The old convict spent the whole day walking up and down the prison courtyard, wearing a gloomy expression and sunk in deep meditation like a man trying to recollect something which he had long forgotten. He was entered on the roll of prisoners as Ivan the Forgetful, but his fellow-prisoners nicknamed him "Ivan the Runaway," because of his numerous attempts to escape. No one spoke to him, for all knew that nothing could be got from him but words of abuse and gloomy looks. On this particular day Ivan the Runaway was in a specially bad humour.

The spring had arrived in the previous night, and the mounds of snow at the corners of the grey towers, which in winter were so hard that the prisoners could amuse themselves by climbing on them, were now as full of holes as a sponge and discharged dirty-looking rivulets into the pools near them.

The sky was so warm and bright, and the wind blew so softly that a strange giddiness seized the old man, and the thick walls with the iron-barred windows seemed to him more hateful than ever. He was taken back to his cell; the key turned creaking in the door; he felt as though something in his heart were turned round with it, and his expression became more gloomy and morose than ever; he looked at the door like a hunted wolf. Ah, if he could only grip the warder's throat!—one squeeze would finish the business! The convict went to the window, and laid his hot face against the cold rusty iron bars. He could not gaze long enough at the deep blue sky behind them, and dreamt of dark forests, wide fields and majestic rivers rolling freely along. Just then a little cloud rose and hung motionless in space; rosy lights passed over it and its edges glowed like fiery gold. "The sun is setting," thought the prisoner, and lingered by the window till the little wandering cloud turned pale and was lost in the darkness, and the first star began to tremble in the sky. Ivan the Runaway went to sleep, but in dreams he heard the tops of the pines whispering, and the fir-cones dropping on the soft soil of the forest; he heard invisible wings beating and the stream fretting against the gnarled roots which barred its way to liberty.

II

The first thunderstorm, the harbinger of spring, has aroused the earth from her light slumber. At day-break, the convicts were mustered outside the prison walls. "Ivan the Forgetful," called out the warder, with the list in his hand. The old convict sulkily took his place in the row. He scanned with a searching glance the weak-looking undergrown soldiers of the escort, who in their ill-fitting grey cloaks looked almost deformed. Their bayonets gleamed in the sun, their musket-barrels were stopped with wads of cloth. "Loaded," said the old man to himself and smiled significantly. It was on just such a spring morning in the previous year that blindly-fired shots had rung out behind him. He remembered the warm scent of the earth on which he had then flung himself, as though he wished to be one with it, and then the deep weird silence during which he seemed to hear incessantly soft creeping footsteps behind him ... and finally, for a time, freedom. But now? Would he really have to recommence the hated hard labour with which he had already been so familiar? The dark mine-shaft yawned plainly enough at his feet; like mole-holes the galleries wound through rocks and earth; here and there in the darkness glimmered the miners' lamps, and he heard the melancholy sound of monotonous, ceaseless hammering. The convicts were driven down into the subterranean darkness before sunrise, and only when the sun had sunk behind the blue mountains could they come up again, so that they never saw the cheerful daylight.

Ivan jogged his neighbour with his elbow. "Where do you come from?"

"From a long way off;—farther than you can see."

"I expect you have already run away once?" asked the old man with a peculiar intonation of voice.

"Certainly I did not fly."

"Did you confess it or deny it?"

"You can confess if you choose to."

"What is your name?"

"Ivan the Distant. If you like you can also call me 'The Near'; it's all the same to me."

"Ah well, you suit us." Ivan's good humour increased perceptibly. "And what are you thinking of doing now?"

"That will be seen soon enough. I have got twenty years."

"What? Hard labour?"

"Did you think I meant sentinel duty?"

"Well, that is another point in which we are similar."

Two days had passed. The weary convicts and the no less weary warders had not been long asleep in the prison which stood in the midst of an impenetrable wood, when the sentinel suddenly heard a strange noise. There was the sound of a human body falling on the ground once—twice, and then the clanking of a chain. A dark mass rolled towards the wood. The soldier aimed hastily, a flash cut through the darkness, and the echoes of the shot woke the forest; a cry died away in the distance.

"Ivan the Distant is hit," said Ivan the Forgetful, and darted blindly forwards at random into the mysterious realm of the aged giant trees which towered like shadows in the darkness of the night. Shots and cries echoed behind him. The wood seemed to grow alive; it clutched at him with hard horny hands, it seized the skirts of his coat and dug sharp claws into his trembling body, it threw obstacles in his way so that he stumbled, it drew the ground from under his feet so that he fell into a depth; wet grass sprinkled his face with dew, and he found that he had fallen down a steep declivity. He recovered from the shock and saw that his fall had been arrested by the projecting stump of a tree. He raised his head and listened. There was deep darkness and silence above him and beneath him; only from time to time he saw the faint reflection of a flash and heard the rolling echo of distant shots. Ivan climbed carefully lower down and crawled farther on, looking round him on all sides like a beast of prey and disregarding the pain of his torn hands and knees. "It is all up with Ivan the Distant," he said to himself. "He had no luck." And he crept on farther and farther, without knowing whither, into the impenetrable darkness of the warm spring night.

III

O Liberty! With a thousand tongues she spoke to him, with a thousand tones and colours she greeted the fugitive everywhere. For two weeks he saw nothing overhead but the immense expanse of blue sky, against which the branches with their reddish opening blossoms showed in delicate relief. It seemed as if there were no such things in the world as gloomy walls and rusty prison bars. Only in his dreams at times the fugitive still heard the clanking of chains and the rattling of locks; then he awoke in terror to see above him the starry sky of night and the waving pine-tops. He would lie for hours without moving, listening to the solemn sound of the wind roaring through the forest. O Liberty!

He did not know how many versts he was from the great high road, along which he had been driven together with the whole herd of prisoners. At first he had come across clearings and settlements in the forest, seen the smoke of chimneys from a distance, and made a wide detour. It was only at night that he ventured into the neighbourhood of human dwellings, and looked about, like a wild animal, to see where he could clamber in, and get some bread without awaking the dogs. On one occasion hunger drove him into a cottage in the window of which he had seen a candle burning. An old woman who was cowering down by the hearth was paralysed by fear and began to tremble all over. What wonder? Who did not know the yellow sign on the convict's back? He tried to speak gently. "Don't fear, mother! Have you any bread?" But the old woman's tongue could not move. So he looked for and found a crust of bread and drank some water. He saw her desperate poverty and asked, "Have you got no more bread?"

Then the old woman recovered herself a little. "Go!" she stammered; "to-morrow I will get some more."

"Shall I take your last piece?" he said, left the crust lying on the table and departed.

Another day he met a hunter in the forest and would probably have passed him with an ordinary greeting, had not the latter pointed his gun at him.

