The Red Laugh

CHAPTER V

I WAS already asleep when the doctor roused me by pushing me cautiously. I woke, and jumping up, cried out, as we all did when anybody wakened us, and rushed to the entrance of our tent. But the doctor held me firmly by the arm, excusing himself:

“I frightened you, forgive me. I know you want to sleep…”

“Five days and nights...” I muttered, dozing off. I fell asleep and slept, as it seemed to me for a long time, when the doctor again began speaking, poking me cautiously in the ribs and legs.

“But it is very urgent. Dear fellow, please—it is so pressing. I keep thinking...I cannot...I keep thinking, that some of the wounded were left...”

“What wounded? Why, you were bringing them in the whole day long. Leave me in peace. It is not fair—I have not slept for five days!”

“Dear boy, don't be angry,” muttered the doctor, awkwardly putting my cap on my head; “everybody is asleep, it's impossible to rouse anybody. I've got hold of an engine and seven carriages, but we're in want of men. I understand. ...Dear fellow, I implore you. Everybody is asleep and everybody refuses. I'm afraid of falling asleep myself. I don't remember when I slept last. I believe I'm beginning to have hallucinations. There's a dear fellow, put down your feet, just one—there—there....”

The doctor was pale and tottering, and one could see that if he were only to lie down for an instant he would fall asleep and remain so without waking for several days running. My legs sank under me, and I am certain I fell asleep as I walked—so suddenly and unexpectedly appeared before us a row of black outlines—the engine and carriages. Near them, scarcely distinguishable in the darkness, some men were wandering about slowly and silently.

There was not a single light either on the engine or carriages, and only the shut ash-box threw a dim reddish light on to the rails.

“What is this?” asked I, stepping back.

“Why, we are going in the train. Have you forgotten? We are going in the train,” muttered the doctor.

The night was chilly and he was trembling from cold, and as I looked at him I felt the same rapid tickling shiver all over my body.

“Damn you!” I cried loudly. “Just as if you couldn't have taken somebody else.”

“Hush! please, hush!” and the doctor caught me by the arm.

Somebody out of the darkness said:

“If you were to fire a volley from all the guns, nobody would stir. They are all asleep. One could go up and bind them all. Just now I passed quite close to the sentry. He looked at me and did not say a word, never stirred. I suppose he was asleep too. It's a wonder he does not fall down.”

He who spoke yawned and his clothes rustled, evidently he was stretching himself. I leaned against the side of the carriage, intending to climb up—and was instantly overcome by sleep. Somebody lifted me up from behind and laid me down, while I began pushing him away with my feet, without knowing why, and again I fell asleep, hearing as in a dream fragments of a conversation:

“At the seventh verst.”

“Have you forgotten the lanterns?”

“No, he won't go.”

“Give them here. Back a little. That's it.”

The carriages were jerking backwards and forwards, something was rattling. And gradually, because of all these sounds and because I was lying comfortably and quietly, sleep deserted me. But the doctor was sound asleep, and when I took him by the hand it was like the hand of a corpse, heavy and limp. The train was now moving slowly and cautiously, shaking slightly, as if groping its way. The student acting as hospital orderly lighted the candle in the lantern, lighting up the walls and the black aperture of the entrance, and said angrily:

“Damn it! Much they need us by this time. But you had better wake him, before he falls into a sound sleep, for then you won't be able to do anything with him. I know by myself.”

We roused the doctor and he sat up, rolling his eyes vacantly. He tried to lie down again, but we did not let him. “It would be good to have a drop of vodka now,” said the student.

We drank a mouthful of brandy, and all sleepiness disappeared entirely. The big black square of the door began to grow pink, then red—somewhere from behind the hills appeared an enormous mute flare of a conflagration as if the sun was rising in the middle of the night.

“It's far away. About twenty versts.”

“I feel cold,” said the doctor, snapping his teeth.

The student looked out of the door and beckoned me to come up to him. I looked out: at different points of the horizon motionless flares of similar conflagration stood out in a mute row: as if dozens of suns were rising simultaneously. And now the darkness was not so great. The distant hills were growing more densely black, sharply outlined against the sky in a broken and wavy contour, while in the foreground all was flooded with a red soft glow, silent and motionless. I glanced at the student; his face was tinged by the same red fantastic color of blood, that had changed itself into air and light.

“Are there many wounded ?” asked I.

He waved his hand.

“A great many madmen. More so than wounded.”

“Real madmen?”

“What others can there be?”

