The Red Symbol

by John Ironside

  CHAPTER XXXIII

  THE ROAD TO ZOSTROV

  Even before we left Riga,--where we were delayed for a couple of daysgetting our goods through the Customs and on to the train,--I realizedsomewhat at least of the meaning of Mishka's enigmatic utterance. Notthat we experienced any adventures. I suppose I played my part all rightas the American mechanic whose one idea was safeguarding the machineryhe was in charge of. Anyhow we got through the necessary interviews withtruculent officials without much difficulty. Most of them were unable tounderstand the sort of German I chose to fire off at them, and had torely on Mishka's services as interpreter. The remarks they passed uponme were not exactly complimentary,--low-grade Russian officials arefoul-mouthed enough at the best of times, and now, imagining thatI did not know what they were saying, they let loose their wholevocabulary,--while I blinked blandly through the glasses I had assumed,and, in reply to a string of filthy abuse, mildly suggested that theyshould get a hustle on, and pass the things promptly.

  I quite appreciated the humor of the situation, and I guess Mishka didso, too, for more than once I saw his deep-set eyes twinkle just for amoment, as he discreetly translated my remarks, and, at the same time,cordially endorsed our tyrants' freely expressed opinions concerningmyself.

  "You have done well, 'Herr Gould,' yes, very well," he condescended tosay, when we were at last through with the troublesome business. "We aresafe enough so far, though for my part I shall be glad to turn my backon this hole, where the trouble may begin at any moment."

  "What trouble?" I asked.

  "God knows," he answered evasively, with a characteristic movement ofhis broad shoulders. "Can you not see for yourself that there is troublebrewing?"

  I had seen as much. The whole moral atmosphere seemed surcharged withelectricity; and although as yet there was no actual disturbance, beyondthe individual acts of ruffianism that are everyday incidents in allRussian towns, the populace, the sailors, and the soldiery eyed eachother with sullen menace, like so many dogs, implacably hostile, but notyet worked up to fighting pitch. A few weeks later the storm burst, andRiga reeked with fire and carnage, as did many another city, town, andvillage, from Petersburg to Odessa.

  I discerned the same ominous state of things--the calm before thestorm--at Dunaburg and Wilna, but it was not until we had left therailroad and were well on our two days' cross-country ride to Zostrovthat I became acquainted with two important ingredients in that"seething pot" of Russian affairs,--to use Mishka's apt simile. Thosetwo ingredients were the peasantry and the Jews.

  Hitherto I had imagined, as do most foreigners, whose knowledge ofRussia is purely superficial, and does not extend beyond the principalcities, that what is termed the revolutionary movement was a conflictbetween the governing class,--the bureaucracy which dominates every onefrom the Tzar himself, an autocrat in name only, downwards,--and thedemocracy. The latter once was actively represented only by the variousNihilist organizations, but now includes the majority of the urbanpopulation, together with many of the nobles who, like Anne's kindred,have suffered, and still suffer so sorely under the iron rule ofcruelty, rapacity, and oppression that has made Russia a byword amongcivilized nations since the days of Ivan the Terrible. But now Irealized that the movement is rendered infinitely complex by theexistence of two other conflicting forces,--the _moujiks_ and the Jews.The bureaucracy indiscriminately oppresses and seeks to crush all threesections; the democracy despairs of the _moujiks_ and hates the Jews,though it accepts their financial help; while the _moujiks_ distrustevery one, and also hate the Jews, whom they murder whenever they getthe chance.

  That's how the situation appeared to me even then, before the curtainwent up on the final act of the tragedy in which I and the girl I lovedwere involved; and the fact that all these complex elements were presentin that tragedy must be my excuse for trying to sum them up in a fewwords.

  I've knocked around the world somewhat, and have had many a long andperilous ride through unknown country, but never one that interested memore than this. I've said before that Russia is still back in the MiddleAges, but now, with every verst we covered, it seemed to me we weregetting farther back still,--to the Dark Ages themselves.

  We passed through several villages on the first day, all lookingexactly alike. A wide thoroughfare that could not by any stretch ofcourtesy be called a street or road, since it showed no attempt atpaving or making and was ankle-deep in filthy mud, was flanked byirregular rows of low wooden huts, reeking with foulness, and more likethe noisome lairs of wild beasts than human habitations. Theirinhabitants looked more bestial than human,--huge, shaggy men who peeredsullenly at us with swinish eyes, bleared and bloodshot withdrunkenness; women with shapeless figures and blunt faces, stolid masksexpressive only of dumb hopeless endurance of misery,--the abject miserythat is the lot of the Russian peasant woman from birth to death. I wassoon to learn that this centuries' old habit of patient endurance wasnearly at an end, and that when once the mask is thrown aside the furyof the women is more terrible, because more deliberate and merciless,than the brutality of the men.

  At a little distance, perhaps, would be a small chapel with the priest'shouse adjacent, and the somewhat more commodious houses of thetax-gatherer and _starosta_--the head man of the village, when hehappened to be a farmer. Sometimes he was a kalak keeper, scarce onedegree superior to his fellows. One could tell the tax-gatherer's housea mile away by its prosperous appearance, and the kind of courtyardround it, closed in with a solid breast-high log fence; for in thesedays the hated official may at any moment find his house besieged by amob of vodka-maddened _moujiks_ and implacable women. If he and hisguard of one or two armed _stragniki_ (rural police) are unable to holdout till help comes,--well, there is red murder, another house inflames, a vodka orgy in the frenzied village, and retribution next dayor the day after, when the Cossacks arrive, and there is more redmurder. Then every man, woman, and child left in the place isslaughtered; and the agglomeration of miserable huts that form thevillage is burned to the ground.

  That, at least, is the explanation Mishka gave me when we rode through aheap of still smouldering and indescribably evil-smelling ruins, wherethere was no sign of life, beyond a few disreputable-looking pigs andfowls grubbing about in what should have been the cultivated ground. Thepeasant's holdings are inconceivably neglected, for the _moujik_ is thelaziest creature on God's earth. In the days of his serfdom he workedunder the whip, but as a freeman he has reduced his labor to a minimum,especially since the revolutionary propagandists have told him that heis the true lord of the soil, who should pay no taxes, and should liveat ease,--and in sloth.

  The sight and stench of that holocaust sickened me, but Mishka rodeforward stolidly, unmoved either physically or mentally.

  "They bring it on themselves," he said philosophically. "If they wouldwork more and drink less they could live and pay their taxes well enoughand there would be no trouble."

  "But why on earth didn't they make themselves scarce after they'dsettled scores with the tax collector, instead of waiting to bemassacred?" I mused.

  "God knows," said Mishka. "The _moujik_ is a beast that goes mad at thesight and smell of blood, and one that takes no thought for the morrow.Also, where would they run to? They would soon be hunted down. Now theyhave had their taste of blood, and paid for it in full, that is all.There were no Jews there," he jerked his head backwards, "otherwise theymight have had their taste without payment."

  "What do you mean?" I asked.

  He shrugged his broad shoulders.

  "Wait, and perhaps you will see. Have you never heard of a _pogrom_?"

  And that was all I could get out of him at the time.