A fierce and merciless class struggle gripped the Ukraine. More and more people took to arms and each clash brought forth new fighters.
Gone were the days of peace and tranquillity for the respectable citizen.
The little tumbledown houses shook in the storm blasts of gun salvos, and the respectable citizen huddled against the walls of his cellar or took cover in his backyard trench.
An avalanche of Petlyura bands of all shades and hues overran the gubernia, led by little chieftains and big ones, all manner of Golubs, Archangels, Angels and Gordiuses and a host of other bandits.
Ex-officers of the tsarist army, Right and Left Ukrainian Socialist-Revolutionaries—any desperado who could muster a band of cutthroats, declared himself Ataman, and some raised the yellow-and-blue Petlyura flag and established their authority over whatever area was within the scope of their strength and opportunities.
Out of these heterogeneous bands reinforced by kulaks and the Galician regiments of Ataman Konovalets' siege corps, "Chief Ataman" Petlyura formed his regiments and divisions. And when Red partisan detachments struck at this Socialist-Revolutionary and kulak rabble the very earth trembled under the pounding of hundreds and thousands of hoofs and the rumble of the wheels of machine-gun carts and gun carriages.
In April of that turbulent 1919, the respectable citizen, dazed and terrified, would open his shutters of a morning and, peering out with sleep-heavy eyes, greet his next-door neighbour with the anxious question:
"Avtonom Petrovich, do you happen to know who's in power today?"
And Avtonom Petrovich would hitch up his trousers and cast a frightened look around.
"Can't say, Afanas Kirillovich. Somebody did enter the town during the night. Who it was we'll find out soon enough; if they start robbing the Jews, we'll know they're Petlyura men, and if they're some of the 'comrades', we'll be able to tell at once by the way they talk. I'm keeping an eye open myself so's to know what portrait to hang up. Wouldn't care to get into trouble like Gerasim Leontievich next door. You see, he didn't look out properly and had just gone and hung up a picture of Lenin when three men rushed in—Petlyura men as it turned out. They took one look at the picture and jumped on him—a good twenty strokes they gave him. 'We'll skin you alive, you Communist sonofabitch,' they shouted. And no matter how hard he tried to explain and
how loud he yelled, nothing helped."
Noting groups of armed men coming down the street the respectable citizen closed his windows and went into hiding. Better to be on the safe side. . . .
As for the workers, they regarded the yellow-and-blue flags of the Petlyura thugs with suppressed hatred. They were powerless in the face of this wave of Ukrainian bourgeois chauvinism, and their spirits rose only when passing Red units, fighting fiercely against the yellow-and-blues that were bearing down on them from all sides, wedged their way into the town. For a day or two the flag so dear to the worker's heart would fly over the town hall, but then the unit would move on again and the engulfing gloom return.
Now the town was in the hands of Colonel Golub, the "hope and pride" of the Transdnieper Division.
His band of two thousand cutthroats had made a triumphal entry into the town the day before. Pan the Colonel had ridden at the head of the column on a splendid black stallion. In spite of the warm April sun he wore a Caucasian burka, a lambskin Zaporozhye Cossack cap with a raspberry-red crown, a cherkesska, and the weapons that went with the outfit: dagger and sabre with chased-silver hilts. Between his teeth he held a pipe with a curved stem.
A handsome fellow, Pan the Colonel Golub, with his black eyebrows and pallid complexion tinged slightly green from incessant carousals!
Before the revolution Pan the Colonel had been an agronomist at the beet plantations of a sugar refinery, but that was a dull life not to be compared with the position of an Ataman, and so on the crest of the murky waves that swept the land the agronomist emerged as Pan the Colonel Golub.
