At the dawn of day we started forth, leaving my first place ofrefuge. Into the bags we packed our personal estate and fastenedthem on one of the saddles.
"We must go four or five hundred versts," very calmly announced myfellow traveler, who called himself "Ivan," a name that meantnothing to my mind or heart in this land where every second manbore the same.
"We shall travel then for a very long time," I remarkedregretfully.
"Not more than one week, perhaps even less," he answered.
That night we spent in the woods under the wide spreading branchesof the fir trees. It was my first night in the forest under theopen sky. How many like this I was destined to spend in the yearand a half of my wanderings! During the day there was very sharpcold. Under the hoofs of the horses the frozen snow crunched andthe balls that formed and broke from their hoofs rolled away overthe crust with a sound like crackling glass. The heathcock flewfrom the trees very idly, hares loped slowly down the beds ofsummer streams. At night the wind began to sigh and whistle as itbent the tops of the trees over our heads; while below it was stilland calm. We stopped in a deep ravine bordered by heavy trees,where we found fallen firs, cut them into logs for the fire and,after having boiled our tea, dined.
Ivan dragged in two tree trunks, squared them on one side with hisax, laid one on the other with the squared faces together and thendrove in a big wedge at the butt ends which separated them three orfour inches. Then we placed live coals in this opening and watchedthe fire run rapidly the whole length of the squared faces vis-a-vis.
"Now there will be a fire in the morning," he announced. "This isthe 'naida' of the gold prospectors. We prospectors wandering inthe woods summer and winter always sleep beside this 'naida.'
Fine! You shall see for yourself," he continued.
He cut fir branches and made a sloping roof out of them, resting iton two uprights toward the naida. Above our roof of boughs and ournaida spread the branches of protecting fir. More branches werebrought and spread on the snow under the roof, on these were placedthe saddle cloths and together they made a seat for Ivan to rest onand to take off his outer garments down to his blouse. Soon Inoticed his forehead was wet with perspiration and that he waswiping it and his neck on his sleeves.
"Now it is good and warm!" he exclaimed.
In a short time I was also forced to take off my overcoat and soonlay down to sleep without any covering at all, while through thebranches of the fir trees and our roof glimmered the cold brightstars and just beyond the naida raged a stinging cold, from whichwe were cosily defended. After this night I was no longerfrightened by the cold. Frozen during the days on horseback, I wasthoroughly warmed through by the genial naida at night and restedfrom my heavy overcoat, sitting only in my blouse under the roofsof pine and fir and sipping the ever welcome tea.
During our daily treks Ivan related to me the stories of hiswanderings through the mountains and woods of Transbaikalia in thesearch for gold. These stories were very lively, full ofattractive adventure, danger and struggle. Ivan was a type ofthese prospectors who have discovered in Russia, and perhaps inother countries, the richest gold mines, while they themselvesremain beggars. He evaded telling me why he left Transbaikalia tocome to the Yenisei. I understood from his manner that he wishedto keep his own counsel and so did not press him. However, theblanket of secrecy covering this part of his mysterious life wasone day quite fortuitously lifted a bit. We were already at theobjective point of our trip. The whole day we had traveled withdifficulty through a thick growth of willow, approaching the shoreof the big right branch of the Yenisei, the Mana. Everywhere wesaw runways packed hard by the feet of the hares living in thisbush. These small white denizens of the wood ran to and fro infront of us. Another time we saw the red tail of a fox hidingbehind a rock, watching us and the unsuspecting hares at the sametime.
Ivan had been silent for a long while. Then he spoke up and toldme that not far from there was a small branch of the Mana, at themouth of which was a hut.
"What do you say? Shall we push on there or spend the night by thenaida?"I suggested going to the hut, because I wanted to wash and becauseit would be agreeable to spend the night under a genuine roofagain. Ivan knitted his brows but acceded.
It was growing dark when we approached a hut surrounded by thedense wood and wild raspberry bushes. It contained one small roomwith two microscopic windows and a gigantic Russian stove. Againstthe building were the remains of a shed and a cellar. We fired thestove and prepared our modest dinner. Ivan drank from the bottleinherited from the soldiers and in a short time was very eloquent,with brilliant eyes and with hands that coursed frequently andrapidly through his long locks. He began relating to me the storyof one of his adventures, but suddenly stopped and, with fear inhis eyes, squinted into a dark corner.
"Is it a rat?" he asked.
"I did not see anything," I replied.
He again became silent and reflected with knitted brow. Often wewere silent through long hours and consequently I was notastonished. Ivan leaned over near to me and began to whisper.
"I want to tell you an old story. I had a friend in Transbaikalia.
He was a banished convict. His name was Gavronsky. Through manywoods and over many mountains we traveled in search of gold and wehad an agreement to divide all we got into even shares. ButGavronsky suddenly went out to the 'Taiga' on the Yenisei anddisappeared. After five years we heard that he had found a veryrich gold mine and had become a rich man; then later that he andhis wife with him had been murdered. . . ." Ivan was still for amoment and then continued:
"This is their old hut. Here he lived with his wife and somewhereon this river he took out his gold. But he told nobody where. Allthe peasants around here know that he had a lot of money in thebank and that he had been selling gold to the Government. Herethey were murdered."Ivan stepped to the stove, took out a flaming stick and, bendingover, lighted a spot on the floor.
"Do you see these spots on the floor and on the wall? It is theirblood, the blood of Gavronsky. They died but they did not disclosethe whereabouts of the gold. It was taken out of a deep hole whichthey had drifted into the bank of the river and was hidden in thecellar under the shed. But Gavronsky gave nothing away. . . . ANDLORD HOW I TORTURED THEM! I burned them with fire; I bent backtheir fingers; I gouged out their eyes; but Gavronsky died insilence."He thought for a moment, then quickly said to me:
"I have heard all this from the peasants." He threw the log intothe stove and flopped down on the bench. "It's time to sleep," hesnapped out, and was still.
I listened for a long time to his breathing and his whispering tohimself, as he turned from one side to the other and smoked hispipe.
In the morning we left this scene of so much suffering and crimeand on the seventh day of our journey we came to the dense cedarwood growing on the foothills of a long chain of mountains.
"From here," Ivan explained to me, "it is eighty versts to the nextpeasant settlement. The people come to these woods to gather cedarnuts but only in the autumn. Before then you will not meet anyone.
Also you will find many birds and beasts and a plentiful supply ofnuts, so that it will be possible for you to live here. Do you seethis river? When you want to find the peasants, follow along thisstream and it will guide you to them."Ivan helped me build my mud hut. But it was not the genuine mudhut. It was one formed by the tearing out of the roots of a greatcedar, that had probably fallen in some wild storm, which made forme the deep hole as the room for my house and flanked this on oneside with a wall of mud held fast among the upturned roots.
Overhanging ones formed also the framework into which we interlacedthe poles and branches to make a roof, finished off with stones forstability and snow for warmth. The front of the hut was ever openbut was constantly protected by the guardian naida. In that snow-covered den I spent two months like summer without seeing any otherhuman being and without touch with the outer world where suchimportant events were transpiring. In that grave under the rootsof the fallen tree I lived before the face of nature with my trialsand my anxiety about my family as my constant companions, and inthe hard struggle for my life. Ivan went off the second day,leaving for me a bag of dry bread and a little sugar. I never sawhim again.