Lukishka all this time had stood silently looking at Maryanka. His gaze evidently confused the girl.
"Well, Maryanka! I hear they"ve quartered one of the chiefs on you?" he said, drawing nearer.
Maryanka, as was her wont, waited before she replied, and slowly raising her eyes looked at the Cossack. Lukashka"s eyes were laughing as if something special, apart from what was said, was taking place between himself and the girl.
"Yes, it"s all right for them as they have two huts," replied an old woman on Maryanka"s behalf, "but at Fomushkin"s now they also have one of the chiefs quartered on them and they say one whole corner is packed full with his things, and the family have no room left. Was such a thing ever heard of as that they should turn a whole horde loose in the village?" she said. "And what the plague are they going to do here?"
"I"ve heard say they"ll build a bridge across the Terek," said one of the girls.
"And I"ve been told that they will dig a pit to put the girls in because they don"t love the lads," said Nazarka, approaching Ustenka; and he again made a whimsical gesture which set everybody laughing, and Ergushov, pa.s.sing by Maryanka, who was next in turn, began to embrace an old woman.
"Why don"t you hug Maryanka? You should do it to each in turn," said Nazarka.
"No, my old one is sweeter," shouted the Cossack, kissing the struggling old woman.
"You"ll throttle me," she screamed, laughing.
The tramp of regular footsteps at the other end of the street interrupted their laughter. Three soldiers in their cloaks, with their muskets on their shoulders, were marching in step to relieve guard by the ammunition wagon.
The corporal, an old cavalry man, looked angrily at the Cossacks and led his men straight along the road where Lukashka and Nazarka were standing, so that they should have to get out of the way. Nazarka moved, but Lukashka only screwed up his eyes and turned his broad back without moving from his place.
"People are standing here, so you go round," he muttered, half turning his head and tossing it contemptuously in the direction of the soldiers.
The soldiers pa.s.sed by in silence, keeping step regularly along the dusty road.
Maryanka began laughing and all the other girls chimed in.
"What swells!" said Nazarka, "Just like long-skirted choristers," and he walked a few steps down the road imitating the soldiers.
Again everyone broke into peals of laughter.
Lukashka came slowly up to Maryanka.
"And where have you put up the chief?" he asked.
Maryanka thought for a moment.
"We"ve let him have the new hut," she said.
"And is he old or young," asked Lukashka, sitting down beside her.
"Do you think I"ve asked?" answered the girl. "I went to get him some chikhir and saw him sitting at the window with Daddy Eroshka.
Red-headed he seemed. They"ve brought a whole cartload of things."
And she dropped her eyes.
"Oh, how glad I am that I got leave from the cordon!" said Lukashka, moving closer to the girl and looking straight in her eyes all the time.
"And have you come for long?" asked Maryanka, smiling slightly.
"Till the morning. Give me some sunflower seeds," he said, holding out his hand.
Maryanka now smiled outright and unfastened the neckband of her smock.
"Don"t take them all," she said.
"Really I felt so dull all the time without you, I swear I did," he said in a calm, restrained whisper, helping himself to some seeds out of the bosom of the girl"s smock, and stooping still closer over her he continued with laughing eyes to talk to her in low tones.
"I won"t come, I tell you," Maryanka suddenly said aloud, leaning away from him.
"No really ... what I wanted to say to you, ..." whispered Lukashka.
"By the Heavens! Do come!"
Maryanka shook her head, but did so with a smile.
"Nursey Maryanka! Hallo Nursey! Mammy is calling! Supper time!" shouted Maryanka"s little brother, running towards the group.
"I"m coming," replied the girl. "Go, my dear, go alone--I"ll come in a minute."
Lukashka rose and raised his cap.
"I expect I had better go home too, that will be best," he said, trying to appear unconcerned but hardly able to repress a smile, and he disappeared behind the corner of the house.
Meanwhile night had entirely enveloped the village. Bright stars were scattered over the dark sky. The streets became dark and empty. Nazarka remained with the women on the earth-bank and their laughter was still heard, but Lukashka, having slowly moved away from the girls, crouched down like a cat and then suddenly started running lightly, holding his dagger to steady it: not homeward, however, but towards the cornet"s house. Having pa.s.sed two streets he turned into a lane and lifting the skirt of his coat sat down on the ground in the shadow of a fence. "A regular cornet"s daughter!" he thought about Maryanka. "Won"t even have a lark--the devil! But just wait a bit."
The approaching footsteps of a woman attracted his attention. He began listening, and laughed all by himself. Maryanka with bowed head, striking the pales of the fences with a switch, was walking with rapid regular strides straight towards him. Lukashka rose. Maryanka started and stopped.
"What an accursed devil! You frightened me! So you have not gone home?"
she said, and laughed aloud.
Lukashka put one arm round her and with the other hand raised her face.
"What I wanted to tell you, by Heaven!" his voice trembled and broke.
"What are you talking of, at night time!" answered Maryanka. "Mother is waiting for me, and you"d better go to your sweetheart."
And freeing herself from his arms she ran away a few steps. When she had reached the wattle fence of her home she stopped and turned to the Cossack who was running beside her and still trying to persuade her to stay a while with him.
"Well, what do you want to say, midnight-gadabout?" and she again began laughing.
"Don"t laugh at me, Maryanka! By the Heaven! Well, what if I have a sweetheart? May the devil take her! Only say the word and now I"ll love you--I"ll do anything you wish. Here they are!" and he jingled the money in his pocket. "Now we can live splendidly. Others have pleasures, and I? I get no pleasure from you, Maryanka dear!"
The girl did not answer. She stood before him breaking her switch into little bits with a rapid movement of her fingers.
Lukashka suddenly clenched his teeth and fists.
"And why keep waiting and waiting? Don"t I love you, darling? You can do what you like with me," said he suddenly, frowning angrily and seizing both her hands.
The calm expression of Maryanka"s face and voice did not change.