Old Izergil and other stories / Старуха Изергиль и другие рассказы. Книга для чтения на английском языке

I

These stories were told to me on the shore of the sea near Akkerman, in Bessarabia.

One evening, when our grape-picking was over for the day, the group of Moldavians with whom I had been working went down to the sea-shore, leaving me and an old woman named Izergil lying in the deep shadow of the grape-vines, silently watching the silhouettes of the people who had gone down to the shore merge with the blue shadows of night.

They sang and laughed as they went; the men were bronzed by the sun, they had thick black moustaches and curly hair that hung clown to their shoulders, and they were wearing short jackets and wide trousers tight at the ankle; the girls and women were gay, they had dark-blue eyes and graceful bodies, and their skins were as bronzed as the men’s. Their silky black hair hung loose and the warm breeze played with it, making the coins plaited into it tinkle. The wind flowed over us in a broad continuous current, but from time to time it seemed to come up against some obstacle, and then there would be a great gust that blew out the women’s hair, making it stream about their heads in fantastic manes. This gave them the appearance of strange creatures out of fairy-tales. As they went farther and farther away, the night and my imagination clothed them in increasing beauty.

Someone was playing a violin, a girl was singing in a deep throaty voice, bursts of laughter could be heard…

The air was heavy with the tang of the sea and the vapours rising from the earth, which had been drenched by rain just before nightfall. Even now tattered storm-clouds were meandering across the sky in odd forms and colourings – here they were vague, like columns of smoke, grey and ashen-blue; there they were mottled black and brown and as sharp as fragments of rock. And between them gleamed the tender night sky dotted with gold. All of this – the sounds and the smells, the clouds and the people – was sad and beautiful and seemed to be the introduction to a marvellous tale. It was as if everything had been checked in its growth and was dying. The sound of the voices faded away as they receded, becoming nothing but mournful sighs.

“Why did you not go with them?” asked old Izergil, nodding in the direction of the sea.

She had become bent in two by time, her eyes, once shining black, were now dull and rheumy. And she had a strange voice – it sounded as if her tongue were made of crunching bone.

“I did not wish to,” I replied.

“You Russians are born old. All of you are as gloomy as demons. Our girls are afraid of you. But you, my lad, are young and strong.”

The moon came up. Large, round and blood-red, it seemed to have emerged from the bowels of that steppe which had swallowed up so much human flesh and blood; this, perhaps, was why it was so rich and fertile. The old woman and I were caught in the lacy shadow of the leaves as in a net. Across the steppe, which extended to our left, flitted cloud shadows made pale and transparent by the blue moonshine.

“Look, there goes Larra!”

I turned to where the old woman pointed a crooked shaking finger and saw the shadows moving – there were many of them, and one, darker than the others, was travelling faster; it was cast by a wisp of cloud sailing closer to the earth and more swiftly than its sisters.

“There is no one there,” I said.

“You are blinder than me, an old woman. Look. Do you not see something dark fleeing across the steppe?”

I looked again, and again saw nothing but shadows.

“It is only a shadow. Why do you call it Larra? “

“Because it is Larra. A shadow is all that is left of him, and no wonder – he has been living for thousands of years. The sun has dried up his flesh and blood and bones and the wind has scattered them like dust. Just see how God can punish a man for his pride!”

“Tell me the story,” I said to the old woman, anticipating one of those delightful tales born of the steppe.

And she told me the story.

“Many thousands of years have passed since this took place. Far across the sea, in the place where the sun rises, is a land where a great river flows, and in that land every leaf and blade of grass casts a shadow large enough to protect a man from the sun, which pours down mercilessly there.

“That is how generous the earth is in that land.

“A tribe of powerful people once lived there; they tended their flocks and displayed great strength and courage in hunting wild animals, and they feasted when the hunt was over, singing songs and making merry with the maids.

“One day, during such a feast, an eagle flew out of the sky and carried off a black-haired maiden as lovely as the night. The arrows the men sent after the bird fell back on the ground without injuring it. And so the men set out in search of the maiden, but they could not find her. And in time she was forgotten, as everything on this earth is forgotten.”

