads, and he'll callfor it. '

'May Christ keep you, Lukashka. God be with you! I'll send you some, some from the new barrel, ' said the old woman, going to the fence: 'Butlisten, ' she added, leaning over the fence. 

The Cossack stopped. 

'You've been making merry here; well, that's all right. Why should nota young man amuse himself? God has sent you luck and that's good. Butnow look out and mind, my son. Don't you go and get into mischief. Above all, satisfy your superiors: one has to! And I will sell the wineand find money for a horse and will arrange a match with the girl foryou. '

'All right, all right!' answered her son, frowning. 

His deaf sister shouted to attract his attention. She pointed to herhead and the palm of her hand, to indicate the shaved head of aChechen. Then she frowned, and pretending to aim with a gun, sheshrieked and began rapidly humming and shaking her head. This meantthat Lukashka should kill another Chechen. 

Lukashka understood. He smiled, and shifting the gun at his back underhis cloak stepped lightly and rapidly, and soon disappeared in thethick mist. 

The old woman, having stood a little while at the gate, returnedsilently to the hut and immediately began working. 

Chapter XVIII

Lukasha returned to the cordon and at the same time Daddy Eroshkawhistled to his dogs and, climbing over his wattle fence, went toOlenin's lodging, passing by the back of the houses (he dislikedmeeting women before going out hunting or shooting). He found Oleninstill asleep, and even Vanyusha, though awake, was still in bed andlooking round the room considering whether it was not time to get up, when Daddy Eroshka, gun on shoulder and in full hunter's trappings, opened the door. 

'A cudgel!' he shouted in his deep voice. 'An alarm! The Chechens areupon us! Ivan! get the samovar ready for your master, and get upyourself--quick, ' cried the old man. 'That's our way, my good man! Whyeven the girls are already up! Look out of the window. See, she's goingfor water and you're still sleeping!'

Olenin awoke and jumped up, feeling fresh and lighthearted at the sightof the old man and at the sound of his voice. 

'Quick, Vanyusha, quick!' he cried. 

'Is that the way you go hunting?' said the old man. 'Others are havingtheir breakfast and you are asleep! Lyam! Here!' he called to his dog. 'Is your gun ready?' he shouted, as loud as if a whole crowd were inthe hut. 

'Well, it's true I'm guilty, but it can't be helped! The powder, Vanyusha, and the wads!' said Olenin. 

'A fine!' shouted the old man. 

'Du tay voulay vou?' asked Vanyusha, grinning. 

'You're not one of us--your gabble is not like our speech, you devil!'the old man shouted at Vanyusha, showing the stumps of his teeth. 

'A first offence must be forgiven, ' said Olenin playfully, drawing onhis high boots. 

'The first offence shall be forgiven, ' answered Eroshka, 'but if youoversleep another time you'll be fined a pail of chikhir. When it getswarmer you won't find the deer. '

'And even if we do find him he is wiser than we are, ' said Olenin, repeating the words spoken by the old man the evening before, 'and youcan't deceive him!'

'Yes, laugh away! You kill one first, and then you may talk. Now then, hurry up! Look, there's the master himself coming to see you, ' addedEroshka, looking out of the window. 'Just see how he's got himself up. He's put on a new coat so that you should see that he's an officer. Ah, these people, these people!'

Sure enough Vanyusha came in and announced that the master of the housewished to see Olenin. 

'L'arjan!' he remarked profoundly, to forewarn his master of themeaning of this visitation. Following him, the master of the house in anew Circassian coat with an officer's stripes on the shoulders and withpolished boots (quite exceptional among Cossacks) entered the room, swaying from side to side, and congratulated his lodger on his safearrival. 

The cornet, Elias Vasilich, was an educated Cossack. He had been toRussia proper, was a regimental schoolteacher, and above all he wasnoble. He wished to appear noble, but one could not help feelingbeneath his grotesque pretence of polish, his affectation, hisself-confidence, and his absurd way of speaking, he was just the sameas Daddy Eroshka. This could also be clearly seen by his sunburnt faceand his hands and his red nose. Olenin asked him to sit down. 

'Good morning. Father Elias Vasilich, ' said Eroshka, rising with (or soit seemed to Olenin) an ironically low bow. 

'Good morning. Daddy. So you're here already, ' said the cornet, with acareless nod. 

The cornet was a man of about forty, with a grey pointed beard, skinnyand lean, but handsome and very fresh-looking for his age. Having cometo see Olenin he was evidently afraid of being taken for an ordinaryCossack, and wanted to let Olenin feel his importance from the first. 

'That's our Egyptian Nimrod, ' he remarked, addressing Olenin andpointing to the old man with a self-satisfied smile. 'A mighty hunterbefore the Lord! He's our foremost man on every hand. You've alreadybeen pleased to get acquainted with him. '

Daddy Eroshka gazed at his feet in their shoes of wet raw hide andshook his head thoughtfully at the cornet's ability and learning, andmuttered to himself: 'Gyptian Nimvrod! What things he invents!'

'Yes, you see we mean to go hunting, ' answered Olenin. 

'Yes, sir, exactly, ' said the cornet, 'but I have a small business withyou. '

'What do you want?'

'Seeing that you are a gentleman, ' began the cornet, 'and as I mayunderstand myself to be in the rank of an officer too, and therefore wemay always progressively negotiate, as gentlemen do. ' (He stopped andlooked with a smile at Olenin and at the old man. ) 'But if you have thedesire with my consent, then, as my wife is a foolish woman of ourclass, she could not quite comprehend your words of yesterday's date. Therefore my quarters might be let for six rubles to the RegimentalAdjutant, without the stables; but I can always avert that from myselffree of charge. But, as you desire, therefore I, being myself of anofficer's rank, can come to an agreement with you in everythingpersonally, as an inhabitant of this district, not according to ourcustoms, but can maintain the conditions in every way. .. . '

'Speaks clearly!' muttered the old man. 

The cornet continued in the same strain for a long time. At last, notwithout difficulty, Olenin gathered that the cornet wished to let hisrooms to him, Olenin, for six rubles a month. The latter gladly agreedto this, and offered his visitor a glass of tea. The cornet declined it. 

'According to our silly custom we consider it a sort of sin to drinkout of a "worldly" tumbler, ' he said. 'Though, of course, with myeducation I may understand, but my wife from her human weakness. .. '

'Well then, will you have some tea?'

'If you will permit me, I will bring my own particular glass, ' answeredthe cornet, and stepped out into the porch. 

'Bring me my glass!' he cried. 

In a few minutes the door opened and a young sunburnt arm in a printsleeve thrust itself in, holding a tumbler in the hand. The cornet wentup, took it, and whispered something to his daughter. Olenin poured teafor the cornet into the latter's own 'particular' glass, and forEroshka into a 'worldly' glass. 

'However, I do not desire to detain you, ' said the cornet, scalding hislips and emptying his tumbler. 'I too have a great liking for fishing, and I am here, so to say, only on leave of absence for recreation frommy duties. I too have the desire to tempt fortune and see whether someGifts of the Terek may not fall to my share. I hope you too will comeand see us and have a drink of our wine, according to the custom of ourvillage, ' he added. 

The cornet bowed, shook hands with Olenin, and went out. While Oleninwas getting ready, he heard the cornet giving orders to his family inan authoritative and sensible tone, and a few minutes later he saw himpass by the window in a tattered coat with his trousers rolled up tohis knees and a fishing net over his shoulder. 

'A rascal!' said Daddy Eroshka, emptying his 'worldly' tumbler. 'Andwill you really pay him six rubles? Was such a thing ever heard of?They would let you the best hut in the village for two rubles. What abeast! Why, I'd let you have mine for three!'

'No, I'll remain here, ' said Olenin. 

'Six rubles! . .. Clearly it's a fool's money. Eh, eh, eh! answered theold man. 'Let's have some chikhir, Ivan!'

Having had a snack and a drink of vodka to prepare themselves for theroad, Olenin and the old man went out together before eight o'clock. 

At the gate they came up against a wagon to which a pair of oxen wereharnessed. With a white kerchief tied round her head down to her eyes, a coat over her smock, and wearing high boots, Maryanka with a longswitch in her hand was dragging the oxen by a cord tied to their horns. 

'Mammy, ' said the old man, pretending that he was going to seize her. 

Maryanka flourished her switch at him and glanced merrily at them bothwith her beautiful eyes. 

Olenin felt still more light-hearted. 

'Now then, come on, come on, ' he said, throwing his gun on his shoulderand conscious of the girl's eyes upon him. 

'Gee up!' sounded Maryanka's voice behind them, followed by the creakof the moving wagon. 

As long as their road lay through the pastures at the back of thevillage Eroshka went on talking. He could not forget the cornet andkept on abusing him. 

'Why are you so angry with him?' asked Olenin. 

'He's stingy. I don't like it, ' answered the old man. 'He'll leave itall behind when he dies! Then who's he saving up for? He's built twohouses, and he's got a second garden from his brother by a law-suit. And in the matter of papers what a dog he is! They come to him fromother villages to fill up documents. As he writes it out, exactly so ithappens. He gets it quite exact. But who is he saving for? He's onlygot one boy and the girl; when she's married who'll be left?'

'Well then, he's saving up for her dowry, ' said Olenin. 

'What dowry? The girl is sought after, she's a fine girl. But he's sucha devil that he must yet marry her to a rich fellow. He wants to get abig price for her. There's Luke, a Cossack, a neighbour and a nephew ofmine, a fine lad. It's he who killed the Chechen--he has been wooingher for a long time, but he hasn't let him have her. He's given oneexcuse, and another, and a third. "The girl's too young, " he says. ButI know what he is thinking. He wants to keep them bowing to him. He'sbeen acting shamefully about that girl. Still, they will get her forLukashka, because he is the best Cossack in the village, a brave, whohas killed an abrek and will be rewarded with a cross. '

'But how about this? When I was walking up and down the yard lastnight, I saw my landlord's daughter and some Cossack kissing, ' saidOlenin. 

'You're pretending!' cried the old man, stopping. 

'On my word, ' said Olenin. 

'Women are the devil, ' said Eroshka pondering. 'But what Cossack wasit?'

'I couldn't see. '

'Well, what sort of a cap had he, a white one?'

'Yes. '

'And a red coat? About your height?'

'No, a bit taller. '

'It's he!' and Eroshka burst out laughing. 'It's himself, it's Mark. Heis Luke, but I call him Mark for a joke. His very self! I love him. Iwas just such a one myself. What's the good of minding them? Mysweetheart used to sleep with her mother and her sister-in-law, but Imanaged to get in. She used to sleep upstairs; that witch her motherwas a regular demon; it's awful how she hated me. Well, I used to comewith a chum, Girchik his name was. We'd come under her window and I'dclimb on his shoulders, push up the window and begin groping about. Sheused to sleep just there on a bench. Once I woke her up and she nearlycalled out. She hadn't recognized me. "Who is there?" she said, and Icould not answer. Her mother was even beginning to stir, but I took offmy cap and shoved it over her mouth; and she at once knew it by a seamin it, and ran out to me. I used not to want anything then. She'd bringalong clotted cream and grapes and everything, ' added Eroshka (whoalways explained things practically), 'and she wasn't the only one. Itwas a life!'

'And what now?'

'Now we'll follow the dog, get a pheasant to settle on a tree, and thenyou may fire. '

'Would you have made up to Maryanka?'

'Attend to the dogs. I'll tell you tonight, ' said the old man, pointingto his favourite dog, Lyam. 

After a pause they continued talking, while they went about a hundredpaces. Then the old man stopped again and pointed to a twig that layacross the path. 

'What do you think of that?' he said. 'You think it's nothing? It's badthat this stick is lying so. '

'Why is it bad?'

He smiled. 

'Ah, you don't know anything. Just listen to me. When a stick lies likethat don't you step across it, but go round it or throw it off the paththis way, and say "Father and Son and Holy Ghost, " and then go on withGod's blessing. Nothing will happen to you. That's what the old menused to teach me. '

'Come, what rubbish!' said Olenin. 'You'd better tell me more aboutMaryanka. Does she carry on with Lukashka?'

'Hush . .. Be quiet now!' the old man again interrupted in a whisper:'just listen, we'll go round through the forest. '

And the old man, stepping quietly in his soft shoes, led the way by anarrow path leading into the dense, wild, overgrown forest. Now andagain with a frown he turned to look at Olenin, who rustled andclattered with his heavy boots and, carrying his gun carelessly, several times caught the twigs of trees that grew across the path. 

'Don't make a noise. Step softly, soldier!' the old man whisperedangrily. 

There was a feeling in the air that the sun had risen. The mist wasdissolving but it still enveloped the tops of the trees. The forestlooked terribly high. At every step the aspect changed: what hadappeared like a tree proved to be a bush, and a reed looked like a tree. 

Chapter XIX

The mist had partly lifted, showing the wet reed thatches, and was nowturning into dew that moistened the road and the grass beside thefence. Smoke rose everywhere in clouds from the chimneys. The peoplewere going out of the village, some to their work, some to the river, and some to the cordon. The hunters walked together along the damp, grass-grown path. The dogs, wagging their tails and looking at theirmasters, ran on both sides of them. Myriads of gnats hovered in the airand pursued the hunters, covering their backs, eyes, and hands. The airwas fragrant with the grass and with the dampness of the forest. Olenincontinually looked round at the ox-cart in which Maryanka sat urging onthe oxen with a long switch. 

It was calm. The sounds from the village, audible at first, now nolonger reached the sportsmen. Only the brambles cracked as the dogs ranunder them, and now and then birds called to one another. Olenin knewthat danger lurked in the forest, that abreks always hid in suchplaces. But he knew too that in the forest, for a man on foot, a gun isa great protection. Not that he was afraid, but he felt that another inhis place might be; and looking into the damp misty forest andlistening to the rare and faint sounds with strained attention, hechanged his hold on his gun and experienced a pleasant feeling that wasnew to him. Daddy Eroshka went in front, stopping and carefullyscanning every puddle where an animal had left a double track, andpointing it out to Olenin. He hardly spoke at all and only occasionallymade remarks in a whisper. The track they were following had once beenmade by wagons, but the grass had long overgrown it. The elm andplane-tree forest on both sides of them was so dense and overgrown withcreepers that it was impossible to see anything through it. Nearlyevery tree was enveloped from top to bottom with wild grape vines, anddark bramble bushes covered the ground thickly. Every little glade wasovergrown with blackberry bushes and grey feathery reeds. In places, large hoof-prints and small funnel-shaped pheasant-trails led from thepath into the thicket. The vigour of the growth of this forest, untrampled by cattle, struck Olenin at every turn, for he had neverseen anything like it. This forest, the danger, the old man and hismysterious whispering, Maryanka with her virile upright bearing, andthe mountains--all this seemed to him like a dream. 

'A pheasant has settled, ' whispered the old man, looking round andpulling his cap over his face--'Cover your mug! A pheasant!' he wavedhis arm angrily at Olenin and pushed forward almost on all fours. 'Hedon't like a man's mug. '

Olenin was still behind him when the old man stopped and beganexamining a tree. A cock-pheasant on the tree clucked at the dog thatwas barking at it, and Olenin saw the pheasant; but at that moment areport, as of a cannon, came from Eroshka's enormous gun, the birdfluttered up and, losing some feathers, fell to the ground. Coming upto the old man Olenin disturbed another, and raising his gun he aimedand fired. The pheasant flew swiftly up and then, catching at thebranches as he fell, dropped like a stone to the ground. 

'Good man!' the old man (who could not hit a flying bird) shouted, laughing. 

Having picked up the pheasants they went on. Olenin, excited by theexercise and the praise, kept addressing remarks to the old man. 

'Stop! Come this way, ' the old man interrupted. 'I noticed the track ofdeer here yesterday. '

After they had turned into the thicket and gone some three hundredpaces they scrambled through into a glade overgrown with reeds andpartly under water. Olenin failed to keep up with the old huntsman andpresently Daddy Eroshka, some twenty paces in front, stooped down, nodding and beckoning with his arm. On coming up with him Olenin saw aman's footprint to which the old man was pointing. 

'D'you see?'

'Yes, well?' said Olenin, trying to speak as calmly as he could. 'Aman's footstep!'

Involuntarily a thought of Cooper's Pathfinder and of abreks flashedthrough Olenin's mind, but noticing the mysterious manner with whichthe old man moved on, he hesitated to question him and remained indoubt whether this mysteriousness was caused by fear of danger or bythe sport. 

'No, it's my own footprint, ' the old man said quietly, and pointed tosome grass under which the track of an animal was just perceptible. 

The old man went on; and Olenin kept up with him. 

Descending to lower ground some twenty paces farther on they came upona spreading pear-tree, under which, on the black earth, lay the freshdung of some animal. 

The spot, all covered over with wild vines, was like a cosy arbour, dark and cool. 

'He's been here this morning, ' said the old man with a sigh; 'the lairis still damp, quite fresh. '

Suddenly they heard a terrible crash in the forest some ten paces fromwhere they stood. They both started and seized their guns, but theycould see nothing and only heard the branches breaking. The rhythmicalrapid thud of galloping was heard for a moment and then changed into ahollow rumble which resounded farther and farther off, re-echoing inwider and wider circles through the forest. Olenin felt as thoughsomething had snapped in his heart. He peered carefully but vainly intothe green thicket and then turned to the old man. Daddy Eroshka withhis gun pressed to his breast stood motionless; his cap was thrustbackwards, his eyes gleamed with an unwonted glow, and his open mouth, with its worn yellow teeth, seemed to have stiffened in that position. 

'A homed stag!' he muttered, and throwing down his gun in despair hebegan pulling at his grey beard, 'Here it stood. We should have comeround by the path. .. . Fool! fool!' and he gave his beard an angry tug. Fool! Pig!' he repeated, pulling painfully at his own beard. Throughthe forest something seemed to fly away in the mist, and ever fartherand farther off was heard the sound of the flight of the stag. 

It was already dusk when, hungry, tired, but full of vigour, Oleninreturned with the old man. Dinner was ready. He ate and drank with theold man till he felt warm and merry. Olenin then went out into theporch. Again, to the west, the mountains rose before his eyes. Againthe old man told his endless stories of hunting, of abreks, ofsweethearts, and of all that free and reckless life. Again the fairMaryanka went in and out and across the yard, her beautiful powerfulform outlined by her smock. 

Chapter XX

The next day Olenin went alone to the spot where he and the old manstartled the stag. Instead of passing round through the gate he climbedover the prickly hedge, as everybody else did, and before he had hadtime to pull out the thorns that had caught in his coat, his dog, whichhad run on in front, started two pheasants. He had hardly stepped amongthe briers when the pheasants began to rise at every step (the old manhad not shown him that place the day before as he meant to keep it forshooting from behind the screen). Olenin fired twelve times and killedfive pheasants, but clambering after them through the briers he got sofatigued that he was drenched with perspiration. He called off his dog, uncocked his gun, put in a bullet above the small shot, and brushingaway the mosquitoes with the wide sleeve of his Circassian coat he wentslowly to the spot where they had been the day before. It was howeverimpossible to keep back the dog, who found trails on the very path, andOlenin killed two more pheasants, so that after being detained by thisit was getting towards noon before he began to find the place he waslooking for. 

