“Good luck!” said General Lakubeit, about to board the train. His dried-up little hand was strangely warm, a helpless bird in the mighty grip of mighty Tarabas. “Don’t forget the beer, and if you think the situation calls for vodka, let them have it,” Lakubeit added from the carriage window.
The train steamed out — and the mighty Tarabas was alone; alone, it seemed to him, as he had never been in all his life before.
13
THEREFORE he drank, on that disastrous day, far more than usual. He drank so much that the Jew Kristianpoller began to cast round in his mind for a means whereby he might dilute the spirits with a little water. Life had ceased to smile upon Kristianpoller, although he already knew that two chests of money for the officers and men had arrived late that afternoon. Two non-commissioned officers and six privates, all with carbines in their hands, had escorted the automobile. It was still standing in Kristianpoller’s yard. The chests were inside. A sentinel marched up and down outside the door. It was he who prevented the Jew from diluting the brandy.
Above the entrance to the out-house a lantern swung gently in the evening wind, shedding an oily, yellow gleam over the yard. One could hear from the parlour the sentinel’s measured, hob-nailed footsteps, and this although the officers were gathered at their tables in full force, as usual. But they did not talk, they whispered. For in their midst, as though upon an island of silence, immured within a wall of mute, transparent ice, sat Colonel Tarabas, alone at his own table. He was drinking.
The whole world had deserted Tarabas. It had forgotten him and spat him out. The war was over. Even the war had deserted him. There was no danger left to hope for. Tarabas felt betrayed by the peace. He could not understand this business of the regiment. His cousin Maria had betrayed him. His father and mother had not sent him their love. They betrayed him too. Forgotten, deserted, spat out and betrayed, was Colonel Tarabas.
The regiment that he had got together was good for nothing. He was aware of it himself. Tomorrow he would have to send half of them away — disarm and turn them off. He rose, already not quite steady on his feet. He went into the yard to his own men that he could trust.
He called for Kontsev, his oldest sergeant-major. Kontsev had been serving under Tarabas for three years now, and more.
“My dear fellow,” said Tarabas. “My dear fellow,” Tarabas repeated; he was not quite clear in his speech.
The huge form of Sergeant-Major Kontsev merged under the starry dome of the clear night, wanly lit by the yellow-gleaming lantern, and stood immobile before the colonel. “Come with me,” said Tarabas. And the colossus Kontsev set himself in motion. Seeing that Tarabas stumbled a little, he walked stooping, thus offering the colonel his shoulder for support. Tarabas flung his arm round Kontsev’s shoulder. He tried to bring the great bearded face close to his own; the smell of Kontsev’s moustache was pleasant to him, and the tobacco- and alcohol-laden breath, oh, the whole familiar odour of the proper soldier — the dampness which the woolly stuff of the uniform exuded, the earthiness of the heavy, cloddish hands, the leathernness of boots and straps. These scents could move Colonel Tarabas to tears. Already two scalding drops were stealing down his cheeks. Tarabas could not speak. He staggered, embracing with one arm the stooping, shortened giant Kontsev, into the farthest, darkest corner of the yard.
“Kontsev,” Tarabas began, and it was the first time he had talked so to his sergeant-major, “my dear old Kontsev, our regiment’s no good. The general told me so today, but we two knew it without that, didn’t we, my Kontsev? My good old Kontsev, there’s nothing to be done about it, we’ll have to let the bad half go tomorrow. And we must get them drunk.”
“Yes, sir,” Kontsev answered him. “We’ll get them drunk, and we’ll get rid of them all right. We’ll get their guns and things away from them. And their ammunition too,” he said after a while, by way of special consolation. He was a good ten years older and two inches taller than Colonel Tarabas, and his manner now was very fatherly.
“Remember the war, Kontsev,” said the colonel. “That was a grand time, wasn’t it? No collecting regiments then. Just shooting, that’s all — and you either got through or you kicked the bucket. Quite simple. Wasn’t it, Kontsev?”
“Yes, it was,” said the colossus. “The war! That was something like! We’ll not have another one though, not while we’re alive — never any more!”
“It was splendid!” said Tarabas.
“Glorious!” Kontsev confirmed him.
“We’ll let them off the march tomorrow,” said Tarabas. “We’ll say the general has given them a day off for drinking. Let them begin at six in the morning. In the evening we’ll get them away under escort.”
“We have four lorries,” Kontsev agreed. “Best go back now, sir.” And once more, bent to a good inch less than nature had made him, he accompanied Colonel Tarabas back to the inn parlour.
“Let me embrace you, Kontsev,” said Tarabas on the threshold. But Kontsev stepped smartly in front of him, pushed open the door, and stood immovable in the doorway until Tarabas had entered. Thereupon he saluted, and with a single giant stride was gone. For a while the tread of his mighty boots could still be heard tramping about in the dark ground of the yard.
Tarabas sat down again at his table, and there he remained, while in front of him the glasses formed up in a row like glittering soldiers on parade. Gradually the officers, one after another, left the room, each with a silent salute to the colonel. Alone at his table Tarabas sat on. Behind the counter sat the inn-keeper Kristianpoller.
It was obvious that Colonel Tarabas had no intention of getting up again that night. On the wall above the bar Kristianpoller’s clock struck hour after hour. In between, one heard only its steady iron ticking, and the regular, hob-nailed footsteps of the sentinel in the yard outside. Each time Colonel Tarabas raised his glass to his lips, Kristianpoller started out of his doze and prepared to fill the next one. More sinister even than the ceaselessly drinking Tarabas seemed to him the perfect silence of this night; it weighed upon him so intolerably that he was positively glad when Tarabas moved to take up his glass and set it down again. From time to time both men glanced towards the window, at the narrow square of the starry, dark blue sky. Then their eyes would meet. And the more often their eyes encountered each other, the more intimate the two men seemed to become.
“Yes, yes, Jew, I know!” said the eyes of Colonel Tarabas. And “Yes, yes, you poor hero, I too!” said the Jew Kristianpoller’s one sound eye.
14
DAY broke. A fine day. It rose with gentle indifference out of soft mists. Kristianpoller was the first to wake. He had fallen asleep behind his counter; he could not remember at what hour. Colonel Tarabas was with him still. He was asleep. He was snoring powerfully, his head upon his folded arms sprawled across the table, with the glittering empty glasses now a disorderly rout in front of him. The colonel’s broad, now slightly stooping back rose and fell with the heavy breaths he drew. Kristianpoller contemplated the sleeping Tarabas, wondering whether he should dare to take it upon himself to wake him. The clock above the counter said half-past eight. Kristianpoller remembered the tired, gentle, kindly expression which had shone out of the drunken eyes of Colonel Tarabas in the small hours of that night, and crossed resolutely to the table. He touched the shoulder of the terrible one with a timid finger. Tarabas jumped up at once, cheerful, even gay. His sleep had been short, uncomfortable, and very deep. He felt strong. He was in excellent spirits. He ordered tea. He shouted for his orderly, stretched out his legs to have his boots polished while he drank, bit into an enormous slice of bread and butter, and with his mouth still full called for a mirror, which the Jew Kristianpoller took down from the wall and brought to the table, where he stood holding it up to Tarabas.