cote! He must have discovered something.»
On the outskirts of the village a figure rather resembling a bear was limping at a slow pace towards the travellers.
«A cripple!» thought Mesentzeff surprised; though when the figure came nearer he saw it had no infirmity whatsoever. Sometimes Misha walked dragging his feet one after the other behind him, sometimes quite normally. At one moment his arms would hang forward limply and at another be hunched up, his shoulders touching his ears. His swollen eyelids see med to conceal a fell disease. It was almost alarming when he opened them and disclosed a pair of clear, grey eyes. He was advancing now in strange fashion, sideways, like a crab. Having reached the travellers, he hesitated and stopped shyly.
«Good day, my beauty,» said Mitia, embracing him. «How’s the work getting on?»
«The work is all right. There is nothing the matter with the work,» said Misha, rubbing his cheek where Mitia’s lips had touched it. Presently, seeming to gain courage, he bowed low before Mesentzeff and Vania.
«Forgive me,» he murmured.
«What’s the matter with you?» cried Mitia. «These are friends,» and turning to his companions, he went on: «He’s afraid lest you should think ill of him because of his feet and arms. But why should you? What’s the use? Who knows if we are better than he? Well, my pigeon, take us home!» And he put his arm round Misha’s neck in his most caressing manner.
The hut they were taken to was large and well lit. The window curtains were of cheap stuff but of pleasant colour and gracefully complicated design. On the walls were rough, highly tinted reproductions of the Battle of Plevna, the last Judgment and the Princes of Bova. All was neat and simple until a visitor came in sight of en object as out of place and unexpected in such surroundings as a peacock’s tail on an ox, or a dog sitting on a tree top. On a large table in a comer stood a complete chemical laboratory!..
On the table was also a spirit lamp such as is used to heat coffee and over it a number of tiny phials in which an evil looking mixture was being concocted. Among a number of crystals, lay aimlessly, half a herring.
«This must be the last survivor of the Ancient Order of Alchemists,» thought Mesentzeff, «searching I presume for the philosopher’s stone.»
Very respectfully, Mitia went to the table.
«Is it boiling?» he inquired, touching a crucible. «Doesn’t it burst sometimes?»
«Why should it burst?» growled Misha.
«When will it be finished?»
«In another two years perhaps.»
«But you tried before? How often does this make?»
«The third time.»
«So it will have taken, six years altogether.»
«Why only six? Why not sixteen? The task is very difficult.»
«Well, well no doubt it’ll succeed some day and then the whole machine begins working. Go on! We won’t stop you. We’re only staying the night and tomorrow morning will bid you ‘good bye!’ Where do the girls meet hereabouts at night?» he concluded unexpectedly.
«What girls? Why should they meet? They must work and sleep: that’s all... But they meet on the bridge, suppose: where else?»
«And which way is the bridge?»
«To the left.»
«Well, let’s be off, children, or we shall be interfering with our brother here. We’ve walked all day and I must dance.»
Mesentzeff would have liked to remain and talk quietly to the alchemist. But realizing that Mitia would never allow it, he followed the others, determined to escape later unnoticed.
«Forgive me!...»
The words came in low tones and Mesentzeff turned to find Misha close behind him. The peasant looked like a wild beast that had been only recently trapped; awkward, half-cowering and hunch backed, with tufts of rough hair on a still youthful face. Mesentzeff thought of the laboratory and of his own strong desire to fathom the mystery. He glanced about him.
Mitia was dancing ecstatically, his eyes closed like those of a nightingale entranced by its own song. From him there was nothing to fear at present. As to Vania, he was watching the dancer, on his face a smile of perfect beatitude.
Mesentzeff and Misha slipped away. Through back gardens where nettles stung them and their feet splashed in filth, they reached Misha’s hut. Inside, Misha, having barred the door, stood humbly beside his guest, awaiting his pleasure.
From the peasant’s manner, Mesentzeff judged him to be by no means whole hearted in the cause (whatever it was); and that if not a traitor to the brotherhood, was at least an uncertain member of it. He determined to cany the situation by assault.
«What are you concocting over there?» he asked, pointing to the laboratory.
Misha did not reply.
«The philosopher’s stone?»
«Eh?»
«The philosopher’s stone that turns iron to gold.»
Misha shuddered. «Heaven help me! How could I? If I tried a thing like that, I should be rotting in Siberia... Are such things possible?» He stopped indignantly and Mesentzeff realized his mistake.
«Listen, Misha», he said more gently. «I am not an enemy. Be frank with me. I hardly know Mitia. His affairs are no business of mine and to tell you the truth they don’t please me.»
«They please only the devil,» wailed Misha.
«I know some work, some task has been set you, but I don’t know what it is. Tell me. I might be of use to you.»
Misha looked pained and embarrassed. He was trembling all over.
His lips and eyebrows, even his ears twitched; or so it appeared to Mesentzeff... «Be kind to me!» he implored in an almost feminine tone of appeal. «I see you are a gentleman, neither a peasant nor a Christian. If I had been only educated at the elementary school or university, I should be someone. Ever since I was a child, I have known how to count. Before I could walk, I could
