by Iliazd
In fact, Galaction didn’t go away to see physicians, but on the shadiest, most criminal business. If you needed to load or unload contraband cargo, keep a boat from leaving the port on time or make it meet with an accident while heading out to sea—there wasn’t a fixer more resourceful or reliable in all these matters than Galaction. At Laurence’s request he had even traveled out to the village with the sawmill, and in the tavern where the stonecutter Luke had been killed a bargain was struck between the seafarer and the robber band. Galaction, for a tenth share of the presumed take, was obliged not only to unload the weapons brought out of the mountains and shelter the bandits before and after the deed, but also to obtain all the intelligence necessary for carrying it out
The port town was already in sight when Galaction pointed to a small cove enclosed between two bluffs jutting out into the sea and suggested they steer toward it. When their boat reached the shore, entering a kind of grotto that hid it securely, their guide announced that they shouldn’t unload right away, but wait for night
Laurence regarded with suspicion the pink mist, ravishingly transparent, that had colored everything. Flat fish are lying on their sides and you know neither their names nor use; sundry jellyfish; shells are weighing on something that’s making them shift slowly and occasionally sticking its tentacles out; when the boat approaches, crabs plop from the rocks into the water, swell to frightening size and suddenly melt away; shades hurtle past under the water, but so headlong and blurred that you can’t say who or what they are, in essence—and all this seemed hostile to Laurence, full of pitfalls and peril. Grabbing Galaction’s arm, visibly upset, the young man demanded explanations from his conductor: what was that seaweed, what were those fish trying at any cost to be absorbed into the sea? But Galaction turned out to be a poor connoisseur of his native land and could say nothing more than that these fish were good for nothing, the seaweeds were useless and so didn’t deserve names
The shore was strewn with bright jewels. Laurence scooped up a handful, scrutinizing them—were they valuable? But the pebbles dried and dulled
They lingered idly until dusk, glad that it wasn’t hot in the grotto
When it got dark, they took the guns and scores of bandoliers from the boat and moved out toward the port. It was not yet midnight, and the whole populace remained within the coffeehouse. Therefore, passing behind the houses right up to the coffeehouse and descending into its cellar with the weapons presented no danger for the conspirators. Toward morning, Laurence and the wennies mixed with the crowd that frequented the coffeehouse. And even though the highlanders’ dress was picturesque, no one lifted their heads, let alone turned to look at the new arrivals
Laurence found these new circumstances extremely oppressive. He was flustered by being compelled to hide who he really was without really hiding, by having to pass for a merchant and spend the whole day sitting at a table doing nothing, sickened by the heat and the lack of brandy, and watching the townspeople scurry around under the figs and sycamores, bareheaded in all weather, but when it rained, barefoot under umbrellas, carrying their shoes to spare them. Time was slipping away, and there was no knowing when the moment for action would arrive and, most important, for returning to the mountains, to Ivlita. Now he no longer blamed her for anything, he wanted to see her, worried about her. At times, he had half a mind to give it all up and run away. But how could he return without accomplishing anything, empty-handed
But Galaction kept putting everything off, kept insisting it was still necessary to wait, the opportunity was too tantalizing and rare, it would be stupid to spoil it in haste, and so on. He alluded to information he’d received, read from some letters, made promises: soon everything would fall into place. In passing, he would come back to the terms he’d concluded with the robber band, review them, stipulate new ones, in a way you wouldn’t notice, without threats, just by grimacing and gesturing. Laurence understood that Galaction was a finagler, thought scornfully of his tricks, and had resolved, if need be, to use force to get his own way. Whenever he complained to Galaction about the delays, about his intolerable environment, there was no end to his admonishing persuasion
