"They are coming nearer," said Kireelka, as he watched them.
The judge watched him from the corner of his eye.
"Do you still drink as much as you used to?" he asked the peasant.
"If I have a chance, I drink a glass."
"And do you still steal firewood in the forest?"
"Why should I do that, your honour?"
"Come, tell the truth!"
"I never did steal wood," replied Kireelka, shaking his head
deprecatingly.
"What was it I condemned you for, then?"
"It's true you condemned me."
"What was it for, then?"
"Why, your honour, you see, you are put in authority over us; you have
a right to condemn us." "Ah! I see you are a cunning rascal! And you do
not steal plums from the barges either, when they are detained; do you?"
"I only tried that once, your honour."
"And that once you were caught! Wasn't that so? Ha! Ha! Ha!"
"We are not accustomed to that sort of work. That's why I was caught."
"Well, you had better get a little practice at it; hadn't you? Ha! Ha!
Ha!"
"He! He! He!" echoed Mamaieff, laughing also.
The peasants on board the boat pushed away with large iron bars the ice
which impeded its course; and, as they drew nearer, we could hear them
shouting to each other. Kireelka, putting his hands to his mouth, stood
up and shouted back to them, "Steer for the old willow!"
Then he hurried down the bank towards the river, almost tumbling head
over heels in his haste. We quickly followed him, and were soon on
board; Isaiah and I going in one boat, whilst the judge and Mamaieff
went in the other.
"All right, my men!" said the judge, taking off his hat and crossing
himself.
The two men in his boat crossed themselves devoutly, and once more
started pushing away the ice-blocks which pressed against the sides of
the boat.
But the blocks continued to strike the sides of the boat with an
angry crashing sound; the air struck cold as it blew over the water.
Mamaieff's face turned livid, and the judge, with knitted brow and
with a look of intense anxiety, watched the current which was driving
enormous blue-grey heaps of ice against the boats. The smaller pieces
grated against the keel with a sound of sharp teeth gnawing through
the wooden planks.
The air was damp and full of noises; our eyes were anxiously fixed
on the cold, dirty ice--so powerful and yet so helpless. Through the
various noises around us I suddenly distinguished the voice of someone
shouting from the shore, and glancing in the direction of the sound I
saw Kireelka standing bareheaded on the bank behind us. There was a
twinkle in his cunning grey eyes as he shouted in a strange, hoarse
voice, "Uncle Anthony, when you go to fetch the mail mind you don't
forget to bring some bread for me! The gentry have eaten my loaf of
bread whilst they were waiting for the ferry; and it was the last I
had!"
THE AFFAIR OF THE CLASPS
There were three of us friends--Semka[1] Kargouza, myself, and
Mishka,[2] a bearded giant with great blue eyes that perpetually beamed
on everything and were always swollen from drink. We lived in a field
beyond the town in an old tumbledown building, called for some reason
"the glass factory," perhaps because there was not a single whole pane
in its windows, and undertook all kinds of work, despising nothing;
cleaned yards, dug ditches and sewers, pulled down old buildings and
fences, and once even tried to build a henhouse. But in this we were
unsuccessful. Semka, who was pedantically honest about the duties he
took upon himself, began to doubt our knowledge of the architecture of
hen-houses, and one day at noon, when we were all resting, took the
nails that had been given out to us, two new planks, and the master's
axe to the public-house. For this we lost our work, but as we possessed
nothing no one demanded compensation.
[Footnote 1: An abbreviation or diminutive of _Simon,_ used to express
intimacy or contempt.--TR.]
[Footnote 2: An abbreviation or diminutive of _Michael,_ used
to express intimacy or contempt. Bears are nicknamed Mishka in
Russia.--TR.]
We struggled on, living from hand to mouth,[3] and all three of us felt
a very natural and lawful dissatisfaction with our fate. Sometimes this
took an acute form, giving us a hostile feeling to all around us, and
drawing us into somewhat riotous exploits provided for in the "Statutes
on Penalties inflicted by the Justices of the Peace"; but as a rule
we were weighed down by a dull melancholy, anxiously preoccupied in
the search of a meagre earning, and responded but feebly to all those
impressions which we could not turn to material advantage. In our
spare time--and there was always more of it than we required--we built
castles in the air. Semka, the eldest and most matter-of-fact of us,
was a thick-set, Penza-born peasant. He used to be a gardener, but,
ruined by drink, as fate willed it, he struck at the town of K---- a
year ago, on his way to the Nigny Fair, where he hoped somehow to "get
on." His dreams, the embittered sceptic's, took a clear and definite
form. He required but little.
