‘I warn you, captain,’ one of the officers was saying, a thin, little man, visibly wrathful.
‘Well, I have told you, I won’t give them up,’ answered D.enisov.
‘You will have to answer for it, captain. It’s mutiny—carrying off transports from your own army! Our men have had no food for two days.’
‘Mine have had nothing for a fortnight,’ answered Denisov.
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‘It’s brigandage; you will answer for it, sir!’ repeated the infantry officer, raising his voice.
‘But why do you keep pestering me? Eh?’ roared Denisov, suddenly getting furious. ‘It’s I will have to answer for it, and not you; and you’d better not cry out till you’re hurt. Be off! ’ he shouted at the officers.
‘All right!’ the little officer responded, not the least intimidated, and not moving away. ‘It’s robbery, so I tell you. . . .’
‘Go to the devil, quick march, while you’re safe and sound.’ And Denisov moved towards the officer.
‘All right, all right,’ said the officer threateningly; and he turned his horse and trotted away, swaying in the saddle.
‘A dog astride a fence, a dog astride a fence to the life! ’ Denisov called after him—the bitterest insult a cavalry man can pay an infantry man on horseback; and riding up to Rostov he broke into a guffaw.
‘Carried off the transports, carried them off from the infantry by force.! ’ he said. ‘Why, am I to let the men die of hunger?’
The stores carried off by the hussars had been intended for an infantry regiment, but learning from Lavrushka that the transport was unescorted, Denisov and his hussars had carried off the stores by force. Biscuits were dealt out freely to the soldiers; they even shared them with the other squadrons.
Next day the colonel sent for Denisov, and putting his fingers held apart before his eyes, he said to him: ‘I look at the matter like this; see, I know nothing, and will take no steps; but I advise you to ride over to the staff, and there, in the commissariat department, to smooth the thing over, and if possible give a receipt for so much stores. If not, and a claim is entered for the infantry regiments, there will be a fuss, and it may end unpleasantly.’
Denisov went straight from the colonel to the staff with a sincere desire to follow his advice.
In the evening he came back to his hut in a condition such as Rostov had never seen his friend in before. Denisov could not speak, and was gasping for breath. When Rostov asked him what was wrong with him, he could only in a faint and husky voice utter incoherent oaths and threats.
Alarmed at Denisov’s condition, Rostov suggested he should undress, drink some water, and sent for the doctor.
‘Me to be court-martialled for brigandage—oh! some more water! — Let them court-martial me; I will, I always will, beat blackguards, and I’ll tell the Emperor.—Ice,’ he kept saying.
The regimental doctor said it was necessary to bleed him. A deep saucer of black blood was drawn from Denisov’s hairy arm, and only then did he recover himself sufficiently to relate what had happened.
‘I got there,’ Denisov said. ‘ “Well, where are your chief’s quarters,” 1 asked. They showed me. “Will you please to wait?” “I have come on business, and I have come over thirty versts, I haven’t time to wait; announce me.” Very good; but the over-thief appears; he, too, thought fit to lecture me. “This is robbery!” says he. “The robber,”.said I, “is not
the man who takes the stores to feed his soldiers, but the man who takes them to fill his pockets.” “Will you please to be silent?” Very good. “Give a receipt,” says he, “to the commissioner, but the affair will be reported at headquarters.” I go before the commissioner. I go in. Sitting at the table . . . Who? No, think of it! . . Who is it that’s starving us to death?’ roared Denisov, bringing the fist of his lanced arm down so violently that the table almost fell over, and the glasses jumped on it. ‘Telyanin! . . . “What, it’s you that’s starving us to death?” said I, and I gave him one on the snout, and well it went home, and then another, so . . . “Ah! . . . you so-and-so . . .” and I gave him a thrashing. But I did have a bit of fun, though, I can say that,’ cried Denisov, his white teeth showing in a smile of malignant glee under his black moustaches. ‘I should have killed him, if they hadn’t pulled me off.’
‘But why are you shouting; keep quiet,’ said Rostov; ‘it’s bleeding again. Stay, it must be bound up.’
Denisov was bandaged up and put to bed. Next day he waked up calm and in good spirits.