In the only theatre in town a gala affair was got up in honour of the new arrivals. The "flower" of the Petlyura intelligentsia was there in full force: Ukrainian teachers, the priest's two daughters, the beautiful Anya and her younger sister Dina, some ladies of lesser standing, former members of
the household of Count Potocki, a few members of the middle class, remnants of the Ukrainian Socialist-Revolutionaries, who called themselves "free Cossacks". The theatre was packed. Spur-clicking officers who might have been copied from old paintings of Zaporozhye Cossacks pranced around the teachers, the priest's daughters and the burghers' ladies who were decked out in Ukrainian national costumes ornamented with bright-coloured
embroidered flowers and multihued beads and ribbons.
The regimental band blared. On the stage feverish preparations were under way for the performance of Nazar Stodolya scheduled for the evening.
There was no electricity, however, and the fact was reported in due course to Pan the Colonel at headquarters by his adjutant, Sublieutenant Polyantsev, who had now Ukrainianised his name and rank and styled himself Khorunzhy Palyanytsya. The Colonel, who intended to grace the evening with his presence, heard out Palyanytsya and said casually but imperiously:
"See that there is light. Find an electrician and start the electric power plant if you have to break your neck doing it."
"Very good, Pan Colonel."
Khorunzhy Palyanytsya found electricians without breaking his neck. Within two hours Pavel and two other workers were brought to the power plant by armed guards.
"If you don't have the lights on by seven I'll have all three of you strung up," Palyanytsya told them curtly, pointing to an iron beam overhead.
This blunt exposition of the situation had its effect and the lights came on at the appointed time.
The evening was in full swing when Pan the Colonel arrived with his lady, the buxom yellow-haired daughter of the barkeeper in whose house he was staying. Her father being a man of means,she had been educated at the Gymnasium in the gubernia town.
When the two had taken the seats reserved for them as guests of honour in the front row, Pan the Colonel gave the signal and the curtain rose so suddenly that the audience had a glimpse of the stage director's back as he hurried off the stage.
During the play the officers and their ladies whiled away the time at the refreshment counter,filling up on raw homebrew supplied by the ubiquitous Palyanytsya and delicacies acquired by requisitioning. By the end of the performance they were all well under the weather.
After the final curtain Palyanytsya leaped on the stage "Ladies and gentlemen, the dancing is about to begin," he announced with a theatrical sweep of
his arm.
There was general applause and the audience emptied out into the yard to give the Petlyura soldiers posted to guard the guests a chance to carry out the chairs and clear the dance floor.
A half an hour later the theatre was the scene of wild revelry.
The Petlyura officers, flinging all restraint to the winds, furiously danced the hopak with local belles flushed from the heat, and the pounding of heavy boots rocked the walls of the ramshackle theatre building.
In the meantime a troop of armed horsemen was approaching the town from the direction of the flour mill. A Petlyura sentry-post stationed at the town limits sprang in alarm to their machine guns and there was a clicking of breech-blocks in the night. Through the darkness came the sharp challenge:
"Halt! Who goes there?"
Two dark figures loomed out of the darkness. One of them stepped forward and roared out in a hoarse bass:
"Ataman Pavlyuk with his detachment. Who are you? Golub's men?"
"That's right," replied an officer who had also stepped forward.
"Where can I billet my men?" Pavlyuk asked.
"I'll phone headquarters at once," replied the officer and disappeared into a tiny hut on the roadside.
A minute later he came out and began issuing orders:
"Clear the machine gun off the road, men! Let the Pan Ataman pass."
Pavlyuk reined in his horse in front of the brightly illuminated theatre where a great many people were strolling out in the open air.
"Some fun going on here by the look of it," he said, turning to the captain riding beside him. "Let's dismount, Gukmach, and join the merrymaking. We'll pick ourselves a couple of women—I see the place is thick with them. Hey, Stalezhko," he shouted. "You billet the lads with the townsfolk.
We'll stop here. Escort, follow me." And he heaved himself heavily from his staggering mount.
At the entrance to the theatre Pavlyuk was stopped by two armed Petlyura men.
"Tickets
Pavlyuk gave them a derisive look and pushed one of them aside with his shoulder. The dozen men with him followed suit. Their horses were outside, tethered to the fence.
