“Why?” the driver asked crossly. “Can you really see a road? I know, I know: not your horses, not your sleigh—drive like a madman, you won’t have to pay!” I too had my doubts. “Yes,” I said, “what makes you so sure there’s a house nearby?” “Because the wind changed,” said the wayfarer, “and I smelt smoke. There’s a hamlet nearby.” The man’s alertness and his keen sense of smell astonished me. I ordered the driver to follow his directions. The horses trudged through the deep snow. The sleigh moved slowly forward, ploughing through drifts, sinking into hollows and rolling first to one side, then to the other. It was like being in a ship on a stormy sea. Savelich kept groaning; he was repeatedly thrown against me. I pulled down the matting that served as a curtain, wrapped myself in my fur coat and dozed off, lulled by the singing of the storm and the rocking of our slow progress.
I dreamed a dream I have never been able to forget and in which, when I compare it to the strange events of my life, I still see something prophetic. The reader will forgive me; probably he knows from experience how easily a man may surrender to superstition, however great his contempt for such foolishness.
I was in that mental and emotional state when reality, yielding to reverie, merges with it in the unclear visions of the beginning of sleep. I dreamed that the storm was still raging and that we were still lost on the snow-covered steppe. All of a sudden I saw a gateway, and I drove into the courtyard of our manor house. My first thought was that my father might be angered by my involuntary return and regard it as deliberate disobedience. Jumping down anxiously from the sleigh, I see my mother. She is coming out to meet me, a look of deep grief on her face. “Hush,” she says, “your father is mortally ill and wishes to say farewell to you.” I follow her fearfully into the bedroom. The room is dimly lit; around the bed are people with sad faces. I tiptoe up to the bed. Mother lifts a corner of the curtain and says, “Andrey Petrovich, Petrusha has come. He heard of your illness and turned back. Give him your blessing.” I kneel down and look at the sick man. But . . . instead of my father, I see a peasant with a black beard lying on the bed, looking up at me cheerfully. I turn to Mother in bewilderment and say, “What’s going on? This isn’t Father. Why should I ask a peasant for his blessing?” “Never mind, Petrusha,” says Mother. “He’s taking Father’s place at your wedding. Kiss his hand and let him give you his blessing.” I refuse. Then the peasant jumps out of bed, draws the ax that was tucked into his belt behind him and begins swinging it about in all directions. I want to run and I can’t; the room fills with dead bodies; I stumble against the bodies and slip in pools of blood. The terrible peasant calls out to me gently, “Don’t be frightened. Come and receive my blessing.” Horror and bewilderment overwhelm me. At that moment I awoke. The horses had stopped; Savelich was tugging me by the arm and saying, “Get out, sir, we’ve arrived.”
“Arrived where?” I asked, rubbing my eyes.
“At an inn. By the grace of God we knocked up against the fence. Hurry up, master. Get out of the sleigh and into the warm.”
I got out of the sleigh. The storm still raged but with less force. It was pitch dark. The innkeeper met us at the gate, holding a lantern under the skirt of his coat, and led me into a room that was small but fairly clean; it was lit by a pinewood torch. On the wall hung a rifle and a tall Cossack hat.
The innkeeper, a Yaik Cossack, [1] was probably about sixty, still hale and hearty. Savelich brought in the provisions chest and asked for a fire to be made up so he could prepare some tea, which I felt I had never needed more. The innkeeper went off to attend to this.
“But where’s our guide?” I asked Savelich.
“Here, your Honor,” replied a voice from above. I looked up at the bed-shelf over the stove and saw a black beard and two glittering eyes. “Cold, brother?” I asked. “How could I not be cold, with only this thin coat? To be honest with you, I once had a sheepskin but I pawned it last night in a tavern. The frost didn’t seem so fierce then.” The innkeeper came in with a boiling samovar; [2] I offered our guide a cup of tea and he climbed down from the shelf. His appearance was striking. He looked about forty; he was lean, broad-shouldered, and of medium height. There were streaks of grey in his black beard; his large, lively eyes were never still. His face was attractive but roguish. His hair had been cut in a bowl cut; he wore a ragged coat and loose Tatar trousers. I handed him a cup of tea; he tasted it and made a wry face. “Do me a favor, your Honor; tell them to bring me some vodka. Tea’s no drink for us Cossacks.” I gladly did as he asked. The innkeeper took a glass and a square quart bottle from the dresser, went up to him and, looking him in the eye, said, “Aha! You again! Where’ve you been all this time?” My guide gave a knowing wink and answered enigmatically, “I flew around the garden, pecked seed after seed. Granny threw a stone at me, but missed my head. Well, and how are your folk?” “Our folk?” the innkeeper replied in the same vein. “They were going to ring for vespers, but the priest’s wife forbade it. The priest’s out on a visit, there’s devils in the graveyard.” “Hold your tongue, man,” said my wanderer. “If there’s rain, there’ll be mushrooms; if there’s mushrooms, there’ll be a basket. But for now,” (here he gave another wink) “hide your axe behind your back—the forester’s about . . . Your Honor! Here’s to your good health!” With these words he raised his glass, crossed himself, and knocked back his vodka. Then he bowed to me and returned to the shelf above the stove.