"Damn my soul!"[3] he used to say, when we, lying on our empty
stomachs on the ground, somewhere in the shade, beyond the town, tried
to illumine our future, little by little, but insistently looking into
its darkness.
[Footnote 3: The Russian exclamation has no English equivalent.--TR.]
"If I could just cut to Siberia. I'd make my way there, meet a good
business-like man, apprentice myself to him directly. 'Take me, mate,'
I'd say, 'to share your luck. Pals in prison, pals in hunger.' Then I'd
polish off one or two little jobs with him. That would be something
_like._ Ye-es."
"Why should you go to Siberia particularly?" I asked him once.
"Why? It's there the real smart ones are, man. Lots of 'em--easy to
find. But _here_--here you can't for the life of you find a good one.
As for trying alone, you'd only go hang for nothing. Not used to it.
Skill it wants--experience."
Mishka could not express his dreams in words, but there was not the
slightest doubt that he dreamed continually and persistently. You had
but to look at his good-natured blue eyes, always gazing into space,
at his gentle tipsy smile, constantly parting his thick moustache and
beard, which always contained some extraneous matter, such as bird's
feathers, bits of straw, a shaving or two, breadcrumbs, pieces of
eggshell, etc.; you had but to glance at his simple open face to see in
him the typical peasant-dreamer. I had my dreams too, but the direction
of my thoughts is even now interesting to no one but myself.
We had all three met in a night shelter a fortnight or so before the
incident I want to describe, deeming it interesting. In a day or two we
were friends--that is, went everywhere together, told each other our
aims and wishes, divided everything that fell to one equally amongst
us, and, in fact, made a tacit defensive and offensive alliance against
Life, which treated us in an extremely hostile manner.
During the day we tried with great energy to find something to saw
or take to pieces, to pull down, to dig, to carry, and, if such an
opportunity occurred, at first set to work with a will.
But, perhaps because each of us in his heart thought himself destined
for the fulfilment of higher-business than, for instance, the digging
of cesspools, or cleaning them, which is still worse, I may add, for
the information of those not initiated into that art, after some two
hours of the work our ardour somewhat abated. Then Semka would begin to
doubt its necessity.
"They dig a ditch ... And what for? For _slops._ Why can't they just
pour them out on the ground? 'Won't do. They'll smell,' they say. Get
along with you! Slops smell! What stuff people do talk, just from
having nothing to do. Now throw a salt cucumber[4] out. Why should it
smell if it's a little one? It'll lie there a day or two, and there you
are--it's gone, rotted away. If you throw a dead man out into the sun,
now, he'll smell a bit, to be sure, for it's a big carcass."
[Footnote 4: A very common food in Russia.--TR.]
Such reasoning and conclusions on Semka's part considerably damped our
ardour for work. And this was rather advantageous for us if the job
was by the day, but if it was by the piece it invariably happened that
we took our wages and spent them on food before the work was finished.
Then we used to go to our employer to ask for a "pribavka";[5] he
generally told us to clear out, and threatened, with the help of the
police, to make us finish the job already paid for. We argued that
we could not work hungry, and more or less hotly insisted on the
"pribavka," which in the majority of cases we got. Of course it was not
exactly honourable, but really it was extremely advantageous, and it
is not our fault if life is so clumsily arranged that the honourable
and the advantageous nearly always clash. The wages disputes with our
employers Semka always took upon himself, and really he conducted them
with an artist's skill, detailing the proofs of his rights in the tones
of a man worn out with work and exhausted by the burden of it.
[Footnote 5: Lit., "an addition," _i.e._ additional wage.--TR.]
Meanwhile Mishka looked on in silence, and blinked his blue eyes,
smiling from time to time with his good-natured, kindly smile, as
if he were trying to say something but could not summon up courage.
He generally spoke very little, and only when half-seas-over was he
capable of delivering something like an oration.
"Bratsi!"[6] he would then cry, smiling, and his lips twitched
curiously, his throat grey husky, and he would cough for some time
after the beginning of the speech, pressing his hand to his throat.
[Footnote 6: Diminutive of "brothers."--TR.]
"W-e-ll?" would be Semka's impatient and ungracious encouragement.
