Читать книгу Two American Boys in the War Zone - Levi Worthington Green - Страница 6

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“We’re going to be robbed by bandits, Sid!” exclaimed Raymond when he saw that they were about to be halted by the men in front of them.

“They can’t be bandits; they must be soldiers, for they’re in uniform.”

“I guess Russian soldiers would be as bad as bandits.”

The officer, who, the boys thought, must be a lieutenant, said something to them in Russian which of course they did not understand. Then he made a motion which seemed to indicate that he wanted them to dismount. “He is telling us to get off,” said Sidney. “I’m not going to get off,” declared Raymond. “Show him your passport.”

Sidney took out the passport and presented it to the officer, who received and read it. He then returned it with a polite bow and with a statement of which the boys understood only the words meaning “government” and “army.” Still he motioned for the boys to get off their horses.

“We are Americans,” declared Sidney to the officer, “and are returning home. The Russian Government has ordered that all Americans be helped to leave the country.” The man replied in his own language, which was Greek to the boys, and they concluded that he did not understand them any better than they did him.

When the officer saw that the boys did not obey his request he gave an order to his own men, and one of the soldiers dismounted and took Sidney’s horse by the bit, motioning to the boy to get off.

“I tell you what, Ray,” said Sidney, “he’s going to seize our horses for the Government to use in the army. See, some of those loose horses have saddles, they’ve taken them away from somebody else.”

“He’s not going to have my horse.” And Raymond dug his heels into the horse and struck him with the end of the reins. The spirited animal leaped forward and dashed to one side of the road to pass the little group of mounted men and their herd of horses. The officer gave a sharp order and the men whipped out their pistols. Sidney, when he saw the threatening movement, shouted to his brother,—

“.”

Raymond either did not hear or did not care, for he struck his horse another blow and dashed past the obstructing group. Just as he reached the clear road beyond, the officer gave another sharp order and the soldiers fired a volley, all together.

Sidney turned sick and faint, expecting to see his brother fall from his horse pierced by half a dozen bullets. Instead, the boy pulled his horse up with a jerk and took off his hat, which he examined ruefully.

“They plugged my hat,”—and he exhibited a hole through the brim,—“but if I had my pistol here I’d show them better shooting than that.”

“What made you run, Ray?” Sidney remonstrated, who was trembling with fright; “I don’t see how you escaped being killed.” “Pshaw! these fellows couldn’t kill anybody. I’ll let them see how we shoot in Texas.”

Raymond jumped off his horse, and going up to one of the soldiers took hold of the pistol which the man was still holding in his hand, at the same time asking him, of course in English, for the loan of it a few minutes. The soldier looked inquiringly at his officer, who made no comment, and the man yielded the gun.

“Gee! if it isn’t a Colt .38.” And the boy gazed longingly on the revolver. “That sure looks like home.”

He held back the hammer and ran the cylinder around two or three times in wistful admiration, then he picked up two small rocks and throwing them into the air he fired twice in quick succession, shattering both rocks while they were still high in air.

There were exclamations of wonder from the soldiers, and the officer said something which was apparently very complimentary.

“I’ve just got to have that gun, Sid,”—and Raymond handled the revolver lovingly,—“I’m going to see if I can’t buy it.”

He took twenty rubles from his purse and holding the gold out to the soldier, pointed to the revolver. The soldier looked covetously at the money, but the officer shook his head, and taking the revolver from Raymond he showed some letters cut in the barrel, which evidently marked it as belonging to the Government.

“They wouldn’t dare to sell government property,” said Sidney, “and anyway we can’t spare money to buy guns.”

“I suppose we can’t, but I’m thinking we may wish we had some before we get through the mountains.”

Raymond turned around to his horse, which he had left standing when he dismounted to give his exhibition of shooting, and was surprised to find that one of the soldiers had the animal in charge and had led him over to the bunch.

“Well, they’ve got my horse, all right. I guess you’ll have to turn yours over too, Sid.”