At the time I understood nothing of this thieves’ cant, but I realized later that they had been talking about the Yaik Cossacks; their revolt of 1772 had only recently been put down.[3] Savelich listened with an air of deep disapproval, glancing suspiciously now at the innkeeper, now at our guide. The inn—though they called it by some more outlandish word of their own—was in the middle of the steppe, a long way from anywhere, and uncommonly like a brigands’ den. But there was nothing for it. Continuing on our way was out of the question. Anyway, I was amused by Savelich’s anxieties. I readied myself for the night and lay down on a bench. Savelich decided to sleep on top of the stove; the innkeeper lay down on the floor. Very soon the whole room was snoring and I fell fast asleep.
Waking rather late the next morning, I saw that the storm had passed. The sun shone; the snow on the vast steppe was like a dazzling shroud. The horses were harnessed. I settled up with the innkeeper, who asked for such a modest sum that not even Savelich could object or haggle in his usual way. He seemed to have quite forgotten his suspicions of the evening before. I called our guide, thanked him for his help and told Savelich to tip him half a ruble. Savelich frowned. “Fifty kopeks so he can buy more vodka!” he said. “Why? Because we’ve been so kind as to drive the man to an inn? As you like, sir, but we don’t have fifty kopeks to throw away. If we hand out tips like that to everyone we meet, we’ll soon be going hungry ourselves.” I could not argue with Savelich. I had given my word that our money would be at his disposal. It was annoying, however, to be prevented from showing my gratitude to a man who had saved us, if not from disaster, at least from a very unpleasant predicament. “Very well,” I said calmly. “If you don’t want to give him fifty kopeks, then give him something of mine to wear. He has no warm clothes. Give him my hare-skin coat.”
“Mercy on us, Pyotr Andreich!” said Savelich. “Your hare-skin coat! He’ll trade it for vodka, the dog, at the first tavern he comes to.”
“Maybe I will and maybe I won’t,” said my vagabond, “but that’s no concern of yours, old man. His Honor is minded to favor me with a fur coat from off his own back. That is his gentle pleasure, while your duty as a serf is to hold your peace and obey.”
“Have you no fear of God, you brigand?” Savelich retorted angrily. “The child can’t yet think straight, so you want to rob him, just because he’s so young. What do you want with a nobleman’s coat? It won’t even stretch across your hulking great shoulders.”
“Please don’t try to be clever,” I said to my old tutor. “Bring me the coat at once.”
/> “Dear God Almighty!” groaned my Savelich. “That coat’s as good as new. To give it to a drunkard—to a tramp and a drunkard!”
But the hare-skin coat was produced. The peasant tried it on there and then. The coat, which even I had outgrown, was indeed rather tight on him. All the same, he managed to get it on, ripping some of the seams. Savelich almost howled as he heard the threads snap. The vagabond was extremely pleased with my gift. He saw me to the sleigh and said with a low bow, “Thank you, your Honor! May the Lord reward you for your kindness. Never shall I forget your charity.” He went on his own way—and we set off. I ignored Savelich’s irritation and in no time at all I had entirely forgotten the snowstorm, my guide, and the hare-skin coat.
