Chapter 19 Part Five 16-20

sixteen On the second night, I got on the train and sat alone in the shabby third-class carriage, feeling a little scared.The faint lights flickered constantly, shining on the wooden bench, looking desolate and bleak.I stood by the dark window, gusts of fresh air came in through the invisible cracks of the window, piercing my skin.I put my hands on my face to block the light, and stared intently at the night and forest outside the window.There seemed to be thousands of red bees buzzing and buzzing, and then disappeared all of a sudden.Sometimes the smell of pitch and locomotive wood wafts along with the cool winter air... Oh, how dark, how austere, how heavy the night in the woods is!The path in the forest is narrow, deep and endless.On both sides of the trail, tall and slender black shadows of thousand-year-old pines overlap densely.The square shadows of the bright car windows slanted on the snowdrifts at the edge of the forest and passed by in a flash.From time to time, there was a telegraph pole outside the window. It first became higher and higher, and then further and further away, disappearing in darkness and mystery.

In the morning I woke up with a start, refreshed.The train has stopped and has reached Smolensk.This is a big stop.The surroundings are bright and peaceful.I jumped out of the car and greedily took a breath of fresh air... There was a group of people around the station gate, so I ran over to have a look.It turned out to be a wild boar that was killed by a hunter and left on the ground. It was huge, strong, and hardened by the cold.It has long and dense gray bristles all over its body, covered with a layer of dry snow powder. It has two small eyes like a domestic pig, and its mouth is clenched tightly, with two big fangs sticking out. "Stay here?" I thought for a while, "No, go on, to Vitebsk!"

It was almost dusk when I drove to Vitebsk, a cold but bright dusk.There are thick layers of snow everywhere, clean and lifeless, like a piece of virgin land.The city seems to me ancient and un-Russian.The tall houses are connected together, with pointed roofs, small windows, and deep, semicircular doors on the ground floor, with rough workmanship.You often meet old Jews, all wearing long skirts, white stockings and leather boots, and long hair on the sideburns like curved tubular sheep's horns.Their faces were pale, and their eyes, uniformly black, had a look of melancholy doubt.People were walking up and down the busy street, and a large group of fat girls moved slowly on the sidewalk.They were dressed in the fine attire of the Jews in the province, thick suede fur coats of lavender, sky blue, and garnet.Some lads followed them, but modestly and at a distance.They all wear bowler hats.He also has long sideburns, and the sweet oriental face is delicate and round, like a girl.There is a layer of puberty down on their cheeks, and their eyes are as lazy as those of antelope... Among these people, walking in this city that I think is so old, I seem to be fascinated, and I feel that everything is so magical .

It was getting dark, and I came to a square where stood a yellow Catholic church with two small bell towers.When I walked in, I saw rows of benches in the semi-darkness, and further on, there was a half-circle of candles on the altar table.Suddenly, somewhere above my head, there was a slow, brooding organ sound, the sound flow was low and steady, and then gradually increased and expanded, and there was a piercing, sharp sound like metal ... and it turned into a trill, The fricative sound seemed to break free from something that suppressed it; suddenly, it broke through.A resounding hymn to heaven...Further ahead, in the dimly lit place, there were high and low whispers and nasal Latin chanting.On both sides of the national stone pillar with the thick upper end hidden in the darkness, some iron armored soldiers stood on the foundation, looking like black ghosts in the dim light.High above the altar, there is a large painted window, hidden in the twilight...

seventeen I drove to Petersburg that night.As soon as I came out of the church, I walked back to the railway station to catch a train to Polotsk, where I wanted to find a random old hotel and spend a while in isolation.The train to Polotsk left very late.The station was empty and pitch black.Only a sleepy lamp was lit on the counter of the commissary, and the ticking of the wall clock was so protracted, as if time itself had come to an end.There was deathly silence all around me, and I sat alone for a long, long time, until finally, from nowhere, the scent of a samovar wafted, and the station began to stir and brighten.At this time, who would have thought that I bought a ticket to Petersburg in a daze.

