CHAPTER II
THE SCHOOL-HOUSE
The greater part of the next day was spent by us in the little town ofS----, a comfortable place very slightly disturbed by the fact that ithad been already the scene of four battles; there was just thiseffect, as it seemed to me, that the affairs of the day were carriedon with a kind of somnolent indifference.... "You may order yourveal," the waiter seemed to say, "but whether you will get it or no isentirely in the hands of God. It is, therefore, of no avail that Ishould hurry or that you should show temper should the veal notappear. At any moment your desire for veal and my ability to bring ityou may have ceased for ever."
For the rest the town billowed with trees of the youngest green; alsobirds of the tenderest age, if one may judge by their happiness at thespring weather. There were many old men in white smocks and whitetrousers and women in brightly-coloured kerchiefs. But, except for theyoung birds, it was a silent place.
I had much business to carry through and saw the rest of our companyonly at luncheon time; it was after luncheon that I had a littleconversation with Marie Ivanovna. She chose me quite deliberately fromthe others, moved our chairs to the quieter end of the little balconywhere we were, planted her elbows on the table and stared into my facewith her large round credulous eyes. (I find on looking back, that Ihave already used exactly those adjectives. That may stand: I meanthat, emphatically, and beyond every other impression she made, hergaze declared that she was ready to believe anything that she weretold, and the more in the telling the better.)
She spoke, as always, with that sense of restrained, sharplydisciplined excitement, as though her eager vitality were somesplendid if ferocious animal struggling at its chain.
"You talked to John--Mr. Trenchard--last night," she said.
"Yes," I said, smiling into her eyes.
"I know--all night--he told me. He's splendid, isn't he? Splendid!"
"I like him very much," I answered.
"Ah! you must! you must! You must all like him! You don't know--histhoughts, his ideals--they are wonderful. He's like some knight of theMiddle Ages.... Ah, but you'll think that silly, Mr. Durward. You're apractical Englishman. I hate practical Englishmen."
"Thank you," I said, laughing.
"No, but I do. You sneer at everything beautiful. Here in Russia we'remore simple. And John's very like a Russian in many ways. Don't youthink he is?"
"I haven't known him long enough--" I began.
"Ah, you don't like him! I see you don't.... No, it's no use yoursaying anything. He isn't English enough for you, that's what it is.You think him unpractical, unworldly. Well, so he is. Do you think I'dever be engaged to an ordinary Englishman? I'd die of ennui in a week.Oh! yes, I would. But you like John, really, don't you?"
"I tell you that I do," I answered, "but really, after only twodays--"
"Ah! that's so English! So cautious! How I hate your caution! Whycan't you say at once that you haven't made up your mind abouthim--because that's the truth, isn't it? I wish he would not sitthere, looking at me, and not talking to the others. He ought to talkto them, but he's afraid that they'll laugh at his Russian. It's notvery good, his Russian, is it? I can't help laughing myselfsometimes!"
_Her_ English was extremely good. Sometimes she used a word in itswrong sense; she had one or two charming little phrases of her own:"What a purpose to?" instead of: "Why?" and sometimes a doublenegative. She rolled her r's more than is our habit.
I said, looking straight into her eyes:
"It's a tremendous thing to him, his having you. I can see thatalthough I've known him so short a time. He's a very lucky manand--and--if his luck were to go, I think that he'd simply die. There!That isn't a very English thing to have said, is it?"
"Why did you say it?" she cried sharply. "You don't trust me. Youthink--"
"I think nothing," I answered. "Only he's not like ordinary men. He'sso much younger than his age."
She gave me then the strangest look. The light seemed suddenly to dieout of her face; her eyes sought mine as though for help. There weretears in them.
"Oh! I do want to be good to him!" she whispered. Then got up abruptlyand joined the others.
Late in the afternoon an automobile arrived and carried off most ofour party. I was compelled to remain for several hours, and intendedto drive, looking forward indeed to the long quiet silence of thespring evening. Moved by some sudden impulse I suggested to Trenchardthat he should wait and drive with me: "The car will be verycrowded," I said, "and I think too that you'd like to see some of thecountry properly. It's a lovely evening--only thirty versts.... Willyou wait and come with me?"
He agreed at once; he had been, all day, very quiet, watching, withthat rather clumsy expression of his, the expression of a dog who hadbeen taught by his master some tricks which he had half-forgotten andwould presently be expected to remember.
When I made my suggestion he flung one look at Marie Ivanovna. She wasbusied over some piece of luggage, and half-turned her head, smilingat him:
"Ah, do go, John--yes? We will be so cr-rowded.... It will be verynice for you driving."
I fancied that I heard him sigh. He tried to help the ladies withtheir luggage, handed them the wrong parcels, dropped delicatepackages, apologised, blushed, was very hot, collected dust from Iknow not where.... Once I heard a sharp, angry voice: "John! Oh!..." Icould not believe that it was Marie Ivanovna. Of course she was hotand tired and had slept, last night, but little. The car, watched byan inquisitive but strangely apathetic crowd of peasants, snorted itsway down the little streets, the green trees blowing and the starlingschattering. In a moment the starlings and our two selves seemed tohave the whole dead little town to ourselves.
I saw quite clearly that he was unhappy; he could never disguise hisfeelings; as he waited for the trap to appear he had the same lost andabandoned appearance that he had on my first vision of him at thePetrograd station. The soldier who was to drive us smiled as he sawme.
"Only thirty versts, your honour ... or, thank God, even less. It willtake us no time." He was a large clumsy creature, like an eagerovergrown puppy; he was one of the four or five Nikolais in ourOtriad, and he is to be noticed in this history because he attachedhimself from the very beginning to Trenchard with that faithful andutterly unquestioning devotion of which the Russian soldier is sofrequently capable. He must, I think, have seen something helpless andunhappy in Trenchard's appearance on this evening. Sancho to our DonQuixote he was from that first moment.
