I jumped over the fence—and went in the
direction from which, as far as I could judge, the
voice came.
I felt the earth soft and crumbling under my feet;
long ridges stretched before me vanishing into the
mist. I was in the kitchen garden. But nothing
was stirring around me or before me. Everything
seemed spellbound in the numbness of sleep. I
went a few steps further.
“Who is there?” I cried as wildly as Tyeglev
had.
“Prrr-r-r!” a startled corn-crake flew
up almost under my feet and flew away as straight
as a bullet. Involuntarily I started....
What foolishness!
I looked back. Tyeglev was in sight at the spot
where I left him. I went towards him.
“You will call in vain,” he said.
“That voice has come to us—to me—from
far away.”
He passed his hand over his face and with slow steps
crossed the road towards the hut. But I did not
want to give in so quickly and went back into the
kitchen garden. That someone really had three
times called “Ilyusha” I could not doubt;
that there was something plaintive and mysterious
in the call, I was forced to own to myself....
But who knows, perhaps all this only appeared to be
unaccountable and in reality could be explained as
simply as the knocking which had agitated Tyeglev
so much.
I walked along beside the fence, stopping from time
to time and looking about me. Close to the fence,
at no great distance from our hut, there stood an
old leafy willow tree; it stood out, a big dark patch,
against the whiteness of the mist all round, that dim
whiteness which perplexes and deadens the sight more
than darkness itself. All at once it seemed to
me that something alive, fairly big, stirred on the
ground near the willow. Exclaiming “Stop!
Who is there?” I rushed forward. I heard
scurrying footsteps, like a hare’s; a crouching
figure whisked by me, whether man or woman I could
not tell.... I tried to clutch at it but did
not succeed; I stumbled, fell down and stung my face
against a nettle. As I was getting up, leaning
on the ground, I felt something rough under my hand:
it was a chased brass comb on a cord, such as peasants
wear on their belt.
Further search led to nothing—and I went
back to the hut with the comb in my hand, and my cheeks
tingling.
I found Tyeglev sitting on the bench. A candle
was burning on the table before him and he was writing
something in a little album which he always had with
him. Seeing me, he quickly put the album in his
pocket and began filling his pipe.
“Look here, my friend,” I began, “what
a trophy I have brought back from my expedition!”
I showed him the comb and told him what had happened
to me near the willow. “I must have startled
a thief,” I added. “You heard a horse
was stolen from our neighbour yesterday?”
Tyeglev smiled frigidly and lighted his pipe.
I sat down beside him.
