This was because the fitful illumination of a flash had just shown up
in front of us the trunk of an oak tree which had a large black hollow
let into it like a doorway. So into that hollow we crawled as two mice
might have done--laughing aloud in our glee as we did so.
"Here there is room for THREE persons," my companion remarked.
"Evidently it is a hollow that has been burnt out--though rascals
indeed must the burners have been to kindle a fire in a living tree!"
However, the space within the hollow was both confined and redolent of
smoke and dead leaves. Also, heavy drops of rain still bespattered our
heads and shoulders, and at every peal of thunder the tree quivered and
creaked until the strident din around us gave one the illusion of being
afloat in a narrow caique. Meanwhile at every flash of the lightning's
glare, we could see slanting ribands of rain cutting the air with a
network of blue, glistening, vitreous lines.
Presently, the wind began to whistle less loudly, as though now it felt
satisfied at having driven so much productive rain into the ground, and
washed clean the mountain tops, and loosened the stony soil.
"U-oh! U-oh!" hooted a grey mountain owl just over our heads.
"Why, surely it believes the time to be night!" Kalinin commented in a
whisper.
"U-oh! U-u-u-oh!" hooted the bird again, and in response my companion
shouted:
"You have made a mistake, my brother!"
By this time the air was feeling chilly, and a bright grey fog had
streamed over us, and wrapped a semi-transparent veil about the
gnarled, barrel-like trunks with their outgrowing shoots and the few
remaining leaves still adhering.
Far and wide the monotonous din continued to rage--it did so until
conscious thought began almost to be impossible. Yet even as one
strained one's attention, and listened to the rain lashing the fallen
leaves, and pounding the stones, and bespattering the trunks of the
trees, and to the murmuring and splashing of rivulets racing towards
the sea, and to the roaring of torrents as they thundered over the
rocks of the mountains, and to the creaking of trees before the wind,
and to the measured thud-thud of the waves; as one listened to all
this, the thousand sounds seemed to combine into a single heaviness of
hurried clamour, and involuntarily one found oneself striving to
disunite them, and to space them even as one spaces the words of a song.
Kalinin fidgeted, nudged me, and muttered:
"I find this place too close for me. Always I have hated confinement."
Nevertheless he had taken far more care than I to make himself
comfortable, for he had edged himself right into the hollow, and, by
squatting on his haunches, reduced his frame to the form of a ball.
Moreover, the rain-drippings scarcely or in no wise touched him, while,
in general, he appeared to have developed to the full an aptitude for
vagrancy as a permanent condition, and for the allowing of no
unpleasant circumstance to debar him from invariably finding the most
convenient vantage-ground at a given juncture. Presently, in fact, he
continued:
"Yes; despite the rain and cold and everything else, I consider life to
be not quite intolerable."
"Not quite intolerable in what?"
"Not quite intolerable in the fact that at least I am bound to the
service of no one save God. For if disagreeablenesses have to be
endured, at all events they come better from Him than from one's own
species."
"Then you have no great love for your own species?"
"One loves one's neighbour as the dog loves the stick." To which, after
a pause, the speaker added:
"For WHY should I love him?"
It puzzled me to cite a reason off-hand, but, fortunately, Kalinin did
not wait for an answer--rather, he went on to ask:
"Have you ever been a footman?"
"No," I replied.
"Then let me tell you that it is peculiarly difficult for a footman to
love his neighbour."
"Wherefore?"
"Go and be a footman; THEN you will know. In fact, it is never the case
that, if one serves a man, one can love that man.... How steadily
the rain persists!"
Indeed, on every hand there was in progress a trickling and a splashing
sound as though the weeping earth were venting soft, sorrowful sobs
over the departure of summer before winter and its storms should arrive.
"How come you to be travelling the Caucasus?" I asked at length.
"Merely through the fact that my walking and walking has brought me
hither," was the reply. "For that matter, everyone ends by heading for
the Caucasus."
"Why so?"