The day was perfectly clear, calm, and hot. The morning moisture haddried up even in the forest, and myriads of mosquitoes literallycovered his face, his back, and his arms. His dog had turned from blackto grey, its back being covered with mosquitoes, and so had Olenin'scoat through which the insects thrust their stings. Olenin was ready torun away from them and it seemed to him that it was impossible to livein this country in the summer. He was about to go home, but rememberingthat other people managed to endure such pain he resolved to bear itand gave himself up to be devoured. And strange to say, by noontime thefeeling became actually pleasant. He even felt that without thismosquito-filled atmosphere around him, and that mosquito-paste mingledwith perspiration which his hand smeared over his face, and thatunceasing irritation all over his body, the forest would lose for himsome of its character and charm. These myriads of insects were so wellsuited to that monstrously lavish wild vegetation, these multitudes ofbirds and beasts which filled the forest, this dark foliage, this hotscented air, these runlets filled with turbid water which everywheresoaked through from the Terek and gurgled here and there under theoverhanging leaves, that the very thing which had at first seemed tohim dreadful and intolerable now seemed pleasant. After going round theplace where yesterday they had found the animal and not findinganything, he felt inclined to rest. The sun stood right above theforest and poured its perpendicular rays down on his back and headwhenever he came out into a glade or onto the road. The seven heavypheasants dragged painfully at his waist. Having found the traces ofyesterday's stag he crept under a bush into the thicket just where thestag had lain, and lay down in its lair. He examined the dark foliagearound him, the place marked by the stag's perspiration and yesterday'sdung, the imprint of the stag's knees, the bit of black earth it hadkicked up, and his own footprints of the day before. He felt cool andcomfortable and did not think of or wish for anything. And suddenly hewas overcome by such a strange feeling of causeless joy and of love foreverything, that from an old habit of his childhood he began crossinghimself and thanking someone. Suddenly, with extraordinary clearness, he thought: 'Here am I, Dmitri Olenin, a being quite distinct fromevery other being, now lying all alone Heaven only knows where--where astag used to live--an old stag, a beautiful stag who perhaps had neverseen a man, and in a place where no human being has ever sat or thoughtthese thoughts. Here I sit, and around me stand old and young trees, one of them festooned with wild grape vines, and pheasants arefluttering, driving one another about and perhaps scenting theirmurdered brothers. ' He felt his pheasants, examined them, and wiped thewarm blood off his hand onto his coat. 'Perhaps the jackals scent themand with dissatisfied faces go off in another direction: above me, flying in among the leaves which to them seem enormous islands, mosquitoes hang in the air and buzz: one, two, three, four, a hundred, a thousand, a million mosquitoes, and all of them buzz something orother and each one of them is separate from all else and is just such aseparate Dmitri Olenin as I am myself. ' He vividly imagined what themosquitoes buzzed: 'This way, this way, lads! Here's some one we caneat!' They buzzed and stuck to him. And it was clear to him that he wasnot a Russian nobleman, a member of Moscow society, the friend andrelation of so-and-so and so-and-so, but just such a mosquito, orpheasant, or deer, as those that were now living all around him. 'Justas they, just as Daddy Eroshka, I shall live awhile and die, and as hesays truly:

"grass will grow and nothing more". 

'But what though the grass does grow?' he continued thinking. 'Still Imust live and be happy, because happiness is all I desire. Never mindwhat I am--an animal like all the rest, above whom the grass will growand nothing more; or a frame in which a bit of the one God has beenset, --still I must live in the very best way. How then must I live tobe happy, and why was I not happy before?' And he began to recall hisformer life and he felt disgusted with himself. He appeared to himselfto have been terribly exacting and selfish, though he now saw that allthe while he really needed nothing for himself. And he looked round atthe foliage with the light shining through it, at the setting sun andthe clear sky, and he felt just as happy as before. 'Why am I happy, and what used I to live for?' thought he. 'How much I exacted formyself; how I schemed and did not manage to gain anything but shame andsorrow! and, there now, I require nothing to be happy;' and suddenly anew light seemed to reveal itself to him. 'Happiness is this!' he saidto himself. 'Happiness lies in living for others. That is evident. Thedesire for happiness is innate in every man; therefore it islegitimate. When trying to satisfy it selfishly--that is, by seekingfor oneself riches, fame, comforts, or love--it may happen thatcircumstances arise which make it impossible to satisfy these desires. It follows that it is these desires that are illegitimate, but not theneed for happiness. But what desires can always be satisfied despiteexternal circumstances? What are they? Love, self-sacrifice. ' He was soglad and excited when he had discovered this, as it seemed to him, newtruth, that he jumped up and began impatiently seeking some one tosacrifice himself for, to do good to and to love. 'Since one wantsnothing for oneself, ' he kept thinking, 'why not live for others?' Hetook up his gun with the intention of returning home quickly to thinkthis out and to find an opportunity of doing good. He made his way outof the thicket. When he had come out into the glade he looked aroundhim; the sun was no longer visible above the tree-tops. It had growncooler and the place seemed to him quite strange and not like thecountry round the village. Everything seemed changed--the weather andthe character of the forest; the sky was wrapped in clouds, the windwas rustling in the tree-tops, and all around nothing was visible butreeds and dying broken-down trees. He called to his dog who had runaway to follow some animal, and his voice came back as in a desert. Andsuddenly he was seized with a terrible sense of weirdness. He grewfrightened. He remembered the abreks and the murders he had been toldabout, and he expected every moment that an abrek would spring frombehind every bush and he would have to defend his life and die, or be acoward. He thought of God and of the future life as for long he had notthought about them. And all around was that same gloomy stern wildnature. 'And is it worth while living for oneself, ' thought he, 'whenat any moment you may die, and die without having done any good, and sothat no one will know of it?' He went in the direction where he fanciedthe village lay. Of his shooting he had no further thought; but he felttired to death and peered round at every bush and tree with particularattention and almost with terror, expecting every moment to be calledto account for his life. After having wandered about for a considerabletime he came upon a ditch down which was flowing cold sandy water fromthe Terek, and, not to go astray any longer, he decided to follow it. He went on without knowing where the ditch would lead him. Suddenly thereeds behind him crackled. He shuddered and seized his gun, and thenfelt ashamed of himself: the over-excited dog, panting hard, had thrownitself into the cold water of the ditch and was lapping it!

He too had a drink, and then followed the dog in the direction itwished to go, thinking it would lead him to the village. But despitethe dog's company everything around him seemed still more dreary. Theforest grew darker and the wind grew stronger and stronger in the topsof the broken old trees. Some large birds circled screeching roundtheir nests in those trees. The vegetation grew poorer and he cameoftener and oftener upon rustling reeds and bare sandy spaces coveredwith animal footprints. To the howling of the wind was added anotherkind of cheerless monotonous roar. Altogether his spirits becamegloomy. Putting his hand behind him he felt his pheasants, and foundone missing. It had broken off and was lost, and only the bleeding headand beak remained sticking in his belt. He felt more frightened than hehad ever done before. He began to pray to God, and feared above allthat he might die without having done anything good or kind; and he sowanted to live, and to live so as to perform a feat of self-sacrifice. 

Chapter XXI

Suddenly it was as though the sun had shone into his soul. He heardRussian being spoken, and also heard the rapid smooth flow of theTerek, and a few steps farther in front of him saw the brown movingsurface of the river, with the dim-coloured wet sand of its banks andshallows, the distant steppe, the cordon watch-tower outlined above thewater, a saddled and hobbled horse among the brambles, and then themountains opening out before him. The red sun appeared for an instantfrom under a cloud and its last rays glittered brightly along the riverover the reeds, on the watch-tower, and on a group of Cossacks, amongwhom Lukashka's vigorous figure attracted Olenin's involuntaryattention. 

Olenin felt that he was again, without any apparent cause, perfectlyhappy. He had come upon the Nizhni-Prototsk post on the Terek, oppositea pro-Russian Tartar village on the other side of the river. Heaccosted the Cossacks, but not finding as yet any excuse for doinganyone a kindness, he entered the hut; nor in the hut did he find anysuch opportunity. The Cossacks received him coldly. On entering the mudhut he lit a cigarette. The Cossacks paid little attention to him, first because he was smoking a cigarette, and secondly because they hadsomething else to divert them that evening. Some hostile Chechens, relatives of the abrek who had been killed, had come from the hillswith a scout to ransom the body; and the Cossacks were waiting fortheir Commanding Officer's arrival from the village. The dead man'sbrother, tall and well shaped with a short cropped beard which was dyedred, despite his very tattered coat and cap was calm and majestic as aking. His face was very like that of the dead abrek. He did not deignto look at anyone, and never once glanced at the dead body, but sittingon his heels in the shade he spat as he smoked his short pipe, andoccasionally uttered some few guttural sounds of command, which wererespectfully listened to by his companion. He was evidently a brave whohad met Russians more than once before in quite other circumstances, and nothing about them could astonish or even interest him. Olenin wasabout to approach the dead body and had begun to look at it when thebrother, looking up at him from under his brows with calm contempt, said something sharply and angrily. The scout hastened to cover thedead man's face with his coat. Olenin was struck by the dignified andstem expression of the brave's face. He began to speak to him, askingfrom what village he came, but the Chechen, scarcely giving him aglance, spat contemptuously and turned away. Olenin was so surprised atthe Chechen not being interested in him that he could only put it downto the man's stupidity or ignorance of Russian; so he turned to thescout, who also acted as interpreter. The scout was as ragged as theother, but instead of being red-haired he was black-haired, restless, with extremely white gleaming teeth and sparkling black eyes. The scoutwillingly entered into conversation and asked for a cigarette. 

'There were five brothers, ' began the scout in his broken Russian. 'This is the third brother the Russians have killed, only two are left. He is a brave, a great brave!' he said, pointing to the Chechen. 'Whenthey killed Ahmet Khan (the dead brave) this one was sitting on theopposite bank among the reeds. He saw it all. Saw him laid in the skiffand brought to the bank. He sat there till the night and wished to killthe old man, but the others would not let him. '

Lukashka went up to the speaker, and sat down. 'Of what village?' askedhe. 

'From there in the hills, ' replied the scout, pointing to the mistybluish gorge beyond the Terek. 'Do you know Suuk-su? It is about eightmiles beyond that. '

'Do you know Girey Khan in Suuk-su?' asked Lukashka, evidently proud ofthe acquaintance. 'He is my kunak. '

'He is my neighbour, ' answered the scout. 

'He's a trump!' and Lukashka, evidently much interested, began talkingto the scout in Tartar. 

Presently a Cossack captain, with the head of the village, arrived onhorseback with a suite of two Cossacks. The captain--one of the newtype of Cossack officers--wished the Cossacks 'Good health, ' but no oneshouted in reply, 'Hail! Good health to your honour, ' as is customaryin the Russian Army, and only a few replied with a bow. Some, and amongthem Lukashka, rose and stood erect. The corporal replied that all waswell at the outposts. All this seemed ridiculous: it was as if theseCossacks were playing at being soldiers. But these formalities soongave place to ordinary ways of behaviour, and the captain, who was asmart Cossack just like the others, began speaking fluently in Tartarto the interpreter. They filled in some document, gave it to the scout, and received from him some money. Then they approached the body. 

'Which of you is Luke Gavrilov?' asked the captain. 

Lukishka took off his cap and came forward. 

'I have reported your exploit to the Commander. I don't know what willcome of it. I have recommended you for a cross; you're too young to bemade a sergeant. Can you read?'

'I can't. '

'But what a fine fellow to look at!' said the captain, again playingthe commander. 'Put on your cap. Which of the Gavrilovs does he comeof? . .. The Broad, eh?'

'His nephew, ' replied the corporal. 

'I know, I know. Well, lend a hand, help them, ' he said, turning to theCossacks. 

Lukashka's face shone with joy and seemed handsomer than usual. Hemoved away from the corporal, and having put on his cap sat down besideOlenin. 

When the body had been carried to the skiff the brother Chechendescended to the bank. The Cossacks involuntarily stepped aside to lethim pass. He jumped into the boat and pushed off from the bank with hispowerful leg, and now, as Olenin noticed, for the first time threw arapid glance at all the Cossacks and then abruptly asked his companiona question. The latter answered something and pointed to Lukashka. TheChechen looked at him and, turning slowly away, gazed at the oppositebank. That look expressed not hatred but cold contempt. He again madesome remark. 

'What is he saying?' Olenin asked of the fidgety scout. 

'Yours kill ours, ours slay yours. It's always the same, ' replied thescout, evidently inventing, and he smiled, showing his white teeth, ashe jumped into the skiff. 

The dead man's brother sat motionless, gazing at the opposite bank. Hewas so full of hatred and contempt that there was nothing on this sideof the river that moved his curiosity. The scout, standing up at oneend of the skiff and dipping his paddle now on one side now on theother, steered skilfully while talking incessantly. The skiff becamesmaller and smaller as it moved obliquely across the stream, the voicesbecame scarcely audible, and at last, still within sight, they landedon the opposite bank where their horses stood waiting. There theylifted out the corpse and (though the horse shied) laid it across oneof the saddles, mounted, and rode at a foot-pace along the road past aTartar village from which a crowd came out to look at them. TheCossacks on the Russian side of the river were highly satisfied andjovial. Laughter and jokes were heard on all sides. The captain and thehead of the village entered the mud hut to regale themselves. Lukashka, vainly striving to impart a sedate expression to his merry face, satdown with his elbows on his knees beside Olenin and whittled away at astick. 

'Why do you smoke?' he said with assumed curiosity. 'Is it good?'

He evidently spoke because he noticed Olenin felt ill at ease andisolated among the Cossacks. 

'It's just a habit, ' answered Olenin. 'Why?'

'H'm, if one of us were to smoke there would be a row! Look there now, the mountains are not far off, ' continued Lukashka, 'yet you can't getthere! How will you get back alone? It's getting dark. I'll take you, if you like. You ask the corporal to give me leave. '

'What a fine fellow!' thought Olenin, looking at the Cossack's brightface. He remembered Maryanka and the kiss he had heard by the gate, andhe was sorry for Lukashka and his want of culture. 'What confusion itis, ' he thought. 'A man kills another and is happy and satisfied withhimself as if he had done something excellent. Can it be that nothingtells him that it is not a reason for any rejoicing, and that happinesslies not in killing, but in sacrificing oneself?'

'Well, you had better not meet him again now, mate!' said one of theCossacks who had seen the skiff off, addressing Lukashka. 'Did you hearhim asking about you?'

Lukashka raised his head. 

'My godson?' said Lukashka, meaning by that word the dead Chechen. 

'Your godson won't rise, but the red one is the godson's brother!'

'Let him thank God that he got off whole himself, ' replied Lukashka. 

'What are you glad about?' asked Olenin. 'Supposing your brother hadbeen killed; would you be glad?'

The Cossack looked at Olenin with laughing eyes. He seemed to haveunderstood all that Olenin wished to say to him, but to be above suchconsiderations. 

'Well, that happens too! Don't our fellows get killed sometimes?'

Chapter XXII

The Captain and the head of the village rode away, and Olenin, toplease Lukashka as well as to avoid going back alone through the darkforest, asked the corporal to give Lukashka leave, and the corporal didso. Olenin thought that Lukashka wanted to see Maryanka and he was alsoglad of the companionship of such a pleasant-looking and sociableCossack. Lukashka and Maryanka he involuntarily united in his mind, andhe found pleasure in thinking about them. 'He loves Maryanka, ' thoughtOlenin, 'and I could love her, ' and a new and powerful emotion oftenderness overcame him as they walked homewards together through thedark forest. Lukashka too felt happy; something akin to love madeitself felt between these two very different young men. Every time theyglanced at one another they wanted to laugh. 

'By which gate do you enter?' asked Olenin. 

'By the middle one. But I'll see you as far as the marsh. After thatyou have nothing to fear. '

Olenin laughed. 

'Do you think I am afraid? Go back, and thank you. I can get on alone. '

'It's all right! What have I to do? And how can you help being afraid?Even we are afraid, ' said Lukashka to set Olenin's self-esteem at rest, and he laughed too. 

'Then come in with me. We'll have a talk and a drink and in the morningyou can go back. '

'Couldn't I find a place to spend the night?' laughed Lukashka. 'Butthe corporal asked me to go back. '

'I heard you singing last night, and also saw you. '

'Every one. .. ' and Luke swayed his head. 

'Is it true you are getting married?' asked Olenin. 

'Mother wants me to marry. But I have not got a horse yet. '

'Aren't you in the regular service?'

'Oh dear no! I've only just joined, and have not got a horse yet, anddon't know how to get one. That's why the marriage does not come off. '

'And what would a horse cost?'

'We were bargaining for one beyond the river the other day and theywould not take sixty rubles for it, though it is a Nogay horse. '

'Will you come and be my drabant?' (A drabant was a kind of orderlyattached to an officer when campaigning. ) 'I'll get it arranged andwill give you a horse, ' said Olenin suddenly. 'Really now, I have twoand I don't want both. '

'How--don't want it?' Lukashka said, laughing. 'Why should you make mea present? We'll get on by ourselves by God's help. '

'No, really! Or don't you want to be a drabant?' said Olenin, glad thatit had entered his head to give a horse to Lukashka, though, withoutknowing why, he felt uncomfortable and confused and did not know whatto say when he tried to speak. 

Lukashka was the first to break the silence. 

'Have you a house of your own in Russia?' he asked. 

Olenin could not refrain from replying that he had not only one, butseveral houses. 

'A good house? Bigger than ours?' asked Lukashka good-naturedly. 

'Much bigger; ten times as big and three storeys high, ' replied Olenin. 

'And have you horses such as ours?'

'I have a hundred horses, worth three or four hundred rubles each, butthey are not like yours. They are trotters, you know. .. . But still, Ilike the horses here best. '

'Well, and did you come here of your own free will, or were you sent?'said Lukashka, laughing at him. 'Look! that's where you lost your way, 'he added, 'you should have turned to the right. '

'I came by my own wish, ' replied Olenin. 'I wanted to see your partsand to join some expeditions. '

'I would go on an expedition any day, ' said Lukashka. 'D'you hear thejackals howling?' he added, listening. 

'I say, don't you feel any horror at having killed a man?' asked Olenin. 

'What's there to be frightened about? But I should like to join anexpedition, ' Lukashka repeated. 'How I want to! How I want to!'

'Perhaps we may be going together. Our company is going before theholidays, and your "hundred" too. '

'And what did you want to come here for? You've a house and horses andserfs. In your place I'd do nothing but make merry! And what is yourrank?'

'I am a cadet, but have been recommended for a commission. '

'Well, if you're not bragging about your home, if I were you I'd neverhave left it! Yes, I'd never have gone away anywhere. Do you find itpleasant living among us?'

'Yes, very pleasant, ' answered Olenin. 

It had grown quite dark before, talking in this way, they approachedthe village. They were still surrounded by the deep gloom of theforest. The wind howled through the tree-tops. The jackals suddenlyseemed to be crying close beside them, howling, chuckling, and sobbing;but ahead of them in the village the sounds of women's voices and thebarking of dogs could already be heard; the outlines of the huts wereclearly to be seen; lights gleamed and the air was filled with thepeculiar smell of kisyak smoke. Olenin felt keenly, that nightespecially, that here in this village was his home, his family, all hishappiness, and that he never had and never would live so happilyanywhere as he did in this Cossack village. He was so fond of everybodyand especially of Lukashka that night. On reaching home, to Lukashka'sgreat surprise, Olenin with his own hands led out of the shed a horsehe had bought in Groznoe--it was not the one he usually rode butanother--not a bad horse though no longer young, and gave it toLukashka. 

'Why should you give me a present?' said Lukashka, 'I have not yet doneanything for you. '

'Really it is nothing, ' answered Olenin. 'Take it, and you will give mea present, and we'll go on an expedition against the enemy together. '

Lukashka became confused. 

'But what d'you mean by it? As if a horse were of little value, ' hesaid without looking at the horse. 

'Take it, take it! If you don't you will offend me. Vanyusha! Take thegrey horse to his house. '

Lukashka took hold of the halter. 

'Well then, thank you! This is something unexpected, undreamt of. '

Olenin was as happy as a boy of twelve. 

'Tie it up here. It's a good horse. I bought it in Groznoe; it gallopssplendidly! Vanyusha, bring us some chikhir. Come into the hut. '

The wine was brought. Lukashka sat down and took the wine-bowl. 

'God willing I'll find a way to repay you, ' he said, finishing hiswine. 'How are you called?'

'Dmitri Andreich. '

'Well, 'Mitry Andreich, God bless you. We will be kunaks. Now you mustcome to see us. Though we are not rich people still we can treat akunak, and I will tell mother in case you need anything--clotted creamor grapes--and if you come to the cordon I'm your servant to go huntingor to go across the river, anywhere you like! There now, only the otherday, what a boar I killed, and I divided it among the Cossacks, but ifI had only known, I'd have given it to you. ' 'That's all right, thankyou! But don't harness the horse, it has never been in harness. '

'Why harness the horse? And there is something else I'll tell you ifyou like, ' said Lukashka, bending his head. 'I have a kunak, GireyKhan. He asked me to lie in ambush by the road where they come downfrom the mountains. Shall we go together? I'll not betray you. I'll beyour murid. '

'Yes, we'll go; we'll go some day. '

Lukashka seemed quite to have quieted down and to have understoodOlenin's attitude towards him. His calmness and the ease of hisbehaviour surprised Olenin, and he did not even quite like it. Theytalked long, and it was late when Lukashka, not tipsy (he never wastipsy) but having drunk a good deal, left Olenin after shaking hands. 