Still at the Vitebsk station, when the train to Polotsk was waiting for a long time, I felt that everything around me was so strange. I was very surprised and wondered: what is everything in front of me?For what purpose?And why am I in it?The canteen was deserted and half-dark, with a sleepy lamp on the counter, and the gloomy station hall looked empty, long, and tall, with a long table in the center, as rigidly arranged as any station.When the commissary smelled of the station samovar at night, a sleepy, hunchbacked old servant, with the tail of his tailcoat trailing behind him, limped out from somewhere behind the counter, bemoaning his old age and infirmity, His legs and feet were weak, and he began to climb onto the chair by the wall, and lit the frosted glass spherical wall lamp with a trembling hand... Then a burly military policeman walked past the commissary and walked towards the platform with his spurs rattling. His long army coat drags down to the heels, and the tail is reminiscent of the tail of a precious stallion. What is this?For what purpose?With what motivation?How strange it was that the gendarmes let in the fresh air of a snowy winter night when they opened the door to the platform!Suddenly I woke up from my stupor, and for some reason suddenly decided to go to Petersburg.

Polotsk was rainy in winter, and through the gaps between the trains I saw the muddy, monotonous, featureless streets of the city. I was disappointed, but this disappointment pleased me.Later I wrote on the way. "Endless days. Boundless forests and snowfields. There is always a pale sky and snow outside the car window. The train goes into the dense forest for a while, and appears in the desolate snowfield for a while, the distant land line, the dark woods Above, a leaden cloud hangs in the low-hanging sky. The station is all timber... North, North!" In my eyes, Petersburg is already located in the extreme north.In the cloudy snowstorm, the taxi drove me along the streets with unusually neat, unusually tall, and unusually similar buildings, to Ligovka, to Nikolayev Station.However, it was only after two o'clock in the afternoon, and the round clock on the main building of the station was already lit.I parked my car at Ligovka, where the canal runs, only two steps away from the station.There are firewood stores, coachmen's clubs, tea houses, small restaurants, and beer shops everywhere, and the environment is very bad.I was introduced to a hotel by the coachman, and sat for a long time in my clothes, watching the snowy sky before dusk from an extremely gloomy window on the sixth floor.The fatigue of the journey, the turbulence of the train, made me feel that everything was spinning before my eyes... Petersburg!I had a strong feeling that I was in Petersburg, completely surrounded by its dark, complex, terrifying grandeur.The room was stuffy and stuffy, with a foul smell from the old woolen draperies and sofa covers, from a reddish thing used to light the floors of lower hotel rooms.I walked out of the room and ran down the steep escalator.The snowstorm in the street made the sky dark, and the icy snowflakes rushed towards my face.I stopped a cab that appeared in the wind and snow, and went straight to Finland Station—to experience the exotic atmosphere.I got drunk very quickly there.Suddenly sent her a telegram.

"I'll be there the day after tomorrow." In the grand, old, busy Moscow, I was greeted by sunny weather.The ice and snow have melted, the snowdrifts have gradually disappeared, and the creeks and puddles have thawed.Horse-drawn carriages rattled and rattled past, a steady stream of people on foot and in carriages, bustling, laden sleighs, and dirty, narrow streets.The walls of the Kremlin, the palaces, and the golden domes of the churches densely interspersed therein look like a folk engraving.I admired Vasily Brazen in amazement, visited the cathedrals in the Kremlin, and had breakfast at the famous Yegorov Tavern on the game market.This tavern is quite special, the customers downstairs are mostly business people, quite tacky and noisy, but the two not-so-nice small halls upstairs are neat and elegant, very well-mannered-even no smoking.The sun came in through the warm little window somewhere in the courtyard, and a canary sang softly in its cage, making the small hall even more cozy.A lamp in the corner glowed with a white flame, and the upper part of one wall was a darkened picture, varnished and enhanced with ecru varnish, of a scaly roof with cornices, a gallery, a gallery There were some unreasonably big Chinese drinking tea, with sallow faces, wearing golden gowns, and green caps with melon skins, which looked like cheap lamps... I left Moscow that night...