"Why NOT, seeing that from one's earliest years one hears of nothing
but the Caucasus, the Caucasus? Why, even our old General used to harp
upon the name, with his moustache bristling, and his eyes protruding,
as he did so. And the same as regards my mother, who had visited the
country in the days when, as yet, the General was in command but of a
company. Yes, everyone tends hither. And another reason is the fact
that the country is an easy one to live in, a country which enjoys much
sunshine, and produces much food, and has a winter less long and severe
than our own winter, and therefore presents pleasanter conditions of
life."
"And what of the country's people?"
"What of the country's people? Oh, so long as you keep yourself to
yourself they will not interfere with you."
"And why will they not?"
Kalinin paused, stared at me, smiled condescendingly, and, finally,
said:
"What a dullard you are to ask about such simple things! Were you never
given any sort of an education? Surely by this time you ought to be
able to understand something?"
Then, with a change of subject, and subduing his tone to one of
snuffling supplication, he added in the sing-song chant of a person
reciting a prayer:
"'Oh Lord, suffer me not to become bound unto the clergy the
priesthood, the diaconate, the tchinovstvo, [The official class] or the
intelligentsia!' This was a petition which my mother used often to
repeat."
The raindrops now were falling more gently, and in finer lines and more
transparent network, so that one could once more descry the great
trunks of the blackened oaks, with the green and gold of their leaves.
Also, our own hollow had grown less dark, and there could be discerned
its smoky, satin-bright walls. From those walls Kalinin picked a bit of
charcoal with finger and thumb, saying:
"It was shepherds that fired the place. See where they dragged in hay
and dead leaves! A shepherd's fife hereabouts must be a truly glorious
one!"
Lastly, clasping his head as though he were about to fall asleep, he
sank his chin between his knees, and relapsed into silence.
Presently a brilliant, sinuous little rivulet which had long been
laving the bare roots of our tree brought floating past us a red and
fawn leaf.
"How pretty," I thought, "that leaf will look from a distance when
reposing on the surface of the sea! For, like the sun when he is in
solitary possession of the heavens, that leaf will stand out against
the blue, silky expanse like a lonely red star."
After awhile my companion began, catlike, to purr to himself a song.
Its melody, the melody of "the moon withdrew behind a cloud," was
familiar enough, but not so the words, which ran:
Oh Valentina, wondrous maid,
More comely thou than e'er a flow'r!
The nurse's son doth pine for thee,
And yearn to serve thee every hour!
"What does that ditty mean?" I inquired.
Kalinin straightened himself, gave a wriggle to a form that was as
lithe as a lizard's, and passed one hand over his face.
"It is a certain composition," he replied presently. "It is a
composition that was composed by a military clerk who afterwards died
of consumption. He was my friend his life long, and my only friend, and
a true one, besides being a man out of the common."
"And who was Valentina?"
"My one-time mistress," Kalinin spoke unwillingly.
"And he, the clerk--was he in love with her?"
"Oh dear no!"
Evidently Kalinin had no particular wish to discuss the subject, for he
hugged himself together, buried his face in his hands, and muttered:
"I should like to kindle a fire, were it not that everything in the
place is too damp for the purpose."
The wind shook the trees, and whistled despondently, while the fine,
persistent rain still whipped the earth.
"I but humble am, and poor, Nor fated to be otherwise,"
sang Kalinin softly as, flinging up his head with an unexpected
movement, he added meaningly:
"Yes, it is a mournful song, a song which could move to tears. Only to
two persons has it ever been known; to my friend the clerk and to
myself. Yes, and to HER, though I need hardly add that at once she
forgot it."
And Kalinin's eyes flashed into a smile as he added:
"I think that, as a young man, you had better learn forthwith where the
greatest danger lurks in life. Let me tell you a story."
And upon that a very human tale filtered through the silken monotonous
swish of the downpour, with, for listeners to it, only the rain and
myself.
"Lukianov was NEVER in love with her," he narrated. "Only I was that.