The old woman drew a deep breath and grew silent. When she spoke in her crackling voice it was as if she were voicing the sentiments of all the forgotten ages embodied in the shades of remembrance dwelling in her breast. Softly the sea echoed the introduction to this ancient legend which may have had beginning on these very shores.

“But in twenty years she herself came back, worn and wizened, and with her was a youth as strong and handsome as she had been twenty years before. And when she was asked where she had been, she replied that the eagle had carried her off to the mountains and had lived with her there as his wife. This was their son. The eagle was no more; on feeling his strength ebbing he had soared high into the sky for the last time, and, folding his wings, had plunged to his death upon the jagged cliffs.

“Everyone gazed in amazement at the son of the eagle, and they saw that he in no way differed from them except that his eyes had the cold proud gleam of the king of birds. When they addressed him, he sometimes did not deign to reply, and when the elders of the tribe approached him, he spoke to them as their equal. This they took as an insult, and they called him an unfeathered arrow with an unsharpened tip, and they told him that thousands like him and thousands twice his age paid them homage and obeyed their commands. But he looked them boldly in the eye and said that there were no others like himself; let others pay them homage if they wished, but he had no mind to. Oh, then the elders were angry indeed, and in their anger they said:

“‘There can be no place for him among us. Let him go wherever he wishes.’

“He laughed and went where he wished: he went over to a fair maid who had been studying him intently, and he took her in his arms. And she was the daughter of one of the elders who had reproved him. And although he was very handsome, she thrust him away, for she was afraid of her father. She thrust him away and walked off, and he struck her mightily, and when she fell down he stamped upon her breast until the blood spurted out of her mouth as high as the sky, and the maiden gave a great sigh and writhed like a snake and died.

“Those who saw this happen were speechless with fear; never before had they seen a woman killed so brutally. And for a long time they stood there in silence, looking at her where she lay with wide-open eyes and blood-stained mouth, and at him who was standing beside her, standing alone, apart from everyone else, very proud – he even held his head high as if he were calling down punishment upon it. When at last people recovered from their surprise, they seized him and bound him and left him there, finding that to kill him now would be too simple and would give them little satisfaction.”

The night deepened and darkened and became filled with odd little sounds. The marmots peeped mournfully in the steppe, the grasshoppers whirred among the vines, the leaves sighed and whispered to one another, the disc of the moon, which had been blood-red, paled as it withdrew from the earth and poured its blue light down on the steppe more lavishly than ever.

“And then the elders gathered to decide on a punishment equal to such a crime. At first they thought of having horses tear him to pieces, but this seemed too mild; they thought of having each of them send an arrow into his body, but this, too, was rejected; it was suggested that they burn him alive, but the smoke of the fire would hide his sufferings from them; many suggestions were made, but not one of them satisfied everyone. And all the while his mother knelt silently before them, finding neither words nor tears to move them to pity. For a long time they spoke together, and at last one of their wise men said, after due consideration:

“‘Let us ask him why he has done this.’ “And they asked him. “‘Unbind me,’ he said. ‘I shall not say a word so long as I am bound.’

“And when they had unbound him he said: ‘“What would you have of me?’ – and his tone was that of a master to his slaves.

“‘You have heard,’ said the wise man.

“‘Why should I explain my actions to you?’

“‘That we may understand them. Listen, proud one: it is certain that you are to die; then help us to understand why you have done such a thing. We shall go on living, and it is important that we add to our store of knowledge.’

“‘Very well, I shall tell you, although perhaps I myself do not wholly understand why I did it. It seems to me that I killed her because she repulsed me. And I had need of her.’

“‘But she was not yours,’ they said to him.

“‘And do you make use of only those things which are yours? I see that each man has nothing but arms and legs and a tongue to speak with. And yet he owns cattle and women and land and many other things.’

“To this they replied that a man must pay for whatever he takes possession of – pay with his mind or his strength or even his life.

“He said that he had no wish to pay.

“When they had spoken to him for some time they saw that he considered himself above everyone else, that indeed he had no thought for anyone but himself. And they were horrified when they realized that he had isolated himself from the whole world. He had neither tribe nor mother nor cattle nor wife; nor did he wish to have any of these things.