————— ① Refers to Vasily Braren Cathedral, a famous architectural monument with world significance on the Red Square in Moscow. Our county has been connected to the train, and the strong wind from the Sea of ​​Azov is howling wildly at the station.She was waiting for me on the clean platform that was no longer covered with snow.The wind whipped her spring sombrero, blocking her view.I saw her from afar, and she frowned in the wind, frantically looking for me along the moving carriage.There was something sweet and lovable about her that always surprises us in a long-lost relative.She was thin and plainly dressed.After I jumped out of the car, she tried to lift the veil, but failed, and just kissed me awkwardly through the veil, pale as death.She was silent in the carriage, tilting her head against the wind, and repeated sadly and coldly:

"Look what you've done to me! Look what you've done to me!" Then she said it again, still gravely: "Are you going to the Noble Hotel? I'll go with you." We went into a large, anteroom room on the second floor, and she sat on the sofa and watched the bellman awkwardly place my case on the rug in the middle of the house.Then the waiter asked me if I had any other orders. "No," she replied in my place, "go ahead..." Then she took off her hat. "Why do you keep silent and tell me nothing?" She suppressed her trembling lips and said nonchalantly.

I knelt down and hugged her legs, sobbing as I kissed them through my skirt.She took my head in her cup, and I recognized and felt again those wonderfully sweet lips that were so familiar to me, and our hearts contracted happily, as if they had stopped beating.I jumped up, locked the door, and used two cold hands to close the white curtains that were bulging by the wind.Outside the window, the wind shakes the dark spring tree. On the tree, a rook sways back and forth like a drunk man, yelling loudly in shock... Later, when she was lying down and resting, she whispered to me: "Father has a request; it's fine to wait half a year for getting married. You just wait, anyway, my life now belongs to you alone, it's up to you Arranged." A few unlit candles stood vertically on the mirror stand, the hanging white curtains were dull and motionless, and all kinds of strange clay sculpture decorations on the pink and white ceiling looked down. eighteen Brother Georgi has moved from Kharkov to a city in Little Russia, and we are going there.Both of us will work at the local statistics bureau that my brother is in charge of.We spent the week before Easter and Easter at Baturino.Her mother and sister were very fond of her, her father lovingly called her "you" and offered her to kiss his hand every morning, but brother Nikolai was reserved and polite.She got to know the members of my family, looked at our house, learned about our estate, went to the room where I lived as a boy, which she finds still lovely, and looked through my books with the joy of her heart , she found all these fresh and interesting, immersed in a kind of happiness that was both calm and bewildered... Then we left. We arrived in Orel during the night and changed to a train for Kharkov at dawn the next day. The sun was shining brightly in the morning, and we stood on the aisle of the carriage, leaning against the warm windows. "You see, I've never been anywhere except Orel and Lipetsk!" she said. "Is Kursk coming soon? This is already the South for me." "Yes, it's the same in my eyes." "Shall we have breakfast at Kursk? You know, I've never had breakfast at a station in my life..." After standing over Kursk, the further you go, the more warm and pleasant you feel.The slopes on both sides of the roadbed are already covered with green grass and clusters of wild flowers; white butterflies are flying around the gate, and the presence of butterflies means that it is already summer. "It's very hot there in summer!" she said with a smile. "My brother wrote to say that the whole city is a big garden." "Yes, Little Russia. I hadn't thought of it... Look, look, how tall the poplars are! They're all green! Why are there so many mills?" "It's a windmill, not a mill. Soon you'll see the Chalk Mountains, and then Belgorod." "Now I understand you. I'm afraid I will never be able to live in the north, where there is not such ample sunshine!" I lower the window.The smoked wind is coming slowly, bringing warmth, and even the soot from the locomotive has the smell of the south.Her eyes were half-closed, and on her face, on the black down on her forehead, and on her simple calico dress, scorching sunbeams moved, shone, and seared. Near Belgorod, there are cherry orchards in full bloom and cottages with white lime walls in the river valley, which are rustic and lovely.At the Belgorod station one could hear the quick, soft voice of the little Russian woman selling bagels. She got out of the car to do some shopping, haggled over the price, and was glad that she was a penny-pincher and spoke