The Little Devil and Other Stories

by Alexei Remizov

  Unobtrusively Pyotr left.

  One of Pavel’s servants came toward him.

  “Is my brother in his room?”

  “The prince has not gone out.”

  “Quiet!” Pyotr warned. “Don’t scare him off!” He got on tiptoe: suddenly he understood everything.

  Pavel was in his room examining the strange sword.

  “Have you been out?”

  “No!” Pavel replied his eyes still on the sword.

  “Then how can it be that I just saw you with Olga.”

  “You saw me?”

  “He is sitting with her. He knows his death”—Pyotr pointed at the sword. “He’s turned himself into you so I won’t touch him. Give me the sword, you stay here.”

  “Careful!” Pavel handed him the sword. “It might break.”

  With the naked sword Pyotr left Pavel.

  Creeping up—so as not to scare him off!—he came to Olga’s doors. Without warning, he crossed the threshold.

  Before his eyes, Olga, and with her, Pavel. Holding his breath, he came closer. And looked closely. He wasn’t imagining it: it was Pavel! But strange: he could see through Pavel, he saw the window and in the window a golden birch. He understood: fire!—the fiery Serpent.

  They were sitting close together: his lips flinched, and she smiled.

  Pyotr came closer and his feet touched hers. With a cry she stood up—and following her Pavel got up.

  There was bright gold in Pyotr’s eyes and he rose in a golden whirlwind and struck the Serpent on the head with the sword.

  Fire sprayed blood—through the fiery haze he could see Pavel, shuddered and bending toward the ground, splattering Olga with blood, and Olga, like Pavel, hunched over and pecked the ground.

  Pyotr imagined that something ringed and bloody was crawling toward him, threatening to choke him, and he waved the sword until the sword fell to pieces and a piece of metal woke him.

  The Serpent had been dealt with—no need for the sword: the Agrik sword receded into bogatyr memory.

  The Murom chronicler wrote it, and now everyone knows: Prince Pavel’s wife Olga, who was visited by the fiery flying Serpent, drowned in the Serpent’s blood, and Prince Pyotr, the Serpent-slayer, blistered all over from the blood that sprayed him, as if from a burn.

  They said that the blisters covered his body from fear, and out of fear he struck Olga. Pavel thought so, too, but he didn’t say “Why did you do in the woman?” as the boyars said with a wink. Pavel was glad that she was in Pyotr’s way: a serpent woman was no wife for him!

  Pyotr was called the Serpent-slayer. That was how he thought of himself, patiently bearing his physical woes—a mess: all scratched up, neck twisted and legs cramped, gritting his teeth, he lay in bed, a blistery cross on his chest, a burning belt cinching him, his eyes and mouth being corroded by a creeping rash, and his bones groaned and his joints creaked.

  The Murom healers, whomever they asked, could not help with whispers, spirit, salve, or herbs, but made it worse: his back and legs were covered in sores and the ache scraped away sleep. He was too weak to stand.

  They said that in the Ryazan lands there were wizards superior to the Murom ones: take him to Ryazan.

  Laska said this—who would know better?

  They decided to take Pyotr to Ryazan: why not try?—the Ryazan wizards, it’s scary to even look at them, they will find the right word beyond the clouds and beneath the ground—shamans!

  II

  Pyotr could not sit on a horse; they carried him. The trip was not jolly: hard for the patient and a burden for his servants. Not far from Murom in Pereyaslavl they decided to stop and test their luck.

  Pyotr’s entourage spread around town, asking if there were wizards to treat the prince. Gridya, a young page in the service of the prince, did not linger in town but went out beyond the outpost and ended up in Laskovo outside the city.

  House to house. He saw the gate open, he came into the courtyard. No one hailed him. He opened the door and came into the entry. And he saw a young girl sitting at the table, weaving cloth, and a hare hopping around her. He stared at the hare: it was a strange hare—twitching its whiskers, not afraid, hopping around. The girl stopped weaving and started flirting: what a silver man that had wandered into the house.

  “A fine thing,” she said sadly, “when the yard is without ears and the house without eyes.”

  Gridya stared stupidly at her and at the hare.