As soon as we reached Orenburg, I presented myself to the general. He was tall, but bent with age. His long hair was entirely white. His old, faded uniform made him look like a warrior from the days of the Empress Anna Ioannovna, [4] and he spoke with a strong German accent. I gave him the letter. On hearing me pronounce my father’s name, he shot me a swift look. “Mein Gott!” he said. “Only ze ozer day Andrey Petrovich vass your age, and now he hass such a fine young lad. Ach, how time fly!” He unsealed the letter and began to read it in an undertone: “Gracious Sir, Andrey Karlovich, I hope that your Excellency (Ach, how ceremonious ve are. I vonder he iz not ashamed. Discipline, of course, iz discipline, but iz zis ze vay to an old Kamerad to write?) that your Excellency will not have forgotten (Hm . . .) and . . . under the late Field Marshal Münnich . . . and little Karolinka . . . (Ach, bruder! Zo shtill he our old escapades remembers!) But now to business . . . my young rascal to your care (Hm . . .) Hold the boy with hedgehog gloves (Vot is zeze hedgehog gloves? Must be a Rusland zayink.)” And turning to me, he repeated, “Vot is zeze hedgehog gloves?”
“To hold with hedgehog gloves,” I replied in as innocent as possible a tone of voice. “It means: to treat someone gently, not to be too severe with them, to give them a free rein.”
“(Hm . . . I see . . .) And not give him too free a rein. (Zeze hedgehog gloves does not mean vot you say . . .) Herewith . . . his passport. (But vere is it? Ach, here is it.) And notify the Semyonov regiment. (Very goot, very goot, all shall be done.) Allow me, forgetting your rank, to embrace you as an old friend and comrade. (Ach, at last . . .) And so on, and so on . . . Vell, young sir,” he said, after he had finished the letter and put my passport to one side, “all shall be done. You vill be transferred, as an officer, to ze regiment and, not to lose time, you may leave tomorrow for Fort Belogorsk, vere you vill be under ze command of Captain Mironov, a kind and honorable man. Zere you vill see service and learn discipline. Zere is nothink you in Orenburg to keep; dissipation is harmful to a young man. Zis evening I invite you to dine viz me.”
“From bad to worse!” I said to myself. “I was a Guards sergeant when I was still in the womb—and look at me now! On my way to the regiment and a remote fortress on the edge of the Kirghiz steppe!” I dined with the general and his elderly adjutant. His table was governed by strict German parsimony, and I suspect that the speed with which he dispatched me to Belogorsk may have been occasioned, at least in part, by a fear of having to share some of his bachelor meals with an unwanted guest. The following day I took my leave of him and set out for this steppe fortress.
3. THE FORTRESS
Bread and water is our fare
In this fortress bleak and bare.
But if foes come, never fear,
We shall greet them with good cheer.
With powder, bullet, shot, and shell
We shall feast them, feast them well.
—OLD SONG [1]
Old-fashioned people, dear sir!
—DENIS FONVIZIN [2]
FORT BELOGORSK lay about twenty-five miles from Orenburg. The road ran along the steep bank of the Yaik. The river had not yet frozen over and, between monotonous banks covered in white snow, its leaden waters looked black and dismal. Beyond the river stretched the Kirghiz steppe. I was sunk deep in my thoughts, which were for the main part gloomy. Garrison life held few attractions for me. I tried to picture Captain Mironov, the fortress commandant, and the image that came to mind was of a stern, short-tempered old man, blind to everything beyond his army duties and ready to arrest me and put me on a diet of bread and water for the most trifling offence. Meanwhile, it was growing dark. We were going quite fast. “Is it much further to the fortress?” I asked my driver. “No,” he replied. “Look—there it is!” I looked all around, expecting to see menacing bastions, towers and a rampart—but there was only a small village encircled by a log palisade. On one side stood three or four hayricks, half buried under snow; on the other—a crooked windmill, its bast sails sagging idly. “But where’s the fortress?” I asked in surprise. “Here!” said the driver, pointing in front of him as we entered the village. By the gate I saw an ancient cast-iron cannon; the lanes were narrow and crooked; the houses were squat, most of them thatched.[3] I asked to be taken to the commandant, and a moment later our sleigh drew up before a small wooden house built on some high ground beside a wooden church.
