his throat impatiently and, shrinking from the penetrating damp, walks
round the engine, and as he does so the brilliant light of the two
engine lamps dazzles his eyes for an instant and makes the night even
blacker to him; he goes to the station.
The platform and steps of the station are wet. Here and there are white
patches of freshly fallen melting snow. In the station itself it is
light and as hot as a steam-bath. There is a smell of paraffin. Except
for the weighing-machine and a yellow seat on which a man wearing a
guard's uniform is asleep, there is no furniture in the place at all. On
the left are two wide-open doors. Through one of them the telegraphic
apparatus and a lamp with a green shade on it can be seen; through the
other, a small room, half of it taken up by a dark cupboard. In this
room the head guard and the engine-driver are sitting on the window-
sill. They are both feeling a cap with their fingers and disputing.
"That's not real beaver, it's imitation," says the engine-driver. "Real
beaver is not like that. Five roubles would be a high price for the
whole cap, if you care to know!"
"You know a great deal about it,..." the head guard says, offended.
"Five roubles, indeed! Here, we will ask the merchant. Mr. Malahin," he
says, addressing the old man, "what do you say: is this imitation beaver
or real?"
Old Malahin takes the cap into his hand, and with the air of a
connoisseur pinches the fur, blows on it, sniffs at it, and a
contemptuous smile lights up his angry face.
"It must be imitation!" he says gleefully. "Imitation it is."
A dispute follows. The guard maintains that the cap is real beaver, and
the engine-driver and Malahin try to persuade him that it is not. In the
middle of the argument the old man suddenly remembers the object of his
coming.
"Beaver and cap is all very well, but the train's standing still,
gentlemen!" he says. "Who is it we are waiting for? Let us start!"
"Let us," the guard agrees. "We will smoke another cigarette and go on.
But there is no need to be in a hurry.... We shall be delayed at the
next station anyway!"
"Why should we?"
"Oh, well.... We are too much behind time.... If you are late at one
station you can't help being delayed at the other stations to let the
trains going the opposite way pass. Whether we set off now or in the
morning we shan't be number fourteen. We shall have to be number twenty-
three."
"And how do you make that out?"
"Well, there it is."
Malahin looks at the guard, reflects, and mutters mechanically as though
to himself:
"God be my judge, I have reckoned it and even jotted it down in a
notebook; we have wasted thirty-four hours standing still on the
journey. If you go on like this, either the cattle will die, or they
won't pay me two roubles for the meat when I do get there. It's not
traveling, but ruination."
The guard raises his eyebrows and sighs with an air that seems to say:
"All that is unhappily true!" The engine-driver sits silent, dreamily
looking at the cap. From their faces one can see that they have a secret
thought in common, which they do not utter, not because they want to
conceal it, but because such thoughts are much better expressed by signs
than by words. And the old man understands. He feels in his pocket,
takes out a ten-rouble note, and without preliminary words, without any
change in the tone of his voice or the expression of his face, but with
the confidence and directness with which probably only Russians give and
take bribes, he gives the guard the note. The latter takes it, folds it
in four, and without undue haste puts it in his pocket. After that all
three go out of the room, and waking the sleeping guard on the way, go
on to the platform.
"What weather!" grumbles the head guard, shrugging his shoulders. "You
can't see your hand before your face."
"Yes, it's vile weather."
From the window they can see the flaxen head of the telegraph clerk
appear beside the green lamp and the telegraphic apparatus; soon after
another head, bearded and wearing a red cap, appears beside it--no doubt
that of the station-master. The station-master bends down to the table,
reads something on a blue form, rapidly passing his cigarette along the
lines.... Malahin goes to his van.
The young man, his companion, is still half reclining and hardly audibly
strumming on the accordion. He is little more than a boy, with no trace
of a mustache; his full white face with its broad cheek-bones is
childishly dreamy; his eyes have a melancholy and tranquil look unlike
that of a grown-up person, but he is broad, strong, heavy and rough like
the old man; he does not stir nor shift his position, as though he is
not equal to moving his big body. It seems as though any movement he
made would tear his clothes and be so noisy as to frighten both him and
the cattle. From under his big fat fingers that clumsily pick out the
stops and keys of the accordion comes a steady flow of thin, tinkling
sounds which blend into a simple, monotonous little tune; he listens to
it, and is evidently much pleased with his performance.
