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It was a beautiful July day, one of those days that come only when the weather has settled for a long time. From earliest morning the sky is clear; the morning dawn does not blaze like a fire: it spreads like a gentle blush. The sun—not fiery, not red-hot as during a scorching drought, not dull purple as before a storm, but bright and welcomingly radiant—peacefully rises beneath a narrow, elongated cloud, shines freshly, and sinks into its lilac mist. The upper, thin edge of the stretched cloud sparkles like little snakes; their gleam resembles that of hammered silver... But now the playful rays pour forth again—and cheerfully and majestically, as if soaring upward, the mighty luminary rises. Around midday, a multitude of round, high clouds usually appear, golden-gray with delicate white edges. Like islands scattered across an infinitely spreading river that flows around them in deeply transparent channels of even blue, they scarcely move from their place; farther toward the horizon they draw together, crowd closer, and the blue between them is no longer visible; but they themselves are just as azure as the sky: they are all thoroughly permeated with light and warmth. The color of the horizon, light, pale lilac, does not change all day and is the same all around; nowhere does it darken or thicken with storm clouds; here and there perhaps bluish streaks extend from top to bottom: it is barely perceptible rain falling. Toward evening these clouds disappear; the last of them, blackish and vague as smoke, lie in rosy puffs opposite the setting sun; at the place where it set as calmly as it rose calmly into the sky, a crimson glow stands for a brief time over the darkened earth, and, quietly twinkling like a carefully carried candle, the evening star kindles upon it. On such days all colors are softened; bright but not vivid; everything bears the stamp of some touching gentleness. On such days the heat is sometimes quite strong, sometimes even "steams" along the slopes of the fields; but the wind disperses and parts the accumulated heat, and whirlwinds—an unmistakable sign of steady weather—walk in tall white columns along the roads across the plowed land. In the dry, pure air there is a scent of wormwood, harvested rye, buckwheat; even an hour before nightfall you feel no dampness. The farmer desires such weather for gathering in the grain...

On just such a day I was once hunting grouse in the Chernsky district of Tula province. I had found and shot a fair amount of game; my filled game bag was mercilessly cutting into my shoulder; but the evening glow had already faded, and in the air, still light though no longer illuminated by the rays of the set sun, cold shadows were beginning to thicken and spread, when I finally resolved to return home. With rapid steps I passed through a long "square" of bushes, climbed a hill, and instead of the expected familiar plain with an oak grove on the right and a low white church in the distance, saw completely different places unknown to me. At my feet stretched a narrow valley; directly opposite, a dense aspen forest rose like a steep wall. I stopped in perplexity and looked around. "Aha!" I thought, "I've come to the wrong place entirely: I've gone too far to the right"—and, myself marveling at my error, I quickly descended the hill. An unpleasant, motionless dampness immediately enveloped me, as if I had entered a cellar; the thick, tall grass at the bottom of the valley, all wet, showed white like a smooth tablecloth; it felt somehow eerie to walk on it. I quickly scrambled up the other side and walked on, bearing to the left, along the aspen forest. Bats were already flitting above its sleeping treetops, mysteriously circling and quivering against the dimly clear sky; a belated hawk flew swiftly and directly overhead, hurrying to its nest. "As soon as I reach that corner," I thought to myself, "the road will be right there, though I've made about a verst's detour!"

I finally reached the corner of the forest, but there was no road there: some unmown, low bushes spread widely before me, and beyond them, far in the distance, a deserted field was visible. I stopped again. "What is this?... Where am I?" I began to recall how and where I had walked during the day... "Eh! These must be the Parakhinskiye bushes!" I finally exclaimed. "Exactly! That must be Sindeyevskaya grove... But how did I get here? So far?.. Strange!" Now I need to bear right again."