Then a cloud came before Ivan's eyes; he rushed at the stranger and tore him down. His breath was soon choked out of him, and no one knew how long his body lay in the forest before the wolves devoured it. He had brought his death on himself. The fugitive was glad to get rid of his convict's garb and now wore a coat of sheepskin. He also had a gun to protect himself from wild beasts. If his hair had only been longer, he had no need to go out of people's way.

O Liberty! His conscience was silent; no recollection of the blood which he had shed stirred in him, or if it did occur to his mind, it troubled him as little as it troubles a beast of prey. Men had always been the old vagabond's worst enemies. He had grown up like a hungry, young dog, a mark for missiles and kicks. He received little to eat and many blows, and when hunger drove him to steal, he received more blows. In the house of correction the priest spoke to him of the sufferings of Christ, of repentance and reform. He listened gloomily and returned to his cell. "Christ is gracious to sinners," he thought, "but who has ever been gracious to me?"

After he had shed blood once, his soul seemed to become covered with a hard crust. He became like an animal, escaped from prison when he could, and no longer had a home. Since then his eyebrows were closely contracted over his gloomy eyes, and he was filled with bitter hatred against the whole world. He only longed for one thing, the solitude of field and forest, for liberty and loneliness, where he felt no one near him.

Still farther and farther he roamed between the grey scarred tree-trunks. Through the carpet of pine-needles over which his foot passed, there were springing here and there pointed little leaves and the first grass-blades. The squirrels had already ventured out of their warm nests into the sunshine and sprang briskly and blithely from branch to branch, as though they would make fun of the old vagabond. The sky sent down soft spring showers, or brief thunder-storms, or expanded itself in blue serenity as though it would warm the earth on its bosom. Ivan wandered through dark ravines, where noisy rivulets streamed down on all sides, and in the perpetual shadow the snow still lay white and untouched.

The farther he went, the louder and merrier foamed and bubbled the tides of spring. O Liberty!

When the fugitive was tired, he could find a shelter anywhere. He would fling himself down where he liked, cross his hands under his head, and look up at the sky till his eyes closed of themselves. The wounds on his legs caused by the iron fetters began to heal; no one who met him would have guessed who he was. But the primeval forest seemed quite deserted; no tree bore the mark of an axe, and none had been felled. Here a black scorched pine-tree had been blasted by the lightning; there a half-decayed one, whose top was entangled in its neighbour's branches, had collapsed from sheer old age. This solitude had been profaned by no one's foot; here was real freedom.

Only now and then he encountered wild animals. Once a bear came within gun-shot, but the old man spared his life. "You have nothing to give me now," he thought. "Your skin is no use in summer. Come again in winter." And he shouted at the animal in such a terrible voice, that it trotted off with its tail drawn in.

Sometimes he heard the howling of the wolves in the distance; in the deep silence it sounded weird and terrifying. It filled the old man with a strange feeling, not fear, but in his innermost being something seemed to howl and moan in sympathy with the beasts of prey. Was he not indeed like a wolf among men? Cowering by the fires he made, he would gaze for hours into the red glowing embers. The flames roared and strained towards the dark sky as though they would make themselves free; the fresh brushwood crackled and emitted clouds of blue whirling smoke; the birch-trunk over which the sparks danced, contracted itself as though in a spasm, till it finally flared up in a sheet of fire, and the solitary man felt ever more painfully conscious that he too was every one's enemy, and was only tolerated in this wilderness like those creatures whose howling so strangely thrilled his heart. The darkness which seemed to press from all sides on the fire looked between the grey pine-trunks on the gloomy face of the convict, and listened to his moody murmuring.

IV

Ivan the Runaway wandered farther through dark forests over waste silent stretches of land and wide moors where his step left behind it little cold pools in the spongy ground, and where the wildfowl gathered on the mossy hillocks and chattered cheerfully in the sunshine. At last he came across traces of human existence. It was true that from the pine-tree which he climbed up he could perceive in the grey plain enclosed by woods neither cottage roofs nor smoke, though it was such a clear day that the streamlets which ran between the hillocks shone brightly and dazzled his eyes which were accustomed to the darkness of the forest. But yet the district seemed to be inhabited. A firm yellow road wound in a broad semicircle round the moor. The ruts left by the cart-wheels of the previous year crossed each other distinctly, but no new wheels had ground the dry clods of earth into dust. Probably the road was seldom used; at any rate the fugitive sat for hours in his tree, without hearing in the distance the creaking of the ungreased axle of a peasant's cart.

From the road there branched off a path which seemed to lead to a distant village. Ivan was heartily tired of his diet of wood-game, and began to consider whether he could venture into a village to buy bread. In the pocket of the murdered huntsman he had found a rouble-note and some silver coins. It was true that his hair had not grown again the normal length, but he could tie a piece of cloth round his half-shorn skull; and need not take it off when he entered a shop. "One buys what one wants, and goes one's way, that is all," he said to re-assure himself, for he felt a nervous antipathy to meeting any one, just as a wolf fears every yelping cur as soon as he wanders by mistake into a village.

At last he determined to go on quite slowly so as to reach the village under cover of the approaching darkness. With this idea he turned into the path which wound in an eccentric fashion through the moor, sometimes diving into ravines, and sometimes emerging into clear sunshine. Here and there stumps of trees bearing the fresh marks of an axe, and black abandoned fire-places whose ashes had not yet been quite blown away, showed that men had worked and rested here. The wanderer also thought he often heard human voices, but when he held his breath to listen, he always found it had been the deceptive cry of a bird.

The day came to an end, the golden radiance of the sun setting behind the distant hills grew pale, and the first stars glimmered in the dusky sky. Ivan strode valiantly forwards through the white rising mists out of which single branches of trees projecting, beckoned to him like long lean arms, till he reached a copse with dry mossy ground which seemed admirably adapted to furnish him with a sleeping-place for the night. He collected a bundle of twigs together and struck a light.

But in the act of raising his hand he stopped. What was that? Was there not a sound from the wood like a child's crying? For a moment a cold thrill passed through him; half-forgotten ghost-stories occurred to him, but he was too intimately familiar with the life of the forest to be seriously alarmed. After a short pause the crying began again.

"Hullo! Who is there? Is there any one?" Ivan shouted as loud as he could. His voice aroused the sleeping wood; squirrels rustled among the branches, and startled birds flapped their wings. Then everything was again perfectly silent, nor could the sound of crying be heard any more. Ivan again turned into the path.

"It must be a woman or a child," he thought, "and quite close too."