He was looking at me, and his eyes wore the same fixed, wild expression, full of cold horror, that the soldier's had, who died of sunstroke.

“Stop that,” said I, turning away.

“The doctor is mad also. Just look at him.”

The doctor had not heard. He was sitting cross-legged, like a Turk, swaying to and fro, soundlessly moving his lips and finger-tips. And in his gaze there was the same fixed, stupefied, blunt, stricken expression.

“I feel cold,” said he, and smiled.

“Hang you all!” cried I, moving away into a corner of the carriage. “What did you call me up for?”

Nobody answered. The student stood gazing out at the mute spreading glow, and the back of his head with its curly hair was youthful; and when I looked at him, I do not know why, but I kept picturing to myself a delicate woman's hand passing through that hair. And this image was so unpleasant, that a feeling of hatred sprang up in my breast, and I could not not look at him without a feeling of loathing.

“How old are you?” I asked, but he did not turn his head and did not answer.

The doctor kept on rocking himself.

“I feel cold.”

‘When I think,” said the student, without turning round, “when I think that there are streets, houses, a University...”

He broke off, as if he had said all and was silent. Suddenly the train stopped almost instantaneously, making me knock myself against the wall, and voices were to be heard, We jumped out. In front of the very engine upon the rails lay something, a not very large lump, out of which a leg was projecting.

“Wounded ?”

“No, dead. The head is torn off. Say what you will, but I will light the head-light. Otherwise we shall be crushing somebody.”

The lump with the protruding leg was thrown aside; for an instant the leg lifted itself up, as if it wanted to run through the air, and all disappeared in a black ditch. The head-light was lit and the engine instantly grew black.

“Listen!” whispered somebody, full of silent terror. How was it that we had not heard it before? From everywhere—the exact place could not be defined—a groan, unbroken and scraping, wonderfully calm in its breadth, and even indifferent, as it seemed, was borne upon us. We had heard many cries and groans, but this resembled none of those heard before. On the dim reddish surface our eyes could perceive nothing, and therefore the very earth and sky, lit up by a never-rising sun, seemed to be groaning.

“The fifth verst,” said the engine-driver.

“That is where it comes from,” and the doctor pointed forwards. The student shuddered, and slowly turned towards us.

“What is it? It's terrible to listen to!”

“Let's move on.”

We walked along in front of the engine, throwing a dense shadow upon the rails, but it was not black but of a dim red color, lit up by the soft motionless flares, that stood out mutely at the different points of the black sky. And with each step we made, that wild unearthly groan, that had no visible source, grew ominously, as if it was the red air, the very earth and sky, that were groaning. In its ceaselessness and strange indifference it recalled at times the noise of grasshoppers in a meadow—the ceaseless noise of grasshoppers in a meadow on a warm summer day. And we came upon dead bodies oftener and oftener. We examined them rapidly, and threw them off the rails—those indifferent, calm, limp bodies, that left dark oily stains where the blood had soaked into the earth where they had lain. At first we counted them, but soon got muddled, and ceased. They were many—too many for that ominous night, that breathed cold and groans from each fibre of its being.<

“What does it mean?” cried the doctor, and threatened somebody with his fist. “Just listen...”

We were nearing the sixth verst, and the groans were growing distinct and sharp, and we could almost feel the distorted mouths, from which those terrible sounds were issuing.

We  looked anxiously into the rosy gloom, so deceitful in is fantastic light, when suddenly, almost at our feet, be­side the rails, somebody gave a loud, calling, crying groan. We found him instantly, that wounded man, whose face seemed to consist only of two eyes, so big they appeared, when the light of the lantern fell on his face. He stopped moaning, and rested his eyes on each of us and our lanterns in turn, and in his glance there was a mad joy at seeing men and lights—and a mad fear that all would disappear like a vision. Perhaps he had seen men with lanterns bending over him many times, but they had always disappeared in a bloody confused nightmare.

We moved on, and almost instantly stumbled against two more wounded, one lying on the rails, the other groaning in a ditch. As we were picking them up, the doctor, trembling with anger, said to me: “Well?” and turned away. Several steps farther on we met a man wounded slightly, who was walking alone, supporting one arm with the other. He was walking with his head thrown back, straight towards us, but seemed not to notice us, when we drew aside to it him pass. I believe he did not see us. He stopped for an instant near the engine, turned aside, and went past the train.

“You had better get in!” cried the doctor, but he did not answer.

