A SHORT STORY.

Sun (Christchurch), Volume II, Issue 565, 1 December 1915, Page 2

A SHORT STORY.

ALL IN THE DAY'S WORK.

[From the ftossian of V. NemirovichDanchenko, by Alder Anderson, in ;> . "Chambers's Journal."! Fighting had- just ceased. ' Officers and men were alike gloomy. Almost every soldier in the ranks .appeared to be wounded. One had a bandaged hand ; his neighbour a bullet in the leg, limped painfully, using his rifle as a crutch; , the head of the man behind him was bound up in a soiled-handkerchief, from underneath which blood was trickling, and his cap was pushed right back to the nape of his neck. There was no sound of singing, as ia usual when a regiment is falling back from the fighting line to rest; there was not even talking; nothing but the monotonous tramp, ' tramp of thousands of weary feet blending into a sort of confused rumble with the metallic clink of steel. The colonel, 1 the adjutant at his side, rode at the head of the regiment. He looked gloomier than anybody. His favourite charger j had been killed under him, and he was obliged to bestride a huge, unwieldy artillery horse accustomed to drag heavy trans. Whenever he forgot himself, and " . relaxed his hold of the bridle, he was 1 treated to a most unmerciful jolting. Suddenly my eyes fell upon Saharoff, whom I knew to be an officer's servant. ' He was standing at the side of the roadway, as the men marched past, atten- . - tively scrutinising each officer. The man's extraordinary devotion to his very youthful master, Second-Lieut. , Olenine—-"Girlie/' as he was called by - every one in the regiment- was proverbial, and we all knew whose face it was he was now looking for; a face he would > to look for, alas! in vain.

Saharoff was in every way a unique type of soldier. To begin with, his' - -hideous, appearance was notorious throughout -the' whole force. There was no trace of hair * oh those parts of his face where you might expect to see hair on a man—the jaws and the chin; but, as if to make up for tliis, the cheeks were covered right up to the eyes by la thick crop of bristles, which even made a very successful attempt to scale the nose. The ears, too, were completely . . hidden by a similar abundant growth. Awkward and uncouth-looking beyond - iwords, and lame into the bargain, he invariably "walked stooping, as if bowed ' down by the weight of some terribly heavy, though invisible, burden. ,With .all this, he possessed phenomena! ]»hy--,rical strength, combined with the 16%f suffering disposition of one of those vil- • ' lage dogs which patiently submit to * have their ears pulled by every *urchin V in the* place. He was always ruminating and dreamy, and it would have befen less difficult .to engage a lamp- ■' post, in cpriversation than to extract 'a half-a : dozen phrases .from him. *'' Your honour, my master, Lieut. ' ,01' : Saharoff addressed our lieu- ■. ? tenant, who had just joined from Petrogr&A. : , ■ " ' 3" .The officer did not answer. He even half-turned away, with an impatient gesture. • . v • In spite of the snub, Saharoff at-

