King Stakh's Wild Hunt (21 page)

I picked up the revolver from the ground.

“And why did you throw yourself on me like that, Mr. Dubatowk?”

“The devil alone knows! I saw some worm creeping, so I grabbed it without thinking. May your parents meet you in the next world as you have met me in this one. However, you skunk, how painfully you strike!”

It turned out that the old man had learned by-passing us about the visits of the Wild Hunt and he had decided to take it by surprise, “since the young ones are such weak ones – the wind swings them, and they are such cowards that they cannot defend a woman.” The end of this undertaking of his you know now. Hardly able to keep from laughing, which might have seemed disrespectful, I helped the groaning Dubatowk onto his freezing horse standing not far away. He mounted him groaning and swearing, sat sidewise, muttered something like “the devil tugged me to fight ghosts – ran up against a fool with sharp knees” and rode off.

His pinched face, his crooked one-sided figure were so pitiful, that I choked with laughter. He rode off to his house, groaning, moaning, casting curses on all my kin until the twelfth generation.

Dubatowk disappeared in the darkness, and here an indescribable, an inexplicable alarm pierced my heart. A kind of fearful guess stirred in my subconscious, but would not come to light. “Hands?” No, I could not recollect why this word worried me. Here there was something different... Why had there been so few horsemen? Why had only eight ghosts appeared today near the torn fence? What had happened to the rest? And suddenly an alarming thought struck me:

“Svetsilovich! His meeting with a person at Cold Hollow. His foolish joke about the Wild Hunt that might be interpreted as meaning that he suspected someone or had discovered the participants in this dark affair. My God! If that person is indeed a bandit, he will inevitably make an attempt to kill Svetsilovich even today. Why so few of them? Probably the second half made its way to my new friend, and these to Marsh Firs. Maybe they even saw us talking, after all, we, like fools, were standing in view of everybody over the precipice. Oh! If that is true, what a mistake you made today, Andrey Svetsilovich, when you did not tell us who that man is!”

It was clear that I had to hurry! Perhaps I could yet arrive in time. Our success in this affair and the very life of a kind, young soul depended on the speed of my feet. And I ran off so fast, faster than I had run the night when King Stakh’s Wild Hunt raced after me. I dashed straight through the park, climbed over the fence and rushed to Svetsilovich’s house. I did not fly in a frenzy. I understood very well that I would not last all the way, therefore ran at a measured pace, 300 steps running as fast as I could, and fifty steps more slowly. And I kept to this pace, although after the first two miles my heart was ready to jump out of my chest. Then it became easier. I alternated running with walking almost mechanically and increased the running norm to 400 steps. Stamp-stamp-stamp... and so 400 times, tap-tap... fifty times. Misty, solitary fire swam past. A smarting pain in my chest, my consciousness almost not working, towards the finish my counting mechanical. I was so tired that I’d have gladly lain down on the ground or at least have increased by five the number of such calm and pleasant steps, but I honestly fought temptation.

In this way I came running up to Svetsilovich’s house – a whitewashed building, not a large one, in the back of a stunted little garden. Straight across empty beds, crushing the last cabbages popping under my feet, I darted onto the porch decorated with four wooden columns and began to drum on the door.

In the last window a still, small light flickered, then a senile voice asked from behind the door:

“What’s brought someone here?”

It was the old man, a former attendant, who was living with Svetsilovich.

“Open the door, Kandrat. It’s me, Belaretsky.”

“Oh, my God! What’s happened? Why are you panting so?”

The door opened. Kandrat in a long shirt and in felt boots was standing before me, in one hand a gun, and in the other – a candle.

“Is the master at home?” I asked, breathing heavily.

“No, he’s not,” he answered calmly.

“But where did he go?”

“How should I know? Is he a child, sir, that he should report to me where he is going?”

“Lead into the house,” I screamed, stung by this coldness.

“What for?”

“Maybe he’s left a note.”

