And quiet flows the Don; a novel (3 page)

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left with the baby. . . . We'll have to do the mowing without him."

He buried his head in his hot pillow, but the chant seeped persistently into his ears:

And where is your horse? Outside the gate. And where is the gate? Swept away by the flood.

He was aroused from sleep by lusty neighing. By its tone he recognized Pyotr's army horse. His sleep-numbed fingers were slow in buttoning up his shirt, and he almost dropped off again under the flowing rhythm of Darya's song.

And where are the geese?

They've gone into the reeds.

And where are the reeds?

The girls have mown them.

And where are the girls?

The girls have taken husbands.

And where are the Cossacks?

They've gone to the war.

Rubbing his eyes, Grigory made his way to the stable and led Pyotr's horse out into the street. A floating cobweb tickled his face, and his drowsiness unexpectedly left him.

Slanting across the Don lay the wavy never-ridden track of the moonlight. Over the river

hung a mist, and above it, the stars, like sprinkled grain. The horse set its hoofs down cautiously. The slope to the water was hard going. From the farther side of the river came the quacking of ducks. A sheat-fish jumped with a splash in the muddy shallows by the bank, hunting at random for smaller fry.

Grigory stood a long time by the river. The bank exuded a dank and musty rottenness. A tiny drop of water fell from the horse's lips. There was a light, pleasant void in Grigory's heart, he felt good and free from thought. As he walked back, he glanced towards the east, where the blue murk was already clearing.

By the stable he ran into his mother.

"Is that you, Grisha?"

"And who do you think it is?"

"Watered the horse?"

"Yes," he answered shortly.

His mother waddled away with an apronful of dried dung fuel, her bare withered feet slapping on the ground.

"You might go and wake up the Astakhovs. Stepan said he would go with our Pyotr."

The morning rawness set a spring stiffly quivering in Grigory. His body tingled with prickles. He ran up the three echoing steps leading to the Astakhovs' house. The door was unlatched. Stepan was asleep on an outspread

rug in the kitchen, his wife's head resting on his arm.

In the greying dawn light Grigory saw Ak-sinya's shift rumpled above her knees, and her unashamedly parted legs white as birch bark. For a moment he stood gazing, feeling his mouth going dry and his head bursting with an iron clangour.

He shifted his eyes stealthily. In a strange, hoarse voice he called:

"Hey! Anyone here? Get up."

Aksinya gave a sob of waking.

"Oh, who's that?" She hurriedly began to fumble with her shift, drawing it over her legs. A little drop of spittle was left on her pillow; a woman's sleep is sound at dawn.

"It's me. Mother sent me to wake you up."

"We'll be up in a minute. We're sleeping on the floor because of the fleas. Stepan, get up, d'you hear?" By her voice Grigory guessed that she felt embarrassed and he hastened to leave.

Thirty Cossacks were going from the village to the May training camp. Just before seven o'clock wagons with tarpaulin covers, Cossacks on foot and on horseback, in homespun shirts and carrying their equipment, began to stream towards the square.

Pyotr was standing on the steps, hurriedly stitching a broken rein.

Pantelei stamped about round Pyotr's horse, pouring oats into the trough. Every now and then he shouted:

"Dunya, have you put the rusks in the sack yet? Have you salted the bacon?"

Dunya, rosy and blooming, flew to and fro like a swallow and answered her father's shouts with a laugh:

"You look after your own affairs. Father, and I'll pack for Brother so well that nothing will budge till he reaches Cherkassk."*

"Not finished eating yet?" Pyotr asked, nodding towards the horse.

"Not yet," his father replied deliberately, testing the saddle-cloth with his rough palm. One little crumb sticking to the cloth can chafe a horse's back into a sore in a single march.

"When he's done eating, water him. Father."

"Grisha will take him down to the Don,"

Grigory took the tall, rawboned Don horse with a white blaze on its forehead, led it out through the gate, and resting his left hand lightly on its withers, vaulted on to its back and went off at a swinging trot. He tried to rein the horse in at the descent to the river, but the animal stumbled, quickened its pace, and flew down the slope. Leaning back until he

* Novocherkassk.

almost lay along the animal's spine, Grigory saw a woman with pails going down the hill. He turned sharply off the path and dashed into the water, leaving a cloud of dust behind him.

