"O Lord!" she gasped with blue lips flecked with foam as her eyes (suddenly bereft of their colour in the sunlight) shed tears born of the intolerable anguish of the maternal function, and her body writhed and twisted as though her frame had been severed in the middle.

"Away, you brute!" was her oft-repeated cry as with her weak hands, hands seemingly dislocated at the wrists, she strove to thrust me to a distance. Yet all the time I kept saying persuasively: "You fool! Bring forth as quickly as you can!" and, as a matter of fact, was feeling so sorry for her that tears continued to spurt from my eyes as much as from hers, and my very heart contracted with pity. Also, never did I cease to feel that I ought to keep saying something; wherefore, I repeated, and again repeated: "Now then! Bring forth as quickly as ever you can!"

And at last my hands did indeed hold a human creature in all its pristine beauty. Nor could even the mist of tears prevent me from seeing that that human creature was red in the face, and that to judge from the manner in which it kept kicking and resisting and uttering hoarse wails (while still bound to its mother by the ligament), it was feeling dissatisfied in advance with the world. Yes, blue-eyed, and with a nose absurdly sunken between a pair of scarlet, rumpled cheeks and lips which ceaselessly quivered and contracted, it kept bawling: "A-aah! A-a-ah!"

Moreover, so slippery was it that, as I knelt and looked at it and laughed with relief at the fact that it had arrived safely, I came near to letting it fall upon the ground: wherefore I entirely forgot what next I ought to have done.

"Cut it!" at length whispered the mother with eyes closed, and features suddenly swollen and resembling those of a corpse.

"A knife!" again she whispered with her livid lips. "Cut it!"

My pocket-knife I had had stolen from me in the workmen's barraque; but with my teeth I severed the caul, and then the child gave renewed tongue in true Orlovian fashion, while the mother smiled. Also, in some curious fashion, the mother's unfathomable eyes regained their colour, and became filled as with blue fire as, plunging a hand into her bodice and feeling for the pocket, she contrived to articulate with raw and blood-flecked lips:

"I have not a single piece of string or riband to bind the caul with."

Upon that I set to, and managed to produce a piece of riband, and to fasten it in the required position.

Thereafter she smiled more brightly than ever. So radiantly did she smile that my eyes came near to being blinded with the spectacle.

"And now rearrange yourself," I said, "and in the meanwhile I will go and wash the baby."

"Yes, yes," she murmured uneasily. "But be very careful with him – be very gentle."

Yet it was little enough care that the rosy little homunculus seemed to require, so strenuously did he clench his fists, and bawl as though he were minded to challenge the whole world to combat.

"Come, now!" at length I said. "You must have done, or your very head will drop off."

Yet no sooner did he feel the touch of the ocean spray, and begin to be sprinkled With its joyous caresses, than he lamented more loudly and vigorously than ever, and so continued throughout the process of being slapped on the back and breast as, frowning and struggling, he vented squall after squall while the waves laved his tiny limbs.

"Shout, young Orlovian!" said I encouragingly. "Let fly with all the power of your lungs!"

And with that, I took him back to his mother. I found her with eyes closed and lips drawn between her teeth as she writhed in the torment of expelling the after-birth. But presently I detected through the sighs and groans a whispered:

"Give him to me! Give him to me!"

"You had better wait a little," I urged.

"Oh no! Give him to me now!"

And with tremulous, unsteady hands she unhooked the bosom of her bodice, and, freeing (with my assistance) the breast which nature had prepared for at least a dozen children, applied the mutinous young Orlovian to the nipple. As for him, he at once understood the matter, and ceased to send forth further lamentation.

"O pure and holy Mother of God!" she gasped in a long-drawn, quivering sigh as she bent a dishevelled head over the little one, and, between intervals of silence, fell to uttering soft, abrupt exclamations. Then, opening her ineffably beautiful blue eyes, the hallowed eyes of a mother, she raised them towards the azure heavens, while in their depths there was coming and going a flame of joy and gratitude. Lastly, lifting a languid hand, she with a slow movement made the sign of the cross over both herself and her babe.

"Thanks to thee O purest Mother of God!" she murmured. "Thanks indeed to thee!"

Then her eyes grew dim and vague again, and after a pause (during which she seemed to be scarcely breathing) she said in a hard and matter-of-fact tone:

"Young fellow, unfasten my satchel."

And whilst I was so engaged she continued to regard me with a steady gaze; but, when the task was completed she smiled shamefacedly, and on her sunken cheeks and sweat-flecked temples there dawned the ghost of a blush.

"Now," said she, "do you, for the present, go away."

"And if I do so, see that in the meanwhile you do not move about too much."

"No, I will not. But please go away."

So I withdrew a little. In my breast a sort of weariness was lurking, but also in my breast there was echoing a soft and glorious chorus of birds, a chorus so exquisitely in accord with the never-ceasing splash of the sea that for ever could I have listened to it, and to the neighbouring brook as it purled on its way like a maiden engaged in relating confidences about her lover.

Presently, the woman's yellow-scarfed head (the scarf now tidily rearranged) reappeared over the bushes.

"Come, come, good woman!" was my exclamation. "I tell you that you must not move about so soon."

And certainly her attitude now was one of utter languor, and she had perforce to grasp the stem of a bush with one hand to support herself. Yet while the blood was gone from her face, there had formed in the hollows where her eyes had been two lakes of blue.

"See how he is sleeping!" she murmured.

And, true enough, the child was sound asleep, though to my eyes he looked much as any other baby might have done, save that the couch of autumn leaves on which he was ensconced consisted of leaves of a kind which could not have been discovered in the faraway forests of Orlov.

"Now, do you yourself lie down awhile," was my advice.

"Oh, no," she replied with a shake of her head on its sinuous neck; "for I must be collecting my things before I move on towards – "

"Towards Otchenchiri"

"Yes. By now my folk will have gone many a verst in that direction."

"And can you walk so far?"

"The Holy Mother will help me."

Yes, she was to journey in the company of the Mother of God. So no more on the point required to be said.

Glancing again at the tiny, inchoate face under the bushes, her eyes diffused rays of warm and kindly light as, licking her lips, she, with a slow movement, smoothed the breast of the little one.

Then I arranged sticks for a fire, and also adjusted stones to support the kettle.

"Soon I will have tea ready for you," I remarked.

"And thankful indeed I shall be," she responded, "for my breasts are dried up."

"Why have your companions deserted you?" I said next.

"They have not deserted me. It was I that left them of my own accord. How could I have exposed myself in their presence?"

And with a glance at me she raised a hand to her face as, spitting a gout of blood, she smiled a sort of bashful smile.

"This is your first child, I take it?"

"It is… And who are you?"

"A man."

"Yes, a man, of course; but, are you a MARRIED man?"

"No, I have never been able to marry."

"That cannot be true."

"Why not?"

With lowered eyes she sat awhile in thought.

"Because, if so, how do you come to know so much about women's affairs?"

This time I DID lie, for I replied:

"Because they have been my study. In fact, I am a medical student."

"Ah! Our priest's son also was a student, but a student for the Church."

"Very well. Then you know what I am. Now I will go and fetch some water."

Upon this she inclined her head towards her little son and listened for a moment to his breathing. Then she said with a glance towards the sea:

"I too should like to have a wash, but I do not know what the water is like. What is it? Brackish or salt?"

"No; quite good water – fit for you to wash in."

"Is it really?"

"Yes, really. Moreover, it is warmer than the water of the streams hereabouts, which is as cold as ice."

"Ah! Well, you know best."

Here a shaggy-eared pony, all skin and bone, was seen approaching us at a foot's pace. Trembling, and drooping its head, it scanned us, as it drew level, with a round black eye, and snorted. Upon that, its rider pushed back a ragged fur cap, glanced warily in our direction, and again sank his head.

"The folk of these parts are ugly to look at," softly commented the woman from Orlov.

Then I departed in quest of water. After I had washed my face and hands I filled the kettle from a stream bright and lively as quicksilver (a stream presenting, as the autumn leaves tossed in the eddies which went leaping and singing over the stones, a truly enchanting spectacle), and, returning, and peeping through the bushes, perceived the woman to be crawling on hands and knees over the stones, and anxiously peering about, as though in search of something.

"What is it?" I inquired, and thereupon, turning grey in the face with confusion she hastened to conceal some article under her person, although I had already guessed the nature of the article.

"Give it to me," was my only remark. "I will go and bury it."

"How so? For, as a matter of fact, it ought to be buried under the floor in front of some stove."

"Are we to build a stove HERE? Build it in five minutes?" I retorted.

"Ah, I was jesting. But really, I would rather not have it buried here, lest some wild beast should come and devour it… Yet it ought to be committed only to the earth."

That said, she, with averted eyes, handed me a moist and heavy bundle; and as she did so she said under her breath, with an air of confusion:

"I beg of you for Christ's sake to bury it as well, as deeply, as you can. Out of pity for my son do as I bid you."

I did as she had requested; and, just as the task had been completed, I perceived her returning from the margin of the sea with unsteady gait, and an arm stretched out before her, and a petticoat soaked to the middle with the sea water. Yet all her face was alight with inward fire, and as I helped her to regain the spot where I had prepared some sticks I could not help reflecting with some astonishment:

"How strong indeed she is!"

Next, as we drank a mixture of tea and honey, she inquired:

"Have you now ceased to be a student?"

"Yes."

"And why so? Through too much drink?"

"Even so, good mother."

"Dear me! Well, your face is familiar to me. Yes, I remember that I noticed you in Sukhum when once you were arguing with the barraque superintendent over the question of rations. As I did so the thought occurred to me: 'Surely that bold young fellow must have gone and spent his means on drink? Yes, that is how it must be.'"

Then, as from her swollen lips she licked a drop of honey, she again bent her blue eyes in the direction of the bush under which the slumbering, newly-arrived Orlovian was couched.

"How will he live?" thoughtfully she said with a sigh – then added:

"You have helped me, and I thank you. Yes, my thanks are yours, though I cannot tell whether or not your assistance will have helped HIM."

And, drinking the rest of her tea, she ate a morsel of bread, then made the sign of the cross. And subsequently, as I was putting up my things, she continued to rock herself to and fro, to give little starts and cries, and to gaze thoughtfully at the ground with eyes which had now regained their original colour. At last she rose to her feet.

"You are not going yet?" I queried protestingly.

"Yes, I must."

"But – "

"The Blessed Virgin will go with me. So please hand me over the child."

"No, I will carry him."

And, after a contest for the honour, she yielded, and we walked away side by side.

"I only wish I were a little steadier on my feet," she remarked with an apologetic smile as she laid a hand upon my shoulder.

Meanwhile, the new citizen of Russia, the little human being of an unknown future, was snoring soundly in my arms as the sea plashed and murmured, and threw off its white shavings, and the bushes whispered together, and the sun (now arrived at the meridian) shone brightly upon us all.

In calm content it was that we walked; save that now and then the mother would halt, draw a deep breath, raise her head, scan the sea and the forest and the hills, and peer into her son's face. And as she did so, even the mist begotten of tears of suffering could not dim the wonderful brilliancy and clearness of her eyes. For with the sombre fire of inexhaustible love were those eyes aflame.

Once, as she halted, she exclaimed:

"O God, O Mother of God, how good it all is! Would that for ever I could walk thus, yes, walk and walk unto the very end of the world! All that I should need would be that thou, my son, my darling son, shouldst, borne upon thy mother's breast, grow and wax strong!"

And the sea murmured and murmured.