Characters of modern times are fabled by the author. Any resemblance to living or deceased people is purely coincidental.
A short story
If you presume that you can create a new plot in this life, then you either don’t muse deeply enough about it or you don’t know much enough. And it doesn’t matter where you live – in the capital or, like me, in a small resort town. People are the same everywhere. That’s for sure!
Before enlisting to army, I wanted to be a writer or journalist and I’ve read a lot of books. But no matter what I read, no matter what complicated story I told, my Jewish grandfather always found an example from the Tanah, and my Greek grandfather just grinned,
“So you haven’t studied all the tragedies yet.”
I thought that I would live my life retelling in Russian the wisdom of other peoples, well, at least peoples related to me. But fate decided otherwise… And, without graduating the Literature Institute and raising a son, I along with the entire crowd of readers and a handful of writers went to the front. Who was called up, who volunteered, but the majority had a feeling “it’s necessary!” This had happened more than once in the history of my beloved peoples. An enemy is an enemy.
My wife told me,
“Come back alive! Gosha and I are waiting for you, and smart books will wait.”
That’s how I remembered Lena’s delicate features and fragile girlish figure against the backdrop of shelves with books’ gold spines, as soldiers weren’t entitled a family or books during a war.
At the military registration and enlistment office we were divided by height. At first, the tall guys laughed at the others, but when it turned out that the short ones were not sent directly to the front, but to tank training school, they even began to envy us. But what kind of envy is there? It is unknown who will fall into which fire. Or maybe even into a flame – it was blazed all around.
The months in the tank training school seemed long-lasting and slow-running. Everyone was eager to fight. But you can quickly study only the three-line rifle. A tank is a serious machine. And the cadets crammed and crammed – weapons, chassis and even repairs. The tank commander must know and be able to do everything about it in order to replace both the gunner and the driver – anything may happen in battle.
Our school was located opposite the bread factory, and I imprinted in my memory the smell of fresh baked goods, mixed with the kerosene smell of our twenty-sixes. There were not enough tanks at the front, like bread in the rear, but sometimes you could buy an extra loaf. But sending it home sounded like the fairy tale about Kolobok or Little Round Bun.
My wife wrote that she and our son were fine; working at the military registration and enlistment office gave her increased rations. And only separation from my family and stories about the adventures of a military commissar, a “Don Juan”, a former artilleryman shell-shocked in the Finnish war, darkened my studies, without any hope of even a short vacation.
After graduating from the tank school, we were scattered along the fronts. I ended up in a tank brigade with a wonderful commander. He was a tanker from God, if only God sorted out tanks. He drove all the type of vehicles that were ever in service, and in a combat situation during the conflict with Japan, having sealed the hatch with resin, as if on an amphibian of the future, he crossed the bottom of the river to the other side and unexpectedly struck the enemy. For this he received his first combat order. And then others followed in a string: for courage, technical solutions, crossing rivers, encircling enemy groups, capturing bases of operations and cities. The brigade commander was my David, Achilles, Alexander, Richard. We, tankers, armored knights of the twentieth century, secretly prayed for him, admiring his reckless courage. Despite his commanding position, he led the brigade and crushed enemies in the front rows, like a young lieutenant.
In free moments of respite, we talked about the heroes of antiquity, from whom he took an example. He really liked King David. He valued the fearless hero and warrior in the king more than a wise politician. For this, he could forgive a person a lot, just as he “forgave” Achilles’ initial cowardice and attempt to hide from the Trojan campaign in a woman’s dress, Alexander’s arrogance and love for boys and Richard’s cruelty towards prisoners.
“A war is a terrible test,” he said, “Everything is subordinated to one thing – victory, therefore a person’s valor outweighs many of his shortcomings and mistakes, which he will later repent of and which he will secretly pray for forgiveness.”
It was easy for him to say that – not a single woman in the division could or wanted to ignore the thirty-five-year-old handsome hero, whom I called “King David” behind his back, and achieving his reciprocity was considered akin to a feat. And for the second year now I was tormented by my own infidelity and letters from home, which breathed calm and comfort, but twisted the spring of my jealousy ever tighter. One day I shared my concern with the brigade commander and asked for leave.
“Listen, warrior,” he said, “tear this thorn out of your heart. We have “combat allowance”, thanks to the party and the sanitary battalion, but we should hide the “bad thoughts” deeper. So, are you judging Anna, who lives with me? But she has a husband. The man also fights and suffers. We all stand for each other and put our lives at the stake. And front-line love and infidelity are only a small part of the costs of war. There will be no vacation for you, warrior, until you are wounded. Don’t dream!”
I didn’t even know that just these days the brigade commander received bad news. His parents and sisters were shot in their hometown by the Nazis. Perhaps this redoubled his frantic military drive. As always, he was rushing in the lead tank when it was hit by shots from two Panthers.
Washing the soot from her face with streams of tears, Anna dragged commander’s bloody body under a hail of earth clods and shrapnel. And she had dragged him alive to the safety. “King David” was sent to the hospital, and then to the rear to recover.
The night was stuffy. The tall guard shaking his fan rhythmically, was directing a life-giving stream of air at the king. David couldn’t sleep. The chain of events in recent months has been rapid and alarming. It seemed there was nothing to worry about for the victorious king, but no, fate always presented him with unexpected challenges.
The victory over Goliath and the rapid approach to the court forever changed the future of a simple shepherd. Was he really a simple one? Soon he had to take refuge with his enemies from the death-threatening jealousy of King Saul towards his growing popularity and glory among the people. But he never, never rebelled against legitimate authority. Fate itself found him after the death of Saul and made him king – first of his tribe, and seven years later of the entire people of Israel.
