The gallery in which the old man worked was fairly high. Here and there
beams sustaining the roof were visible, but their decrepit condition
testified to their age. Above these worm-eaten beams, the earth formed
protuberances bristling with pointed rocks. The ground was strewn with
fragments of rock which had fallen from the roof.
Old Ivan remembered having seen one day one of these fragments kill as
it fell a little boy who had been a great pet of his. This little boy
generally accompanied his father, and his gay bursts of careless
laughter animated a little the sepulchral silence of the mine. It seemed
but yesterday that the old man had seen the child running merrily along
the gallery. All at once a misshapen block protruded from the roof. The
child stopped, out of curiosity, raised his clear eyes to see what it
was, and the huge stone suddenly dropped, burying and crushing him
entirely. His father was in utter despair and the other miners could not
restrain their tears; as for Ivan, he persisted in prowling for a long
time round the great black stone, as though he were expecting to hear
from under the enormous block the well-known laugh of the little one.
But nothing came to awaken the melancholy silence of the gallery.
The old man now halted near this murderous rock and held his lamp near
it, lighting up the indistinct outlines of a cross rudely engraved in
the stone. After looking round, as though he were afraid of being seen,
he rapidly made the sign of the cross above the "tomb." If the miners
had been able to watch him just then, they would have been astonished to
his perpetually closed lips moving. But no one could have said whether
he only wished to speak or actually spoke, for none but himself heard
the vague murmur which issued from his lips.
On his left hand there was an extremely narrow passage; the old man
entered it, crawled through it, and stood upright again, for he had
reached the place where he worked, which was fairly roomy. However,
although one could stand upright in it, the place had a sepulchral
aspect.
The old man raised his lamp, whose tiny gleam lit up for a moment the
black walls discoloured by stains of yellowish rust. Here it was almost
dry and the light of the lamp revealed no moisture. Little irregular
heaps of ore dotted the ground. However, there was one damp corner, and
in it grew thickly together a little group of mushrooms with little flat
hoods of a sickly white colour on stalks which were also white and very
slender. The old man took care of them and avoided covering them with
any of the earth which he dug out. One day he had even brought to this
corner a piece of turf in the midst of which were some field-flowers.
But neither the buttercups nor the daisies consented to live without
the sun; they gradually died, fading away by stages like consumptives
who are deprived of the sun and of its warmth. Only one little flower
had a tougher life than the rest and held out a long time, although it
completely lost its colour in the eternal darkness of this tomb. Ivan
watched it with curiosity until it also hung its head over its
desiccated stalk. Then he had nothing left but the mushrooms and a kind
of greyish lichen which spotted the rock at intervals.
To-day old Ivan was very tired; he sat down on a heap of ore, placed his
little lamp in a niche of the rock, which was already blackened with
smoke, and buried his head in his hands. Not a single echo reached this
spot. A melancholy silence reigned in this vault, but the old man was
accustomed to it. He for whom the darkness was peopled by mysterious
apparitions vanishing as soon as they appeared, heard also strange
voices down here. Sometimes it was like the fragment of an incomplete
song or a distant call which pierced the silence. At other times, when
his pickaxe penetrated deeply the heart of the rock, he fancied he heard
a stifled sigh as if the tool had pierced the breast of a living
creature. All these vague sounds seemed to him full of significance.
Having nothing in common with the world of reality, he lived in fancies
and dreams.
Sometimes, after making sure that he had a supply of matches, he put out
his lamp, lay on his back on the ground and fixed his wide-open eyes on
the darkness. Then it seemed to him that the walls of his black prison
expanded indefinitely. The vaulted roof overhead rose to a prodigious
height, and he felt himself for the first few moments lost in such a
terrible void that his breath seemed to stop. He felt a strange
uneasiness mixed with fear, for in the absolute darkness he seemed
suspended alone and without the least support in the immensity of space,
and every moment about to fall.
But this lasted only a short time, and the darkness gradually became
less dense. First of all the blackness was diversified by spots of
light, then by blazing spirals of fire; these then changed into golden
circles, which in their turn disappeared in showers of sparks. Then the
spots of light assumed all the colours of the rainbow and the fiery
spirals shone with a dazzling light, revolving rapidly in the darkness,
which, however, was not dispersed by this lightning-like splendour. Then
they melted together and rose to giddy heights, appearing up there like
glittering mirages. Sometimes the spots of light assumed indistinct
shapes which seemed to have transparent wings, while white robes
fluttered behind them. Mysterious spirits who shunned the light of the
lamp escaped from the black rock bastion and gathered round the old man,
leaning over him and gazing intently into his wide-open eyes. At such
times he heard a vague rustling around him.
