20. Last Wreaths

“The day was declining. The sun’s rays were no longer so burning. The road, or rather the path, wound sometimes through fields of barley, rye, and wheat,—there were still in that section some farms that had not been destroyed,—sometimes through little green groves, filled with flowers, perfumes, and birds’ nests. Birds with varied song and plumage, all sorts of butterflies, battalions of wild bees, were flying and buzzing as if nothing in the world had been changed. Their own little bit of Ukraine had not been touched, and they did not suspect anything.

The sun’s rays shone through the foliage without remembering that the day before and not very far from there, they had lighted up and gilded a massacre.

From time to time a church tower could be seen rising to the right or the left, or the glimmering of a little lake, pool, or river, or instead they saw a village at the end of a prairie, whose houses still white shone among the gardens and orchards, sometimes it was only a deserted hamlet, half hid in the verdure.

They came to a field. “How many cornflowers,” said Tchetchevik; “look, Maroussia, we have never seen so many or such beautiful ones.”

Words cannot express all there was of gentleness in the accent of Tchetchevik when he spoke to the little girl, a young mother could not have had other smiles in her eyes, or more of tenderness in her voice for her little child.

“Do you know, Maroussia,” continued her good friend, “I think we shall do well to seat ourselves here; your little hands can make me a wreath of these cornflowers, which I wish very much.”

He placed the little girl on the grass, and stretching out his long arms began to gather all the flowers within his reach.

“Gather those with long stems,” said Maroussia to him, “it is easier to make the wreath with them, and they will also make it stronger.”

The Envoy, obliged to go farther to gather the flowers, said to her:

“Rest yourself until I have brought a sufficient quantity. Don’t stir. If you could only sleep a little!”

“No, no,” said Maroussia. “I will not move; I will rest, but I cannot sleep. I like better to see you gather the flowers.”

The Envoy was not very skillful. In order to get them with long stems, he sometimes pulled up the entire plant.

“You mustn’t do that,” Maroussia said to him, “it is a loss for those who come after us and also for the next year. The plants pulled up by the root do not grow any more. That isn’t the way to make the most of the harvest. In my mother’s house, you would be reproved for it.”

Her good friend felt that he was justly corrected, but he did not become discouraged, he only tried to do better.