a little Russian. In the evening, we arrived in Kharkov and took another train. It was dawn by the end of the day. she fell asleep.The candles in the carriage were almost finished, and it was still dark and hazy on the grassland, but in the distance, the eastern skyline was darkly blue.Here, on the endless bare plain, the gray-green hills are close to each other, which is not like the land of our hometown.A small sleeping station flashed outside the window. There were neither shrubs nor woods around the station. Even the station itself was made of stones, without any cover, and it glowed with a bluish-white light at the mysterious moment of dawn... Here How lonely and desolate is my little station! At this time, the carriage had a little light.The gloom was already under the floor, and it was already half-dark above the floor.She is still in dreamland.Head buried in pillow, legs curled up.I carefully covered her with a quaint silk shawl my mother had given her. nineteen The station is located in a wide valley, away from the city.The station is not big.But pleasant.On the station, the servants are courteous and courteous, the porters are amiable, and the driver sitting in the double-set family long-distance carriage is honest and kind. The city is surrounded by lush gardens, and its Hetman Cathedral sits on a cliff face from which it can be seen to the east and south.In the valley to the east stands a steep hill alone, with an ancient temple on the top of the hill, and beyond that is green and empty, and the valley gradually turns into the slope of the grassland.To the south, across the river and across the green meadows, the view was lost in the blinding sunlight. The gardens here and there, along with the rows of poplars lining the boardwalks, make many of the city's streets appear narrow.You can often meet a proud girl on the sidewalk, with her breasts puffed out, her hips hidden in a checkered skirt, and a heavy load of water is carried on her strong shoulders.The poplar trees are unusually tall and strong, which makes us marvel at the spectacle.It's May weather, and there are often thunderstorms and heavy rains. At this time, the thick leaves of the poplar trees are green and shiny, and they also emit the fragrance of resin!The spring here is always gorgeous, the summer is hot, the autumn is clear and long, and the winter is mild with a moist wind. The sledges are hung with small bells and make a dull and pleasant jingling sound as they run. We rented a flat on one such street.The landlord, Kovaniko, is a tall old man with a tanned skin and gray hair cut into a round shape.He is an authentic manor owner: he has a yard, side rooms, main house, and back garden.He lived in the wing room by himself, and rented the main room to us.The walls of the main house are white and covered by the shade of the garden at the back, and the corridor with large glass windows in front.He didn't know where he was working, and he was used to having a full meal and a night's sleep after work, and then sitting in front of the open window before he put on his farm clothes, smoking his pipe and singing, "Ah, The woman on the mountain is cutting the wheat..." The rooms in the courtyard are neither high nor simple.In the front room was a large old wooden chest.It is covered with rough sackcloth with colorful peach blossoms.A young Cossack woman with a Nogai beauty served as our servant. ————— ① A nation of the Turkish language family. The elder brother became more amiable and kind-hearted.My expectations were fulfilled: the intimacy of family and friends quickly developed between him and her.In any case, whenever I had an argument with her or him, they always took sides. Our colleagues and acquaintances here (doctors, lawyers, Zemstvo people) are similar to those of my brother in Kharkov.I slipped into their circle lightly, and had the pleasure of meeting among them Leontovich and Vagin, who had also emigrated from Kharkov.The people in this circle differed from those in Kharkov's only in that they were milder, in almost perfect harmony with the peaceful and peaceful atmosphere of the city.They were only friendly with people from any other city, even the police chief. We used to meet at the house of a senator who owned five thousand dessiatins of land and ten thousand head of sheep, and who had furnished his home with splendor and high-society style for the sake of his family, but who himself was short in stature and dressed in poor.He had been in Yakutsk for a while, but he was courteous and courteous, like a poor guest. twenty There is an ancient stone well in the yard, two white locust trees in front of the wing, and a chestnut tree with dense branches and leaves covering the right half of the glass window corridor beside the steps of the house.At seven o'clock in the summer morning, the sun has made everything dazzling and scorching hot, and the monotonous and panic-stricken cries of the hens can be heard from the