The Daughter of the Commandant Part 3

"Here, your excellency," replied a voice from above.

I raised my eyes to the recess above the stove, and I saw a black beard and two sparkling eyes.

"Well, are you cold?"

"How could I not be cold," answered he, "in a little caftan all holes? I had a _touloup_, but, it's no good hiding it, I left it yesterday in p.a.w.n at the brandy shop; the cold did not seem to me then so keen."

At this moment the host re-entered with the boiling _samovar_.[20] I offered our guide a cup of tea. He at once jumped down.

I was struck by his appearance. He was a man about forty, middle height, thin, but broad-shouldered. His black beard was beginning to turn grey; his large quick eyes roved incessantly around. In his face there was an expression rather pleasant, but slightly mischievous. His hair was cut short. He wore a little torn _armak_,[21] and wide Tartar trousers.

I offered him a cup of tea; he tasted it, and made a wry face.

"Do me the favour, your excellency," said he to me, "to give me a gla.s.s of brandy; we Cossacks do not generally drink tea."

I willingly acceded to his desire. The host took from one of the shelves of the press a jug and a gla.s.s, approached him, and, having looked him well in the face--

"Well, well," said he, "so here you are again in our part of the world.

Where, in heaven's name, do you come from now?"

My guide winked in a meaning manner, and replied by the well-known saying--

"The sparrow was flying about in the orchard; he was eating hempseed; the grandmother threw a stone at him, and missed him. And you, how are you all getting on?"

"How are we all getting on?" rejoined the host, still speaking in proverbs.

"Vespers were beginning to ring, but the wife of the _pope_[22] forbid it; the pope went away on a visit, and the devils are abroad in the churchyard."

"Shut up, uncle," retorted the vagabond. "When it rains there will be mushrooms, and when you find mushrooms you will find a basket to put them in. But now" (he winked a second time) "put your axe behind your back,[23] the gamekeeper is abroad. To the health of your excellency."

So saying he took the gla.s.s, made the sign of the cross, and swallowed his brandy at one gulp, then, bowing to me, returned to his lair above the stove.

I could not then understand a single word of the thieves' slang they employed. It was only later on that I understood that they were talking about the army of the Yak, which had only just been reduced to submission after the revolt of 1772.[24]

Saveliitch listened to them talking with a very discontented manner, and cast suspicious glances, sometimes on the host and sometimes on the guide.

The kind of inn where we had sought shelter stood in the very middle of the steppe, far from the road and from any dwelling, and certainly was by no means unlikely to be a robber resort. But what could we do? We could not dream of resuming our journey. Saveliitch's uneasiness amused me very much. I stretched myself on a bench. My old retainer at last decided to get up on the top of the stove,[25] while the host lay down on the floor. They all soon began to snore, and I myself soon fell dead asleep.

When I awoke, somewhat late, on the morrow I saw that the storm was over. The sun shone brightly; the snow stretched afar like a dazzling sheet. The horses were already harnessed. I paid the host, who named such a mere trifle as my reckoning that Saveliitch did not bargain as he usually did. His suspicions of the evening before were quite gone. I called the guide to thank him for what he had done for us, and I told Saveliitch to give him half a rouble as a reward.

Saveliitch frowned.

"Half a rouble!" cried he. "Why? Because you were good enough to bring him yourself to the inn? I will obey you, excellency, but we have no half roubles to spare. If we take to giving gratuities to everybody we shall end by dying of hunger."

I could not dispute the point with Saveliitch; my money, according to my solemn promise, was entirely at his disposal. Nevertheless, I was annoyed that I was not able to reward a man who, if he had not brought me out of fatal danger, had, at least, extricated me from an awkward dilemma.

"Well," I said, coolly, to Saveliitch, "if you do not wish to give him half a rouble give him one of my old coats; he is too thinly clad. Give him my hareskin _touloup_."

"Have mercy on me, my father, Petr' Andrejtch!" exclaimed Saveliitch.

"What need has he of your _touloup_? He will p.a.w.n it for drink, the dog, in the first tavern he comes across."

