"What a rude, rough, primitive lot we Russians are!" commented Ossip, seating himself atop of the icebreaker, and screwing up his eyes to measure its fall. "To speak plainly, we Russians are sheer barbarians. Once upon a time, I may tell you, an anchorite happened to be on his travels; and as the people came pressing around him, and kneeling to him, and tearfully beseeching him with the words, 'Oh holy father, intercede for us with the wolves which are devouring our substance!' he replied: 'Ha! Are you, or are you not, Orthodox Christians? See that I assign you not to condign perdition!' Yes, angry, in very truth he was. Nay, he even spat in the people's faces. Yet in reality he was a kindly old man, for his eyes kept shedding tears equally with theirs."

Twenty sazheni below the icebreaker was a gang of barefooted sailors, engaged in hacking out the floes from under their barges; and as they shattered the brittle, greyish-blue crust on the river, the mattocks rang out, and the sharp blades of the icecutters gleamed as they thrust the broken fragments under the surface. Meanwhile, there could be heard a bubbling of water, and the sound of rivulets trickling down to the sandy margin of the river. And similarly among our own gang was there audible a scraping of planes, and a screeching of saws, and a clattering of iron braces as they were driven into the smooth yellow wood, while through all the web of these sounds there ran the ceaseless song of the bells, a song so softened by distance as to thrill the soul, much as though dingy, burdensome labour were holding revel in honour of spring, and calling upon the latter to spread itself over the starved, naked surface of the gradually thawing ground.

At this point someone shouted hoarsely:

"Go and fetch the German. We have not got hands enough."

And from the bank someone bawled in reply:

"Where IS he?"

"In the tavern. That is where you must go and look for him."

And as they made themselves heard, the voices floated up turgidly into the sodden air, spread themselves over the river's mournful void, and died away.

Meanwhile our men worked with industry and speed, but not without a fault or two, for their thoughts were fixed upon the town and its washhouses and churches. And particularly restless was Sashok Diatlov, a man whose hair, as flaxen as that of his brother, seemed to have been boiled in lye. At intervals, glancing up-river, this well-built, sturdy young fellow would say softly to his brother:

"It's cracking now, eh?"

And, certainly, the ice had "moved" two nights ago, so that since yesterday morning the river watchmen had refused to permit horsed vehicles to cross, and only a few beadlike pedestrians now were making their way along the marked-out ice paths, while, as they proceeded, one could hear the water slapping against the planks as the latter bent under the travellers' weight.

"Yes, it IS cracking," at length Mishuk replied with a hoist of his ginger eyebrows.

Ossip too scanned the river from under his hand. Then he said to Mishuk:

"Pah! It is the dry squeak of the planes in your own hand that you keep hearing, so go on with your work, you son of a beldame. And as for you, Inspector, do you help me to speed up the men instead of burying your nose in your notebook."

By this time there remained only two more hours for work, and the arch of the icebreaker had been wholly sheathed in butter-tinted scantlings, and nothing required to be added to it save the great iron braces. Unfortunately, Boev and Saniavin, the men who had been engaged upon the task of cutting out the sockets for the braces, had worked so amiss, and run their lines so straight, that, when it came to the point, the arms of the braces refused to sink properly into the wood.

"Oh, you cock-eyed fool of a Morduine!" shouted Ossip, smiting his fist against the side of his cap. "Do you call THAT sort of thing work?"

At this juncture there came from somewhere on the bank a seemingly exultant shout of:

"Ah! NOW it's giving way!"

And almost at the same moment, there stole over the river a sort of rustle, a sort of quiet crunching which made the projecting pine branches quiver as though they were trying to catch at something, while, shouldering their mattocks, the barefooted sailors noisily hastened aboard their barges with the aid of rope ladders.

And then curious indeed was it to see how many people suddenly came into view on the river – to see how they appeared to issue from below the very ice itself, and, hurrying to and fro like jackdaws startled by the shot of a gun, to dart hither and thither, and to seize up planks and boathooks, and to throw them down again, and once more to seize them up.

"Put the tools together," Ossip shouted. "And look alive there, and make for the bank."

"Aye, and a fine Easter Day it will be for us on THAT bank!" growled Sashok.

Meanwhile, it was the river rather than the town that seemed to be motionless – the latter had begun, as it were, to quiver and reel, and, with the hill above it, to appear to be gliding slowly up stream, even as the grey, sandy bank some ten sazheni from us was beginning to grow tremulous, and to recede.

"Run, all of you!" shouted Ossip, giving me a violent push as he did so. Then to myself in particular he added: "Why stand gaping there?"

