'That was a heron's cry,' replied Pavel tranquilly.
'A heron,' repeated Kostya.... 'And what was it, Pavlusha, I heard
yesterday evening,' he added, after a short pause; 'you perhaps will
know.'
'What did you hear?'
'I will tell you what I heard. I was going from Stony Ridge to
Shashkino; I went first through our walnut wood, and then passed by a
little pool--you know where there's a sharp turn down to the
ravine--there is a water-pit there, you know; it is quite overgrown
with reeds; so I went near this pit, brothers, and suddenly from this
came a sound of some one groaning, and piteously, so piteously; oo-oo,
oo-oo! I was in such a fright, my brothers; it was late, and the voice
was so miserable. I felt as if I should cry myself.... What could that
have been, eh?'
'It was in that pit the thieves drowned Akim the forester, last
summer,' observed Pavel; 'so perhaps it was his soul lamenting.'
'Oh, dear, really, brothers,' replied Kostya, opening wide his eyes,
which were round enough before, 'I did not know they had drowned Akim
in that pit. Shouldn't I have been frightened if I'd known!'
'But they say there are little, tiny frogs,' continued Pavel, 'who cry
piteously like that.'
'Frogs? Oh, no, it was not frogs, certainly not. (A heron again uttered
a cry above the river.) Ugh, there it is!' Kostya cried involuntarily;
'it is just like a wood-spirit shrieking.'
'The wood-spirit does not shriek; it is dumb,' put in Ilyusha; 'it only
claps its hands and rattles.'
'And have you seen it then, the wood-spirit?' Fedya asked him
ironically.
'No, I have not seen it, and God preserve me from seeing it; but others
have seen it. Why, one day it misled a peasant in our parts, and led
him through the woods and all in a circle in one field.... He scarcely
got home till daylight.'
'Well, and did he see it?'
'Yes. He says it was a big, big creature, dark, wrapped up, just like a
tree; you could not make it out well; it seemed to hide away from the
moon, and kept staring and staring with its great eyes, and winking and
winking with them....'
'Ugh!' exclaimed Fedya with a slight shiver, and a shrug of the
shoulders; 'pfoo.'
'And how does such an unclean brood come to exist in the world?' said
Pavel; 'it's a wonder.'
'Don't speak ill of it; take care, it will hear you,' said Ilyusha.
Again there was a silence.
'Look, look, brothers,' suddenly came Vanya's childish voice; 'look at
God's little stars; they are swarming like bees!'
He put his fresh little face out from under his rug, leaned on his
little fist, and slowly lifted up his large soft eyes. The eyes of all
the boys were raised to the sky, and they were not lowered quickly.
'Well, Vanya,' began Fedya caressingly, 'is your sister Anyutka well?'
'Yes, she is very well,' replied Vanya with a slight lisp.
'You ask her, why doesn't she come to see us?'
'I don't know.'
'You tell her to come.'
'Very well.'
'Tell her I have a present for her.'
'And a present for me too?'
'Yes, you too.'
Vanya sighed.
'No; I don't want one. Better give it to her; she is so kind to us at
home.'
And Vanya laid his head down again on the ground. Pavel got up and took
the empty pot in his hand.
'Where are you going?' Fedya asked him.
'To the river, to get water; I want some water to drink.'
The dogs got up and followed him.
'Take care you don't fall into the river!' Ilyusha cried after him.
'Why should he fall in?' said Fedya. 'He will be careful.'
'Yes, he will be careful. But all kinds of things happen; he will stoop
over, perhaps, to draw the water, and the water-spirit will clutch him
by the hand, and drag him to him. Then they will say, "The boy fell
into the water." ... Fell in, indeed! ... "There, he has crept in among
the reeds," he added, listening.
The reeds certainly 'shished,' as they call it among us, as they were
parted.
'But is it true,' asked Kostya, 'that crazy Akulina has been mad ever
since she fell into the water?'
'Yes, ever since.... How dreadful she is now! But they say she was a
beauty before then. The water-spirit bewitched her. I suppose he did
not expect they would get her out so soon. So down there at the bottom
he bewitched her.'
(I had met this Akulina more than once. Covered with rags, fearfully
thin, with face as black as a coal, blear-eyed and for ever grinning,
she would stay whole hours in one place in the road, stamping with her
feet, pressing her fleshless hands to her breast, and slowly shifting
from one leg to the other, like a wild beast in a cage. She understood
nothing that was said to her, and only chuckled spasmodically from time
to time.)
'But they say,' continued Kostya, 'that Akulina threw herself into the
river because her lover had deceived her.'
'Yes, that was it.'
