'Well, Magda, good-bye!'
'Oh, my poor fellow!'
'You will never see me again!'
'I shall never see you again!'
'There's no help for it!'
'May the Mother of God protect and shelter you!'
'Good-bye. Take care of the cottage.'
The woman embraced him in tears.
'May God guide you!'
The last moment had come. The whistle and the women's crying and sobbing drowned everything else. 'Good-bye! Good-bye!' But the soldiers were already separated from the motley crowd, and formed a dark, solid mass, moving forward in square columns with the certainty and regularity of clockwork. The order was given: 'Take your seats!' Columns and squares broke asunder from the centre, marched with heavy strides towards the carriages, and jumped into them. The engine, now breathing like a dragon and exhaling streams of vapour, sent forth wreaths of grey smoke. The women cried and sobbed still louder; some of them hid their eyes with their handkerchiefs, others waved their hands towards the carriages; sobbing voices repeated the name of husband and son.
'Good-bye, Bartek!' Magda cried from amongst them. 'Take care of yourself! – May the Mother of God – Good-bye! Oh, God! – '
'And take care of the cottage,' answered Bartek.
The line of trucks suddenly trembled, the carriages knocked against one another, – and went forward.
'And remember you have a wife and child,' Magda cried, running after the train. 'Good-bye, in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost! Good-bye – '
On went the train, faster and faster, bearing away the warriors of Pognębin, of both Krzywdas, of Niedola, and Mizerów.
CHAPTER II
Magda, with the crowd of women, returned crying to Pognębin in one direction; in the other the train, bristling with bayonets, rushed into the grey distance, and Bartek with it. There seemed to be no end to the long cloud of smoke; Pognębin was also scarcely visible. Only the lime-tree showed faintly, and the church tower, glistening as the rays of the sun played upon it. Soon the lime-tree also disappeared, and the gilt cross resembled a shining speck. As long as that speck continued to shine Bartek kept his eyes fixed upon it, but when that vanished too there were no bounds to the poor fellow's grief. A sense of great weakness came over him and he felt lost. So he began to look at the Sergeant, for, after the Almighty, he already felt there was no one greater than he. The Sergeant clearly knew what would become of Bartek now; he himself knew nothing, understood nothing. The Sergeant sat on the bench, and, supporting his rifle between his knees, he lighted his pipe. The smoke rose in clouds, hiding his grave, discontented face from time to time. Not Bartek's eyes alone watched his face; all the eyes from every corner of the carriage were watching it. At Pognębin or Krzywda every Bartek or Wojtek was his own master, each had to think about himself, and for himself, but now the Sergeant would do this for him. He would command them to look to the right, and they would look to the right; he would command them to look to the left, and they would look to the left. The question, 'Well, and what is to become of us?' stood in each man's eyes, but he knew as much as all of them put together, and also what was expected of them. If only one were able by glances to draw some command or explanation from him! But the men were afraid to ask direct, as war was now drawing near with all the chances of being court-martialled. What was permitted and was not permitted, and by whom, was unknown. They, at least, did not know, and the sound of such a word as 'Kriegsgericht,' though they did not understand it, frightened them very much.
They felt that this Sergeant had still more power over them now than at the manœuvres in Posen; he it was who knew everything, and without him nothing would be done. He seemed meanwhile to be finding his rifle growing heavy, for he pushed it towards Bartek to hold for him. Bartek reached out hastily for it, held his breath, stared, and looked at the Sergeant as he would at a rainbow, yet derived little comfort from that. Ah, there must surely be bad news, for even the Sergeant looked worried. At the stations one heard singing and shouting; the Sergeant gave orders, bustled about and swore, as if to show his importance. But let the train once move on, and everyone, including himself, was silent. Owing to him the world now seemed to wear two aspects, the one clear and intelligible – that represented by home and family – the other dark, yes, absolutely dark – that of France and war. He effectually revived the spirits of the Pognębin soldiers, not so much by his personality, as that each man carried him at the back of his mind. And since each soldier carried his knapsack on his shoulder, with his cloak and other warlike accoutrements, the whole load was extremely heavy.
All the while the train was shaking, roaring, and rushing along into space. Now a station where they added fresh carriages and engines; now another where helmets, cannon, horses, bayonets, and companies of Lancers were to be seen. The fine evening drew in slowly. The sun sank in a deep crimson, and a number of light flying clouds spread from the edge of the darkening sky across to the west. The train, stopping frequently at the stations to pick up passengers and carriages, shook and rushed forward into that crimson brightness, as into a sea of blood. From the open carriage, in which Bartek and the Pognębin troops were seated, one could see villages, hamlets and little towns, church steeples, storks – looking like hooks, as they stood on one leg on their nests, – isolated cottages, and cherry orchards. Everything was passed rapidly, and everything looked crimson. Meanwhile the soldiers, growing bolder, began to whisper to one another, because the Sergeant, having laid his kit bag under his head, had fallen asleep, with his clay pipe between his teeth. Wojtek Gwizdała, a peasant from Pognębin, sitting beside Bartek, jogged his elbow: 'Bartek, listen!'
Bartek turned a face with pensive, wide open eyes towards him.
'Why do you look like a calf going to be slaughtered?' Gwizdała whispered. 'True, you, poor beggar, are going to be slaughtered, that's certain!'
'Oh, my word!' groaned Bartek.
'Are you afraid?' Gwizdała asked.
'Why shouldn't I be afraid?'
The crimson in the sky was growing deeper still, so Gwizdała pointed towards it and went on whispering:
'Do you see that brightness? Do you know, Blockhead, what that is? That's blood. Here's Poland, – our frontier, say, – do you understand? But there in the distance, where it's so bright, that's France itself.'
'And shall we be there soon?'
'Why are you in such a hurry? They say that it's a terribly long way. But never fear, the French will come out to meet us.'
Bartek's Pognębin brain began to work laboriously. After some moments he asked: 'Wojtek.'
'Yes?'
'What sort of people are these Frenchmen?'
Here Wojtek's wisdom suddenly became aware of a pitfall into which it might be easier to tumble headforemost than to come out again. He knew that the French were the French. He had heard something about them from old people, who had related that they were always fighting with everyone; he knew at least that they were very strange people. But how could he explain this to Bartek to make him understand how strange they were? First of all, therefore, he repeated the question, 'What sort of people?'
'Why, yes.'
Now there were three nations known to Wojtek: living in the centre were the Poles; on the one side were the Russians, on the other the Germans. But there were various kinds of Germans. Preferring, therefore, to be clear rather than accurate, he said:
'What sort of people are the French? How can I tell you; they must be like the Germans, only worse.'
At which Bartek exclaimed: 'Oh, the low vermin!'
Up to that time he had had one feeling only with regard to the French, and that was a feeling of unspeakable fear. Henceforth this Prussian Reservist cherished the hatred of a true patriot towards them. But not feeling quite clear about it all, he asked again: 'Then Germans will be fighting Germans?'
Here Wojtek, like a second Socrates, chose to adopt a simile, and answered:
'But