It is a long, hot, sultry day. The inexorable Dragon looks down
indifferently upon the children. Unwearying, he aims his bright, vivid
shafts at the sunburnt, fiery-eyed lad and at the slender, erect,
black-eyed girl. His blazing shafts are evil, and they are well aimed;
and his strong clear light is pitiless—but she walks on, and in her
eyes there is hope, and in her eyes there is resolution, and in her
dark eyes there is a flame which sets the soul afire to achieve deeds
beyond the powers of man.
Natasha suddenly pauses at the end of the path by the dusty road. Her
eyes look at Boris full of tender admiration. It is evident that she
desires to stamp upon her memory all the beloved features of the
familiar tanned face—the curve of the dense brows, the rigid set of the
red lips, the firm outlines of the chin, the stern profile.
Natasha sighs lightly and addresses Boris gently and cheerfully:
“Enough, dearest. They may not let me into the train with a heap like
this. They will say: ‘This should be put in the luggage van.’”
Both laugh carelessly. And still Boris is loath to leave the
cornflowers. He says:
“Only a few more. I want you to have a gigantic bouquet.”
“You would have everything gigantic!” Natasha returns good-humouredly.
But her face is serious. She knows how deep this quality is in him, and
how significant. Boris looks at her, and in answer repeats his
favourite, his most intimate thought:
“Yes, it is true. I love all bigness, all immoderation. In everything!
In everything! If we only acted like this always! And gave ourselves
wholly to a thing! Oh, how different life would be!”
Natasha, lost in thought, repeats: “Yes, big things, things beyond the
powers of man. To make life lavish. Only no stinginess, no trembling
for one’s skin. Far better to die—to gather all life into one little
knot, and to throw it away!”
“Yes, yes,” says Boris, and his eyes, dark as night, glow with the fury
of a yet distant storm. “We must have no care for lives, but be lavish
with them, lavish to the end—only then may we reach our goal!”
They cross the road and again walk calmly along a narrow path. Her
dress is white among the golden waves. Natasha stretches out her
slender hand, the ears of rye rustle dryly and solid seeds of ripe rye
fall into it. They are struck from above by the vivid shafts of the
pitiless Dragon.
The children are walking on, conscious of their vow. They go
trustingly, and they do not know that he who sends them is a traitor,
and that their sacrifice is vain.