'Piotr Petrovitch! Come in, please!' the voice repeated. It came from
the corner where were the trestles I had noticed.
I drew near, and was struck dumb with amazement. Before me lay a living
human being; but what sort of a creature was it?
A head utterly withered, of a uniform coppery hue--like some very
ancient holy picture, yellow with age; a sharp nose like a keen-edged
knife; the lips could barely be seen--only the teeth flashed white and
the eyes; and from under the kerchief some thin wisps of yellow hair
straggled on to the forehead. At the chin, where the quilt was folded,
two tiny hands of the same coppery hue were moving, the fingers slowly
twitching like little sticks. I looked more intently; the face, far from
being ugly, was positively beautiful, but strange and dreadful; and the
face seemed the more dreadful to me that on it--on its metallic
cheeks--I saw, struggling...struggling, and unable to form itself--a
smile.
'You don't recognise me, master?' whispered the voice again: it seemed
to be breathed from the almost unmoving lips. 'And, indeed, how should
you? I'm Lukerya....Do you remember, who used to lead the dance at your
mother's, at Spasskoye?... Do you remember, I used to be leader of the
choir too?'
'Lukerya!' I cried. 'Is it you? Can it be?'
'Yes, it's I, master--I, Lukerya.'
I did not know what to say, and gazed in stupefaction at the dark
motionless face with the clear, death-like eyes fastened upon me. Was it
possible? This mummy Lukerya--the greatest beauty in all our
household--that tall, plump, pink-and-white, singing, laughing, dancing
creature! Lukerya, our smart Lukerya, whom all our lads were courting,
for whom I heaved some secret sighs--I, a boy of sixteen!
'Mercy, Lukerya!' I said at last; 'what is it has happened to you?'
'Oh, such a misfortune befel me! But don't mind me, sir; don't let my
trouble revolt you; sit there on that little tub--a little nearer, or
you won't be able to hear me....I've not much of a voice
now-a-days!... Well, I am glad to see you! What brought you to
Aleksyevka?'
Lukerya spoke very softly and feebly, but without pausing.
'Yermolaï, the huntsman, brought me here. But you tell me...'
'Tell you about my trouble? Certainly, sir. It happened to me a long
while ago now--six or seven years. I had only just been betrothed then
to Vassily Polyakov--do you remember, such a fine-looking fellow he was,
with curly hair?--he waited at table at your mother's. But you weren't
in the country then; you had gone away to Moscow to your studies. We
were very much in love, Vassily and me; I could never get him out of my
head; and it was in the spring it all happened. Well, one night...not
long before sunrise, it was...I couldn't sleep; a nightingale in the
garden was singing so wonderfully sweet!... I could not help getting up
and going out on to the steps to listen. It trilled and trilled... and
all at once I fancied some one called me; it seemed like Vassya's voice,
so softly, "Lusha!"... I looked round, and being half asleep, I suppose,
I missed my footing and fell straight down from the top-step, and flop
on to the ground! And I thought I wasn't much hurt, for I got up
directly and went back to my room. Only it seems something inside me--in
my body--was broken.... Let me get my breath...half a minute... sir.'
Lukerya ceased, and I looked at her with surprise. What surprised me
particularly was that she told her story almost cheerfully, without
sighs and groans, not complaining nor asking for sympathy.
'Ever since that happened,' Lukerya went on, 'I began to pine away and
get thin; my skin got dark; walking was difficult for me; and then--I
lost the use of my legs altogether; I couldn't stand or sit; I had to
lie down all the time. And I didn't care to eat or drink; I got worse
and worse. Your mamma, in the kindness of her heart, made me see
doctors, and sent me to a hospital. But there was no curing me. And not
one doctor could even say what my illness was. What didn't they do to
me?--they burnt my spine with hot irons, they put me in lumps of ice,
and it was all no good. I got quite numb in the end....
So the gentlemen decided it was no use doctoring me any more, and there
was no sense in keeping cripples up at the great house... well, and so
they sent me here--because I've relations here. So here I live, as you
see.'
Lukerya was silent again, and again she tried to smile.
'But this is awful--your position!' I cried... and not knowing how to
go on, I asked: 'and what of Vassily Polyakov?' A most stupid question
it was.
Lukerya turned her eyes a little away.
'What of Polyakov? He grieved--he grieved for a bit--and he is married
to another, a girl from Glinnoe. Do you know Glinnoe? It's not far from
us. Her name's Agrafena. He loved me dearly--but, you see, he's a young
man; he couldn't stay a bachelor. And what sort of a helpmeet could I
be? The wife he found for himself is a good, sweet woman--and they have
children. He lives here; he's a clerk at a neighbour's; your mamma let
him go off with a passport, and he's doing very well, praise God.'
