'Harassing fire on cavalry in the target area . . .' The message stopped abruptly and finally.
Three officers and three cadets clambered out of the dugout with lanterns. The fourth officer and two cadets were already in the gun position, standing around a lantern which the storm was doing its best to put out. Five minutes later the guns began to jump and fire into the darkness. They filled the countryside for ten miles around with their terrible roar, which was heard at No. 13 St Alexei's Hill . . . Please God . . .
Prancing through the snow, a troop of cavalry leaped out of the dark beyond the lamplight and killed all the cadets and four of the officers. The battery commander, who had stayed by the telephone in the dugout, shot himself in the mouth.
The battery commander's last words were: 'Those swine at headquarters. It's enough to make one turn Bolshevik.'
That night Nikolka lit the lamp hanging from the ceiling in his room in the corner of the apartment; then with a penknife he carved on the door a large cross and an irregular inscription:
'Col. Turs. Dec. 14th. 1918. 2 p.m.' He left out the 'Nai' from the colonel's name for security, in case Petlyura's men searched the apartment.
He did not want to sleep, in case he missed hearing the doorbell He knocked on the wall of Elena's room and said:
'Go to sleep - I'll stay awake.'
After which he at once fell asleep as though dead, lying fully dressed on his bed. Elena did not sleep until dawn and stayed listening in case the bell should ring. But the bell did not ring and there was no sign of their elder brother Alexei.
A tired, exhausted man needs sleep, and by eleven o'clock next morning Nikolka was still asleep despite the discomforts of sleeping in tight boots, a belt that dug into his lower ribs, a throttling collar and a nightmare that crouched over him with its claws dug into his chest.
Nikolka had fallen asleep flat on his back with his head on one side. His face had turned purple and a whistling snore came from his throat . . . There was a whistling snowstorm and a kind of damned web that seemed to envelop him from all sides. The main thing was to break through this web but the accursed thing grew and grew until it had reached up to his very face. For all he knew it could envelop him so completely that he might never get out, and he would be stifled. Beyond the web were great white plains of the purest snow. He had to struggle through to that snow, and quickly, because someone's voice had apparently just called out 'Nikolka!' Amazingly, some very lively kind of bird seemed to be caught in the net too, and was pecking and chirping to get out. . . Tik, tik, tikki, Tweet, Too-weet! 'Hell' He couldn't see it, but it was twittering somewhere nearby. Someone else was bewailing their fate, and again came the other voice: 'Nicky! Nikolka!'
'Ugh!' Nikolka grunted as he tore the web apart and sat up in one movement, dishevelled, shaken, his belt-buckle twisted round to one side. His fair hair stood on end as though someone had been tousling it for a long time.
'Who? Who? Who is it?' asked Nikolka in horror, utterly confused.
'Who. Who, who, who, who's it? Who's it? Tweet, tweet!' the web replied and the mournful voice, quivering with suppressed tears, said:
'Yes, with her lover!'
Horrified, Nikolka backed against the wall and stared at the apparition. The apparition was wearing a brown tunic, riding-breeches of the same color and yellow-topped jockey's boots. Its dull, sad eyes stared from the deepest of sockets set in an improbably large head with close-cropped hair. Undoubtedly the apparition was young, but the skin on its face was the grayish skin
of an old man, and its teeth were crooked and yellow. The apparition was holding a large birdcage covered with a black cloth andan unsealed blue letter . . .
'I must be still asleep', Nikolka thought, with a gesture trying to brush the apparition aside like a spider's web and knocking his fingers painfully against the wires of the cage. Immediately the bird in the cage screeched in fury, whistled and clattered.
'Nikolka!' cried Elena's voice anxiously somewhere far, far away.
'Jesus Christ', thought Nikolka. 'No, I'm awake all right, but I've gone mad, and I know why - combat fatigue. My God! And I'm seeing things too . . . and what's happening to my fingers? Lord! Alexei's not back yet . . . yes, now I remember . . . he's not back . . . he's been killed . . . Oh, God . . .'
'With her lover on the same divan,' said the apparition in a tragic voice, 'where I once read poetry to her.'
The apparition turned towards the door, obviously to someone who was listening, then turned round again and bore down on Nikolka:
'Yes, on the very same divan . . . They're sitting there now and kissing each other . . . after I signed those IOU's for seventy-five thousand roubles without thinking twice about it, like a gentleman, because I am and always shall be a gentleman. Let them kiss!'
'Oh, Lord!' thought Nikolka. His eyes stared and a shiver ran down his back.
'I'm sorry', said the apparition, gradually emerging from the shimmering fog of sleep and turning into a real live body. 'Perhaps you may not quite understand. Look, this letter will explain it all. Like a gentleman, I won't hide my shame from anyone.'
And with these words the stranger handed Nikolka the blue letter. Feeling he had gone quite insane, Nikolka took it and moving his lips, began to read the large sprawling, agitated handwriting. Undated, the letter on the thin sky-blue paper read thus:
'Lena darling, I know how good-hearted you are and I am sending him to you because you're one of the family. I did send a telegram, but he'll tell you all about it himself, poor boy. Lariosik has had a most terrible blow and for a long time Iwas afraid he
wouldn't get over it. You know he married Milochka Rubtsova a year ago. Well, she has turned out to be a snake in the grass! Take him in I beg you, and look after him as only you can. I will send you a regular allowance for his keep. He has come to hate Zhitomir and I can quite understand why. I won't write any more - I'm too upset. The hospital train is just leaving and he'll tell you all about it himself. A big, big kiss for you and Seryozha.'
This was followed by an indecipherable signature.
'I brought the bird with me', said the stranger, sighing. 'A bird is man's best friend. I know many people think they're a nuisance to keep, but all I can say is that at least a bird never does anyone any harm.'
Nikolka very much liked that last sentence. Making no effort to understand it, he shyly scratched his forehead with the incomprehensible letter and slowly swung his legs down from the bed, thinking: 'I can't ask him his name ... it would sound so rude . . . What an extraordinary thing to happen . . .'
'Is it a canary?' he asked.
'It certainly is', replied the stranger enthusiastically. 'Actually it's not a hen-canary as most of them are, but a real cock-canary. I have fifteen of them at home in Zhitomir. I took them to mother, so that she can look after them. I'm sure that beast would wring their necks. He hates birds. May I put him down on your desk for a moment?'
'Please do', Nikolka replied. 'Are you from Zhitomir?'
'Yes, I am', answered the stranger. 'And wasn't it a coincidence - I arrived here at the same time as your brother.'
'What brother?'
'What d'you mean - what brother? Your brother arrived here as I did', the stranger replied with astonishment.
'But what brother?' Nikolka exclaimed miserably. 'What brother? From Zhitomir!'
'Your elder brother . . .'
Elena's voice came piercingly from the drawing-room: 'Nikolka! Nikolka! Illarion - please! Wake him up!'
'Tweet, tweet, tweee-ee, tik, tik, tikki', screeched the bird.
Nikolka dropped the blue letter and shot like a bullet through the library and dining-room into the drawing-room, where he stopped in horror, his arms spread wide.