Olenin looked out of the window to see what he would do. Lukashka wentout, hanging his head. Then, having led the horse out of the gate, hesuddenly shook his head, threw the reins of the halter over its head, sprang onto its back like a cat, gave a wild shout, and galloped downthe street. Olenin expected that Lukishka would go to share his joywith Maryanka, but though he did not do so Olenin still felt his soulmore at ease than ever before in his life. He was as delighted as aboy, and could not refrain from telling Vanyusha not only that he hadgiven Lukashka the horse, but also why he had done it, as well as hisnew theory of happiness. Vanyusha did not approve of his theory, andannounced that 'l'argent il n'y a pas!' and that therefore it was allnonsense. 

Lukashka rode home, jumped off the horse, and handed it over to hismother, telling her to let it out with the communal Cossack herd. Hehimself had to return to the cordon that same night. His deaf sisterundertook to take the horse, and explained by signs that when she sawthe man who had given the horse, she would bow down at his feet. Theold woman only shook her head at her son's story, and decided in herown mind that he had stolen it. She therefore told the deaf girl totake it to the herd before daybreak. 

Lukashka went back alone to the cordon pondering over Olenin's action. Though he did not consider the horse a good one, yet it was worth atleast forty rubles and Lukashka was very glad to have the present. Butwhy it had been given him he could not at all understand, and thereforehe did not experience the least feeling of gratitude. On the contrary, vague suspicions that the cadet had some evil intentions filled hismind. What those intentions were he could not decide, but neither couldhe admit the idea that a stranger would give him a horse worth fortyrubles for nothing, just out of kindness; it seemed impossible. Had hebeen drunk one might understand it! He might have wished to show off. But the cadet had been sober, and therefore must have wished to bribehim to do something wrong. 'Eh, humbug!' thought Lukashka. 'Haven't Igot the horse and we'll see later on. I'm not a fool myself and weshall see who'll get the better of the other, ' he thought, feeling thenecessity of being on his guard, and therefore arousing in himselfunfriendly feelings towards Olenin. He told no one how he had got thehorse. To some he said he had bought it, to others he repliedevasively. However, the truth soon got about in the village, andLukashka's mother and Maryanka, as well as Elias Vasilich and otherCossacks, when they heard of Olenin's unnecessary gift, were perplexed, and began to be on their guard against the cadet. But despite theirfears his action aroused in them a great respect for his simplicity andwealth. 

'Have you heard, ' said one, 'that the cadet quartered on Elias Vasilichhas thrown a fifty-ruble horse at Lukashka? He's rich! . .. '

'Yes, I heard of it, ' replied another profoundly, 'he must have donehim some great service. We shall see what will come of this cadet. Eh!what luck that Snatcher has!'

'Those cadets are crafty, awfully crafty, ' said a third. 'See if hedon't go setting fire to a building, or doing something!'

Chapter XXIII

Olenin's life went on with monotonous regularity. He had littleintercourse with the commanding officers or with his equals. Theposition of a rich cadet in the Caucasus was peculiarly advantageous inthis respect. He was not sent out to work, or for training. As a rewardfor going on an expedition he was recommended for a commission, andmeanwhile he was left in peace. The officers regarded him as anaristocrat and behaved towards him with dignity. Cardplaying and theofficers' carousals accompanied by the soldier-singers, of which he hadhad experience when he was with the detachment, did not seem to himattractive, and he also avoided the society and life of the officers inthe village. The life of officers stationed in a Cossack village haslong had its own definite form. Just as every cadet or officer when ina fort regularly drinks porter, plays cards, and discusses the rewardsgiven for taking part in the expeditions, so in the Cossack villages heregularly drinks chikhir with his hosts, treats the girls tosweet-meats and honey, dangles after the Cossack women, and falls inlove, and occasionally marries there. Olenin always took his own pathand had an unconscious objection to the beaten tracks. And here, too, he did not follow the ruts of a Caucasian officer's life. 

It came quite naturally to him to wake up at daybreak. After drinkingtea and admiring from his porch the mountains, the morning, andMaryanka, he would put on a tattered ox-hide coat, sandals of soakedraw hide, buckle on a dagger, take a gun, put cigarettes and some lunchin a little bag, call his dog, and soon after five o'clock would startfor the forest beyond the village. Towards seven in the evening hewould return tired and hungry with five or six pheasants hanging fromhis belt (sometimes with some other animal) and with his bag of foodand cigarettes untouched. If the thoughts in his head had lain like thelunch and cigarettes in the bag, one might have seen that during allthose fourteen hours not a single thought had moved in it. He returnedmorally fresh, strong, and perfectly happy, and he could not tell whathe had been thinking about all the time. Were they ideas, memories, ordreams that had been flitting through his mind? They were frequentlyall three. He would rouse himself and ask what he had been thinkingabout; and would see himself as a Cossack working in a vineyard withhis Cossack wife, or an abrek in the mountains, or a boar running awayfrom himself. And all the time he kept peering and watching for apheasant, a boar, or a deer. 

In the evening Daddy Eroshka would be sure to be sitting with him. Vanyusha would bring a jug of chikhir, and they would converse quietly, drink, and separate to go quite contentedly to bed. The next day hewould again go shooting, again be healthily weary, again they would sitconversing and drink their fill, and again be happy. Sometimes on aholiday or day of rest Olenin spent the whole day at home. Then hischief occupation was watching Maryanka, whose every movement, withoutrealizing it himself, he followed greedily from his window or hisporch. He regarded Maryanka and loved her (so he thought) just as heloved the beauty of the mountains and the sky, and he had no thought ofentering into any relations with her. It seemed to him that between himand her such relations as there were between her and the CossackLukashka could not exist, and still less such as often existed betweenrich officers and other Cossack girls. It seemed to him that if hetried to do as his fellow officers did, he would exchange his completeenjoyment of contemplation for an abyss of suffering, disillusionment, and remorse. Besides, he had already achieved a triumph ofself-sacrifice in connexion with her which had given him greatpleasure, and above all he was in a way afraid of Maryanka and wouldnot for anything have ventured to utter a word of love to her lightly. 

Once during the summer, when Olenin had not gone out shooting but wassitting at home, quite unexpectedly a Moscow acquaintance, a very youngman whom he had met in society, came in. 

'Ah, mon cher, my dear fellow, how glad I was when I heard that youwere here!' he began in his Moscow French, and he went on interminglingFrench words in his remarks. 'They said, "Olenin". What Olenin? and Iwas so pleased. .. . Fancy fate bringing us together here! Well, and howare you? How? Why?' and Prince Beletski told his whole story: how hehad temporarily entered the regiment, how the Commander-in-Chief hadoffered to take him as an adjutant, and how he would take up the postafter this campaign although personally he felt quite indifferent aboutit. 

'Living here in this hole one must at least make a career--get across--or a rank--be transferred to the Guards. That is quiteindispensable, not for myself but for the sake of my relations andfriends. The prince received me very well; he is a very decent fellow, 'said Beletski, and went on unceasingly. 'I have been recommended forthe St. Anna Cross for the expedition. Now I shall stay here a bituntil we start on the campaign. It's capital here. What women! Well, and how are you getting on? I was told by our captain, Startsev youknow, a kind-hearted stupid creature. .. . Well, he said you were livinglike an awful savage, seeing no one! I quite understand you don't wantto be mixed up with the set of officers we have here. I am so glad nowyou and I will be able to see something of one another. I have put upat the Cossack corporal's house. There is such a girl there. Ustenka! Itell you she's just charming. '

And more and more French and Russian words came pouring forth from thatworld which Olenin thought he had left for ever. The general opinionabout Beletski was that he was a nice, good-natured fellow. Perhaps hereally was; but in spite of his pretty, good-natured face, Oleninthought him extremely unpleasant. He seemed just to exhale thatfilthiness which Olenin had forsworn. What vexed him most was that hecould not--had not the strength--abruptly to repulse this man who camefrom that world: as if that old world he used to belong to had anirresistible claim on him. Olenin felt angry with Beletski and withhimself, yet against his wish he introduced French phrases into his ownconversation, was interested in the Commander-in-Chief and in theirMoscow acquaintances, and because in this Cossack village he andBeletski both spoke French, he spoke contemptuously of their fellowofficers and of the Cossacks, and was friendly with Beletski, promisingto visit him and inviting him to drop in to see him. Olenin however didnot himself go to see Beletski. Vanyusha for his part approved ofBeletski, remarking that he was a real gentleman. 

Beletski at once adopted the customary life of a rich officer in aCossack village. Before Olenin's eyes, in one month he came to be likean old resident of the village; he made the old men drunk, arrangedevening parties, and himself went to parties arranged by thegirls--bragged of his conquests, and even got so far that, for someunknown reason, the women and girls began calling him grandad, and theCossacks, to whom a man who loved wine and women was clearlyunderstandable, got used to him and even liked him better than they didOlenin, who was a puzzle to them. 

Chapter XXIV

It was five in the morning. Vanyusha was in the porch heating thesamovar, and using the leg of a long boot instead of bellows. Oleninhad already ridden off to bathe in the Terek. (He had recently inventeda new amusement: to swim his horse in the river. ) His landlady was inher outhouse, and the dense smoke of the kindling fire rose from thechimney. The girl was milking the buffalo cow in the shed. 'Can't keepquiet, the damned thing!' came her impatient voice, followed by therhythmical sound of milking. 

From the street in front of the house horses' hoofs were heardclattering briskly, and Olenin, riding bareback on a handsome dark-greyhorse which was still wet and shining, rode up to the gate. Maryanka'shandsome head, tied round with a red kerchief, appeared from the shedand again disappeared. Olenin was wearing a red silk shirt, a whiteCircassian coat girdled with a strap which carried a dagger, and a tallcap. He sat his well-fed wet horse with a slightly conscious eleganceand, holding his gun at his back, stooped to open the gate. 

His hair was still wet, and his face shone with youth and health. Hethought himself handsome, agile, and like a brave; but he was mistaken. To any experienced Caucasian he was still only a soldier. 

When he noticed that the girl had put out her head he stooped withparticular

[Updater's note: a page, possibly two, appears to be missing at thispoint. ]

rested on the ground without altering their shape; how her strong armswith the sleeves rolled up, exerting the muscles, used the spade almostas if in anger, and how her deep dark eyes sometimes glanced at him. Though the delicate brows frowned, yet her eyes expressed pleasure anda knowledge of her own beauty. 

'I say, Olenin, have you been up long?' said Beletski as he entered theyard dressed in the coat of a Caucasian officer. 

'Ah, Beletski, ' replied Olenin, holding out his hand. 'How is it youare out so early?'

'I had to. I was driven out; we are having a ball tonight. Maryanka, ofcourse you'll come to Ustenka's?' he added, turning to the girl. 

Olenin felt surprised that Beletski could address this woman so easily. But Maryanka, as though she had not heard him, bent her head, andthrowing the spade across her shoulder went with her firm masculinetread towards the outhouse. 

'She's shy, the wench is shy, ' Beletski called after her. 'Shy of you, 'he added as, smiling gaily, he ran up the steps of the porch. 

'How is it you are having a ball and have been driven out?'

'It's at Ustenka's, at my landlady's, that the ball is, and you two areinvited. A ball consists of a pie and a gathering of girls. '

'What should we do there?'

Beletski smiled knowingly and winked, jerking his head in the directionof the outhouse into which Maryanka had disappeared. 

Olenin shrugged his shoulders and blushed. 

'Well, really you are a strange fellow!' said he. 

'Come now, don't pretend'

Olenin frowned, and Beletski noticing this smiled insinuatingly. 'Oh, come, what do you mean?' he said, 'living in the same house--and such afine girl, a splendid girl, a perfect beauty. '

'Wonderfully beautiful! I never saw such a woman before, ' repliedOlenin. 

'Well then?' said Beletski, quite unable to understand the situation. 

'It may be strange, ' replied Olenin, 'but why should I not say what istrue? Since I have lived here women don't seem to exist for me. And itis so good, really! Now what can there be in common between us andwomen like these? Eroshka--that's a different matter! He and I have apassion in common--sport. '

'There now! In common! And what have I in common with Amalia Ivanovna?It's the same thing! You may say they're not very clean--that's anothermatter. .. A la guerre, comme a la guerre! . .. '

'But I have never known any Amalia Ivanovas, and have never known howto behave with women of that sort, ' replied Olenin. 'One cannot respectthem, but these I do respect. '

'Well go on respecting them! Who wants to prevent you?'

Olenin did not reply. He evidently wanted to complete what he had begunto say. It was very near his heart. 

'I know I am an exception. .. ' He was visibly confused. 'But my life hasso shaped itself that I not only see no necessity to renounce my rules, but I could not live here, let alone live as happily as I am doing, were I to live as you do. Therefore I look for something quitedifferent from what you look for. '

Beletski raised his eyebrows incredulously. 'Anyhow, come to me thisevening; Maryanka will be there and I will make you acquainted. Docome, please! If you feel dull you can go away. Will you come?'

'I would come, but to speak frankly I am afraid of being' seriouslycarried away. '

'Oh, oh, oh!' shouted Beletski. 'Only come, and I'll see that youaren't. Will you? On your word?'

'I would come, but really I don't understand what we shall do; whatpart we shall play!'

'Please, I beg of you. You will come?'

'Yes, perhaps I'll come, ' said Olenin. 

'Really now! Charming women such as one sees nowhere else, and to livelike a monk! What an idea! Why spoil your life and not make use of whatis at hand? Have you heard that our company is ordered to Vozdvizhensk?'

'Hardly. I was told the 8th Company would be sent there, ' said Olenin. 

'No. I have had a letter from the adjutant there. He writes that thePrince himself will take part in the campaign. I am very glad I shallsee something of him. I'm beginning to get tired of this place. '

'I hear we shall start on a raid soon. '

'I have not heard of it; but I have heard that Krinovitsin has receivedthe Order of St. Anna for a raid. He expected a lieutenancy, ' saidBeletski laughing. 'He was let in! He has set off for headquarters. '

It was growing dusk and Olenin began thinking about the party. Theinvitation he had received worried him. He felt inclined to go, butwhat might take place there seemed strange, absurd, and even ratheralarming. He knew that neither Cossack men nor older women, nor anyonebesides the girls, were to be there. What was going to happen? How washe to behave? What would they talk about? What connexion was therebetween him and those wild Cossack girls? Beletski had told him of suchcurious, cynical, and yet rigid relations. It seemed strange to thinkthat he would be there in the same hut with Maryanka and perhaps mighthave to talk to her. It seemed to him impossible when he remembered hermajestic bearing. But Beletski spoke of it as if it were all perfectlysimple. 'Is it possible that Beletski will treat Maryanka in the sameway? That is interesting, ' thought he. 'No, better not go. It's all sohorrid, so vulgar, and above all--it leads to nothing!' But again hewas worried by the question of what would take place; and besides hefelt as if bound by a promise. He went out without having made up hismind one way or the other, but he walked as far as Beletski's, and wentin there. 

The hut in which Beletski lived was like Olenin's. It was raised nearlyfive feet from the ground on wooden piles, and had two rooms. In thefirst (which Olenin entered by the steep flight of steps) feather beds, rugs, blankets, and cushions were tastefully and handsomely arranged, Cossack fashion, along the main wall. On the side wall hung brassbasins and weapons, while on the floor, under a bench, lay watermelonsand pumpkins. In the second room there was a big brick oven, a table, and sectarian icons. It was here that Beletski was quartered, with hiscamp-bed and his pack and trunks. His weapons hung on the wall with alittle rug behind them, and on the table were his toilet appliances andsome portraits. A silk dressing-gown had been thrown on the bench. Beletski himself, clean and good-looking, lay on the bed in hisunderclothing, reading Les Trois Mousquetaires. 

He jumped up. 

'There, you see how I have arranged things. Fine! Well, it's good thatyou have come. They are working furiously. Do you know what the pie ismade of? Dough with a stuffing of pork and grapes. But that's not thepoint. You just look at the commotion out there!'

And really, on looking out of the window they saw an unusual bustlegoing on in the hut. Girls ran in and out, now for one thing and nowfor another. 

'Will it soon be ready?' cried Beletski. 

'Very soon! Why? Is Grandad hungry?' and from the hut came the sound ofringing laughter. 

Ustenka, plump, small, rosy, and pretty, with her sleeves turned up, ran into Beletski's hut to fetch some plates. 

'Get away or I shall smash the plates!' she squeaked, escaping fromBeletski. 'You'd better come and help, ' she shouted to Olenin, laughing. 'And don't forget to get some refreshments for the girls. '('Refreshments' meaning spicebread and sweets. )

'And has Maryanka come?'

'Of course! She brought some dough. '

'Do you know, ' said Beletski, 'if one were to dress Ustenka up andclean and polish her up a bit, she'd be better than all our beauties. Have you ever seen that Cossack woman who married a colonel; she wascharming! Borsheva? What dignity! Where do they get it. .. '

'I have not seen Borsheva, but I think nothing could be better than thecostume they wear here. '

'Ah, I'm first-rate at fitting into any kind of life, ' said Beletskiwith a sigh of pleasure. 'I'll go and see what they are up to. '

He threw his dressing-gown over his shoulders and ran out, shouting, 'And you look after the "refreshments". '

Olenin sent Beletski's orderly to buy spice-bread and honey; but itsuddenly seemed to him so disgusting to give money (as if he werebribing someone) that he gave no definite reply to the orderly'squestion: 'How much spice-bread with peppermint, and how much withhoney?'

'Just as you please. '

'Shall I spend all the money, ' asked the old soldier impressively. 'Thepeppermint is dearer. It's sixteen kopeks. '

'Yes, yes, spend it all, ' answered Olenin and sat down by the window, surprised that his heart was thumping as if he were preparing himselffor something serious and wicked. 

He heard screaming and shrieking in the girls' hut when Beletski wentthere, and a few moments later saw how he jumped out and ran down thesteps, accompanied by shrieks, bustle, and laughter. 

'Turned out, ' he said. 

A little later Ustenka entered and solemnly invited her visitors tocome in: announcing that all was ready. 

When they came into the room they saw that everything was really ready. Ustenka was rearranging the cushions along the wall. On the table, which was covered by a disproportionately small cloth, was a decanterof chikhir and some dried fish. The room smelt of dough and grapes. Some half dozen girls in smart tunics, with their heads not covered asusual with kerchiefs, were huddled together in a corner behind theoven, whispering, giggling, and spluttering with laughter. 

'I humbly beg you to do honour to my patron saint, ' said Ustenka, inviting her guests to the table. 

Olenin noticed Maryanka among the group of girls, who without exceptionwere all handsome, and he felt vexed and hurt that he met her in suchvulgar and awkward circumstances. He felt stupid and awkward, and madeup his mind to do what Beletski did. Beletski stepped to the tablesomewhat solemnly yet with confidence and ease, drank a glass of wineto Ustenka's health, and invited the others to do the same. Ustenkaannounced that girls don't drink. 'We might with a little honey, 'exclaimed a voice from among the group of girls. The orderly, who hadjust returned with the honey and spice-cakes, was called in. He lookedaskance (whether with envy or with contempt) at the gentlemen, who inhis opinion were on the spree; and carefully and conscientiously handedover to them a piece of honeycomb and the cakes wrapped up in a pieceof greyish paper, and began explaining circumstantially all about theprice and the change, but Beletski sent him away. Having mixed honeywith wine in the glasses, and having lavishly scattered the threepounds of spice-cakes on the table, Beletski dragged the girls fromtheir comers by force, made them sit down at the table, and begandistributing the cakes among them. Olenin involuntarily noticed howMaryanka's sunburnt but small hand closed on two round peppermint nutsand one brown one, and that she did not know what to do with them. Theconversation was halting and constrained, in spite of Ustenka's andBeletski's free and easy manner and their wish to enliven the company. Olenin faltered, and tried to think of something to say, feeling thathe was exciting curiosity and perhaps provoking ridicule and infectingthe others with his shyness. He blushed, and it seemed to him thatMaryanka in particular was feeling uncomfortable. 'Most likely they areexpecting us to give them some money, ' thought he. 'How are we to doit? And how can we manage quickest to give it and get away?'

Chapter XXV

'How is it you don't know your own lodger?' said Beletski, addressingMaryanka. 

'How is one to know him if he never comes to see us?' answeredMaryanka, with a look at Olenin. 

Olenin felt frightened, he did not know of what. He flushed and, hardlyknowing what he was saying, remarked: 'I'm afraid of your mother. Shegave me such a scolding the first time I went in. '

Maryanka burst out laughing. 'And so you were frightened?' she said, and glanced at him and turned away. 

