She couldn't say a word. Then the pupils of her eyes filled with horror.
“Ah!” she screamed and shook her head in fright.
Awakened while sleep-walking, she as yet understood nothing, except the fear in her tiny, trembling little heart. Indescribable fear overtook me, too, for I knew that from such a fright people often lose their minds or remain dumb.
I was slow to grasp what I was doing, how to save her, but I began to cover her with kisses, kissing her sweet-smelling long hair, frightened, trembling eyelids, her cold hands.
“Nadzieja, my beloved! My dearest! Don't fear! I'm right here, I'm with you. I've destroyed King Stach! Now nobody will disturb your peace, your rest, ease comfort!”
Slowly, very slowly, consciousness returned to her. She opened her eyes again. And I stopped kissing her.
Although that was harder than death itself.
“What is it? What room is this? Why am I here?” her lips whispered.
I was still holding this little reed, without which I, a strong man, would instantly be broken. I held her because I knew that if I let go of her, she would fall.
And in the meantime, fright rushed into her eyes, fright mixed with such distraction that I regretted having awakened her.
“Miss Janoŭskaja! For God's sake, calm yourself! There's no need to be afraid any longer. All, all will be well and bright for you in this world.”
She did not understand. A black shadow was creeping towards her from somewhere in a corner, (a cloud had evidently floated across the moon). She looked at it and the pupils of her eyes became wider and wider and wider.
Suddenly a wind began to rattle some half-broken shutters somewhere, it howled, it whined and whimpered in the chimney. So striking was its resemblance to the distant thunder of the hoofs of the Wild Hunt, to its inhuman yell: “Raman! Come out!”, that I shuddered.
And she suddenly began to scream, pressing herself to me. I felt her breast and her knees under the thin fabric, and I, overcome by an irresistable desire, held her hard in my arms.
“That accursed money! Damned money! Take me away, take me away from here, take me away! You are a big and strong man, my master: take me away from here! I cannot, I cannot... It's so frightening here, so cold, so dark and gloomy! I don't want to die, don't want to die!”
And still pressing herself to me, on catching my look hid herself on my breast.
I turned my face away, I was choking. Everything became fused in a fiery whirpool, and she forgave me even the pain.
The moon hid behind the house, the last gleams fell on her face, on her hair that had fallen on my hand, on her happy and peaceful eyes looking into the dark.
I was ready to burst into tears of happiness, ready to burst into tears, because nobody had ever touched my hand with her face like that before, and I thought with horror that she, my only one, forever mine, might have become like the woman in the Kulša's house if those villains had achieved their aim.
That will not be. With tenderness, kindness, with everlasting gratefulness, I shall do whatever may be necessary to cure her somnambulance. Not a single stern word will she hear from me. For was it not unimaginable fright, the expectation of death, a mutual desire for ordinary warmth which brought us together, married us? Had we not risked our lives for each other's sake? Did I not then receive her as the greatest happiness a man can have, a happiness that I had not hoped for?
And that is all. On the following day, for the first time, the sun together with a slight hoarfrost fell on the moss-covered castle walls. The tall grass was bestrewed with a cold white powder and was reddening under the first rays of the sun. And the walls were rose-coloured, they had even become younger, awakened from a heavy sleep that had reigned over them for three years. The bright window-panes looked young, pale rays shining on them, the earth at the walls was moist, and the grass was damp.
We were leaving. The carriage was standing in front of the castle and our modest belongings were being tied on behind it. I led Janoŭskaja out of the house. She was wrapped up in a light fur-coat and I sat beside her. We cast a last glance at the castle in which we had experienced pain and suffering and unexpectedly for ourselves had found love, such love that a man could, without regret, give up even his life for its sake.
“What do you think you will do with all this?” I asked. Janoŭskaja winced as if it were cold.
“The antique things I'll give away to museums, the rest let the mužyks take, the mužyks who rose in defence of their huts and saved me. The castle — let it be turned into a hospital, a school, or something like that.” And she smiled an ironical smile. “An entailed estate! How much blood, such a tangle of meanness, sordid crimes and intrigue. And for the sake of what? For a handful of gold... No, let's forget about it, about this entailed estate.”
I put my arms round her narrow shoulders.
“That's what I think, too. That's how to act. We don't need all this, now we have found each other.”
In the castle we left a new housekeeper — the widow I had once found with her child along the road. The other servants remained as they were.
And we sighed slightly when the castle disappeared behind the turning in the lane. The nightmare was over and done with.
When we rode out of the park onto the heather land along the Giant's Gap, and the gates closed behind us for the last time, and in the distance the burial mounds were already coming into sight, I saw a man standing at the roadside.
The man making long strides came up to meet us. He took the horse by the bridle, and we recognized Ryhor. He was standing in his leather coat, his entangled hair falling on his face and on his kind, childish eyes.
I jumped out of the carriage.
“Ryhor, my dear fellow, why didn't you come to take leave of us?”
“I wanted to meet you alone. It's hard for me after all we've done. You are right to leave. Here everything would remind you of the past.”
He stuck his hand in his pocket, blushed, and took out an earthenware doll.
“This is for you, Miss Nadzieja... Maybe you'll keep it near you... you'll remember...”
Nadzieja drew his head to her and kissed him on the forehead. Then she took off her earrings and put them in the dark wide palm of the hunter.
“For your future wife.”
Ryhor grunted, shook his head.
“So long... So long... The quicker you leave the better... or else you may see me whimpering like an old woman... You are children. I wish you the best of everything, the very best in the world.”
“Ryhor! My friend! Come away with us, you'll stay with us a while, while they're looking for Dubatoŭk and the others. Some good-for-nothing fellow might kill you here.”
Ryhor's eyes became severe, his jaw-muscles began to move.
“Huh, just let anyone try!”
And his hands gripped his long gun, his veins even swelled.
“I've a weapon in my hands. Here it is. Just let them try to take it! I won't leave. My domain is the forest. And this domain must be a happy one.”
“And I believe in that,” I said simply.
When we had ridden away, I again saw from the edge of the forest his big silhouette on the mound. Ryhor was standing against the background of a crimson sky with his long gun in his hands, the gun reaching above his head, and on him his closely-fitting leather-coat turned inside out. The wind was blowing his long hair about.
All day and all night we rode through forests. The following morning we were met by the sun, by wet, tall grass, by joy! It was only now that I began to understand the difference between the Janoŭski region and this land.
Enormous nests of storks and a sky-blue silence over the clean huts.
Then how was my lady from the eighteenth century to look at this new world, if even I, during such a short period, had forgotten all this?