The White Guard (33 page)

   'L can't sleep, so do you mind if we sit and talk for a while?'

   The stove was burning low. Calm at last, settled in his armchair, Vasilisa sighed and said:

   'That's how it goes, Fyodor Nikolaevich. Everything I've earned in a lifetime of hard work has disappeared in one evening into the pockets of those scoundrels ... by violence. Don't think I rejected the revolution - oh no, I fully understand the historical reasons which caused it all.'

   A crimson glow played over Vasilisa's face and on the clasps of his suspenders. Feeling pleasantly languorous from the brandy, Karas was beginning to doze, whilst trying to keep his face in a look of polite attention.

   'But you must agree that here in Russia, this most backward country, the revolution has already degenerated into savagery and chaos . . . Look what has happened: in less than two years we have been deprived of any protection by the law, of the very minimal protection of our rights as human beings and citizens. The English have an expression . . .'

   'M'mm, yes, the English . . . They, of course . . .' Karas mumbled, feeling that a soft wall was beginning to divide him from Vasilisa.

   '. . . but here - how can one say "my home is my castle" when even in your own apartment, behind seven locks, there's no guarantee that a gang like that one which got in here today won't come and take away not only your property but, who knows, your life as well!'

   'We'll prevent it with our signalling system', Karas replied rather vaguely in a sleepy voice.

   'But Fyodor Nikolaevich! There's more to the problem than just a signalling system! No signalling system is going to stop the ruin and decay which have eaten into people's souls. Our signalling system is a particular case, but let's suppose it goes wrong?'

   'Then we'll fix it', answered Karas happily.

   'But you can't build a whole way of life on a warning system and a few revolvers. That's not the point. I'm talking in broader terms, generalising from a single instance, if you like. The fact is that the most important thing of all has disappeared -1 mean respect for property. And once that happens, it's the end. We're finished. I'm a convinced democrat by nature and I come from a poor background. My father was just a foreman on the railroad. Everything you can see here and everything those rogues stole from me today - all that was earned by my own efforts. And believe me I never defended the old regime, on the contrary, I can admit to you in secret I belonged to the Constitutional Democrat party, but now that I've seen with my own eyes what this revolution's turning into, then I swear to you I am horribly convinced that there's only one thing that can save us . . .' From some point in the fuzzy cocoon in which Karas was wrapped came the whispered word: '. .
'.
Autocracy. Yes, sir . . . the most ruthless dictatorship imaginable . . . it's our only hope . . . Autocracy . . .'

   'God, how he goes on', Karas thought beatifically. 'M'yes . . . autocracy - good idea. Aha . . . h'm m.' he mumbled through the surrounding cotton wool.

   'Yes, mumble, mumble, mumble . . . habeas corpus, mumble

   mumble . . . Yes, mumble, mumble . . .' The voice droned on through the wadding, 'mumble, mumble they're making a mistake if they think this state of affairs can last for long, mumble, mumble and they shout hurrah and sing "Long Live." No sir! It will
not
be long lived, and it would be ridiculous to think . . .'

   'Long live Fort Ivangorod.' Vasilisa's voice was unexpectedly interrupted by the dead commandant of the fort in which Karas had served during the war.

   'And long live Ardagan and Kars!' echoed Karas from the mists.

   From far away came the thin sound of Vasilisa's polite laughter.

   'Long may he live!' sang joyous voices in Karas' head.

   'Long may he live. Long may he live. Lo-o-ong li-i-ive . . .' sang the nine basses of Tolmashevsky's famous choir.

   'Long may he li-i-i-ive . . .' rang out the crystalline descant.

   'Long may . . . long may . . . long may . . .' the soprano soared up to the very dome of the cathedral.

   'Look! Look! It's Petlyura

   'Look, Ivan . . .'

   'No, you fool, Petlyura's out in the square by now . . .'

   Hundreds of heads in the choir-loft crowded one on another, jostling forward, hanging down over the balustrade between the ancient pillars adorned with smoke-blackened frescoes. Craning, excited, leaning forward, pushing, they surged towards the balustrade trying to look down into the well of the cathedral, but could see nothing for the hundreds of heads already there, like rows of yellow apples. Down in the abyss swayed a reeking, thousand-headed crowd, over which hovered an almost incandescent wave of sweat, steam, incense smoke, the lamp-black from hundreds of candles, and soot from heavy chain-hung ikon-lamps.

