Makar's Dream, and Other Stories

by Vladimir Galaktionovich Korolenko

IV

I MAKE SOME NEW ACQUAINTANCES

We started on our expedition one day after dinner, and, having reached the hill, began climbing the clay landslides that had been torn from its side by grave diggers long dead and by the freshets of Spring. These landslides had stripped the hillside bare, and here and there white, crumbling bones protruded through the clay. In one place the rotting corner of a coffin jutted out; in another a human skull grinned at us, fixing us with its dark, hollow eyes.

At last, lending one another a hand, we scrambled up over the last cliff and found ourselves on the summit of the hill. The sun was already nearing the horizon. Its slanting rays were tenderly gilding the sward of the old cemetery, playing across its ancient, zig-zag crosses, and streaming through the windows of the chapel. The air was still, and about us reigned the deep peace of a deserted burial ground. Here we no longer saw skulls and shank-bones and coffins. A soft, gently sloping carpet of fresh green grass had lovingly concealed in its embrace the horror and ugliness of death.

We were alone. Only the sparrows were bustling merrily about us, and a few swallows were silently flying in and out of the windows of the chapel standing disconsolately among its grassy graves, modest crosses, and the tumble-down stone sepulchres on the débris of which gleamed the bright faces of butter-cups, violets, and clover blossoms.

“No one is here,” said one of my companions.

“The sun is setting,” added another, looking at the sun, which, although it had not yet set, was hanging low above the hill.

The doors and windows were boarded up for some distance above the ground, but, with the help of my companions, I had hopes of scaling them and peeping into the chapel.

“Don’t!” cried one of my band, suddenly losing his courage and seizing my arm.

“Get away, you old woman!” the oldest of our little army shouted at him, deftly offering me his back.

I jumped bravely upon it; he stood up, and I found myself with my feet on his shoulders. In this position I could easily reach the window-sill with my hand. I made sure of its strength, and then pulled myself up and sat on it.

“Well, what do you see?” the boys asked from below, with lively curiosity.

I was silent. By peering over the sill I could see down into the interior of the chapel, from whence there rose to meet me all the solemn quiet of an abandoned place of worship. The interior of the tall, narrow building was innocent of paint. The evening sunlight was streaming unobstructed through the open windows, staining the peeling walls a brilliant gold. I saw the inside of the closed door, the crumbling gallery, the ancient tottering columns. The distance from the window to the floor appeared much greater than from the window to the grass outside. I seemed to be looking down into a deep abyss, and at first I could not make out what certain strange objects were whose fantastic forms were resting upon the floor.

Meanwhile my friends were growing weary of standing below waiting for me to give them news, and one of them climbed up by the same method that I had employed, and took his seat beside me, holding on to the window frame.

“That’s the altar,” he said, looking down at one of the strange objects on the floor.

“And that’s the lustre.”

“And that’s the little table for the Bible.”

“Yes, but what’s that?” I asked, pointing to the dark shape that lay beside the altar.

“That’s a priest’s hat.”

“No, it’s a bucket.”

“What would they have used a bucket for?”

“To carry coals for the incense.”

“No, it certainly is a hat. Anyhow, we can find out!” I cried. “Here, let’s tie your belt to the window-sill, and you can let yourself down by it!”

“I like that! Let yourself down if you want to!”

“Do you think I wouldn’t go?”

“Go on then!”

Acting on impulse I tied the two belts together, slipped them under the window-sill, and, giving one end to my companion, let myself down by the other. I trembled as my feet touched the floor, but a glance at my friend’s face bending sympathetically over me reassured me. The sound of my heels rang out under the ceiling, resounding in the chapel’s void, and echoing among its dark corners. A few sparrows started up from their roosts in the gallery and fluttered out through a large hole in the roof. All at once I caught sight of a stern, bearded face under a crown of thorns looking down at me from over the window in which we had been sitting. It was an immense crucifix leaning out from high up under the rafters.

I was seized with dread. My companion’s eyes sparkled, and he held his breath with curiosity and sympathy.

“Are you going any farther?” he asked in a low voice.

