The Complete Works of Count Tolstoy/Childhood/Chapter 7
VII.
The Hunt
Túrka, the Chief Hunter, rode ahead of us, on a gray, hook-nosed horse. He wore a shaggy cap, and had a huge horn on his shoulders and a hunting-knife in his belt. From the gloomy and ferocious exterior of that man one would have concluded that he was going to a mortal conflict rather than to a hunt. At the hind feet of his horse ran, in a motley, wavering mass, the hounds, in close pack. It was a pity to see what fate befell the unfortunate hound that took it into his head to drop behind. In order to do so, he had to pull his companion with all his might, and whenever he accomplished it, one of the dog-keepers who rode behind struck him with his hunting-whip, calling out, "Back to the pack!" When he rode out of the gate, papa ordered the hunters and us to ride on the road, but he himself turned into the rye-field.
The harvesting was in full blast. The immeasurable, bright yellow field was closed in only on one side by a tall, bluish forest which then appeared to me as a most distant and mysterious place, beyond which either the world came to an end, or uninhabitable countries began. The whole field was filled with sheaves and men. Here and there, in the high, thick rye, could be seen, in a reaped swath, the bent form of a reaping woman, the swinging of the ears as she drew them through her fingers; a woman in the shade, bending over a cradle; and scattered stacks in the stubble-field that was overgrown with bluebottles. Elsewhere peasants in nothing but shirts, standing on carts, were loading the sheaves, and raising the dust on the dry, heated field. The village elder, in boots and with a camel-hair coat over his shoulders, and notched sticks in his hand, having noticed us in the distance, doffed his lambskin cap, wiped off his red-haired head and beard with a towel, and called out loud to the women. The sorrel horse on which papa was riding went at a light, playful canter, now and then dropping his head to his breast, drawing out his reins, and switching off with his heavy tail the horseflies and gnats that eagerly clung to him.
Two greyhounds, bending their tails tensely in the shape of a sickle and lifting their legs high, gracefully leaped over the high stubble, behind the feet of the horse; Mílka ran in front and, bending her head, waited to be fed. The conversation of the people, the tramp of the horses, the rattle of the carts, the merry piping of the quails, the buzzing of the insects that hovered in the air in immovable clouds, the odour of wormwood, of straw, and of horses' sweat, thousands of various flowers and of shadows which the burning sun spread over the light-yellow stubble-field, over the blue distance of the forest, and over the light, lilac clouds, the white cobwebs that were borne in the air or that lodged upon the stubbles, — all that I saw, heard, and felt.
When we reached the Viburnum Forest, we found the carriage there and, above all expectation, another one-horse vehicle, in the midst of which sat the butler. Through the hay peeped a samovár, a pail with an ice-cream freezer, and a few attractive bundles and boxes. There was no mistaking; we were to have tea, ice-cream, and fruit in the open. At the sight of the vehicle we expressed a noisy delight, because it was regarded as a great pleasure to drink tea in the woods, on the grass, and, in general, in a spot where no one ever drank tea.
Túrka rode up to the grove, stopped, attentively listened to papa's minute instructions as to where to line up and where to come out (however, he never complied with these instructions, but did as he thought best), unloosed the dogs, fixed the braces, mounted his horse, and, whistling, disappeared behind the young birch-trees. The loosed hounds first expressed their pleasure by wagging their tails, then shook themselves, straightened themselves, and, scenting their way and shaking their tails, ran in different directions.
"Have you a handkerchief?" asked papa.
I took it out of my pocket and showed it to him.
"Well, so, take this gray dog on your handkerchief."
"Zhirán?" said I, with the look of a connoisseur.
"Yes! and run along the road. When you come to a clearing, stop. And look out; do not come back to me without a hare!"
I tied my handkerchief around Zhirán's shaggy neck, and ran headlong to the place indicated. Papa laughed and cried after me:
"Hurry up, hurry up, or you will be late!"
Zhirán kept stopping all the time, pricking his ears, and listening to the calls of the hunters. I did not have enough strength to pull him off, and I began to cry, "Atú! atú!" Then Zhirán tugged so hard that I barely could hold him back and fell down several times before I could reach the place. Having found a shady, level spot at the foot of a tall oak-tree, I lay down in the grass, placed Zhirán near me, and began to wait. My imagination, as generally happens under such circumstances, far outran the actual facts; I imagined that I was baiting the third hare, whereas it was only the first hound that was heard in the woods. Túrka's voice was heard through the forest ever louder and more animated; the hound whimpered, and his voice was heard more frequently; a second, bass voice joined it, then a third, a fourth. These voices now grew silent, now interrupted each other. The sounds grew in volume and became less irregular, and finally ran together into one hollow, long-drawn tone. The grove was rich in echoes, and the hounds bayed incessantly.
When I heard that, I remained as if petrified in my place. Fixing my eyes on the clearing, I smiled meaninglessly; the perspiration coursed down my face in a stream, and, though its drops, running over my cheek, tickled me, I did not wipe them off. It seemed to me that there could be nothing more decisive than this moment. The strain of this intent feeling was too great to last long. The hounds now bayed at the very clearing, now kept on receding from me. There was no hare. I began to look around me. The same mood seemed to possess Zhirán; at first he tugged to get away and whimpered; then he lay down near me, placed his snout on my knees, and grew quiet.
Near the bared roots of that oak-tree, under which I was sitting, ants were swarming over the gray, dry earth, between the dry oak leaves, acorns, dried up, lichen-covered sticks, yellowish green moss and the thin blades of grass that peeped through here and there. They were hastening, one after the other, along the foot-paths which they had laid out: some of them went with burdens, others without burdens. I took a stick in my hand and barred their way. It was a sight to see how some of them, despising the danger, crawled under the obstacle, while others crept over it; and some, especially those that were with burdens, were completely lost, and did not know what to do: they stopped, looked for a way round, or turned back, or climbing over the stick reached my hand and, it seemed, were trying to get in the sleeve of my blouse. I was distracted from these interesting observations by a butterfly with yellow wings that enticingly circled about me. The moment I directed my attention to it, it flew away some two steps from me, hovered above an almost withered white flower of wild clover, and alighted upon it. I do not know whether the sun warmed the butterfly, or whether it was drinking the juice of that flower, — in any case, it was evidently happy there. It now and then flapped its wings and pressed close to the flower; finally it remained perfectly quiet. I put my head on both my hands, and looked with delight at the butterfly.
Suddenly Zhirán began to whine, and he tugged with such strength that I almost fell down. I looked around. At the edge of the forest leaped a hare, one of his ears lying flat and the other standing erect. The blood rushed to my head and I, forgetting myself for the moment, cried something in an unnatural voice, let the dog go, and started to run myself. No sooner had I done that, than I began to feel remorse; the hare squatted, took a leap, and I never saw him again.
But what was my shame when Túrka appeared from behind a bush, in the wake of the hounds that with one voice made for the open! He had seen my mistake (which was that I did not hold out), and, looking contemptuously at me, he said only: "Ah, master!" But you should have heard how he said it! I should have felt better if he had hung me from his saddle like a hare.
I stood long in the same spot in great despair, did not call the dog back, and only kept on repeating, striking my thighs:
"O Lord, what have I done!"
I heard the hounds coursing away; I heard them beating at the other end of the grove, and driving the hare, and Túrka blowing his huge horn and calling the dogs, — but I did not budge.