“Wise up,” said Galaction before bedtime, when he was heading home with Laurence, “this ain’t the mountains. The authorities can’t get at you, but you have your laws. We’re within easy reach and so we live without laws. You rob, we burgle. But while you rob only occasionally and there’s the possibility of using tithes to cut you down, since you’re easy to find, we burgle continually, from our first tooth ’til our last, and you can’t seal a deal, since you don’t know whom to deal with. You attack from the front, but we steal on the sly, and always at retail. If you showed up at my place in your Sunday best for a reception (since you’re a bandit, right?) and demanded tribute, the way you do up there, people would laugh in your face; here folks even laugh at my sickness. Down here, it’s not just angels’ wings they don’t believe in—even you don’t believe in them—here no one believes in anything, everything’s mocked and everything’s traded. Everyone thinks everyone else is a swindler and so they’re always on their toes. You live by an established code, and if something does go wrong, you never betray one of your own, but the people here, while pretending to be rebels, will be the first to turn you in if they don’t take a liking to you. And you’d never even dream up the nastiness they’re capable of, their filth. Down here, you need special caution and different manners, you need to act skillfully, or you’ll be dead before you know it”
And Laurence waited. The sea, poured out before him, didn’t speak to him and only aggravated his boredom. Sometimes, wandering over the wooden docks, he tried taking a closer look at the work being done, how ships were loaded with the logs he had lashed into rafts on more than one occasion, fresh skins, dried fruits, how herring was brought in and nets were set. But he found this way of life alien and disgusting. He couldn’t tolerate the local cuisine, primarily fish dishes, and grew sickly. Someone of his companions came down with a fever, a pretty malignant one. Watching people splash in the sea along the shore, Laurence thought how he could swim a raging river, but plunging into these waves would be just as disagreeable as living beside them. Nights were particularly cruel: it was stifling, but you couldn’t open a window or the mosquitoes would eat you alive
One day, while walking along the embankment, he paused near a sailor mending his net, knocked him senseless with one blow, and heaved him into the water, without even thinking that there might be witnesses. Only when the sailor failed to resurface did Laurence take a look over his shoulder, but no one was there. In the morning, however, the body washed up on shore not far from the port and caused some talk. People were even saying that someone had supposedly seen the sailor attacked, and that they could easily identify the murderer. Galaction was particularly upset, started sweating, covered his bald spot with two napkins instead of one, paced worriedly among the tables, shouting that they needed to summon judges from the city. But, when Laurence told him that evening, “I did it out of longing for my wife, you’re jerking me around,” Galaction wasn’t surprised and dryly called him a dumbass. “Your blood is fuming, seeking death,” he added. “Why does it need to search?” Laurence snarled, “It seems like there’s plenty, not just on the bottom of the sea, but even under the snow.” “You got the bright idea of playing the fool,” Galaction hissed, bugging out his eyes even more, “You want them to drag us all to jail tomorrow?” “Don’t get smart, or I’ll send you to the fish, too.” Galaction wasn’t frightened, but he didn’t sleep at home that night, and when he came back before sunrise, he announced to his boarders, “Get moving, you can’t stay here anymore; it’s high time you got to work. Only, since there’ll be extra expenses on account of your stupidity, Laurence…”—and he rattled off a string of new concessions
They loaded up the horses with boxes and marched for a long time along the shore road, then turned off into a thicket of cotoneaster, hid the boxes there, got their rifles,
belted on their bandoliers, and continued their parade. The jackals that entertained the port nightly with their lament leapt now and then from the bushes and ran off, but there was no need to shoot them. After noon, when he heard a whistle, Galaction called a halt and a rest until evening
Not far away, a railway that cut across the savage land had been laid willy-nilly to join the regions that lay to the north and south, and along the sea so as to avoid the problems associated with passing over the mountains. Trains ceaselessly departed from certain debauched and flourishing cities for others just like them, slid into the woods and, cringing from the dreadful scenery, hurried to get beyond this district where the railway itself seemed, to the people who lived there, a silly, pointless gadget they never used, since they preferred their araba carts and their own feet