  “Anyone older here?” he asked meekly.

  “My father and mother went to weep borrowed tears,” she said, admiring the expensive garments of the guest who had wandered in, “and my brother went to look at the corpses through his legs.”

  “Corpses,” repeated Gridya in bewilderment, “you’re setting riddles.”

  “Why did you barge in without permission,” she said severely. “If we had a dog in the yard, he would hear your steps and bark, and if we had a servant in the house, he would see that someone has come in and warn me: that’s the answer about the ears and eyes of the house. Father and Mother went to the cemetery to weep over the dead, and those tears are borrowed: in their turn people will weep over them. My brother went into the woods, we are beekeepers, we climb trees: you climb up a tree for honey, watch your feet, if you fall, you won’t get up and you’ll join the corpses.”

  “The corpses,” Gridya repeated, “the dead.” And he thought: “She’s not simple!” And he asked, “What’s your name?”

  “Fevronia.”

  “And the name is fancy,” thought Gridya, “Fevronia!” “I’m from Murom, I serve the prince,” and he showed his grivna, a silver necklace. “I’ve come with the prince: the prince is sick, he is covered in a rash.”

  “The one who slayed the serpent?”

  “Pyotr cut off the head of the fiery flying Serpent with the Agrik sword and broke out in sores from the serpent’s blood. Our Murom healers cannot help; they say you have great witches here. But we don’t know how to call them or find them.”

  “What if the one who demanded your prince to come could heal him?”

  “What do you mean: ‘the one who demanded my prince to come … ?’ The one who heals him will receive a great reward. Tell me the name of that sorcerer and where to find him.”

  “Bring your prince here. If he is meek and answers humbly, he will be healthy. Tell that to your prince.”

  When she spoke there was such meekness in her words, like Laska, and she smiled. Gridya felt happy: Prince Pyotr’s men loved him for his meekness.

  With breathless elation, like children, Gridya told Pyotr about Fevronia, how there was no equal to her among the boyar women, about the riddles and the hare—in farewell the hare pulled back its ears, as if doffing a hat—you’ll be well, Gridya said, repeating Fevronia’s words about meekness and humility.

  Pyotr ordered them to take him to Laskovo.

  In Laskovo, Pyotr sent Gridya and the other young men to Fevronia: have her tell them which sorcerer to approach—if he cures him, she will get a big reward.

  Fevronia said firmly: “I am that sorcerer, and I do not need a reward, not gold, not land. Here is my word: if I cure him, let him marry me.”

  Gridya did not understand the test of will hidden in those words; he did not hear anything unexpected in the words.

  With the same elation he passed the words on to the prince.

  “How could a prince take the daughter of a beekeeper for a wife!” A contrary thought flashed, but he was so weak and suffering.

  “Go tell Fevronia that I agree to everything; have her tell me what to do.”

  When Gridya told Fevronia “the prince agrees to everything,” Fevronia ladled out from the kneading trough into a birch box of dried peaches and apricots and gave the box to Gridya.

  “Prepare a banya for the prince and have him smear his body where the scabs are, all over,” and then after a thought, “no, let him leave one sore without the salve.”

  Gridya didn’t even think to q
uestion why, he believed Fevronia implicitly, and the hare threatened him with an ear.

  “I won’t drop it, don’t worry,” said Gridya, holding the box in both hands and exiting carefully.

  While the banya was heated, all the young men and the servants gathered near the prince. They were all interested in Gridya’s story about Fevronia, her witchcraft, the hare, the birds—birds fluttered in Gridya’s imagination—and most of all, her riddles. Belief that the prince would get better made the biggest worriers smile and Pyotr himself cheered up.

  “Whatever we think up,” said Gridya, “she can do anything. Let’s test her.”

  “I have an idea,” said Pyotr and ordered him to bring some linen thread. He handed it to Gridya and said, “Take it to her and while I’m in the banya have her weave me a shirt, pants, and towel.”

  Fevronia was surprised to see Gridya.

  He was radiant: now we would see. Placing the linen thread on the table before her, he repeated the prince’s words.

