My Childhood
When she had finished dancing, grandmother returned to her place by the samovar. They all applauded her, and as she put her hair straight, she said:
"That is enough! You have never seen real dancing. At our home in Balakya, there was one young girl — I have forgotten her name now, with many others — but when you saw her dance you cried for joy. To look at her was a treat. You didn't want anything else. How I envied her — sinner that I was!"
"Singers and dancers are the greatest people in the world," said Nyanya Eugenia gravely, and she began to sing something about King David, while Uncle Jaakov, embracing Tsiganok, said to him:
"You ought to dance in the wineshops. You would turn people's heads."
"I wish I could sing!" complained Tsiganok. "If God had given me a voice I should have been singing ten years by now, and should have gone on singing if only as a monk."
They all drank vodka, and Gregory drank an extra
lot. As she poured out glass after glass for him, grandmother warned him:
"Take care, Grisha, or you '11 become quite blind."
"I don't care! I 've no more use for my eyesight," he replied firmly.
He drank, but he did not get tipsy, only becoming more loquacious every moment; and he spoke to me about my father nearly all the time.
"A man with a large heart was my friend Maxim Savatyevitch ..."
Grandmother sighed as she corroborated:
"Yes, indeed he was — a true child of God."
All this was extremely interesting, and held me spellbound, and filled my heart with a tender, not unpleasant sadness. For sadness and gladness live within us side by side, almost inseparable; the one succeeding the other with an elusive, unappreciable swiftness.
Once Uncle Jaakov, being rather tipsy, began to rend his shirt, and to clutch furiously at his curly hair, his grizzled mustache, his nose and his pendulous lip.
"What am I?" he howled, dissolved in tears. "Why am I here?" And striking himself on the cheek, forehead and chest, he sobbed: "Worthless, degraded creature! Lost soul!"
"A — ah! You 're right!" growled Gregory.
But grandmother, who was also not quite sober, said to her son, catching hold of his hand:
"That will do, Jaasha. God knows how to teach us."
, When she had been drinking, she was even more attractive; her eyes grew darker and smiled, shedding the warmth of her heart upon every one. Brushing aside the handkerchief which made her face too hot, she would say in a tipsy voice:
"Lord! Lord! How good everything is! Don't you see how good everything is?"
And this was a cry from her heart — the watchword of her whole life.
I was much impressed by the tears and cries of my happy-go-lucky uncle, and I asked grandmother why he cried and scolded and beat himself so.
"You want to know everything!" she said reluctantly, quite unlike her usual manner. "But wait a bit. You will be enlightened about this affair quite soon enough."
My curiosity was still more excited by this, and I went to the workshop and attacked Ivan on the subject, but he would not answer me. He just laughed quietly with a sidelong glance at Gregory, and hustled me out, crying:
"Give over now, and run away. If you don't I '11 put you in the vat and dye you."
Gregory, standing before the broad, low stove, with vats cemented to it, stirred them with a long black
poker, lifting it up now and again to see the colored drops fall from its end. The brightly burning flames played on the skin-apron, multi-colored like the chasuble of a priest, which he wore. The dye simmered in the vats; an acrid vapor extended in a thick cloud to the door. Gregory glanced at me from under his glasses, with his clouded, bloodshot eyes, and said abruptly to Ivan:
"You are wanted in the yard. Can't you see1?"
But when Tsiganok had gone into the yard, Gregory, sitting on a sack of santaline, beckoned me to him.
"Come here!"
Drawing me on to his knee, and rubbing his warm, soft beard against my cheek, he said in a tone of reminiscence:
"Your uncle beat and tortured his wife to death, and now his conscience pricks him. Do you understand? You want to understand everything, you seej and so you get muddled."
Gregory was as simple as grandmother, but his words were disconcerting, and he seemed to look through and through every one.
"How did he kill her?" he went on in a leisurely tone. "Why, like this. He was lying in bed with her, and he threw the counterpane over her head, and held it down while he beat her. Why"? He doesn't know himself why he did it."
And paying no attention to Ivan, who, having returned with an armful of goods from the yard, was squatting before the fire, warming his hands, the head workman suggested:
"Perhaps it was because she was better than he was, and he was envious of her. The Kashmirins do not like good people, my boy. They are jealous of them. They cannot stand them, and try to get them out of the way. Ask your grandmother how they got rid of your father. She will tell you everything; she hates deceit, because she does not understand it. She may be reckoned among the saints, although she drinks wine and takes snuff. She is a splendid woman. Keep hold of her, and never let her go."
He pushed me towards the door, and I went out into the yard, depressed and scared. Vaniushka overtook me at the entrance of the house, and whispered softly:
"Don't be afraid of him. He is all right. Look him straight in the eyes. That 's what he likes."
It was all very strange and distressing. I hardly knew any other existence, but I remembered vaguely that my father and mother used not to live like this; they had a different way of speaking, and a different idea of happiness. They always went about together and sat close to each other. They laughed very frequently and for a long time together, in the evenings,
as they sat at the window and sang at the top of their voices; and people gathered together in the street and looked at them. The raised faces of these people as they looked up reminded me comically of dirty plates after dinner. But here people seldom laughed, and when they did it was not always easy to guess what they were laughing at. They often raged at one another, and secretly muttered threats against each other in the corners. The children were subdued and neglected; beaten down to earth like the dust by the rain. I felt myself a stranger in the house, and all the circumstances of my existence in it were nothing but a series of stabs, pricking me on to suspicion, and compelling me to study what went on with the closest attention.
My friendship with Tsiganok grew apace. Grandmother was occupied with household duties from sunrise till late at night, and I hung round Tsiganok nearly the whole day. He still used to put his hand under the rod whenever grandfather thrashed me, and the next day, displaying his swollen fingers, he would complain:
"There 's no sense in it! It does not make it any lighter for you, and look what it does to me. I won't stand it any longer, so there!"
But the next time he put himself in the way of being needlessly hurt just the same.
"But I thought you did not mean to do it again?" I would say.
"I didn't mean to, but it happened somehow. I did it without thinking."
Soon after this I learned something about Tsiganok which increased my interest in and love for him.
Every Friday he used to harness the bay gelding Sharapa, grandmother's pet — a cunning, saucy, dainty creature — to the sledge. Then he put on his fur coat, which reached to his knees, and his heavy cap, and tightly buckling his green belt, set out for the market to buy provisions. Sometimes it was very late before he returned, and the whole household became uneasy. Some one would run to the window every moment, and breathing on the panes to thaw the ice, would look up and down the road.
"Isn't he in sight yet?'
"No."
Grandmother was always more concerned than any of them.
"Alas!" she would exclaim to her sons and my grandfather, "you have ruined both the man and the horse. I wonder you aren't ashamed of yourselves, you conscienceless creatures! Ach! You family of fools, you tipplers! God will punish you for this."
"That is enough!" growled grandfather, scowling. "This is the last time it happens."
Sometimes Tsiganok did not return till midday. My uncles and grandfather hurried out to the yard to meet him, and grandmother ambled after them like a bear, taking snuff with a determined air, because it was her hour for taking it. The children ran out, and the joyful unloading of the sledge began. It was full of pork, dead birds, and joints of all kinds of meat.
