My Childhood (16 page)

"I must be looking down on you," she would explain. "I can always talk better that way."

I placed myself at her feet on the broad ledge, almost on a level with the head of "Good-business," and grandmother told us the fine story of Ivan the Warrior, and Miron the Hermit, in a smooth stream of pithy, well-chosen words.

"Once lived a wicked captain--Gordion, 
 His soul was black, his conscience was of stone; 
 He hated truth, victims he did not lack, 
 Fast kept in chains, or stretched upon the rack, 
 And, like an owl, in hollow tree concealed, 
 So lived this man, in evil unrevealed. 
 But there was none who roused his hate and fear 
 Like Hermit Miron, to the people dear. 
 Mild and benign, but fierce to fight for truth, 
 His death was planned without remorse or ruth. 
 The captain calls--most trusted of his band-- 
 Ivan the Warrior, by whose practiced hand 
 The Monk, unarmed and guileless, must be slain. 
 'Ivan!' he said, 'too long that scheming brain 
 Of Hermit Miron has defied my power. 
 This proud Monk merits death, and now the hour 
 Has struck when he must say farewell to earth. 
 A curse he has been to it, from his birth. 
 Go, seize him by his venerable beard, 
 And to me bring the head which cowards have feared. 
 My dogs with joy shall greedily devour 
 The head of him who thirsted after power.' 
 Ivan, obedient, went upon his way; 
 But to himself he bitterly did say: 
  'It is not I who do this wicked deed; 
  I go because my master I must heed.' 
 His sharp word he hid lest it should betray 
 The evil designs in his mind that day. 
 The Monk he salutes with dissembling voice: 
 'To see you in health I greatly rejoice! 

Your blessing, my Father! And God bless you!'

The Monk laughed abrutly, his words were few:

'Enough, Ivan! Your lies do not deceive.

That God knows all, I hope you do believe.

Against His will, nor good nor ill is done.

I know, you see, why you to me have come.'

In shame before the Monk Ivan stood still;

In fear of this man he had come to kill.

From leathern sheath his sword he proudly drew;

The shining blade he rubbed till it looked new.

T meant to take you unawares,' he said;

'To kill you prayerless; now I am afraid.

To God you now shall have some time to pray.

I 'll give you time for all you want to say,

For me, for you, for all, born and unborn,

And then I 'll send you where your prayers have gone.'

The Hermit knelt; above him spread an oak

Which bowed its head before him. Then he spoke,

In archness smiling. 'Oh, Ivan, think well!

How long my prayer will take I cannot tell.

Had you not better kill me straight away

Lest waiting tire you, furious at delay?'

Ivan in anger frowned, and said in boast,

'My word is given, and though at my post

You keep me a century, I will wait.

So pray in peace, nor your ardor abate.'

The shadows of even fell on the Monk,

And all through the night in prayer he was sunk;

From dawn till sunset, through another night;

From golden summer days to winter's blight

So ran on, year by year, old Miron's prayer.

And to disturb him Ivan did not dare.

The sapling oak its lofty branches reared

Into the sky, while all around appeared

Its offshoots, into a thick forest grown.

And all the time the holy prayer went on,

And still continues to this very day.

The old man softly to his God doth pray,

And to Our Lady, the mother of all,

To help men and women who faint and fall,

To succor the weak, to the sad give joy.

Ivanushka, Warrior, stands close by,

His bright sword long has been covered with dust.

Corroded his armor by biting rust,

Long fallen to pieces his brave attire.

His body is naked and covered with mire.

The heat does but sear, no warmth does impart;

Such fate as his would freeze the stoutest heart.

Fierce wolves and savage bears from him do flee,

From snowstorm and from frost alike he 's free;

No strength has he to move from that dread spot

Or lift his hands. To speak is not his lot.

Let us be warned by his terrible fate,

Nor of meek obedience let us prate.

If we are ordered to do something wrong,

Our duty is then to stand firm and be strong.

But for us sinners still the Hermit prays,

Still flows his prayer to God, e'en in these days--

A dear, bright river, flowing to the sea."

