THE COMMISSARY WITH THE CROOKED NOSE
There were a dozen men in the room in stained military overcoats and red
armlets. One, evidently an officer, who carried a black portfolio under
his arm, was leaning against the panelled wall, smoking and snapping his
fingers to a dingy white terrier that leapt to his repeated invitations.
At the table, covered with documents, were two people, the man and the
woman.
She, sprawling indolently forward, her head upon her arm, her strong
brown face turned to the man, was obviously a Jewess. The papers were
streaked and greasy where her thick black ringlets had rested, and the
ashes of her cigarette lay in little untidy heaps on the table.
The man was burly, with a great breadth of shoulder and big rough hands.
But it was his face which arrested the feet of Malcolm and brought him
to a sudden halt the moment he came near enough to see and recognize the
Commissary.
It was not by his bushy red beard nor the stiff, upstanding hair, but
by the crooked nose, that he recognized Boolba, sometime serving-man to
the Grand Duke Yaroslav. Malcolm, looking at the sightless eyes, felt
his spine go creepy.
Boolba lifted his head sharply at the sound of an unfamiliar footfall.
"Who is this?" he asked. "Sophia Kensky, you who are my eyes, tell me
who is this?"
"Oh, a boorjoo," said the woman lazily.
"A foreigner too--who are you, boorjoo?"
"A Britisher," said Malcolm.
Boolba lifted his chin and turned his face at the voice.
"A Britisher," he repeated slowly. "The man on the oil-fields. Tell me
your name."
"Hay--Malcolm Hay," said Malcolm, and Boolba nodded.
His face was like a mask and he expressed no emotion.
"And the other?"
"Malinkoff!" snapped the voice at Malcolm's side, and Boolba nodded.
"Commanding an army--I remember. You drive a cab, comrade. Are there any
complaints against this man?"
He turned his face to Sophia Kensky, and she shook her head.
"Are there any complaints against this man, Sophia?" he repeated.
"None that I know. He is an aristocrat and a friend of the Romanoffs."
"Huh!" The grunt sounded like a note of disappointment. "What do you
want?"
"The stranger wishes permission to remain in Moscow until he can find a
train to the north," said Malinkoff.
Boolba made no reply. He sat there, his elbows on the table, his fingers
twining and untwining the thick red hair of his beard.
"Where does he sleep to-night?" he asked after awhile.
"He sleeps in my stable, near the Vassalli Prospekt," said Malinkoff.
Boolba turned to the woman, who was lighting a new cigarette from the
end of the old one, and said something in a low, growling tone.
"Do as you wish, my little pigeon," she said audibly.
Again his hand went to his beard and his big mouth opened in meditation.
Then he said curtly:
"Sit down."
There was no place to sit, and the two men fell back amongst the
soldiers.
Again the two at the table consulted, and then Sophia Kensky called a
name. The man in a faded officer's uniform came forward, his big black
portfolio in his hand, and this he laid on the table, opening the flap
and taking out a sheaf of papers.
"Read them to me, Sophia," said Boolba. "Read their names."
He groped about on the table and found first a rubber stamp and then a
small, flat ink-pad. Sophia lifted the first of the papers and spelt out
the names.
"Mishka Sasanoff," she said, and the man growled.
"An upstart woman and very ugly," he said. "I remember her. She used to
whip her servants. Tell me, Sophia, my life, what has she done now?"
"Plotted to destroy the Revolution," said the woman.
"Huh!" grunted the man, as he brought his rubber stamp to the paper,
passing it across to the waiting officer, who replaced it in his
portfolio. "And the next?"
"Paul Geslkin," she said and passed the document to him. "Plotting to
overthrow the Revolution."
"A boorjoo, a tricky young man, in league with the priests," he said,
and again his stamp came down upon the paper, and again the paper went
across the table into the portfolio of the officer.
The soldiers about Malcolm and his friend had edged away, and they were
alone.
"What are these?" whispered Malcolm.
"Death warrants," replied Malinkoff laconically, and for the second time
a cold chill ran down Malcolm's spine.
Name after name were read out, and the little rubber stamp, which
carried death to one and sorrow to so many, thudded down upon the paper.
Malcolm felt physically ill. The room was close and reeked of vile
tobacco fumes. There was no ventilation, and the oil lamps made the
apartment insufferably hot. An hour, two hours passed, and no further
notice was paid to the two men.
"I can't understand it quite," said Malinkoff in a low voice.
"Ordinarily this would mean serious trouble, but if the Commissary had
any suspicion of you or me, we should have been in prison an hour ago."
Then suddenly Boolba rose.
"What is the hour?" he said.
A dozen voices replied.
"Half-past ten? It is time that the sweeper was here."
He threw back his head and laughed, and the men joined in the laughter.
With a great yellow handkerchief, which reminded Malcolm of something
particularly unpleasant, Boolba wiped the streams from his sightless
eyes and bent down to the woman at his side, and Malcolm heard him say:
"What is his name--he told me," and then he stood up.
"Hay," he said, "you are a boorjoo. You have ordered many men to sweep
your room. Is it not good that a house should be clean, eh?"
"Very good, Boolba," said Malcolm quietly.
