A COLD wet wind blew from the sea, wafting over the steppes the pensive melody of the splashing surf and the rustle of shrubbery on the beach. Now and then its gusts brought shrivelled yellow leaves and whirled them into the flickering flames of the campfire. The gloom of autumnal night around us quivered and receded apprehensively, disclosing for a brief moment the endless steppe on the left, the boundless sea on the right, and opposite me the figure of Makar Chudra, the old Gypsy, who was looking after the horses of his Gypsy camp pitched within fifty paces of where we sat.
Heedless of the cold blasts that blew open his Caucasian coat and mercilessly buffeted his bared hairy chest, he reclined in a graceful vigorous pose with his face towards me, drawing methodically at his huge pipe, emitting thick puffs of smoke through his mouth and nose, staring out over my head into the deathly hushed darkness of the steppes, talking incessantly and making not a single movement to shield himself from the cruel gusts of wind.
“So you’re on the tramp? That’s fine! You’ve made a splendid choice, my lad. That’s the way: trot around and see things, and when you’ve seen all you want, lie down and die—that’s all!
“Life? Other people?” he went on, having lent a sceptical ear to my protest about his “that’s all.” “H’m. Why should that worry you? Aren’t you Life? Other people live without you and’ll live their lives without you. Do you imagine anybody needs you? You’re neither bread nor a stick, and nobody wants you.
“To learn and teach, you say? But can you learn how to make people happy? No, you cannot. You get grey hairs first before talking about teaching. Teach what? Every one knows what he wants. Those that are cleverer take what there is to take, the sillier ones get nothing, but every man learns himself.
“They’re a curious lot, those people of yours. All herded together and treading on each other’s toes when there’s so much room in the world,” he waved a sweeping hand towards the steppes. “And toiling away all the time. What for? Whom for? Nobody knows. You see a fellow ploughing, and think—there he is sweating out his strength drop by drop on that land, then he’ll lie down in it and rot away. He leaves nothing after him, he sees nothing from that field of his and dies as he was born—a fool.
“D’you mean to say he was born to dig the earth and die without having managed to dig a grave for himself? Does he know what freedom is? Has he any idea of the vast and glorious steppe? Does the music of the steppe gladden his heart? He’s a slave, from the moment he is born, a slave all his life long, and that’s all! What can he do for himself? All he can do is to hang himself, if he learned a little sense.
“Now look at me; at fifty-eight I’ve seen so much that if you’d write it down on paper it would fill a thousand bags like the one you’ve got there. You just ask me what places I haven’t been to? There aren’t such places. You’ve got no idea of the places I’ve been to. That’s the way to live—gad about the world, and that’s all! Don’t stay long in one place—it’s not worth it! Like day and night that chase each other around the world, you keep chasing yourself away from thoughts of life, so as not to grow sick of it. Once you stop to think you’ll get sick of life—that’s how it always happens. It happened to me too. Humph! So it did, my lad.
“I was in prison, in Galicia. What am I living on this earth for?—I started to mope, feeling sort of dreary—it’s dreary in prison, my lad, ever so dreary! And I felt sick at heart when I looked out of the window at the fields, so sick as though some one were gripping and wrenching my heart. Who can say what he lives for? No one can say it, my lad! And it’s no use asking yourself about it. Live, and that’s all. Go about and look around, and you’ll never be bored. I very nearly hung myself by my belt that time that’s a fact!
“Huh! I spoke to a man once. He was a serious man, one of yours, a Russian. You must live, he says, not the way you want, but according to the word of God. Obey the Lord and he will give you everything you ask for. He himself was all in rags and holes. I told him to ask God for a new suit of clothes. He fell into a rage and drove me away, cursing. And he’d just been telling me that one should forgive and love his fellow creatures. He might have forgiven me if what I said offended his lordship. There’s a teacher for you! They teach you to eat less, while they themselves eat ten times a day.”
He spat into the fire and fell silent, while refilling his pipe. The wind moaned plaintively and softly, the horses whinnied in the darkness, and the tender passionate strains of the dumka melody floated up from the Gypsy camp. The beautiful Nonka, Makar’s daughter, was singing. I knew that deep throaty-toned voice of hers, that always sounded so strange, discontented and imperious, whether she sang a song or said “good day.” The warm pallor of her dark-skinned face was fixed in a look of queenly hauteur, and the deep pools of her dark brown eyes shone with a realization of her own irresistible loveliness and disdain for everything that was not she.