* *****#a

Before grandmother had reached the end of her story, I had noticed that "Good-business" was, for some reason, agitated; he was fidgeting restlessly with his hands, taking off his spectacles and putting them on again', or waving them to keep time with the rhythm of the words, nodding his head, putting his fingers into his eyes, or rubbing them energetically, and passing the palms of his hands over his forehead and cheeks, as if he were perspiring freely. When any one of the others moved, coughed, or scraped his feet on the floor, the boarder hissed: "Ssh!"; and when grandmother ceased speaking, and sat rubbing her perspiring face with the sleeve of her blouse, he jumped up noisily, and putting out his hands as if he felt giddy, he babbled:

"I say! That's wonderful! It ought to be written down; really, it ought. It is terribly true too. . . . Our . . ."

Every one could see now that he was crying; his eyes were full of tears, which flowed so copiously that his eyes were bathed in them--it was a strange and pitiful sight. He looked so comical as he ran about the kitchen, or rather clumsily hopped about--swinging his glasses before his nose; desirous of putting them on again but unable to slip the wires over his ears--that Uncle Peter laughed, and the others were silent from embarrassment. Grandmother said harshly:

"Write it down by all means, if you like. There 's no harm in that. And I know plenty more of the same kind."

"No, that is the only one I want. It is--so-- dreadfully Russian!" cried the boarder excitedly; and standing stock-still in the middle of the kitchen, he began to talk loudly, clearing the air with his right hand, and holding his glasses in the other. He spoke for some time in a frenzied manner, his voice rising to a squeak, stamping his feet, and often repeating himself:
-?s
"If we are ordered to do something wrong our duty

is then to be firm and strong. True! True!"

Then suddenly his voice broke, he ceased speaking, looked round on all of us, and quietly left the room, hanging his head with a guilty air.

The other guests laughed, and glanced at each other with expressions of embarrassment. Grandmother moved farther back against the stove, into the shadow, and was heard to sigh heavily.

Rubbing the palm of her hand across her thick red lips, Petrovna observed:

"He seems to be in a temper."

"No," replied Uncle Peter; "that's only his way."

Grandmother left the stove, and in silence began to heat the samovar; and Uncle Peter added, in a slow voice:

"The Lord makes people like that sometimes-- freaks."

"Bachelors always play the fool," Valei threw out gruffly, at which there was a general laugh; but Uncle Peter drawled:

"He was actually in tears. It is a case of the pike nibbling what the roach hardly--"

I began to get tired of all this. I was conscious of a heartache, I was greatly astonished by the behavior of "Good-business," and very sorry for him. I could not get his swimming eyes out of my mind.

That night he did not sleep at home, but he returned the next day, after dinner--quiet, crushed, obviously embarrassed.

"I made a scene last night," he said to grandmother, with the air of a guilty child. "You are not angry?"

"Why should I be angry?"

"Why, because I interrupted . . . and talked . . ."

"You offended no one."

I felt that grandmother was afraid of him. She did not look him in the face, and spoke in a subdued tone, and was quite unlike herself.

He drew near to her and said with amazing simplicity:

"You see, I am so terribly lonely. I have no one belonging to me. I am always silent--silent; and then, all on a sudden, my soul seems to boil over, as if it had been torn open. At such times I could speak to stones and trees--"

Grandmother moved away from him.

"If you were to get married now," she began.

"Eh?" he cried, wrinkling up his face, and ran out, throwing his arms up wildly.

Grandmother looked after him frowning, and took a pinch of snuff; after which she sternly admonished me:

"Don't you hang round him so much. Do you hear? God knows what sort of a man he is!"

But I was attracted to him afresh. I had seen how his face changed and fell when he said "terribly lonely"; there was something in those words which I well understood, and my heart was touched. I went to find him.