“Yes,” I answered in the same tone, summoning all my courage, but at that instant something totally unexpected happened. First, we heard the rattle of plaster falling in the gallery. Then something moved overhead, stirring up clouds of dust, and a big grey mass flapped its wings and rose to the hole in the roof. The chapel was darkened in a moment. A huge old owl, frightened out of a dark corner by our noise, hung poised for a moment in the aperture with outstretched wings, and then sailed away.

A wave of shuddering fear passed over me.

“Pull me up!” I cried to my playmate, and seized the strap.

“Don’t be frightened!” he answered soothingly and prepared to pull me up into the sunshine and the light of day.

But all at once I saw his face become distorted with alarm. He screamed, jumped down from the window-sill, and vanished in an instant. I instinctively looked behind me, and caught sight of a strange apparition which filled me, however, more with surprise than terror.

The dark object that had been the subject of our dispute, and that had first looked like a bucket, then like a hat, and then at last like a kettle, suddenly flashed across my vision and vanished behind the altar. All I could distinguish was the dim outline of a small, what seemed to be a child’s, hand, beckoning the object into its hiding place.

It would be hard to describe my sensations at that moment. They were not painful, the feeling that overcame me could not even be called fear. I seemed to be in another world. From somewhere, as if from the world that I had left, there came to me, a few seconds later, the swift frightened pattering of three pairs of children’s feet. This sound soon died away, and I was left alone in that tomb-like place, in the presence of an apparition inexplicable and strange.

Time ceased to exist for me, therefore I cannot say whether it was soon or not before I was aware of suppressed whispering under the altar.

“Why doesn’t he climb up again?”

“You can see, he’s frightened.”

The first voice seemed to be that of a very little child, the second might have belonged to a boy of my own age. I seemed to see, too, a pair of black eyes shining through the chinks in the old altar.

“What’s he going to do now?” the whisper recommenced.

“Wait and see,” answered the older voice.

Something moved so violently under the altar that the structure trembled, and a little figure emerged from underneath it.

It was a boy of nine, taller than I was, thin and slight as a reed. He was dressed in a dirty shirt, and his hands were thrust into the pockets of a pair of short, tight breeches. His black hair hung in shaggy elf-locks over his dark, pensive eyes.

Although he was a stranger and had appeared on the scene in such an unusual and unexpected manner, and although he was approaching me with that infinitely provocative look with which boys always met each other among our bazaars when they were preparing for a fight, I nevertheless felt very much braver than I had before. My courage increased when there appeared from under the altar, or rather from a trap-door in the floor which was concealed by the altar, another grimy little face framed in golden curls, and a pair of bright blue eyes fixed on me full of childish curiosity.

I moved slightly away from the wall and also put my hands into my pockets according to the rules of our bazaars. This was a sign that I was not afraid of my adversary and even partly wished to hint at my contempt for him.

We stood face to face, measuring each other with our eyes. Having stared at me from head to foot, the boy asked:

“What are you doing here?”

“Nothing,” I answered. “What business is it of yours?”

My adversary jerked his shoulder as if he intended to take his hand out of his pocket and strike me. I did not blink.

“I’ll show you!” he threatened.

I stuck out my chest.

“Hit me! Try!”

The moment was crucial. On it depended the character of our future relationship. I waited, but my opponent continued to fix me with the same scrutinising gaze and did not move.

“I’ll hit—too——” I said, but more peaceably this time.

Meanwhile the little girl, with her tiny hands resting on the floor of the chapel, was trying to scramble up out of the trap-door. She fell down, got up again, and at last came tottering with uncertain steps toward the boy. Having reached him, she seized him and nestled closely to him, at the same time fixing eyes of wonder and fear upon my face.

This decided the affair. It was obvious that the boy could not fight under conditions such as these. Of course I was too generous to take advantage of the awkward situation he was in.

“What’s your name?” asked the boy, stroking the little girl’s fair curls.

“Vasia. What’s yours?”

“Mine’s Valek. I know you. You live in the garden near the pond. You have big apples.”

“Yes, our apples are fine. Don’t you want some?”

