Читать книгу The Tartar Steppe - Dino Buzzati - Страница 9

Chapter Three

The first thing Drogo did was to report to the adjutant, Major Matti. The orderly officer, an easy-going, friendly young man called Carlo Morel, accompanied him through the heart of the fortress. Leaving the entrance hall, from which one caught a glimpse of a great empty courtyard, the two went down a long corridor whose end was lost to sight. The ceiling was hidden in shadow; at intervals a little beam of light came in through a narrow window.

It was not until they had climbed to the next floor that they met a soldier carrying a bundle of papers. From the damp and naked walls, the silence, the dim lighting, it seemed as if the inmates had forgotten that somewhere in the world there existed flowers, laughing women, gay and hospitable houses. Here everything spoke of renunciation, but for whom, to what mysterious end? Now they were traversing the second floor along a corridor exactly similar to the first. From somewhere behind the walls there came the distant echo of a laugh; to Drogo it seemed unreal.

Major Matti was plump and smiled with an excess of good nature. His office was huge, the desk big in proportion and covered with orderly heaps of paper. There was a coloured print of the king, and the major’s sword hung on a wooden peg driven in for the purpose.

Drogo came to attention and reported. He produced his personal documents and began to explain that he had not made any request to be posted to the fortress – he was determined to have himself transferred as soon as possible – but Major Matti interrupted him.

‘I knew your father years ago. A very fine gentleman. I am sure you will wish to live up to his memory. A President of the High Court, if I remember rightly?’

‘No, sir,’ said Drogo, ‘he was a doctor, my father.’

‘Ah, yes, of course, I was forgetting, a doctor, of course, of course.’ For a moment Matti seemed to be embarrassed, and Drogo noted how he kept raising his left hand to his collar as if trying to hide a round, greasy stain, evidently a fresh one, on the breast of his uniform.

The major recovered himself quickly.

‘I am very pleased to see you,’ he said. ‘You know what His Majesty Peter III said? “Fort Bastiani the guardian of my crown.” I may add that it is an honour to belong to it. Don’t you agree?’

He said these things automatically, as if they were a formula learned years before which he must produce on certain set occasions.

‘Yes, sir,’ said Giovanni, ‘you are quite right, but I must confess it was a surprise to me. I have my family in the city and should prefer if possible to stay …’

‘So you want to leave us before you arrive, do you? I must say I’m sorry, very sorry.’

‘It isn’t that I wish to. I would not dream of arguing. I mean that I …’

‘I understand,’ said the major and sighed as if this were an old story and he could sympathise with it. ‘I understand. You had thought the Fort would be different and now you are a bit frightened. But tell me honestly – how can you form an opinion of it if you have only arrived a few minutes ago?’

‘I haven’t the slightest objection to the Fort, sir,’ said Drogo. ‘Only I should prefer to stay in the city or at least near it. You understand? I am talking to you in confidence, because I see you understand these things. I put myself in your hands.’

‘Of course, of course,’ exclaimed Matti with a short laugh. ‘That’s what we are here for. We don’t want anyone here against his will – not even the least important sentry. Still, I’m sorry. You seem a good lad to me.’

The major fell silent a moment as if to consider the best solution. It was at this point, as he turned his head a little to the left, that Drogo’s glance fell on the window opening on to the inner courtyard. He could see the northern wall, yellowish like the others and sun-beaten like them, with here and there the black rectangle of a window. There was a clock as well, pointing to two o’clock, and on the topmost terrace a sentry walking to and fro with his rifle at the slope. But over the ramparts, far, far away, in the glare of noon, there rose a rocky crest. Only its extreme tip could be seen and in itself it was nothing out of the ordinary. Yet for Giovanni Drogo that fragment of rock represented the first visible lure of the northern territory, the legendary kingdom whose existence hung heavily over the Fort. What was the rest like? he wondered. From it there came a drowsy light shining through slow-moving smoky wisps of mist. Then the major began to speak again.

‘Tell me,’ he asked Drogo, ‘would you like to go back straight away or would it be the same to you if you waited a month or two? For us, I repeat, it is all the same – from the official point of view, that is,’ he added so as not to sound discourteous.

‘Since I have to go back,’ said Giovanni, pleasantly surprised at the lack of difficulties, ‘since I have to go back it seems to me I had better go at once.’

