Selected Polish Tales Part 62

Silence reigned in the sleeping world, every step could be heard.

This silence filled Yakob's heart with a wild fear; he turned round with a feeling of helplessness and looked back at his cottage. Probably the fire was now going out; a red glow appeared and disappeared on the windows.

Beyond the cross the road lay through low-lying ground, and was crossed by another road which led abruptly downwards into fields. Yakob hesitated.

'Come on, old man, come on,' they called to him, and walked on without waiting for his answer. The Cossacks dug their heels into the rugged ice of the road, and tumbled about in all directions. They had left their horses at the cross-roads. Each one kept a close hold on his gun, so that there should be no noise. They were whispering to each other; it sounded as if a congregation were murmuring their prayers. Yakob led them, and mentally he held fast to every bush, every lump of ice, saying to himself at every step that now he was going to leave them, they could not miss the road now. But he was afraid.

They no longer whispered, they had become taciturn as they pushed onwards, stumbling, breathing hard.

'As far as Gregor's cottage, and then no more!'

The effect of the drink was pa.s.sing off. He rubbed his eyes, drew his rags across his chest. 'What was he doing, leading these people about on this night?'

He suddenly stopped where the field-road crossed theirs; the soldiers in front and behind threw themselves down. It was as if the ground had swallowed them.

A black horse was standing in the middle of the road, with extended nostrils. Its black mane, covered with h.o.a.r-frost, was tossed about its head; the saddle-bags, which were fur-lined, swung in the breeze; large dark drops were falling from its leg to the ground.

'd.a.m.n it!' cursed the captain.

The horse looked meekly at them, and stretched its head forward submissively. Yakob was sorry for the creature; perhaps one could do something for it. He stood still beside it, and again pointed out the road.

'I have done enough, I shan't go any further!' He scratched his head and smiled, thinking that this was a good opportunity for escape.

'Come on,' hissed the captain so venomously in his ear that he marched forward without delay; they followed.

A dull fear mixed with resentment gripped him with terrible force. He now ran at the head like a sheep worried by watch-dogs.

They stopped in front of the cottage, silent, breathless, expectant.

Yakob looked at his companions with boundless astonishment. Their faces under their fur-caps had a tense, cruel look, their brows were wrinkled, their eyes glittered.

From all sides other Cossacks were advancing.

He noticed only now that there were some lying concealed behind the fence on the straw in a confused ma.s.s.

He shuddered; thick drops of perspiration stood on his forehead. The beating of his heart filled his head like the noise of a hammer, it seemed to fill everything. In spite of the feeling that he was being forced to do this thing, he again heard the voice calling: 'Yakob, Yakob!'

Up the hillock where Gregor's cottage stood, they advanced on all fours.

He clambered upwards, thinking of his wife, and of the cow he had loosed. Fear veiled his eyes, he saw black spots dancing.

Gregor's cottage was empty as a graveyard. It had been abandoned; the open doors creaked on their hinges. Under the window stood a cradle, covered with snow.

Silently the soldiers surrounded the cottage, and Yakob went with them, as though mesmerized by terror, mute and miserable.

They had hardly got round, when a red glow shot up from the other side of the village. The soldiers threw themselves down in the snow.

The thundering of guns began on all sides; blood-red lights came flying overhead. An appalling noise broke out, reinforced by the echo from the mountains, as though the whole world were going to perish. The Cossacks advanced, trembling.

Yakob advanced with them, for the captain had hit him across the head.

He saw stars when he received the blow, gesticulated wildly, and staggered along the road.

He could distinguish the road running out from the forest like a silver thread. As they advanced, they came under a diabolically heavy rifle fire; bullets were raining upon them from all sides.

Here and there he heard moans already, when one of the soldiers fell bleeding on the snow. Close to him fell the young Cossack who had given him the m.u.f.fler and breeches. He held out his hand, groaning. Yakob wanted to stop, but the captain would not let him, but rapped him over the head again with his knuckles.

The soldiers lay in heaps. The rest wavered, fell back, hid in the ditch or threw themselves down. The rifle-fire came nearer, the outlines and faces of the advancing enemy could already be distinguished. Another blow on the head stretched Yakob to the ground, and he feigned death. The Cossacks retreated, the others advanced, and he understood that they belonged to his friends.

When he got up, he was immediately surrounded by them, taken by the scruff of the neck and so violently shaken, that he tumbled on his knees. Gunfire was roaring from the mountains, shadows of soldiers flitted past him, the wounded Cossacks groaned in the snow. Young, well-nourished looking men were bending over him.

Looking up into their faces, he crossed his hands over his chest and laughed joyfully.

'Ah, those Russians, those Russians...the villains!' he croaked, 'aho, aho, ho hurlai!' He rolled his tear-filled eyes.

Things were happening thick and fast. From where the chimney stood close to the water, near the manor-house, the village was burning. He could feel the heat and soot and hear the shouting of the crowd through the noise of the gunfire. Now he would see his wife and children again, the friendly soldiers surely had saved them. The young Cossack was still struggling on the ground; now he stretched himself out for his eternal sleep. 'Ah, the villains!' Yakob repeated; the great happiness which filled his heart rushed to his lips in incoherent babblings. 'The villains, they have served me nicely!'

He felt his bleeding head, crouched on his heels and got up. The fleshy red faces were still pa.s.sing close to him, breathing harder and harder.

Fear rose and fell in him like the flames of the burning village; again everything was swallowed up in indescribable noise.

Suddenly Yakob began to sob; he threw himself down at the soldiers'

feet and wept bitterly, as though he would weep out his soul and the marrow of his bones.

They lifted him up, almost unconscious, and took him along the high road, under escort with fixed bayonets. His tears fell fast upon the snow, and thus he came into his own village, among his own people, pale as a corpse, with poison in his heart.

He looked dully at the blazing wooden church-spire where it stood enveloped in flames as though wrapped in an inflated glittering cloak.

Dully he let his eyes wander over the hedges and fences; everything seemed unreal, as things seen across a distant wave or a downpour of rain, out of reach and strange.

He was standing where the field-path joined the high road. The soldiers sat down on a heap of stones and lighted their cigarettes.

Yakob, trembling all over, looked at his own black shadow; fugitives arrived from the burning village and swarmed past him; the rifle fire now sounded from the direction of the mountains.

Suddenly Gregor's cottage burst into flames. A blood-red glow inflated the clouds of smoke, trembled on the snow and ran over the pine-trees like gold.

Soldiers were arriving from that direction, streaming with blood, supported by their comrades.

Yakob stood motionless, looking at his shadow; fear was burning within him. He looked at the sky above the awful chaos on the earth, and became calmer. He tried to remember how it had all happened.

They had come, had given him food. His wife and children were probably safe in the manor-house. Blinking his swollen eyelids, he tried to deceive himself, crouched down near the guard who was smoking, and asked him for fire. His fear miraculously disappeared.

He began to talk rapidly to the soldier: 'I was sitting...the wind was moaning...' he told him circ.u.mstantially how he was sitting, what he had been thinking, how the shots had struck his cottage.

The soldier put his rifle between his knees, crossed his hands over his sleeves, spat out and sighed.

'But you have had underhand dealings with the Russians.'

'No...no.'

'Tell that to another.'