Makar held out his pipe.
“Take a smoke! She sings well, that lass, eh? I should say so! Would you like a girl like that to love you? No? That’s right! Never believe girls, and keep away from them. Girls find kissing better and more pleasant than I do smoking a pipe, but once you’ve kissed her say good-bye to your liberty. She’ll bind you to her by invisible strings which you’ll never be able to break, and you’ll lay your soul at her feet. That’s a fact! Beware of the girls! They’re all liars! She’ll say she loves you more’n anything in the world, but you just prick her with a pin and she’ll break your heart. I know a lot about their kind, I do! Well, my lad, d’you want me to tell you a story, a true story? Try to remember it if you can, and it’s a free bird you’ll be all your life.
“Once upon a time there was a young Gypsy, a young Gypsy named Loiko Zobar. All Hungary and Bohemia and Slavonia and all around the sea everybody knew him—he was a fine lad! There wasn’t a village in those parts, but where a half-dozen or so of the inhabitants didn’t swear to God they’d kill him. But Loiko went on living, and if he took a fancy to a horse, Zobar’d be curvetting about on that horse even if you was to put a regiment of soldiers to guard it! Ah! He wasn’t afraid of anybody, not likely! Why, if the prince of devils with all his pack came to him, he’d as likely as not stick a knife in him, and he’d certainly curse him roundly and send the whole pack off with a flea in its ear—you can take that from me!
“And all the Gypsy camps knew him or had heard of him. All he loved was horses, and nothing more, and even then not for long—he’d ride ‘em a bit then sell ’em, and the money was anybody’s for the asking. He had nothing that he cherished—if you wanted his heart he’d tear it out of his breast and give it to you, as long as it made you happy. That’s the kind he was, my lad!
“Our caravan was wandering at the time through Bukowina—that was about ten years ago. Once, on a night in spring, we were sitting around—myself, the old soldier Danilo who fought under Kossuth, and old Noor and all the others and Radda, Danilo’s daughter.
“You know my girl Nonka, don’t you? A beautiful maid she is! Well, you couldn’t compare her to Radda—too great an honour! There aren’t any words to describe that girl Radda. Maybe her beauty could be played on the violin, and even then only by a person who knew that violin as well as he did his own soul.
“She seared the hearts of many a fine lad she did, aye, many a fine lad! In Morava a magnate, an old, shock-headed man saw her and was struck all of a heap. Sat on his horse and stared, shivering as with the ague. He was pranked out like the devil on a holiday, in a rich Ukrainian coat embroidered with gold, and the sword at his side all set in precious stones flashed like lightning whenever his horse stamped its foot, and the blue velvet of his cap was like a bit of sky—he was a big lord, that old gent! He stared and stared, then he says to Radda: ‘Hi, give me a kiss, I’ll give you my purse!’ She just turned away without a word! ‘Forgive me if I’ve offended you, can’t you look at me more kindly?’ said the old magnate, immediately coming down a peg, and he threw a purse at her feet—a fat purse, brother! And she spurned it in the dust, casual like, with her foot, and that’s all.
“‘Ah, what a maid!’ he groaned, and flicked his horse with his riding crop and was gone in a cloud of dust.
“The next day he came again. ‘Who’s her father?’ he went thundering about the camp. Danilo stepped out. ‘Sell me your daughter, take whatever you want!’ And Danilo, he says: ‘Only the nobility sell everything from their pigs to their conscience, but I fought under Kossuth, and don’t traffic in anything!’ The other became furious, made a snatch for his sword, but one of the boys stuck a lighted tinder in the horse’s ear and he made off with his rider in a flash. We struck tents and moved off. We hadn’t been travelling two days when up he dashes again! ‘Hi, you,’ he says, ‘before God and you my conscience is clear, give that maid to me in marriage. I’ll share all I have with you, I’m mighty rich!’ He was all on fire and swaying in the saddle like feathergrass in the wind. That set us all thinking.
“‘Well, daughter, what do you say?’ Danilo muttered under his moustache.