A bell rings, but with such a muffled note that it seems to come from
far away. A hurried second bell soon follows, then a third and the
guard's whistle. A minute passes in profound silence; the van does not
move, it stands still, but vague sounds begin to come from beneath it,
like the crunch of snow under sledge-runners; the van begins to shake
and the sounds cease. Silence reigns again. But now comes the clank of
buffers, the violent shock makes the van start and, as it were, give a
lurch forward, and all the cattle fall against one another.
"May you be served the same in the world to come," grumbles the old man,
setting straight his cap, which had slipped on the back of his head from
the jolt. "He'll maim all my cattle like this!"
Yasha gets up without a word and, taking one of the fallen beasts by the
horns, helps it to get on to its legs.... The jolt is followed by a
stillness again. The sounds of crunching snow come from under the van
again, and it seems as though the train had moved back a little.
"There will be another jolt in a minute," says the old man. And the
convulsive quiver does, in fact, run along the train, there is a
crashing sound and the bullocks fall on one another again.
"It's a job!" says Yasha, listening. "The train must be heavy. It seems
it won't move."
"It was not heavy before, but now it has suddenly got heavy. No, my lad,
the guard has not gone shares with him, I expect. Go and take him
something, or he will be jolting us till morning."
Yasha takes a three-rouble note from the old man and jumps out of the
van. The dull thud of his heavy footsteps resounds outside the van and
gradually dies away. Stillness.... In the next van a bullock utters a
prolonged subdued "moo," as though it were singing.
Yasha comes back. A cold damp wind darts into the van.
"Shut the door, Yasha, and we will go to bed," says the old man. "Why
burn a candle for nothing?"
Yasha moves the heavy door; there is a sound of a whistle, the engine
and the train set off.
"It's cold," mutters the old man, stretching himself on the cape and
laying his head on a bundle. "It is very different at home! It's warm
and clean and soft, and there is room to say your prayers, but here we
are worse off than any pigs. It's four days and nights since I have
taken off my boots."
Yasha, staggering from the jolting of the train, opens the lantern and
snuffs out the wick with his wet fingers. The light flares up, hisses
like a frying pan and goes out.
"Yes, my lad," Malahin goes on, as he feels Yasha lie down beside him
and the young man's huge back huddle against his own, "it's cold. There
is a draught from every crack. If your mother or your sister were to
sleep here for one night they would be dead by morning. There it is, my
lad, you wouldn't study and go to the high school like your brothers, so
you must take the cattle with your father. It's your own fault, you have
only yourself to blame.... Your brothers are asleep in their beds now,
they are snug under the bedclothes, but you, the careless and lazy one,
are in the same box as the cattle.... Yes.... "
The old man's words are inaudible in the noise of the train, but for a
long time he goes on muttering, sighing and clearing his throat.... The
cold air in the railway van grows thicker and more stifling. The pungent
odor of fresh dung and smoldering candle makes it so repulsive and acrid
that it irritates Yasha's throat and chest as he falls asleep. He coughs
and sneezes, while the old man, being accustomed to it, breathes with
his whole chest as though nothing were amiss, and merely clears his
throat.
To judge from the swaying of the van and the rattle of the wheels the
train is moving rapidly and unevenly. The engine breathes heavily,
snorting out of time with the pulsation of the train, and altogether
there is a medley of sounds. The bullocks huddle together uneasily and
knock their horns against the walls.
When the old man wakes up, the deep blue sky of early morning is peeping
in at the cracks and at the little uncovered window. He feels unbearably
cold, especially in the back and the feet. The train is standing still;
Yasha, sleepy and morose, is busy with the cattle.
The old man wakes up out of humor. Frowning and gloomy, he clears his
throat angrily and looks from under his brows at Yasha who, supporting a
bullock with his powerful shoulder and slightly lifting it, is trying to
disentangle its leg.
"I told you last night that the cords were too long," mutters the old
man; "but no, 'It's not too long, Daddy.' There's no making you do
anything, you will have everything your own way.... Blockhead!"
