Sabres in the Snow

Chapter Eight

Boniak slept uneasily, tossing and turning beneath the blanket. Dreams plagued him and he awoke with a start, stifling a cry. He rubbed his eyes and looked around him. Other members of the squadron were lying close-by, Rostov amongst them. The commander still had his pipe in his mouth and, for a moment, the youngster thought he was awake but as Boniak got to his feet, he peered over to see that his superior was sleeping. Mig lay close-by, snoring like a fog horn. One of the other cossacks dug him in the ribs and he shut up.

Boniak stood over the glowing embers of the fire, trying to warm his hands but it was as if the freezing night was sucking the warmth from the fire and digesting it. Powdery flecks of snow still gusted into his face, brought by the wind which hissed in the white-covered branches of nearby trees.

An owl hooted, its call startling a horse tethered to the tree. The animal whinneyed and Boniak saw one of the cossack guards walk across to it, pat its muzzle and whisper a few words to it. All the animals were standing in long rows, most of them with heads bowed, untethered. Cossacks moved quietly amongst them as they did amongst the sleeping men.

After the encounter with the Germans that morning, Namarov and his men had ridden West through the snow, the major fearfully watching the sky in case the blizzard which threatened should break. By dusk they found this place where they now camped. It was sheltered on one side by trees and, on the other, by the reverse slope of a ridge and offered some protection from the savage climate. The wounded had been treated as far as was possible and even some injured horses had been cared for. More men than horses had been killed in the engagement (about twelve, Namarov had counted) so there were spare animals should any of the cossacks choose to change mounts. Boniak’s own horse had been hurt slightly, a small flesh wound on its rump but it seemed unconcerned and had given him no trouble. He rubbed his hands once more over the remnants of the fire then wandered slowly away, walking up the gentle slope to the top of the crest.

He was surprised to find Namarov there.

The major turned when he heard footsteps approaching, crunching in the fresh snow.

“Trouble sleeping?” asked the officer.

Boniak nodded.

“I’m sorry if I distrubed you,” he said. “If you want to be alone…” He allowed the sentence to trail off.

Namarov smiled and shook his head.

“I was just checking on the guards and the horses. I do it every night. What’s your excuse?”

“I kept thinking about what happened this morning,” the youth told him. “The fight with the Germans.”

“I told you that killing a man was different to killing an animal.”

The youngster shook his head.

“No, I don’t mean that,” he said. “I mean before we attacked, even during the battle, I was so frightened. More frightened than I’ve ever been in my life.”

“You are not alone in your feelings. It doesn’t matter how long a man fights in a war, he never loses his fear,” Namarov said.

“But what about you? Rostov. Kuragin. Do you all feel that fear every time?”

“You would call it fear, Rostov would call it exhilaration,” the officer smiled. “Kuragin might even call it enjoyment but, somewhere inside them they feel the same emotion as you. Except they know it by a different name. Or at least they fool themselves into thinking of it as something other than fear.”

“And you?” asked the boy.

“I don’t want to die, but that doesn’t mean I fear death,” said the officer. “I have nothing to lose any more. Your fear is greater becuase you have more to lose.”

“I was wondering what I would do if I ever came face to face with Kleiser. I used to think it would be easy to kill him, now I’m not so sure.” The youth toyed with the hilt of his sabre.

“Don’t live for the hope that you will find him one day. You may go the rest of your life and never catch up with him. Revenge eats away at a man’s insides, it can destroy him if it is unfulfilled. If you meet Kleiser you will have no difficulty killing him but don’t let that single thought occupy your mind.”

Boniak sighed.

“But he murdered my parents, I will be failing them if I don’t kill him,” he said.

“And if someone gets to him before you. Will you feel cheated?”

“Yes.”

“Then you have a way to conquer your fear my young friend,” Namarov said, smiling. “You live for vengeance. Then make sure you think about that the next time we meet up with some Germans.” He pointed at the pouch on the youth’s belt which contained the bear claws. “There are all the memories you need. Guard them.”

