He paced slowly along the edge of the valley. His feet sank in the dust. He could hear the wood-shavings and pieces of paper rustle and crackle as he walked. An open part of the ground, not yet encumbered with rubbish, led away into the valley like a narrow tongue of land. He went to the end of it, and there sat down. Here the air was fresher, and as his eyes travelled along the gully, they rested far off on the steely ribbon of the river. The lights of invisible vessels glimmered on the water, which seemed as still as ice, and one light swayed, like a red speck, in the air. Another glowed steadily, green and foreboding, without rays; and at his feet, full of mist, the wide throat of the valley seemed itself like the bed of a stream, wherein black air-waves rolled noiselessly. Deep melancholy fell on Ilya's heart. He looked down and thought, "A moment ago I felt full of courage, light, and happy, and now it's all gone again. Why does life drive a man on and on against his will, where he has no desire to go? Everything in life is so oppressive and heavy, full of injustice, full of perplexity! Perhaps Jakov is right--men must first of all understand themselves, how they live and by what laws?" He remembered how strange, almost hostile, Jakov had been towards him to-day, and he grew more sorrowful as he remembered. Suddenly there was a noise in the valley, a mass of earth had loosened and rolled down. The damp night wind breathed on Ilya's face; he looked up to the sky. The stars burned shyly, and over the wood the great red ball of the moon heaved slowly up, like a huge, pitiless eye. And like the bat through the twilight, dark images and memories fluttered through Ilya's soul. They came and went without solving the riddles that oppressed him, and denser and heavier grew the darkness over his heart. "Men rob and torment and strangle one another, and no one dreams of making life easier for his fellows, but each watches only for a chance to fight his way out and rest in a peaceful corner. I, too, am seeking for such a corner, and where is the Truth and Reality and Steadfastness in this life?" He sat a long time there, thinking, looking now at the sky, now at the valley. All was still in the fields. The moonlight looking into the dark gully, showed its clefts and the bushes on its slopes, that threw vague shadows on the ground. The sky was pure and clear, nothing showed but the moon and stars. A cold shiver ran through Ilya, he got up and went slowly to the town, whose lights gleamed in the distance. He had no further wish to think at all. His breast was now filled with cold indifference.