The village. [Translation from the original Russian text by Isabel Hapgood]

by Bunin, Ivan Alekseevich, 1870-1953

  He wanted to strike a match. But his whisper was feverish; something rustled and reverberated in his burning head; his hands and feet were icy cold. Klasha came, quickly threw open the door, placed his head on the pillow, and sat down on a chair by the side of the couch. She was dressed like a young lady, in a velvet cloak and a little cap and muff of white fur; her hands were scented with perfume, her eyes shone, her cheeks had turned crimson with the frost. "Ah, how well everything has come out!" some one whispered. But what was not nice was that Klasha, for some reason, had not lighted the lamp; that she had come, not to see him, but to go to Ivanushka's funeral; that she suddenly

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  began to sing, accompanying herself on a guitar: "Haz-Bulat, the dauntless, thy mountain hut is poor." . . . Then, all at once, the whole thing vanished; he opened his eyes—and not a trace remained of that mysterious, agitating, and alarming affair which had filled his head with nonsense. Again he beheld the dark, cold room, the grey gleaming windows; he comprehended that everything around him was plain and simple, too simple—that he was ill and quite, quite alone. . . .

  In the deadly melancholy which poisoned his soul at the beginning of his illness, Kuzma had raved about the bullfinch, Klasha, Voronezh. But even in his delirium the thought had never left him that he must tell some one that they must show pity on him in one respect—they must not bury him in Kolodezy. But, my God! was it not madness to hope for pity in Dur-novka? Once he came to himself in the morning, when the fire was being made in the stove—and the simple, quiet voices of Koshel and the Bride seemed to him pitiless, alien, and strange, as the life of well people always appears pitiless, alien, strange to a sick person. He tried to call out, to ask for the samovar—but remained dumb and almost fell to weeping. The angry whisper of Koshel became audible—discussing him, the sick man, of course—and the Bride's abrupt reply: "Well, all's up with him! He'll die—and be buried. . . ."

  Then his melancholy began to abate. The sun, declining to the west, shone through the windows, athwart the bare branches of the acacias. The tobacco

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  smoke hung in a blue cloud. Beside the bed sat the aged medical man, redolent of drugs and frosty freshness, pulling icicles from his mustache. On the table the samovar was bubbling, and Tikhon Hitch, tall, grey, severe, was brewing aromatic tea as he stood by it. The medical man drank eight or ten glasses, talked about his cows, the price of flour and butter; Tikhon Hitch described how wonderful, how expensive, Nas-tasya Petrovna's funeral had been, and how glad he was that at last he had found a purchaser for Dur-novka. Kuzma understood that Tikhon Hitch had just come from the town, that Nastasya Petrovna had died there suddenly, on her way to a railway station; he understood that the funeral had cost Tikhon Hitch frightfully dear, and that he had already taken earnest-money for Durnovka—and he was completely indifferent.

  XI

  ONE day he awakened very late and, feeling neither weakness nor trembling in his legs, sat up to drink his tea. The day was overcast, warm, and much snow had fallen. Syery passed the window, making on the new snow imprints of his bark-shoes, sprinkled with tiny crosses. The sheep dogs were running beside him, sniffing at his tattered coattails. And he was leading by the bridle a tall horse of a dirty light bay colour, hideously old and skinny, its

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  shoulders abraded by the collar; it had an in-curving back and a thin, unclean tail. The horse was limping on three legs and dragging the fourth, which was broken below the knee. Then Kuzma recalled that two days previously Tikhon Hitch had been there, and had said that he had ordered Syery to give the dogs a treat—to find and kill an old horse; that Syery had in former days been engaged in that occupation at times— the purchase of dead or worthless cattle for their hides. A terrible thing had recently happened to Syery, Tikhon Hitch had said; in making ready to kill a mare, Syery had forgotten to hobble her—he had merely bound her and turned her muzzle to one side—and the mare, as soon as, crossing himself, he had plunged the thin small knife into her jugular vein, had uttered a scream and, screaming, had hurled herself upon her assassin, her yellow teeth laid bare in pain and rage, streams of black blood spurting out upon the snow, and had pursued him for a long time, exactly as if she had been a man—and would have caught him but that, "luckily, the snow was deep."