"Yes, he's an English gentleman," I said when he had listened for amoment to Trenchard's Russian.
"Like yourself," said Nikolai.
"Yes, Nikolai. You must look after him. He'll be strange here atfirst."
"_Slushaiu_ (I hear)."
That was all he said. He got up on to his seat, his broad back wasbent over his horses.
"Well, and how have things been, Nikolai, busy?"
"_Nikak nyet_--not at all. Very quiet."
"No wounded?"
"Nothing at all, _Barin_, for two weeks now."
"Have you liked that?"
"_Tak totchno._ Certainly yes."
"No, but have you?"
"_Tak totchno, Barin._"
Then he turned and gave, for one swift instant, a glance at Trenchard,who was, very clumsily, climbing into the carriage. Nikolai looked athim gravely. His round, red face was quite expressionless as he turnedback and began to abjure his horses in that half-affectionate,half-abusive and wholly human whispering exclamation that Russians useto their animals. We started.
I have mentioned in these pages that I had already spent three monthswith our Otriad at the Front. I cannot now define exactly what it wasthat made this drive on this first evening something utterly distinctand apart from all that I had experienced during that earlier period.It is true that, before, I had been for almost two months in one placeand had seen nothing at all of actual warfare, except the feeding andbandaging of the wounded. But I had imagined then, nevertheless
, thatI was truly "in the thick of things," as indeed, in comparison with myMoscow or Petrograd life, I was. We had not now driven through thequiet evening air for ten minutes before I knew, with assuredcertainty, that a new phase of life was, on this day, opening beforeme; the dark hedges, the thin fine dust on the roads, the deep purplecolour of the air, beat at my heart, as though they themselves werehelping with quiet insistency to draw me into the drama. And yetnothing could have been more peaceful than was that lovely evening.The dark plum-colour in the evening sky soaked like wine into thehills, the fields, the thatched cottages, the streams and the littlewoods.
The faint saffron that lingered below the crests and peaks of rosycloud showed between the stems of the silver birches like the friendlysmile of a happy day. The only human beings to be seen were thepeasants driving home their cows; far on the horizon the Carpathianmountains were purple in the dusk, the snow on their highest ridgesfaintly silver. There was not a sound in the world except the ring ofour horses' hoofs upon the road. And yet this sinister excitementhammered, from somewhere, at me as I had never felt it before. It wasas though the lovely evening were a painted scene lowered to hide someatrocity.
"This is scarcely what you expected a conquered country to look like,is it?" I said to Trenchard.
He looked about him, then said, hesitating: "No ... that is ... Idon't know what I expected."
A curved moon, dull gold like buried treasure, rose slowly above thehill; one white star flickered and the scents of the little gardensthat lined the road grew thicker in the air as the day faded.
I was conscious of some restraint with Trenchard: "He's probablywishing," I thought, "that he'd not been so expansive last night. Hedoesn't trust me."
Once he said abruptly:
"They'll give me ... won't they ... work to do? It would be terribleif there wasn't work. I'm not so ... so stupid at bandaging. I learnta lot in the hospital and although I'm clumsy with my hands generallyI'm not so clumsy about that--"
"Why of course," I answered. "When there's work they'll be only toodelighted. But there won't always be work. You must be prepared forthat. Sometimes our Division is in reserve and then we're in reservetoo. Sometimes for so much as a fortnight. When I was out here beforeI was in one place for more than two months. You must just takeeverything as it comes."
"I want to work," he said. "I _must_."
Once again only he spoke:
"That little fat man who travelled with us...."
"Andrey Vassilievitch," I said.
"Yes.... He interests me. You knew him before?"
"Yes. I've known him slightly for some years."
"What has he come for? He's frightened out of his life."
"Frightened?"
"Yes, he himself told me. He says that he's very nervous but that hemust do everything that every one else does--for a certain reason. Hegot very excited when he talked to me and asked me whether I thoughtit would all be very terrible."
"He is a nervous fussy little man. Russians are not cowards, butAndrey Vassilievitch lost his wife last year. He was very devoted toher--very. He is miserable without her, they say. Perhaps he has cometo the war to forget her."
I was surprised at Trenchard's interest; I had thought him so wrapt inhis own especial affair that nothing outside it could occupy him. Buthe continued:
"He knew the tall doctor--Nikitin--before, didn't he?"
"Yes.... Nikitin knew his wife."
"Oh, I see.... Nikitin seems to despise him--I think he despises allof us."
"Oh no. That's only his manner. Many Russians look as though they weredespising their neighbours when, as a matter of fact, they're reallydespising themselves. They're very fond of despising themselves: theircontempt allows them to do what they want to."
"I don't think Nikitin despises himself. He looks too happy--at least,happy is not the word. Perhaps triumphant is what I mean."
"Ah, if you begin speculating about Russian expression you're lost.They express so much in their faces that you think you know all theirdeepest feelings. But they're not their deep feelings that you see.Only their quick transient emotions that change every moment." Ifancied, just at that time, that I had studied the Russian charactervery intently and it was perhaps agreeable to me to air my knowledgebefore an Englishman who had come to Russia for the first time sorecently.
But Trenchard did not seem to be greatly impressed by my cleverness.He spoke no more. We drove then in silence whilst the moon, risinghigh, caught colour into its dim outline, like a scimitar unsheathed;the trees and hedges grew, with every moment, darker. We left thevalley through which we had been driving, slowly climbing the hill,and here, on the top of the rising ground, we had our first glimpse ofthe outposts of the war. A cottage had been posted on the highestpoint of the hill; now all that remained of it was a sheet of iron,crumpled like paper, propped in the centre by a black and solitarypost, trailing thence on the ground amongst tumbled bricks and refuse.This sheet of iron was silver in the moonlight and stood out with itssolitary black support against the night sky, which was now breakinginto a million stars. Behind it stretched a flat plain that reached tothe horizon.
