Aksinia stood by the haycock adjusting her kerchief, steam rising from her.
‘We’re not lost, but I’m all but frozen,’ she answered.
‘Look, woman, there’s a haycock, warm yourself,’ the old man told her.
Aksinia smiled as she stooped to pick up the sack.
From Tatarsk to Sietrakov – the training-camp centre – it was some forty miles. Piotra Melekhov and Stepan Astakhov rode in the same covered wagon. With them were three others from their village: Fiodot Bodovskov, a young Kalmik-faced and pock-marked cossack, Christonia Tokin, a second reservist in the Ataman’s regiment of lifeguards, and the artilleryman Ivan Tomilin. After the first halt for food they harnessed Christonia’s and Astakhov’s horses into the wagon, and the other horses were tethered behind. Christonia, strong and crack-brained like all the men of the Ataman’s regiment, took the reins. He sat in front with bowed back, shading the light from the interior of the wagon, urging on the horses with his deep, rumbling bass voice. Piotra, Stepan, and Tomilin lay smoking under the tightly-stretched tarpaulin cover, Bodovskov walked behind.
Christonia’s wagon led the way. Behind trailed seven or eight others, leading saddled and unsaddled horses behind them. The road was noisy with laughter, shouts, songs, the snorting of horses, and the jingling of empty stirrups.
Under Piotra’s head was his bag of biscuit. He lay, twirling his tawny whiskers.
‘Stepan!’ he said.
‘Ah?’
‘Let’s have a song.’
‘It’s too hot. My mouth’s all dried out.’
‘There are no taverns anywhere near. So don’t wait for that!’
‘Well, sing up. Only you’re no good at it. Your Grishka now, he can sing. His isn’t a voice, it’s a pure silver thread.’
Stepan threw back his head, coughed, and began in a low, tuneful voice:
‘Hey, the ruddy, flushing sunrise
Early came up in the sky.’
Tomilin put his palm against his cheek and caught up the refrain in a thin, wailing undertone. Smiling, Piotra watched the little knots of veins on his temples going blue with his efforts.
‘Young was she, the little woman
Went for water to the stream.’
Stepan, who was lying with his head towards Christonia, turned round on his elbow:
‘Christonia, join in!’ he ordered.
‘And the lad, he guessed her purpose,
Saddled he his chestnut mare.’
Stepan turned his smiling glance towards Piotra, and Piotra added his voice. Opening wide his heavily bearded jaws, Christonia roared in a voice that shook the tarpaulin cover.
‘Saddled he his chestnut mare,
Overtook the little woman.’
Christonia set his bare foot against the cross-tree and waited for Piotra to begin again. Closing his eyes, his perspiring face in shadow, Stepan affably sang on, now dropping his voice to a whisper, then causing it to ring out metallically.
‘Let me, let me, little woman,
Water my mare in the stream.’
And again Christonia joined in with his alarming howl. Voices from the neighbouring wagons took up the song. The wheels clashed on their iron frames, the horses snorted with the dust. A white-winged peewit flew up from the parching steppe. It flew with a cry into a hollow, watching the chain of wagons, the horses kicking up clouds of white dust with their hoofs, the men, in white, dusty shirts, walking at the edge of the road.
Stepan stood up on the wagon, holding the tarpaulin with one hand, beating a rough time with the other, and sang on; Fiodot Bodovskov whistled; the horses strained at the traces; leaning out of the wagon, Piotra laughed and waved his cap; Stepan, gleaming with a dazzling smile, impudently swung his shoulders; along the road the dust rolled in a cloud. Christonia jumped out of the wagon in his unbelted, over-long shirt, his hair matted, and, wet with sweat, did the Cossack dance, whirling in a swinging circle, frowning and groaning, and leaving the monstrous, spreading marks of his bare feet in the silky-grey dust.
They stopped for the night by a barrow with a sandy summit. Clouds gathered from the west. Rain dripped out of their black wings. The horses were watered at a pond. Above the dyke dismal willows bowed before the wind. In the water, covered with stagnant duckweed and scaled with miserable little ripples, the lightning was distortedly reflected. The wind scattered the raindrops as though showering largesse into the earth’s swarthy palms.
