Once he came across a man, standing and grinning at him.
Semyon would have gone on, but the man cried softly:
"Brother!"
Semyon gave a start. Could it be a friend?
"What d'you want?" he said, casting an oblique glance at him.
"Aren't you Alexei's brother?"
"Well, and if I am?"
"You don't know your own people.... Remember the crew on the Kerch?"
"Kozhin?
Is it you?"
Semyon thrust his hand vigorously into the other man's.
They stood looking at one another.
Kozhin, with a quick look aside, said:
"Are they sawing their guns?"
"No. Things are quiet so far."
"Are there any lively lads here?"
"Who knows? I haven't seen any yet.
We must wait and see."
"What are you fellows doing?” said Kozhin, his eyes continually on the move, peering about among the twilight-muffled outlines of objects.
"What are you thinking about?
You allow yourselves to be plucked like geese.
Are you aware that everything in Uspenskoye, where I come from, has been burned down by artillery fire?
The women and children have all run away somewhere, the; men are in the woods.... The people are running away from Fedorovka, from Gulyai-Polye, and they all come to us...."
"What d'you mean—'us'?"
"Know the Dibrivski woods?
That's where we meet.... Well, all right.... Just whisper in the ears of some of your lot: Vladimirskoye must supply forty sawed-off rifles, ten rifles with cartridges, as many hand grenades as you can muster.... And all that must be hidden among the haycocks, in the fields. Understand?
They've got it all hidden in the hay at Sosnovka, the lads are only waiting for me.... At Gundayevka thirty peasants are waiting with horses.
We must get away."
"But where to?
Who to?"
"To the Ataman.... Shchuss, he's called.
We're forming detachments all over the Ekaterinoslav region. Last week we defeated the haidamaks and set fire to the estate.... That was good sport, brother! We threw the spirits and the sugar to the peasants, free.... Remember, I shall be back in a week."
He winked at Semyon, leaped over the wattle fence and ran with a crouching movement towards the reeds, where the frogs were croaking vociferously.
Rumours of the atamans and of raids, had already reached Vladimirskoye, but no one had believed them.
But here was a living witness.
Semyon' confided in his brother the same evening.
Alexei heard him with a grave face.
"What's that ataman's name?''
"Shchuss, he says."
"Never heard of him.
They say Nestor Ivanovich Makhno has a gang of twenty-five daredevils who raid the estates.
But I never heard of Shchuss. He may be all right—the muzhik's capable of anything nowadays.
Anyway—whether it's Shchuss or another man, the cause is good.... But Semyon, don't tell the muzhiks yet.
When the time comes I'll tell them myself."
Semyon shrugged his shoulders, smiling.
"You'll wait till they've picked your bones clean."
Apparently Semyon was not the only one who had met Kozhin.
Whispers of sawed-off guns, hand grenades, ataman bands stole about in the village.
A keen ear could have made out the rasp of the file at night, in the farm yards.
But so far all remained quiet.