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

forest was nearly finished, and we were expecting every day to receive orders from headquarters to retire to the fort.

Our division of the battery guns was placed on the slope of a steep mountain range which stretched down to the rapid little mountain river Mechik, and we had to command the plain in front. Occasionally, especially towards evening, on this picturesque plain, beyond the range of our guns, groups of peaceable mountaineers on horseback appeared here and there, curious to see the Russian camp. The evening was clear, quiet, and fresh, as December evenings usually are in the Caucasus. The sun was setting behind the steep spur of the mountain range to the left, and threw rosy beams on the tents scattered over the mountain side, on the moving groups of soldiers, and on our two guns, standing as if with outstretched necks, heavy and motionless, on the earthwork battery close by. The infantry picket, stationed on a knoll to our left, was sharply outlined against the clear light of the sunset, with its piles of arms, the figure of its sentry, its group of soldiers, and the smoke of its watch-fires. To the right and to the left, halfway down the hill, white tents gleamed on the trodden black earth, and beyond the tents loomed the bare black trunks of the plane forest, where axes continually rang, fires crackled, and trees fell crashing down. On all sides the pale bluish smoke rose in columns towards the blue frosty sky. Beyond the tents, and on the low ground by the stream, Cossacks, dragoons, and artillery drivers trailed, with stampings and snortings, returning from watering their horses. It was beginning to freeze; all sounds were heard with unusual distinctness, and one could see far into the plain through the clear rarefied air. The groups of natives, no longer exciting the curiosity of our men, rode quietly over the light-yellow stubble of the maize-fields. Here and there through the trees could be seen the tall posts of Tartar cemeteries, and the smoke of their aouls.

Our tent was pitched near the guns, on a dry and elevated spot whence the view was specially extensive. By the tent, close to the battery, we had cleared a space for the games of Gorodki,79 or Choushki. Here the attentive soldiers had erected for us rustic seats and a small table. Because of all these conveniences, our comrades the artillery officers, and some of the infantry, liked to assemble at our battery, and called this place “The Club.”

It was a beautiful evening, the best players had come, and we were playing Gorodki. I, Ensign O⁠⸺, and Lieutenant O⁠⸺, lost two games running, and to the general amusement and laughter of the onlooking officers, and of soldiers and orderlies who were watching us from their tents, we twice carried the winners pickaback from one end of the ground to the other. Specially amusing was the position of the enormous, fat Lieutenant-Captain S⁠⸺, who, puffing and smiling good-humouredly, with his feet trailing on the ground, rode on the back of the small and puny Lieutenant O⁠⸺. But it was growing late. The orderlies brought three tumblers of tea without any saucers, for the whole six of us, and having finished our game we came to the rustic seats. Near them stood a short, bandy-legged man whom I did not know, dressed in a sheepskin coat, and with a large, white, long-woolled sheepskin cap on his head. As soon as we approached him he hesitatingly took off and put on his cap several times, and repeatedly seemed on the point of coming up to us but then stopped again. Having, I suppose, decided that he could no longer remain unnoticed, this stranger again raised his cap, and passing round us approached Lieutenant-Captain S⁠⸺.

“Ah, Guskantini! Well, what is it, old chap?” said S⁠⸺, still continuing to smile good-humouredly after his ride.

Guskantini, as S⁠⸺ called him, put on his cap at once, and pretended to put his hands in the pockets of his sheepskin coat; but on the side turned to me, I could see it had no pocket, so that his little red hand remained in an awkward position. I tried to make up my mind what this man could be (a cadet or an officer reduced to the ranks?), and without noticing that my attention (the attention of an unknown officer) confused him, I looked intently at his clothing and general appearance. He seemed to be about thirty. His small round grey eyes seemed to look sleepily and yet anxiously from under the dirty white wool which hung over his face from his shaggy cap. The thick irregular nose between the sunken cheeks accentuated his sickly unnatural emaciation. His lips, but slightly covered with thin light-coloured moustaches, were continually in motion, as if trying to put on now one, now another expression. But all these expressions seemed unfinished; his face still kept its one predominant expression of mingled fear and hurry. His thin scraggy neck was enveloped in a green woollen scarf partly hidden under his sheepskin coat. The coat was worn bare and was short; it was trimmed with dog’s fur round the collar and at the false pockets. He had checked greyish trousers on, and soldier’s boots with short unblacked tops.

“Please don’t trouble,” said I, when he again raised his cap, looking timidly at me.

He bowed with a grateful look, put on his cap, and taking from his trousers-pocket a dirty calico tobacco-pouch tied with a cord, began to make a cigarette.

It was not long since I myself had been a cadet; an old cadet, who could no longer act the good-humoured attentive younger comrade to the officers, and a cadet without means. Understanding, therefore, all the wretchedness of such a position for a proud man no longer young, I felt for all who were in that state, and tried to discern their characters and the degree and direction of their mental capacities,