The newcomers were noticed at once. Particularly conspicuous was the huge frame of Pavlyuk; he was wearing an officer's coat of good cloth, blue breeches of the kind worn in the guards, and a shaggy fur cap. A Mauser hung from a strap slung over his shoulder and a hand grenade stuck out
of his pocket.
"Who's that?" the whisper passed through the crowd around the dance floor where Golub's second in command was executing a wild dance.
His partner was the priest's elder daughter, ^ who was whirling round with such abandon that her skirts flared out high enough to give the delighted men a good view of her silk petticoats.
Forcing his way through the crowd, Pavlyuk went right out onto the dance floor.
Pavlyuk stared with glazed eyes at the priest's daughter's legs, passed his tongue over his dry lips,then strode across the dance floor to the orchestra platform, stopped, and flicked his plaited ridingwhip.
"Come on, give us the hopak!"
The conductor paid no attention to the order.
A sharp movement of Pavlyuk's hand and the whip cut down the conductor's back. The latter jumped as if stung and the music broke off, plunging the hall into silence.
"What insolence!" The barkeeper's daughter was furious. "You can't let him do that," she cried,clutching at the elbow of Golub seated at her side.
Golub heaved himself to his feet, kicked aside a chair, took three paces forward and stopped faceto face with Pavlyuk. He had recognised the newcomer at once, and he had scores to settle with this rival claimant for local power. Only a week ago Pavlyuk had played the most scurvy trick on Pan the Colonel. At the height of a battle with a Red regiment which had mauled Golub's detachment on more than one occasion, Pavlyuk, instead of striking at the Bolsheviks from the rear, had broken into a town, overcome the resistance of the small pickets the Reds had left there,and, leaving a screening force to protect himself, sacked the place in the most thorough fashion.
Of course, being a true Petlyura man, he saw to it that the Jewish population were the chief victims. In the meantime the Reds had smashed up Golub's right flank and moved on.
And now this arrogant cavalry Captain had burst in here and had the audacity to strike Pan the Colonel's own bandmaster under his very eyes. No, this was too much. Golub knew that if he did not put the conceited upstart in his place his prestige in the regiment would be gone.
For several seconds the two men stood there in silence glaring at each other.
Gripping the hilt of his sabre with one hand and feeling for the revolver in his pocket with the other, Golub rapped out:
"How dare you lay your hands on my men, you scoundrel!"
Pavlyuk's hand crept toward the grip of the Mauser.
"Easy there, Pan Golub, easy, or you may trip yourself up. Don't step on my pet corn. I'm liable to lose my temper."
This was more than Golub could stand.
"Throw them out and give them twenty-five lashes each!" he shouted.
The officers fell upon Pavlyuk and his men like a pack of hounds.
A shot crashed out with a report that sounded as if an electric bulb had been smashed against the floor, and the struggling men swirled and spun down the hall like two packs of fighting dogs. In the wild melee men slashed at each other with sabres and dug their fingers into hair and throats,while the women, squealing with terror like stuck pigs, scattered away from the contestants.
In a few minutes Pavlyuk and his followers, disarmed and beaten, were dragged out of the hall,and thrown out into the street.
Pavlyuk lost his fur hat in the scrimmage, his face was bruised and his weapons were gone and now he was beside himself with rage. He and his men leapt into the saddle and galloped down the street.
The evening was broken up. No one felt inclined to make merry after what had happened. The women refused to dance and insisted on being taken home, but Golub would not hear of it.
"Post sentries," he ordered. "Nobody is to leave the hall."
Palyanytsya hastened to carry out the orders.
"The dancing will continue until morning, ladies and gentlemen," Golub replied stubbornly to the protests that showered upon him. "I shall dance the first waltz myself."
The orchestra struck up again but there was to be no more frolicking that night nevertheless.
The Colonel had not circled the dance floor once with the priest's daughter when the sentries ran into the hall shouting:
"Pavlyuk's surrounding the theatre!"