"Have you bought all we told you to?" asked grandfather, probing the load with a sidelong glance of his sharp eyes.
"Yes, it is all right," answered Ivan gaily, as he jumped about the yard, and slapped his mittened hands together, to warm himself.
"Don't wear your mittens out. They cost money," said grandfather sternly. "Have you any change1?"
"No."
Grandfather walked quietly round the load and said in a low tone:
"Again you have bought too much. However, you can't do it without money, can you? I '11 have no more of this." And he strode away scowling.
My uncles joyfully set to work on the load, whistling as they balanced bird, fish, goose-giblets, calves' feet, and enormous pieces of meat on their hands.
"Well, that was soon unloaded!" they cried with loud approval.
Uncle Michael especially was in raptures, jumping
about the load, sniffing hard at the poultry, smacking his lips with relish, closing his restless eyes in ecstasy. He resembled his father; he had the same dried-up appearance, only he was taller and his hair was dark.
Slipping his chilled hands up his sleeves, he inquired of Tsiganok:
"How much did my father give you?"
"Five roubles."
"There is fifteen roubles' worth here! How much did you spend?"
"Four roubles, ten kopecks."
"Perhaps the other ninety kopecks is in your pocket. Haven't you noticed, Jaakov, how money gets all over the place?'
Uncle Jaakov, standing in the frost in his shirtsleeves, laughed quietly, blinking in the cold blue light.
"You have some brandy for us, Vanka, haven't you1?" he asked lazily.
Grandmother meanwhile was unharnessing the horse.
"There, my little one! There! Spoiled child! There, God's plaything!"
Great Sharapa, tossing his thick mane, fastened his white teeth in her shoulder, pushed his silky nose into her hair, gazed into her face with contented eyes, and shaking the frost from his eyelashes, softly neighed.
"Ah! you want some bread."
She thrust a large, salted crust in his mouth, and making her apron into a bag under his nose, she thoughtfully watched him eat.
Tsiganok, himself as playful as a young horse, sprang to her side.
"He is such a good horse, Grandma! And so clever!"
"Get away! Don't try your tricks on me!" cried grandmother, stamping her foot. "You know that I am not fond of you to-day."
She afterwards explained to me that Tsiganok had not bought so much in the market as he had stolen. "If grandfather gives him five roubles, he spends three and steals three roubles' worth," she said sadly. "He takes a pleasure in stealing. He is like a spoiled child. He tried it once, and it turned out well; he was laughed at and praised for his success, and that is how he got into the habit of thieving. And grandfather, who in his youth ate the bread of poverty till he wanted no more of it, has grown greedy in his old age, and money is dearer to him now than the blood of his own children! He is glad even of a present! As for Michael and Jaakov ..."
She made a gesture of contempt and was silent a moment; then looking fixedly at the closed lid of her snuff-box, she went on querulously:
"But there, Lenya, that 's a bit of work done by a
blind woman ...Dame Fortune ...there she sits spinning for us and we can't even choose the pattern. ...But there it is! If they caught Ivan thieving they would beat him to death."
And after another silence she continued quietly:
"Ah! we have plenty of principles, but we don't put them into practice."
The next day I begged Vanka not to steal any more. "If you do they '11 beat you to death."
"They won't touch me ... I should soon wriggle out of their clutches. I am as lively as a mettlesome horse," he said, laughing; but the next minute his face fell. "Of course I know quite well that it is wrong and risky to steal. I do it ...just to amuse myself, because I am bored. And I don't save any of the money. Your uncles get it all out of me before the week is over. But I don't care! Let them take it. I have more than enough."
Suddenly he took me up in his arms, shaking me gently.
"You will be a strong man, you are so light and slim, and your bones are so firm. I say, why don't you learn to play on the guitar? Ask Uncle Jaakov! But you are too small yet, that 's a pity! You 're little, but you have a temper of your own! You don't like your grandfather much, do you?"
"I don't know."
"I don't like any of the Kashmirins except your grandmother. Let the devil like them!"
"What about me?"
"You? You are not a Kashmirin. You are a Pyeshkov...That's different blood — a different stock altogether."
Suddenly he gave me a violent squeeze.
"Ah!" he almost groaned. "If only I had a good voice for singing! Good Lord! what a stir I should make in the world! ...Run away now, old chap. I must get on with my work."
He set me down on the floor, put a handful of fine nails into his mouth, and began to stretch and nail damp breadths of black material on a large square board.
His end came very soon after this.
It happened thus. Leaning up against a partition by the gate in the yard was placed a large oaken cross with stout, knotty arms. It had been there a long time. I had noticed it in the early days of my life in the house, when it had been new and yellow, but now it was blackened by the autumn rains. It gave forth the bitter odor of barked oak, and it was in the way in the crowded, dirty yard.
Uncle Jaakov had bought it to place over the grave of his wife, and had made a vow to carry it on his shoulders to the cemetery on the anniversary of her
death, which fell on a Saturday at the beginning of winter.
It was frosty and windy and there had been a fall of snow. Grandfather and grandmother, with the three grandchildren, had gone early to the cemetery to hear the requiem; I was left at home as a punishment for some fault.
My uncles, dressed alike in short black fur coats, lifted the cross from the ground and stood under its arms. Gregory and some men not belonging to the yard raised the heavy beams with difficulty, and placed the cross on the broad shoulders of Tsiganok. He tottered, and his legs seemed to give way.
"Are you strong enough to carry it1?" asked Gregory.
"I don't know. It seems heavy."
"Open the gate, you blind devil!" cried Uncle Michael angrily.
And Uncle Jaakov said:
"You ought to be ashamed of yourself, Vanka. You are stronger than the two of us together."
But Gregory, throwing open the gate, persisted in advising Ivan:
"Take care you don't break down! Go, and may God be with you!"
"Bald-headed fool!" cried Uncle Michael, from the street.
All the people in the yard, meanwhile, laughed and talked loudly, as if they were glad to get rid of the cross.
Gregory Ivanovitch took my hand and led me to the workshop, saying kindly:
"Perhaps, under the circumstances, grandfather won't thrash you to-day."
He sat me on a pile of woolens ready for dyeing, carefully wrapping them round me as high as my shoulders; and inhaling the vapor which rose from the vats, he said thoughtfully:
"I have known your grandfather for thirty-seven years, my dear. I saw his business at its commencement, and I shall see the end of it. We were friends then — in fact, we started and planned out the business together. He is a clever man, is your grandfather! He meant to be master, but I did not know it. However, God is more clever than any of us. He has only to smile and the wisest man will blink like a fool. You don't understand yet all that is said and done, but you must learn to understand everything. An orphan's life is a hard one. Your father, Maxim Savatyevitch, was a trump. He was well-educated too. That is why your grandfather did not like him, and would have nothing to do with him."
It was pleasant to listen to these kind words and to watch the red and gold flames playing in the stove,
and the milky cloud of steam which rose from the vats and settled like a dark blue rime on the slanting boards of the roof, through the uneven chinks of which the sky could be seen, like strands of blue ribbon. The wind had fallen; the yard looked as if it were strewn with glassy dust; the sledges gave forth a sharp sound as they passed up the street; a blue smoke rose from the chimneys of the house; faint shadows glided over the snow ...also telling a story.
