第 44 页

"Look at the crowd coming this way! Look, women too!" Korchagin heard a surprised

exclamation at his back. He turned round. Tokarev came up.

"Here are a hundred helpers for you," he said. "Give them work and see none of them is idle."

Korchagin put the newcomers to work. One tall man in a smart railway uniform with a fur collar and a warm caracul cap indignantly twirled the shovel in his hands and turned to his companion, a young woman wearing a sealskin hat with a fluffy pompon on top.

"I am not going to shovel snow and nobody has the right to force me to do it. As a railway engineer I could take charge of the work if they ask me to, but neither you nor I need to shovel snow. It's contrary to the regulations. That old man is breaking the law. I can have him prosecuted.

Where is your foreman?" he demanded of the worker nearest him.

Korchagin came over.

"Why aren't you working?"

The man examined Pavel contemptuously from head to foot.

"And who may you be?"

"I am a worker."

"Then I have nothing to say to you. Send me your foreman, or whatever you call him...."

Korchagin scowled.

"You needn't work if you don't want to. But you won't get back on that train unless your ticket is countersigned by us. That's the construction chief's orders."

"What about you?" Pavel turned to the woman and was struck dumb with surprise. Before him stood Tonya Tumanova!

Tonya could hardly believe that this tramp who stood before her in his tattered clothing and incredible footwear, with a filthy towel around his neck and a face that had not been washed for many a day, was the Korchagin she once knew. Only his eyes blazed as fiercely as ever. The eyes of the Pavel she remembered. And to think that only a short while ago she had given her love to this ragged creature. How everything had changed!

She had recently married, and she and her husband were on their way to the city where he held an important position in the railway administration. Who could have thought that she would meet the object of her girlish affections in this way? She even hesitated to give him her hand. What would Vasili think? How awful of Korchagin to have fallen so low. Evidently the young stoker had not been able to rise above navvy work.

She stood hesitating, her cheeks burning. Meanwhile the railway engineer, infuriated by what he considered the insolence of this tramp who stood staring at his wife, flung down his shovel and went over to her side.

"Let us go, Tonya, I can't stand the sight of this lazzarone."

Korchagin had read Giuseppe Garibaldi and he knew what that word meant.

"I may be a lazzarone, but you're no more than a rotten bourgeois," he said hoarsely, and turning to Tonya, added curtly: "Take a shovel, Comrade Tumanova, and get into line. Don't take an example from this prize bull here. . .. Excuse me if he is any relation of yours."

Pavel glanced at Tonya's fur boots and smiled grimly, adding casually:

"I wouldn't advise you to stop over here. The other night we were attacked by bandits."

With that he turned on his heel and walked off, his galosh flapping as he went.

His last words impressed the railway engineer, and Tonya succeeded in persuading him to stay and work.

That evening, when the day's work was over, the crowd streamed back to the station. Tonya's husband hurried ahead to make sure of a seat in the train. Tonya, stopping to let a group of workers pass, saw Pavel trudging wearily behind the others, leaning heavily on his shovel.

"Hello, Pavlusha," she said and fell into step beside him. "I must say I never expected to find you in such straits. Surely the authorities ought to know you deserve something better than navvy's work? I thought you'd be a commissar or something like that by now. What a pity life has been so unkind to you...."

Pavel halted and surveyed Tonya with surprise.

"Nor did I expect to find you ... so stuffy," he said, choosing the most polite word he could think of to express his feelings.

The tips of Tonya's ears burned.

"You're just as rude as ever!"

Korchagin hoisted his shovel onto his shoulder and strode off. After a few steps he stopped.

"My rudeness, Comrade Tumanova," he said, "is not half as offensive as your so-called politeness.

And as for my life, please don't worry about that. There's nothing wrong with it. It's your life that's all wrong, ever so much worse than I expected. Two years ago you were better, you wouldn't have been ashamed to shake hands with a workingman. But now you reek of moth balls. To tell the truth, you and I have nothing more to say to each other."

Pavel had a letter from Artem announcing that he was going to be married and urging Pavel to come to the wedding without fail.

