by Leo Tolstoy
In the case of the criminals the decisions were given according to the Shariát: two were sentenced to have a hand cut off for stealing, one man to be beheaded for murder, and three were pardoned. Then they came to the principal business: how to stop the Chechens from going over to the Russians. To counteract that tendency Jemal Eddin drew up the following proclamation:
‘I wish you eternal peace with God the Almighty!
‘I hear that the Russians flatter you and invite you to surrender to them. Do not believe what they say, and do not surrender but endure. If ye be not rewarded for it in this life ye shall receive your reward in the life to come. Remember what happened before when they took your arms from you! If God had not brought you to reason then, in 1840, ye would now be soldiers, and your wives would be dishonoured and would no longer wear trousers.
‘Judge of the future by the past. It is better to die in enmity with the Russians than to live with the Unbelievers. Endure for a little while and I will come with the Koran and the sword and will lead you against the enemy. But now I strictly command you not only to entertain no intention, but not even a thought, of submitting to the Russians!’
Shamil approved this proclamation, signed it, and had it sent out.
After this business they considered Hadji Murád’s case. This was of the utmost importance to Shamil. Although he did not wish to admit it, he knew that if Hadji Murád with his agility, boldness, and courage, had been with him, what had now happened in Chechnya would not have occurred. It would therefore be well to make it up with Hadji Murád and have the benefit of his services again. But as this was not possible it would never do to allow him to help the Russians, and therefore he must be enticed back and killed. They might accomplish this either by sending a man to Tiflis who would kill him there, or by inducing him to come back and then killing him. The only means of doing the latter was by making use of his family and especially his son, whom Shamil knew he loved passionately. Therefore they must act through the son.
When the councillors had talked all this over, Shamil closed his eyes and sat silent.
The councillors knew that this meant that he was listening to the voice of the Prophet, who spoke to him and told him what to do.
After five minutes of solemn silence Shamil opened his eyes, and narrowing them more than usual, said:
‘Bring Hadji Murád’s son to me.’
‘He is here,’ replied Jemal Eddin, and in fact Yusúf, Hadji Murád’s son, thin, pale, tattered, and evil-smelling, but still handsome in face and figure, with black eyes that burnt like his grandmother Patimát’s, was already standing by the gate of the outside court waiting to be called in.
Yusúf did not share his father’s feelings towards Shamil. He did not know all that had happened in the past, or if he knew it, not having lived through it he still did not understand why his father was so obstinately hostile to Shamil. To him who wanted only one thing – to continue living the easy, loose life that, as the naïb’s son, he had led in Khunzákh – it seemed quite unnecessary to be at enmity with Shamil. Out of defiance and a spirit of contradiction to his father he particularly admired Shamil, and shared the ecstatic adoration with which he was regarded in the mountains. With a peculiar feeling of tremulous veneration for the Imám he now entered the guest-chamber. As he stopped by the door he met the steady gaze of Shamil’s half-closed eyes. He paused for a moment, and then approached Shamil and kissed his large, long-fingered hand.
‘Thou art Hadji Murád’s son?’
‘I am, Imám.’
‘Thou knowest what he has done?’
‘I know, Imám, and deplore it.’
‘Canst thou write?’
‘I was preparing myself to be a Mullah—’
‘Then write to thy father that if he will return to me now, before the Feast of Bairam, I will forgive him and everything shall be as it was before; but if not, and if he remains with the Russians’ – and Shamil frowned sternly – ‘I will give thy grandmother, thy mother, and the rest to the different aouls, and thee I will behead!’
Not a muscle of Yusúf’s face stirred, and he bowed his head to show that he understood Shamil’s words.
‘Write that and give it to my messenger.’
Shamil ceased speaking, and looked at Yusúf for a long time in silence.
‘Write that I have had pity on thee and will not kill thee, but will put out thine eyes as I do to all traitors!… Go!’
While in Shamil’s presence Yusúf appeared calm, but when he had been led out of the guest-chamber he rushed at his attendant, snatched the man’s dagger from its sheath and tried to stab himself, but he was seized by the arms, bound, and led back to the pit.
