Sister Pelagia and the Red Cockerel (41 page)

Only six of them had Winchesters, the others had Bedan rifles or hunting guns. Malke had ended up with a shotgun for hunting ducks. As she hurried along, barely able to keep up with Magellan, she kept repeating to herself: first you lift the two little metal bits, then you press the trigger with your index finger: first the metal bits, then the trigger …

The plan—or, as Magellan called it, military fashion, “the disposition of forces”—was as follows: scramble up the hill from the cliff side, because the view from the tower was not so good in that direction. Hide in the bushes and wait for the dawn. As soon as there was enough light to aim a gun, Magellan would shoot the sentry, and then they had to run as fast as they could to get into the tower, occupy it, and keep the entire
aul
in their sights. Fire at anybody who poked their nose out of a
saklya—
from up there the entire village would be in plain view. “We’ll force them to capitulate,” Magellan declared cheerfully. “We’ll get back what was stolen and make them pay a fine, too. There’ll only be one dead body, and that will be my problem. I’m not afraid of the Devil himself, never mind some blood feud.”

Malke looked at him and suddenly thought that if only he loved her, there was nothing she wouldn’t sacrifice for such happiness. But of course she drove the absurd thought out of her mind immediately, because it was uncomradely, and anyway, how could he love her, with these short legs that made her look like a little goose?

A COMEDY IN five acts could have been written about how they climbed the steep slope. Or a tragedy.

Yankel the violinist went tumbling down into the river. He climbed out soaking wet, hiccupping and with his teeth chattering violently.

Meir Shalevich tore his trousers on a thorn bush, and the white rent on his backside stood out clearly in the darkness.

That clumsy oaf Briun reached up and caught hold of a snake instead of a branch. Luckily it didn’t bite him, but darted away, startled out of its sleep. And it was a lucky thing, too, that Sasha had asthma. He tried to yell, but he just choked. Otherwise the entire “disposition” would have been ruined.

But somehow or other they managed to clamber up, and then they lay down on the very edge, gulping in the air.

Soon their sweat dried and the communards started feeling chilly, but there was still a long time to go until dawn. This was the hardest part. Now, while they lay there without moving, all sorts of bad thoughts came into their heads. If not for the cliff behind them, they could well have broken down and taken to their heels.

Magellan could sense that. He didn’t lie still, he kept moving along the line the whole time, whispering a couple of words to one of them, giving another an encouraging slap on the shoulder. But he squeezed Malke’s elbow and whispered: “That’s my girl! You’re a great kid.” And suddenly she wasn’t even a little bit frightened. “My girl!” “Great kid!”

Lyova Sats, the youngest member of the commune at just barely seventeen, was lying on Malke’s right. He kept squirming about and sighing to himself, and as soon as the sky grew just a little brighter, he began scribbling something on a piece of paper. He crept across to Malke with his lips twitching. “I’m going to be killed,” he whispered. “I can sense it. Take this letter and send it to my mother in Moscow.”

“Don’t go imagining things!” she hissed.

“I’m not imagining things. Men who are killed in battle can always sense it beforehand, I read that in a book.”

Malke took the letter and began listening carefully to her own feelings, to see whether she had a premonition of death. And straightaway she felt that she did. She was going to die today. It was an absolute certainty. She ought to write to her family and friends too. The entire street would read it and weep …

She borrowed a sheet of paper and a pencil from Lyova and had already written the beginning: “Dear mama and papa! You know, I don’t regret,” when suddenly the word came rustling along the line:

“It’s time! It’s time!”

Magellan hunched down and ran toward the fence behind which they could see the first
saklya
.

The others hesitated. Malke grabbed her gun and was the first to go trotting after their commander. They advanced in arrowhead formation, like storks in flight: Magellan in the center, Malke hanging back a little on his right, Lyova on his left, and the others stretching out in both directions.

Magellan set his rifle on the wicker fence, carefully unwrapped the rag from the optical sight, and set the sight in its groove.

The crude stonework of the tower soared up above the low, flat roofs. Three levels, with a narrow embrasure on each one, and an open platform at the top. The sentry’s head and shoulders could be seen between the teeth of the battlements.

Is it really possible to hit anything at this distance?
Malke wondered. It must be a hundred paces at least.

Magellan set his cheek to the gun butt and closed one eye.

She squeezed the shotgun between her knees and put her hands over her ears. What a terrible bang there would be now! And then they would have to make a dash for the tower, before the Circassians woke up.

But Magellan didn’t fire. He prodded Malke on the shoulder, and when she took her hands away from her ears, he whispered, “He’s asleep! My God, he’s sleeping like a log. I can see it through the sight!” And he added angrily, “They don’t think we’re real men at all. It doesn’t even enter their heads that we might take revenge. Right then, forward! Let’s try to manage everything without any bloodshed. Pass it down the line—take your shoes off.”

Everyone took their shoes off and ran after Magellan, jerking their knees up in that funny way you do when you’re running on tiptoe. No arrowhead formation now, they were moving in a tight bunch.

Malke bit her lip to stop herself from gasping out loud when sharp stones stuck into the soles of her feet. She had her boots in one hand and the gun in the other. The front of her shorts was soaking wet with dew.

The yards of the
aul
were quiet, with only a rooster crowing somewhere. There was the square—actually a square only in name, just a broad triangle of empty space between the tower, the small wattle-and-daub mosque, and a two-story stone house (which must belong to the
bek
himself).

Standing by the porch was an Arab cart, a hantur, with no horse.

Malke suddenly froze on the spot. There was a man sitting beside the cart, attached to it by a chain around his neck. He wasn’t asleep, he was watching the Jews with his eyes staring out of his head in terror.