I went to the right, through the bushes. Meanwhile night was approaching and growing like a thundercloud; it seemed that darkness was rising from everywhere along with the evening vapors and even pouring down from above. I came upon some unused, overgrown path; I set off along it, looking ahead attentively. Everything around was rapidly darkening and growing quiet—only the quail cried out occasionally. A small night bird, rushing silently and low on its soft wings, almost collided with me and dove timidly aside. I emerged at the edge of the bushes and made my way across the field along a boundary strip. Already I could barely distinguish distant objects; the field showed white indistinctly around me; beyond it, advancing with each moment, gloomy darkness rose in enormous billows. My steps echoed hollowly in the stiffening air. The paling sky began to turn blue again—but this was already the blue of night. Little stars began to twinkle and stir upon it.

What I had taken for a grove turned out to be a dark, round knoll. "But where am I?" I repeated aloud, stopped for the third time, and looked questioningly at my English yellow-spotted dog Diana, decidedly the most intelligent of all four-legged creatures. But the most intelligent of four-legged creatures only wagged her tail, blinked her tired eyes mournfully, and offered me no sensible advice. I felt ashamed before her, and desperately rushed forward, as if I had suddenly guessed which way to go, went around the knoll, and found myself in a shallow, plowed-all-around hollow. A strange feeling immediately took hold of me. This hollow had the appearance of an almost regular cauldron with sloping sides; at its bottom several large white stones stood upright—it seemed they had crawled there for a secret council—and it was so mute and hollow there, the sky hung so flatly, so drearily above it, that my heart contracted. Some small animal squeaked weakly and pitifully among the stones. I hastened to climb back out onto the knoll. Until now I had still not lost hope of finding the road home; but here I finally became convinced that I was completely lost, and no longer trying at all to recognize the surrounding places, almost completely drowned in darkness, I walked straight ahead, following the stars—at random... For about half an hour I walked thus, moving my legs with difficulty. It seemed I had never been in such empty places: nowhere did a light glimmer, no sound was heard. One gentle slope replaced another, fields stretched endlessly beyond fields, bushes seemed to rise suddenly from the earth right before my very nose. I kept walking and was already preparing to lie down somewhere until morning, when suddenly I found myself above a terrible abyss.

I quickly drew back my extended foot and through the barely transparent twilight of night saw far below me an enormous plain. A wide river encircled it in a semicircle receding from me; steely reflections of water, glimmering rarely and dimly, marked its course. The hill on which I stood descended suddenly in an almost sheer precipice; its huge outlines stood out, darkening, against the bluish aerial emptiness, and directly below me, in the corner formed by that precipice and the plain, beside the river, which in this place stood like a motionless, dark mirror under the very cliff of the hill, two fires burned and smoked side by side with a red flame. People were bustling around them, shadows were swaying, sometimes the front half of a small curly head was brightly illuminated...

I finally recognized where I had wandered. This meadow is famous in our parts under the name of Bezhin Meadow... But there was no possibility of returning home, especially at night; my legs were giving way beneath me from fatigue. I resolved to approach the fires and in the company of those people, whom I took for drovers, to await the dawn. I descended successfully, but had barely released from my hands the last branch I had grasped when suddenly two large, white, shaggy dogs threw themselves at me with vicious barking. Children's ringing voices rang out around the fires; two or three boys quickly rose from the ground. I responded to their questioning shouts. They ran up to me, immediately called off the dogs, which were especially startled by the appearance of my Diana, and I approached them.

I had been mistaken in taking the people sitting around those fires for drovers. These were simply peasant children from neighboring villages who were watching over a herd. In the hot summer season horses are driven out at night to feed in the fields with us: during the day flies and gadflies would give them no peace. Driving out before evening and driving in at morning dawn the herd is a great holiday for peasant boys. Sitting without caps and in old sheepskin coats on the most spirited nags, they race along with merry whooping and shouting, waving their arms and legs, bouncing high, laughing loudly. Light dust rises and rushes along the road in a yellow column; the friendly trampling carries far; the horses run with pricked ears; at the very front, having raised its tail and constantly changing legs, gallops some reddish shaggy horse with burdock in its tangled mane.

