When they arrived, at nightfall, at the great bridge over the bay,
Volodia was not exactly in bad humor, but a terrible weight lay on his
heart. Everything he saw, everything he heard, harmonized so little with
the last impressions that had been left in his mind by the great, light
examination-hall with polished floor, the voices of his comrades and the
gayety of their sympathetic bursts of laughter, his new uniform, the
well-beloved Czar, whom he was accustomed to see during seven years, and
who, taking leave of them with tears in his eyes, had called them “his
children”--yes, everything he saw little harmonized with his rich dreams
sparkling from a thousand facets.
“Here we are!” said his brother, getting out of the carriage in front of
the M---- battery. “If they let us cross the bridge we will go straight
to the Nicholas barracks. You will stop there until to-morrow morning.
As for me, I shall go back to my regiment to find out where the battery
is, and to-morrow I will go and hunt you up.”
“Why do that? rather let’s go together,” said Volodia. “I will go to the
bastion with you; won’t that be the same thing? One must get accustomed
to it. If you go there, why can’t I go?”
“You would do better not to go.”
“Let me go--please do. At least I will see what it is--”
“I advise you not to go there; but, nevertheless--”
The cloudless sky was sombre, the stars, and the flashes of the cannon,
and the bombs flying in space, shone in the darkness. The _tête du pont_
and the great white pile of the battery came out sharply in the dark
night. Every instant reports, explosions, shook the air, together or
separately, ever louder, ever more distinct. The mournful murmur of the
waves played an accompaniment to this incessant roll. A fresh breeze
filled with moisture blew from the sea. The brothers approached the
bridge. A soldier awkwardly shouldered arms and shouted,
“Who comes there?”
“A soldier.”
“You can’t pass.”
“Impossible--we must pass!”
“Ask the officer.”
The officer was taking a nap, seated on an anchor. He arose and gave the
order to let them pass.
“You can go in, but you can’t come out. Attention! Where are you getting
to all together?” he shouted to the wagons piled up with gabions, which
were stopping at the entrance to the bridge.
On the first pontoon they met some soldiers talking in a loud voice.
“He has received his outfit; he has received it all.”
“Ah! friends,” said another voice, “when a fellow gets to Severnaïa he
begins to revive. There is quite another air here, by heavens!”
“What nonsense are you talking there?” said the first. “The other day a
cursed bomb-shell carried away the legs of two sailors. Oh! oh!”
The water in several places was dashing into the second pontoon, where
the two brothers stopped to await their carriage. The wind, which had
appeared light on land, blew here with violence and in gusts. The bridge
swayed, and the waves, madly dashing against the beams, broke upon the
anchors and the ropes and flooded the flooring. The sea roared with a
hollow sound, forming a black, uniform, endless line, which separated it
from the starry horizon, now lighted by a silvery glow. In the distance
twinkled the lights of the hostile fleet. On the left rose the dark mass
of a sailing ship, against the sides of which the water dashed
violently; on the right, a steamer coming from Severnaïa, noisily and
swiftly advanced. A bomb-shell burst, and lighted up for a second the
heaps of gabions, revealing two men standing on the deck of the ship, a
third in shirt-sleeves, sitting with swinging legs, busy repairing the
deck, and showing the white foam and the dashing waves with green
reflections made by the steamer in motion.
The same lights continued to furrow the sky over Sebastopol, and the
fear-inspiring sounds came nearer. A wave driven from the sea broke into
foam on the right side of the bridge and wet Volodia’s feet. Two
soldiers, noisily dragging their legs through the water, passed by.
Suddenly something burst with a crash and lighted up before them the
part of the bridge along which was passing a carriage, followed by a
soldier on horseback. The pieces fell whistling into the water, which
spouted up in jets.
“Ah, Mikhaïl Semenovitch!” said the horseman, drawing up before
Koseltzoff the elder, “here you are--well again?”
“Yes, as you see. Where in God’s name are you going?”
“To Severnaïa for cartridges. They send me in place of the aide-de-camp
of the regiment. They are expecting an assault every moment.”
“And Martzeff, where’s he?”
“He lost a leg yesterday in the city; in his room. He was asleep. You
know him, perhaps.”
“The regiment is in the fifth, isn’t it?”
“Yes; it relieved the M----. Stop at the field-hospital, you will find
our fellows there; they will show you the way.”
“Have my quarters in the Morskaïa been kept?”
“Ah, brother, the shells destroyed them long since! You wouldn’t
recognize Sebastopol any longer. There isn’t a soul there; neither
women, nor band, nor eating-house. The last café closed yesterday. It is
now so dismal! Good-by!” and the officer went away on the trot.
A terrible fear suddenly seized Volodia. It seemed to him that a shell
was going to fall on him, and that a piece would surely strike him on
the head. The moist darkness, the sinister sounds, the constant noise of
the wrathful waves, all seemed to urge him to take not another step, and
to tell him that no good awaited him there; that his foot would never
touch the solid earth on the other side of the bay; that he would do
well to turn back, to flee as quickly as possible this terrible place
where death reigns. “Who knows? Perhaps it is too late. My lot is
fixed.” He said this to himself, trembling at the thought, and also on
account of the water which was running into his boots. He sighed deeply,
and kept away from his brother a little.
“My God! shall I really be killed--I? Oh, my God, have mercy on me!” he
murmured, making the sign of the cross.
“Now we will push on, Volodia,” said his companion, when their carriage
had rejoined them. “Did you see the shell?”
Farther on they met more wagons carrying wounded men and gabions. One of
them, filled with furniture, was driven by a woman. On the other side no
one stopped their passage.
Instinctively hugging the wall of the Nicholas battery the two brothers
silently went along it, with ears attentive to the noise of the shells
which exploded over their heads and to the roar of the pieces thrown
down from above; and at last they reached the part of the battery where
the holy image was placed. There they learned that the Fifth Light
Artillery Regiment, which Volodia was to join, was at Korabelnaïa. They
consequently made up their minds in spite of the danger to go and sleep
in the fifth bastion, and to go from there to their battery on the next
day. Passing through the narrow passage, stepping over the soldiers who
were sleeping along the wall, they at last reached the hospital.