"Boolba he calls me. He remembers well. That is good! I stood behind
him, comrades, giving wine and coffee and bowing to this great English
lord! Yes, I, Boolba!" he struck his chest, "crawled on my knees to this
man, and he calls me Boolba now--Boolba!" he roared ferociously. "Come
here! Do this! Clean my boots, Boolba! Come, little Boolba, bow thy neck
that I may rest my foot!"
A voice from the door interrupted him.
"Good!" he said. "My sweeper has arrived, Hay. Once a day she sweeps my
room and once a day she makes my bed. No ordinary woman will satisfy
Boolba. She must come in her furs, drive in her fine carriage from the
Nijitnkaya--behold!"
Malcolm looked to the doorway and was struck dumb with amazement.
The girl who came in was dressed better than he expected any woman to
be dressed in Moscow. A sable wrap was about her shoulders, a sable
toque was on her head. He could not see the worn shoes nor the shabby
dress beneath the costly furs; indeed, he saw nothing but the face--the
face of his dreams--unchanged, unlined, more beautiful than he had
remembered her. She stood stiffly in her pride, her little chin held up,
her contemptuous eyes fixed upon the man at the table. Then loosing her
wrap, she hung it upon a peg, and opening a cupboard, took out a broad
broom.
"Sweep, Irene Yaroslav," said the man.
Malcolm winced at the word, and Malinkoff turned to him sharply.
"You know her?" he said. "Of course you do--I remember. Was that why
Boolba kept us waiting?"
"He was butler in the Yaroslav household," said Malcolm in the same
tone.
"That explains it," said Malinkoff. "All this is for the humiliation of
the Grand Duchess."
"Sweep well, little one," scoffed Boolba from his table. "Does it not do
your heart good, Sophia Kensky? Oh, if I had only eyes to see! Does she
go on her knees? Tell me, Sophia."
But the woman found no amusement in the sight, and she was not smiling.
Her high forehead was knitted, her dark eyes followed every movement of
the girl. As Boolba finished speaking she leant forward and demanded
harshly:
"Irene Yaroslav, where is Israel Kensky?"
"I do not know," replied the girl, not taking her eyes from her work.
"You lie," said the woman. "You shall tell me where he is and where he
has hidden his 'Book of All-Power.' She knows, Boolba."
"Peace, peace!" he said, laying his big hand on her shoulder. "Presently
she will tell and be glad to tell. Where is your father, Irene
Yaroslav?"
"You know best," she replied, and the answer seemed to afford him
amusement.
"He was a religious man," he scoffed. "Did he not believe in miracles?
Was there any saint in Kieff he did not patronize? He is with the saints
this day," and then, in a fierce whisper to Sophia--"How did she look?
Tell me, Sophia. How did she look when I spoke?"
"He died three weeks ago," said Irene quietly, "at the Fortress of Peter
and Paul," and Boolba rapped out an oath.
"Who told you? Who told you?" he roared. "Tell me who told you, and I
will have his heart out of him! I wanted to tell you that myself!"
"The High Commissary Boyaski," she replied, and Boolba swallowed his
rage, for who dared criticize the High Commissaries, who hold power of
life and death in their hands, even over their fellow officials? He sank
down in his chair again and turned impatiently to Sophia.
"Have you no tongue in your head, Sophia Kensky!" he asked irritably.
"Tell me all she does. How is she sweeping--where?"
"By the men, near the big bookcase," said the woman reluctantly.
"Yes, yes," and he nodded his great head.
He rose, walked round the table, and paced slowly to the girl as she
stood quietly waiting. Malcolm had no weapon in his pocket. He had been
warned by Malinkoff that visitors were searched. But on the table lay a
sheathed sword--possibly the mark of authority which Boolba carried. But
evidently this ceremony was a nightly occurrence. Boolba did no more
than pass his hand over the girl's face.
"She is cool," he said in a disappointed tone. "You do not work hard
enough, Irene Yaroslav. To-morrow you shall come with water and shall
scrub this room."
The girl made no reply, but as he walked back to his seat of authority
she continued her work, her eyes fixed on the floor, oblivious of her
surroundings. Presently she worked round the room until she came to
where Malcolm stood, and as she did so for the first time she raised her
head, and her eyes met his. Again he saw that little trick of hers; her
hand went to her mouth, then her head went down, and she passed on as
though she had never seen him.
"What did she do, Sophia? Tell me what she did when she came to the
Englishman. Did she not see him?"
"She was startled," grumbled Sophia; "that is all. Boolba, let the woman
go."
"Nay, nay, my little pigeon, she must finish her work."
"She has finished," said Sophia impatiently; "how long must this go on,
Boolba? Is she not an aristocrat and a Romanoff, and are there none of
your men who want wives?"
Malcolm felt rather than saw the head of every soldier in the room lift
to these words.
"Wait a little," said Boolba. "You forget the book, my little
pigeon--the 'Book of All-Power.' I would have that rather than that
Irene Yaroslav found a good husband from our comrades. You may go, Irene
Yaroslav," he said. "Serge!"
The officer who had taken the death warrants, and who stood waiting for
dismissal, came forward.
"Take our little brother Malinkoff and the Britisher Hay and place them
both in the prison of St. Basil. They are proved enemies to the
Revolution."
"I wonder who will feed my little horse to-night," said Malinkoff as,
handcuffed to his companion, he marched through the streets in the light
of dawn, en route, as he believed, to certain death.