‘Quite right, quite right,’ said the major soothingly. ‘But now I must tell you something. If you want to go right away the best thing is for you to go sick. You go into the sick bay under observation for a day or two and the doctor gives you a certificate. There are a lot of people in any case who can’t stand up to the altitude.’

‘Do I really have to go sick?’ asked Drogo, who did not like this sort of fiction.

‘You don’t have to, but it makes everything easier. Otherwise you would have to make a written request for a posting. That has to be sent to the High Command, the High Command has to reply – that means at least a fortnight. Above all, the colonel has to go into the matter, and that I would prefer to avoid. Because he does find these things unpleasant – they hurt him, that’s it, they hurt him just as if you were doing an injury to his Fort. Well then, if I were you, if you want me to be frank, I would try to avoid it.’

‘But excuse me, sir,’ said Drogo, ‘I didn’t know that. If my going away might cause me trouble then it’s another matter.’

‘Not at all, you have misunderstood me. In neither case will your career suffer. It is only a case of a – of a shade of meaning. Of course, and I told you this right away, the colonel will not be pleased. But if you have really made up your mind …’

‘No, no,’ said Drogo, ‘if things are as you say perhaps the medical certificate is better.’

‘Unless …’ said Matti with a meaning smile and leaving his sentence in mid-air.

‘Unless?’

‘Unless you were to put up with staying here four months – which would be the best solution.’

‘Four months?’ asked Drogo, already somewhat disappointed, since he had thought to be leaving at once.

‘Four months,’ Matti confirmed. ‘The procedure is much more regular that way. I’ll explain to you direct. Twice a year there is a medical inspection – it is laid down. The next will be in four months’ time. That seems to me to be your best opportunity. I give you my word that, if you like, your report will be adverse. You can set your mind absolutely at rest.’

‘Besides,’ continued the major after a pause, ‘besides, four months are four months – long enough for a personal report. You can be certain that the colonel will do one on you. And you know how important that can be for your career. But let us get this quite, quite clear – you are perfectly free …’

‘Yes, sir,’ said Drogo, ‘I understand perfectly.’

‘Service here is not hard,’ the major emphasised, ‘almost always guard duties. And the New Redoubt, which demands more of one, will certainly not be entrusted to you to begin with. There will be no hard tasks, don’t be afraid – you won’t ever be bored.’

But Drogo was scarcely listening to Matti’s explanations, for his attention was strangely attracted by the picture framed in the window with that tiny piece of crag showing above the wall. A vague feeling to which he did not have the key was gradually penetrating into his inmost being – a stupid and absurd feeling, a baseless fancy.

At the same time he felt somewhat calmer. He was still anxious to go, but not so desperately as before. He was almost ashamed at the fears he had had on his arrival. He could not believe that he was not as good a man as all the others. If he left at once, he now thought, it might be looked upon as a confession of inferiority. Thus his own conceit of himself fought with his longing for the old familiar existence.

‘Sir,’ said Drogo, ‘thank you for your advice, but let me think it over till tomorrow.’

‘Very well,’ said Matti with evident satisfaction. ‘And this evening? Do you want to meet the colonel in the mess or would you prefer to leave things in the air?’

‘I don’t know,’ answered Giovanni, ‘it seems to me there’s no use my hiding myself, particularly if I have to stay four months?’

‘That’s better,’ said the major. ‘You’ll get confidence that way. You will see what nice people they are, all first class officers.’

Matti smiled and Drogo saw that the time had come to leave. But first of all he asked:

‘Sir,’ his voice was apparently calm, ‘may I take a quick look to the north and see what there is beyond that wall?’

‘Beyond the wall? I didn’t know you were interested in views,’ answered the major.

‘Just a glance, sir, merely out of curiosity. I’ve heard there is a desert and I’ve never seen one.’

‘It isn’t worth it. A monotonous landscape – no beauty in it. Take my advice – don’t think about it.’

‘I won’t insist, sir,’ said Drogo. ‘I did not think there was anything against it.’

Major Matti put the tips of his plump fingers together almost as if in prayer.

‘You have asked me,’ he said, ‘the one thing I can’t grant you. Only personnel on duty may go on to the ramparts or into the guard rooms; you need to know the password.’

‘But not even as a special exception – not even for an officer?’

