, but not far from one another
and in a parallel direction, so that they could see each other. Among
the ferns between the pine trees could be seen fluttering the
vari-colored skirt and yellow kerchief of Kasya. The slender, supple
maiden seemed to float amid the berry-laden bushes, mosses and ferns.
You would say it was some fairy _wila_ or _rusalka_ of the woods;
every moment she stooped and stood erect again, and so, further and
further, passing the pine trees, she entered deeper into the forest as
some spritely nymph.

Sometimes the thick growth of young hemlocks and cedars would conceal
her from view, then John stopped, and putting his hand to his mouth
would shout, "Halloo! Halloo!"

Kasya heard it; she stopped with a smile, and pretending that she did
not see him, answered in a high, silvery voice:

"John!"

The echo answers:

"John! John!"

Meanwhile Burek had espied a squirrel up a tree, and, standing before
it looking upward, barked. The squirrel sitting on a branch covered
herself with her tail in a mocking manner, lifted her forepaws to her
mouth and rubbed her nose, seemed to play with her forefingers, make
grimaces, and laugh at the anger of Burek. Kasya, seeing it, laughed
with a resounding, silvery tone, and so did John, and so the woods
were filled with the sound of human voices, echoes, laughter and sunny
joy.

Sometimes there was a deep silence, and then the woods seemed to
speak; the breeze struck the fronds of the ferns, which emitted a
sharp sound; the trunks of the pines swayed and creaked, and there was
silence again.

Then could be heard the measured strokes of the woodpecker. It seemed
as if some one kept knock--knocking at a door, and you could even
expect that some mysterious voice would ask:

"Who is there?"

Again, the wood thrush was whistling with a sweet voice; the
golden-crowned hammer plumed his feathers. In the thicket the
pheasants clucked and the bright green humming birds flitted between
the leaves; sometimes on the top of the pine tree a crow, hiding
itself from the heat of the sun, lazily flapped its wings.

On this afternoon the weather was most clear, the sky was cloudless,
and above the green canopy of the leaves there spread out the blue
dome of the heavens--immense, limitless, transparently gray-tinted on
the sides and deep blue above. In the sky stood the great golden sun;
the space was flooded with light; the air was bright and serene, and
far-off objects