“And, seeing this, they again discussed what might be a fitting punishment for him. But they had not spoken long before that same wise man, who until this moment had taken no part in the discussion, said:

“‘Wait. A punishment has been found, and a dreadful one it is. In a thousand years you could not think of anything to equal it. The punishment lies in himself. Unbind him and let him go free. That will be his punishment.’

“And then a wonderful thing happened. A bolt of thunder struck out of a cloudless sky. In this way the heavenly powers confirmed the decision of the wise man. Everyone accepted it, and, having done so, they went away. And the youth, who was henceforth named Larra, meaning the despised and rejected – the youth laughed at the people who had rejected him; laughed loudly on finding himself alone and as free as his father had been. But his father had not been a man, whereas he was. Yet he began to live as free as a bird. He stole cattle and maidens and anything else he wished from the tribesmen. They shot arrows at him, but they could not pierce his body, protected as it was by the invisible armour of the highest punishment. He was adroit, rapacious, strong and cruel, and never did he meet people face to face. He only saw them from a distance. Thus for a long time did he hover alone at the edge of human communities – for a long, long time. And then one day he crept close to a settlement, and when the people rushed out to attack him, he remained where he was and made not the slightest effort to defend himself. Then one of the men guessed his intention and cried out:

“‘Do not touch him! He is seeking death!’

“And the people stayed their hands, not wishing to kill him and thereby bring relief to one who had wronged them so. They stayed their hands and laughed at him. And he shuddered at the sound of their laughter, and he clutched at his breast, as if searching for something there. And suddenly he hurled himself at the people and threw stones at them. But they dodged his stones and did not throw a single one in return, and when at last, exhausted, he let out a cry of despair and threw himself down on the ground, they withdrew and stood watching him. They saw him struggle to his feet and pick up a knife someone had dropped in the scuffle and strike himself in the breast with it. But the knife broke in two as if it had struck upon stone. And again he threw himself down on the ground and beat his head against it, but the earth, too, withdrew from him, leaving a hollow where his head struck it.

“‘He is unable to die!’ cried the people in joy.

“And they went away and left him. He lay on his back gazing up into the sky, and he saw the black dots of mighty eagles soaring far, far away. And there was enough misery in his eyes to sadden the whole world. From that time to this he has been alone, at large, waiting for death. He does nothing but wander over the earth. You yourself have seen how like a shadow he has become, and like a shadow he will remain till the end of time. He understands nothing, neither human speech nor actions; he just goes on and on, for ever in search of something. He cannot be said to live, and yet he is unable to die. And there is no place for him among men. Just see what a man’s pride can bring him to!”

The old woman heaved a sigh, and once or twice she gave an odd shake of her head, which had fallen on her breast.

I looked at her. Sleep, it seemed, was overpowering her, and for some reason I felt sorry for her. She had ended her story in an exalted, admonishing tone, and yet I had detected a note of fear and servility in it.

The people down by the sea were singing, and singing in an unusual way. The tune was begun by a contralto, who sang only two or three notes before a second voice took it up from the beginning while the first carried it forward. A third, fourth and fifth voice joined in in the same way, and suddenly this same tune was begun by a chorus of men’s voices.

Each of the women’s voices was heard separately, and they were like streams of different colours tumbling down over rocks, leaping and sparkling as they rushed to join the rising swell of men’s voices, were drowned in it, darted up out of it, drowned it out in their turn, and again, one by one, separated themselves from the heavier stream and soared, clear and strong, into the heights.

The sound of the surf could not be heard for the singing.

II

“Have you ever heard such singing before?” asked Izergil, raising her head to give me a toothless smile.

“No, I have not. Not anywhere.”

“And you never will. We love to sing. Only a handsome race can sing well – a handsome race that is filled with love of life. We are such a race. Look, think you those people who are singing are not weary from the day’s labour? They laboured from sunrise to sunset, but now that the moon has risen they are singing. People with no interest in life would have gone to bed; but those who find life sweet are singing.”

“But their health —” I began.