Lean, long-limbed Gregory, bearded and hatless, large-eared, just like a good-natured wizard, stirred the boiling dye, instructing me the while.
"Look every one straight in the eyes. And if a dog should fly at you, do the same; he will let you alone then."
His heavy spectacles pressed on the bridge of his nose, the tip of which was blue like grandmother's — and for the same reason.
"What is that?" he exclaimed suddenly, listening; then closing the door of the stove with his foot, he ran, or rather hopped, across the yard, and I dashed after him. In the middle of the kitchen floor lay Tsiganok, face upwards; broad streaks of light from the window fell on his head, his chest, and on his feet. His forehead shone strangely; his eyebrows were raised; his squinting eyes gazed intently at the blackened ceiling; a red-flecked foam bubbled from
his discolored lips, from the corners of which also flowed blood over his cheeks, his neck, and on to the floor; and a thick stream of blood crept from under his back. His legs were spread out awkwardly, and it was plain that his trousers were wet; they clung damply to the boards, which had been polished with sand, and shone like the sun. The rivulets of blood intersected the streams of light, and, showing up very vividly, flowed towards the threshold.
Tsiganok was motionless, except for the fact that as he lay with his hands alongside his body, his fingers scratched at the floor, and his stained fingernails shone in the sunlight.
Nyanya Eugenia, crouching beside him, put a slender candle into his hand, but he could not hold it and it fell to the floor, the wick being drenched in blood. Nyanya Eugenia picked it up and wiped it dry, and made another attempt to fix it in those restless fingers. A gentle whispering made itself heard in the kitchen; it seemed to blow me away from the door like the wind, but I held firmly to the door-post.
"He stumbled!" Uncle Jaakov was explaining, in a colorless voice, shuddering and turning his head about. His face was gray and haggard; his eyes had lost their color, and blinked incessantly. "He fell, and it fell on top of him ...and hit him on the
back. We should have been disabled if we had not dropped the cross in time."
"This is your doing," said Gregory dully.
"But how ...?"'
"JWdidit!"
All this time the blood was flowing, and by the door had already formed a pool which seemed to grow darker and deeper. With another effusion of bloodflecked foam, Tsiganok roared out as if he were dreaming, and then collapsed, seeming to grow flatter and flatter, as if he were glued to the floor, or sinking through it.
"Michael went on horseback to the church to find father," whispered Uncle Jaakov, "and I brought him here in a cab as quickly as I could. It is a good job that I was not standing under the arms myself, or I should have been like this."
Nyanya Eugenia again fixed the candle in Tsiganok's hand, dropping wax and tears in his palm.
"That 's right! Glue his head to the floor, you careless creature," said Gregory gruffly and rudely.
"What do you mean?"
"Why don't you take off his cap"?"
Nyanya dragged Ivan's cap from his head, which struck dully on the floor. Then it fell to one side and the blood flowed profusely from one side of his mouth only. This went on for a terribly long time. At first
I expected Tsiganok to sit up on the floor with a sigh, and say sleepily, "Phew! It is baking hot!" as he used to do after dinner on Sundays.
But he did not rise; on the contrary he seemed to be sinking into the ground. The sun had withdrawn from him now; its bright beams had grown shorter, and fell only on the window-sill. His whole form grew darker; his fingers no longer moved; the froth had disappeared from his lips. Round his head three candles stood out from the darkness, waving their golden flames, lighting up his dishevelled blue-black hair, and throwing quivering yellow ripples on his swarthy cheek, illuminating the tip of his pointed nose and his blood-stained teeth.
Nyanya, kneeling at his side, shed tears as she lisped: "My little dove! My bird of consolation!"
It was painfully cold. I crept under the table and hid myself there. Then grandfather came tumbling into the kitchen, in his coat of racoon fur; with him came grandmother in a cloak with a fur collar, Uncle Michael, the children, and many people not belonging to the house.
Throwing his coat on the floor, grandfather cried:
"Riff-raff! See what you have done for me, between you, in your carelessness! He would have been worth his weight in gold in five years — that 's certain!"
The coats which had been thrown on the floor hindered me from seeing Ivan, so I crept out and knocked myself against grandfather's legs. He hurled me to one side, as he shook his little red fist threateningly at my uncles.
"You wolves!"
He sat down on a bench, and resting his arms upon itj burst into dry sobs, and said in a shrill voice:
"I know all about it! ... He stuck in your gizzards! That was it! Oh, Vaniushka, poor fool! What have they done to you, eh? 'Rotten reins are good enough for a stranger's horse!' Mother! God has not loved us for the last year, has He? Mother!"
Grandmother, doubled up on the floor, was feeling Ivan's hands and chest, breathing upon his eyes, holding his hands and chafing them. Then, throwing down all the candles, she rose with difficulty to her feet, looking very somber in her shiny black frock, and with her eyes dreadfully wide open, she said in a low voice: "Go, accursed ones!"
All, with the exception of grandfather, straggled out of the kitchen.
Tsiganok was buried without fuss, and was soon forgotten.
CHAPTER IV
I WAS lying in a wide bed, with a thick blanket folded four times around me, listening to grandmother, who was saying her prayers. She was on her knees; and pressing one hand against her breast, she reverently crossed herself from time to time with the other. Out in the yard a hard frost reigned; a greenish moonlight peeped through the ice patterns on the window-panes, falling flatteringly on her kindly face and large nose, and kindling a phosphorescent light in her dark eyes. Her silky, luxuriant tresses were lit up as if by a furnace; her dark dress rustled, falling in ripples from her shoulders and spreading about her on the floor.
When she had finished her prayers grandmother undressed in silence, carefully folding up her clothes and placing them on the trunk in the corner. Then she came to bed. I pretended to be fast asleep.
"You are not asleep, you rogue, you are only making believe," she said softly. "Come, my duck, let 's have some bedclothes!"
Foreseeing what would happen, I could not repress a smile, upon seeing which she cried: "So this is how
you trick your old grandmother?" And taking hold of the blanket she drew it towards her with so much force and skill that I bounced up in the air, and turning over and over fell back with a squash into the soft feather bed, while she said with a chuckle: "What is it, little Hop o' my Thumb? Have you been bitten by a mosquito1?"
But sometimes she prayed for such a long time that I really did fall asleep, and did not hear her come to bed.
The longer prayers were generally the conclusion of a day of trouble, or a day of quarreling and fighting; and it was very interesting to listen to them. Grandmother gave to God a circumstantial account of all that had happened in the house. Bowed down, looking like a great mound, she knelt, at first whispering rapidly and indistinctly, then hoarsely muttering:
"O Lord, Thou knowest that all of us wish to do better. Michael, the elder, ought to have been set up in the town — it will do him harm to be on the river; and the other is a new neighborhood and not overdone. I don't know what will come of it all! There 's father now. Jaakov is his favorite. Can't it be right to love one child more than the others'? He is an obstinate old man; do Thou, O Lord, teach him!"
Gazing at the dark-featured icon, with her large, brilliant eyes, she thus counseled God:
"Send him a good dream, O Lord, to make him understand how he ought to treat his children!"
