Vladimir Sorokin - The Blizzard

“Small creatures, and yet they come to our aid in difficult, insurmountable circumstances…,” he thought. “How would I have continued on without these tiny beasts? It’s strange … all hope now lies with them. No one else will take me to this Dolgoye…”

He recalled the two ordinary horses that had brought him to this accursed Dolbeshino three and a half hours ago; they were utterly exhausted by the blizzard and were now lodged in the station stables, probably munching on something.

“The larger the animal, the more vulnerable it is to our vast expanses. And humans are the most vulnerable of all…”

The doctor stretched out his gloved hand, splayed his fingers, and touched the rumps of the two dark bays in the last row. The little horses glanced at him indifferently.

Crouper approached, sat down next to the doctor, fastened the rug, took up the reins, and flicked his whip:

“And off we go! Heigh-yup!”

He made a clicking sound with his tongue. The horses strained, and their hooves scraped against the drive belt; it responded with a screech and began to move under them.

“Heigh-yup! Ha!” cried Crouper as he whirled the whip over their heads.

The muscles of their small hindquarters rippled, the horses’ yokes creaked, the hooves scraped against the drive belt, which began to turn, turn, turn. The sled set off, and the snow squeaked under the runners.

Crouper stuck the whip back in its case and took hold of the reins. The sled was moving out of the yard. There weren’t any gates left, all that remained of them were two crooked posts. The sled moved between them, Crouper maneuvered it onto the high road and, smacking his lips, winked at the doctor:

“Off we go!”

The doctor raised his coat’s baby-beaver collar in satisfaction, and slid his hands under the rug. They soon left the high road: Crouper turned at the fork; to the left the road led to distant Zaprudny; to the right, Dolgoye. The sled turned right. The road was covered with snow, but here and there occasional mileposts and bare, wind-tossed bushes could be seen. The snow kept falling: flakes the size of oats fell on the horses’ backs.

“Why aren’t they covered?” asked the doctor.

“Let ’em breathe a bit, there’ll be time to cover up,” Crouper replied.

The doctor noticed that the driver was almost always smiling.

“A good-hearted fellow…,” he thought, and asked:

“So, then, is it profitable to keep little horses?”

“Well, how’s to put it.” Crouper’s smile widened, exposing his crooked teeth. “So far it’s enough for bread and kvass.”

“You deliver bread?”

“That’s right.”

“Live alone?”

“Alone.”

“Why’s that?”

“My fly got stuck.”

“Hmm … impotence,” the doctor realized.

“But were you married before?”

“I was.” Crouper smiled. “For two years. Afterward, when I buttoned up, I come to see that I ain’t got the knack for a woman’s body. Who’s gonna wanna live with me?”

“She left you?” asked the doctor, straightening his pince-nez.

“Left. And thank God.”

They rode on silently for a verst or so. The horses didn’t run very fast on the drive belt, but they weren’t slow either; you could tell that they were well tended to and well fed.

“Doesn’t it get lonely by yourself out there on the farmstead?” asked the doctor.

“No time for bein’ lonely. In the summer I haul hay.”

“And in the winter?”

“In the winter I haul … you!” Crouper laughed.

Platon Ilich chuckled.

Crouper somehow made him feel good, and calm; his usual sense of irritation left him and he stopped rushing himself and others. It was clear that Crouper would get him there no matter what happened, that he’d make it in time to save people from that terrible illness.

There was something birdlike in the driver’s face, the doctor thought, something that seemed a bit mocking, but at the same time was helpless, kind, and good-natured. This sharp-nosed, smiling face with its sparse reddish beard and swollen squinting eyes, swimming in a large old fur hat with earflaps, swayed next to him in time with the movement of the sled, perfectly happy with everything: the sled, the cold, his well-kept, smooth-gaited little horses, and this fox-fur-hatted doctor in a pince-nez who had appeared out of nowhere with his important travel bags—and even with the endless white plain that stretched far ahead until it drowned in a blur of swirling snow.

“Do you hire out for wagon trains?” the doctor asked.

“Naw, why shud I … The job pays enough. I used to work in Soloukhi for some folks, then I figured out that another’s bread goes down like lead. So I just stick to haulin’ my own bread. And thank God…”

“Why do they call you ‘Crouper’?”

“Ah…” The driver grinned. “From when I was young and I worked at the border. We was cuttin’ a road through the forest. Lived in barracks. I caught the croup, was up all the night long. Everbody’s sleepin’ and here I am coughin’ up a storm, they cain’t get a wink all night. They got good and mad at me and piled on the work: ‘You’s coughin’ all night, don’t give us no peace, so you go chop all the wood, light the fire, draw the water!’ They gave it to me good for that croup, they sure did. That’s what they’d say: ‘Crouper, do this! Crouper, do that!’ I was the young’un in the crew. It just stuck: ‘Crouper! Hey, Crouper!’”

“Your name is Kozma?”

“Kozma.”

“Well, then, Kozma—you don’t cough at night anymore?”

“Nope! The Lord looked out for me. Got a bit of ague in the back when the weather’s bad. But I’m healthy.”

“And you deliver bread?”

“That I do.”

“Isn’t it a bit unnerving to make the deliveries all alone?”

“Naw. By your lonesome is just fine, yur ’onor. The old-timers had a saying: Drive by your lonesome, you got an angel on each shoulder; drive in a pair, one angel to share; but drive in a troika, and the devil’ll grab the reins.”

“Wisely put!” The doctor laughed.

“And that’s the livin’ truth, yur ’onor. When the wagon train’s comin’ back—the whole string of ’em’ll turn off somewheres to drink up their pay.”

“And you don’t drink?”

“I drink. But I knows my limit.”

“Now that’s surprising!” The doctor chuckled as he wriggled around under the rug, trying to take out his cigarette case.

“What’s the surprise in it?”

“Bachelors usually drink.”

“If’n someone brings smoked fish by—I’ll drink. But I don’t keep none at home. What for? No time fer drink, yur ’onor—I got fifty horses to watch over, after all.”

“I see, I see.” The doctor tried to light his cigarette, but the match blew out.

The second blew out as well. The wind had risen noticeably, and the snow fell in large flakes on the horses’ backs, wedged itself into the corners of the hood, tickled the doctor’s face, and made a slight shushing sound on his pince-nez.

He lit up, and peered ahead:

“How many versts to Dolgoye?”

“’Bout seventeen.”

The doctor remembered that the stationmaster had said it was fifteen.

“Can we make it in a couple of hours in this weather?” Platon Ilich asked.

“Who knows? Hard to say.” Crouper grinned, pulling his hat down to his eyes.

“The road is smooth.”

“Right hereabouts it’s a good’un.” Crouper nodded.

The road ran along a field lined with bushes, so it could be seen even without the rare mileposts that stuck up out of the snow. The field soon gave way to a sparse forest, and the mileposts ended, but sleigh tracks merged into the road, marking the path ahead of them, and encouraging the doctor: someone had just recently traveled along this road.