Berezovo: A Revolutionary Russian Epic

Cautiously, the two men in the corner edged towards the nearest cell. Dropping their mops together, they rushed the doorway but they were too slow. Spinning round, Janinski caught both of them with a severe blow across their shoulder blades that left them writhing and gasping on the floor of their cell.

“Prisoners all present and correct, sir!” Janinski barked, saluting sharply.

Ignoring the salute, Skyralenko took in the scene of battle. A pail lay on its side in the middle of the landing. Looking down at his boots, he saw that he was standing in a pool of dirty water. He tapped first one boot and then the other against the stone floor, sending the water rippling and eddying around the soles of his feet.

“What is the meaning of all this, Janinski?” he asked quietly.

“Prisoner refused to obey your orders, Sir,” shouted Janinski, standing in front of him. “When I gave them the mops and buckets they became abusive and attacked me, Sir!”

The Prison Director’s neat moustache twitched in disbelief. It seemed unlikely that any prisoner familiar with Janinski’s brutish reputation would risk a beating by open defiance. Raising his truncheon, he pointed silently to one of the two prisoners Janinski had hit. He had crawled to his feet and now stood in the correct position dictated by the prison regulations in the event of a cell door being opened: facing the wall of his cell with his arms folded at the elbows behind his back, palms visible.

“Prisoner Arkov!” Janinski bellowed. “Face about!”

The old man turned around, his eyes unblinking as they returned Skyralenko’s embarrassed gaze. Skyralenko had known the man intimately a long time ago; until recently they had been good friends.

Skyralenko nodded towards him.

“Approach the door! Front and centre!”

The man moved slowly, because of the pain across his back.

“Tell him he can stand at ease,” Skyralenko muttered.

“You heard the Director!” Janinski shouted at the man. “Arms by your sides!”

Gratefully, Arkov obeyed.

“Why did you refuse to obey my orders?” asked Skyralenko.

“Well, Director…” the prisoner began.

Too late, the elderly man realised his mistake. Janinski’s fist crashed the side of his face.

“Take your cap off when you address the Prison Director!” screamed the warder.

The blow, when it had come, had been as much a surprise to Skyralenko as it had to the prisoner. Sickened, he watched as blood began to trickle from behind the old man’s ear.

“That’s enough, Janinski!” he said hoarsely.

In the silence that followed, a prisoner in one of the other cells muttered, “Bastard.”

Picking himself up from the floor a second time, the old man held his prison cap tightly against his chest. He opened his mouth but no words came. Tears of pain and humiliation sprang from his eyes and rolled down his swollen cheeks. At length the man regained control of himself and, fighting his sobs, began speaking between tightly clenched teeth.

“Director, I wish to report… that… I… protested to warder Janinski that… it is too cold… to wash our cells…”

Skyralenko swallowed, angry at the man for giving Janinski the excuse he wanted to strike him, then at himself for his cowardice at not ordering the warder from the landing.

“Go on.”

“The heating in the pipes has been turned off,” Arkov continued. He had regained some of his composure. “The water will freeze on the walls and we may all die from pneumonia.”

At the back of the cell Arkov’s cellmate, half turning his face from the wall, called out:

“The cell was only washed out a fortnight ago.”

“Silence, you swine!” Janinski shouted. “Speak only when you are spoken to.”

“Let him speak!” ordered Skyralenko sharply.

He told the second prisoner to turn round.

“Director, it is only two weeks since we last washed these cells,” the man appealed to him. “I remember because it was on my name day.”

A chorus of agreement now rose from the other cells on the landing. Feeling the warder stiffen at his side, he laid his truncheon warningly against Janinski’s arm.

“Quiet, all of you!” he called out.

The protests stopped abruptly. Leaving the doorway of the cell, Skyralenko walked back to where the pail lay. Bending, he slowly and deliberately picked it up and set it straight. Then, moving to where all the prisoners could hear him from their doors, he called for their attention.

“You will do as you are ordered,” he told them, adding before the chorus of protests could start again, “the heating will be restored so you will not freeze. And,” he continued, raising his voice, “it will remain on until I order otherwise. So do not give me cause to do so.”

There were a few ragged cheers. Several of the prisoners had left the walls and were now watching him from their doorways.

“It was my order that you should wash down your cells and clean this corridor, and you were foolish enough to disobey me,” he announced. “Nevertheless, because it is so cold, and because you have only recently cleaned them out, I shall be lenient.”

More prisoners began to crowd around the doors.