"There," I said to Trenchard, "there's your first glimpse of actualwarfare. What do you say to every house in your village at home likethat? It's ghastly enough if you see it as I have done, still smoking,with the looking-glasses and flower-pots and pictures lying about."
But Trenchard said nothing.
We started across the plain and at once, as with "Childe Roland":
_For mark! no sooner was I fairly found Pledged to the plain, after a pace or two, Than, pausing to throw backward a last view O'er the safe road, 'twas gone! grey plain all round: Nothing but plain to the horizon's bound. I might go on; nought else remained to do._
Our "safe road" was a rough and stony track; far in front of us on therising hill that bounded the horizon a red light watched us like anangry eye. There were cornfields that stirred and whispered, but nohedges, no trees, and not a house to be seen.
Nikolai turned and said: "A very strong battle here, Your Honour, onlythree weeks back."
By the side of the road stood a little cluster of wooden crosses andbehind them were two large holes filled now with water upon which themoon was shining. In these holes the frogs were making a tremendousnoise.
"That was shell," I said to Trenchard, pointing. The frogs drowned myvoice; there was something of a melancholy triumph in their cry andtheir voices seemed to be caught up and echoed by thousands uponthousands of other frogs inhabiting the plain.
We came then upon a trench; the ridge of it stretched like a blackcord straight across the cornfield and here for a moment the roadseemed lost.
I got out. "Here, Trenchard. You must come and look at this. Yourfirst Austrian trench. You may find treasure."
We walked along in single file for some time and then suddenly I losthim: the trench, just where we were, divided into two. I waitedthinking that in a moment he would appear. There was nothing verythrilling about my trench; it was an old one and all that remained nowof any life was the blackened ground where there had been cooking, thebrown soiled cartridge-cases, and many empty tin cans. And then as Iwaited, leaning forward with my elbows on the earthwork, the frogs theonly sound in the world, I was conscious that some one was watchingme. In front of me I could see the red light flickering and turning alittle as it seemed--behind me nothing but the starlight. I turned,looked back, and for my very life could not hold myself from callingout:
"Who's there?"
I waited, then called more loudly: "Trenchard! Trenchard!" I laughedat myself, leant again on the trench and puffed at my cigarette. Thenonce more I was absolutely assured that some one watched me.
I called again: "Who's there?"
Then quite suddenly and to my own absurd relief Trenchard appeared,stumbling forward over some roughness in the ground almost into myarms:
"I say, it's beastly here," he cried. "Let's go
on--the frogs...."
He had caught my hand.
"Well," I said, "what did you find?"
"Nothing--only ... I don't know.... It's as though some one werewatching me. It's getting late, isn't it? The frogs...." he saidagain--"I hate them. They seem to be triumphing."
We climbed into the trap and drove on in silence.
I was half asleep when at last we left the plain and dropped down intothe valley beyond. I was surprised to discover on looking at my watchthat it was only eleven o'clock; we had been, it seemed to me, hourscrossing that plain. "It's a silly thing," I said to Trenchard, "butit would take quite a lot to get me to drive back over that again." Henodded his head. We drove over a bridge, up a little hill and were inthe rough moonlit square of O----, our destination. Almost immediatelywe were climbing the dark rickety stairs of our dwelling. There werelights, shouts of welcome, Molozov our chief, sisters, doctors,students, the room almost filled with a table covered with food--coldmeat, boiled eggs, sausage, jam, sweets, and of course a huge samovar.I can only say that never once, during my earlier experience with theOtriad, had I been so rejoiced to see lights and friendly faces. Ilooked round for Trenchard. He had already discovered Marie Ivanovnaand was standing with her at the window.
I learned at breakfast the next morning that we were at once to moveto a house outside the village. The fantastic illusions that my driveof the evening before had bred in me now in the clear light of morningentirely deserted me. Moreover fantasy had slender opportunity ofencouragement in the presence of Molozov.
Molozov, I would wish to say once and for all, was the heart and soulof our enterprise. Without him the whole organisation so admirablysupported by the energetic ladies and gentlemen in Petrograd, wouldhave tumbled instantly into a thousand pieces. In Molozov they haddiscovered exactly the man for their purpose; a large land-owner, amember of one of the best Russian families, he had, since thebeginning of the war, given himself up to the adventure with the wholeof his energy, with the whole of that great capacity for organisationthat the management of his estates had already taught him. He was inappearance, short, squarely built, inclined, although he was onlythirty-two or three, to be stout; he wore a dark black moustache andhis hair was already grey. He was a Russian of the purest blood andyet possessed all the qualities that the absolute Russian is supposedto lack. He was punctual to the moment, sharply accurate in all hisaffairs, a shrewd psychologist but never a great talker and, aboveall, a consummate diplomatist. As I watched him dealing with thewidely opposed temperaments and dispositions of all our company,soothing one, scolding another, listening attentively, cuttingcomplaints short, comforting, commanding, soliciting, I marvelled atthe good fortune of that Petrograd committee. In spite of his kindheart--and he was one of the kindest-hearted men I have ever met--hecould be quite ruthless in dismissal or rebuke when occasion arrived.He had a great gift of the Russian irony and he could be also, likeall Russians, a child at an instant's call, if something pleased himor if he simply felt that the times were good and the sun was shining.I only once, in a moment that I shall have, later on, to describe, sawhim depressed and out of heart. He was always a most courteousgentleman.
