Iermola Part 19

"World without end! Where do you come from?"

"From Malyczki."

"Did you go there alone?"

"I carried Mikita the potatoes I had sold him."

"What is the news down there?"

"Oh, there is some news; there is a great deal of news," answered Chwedko, seating himself on the trunk of a fallen tree. "The old chief of squadron is dead."

"The old man is dead!" replied Iermola. "Peace to his soul! he has suffered a long time."

"And he knew pretty well how to make others suffer."

"So he is really dead!" repeated Iermola. "You see old men must look out; death may call them any time. I trust he will not come for us very soon."

"He was very sick," said Chwedko; "and I do not see how he held out so many years. But there is a regular upturning at the _dwor_."

"And how about his son?"

"His son and his people and every one whom he has tormented so much shed fountains of tears over him. All the people from the village are in the courtyard; it is a pitiful scene of desolation."

"It is the destiny of us all," replied Iermola, with a sigh.

"Yes, truly," continued Chwedko; "but to tell the truth, the chief of squadron was a perfect tyrant over his family. Sick, helpless, and infirm as he was, to the hour of his death he never gave up his keys nor the management of his household, never confided in either his son or his young ward. His son has grown old in his service without enjoying his fortune and without being able to attempt to direct his household; he never would allow him to marry, nor would he permit him to go away from him. He kept the young lady in equal bondage; and though he knew they loved each other, he always forbade them to marry under penalty of his curse."

"Ah, well, they will marry now," said Iermola.

"So you do not know about it, then? They have already been married for a long time; no one knew it at the _dwor_ except the old housekeeper.

The parish curate married them. There were witnesses; but what good did that do them? They could not live together, because the old father kept them both always by his bedside night and day; he would have one or other of them always by him. In addition to this, matters were so arranged at the _dwor_ that the stewards and servants were obliged to tell the master everything the young lord did, or else he would scold and abuse them all; and he had a.s.sured his son of his curse if he ever dared to think of such a marriage."

"The old man was a little stern, it is true," said Iermola, "but he had his good side. And besides, he suffered a great deal,--so much that during the long hours of the night, one might hear him crying out almost every moment, 'Good Lord, have mercy on me and take me out of this world!' Toward strangers his manner was gentle as a lamb. It was he who managed so nicely to get Procope to teach me how to make pottery; and when I went to see him, he talked with me and told me stories of old times, and joked and laughed. But that was because he was an old friend of my master."

The old men continued to talk a long time about the chief of squadron, relating in turn various small events of his life, mourning and regretting the dead man as people generally do, for each one of us on leaving this world leaves behind a certain measure of regret and remembrance. They were still talking when the sound of carriage-wheels was heard at a distance on the road from Malyczki; and they could hear that the vehicle which was coming was not the wagon of a peasant.

"That must certainly be Hudny going home," said Iermola. "Let us go inside the cabin; it is best that he should not see us."

"Oh, no, it is not he," answered Chwedko; "it must be a stranger. From the sound of the wheels I should say it was a covered carriage. Some one has lost his way, surely."

Curious to know who it could be, they stood still with their eyes fixed on that side of the plain which extended beyond the oaks and which was crossed by a narrow pathway. Soon, sure enough, a covered carriage appeared, a very neat and almost elegant one, which was coming at a brisk trot toward the village. "Who can it be, I wonder," murmured Iermola.

"Those are the chief of squadron's horses. And that is the young lord and his wife, I am sure. But why are they coming here?"

The carriage approached rapidly; and instead of going past the old inn, where the child and the two old men were standing gazing at it with astonished faces, it stopped suddenly in front of them.

A man of somewhat more than thirty years, and a woman who was still young, got out of it together and hastened up to Iermola; but before reaching him, they stopped. Then a startled cry, sobs, and tears were heard. The young woman rushed to Radionek; the strange man also stepped toward the boy, who drew back frightened.

Iermola understood the whole matter at once. He turned pale, stumbled, and was obliged to sit down, he felt so faint and overcome; for him had sounded that fatal hour, the very thought of which he had always dismissed from his mind with mortal terror.

"My son! my dear child!" cried the lady.

"Marie, be calm, for the love of G.o.d, and let us speak to them first!"