'And so you go on lying here all the time?' I asked again.
'Yes, sir, I've been lying here seven years. In the summer-time I lie
here in this shanty, and when it gets cold they move me out into the
bath-house: I lie there.'
'Who waits on you? Does any one look after you?'
'Oh, there are kind folks here as everywhere; they don't desert me. Yes,
they see to me a little. As to food, I eat nothing to speak of; but
water is here, in the pitcher; it's always kept full of pure spring
water. I can reach to the pitcher myself: I've one arm still of use.
There's a little girl here, an orphan; now and then she comes to see me,
the kind child. She was here just now.... You didn't meet her? Such a
pretty, fair little thing. She brings me flowers. We've some in the
garden--there were some--but they've all disappeared. But, you know,
wild flowers too are nice; they smell even sweeter than garden flowers.
Lilies of the valley, now... what could be sweeter?'
'And aren't you dull and miserable, my poor Lukerya?'
'Why, what is one to do? I wouldn't tell a lie about it. At first it was
very wearisome; but later on I got used to it, I got more patient--it
was nothing; there are others worse off still.'
'How do you mean?'
'Why, some haven't a roof to shelter them, and there are some blind or
deaf; while I, thank God, have splendid sight, and hear
everything--everything. If a mole burrows in the ground--I hear even
that. And I can smell every scent, even the faintest! When the buckwheat
comes into flower in the meadow, or the lime-tree in the garden--I don't
need to be told of it, even; I'm the first to know directly. Anyway, if
there's the least bit of a wind blowing from that quarter. No, he who
stirs God's wrath is far worse off than me. Look at this, again: anyone
in health may easily fall into sin; but I'm cut off even from sin. The
other day, father Aleksy, the priest, came to give me the sacrament, and
he says: "There's no need," says he, "to confess you; you can't fall
into sin in your condition, can you?" But I said to him; "How about
sinning in thought, father?" "Ah, well," says he, and he laughed
himself, "that's no great sin."
'But I fancy I'm no great sinner even in that way, in thought,' Lukerya
went on, 'for I've trained myself not to think, and above all, not to
remember. The time goes faster.'
I must own I was astonished. 'You're always alone, Lukerya: how can you
prevent the thoughts from coming into your head? or are you constantly
asleep?'
'Oh, no, sir! I can't always sleep. Though I've no great pain, still
I've an ache, there, right inside, and in my bones too; it won't let me
sleep as I ought. No... but there, I lie by myself; I lie here and lie
here, and don't think: I feel that I'm alive, I breathe; and I put
myself all into that. I look and listen. The bees buzz and hum in the
hive; a dove sits on the roof and coos; a hen comes along with her
chickens to peck up crumbs; or a sparrow flies in, or a
butterfly--that's a great treat for me. Last year some swallows even
built a nest over there in the corner, and brought up their little ones.
Oh, how interesting it was! One would fly to the nest, press close, feed
a young one, and off again. Look again: the other would be in her place
already. Sometimes it wouldn't fly in, but only fly past the open door;
and the little ones would begin to squeak, and open their beaks
directly....I was hoping for them back again the next year, but they say
a sportsman here shot them with his gun. And what could he gain by it?
It's hardly bigger, the swallow, than a beetle....What wicked men you
are, you sportsmen!'
'I don't shoot swallows,' I hastened to remark.
'And once, Lukerya began again, 'it was comical, really. A hare ran in,
it did really! The hounds, I suppose, were after it; anyway, it seemed
to tumble straight in at the door!... It squatted quite near me, and sat
so a long while; it kept sniffing with its nose, and twitching its
whiskers--like a regular officer! and it looked at me. It understood, to
be sure, that I was no danger to it. At last it got up, went hop-hop to
the door, looked round in the doorway; and what did it look like? Such a
funny fellow it was!'
Lukerya glanced at me, as much as to say, 'Wasn't it funny?' To satisfy
her, I laughed. She moistened her parched lips.
'Well, in the winter, of course, I'm worse off, because it's dark: to
burn a candle would be a pity, and what would be the use? I can read, to
be sure, and was always fond of reading, but what could I read? There
are no books of any kind, and even if there were, how could I hold a
book? Father Aleksy brought me a calendar to entertain me, but he saw it
was no good, so he took and carried it away again. But even though it's
dark, there's always something to listen to: a cricket chirps, or a
mouse begins scratching somewhere. That's when it's a good thing--not to
think!'