  “All right,” Fevronia said, “you go up on top of the stove, get a log from the pile, and bring it here.”

  Gridya took a log and put it on the bench. She looked and measured a piece.

  “Chop it off.”

  Gridya took the axe and chopped off the piece.

  “Take this piece,” Fevronia said, “and tell the prince: in the time it takes me to comb the linen, let him make me a loom so that I can weave him a shirt, pants, and towel.

  Gridya hopped out like a hare. They were waiting. He put the wood before Pyotr the way he had the linen before Fevronia: make a loom while she combs the linen.

  “What nonsense,” said Pyotr, turning over the piece of wood, “how can you make a loom in just an hour.”

  But who couldn’t see that Pyotr’s task was no less nonsensical: weave him a shirt, pants, and towel in the hour for the banya. Pyotr was not so much impressed by Fevronia’s wisdom as that he realized his own stupidity.

  Everything proceeded properly: Pyotr was washed and steamed and lifted to the high shelf and sprinkled with the banya brush of leaves, and then they put him in the antechamber and cooled him off with kvass and pickled apples, and smeared his body, face, and hands with the magic salve.

  But which scab should they leave without salve? They decided to pick one that would be unnoticed. And what is less noticeable than the rear. They should have asked Fevronia, but they hoped it was obvious and left the contagion on that place.

  Pyotr spent a quiet night—they gave him only drinks: thirst tormented him. That must have been the serpent’s flames going out. In the morning he rose easily. His body did not itch, it had cleared up, and his face was clear and his hands were clear—unrecognizable.

  The evil was over. You would think he should obey Fevronia’s word. But as always happens when it comes time to pay, a person takes the easier way and gives you what he does not need or what was gotten without effort.

  Leaving Laskovo, Pyotr sent Fevronia a present of gratitude: gold and pearls. She did not accept. Silently she pushed the precious things aside and sadness lay on her lips: “Poor wretch!”

  Pyotr returned to Murom on horseback.

  People were amazed by Pyotr: maybe it was witchcraft: the man had been doomed and now you can’t find a spot. As clean as a dove’s feather.

  Fame spread in Russia: there are Kiev witches and Murom witches but the beekeeper Fevronia was the greatest. Fevronia’s name entered Murom with Pyotr and resounded like the name Laska; no wonder her village was called Laskovo, the gentle place.

  Pyotr was congratulated. A service was held in the Cathedral. In the Kremlin Pavel gave a feast in honor of his brother the Serpent-slayer.

  It began with a trifle: a sharp pain. He paid no attention. Then it itched, which was worse. In the morning he looked: from the unsalved scab the evil spread in a chain. They thought it was from the saddle. What saddle, a blister appeared on his face. It began all over again.

  Pyotr bore it for a week, spoke Fevronia’s name, apologized—but does repentance change anything?—“Sin, repent, and you’ll be saved!”—what scoundrel said that while lying to villains? Sins cannot be expiated. Only the will of the victim has power.

  Pyotr was taken to Laskovo.

  Fevronia did not meet him very gently. Restraining her anger, she repeated her words. Pyotr swore. And they took him to the banya again and this time smeared all of him. In the morning he awoke cleansed.

  A Laskovo priest married Pyotr and Fevronia. And Pyotr returned to Murom a happy man.

  While Pavel was alive, everything went well, they let Pyotr’s marriage to a beekeeper go. But after Pavel’s death, when Pyotr became the prince of Murom, people started complaining: “He married a witch!”

  It struck everyone in the eye that Pyotr was called the prince of Murom, but a “witch” ruled Murom. If not for Fevronia, everything would be “our way.” They would have handled the Serpent-slayer easily: he was meant to tell stories with Laska, not to rule a city. Pyotr and Fevronia had to be separated, there was no other way.

  In the city Fevronia was a princess; at home she was mistress of the house. Things that are badly placed make their way into your hands—but in the prince’s house, everything was in its place, a barrier to pilferers: the beekeeper’s rules, not the prince’s wherever. Order can be disputed, but it is tight.

  The servants were turning. And to vent their souls, they began maligning Fevronia to Pyotr.