He peered with keen eyes through the darkness and moved noiselessly forward, in order not to frighten the weeper. Now he heard the sound of sobbing more distinctly; it was a child. But how had a child got here? The moon had risen and threw an uncertain light on the path; in a ditch by the side of it lay something white—it was the skeleton of a horse which had been devoured by wolves. Near it was rustling some creature which moved off at the convict's approach, first crawling and then at full speed.

Ivan went on and asked in a lower voice, "Who is there?"

A low sob was the only answer, "Oh, I am frightened. Mother! Mother!"

The moon now showed distinctly a little clearing in the wood. At the edge of it lay a woman's figure stretched out at full length. The wide-open eyes stared fixedly at the sky; no breath moved the rags which covered her breast; from under her wretched dress projected the lean way-worn feet. Near her lay a wallet. A little living creature clung to the motionless body and tried to raise it.

"What are you doing there?" asked the old man in a hoarse voice.

"Oh, I am so frightened, so frightened!" sobbed the child. A little ragged girl lifted her pale face to the convict, and then, seized with alarm, tried to hide herself again in her mother's clothing. Ivan touched the woman's ice-cold forehead.

"What is your name?" he asked.

"Anjuta," whispered the child without letting go of the body.

"Have you been here long?"

"I do not know. Oh, I am so frightened!"

"Was the sun still high when your mother fell down?"

"Yes, Grandfather."

Ivan stepped to one side, and piled up a heap of dry twigs which he set on fire. The merry flames licked with red tongues at the branches.

"Go and warm yourself," said the old man, speaking as abruptly as before to the child. "Do it quickly."

"And mother?"

"Let mother rest. She is asleep."

The fire-light played on the face of the dead woman and lent it a ghostly semblance of life. The convict sat by the fire, buried in his thoughts. Perhaps he also would soon be somewhere in the forest or by the road-side like this woman. The thought was not a new one to him. How cold-bloodedly he had himself often engaged in a deadly affray with knives and turned his back on his fallen opponent without compunction. And yet he felt moved at the sight of this stranger woman, who lay there in such a pitiable way like an animal which has breathed its last. "It's a pity, a pity!" he growled to himself.

Anjuta approached the fire timidly and stared straight at him. Perhaps the rapidly increasing darkness alarmed her, for she came nearer, without his observing it; suddenly with her little hand she seized his finger and held it fast.

"Well, little thing, what do you want?" he growled, involuntarily laying his free hand on her head.

"What are we to do?"

Anjuta raised her clear little eyes. For the first time a human being looked at him, the thief and murderer, trustfully.

"It is all right, all right; don't worry!" he said half-embarrassed. And for the first time something strange came into his eyes and rolled in warm drops into his grey bristly beard.

V

Ivan the Runaway could not bury Anjuta's mother, for he had no spade. He contented himself with collecting twigs, pine-branches, and stones in order to cover the body of the poor tramp. The little girl at first wanted to hold his hands, but at his sharp rebuke she crept into a ditch and remained there crying bitterly, while he finished his work.

"Well, why are you crying?" he asked at last to comfort her.

"I am sad about mother."

"Your mother is dead; she won't come back."

"How can she be dead?"

"Have you never seen any one die?"

"Oh yes, Uncle Andron, whom God took to Himself."

"Well, God has taken your mother to Himself. Perhaps He wanted her."

"There was also the grey horse," said the child. "God took him too. When will He take me?"

The old man looked long at the child, and something like pity stirred him.

"For you it is still too early," he said gloomily.

"But what shall I do without mother?" She again held his finger with her little hand.

"Don't be afraid. I will stay with you. No one will touch you; I have a gun."

The old man picked up two slender sticks and tied them together with a strip of birch-bark, so as to make a rude cross. "Now your mother's grave is finished. Make a prayer, Anjuta; then we will go."

"I don't know how to pray; mother never taught me. I can only say, 'Give me a piece of bread for Jesus' sake.'"

"Have you never been in church?"

"No; mother and I—we always stood before the church door when people came out and cried, 'Good people, give us bread for Jesus' sake; we have eaten nothing for two days.'"

"Well then, God can ask nothing more of you, poor thing," said Ivan in a more friendly tone and stroked her. "He will be tolerant. Cross yourself and kiss this cross. That's right. And now say, 'Lord, have mercy on her poor soul.'"

"Lord, have mercy on her poor soul," the child repeated.

"Now let us go on. We have no time to loiter."

It was not till evening that Ivan, carrying the tired child on his arm, reached a little village. He waited till it was dark and lights showed in the windows. As though they scented a thief in him, the dogs raised an ear-splitting noise. Anjuta, who had been asleep, nestling against his cheek, started with fright, and began to cry; he told her harshly to be quiet and approached the last cottage in the village which stood near the wood.

"Who is knocking? Is it a Christian?" asked a woman's voice.

"Will you give me a bed for the night? I am tired with carrying her." He pointed to the child, whose little head had again sunk on his shoulder. The woman would hardly have admitted him alone.

"Come in, but don't take it ill that there is nothing to eat; we have nothing ourselves."

"I have money, if there is any chance of buying anything."

"Is the child yours? How tired it is, poor little thing!"

"No, she is not mine. What should a hunter do with children? She came in my way, that is all. Her mother died in the forest and I found her before the wolves ate her. Perhaps some one will adopt her. She is quite healthy and her name is Anjuta."

"Who can adopt her? We ourselves have barely enough to live upon. You must report your finding her at the police office in the nearest town, or go with her to the bailiff of the village."

But Ivan was not at all disposed to go either to the town or to the village bailiff. "Since God has sent me the poor orphan, she can remain with me," he said. "We will not come to grief, we two, in the forest. Will you promise not to be afraid when you hear howlings and moanings in the wood?"

"If you are with me, Grandfather, I won't be afraid. You have a gun and can shoot all the wolves dead."

As the child chattered, the old man's sulky face assumed a brighter expression.

VI

The forest was silent. An atmosphere of church-like stillness brooded round every branch and leaf. It seemed as if in the azure heights of the sky a solemn mystery was being performed, and the earth lay silent in solemn awe. The birds were hidden in the bushes and not a squirrel could be seen. The heat had penetrated even the shady parts of the wood; it was cool only in the ravines where scanty rivulets trickled over the sandy ground and conjured forth a green cloud of fine perfumed grass. A profusion of flowers—red, yellow, white and blue—grew on the slopes. They arranged themselves in most fantastic patterns, crowded together in gay groups, or climbed the hills singly. Some seemed to stretch themselves as though with curiosity on swaying stems, others hung their heads languidly. The wild rose-bush opened its first blossoms like thirsty red lips which could not breathe in air enough. From a thousand altars rose incense in this majestic temple; the mysterious Celebration continued in the heights above and the sun glowed and glittered like a golden chalice in the hands of the invisible high-priest.