I drove now with him in a trap at the head of the _Oboz_, as our longtrain, with our tents, provisions, boxes and beds, was called. We werea fine company now and my heart was proud as I looked back up theshining road and saw the long winding procession of carts and"sanitars" and remembered how tiny an affair we had been in thebeginning.
"Well," said Molozov, "and what of your Englishman?"
"Oh, I like him," I said rather hurriedly. "He'll do."
"I'm glad you think so--very glad. I was not sure last night.... Hedoesn't speak Russian very well, does he? He was tired last night. I'mvery glad that he should come, of course, but it's unpleasant ... thisengagement ... the Sister told me. It's a little difficult for all ofus."
"They were engaged the evening before they left."
"I know ... nothing to do about it, but it would have been betterotherwise. And Andrey Vassilievitch! Whatever put it into AnnaMihailovna's head to send him! He's a tiresome little man--I've knownhim earlier in Petrograd! He's on my nerves already with his chatter.No, it's too bad. What can he do with us?"
"He has a very good business head," I said. "And he's not really a badlittle man. And he's very anxious to do everything."
"Ah, I know those people who are 'anxious to do everything.'... Don'tI know? Don't you remember Sister Anna Maria? anxious to doeverything, anything--and then, when it came to it, not even thesimplest bandage.... Nikitin's a good man," he added, "one of the bestdoctors in Petrograd. We've no doctors of our own now, youknow--except of course Alexei Petrovitch. The others are all from theDivision--"
"Ah, Semyonov!" I said. "How is he?"
At that moment he rode up to us. Seen on horseback Alexei PetrovitchSemyonov appeared a large man; he was, in reality, of middle heightbut his back was broad, his whole figure thickly-set and muscular. Hewore a thick square-cut beard of so fair a shade that it was almostwhite! His whole colour was pale and yet, in some way, expressive ofimmense health and vitality. His lips showed through his beard andmoustache red and very thick. His every movement showed greatself-possession and confidence. He had, indeed, far more personalitythan any other member of our Otriad.
Although he was an extremely capable doctor his main business in lifeseemed to be self-indulgence. He apparently did not know the meaningof the word "restraint." The serious questions in life to him werefood, drink, women.
He believed in no woman's virtue and no man's sincerity. He hailed anyone as a friend but if he considered some one a fool he said soimmediately. He concealed his opinions from no one.
When he was at work his indulgence seemed for the moment to leave him.He was a surgeon of the first order and loved his profession. He was aman now of fifty, but had never married, preferring a long successionof mistresses--women who had loved him, at whom he had always laughed,to whom he had been kind in a careless fashion.... He always declaredthat no woman had ever touched his heart.
He had come to the war voluntarily, forsaking a very lucrativepractice. This was always a puzzle to me. He had no romantic notionsabout the war, no altruistic compulsions, no high conceptions of hisduty ... no one had worked more magnificently in the war than he. Hecould not be said to be popular amongst us; we were all of us perhapsa little afraid of him. He cared, so obviously, for none of us. But weadmired his vitality, his courage, his independence. I myself wasassured that he allowed us to see him only with the most casualsuperficiality.
As he rode up to me I wondered how he and Nikitin would fare. Thesewere two personalities worthy of attention. Also, what would he thinkof Trenchard? His opinion of any one had great weight amongst us.
I had not seen him last night and he leant over his horse now andshook hands with me with a warm friendliness that surprised me. Helaughed, joked, was evidently in excellent spirits. He rode on alittle, then came back to us.
"I like your new Sister," he said. "She's charming."
"She's engaged," I answered, "to the new Englishman."
"Ah! the new Englishman!" He laughed. "Apologies, Ivan Andreievitch(myself), to your country ... but really ... what's he going to dowith us?"
"He'll work," I said, surprised at the heat that I felt in Trenchard'sdefence. "He's a splendid fellow."
"I have no doubt"--again Semyonov laughed. "We all know yourenthusiasms, Ivan Andreievitch, ... but an Englishman! _Ye Bogu_!..."
"Engaged to that girl!" I heard him repeat to himself as again he rodeforward. Trenchard, little Andrey Vassilievitch, Semyonov, Nikitin ... yes,there was promise of much development here.
We had dropped down into the valley and, at a sudden turn, saw theschool-house in front of us. It is before me now as I write with itslong low whitewashed two-storied front, its dormer-windows, its rooffaintly pink with a dark red bell-tower perched on the top. Behind itis a long green field stretching to where hills, faintly blu
e in themorning light, rose, with very gradual slopes against the sky. To theright I could see there was a garden hidden now by trees, on the lefta fine old barn, its thatched roof deep brown, the props supporting itblack with age. In front of the pillared porch there was a littlesquare of white cobble-stones and in the middle of these an old greysundial. The whole place was bathed in the absolute peace of thespring morning.
As we drove up a little old lady with two tiny children clinging toher skirts came to the porch. I could see, as we came up to her, thatshe was trembling with terror; she put up her hand to her white hair,clutched again desperately the two children, found at last her voiceand hoped that we would be "indulgent."
Molozov assured her that she would suffer in no kind of way, that wemust use her school for a week or so and that any loss or damage thatshe incurred would of course be made up to her. She was then, of asudden, immensely fluent, explaining that her husband--"a mostexcellent husband to me in every way one might say"--had been deadfifteen years now, that her two sons were both fighting for theAustrians, that she looked after the school assisted by her daughter.These were her grandchildren.... Such a terrible year she, in all herlong life, had never remembered. She....
The arrival of the rest of the Oboz silenced her. She remained, withwide-open staring eyes, her hand at her breast, watching, sayingabsent-mindedly to the children: "Now Katya.... Now Anna.... See whatyou're about!"