  The stolnichii, the senior servant, with servile regret denounced Fevronia: she didn’t know her place—she kept jumping up from the table, she ate bread without order, while the main dish cooled.

  “And what is this habit: she forgets to bow after lunch and then gathers up all the crumbs from the tablecloth, and for what? As if there’s a lack or money is tight?”

  Suspicious curiosity follows such a report.

  They dined separately, in their own quarters. Pyotr ordered two settings and seated Fevronia with him. He watched. Nothing special, Laska still hasn’t learned, he uses his fingers instead of a fork, but Fevronia could have been eating at the prince’s table since childhood. But when all that was left was to cross herself, she rose and started gathering crumbs from the tablecloth. Pyotr rose and took her hand, opened her fingers.

  “Are we impoverished?” he said in reproach, took a look, and pulled away his hand: there were no crumbs in her palm but smoking incense.

  The dining room filled with fragrance as if a priest had used a censer. Or as if her smile blossomed with flowers and a perfume came from her eyes, so full and ripe.

  “No, our shame is we are too rich,” she said.

  Pyotr didn’t know where to look from shame: how could he have thought anything? And since then no matter what people told him about Fevronia, he did not worry: faith in a person quenches every suspicion easily and openly, even the most mysterious and incomprehensible.

  The boyars had their own thoughts—with every year Fevronia’s power extended to trifles, to the “bread crumbs” of the principality, there was no place to warm their hands, they weren’t people, they were slaves. How to get rid of Fevronia? The wives were rebelling: the beekeeper was in first place and they, born here, had to bow and be subordinate—they didn’t want to. And they nagged their husbands: they stared at Fevronia and connived.

  The infuriated boyars burst into Pyotr’s Kremlin.

  “Listen, Pyotr! You are our Serpent-slayer! We are happy to serve you honestly. Get rid of the princess: we do not want Fevronia. And we won’t allow her to lord over our wives. Let her take whatever she wants, we won’t stint the treasury, and let her go where she wants: Murom is not for her.”

  Pyotr did not shout: “Get out!” He suddenly felt so insignificant before the force that attacked him and helpless and, more softly than usual, he replied:

  “I don’t know, ask her. And whatever she says.”

  The boyar’s fists unclenched: there you are, show your mind, a fine thing! They themselves had said: P
yotr is not his brother Pavel, you could weave ropes out of the Serpent-slayer, and yet they treated him like Pavel: decide. Had Pyotr been alone, it would have been different, but behind a wall like that, even a kremlin wouldn’t last.

  The boyars went off in shame.

  “Talk to her!” Just try, she’ll answer. A brain-twisting problem.

  The women whined—but this is harsher: a punch in the mouth—and they all sing the same tune: Fevronia. They don’t dare tell her to her face, they’re afraid, she’s a witch, but you’re supposed to do it for them—it drives you crazy. So the boyars decided to deal with it cleverly and at one swoop.

  The City Izba is as spacious as the prince’s mansion, and the whole city gave a banquet. They invited Prince Pyotr and Fevronia—honoring them with the best seat at the main table.

  They ate and drank with dignity. But once the hops blossomed, meekness hid, voices grew strong, and they barked like hounds. Urged each other on. Circled.

  And it burst out:

  “In the name of the city of Murom,” the braggart came up to Fevronia and the rest got up and followed, like swine, “grant what we ask.”

  Fevronia stood up, too, she understood everything, but was calm.

  “I’m listening,” Fevronia replied, “I’m happy to grant you anything.”

  “We want Prince Pyotr,” the brave one demanded, emboldened by Fevronia’s agreement. “Pyotr vanquished the Serpent, let the Serpent-slayer rule us, but our wives don’t want you. They do not wish to be under your power. Take treasures and gold, as much as you want, and go where you want.”

  “All right, I will grant your wish and the wish of your wives, I will go away. But you must grant what I ask of you.”

  “We give our word without demur; we will grant you anything!” they all shouted.

  “I don’t want anything, none of your riches. I ask only one thing, give me Prince Pyotr.”

  They looked at one another.

  And in one gasp they said: “Take him.”

  Each one thought: “They’ll elect a new prince and I will be that prince.”