But no matter how natural it was in such a case to be wary of robberies, an unaccountable respect for the train secured it, since no one was daring enough to rob it. Therefore, Laurence’s resolve to ascertain what rich people brought along and what the postal car contained was not only an innovation, but an exceptionally bold plan. The obligation to find out when the postal train would pass and the most convenient place to attack it had been laid on Galaction
Galaction could have sprung into action long ago, since his claim that the trains they wanted ran rarely was false. But he had decided to buy time for stipulating more things in his own favor. When Laurence suddenly did away with the sailor and sneeringly threatened him, Galaction, annoyed with the bandits and with himself, realizing that he had put too much heart into drawing things out, and certain that now, no matter what, they would outflank him, decided to act without delay
In the evening they went down to the railway bed and made it to the watchman’s shack. Eliminating the watchman, his wife, and his small daughter was easy. Galaction was showing signs of agitation significantly beyond what was warranted. They let a train pass—it was the wrong one—took some crowbars they found at the watchman’s and set off, some to twist rails, others to lug stones and arrange a bank across the tracks. Galaction took up lighting the fires necessary, as he explained it, for outwitting the engineer’s vigilance
And yet the postal train, when it surfaced from beyond the bend, had no wish to topple over and stopped instantly before reaching the shack. That hadn’t entered into Laurence’s calculations or his accomplices’, but there was no time for reflection. The highlanders took off running toward the steam engine, holding their fire for the moment. They were met with a barrage. One of the wennies sank slowly, sat for moment, and then fell over on his side. Laurence stopped, confused, and looked questioningly in Galaction’s direction. But Galaction wasn’t there. They had to respond shot for shot and move forward by crawling. There were evidently more defenders than attackers. Laurence ordered a halt to their senseless waste of powder, left one to keep shooting as a diversion, and led the rest on a flanking maneuver. Once they had determined that the return shots were coming from the engine and the cars just behind it, the highlanders decided to break into the train from the other end. But the doors were locked and the lights were out. It wasn’t worth trying the windows and getting tied up in the passenger cars, that wasn’t the main aim. Therefore, once they’d made a complete circuit, the gang charged the engine. The shooters hadn’t counted on an attack from the rear and paid for their mistake with the engine. Laurence got through without losses and, after casting down several defenders while the rest retreated to the train cars, was on top. But more frequent fire came from the postal wagon and the following cars, and now in all directions. In short, they had captured the engine without gaining any advantage
Regardless of the heat of the action, Galaction’s disappearance never left Laurence’s head. Why was he running away? The bandit guessed there was some connection between his disappearance and the fact that the fires hadn’t duped the engineer, and maybe even that the highlanders had encountered a barrage, but Laurence couldn’t search out what it was, exactly. How long Galaction had been giving him the runaround! He’d been thinking about it, but never drew any conclusions. Meanwhile, they couldn’t stay put on the engine and keep up their fruitless shootout with the rest of the cars. If the shooters hadn’t yet made up their minds to take the offensive, they might work up their courage sooner or later. And if not, as long as they kept cool heads, they could easily hang on until morning or receive reinforcements even earlier. And retreating under those conditions in a strange land meant not escaping defeat and capture. They had to leave right away and admit the attack had failed
But once Laurence had rendered this wise decision, he flew into a rage like he’d never experienced in his life. To leave without achieving anything after months of planning and of humiliating, needless waiting in the port? When his goal lay just a few steps away? With one of his comrades killed? To return empty-handed and be the butt of everyone’s jokes? And what about Ivlita? And the treasures for her, the point of the whole undertaking?
