War and Peace
big blazing campfire, around which sat several men talking noisily.
Something was boiling in a small cauldron at the edge of the fire and
a soldier in a peaked cap and blue overcoat, lit up by the fire, was
kneeling beside it stirring its contents with a ramrod.
“Oh, he’s a hard nut to crack,” said one of the officers who was sitting
in the shadow at the other side of the fire.
“He’ll make them get a move on, those fellows!” said another, laughing.
Both fell silent, peering out through the darkness at the sound of
Dólokhov’s and Pétya’s steps as they advanced to the fire leading their
horses.
“Bonjour, messieurs!” * said Dólokhov loudly and clearly.
* “Good day, gentlemen.”
There was a stir among the officers in the shadow beyond the fire,
and one tall, long-necked officer, walking round the fire, came up to
Dólokhov.
“Is that you, Clément?” he asked. “Where the devil...?” But, noticing
his mistake, he broke off short and, with a frown, greeted Dólokhov as a
stranger, asking what he could do for him.
Dólokhov said that he and his companion were trying to overtake their
regiment, and addressing the company in general asked whether they knew
anything of the 6th Regiment. None of them knew anything, and Pétya
thought the officers were beginning to look at him and Dólokhov with
hostility and suspicion. For some seconds all were silent.
“If you were counting on the evening soup, you have come too late,” said
a voice from behind the fire with a repressed laugh.
Dólokhov replied that they were not hungry and must push on farther that
night.
He handed the horses over to the soldier who was stirring the pot and
squatted down on his heels by the fire beside the officer with the long
neck. That officer did not take his eyes from Dólokhov and again asked
to what regiment he belonged. Dólokhov, as if he had not heard the
question, did not reply, but lighting a short French pipe which he took
from his pocket began asking the officer in how far the road before them
was safe from Cossacks.
“Those brigands are everywhere,” replied an officer from behind the
fire.
Dólokhov remarked that the Cossacks were a danger only to stragglers
such as his companion and himself, “but probably they would not dare to
attack large detachments?” he added inquiringly. No one replied.
“Well, now he’ll come away,” Pétya thought every moment as he stood by
the campfire listening to the talk.
But Dólokhov restarted the conversation which had dropped and began
putting direct questions as to how many men there were in the battalion,
how many battalions, and how many prisoners. Asking about the Russian
prisoners with that detachment, Dólokhov said:
“A horrid business dragging these corpses about with one! It would be
better to shoot such rabble,” and burst into loud laughter, so strange
that Pétya thought the French would immediately detect their disguise,
and involuntarily took a step back from the campfire.
No one replied a word to Dólokhov’s laughter, and a French officer whom
they could not see (he lay wrapped in a greatcoat) rose and whispered
something to a companion. Dólokhov got up and called to the soldier who
was holding their horses.
“Will they bring our horses or not?” thought Pétya, instinctively
drawing nearer to Dólokhov.
The horses were brought.
“Good evening, gentlemen,” said Dólokhov.
Pétya wished to say “Good night” but could not utter a word. The
officers were whispering together. Dólokhov was a long time mounting
his horse which would not stand still, then he rode out of the yard at a
footpace. Pétya rode beside him, longing to look round to see whether or
not the French were running after them, but not daring to.
Coming out onto the road Dólokhov did not ride back across the open
country, but through the village. At one spot he stopped and listened.
“Do you hear?” he asked. Pétya recognized the sound of Russian voices
and saw the dark figures of Russian prisoners round their campfires.
When they had descended to the bridge Pétya and Dólokhov rode past the
sentinel, who without saying a word paced morosely up and down it, then
they descended into the hollow where the Cossacks awaited them.
“Well now, good-by. Tell Denísov, ‘at the first shot at daybreak,’” said
Dólokhov and was about to ride away, but Pétya seized hold of him.
“Really!” he cried, “you are such a hero! Oh, how fine, how splendid!
How I love you!”
“All right, all right!” said Dólokhov. But Pétya did not let go of him
and Dólokhov saw through the gloom that Pétya was bending toward him and
wanted to kiss him. Dólokhov kissed him, laughed, turned his horse, and
vanished into the darkness.
CHAPTER X
Having returned to the watchman’s hut, Pétya found Denísov in the
passage. He was awaiting Pétya’s return in a state of agitation,
anxiety, and self-reproach for having let him go.
“Thank God!” he exclaimed. “Yes, thank God!” he repeated, listening to
Pétya’s rapturous account. “But, devil take you, I haven’t slept because
of you! Well, thank God. Now lie down. We can still get a nap before
morning.”
“But... no,” said Pétya, “I don’t want to sleep yet. Besides I know
myself, if I fall asleep it’s finished. And then I am used to not
sleeping before a battle.”
He sat awhile in the hut joyfully recalling the details of his
expedition and vividly picturing to himself what would happen next day.
Then, noticing that Denísov was asleep, he rose and went out of doors.
It was still quite dark outside. The rain was over, but drops were still
falling from the trees. Near the watchman’s hut the black shapes of the
Cossacks’ shanties and of horses tethered together could be seen. Behind
the hut the dark shapes of the two wagons with their horses beside them
were discernible, and in the hollow the dying campfire gleamed red.
Not all the Cossacks and hussars were asleep; here and there, amid the
sounds of falling drops and the munching of the horses near by, could be
heard low voices which seemed to be whispering.
