The mist had now risen quite high and, turning into clouds, gradually disappeared into the dark-blue depths of the sky; the unveiled sun shone brightly, throwing sparkling reflections from the steel bayonets, the brass of the guns, the thawing earth, and the glittering hoar-frost. In the air one felt the freshness of the morning frost together with the warmth of the spring sunshine; thousands of different hues and tints mingled in the dry leaves of the forest, and the shining, beaten track plainly showed the traces left by wheels and the marks of rough-shod horses’ feet.
The movement became greater and more noticeable between the two forces. On all sides the blue smoke of the guns appeared more and more frequently. Dragoons rode forward, the streamers of their lances flying; from the infantry companies one heard songs, and the carts laden with firewood formed into a train in our rear. The general rode up to our platoon and ordered us to prepare to retire. The enemy settled in the bushes on our left flank and their snipers began to molest us seriously. A bullet came humming from the woods to the left and struck a gun-carriage, then came another, and a third. . . . The infantry supports that had been lying near us rose noisily, took up their muskets and formed into line.
The small-arm firing increased and bullets flew more and more frequently. The retreat commenced and consequently the serious Part of the action, as is usual in the Caucasus.
Everything showed that the artillerymen liked the bullets as little as the infantry had liked the cannon-balls. Antanov frowned, Chikin imitated the bullets and joked about them, but it was easy to see he did not like them. ‘It’s in a mighty hurry,’ he said of one of them; another he called ‘little bee’; a third, which seemed to fly slowly past overhead with a kind of piteous wail, he called an ‘orphan’, which caused general laughter.
The recruit who, unaccustomed to such scenes, bent his head to one side and stretched his neck every time a bullet passed, also made the soldiers laugh. ‘What, is that a friend of yours you’re bowing to?’ they said to him. Velenchuk also, usually quite indifferent to danger, was now excited: he was evidently vexed that we did not fire case-shot in the direction whence the bullets came. He repeated several times in a discontented tone, ‘Why is he allowed to go for us and gets nothing in return? If we turned a gun that way and gave them a taste of case-shot they’d hold their noise, no fear!’
It was true that it was time to do this, so I ordered them to fire a last bomb and then to load with case-shot. ‘Case-shot!’ Antonov called out briskly as he went through the thick of the smoke to sponge out the gun as soon as it was discharged.
At that moment I heard just behind me the rapid whiz of a bullet suddenly stopped by something, with a dull thud. My heart ceased beating. ‘Someone of the men has been hit,’ I thought, while a sad presentiment made me afraid to turn round. And really that sound was followed by the heavy fall of a body, and the heart-rending ‘Oh-o-oh’ of someone who had been wounded. I’m hit, lads!’ a voice I knew exclaimed with an effort. It was Velenchuk. He was lying on his back between the limbers and a cannon. The cartridge-bag he had been carrying was thrown to one side. His forehead was covered with blood, and a thick red stream was running down over his right eye and nose. He was wounded in the stomach but hardly bled at all there; his forehead he had hurt against a log in falling.
All this I made out much later; the first moment I could only see an indistinct mass and, as it seemed to me, a tremendous quantity of blood.
Not one of the soldiers who were loading said a word, only the young recruit muttered something that sounded like ‘Dear me! he’s bleeding’, and Antonov, frowning, gave an angry grunt; but it was clear that the thought of death passed through the soul of each. All set to work very actively and the gun was loaded in a moment, but the ammunition-bearer bringing the case-shot went two or three steps round the spot where Velenchuk still lay groaning.
Chapter VIII
EVERYONE WHO HAS been in action undoubtedly knows that strange and though illogical yet powerful feeling of aversion for the spot where some one has been killed or wounded. It was evident that for a moment my men gave way to this feeling when Velenchuk had to be taken to the cart that came up to fetch him. Zhdanov came up angrily to the wounded man and, taking him under the arms, lifted him without heeding his loud screams. ‘Now then, what are you standing there for? take hold!’ he shouted, and about ten assistants, some of them superfluous, immediately surrounded Velenchuk. But hardly had they moved him when he began screaming and struggling terribly.
‘What are you screaming like a hare for?’ said Antonov roughly, holding his leg; ‘mind, or we’ll just leave you.’
And the wounded man really became quiet and only now and then uttered, ‘Oh, it’s my death! Oh, oh, oh, lads!’
When he was laid in the cart he even stopped moaning and I heard him speak to his comrades in low clear tones, probably saying farewell to them.
No one likes to look at a wounded man during an action and, instinctively hurrying to end this scene, I ordered him to be taken quickly to the ambulance, and returned to the guns. But after a few minutes I was told that Velenchuk was asking for me, and I went up to the cart.
The wounded man lay at the bottom of the cart holding on to the sides with both hands. His broad healthy face had completely changed during those few moments; he seemed to have grown thinner and years older, his lips were thin and pale and pressed together with an evident strain. The hasty and dull expression of his glance was replaced by a kind of bright clear radiance, and on the bloody forehead and nose already lay the impress of death. Though the least movement caused him excruciating pain, he nevertheless asked to have a small chirez1 with money taken from his left leg.
The sight of his bare, white, healthy leg, when his
1 The chirez is a purse in the form of a garter, usually worn by soldiers below the knee. jack-boot had been taken off and the purse untied, produced on me a terribly sad feeling.
‘Here are three rubles and a half,’ he said, as I took the purse: ‘you’ll take care of them.’
The cart was starting, but he stopped it.
T was making a cloak for Lieutenant Sulimovsky. He gave me two rubles. I bought buttons for one and a half, and half a ruble is in my bag with the buttons. Please let him have it.’
‘All right! all right!’ said I. ‘Get well again, old fellow.’
He did not answer; the cart started and he again began to groan and cry out in a terrible, heartrending voice. It was as if, having done with the business of this life, he did not think it necessary to restrain himself and considered it permissible to allow himself this relief.
Chapter IX
‘WHERE ARE YOU off to? Come back! Where are you going?’ I shouted to the recruit, who with his reserve linstock under his arm and a stick of some sort in his hand was, in the coolest manner, following the cart that bore the wounded man.
But the recruit only looked at me lazily, muttered something or other, and continued his way, so that I had to send a soldier to bring him back. He took off his red cap and looked at me with a stupid smile.
‘Where were you going?’ I asked.
‘To the camp.’
‘Why?’
‘Why? . . . Velenchuk is wounded,’ he said, again smiling.
‘What’s that to you? You must stay here.’
He looked at me with surprise, then turned quietly round, put on his cap, and went back to his place.
The affair in general was successful. The Cossacks, as we heard, had made a fine charge and brought back three dead Tartars;1 the infantry had provided itself with firewood and had only half-a-dozen men wounded; the artillery had lost only Velenchuk and two horses. For that, two miles of forest had been cut down and the place so cleared as to be unrecognizable. Instead of the thick outskirts of the forest you saw before you a large plain covered with smoking fires and cavalry and infantry marching back to camp.
Though the enemy continued to pursue us with artillery and small-arm fire up to the cemetery by the little river we had crossed in the morning, the retirement was successfully accomplished. I was already beginning to dream of the cabbage-soup and mutton-ribs with buckwheat that were awaiting me in camp, when a message came from the General ordering a redoubt to be constructed by the river, and the
3rd battalion of the K-Regiment and the platoon
of the 4th Battery to remain there till next day.
The carts with the wood and the wounded, the Cossacks, the artillery, the infantry with muskets and faggots on their shoulders, all passed us with noise and songs. Every face