The capture of the “city of Peace” – Ir Shalaim and its transformation into the capital was David’s main political success. By placing the shrine of the people – the Ark of the Covenant with the Tablets – in his city, David made it holy forever. But the only thing he did not fulfil was building the Temple. He left this task to his son, the heir to the throne. But while his sons and “Brave Men” – his military leaders were expanding and strengthening the kingdom, a king’s second youth knocked on the royal door.
On the same stuffy night, two months ago, towards morning, David went out for a walk on the terrace of his new palace. Built of Lebanese cedar and decorated with gold and ivory, the House of David towered over the city that was rapidly growing around it. Beautiful houses of generals, advisers, and royal officials surrounded it. Usually at this time their yards were empty, but suddenly David’s heart began to beat anxiously. The naked beauty – Bathsheba, the wife of one of his “Brave Men” – Uriah, who fought on the Ammonite front, poured water on her hot and beautiful body. The picture was unbearable. The voice of reason was suppressed in seconds, and the servants rushed to deliver the woman, trembling, but submissive to the will of the powerful king, to the chambers of the palace.
It was the morning of his new life. Never since the days of David’s youth had such a keen sense of love and beauty seized a king.
“Wonderful woman, she must be mine, she must bear me a son!” – whispered the voice of the tempter.
The secret meetings continued until it became clear that Bathsheba had become pregnant. And then the voice of reason woke up.
“Urgently recall Uriah from the front. Then gossip and dirt will not touch her. No one will recognize David as the father of the child when the husband is next to his wife, even for a short time.”
But unfortunately, Uriah, suspecting that something was wrong, refused to sleep with his wife and did not even cross the threshold of his house, spending the night with his retinue in the palace. David was beside himself,
“Well, if you want to test your own courage, have it your way!”
He personally wrote an order to the commander of the army, Joab,
“Send Uriah’s detachment to attack without the support of the main forces!” and handed the letter to Uriah – deliver it yourself.
You don’t have to be a genius to predict the outcome of such an attack. And then David was “twisted” by his conscience: sending people to attack is his royal right, but deliberately exposing them to mortal danger is a sin, a great sin!
And he began to publicly repent, punishing himself spiritually, but Bathsheba became the new queen and over time bore him a child, the heir to the throne, a sage and builder of a people’s shrine – the Temple…
Well, who would have thought that the summer heat can make history?!
The news from home was unexpected, and my heart sank with vague anxiety. My Lena met… my “King David”. As fate would have it, he ended up in the sanatorium of our resort town and, naturally, conveyed greetings from me to the family. My wife wrote what a knight my commander was, and Gosha, the “traitor,” rode on his strong neck and played with his brand new gold star of the hero’s. I was instantly cured of my jealousy for the military commissar and was inflamed with a new, even more terrible one – for my beloved brigade commander. I tirelessly thought about how I would ask him directly,
“Well, commander, tell the truth, did you sleep with my wife?”
And he will grin and answer sharply,
“And why do you need this damn truth? Do you think she has something there that others don’t? Or don’t you believe in your own strength? Yes, she loves you fool, loves!”
And I will stand weakened and disarmed by his words, never knowing how everything really happened.
The colonel returned to the brigade just before the assault on the Vistula. Army Commander Rybalko hugged him and said,
“That’s it, end of boyishness! The army needs brains, not just muscles! I forbid you to go in the first echelon. We are waiting for watercraft and starting the crossing!”
I was as on pins and needles. My mentally asked question dozens of times was on my tongue. But I understood – well, now is not the time. And somehow it dwarfed against the background of an important strategic blow: thousands of people would die in the coming hours, but here “she yielded or not.” I was “calming” myself by quoting Chekhov,
“Rejoice if your wife cheated on you, and not on your Motherland!”
But sarcasm didn’t help. Finally, the unit commanders were called to a meeting to receive orders, and I ran, exchanging the pangs of jealousy for the excitement of the upcoming attack.
“Guys,” said “King David,” “I have an idea. While the boats and pontoons are being brought up, another day will begin, and the enemy will group up. We need an unexpected move, a blow that is not expected. Therefore, we build rafts on our own, cross over and seize a beachhead. And there we are already fighting to the death and ensuring the passage of the entire tank army.”
Yes, he was a dashing guy! And he kept his word to the army commander – he appointed me commander of the lead tank. I would have turned my nose up, but disturbing historical analogies kept popping into my head.
Early morning caught me in my T-34 on a raft in the middle of the Vistula. This is when the first shells exploded around. The water has boiled.
“Not now!” pounding in my temples, as we covered the remaining meters to the shore. A tank on a nearby raft caught fire, the logs of the other raft drifted apart, and the gray water gasped and swallowed up two combat vehicles.
“A little more, a little more!” I prayed to fate with all might of an atheist- Komsomol member. And so far the fate has obeyed. The raft had already buried itself in the gentle bank, and the tank, like a horse yearning for dry land, rushed with all its horsepower across the green July grass.
“At the coastal battery, fire!” I commanded, and the iron body of the machine jerked back with the force of recoil. Something flared up, smoke poured out and there was a deafening explosion – we hit the ammunition stacked near the battery. And new machines were already growling around, reaching the shore and entering the battle with the enemy…
“Historical analogies” did not take place. I was “finally” wounded. I received an award and a sick leave to go home. There, in the circle of my close and dear people, we commemorated my “King David”, who was burned alive in one of the attacks. The fighting for the beachhead continued until January. I managed to recover, return to the brigade and continue the war. We named our youngest son Solomon, in honor of my Jewish grandfather, just as we once named our eldest son George in honor of my Greek grandfather.
But for some reason I still don’t like King David, the real one, the hero, ruler and politician. As both my grandfathers would say,
“The silver spoons were found, but the sediment in the soul has remained.”
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