I told the boys that I had gotten lost and sat down beside them. They asked me where I was from, fell silent, moved aside. We talked a little. I lay down under a gnawed bush and began to look around. The picture was wonderful: around the fires trembled and seemed to fade, pressing against the darkness, a round reddish reflection; the flame, flaring up, occasionally cast beyond the boundary of that circle quick gleams; a thin tongue of light would lick the bare branches of the osiers and immediately disappear; sharp, long shadows, bursting in for an instant, in turn ran right up to the fires: darkness struggled with light. Sometimes, when the flame burned more weakly and the circle of light narrowed, from the advancing darkness a horse's head would suddenly appear—bay with a winding blaze, or all white—looking at us attentively and dully, briskly chewing long grass, and, lowering again, would immediately hide. Only the sound of its continued chewing and snorting could be heard. From an illuminated place it is difficult to make out what is happening in the darkness, and therefore close by everything seemed curtained with an almost black veil; but farther toward the horizon, hills and forests were dimly visible in long patches. The dark, pure sky stood solemnly and immeasurably high above us with all its mysterious splendor. The chest constricted sweetly, breathing in that special, languorous and fresh scent—the scent of a Russian summer night. Almost no sound was heard around... Only occasionally in the nearby river a large fish would splash with sudden resonance, and the shoreline reeds would rustle faintly, barely stirred by the approaching wave... Only the fires crackled quietly.

The boys sat around them; there also sat those two dogs who had so wanted to eat me. They could not reconcile themselves to my presence for a long time and, squinting sleepily and glancing sideways at the fire, occasionally growled with an unusual sense of their own dignity; first they would growl, then whimper slightly, as if regretting the impossibility of fulfilling their desire. There were five boys in all: Fedya, Pavlusha, Ilyusha, Kostya, and Vanya. (From their conversations I learned their names and intend now to acquaint the reader with them.)

The first, the eldest of all, Fedya, you would have given fourteen years. This was a slender boy with handsome and delicate, somewhat small features, curly fair hair, bright eyes, and a constant half-cheerful, half-distracted smile. He belonged, by all signs, to a wealthy family and had ridden out to the field not from necessity but just for amusement. He wore a colorful calico shirt with a yellow border; a small new peasant coat, thrown over his shoulders, barely held on his narrow little shoulders; a comb hung on his light blue belt. His boots with low tops were certainly his boots—not his father's. The second boy, Pavlusha, had tousled black hair, gray eyes, broad cheekbones, a pale, pockmarked face, a large but regular mouth, a huge head, as they say, like a beer pot, and a squat, awkward body. The lad was homely—what can you say!—but still I liked him: he looked very intelligent and direct, and there was strength in his voice. He could not boast of his clothing: it consisted entirely of a simple homespun shirt and patched trousers. The face of the third, Ilyusha, was rather insignificant: hook-nosed, drawn out, short-sighted, it expressed a kind of dull, sickly anxiety; his compressed lips did not move, his knitted brows did not part—he seemed to be constantly squinting from the fire. His yellow, almost white hair stuck out in sharp tufts from under a low felt cap, which he kept pushing down over his ears with both hands. He wore new bast shoes and leg wrappings; a thick rope, wound three times around his waist, carefully tightened his neat black jacket. Both he and Pavlusha appeared to be no more than twelve years old. The fourth, Kostya, a boy of about ten, aroused my curiosity with his thoughtful and sad gaze. His whole face was small, thin, freckled, pointed at the bottom like a squirrel's; his lips could barely be distinguished; but his large, black eyes, shining with a liquid gleam, made a strange impression: they seemed to want to express something for which there were no words in language—in his language at least. He was small in stature, of frail build, and dressed rather poorly. The last, Vanya, I did not notice at first: he lay on the ground, quietly huddled under an angular bast mat, and only occasionally stuck out from under it his fair curly head. This boy was only about seven years old.

So I lay under a bush to the side and glanced at the boys. A small pot hung over one of the fires; in it "potatoes" were cooking. Pavlusha watched over it and, standing on his knees, poked a stick into the boiling water. Fedya lay propped on his elbow with the skirts of his coat spread out. Ilyusha sat next to Kostya and still squinted just as intently. Kostya lowered his head a little and looked somewhere into the distance. Vanya did not stir under his mat. I pretended to be sleeping. Gradually the boys began talking again.

