He walked on more rapidly.
We passed by a little village and reached the last hut. Its small windows looked out sightlessly into the dark field.... All were sleeping within.
Avtonomov suddenly walked up to the window and tapped sharply on the pane. An indistinct face appeared behind it.
“Who’s there?” asked a dull voice, and a frightened face was pressed against the glass. “Who’s coming around this time of night?”
“The d-devil,” drawled Avtonomov in a piercing, evil tone, and he stuck his head with its floral decorations against the pane.... The face within disappeared in terror.... Dogs began to bark in the village; the guard struck his rattle; the dark plain went on guard.... Again somewhere in the distance the sleeping churches droned forth their prolonged notes, as if to defend the peaceful region from some unknown evil. As if they felt that above them was hanging the menace of certain dark and hopelessly ruined lives.
VI
We walked for more than an hour through the dark fields. Weariness claimed its own and we neither wished to speak nor listen. At first I kept on thinking and tried in the darkness to imagine the appearance of my companions. This worked with Andrey Ivanovich, whom I knew well, and also with the little wanderer, but I had forgotten the features of Avtonomov, and as I looked at his dark form I could not recall his face.... Avtonomov at the clerk’s house and yesterday’s preacher seemed two distinct people.
My thoughts became still more confused; several days of tramping,—the dull night, the silence, the heavy, muddy road or the absence of one,—this was all that I could learn from my great weariness, and I began to lose myself as I walked along. It was a sort of semi-consciousness which permitted fantastic dreams strangely intertwined with reality. But reality for me was merely the dark road and three misty shapes, now behind me, now driving me onward.... I went with them almost unconsciously.
When I partially awoke, they were standing in the road and arguing.
“Open your eyes,” said the bootmaker, angrily but lazily.