Knight Without Armour

Then the train moved out and resumed its slow jog-jog over the badly-laid track. Towards noon the weather, which till then had been merely cold and cloudy, turned to rain, which at first was greeted with joy, for it removed all fears of a water-shortage. It was, plainly, the end of the long drought, and such torrents were falling within an hour that the thirsty had only to hold their tin cups through the slats to have them, after a few moments, half- filled. But the removal of thirst served only to accentuate hunger, from which many, especially the women, were already suffering torments.

A.J. had slept intermittently during the night and had tried to shelter Daly with his great-coat; she, too, had slept, but he was concerned by the way she had felt the cold. Throughout the morning the weather worsened in every way, and by late afternoon everyone (except the Tartar) was in the lowest depth of misery and depression. The roof of the car leaked water on the huddled occupants, and a slanting wind cut in like knives. It was sad to remember that twenty-four hours before men had been shielding their faces from the sun; for now the sun seemed a last good friend who had deserted them. No one could draw comfort from the grey and empty desolation of those plains that stretched mile beyond level mile until all was hazy in rain-swept distance.

Again and again the train came to sudden jangling stops, till at last the occupants were too tired and disspirited to say anything, even to ask each other why; they just lay where they were, crouching away from the wind, and trying not to listen to the tattoo of rain on the roof. But after one particularly long wait the engine-driver and fireman carne walking together along the track and to a few dismally enquiring faces announced that the train could proceed no further; a heavy storm just ahead had caused part of the line to subside. As for how long it would take to repair the damage, they could only shrug their shoulders and mutter ‘Nichevo.’ Where were they?—someone asked; and the same answer came—’Nichevo’—neither the driver nor the fireman had had any previous knowledge of that line. After which, cursing the rain that was drenching their thin clothes, they returned to the warmth and dryness of the engine-cab.

For the passengers in the box-cars, however, such consolations were not available. They were wet, cold, miserable, ravenous with hunger, and stranded in an unknown land. It was the little one-eyed man, who, still dreaming of Krokol, gave them their first lift of hope when, for a few seconds, the rain slackened. During that interval he alone chanced to be searching the horizon with his single eye and saw the towers and roofs of a town in the far distance. It gave him no thrill, for the place was decidedly not Krokol, but the others, when he told them, were swept into a flurry of anticipation. A town—perhaps a large town—food—shelter—warmth—their cravings soared dizzily as they began in frantic haste to gather up their bundles and clamber out of the train. How even a large town could instantly supply the wants of a thousand starving and penniless refugees was a question that did not, in that first intoxicating moment, occur to them.

A.J. shared, though more soberly, the general jubilation, but he had the more reason to, since money was in his pocket and he could buy if there were anything at all to be bought. Daly, tired and chilled, summoned all her strength for the effort, and they climbed out of the train with the others and began the dismal trek over the fields. To those already weak and feverish, it was a perilous journey. The rain continued to fall in heavy slanting swathes, through which, from time to time, the distant town showed like a mocking mirage; and the dry brown dust of the steppes had been transformed to a jelly of squelching mud, into which the feet sank ankle-deep with every pace. After the first mile the procession had thinned out into a trail of weary, mud- smeared stragglers, floundering along at scarcely a mile an hour.

It was dark when A.J. and Daly reached the outskirts of the town, and he had had to lift her practically every step during that last half-mile. She was so obviously on the verge of collapse that when he saw a large barn not far away he made for it eagerly, anxious to reach any place where she could rest out of the rain. There were already several shelterers in the barn—women and children, mostly, to whom weariness had grown to mean more than hunger, cold, or any other feeling. He laid her gently on a heap of sodden straw; the others were too tired to speak, and so was she. “Wait here till I come back,” he whispered, and she gave him a faintly answering smile.