“What shall we do?” I asked when we had again moved forward.
“Do? Why, go whither God allows us!” And on we went at the same jig-trot, obviously across country, sometimes over snow piled op bushels high, sometimes over brittle, naked ice.
Notwithstanding the cold, the snow on our collars thawed very quickly; the snow drift below increased continually, and fine dry flakes began to fall from above.
It was plain we were going God only knew whither, for after going along for another quarter of an hour we did not see a angle verst post.
“What do you think, eh?” I said again to the driver; “do you think we shall get to the station?”
“To which station? We may get back, if the horses take it into their heads to try, they’ll take us right enough, but as to reaching the other station, scarcely, we might perish, that’s all.”
“Then turn back by all means,” said I, “at any rate. . .”
“Turn the horses round, do you mean?”
“Yes, turn ’em round!”
The driver let go the reins. The horses began to run more quickly, and although I observed that we had turned round, yet the wind had changed too, and soon, through the snow the windmills were visible. The driver took heart again and began to be loquacious.
“The Anudiuses got into the drifts and turned back just in the same way when they came from this station,” said he, “and passed the night by the haystacks; they only got in by morning. They were only too thankful for the shelter of the haystacks; they might have easily frozen to death. It was cold, and one of them did have his legs frostbitten, so that he died of it three weeks later.”
“But now you see it is not so cold, and it has grown quieter; might not we drive on now, eh?”
“It’s fairly warm, warm, oh yes! and the snow’s coming down. Now we’ll turn back, as it seems easier going and the snow comes down thicker. You might drive if you had a courier, but you’ll do it at your own risk. Are you joking? Why, you’d be frozen! And what should I say who am responsible for your honour?”
II.
Just then there was a sound of little bells behind us, the bells of some troika, a three-horse sledge, which was rapidly overtaking us.
“That is a courier’s bell,” said my driver; “there’s one such courier at every post-station.”
And, indeed, the little bell of the front troika, the sound of which was now plainly borne to us by the wind, was an extraordinarily welcome sound to hear: a pure, musical, sonorous, and slightly droning sound. As I afterwards ascertained, it was a hunter’s arrangement of three little bells — one big one in the centre and two little ones adjusted to tierce. The sound of this tierce and the droning quinte, resounding through the air, was extraordinarily penetrating and strangely pleasant in that vast and voiceless steppe.
“The post is in haste,” said my driver when the foremost of the three horses was level with us.
“What sort of a road, eh? Can one get through?” cried he to the hindmost driver; but the fellow only shouted to his horses and didn’t answer him.
The sound of the little bells quickly died away on the wind as soon as the post-car had passed us.
My driver must now have felt a bit ashamed, I fancy.
“We’ll go on, sir,” said he; “these people have gone on before us and have left a fresh track, which we can now follow.”
I agreed, and again we turned towards the wind and crawled along a bit through the deep snow. I kept a side-long glance upon the road so as to see that we did not wander away from the track made by the sledge. For two versts the track was plainly visible, after that the only thing observable was a very slight unevenness under the curved sides of the sledge, and I began to look straight in front of me. The third verst pole we could still make out, but the fourth we could not find at all. As before, we were driving both against and with the wind, both left and right, and at last it got to such a pass that the driver said we had deviated to the right. I said we had gone to the left, while Alec proved that we were absolutely going back again. Once more we stopped for a while, the driver extricated his big feet and crawled out to find the road; but it was all in vain. I also made up my mind to get out for once and see for myself whether that was not the road which I saw glimmering indistinctly; but scarcely had I taken six steps forward, with the utmost difficulty, against the wind and persuaded myself that everywhere were the selfsame uniform white layers of snow and that the road existed only in my imagination — than I no longer saw the sledge.
“Driver! Alec!” I cried, but my voice! — well I felt that the wind snatched it right out of my mouth and carried it in the twinkling of an eye away from me. I have a very distinct recollection of the loud, penetrating, and even desperate voice with which I once more yelled: “Driver!” when he was only two good paces distant from me. His black figure, whip in hand, and with his large hat perched on one side, suddenly grew up in front of me. He led me to the sledge.
“Still warm, thank goodness!” said he, “but it’s bad if the frost does catch you, my little master!” said he.
“Let the horses go; we must go back,” said I, taking, my seat on the sledge. “ I suppose you can guide them, driver?”
“I must guide them.”
He threw aside the reins, struck the saddle of the thill horse thrice with his whip and again we went on somewhither for a bit. We went along for about half an hour. Suddenly we again heard in front of us the, to me, familiar little hunting-bell and two more besides; but this time they were coming towards us. It was the same three troikas returning to the post-station after delivering the mails, with the fresh horses fastened on behind. The couriers troika, with its three powerful horses with the hunting bells came rapidly forward. A single driver sat on the box, shouting lustily. Behind, in the middle of the empty sledge, sat a couple of drivers. I could hear their loud and merry discourse. One of them was smoking a pipe, and the sparks, kindled by the wind, lit up Part of his face.
As I looked at them I began to be ashamed that I had been afraid to go on, and my driver must have experienced much the same sensation, for we said with one voice: “Let us go after them.”
III.
The hindmost troikas had not yet passed when my driver turned clumsily and struck the attached horses with the sledge shafts. One of the troika team thereupon fell heavily, tearing away the traces and plunging to one side.
“You cock-eyed devil, don’t you see where you’re going, driving over people like that? Devil take you!” began one of the drivers in a hoarse, quavering voice.
He was smallish and an old fellow, as far as I could judge from his voice and his position. He had been sitting in the hinder troika, but now leaped quickly out of the sledge and ran to the horses, never ceasing the whole time to curse my driver in the most coarse and cruel manner.
But the horses would not be pacified. The driver ran after them, and in a minute both horses and driver had vanished in the white mist of the snowstorm.
“Vas-il-y! bring the chestnut hither, we shall never get them else,” his voice still resounded.
One of the drivers, a very tall man, got out of the sledge, silently detached his three horses,” saddled and bridled one of them, and, crunching the snow beneath him, disappeared in the direction of his comrade. We, with the two other horses, went after the courier’s troika, which, ringing its bell, set off in front at full gallop; we just let ourselves go without troubling any more about the road,
“A pretty way of catching them !” said my driver, alluding to the other driver, who had gone off after the horses; “he’ll never catch’ em, and he’s leading the spare horse to a place he’ll never get him out of again.”
Ever since my driver had begun to go back, he had become in better spirits and more inclined to be talkative, which I, of course, did not fail to take advantage of as, so far, I had no desire to sleep. I began to ask him all about himself and whence he came, and soon found out that he was a fellow countryman, hailing from Tula country, being a small proprietor in the village of Kirpechny; that their land was of very little good to them and had quite ceased to produce grain since the cholera visitation; that there were two brothers at home, while a third had enlisted as a soldier; that the supply of bread would not hold out till Christmas, and they had to hire themselves out to make more money; that the younger brother was master in the house because he was married, while my friend was a widower; that an artel, or society of drivers, went forth from their village every year; that though he was not a coachman by profession he served
