LITMIR.BIZ

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he threw down the book and began again putting his room to rights; at last he took up his cap, put on his coat and went out into the street. Walking at hazard, without seeing the road, he still tried as far as he could to concentrate his mind, to collect his scattered thoughts and to reflect a little upon his position. But the effort only reduced him to misery, to torture. He was attacked by fever and chills alternately, and at times his heart beat so violently that he had to support himself against the wall. “No, better death,” he thought; “better death,” he whispered with feverish, trembling lips, hardly thinking of what he was saying. He walked for a very long time; at last, feeling that he was soaked to the skin and noticing for the first time that it was pouring with rain, he returned home. Not far from home he saw his porter. He fancied that the Tatar stared at him for some time with curiosity, and then went his way when he noticed that he had been seen.

      “Good-morning,” said Ordynov, overtaking him. “What are you called?”

      “Folks call me porter,” he answered, grinning.

      “Have you been porter here long?”

      “Yes.”

      “Is my landlord an artisan?”

      “Yes, if he says so.”

      “What does he do?”

      “He’s ill, lives, prays to God. That’s all.”

      “Is that his wife?”

      “What wife?”

      “Who lives with him.”

      “Ye-es, if he says so. Goodbye, sir.”

      The Tatar touched his cap and went off to his den. Ordynov went to his room. The old woman, mumbling and grumbling to herself, opened the door to him, fastened it again with the latch, and again climbed on the stove where she spent her life. It was already getting dark. Ordynov was going to get a light, when he noticed that the door to the landlord’s room was locked. He called the old woman, who, propping herself on her elbow, looked sharply at him from the stove, as though wondering what he wanted with the landlord’s lock; she threw him a box of matches without a word. He went back into his room and again, for the hundredth time, tried to busy himself with his books and things. But, little by little, without understanding what he was doing, he sat down on the locker, and it seemed to him that he fell asleep. At times he came to himself and realised that his sleep was not sleep but the agonising unconsciousness of illness. He heard a knock at the door, heard it opened, and guessed that it was the landlord and landlady returning from evening service. At that point it occurred to him that he must go in to them for something. He stood up, and it seemed to him that he was already going to them, but stumbled and fell over a heap of firewood which the old woman had flung down in the middle of the floor. At that point he lost consciousness completely, and opening his eyes after a long, long time, noticed with surprise that he was lying on the same locker, just as he was, in his clothes, and that over him there bent with tender solicitude a woman’s face, divinely, beautiful and, it seemed, drenched with gentle, motherly tears. He felt her put a pillow under his head and lay something warm over him, and some tender hand was laid on his feverish brow. He wanted to say “Thank you,” he wanted to take that hand, to press it to his parched lips, to wet it with his tears, to kiss, to kiss it to all eternity. He wanted to say a great deal, but what he did not know himself; he would have been glad to die at that instant. But his arms felt like lead and would not move; he was as it were numb, and felt nothing but the blood pulsing through his veins, with throbs which seemed to lift him up as he lay in bed. Somebody gave him water…. At last he fell into unconsciousness.

      He woke up at eight o’clock in the morning. The sunshine was pouring through the green, mouldy windows in a sheaf of golden rays; a feeling of comfort relaxed the sick man’s limbs. He was quiet and calm, infinitely happy. It seemed to him that someone had just been by his pillow. He woke up, looking anxiously around him for that unseen being; he so longed to embrace his friend and for the first time in his life to say, “A happy day to you, my dear one.”

      “What a long time you have been asleep!” said a woman’s gentle voice.

      Ordynov looked round, and the face of his beautiful landlady was bending over him with a friendly smile as clear as sunlight.

      “How long you have been ill!” she said. “It’s enough; get up. Why keep yourself in bondage? Freedom is sweeter than bread, fairer than sunshine. Get up, my dove, get up.”

      Ordynov seized her hand and pressed it warmly. It seemed to him that he was still dreaming.

      “Wait; I’ve made tea for you. Do you want some tea? You had better have some; you’ll be better. I’ve been ill myself and I know.”

      “Yes, give me something to drink,” said Ordynov in a faint voice, and he got up on his feet. He was still very weak. A chill ran down his spine, all his limbs ached and felt as though they were broken. But there was a radiance in his heart, and the sunlight seemed to warm him with a sort of solemn, serene joy. He felt that a new, intense, incredible life was beginning for him. His head was in a slight whirl.

      “Your name is Vassily?” she asked. “Either I have made a mistake, or I fancy the master called you that yesterday.”

      “Yes, it is. And what is your name?” said Ordynov, going nearer to her and hardly able to stand on his feet. He staggered.

      She caught him by the arm, and laughed.

      “My name is Katerina,” she said, looking into his face with her large, clear blue eyes. They were holding each other by the hands.

      “You want to say something to me,” she said at last.

      “I don’t know,” answered Ordynov; everything was dark before his eyes.

      “See what a state you’re in. There, my dove, there; don’t grieve, don’t pine; sit here at the table in the sun; sit quiet, and don’t follow me,” she added, seeing that the young man made a movement as though to keep her. “I will be with you again at once; you have plenty of time to see as much as you want of me.” A minute later she brought in the tea, put it on the table, and sat down opposite him.

      “Come, drink it up,” she said. “Does your head ache?”

      “No, now it doesn’t ache,” he said. “I don’t know, perhaps it does…. I don’t want any… enough, enough!… I don’t know what’s the matter with me,” he said, breathless, and finding her hand at last. “Stay here, don’t go away from me; give me your hand again…. It’s all dark before my eyes; I look at you as though you were the sun,” he said, as it were tearing the words out of his heart, and almost swooning with ecstasy as he uttered them. His throat was choking with sobs.

      “Poor fellow! It seems you have not lived with anyone kind. You are all lonely and forlorn. Haven’t you any relations?”

      “No, no one; I am alone… never mind, it’s no matter! Now it’s better; I am all right now,” said Ordynov, as though in delirium. The room seemed to him to be going round.

      “I, too, have not seen my people for many years. You look at me as..,” she said, after a minute’s silence.

      “Well… what?”

      “You look at me as though my eyes were warming you! You know, when you love anyone… I took you to my heart from the first word. If you are ill I will look after you again. Only don’t you be ill; no. When you get up we will live like brother and sister. Will you? You know it’s difficult to get a sister if God has not given you one.”

      “Who are you? Where do you come from?” said Ordynov in a weak voice.

      “I am not of these parts…. You know the folks tell how twelve brothers lived in a dark forest, and how a fair maiden lost her way in that forest. She went to them and tidied everything in the house for them, and put her love into everything.

      The brothers came home, and learned that the sister had spent the day there. They began calling her; she came out to them. They all called her sister, gave her freedom,

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