Again considerable time elapsed and I heard nothing of Misha.... G.o.d knows where he had vanished.--One day, as I was sitting before the samovar at a posting-station on the T---- highway, waiting for horses, I suddenly heard, under the open window of the station-room, a hoa.r.s.e voice uttering in French:--"_Monsieur ... monsieur ... prenez pitie d'un pauvre gentilhomme ruine!_".... I raised my head and looked.... The kazak cap with the fur peeled off, the broken cartridge-pouches on the tattered Circa.s.sian coat, the dagger in a cracked sheath, the bloated but still rosy face, the dishevelled but still thick hair.... My G.o.d!

It was Misha! He had already come to begging alms on the highways!--I involuntarily uttered an exclamation. He recognised me, shuddered, turned away, and was about to withdraw from the window. I stopped him ... but what was there that I could say to him? Certainly I could not read him a lecture!... In silence I offered him a five-ruble bank-note. With equal silence he grasped it in his still white and plump, though trembling and dirty hand, and disappeared round the corner of the house.

They did not furnish me with horses very promptly, and I had time to indulge in cheerless meditations on the subject of my unexpected encounter with Misha. I felt conscience-stricken that I had let him go in so unsympathetic a manner.--At last I proceeded on my journey, and after driving half a verst from the posting-station I observed, ahead of me on the road, a crowd of people moving along with a strange and as it were measured tread. I overtook this crowd,--and what did I see?--Twelve beggars, with wallets on their shoulders, were walking by twos, singing and skipping as they went,---and at their head danced Misha, stamping time with his feet and saying: "Natchiki-tchikaldi, tchuk-tchuk-tchuk!

Natchiki-tchikaldi, tchuk-tchuk-tchuk!"

As soon as my calash came on a level with him, and he caught sight of me, he immediately began to shout, "Hurrah! Halt, draw up in line! Eyes front, my guard of the road!"

The beggars took up his cry and halted,--while he, with his habitual laugh, sprang upon the carriage-step, and again yelled: "Hurrah!"

"What is the meaning of this?" I asked, with involuntary amazement.

"This? This is my squad, my army; all beggars, G.o.d's people, my friends!

Each one of them, thanks to your kindness, has quaffed a cup of liquor: and now we are all rejoicing and making merry!... Uncle! 'Tis only with the beggars and G.o.d's poor that one can live in the world, you know ...

by G.o.d, that's so!"

I made him no reply ... but this time he seemed to me such a good-natured soul, his face expressed such childlike ingenuousness ... a light suddenly seemed to dawn upon me, and there came a p.r.i.c.k at my heart....

"Get into the calash with me," I said to him.

He was amazed....

"What? Get into the calash?"

"Get in, get in!" I repeated. "I want to make thee a proposition. Get in!... Drive on with me."

"Well, you command."--He got in.--"Come, and as for you, my dear friends, respected comrades," he added to the beggars: "good-bye! Until we meet again!"--Misha took off his kazak cap and made a low bow.--The beggars all seemed to be dumbfounded.... I ordered the coachman to whip up the horses, and the calash rolled on.

This is what I wished to propose to Misha: the idea had suddenly occurred to me to take him into my establishment, into my country-house, which was situated about thirty versts from that posting-station,--to save him, or, at least, to make an effort to save him.

"Hearken, Misha," said I; "wilt thou settle down with me?... Thou shalt have everything provided for thee, clothes and under-linen shall be made for thee, thou shalt be properly fitted out, and thou shalt receive money for tobacco and so forth, only on one condition: not to drink liquor!... Dost thou accept?"

Misha was even frightened with joy. He opened his eyes very wide, turned crimson, and suddenly falling on my shoulder, he began to kiss me and to repeat in a spasmodic voice:--"Uncle ... benefactor.... May G.o.d reward you!..." He melted into tears at last, and doffing his kazak cap, began to wipe his eyes, his nose, and his lips with it.

"Look out," I said to him. "Remember the condition--not to drink liquor!"

"Why, d.a.m.n it!" he exclaimed, flourishing both hands, and as a result of that energetic movement I was still more strongly flooded with that spirituous odour wherewith he was thoroughly impregnated.... "You see, dear uncle, if you only knew my life.... If it were not for grief, cruel Fate, you know.... But now I swear,--I swear that I will reform, and will prove.... Uncle, I have never lied--ask any one you like if I have.... I am an honourable, but an unhappy man, uncle; I have never known kindness from any one...."