No one came out to meet me. I went inside, then opened the door to the anteroom. An old soldier was sitting cross-legged on a table, sewing a blue patch onto the elbow of a green uniform. I told him to announce my arrival. “Our folk are at home,” he replied. “Go on in, sir.” I went into a clean little room, furnished in an old-fashioned style. In one corner stood a crockery cupboard; on the wall hung an officer’s commission, framed and glazed; beside it were some popular wood-cuts, depicting in bright colors “The Capture of Küstrin” and “The Capture of Ochakov”[4] as well as “Choosing a Bride” and “The Cat’s Funeral.”[5] An old woman in a quilted jerkin and with a scarf over her head was sitting by the window. She was winding some yarn that a one-eyed old man in an officer’s uniform held stretched between his hands. “What can we do for you, dear sir?” she asked, continuing with her work. I replied that I had been posted to the fortress and wished to report to the commandant. Taking the one-eyed man for the commandant, I was about to begin the speech I had prepared when the mistress of the house said, “Ivan Kuzmich is out. He’s gone to visit Father Gerasim, but never mind, dear sir, I am his wife and you are most welcome. Please sit down.” She called a maid and asked her to fetch the sergeant. The old man kept looking at me inquisitively with his one eye. “May I be so bold,” he said, “as to ask in which regiment it was your pleasure to serve?” I satisfied his curiosity. “And may I also ask,” he went on, “why it was your pleasure to be transferred from the Guards to a fortress garrison?” I replied that this had been the wish of my superiors. “For conduct unbecoming an officer of the Guards, I assume?” my interrogator continued. “That’s enough of your chatter,” said the captain’s wife. “You can see the young man’s tired from his journey; let him be. And keep your hands straight! And you, sir,” she said, turning to me, “don’t grieve that you’ve been packed off to this far-flung corner of ours. You’re not the first and you won’t be the last. And who knows—you might even grow to like it! Alexey Ivanovich Shvabrin has been with us nearly five years now; he was sent here for manslaughter. Heaven knows what possessed him. He rode out of town, you see, with some lieutenant or other. They’d both brought their swords along and they started jabbing away at each other—and Alexey Ivanovich went and ran the lieutenant through in the presence of two witnesses. Well, there you are—we’re none of us free from sin.”
The sergeant, a well-built young Cossack, came into the room. “Maximich!” said the captain’s wife. “Find quarters for this officer—and mind they’re nice and clean!” “Certainly, Vasilisa Yegorovna,” replied the sergeant. “Shall I take him to Ivan Polezhaev’s?” “What’s do you mean, Maximich?” said the captain’s wife. “It’s crowded enough there already. Besides, Ivan’s a good friend—and he doesn’t give himself airs. Take the officer—please tell me your name, my dear sir! Pyotr Andreich?—take Pyotr Andreich to Semyon Kuzov. He let
his horse into my vegetable garden, the rascal! And how are things otherwise, Maximich? Everything all right?”
“Everything’s quiet, thank the Lord!” replied the Cossack. “Except that Corporal Prokhorov had a set-to with Ustinya Negulina in the bathhouse, over a pail of hot water.”
“Ivan Ignatich!” said the captain’s wife, turning to the one-eyed old man. “Look into this Prokhorov and Ustinya business and find out which of them is to blame. Then punish them both. Well, Maximich, off you go now. Pyotr Andreich, Maximich will accompany you to your quarters.”
I took my leave. The sergeant led me to a hut high on the riverbank, at the very edge of the village. The hut was tidy and consisted of one room, divided by a partition. Semyon Kuzov and his family occupied one half; the other was allotted to me. Savelich began to sort out our belongings; I looked out of the narrow window. Dismal steppe stretched out before me. Almost opposite stood a few huts; some hens were wandering about the street. An old woman was standing by her front door, holding a tub and calling to her pigs, which were grunting affably in reply. And this was where I was condemned to spend my youth! I was overcome by melancholy. I turned from the window and went to bed without any supper, despite the entreaties of Savelich, who kept repeating in tones of deep distress, “Lord Almighty! He’s refusing to eat! What will the mistress say if the child’s taken ill?”
The next morning I was beginning to dress when the door opened and a young officer came in. He was short and swarthy, his face ugly but very animated. “Pardon me,” he said in French, “for calling on you without ceremony. I learned yesterday of your arrival. I was so overwhelmed by the desire to set eyes on a human face that I couldn’t restrain myself. When you’ve been here a little longer, you’ll know what I mean.” I realized that this must be the officer transferred from the Guards for dueling. We introduced ourselves. Shvabrin was clearly not stupid. His conversation was witty and entertaining. He gave me the most spirited description of the commandant’s family and social circle, and of the region to which fate had brought me. I was laughing heartily when the old soldier, the veteran who had been mending his uniform in the commandant’s anteroom, came in and said that Vasilisa Yegorovna would like me to have lunch with her and her husband. Shvabrin offered to go with me.