The school was spotlessly clean. In the schoolroom the rough bencheswere marked with names and crosses. On the whitewashed walls werecoloured maps of Galicia and tables of the Austrian kings and queens;on the blackboard still an unfinished arithmetical sum and on themaster's desk a pile of exercise books.
In a moment everything was changed; the sanitars had turned theschoolroom into a dormitory, another room was to be our dining-room,another a bedroom for the Sisters. In the high raftered kitchen ourmidday meal was already cooking; the little cobbled court was piledhigh with luggage. In the field beyond the house the sanitars hadpitched their tents.
I walked out into the little garden--a charming place with yew hedges,a lichen-covered well and old thick apple-trees, and here I found anold man in a broad-brimmed straw hat tending the bees. The hives wereopen and he was working with a knife whilst the bees hung in atrembling hovering cloud about him. I spoke to him but he paid noattention to me at all. I watched him then spoke again; hestraightened himself then looked at me for a moment with eyes full ofscorn. Words of fury, of abuse perhaps, seemed to tremble on his lips,then shaking his head he turned his back upon me and continued hiswork. Behind us I could hear the soldiers breaking the garden-fence tomake stakes for their tents.
Here we were for a fortnight and it was strange to me, in the days ofstress and excitement that followed, to look back to that fortnightand remember that we had, so many of us, been restless anddiscontented at the quiet of it. Oddly enough, of all the manybackgrounds that were, during the next months, to follow in processionbehind me, there only remain to me with enduring vitality: thisschool-house at O----, the banks of the River Nestor which I hadindeed good reason to remember, and finally the forest of S----. Howstrange a contrast, that school-house with its little garden and whitecobbles and that forest which will, to the end of my life, ever hauntmy dreams.
And yet, by its very contrast, how fitting a background to ourPrologue this school-house made! I wonder whether Nikitin sees itstill in his visions? Trenchard and Semyonov ... does it mean anythingto them, where they now are? First of them all, Marie Ivanovna.... Isee her still, bending over the well looking down, then suddenlyflinging her head back, laughing as we stood behind her, the sunlightthrough the apple-trees flashing in her eyes.... That fortnight mustbe to many of us of how ironic, of how tragic a tranquillity!
So we settled down and did our best to become happily accustomed toone another. Our own immediate company numbered twenty or so--Molozov,two doctors, myself, Trenchard and Andrey Vassilievitch, the two newSisters and the three former ones, five or six young Russians,gentlemen of ease and leisure who had had some "bandaging" practice atthe Petrograd hospitals, and three very young medical students,directly attached to our two doctors. In addition to these there werethe doctors, Sisters and students belonging to the army itself--theSixty-Fifth Division of the Ninth Army. These sometimes lived with usand sometimes by themselves; they had at their head Colonel Oblonsky,a military doctor of much experience and wide knowledge. There werealso the regular sanitars, some thirty or forty, men who were often byprofession schoolmasters or small merchants, of a better class for themost part than the ordinary soldier.
It is not, of course, my intention to describe with any detail theindividuals of this company. I have chosen already those of us who areespecially concerned with my present history, but these others made acontinually fluctuating and variable background, at first confusingand, to a stranger, almost terrifying. When the army doctors andSisters dined with us we numbered from thirty to forty persons:sometimes also the officers of the Staff of the Sixty-Fifth came toour table. There were other occasions when every one was engaged onone business or another and only three or four of us were left at thecentral station or "Punkt," as it was called.
And, of all these persons, who now stands out? I can remember aSister, short, plain, with red hair, who felt that she was treatedwith insufficient dignity, whose voice rising in complaint is with menow; I can see her small red-rimmed eyes watching for some insult andthen the curl of her lip as she snatched her opportunity.... Or therewas the jolly, fat Sister who had travelled with us, an admirableworker, but a woman, apparently, with no personal life at all, noexcitements, dreads, angers, dejections. Upon her the war made noimpression at all. She spoke sometimes to us of her husband and herchildren. She was not greedy, nor patriotic, neither vain nor humble,neither egoistic nor unselfish. She was simply reliable.
Or there was the tall gaunt Sister, intensely religious and serious.She was regarded by all of us as an excellent woman, but of course wedid not like her.
One would say to another: "Sister K----, what an excellent worker!"
"Yes. How she works!"
"Splendid! Splendid!"
When owing to the illness of her old mother she was compelled toreturn to Petrograd what relief we all felt! How gay was our supperthe night of her departure! There was something very childish at theheart of all of us.
Of the young gentlemen from Petrograd I remember only three. Thefamily name of one was Ivanoff, but he was always known to the Otriadas Goga, a pet diminutive of George. He was perhaps the youngestperson whom I have ever known. He must have been eighteen years ofage; he looked about eleven, with a round red face and wide-open eyesthat expressed eternal astonishment. Like Mr. Toots', his mind wascontinually occupied with his tailor and he told me on severaloccasions that he hoped I should visit him in Petrograd because therein the house of his mother he had many splendid suits, shirts, ties,that it would give him pleasure to show me. In spite of this littleweakness, he showed a most energetic character, willing to do anythingfor anybody, eager to please the whole world. I can hear his voicenow:
"_Yeh Bogu_! Ivan Andreievitch!... Imagine my position! There wasGeneral Polinoff and the whole Staff.... What to do? Only three verstsfrom the position too and already six o'clock...."
Or there was another serious gentleman, whose mind was continuallyoccupied with Russia: "It may be difficult for you, Ivan Andreievitch,to see with our eyes, but for those of us who have Russia in ourhearts ... what rest or peace can there be? I can assure you...."
