Book Seven: 1810-11 - Chapter VI

by Leo Tolstoy

　　The old count went home, and Natasha and Petya promised to returnvery soon, but as it was still early the hunt went farther. Atmidday they put the hounds into a ravine thickly overgrown withyoung trees. Nicholas standing in a fallow field could see all hiswhips.

　　Facing him lay a field of winter rye, there his own huntsman stoodalone in a hollow behind a hazel bush. The hounds had scarcely beenloosed before Nicholas heard one he knew, Voltorn, giving tongue atintervals; other hounds joined in, now pausing and now again givingtongue. A moment later he heard a cry from the wooded ravine that afox had been found, and the whole pack, joining together, rushed alongthe ravine toward the ryefield and away from Nicholas.

　　He saw the whips in their red caps galloping along the edge of theravine, he even saw the hounds, and was expecting a fox to show itselfat any moment on the ryefield opposite.

　　The huntsman standing in the hollow moved and loosed his borzois,and Nicholas saw a queer, short-legged red fox with a fine brush goinghard across the field. The borzois bore down on it.... Now they drewclose to the fox which began to dodge between the field in sharper andsharper curves, trailing its brush, when suddenly a strange whiteborzoi dashed in followed by a black one, and everything was inconfusion; the borzois formed a star-shaped figure, scarcely swayingtheir bodies and with tails turned away from the center of thegroup. Two huntsmen galloped up to the dogs; one in a red cap, theother, a stranger, in a green coat.

　　"What's this?" thought Nicholas. "Where's that huntsman from? Heis not 'Uncle's' man."

　　The huntsmen got the fox, but stayed there a long time withoutstrapping it to the saddle. Their horses, bridled and with highsaddles, stood near them and there too the dogs were lying. Thehuntsmen waved their arms and did something to the fox. Then from thatspot came the sound of a horn, with the signal agreed on in case ofa fight.

　　"That's Ilagin's huntsman having a row with our Ivan," saidNicholas' groom.

　　Nicholas sent the man to call Natasha and Petya to him, and rodeat a footpace to the place where the whips were getting the houndstogether. Several of the field galloped to the spot where the fightwas going on.

　　Nicholas dismounted, and with Natasha and Petya, who had riddenup, stopped near the hounds, waiting to see how the matter wouldend. Out of the bushes came the huntsman who had been fighting androde toward his young master, with the fox tied to his crupper.While still at a distance he took off his cap and tried to speakrespectfully, but he was pale and breathless and his face was angry.One of his eyes was black, but he probably was not even aware of it.

　　"What has happened?" asked Nicholas.

　　"A likely thing, killing a fox our dogs had hunted! And it was mygray bitch that caught it! Go to law, indeed!... He snatches at thefox! I gave him one with the fox. Here it is on my saddle! Do you wanta taste of this?..." said the huntsman, pointing to his dagger andprobably imagining himself still speaking to his foe.

　　Nicholas, not stopping to talk to the man, asked his sister andPetya to wait for him and rode to the spot where the enemy's,Ilagin's, hunting party was.

　　The victorious huntsman rode off to join the field, and there,surrounded by inquiring sympathizers, recounted his exploits.

　　The facts were that Ilagin, with whom the Rostovs had a quarreland were at law, hunted over places that belonged by custom to theRostovs, and had now, as if purposely, sent his men to the verywoods the Rostovs were hunting and let his man snatch a fox their dogshad chased.

　　Nicholas, though he had never seen Ilagin, with his usual absence ofmoderation in judgment, hated him cordially from reports of hisarbitrariness and violence, and regarded him as his bitterest foe.He rode in angry agitation toward him, firmly grasping his whip andfully prepared to take the most resolute and desperate steps to punishhis enemy.

　　Hardly had he passed an angle of the wood before a stout gentlemanin a beaver cap came riding toward him on a handsome raven-blackhorse, accompanied by two hunt servants.

　　Instead of an enemy, Nicholas found in Ilagin a stately andcourteous gentleman who was particularly anxious to make the youngcount's acquaintance. Having ridden up to Nicholas, Ilagin raisedhis beaver cap and said he much regretted what had occurred andwould have the man punished who had allowed himself to seize a foxhunted by someone else's borzois. He hoped to become better acquaintedwith the count and invited him to draw his covert.

