XI
Past the orchard, gliding swiftly, stooping forward as they went under the snow-laden boughs, they ran like frightened deer along by the barns and into the murky snow-plain, into the starless night, into the unfathomable stillness of the frozen waste.
So, speeding on, swallowed up by the shadows, they presently forgot all the rest of the world. Each, with arm round the other’s waist, seized in a tight grasp, ran along with rapid steps, bending down, hip to hip—rejoicing, yet with fear, silent, yet with hearts full of song—athwart the bluish livid obscurity which enveloped them.
“Yagna?”
“Dearest?”
“Are you really here?”
“Can you doubt it?”
They said no more, and were at times forced to stop and take breath.
Unable to speak for the throbbing of their hearts, and forced besides to suppress their feelings, which else would have burst out in a wild cry, they only glanced at one another; their eyes darted still but ardent lightnings, and lips flew to lips in an impetuous rush, and with such hungry ravenous craving that they both reeled in ecstasy, panted for breath, feeling the earth crumble beneath their feet, as it were, while they fell into a fiery abyss—and, looking at one another with eyes blinded by those flames, saw nothing more!—And again they would dash forward—whither, they could not tell: only longing to be farther, farther away—plunged in the murkiest possible shadows, in the thickest intricacy of gloom.
One more field passed—and yet another! Farther and deeper still—till nothing more was seen—till they could forget the whole world, and their own existence, and enter the realm of Fairyland, lost as in some strange dream, like to the marvellous waking vision which they had had but now, in Klemba’s hut!—And, indeed, they still felt the influence, luminous in its vagueness, of those mystic legends they had heard breathed low; they still were attuned to the diapason of wonders and of miracles; and those same fantastic myths were pouring a shower of unearthly blossoms into their souls: entrancement, awe, intense stupefaction, intoxicating bliss, unappeasable desire!
Yes, they were yet wrapped in that rainbow-coloured mantle of marvellous ideal happenings; still, so to speak, they followed in the wake of the wonderful pageant they had seen go by; they traversed strange fabulous lands, and went through all those superhuman scenes and actions, all those wonders, those enchantments, those magical spells. They beheld visions, swaying in the dark, floating along the sky, expanding as they looked, and touching their hearts with such telling power that they could not breathe for dread, but stood pressed close one to the other, mute, terror-struck, and gazing into the opaque bottomless depths of their dreams. And their minds would then blossom forth into the blossoms of fantasy—the beautiful flowers of faith and loving rapture … and they sounded the extremes of admiration and oblivious joy.
Then, returning to earth once more, they would search the night with bewildered eyes, scarce knowing in which world they were, whether those marvels had been realized, or were all mere phantoms and creations of the brain.
“Say, Yagna, are you not afraid?”
“I? I would go with you to the very end of the world—die with you!” she whispered with energy, pressing very close to him.
“Were you waiting there for me?” he asked after a while.
“Dearest, at every opening of the door, I expected you! I went there only for you; and how I feared you would fail to come!”
“Yet, when I came, ye feigned not to see me!”
“Nonsense. Should I look, with folks’ eyes upon me?—Ah, there was that within me which yearned so, I wonder I did not fall off my seat in a swoon.”
“Sweetest!”
“You sat behind me, and I knew it; but I feared to look round—feared to speak: all the time my heart went pit-a-pat, and beat so loud, I think folk must have heard.”
“I thought to find you at the Klembas’, and to leave with you.”
“I meant to run straight home … but ye constrained me. …”
“Against your will? Say, Yagna!”
“Nay … more than once … I thought that this might come to pass!”
“Did you think so? Did you think so?” he whispered, in a passion of love.
“Surely, Antek.—And besides … there … continually … beyond the stile … it was not well with us.”
“True.—Here, none will disturb us. We are alone.”
“Aye, alone! And how thick this darkness is!” she murmured, throwing her arms about his neck, and embracing him with all the vehemence of her passionate soul.
Now there was no longer any wind; only a slight breeze which from time to time caressed and cooled their burning faces. Neither stars nor moon were visible: the sky was louring, covered with thick clouds as with a ragged fleece, and dark-brown as a herd of oxen upon a bare waste field. Things loomed dimly afar, as if seen through expanses of drab smoke, as if the whole world were but a tissue of fogs, of darkness rolling around on every side, of seething murk.
