A Allen: Berezovo: A Revolutionary Russian Epic

Stopping by the light from a half shaded window she carefully lifted the lid of the jar, and peered down at the steaming viscous broth of yellow goat meat. Grey globules of fat began immediately to congeal and float to the surface. She debated whether to hook them out with her fingers and throw them into the road, but decided against doing so. Anton Ivanovich had told her that the fat was good for the chests of weak children; he would be upset if she wasted it. Unwilling to displease the doctor’s young assistant, she replaced the lid and moved quickly towards the step that led down to the junction with Alexei Street. From the eastern end of the broad thoroughfare the last clear notes of the church’s bell reproached her as she began to half run, half lope across the frozen sleigh tracks. The lid, clumsily set on the lip of the jar, shifted and some of the broth splashed onto her rough blouse scalding her. Pausing only to wipe off what she could, she continued her journey across the boulevard’s broad expanse. The Pirogovs lived close to Jew Alley, deep in the Quarter and only the thought of seeing Anton Ivanovich’s broad handsome face prevented her from feeling afraid. He would protect her from harm.

She had once tried to tell Father Arkady what she had felt for Anton Ivanovich but the priest had grown angry and reprimanded her. It was true, he told her, that Anton Ivanovich Chevanin would one day become a hero – as would all good men of science who dedicated their lives to the welfare of mankind – but it was wrong, very wrong of her to have such feelings of adoration for him. What Katya had seen in her employer’s assistant, the priest had explained, was but the outward manifestation of the gifts placed there by God the Father; gifts that could be found in varying degrees within every soul on earth. That she should respect Anton Ivanovich and care for him as a frequent guest at the Tortsovs’ household until he took a wife of his own was quite appropriate, but she must think of herself as a handmaiden of God the Father for there was no mortal man who would return her love as He could. Reminding her of the reason why she was as she was, of the terrible sins of her parents, Father Arkady had assured her that as she grew older she would realise that the emotions she was now experiencing were misplaced and sinful.

For once the priest’s counsel had fallen upon deaf ears. She had not understood; she had not wanted to understand. Like the lights now burning outside the gate to the hospital courtyard, a small flame had been lit in the loneliness of her heart. The more often Anton Ivanovich visited the doctor’s house, the stronger her feelings had grown. Whenever he saw her, he was always so respectful, so charming. Never once had he berated her when she was clumsy or slow. Just the way he called her name excited her. “ Katya… ” he would drawl and immediately she would feel her face begin to glow. It was strange, almost magical. When Madame Tortsova summoned her, she made her name sound quick and ugly; like the yelp of a kicked dog. But her beloved (for so she secretly thought of him) had only to murmur it and she had to hide her face in her apron! And it was not only to her that he showed such kindness: he was like that with everybody. How else could she love him? That very afternoon, as she had taken the dishes out into the kitchen, she had overheard him offer to attend to the Pirogovs’ birth simply so that the doctor could go to his drama meeting. On a night like this too! That was the sort of man her Anton Ivanovich was.

Before she had realised it, the horse and its rider were almost upon her. Katya froze, uncertain whether to rush forwards toward the far side of the boulevard or try to retreat to the safety of the steps she had left. With a tired curse, the horseman wrenched at his rein, pulling his mount away from the woman who had suddenly stepped out into their path. In the darkness the two startled figures peered at each other: the thickset young woman protectively clasping her precious burden; the rider, dressed in the uniform of the mounted gendarmerie, easing himself forward in his saddle.

Remembering her mission, Katya began to back away, but as she turned to go, the gendarme called out to her gruffly.

“Hey! You!”

Fearfully she turned back to face him.

“Which way is it to the uchastok ?”

Pulling nervously at her shawl, Katya stared at the worn leather scabbard that hung from the man’s left hip.

“Did you hear me, woman?” the gendarme growled again.

With a gentle dig of his spurs, he edged the horse nearer to her. The smell of the broth filled the horse’s nostrils and it turned its head away sharply.

“Answer me!” he demanded irritably. “Quickly, where is the uchastok ?”

Shifting the jar to her other arm, Katya flung out her free hand and pointed awkwardly towards the town’s police headquarters. The sudden movement startled the horse again, making the man swear angrily as he fought to control it. As if he had struck her, she flinched at his violent curses, and began backing away.

Wearily shaking his head, the gendarme watched her stumble away across the uneven street and wondered why, after three days on the road from Kandinskoye, he had to pick upon an idiot bitch to ask for directions. With an irritable kick he turned his horse and rode on slowly towards the two storey building at the far end of Alexei Street.

Three days in the saddle , he thought bitterly. Over one hundred and eighty versts, just because the swine of a sergeant was too sick to do his job properly. The bastard hadn’t been too sick to drink the bottle his cousin had sent him from Samarovo. Three days without proper food or rest. Sheltering in stinking yurts when the weather blew up. Sleeping alongside stinking Ostyaks. Just to deliver a stinking package to the stinking Chief of Police at Berezovo. “Why not wait until the postal sleigh comes through?” he had suggested. But no, that had not been good enough for the idle swine. And to be given such a broken winded nag as this to ride. Was ever a man so badly treated? If the son of a whore had obeyed orders in the first place and carried the package himself, he would have made damn sure to take the best horse in the village, the thief! He would have taken Sasha’s horse, or Pyotr’s.

Despite his fatigue, the gendarme grinned at the thought. No, not Pyotr’s! That brute had the blood of the Devil in him and would have dumped his precious sergeant on his precious arse before he had gone a single verst .

As he drew nearer he could pick out the name ‘HOTEL NEW CENTURY’ painted above the drab entrance of the building opposite the police headquarters, illuminated by the lights shining from the windows of the hotel’s upper floor.

“Very grand,” he said under his breath. “A place fit for barines . A regular palace.”

As soon as he had dumped the damned package in the fat lap of the Chief of Police (who was, he was certain, another bastard like his sergeant) he would stable his mount, go over to the hotel and demand a bath. By the looks of the building it was a big enough place: it was bound to have a least one tub. It was unlikely, he reasoned, that anyone would be staying there; at least anybody important. Only fools like himself would be on the road during the blizzard season. A bath and a bottle, that was what was needed. After that, he would be fit for anything.

A movement in one of the upper windows caught his eye and he became aware of the silhouette of a figure watching him ride by. The warmth of the room behind the figure reached out to him, throwing into sharp relief his own feelings of cold and exhaustion. Hunching his shoulders, he urged his horse forward with a gentle dig of his spurs as the first snowflakes fluttered from the night sky onto its bedraggled mane.