Short Fiction - Vladimir Korolenko (easy books to read in english txt) 📗

I saw Andrey Ivanovich, with his long legs reaching almost to the very middle of the street. As I approached, he looked utterly unconcerned.

“What are you doing, Andrey Ivanovich?”

“Drinking tea. Did you think I was waiting for you? Don’t flatter yourself. When the cloud passes, I’m going on.”

“Fine.”

“And your adored⁠—”

“Who?”

“Those wanderers, people of God.⁠ ⁠… Please see what they’re doing in that hut! Go, look: it’s nothing; don’t be ashamed.⁠ ⁠…”

I walked up to the window. The hut was full. The peasants of the village were all away on business and so there were only women present. A few young women and girls were still running back and forth past me. The windows were open and illuminated, and I could hear within the even voice of Avtonomov. He was teaching the dissenters.

“Come, join us,” I suddenly heard the low voice of Ivan Ivanovich. He was standing in a dark corner near the gate.

“What are you doing?”

“Fooling the people. That’s what they’re doing,” interrupted Andrey Ivanovich.

The little wanderer coughed, and, squinting at Andrey Ivanovich, he said:

“What can we do, sir?”

He bent toward me and whispered:

“The old dissenters think Gennady Sergeich is a runaway priest. It’s dark. What can we do? We may not get anything. And, besides, there’s nothing else to do. Won’t you come in?”

“Let’s go in, Andrey Ivanovich.”

“What I haven’t seen there?” he answered, turning away. “Go⁠—kiss them. I think enough of myself not to do this, for I wear a cross.”

“So do we,” Ivan Ivanovich spoke with a mild tone of reproach.

Andrey Ivanovich whistled suspiciously, and then, with a serious look on his face, he called to me:

“Do you know this disreputable crowd?”

With an enigmatic glance at me, he added in a lower tone:

“Did you understand?”

“No, I didn’t. Goodbye. If you want to, wait for me.”

“We’ve nothing to wait for. Some people don’t understand.⁠ ⁠…”

I didn’t hear the rest of the sentence, because I went into the hut with Ivan Ivanovich.

Our entrance caused some excitement. The preacher noticed me and stopped.

“Oh! We thank you,” he said, pushing the women aside. “Please. Won’t you have a little cup of tea? Here’s the samovar, even though it’s a dissenting village.”

“Did I disturb you?”

“What nonsense. Woman, bring the samovar! Quick!”

“Do you use that weed, too?” asked a young woman with a full bosom and bashful, coal-black eyes, who was standing in the front.

“If the gentleman will permit⁠—it will give me pleasure,⁠ ⁠… and I’ll drink another.⁠ ⁠…”

“If you please,” I said.

“Please give me a cigarette.”

I gave it to him. He lighted it and looked laughingly at the surprised women. A murmur of dissatisfaction ran through the hut.

“Do you suck that?” asked the young woman spitefully.

“Of course.⁠ ⁠… According to the Scriptures, it is permitted.”

“In what part?⁠—teach us, please.”

He smoked on and then he threw the cigarette over the heads of the women into a basin of water.

“He’s thrown it away,” said the hostess, fussing around the samovar.

“Don’t throw it away, fool; you’ll set the place on fire,” interrupted another.

“Afire? If the well won’t stop that, you’d better put out the fire in the kitchen.”

“What are you thinking of? Everything is done nowadays. Even the priests smoke.”

“Of course, of course. You’ve a voice like a bell. You ought to be in a convent choir. Come with me.”

He reached for her. She cleverly turned aside, bending her beautiful form, while the other women, laughing and spitting, ran out of the hut.

“W-what a priest,” said a thin woman with childishly open eyes. She was in evident terror. “T-teacher!”

“Yes, he’ll teach us.”

“Teach us,” laughed a soldier’s wife, coming forward and resting her cheek on her fat hand. “Teach us something easy and sweet.”

“Yes! We’ll sigh for you.”

“I’ll teach you. What is your name, beauty?”

“I’m called what I’m called and nicknamed Gray Duck. What do you want?”

“You, Gray Duck. Give us some vodka⁠—heavens, they’ll pay up.”

“Get what? We’ll get it.”

She looked at me questioningly and cunningly.

“Please, a little,” I said.

The soldier’s wife hurried from the hut. Laughing and pushing, two or three women ran out after her. The hostess looked displeased but she put the samovar on the table and without a word she sat down on the bench and commenced to work. The children watched us curiously from their plank beds.

Laughing and panting, the soldier’s wife put on the table a bottle of some sort of greenish liquid. Then she walked away from the table and looked at us laughingly and boldly. Ivan Ivanovich coughed from embarrassment and the temporary widows still in the hut gazed at us in secret expectation. After the first cups, the preacher of the evening lifted the skirts of his cassock and stamped around the Gray Duck, who avoided his caresses.

“Go away!” She waved her hand, and, with a provokingly challenging glance at me, she walked up to the table.

“Why don’t you drink? Look at them⁠—they’ll finish it, I bet. Go ahead and drink.”

Smiling and shrugging her shoulders, she filled a glass and brought it to me.

“Don’t drink!” These words, in an unexpectedly venomous tone, came through the window, and out of the darkness appeared the bony face of Andrey Ivanovich.

“Don’t drink the vodka, I tell you!” he repeated, still more sternly, and again disappeared in the darkness.

The soldier’s wife let the glass tremble and spill. Thoroughly frightened she looked out of the window.

“May the power of the cross help us⁠—what was that?”

Everyone felt ill at ease. The vodka was exhausted and the question was whether to get more and continue, or to end now. Ivan Ivanovich looked at me in timid sorrow, but I had not the slightest desire to continue this feast. Avtonomov suddenly understood this.

“Really⁠—it’s time to be going,” he said, walking towards the window.

“But it’s raining outdoors,” said the soldier’s wife, glancing to one side.

“No. The clouds are all right;⁠ ⁠… they look dry.⁠ ⁠… Get ready, Ivan Ivanovich.”

We began to get ready. Ivan Ivanovich went out first. When I followed him into the dark, closed yard, he took my hand and said in a low tone:

“There’s that long-legged fellow waiting by the gate.”

In