The Cossacks - graf Tolstoy Leo (suggested reading TXT) 📗

class="calibre1">Ergushov, ‘so it’s here we’ll lie. It’s a first-rate place!’

 

Nazarka and Ergushov spread out their cloaks and settled down

behind the log, while Lukashka went on with Uncle Eroshka.

 

‘It’s not far from here. Daddy,’ said Lukashka, stepping softly in

front of the old man; ‘I’ll show you where they’ve been—I’m the

only one that knows. Daddy.’

 

‘Show me! You’re a fine fellow, a regular Snatcher!’ replied the

old man, also whispering.

 

Having gone a few steps Lukashka stopped, stooped down over a

puddle, and whistled. ‘That’s where they come to drink, d’you

see?’ He spoke in a scarcely audible voice, pointing to fresh

hoof-prints.

 

‘Christ bless you,’ answered the old man. ‘The boar will be in the

hollow beyond the ditch,’ he added. Til watch, and you can go.’

 

Lukashka pulled his cloak up higher and walked back alone,

throwing swift glances now to the left at the wall of reeds, now

to the Terek rushing by below the bank. ‘I daresay he’s watching

or creeping along somewhere,’ thought he of a possible Chechen

hillsman. Suddenly a loud rustling and a splash in the water made

him start and seize his musket. From under the bank a boar leapt

up—his dark outline showing for a moment against the glassy

surface of the water and then disappearing among the reeds.

Lukashka pulled out his gun and aimed, but before he could fire

the boar had disappeared in the thicket. Lukashka spat with

vexation and went on. On approaching the ambuscade he halted again

and whistled softly. His whistle was answered and he stepped up to

his comrades.

 

Nazarka, all curled up, was already asleep. Ergushov sat with his

legs crossed and moved slightly to make room for Lukashka.

 

‘How jolly it is to sit here! It’s really a good place,’ said he.

‘Did you take him there?’

 

‘Showed him where,’ answered Lukashka, spreading out his cloak.

‘But what a big boar I roused just now close to the water! I

expect it was the very one! You must have heard the crash?’

 

‘I did hear a beast crashing through. I knew at once it was a

beast. I thought to myself: “Lukashka has roused a beast,”’

Ergushov said, wrapping himself up in his cloak. ‘Now I’ll go to

sleep,’ he added. ‘Wake me when the cocks crow. We must have

discipline. I’ll lie down and have a nap, and then you will have a

nap and I’ll watch—that’s the way.’

 

‘Luckily I don’t want to sleep,’ answered Lukashka.

 

The night was dark, warm, and still. Only on one side of the sky

the stars were shining, the other and greater part was overcast by

one huge cloud stretching from the mountaintops. The black cloud,

blending in the absence of any wind with the mountains, moved

slowly onwards, its curved edges sharply denned against the deep

starry sky. Only in front of him could the Cossack discern the

Terek and the distance beyond. Behind and on both sides he was

surrounded by a wall of reeds. Occasionally the reeds would sway

and rustle against one another apparently without cause. Seen from

down below, against the clear part of the sky, their waving tufts

looked like the feathery branches of trees. Close in front at his

very feet was the bank, and at its base the rushing torrent. A

little farther on was the moving mass of glassy brown water which

eddied rhythmically along the bank and round the shallows. Farther

still, water, banks, and cloud all merged together in impenetrable

gloom. Along the surface of the water floated black shadows, in

which the experienced eyes of the Cossack detected trees carried

down by the current. Only very rarely sheet-lightning, mirrored in

the water as in a black glass, disclosed the sloping bank

opposite. The rhythmic sounds of night—the rustling of the reeds,

the snoring of the Cossacks, the hum of mosquitoes, and the

rushing water, were every now and then broken by a shot fired in

the distance, or by the gurgling of water when a piece of bank

slipped down, the splash of a big fish, or the crashing of an

animal breaking through the thick undergrowth in the wood. Once an

owl flew past along the Terek, flapping one wing against the other

rhythmically at every second beat. Just above the Cossack’s head

it turned towards the wood and then, striking its wings no longer

after every other flap but at every flap, it flew to an old plane

tree where it rustled about for a long time before settling down

among the branches. At every one of these unexpected sounds the

watching Cossack listened intently, straining his hearing, and

screwing up his eyes while he deliberately felt for his musket.

 

The greater part of the night was past. The black cloud that had

moved westward revealed the clear starry sky from under its torn

edge, and the golden upturned crescent of the moon shone above the

mountains with a reddish light. The cold began to be penetrating.

Nazarka awoke, spoke a little, and fell asleep again. Lukashka

feeling bored got up, drew the knife from his dagger-handle and

began to fashion his stick into a ramrod. His head was full of the

Chechens who lived over there in the mountains, and of how their

brave lads came across and were not afraid of the Cossacks, and

might even now be crossing the river at some other spot. He thrust

himself out of his hiding-place and looked along the river but

could see nothing. And as he continued looking out at intervals

upon the river and at the opposite bank, now dimly distinguishable

from the water in the faint moonlight, he no longer thought about

the Chechens but only of when it would be time to wake his

comrades, and of going home to the village. In the village he

imagined Dunayka, his ‘little soul’, as the Cossacks call a man’s

mistress, and thought of her with vexation. Silvery mists, a sign

of coming morning, glittered white above the water, and not far

from him young eagles were whistling and flapping their wings. At

last the crowing of a cock reached him from the distant village,

followed by the long-sustained note of another, which was again

answered by yet other voices.