“‘What would the eagle be if she went into the crow’s nest of her own free will?’ Radda asked us.
“Danilo laughed, and so did we all.
“‘Well said, daughter! Hear that, Sir? Nothing doing! Look among the doves—they’re more docile.’ And we moved on.
“That gentleman seized his cap, threw it to the ground and galloped away so furiously that the very earth shook. That’s the kind of girl Radda was, my lad!
“Yes! Well, one night as we sat around we heard music floating over the steppe. Fine music! It set your blood on fire and lured you into the unknown. That music, we all felt, made one yearn for something after which, if you got it, life would no longer be worth living, unless it was, as kings over all the earth, my lad!
“Well, a horse loomed out of the darkness, and on the horse a man sat and played as he approached us. He drew up at the campfire, ceased playing and smiled down at us.
“‘Ah, why, that’s you, Zobar!’ Danilo cried out to him joyfully. Yes, that was Loiko Zobar!
“His moustaches lay on his shoulders and mingled with his locks, his eyes were as bright as stars and his smile was like the sun so help me God! He and his horse might have been forged of a single piece of iron. There he stood red as blood in the firelight, his teeth flashing in a smile! Damned if I didn’t love him then more than I loved myself, even before he had spoken a word to me or had as much as noticed my existence!
“Yes, my lad, that’s the kind of man he was! He’d look into your eyes and captivate your soul, and you wouldn’t be the least bit ashamed of it, only feel proud about it. With a man like that you feel nobler yourself. Such men are rare, my friend! Perhaps that’s better so. If there’d be too much of a good thing in this world it wouldn’t be looked on as a good thing. Aye! Well, let’s get on with the story.
“Radda she says: ‘You play well, Loiko! Who made you such a sweet-toned delicate fiddle?’ He laughed—‘I made it myself! And I made it not of wood, but from the breast of a young girl whom I loved dearly, and the strings I play on are her heartstrings. The fiddle plays a little false, but I know how to handle the bow!’
“Our breed, you know, tries straight away to befog a girl’s eyes, so they be dimmed with sad yearning for a fellow without kindling his own heart. That was Loiko’s way too. But Radda was not to be caught that way. She turned away with a yawn and said: ‘And people said Zobar was clever and adroit—what liars!’ With that she walked away.
“‘Oho, pretty maid, you’ve got sharp teeth!’ said Loiko with a flashing eye, getting off his horse. ‘How do you do, brothers! Well, here I am come to you!’
“‘Welcome, guest!’ said Danilo in reply. We kissed, had a talk and went to bed.... We slept soundly. In the morning we saw that Zobar’s head was tied up with a rag. What’s that? Oh, his horse accidentally hurt him with its hoof while he was asleep.
“Ha-a! We guessed who that horse was and smiled into our moustaches, and Danilo smiled too. Well, wasn’t Loiko worthy of Radda? I should think so! However fair a maid may be, she has a narrow, petty soul, and though you’d hang a pood of gold round her neck she’d never be any better than she was. Well, anyway!
“We lived a pretty long time on that spot, things were going well with us and Zobar was with us. That was a comrade for you! Wise like an old man, informed on everything and knew how to read and write Russian and Magyar. When he’d start speaking you’d forget about sleep and could listen to him for ages! As for playing—well salt my hide if there’s another man in the world could play like that! He’d draw his bow across the strings and your heart’d begin to flutter, then he’d draw it again and it’d stop beating while you listened, and he just played and smiled. You felt like crying and laughing one and the same time when listening to him. Now you’d hear some one moaning bitterly, pleading for help and lacerating your heart as with a knife; now the steppe telling the heavens a fairy tale, a sad tale; now a maid weeping, bidding farewell to her beloved! And now a valiant youth calling his beloved to the steppe. Then suddenly—heigh-ho! A brave merry tune fills the air, and the very sun, it seems, bids fair to start a jig up in the sky! Yes, my lad, that’s how it was!