"Bratsi! We live like dogs, we do. And worse even. And what for? Nobody
knows. But I suppose by the will of God. Everything is done by His
will--eh, bratsi? Well, then--So there ... it shows we deserve to live
like dogs, for we are bad men. We're bad men, eh? Well, then--Now I
say, serve'em right, the dogs. Isn't it true what I say? So it shows
it's for our sins. And we must put up with it, eh? Isn't it true?"
"Fool!" briefly and indifferently answered Semka to the anxious
questioning of his comrade. And the other would penitently shrink up
into himself, smile timidly, and fall silent, blinking his eyes, which
he could scarcely keep open from drunken sleepiness.
Once we were in luck.
We were waiting for likely employers, elbowing our way through the
market, when we came upon a small wizened old lady with a stern,
wrinkled face. Her head shook, and on her beak-like nose hopped large
spectacles with heavy silver rims; she was constantly putting them
straight as her small, coldly glittering eyes gleamed out from behind
them.
"You are free? Are you looking for work?" she asked us, when we all
stared at her longingly. "Very well," she said, on receiving a quick
and respectful answer in the affirmative from Semka. "I want to have an
old bath-house[7] pulled down, and a well cleaned. How much would you
charge for it?"
"We should have to see, barynia, what sort of size your bath-house
is," said Semka, politely and reasonably. "And the well too. They run
different depths. Sometimes they are very deep."
We were invited to look, and in an hour's time, already armed with
axes and a lever, we were lustily pulling down the rafters of the
bath-house, having agreed to take it to pieces and to clean the well
for five roubles.[8] The bath-house stood in the corner of an old
neglected garden. Not far from it, among some cherry trees, was a
summer-house, and from the top of the bath-house we saw that the old
lady sat reading in there, holding a large open book on her lap. Now
and then she cast a sharp, attentive glance at us, the book on her lap
moved, and its massive clasps, evidently of silver, shone in the sun.
[Footnote 7: In Russia private dwellings have separate bath-houses,
built mostly of wood, and the baths are taken in somewhat the same
manner as Turkish.--TR.]
No work is so rapid as the work of destruction. We zealously bustled
about among clouds of grey, pungent dust, sneezing, coughing, blowing
our noses, and rubbing our eyes every minute. The bathhouse, half
rotten, and old like its mistress, was soon crashing and falling to
pieces.
"Now, mates, hard on it--ea-sy!" commanded Semka, and row after row of
beams fell creaking to the ground.
"Wonder what book that is she's got. Such a thick one!" said Mishka,
reflectively leaning upon his lever and wiping the sweat off his face
with his palm. Immediately turned into a mulatto, he spat on his
hands, raised the lever to drive it into a crack between two beams,
drove it in, and added in the same reflective tone, "Suppose it's the
Gospels--seems to me it's too thick."
"What's that to you?" asked Semka.
"To me? Why, nothing. I like to hear a book read--if it's a holy one.
We had a soldier in the village, African his name was; he'd begin to
reel off the psalms sometimes, just like a drum--fine."
[Footnote 8: A rouble is about two shillings.--TR.]
"Well?" Semka said again, busy making a cigarette.
"Well--nothing. Only it _was_ fine! Couldn't understand it, still it's
the Word of God--don't hear it in the street like. Can't understand it,
still you feel it's a word for the soul."
"Can't understand it, you say. Still you can see you're a blockhead,"
said Semka, imitating him.
"I know you're always swearing at me," sighed the other.
"How else can you talk to fools? They can't understand anything. Come
on--let's have a go at this rotten plank."
The bath-house was falling to pieces, surrounded by splinters and
drowned in clouds of dust, which had even made the leaves of the
nearest trees a light grey. The July sun mercilessly scorched our backs
and shoulders. One could not tell from our faces, streaked with dust
and sweat, to which precisely of the four coloured races we belonged.
"The book's got silver on too," again began Mishka.
Semka raised his head and looked attentively in the direction of the
summer-house.
"Looks like it," he said shortly.
"Must be the Gospels, then."
"Well, and what if it is?"
"Nothing."
"Got enough and to spare of that stuff, my boy. If you're so fond of
Holy Scripture you'd better go to her. Go to her and say, 'Read to me a
bit, grannie. For _we_ can't get that sort of thing.' Say, '_We_ don't
go to church, by reason of our dirtiness. But we've got souls too, all
as they should be, in the right place.' Go on--go along."