He wore pince-nez and with his long pear-shaped head, shaven to theskin, his white cheeks, protruding chin and long heavy white hands heresembled nothing so much as a large fish hanging on a nail at afishmonger's. He worked always in a kind of cold desperate despair,his pince-nez slipping off his shiny nose, his mouth set grimly. "Whatis the use?" he seemed to say, "of helping these poor wounded soldierswhen Russia is in such a desperate condition? Tell me that!"
Or there was a w
ild rough fellow from some town in Little Russia, aboy of the most primitive character, no manners at all and a heart ofshining gold. Of life he had the very wildest notions. He loved womenand would sing Southern Russian songs about them. He had a strain offantasy that continually surprised one. He liked fairy tales. He wouldsay to me: "There's a tale? Ivan Andreievitch, about a princess wholived on a lake of glass. There was a forest, you know, round the lakeand all the trees were of gold. The pond was guarded by three dwarfs.I myself, Ivan Andreievitch, have seen a dwarf in Kiev no higher thanyour leg, and in our town they say there was once a whole family ofdwarfs who lived in a house in the chief street in our town and soldpotatoes.... I don't know.... People tell one such things. But for therest of that tale, do you remember how it goes?"
He could ride any horse, carry any man, was never tired nor out ofheart. He had the vaguest ideas about the war. "I knew a German oncein our town," he told me. "I always hated him.... He was going toPetrograd to make his fortune. I hope he's dead." This fellow wascalled Petrov.
My chief interest during this fortnight was to watch the fortunes ofMarie Ivanovna and Trenchard with their new companions. It wasinstantly apparent that Marie Ivanovna was a success. On the secondday after our arrival at the school-house there were continualexclamations: "But how charming the new Sister! How sympathetic!...Have you talked to the new Sister?"
Even Sister K----, so serious and religious, approved. It was evidentat once that Marie Ivanovna was, on her side, delighted with everyone. I could see that at present she was assured that what she wantedfrom life would be granted to her. She gave herself, with completeconfidence, to any one and every one, and, with that triumphingvitality that one felt in her from the first moment of meeting her,she carried all before her. In the hospital at Petrograd they hadbeen, I gathered, "all serious and old," had treated her I fancy withsome sternness. Here, at any rate, "serious and old" she would notfind us. We welcomed, with joy, her youth, her enthusiasm, herhappiness.
Semyonov, who never disguised nor restrained his feelings, was, fromthe first instant, strangely attracted to her. She, I could see, likedhim very much, felt in him his strength and capacity and scorn ofothers. Molozov also yielded her his instant admiration. He alwaysavoided any close personal relationship with any of us but I could seethat he was delighted with her vitality and energy. She pleased theolder Sisters by her frank and quite honest desire to be told thingsand the younger Sisters by her equally honest admiration of theirgifts and qualities. She was honest and sincere, I do believe, inevery word and thought and action. She had, in many ways, the naivepurity, the unconsidered faith and confidence of a child still in thenursery. She amazed me sometimes by her ignorance; she delighted mefrequently by her refreshing truth and straightforwardness. She felt alittle, I think, that I did not yield her quite the extravagantadmiration of the others. I was Trenchard's friend....
Yes, I was now Trenchard's friend. What had occurred since that nightin the train, when I had felt, during the greater part of the time,nothing but irritation? Frankly, I do not know. It may be, partly,that he was given to me by the rest of the Otriad. He was spoken ofnow as "my" Englishman. And then, poor Trenchard!... How, during thisfortnight, he was unhappy! It had begun with him as I had foreseen. Inthe first place he had been dismayed and silenced by the garrulity ofhis new companions. It had seemed to him that he had understoodnothing of their conversation, that he was in the way, that finally hewas more lonely than he had ever been in his life before. Then,however strongly he might to himself deny it, he had arrived in Russiawith what Nikitin called "his romantic notions." He had read hisDostoevski and Turgenev; he had looked at those books of Russianimpressions that deal in nothing but snow, ikons, and the sublimesimplicity of the Russian peasant. He was a man whose circumstanceshad led him to believe profoundly in his own incapacity, unpopularity,ignorance. For a moment his love had given him a new confidence butnow how was that same love deserting him? He had foreseen a gloriouscampaign, his lady and himself side by side, death and terror flyingbefore him. He found himself leading a country life of perfect quietand comfort, even as he might have led it in England, with a crowd ofpeople, strangely unfamiliar to him, driving him, as he had beendriven in the old days, into a host of awkwardnesses, confusions andfoolishnesses. I could not forgive Marie Ivanovna for herdisappointment in him, and yet I could understand how different hemust have appeared to her during those last days in Petrograd, whenalone with her and on fire with love, he had shown his true andbravest self to her. She was impatient, she had hoped that the otherswould see him as she had seen him. She watched them as they expressedtheir surprise that he was not the practical, fearless andunimaginative Englishman who was their typical figure. Whilst he foundthem far from the Karamazovs, the Raskolnikoffs, of his imagination,they in their turn could not create the "sportsman" and "man ofaffairs" whom they had expected.
To all of this Semyonov added, beyond question, his personal weight.He had from the first declared Trenchard "a ridiculous figure." Whilstthe others were unfailingly kind, hospitable and even indulgent toTrenchard, Semyonov was openly satirical, making no attempt to hidehis sarcastic irony. I do not know how much Trenchard's engagement toMarie Ivanovna had to do with this, but I know that "my Englishman"could not to his misfortune have had a more practical, more efficientfigure against whom to be contrasted than Semyonov.
During these weeks I think that I hated Semyonov. There was, however,one silent observer of all this business upon whose personalinterference I had not reckoned. This was Nikitin, who, at the end ofour first week at the school-house, broke his silence in aconversation with me.