All that Lukianov did in the matter was to write, at my request, some
verses. When she first appeared on the scene (I mean Valentina
Ignatievna) I was just turned nineteen years of age; and the instant
that my eyes fell upon her form I realised that in her alone lay my
fate, and my heart almost stopped beating, and my vitality stretched
out towards her as a speck of dust flies towards a fire. Yet all this I
had to conceal as best I might; with the result that in the company's
presence I felt like a sentry doing guard duty in the presence of his
commanding officer. But at last, though I strove to pull myself
together, to steady myself against the ferment that was raging in my
breast, something happened. Valentina Ignatievna was then aged about
twenty-five, and very beautiful--marvellous, in fact! Also, she was an
orphan, since her father had been killed by the Chechentzes, and her
mother had died of smallpox at Samarkand. As regards her kinship with
the General, she stood to him in the relation of niece by marriage.
Golden-locked, and as skin-fair as enamelled porcelain, she had eyes
like emeralds, and a figure wholly symmetrical, though as slim as a
wafer. For bedroom she had a little corner apartment situated next to
the kitchen (the General possessed his own house, of course), while, in
addition, they allotted her a bright little boudoir in which she
disposed her curios and knickknacks, from cut-glass bottles and goblets
to a copper pipe and a glass ring mounted on copper. This ring, when
turned, used to emit showers of glittering sparks, though she was in no
way afraid of them, but would sing as she made them dance:
"Not for me the spring will dawn!
Not for me the Bug will spate!
Not for me love's smile will wait!
Not for me, ah, not for me!
"Constantly would she warble this.
"Also, once she flashed an appeal at me with her eyes, and said:
"'Alexei, please never touch anything in my room, for my things are too
fragile.'
"Sure enough, in HER presence ANYTHING might have fallen from my hands!
"Meanwhile her song about 'Not for me' used to make me feel sorry for
her. 'Not for you?' I used to say to myself. 'Ought not EVERYTHING to
be for you?' And this reflection would cause my heart to yearn and
stretch towards her. Next, I bought a guitar, an instrument which I
could not play, and took it for instruction to Lukianov, the clerk of
the Divisional Staff, which had its headquarters in our street. In
passing I may say that Lukianov was a little Jewish convert with dark
hair, sallow features, and gimlet-sharp eyes, but beyond all things a
fellow with brains, and one who could play the guitar unforgettably.
"Once he said: 'In life all things are attainable--nothing need we lose
for want of trying. For whence does everything come? From the plainest
of mankind. A man may not be BORN in the rank of a general, but at
least he may attain to that position. Also, the beginning and ending of
all things is woman. All that she requires for her captivation is
poetry. Hence, let me write you some verses, that you may tender them
to her as an offering.'
"These, mind you, were the words of a man in whom the heart was
absolutely single, absolutely dispassionate."
Until then Kalinin had told his story swiftly, with animation; but
thereafter he seemed, as it were, to become extinguished. After a pause
of a few seconds he continued--continued in slower, to all appearances
more unwilling, accents--
"At the time I believed what Lukianov said, but subsequently I came to
see that things were not altogether as he had represented--that woman
is merely a delusion, and poetry merely fiddle-faddle; and that a man
cannot escape his fate, and that, though good in war, boldness is, in
peace affairs, but naked effrontery. In this, brother, lies the chief,
the fundamental law of life. For the world contains certain people of
high station, and certain people of low; and so long as these two
categories retain their respective positions, all goes well; but as
soon as ever a man seeks to pass from the upper category to the
inferior category, or from the inferior to the upper, the fat falls
into the fire, and that man finds himself stuck midway, stuck neither
here nor there, and bound to abide there for the remainder of his life,
for the remainder of his life.... Always keep to your own position,
to the position assigned you by fate..... Will the rain NEVER cease,
think you?"
By this time, as a matter of fact, the raindrops were falling less
heavily and densely than hitherto, and the wet clouds were beginning to
reveal bright patches in the moisture-soaked firmament, as evidence
that the sun was still in existence.
"Continue," I said.
Kalinin laughed.
"Then you find the story an interesting one," he remarked.
