“It’s all right now,” said Arkhip. “How’s that for burning, eh? Bet it looks nice from Pokrovskoe.”
Just then a new event caught his attention. A cat went running along the roof of the blazing shed, at a loss where to jump down; it was surrounded on all sides by flames. The poor animal meowed pitifully, calling for help. The boys died with laughter, looking at its despair.
“What’re you laughing at, you little devils,” the blacksmith said angrily. “You’ve got no fear of God: God’s creature is perishing, and you fools are glad.” And leaning a ladder against the already-burning roof, he climbed up for the cat. It understood his intention and with a look of hurried gratitude clung to his sleeve. The half-singed blacksmith climbed down with his booty.
“And so farewell, lads,” he said to the confused servants. “There’s nothing for me to do here. Good luck, and don’t hold anything against me.”
The blacksmith left. The fire raged for some time. It finally died down, and heaps of flameless embers glowed brightly in the darkness of the night, and around them wandered the burnt-out inhabitants of Kistenevka.
CHAPTER SEVEN
The next day news of the fire spread all over the neighborhood. Everybody explained it with various conjectures and suppositions. Some insisted that Dubrovsky’s people had gotten drunk at the funeral and set fire to the house out of carelessness; others accused the officials, who had made too merry at the housewarming; many were convinced that it had burned down of itself with the court officials and all the servants. Some guessed the truth and maintained that Dubrovsky himself, moved by anger and despair, was to blame for the terrible calamity. Troekurov came to the scene of the fire the next day and conducted an investigation himself. It turned out that the police chief, the local court assessor, the lawyer, and the clerk, as well as Vladimir Dubrovsky, the nanny Egorovna, the servant Grigory, the coachman Anton, and the blacksmith Arkhip had disappeared no one knew where. All the servants testified that the officials had burned up when the roof collapsed. Their charred bones were unearthed. The women Vasilisa and Lukerya said they had seen Dubrovsky and the blacksmith Arkhip a few minutes before the fire. The blacksmith Arkhip, according to general testimony, was alive and was probably the main one, if not the only one, to blame for the fire. Dubrovsky, too, was under strong suspicion. Kirila Petrovich sent the governor a detailed account of the whole incident, and a new case was started.
Soon other news gave other food for curiosity and gossip. Robbers had appeared in * * * and spread terror through the whole region. The measures taken against them by the government proved inadequate. Robberies, one more remarkable than the other, followed one after the other. There was no safety either on the roads or in the villages. Several troikas full of robbers drove in broad daylight all over the province, stopped travelers and the post, rode into villages, robbed landowners’ houses and committed them to the flames. The chief of the band became known for his intelligence, daring, and a sort of magnanimity. Wonders were told of him; the name of Dubrovsky was on everybody’s lips, everybody was sure that he and no one else was the leader of these daring evildoers. One thing was astonishing: Troekurov’s estates had been spared; not a single barn had been robbed, not a single cart had been stopped. With his usual arrogance, Troekurov ascribed this exception to the fear he had been able to instill in the whole province, and also to the excellent quality of the police he had established in his villages. At first the neighbors laughed among themselves at Troekurov’s haughtiness, and expected every day that the uninvited guests would visit Pokrovskoe, where there was a good haul to be made, but they were finally forced to agree with him and admit that the robbers, too, had an incomprehensible respect for him…Troekurov was triumphant, and each time there was news of a new robbery by Dubrovsky, he burst into mockery of the governor, the police chiefs and company commanders from whom Dubrovsky always escaped unharmed.
Meanwhile October 1st came—the day of the church feast in Troekurov’s village. But before we set about describing this solemnity and the subsequent events, we ought to acquaint the reader with some persons new to him, or of whom we made only slight mention at the beginning of our story.
CHAPTER EIGHT
The reader has probably guessed that Kirila Petrovich’s daughter, of whom we have as yet said only a few words, is the heroine of our story. In the period we are describing, she was seventeen years old and her beauty was in full bloom. Her father loved her to distraction, but treated her with his own special willfulness, now trying to cater to her slightest whims, then frightening her with severe and sometimes cruel treatment. Assured of her affection, he could never gain her confidence. She was used to concealing her feelings and thoughts from him, because she could never know for certain how they would be received. She had no friends and grew up in solitude. The neighbors’ wives and daughters rarely visited Kirila Petrovich, whose habitual conversation and amusements called for the camaraderie of men and not the presence of ladies. Rarely did our beauty appear among the guests feasting at Kirila Petrovich’s. An enormous library, consisting for the most part of works by eighteenth-century French writers, was put at her disposal. Her father, who never read anything except The Perfect Cook, could not guide her in the choice of books, and Masha, having leafed through works of various sorts, quite naturally settled on novels. It was thus that she completed her education, begun previously under the guidance of Mam’selle Mimi, to whom Kirila Petrovich had shown great confidence and benevolence, and whom he had finally been forced to send quietly to another estate, once the consequences of his friendship became too obvious. Mam’selle Mimi left quite a pleasant memory behind her. She was a good girl and never misused the influence she obviously had over Kirila Petrovich, differing in this from other confidantes, who were replaced every minute. Kirila Petrovich himself seemed to have liked her more than the others, and a dark-eyed boy, a scamp of about nine, recalling Mam’selle Mimi’s southern features, was brought up in the house and recognized as his son, though many barefoot children, as like him as two drops of water, ran around outside his windows and were considered serfs. For his little Sasha, Kirila Petrovich invited a French tutor from Moscow, who arrived in Pokrovskoe during the events we are now describing.
Kirila Petrovich liked this tutor for his pleasant appearance and simple manners. He presented Kirila Petrovich with his references and a letter from one of Troekurov’s relations, with whom he had lived for four years as a tutor. Kirila Petrovich looked through it all and was displeased only by his Frenchman’s youth—not that he considered this agreeable drawback incompatible with the patience and experience so necessary to the unfortunate position of tutor, but he had doubts of his own, which he decided at once to explain to him. For that he ordered Masha to be sent to him (Kirila Petrovich did not speak French, and she served as his interpreter).
“Come here, Masha. Tell this moosieu that, so be it, I’ll take him; only provided that he not dare to go chasing after my girls, otherwise I’ll show the son of a dog…Translate that for him, Masha.”
Masha blushed and, turning to the tutor, told him in French that her father hoped for his modesty and proper behavior.
The Frenchman bowed and replied that he hoped to earn respect, even if favor were denied him.
Masha translated his reply word for word.
“All right, all right,” said Kirila Petrovich. “He has no need of favor or respect. His business is to look after Sasha and teach him grammar and geography. Translate that for him.”