“Dulcinea is loved,” said Elisaveta, “but the fullness of life belongs to Aldonza becoming Dulcinea.”
“But does Aldonza want that?” asked Trirodov.
“She wants it, but cannot realize it,” said Elisaveta. “But we will help her, we will teach her.”
Trirodov smiled affectionately—if sadly—and said:
“But he, like the eternal Don Juan, always seeks Dulcinea. And what is to him the poor earthly Aldonza, poisoned by the dream of beauty?”
“It is for that that he will love her,” replied Elisaveta; “because she is poor and has been poisoned by the exultant dream of beauty. The basis for their union will be creative beauty.”
The night came: a darkness settled outside the windows, full of the whisperings of sad, pellucid voices. Trirodov walked up to the window. Elisaveta soon stood beside him—and almost at the same instant their eyes fixed themselves upon the distant, dimly visible cemetery. Trirodov said quietly:
“He has been buried there. But he will rise from his grave.”
Elisaveta looked at him in astonishment and asked:
“Who?”
Trirodov glanced at her like one suddenly awakened and said slowly:
“It is a boy who has not yet lived, and who is still chaste. His body contains all possibilities and not a single achievement. He is like one created to receive every energy directed at him. Now he is asleep in his tight coffin, in a grave. He will awake for a life free from passions and desires, for clear seeing and hearing, for the establishment of one will.”
“When will he awake?” asked Elisaveta.
“When I wish it,” said Trirodov, “I will wake him.”
The sound of his voice was sad and insistent—like the sound of an invocation.
“Tonight?” asked Elisaveta.
“If you wish it,” answered Trirodov quietly.
“Must I leave?” she asked again.
“Yes,” he answered, just as simply and as quietly as before.
She bid him goodbye and left. Trirodov again walked up to the window. He called someone in a voice of invocation and whispered:
“You will awake, dear one. Wake, rise, come to me. I will open your eyes, and you will see what you have not yet seen. I will open your ears, and you will hear what you have not yet heard. You are of the earth—I will not part you from the earth. You are from me, you are mine, you are I; come to me. Wake!”
He waited confidently. He knew that when the sleeper had awakened in his grave they would come to him—the wise, innocent ones—and would tell him.
Kirsha walked into the room quietly. He walked up to his father and asked:
“Are you looking at the cemetery?”
Trirodov laid his hand silently on the boy’s head. Kirsha said:
“There is a boy in one of the graves who is not dead.”
“How do you know?” asked Trirodov.
But he knew what Kirsha’s answer would be. Kirsha said:
“Grisha told me that Egorka was not quite dead. He is asleep; but he will awake!”
“Yes,” said Trirodov.
“And will he come to you?” asked Kirsha.
“Yes,” was the answer.
“When will he come?” asked Kirsha again.
Trirodov said with a smile:
“Rouse Grisha and ask him whether the sleeper has yet begun to wake in his grave.”
Kirsha walked away. Trirodov looked in silence at the distant cemetery, where the dark, bereaved night stooped sadly over the crosses.
“And where are you, my happy beloved?”
A quiet rustle made itself audible behind the doors: the little house-sprites moved quietly near the walls, and whispered and waited.
Awakened by a low sigh, Grisha arose. He walked out into the garden and stood listening with downcast eyes near the railing. He was smiling, but without joy. Who knew whether the other would rejoice?
Kirsha walked up to him and, indicating the cemetery with a movement of his head, asked:
“Is he alive? Has he awakened?”
“Yes,” said Grisha. “Egorushka is sighing in his grave; he’s just awakened.”
Kirsha ran home to his father and repeated to him Grisha’s words.
“We must make haste,” said Trirodov.
He again experienced an agitation with which he had been long familiar. He felt in himself an ebb and flow as of some strange power. A kind of marvellous energy, gathered by some means known to himself alone, issued slowly from him. A mysterious current passed between himself and the grave where the boy who had departed from life lay in the throes of death-sleep; it cast a spell upon the sleeper and caused him to stir.
Trirodov quickly descended the stairway into the room where the quiet children slept. His light footsteps were barely audible, and his feet felt the cold that came from the planked floor. The quiet children lay upon their beds motionlessly, as if they did not breathe. It seemed as if there were many of them, and that they slept eternally in the endless darkness of that quiet bedchamber.
Trirodov paused seven times, and each time one of the sleepers awoke at his one glance. Three boys and four girls answered his call. They stood there tranquilly, looked at Trirodov and waited.
“Follow me!” said Trirodov.
They walked after him, the white quiet ones, and the rustle of their light footsteps was barely heard.
Kirsha waited in the garden—and he seemed earthly and dark among the white, quiet children.
They walked quickly upon the Navii path like gliding, nocturnal shadows, one after another, the whole ten of them, with Grisha leading. The dew fell upon their naked feet, and the ground under their feet was soft, warm, and sad.
Egorka awoke in his grave. It was dark and somewhat stuffy. His head felt oppressed as under a weight. There sounded in his ears the persistent call:
“Rise, come to me.”
Fear assailed him. His eyes looked but did not see. It was hard to breathe. He recalled something, and all that he recalled was like a horrible delirium. Then came the sudden awful realization:
“I am in a grave, in a coffin.”
He groaned, and his heart began to thump. His throat, as if clutched by someone’s fingers, shivered convulsively. His eyes dilated widely, and the flaming darkness of the nailed-up coffin swept before them. As he tossed about in the tight coffin, tormented by his dread, Egorka
