But here again he had to avert his glance. What truth did his brother-officers believe in?
What truth did he himself believe in?
In the great, tragic history of Russia?
But this was an axiom, not the truth.
Truth lay in movement, in life—not in the well-thumbed pages of some dusty folio, but in the ever-living stream of the future.
In the name of what truth (if one disregarded the church bells of Moscow, the white horse, the flowers on bayonets, and all that) was it necessary to kill Russian peasants?
This was the question which was beginning to steal into the consciousness of Vadim Petrovich, disturbing his thoughts as a stone cast into water disturbs the reflections on its surface.
At this point began the agonizing splitting of his personality.
He was a stranger among his brother-officers, a "Red," a "Bolshie."
The memory of his last words to Katya kept recurring with increasing frequency to his mind, causing his ears to burn with shame.
She had wrung her hands, breathless with emotion, as if she saw the pebbles on the edge of an abyss slipping beneath the feet of Vadim Petrovich.
"Vadim, Vadim! Something quite different must be done!"
He was not yet ready to admit that Katya had been right, that he was in a state of hopelessness, that the further he went the less he was able to understand whence came the power of the "insurgent rabble," a power which was growing with nightmare rapidity; that to rush to the conclusion that the people were being deceived by the Bolsheviks was utterly absurd, since nobody knew whether it was the Bolsheviks who had called the Revolution into life, or the people the Bolsheviks; and that there was now no one for him to blame any more— (unless it were himself.
Katya had been right about everything.
She had brought to these troublous times from the old life only one defence, one treasure—love and pity.
He remembered how she had gone about Rostov, with her shawl and her bundle—the gentle companion of his days.... So dear, so dear.... To lay one's head in her lap, to press one's face against her tender hands, to say nothing but:
"I can't stand it any longer, Katya!" But an absurd pride held Vadim Petrovich in its grip.
His lean figure, as (rigid as if he were laced up in a corset of steel, his head, now quite grey, arrogantly erect, were conspicuous everywhere he went—in the dusty village street, in the ranks, in the officers' mess....
"The dandy!" men said of him. "Keeping up the tone, forsooth! Fancies himself a guardsman——the infantry swine!"
He had sent Katya two short notes, but had received no reply.
He then decided to write to Colonel Tetkin.
But just then he got his leave, and set off at once for Rostov.
He took a droshky from the station at midday.
The town was changed out of all knowledge.
Sadovaya Street was swept and clean, the trees were clipped, and smart women in white dresses strolled along the shady side of the street, admiring their reflections in the shop windows.
Roshchin turned continually on the seat, looking for Katya.
He could hardly believe his eyes.
The women, in their plumed hats, panamas, white boas, were like wraiths from a forgotten dream... White-shod feet tripped over pavements washed clean by the gloomy yardmen, and there was not the tiniest stain of blood on those white stockings.
So that was why covering detachments had to be posted at Velikoknyazheskaya!
That was why Denikin had been fighting the Reds these four weeks!
There it is, as clear as- daylight! The truth of the White war.
Roshchin laughed scornfully.
There were Germans in their sickeningly familiar grey-green uniforms, in brand-new caps at street corners—Germans feeling very much at home!
Look at that one, his monocle falling out of his eye socket as he bends over the hand of a tall, laughing beauty in a white dress....
"Faster, izvozchik!"
Colonel Tetkin was standing in front of the yard gate of his house.
Vadim Petrovich, driving in, leaped out of the droshky and noticed how Tetkin stepped back, his eyes round and bulgy, his chubby hand waving Roshchin off as if trying to exorcise him.
"Good morning, Colonel.... Don't you know me?
I... for God's sake, where's Katya?
Is she well?
Why don't...."
"For heaven's sake—you alive!" cried Tetkin in his shrill, feminine voice.
"Vadim Petrovich, old man!" and he fell upon Roshchin, throwing his arms round him and wetting his cheek with his tears.
"What's happened?
Colonel ... tell me all...."
"I knew you were alive! Oh, poor Ekaterina Dmitrevna! How she suffered!"
And Tetkin began pouring out everything helter-skelter—how Katya-had gone to Onoli, who had for some reason or other assured her that Roshchin was dead.
He spoke of Katya's grief, of her departure.
"So that's it," said Roshchin firmly, looking down at the ground. "Where did Ekaterina Dmitrevna go?"
Tetkin made a gesture of despair, his good-natured face expressing an agonizing desire to help.