One Day In The Life

He was called an orderly. But, looking closer into it, he was a real prince--he palled around with the cooks.
Today all the squads may have turned up together or there may have been delay in getting things in order, but there was quite a crowd on the porch. Among them was the Limper, with his assistant. The mess chief himself was there too. They were handling the crowd without guards--the bruisers.
The mess chief was a fat pig with a head like a pumpkin and a broad pair of shoulders. He was bursting with energy and when he walked he seemed nothing but a lot of jerks, with springs for arms and legs. He wore a white lambskin hat without a number on it, finer than any civilian's. And his waistcoat was lambskin to match, with a number on it, true, but hardly bigger than a postage stamp--thanks to Volkovoi. He bore no number at all on his back. He respected no one and all the zeks were afraid of him. He held the lives of thousands in his hands. Once they'd tried to beat him up but all the cooks--a prize bunch of thugs they were--had leaped to his defense.
Shukhov would be in hot water if the 104th had already gone in. The Limper knew everyone by sight and, with his chief present, wouldn't think of letting a man in with the wrong squad; he'd make a point of putting the finger on him.
Prisoners had been known to slip in behind the Limper's back by climbing over the porch railings. Shukhov had done it too. But tonight, under the chief's very nose, that was out of the question--he'd bust you so bad that you'd only just manage to drag yourself off to the doctor.
Get along to the porch and see whether, among all those identical black coats, the 104th was still there.
He got there just as the men began shoving (what could they do? it would soon be time to turn in) as though they were storming a stronghold--the first step, the second, the third, the fourth. Got there! They poured onto the porch.
"Stop, you f*ckers," the Limper shouted and raised his stick at the men in front "Get back or I'll bash your heads in."
"What can we do about it?" they yelled back at him. "The men at the back are pushing us."
That was true, but those up in front were offering little resistance. They hoped to dash through into the mess hall.
The Limper put his club across his chest--it might have been a barricade in a street battle--and rushed headlong at the men in front. His assistant, the trusty, shared the stick with him, and so did the mess chief-- who had apparently decided to soil his hands with it.
They pushed hard--they had plenty of strength, with all that meat in them. The zeks reeled back. The men in front toppled down onto the men behind them, bowled them over like wheat stalks.
"You f*cking Limper, we'll fix you," cried a man in the crowd, hiding behind the others. As for the rest, they fell without a word, they got up without a word-- as quick as they could, before being stepped on.
The steps were clear. The mess chief went back to the porch but the Limper stayed on the top.
"Form fives, blockheads," he shouted. "How many times have I told you I'll let you in when I'm ready?"
Shukhov imagined that he saw Senka's head right in front of the porch. He felt wildly elated, and using his elbows made an effort to push through to him. But, looking at those backs, he knew that it was beyond his strength. He wouldn't get through.
"Twenty-seventh," the Limper called, "go ahead."
The 27th bounded up and made a dash for the door, and the rest surged after them. Shukhov, among them, was shoving with all his might. The porch quivered, and the lamp overhead protested shrilly.
"What again, you shits?" the Limper shouted in rage. Down came his stick, on a shoulder, on a back, pushing the men off, toppling one after another.
Again he cleared the steps.
From below Shukhov saw Pavlo at the Limper's side. It was he who led the squad to the mess hall--Tiurin wouldn't lower himself by joining in the hullabaloo.
"Form fives, hundred and fourth," Pavlo called from the porch. "Make way for them, friends."
Friends--just see theni making way, f*ck 'em.
"Let me through, you in front. That's my squad," Shukhov grunted, shoving against a back.
The man would gladly have done so but others were squeezing him from every side.
The crowd heaved, pushing away so that no one could breathe. To get its stew. Its lawful stew.
Shukhov tried something else. He grasped the porch rail on his left, got his arms around a pillar, and heaved himself up. He kicked someone's knee and caught a blow in the ribs; a few curses, but he was through. He planted a foot on the edge of the porch floor, close to the top step, and waited. Some of his pals who were already there gave him a hand.
The mess chief walked to the door and looked back.
"Come on, Limper, send in two more squads."
"One hundred and fourth," shouted the Limper. "Where d'you think _you're_ crawling, shit?"
He slammed a man from another squad on the back of the neck with his stick.
