第 40 页

那个姑娘一边听杜巴瓦诙谐的介绍，一边打量着保尔。她用手理了理从淡紫色头巾下滑出来的头发。

她和保尔的目光碰到一起了，双方对视了好几秒钟，各不相让。她那两只乌黑的眼睛闪着挑战的光芒，睫毛又长又密。保尔把目光转向了杜巴瓦。他觉得脸上发热，不高兴地皱了皱眉头，然后勉强笑着说：“你们俩到底是谁宣传谁呀？”

大厅里一阵喧哗。米海拉•什科连科登上椅子，喊道：“第一中队在这儿集合！快一点，同志们，快一点！”

朱赫来、省委书记和阿基姆一起走进了大厅。他们是刚到达的。

大厅里站满了排着队的人。

省委书记登上教练机枪的平台，举起一只手，说：“同志们，我们把你们召集到这里来，是为了完成一项严肃艰巨的任务。现在要告诉你们的，甚至昨天还不能说，因为这是重大的军事秘密。明天夜里，在这个城市，以及在全乌克兰的其他城市，将要发生反革命暴乱。咱们城里已经潜伏进来许多反动军官。周围也集结了好几股土匪。有些阴谋分子甚至混进我们的装甲车营，当上了驾驶员。但是，他们的阴谋给肃反委员会察觉了，所以现在我们要把整个党团组织都武装起来。第一和第二共产主义大队要配合肃反工作人员和军校学员，跟这两支有丰富战斗经验的队伍一起行动。军校的队伍已经出发。同志们，现在该你们出发了。给你们十五分钟的时间，领取武器，整理队伍。这次行动由朱赫来同志指挥。他会给指挥员们做详细指示。我认为当前局势的严重性已经十分清楚，没有必要再向同志们解释了。我们必须先发制人，今天就制止明天的暴乱。”

一刻钟后，全副武装的队伍已经在校园里集合好了。

朱赫来用眼睛扫了一遍肃立的行列。

在队列前三步，并肩站着两个扎皮带的人：一个是大队长梅尼亚伊洛，他是个彪形大汉，乌拉尔的铸工；另一个是政委阿基姆。左面是第一中队的队伍。队伍前两步，也站着两个人——中队长什科连科和指导员乌斯季诺维奇。他们的后面是默无声息的共产主义大队的行列。一共三百名战士。

朱赫来发出命令：“出发！”

三百个人在空荡荡的街道上行进。

城市在沉睡。

走到荒凉街对面的利沃夫大街，队伍停了下来。就在这里开始行动。

他们一声不响地包围了整个地段。指挥部就设在一家商店的台阶上。

一辆汽车亮着车灯，从市中心沿利沃夫大街急驰过来，开到指挥部，刹住了车。

这一次古戈•利特克送来的是他的父亲——本市的卫戍司令扬•利特克。老利特克从车上跳下来，向儿子匆忙说了几句拉脱维亚话。汽车猛然向前一冲，一眨眼就拐到德米特里大街，不见了。古戈•利特克全神贯注地望着前方，两只手像长在方向盘上似的——忽而向左，忽而向右，不停地打着舵。

哈哈，这回可用着他利特克开飞车的本领了！谁也不会因为他发狂似的急转弯而关他两天禁闭了。

小利特克的汽车疾如流星，在街上飞驰。

转眼间，他就把朱赫来从城市的一头送到了另一头。朱赫来不禁夸奖他说：“古戈，像你今天这样开法，要是不出事，明天就奖给你一块金表。”

古戈•利特克喜出望外地说：“我还以为这样开车要关我十天禁闭呢……”

最先遭到打击的是阴谋分子的司令部。第一批俘虏和缴获的文件马上送到了特勤部。

荒凉街上有一条胡同，也叫这个古怪名字，这条胡同的十一号住着一个姓秋贝特的人。根据肃反委员会掌握的情报，他在这次反革命阴谋中扮演一个不小的角色。他那里藏有预定在波多拉区行动的军官团的名单。