  Kuzma had been so deeply impressed by this incident that now, as he glanced through the window, he felt the heaviness returning in his legs. He began to gulp down the boiling hot tea, and gradually recovered himself. He lighted his cigarette and sat for a while smoking. At last he rose, went into the ante-room, and looked out at the bare, sparse orchard through the window, which had thawed. In the orchard, on the snow-white pall of the meadow, a high-ribbed, bloody carcass with a long neck and a crushed head stood out

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  redly. The dogs, their backs all hunched up and their paws braced on the meat, were greedily tearing out and dragging away the entrails. Two aged blackish-grey crows were hopping sidewise toward the head, and had started to fly thither, when the dogs, snarling, darted upon them; and once more they alighted on the virginally pure snow. "Ivanushka, Syery, the crows—" Kuzma said to himself. "Perhaps those crows can recall the times of Ivan the Terrible. O Lord, save and show mercy—take me away from here!" Kuzma's indisposition did not leave him for another fortnight. The thought of spring affected him both mournfully and joyfully; he longed to get away from Durnovka as speedily as possible. He knew that the end of winter was not yet in sight; but the thaw had already set in. The first week of February was dark and foggy. The fog covered the plain and devoured the snow. The village turned black; water stood between the dirty snowdrifts; the village policeman drove through the village one day, his horses hitched tandem, all spattered with horse droppings. The cocks took to crowing; through the ventilators penetrated a disturbing spring-like dampness. He wanted to go on living; to go on living and wait for the spring, his removal to the town; to live on, submitting to fate, and to do any sort of work whatsoever, if only to earn a single bit of bread. And to work, of course, for his brother—regardless of what he was like. Why, his brother had proposed to him while he was ill that they should move over to Vorgol. "Why should I turn you out of doors?" he had said after pondering

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  the matter.—"I'm giving up the shop and the homestead on the first of March: let's go to the town, brother, as far as possible from these cutthroats."

  And it was true: cutthroats they were. Odnodvorka had come in and imparted the particulars of a recent encounter with Syery. Deniska had returned from Tula, and had been knocking about without work, gabbling about the village that he wanted to marry; that he had no money, but would soon earn some of first-class quality. At first the village had pronounced these tales absurd nonsense; then, following Deniska's hints, it had come to understand the drift of the matter and had believed him. Syery, too, had believed him, and began to curry favour with his son. But after slaying the horse and receiving a ruble from Tikhon Hitch and securing half a ruble for the skin, he had begun to chatter incautiously and had gone on a spree. He drank for two days, and lost his pipe, and lay down on the oven to recover. His head ached, and he had nothing in which to put tobacco for a smoke. So, to make cigarettes, he began to peel the ceiling, which Deniska had pasted over with newspapers and divers pictures. He did his peeling on the sly, of course; but nevertheless, one day, Deniska caught him at it. He caught him and began to roar at him. Syery, being intoxicated, began to roar in return. Thereupon, Deniska pulled him off the oven and thrashed him within an inch of his life, until the neighbors rushed in. Peace was concluded on the evening of the following day, it is true, over cracknels and vodka; but, as Kuzma said to himself, was not Tikhon Hitch a cut-

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  throat also when he insisted, with the obstinacy of a crazy man, on the marriage of the Bride to one of these cutthroats?

  When Kuzma first heard about that marriage, he firmly made up his min
d that he would not permit it. What a horror, what folly! But later on, when he recovered consciousness during his illness, he actually rejoiced over this foolish idea. He had been surprised and impressed by the indifference which the Bride had displayed toward him, a sick man. "A beast, a savage!" he had said to himself; and, calling to mind the wedding, he had added spitefully: "And that's capital! That's exactly what she deserves!" Now, after his illness, both his decision and his wrath disappeared. He managed to get into conversation with the Bride about Tikhon Hitch's intentions; and she replied calmly:

  "Well, yes, I did have some talk about that affair with Tikhon Hitch. God grant him good health for such a fine idea!"

  "A fine idea?" said Kuzma in amazement.

  The Bride looked at him and shook her head. "Well, and why isn't it fine? Great heavens, but you are queer, Kuzma Hitch! He offers money, and takes the expense of the wedding on himself. Then again, he has not picked out some widower or other, but a young, unmarried man, without vices—neither rotten nor a drunkard—"

  "But he's a sluggard, a bully, a downright fool," added Kuzma.

  The bride dropped her eyes and made no reply.

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  Heaving a sigh, she turned and went toward the door.

  "As you like," she said, her voice trembling. " Tis your affair. Break it off—God help you—"

  Kuzma opened his eyes very wide and shouted: "Stop! have you lost your senses? Do you think I wish you ill?"

  The Bride turned round and halted. "And isn't it wishing me ill?" she said hotly and roughly, her cheeks flushing and her eyes blazing. "What is to become of me, according to your idea? Am I to go on for ever as an outcast, at the thresholds of other people's houses? Eating the crusts of strangers? Wandering about, a homeless beggar? Or am I to hunt up some old widower? Haven't I swallowed tears enough already?"

  And her voice broke. She fell to weeping and left the room. In the evening Kuzma tried to convince her that he had no intention of breaking up the affair, and at last she believed him and smiled a friendly, reserved smile.

  "Well, thank you," she said in the pleasant tone which she used to Ivanushka.

  But at this point the tears began to quiver on her eyelashes, and once more Kuzma gave up in despair. "What's the matter now?" said he.

  And the Bride answered softly: "Well, perhaps Deniska is not much of a joy—"

  Koshel brought from the post-office a newspaper nearly six weeks old. The days were dark and foggy, and Kuzma read from morning till night, seated at the window.

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  And when he had finished and had made himself dizzy with the number of fresh executions, he was benumbed. Heretofore he had been suffocated with rage when he read the newspapers—futile rage, because human receptivity was unequal to taking in what one read there. Now his fingers grew cold—nothing more. Yes, yes, there was nothing to get excited about. Everything went as if according to programme. Everything fitted together perfectly. He raised his head: the sleet was driving in white slanting lines, falling upon the black, miserable little village, on the muddy roads with their hillocks and hollows, on the horse-dung, the ice, and the pools of water. A twilight mist concealed the boundless plain—all that vast empty space with its snows, forests, settlements, towns—the kingdom of cold and of death.

  "Avdotya!" shouted Kuzma, as he rose to his feet. "Tell Koshel to harness the horse to the sledge. I'm going to my brother's. . . ."

  XII

  TIKHON ILITCH was at home. In a Russian shirt of cotton print, huge and powerful, swarthy of countenance, with white beard and grey frowning brows, he was sitting with the samovar and brewing himself some tea.

  "Ah! how are you, brother?" he exclaimed in welcome, but with his brows still contracted. "So you

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  have crawled out through God's snow? Look out: isn't it rather early?"

  "I was so deadly bored, brother," replied Kuzma, as they kissed each other.

  "Well, if you were bored, come and warm yourself and we'll have a chat. . . ."

  After questioning each other as to whether there were any news, they began in silence to drink tea, after which they started to smoke.

  "You are growing very thin, dear brother!" remarked Tikhon Hitch as he inhaled his smoke and scrutinized Kuzma with a sidelong glance.

  "One does get thin," replied Kuzma quietly. "Don't you read the newspapers?'"

  Tikhon Hitch smiled. "That nonsense? No, God preserve me."

  "If you only knew how many executions there are!" "Executions? That's all right. Haven't you heard what happened near Eletz? At the farm of the Bykoff brothers? Probably you remember—those fellows who can't pronounce their letters right? Well, those By-koffs were sitting, just as you and I are sitting together now, playing checkers one evening. Suddenly—what was it? There was a stamping on the porch and a shout of 'Open the door!' Well, brother, and before those Bykoffs had time to blink an eye, in rolls their labourer, a peasant after the pattern of Syery, and behind him two scalawags of some breed or other— hooligan adventurers, in a word. And all of them armed with crowbars. They brandished their crowbars and began to yell: 'Put up your hands, curse

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  your mother's memory!' Of course, the Bykoffs were thoroughly scared—scared to death—and they leaped to their feet and shouted: 'What's the meaning of this?' And their nice little peasant yells, 'Put 'em oop, put 'em oop!' Here Tikhon Hitch smiled, became thoughtful, and stopped talking.

