Meanwhile Vasili Andreevich,
with his feet and the ends of
the reins, urged the horse on
in the direction in which for
some reason he expected the forest
and forester's hut to be. The
snow covered his eyes and the
wind seemed intent on stopping
him, but bending forward and
constantly lapping his coat over
and pushing it between himself
and the cold harness pad which
prevented him from sitting properly,
he kept urging the horse on.
Mukhorty ambled on obediently
though with difficulty, in the
direction in which he was driven.
Vasili Andreevich rode for
about five minutes straight ahead,
as he thought, seeing nothing
but the horse's head and the
white waste, and hearing only
the whistle of the wind about
the horse's ears and his coat
collar.
Suddenly a dark patch showed
up in front of him. His heart
beat with joy, and he rode towards
the object, already seeing in
imagination the walls of village
houses. But the dark patch was
not stationary, it kept moving;
and it was not a village but
some tall stalks of wormwood
sticking up through the snow
on the boundary between two fields,
and desperately tossing about
under the pressure of the wind
which beat it all to one side
and whistled through it. The
sight of that wormwood tormented
by the pitiless wind made Vasili
Andreevich shudder, he knew not
why, and he hurriedly began urging
the horse on, not noticing that
when riding up to the wormwood
he had quite changed his direction
and was now heading the opposite
way, though still imagining that
he was riding towards where the
hut should be. But the horse
kept making towards the right,
and Vasili Andreevich kept guiding
it to the left.
Again something dark appeared
in front of him. Again he rejoiced,
convinced that now it was certainly
a village. But once more it was
the same boundary line overgrown
with wormwood, once more the
same wormwood desperately tossed
by the wind and carrying unreasoning
terror to his heart. But its
being the same wormwood was not
all, for beside is* there was
a horse's track partly snowed
over. Vasili Andreevich stopped,
stooped down and looked carefully.
It was a horse-track only partially
covered with snow, and could
be none but his own horse's hoofprints.
He had evidently gone round in
a small circle. 'I shall perish
like that!' he thought, and not
to give way to his terror he
urged on the horse still more,
peering into the snowy darkness
in which he saw only flitting
and fitful points of light. Once
he thought he heard the barking
of dogs or the howling of wolves,
but the sounds were so faint
and indistinct that he did not
know whether he heard them or
merely imagined them, and he
stopped and began to listen intently.
Suddenly some terrible, deafening
cry resounded near his ears,
and everything shivered and shook
under him. He seized Mukhorty's
neck, but that too was shaking
all over and the terrible cry
grew still more frightful. For
some seconds Vasili Andreevich
could not collect himself or
understand what was happening.
It was only that Mukhorty, whether
to encourage himself or to call
for help, had neighed loudly
and resonantly. 'Ugh, you wretch!
How you frightened me, damn you!'
thought Vasili Andreevich. But
even when he understood the cause
of his terror he could not shake
it off.
'I must calm myself and think
things over,' he said to himself,
but yet he could not stop, and
continued to urge the horse on,
without noticing that he was
now going with the wind instead
of against it. His body, especially
between his legs where it touched
the pad of the harness and was
not covered by his overcoats,
was getting painfully cold, especially
when the horse walked slowly.
His legs and arms trembled and
his breathing came fast. He saw
himself perishing amid this dreadful
snowy waste, and could see no
means of escape.
Suddenly the horse under him
tumbled into something and, sinking
into a snow-drift, began to plunge
and fell on his side. Vasili
Andreevich jumped off, and in
so doing dragged to one side
the breechband on which his foot
was resting, and twisted round
the pad to which he held as he
dismounted. As soon as he had
jumped off, the horse struggled
to his feet, plunged forward,
gave one leap and another, neighed
again, and dragging the drugget
and the breechband after him,
disappeared, leaving Vasili Andreevich
alone on the snow-drift.
The latter pressed on after
the horse, but the snow lay so
deep and his coats were so heavy
that, sinking above his knees
at each step, he stopped breathless
after taking not more than twenty
steps. 'The copse, the oxen,
the lease-hold, the shop, the
tavern, the house with the iron-roofed
barn, and my heir,' thought he.
'How can I leave all that? What
does this mean? It cannot be!'
These thoughts flashed through
his mind. Then he thought of
the wormwood tossed by the wind,
which he had twice ridden past,
and he was seized with such terror
that he did not believe in the
reality of what was happening
to him. 'Can this be a dream?'
he thought, and tried to wake
up but could not. It was real
snow that lashed his face and
covered him and chilled his right
hand from which he had lost the
glove, and this was a real desert
in which he was now left alone
like that wormwood, awaiting
an inevitable, speedy, and meaningless
death.
'Queen of Heaven! Holy Father
Nicholas, teacher of temperance!'
he thought, recalling the service
of the day before and the holy
icon with its black face and
gilt frame, and the tapers which
he sold to be set before that
icon and which were almost immediately
brought back to him scarcely
burnt at all, and which he put
away in the store-chest. He began
to pray to that same Nicholas
the Wonder-Worker to save him,
promising him a thanksgiving
service and some candles. But
he clearly and indubitably realized
that the icon, its frame, the
candles, the priest, and the
thanksgiving service, though
very important and necessary
in church, could do nothing for
him here, and that there was
and could be no connexion between
those candles and services and
his present disastrous plight.
'I must not despair,' he thought.
'I must follow the horse's track
before it is snowed under. He
will lead me out, or I may even
catch him. Only I must not hurry,
or I shall stick fast and be
more lost than ever.'
But in spite of his resolution
to go quietly, he rushed forward
and even ran, continually falling,
getting up and falling again.
The horse's track was already
hardly visible in places where
the snow did not lie deep. 'I
am lost!' thought Vasili Andreevich.
'I shall lose the track and not
catch the horse.' But at that
moment he saw something black.
It was Mukhorty, and not only
Mukhorty, but the sledge with
the shafts and the kerchief.
Mukhorty, with the sacking and
the breechband twisted round
to one side, was standing not
in his former place but nearer
to the shafts, shaking his head
which the reins he was stepping
on drew downwards. It turned
out that Vasili Andreevich had
sunk in the same ravine Nikita
had previously fallen into, and
that Mukhorty had been bringing
him back to the sledge and he
had got off his back no more
than fifty paces from where the
sledge was.
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