“It is better for me to go on foot, grandfather.  Now my heart is all of a tremble.”

“Never mind, sit still.”

The old man yawned and made the sign of the cross over his mouth.

“Never mind,” he repeated.  “Yours is not the worst of sorrows.  Life is long, there will be good and bad to come, there will be everything.  Great is mother Russia,” he said, and looked round on each side of him.  “I have been all over Russia, and I have seen everything in her, and you may believe my words, my dear.  There will be good and there will be bad.  I went as a delegate from my village to Siberia, and I have been to the Amur River and the Altai Mountains and I settled in Siberia; I worked the land there, then I was homesick for mother Russia and I came back to my native village.  We came back to Russia on foot; and I remember we went on a steamer, and I was thin as thin, all in rags, barefoot, freezing with cold, and gnawing a crust, and a gentleman who was on the steamer—­the kingdom of heaven be his if he is dead—­looked at me pitifully, and the tears came into his eyes.  ‘Ah,’ he said, ’your bread is black, your days are black....’  And when I got home, as the saying is, there was neither stick nor stall; I had a wife, but I left her behind in Siberia, she was buried there.  So I am living as a day labourer.  And yet I tell you:  since then I have had good as well as bad.  Here I do not want to die, my dear, I would be glad to live another twenty years; so there has been more of the good.  And great is our mother Russia!” and again he gazed to each side and looked round.

“Grandfather,” Lipa asked, “when anyone dies, how many days does his soul walk the earth?”

“Who can tell!  Ask Vavila here, he has been to school.  Now they teach them everything.  Vavila!” the old man called to him.

“Yes!”

“Vavila, when anyone dies how long does his soul walk the earth?”

Vavila stopped the horse and only then answered: 

“Nine days.  My uncle Kirilla died and his soul lived in our hut thirteen days after.”

“How do you know?”

“For thirteen days there was a knocking in the stove.”

“Well, that’s all right.  Go on,” said the old man, and it could be seen that he did not believe a word of all that.

Near Kuzmenki the cart turned into the high road while Lipa went straight on.  It was by now getting light.  As she went down into the ravine the Ukleevo huts and the church were hidden in fog.  It was cold, and it seemed to her that the same cuckoo was calling still.

When Lipa reached home the cattle had not yet been driven out; everyone was asleep.  She sat down on the steps and waited.  The old man was the first to come out; he understood all that had happened from the first glance at her, and for a long time he could not articulate a word, but only moved his lips without a sound.

“Ech, Lipa,” he said, “you did not take care of my grandchild....”