The old body hesitated for a moment, as if slightly swaying, but in good time rose from the ground. This was repeated five more times. In the end, eyes met eyes. After the eighth “setzen!” no further “salutiert!” followed; relief came from the commands to stand at ease and carry on:
“Ruht! Weitermachen!”
After that, the old man could do with his body as he wished. Having eaten its fill of salutes from a sitting position, Discipline smiled kindly from the young man’s mouth, showing two rows of strong, healthy teeth.
“Garbacz!” whispered one of the soldiers in Piotr’s ear.
So that was Cadet Garbacz! Piotr compared him with the conception of the man he had formed on the basis of his surname. Wrong! Tryhubiak had been right. Garbacz did not look like a “dog”, although he had tortured a tired old man. Everyone who knew Garbacz was aware that, personally, he could not care less whether people saluted him. He was indifferent to polite greetings. But bad saluting he could not tolerate. Only those officers who considered bad saluting a mark of personal disrespect could overlook it, as it was they who were looking, not Discipline. Cadet Garbacz had no right to give away something that was not his own property. On the other hand he could, for example, offer people his own cigarettes. He actually wondered whether he should give one to the old soldier. He did not give him one. The uninitiated might think he regretted what he had done. But he did not regret it. He had a clear conscience. If people saluted so badly in the very first month of the war, what would happen later on? The war might last until Christmas. Was it permissible to condone sloppy saluting in the presence of the new recruits, who were still civilians? It was actually because of the civilians that he had to react so strictly. He would not give him a cigarette. On the other hand, it would be good to speak to the civilians. Don’t let them think that they are dealing with some blunt, bigoted blockhead of an official.
“Well, you fellows, was the meal all right?”
He knew it was all right, although he himself did not eat in the soldiers’ canteen. He was on his way back from the officers’ mess, where he had been dining on something akin to ambrosia and nectar. His question was intended to indicate that he was partly human, even if the rest of him was not.
He did not wait to hear the response, which was a positive one of course, chanted in unison. He saluted first, and, arm in arm with his companion, who had observed the spectacle with indifference, set off in the direction of the town.
Piotr Niewiadomski now knew for sure that this was no “son of a bitch”. But how could you recognize those with a heart of gold round here?
If Cadet Garbacz had been a son of a bitch, by now he would have been running around with his tongue lolling out, in this heat. The stuffy Hungarian air was contaminated with rabies germs. Piotr thought of his Bass—would he be able to stand this inferno? Of course he would. The men were dreaming of the cool mountain rivers, of the Prut or the Czeremosz. The feebler souls among them were ready to sell themselves to the devil and betray the Emperor in return for the chance to soak their bodies in running water. They enquired of the soldiers whether there was a river, a pond or a brook anywhere nearby. There was a pond, on the other side of town on the way to the firing range, but it was dried-up and abandoned. So they eyed the luxuriant row of linden trees lining the main road, the garden surrounding the brewery officials’ cottage, but help was not forthcoming from any direction. One by one, the soldiers abandoned their compatriots and retired to the straw mattresses in their quarters, where it was cooler. Although it was a Sunday, there was still work for them to do—cleaning weapons for the inspection on the following day.
Presently, two figures appeared from somewhere inside the red walls of the brewery. First came an unshaven giant of a man in crumpled uniform. He shuffled along in ungainly fashion in boots from which the laces had been removed. His trousers were slipping down and he kept pulling them up with his elbows. Both hands were full—he was carrying buckets. He was closely followed by another soldier. His trousers were not slipping down, his boots were no problem, on his shoulder was a rifle with fixed bayonet. At his waist, on both sides of the brass eagle on his belt, hung two bulging pouches like a pair of black udders filled with the leaden milk of death. The space between these two men was charged with some deadly current. Again a death zone. This time a physical one. It was amazing that the insects carelessly flitting between the two soldiers did not drop dead.
“A deserter,” thought Piotr to himself at the sight of the prisoner. “Perhaps he is a traitor, one of those who, carrying the colours…”
But this was no deserter, nor was he a traitor.
“Hello, Huk! Hello, Ilko! Come over here and roll one! Oh, you’ve grown a beard!” called out the giant’s comrades from the third company. Some of them temptingly offered him their tobacco pouches. But no one was seriously thinking of giving any to him. Ilko Huk had had enough tobacco in detention. Throughout the monarchy detainees secretly obtained tobacco. The soldier carrying the buckets threw his comrades a friendly glance, winking at them knowingly, and gestured with his bearded chin. The soldier with the rifle kept his eyes on the other’s back. He was obviously afraid.
“He’s going to the kitchens to fetch rations for the men under arrest,” explained one of the soldiers.
“Who is he?”
“Some Polish comrade. Very fond of girls. After he went out last Saturday, without a pass of course, he didn’t come back until Monday, after the physical exercises. But the man’s in luck! The captain likes him. He only got twelve days. The captain would give anyone else twenty-one, and irons as well, because it was the second time he’d bunked off.”
“What are irons?” asked Piotr Niewiadomski. Tryhubiak had not said anything about those.
The initiates of the first category burst into ironic laughter and Lance Corporal Zubiak shook his head:
“Don’t you know what irons are, conductor, sir? Have you got a mother?”
“No, I haven’t.”
“That’s a shame, because when they cuff your left hand to your right leg or your right hand to your left leg and you have to sit like that for two hours, three, four—whatever you’ve earned—your liver will swell and you’ll curse your mother that you were ever born.”
The initiates roared with laughter once more. A few civilians joined in. Piotr frowned. Snippets of the vision of his mother feeding him soup flickered before his eyes and her words still echoed in his ears. And a stranger tells me to curse such a mother? Perhaps the devil deliberately evoked this image in the infernal heat of the midday sun? Curse her! What for? For the left hand, for the right hand, for the right leg… Piotr looked at his hands. For God’s sake, which is the right and which is the left? Was he never going to learn that unless he was placed in irons?
The soldier carrying the buckets and the soldier with the rifle had already passed the most menacing place in the garrison, the command headquarters, from where they could be observed by the officers. The tension between them had subsided a good deal. The soldier carrying the rifle was now more relaxed, walking like a human being instead of marching. As they were about to turn towards the machine room, the prisoner turned, lifting the buckets without caring what happened to his trousers. He struck them triumphantly and they resounded like cymbals.
Piotr was still upset, despite the amusement the prisoner had aroused among his comrades. The soldiers lost no time in explaining to the civilians that the guard with the loaded rifle was infantryman Ołes Hnidej from the same third company as infantryman Ilko Huk. That day, the third company was on guard duty. Lieutenant Smekal was to blame for a two-hour delay in the changing of the guard. Ilko Huk had been guarded by his comrades for twenty-six hours instead of twenty-four. In half an hour, new men from the first company would take over. Ołes Hnidej would lay down his weapon and be released from guard duty. He would hand over to the guard commander in person the live cartridges, which he was obliged to fire at a comrade should he attempt to escape. The gendarme, the detention guard, the enemy, would become a friend once more. The prisoner was also one of the initiated. He was familiar with the metamorphic nature of discipline. He knew that in a few days, when he was released from detention, everything could be reversed. Today’s gendarme could become a prisoner, and the prisoner become a gendarme.