Their mother was there, and all their old friends, and they wished for nothing further.

Was there not Toulu, the horse, in his stall in the ruined stable; Tulipan, the Pomeranian dog, Adam, the old butler, and Alexis, the "man of all work," who rowed their boat on the lake, tidied the garden--as well as the weeds and his own natural laziness would allow him--and was regarded by Boris as the type of all manly perfection!

What could children want more? Especially as Volodia was always ready at a moment's notice to tell them a story, carve them a peasant or a dog from a chip of pine-wood, dance a jig, or entertain them in a hundred other ways dear to the heart of Russian children.

CHAPTER II.

On one of the clear dry days of an early Russian autumn, when a brilliant glow of colour and sunshine floods the air, and the birch trees turned to golden glories shake their fluttering leaves like brilliant b.u.t.terflies, Elena, Boris, and Daria, stood on one of the wide balconies of the great house, with their mother beside them, sorting seeds and tying them up in packets for the springtime.

Some large hydrangeas, and orange trees, in green tubs, made a background to the little scene.

The eager children with clumsy fingers, bent on being useful; the pale, thin mother leaning back in her garden chair smiling at their absorbed faces.

"Children, I have something I must tell you," commenced Madame Olsheffsky, seriously, when the last seeds had been put away and labelled. "It is something that will make you sad, but you must try and bear it well for my sake, and for your poor father's--who I hope will return to us one day. I think you are old enough to know something about our affairs, Elena, for you are nearly thirteen. Even my little Boris is almost eleven. Don't look so frightened, darling,"

continued Madame Olsheffsky, taking little Daria in her arms, "it is nothing very dreadful. I am obliged to enter into a lawsuit--a troublesome, difficult lawsuit. One of our distant cousins has just found some papers which he thinks will prove that he ought to have had this estate instead of your grandfather, and he is going to try and take it from us. I have sent a great box of our t.i.tle deeds to the lawyer in Viletna, and he is to go through them immediately--but who knows how it may turn out? Oh, children! you must help me bravely, if more ill-fortune is to fall upon us!"

Elena rushed towards her mother, and threw her arms round her neck.

"We will! We will! Don't trouble about it, dear little mother," she cried. "What does it matter if we are all together. _I_ will work and dig in the garden, and Boris can be taught to groom Toulu, and be useful--he really can be very sensible if he likes. Then Var-Vara will cook, and Adam and Daria can do the dusting. Oh, we shall manage beautifully!"

Madame Olsheffsky smiled through some tears.

"You are a dear child, Elena! I won't complain any more while I have all my children to help me. But run now Boris, and tell Alexis to get the boat ready. I must go to the other side of the lake, to see that poor child who broke his arm the other day."

Boris ran off to the stables with alacrity. He found it difficult to realize all that his mother had just told them. "Of course it was very dreadful," he thought, "but very likely it wouldn't come true. Then, as Elena said, nothing mattered much if they were all together; and perhaps, if they were obliged to move into the village, they might live near Volodia's shop; and the wicked cousin might let them come and play sometimes in the garden."

"Alexis! Alexis!" he shouted into the hay loft, and a brown face with a shock of black hair, appeared at one of the windows.

"What is it, Boris Andreevitch?"

"Mamma wants the boat immediately," replied Boris. "She is going over to see Marsha's sick child."

Alexis took a handful of sunflower seeds out of his pocket, and began to eat them meditatively, throwing the husks behind him.

"The mistress won't go another day?" he enquired slowly.

Boris shook his head.

"The lake's overflowing, and the dam is none too strong over there by Viletna," continued Alexis; "it would be better for her to wait a little."

"She says she must go to-day," said Boris, "but I will tell her what you say."

Madame Olsheffsky, however, refused to put off her visit; and Elena, Boris, and Daria, looking out from the balcony, saw the boat with the two figures in it start off from the little landing-place, and grow smaller and smaller, until it faded away into a dim speck in the distance.

CHAPTER III.

Late that afternoon the three children were playing with Tulipan in the garden, when they heard Volodia's well-known voice shouting to them--

"Elena! Boris Andreevitch!"