After prostrating herself and striking her broad forehead on the floor, she again straightened herself, and said coaxingly:
"And send Varvara some happiness! How has she displeased Thee"? Is she more sinful than the others'? Why should a healthy young woman be so afflicted1? And remember Gregory, O Lord! His eyes are getting worse and worse. If he goes blind he will be sent adrift. That will be terrible! He has used up all his strength for grandfather, but do you think it likely that grandfather will help him? O Lord! Lord!"
She remained silent for a long time, with her head bowed meekly, and her hands hanging by her sides, as still as if she had fallen asleep, or had been suddenly frozen.
"What else is there4?" she asked herself aloud, wrinkling her brows.
"O Lord, save all the faithful! Pardon me — accursed fool as I am! — Thou knowest that I do not sin out of malice but out of stupidity." And drawing a deep breath she would say lovingly and contentedly: "Son of God, Thou knowest all! Father, Thou seest all things."
I was very fond of grandmother's God Who seemed so near to her, and I often said:
"Tell me something about God."
She used to speak about Him in a peculiar manner — very quietly, strangely drawing out her words, closing her eyes; and she made a point of always sitting down and arranging her head-handkerchief very deliberately before she began.
"God's seat is on the hills, amidst the meadows of Paradise; it is an altar of sapphires under silver linden trees which flower all the year round, for in Paradise there is no winter, nor even autumn, and the flowers never wither, for joy is the divine favor. And round about God many angels fly like flakes of snow; and it may be even that bees hum there, and white doves fly between Heaven and earth, telling God all about us and everybody. And here on earth you and I and grandfather each has been given an angel. God treats us all equally. For instance, your angel will go and tell God: 'Lexei put his tongue out at grandfather.' And God says: 'All right, let the old man whip him.' And so it is with all of us; God gives to all what they deserve — to some grief, to others joy. And so all is right that He does, and the angels rejoice, and spread their wings and sing to Him without ceasing: 'Glory be unto Thee, O God; Glory be unto Thee.' And He just smiles on them, and it is enough for them — and more." And she would smile herself, shaking her head from side to side.
"Have you seen that?"
"No, I have not seen it, but I know."
When she spoke about God, or Heaven, or the angels, she seemed to shrink in size; her face grew younger, and her liquid eyes emitted a curious warm radiance. I used to take her heavy, satiny plait in my hands, and wind it round my neck as I sat quite still and listened to the endless but never tedious story.
"It is not given to men to see God — their sight is dim! Only the saints may look upon Him face to face. But I have seen angels myself; they reveal themselves sometimes to souls in a state of grace. I was standing in church at an early Mass, and I saw two moving about the altar like clouds. One could see everything, through them, growing brighter and brighter, and their gossamer-like wings touched the floor. They moved about the altar, helping old Father Elia, and supporting his elbows as he raised his feeble hands in prayer. He was very old, and being almost blind, stumbled frequently; but that day he got through the Mass quickly, and was finished early. When I saw them I nearly died of joy. My heart seemed as if it would burst; my tears ran down. Ah, how beautiful it was! Oh, Lenka, dear heart, where God is — whether in Heaven or earth — all goes well."
"But you don't mean to say that everything goes well here — in our house?"
Making the sign of the cross grandmother answered:
"Our Lady be praised — everything goes well."
This irritated me. I could not agree that things were going well in our household. From my point of view they were becoming more and more intolerable.
One day, as I passed the door of Uncle Michael's room I saw Aunt Natalia, not fully dressed, with her hands folded on her breast, pacing up and down like a creature distraught, and moaning, not loudly, but in a tone of agony:
"My God, take me under Thy protection! Remove me from here!"
I could sympathize with her prayer as well as I could understand Gregory when he growled:
"As soon as I am quite blind they will turn me out to beg; it will be better than this, anyhow."
And I wished that he would make haste and go blind, for I meant to seize the opportunity to go away with him so that we could start begging together. I had already mentioned the matter to Gregory, and he had replied, smiling in his beard:
"That 's right! We will go together. But I shall show myself in the town. There 's a grandson of Vassili Kashmirin's there — his daughter's son; he may give me something to do."
More than once I noticed a blue swelling under the
sunken eyes of Aunt Natalia; and sometimes a swollen lip was thrown into relief by her yellow face.
"Does Uncle Michael beat her, then?" I asked grandmother. And she answered with a sigh:
"Yes, he beats her, but not very hard — the devil! Grandfather does not object so long as he does it at night. He is ill-natured, and she — she is like a jelly!
"But he does not beat her as much as he used to," she continued in a more cheerful tone. "He just gives her a blow on the mouth, or boxes her ears, or drags her about by the hair for a minute or so; but at one time he used to torture her for hours together. Grandfather beat me one Easter Day from dinner-time till bed-time. He kept on; he just stopped to get his breath sometimes, and then started again. And he used a strap too!"
"But why did he do it?"
"I forget now. Another time he knocked me about till I was nearly dead, and then kept me without food for five hours. I was hardly alive when he had finished with me."
I was thunderstruck. Grandmother was twice as big as grandfather, and it was incredible that he should be able to get the better of her like this.
"Is he stronger than you, then?" I asked.
"Not stronger, but older. Besides, he is my hus-
band, he has to answer for me to God; but my duty is to suffer patiently."
It was an interesting and pleasing sight to see her dusting the icon and cleaning its ornamentation; it was richly adorned with pearls, silver and colored gems in the crown, and as she took it gently in her hands she gazed at it with a smile, and said in a tone of feeling:
"See what a sweet face it is!" And crossing herself and kissing it, she went on: "Dusty art thou, and begrimed, Mother, Help of Christians, Joy of the Elect! Look, Lenia, darling, how small the writing is, and what tiny characters they are; and yet it is all quite distinct. It is called The Twelve Holy-Days,' and in the middle you see the great Mother of God by predestination immaculate; and here is written: 'Mourn not for me, Mother, because I am about to be laid in the grave.' "
Sometimes it seemed to me as if she played with the icon as earnestly and seriously as my Cousin Ekaterina with her doll.
She often saw devils, sometimes several together, sometimes one alone.
"One clear moonlight night, during the great Fast, I was passing the Rudolphovs' house, and looking up I saw, on the roof, a devil sitting close to the chimney! He was all black, and he was holding his horned head over the top of the chimney and sniffing vigorously.
There he sat sniffing and grunting, the great, unwieldy creature, with his tail on the roof, scraping with his feet all the time. I made the sign of the Cross at him and said: 'Christ is risen from the dead, and His enemies are scattered.' At that he gave a low howl and slipped head over heels from the roof to the yard — so he was scattered! They must have been cooking meat at the Rudolphovs' that day, and he was enjoying the smell of it."