Presently he resumed:
"As I have said, I trusted Lukianov implicitly, and begged of him to
write the verses. And write them he did--he wrote them the very next
day. True, at this distance of time I have forgotten the words in their
entirety, but at least I remember that there occurred in them a phrase
to the effect that 'for days and weeks have your eyes been consuming my
heart in the fire of love, so pity me, I pray.' I then proceeded to
copy out the poem, and tremblingly to leave it on her table.
"The next morning, when I was tidying her boudoir, she made an
unexpected entry, and, clad in a loose, red dressing-gown, and holding
a cigarette between her lips, said to me with a kindly smile as she
produced my precious paper of verses:
"'Alexei, did YOU write these?'
"'Yes,' was my reply. 'And for Christ's sake pardon me for the same.'
"'What a pity that such a fancy should have entered your head! For, you
see, I am engaged already--my uncle is intending to marry me to Doctor
Kliachka, and I am powerless in the matter.'
"The very fact that she could address me with so much sympathy and
kindness struck me dumb. As regards Doctor Kliachka, I may mention that
he was a good-looking, blotchy-faced, heavy-jowled fellow with a
moustache that reached to his shoulders, and lips that were for ever
laughing and vociferating. 'Nothing has either a beginning or an end.
The only thing really existent is pleasure.'
"Nay, even the General could, at times, make sport of the fellow, and
say as he shook with merriment:
"'A doctor-comedian is the sort of man that you are.'
"Now, at the period of which I am speaking I was as straight as a dart,
and had a shock of luxuriant hair over a set of ruddy features. Also, I
was living a life clean in every way, and maintaining a cautious
attitude towards womenfolk, and holding prostitutes in a contempt born
of the fact that I had higher views with regard to my life's destiny.
Lastly, I never indulged in liquor, for I actually disliked it, and
gave way to its influence only in days subsequent to the episode which
I am narrating. Yes, and, last of all, I was in the habit of taking a
bath every Saturday.
"The same evening Kliachka and the rest of the party went out to the
theatre (for, naturally, the General had horses and a carriage of his
own), and I, for my part, went to inform Lukianov of what had happened.
"He said: 'I must congratulate you, and am ready to wager you two
bottles of beer that your affair is as good as settled. In a few
seconds a fresh lot of verses shall be turned out, for poetry
constitutes a species of talisman or charm.'
"And, sure enough, he then and there composed the piece about 'the
wondrous Valentina.' What a tender thing it is, and how full of
understanding! My God, my God!"
And, with a thoughtful shake of his bead, Kalinin raised his boyish
eyes towards the blue patches in the rain-washed sky.
"Duly she found the verses," he continued after a while, and with a
vehemence that seemed wholly independent of his will. "And thereupon
she summoned me to her room.
"'What are we to do about it all?' she inquired.
"She was but half-dressed, and practically the whole of her bosom was
visible to my sight. Also, her naked feet had on them only slippers,
and as she sat in her chair she kept rocking one foot to and fro in a
maddening way.
"'What are we to do about it all?' she repeated.
"'What am I to say about it, at length I replied, 'save that I feel as
though I were not really existing on earth?'
"'Are you one who can hold your tongue?' was her next question.
"I nodded--nothing else could I compass, for further speech had become
impossible. Whereupon, rising with brows puckered, she fetched a couple
of small phials, and, with the aid of ingredients thence, mixed a
powder which she wrapped in paper, and handed me with the words:
"'Only one way of escape offers from the Plagues of Egypt. Here I have
a certain powder. Tonight the doctor is to dine with us. Place the
powder in his soup, and within a few days I shall be free!--yes, free
for you!'
"I crossed myself, and duly took from her the paper, whilst a mist
rose, and swam before my eyes, as I did so, and my legs became
perfectly numb. What I next did I hardly know, for inwardly I was
swooning. Indeed, until Kliachka's arrival the same evening I remained
practically in a state of coma."
Here Kalinin shuddered--then glanced at me with drawn features and
chattering teeth, and stirred uneasily.
"Suppose we light a fire?" he ventured. "I am growing shivery all over.
But first we must move outside."