'And I repeat the prayers too,' Lukerya went on, after taking breath a
little; 'only I don't know many of them---the prayers, I mean. And
besides, why should I weary the Lord God? What can I ask Him for? He
knows better than I what I need. He has laid a cross upon me: that means
that He loves me. So we are commanded to understand. I repeat the Lord's
Prayer, the Hymn to the Virgin, the Supplication of all the Afflicted,
and I lie still again, without any thought at all, and am all right!'
Two minutes passed by. I did not break the silence, and did not stir on
the narrow tub which served me as a seat. The cruel stony stillness of
the living, unlucky creature lying before me communicated itself to me;
I too turned, as it were, numb.
'Listen, Lukerya,' I began at last; 'listen to the suggestion I'm going
to make to you. Would you like me to arrange for them to take you to a
hospital--a good hospital in the town? Who knows, perhaps you might yet
be cured; anyway, you would not be alone'...
Lukerya's eyebrows fluttered faintly. 'Oh, no, sir,' she answered in a
troubled whisper; 'don't move me into a hospital; don't touch me. I
shall only have more agony to bear there! How could they cure me now?...
Why, there was a doctor came here once; he wanted to examine me. I
begged him, for Christ's sake, not to disturb me. It was no use. He
began turning me over, pounding my hands and legs, and pulling me about.
He said, "I'm doing this for Science; I'm a servant of Science--a
scientific man! And you," he said, "really oughtn't to oppose me,
because I've a medal given me for my labours, and it's for you
simpletons I'm toiling." He mauled me about, told me the name of my
disease--some wonderful long name--and with that he went away; and all
my poor bones ached for a week after. You say "I'm all alone; always
alone." Oh, no, I'm not always; they come to see me--I'm quiet--I don't
bother them. The peasant girls come in and chat a bit; a pilgrim woman
will wander in, and tell me tales of Jerusalem, of Kiev, of the holy
towns. And I'm not afraid of being alone. Indeed, it's better--ay, ay!
Master, don't touch me, don't take me to the hospital.... Thank you, you
are kind; only don't touch me, there's a dear!'
'Well, as you like, as you like, Lukerya. You know, I only suggested it
for your good.'
'I know, master, that it was for my good. But, master dear, who can help
another? Who can enter into his soul? Every man must help himself! You
won't believe me, perhaps. I lie here sometimes so alone...and it's as
though there were no one else in the world but me. As if I alone were
living! And it seems to me as though something were blessing me....I'm
carried away by dreams that are really marvellous!'
'What do you dream of, then, Lukerya?'
'That, too, master, I couldn't say; one can't explain. Besides, one
forgets afterwards. It's like a cloud coming over and bursting, then it
grows so fresh and sweet; but just what it was, there's no knowing! Only
my idea is, if folks were near me, I should have nothing of that, and
should feel nothing except my misfortune.'
Lukerya heaved a painful sigh. Her breathing, like her limbs, was not
under her control.
'When I come to think, master, of you,' she began again, 'you are very
sorry for me. But you mustn't be too sorry, really! I'll tell you one
thing; for instance, I sometimes, even now.... Do you remember how merry
I used to be in my time? A regular madcap!... So do you know what? I sing
songs even now.'
'Sing?... You?'
'Yes; I sing the old songs, songs for choruses, for feasts, Christmas
songs, all sorts! I know such a lot of them, you see, and I've not
forgotten them. Only dance songs I don't sing. In my state now, it
wouldn't suit me.'
'How do you sing them?...to yourself?'
'To myself, yes; and aloud too. I can't sing loud, but still one can
understand it. I told you a little girl waits on me. A clever little
orphan she is. So I have taught her; four songs she has learnt from me
already. Don't you believe me? Wait a minute, I'll show you
directly....'
Lukerya took breath.... The thought that this half-dead creature was
making ready to begin singing raised an involuntary feeling of dread in
me. But before I could utter a word, a long-drawn-out, hardly audible,
but pure and true note, was quivering in my ears... it was followed by
a second and a third. 'In the meadows,' sang Lukerya. She sang, the
expression of her stony face unchanged, even her eyes riveted on one
spot. But how touchingly tinkled out that poor struggling little voice,
that wavered like a thread of smoke: how she longed to pour out all her
soul in it!... I felt no dread now; my heart throbbed with unutterable
pity.
'Ah, I can't!' she said suddenly. 'I've not the strength. I'm so upset
with joy at seeing you.'