Only from one corner came the sound of suppressed laughter. It was difficult to recognize Anjuta again. Her pale face had become sunburnt, her eyes glowed, and her mouth smiled continually. Just now the smile would have turned into loud laughter, had not the child feared to awaken Grandfather. The latter had found for himself a cool spot by the edge of the stream and was sleeping with his cap under his head, like an old wolf, after a full meal. Anjuta had just been throwing flowers at him. A tiny beetle had crawled out of one, and the child held her breath as she watched its movements. The beetle balanced itself skilfully on one of the longer hairs of Ivan's beard, then fell among the grey stubble, worked its way laboriously out with its slender wings, and finally settled on the old man's nose. Then the little girl could no longer contain herself; she laughed outright and clapped her hands.

"Good-for-nothing brat!" growled Ivan, awaking. "Can't you be quiet?" He shook off the flowers and tried to seize her.

Anjuta sprang with a joyous shriek among the reeds, rustled about among them, and presently her voice was heard calling from the opposite bank of the stream, "Catch me, Grandfather! Catch me!"

"That beats everything. Go and play with the squirrels! They are just such wind-bags as you are!"

"But I want to play with you."

"Well, you will have to wait long for that," and he crept quietly nearer to her.

"Grandfather, where are you?" she cried in an anxious tone. "Grandfather, I am frightened."

"There, I have caught you," he exclaimed suddenly and held the struggling child fast. "How wet you are, a regular frog!"

The child flung her puny arms round his brown sinewy neck and coaxed him. "Grandfather, listen, Grandfather! Now you be the wolf!"

"You are always wanting something," he grumbled discontentedly.

"Please! Please! You can do it so beautifully. I will be the little hare. Little hare with the long ears."

"Then I must eat you, stupid!" And the old man took the trouble to roll his eyes and growl fiercely.

But it was very difficult to satisfy Anjuta. "But you don't do it properly. Please, please come!" She stooped down and looked pleadingly into his eyes overhung by their shaggy brows.

"Very well, little one! Here goes!"

He placed the child carefully on the ground and crept among the reeds and bushes. The thorns scratched his face and hands, but he had something more important to think about. He lay flat and kept a sharp look-out. Were it not for his eyes, his grey shaggy head might frighten one. In order to heighten the illusion, he gnashed with his teeth. Anjuta played the part of the hare, sprang hither and thither, pulled at the grasses, and waved her hands to and fro above her head, to represent long ears. She pretended not to notice the old man.

"I don't see you. Grandfather, really I don't!"

Then the wolf sprang out of his hiding-place; the hare fled to the stream, crossed over, and climbed the opposite bank. But the wicked wolf came creeping nearer and nearer and seized the poor little animal by the throat with his great jaws.

"Were you very frightened?" the old wolf asked good-humouredly.

"Not a little bit. Grandfather, why does the wolf eat hares?"

"He can't eat grass. He wants flesh—hares, dogs, fowls, little children like you—it is all the same to him. He seizes them so, you see, and tears them in pieces."

"Does it hurt them?" asked Anjuta.

"Oh, you stupid, stupid thing! Of course it hurts them. Death is never pleasant."

Anjuta became very thoughtful. "Do you know, Grandfather," she said after a pause, "we won't play that game any more. You must not be a wolf. Wolves are wicked and you are good." "I—good? Ah, you...." Ivan made a long pause; something seemed to stick in his throat. "For you perhaps I may be good"—he cleared his throat violently—"You see, Anjuta, when I was little like you, no one said a kind word to me. I was thrashed nearly to a jelly, and always black and blue. Otherwise I would have been good; why should I be wicked without a reason? Oh, you stupid little thing, what do you know about it?"

"Take me on your arm," asked Anjuta, standing on tiptoe.

He awoke as out of a dream. "What do you want?"

"Take me on your arm, Grandfather. I am tired."

"First you jump about like a hare; then you want to be carried. No, stay down there."

"Yes, yes, you will take me," she coaxed him. "When I ask, you never say no."

"Look at the little rogue! Shall I break off a switch and whip you? Well, come along then!"

He lifted her up and walked with her deeper into the solemn stillness of the forest. The old man felt his heart grow warmer as the tired child's eyelids gradually drooped, and she began to breathe regularly in his arms. With a kind of pity he looked at the little open mouth and the helpless dusty little legs as they hung down.

"And that, too, is one of God's creatures! Why does such a useless thing come into the world?" he philosophized to himself and took the greatest pains to tread gently and not to move his outstretched arm in order not to wake the child.

VII

In the middle of the forest was a green meadow traversed by a path along which Ivan was now proceeding. It ended before what looked like a pile of earth and dry sticks projecting like those of a raven's nest in all directions. At first sight it was hard to recognize what the object of the structure was; it seemed too large for a mere wood-pile, and too shapeless for a human shelter.

Close by stood a stake with a long rope attached to it, and at the end of the rope, all day long, there ran about a young bear growling and shaking its head. Just then it stood on its hindlegs and sniffed with its snout in the air. Between the trees appeared a dark form, and dry branches lying on the ground cracked under a heavy foot-tread. The animal, out of sheer impatience, ran so rapidly round the stake that it completely entangled itself and could not take another step. Forced to stand still, it watched Ivan's approach with its head on one side and an absurdly serious air.

Ivan came across the meadow with his burden on his arm. He untied the rope; the liberated baby bear threw itself between his legs, embraced him with its paws and signified its intention of climbing up him.

"Ah, you want bread, you hungry rascal," said Ivan. "I know you; as soon as you are satisfied, off you go."

Anjuta awoke and rubbed her eyes with her little fist.

"That is a fine family," growled the grandfather. "Brother and sister both grown on one tree. The right children for a vagabond. Yes, yes, when a man has no cares, he must make himself some."

He had caught the little bear, when he killed its mother, whose skin served Anjuta for a bed. The young animal continued to regard the skin as something alive and related to itself; it always lay close to Anjuta, sucked at the long tufts of hair which it held between its paws, and growled sleepily.

The huge raven's-nest which the little girl now entered discovered itself to be a dwelling. Ivan had burnt off the grass, fixed on the levelled ground a rough platform of thick poles and covered it with twigs, moss and fresh earth out of which already some green shoots, and, to Anjuta's delight, some stunted flowers were springing. Ivan was very proud of the hut which began to display even some traces of luxury. The floor was covered with skins of wolves and bears; on the walls there hung whole rows of squirrel-skins. Every fortnight these were sold to a peasant from the village who did not trouble his head about Ivan's past.

The housekeeping also was on a satisfactory basis. Under the roof hung dried mushrooms from long strings and in a corner stood a sack full of potatoes. In the hollow of an old gnarled tree which threw its shade far over the forest-clearing, some round loaves of black-bread as hard as stones were stored up. In the wood they always had traps and snares ready set which caught abundance of game.

When Anjuta, who had again gone to sleep, put her head out of the hut, the water bubbled merrily in the pot from which the feet of a plucked fowl projected. Ivan was busily engaged in slicing potatoes into the broth.

"It smells good," said the little girl, pursing her mouth in eager expectation.

"But you won't get any," said the old man teasingly.

"Oh yes I will. You will always give me something, even when you remain hungry yourself."

"What a princess you have become! Yesterday you ate your fill, and now there is no more."

"Listen, Grandfather," said the child after a few moments of reflection. "Have you always lived in the forest?"

Ivan wrinkled his brow and was silent.

"It is jolly in the forest," continued she. "There is no one to beat one. But mother was afraid in it. She said there were wicked and cursed men in the forest. Grandfather, what kind of men are they?"

Ivan's face became still gloomier.

"Who has cursed them, Grandfather? Has God done it? Will they burn in hell?"

The old man laid his hand on the child's ruffled hair.

"May God protect you from them. They are worse than wild animals. An animal, when it is satisfied, can be merciful, but they——" He broke off and stared into the fire.

"Well, what do they do?" the child urged him in her keen curiosity. "Grandfather, what do they do? Are they villains?"

"Be off," cried the convict suddenly. "Get away, or I shall beat you. What nonsense are you talking?"

He pushed the child violently to one side. Before her stood all at once a completely altered "grandfather." In his sunken eyes there glowed a lurid spark, his grey hairs bristled, and his face twitched convulsively. His breast heaved with a rattling sound, and his hand was clenched as though to strike. Anjuta started back in wild terror; even the baby bear was alarmed and slunk into the hut with its tail between its legs.

Ivan stood for a long while motionless, then he sat down silently by the fire and stirred it up.

"Cursed—cursed," he murmured to himself. "Who has cursed them. God pardons sinners, they say. Come!" he said gloomily to the little one. "Sit down here. It is all right."

"I am frightened."

Ivan bent lower over the fire. "The past will not let itself be buried," he thought. "Why must I frighten an innocent creature too?" Then again his memories stung him and he cried in a new outburst of rage, "Who dares curse us. You hard-hearted——Yes, it is all right," he added, trying to quiet the child who was still trembling. "You say you love Grandfather; so come nearer."

But Anjuta stared hard at him and did not move.

"Look at the nice soup," he said to tempt her and recovered his self-control. "We will take the fowl out by its legs. It shall have a special privilege and lie on the grass till it is cool, else you will burn your mouth." Anjuta approached with visible mistrust.

"Why are you afraid, you simpleton? Bring our spoons. Oh, you stupid thing! Have I ever hurt you?"

"You looked so dreadful—quite like another man."

"Oh, that was only a joke. I wanted to show you what wicked men look like. You always ask me to play 'wolf'; just now I played 'bad man.'"

"I am not so frightened at the wolf as at the bad man."

"Ah, child, one must sympathize with them. Do you think it is so easy to be bad? The Lord has made it hard enough for them; they must suffer much. It is not really of their own accord that they seize every one by the throat. They say that God hears children's prayers. Pray then, Anjuta: 'O God, have mercy on the wicked men.' The good need no one to pray for them; they are safe anyhow."

VIII

Such fits of excitement grew ever rarer with Ivan. As the summer advanced, the convict became quieter. Whenever he watched Anjuta playing with her mischievous playfellow, or listened to the melancholy call of the birds, or sat by the blazing fire, the furrows on his brow became smoother and a comfortable drowsiness lulled his wild instincts to rest. He had become quite a different man from what he was when he first escaped. But his dreams at night often transported him back to the damp prison-cell, or he saw himself again walking in the file of the prisoners on the apparently endless high road, heard the familiar calls of the warders through the cold winter air, and felt the heavy butt end of the musket fall on his bowed back. On such occasions when he awoke, it was a long time before the quiet breathing of Anjuta and the bear's peaceful snoring restored him to a sense of reality. He generally spent the remainder of such a night on his bear-skin outside the narrow hut, enjoying the consciousness of freedom that came with the balmy coolness of the forest and the distant murmur of the stream. The next day he was generally in a specially good humour, played with Anjuta, and listened to the thousand voices in which the primeval forest revealed to him its secrets.

He never thought of the morrow; his adventurous and uncertain gipsy life had taught him to prize to-day. So long as the sun shone, the pot boiled merrily on the fire, and his child laughed and clapped her hands—what more did he need? And what could the obscure future bring him, but at the best a succession of similar days, and at the worst the dungeon and the knout.

But in August there came a bad time. The clouds almost touched the tops of the forest-giants, from whose bark the rain trickled down in large cold drops; the birds were silent and the beasts crept into their lairs. The little bear rolled himself up in his skin and growled discontentedly. The old man and the child sat, huddling close together in the dry hut and whispered to the accompaniment of the howling of the wind and the pouring of the rain.

"When the black-berries are ripe, the thrushes will come from everywhere, and I will catch you a pair," he promised the delighted child. "But what will you do with them?"

"I will have fine games with them—but then I will let them fly; thrushes do not like cages, do they, Grandfather?"

"Who would like a cage? Listen, Anjuta; you are a good child. Will you come to Grandfather, if he is ever put in a cage?"

The child laughed aloud and clapped her hands. "But, Grandfather, you are not a bird."

"There is another kind of cage which is not for birds——Ah, what do you understand about it?"

Presently the sun shone again and it was cheerful in the forest. The days passed monotonously but happily. Gradually the nights began to grow cold. In the evenings the sun no longer sank in a golden mist, but glowed with an angry red, and descended constantly more often surrounded by thick clouds, through which it looked out like a blood-stained eye. Ivan enlarged the hut; in the evening he lit the fire in it, and closed the door carefully that the warmth should not be too quickly dissipated. But in spite of all, the three—the old man, the child and the bear—had, towards morning, to nestle close together in order not to be frozen.

Anjuta was much alone and became tired of solitude, when Ivan spent whole days hunting. "Mischka, do you hear Grandfather shooting?" she would ask the bear when the dull sound of a distant shot came to their ears.

A great change had taken place in Mischka. His fur had become thicker and shaggier, he had grown considerably and often disappeared in the forest in order to hunt on his own account. When he came home, gorged and unwieldy, he showed no inclination to play, but lay down to sleep. Once the little girl wished to rouse him from his slumber, and seized him somewhat roughly by the ears. The creature uttered a loud roar, reared on his hind-legs, showing his teeth, and when the unsuspecting child stretched out her hand, laughing to her refractory playfellow, she was suddenly struck down by a blow from one of its paws.