“One always has enough health to last a lifetime. Health! If you had money, would you not spend it? Health is gold no less than money. Do you know how my youth was spent? I wove rugs from dawn till dusk, scarcely unbending my back. I, who was as full of life as a ray of sunlight, had to sit as motionless as a stone. Sometimes my very bones ached from sitting so long. But when evening came I ran off to embrace the man I loved. For the three months that my love lasted I ran to him and spent all my nights with him. Yet see to what a great old age I have lived! The blood in my veins was sufficient, it seems. How often I fell in love! How many kisses I gave and took!”

I looked into her face. Her black eyes were still dull; not even her memories could restore their shine. The moon poured light on her dry, cracked lips, on her sharp chin tufted with grey hair, and on her wrinkled nose that was curved like the beak of an owl. There were dark hollows where her cheeks had been, and in one of them lay a strand of grey hair that had escaped from under the red rag she had twisted round her head. A web of wrinkles covered her face, neck, and hands, and at every movement she made I expected this parchment-like skin to split and peel off, leaving a bare skeleton with dull black eyes sitting beside me.

Once more she began to talk in her cracked voice:

“I lived with my mother near Falmi, on the banks of the Birlat River, and I was fifteen years old when he came to our farm. He was tall and dark and graceful and very gay. He stopped his boat under our window and called out in a ringing voice: ‘Hullo! Can I get some wine and something to eat here?’ I looked out of the window, and through the branches of the ash-tree I saw the river all blue in the moonlight, and him standing there in a white blouse tied with a wide sash, one foot in the boat, the other on the bank. And he was rocking the boat and singing, and when he caught sight of me he said: ‘Just see what a fair maid lives here, and I knew nothing of it!’ – as if he knew all the other fair maids in the world. I gave him some wine and some pork, and four days later I gave myself to him. Every night he and I went boating together. He would come and whistle softly, like a marmot, and I would jump out of the window like a fish on to the river-bank. And off we would go. He was a fisherman from the Prut, and when my mother found out about us and beat me, he urged me to run away to Dobruja with him and even further – to the tributaries of the Danube. But I had grown tired of him by then – he never did anything but sing and make love. I found it boring. And just at that time a band of Hutsuls came roaming through these parts and they found sweethearts for themselves here. Those maids had a merry time of it! Sometimes one of the lovers would disappear, and his sweetheart would pine away, sure that he had been put in prison or killed in a fight, and then, lo and behold! he would drop out of a clear sky, alone or with two or three comrades, bringing rich gifts (they came by their riches easily). And he would feast with her, and boast of her to his comrades. And this would give her pleasure. Once I asked a girl who had such a lover to introduce me to the Hutsuls. Yet see, what was that girl’s name? I have forgotten. My memory has begun to fail me. But it happened so long ago, anyone would forget. Through this girl I met a young Hutsul. He was handsome. A red-head. Red hair and red whiskers. Flaming red. At times he was moody, at others tender, and again he would roar and fight like a wild beast. Once he struck me in the face. I sprang up on his chest like a cat and sank my teeth into his cheek. From then on he had a dimple in his cheek, and he liked me to kiss him on that dimple.”

“But what happened to the fisherman?” I asked.

“The fisherman? He stayed on. He joined their band – the Hutsuls. At first he begged me to come back to him and threatened to throw me into the river if I did not, but he soon got over it. He joined their band and found himself another sweetheart. They were both hanged together – the fisherman and my Hutsulian lover. I went to see them hanged. In Dobruja. The fisherman was deathly pale and wept when he went to his death, but the Hutsul smoked his pipe. He walked straight ahead, smoking his pipe, his hands in his pockets, one of his moustaches sweeping his shoulder, the other his chest. When he caught sight of me, he took the pipe out of his mouth and cried out: ‘Farewell!’ I wept for him a whole year. They had been caught just when they were ready to go back to their native mountains. They were holding a farewell party at the house of a certain Rumanian when they were captured. Just the two of them. Several others were killed on the spot and the rest escaped. But the Rumanian was made to pay for what he had done. His farm and his mill and his barns of grain were burnt to the ground. He was turned into a beggar.”

“Did you do it?” I hazarded a guess.

“The Hutsuls had many friends – I was not the only one. Whoever was their best friend did this in their memory.”

