Talking to herself, she took from the bench some kind of rags—probably her unhooked two sheep-skins from a nail by the stove, and spread them out for Egorooshka.
"That storm does not abate," she mumbled on. "Howbeit till now nothing's burnt. Our folks too are in the steppe. Lie down, batushka; go to deep. . . . Christ be with you, childie. . . . 111 leave the melon, perhaps you'U eat some more."
The sighs and of the old woman, the continuous
breathing of the woman asleep, the crepuscular light of the cottage, the patter of rain on the window, all conduced to slumber. Egorooshka ^^ shy of undressing before the old woman, so he only took off his boots, then lay down and covered himself with the sheep-skins.
"The little lad has lain down?" in a few moments came a whisper from Panteli.
"He has lain down," answered the old woman in a whisper. "Our Saviour, our Saviour's Passion! It is thundering, thun- dering—when will it end? . . ."
"It'll be over soon," hoarsely whispered Panteli, seating himself. "It's got quieter. . . . The boys have gone into the tottages, and two have stayed with the horses . . . the boy? have. . . . They must . . . or the horses'd be stolen . . . . m sit a bit, then I'll take a shift. . . . We must, they'd be stolen. . . ."
Panteli and the old woman sat side by side at Egorooshka's feet speaking in sibilant whispers, interrupting their talk with sighs and yawns. l\leanwhile. Egorooshka could not get warm; he had over him that thick heavy sheep's coat, but all the same he was shivering, and he had cramp in his hands and feet. . . . He undressed himself beneath his sheep's covering, but that did not help. His feeling of cold grew worse and worse.
Panteli went out to take his shift, and then returned, and still Egorooshka could not sleep and was shivering all over, Something was pressing on his head and chest, and he did not know what it was—whether it was the old people murmuring, or the oppressive smell of the sheep-skins: also the slices of melon and water-melon had left an unpleasant metallic taste in his mouth; to add to it all, he was being bitten by fleas.
"Dad, I'm cold," he said, and hardly recognised his own voice.
"Go to sleep, childie, go to sleep," sighed the old woman.
The thin-legged little Tit approached the bed, waved his arms, then grew up to the ceiling and became the windmill. Father Christopher, not as he was when he sat in the vehicle, but in full priestly vestments, with the aspergill in his hand, walked around the windmill, sprinkling it well with hoiy water, whereupon it ceased to wave its fans. Egorooshka, tealising this was delirium, opened his eyes.
"Dad," he called, "give me some water."
No one answered. Egorooshka was finding it unbearably stuffy, and very uncomfortable lying down. He got up, put on his clothes, and went outside the cottage. The dawn was rising, the sky was overcast, but it was no longer raining. Shivering and wrapping himself up in his wet coat, Ego- rooshka walked across the muddy yard, listening to the silence; he caught sight of a little shed with a grass mat over its half-open doorway. He peeped into the shed, walked in, and sat on a perch in a dark corner.
His head was aching, his thoughts were getting mixed, and his mouth was dry and unpleasant from the metallic taste. He gazed at his hat, straightened the peacock's feather and remembered how he had gone with his mother to buy that hat. He put his hand in his pocket, and extracted thence a clod of brown sticky mastic. However did ^at mastic get into his pocket? He reflected, smelt it: it smelt of honey. Ah-ha, it was the Jewess's ginger-bread! How soft the poor thing had become!
Egorooshka looked at his coat. His coat was grey, with large bone buttons arranged like those of an overcoat. Being 1 new and expensive article, it hung at home not in the vestibule but in the bedroom alongside of his mother's clothes, and he was only allowed to wear it on festivals and holidays. Egorooshka, as he looked at it now, felt sorry for it; he recollected that he and the coat were both abandoned to the buffetings of fate, that he would never go back home, and he sobbed so that he nearly fell off his perch.