I laughed at her picture of the devil flying head over heels off the roof, and she laughed too as she said:
"They are as fond of playing tricks as children. One day I was doing the washing in the washhouse and it was getting late, when suddenly the door of the little room burst open and in rushed lots of little red, green and black creatures like cockroaches, and all sizes, and spread themselves all over the place. I flew towards the door, but I could not get past; there I was unable to move hand or foot amongst a crowd of devils! They filled the whole place so that I could not turn round. They crept about my feet, plucked at my dress, and crowded round me so that I had not even room to cross myself. Shaggy, and soft, and warm, somewhat resembling cats, though they walked on their hind legs, they went round and round me, peering into everything, showing their teeth like mice, blinking their small green
eyes, almost piercing me with their horns, and sticking out their little tails — they were like pigs' tails. Oh, my dear! I seemed to be going out of my mind. And didn't they push me about too! The candle nearly went out, the water in the copper became luke-warm, the washing was all thrown about the floor. Ah! your very breath was trouble and sorrow."
Closing my eyes, I could visualize the threshold of the little chamber with its gray cobble-stones, and the unclean stream of shaggy creatures of diverse colors which gradually filled the washhouse. I could see them blowing out the candle and thrusting out their impudent pink tongues. It was a picture both comical and terrifying.
Grandmother was silent a minute, shaking her head, before she burst out again:
"And I saw some fiends too, one wintry night, when it was snowing. I was coming across the Dinkov Causeway — the place where, if you remember, your Uncle Michael and your Uncle Jaakov tried to drown your father in an ice-hole — and I was just going to take the lower path, when there came the sounds of hissing and hooting, and I looked up and saw a team of three raven-black horses tearing towards me. On the coachman's place stood a great fat devil, in a red nightcap, with protruding teeth. He was holding the reins, made of forged iron chains, with outstretched arms, and as
there was no way round, the horses flew right over the pond, and were hidden by a cloud of snow. All those sitting in the sledge behind were devils too; there they sat, hissing and screaming and waving their nightcaps. In all, seven troikas like this tore by, as if they had been fire-engines, all with black horses, and all carrying a load of thoroughbred devils. They pay visits to each other, you know, and drive about in the night to their different festivities. I expect that was a devil's wedding that I saw."
One had to believe grandmother, because she spoke so simply and convincingly.
But the best of all her stories was the one which told how Our Lady went about the suffering earth, and how she commanded the woman-brigand, or the "Amazon-chief" Engalichev, not to kill or rob Russian people. And after that came the stories about Blessed Alexei; about Ivan the Warrior, and Vassili the Wise; of the Priest Kozlya, and the beloved child of God; and the terrible stories of Martha Posadnitz, of Baba Ustye the robber chief, of Mary the sinner of Egypt, and of sorrowing mothers of robber sons. The fairy-tales, and stories of old times, and the poems which she knew were without number.
She feared no one — neither grandfather, nor devils, nor any of the powers of evil; but she was terribly afraid of black cockroaches, and could feel their pres-
ence when they were a long way from her. Sometimes she would wake me in the night whispering:
"Oleysha, dear, there is a cockroach crawling about. Do get rid of it, for goodness' sake."
Half-asleep, I would light the candle and creep about on the floor seeking the enemy — a quest in which I did not always succeed at once.
"No, there's not a sign of one," I would say; but lying quite still with her head muffled up in the bedclothes, she would entreat me in a faint voice:
"Oh, yes, there is one there! Do look again, please. I am sure there is one about somewhere."
And she was never mistaken. Sooner or later I found the cockroach, at some distance from the bed; and throwing the blanket off her she would breathe a sigh of relief and smile as she said:
"Have you killed it? Thank God! Thank you."
If I did not succeed in discovering the insect, she could not go to sleep again, and I could feel how she trembled in the silence of the night; and I heard her whisper breathlessly:
"It is by the door. Now it has crawled under the trunk."
"Why are you so frightened of cockroaches'?"
"I don't know myself," she would answer, reasonably enough. "It is the way the horrid black things crawl about. God has given a meaning to all other vermin:
woodlice show that the house is damp; bugs mean that the walls are dirty; lice foretell an illness, as every one knows; but these creatures! — who knows what powers they possess, or what they live on?"
One day when she was on her knees, conversing earnestly with God, grandfather, throwing open the door, shouted hoarsely:
"Well, Mother, God has afflicted us again. We are on fire."
"What are you talking about?" cried grandmother, jumping up from the floor; and they both rushed into the large parlor, making a great noise with their feet. "Eugenia, take down the icons. Natalia, dress the baby."
Grandmother gave her orders in a stern voice of authority, but all grandfather did was to mutter: Ug — h!"
I ran into the kitchen. The window looking on to the yard shone like gold, and yellow patches of light appeared on the floor, and Uncle Jaakov, who was dressing, trod on them with his bare feet, and jumped about as if they had burned him, shrieking:
"This is Mischka's doing. He started the fire, and then went out."
"Peace, cur!" said grandmother, pushing him towards the door so roughly that he nearly fell.
Through the frost on the window-panes the burning roof of the workshop was visible, with the curling flames pouring out from its open door. It was a still night, and the color of the flames was not spoiled by any admixture of smoke; while just above them hovered a dark cloud which, however, did not hide from our sight the silver stream of the Mlethchna Road. The snow glittered with a livid brilliance, and the walls of the house tottered and shook from side to side, as if about to hurl themselves into that burning corner of the yard where the flames disported themselves so gaily as they poured through the broad red cracks in the walls of the workshop, dragging crooked, red-hot nails out with them. Gold and red ribbons wound themselves about the dark beams of the roof, and soon enveloped it entirely; but the slender chimney-pot stood up straight in the midst of it all, belching forth clouds of smoke. A gentle crackling sound like the rustle of silk beat against our windows, and all the time the flames were spreading till the workshop, adorned by them, as it were, looked like the iconostasis in church, and became more and more attractive to me.
Throwing a heavy fur coat over my head and thrusting my feet into the first boots that came handy, I ran out to the porch and stood on the steps, stupefied and blinded by the brilliant play of light, dazed by the yells of my grandfather, and uncles, and Gregory, and
alarmed by grandmother's behavior, for she had wrapped an empty sack round her head, enveloped her body in a horse-cloth, and was running straight into the flames. She disappeared, crying, "The vitriol, you fools! It will explode!"
"Keep her back, Gregory!" roared grandfather. "Aie! she's done for — !"
But grandmother reappeared at this moment, blackened with smoke, half-fainting, bent almost double over the bottle of vitriolic oil which she was carrying in her stretched-out hands.
"Father, get the horse out!" she cried hoarsely, coughing and spluttering, "and take this thing off my shoulders. Can't you see it is on fire?"
Gregory dragged the smoldering horse-cloth from her shoulders, and then, working hard enough for two men, went on shoveling large lumps of snow into the door of the workshop. My uncle jumped about him with an ax in his hands, while grandfather ran round grandmother, throwing snow over her; then she put the bottle into a snowdrift, and ran to the gate, where there were a great many people gathered together. After greeting them, she said:
"Save the warehouse, neighbors! If the fire fastens upon the warehouse and the hay-loft, we shall be burnt out; and it will spread to your premises. Go and pull
off the roof and drag the hay into the garden! Gregory, why don't you throw some of the snow on top, instead of throwing it all on the ground? Now, Jaakov, don't dawdle about! Give some axes and spades to these good folk. Dear neighbors, behave like true friends, and may God reward you!"
She was quite as interesting to me as the fire. Illuminated by those flames which had so nearly devoured her, she rushed about the yard — a black figure, giving assistance at all points, managing the whole thing, and letting nothing escape her attention.
