And quiet flows the Don; a novel (5 page)

"I'm telling how I and my father, may his soul rest in peace, looked for treasure. It was the Merkulov mound. Well, and Father says: 'Come on, Christonya, we'll dig up the Merkulov mound.' He'd heard from his father that treasure was buried in it. You see. Father promised God: 'Give me the treasure, and I'll build a fine church.' So we agreed and off we

* Atamans were elected by the Cossacks of tsarist Russia for posts of leadership at various levels. The chief of the Don Army was called the army ataman, the chief of a stanitsa, a Cossack district or district centre, the stanitsa ataman. When a Cossack detachment went out on a campaign it elected its own "campaign ataman." In a broad sense the word meant "chief." When the Don Cossacks finally lost their independence, the title of Ataman of all Cossack Forces became a hereditary title of the tsar and, in effect, all Cossack troops were commanded by appointed atamans.

went. It was on common land, so only the ataman could stop us. We arrived late in the afternoon. So we waited until nightfall and then climbed up on top with shovels. We began to dig straight down from its top-knot. We'd dug a hole six feet deep; the earth was like stone. I was wet through. Father kept on muttering prayers, but believe me, brothers, my belly was grumbling so much. , . . You know what we eat in summer: sour milk and kvass. My father, he says: 'Pfooh!' he says, 'Christonya, you're a heathen. Here am I praying, and you can't hold your food, I can't breathe for the stink. Get off the mound, you ... or I'll split your head open with the shovel. Your stink's enough to make the treasure sink into the ground.' So I lay down by the mound, fit to die with my belly-ache, and my father-a strong man he was-goes on digging alone. And he digs down to a stone slab. He calls me. I push a crow-bar under it, and lift it up. Believe me, brothers, it was a moonlight night, and under this slab was such a glitter. . . ."

"Now you're lying, Christonya," Pyotr broke in, smiling and tugging at his whiskers.

"Who's lying? Go to the devil, and to the devil's dam!" ChriiStonya hitched up his sharo-vari and glanced round at his audience. "No, I'm not lying. It's God's truth! There it shone.

I look, and it's charcoal. Some forty bushels of it. Father says: 'Crawl in, Christonya, and dig it up.' So I dug out this rubbish. I went on digging till daylight. And in the morning there he was."

"Who?" asked Tomilin.

"Why, the ataman, who else? He happens to come driving by. 'Who gave you permission?' and all the rest of it. He lays hold of us and hauls us off to the stanitsa. We were called before the court at Kamenskaya the year before last, but Father, he guessed what was coming, and managed to die beforehand. We wrote back saying he was not among the living."

Christonya took his pot of boiling millet and went to the wagon for spoons.

"Well, what about your father? He promised to build a church; didn't he do it?" Stepan asked, when he returned.

"You're a fool, Stepan. What could he build for charcoal?"

"Once he promised he ought to have done it."

"There was no agreement whatever about charcoal, and the treasure,. .." The guffaw that went up made the flames of the fire tremble. Christonya raised his head from the pot, and not understanding what the laughter was about, drowned all the rest with his heavy roar.

Aksinya was seventeen when she was given in marriage to Stepan Astakhov. She came from the village of Dubrovka, from the sands on the other side of the Don.

About a year before her marriage she was ploughing in the steppe eight versts or so from the village. In the night her father, a man of some fifty years, tied her hands and raped her.

"I'll kill you if you breathe a word, but if you keep quiet I'll buy you a plush jacket and gaiters with goloshes. Remember, I'll kill you if you . . ." he promised her.

Aksinya ran back through the night in her torn petticoat to the village. She flung herself at her mother's feet and sobbed out the whole story. Her mother and elder brother harnessed horses to the wagon, made Aksinya get in with them, and drove to the father. Her brother almost drove the horses to death over the eight versts. They found the old man close to the field camp. He was lying on his overcoat in a drunken sleep with an empty vodka bottle by his side. Before Aksinya's eyes her brother unhooked the swingle-tree from the wagon, brought him to his feet with a kick, curtly asked him a question or two and struck him a blow between the eyes with the iron-shod

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swingle-tree. He and his mother went on beating him steadily for an hour and a half. The ageing mother, who had always been an obedient wife, frenziedly tore at her unconscious husband's hair, the brother used his feet. Ak-sinya lay under the wagon, her head covered, shaking silently. They carried her father home just before dawn. He lay moaning pitifully, his eyes wandering around the room, seeking for Aksinya, who had hidden herself away. Blooid and puss ran from his torn ear on to the pillow. Towards evening he died. They told the neighbours he had fallen from the wagon.