In the evening Ivan found his pet with a scratched and much-swollen cheek. He chastised the snapping bear severely in spite of Anjuta's supplications and tears, and tied it up for the night. The next morning the rope was found broken and the bear had vanished. It was not till two days afterwards that Mischka appeared again between the pine-trunks and approached the hut hesitatingly; but when he saw his master standing on the threshold, he sat down and sucked his paw in an embarrassed manner.

"Come along, you tramp!" Ivan called to him. "Has hunger driven you home at last, you rascal!" Mischka, feeling deeply injured, turned round and trotted away without heeding the cajoling calls of his little companion.

"One who is born a tramp, remains a tramp," said Ivan.

"Let him run! Don't cry, Anjuta; you will get a better playfellow."

The leaves of the birch turned yellow and the maples looked as if splashed with blood. Their leaves trembled as though with cold. Light as feathers and quite dry, they eddied long in the air before they sank to their funeral in the colourless grass.

"How cold it is, Grandfather! Will it never be warm again?"

"Wait a little; soon there will come St. Martin's summer which will bring us warmth. Before it is really winter, I will dig for us both a hole deep in the ground, so that we can pass it there."

"Just like moles! But it will be pitch-dark, Grandfather."

"Well, we will light some pine-chips. Don't worry about that. All you have to do is to grow and get strong, so as to look after me, if I am not first——"

"What, Grandfather? If you are not first——"

But instead of answering, Ivan shook his head, and went to one side.

IX

St. Martin's summer came and went. In the forest it became so cold, that Ivan thought of giving Anjuta into the charge of one of the villagers for the winter. But none of them could afford to take care of her. They were already beginning to mix the meal, which was their food during the winter, with pieces of pine-bark and chaff. Moreover, the old man would have sorely missed the clear, eager childish eyes, which looked so confidingly into his, and the merry laughter which relieved the monotony of his dark life. The forest became more and more silent in preparation for its winter sleep; and winter came stealing on with muffled footsteps.

"It is time, Anjuta, to dig our hole for the winter. To-morrow, with Gods help, I will begin. There the frost cannot pinch us, when we sit together and gossip."

"Do you know how to sing, too, Grandfather?"

"Never mind that. The songs which I sing are not for you. But I will tell you many things, for you are still stupid, and must learn how things go in life, so that you may get on well, and not be a burden to others. The world, Anjuta, is like a bottomless pit. It is easy to go down, but one never finds the way up again, and nobody helps one. The Pope[2] told me once that there used to be good people who loved all men alike and did good alike to all. Even for lepers they did something."

"What does that mean—'lepers'?"

"Lepers?" He hesitated. "It is a pity I never thought of asking the Pope what it meant. Every one had a horror of them. They were not allowed to go about as they liked." He thought for a moment. "Yes, Anjuta, I remember now. Lepers are those who sit behind iron bars. Men fasten fetters on them and march them up the streets with soldiers on both sides. You see, good people in their great kindness have helped the lepers, that is the convicts. They have done no end of good to all men, but wicked men and scoundrels who ought to have honoured and loved them, like fathers, have tortured and crucified them."

"What does 'crucified' mean?"

"They drove nails through their hands and feet. So.... Do you see?"

"Just like you nailed the raven to the tree with nails in its wings and feet."

"Yes. But the raven does harm, but those men were good and kind to people like us. That is all I know about the good folk. To-morrow we will begin our work."

But the hole was not destined to be dug. The night was bitterly cold. The howling of the wolves sounded so wild and terrible that Anjuta awoke suddenly out of her sleep, crying loudly, and still lay awake listening long after the old man by her side was comfortably snoring. The wind had risen and drove the dry leaves round the hut. Suddenly the child thought she heard a distant growling, and soon she was sure of it; heavy footsteps were stamping outside the hut.

"Grandfather, Grandfather, listen!" cried Anjuta, and shook him by the arm. "Wake up! I am so frightened!"

An enormous bear, whom the huntsmen had probably roused from his winter lair, was coming straight towards Ivan's hut. He went round the shapeless edifice on all sides, sniffing cautiously, as though he meant to choose it as a new dwelling. Under his heavy tread the pine-needles crackled, and dry branches snapped. At last he stood still, rubbing his mighty back against a tree. His every movement was distinctly audible in the hut.

"Of course it's a bear!" exclaimed Ivan, who had held his breath to listen. "Well, the fellow shall give us his fur for winter wear. Meanwhile light the pine-chips, Anjuta."

The old man seized his gun, which was always loaded, and pushed open the rude door, which was made fast with a stone. Through the mist which hung thickly round the trees he saw a dark shape retreating slowly into the forest. That did not suit Ivan's plans; he aimed hastily and fired. The bear was only grazed, for he attacked the old man, and enveloped him with his hot evil-smelling breath, hardly giving him time to reload his gun. The old man started back; the bear rose on its hind-legs and towered over him like an indistinct, gigantic shadow.

"Where are you going, you blockhead? Stop, I have an account to settle with you," cried Ivan, and fired right under the beast's jaw. The shot missed, and suddenly the convict found himself crushed under the terrible weight of his enraged enemy. He tried to raise himself on his elbow, but the bear understood his business, pushed his paw under his body, and pressed him in his close embrace till all his bones cracked.

"Jesus and all the saints," gasped the old man. "Help my Anjuta." And his eyes closed.

Then something quite unexpected happened. The beast was already preparing to flay his victim in the most approved bear-fashion from the skull downwards, when a bright light flared in his eyes. Master Bruin's mind became suddenly confused. He did not pause to investigate, but rose at once and trotted away as fast as his feet could carry him.

"Grandfather! O Grandfather!" cried the child, lamenting as she threw herself on his prostrate body. Driven by fear for him, she had appeared with the burning pine-torch just in time to save her benefactor.

Ivan awoke from his swoon. "Water! Water!" he gasped hoarsely. Before his eyes there danced fiery sparks: his breast felt terribly constricted. He eagerly drained the cup which the child reached to him; then he rose painfully and limped, leaning on his gun, to the hut, where, covered up warmly by Anjuta, he fell into a death-like slumber. He awoke, feeling tired and sick. There was a buzzing in his head; one leg was badly injured, and the bear's claw had left deep marks on his back.

"We can't do anything to-day with the hole, Anjuta! If I remain quiet to-day, perhaps we can to-morrow."

But the next day came, and a second, and a third, and there was no possibility of thinking of work. Not till a week had passed could he rise from his bed. When he came out of the hurt, he uttered a cry of surprise. The red and yellow leaves still hung on the trees, but a thin coverlet of snow lay over the whole face of the clearing. In the air the snow-flakes crossed and whirled in white confusion. Winter had brought out its corpse-cloth overnight.