That evening at dusk after he had finished his evening prayers, Shamil put on a white fur-lined cloak and passed out to the other side of the fence where his wives lived, and went straight to Aminal’s room, but he did not find her there. She was with the older wives. Then Shamil, trying to remain unseen, hid behind the door and stood waiting for her. But Aminal was angry with him because he had given some silk stuff to Zeidát and not to her. She saw him come out and go into her room looking for her, and she purposely kept away. She stood a long time at the door of Zeidát’s room, laughing softly at Shamil’s white figure that kept going in and out of her room.
Having waited for her in vain, Shamil returned to his own apartments when it was already time for the midnight prayers.
XX
HADJI Murád had been a week in the major’s house at the fort. Although Márya Dmítrievna quarrelled with the shaggy Khanéfi (Hadji Murád had only brought two of his murids, Khanéfi and Eldár, with him) and had turned him out of her kitchen – for which he nearly killed her – she evidently felt a particular respect and sympathy for Hadji Murád. She now no longer served him his dinner, having handed that duty over to Eldár, but she seized every opportunity of seeing him and rendering him service. She always took the liveliest interest in the negotiations about his family, knew how many wives and children he had, and their ages, and each time a spy came to see him she inquired as best she could into the results of the negotiations.
Butler during that week had become quite friendly with Hadji Murád. Sometimes the latter came to Butler’s room, sometimes Butler went to Hadji Murád’s: sometimes they conversed by the help of the interpreter, and sometimes they got on as best they could with signs and especially with smiles.
Hadji Murád had evidently taken a fancy to Butler, as could be gathered from Eldár’s relations with the latter. When Butler entered Hadji Murád’s room Eldár met him with a pleased smile showing his glittering teeth, and hurried to put down a cushion for him to sit on and to relieve him of his sword if he was wearing one.
Butler also got to know, and became friendly with, the shaggy Khanéfi, Hadji Murád’s sworn brother. Khanéfi knew many mountain songs and sang them well, and to please Butler, Hadji Murád often made Khanéfi sing, choosing the songs he considered best. Khanéfi had a high tenor voice and sang with extraordinary clearness and expression. One of the songs Hadji Murád specially liked impressed Butler by its solemnly mournful tone and he asked the interpreter to translate it.
The subject of the song was the very blood-feud that had existed between Khanéfi and Hadji Murád. It ran as follows:
‘The earth will dry on my grave,
Mother, my Mother!
And thou wilt forget me!
And over me rank grass will wave,
Father, my Father!
Nor wilt thou regret me
When tears cease thy dark eyes to lave,
Sister, dear Sister!
No more will grief fret thee!
‘But thou, my Brother the elder, wilt never forget,
With vengeance denied me!
And thou, my Brother the younger, wilt ever regret,
Till thou liest beside me!
‘Hotly thou camest, O death-bearing ball that I spurned,
For thou wast my slave!
&nbs
p; And thou, black earth, that battle-steed trampled and churned,
Wilt cover my grave!
‘Cold art Thou, O Death, yet I was thy Lord and thy Master!
My body sinks fast to the earth, my soul to Heaven flies faster.’
Hadji Murád always listened to this song with closed eyes and when it ended on a long gradually dying note he always remarked in Russian –
‘Good song! Wise song!’
After Hadji Murád’s arrival and his intimacy with him and his murids, the poetry of the stirring mountain life took a still stronger hold on Butler. He procured for himself a beshmét and a Circassian coat and leggings, and imagined himself a mountaineer living the life those people lived.
On the day of Hadji Murád’s departure the major invited several officers to see him off. They were sitting, some at the table where Márya Dmítrievna was pouring out tea, some at another table on which stood vodka, chikhír, and light refreshments, when Hadji Murád dressed for the journey came limping into the room with soft, rapid footsteps.
They all rose and shook hands with him. The major offered him a seat on the divan, but Hadji Murád thanked him and sat down on a chair by the window.
The silence that followed his entrance did not at all abash him. He looked attentively at all the faces and fixed an indifferent gaze on the tea-table with the samovar and refreshments. Petróvsky, a lively officer who now met Hadji Murád for the first time, asked him through the interpreter whether he liked Tiflis.