Within a year match-makers arrived on a gaily bedecked wagonette to ask for Aksinya's hand. The tall Stepan with his clean-cut neck and well-proportioned figure appealed to his future bride, and the wedding was fixed for the autumn.

The day was frosty and the ice rang merrily on the roads when Aksinya was installed as young mistress of the Astakhov household. The morning after the festivities her mother-in-law, a tall old woman doubled up with some painful woman's disease, woke Aksinya, led her into the kitchen, and aimlessly shifting things about, said to her:

"Now, dear daughter, we didn't take you for making love, nor for you to lie abed. Go and

milk the cows, and then get some food ready. I'm old and sick. You must take over the household, it will all fall on you,"

The same day Stepan took his young wife into the barn and beat her deliberately and terribly. He beat her on the belly, the breasts and the back, taking care that the marks should not be visible to others. After that he neglected her, kept company with flighty grass-widows and went out almost every night, leaving Aksinya locked in the barn or the best room.

For eighteen months, until there was a child, he would not forgive her his disgrace. Then he was quieter, but was grudging with caresses and rarely spent the night at home.

The large farm with its numerous cattle burdened Aksinya with work. Stepan worked halfheartedly, and went off to smoke, to play cards, to learn the latest news, and Aksinya had to do everything. Her mother-in-law was a poor help. After bustling around a little she would drop on to the bed, and with lips tight-drawn and eyes gazing agonizedly at the ceiling, would lie groaning, rolled into a bundle. At such times her face, which was dotted all over with great ugly moles, broke out in perspiration and tears slithered one by one down her cheeks. Throwing down her work, Aksinya

would hide in a corner and stare at her mother-in-law's face in fear and pity.

The old woman died just before the child was born. In the morning Aksinya's labour pains began, and about noon, an hour or so before the child came into the world, the grandmother dropped dead by the stable door. The midwife ran out to warn the tipsy Stepan not to go into the bedroom, and saw the old woman lying with her legs tucked under her. After the birth of the child, Aksinya devoted herself to her husband, but she had no feeling for him, only a bitter womanly pity and force of habit remained. The child died within a year. The old life returned. And when Grisha Melekhov crossed Aksinya's path, she realized with terror that she was attracted to the gentle, swarthy young fellow. He waited on her with a persistent expectant love, and it was this persistence that Aksinya feared in him. She saw that he was not afraid of Stepan, she felt that he would not hold back because of him, and without consciously desiring it, resisting the feeling with all her might, she noticed that on Sundays and weekdays she was attiring herself more carefully. Making up excuses for her conscience, she tried to place herself more frequently in his path. It made her happy to feel Grigory's black eyes caressing her heavily and

rapturously. When she awoke of a morning and went to milk the cows she would smile, and without realizing why, think to herself: "Today's a happy day. But why. . .? Oh, Grigo-ry. ,.. Grisha." She was frightened by the new feeling which filled her, and in her thoughts she felt her way gropingly, cautiously, as though crossing the Don over the melting ice of March.

After seeing Stepan off to camp she decided to see Grigory as little as possible. After the fishing, her decision was still further strengthened.

VIII

Some two days before Trinity the distribution of the village meadowland took place. Pan-telei attended the allotment. He came back at dinner-time, kicked off his boots with a groan, and noisily scratching his weary feet, announced :

"We've got the stretch near the Red Bank. Not very good grass as grass goes. The upper part runs up to the forest, it's just scrub in places. And a bit of quitch coming through."

"When shall we do the mowing?" Grigory asked.

"After the holidays."

"Are you going to take Darya along?" the old woman frowned. Pantelei Prokofyevich brushed her aside.

"Let me alone! We'll take her if we need her. Get lunch ready. Why do you stand around gaping?"

The old wife opened the oven door with a clatter, and drew out the warmed-up cabbage soup. Pantelei sat over the meal a long time, telling of the day's events, and of the tricky ataman, who had all but swindled the whole assembly of Cossacks.