A movement in the air—an uneasy vibration, scarce to be felt, seemed floating forth from the forests, lost in the night.
It was very dark: in the atmosphere, thrilled with a dreary and ominous agitation, they were aware of a dull eerie motion, of strange indefinite vibrations, of vague fearful mutterings and lurking shapes that had no shape! Sometimes, on a sudden, feebly gleaming from out the voluminous dusk, there appeared the spectral pallor of the snowfields; and a few glimmers—chilly, moist, viscous glimmers—would coil and uncoil in snaky folds across the shadows; and again the night would shut her eyelids fast, and the darkness descended with a black impenetrable downpour, in which all things were lost. The eye, no longer able to perceive anything, now sounded the uttermost abyss of this portentous invisibility, whose dull sepulchral deadness benumbed and overwhelmed the mind.—But at times the veil of obscurity was rent in twain, as by some mighty force, and through that tremendous rift one could see the black-hue expanse of heaven, serene and studded with stars.
And now—was it from fields or from huts? from the sky above, or from the gloom-drowned horizons?—who can say? … but there came … trembling … muttering … slinking … what? voices, gleams, scarce audible echoes—call them what you will: the ghosts of things and sounds long ago dead and gone, now haunting the world again, seemed moving to and fro in a ghastly procession, expiring far away, as the light of a star may expire in the abyss.
But these two paid little heed to all this. Within them there raged a tempest; every minute it grew and grew, rolling from heart to heart in a hurricane of hot unspoken desires, of flashing glances, of shuddering pangs, of scorching kisses, of words as stammering and incoherent and inarticulate as is the thunder in the sky: of instants as mute as death, of fondness so excruciating that they choked each other with caresses, and their hugs gave them intense pain, while they struggled to hurt and to be hurt for the delight of that pain; and their eyes filmed over, and they could no longer see anything at all!
Swept onward by the wild blast of their passion, blinded to everything, maddened even to frenzy, forgetful of all, and burning with the same mutual flame, they had, in that night of palpable darkness, fled out into the loneliness of the silent waste, about to give themselves to each other entirely, “till death did them part,” and from the very bottom of their souls that were starving with the insatiable hunger of unfulfilled desire.
They were by this time unable to speak, save for a few instinctive cries that welled out of their inmost being—a few strangled whispers, thrown forth as spasmodically, as fitfully, as the flames of a fire—rambling, raving, insane words—with hungry devouring looks, looks of frenzy mixed with haggard terror, looks that betrayed the storm that raged within.—Till at last there swept over him and her a convulsion so irresistible, such an uncontrollable spasm of craving, that, losing their senses completely, they closed with a mad frantic cry … and fell!
And, with them, their whole world reeled and crashed headlong into the abyss!
“Oh, I am beside myself!”
“Be silent, dear, be silent!”
“I cannot; else I should go mad!”
“My heart is bursting asunder!”
“And my blood burns my veins!”
“Death—is it death coming—or a swoon?”
“My own, my own!”
“O Antek!”
Even as those elements which combine to form life wake up in the early months of every year, and—impelled by eternal affinity—set out to seek one another throughout the world, from end to end of earth and sky, until they meet in springtime, and unite, and bring forth to our astonished eyes now flowers, now babes, now huge green trees that murmur in the wind:
So they too, after long days of desire and torment, days of greyness and of void, met, found each other, mingled with an uncontrollable cry, rushing into one another’s arms, and clinging close: Just so may two pine-trees, uprooted by the storm and tossed together in a desperate embrace, strive with might and main, wrestling in a mortal grip, whirling, reeling, rebounding—till they both drop to the ground and die!
And over these two did the night weave her veil of shadows, that the things which were to be might come to pass.
Somewhere among those shadows, partridges were heard to pipe, so near at hand that the passage of the whole covey was distinctly audible. A quick rustling sounded—wings flapping the snow for an upward flight. Other noises, keen and shrill, broke the stillness now and then; and from the village that therefore could hardly be very far away, there came the loud though muffled crowing of cocks.
“It must be late,” she whispered timidly.
“Oh, it is yet long before midnight: ’tis only change of weather makes them crow.”
“A thaw is setting in.”
