(After I reached the Caucasus I learnt, and then not from the captain himself, that he had been severely wounded four times, and of course never wrote to his mother either about his wounds or his campaigns.)
“So let him now wear this holy image,” she continued, “I give it him with my blessing. May the most Holy Mediatress guard him. Especially when going to battle let him wear it. Tell him so, dear friend; say ‘Your mother wishes it.’ ”
I promised to carry out her instructions carefully.
“I know you will grow fond of my Pashenka,” continued the old lady. “He is such a splendid fellow! Will you believe it, he never lets a year pass without sending me some money, and he also helps my daughter, Annoushka, a good deal, and all out of his pay! I thank God for having given me such a child,” she continued with tears in her eyes.
“Does he often write to you?” I asked.
“Seldom, my dear: perhaps once a year. Only when he sends the money, not otherwise. He says, ‘If I don’t write to you, mother, that means I am alive and well. Should anything befall me, which God forbid, they’ll tell you without me.’ ”
When I handed his mother’s present to the captain (it was in my own quarters) he asked for a bit of paper, carefully wrapped it up, and then put it away. I told him many things about his mother’s life. He remained silent, and when I had finished speaking he went to a corner of the room, and busied himself for what seemed a long time, filling his pipe.
“Yes, she’s a splendid old woman!” he said from there, in rather a muffled voice. “Will God let me ever see her again?” These simple words expressed much love and sadness.
“Why do you serve here?” I asked.
“One has to serve,” he answered with conviction. “And to get double pay, as we do here in the Caucasus, means a great deal to poor men like myself.”
The captain lived economically, did not gamble, rarely went carousing, and smoked the cheapest tobacco (which, for some reason, he called homegrown tobacco). I had liked the captain before; and after this talk I felt a sincere regard for him. He had one of those simple, calm, Russian faces which are easy and pleasant to look straight in the eyes.
II
Next morning, at four o’clock, the captain came for me. He wore an old threadbare coat without epaulettes, wide Caucasian trousers, a white sheepskin cap, the wool of which had grown yellow and limp, and had a shabby Asiatic sword strapped round his shoulders. The small white horse he rode ambled along with short strides, hanging its head down and swinging its thin tail. Although the worthy captain’s figure was not very martial, nor even good-looking, it expressed such equanimity towards everything around him, that it involuntarily inspired respect.
I did not keep him waiting a single moment, but mounted my horse at once, and we rode together through the gates of the fortress. The battalion was some five hundred yards in front of us, and looked like a dense, oscillating, black mass. It was only possible to guess that it was an infantry battalion by the bayonets which looked like needles standing close together, and by the sounds of the soldiers’ songs which occasionally reached us, the beating of a drum, and the delightful voice of the fifth company’s second tenor, which had so often charmed me in the fortress. The road lay along the middle of a deep and broad ravine, by the side of a stream which had overflowed its banks. Flocks of wild pigeons whirled above it, now alighting on the rocky banks, now turning in the air in rapid circles and vanishing out of sight.
The sun was not yet visible, but the crest of the right side of the ravine was just beginning to be lit up. The grey and whitish rock, the yellowish-green moss, the dew-covered bushes of Christ’s-Thorn, dogberry and dwarf elm, appeared extraordinarily distinct and salient in the golden morning light; but the other side and the valley, wrapt in thick mist which floated in uneven strata, were damp and gloomy, and presented an indefinite mingling of colours: pale purple, almost black, dark green and white. Right in front of us, strikingly distinct against the dark-blue horizon, rose the bright dead-white masses of the snowy mountains, with their shadows and outlines, fantastic and yet exquisite in every detail. Crickets, grasshoppers, and thousands of other insects, awoke in the tall grasses and filled the air with their clear and ceaseless sounds: it was as if innumerable tiny bells were ringing inside our very ears. The air was full of the scent of water, grass, and mist—the scent of a lovely early summer morning. The captain struck a light and lit his pipe, and the smell of his cheap tobacco and of the tinder seemed extraordinarily pleasant to me.
To overtake the infantry more quickly we left the road. The captain appeared more thoughtful than usual, did not take his Daghestan pipe out of his mouth, and at every step touched with his heels his horse, which swaying from side to side left a scarcely perceptible green track on the tall wet grass. From under its very feet, with the cry and the whirr of wings which involuntarily sends a thrill through every sportsman, rose a pheasant, which flew slowly upwards. The captain did not take the least notice of it.
We had nearly overtaken the battalion, when we heard the thud of a galloping horse behind us, and that same minute a good-looking youth, in an officer’s uniform and a white sheepskin cap, galloped past us. In passing he smiled, nodded to the captain, and flourished his