The fettered horses were turned out to graze, three men being appointed as guards. The other men lit fires and hung pots on the cross-trees of the wagons.
Christonia was cooking millet. As he stirred it with a spoon, he told a story to the cossacks sitting around:
‘The barrow was high, like this one. And I says to my dead father: “Won’t the Ataman stop us for digging up the barrow without his being asked?”’
‘What is he lying about?’ asked Stepan, as he came back from the horses.
‘I’m telling how me and my dead father looked for treasure. It was the Merkulov barrow. Well, and father says: “Come on, Christonia, we’ll dig up the Merkulov barrow.” He’d heard from his father that treasure was buried in it. Father promised God: “Give me the treasure, and I’ll build a fine church.” So we agreed and off we went. It was on common land, so only the Ataman could stop us. We arrived late in the afternoon. We waited until nightfall and then set to work with shovels at the crown. We began to dig straight down from the top. We’d dug a hole six feet deep; the earth was like stone. I was wet through. Father kept on muttering prayers, but believe me, brothers, my belly was grumbling so much … You know what we eat in summer: sour milk and kvas. My dead father, he says: “Pfooh!” he says, “Christan, you’re a heathen. Here am I praying, and you can’t keep your food down. I can’t breathe for the stink. Crawl out of the barrow, you … or I’ll split your head open with the shovel. Through you the treasure may sink into the ground.” I lay outside the barrow and suffer with my belly, and my dead father – a strong man he was – goes on digging alone. And he digs down to a stone plate. He calls me. I push a crowbar under it, and lift it up. Believe me, brothers, it was a moonlight night, and under this plate was such a shine …’
‘Now you are lying, Christonia,’ Piotra broke in, smiling and tugging at his whiskers.
‘How am I lying? Go to the devil, and to the devil’s dam!’ Christonia gave a hitch to his broad-bottomed trousers and glanced around his hearers. ‘No, I’m not lying. It’s God’s truth! There it shone. I look, and it’s charcoal. Some forty bushels of it. Father says: “Crawl in, Christan, and dig it up.” I dig out this rubbish. I went on digging till daylight. In the morning, I look, and he … there he is.’
‘Who?’ asked Tomilin.
‘Why, the Ataman, who else? He happens to come driving by. “Who gave you permission?” and all the rest of it. He lays hold of us and hauls us off to the village. We were called before the court at Kaminskaya the year before last, but father, he guessed what was coming, and managed to die beforehand. We wrote back saying he was not among the living.’
Christonia took his pot with the boiling millet and went to the wagon for spoons.
‘Well, what of your father? He promised to build a church; didn’t he do it?’ Stepan asked, when he returned.
‘You’re a fool, Stepan. What could he build with coal?’
‘Once he promised he ought to have done it.’
‘There was no agreement whatever about coal, and the treasure …’ The flames of the fire shook with the laughter that arose. Christonia raised his head from the pot, and not understanding what the laughter was about, drowned all the rest with his heavy roar.
Aksinia was seventeen when she was given in marriage to Stepan Astakhov. She came from the village of Dubrovka, from the sands on the other side of the Don.
About a year before her marriage she was ploughing in the steppe some five miles from the village. In the night her father, a man of some fifty years, tied her hands an
d raped her.
‘I’ll kill you if you breathe a word, but if you keep quiet I’ll buy you a plush jacket and gaiters with goloshes. Remember, I’ll kill you if you …’ he promised her.
Aksinia ran back through the night in her torn petticoat to the village. She flung herself at her mother’s feet and sobbed out the whole story. Her mother and elder brother harnessed horses into the wagon, made Aksinia get in with them, and drove to the father. Her brother almost drove the horses to death in the five miles. They found the old man close to the field camp. He was lying in a drunken sleep on his overcoat, with an empty vodka bottle by his side. Before Aksinia’s eyes her brother unhooked the swing-tree from the wagon, picked up his father by the feet, curtly asked him a question or two and struck him a blow with the iron-shod swing-tree between the eyes. He and his mother went on beating steadily for an hour and a half. The ageing and always meek mother frenziedly tore at her senseless husband’s hair, the brother used his feet. Aksinia lay under the wagon, her head covered, silently shaking. They carried her father home just before dawn. He lay bellowing mournfully, his eyes wandering around the room, seeking for Aksinia, who had hidden herself away. Blood and matter ran from his torn ear on to the pillow. Towards evening he died. They told the neighbours he had fallen from the wagon.