   The ponderous gray-blue drape creaked along on its rings and covered the doors of the altar screen, floridly wrought in centuries-old metal as dark and grim as the whole gloomy cathedral of St Sophia. Crackling faintly and swaying, the flaming tongues of candles in the chandeliers drifted upwards in threads of smoke. There was not enough air for them. Around the altar there was incredible confusion. From the doors of side-chapels, down the worn granite steps, poured streams of gold copes and fluttering stoles. Priestly headdresses, like short violet stovepipes, slid out of their cardboard boxes, religious banners were taken down, flapping, from the walls. Somewhere in the thick of the crowd boomed out the awesome bass of Archdeacon Seryebryakov. A headless, armless cope swayed above the crowd and was swallowed up again; then there rose up one sleeve of a quilted cassock, followed by the other as its wearer was enrobed in the cope. Check handkerchiefs fluttered and were twisted into plaits.

   'Tie up your checks tighter, Father Arkady, the frost outside is wicked. Please let me help you.'

   Like the flags of a conquered army the sacred banners were dipped as they passed under the doorway, brown faces and mysterious gold words swaying, fringes scraping along the ground.

   'Make way, there . . .'

   'Where are they going?'

   'Manya! Look out! You'll be crushed . . .'

   'What are they celebrating? (whisper:) Is it theUkrainian people's republic?'

   'God knows' (whisper).

   'That's not a priest, that's a bishop . . .'

   'Look out, careful . . .'

   'Long may he live . . .!' sang the choir, filling the whole cathedral. The fat, red-faced precentor Tolmashevsky extinguished a greasy wax candle and thrust his tuning-fork into his pocket. The choir, in brown heel-length surplices with gold braid, the swaying choirboys whose cropped fair hair made their little heads look almost bald, the bobbing of Adam's apples and horse-like heads of the basses

   streamed out of the dark, eerie choir-loft. Thicker and thicker, jostling through all the doors, like a swelling avalanche, like water gushing from drainpipes flowed the murmuring crowd.

   From the doors of the sacristy floated a stream of vestments, their wearers' heads wrapped up as if they all had toothache, eyes anxious and uneasy beneath their toylike, mauve stovepipe hats. Father Arkady, dean of the cathedral, a puny little man, wearing a sparkling jewelled mitre above the gray check scarf wrapped around his head, glided along with little mincing steps. There was a desperate look in his eyes and his wispy beard trembled.

   'There's going to be a procession round the cathedral. Out of the way, Mitya.'

   'Hey, you - not so fast! Come back! Give the priests room to walk.'

   'There's plenty of room for them to pass.'

   'For God's sake - this child is suffocating . . .'

   'What is happening?'

   'If you don't know what's happening you'd better go home,where there's nothing for you to steal . . .'

   'Somebody's cut the strap of my handbag!'

   'But Petlyura's supposed to be a socialist, isn't he? So why areall the priests praying for him?'

   'Look out!'

   'Give the fathers twenty-five roubles, and they'll say a mass for the devil himself

   'We ought to go straight off to the bazaar now and smash in some of the Yids' shop windows. I once did . . .'

   'Don't speak Russian.'

   'This woman's suffocating! Clear a space!'

   'Kha-a-a-a

   Shoulder to shoulder, unable to turn, from the side chapels, from the choir-lofts, down step after step the crowd slowly moved out of the cathedral in one heaving mass. On the wall frescoes the brown painted figures of fat-legged buffoons, of unknown antiquity, danced and played the bagpipes. Half suffocated, half intoxicated by carbon dioxide, smoke and incense the crowd

   flowed noisily out of the doors, the general hum occasionally pierced by the strangled cries of women in pain. Pickpockets, hat brims pulled low, worked hard and with steady concentration, their skilled hands slipping expertly between sticky clumps of compressed human flesh. The crowd rustled and buzzed above the scraping of a thousand feet.

   'Oh Lord God . . .'

   'Jesus Christ . . . Holy Mary, queen of heaven . . .'

   'I wish I hadn't come. What is supposed to be happening?'

   'I don't care if you are being crushed . . .'

   'My watch! My silver watch! It's gone! I only bought it yesterday . . .'

   'This may be the last service in this cathedral . . .'