"One hundred and fourth," shouted Pavlo, leading in his men.
"Whew!" gasped Shukhov in the mess hall. And, without waiting for Pavlo's instructions, he started looking for free trays.
The mess hall seemed as usual, with clouds of steam curling in through the door and the men sitting shoulder to shoulder--like seeds in a sunflower. Others pushed their way through the tables, and others were carrying loaded trays. Shukhov had grown used to it all over the years and his sharp eyes had noticed that S 208 had only five bowls on the tray he was carrying. This meant that it was the last tray-load for his squad. Otherwise the tray would have been full.
He went up to the man and whispered in his ear: "After you with that tray."
"Someone's waiting for it at the counter. I promised. . . ."
"Let him wait, the lazy bastard."
They came to an understanding.
S 280 carried his tray to the table and unloaded the bowls. Shukhov immediately grabbed it. At that moment the man it had been promised to ran up and tried to grab it. But he was punier than Shukhov. Shukhov shoved him off with the tray--what the hell are you pulling for?--and threw him against a post Then putting the tray under his arm, he trotted off to the serving window.
Pavlo was standing in the line there, worried because there was no empty tray. He was delighted to see Shukhov. He pushed the man ahead of him out of the way: "Why are you standing here? Can't you see I've got a tray?"
Look, there was Gopchik--with another tray.
"They were arguing," he said with a laugh, "and I grabbed it."
Gopchik will do well. Give him another three years--he has still to grow up--and he'll become nothing less than a bread cutter. He's fated for it.
Pavlo told him to hand over the second of the trays to Yermolayev, a hefty Siberian who was serving a tenyear stretch, like Shukhov, for being caught by the Germans; then sent him to keep an eye on any table where the men might be finishing Shukhov put his tray down and waited.
"One hundred and fourth," announced Pavlo at the counter.
In all there were five of these counters: three for serving regular food, one for zeks on special diets (ulcer victims, and bookkeeping personnel, as a favor), and one for the return of dirty dishes (that's where the dish-lickers gathered, sparring with one another). The counters were low--about waist level. The cooks themselves were out of sight; only their hands, and the ladles, could be seen.
The cook's hands were white and well cared for, but huge and hairy: a boxer's hands, not a cook's. He took a pencil and made a note on the wall--he kept his list there.
"One hundred and fourth--twenty-four portions."
Pantaleyev slopped into the mess hall. Nothing wrong with him, the son-of-a-bitch.
The cook took an enormous ladle and stirred, stirred, stirred. The soup kettle had just been refilled, almost up to the brim, and steam poured from it. Replacing the huge ladle with a smaller one he began serving the stew in twenty-ounce portions. He didn't go deep.
"One, two, three, four . . . ."
Some of the bowls had been filled while the stuff from the bottom of the kettle hadn't yet settled after the stirring, and some were duds--nothing but soup. Shukhov made a mental note of which was which. He put ten bowls on his tray and carried them off. Gopchik waved from the second row of posts.
"Over here, Ivan Denisovich, over here."
No horsing around with bowls 'of stew. Shukhov was careful not to stumble. Ho kept his throat busy too.
"Hey you, H 920. Gently, uncle. Out of the way, my boy"
It was hard enough, in a crowd like this, to carry a single bowl without slopping it. He was carrying ten. Just the same, he put the tray down safely, on the end of the table that Gopchik had cleared. No splashes. He managed, too, to maneuver the tray so that the two bowls with the thickest stew were just opposite the place he was about to sit down in.
Yermolayev brought another ten bowls. Gopchlk ran off and came back with Pavlo, the last four in their hands.
Kilgas brought the bread tray. Tonight they were being fed in accordance with the work they had done. Some got six ounces, some nine, and Shukhov twelve. He took a piece with a crust for himself, and six ounces from the middle of the loaf for Tsezar.
Now from all over the mess hall Shukhov's squad began streaming up, to collect their supper and eat it where they could. As he handed out the bowls, there were two things he had to take care of: he had to remember whom he'd served, and he had to watch out for the tray--and' for his own corner of it. (He put his spoon into a bowl--one of the "thick" ones. Reserved, that meant.) Fetiukov was among the first to arrive. But he soon walked off, figuring there was nothing to be scrounged that particular evening; better to wander around the mess,, hunting for leftovers (if someone doesn't finish his stew and pushes his bowl back, there are always people hustling to pounce on it, like vultures).
