Maid of Baikal: A Novel of the Russian Civil War

“If you will not go, God will find other uses for you,” she answered with a shrug. “We will meet up afterward, to be sure, for our work together is far from finished.”

Ivashov let out an uncharacteristic guffaw at this, for he seemed to enjoy seeing the Maid under full sail, and had long been accustomed to going wherever his orders might take him. But Ned bit his tongue and said nothing. For while he had seen too many of the Maid’s unlikely successes to call her latest plans impossible, they went so far beyond what seemed reasonable that his mind reeled at imagining how she could pull it off. And he was certain that the AEF brass would never allow him to tag along on such a reckless escapade.

* * *

News reached Uralsk the next day that the Fifth Red Army was encamped at Belebey, less than two hundred versts from Ufa, thus lending credence to the Maid’s earlier calls for haste in taking Uralsk. After some coaxing, General Tolstov agreed to release Zhanna’s brigade, and as many Cossack and non-Cossack volunteers as were willing to go with them, on her planned raid to the north. Because many of the Ural Cossacks had families in Uralsk and preferred not to venture far from the city, the cavalrymen who joined the Maid’s volunteers comprised an assortment of men who had come to Uralsk by way of the Volunteer Army, the People’s Army of Komuch, and former Kirghiz[34] and Kalmyk[35] cavalry units.

Since the armored cars were to be turned over to General Dutov at Orenburg, Zhanna requisitioned as many two-wheeled tachankas as Tolstov would give up and had a dozen other mobile firing platforms constructed by mounting twin machine guns on a flatbed light truck. The raiding force also included mortar crews, machine gunners and the best logistics experts available. To conserve fuel and avoid creating excessive noise, some of the firing platforms would be towed to the battlefield by horses or bullocks, as would the tachankas and baggage carts. And a portion of the infantry would ride in horse-drawn carriages to give them a rest between forced marches and to enhance the column’s speed on the move.

While Tolstov’s cooperation had come as a surprise to Ned and Ivashov, an even greater shock hit them when, upon reaching General Dutov’s camp outside the besieged city of Orenburg, each received new orders from Omsk. Ned’s orders were from Colonel Ward and Ivashov’s from the Stavka, but both directed them to report to Ufa on an undisclosed intelligence mission. Though Ned had not solicited it, he received a second cable from Colonel Barrows, who was now in Omsk and apparently in contact with Ward and the Stavka. That cable extended Ned’s leave from duty at Beregovoy. Once again, though Barrows and the Stavka could not have been aware of it, all obstacles were now cleared for the new mission that Zhanna’s Voices had hinted at for the two captains.

And, as if by design, a third cable announced that a freight train was being held at Iletsk for Ned and Ivashov to make the journey north to Ufa.

* * *

As the freight train approached the outskirts of Ufa several days later, the city appeared to be in complete disarray. The station was mobbed with fleeing civilians encumbered with extravagant amounts of baggage, while police and reserve troops struggled to keep order. The dark rumble of artillery fire could be heard at a distance. To the west, an oily black cloud extended across the horizon, hiding the sun behind a sinister pall and leaving an acrid smell in the air. A policeman said the cloud came from the villages on the Belaya River that the Reds had set ablaze some twenty versts away.

Upon being deposited in the military rail yard, Ned and Ivashov made their way to the railway offices, where they solicited directions to the Western Army’s headquarters. There they came upon a Colonel Panin, a senior staff officer in his late thirties, whose disheveled uniform, stubbled face and bloodshot eyes revealed just how desperate had been the army’s latest retreat. When Ivashov asked Panin why he and Ned had been summoned to Ufa, the colonel dodged the question, claiming he was instructed only to brief them on the current situation at Ufa and to ask them some questions about events at Uralsk and Orenburg.

The colonel began by reporting that Kolchak’s Stavka had ordered the Western Army to form a defensive line on the east bank of the Belaya River, just west of Ufa. General Lebedev had further insisted that this line be held at all costs, and that every available man and weapon be thrown into defending Ufa and the railway lines leading east through the Urals passes onto the Siberian plateau. To this end, the Western Army Commander, Khanzin, had withdrawn troops from his northern flank to focus on the threat in the east from the Fifth Red Army, now advancing from Belebey.