The train went roaring by little villages and great pasture stretches. The real journey had begun. They began to love the powerful engine. It was eating up the versts at a tremendous rate. They looked at each other from time to time and smiled like two children.
They came to Minsk, the biggest town they had ever seen. They looked out from the car windows at the miles of wooden buildings, at the big church of St. Catharine, and the woolen mills. Minsk would have frightened them if they hadn’t had the Dream. The farther they went from the little village on the Beresina the more courage the Dream gave to them.
On and on went the train, the wheels singing the song of the road. Fellow travelers asked them where they were going. “To America,” Ivan would answer.
“To America?” they would cry. “May the little saints guide you. It is a long way, and you will be lonely.”
“No, we shall not be lonely,” Ivan would say.
“No, we have no friends, but we have something that keeps us from being lonely.” And when Ivan would make that reply Anna would pat his hand and the questioner would wonder if it was a charm or a holy relic that the bright-eyed couple possessed.
They ran through Vilna, on through flat stretches of Courland to Libau, where they saw the sea. They sat and stared at it for a whole day, talking little but watching it with wide, wondering eyes. And they stared at the great ships that came rocking in from distant ports, their sides gray with the salt from the big combers which they had battled with.
No wonder this America of ours is big. We draw the brave ones from the old lands, the brave ones whose dreams are like the guiding sign that was given to the Israelites of old—a pillar of cloud by day, a pillar of fire by night.
The harbor master spoke to Ivan and Anna as they watched the restless waters.
“A long way. Three ships bound for America went down last month.”
The harbor master looked at the strange blue eyes of the giant, and spoke softly. “You have the eyes of a man who sees things,” he said. “There was a Norwegian sailor in the _White Queen_, who had eyes like yours, and he could see death.”
“I see life!” said Ivan boldly. “A free life——”
“Hush!” said the harbor master. “Do not speak so loud.” He walked swiftly away, but he dropped a ruble into Anna’s hand as he passed her by. “For luck,” he murmured. “May the little saints look after you on the big waters.”