Aksinya came swinging down the slope. When still some distance away she shouted to him:

"You mad devil! You almost rode me down. You wait, I'll tell your father how you ride."

"Now, neighbour, don't get angry. When you've seen your husband off to camp maybe I'll be useful on your farm."

"How the devil could you be useful to me?"

"You'll be asking me when mowing time comes," Grigory laughed.

Aksinya dexterously drew a full pail of water from the river, and pressed her skirt between her knees away from the wind.

"Is your Stepan ready yet?" Grigory asked.

"What's that to do with you?"

"What a spitfire! Can't I ask?"

"He is, what of it?"

"So you'll be left a grass-widow?"

"Yes."

The horse raised its lips from the water, and stood gazing across the Don, its fore-feet treading the stream. Aksinya filled her second pail, hoisted the yoke across her shoulders, and with a swinging stride set off up the slope.

Grigory turned the horse and followed her. The wind fluttered her skirt and played with the fine, fluffy curls on her swarthy neck. Her flat, embroidered cap flamed on her heavy knot of hair, her rose-coloured shift, gathered into her skirt at the waist, clung smoothly to her steep back and compact shoulders. As she climbed the slope she bent forward, and the hollow between her shoulders showed clearly beneath her shift. He saw the brownish rings under her arms, where her shift was stained with sweat. Grigory watched her ever^^ movement. He wanted to renew the talk with her.

"You'll be missing your husband, won't

you

?"

Without halting Aksinya turned her head and smiled.

"Of course I shall. Get married yourself," she caught her breath and went on jerkily, "then you'll know whether you miss your darling or not."

Grigory brought the horse level with her and looked into her eyes.

"But other wives are glad when their husbands go. Our Darya will grow fat without her Pyotr."

Aksinya's nostrils quivered and she breathed hard.

"A husband's not a leech, but he sucks your

blood all the same." She pushed her hair straight. "Shall we be seeing you married soon?"

"I don't know, it depends on Father. After my army service, I suppose."

"You're still young; don't get married."

"Why not?"

"It dries you up." She looked up from under her brows, and smiled cheerlessly without parting her lips. For the first time Grigory noticed that her lips were shamelessly greedy and rather swollen. Stranding the horse's mane with his fingers, he replied:

"I don't want to get married. Someone will love me without that."

"Have you noticed anyone, then?"

"What should I notice? Now you're seeing your Stepan off. . .?"

"Don't try to play about with me!"

"What will you do about it?"

"I'll tell Stepan."

"I'll show your Stepan. . . ."

"You're so cocksure, mind you don't cry first."

"Don't try to scare me, Aksinya!"

"I'm not trying to scare you. You hang around with the girls, let them hem your hankies for you, but keep your eyes off me,"

"I'll look at you all the more now."

"Well, look then."

Aksinya gave him a conciliatory smile and left the path, trying to pass the horse. Grigory turned the animal sideways and blocked the way.

"Let me pass, Grisha." |

"I won't."

"Don't be a fool. I must see to my husband."

Grigory smilingly teased the horse, and it edged Aksinya towards the bank.

"Let me pass, you devil! There are some people over there. If they see us what will they think?" she muttered.

She swept a frightened glance around and passed by, frowning and without a backward glance.

Pyotr was saying good-bye to his family on the steps. Grigory saddled the horse. His brother, holding his sabre to his side, hurried down the steps and took the reins. Scenting the road, the horse fretted and chewed the bit. With one foot in the stirrup, Pyotr said to his father:

"Don't overwork the baldheads. Father. In the autumn we'll sell them. Grigory will need a horse for the army, you know. And don't sell the steppe grass; you know yourself what hay we're likely to get in the meadow this year."

"Well, God be with you. Good luck," the old man replied, crossing himself.

Pyotr swung his firm body into the saddle, and adjusted the folds of his shirt in his belt at the back. The horse moved towards the gate. The sabre swung rhythmically, its pommel glittering dully in the sun.

Darya followed with the child on her arm. Wiping her eyes with her sleeve and her nose with the corner of her apron, his mother, Ilyi-nichna, stood in the middle of the yard.