‘Alya!’ he replied.
‘He says “Yes”,’ translated the interpreter.
‘What did he like there?’
Hadji Murád said something in reply.
‘He liked the theatre best of all.’
‘And how did he like the ball at the house of the commander-in-chief?’
Hadji Murád frowned. ‘Every nation has its own customs! Our women do not dress in such a way,’ said he, glancing at Márya Dmítrievna.
‘Well, didn’t he like it?’
‘We have a proverb,’ said Hadji Murád to the interpreter, ‘ “The dog gave meat to the ass and the ass gave hay to the dog, and both went hungry,” ’ and he smiled. ‘Its own customs seem good to each nation.’
The conversation went no farther. Some of the officers took tea, some other refreshments. Hadji Murád accepted the tumbler of tea offered him and put it down before him.
‘Won’t you have cream and a bun?’ asked Márya Dmítrievna, offering them to him.
Hadji Murád bowed his head.
‘Well, I suppose it is good-bye!’ said Butler, touching his knee. ‘When shall we meet again?’
‘Good-bye, good-bye!’ said Hadji Murád, in Russian, with a smile. ‘Kunák bulug. Strong kunák to thee! Time – ayda – go!’ and he jerked his head in the direction in which he had to go.
Eldár appeared in the doorway carrying something large and white across his shoulder and a sword in his hand. Hadji Murád beckoned to him and he crossed the room with big strides and handed him a white búrka and the sword. Hadji Murád rose, took the búrka, threw it over his arm, and saying something to the interpreter handed it to Márya Dmítrievna.
‘He says thou hast praised the búrka, so accept it,’ said the interpreter.
‘Oh, why?’ said Márya Dmítrievna blushing.
‘It is necessary. Like Adam,’ said Hadji Murád.
‘Well, thank you,’ said Márya Dmítrievna, taking the búrka. ‘God grant that you rescue your son,’ she added. ‘Ulan yakshi. Tell him that I wish him success in releasing his son.’
Hadji Murád glanced at Márya Dmítrievna and nodded his head approvingly. Then he took the sword from Eldár and handed it to the major. The major took it and said to the interpreter, ‘Tell him to take my chestnut gelding. I have nothing else to give him.’
Hadji Murád waved his hand in front of his face to show that he did not want anything and would not accept it. Then, pointing first to the mountains and then to his heart, he went out.
All the household followed him as far as the door, while the officers who remained inside the room drew the sword from its scabbard, examined its blade, and decided that it was a real Gurda.26
Butler accompanied Hadji Murád to the porch, and then came a very unexpected incident which might have ended fatally for Hadji Murád had it not been for his quick observation, determination, and agility.
The inhabitants of the Kumúkh aoul, Tash-Kichu, which was friendly to the Russians, respected Hadji Murád greatly and had often come to the fort merely to look at the famous naïb. They had sent messengers to him three days previously to ask him to visit their mosque on the Friday. But the Kumúkh princes who lived in Tash-Kichu hated Hadji Murád because there was a blood-feud between them, and on hearing of this invitation they announced to the people that they would not allow him to enter the mosque. The people became excited and a fight occurred between them and the princes’ supporters. The Russian authorities pacified the mountaineers and sent word to Hadji Murád not to go to the mosque.
Hadji Murád did not go and everyone supposed that the matter was settled.
But at the very moment of his departure, when he came out into the porch before which the horses stood waiting, Arslán Khan, one of the Kumúkh princes and an acquaintance of Butler and the major, rode up to the house.
When he saw Hadji Murád he snatched a pistol from his belt and took aim, but before he could fire, Hadji Murád in spite of his lameness rushed down from the porch like a cat towards Arslán Khan who missed him.
Seizing Arslán Khan’s horse by the bridle with one hand, Hadji Murád drew his dagger with the other and shouted something to him in Tartar.
Butler and Eldár both ran at once towards the enemies and caught them by the arms. The major, who had heard the shot, also came out.