Taking out of my pocket two apples that had been intended as payment for my shamefully fugitive band, I gave one to Valek and held out the other to the little girl. But she only hid her face and pressed closer to Valek.

“She’s frightened,” he said, and handed the apple to the child himself.

“What did you come down here for?” he asked next. “Did I ever come into your garden?”

“You can come if you want to. I wish you would!” I answered joyfully.

Valek was taken back.

“I can’t play with you,” he answered sadly.

“Why not?” I asked, deeply grieved by the sorrowful voice in which he had spoken these words.

“Your father is a judge.”

“Well, what if he is?” I asked with candid amazement. “You’d play with me, not with my father!”

Valek shook his head.

“Tiburtsi wouldn’t let me.” And as if the name had reminded him of something, he suddenly recollected himself and went on: “Look here, you’re a fine boy, but you’d better go. If Tiburtsi should find you here it would be awful.”

I agreed that it was time for me to go. The last rays of the setting sun were already fading behind the windows of the chapel, and the town was some distance away.

“How can I get out of here?”

“I’ll show you. We’ll go out together.”

“And what about her?” I asked, pointing to the little girl.

“What, Marusia? She’ll come with us.”

“How? Through the window?”

Valek reflected a moment.

“I’ll tell you what; I’ll help you to climb through the window and we’ll go out another way.”

With the help of my new friend I climbed up to the window-sill. Untying the belt, I slipped it around the sill, seized both ends, and swung myself into the air. Then, releasing one end, I dropped to the ground and jerked down the belt. Valek and Marusia were already waiting for me outside, at the foot of the wall.

The sun had just set behind the hill. The town was sunk in purple mist, only the tall poplars on the island, stained by the last glow of the sunset, stood out sharply defined in pure gold. I felt as if I had been in the old cemetery for a day and a night; it was as if I had come there the day before.

“It’s lovely here!” I exclaimed, struck by the freshness of the evening and filling my lungs with the cool, damp air.

“It’s lonely here,” said Valek sadly.

“Do you live here?” I asked, as the three of us began to descend the hill.

“Yes.”

“Where’s your house?”

I couldn’t imagine that children like myself could live without a house.

Valek smiled in his habitual sad way and did not answer.

We avoided the steep landslides, for Valek knew a better path. Pushing through the reeds of a dry marsh and crossing a couple of little streams on narrow planks, we found ourselves on a flat at the foot of the hill.

Here we were forced to take leave of one another. I pressed my new friend’s hand and then held out mine to the little girl. She gave me her tiny paw affectionately and, looking up at me with her blue eyes, asked:

“Will you come again?”

“Oh, yes,” I answered. “I’ll surely come!”

“All right,” said Valek thoughtfully. “You might as well come, but only when our people are in town.”

“Who are your people?”

“Why our people: all of them, Tiburtsi and Lavrovski and Turkevich and the Professor—but perhaps he wouldn’t matter.”

“All right, I’ll watch for them, and when they’re in town, I’ll come. Good-bye!”

“Hi! Listen!” Valek called after me when I had gone a few steps. “You won’t tell any one you’ve been here with us, will you?”

“No, not a soul!” I answered firmly.

“That’s good. And when those idiots of yours ask you what you saw say the Devil.”

“All right. I’ll say that.”

“Good-bye, then!”

“Good-bye!”

The thick shades of night were descending on Kniazh Gorodok as I approached our garden wall. A slender crescent moon was hanging over the castle and the sky was bright with stars. I was about to climb the wall when some one seized my arm.

“Vasia!” my runaway friend burst out in an excited whisper. “Is that you?”

“You know it is. And so you all ran away!”

He hung his head, but curiosity got the better of his confusion and he asked again:

“What did you see there?”

“What do you think I saw?” I answered in a voice that would not admit of a doubt; “devils, of course. And you are all cowards!”

Pushing my abashed companion aside, I climbed over the wall.

Fifteen minutes later I had sunk into a profound slumber, and was dreaming that I was watching real little devils merrily hopping up out of the hole in the chapel floor. Valek was chasing them about with a birch twig, and Marusia, her eyes sparkling with pleasure, was laughing and clapping her hands.