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Until Prince Andrew settled in Bogucharovo its owners had
always been absentees, and its peasants were of quite a different
character from those of Bald Hills. They differed from them in
speech, dress, and disposition. They were called steppe peasants.
The old prince used to approve of them for their endurance at
work when they came to Bald Hills to help with the harvest or
to dig ponds, and ditches, but he disliked them for their boorishness.
Prince Andrew's last stay at Bogucharovo, when he introduced
hospitals and schools and reduced the quitrent the peasants had
to pay, had not softened their disposition but had on the contrary
strengthened in them the traits of character the old prince called
boorishness. Various obscure rumors were always current among
them: at one time a rumor that they would all be enrolled as Cossacks;
at another of a new religion to which they were all to be converted;
then of some proclamation of the Tsar's and of an oath to the
Tsar Paul in 1797 (in connection with which it was rumored that
freedom had been granted them but the landowners had stopped it),
then of Peter Fedorovich's return to the throne in seven years'
time, when everything would be made free and so "simple"
that there would be no restrictions. Rumors of the war with Bonaparte
and his invasion were connected in their minds with the same sort
of vague notions of Antichrist, the end of the world, and "pure
freedom."
In the vicinity of Bogucharovo were large villages belonging
to the crown or to owners whose serfs paid quitrent and could
work where they pleased. There were very few resident landlords
in the neighborhood and also very few domestic or literate serfs,
and in the lives of the peasantry of those parts the mysterious
undercurrents in the life of the Russian people, the causes and
meaning of which are so baffling to contemporaries, were more
clearly and strongly noticeable than among others. One instance,
which had occurred some twenty years before, was a movement among
the peasants to emigrate to some unknown "warm rivers."
Hundreds of peasants, among them the Bogucharovo folk, suddenly
began selling their cattle and moving in whole families toward
the southeast. As birds migrate to somewhere beyond the sea, so
these men with their wives and children streamed to the southeast,
to parts where none of them had ever been. They set off in caravans,
bought their freedom one by one or ran away, and drove or walked
toward the "warm rivers." Many of them were punished,
some sent to Siberia, many died of cold and hunger on the road,
many returned of their own accord, and the movement died down
of itself just as it had sprung up, without apparent reason. But
such undercurrents still existed among the people and gathered
new forces ready to manifest themselves just as strangely, unexpectedly,
and at the same time simply, naturally, and forcibly. Now in 1812,
to anyone living in close touch with these people it was apparent
that these undercurrents were acting strongly and nearing an eruption.
Alpatych, who had reached Bogucharovo shortly before the old
prince's death, noticed an agitation among the peasants, and that
contrary to what was happening in the Bald Hills district, where
over a radius of forty miles all the peasants were moving away
and leaving their villages to be devastated by the Cossacks, the
peasants in the steppe region round Bogucharovo were, it was rumored,
in touch with the French, received leaflets from them that passed
from hand to hand, and did not migrate. He learned from domestic
serfs loyal to him that the peasant Karp, who possessed great
influence in the village commune and had recently been away driving
a government transport, had returned with news that the Cossacks
were destroying deserted villages, but that the French did not
harm them. Alpatych also knew that on the previous day another
peasant had even brought from the village of Visloukhovo, which
was occupied by the French, a proclamation by a French general
that no harm would be done to the inhabitants, and if they remained
they would be paid for anything taken from them. As proof of this
the peasant had brought from Visloukhovo a hundred rubles in notes
(he did not know that they were false) paid to him in advance
for hay.
More important still, Alpatych learned that on the morning
of the very day he gave the village Elder orders to collect carts
to move the princess' luggage from Bogucharovo, there had been
a village meeting at which it had been decided not to move but
to wait. Yet there was no time to waste. On the fifteenth, the
day of the old prince's death, the Marshal had insisted on Princess
Mary's leaving at once, as it was becoming dangerous. He had told
her that after the sixteenth he could not be responsible for what
might happen. On the evening of the day the old prince died the
Marshal went away, promising to return next day for the funeral.
But this he was unable to do, for he received tidings that the
French had unexpectedly advanced, and had barely time to remove
his own family and valuables from his estate.
For some thirty years Bogucharovo had been managed by the
village Elder, Dron, whom the old prince called by the diminutive
"Dronushka."
Dron was one of those physically and mentally vigorous peasants
who grow big beards as soon as they are of age and go on unchanged
till they are sixty or seventy, without a gray hair or the loss
of a tooth, as straight and strong at sixty as at thirty.
