Short Fiction, Aleksandr Kuprin [the speed reading book txt] 📗

dear,” I said to the girl. “Please show me the way to the Irenov road; otherwise I’ll stick in this marsh forever.”

It must have been that the kindly pleading tone in which I spoke impressed her. Carefully she put her little finches on the stove, side by side with the starlings, flung the overcoat which she had already taken off on to the bench, and silently left the hut.

I followed her.

“Are all your birds tame?” I asked, overtaking the girl.

“All tame,” she answered abruptly, not even glancing at me. “Now look,” she said, stopping by the wattle hedge. “Do you see the little footpath there, between the fir-trees? Can you see it?”

“Yes, I see.”

“Go straight along it. When you come to the oak stump, turn to your left. You must go straight on through the forest. Then you will come out on the Irenov road.”

All the while she directed me, pointing with her right hand, involuntarily I admired her. There was nothing in her like the local girls, whose faces have such a scared, monotonous look under the ugly headbands which cover their forehead, mouth, and chin. My unknown was a tall brunette from twenty to twenty-five years old, free and graceful. Her white shirt covered her strong young bosom loosely and charmingly. Once seen, the peculiar beauty of her face could not be forgotten; it was even difficult to get accustomed to it, to describe it. The charm lay in her large, shining, dark eyes, to which the thin arched eyebrows gave an indescribable air, shy, queenly, and innocent, and in the dusky pink of her skin, in the self-willed curl of her lips. Her underlip was fuller, and it was pushed forward a little, giving her a determined and capricious look.

“Are you really not afraid to live by yourselves in such a lonely spot?” I asked, stopping by the hedge.

She shrugged her shoulders indifferently.

“Why should we be afraid? The wolves do not come near us.”

“Wolves are not everything. Your hut might be smothered under the snow. The hut might catch on fire. Anything might happen. You two are there alone, no one could come to your assistance.”

“Thank God for that!” she waved her hand scornfully. “If granny and I were left alone entirely, it would be much better, but⁠—”

“What?”

“You will get old, if you want to know so much,” she cut me short. “And who are you?” she asked anxiously.

I realised that probably the old woman and the girl were afraid of persecution from the authorities, and I hastened to reassure her.

“Oh, don’t be alarmed. I’m not the village policeman, or the clerk, or the exciseman.⁠ ⁠… I’m not an official at all.”

“Is that really true?”

“On my word of honour. Believe me, I am the most private person. I’ve simply come to stay here a few months, and then I’m going away. If you like, I won’t tell a soul that I’ve been here and seen you. Do you believe me?”

The girl’s face brightened a little.

“Well, then, if you’re not lying, you’re telling the truth. But tell me: had you heard about us, or did you come across us by accident?”

“I don’t quite know how to explain it myself.⁠ ⁠… Yes, I had heard, and I even wanted to call on you some time. But it was an accident that I came today, I lost my way. Now tell me: why are you afraid of people? What harm do they do you?”

She glanced at me with suspicion. But my conscience was clear, and I endured her scrutiny without a tremor. Then she began to speak, with increasing agitation.

“They do bad things.⁠ ⁠… Ordinary people don’t matter, but the officials.⁠ ⁠… The village policeman comes⁠—he must be bribed. The inspector⁠—pay again. And before he takes the bribe he insults my grandmother; says she’s a witch, a hag, a convict.⁠ ⁠… But what’s the good of talking?⁠ ⁠…”

“But don’t they touch you?” The imprudent question escaped my lips.

She drew up her head with proud self-confidence, and angry triumph flashed in her half-closed eyes.

“They don’t touch me.⁠ ⁠… Once a surveyor came near to me.⁠ ⁠… He wanted a kiss.⁠ ⁠… I don’t think he will have forgotten yet how I kissed him.”

So much harsh independence sounded in these proud, derisive words, that I involuntarily thought:

“You haven’t been bred in the Polyessie forest for nothing. You’re really a dangerous person to joke with.⁠ ⁠…”

“Do we touch anybody?” she continued as her confidence in me grew. “We do not want people. Once a year I go to the little town to buy soap and salt⁠ ⁠… and some tea for granny. She loves tea. Otherwise, I could do without them forever.”

“Well, I see you and your granny are not fond of people.⁠ ⁠… But may I come to see you sometimes for a little while?”

She laughed. How strange and unexpected was the change in her pretty face! There was no trace of her former sternness in it. It had in an instant become bright, shy, and childish.

“Whatever will you do with us? Granny and I are dull.⁠ ⁠… Why, come, if you like, and if you are really a good man. But⁠ ⁠… if you do happen to come, it would be better if you came without a gun.⁠ ⁠…”

“You’re afraid?”

“Why should I be afraid? I’m afraid of nothing.” Again I could catch in her voice her confidence in her strength. “But I don’t like it. Why do you kill birds, or hares even? They do nobody any harm, and they want to live as much as you or I. I love them; they are so tiny, and such little stupids.⁠ ⁠… Well, goodbye.” She began to hurry. “I don’t know your name.⁠ ⁠… I’m afraid granny will be cross with me.”

With easy swiftness she ran to the hut. She bent her head, and with her hands caught up her hair, blown loose in the wind.

“Wait, wait a moment,” I called. “What is your name? Let us be properly introduced.”

“My name’s Alyona.⁠ ⁠… Hereabouts they call me Olyessia.”

I shouldered my gun and went the way I had been shown. I