“Every fibre in your body understood that song, and you became its slave, body and soul. If Loiko had then cried out: ‘To knives, comrades!’ we’d have snatched up our knives as one man and followed him blindly. He could do anything he wanted with a man, and everybody loved him, loved him mightily—only Radda had no eyes for the lad. That wouldn’t have been so bad, worse was she mocked him. She smote that lad’s heart sorely, aye sorely! He’d gnash his teeth, Loiko would, pulling at his moustache. Eyes darker than an abyss, and sometimes with a gleam of something fit to harrow up the soul. At night he’d go far out into the steppe, would Loiko, and his fiddle would weep till morning, weep over the death of Loiko’s liberty. And we lay listening and thinking: what’s to be done? We knew that if two stones are rolling down on each other it’s no use getting between them—they’d crush you. That’s how things were.
“Well, we all sat assembled, discussing affairs. Then things got dull. So Danilo asks Loiko: ‘Sing a song, Loiko, something to cheer the soul!’ The lad glanced at Radda who was lying at a little distance with her face looking up into the sky, and drew his bow across the strings. The fiddle spoke as though it were really a maiden’s heart, and Loiko sang:
Hey-ho! A flame the heart doth feed,
Vast the steppe. and wide!
Fleet as the wind my gallant steed,
Strong-armed rider astride!
“Radda turned her head, and rising on her elbow, smiled mockingly into the singer’s eyes. He reddened like the dawn.
Hey-ho-hey! Up comrade arise!
Onward let us race!
Where steppe in deepest darkness lies,
To waiting dawn’s embrace!
Hey-ho! We fly to meet the day,
Soarirrg above the plain!
Touch not thee in passing, pray
The beauteous moon with thy mane!
“Did he sing! Nobody sings like that any more! And Radda says, letting the words drop:
“‘You shouldn’t fly so high, Loiko. You might fall and come down on your nose in a puddle and wet your moustache, be careful.’ Loiko glared fiercely at her and said nothing—he swallowed it and went on singing:
Hey-ho-hey! Lest daybreak’s flush
Overtake us in idle slumber,
Away, away, ere for shame we blush,
And men begin to wonder!
“‘What a song!’ said Danilo, ‘never heard anything like it before, may the Devil make a pipe out of me if I lie!’ Old Noor twitched his moustache and shrugged his shoulders and everybody was delighted with that brave song of Zobar’s! Only Radda didn’t like it.
“ ‘That’s how a wasp once buzzed when he tried to imitate the cry of an eagle,’ said she, and it was as if she had thrown snow over us.
“‘Maybe you’d like a taste of the whip, Radda?’ Danilo said, starting up, but Zobar threw his cap on the ground and spoke, his face as dark as the earth:
“‘Stop, Danilo! A spirited horse needs a steel bridle! Give your daughter to me as wife!’
“‘Now you’ve said something!’ said Danilo with a smile. ‘Take her if you can!’
“‘Good!’ said Loiko and spoke thus to Radda:
‘“Well, lass, listen to me a while and don’t put on airs! I’ve seen a lot of your sisterhood in my time, aye quite a lot! But not one of them ever touched my heart like you have. Ah, Radda, you have snared my soul! Well? What’s to be must needs be, and ... the steed does not exist on which one could escape from one’s self! ... I take you to wife before God, my conscience, your father and all these people. But mind, you are not to oppose my will—1 am a free man and will live the way I want!’ And he went up to her, his teeth clenched and eyes flashing. We saw him holding out his hand to her—now, thought we, Radda has bridled the horse of the steppe! Suddenly we saw his hand go up and he fell, hitting the ground with the back of his head with a crash! ...
“Good heavens! It was as if a bullet had struck the lad in the heart. Radda, it appears, had swept the whiplash round his legs and pulled it, sending him off his feet.
“There she was lying back again without stirring, with a mocking smile on her face. We waited to see what would happen next. Loiko sat on the ground clutching his head as though afraid it would burst. Then he got up quietly and walked off into the steppe without a glance at anyone. Noor whispered to me: ‘Keep your eye on him!’ And I crawled after Zobar into the darkness of the steppe. Yes, my lad!”
Makar knocked the ashes out of his pipe and began refilling it again. I drew my coat closer about me and lay looking at his old face, blackened by the sun and winds. He was whispering to himself, shaking his head sternly; his grizzled moustache moved up and down and the wind stirred the hair on his head. He was like an old oak tree seared by lightning, but still strong and sturdy and proud of its strength. The sea still carried on a whispered converse with the shore and the wind still carried its whispers over the steppe. Nonka had stopped singing, and the clouds that had gathered in the sky made the autumn night still darker.