Pétya came out, peered into the darkness, and went up to the wagons.
Someone was snoring under them, and around them stood saddled horses
munching their oats. In the dark Pétya recognized his own horse, which
he called “Karabákh” though it was of Ukranian breed, and went up to it.
“Well, Karabákh! We’ll do some service tomorrow,” said he, sniffing its
nostrils and kissing it.
“Why aren’t you asleep, sir?” said a Cossack who was sitting under a
wagon.
“No, ah... Likhachëv—isn’t that your name? Do you know I have only just
come back! We’ve been into the French camp.”
And Pétya gave the Cossack a detailed account not only of his ride but
also of his object, and why he considered it better to risk his life
than to act “just anyhow.”
“Well, you should get some sleep now,” said the Cossack.
“No, I am used to this,” said Pétya. “I say, aren’t the flints in your
pistols worn out? I brought some with me. Don’t you want any? You can
have some.”
The Cossack bent forward from under the wagon to get a closer look at
Pétya.
“Because I am accustomed to doing everything accurately,” said Pétya.
“Some fellows do things just anyhow, without preparation, and then
they’re sorry for it afterwards. I don’t like that.”
“Just so,” said the Cossack.
“Oh yes, another thing! Please, my dear fellow, will you sharpen my
saber for me? It’s got bl...” (Pétya feared to tell a lie, and the saber
never had been sharpened.) “Can you do it?”
“Of course I can.”
Likhachëv got up, rummaged in his pack, and soon Pétya heard the warlike
sound of steel on whetstone. He climbed onto the wagon and sat on its
edge. The Cossack was sharpening the saber under the wagon.
“I say! Are the lads asleep?” asked Pétya.
“Some are, and some aren’t—like us.”
“Well, and that boy?”
“Vesénny? Oh, he’s thrown himself down there in the passage. Fast asleep
after his fright. He was that glad!”
After that Pétya remained silent for a long time, listening to the
sounds. He heard footsteps in the darkness and a black figure appeared.
“What are you sharpening?” asked a man coming up to the wagon.
“Why, this gentleman’s saber.”
“That’s right,” said the man, whom Pétya took to be an hussar. “Was the
cup left here?”
“There, by the wheel!”
The hussar took the cup.
“It must be daylight soon,” said he, yawning, and went away.
Pétya ought to have known that he was in a forest with Denísov’s
guerrilla band, less than a mile from the road, sitting on a wagon
captured from the French beside which horses were tethered, that under
it Likhachëv was sitting sharpening a saber for him, that the big dark
blotch to the right was the watchman’s hut, and the red blotch below to
the left was the dying embers of a campfire, that the man who had come
for the cup was an hussar who wanted a drink; but he neither knew nor
waited to know anything of all this. He was in a fairy kingdom where
nothing resembled reality. The big dark blotch might really be the
watchman’s hut or it might be a cavern leading to the very depths of
the earth. Perhaps the red spot was a fire, or it might be the eye of an
enormous monster. Perhaps he was really sitting on a wagon, but it might
very well be that he was not sitting on a wagon but on a terribly high
tower from which, if he fell, he would have to fall for a whole day or a
whole month, or go on falling and never reach the bottom. Perhaps it
was just the Cossack, Likhachëv, who was sitting under the wagon, but it
might be the kindest, bravest, most wonderful, most splendid man in the
world, whom no one knew of. It might really have been that the hussar
came for water and went back into the hollow, but perhaps he had simply
vanished—disappeared altogether and dissolved into nothingness.
Nothing Pétya could have seen now would have surprised him. He was in a
fairy kingdom where everything was possible.
He looked up at the sky. And the sky was a fairy realm like the earth.
It was clearing, and over the tops of the trees clouds were swiftly
sailing as if unveiling the stars. Sometimes it looked as if the clouds
were passing, and a clear black sky appeared. Sometimes it seemed as
if the black spaces were clouds. Sometimes the sky seemed to be rising
high, high overhead, and then it seemed to sink so low that one could
touch it with one’s hand.
Pétya’s eyes began to close and he swayed a little.
The trees were dripping. Quiet talking was heard. The horses neighed and
jostled one another. Someone snored.
“Ozheg-zheg, Ozheg-zheg...” hissed the saber against the whetstone,
and suddenly Pétya heard an harmonious orchestra playing some unknown,
sweetly solemn hymn. Pétya was as musical as Natásha and more so than
Nicholas, but had never learned music or thought about it, and so the
melody that unexpectedly came to his mind seemed to him particularly
fresh and attractive. The music became more and more audible. The melody
grew and passed from one instrument to another. And what was played was
a fugue—though Pétya had not the least conception of what a fugue is.
Each instrument—now resembling a violin and now a horn, but better
and clearer than violin or horn—played its own part, and before it had
finished the melody merged with another instrument that began almost the
same air, and then with a third and a fourth; and they all blended into
one and again became separate and again blended, now into solemn church
music, now into something dazzlingly brilliant and triumphant.
“Oh—why, that was in a dream!” Pétya said to himself, as he lurched
forward. “It’s in my ears. But perhaps it’s music of my own. Well, go
on, my music! Now!...”
He closed his eyes, and, from all sides as if from a distance, sounds
fluttered, grew into harmonies, separated, blended, and again all