“I suppose so, but it’s certainly a shame.”

Sidney dismounted and left his horse with the soldier, who still retained hold of the bridle. The officer gave an order and two of the men untied the rolls of blankets and cloaks from back of the saddles and laid them on the ground. They then emptied the saddlebags and placed the contents with the blankets, but did not remove the bags themselves. The officer then made out and signed a paper which he gave to Sidney, and which the boys assumed was a receipt for the horses.

“You want to take good care of that paper, Sid,” said Raymond; “it will be a fine souvenir of the trip, and I expect that’s about all it will be good for.”

When that was done the soldiers sprang into their saddles, rounded up all of the loose horses, including the two which had so recently belonged to the boys, and galloped off, the officer giving a courteous salutation to the boys as they departed.

Sidney and Raymond stood in the road and looked after their vanishing steeds, then at the rolls of blankets which lay on the ground near them. For a few minutes neither spoke, then Raymond said,—“We’re stranded all right this time, Sid. This beats Lower California.”

“It certainly does, and look at that range we’ve got to cross.” And Sidney gazed doubtfully at the far Caucasus, whose northern heights were white even at that distance.

“I move we go back to Nizhni-Novgorod,” said Raymond, “and wait for father.”

“I don’t believe it would be wise to try that,” replied Sidney. “By the time we reached the Volga probably all of the boats would be taken over by the Government to carry troops; you remember the captain said that Russia would mobilize more than five million men. We might not even be able to reach Astrakhan. It seems to me the quicker we get into the mountains the better, for I imagine they will take soldiers out of those mountains only as a last resort.” “Well, it’s going to be dark pretty soon, and we’d better hustle for this town ahead; what’s its name?—Timmy Can Show you.”

Sidney laughed, “I’m sure I hope Timmy can show us, for we may, like the Missourian, need to be shown.”

“It’s simply fierce that we’ve got to tote these things.” And Raymond kicked the blankets vindictively. “And what are we going to do with the plunder that came out of the saddlebags?”

The saddlebags had not contained very much,—only the few things that Sidney had carried in his handbag when they arrived at Nizhni-Novgorod: a suit of pajamas for each of them, socks, handkerchiefs, brush and comb, and their toothbrushes. Those few things, however, added to their blankets and cloaks, seemed to Raymond to be the culminating straw.

“We must hang on to those pajamas,” continued Raymond; “they’ll be great when we make our bed toilets on cold nights under the lee side of a rock.”

“I’ll tell you what they will be great for, Ray, and that is to put on under our other clothes when the weather does get cold.”

“Well, I suppose we’d better take them along,” said Raymond grudgingly; “and we may as well start.”

The small articles the boys crowded into their pockets, and each made a long roll of his blankets and cloak, and carried it over one shoulder, tying the ends together under the opposite arm. In that way the bundle rode well, with very little inconvenience to the traveler.

When their packs were arranged the boys started out, and passing through a small ravine, on emerging into a broader valley, they were cheered to observe the town which was the goal of their day’s journey. For the capital of a large province like Daghestan, Timour Khan Shoura appeared very insignificant, and when they reached the inn, they found it to be primitive in the extreme.

Sidney presented their passport to the landlord, who seemed properly impressed, though it was plain that he could not read it. The news of their arrival must have been spread very promptly, for immediately there appeared men of all sorts and conditions, who apparently came solely to view the travelers. In this crowd was the chief of police, to whom the passport was turned over, and who seemed to consider it satisfactory. He read the paper aloud, and its effect on the assemblage was great. There was instantly a Babel of talk, and the boys were familiar enough with the sound of Russian to know that a large part of the conversation was in some other language.

The chief of police asked them a long string of questions of which they understood only an occasional word. Sidney assumed, however, that the official was asking who they were, where they came from, and where they were going, so he politely imparted that information, to Raymond’s great amusement.

“See how wise the old owl looks, Sid, and I’ll wager he doesn’t understand a word you say.”

