Seven long years had passed since the earth swallowed the coffin with Lydia’s body. Seven years of silence that rang in his ears louder than any music, and of loneliness that soaked into the house’s walls like the smell of stove smoke. Stepan—everyone called him Stepanych—was left alone at sixty-three. Not old, but no longer young either, as if frozen between two banks: behind him a stormy life full of love; ahead, only the quiet, joyless flow of time toward the inevitable estuary.
God had not slighted him in health; a body trained by peasant labor still held its strength, but his soul was splintered and empty. Lydia had faded for a long time, with pain, and he nursed her to her last breath, to the last quiet tear on her gaunt cheek. And then she was gone, leaving him alone in all the wide world. The Lord had not given them children; they had lived soul to soul in their own small universe bounded by the outskirts of their native village.
He was used to Lydia being the sun of his little planet. She was the warmth that heated the home, the light that filled it with coziness. Her hands made the best cabbage soup, baked pies with dough so airy it melted on the tongue. She ran the household: a milking cow, chickens, every year a calf to fatten so that come winter they’d have their own fragrant meat. The garden was her realm, ruled by perfect rows of carrots, onions, and potatoes. His men’s work was plowing, digging beds, and fixing whatever broke. He was the outer perimeter of defense; she was the heart and soul of their fortress.
A person gets used to anything. Stepanych got used to the silence. At first it pressed on him, shrieked in his ears, made him start at every creak of the floorboards. Then it became background. Boring? Yes. Intolerably empty? Of course. But what could he do? Such is fate’s will; you can’t stand against it.
The local women, of course, cast their eyes his way. Stepan was a striking man, good with his hands, his home a full bowl, and without heirs besides—which in the village counted as nearly a winning lottery ticket. They sent matchmakers, hinted themselves; some, still rather young, outright proposed “starting a family.” But he brushed them all off, fending them away like pesky flies.
“I pine for my Lida,” he explained to the villagers, looking somewhere over their heads into the void. “From up there, she sees everything. She probably wouldn’t approve if I brought a new mistress into the house. She wouldn’t want some other woman to overshadow her memory here.”
But in the silence of his thoughts he reasoned otherwise: “To live together, you need at least a spark. At least a drop of fondness. And there isn’t any. Seems I’m not ready yet. The soul hasn’t thawed, hasn’t come back to life.”
After his wife’s death he sold the cow—what would one man do with so much milk? That good cow gave a bucket morning and evening. He sold her to a neighboring village, shriveling inside with pain, as if he were betraying another living creature tied to Lida. But in summer he kept a young bull or a heifer—for meat. That’s how he lived: his own meat, his own eggs; milk he got from the neighbors, sometimes buying it, sometimes accepting it as charity from Anisya, the neighbor who looked at him with mute pity.
Stepanych limped. Long ago, in his youth, an unruly horse broke his leg. The bone knitted crooked, but he waved it off—there was work to do. The limp became part of him, and in recent years a cane had appeared too—carved, oak, a gift from Lydia. No one paid attention to his sidelong gait anymore, as if it had always been so.
That day he sat at the dining table alone and ladled freshly cooked cabbage soup into a deep bowl. The summer was scorching, the air simmered above the ground. The door to the entryway stood flung wide, letting in lazy streams of oven-hot air. Suddenly a shadow blocked the sunlit rectangle on the floor.
“Howdy, Stepanych! I’m here for you! The door was open, so I came in without asking!” boomed the voice of Artyom, the neighbor two houses down, loud as a bell strike, rolling through the room. Artyom was much younger, full of unspent energy and some kind of plans Stepan could never make sense of.
“Howdy,” the host grumbled. “Want some soup? Just off the boil. Chop a little green onion in—then you won’t be dragged away by your ears. Come on, keep me company.”
“Wouldn’t I! I adore your soup! It may be hot outside, but hot food is always a joy. We’ll cool off after!”
Shoveling soup in with both cheeks, Artyom shot Stepanych a predatory, sidelong look.
“I was thinking, Stepanych, it’s time you got married. It’s not a tsar’s business to be standing by the stove alone. A wife would cook your soup, make your bed, and… well, you know.”
“So you’re applying to be my matchmaker?” Stepan smirked. “Got a bride in mind?”
“What’s wrong with that? How long will you go about as a bitter widower? You’re a choosy sort—by now you could be living high with some beauty!”
“It’s not enough for a woman simply to be there,” Stepan said quietly but firmly. “You need soul to soul. To understand each other without words. One look—and everything’s clear.”
“Oh, the soul!” Artyom waved a hand. “You’ve already passed seventy! What soul are we talking about? At your age the main thing is to have someone beside you, to keep an eye on you, bring you tea if needed. Think of the future!”
“The future?” Stepan set down his spoon and looked his neighbor straight in the eye. “Do you take me for a decrepit useless old man? So I should join up with the first one who calls? No, Artyom. I can still choose. And I’ll live as I wish for now.”
“That’s not what I meant! Did I offend you?” Artyom faltered. “I want what’s good for you! That’s why I brought it up. I’ve got an aunt, you see, Aglaya. In the next district, the village of Zaozerye. A fire of a woman! Not old yet, a homemaker to the marrow. Keeps a hog, geese, a heifer. And easy on the eyes, stately too. Even the name—Aglaya! I visited her recently. Lively, energetic, and all alone. How about we drive over? You’ll meet her. If you like her—done deal. We’ll bring her back here. Eh?”
“Is it the name that matters?” Stepan sighed. “We’d have to live under one roof, keep a household. Women nowadays love themselves more than the work. Will she want to fuss with a garden, with livestock? These days they want the man to pamper them, carry them in his arms. And I’m no young cavalier. Besides, it feels awkward, at my age, to go bride-hunting.”
“Oh, drop it! I’ll go with you. She’s my relative; we’d be practically kin! I know you, you know me. We’ll live soul to soul!”
Word led to word, and the talk stretched till evening. Yielding to the onslaught and to a sudden curiosity of his own, Stepan gave in. They decided to go in two days, on Saturday, in Artyom’s old, much-traveled Volga.
When the neighbor left, Stepan remained in a sepulchral silence. The idea of marriage, so abstract before, suddenly took on flesh and blood. He cast his eye around his house and it seemed to him he was seeing it for the first time. Dusty windowsills cluttered with useless junk—little jars, nails, some dried leaves Lydia had once collected. The floor, not scrubbed to a squeak in a long time. A mountain of unwashed dishes in the sink.
The next morning he got up at dawn as if lashed from within. He swept the dust from the sills, ruthlessly threw out all the junk. He washed the floor, and the smell of damp and cleanliness perked him up in a strange way. Then he tackled the dishes. He found some cleaner bought once upon a time and squeezed out thick, fragrant foam.
“Well now,” he thought in surprise, watching the plates shine like new under the running water. “Even my mood is lifting. Might as well wash the mugs too. It’s been a long time since I put this kind of sparkle on things.”
On Saturday morning Artyom was already honking under the window. Stepan put on his one festive suit, which still fit him fairly well, though it smelled of mothballs—and of the past. The road was long and rutted. They arrived only by midday.
Artyom’s car stopped by a fence that leaned but was still sturdy. A woman came straight out of the gate. Pleasant-looking, a little over fifty, making her a good ten years younger than Stepan. Her smile was wide, but somehow a bit practiced, rehearsed.
“At last! I’ve been waiting; lunch is getting cold! Where did you get yourselves lost?” she called out before they reached her.
And at those words, at that familiarity, Stepan felt a chill inside. It was clear—he had already been “promised” here in absentia, without his consent. His hand reached on its own for the door handle to tell Artyom to turn around and drive back. But at that moment he heard her whisper to her nephew:
“Is he a cripple?” Her glance dropped to the cane in his hand.
“No, Aunt Aglaya, he just broke his leg once, he leans on it a bit. It’s nothing.”
The woman walked up to Stepan and held out her hand. It was unexpectedly warm and soft, as if it had never known hard work.
“Welcome. You’re very kind to come. My name is Aglaya.”
Feeling awkward, he clasped her fingers.
“Hello. Stepan. Stepanych.”
His eye ran quickly over the yard. Cleanliness, order, neat rows of beds, a freshly whitewashed shed. “Industrious,” he thought. “A homemaker, that’s plain.”
The house, too, was spotless. But his gaze was drawn to the table. It groaned under the weight of dishes. Stewed potatoes with giant, juicy chunks of pork, pickled cucumbers and tomatoes, a heap of golden pancakes with a squat clay jug of sour cream beside them, salt pork, green onions and, crowning it all, meat pies sending up tempting steam.
“Generous,” Stepan noted to himself. “She’s gone all out.” Artyom, seizing a moment, winked at him meaningfully: “What did I tell you? We know how it’s done!”
Aglaya proved a hospitable hostess. She kept piling food on his plate while studying him and sprinkling on compliments:
“Oh, Stepan Stepanych, what a striking, well-kept man you are! You wouldn’t even say you were alone! Despite your age—well, of course, you’re up there in years, an old man—but you look wonderful! And don’t let your… infirmity bother you. A limp is nothing. Artyomushka said you live alone?”
“Alone,” he nodded.
“And children? Do they visit?”
“God didn’t give us children. No wife now, no children. Alone as a finger. That’s why I came.”
“Oh, and I’m all alone too…”
The word “old man” cut him to the quick. He had always thought of himself as elderly but still a sturdy man, not an old one. And suddenly, without knowing why, he blurted out:
“Well then, what’s there to drag out? Marry me. We’re not children to plan a wedding for a year.”
“Why not indeed?” she clapped her hands. “Only, you do limp… How will you manage the household?”
“What’s a limp got to do with it?” Stepan flared, stung to the quick. “I handle all the men’s work myself; I ask help from no one! My hands are golden—ask Artyom! I hewed my house and built the bathhouse!”
“Yes, yes, Auntie!” Artyom chimed in. “I told you—our Stepanych is a jack of all trades! A real man!”
“And where would we live?” Aglaya asked suddenly, narrowing her eyes slyly. “At your place or mine?”
“Where else?” Stepan was surprised. “Of course at my place! I’m not one to marry into someone else’s house. I’m master in my own home. You’ll lock yours and bring only what’s necessary.”
Aglaya suddenly started, as if remembering something.
“Oh, Artyomushka, step out with me a minute, I need a hand!”
They went out onto the porch. It was summer, the windows were open, and Stepan unavoidably heard every word that reached him with icy clarity.
“Listen, Mish— Artyom, I’ve already put my house in my elder son Sasha’s name. And Kostya, the younger, got terribly offended. So I promised him he’d have a house too.”
“What do you mean, a house?” Artyom was taken aback. “You don’t have another house.”
“What do you mean where? Stepanych’s house will be for my Kostya! I’ll talk him into it, dear. I can see he’s taken with me. I’ll sweet-talk him, talk him round, and if need be—I’ll slip him something to drink; he’ll sign the papers, no problem…”
“Auntie, what are you saying?” Artyom’s voice quivered. “That’s where I step out. I introduced you, and from here on it’s your business. I’m not getting involved.”
“Is his house good? Does he have a holding?”
“A sturdy house… A new bathhouse… Livestock—a heifer, chickens…”
Stepan froze. His ears rang. The blood drained from his face, hammering coldly at his temples. They were already dividing his house? His fortress, his memory, his last refuge? They were planning to settle some Kostya, this predator’s son, right here? And him—what then—out on the street? Or into the grave sooner?
He barely managed to step back from the window and pretend he was studying the photos on the wall before they came back in.
“Well, Aunt Aglaya, are you going to move in with Stepanych?” Artyom asked, avoiding his neighbor’s eyes.
“I’m ready this very minute!” she exclaimed. “But I’ve got a hog on feed, a calf, geese… You can’t just leave them now! It’s summer, time for putting things up. We have to think.”
A heavy, awkward silence hung in the room.
“Then let’s do this,” Stepan said unexpectedly quickly, feeling himself shake inside. “We’ll come for you in the fall, after the harvest. With Artyom. By then we’ll have arranged what to do with your livestock.”
“That’s probably best,” Aglaya agreed after a pause. “Come in the fall. I’ll be waiting.”
“Fall it is,” Stepan exhaled with relief. “And we have to head back now. It’s a long road, and there’s work at home.”
“How can you leave like that?” she fluttered her hands. “You haven’t had tea! I’ll light the samovar; I’ve got fragrant herbs! And I haven’t shown you the little shed!”
At the word “tea,” Stepan shuddered inside.
“No, no!” he almost shouted. “I don’t drink tea! At all! Don’t like it! And we’ll look at the shed next time!”
Artyom stared at him in surprise. “Well I’ll be,” flashed through his head. “He can’t go a day at home without boiling the kettle. And he’s always pouring me some.” But he kept silent.
At parting, Aglaya gave Stepan her hand and held his palm in hers—warm and soft—but now that softness seemed sticky and dangerous. He ached to pull free.
“I’ll be waiting! Do come! Or you can drop by earlier, as a guest; no need to wait till fall!” she rattled on without stopping. “I like you very much, Stepanych! A real man! You won’t find one like you in our parts! And your limp—it’s nothing! Come help me dig potatoes!”
At last she let go of his hand. Without looking back, he almost ran to the car, feeling her gaze on his back—pricking and clinging.
All the way back he kept silent, staring out the window at the flickering fields. Artyom tried to chatter about trifles, then started praising his aunt again. Stepan wasn’t listening. He saw only her predatory, glittering, gimlet eyes and heard that soul-freezing conversation on the porch.
That year he dug the potatoes alone. He carefully stacked the harvest from the beds in the cellar. He changed the old lock on the bathhouse door for a new one, the most reliable, with a powerful bolt. And when the first snow fell, covering the garden with a white shroud, Artyom dropped by.
“So, Stepanych, when are we going to my aunt’s? She called; she’s worried.”
Stepan looked at him, then at Lydia’s photograph in the frame on the dresser. Her calm, kind face seemed to be speaking to him.
“I don’t know, Artyom. Seems it didn’t work out. Maybe we’ll wait till spring?” he said quietly—but with such finality that no more questions arose.
It felt awkward to offend Artyom, but he had long since convinced himself: he would never marry that Aglaya. And most likely, no one else either. He went to the window. From the sky the first timid stars were looking down at him. And it seemed to him that his Lida was looking. And she was silent. And if she was silent—she didn’t agree. She had always known how to express her disagreement without words. And he, her Stepan, had always understood that silence as if it were spoken.