Shukhov counted the portions with Pavlo. Correct, apparently. He pushed across a bowl for Tiurin, one of the "thick" ones; and Pavlo poured his stew into a narrow German mess-tin, with a lid--you could carry it under your coat, close to your chest.
The empty trays were handed in. Pavlo sat there with his double helping, Shukhov with his two bowls. And now they had nothing more to say to one another---the sacred moments had come.
Shukhov took off his hat and laid it on his knees. He tasted one bowl, he tasted the other. Not bad--there was some fish in it. Generally, the evening stew was much thinner than at breakfast: if they're to work, prisoners must be fed in the morning; in the evening they'll go to sleep anyway.
He dug in. First he only drank the broth, drank and drank. As it went down, filling his whole body with warmth, all his guts began to flutter inside him at their meeting with that stew. Goo-ood! There it comes, that brief moment for which a zek lives.
And now Shukhov complained about nothing: neither about the length of his stretch, nor about the length of the day, nor about their swiping another Sunday. This was all he thought about now: we'll survive. We'll stick it out, God willing, till it's over.
He drained the hot soup from both bowls, and then tipped what was left in the second into the first, scraping it clean with his spoon. That set his mind at ease. Now he didn't have to think about the second and keep an eye or a hand on it.
Now that he could look freely he glanced at his neighbors' bowls. The one on his left was little more than water. The dirty snakes. The tricks they play! And on their fellow zeks.
He began to eat the cabbage with what was left of the soup. A potato had found its way into one of the bowls--Tsezar's. A medium-sized spud, frost-bitten, hard and sweetish. There wasn't much fish, just a few stray bits of bare backbone. But you must chew every bone, every fin, to suck the juice out of them, for the juice is healthy. It takes time, of course, but he was in no hurry to go anywhere. Today was a red-letter day for him: two helpings for dinner, two helpings for supper. Everything else could wait.
Except, maybe, that visit to the Left for tobacco. None might be left in the morning,
He ate his supper without bread. A double helping _and_ bread--that was going too far. The bread would do for tomorrow. The belly is a demon. It doesn't remember how well you treated it yesterday; it'll cry out for more tomorrow.
He ate up his stew without taking much interest in what was happening around him. No need for that: he wasn't on the lookout for extras, he was eating his own lawful portions. All the same, he noticed that 'when the fellow opposite got up a tall old man--U 81--sat down in his place. Shukhov knew he was in the 64th and had heard, while waiting in the parcels line, that the 64th had been sent to the Socialist Way of Life settlement that day instead of the 104th, and had spent the whole time without a chance of getting warm--putting up barbed wire, building their own zone.
He'd been told that this old man had spent years without number in camps and prisons, and that he hadn't benefited from a single amnesty. Whenever one ten-year stretch had run out they shoved another onto him right away.
Now Shukhov looked closely at the man. He held himself straight--the other zeks sat all hunched up-- and looked as if he'd put something extra on the bench to sit on. There was nothing left to crop on his head: his hair had dropped out long since--the result of high living, no doubt. His eyes didn't dart after everything going on in the mess hall. He kept them fixed in an unseeing gaze at some spot over Shukhov's head. His worn wooden spoon dipped rhythmically into the thin stew, but instead of lowering his head to the bowl like everybody else, he raised the spoon high to his lips. He'd lost all his teeth and chewed his bread with iron gums. All life had drained out of his face but it had been left, not sickly or feeble, but hard and dark like carved stone. And by his hands, big and cracked and blackened, you could see that he'd had little opportunity of doing soft jobs. But he wasn't going to give in, oh no! _He_ wasn't going to put his nine ounces on the dirty, bespattered table--be put it on a well-washed bit of rag.
However, he couldn't go on watching the old man-- he had other things to do. He finished his supper, licked his spoon clean, and put it In his boot. He pulled his bat over his eyes, got up, picked up his bread and Tsezar's, and went out. Another porch led from the mess ball. Two more orderlies stood there: they had nothing to do except unhook the door, let people through, and slip the hook on again.