The torn clouds were casting their shadows wearily athwart the sodden
earth and glittering stones and silver-dusted herbage. Only on a single
mountain top had a blur of mist settled like an arrested avalanche, and
was resting there with its edges steaming. The sea too had grown calmer
under the rain, and was splashing with more gentle mournfulness, even
as the blue patches in the firmament had taken on a softer, warmer
look, and stray sunbeams were touching upon land and sea in turn, and,
where they chanced to fall upon herbage, causing pearls and emeralds to
sparkle on every leaf, and kaleidoscopic tints to glow where the
dark-blue sea reflected their generous radiance. Indeed, so goodly, so
full of promise, was the scene that one might have supposed autumn to
have fled away for ever before the wind and the rain, and beneficent
summer to have been restored.
Presently through the moist, squelching sound of our footsteps, and the
cheerful patter of the rain-drippings, Kalinin's narrative resumed its
languid, querulous course:
"When, that evening, I opened the door to the doctor I could not bring
myself to look him in the face--I could merely hang my head; whereupon,
taking me by the chin, and raising it, he inquired:
"Why is your face so yellow? What is the matter with you?'
"Yes, a kind-hearted man was he, and one who had never failed to tip me
well, and to speak to me with as much consideration as though I had not
been a footman at all.
"'I am not in very good health,' I replied. 'I, I--'
"'Come, come!' was his interjection. 'After dinner I must look you
over, and in the meanwhile, do keep up your spirits.'
"Then I realised that poison him I could not, but that the powder must
be swallowed by myself--yes, by myself! Aye, over my heart a flash of
lightning had gleamed, and shown me that now I was no longer following
the road properly assigned me by fate.
"Rushing away to my room, I poured out a glass of water, and emptied
into it the powder; whereupon the water thickened, fizzed, and became
topped with foam. Oh, a terrible moment it was!... Then I drank the
mixture. Yet no burning sensation ensued, and though I listened to my
vitals, nothing was to be heard in that quarter, but, on the contrary,
my head began to lighten, and I found myself losing the sense of
self-pity which had brought me almost to the point of tears....
Shall we settle ourselves here?"
Before us a large stone, capped with green moss and climbing plants,
was good-humouredly thrusting upwards a broad, flat face beneath which
the body had, like that of the hero Sviatogov, sunken into the earth
through its own weight until only the face, a visage worn with aeons of
meditation, was now visible. On every side, also, had oak-trees
overgrown and encompassed the bulk of the projection, as though they
too had been made of stone, with their branches drooping sufficiently
low to brush the wrinkles of the ancient monolith. Kalinin seated
himself on his haunches under the overhanging rim of the stone, and
said as he snapped some twigs in half:
"This is where we ought to have been sitting whilst the rain was coming
down."
"And so say I," I rejoined. "But pray continue your story."
"Yes, when you have put a match to the fire."
Whereafter, further withdrawing his spare frame under the stone, so
that he might stretch himself at full length, Kalinin continued:
"I walked to the pantry quietly enough, though my legs were tottering
beneath me, and I had a cold sensation in my breast. Suddenly I heard
the dining-room echo to a merry peal of laughter from Valentina
Ignatievna, and the General reply to that outburst:
"'Ah, that man! Ah, these servants of ours! Why, the fellow would do
ANYTHING for a piatak '[A silver five-kopeck piece, equal in value to 2
1/4 pence.]
"To this my beloved one retorted:
"'Oh, uncle, uncle! Is it only a piatak that I am worth?
And then I heard the doctor put in:
"'What was it you gave him?'
"'Merely some soda and tartaric acid. To think of the fun that we shall
have!'"
Here, closing his eyes, Kalinin remained silent for a moment, whilst
the moist breeze sighed as it drove dense, wet mist against the black
branches of the trees.
"At first my feeling was one of overwhelming joy at the thought that at
least not DEATH was to be my fate. For I may tell you that, so far from
being harmful, soda and tartaric acid are frequently taken as a remedy
against drunken headache. Then the thought occurred to me: 'But, since
I am not a tippler, why should such a joke have been played upon ME?'