He patted the boy on the shoulder and wandered off, back down the slope, leaving Boniak alone on the crest of the ridge. The boy opened the pouch and took out three or four of the claws, gripping them tightly in his fist. The vision of Kleiser swam into his mind and he clenched his fist tighter, hardly noticing when one of the claws punctured his palm. when he opened his hand again, a thin dribble of blood was oozing from the gash but Boniak ignored it. He dropped the claws back into the pouch and wandered back down the slope towards the barely glowing clutch of camp fires.

As the cossacks rode further West, the land flattened, only occasionally interrupted by the slight undulations of hills. Trees too grew more sparsely. They seemed to huddle together in groups as if seeking protection from the biting wind which swept across the white-blanketed landscape. Grey cloud rolled by menacingly overhead and most of the cossacks rode with scarves pulled over their faces to shield them from the worst ravages of the elements.

However, the worst wind and snow were not sufficient to cover the tyre tracks which Ammasova pored over, holding his horse by its reins whilst he knelt in the snow scanning the tracks with an expert eye.

“It’s difficult to tell how old they are because of this damned wind blowing snow over the marks,” said the cossack, brushing away some of the powdery substance.

Namarov leant over and pointed at something dark.

“What’s that?” he said and Amassova touched the substance with one finger tip.

He sniffed it, rubbing it between thumb and index finger.

“Oil,” he announced. “And it’s pretty fresh. They can’t be more than five or six miles in front of us.” The cossack swung himself back into the saddle and, at an order from Namarov, the column moved forward again.

Mig was the first one to notice the smoke.

“Look,” he shouted, pointing to a rising pall of black vapour and all eyes followed his pointing finger.

Namarov waved his men forward and they broke into a canter, the three squadrons separating until they were riding in their familiar triangular formation.

Boniak saw the smoke now and he glanced at Petrovski who was riding beside him.

“What do you think it is?” the youth asked, his voice almost lost beneath the jingling bits, rumbling hooves and whistling wind. His companion shook his head slowly.

“There are lots of small villages in this area,” he said, cryptically.

The cossacks, by this time, were very close to the source of the smoke and Namarov raised a hand for them to slow their pace. A canter became a trot and then a walk as the leading squadron approached the outskirts of what had once been a village.

“Oh God,” murmured the major.

What the village was called no-one knew. It was little more than fifty small dwellings all of which seemed to be ablaze, the thick black smoke rising mournfully, gathering over the scene of destruction like a shroud. There were bodies everywhere, scattered across snow which was splashed bright-red with blood. Some lay half-in, half-out of blazing buildings, the corpses devoured by the flames with the same enthusiasm they displayed in destroying the huts themselves.

The cossacks formed a column once more as they passed slowly through the remains of the village.

There were several bodies piled up in the centre of a clearing and, even from a distance, Namarov could see that they had been neck-shot. Trees which grew thinly around the village had been used as gallows. A dozen of so bodies dangled from the branches, twisting slowly in the wind. More than half were women, one had been stripped first, her skin now blue and mottled.

Boniak shuddered as he ran his eyes over the carnage. It had an appalling familiarity about it. He saw a small child slumped against a tree, a single bullet hole in the back of her neck, the skin round the hole was black, indicating that the muzzle of the pistol had actually been touching the flesh when it was fired.

There were more tyre tracks in the village itself and many footprints. The outline of heavy boots. Spent cartridge cases littered the snow like so much brass confetti. Cinders drifted through the air, mingling with the flakes of snow.

And, everywhere, there was blood; frozen like red water around the bodies of the men women and children who had once people this tiny village.

Namarov dismounted and walked slowly amongst the bodies, kneeling beside one every so often, sometimes inspecting their injuries. Kuragin joined him, lifting the body of a child in his powerful arms. A single bullet had been fired through her forehead, blasting away much of the back of her head as it exited. Her eyes, now glazed and frozen, almost opaque, were bright-blue and they seemed to fix the cossack in a hypnotic stare. He gently laid her down again, next to a man who had been virtually decapitated-such was the ferocity with which his throat had been cut.

