And quiet flows the Don; a novel Read online

  Grigory and Mitka joined up with the rest of the lads from their village, and they set off together for home.

  They walked back along the Don. The smoke of cottage stoves hung in wisps over the village of Bazki, and bells were ringing faintly. Mitka limped along behind the others, leaning on a knotty stake that he had broken out of a fence.

  "Take your boot off," one of the lads advised.

  "I'll get my foot frost-bitten," Mitka replied hesitantly.

  "You can keep your sock on."

  Mitka sat down on the snow and tugged off his boot. Then he walked on, stepping heavily on his stockinged foot. The thick knitted stocking made a sharp imprint in the crisp snow.

  "What road shall we take?" the stumpy shock-headed Alexei Beshnyak asked.

  "Along the Don," Grigory answered for them all.

  They walked on, talking and jostling one another off the road. Each of them was pulled over by the others, who piled on top of him. Between Bazki and Gromkovsky Mitka was the first to spot a wolf crossing the Don.

  "Look, lads, there's a wolf!"

  The young Cossacks started shouting and catcalling and the wolf loped off, then halted, standing sideways, not far from the opposite bank.

  "Catch him!"

  "Yah!"

  "It's you he's looking at, Mitka, walking in your sock."

  "What a fat neck he's got!"

  "Look, there he goes!"

  The grey form stood stiffly for a moment, as though carved out of granite, then took a hurried leap and slunk away into the willows girding the bank.

  It was dusk when they reached the village. Grigory made his way along the ice to the path that led up to his home. A disused sledge stood in the yard; in a heap of brushwood piled near the fence the sparrows were twittering. He felt the smell of habitation, of charred soot, and the steamy odour of the stables.

  Grigory went up the steps of the house and glanced in at the window. The hanging lamp

  shed a dim yellow glow through the room. Pyotr was standing in its light with his back to the window. Grigory brushed the snow off his boots with the besom at the door, and entered the kitchen amid a flurry of steam.

  "Well, I'm back."

  "You've been quick. You got frozen, I expect," Pyotr replied in an anxious and hurried tone.

  Pantelei was sitting with his head bowed in his hands, his elbows on his knees. Darya was spinning at the droning spinning-wheel. Nata-lya was standing at the table with her back to Grigory, and did not turn round on his entry. Glancing hastily around the kitchen Grigory rested his eyes on Pyotr. His brother's agitatedly expectant face told him that something was amiss.

  "Taken the oath?"

  "Uh-huh."

  Grigory took off his outdoor clothes slowly, playing for time, and turning over in his mind all the possibilities which might have led to this chilly and silent welcome. Ilyinichna came out of the best room, her face expressing her agitation.

  "It's Natalya!" Grigory thought, as he sat down on the bench beside his father.

  ''Get him some supper," his mother said to

  Darya, indicating Grigory with her eyes. Darya stopped in the middle of her spinning-song, and went to the stove, her girlish figure swaying from the waist. The kitchen was engulfed in a silence broken only by the heavy breathing of a goat and its newly-born kid.

  As Grigory sipped his soup he glanced at Natalya. But he could not see her face. She was sitting sideways to him, her head bent over her knitting-needles. Pantelei was the first to be provoked into speech by the general silence. Coughing artificially, he said:

  "Natalya is talking about going back to her parents."

  Grigory pressed some bread-crumbs into a ball, and said nothing.

  "And why's that?" his father asked, his lower lip quivering: the first sign of a coming outburst of frenzy.

  "I don't know," Grigory replied as he rose and crossed himself.

  "But I know!" his father raised his voice.

  "Don't shout, don't shout!" Ilyinichna interposed.

  "Yes, there's no cause for shouting." Pyotr moved from the window to the middle of the room. "It's up to her. If she wants to stay, she can stay; if she doesn't, well . . . God be with her!"

  "I'm not blaming her. Of course it's a disgrace and a sin before God to leave your husband, but I don't blame her. It's not her fault, but that son of a bitch's." Pantelei pointed to Grigory who was warming himself at the stove.

  "Who have I done wrong?" Grigory asked.

  "You don't know? You don't know, you devil?"

