THE COMMISSIONER'S CHRISTMAS[]
By Dimitri Ivanov[]
Published in Bulgarian Stories 1904
ELIN-PELIN, whose real name is Dimitr Ivanov (born in 1878 near ), is one of the common people. As a village teacher he spread enlightenment among his fellow-countrymen. Wishing to win their confidence, he "lived among the peasants and in the repression of self he found the power to create." In his stories the spiritual life of the Bulgarian countryman is depicted as in a mirror. The motives of his first collection of stories are as simple as folksongs and, like them, were born of the emotions of life. The first collection of his tales was published in 1904, The author, who since that date has been an official of the School Museum in Sofia, has recently published a second collection of stories in which not only Bulgarian peasants and villagers but many Mohammedan types appear in refreshing variety. The Commissioner's Christmas presents a characteristic sketch of the peasants of 's hinterland. This story, here translated for the first time into English, by Sarka B. Hrbkova, is reprinted by permission of the translator.
We will get there in plenty of time, sir. Yes, we'll get there yet before daylight's gone. See there's the village over yonder at the foot of the hill! Do you see it? As soon as we cross that low ridge we can say we're there." And the young driver, swinging his whip above the backs of his lean horses, shouted lustily to spur them on: "Vyee hey! Vyee! Sirs!"
The four wheels of the light coach splattered worse than ever through the soft mud of the country road. The rickety skeleton of the coach rattled dismally through the cheerless, dreary plain soaked by the late December rains.
The country lad shouted once more to his horses, settled himself more comfortably on the box, slapped his wet cap on his thick cape and, in a carefree voice, started up a gay tune.
"What's your name, boy?" inquired a fat man bundled up in a wolfskin coat, who sat inside the coach.
The lad continued his song.
"Ho, boy!" cried the man in a loud, harsh voice.
"What?" The boy turned around.
"Name! Your name? What's your name?"
"Ondra."
"Ah, ah, Ondra. Clever lad, you are! All of you have become clever. Sly, you country bumpkins. You only know how to lie and deceive. And how you do put on! I watch 'em at court. Sheep little lamblcins of innocence but really regular wolves! They play with the judges!" ^
"We're just simple folk, sir, and they only slander us. You just think so, but we're really not bad like that. Our peasant people deceive only out of ignorance. Ignorance and poverty." ^
"Ah! So that's it! Because of poverty! Cursed clods! They complain of ignorance and poverty, and guzzle like fish!"
"You think it's prosperity they're suffering from, sir? From being overprosperous? No! Not from prosperity. Drink guzzle? Yes, they all drink. To feel a bit happier, not because they're well off. That's something a man like you can set down in his note-book."
"Ah! It looks to me as if you, too, had had a drink, friend! You're still too young for that; your whiskers haven't spfouted yet. Those peasants of yours just write it down arc a lost lot lost, that's what!"
"You write it down, sir! We don't know how to write," said the boy and turning to his skinny horses, he called "Vyee, vyee, sirs!" and lapsed into deep thought.
The horses hesitated for a moment, as if they, too, were thinking.
The man put up the big collar of his wolf cloak, disappeared inside it and he, too, lost himself in meditation.
A crow with ruffled wings settled on a solitary tree beside the road and swinging on a dry twig croaked mournfully, while it, too, ruminated. Even the somber wintry weather seemed in a gray reflective mood, portending a gloomy Christmas on the morrow. Across the heavens thick scraggly storm-clouds crept and broke heavily beneath a cold blue sky. The earth was submerged in mud and moisture. The vistas of villages, streams, distant forests and mountains darkened, lifeless and distorted, before them. On the plains here and there glistened great pools, all cloudy, cold and glassy like the eyes of a corpse.
The small coach slowly wallowed through the deep soft mud, wading in, wading out, twisting and turning. A loose board on the side of it constantly, monotonously, dismally and senselessly rattled and banged mercilessly on the nerves of the corpulent gentleman in the fur coat. Finally, losing all patience, he opened his collar, thrust out his fat face, and shouted: "What is that horrible rattle? Devil take it!"
"It's only a loose clapboard, sir. It bangs away like a learned man: no sense to its rattle at all!"
"You're clever, Ondra, very clever! You know how to fool the young girls, I'll bet. You fellows marry young and have pretty wives."
The gentleman thrust back the tall collar of his fur coat in his attempt it jocularity.
"Say what you will, the married women are better! I know it! And you, sir, have an errand in our village, I take it?"
"I'm the court commissioner."