All that remained to the convict of his brief summer happiness was Anjuta. As he lay on his bed of soft skins his burning eyes never left the child. The unfortunate man suffered severely. In the first shock he had not been able to judge distinctly how seriously the bear had injured him. The deep wound in his shoulder would not heal, although Anjuta had learnt how to wash and bandage it daily. It was soon accompanied by a fever. Meanwhile, time went on remorselessly; the winter regularly settled in, and the rude hut no longer afforded sufficient shelter. One day Ivan dragged himself on all fours into the open, and with endless trouble began to plaster the hut outside with earth. Within, he dug a hollow in the ground, and with the help of a pole made a hole in the roof, which could be closed with a small board. The fire-place was then ready.

"Listen, little girl." In his illness the old man had become especially gentle towards the orphan. "Now you must look after me. Be my little housekeeper. Light the fire and boil the water. Thank God we have enough bread and wood and meal. Put a couple of handfuls into the soup with sliced potatoes; it will be quite tasty. Later on we will catch hares. Peasants are not allowed to eat hares, but we are foresters, and that has nothing to do with us."

So Anjuta lit the fire, cooked the soup, brought fresh wood from the wood-pile. When the fire had burnt out, she clambered on the roof and closed the opening—the "chimney," as Ivan called it—so that it remained comfortably warm in the hut.

"Is that right, Grandfather?" she laughed.

"You are my treasure, my little dove," the old man said as he lay on his skins. "Without you it would be all over with me."

Ivan was glad that he had taken care in the summer that the little girl should know the way to the village thoroughly well. If his sickness lasted, she would have to go many errands for him. But he did not like sending the little creature out when all the paths were covered with snow.

"Anjuta," he asked by way of precaution, "how will you recognize the way to the village?"

"By the axe-cuts on the trunks as far as the pine which was struck by lightning."

"You are a sharp little girl."

"And then by the ravine to the birch-tree where you have made the sign of the cross. Then following the notches to the river, and from there one can see the village."

Ivan became easier in mind. His protÉgÉe would not be lost, but in case of need could fetch help by herself. But he continued in a weak state. One day, when he felt he could no longer bear doing nothing, he dragged himself, gun in hand, as far as the edge of the clearing, only to sink down exhausted. Shaking with fever, after some time he returned home. Anjuta, who ran to help him, was frightened and saw that all was not right with him. He threw off his fur coat and talked to her excitedly, with delirious eyes. "I will not go back behind the iron bars, do you hear? I will not. I am innocent, your honour. Why do you torment the old man? You might sentence a younger man to be knouted, but it will be the death of me. Have pity, kind sirs, I must look after Anjuta." His voice sank to a hardly intelligible whisper. "You have made a bad beginning, comrade. When the hour comes, everything must be ready. Take out the plank and lower it. Do you see the sentry. Spring on his shoulder and throttle him so that he does not stir ... it serves him right. Don't sentence me, kind sirs; I have not killed Anjuta. Ask her herself."

At last he fell into a light slumber, and when he awoke he was calmer. "Have I frightened you, my dovelet? Ah, I am very ill, Anjuta; you have much trouble. But wait; when I am well again we will have a jolly life."

But weeks passed, and Ivan did not get up. He was quite emaciated, and his dark eyes were sunken still more deeply in their sockets, under his bushy white eye-brows. Fortunately the winter was mild, and there was not much snow.

"Anjuta, have we still bread and meal?"

"There is only a hard crust left for you to-morrow, and the meal too is nearly finished."

"I will go to-morrow to the village," said the old man. "I will send Andryushka Lasaref for the skins which are lying ready; the sledge can go all the way."

The next day he took a tender adieu of the child and started; but half an hour afterwards he knocked at the door and threw himself on the bed in a state of complete exhaustion.

"I can't do it, Anjuta, really I can't," he said as though in apology. "There is no more marrow in my bones. If I can't stand up to-morrow, you must go. You are not afraid?"

"No, Grandfather ... only a little of the bears."

"The bears are now asleep in their holes, you little stupid, and suck their paws. And there are no wolves to be heard just now. There is nothing more for them here; therefore they are gone near the villages; otherwise we would hear them howling every night."

The old man had tears in his eyes when Anjuta got herself ready next morning for the journey.

"Such a tiny thing, quite alone in the deep forest!" he murmured to himself.

"Tell Lasaref to bring a sack of meal, two large loaves of bread, and some barley, and say that Grandfather has all kinds of fine things ready for him. But mind you don't try to come home by night, Anjuta. Stay with Andryushka for the night, and he will bring you in the sledge in the morning. Tell him I am ill—the bear has badly mauled Ivan the Runaway. Do you understand?"

"Yes; but why do you cry, Grandfather?"

"It is only foolishness.... I have grown quite weak. Now go, and God preserve you! And listen, Anjuta; whenever you feel frightened, you must sing."

The child started and the old man, creeping out of the hut, followed her with his eyes. She soon reached the edge of the clearing. How nimbly her young feet moved! Under the gigantic trees she moved like a little beetle. Now she turned and laughed at him, and his eyes, misty with tears, could see nothing more.

XI

The forest was brilliant in white apparel. Under the wintry veil its creative forces slumbered. Not a tree-top swayed, nor a branch stirred. The sky was covered with grey clouds and the earth with snow, which in the stillness gave out a light crackling sound under Anjuta's feet. She tried once or twice to sing, but the grim silence of the primeval pines sobered her with a sense of weird mystery. She tried to tread as lightly as possible in order not to awake the gloomy trees on the right and left out of their slumbers.

What might not be hidden under these snow-laden branches which almost touched the ground? How terrible it would be if "it" suddenly crept out without a sound. The fact that she could not define to herself what the "it" was, made it all the more formidable.

And now she heard a low moaning at the bottom of the ravine. Perhaps it was the brook, but if...? She did not think the thought out, but hastened forward, stumbling and gliding. She looked attentively for the axe-notches in the tree-trunks in order not to lose her way. She also saw the sign of the cross on the birch half obliterated with snow.

The child sat on a snow-heap, and looked at the cross for the first time attentively. Round about were visible what looked like footprints in the snow. Were they caused by the wind, or——? An icy shudder ran through her; fortunately it occurred to her that "they" had no power by day, and only went about in the darkness. Yes, of course it was "they."

How often had her mother, whom her Grandfather had buried in the forest, told her that the souls of unbaptized children roamed about by night. When such a child dies, the Lord does not take it to Himself. "You do not belong to Me," He says. Woe betide the unlucky person who meets one of "them." It weeps and sobs pitiably, but if one takes it up, it seizes one's throat with its teeth.