Shukhov came out with a full belly. He felt pleased with himself and decided that, although it was close to curfew, he'd run over to the Left all the same. Instead of taking the bread to his barracks, he strode to Barracks 7.
The moon was high--clean and white, as if chiseled out of the sky. It was clear up there and there were some stars out--the brightest of them. But he had even less time for stargazing than for watching people in the mess hall. One thing he realized--the frost was no milder. One of the civilians had said, and this had been passed on, that it was likely to drop to -25° in the night, and as low as -40° toward morning,
From far away in the settlement he heard the drone of a tractor. From the direction of the main thoroughfare an excavator squealed shrilly. And creak, creak, went every pair of boots in which people walked or ran about the camp.
There was no wind.
He meant to buy the tobacco at the price he'd paid before--one ruble a glassful, though, outside, that amount would cost three times as much, and for some cuts even more. In forced-labor camps all prices were local; it was quite different from anywhere else, because you couldn't save money and few had any at all, for it was very hard to come by. No one was paid a kopeck for his work (at Ust-Izhma he'd received at least thirty rubles a month). If anyone's relatives sent money by mail he didn't get it in cash anyway; it was credited to his personal account. You could draw on a personal account once a month at the, commissary to buy soap, moldy biscuits, and "Prima" cigarettes. Whether you liked the wares or not, you had to spend the amount the chief had given you a slip for. If you didn't, the money was lost--simply written off.
Shukhov did private jobs to get money, making slippers out of customers' rags--two rubles a pair--or patching torn jackets, price by agreement.
Barracks 7, unlike Barracks 9, wasn't in two big halves. It had a long passage, with ten doors opening off it. Each room housed a squad, packed into seven tiers of bunks. In addition, there was a little cubbyhole for the bucket and another for the senior orderly. The artists had a cubbyhole to themselves, too.
Shukhov headed for the Lett's room. He found him lying on a lower bunk, his feet propped on a ledge. He was talking to his neighbor in Latvian.
Shukhov sat down beside him. "Evening." "Evening," replied the Lett, without lowering his feet. The room was small, everyone was listening. Who was he? What did he want?
Both Shukhov and the Lett realized that people were curious, so Shukhov let the conversation drag on. Well, how are you doing? Oh, not so bad. Cold today. Yes.
Shukhov waited until everyone had started talking again. (They were arguing about the Korean war--now that the Chinese had joined in, would that mean a world war or not?) He leaned closer to the Lett.
"Any t'bacca?"
"Yes."
"Let's see it."
The Lett dropped his feet off the ledge, put them on the floor, sat up. He was a mean fellow, that Lett--filled a glass with tobacco as if he was afraid of putting in a single pinch too many.
He showed Shukhov his tobacco pouch and slid open the fastener.
Shukhov took a pinch and laid the leaf on his palm. He examined it. Same as last time, brownish, same rough cut. He held it to his nose and sniffed. That was the stuff. But to the Lett he said: "Not the same, somehow."
"The same, the same," the Lett said testily. "I never have any other kind. Always the same."
"All right," said Shukhov. "Stuff some into a glass for me. I'll have a smoke and perhaps take a second glassful."
He said "stuff" on purpose, because the Lett had the habit of dropping the tobacco in loosely.
The Lett brought out another pouch from under his pillow, fuller than the first. He took his glass out of a locker. It was really a plastic container, but Shukhov figured it held the same as an ordinary glass.
The Lett began fray out the tobacco into the glass.
"Push it down, push it down," said Shukhov, laying his own thumb on it.
"I know how to do it," the Lett said sharply, jerking away the glass and pressing the tobacco, though lightly. He dropped in a little more.
Meanwhile, Shukhov had unbuttoned his jacket and was groping inside the cotton lining for a piece of paper that only he knew where to find. Using both hands he squeezed it along under the lining and forced it into a little hole in the cloth somewhere quite different, a small tear that he'd tacked with a couple of loose stitches. When the paper reached the hole he snapped the thread with a fingernail, folded the paper lengthwise (it had already been folded in a longish rectangle), and pulled it through the hole. Two rubles. Worn notes that didn't rustle.
In the room a prisoner shouted: "D'you mean to say you think Old Whiskers *[* Stalin.]  will take pity on you? Why, he wouldn't trust his own brother. You haven't a chance, you ass."