"That, my dear old fellow, is no longer your affair," said the vagabond, "whether I drink it or whether I do not. His excellency honours me with a coat off his own back.[26] It is his excellency's will, and it is your duty as a serf not to kick against it, but to obey."

"You don't fear heaven, robber that you are," said Saveliitch, angrily.

"You see the child is still young and foolish, and you are quite ready to plunder him, thanks to his kind heart. What do you want with a gentleman's _touloup_? You could not even put it across your cursed broad shoulders."

"I beg you will not play the wit," I said to my follower. "Get the cloak quickly."

"Oh! good heavens!" exclaimed Saveliitch, bemoaning himself. "A _touloup_ of hareskin, and still quite new! And to whom is it given?--to a drunkard in rags."

However, the _touloup_ was brought. The vagabond began trying it on directly. The _touloup_, which had already become somewhat too small for me, was really too tight for him. Still, with some trouble, he succeeded in getting it on, though he cracked all the seams. Saveliitch gave, as it were, a subdued howl when he heard the threads snapping.

As to the vagabond, he was very pleased with my present. He ushered me to my _kibitka_, and saying, with a low bow, "Thanks, your excellency; may Heaven reward you for your goodness; I shall never forget, as long as I live, your kindnesses," went his way, and I went mine, without paying any attention to Saveliitch's sulkiness.

I soon forgot the snowstorm, the guide, and my hareskin _touloup_.

Upon arrival at Orenburg I immediately waited on the General. I found a tall man, already bent by age. His long hair was quite white; his old uniform reminded one of a soldier of Tzarina Anne's[27] time, and he spoke with a strongly-marked German accent. I gave him my father's letter. Upon reading his name he cast a quick glance at me.

"Ah," said he, "it was but a short time Andrej Petrovitch was your age, and now he has got a fine fellow of a son. Well, well--time, time."

He opened the letter, and began reading it half aloud, with a running fire of remarks--

"'Sir, I hope your excellency'--What's all this ceremony? For shame! I wonder he's not ashamed of himself! Of course, discipline before everything; but is it thus one writes to an old comrade? 'Your excellency will not have forgotten'--Humph! 'And when under the late Field Marshal Munich during the campaign, as well as little Caroline'--Eh! eh! _bruder_! So he still remembers our old pranks? 'Now for business. I send you my rogue'--Hum! 'Hold him with gloves of porcupine-skin'--What does that mean--'gloves of porcupine-skin?' It must be a Russian proverb.

"What does it mean, 'hold with gloves of porcupine-skin?'" resumed he, turning to me.

"It means," I answered him, with the most innocent face in the world, "to treat someone kindly, not too strictly, to leave him plenty of liberty; that is what holding with gloves of porcupine-skin means."

"Humph! I understand."

"'And not give him any liberty'--No; it seems that porcupine-skin gloves means something quite different.' Enclosed is his commission'--Where is it then? Ah! here it is!--'in the roll of the s.e.m.e.nofsky Regiment'--All right; everything necessary shall be done. 'Allow me to salute you without ceremony, and like an old friend and comrade'--Ah! he has at last remembered it all," etc., etc.

"Well, my little father," said he, after he had finished the letter and put my commission aside, "all shall be done; you shall be an officer in the ----th Regiment, and you shall go to-morrow to Fort Belogorsk, where you will serve under the orders of Commandant Mironoff, a brave and worthy man. There you will really serve and learn discipline. There is nothing for you to do at Orenburg; amus.e.m.e.nt is bad for a young man.

To-day I invite you to dine with me."

"Worse and worse," thought I to myself. "What good has it done me to have been a sergeant in the Guard from my cradle? Where has it brought me? To the ----th Regiment, and to a fort stranded on the frontier of the Kirghiz-Kasak Steppes!"

I dined at Andrej Karlovitch's, in the company of his old aide de camp.

Strict German economy was the rule at his table, and I think that the dread of a frequent guest at his bachelor's table contributed not a little to my being so promptly sent away to a distant garrison.

The next day I took leave of the General, and started for my destination.

CHAPTER III.

THE LITTLE FORT.