e into my tear-stained face. I believe at that moment he
recalled the storm, the streaks of rain, our laughter, my face that day;
he longed to say something to me, and he would have been glad to say it;
but he said nothing, he merely shook his head and pressed my hand. God
help him!

After seeing him out, I went back to my study and again sat on the
carpet before the fireplace; the red embers were covered with ash and
began to grow dim. The frost tapped still more angrily at the windows,
and the wind droned in the chimney.

The maid came in and, thinking I was asleep, called my name.

IN EXILE

OLD SEMYON, nicknamed Canny, and a young Tatar, whom no one knew by
name, were sitting on the river-bank by the camp-fire; the other
three ferrymen were in the hut. Semyon, an old man of sixty, lean and
toothless, but broad shouldered and still healthy-looking, was drunk;
he would have gone in to sleep long before, but he had a bottle in his
pocket and he was afraid that the fellows in the hut would ask him for
vodka. The Tatar was ill and weary, and wrapping himself up in his rags
was describing how nice it was in the Simbirsk province, and what a
beautiful and clever wife he had left behind at home. He was not more
than twenty five, and now by the light of the camp-fire, with his pale
and sick, mournful face, he looked like a boy.

"To be sure, it is not paradise here," said Canny. "You can see for
yourself, the water, the bare banks, clay, and nothing else....
Easter has long passed and yet there is ice on the river, and this
morning there was snow..."

"It's bad! it's bad!" said the Tatar, and looked round him in terror.

The dark, cold river was flowing ten paces away; it grumbled, lapped
against the hollow clay banks and raced on swiftly towards the far-away
sea. Close to the bank there was the dark blur of a big barge, which the
ferrymen called a "karbos." Far away on the further bank, lights, dying
down and flickering up again, zigzagged like little snakes; they were
burning last year's grass. And beyond the little snakes there was
darkness again. There little icicles could be heard knocking against the
barge It was damp and cold....

The Tatar glanced at the sky. There were as many stars as at home, and
the same blackness all round, but something was lacking. At home in the
Simbirsk province the stars were quite different, and so was the sky.

"It's bad! it's bad!" he repeated.

"You will get used to it