"Truth, shall I?"
"Go on."
Mishka threw down his lever, pulled his shirt straight, smeared the
dust over his face with his sleeve, and jumped down from the bath-house.
"_She'll_ give it you, devil of a fool, you," mumbled Semka, smiling
sceptically, but watching with extreme curiosity the figure of his
comrade, making its way to the summer-house through the mass of
dock-leaves.
Tall and bent, with bare, dirty hands, heavily lurching as he walked
and catching the branches of the bushes now and then, he was moving
clumsily forward, a confused, gentle smile on his face.
The sun glistened on the glasses of the old lady's spectacles and on
their silver rims.
Contrary to Semka's supposition, she did not "give it him." We could
not hear for the rustle of the foliage what Mishka was saying to her,
but we presently saw him heavily sitting down at her feet, so that his
nose almost touched the open book. His face was dignified and calm;
we saw him blow on his beard, to try and get the dust off it, fidget,
and at last settle down in an uncomfortable position, with his neck
stretched out, expectantly watching the old lady's little shrivelled
hands as they methodically turned over the leaves of the book.
"Look at him, the hairy dog! Got a fine rest for himself. Let's go too!
He'll be taking it easy there, and we've got to do his work for him.
Come on!"
In two or three minutes Semka and I were also sitting on the ground,
one on each side of our comrade. The old lady did not say a word to us
when we appeared, only looked at us attentively and sharply, and again
began to turn over the leaves of the book, searching for something. We
sat in a luxuriant green ring of fresh, sweet-smelling foliage, and
above us was spread the kindly, soft, cloudless sky. Now and then came
a light breeze, and the leaves began to rustle with that mysterious
sound which always speaks to the heart, waking in it gentleness and
peace, and turning the thoughts to something indefinite, yet dear to
man, cleansing his soul from foulness, or, at any rate, making him
forget it for a time and breathe freely, and, as it were, anew.
"'Paul, a servant of Jesus Christ,'" began the old lady's voice.
Shaking and cracked from age, it was yet full of a stern and pompous
piety. At its first sound Mishka energetically crossed himself.
Semka began fidgeting on the ground, trying to find a more comfortable
position. The old lady cast a glance at him, but continued to read.
"'For I long to see you, that I may impart unto you some spiritual
gift, to the end ye may be established--that is, that I with you may
be comforted in you, each of us by the other's faith, both yours and
mine.'"
Semka, like the true heathen he was, gave a loud yawn. His comrade cast
a reproachful glance at him from his blue eyes and hung his touzled
head, all covered with dust. The old lady also looked at him severely
without leaving off reading, and this somewhat abashed him. He wrinkled
up his nose, looked sideways, and, evidently wishing to atone for his
yawn, gave a long, pious sigh.
Several minutes passed quietly. The improving and monotonous reading
acted as a sedative.
"'For the wrath of God is revealed against all ungodliness and'"--
"What do you want?" suddenly cried the old lady to Semka.
"O-oh ... nothing. If you would kindly go on reading--I am listening!"
he explained meekly.
"Why are you touching the clasp with your dirty great hand?" she said,
in exasperation.
"I'm curious, for--it's such fine work, you see. And it's in my line. I
understand locksmith work. So I just felt it."
"Listen," said the old lady drily. "Tell me, what have I been reading
about?"
"Why, certainly. I understand."
"Well, tell me."
"A sermon--so, of course, it's teaching on the faith and likewise on
sin. It's very simple, all of it, and--all very true. Just takes hold
of the soul--pinches it, like!"
The old lady shook her head sadly and looked round on us all with
reproach.
"Lost souls you are--stones. Go back to work!"
"She--seems to be annoyed, mates," observed Mishka, smiling penitently.
Semka scratched his back, yawned, and looking after the old lady, who,
without turning round, was walking away down the narrow path, said
reflectively--
"The clasps are silver, no mistake," and he gave a broad smile, as if
enjoying some pleasant prospect.
Having spent the night in the garden by the ruins of the bath-house,
which we had finished pulling down that day, towards noon of the next
we cleaned out the well, got soaked in the water, smeared all over with
mud, and were sitting in the yard by the porch in the expectation of
our wages, talking to each other and anticipating a good dinner and
supper in the near future; to look farther ahead we none of us were
inclined.
"Why the devil doesn't that old hag come?" said Semka impatiently, but
in a low voice.
