The Complete Works of Isaac Babel Reprint Edition by Isaac Babel, Nathalie Babel, Peter Constantine

by Nathalie Babel, Peter Constantine Isaac Babel

  We continue circling and searching. We run our fingers over ivory buttons and suddenly icons split open, revealing vaults and caverns blossoming with mold. This church is ancient and filled with secrets. Its lustrous walls hide clandestine passages, niches, and noiseless trapdoors.

  You foolish priest, hanging the brassieres of your female parishioners on the nails of the Savior s cross! Behind the holy gates we found a suitcase of gold coins, a morocco-leather sackful of banknotes, and Parisian jewelers’ cases filled with emerald rings.

  We went and counted the money in the military commissar s room. Columns of gold, carpets of paper money, wind gusts blowing on our candle flames, the raven madness in the eyes of Pant Eliza, the thundering laughter of Romuald, and the endless roar of the bells tolled by Pan Robacki, the crazed bell ringer.

  “I have to get away from here,” I said to myself, “away from these winking Madonnas conned by soldiers.”

  A LETTER

  Here is a letter home dictated to me by Kurdyukov, a boy in our I regiment. This letter deserves to be remembered. I wrote it down without embellishing it, and am recording it here word for word as he said it.

  Dearest Mama, Evdokiya Fyodorovna,

  I hasten in these first lines of my letter to set your mind at rest and to inform you that by the grace of the Lord I am alive and well, and that I hope to hear the same from you. I bow most deepest before you, touching the moist earth with my white forehead. (There follows a list of relatives, godfathers, and godmothers. I am omitting this. Let us proceed to the second paragraph.)

  Dearest Mama, Evdokiya Fyodorovna Kurdyukova, I hasten to inform you that I am in Comrade Budyonny’s Red Cavalry Regiment, and that my godfather Nikon Vasilich is also here and is at the present time a Red Hero. He took me and put me in his special detachment of the Polit-otdel5 in which we hand out books and newspapers to the various positions: the Moscow ZIK Izvestia^ the Moscow Pravday and our own merciless newspaper the Krasny Kavalerist,6 which every fighter on the front wants to read and then go and heroically hack the damn Poles to pieces, and I am living real marvelous at Nikon Vasilich’s.

  Dearest Mama, Evdokiya Fyodorovna, send me anything that you possibly in any way can. I beg you to butcher our speckled pig and make a food packet for me, to be sent to Comrade Budyonnys Polit-otdel unit, addressed to Vasily Kurdyukov. All evenings I go to sleep hungry and bitterly cold without any clothes at all. Write to me a letter about my Stepan—is he alive or not, I beg you to look after him and to write to me about him, is he still scratching himself or has he stopped, but also about the scabs on his forelegs, have you had him shod, or not? I beg you dearest Mama, Evdokiya Fyodorovna, to wash without fail his forelegs with the soap I hid behind the icons, and if Papa has swiped it all then buy some in Krasnodar, and the Lord will smile upon you. I must also describe that the country here is very poor, the muzhiks with their horses hide in the woods from our Red eagles, there’s hardly no wheat to be seen, it’s all scrawny and we laugh and laugh at it. The people sow rye and they sow oats too. Hops grow on sticks here so they come out very well. They brew home brew with them.

  In these second lines of this letter I hasten to write you about Papa, that he hacked my brother Fyodor Timofeyich Kurdyukov to pieces a year ago now. Our Comrade Pavlichenko’s Red Brigade attacked the town of Rostov, when there was a betrayal in our ranks. And Papa was with the Whites back then as commander of one of Denikins companies. All the folks that saw Papa says he was covered in medals like with the old regime. And as we were betrayed, the Whites captured us and threw us all in irons, and Papa caught sight of my brother Fyodor Timofeyich. And Papa began hacking away at Fyodor, saying: you filth you, red dog, son of a bitch, and other things, and hacked away at him until sundown until my brother Fyodor Timofeyich died. I had started writing you a letter then, about how your Fyodor is lying buried without a cross, but Papa caught me and said: you are your mother’s bastards, the roots of that whore, I’ve plowed your mother and I’ll keep on plowing her my whole damn life till I don’t have a drop of juice left in me, and other things. I had to bear suffering like our Savior Jesus Christ. I managed to run away from Papa in the nick of time and join up with the Reds again, Comrade Pavlichenko’s company. And our brigade got the order to go to the town of Voronezh to get more men, and we got more men and horses too, bags, revolvers, and everything we needed.

