Gerald Seymour - Archangel

What is the price to be paid for pride, what is the reward of the humble?

'The price of pride is crippling. The reward of the humble is survival.'

Bloody words, Michael Holly, daft words. And outside the fences they would be mustering an army, and inside the fences we're at play smashing and destroying.

He walked away from the fences and towards the Kitchen. Half a dozen men were sitting on the step outside the doorway of Hut 6. They were drunk. They had broken open the store of distilled alcohol that had been the property of the hut's 'baron'. That was democracy, that was power to the people. The capitalist had been overthrown. They were from Georgia, dark-skinned and curly-haired, singing and belching and hiccuping.

You started it, Holly.

He walked past the back of the Kitchen where the Store door sagged away from its upper hinge. An old zek came out trying to stuff potatoes down into his trouser pockets. They were raw potatoes and he would have no way of cooking them adequately, but a man who has been starved of potato for half a decade does not have to concern himself with the niceties of cooking. He had yellow rat teeth that could handle raw potato. Another man chewed uncooked semi-frozen herrings, gulped at the grey white meat. Another bit and worried at a length of tripe stomach-lining that would make him vomit. They would be fighting soon, those who already crowded the Store and blocked its entrance, and those who shouted outside the door for access.

You started it, Holly.

He walked along the side of the Kitchen and saw the broken windows. The breaking served no purpose. The snow would come in, and later the rain, the Kitchen would be a worse place for the zeks of the future… Perhaps, perhaps they do not believe in the future of the camp.

Perhaps that is why they have begun to damage systematically everything that is the camp. That can be a man's freedom. A man's freedom can be to damage systematically all the apparatus of the Dubrovlag.

He walked to the door of the Kitchen, where a knot of men with their backs to him formed an inverted laager.

They craned forward to see something at their feet. He heard the oaths and the whimper of a man who had once been privileged. Of course there would be beatings, the settling of age-old scores. Hands pulled Holly closer, he was invited to watch. He saw Mamarev on the ground. The snow was dark with mud and bright with blood. Blood dripped from the boy's mouth, from his nose. Two zeks kneeled above him and scrabbled with each other for the chance to strike the next blow. One of the zeks was Poshekhonov. Holly thought he might be sick. He reached forward and tore the two men back, and there was sudden surprise drifting to anger from Poshekhonov. Holly didn't speak. He picked Mamarev up from the ground. The sobbing gratitude of the boy shrilled in Holly's head.

You started it, Holly.

He carried Mamarev into the Kitchen.

A meeting had started. Amongst the debris of furniture one table and two benches had been retrieved. A dozen men, perhaps fifteen, were round the table. He heard a cacophony of raised voices. Argument, dissent, discussion. Poor bastards… poor, stupid bastards. They had begun something incredible and they had not known what they had done.

They were debating what to do next. That was a kind of freedom.

Holly let Mamarev slide down to the floor. He wondered how the men, some from each of the six huts, had been chosen. They were the doomed ones, they were the condemned men. When it was over, these names would be on Yuri Rudakov's desk. They would shoot these men in the yard of the Central Investigation Prison at Yavas. Zeks rule, OK. .. and for how long? For a day? For a day and a night?

Chernayev and Byrkin were the representatives of Hut 2.

Some of the other men he recognized, some he had never spoken with.

You started it, Holly.

He raised his hand, cut the squabble. it won't be a small force the next time, they'll come in strength. Now they'll be waiting for reinforcement. This time they will shoot. We have no guns… When the big force arrives they will again offer us a choice, surrender or take the consequences. This is your camp, not mine, you must decide for yourselves which way you will fall.'

'You led us before, Holly,' Chernayev said mildly.

'When you had already made your decision. You either give in now or you finish what has begun.'

The voices that Holly had hushed were raised again. if we give in, all of us will be shot or get Fifteens… we'll be behind wire for the rest of our natural… how can we fight them when we have no g u n s… we slid into this, if we slide further we're screwed… '

Brave men. Men out of the gutters, men who were unable to read the page of a newspaper, men who had thieved and killed for a petty purse of roubles. Michael Holly could never walk away from them.

Holly said, 'There was a riot some years ago in the Dubrovlag, what was the reaction of the military?'

'They brought in helicopters.'

'They used the down-blast to flatten everybody.'

'When everyone was on the ground, the guards and warders came in.'

'They used chains on the men.'

Holly asked, 'What is the stomach of the camp for a fight?'

'Don't underestimate their hate.'

He breathed deeply, screwed his eyes shut. There would be no going back. 'Any man who wants to leave the compound should be given the chance to do so immediately.

I want wire and I want rope and I want blankets. I want every man, who wishes to stay, inside the Kitchen in fifteen minutes. There is no going back. We have to finish what has been begun… '

'Where is that finish?' The zek from Hut 4, a big man with a bulbous mole set half way up his nose, and mud streaks on his cheeks.

'There is the possibility, just the possibility, that the very weight of our action will frighten them. There is the possibility that they will step back, try to talk with us.'

'And the probability?'

'They will hit us with everything they have.'

There was silence round the table. One man slowly drummed his fingers on the wood boards, another fished in his pocket for a loose cigarette, another snorted into a rag handkerchief.

Byrkin scraped his chair, stood up. 'I'll start looking for wire and the rope and blankets. I'll pass the word for the meeting.'

Vasily Kypov put down the telephone.

He looked across his desk towards Yuri Rudakov, who was hunched on the edge of an easy chair.

'Yavas is sending a hundred men, a Company and a Colonel General. Saransk is sending four helicopters. That was staff at Yavas, a shitty Lieutenant, he was almost fucking laughing at me.'

The telephone rang. Kypov grimaced, reached out for it, listened intently.

Rudakov watched him for a moment, then resumed his own brooding. The Political Officer was responsible for gauging the mood of the compound. It had all happened at such speed, with such fury. He was baffled. He doubted if Kypov had ever considered the prospect of mutiny. Why should he have done? Rudakov had never entertained the thought. Smart arse, wasn't he? And he'd never entertained an anxiety of mutiny.

Kypov covered over the telephone, guarding it from his voice, it's bloody Moscow… the big bastard boss from Interior…' and he was listening again and Rudakov knew the connection had been made because Kypov seemed to straighten in his chair. 'Good morning, Comrade Procurator… yes, the situation is contained. There is no chance of a break-out. I am sorry if you disagree with my decision to withdraw… I was on the spot, in the compound myself… the reinforcement troops are expected very soon… no, I have not yet identified the clique of leadership… tomorrow, you are coming, tomorrow? I am sure that by then we will have the compound returned to normal working…