Ondra turned round and inspected his fare with a penetrating look.
"On official service, I suppose?"
"Service, of course. One of your fine fellows played a trick on me, but this time I'll fix him properly. I've got one official paper in my hands that'll catch him right. I got wind of the fact that this fellow was deceiving us and I'll search him out in the evening. Believe me, he'll have cause to remember me and this Christmas! I'll confiscate all his rye every grain of it! Not only to teach him what's what, but to set an example to all the rest of you not to try to fool the authorities. You cheat the merchants, you cheat the townspeople; you sell them spoiled eggs and rancid butter. But just wait, you peasant brood> you can't cheat; the courts! We know how to punish you! What you need is the lash a stout Russian knout that's the only way to teach you! You've all become drunkards, low-down trash. You're failing to meet your taxes you're destroyers of the State! Our patriotic interests are suffering! I wish I could be Czar for at least two days, and I'd fix you all my way! I'd make angels of all of you; yes, sir, angels! Pity I'm not the Czar!"
The court commissioner unbuttoned his fur coat, inside of which he squirmed like a chick breaking out of its shell.
"Oh, but Mr. Commissioner, God created the world and calculated that women don't need beards, so he didn't give them beards. He figured that an ass needs long ears, so he gave a pair to every donkey," answered Ondra with feigned simplicity.
"Stop your silly chatter and get along. It's getting dark, and I've got to get back to celebrate Christmas with my family. You charge too much, you imp! Three leu for twenty kilometers! You surely know how to skin us. Hurry up, will you: drive faster or those jades of yours will go to sleep!"
"Vyee, there! Vyee, sirs!" shouted Ondra, swinging his whip in the air.
"Sirs, you call them? Sirs! Better call them 'brothers,' " commented the commissioner in a rage.
"They'd resent that, Mr. Commissioner! I'd insult 'cm if I didn't call 'em sirs. Why, they're regular gentlemen! Their service is official: they run on a regular schedule. In the morning they get up; at a certain hour we water them and give them their feed. Then we harness them up, they go, you might say, to their offices: they pull till evening. Have supper at a regular hour, drink water, 'read the news,' so to speak, and sleep. Regular official life!"
"Where did you get your drinks, friend? Stop your jabbering and get on, or I'll be late. You've got a sly look, fellow, sly!"
"There're no wolves about, Mr. Commissioner, don't fear/' the driver said in such a tone that the honorable court official looked round with apprehensive eyes.
"I'm not afraid of wolves, friend, but of the cold weather. I haven't time to nurse a -cold."
They jogged on silently for a while.
"So you're on an official mission? Who's going to get scorched this time?" Ondra turned a serious face toward his passenger.
The commissioner waited for a while before answering. "Why shouldn't you know? Stanoycho they call him, little man with a thick neck."
"I know him. So you're going to take his rye, are you? He's a poor fellow, Mr. Commissioner j let him off this time. It's Christmas, you know, and all that!"
"Poor fellow, yes, but a regular devil!" The commissioner lapsed into silence. Darkness was falling. The horses could barely crawl to the top of the hill beyond which lay the village. Ondra no longer urged them on, nor swung his long whip above them. He stopped his talk, he no longer sang, and was lost in meditation.
When they reached the summit and started down on the other side, night had come, but there was still no sign of the village. A cold penetrating wind blew over the land buried under the mire. Scattered clouds moved up toward the mountains. The blue vault of the frosty sky cleared up, widened and lifted itself to greater heights. Soon stars, cold and glistening, appeared on its surface. The air was perceptibly chillier. The horses plodded on slowly, sluggishly.
"Whip 'em up! Hurry up! You lazybones! We'll freeze to death!" shrieked the furious commissioner.
Ondra indifferently shouted to the horses and drowsily swung his whip over their heads, but as before they wearily, inertly dragged on the coach as if they had heard nothing at all.
Ondra was thinking of the miserable Stanoycho whose rye the commissioner was going to confiscate early next morning.
"It was you brought me this misfortune, Ondra/' Stanoycho would say to him, and when he'd be through blaming him, he'd ask Ondra to join his family in their meal, and then he'd weep. Yes, he would surely weep. Stanoycho's heart was soft. Ondra knew that.
He must help the poor fellow, contrive to tell him to hide his rye overnight and sweep the granary clean, or else all the coming year he'd be stretching his lean ears in hunger. Yes, he must do something!
Nothing was distinguishable but mud deep, thick mud. The road lost itself in the mire, and led nowhere except into more mud. 9 Ondra pulled up the lines and stopped the horses
"I'm afraid we're in danger of losing our way, Mr. Commissioner!" And the lad peered intently into the darkness.
The commissioner looked gravely at the driver's face on which not a trace of his former mischief was visible.
"Boy, open your eyes, or I'll not answer for the consequences. You'll get a thrashing.**
Ondra jerked the reins, swished his whip and cried, "Hold on tight, Mr. Commissioner!" Far off in the distance before them the lights of the village glimmered. The distant echoes of dogs' barking was carried to them. A few feet to the right of them glistened the pearly surface of a great pool of motionless water. The coach turned its course in that direction.
"What's that?" asked the commissioner.
"A swamp, Mr. Commissioner. The road leads right through it. It's shallow, don't be afraid. Only a few holes here and there. I usually miss 'em, whether I go by wagon or on foot. Vyee, there, sirs! Hold tight, Mr. Commissioner!"
The horses plunged into the cold water, which mirrored the starry sky. They proceeded more and more cautiously as they began to sink deeper and deeper into the mire. The dead surface of the pearl-green water broke into lively motion.
"Stop, you cattle!" cried the commissioner in terror, drawing his coat tightly round him. "You'll drown me, you fool! Can't you see the coach is filling with water! Stop! Stop!"
Ondra stopped. The coach sank in to the bottom, standing in the middle of a swamp whose margin was lost in the impenetrable blackness.
"Ho! Go ahead!" bawled Ondra to his horses. His powerful young voice reechoed through the night. Near by some wild ducks fluttered excitedly and vanished in the dark.
"Guess we, too, have to turn into moor-hens and wade out," said Ondra thoughtfully, "or else "
"Oh, you idiot! Just wait till we get but of this! I'll break every bone in your body! We'll drown here like rats! You ass!"
"No, we won't drown, Mr. Commissioner, we won't drown, don't be afraid. In this darkness anyone would miss the way. Just be calm," said Ondra, and began to examine the harness. Then he proceeded to buckle and unbuckle various straps, swearing loudly, tying, untying, cursing incessantly. Finally he resumed his place on the driver's seat, swung his whip and shouted, "Vyee, there! Go on!"
The horses pulled and went forward. Suddenly one of them slipped loose from the shaft and staggered ahead in the mire, free of the harness. The other horse stood still with the coach.
"Ho, you! What's happened now?" shrieked the commissioner.
"Stop, you! Dorcha, Dorcha!" called Ondra to the liberated horse,, and began to coax it to come back.
But the animal, frightened by the water, turned round and warily made its way back in die direction of the shore, where it gradually lose itself to view, wholly oblivious of the pleadings of his master.
The commissioner stood up excitedly in the coach, terror written on every feature. *
At that instant Ondra quickly leaped onto the other horse and, following in Dorcha's path, continued to call loudly, "Dorcha, Dorcha, wait! Come back Dorcha, Dorcha!"
"Where are you going? Stop! What are you doing, you cattle? You crazy fool! Oh, you lousy peasant! I'll fix you!"
In the darkness only merry laughter was his response.
"Oh, you cattle, so you're leaving me here! To perish! For the beasts to devour me! Boy, don't do it, please, I beg you!" implored the commissioner in a trembling voice.
"Don't be afraid, don't be afraid, Mr. Commissioner” sounded Ondra's voice. "No wild beasts here in the swamp. Just wrap up, so you don't take cold. To-morrow morning early, bright and early Til come. There's hay in the coach, make yourself a bed. I'll not charge you for the night's lodging!"
"Boy, don't joke," pleaded the commissioner. "Don't leave me! Come back! Pull me out of here!"
"It's dark, sir, very dark. I can't see a thing! And my horse has run away! How can I help you? I can't do it!"
The commissioner heard the mocking voice wafted back out of the darkness. Terrified at the prospect, alone there in the middle of the dismal swamp, he burst into tearful entreaty.
"Ondra, come back! Please please! I'll pay you well pay you anything! Help me out of this! I'll die here! I have children! They're waiting for me! It's Christmas! Have you no heart?" His voice broke in desperation. He listened, but no answer came. Then, as if bereft of his senses, he howled out into the unanswering darkness: "Ho, fellow! Cattle! You ox! You beast! Come back! Take me out of this! Have pity! My children! Christmas! You peasant cur! You dog!"
And sinking back into the coach, he drew his fur coat about him and burst out crying like a child.
But the black night gave no answer.