King Stakh's Wild Hunt Read Online Free PDF Page A

whose master has been hanged.
    In a broken voice she said:
    “And you... And you, too... why do you torture me, why does everybody..?”
    “My dear lady! Upon my word of honour, I had nothing harmful in mind, I don’t know anything... Look, here is my certificate from the Academy. Here is a letter from the governor. I’ve never been here before. Please forgive me, for heaven’s sake, if I have caused you any pain.”
    “Never mind,” she said. “Never mind, calm yourself, Mr. Belaretsky... It’s simply that I hate what savages can create in the minds of savages. Perhaps you, too, will someday understand what it is... this gloom. Whereas I understood that all too well long before. But I’ll be long dead prior to everything becoming clearer to me.”
    I realized it would be tactless of me to question her any further, and I kept silent. It was only after a while, when she had calmed down, that I said:
    “I beg your pardon for having disturbed you, Miss Yanovsky, I see that I have immediately become an unpleasant person for you. When must I leave? It seems to me the sooner the better.”
    Again that distorted face!
    “Ah! As if that were the trouble! Don’t leave us. You will offend me deeply if you leave now. And besides,” her voice began to tremble, “What would you say if I asked you to remain here, in this house, for at least two or three weeks? Until the season of the dark autumn nights are over?”
    Her look began to wander. On her lips a pitiful smile appeared.
    “Afterwards there will be snow... And footprints in the snow. Of course, you will do as you see fit. However, it would be unpleasant for me were it to be said of the last of the Yanovskys that she had forgotten the custom of hospitality.”
    She said ‘the last of the Yanovskys’ in such a way, this eighteen year old girl, that my heart was wrung with pain.
    “Well then,” she continued, “If this awful stuff interests you, how can I possibly object? Some people collect snakes. We here have more spectres and ghosts than living people. Peasants, shaken with fever, tell amazing and fearful stories. They live on potatoes, bread made of grasses, porridge without butter, and on fantasy. You mustn’t sleep in their huts: it’s dirty there and congested, and all is evilly neglected. Go about the neighbouring farmsteads, there for money that will be spend on bread or vodka, warming up for a moment the blood that is everlastingly cold from malaria, they will tell you everything. And in the evening return here. Dinner will be ready, awaiting you here, as well as a place to sleep in, and a fire in the fireplace. Remember this – I am the mistress here, and the peasants obey me. Agreed?”
    By this time I was already quite certain that nobody obeyed this child, nobody was afraid of her, and nobody depended on her. Perhaps, had it been anybody else, I might have smiled into her eyes, but in this “command” of hers there was so much entreaty that I did not yet quite understand that I answered with my eyes lowered:
    “Alright. I agree to your wish.”
    She did not notice the ironic gleam in my eyes and for a moment even blushed, apparently because somebody had obeyed her.
    The leftovers of a very modest supper were removed from the table. We remained in our armchairs before the fireplace. Yanovsky looked around at the black windows behind which the branches of enormous trees rubbed against, and said:
    “Perhaps you are ready for sleep now?”
    This strange evening had put me into such a state of mind that I had lost all desire for sleep. And here we were sitting side by side looking into the fire.
    “Tell me,” she suddenly said. “Do people everywhere live as we do here?”
    I glanced at her, puzzled. Hadn’t she ever been anywhere outside of her home? As if she had read my thoughts, she said: “I’ve never been anywhere beyond this plain in the forest... My father was the best man living on Earth, taught me on his own for he was a very