  "No, I don't."

  Pantelei jumped up, overturning the bench, and went close up to Grigory. Natalya dropped her stocking and the needles clattered to the floor. At the sound a kitten jumped down from the stove and, with its head on one side and paw curved, began to pat the ball of wool towards the chest.

  "What I say to you is this," the old man began slowly and deliberately. "If you won't live with Natalya, you can clear out of this house and go wherever your feet will carry you. That's what I say to you. Go where your feet will carry you," he repeated in a calm voice, and turned and picked up the bench.

  Dunya sat on the bed, her round frightened eyes darting from one to the other.

  "I don't say this in anger. Dad," Grigory's voice was jarringly hollow. "I didn't marry of my own choice, it was you who married me

  off. As for Natalya, I'm not stopping her. She can go to her father, if she wants to." "You clear out yourself." "I will!"

  "Go to the devil!"

  "I'm going. I'm going, don't be in a hurry." Grigory reached for the sleeve of his short fur coat lying on the bed, his nostrils dilated, his whole body quivering with a boiling anger that was just like his father's. The same mingled Turkish and Cossack blood flowed in their veins, and at that moment their resemblance to each other was extraordinary.

  "Where are you going?" Ilyinichna groaned, seizing Grigory's arm. But he pushed her away forcibly and snatched up his fur cap.

  "Let him go, the sinful swine! Let him go, curse him! Go on, go! Clear out!" the old man thundered throwing the door wide open.

  Grigory ran out on to the steps, and the last sound he heard was Natalya's loud uncontrollable weeping.

  The frosty night held the village in its grip, prickly snow was falling from the black sky, the cracking of the ice on the Don resounded like cannon shots. Grigory ran panting out of the gate. At the far end of the village dogs were barking discordantly, and yellow points of light shone through the frosty haze.

  He walked aimlessly down the street. The blackness of the Astakhovs' windows gleamed with the brilliance of a diamond.

  "Grisha!" he heard Natalya's yearning cry from the gate.

  "You go to hell!" Grigory grated his teeth and hastened his steps.

  "Grisha, come back!"

  He stumbled drunkenly into the first cross-lane, and for the last time heard her distant, anguished cry:

  "Grisha, darling.. .."

  He swiftly crossed the square and stopped at a fork in the road, wondering where to spend the night. He decided on Misha Koshe-voi. Misha lived with his mother, sister and two little brothers in a lonely straw-thatched house right by the hill, Grigory entered their yard and knocked at the tiny window.

  "Who is it?"

  "Is Misha there?"

  "Yes, who is it wants him?"

  "It's me, Grigory Melekhov."

  After a moment, Misha, awakened from his first sleep, opened the door.

  "You, Grisha?"

  "Me."

  "What do you want at this time of night?"

  "Let me in, we'll talk inside,"

  In the passage, Grigory gripped Misha's elbow and cursing himself for being unable to find the right words, whispered: "I want to spend the night with you. I've fallen out with my people. Have you got room for me? Anywhere will do."

  "We'll fix you up somewhere. What's the row about?"

  "I'll tell you later. , . . Where's the door here? I can't see it."

&nb
sp; They made Grigory a bed on the bench. He lay thinking, his head tucked under his sheepskin so as not to hear the whispering of Misha's mother, who slept in the same bed as her daughter. What was happening at home now, he wondered. Would Natalya go back to her father or not? Well, life had taken a new turn. Where should he go? And the answer came swiftly. He would send for Aksinya tomorrow, and go with her to the Kuban, far away from here . . . far, far away. . . .

  Rolling steppeland, villages, stanitsas, unknown, unloved, floated before Grigory's closed eyes. And beyond the rolling hills, beyond the long grey road lay a welcoming land of blue skies, a fairy-tale land with Aksinya's love, in all its rebellious late-flowering strength, to make it the more attractive.

  His sleep was troubled by the approaching unknown. Before he finally dozed off he tried hard to recall what it was that oppressed him. In his drowsy state his thoughts would flow easily and smoothly, like a boat going downstream, then suddenly they would come up against something, as though the boat had struck a sandbank. He wrestled with the baffling obstacle. What was it that lay in his path?

