.. do you hear? I speak in front of
you?"
Vera Lvovna nodded, laid her hand gently on Kseniya's forehead, and
answered softly and tenderly:
"I understand you perfectly."
Again Kseniya wept.
* * * * * * *
The dawn trod gently down the lanes of darkness. The light grew
clearer and the candles became dim and useless. The outlines of the
furniture crept out of the net of shadows. Through the blue mist
outside the snow, valley, forest, and fields were faintly visible.
From the right of the horizon dawn's red light flushed the heavens
with a cold purple.
Polunin drove along by the fields, trotting smoothly behind his
stallion. The earth was blue and cold and ghostly, a land carved out
of dreams, seemingly unsubstantial and unreal. A harsh, bitter wind
blew from the north, stirring the telegraph-wires by the roadside to
a loud, humming refrain. A silence as of death reigned over the land,
yet life thrilled through it; and now and then piping goldfinches
appeared from their winter nests in the moist green ditches, and flew
ahead of Polunin; then suddenly turned aside and perched lightly on
the wayside brambles.
Night still lingered amid the calm splendour of the vast, primeval
forest. As he drove through the shadowed glades the huge trees gently
swayed their giant boughs, softly brushing aside the shroud of
encompassing darkness.
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