“Loiko dragged his feet wearily along, his head bent and hands hanging nervelessly by his sides, and when he reached a ravine by the stream he sat down on a boulder and groaned. It was a groan that made my heart bleed for pity, but I didn’t go up to him. Grief won’t be comforted by words, will it? That’s just it! He sat on for an hour, then another, and a third, just sat without stirring.
“And I was lying on the ground nearby. It was a bright night, the whole steppe was bathed in silver moonlight and you could see far away in the distance.
“Suddenly, I saw Radda hurrying towards us from the camp.
“That cheered me up! ‘Ah, splendid!’ I thought, ‘brave lass, Radda!’ She drew close, but he hadn’t heard her coming. She put her hand on his shoulder; Loiko started, unclasped his hands and raised his head. Then he leapt to his feet and gripped his knife! ‘Ah, he’ll knife the maid, I thought,’ and I was just going to shout out to the camp and run to them when I suddenly heard:
“‘Drop it! I’ll smash your head!’ I looked—there was Radda with a pistol in her hand aimed at Zobar’s head. There’s a hell-cat for you! Well, I thought, they’re now matched in strength, I wonder what’ll happen next?
“‘Look here!’—Radda thrust the pistol into her waistband—‘I didn’t come here to kill you, but to make up—drop the knife!’ He dropped it and looked sullenly into her eyes! It was a sight, brother! There were two people glaring at each other like animals at bay, and both such fine, brave people. There were just the shining moon and I looking on, that’s all.
“‘Now, listen to me, Loiko. I love you!’ said Radda. He merely shrugged, as though tied hand and foot.
“‘I’ve seen brave youths, but you’re braver and better in face and soul. Any of them would have shaven their moustache had I so much as winked my eye, all of them would have fallen at my feet had I wished it. But what’s the sense? They’re none too brave anyway, and I’d have made them all womanish. There are few brave Gypsies left in the world as it is, very few, Loiko. I never loved anybody, Loiko, but you I love. But I love liberty too! I love liberty, Loiko, more than I do you. But I cannot live without you, as you cannot live without me. So I want you to be mine, body and soul, do you hear?’ He smiled a twisted smile.
“‘I hear! It cheers the heart to hear your speeches! Say some more!’
“ ‘This more I want to say, Loiko: no matter how you twist I’ll have my way with you, you’ll be mine. So don’t waste time—my kisses and caresses are awaiting you, and I shall kiss you sweetly, Loiko! Under my kisses you shall forget your adventurous life ... and your lively songs which so gladden the hearts of the Gypsy lads will be heard no more in the steppe—you shall sing other songs, tender love songs to me, Radda.... Waste not time then—I have spoken, therefore tomorrow you shall obey me like the youth who obeys his elder comrade. You shall bow the knee to me before the whole Gypsy camp and kiss my right hand—then I shall be your wife.’
“So that’s what she was after, the mad girl! It was unheard of! It had been the custom once among the Montenegrins, so the old men said, but never among the Gypsies! Well, my lad, can you think of anything funnier than that? Not if you racked your brains a year, you wouldn’t!
“Loiko recoiled and his cry rang out over the steppe like that of a man wounded in the breast. Radda winced but did not betray herself.
“‘Well, good-bye till tomorrow, and tomorrow you will do as I bade you. Do you hear, Loiko?’
“‘I hear! I will,’ groaned Zobar and held his arms out to her. She went without even turning her head, and he swayed like a tree broken by the wind and dropped to the ground, sobbing and laughing.
“That is what the accursed Radda did to the poor lad. I had a job bringing him to his senses.
“Ah well! Why the devil should people have to drain the cup of misery? Who cares to hear a human heart moaning in pain and grief? Make it out if you can! ...
