In bad company

VIII

This failure cost the poor mother many tears—tears, and shame. That she, "gracious Рапi" Popelskaya, whom "the best society" had thunderously applauded—that she should be so cruelly defeated! And by whom? By that coarse stableman, Iochim, and his idiotic pipe! The angry blood came rushing to her face at the very thought of the contempt she had glimpsed in his eyes after her unfortunate concert. With all her heart, she hated "that horrid peasant".
Yet every evening, when her little one ran off to the stable, she would open her window and stand listening. At first it was with contempt and anger that she listened, seeking only to pick out the comic aspects of this "silly piping". But then, little by little—she could not herself have said how it came about—the silly piping began to hold her attention, and she would listen eagerly for the wistful, dreamy melodies. Sometimes, catching herself at this, she would wonder what it was that made them so attractive, that gave them their mysterious charm. And as time passed her question found its answer, in the blue of these summer evenings, in the blurred shadows of the twilight hours, in the amazing harmony of song and surrounding Nature.
Yes—she reflected, altogether conquered now—this music had something about it all its own, a genuine depth of feeling, a poetry and charm never to be mastered simply by rote.
True, very true. The secret of this poetry lay in the wonderful tie that binds the long-dead past with Nature, witness of this past—Nature, that never dies, and never ceases to sing to the heart of man. And Iochim, a coarse, horny-handed peasant, in clumsy boots, carried in his heart this wonderful harmony, this genuine feeling of Nature.
And Pani Popelskaya's aristocratic pride was humbled, in her heart, before this peasant stableman. She would forget his coarse clothing, and the smell of tar that hung about him—would remember nothing, through his soft melodies, but the kindly face, the gentle grey eyes, the bashful humour of the smile, half-hidden by the drooping moustache. There were still moments, however, when the angry blood would flush her cheeks; for she could not but feel that, in the struggle to win her child's interest, she had put herself on an equal footing with this peasant, in his own field, and the peasant had won.
But, day after day, the trees murmured overhead, and evening lit the stars in the dark blue of the sky and poured soft, blue-black shadow over the earth; and, day after day, Iochim's songs poured their warm melancholy into the young mother's heart. More and more, she submitted to their power; more and more, she learned to understand the secret of their simple, unaffected, untainted poetry.