At first they chatted about this and that, about tomorrow's work, about the horses; but suddenly Fedya turned to Ilyusha and, as if resuming an interrupted conversation, asked him:

"Well, and so you actually saw the house spirit?"

"No, I didn't see him, and you can't see him," answered Ilyusha in a hoarse, weak voice, the sound of which corresponded perfectly to the expression of his face, "but I heard him... And I wasn't the only one."

"Where does he live at your place?" asked Pavlusha.

"In the old rolling room." ("Rolling room" or "dipping room" at paper mills is the name for that building where paper is dipped out in vats. It is located right by the dam, under the wheel. Author's note.)

"Do you go to the mill?"

"Of course we do. My brother Avdyushka and I work as glazers." ("Glazers" smooth and scrape paper. Author's note.)

"Well, well—mill workers!.."

"So how did you hear him?" asked Fedya.

"Well, here's how. My brother Avdyushka and I had to stay, along with Fyodor Mikheyevsky, and Ivashka the Squint-Eyed, and another Ivashka from Krasnye Kholmy, and also Ivashka Sukhorukov, and there were other boys there too; altogether there were about ten of us boys—a whole shift; and we had to spend the night in the rolling room, that is, not that we had to exactly, but Nazarov, the overseer, forbade us; he says, 'Why should you boys drag yourselves home; there's a lot of work tomorrow, so you boys don't go home.' So we stayed and were all lying together, and Avdyushka started saying, well, what if the house spirit comes?.. And no sooner had he, Avdey, said this than suddenly someone above our heads started walking; but we were lying below, and he was walking up above, by the wheel. We hear: he's walking, the boards under him bending and creaking; then he passed over our heads; the water suddenly started rushing, rushing over the wheel; the wheel started knocking, knocking, turning; but the sluice gates at the race (With us, 'race' is the name for the place along which water runs onto the wheel. Author's note.) were lowered. We wondered: who raised them so that the water started flowing; however, the wheel turned and turned, then stopped. That one went again to the door upstairs and started coming down the stairs, and you could hear he wasn't hurrying; the steps under him even groaned... Well, that one approached our door, waited, waited—the door suddenly swung wide open. We were alarmed, we look—nothing... Suddenly, look, at one vat a mold (The screen with which paper is dipped. Author's note.) started moving, rose, dipped, moved about, moved about in the air, as if someone was rinsing it, and went back to its place. Then at another vat a hook came off a nail and went back on the nail; then it was as if someone went to the door and suddenly started coughing, choking, like some sheep, and so loudly... We all tumbled in a heap, crawling under each other... How frightened we were at that time!"

"Well, well!" said Pavel. "Why did he start coughing?"

"Don't know; maybe from the dampness."

Everyone fell silent.

"What," asked Fedya, "are the potatoes cooked?"

Pavlusha felt them.

"No, still raw... Listen, there was a splash," he added, turning his face toward the river, "must be a pike... And look, a little star fell."

"No, I'll tell you something, brothers," Kostya began in a thin voice, "listen, the other day what my father told me when I was there."

"Well, we're listening," said Fedya with a patronizing air.

"You know Gavrila, the village carpenter?"

"Well yes; we know him."