She closed her eyes.
I laid my hand on her tiny, chill fingers.... She glanced at me, and her
dark lids, fringed with golden eyelashes, closed again, and were still
as an ancient statue's. An instant later they glistened in the
half-darkness.... They were moistened by a tear.
As before, I did not stir.
'How silly I am!' said Lukerya suddenly, with unexpected force, and
opened her eyes wide: she tried to wink the tears out of them. 'I ought
to be ashamed! What am I doing? It's a long time since I have been like
this... not since that day when Vassya-Polyakov was here last spring.
While he sat with me and talked, I was all right; but when he had gone
away, how I did cry in my loneliness! Where did I get the tears from?
But, there! we girls get our tears for nothing. Master,' added Lukerya,
'perhaps you have a handkerchief.... If you won't mind, wipe my eyes.'
I made haste to carry out her desire, and left her the handkerchief. She
refused it at first.... 'What good's such a gift to me?' she said. The
handkerchief was plain enough, but clean and white. Afterwards she
clutched it in her weak fingers, and did not loosen them again. As I got
used to the darkness in which we both were, I could clearly make out her
features, could even perceive the delicate flush that peeped out under
the coppery hue of her face, could discover in the face, so at least it
seemed to me, traces of its former beauty.
'You asked me, master,' Lukerya began again, 'whether I sleep. I sleep
very little, but every time I fall asleep I've dreams--such splendid
dreams! I'm never ill in my dreams; I'm always so well, and young....
There's one thing's sad: I wake up and long for a good stretch, and I'm
all as if I were in chains. I once had such an exquisite dream! Shall I
tell it you? Well, listen. I dreamt I was standing in a meadow, and all
round me was rye, so tall, and ripe as gold!... and I had a reddish dog
with me--such a wicked dog; it kept trying to bite me. And I had a
sickle in my hands; not a simple sickle; it seemed to be the moon
itself--the moon as it is when it's the shape of a sickle. And with this
same moon I had to cut the rye clean. Only I was very weary with the
heat, and the moon blinded me, and I felt lazy; and cornflowers were
growing all about, and such big ones! And they all turned their heads to
me. And I thought in my dream I would pick them; Vassya had promised to
come, so I'd pick myself a wreath first; I'd still time to plait it. I
began picking cornflowers, but they kept melting away from between my
fingers, do what I would. And I couldn't make myself a wreath. And
meanwhile I heard someone coming up to me, so close, and calling,
"Lusha! Lusha!"... "Ah," I thought, "what a pity I hadn't time!" No
matter, I put that moon on my head instead of cornflowers. I put it on
like a tiara, and I was all brightness directly; I made the whole field
light around me. And, behold! over the very top of the ears there came
gliding very quickly towards me, not Vassya, but Christ Himself! And how
I knew it was Christ I can't say; they don't paint Him like that--only
it was He! No beard, tall, young, all in white, only His belt was
golden; and He held out His hand to me. "Fear not," said He; "My bride
adorned, follow Me; you shall lead the choral dance in the heavenly
kingdom, and sing the songs of Paradise." And how I clung to His hand!
My dog at once followed at my heels... but then we began to float
upwards! He in front.... His wings spread wide over all the sky, long
like a sea-gull's--and I after Him! And my dog had to stay behind. Then
only I understood that that dog was my illness, and that in the heavenly
kingdom there was no place for it.'
Lukerya paused a minute.
'And I had another dream, too,' she began again; 'but may be it was a
vision. I really don't know. It seemed to me I was lying in this very
shanty, and my dead parents, father and mother, come to me and bow low
to me, but say nothing. And I asked them, "Why do you bow down to me,
father and mother?" "Because," they said, "you suffer much in this
world, so that you have not only set free your own soul, but have taken
a great burden from off us too. And for us in the other world it is much
easier. You have made an end of your own sins; now you are expiating our
sins." And having said this, my parents bowed down to me again, and I
could not see them; there was nothing but the walls to be seen. I was in
great doubt afterwards what had happened with me. I even told the priest
of it in confession. Only he thinks it was not a vision, because visions
come only to the clerical gentry.'
'And I'll tell you another dream,' Lukerya went on. 'I dreamt I was
sitting on the high-road, under a willow; I had a stick, had a wallet on
my shoulders, and my head tied up in a kerchief, just like a pilgrim
woman! And I had to go somewhere, a long, long way off, on a pilgrimage.