  In the morning he awoke and at once remembered what it was-his army service! How could he go away with Aksinya? In the spring there was the training camp, and in the autumn the army draft.

  He had some breakfast, and called Misha out into the passage.

  "Misha, go to the Astakhovs for me, will you?" he said. "Tell Aksinya to come to the windmill this evening after dark."

  "But what about Stepan?" Misha said hesitantly.

  "Say you've come on some business or other."

  "All right, I'll go."

  "Tell her to be sure to come."

  "Oh, all right."

  In the evening Grigory went to the mill and sat there smoking, hiding the cigarette in his cuff. Beyond the mill the wind was stumbling

  over withered maize stalks. A scrap of torn canvas flapped on the chained and motionless sail. It sounded like a great bird flapping round the mill, unable to fly away. Aksinya did not appear. The sun had set in the west in a fading, gilded lilac, from the east the wind began to blow freshly; darkness was overtaking the moon stranded among the willows. Above the windmill the ruddy, blue-streaked sky was deathly dark; the last sounds of busy day hovered over the village.

  He smoked three cigarettes in succession, thrust the last end into the trodden snow, and gazed round in anxious irritation. Half-thawed cart-tracks from the mill to the village showed darkly in the snow. There was no one in sight. He rose, stretched himself, and moved towards the light twinkling invitingly in Misha's window. He was approaching the yard, whistling through his teeth, when he stumbled into Aksinya. She had evidently been running: she was out of breath, and the faint scent of the winter wind, or perhaps of fresh steppe hay, came from her fresh cold mouth.

  "I waited and waited, I thought you weren't coming."

  "I had to get rid of Stepan."

  "You've made me frozen, you wretch!"

  "I'm hot, I'll warm you." She flung open her wool-lined coat and wrapped herself round Grigory like hops round an oak,

  "Why did you send for me?"

  "Take your arms away, somebody may pass."

  "You haven't quarrelled with your people, have you?"

  "I've left them. I spent the night with Misha. I'm a homeless dog now."

  "What will you do now?" Aksinya relaxed the grip of her arms and drew her coat tight with a shiver. "Let's go over to the fence, Grisha, We can't stand here in the middle of the road."

  They turned off the road, and Grigory, sweeping away the drift-snow, leaned against the frosty crackling wattle fence.

  "You don't know whether Natalya has gone home, do you?"

  "I don't. . . . She'll go, I expect. How can she stay here?"

  Grigory slipped Aksinya's frozen hand up the sleeve of his coat, and squeezing her slender wrist, he said:

  "And what about us?"

  "I don't know, dear. Whatever you think best."

  "Will you leave Stepan?"

  "Without a sigh. This evening, if you like."

  "And we'll find work somewhere, and live somehow."

  "They can put me in the shafts as long as I'm with you, Grisha. Anything to be with you."

  They stood close together, each warming the other. Grigory did not want to stir; he stood facing into the wind, his nostrils quivering, his eyelids closed. Aksinya, her face pressed into his armpit, breathed in the familiar, intoxicating scent of his sweat; and on her shamelessly avid lips, hidden from Grigory's eyes, trembled a joyous smile of happiness fulfilled.

  "Tomorrow I'll go and see Mokhov. He may be able to give me work," Grigory said, shifting his grip on Aksinya's wrist, which had grown damp with perspiration under his fingers. Aksinya did not speak, nor did she raise her head. The smile slipped like a dying wind from her face, and the anxiety and fear lurking in her dilated eyes gave them the look of a frightened animal. "Shall I tell him or not?" she thought, as she remembered that she was pregnant. "I must tell him," she decided, but immediately, trembling with fear, she drove away the terrible thought. With a woman's instinct she sensed that this was not the moment to tell him; she realized that she might lose Grigory for ever; and uncertain whether the

  child leaping beneath her heart was Grigory's or Stepan's, she deceived her conscience, and did not tell him.

  "Why are you trembling? Are you cold?" Grigory asked, wrapping his coat about her.

  "I am a little. ... I must go, Grisha. Stepan will come back and find me away."

  "Where's he gone?"