"And do you know why he's always so gloomy, always silent, you know? Here's why he's so gloomy. He went once, my father said—he went, my brothers, to the forest for nuts. So he went to the forest for nuts and got lost; he wandered off—God knows where he wandered. He walked and walked, brothers—no! he can't find the road; and it's already night outside. So he sat down under a tree; let me, he says, wait till morning—he sat down and dozed off. So he dozed off and suddenly hears someone calling him. He looks—nobody. He dozed off again—they call again. He looks, looks again: and before him on a branch sits a water nymph, swaying and calling him to her, and she's dying with laughter, laughing... And the moon is shining strongly, so strongly, the moon is shining clearly—everything is visible, brothers. So she's calling him, and she herself is all so bright, whitish, sitting on the branch, like some roach or minnow—or else there are carp like that, whitish, silvery... Gavrila the carpenter just froze, brothers, but she keeps laughing and beckoning him to her with her hand. Gavrila was about to get up, was about to obey the water nymph, brothers, but—it must be the Lord gave him sense: he did cross himself... And how hard it was for him to make the sign of the cross, brothers; he says his hand was just like stone, wouldn't move... Oh, you devil!.. So when he made the sign of the cross, brothers, the water nymph stopped laughing, and suddenly started crying... She's crying, brothers, wiping her eyes with her hair, and her hair is green, like hemp. So Gavrila looked and looked at her and started asking her: 'Why are you crying, forest weed?' And the water nymph says to him: 'If you hadn't crossed yourself, she says, you human, you would have lived with me in merriment till the end of your days; but I'm crying, I'm grieving because you crossed yourself; but I won't be the only one grieving: grieve yourself till the end of your days.' Then she, brothers, disappeared, and Gavrila immediately understood how to get out of the forest, that is... But since then he always goes around gloomy."

"Well!" said Fedya after a short silence, "but how can such forest uncleanness spoil a Christian soul—he didn't obey her, did he?"

"That's just it!" said Kostya. "And Gavrila said that her voice, he says, was so thin, plaintive, like a toad's."

"Your father told this himself?" continued Fedya.

"Himself. I was lying on the sleeping platform, heard everything."

"Strange business! Why should he be gloomy?.. But I guess he pleased her, that she called him."

"Yes, pleased her!" picked up Ilyusha. "How else! She wanted to tickle him, that's what she wanted. That's their business, those water nymphs."

"But there must be water nymphs here too," remarked Fedya.

"No," answered Kostya, "this is a clean, open place. The only thing—the river is near."

Everyone fell silent. Suddenly, somewhere in the distance, a long, ringing, almost moaning sound rang out, one of those incomprehensible night sounds that sometimes arise in the midst of deep silence, rise up, hang in the air, and slowly spread at last, as if dying away. You listen—and it's as if there's nothing, but it rings. It seemed someone cried out for a long, long time under the very horizon, someone else seemed to respond to him in the forest with thin, sharp laughter, and a weak, hissing whistle rushed along the river. The boys exchanged glances, shuddered...

"May the cross protect us!" whispered Ilya.

"Eh, you crows!" shouted Pavel. "What are you scared of? Look, the potatoes are cooked." (Everyone moved closer to the pot and began eating the steaming potatoes; only Vanya didn't stir.) "What about you?" said Pavel.

But he didn't come out from under his mat. The pot was soon completely emptied.

"But have you heard, boys," began Ilyusha, "what happened the other day at our Varnavitsy?"

"At the dam?" asked Fedya.

"Yes, yes, at the dam, at the broken one. That's really an unclean place, so unclean, and so desolate. All around are such ravines, gullies, and in the gullies all kinds of snakes (In Oryol dialect: vipers. Author's note.) live."

"Well, what happened? Tell us..."

"Well, here's what happened. You maybe don't know, Fedya, but there's a drowned man buried there; and he drowned a long, long time ago, when the pond was still deep; but his grave is still visible, though barely visible: just—a little mound... So the other day, the steward calls the dog-keeper Ermil; he says: 'Go, he says, Ermil, to the post office.' Ermil always goes to the post office for us; he's killed all his dogs somehow: they don't live with him for some reason, never have lived, but he's a good dog-keeper, knows his business. So Ermil went for the mail and lingered in town, but when he's riding back he's already drunk. And it's night, and a bright night: the moon is shining... So Ermil is riding across the dam: that's how his road went. He's riding along like this, the dog-keeper Ermil, and he sees: at the drowned man's grave a little lamb, white, curly, pretty, is walking about. So Ermil thinks: 'I'll take him—why should he perish like that,' and he got down and took him in his arms... But the lamb—nothing. So Ermil goes to his horse, and the horse shies away from him, snorts, shakes its head; however, he soothed it, got on it with the lamb and rode on again: he holds the lamb in front of him. He looks at it, and the lamb looks right into his eyes. Ermil the dog-keeper got scared: I don't remember, he says, sheep looking into people's eyes like that; however, nothing; he started stroking it like this on the wool—says: 'Baa, baa!' And the ram suddenly bares its teeth and says to him too: 'Baa, baa!..'"