And pilgrims kept coming past me; they came along slowly, all going one
way; their faces were weary, and all very much like one another. And I
dreamt that moving about among them was a woman, a head taller than the
rest, and wearing a peculiar dress, not like ours--not Russian. And her
face too was peculiar--a worn face and severe. And all the others moved
away from her; but she suddenly turns, and comes straight to me. She
stood still, and looked at me; and her eyes were yellow, large, and
clear as a falcon's. And I ask her, "Who are you?" And she says to me,
"I'm your death." Instead of being frightened, it was quite the other
way. I was as pleased as could be; I crossed myself! And the woman, my
death, says to me: "I'm sorry for you, Lukerya, but I can't take you
with me. Farewell!" Good God! how sad I was then!... "Take me," said I,
"good mother, take me, darling!" And my death turned to me, and began
speaking to me.... I knew that she was appointing me my hour, but
indistinctly, incomprehensibly. "After St. Peter's day," said she....
With that I awoke.... Yes, I have such wonderful dreams!'
Lukerya turned her eyes upwards... and sank into thought....
'Only the sad thing is, sometimes a whole week will go by without my
getting to sleep once. Last year a lady came to see me, and she gave me
a little bottle of medicine against sleeplessness; she told me to take
ten drops at a time. It did me so much good, and I used to sleep; only
the bottle was all finished long ago. Do you know what medicine that
was, and how to get it?'
The lady had obviously given Lukerya opium. I promised to get her
another bottle like it, and could not refrain from again wondering aloud
at her patience.
'Ah, master!' she answered, 'why do you say so? What do you mean by
patience? There, Simeon Stylites now had patience certainly, great
patience; for thirty years he stood on a pillar! And another saint had
himself buried in the earth, right up to his breast, and the ants ate
his face.... And I'll tell you what I was told by a good scholar: there
was once a country, and the Ishmaelites made war on it, and they
tortured and killed all the inhabitants; and do what they would, the
people could not get rid of them. And there appeared among these people
a holy virgin; she took a great sword, put on armour weighing eighty
pounds, went out against the Ishmaelites and drove them all beyond the
sea. Only when she had driven them out, she said to them: "Now burn me,
for that was my vow, that I would die a death by fire for my people."
And the Ishmaelites took her and burnt her, and the people have been
free ever since then! That was a noble deed, now! But what am I!'
I wondered to myself whence and in what shape the legend of Joan of Arc
had reached her, and after a brief silence, I asked Lukerya how old she
was.
'Twenty-eight... or nine.... It won't be thirty. But why count the
years! I've something else to tell you....'
Lukerya suddenly gave a sort of choked cough, and groaned....
'You are talking a great deal,' I observed to her; 'it may be bad for
you.'
'It's true,' she whispered, hardly audibly; 'it's time to end our talk;
but what does it matter! Now, when you leave me, I can be silent as long
as I like. Any way, I've opened my heart....'
I began bidding her good-bye. I repeated my promise to send her the
medicine, and asked her once more to think well and tell me--if there
wasn't anything she wanted?'
'I want nothing; I am content with all, thank God!' she articulated with
very great effort, but with emotion; 'God give good health to all! But
there, master, you might speak a word to your mamma--the peasants here
are poor--if she could take the least bit off their rent! They've not
land enough, and no advantages.... They would pray to God for you....
But I want nothing; I'm quite contented with all.'
I gave Lukerya my word that I would carry out her request, and had
already walked to the door.... She called me back again.
'Do you remember, master,' she said, and there was a gleam of something
wonderful in her eyes and on her lips, 'what hair I used to have? Do you
remember, right down to my knees! It was long before I could make up my
mind to it.... Such hair as it was! But how could it be kept combed? In
my state!... So I had it cut off.... Yes.... Well, good-bye, master! I
can't talk any more.'...
That day, before setting off to shoot, I had a conversation with the
village constable about Lukerya. I learnt from him that in the village
they called Lukerya the 'Living Relic'; that she gave them no trouble,
however; they never heard complaint or repining from her. 'She asks
nothing, but, on the contrary, she's grateful for everything; a gentle
soul, one must say, if any there be. Stricken of God,' so the constable
concluded, 'for her sins, one must suppose; but we do not go into that.
And as for judging her, no--no, we do not judge her. Let her be!'
* * * * *
A few weeks later I heard that Lukerya was dead. So her death had come
for her... and 'after St. Peter's day.' They told me that on the day of
her death she kept hearing the sound of bells, though it was reckoned
over five miles from Aleksyevka to the church, and it was a week-day.
Lukerya, however, had said that the sounds came not from the church, but
from above! Probably she did not dare to say--from heaven.