  "To Anikei's to play cards."

  They parted. The agitating scent of her lips remained on Grigory's lips; the scent of the winter wind, or perhaps that faint, faraway scent that comes from the hay after a spring shower in the steppe.

  Aksinya turned into a by-way; bending low, she almost ran. By a well, where the cattle had churned up the autumn mud, she stumbled awkwardly, her foot slipping on a frozen clod; and feeling a lacerating pain in her belly she caught at the fence. The pain died away, but in her side something living, moving, beat angrily and strongly time and again.

  XI

  Next morning Grigory went to see Mokhov. Mokhov had just returned from the shop and was sitting with Atyopin in the dining-room with its rich oak-coloured wall-paper, sipping

  strong, claret-coloured tea. Grigory left his cap in the hall and went in,

  "I'd like to have a word with you, Sergei Pla-tonovich,"

  "Ah, Pantelei Melekhov's son, isn't it? What do you want?"

  "I've come to ask whether you could give me a job."

  As Grigory spoke the door creaked, and a young officer in a khaki tunic with a lieutenant's epaulettes entered. Grigory recognized him as the young Listnitsky whom Mitka Korshunov had outraced the previous summer. Mokhov moved a chair up for the officer, and turned back to Grigory.

  "Has your father come down in the world, that he is putting his son out to work?" he inquired,

  "I'm not living with him any more,"

  "Left him?"

  "Yes."

  "Well, I'd gladly take you on. I know your family to be a hard-working lot, but I'm afraid I haven't any work for you to do."

  "What's the matter?" Listnitsky inquired, pulling his chair up to the table.

  "This lad is looking for work."

  "Can you look after horses? Can you drive a team?" the officer asked as he stirred his tea.

  "I can. I've had the care of our own six horses."

  "I want a coachman. What are your terms?"

  "I'm not asking for much."

  "In that case come to my father at our estate tomorrow. You know the house? At Yagodnoye, about twelve versts from here." i

  "Yes, I know it."

  "Then come tomorrow morning and we shall settle the matter."

  Grigory went to the door. As he turned the handle he hesitated, and said: "I'd like to have a word with you in private. Your Honour."

  Listnitsky followed Grigory out into the semi-darkne
ss of the passage. A rosy light filtered dimly through the Venetian glass of the door leading to the balcony.

  "Well, what is it?"

  "I'm not alone. .. ." Grigory flushed darkly. "I've got a woman with me... . Perhaps you can find something for her to do?"

  "Your wife?" Listnitsky inquired, smiling and raising his eyebrows.

  "Someone else's."

  "Oh, I see. All right, we'll fix her up as cook for the servants. But where is her husband?"

  "Here in the village."

  "So you've stolen another man's wife?"

  "She wanted to come."

  "A romantic affair! Well, come along tomorrow. You may go now."

  Grigory arrived at Yagodnoye at about eight the next morning. The house was surrounded by a peeling brick and plaster wall. Outbuildings straggled over the big yard: a wing with a tiled roof, the date 1910 picked out with tiles of a different colour; the servants' quarters, a bath-house, stables, poultry-house and cattle-shed, a long barn and coach-house.

  The house was large and old, and nestled in an orchard. Beyond it rose a grey wall of bare poplars and the meadow willows, empty rooks' nests swinging in their brown tops.

  As he entered the yard Grigory was welcomed by a pack of Crimean borzois. An old bitch, rheumy-eyed and lame, was the first to sniff at him and follow him with drooping head. In the servants' quarters a cook was quarrelling with a young, freckled maid. A thick-lipped old gaffer was sitting in a cloud of tobacco smoke on the door-step. The maid conducted Grigory to the house. The hall reeked of dogs and uncured pelts. On a table lay the case of a double-barrelled gun and a game-bag with a frayed green silk fringe.

  "The young master will see you," the maid called to Grigory through a side door.

  Grigory glanced apprehensively at his muddy

  boots, and entered. Listnitsky was lying on a bed next to the window. On the eider-down was a box containing tobacco and smoking utensils. The officer made himself a cigarette, buttoned up the collar of his white shirt, and remarked: