Rapidly adjusting his trousers, he threw his tunic over his shoulders and fastened his holster and sword.
"Issue the order to the army immediately.... My horse!"
At dawn Telegin, his head freshly bandaged, made his way among the carts, and went in search of his regimental headquarters.
Just then a group of mounted escorts, the long ends of their Cossack hoods streaming behind them, came galloping along the road from the station. Among them was a bugler followed by two horsemen—Sorokin sawing at the mouth of his long-maned mount, and a Cossack holding a lance from which fluttered the pennon of the Supreme Commander.
The riders flew by towards the place from which the firing was coming, like wraiths enveloped in whirling clouds of dust.
Heads and beards were raised drowsily from the dew-drenched carts—hoarse voices broke the silence But the bugler was already far away in the steppe, proclaiming that the Supreme Commander was near, he was here, in the thick of battle, amidst the flying bullets....
"We will rout the foe!" sang the bugle. "On to victory and glory.... It is not death, but fame everlasting that awaits the hero.... Ta-ra-ta...."
Ivan Ilyich found Gimza in a mud hut with broken windows.
There was no other member of the staff there.
Gimza, huge and morose, was sitting stoop-shouldered on a bench, one hand, with a wooden spoon in it, hanging between his knees.
On the table was a pot of cabbage soup, beside which lay a bulging brief case—the entire equipment of the chief of the Special Department.
Gimza seemed to be half-asleep.
He turned his eyes towards Ivan Ilyich without moving.
"Wounded?"
"It's nothing—a mere scratch. I've been lying in the wheat half the night. I lost touch with my men—there was a lot of confusion. Where's the regiment?"
"Sit down," said Gimza.
"Hungry?"
Lifting his arm stiffly, he held out the spoon to Telegin.
Ivan Ilyich fell upon the pot of half-cold soup with a suppressed groan.
For a moment or two he ate in silence, before bursting out:
"How our fellows fought last night, Comrade Gimza! They didn't need any urging. They made bayonet charges at a distance of three and even four hundred yards!"
"You've had enough," said Gimza.
"Heard the new order?"
"No."
"Sorokin has been made Supreme Commander.
What d’you think of that?"
"That's all right.... Did you see him yesterday?
He flew right into the line of fire with his reins loose—in a crimson shirt, so that everyone could see him.
The moment the men saw him they started cheering.
But for him, I don't know how it would have been yesterday.... We were simply astonished—a regular Caesar!"
"That's just it," said Gimza.
"He is a Caesar—a pity I can't shoot him!"
Telegin was astonished.
"You don't mean it!" he cried.
"But I do!
Never mind—you wouldn't understand, anyhow."
He looked at Ivan Ilyich with a heavy, unblinking gaze.
"And you—you won't betray me?" (Telegin looked him steadily in the eyes.) "Well then.... I want to entrust a difficult matter to you, Comrade Telegin. It seems to me you're the best person.... You'll have to go to the Volga...."
"Very good!"
"I'll write you out all sorts of mandates.
I'll give you a letter to the chairman of the Military Council.
If you don't bring it off, if you don't deliver it, better go over to the Whites—don't come back.
Understand?"
"Very well."
"Don't give yourself up alive.
Guard that letter as your life.
If you get caught by the counterintelligence, do anything, eat it, anything.... Understand?"
Gimza moved forward, banging his clenched fist on the table so hard that the pot gave a jump.
"You must know what there is in the letter: the army believes in Sorokin.
Sorokin is a hero, the army would follow him anywhere.... And I demand that Sorokin be shot.... Immediately, before he takes the reins of the Revolution in his own hands.