Человек, который смеется / The Man Who Laughs. Уровень 4

As he arose he had a sensation of hearing some indistinct sound, but he could not be sure of it. It resembled a voice, a breath, a shadow. It was more human than animal. It was a sound, but the sound of a dream.

He looked, but saw nothing. He listened. Nothing. He still listened. All was silent. There was illusion in the mist.

He went on his way again. He walked forward at random[21 - at random – наугад], with nothing henceforth to guide him.

As he moved away the noise began again. It was a groan, almost a sob.

He turned. He searched the darkness of space with his eyes. He saw nothing. The sound arose once more.

Nothing so penetrating, so piercing, so feeble as the voice – for it was a voice. It was an appeal of suffering. The child fixed his attention everywhere, far, near, on high, below. There was no one. There was nothing. He listened. The voice arose again. He perceived it distinctly. The sound somewhat resembled the bleating of a lamb.

Then he was frightened.

The groan again. This was the fourth time. It was strangely miserable and plaintive. The child approached in the direction from whence the sound came. Still he saw nothing. He advanced again, watchfully.

The complaint continued. Inarticulate and confused as it was, it had become clear. The child was near the voice; but where was it?

Suddenly he perceived in the snow at his feet, a few steps before him, a sort of undulation of the dimensions of a human body. At the same time the voice cried out.

It was from beneath the undulation. The child bent down, crouching before the undulation, and with both his hands began to clear it away.

Beneath the snow which he removed a form grew under his hands; and suddenly in the hollow he had made there appeared a pale face. The cry had not proceeded from that face. Its eyes were shut, and the mouth open but full of snow.

It remained motionless; it stirred not under the hands of the child. The child, whose fingers were numbed with frost, shuddered when he touched its coldness.

It was that of a woman. The woman was dead.

The neck of the dead woman appeared; then her shoulders, clothed in rags. Suddenly he felt something move feebly under his touch. The child swiftly cleared away the snow, discovering a wretched little body. It was a little girl.

The girl was five or six months old, but perhaps she might be a year. The child took the infant in his arms.