The wind tore the sheet of paper out of Pavel's hand and it flew off into the air. No wedding parties for him. How could he leave now? Only yesterday that bear Pankratov had outstripped his team and spurted forward at a pace that amazed everyone. The stevedore was making a desperate bid for first place in the contest. His usual nonchalance had forsaken him and he was whipping up his "water-fronters" to a furious tempo.

Patoshkin, noting the silent intensity with which the men worked, scratched his head perplexedly.

"Are these men or giants?" he marvelled. "Where do they get their incredible strength? If the weather holds out for only eight more days we'll reach the timber! Well, live and learn! These men are breaking all records and estimates." Klavicek came from town bringing the last batch of bread he had baked. He had a talk with Tokarev and then went off to hunt for Korchagin. The two men shook hands warmly. Klavicek with a broad smile dived into his knapsack and produced a handsome fur-lined leather jacket of Swedish make.

"This is for you!" he said stroking the soft leather. "Guess from whom? What! You don't know?

You are dense, man! It's from Comrade Ustinovich. So you shouldn't catch cold. Olshinsky gave it to her. She took it from him and handed it straight to me with orders to take it to you. Akim told her you've been going about in the frost with nothing but a thin jacket. Olshinsky's nose was put out of joint a bit. 'I can send the comrade an army coat,' he says. But Rita only laughed. 'Never mind,' she said, 'he'll work better in this jacket.' "

The astonished Pavel took the luxurious-looking jacket and after some hesitation slipped it on. Almost at once he felt the warmth from the soft fur spreading over his shoulders and chest.

Rita wrote in her diary:

December 20

"We have been having a bout of blizzards. Snow and wind. Out at Boyarka they had almost reached their goal when the frosts and storms halted them. They are up to their necks in snow and the frozen earth is not easy to dig. They have only three-quarters of a kilometre to go, but this is the hardest lap of all.

"Tokarev reports an outbreak of typhoid fever. Three men are down with it."

December 22

"There was a plenary session of the Komsomol Guber-nia Committee but no one from Boyarka attended. Bandits derailed a trainload of grain seventeen kilometres from Boyarka, and the Food Commissariat representative ordered all the construction workers to be sent to the spot."

December 23

"Another seven typhoid cases have been brought to town from Boyarka. Okunev is one of them. I went down to the station and saw frozen corpses of people who had been riding the buffers taken off a Kharkov train. The hospitals are unheated. This accursed blizzard, when will it end?"

December 24

"Just seen Zhukhrai. He confirmed the rumour that Orlik and his band attacked Boyarka last night. The fight lasted two hours. Communications were cut and Zhukhrai did not get the exact report until this morning. The band was beaten back but Tokarev has been wounded, a bullet went right through his chest. He will be brought to town today. Franz Klavicek, who was in charge of the guard that night, was killed. He was the one who spotted the band and raised the alarm. He started shooting at the raiders but they were on him before he had time to reach the school building. He was cut down by a sabre blow. Eleven of the builders were wounded. Two cavalry squadrons and an armoured train are there by now.

"Pankratov has taken charge of the job. Today Puzyrevsky caught up with part of the band in Gluboky village and wiped it out. Some of the non-Party workers started out for town without waiting for a train; they are walking along the track."

December 25

"Tokarev and the other wounded men arrived, and were placed in hospital. The doctors promised to save the old man. He is still unconscious. The lives of the others are not in danger.

"A telegram came from Boyarka addressed to us and the Gubernia Party Committee. 'In reply to the bandit assault, we builders of the narrow-gauge line gathered at this meeting together with the crew of the armoured train For Soviet Power and the Red Army men of the cavalry regiment, vow to you that notwithstanding all obstacles the town shall have firewood by January 1. Mustering all our strength we are setting to work. Long live the Communist Party, which sent us here!

Korchagin, chairman of the meeting. Berzin, secretary.'

"Klavicek was buried with military honours at Solomenka."

The cherished goal was in sight, but the advance toward it was agonisingly slow, for every day typhoid fever tore dozens of badly needed hands from the builders' ranks.