  About Voronezh, beloved Mama Evdokiya Fyodorovna, I can describe that it is indeed a marvelous town, a bit larger I think than Krasnodar, the people in it are very beautiful, the river is brilliant to the point of being able to swim. We were given two pounds of bread a day each, half a pound of meat, and sugar enough so that when you got up you drank sweet tea, and the same in the evenings, forgetting hunger, and for dinner I went to my brother Semyon Timofeyich for blini or goose meat and then lay down to rest. At the time, the whole regiment wanted to have Semyon Timofeyich for a commander because he is a wild one, and that order came from Comrade Budyonny, and Semyon Timofeyich was given two horses, good clothes, a cart specially for rags he’s looted, and a Red Flag Medal, and they really looked up to me as I am his brother. Now when some neighbor offends you, then Semyon Timofeyich can completely slash him to pieces. Then we started chasing General Denikin, slashed them down by the thousand and chased them to the Black Sea, but Papa was nowhere to be seen, and Semyon Timofeyich looked for him in all the positions, because he mourned for our brother Fyodor. But only, dearest Mama, since you know Papa and his stubborn character, do you know what he did? He impudently painted his red beard black and was in the town of Maykop in civilian clothes, so that nobody there knew that he is he himself, that very same police constable in the old regime. But truth will always show its head—my godfather Nikon Vasilich saw him by .chance in the hut of a townsman, and wrote my brother Semyon Timofeyich a letter. We got on horses and galloped two hundred versts—me, my brother Semyon, and boys which wants to come along from the Cossack village.

  And what is it we saw in the town of Maykop? We saw that people away from the front, they dont give a damn about the front, and its all full of betrayal and Yids like in the old regime. And my brother Semyon Timofeyich in the town of Maykop had a good row with the Yids who would not give Papa up and had thrown him in jail under lock and key, saying that a decree had come not to hack to pieces prisoners, we’ll try him ourselves, don’t be angry, he’ll get what he deserves. But then Semyon Timofeyich spoke and proved that he was the commander of a regiment, and had been given all the medals of the Red Flag by Comrade Budyonny, and threatened to hack to pieces everyone who argued over Papa’s person without handing him over, and the boys from the Cossack villages threatened them too. But then, the moment Semyon got hold of Papa, Semyon began whipping him, and lined up all the fighters in the yard as befits military order. And then Semyon splashed water all over Papas beard and the color flowed from the beard. And Semyon asked our Papa, Timofey Rodyonich, “So, Papa, are you feeling good now that you’re in my hands?”

  “No,” Papa said, “I’m feeling bad.”

  Then Semyon asked him, “And my brother Fyodor, when you were hacking him to pieces, did he feel good in your hands?”

  “No,” Papa said, “Fyodor was feeling bad.”

  Then Semyon asked him, “And did you think, Papa, that someday you might be feeling bad?”

  “No,” Papa said, “I didn’t think that I might be feeling bad.”

  Then Semyon turned to the people and said, “And I believe, Papa, that if I fell into your hands, I would find no mercy. So now, Papa, we will finish you off!”

  Timofey Rodyonich began impudently cursing Semyon, by Mama and the Mother of God, and slapping Semyon in the face, and Semyon sent me out of the yard, so that I cannot, dearest Mama, Evdokiya Fyodorovna, describe to you how they finished off Papa, because I had been sent out of the yard.

  After that we stopped at the town of Novorossisk. About that town one can say that there isn’t a single bit dry anywhere anymore, just water, t
he Black Sea, and we stayed there right until May, and then we set off for the Polish Front where we are slapping the Polish masters about in full swing.

  I remain your loving son, Vasily Timofeyich Kurdyukov. Mama, look in on Stepan, and the Lord will smile upon you.

  This is Kurdyukov s letter, without a single word changed. When I had finished, he took the letter and hid it against the naked flesh of his chest.

  “Kurdyukov,” I asked the boy, “was your father a bad man?”

  “My father was a dog,” he answered sullenly.

  “And your mother?”

