The Tartar Steppe by Dino Buzzati & Stuart C. Hood (Translator)

Author:Dino Buzzati & Stuart C. Hood (Translator)
Language: eng
Format: azw3, epub
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

14

THE expedition to trace the unexplored stretch of frontier left the next day at dawn. In command was Monti, the huge captain, accompanied by Lieutenant Angustina and a sergeant-major. Each of the three had been entrusted with the password for that day and for the four following days. It was highly improbable that all three of them would perish; in any case the most senior surviving soldier would have had powers to open his superior officers' jackets, if they were dead or had fainted, to search in the little inside pocket and take from it the sealed envelope containing the secret pass for re-entering the Fort.

As the sun rose, some forty armed men emerged from the walls of the Fort. Captain Monti wore heavy nailed boots like those of his men. Only Angustina wore jackboots ; before they left, the captain had looked at them with extreme curiosity but had said nothing.

They descended a hundred yards or so over the stony road, then struck across to the right towards the mouth of a narrow rocky valley which ran into the heart of the mountain.

They had been walking for half an hour when the captain said : "You'll have hard going with these," and pointed to Angustina's jackboots.

Angustina said nothing.

"I don't want to have to stop," the captain went on after a little. "They'll hurt you, you'll see."

"It's too late now," replied Angustina, "you could have told me sooner, if that is the case."

"Either way it would have come to the same thing," retorted Monti. "I know you, Angustina, you would have put them on just the same."

Monti could not stand him. With all the airs you give yourself, he thought, I'll show you soon. And he forced the pace to the utmost even up the steepest slopes, knowing that Angustina was not strong. Meanwhile they had come close to the base of the cliffs. The loose stones had grown smaller and their feet sank into them exhaustingly.

"Usually there is a devilish wind blowing down this gorge," said the captain. "But today it's fine."

Lieutenant Angustina said nothing.

"It's a good job there's no sun," Monti went on. "It's good going today."

"Then you have been here already?" asked Angustina.

"Once," answered Monti, "we had to look for a deserter."

He broke off the last word because the noise of a stonefall had come from high up on a grey overhanging wall of rock. They could hear the crash of the boulders exploding against the crags and rebounding wildly down into the abyss amidst clouds of dust. A crash of thunder was thrown from cliff to cliff. The mysterious stonefall continued for some minutes in the heart of the crags, but died away in the gullies before reaching the foot; only two or three stones reached the screes where the soldiers were climbing.

All had fallen silent—in the roaring of the stonefall they had felt the presence of a hostile power. Monti looked at Angustina with a vague air of distrust. He hoped he would be afraid, but not at all.

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