Makar's Dream, and Other Stories

by Vladimir Galaktionovich Korolenko

Tears rose in the eyes of the old Toyon, and Makar saw the scales trembling and the wooden bowl rising as the golden one sank.

And still he talked on.

Everything was written down in their book, he said, let them look and see if any one had ever done him a kindness or brought him happiness and joy! Where were his children? If they had died his heart had been heavy and sad; if they had lived to grow up they had left him, to carry on their fight alone with their own grinding needs. So he had remained to grow old with his second wife, and had felt his strength failing and had seen that a pitiless, homeless old age was creeping upon him. They two had stood solitary as two lorn fir-trees on the steppe, buffeted on every hand by the merciless winds.

“Is that true?” asked the Toyon again, and the priest hastened to answer:

“Absolutely true.”

And the scales trembled once more—but the old Toyon pondered.

“How is this?” he asked. “Have I not many on earth who are truly righteous? Their eyes are clear, their faces are bright, and their garments are without a stain. Their hearts are mellow as well tilled soil in which flourishes good seed, sending up strong and fragrant shoots whose odour is pleasant to my nostrils. But you—look at yourself!”

All eyes were now turned on Makar, and he felt ashamed. He knew that his eyes were dim, that his face was dull, that his hair and beard were unkempt, that his raiment was torn. And though for some time before his death he had intended to buy a pair of new boots in which to appear at the Judgment, he somehow had always managed to drink up the money, and now stood before the Toyon in wretched fur shoes like a Yakut.

“Your face is dull,” the Toyon went on. “Your eyes are bleared and your clothes are torn. Your heart is choked with weeds and thistles and bitter wormwood. That is why I love my righteous and turn my face from the ungodly such as you.”

Makar’s heart contracted and he blushed for his own existence. He hung his head for a moment and then suddenly raised it and took up his tale once more.