"Just listen to him!" said Mishka reproachfully, shaking his head.
"Now, what on earth is he swearing for? She's a real godly old lady.
And he swears at her. What a disposition!"
"We are clever, aren't we? You great scarecrow!"
This pleasant and interesting conversation of friends was interrupted
by the appearance of the old lady. She came up to us, and holding out
her hand with the money in it said scornfully--
"There, take it and go along. I wanted to give you the wash-house
planks to break up for firewood, but you are not worth it."
Unhonoured with the task of breaking up the wash-house planks, which,
however, we were not in need of now, we took the money in silence and
went.
"Oh, you old she-devil!" began Semka, as soon as we were outside the
gate. "Did you ever? We're not worth it! You dead toad--you! There, go
and screech over your book now!"
Plunging his hand into his pocket, he pulled out two bright metal
objects and showed them to us in triumph.
Mishka stopped, stretching his neck towards Semka's uplifted hand.
"You've broken the clasps off?" he asked, astonished.
"That's it, mate. Silver! Get a rouble for them at least."
"Well, I never! When did you do it? Hide them quick, out of harm's way!"
"I'll hide 'em all right."
We continued our way up the street in silence.
"That's smart," Mishka said to himself. "Went and broke it off! Ye-es.
But the book is a good book. The old lady will be offended with us very
likely."
"Why, no, mate, not she! She'll call us back and tip us," joked Semka.
"How much do you want for them?"
"Lowest price--ninety kopeks.[9] Not a copper less. Cost more to me.
Broke my nail over it--look."
"Sell them to me," said Mishka timidly.
[Footnote 9: A penny is equal to four or five kopeks.--TR.]
"To you? Thinking of having 'em for studs? They'll make first-rate
ones--just suit your lovely face they would!"
"No; truth--sell them to me!" And Mishka lowered his tone in
supplication.
"Why, take 'em, I say. How much will you give?"
"Take. How much is there for my share?"
"Rouble twenty."
"And how much do you want for them?"
"A rouble."
"Make it less to oblige a mate."
"Oh, you fool! What the devil do you want them for?"
"Never mind; you just sell them to me."
At last the bargain was struck, and the clasps were transferred to
Mishka for ninety kopeks.
He stopped and began turning them over in his hand, his touzled head
bent low, carefully examining them with knit brows.
"Hang 'em on your nose," suggested Semka.
"Why should I?" replied Mishka gravely. "I'll take'em back to the old
lady. 'Here, old lady,' I'll say, 'we just took these little things
with us by mistake, so you put'em on again,' I'll say, 'in their
places--on that same book there.' Only you've torn them out with the
stuff; how can she fix them on now?"
"Are you actually going to take them back?" and Semka opened his mouth.
"Why, yes. You see a book like that--it ought to be all whole, you
know. It won't do to tear off bits of it. The old lady will be
offended, too. And she's not far from her grave. So I'll just--You wait
for me a minute. I'll run back."
And before we could hold him, he had disappeared round the street comer.
"There's a soft-boned fool for you. You dirty insect, you!" cried
Semka in indignation, taking in the meaning of the occurrence and its
possible consequences. And swearing for all he was worth, he began
persuading me.
"Come on, hurry up! He'll do us. He's sitting there now, as like as
not, with his hands tied behind him, and the old hag's sent for the
policeman already. That's what philandering round with a ninny like
that means. Why, he'll get you into jail for nothing at all. What a
scoundrel! What foul-souled thing would treat his mate like this? Good
Lord! That's what people have come to! Come on, you devil, what are you
standing there for? Waiting? The devil wait for you and take you all,
the scoundrels. Pah, you damned asses! Not coming? All right, then"--
Promising me something extraordinarily dreadful, Semka gave me a
despairing poke in the ribs, and went off with rapid strides.
I wanted to know what was happening to Mishka and the old lady, and
walked quietly towards her house. I did not think that I would incur
any danger or unpleasantness.
And I was not mistaken.
Approaching the house, I looked through a chink in the board fence, and
saw and heard the following:--
The old lady sat on the steps holding the clasps of her Bible, "torn
out with the stuff," in her hand, and looked searchingly and sternly
through her spectacles at Mishka's face, who stood with his back to me.
Notwithstanding the stern, hard gleam in her hard eyes, there were soft
lines at the corners of her mouth now; it was clear that the old lady
wanted to conceal a kindly smile--the smile of forgiveness.