They fancied he seemed to be in a great hurry, and as they flew towards him, they noticed that he had no hat, and there was a look of terror on his face that froze Elena's heart with the certainty of some unknown but terrible misfortune.

"The lake! the lake!" he panted; "where is the mistress?"

"Gone to see Marsha's sick child," said Elena, clinging to little Daria with one hand, and gazing at Volodia with eyes full of terror.

"Ah, then it is true. It was her I saw! The poor mistress! Ae! Ae!

Don't move, children! Don't stir. Here is your only safety," cried Volodia in piercing tones. "The river has flooded into the lake, and the dam may go any moment. The village will be overwhelmed. Nothing can save it! The water rises! rises! and any minute it may burst through! The Saints have mercy! All our things will be lost; but it is the will of G.o.d--we cannot fight against it." And Volodia crossed himself devoutly with Russian fatalism.

"But mamma! what will happen to her?" cried Elena pa.s.sionately. "Can nothing be done?"

"To go towards the lake now would be certain death," replied Volodia brokenly. "No, Elena Andreevna; we must trust in G.o.d. He alone can save her if she is on the water now! Pray Heaven she may not have started!"

As he spoke, a long procession of terrified peasants came winding up the road towards the great house. All the inhabitants of the village had fled from their threatened homes, and were taking refuge on the only hill in the neighbourhood.

Weeping, gesticulating and talking; the men, women, and children, rushed on in the greatest state of confusion.

Some carried a few possessions they had s.n.a.t.c.hed up hastily as they left their houses, some helped the old bed-ridden people to hobble along on their sticks and crutches; others led the smaller children, or carried the gaily-painted chests containing the holiday clothes of the family; while the boys dragged along the rough unkempt horses, and the few cows and oxen they had been able to drive in from the fields close by.

All, as they came within speaking distance of Elena and Boris, began to describe their misfortunes; and such a babel of sound rose on the air that it was impossible to separate one word from another.

"Where shall they go to, _Matoushka_?"[B] enquired Volodia anxiously, as the strange procession spread itself out amongst the low-growing birch trees.

[B] _Matoushka_--little mother.

Elena shook herself, as if awakening from a horrible dream.

"Oh, it is dreadful! dreadful! But you are welcome, poor people!" she cried. "Put the horses into the stables--Adam will show you where--and the dogs too; and come into the house all of you, if you can get in.

The cows must go to the yard. Oh, Var-Vara!" she added, as she turned to her old nurse, who had just come out, attracted by the noise. "Have you heard? Oh, poor mamma! Do you think she will be safe?" and Elena rushed into the house, and up the stair of a wooden tower, from which she could see for miles round, a wide vista of field, lake, and forest.

No boat was in sight, and the lake looked comparatively peaceful; but just across the middle stretched an ominous streak of muddy, rushing water, that beat against the high gra.s.s-grown dam, separating the lake from the village, and threatened every moment to roll over it.

Elena held her breath, and listened. There was a dull roaring sound like distant thunder.

The streak of brown water surged higher and higher; and suddenly--in one instant, as it seemed to the terrified child--a vast volume of water shot over the dam, seeming to carry it away bodily with its violence; and with a crash like an earthquake, the pent-up lake burst out in one huge wave, that rolled towards the village of Viletna, tearing up everything it pa.s.sed upon its way.

Elena turned, and, almost falling downstairs in her terror, ran headlong towards the group of peasants who had gathered on the gra.s.s before the wooden verandah, and in despairing silence were watching the destruction of their fields and houses.

Beside them stood the old Priest, his long white hair shining in the sunshine.

"My children, let us pray to the good G.o.d for any living things that are in danger!" he said.

The peasants fell upon their knees.

"Save them! Save them!" they cried, imploringly, "and save our cattle and houses!"

The blue sky stretched overhead, all round the garden the birch trees shed their quivering glory; the very flowers that the three children had picked for their mother, in the morning, lay on a table fresh and unfaded; yet it seemed to Elena that years must have pa.s.sed by since she stood there, careless and happy.