卫戍司令扬•利特克亲自到荒凉街来逮捕这个家伙。秋贝特住的房子有几个窗户朝着花园，越过花园的高墙，就是从前的修道院。在这所房子里没有找到他。据邻居说，他今天一直没有回来。经过搜查，除一箱手榴弹外，还找到了一些名单和地址。老利特克下令埋伏好，自己就在桌子旁边翻看起搜到的材料来。

花园里的哨兵是军校的一个年轻学员。他可以看到这个亮着灯光的窗户。一个人站在角落里真不是滋味。有点可怕。

他的任务是监视那堵高墙。可这里离那个能壮人胆的明亮窗户很远。那个鬼月亮又很少露面，周围黑洞洞的，灌木丛像是在动弹。他用刺刀向四周探了探——什么也没有。

“干吗派我到这儿来站岗呢？墙这么高——反正谁也爬不上来。到窗子跟前瞧瞧怎么样？”年轻学员这样想。他再一次看了看墙头，就离开了散发着霉味的墙角。他在窗前停住了脚步。老利特克正匆忙地收拾文件，准备离开那个房间。就在这当口，一个人影在墙头上出现了。他从墙头上看见了窗外的哨兵和屋子里的老利特克。人影像猫一样，敏捷地从墙头攀到树上，溜到了地面，又像猫一样悄悄地接近哨兵，一扬手，哨兵倒下去了。一把海军短剑刺进了哨兵的脖子，只剩剑柄露在外面。

花园里一声枪响，包围这个地段的人们就像触了电一样。

一阵皮靴声，六个人飞速向这所房子跑来。

扬•利特克已经死了。他坐在靠椅上，头贴着桌子，满脸鲜血。窗户的玻璃已被打得粉碎，但是敌人没能把文件抢走。

修道院旁边响起了密集的枪声。凶手跳到街上，一面拼命向卢基扬诺夫广场跑去，一面不断向后开枪。他并没有逃脱：一颗子弹追上了他。

通夜进行了挨户搜查。几百个没报户口、证件可疑、藏有武器的人被押到肃反委员会，在那里由审查委员会进行甄审。

有几个地方，阴谋分子进行了武力反抗。在日良大街，安托沙•列别杰夫在一家搜查的时候，被人一枪打死了。

这天夜里，索洛缅卡大队损失了五个人，肃反委员会牺牲了一个老布尔什维克，他就是共和国的忠实保卫者扬•利特克。

暴动被制止了。

同一天夜里，在舍佩托夫卡逮捕了瓦西里神甫、他的两个女儿以及他们的全部同伙。

一场风暴平息了。

然而，新的敌人又在威胁着这个城市——铁路运输眼看要瘫痪，饥饿和寒冷就会接踵而来。

现在，一切都取决于粮食和木柴。

Part Two Chapter 2

Fyodor took his short-stemmed pipe out of his mouth and poked reflectively at the ash in the bowl with a cautious finger; the pipe was out.

A dense cloud of grey smoke from a dozen cigarettes hovered below the ceiling and over the chair where sat the Chairman of the Gubernia Executive Committee. From the corners of the room the faces of the people seated around the table were only dimly visible through the haze.

Tokarev, sitting next to the Chairman, leaned forward and plucked irritably at his sparse beard, glancing now and again out of the corner of his eye at a short, bald-headed man whose high-pitched voice went on endlessly stringing out phrases that were as empty and meaningless as a sucked egg.

Akim caught the look in the old worker's eye and was reminded of a fighting cock back in his childhood days in the village who had had the same wicked look in his eye just before pouncing on his adversary.

The Gubernia Party Committee had been in conference for more than an hour. The bald man was Chairman of the Railway Firewood Committee.

Leafing with nimble fingers through the heap of papers before him, the bald man rattled on: "..

.Under these circumstances it is clearly impossible to carry out the decision of the Gubernia Committee and the railway management. I repeat, even a month from now we shall not be able to give more than four hundred cubic metres of firewood. As for the one hundred and eighty thousand cubic metres required, well, that's sheer..." the speaker fumbled for the right word, "er... sheer utopia!" he wound up and his small mouth pursed itself up into an expression of injury. There was a long silence.

Fyodor tapped his pipe with his fingernail and knocked out the ashes. It was Tokarev who finally broke the silence.

