Chapter 38

It was already dark when Lukashka went out into the street. The
autumn night was fresh and calm. The full golden moon floated up
behind the tall dark poplars that grew on one side of the square.
From the chimneys of the outhouses smoke rose and spread above the
village, mingling with the mist. Here and there lights shone
through the windows, and the air was laden with the smell of
kisyak, grape-pulp, and mist. The sounds of voices, laughter,
songs, and the cracking of seeds mingled just as they had done in
the daytime, but were now more distinct. Clusters of white
kerchiefs and caps gleamed through the darkness near the houses
and by the fences.

In the square, before the shop door which was lit up and open, the
black and white figures of Cossack men and maids showed through
the darkness, and one heard from afar their loud songs and
laughter and talk. The girls, hand in hand, went round and round
in a circle stepping lightly in the dusty square. A skinny girl,
the plainest of them all, set the tune:

'From beyond the wood, from the forest dark,
From the garden green and the shady park,
There came out one day two young lads so gay.
Young bachelors, hey! brave and smart were they!
And they walked and walked, then stood still, each man,
And they talked and soon to dispute began!
Then a maid came out; as she came along,
Said, "To one of you I shall soon belong!"
'Twas the fair-faced lad got the maiden fair,
Yes, the fair-faced lad with the golden hair!
Her right hand so white in his own took he,
And he led her round for his mates to see!
And said, "Have you ever in all your life,
Met a lass as fair as my sweet little wife?"'

The old women stood round listening to the songs. The little boys
and girls ran about chasing one another in the dark. The men stood
by, catching at the girls as the latter moved round, and sometimes
breaking the ring and entering it. On the dark side of the doorway
stood Beletski and Olenin, in their Circassian coats and sheepskin
caps, and talked together in a style of speech unlike that of the
Cossacks, in low but distinct tones, conscious that they were
attracting attention. Next to one another in the khorovod circle
moved plump little Ustenka in her red beshmet and the stately
Maryanka in her new smock and beshmet. Olenin and Beletski were
discussing how to snatch Ustenka and Maryanka out of the ring.
Beletski thought that Olenin wished only to amuse himself, but
Olenin was expecting his fate to be decided. He wanted at any cost
to see Maryanka alone that very day and to tell her everything,
and ask her whether she could and would be his wife. Although that
question had long been answered in the negative in his own mind,