"He was up to his tricks last year," Darya put in. "The way he tried to swindle Malashka when they were sharing out the plots."

"He's always been a son of a bitch," Pantelei muttered.

"But who's going to do the raking and stacking. Dad?" Dunya asked timidly.

"What about you?"

"I can't do it all by myself."

"We'll ask Aksinya Astakhova. Stepan asked us to mow for him."

The next morning Mitka Korshunov rode up to the Melekhov yard on his white-legged stallion. A fine rain was falling. Thick mist hung over the village. Mitka leaned out of his saddle, opened the wicket and rode in. The old wife hailed him from the steps.

"Hey, you rapscallion, what do you want?" she asked with evident dissatisfaction in her voice, for she had no love for the reckless and quarrelsome Mitka.

"What's that to you, Ilyinichna?" Mitka said in surprise, as he tied his horse to the railing. "I want Grisha. Where is he?"

"He's asleep in the shed. But have you had a -stroke? Have you lost the use of your legs that you must ride?"

"You're always poking your nose in, old lady!" Mitka retorted huffily. Smacking an elegant whip against the legs of his glossy leather boots, he went to look for Grigory, and found him asleep in a cart. Screwing up his left eye, Mitka lashed Grigory with his whip.

"Get up, muzhik!"

"Muzhik" was the most abusive word Mitka could think of using. Grigory jumped up as though on springs.

"What do you want?"

"You've been in bed long enough."

"Stop fooling around, Mitka, before I get angry."

"Get up, I've got to talk to you."

"Well?"

Mitka sat down on the side of the cart, and scraping the dried mud off his boots with a stick, he said:

"I've been insulted, Grisha."

"Well?"

"You see, it's . . /' Mitka cursed heavily. "He's a lieutenant, so he likes to show off." He snapped out the words angrily, without opening his mouth, his legs were trembling. Grigory got up.

"What lieutenant?"

Seizing him by the sleeve, Mitka said more quietly:

"Saddle your horse at once, and come to the meadows. I'll show him! I said to him: 'Come on. Your Honour, and we'll see.' 'Bring all your friends and comrades,' he said, 'I'll beat the lot of you. My mare's dam took prizes at the officers' hurdle-races at St. Petersburg.' What is his mare or her dam to me? Curse them! I won't let them outrace my stallion!"

Grigory hastily dressed. Choking with rage Mitka hurried him up,

"He's come to visit the merchant Mokhov. Wait, what's his name? Listnitsky, I think. Big, serious-looking fellow, wears glasses. Well, and let him! His glasses won't help him: I won't let him catch my stallion!"

With a laugh, Grigory saddled the old mare and, to avoid meeting his father, rode out to the steppe through the threshing-floor gate. They rode to the meadow at the foot of the hill,

Close to a withered poplar, horsemen were awaiting them: the officer Listnitsky on a handsome, clean-limbed mare, and seven of the village lads mounted bareback.

"Where shall we start from?" the officer turned to Mitka, adjusting his pince-nez and admiring the stallion's powerful chest muscles.

"From the poplar to the Tsar's Pond."

"Where's the Tsar's Pond?" Listnitsky screwed up his eyes short-sightedly.

"There, Your Honour, on the edge of the wood."

They lined up the horses. The officer raised his whip above his head.

"When I say 'three.' All right? One . . . two . . . three!"

Listnitsky got away first, pressing close to the saddle-bow, holding his cap on with his hand. For a second he led all the rest. Mitka, his face desperately pale, rose in his stirrups-to Grigory he seemed unbearably slow in bringing the whip down on the croup of his stallion.

It was some three versts to the Tsar's Pond, Stretched out straight as an arrow, Mitka's stallion caught up with Listnitsky's mare when half the course had been covered. Left behind from the very beginning, Grigory trotted along, watching the straggling chain of riders.

By the Tsar's Pond was a sandy hillock, washed up by the spring floods. Its yellow camel-hump was overgrown with sandwort. Gri-gory saw the officer and Mitka gallop up the hillock and disappear over the brow together, the others following. When he reached the pond the horses were already standing in a group around Listnitsky. Mitka was sleek with restrained delight, every movement expressing his triumph. Contrary to his expectations, the officer did not seem at all disconcerted. He stood with his back against a tree, smoking a cigarette, and said, pointing to his foam-flecked horse: