The Duel

“Mikhail Borichuk, your Excellency,” boldly replied the young recruit with a frank, happy smile.

“Oh, you scamp, I thought you were called Kovál. Well, this time I was out of my reckoning,” said the General in fun, “but there’s no harm done; better luck next time,” he added, with the same good-humour.

At these words the soldier’s countenance puckered in a broad grin.

“No, your Excellency, you are not wrong at all,” shouted the soldier in a raised voice. “At home, in the village, I am employed as a farrier, and, therefore, they call me Kovál.”

The General nodded in delight, and he was evidently very proud of his memory. “Well, Captain, is he a good soldier?”

“Very good, General. All my soldiers are good,” replied Stelikovski in his usual confident tone.

The General’s eyebrows were knitted, but his lips kept smiling, and the crabbed old face gradually resumed its light and friendly expression. “Well, well, Captain; we will see about that. How is the punishment-list?”

“Your Excellency, for five years not a single man in my company has been punished.”

The General bent forward heavily and held out to Stelikovski his hairy hand in the white, unbuttoned glove that had slipped down to the knuckles.

“I heartily thank you, my friend,” he replied in a trembling voice, and tears glistened in his eyes. The General, like many old warriors, liked, now and then, to shed a slight tear. “Again my thanks for having given an old man pleasure. And you, too, my brave boys, accept my thanks,” he shouted in a loud and vigorous voice to the soldiers.

Thanks to the good impression left behind from Stelikovski’s inspection, the review of the 6th Company also went off nearly satisfactorily; the General did certainly not bestow praise, but neither were any reproaches heard. At the bayonet attack on the straw mannikin this company even went astray.

“Not that way, not that way, not that way!” screamed the General, shaking with wrath in the saddle. “Hold, stop! that’s damnable. You go to work as if you were making a hole in soft bread. Listen, boys. That’s not the way to deal with an enemy. The bayonet should be driven in forcibly and furiously right in the waist up to the muzzle of your rifle. Don’t forget.”

The remaining companies made, one after the other, a hopeless “hash” of everything. At last the General’s outburst of anger ceased. Tired and listless, he watched the miserable spectacle with gloomy looks, and, without uttering a word, he entirely excused himself from inspecting the 15th and 16th Companies, exclaiming with a gesture of disgust —

“Enough, enough of such abortions.”

There still remained the grand march past, and the parade. The whole regiment was formed into columns with half companies in front, and reduced gaps. Again the everlasting markers were ordered out to set the line of march by their ropes. The heat was now almost unbearable, and the soldiers could hardly bear any longer the fearful stench that exuded from their own freely perspiring bodies.

But for the forthcoming “solemn” march past, the men now made a final effort to pull themselves together. The officers almost besought their subordinates to strain every nerve for this final proof of their endurance and discipline. “Brothers, for the honour of the regiment, do your best. Save yourselves and us from disgracing ourselves before the General.” In this humble recourse on the part of the officers to their subordinates there lay – besides much else that was little edifying – too, an indirect recognition of their own faults and shortcomings. The wrath aroused in such a great personage as the General of the regiment was felt to be equally painful and oppressive to officers and troops alike, and it had, to some extent, a levelling effect, so that all were, in an equally high degree, dispirited, nervous, and apathetic.

“Attention! The band in front!” ordered Colonel Shulgovich, in the far distance.

And all these fifteen hundred human beings for a second suppressed their faint inward murmurings; all muscles were once more strained, and again they stood in nervous, painful expectation.

Shulgovich could not be detected by any eye, but his tremendous voice again rang across the field —

“Stand at ease!”

Four battalion Captains turned in their saddles to their respective divisions, and each uttered the command —

“Battalion, stand at – ” after which they awaited with feverish nervousness the word of command.

Somewhere, far away on the field, a sabre suddenly gleamed like lightning in the air. This was the desired signal, and all the Captains at once roared —

“ – ease!” whereupon all the regiment, with a dull thud, grounded their rifles. Here and there was heard the click of a few unfortunate bayonets which, in the movement, happened to clash together.

But now, at last, the solemn, never-to-be-forgotten moment had arrived, when the commander of the regiment’s tremendous lungs were to be heard by the world in all their awful majesty. Solemnly, confidently, but, at the same time, menacingly, like slow rumblings of thunder, the strongly accentuated syllables rolled across the plain in the command —

“March past!”

In the next moment you might hear sixteen Captains risking their lives in mad attempt to shout each other down, when they repeated all at once —

“March past!”

One single poor sinner far away in detail of the column managed to come too late. He whined in a melancholy falsetto:

“March pa – !”

The rest of the word was unfortunately lost to the men, and probably drowned in the oaths and threats of the bystanders.

“Column in half companies!” roared Colonel Shulgovich.

“Column in half companies!” repeated the Captains.

“With double platoon – hollow!” chanted Shulgovich.

“With double platoon – hollow!” answered the choir.

“Dress-ing – ri-ight!” thundered the giant.

“Dress-ing – ri-ight!” came from the dwarfs.

Shulgovich now took breath for two or three seconds, after which he once more gave vent to his voice of thunder in the command —

“First half company – forward – march!”

Rolling heavily through the dense ranks across the level plain came Osadchi’s dull roar —

“First half company, dress to the right – forward – march!”

Away in the front was heard the merry rattle of drums. Seen from the rear, the column resembled a forest of bayonets which often enough waved backwards and forwards.

“Second half company to the middle!” Romashov recognized Artschakovski’s squeaky falsetto.

A new line of bayonets assumed a leaning position and departed. The thunder of the drums grew more and more faint, and was just about to sink down, as it were, and be absorbed in the ground, when suddenly the last sounds of drum-beats were dispersed by the rhythmically jubilant, irresistible waves of music from the wind instruments. The sleepy marching time of the companies filing past at once caught fire and life; languid eyes and greyish cheeks regained their colour, and tired muscles were once more braced to save the honour of the regiment.

The half companies proceeded to march, one after the other, and at every step the soldiers’ torpid spirits were revived under the influence of the band’s cheerful strains. The 1st Battalion’s last company had already got some distance when, lo! Lieutenant-Colonel Liech advanced gently on his thin, raven-black horse, followed close at his heels by Olisár. Both had their sabres ready for the salute, with their sabre-hilts’ knots dangling on a level with their mouths. Soon Stelikovski’s quiet, nonchalant command was heard. High above the bayonets, the standard lorded on its long pole, and it was now the 6th Company’s turn to march. Captain Sliva stepped to the front and inspected his men by a glance from his pale, prominent, fishy eyes. With his miserable shrunken figure stooping, and his long arms, he had a striking resemblance to an ugly old monkey.

“F-irst half company – forward!”

With a light and elegant step Romashov hurried to his place right in front of the second half company’s pivot. A blissful, intoxicating feeling of pride came over him whilst he allowed his glance to glide quickly over the first row of his division. “The old swashbuckler viewed with an eagle’s eyes the brave band of veterans,” he declaimed silently, after which in a prolonged sing-song he gave the order —

“Second half company – forward!”

“One, two,” Romashov counted softly to himself, marking time with a soft stamping on the spot. Pronouncing the word at the right moment was of infinite importance, as upon it depended the exact carrying out of the inexorable command that the half company should begin marching with the proper foot, i.e., with the same foot as the preceding division, “left, right; left, right.” At last a start was made. With head erect, and beaming with a smile of boundless happiness, he cried in a loud, resonant voice —

“March!”