Fire in the Steppe Read Free Page A

that it is to honor Volodyovski?"
    "But should not the first remembrance be given to my grandfather?"
    "And my benefactor— H'm! true—but the next will be Michael. It cannot be otherwise."
    Here Olenka, standing up, tried to free herself from the arms of Pan Andrei; but he, gathering her in with still greater force, began to kiss her on the lips and the eyes, repeating at the same time,—
    "O thou my hundreds, my thousands, my dearest love!"
    Further conversation was interrupted by a lad who appeared at the end of the walk and ran quickly toward the summer-house.
    "What is wanted?" asked Kmita, freeing his wife.
    "Pan Kharlamp has come, and is waiting in the parlor," said the boy.
    "And there he is himself!" exclaimed Kmita, at sight of a man approaching the summer-house. "For God's sake, how gray his mustache is! Greetings to you, dear comrade! greetings, old friend!"
    With these words he rushed from the summer-house, and hurried with open arms toward Pan Kharlamp. But first Pan Kharlamp bowed low to Olenka, whom he had seen in old times at the court of Kyedani; then he pressed her hand to his enormous mustache, and casting himself into the embraces of Kmita, sobbed on his shoulder.
    "For God's sake, what is the matter?" cried the astonished host.
    "God has given happiness to one and taken it from another," said Kharlamp. "But the reasons of my sorrow I can tell only to you."
    Here he looked at Olenka; she, seeing that he was unwilling to speak in her presence, said to her husband, "I will send mead to you, gentlemen, and now I leave you."
    Kmita took Pan Kharlamp to the summer-house, and seating him on a bench, asked, "What is the matter? Are you in need of assistance? Count on me as on Zavisha!" [3]
    "Nothing is the matter with me," said the old soldier, "and I need no assistance while I can move this hand and this sabre; but our friend, the most worthy cavalier in the Commonwealth, is in cruel suffering. I know not whether he is breathing yet."
    "By Christ's wounds! Has anything happened to Volodyovski?"
    "Yes," said Kharlamp, giving way to a new outburst of tears. "Know that Panna Anna Borzobogati has left this vale—"
    "Is dead!" cried Kmita, seizing his head with both hands.
    "As a bird pierced by a shaft."
    A moment of silence followed,—no sound but that of apples dropping here and there to the ground heavily, and of Pan Kharlamp panting more loudly while restraining his weeping. But Kmita was wringing his hands, and repeated, nodding his head,—
    "Dear God! dear God! dear God!"
    "Your grace will not wonder at my tears," said Kharlamp, at last; "for if your heart is pressed by unendurable pain at the mere tidings of what happened, what must it be to me, who was witness of her death and her pain, of her suffering, which surpassed every natural measure?"
    Here the servant appeared, bringing a tray with a decanter and a second glass on it; after him came Kmita's wife, who could not repress her curiosity. Looking at her husband's face and seeing in it deep suffering, she said straightway,—
    "What tidings have you brought? Do not dismiss me. I will comfort you as far as possible, or I will weep with you, or will help you with counsel."
    "Help for this will not be found in your head," said Pan Andrei; "and I fear that your health will suffer from sorrow."
    "I can endure much. It is more grievous to live in uncertainty."
    "Anusia is dead," said Kmita.
    Olenka grew somewhat pale, and dropped on the bench heavily. Kmita thought that she would faint; but grief acted more quickly than the sudden announcement, and she began to weep. Both knights accompanied her immediately.
    "Olenka," said Kmita, at last, wishing to turn his wife's thoughts in another direction, "do you not think that she is in heaven?"
    "Not for her do I weep, but over the loss of her, and over the loneliness of Pan Michael. As to her eternal happiness, I should wish to have such hope for my own salvation as I have for hers. There was not a worthier