CHAPTER XXXVII
THE CAMP OF MARTYRS
Near the entrance to the town, a motor car stood before a small house.
“What does that mean?” exclaimed the Baron. “Go over there!”
Our car drew up beside the other. The house door opened sharply, several officers rushed out and tried to hide.
“Stand!” commanded the General. “Go back inside.” They obeyed and he entered after them, leaning on his tashur. As the door remained open, I could see and hear everything.
“Woe to them!” whispered the chauffeur. “Our officers knew that the Baron had gone out of the town with me, which means always a long journey, and must have decided to have a good time. He will order them beaten to death with sticks.”
I could see the end of the table covered with bottles and tinned things. At the side two young women were seated, who sprang up at the appearance of the General. I could hear the hoarse voice of Baron Ungern pronouncing sharp, short, stern phrases.
“Your native land is perishing. . . . The shame of it is upon all you Russians . . . and you cannot understand it . . . nor feel it. . . . You need wine and women. . . . Scoundrels! Brutes! . . . One hundred fifty tashur for every man of you.”
The voice fell to a whisper.
“And you, Mesdames, do you not realize the ruin of your people? No? For you it is of no moment. And have you no feeling for your husbands at the front who may even now be killed? You are not women. . . . I honor woman, who feels more deeply and strongly than man; but you are not women! . . . Listen to me, Mesdames. Once more and I will hang you. . . .”
He came back to the car and himself sounded the horn several times. Immediately Mongol horsemen galloped up.
“Take these men to the Commandant. I will send my orders later.”
On the way to the Baron’s yurta we were silent. He was excited and breathed heavily, lighting cigarette after cigarette and throwing them aside after but a single puff or two.
“Take supper with me,” he proposed.
He also invited his Chief of Staff, a very retiring, oppressed but splendidly educated man. The servants spread a Chinese hot course for us followed by cold meat and fruit compote from California with the inevitable tea. We ate with chopsticks. The Baron was greatly distraught.
Very cautiously I began speaking of the offending officers and tried to justify their actions by the extremely trying circumstances under which they were living.
“They are rotten through and through, demoralized, sunk into the depths,” murmured the General.
The Chief of Staff helped me out and at last the Baron directed him to telephone the Commandant to release these gentlemen.
The following day I spent with my friends, walking a great deal about the streets and watching their busy life. The great energy of the Baron demanded constant nervous activity from himself and every one round him. He was everywhere, seeing everything but never, interfering with the work of his subordinate administrators. Every one was at work.
In the evening I was invited by the Chief of Staff to his quarters, where I met many intelligent officers. I related again the story of my trip and we were all chatting along animatedly when suddenly Colonel Sepailoff entered, singing to himself. All the others at once became silent and one by one under various pretexts they slipped out. He handed our host some papers and, turning to us, said:
“I shall send you for supper a splendid fish pie and some hot tomato soup.”
As he left, my host clasped his head in desperation and said:
“With such scum of the earth are we now forced after this revolution to work!”
A few minutes later a soldier from Sepailoff brought us a tureen full of soup and the fish pie. As the soldier bent over the table to set the dishes down, the Chief motioned me with his eyes and slipped to me the words: “Notice his face.”
When the man went out, my host sat attentively listening until the sounds of the man’s steps ceased.
“He is Sepailoff’s executioner who hangs and strangles the unfortunate condemned ones.”
Then, to my amazement, he began to pour out the soup on the ground beside the brazier and, going out of the yurta, threw the pie over the fence.
“It is Sepailoff’s feast and, though it may be very tasty, it may also be poison. In Sepailoff’s house it is dangerous to eat or drink anything.”
Distinctly oppressed by these doings, I returned to my house. My host was not yet asleep and met me with a frightened look. My friends were also there.
“God be thanked!” they all exclaimed. “Has nothing happened to you?”
“What is the matter?” I asked.
“You see,” began the host, “after your departure a soldier came from Sepailoff and took your luggage, saying that you had sent him for it; but we knew what it meant—that they would first search it and afterwards. . . .”
I at once understood the danger. Sepailoff could place anything he wanted in my luggage and afterwards accuse me. My old friend, the agronome, and I started at once for Sepailoff’s, where I left him at the door while I went in and was met by the same soldier who had brought the supper to us. Sepailoff received me immediately. In answer to my protest he said that it was a mistake and, asking me to wait for a moment, went out. I waited five, ten, fifteen minutes but nobody came. I knocked on the door but no one answered me. Then I decided to go to Baron Ungern and started for the exit. The door was locked. Then I tried the other door and found that also locked. I had been trapped! I wanted at once to whistle to my friend but just then noticed a telephone on the wall and called up Baron Ungern. In a few minutes he appeared together with Sepailoff.
“What is this?” he asked Sepailoff in a severe, threatening voice; and, without waiting for an answer, struck him a blow with his tashur that sent him to the floor.
We went out and the General ordered my luggage produced. Then he brought me to his own yurta.
“Live here, now,” he said. “I am very glad of this accident,” he remarked with a smile, “for now I can say all that I want to.”
This drew from me the question:
“May I describe all that I have heard and seen here?”
He thought a moment before replying: “Give me your notebook.”
I handed him the album with my sketches of the trip and he wrote therein: “After my death, Baron Ungern.”
“But I am older than you and I shall die before you,” I remarked.
He shut his eyes, bowed his head and whispered:
“Oh, no! One hundred thirty days yet and it is finished; then . . . Nirvana! How wearied I am with sorrow, woe and hate!”
We were silent for a long time. I felt that I had now a mortal enemy in Colonel Sepailoff and that I should get out of Urga at the earliest possible moment. It was two o’clock at night. Suddenly Baron Ungern stood up.
“Let us go to the great, good Buddha,” he said with a countenance held in deep thought and with eyes aflame, his whole face contracted by a mournful, bitter smile. He ordered the car brought.
Thus lived this camp of martyrs, refugees pursued by events to their tryst with Death, driven on by the hate and contempt of this offspring of Teutons and privateers! And he, martyring them, knew neither day nor night of peace. Fired by impelling, poisonous thoughts, he tormented himself with the pains of a Titan, knowing that every day in this shortening chain of one hundred thirty links brought him nearer to the precipice called “Death.”