tempted to arrest the attention of the next officer who passed him. Again he received a rebuff. Then he caught sight of me, and gripped my hand. '' Thanks be to God! Where is my master? You can tell me.'' But, like the others, I, too, held my tongue.' "Is it possible? Oh God! Is it possible he is wounded?" Silence, as before! No one of us was inclined to be the first to give him the bad news. At last lie decided to ask the men, and pushed into the ranks among them. He was soon told all he dreaded to learn. Half-a-score of the men had actually noticed how "Girlie" had been struck down by a bullet as he was running forward to the attack. After that, no one could recall having seen him again. Perhaps the Bed Cross men had picked him up; or, on the other hand, perhaps he was dead! Beyond the bare fact that he had fallen, nothing was known for certain. Saharoff, reeling out of the ranks as if he had received a blow, seemed to collapse utterly. He sat down right in the thickest part of the mud, an expression of saturnine despair on his face. The pet dog of the regiment, Muharka, ran up to him and licked his face; but the unceremonious caress was absolutely unnoticed. Much perturbed by such a reception, Muharka retreated a few steps, and began to bark; but to this fresh demonstration Saharoff remained equally unresponsive. Thereupon the dog, giving the case up as hopeless, put its tail between \ts legs and trotted quickly after the soldiers on their way to camp. The evening was cold, grey, and miserable, and the thick putrescent fog penetrated everywhere. Our tent was dimly lighted by a single candle. As soon as we entered it we flung ourselves down to rest. Now and again, as if grudgingly, we tossed a brief phrase at one another. No one had any desire for conversation. About an hour had passed in thi3 manner, when the flap of the tent waa raised, and Saharoff's massive frame filled the opening. '''Hallo, Saharoff! what's the matter?" I asked.* ' 'I have looked into every ambulance, your Honour. There's nothing—nowhere." None of us needed to be told what' Saharoff was referring to. , "Well, what do you want me to do?" . "Please, your Honour, a revolver." "A revolver?" I had jumped to my feet. " That's right, your Honour —a revolver. " , ; "What for? Can it be possible the fellow wants to shoot himself?" was the first though that had flashed into my mind, tho.ugh a moment later I found myself laughing at this wild flight of my imagination. "I am going," Saharoff said simply. "Going! What do you mean?" "To my master. To find Lieut. Olenine." "Are you crazy, man? Don't you understand that, even if he has remain-, ed there still, .the Turks have long ago occupied the hill?" ' '' That's right, your Honour.'' . "How the deuce do you think you can get there, then?"*, "Please give me a/revolver, your Honour." "Don't you understand plain Rus-

sian, my good fellow? I tell you again you cannot go there. The Turks occupy the ground.'' "That's right, your Honour; and I am going back. Others have had to remain there. What would it matter if I "

This was probably the longest speech Saharoff had ever made in his life. He stopped abruptly. He had noticed the revolver lying on the bed I had risen from. He stepped quickly forward and made a grab at it. '' This is all I want, your Honour."

I have never been able to recall precisely how Saharoff got out of the tent; although I know that we all looked upon him as done for. But in war death is such a very ordinary occurrence, and everybody is always so ready to meet it, that we speedily fell asleep without, I am afraid, giving another thought either to Saharoff or to -his youthful master, Second-Lieut. Olenine. During our slumbers, however, something very extraordinary took place.

Slowly and deliberately Saharoff made all his preparations. The outposts were held by dragoons who had gone through the whole campaign with us, and thereifore knew Saharoff quite well both by sight and reputation. As a matter Of fact, however, they did not notice him until he suddenly appeared in their midst and announced his intention of going to look for his master. However mad and extravagant such an enterprise might have seemed to us, these soldiers apparently looked upon it as all part of the day's work; as obligatory, indeed, in Saharoff's case, though they quite realised how risky it was.

"What a rum old stick you are!" said a dragoon. "How do fancy you are going to recognise him in this fog? They are lying about in heaps out there." , .

- "Haven't I matches?' I have 10 boxes," said Sararoff curtly. And with: out more ado he started on his perilous adventure. -

For three hours he stumbled on in the darkness, his ears ever on the alert, to catch the sound of the Turkish soldiers' voices or the moans of the wounded. But he heard nothing but the wind rustling through the maize, for the inhabitants, under military instructions, had fled, leaving the harvest ungathered. Occasionally he was startled, but it turned out to be only a jackal moving in the same direction as himself,; towards the battlefield where so many, Turkish bodies lay scattered, or a hungry wolf running in and out among the half-rot-ten maizestalks. More than once he found himself at the bottom of a deep hollow, where all the tracks became inextricably mixed, and he would get eiear of this only to stumble into a ravine which absolutely barred all further progress. Then, face downwards in the deep, slimy mud, which afforded grip for neither hand nor foot, he had laboriously to retrace his path, and could get on his feet again only with the greatest difficulty. At last he was confronted by a steep incline.. He began to clamber up, but had hardly made 50 steps when on the skyline he noticed several indistinct reddish blotches, which alternately increased in volume, then disappeared entirely in the drifting fog. These could only be campfires, and Saharoff realised that he was now quite close to the Turkish lines. This was the moment to take his final measures. ¥ Very carefully, with infinite