These were the first that we found, and they horrified us. But later on we came upon them oftener and oftener along the rails or near them, and the whole field, lit up by the motionless red flare of the conflagrations, began stirring as if it were alive, breaking out into loud cries, wails, curses and groans. All those dark mounds stirred and crawled about like half-dead lobsters let out of a basket, with outspread legs, scarcely resembling men in their broken, unconscious movements and ponderous immobility. Some were mute and obedient, others groaned, wailed, swore and showed such a passionate hate towards us who were saving them, as if we had brought about that bloody, indifferent night, and been the cause of all those terrible wounds and their loneliness amidst the night and dead bodies.

The train was full, and our clothes were saturated with blood, as if we had stood for a long time under a rain of blood, while the wounded were still being brought in, and the field, come to life, was stirring wildly as before.

Some of the wounded crawled up themselves, some walked up tottering and falling. One soldier almost ran up to us. His face was smashed, and only one eye remained, burning wildly and terribly, and he was almost naked, as if he had come from the bath-room. Pushing me aside, he caught sight of the ddctor, and rapidly seized him by the chest with his left hand.

“I'll smash your snout!” he cried, shaking the doctor, and added slowly and mordantly a coarse oath. “I'll smash your snouts, you rabble!”

The doctor broke away from the soldier, and advancing towards him, cried chokingly:

“I will have you court-martialled, you scoundrel! To prison with you! You're hindering my work! Scoundrel! Brute!”

We pulled them apart, but the soldier kept on crying out for a long time: “Rabble! I'll smash your snout!”

I was beginning to get exhausted, and went a little way off to have a smoke and rest a bit. The blood, dried to my hands, covered them like a pair of black gloves, making it difficult for me to bend my fingers, so that I kept dropping my cigarettes and matches. And when I succeeded in lighting my cigarette, the tobacco smoke struck me as novel and strange, with quite a peculiar taste, the like of which I never experienced before or after. Just then the ambulance student with whom I had travelled came up to me, and it seemed to me as if I had met with him several years back, but where I could not remember. His tread was firm as if he were marching, and he was staring through me at something farther on and higher up.

“And they are sleeping,” said he, as it seemed, quite calmly.

I flew in a rage, as if the reproach was addressed to me.

“You forget, that they fought like lions for ten days.”

“What?”

He stooped still lower towards me, shaking his finger meaningly, and kept repeating the words as if they expressed a completed idea:

“I will tell you—I will tell you. Tell them...” And still looking at me in the same severe way, he shook his finger once more, then took out his revolver and shot himself in the temple. And this did not surprise or terrify me in the least. Putting my cigarette in the left hand, I felt his wound with my fingers, and went back to the train.

“The student has shot himself. I believe he is still alive,” said I to the doctor. The latter caught hold of his head and groaned.

“D—n him! ...There is no room. There, that one will go and shoot himself, too, soon. And I give you my word of honor,” cried he, angrily and menacingly, “I will do the same! Yes! And let me beg you—just walk back. There is no room. You can lodge a complaint against me if you like.”

And he turned away, still shouting, while I went up to the other who was about to commit suicide. He was an ambulance man, and also, I believe, a student. He stood, pressing his forehead against the wall of the carriage, and his shoulders shook with sobs.

“Stop!” said I, touching his quivering shoulder. But be did not turn round or answer, and continued crying. And the back of his head was youthful, like the other student's, and as terrifying, and he stood in an absurd manner with his legs spread out like a person drunk, who is sick; and his neck was covered with blood; probably he had clutched it with his own hands.

“Well?” said I, impatiently.

He pushed himself away from the carriage and, stooping like an old man, with his head bent down, he went away into the darkness away from all of us. I do not know why, but I followed him, and we walked along for a long time away from the carriages. I believe he was crying, and a feeling of distress stole over me, and I wanted to cry too.

“Stop!” I cried, standing still.

But he walked on, moving his feet ponderously, bent down, looking like an old man with his narrow shoulders and shuffling gait. And soon he disappeared in the reddish haze, that resembled light and yet lit nothing. And I remained alone. To the left of me a row of dim lights bled past—it was the train. I was alone—amidst the dead and dying. How many more remained? Near me all was still and dead, but farther on the field was stirring, as if it were alive—or so it seemed to me in my loneliness. But the moan did not grow less. It spread along the earth—high-pitched, hopeless, like the cry of a child or the yelping of thousands of cast-away puppies, starving and cold. Like a sharp, endless, icy needle it pierced your brain and slowly moved backwards and forwards—backwards and forwards....



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