The yard was silent, but once or twice Aganka's voice
could be heard from the cattle-shed calling to the cows, and the
sound of milk falling into her pail was faintly audible.
Ivanov listened to the church chimes and the subdued sounds of night
round the manor, then noiselessly, well accustomed to the obscurity,
he descended the steps; only Gek was at his side, the other dogs did
not hear him.
Cold raindrops fell from the trees in tiny shining globules of
iridescent light, close by him an owl fluttered in a tangle of
branches, uttering its dreadful cry of joy as it flashed past.
Ivanov walked through the fields, descended by a chalky ribbon of a
footpath to the ravine, crossed over it by a narrow shadow-dappled
pathway hidden among a maze of trees, and made his way along its
further ridge to a forest watch-house. It stood in a bare open space,
exposed to the swift rushing Dance of the Winds, and close to the
naked trunks of three ancient pines that still reared their grim,
shaggy heads to the sky and spilled their pungent balsam perfumes
into the air. Behind it loomed the faint grey shadow of an
embankment.
A dog at the watch-house began to bark. Gek growled in return and
suddenly disappeared. The dogs became silent. A man appeared on the
step with a lantern.
"Who is there?" he asked quietly.
"It is I," said Ivanov.
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