However, from that moment I began to feel easier, and when the company
had sat down to dinner, and, amid a general silence, I was handing
round the soup, the doctor tasted his portion, and, raising his head
with a frown, inquired:
"'Forgive me, but what soup is this?'
"'Ah!' I inwardly reflected. 'Soon, good gentlefolk, you will see how
your jest has miscarried.'
"Aloud I replied--replied with complete boldness:
"'Do not fear, sir. I have taken the powder myself.'
Upon this the General and his wife, who were still in ignorance that
the jest had gone amiss, began to titter, but the others said nothing,
though Valentina Ignatievna's eyes grew rounder and rounder, until in
an undertone she murmured:
"'Did you KNOW that the stuff was harmless?'
"'I did not,' I replied. 'At least, not at the moment of my drinking
it.'
"Whereafter falling headlong to the floor, I lost consciousness."
Kalinin's small face had become painfully contracted, and grown old and
haggard-looking. Rolling over on to his breast before the languishing
fire, he waved a hand to dissipate the smoke which was lazily drifting
slant-wise.
"For seventeen days did I remain stretched on a sick-bed, and was
attended by the doctor in person. One day, when sitting by my side, he
inquired:
"'I presume your intention was to poison yourself, you foolish fellow?'
"Yes, merely THAT was what he called me--a 'foolish fellow.' Yet
indeed, what was I to him? Only an entity which might become food for
dogs, for all he cared. Nor did Valentina Ignatievna herself pay me a
single visit, and my eyes never again beheld her. Before long she and
Dr. Kliachka were duly married, and departed to Kharkov, where he was
assigned a post in the Tchuguerski Camp. Thus only the General
remained. Rough and ready, he was, nevertheless, old and sensible, and
for that reason, did not matter; wherefore I retained my situation as
before. On my recovery, he sent for me, and said in a tone of reproof:
"'Look here. You are not wholly an idiot. What has happened is that
those vile books of yours have corrupted your mind' (as a matter of
fact, I had never read a book in my life, since for reading I have no
love or inclination). 'Hence you must have seen for yourself that only
in tales do clowns marry princesses. You know, life is like a game of
chess. Every piece has its proper move on the board, or the game could
not be played at all.'"
Kalinin rubbed his hands over the fire (slender, non-workmanlike hands
they were), and winked and smiled.
"I took the General's words very seriously, and proceeded to ask
myself: 'To what do those words amount? To this: that though I may not
care actually to take part in the game, I need not waste my whole
existence through a disinclination to learn the best use to which that
existence can be put.'"
With a triumphant uplift of tone, Kalinin continued:
"So, brother, I set myself to WATCH the game in question; with the
result that soon I discovered that the majority of men live surrounded
with a host of superfluous commodities which do but burden them, and
have in themselves no real value. What I refer to is books, pictures,
china, and rubbish of the same sort. Thought I to myself: 'Why should I
devote my life to tending and dusting such commodities while risking,
all the time, their breakage? No more of it for me! Was it for the
tending of such articles that my mother bore me amid the agonies of
childbirth? Is it an existence of THIS kind that must be passed until
the tomb be reached? No, no--a thousand times no! Rather will I, with
your good leave, reject altogether the game of life, and subsist as may
be best for me, and as may happen to be my pleasure.'"
Now, as Kalinin spoke, his eyes emitted green sparks, and as he waved
his hands over the fire, as though to lop off the red tongues of flame,
his fingers twisted convulsively.
"Of course, not all at a stroke did I arrive at this conclusion; I did
so but gradually. The person who finally confirmed me in my opinion was
a friar of Baku, a sage of pre-eminent wisdom, through his saying to
me: 'With nothing at all ought a man to fetter his soul. Neither with
bond-service, nor with property, nor with womankind, nor with any other
concession to the temptations of this world ought he to constrain its
action. Rather ought he to live alone, and to love none but Christ.
Only this is true. Only this will be for ever lasting.'
