Читать книгу Three Men - Maksim Gorky - Страница 7

"When she went away yesterday, father gnashed his teeth, and raged more and more, and growled all the time. He pulled my hair every minute. I soon saw something was up, and then she came back. The house was shut up, we were in the smithy, and I was standing by the bellows. All at once I saw her come nearer, and stand in the door. 'Give me the key,' she said. But father took the tongs and went at her. He went quite slowly—creeping slowly. I shut my eyes, it was awful. I wanted to cry out 'Run, mother!' but I couldn't. When I looked again, he was still going slowly towards her, and his eyes burned! Then she tried to go—she turned her back—she tried to run——"

Pashka's face quivered and his thin angular body began to shudder. He drew in a deep breath, then breathed out again, and said:

"Then he hit her on the head with the tongs."

A movement ran through the children, who had not stirred hitherto.

"She stretched out her arms and fell forward, as if she were diving into the water."

He stopped speaking, picked up a shaving, looked at it carefully, and threw it away over the heads of the children. They all sat still, silent and motionless, as if they expected him to speak again. But he said no more, and let his head fall on to his breast.

"Did he kill her quite dead?" asked Masha in her thin, trembling voice.

"Silly!" said Pashka, without raising his head.

Jakov put his arms round the little one and drew her close to him, while Ilya moved nearer to Pashka and asked him gently:

"Does it hurt you?"

"What's that to do with you?" answered Pashka, crossly.

All the children looked at him silently.

"She was always idling about," said Mashka's clear voice, but Jakov interrupted her uneasily.

"Idling? But think what the smith was like, always so cross and grumbling, enough to make any one afraid, and she so lively, like Perfishka—it was dull for her with the smith."

Pashka looked at him and spoke solemnly and gloomily like a grown-up person.

"I always said to her, 'Mother,' I said, 'look out for yourself, he'll kill you,' but she wouldn't listen. She always told me not to say anything to him. She bought me sweets and things, and the sergeant gave me five kopecks every time—every time I took him a letter from her—I got five kopecks. He's a good fellow, and so strong, and he's got a big moustache."

"Has he a sword?" asked Mashka.

"Rather," said Pashka, and added proudly, "Once I drew it out of the sheath—my word! it was heavy!"

"Now you're an orphan like Ilyushka," said Jakov thoughtfully, after a pause.

"Hardly," answered Pashka angrily. "Do you mean I've got to go and be a rag-picker? I should think not."

"I don't mean that."

"I shall just live as I like," went on Pashka proudly, with his head held up and his eyes sparkling. "I'm not an orphan, I'm only just alone in the world, and I will just live for myself, my father wouldn't send me to school, and now they'll put him in prison, and I shall just go to school and learn more than you."

"Where will you get the clothes?" said Ilya, and looked triumphantly at Pashka, "you can't go there in rags."

"Clothes? I will sell the smithy!"

All looked respectfully at Pashka, and Ilya felt himself beaten. Pashka observed the impression his words produced, and held himself still straighter.

"Yes, and I'll buy a horse, a real live horse, and I'll ride to school."

This idea pleased him so much that he even smiled, only a very, very shy smile that flitted over his mouth and was gone in a moment.

"No one will beat you now," said Mashka suddenly to Pashka, and looked at him enviously.

"He'll soon find some one willing," said Ilya in a tone of conviction.

Pashka looked at him, then spat to one side and said,

"What do you mean by that? Just you try it on with me!"

Jakov joined again in the conversation.-"How strange it is, children! there was some one—walked about and talked—and so on—full of life like all the rest, and one blow on the head with the tongs—and that's the end."

The children looked attentively at Jakov whose eyes stood out oddly under his brows.

"Yes, I thought of that, too," said Ilya.

"People say dead," went on Jakov slowly and mysteriously, "but then what is it to be dead?"

"The soul has flown away," explained Pashka moodily.

"To Heaven," added Masha, and looked up into the sky, while she nestled closer to Jakov. The stars were already flaming; one of them a great bright star that did not twinkle, seemed nearer to the earth than the rest and looked down on them like a cold unmoving eye. The three boys turned their faces upwards like Mashka. Pashka glanced up and at once slipped away. Ilya looked up long and keenly, with an expression of fear, always at the one point, and Jakov's big eyes wandered here and there over the deep blue heavens as if they were seeking something there.

"Jakov!" called out his friend, looking down again.

"What?"

"I was thinking——" Ilya broke off.

"What were you thinking?" asked Jakov, speaking softly too.

"About the people here."

"What then?"

"How they——I can't bear it. Here is some one killed, and they all run about the place and seem so busy and talk all the time; but no one cried, not one."

"Yes, Jeremy did."

"He always has tears in his eyes. But Pashka, how he behaves—as if he were telling a tale."

"It isn't that, really. It pains him, but he's ashamed to cry before us; but now he's gone away, and is crying—as he's reason enough to."

Huddled close together, they sat still for a minute or two. Mashka had fallen asleep on Jakov's knees, her face still turned to the sky.

"Are you afraid?" asked Jakov very softly.

"A little," replied Ilya, in the same tone. "Now her soul is wandering round here. Yes—yes, and Masha is asleep; we must take her into the house, and I'm so afraid to go away from here."

"Let's go together."

Jakov laid the head of the sleeping child against his shoulder, put his arms round her slender body and rose with an effort, while he whispered to Ilya, who stood in the way, "Hold on, let me go in front!"

He stepped down into the cellar, staggering under his burden, while Ilya followed so close that he almost trod on his friend's heels. It seemed to Ilya that an invisible shape glided behind him, that he felt its cold breath on his neck, and he feared every moment to be gripped by it. He touched his friend on the back and called to him in a barely audible voice:

"Go quicker!"