  "Well, tell the rest of it," said Kuzma.

  "There's nothing more to tell. They stuck up their hands, as a matter of course, and asked: 'What do you want?' 'Give us some ham! Where are your keys?' 'Damn you! As if you didn't know! There they are yonder, on the door lintel, hanging on the nail.' "

  "And they said that with their hands raised?" interrupted Kuzma.

  "Of course they had their hands raised. And those men are going to pay heavily for those upraised hands! They'll be hanged, naturally. They are already in jail, the dear creatures—"

  "Are they going to hang them on account of the ham?"

  "No! for the fun of it, Lord forgive me for my sin," retorted Tikhon Hitch, half angrily, half in jest. "For the love of God, do stop talking balderdash and trying to pretend you're a Balashkin! 'Tis time to drop that."

  Kuzma pulled at his grey beard. His haggard, emaciated face, his mournful eyes, his left brow, which slanted upward, all were reflected in the mirror, and as he looked at himself he silently assented.

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  "Talking balderdash? Truly it is time—I ought to have dropped that long ago. . . ."

  Then Tikhon Hitch turned the conversation to business. Evidently he had been thinking things over a little while previously, during the story, merely because something far more important than executions had occurred to him—a bit of business.

  "Here now, I've already told Deniska that he is to finish off that music as soon as possible," he began firmly, clearly, and sternly, sifting tea into the teapot from his fist. "And I beg you, brother, to take a hand in it also—in that music. It is awkward for me, you understand. And after it is over, you can move over here. Twill be comfortable, brother! Once we have made up our mind to change our entire investment, down to the last scrap, there's no sense in your stopping on there with nothing to do. It only doubles the expense. And once we have removed elsewhere, why, get into harness alongside me. Once we have shifted the burden from our shoulders, we'll go off to the town, God willing, to amass grain, and we'll get into real business. And then we'll never come back to this hole of a place again. We'll shake the dust of it from our feet, and it may go to hell for all I care. I don't propose to rot in it! Bear in mind," he said, contracting his brows in a frown, stretching out his arms, and clenching his fists, "you can't wrest things out of my grasp yet a while. 'Tis too early for me to take to lying on top of the oven! I'm still capable of ripping the horns off the devil himself!"

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  Kuz
ma listened, staring almost in terror at his fixed, fairly crazed eyes, at his mouth set awry, at his words distinctly uttered in a rapacious sort of way—listened and held his peace. Later on he inquired: "Brother, tell me, for Christ's sake, what profit to you is there in this marriage? I don't understand; God is my witness, I don't understand it. I can't bear even the sight of that Deniska of yours. That's a new type— new Russia will be worse than all the old types. Don't you make any mistake, thinking he is bashful and sentimental and only pretends to be a fool: he's an extremely cynical beast. People are saying of me that I am living with the Bride—"

  "Well, you don't know moderation in anything," interrupted Tikhon Hitch with a frown. "You're for ever hammering away at the same thing: 'an unhappy nation, an unhappy nation!' And now—you call them brutes!"

  "Yes, I do hammer at that idea, and I shall go on hammering at it!" Kuzma broke in hotly. "But I've lost my wits completely! Nowadays I don't understand at all: whether it is an unhappy nation, or— Come now, listen to me. You know you hate that man yourself, that Deniska! You both hate each other! He never speaks of you except to call you a 'bloodsucker who has gnawed himself into the very vitals of the people,' and here you are calling him a bloodsucker! He is boasting insolently about the village that now he is the equal of the king!"

  "Well, I know that," Tikhon Hitch again interrupted.

  "But do you know what he is saying about the

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  Bride?" went on Kuzma, not listening to him. "She's handsome—she has, you know, such a white, delicate complexion—but he, the stupid animal—do you know what he is saying about her? 'She's all enameled, the trollop!' And, by this vtime, you must understand one thing: he certainly will not live in the village. You couldn't keep that vagabond in the country now with a lasso. What sort of a farmer and what sort of a family man do you suppose he'll be? Yesterday, I heard, he was roaming about the village and singing in a lewd voice: 'She's beautiful as an angel from heaven, as sly as a damon from hell.' "