“I hope he doesn’t understand a word you say. You ought to be careful, Ray; we may sometime run up against a man who does understand English.”

“I’d like to meet him now; his voice would sound good.”

The chief looked at the boys while they were talking, with a certain amount of suspicion, as though he thought they might be plotting something revolutionary, then he asked another question, of which Sidney caught the word for “horses.”

“He’s asking if we have no horses,” said Sidney, and he related how their horses had been taken, giving it all in English except the words “government,” “army,” and “horses,” of which he knew the Russian equivalents.

The chief appeared to grasp his meaning without any difficulty, and to be rather amused by it, for he made a remark to the surrounding men, who all laughed, and the talking began afresh.

“They think it’s a great joke,” growled Raymond, “that our horses were stolen. Maybe they’ll lose some if they don’t look out.”

“I expect they have lost some already,” said Sidney, “and that is the reason they are so interested.”

“Don’t you suppose, Sid, that we can buy horses here?”

“I doubt it, and I don’t believe we had better buy more horses even if we can get them, for we should probably lose them in the same way.”

“But I don’t see how we are going to cross that range on foot, Sid. If we only had a pack-mule now,—old Tuerto, for instance,—we should get along fine.”

“What seems the worst to me,” said Sidney, “is the time it will take.”

“Yes, that will be bad; but I must say I don’t hanker after climbing those mountains on foot, even if we had all the time there is.”

“Well, I’ll ask about horses, if I can make them understand.”

Sidney took some gold out of his pocket and showed it to the chief, using the Russian word for “horses” and holding up two fingers. The man shook his head and made a vigorous statement in which occurred the familiar Russian words for “government” and “army.”

“I guess he is saying that the Government has taken their horses too, but I did a foolish thing to show that money.”

“There are certainly some villainous faces in the crowd,” said Raymond. “I think we had better buy guns.”

“I don’t know but you are right, Ray. Suppose we buy one gun; I guess we can spare money for that.”

“We can better spare money for that than to lose all we have.”

“Then we’d better go out and find one now, before it gets dark.”

The streets of Timour Khan Shoura were so narrow and dark that the boys feared they had waited too long as it was. They found, however, to their great surprise, that the bazaars of the town were well stocked with excellent guns, though their pattern was somewhat Oriental. They did not know until afterward that many of the weapons were manufactured there.

After a short search they purchased a five-shot, .38 caliber revolver with a silver-trimmed stock. The decorative part of the gun they would have been willing to omit in order to save expense, but they could find none simpler that satisfied Raymond. With the purchase of a box of cartridges, five of which went immediately into the cylinder of the new gun, Raymond said he felt more like himself.

When they returned to the inn the landlord indicated that supper was prepared, and after they had partaken of that they went to their room, which was on the second floor. Sidney had been made rather nervous when he thought about his mistake in showing money to the crowd of strangers, and his first care was to assure himself that the room was secure. He found to his relief that the window overlooked a clear space with no other building near. The door was very solid, but the lock appeared to be more ornamental than effective.

“I don’t think much of that lock, Ray,” he said, “and I don’t want to run the risk of a visit in the night from one of those men.”

“We can soon fix that.” And Raymond dragged up the only chair, a very heavy oak one, and braced it under the door handle in such a way that the door could not be opened from without. They then swung the window back for air, as there seemed to be no possibility of danger from that quarter.

“I’m going to divide my money,” said Sidney, “and you had better do the same. We can’t tell what may happen on the road.” He knotted the greater part of the gold which he carried in a handkerchief and suspended it from his neck underneath all of his clothes.

“Now, if we are held up, unless we are stripped, the robbers will think the forty rubles I have left in my purse is all I have. It’s lucky father insisted on dividing his money with us. If he hadn’t we should not have any now to hide from robbers.”

“We shan’t be so likely to be held up,” said Raymond, “now I have this gun. I wish I had had a chance to show them the way I can use it. They would have greater respect for me.”