It was the first time Olenin had seen the whole of her beautiful face. Till then he had seen her with her kerchief covering her to the eyes. It was not for nothing that she was reckoned the beauty of the village. Ustenka was a pretty girl, small, plump, rosy, with merry brown eyes, and red lips which were perpetually smiling and chattering. Maryanka onthe contrary was certainly not pretty but beautiful. Her features mighthave been considered too masculine and almost harsh had it not been forher tall stately figure, her powerful chest and shoulders, andespecially the severe yet tender expression of her long dark eyes whichwere darkly shadowed beneath their black brows, and for the gentleexpression of her mouth and smile. She rarely smiled, but her smile wasalways striking. She seemed to radiate virginal strength and health. All the girls were good-looking, but they themselves and Beletski, andthe orderly when he brought in the spice-cakes, all involuntarily gazedat Maryanka, and anyone addressing the girls was sure to address her. She seemed a proud and happy queen among them. 

Beletski, trying to keep up the spirit of the party, chatteredincessantly, made the girls hand round chikhir, fooled about with them, and kept making improper remarks in French about Maryanka's beauty toOlenin, calling her 'yours' (la votre), and advising him to behave ashe did himself. Olenin felt more and more uncomfortable. He wasdevising an excuse to get out and run away when Beletski announced thatUstenka, whose saint's day it was, must offer chikhir to everybody witha kiss. She consented on condition that they should put money on herplate, as is the custom at weddings. 

'What fiend brought me to this disgusting feast?' thought Olenin, rising to go away. 

'Where are you off to?'

'I'll fetch some tobacco, ' he said, meaning to escape, but Beletskiseized his hand. 

'I have some money, ' he said to him in French. 

'One can't go away, one has to pay here, ' thought Olenin bitterly, vexed at his own awkwardness. 'Can't I really behave like Beletski? Iought not to have come, but once I am here I must not spoil their fun. I must drink like a Cossack, ' and taking the wooden bowl (holding abouteight tumblers) he almost filled it with chikhir and drank it almostall. The girls looked at him, surprised and almost frightened, as hedrank. It seemed to them strange and not right. Ustenka brought themanother glass each, and kissed them both. 'There girls, now we'll havesome fun, ' she said, clinking on the plate the four rubles the men hadput there. 

Olenin no longer felt awkward, but became talkative. 

'Now, Maryanka, it's your turn to offer us wine and a kiss, ' saidBeletski, seizing her hand. 

'Yes, I'll give you such a kiss!' she said playfully, preparing tostrike at him. 

'One can kiss Grandad without payment, ' said another girl. 

'There's a sensible girl, ' said Beletski, kissing the struggling girl. 'No, you must offer it, ' he insisted, addressing Maryanka. 'Offer aglass to your lodger. '

And taking her by the hand he led her to the bench and sat her downbeside Olenin. 

'What a beauty, ' he said, turning her head to see it in profile. 

Maryanka did not resist but proudly smiling turned her long eyestowards Olenin. 

'A beautiful girl, ' repeated Beletski. 

'Yes, see what a beauty I am, ' Maryanka's look seemed to endorse. Without considering what he was doing Olenin embraced Maryanka and wasgoing to kiss her, but she suddenly extricated herself, upsettingBeletski and pushing the top off the table, and sprang away towards theoven. There was much shouting and laughter. Then Beletski whisperedsomething to the girls and suddenly they all ran out into the passageand locked the door behind them. 

'Why did you kiss Beletski and won't kiss me?' asked Olenin. 

'Oh, just so. I don't want to, that's all!' she answered, pouting andfrowning. 'He's Grandad, ' she added with a smile. She went to the doorand began to bang at it. 'Why have you locked the door, you devils?'

'Well, let them be there and us here, ' said Olenin, drawing closer toher. 

She frowned, and sternly pushed him away with her hand. And again sheappeared so majestically handsome to Olenin that he came to his sensesand felt ashamed of what he was doing. He went to the door and beganpulling at it himself. 

 'Beletski! Open the door! What a stupid joke!'

Maryanka again gave a bright happy laugh. 'Ah, you're afraid of me?'she said. 

'Yes, you know you're as cross as your mother. '

'Spend more of your time with Eroshka; that will make the girls loveyou!' And she smiled, looking straight and close into his eyes. 

He did not know what to reply. 'And if I were to come to see you--' helet fall. 

'That would be a different matter, ' she replied, tossing her head. 

At that moment Beletski pushed the door open, and Maryanka sprang awayfrom Olenin and in doing so her thigh struck his leg. 

'It's all nonsense what I have been thinking about--love andself-sacrifice and Lukashka. Happiness is the one thing. He who ishappy is right, ' flashed through Olenin's mind, and with a strengthunexpected to himself he seized and kissed the beautiful Maryanka onher temple and her cheek. Maryanka was not angry, but only burst into aloud laugh and ran out to the other girls. 

That was the end of the party. Ustenka's mother, returned from herwork, gave all the girls a scolding, and turned them all out. 

Chapter XXVI

'Yes, ' thought Olenin, as he walked home. 'I need only slacken thereins a bit and I might fall desperately in love with this Cossackgirl. ' He went to bed with these thoughts, but expected it all to blowover and that he would continue to live as before. 

But the old life did not return. His relations to Maryanka werechanged. The wall that had separated them was broken down. Olenin nowgreeted her every time they met. 

The master of the house having returned to collect the rent, on hearingof Olenin's wealth and generosity invited him to his hut. The old womanreceived him kindly, and from the day of the party onwards Olenin oftenwent in of an evening and sat with them till late at night. He seemedto be living in the village just as he used to, but within himeverything had changed. He spent his days in the forest, and towardseight o'clock, when it began to grow dusk, he would go to see hishosts, alone or with Daddy Eroshka. They grew so used to him that theywere surprised when he stayed away. He paid well for his wine and was aquiet fellow. Vanyusha would bring him his tea and he would sit down ina comer near the oven. The old woman did not mind him but went on withher work, and over their tea or their chikhir they talked about Cossackaffairs, about the neighbours, or about Russia: Olenin relating and theothers inquiring. Sometimes he brought a book and read to himself. Maryanka crouched like a wild goat with her feet drawn up under her, sometimes on the top of the oven, sometimes in a dark comer. She didnot take part in the conversations, but Olenin saw her eyes and faceand heard her moving or cracking sunflower seeds, and he felt that shelistened with her whole being when he spoke, and was aware of hispresence while he silently read to himself. Sometimes he thought hereyes were fixed on him, and meeting their radiance he involuntarilybecame silent and gazed at her. Then she would instantly hide her faceand he would pretend to be deep in conversation with the old woman, while he listened all the time to her breathing and to her everymovement and waited for her to look at him again. In the presence ofothers she was generally bright and friendly with him, but when theywere alone together she was shy and rough. Sometimes he came in beforeMaryanka had returned home. Suddenly he would hear her firm footstepsand catch a glimmer of her blue cotton smock at the open door. Then shewould step into the middle of the hut, catch sight of him, and her eyeswould give a scarcely perceptible kindly smile, and he would feel happyand frightened. 

He neither sought for nor wished for anything from her, but every dayher presence became more and more necessary to him. 

Olenin had entered into the life of the Cossack village so fully thathis past seemed quite foreign to him. As to the future, especially afuture outside the world in which he was now living, it did notinterest him at all. When he received letters from home, from relativesand friends, he was offended by the evident distress with which theyregarded him as a lost man, while he in his village considered those aslost who did not live as he was living. He felt sure he would neverrepent of having broken away from his former surroundings and of havingsettled down in this village to such a solitary and original life. Whenout on expeditions, and when quartered at one of the forts, he felthappy too; but it was here, from under Daddy Eroshka's wing, from theforest and from his hut at the end of the village, and especially whenhe thought of Maryanka and Lukashka, that he seemed to see thefalseness of his former life. That falseness used to rouse hisindignation even before, but now it seemed inexpressibly vile andridiculous. Here he felt freer and freer every day and more and more ofa man. The Caucasus now appeared entirely different to what hisimagination had painted it. He had found nothing at all like hisdreams, nor like the descriptions of the Caucasus he had heard andread. 'There are none of all those chestnut steeds, precipices, AmaletBeks, heroes or villains, ' thought he. 'The people live as naturelives: they die, are born, unite, and more are born--they fight, eatand drink, rejoice and die, without any restrictions but those thatnature imposes on sun and grass, on animal and tree. They have no otherlaws. ' Therefore these people, compared to himself, appeared to himbeautiful, strong, and free, and the sight of them made him feelashamed and sorry for himself. Often it seriously occurred to him tothrow up everything, to get registered as a Cossack, to buy a hut andcattle and marry a Cossack woman (only not Maryanka, whom he concededto Lukashka), and to live with Daddy Eroshka and go shooting andfishing with him, and go with the Cossacks on their expeditions. 'Whyever don't I do it? What am I waiting for?' he asked himself, and heegged himself on and shamed himself. 'Am I afraid of doing what I holdto be reasonable and right? Is the wish to be a simple Cossack, to liveclose to nature, not to injure anyone but even to do good to others, more stupid than my former dreams, such as those of becoming a ministerof state or a colonel?' but a voice seemed to say that he should wait, and not take any decision. He was held back by a dim consciousness thathe could not live altogether like Eroshka and Lukashka because he had adifferent idea of happiness--he was held back by the thought thathappiness lies in self-sacrifice. What he had done for Lukashkacontinued to give him joy. He kept looking for occasions to sacrificehimself for others, but did not meet with them. Sometimes he forgotthis newly discovered recipe for happiness and considered himselfcapable of identifying his life with Daddy Eroshka's, but then hequickly bethought himself and promptly clutched at the idea ofconscious self-sacrifice, and from that basis looked calmly and proudlyat all men and at their happiness. 

Chapter XXVII

Just before the vintage Lukashka came on horseback to see Olenin. Helooked more dashing than ever. 'Well? Are you getting married?' askedOlenin, greeting him merrily. 

Lukashka gave no direct reply. 

'There, I've exchanged your horse across the river. This is a horse! AKabarda horse from the Lov stud. I know horses. '

They examined the new horse and made him caracole about the yard. Thehorse really was an exceptionally fine one, a broad and long gelding, with glossy coat, thick silky tail, and the soft fine mane and crest ofa thoroughbred. He was so well fed that 'you might go to sleep on hisback' as Lukashka expressed it. His hoofs, eyes, teeth, wereexquisitely shaped and sharply outlined, as one only finds them in verypure-bred horses. Olenin could not help admiring the horse, he had notyet met with such a beauty in the Caucasus. 

'And how it goes!' said Lukashka, patting its neck. 'What a step! Andso clever--he simply runs after his master. '

'Did you have to add much to make the exchange?' asked Olenin. 

'I did not count it, ' answered Lukashka with a smile. 'I got him from akunak. '

'A wonderfully beautiful horse! What would you take for it?' askedOlenin. 

'I have been offered a hundred and fifty rubles for it, but I'll giveit you for nothing, ' said Lukashka, merrily. 'Only say the word andit's yours. I'll unsaddle it and you may take it. Only give me somesort of a horse for my duties. '

'No, on no account. '

'Well then, here is a dagger I've brought you, ' said Lukashka, unfastening his girdle and taking out one of the two daggers which hungfrom it. 'I got it from across the river. '

'Oh, thank you!'

'And mother has promised to bring you some grapes herself. '

'That's quite unnecessary. We'll balance up some day. You see I don'toffer you any money for the dagger!'

'How could you? We are kunaks. It's just the same as when Girey Khanacross the river took me into his home and said, "Choose what you like!" So I took this sword. It's our custom. '

They went into the hut and had a drink. 

'Are you staying here awhile?' asked Olenin. 

'No, I have come to say good-bye. They are sending me from the cordonto a company beyond the Terek. I am going to-night with my comradeNazarka. '

'And when is the wedding to be?'

'I shall be coming back for the betrothal, and then I shall return tothe company again, ' Lukashka replied reluctantly. 

'What, and see nothing of your betrothed?'

'Just so--what is the good of looking at her? When you go on campaignask in our company for Lukashka the Broad. But what a lot of boarsthere are in our parts! I've killed two. I'll take you. ' 'Well, good-bye! Christ save you. '

Lukashka mounted his horse, and without calling on Maryanka, rodecaracoling down the street, where Nazarka was already awaiting him. 

'I say, shan't we call round?' asked Nazarka, winking in the directionof Yamka's house. 

'That's a good one!' said Lukashka. 'Here, take my horse to her and ifI don't come soon give him some hay. I shall reach the company by themorning anyway. '

'Hasn't the cadet given you anything more?'

'I am thankful to have paid him back with a dagger--he was going to askfor the horse, ' said Lukashka, dismounting and handing over the horseto Nazarka. 

He darted into the yard past Olenin's very window, and came up to thewindow of the cornet's hut. It was already quite dark. Maryanka, wearing only her smock, was combing her hair preparing for bed. 

'It's I--' whispered the Cossack. 

Maryanka's look was severely indifferent, but her face suddenlybrightened up when she heard her name. She opened the window and leantout, frightened and joyous. 

'What--what do you want?' she said. 

'Open!' uttered Lukashka. 'Let me in for a minute. I am so sick ofwaiting! It's awful!'

He took hold of her head through the window and kissed her. 

'Really, do open!'

'Why do you talk nonsense? I've told you I won't! Have you come forlong?'

He did not answer but went on kissing her, and she did not ask again. 

'There, through the window one can't even hug you properly, ' saidLukashka. 

'Maryanka dear!' came the voice of her mother, 'who is that with you?'

Lukashka took off his cap, which might have been seen, and croucheddown by the window. 

'Go, be quick!' whispered Maryanka. 

'Lukashka called round, ' she answered; 'he was asking for Daddy. '

'Well then send him here!'

'He's gone; said he was in a hurry. '

In fact, Lukashka, stooping, as with big strides he passed under thewindows, ran out through the yard and towards Yamka's house unseen byanyone but Olenin. After drinking two bowls of chikhir he and Nazarkarode away to the outpost. The night was warm, dark, and calm. They rodein silence, only the footfall of their horses was heard. Lukashkastarted a song about the Cossack, Mingal, but stopped before he hadfinished the first verse, and after a pause, turning to Nazarka, said:

'I say, she wouldn't let me in!'

'Oh?' rejoined Nazarka. 'I knew she wouldn't. D'you know what Yamkatold me? The cadet has begun going to their house. Daddy Eroshka bragsthat he got a gun from the cadet for getting him Maryanka. '

'He lies, the old devil!' said Lukashka, angrily. 'She's not such agirl. If he does not look out I'll wallop that old devil's sides, ' andhe began his favourite song:

'From the village of Izmaylov, From the master's favourite garden, Once escaped a keen-eyed falcon. Soon after him a huntsman came a-riding, And he beckoned to the falcon that had strayed, But the bright-eyed bird thus answered: "In gold cage you could not keep me, On your hand you could not hold me, So now I fly to blue seas far away. There a white swan I will kill, Of sweet swan-flesh have my fill. "'

Chapter XXVIII

The bethrothal was taking place in the cornet's hut. Lukashka hadreturned to the village, but had not been to see Olenin, and Olenin hadnot gone to the betrothal though he had been invited. He was sad as hehad never been since he settled in this Cossack village. He had seenLukashka earlier in the evening and was worried by the question whyLukashka was so cold towards him. Olenin shut himself up in his hut andbegan writing in his diary as follows:

'Many things have I pondered over lately and much have I changed, 'wrote he, 'and I have come back to the copybook maxim: The one way tobe happy is to love, to love self-denyingly, to love everybody andeverything; to spread a web of love on all sides and to take all whocome into it. In this way I caught Vanyusha, Daddy Eroshka, Lukashka, and Maryanka. '

As Olenin was finishing this sentence Daddy Eroshka entered the room. 

Eroshka was in the happiest frame of mind. A few evenings before this, Olenin had gone to see him and had found him with a proud and happyface deftly skinning the carcass of a boar with a small knife in theyard. The dogs (Lyam his pet among them) were lying close by watchingwhat he was doing and gently wagging their tails. The little boys wererespectfully looking at him through the fence and not even teasing himas was their wont. His women neighbours, who were as a rule not toogracious towards him, greeted him and brought him, one a jug ofchikhir, another some clotted cream, and a third a little flour. Thenext day Eroshka sat in his store-room all covered with blood, anddistributed pounds of boar-flesh, taking in payment money from some andwine from others. His face clearly expressed, 'God has sent me luck. Ihave killed a boar, so now I am wanted. ' Consequently, he naturallybegan to drink, and had gone on for four days never leaving thevillage. Besides which he had had something to drink at the betrothal. 

He came to Olenin quite drunk: his face red, his beard tangled, butwearing a new beshmet trimmed with gold braid; and he brought with hima balalayka which he had obtained beyond the river. He had longpromised Olenin this treat, and felt in the mood for it, so that he wassorry to find Olenin writing. 

'Write on, write on, my lad, ' he whispered, as if he thought that aspirit sat between him and the paper and must not be frightened away, and he softly and silently sat down on the floor. When Daddy Eroshkawas drunk his favourite position was on the floor. Olenin looked round, ordered some wine to be brought, and continued to write. Eroshka foundit dull to drink by himself and he wished to talk. 

'I've been to the betrothal at the cornet's. But there! They'reshwine!--Don't want them!--Have come to you. '

'And where did you get your balalayka asked Olenin, still writing. 

'I've been beyond the river and got it there, brother mine, ' heanswered, also very quietly. 'I'm a master at it. Tartar or Cossack, squire or soldiers' songs, any kind you please. '

Olenin looked at him again, smiled, and went on writing. 

That smile emboldened the old man. 

'Come, leave off, my lad, leave off!' he said with sudden firmness. 

'Well, perhaps I will. '

'Come, people have injured you but leave them alone, spit at them!Come, what's the use of writing and writing, what's the good?'

And he tried to mimic Olenin by tapping the floor with his thickfingers, and then twisted his big face to express contempt. 

'What's the good of writing quibbles. Better have a spree and showyou're a man!'

No other conception of writing found place in his head except that oflegal chicanery. 

Olenin burst out laughing and so did Eroshka. Then, jumping up from thefloor, the latter began to show off his skill on the balalayka and tosing Tartar songs. 

'Why write, my good fellow! You'd better listen to what I'll sing toyou. When you're dead you won't hear any more songs. Make merry now!'

First he sang a song of his own composing accompanied by a dance:

'Ah, dee, dee, dee, dee, dee, dim, Say where did they last see him? Ina booth, at the fair, He was selling pins, there. '

Then he sang a song he had learnt from his former sergeant-major:

'Deep I fell in love on Monday, Tuesday nothing did but sigh, WednesdayI popped the question, Thursday waited her reply. Friday, late, it cameat last, Then all hope for me was past! Saturday my life to take Idetermined like a man, But for my salvation's sake Sunday morningchanged my plan!'

Then he sang again:

'Oh dee, dee, dee, dee, dee, dim, Say where did they last see him?'

And after that, winking, twitching his shoulders, and footing it to thetune, he sang:

'I will kiss you and embrace, Ribbons red twine round you; And I'llcall you little Grace. Oh, you little Grace now do Tell me, do you loveme true?'

And he became so excited that with a sudden dashing movement he starteddancing around the room accompanying himself the while. 

Songs like 'Dee, dee, dee'--'gentlemen's songs'--he sang for Olenin'sbenefit, but after drinking three more tumblers of chikhir heremembered old times and began singing real Cossack and Tartar songs. In the midst of one of his favourite songs his voice suddenly trembledand he ceased singing, and only continued strumming on the balalayka. 

'Oh, my dear friend!' he said. 

The peculiar sound of his voice made Olenin look round. 

The old man was weeping. Tears stood in his eyes and one tear wasrunning down his cheek. 

'You are gone, my young days, and will never come back!' he said, blubbering and halting. 'Drink, why don't you drink!' he suddenlyshouted with a deafening roar, without wiping away his tears. 

There was one Tartar song that specially moved him. It had few words, but its charm lay in the sad refrain. 'Ay day, dalalay!' Eroshkatranslated the words of the song: 'A youth drove his sheep from theaoul to the mountains: the Russians came and burnt the aoul, theykilled all the men and took all the women into bondage. The youthreturned from the mountains. Where the aoul had stood was an emptyspace; his mother not there, nor his brothers, nor his house; one treealone was left standing. The youth sat beneath the tree and wept. "Alone like thee, alone am I left, '" and Eroshka began singing: 'Ayday, dalalay!' and the old man repeated several times this wailing, heart-rending refrain. 