One day Korchagin, returning from work to the station, staggered along like a drunkard, his legs ready to give way beneath him. He had been feverish for quite some time, but today it gripped him more fiercely than usual.

Typhoid fever, which had thinned the ranks of the building detachment, had claimed a new victim.

But Pavel's sturdy constitution resisted the disease and for five days in succession he had found the strength to pick himself up from his straw pallet on the concrete floor and join the others at work. But the fever had taken possession of him and now neither the warm jacket nor the felt boots, Fyodor's gift, worn over his already frostbitten feet, helped.

A sharp pain seared his chest with each step he took, his teeth chattered, and his vision was blurred so that the trees seemed to be whirling around in a strange merry-go-round.

With difficulty he dragged himself to the station. An unusual commotion there caused him to halt,and straining his fever-hazed eyes, he saw a long train of flatcars stretching the entire length of the platform. Men who had come with the train were busy unloading narrow-gauge engines, rails and leepers. Pavel staggered forward and lost his balance. He felt a dull pain as his head hit the ground and the pleasant coolness of the snow against his burning cheek.

Several hours later he was found and carried back to the barracks. He was breathing heavily, quite unconscious of his surroundings. A doctor's assistant summoned from the armoured train examined him and diagnosed pneumonia and typhoid fever. His temperature was over 106°. The doctor's assistant noted the inflammation of the joints and the ulcers on the neck but said they were trifles compared with the pneumonia and typhoid which alone were enough to kill him.

Pankratov and Dubava, who had arrived from town, did all they could to save Pavel.

Alyosha Kokhansky, who came from the same town as Pavel, was entrusted with taking him home to his people.

With the help of all the members of Korchagin's team, and mainly with Kholyava acting as battering ram, Pankratov and Dubava managed to get Alyosha and the unconscious Korchagin into the packed railway carriage. The passengers, suspecting typhus, resisted violently and threatened to throw the sick man out of the train en route.

Kholyava waved his gun under their noses and roared: "His illness is not infectious! And he's going on this train even if we have to throw out the whole lot of you! And remember, you swine,if anyone lays a finger on him, I'll send word down the line and you'll all be taken off the train and put behind the bars. Here, Alyosha, take Pavel's Mauser and shoot the first man who tries to put him off," Kholyava wound up for additional emphasis.

The train puffed out of the station. Pankratov went over to Dubava standing on the deserted platform.

"Do you think he'll pull through?"

The question remained unanswered.

"Come along, Mityai, it can't be helped. We've got to answer for everything now. We must get those engines unloaded during the night and in the morning we'll try to start them going."

Kholyava telephoned to all his Cheka friends along the line urging them to make sure that the sick Korchagin was not taken off the train anywhere. Not until he had been given a firm assurance that this would be done did he finally go to bed.

At a railway junction farther down the line the body of an unknown fair-haired young man was carried out of one of the carriages of a passenger train passing through and set down on the platform. Who he was and what he had died of no one knew. The station Cheka men, remembering Kholyava's request, ran over to the carriage, but when they saw that the youth was dead, gave instructions for the corpse to be removed to the morgue, and immediately telephoned to Kholyava at Boyarka informing him of the death of his friend whose life he had been so anxious to save.

A brief telegram was sent from Boyarka to the Gubernia Committee of the Komsomol announcing Korchagin's death.

In the meantime, however, Alyosha Kokhansky delivered the sick Korchagin to his people and came down himself with the fever.

January 9

"Why does my heart ache so? Before I sat down to write I wept bitterly. Who would have believed that Rita could weep and with such anguish? But are tears always a sign of weakness? Today mine are tears of searing grief. Why did grief come on this day of victory when the horrors of cold have been overcome, when the railway stations are piled high with precious fuel, when I have just returned from the celebration of the victory, an enlarged plenary meeting of the Town Soviet where the heroes of the railway job were accorded all honours. This is victory, but two men lost their lives — Klavicek and Korchagin.

"Pavel's death has opened my eyes to the truth — he was far dearer to me than I had thought.