He angrily moves the door open and the light rushes into the van. A
passenger train is standing exactly opposite the door, and behind it a
red building with a roofed-in platform--a big station with a refreshment
bar. The roofs and bridges of the trains, the earth, the sleepers, all
are covered with a thin coating of fluffy, freshly fallen snow. In the
spaces between the carriages of the passenger train the passengers can
be seen moving to and fro, and a red-haired, red-faced gendarme walking
up and down; a waiter in a frock-coat and a snow-white shirt-front,
looking cold and sleepy, and probably very much dissatisfied with his
fate, is running along the platform carrying a glass of tea and two
rusks on a tray.
The old man gets up and begins saying his prayers towards the east.
Yasha, having finished with the bullock and put down the spade in the
corner, stands beside him and says his prayers also. He merely moves his
lips and crosses himself; the father prays in a loud whisper and
pronounces the end of each prayer aloud and distinctly.
"... And the life of the world to come. Amen," the old man says aloud,
draws in a breath, and at once whispers another prayer, rapping out
clearly and firmly at the end: "... and lay calves upon Thy altar!"
After saying his prayers, Yasha hurriedly crosses himself and says:
"Five kopecks, please."
And on being given the five-kopeck piece, he takes a red copper teapot
and runs to the station for boiling water. Taking long jumps over the
rails and sleepers, leaving huge tracks in the feathery snow, and
pouring away yesterday's tea out of the teapot he runs to the
refreshment room and jingles his five-kopeck piece against his teapot.
From the van the bar-keeper can be seen pushing away the big teapot and
refusing to give half of his samovar for five kopecks, but Yasha turns
the tap himself and, spreading wide his elbows so as not to be
interfered with fills his teapot with boiling water.
"Damned blackguard!" the bar-keeper shouts after him as he runs back to
the railway van.
The scowling face of Malahin grows a little brighter over the tea.
"We know how to eat and drink, but we don't remember our work. Yesterday
we could do nothing all day but eat and drink, and I'll be bound we
forgot to put down what we spent. What a memory! Lord have mercy on us!"
The old man recalls aloud the expenditure of the day before, and writes
down in a tattered notebook where and how much he had given to guards,
engine-drivers, oilers....
Meanwhile the passenger train has long ago gone off, and an engine runs
backwards and forwards on the empty line, apparently without any
definite object, but simply enjoying its freedom. The sun has risen and
is playing on the snow; bright drops are falling from the station roof
and the tops of the vans.
Having finished his tea, the old man lazily saunters from the van to the
station. Here in the middle of the first-class waiting-room he sees the
familiar figure of the guard standing beside the station-master, a young
man with a handsome beard and in a magnificent rough woollen overcoat.
The young man, probably new to his position, stands in the same place,
gracefully shifting from one foot to the other like a good racehorse,
looks from side to side, salutes everyone that passes by, smiles and
screws up his eyes.... He is red-cheeked, sturdy, and good-humored; his
face is full of eagerness, and is as fresh as though he had just fallen
from the sky with the feathery snow. Seeing Malahin, the guard sighs
guiltily and throws up his hands.
"We can't go number fourteen," he says. "We are very much behind time.
Another train has gone with that number."
The station-master rapidly looks through some forms, then turns his
beaming blue eyes upon Malahin, and, his face radiant with smiles and
freshness, showers questions on him:
"You are Mr. Malahin? You have the cattle? Eight vanloads? What is to be
done now? You are late and I let number fourteen go in the night. What
are we to do now?"
The young man discreetly takes hold of the fur of Malahin's coat with
two pink fingers and, shifting from one foot to the other, explains
affably and convincingly that such and such numbers have gone already,
and that such and such are going, and that he is ready to do for Malahin
everything in his power. And from his face it is evident that he is
ready to do anything to please not only Malahin, but the whole world--he
is so happy, so pleased, and so delighted! The old man listens, and
though he can make absolutely nothing of the intricate system of
numbering the trains, he nods his head approvingly, and he, too, puts
two fingers on the soft wool of the rough coat. He enjoys seeing and
hearing the polite and genial young man. To show goodwill on his side
also, he takes out a ten-rouble note and, after a moment's thought, adds
a couple of rouble notes to it, and gives them to the station-master.