I looked, from the yard, into the window of his room; it was empty, and looked like a lumber-room into which had been hurriedly thrown all sorts of unwanted things--as unwanted and as odd as its occupier. I went into the garden, and there I saw him by the pit. He was bending over, with his hands behind his head, his elbows resting on his knees, and was seated uncomfortably on the end of a half-burnt plank. The greater part of this plank was buried in the earth, but the end of it struck out, glistening like coal, above the top of the pit, which was grown over with nettles.

The very fact of his being in such an uncomfortable place made me look upon this man in a still more favorable light. He did not notice me for some time; he was gazing beyond me with his half-blind, owl-like eyes, when he suddenly asked in a tone of vexation:

"Did you want me for anything
^?
"

"No."

"Why are you here then?"

"I could n't say."

He took off his glasses, polished them with his red and black spotted handkerchief, and said:

"Well, climb up here."

When I was sitting beside him, he put his arm round my shoulders and pressed me to him.

"Sit down. Now let us sit still and be quiet. Will that suit you? This is the same--* Are you obstinate?"

"Yes."

"Good-business!"

We were silent a long time. It was a quiet, mild evening, one of those melancholy evenings of late summer, when, in spite of the profusion of flowers, signs of decay are visible, and every hour brings impoverishment; when the earth, having already exhausted its luxuriant summer odors, smells of nothing but a chill dampness; when the air is curiously transparent, and the daws dart aimlessly to and fro against the red sky, arousing a feeling of unhappiness. Silence reigned; and any sound, such as the fluttering of birds or the rustling of fallen leaves, struck one as being unnaturally loud, and caused a shuddering start, which soon died away into that torpid stillness which seemed to encompass the earth and cast a spell over the heart. In such moments as these are born thoughts of a peculiar purity--ethereal thoughts, thin, transparent as a cobweb, incapable of being expressed in words. They come and go quickly, like falling stars, kindling a flame of sorrow in the soul, soothing and disturbing it at the same time; and the soul is, as it were, on fire, and, being plastic, receives an impression which lasts for all time.

Pressed close to the boarder's warm body, I gazed, with him, through the black branches of the apple tree, at the red sky, following the flight of the flapping rooks, and noticing how the dried poppy-heads shook on their stems, scattering their coarse seeds; and I observed the ragged, dark blue clouds with livid edges, which stretched over the fields, and the crows flying heavily under the clouds to their nests in the burial-ground.

It was all beautiful; and that evening it all seemed especially beautiful, and in harmony with my feelings. Sometimes, with a heavy sigh, my companion said:

"This is quite all right, my boy, is n't it? And you don't feel it damp or cold?"

But when the sky became overcast, and the twilight, laden with damp, spread over everything, he said:

"Well, it can't be helped. We shall have to go in."

He halted at the garden gate and said softly:

"Your grandmother is a splendid woman. Oh, what a treasure!" And he closed his eyes with a smile and recited in a low, very distinct voice:

"'Let us be warned by his terrible fate, 
  Nor of meek obedience let us prate. 
  If we are ordered to do something wrong, 
  Our duty is then to stand firm and be strong.'" 

"Don't forget that, my boy!"

And pushing me before him, he asked:

"Can you write
^?
"

"No."

"You must learn; and when you have learned, write down grandmother's stories. You will find it worth while, my boy."

And so we became friends; and from that day I went to see "Good-business" whenever I felt inclined; and sitting on one of the cases, or on some rags, I used to watch him melt lead and heat copper till it was red-hot, beat layers of iron on a little anvil with an eleganthandled, light hammer, or work with a smooth file and a saw of emery, which was as fine as a thread. He weighed everything on his delicately adjusted copper scales; and when he had poured various liquids into bulging, white vessels, he would watch them till they smoked and filled the room with an acrid odor, and then with a wrinkled-up face he would consult a thick book, biting his red lips, or softly humming in his husky voice:

"O Rose of Sharon--!"

"What are you doing?"

"I am making something, my boy."

"What?"

"Ah--that I can't tell you. You would n't understand."

"Grandfather says he would not be surprised if you were coining false money."

"Your grandfather? M'm! Well, he says that for something to say. Money's all nonsense, my boy."

"How should we buy bread without it?"