Asko Sahlberg - The Brothers

‘When do we have to leave?’

‘We’re off tomorrow.’

‘How come so soon? The Russians haven’t got as far as here yet. You should’ve said that we haven’t done the harvest and-’

‘There’s nothing for it, we’ve got to go tomorrow,’ he interrupted. ‘We’d better start thinking about what to take. We won’t be given clothes but we’ll get muskets.’

‘We won’t look like soldiers, then.’

‘Good thing too. Won’t catch the Russky’s eye that way.’

The inevitable wailing and scolding of women ensued and made me long for war, in the end. Not that anyone cared about my fate, but women’s tearful laments are, to my ears, almost as heart-rending as the squealing of a pig up for slaughter. Consequently, I felt a degree of relief when we set off early the following morning.

You understand nothing about war until you have experienced it. And once you have seen it, you realize that there is not much else to see in this life. Maimed bodies and horse carcasses, that’s your world. The oddest thing is how you get used to war, how quickly your mind becomes indifferent. Although Erik and I were not generally on the front line, our missions were sometimes even more dangerous, but after a few weeks, I stopped being troubled by the risks. We were generally on the move at night, trying to find out what the enemy was doing. I would not have believed that a man of my years could learn not to be afraid of the forest at night, but I learnt that too. I even began to think I would not mind an eternal night. Perhaps because in the dark I did not feel like such a miserable, insignificant runt.

We reached areas unknown to us, where we were of no greater use than anyone else. We could have gone back home, but instead we went on with the others. Again, my opinion was not sought – Erik would probably have glanced back more frequently if he had been followed by a faithful dog. I began to suspect that the excursion had to have some higher purpose, that we were for some reason destined to it. I had to wait until September before the point of it all became clear to me.

The battles of Ruona and Salmi had been lost and the army was retreating towards the north. We spent the night on a hill; a river ran at its foot and you could see the Vaasa road if you craned your neck. I had difficulty getting to sleep, I was not used to sleeping at nights. It was dawn when I finally began dropping off. But suddenly I heard cannon, like thunder, and muskets, banging. The noise was coming from the outposts. Erik, recumbent next to me, also woke up.

We received an order: we were to snoop on the enemy and establish their strength. So we went in a big loop behind our own troops. The boom of the cannon and the sporadic firing of the muskets became more distant as we stalked along the forest edge, crouching, alert as hunters after a timid prey. The smell of powder trailed us in the wind, early light filtered through the tree trunks like water, everything was at a standstill and unreal and too real. Erik went ahead, as always, until we turned back and again approached the sounds of battle, stopping on a gentle slope at the edge of a long field. We had a clear view. Erik kept peering through the telescope that had been lent to him by the officers. He said, ‘They must be somewhere over there in the meadow, because I can see some of our men at the edge of the forest. And we’re bound to see better from that hillock. We should go there.’

‘But what if they’re there?’ I asked. ‘Not too many trees on the slope.’

‘Let’s go carefully. If you head straight to the top and I go round to that spot over there with the three big pines, we might see them from two directions.’

‘And we’re supposed to count up the heads?’

‘They can’t really be counted, but we can make some sort of estimate.’

‘Let’s go, then. Got to help the King, I suppose.’

He looked at me coolly. ‘Don’t hurry, though. It’s hardly going to help the King if we start rushing round. And he’s not here himself, crawling along.’

‘He may have other business to attend to,’ I suggested. ‘A ball or suchlike. Or some noble lady.’

He stuffed the telescope into his knapsack and some chewing tobacco into his mouth. ‘Bet he’s good at it, dancing. He’ll know a bit about the ladies, too.’

‘How do I know when you’ve got there?’

‘I’ll come to you. We’ll meet at the top.’

And we did. But I had to crawl first, and I was not actually used to crawling. I was exhausted halfway up the slope, my knees and elbows were stinging, my face was all scratched by the brush. On reaching the hilltop, I came to a halt, panting. I closed my eyes and thought I might just as well stay there, rot away on the spot, end up as bones, forgotten. I did not stay there. I lifted my head cautiously and looked around. I did not see anybody.

Then I did. There was a surreptitious movement between two intertwined junipers. At the same time Erik appeared further away, bent down and carrying his musket across his breast. A man wearing the green coat of the Russian army raised himself and moved from the cover of the bushes to a massive pine, all the while staring at Erik’s back. He lowered himself and then, resting on one knee, took aim. He was so close to Erik, it would be hard to miss.

I lifted my gun. I focused on the enemy. Then I saw who it was. For a moment, my heart stopped beating.

I often return to the scene in my mind. I could so easily have killed Henrik. He had never been a great shot and now, too, he took unnecessarily long to aim. Or perhaps he wanted to be absolutely certain that his bullet would pierce Erik’s heart. Who knows? I do not even know how my own reaction came about. When I pulled the trigger, the decision seemed to have been made somewhere outside myself, independently of me. My actions were not dictated by my own will, but determined by a power bigger than I, unknown to me. Then everything happened fast, faster, all at once. The bullet dispatched by me hit the tree trunk. Henrik shrank back as splinters hit his eyes, Erik threw himself on his stomach and Henrik was instantly on the move, twisting sideways and diving deep into the junipers. I could see from the swaying of the shrubbery that he was storming towards the southern slope of the hill. I fell first to my knees, then into a sitting position. My eyes became blurry, I felt like my limbs were falling off my body. I squeezed my eyes shut again.

‘Who fired that shot?’ Erik asked. ‘Was it you?’

I opened my eyes. ‘I had to shoot when I saw the green coat tail.’

‘How did he fare? You hit him?’

‘It was all so quick I don’t think I did. He ran off, in any case.’

‘He may have been wounded, at least.’

‘Let’s hope so.’

And nothing more was said about the incident. So much else happened that there were plenty of other things to talk about. For me, the fighting ceased on that hill, in a way. We landed up in many more knotty situations afterwards, and finally in Tornio, in such wretched winter quarters that the misery is indescribable. But lying amidst dying soldiers seemed to me neither here nor there. Nothing can move a man once he has seen someone trying to kill his own brother.

I hear footsteps coming closer from outside, along with the wind. I sit still, my elbows resting on the table, and wait. The Old Mistress treads decisively but unhurriedly, as is her wont, setting her town shoes carefully in the snow, one after the other. She stops on the steps, hesitates a moment, knocks on the door. I clear my throat and shout out, ‘Couldn’t afford a latch!’

A flurry of cold air comes in. The wind is shut out by the door, disappointed. The floor creaks and the Old Mistress says, ‘You’re just sitting here.’