chicken coop.It was cool, however, in the house, especially in the back rooms where the windows looked on the garden.She stood in her bedroom in her dainty Tatar sandals, splashing water on her head, her breasts constricted with cold; the nape of her neck and the bottom of her hair were full of foam, and the whole bedroom was filled with cold water and scented soap. fresh breath.She turned away her wet face in embarrassment, stomped her feet and said to me, "Go away!" Soon, the smell of burning tea wafted from the room with the window facing the corridor.Cossack maids walked there, rattling their studded boots.She didn't wear socks, and her ankles were exposed, thin, like those of a thoroughbred filly, swaying under the skirt, which was somewhat oriental; on her round neck was an amber necklace, which was also shining; The little head has black hair, and the brain is very clever and agile. The eyes slanting outward are piercing, and the buttocks twist every time they take a step. The elder brother came out to drink tea with a cigarette. His smile and mannerisms were the same as that of his father, except that he was short and fat, which was not at all like his father. However, he could see a gentleman in his manner.He began to pay attention to his clothes. When sitting, he imitated the demeanor of the upper class, with his legs crossed freely and with a cigarette in his mouth.There had been a time when everyone believed in his great future, and he himself believed in it, and now he was completely content with his position in this remote part of Little Russia.From the look in his eyes when he came out to drink tea, he felt energetic and healthy.We raised him a very lovely family.He went to work with us every day, and things were pretty much the same as in Kharkov, but half the time was spent smoking and chatting, which became his daily pleasure.Whenever she finished packing up and finally came out in a beautiful summer dress, he would always go up to kiss her hand with joy. We walked along the scorched boardwalks, next to the scorched walls and gardens, next to rows of gorgeous poplars that looked oily in the sun.She was holding a gleaming silk umbrella, the dome of which stood out against the dark blue sky.Then we walked across the steamy square into the yellow building of the Senate Chamber.Downstairs reeked of the boots of the watchmen and the cheap tobacco they smoked.All kinds of clerks and clerks, with official documents in their hands, bowed their heads according to the habit of the Little Russians, went up and down the stairs on the second floor; Cunning, skilled in the world.We walked down the stairs to the first floor, into the low rooms of our department, which were pleasantly filled with chattering, slovenly intellectuals... I saw her go into these rooms to fetch various Questionnaires, it always feels weird to put them in envelopes and mail them to the counties. At noon the guards brought us tea and a few slices of lemon in cheap cups and saucers.This kind of yamen life also gave me a certain kind of happiness at first.At tea time all our friends from other departments come to us to chat and smoke.Sulima, the secretary of the Senate, also often comes.The man was handsome, a little stooped, and wore gold-rimmed spectacles.The hair and beard were beautiful, black and shining like velvet.His gait is slow, and his demeanor, talking and laughing all contain ingratiating meaning.He always greeted him with a smile and always showed off his ease and refinement.He was a man of great aesthetics, and called the monastery on top of the hill in the valley Frozen Harmony.He came not too often, but he always looked at her with more and more silly and mysterious eyes, walked to her table and leaned over to look at her hands, adjusted his glasses, and asked with a gentle smile. "What official document are you sending?" At this moment she straightened up and answered him as politely as possible, but also as simply as possible.I'm completely relieved, I don't feel jealous anymore now. Unwittingly, I occupy a special position in this institution, as in the editorial office of Orel's Golos, and I am regarded as a member of staff with a good-natured sneer.I sit here and make statistics and make reports: how much tobacco and sugar beets are planted in a certain county and township, and what measures have been taken to "combat" against the small beetles that harm these sugar beets.Sometimes I just read a little and ignore the chatter of the people around me.To my delight I had a desk of my own, and an unlimited supply of new quills, pencils, and fine paper from the office. Get off work at two o'clock in the afternoon.My brother stood up and said with a smile, "Go home, everyone!" And they all rushed to find their summer hats and wide-brimmed hats, rushed into the dazzling square, shook hands and said goodbye, and went their separate ways. I saw the flickering of the flowered silk shirt and walking stick.