The child, who was gazing at his mother with his large, brilliant, and astonished eyes, threw himself into Iermola's arms as though he wished to call upon him to help him.

"He does not know me," cried the young woman, in a sad tone. "He does not know me, and he cannot know me; he runs away from me and repulses me. He cannot do otherwise. Oh, it would have been better to give up everything, to bring down upon our heads your father's curse, rather than abandon our child. He is ours no longer; we have lost him!" As she said this, she wept bitterly and wrung her hands.

"Marie, be calm, I beg you!" repeated the young man.

In the midst of this scene of grief and trouble, Iermola had time to become less agitated, and his face now wore a grave, sad expression.

"This child," said the father, in a choking and deeply agitated voice,--"this child, whom you found twelve years ago under the oak-trees, is our son. In order to escape the curse with which our father threatened us, and the watchfulness of the people who would have accused us before him if they had known of our secret marriage, we were compelled to send him away from us, to abandon him for a time, and to forget him. But the priest who married us, and who baptized the child, will be our witness; the man who placed him here--"

"He may indeed have been your son," slowly answered the old man, to whom strength had returned at this critical moment, "but now he is mine alone; he is my child. You see he does not know his mother, that when his father calls him he runs to me. I have reared him by the labour of my old age, by taking the bread from my own mouth. No one shall take him from me; Radionek will never leave me."

The mother, as she heard this, sobbed aloud. Jan Druzyna held her; but he himself blushed, trembled, and various expressions pa.s.sed over his countenance.

"Listen, old man," he cried, "whether you will or no, you will be obliged to give up this child, whose caresses we have longed for so many years."

"If I should give him up to you, he would not go with you," answered Iermola; "he does not know you. He would not abandon the old man who has brought him up."

Radionek stood motionless, pale, and troubled. His mother held out her hands to him; her eyes sought his; her lips sought his lips. The mysterious power of maternal feeling roused itself to draw him to her; and the boy's eyes filled with tears.

"Anything for your son, anything you can ask!" cried Jan Druzyna.

"And what should I take from you?" replied the old man, indignantly.

"What could you give me which would supply the place of my beloved, my only child? I ask nothing of you,--nothing but permission to die near him and to die in peace."

As he spoke, the old man burst into tears; his limbs shook, and he leaned against the wall to keep from falling. Radionek held him up, and helped him to sit down again on the door-sill; and Iermola, laying his hand on the child's fair head, kissed him pa.s.sionately. The young mother wrung her hands in despair; her grief increased, and she became beside herself. At last she threw herself upon her child, ardent and strong as a lioness, and strained him in her maternal arms.

"You are mine!" she cried, choked by her tears; "you are mine!"

And already Radionek no longer sought to avoid her caresses; he had just received his mother's first kiss,--a kiss so sweet, so penetrating, so long awaited.

The father also tremblingly approached his child, and kissed him through his tears.

Iermola watched them with a glance now sad and despairing, now bright and burning with jealousy; one single moment, one single word, had been sufficient to deprive him of his treasure.

"It was happiness enough for me," murmured the old man. "G.o.d takes it all from me. I must give him up; fate had only lent him to me. And I shall doubtless not live long. Sir," said he then, in a voice full of tears and emotion, "you see it is I who now supplicate you. I am old; I shall not live long; leave me my child until I die. I shall die soon, I am very old; then you will drag him away from my coffin. How could I live without him? Ah, do not leave me alone for the last days I have to live in this world; do not punish me; do not kill me, if for no other reason but because I have welcomed and reared your child!"

"We will take you away with the little fellow," cried Jan. "Come with him; we are more grateful to you than any words can express."

The old man interrupted him by sobbing violently; and Radionek hastened to run to Iermola as soon as he heard him crying. He knelt down beside him and hid his weeping face on his lap.

"My father, my father!" he cried, "do not weep; I will never leave you.

We will not go away from your cabin; we will stay here together. I am so happy with you, I want nothing more."

Then the mother, seeing herself still forsaken, began to sob again, and nearly fainted. The neighbours, attracted by the noise, gathered on the spot and were witnesses of the scene. The cossack's widow, Chwedko, Huluk, and others shed the tears of compa.s.sion which the poor have always ready even for the griefs and miseries which they cannot comprehend, for the tears of others always suffice to move them to pity.