If Galaction were to turn up, if only, it would be rapture for Laurence to whack him. Thanks to this money-grubbing con artist, how many days had Laurence spent in the coffeehouse, footing a fabulously expensive bill for himself and his friends, and he’d been obliged to humble himself, hiding who he was! And why hadn’t the train wrecked—had Galaction’s fires warned the engineer instead of tricking him? The thought of betrayal was monstrous, but Galaction had boasted of being a seafarer, not a highlander, and Laurence had heard enough to know what sailors were like
Furious, Laurence delayed his withdrawal. When the night, half over, got fresher, he tried capturing the postal wagon. And he had already climbed up onto the roof, but it began to dawn on him that his hand was refusing to squeeze the trigger and hurt too much, shot through. There were more losses. Whistles that slipped between shots announced a new train’s approach. More distant shots joined those close by. There could be no more delay. Laurence gathered his own, ascertained that no more had been killed, some were wounded, though not badly, and ordered a retreat. They carried the dead wenny
But the highlanders did not head for the mountains. They followed the same path they had taken the evening before with the owner of the coffeehouse. And the sun already stood high in the sky when they walked out to the shore and the town came into view
The coffeehouse was full, and Galaction was strolling among the tables with a satisfied air, narrating the night’s current events: about how, not far from the port, a band of robbers who, it seemed, had met to make plans at these very tables, attempted to rob the postal train, but fell into an ambush, since they were expected, and were massacred. His effusions were interrupted by an extraordinary phenomenon
Four highlanders approached the coffeehouse, holding a stretcher cobbled from branches, on which lay a corpse covered in fiddlehead fern leaves. Behind the stretcher, with their hats off, several wennies were marching, carrying rifles and pistols, and Laurence, with bandaged hand, was bringing up the rear of the parade. Laurence passed to the front, coming closer to Galaction. Everyone turned toward the owner of the coffeehouse and saw that Galaction wanted to run, but could not, he was ready to fall down dead on the spot. “You motherfucker,” Laurence screamed, “Say you didn’t betray us.” No answer came. “Cover his eyes,” Laurence ordered. One of the wennies carried out his directive. “Take him to the dock.” But when they grabbed Galaction by the arms, the condemned man, deprived of his only weapon—his eyes—tried to resist. He roared and howled, thrashed about, fell down, snatched at the earth, latched onto chairs. At last, they dragged him onto a gantry. Laurence demanded a rope. One of the customers hurriedly finished his coffee and ran off to bring one. They mastered Galaction and lashed him to the railing. “Gag him.” The highlanders stepped back and shot, some sooner, some later
Then Laurence’s accomplices came back, lifted the stretcher, and headed toward home. Several hundred people, crowding together by the coffeehouse, watched the bunch of toughs slowly recede along the shore until they
turned out of sight
What a wind there was! It burst forth from under the earth, tossing up a prodigious weight of snow. Pines, whole forests of them, took off, with their roots. Along these expansive clearings the glaciers slid down unhindered onto the hamlet. But neither the crack of broken-up structures nor the screams of those crushed could pierce through the unheard-of blizzard
Ivlita, who had buried herself in the hay, lay for how long—hours, months, millennia, who knows—awaiting her hour. She’d never before suspected how unbelievably difficult dying was. Much more complicated than living. Had she alone been spared, had anyone else? Where was Laurence? From the moment Ivlita huddled into the corner, the reassuring voice had stopped wafting to her. Was it even now trying to shout death down?
Or do blasts only precede death, whereas it arrives silently? Most likely the latter. The roof no longer attempted to fly off, no one whipped the walls. Why so quiet, it would be better if the storm roared again, anything would be better, just not silence. What a trial—awaiting your final moments
But Ivlita did not die. Admittedly, she could not have assimilated this fact if the warm air that penetrated the chinks in the barn had not drenched her in resurrecting exhaustion. Ivlita calmed down, fell asleep, and when she awoke, could not tell for a long time where she was; not until the circumstances of the day when Laurence had abducted her appeared in her intelligence, her father’s fury and curses and the love she shared with Laurence, interrupted by spring’s onset and seemingly past its prime. What was wrong with her father? Who was looking after him? And where was Laurence?
Oh, if only her doom had freed her from hesitation and uncertainty! But Ivlita allowed with equanimity, and none of these left the slightest aftertaste, that Laurence might have thrown her over because he didn’t need her, might be buried under the ice, or might simply have gone away on business. Did any of this matter to Ivlita? And she adamantly insisted: No, it made no difference to her