[adapted]

by
Leo Tolstoy

I

A Russian with a high rank was working as an officer in the army in the Caucasus. His name was Zhilin.

One day he got a letter from his home. His old mother wrote to him: “I am now getting older, and before I die I would like to see my dear son. Come and say goodbye to me, bury me, and then with my blessing go back to your service. And I have found a bride for you, and she is smart and pretty and has land and money. If you like, you can marry and live together.”

Zhilin thought, “It is very true: the old lady has been getting weak; maybe I will not have a chance to see her again. Let us go, and if the bride is pretty — then I might marry.”

He went to his colonel, got permission to be away, said goodbye to his fellow soldiers, gave the soldiers under him nine gallons (Four vedros, which is exactly 8.80 gallons) of vodka as a goodbye treat, and made his plans to leave.

There was war at that time in the Caucasus. The roads were not safe to travel either by day or night. If any of the Russians rode or walked outside the fortress, the Tatars might either kill him or take him away to the mountains. And they arranged that twice a week a group of soldiers would go from fortress to fortress. In front and behind walked the soldiers, and the travellers rode in the middle.

It was now summer. At sunrise the line of carts was put together behind the fort; the soldiers on guard marched ahead, and the line moved along the road.

Zhilin was on a horse, and his belongings were on a cart that was part of the train.

They had twenty-five versts (Sixteen and a half miles.) to go. The train moved slowly; sometimes the soldiers stopped; sometimes a wagon-wheel came off, or a horse would not move, and all had to stop and wait.

The sun was already past the highest point in the sky, but the train had only gone half way, because the dust and heat were so great. The sun was baking hot, and there was no shelter anywhere. A bare plain; not a tree or a bush on the road.

Zhilin rode on ahead, sometimes stopping and waiting until the train reached him. He would listen, and hear the signal on the horn to stop again. And Zhilin thought, “Would it be better to go on alone without the soldiers? I have a good horse under me; if I meet the Tatars, I can get away. Or shall I wait?”

He kept stopping and thinking. And just then another officer, also on horseback, rode up to him; his name was Kostuilin, and he had a gun.

He said, “Zhilin, let’s ride on ahead together. I am so hungry that I can’t stand it anymore, and the heat too — I could squeeze my shirt dry!” Kostuilin was a heavy, fat, red-faced man, and the sweat was dripping from him.

Zhilin thought, and said, “And your gun is loaded?”

“It is.”

“Okay, let’s go. Just one rule: don’t split up.”

And they started up the road. They rode along the plain, talking and looking on each side. There was a very wide view. As soon as the plain ended, the road went into a narrow way between two mountains.

And Zhilin said, “I must ride up on that mountain, and look around, otherwise you see they might come down from the mountain and surprise us.”

But Kostuilin said, “What is there to check? Let us go ahead.”

Zhilin did not listen to him.

“No,” he says, “you wait for me down here. I’ll just look around.”

And he made his horse go up the mountain to the left.

The horse that Zhilin rode was a horse for hunting; he had bought him out of a group of young horses, paying a hundred rubles for him, and he trained him himself. He carried him up the steep slope as if on wings. He had hardly reached the top when before him less than seven hundred feet away Tatars on horseback were standing, — thirty men.

He saw them, and started to turn back, but the Tatars had seen him; they began to chase him, taking out their weapons as they ride fast. Zhilin rides down the steep slope as fast as his horse can go, and shouts to Kostuilin, “Fire your gun!” and to his horse he says, but not out loud, “Little mother, carry me safely, don’t trip; if you trip, I am lost. If we get back to the gun, they won’t catch us.”

But Kostuilin, instead of waiting for him, as soon as he saw the Tatars, rode as fast as he could toward the fortress. With his whip he hit his horse hard, first on one side, then on the other; all that could be seen through the dust was the horse moving her tail.

Zhilin saw that his situation was very bad. The gun was gone; he could do nothing with only a sword. He turned his horse back toward the train; he thought he might get away that way.

But in front of him, he sees that six are riding fast down the steep slope. His horse is good, but theirs are better; and also, they started before him. He started to turn around, and was going to ride forward fast again, but his horse was moving too fast and could not be stopped; he went straight down toward them.

He sees a Tatar with a red beard coming toward him on a gray horse. He is getting closer to him; he presses his teeth together; he is getting his gun ready.

“Well,” thinks Zhilin, “I know you bad men; if you take me prisoner, you will put me in a hole, and beat me with a whip. I won’t let you take me alive.”

Now, Zhilin was not very big, but he was a soldier on horseback. He drew his sword, kicked his horse to run straight at the red-bearded Tatar. He says to himself, “Either I will crush him with my horse, or I will cut him down with my sword.”

But Zhilin did not get to the place on the horse; suddenly, behind him, people shot at the horse. The horse fell head first, and held Zhilin’s leg to the ground.

He tried to get up; but already bad-smelling Tatars were sitting on him, and holding his hands behind his back.

He got free from them, knocking the Tatars down; but three others had got off their horses, and began to hit him on the head with the back ends of their guns.

He could not see, and he almost fell.

The Tatars grabbed him, took extra straps from their saddles, bent his arms behind his back, tied them with a Tatar knot, and lifted him up.

They took his sword from him, pulled off his boots, searched him carefully, pulled out his money and his watch, tore all his clothes to pieces.

Zhilin looked at his horse. The poor horse lay where he had fallen, on his side, and was kicking, trying to get up, but could not. There was a hole in his head, and black blood was flowing out of the hole; the dust for about a meter around was wet with it.

A Tatar went to the horse to take off the saddle. He was still kicking, so the man took out his knife, and cut his throat. The throat made a whistling sound, a shaking ran over the body, and all was over.

The Tatars took off the saddle and the other gear. The one with the red beard got on his horse, and the others lifted Zhilin behind him to keep him from falling; they tied him with the reins to the Tatar’s belt, and in this way they took him away to the mountains.

Zhilin sat behind, moving from side to side and hitting his face against the smelly Tatar’s back.

All he could see before him was the healthy Tatar back, and the strong neck, and a shaved, smooth back of his neck, looking a little blue under the cap.

Zhilin’s head ached; the blood ran into his eyes. And he could not sit more comfortably on the horse, or wipe away the blood. His arms were tied so tight that his collar bones ached. They rode for a long time from mountain to mountain; they crossed a river; then they went onto a road, and rode along a valley. Zhilin tried to follow the way that they took him; but his eyes were stuck together with blood, and he could not turn around.

It started to get dark; they crossed another river, and started to climb a rocky mountain. There was a smell of smoke. They heard dogs barking.

They reached an aul. (A Tatar village)

The Tatars got off their horses. The Tatar children came running up, and crowded around Zhilin, whistling and cheering. Finally they began to throw stones at him.

The Tatar sent the children away, took Zhilin down from the horse, and called a servant.

A Nogáï, with high cheekbones, came when called. He wore only a shirt. The shirt was torn; his whole chest was bare. The Tatar said something to him. The servant brought a wooden block for the feet. It was made of two oak blocks with iron rings, and in one of the rings was a clasp with a lock. They untied Zhilin’s arms, put on the foot block, and took him to a barn, pushed him in, and shut the door.

Zhilin fell on the animal waste. As he lay there, he felt around in the darkness, and when he had found a place that was less dirty, he stretched himself out.

II

Zhilin hardly slept that night. The nights were short. He saw through a crack that it was getting light. Zhilin got up, made the crack wider, and was able to look out.

Through the crack he could see a road leading down from the mountain; at the right, a Tatar hut with two trees near it. A black dog was lying on the road; a female goat with her young goats was walking by, all of them shaking their tails.

He saw coming down the mountain a young Tatar girl in a colorful shirt, without a belt, in long pants and boots; her head was covered with a scarf, and on it she carried a big tin water jug.

She walked along, moving from side to side and bending her back, and holding by the hand a little Tatar child, with a shaved head, who wore only a shirt.

After the Tatar girl had passed with her water jug, the red-bearded Tatar from the evening before came out, wearing a silk jacket, a silver dagger in his belt, and sandals on his bare feet. On his head was a high cap of sheepskin, colored black, and with the point hanging down. He came out, stretched himself, stroked his red beard. He stopped, gave an order to the servant, and went off somewhere.