When he reached the little house in which he and his comrade lived he pushed the door, but it was locked. He knocked, with no result. He felt vexed, and began kicking the door and banging it with his sword. Then he heard a sound of footsteps and Vovílo – a domestic serf of his – undid the cabin-hook which fastened the door.
‘What do you mean by locking yourself in, blockhead?’
‘But how is it possible, sir …?’
‘You’re tipsy again! I’ll show you “how it is possible!” ’ and Poltorátsky was about to strike Vovílo but changed his mind. ‘Oh, go to the devil!… Light a candle.’
‘In a minute.’
Vovílo was really tipsy. He had been drinking at the name-day party of the ordnance-sergeant, Iván Petróvich. On returning home he began comparing his life with that of the latter. Iván Petróvich had a salary, was married, and hoped in a year’s time to get his discharge.
Vovílo had been taken ‘up’ when a boy – that is, he had been taken into his owner’s household service – and now although he was already over forty he was not married, but lived a campaigning life with his harum-scarum young master. He was a good master, who seldom struck him, but what kind of a life was it? ‘He promised to free me when we return from the Caucasus, but where am I to go with my freedom?… It’s a dog’s life!’ thought Vovílo, and he felt so sleepy that, afraid lest someone should come in and steal something, he fastened the hook of the door and fell asleep.
* * *
Poltorátsky entered the bedroom which he shared with his comrade Tíkhonov.
‘Well, have you lost?’ asked Tíkhonov, waking up.
‘No, as it happens, I haven’t. I’ve won seventeen rubles, and we drank a bottle of Cliquot!’
‘And you’ve looked at Márya Vasílevna?’
‘Yes, and I’ve looked at Márya Vasílevna,’ repeated Poltorátsky.
‘It will soon be time to get up,’ said Tíkhonov. ‘We are to start at six.’
‘Vovílo!’ shouted Poltorátsky, ‘see that you wake me up properly to-morrow at five!’
‘How can I wake you if you fight?’
‘I tell you you’re to wake me! Do you hear?’
‘All right.’ Vovílo went out, taking Poltorátsky’s boots and clothes with him. Poltorátsky got into bed and smoked a cigarette and put out his candle, smiling the while. In the dark he saw before him the smiling face of Márya Vasílevna.
* * *
The Vorontsóvs did not go to bed at once. When the visitors had left, Márya Vasílevna went up to her husband and standing in front of him, said severely –
‘It was Hadji Murád, wasn’t it?’ said Márya Vasílevna, who had for some days past heard of the negotiations and thought that Hadji Murád himself had been to see her husband. Vorontsóv could not altogether deny this, but disappointed her by saying that it was not Hadji Murád himself but only an emissary to announce that Hadji Murád would come to meet him next day at the spot where a wood-cutting expedition had been arranged.
In the monotonous life of the fortress the young Vorontsóvs – both husband and wife – were glad of this occurrence, and it was already past two o’clock when, after speaking of the pleasure the news would give his father, they went to bed.
IV
AFTER the three sleepless nights he had passed flying from the
At a little distance, by the wall, slept Eldár. He lay on his back, his strong young limbs stretched out so that his high chest, with the black cartridge-pouches sewn into the front of his white Circassian coat, was higher than his freshly shaven, blue-gleaming head, which had rolled off the pillow and was thrown back. His upper lip, on which a little soft down was just appearing, pouted like a child’s, now contracting and now expanding, as though he were sipping something. Like Hadji Murád he slept with pistol and dagger in his belt. The sticks in the grate burnt low, and a night-light in a niche in the wall gleamed faintly.
In the middle of the night the floor of the guest-chamber creaked, and Hadji Murád immediately rose, putting his hand to his pistol. Sado entered, treading softly on the earthen floor.
‘What is it?’ asked Hadji Murád, as if he had not been asleep at all.
‘We must think,’ replied Sado, squatting down in front of him. ‘A woman from her roof saw you arrive and told her husband, and now the whole