One good thing about these "special" camps--you were free to let off steam. At Ust-Izhma you need only whisper that there was a shortage of matches outside, and they'd put you in the guardhouse and add another ten years to your stretch. But here you could bawl anything you liked from the top row of bunks--the squealers didn't pass it on, the security boys had stopped caring.
The trouble was, you didn't have much time to talk in.
"Ugh, you're making it lie too loose," Shukhov complained.
"Oh well, there you are," said the Left, adding a pinch on top.
Shukhov took his pouch out of an inside pocket and poured in the tobacco from the glass.
"All right," he said, deciding not to waste the first precious cigarette by smoking it hurriedly. "Stuff it full again."
Wrangling a bit more, he poured the second glassful into his pouch, handed over the two rubles, and left with a nod.
As soon as he was outside again he doubled back to Barracks 9. He didn't want to miss Tsezar when he came back with that package.
But Tsezar was already there, sitting on his bunk and gloating over the parcel. Its contents were laid out on his bunk and on'top of the locker, but as there was no direct light there--Shukhov's bunk was in the way-- it wasn't very easy to see.
Shukhov stooped, passed between Tsezar's bunk and the captain's, and handed Tsezar his bread ration.
"Your bread, Tsezar Markovich."
He didn't say, "Well, did you get it?" That would have been to hint, "I kept that place in the line and now have a right to my share." The right was his, that be knew, but even eight years as a convict hadn't turned him into a jackal--and the longer he spent at the camp the stronger he made himself.
But his eyes were another matter. Those eyes, the hawklike eyes of a zek, darted to one side and slid swiftly over what was laid out there; and although the food hadn't been unpacked and some of the bags were still unopened, that quick look and the evidence of his nose told him that Tsezar had got sausage, condensed milk, a plump smoked fish, salt pork, crackers, biscuits, four pounds of lump sugar and what looked like butter, as well as cigarettes and pipe tobacco--and that wasn't all.
He learned all this during the brief moment it took him to say: "Your bread, Tsezar Markovich."
Tsezar, all excited and looking a bit tipsy (and who wouldn't, after getting a parcel like that!) waved the bread away: "Keep it, Ivan Denisovich."
His bowl of stew, and now this six ounces of bread-- that was a full supper, and of course Shukhov's fair share of the parcel.
And he put out of his mind any idea of getting something tasty from what Tsezar had laid out. There's nothing worse than working your belly to no purpose.
Well, he had his twelve ounces and now this extra six, besides the piece in his mattress, at least another six ounces. Not bad. He'd eat six now and some more later, and still have next day's ration for work. Living high, ehi As for the hunk in the mattress, let it stay there! A good thing he'd found time to sew it in! Someone in the 75th had had a hunk pinched from his locker. That was a dead loss; nothing could be done about it.
People imagine that the package a man gets is a sort of nice, tight sack he has only to slit open and be happy. But if you work it out it's a matter of easy come, easy go. Shukhov had known cases when before his parcel arrived a fellow would be doing odd jobs to earn a bit of extra kasha, or cadging cigarette butts--just like anybody else. He has to share with the guard and the squad leader--and how can he help giving a little something to the trusty in the parcels office? Why, next time the fellow may mislay your parcel and a week may go by before your name appears again on the list! And that other fellow at the place where you hand in your food to be kept for you, safe from friskers and pilferers--Tsezar will be there before the morning roll call, with everything in a sack--he must have his cut too, and a good one, if you don't want him little by little swiping more than you gave him. Sitting there all day, the rat, shut up with other people's food--try to keep an eye on him! And there must be something for services like Shukhov's. And something to the bath attendant for issuing you decent underwear--not much but something. And for the barber who shaves you "with paper" (for wiping the razor on--he usually does it on your knee). Not much to him either but, still, three or four butts. And at the C.ED., for your letters to be kept separate and not get lost. And if you want to goof off a day or two and lie in bed, Instead of going to work, you have to slip the doctor something. And what about the neighbor you share a locker with (the captain, in Tsezar's case)? He must have his cut. After all, he sees every blessed ounce you take. Who'd be nervy enough not to give him his share?
