by John Burke
The door opened. There was a blast of cold air. A young man came in and stopped, thunderstruck.
Karl glanced apprehensively at his daughter. The dance came to an end, there was a roar of applause, and she leaned against Rasputin, getting her breath back.
The young man wouldn’t like that. Young Nikita had taken it for granted for many months now that Nadejda was his. If it had not been for her mother’s illness he would perhaps have taken her away from the inn before now.
Karl lurched towards the boy and put an arm round his shoulders. Rashly he said: “Have you ever seen her dance like that?”
“Who is he?” Nikita’s lips were tight and hostile.
“I don’t know. But he saved my Tanya. He saved her.”
The full realization of it welled up within Karl, and he could hardly see for the tears in his eyes. He patted Nikita vaguely, pointlessly on the shoulder and staggered away towards the bar. Rasputin was already there, having dragged Nadejda with him.
“More wine, my friend,” said Karl lovingly. “Have more wine.”
Behind them there was the clink of glasses and the drunken bellow of his customers, his friends, his dear old pals, the rough and rowdy men who carved a savage existence out of the iron frigidity of Siberia. Let them drink. Let them laugh. Let them sing. Let them say what they wanted . . .
But he heard, through the ebb and flow of laughter, his son’s voice. And the voice of Nikita, jealous and ready for trouble.
“Who is he? He must be the same as—”
“Tonight he cured my mother when the doctor could do nothing. Then he insisted that we have this party.”
“He’s drunk three bottles of wine already. That’s the fourth he’s starting on now. He must be the same.”
“The same?”
“There’s an inn far across the province. My uncle runs it. And he tells me—they all tell me—of this shambling creature who appears, gets drunk, and goes.”
Karl tore the cork from a bottle. “More wine, my friend.” Ten minutes from now he would leave them all and go up to see his wife and reassure himself that the miracle had indeed worked. “More wine.”
“Have you seen him dance?” Vassily was saying. And Nikita’s growl cut through the turmoil: “Yes.”
“Nadejda’s been dancing with him all evening. I don’t like it.”
“No more do I.” Nikita had been smoking a cheroot. Now he stubbed it out and peeled off his jacket. “I’m going to show that savage a real dance. Come on, Vassily—strike up a tune.”
The sound of the accordion squawked out again through the room. Two or three sleepy drunkards began to clap out the beat.
Karl leaned on the bar and nodded. And then he realized that there was nobody on the other side. He had poured out two large glasses of wine, and there was nobody to pick them up and drink them. His daughter and Rasputin had vanished.
Wait a minute, he said to himself. Wait a minute. The words seeped through his befuddled mind. A great man, a noble man, a healer with supernatural powers . . . eternally grateful . . . but wait a minute . . .
Nikita said furiously: “Where are they?”
The chords of the accordion slurred away into a discordant jangle. Vassily looked at his friend and looked away. Nikita went to the door and wrenched it open.
Karl cried: “Look, we don’t want any trouble. I don’t want . . .”
What did he want, then? Because his wife had been saved, must he deliver his daughter to that strange, stinking animal? He reached for his glass.
And the burly, quarrelsome Dmitri slopped drink down his chest and said: “You’ve got no pride, Karl? You’ll turn a blind eye, mm? My son goes out there to defend your daughter, and you say there must be no trouble. Hey?”
Dmitri sometimes had enemies; but now he had friends. The men in this bar had their own code of honor. When Dmitri stalked towards the door, they followed him.
Karl dashed after them.
Their feet crunched through the snow and then were quiet as they approached the barn on the far side of the inn yard.
Nikita was ahead of them. He was several steps inside the barn, with a billhook in his right hand. And in the corner of the barn Rasputin bent over Nadejda, his huge hand caressing her face and neck and bare shoulders—not to cure her of an illness but to coax from her a responsive bestiality.
Nikita let out a howl of rage and flung himself at Rasputin.