'And do you remember Vasya? added Kostya, mournfully.
'What Vasya?' asked Fedya.
'Why, the one who was drowned,' replied Kostya,' in this very river.
Ah, what a boy he was! What a boy he was! His mother, Feklista, how she
loved him, her Vasya! And she seemed to have a foreboding, Feklista
did, that harm would come to him from the water. Sometimes, when Vasya
went with us boys in the summer to bathe in the river, she used to be
trembling all over. The other women did not mind; they passed by with
the pails, and went on, but Feklista put her pail down on the ground,
and set to calling him, 'Come back, come back, my little joy; come
back, my darling!' And no one knows how he was drowned. He was playing
on the bank, and his mother was there haymaking; suddenly she hears, as
though some one was blowing bubbles through the water, and behold!
there was only Vasya's little cap to be seen swimming on the water. You
know since then Feklista has not been right in her mind: she goes and
lies down at the place where he was drowned; she lies down, brothers,
and sings a song--you remember Vasya was always singing a song like
that--so she sings it too, and weeps and weeps, and bitterly rails
against God.'
'Here is Pavlusha coming,' said Fedya.
Pavel came up to the fire with a full pot in his hand.
'Boys,' he began, after a short silence, 'something bad happened.'
'Oh, what?' asked Kostya hurriedly.
'I heard Vasya's voice.'
They all seemed to shudder.
'What do you mean? what do you mean?' stammered Kostya.
'I don't know. Only I went to stoop down to the water; suddenly I hear
my name called in Vasya's voice, as though it came from below water:
"Pavlusha, Pavlusha, come here." I came away. But I fetched the water,
though.'
'Ah, God have mercy upon us!' said the boys, crossing themselves.
'It was the water-spirit calling you, Pavel,' said Fedya; 'we were just
talking of Vasya.'
'Ah, it's a bad omen,' said Ilyusha, deliberately.
'Well, never mind, don't bother about it,' Pavel declared stoutly, and
he sat down again; 'no one can escape his fate.'
The boys were still. It was clear that Pavel's words had produced a
strong impression on them. They began to lie down before the fire as
though preparing to go to sleep.
'What is that?' asked Kostya, suddenly lifting his head.
Pavel listened.
'It's the curlews flying and whistling.'
'Where are they flying to?'
'To a land where, they say, there is no winter.'
'But is there such a land?'
'Yes.'
'Is it far away?'
'Far, far away, beyond the warm seas.'
Kostya sighed and shut his eyes.
More than three hours had passed since I first came across the boys.
The moon at last had risen; I did not notice it at first; it was such a
tiny crescent. This moonless night was as solemn and hushed as it had
been at first.... But already many stars, that not long before had been
high up in the heavens, were setting over the earth's dark rim;
everything around was perfectly still, as it is only still towards
morning; all was sleeping the deep unbroken sleep that comes before
daybreak. Already the fragrance in the air was fainter; once more a dew
seemed falling.... How short are nights in summer!... The boys' talk
died down when the fires did. The dogs even were dozing; the horses, so
far as I could make out, in the hardly-perceptible, faintly shining
light of the stars, were asleep with downcast heads.... I fell into a
state of weary unconsciousness, which passed into sleep.
A fresh breeze passed over my face. I opened my eyes; the morning was
beginning. The dawn had not yet flushed the sky, but already it was
growing light in the east. Everything had become visible, though dimly
visible, around. The pale grey sky was growing light and cold and
bluish; the stars twinkled with a dimmer light, or disappeared; the
earth was wet, the leaves covered with dew, and from the distance came
sounds of life and voices, and a light morning breeze went fluttering
over the earth. My body responded to it with a faint shudder of
delight. I got up quickly and went to the boys. They were all sleeping
as though they were tired out round the smouldering fire; only Pavel
half rose and gazed intently at me.
I nodded to him, and walked homewards beside the misty river. Before I
had walked two miles, already all around me, over the wide dew-drenched
prairie, and in front from forest to forest, where the hills were
growing green again, and behind, over the long dusty road and the
sparkling bushes, flushed with the red glow, and the river faintly blue
now under the lifting mist, flowed fresh streams of burning light,
first pink, then red and golden.... All things began to stir, to
awaken, to sing, to flutter, to speak. On all sides thick drops of dew
sparkled in glittering diamonds; to welcome me, pure and clear as
though bathed in the freshness of morning, came the notes of a bell,
and suddenly there rushed by me, driven by the boys I had parted from,
the drove of horses, refreshed and rested....
Sad to say, I must add that in that year Pavel met his end. He was not
drowned; he was killed by a fall from his horse. Pity! he was a
splendid fellow!