At that moment a window facing the street crashed in and the snub-nosed muzzle of a machine gun was pushed in through the shattered window frame. It moved stupidly this way and that, as if picking out the figures scattering wildly away from it toward the centre of the hall as from the devil himself.
Palyanytsya fired at the thousand-candle-power lamp in the ceiling which exploded like a bomb,sending a shower of splintered glass down on everyone in the hall.
The hall was plunged in darkness. Someone shouted in the yard:
"Everybody get outside!" A stream of violent abuse followed.
The wild, hysterical screams of the women, the furious commands issued by Golub as he dashed about the hall trying to rally his officers who had completely lost their heads, the firing and shouting out in the yard all merged into an indescribable pandemonium. In the panic nobody noticed Palyanytsya slip through the back door into a deserted side street and run for all he was worth to Golub's headquarters.
A half an hour later a full-dress battle was raging in the town. The silence of the night wasshattered by the incessant cracking of rifle fire interspersed with the rattle of machine guns.
Completely stupefied, the townsfolk leapt up from warm beds and pressed against window panes.
At last the firing abated, and only one machine gun somewhere in the outskirts kept up a desultory shooting like the barking of a dog.
The fighting died down as the glimmer of dawn appeared on the horizon. . . .
Rumours that a pogrom was brewing crept through the town, finally reaching the tiny, low-roofedewish cottages with crooked windows that somehow managed to cling to the top of the filthy ravine leading down to the river. In these incredibly overcrowded hovels called houses lived the Jewish poor.
The compositors and other workers at the printshop where Sergei Bruzzhak had been working for more than a year were Jews. Strong bonds of friendship had sprung up between them and Sergei.
Like a closely knit family, they stood solid against their employer, the smug, well-fed Mr.Blumstein. An incessant struggle went on between the proprietor and the printers. Blumstein did his best to grab more and pay his workers less. The printers had gone on strike several times and the printshop had stood idle for two or three weeks running. There were fourteen of them. Sergei,the youngest, spent twelve hours a day turning the wheel of a hand press.
Today Sergei noticed an ominous uneasiness among the workers. For the past several troubledmonths the shop had had little to do apart from printing occasional proclamations issued by the "Chief Ataman".
A consumptive compositor named Mendel called Sergei into a corner.
"Do you know there's a pogrom coming?" he said, looking at the boy with his sad eyes.
Sergei looked up in surprise.
"No, I hadn't the slightest idea."
Mendel laid a withered, yellow hand on Sergei's shoulder and spoke in a confiding, paternal tone.
"There's going to be a pogrom—that's a fact. The Jews are going to be beaten up. What I want to know is this—will you help your comrades in their misfortune or not?"
"Of course I will, if I only can. What can I do, Mendel?"
The compositors were now listening to the conversation.
"You're a good boy, Seryozha, and we trust you. After all, your father's a worker like us. Now you run home and ask him whether he would agree to hide some old men and women at his place, and then we'll decide who they will be. Ask your people if there's anyone else they know willing to do
the same. The Russians will be safe from these bandits for the time being. Run along, Seryozha,there's no time to waste."
"You can count on me, Mendel. I'll see Pavka and Klimka right away—their folks are sure to take in somebody."
"Just a minute," Mendel anxiously halted Sergei who was about to leave. "Who are Pavka and Klimka? Do you know them well?"
Sergei nodded confidently.
"Of course. They're my pals. Pavka Korchagin's brother is a mechanic."
"Ah, Korchagin," Mendel was reassured. "I know him —used to live in the same house. Yes, you can see the Korchagins. Go, Seryozha, and bring back an answer as soon as you can."
Sergei shot out into the street.
The pogrom began on the third day after the pitched battle between the Pavlyuk detachment and Golub's men.
Pavlyuk, routed and driven out of Shepetovka, had cleared out of the neighbourhood and seized a small town nearby. The night encounter in Shepetovka had cost him a score of men. Golub had lost as many.
