Solovyov’s grandmother did not watch in that same way. Gazes into the distance were not really characteristic of her. Most often, she would sit, propping up her cheek with the palm of her hand and looking straight ahead. She outlived her daughter by several years and died not long before Solovyov graduated from high school. Her death pushed him to move to Petersburg. It was in Petersburg that he first heard about General Larionov.
Broadly speaking, it was not accidental that both Solovyov and Larionov were children of railroad workers. Perhaps it was exactly this that determined certain similar characteristics, despite all their external differences. Railroad workers in Russia have a special mission because the role of the railroad in our country is not the same as in other places. The time that we spend traveling is measured in days. That time is enough not only for a good conversation but—in successful cases—even for making marriage plans. What marriage could be planned on the Munich–Berlin express in seats lined up one after the other, with radio jacks in the armrests? Most likely, none.
People who are somehow involved with the railroad are all predominantly even-tempered and unhurried. They know about conquering an expanse. These people know how to listen to the sound of the even clatter of wheels and will never start rushing around: they understand that they still have time. This is why the most serious of foreigners also choose a week or two, once a year, to take a ride on the Trans-Siberian Railway. There is little need to mention that these people resolutely prefer a train to an airplane, other than for transatlantic situations, at any rate. The Americans leave them no choice at all.
General Larionov’s father had no choice, either. Airplanes were simply not flying at the time he decided to associate his life with the railroad. Strictly speaking, at that time, even the railroad itself had not yet become a truly day-to-day matter. Using it demanded of passengers not only a certain degree of courage but also a progressive mindset. Possessing these qualities in full measure, Larionov, director of the railroad department, spent half of his on-duty hours on wheels. He was entitled to use a special first-class lounge carriage that was hitched to the end of the train. It was in that carriage that he would set off to Crimea, for his vacation. As a scrupulous person, the department director paid for his family’s passage in that carriage, notwithstanding the persuasion of railroad employees who considered that his privileges should extend to his family. The governess rode in second class on the same train and the servants in third. This latter circumstance served later as cause for various forms of speculation and even conclusions regarding the openly undemocratic character of relationships within the Larionov household.
In answer to accusations of that sort, one might cite the opinion of Ieronim A. Ratsimor, who pointed out in his 1992 article ‘Sprouts of Democracy in the Russian Military Environment from the Late 19th to Early 20th Centuries’, that, for a number of reasons, class ideology prevailed over democratic ideology at the end of the nineteenth century. Ratsimor also put forth the supposition that democracy is not a universal concept and is generally not obligatory for characterizing all times and peoples. When established in countries not prepared for it, democracy is capable of bearing the saddest of fruits. According to the historian’s convictions, the distinctness of Russia’s class divide regulated social relationships far more effectively than democratic procedures. Using material from the general’s biography, he convincingly demonstrated that, while still a pupil and junior cadet, Larionov was obligated to ride second class but after becoming a senior cadet, he could only ride third since senior cadets were already considered to have attained a low army rank and were not admitted into the two other classes.
Less radical points of view were also expressed with regard to democracy in the Larionov family. The graduate student Kalyuzhny surmised, verbally, that the defining traits of the seating arrangements of those riding south were determined not so much by the opinion of Larionov, department director, as by the presence at the station of the elder General Larionov, who was allegedly incapable of coming to terms with scorn for Russia’s class divide. The latter man was, to be sure, known for his conservatism, which he expressed in part through a disdainful regard for the railroad. To him, the realm of the railroad seemed unworthy of their family line—in the veteran’s watery eyes, it presented something akin to a circus attraction. Only the post of department director brought a certain seriousness to his grandson’s work and partially reconciled the old man with this odd choice of profession. And though the hero of the Battle of Borodino considered train travel inappropriate for himself, he invariably came to the train station at Tsarskoe Selo to see his family off on their travels. As he made his way along the row of carriages on his peg leg, he would stop by the locomotive with unexpected timidity and spend a long while watching the steam bursting out of the boilers. Then he would shrug his shoulders for effect, hurriedly make the sign of the cross over his family members, and resolutely hobble toward the exit, an echo resonating under the station’s metal arches. One might suppose the last thing on his mind at those moments was the passengers’ seating arrangements.
Those trips were preserved in the future general’s memory as one of the brightest pages of his childhood. In Notes for an Autobiography, which Dupont found and published, General Larionov describes in detail the railroad journeys of his childhood. The carriage itself evoked the greatest delight for him; with brass handles polished to a shine, oak paneling, and—most importantly—a glass rear wall that displayed the entire expanse of road already traveled. To the juvenile Larionov, it seemed as if the carriage at their disposal was a giant spider capable of producing two steel threads that ran out from under it at high speed and converged on the horizon.
The child was particularly keen on watching sunsets that lent enchanting colors to the forest on both sides of the railroad bed. The colors dimmed with every minute and the trees darkened, approaching the railroad bed ever closer. For the future general, who had first-hand familiarity with Russian folk tales, the train’s motion was reminiscent of an escape from a spellbound forest. Clutching at the nickel handle on the bunk, he anxiously observed the rocking of fir crowns, from which, to his mind, it would be most opportune for an unseen adversary to attack. Only after some time had passed, when it was completely dark and the small glass wall had begun reflecting the carriage’s cozy luxury, would the child calm down, unclench his numbed fingers, and let go of the nickel handle. General Larionov caught himself making that motion later, when he let go of a handle on the hatch of an armored train one summer evening in 1920. The scent of wormwood wafted from a stilled field. Sudden silence had replaced the sounds of battle, with the only exception being the brooding metallic noises that carried from somewhere below, deep underneath the carriage and inaccessible to the eye.
His Crimean battles ended just as abruptly as they had begun. These battles took place while traveling and were just as unpredictable as the movements of the general’s armored train around Crimea. Larionov was often reproached—justifiably so, one must deem, albeit with a certain qualification—for excessive use of railroad transportation. The qualification is the fact that the railroad network in Crimea is not overly developed to this day. As is common knowledge, central Crimea is linked to only three cities on the coast: Kerch, Sevastopol, and Yevpatoria. It thus follows that the general’s excessiveness, even in the worst case, could have had only an extremely limited character.