The Enchanted Wanderer and Other Stories

Nikolai Ivanovich Miller immediately sent an alarmed note to his battalion commander, Lieutenant Colonel Svinyin,⁴ in which he asked him to come to the palace guardroom as soon as possible and take all measures to remedy the horrible disaster.

By then it was around three o’clock, and Kokoshkin appeared with his report to the sovereign quite early in the morning, so there was very little time for any thinking or acting.

VII

Lieutenant Colonel Svinyin did not have that compassion and soft-heartedness which had always distinguished Nikolai Ivanovich Miller. Svinyin was not heartless, but before all and above all he was a “serviceman” (a type that is nowadays remembered with regret). Svinyin was distinguished by his strictness and even liked to flaunt his exactingness in discipline. He had no taste for evil, and never sought to cause anyone needless suffering; but if a man violated any duty of the service whatsoever, Svinyin was implacable. He considered it irrelevant to get into a discussion of the motives that guided the actions of the guilty man in a given case, but held to the rule that in the service all guilt is guilt. And therefore in the guards company everybody knew that, whatever Private Postnikov was going to suffer for having abandoned his post, he was going suffer, and Svinyin was not going to grieve over it.

That was how this staff officer was known to his superiors and comrades, among whom were people who did not sympathize with Svinyin, because back then “humanism” and other such delusions had not yet been entirely rooted out. Svinyin was indifferent to whether the “humanists” blamed or praised him. To beg and beseech Svinyin, or even to appeal to his sense of pity, was a totally useless thing. He was hardened against all that with the firm hardening of the career men of that time, but, like Achilles, he had his weak spot.

Svinyin also had a well-launched career in the service, which he, of course, carefully protected and cared for, so that not one speck of dust should settle on it, as on a dress uniform; and yet the unfortunate escapade of a man from a battalion entrusted to him must unfailingly cast a bad shadow on the discipline of his entire unit. Whether the battalion commander was or was not responsible for what one of his soldiers had done under the influence of the most noble compassion—that was not going to be sorted out by those upon whom Svinyin’s well-launched and carefully maintained career in the service depended, and many would even willingly roll the log under his feet, in order to clear the way for a relative or promote some fine fellow patronized by the current favorites. The sovereign would, of course, get angry and would unfailingly tell the regimental commander that he had “weak officers” and “undisciplined people” under him. And who was the cause of it? Svinyin. And so it would go on being repeated that “Svinyin is weak,” and so the reproach of weakness might well remain as an indelible blot on his, Svinyin’s, reputation. He was not, then, to become anything noteworthy in the ranks of his contemporaries, and was not to leave his portrait in the gallery of historical personages of the Russian State.

Though history was little studied back then, people believed in it, and were especially eager to participate in its making themselves.

VIII

As soon as Svinyin received the alarming note from Captain Miller, at around three o’clock in the morning, he jumped out of bed, put on his uniform, and, under the influence of fear and wrath, arrived in the guardroom of the Winter Palace. There he immediately carried out the questioning of Private Postnikov and convinced himself that the incredible incident had taken place. Private Postnikov again quite candidly confirmed to his battalion commander all that had happened during his watch and that he, Postnikov, had told earlier to his company captain, Miller. The soldier said that he was “guilty before God and his sovereign without mercy,” that he had been standing watch and, hearing the moans of a man drowning in a pool, had suffered for a long time, had struggled for a long time between duty to the service and compassion, and, finally, temptation had come over him, and he had been unable to keep up the struggle: he had abandoned the sentry box, had jumped down onto the ice, and had pulled the drowning man to the bank, and there, as ill luck would have it, he had run into the officer of the Palace Invalid Command driving by.