Page:Korolenko - Makar's Dream and Other Stories.djvu/54

30 astride stolen oxen and were goading them on with lumps of ice.

Makar looked with hatred at the Tartars, and muttered every time he passed one that the fellow had deserved much worse than this, but when he met a peasant from Chalgan he would stop and chat amicably with him, as they were friends, after all, even if they were thieves! Sometimes he would even show his fellow-feeling by picking up a lump of ice and diligently beating the ox or horse from behind, but let him take so much as one step forward himself, and horse and rider would be left far in the rear, a scarcely visible dot.

The plain seemed to be boundless. Though Makar and his companion occasionally overtook these riders and pedestrians, the country around was deserted, and the travellers seemed to be separated by hundreds of thousands of miles.

Among others, Makar fell in with an old man unknown to him, who plainly hailed from Chalgan; this could be discerned from his face, his clothes, and even from his walk, but Makar could not remember ever having seen him before. The old man wore a ragged fur coat, a great shaggy hat, tattered and worn leather breeches, and still older calf-skin boots. Worst of all, he was carrying on his shoulders, in spite of his old age, a crone still more ancient than himself, whose feet trailed on the ground. The old man was wheezing and staggering along,