And quiet flows the Don; a novel

by Sholokhov, Mikhail Aleksandrovich, 1905-

  whom he was riding spat at the horse's belly and explained:

  "Been guzzling grain . .. been eating too much grain . . ." he corrected himself; he was about to spit again but for politeness' sake swallowed his spittle and wiped his mouth with his sleeve. "There it lies, and no one troubles to bury it. That's just like the Russians. The Germans are different."

  "What do you know about it?" Yevgeny asked with unreasoning anger. At that moment he was filled with hatred for the orderly's phlegmatic face with its suggestion of superiority and contempt. The man was grey and dreary like a stubble field in September; he was in no way different from the thousands of peasant soldiers whom Yevgeny had seen on his way to the front. They all seemed faded and drooping, dullness stared in their eyes, grey, blue, green or any other colour, and they strongly reminded him of ancient, well-worn copper coins.

  "I lived in Germany for three years before the war," the orderly replied unhurriedly. In his voice was the same shade of superiority and contempt that showed in his face. "I worked at a cigar factory in Konigsberg," the orderly continued lazily, flicking the horse with the knotted rein.

  "Hold your tongue!" Listnitsky commanded

  sternly, and turned to glance at the horse's head with its forelock tousled over its eyes and its bare sun-yellowed row of teeth.

  One leg was raised and bent in an arch; the hoof was slightly cracked but the hollow had a smooth grey-blue gleam about it and the lieutenant could tell by the leg and by the finely chiselled pastern that the horse was young and of a good breed.

  They drove on over the bumpy road. The colours faded in the west, a wind sprang up and scattered the clouds. Behind them the leg of the dead horse stuck up like a broken wayside cross. As Yevgeny stared back at it, a sheaf of rays fell suddenly on the horse, and in their orange light the leg with its sorrel hair blossomed unexpectedly like some marvellous leafless branch of legend.

  As the field hospital drove into Bereznyagi it passed a transport of wounded soldiers. An elderly Byelorussian, the owner of the first wagon, strode along at his horse's head, the hempen reins gathered in his hands. On the wagon lay a Cossack with bandaged head. He was resting on his elbow, but his eyes were closed wearily as he chewed bread and spat out the black mess. At his side a soldier was stretched out; over his buttocks his torn trousers were horribly shrivelled and taut with congealed

  blood. He was cursing savagely, without lifting his head. Listnitsky was horrified as he listened to the intonation of the man's voice, for it sounded exactly like a believer fervently muttering prayers. On the second Vv^agon five or six soldiers were lying side by side. One of them, possessed of a feverish gaiety, his eyes unnaturally bright and inflamed, was telling a story:

  ". . . It seems an ambassador from that em.per-or of theirs came here and made an offer about having peace. The thing is it was an honest man who told me. I'm hoping he wasn't just spinning a yarn."

  "I expect he was," one of the others rejoined doubtfully, shaking his round head that bore the scars of a recent attack of scrofula.

  "But perhaps he did really come here," responded a third man who was sitting with his back to the horses, in a soft Volga country brogue.

  On the fifth wagon three Cossacks were comfortably seated. As Listnitsky passed they stared silently at him, their harsh dusty faces showing no sign of respect for an officer.

  "Good-day, Cossacks!" the lieutenant greeted them.

  "Good-day, Your Honour," the handsome sil-ver-moustached Cossack sitting nearest the driver replied indifferently.

  "What regiment are you?" Listnitsky continued, trying to make out the number on the Cossack's blue shoulder-strap.

  "The Twelfth."

  "Where is your regiment now?"

  "We couldn't say."

  "Well, where were you wounded?"

  "By the village .. . not far from here."

  The Cossacks whispered among themselves and one of them, holding his roughly bandaged hand with his sound hand, jumped down from the wagon.

  "Just a minute. Your Honour." He padded across the road on bare feet, carefully nursing his bullet-torn hand, which was already showing signs of inflammation.

  "You wouldn't be from Vyeshenskaya, would you? You're not Listnitsky?"

  "Yes, I am."

  "That's what we thought. You haven't got anything to smoke, have you. Your Honour? Give us something, for Christ's sake, we're dying for a smoke."