The singing on the sea-shore had ceased by this time, and no other sound but the murmur of the waves accompanied the old woman’s tale. Their murmur, restless and brooding, was fitting accompaniment to this tale of a restless life. Milder grew the night, deeper the blue of the moonshine, and softer the indefinable sounds of night’s invisible denizens whose clamour was drowned out by the increasing roar of the sea as the wind rose.

“And then there was a Turk I fell in love with. I was one of his harem in Scutari. For a whole week I lived there without minding it, but then I found the life tiresome. Nothing but women everywhere. He had eight of them. All day long they ate and slept and chattered nonsense. Or they quarrelled, and then they were like a set of cackling hens. The Turk was not a young man. His hair was almost white, and he was very rich and important. He spoke like an emperor. His eyes were black and straight – I mean they looked straight into your soul. And he was always praying. I first saw him in Bucharest. He was strutting about the bazaar like a king, looking very important. I smiled at him. That same evening I was seized in the street and brought to him. He traded in sandal and palm wood and had come to Bucharest to make purchases of some sort.

“‘Will you go away with me?’ he asked.

“‘I will indeed,’ I said.

“‘Very well,’ he said.

“And I went away with him. He was very rich. He had a son, a slim dark-haired youth of sixteen. It was with him I ran away from the Turk – ran away to Bulgaria, to Lom-Palanka. There a Bulgarian woman knifed me in the chest because of her husband or lover, I have forgotten which.

“For a long time after that I lay ill in a nunnery. A Polish girl, a nun, took care of me, and her brother, a monk from a monastery near Artzer-Palanka, used to come to see her. He kept wriggling round me like a worm, and when I got well I went off with him to Poland.”

“But wait: what happened to the Turkish boy?”

“Oh, him? He died. He pined away with homesickness, or perhaps it was love. He began to wither like a sapling that has too much sun. Just withered away. I remember him lying there blue and transparent as ice, yet consumed by the flames of love. He kept asking me to bend over and kiss him. I loved him dearly and kissed him a lot. Little by little he became so weak he could hardly move. He would just lie there and beg me, as if he were begging alms, to lie down beside him and warm his poor body. And I did. The minute I lay down beside him he would be all aflame. One day I woke up to find him stone-cold. He was dead. I wept over him. Who can tell? Perhaps it was I who had killed him. I was twice his age and very strong and vigorous, but he? – he was just a child.”

She sighed and crossed herself – I had not seen her do that before. Three times she made the sign of the cross, muttering something between her dry lips.

“So you went off to Poland —” I prompted.

“I did, with that little Pole. He was beastly and absurd. When he wanted a woman, he would rub up against me like a tom-cat, the honey oozing between his lips; when his desire was satisfied he would lash me with his tongue as with a knout. One day when we were walking along the bank of a river, he said something proud and insulting. Oh, I was angry! I seethed like boiling pitch. I picked him up like a baby – he was very small – and squeezed him until he went black in the face. Then I swung out and hurled him over the bank into the river. He gave a shout, and it sounded very funny. From the top of the bank I watched him struggling in the water, and then I went away and I have never seen him since. I was lucky in that respect: I never met my lovers after I had left them. It would be bad to meet them – like meeting the dead.”

The old woman grew silent. In my mind’s eye I saw the people her tale had conjured up. I saw her Hutsulian lover with the flaming-red hair and moustache calmly smoking his pipe as he went to his death. His eyes, it seemed to me, were a cold blue, and their glance was firm and intense. Beside him walked the dark-whiskered fisherman from the Prut. Loath to die, he was weeping, and his once merry eyes stared dully out of a face that had grown white in the anticipation of death, while his tear-drenched moustaches drooped mournfully at the corners of his twisted mouth. I saw the important old Turk who was no doubt a fatalist and a despot, and beside him his son, a pale delicate flower of the Orient, poisoned by kisses. And the conceited Pole, polite and cruel, eloquent and cold. And all of them now were but wan shades, and she whom they had kissed so ardently was sitting beside me, still alive but shrivelled with age – bloodless, fleshless, with a heart bereft of all desire and eyes bereft of their shine – almost as much of a shade as they themselves.