No sooner had the storyteller uttered this last word than suddenly both dogs rose at once, rushed away from the fire with convulsive barking, and disappeared into the darkness. All the boys were frightened. Vanya jumped out from under his mat. Pavlusha rushed after the dogs with a shout. Their barking quickly receded... The anxious running of the alarmed herd was heard. Pavlusha shouted loudly: "Gray! Zhuchka!.." A few moments later the barking ceased; Pavel's voice came from far away now... A little more time passed; the boys exchanged puzzled glances, as if waiting to see what would happen... Suddenly the trampling of a galloping horse was heard; it stopped short right at the fire, and, clutching the mane, Pavlusha nimbly jumped off it. Both dogs also jumped into the circle of light and immediately sat down, sticking out their red tongues.

"What was it? What happened?" asked the boys.

"Nothing," answered Pavel, waving his hand at the horse, "the dogs just caught a scent of something. I thought it was a wolf," he added in an indifferent voice, breathing rapidly with his whole chest.

I involuntarily admired Pavlusha. He was very fine at that moment. His homely face, animated by the rapid ride, glowed with bold daring and firm resolve. Without a stick in his hand, at night, he had galloped alone after a wolf without the slightest hesitation... "What a splendid boy!" I thought, looking at him.

"Did you see them, the wolves?" asked the timid Kostya.

"There are always many of them here," answered Pavel, "but they're only troublesome in winter."

He settled down again before the fire. Sitting down on the ground, he laid his hand on the shaggy withers of one of the dogs, and for a long time the delighted animal didn't turn its head, gazing sideways at Pavlusha with grateful pride.

Vanya burrowed under the mat again.

"What terrors you were telling us, Ilyushka," began Fedya, who as the son of a wealthy peasant had to be the leader (though he himself spoke little, as if afraid of lowering his dignity). "And the devil made the dogs start barking here... But it's true, I've heard that place is unclean at your place."

"Varnavitsy?.. I should say so! Really unclean! They say the old master has been seen there more than once—the late master. He walks, they say, in a long-skirted caftan and keeps moaning like this, looking for something on the ground. Grandfather Trofimych met him once: 'What, he says, father, Ivan Ivanovich, are you pleased to be looking for on the ground?'"

"He asked him that?" interrupted the astonished Fedya.

"Yes, he asked."

"Well, Trofimych is brave for that... Well, and what did he say?"

"'I'm looking for tear-grass,' he says."—And he speaks so hollowly, hollowly: 'Tear-grass.'—'And what do you need tear-grass for, father Ivan Ivanovich?'—'The grave is pressing, he says, Trofimych: it's pressing, pressing... I want to get out, get out...'"

"Well!" remarked Fedya, "he must not have lived long enough."

"What a wonder!" said Kostya. "I thought you could only see the dead on Ancestors' Saturday."

"You can see the dead at any hour," Ilyusha picked up with assurance, who, as far as I could observe, knew all the village superstitions best of all... "But on Ancestors' Saturday you can see the living too, those, that is, whose turn it is to die that year. You just have to sit at night on the church porch and keep looking at the road. Those will pass by you on the road who, that is, are to die that year. Last year our old woman Ulyana went to the porch."

"Well, and did she see anyone?" asked Kostya with curiosity.

"Of course. First she sat for a long, long time, didn't see or hear anyone... only it seemed like a little dog kept barking, barking somewhere... Suddenly she looks: a boy is walking along the path in just a shirt. She took a closer look—Ivashka Fedoseyev is walking..."