“I went back to the camp and told the old men all about it. They thought the matter over and decided to wait and see what would happen. And this is what happened. When we all gathered next evening around the campfire Loiko joined us. He was gloomy and had become terribly haggard overnight and his eyes were sunken. He cast them down and, without raising them, said to us:
“‘I want to tell you something, comrades. I looked into my heart this night and found no place therein for the old carefree life of mine. Radda alone dwells in it—and that’s all! There she is, beautiful Radda, smiling like a queen! She loves her liberty more than me, and I love her more than my liberty, and I have decided to bend my knee to her, as she bade me, so that all may see how her beauty has conquered brave Loiko Zobar, who until he knew her used to play with the girls like a gerfalcon with the ducks. After that she will become my wife and will kiss and caress me, so that I will have no more desire to sing you songs and will not regret my liberty! Is that right, Radda?’ He raised his eyes and looked darkly at her. She silently and sternly nodded her head and pointed her hand to her feet. And we looked on, understanding nothing. We even felt like going away, not to see Loiko Zobar prostrate himself at a maid’s feet, even though that maid were Radda. We felt sort of ashamed, and sorry and sad.
“‘Well!’ cried Radda to Zobar.
‘“Aha, don’t be in a hurry, there’s plenty of time, you’ll have more than enough of it ...’ he retorted with a laugh. And that laugh had a ring of steel in it.
“‘So that’s all I wanted to tell you, comrades! What next? It remains next but to test whether Radda has so strong a heart as she showed me. I’ll test it—forgive me, brothers!’
“Before we could fathom these words Radda lay stretched on the earth with Zobar’s curved knife sunk to the hilt in her breast. We were horror-struck.
“And Radda pulled out the knife, threw it aside, and pressing a lock of her black hair to the wound, said loudly and audibly with a smile:
“‘Farewell, Loiko! I knew you would do that! ...’ and she died....
“D’you grasp the kind of maid that was, my lad? A hell of a maid she was, may I be damned to eternity!
“‘Oh! Now I’ll kneel at your feet, proud queen!’ Loiko’s loud cry echoed all over the steppe, and throwing himself to the ground he pressed his lips to the feet of dead Radda and lay motionless. We took off our caps and stood in silence.
“What do you say to that, my lad? Aye, that’s just it! Noor said: ‘We ought to bind him! ...’ No hand would lift to bind Loiko Zobar, not a hand would lift, and Noor knew it. He waved his hand and turned away. And Danilo picked up the knife which Radda had cast aside and gazed long at it, his moustache twitching. The blade of that knife, so curved and sharp, was still wet with Radda’s blood. And then Danilo went up to Zobar and stuck the knife into his back over the heart. For he was Radda’s father, was Danilo the old soldier!
“‘There you are!’ said Loiko in a clear voice, turning to Danilo, and he followed on the heels of Radda.
“And we stood looking. There lay Radda, pressing a lock of hair to her bosom, and her open eyes stared into the blue sky while at her feet brave Loiko Zobar lay stretched. His face was covered by his locks and you couldn’t see his face.
“We stood lost in thought. Old Danilo’s moustaches trembled and his bushy brows were knitted. He stared at the sky and said nothing, while Noor, grey old Noor, lay down with his face on the ground and all his old body was racked with sobs.
“There was something to cry over, my lad!
“. . . So you’re going on the tramp—well, go your way, don’t turn off the road. You go straight on. Maybe you won’t go to the dogs. That’s all, my lad!”
Makar fell silent, and putting the pipe into his pouch, wrapped his coat over his chest. Rain began to fall in a drizzle, the wind was rising, the sea growled and rumbled angrily. The horses one by one came up to the dying campfire and regarding us with their big intelligent eyes stopped motionless around us in a dense ring.
“Hey, hey, ho!” Makar cried to them kindly, and patting the neck of his favourite black horse, said, turning to me:
“Time to go to sleep!” and, drawing his coat over his head and stretching his great length out on the ground he fell silent. I did not feel like sleeping. I gazed into the darkness of the steppe and before my eyes swum the queenly beautiful image of proud Radda. She was pressing a lock of hair to the wound in her breast and through her delicate swarthy fingers the blood oozed drop by drop, falling to the ground like flaming-red little stars.
Following close on her heels there floated the vision of the brave Gypsy lad Loiko Zobar. His face was screened by thick black locks from under which big cold tears fell fast....
The rain grew heavier and the sea was chanting a mournful solemn dirge to the proud pair of Gypsy lovers—to Loiko Zobar and to Radda, the daughter of the old soldier Danilo.
And they both hovered silently in the misty darkness, and the dashing Loiko, try as he may, was unable to catch up with the proud Radda.