When he had finished the refrain Eroshka suddenly seized a gun thathung on the wall, rushed hurriedly out into the yard and fired off bothbarrels into the air. Then again he began, more dolefully, his 'Ay day, dalalay--ah, ah, ' and ceased. 

Olenin followed him into the porch and looked up into the starry sky inthe direction where the shots had flashed. In the cornet's house therewere lights and the sound of voices. In the yard girls were crowdinground the porch and the windows, and running backwards and forwardsbetween the hut and the outhouse. Some Cossacks rushed out of the hutand could not refrain from shouting, re-echoing the refrain of DaddyEroshka's song and his shots. 

'Why are you not at the betrothal?' asked Olenin. 

'Never mind them! Never mind them!' muttered the old man, who hadevidently been offended by something there. 'Don't like them, I don't. Oh, those people! Come back into the hut! Let them make merry bythemselves and we'll make merry by ourselves. '

Olenin went in. 

'And Lukashka, is he happy? Won't he come to see me?' he asked. 

'What, Lukashka? They've lied to him and said I am getting his girl foryou, ' whispered the old man. 'But what's the girl? She will be ours ifwe want her. Give enough money--and she's ours. I'll fix it up for you. Really!'

'No, Daddy, money can do nothing if she does not love me. You'd betternot talk like that!'

'We are not loved, you and I. We are forlorn, ' said Daddy Eroshkasuddenly, and again he began to cry. 

Listening to the old man's talk Olenin had drunk more than usual. 'Sonow my Lukashka is happy, ' thought he; yet he felt sad. The old man haddrunk so much that evening that he fell down on the floor and Vanyushahad to call soldiers in to help, and spat as they dragged the old manout. He was so angry with the old man for his bad behaviour that he didnot even say a single French word. 

Chapter XXIX

It was August. For days the sky had been cloudless, the sun scorchedunbearably and from early morning the warm wind raised a whirl of hotsand from the sand-drifts and from the road, and bore it in the airthrough the reeds, the trees, and the village. The grass and the leaveson the trees were covered with dust, the roads and dried-up saltmarshes were baked so hard that they rang when trodden on. The waterhad long since subsided in the Terek and rapidly vanished and dried upin the ditches. The slimy banks of the pond near the village weretrodden bare by the cattle and all day long you could hear thesplashing of water and the shouting of girls and boys bathing. Thesand-drifts and the reeds were already drying up in the steppes, andthe cattle, lowing, ran into the fields in the day-time. The boarsmigrated into the distant reed-beds and to the hills beyond the Terek. Mosquitoes and gnats swarmed in thick clouds over the low lands andvillages. The snow-peaks were hidden in grey mist. The air was rarefiedand smoky. It was said that abreks had crossed the now shallow riverand were prowling on this side of it. Every night the sun set in aglowing red blaze. It was the busiest time of the year. The villagersall swarmed in the melon-fields and the vineyards. The vineyardsthickly overgrown with twining verdure lay in cool, deep shade. Everywhere between the broad translucent leaves, ripe, heavy, blackclusters peeped out. Along the dusty road from the vineyards thecreaking carts moved slowly, heaped up with black grapes. Clusters ofthem, crushed by the wheels, lay in the dirt. Boys and girls in smocksstained with grape-juice, with grapes in their hands and mouths, ranafter their mothers. On the road you continually came across tatteredlabourers with baskets of grapes on their powerful shoulders; Cossackmaidens, veiled with kerchiefs to their eyes, drove bullocks harnessedto carts laden high with grapes. Soldiers who happened to meet thesecarts asked for grapes, and the maidens, clambering up without stoppingtheir carts, would take an armful of grapes and drop them into theskirts of the soldiers' coats. In some homesteads they had alreadybegun pressing the grapes; and the smell of the emptied skins filledthe air. One saw the blood-red troughs in the pent-houses in the yardsand Nogay labourers with their trousers rolled up and their legsstained with the juice. Grunting pigs gorged themselves with the emptyskins and rolled about in them. The flat roofs of the outhouses wereall spread over with the dark amber clusters drying in the sun. Dawsand magpies crowded round the roofs, picking the seeds and flutteringfrom one place to another. 

The fruits of the year's labour were being merrily gathered in, andthis year the fruit was unusually fine and plentiful. 

In the shady green vineyards amid a sea of vines, laughter, songs, merriment, and the voices of women were to be heard on all sides, andglimpses of their bright-coloured garments could be seen. 

Just at noon Maryanka was sitting in their vineyard in the shade of apeach-tree, getting out the family dinner from under an unharnessedcart. Opposite her, on a spread-out horse-cloth, sat the cornet (whohad returned from the school) washing his hands by pouring water onthem from a little jug. Her little brother, who had just come straightout of the pond, stood wiping his face with his wide sleeves, and gazedanxiously at his sister and his mother and breathed deeply, awaitinghis dinner. The old mother, with her sleeves rolled up over her strongsunburnt arms, was arranging grapes, dried fish, and clotted cream on alittle low, circular Tartar table. The cornet wiped his hands, took offhis cap, crossed himself, and moved nearer to the table. The boy seizedthe jug and eagerly began to drink. The mother and daughter crossedtheir legs under them and sat down by the table. Even in the shade itwas intolerably hot. The air above the vineyard smelt unpleasant: thestrong warm wind passing amid the branches brought no coolness, butonly monotonously bent the tops of the pear, peach, and mulberry treeswith which the vineyard was sprinkled. The cornet, [Updater's note: one, possibly two, pages appear to be missing at thispoint. ]

she felt unbearably hot. Her face was burning, and she did not knowwhere to put her feet, her eyes were moist with sleepiness andweariness, her lips parted involuntarily, and her chest heaved heavilyand deeply. 

The busy time of year had begun a fortnight ago and the continuousheavy labour had filled the girl's life. At dawn she jumped up, washedher face with cold water, wrapped herself in a shawl, and ran outbarefoot to see to the cattle. Then she hurriedly put on her shoes andher beshmet and, taking a small bundle of bread, she harnessed thebullocks and drove away to the vineyards for the whole day. There shecut the grapes and carried the baskets with only an hour's interval forrest, and in the evening she returned to the village, bright and nottired, dragging the bullocks by a rope or driving them with a longstick. After attending to the cattle, she took some sunflower seeds inthe wide sleeve of her smock and went to the corner of the street tocrack them and have some fun with the other girls. But as soon as itwas dusk she returned home, and after having supper with her parentsand her brother in the dark outhouse, she went into the hut, healthyand free from care, and climbed onto the oven, where half drowsing shelistened to their lodger's conversation. As soon as he went away shewould throw herself down on her bed and sleep soundly and quietly tillmorning. And so it went on day after day. She had not seen Lukashkasince the day of their betrothal, but calmly awaited the wedding. Shehad got used to their lodger and felt his intent looks with pleasure. 

Chapter XXX

Although there was no escape from the heat and the mosquitoes swarmedin the cool shadow of the wagons, and her little brother tossing aboutbeside her kept pushing her, Maryanka having drawn her kerchief overher head was just falling asleep, when suddenly their neighbour Ustenkacame running towards her and, diving under the wagon, lay down besideher. 

'Sleep, girls, sleep!' said Ustenka, making herself comfortable underthe wagon. 'Wait a bit, ' she exclaimed, 'this won't do!'

She jumped up, plucked some green branches, and stuck them through thewheels on both sides of the wagon and hung her beshmet over them. 

'Let me in, ' she shouted to the little boy as she again crept under thewagon. 'Is this the place for a Cossack--with the girls? Go away!'

When alone under the wagon with her friend, Ustenka suddenly put bothher arms round her, and clinging close to her began kissing her cheeksand neck. 

'Darling, sweetheart, ' she kept repeating, between bursts of shrill, clear laughter. 

'Why, you've learnt it from Grandad, ' said Maryanka, struggling. 'Stopit!'

And they both broke into such peals of laughter that Maryanka's mothershouted to them to be quiet. 

'Are you jealous?' asked Ustenka in a whisper. 

'What humbug! Let me sleep. What have you come for?'

But Ustenka kept on, 'I say! But I wanted to tell you such a thing. '

Maryanka raised herself on her elbow and arranged the kerchief whichhad slipped off. 

'Well, what is it?'

'I know something about your lodger!'

'There's nothing to know, ' said Maryanka. 

'Oh, you rogue of a girl!' said Ustenka, nudging her with her elbow andlaughing. 'Won't tell anything. Does he come to you?'

'He does. What of that?' said Maryanka with a sudden blush. 

'Now I'm a simple lass. I tell everybody. Why should I pretend?' saidUstenka, and her bright rosy face suddenly became pensive. 'Whom do Ihurt? I love him, that's all about it. '

'Grandad, do you mean?'

'Well, yes!'

'And the sin?'

'Ah, Maryanka! When is one to have a good time if not while one's stillfree? When I marry a Cossack I shall bear children and shall havecares. There now, when you get married to Lukashka not even a thoughtof joy will enter your head: children will come, and work!'

'Well? Some who are married live happily. It makes no difference!'Maryanka replied quietly. 

'Do tell me just this once what has passed between you and Lukishka?'

'What has passed? A match was proposed. Father put it off for a year, but now it's been settled and they'll marry us in autumn. '

'But what did he say to you?' Maryanka smiled. 

'What should he say? He said he loved me. He kept asking me to come tothe vineyards with him. '

'Just see what pitch! But you didn't go, did you? And what a dare-devilhe has become: the first among the braves. He makes merry out there inthe army too! The other day our Kirka came home; he says: "What a horseLukashka's got in exchange!" But all the same I expect he frets afteryou. And what else did he say?'

'Must you know everything?' said Maryanka laughing. 'One night he cameto my window tipsy, and asked me to let him in. ' 'And you didn't lethim?'

'Let him, indeed! Once I have said a thing I keep to it firm as arock, ' answered Maryanka seriously. 

'A fine fellow! If he wanted her, no girl would refuse him. '

'Well, let him go to the others, ' replied Maryanka proudly. 

'You don't pity him?'

'I do pity him, but I'll have no nonsense. It is wrong. ' Ustenkasuddenly dropped her head on her friend's breast, seized hold of her, and shook with smothered laughter. 'You silly fool!' she exclaimed, quite out of breath. 'You don't want to be happy, ' and she begantickling Maryanka. 'Oh, leave off!' said Maryanka, screaming andlaughing. 'You've crushed Lazutka. '

'Hark at those young devils! Quite frisky! Not tired yet!' came the oldwoman's sleepy voice from the wagon. 

'Don't want happiness, ' repeated Ustenka in a whisper, insistently. 'But you are lucky, that you are! How they love you! You are so crusty, and yet they love you. Ah, if I were in your place I'd soon turn thelodger's head! I noticed him when you were at our house. He was readyto eat you with his eyes. What things Grandad has given me! And yoursthey say is the richest of the Russians. His orderly says they haveserfs of their own. '

Maryanka raised herself, and after thinking a moment, smiled. 

'Do you know what he once told me: the lodger I mean?' she said, bitinga bit of grass. 'He said, "I'd like to be Lukashka the Cossack, or yourbrother Lazutka--. " What do you think he meant?'

'Oh, just chattering what came into his head, ' answered Ustenka. 'Whatdoes mine not say! Just as if he was possessed!'

Maryanka dropped her hand on her folded beshmet, threw her arm overUstenka's shoulder, and shut her eyes. 

'He wanted to come and work in the vineyard to-day: father invitedhim, ' she said, and after a short silence she fell asleep. 

Chapter XXXI

The sun had come out from behind the pear-tree that had shaded thewagon, and even through the branches that Ustenka had fixed up itscorched the faces of the sleeping girls. Maryanka woke up and beganarranging the kerchief on her head. Looking about her, beyond thepear-tree she noticed their lodger, who with his gun on his shoulderstood talking to her father. She nudged Ustenka and smilingly pointedhim out to her. 

'I went yesterday and didn't find a single one, ' Olenin was saying ashe looked about uneasily, not seeing Maryanka through the branches. 

'Ah, you should go out there in that direction, go right as bycompasses, there in a disused vineyard denominated as the Waste, haresare always to be found, ' said the cornet, having at once changed hismanner of speech. 

'A fine thing to go looking for hares in these busy times! You hadbetter come and help us, and do some work with the girls, ' the oldwoman said merrily. 'Now then, girls, up with you!' she cried. 

Maryanka and Ustenka under the cart were whispering and could hardlyrestrain their laughter. 

Since it had become known that Olenin had given a horse worth fiftyrubles to Lukashka, his hosts had become more amiable and the cornet inparticular saw with pleasure his daughter's growing intimacy withOlenin. 'But I don't know how to do the work, ' replied Olenin, tryingnot to look through the green branches under the wagon where he had nownoticed Maryanka's blue smock and red kerchief. 

'Come, I'll give you some peaches, ' said the old woman. 

'It's only according to the ancient Cossack hospitality. It's her oldwoman's silliness, ' said the cornet, explaining and apparentlycorrecting his wife's words. 'In Russia, I expect, it's not so muchpeaches as pineapple jam and preserves you have been accustomed to eatat your pleasure. '

'So you say hares are to be found in the disused vineyard?' askedOlenin. 'I will go there, ' and throwing a hasty glance through thegreen branches he raised his cap and disappeared between the regularrows of green vines. 

The sun had already sunk behind the fence of the vineyards, and itsbroken rays glittered through the translucent leaves when Oleninreturned to his host's vineyard. The wind was falling and a coolfreshness was beginning to spread around. By some instinct Oleninrecognized from afar Maryanka's blue smock among the rows of vine, and, picking grapes on his way, he approached her. His highly excited dogalso now and then seized a low-hanging cluster of grapes in hisslobbering mouth. Maryanka, her face flushed, her sleeves rolled up, and her kerchief down below her chin, was rapidly cutting the heavyclusters and laying them in a basket. Without letting go of the vineshe had hold of, she stopped to smile pleasantly at him and resumed herwork. Olenin drew near and threw his gun behind his back to have hishands free. 'Where are your people? May God aid you! Are you alone?' hemeant to say but did not say, and only raised his cap in silence. 

He was ill at ease alone with Maryanka, but as if purposely to tormenthimself he went up to her. 

'You'll be shooting the women with your gun like that, ' said Maryanka. 

'No, I shan't shoot them. '

They were both silent. 

Then after a pause she said: 'You should help me. '

He took out his knife and began silently to cut off the clusters. Hereached from under the leaves low down a thick bunch weighing aboutthree pounds, the grapes of which grew so close that they flattenedeach other for want of space. He showed it to Maryanka. 

'Must they all be cut? Isn't this one too green?'

'Give it here. '

Their hands touched. Olenin took her hand, and she looked at himsmiling. 

'Are you going to be married soon?' he asked. 

She did not answer, but turned away with a stern look. 

'Do you love Lukashka?'

'What's that to you?'

'I envy him!'

'Very likely!' 'No really. You are so beautiful!'

And he suddenly felt terribly ashamed of having said it, so commonplacedid the words seem to him. He flushed, lost control of himself, andseized both her hands. 

'Whatever I am, I'm not for you. Why do you make fun of me?' repliedMaryanka, but her look showed how certainly she knew he was not makingfun. 

'Making fun? If you only knew how I--'

The words sounded still more commonplace, they accorded still less withwhat he felt, but yet he continued, 'I don't know what I would not dofor you--'

'Leave me alone, you pitch!'

But her face, her shining eyes, her swelling bosom, her shapely legs, said something quite different. It seemed to him that she understoodhow petty were all things he had said, but that she was superior tosuch considerations. It seemed to him she had long known all he wishedand was not able to tell her, but wanted to hear how he would say it. 'And how can she help knowing, ' he thought, 'since I only want to tellher all that she herself is? But she does not wish to under-stand, doesnot wish to reply. '

'Hallo!' suddenly came Ustenka's high voice from behind the vine at nogreat distance, followed by her shrill laugh. 'Come and help me, DmitriAndreich. I am all alone, ' she cried, thrusting her round, naive littleface through the vines. 

Olenin did not answer nor move from his place. 

Maryanka went on cutting and continually looked up at Olenin. He wasabout to say something, but stopped, shrugged his shoulders and, havingjerked up his gun, walked out of the vineyard with rapid strides. 

Chapter XXXII

He stopped once or twice, listening to the ringing laughter of Maryankaand Ustenka who, having come together, were shouting something. Oleninspent the whole evening hunting in the forest and returned home at duskwithout having killed anything. When crossing the road he noticed heropen the door of the outhouse, and her blue smock showed through it. Hecalled to Vanyusha very loud so as to let her know that he was back, and then sat down in the porch in his usual place. His hosts nowreturned from the vineyard; they came out of the outhouse and intotheir hut, but did not ask of the latch and knocked. The floor hardlycreaked under the bare cautious footsteps which approached the door. The latch clicked, the door creaked, and he noticed a faint smell ofmarjoram and pumpkin, and Maryanka's whole figure appeared in thedoorway. He saw her only for an instant in the moonlight. She slammedthe door and, muttering something, ran lightly back again. Olenin beganrapping softly but nothing responded. He ran to the window andlistened. Suddenly he was startled by a shrill, squeaky man's voice. 

'Fine!' exclaimed a rather small young Cossack in a white cap, comingacross the yard close to Olenin. 'I saw . .. Fine!'

Olenin recognized Nazarka, and was silent, not knowing what to do orsay. 

'Fine! I'll go and tell them at the office, and I'll tell her father!That's a fine cornet's daughter! One's not enough for her. '

'What do you want of me, what are you after?' uttered Olenin. 

'Nothing; only I'll tell them at the office. '

Nazarka spoke very loud, and evidently did so intentionally, adding:'Just see what a clever cadet!'

Olenin trembled and grew pale. 

'Come here, here!' He seized the Cossack firmly by the arm and drew himtowards his hut. 

'Nothing happened, she did not let me in, and I too mean no harm. Sheis an honest girl--'

'Eh, discuss--'

'Yes, but all the same I'll give you something now. Wait a bit!'

Nazarka said nothing. Olenin ran into his hut and brought out tenrubles, which he gave to the Cossack. 

'Nothing happened, but still I was to blame, so I give this!--Only forGod's sake don't let anyone know, for nothing happened. .. '

'I wish you joy, ' said Nazarka laughing, and went away. 

Nazarka had come to the village that night at Lukashka's bidding tofind a place to hide a stolen horse, and now, passing by on his wayhome, had heard the sound of footsteps. When he returned next morningto his company he bragged to his chum, and told him how cleverly he hadgot ten rubles. Next morning Olenin met his hosts and they knew nothingabout the events of the night. He did not speak to Maryanka, and sheonly laughed a little when she looked at him. Next night he also passedwithout sleep, vainly wandering about the yard. The day after hepurposely spent shooting, and in the evening he went to see Beletski toescape from his own thoughts. He was afraid of himself, and promisedhimself not to go to his hosts' hut any more. 

That night he was roused by the sergeant-major. His company was orderedto start at once on a raid. Olenin was glad this had happened, andthought he would not again return to the village. 

The raid lasted four days. The commander, who was a relative ofOlenin's, wished to see him and offered to let him remain with thestaff, but this Olenin declined. He found that he could not live awayfrom the village, and asked to be allowed to return to it. For havingtaken part in the raid he received a soldier's cross, which he hadformerly greatly desired. Now he was quite indifferent about it, andeven more indifferent about his promotion, the order for which hadstill not arrived. Accompanied by Vanyusha he rode back to the cordonwithout any accident several hours in advance of the rest of thecompany. He spent the whole evening in his porch watching Maryanka, andhe again walked about the yard, without aim or thought, all night. 

Chapter XXXIII

It was late when he awoke the next day. His hosts were no longer in. Hedid not go shooting, but now took up a book, and now went out into theporch, and now again re-entered the hut and lay down on the bed. Vanyusha thought he was ill. 