He seemed to feel the breath of the rocks reaching him through invisible
fissures. He heard the musical complaint of a spring imprisoned in the
rock, or it might be a distant song. His ear caught distinctly
harmonious sounds, which sometimes melted together and sometimes
followed each other, sporting like butterflies in the field, and he
eagerly listened to their ineffable melody. Thus he would pass hours and
even entire nights while, forgotten by his comrades, he remained alone
in the enormous mine, alone with his visions and the fantastic echoes of
a world unknown and invisible. But to-day these things hardly occupied
his mind at all.
The next day was a Saturday, and he had to break as much ore possible
and convey it, together with the piles already prepared, to the
principal gallery, where the overseer of the mine would take it over. In
the evening he would receive his pay, the whole of which he would take
to an old woman living in the village. She looked after him, prepared
his meagre repasts, mended his clothes, and bought his boots. People
said she was his sister, but he felt doubtful about it. He knew that he
had passed his childhood far away from her, for while he was always in
the mine with his mother, she was growing up in a strange family who
took care of her. He never spoke to her. When he entered in the evening
he silently placed his money on the table, let his head drop in his
hands, and remained sitting in this attitude. When she called him to sit
down at table, he rose and obeyed, otherwise he would have remained as
he was till the morning, as motionless as a log. When he happened to
remain in the mine for the night, his sister was not anxious about it;
she knew that he had taken with him a large chunk of bread and a handful
of salt; as for water, there was no lack of that in the mine! She knew
also that in a corner of the sepulchral vault, where he worked like a
mole from morning to night, there was a can of oil, and that he could
re-light his lamp whenever it went out.
Ivan stooped down, looked for his pickaxe, found it, and sat down to
break pieces from a block of ore which projected from the wall. This
ferruginous earth was as hard to break as stone. Ivan worked slowly,
sparing his strength because he could not do otherwise; care had been
taken to show him a place where the rock was not so hard as elsewhere.
Fragments of yellowish earth fell on the ground, and the rays of the
little lamp lit up the particles of copper which glittered here and
there in the pieces of rock. After two hours' work the pickaxe fell from
the old man's hand. Feeling quite exhausted, he squatted down on the
ground, cut himself a large slice of bread, sprinkled it plentifully
with salt, and began to munch the soft part of it with the remnants of
his teeth.
There was in one corner a wheelbarrow light enough for the old man to
push it. After having rested, he filled it with ore, and crawled,
pushing the barrow in front of him, through the narrow passage which led
to the main gallery. At the end of the passage a point of yellow light
was visible. This proceeded from the main gallery where a large number
of miners worked, and the yellow light was that cast by their lamps.
Several times the old man sank exhausted on his stomach on the ground;
then after resting a minute or two to recover strength, he began to
crawl on again, pushing his load in front of him. The point of light
grew larger from moment to moment and soon became a broad luminous disk
against which the outline of a miner stood out in sharp relief. A few
minutes more and the wheelbarrow issued from the passage, pushed by the
old man, who sank as he did so on the ground.
"Stop a minute! You are tired: let me help you, old man," said a young
miner who had finished his work. The old man lifted his head, looked at
him for a moment, and sank down again. The younger laid hold of the
wheelbarrow, but Ivan took it brusquely from him, and shook his head
with an air of disapproval.
"What fly is buzzing in your head, comrade?" several of the other miners
said to the young one. "Have you forgotten the old man's habits? You
know that he never allows any one to enter his hole, nor to touch his
barrow, for he has heaped up riches in it. Since he has worked in the
mine, he has found so much gold that he has become a regular Croesus."
The miners laughed good-naturedly, tapping the old man's shoulder with
their horny fingers.
"March on in front, Ivan, and the other one will follow," they said to
soothe him.
Instead of answering, Ivan removed his old leather cap and commenced
bowing to right and to left as if to give his comrades a good view of
his bald head.
"That's enough, old man! Yes, we know your zeal!" said the miners,
laughing. "He is quite a child, eh?"
"He has forgotten how to talk," some one remarked.
"Yes, he is an innocent. Ah, my God! What is that?"
In the twinkling of an eye every one was on their feet. It seemed as
though the huge mountain was breathing with all its lungs. The noise
came from a distance and drowned all the others. The miners were
deafened. Suddenly a gust of wind rushed violently through the gallery,
extinguishing nearly all the lamps. Somewhere, one knew not where, rose
cries of anguish which were soon lost in an immense uproar. After
hurriedly re-lighting their lamps, the miners rushed in the direction of
the cries. A gleam of intelligence lit up the eyes of old Ivan as he
tottered after them on his feeble legs.