So leave envy to those who always think the radish in the other fellow's hand is bigger than yours. Shukhov knows life and never opens his belly to what doesn't belong to him.
Meanwhile he pulled off his boats, climbed up to his bunk, took the strip of hacksaw out of his mitten, and decided that tomorrow he'd look around for a good pebble and start whetting down the blade to make a cobbler's knife. Four days' work, he figured, if he sat over it mornings and evenings, and he'd have a fine little knife with a sharp, curved blade.
But now he had to conceal that find of his, if only till morning. He'd slip it into the edge of the partition under the crossbeam. And as the captain hadn't returned yet to his bunk down below and the sawdust wouldn't fall on his face, Shukhov turned back the head of his mattress and set about hiding the thing.
His top-bunk neighbors could see what he was doing: Alyosha the Baptist and--across the aisle, in the next tier--the two Estonians. But he didn't worry about them.
Petiukov walked through the barracks. He was sobbing, all hunched up, his mouth smeared with blood. So he'd been beaten up again--over the bowls! With no attempt to hide his tears, and looking at no one, he passed the whole squad, crawled into his bunk, and buried his face in his mattress.
When you thought about it, you couldn't help feeling sorry for him. He wouldn't live to see the end of his stretch. His attitude was all wrong.
Just then the captain turned up. He looked cheerful as he carried a pot of tea, special tea, you can bet! Two tea barrels stood in the barracks, but what sort of tea could you call it? Sewage: warm water with a touch of coloring, dishwater smelling of the barrel--of steamed wood and rot. That was tea for the workers. But the captain must have taken a pinch of real tea from Tsezar, put it in his pot, and hurried to the hot-water faucet. And now, well satisfied, he settled down beside his locker.
"Nearly scalded my fingers at the faucet," he boasted. Down there Tsezar spread a sheet of paper, and began laying this and that on it. Shukhov turned the head of his mattress back. He didn't want to see what was going on; he didn't want to upset himself. But even now they couldn't get along without him; Tsezar rose to his full height, his eyes level with Shukhov's, and winked.
"Ivan Denisovich! Er . . . . . lend me your 'ten days.'"
That meant a small penknife. Yes, Shukhov had one--he kept it concealed in the partition. A bit shorter than half a finger but it cut salt pork five fingers thick. He'd made the blade himself, mounted it and whetted it sharp.
He crawled to the beam. He fished the knife out. He handed it over. Tsezar nodded and ducked below.
That knife's a breadwinner too. After all, you can be put in the cells for keeping it, and only a man without a conscience would say: lend us your knife, we're going to slice some sausage, and you can go f*ck off.
Now Tsezar was again in his debt.
Having settled the bread and knife business, Shukhov opened his tobacco pouch. First he took a pinch of tobacco out of it, equal to what he'd borrowed, and stretched a hand across the aisle to Eino the Estonian. Thanks.
The Estonian's lips stretched in a sort of smile. He muttered something to his "brother," and together they rolled the pinch of tobacco into a cigarette. Let's try Shukhov's tobacco.
No worse than yours. Try it, if you please. He'd like to try it himself, but some timekeeper in his brain told him that the evening count would very soon be starting. This was just the time the guards poked around the barracks. If he was going to smoke now he'd have to go Into the corridor, but up there in his bunk he somehow felt warmer. The barracks was, as a matter of fact, far from warm--that film of frost was still on the ceiling. He'd shiver In the night, but now it was bearable.
Shukhov stayed in his bunk and began crumbling little bits off his bread. He listened unwillingly to Tsezar and Buinovsky, talking below over their tea.
"Help yourself, captain. Help yourself, don't hold back. Take some of this smoked fish. Have a slice of sausage."
"Thanks, I will."
"Spread some butter on that bread. It's real Moscow bread."
"D'you know, I simply can't believe they're still baking pure white bread anywhere. Such luxury reminds me of a time when I happened to be in Archangel. . . ."
The two hundred voices in Shukhov's half of the barracks were making a terrific din, but he fancied he heard the rail being struck. No one else seemed to have heard it. He also noticed that "Snubnose," the guard, had come into the barracks. He was no more than a boy, small and rosy-cheeked. He was holding a sheet of paper, and it was clear from this and his manner that he'd come, not to turn them all out for the evening count or catch smokers, but to get someone.