"And," added Kalinin with animation and inflated cheeks and flushed,
suppressed enthusiasm, "many lands and many peoples have I seen, and
always have I found (particularly in Russia) that many folk already
have reached an understanding of themselves, and, consequently, refused
any longer to render obeisance to absurdities. 'Shun evil, and you will
evolve good.' That is what the friar said to me as a parting
word--though long before our encounter had I grasped the meaning of the
axiom. And that axiom I myself have since passed on to other folk, as I
hope to do yet many times in the future."
At this point the speaker's tone reverted to one of querulous anxiety.
"Look how low the sun has sunk!" he exclaimed.
True enough, that luminary, large and round, was declining
into--rather, towards--the sea, while suspended between him and the
water were low, dark, white-topped cumuli.
"Soon nightfall will be overtaking us," continued Kalinin as he fumbled
in his kaftan. "And in these parts jackals howl when darkness is come."
In particular did I notice three clouds that looked like Turks in white
turbans and robes of a dusky red colour. And as these cloud Turks bent
their heads together in private converse, suddenly there swelled up on
the back of one of the figures a hump, while on the turban of a second
there sprouted forth a pale pink feather which, becoming detached from
its base, went floating upwards towards the zenith and the now rayless,
despondent, moonlike sun. Lastly the third Turk stooped forward over
the sea to screen his companions, and as he did so, developed a huge
red nose which comically seemed to dip towards, and sniff at, the
waters.
"Sometimes," continued Kalinin's even voice through the crackling and
hissing of the wood fire, "a man who is old and blind may cobble a shoe
better than cleverer men than he, can order their whole lives."
But no longer did I desire to listen to Kalinin, for the threads which
had drawn me, bound me, to his personality had now parted. All that I
desired to do was to contemplate in silence the sea, while thinking of
some of those subjects which at eventide never fail to stir the soul to
gentle, kindly emotion. Bombers, Kalinin's words continued dripping
into my ear like belated raindrops.
"Nowadays everybody is a busybody. Nowadays everyone inquires of his
fellow-man, 'How is your life ordered?' To which always there is added
didactically, 'But you ought not to live as you are doing. Let me show
you the way.' As though anyone can tell me how best my life may attain
full development, seeing that no one can possibly have such a matter
within his knowledge! Nay, let every man live as best he pleases,
without compulsion. For instance, I have no need of you. In return, it
is not your business either to require or to expect aught of me. And
this I say though Father Vitali says the contrary, and avers that
throughout should man war with the evils of the world."
In the vague, wide firmament a blood-red cluster of clouds was hanging,
and as I contemplated it there occurred to me the thought, "May not
those clouds be erstwhile righteous world-folk who are following an
unseen path across that expanse, and dyeing it red with their good
blood as they go, in order that the earth may be fertilised?"
To right and left of that strip of living flame the sea was of a
curious wine tint, while further off, rather, it was as soft and black
as velvet, and in the remote east sheet-lightning was flashing even as
though some giant hand were fruitlessly endeavouring to strike a match
against the sodden firmament.
Meanwhile Kalinin continued to discourse with enthusiasm on the subject
of Father Vitali, the Labour Superintendent of the monastery of New
Athos, while describing in detail the monk's jovial, clever features
with their pearly teeth and contrasting black and silver beard. In
particular he related how once Vitali had knitted his fine, almost
womanlike eyes, and said in a bass which stressed its "o's":
"On our first arrival here, we found in possession only prehistoric
chaos and demoniacal influence. Everywhere had clinging weeds grown to
rankness; everywhere one found one's feet entangled among bindweed and
other vegetation of the sort. And now see what beauty and joy and
comfort the hand of man has wrought!"
And, having thus spoken, the monk had traced a great circle with his
eye and doughty hand, a circle which had embraced as in a frame the
mount, and the gardens fashioned and developed by ridgings of the rock,
and the downy soil which had been beaten into those ridgings, and the
silver streak of waterfall playing almost at Vitali's feet, and the
stone-hewn staircase leading to the cave of Simeon the Canaanite, and
the gilded cupolas of the new church where they had stood flashing in
the noontide sun, and the snow-white, shimmering blocks of the
guesthouse and the servants' quarters, and the glittering fishponds,
and the trees of uniform trimness, yet a uniformly regal dignity.