Within a year the matchmakers came on a gaily bedecked wagonette to ask for Aksinia’s hand. The tall, stiff-necked and well-proportioned Stepan approved of his future bride, and the wedding was fixed for the autumn.
The day was frosty and ringingly icy. Aksinia was installed as young mistress of the Astakhov household. The morning after the festivities her mother-in-law, a tall old woman doubled up with some female complaint, woke Aksinia up, led her into the kitchen, and aimlessly shifting things about, said to her:
‘Now, dear little daughter, we’ve taken you not for love, nor for you to lie abed. Go and milk the cows, and then get some food ready. I’m old and feeble. You must take over the household, it will all fall on you.’
The same day Stepan took his young wife into the barn and beat her deliberately and terribly. He beat her on the belly, the breast and the back, taking care that the marks should not be visible to others. After that he neglected her, kept company with flighty grass-widows and went out almost every night, first locking Aksinia into the barn or the room.
For eighteen months, so long as there was no child, he would not forgive her his disgrace. Then he was quieter, but was niggardly with caresses and rarely spent the night at home.
The large farm with its numerous cattle burdened Aksinia with work; Stepan was lazy and went off to smoke, to play cards, to learn the latest news, and Aksinia had to do everything. Her mother-in-law was a poor help. After bustling around a little she would drop on to the bed, and with lips tight-drawn and eyes gazing agonizedly at the ceiling, would lie groaning, rolled into a bundle. Throwing down her work, Aksinia would hide in a corner and stare at her mother-in-law’s face in fear and pity.
The old woman died some eighteen months after the marriage. In the morning Aksinia was taken in travail, and about noon, an hour or so before the child’s entry into the world, the grandmother dropped dead by the stable door. The midwife ran out to warn tipsy Stepan not to go into the bedroom, and saw the old woman lying with her legs tucked up beneath her. After the birth of the child, Aksinia devoted herself to her husband, but she had no feeling for him, only bitter womanly pity and force of habit. The child died within the year. The old life was resumed. And when Gregor Melekhov crossed Aksinia’s path she realized with terror that she was attracted to the swarthy youngster. He waited on her stubbornly, with bulldog insistence. She saw that he was not afraid of Stepan, she felt that he would not hold back because of him, and without consciously desiring it, resisting the feeling with all her might, she noticed that on Sundays and week-days she was attiring herself more carefully. Making pretexts to herself, she sought to place herself more frequently in his path. She was happy to find Gregor’s black eyes caressing her heavily and rapturously. When she awoke of a morning and went to milk the cows she smiled, and without realizing why, recalled: ‘Today’s a happy day. But why …? Oh, Gregor … Grishka.’ She was frightened by the new feeling which filled her, and in her thoughts she went gropingly, cautiously, as though crossing the Don over the broken ice of March.
After seeing Stepan off to camp she decided to see Gregor as little as possible. After the fishing expedition her decision was still further strengthened.
Chapter Four
Some two days before Trinity the distribution of the village meadowland took place. Pantaleimon attended the allotment. He came back at dinner-time, threw off his boots with a groan, and noisily scratching his weary legs, announced:
‘Our portion lies close to the Red Cliff. Not over-good grass as grass goes. The upper part runs up to the forest, it’s just scrub in places. And speargrass coming through.’
‘When shall we do the mowing?’ Gregor asked.
‘After the holidays.’
The old wife opened the oven door with a clatter, and drew out the warmed-up cabbage soup. Pantaleimon sat over the meal a long time, telling of the day’s events, and of the knavish Ataman, who had all but swindled the whole assembly of cossacks.
‘But who’s going to do the raking and stacking, dad?’ Dunia asked timidly. ‘I can’t do it all by myself.’
‘We’ll ask Aksinia Astakhova. Stepan asked us to mow for him.’
Two mornings later Mitka Korshunov rode on his white-legged stallion up to the Melekhov yard. A fine rain was falling. A heavy mist hung over the village. Mitka leant out of his saddle, opened the wicket and rode in. The old wife called to him from the steps:
‘Hey, you rapscallion, what do you want?’ she asked with evident dissatisfaction in her voice. The old lady had no love for the desperate and quarrelsome Mitka.
‘And what do you want, Ilinichna?’ Mitka said in surprise as he tied his horse to the balustrade of the steps. ‘I want Gregor. Where is he?’
‘He’s asleep under the shed. But have you had a stroke? Have you lost the use of your legs that you must ride?’
‘You’re always sticking in your spoke, old lady!’ Mitka took umbrage. Smacking an elegant whip against the legs of his polished boots, he went to look for Gregor, and found him asleep in a cart. Screwing up his left eye as though taking aim, Mitka tugged at Gregor’s hair.
‘Get up, peasant!’
‘Peasant’ was the most abusive word Mitka could think of using. Gregor jumped up as though on springs.
‘What do you want?’ he demanded.
Mitka sat down on the side of the cart, and scraping the dried mud off his boots with a stick, he said:
‘I’ve been insulted, Grishka.’
‘Well?’
‘You see, it’s …’ Mitka cursed heavily. ‘He’s a troop commander, he says.’ He threw out the words angrily, not opening his mouth, his legs trembling. Gregor got up.
‘What troop commander?’
Seizing him by the sleeve, Mitka said more quietly:
‘Saddle your horse at once, and come to the meadows. I’ll show him! I said to him: “Come on, your excellency, and we’ll see.” “Bring all your friends and comrades,” he said, “I’ll beat the lot of you. The mother of my mare took prizes at the officers’ hurdle-races at Petersburg.” What are his mare and mother to me? Curse them! I won’t let them outrace my stallion!’
Gregor hastily dressed. Choking with wrath Mitka hurried him up.
‘He has come on a visit to the Mokhovs. Wait, what is his name? Listnitsky, I think. He’s stout and serious-looking and wears glasses. Well, and let him! His glasses won’t help him; I won’t let him catch my stallion!’
With a laugh, Gregor saddled the old mare and, to avoid meeting his father, rode out to the steppe through the threshing-floor gate. They rode to the field at the top of the hill. Close to a withered ash horsemen were awaiting them: the officer Listnitsky on a clean-limbed, handsome
mare, and seven of the village lads mounted bareback.
‘Where shall we start from?’ the officer turned to Mitka, adjusting his pince-nez and admiring the stallion’s powerful chest muscles.
‘From the ash to the Tsar’s lake.’
‘Where is the Tsar’s lake?’ Listnitsky screwed up his eyes short-sightedly.
‘There, your excellency, close to the forest.’
They lined up the horses. The officer raised his whip above his head.
‘When I say three. All right? One … two … three.’
Listnitsky got away first, pressing close to the saddle-bow, holding his cap on with his hand. For a second he led all the rest. Mitka, with face desperately pale, rose in his stirrups – to Gregor he seemed insufferably slow in bringing the whip down on the croup of his stallion.
It was some two miles to the Tsar’s lake. Stretched into an arrow, Mitka’s stallion caught up with Listnitsky’s mare when half the course had been covered. Left behind from the very beginning, Gregor trotted along, watching the straggling chain of riders.
By the Tsar’s lake was a sandy hillock, washed up through the ages. Its yellow camel-hump was overgrown with sandwort. Gregor saw the officer and Mitka gallop up the hillock and disappear over the brow together, the others following. When he reached the lake the horses were already standing in a group around Listnitsky. Mitka was sleek with restrained delight, his every movement was expressive of triumph. Contrary to his expectation, the officer seemed not at all disconcerted. He stood with his back against a tree, smoking a cigarette, and said, pointing to his foam-flecked horse:
‘I’ve raced her a hundred and twenty miles. I rode over from the station only yesterday. If she were fresh, you’d never overtake me, Korshunov.’
‘Maybe,’ Mitka said magnanimously.
Gregor and Mitka left the others and rode home around the hill. Listnitsky took a chilly leave of them, thrust two fingers under the peak of his cap and turned away.
As he was approaching the hut, Gregor saw Aksinia coming towards him. She was stripping a twig as she walked. When she noticed him she bent her head lower.