The Exile: A novel about Taras Shevchenko

by Zinaida Tulub

“Did you call me, Voldemar?” she asked in French.

  “I did, my dear,” the general replied. “Here is the St. Petersburg artist whose album we sent to the emperor the other day. I have invited Mr. Shevchenko to paint your portrait.”

  “Oh, was it you who painted Baroness Blaramberg? I saw her portrait. It is very life-like, even a bit embellished,” she said after Shevchenko had bowed silently. “So do you agree to paint me?”

  “As you wish, your Excellency,” Shevchenko replied, snapping to attention and even clicking his heels.

  “My name is Mathilda Petrovna,” she said graciously. “And what is yours?”

  “Taras Shevchenko.”

  “Taras… and your patronymic?”

  “Grigorievich,” the poet said, bowing slightly, in an unmilitary fashion this time.

  “Well then, Taras Grigorievich, let us not delay Vladimir Afanasyevich anymore: we have a lot of work to do now. Come to my chambers, and there we’ll talk things over.”

  She took him to a little sitting room that was unusually cozy and well lit by three large windows. Mathilda Petrovna showed him her favored dress, in which she wanted to sit for the portrait. She chose a life-size portrait without waver­ing and wished to look “absolutely her living likeness” on the canvas. The only thing left for Shevchenko to do was to find the best illuminated place in the room, seat his sitter in an armchair, and make her adopt the best posture.

  Not a single word was uttered about the price.

  35

  At the Turn of Two Years

  When Shevchenko returned from the Obruchevs, a letter from Lizohub was waiting for him. It was like a waft of warmth from his homeland, conjuring up in his mind the fragrance of Kiev’s autumnal orchards and the easy com­fort of Sedniv. Lizohub congratulated him on his return to Orenburg, writing that this was probably the poet’s first step on a new road and a sign of a change in his destiny; he also promised to send a parcel with warm clothes, books, and produce from his own farm.

  The second page of the letter must have been written several days later, because it was a response to Shevchenko’s questions contained in his second and last letter.

  Lizohub wrote:

  “You ask me, my friend, about the fate of those who were arrested along with you. I know a few things about the young people only, since they correspond with their old parents.

  “The students Andruzky and Posiada were held behind prison bars for several days each and then taken to Kazan where they were permitted to enroll in the local university. When they graduated from it and were granted their diplo­mas, they were sent to work at their professions in one of the central provinces of Russia ‘under police surveillance,’ with the right to return to Ukraine. Hulak’s friend, the student Tulub, was not taken to St. Petersburg, since nothing serious was found at his home during the search. He was given the opportunity to graduate from Kiev University and was then exiled to Zlatopol in Poltava Province to live ‘under police surveillance.’ With no Gymnasium there, he had to teach the children of the nobility at a district school.

  “The traitor Petrov, the sonny of a gendarme officer, was accepted for a job with the Third Department and issued five hundred rubles in silver as a reward: he whom no university students would have tolerated in their midst for being a Judas, was granted, on the gendarmes’ order, an officially registered diploma from Kiev University with the title of ‘full-time student’; on receiving his five hundred pieces of silver, this blackguard did not go and hang him­self like Judas Iscariot, but continues to live happily, and, perhaps, crawls like a poisoned vermin.

  “We have not heard any hint of the Brotherhood mem­bers of the older generation. The only thing I know is that they have been exiled to live somewhere ‘under police surveillance’ and teach, without any right to visit Ukraine even on holidays.”

  “Satraps! Barbarians!” Shevchenko exclaimed, not able to restrain himself, and in response to Levitsky and Lazarevsky’s quizzical look, added: “Andruzky squealed too much from fright. It was good that the others did not con­firm his testimony. He drowned himself with his long tongue. As for Posiada… the only thing that worried him was the bitter lot of the peasantry and the abolition of serfdom; he hadn’t the slightest idea about constitutions, republics or reforms. During the interrogations he replied briefly, did not squeal on anybody, and confronted with the gendarmes’ pressure, he proved to be much cleverer than the scholar and smart professor Kostomarov… I pity Hulak. His is a keen mind and strong character — a real fighter, I’d say. The gendarmes sensed it, too, and threw him into the Schlüsselburg Fortress. I wonder whether the poor fellow is still alive.”