"The one who died in spring?" interrupted Fedya.

"That very one. He's walking and doesn't raise his little head... And Ulyana recognized him... But then she looks: a woman is walking. She peers and peers—oh Lord!—she herself is walking along the road, Ulyana herself."

"Really herself?" asked Fedya.

"By God, herself."

"Well what, she hasn't died yet, has she?"

"But the year hasn't passed yet. Just look at her: barely alive."

Everyone fell quiet again. Pavel threw a handful of dry branches on the fire. They turned sharply black against the suddenly flaring flame, crackled, began to smoke and curl, raising their charred ends. The reflection of light struck out, trembling fitfully in all directions, especially upward. Suddenly, out of nowhere, a white dove—flew right into this reflection, whirled fearfully in one spot, all bathed in hot radiance, and disappeared, wings ringing.

"Must have strayed from home," remarked Pavel. "Now it will fly until it bumps into something, and where it bumps, there it will spend the night till dawn."

"What, Pavlusha," said Kostya, "wasn't that a righteous soul flying to heaven, eh?"

Pavel threw another handful of branches on the fire.

"Maybe," he said at last.

"But tell me, please, Pavlusha," began Fedya, "was the heavenly portent visible at your Shalamovo too?" (This is what our peasants call a solar eclipse. Author's note.)

"When the sun disappeared? Of course."

"I guess you were frightened too?"

"Not just us. Our master, though he explained to us beforehand that there would be a portent, when it got dark, they say he got so scared himself, you wouldn't believe it. And in the servants' hut, the cook woman, as soon as it got dark, hear this, she took and smashed all the pots in the stove with the poker: 'Who's going to eat now, she says, the end of the world has come.' So the cabbage soup ran all over. And in our village, brother, such rumors were going around that white wolves would run over the earth, would eat people, a bird of prey would fly, or they'd even see Trishka himself." (The belief about "Trishka" probably echoes the legend of the Antichrist. Author's note.)

"What's this Trishka?" asked Kostya.

"Don't you know?" Ilyusha picked up with fervor. "Well, brother, where are you from that you don't know Trishka? Real stay-at-homes you have in your village, that's for sure, real stay-at-homes! Trishka—he'll be such a marvelous man who will come; and he'll come when the last times arrive. And he'll be such a marvelous man that you can't catch him, and you can't do anything to him: he'll be such a marvelous man. For instance, the peasants will want to catch him; they'll come out against him with cudgels, surround him, but he'll blind them—he'll blind them so that they'll beat each other. They'll put him in jail, for instance—he'll ask for a drink of water in a dipper: they'll bring him a dipper, and he'll dive into it and vanish. They'll put chains on him, but he'll just clap his hands—and they'll fall right off him. Well, and this Trishka will walk through villages and towns; and this Trishka, the cunning man, will seduce the Christian people... well, but you won't be able to do anything to him... He'll be such a marvelous, cunning man."

"Well yes," continued Pavel in his unhurried voice, "such a one. That's who they were expecting at our place. The old people said that as soon as the heavenly portent begins, Trishka will come. So it began. All the people poured out into the street, into the field, waiting for what would happen. And our place, you know, is visible, spacious. They look—suddenly from the settlement down the hill comes some kind of man, so strange, such a marvelous head... Everyone shouts: 'Oh, Trishka is coming! Oh, Trishka is coming!'—and everyone wherever they could! Our village elder dove into a ditch; the elder's wife got stuck in the gateway, screaming bloody murder, so frightened her own yard dog that it broke off the chain and over the fence and into the woods; and Kuzka's father, Dorofeich, jumped into the oats, squatted down, and started crying like a quail: 'Maybe, he says, the enemy, the soul-destroyer, will at least spare a bird.' That's how frightened everyone was!.. But the man walking was our cooper, Vavila: he'd bought himself a new tub and put the empty tub on his head."

All the boys laughed and fell quiet again for a moment, as often happens with people conversing in the open air. I looked around: the night stood solemn and majestic; the damp freshness of lat