Sharapa ran into the yard, rearing and nearly throwing grandfather down. The light fell on his large eyes which shone expressively; he breathed heavily as his forefeet pawed the air, and grandfather let the reins fall, and jumping aside called out: "Catch hold of him, Mother!"
She threw herself almost under the feet of the rearing horse, and stood in front of him, with outstretched arms in the form of a cross; the animal neighed pitifully and let himself be drawn towards her, swerving aside at the flames.
"Now, you are not frightened," said grandmother in a low voice, as he patted his neck and grasped the reins, "Do you think I would leave you when you are in such a state? Oh, you silly little mouse!"
And the little "mouse," who was twice as large as herself, submissively went to the gate with her, snuffling, and gazing at her red face.
Nyanya Eugenia had brought some muffled-up youngsters, who were bellowing in smothered tones, from the house.
"Vassili Vassilitch," she cried, "we can't find Alexei anywhere!"
"Go away! Go away!" answered grandfather, waving his hands, and I hid myself under the stairs so that Nyanya should not take me away.
The roof of the workshop had fallen in by this time, and the stanchions, smoking, and glittering like golden coal, stood out against the sky. With a howl and a crash a green, blue and red tornado burst inside the building, and the flames threw themselves with a new energy on the yard and on the people who were gathered round and throwing spadefuls of snow on the huge bonfire.
The heat caused the vats to boil furiously; a thick cloud of steam and smoke arose, and a strange odor, which caused one's eyes to water, floated into the yard. I crept out from beneath the stairs and got under grandmother's feet.
"Get away!" she shrieked. "You will get trampled on. Get away!"
At this moment a man on horseback, with a copper helmet, burst into the yard. His roan-colored horse was covered with froth, and he raised a whip high above his head and shouted threateningly:
"Make way there!"
Bells rang out hurriedly and gaily; it was just as beautiful as a festival day.
Grandmother pushed me back towards the steps.
"What did I tell you? Go away!"
I could not disobey her at such a time, so I went back to the kitchen and glued myself once more to the window; but I could not see the fire through that dense mass of people — I could see nothing but the gleam of copper helmets amongst the winter caps of fur.
In a short time the fire was got under, totally extinguished, and the building submerged. The police drove the onlookers away, and grandmother came into the kitchen.
"Who is this"? Oh, it is you! Why aren't you in bed? Frightened, eh? There 's nothing to be frightened about; it is all over now."
She sat beside me in silence, shaking a little. The return of the quiet night with its darkness was a relief. Presently grandfather came in, and standing in the doorway said:
"Mother?"
"Yes?"
"Were you burned?"
"A little — nothing to speak of."
He lit a brimstone match, which lit up his soot-begrimed face, looked for and found the candle on the table, and then came over swiftly and sat beside grandmother.
"The best thing we can do is to wash ourselves," she said, for she was covered with soot too, and smelt of acrid smoke.
"Sometimes," said grandfather, drawing a deep breath, "God is pleased to endue you with great goodsense." And stroking her shoulder he added with a grin: "Only sometimes, you know, just for an hour or so; but there it is all the same."
Grandmother smiled too, and began to say something, but grandfather stopped her, frowning:
"We shall have to get rid of Gregory. All this trouble has been caused by his neglect. His working days are over. He is worn out. That fool Jaaschka is sitting on the stairs crying; you had better go to him."
She stood up and went out, holding her hand up to her face and blowing on her fingers; and grandfather, without looking at me, asked softly:
"You saw it all from the beginning of the fire, didn't you"? Then you saw how grandmother behaved,
didn't you? And that is an old woman, mind you! — crushed and breaking-up — and yet you see — ! U — ugh, youT
After a long silence, during which he sat huddled up, he rose and snuffed the candle, as he asked me:
"Were you frightened?"
"No."
"Quite right! There was nothing to be frightened about."
Irritably dragging his shirt from his shoulder, he went to the washstand in the corner, and I could hear him in the darkness stamping his feet as he exclaimed:
"A fire is a silly business. The person who causes a fire ought to be beaten in the market-place. He must be either a fool or a thief. If that was done there would be no more fires. Go away now, and go to bed! What are you sitting there for?"
I did as he told me, but sleep was denied to me that night. I had no sooner laid myself down when an unearthly howl greeted me, which seemed to come from the bed. I rushed back to the kitchen, in the middle of which stood grandfather, shirtless, holding a candle which flickered violently as he stamped his feet on the floor, crying:
"Mother! Jaakov! What is that?"
I jumped on the stove and hid myself in a corner, and the household was once more in a state of wild
commotion; a heartrending howl beat against the ceiling and walls, increasing in sound every moment.
It was all just the same as it had been during the fire. Grandfather and uncle ran about aimlessly; grandmother shouted as she drove them away from one place to another; Gregory made a great noise as he thrust logs into the stove and filled the iron kettle with water. He went about the kitchen bobbing his head just like an Astrakhan camel.
"Heat the stove first," said grandmother in a tone of authority.
He rushed to do her bidding, and fell over my legs.
"Who is there?" he cried, greatly flustered. "Phew! How you frightened me! You are always where you ought not to be."
"What has happened?"
"Aunt Natalia has had a little baby born to her," he replied calmly, jumping down to the floor.
I remembered that my mother had not screamed like that when her little baby was born.
Having placed the kettle over the fire, Gregory climbed up to me on the stove, and drawing a long pipe from his pocket, showed it to me.
"I am taking to a pipe for the good of my eyes," he explained. "Grandmother advised me to take snuff, but I think smoking will do me more good."
He sat on the edge of the stove with his legs crossed,
looking down at the feeble light of the candle; his ears and cheeks were smothered in soot, one side of his shirt was torn, and I could see his ribs — as broad as the ribs of a cask. One of his eyeglasses was broken; almost half of the glass had come out of the frame, and from the empty space peered a red, moist eye, which had the appearance of a wound.
Filling his pipe with coarse-cut tobacco, he listened to the groans of the travailing woman, and murmured disjointedly, like a drunken man:
"That grandmother of yours has burned herself so badly that I am sure I don't know how she can attend to the poor creature. Just hear how your aunt is groaning. You know, they forgot all about her. She was taken bad when the fire first broke out. It was fright that did it. You see what pain it costs to bring children into the world, and yet women are thought nothing of! But, mark my words — women ought to be thought a lot of, for they are the mothers — "
Here I dozed, and was awakened by a tumult: a banging of doors, and the drunken cries of Uncle Michael; these strange words floated to my ears:
"The royal doors must be opened — !"
"Give her holy oil with rum, half a glass of oil, half a glass of rum, and a tablespoonful of soot — "
Then Uncle Michael kept asking like a tiresome child:
ioo MY CHILDHOOD
"Let me have a look at her!"
He sat on the floor with his legs sprawling, and kept spitting straight in front of him, and banging his hands on the floor.
I began to find the stove unbearably hot, so I slid down, but when I got on a level with uncle he seized and held me by the legs, and I fell on the back of my head.
"Fool!" I exclaimed.