The dead were hastily carted off to the cemetery and buried the same day without much ceremony,for there was nothing to boast about in the whole affair. The two Atamans had flown at each other's throats like two stray curs, and to make a fuss over the funeral would have been unseemly.
True, Palyanytsya had wanted to make a big thing of it and declare Pavlyuk a Red bandit, but the Socialist-Revolutionaries headed by the priest Vasili objected.
The skirmish evoked some grumbling in Golub's regiment, especially among his bodyguard which had sustained the heaviest losses, and to put an end to the dissatisfaction and bolster up spirits, Palyanytsya proposed staging a pogrom—to provide "a little diversion" for the men, was the cynical way he broached the subject to Golub. He argued that this was essential in view of the grumbling in the unit. And although the Colonel was loth to disturb the peace in the town on the eve of his marriage to the barkeeper's daughter, he finally gave in.
Pan the Colonel had another reason for objecting to the operation: his recent admission into the S.R. Party. His enemies might stir up trouble again by branding him a pogrom-monger, and without doubt would slander him to the "Chief Ataman". So far, however, Golub was not greatly dependent on the "Chief", since he foraged for himself. Besides, the "Chief" knew very well what riffraff he had serving under him, and himself had time and again demanded money for the Directory's needs from the so-called requisitions; as for the reputation of a pogrom-monger, Golub already had quite a record in that respect. There was very little that he could add to it now.
The pogrom began early in the morning.
The town was still wrapped in the grey mist of dawn. The narrow streets which wound themselves like strips of wet linen around the haphazardly built blocks of the Jewish quarter were deserted and dead. The windows were heavily curtained and shuttered.
Outwardly the quarter appeared to be immersed in sound early-morning slumber, but inside the houses there was no sleep. Entire families, fully dressed, huddled together in one room, preparing themselves for the impending disaster. Only children, too young to realise what was happening, slept peacefully in their mothers' arms.
Salomyga, the chief of Golub's bodyguard, a dark fellow with the swarthy complexion of a Gypsy and a livid sabre scar across his cheek, worked hard that morning to wake up Golub's aide. It was a painful awakening for Palyanytsya—he could not shake himself loose from the nightmare that had beset him all night; the grimacing, hunchbacked devil was still clawing at his throat. At last he raised his splitting head and saw Salomyga bending over him.
"Get up, you souse," Salomyga was shaking him by the shoulder. "It's high time to get down to business!"
Palyanytsya, now wide awake, sat up and, his face grimacing with pain, spat out the bitter saliva that filled his mouth.
"What business?" he stared blankly at Salomyga.
"To rip up the sheenies, of course! You haven't forgotten, I hope."
It all came back to Palyanytsya. True enough, he had forgotten about it. The drinking bout at the farm where Pan the Colonel had retired with his fiancée and a handful of boon companions had been a heavy one.
Golub had found it convenient to leave town for the duration of the pogrom, for afterwards he could put it down to a misunderstanding in his absence, and in the meantime Palyanytsya would have ample opportunity to make a thorough job of it. Yes, Palyanytsya was an expert when it came to providing "diversion"! Palyanytsya poured a pail of water over his head and, thus sobered, was soon striding about headquarters issuing orders.
The bodyguard hundred was already in the saddle. To avoid possible complications, the farsighted Palyanytsya ordered pickets posted between the town proper and the workers' quarters and the
station. A machine gun was mounted in the Leszczinski garden facing the road in order to meet the workers with a squall of lead if they took it into their heads to interfere.
When all the preparations were complete, the aide and Salomyga leapt into the saddle.
"Wait, I nearly forgot," Palyanytsya said when they had already set out. "Get two carts to bring back Golub's wedding present. Ha-ha-ha! The first spoils as always to the commander, and the first girl for his aide—and that's me. Got it, you blockhead?"
The last remark was addressed to Salomyga, who glared back at him with jaundiced eyes.
