XV
DURING the night the rain poured down again, and it was so dark you could not see your hand before your face. Tikhon Ilitch slept badly and gritted his teeth in torture. He had a chill—evidently he had taken cold by standing on the highway in the evening—and the overcoat which he had thrown over himself slid off upon the floor, and immediately he dreamed the same thing he had always dreamed ever since childhood, whenever his back was cold: twilight, narrow alleys, a hurrying throng, firemen galloping along in heavy carts drawn by vicious black truck-horses. Once he woke up, struck a match, looked at the ticking clock—it showed the hour of three—and picked up the overcoat; and, as he fell asleep, the thought of Zhikhareff once more recurred distressingly to his mind. And athwart his slumbers a persistent thought obsessed him: that the shop was being looted and the horses driven away.
Sometimes it seemed to him that he was at the Dankova posting-station, that the nocturnal rain was pattering on the pent-house over the gate, and that the little bell above it was being pulled and was ringing incessantly—thieves had come and had led thither, through the impenetrable darkness, his splendid stallion, and if they were to discover his presence there, they would murder him. And again consciousness of the reality would return to him. But even the reality was alarming. The old watchman was walking about under the windows with his mallet, but it seemed as if he were far, far away; as if the sheep-dog, with choking growls, were rending some one—had rushed off into the fields with tempestuous barking, and suddenly had presented himself again under the windows and was trying to rouse him by standing on one spot and barking violently. Then Tikhon Ilitch started to go out and see what was the matter, whether everything were as it should be. But as soon as he reached the point of making up his mind to rise, the heavy slanting rain began to rattle more thickly and densely than ever against the small dark windows, driven by the wind from the dark and boundless fields, and sleep seemed to him the most precious thing in the world. At last a door banged, a stream of damp, cold air entered, and the watchman, Chaff, dragged a bundle of rustling straw into the vestibule. Tikhon Ilitch opened his eyes: it was six o’clock, the daylight was dull and wet, the tiny windows were misted over with moisture.
“Make a little fire, my good man, make a little fire,” said Tikhon Ilitch, his voice still hoarse with sleep. “Then we’ll go and feed the cattle, and you can go to your place and sleep.”
The old man, who had grown thin over night and all blue with cold, the dampness, and fatigue, gazed at him with sunken dead eyes. In his wet cap, his short rain-drenched outer coat, and his ragged bast-slippers soaked with mud and water, he growled out something in a dull tone as he got down with difficulty on his knees in front of the stove, stuffing it with the cold, fragrant bundle of straw and blowing on the lighted mass.
“Well, has the cow bitten your tongue off?” shouted Tikhon Ilitch hoarsely, as he climbed out of bed and picked up his coat from the floor. “What’s that you’re muttering there to yourself?”
“I’ve been walking all night long, and now it’s ‘give the cattle their fodder,’” mumbled the old man without raising his head, as if talking to himself.
Tikhon Ilitch looked askance at him: “I saw the way you walked about!”
He felt worn out; nevertheless he put on his coat and, conquering a petty fit of shivering in his bowels, went out on the porch, which was covered with the footprints of the dogs, into the icy chill of the pale stormy morning. Everywhere the ground was flooded with lead-coloured puddles; all the walls had turned dark with the rain.
“A nice lot; these workmen!” he said to himself angrily.
It was barely drizzling. “But surely it will be pouring again by noon,” he said to himself. And he glanced with surprise at shaggy Buyan, who dashed toward him from under the granary. His paws were muddy, but he himself was boiling with excitement, his eyes were sparkling, his tongue was fresh and red as fire, his healthy hot breath fairly exuding the odour of dog. And that after racing about and barking all night long!
He took Buyan by the collar and, slopping through the mud, made the rounds, inspecting all the locks. Then he chained the dog under the granary, returned to his ante-room, and glanced into the roomy kitchen, the cottage proper. The cottage had a hot, repulsive odour; the cook lay fast asleep on a bare box-bench, beneath the holy pictures, her face covered with her apron, her loins displayed, and her legs clad in huge old felt boots, the soles thickly plastered with the dirt from the earthen floors. Oska lay on the sleeping-board face downward, fully dressed, in his short sheepskin coat and his bast-slippers, his head buried in a heavy, soiled pillow.
“That devil has been at the lad!” thought Tikhon Ilitch with disgust. “Just look at her—at her nasty debauch all night long—and towards morning, off she goes to the bench!”
And after a survey of the black walls, the tiny windows, the tub filled with dirty dish-water, the huge broad-shouldered stove, he shouted loudly and harshly: “Hey, there! My noble lords! You ought to know when you’ve had enough!”
While the cook, scratching herself and yawning, heated the stove, boiled some potatoes for the pigs, and got the samovar alight, Oska, minus his cap and stumbling with sleep, dragged bran for the horses and cows. Tikhon Ilitch himself unlocked the creaking doors of the stable and was the first to enter its warm, dirty comfort, surrounded by sheds, enclosures, and styes. The stable was ankle-deep in manure. Dung, urine, and rain had all run together and formed a thick, light-brown fluid. The horses, already darkening with their velvety winter coats, were roaming about under the pent-houses. The sheep, of a dirty-grey hue, were huddled in an agitated mass in one corner. An old brown gelding dozed in isolation alongside his empty manger, smeared with dough. The drizzling rain fell and fell interminably upon the square farmyard from the unfriendly, stormy sky, but the gelding paid no heed to anything. The pigs moaned and grunted in an ailing, persistent way in their pen.
“’Tis deadly boresome!” thought Tikhon Ilitch, and immediately emitted a fierce yell at the old man, who was dragging along a bundle of grain-straw: “Why are you dragging that through the mud, you vile profligate?”
The old man flung the bundle of straw on the ground, looked him over, and all at once remarked quietly: “I’m listening to a vile profligate.”
Tikhon Ilitch cast a swift glance around, to see whether the lad had gone out, and, on convincing himself that he had, stepped up to the old man and with apparent calmness gave him such a thwack in the teeth that his head shook to and fro, seized him by the collar, and hustled him to the gate with all his might. “Begone!” he bawled, panting for breath and turning as white as chalk. “Don’t let me ever catch so much as the smell of you here in the future, you cursed tatterdemalion!”
The old man flew through the gate, and five minutes later, his bag on his shoulders and a stick in his hand, he was striding along the highway to his home in Ulianovka. Meanwhile Tikhon Ilitch, with shaking hands, had watered the stallion, had himself given the animal his portion of fresh oats—he had merely turned yesterday’s oats over with his muzzle and slobbered on them—and with long strides, through the liquid mess and the manure, had betaken himself to his cottage.
“Are things ready?” he inquired, opening the door a crack.
“There’s no hurry!” snarled the cook.
The cottage was beclouded with a warm, sweetish steam emanating from the pot where the potatoes were boiling. The cook, assisted by the lad, was energetically mashing them with a pestle, sprinkling in flour the while, and Tikhon Ilitch did not hear the reply because of the noise. Slamming the door, he went to drink his tea.