   'What language were they holding the service in, I didn't understand?'

   'In God's language, dear.'

   'It's been strictly forbidden to use Russian in church any more.'

   'What's that? Aren't we allowed to use our own Orthodox language any more?'

   'They pulled her ear-rings off and tore half her ears away at the same time . . .'

   'Hey, cossacks, stop that man! He's a spy! A Bolshevik spy!'

   'This isn't Russia any longer, mister. This is the Ukraine now.'

   'Oh my God, look at those soldiers - wearing pigtails . . .'

   'Oh, I'm going ... to faint . . .'

   'This woman's feeling bad.'

   'We're all feeling bad, dear. Everybody's feeling terrible. Look out, you'll poke my eye out - stop pushing! What's the matter with you? Gone crazy?'

   'Down with Russia! Up the Ukraine!'

   'There ought to be a police cordon here, Ivan Ivanovich. Do you remember the celebrations in 1912? Ah, those were the days . . .'

   'So you want Bloody Nicholas back again, do you? Ah, we know your sort ... we know what you're thinking.'

   'Keep away from me, for Christ's sake. I'm not in your way, so keep your hands to yourself . . .'

   'God, let's hope we get out of here soon . . . get a breath of fresh air.'

   'I won't make it. I shall die of suffocation in a moment.'

   Like soda-water from a bottle the crowd burst swirling out of the main doors. Hats fell off, people groaned with relief, crossed themselves. Through the side door, where two panes of glass were broken in the crush, came the religious procession, silver and gold, the priests breathless and confused, followed by the choir. Flashes of gold among the black vestments, mitres bobbed, sacred banners were held low to pass under the doorway, then straightened and floated on upright.

   There was a heavy frost, a day when smoke rose slowly and heavily above the City. The cathedral courtyard rang to the ceaseless stamp of thousands of feet. Frosty clouds of breath swayed in the freezing air and rose up towards the belfry. The great bell of St Sophia boomed out from the tallest bell-tower, trying to drown the awful, shrieking confusion. The smaller bells tinkled away at random, dissonant and tuneless, as though Satan had climbed into the belfry and the devil in a cassock was amusing himself by raising bedlam. Through the black slats of the multi-storied belfry, which had once warned of the coming of the slant-eyed Tartars, the smaller bells could be seen swinging and yelping like mad dogs on a chain. The frost crunched and steamed. Shocked by noise and cold, the black mob poured across the cathedral courtyard.

   In spite of the cruel frost, mendicant friars with bared heads, some bald as ripe pumpkins, some fringed with sparse orange-colored hair, were already sitting cross-legged in a row along the stone-flagged pathway leading to the main entrance of the old belfry of St Sophia and were chanting in a nasal whine.

   Blind ballad-singers droned their eerie song about the Last Judgment, their tattered peaked caps lying upwards to catch the sparse harvest of greasy rouble bills and battered coppers.

   Oh, that day, that dreadful day, When the end of the world will come. The judgment day . . .

   The terrible heart-rending sounds floated up from the crunching, frosty ground, wrenched whining from these yellow-toothed old instruments with their palsied, crooked limbs.

   'Oh my brethren, oh my sisters, have mercy on my poverty, for the love of Christ, and give alms.'

   'Run on to the square and keep a place, Fedosei Petrovich, or we'll be late.'

   'There's going to be an open-air service.'

   'Procession . . .'

   'They're going to pray for victory for the revolutionary people's army of the Ukraine.'

   'What victory? They've already won.'

   'And they'll win again!'

   'There's going to be a campaign.'

   'Where to?'

   'To Moscow.'

   'Which Moscow?'

   'The usual.'

   'They'll never make it.'

   'What did you say? Say that again! Hey, lads, listen to what this Russian's saying!'

   'I didn't say anything!'

   'Arrest him! Stop, thief!'

   'Run through that gateway, Marusya, otherwise we'll never get through this crowd. They say Petlyura's in the square. Let's go and see him.'

   'You fool, Petlyura's in the cathedral.'

   'Fool yourself. They say he's riding on a white horse.'

   'Hurrah for Petlyura! Hurrah for the Ukrainian People's Republic!'

   Bong . . . bong . . . bong . . . tinkle - clang-clang . . . Bong-clang-bong . . . raged the bells.