‘What do you mean by it, Arslán – starting such a nasty business on my premises?’ said he, when he heard what had happened. ‘It’s not right, friend! “To the foe in the field you need not yield!” – but to start this kind of slaughter in front of my house —’
Arslán Khan, a little man with black moustaches, got off his horse pale and trembling, looked angrily at Hadji Murád, and went into the house with the major. Hadji Murád, breathing heavily and smiling, returned to the horses.
‘Why did he want to kill him?’ Butler asked the interpreter.
‘He says it is a law of theirs,’ the interpreter translated Hadji Murád’s reply. ‘Arslán must avenge a relation’s blood and so he tried to kill him.’
‘And supposing he overtakes him on the road?’ asked Butler.
Hadji Murád smiled.
‘Well, if he kills me it will prove that such is Allah’s will.… Good-bye,’ he said again in Russian, taking his horse by the withers. Glancing round at everybody who had come out to see him off, his eyes rested kindly on Márya Dmítrievna.
‘Good-bye, my lass,’ said he to her. ‘I thank you.’
‘God help you – God help you to rescue your family!’ repeated Márya Dmítrievna.
He did not understand her words, but felt her sympathy for him and nodded to her.
‘Mind, don’t forget your kunák,’ said Butler.
‘Tell him I am his true friend and will never forget him,’ answered Hadji Murád to the interpreter, and in spite of his short leg he swung himself lightly and quickly into the high saddle, barely touching the stirrup, and automatically feeling for his dagger and adjusting his sword. Then, with that peculiarly proud look with which only a Caucasian hill-man sits his horse – as though he were one with it – he rode away from the major’s house. Khanéfi and Eldár also mounted and having taken a friendly leave of their hosts and of the officers, rode off at a trot, following their murshíd.
As usual after a departure, those who remained behind began to discuss those who had left.
‘Plucky fellow! He rushed at Arslán Khan like a wolf! His face quite changed!’
‘But he’ll be up to tricks – he
’s a terrible rogue, I should say,’ remarked Petróvsky.
‘It’s a pity there aren’t more Russian rogues of such a kind!’ suddenly put in Márya Dmítrievna with vexation. ‘He has lived a week with us and we have seen nothing but good from him. He is courteous, wise, and just,’ she added.
‘How did you find that out?’
‘No matter, I did find it out!’
‘She’s quite smitten, and that’s a fact!’ said the major, who had just entered the room.
‘Well, and if I am smitten? What’s that to you? Why run him down if he’s a good man? Though he’s a Tartar he’s still a good man!’
‘Quite true, Márya Dmítrievna,’ said Butler, ‘and you’re quite right to take his part!’
XXI
LIFE in our advanced forts in the Chechen lines went on as usual. Since the events last narrated there had been two alarms when the companies were called out and militiamen galloped about; but both times the mountaineers who had caused the excitement got away, and once at Vozdvízhensk they killed a Cossack and succeeded in carrying off eight Cossack horses that were being watered. There had been no further raids since the one in which the aoul was destroyed, but an expedition on a large scale was expected in consequence of the appointment of a new commander of the left flank, Prince Baryátinsky. He was an old friend of the Viceroy’s and had been in command of the Kabardá Regiment. On his arrival at Grózny as commander of the whole left flank he at once mustered a detachment to continue to carry out the Tsar’s commands as communicated by Chernyshóv to Vorontsóv. The detachment mustered at Vozdvízhensk left the fort and took up a position towards Kurín, where the troops were encamped and were felling the forest. Young Vorontsóv lived in a splendid cloth tent, and his wife, Márya Vasílevna, often came to the camp and stayed the night. Baryátinsky’s relations with Márya Vasílevna were no secret to anyone, and the officers who were not in the aristocratic set and the soldiers abused her in coarse terms – for her presence in camp caused them to be told off to lie in ambush at night. The mountaineers were in the habit of bringing guns within range and firing shells at the camp. The shells generally missed their aim and therefore at ordinary times no special measures were taken to prevent such firing, but now men were placed in ambush to hinder the mountaineers from injuring or frightening Márya Vasílevna with their cannon. To have to be always lying in ambush at night to save a lady from being frightened, offended and annoyed them, and therefore the soldiers, as well as the officers not admitted to the higher society, called Márya Vasílevna bad names.