"Snubnose" checked something on his list and said: "Where's the hundred and fourth?"
"Here," they answered. The Estonians hid their cigarettes and waved away the smoke.
"Where's the squad leader?"
"Well?" said Tiurin from his bunk, lowering his feet reluctantly.
"Your people signed those forms--about the extra stuff they were wearing?"
"They'll sign them," said Tiurin with assurance.
"They're overdue."
"My men haven't had much education. It's not an easy job. (This about Tsezar and the captain! What a squad leader! Never at a loss for an answer.) No pens. No ink."
"Ought to have them."
"They take them, away from us."
"Well, look out, squad leader. If you go on talking like that I'll put you in the guardhouse with the rest," "Snubnose" promised Tiurin, but mildly. "Now about those forms--see they're handed in to the guardroom before roll call tomorrow morning. And give orders that all prohibited garments are to be surrendered to personal property. Get that?"
"I get it."
(The captain was in luck, thought Shukhov. He hadn't heard a word, he was having such a fine time with his sausage.)
"Let's see now," said the guard. "S 311. He one of yours?"
"Have to look at my list," said Tiurin vaguely. "Expect me to keep all those damned numbers in my head?"
(He was playing for time. He wanted to save Buinovsky one night at least, by dragging things out till the count.)
"Buinovsky. He here?"
"Eh? Here I am," called the captain from his haven under Shukhov's bunk.
There you are; the quickest louse is always the first to be caught in the comb.
"You? Yes, that's right. S 311. Get ready."
"Where am I to go?"
"You know where."
The captain sighed. He grunted. Nothing more. It must have been easier for him to take out a squadron of destroyers into the dark, stormy night than to tear himself away from this friendly chat and set out for the icy cells.
"How many days?" he asked, his voice falling.
"Ten. Come on, come on. Get going."
At that moment the barracks orderlies shouted: "Evening count. All out for evening count."
This meant that the guard who was to count them had already entered the barracks.
The captain looked around. Should he take his coat? Anyway, they'd strip it off him when be got there, leaving him only his jacket. Better go as he was. He'd hoped that Volkovoi would forget (but Volkovoi never forgot anyone) and he had made no preparations, hadn't even hidden a pinch of tobacco in his jacket. And to carry it in his hands--that would be useless; they'd take it from him the minute they frisked him.
All the same . . . Tsezar slipped him a couple of cigarettes as he put on his hat.
"Well, brothers, good-by," said the captain with an embarrassed iiod to his fellow prisoners, and followed the guard out.
A few voices shouted: Keep your chin up. But what could you really say to him? They knew the cells, the 104th did; they'd built them. Brick walls, cement floor, no windows, a stove they lit only to melt the ice on the walls and make pools on the floor. You slept on bare boards, and if you'd any teeth left to eat with after all the chattering they'd be doing, they gave you nine ounces of bread day after day and hot stew only on the third, sixth, and ninth.
Ten days. Ten days "hard" In the cells--If you sat them out to the end, your health would be ruined for the rest of your life. T.B. and nothing but hospital for you till you kicked the bucket.
As for those who got fifteen days "hard" and sat them out--they went straight into a hole in the cold earth.
As long as you're in the barracks--praise the Lord and sit tight.
"Come on now, out you get, before I count three," shouted the barracks commander. "Anyone who isn't out will have his number taken. I'll give it to the guard."
The barracks commander was one of the biggest bastards. After all, just think, he's locked in with us all night, but the way he acts, not afraid of anyone! On the contrary, everyone's afraid of him. Some of us he betrays to the guards, others he wallops himself. He lost a thumb in a scrap and is classed as an invalid, but his face is the face of a thug. Actually he _is_ a thug with a criminal record, but among the charges against him was one under Article 58, 14, and that's how he landed in with us.
He wouldn't think twice about taking your number and passing it to the guard--and that means two days in the guardhouse, with work. So instead of just trailing to the door one by one they all rushed out in a crowd, tumbling down from the bunks as if they were bears and pressing to the narrow exit.