  He walked along by the trap, gripping its painted side, Listnitsky took out his cigarette case.

  "Could you spare us a dozen? There are three of us, you know," the Cossack smiled appealingly,

  Listnitsky emptied the contents of his case on to the man's broad brown palm and asked: "Many wounded in your regiment?"

  "A couple of dozen."

  "Heavy losses?"

  "A lot of us have been killed. Light a match for me. Your Honour. Thank you kindly." The Cossack took the light and as he dropped behind he shouted: "Three Cossacks from Tatarsky, near your estate, have been killed. They've done in a lot of us Cossacks."

  He waved his sound hand and went to catch up with the wagon. The wind flapped through his unbelted tunic.

  The commander of Listnitsky's new regiment had his headquarters in the house of a priest. On the square Listnitsky took leave of the doctor, who had kindly offered him a seat in the hospital trap, and went off to find regimental headquarters, brushing the dust off his uniform as he walked. A vividly red-bearded sergeant-major, busy changing the guard, marched past him with a sentry. He saluted smartly and, in reply to Listnitsky's question, pointed out the house. The place was very quiet and slack, like all staff headquarters situated away from the front line. Clerks were bent over a table; an elderly captain was laughing into the mouthpiece of a field-telephone. The flies droned

  around the windows, and distant telephone bells buzzed like mosquitoes. An orderly conducted Yevgeny to the regimental commander's private room. They were met on the threshold by a tall colonel with a scar on his chin, who greeted him coldly, and with a gesture invited him into the room. As he closed the door the colonel passed his hand over his hair with a gesture of ineffable weariness, and said in a soft, monotonous voice:

  "The brigade staff informed me yesterday that you were on your way. Sit down."

  He questioned Yevgeny about his previous service, asked for the latest news from the capital, inquired about his journey, but not once during all their brief conversation did he raise his weary eyes to Listnitsky's face.

  "He must have had a hard time at the front; he looks mortally tired," Yevgeny thought sympathetically. As though deliberately to disillusion him, the colonel scratched the bridge of his nose with his sword-hilt and remarked:

  "Well, Lieutenant, you m.ust make the acquaintance of your brother officers. You must excuse me, I haven't been to bed for three nights running. In this dead hole there's nothing to do except play cards and get drunk."

  Listnitsky saluted and turned to the door, hiding his contempt with a smile. He went out

  reflecting unfavourably on this first meeting with his commanding officer, and ironically amused at the respect which the colonel's tired appearance and the scar on his chin had instilled in him.

  XV

  The division was allotted the task of forcing the river Styr and taking the enemy in the rear.

  In a few days Listnitsky got used to the officers of the regiment and was quickly drawn into the atmosphere of battle, which drove out the feeling of ease and complacency that had crept into his soul.

  The operations to force the river were carried through brilliantly. The division shattered a considerable concentration of enemy forces on their left flank, and came out in the rear of the main forces. The Austrians attempted to initiate a counter-offensive with the aid of Magyar cavalry, but the Cossack batteries swept them away with shrapnel, and the Magyar squadrons retreated in disorder, cut to pieces by flanking machine-gun fire and pursued by the Cossacks.

  Listnitsky went int
o the counter-attack with his regiment. The troop he commanded lost one Cossack, and four were wounded. One of them, a young, hook-nosed man was crushed under his dead horse. Outwardly calm, the lieutenant

  rode past trying not to hear the Cossack's low hoarse groaning. He was wounded in the shoulder and kept beseeching the Cossacks riding past:

  "Brothers, don't leave me. Get me free of the horse, brothers. . . ."

  His low, tortured voice could be heard calling faintly, but there was no spark of pity in the surging hearts of the other Cossacks, or if there was, it was crushed by the will that drove them on relentlessly, forbidding them to dismount. The troop rode on for five minutes at a trot, letting the horses recover their wind. Half a verst away the scattered Magyar squadrons were in full retreat; here and there among them appeared the grey-blue uniforms of the enemy infantry. An Austrian baggage train crawled along the crest of a hill with the farewell smoke of shell bursts hovering above it. From the left a battery was bombarding the train, and its dull thunder rolled over the fields and echoed through the forest.

  The sergeant-major leading the battalion gave the command "canter" and the three squadrons broke into a flagging trot. The horses swayed under their riders and foam scattered from their flanks in yellowish pink blossoms.

  The regiment halted for the night in a small village. The twelve officers were all crowded

  into one hut. Broken with fatigue and hunger, they lay down to sleep. The field-kitchen arrived only about midnight. Cornet Chubov brought in a pot of soup. The rich smell awakened the officers and within a few minutes, their faces still puffy with sleep, they were eating in greedy silence, making up for the two days lost in battle. After the late meal their previous sleepiness passed, and they lay on their cloaks on the straw talking and smoking.

  Junior captain Kalmykov, a tubby little officer whose face as well as his name bore the traces of his Mongolian origin, gesticulated fiercely as he declared:

  "This war is not for me. I was born four centuries too late. You know, I shan't live to see the end of the war."

  "Oh, drop your fortune-telling!"

  "It's not fortune-telling. It's my predestined end. I'm atavistic, and I'm superfluous here. When we were under fire today I trembled with frenzy; I can't stand not seeing the enemy. The horrible feeling I get is equivalent to fear. They fire at you from several versts away, and you ride like a bustard hunted over the steppe."

  "I had a look at an Austrian howitzer in Ku-palka. Have any of you seen one, gentlemen?" asked Captain Atamanchukov, licking the re-

  mains of tinned meat off his ginger moustache, which was clipped in the English style.

  "A wonderful piece of work! Those sights, the whole mechanism-sheer perfection," the enthusiastic reply came from Cornet Chubov, who had by this time emptied a second mess-tin of soup.

  "I have seen it, but I have nothing to say. I am a complete ignoramus where artillery is concerned. To me it was just a gun like any other, with a big barrel, that's all."

  "I envy those who fought in the old-tim.e, primitive fashion/' Kalmykov continued, turning to Listnitsky. "To thrust at your opponent in honourable battle, and to split him in two with your sword-that's the sort of warfare I understand. But this is the devil knows what."

  "In future wars cavalry will play no part. It will be abolished."

  "It simply won't exist."

  "Well, that I couldn't say."

  "No doubt about it."

  "But you can't replace men by machines.-You're going too far."

  "I'm not referring to men, but to horses. Motor cycles or motor cars will take their place."

  "I can just imagine a motor squadron!"

  "That's all nonsense!" Kalmykov interposed excitedly. "An absurd fantasy! Armies will use

  horses for a long time yet. We don't know what war will be like in two or three centuries' time, but today cavalry. . . ."

  "What will you do with the cavalry when there are trenches all along the front? Tell me that!"

  "They'll break through the trenches, ride across them, and make sorties far to the rear of the enemy; that will be the cavalry's task."

  "Nonsense!"

  "Oh, shut up and let's get some sleep."

  The argument tailed off, and snores took its place. Listnitsky lay on his back, breathing the pungent scent of the musty straw on which he had spread his cloak. Kalmykov lay down at his side.

  "You should have a talk with the volunteer Bunchuk," he whispered to Yevgeny. "He's in your troop. A very interesting fellow!"

  "In what way?" Listnitsky asked, as he turned his back to Kalmykov.

  "He's a Russianized Cossack. Lived in Moscow. An ordinary worker, but interested in the question of machinery. He's a first-rate machine-gunner, too."

  "Let's go to sleep," Listnitsky proposed.

  "Perhaps we should," Kalmykov agreed, thinking of something else. He frowned sheepishly: "You must forgive me, Lieutenant, for

  the way my feet smell. You know, I haven't changed my socks for a fortnight, they are simply rotting with sweat. . . . It's really foul. I must get a pair of foot-cloths from one of the men."

  "Not at all," Listnitsky mumbled as he dropped asleep.

  Listnitsky completely forgot Kalmykov's reference to Bunchuk, but the very next day chance brought him into contact with the volunteer. The regimental commander ordered him to ride at dawn on reconnaissance patrol, and if possible to establish contact with the infantry regiment which was continuing the advance on the left flank. Stumbling about the yard in the half-light, and falling over the bodies of sleeping Cossacks, Listnitsky found the troop sergeant and roused him:

  "I want five men to go on a reconnaissance with me. Have my horse got ready. Quickly!"

  While he was waiting for the men to assemble, a stocky Cossack came to the door of the hut.

  "Your Honour," the man said, "the sergeant will not let me go with you because it isn't my turn. Will you give me permission to go?"

  "Are you out for promotion? Or have you done something wrong?" Listnitsky asked, trying to make out the man's face in the darkness.

  "I haven't done anything."

  "All right, you can come," Listnitsky decided. As the Cossack turned to go, he shouted after him:

  "Hey! Tell the sergeant...."

  "My name's Bunchuk," the Cossack interrupted.

  "A volunteer?"

  "Yes."

  Recovering from his confusion, Listnitsky corrected his style of address: "Well, Bunchuk, please tell the sergeant to. . . . Oh, all right, I'll tell him myself."

  The morning darkness thinned as Listnitsky led his men out of the village past sentries and outposts. When they had ridden some distance he called:

  "Volunteer Bunchuk!"

  "Sir!"

  "Please bring your horse up beside me."

  Bunchuk brought his commonplace mount alongside Listnitsky's thoroughbred.

  "What village are you from?" Listnitsky asked him, studying the man's profile.

  "Novocherkasskaya."

  "May I be informed of the reason that compelled you to join up as a volunteer?"

  "Certainly!" Bunchuk replied with the slightest trace of a smile. The unwinking gaze of

  36—1933 JS61

  his greenish eyes was harsh and fixed. "I'm interested in the art of war. I want to master it."

  "There are military schools established for that purpose."

  "There are."

  "Well, what is your reason?"

  "I want to study it in practice first. I can get the theory afterwards."

  "What were you before the war broke out?"

  "A worker."

  "Where were you working?"

  "In Petersburg, Rostov, and the armament works at Tula. I'm thinking of applying to be transferred to a machine-gun detachment."

  "Do you know anything about machine-guns?"

  "1 can handle the Bertier, Madsen, Maxim, Hotchkiss, Vickers, Lewis, and several other makes."

  "Oho!
I'll have a word with the regimental commander about it!"

  "Please do."

  Listnitsky glanced again at Bunchuk's stocky figure. It reminded him of the Don-side cork-elm. There was nothing remarkable about the man. Only the firmly pressed jaws and the direct challenging glance distinguished him from the mass of other rank-and-file Cossacks around him. He smiled but rarely, with only the corners

  of his lips; and even then his eyes grew no softer, but still retained a faint gleam of aloofness. Coldly restrained, he was exactly like the cork-elm, the tree of a stern, iron hardness that grows on the grey, loose soil of the inhospitable Don-side earth.

  They rode in silence for a while. Bunchuk rested his broad palms on his blistered saddlebow. Listnitsky selected a cigarette, and as he lit it from Bunchuk's match he smelled the sweet resinous scent of horse's sweat on the man's hand. The back of his hand was thickly covered with brown hair, and Listnitsky felt an involuntary desire to stroke it.

  Swallowing down the pungent tobacco smoke, he said:

  "When we get to the wood, you and another Cossack will take the track running off to the left. Do you see it?"

  "Yes."

  "If you don't come across our infantry by the time you have gone half a verst, turn back."

  "Very good."

  They broke into a trot.

  At a turn of the road into the forest stood a clump of maidenly birches. Beyond them the eye was wearied by the joyless yellow of stunted pines, the straggling forest undergrowth

  and bushes crushed by Austrian baggage trains. On the right the earth trembled with the thunder of distant artillery, but by the birches it was inexpressibly quiet. The earth was drinking in the heavy dew; the pink-hued grasses were flooded with autumnal colours that cried of the speedy death of colour. Listnitsky halted by the birches and, taking out his binoculars, studied the rise beyond the forest. A bee settled on the honey-coloured hilt of his sabre.

  "Stupid!" Bunchuk remarked quietly and compassionately.