We entered Svetsilovich’s room. The bed of an ascetic, covered with a grey blanket, the floor washed to a yellow colour and waxed, a carpet on the floor. On a plain pine table a few thick books, papers, pens thrown about. An engraved portrait of Marat in his bath, stabbed with a dagger, and above the table a pencil portrait of Kalinowsky. On another wall hung a caricature of Muravyov with a whip in his hand, standing over a heap of skulls. His face that of a bulldog, a frightful one. Katkov, bending low, is licking his behind.

I turned over all the papers on the table, but in my excitement found nothing except a sheet on which in Svetsilovich’s handwriting was: “Can it really be he?” I seized the woven wastepaper basket and shook out all its contents on the floor: nothing interesting there except an envelope made of rough paper, on which was written: “For Andrey Svetsilovich”.

“Were there any letters today for the gentleman?” I asked Kadrat, who was completely dumbfounded and perplexed.

“There was one, I found it under the door when I returned from the vegetable garden – of course I gave it to the owner.”

“It wasn’t in this envelope, was it?”

“Just a minute... well yes, in this one.”

“And where is the letter itself?”

“The letter? Devil knows. Maybe in the stove.”

I rushed to the stove, opened the door – a whiff of warm air came out from it. I saw two cigarette butts at the very door and a small scrap of white paper. I grabbed it – the handwriting exactly the same as that on the envelope.

“Your luck, damn you,” I swore, “that you heated the stove early.”

But not quite good luck yet. The paper was folded in half, and the side closer to the corners, now covered already with grey ash, had become brown. Impossible to make out the letters there.

“
Andrey!
I
learned
that
you
are
interested
in
the Wild Hun
t
...
K
i
...
Nadzeya
Ro
m
...
in dange
r
...
my
d
a
...
(a large piece burnt out) ...
Today
I
spoke
with Mr.
Belaretsky.
He
agree
s
...
left
for
town.
Drygant
s
.
.
.
chi
e
...
When
you
receive
this
letter,
go
immediatel
y
.
.
. t
o
...
ain,
where
only
three
pines
stand.
Belaretsky
and
I
will
wai
t
...
ly
m
a
...
is
going
on
this
e
a
...
Come
without
fail.
Burn
this
letter,
because
it
is
very
dan
g
... for
me.
Yo
u
...
fi
r
...
He
is
also
in
mortal
danger
which
only
you
can
ward
off
...
(again much burnt out)
...
.
me.

Your
well
wisher
Likol...”

All was obvious somebody had sent the letter to lure Svetsilovich out of the house. He believed every word. He evidently knew very well the person who had written it. Something subtle had been planned here. He shouldn’t come to me, they wrote they had spoken with me, that I had left for town, I would be awaiting him somewhere at “ain” where three pines stand alone. What is this “...ain”? At the plain?

Not a minute to be wasted!

“Kandrat, where are there nearby three big pines on the plain?”

“The devil knows,” he thought awhile. “Unless it’s those near the Giant’s Gap. Three enormous pines stand there. It’s there that King Stakh’s horses – so people say – flew into the quagmire. But what’s happened?”

“This is what’s happened: Mr. Andrey’s life is in grave danger... He left long ago?”

“No, an hour ago, perhaps.”

I dragged him out onto the porch, and he, almost in tears, pointed out to me the way to the three pines. I ordered him to remain in the house, and I myself ran away. This time I did not alternate running with walking. I flew, I tore on as fast as I only could, as if I wanted to fall down dead there at the three pines. I threw off my jacket as I ran, and my cap, threw out of my pockets my gold cigarette case, the pocket edition of Dante which I always carried with me. Running became a little easier. I would have removed my boots, if I could have done that without stopping. It was mad racing. As I timed it I should turn up at the pines some twenty minutes after my friend. Terror, despair, hatred gave me strength. Suddenly a wind arose behind me, pushing me ahead. I hadn’t noticed the sky become completely cloudy, that something heavy, depressing was felt in the atmosphere. I kept racing on, madly...