　　Natasha, afraid that her brother would do something dreadful, hadfollowed him in some excitement. Seeing the enemies exchangingfriendly greetings, she rode up to them. Ilagin lifted his beavercap still higher to Natasha and said, with a pleasant smile, thatthe young countess resembled Diana in her passion for the chase aswell as in her beauty, of which he had heard much.

　　To expiate his huntsman's offense, Ilagin pressed the Rostovs tocome to an upland of his about a mile away which he usually kept forhimself and which, he said, swarmed with hares. Nicholas agreed, andthe hunt, now doubled, moved on.

　　The way to Iligin's upland was across the fields. The huntservants fell into line. The masters rode together. "Uncle," Rostov,and Ilagin kept stealthily glancing at one another's dogs, tryingnot to be observed by their companions and searching uneasily forrivals to their own borzois.

　　Rostov was particularly struck by the beauty of a small,pure-bred, red-spotted bitch on Ilagin's leash, slender but withmuscles like steel, a delicate muzzle, and prominent black eyes. Hehad heard of the swiftness of Ilagin's borzois, and in thatbeautiful bitch saw a rival to his own Milka.

　　In the middle of a sober conversation begun by Ilagin about theyear's harvest, Nicholas pointed to the red-spotted bitch.

　　"A fine little bitch, that!" said he in a careless tone. "Is sheswift?"

　　"That one? Yes, she's a good dog, gets what she's after," answeredIlagin indifferently, of the red-spotted bitch Erza, for which, a yearbefore, he had given a neighbor three families of house serfs. "Soin your parts, too, the harvest is nothing to boast of, Count?" hewent on, continuing the conversation they had begun. And consideringit polite to return the young count's compliment, Ilagin looked at hisborzois and picked out Milka who attracted his attention by herbreadth. "That black-spotted one of yours is fine- well shaped!"said he.

　　"Yes, she's fast enough," replied Nicholas, and thought: "If onlya full-grown hare would cross the field now I'd show you what sortof borzoi she is," and turning to his groom, he said he would give aruble to anyone who found a hare.

　　"I don't understand," continued Ilagin, "how some sportsmen can beso jealous about game and dogs. For myself, I can tell you, Count, Ienjoy riding in company such as this... what could be better?" (heagain raised his cap to Natasha) "but as for counting skins and whatone takes, I don't care about that."

　　"Of course not!"

　　"Or being upset because someone else's borzoi and not mine catchessomething. All I care about is to enjoy seeing the chase, is it notso, Count? For I consider that..."

　　"A-tu!" came the long-drawn cry of one of the borzoi whippers-in,who had halted. He stood on a knoll in the stubble, holding his whipaloft, and again repeated his long-drawn cry, "A-tu!" (This call andthe uplifted whip meant that he saw a sitting hare.)

　　"Ah, he has found one, I think," said Ilagin carelessly. "Yes, wemust ride up.... Shall we both course it?" answered Nicholas, seeingin Erza and "Uncle's" red Rugay two rivals he had never yet had achance of pitting against his own borzois. "And suppose they outdomy Milka at once!" he thought as he rode with "Uncle" and Ilagintoward the hare.

　　"A full-grown one?" asked Ilagin as he approached the whip who hadsighted the hare- and not without agitation he looked round andwhistled to Erza.

　　"And you, Michael Nikanorovich?" he said, addressing "Uncle."

　　The latter was riding with a sullen expression on his face.

　　"How can I join in? Why, you've given a village for each of yourborzois! That's it, come on! Yours are worth thousands. Try yoursagainst one another, you two, and I'll look on!"

　　"Rugay, hey, hey!" he shouted. "Rugayushka!" he added, involuntarilyby this diminutive expressing his affection and the hopes he placed onthis red borzoi. Natasha saw and felt the agitation the two elderlymen and her brother were trying to conceal, and was herself excited byit.

　　The huntsman stood halfway up the knoll holding up his whip andthe gentlefolk rode up to him at a footpace; the hounds that werefar off on the horizon turned away from the hare, and the whips, butnot the gentlefolk, also moved away. All were moving slowly andsedately.

　　"How is it pointing?" asked Nicholas, riding a hundred pacestoward the whip who had sighted the hare.