Towards evening Olenin got up, resolutely began writing, and wrote ontill late at night. He wrote a letter, but did not post it because hefelt that no one would have understood what he wanted to say, andbesides it was not necessary that anyone but himself should understandit. This is what he wrote:

'I receive letters of condolence from Russia. They are afraid that Ishall perish, buried in these wilds. They say about me: "He will becomecoarse; he will be behind the times in everything; he will take todrink, and who knows but that he may marry a Cossack girl. " It was notfor nothing, they say, that Ermolov declared: "Anyone serving in theCaucasus for ten years either becomes a confirmed drunkard or marries aloose woman. " How terrible! Indeed it won't do for me to ruin myselfwhen I might have the great happiness of even becoming the CountessB----'s husband, or a Court chamberlain, or a Marechal de noblesse ofmy district. Oh, how repulsive and pitiable you all seem to me! You donot know what happiness is and what life is! One must taste life oncein all its natural beauty, must see and understand what I see every daybefore me--those eternally unapproachable snowy peaks, and a majesticwoman in that primitive beauty in which the first woman must have comefrom her creator's hands--and then it becomes clear who is ruininghimself and who is living truly or falsely--you or I. If you only knewhow despicable and pitiable you, in your delusions, seem to me! When Ipicture to myself--in place of my hut, my forests, and my love--thosedrawing-rooms, those women with their pomatum-greased hair eked outwith false curls, those unnaturally grimacing lips, those hidden, feeble, distorted limbs, and that chatter of obligatory drawing-roomconversation which has no right to the name--I feel unendurablyrevolted. I then see before me those obtuse faces, those rich eligiblegirls whose looks seem to say:

"It's all right, you may come near though I am rich and eligible"--andthat arranging and rearranging of seats, that shameless match-makingand that eternal tittle-tattle and pretence; those rules--with whom toshake hands, to whom only to nod, with whom to converse (and all thisdone deliberately with a conviction of its inevitability), thatcontinual ennui in the blood passing on from generation to generation. Try to understand or believe just this one thing: you need only see andcomprehend what truth and beauty are, and all that you now say andthink and all your wishes for me and for yourselves will fly to atoms!Happiness is being with nature, seeing her, and conversing with her. "He may even (God forbid) marry a common Cossack girl, and be quitelost socially" I can imagine them saying of me with sincere pity! Yetthe one thing I desire is to be quite "lost" in your sense of the word. I wish to marry a Cossack girl, and dare not because it would be aheight of happiness of which I am unworthy. 

'Three months have passed since I first saw the Cossack girl, Maryanka. The views and prejudices of the world I had left were still fresh inme. I did not then believe that I could love that woman. I delighted inher beauty just as I delighted in the beauty of the mountains and thesky, nor could I help delighting in her, for she is as beautiful asthey. I found that the sight of her beauty had become a necessity of mylife and I began asking myself whether I did not love her. But I couldfind nothing within myself at all like love as I had imagined it to be. Mine was not the restlessness of loneliness and desire for marriage, nor was it platonic, still less a carnal love such as I haveexperienced. I needed only to see her, to hear her, to know that shewas near--and if I was not happy, I was at peace. 

'After an evening gathering at which I met her and touched her, I feltthat between that woman and myself there existed an indissoluble thoughunacknowledged bond against which I could not struggle, yet I didstruggle. I asked myself: "Is it possible to love a woman who willnever understand the profoundest interests of my life? Is it possibleto love a woman simply for her beauty, to love the statue of a woman?"But I was already in love with her, though I did not yet trust to myfeelings. 

'After that evening when I first spoke to her our relations changed. Before that she had been to me an extraneous but majestic object ofexternal nature: but since then she has become a human being. I beganto meet her, to talk to her, and sometimes to go to work for her fatherand to spend whole evenings with them, and in this intimate intercourseshe remained still in my eyes just as pure, inaccessible, and majestic. She always responded with equal calm, pride, and cheerful equanimity. Sometimes she was friendly, but generally her every look, every word, and every movement expressed equanimity--not contemptuous, but crushingand bewitching. Every day with a feigned smile on my lips I tried toplay a part, and with torments of passion and desire in my heart Ispoke banteringly to her. She saw that I was dissembling, but lookedstraight at me cheerfully and simply. This position became unbearable. I wished not to deceive her but to tell her all I thought and felt. Iwas extremely agitated. We were in the vineyard when I began to tellher of my love, in words I am now ashamed to remember. I am ashamedbecause I ought not to have dared to speak so to her because she stoodfar above such words and above the feeling they were meant to express. I said no more, but from that day my position has been intolerable. Idid not wish to demean myself by continuing our former flippantrelations, and at the same time I felt that I had not yet reached thelevel of straight and simple relations with her. I asked myselfdespairingly, "What am I to do?" In foolish dreams I imagined her nowas my mistress and now as my wife, but rejected both ideas withdisgust. To make her a wanton woman would be dreadful. It would bemurder. To turn her into a fine lady, the wife of Dmitri AndreichOlenin, like a Cossack woman here who is married to one of ourofficers, would be still worse. Now could I turn Cossack like Lukashka, and steal horses, get drunk on chikhir, sing rollicking songs, killpeople, and when drunk climb in at her window for the night without athought of who and what I am, it would be different: then we mightunderstand one another and I might be happy. 

'I tried to throw myself into that kind of life but was still moreconscious of my own weakness and artificiality. I cannot forget myselfand my complex, distorted past, and my future appears to me still morehopeless. Every day I have before me the distant snowy mountains andthis majestic, happy woman. But not for me is the only happinesspossible in the world; I cannot have this woman! What is most terribleand yet sweetest in my condition is that I feel that I understand herbut that she will never understand me; not because she is inferior: onthe contrary she ought not to understand me. She is happy, she is likenature: consistent, calm, and self-contained; and I, a weak distortedbeing, want her to understand my deformity and my torments! I have notslept at night, but have aimlessly passed under her windows notrendering account to myself of what was happening to me. On the 18thour company started on a raid, and I spent three days away from thevillage. I was sad and apathetic, the usual songs, cards, drinking-bouts, and talk of rewards in the regiment, were morerepulsive to me than usual. Yesterday I returned home and saw her, myhut. Daddy Eroshka, and the snowy mountains, from my porch, and wasseized by such a strong, new feeling of joy that I understood it all. Ilove this woman; I feel real love for the first and only time in mylife. I know what has befallen me. I do not fear to be degraded by thisfeeling, I am not ashamed of my love, I am proud of it. It is not myfault that I love. It has come about against my will. I tried to escapefrom my love by self-renunciation, and tried to devise a joy in theCossack Lukashka's and Maryanka's love, but thereby only stirred up myown love and jealousy. This is not the ideal, the so-called exaltedlove which I have known before; not that sort of attachment in whichyou admire your own love and feel that the source of your emotion iswithin yourself and do everything yourself. I have felt that too. It isstill less a desire for enjoyment: it is something different. Perhapsin her I love nature: the personification of all that is beautiful innature; but yet I am not acting by my own will, but some elementalforce loves through me; the whole of God's world, all nature, pressesthis love into my soul and says, "Love her. " I love her not with mymind or my imagination, but with my whole being. Loving her I feelmyself to be an integral part of all God's joyous world. I wrote beforeabout the new convictions to which my solitary life had brought me, butno one knows with what labour they shaped themselves within me and withwhat joy I realized them and saw a new way of life opening out beforeme; nothing was dearer to me than those convictions. .. Well! . .. Lovehas come and neither they nor any regrets for them remain! It is evendifficult for me to believe that I could prize such a one-sided, cold, and abstract state of mind. Beauty came and scattered to the winds allthat laborious inward toil, and no regret remains for what hasvanished! Self-renunciation is all nonsense and absurdity! That ispride, a refuge from well-merited unhappiness, and salvation from theenvy of others' happiness: "Live for others, and do good!"--Why? whenin my soul there is only love for myself and the desire to love her andto live her life with her? Not for others, not for Lukashka, I nowdesire happiness. I do not now love those others. Formerly I shouldhave told myself that this is wrong. I should have tormented myselfwith the questions: What will become of her, of me, and of Lukashka?Now I don't care. I do not live my own life, there is somethingstronger than me which directs me. I suffer; but formerly I was deadand only now do I live. Today I will go to their house and tell hereverything. '

Chapter XXXIV

Late that evening, after writing this letter, Olenin went to his hosts'hut. The old woman was sitting on a bench behind the oven unwindingcocoons. Maryanka with her head uncovered sat sewing by the light of acandle. On seeing Olenin she jumped up, took her kerchief and steppedto the oven. 'Maryanka dear, ' said her mother, 'won't you sit here withme a bit?' 'No, I'm bareheaded, ' she replied, and sprang up on theoven. Olenin could only see a knee, and one of her shapely legs hangingdown from the oven. He treated the old woman to tea. She treated herguest to clotted cream which she sent Maryanka to fetch. But having puta plateful on the table Maryanka again sprang on the oven from whenceOlenin felt her eyes upon him. They talked about household matters. Granny Ulitka became animated and went into raptures of hospitality. She brought Olenin preserved grapes and a grape tart and some of herbest wine, and pressed him to eat and drink with the rough yet proudhospitality of country folk, only found among those who produce theirbread by the labour of their own hands. The old woman, who had at firststruck Olenin so much by her rudeness, now often touched him by hersimple tenderness towards her daughter. 

'Yes, we need not offend the Lord by grumbling! We have enough ofeverything, thank God. We have pressed sufficient CHIKHIR and havepreserved and shall sell three or four barrels of grapes and haveenough left to drink. Don't be in a hurry to leave us. We will makemerry together at the wedding. '

'And when is the wedding to be?' asked Olenin, feeling his bloodsuddenly rush to his face while his heart beat irregularly andpainfully. 

He heard a movement on the oven and the sound of seeds being cracked. 

'Well, you know, it ought to be next week. We are quite ready, ' repliedthe old woman, as simply and quietly as though Olenin did not exist. 'Ihave prepared and have procured everything for Maryanka. We will giveher away properly. Only there's one thing not quite right. Our Lukashkahas been running rather wild. He has been too much on the spree! He'sup to tricks! The other day a Cossack came here from his company andsaid he had been to Nogay. '

'He must mind he does not get caught, ' said Olenin. 

'Yes, that's what I tell him. "Mind, Lukashka, don't you get intomischief. Well, of course, a young fellow naturally wants to cut adash. But there's a time for everything. Well, you've captured orstolen something and killed an abrek! Well, you're a fine fellow! Butnow you should live quietly for a bit, or else there'll be trouble. "'

'Yes, I saw him a time or two in the division, he was alwaysmerry-making. He has sold another horse, ' said Olenin, and glancedtowards the oven. A pair of large, dark, and hostile eyes glittered asthey gazed severely at him. 

He became ashamed of what he had said. 'What of it? He does no one anyharm, ' suddenly remarked Maryanka. 'He makes merry with his own money, 'and lowering her legs she jumped down from the oven and went outbanging the door. 

Olenin followed her with his eyes as long as she was in the hut, andthen looked at the door and waited, understanding nothing of whatGranny Ulitka was telling him. 

A few minutes later some visitors arrived: an old man, Granny Ulitka'sbrother, with Daddy Eroshka, and following them came Maryanka andUstenka. 

'Good evening, ' squeaked Ustenka. 'Still on holiday?' she added, turning to Olenin. 

'Yes, still on holiday, ' he replied, and felt, he did not know why, ashamed and ill at ease. 

He wished to go away but could not. It also seemed to him impossible toremain silent. The old man helped him by asking for a drink, and theyhad a drink. Olenin drank with Eroshka, with the other Cossack, andagain with Eroshka, and the more he drank the heavier was his heart. But the two old men grew merry. The girls climbed onto the oven, wherethey sat whispering and looking at the men, who drank till it was late. Olenin did not talk, but drank more than the others. The Cossacks wereshouting. The old woman would not let them have any more chikhir, andat last turned them out. The girls laughed at Daddy Eroshka, and it waspast ten when they all went out into the porch. The old men invitedthemselves to finish their merry-making at Olenin's. Ustenka ran offhome and Eroshka led the old Cossack to Vanyusha. The old woman wentout to tidy up the shed. Maryanka remained alone in the hut. Oleninfelt fresh and joyous, as if he had only just woke up. He noticedeverything, and having let the old men pass ahead he turned back to thehut where Maryanka was preparing for bed. He went up to her and wishedto say something, but his voice broke. She moved away from him, satdown cross-legged on her bed in the corner, and looked at him silentlywith wild and frightened eyes. She was evidently afraid of him. Oleninfelt this. He felt sorry and ashamed of himself, and at the same timeproud and pleased that he aroused even that feeling in her. 

'Maryanka!' he said. 'Will you never take pity on me? I can't tell youhow I love you. '

She moved still farther away. 

'Just hear how the wine is speaking! . .. You'll get nothing from me!'

'No, it is not the wine. Don't marry Lukashka. I will marry you. '('What am I saying, ' he thought as he uttered these words. 'Shall I beable to say the same to-morrow?' 'Yes, I shall, I am sure I shall, andI will repeat them now, ' replied an inner voice. )

'Will you marry me?'

She looked at him seriously and her fear seemed to have passed. 

'Maryanka, I shall go out of my mind! I am not myself. I will dowhatever you command, ' and madly tender words came from his lips oftheir own accord. 

'Now then, what are you drivelling about?' she interrupted, suddenlyseizing the arm he was stretching towards her. She did not push his armaway but pressed it firmly with her strong hard fingers. 'Do gentlemenmarry Cossack girls? Go away!'

'But will you? Everything. .. '

'And what shall we do with Lukashka?' said she, laughing. 

He snatched away the arm she was holding and firmly embraced her youngbody, but she sprang away like a fawn and ran barefoot into the porch:Olenin came to his senses and was terrified at himself. He again felthimself inexpressibly vile compared to her, yet not repenting for aninstant of what he had said he went home, and without even glancing atthe old men who were drinking in his room he lay down and fell asleepmore soundly than he had done for a long time. 

Chapter XXXV

The next day was a holiday. In the evening all the villagers, theirholiday clothes shining in the sunset, were out in the street. Thatseason more wine than usual had been produced, and the people were nowfree from their labours. In a month the Cossacks were to start on acampaign and in many families preparations were being made for weddings. 

Most of the people were standing in the square in front of the CossackGovernment Office and near the two shops, in one of which cakes andpumpkin seeds were sold, in the other kerchiefs and cotton prints. Onthe earth-embankment of the office-building sat or stood the old men insober grey, or black coats without gold trimmings or any kind ofornament. They conversed among themselves quietly in measured tones, about the harvest, about the young folk, about village affairs, andabout old times, looking with dignified equanimity at the youngergeneration. Passing by them, the women and girls stopped and bent theirheads. The young Cossacks respectfully slackened their pace and raisedtheir caps, holding them for a while over their heads. The old men thenstopped speaking. Some of them watched the passers-by severely, otherskindly, and in their turn slowly took off their caps and put them onagain. 

The Cossack girls had not yet started dancing their khorovods, buthaving gathered in groups, in their bright coloured beshmets with whitekerchiefs on their heads pulled down to their eyes, they sat either onthe ground or on the earth-banks about the huts sheltered from theoblique rays of the sun, and laughed and chattered in their ringingvoices. Little boys and girls playing in the square sent their ballshigh up into the clear sky, and ran about squealing and shouting. Thehalf-grown girls had started dancing their khorovods, and were timidlysinging in their thin shrill voices. Clerks, lads not in the service, or home for the holiday, bright-faced and wearing smart white or newred Circassian gold-trimmed coats, went about arm in arm in twos orthrees from one group of women or girls to another, and stopped to jokeand chat with the Cossack girls. The Armenian shopkeeper, in agold-trimmed coat of fine blue cloth, stood at the open door throughwhich piles of folded bright-coloured kerchiefs were visible and, conscious of his own importance and with the pride of an Orientaltradesman, waited for customers. Two red-bearded, barefooted Chechens, who had come from beyond the Terek to see the fete, sat on their heelsoutside the house of a friend, negligently smoking their little pipesand occasionally spitting, watching the villagers and exchangingremarks with one another in their rapid guttural speech. Occasionally aworkaday-looking soldier in an old overcoat passed across the squareamong the bright-clad girls. Here and there the songs of tipsy Cossackswho were merry-making could already be heard. All the huts were closed;the porches had been scrubbed clean the day before. Even the old womenwere out in the street, which was everywhere sprinkled with pumpkin andmelon seed-shells. The air was warm and still, the sky deep and clear. Beyond the roofs the dead-white mountain range, which seemed very near, was turning rosy in the glow of the evening sun. Now and then from theother side of the river came the distant roar of a cannon, but abovethe village, mingling with one another, floated all sorts of merryholiday sounds. 

Olenin had been pacing the yard all that morning hoping to seeMaryanka. But she, having put on holiday clothes, went to Mass at thechapel and afterwards sat with the other girls on an earth-embankmentcracking seeds; sometimes again, together with her companions, she ranhome, and each time gave the lodger a bright and kindly look. Oleninfelt afraid to address her playfully or in the presence of others. Hewished to finish telling her what he had begun to say the night before, and to get her to give him a definite answer. He waited for anothermoment like that of yesterday evening, but the moment did not come, andhe felt that he could not remain any longer in this uncertainty. Shewent out into the street again, and after waiting awhile he too wentout and without knowing where he was going he followed her. He passedby the corner where she was sitting in her shining blue satin beshmet, and with an aching heart he heard behind him the girls laughing. 

Beletski's hut looked out onto the square. As Olenin was passing it heheard Beletski's voice calling to him, 'Come in, ' and in he went. 

After a short talk they both sat down by the window and were soonjoined by Eroshka, who entered dressed in a new beshmet and sat down onthe floor beside them. 

'There, that's the aristocratic party, ' said Beletski, pointing withhis cigarette to a brightly coloured group at the corner. 'Mine isthere too. Do you see her? in red. That's a new beshmet. Why don't youstart the khorovod?' he shouted, leaning out of the window. 'Wait abit, and then when it grows dark let us go too. Then we will invitethem to Ustenka's. We must arrange a ball for them!'

'And I will come to Ustenka's, ' said Olenin in a decided tone. 'WillMaryanka be there?'

'Yes, she'll be there. Do come!' said Beletski, without the leastsurprise. 'But isn't it a pretty picture?' he added, pointing to themotley crowds. 

'Yes, very!' Olenin assented, trying to appear indifferent. 

'Holidays of this kind, ' he added, 'always make me wonder why all thesepeople should suddenly be contented and jolly. To-day for instance, just because it happens to be the fifteenth of the month, everything isfestive. Eyes and faces and voices and movements and garments, and theair and the sun, are all in a holiday mood. And we no longer have anyholidays!'

'Yes, ' said Beletski, who did not like such reflections. 

'And why are you not drinking, old fellow?' he said, turning to Eroshka. 

Eroshka winked at Olenin, pointing to Beletski. 'Eh, he's a proud onethat kunak of yours, ' he said. 

Beletski raised his glass. ALLAH BIRDY' he said, emptying it. (ALLAHBIRDY, 'God has given!'--the usual greeting of Caucasians when drinkingtogether. )

'Sau bul' ('Your health'), answered Eroshka smiling, and emptied hisglass. 

'Speaking of holidays!' he said, turning to Olenin as he rose andlooked out of the window, 'What sort of holiday is that! You shouldhave seen them make merry in the old days! The women used to come outin their gold--trimmed sarafans. Two rows of gold coins hanging roundtheir necks and gold-cloth diadems on their heads, and when they passedthey made a noise, "flu, flu, " with their dresses. Every woman lookedlike a princess. Sometimes they'd come out, a whole herd of them, andbegin singing songs so that the air seemed to rumble, and they went onmaking merry all night. And the Cossacks would roll out a barrel intothe yards and sit down and drink till break of day, or they would gohand-in-hand sweeping the village. Whoever they met they seized andtook along with them, and went from house to house. Sometimes they usedto make merry for three days on end. Father used to come home--I stillremember it--quite red and swollen, without a cap, having losteverything: he'd come and lie down. Mother knew what to do: she wouldbring him some fresh caviar and a little chikhir to sober him up, andwould herself run about in the village looking for his cap. Then he'dsleep for two days! That's the sort of fellows they were then! But nowwhat are they?'

'Well, and the girls in the sarafans, did they make merry all bythemselves?' asked Beletski. 

'Yes, they did! Sometimes Cossacks would come on foot or on horse andsay, "Let's break up the khorovods, " and they'd go, but the girls wouldtake up cudgels. Carnival week, some young fellow would come gallopingup, and they'd cudgel his horse and cudgel him too. But he'd breakthrough, seize the one he loved, and carry her off. And his sweetheartwould love him to his heart's content! Yes, the girls in those days, they were regular queens!'