“Aye, the snow is softer now.”
Some hares, not far from the rock under which they were sitting, then fell to squeaking, playing about and gambolling merrily; and presently a whole band of them darted by, so near them that they shrank in alarm.
“ ’Tis pairing-time; the little beasts are so excited that they fear nothing. … Spring will soon be here.”
“I thought some large creature was rushing at us!”
“Hush!” he hissed in sudden terror. “Crouch low!”
They silently crept close to the rock. Out of the dusk, less black because of the reflecting snow, appeared long shadows, stalking some prey, advancing slowly, slowly, pressed close to the ground, and sometimes completely vanishing—swallowed up, as it were, by the earth; their eyes alone shining greenly phosphorescent, like glowworms in a copse. The creatures were about forty yards away, but soon farther, disappearing into the darkness. … And then, all at once, came the throttled scream of a hare in mortal jeopardy … a scraping and a scuffling of feet … a rattle and a snarl, the sound of crunched bones, a fierce growling; and then once more silence, deep and dreadful, prevailed all around.
“Wolves.—Tearing a hare piecemeal.”
“If they had scented us!”
“They could not: the wind blows towards us.”
“I am afraid. Let us go. I feel cold as ice,” she said with a shudder.
He took her in his arms. She warmed to his kisses, and oblivion of all things came over them once more. With one arm tight round the other’s waist, they both went along their straggling way, swinging and bending to and fro, as trees do, when, too heavily laden with blossoms, they wave restfully to the gentle hum of bees.
They spoke rarely; but their kisses and sighs and passionate ejaculations, their low blissful murmurs and rapturous heartbeats, vibrated above them and around, as the warm air trembles and quivers over a field in springtime. For now they were like those vast plains all in flower, plunged in the radiance and harmony of joy; thus did they glow, with eyes like opening buds; thus did their souls echo back the hot perfumes of meadows basking in the sunbeams, the shimmering of brooks, the low faint twittering of birds. Their beating hearts were in unison with those springtide regions; and the words they uttered—few, full of meaning, and scarce audible—welled forth from their innermost souls, as young shoots burst from the parent tree at the dawn of a May morning; their breaths were like the zephyrs that fondle the sprouting corn, and their souls like a day in the spring season—sunny as the rising blades of wheat, and not less full of the songs of larks, of brightness, of whispering, of dazzling virescence, and the irresistible gladness of life!
Then again they grew silent and stopped short, seized with awe of something they knew not what, which was about to be: as when a cloud floats over the sun, and the world at once waxes still and sad, and darkens with uneasy misgiving.
But they soon shook off this mood, and joy again burst out in their bosoms with a great conflagration; glee once more swept the chords of their hearts, and now they were flying up with bliss, compelled to soar.—And, all unwittingly, they burst out into passionate and delirious song.
They swayed to the rhythm of their voices, which rose as on many-coloured pinions, and sped through the dead stillness of the night in a star-seeking, fiery rush.
And now, completely beside themselves, they strode along, each leaning on the other, driven on by a blind impulse, lost in their mutual love, oblivious of all things, entranced by the spell of a superhuman emotion, which lifted them up to the topmost heights of entrancement, and forced its way out in that timeless, formless, almost wordless chant of theirs!
A wild and a stormy chant it was, rushing torrentially out of their burning hearts, and pouring forth into the world with its all-conquering strain of love!
How it flamed in the sombre chaos of the night! How it lit up the wilds like a bush burning in the desert!
Now it was like the dull and ponderous growl of the waters, when they arise in their strength, and shatter their icy bonds.
Now it was scarce to be heard—a sweet melodious whisper, sounding and rustling faintly, like corn that waves in the sunshine!
And, after a while, it resembled the lay of frightened birds that rise to the sun on frenzied fluttering wings, and at last (their bosoms expanded with soaring up towards those infinite heights) utter forth the triumphant hymn of the earth, the immortal cry of life and existence!
“Yagna!” Antek whispered, as if surprised to know she was by his side.
“Here I am.”—But her reply seemed subdued and sorrowful.
They were now upon the pathway that skirted the village, at some distance outside of the encircling granaries, but on the side next to Boryna’s farm.
All at once, Yagna burst out crying.
“Why, what is amiss?”