Karl winced and hugged himself with fear—fear for his daughter, himself, the young man, and Tanya. Tanya had been cured: that was all he asked and all he had ever asked. There should be nothing more—no struggle, no vindictiveness.
Rasputin grabbed the young man by the wrist. They struggled for a moment, with Nikita lashing out and trying to free himself. The billhook was wrenched from his grasp. At once he got Rasputin by the throat and tried to force him back against the wall of the barn.
Rasputin raised the billhook. The movement was slow and calculating and almost thoughtful.
The hook slashed down.
Nikita howled and fell back. His right hand fell into the hay. Blood spurted in a rich dark flow from the wrist, jerked into a shuddering, hysterical spasm, he swung round and blundered towards the door of the barn.
Rasputin bent and picked up the severed hand. He tossed it into a corner of the barn and said mildly to Nadejda:
“Don’t be frightened. He won’t trouble us any more.”
Nadejda was screaming. Her shattered voice jolted Karl out of every other preoccupation: he forgot his wife, forgot what Rasputin had done, was filled only with a terror and hatred for this alien creature which had walked into their lives. He held out his arms, and his daughter ran sobbing into them.
Dmitri trod over the hay towards Rasputin.
The stranger summed them all up coolly, with a devilish contempt. He waited. Dmitri and the men around him reached out for forks and billhooks, grabbed anything that stood against the walls of the barn . . . and advanced.
Rasputin glanced casually backwards. There was a raised platform at the back of the barn, with a closed door at one side. Here produce was unloaded from the high carts of the province.
“Get him!” yelled Dmitri suddenly.
They launched themselves. Rasputin sprang back and thrust himself up on to the platform. He bared his yellow teeth in a wicked, derisive grin. Before they could scramble up and grab him, he snatched the broken shaft of a plough from a corner of the platform and rammed it up with all his strength. It went through the rotted wooden roof, and fragments of planks and branches showered round the heads of the men below.
Rasputin hurled the plough shaft at them. Dmitri cursed as one end struck him above the left ear and sent him down to the floor. As he struggled up, Rasputin had thrown himself into the air and got a grip on the jagged edges of the roof. He pulled himself up, swung through the opening, and was gone.
They rushed out. Already he was on horseback and racing towards the dark curtain of the forest.
Karl let out a sob. He didn’t know what he was trying to say. He wanted the man to be punished, and was afraid of him . . . yet wanted him to escape and be happy because of the goodness he had wrought within the walls of the inn.
Vassily bent and picked up something from the dust and chaff on the floor. When he stood up he dangled it questioningly in front of his father.
It was a rosary.
2
The deputation to the Abbot was one which Karl would have preferred not to join. But they said that he had been there all the time and was an important witness: it was his duty to speak out about what he had seen. There was no escape. Dmitri was adamant, and even if Karl had possessed the strength to oppose Dmitri he would not have wanted to lose all the rest of his customers. They all demanded swift retribution. He joined them as they rode to the distant monastery.
The Abbot was a splendid figure of a man who managed to make his simple clothes look magnificent. His humility had a splendid flourish about it. Wit
hout being vain he nevertheless imposed on people in his presence the awareness of his spiritual grandeur. Clearly he enjoyed every florid moment of it, and if there were times when he confessed a love of florid ritual to his God, he kept such confessions very private indeed.
Dmitri told him the story bluntly. The Abbot nodded with solemn dignity. Dmitri unwrapped the severed hand and laid it on the table. The Abbot wrinkled his nose. “And your reason for supposing . . . ?” The rosary was put before him, and the appearance of the gifted but wayward intruder described to him.
The Abbot sighed and looked at the monk who stood by his left shoulder The monk tried to remain impassive but was clearly of one mind with his superior.
“Fetch Brother Grigori.”
The visitors waited. The Abbot looked grave and remote. Karl wished that he could be a thousand miles from here. He had wanted no trouble . . . had asked, over and over again, that there should be no trouble . . .
And Rasputin was ushered in.
The Abbot looked up. “Where is your rosary, Brother Grigori?”