The latter takes them, puts his finger to his cap, and gracefully
thrusts them into his pocket.
"Well, gentlemen, can't we arrange it like this?" he says, kindled by a
new idea that has flashed on him. "The troop train is late,... as you
see, it is not here,... so why shouldn't you go as the troop train?**
And I will let the troop train go as twenty-eight. Eh?"
"If you like," agrees the guard.
"Excellent!" the station-master says, delighted. "In that case there is
no need for you to wait here; you can set off at once. I'll dispatch you
immediately. Excellent!"
He salutes Malahin and runs off to his room, reading forms as he goes.
The old man is very much pleased by the conversation that has just taken
place; he smiles and looks about the room as though looking for
something else agreeable.
"We'll have a drink, though," he says, taking the guard's arm.
"It seems a little early for drinking."
"No, you must let me treat you to a glass in a friendly way."
They both go to the refreshment bar. After having a drink the guard
spends a long time selecting something to eat.
He is a very stout, elderly man, with a puffy and discolored face. His
fatness is unpleasant, flabby-looking, and he is sallow as people are
who drink too much and sleep irregularly.
"And now we might have a second glass," says Malahin. "It's cold now,
it's no sin to drink. Please take some. So I can rely upon you, Mr.
Guard, that there will be no hindrance or unpleasantness for the rest of
the journey. For you know in moving cattle every hour is precious. To-
day meat is one price; and to-morrow, look you, it will be another. If
you are a day or two late and don't get your price, instead of a profit
you get home--excuse my saying it--without your breeches. Pray take a
little.... I rely on you, and as for standing you something or what you
like, I shall be pleased to show you my respect at any time."
After having fed the guard, Malahin goes back to the van.
"I have just got hold of the troop train," he says to his son. "We shall
go quickly. The guard says if we go all the way with that number we
shall arrive at eight o'clock to-morrow evening. If one does not bestir
oneself, my boy, one gets nothing.... That's so.... So you watch and
learn...."
After the first bell a man with a face black with soot, in a blouse and
filthy frayed trousers hanging very slack, comes to the door of the van.
This is the oiler, who had been creeping under the carriages and tapping
the wheels with a hammer.
"Are these your vans of cattle?" he asks.
"Yes. Why?"
"Why, because two of the vans are not safe. They can't go on, they must
stay here to be repaired."
"Oh, come, tell us another! You simply want a drink, to get something
out of me.... You should have said so."
"As you please, only it is my duty to report it at once."
Without indignation or protest, simply, almost mechanically, the old man
takes two twenty-kopeck pieces out of his pocket and gives them to the
oiler. He takes them very calmly, too, and looking good-naturedly at the
old man enters into conversation.
"You are going to sell your cattle, I suppose.... It's good business!"
Malahin sighs and, looking calmly at the oiler's black face, tells him
that trading in cattle used certainly to be profitable, but now it has
become a risky and losing business.
"I have a mate here," the oiler interrupts him. "You merchant gentlemen
might make him a little present...."
Malahin gives something to the mate too. The troop train goes quickly
and the waits at the stations are comparatively short. The old man is
pleased. The pleasant impression made by the young man in the rough
overcoat has gone deep, the vodka he has drunk slightly clouds his
brain, the weather is magnificent, and everything seems to be going
well. He talks without ceasing, and at every stopping place runs to the
refreshment bar. Feeling the need of a listener, he takes with him first
the guard, and then the engine-driver, and does not simply drink, but
makes a long business of it, with suitable remarks and clinking of
glasses.
"You have your job and we have ours," he says with an affable smile.
"May God prosper us and you, and not our will but His be done."
The vodka gradually excites him and he is worked up to a great pitch of
energy. He wants to bestir himself, to fuss about, to make inquiries, to
talk incessantly. At one minute he fumbles in his pockets and bundles
and looks for some form. Then he thinks of something and cannot remember
it; then takes out his pocketbook, and with no sort of object counts
over his money. He bustles about, sighs and groans, clasps his hands....
Laying out before him the letters and telegrams from the meat salesmen
in the city, bills, post office and telegraphic receipt forms, and his
note book, he reflects aloud and insists on Yasha's listening.
