“Never mind, friend! They’ll heal again. You should spring more lightly. Like this!”
And Zhílin ran back and turned to the left up the hill towards the wood.
Kostílin still lagged behind, and groaned. Zhílin only said “Hush!” and went on and on.
They went up the hill and found a wood as Zhílin had said. They entered the wood and forced their way through the brambles, which tore their clothes. At last they came to a path and followed it.
“Stop!” They heard the tramp of hoofs on the path, and waited, listening. It sounded like the tramping of a horse’s feet, but then ceased. They moved on, and again they heard the tramping. When they paused, it also stopped. Zhílin crept nearer to it, and saw something standing on the path where it was not quite so dark. It looked like a horse, and yet not quite like one, and on it was something queer, not like a man. He heard it snorting. “What can it be?” Zhílin gave a low whistle, and off it dashed from the path into the thicket, and the woods were filled with the noise of crackling, as if a hurricane were sweeping through, breaking the branches.
Kostílin was so frightened that he sank to the ground. But Zhílin laughed and said: “It’s a stag. Don’t you hear him breaking the branches with his antlers? We were afraid of him, and he is afraid of us.”
They went on. The Great Bear was already setting. It was near morning, and they did not know whether they were going the right way or not. Zhílin thought it was the way he had been brought by the Tartars, and that they were still some seven miles from the Russian fort; but he had nothing certain to go by, and at night one easily mistakes the way. After a time they came to a clearing. Kostílin sat down and said: “Do as you like, I can go no farther! My feet won’t carry me.”