"Brethren," the monk had said in triumphant conclusion, "wheresoever
man may be, he will, as he so desires, be given power to overcome the
desolation of the wilds."
"And then I pressed him further," Kalinin added. "Yes, I said to him:
'Nevertheless Christ, our Lord, was not like you, for He was homeless
and a wanderer. He was one who utterly rejected your life of intensive
cultivation of the soil'" (as he related the incident Kalinin gave his
head sundry jerks from side to side which made his ears flap, to and
fro). "'Also neither for the lowly alone nor for the exalted alone did
Christ exist. Rather, He, like all great benefactors, was one who had
no particular leaning. Nay, even when He was roaming the Russian Land
in company with Saints Yuri and Nikolai, He always forbore to intrude
Himself into the villages' affairs, just as, whenever His companions
engaged in disputes concerning mankind, He never failed to maintain
silence on the subject.' Yes, thus I plagued Vitali until he shouted at
my head, 'Ah, impudence, you are a heretic!'"
By this time, the air under the lee of the stone was growing smoky and
oppressive, for the fire, with its flames looking like a bouquet
compounded of red poppies or azaleas and blooms of an aureate tint, had
begun fairly to live its beautiful existence, and was blazing, and
diffusing warmth, and laughing its bright, cheerful, intelligent laugh.
Yet from the mountains and the cloud-masses evening was descending, as
the earth emitted profound gasps of humidity, and the sea intoned its
vague, thoughtful, resonant song.
"I presume we are going to pass the night here?" Kalinin at length
queried.
"No, for my intention is, rather, to continue my journey."
"Then let us make an immediate start."
"But my direction will not be the same as yours, I think?"
Previously to this, Kalinin had squatted down upon his haunches, and
taken some bread and a few pears from his wallet; but now, on hearing
my decision, he replaced the viands in his receptacle, snapped--to the
lid of it with an air of vexation--and asked:
"Why did you come with me at all?"
"Because I wanted to have a talk with you--I had found you an
interesting character."
"Yes. At least I am THAT; many like me do not exist."
"Pardon me; I have met several."
"Perhaps you have." After which utterance, doubtfully drawled, the
speaker added more sticks to the fire.
Eventide was falling with tardy languor, but, as yet, the sun, though
become a gigantic, dull, red lentil in appearance, was not hidden, and
the waves were still powerless to besprinkle his downward road of fire.
Presently, however, he subsided into a cloud bank; whereupon darkness
flooded the earth like water poured from an empty basin, and the great
kindly stars shone forth, and the nocturnal profundity, enveloping the
world, seemed to soften it even as a human heart may be rendered gentle.
"Good-bye!" I said as I pressed my companion's small, yielding hand:
whereupon he looked me in the eyes in his open, boyish way, and replied:
"I wish I were going with you!"
"Well, come with me as far as Gudaout."
"Yes, I will."
So we set forth once more to traverse the land which I, so alien to its
inhabitants, yet so at one with all that it contained, loved so dearly,
and of which I yearned to fertilise the life in return for the vitality
with which it had filled my own existence.
For daily, the threads with which my heart was bound to the world at
large were growing more numerous; daily my heart was storing up
something which had at its root a sense of love for life, of interest
in my fellow-man.
And that evening, as we proceeded on our way, the sea was singing its
vespertinal hymn, the rocks were rumbling as the water caressed them,
and on the furthermost edge of the dark void there were floating dim
white patches where the sunset's glow had not yet faded--though already
stars were glowing in the zenith. Meanwhile every slumbering treetop
was aquiver, and as I stepped across the scattered rain-pools, their
water gurgled dreamily, timidly under my feet.
Yes, that night I was a torch unto myself, for in my breast a red flame
was smouldering like a living beacon, and leading me to long that some
frightened, belated wayfarer should, as it were, sight my little speck
of radiancy amid the darkness.