The traveler quietly slid the damper aside to see whether her son, Vakula, had invited guests into the house, but seeing no one there except for some sacks lying in the middle of the room, she got out of the oven, threw off her warm sheepskin coat, straight- ened her clothes, and no one would have been able to tell that a minute before she had been riding on a broom.
The mother of the blacksmith Vakula was no more than forty years old. She was neither pretty nor ugly. It's hard to be pretty at such an age. Nevertheless, she knew so well how to charm the gravest of Cossacks over to herself (it won't hurt to observe in passing that they couldn't care less about beauty) that she was visited by the headman, and the deacon Osip Nikiforovich (when his wife wasn't home, of course), and the Cossack Korniy Choub, and the Cossack Kasian Sverbyguz. And, to do her credit, she knew how to handle them very skillfully. It never occurred to any one of them that he had a rival. If on Sunday a pious muzhik or squire, as the Cossacks call themselves, wearing a cloak with a hood, went to church-or, in case of bad weather, to the tavern-how could he not stop by at Solokha's, to eat fatty dumplings with sour cream and chat in a warm cottage with a talkative and gregarious hostess? And for that purpose the squire would make a big detour before reaching the tavern, and called it "stopping on the way." And when Solokha would go to church on a feast day, putting on a bright gingham shift with a gold-embroidered blue skirt and a nankeen apron over it, and if she were to stand just by the right-hand choir, the deacon was sure to cough and inadvertently squint in that direction; the headman would stroke his mustache, twirl his topknot around his ear, and say to the man standing next to him, "A fine woman! A devil of a woman!"
Solokha nodded to everyone, and everyone thought she was nodding to him alone. But anyone who liked meddling into other people's affairs would have noticed at once that Solokha was most amiable with the Cossack Choub. Choub was a widower. Eight stacks of wheat always stood in front of his house. Two yoke of sturdy oxen always stuck their heads from the wattle shed outside and mooed whenever they saw a chummy cow or their fat bull uncle coming. A bearded goat climbed on the roof and from there bleated in a sharp voice, like a mayor, teasing the turkey hens who strutted about the yard and turning his back whenever he caught sight of his enemies, the boys who made fun of his beard. In Choub's chests there were quantities of linen, fur coats, old- style jackets with gold braid-his late wife had liked dressing up. In his kitchen garden, besides poppies, cabbages, and sunflowers, two plots of tobacco were planted every year. All this Solokha thought it not superfluous to join to her own property, reflecting beforehand on the order that would be introduced into it once it passed into her hands, and she redoubled her benevolence toward old Choub. And to keep Vakula from getting round his daughter and laying hands on it all for himself, thus certainly preventing any mixing in on her part, she resorted to the usual way of all forty-year-old hens: making Choub and the blacksmith quarrel as often as possible. Maybe this keenness and cunning were responsible for the rumors started here and there by the old women, especially when they'd had a drop too much at some merry gathering, that Solokha was in fact a witch; that the Kizyakolupenko lad had seen she had a tail behind no longer than a spindle; that just two weeks ago Thursday she had crossed the road as a black cat; that the priest's wife once had a sow run in, crow like a rooster, put Father Kondrat's hat on her head, and run back out.
It so happened that as the old women were discussing it, some cowherd by the name of Tymish Korostyavy came along. He didn't fail to tell how in the summer, just before the Peter and Paul fast, 3 as he lay down to sleep in the shed, putting some straw under his head, he saw with his own eyes a witch with her hair down, in nothing but a shirt, start milking the cows, and he was so spellbound he couldn't move; after milking the cows, she came up to him and smeared something so vile on his lips that he spent the whole next day spitting. But all this was pretty doubtful, because no one but the Sorochintsy assessor could see a witch. And so all the notable Cossacks waved their hands on hearing this talk. "The bitches are lying!" was their usual response.
Having climbed out of the oven and straightened her clothes, Solokha, like a good housekeeper, began tidying up and putting things in order, but she didn't touch the sacks: "Vakula brought them in, let him take them out!" Meanwhile the devil, as he was flying into the chimney, had looked around somehow inadver-tendy and seen Choub arm in arm with his chum, already far from his cottage. He instantly flew out of the oven, crossed their path, and began scooping up drifts of frozen snow on all sides. A blizzard arose. The air turned white. A snowy net swirled back and forth, threatening to stop up the walkers' eyes, mouths, and ears. Then the devil flew back down the chimney, firmly convinced that Choub and his chum would turn back, find the blacksmith, and give him such a hiding that it would be long before he was able to take his brush and paint any offensive caricatures.
In fact, as soon as the blizzard arose and the wind began cutting right into their eyes, Choub showed repentance and, pulling his ear-flapped hat further down on his head, treated himself, the devil, and the chum to abuse. However, this vexation was a pretense. Choub was very glad of the blizzard. The distance to the deacon's was eight times longer than they had already gone. The travelers turned back. The wind was blowing from behind them; but they could see nothing through the sweeping snow.
"Wait, chum! I don't think this is the right way," Choub said after a short while. "I don't see any houses. Ah, what a blizzard! Go to that side a little, chum, maybe you'll find the road, and meanwhile I'll search over here. It was the evil one prompted us to drag around in such a storm! Don't forget to holler if you find the road. Eh, what a heap of snow the devil's thrown in my face!"
The road, however, could not be seen. The chum went to one side and, wandering back and forth in his high boots, finally wandered right into the tavern. This find made him so happy that he forgot everything and, shaking off the snow, went into the front hall, not the least concerned about his chum who was left outside. Choub, meanwhile, thought he had found the road; he stopped and began shouting at the top of his lungs, but seeing that his chum didn't appear, he decided to go on by himself. He walked a little and saw his own house. Drifts of snow lay around it and on the roof. Clapping his hands, frozen in the cold, he began knocking at the door and shouting commandingly for his daughter to open.
"What do you want here?" the blacksmith cried sternly, coming out.
Choub, recognizing the blacksmith's voice, stepped back a little. "Ah, no, it's not my house," he said to himself, "the blacksmith wouldn't come to my house. Again, on closer inspection, it's not the blacksmith's either. Whose house could it be? There now! I didn't recognize it! It's lame Levchenko's, who recently married a young wife. He's the only one who has a house like mine. That's why it seemed a bit odd to me that I got home so soon. However, Levchenko is now sitting at the deacon's, that I know. Why, then, the blacksmith?… Oh-ho-ho! he comes calling on the young wife. That's it! Very well!… now I understand everything."
"Who are you and why are you hanging around the door?" the blacksmith, coming closer, said more sternly than before.
"No, I won't tell him who I am," thought Choub. "He may give me a thrashing for all I know, the cursed bastard!" and, altering his voice, he replied:
"It's me, good man! I've come to your windows to sing some carols for your amusement."
"Go to the devil with your carols!" Vakula cried angrily. "Why are you standing there? Clear out right now, do you hear?"
Choub himself was already of that sensible intention; but he found it vexing to have to obey the blacksmith's orders. It seemed some evil spirit nudged his arm, forcing him to say something contrary.
"Really, why are you shouting so?" he said in the same voice. "I want to sing carols, that's all!"