"There's no use wasting our breath," he began in his rumbling bass. "The Railway Firewood Committee hasn't any firewood, never had any, and doesn't expect any in the future.... Right?"

The bald man shrugged a shoulder.

"Excuse me, Comrade, we did stock up firewood, but the shortage of road transport...." He swallowed, wiped his polished pate with a checkered handkerchief; he made several fruitless attempts to stuff the handkerchief back into his pocket, and finally shoved it nervously under his portfolio.

"What have you done about delivering the wood? After all, a good many days have passed since the leading specialists mixed up in the conspiracy were arrested," Denekko observed from his corner.

The bald man turned to him. "I wrote the railway administration three times stating that unless we had the proper transport facilities it would be impossible...."

Tokarev stopped him. "We've heard that already," he said coldly, eyeing the bald man with hostility. "Do you take us for a pack of fools?"

The bald man felt a chill run down his spine at these words.

"I cannot answer for the actions of counter-revolutionaries," he replied in a low voice.

"But you knew, didn't you, that the timber was being felled a long distance from the railway line?"

"I heard about it, but I could not bring the attention of my superiors to irregularities on a sector outside my province."

"How many men have you on the job?" the chairman of the trade union council demanded.

"About two hundred," the bald man replied.

"That makes a cubic metre a year for every parasite!" fumed Tokarev.

"The Railway Firewood Committee has been allotted special rations, food the workers ought to be getting, and look what you're doing? What happened to those two carriages of flour you received for the workers?" the trade union chairman persisted.

Similar pointed questions rained down on the bald man from all sides and he answered them in the harassed manner of a man trying to ward off annoying creditors. He twisted and turned like an eel to avoid direct answers, but his eyes darted nervously about him. He sensed danger and his cowardly soul craved but one thing: to get away from here as quickly as possible and slink off to his cosy nest, to his supper and his still youthful wife who was probably cosily whiling away the time with a Paul de Kock novel.

Lending an attentive ear to the bald man's replies, Fyodor scribbled in his notebook: "I believe this man ought to be checked up on properly. This is more than mere incompetence. I know one or two things about him.... Stop the discussion and let him go so we can get down to business."

The Chairman read the note and nodded to Fyodor.

Zhukhrai rose and went out into the corridor to make a telephone call. When he returned the Chairman was reading the resolution:

". . .to remove the management of the Railway Firewood Committee for downright sabotage, the matter of the timber workings to be turned over to the investigation authorities."

The bald man had expected worse. True, to be removed from his post for downright sabotage would raise the question of his reliability in general, but that was a mere trifle. As for the Boyarka business, he was not worried, that was not his province after all. "A close shave, though," he said to himself, "I thought they had really dug up something. ..."

Now almost reassured, he remarked as he put his papers back into his portfolio: "Of course, I am a non-Party specialist and you are at liberty to distrust me. But my conscience is clear. If I have failed to do what was required of me that was because it was impossible."

No one made any comment. The bald man went out, hurried downstairs, and opened the street door with a feeling of intense relief.

"Your name, please?" a man in an army coat accosted him.

With a sinking heart the baldhead stammered: "Cher. . . vinsky...."

Upstairs as soon as the outsider was gone, thirteen heads bent closer over the large conference table.

"See here," Zhukhrai's finger jabbed the unfolded map. "That's Boyarka station. The timber felling is six versts away. There are two hundred and ten thousand cubic metres of wood stacked up at this point: a whole army of men worked hard for eight months to pile up all that wood, and what's the result? Treachery. The railway and the town are without firewood. To haul that timber six versts to the station would take five thousand carts no less than one month, and that only if they made two trips a day. The nearest village is fifteen versts away. What's more, Orlik and his band are prowling about in those parts. You realise what this means? Look, according to the plan the felling was to have been started right here and continued in the direction of the station, and those scoundrels carried it right into the depths of the forest. The purpose was to make sure we would not be able to haul the firewood to the railway line. And they weren't far wrong — we can't even get a hundred carts for the job. It's a foul blow they've struck us. The uprising was no more serious than this."

Zhukhrai's clenched fist dropped heavily onto the waxed paper of the map. Each of the thirteen clearly visualised the grimmer aspects of the situation which Zhukhrai had omitted to mention.

Winter was in the offing. They saw hospitals, schools, offices and hundreds of thousands of people caught in the icy grip of the frost; the railway stations swarming with people and only one train a week to handle the traffic.

There was deep silence as each man pondered the situation.

At length Fyodor relaxed his fist.

"There is one way out, Comrades," he said.

"We must build a seven-verst narrow-gauge line from the station to the timber tract in three months. The first section leading to the beginning of the tract must be ready in six weeks. I've been working on this for the past week. We'll need," Zhukhrai's voice cracked in his dry throat, "three hundred and fifty workers and two engineers. There is enough rails and seven engines at Pushcha-Voditsa. The Komsomols dug them up in the warehouses. There was a project to lay a narrow-gauge line from Pushcha-Voditsa to the town before the war. The trouble is there are no accommodations in Boyarka for the workers, the place is in ruins. We'll have to send the men in

small groups for a fortnight at a time, they won't be able to hold out any longer than that. Shall we send the Komsomols, Akim?" And without waiting for an answer, he went on: "The Komsomol will rush as many of its members to the spot as possible. There's the Solomenka organisation to begin with, and some from the town. The-task is hard, very hard, but if the youngsters are told what is at stake I'm certain they'll do it."

The chief of the railway shook his head dubiously.

"I'm afraid it's no use. To lay seven versts of track in the woods under such conditions, with the autumn rains due and the frosts coming..." he began wearily. But Zhukhrai cut him short. "You ought to have paid more attention to the firewood problem, Andrei Vasilievich. That line has got to be built and we're going to build it. We're not going to fold our hands and freeze to death,are we?"

The last crates of tools were loaded onto the train. The train crew took their places. A fine drizzle was falling. Crystal raindrops rolled down Rita's glistening leather jacket.

Rita shook hands warmly with Tokarev. "We wish you luck," she said softly.

The old man regarded her affectionately from beneath his bushy grey eyebrows.

"Yes, they've given us a peck of trouble, blast 'em," he growled in answer to his own thoughts.

"You here had better look to things, so that if there's any hitch over there you can put a bit of pressure on where it's needed. These good-for-nothings here can't do anything without a lot of red tape. Well, time I was getting aboard, daughter."

The old man buttoned up his jacket. At the last moment Rita inquired casually: "Isn't Korchagin going along? I didn't notice him among the boys."

"No, he and the job superintendent went out there yesterday by handcar to prepare for our coming."

At that moment Zharky, Dubava, and Anna Borhart with her jacket thrown carelessly across her shoulders and a cigarette between her slender fingers, came hurrying down the platform toward them.

Rita had time to ask Tokarev one more question before the others joined them.

"How are your studies with Korchagin getting along?"

The old man looked at her in surprise.

"What studies? The lad's under your wing, isn't he? He's told me a lot about you. Thinks the world of you."

Rita looked sceptical. "Are you quite sure, Comrade Tokarev? Didn't he always go to you for a proper explanation after his lessons with me?"

The old man burst out laughing. "To me? Why, I never saw hide or hair of him."

The engine shrieked. Klavicek shouted from one of the carriages:

"Hey, Comrade Ustinovich, give us our daddy back! What'd we do without him?"

The Czech was about to say something else, but catching sight of the three late-comers he checked himself. He noticed the anxious look in Anna's eyes, caught with a pang her parting smile to Dubava and turned quickly away from the window.

The autumn rain lashed the face. Low clouds, leaden-hued and swollen with moisture, crawled over the earth. Late autumn had stripped the woods bare; and the old hornbeams looked gaunt and downcast, their wrinkled trunks hidden under the brown moss. Remorseless autumn had robbed them of their luxuriant garments, and they stood there naked and pitiful.

The little station building huddled forlornly in the midst of the forest. A strip of freshly dug earth ran from the stone freight platform into the woods. Around this strip men swarmed like ants.

The clayey mud squelched unpleasantly underfoot. There was a ringing of crowbars and a grating of spades on stone over by the embankment where the men were furiously digging.

The rain came down as if through a fine sieve and the chill drops penetrated the men's clothing.

The rain threatened to wash away what their labour had accomplished, for the clay slid down the embankment in a soggy mass.