A large white dog drenched by the rain, with tufts of hair on his face somewhat resembling curling-papers, entered the shed and stared very inquisitively at Egorooshka. It evidently was wondering if it should bark. Having decided not to bark, it went carefully up to Egorooshka, ate the mastic, and went out again.
"It's Varlamov'sl" cried someone from the road. ^ften he had cried himself out, Egorooshka came out of the shed, skirted a large puddle, and slowly went towards the street. Exactly by the gates on the road stood the train of waggons. The wet drivers, with muddy boots, looking as sleepy as autumn flies, were hanging round or sitting on the thills of the waggons. Egorooshka looked at them, and thought, "How tiresome and uncomfortable to be a moujik!" He went up to Panteli, and sat by his side on a thill.
"Dad, I'm cold!" he said, shivering and pulling his sleeves down over his hands.
"It's all right, we'll soon be moving," yawned Panteli. "It doesn't matter—you'll soon be warm."
The waggons moved on early, as it was not too warm. Egorooshka lay on the bale of wool, trembling with cold, although the sun soon appeared in the skies and dried his clothes, the bales and the ground. Each time he closed his eyes he saw Tit and the windmill. Conscious of a languor and heaviness creeping over him, he exerted all his strength to drive away those figures, but they had hardly disappeared when the devil-may-care Dimov flung himself at Egorooshka with a shout, blood-shot eyes and upraised fists, and he heard him complaining, "It's wearisome!" Varlamov on his Cossack cob went by, and the happy Constantine walked past with his smile and his bustard. How heavy, unbearable, and irksome these people were I
Then—this was towards evening—he raised his head to ask for something to drink. The waggons were standing by a large bridge spanning a wide river. There was a smoke over the river, and through the smoke was a steamer with a barge in tow. Over the river in front was a high hill dotted with houses and churches; at the foot of the hill, by some goods vans, there was a locomotive moving about.
Never before had Egorooshka seen steamers or locomotives, or wide rivers. Gazing upon them now he felt neither fear nor astonishment, not even the faintest resemblance to curiosity was depicted on his face. He only felt giddy, and hastened to lie downwards on the edge of the bales, and was sick. Panteli, noticing this, turned round, and exclaimed:
"Our little laddie is taken ill. It must be a chill . . . the laddie has. . . . Away from home. . . . Bad affair!"
VIII
The waggons halted not far from the wharf of a large commercial inn. As he slid down from the waggon, Egorooshka recognised a very well-known voice. Someone was helping him to descend, and saying:
"But we arrived last evening. We have waited a whole day for you. They thought to overtake you last night, but it didn't work, they took another road. Eh, but how you've crumpled your coat! You'll catch it from your uncle!"
Egorooshka looked at the marble face of him who was addressing him, and recognised Deniski.
"Your uncle and Father Christopher are in their rooms," continued Deniski, "drinking tea. Come alone!"
He led Egorooshka into a large two-storied building, dark and gloomy and similar to the charitable institution in
N . They crossed the vestibule, passed up a dark stair-
case and through a long narrow passage, and entered a small room in which there indeed sat Ivan Ivanitch and Father Christopher drinking tea. When they saw the boy both the old fellows expressed much joy and surprise.
"Ah, Egor Nicola-aitch," half sang Father Christopher— "Mr. Lomonossov!"
"Ah, noble young man," said Kuzmitchov, "be welcome!"
Egorooshka took off his coat, kissed his uncle's hand and Father Christopher's, then sat down at the table.
"Well, how has puer bone fared?" Father Christopher began, overwhelming him with questions, pouring him out some tea, and, as usual, with a radiant smile on his face. "I'm afraid he was bored. God forbid travelling on waggons or bullocks! You go on .tnd on—the Lord forgive me—you look ahead, and the stc!ppe is just the same vast stretch as before: you can't even see the beginning of the end! It's no progres- sion, it's a scandal! What—you won't drink tea? Drink it! While you were crawling along with the waggons, we have satisfactorily settled our business, thank God! Sold the work to Tcherepahin, and God grant the like to everyone. . • . We did very well."