Joseph Roth - Tarabas

For a fortnight now the officers of the new army of the new-born country had been living at the White Eagle with their servants. It is true that they caroused each night in the spacious parlour, shaking the brown rafters on the low plank ceiling with their noise which they continued in their own rooms afterwards. But Kristianpoller soon realized that their wildness and drinking had nothing worse behind it than harmless exuberance, and that they were only waiting for the call of a lord and master who would lead them to objectives still unknown but certainly full of peril. And certainly Tarabas was that lord and master. Accordingly Kristianpoller loaded his whole family, as was his wont now, into the big landau which stood in readiness in the hotel stable, and dispatched all his dear ones to Kyrbitki. He stayed behind. He forsook the two large rooms to which an almost invisible door in the tap-room gave access, and in which he and the family had lived, and made himself a shake-down of straw on the kitchen floor. Beside the shed in the yard there was a small building of yellow brick, half fallen down and, built for no apparent purpose, put only to temporary and occasional uses. It was a lumber-room for all kinds of household implements, empty barrels, tubs, and baskets, logs for the winter and bundles of kindling, old samovars no longer fit for service and all manner of other useful and useless litter such as collects in the course of years.

In his early youth Kristianpoller had never been able to enter this building without a touch of fear. For there was a tale about it to the effect that long, long ago, when the first Christian missionaries had come to this stubborn heathen land, in that very yard and on that very spot they had erected a chapel. The Jew Kristianpoller kept these stories locked up in his own breast; he did not divulge them, for something told him that they were true. Had he been convinced that they were merely legends he would not have been so careful never to mention them, not even when he might well have done so, instead of enjoining silence upon his wife and the children whenever one of them referred to the strange origins of their lumber-house. Such foolish tales should not be repeated, Kristianpoller used to say.

He now gave Fedya, the stable-boy, orders to clean out the “out-house” and put it in order. He himself descended to the cellar, where the portly little brandy kegs were stored, and the bigger wine barrels, which were very old and had fortunately survived even the war and all the subsequent invasions. The cellar was a spacious vaulted one in two stories; it had stone walls, a stone floor, and a steep winding staircase. Arrived upon the last step, the foot met a large flagstone which, with the aid of a stout iron ring, one could raise slightly and prop open with a heavy iron bar. Kristianpoller had taken this ring out of its hook and hidden it, in order that no one whose business it was not should be inspired with the idea that the cellar had another story underneath. But in that deeper level the old and costly wines were kept. Beer and brandy were in the open cellar, accessible to all.

The iron bar and the ring were now brought from their hiding-place and dragged into the bar. Kristianpoller was a man of fair strength; his face and neck were ruddy with the breath of the alcohol which had fanned them since the days of his childhood; thanks to the daily exercise with heavy barrels and with the wagons of his peasant guests, his muscles had been well developed. He had escaped military service and thus the immediate dangers of the war by virtue of a trifling physical defect — a thin white film obscured his left eye. Upon his bare forearms, under the rolled-up shirt-sleeves, grew forests of thick black hair. There was something savage about his whole appearance, and his extinguished eye could sometimes make his brown-bearded face look even sinister. He was by nature fearless. Yet dread had now entered his heart to stay.

Gradually, as he made his preparations, he was able to reassure himself somewhat, and suppress his fear of the unknown Tarabas. Yes, he even forced himself to get used to the idea that he himself might fall a victim to the cruelty of this man of iron from afar. And if he was now to suffer a dreadful end, thought Kristianpoller, at least it would be a brave one, too. And he looked at the iron bar which he had fetched out of the cellar and propped against the bar. The dampness of the cellar had rusted it a little. The brown stains reminded one of blood long dried.

It was the hour of the midday meal, and Kristianpoller received the officers living in his house, who now entered the parlour with much shouting and jingling of metal. He hated them. For four years now, his smiling face hiding the alternate fury and terror of his heart, he had endured the sight of the various uniforms, the sound of various kinds of clattering swords, of the dull thud of carbine and rifle butts upon the wooden floor of his parlour, the clink of spurs and the brutal tramp of riding-boots, the creak of leather in which the pistols hung and the clatter of mess-bowls knocking against field-flasks. Kristianpoller had hoped that, once the war was over, he would see another kind of customer again, the peasants from the villages, tradesmen from other towns, shy and cunning Jews with contraband brandy for sale. But the fashion for war was not, apparently, a passing one. They were even inventing brand-new regimentals and insignia of an even later pattern. Kristianpoller could no longer recognize with certainty his new guests’ rank. For safety’s sake he called each one “Colonel.” And he had made up his mind to address Tarabas as “General” and “Your Excellency.”

He came round the bar smiling and bowing without intermission, and secretly wishing each of them without exception an agonizing death. They gorged and drank, but since this new land had risen into being they had not paid. They got no pay themselves, consequently they had no money. The Jew Kristianpoller regarded the finances of his new country with grave misgiving. These gentlemen were certainly waiting for Tarabas, and for the new regiment. They talked of him incessantly, and Kristianpoller’s sharp and clever ears let little escape them whilst he waited upon his guests. The Jew did not venture to ask them any questions on his own account. Undoubtedly they could have told him much. They all knew him.

All at once, in the middle of the meal, the door was thrown violently open. One of Tarabas’s armed guards entered, saluted with a click of heels, and remained standing at the door, a statue fearful to behold. “Tarabas’s messenger,” said the inn-keeper to himself. “Soon he will be here himself.”

And indeed a moment later the clanking footsteps of soldiers could be heard approaching. Through the opened door strode Colonel Tarabas, followed by his bodyguard. The door remained open. All the officers leapt to their feet. Colonel Tarabas saluted and motioned them to sit down again. He turned to the Jew Kristianpoller, who had stood the whole time in an obsequious attitude in front of his counter, and ordered food, drink, and accommodation for twelve without delay. He, too, would put up here, said Tarabas. He wanted a room that you could move about in. A bed outside the door for his servant. He wished to have twelve of his men in his immediate neighbourhood. What he expected of the inn-keeper and whatever servants there might be was punctuality, cleanliness, and obedience. And he concluded with this: “Repeat what I’ve just said, Jew!”

Word for word each wish of Colonel Tarabas’s was repeated by Kristianpoller. The repetition was an easy enough task. For the words of Tarabas had buried themselves in Kristianpoller’s brain like nails driven into wax. And there they would stay imbedded till the end of time. He said them back now word for word, his face still bent towards the ground, his eyes upon the shining toe-caps of Tarabas’s boots and on the silver rim which the mud had left round the soles. He might make me clean the edge of his soles with my tongue, thought Kristianpoller. Woe is me if he should!