Chapter XXXVI

Just then two men rode out of the side street into the square. One ofthem was Nazarka. The other, Lukashka, sat slightly sideways on hiswell-fed bay Kabarda horse which stepped lightly over the hard roadjerking its beautiful head with its fine glossy mane. The well-adjustedgun in its cover, the pistol at his back, and the cloak rolled upbehind his saddle showed that Lukashka had not come from a peacefulplace or from one near by. The smart way in which he sat a littlesideways on his horse, the careless motion with which he touched thehorse under its belly with his whip, and especially his half-closedblack eyes, glistening as he looked proudly around him, all expressedthe conscious strength and self-confidence of youth. 'Ever seen as finea lad?' his eyes, looking from side to side, seemed to say. The eleganthorse with its silver ornaments and trappings, the weapons, and thehandsome Cossack himself attracted the attention of everyone in thesquare. Nazarka, lean and short, was much less well dressed. As he rodepast the old men, Lukashka paused and raised his curly white sheepskincap above his closely cropped black head. 

'Well, have you carried off many Nogay horses?' asked a lean old manwith a frowning, lowering look. 

'Have you counted them, Grandad, that you ask?' replied Lukashka, turning away. 

'That's all very well, but you need not take my lad along with you, 'the old man muttered with a still darker frown. 

'Just see the old devil, he knows everything, ' muttered Lukashka tohimself, and a worried expression came over his face; but then, noticing a corner where a number of Cossack girls were standing, heturned his horse towards them. 

'Good evening, girls!' he shouted in his powerful, resonant voice, suddenly checking his horse. 'You've grown old without me, youwitches!' and he laughed. 

'Good evening, Lukashka! Good evening, laddie!' the merry voicesanswered. 'Have you brought much money? Buy some sweets for the girls!. .. Have you come for long? True enough, it's long since we saw you. .. . '

'Nazarka and I have just flown across to make a night of it, ' repliedLukashka, raising his whip and riding straight at the girls. 

'Why, Maryanka has quite forgotten you, ' said Ustenka, nudging Maryankawith her elbow and breaking into a shrill laugh. 

Maryanka moved away from the horse and throwing back her head calmlylooked at the Cossack with her large sparkling eyes. 

'True enough, you have not been home for a long time! Why are youtrampling us under your horse?' she remarked dryly, and turned away. 

Lukashka had appeared particularly merry. His face shone with audacityand joy. Obviously staggered by Maryanka's cold reply he suddenlyknitted his brow. 

'Step up on my stirrup and I'll carry you away to the mountains. Mammy!' he suddenly exclaimed, and as if to disperse his dark thoughtshe caracoled among the girls. Stooping down towards Maryanka, he said, 'I'll kiss, oh, how I'll kiss you! . .. '

Maryanka's eyes met his and she suddenly blushed and stepped back. 

'Oh, bother you! you'll crush my feet, ' she said, and bending her headlooked at her well-shaped feet in their tightly fitting light bluestockings with clocks and her new red slippers trimmed with narrowsilver braid. 

Lukashka turned towards Ustenka, and Maryanka sat down next to a womanwith a baby in her arms. The baby stretched his plump little handstowards the girl and seized a necklace string that hung down onto herblue beshmet. Maryanka bent towards the child and glanced at Lukashkafrom the comer of her eyes. Lukashka just then was getting out fromunder his coat, from the pocket of his black beshmet, a bundle ofsweetmeats and seeds. 

'There, I give them to all of you, ' he said, handing the bundle toUstenka and smiling at Maryanka. 

A confused expression again appeared on the girl's face. It was asthough a mist gathered over her beautiful eyes. She drew her kerchiefdown below her lips, and leaning her head over the fair-skinned face ofthe baby that still held her by her coin necklace she suddenly began tokiss it greedily. The baby pressed his little hands against the girl'shigh breasts, and opening his toothless mouth screamed loudly. 

"You're smothering the boy!" said the little one's mother, taking himaway; and she unfastened her beshmet to give him the breast. "You'dbetter have a chat with the young fellow. "

"I'll only go and put up my horse and then Nazarka and I will comeback; we'll make merry all night, " said Lukashka, touching his horsewith his whip and riding away from the girls. 

Turning into a side street, he and Nazarka rode up to two huts thatstood side by side. 

"Here we are all right, old fellow! Be quick and come soon!" calledLukashka to his comrade, dismounting in front of one of the huts; thenhe carefully led his horse in at the gate of the wattle fence of hisown home. 

"How d'you do, Stepka?" he said to his dumb sister, who, smartlydressed like the others, came in from the street to take his horse; andhe made signs to her to take the horse to the hay, but not to unsaddleit. 

The dumb girl made her usual humming noise, smacked her lips as shepointed to the horse and kissed it on the nose, as much as to say thatshe loved it and that it was a fine horse. 

"How d'you do. Mother? How is it that you have not gone out yet?"shouted Lukashka, holding his gun in place as he mounted the steps ofthe porch. 

His old mother opened the door. 

"Dear me! I never expected, never thought, you'd come, " said the oldwoman. "Why, Kirka said you wouldn't be here. "

"Go and bring some chikhir, Mother. Nazarka is coming here and we willcelebrate the feast day. "

"Directly, Lukashka, directly!" answered the old woman. "Our women aremaking merry. I expect our dumb one has gone too. "

She took her keys and hurriedly went to the outhouse. Nazarka, afterputting up his horse and taking the gun off his shoulder, returned toLukashka's house and went in. 

Chapter XXXVII

'Your health!' said Lukashka, taking from his mother's hands a cupfilled to the brim with chikhir and carefully raising it to his bowedhead. 

'A bad business!' said Nazarka. 'You heard how Daddy Burlak said, "Haveyou stolen many horses?" He seems to know!'

'A regular wizard!' Lukashka replied shortly. 'But what of it!' headded, tossing his head. 'They are across the river by now. Go and findthem!'

'Still it's a bad lookout. '

'What's a bad lookout? Go and take some chikhir to him to-morrow andnothing will come of it. Now let's make merry. Drink!' shoutedLukashka, just in the tone in which old Eroshka uttered the word. 'We'll go out into the street and make merry with the girls. You go andget some honey; or no, I'll send our dumb wench. We'll make merry tillmorning. '

Nazarka smiled. 

'Are we stopping here long?' he asked. 

Till we've had a bit of fun. Run and get some vodka. Here's the money. '

Nazarka ran off obediently to get the vodka from Yamka's. 

Daddy Eroshka and Ergushov, like birds of prey, scenting where themerry-making was going on, tumbled into the hut one after the other, both tipsy. 

'Bring us another half-pail, ' shouted Lukashka to his mother, by way ofreply to their greeting. 

'Now then, tell us where did you steal them, you devil?' shoutedEroshka. 'Fine fellow, I'm fond of you!'

'Fond indeed. .. ' answered Lukashka laughing, 'carrying sweets fromcadets to lasses! Eh, you old. .. '

'That's not true, not true! . .. Oh, Mark, ' and the old man burst outlaughing. 'And how that devil begged me. "Go, " he said, "and arrangeit. " He offered me a gun! But no. I'd have managed it, but I feel foryou. Now tell us where have you been?' And the old man began speakingin Tartar. 

Lukashka answered him promptly. 

Ergushov, who did not know much Tartar, only occasionally put in a wordin Russian: 'What I say is he's driven away the horses. I know it for afact, ' he chimed in. 

'Girey and I went together. ' (His speaking of Girey Khan as 'Girey'was, to the Cossack mind, evidence of his boldness. ) 'Just beyond theriver he kept bragging that he knew the whole of the steppe and wouldlead the way straight, but we rode on and the night was dark, and myGirey lost his way and began wandering in a circle without gettinganywhere: couldn't find the village, and there we were. We must havegone too much to the right. I believe we wandered about well--nigh tillmidnight. Then, thank goodness, we heard dogs howling. '

'Fools!' said Daddy Eroshka. 'There now, we too used to lose our way inthe steppe. (Who the devil can follow it?) But I used to ride up ahillock and start howling like the wolves, like this!' He placed hishands before his mouth, and howled like a pack of wolves, all on onenote. 'The dogs would answer at once . .. Well, go on--so you foundthem?'

'We soon led them away! Nazarka was nearly caught by some Nogay women, he was!'

'Caught indeed, ' Nazarka, who had just come back, said in an injuredtone. 

'We rode off again, and again Girey lost his way and almost landed usamong the sand-drifts. We thought we were just getting to the Terek butwe were riding away from it all the time!'

'You should have steered by the stars, ' said Daddy Eroshka. 

'That's what I say, ' interjected Ergushov, 'Yes, steer when all is black; I tried and tried all about. .. And atlast I put the bridle on one of the mares and let my own horse gofree--thinking he'll lead us out, and what do you think! he just gave asnort or two with his nose to the ground, galloped ahead, and led usstraight to our village. Thank goodness! It was getting quite light. Webarely had time to hide them in the forest. Nagim came across the riverand took them away. '

Ergushov shook his head. 'It's just what I said. Smart. Did you getmuch for them?'

'It's all here, ' said Lukashka, slapping his pocket. 

Just then his mother came into the room, and Lukashka did not finishwhat he was saying. 

'Drink!' he shouted. 

'We too, Girich and I, rode out late one night. .. ' began Eroshka. 

'Oh bother, we'll never hear the end of you!' said Lukashka. 'I amgoing. ' And having emptied his cup and tightened the strap of his belthe went out. 

Chapter XXXVIII

It was already dark when Lukashka went out into the street. The autumnnight was fresh and calm. The full golden moon floated up behind thetall dark poplars that grew on one side of the square. From thechimneys of the outhouses smoke rose and spread above the village, mingling with the mist. Here and there lights shone through thewindows, and the air was laden with the smell of kisyak, grape-pulp, and mist. The sounds of voices, laughter, songs, and the cracking ofseeds mingled just as they had done in the daytime, but were now moredistinct. Clusters of white kerchiefs and caps gleamed through thedarkness near the houses and by the fences. 

In the square, before the shop door which was lit up and open, theblack and white figures of Cossack men and maids showed through thedarkness, and one heard from afar their loud songs and laughter andtalk. The girls, hand in hand, went round and round in a circlestepping lightly in the dusty square. A skinny girl, the plainest ofthem all, set the tune:

 'From beyond the wood, from the forest dark, From the garden green and the shady park, There came out one day two young lads so gay. Young bachelors, hey! brave and smart were they! And they walked and walked, then stood still, each man, And they talked and soon to dispute began! Then a maid came out; as she came along, Said, "To one of you I shall soon belong!" 'Twas the fair-faced lad got the maiden fair, Yes, the fair-faced lad with the golden hair! Her right hand so white in his own took he, And he led her round for his mates to see! And said, "Have you ever in all your life, Met a lass as fair as my sweet little wife?"'

The old women stood round listening to the songs. The little boys andgirls ran about chasing one another in the dark. The men stood by, catching at the girls as the latter moved round, and sometimes breakingthe ring and entering it. On the dark side of the doorway stoodBeletski and Olenin, in their Circassian coats and sheepskin caps, andtalked together in a style of speech unlike that of the Cossacks, inlow but distinct tones, conscious that they were attracting attention. Next to one another in the khorovod circle moved plump little Ustenkain her red beshmet and the stately Maryanka in her new smock andbeshmet. Olenin and Beletski were discussing how to snatch Ustenka andMaryanka out of the ring. Beletski thought that Olenin wished only toamuse himself, but Olenin was expecting his fate to be decided. Hewanted at any cost to see Maryanka alone that very day and to tell hereverything, and ask her whether she could and would be his wife. Although that question had long been answered in the negative in hisown mind, he hoped he would be able to tell her all he felt, and thatshe would understand him. 

'Why did you not tell me sooner?' said Beletski. 'I would have gotUstenka to arrange it for you. You are such a queer fellow! . .. '

'What's to be done! . .. Some day, very soon, I'll tell you all aboutit. Only now, for Heaven's sake, arrange so that she should come toUstenka's. '

'All right, that's easily done! Well, Maryanka, will you belong to the"fair-faced lad", and not to Lukashka?' said Beletski, speaking toMaryanka first for propriety's sake, but having received no reply hewent up to Ustenka and begged her to bring Maryanka home with her. Hehad hardly time to finish what he was saying before the leader begananother song and the girls started pulling each other round in the ringby the hand. 

They sang:

 "Past the garden, by the garden, A young man came strolling down, Up the street and through the town. And the first time as he passed He did wave his strong right hand. As the second time he passed Waved his hat with silken band. But the third time as he went He stood still: before her bent. 

 "How is it that thou, my dear, My reproaches dost not fear? In the park don't come to walk That we there might have a talk? Come now, answer me, my dear, Dost thou hold me in contempt? Later on, thou knowest, dear, Thou'lt get sober and repent. Soon to woo thee I will come, And when we shall married be Thou wilt weep because of me!"

 "Though I knew what to reply, Yet I dared not him deny, No, I dared not him deny! So into the park went I, In the park my lad to meet, There my dear one I did greet. "

 "Maiden dear, I bow to thee! Take this handkerchief from me. In thy white hand take it, see! Say I am beloved by thee. I don't know at all, I fear, What I am to give thee, dear! To my dear I think I will Of a shawl a present make-- And five kisses for it take. "'

Lukashka and Nazarka broke into the ring and started walking aboutamong the girls. Lukashka joined in the singing, taking seconds in hisclear voice as he walked in the middle of the ring swinging his arms. 'Well, come in, one of you!' he said. The other girls pushed Maryanka, but she would not enter the ring. The sound of shrill laughter, slaps, kisses, and whispers mingled with the singing. 

As he went past Olenin, Lukashka gave a friendly nod. 

'Dmitri Andreich! Have you too come to have a look?' he said. 

'Yes, ' answered Olenin dryly. 

Beletski stooped and whispered something into Ustenka's ear. She hadnot time to reply till she came round again, when she said:

'All right, we'll come. '

'And Maryanka too?'

Olenin stooped towards Maryanka. 'You'll come? Please do, if only for aminute. I must speak to you. '

'If the other girls come, I will. '

'Will you answer my question?' said he, bending towards her. 'You arein good spirits to-day. '

She had already moved past him. He went after her. 

'Will you answer?'

'Answer what?'

'The question I asked you the other day, ' said Olenin, stooping to herear. 'Will you marry me?'

Maryanka thought for a moment. 

'I'll tell you, ' said she, 'I'll tell you to-night. '

And through the darkness her eyes gleamed brightly and kindly at theyoung man. 

He still followed her. He enjoyed stooping closer to her. But Lukashka, without ceasing to sing, suddenly seized her firmly by the hand andpulled her from her place in the ring of girls into the middle. Oleninhad only time to say, "Come to Ustenka's, " and stepped back to hiscompanion. 

The song came to an end. Lukashka wiped his lips, Maryanka did thesame, and they kissed. "No, no, kisses five!" said Lukashka. Chatter, laughter, and running about, succeeded to the rhythmic movements andsound. Lukashka, who seemed to have drunk a great deal, began todistribute sweetmeats to the girls. 

"I offer them to everyone!" he said with proud, comically patheticself-admiration. "But anyone who goes after soldiers goes out of thering!" he suddenly added, with an angry glance at Olenin. 

The girls grabbed his sweetmeats from him, and, laughing, struggled forthem among themselves. Beletski and Olenin stepped aside. 

Lukashka, as if ashamed of his generosity, took off his cap and wipinghis forehead with his sleeve came up to Maryanka and Ustenka. 

"Answer me, my dear, dost thou hold me in contempt?" he said in thewords of the song they had just been singing, and turning to Maryankahe angrily repeated the words: "Dost thou hold me in contempt? When weshall married be thou wilt weep because of me!" he added, embracingUstenka and Maryanka both together. 

Ustenka tore herself away, and swinging her arm gave him such a blow onthe back that she hurt her hand. 

"Well, are you going to have another turn?" he asked. 

"The other girls may if they like, " answered Ustenka, "but I am goinghome and Maryanka was coming to our house too. "

With his arm still round her, Lukashka led Maryanka away from the crowdto the darker comer of a house. 

"Don't go, Maryanka, " he said, "let's have some fun for the last time. Go home and I will come to you!"

"What am I to do at home? Holidays are meant for merrymaking. I amgoing to Ustenka's, " replied Maryanka. 

'I'll marry you all the same, you know!'

'All right, ' said Maryanka, 'we shall see when the time comes. '

'So you are going, ' said Lukashka sternly, and, pressing her close, hekissed her on the cheek. 

'There, leave off! Don't bother, ' and Maryanka, wrenching herself fromhis arms, moved away. 

'Ah my girl, it will turn out badly, ' said Lukashka reproachfully andstood still, shaking his head. 'Thou wilt weep because of me. .. ' andturning away from her he shouted to the other girls:

'Now then! Play away!'

What he had said seemed to have frightened and vexed Maryanka. Shestopped, 'What will turn out badly?'

'Why, that!'

'That what?'

'Why, that you keep company with a soldier-lodger and no longer carefor me!'

'I'll care just as long as I choose. You're not my father, nor mymother. What do you want? I'll care for whom I like!'

'Well, all right. .. ' said Lukashka, 'but remember!' He moved towardsthe shop. 'Girls!' he shouted, 'why have you stopped? Go on dancing. Nazarka, fetch some more chikhir. '

'Well, will they come?' asked Olenin, addressing Beletski. 

'They'll come directly, ' replied Beletski. 'Come along, we must preparethe ball. '

Chapter XXXIX

It was already late in the night when Olenin came out of Beletski's hutfollowing Maryanka and Ustenka. He saw in the dark street before himthe gleam of the girl's white kerchief. The golden moon was descendingtowards the steppe. A silvery mist hung over the village. All wasstill; there were no lights anywhere and one heard only the recedingfootsteps of the young women. Olenin's heart beat fast. The fresh moistatmosphere cooled his burning face. He glanced at the sky and turned tolook at the hut he had just come out of: the candle was already out. Then he again peered through the darkness at the girls' retreatingshadows. The white kerchief disappeared in the mist. He was afraid toremain alone, he was so happy. He jumped down from the porch and ranafter the girls. 

'Bother you, someone may see. .. ' said Ustenka. 

'Never mind!'

Olenin ran up to Maryanka and embraced her. 

Maryanka did not resist. 

'Haven't you kissed enough yet?' said Ustenka. 'Marry and then kiss, but now you'd better wait. '

'Good-night, Maryanka. To-morrow I will come to see your father andtell him. Don't you say anything. '

'Why should I!' answered Maryanka. 

Both the girls started running. Olenin went on by himself thinking overall that had happened. He had spent the whole evening alone with her ina corner by the oven. Ustenka had not left the hut for a single moment, but had romped about with the other girls and with Beletski all thetime. Olenin had talked in whispers to Maryanka. 

'Will you marry me?' he had asked. 

'You'd deceive me and not have me, ' she replied cheerfully and calmly. 

'But do you love me? Tell me for God's sake!'

'Why shouldn't I love you? You don't squint, ' answered Maryanka, laughing and with her hard hands squeezing his. .. . 

'What whi-ite, whi-i-ite, soft hands you've got--so like clottedcream, ' she said. 

'I am in earnest. Tell me, will you marry me?'

'Why not, if father gives me to you?'

'Well then remember, I shall go mad if you deceive me. To-morrow I willtell your mother and father. I shall come and propose. '

Maryanka suddenly burst out laughing. 

'What's the matter?'

'It seems so funny!'

'It's true! I will buy a vineyard and a house and will enroll myself asa Cossack. '

'Mind you don't go after other women then. I am severe about that. '

Olenin joyfully repeated all these words to himself. The memory of themnow gave him pain and now such joy that it took away his breath. Thepain was because she had remained as calm as usual while talking tohim. She did not seem at all agitated by these new conditions. It wasas if she did not trust him and did not think of the future. It seemedto him that she only loved him for the present moment, and that in hermind there was no future with him. He was happy because her wordssounded to him true, and she had consented to be his. 'Yes, ' thought heto himself, 'we shall only understand one another when she is quitemine. For such love there are no words. It needs life--the whole oflife. To-morrow everything will be cleared up. I cannot live like thisany longer; to-morrow I will tell everything to her father, toBeletski, and to the whole village. '

Lukashka, after two sleepless nights, had drunk so much at the fetethat for the first time in his life his feet would not carry him, andhe slept in Yamka's house. 

Chapter XL

The next day Olenin awoke earlier than usual, and immediatelyremembered what lay before him, and he joyfully recalled her kisses, the pressure of her hard hands, and her words, 'What white hands youhave!' He jumped up and wished to go at once to his hosts' hut to askfor their consent to his marriage with Maryanka. The sun had not yetrisen, but it seemed that there was an unusual bustle in the street andside-street: people were moving about on foot and on horseback, andtalking. He threw on his Circassian coat and hastened out into theporch. His hosts were not yet up. Five Cossacks were riding past andtalking loudly together. In front rode Lukashka on his broad-backedKabarda horse. 

