'Oh Lord,' they wept, 'what sin have we committed that Thou hast bent iis to the growtd and wilt not set us free?'
'Whoa there!' said Kalashnikov sternly, mounting his horse.
One half of the gate was open, and by it lay a deep snowdrift.
'Come on then, gee up!' shouted Kalashnikov.
Starting off, his small, short-legged nag sank belly deep in the drift. White with snow, Kalashnikov and horse soon vanished through the gate.
When Yergwtov came back into the room, Lyubka was crawling about the floor picking up her beads, and Merik was not there.
'A glorious girl,' Yergunov thought, lying on the bench and placing his coat wtder his head. 'Oh, if only Merik wasn't here!'
Lyubka aroused him as she crawled about the floor near the bench. He would most certainly get up and embrace her, he thought, ifMerik wasn't there, and what happened after that would remain to be seen. She was still a girl, admittedly, but hardly a virgin—and even if she were, need one stand on ceremony in this robbers' lair?
Lyubka picked up her beads and went out. The candle was burning low, and the flame caught a piece ofpaper in the candle-stick. Yergwtov placed his revolver and matches beside him, and put out the candle. The icon-lamp was flickering so much that it hurt his eyes. Patches of light danced on ceiling, floor and cupboard, and among them he had visions of Lyubka—a buxom, fuU-breasted girl. Now she spun like a top. Now she panted, exhausted by the dance.
'Oh, if only Merik would go to the devil!' he thought.
The lamp gave a last flicker, sputtered and went out. Someone who could only be Merik came in and sat on the bench. He drew at his pipe, and his dark cheek with its black spot was lit up for a moment. The foul tobacco smoke tickled Yergwtov's throat.
'What filthy tobacco, da^ it!' he said. 'It makes me feel quite sick.'
'I mix my tobacco with oat blooms,' Merik answered after a short pause. 'It's better for the chest.'
He smoked, spat and went out again. About half an hour passed, then a light suddenly flashed in the lobby, and Merik appeared in a short fur coat and cap, followed by Lyubka carrying a candle.
'Don't go away, Merik,' Lyubka implored.
'No, Lyubka. Don't keep me.'
'Listen, Merik,' said Lyubka, her voice growing soft and tender. 'I know you'll find Mother's money, you'll kill us both, you'U go to the
Kuban and you'll love other girls. But I don't care, I ask only one thing of you, darling—stay with me.'
'No, I want to go and celebrate,' said Merik, fastening his belt.
'But you have no mount. You walked here, didn't you ? So what will you ride?'
Merik bent down and whispered in Lyubka's ear. She looked at the door, and laughed through her tears.
'And he's asleep, the pompous swine,' she said.
Merik embraced her, kissed her hard and went out. Yergunov stuck his revolver in his pocket, jumped up quickly and ran after him.
'Get out of my way!' he told Lyubka, who had hurriedly bolted the lobby door and stood across the threshold. 'Let me through, don't stand there!'
'Why go out?'
'To look at my horse.'
Mischievously and fondly, Lyubka gazed up at him.
'Why look at that, when you can look at me?' she asked, bending do^ and touching the gilt key on his watch-chain.
'Let me through or he'll take my horse,' Yergunov said. 'Let go, you bitch!' he shouted, hitting her angrily on the shoulder, and barg- ing as hard as he could with his chest to shove her off the door. But she clung hard to the bolt, and seemed made of iron.
'Let me go!' he shouted, exhausted. 'He'll go off with it, I tell you!'
'Why should he? Not he.'
Panting and rubbing her shoulder, which hurt, she looked up at him again, blushed and laughed.
'Don't leave, darling,' she said. 'I'm bored on my own.'
Yergunov gazed into her eyes, hesitated and then put his arms round her. She did not resist.
'Now, no more silliness, let me go,' he said.
She did not speak.
'I heard you just now,' he said, 'telling Merik you loved him.'
'He's not the only one. Who I love—that's my secret.'
She touched his watch-key again.
'Give me that,' she asked softly.
Unfastening the key, Yergunov gave it her. She suddenly craned her neck, listening with a serious expression, and her look struck the orderly as cold and calculating. Remembering his horse, he now easily pushed her to one side and ran out into the yard. In the shed a sleepy pig grunted in lazy thythm, and a cow banged her horn.
Yergunov lit a match. He saw the pig, the cow, the dogs streaking towards his light from all sides, but of his horse there was no trace. Shouting, shaking his fists at dogs, stumbling into drifts, floundering in snow, he ran through the gate and stared into darkness. He strained his eyes, but could see only the flying snow, its flakes distinctly form- ing various figures. Now the white, laughing face of a corpse peeped through the gloom. Now a white horse galloped past, ridden by an Amazon in a muslin dress. Or a string of white swans flew overhead.
Shaking with rage and cold, baffled, Yergunov fired his revolver at the dogs, hitting none of them, and rushed back indoors.
As he entered the lobby, he distinctly heard someone dart out of the room beyond, banging the door. It was dark in there. Yergunov pushed the door, but it was bolted. Then, lighting match after match, he rushed back to the lobby, and thence to the kitchen, and on from there to a little room where the walls were all draped with petticoats and dresses, where there was a smell of co^^ower and dill, and where, in the corner near the stove, stood someone's bed with a great mound of pillows on it. This must be the old mother's room. He passed through to another room, also a small one, where he saw Lyubka—lying on a chest, covered with a gaudy patchwork cotton quilt and pretending to be asleep. Above the head of her bed an icon-lamp was burning.
'Where's my horse?' asked the orderly grimly.
Lyubka did not stir.
'Where's my horse, I ask you?' Yergunov repeated in an even grimmer voice, and tore the quilt off her. 'I asked you a question, you bitch!' he shouted.
She started up and rose to her knees. She held her shift with one hand, and tried to grasp the quilt with the other, crouching against the wall. She looked at Yergunov with loathing and fear as she warily followed his slightest move with eyes like a trapped animal's.
'Tell me where my horse is,' shouted Yergunov, 'or I'll beat the living daylights out of you!'
'Go away, da^ you!' she wheezed hoarsely.
Seizing her shift near the neck, Yergunov wrenched, then lost control of himself and embraced the girl as hard as he could. Hissing with rage, she slithered in his clutches, freed one arm—the other was caught in the torn shift—and punched him on the top of his head.
Pain numbed his senses, there was a ringing and a banging in his ears. Lurching backwards, he received another blow—on the temple. He reeled, clutched the door-posts to stop himselffalling, made his way to the room where his things were, and lay on the bench. He lay there for a wlule, then took the match-box from his pocket, and began light- ing one match after another quite aimlessly. He would light one, blow it out and throw it under the table—until all the matches were gone.
Outside, meanwhile, the sky was tu^^g blue and the cocks had started crowing. Dut Yergunov's head still ached, and his ears roared as if he was under a railway bridge with a train passing overhead. Somehow he got his coat and hat on. He could not find his saddle and bundle of shopping, and his bag was empty. No wonder someone had scurried out of that room when he had come in from the yard not so long ago.
He picked up a poker in the kitchen to keep off the dogs, and went out into the yard, leaving the door wide open. The blizzard had sub- sided, the weather was calm.
When he had passed through the gate, the white fields seemed dead, there was not one bird in the morning sky. On both sides of the road, and in the far distance, were dark blue copses of small trees.