Nikitin, although he spoke as little as possible to any one, hadalready had his effect upon the Otriad. They felt behind his silence apersonality that might indeed be equal to Semyonov's own. By littleAndrey Vassilievitch they were always being assured: "Nikitin! A mostremarkable man! You may believe me. I have known him for many years. Agreat friend of my poor wife's and mine...."
They did not appear to be great friends. Nikitin quite obviouslyavoided the little man whenever it was possible. But then he avoidedus all.
Upon a lovely afternoon Nikitin and I were alone in the wild littlegarden, he lying full length on the grass, I reading a very ancientEnglish newspaper, with my back against a tree.
He looked up at me with a swift penetrating glance, as though he wereseeing me for the first time and would wish at once to weigh mycharacter and abilities.
"Your Englishman," he said. "He's not happy, I'm afraid."
"No," I said, feeling the surprise of his question--it had becomealmost a tradition with me that he never spoke unless he were firstspoken to. "He feels strange and a little lonely, perhaps ... it'snatural enough!"
"Yes," repeated Nikitin, "it's natural enough. What did he come for?"
"Oh, he'll be all right," I said hastily, "in a day or two."
Nikitin lay on his back looking at the green, layer upon layer, lightand dark, with golden fragments of broken light leaping in the breezefrom branch to branch. "Why did he come? What did he expect to see? Iknow what he expected to see--romantic Russia, romantic war. Heexpected to find us, our hearts exploding with love, God's smile onour simple faces, God's simple faith in our souls.... He has been toldby his cleverest writers that Russia is the last stronghold of God.And war? He thought that he would be plunged into a scene of smoke andflame, shrapnel, horror upon horror, danger upon danger. He findsinstead a country house, meals long and large, no sounds of cannon,not even an aeroplane. Are we kind to him? Not at all.... We are notunkind but we simply have other things to think about, and because weare primitive people we do what we want to do, feel what we want tofeel, and show quite frankly our feelings. He is not what we expected,so that we prefer to fill our minds with things that do not give ustrouble. Later, like all Englishmen, he will dismiss us as savages,or, if he is of the intellectual kind, he will talk about ourconfusing subtleties and contradictions. But we are neither savagesnor confusing. We
have simply a skin less than you.... We are a veryyoung people, a real and genuine Democracy, and we care for quitesimple things, women, food, sleep, money, quite simply and withoutrestraint. We show our eagerness, our disgust, our disappointment, ouramusement simply as the mood moves us. In Moscow they eat all day andare not ashamed. Why should they be? In Kiev they think always aboutwomen and do not pretend otherwise ... and so on. We have, of course,no sense of time, nor method, nor system. If we were to think of thesethings we would be compelled to use restraint and that would botherus. We may lose the most important treasure in the world by notkeeping an appointment ... on the other hand we have kept our freedom.We care for ideas for which you care nothing in England but we have asure suspicion of all conclusions. We are pessimists, one and all.Life cannot be good. We ironically survey those who think that itcan.... We give way always to life but when things are at their worstthen we are relieved and even happy. Here at any rate we are on safeground. We have much sentiment, but it may, at any moment, give way tosome other emotion. We are therefore never to be relied upon, asfriends, as enemies, as anything you please. Except this--that in theheart of every Russian there is a passionate love of goodness. We aretolerant to all evil, to all weakness because we ourselves are weak.We confess our weakness to any one because that permits us to indulgein it--but when we see in another goodness, strength, virtue, weworship it. You may bind us to you with bands of iron by yourvirtues--never, as all foreigners think, by your vices. In this, too,we are sentimentalists. We may not believe in God but we have anintense curiosity about Him--a curiosity that with many of us neverleaves us alone, compels us to fill our lives, to fill our lives....We love Russia.... But that is another thing.... Never forget too thatbehind every Russian's simplicity there is always his Ideal--hissecret Ideal, perhaps, that he keeps like an ikon sacred in his heart.Yes, of every Russian, even of the worst of us, that is true. And itcomplicates our lives, delivers us to our enemies, defeats all ourworldly aims, renders us helpless at the moment when we should be moststrong. But it is good, before God, that it should be so...."
He suddenly sprang up and stood before me. "To-morrow I shall thinkotherwise--and yet this is part of the truth that I have told you....And your Englishman? I like him ... I like him. That girl will treathim badly, of course. How can she do otherwise? He sees her likeTurgenev's Liza. Well, she is not that. No girl in Russia to-day islike Turgenev's Liza. And it's a good thing." He smiled--that strange,happy, confident mysterious smile that I had seen first on thePetrograd platform. Then he turned and walked slowly towards thehouse.
What Nikitin had said about Trenchard's expectation of "romantic war"was perhaps true, in different degrees, of all of us. Even I, in spiteof my earlier experience, felt some irritation at this delay, and tothose of us who had arrived flaming with energy, bravery, resolutionto make their name before Europe, this feasting in a country gardenseemed a deliberate insult. Was this "romantic war?" These long mealsunder the trees, deep sleeps in the afternoon when the pigeons cooedround the little red bell-tower and the pump creaked in the cobbledcourtyard and the bees hummed in the garden? Bees, cold water shiningdeep in the well, and the samovar chuckling behind the flower-beds,and fifteen versts away the Austrians challenging the Russiannation!... "You know," Andrey Vassilievitch said to me, "it's verydisheartening."
Marie Ivanovna at the end of the first week spoke her mind. I foundher one evening before supper leaning over the fence, gazing acrossthe long flat field, pale gold in the dusk with the hills like greyclouds beyond it.
"They tell me," she said, turning to me, "that we may be anotherfortnight like this."
"Yes," I said, "it's quite possible, or even longer. We can't providewounded and battles for you if there aren't any."