He jumped to his feet, grabbed me again, and roared:
"I '11 smash you against the stove — "
I escaped to a corner of the best parlor, under the image, and ran against grandfather's knees; he put me aside, and gazing upwards, went on in a low voice:
"There is no excuse for any of us — "
The image-lamp burned brightly over his head, a candle stood on the table in the middle of the room, and the light of a foggy winter's morning was already peeping in at the window.
Presently he bent towards me, and asked:
"What's the matter with you?"
Everything was the matter with me — my head was clammy, my body sorely weary; but I did not like to say so because everything about me was so strange. Almost all the chairs in the room were occupied by strangers; there were a priest in a lilac-colored robe,
a gray-headed old man with glasses, in a military uniform, and many other people who all sat quite still like wooden figures, or figures frozen, as it were, in expectation of something, and listened to the sound of water splashing somewhere near. By the door stood Uncle Jaakov, very upright, with his hands behind his back. "Here!" said grandfather to him, "take this child to bed."
My uncle beckoned me to follow him, and led the way on tiptoe to the door of grandmother's room, and when I had got into bed he whispered:
"Your Aunt Natalia is dead."
I was not surprised to hear it. She had not been visible for a long time, either in the kitchen or at meals.
"Where is grandmother1?" I asked.
"Down there," he replied, waving his hand, and went out of the room, still going softly on his bare feet.
I lay in bed and looked about me. I seemed to see hairy, gray, sightless faces pressed against the window-pane, and though I knew quite well that those were grandmother's clothes hanging over the box in the corner, I imagined that some living creature was hiding there and waiting. I put my head under the pillow, leaving one eye uncovered so that I could look at the door, and wished that I dared jump out of bed and run out of the room. It was very hot, and there was a
heavy, stifling odor which reminded me of the night when Tsiganok died, and that rivulet of blood ran along the floor.
Something in my head or my heart seemed to be swelling; everything that I had seen in that house seemed to stretch before my mind's eye, like a train of winter sledges in the street, and to rise up and crush me.
The door opened very slowly, and grandmother crept into the room, and closing the door with her shoulder, came slowly forward; and holding out her hand to the blue light of the image-lamp, wailed softly, pitifully as a child:
"Oh, my poor little hand! My poor hand hurts me so!"
CHAPTER V
BEFORE long another nightmare began. One evening when we had finished tea and grandfather and I sat over the Psalter, while grandmother was washing up the cups and saucers, Uncle Jaakov burst into the room, as dishevelled as ever, and bearing a strange resemblance to one of the household brooms. Without greeting us, he tossed his cap into a corner and began speaking rapidly, with excited gestures.
"Mischka is kicking up an utterly uncalled-for row. He had dinner with me, drank too much, and began to show unmistakable signs of being out of his mind; he broke up the crockery, tore up an order which had just been completed — it was a woolen dress — broke the windows, insulted me and Gregory, and now he is coming here, threatening you. He keeps shouting, 'I '11 pull father's beard for him! I '11 kill him!' so you had better look out."
Grandfather rose slowly to his feet, resting his hands on the table. He was frowning heavily, and his face seemed to dry up, growing narrow and cruel, like a hatchet.
"Do you hear that, Mother4?" he yelled. "What do
you think of it, eh? Our own son coming to kill his father! But it is quite time; it is quite time, my children."
He went up the room, straightening his shoulders, to the door, sharply snapped the heavy iron hook, which fastened it, into its ring, and turned again to Uncle Jaakov saying:
"This is all because you want to get hold of Varvara's dowry. That 's what it is!"
And he laughed derisively in the face of my uncle, who asked in an offended tone:
"What should I want with it?"
"You? I know you!"
Grandmother was silent as she hastily put the cups and saucers away in the cupboard.
"Well?" cried grandfather, laughing bitterly. "Very good! Thank you, my son. Mother, give this fox a poker, or an iron if you like. Now, Jaakov Vassilev, when your brother breaks in, kill him before my eyes!"
My uncle thrust his hands into his pockets and retired into a corner.
"Of course, if you won't believe me — "
"Believe you?" cried grandfather, stamping his feet. "No! I '11 believe an animal — a dog, a hedgehog even — but I have no faith in you. I know you too well. You made him drunk, and then gave him his in-
structions. Very well! What are you waiting for? Kill me now — him or me, you can take your choice!"
Grandmother whispered to me softly: "Run upstairs and look out of the window, and when you see Uncle Michael coming along the street, hurry back and tell us. Run along now! Make haste!"
A little frightened by the threatened invasion of my turbulent uncles, but proud of the confidence placed in me, I leaned out of the window which looked out upon the broad road, now thickly coated with dust through which the lumpy, rough cobblestones were just visible. The street stretched a long way to the left, and crossing the causeway continued to Ostrojni Square, where, firmly planted on the clay soil, stood a gray building with a tower at each of its four corners — the old prison, about which there was a suggestion of melancholy beauty. On the right, about three houses away, there was an opening in Syenia Square, which was built round the yellow domicile of the prison officials, and on the leaden-colored fire-tower, on the look-out gallery of the tower, revolved the figures of the watchmen, looking like dogs on chains. The whole square was cut off from the causeway — at one end stood a green thicket, and, more to the right, lay the stagnant Dinka Pond, into which, so grandmother used to tell the story, my uncles had thrown my father one winter, with the intention of drowning him. Almost opposite our
windows was a lane of small houses of various colors which led to the dumpy, squat church of the "Three Apostles." If you looked straight at it the roof appeared exactly like a boat turned upside down on the green waves of the garden. Defaced by the snowstorms of a long winter, washed by the continuous rains of autumn, the discolored houses in our street were powdered with dust. They seemed to look at each other with half-closed eyes, like beggars in the church porch, and, like me, they seemed to be waiting for some one, and their open windows had an air of suspicion.
There were a few people moving about the street in a leisurely manner, like thoughtful cockroaches on a warm hearth; a suffocating heat rose up to me, and the detestable odor of pie and carrots and onions cooking forced itself upon me — a smell which always made me feel melancholy.
I was very miserable — ridiculously, intolerably miserable! My breast felt as if it were full of warm lead which pressed from within and exuded through my ribs. I seemed to feel myself inflating like a bladder, and yet there I was, compressed into that tiny room, under a coffin-shaped ceiling.
There was Uncle Michael — peeping from the lane round the corner of the gray houses. He tried to pull his cap down over his ears, but they stuck out all the same. He was wearing a brown pea-jacket and high
boots which were very dusty; one hand was in the pocket of his check trousers, and with the other he tugged at his beard. I could not see his face, but he stood almost as if he were prepared to dart across the road and seize grandfather's house in his rough, black hands. I ought to have run downstairs to say that he had come, but I could not tear myself away from the window, and I waited till I saw my uncle kick the dust about over his gray boots just as if he were afraid, and then cross the road. I heard the door of the wineshop creak, and its glass panels rattle as he opened it, before I ran downstairs and knocked at grandfather's door.
"Who is it?" he asked gruffly, making no attempt to let me in. "Oh, it 's you! Well, what is it?"
"He has gone into the wineshop!"
"All right! Run along!"
"But I am frightened up there."
"I can't help that."
