A few minutes later Alexei Turbin ran out of the front door and glanced at his white enamel plate:
Doctor A. V. Turbin
Specialist in venereal diseases
606-914
Consulting hours: 4 pm to 6 pm.
He stuck a piece of paper over it, altering the consulting hours to: '5 pm to 7 pm', and strode off up St Alexei's Hill.
'Voice of Liberty!'
Turbin stopped, bought a paper from a newsboy and unfolded it as he went:
THE VOICE OF LIBERTY.
A non-party, democratic newspaper.
Published daily.
December 13th 1918.
The problems of foreign trade and, in particular of trade with Germany, oblige us . . .
'Come on, hurry up! My hands are freezing.'
Our correspondent reports that in Odessa negotiations are in progress for the disembarkation of two divisions of black colonial troops - Consul Enno does not admit that Petlyura ...
'Dammit boy, give me my copy!'
Deserters who reached our headquarters at Post-Volynsk described the increasing breakdown in the ranks of Petlyura's bands. Three days ago a cavalry regiment in the Korosten region opened fire on an infantry regiment of nationalist riflemen. A strong urge for peace is now noticeable in Petlyura's bands. Petlyura's ridiculous enterprise is heading for collapse. According to the same deserter Colonel Bol-botun, who has rebelled against Petlyura, has set off in an unknown direction together with his regiment and four guns. Bolbotun is inclined to support the Hetmanite cause.
The peasants hate Petlyura for his requisitioning policy. The mobilisation, which he has decreed in the villages, is having no success. Masses of peasants are evading it by hiding in the woods.
'Let's suppose . . . damn thiscold . . . Sorry.'
'Hey, quit pushing. Why don't you read your paper at home . ..' 'Sorry.'
We have always stressed that Petlyura's bid for power . . .
'Petlyura - the scoundrel. They're all rogues . . .'
Every honest man and true Volunteers - what about you?
'What's the matter with you today, Ivan Ivanovich?'
'My wife's caught a dose of Petlyura. This morning she did a Bolbotun and left me . . .'
Turbin grimaced at this joke, furiously crumpled up his newspaper and threw it down on the sidewalk. Then he pricked up his ears.
Boo-oom, rumbled the guns, answered by a muffled roar from beyond the City that seemed to come from the bowels of the earth.
'What the hell?'
Alexei Turbin turned sharply on his heel, picked up his scrap of newspaper, smoothed it out and carefully re-read the report on the first page:
In the Irpen region there have been clashes between our patrols and groups of Petlyura's bandits . . .
All quiet in the Serebryansk sector.
No change in the Red Tavern district.
Near Boyarka a regiment of Hetmanite cossacks dispersed a fifteen-hundred strong band. Two men were taken prisoner.
Boo-oo-oom roared the gray winter sky far away to the south west. Suddenly Turbin opened his mouth and turned pale. Mechanically he stuffed the newspaper into his pocket. A crowd of people was slowly moving out of the boulevard and along Vladimirskaya Street. The roadway was full of people in black overcoats . . . Peasant women started filling the sidewalks. A horseman of the Hetman's State Guard rode ahead like an outrider. His large horse laid back its ears, glared wildly, walking sideways. The rider's expression was perplexed. Occasionally he would give a
shout and crack his whip for order, but no one listened to his outbursts. In the front ranks of the crowd could be seen the golden copes of bearded priests and a religious banner flapped above their heads. Little boys ran up from all sides.
'Voice of Liberty!' shouted a newsboy and dashed towards the crowd.
A group of cooks in white, flat-topped chef's caps ran out of the nether regions of the Metropole Restaurant. The crowd scattered over the snow like ink over paper.
Several long yellow boxes were bobbing along above the crowd. As the first one drew level with Alexei Turbin he was able to make out the rough charcoal inscription on its side:
Ensign Yutsevich. On the next one he read:
Ensign Ivanov. And on the third:
Ensign Orlov.
Suddenly a squeal arose from the crowd. A gray-haired woman, her hat pushed on to the back of her head, stumbled and dropping parcels to the ground, rushed forward from the sidewalk into the crowd.
'What's happening? Vanya!' she yelled. Turning pale, a man dodged away to one side. A peasant woman screamed, then another.
'Jesus Christ Almighty!' muttered a voice behind Turbin. Somebody nudged him in the back and breathed down his neck.
'Lord . . . the things that happen these days. Have they started killing people? What is all this?'
'I know no more than you do.'
'What? What? What? What's happened? Who are they burying?'
'Vanya!' screamed the voice in the crowd.
'Some officers who were murdered at Popelyukha', growled a voice urgently, panting with the desire to be first to tell the news. 'They advanced to Popelyukha, camped out there and in the night they were surrounded by peasants and men from Petlyura's army who murdered every last one of them. Every last one . . . They
gouged out their eyes, carved their badges of rank into the skin of their shoulders with knives. Completely disfigured them.'
'Was that what happened? God . . .'
Ensign Korovin.
Ensign Herdt -more yellow coffins bobbed past.
'Just think . . . what have we come to . . .'
'Internecine war.'
'What d'you mean . . .'
'Apparently they had all fallen asleep when . . .'
'Serve 'em right . . .' cried a sudden, black little voice in the crowd behind Alexei Turbin and he saw red. There was a melee of faces and hats. Turbin stretched out his arms like two claws, thrust them between the necks of two bystanders and grabbed the black overcoat sleeve that belonged to the voice. The man turned round and fell down in a state of terror.
'What did you say?' hissed Turbin, and immediately relaxed his grip.
'Sorry sir', replied the voice, shaking with fright. 'I didn't say anything. I didn't open my mouth. What's the matter?' The voice trembled.
The man's duck-like nose paled, and Turbin realised at once that he had made a mistake and had grabbed the wrong man. A face of utter loyalty peered out from behind the duck-bill nose. It was struck dumb and its little round eyes flicked from side to side with fright.
Turbin let go the sleeve and in cold fury he began looking around amongst the hats, backs of heads and collars that seethed about him. He kept his left hand ready to grab anything within reach, whilst keeping his right hand on the butt of the revolver in his pocket. The dismal chanting of the priests floated past, beside him sobbed a peasant woman in a headscarf. There was no one to seize now, the voice seemed to have been swallowed up by the earth. The last coffin marked 'Ensign Morskoy' moved past, followed by some people on a sledge.
' Voice of Liberty!' came a piercing contralto shriek right beside
Alexei Turbin's ear. Senseless with rage he pulled the crumpled newspaper out of his pocket and twice rammed it into the boy's face, grinding his teeth and saying as he did so:
'There's your damned Voice of Liberty! You can damn well have it back! Little swine!'
With this his attack of fury subsided. The boy dropped his newspapers, slipped and fell down in a snowdrift. For a moment he pretended to burst into tears, and his eyes filled with a look of the most savage hatred that was no pretence.
'What's the matter with you? Who d'you think you are, mister? What've I done?' he snivelled, trying to cry and stumbling to his feet in the snow. A face stared at Turbin in astonishment, but was too afraid to say anything. Feeling stupid, confused and ashamed Turbin hunched his head into his shoulders and, turning sharply, ran past a lamp-post, past the circular white walls of the gigantic museum building, past some holes in the ground full of snow-covered bricks and towards the huge asphalt square in front of the Alexander I High School.