"There'll be enough for everybody."
They spurred their horses down the highway, the aide and Salomyga leading the disorderly mob of mounted men.
The mist had lifted when Palyanytsya reined in his horse in front of a two-storey house with a rusty sign reading "Fuchs, Draper".
His thin-shanked grey mare nervously stamped her hoof against the cobblestones.
"Well, with God's help we'll begin here," Palyanytsya said as he jumped to the ground.
"All right, men, dismount," he turned to the men crowding around him. "The show's beginning.
Now I don't want any heads bashed, there'll be a time for that. As for the girls, if you can manage it, hold out until evening."
One of the men bared his strong teeth and protested:
"Now then, Pan Khorunzhy, what if it's by mutual consent?"
There was loud guffawing all around. Palyanytsya eyed the man who had spoken with admiring approbation.
"Well, that's another story—if they're willing, go right ahead, nobody can prohibit that."
Palyanytsya went up to the closed door of the store and kicked at it hard, but the sturdy oaken planks did not so much as tremble.
This was clearly the wrong place to begin. Palyanytsya rounded the corner of the house and headed for the door leading to Fuchs' place, supporting his sabre with his hand as he went.
Salomyga followed.
The people inside the house had heard the clatter of hoofs on the pavement outside and when the sound ceased in front of the shop and the men's voices carried through the walls their hearts
seemed to stop beating and their bodies stiffened with fright.
The wealthy Fuchs had left town the day before with his wife and daughters, leaving his servant Riva, a gentle timid girl of nineteen, to look after his property. Since she was afraid to remain alone in the house, he had suggested that she bring her old father and mother to stay with her until his return.
When Riva had tried meekly to protest, the cunning merchant had assured her that in all probability there would be no pogrom at all, for what could they expect to get from beggars? And he promised to give her a piece of stuff for a dress when he returned.
Now the three waited in fear and trembling, hoping against hope that the men would ride past;perhaps they had been mistaken, perhaps it had only seemed that the horses had stopped in front of their house. But their hopes were dashed by the dull reverberation of a blow at the shop door.
Old, silvery-haired Peisakh stood in the doorway, his blue eyes wide open like a frightened child's,and he whispered a prayer to Almighty Jehovah with all the passion of the fanatical believer. He prayed to God to protect this house from misfortune and for a while the old woman standing beside him could not hear the approaching footsteps for the mumble of his prayer.
Riva had fled to the farthest room where she hid behind the big oaken sideboard.
A shattering blow at the door sent a convulsive tremor through the two old people.
"Open the door!" Another blow, still more violent than the first, descended on the door, followed by furious curses.
But those within, numb with fright, could not lift a hand to unfasten the door.
Outside the rifle butts pounded until the bolts gave way and the splintering door crashed open.
Armed men poured into the house; they searched every corner. A blow from a rifle butt smashed in the door leading into the shop and the front door bolts were drawn from within.
The looting began.
When the carts had been piled high with cloth, shoes and other loot, Salomyga set out with the booty to Golub's quarters. When he returned he heard a shriek of terror issuing from the house.
Palyanytsya, leaving his men to sack the shop, had walked into the proprietor's apartment and found the old folks and the girl standing there. Casting his green lynx-like eyes over them he snapped at the old couple: "Get out of here!" Neither mother nor father stirred.
Palyanytsya took a step forward and slowly drew his sabre.
"Mama!" the girl gave a heart-rending scream. It was this that Salomyga heard.
Palyanytsya turned to his men who had run in at the cry.
"Throw them out!" he barked, pointing at the two old people. When this had been done, he told Salomyga who had now appeared. "You watch here at the door while I have a chat with the wench."
The girl screamed again. Old Peisakh made a rush for the door leading into the room, but a violent blow in the chest sent him reeling back against the wall, gasping with pain. Like a she-wolf fighting for her young, Toiba, the old mother, always so quiet and submissive, now flung herself at Salomyga.