precautions, he placed the 10 boxes of matches within the breast of his coat to keep them dry as long as possible. Then he lay down once more flat on his face and began to crawl painfully forward. With every step the advance became more and more difficult. It seemed as if the thick, tenacious clay were actually exerting itself to hold him back. At times he was nearly submerged by it* Finally even his great strength proved unavailing, and he felt himself slipping helplessly downward. The noise of his fall had evidently been noticed, for there was a flash and a report from above; but the bullet flew harmlessly far beyond him. For some minutes Saharoff lay perfectly still, hardly breathing; but there was no second shot. Then the struggle between a man's grimly patient determination and an accumulation of dangers began anew, and Saharoff at length found himself on the battlefield. Through the fog, which had become still more dense, he could just make out dim, shadowy shapes moving to and fro, bending down now and then, as if searching for something on the ground. Saroff well knew what sinister work was afoot. These human jackals looting and murdering the wounded! Godl would he be in time? Then he saw that one of the shadows was coming in hii direction. He became as rigid as if glued to the ground. Already the ruffian had stooped down; but before lie could ascertain whether there was still breath in the prostrate figure, Saharoff had him by the throat in a grip from which- there was no release, and the rising cry was strangled into an almost inaudible death-gasp. .

There were hundreds of Turkish bodies lying on the field, and Saharoff had to light many a match to examine them before he could distinguish the uniforms. In and out among the heaps he crawled with the cunning of a cat, his- eyes everywhere at once. He never gave himself a moment's rest; his courage never faltered. Desperate as such a search might appear to others, he himself did not contemplate even the possibility of failure. And at last he had his reward. His master lay before 'himj still alive!

. Saharoff had come in the very nick of time.- Towards the little hummock on which Olenine had fallen helpless, with a broken leg. and a bullet in the shoulder, a. group of these sinister ghosts was even now making its way. Within 10 minutes, possibly in less, jfche unfortunate young man's, groans would, in all human probability, <have been silenced for ever, so. as not to interfere with the ghoulish work.

In the dim light of eai'ly morning our sentries noticed a. strange figure stumbling towards One man had actually raised his rifle, and was on the point of firing when a, hoarse exclamation- —a groan rather than an, articulate phrase —- reached his ears. He was only just able to make out, "Don't shoot! I am one of you. I am bringing, in Lieutenant Oleninc.'' A moment later Saharoff reached the lines, and immediately fell down senseless, inert as a log. ; Across the whole wide stretch pf country occupied, by , the enemy the brave fellow had crawled on -his hands ,and knees, his master securely strapped to his- back. He hati foreseen everything, and had actually taken a towel and strap with him for this purpose. Until well out of range of the enemy's fire he had n€ver. once stood erect.

The success of; Saharoff's daring exploit aroused as much enthusiasm as it did surprise, but he himself appeared to grow more taciturn than ever. When we congratulated him he seemed hardly to understand what we meant. He never stirred ,from the ambulance to which "Girlie" had been taken. No nurse could possibly" have been more devoted.

On the very, first day when there was a respite from fighting, the entire force, of which our regiment formed-part, was solemnly paraded. The senior General-in-Command was there in all his glory, surrounded by lesser satellites. He called for Saharoff. . ' ; Looking, if possible, inore, ungainly and ugly than ever, Saharoff slouched forward. The General motioned to him to come nearer. Still more embarrassed now, Saharoff obeyed. * "You are a true hero," said the General, "and I thank you." Thereupon, much to Saharoff's confusion, the General embraced him. Then the General continued: "You have proved that a loyal and devoted heart may beat, in every one of us under this grey cloakj What you did was great, both 'in the eyes of your countrymen and before Heaven. Any man may bear himself bravely in the heat of battle; but to go alone, as you did, and carry off your, master from under the enemy's very nose is a deed of which,, you may be very proud." - • The General fixed the Cross of St. George to Saharoff's coat. "I call for cheers for our brave comrade-in-arms, Saharoff," he said in very loud tones. "Hurrah!" "Hurrah!" roared the troops. And Saharoff, the new decoration on his breast, shuffled back into the ranks, tears streaming down his cheeks. The thundering "Hurrahs!followed him; and '' Hurrah!'' was still being shouted long after the object of this imposing demonstration had disappeared againinto obscurity, much perturbed in spirit, and greatly wondering why so much fuss should be -made about something that to him seemed to be merely part of the 'work he had. undertaken to perform when he became Second-Lieuten-ant Olenine's servant.