Fate of the man
There was a rare drive and swiftness in the spring that came to the upper reaches of the Don in the first year after the war.
At the end of March, warm winds blew from the shores of the Azov Sea and in two days the sandy left bank of the river was bare; in the steppe the snow-choked gullies and ravines swelled up, the streams burst the ice and flooded madly, and the roads became almost completely impassable.
At this unfavourable time of the year it so happened that I had to make a journey to the village of Bukanovskaya.
The distance was not great- only about sixty kilometres- but it turned out to be hard going.
My friend and I set out before sunrise.
The pair of well-fed horses strained at the traces and wuld scarcely pull the heavy wagon.
The wheels sank axle-deep into the damp mush of sand mixed with snow and ice and in an hour creamywhite flecks of foam appeared on the horses' flanks and thighs and under the narrow breech bands, and in the fresh morning air there was a sharp, intoxicating smell of sweat and warm harness lavishly smeared with tar.
Where the going was particularly heavy for the horses we got out and walked.
It was hard to walk through the slushy snow, which squelched under our boots, but the roadside was still coated with a glittering crust of ice, and there it was even harder.
It took us about six hours to do the thirty kiloIll etres as far as the ford over the River Y elanka.
At the village of Mokhovskoi the little river, almost dry in summer, had now spread itself over a hdl kilometre of marshy water meadows, overgrown with alders.
We had to make the crossing in a leaky flat-bottomed boat that could not take more than three people at the most.
We let the horses go.
In a collective-farm shed on the other side an old and battered jeep that had been standing there most of the winter was awaiting us.
The driver and I, with some misgivings, climbed into the unsteady little craft.
My friend stayed behind on the bank with our things.
We had scarcely pushed off when little fountains of water came spouting up through the rotten planks.
We plugged them with anything we could lay hands on and kept bailing until we reached the other side.
It took us an hour to reach the far bank of the river.
The driver fetched the jeep from the village and went back to the boat.
"If this perishing old tub doesn't fall to bits in the water," he said, picking up an oar, "I'll be hack with your friend in a couple of hours. At the earliest."
The village lay a good distance from the river, and down by the water there was that kind of stillness that falls on deserted places only late in the autumn or at the very beginning of spring.
The air over the water was damp and bitter wnh the smell of rotting alders, but from the distant steppes bathing in a lilac haze of mist a light breeze brought the eternally young, barely perceptible aroma of earth that has not long been liberated from the snow.
Not far away, on the sand at the water's edge, lay a broken wattle fence.
I sat down on it to have a smoke but, when I put my hand in my jacket pocket, I discovered to my dismay that the packet of cigarettes I had been carrying there was soaked.
On the way across a wave of muddy water had slapped over the side of the wallowing boat and splashed me to the waist.
There had been no time to think of my cigarettes, for I had to drop my oar and start bailing as fast as I could to save us from sinking, but now, vexed at my own carelessness, I drew the sodden packet gingerly out of my pocket, got down on my haunches and began laying out the moist brownish cigarettes one by one on the fence.
It was noon.
The sun shone as hot as in May.
I hoped the cigarettes would soon dry.
It was so hot that I began to regret having put on my quilted army trousers and jacket for the journey.
It was the first really warm day of the year.
But it was good to sit there alone, abandoning myself completely to the stillness and solitude, to take off my old army ushanka and let the breeze dry my hair after the heavy work of rowing, and to stare idly at the white big-breasted clouds floating in the faded blue.
Presently I noticed a man come out on the road from behind the end cottages of the village.
He was leading a little boy; about five or six years old, I reckoned, not more.
They tramped wearily towards the ford, but, on reaching the jeep, turned and came in my direction.
The man, tall and rather stooped, came right up to me and said in a deep husky voice:
"Hullo, mate."
"Hullo."
I shook the big rough hand he offered me.
The man bent down to the little boy and said:
"Say hullo to Uncle, son.
Looks as if he's another driver like your dad.
Only you and I used to drive a lorry, didn't we, and he goes about in that little car over there."
Looking straight at me with a pair of eyes that were as bright and clear as the sky, and smiling a little, the boy boldly held out a pink cold hand.
I shook it gently and asked:
"Feeling chilly, old man?
Why's your hand so cold on a hot day like this?"
With a touching childish trustfulness the boy pressed against my knees and lifted his little flaxen eyebrows in surprise.