Anjuta sprang up and went quickly on. Again the enchanted silence surrounded her, again the lofty motionless trees looked at her as though they were astonished at the little intruder who disturbed their icy winter sleep. Anjuta became hungry and gnawed at a dry crust of bread as she went along; at the same time she was so absorbed in her thoughts that she stumbled. She looked around; there before her spread a white plain with the chimneys of the poverty-stricken little village in the background. Behind her rose the dark stiff wall of the wood. The main road ran close up to it and then, as though in sudden alarm, turned sharply to one side.

Anjuta felt that for nothing in the world would she go back alone. The wood from which she had happily emerged inspired her afterwards with such fear, that she began to run, and sped over the snowy plain like an arrow. A strange sight brought her to a standstill. Four riders with long lances in their hands and guns slung across their backs rode by the side of a sledge, in which sat a stout man. He looked very grand, with his high turned-up fur collar and a cap with a red band round it. She had only once seen such a fine gentleman before, when she was begging with her mother in the town. The joyful consciousness of having the wood happily behind her so braced her up, that she felt no embarrassment before the stranger.

"Listen, child!" the stout gentleman said to her. "Where have you come from?"

"From the wood, Uncle."

"How is that possible? Do people live there?"

"Only Grandfather and I."

"Do you belong to the village?"

"No. Grandfather has come from far away, and he found me in the wood, when my mother had died."

"Wait, wait," exclaimed the man in the sledge, who seemed struck with a new idea. "They said there," he pointed to the village, "that he had not been seen in this neighbourhood. Of course, you don't know your grandfather's name; how should you?"

"Yes, I know it quite well," she laughed. "It is Ivan."

"Ah, but he did not tell you what other name he had. That ought to have occurred to him."

"Yes, but he did," said the child merrily. "And I remember it well."

"You are joking."

"He is called Ivan the Runaway. That's it. And my name is Anjuta."

"That's just the man we want," laughed the official with great satisfaction. "Look out, you rascals"—he made a threatening gesture towards the village—"you shelter escaped convicts. Where is your grandfather?"

"He is in bed."

"What? Out there in the wood?"

"Yes; he is ill since the bear attacked him. He can hardly crawl round our hut."

"Ah! then he can't run away."

"Why should he run away?" laughed Anjuta. "He is waiting for me. I am going to the village," she added with an air of importance, "to buy bread and meal."

"Well, listen now. Sit here by my side. Would you like to help your grandfather? We will make him well and give him bread and money, so that he can live without anxiety."

"Yes, but Grandfather wanted to make a hole under the earth for us both, because it is so terribly cold in the forest."

"Very well; we will build him a strong hut."

"With a real fire-place like Lasaref has?"

"Yes, just like that."

The little girl clapped her hands in glee. "And I will always cook him good broth. That is just what Grandfather has always told me, that one should help the other, and then God helps all."

"Yes, certainly. We will help him too."

Anjuta clambered up on the box-seat. The peasant who held the reins gave her a violent dig in the side and angrily hissed between his teeth, "Stupid goose!"

"Stephan," said the stout official, "can the sledge go through the wood?"

"No," was the sulky reply.

"Ah, but when you get something on your obstinate neck it can. Turn round, rascal! In winter one can go everywhere."

Anjuta had become quite silent. Why was the kind gentleman so angry all of a sudden? The sledge had already reached the wood.

"How pleased Grandfather will be!" she thought, and smiled again her happy childish smile.

XII

Ivan the Runaway's heart sank when Anjuta had gone. "Not even can I pray for her, sinner that I am!" he thought. "I would only bring down misfortune on her."

Suppose a stray wolf attacked her, or she lost her way? There would be no one to help her. His imagination continued to conjure up ever darker and darker images. He saw her little body writhing under the claws of a hungry wild beast, or sinking in the treacherous snow of a deep ravine; he saw her wandering blindly in the thickets of the forest and heard her childish voice crying, "Grandfather, Grandfather, I am frightened!"

Hour after hour passed. The hut seemed too narrow for him. He knew that she would spend the night in the village, and yet he ventured out in the cold, drawn by the hope that he would see her suddenly standing before him laughing and happy with radiant eyes.

Over the white-clothed forest there brooded a foreboding silence; the sky was overcast by dark clouds and the pine-trees towered gaunt and forbidding. A feeling of terror slowly stole over him. Formerly he had never known it in his solitude, but Anjuta had accustomed him to human companionship. Was not somebody creeping near, just as he himself had often crept when on a thievish expedition? His heart beat violently as though it would burst; he stuffed a handful of snow in his mouth in order to quench the burning sensations within him.

There! Were those not voices? Did Andryushka Lasaref wish to take the skins at once, and had he brought the child with him? But there seemed to be several people, and he heard distinctly the beat of the horses' hoofs.

He ought to have been glad perhaps, but his heart felt painfully contracted. What a wolf's life his was, spent in perpetual mistrust and fear! Now he could distinguish Anjuta's merry tones ... and now something came forward from between the trees.

"You come to fetch my soul," cried Ivan with his hair bristling.

The four Cossacks halted on the clearing before the hut.

"Good evening, Grandfather! Grandfather! here I am!"

But what was the matter? Her Grandfather rushed into the hut and re-appeared with his gun in his hand. And he was hardly recognizable with his threatening eyes in his distorted face.

"Come now! No jokes, Ivan the Runaway," exclaimed the kind stout gentleman. "You know you only make matters worse. Throw away your gun, or I will have you knouted."

"Your honour has taken the trouble to come here for the sake of my poor soul," said the old man with a grim smile. His eye fell on Anjuta.

"You have betrayed me, you vermin!" he snarled.

The convict had awoken in him.

"Surrender yourself, Ivan," said the official in the red-bordered cap.

"Let him take me who is tired of life," laughed the old man wildly, turning his gun-muzzle from one Cossack to another!

"Shoot him down!" cried the excited official. One of the riders raised his musket. A shot rang out. Ivan had fired and missed. The Cossack remained motionless and coolly fired in reply. "Hit!" he said in a low voice and turned away.

Ivan fell sideways on the snow, which at once took a red tinge under him. He lifted himself once more on his elbow and sank back again. Then he stretched himself at full length with his face turned upwards.

"Anjuta, my little dove!" his pale lips whispered. But she stood as though petrified; her old familiar expression, "I am afraid," died on her tongue.

The Cossacks approached the convict.

"How is he?" asked the official.

"It is all over with him, your honour."

The official took off his cap piously and crossed himself; the Cossacks followed his example.

Ivan lay quite still, gazing motionless up at the sky. Then the little girl awoke out of her stupor, threw herself on her knees beside him, and tried despairingly to lift him; her poor little body quivered like a bird in the death-struggle. "Grandfather! Wake up! It is I! Listen, Grandfather!"

But he did not answer. Then the child fell on the body, and wept as if her heart would break.