  Shevchenko heaved a sigh.

  “How did you get the letter?” Pospelov asked. “Was it through the ordinary mail? You must write to your friend at once, so that he be more careful and avoid such subjects in his letters: he might get himself into trouble and ruin you completely.”

  “Don’t you worry: Lizohub is a cautious person,” Lazarevsky intervened. “The letter was brought by a landowner’s wife whose son served here, and apart from her, nobody knows about its existence. She probably doesn’t suspect what its contents are all about.”

  The next morning Shevchenko was again visited by Gern.

  “Where is Zaleski?” he asked.

  “Bronek doesn’t work here anymore,” the poet replied. “Do you need him?”

  “No, on the contrary. It’s good that we are alone here. I want to tell you about a very strange matter which you alone can explain.”

  “I’ll try, if I can,” Shevchenko said in surprise, pushing an armchair toward Gern. “What’s happened? You look so agitated.”

  “Not so much excited as bewildered,” Gern replied, sitting down in the armchair. “Close the door lest anyone eavesdrop on us.”

  Shevchenko looked into the adjoining room and kitchen to see whether Guriy was there, then he locked the front door and settled opposite Gern.

  “Colonel Matveiev, as you know, is an utterly decent per­son, and I trust him like I would myself,” Gern said. “Yes­terday he had a meal at the restaurant and accidentally found himself beside the company of General Tolmachov, his aide Mansurov and some other people. Matveiev is not particularly fond of them since they are from the company of the former governor Perovsky. He was surprised to see our Maksheiev in their midst. They were all pretty drunk, and suddenly Maksheiev started slandering Butakov.”

  “That’s incredible!” Shevchenko exclaimed.

  “Matveiev heard him saying that Butakov starved the crew and made a fortune on it, and that all the longitudes and latitudes he established were wrong, because his chro­nometers stopped functioning after they had dropped to the ground one day, no one knew when they started going again, and that’s why his chart was inaccurate, and some­thing else of the sort… Butakov was supposed to have mixed up all the local names of the islands and coasts, then he stopped going ashore altogether and charted the coastline from the schooner ‘by eye,’ and only off the Khiva shore did he go ashore alone at night in disregard of the prohibition of the war minister and the minister for foreign affairs who had strictly forbidden to approach Khiva; what he had been doing in hostile territory at night God alone knew. So something has to be done with Butakov at once: either take measures against Maksheiev for the slander, or, on the contrary, brand Butakov with suspicion. I asked Matveiev to keep silent for the time being, and came here for your advice.”

  “My God!” Shevchenko exclaimed. “What abominable slander!”

  “Don’t take it so close to heart, Taras Grigorievich,” Gern calmed him. “You were there and saw everything with your own eyes. Although you are not a sailor or topographer, you’ve learned to understand such things throughout the year and a half you have been on the expe­dition. Let us consider everything point by point. Obruchev entrusts such matters to me, so sooner or later we’ll be in need of your cooperation. Well then, let’s begin without any delay.”

  “All rig
ht, ask your questions!” Shevchenko moved closer to Gern, after having regained self-control. Still, his jaw muscles moved on his face, betraying his agitation.

  “Is it true that you were hungry while at sea?”

  “Yes, such things did happen; especially during the second navigation, when Maksheiev wasn’t with us any­more. The foodstuffs for the expedition, however, were not procured by Butakov but by the Orenburg officials in charge of provisions. Some of the stocks arrived from other towns to the order of the Orenburg Military District. Medi­cal attendant Istomin kept the records all the time and checked on the accounts. I helped him occasionally, and by the invoices and way-bills I know the true situation of things. Probably, both the groats and the flour and all the other foodstuffs were good at first, but the groats grew moldy in the moist Orenburg stores, and then, moist as the groats were, they traveled under tarps for some two months in what amounted to tropical heat. The rusks were moldy as well. Istomin saw personally to it that every rusk was roasted, and none of our men got poisoned or was taken ill. The groats for the porridge were also roasted. Maggots appeared in the salted beef then, but the meat was so salty it didn’t rot. It was boiled thoroughly before consumption. Indeed, it wasn’t tasty, but there was nothing to be done — everyone realized that in a desert you had to be glad having what you had to eat. Nobody complained: on the contrary, we tried to help by catching fish and shooting whatever game we could.”