Shukhov, the cigarette in his palm--he'd craved it so long and had already rolled it--sprang nimbly down, and slipped his feet into the valenki. He was on the point of leaving when he felt a twinge of pity for Tsezar. It wasn't that he wanted to make anything more out of the man; he felt genuinely sorry for him. For all his high opinion of himself, Tsezar didn't know a thing about life--after collecting his parcel he shouldn't have gloated over it; he should have taken it to the storeroom right away before the evening count. Eating's something that can wait. But now what was Tsezar going to do with all that stuff? He couldn't carry his sack with him to the count. What a horselaugh that would bring! Four hundred zeks roaring their heads off. But to. leave it in the barracks no matter how briefly meant that the first to run back from the count would swipe it. (At Ust-Izhma it was even crueler: there, when we came back from work, the crooks got in first and cleaned out all our lockers.)
Shukhov saw that Tsezar realized the danger. He was bustling here and there, but too late. He was stuffing the sausage and salt pork under his jacket. That at least he could save by taking it to the count.
Pityingly, Shukhov gave him some advice: "Sit here till the last moment, Tsezazr Markovich. Hide here in the shadow and stay till everyone has left. And when the guard comes by the bunks with the orderlies and pokes into everything, come out and say you're feeling bad. I'll go out first and I'll be back first. That's the way. . . ."
And he ran off.
At first he elbowed his way through the crowd mercilessly (protecting his cigarette in his fist, however). In the corridor, which served both halves of the barracks, and near the door, the men in front were hanging back, the cagy beasts, clinging in two rows to the walls on each side, leaving just enough room for any fool who liked the cold to squeeze through. They were going to stay here; they've been out all day. Why should they freeze needlessly for another ten minutes? No fools here! You croak today but _I_ mean to live till tomorrow.
At any other time Shukhov too would have clung to the wall. But now he strode to the door and even grinned.
"What are you scared of, you idiots? Never seen Siberian frost before? Come outside and warm yourselves by the wolf's sun. Give us a light, uncle."
He lit his cigarette at the door and moved out onto the porch. "Wolf's sun," that's what they'd called the moon in Shukhov's village.
The moon rode high now. As high again, and it would be at its zenith. The sky was greenish-white; the rare stars shone brilliantly. The snow gleamed white, the barracks walls gleamed white. The lamps had little effect.
There was a dense black crowd outside one of the barracks. The zeks had come out for the count. They were coming out over there too. But it wasn't the sound of voices you heard from the barracks--it was the creaking of boots on the snow.
Some prisoners were coming down the steps and lining up, opposite the barracks. Five in front, then three behind. Shukhov joined the three. After an extra bit of bread, and with a cigarette between your lips, it wasn't so bad standing there. Good tobacco--the Lett hadn't gypped him. Strong, and smelled good.
Gradually, other prisoners trailed through the door. Two or three more lines of five were forming behind him. They came out angry now. Why were those rats jostling in the corridor? Why weren't they coming out? Why should we have to freeze for them?
No zek ever saw a clock or a watch. What use were they to him anyway? All he needs to know is: will reveille sound soon? How long to roll call? How long to dinner? To the last clanging of the rail?
The evening count, everyone said, was at nine. But it never finished at nine--they would sometimes recount two or even three times. You never got away before ten. And at five o'clock next morning they hounded you out of your bunk with the first clanging of the rail. No wonder that Moldavian had dozed off down at the shop before work was over today. Wherever a zek gets a bit of warmth into him he falls asleep on the spot. You lose so much sleep during the week that on a Sunday--provided they don't send you to work--whole barrackfuls of zeks sleep the day through.
Now they're streaming forward. At last! The barracks commander and the guard were dragging them out, kicking them in the ass. Serve 'em right, the tricky bastards.
"What?" the zeks in front shouted at the late corners. "Pretty smart, huh? Want to lick the cream off the shit, you rats? If you'd come out earlier we'd be through now."
The whole barracks had been emptied. Four hundred men--eighty ranks of five. They lined up in a column, the ones in front strictly in fives, the others any old way.
"Get into line there, you at the back," the barracks commander shouted from the steps.
They didn't move, f*ck 'em.
Tsezar came out shivering, pretending he was sick. At his heels were four orderlies, two from each half of the barracks, and a prisoner who limped. They stood in front so that Shukhov was now a row farther back. Tsezar was sent to the rear of the column.
The guard came out too.