"But there are!" she cried. "Isn't the whole of Europe fighting andisn't it simply disgusting of us to be sitting down here, eating andsleeping, just as though we were in a _dacha_ in the country? At leastin the hospital in Petrograd I was working ... here...."
"We've got to stick to our Division," I answered. "They can't have itin reserve very long. When it goes, we'll go. The whole secret ofleading this life out here is taking exactly what comes as completelyas you can take it. If it's a time for sleeping and eating, sleep andeat--there'll be days enough when you'll get nothing of either."
She laughed then, swinging round to me, with the dusk round her whitenurse's cap and her eyes dark with her desires and hopes anddisappointments.
"Oh, I've no right to be discontented.... Every one is so good to me.I love them all--even you, Mr. Durward. But I want to begin, tobegin, to begin! I want to see what it's like, to find what there isthere that frightens them, or makes them happy. We had a young officerin our hospital who died. He was too ill ... he could tell us nothing,but he was so excited by something ... something he was in the middleof.... Who was it? What was it? I _must_ be there, hunt it out, findthat I'm strong enough not to be afraid of _anything_." She suddenlydropped her voice, changing with sharp abruptness. "And John? He's nothappy here, is he?"
"You should know," I answered, "better than any of us."
"Why should I know?" she replied, flaming out at me. "You always blameme about him, but you are unfair. I want him to be happy--I would makehim so if I could. But he's so strange, so different from his time atthe hospital. He will scarcely speak to me or to any one. Why can't hebe agreeable to every one? I want them to like him but how can theywhen he won't talk to them and runs away if they come near him? He'sdisappointed perhaps at its being so quiet here. It isn't what heexpected to find it, but then isn't that the same for all of us? And_we_ don't sulk all day. He's disappointed with _me_ perhaps but hewon't tell me what he wants. If I ask him he only says 'Oh, it's allr-right--it's all r-right'--I hate that 'all r-right' of yourlanguage--so stupid! What a purpose not to say if he wants something?"
I said nothing. My silence urged her to a warmer defence.
"And then he makes such mistakes--always everything wrong that he'sasked to do. Doctor Semyonov laughs at him--but of course! He's like alittle boy, a man as old as he is. And Englishmen are always sopractical, capable. Oh! speak to him, Mr. Durward; you can, please. If_I_ say anything he's at once so miserable.... I don't understand, Idon't understand!" she cried, raising her hands with a littledespairing gesture. "How can he have been like that in Petrograd, andnow like this!"
"Give him time, Marie Ivanovna," I answered her. "This is all new tohim, confusing, alarming. He's led a very quiet life. He's verysensitive. He cares for you so deeply that the slightest thing woundshim. He would hide that if he could--it's his tragedy that he can't."
She would have answered had not supper arrived and with it our wholecompany. Shall I ever know a more beautiful night? As we sat there themoon came up, red-gold and full; the stars were clustered so thicklybetween the trees that their light lay heavy like smoke upon the air.The little garden seemed to be never still as our candlelight blew inthe breeze; so it hovered and trembled about us, the trees bendingbeneath their precious load of stars, shuddering in their happiness atso good an evening.
We sat there as though we had known that it was to be our last nightof peace.... Many times the glasses of tea were filled, many times thelittle blue tin boxes of sweets were pushed up and down the table,many times the china teapot on the top of the samovar was fed withfresh tea, many times spoons were dipped into the strawberry jam andthen plunged into the glasses of tea, such being the Russian pleasure.
There occurred then an unfortunate incident. Some one had saidsomething about England: there had been a joke then about "sportsmen,"some allusion was made to some old story connected with myself, and Ihad laughingly taken up the challenge. Suddenly Semyonov leaned acrossthe table and spoke to Trenchard. Trenchard, who had been silentthroughout the meal, misunderstood the Russian, thought that Semyonovwas trying to insult him, and sat there colouring, flaming at last,silent. We all of us felt the awkwardness of it. There was a generalpause--Semyonov himself drew back with a li
ttle laugh.
Suddenly Marie Ivanovna, across the table, in English said softly butwith a strange eager hostility:
"How absurd!... To let them all see ... to let them know...." PerhapsI, who was sitting next to her, alone heard her words.
The colour left Trenchard's face; he looked at her once, then got upand left the table. I could see then that she was distressed, but shetalked, laughed more eagerly, more enthusiastically than before.Sometimes I saw her look towards the school-house.
When there came an opportunity I rose and went to find him. He wasstanding near his bed, his back to the door, his hands clenched.
"I say, come out again--just as though nothing had happened. No onenoticed anything, only I...."
He turned to me, his face working and with a passionate gesture, in avoice that choked over the words, he cried: "She should not have saidit. She should not ... every one there.... She knew how it would woundme.... Semyonov...."
He positively was silent over that name. The mild expression of hiseyes, the clumsy kindness of his mouth gave a ludicrous expression tohis rage.
"Wait! Wait!" I cried. "Be patient!"
As I spoke I could hear him in the railway carriage:
"I am mad with happiness.... God forgive me, my heart will break."
Breaking from me, despair in his voice, he whispered to the emptyroom, the desolate row of white beds watching him: "I always knewthat I was hopeless ... hopeless ... hopeless."
"Look here," I said. "You mustn't take things so hard. You go up anddown.... Your emotions...."
But he only shook his head:
"She shouldn't have said it--like that--before every one," herepeated.
I left him. Afterwards as I stood in the passage, white and ghostly inthe moonlight, something suddenly told me that this night the prologueof our drama was concluded.
I waited on the steps of the house, heard the laughing voices in thedistance, while over the rest of the world there was absolute silence;then abruptly, quite sharply, across the long low fields there camethe rumble of cannon. Three times it sounded. Then hearing no more Ireturned into the house.
The Dark Forest Page 2