  “My mother’s good enough. Heres my family, if you want to take a look.”

  He held out a tattered photograph. In it was Timofey Kurdyukov, a wide-shouldered police constable in a policemans cap, his beard neatly combed. He was stiff, with wide cheekbones and sparkling, colorless, vacant eyes. Next to him, in a bamboo chair, sat a tiny peasant woman in a loose blouse, with small, bright, timid features. And against this provincial photographer s pitiful backdrop, with its flowers and doves, towered two boys, amazingly big, blunt, broad-faced, goggle-eyed, and frozen as if standing at attention: the Kurdyukov brothers, Fyodor and Semyon.

  THE RESERVE CAVALRY COMMANDER

  A wail spreads over the village. The cavalry is trampling the grain and trading in horses. The cavalrymen are exchanging their worn-out nags for the peasants’ workhorses. One cant argue with what the cavalrymen are doing—without horses there can be no army.

  But this isn’t much of a comfort to the peasants. They are stubbornly gathering outside the headquarters, dragging behind them struggling old nags tottering with weakness. The muzhiks’ breadwinners have been taken away from them, and with a surge of bitter valor, aware that this valor will not last long, they hurry to rant despairingly at the authorities, at God, and at their bitter lot.

  Chief of Staff Z.* [Konstantin Karlovich Zholnarkevich, the staff commander in the 1920 Diary.] is standing on the front porch in full uniform. His inflamed eyelids half closed, he listens to the muzhiks’ complaints with evident attention. But his attention is only a ploy. Like all disciplined and weary bureaucrats, he has a knack for shutting down all cerebral activity during empty moments of existence. During these moments of blissful empty-headedness our chief of staff recharges his worn-out instrument.

  And this is what he is doing this time too, with the muzhiks.

  To the soothing accompaniment of their desperate and disjointed clamor, Chief of Staff Z. cautiously follows his brain’s soft wisps, those precursors of clear and energetic thought. He waits for the necessary pause, grasps the final muzhik sob, yells in a commanderial fashion, and returns to his office to work.

  But on this particular occasion even yelling would not have been necessary. Galloping up to the porch on an Anglo-Arabian steed came Dyakov,7 a former circus rider and now commander of the Reserve Cavalry—red-faced with a gray mustache, a black cape, and wide red Tatar trousers with silver stripes.

  “The Father Superiors blessing on all the honest filth of the earth!” he shouted, reining in his horse in front of the porch, and at that very instant a shabby little horse that had been given in exchange by the Cossacks collapsed in front of him.

  “There, you see, Comrade Commander!” a muzhik shouted, slapping his thighs in despair. “There you have what your people are giving our people! Did you see what theyVe given us? And were supposed to farm with that?”

  “For this horse,” Dyakov proclaimed distinctly and momentously, “for this horse, my highly esteemed friend, you have every right to request fifteen thousand rubles from the Reserve Cavalry, and if this horse were a trifle livelier, you, my dearest of friends, would be entitled to twenty thousand rubles. Just because a horse falls does not mean its factual! If a horse falls but then gets up—that is a horse. If, to invert what I am saying, the horse does not get up—then that is not a horse. But I do believe I can make this lively little mare spring to her feet again!

  “Lord in Heaven and Mother of God!” the muzhik cried, throwing his hands up in the air. “How is this poor thing supposed to get up? Its on its last legs!”

  “You are insulting this horse, my dear fellow!” Dyakov answered with fierce conviction. “Pure blasphemy, my dear fellow!” And he deftly swung his athletes body out of his saddle. Splendid and deft as if in the circus ring, he stretched his magnificent legs, his trousers girded by cords around the knees, and walked up to the dying animal. She peered at him dolefully with a severe, penetrating eye, licked some invisible command from his crimson palm, and immediately the feeble mare felt bracing power flow from this sprightly, gray, blossoming Romeo. Her muzzle lolling, her legs skidding under her, feeling the whip tickling her stomach with imperious impatience, the mare slowly and deliberately rose onto her legs. And then we all saw Dyakov s slender hand with its fluttering sleeve run through her dirty mane, and his whining whip swatting her bleeding flanks. Her whole body shivering, the mare stood on all four legs without moving her timid, doglike, lovestruck eyes from Dyakov.