The three great pines were already in sight at the distance, and above them such dark clouds, such a pitch darkness, such a dim sky... I rushed into the bushes, trampling them under my feet. And here... ahead, a shot sounded, a shot from an old pistol.

Wildly I yelled, and as if in answer to my yell, the silence was broken by a mad stamping of horses’ hoofs.

I jumped out into a clearing and saw the shadows of ten retreating horsemen who turned about in the bushes at a gallop. And under the pines I saw a human figure slowly settling down on the ground.

By the time I had run up to him, the man had fallen down face upward, with hands widely outstretched, as if wishing to protect his land from bullets with his body. I had time yet to send a few shots in the direction of the murderers, it even seemed to me that one of them had reeled in his saddle, but this unexpected woe made me throw myself down at once on my knees at the side of the body lying there.

“Brother! Brother mine! My brother!”

As if alive he lay there, and only a tiny little wound from which almost no blood flowed, told me of the truth, a cruel and irremediable truth.

The bullet had pierced his temple and left through the back of the head. I looked at him, at the ruthlessly ruined young life. I held him in my arms, called to him, shook him and howled like a wolf, as if that could help.

Then I sat up, put his head on my lap and began to stroke his hair.

“Andrey! Andrey! Wake up! Wake up, my dear friend!”

He was beautiful in death, unusually beautiful. With his face thrown back, his head hanging down, his slender neck as if carved from marble, he lay in my lap. The long, fair hair had become entangled with the dry yellow grass which caressed it. His mouth was smiling as if death had solved one of life’s riddles for him, his eyes were closed peacefully, and his long eyelashes overshadowed them. His hands so beautiful and strong, hands which women might have kissed in moments of happiness, lay alongside his body, as if in rest.

As a mother grieving over her son did I sit there, on my knees my son who had undergone torture on the cross. I howled over him and cursed God who was merciless towards people, towards the best of His sons.

“God! God! All Knowing, All Powerful One! May You perish! You Apostate, having sold Your people!”

Over my head something thundered, and in the following instant an ocean of water, a terrible shower, came pouring down on the swamp and the waste land, so lost and forgotten in the forests of this territory. The firs, bent down under it to the ground, moaned and groaned. Rain drops were beating against my back with which I was sheltering the face of the deceased from all that water, rain went wild, mercilessly slashing at the ground.

I sat, having completely lost my senses, numb to everything. Ringing in my ears were the words that I had heard uttered some hours ago by one of the best of people I had known.

“My heart aches... they go on, stray, perish, because it is shameful to stand still... and there is no resurrection for them after the crucifixion... But do you think that all were strangled? Years and years are ahead! What a golden, magic expanse is ahead! The sun!”

I began to groan. The future, murdered and growing cold in the rain, was lying here in my lap.

I wept, the rain flooded my eyes, my mouth. And my hands continued stroking this youth’s golden head.

“My country! Wretched mother! Weep!”

Crows sense a corpse from afar. The following day a police officer, a handsome man with a moustache, appeared in the Yanovsky region. He arrived without a doctor, examined the place of the murder, and with an air of importance that became a murder, said that because of the shower it was impossible to discover any traces of the crime. Ryhor, who had accompanied him, only smiled bitterly into his moustache. After examining the body of the murdered man, the policeman turned the head around with his thick white fingers, and in a solemn voice, said:

“Well-well! Finished him off how? Fell immediately.”

Then he drank vodka and had a bite to eat in Svetilpvich’s house, in the room next to the hall in which the old servant was bitterly crying, his tears choking him, while I was sitting literally crushed by woe and remorse. At this time nothing existed for me besides the thin candle which Andrey held in his hands. The candle was throwing rosy streaks of light on his white shirt, the front of which was made of lace. It was an old shirt that the servant had dug out from a trunk. But I had to find out what the authorities thought about this murder and what they intended to do.