It was certainly no sight for the fainthearted. In the dim light of the new day, the communards looked like a collection of weird scarecrows. At the front was Magellan in his Mexican sombrero, with two cartridge belts crisscrossed over his chest. Mendel was wearing a colonial pith helmet, and Briun had on a felt bowler hat, while various others were wearing Arab kerchiefs or fezzes. Malke was wearing her mother’s farewell present, a straw hat with porcelain cherries.

Magellan threatened the slave with his Winchester, and the man pulled his head down into his shoulders and put one hand over his mouth to show that he was not going to shout.

But they still didn’t manage to reach the tower without making a sound. Lame Dodik Pevsner stumbled over a rock and dropped his Bedan rifle, and the drowsy silence was shattered by the sound of a shot.

Magellan swore loudly and obscenely, then bounded across to the tower and disappeared inside. The others dashed after him, holding their weapons at the ready. The only ones who hung back were Malke and Lyova—they felt sorry for the poor man who was kept on a chain like a dog.

“Your mother! Your mother!” the slave repeated after Magellan. He had black eyes set in a lively, intelligent-looking face. “You Russian! I Russian too! Save and preserve me!” And he crossed himself rapidly in the Orthodox manner.

“You don’t look Russian to me,” Lyova remarked as he tried to break the chain with the butt of his gun.

“I have Russian faith! Arab, but Russian!”

“And we’re Jews,” Malke told him.

Lyova threw caution to the winds—what point was there now? He set the barrel of the gun against the chain and fired. The chain parted.

“Hurry!” Malke cried, grabbing the Russian Arab by the hand.

After hearing that they were Jews, the man slumped down and tried to creep away under the wagon, but Lyova grabbed him from the other side and the three of them ran to the tower together.

Two members of the commune were waiting inside and they immediately barred the door with a thick beam of wood. Then they all dashed up the stairs.

The warriors of the detachment were crowded together on the third level and the upper platform. Magellan had done well, and managed to get to the sentry before he had any idea what was going on. The lookout, a mere boy, was squatting in the corner, holding his head where it had been clubbed with a rifle butt, but thank God, he was still alive. Malke gestured for him to take his hands away—the wound needed to be bandaged—but the young Circassian snarled at her like a wolf.

“Two men with Winchesters at the loopholes on the second level, two on the third,” Magellan commanded. “Everyone else stand between the battlements and point your guns out. Let the Circassians see that there are a lot of us and we’re armed. Nobody shoot without being ordered.”

Malke stuck her head into a gap. The view of the
aul
and its immediate surroundings was simply wonderful.

The streets were empty. In places she could see women dashing about in the yards, but she couldn’t spot a single man.

“Where are the
dzighits
?” Magellan asked, bemused. “I don’t understand what’s going on here.”

Then the Arab they had released said, “All men gallop in night. Get on horse and gallop. Not back yet.”

“Why, of course!” said Magellan, slapping himself on the forehead. “I ought to have guessed! From our place they went to el-Lejun to sell their loot. It never even entered their heads that we might attack them! Now that’s the real luck of the Jews—do you understand that, you little mother’s boys?” Then he turned to the freed prisoner. “Who are you? How do you know Russian?”

“I Arab, but my bride Jewish,” the man said, bowing. “I marry here. Perhaps I become Jew too. Good faith, I like.”

“Why were you chained?”

“I driving Russian lady, from Jerusalem. Rich lady, only little crazy. Circass attack, bring us here. Want ransom. Going write Russian consul, tell him send ten thousand francs. And for me want thousand francs, but I said I very poor man. Then put chain on me, took my hantur, took two Arab horses. When
bek
come, you tell him give everything back: hantur and horse, and must give lady back too.”

Magellan was not looking at the Arab, but down into the valley. He screwed his eyes up and spoke quietly through his teeth: “There he is, your
bek
. You can tell him everything yourself.”

Malke also looked down and saw a long string of horsemen moving up the incline of the road at a trot.

There was a loud crash right beside her ear—Magellan had fired into the air. He fired again.

The women in the
aul
started wailing more loudly.

Why wars happen

THE SHOTS AND the shouting did not wake Pelagia, because she was not asleep. She had spent the whole night walking backward and forward in the cramped little room with bare walls, without lying down even for a moment on the cushions on the floor.

Sometimes she prayed, and sometimes she abused herself roundly, using all the words that it was appropriate for a nun to use, but neither prayer nor abuse brought her any relief.

How stupid! To ruin everything because of her own sheer carelessness! She should have hired bodyguards at the Russian mission. They had Orthodox Montenegrins there, especially for accompanying pilgrims setting out to Lake Tiberius, Bethlehem, and other trouble spots. They looked absolutely terrifying with their bushy mustaches, silver-embroidered jackets, crooked swords, and pistols in their belts. The Montenegrins’ reputation was so fearsome that no bandit would even come near them.

Mitrofanii was right, a thousand times right: his spiritual daughter could be very adroit, but her approach completely lacked thoroughness. She acted first and only thought afterward. And it was all because she had been afraid of losing another day, or even another hour. She had been spurred on by an irrational, inexplicable feeling that time was wasting, and that there was almost none left. She had felt she could actually see the final grains trickling from the glass cone of the future into the glass funnel of the past.

And she had followed the Russian habit of trusting her luck. For the first two days luck had lured her on, then on the third day it had abandoned her.

At first they had traveled for a long time through mountains. On the steep climbs they had to climb out and walk behind the hantur—the horses were not strong enough to pull the load. On the third day they had reached the broad, green Isreel Valley, almost ten miles long. The Har-Megiddo mountain, which was close to where she ought to search for the commune, was just to the west.