  “So you see—this is a horse,” Dyakov said to the muzhik, and added softly, “and you were complaining, my dearest of friends!”

  Throwing his reins to his orderly, the commander of the Reserve Cavalry jumped the four stairs in a single leap and, swirling off his operatic cloak, disappeared into the headquarters.

  PAN APOLEK

  The wise and wonderful life of Pan Apolek went straight to my head, like an exquisite wine. Among the huddling ruins of Novograd-Volynsk, a town crushed in haste, fate threw at my feet a gospel that had remained hidden from the world. There, surrounded by the guileless shine of halos, I took a solemn oath to follow the example of Pan Apolek. The sweetness of dreamy malice, the bitter contempt for the swine and dogs among men, the flame of silent and intoxicating revenge— I sacrificed them all to this oath.

  • • •

  An icon was hanging high on the wall in the home of the Novograd priest, who had fled. It bore the inscription: “The Death of John the Baptist.” There was no doubt about it: in the portrayal of John I saw a man I had seen somewhere before.

  I remember the gossamer stillness of a summer morning hung on the bright, straight walls. The sun had cast a ray straight on the foot of the icon. Sparkling dust swarmed in it. The tall figure of John came straight at me from the blue depths of the niche. A black cape hung triumphantly on that inexorable, repulsively thin body. Droplets of blood shone in the capes round buckles. His head had been hacked diagonally off the flayed neck. It lay on an earthen platter that was held by the large yellow fingers of a warrior. The face of the dead man seemed familiar. I was touched by a mysterious premonition. The hacked-off head on the earthen platter was modeled after Pan Romuald, the curate of the priest who had fled. Out of his snarling mouth curled the tiny body of a snake, its scales shining brightly. Its head, a tender pink, was bristling with life, and stood out powerfully against the deep background of the cape.

  I was amazed at the painter s artistry, his dark inventiveness. I was even more amazed the following day when I saw the red-cheeked Virgin Mary hanging above the matrimonial bed of Pani Eliza, the old priests housekeeper. Both paintings bore the marks of the same brush. The meaty face of the Virgin Mary was a portrait of Pani Eliza. And this is where I found the key to the mystery of the Novograd icons. And the key led me to Pani Elizas kitchen, where on fragrant evenings the shadows of old servile Poland gather, with the holy fool of a painter at their center. But was Pan Apolek a holy fool, peopling the local villages with angels, and elevating lame Janek, the Jewish convert, to sainthood?

  Pan Apolek had come here thirty years ago on a summer day like any other with blind Gottfried. The two friends, Apolek and Gottfried, had gone to Shmerels tavern on the Rovno high road, two versts from the edge of the town. In his right hand Apolek was holding a box of paints, and with his left hand leading the blind concertina player. The melodious tread of their reinforced German boots echoed with calmness and hope. A canary-yellow
scarf hung from Apolek’s thin neck, and three chocolate-brown feathers swung on the blind mans Tyrolean hat.

  The newcomers had placed the paints and the concertina on a windowsill in the tavern. The artist unwound his scarf, which was never-ending, like a fairground magicians ribbon. Then he went out into the yard, took off all his clothes, and poured freezing water over his thin, feeble, pink body. Shmerel’s wife brought them raisin vodka and a bowl of meat cutlets stuffed with rice. Gottfried ate his fill, and then placed his concertina on his bony knees. He sighed, threw his head back, and flexed his thin fingers. The chords of the Heidelberg songs echoed against the walls of the Jewish tavern. With his scratchy voice Apolek accompanied the blind man. It was as if the organ had been brought from the Church of Saint Indegilda to Shmerels tavern and the muses, with their quilted scarves and reinforced German boots, had seated themselves in a row upon this organ.

  The two men sang till sunset, then they put the concertina and the paints into canvas sacks. Pan Apolek bowed deeply and gave Brayna, the taverner s wife, a sheet of paper.

  “My dear Pant Brayna,” he said. “Please accept from the hands of a wandering artist, upon whom the Christian name of Apollinarius has been bestowed, this portrait as a sign of our most humble gratitude for your sumptuous hospitality. If the Lord Jesus Christ sees fit to lengthen my days and give strength to my art, I will come back and add color to this portrait. There shall be pearls in your hair and a necklace of emeralds upon your breast.”