Bodies lay beside burning huts, machine-gunned in lines. Neck-shot bodies were sprawled in almost regimented ranks.

In one place, two children had been tied to a tree and shot through the nape of the neck. A man dangled from one of the branches, his blackened tongue protruding from his mouth, the spittle frozen on his lips.

“This is war?” muttered the major, shaking his head.

“Most of them seem to have been neck-shot,” said Kuragin. “SS?” It was a statement more than a question.

Nemarov nodded slowly.

They were joined by Rostov who was puffing on his pipe. He looked down at a body which lay nearby, the top half ablaze.

“Fucking animals,” he grunted.

“Do we bury them?” Kuragin asked.

“No,” said Namarov. “It would take too long. If we keep moving we might catch up with them.”

“They’ve got a good three hours’ start on us,” Rostov protested.

“We follow,” said Namarov, flatly.

Elsewhere in the village, the cossacks were dismounting, walking almost dazedly through the carnage, Boniak amongst them. He knelt beside a young boy, not much older than himself, who had been shot twice in the stomach. The boy was clutching an icon in one rigored hand but, as Boniak reached forward to touch it, the boy’s hand moved.

“Major,” shouted the youth and Namarov came running. Kuragin and Rostov followed, now joined by half-a-dozen other cossacks.

“This one is still alive,” Boniak called, supporting the boy’s head with his left hand. The dying youth opened his eyes a fraction and gazed up at Boniak who wiped some blood from the wounded youngster’s mouth with his glove.

Namarov and the others arrived and gathered round.

“Who did this to your village?” asked the major, running an appraising eye over the wounded Russian.

“SS,” the boy groaned and the effort of speaking seemed to renew his pain and, when he coughed, a purple coloured froth formed on his lips.

“How long ago?” the major wanted to know.

Boniak continued to support the boy’s head as he spoke, more blood and sputum spilling from his mouth.

“Two hours,” he gasped. “Scar.”

“What?” said Namarov, puzzled.

“A man with a scar. SS.”

Boniak looked up at his superior.

“Kleiser,” he said.

“What did this man look like?” the major wanted to know.

The boy was already dead. Boniak lowered his body back onto the snow and got to his feet. “Kleiser and his men did this,” he rasped. “We’re close enough to them, we could catch up if we rode hard.”

Namarov shook his head.

“Why not?” Boniak demanded.

“I’m not pushing the horses too hard in these conditions,” the major told him.

“But he’ll escape.”

“Then let him,” said the major, turning his back on the youth.

“So he can burn and kill again,” Boniak roared after him. “Is that what you want? Doesn’t it matter to you how many more Russians he kills?”

Namarov spun round, the sabre slicing air as he drew it, pressing the tip under Boniak’s chin.

“You’ll have your revenge,” he said softly, his voice low but full of power. “We’ll find Kleiser eventually. But he’s not the only German on the Eastern Front.” He pressed the point just that bit harder into the flesh beneath the boy’s chin. “And if you ever speak to me like that again, I’ll cut your head off.” He withdrew the sabre, sheathed it and walked off.

Boniak gently rubbed the place where the sword had touched him, his initial anger subsiding somewhat as the truth of his superior’s words came home to him. He watched as the other cossacks remounted their horses then he too walked back to his mount and swung himself up into the saddle. Petrovski smiled at him.

“You’re very eager to get killed,” said the older man.

Boniak was puzzled.

“First you want to take on Kleiser, then you decide to tell Namarov how to run his war.”

“His war,” said the youth. “You make it sound personal.”

“It is,” the cossack told him.

They rode on and, within fifteen minutes, the village was just a plume of drifting smoke in the distance. Snow was already beginning to cover the bodies and, as the wind grew stronger, the tracks of Kleiser’s convoy gradually disappeared until the trail became impossible to follow.

“We’ve lost him, Major,” said Amassova.

Namarov nodded thoughtfully.

“For now,” he said, softly.