"Brother! The pasties! You've forgotten the pasties! The potato pasties!" Dunya dashed to the gate.

"What are you bawling for, you fool!" Gri-gory snapped irritably.

"He's left his pasties behind," she moaned, leaning against the gate-post, and tears ran down her burning cheeks on to her blouse.

Darya stood gazing under her hand after her husband's white shirt through the screen of dust. Old Pantelei jerked the rotting gate-post and looked at Grigory:

"Mend the gate, and put a new post in." He stood in thought for a moment, then announced as if it were news:

"Pyotr's gone."

Over the wattle fence, Grigory saw Stepan getting ready, Aksinya, dressed up in a green

woollen skirt, led out his horse. Stepan smilingly said something to her. Unhurriedly, possessively, he kissed his wife, and his arm lingered long around her shoulder. His hand, darkened by sun and toil, looked coal-black against her white blouse. He stood with his back to Gri-gory; his firm, clean-shaven neck, his broad, rather sloping shoulders, and (whenever he bent towards his wife) the twisted ends of his light-brown moustache were visible across the fence.

Aksinya laughed at something and shook her head. The big black stallion lurched slightly as Stepan swung his great weight into the saddle. Sitting as though planted in the saddle, Stepan rode his black horse at a brisk trot through the gate, and Aksinya walked at his side, holding the stirrup and looking up lovingly ard hungrily, like a dog, into his eyes.

Grigory watched them to the turn of the road with a long unblinking gaze.

IV

Towards evening a thunderstorm gathered. A mass of heavy cloud lay over the village. Lashed into fury by the wind, the Don sent foaming breakers against its banks. The sky flamed with dry lightning, occasional peals of thunder shook the earth. A kite circled with

outspread wings just below the clouds and was pursued by croaking ravens. Spreading its cool breath, the cloud passed down the Don from the west. Beyond the meadows the heavens blackened menacingly, the steppe lay in expectant silence. In the village there was a rattle of closing shutters, the old people hurried home from vespers crossing themselves. A grey pillar of dust whirled over the square, and the heat-burdened earth was already beginning to be scattered with the first seeds of rain.

Shaking her braided tresses, Dunya flew across the yard, slammed the door of the chick-enhouse, and stood in the middle of the yard with nostrils distended like a horse at a hurdle. In the street the children were prancing about. Eight-year-old Mishka, his father's absurdly large peaked cap drawn over his eyes, was spinning round and chirruping shrilly:

Rain, rain, rain away. We're going ofi for the day. To pay God our vow. And to Christ to how.

Dunya enviously watched Mishka's chapped bare feet stamping the ground. She, too, wanted to dance in the rain and to get her head wet, so that her hair might grow thick and curly; she, too, wanted to stand on her hands like

Mishka's friend in the roadside dust, at the risk of falling into the nettles. But her mother was watching and angrily moving her lips at the window. With a sigh she ran into the house. The rain was now falling heavily. A peal of thunder broke right over the roof and went rolling away across the Don.

In the porch Pantelei and the perspiring Gri-gory were hauling a folded drag-net out of the side-room.

"Raw thread and a pack-needle, quick!" Gri-gory called to Dunya. Darya sat down to mend the net. Her mother-in-law grumbled as she rocked the baby:

"What else will you take into your head, man! Let's go to bed. Kerosene costs more and more. What do you think you'll catch now? Where the plague are you going? And you'll get drowned into the bargain, the terror of the Lord is upon us. Just look at the lightning! Lord Jesus Christ, Mother of Heaven. . . ."

For an instant it was dazzlingly blue and silent in the kitchen; the rain could be heard drumming on the shutters. A clap of thunder followed. Dunya whimpered and buried her face in the net. Darya made the sign of the cross towards the windows and door. The old woman stared with terrible eyes at the cat rubbing itself against her legs:

"Dunya, chase this d-. Mother of Heaven, forgive me my sins. . . . Dunya, put the cat out into the yard! Shoo, evil spirit! May you. . . ."

Dropping the net, Grigory shook with silent laughter.

"Well, what are you fussing about? Enough of that!" shouted Pantelei. "Get on with your mending, women. I told you the other day to see to the net."

"There's no fish now," his wife ventured.