‘Not even for an officer. Oh, I know – for you people from the city all these petty rules seem ridiculous. Besides down there the password is no great secret. But here it is different.’

‘Excuse me, if I keep on about it.’

‘Do please, do.’

‘I wanted to say – isn’t there even a loophole, a window from which one can look?’

‘Only one. Only one in the colonel’s office. Unfortunately no one thought of a belvedere for the inquisitive. But it isn’t worth it, I repeat, a landscape with nothing to recommend it. You will have plenty of that view if you decide to stay.’

‘Thank you, sir, will that be all?’ And coming to attention, he saluted.

Matti made a friendly gesture with his hand.

‘Goodbye. Forget about it – a worthless landscape, I assure you, an extremely stupid landscape.’

But that evening Lieutenant Morel, who had come off orderly duty, secretly led Drogo on to the top of the wall to let him see.

An immensely long corridor, lit by infrequent lamps, ran all the length of the walls from one side of the pass to the other. Every so often there was a door – storerooms, workshops, guard rooms. They walked for about a hundred and fifty yards to the entrance of the third redoubt. An armed sentry stood before the door. Morel asked to speak to Lieutenant Grotta, who was commander of the guard.

Thus they were able to enter in defiance of the regulations. Giovanni found himself in the entrance to a narrow passageway; on one wall there was a board with the names of the soldiers on duty.

‘Come on, come this way,’ said Morel to Drogo, ‘we had better hurry.’

Drogo followed him up a narrow stair which came out into the open air on the ramparts of the redoubt. To the sentry who paced to and fro Lieutenant Morel made a sign as if to say there was no need for formalities.

Giovanni suddenly found himself looking on to the outer battlements; in front of him the valley fell away, flooded with moonlight, and the secrets of the north lay open before his eyes.

A kind of pallor came over Drogo’s face as he looked; he was as rigid as stone. The nearby sentry had halted and an unbroken silence seemed to have descended through the diffused half-light. Then without shifting his gaze Drogo asked:

‘And beyond – beyond that rock what is it like? Does it go on and on like this?’

‘I have never seen it,’ replied Morel. ‘You have to go to the New Redoubt – that one there on the peak. From there you see all the plain beyond. They say …’ And here he fell silent.

‘What do they say?’ asked Drogo, and his voice trembled with unusual anxiety.

‘They say it is all covered with stones – a sort of desert, with white stones, they say – like snow.’

‘All stones – and nothing else?’

‘That’s what they say – and an occasional patch of marsh.’

‘But right over – in the north they must see something.’

‘Usually there are mists on the horizon,’ said Morel, who had lost his previous warm enthusiasm. ‘There are mists which keep you from seeing.’

‘Mists,’ said Drogo incredulously. ‘They can’t always be there – the horizon must clear now and again.’

‘Hardly ever clear, not even in winter. But some people say they have seen things.’

‘Seen? What sort of things?’

‘They mean they’ve dreamt things. You go and hear what the soldiers have to say. One says one thing, one another. Some say they have seen white towers, or else they say there is a smoking volcano and that is where the mists come from. Even Ortiz, Captain Ortiz, maintains he saw something five years ago now. According to him there is a long black patch – forests probably.’

They were both silent. Where, Drogo asked himself, had he seen this world before? Had he lived there in his dreams or created it as he read some ancient tale. He seemed to make some things out – the low crumbling rocks, the winding valley in which there were neither trees nor verdure, those precipitous slopes and finally that triangle of desolate plain which the rocks before him could not conceal. Responses had been awakened in the very depth of his being and he could not grasp them.

At this moment Drogo was looking at the northern world – the uninhabited land across which, or so they said, no man had ever come. No enemy had ever come out of it; there had been no battles; nothing had ever happened.

‘Well,’ asked Morel attempting to assume a jovial tone, ‘you like it?’

‘I don’t know,’ was all Drogo could say. Within he was a whirl of confused desires and foolish fears.

There was a bugle call, a low bugle call, but he could not tell where.

‘You had better go now,’ advised Morel. But Giovanni did not seem to hear, intent as he was on searching his thoughts. The evening light was failing and the wind, re-awakened by the shadows, slid along the geometrical architecture of the Fort. In order to keep warm the sentry had begun to walk up and down again, gazing every now and then at Giovanni Drogo, whom he did not know.

‘You had better go now,’ repeated Morel, taking his comrade by the arm.