Rasputin put his hand in the pocket of his habit. He stiffened, and looked from side to side. His gaze crossed those of Dmitri and Karl. He gave no sign of recognition.
“Is this it?” The Abbot held out the rosary.
“Where did you find it?”
“Is it yours, then?”
There was a silence which Karl longed to break. He yearned to say that an end should be made to this, that the horror should be wiped out by the good that had been done; that somehow it should be possible to draw a line and say that there would be no recriminations, no vengeance exacted for drunken errors in the past.
Rasputin stood defiantly before his Abbot.
“Have you anything to say in your defence?”
“I was attacked,” said Rasputin. “I defended myself.”
“I am not referring merely to this.” The Abbot waved a delicate finger at the withered, crumpled hand. “That is a matter for the civil authorities. And if these gentlemen wish you to be handed over to the authorities, I will add my voice to theirs. But your conduct in relation to your cloth . . . in relation to your church . . . what of that? Your licentious behavior . . . drinking . . . going with women.”
“During the time that I have been here,” said Rasputin arrogantly, “you have gone to great pains to instil in me the belief that confession of sins is good for the soul.”
“Well?”
“You have also, within these walls, eliminated temptation. There is no opportunity for sin here. I have done no more than rectify that omission. When I come to confession I do not offer God a few contrived little sins—intellectual little foibles, petty squabbles and jealousies: I offer God sins worth forgiving.”
“This is blasphemy.” The Abbot tried to sound sad and dispassionate, but his voice shook. “For this you must be punished.”
Karl could bear no more. He looked at the tall, rigid form of Grigori Rasputin and hated the latent bestiality within it; but he remembered Tanya and that first smile of hers, the slow reawakening and the love it had brought back into his life. He said: “Sir, be merciful. This man saved my wife. He restored her to life. She was dying and he brought her back from the grave.”
“Merciful?” growled Dmitri. “Merciful . . . when he mutilated my son!”
The Abbot looked deeply into Karl’s eyes. “What is this you say?”
“Back from the grave. It was a miracle, nothing less.”
The Abbot’s splendid, leonine head turned weightily towards Rasputin. “Is this another of your blasphemies?”
“The woman was sick. I healed her.”
“Healed her? How—with potions?”
Rasputin held out his huge, gnarled hands. “With these.”
The Abbot got up. He looked uncertainly at the spread palms and then approached Karl. In a confidential undertone he asked:
“Was your wife possessed of a devil? Did Brother Grigori exorcize her soul . . . pray for her?”
“No,” said Rasputin loudly, domineeringly. “I touched her—with these.”
“It’s true, sir,” said the innkeeper.
“God would never bless someone so steeped in sin with such a gift.” The Abbot lowered his head and wrestled with himself. “It must come from—”
“The Devil?” said Rasputin scornfully. His long upper lip curled as they all crossed themselves. “Who knows?” he went on softly. “I can only say that I have this power. That I have always had it. I feel it coursing through my veins, firing my spirit. I can feel it in my fingertips. It burns inside me, seeking an outlet. And I warn you . . .” He was still quiet, but venomous now. “I warn you all—I, Grigori Yefimovitch Rasputin, intend to use it. The power is mine . . . and I shall use it for my own ends.”
A terrible resonance seemed to tremble through the walls of the room. And through the heads of all of them. Yet there was silence; utter silence.
The Abbot said: “We will pray for your soul.” He sank to his knees and began to intone a prayer.
The others, with the exception of Rasputin, reverently followed suit. The proud monk looked scornfully from one to the other, then strode to the door and went out.
When the men from the village went their homeward way, disgruntled because they had not been allowed to give Rasputin the rough treatment he deserved, Karl lagged behind. He had brought his wagon to pick up supplies and collect some wood for the winter, and he took his time over moving away from the monastery. When Rasputin emerged and began to walk down the rough track without so much as a glance back over his shoulder, Karl urged his horse forward and brought the wagon alongside the monk.