　　But before the whip could reply, the hare, scenting the frost comingnext morning, was unable to rest and leaped up. The pack on leashrushed downhill in full cry after the hare, and from all sides theborzois that were not on leash darted after the hounds and the hare.All the hunt, who had been moving slowly, shouted, "Stop!" callingin the hounds, while the borzoi whips, with a cry of "A-tu!"gallopedacross the field setting the borzois on the hare. The tranquil Ilagin,Nicholas, Natasha, and "Uncle" flew, reckless of where and how theywent, seeing only the borzois and the hare and fearing only to losesight even for an instant of the chase. The hare they had startedwas a strong and swift one. When he jumped up he did not run atonce, but pricked his ears listening to the shouting and tramplingthat resounded from all sides at once. He took a dozen bounds, notvery quickly, letting the borzois gain on him, and, finally havingchosen his direction and realized his danger, laid back his ears andrushed off headlong. He had been lying in the stubble, but in front ofhim was the autumn sowing where the ground was soft. The two borzoisof the huntsman who had sighted him, having been the nearest, were thefirst to see and pursue him, but they had not gone far before Ilagin'sred-spotted Erza passed them, got within a length, flew at the harewith terrible swiftness aiming at his scut, and, thinking she hadseized him, rolled over like a ball. The hare arched his back andbounded off yet more swiftly. From behind Erza rushed thebroad-haunched, black-spotted Milka and began rapidly gaining on thehare.

　　"Milashka, dear!" rose Nicholas' triumphant cry. It looked as ifMilka would immediately pounce on the hare, but she overtook him andflew past. The hare had squatted. Again the beautiful Erza reachedhim, but when close to the hare's scut paused as if measuring thedistance, so as not to make a mistake this time but seize his hindleg.

　　"Erza, darling! Ilagin wailed in a voice unlike his own. Erza didnot hearken to his appeal. At the very moment when she would haveseized her prey, the hare moved and darted along the balk betweenthe winter rye and the stubble. Again Erza and Milka were abreast,running like a pair of carriage horses, and began to overtake thehare, but it was easier for the hare to run on the balk and theborzois did not overtake him so quickly.

　　"Rugay, Rugayushka! That's it, come on!" came a third voice justthen, and "Uncle's" red borzoi, straining and curving its back, caughtup with the two foremost borzois, pushed ahead of them regardless ofthe terrible strain, put on speed close to the hare, knocked it offthe balk onto the ryefield, again put on speed still more viciously,sinking to his knees in the muddy field, and all one could see washow, muddying his back, he rolled over with the hare. A ring ofborzois surrounded him. A moment later everyone had drawn up round thecrowd of dogs. Only the delighted "Uncle" dismounted, and cut off apad, shaking the hare for the blood to drip off, and anxiouslyglancing round with restless eyes while his arms and legs twitched. Hespoke without himself knowing whom to or what about. "That's it,come on! That's a dog!... There, it has beaten them all, thethousand-ruble as well as the one-ruble borzois. That's it, comeon!" said he, panting and looking wrathfully around as if he wereabusing someone, as if they were all his enemies and had insulted him,and only now had he at last succeeded in justifying himself. "Thereare your thousand-ruble ones.... That's it, come on!..."

　　"Rugay, here's a pad for you!" he said, throwing down the hare'smuddy pad. "You've deserved it, that's it, come on!"

　　"She'd tired herself out, she'd run it down three times by herself,"said Nicholas, also not listening to anyone and regardless ofwhether he were heard or not.

　　"But what is there in running across it like that?" said Ilagin'sgroom.

　　"Once she had missed it and turned it away, any mongrel could takeit," Ilagin was saying at the same time, breathless from his gallopand his excitement. At the same moment Natasha, without drawingbreath, screamed joyously, ecstatically, and so piercingly that it seteveryone's ear tingling. By that shriek she expressed what theothers expressed by all talking at once, and it was so strange thatshe must herself have been ashamed of so wild a cry and everyoneelse would have been amazed at it at any other time. "Uncle" himselftwisted up the hare, threw it neatly and smartly across his horse'sback as if by that gesture he meant to rebuke everybody, and, withan air of not wishing to speak to anyone, mounted his bay and rodeoff. The others all followed, dispirited and shamefaced, and only muchlater were they able to regain their former affectation ofindifference. For a long time they continued to look at red Rugay who,his arched back spattered with mud and clanking the ring of his leash,walked along just behind "Uncle's" horse with the serene air of aconqueror.

　　"Well, I am like any other dog as long as it's not a question ofcoursing. But when it is, then look out!" his appearance seem toNicholas to be saying.

　　When, much later, "Uncle" rode up to Nicholas and began talking tohim, he felt flattered that, after what had happened, "Uncle"deigned to speak to him.