The Enchanted Wanderer and Other Stories

You can imagine, my dear sirs, how frightened I must have been by such a wonder! Where had this commanding, quiet little old man appeared from, and how was it that my Levonty, who had just been as if given over to death and unable to raise his head, was now carrying a bundle of wood!

I quickly jumped down from the tree, put the saber behind my back on its cord, broke off a young tree for a big stick just in case, went after them, and soon caught up with them and saw: the little old man goes on ahead, and looks exactly as he had seemed to me at first—small and hunched over, his wispy little beard like white soapsuds; and behind him walks my Levonty, stepping briskly in his footsteps and not looking at me. I tried several times to address him and to touch him with my hand, but he paid no attention to me and went on walking as if in his sleep.

Then I run to the little old man from the side and say:

“My good-honest man!”

And he replies:

“What is it?”

“Where are you leading us?”

“I don’t lead anyone anywhere,” he says. “The Lord leads us all!”

And with that word he suddenly stopped: and I saw before us a low wall and a gateway, and in the gateway a little door, and the old man began to knock on this door and call out:

“Brother Miron! Hey, brother Miron!”

And an insolent voice rudely replies:

“Again you drag yourself here at night. Sleep in the forest! I won’t let you in!”

But the old man begged again, entreating gently:

“Let me in, brother!”

The insolent fellow suddenly opened the door, and I saw it was a man in the same kind of skullcap as the old man’s, only he was very stern and rude, and just as the old man stepped across the threshold, he shoved him so that he almost fell.

“God save you, brother mine, for your service!” said the old man.

“Lord,” I thought, “where have we landed!” And suddenly it was as if lightning struck me and lit me up.

“Merciful Savior,” it dawned on me, “if this isn’t Pamva the wrathless! It would be better,” I think, “for me to perish in the thick of the forest, or to come upon some beast’s or robber’s den, than to be under his roof.”

And once he had led us into the small hut and lit a yellow wax candle, I guessed straight off that we were indeed in a forest hermitage, and, unable to stand it any longer, I said:

“Forgive me, pious man, for asking you: is it good for me and my comrade to remain here where you’ve brought us?”

And he replies:

“All the earth is the Lord’s and blessed are all who dwell in it²⁴—lie down, sleep!”

“No, allow me to inform you,” I say, “that we are of the old belief.”

“We’re all members of the one body of Christ! He will gather us all together!”

And with that he led us to a corner, where a meager bed of bast matting had been made on the floor, with a round block of wood covered with straw at the head, and, now to us both, he again says:

“Sleep!”

And what then? My Levonty, as an obedient youth, falls onto it at once, but I, pursuing my apprehensions, say:

“Forgive me, man of God, one more question …”

He replies:

“What is there to ask? God knows everything.”

“No,” I say, “tell me: what is your name?”

And he, with a totally unsuitable, womanish singsong, says:

“My name is lucky: they call me ducky”—and with these frivolous words he crawled off with his candle stub to some tiny closet, small as a wooden coffin, but the insolent one shouted at him again from behind the wall:

“Don’t you dare light a candle! You’ll burn down the cell! You pray enough from books in the daytime; now pray in the dark!”

“I won’t, brother Miron,” he replies, “I won’t. God save you!”

And he blew out the candle.

I whisper:

“Father, who’s that yelling at you so rudely?”

And he replies:

“That’s my lay brother Miron … a good man, he watches over me.”

“Well, that’s that!” I think. “It’s the hermit Pamva! It’s none other than him, the envyless and wrathless. Here’s real trouble! He’s found us, and now he’s going to rot us the way gangrene rots fat. There’s only one thing left, to carry Levonty away from here early tomorrow morning and flee the place, so he won’t know where we’ve been.” Holding to this plan, I decided not to sleep and watch for the first light, so as to waken the youth and flee.