Yevsey broke into sobs, feeling himself wronged. Uncle Piotr smiled.
"You fool! You should have remembered that she's been blind only three years. She wasn't born blind. She lost her sight after she had the smallpox. So she recollects what things are really bright. Oh, what a stupid fellow!"
"I'm not stupid. She believed me," Yevsey retorted, wiping his eyes.
"Well, all right. Only don't go with her any more. Do you hear?"
"I won't."
"As to your crying; it's nothing. Let them think I gave you a beating." The blacksmith tapped Yevsey on the shoulder, and continued with a smile, "You and I, we're cheats, both of us."
The little fellow buried his head in his uncle's side, and asked tremulously:
"Why is everybody down on me?"
"I don't know, Orphan," answered the uncle after a moment's reflection.
The wrongs to which he was subjected now began to yield the boy a sort of bitter satisfaction. A dim conviction settled upon him that he was not like everybody else, and this was why all were down on him. He observed that all the people were malicious and worn out with ill-will. They lived, each deceiving his neighbor, abusing one another, and drinking. Everyone sought for mastery over his fellow, though over himself he was not master. Yevsey saw no man who was not in constant fear of something. The whole of life was filled with terror, and terror divided the people into fragments.
The village stood upon a low hill. On the other side of the river stretched a marsh. In the summer after a hot day it exhaled a stifling lilac-colored mist, which breathed a putrid breath upon the village, and sent upon the people a swarm of mosquitoes. The people, angry and pitiful, scratched themselves until blood came. From behind the thin woods in the distance climbed a lowering reddish moon. Huge and round it looked through the haze like a dull sinister eye. Yevsey thought it was threatening him with all kinds of misery and dread. He feared its dirty reddish face. When he saw it over the marsh, he hid himself, and in his sleep he was tormented by heavy dreams. At night bluish, trembling lights strayed over the marsh, said to be the homeless spirits of sinners. The villagers sighed over them sorrowfully, pitying them. But for one another they had no pity.
It was possible for them, however, to have lived differently, in friendship and joy. An incident Yevsey once witnessed proved this to him.
One night the granary of the rich muzhik Veretennikov caught fire. The little boy ran into the garden, and climbed up a willow tree to look at the conflagration.
It seemed to him that the many-winged, supple body of a horrible smoke-begrimed bird with a fiery jaw was circling in the sky. It inclined its red blazing head to the ground, greedily tore the straw with its sharp fiery teeth, gnawed at the wood, and licked it with its hundred yellow tongues. Its smoky body playfully coiled in the black sky, fell upon the village, crept along the roofs of the houses, and again raised itself aloft majestically and lightly, without removing its flaming red head from the ground. It snorted, scattering sheaves of sparks, whistling with joy in its evil work, singing, puffing, and spreading its raging jaw wider and wider, embracing the wood more and more greedily with its red ribbons of flame.
In the presence of the fire the people turned small and black. They sprinkled water into its jaws, thrust long poles at it, and tore flaming sheaves from between its teeth. Then they trampled the sheaves. The people, too, coughed, sniffed, and sneezed, gasping for breath in the greasy smoke. They shouted and roared, their voices blending with the crackling and roaring of the fire. They approached nearer and nearer to the great bird, surrounding its red head with a black living ring, as if tightening a noose about its body. Here and there the noose broke, but they tied it again, and crowded about more firmly. The noose strangled the fire, which lay there savagely. It jumped up, and its body swelled, writhing like a snake, striving to free its head; but the people held it fast to the ground. Finally, enfeebled, exhausted, and sullen it fell upon the neighboring granaries, crept along the gardens, and dwindled away, shattered and faint.
"All together!" shouted the villagers, encouraging one another.
"Water!" rang out the women's voices.
The women formed a chain from the fire to the river, strangers and kinsmen, friends and enemies all in a row. And the buckets of water were rapidly passed from hand to hand.
"Quick, women! Quick, good women!"
It was pleasant and cheerful to look upon this good, friendly life in conflict with the fire. The people emboldened one another. They spoke words of praise for displays of dexterity and disputed in kindly jest. The shouts were free from malice. In the presence of the fire everybody seemed to see his neighbor as good, and each grew pleasant to the other. When at last the fire was vanquished, the villagers grew even jolly. They sang songs, laughed, boasted of the work, and joked. The older people got whiskey to drink away their exhaustion, while the young folk remained in the streets amusing themselves almost until morning. And everything was as good as in a dream.
Yevsey heard not a single malicious shout, nor noticed a single angry face. During the entire time the fire was burning no one wept from pain or abuse, no one roared with the beastly roar of savage malice, ready for murder.
The next day Yevsey said to his uncle:
"How nice it was last night!"
"Yes, Orphan, it was nice. A little more, and the fire would have burned away half the village."
"I mean about the people," explained the boy. "How they joined together in a friendly way. If they would live like that all the time, if there were a fire all the time!"
The blacksmith reflected for an instant, then asked in surprise:
"You mean there should be fires all the time?" He looked at Yevsey sternly, and shook his finger. "You wiseacre, you, look out! Don't think such sinful thoughts. Just see him! He finds pleasure in fires!"
CHAPTER II
When Yevsey completed the school course, the blacksmith said to him:
"What shall we do with you now? There's nothing for you here. You must go to the city. I have to get bellows there, and I'll take you along, Orphan."
"Will you yourself take me?"
"Yes. Are you sorry to leave the village?"
"No, but I am sorry on account of you."
The blacksmith put a piece of iron in the furnace and adjusting the coals with the tongs, said thoughtfully:
"There's no reason to be sorry on account of me. I am grown up. I am the muzhik I ought to be, like every other muzhik."
"You're better than everybody else," Yevsey said in a low voice.
It seemed that Uncle Piotr did not hear the last remark, for he did not answer, but removed the glowing iron from the fire, screwed up his eyes, and began to hammer, scattering the red sparks all about him. Then he suddenly stopped, slowly dropped the hand in which he held the hammer, and said smiling:
"I ought to give you some advice – how to live and all such things."
Yevsey waited to hear the advice. The blacksmith, however, apparently forgetful of his nephew, put the iron back into the fire, wiped the tears from his cheeks, and looked into the furnace. A muzhik entered, bringing a cracked tire. Yevsey went out to go to the ravine, where he crouched in the bushes until sunset, waiting for his uncle to be alone; which did not happen.
The day of his departure from the village was effaced from the boy's memory. He recalled only that when he rode out into the fields, it was dark and the air strangely oppressive. The wagon jolted horribly, and on both sides rose black motionless trees. The further they advanced the wider the space became and the brighter the atmosphere. The uncle was sullen the whole way, and reluctantly gave brief and unintelligible answers to Yevsey's questions.
They rode an entire day, stopping over night in a little village. Yevsey heard the fine and protracted playing of an accordion, a woman weeping, and occasionally an angry voice crying out: "Shut up!" and swearing abusively.
The travelers