 

‘Time to wake them,’ thought Lukashka, who had finished his ramrod

and felt his eyes growing heavy. Turning to his comrades he

managed to make out which pair of legs belonged to whom, when it

suddenly seemed to him that he heard something splash on the other

side of the Terek. He turned again towards the horizon beyond the

hills, where day was breaking under the upturned crescent, glanced

at the outline of the opposite bank, at the Terek, and at the now

distinctly visible driftwood upon it. For one instant it seemed to

him that he was moving and that the Terek with the drifting wood

remained stationary. Again he peered out. One large black log with

a branch particularly attracted his attention. The tree was

floating in a strange way right down the middle of the stream,

neither rocking nor whirling. It even appeared not to be floating

altogether with the current, but to be crossing it in the

direction of the shallows. Lukashka stretching out his neck

watched it intently. The tree floated to the shallows, stopped,

and shifted in a peculiar manner. Lukashka thought he saw an arm

stretched out from beneath the tree. ‘Supposing I killed an abrek

all by myself!’ he thought, and seized his gun with a swift,

unhurried movement, putting up his gun-rest, placing the gun upon

it, and holding it noiselessly in position. Cocking the trigger,

with bated breath he took aim, still peering out intently. ‘I

won’t wake them,’ he thought. But his heart began beating so fast

that he remained motionless, listening. Suddenly the trunk gave a

plunge and again began to float across the stream towards our

bank. ‘Only not to miss …’ thought he, and now by the faint

light of the moon he caught a glimpse of a Tartar’s head in front

of the floating wood. He aimed straight at the head which appeared

to be quite near—just at the end of his rifle’s barrel. He

glanced cross. ‘Right enough it is an abrek! he thought joyfully,

and suddenly rising to his knees he again took aim. Having found

the sight, barely visible at the end of the long gun, he said: ‘In

the name of the Father and of the Son,’ in the Cossack way learnt

in his childhood, and pulled the trigger. A flash of lightning lit

up for an instant the reeds and the water, and the sharp, abrupt

report of the shot was carried across the river, changing into a

prolonged roll somewhere in the far distance. The piece of

driftwood now floated not across, but with the current, rocking

and whirling.

 

‘Stop, I say!’ exclaimed Ergushov, seizing his musket and raising

himself behind the log near which he was lying.

 

‘Shut up, you devil!’ whispered Lukashka, grinding his teeth.

‘abreks!’

 

‘Whom have you shot?’ asked Nazarka. ‘Who was it, Lukashka?’

 

Lukashka did not answer. He was reloading his gun and watching the

floating wood. A little way off it stopped on a sandbank, and

from behind it something large that rocked in the water came into

view.

 

‘What did you shoot? Why don’t you speak?’ insisted the Cossacks.

 

‘Abreks, I tell you!’ said Lukashka.

 

‘Don’t humbug! Did the gun go off? …’

 

‘I’ve killed an abrek, that’s what I fired at,’ muttered Lukashka

in a voice choked by emotion, as he jumped to his feet. ‘A man was

swimming…’ he said, pointing to the sandbank. ‘I killed him.

Just look there.’

 

‘Have done with your humbugging!’ said Ergushov again, rubbing his

eyes.

 

‘Have done with what? Look there,’ said Lukashka, seizing him by

the shoulders and pulling him with such force that Ergushov

groaned.

 

He looked in the direction in which Lukashka pointed, and

discerning a body immediately changed his tone.

 

‘O Lord! But I say, more will come! I tell you the truth,’ said he

softly, and began examining his musket. ‘That was a scout swimming

across: either the others are here already or are not far off on

the other side—I tell you for sure!’ Lukashka was unfastening his

belt and taking off his Circassian coat.

 

‘What are you up to, you idiot?’ exclaimed Ergushov. ‘Only show

yourself and you’ve lost all for nothing, I tell you true! If

you’ve killed him he won’t escape. Let me have a little powder for

my musket-pan—you have some? Nazarka, you go back to the cordon

and look alive; but don’t go along the bank or you’ll be killed—I

tell you true.’

 

‘Catch me going alone! Go yourself!’ said Nazarka angrily.

 

Having taken off his coat, Lukashka went down to the bank.

 

‘Don’t go in, I tell you!’ said Ergushov, putting some powder on

the pan. ‘Look, he’s not moving. I can see. It’s nearly morning;

wait till they come from the cordon. You go, Nazarka. You’re

afraid! Don’t be afraid, I tell you.’

 

‘Luke, I say, Lukashka! Tell us how you did it!’ said Nazarka.

 

Lukashka changed his mind about going into the water just then.

‘Go quick to the cordon and I will watch. Tell the Cossacks to

send out the patrol. If the ABREKS are on this side they must be

caught,’ said he.

 

‘That’s what I say. They’ll get off,’ said Ergushov, rising.

‘True, they must be caught!’

 

Ergushov and Nazarka rose and, crossing themselves, started off

for the cordon—not along the riverbank but breaking their way

through the brambles to reach a path in the wood.

 

‘Now mind, Lukashka—they