“I cannot tell: something has come over me, and forced the tears to start.”
Greatly distressed, he made her sit down with him close to a granary with outstanding beams; there he gathered her tenderly in his arms, rocking her on his breast like a child. Her tears continued to flow, as dew distilling from flowers; he wiped them away, but they still flowed on.
“Are you afraid of anything?”
“Of what, pray? Only within me there waxes a stillness as though Death stood here beside me; yet all the while something lifts me up, so that I would fain climb the sky, and sail away among the clouds.”
He replied nothing. The light had all at once gone out of their souls; a shadow passing over them troubled their calm and bore in upon them a strange sense of longing, which made them cling yet closer one to the other, and seek yet more earnestly to find mutual support, each vying with the other in the desire to flee away into some unknown world.
The wind rose; the trees rocked in ghastly wise, covering them both with moist snow; the close-pressed louring clouds began to fall swiftly asunder and roll away, while a low tremulous moan floated across the fields.
“ ’Tis late, ’tis late; we must run home,” she whispered, half rising.
“Do not fear: people are not yet asleep: I can hear them on the road.—Coming back from Klemba’s, belike.”
“But I left the food-tubs in the byre; the kine may break their legs on them.”
The voices they heard grew louder and then fainter again and more remote, while they stood silent. But on one side of them—on the very same pathway, it seemed—the snow crunched crisply, and a tall shadow came out of the gloom, showing so plain that they both started to their feet.
“Someone is there, skulking behind that hedge!”
“That’s mere fancy: night-clouds often throw such moving shadows.”
They peered long into the darkness, listening intently.
“Come,” he then whispered to her, “let us go to the haystack: we shall be more at ease there.”
Looking round anxiously every now and then, they held their breath as they stopped to listen; but all was as still as death. So on they went, stooping forward cautiously, till they got to the haystack, and disappeared in the deep opening that yawned just above the ground.
All was pitch-dark again; the clouds had come together, forming an impenetrable mass: the pale starlight was quenched, and the night, closing its eyes, had fallen into a deep sleep. The stillness grew yet more intense, more awful, broken only by the waving of the snow-burdened trees, and the water babbling under the mill-wheels far, far away.
But after a long interval, the snow upon the road crackled once more beneath steps—still, stealthy steps like the tread of a wolf. A shadow passed along, close to the walls, and, crouching down, made its way through the snow, ever nearer and nearer. … It grew larger … stopped many a time, to go forward again … passed round the hayrick on the outer side and, creeping up to the opening, listened long and closely.
Then it went away to the stile, and vanished among the trees.
About a minute afterwards, it appeared again, bearing a truss of straw. It stopped, listened awhile, and then, springing forward to the haystack, thrust the truss of straw into the hole, rammed it in tight … and struck a match. Instantly the straw was in flames and shot out many a blazing tongue, which presently burst into a sheet of red fire, spreading all over one side of the rick.
And Boryna, pitchfork in hand, head lowered, stood there watching, white as a sheet!
They at once realized their position; a ruddy glow already lit the darkness of the den where they lay, and a pungent smoke filled the air. They beat wildly about on one side and another, finding no issue, maddened with horror, and scarcely able to breath. But, by marvellous good luck, Antek happened upon the tarpaulin cover and, pushing with all his might, tore it down, falling to the ground along with it. Ere he could rise, Boryna was upon him with pitchfork raised to pin him to the earth. He missed: Antek leaped up and, before the old man could aim a second thrust, felled him with a blow of his fist in the chest—and fled.
Boryna, up in an instant, rushed to the haystack; but Yagna too was no longer there, having slipped out and disappeared in the night. And then, in the voice of one raving mad with rage, he roared out: “Fire! Fire!” and ran round the hayrick, wielding his pitchfork, and looking for all the world like a fiend in the bloodred glow. … —The fire had by now got complete hold of the stack—hissing, humming, roaring, and raising on high its pillar of flame and of smoke.
Folk came along in haste; the cry of “Fire!” had quickly spread through the village. Someone had rung the alarm-bell, and every heart was throbbing with fear. But the flame of the conflagration rose ever higher and higher, waving its fiery mantle from side to side, and raining a torrent of red sparks over all the buildings, both near it and throughout the whole village.