Again I stationed myself at the window. It was getting dark. The dust lay more thickly on the road, and looked almost black; yellow patches of light oozed out from the adjacent windows, and from the house opposite came strains of music played on several stringed instruments — melancholy but pleasing. There was singing in the tavern, too; when the door opened the sound of a feeble, broken voice floated out into the street. I recognized it as belonging to the
io8 MY CHILDHOOD
beggar cripple, Nikitoushka — a bearded ancient, with one glass eye and the other always tightly closed. When the door banged it sounded as if his song had been cut off with an ax.
Grandmother used to quite envy this beggar-man. After listening to his songs she used to say, with a sigh:
"There 's talent for you! What a lot of poetry he knows by heart. It 's a gift — that 's what it is!"
Sometimes she invited him into the yard, where he sat on the steps and sang, or told stories, while grandmother sat beside him and listened, with such exclamations as:
"Go on. Do you mean to tell me that Our Lady was ever at Ryazin?"
To which he would reply in a low voice which carried conviction with it:
"She went everywhere — through every province."
An elusive, dreamy lassitude seemed to float up to me from the street, and place its oppressive weight upon my heart and my eyes. I wished that grandmother would come to me — or even grandfather. I wondered what kind of a man my father had been that grandfather and my uncles disliked him so, while grandmother and Gregory and Nyanya Eugenia spoke so well of him. And where was my mother? I thought of her more and more every day, making her the center of all the fairy-tales and old legends related to
me by grandmother. The fact that she did not choose to live with her own family increased my respect for her. I imagined her living at an inn on a highroad, with robbers who waylaid rich travelers, and shared the spoils with beggars. Or it might be that she was living in a forest — in a cave, of course — with good robbers, keeping house for them, and taking care of their stolen gold. Or, again, she might be wandering about the earth reckoning up its treasures, as the robber-chieftainess Engalitchev went with Our Lady, who would say to her, as she said to the robber-chief tainess:
"Do not steal, O grasping slave, The gold and silver from every cave; Nor rob the earth of all its treasure For thy greedy body's pleasure."
To which my mother would answer in the words of the robber-chieftainess:
"Pardon, Lady, Virgin Blest! To my sinful soul give rest; Not for myself the gold I take, I do it for my young son's sake."
And Our Lady, good-natured, like grandmother, would pardon her, and say:
"Maroushka, Maroushka, of Tartar blood, For you, luckless one, 'neath the Cross I stood; Continue your journey and bear your load, And scatter your tears o'er the toilsome road.
no MY CHILDHOOD
But with Russian people please do not meddle; Waylay the Mongol in the woods Or rob the Kalmuck of his goods."
Thinking of this story, I lived in it, as if it had been a dream. I was awakened by a trampling, a tumult, and howls from below — in the sheds and in the yard. I looked out of the window and saw grandfather, Uncle Jaakov, and a man employed by the tavern-keeper — the funny-looking bartender, Melyan — pushing Uncle Michael through the wicker-gate into the street. He hit out, but they struck him on the arms, the back, and the neck with their hands, and then kicked him. In the end he went flying headlong through the gate, and landed in the dusty road. The gate banged, the latch and the bolt rattled; all that remained of the fray was a much ill-used cap lying in the gateway, and all was quiet.
After lying still for a time, my uncle dragged himself to his feet, all torn and dishevelled, and picking up one of the cobblestones, hurled it at the gate with such a resounding clangor as might have been caused by a blow on the bottom of a cask. Shadowy people crept out of the tavern, shouting, cursing, gesticulating violently; heads were thrust out of the windows of the houses round; the street was alive with people, laughing and talking loudly. It was all like a story which aroused one's curiosity, but was at the same time un-
pleasant and full of horrors. Suddenly the whole thing was obliterated; the voices died away, and every one disappeared from my sight.
On a box by the door sat grandmother, doubled up, motionless, hardly breathing. I went and stood close to her and stroked her warm, soft, wet cheeks, but she did not seem to feel my touch, as she murmured over and over again hoarsely:
"O God! have You no compassion left for me and my children"? Lord! have mercy — !"
It seems that grandfather had only lived in that house in Polevoi Street for a year — from one spring to another — yet during that time it had acquired an unpleasant notoriety. Almost every Sunday boys ran about our door, chanting gleefully:
"There 's another row going on at the Kashmirins!" Uncle Michael generally put in an appearance in the evening and held the house in a state of siege all night, putting its occupants into a frenzy of fear: sometimes he was accompanied by two or three assistants — repulsive-looking loafers of the lowest class. They used to make their way unseen from the causeway to the garden, and, once there, they indulged their drunken whims to the top of their bent, stripping the raspberry and currant bushes, and sometimes making
a raid on the washhouse and breaking everything in it which could be broken — washing-stools, benches, kettles — smashing the stove, tearing up the flooring, and pulling down the framework of the door.
Grandfather, grim and mute, stood at the window listening to the noise made by these destroyers of his property; while grandmother, whose form could not be descried in the darkness, ran about the yard, crying in a voice of entreaty:
"Mischka! what are you thinking of? Mischka!"
For answer, a torrent of abuse in Russian, hideous as the ravings of a madman, was hurled at her from the garden by the brute, who was obviously ignorant of the meaning, and insensible to the effect of the words which he vomited forth.
I knew that I must not run after grandmother at such a time, and I was afraid to be alone, so I went down to grandfather's room; but directly he saw me, he cried:
"Get out! Curse you!"
I ran up to the garret and looked out on the yard and garden from the dormer-window, trying to keep grandmother in sight. I was afraid that they would kill her, and I screamed, and called out to her, but she did not come to me; only my drunken uncle, hearing my voice, abused my mother in furious and obscene language.
On one of these evenings grandfather was unwell, and as he uneasily moved his head, which was swathed in a towel, upon his pillow, he lamented shrilly:
"For this I have lived, and sinned, and heaped up riches! If it were not for the shame and disgrace of it, I would call in the police, and let them be taken before the Governor to-morrow. But look at the disgrace! What sort of parents are they who bring the law to bear on their children1? Well, there 's nothing for you to do but to lie still under it, old man!"
He suddenly jumped out of bed, and went, staggeringly, to the window.
Grandmother caught his arm: "Where are you going?" she asked.
"Light up!" he said, breathing hard.
When grandmother had lit the candle, he took the candlestick from her, and holding it close to him, as a soldier would hold a gun, he shouted from the window in loud, mocking tones:
"Hi, Mischka! You burglar! You mangy, mad cur!"
Instantly the top pane of glass was shattered to atoms, and half a brick fell on the table beside grandmother.
"Why don't you aim straight?" shrieked grandfather hysterically.
Grandmother just took him in her arms, as she would
have taken me, and carried him back to bed, saying over and over again in a tone of terror:
"What are you thinking of? What are you thinking of? May God forgive you! I can see that Siberia will be the end of this for him. But in his madness he can't realize what Siberia would mean."
Grandfather moved his legs angrily, and sobbing dryly, said in a choked voice:
"Let him kill me — !"
From outside came howls, and the sound of trampling feet, and a scraping at walls. I snatched the brick from the table and ran to the window with it, but grandmother seized me in time, and hurling it into a corner, hissed: