He had already run away to the nearest monastery once, but the monks would not take him in. And so there was nothing left for him but the steppe, the wide-open, rolling steppe. A hunter had once given him an old rifle; God alone knows what it used for ammunition. Alyosha always carried it with him, but he never shot it, first of all because he wanted to save the charge, and then because he did not know why he should.
One mild, quiet evening at the beginning of the summer, everyone was sitting together at the crude table, on which was a bowl of kasha. Peter ate, and the others watched him, waiting for his leavings. Suddenly, the old man stopped with his spoon poised in the air and extended his broad, wizened head into the shaft of light that came through the door and crossed the table into the shadows. Everyone listened. Outside there was a noise on the walls of the hut, a sound like that of a night bird brushing its wings against the beams. But the sun had barely set, and on top of that the birds of the night rarely came into the village. And there it was again—as though some large animal were groping around the house and as though its searching steps could be heard from all the walls at once. Alyosha rose stealthily from the bench, and at the same moment something darkened the door, something tall and black. It completely eclipsed the evening light, bringing night into the hut, and for all its size moved forward only with uncertainty.
“It’s Ostap!” said the ugly girl in her malicious voice. And now everyone recognized him. He was one of the blind kobzars, or bards, an old man who with his twelve-string bandura traveled through the villages singing of the great fame of the Cossacks, of their courage and loyalty, of their hetmans2 Kirdyaga, Kukubenko, Bulba, and other heroes, songs that all were glad to hear. Ostap made three deep bows in the direction where he thought the image of the saint was (and it was to the Znamenskaya, the Virgin Mother, that he thus inadvertently turned), sat down by the stove, and asked in a soft voice:
“In whose house am I, actually?”
“You’re in our house, little father, the house of Peter Akimovitch, the shoemaker,” replied Peter with kindness. He was a lover of songs, and this unexpected visit made him happy.
“Oh, at the house of Peter Akimovitch, the painter of pictures,” said the blind man, by way of returning the kindness. Then he fell silent. A sound arose from the six long strings of the bandura. It swelled and then came back from the six short strings, foreshortened and as though exhausted. And this effect was repeated in everfaster cadences, until the point was reached where the listeners had to close their eyes for fear they might see the sounds of the furiously mounting melody crashing to earth somewhere. Then the song of the strings ended and made room for the beautiful, full voice of the kobzar, which soon filled the whole house and went beyond it to call forth the people from the neighboring huts, who gathered in front of the door and beneath the windows. But the song was not about the heroes this time. The fame of Bulba and Ostranitza and Naliwaiko was already secure. Established for all time was the loyalty of the Cossacks. The song was not about their deeds. And more deeply asleep still, as it seemed to the listeners, was dance; for no one stirred a foot or raised a hand. Like Ostap’s own, the heads of all were bowed low, made heavy by the sadness of the song.