Soon after the migration to the "warm rivers," in
which he had taken part like the rest, Dron was made village Elder
and overseer of Bogucharovo, and had since filled that post irreproachably
for twenty-three years. The peasants feared him more than they
did their master. The masters, both the old prince and the young,
and the steward respected him and jestingly called him "the
Minister." During the whole time of his service Dron had
never been drunk or ill, never after sleepless nights or the hardest
tasks had he shown the least fatigue, and though he could not
read he had never forgotten a single money account or the number
of quarters of flour in any of the endless cartloads he sold for
the prince, nor a single shock of the whole corn crop on any single
acre of the Bogucharovo fields.
Alpatych, arriving from the devastated Bald Hills estate,
sent for his Dron on the day of the prince's funeral and told
him to have twelve horses got ready for the princess' carriages
and eighteen carts for the things to be removed from Bogucharovo.
Though the peasants paid quitrent, Alpatych thought no difficulty
would be made about complying with this order, for there were
two hundred and thirty households at work in Bogucharovo and the
peasants were well to do. But on hearing the order Dron lowered
his eyes and remained silent. Alpatych named certain peasants
he knew, from whom he told him to take the carts.
Dron replied that the horses of these peasants were away carting.
Alpatych named others, but they too, according to Dron, had no
horses available: some horses were carting for the government,
others were too weak, and others had died for want of fodder.
It seemed that no horses could be had even for the carriages,
much less for the carting.
Alpatych looked intently at Dron and frowned. Just as Dron
was a model village Elder, so Alpatych had not managed the prince's
estates for twenty years in vain. He a model steward, possessing
in the highest degree the faculty of divining the needs and instincts
of those he dealt with. Having glanced at Dron he at once understood
that his answers did not express his personal views but the general
mood of the Bogucharovo commune, by which the Elder had already
been carried away. But he also knew that Dron, who had acquired
property and was hated by the commune, must be hesitating between
the two camps: the masters' and the serfs'. He noticed this hesitation
in Dron's look and therefore frowned and moved closer up to him.
"Now just listen, Dronushka," said he. "Don't
talk nonsense to me. His excellency Prince Andrew himself gave
me orders to move all the people away and not leave them with
the enemy, and there is an order from the Tsar about it too. Anyone
who stays is a traitor to the Tsar. Do you hear?"
"I hear," Dron answered without lifting his eyes.
Alpatych was not satisfied with this reply.
"Eh, Dron, it will turn out badly!" he said, shaking
his head.
"The power is in your hands," Dron rejoined sadly.
"Eh, Dron, drop it!" Alpatych repeated, withdrawing
his hand from his bosom and solemnly pointing to the floor at
Dron's feet. "I can see through you and three yards into
the ground under you," he continued, gazing at the floor
in front of Dron.
Dron was disconcerted, glanced furtively at Alpatych and again
lowered his eyes.
"You drop this nonsense and tell the people to get ready
to leave their homes and go to Moscow and to get carts ready for
tomorrow morning for the princess' things. And don't go to any
meeting yourself, do you hear?"
Dron suddenly fell on his knees.
"Yakov Alpatych, discharge me! Take the keys from me
and discharge me, for Christ's sake!"
"Stop that!" cried Alpatych sternly. "I see
through you and three yards under you," he repeated, knowing
that his skill in beekeeping, his knowledge of the right time
to sow the oats, and the fact that he had been able to retain
the old prince's favor for twenty years had long since gained
him the reputation of being a wizard, and that the power of seeing
three yards under a man is considered an attribute of wizards.
Dron got up and was about to say something, but Alpatych interrupted
him.
"What is it you have got into your heads, eh?... What
are you thinking of, eh?"
"What am I to do with the people?" said Dron. "They're
quite beside themselves; I have already told them..."
"'Told them,' I dare say!" said Alpatych. "Are
they drinking?" he asked abruptly.
"Quite beside themselves, Yakov Alpatych; they've fetched
another barrel."
"Well, then, listen! I'll go to the police officer, and
you tell them so, and that they must stop this and the carts must
be got ready."
"I understand."
Alpatych did not insist further. He had managed people for
a long time and knew that the chief way to make them obey is to
show no suspicion that they can possibly disobey. Having wrung
a submissive "I understand" from Dron, Alpatych contented
himself with that, though he not only doubted but felt almost
certain that without the help of troops the carts would not be
forthcoming.
And so it was, for when evening came no carts had been provided.
In the village, outside the drink shop, another meeting was being
held, which decided that the horses should be driven out into
the woods and the carts should not be provided. Without saying
anything of this to the princess, Alpatych had his own belongings
taken out of the carts which had arrived from Bald Hills and had
those horses got ready for the princess' carriages. Meanwhile
he went himself to the police authorities.
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