And when he is tired of reading over forms and talking about prices, he
gets out at the stopping places, runs to the vans where his cattle are,
does nothing, but simply clasps his hands and exclaims in horror.
"Oh, dear! oh, dear!" he says in a complaining voice. "Holy Martyr
Vlassy! Though they are bullocks, though they are beasts, yet they want
to eat and drink as men do.... It's four days and nights since they have
drunk or eaten. Oh, dear! oh, dear!"
Yasha follows him and does what he is told like an obedient son. He does
not like the old man's frequent visits to the refreshment bar. Though he
is afraid of his father, he cannot refrain from remarking on it.
"So you have begun already!" he says, looking sternly at the old man.
"What are you rejoicing at? Is it your name-day or what?"
"Don't you dare teach your father."
"Fine goings on!"
When he has not to follow his father along the other vans Yasha sits on
the cape and strums on the accordion. Occasionally he gets out and walks
lazily beside the train; he stands by the engine and turns a prolonged,
unmoving stare on the wheels or on the workmen tossing blocks of wood
into the tender; the hot engine wheezes, the falling blocks come down
with the mellow, hearty thud of fresh wood; the engine-driver and his
assistant, very phlegmatic and imperturbable persons, perform
incomprehensible movements and don't hurry themselves. After standing
for a while by the engine, Yasha saunters lazily to the station; here he
looks at the eatables in the refreshment bar, reads aloud some quite
uninteresting notice, and goes back slowly to the cattle van. His face
expresses neither boredom nor desire; apparently he does not care where
he is, at home, in the van, or by the engine.
Towards evening the train stops near a big station. The lamps have only
just been lighted along the line; against the blue background in the
fresh limpid air the lights are bright and pale like stars; they are
only red and glowing under the station roof, where it is already dark.
All the lines are loaded up with carriages, and it seems that if another
train came in there would be no place for it. Yasha runs to the station
for boiling water to make the evening tea. Well-dressed ladies and high-
school boys are walking on the platform. If one looks into the distance
from the platform there are far-away lights twinkling in the evening
dusk on both sides of the station--that is the town. What town? Yasha
does not care to know. He sees only the dim lights and wretched
buildings beyond the station, hears the cabmen shouting, feels a sharp,
cold wind on his face, and imagines that the town is probably
disagreeable, uncomfortable, and dull.
While they are having tea, when it is quite dark and a lantern is
hanging on the wall again as on the previous evening, the train quivers
from a slight shock and begins moving backwards. After going a little
way it stops; they hear indistinct shouts, someone sets the chains
clanking near the buffers and shouts, "Ready!" The train moves and goes
forward. Ten minutes later it is dragged back again.
Getting out of the van, Malahin does not recognize his train. His eight
vans of bullocks are standing in the same row with some trolleys which
were not a part of the train before. Two or three of these are loaded
with rubble and the others are empty. The guards running to and fro on
the platform are strangers. They give unwilling and indistinct answers
to his questions. They have no thoughts to spare for Malahin; they are
in a hurry to get the train together so as to finish as soon as possible
and be back in the warmth.
"What number is this?" asks Malahin
"Number eighteen."
"And where is the troop train? Why have you taken me off the troop
train?"
Getting no answer, the old man goes to the station. He looks first for
the familiar figure of the head guard and, not finding him, goes to the
station-master. The station-master is sitting at a table in his own
room, turning over a bundle of forms. He is busy, and affects not to see
the newcomer. His appearance is impressive: a cropped black head,
prominent ears, a long hooked nose, a swarthy face; he has a forbidding
and, as it were, offended expression. Malahin begins making his
complaint at great length.
"What?" queries the station-master. "How is this?" He leans against the
back of his chair and goes on, growing indignant: "What is it? and why
shouldn't you go by number eighteen? Speak more clearly, I don't
understand! How is it? Do you want me to be everywhere at once?"
He showers questions on him, and for no apparent reason grows sterner
and sterner. Malahin is already feeling in his pocket for his
pocketbook, but in the end the station-master, aggrieved and indignant,
for some unknown reason jumps up from his seat and runs out of the room.
Malahin shrugs his shoulders, and goes out to look for someone else to
speak to.