The Cossacks were all speaking and shouting so that it was impossibleto make out exactly what they were saying. 

'Ride to the Upper Post, ' shouted one. 

'Saddle and catch us up, be quick, ' said another. 

'It's nearer through the other gate!'

'What are you talking about?' cried Lukashka. 'We must go through themiddle gates, of course. '

'So we must, it's nearer that way, ' said one of the Cossacks who wascovered with dust and rode a perspiring horse. Lukashka's face was redand swollen after the drinking of the previous night and his cap waspushed to the back of his head. He was calling out with authority asthough he were an officer. 

'What is the matter? Where are you going?' asked Olenin, withdifficulty attracting the Cossacks' attention. 

'We are off to catch abreks. They're hiding among the sand-drifts. Weare just off, but there are not enough of us yet. '

And the Cossacks continued to shout, more and more of them joining asthey rode down the street. It occurred to Olenin that it would not lookwell for him to stay behind; besides he thought he could soon comeback. He dressed, loaded his gun with bullets, jumped onto his horsewhich Vanyusha had saddled more or less well, and overtook the Cossacksat the village gates. The Cossacks had dismounted, and filling a woodenbowl with chikhir from a little cask which they had brought with them, they passed the bowl round to one another and drank to the success oftheir expedition. Among them was a smartly dressed young cornet, whohappened to be in the village and who took command of the group of nineCossacks who had joined for the expedition. All these Cossacks wereprivates, and although the cornet assumed the airs of a commandingofficer, they only obeyed Lukashka. Of Olenin they took no notice atall, and when they had all mounted and started, and Olenin rode up tothe cornet and began asking him what was taking place, the cornet, whowas usually quite friendly, treated him with marked condescension. Itwas with great difficulty that Olenin managed to find out from him whatwas happening. Scouts who had been sent out to search for abreks hadcome upon several hillsmen some six miles from the village. Theseabreks had taken shelter in pits and had fired at the scouts, declaringthey would not surrender. A corporal who had been scouting with twoCossacks had remained to watch the abreks, and had sent one Cossackback to get help. 

The sun was just rising. Three miles beyond the village the steppespread out and nothing was visible except the dry, monotonous, sandy, dismal plain covered with the footmarks of cattle, and here and therewith tufts of withered grass, with low reeds in the flats, and rare, little-trodden footpaths, and the camps of the nomad Nogay tribe justvisible far away. The absence of shade and the austere aspect of theplace were striking. The sun always rises and sets red in the steppe. When it is windy whole hills of sand are carried by the wind from placeto place. 

When it is calm, as it was that morning, the silence, uninterrupted byany movement or sound, is peculiarly striking. That morning in thesteppe it was quiet and dull, though the sun had already risen. It allseemed specially soft and desolate. The air was hushed, the footfallsand the snorting of the horses were the only sounds to be heard, andeven they quickly died away. 

The men rode almost silently. A Cossack always carries his weapons sothat they neither jingle nor rattle. Jingling weapons are a terribledisgrace to a Cossack. Two other Cossacks from the village caught theparty up and exchanged a few words. Lukashka's horse either stumbled orcaught its foot in some grass, and became restive--which is a sign ofbad luck among the Cossacks, and at such a time was of specialimportance. The others exchanged glances and turned away, trying not tonotice what had happened. Lukaskha pulled at the reins, frownedsternly, set his teeth, and flourished his whip above his head. Hisgood Kabarda horse, prancing from one foot to another not knowing withwhich to start, seemed to wish to fly upwards on wings. But Lukashkahit its well-fed sides with his whip once, then again, and a thirdtime, and the horse, showing its teeth and spreading out its tail, snorted and reared and stepped on its hind legs a few paces away fromthe others. 

'Ah, a good steed that!' said the cornet. 

That he said steed instead of HORSE indicated special praise. 

'A lion of a horse, ' assented one of the others, an old Cossack. 

The Cossacks rode forward silently, now at a footpace, then at a trot, and these changes were the only incidents that interrupted for a momentthe stillness and solemnity of their movements. 

Riding through the steppe for about six miles, they passed nothing butone Nogay tent, placed on a cart and moving slowly along at a distanceof about a mile from them. A Nogay family was moving from one part ofthe steppe to another. Afterwards they met two tattered Nogay womenwith high cheekbones, who with baskets on their backs were gatheringdung left by the cattle that wandered over the steppe. The cornet, whodid not know their language well, tried to question them, but they didnot understand him and, obviously frightened, looked at one another. 

Lukashka rode up to them both, stopped his horse, and promptly utteredthe usual greeting. The Nogay women were evidently relieved, and beganspeaking to him quite freely as to a brother. 

'Ay--ay, kop abrek!' they said plaintively, pointing in the directionin which the Cossacks were going. Olenin understood that they weresaying, 'Many abreks. '

Never having seen an engagement of that kind, and having formed an ideaof them only from Daddy Eroshka's tales, Olenin wished not to be leftbehind by the Cossacks, but wanted to see it all. He admired theCossacks, and was on the watch, looking and listening and making hisown observations. Though he had brought his sword and a loaded gun withhim, when he noticed that the Cossacks avoided him he decided to takeno part in the action, as in his opinion his courage had already beensufficiently proved when he was with his detachment, and also becausehe was very happy. 

Suddenly a shot was heard in the distance. 

The cornet became excited, and began giving orders to the Cossacks asto how they should divide and from which side they should approach. Butthe Cossacks did not appear to pay any attention to these orders, listening only to what Lukashka said and looking to him alone. Lukashka's face and figure were expressive of calm solemnity. He puthis horse to a trot with which the others were unable to keep pace, andscrewing up his eyes kept looking ahead. 

'There's a man on horseback, ' he said, reining in his horse and keepingin line with the others. 

Olenin looked intently, but could not see anything. The Cossacks soondistinguished two riders and quietly rode straight towards them. 

'Are those the ABREKS?' asked Olenin. 

The Cossacks did not answer his question, which appeared quitemeaningless to them. The ABREKS would have been fools to venture acrossthe river on horseback. 

'That's friend Rodka waving to us, I do believe, ' said Lukashka, pointing to the two mounted men who were now clearly visible. 'Look, he's coming to us. '

A few minutes later it became plain that the two horsemen were theCossack scouts. The corporal rode up to Lukashka. 

Chapter XLI

'Are they far?' was all Lukashka said. 

Just then they heard a sharp shot some thirty paces off. The corporalsmiled slightly. 

'Our Gurka is having shots at them, ' he said, nodding in the directionof the shot. 

Having gone a few paces farther they saw Gurka sitting behind asand-hillock and loading his gun. To while away the time he wasexchanging shots with the ABREKS, who were behind another sand-heap. Abullet came whistling from their side. 

The cornet was pale and grew confused. Lukashka dismounted from hishorse, threw the reins to one of the other Cossacks, and went up toGurka. Olenin also dismounted and, bending down, followed Lukashka. They had hardly reached Gurka when two bullets whistled above them. 

Lukashka looked around laughing at Olenin and stooped a little. 

'Look out or they will kill you, Dmitri Andreich, ' he said. 'You'dbetter go away--you have no business here. ' But Olenin wantedabsolutely to see the ABREKS. 

From behind the mound he saw caps and muskets some two hundred pacesoff. Suddenly a little cloud of smoke appeared from thence, and again abullet whistled past. The ABREKS were hiding in a marsh at the foot ofthe hill. Olenin was much impressed by the place in which they sat. Inreality it was very much like the rest of the steppe, but because theABREKS sat there it seemed to detach itself from all the rest and tohave become distinguished. Indeed it appeared to Olenin that it was thevery spot for ABREKS to occupy. Lukashka went back to his horse andOlenin followed him. 

'We must get a hay-cart, ' said Lukashka, 'or they will be killing someof us. There behind that mound is a Nogay cart with a load of hay. '

The cornet listened to him and the corporal agreed. The cart of hay wasfetched, and the Cossacks, hiding behind it, pushed it forward. Oleninrode up a hillock from whence he could see everything. The hay-cartmoved on and the Cossacks crowded together behind it. The Cossacksadvanced, but the Chechens, of whom there were nine, sat with theirknees in a row and did not fire. 

All was quiet. Suddenly from the Chechens arose the sound of a mournfulsong, something like Daddy Eroshka's 'Ay day, dalalay. ' The Chechensknew that they could not escape, and to prevent themselves from beingtempted to take to flight they had strapped themselves together, kneeto knee, had got their guns ready, and were singing their death-song. 

The Cossacks with their hay-cart drew closer and closer, and Oleninexpected the firing to begin at any moment, but the silence was onlybroken by the abreks' mournful song. Suddenly the song ceased; therewas a sharp report, a bullet struck the front of the cart, and Chechencurses and yells broke the silence and shot followed on shot and onebullet after another struck the cart. The Cossacks did not fire andwere now only five paces distant. 

Another moment passed and the Cossacks with a whoop rushed out on bothsides from behind the cart--Lukashka in front of them. Olenin heardonly a few shots, then shouting and moans. He thought he saw smoke andblood, and abandoning his horse and quite beside himself he ran towardsthe Cossacks. Horror seemed to blind him. He could not make outanything, but understood that all was over. Lukashka, pale as death, was holding a wounded Chechen by the arms and shouting, 'Don't killhim. I'll take him alive!' The Chechen was the red-haired man who hadfetched his brother's body away after Lukashka had killed him. Lukashkawas twisting his arms. Suddenly the Chechen wrenched himself free andfired his pistol. Lukashka fell, and blood began to flow from hisstomach. He jumped up, but fell again, swearing in Russian and inTartar. More and more blood appeared on his clothes and under him. SomeCossacks approached him and began loosening his girdle. One of them, Nazarka, before beginning to help, fumbled for some time, unable to puthis sword in its sheath: it would not go the right way. The blade ofthe sword was blood-stained. 

The Chechens with their red hair and clipped moustaches lay dead andhacked about. Only the one we know of, who had fired at Lukashka, though wounded in many places was still alive. Like a wounded hawk allcovered with blood (blood was flowing from a wound under his righteye), pale and gloomy, he looked about him with wide--open excited eyesand clenched teeth as he crouched, dagger in hand, still prepared todefend himself. The cornet went up to him as if intending to pass by, and with a quick movement shot him in the ear. The Chechen started up, but it was too late, and he fell. 

The Cossacks, quite out of breath, dragged the bodies aside and tookthe weapons from them. Each of the red-haired Chechens had been a man, and each one had his own individual expression. Lukashka was carried tothe cart. He continued to swear in Russian and in Tartar. 

'No fear, I'll strangle him with my hands. ANNA SENI!' he cried, struggling. But he soon became quiet from weakness. 

Olenin rode home. In the evening he was told that Lukashka was atdeath's door, but that a Tartar from beyond the river had undertaken tocure him with herbs. 

The bodies were brought to the village office. The women and the littleboys hastened to look at them. 

It was growing dark when Olenin returned, and he could not collecthimself after what he had seen. But towards night memories of theevening before came rushing to his mind. He looked out of the window, Maryanka was passing to and fro from the house to the cowshed, puttingthings straight. Her mother had gone to the vineyard and her father tothe office. Olenin could not wait till she had quite finished her work, but went out to meet her. She was in the hut standing with her backtowards him. Olenin thought she felt shy. 

'Maryanka, ' said he, 'I say, Maryanka! May I come in?'

She suddenly turned. There was a scarcely perceptible trace of tears inher eyes and her face was beautiful in its sadness. She looked at himin silent dignity. 

Olenin again said:

'Maryanka, I have come--'

'Leave me alone!' she said. Her face did not change but the tears randown her cheeks. 

'What are you crying for? What is it?'

'What?' she repeated in a rough voice. 'Cossacks have been killed, that's what for. '

'Lukashka?' said Olenin. 

'Go away! What do you want?'

'Maryanka!' said Olenin, approaching her. 

'You will never get anything from me!'

'Maryanka, don't speak like that, ' Olenin entreated. 

'Get away. I'm sick of you!' shouted the girl, stamping her foot, andmoved threateningly towards him. And her face expressed suchabhorrence, such contempt, and such anger that Olenin suddenlyunderstood that there was no hope for him, and that his firstimpression of this woman's inaccessibility had been perfectly correct. 

Olenin said nothing more, but ran out of the hut. 

Chapter XLII

For two hours after returning home he lay on his bed motionless. Thenhe went to his company commander and obtained leave to visit the staff. Without taking leave of anyone, and sending Vanyusha to settle hisaccounts with his landlord, he prepared to leave for the fort where hisregiment was stationed. Daddy Eroshka was the only one to see him off. They had a drink, and then a second, and then yet another. Again as onthe night of his departure from Moscow, a three-horsed conveyance stoodwaiting at the door. But Olenin did not confer with himself as he haddone then, and did not say to himself that all he had thought and donehere was 'not it'. He did not promise himself a new life. He lovedMaryanka more than ever, and knew that he could never be loved by her. 

'Well, good-bye, my lad!' said Daddy Eroshka. 'When you go on anexpedition, be wise and listen to my words--the words of an old man. When you are out on a raid or the like (you know I'm an old wolf andhave seen things), and when they begin firing, don't get into a crowdwhere there are many men. When you fellows get frightened you alwaystry to get close together with a lot of others. You think it is merrierto be with others, but that's where it is worst of all! They always aimat a crowd. Now I used to keep farther away from the others and wentalone, and I've never been wounded. Yet what things haven't I seen inmy day?'

'But you've got a bullet in your back, ' remarked Vanyusha, who wasclearing up the room. 

'That was the Cossacks fooling about, ' answered Eroshka. 

'Cossacks? How was that?' asked Olenin. 

'Oh, just so. We were drinking. Vanka Sitkin, one of the Cossacks, gotmerry, and puff! he gave me one from his pistol just here. '

'Yes, and did it hurt?' asked Olenin. 'Vanyusha, will you soon beready?' he added. 

'Ah, where's the hurry! Let me tell you. When he banged into me, thebullet did not break the bone but remained here. And I say: "You'vekilled me, brother. Eh! What have you done to me? I won't let you off!You'll have to stand me a pailful!"'

'Well, but did it hurt?' Olenin asked again, scarcely listening to thetale. 

'Let me finish. He stood a pailful, and we drank it, but the blood wenton flowing. The whole room was drenched and covered with blood. GrandadBurlak, he says, "The lad will give up the ghost. Stand a bottle of thesweet sort, or we shall have you taken up!" They bought more drink, andboozed and boozed--'

'Yes, but did it hurt you much?' Olenin asked once more. 

'Hurt, indeed! Don't interrupt: I don't like it. Let me finish. Weboozed and boozed till morning, and I fell asleep on the top of theoven, drunk. When I woke in the morning I could not unbend myselfanyhow--'

'Was it very painful?' repeated Olenin, thinking that now he would atlast get an answer to his question. 

'Did I tell you it was painful? I did not say it was painful, but Icould not bend and could not walk. '

'And then it healed up?' said Olenin, not even laughing, so heavy washis heart. 

'It healed up, but the bullet is still there. Just feel it!' Andlifting his shirt he showed his powerful back, where just near the bonea bullet could be felt and rolled about. 

'Feel how it rolls, ' he said, evidently amusing himself with the bulletas with a toy. 'There now, it has rolled to the back. '

'And Lukashka, will he recover?' asked Olenin. 

'Heaven only knows! There's no doctor. They've gone for one. '

'Where will they get one? From Groznoe?' asked Olenin. 'No, my lad. Were I the Tsar I'd have hung all your Russian doctors long ago. Cutting is all they know! There's our Cossack Baklashka, no longer areal man now that they've cut off his leg! That shows they're fools. What's Baklashka good for now? No, my lad, in the mountains there arereal doctors. There was my chum, Vorchik, he was on an expedition andwas wounded just here in the chest. Well, your doctors gave him up, butone of theirs came from the mountains and cured him! They understandherbs, my lad!'

'Come, stop talking rubbish, ' said Olenin. 'I'd better send a doctorfrom head-quarters. '

'Rubbish!' the old man said mockingly. 'Fool, fool! Rubbish. You'llsend a doctor!--If yours cured people, Cossacks and Chechens would goto you for treatment, but as it is your officers and colonels send tothe mountains for doctors. Yours are all humbugs, all humbugs. '

Olenin did not answer. He agreed only too fully that all was humbug inthe world in which he had lived and to which he was now returning. 

'How is Lukashka? You've been to see him?' he asked. 

'He just lies as if he were dead. He does not eat nor drink. Vodka isthe only thing his soul accepts. But as long as he drinks vodka it'swell. I'd be sorry to lose the lad. A fine lad--a brave, like me. I toolay dying like that once. The old women were already wailing. My headwas burning. They had already laid me out under the holy icons. So Ilay there, and above me on the oven little drummers, no bigger thanthis, beat the tattoo. I shout at them and they drum all the harder. '(The old man laughed. ) 'The women brought our church elder. They weregetting ready to bury me. They said, "He defiled himself with worldlyunbelievers; he made merry with women; he ruined people; he did notfast, and he played the balalayka. Confess, " they said. So I began toconfess. "I've sinned!" I said. Whatever the priest said, I alwaysanswered "I've sinned. " He began to ask me about the balalayka. "Whereis the accursed thing, " he says. "Show it me and smash it. " But I say, "I've not got it. " I'd hidden it myself in a net in the outhouse. Iknew they could not find it. So they left me. Yet after all Irecovered. When I went for my BALALAYKA--What was I saying?' hecontinued. 'Listen to me, and keep farther away from the other men oryou'll get killed foolishly. I feel for you, truly: you are adrinker--I love you! And fellows like you like riding up the mounds. There was one who lived here who had come from Russia, he always wouldride up the mounds (he called the mounds so funnily, "hillocks"). Whenever he saw a mound, off he'd gallop. Once he galloped off that wayand rode to the top quite pleased, but a Chechen fired at him andkilled him! Ah, how well they shoot from their gun-rests, thoseChechens! Some of them shoot even better than I do. I don't like itwhen a fellow gets killed so foolishly! Sometimes I used to look atyour soldiers and wonder at them. There's foolishness for you! They go, the poor fellows, all in a clump, and even sew red collars to theircoats! How can they help being hit! One gets killed, they drag him awayand another takes his place! What foolishness!' the old man repeated, shaking his head. 'Why not scatter, and go one by one? So you just golike that and they won't notice you. That's what you must do. '

'Well, thank you! Good-bye, Daddy. God willing we may meet again, ' saidOlenin, getting up and moving towards the passage. 

The old man, who was sitting on the floor, did not rise. 

'Is that the way one says "Good-bye"? Fool, fool!' he began. 'Oh dear, what has come to people? We've kept company, kept company for well-nigha year, and now "Good-bye!" and off he goes! Why, I love you, and how Ipity you! You are so forlorn, always alone, always alone. You'resomehow so unsociable. At times I can't sleep for thinking about you. Iam so sorry for you. As the song has it:

"It is very hard, dear brother, In a foreign land to live. "

So it is with you. '

'Well, good-bye, ' said Olenin again. 

The old man rose and held out his hand. Olenin pressed it and turned togo. 

'Give us your mug, your mug!'

And the old man took Olenin by the head with both hands and kissed himthree times with wet moustaches and lips, and began to cry. 

'I love you, good-bye!'

Olenin got into the cart. 

'Well, is that how you're going? You might give me something for aremembrance. Give me a gun! What do you want two for?' said the oldman, sobbing quite sincerely. 

Olenin got out a musket and gave it to him. 

'What a lot you've given the old fellow, ' murmured Vanyusha, 'he'llnever have enough! A regular old beggar. They are all such irregularpeople, ' he remarked, as he wrapped himself in his overcoat and tookhis seat on the box. 

'Hold your tongue, swine!' exclaimed the old man, laughing. 'What astingy fellow!'

Maryanka came out of the cowshed, glanced indifferently at the cart, bowed and went towards the hut. 

'LA FILLE!' said Vanyusha, with a wink, and burst out into a sillylaugh. 

'Drive on!' shouted Olenin, angrily. 

'Good-bye, my lad! Good-bye. I won't forget you!' shouted Eroshka. 

Olenin turned round. Daddy Eroshka was talking to Maryanka, evidentlyabout his own affairs, and neither the old man nor the girl looked atOlenin. 

The End