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Updated: August 29, 2024
"We may be surprised," he said to me; "we must make haste." We laid aside our uniforms, and in our waistcoats we drew our swords from the scabbard. At this moment Iwán Ignatiitch, followed by five pensioners, came out from behind a heap of hay. He gave us an order to go at once before the Commandant. We sulkily obeyed.
I shouted at him, in fury. "You are a shameless liar." Chvabrine's face changed. "This I cannot overlook," he said; "you shall give me satisfaction." "Certainly, whenever you like," replied I, joyfully; for at that moment I was ready to tear him in pieces. I rushed at once to Iwán Ignatiitch, whom I found with a needle in his hand.
In obedience to the order of the Commandant's wife, he was threading mushrooms to be dried for the winter. "Ah! Petr' Andréjïtch," said he, when he saw me; "you are welcome. On what errand does heaven send you, if I may presume to ask?" I told him in a few words that I had quarrelled with Alexey Iványtch, and that I begged him, Iwán Ignatiitch, to be my second.
The yells which had ceased for a moment were redoubled anew. "Now, children," cried the Commandant, "open the door, beat the drum, and forward! Follow me for a sally!" The Commandant, Iwán Ignatiitch, and I found ourselves in a moment beyond the parapet. But the garrison, afraid, had not stirred. "What are you doing, my children?" shouted Iván Kouzmitch.
"Eh! my little mother," replied Iwán Ignatiitch; "the Lord is merciful. We have soldiers enough, and much, powder; I have cleared the cannon. Perhaps we may be able to defeat this Pugatchéf. If God do not forsake us, the wolf will eat none of us here." "And what manner of man is this Pugatchéf?" questioned the Commandant's wife.
Marya Ivánofna soon ceased being shy, and we became better acquainted. I found her a warm-hearted and sensible girl. By degrees I became attached to this honest family, even to Iwán Ignatiitch, the one-eyed lieutenant, whom Chvabrine accused of secret intrigue with Vassilissa Igorofna, an accusation which had not even a shadow of probability. But that did not matter to Chvabrine.
The people whom we could see on the steppe, noticing doubtless some stir in the fort, gathered into parties, and consulted together. The Commandant ordered Iwán Ignatiitch to point the cannon at them, and himself applied the match. The ball passed whistling over their heads without doing them any harm. The horsemen at once dispersed at a gallop, and the steppe was deserted.
All night long Vassilissa Igorofna lay awake trying to think what her husband could have in his head that she was not permitted to know. The morrow, on her return from mass, she saw Iwán Ignatiitch busy clearing the cannon of the rags, small stones, bits of wood, knuckle-bones, and all kinds of rubbish that the little boys had crammed it with.
Day was breaking. I was hurrying down the street when I heard myself called by someone. I stopped. "Where are you going, if I may presume to ask you?" said Iwán Ignatiitch, catching me up. "Iván Kouzmitch is on the ramparts, and has sent me to seek you. The 'pugatch' has come." "Is Marya Ivánofna gone?" I asked, with an inward trembling. "She hasn't had time," rejoined Iwán Ignatiitch.
At once the Commandant put the "ouriadnik" in arrest, and declared Joulaï his substitute. This change was received by the Cossacks with manifest discontent. They grumbled aloud, and Iwán Ignatiitch, who executed the Commandant's orders, heard them with his own ears say pretty clearly "Only wait a bit, you garrison rat!"
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