  “Where is Istomin now?”

  “He stayed behind at Raïm as a medical attendant at a military hospital.”

  “Could he confirm all that?”

  “Of course, under oath, just like Werner, Pospelov and I.”

  “And what happened to the chronometers?”

  “One of them really fell to the ground and stopped for several minutes, but Butakov kept regulating it for about three days with the help of astronomical observations, and this year before the navigation he again regulated all the chronometers for three days in the estuary of the Syr Darya. If they had been incorrect, why then did Maksheiev, who was worn out by sea sickness, simply copy and include in his records Butakov’s data, without going ashore himself? This, too, can be confirmed by Pospelov, Werner, and me, and even by boatswain Parfenov who’s been at sea for thirty years and learned his trade almost as well as a naval officer.”

  “Had there been any surveys ‘by eye’?”

  “By the ministry’s instructions, Butakov was prohibited from setting foot on the Khivan lands, so whether he liked it or not the southern coastline had to be surveyed ‘by eye’ from the Constantine. During fine weather and dead calms we established our position by compass and used instru­ments, the names of which I forgot. Pospelov will tell you what they are called.”

  “I don’t want to take Pospelov in on that matter yet.”

  “Neither do I. Just visit us today in the evening and ask Pospelov out of seeming curiosity to explain to you how a coastline is surveyed from a ship. He’ll tell you. If it had not been for that ministry order and instruction, Butakov would have gone ashore a hundred times and made a survey of all Khiva instrumentally. He just didn’t want to irritate Nesselrode and Chernishov. He is no coward, and the risk of being captured and sold into slavery would not have stopped him.”

  “So why then did he have to go ashore to the Khivans?”

  “Not to the Khivans, but secretly from them in order to sound the depths of all the five estuary arms in the Amu Darya delta. Last year he and Pospelov waded across these arms the whole night through, and this year he did it with Rybin at the risk of their lives. The boats followed them at some distance in case anything happened, and we on the schooner didn’t shut our eyes till dawn, listening alertly to every rustle in the reeds. The sailors just prayed for their Alexei Ivanovich.”

  “One more question. What about those local place names?”

  “Butakov wrote them down from the words of the Kir­ghiz guide we took along on our second voyage. On the old chart from the time of Perovsky’s rule Butakov saw that all the names were really mixed up.”

  “All right,” Gern said, getting to his feet. “Everything seems to be clear. I’ll drop in on you in the evening and have a talk with Pospelov. Tomorrow I’ll have to be at the headquarters. Oh my God, how sick I am of it all. There is work up to my neck, and I have to do all of it myself.”

  “How come? You’ve got so many assistants: five ensigns, clerks, orderlies…”

  “I cannot entrust such matters to the clerks, and the ensigns are outright blockheads who don’t know anything. Isaiev tops them all! He cannot write a simple report, without making twenty grammatical errors, and the simplest of thoughts he muddles up so much you have to rewrite every one of his ‘works.’ “

  “Not the man to invent gunpowder, is he?” Shevchenko laughed, seeing Gern off.

  In the evening Gern dropped in as if by accident and met with a bustling Lazarevsky preparing to leave for a business trip. So as not to interfere with his preparations, Gern took Pospelov to a corner for a chat. He did not stay long. Now he was well prepared to provide a precise answer to Matveiev on all points. Shevchenko saw him off into the street and asked him, worried:

  “What will become of Maksheiev now?”

  “If he continues carrying on like that, we’ll call him to account.”

  In the morning a little covered wagon rolled up. Lazarev­sky bid everyone farewell and disappeared into the depths of the wagon. Under the horses’ yokes the noisy Russian jingle hells, the companions of all the travelers of the past centuries, went off in a monotonous song. Levitsky left for his office, while Shevchenko retired to his room to get ready his painting gear before going to Mathilda Petrovna.

  “Some Kirghiz is asking you,” Axinia suddenly interrupt­ed his preparations, “He says that he came from Orsk.”

  “From Orsk? But there are no Kirghiz at Orsk anymore,” Shevchenko said, getting up with a surprised look. “Must be some akyn. Is he old, lean, bearded?”

  “Oh no. He’s young, younger than our gentleman, and good looking.”

  Shevchenko went out into the kitchen.

  “Jaisak!” he cried out joyously.

  “Taras Aga, my dear man! Oh, how glad I am to have found you. A jatak passed on to me the note from you, but I’ve lost it somewhere. I’ve been looking for you throughout Orsk all day yesterday. I’ve been at the fortress, asked the big chiefs. I saw Golden Mustache, and asked him. He said that he didn’t know where you lived.”

  “Come in, come in!” Shevchenko put an arm around his shoulders. “Axinia, treat my guest to whatever you have. How did you get here? How’s Kuljan, how do you live, and where do you wander? Where are you wintering now?” he bombarded the young Kazakh with questions.

  “I live well. Kuljan asked me to thank you for our happiness. We had two baigas: one at Irghiz Kala and the other at the Syr Darya. Akbozad and Karkerat came first again. Djantemir tells me, ‘You’re my son now, so you and I have one household, one flock, one herd.’ Once a caravan arrived and asked for food. Djantemir took money from them, and gave the Bukharans my sheep instead. I said, ‘But they are my sheep.’ To which he replied, ‘Since you are Kuljan’s husband, we make one family.’ The same happened when a Russian caravan arrived. And here Meshka Mayir and a general came to Raïm, and said, ‘A caravan is coming to Jaman Kala, so it needs sheep, airan, kumiss, but there are no Kirghiz around.’ The cara­van had angry and hungry men who did not want to trade anything; they went to another caravanserai, but Jaman Kala needed the wares badly. Without a caravan there is no life in the steppe. Meshka told Djantcmir, ‘If you please, f you can go back to Jaman Kala and live there on the Or River. But we’ll take one part of the steppe for ourselves and you can have the other, if you want.’ Djantemir did not return to Jaman Kala: he is better off on the Syr Darya, with a lot more sheep and camels than he had before. So I went to Meshka Mayir, and said, ‘Take me — I have over a thousand sheep, fifty camels, and a herd of horses. I was joined by T
aijan and another two families who also have sheep. The only thing we have to do is shoot the wolves every year. ‘Come to us,’ the mayir told me, ‘and we’ll shoot the wolves for you.’ He keeps your pennants for the chase next year. I took my apa, the camels, flock and herd, and left. Then I bought a new door and windows for Djantemir’s house and live there now.”

  “And Rahim?” Shevchenko asked.

  “Rahim left with us. Djantemir wanted to kill him at first, cursed him, gave him a terrible whipping, but in the end he let him have five hundred sheep and almost burst from rage. We saw how the Russians mow hay for the winter and we do the same, so that our flock won’t perish during jut and we turn into beggars like my ata. Soon I’ll have a son. Taras Aga, come and live with us. You won’t have to do ‘left-right’, and you’ll feel fine with my people.”

  Jaisak’s naïve suggestion moved Shevchenko. In the meantime, Axinia had served them a heap of hot Siberian meat dumplings, Ukrainian sausage, and tea. Shevchenko produced a bottle of wine, and filled two glasses.

  “The Prophet forbade us to drink this,” Jaisak said, pushing the glass aside.

  “But that’s not vodka. It’s grape juice, sweet and fra­grant. You don’t have to drink it; just taste it. It’s a sin to kill, steal, do people injustice, but to taste the juice of grapes which grow on this earth — I don’t see a sin in that. It isn’t strong at all; even our women drink it. You must drink it, so that Kuljan, and your son, and Taijan, and all your aul — that all of you be happy.”

  Jaisak dropped his head; then he took the glass abruptly.

  “I agree, if it’s for you, Taras Aga, so that you be free and wander to your dear steppe,” he said, and not know­ing of the Russian custom to clink glasses when drinking a toast, downed the drink in one gulp.

  However much Shevchenko tried to persuade him to follow up the drink with another one, Jaisak refused, and said, clacking his tongue:

  “It tastes good and smells wonderfully. Much better than our kumiss. But the Prophet forbade us, and we have to obey the Prophet.”