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Authors: J. M. Sidorova
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only Tatisheva and Lower Lake. Premier-Major Naumov said they are no more than a crowd of peasants with sticks, and Mr. Obukhov, the customs director, insisted they have cannons. I confronted Andrei afterward but he refused to discuss such matters with me. My maid Alena had relatives in Tatisheva, and yesterday she received her ten-year-old nephew, who came all by himself, and told Alena such things (I can only guess) that the poor girl only crosses herself, prays, and starts pulling too hard at my hair with the comb when I ask what is happening. Alexander, everything is so strange. Why is Commandant Wallenstern inspecting city walls if there is nothing to worry about?
Just now I tracked the ten-year-old to the kitchen. He sits at the table, somber like a little old man, slurping soup, a hunk of bread in his hand. His hair is wheat-blond, and his eyes are very pale blue, like those of a husky, and he has a sore under his nose, a wet, old sore. Seeing me, he stops eating. I ask him what had happened at Tatisheva, he snuffles. He looks at me with his pale eyes, but his stare drifts, he seems unable to fix it in one place. “Hacked up,” he says. “All the lords and two ladies. Master had his one eye hanging out like this”—he shows me with a soup spoon, dangling it by the handle in front of his face, how the eye was hanging. He is so very calm, Alexander, so very dispassionate, only his leg is kicking under the table.
Perhaps you could write to my husband. He would listen to you. But please do not worry about us too much, we are in good hands. We are in God’s hands, and the governor has a plan.
And the garrison here is three thousand strong. My husband is a very experienced soldier. Dear Alexander, they are hanging and quartering all nobles, all officers, all civil servants, wives, children and elderly. Please, please stay in touch.
Yours truly, Anna Velitzyn
What was happening was far bigger than a Cossack mutiny. It was an explosion of pent-up hatred against the existing order of things and those who were part of that order, including my brother, his wife, and his four-year-old son. Could I grasp the scale of it? No. I was still losing time to inertia and guesswork. Could I find anything—anything at all—justifiable in the rebel cause? Not at the time.
I lost sleep.
At an impolitely early hour, I called on the residence of my relative Alexander M., the governor, and my agitated looks and the declaration that my brother and his family were endangered, bought me the following confessions from the sympathetic madame governor: A certain fugitive Cossack with a criminal record, Emelyan Pugachev, had started a disturbance. He and his gang had taken a few fortresses. “But you must understand, darling Alexander, these fortresses are rarely more than villages surrounded by a wooden fence or, at best, by an earth rampart.They are only fortresses against nomads and their arrows, but against cannons and firearms my dear, they are nothing.”
“Oh, so the ‘gang’ does have cannons?”
“Shh, lower your voice, darling, you may upset my husband. I am just saying we should not overestimate the insurgents’ successes. Regular troops with artillery and cavalry under General Carr are already headed there. Carr has a lot of experience suppressing these kinds of outbreaks. They say he’s done just that kind of thing in Poland. In fact he must be already on-site. May I offer you some tea?”
• • •
Carr was not on-site. Only in late October was his army anywhere near the theater of military action (but not near enough to Orenburg), and even then he was defeated disastrously. In November he was back in Moscow, having abandoned his troops under a pretext of a bout of rheumatism.
I swear, I was writing to Anna. I was offering my help to get her and Andrei Junior out of Orenburg. Useless words! By then the sedition was no longer a secret. In Moscow, the arrival of the deserter Carr and the influx of refugees made
Just now I tracked the ten-year-old to the kitchen. He sits at the table, somber like a little old man, slurping soup, a hunk of bread in his hand. His hair is wheat-blond, and his eyes are very pale blue, like those of a husky, and he has a sore under his nose, a wet, old sore. Seeing me, he stops eating. I ask him what had happened at Tatisheva, he snuffles. He looks at me with his pale eyes, but his stare drifts, he seems unable to fix it in one place. “Hacked up,” he says. “All the lords and two ladies. Master had his one eye hanging out like this”—he shows me with a soup spoon, dangling it by the handle in front of his face, how the eye was hanging. He is so very calm, Alexander, so very dispassionate, only his leg is kicking under the table.
Perhaps you could write to my husband. He would listen to you. But please do not worry about us too much, we are in good hands. We are in God’s hands, and the governor has a plan.
And the garrison here is three thousand strong. My husband is a very experienced soldier. Dear Alexander, they are hanging and quartering all nobles, all officers, all civil servants, wives, children and elderly. Please, please stay in touch.
Yours truly, Anna Velitzyn
What was happening was far bigger than a Cossack mutiny. It was an explosion of pent-up hatred against the existing order of things and those who were part of that order, including my brother, his wife, and his four-year-old son. Could I grasp the scale of it? No. I was still losing time to inertia and guesswork. Could I find anything—anything at all—justifiable in the rebel cause? Not at the time.
I lost sleep.
At an impolitely early hour, I called on the residence of my relative Alexander M., the governor, and my agitated looks and the declaration that my brother and his family were endangered, bought me the following confessions from the sympathetic madame governor: A certain fugitive Cossack with a criminal record, Emelyan Pugachev, had started a disturbance. He and his gang had taken a few fortresses. “But you must understand, darling Alexander, these fortresses are rarely more than villages surrounded by a wooden fence or, at best, by an earth rampart.They are only fortresses against nomads and their arrows, but against cannons and firearms my dear, they are nothing.”
“Oh, so the ‘gang’ does have cannons?”
“Shh, lower your voice, darling, you may upset my husband. I am just saying we should not overestimate the insurgents’ successes. Regular troops with artillery and cavalry under General Carr are already headed there. Carr has a lot of experience suppressing these kinds of outbreaks. They say he’s done just that kind of thing in Poland. In fact he must be already on-site. May I offer you some tea?”
• • •
Carr was not on-site. Only in late October was his army anywhere near the theater of military action (but not near enough to Orenburg), and even then he was defeated disastrously. In November he was back in Moscow, having abandoned his troops under a pretext of a bout of rheumatism.
I swear, I was writing to Anna. I was offering my help to get her and Andrei Junior out of Orenburg. Useless words! By then the sedition was no longer a secret. In Moscow, the arrival of the deserter Carr and the influx of refugees made
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