"Let me .in! What are you doing to my girl?" She was struggling to get to the door, and try as he might Salomyga could not break her convulsive grip on his coat.
Peisakh, now recovered from the shock and pain, came to Toiba's assistance.
"Let us pass! Let us pass! Oh my daughter!"
Between them the old couple managed to push Salomyga away from the door. Enraged, he jerked his revolver from under his belt and brought the steel grip down hard upon the old man's grey head. Peisakh crumpled to the floor.
Inside the room Riva was screaming.
Toiba was dragged out of the house frantic with grief, and the street echoed to her wild shrieks and entreaties for help.
Inside the house everything was quiet.
Palyanytsya came out of the room. Without looking at Salomyga, whose hand was already on the door handle, he said:
"No use going in—she choked when I tried to shut her up with a pillow." As he stepped over Peisakh's body he put his foot into a dark sticky mess.
Bad beginning," he muttered as he went outside.
The others followed him without a word, leaving behind bloody footprints on the floor and the stairs.
Pillage was in full swing in the town. Brief savage clashes flared up between brigands over the division of the spoils, and here and there sabres flashed. And almost everywhere fists flailed without restraint. From the beer saloon twenty-five gallon kegs were rolled out onto the street.
Then the looters began to break into Jewish homes.
There was no resistance. They went through the rooms, hastily turned every corner upside down, and went away laden with booty, leaving behind disordered heaps of clothing and the fluttering contents of ripped feather beds and pillows. The first day took a toll of only two victims: Riva and
her father; but the oncoming night carried with it the unavoidable menace of death.
By evening the motley crew of scavengers was roaring drunk. The crazed Petlyura men were waiting for the night.
Darkness released them from the last restraint. It is easier to destroy a man in the pit of night; even the jackal prefers the hours of gloom.
Few would ever forget these two terrible nights and three days. How many crushed and mangled lives they left behind, how many youthful heads turned grey in these bloody hours, how many bitter tears were shed! It is hard to tell whether those were the more fortunate who were left to live with souls desolated, in the agony of shame and humiliation, gnawed by indescribable grief for loved ones who would never return. In the narrow alleys lay the lacerated, tormented, broken bodies of young girls with arms thrown back in convulsive gestures of agony.
Only at the very riverfront, in the house where Naum the blacksmith lived, the jackals who fell upon his young wife Sarah got a fierce rebuff. The smith, a man of powerful build in the prime of his twenty-four years and with the steel muscles of one who wielded the sledge-hammer for a living, did not yield his mate.
In a brief but furious clash in the tiny cottage the skulls of two Petlyura men were crushed like rotten melons. With the terrible fury of despair, the smith fought fiercely for two lives, and for a long time the dry crackle of rifle fire could be heard from the river bank where the brigands now rushed, sensing the danger. With only one round of ammunition left, the smith mercifully shot his wife, and himself rushed out to his death, bayonet in hand. He was met by a squall of lead and his powerful body crashed to the ground outside his front door.
Prosperous peasants from nearby villages drove into town in carts drawn by well-fed horses, loaded their waggon boxes with whatever met their fancy, and, escorted by sons and relatives serving in Golub's force, hurried home so as to make another trip or two to town and back.
Seryozha Bruzzhak, who together with his father had hidden half of his printshop comrades in the cellar and attic, was crossing the garden on his way home when he saw a man in a long, patched coat running up the road, violently swinging his arms.
It was an old Jew, and behind the bareheaded, panting man whose features were paralysed with mortal terror, galloped a Petlyura man on a grey horse. The distance between them dwindled fast and the mounted man leaned forward in the saddle to cut down his victim. Hearing the hoofbeats behind him, the old man threw up his hands as if to ward off the blow. At that moment Seryozha leapt onto the road and threw himself in front of the horse.
"Stop, you dog of a bandit
The rider, making no effort to stay the descending sabre, brought the flat of the blade down on the fair young head.