At this point he finally dissolved in sobs. I tried to soothe him and succeeded, for when we drove up to my house Misha had long been sleeping the sleep of the dead, with his head resting on my knees.

VII

He was immediately allotted a special room, and also immediately, as the first measure, taken to the bath, which was absolutely indispensable.

All his garments, and his dagger and tall kazak cap and hole-ridden shoes, were carefully laid away in the storehouse; clean linen was put on him, slippers, and some of my clothing, which, as is always the case with paupers, exactly fitted his build and stature. When he came to the table, washed, neat, fresh, he seemed so much touched, and so happy, he was beaming all over with such joyful grat.i.tude, that I felt emotion and joy.... His face was completely transfigured. Little boys of twelve wear such faces at Easter, after the Communion, when, thickly pomaded, clad in new round-jackets and starched collars, they go to exchange the Easter greeting with their parents. Misha kept feeling of himself cautiously and incredulously, and repeating:--"What is this?... Am not I in heaven?"--And on the following day he announced that he had not been able to sleep all night for rapture!

In my house there was then living an aged aunt with her niece. They were both greatly agitated when they heard of Misha's arrival; they did not understand how I could have invited him to my house! He bore a very bad reputation. But, in the first place, I knew that he was always very polite to ladies; and, in the second place, I trusted to his promise to reform. And, as a matter of fact, during the early days of his sojourn under my roof Misha not only justified my expectations, but exceeded them; and he simply enchanted my ladies. He played picquet with the old lady; he helped her to wind yarn; he showed her two new games of patience; he accompanied the niece, who had a small voice, on the piano; he read her French and Russian poetry; he narrated diverting but decorous anecdotes to both ladies;--in a word, he was serviceable to them in all sorts of ways, so that they repeatedly expressed to me their surprise, while the old woman even remarked: "How unjust people sometimes are!... What all have not they said about him ... while he is so discreet and polite ... poor Misha!"

It is true that at table "poor Misha" licked his lips in a peculiarly-hasty way every time he even looked at a bottle. But all I had to do was to shake my finger, and he would roll up his eyes, and press his hand to his heart ... as much as to say: "I have sworn...."

"I am regenerated now!" he a.s.sured me.--"Well, G.o.d grant it!" I thought to myself.... But this regeneration did not last long.

During the early days he was very loquacious and jolly. But beginning with the third day he quieted down, somehow, although, as before, he kept close to the ladies and amused them. A half-sad, half-thoughtful expression began to flit across his face, and the face itself grew pale and thin.

"Art thou ill?" I asked him.

"Yes," he answered;--"my head aches a little."

On the fourth day he became perfectly silent; he sat in a corner most of the time, with dejectedly drooping head; and by his downcast aspect evoked a feeling of compa.s.sion in the two ladies, who now, in their turn, tried to divert him. At table he ate nothing, stared at his plate, and rolled bread-b.a.l.l.s. On the fifth day the feeling of pity in the ladies began to be replaced by another--by distrust and even fear.

Misha had grown wild, he avoided people and kept walking along the wall, as though creeping stealthily, and suddenly darting glances around him, as though some one had called him. And what had become of his rosy complexion? It seemed to be covered with earth.

"Art thou still ill?" I asked him.

"No; I am well," he answered abruptly.

"Art thou bored?"

"Why should I be bored?"--But he turned away and would not look me in the eye.

"Or hast thou grown melancholy again?"--To this he made no reply.

On the following day my aunt ran into my study in a state of great excitement, and declared that she and her niece would leave my house if Misha were to remain in it.

"Why so?"

"Why, we feel afraid of him.... He is not a man,--he is a wolf, a regular wolf. He stalks and stalks about, saying never a word, and has such a wild look.... He all but gnashes his teeth. My Katya is such a nervous girl, as thou knowest.... She took a great interest in him the first day.... I am afraid for her and for myself...."

I did not know what reply to make to my aunt. But I could not expel Misha, whom I had invited in.

He himself extricated me from this dilemma.

That very day--before I had even left my study--I suddenly heard a dull and vicious voice behind me.

"Nikolai Nikolaitch, hey there, Nikolai Nikolaitch!"

I looked round. In the doorway stood Misha, with a terrible, lowering, distorted visage.

"Nikolai Nikolaitch," he repeated ... (it was no longer "dear uncle").

"What dost thou want?"

"Let me go ... this very moment!"

"What?"