Old Izergil and other stories / Старуха Изергиль и другие рассказы. Книга для чтения на английском языке

“Get moving!” Osip shouted, giving me a push. “What’re you gaping at?”

A dread sensation of danger gripped me, and my feet, feeling the ice shift underneath, mechanically propelled my body to the sand spit where the willow wands broken and bent by the winter winds jutted up naked and bare. Boyev, Soldier, Budyrin and the two Dyatlovs got there ahead of me. The Mordvinian ran beside me swearing angrily while Osip brought up the rear.

“Stop your howling, Narodets…” I heard Osip shout.

“But what are we going to do, Uncle Osip…”

“Everything’s all right, you’ll see.”

“We’ll be stuck here for a couple of days.”

“Then you’ll sit it out…”

“What about the holiday?”

’They’ll manage this year without you.”

“Bunch of cowards,” sneered Soldier, sitting on the sand and smoking his pipe. “It’s only a hop skip and a jump to the shore and you’re ready to run like mad.”

“You were the first to take to your heels,” Mokei put in.

“What’re you afraid of?” Soldier continued. “Christ was the Saviour and even he had to die…”

“But he was resurrected, wasn’t he?” the Mordvinian muttered, hurt by the other’s remarks.

“Shut up, you pup!” Boyev shouted at him. “Sure he was resurrected. Today’s Friday, not Sunday!”[4 - Sunday in Russian is “voskresenye“ which also means resurrection. – Trans.]

The March sun broke through a blue gulf between the clouds, and the ice glistened as if mocking at us. Osip scanned the deserted river, shading his eyes with his hand.

“She’s stopped,” he said. “But not for long…”

“No holiday for us,” Sashok muttered sullenly.

Angry furrows cleft the Mordvinian’s beardless, moustacheless face, as dark and rough-hewn as an unpared potato.

“So we can sit right here,” he muttered, blinking, “with nothing to eat and no money. People are enjoying themselves, but we… Victims of greed, that’s what we are…”

“It’s a matter of need, not greed!” Osip, his eyes glued to the river and his thoughts apparently far away, spoke as if talking in his sleep. “What are these ice breakers for? To protect the barges and everything else from the ice. The ice hasn’t any sense, it’ll just pile up on the string of boats – and good-bye property…

“Spit on it. It isn’t ours, is it?”

“No use reasoning with a fool…”

“Ought to’ve fixed them earlier…”

Soldier twisted his face in a frightful grimace.

“Shut up, Mordvinian!” he shouted.

“It’s stopped,” Osip repeated.

The boatmen were shouting on board their vessels. From the river a chill breath and an evil, ominous silence were wafted. The pattern of the markers scattered over the ice altered, and everything seemed altered, pregnant with tense expectation.

“Uncle Osip, what are we going to do?” one of the young lads asked timidly.

“Eh?” he responded absently.

“Are we going to stay here?”

“Maybe the Lord doesn’t want you sinners celebrating his holiday, eh?” Boyev said, in a mocking nasal twang.

Soldier came to the assistance of his comrade and pointing to the river with his pipe muttered:

“Want to go to town, eh? Who’s stopping you? The ice’ll go too. Maybe you’ll get drowned – it’d save you from getting hauled to the clink anyway.”

“That’s true enough,” said Mokei.

The sun slipped out of sight, the river grew dark, and the town was now more clearly visible. The young men gazed at it with impatient, longing eyes, silent and still.

I had’ that oppressive feeling which comes with the realization that everyone around you is concerned with his own thoughts and that there is no single purpose that might unite all into an integral, stubborn force. I wanted to get away from them and set off down the ice alone.

With a movement so sudden that he might have just awakened from a deep sleep, Osip got up, removed his cap and, making the sign of the cross in the direction of the town, said in a simple, calm tone of authority:

“Well, lads, let’s go, and God be with us…”

“To town?” cried Sashok, jumping to his feet.

Soldier made no effort to move.

“We’ll drown!” he declared.

“Stay here, then.”

Casting his eye over the men around him, Osip cried:

“Come on, let’s get going!”

Everybody was now on his feet and gathered in a huddle. Boyev, who was rearranging the tools in his basket complained:

“Once you’re told to go, you might as well go… But the one who gives the orders will have to answer…

Osip seemed to have grown younger and stronger. The crafty, good-natured expression had faded from his rosy face, his eyes grew darker, graver and more matter-of-fact. The indolent swagger too disappeared and he now walked with a firm, confident tread.

“Pick up a board, each of you, and hold it crosswise in front. In case the ice cracks, which God forbid, the ends will hit the solid ice and stop you from going under. They’ll help in crossing the cracks too. Anybody got a rope? Here, you, give me the level… Ready? I’ll go ahead, and after me… who’s the heaviest? I suppose you, Soldier. Then Mokei, Mordvinian, Boyev, Mishuk, Sashok. Maximych, being the lightest, will bring up the rear…Off with your caps and let’s pray to the Virgin. Here comes the sun to give us a send-off…”

With one accord the grey and brown heads of matted hair were bared, and the sun glanced down at them through a thin white cloud, only to hide again as if loth to raise unwarranted hopes.

“Let’s go!” said Osip in a dry, strange voice. “God be with us! Keep your eyes on my feet. And no crowding. Keep at least a sagene apart and the more space the better. Come on, lads!”