Next day, when the party was mustered for departure, it became apparent that the ordinary prisoners had hardly any clothes! Their things had vanished, and they were literally half naked. A light was now cast on the events of the preceding night, when there had been such a carousal at the house of the Decabrist. That respectable and hospitable old gentleman was evidently in league with the escort, and had provided the convicts with vodka and other delicacies, in exchange for their clothing, which no doubt he had obtained at a bargain. That the transaction might not be discovered before our arrival in Tchita, the soldiers saw to it that it should be as late as possible before we got in, so that the inspection should be gone through hurriedly, and the absence of the clothes not perceived.
In short, the respectable Karovàiev had not established himself in that lonely spot for nothing. The jollification of the unlucky criminals had evil consequences for themselves. In proportion as their clothing and other State property were deficient they were treated to the soundest of thrashings; and only when that had been administered did they receive a fresh outfit.
In Tchita we had to part from our good stàrosta Làzarev, who was to be interned here. We three others determined to secure for ourselves a thorough rest in this place; for we had been six weeks on the march from Irkutsk, and were thoroughly tired out. We felt in no hurry to go on; a prison awaited us, while on the journey we had at least a certain amount of freedom and variety. Moreover, we knew that there were a number of our comrades interned at Tchita, and we should be able to see something of them; while apparently all intercourse with the outer world would cease for us after this stage, where we must make our last adieux before the prison doors closed on us. We therefore reported ourselves sick, and easily got the prison doctor’s consent to our breaking the journey here; which meant that we should be picked up by the next convoy in about a fortnight’s time. Our comrades paid us frequent visits; that is, they came to the prison gate when we were in the courtyard. The most interesting news they gave us concerned the travels of the American writer, George Kennan, who had just arrived in Tchita on his return journey from Kara; and our friends were full of praise for that excellent man.
During the last days of November we started again, this time in company with a so-called “family party” of ordinary prisoners—women and children as well as men going forward to prison and exile. There had not been much snow that winter, and instead of sledges two-wheeled carts were our means of transport, travelling in which was a positive martyrdom. The cold became more intense every day, and tried us severely, although we wore every warm garment we possessed, so that we moved with the greatest difficulty. The only way to keep warm was to march beside the carts, and one can imagine the sufferings of the unfortunate children who were accompanying their parents into this inhospitable desert. One longed for the next halting-station and for possibilities of warming oneself, which even there were not always all that could be desired. The halting-stations had sometimes not been heated for a good while, and the ordinary prisoners had first to chop wood with their numb and frozen hands; even then there was not always sufficient fuel. The stoves, too, were often out of order, and smoked so badly that to stay in the room was a misery. It happened repeatedly that we three “politicals” were accommodated in a peasant’s hut, and sometimes the whole party had to be quartered in like manner. We were always glad when this happened, for the wretchedest cabin seemed comfortable in comparison with even the best étape. How often we wished we could be by ourselves in a hut of this kind during the rest of our imprisonment!
I have said that relations between prisoners and escort were now very easy-going; strict discipline was no longer the watchword on either side. This had its disadvantages, the soldiers being often very rough with the ordinary prisoners. One day, as we were marching to Nertchinsk, I saw a soldier behaving very brutally to a poor feeble old convict, knocking him about with his rifle-butt for climbing on to one of the carts, and apparently only because the soldier had meant to ride on it himself. I intervened, and called to the sergeant in command that I should report him for not keeping his men in order. Next day, as we went through the town on our way to the prison, I stepped into a sausage shop to buy some provisions, when the soldier whose party I had left called after me, “Where are you going? What do you want?” I let him shout, and concluded my purchases. I then saw that the sergeant had driven on and disappeared, but I only thought that he had taken some short cut to the prison and would meet us there, and I was much surprised when the governor of the gaol received me with the information that the sergeant had reported me for insulting the guard and leaving the ranks without permission. I suppose he wished to forestall the complaint I had threatened him with, about which I had quite forgotten, and I now turned the tables on him by making it in due form. The upshot was that the sergeant apologised to me in the presence of witnesses, and we were respectively pleased to withdraw our complaints!
At Nertchinsk, Tchuikòv and I were taken to the men’s prison, and Maria Kalyùshnaya was given a separate cell. I shall never in my life forget the picture that prison presented. From the dimly-lighted corridor one could see into the various rooms, where the prisoners were already lying down, as it was late. Packed closely side by side they lay not only on the wooden bed-places (which were two wide shelves running along the walls one above the other), but all about the floor; there was literally not an inch of vacant space. Most of the men were clad in shirt and trousers, but many had only trousers on, and lay uncovered on the filthy floor. The throng was so dense, that in order to get to the “privileged” room we had actually to step on the bodies of the sleepers. The stench was pestilential, the wooden tubs filled with excrement were everywhere about, and as they were leaky their contents had been trodden over the whole floor. Although most of the men were asleep, here and there groups of excited card-players squatted on the floor or the bed-places, and throughout the whole place there was a deafening babel of sounds. The general effect was most gruesome, a circle of the Dantean Inferno was the only possible comparison.
The “privileged” room was also full of people, and we found there some comrades from Kara—Tchekondze and Zuckermann. They were lying close together on the crowded floor, and we with difficulty found a vacant spot, so that we could lie down near our friends. Zuckermann was known to me: he was a compositor, who in the middle of the sixties had trudged on foot from Berlin into Switzerland, where I subsequently had made his acquaintance. He had gone to Russia later, and had worked at the secret printing-press of the Naròdnaia Vòlya, where he was arrested at the same time as Sophia Ivànova. I had been told by comrades how heroically he had behaved during the trial. In order to shield the others he had taken all blame on his own shoulders, declared that it was he who had fired the first shot in resistance to the gendarmerie, and so on. He had been condemned to eight years’ “katorga” and sent to Kara, where he had become the darling of the whole prison. Always sunny-tempered, full of wit and fun, he spread good humour everywhere; moreover, he was unselfishness personified, ever ready to help others at his own expense, one of those people who are called “too good for this world.” Even as we lay on the floor in that horrible place he told stories and jested, drawing the most glowing imaginary pictures of his future life in Yakutsk, whither he was being sent for internment. The reality, unhappily, turned out widely different from his sanguine prophecies. Poor merry Zuckermann could not hold out against the hardships and loneliness of his place of exile, and he put an end to his own life.
Tchekondze I had not met before, but we had many common friends. He came from Gruzia, and had graduated in the Petersburg college for artillery officers. With other Caucasians he had then participated in the Propagandist movement, had been arrested in 1875, and sentenced in the “Trial of the fifty” to banishment; but he had escaped from Siberia, and had been recaptured and condemned to three years’ penal servitude. He was now going into exile in Yakutsk. He impressed one as a strong-willed, careful, practical man, who would never be at a loss, but would find a sphere of usefulness under any circumstances; and so indeed he proved in his after life. The privations he suffered during long years of exile undermined his health, however. When sent to Western Siberia in the early nineties he fell seriously ill and died in Kurgan, on the threshold of Europe, in 1897.
At last, on the morning of December 24th, 1885, we arrived at Ust-Kara, a little village wherein is situated the prison for ordinary convicts and the prison for women “politicals.” Here we had to part from Maria Kalyùshnaya, and I saw her that morning for the last time. Tchuikòv and I had fifteen versts more to travel to Nizhnaya Kara, where was the prison for male “politicals”; and we had to wait till next day for the commandant, who received in charge both ourselves and the ordinary criminals. Our luggage was put into a cart; and accompanied by a guard, we marched off, having previously donned our fetters in due form.