Short Fiction, Leo Tolstoy [general ebook reader .txt] 📗

“What do you think of it?” he asked, looking proudly round his cosy establishment. It really was so nice inside the hut that at tea I quite forgot the damp, the darkness, and Velenchuk’s wound. We talked of Moscow, and of things that had not the least relation to the war or to the Caucasus.

After a moment of silence, such as sometimes occurs in the most animated conversation, Bolhov looked at me with a smile.

“I think our conversation this morning struck you as being very strange,” he said.

“No, why do you think so? It only seemed to me that you were too frank; there are things which we all know, but which should never be mentioned.”

“Why not? If there were the least possibility of changing this life for the lowest and poorest without danger and without service, I should not hesitate a moment.”

“Then why don’t you return to Russia?” I asked.

“Why?” he repeated. “Oh, I have thought about that long ago. I can’t return to Russia now until I have the Ann and Vladimir orders: an Ann round my neck, and the rank of major, as I planned when I came here.”

“Why?⁠—if, as you say, you feel unfit for the service here.”

“But what if I feel still more unfit to go back to Russia to the same position that I left? That is also one of the traditions in Russia, confirmed by Passek, Sleptsov, and others, that one need only go to the Caucasus to be laden with rewards. Everyone expects and demands it of us; and I have been here for two years, have been on two expeditions, and have got nothing. But still I have so much ambition that I won’t leave on any account until I am a major with a Vladimir and Ann round my neck. I have become so concerned about it that it upsets me when Gnilokishkin gets a reward and I don’t. And then, how am I to show myself in Russia, to the village elder⁠—the merchant Kotelnikov⁠—to whom I sell my corn; to my Moscow aunt; and to all those good people, if after two years spent in the Caucasus I return without any reward? It is true I don’t at all wish to know all those people, and they, too, no doubt, care very little about me; but man is so made that, though I don’t want to know them, yet on account of them I’m wasting the best years of my life, all my life’s happiness, and am ruining my future.”

Just then we heard the voice of the commander of the battalion outside, addressing Bolhov.

“Who is with you, Nicholas Fedorovich?”

Bolhov gave him my name, and then three officers scrambled into the hut⁠—Major Kirsanov; the adjutant of his battalion; and Captain Trosenko.

Kirsanov was not tall but stout, he had black moustaches, rosy cheeks, and oily little eyes. These eyes were his most remarkable feature. When he laughed, nothing remained of them but two tiny moist stars, and these little stars, together with his wide-stretched lips and outstretched neck, often gave him an extraordinarily senseless look. In the regiment Kirsanov behaved himself and bore himself better than anyone else; his subordinates did not complain of him, and his superiors respected him⁠—though the general opinion was that he was very limited. He knew the service, was exact and zealous, always had ready money, kept a carriage and a man-cook, and knew how to make an admirable pretence of being proud.

“What were you talking about, Nicholas Fedorovich?”

“Why, about the attractions of the service here.”

But just then Kirsanov noticed me, a cadet, and to impress me with his importance he paid no attention to Bolhov’s reply, but looked at the drum and said⁠—

“Are you tired, Nicholas Fedorovich?”

“No, you see we⁠—” Bolhov began.

But again the dignity of the commander of the battalion seemed to make it necessary to interrupt, and to ask another question.

“That was a famous affair today, was it not?”

The adjutant of the battalion was a young ensign recently promoted from being a cadet, a modest, quiet lad with a bashful and kindly-pleasant face. I had met him at Bolhov’s before. The lad would often come to Bolhov’s, bow, sit down in a corner, and remain silent for hours making cigarettes and smoking them; then he would rise, bow, and go away. He was the type of a poor Russian nobleman’s son, who had chosen the military career as the only one possible to him with his education, and who esteemed his position as an officer above everything else in the world⁠—a simple-minded and lovable type, notwithstanding the comical appurtenances inseparable from it: the tobacco-pouch, dressing-gown, guitar, and little moustache-brush we are accustomed to associate with it. It was told of him in the regiment, that he bragged about being just but strict with his orderly, and that he used to say, “I punish seldom, but when I am compelled to do it, it’s no joke,” and that when his tipsy orderly robbed him outrageously and even began to insult him, he, the master, took him to the guardhouse and ordered everything to be prepared for a flogging, but was so upset at the sight of the preparations that he could only say, “There now, you see, I could⁠—” and, becoming quite disconcerted, ran home in great confusion, and was henceforth afraid to look his man Chernov in the eyes. His comrades gave the simple-minded boy no rest, but teased him continually about this episode, and more than once I heard how he defended himself, and, blushing to the tips of his ears, assured them that it was not true, but just the contrary.

The third visitor, Captain Trosenko, was a thoroughgoing old Caucasian⁠—that is, a man for whom the company he commanded had become his family; the fortress where the staff was, his home; and the soldiers’ singing his only pleasure in life. He was a man for whom everything unconnected with the Caucasus was