“I . . . hm . . . I thought you might be leaving.”
Rasputin looked up at him with a wicked, sardonic grin. “Did you, indeed? That was your purpose in coming here with your friends, wasn’t it—to have me thrown out into the wilderness?”
“I’m sorry. I didn’t want them to come. I want you to know that I’m still grateful to you. For saving my wife.”
Rasputin shrugged and began to walk off. Karl said hastily: “Can I take you anywhere?”
Rasputin stopped and considered this. Then he sprang up beside Karl. He was dressed now in a blouse, loose trousers, and soft boots. The clothes were faded and old: probably he had worn them when he entered the monastery and they had been put away, to be handed back to him when he was ejected.
“Drive me as far as you are going,” he said. “Put me down when it is time for you to turn back. I’ll go on from wherever you leave me.”
“Go on . . . where to?”
“Anywhere. Does it matter? Let it just be far from here, from these fools—these disciples of dullness.” He waved contemptuously in the direction of the monastery. “What do they know, shut up there in their trim little cages? That is not living. There is no glory in it. No tribute to God or to anyone else. What have we got senses for, if not to use them? To feel, to taste, to touch, to stroke . . .” He held his massive hands out before him, as Karl had seen him do in the bedroom at the inn. “To crush,” he growled through his teeth.
Karl urged the horse on down the hill and through the forest. He did not know what to say to this huge creature beside him. He thought of him pacing on across Siberia, of faltering and dying as winter’s grip closed on the land. But would he die: was he as destructible as an ordinary mortal?
Karl ventured: “You demand a lot of life.”
“Ha! I ask only that it shall be life, not merely existence. I know too much. Sometimes I feel I know everything.”
“You’re wasted out here with us peasants, then. You should be in St. Petersburg.” Karl made it a joke. It was easier and somehow safer to be flippant. “At Court,” he went on, “telling the Tsar what to do. They could do with someone like you, my son—someone who knows everything.”
He chuckled. But Rasputin was silent. Karl stole a glance at him, and saw that he was sunk in thought. A shiver of fear ran through Karl. The man seem
ed to be taking him seriously.
“Have you ever been there?” asked Rasputin.
“To St. Petersburg?” It was a hazy memory. Long ago he had walked the streets of the capital and announced to himself that he would make his fortune there. He would one day own a palace and choose for himself one of the rich, perfumed women who swept in their carriages to and from the embassies and theatres. Long ago . . . He had spent two whole nights there and got drunk and lost all his money. Not that there had been much of it to start with. It had taken him weeks to get home. He had never been back. The bright lights had dimmed in his memory. He would never walk down those wide, magnificent streets again. “You need money to live there,” he said. “Plenty of money. It’s not for the likes of you or me.”
“I’ll get money,” said Rasputin quietly to himself.
Karl was glad to set him down at last and leave him. The fire which burned within the man was fierce, all-consuming. Karl could almost believe that he was capable of getting to St. Petersburg and seizing the city by the throat to wrest wealth and power from it.
Turning his horse homeward, Karl looked back once to wave. But Rasputin was already striding purposefully towards the west, his eyes fixed on a distant goal.
3
The café was filling up very slowly this evening. People were still milling about and shouting in the street market outside. Occasionally one of the vendors would come in and tip back a drink, but none of them stayed for more than a couple of minutes. They were no good. Besides, most of them worked in this district regularly and knew Zargo and his tricks.
Zargo settled himself into his chair and sipped his drink. He hated sipping. He liked to gulp it down and demand another, and keep them moving. But he must conserve his energies. When he began to drink steadily, somebody else must pay.
“Quiet tonight,” grunted The Fox.
His real name, if he had ever had one, was lost in the past. Everyone knew him as The Fox because of his narrow face and the wisp of red beard which stained his sharp chin. His eyes were red-rimmed, sometimes cunning and sometimes maudlin. Zargo found him repellent but useful. And after all, he could not choose his company. Not nowadays. He could not afford to be as selective as he had once been.