In the courtyard it grew dark. Overhead was stretched a square patch of dark blue sky on which twinkled the shimmering glory of the stars. The courtyard itself with its steep walled sides looked like a deep pit, at the bottom of which sat, huddled up in a corner, the form of Matrona, resting after the beating she had received, and awaiting the return of her drunken husband....
[CHAPTER II]
The Orloffs had been married three years. They had had a child, which died at the age of a year and a half. Neither of them grieved over it much, for they consoled themselves with the thought that they would soon get another one. The cellar in which they lived was a great long, dusty room with a cobwebby ceiling. Close against the door stood, with its front towards the window, a huge Russian oven; between it and the wall a narrow passage led into a square room which obtained its light from two of the windows that looked on to the courtyard. Through these windows the light fell in two dim streaks into the cellar, which was damp, clammy, and death-like in its stillness.... Life flowed by somewhere, far, far away out there and above; here, in this hole only vague, dull sounds found an entrance, and blending with the dust of th? court, pressed in on the senses of the Orloffs in formless and colourless waves. Opposite the stove stood, behind a brown curtain with a pattern of roses, a great wooden double bedstead; over against the bed, and near the other wall stood a table, at which the Orloffs drank their tea and ate their dinner, and between the bed and the opposite wall, in a sort of frame formed by two rays of light, the couple sat and worked.
Blackbeetles wandered about, nibbling the paste with which old newspapers had been stuck against the walls. Flies hovered over everything, buzzing in a melancholy drone; and the pictures, which were decorated with the spots they left, looked against the dirty green background of the walls like dark blotches.
The day's work of the Orloffs left nothing to wish for in the way of monotony. Matrona got up at six o'clock, washed herself, and prepared the samovar; this utensil had more than once in the heat of strife, received some hard hits, and was in consequence covered with patches of solder. While the water was heating in the samovar, she had already swept out the room and prepared breakfast Then she awoke her husband. By the time he was up and washed, the samovar was boiling and hissing on the table. Then they drank their tea and ate their white bread, of which they consumed a whole pound. Grigori was a skilled worker, and never therefore without work. Whilst they were drinking their tea he apportioned out the day's labour; he did the finer parts which required a master hand, whilst his wife's share lay in twisting the waxed threads, and in finishing off pieces of work which did not require so much skill. They also spoke during breakfast of what they should have for their dinner. In the winter, when the stomach required more, this was a fairly interesting subject, but in the summer when the stove, for motives of economy, was only lit on high days and holidays, and not always then, they lived mostly on cold meats, on kwass, varied with salt-fish and onions; sometimes they boiled, on some neighbour's fire in the courtyard, a piece of meat. As soon as their breakfast was finished they sat down to work, Grigori astride on a log of wood covered with bits of leather, Matrona on a low stool beside him. At first they would work in silence, for what had they to talk about? They might sometimes exchange a few words about their work, and then silence would once more reign for half-an-hour or more. The blows of the hammer fell with a dull sound, the thread squeaked as it was drawn through the tight-stretched leather. Grigori yawned now and then, and after each yawn would close his mouth with a loud noise. Matrona sighed and was silent.
Often Orloff would begin a song; he possessed a powerful metallic voice, and did not sing badly. The words of the song poured forth rapidly and plaintively in a ringing recitative from Grischka's whole chest, or they flowed evenly in loud, strong wailings, whose melancholy sounds found their way out of the cellar windows into the courtyard. Matrona in a weak soft alto would sing second to her husband. Both faces at such times would wear a thoughtful, sad expression, and Grischka's dark eyes would grow moist His wife, absorbed in the world of sound, would sit in a half-conscious state, swaying from side to side; sometimes she would appear completely lost in the music, suddenly pausing on a note, and then slowly falling once more into the words of the song her husband was singing. Neither of them felt at such times the presence of the other; they were each pouring forth what seemed to be the whole emptiness and dreariness of their joyless lives, and through the words of the song they were seeking for an outlet for their own half-conscious feelings and thoughts. At times Grischka would improvise—
"Ah! to think of my life, my cursed Life! And the ache in my soul, that cursed ache! Ah! this bitter ache! Ah! this ache and sorrow....!"
But Matrona did not love these improvisings, and she generally asked him—
"Why do you howl then like a dog, when death is about?"