This caused a keen sense of danger to strike home in my heart, and to make my feet feel as though already the ice was escaping their tread. So, automatically picking themselves up, those feet started to bear my body in the direction of a spot on the sandy bank where the winter-stripped branches of a willow tree were writhing, and whither there were betaking themselves also Boev, the old soldier, Budirin, and the brothers Diatlov. Meanwhile the Morduine ran by my side, cursing vigorously as he did so, and Ossip followed us, walking backwards.

"No, no, Narodetz," he said.

"But, my good Ossip – "

"Never mind. What has to be, has to be."

"But, as likely as not, we may remain stuck here for two days!"

"Never mind even if we DO remain stuck here."

"But what of the festival?"

"It will have, for this year at least, to be kept without you."

Seating himself on the sand, the old soldier lit his pipe and growled:

"What cowards you all are! The bank was only fifteen sazheni from us, yet you ran as though possessed!"

"With you yourself as leader," put in Mokei.

The old soldier took no notice, but added:

"What were you all afraid of? Once upon a time Christ Himself, Our Little Father, died."

"And rose again," muttered the Morduine with a tinge of resentment. Which led Boev to exclaim:

"Puppy, hold your tongue! What right have you to air your opinions?"

"Besides, this is Good Friday, not Easter Day," the old soldier concluded with severe, didactical mien.

In a gap of blue between the clouds there was shining the March sun, and everywhere the ice was sparkling as though in derision of ourselves. Shading his eyes, Ossip gazed at the dissolving river, and said:

"Yes, it IS rising – but that will not last for long."

"No, but long enough to make us miss the festival," grumbled Sashok.

Upon this the smooth, beardless face of the youthful Morduine, a face dark and angular like the skin of an unpeeled potato, assumed a resentful frown, and, blinking his eyes, he muttered:

"Yes, here we may have to sit – here where there's neither food nor money! Other folk will be enjoying themselves, but we shall have to remain hugging our hungry stomachs like a pack of dogs!"

Meanwhile Ossip's eyes had remained fixed upon the river, for evidently his thoughts were far away, and it was in absentminded fashion that he replied:

"Hunger cannot be considered where necessity impels. By the way, what use are our damned icebreakers? For the protection of barges and such? Why, the ice hasn't the sense to care. It just goes sliding over a barge, and farewell is the word to THAT bit of property!"

"Damn it, but none of us have a barge for property, have we?

"You had better go and talk to a fool."

"The truth is that the icebreaker ought to have been taken in hand sooner."

Finally, the old soldier made a queer grimace, and ejaculated:

"Blockhead!"

From a barge a knot of sailors shouted something, and at the same moment the river sent forth a sort of whiff of cruel chilliness and brooding calm. The disposition of the pine boughs now had changed. Nay, everything in sight was beginning to assume a different air, as though everything were charged with tense expectancy.

One of the younger men asked diffidently, beneath his breath:

"Mate Ossip, what are we going to do?"

"What do you say?" Ossip queried absent-mindedly.

"I say, what are we going to do? Just to sit here?"

To this Boev responded, with loud, nasal derision in his tone:

"Yes, my lad, for the Lord has seen fit to prevent you from participating in His most holy festival."

And the old soldier, in support of his mate, extended his pipe towards the river, and muttered with a grin:

"You want to cross to the town, do you? Well, be off with you, and though the ice may give way beneath your feet and drown you, at least you'll be taken to the police station, and so get to your festival. For that's what you want, I suppose?"

"True enough," Mokei re-echoed.

Then the sun went in, and the river grew darker, while the town stood out more clearly. Ceaselessly, the younger men gazed towards the town with wistful, gloomy eyes, though silently they remained where they were.

Similarly, I myself was beginning to find things irksome and uncomfortable, as always happens when a number of companions are thinking different thoughts, and contain in themselves none of that unity of will which alone can join men into a direct, uniform force. Rather, I felt as though I could gladly leave my companions and start out upon the ice alone.

Suddenly Ossip recovered his faculties. Rising, then doffing his cap and making the sign of the cross in the direction of the town, he said with a quiet, simple, yet somehow authoritative, air:

"Very well, my mates. Go in peace, and may the Lord go with you!"

"But whither?" asked Sashok, leaping to his feet. "To the town?"

"Whither else?"

The old soldier was the only one not to rise, and with conviction he remarked:

"It will result but in our getting drowned."

"Then stay where you are."

Ossip glanced around the party. Then he continued:

"Bestir yourselves! Look alive!"

Upon which all crowded together, and Boev, thrusting the tools into a hole in the bank, groaned:

"The order 'go' has been given, so go we MUST, well though a man in receipt of such an order might ask himself, 'How is it going to be done?'"

Ossip seemed, in some way, to have grown younger and more active, while the habitually shy, though good-humoured, expression of his countenance was gone from his ruddy features, and his darkened eyes had assumed an air of stern activity. Nay, even his indolent, rolling gait had disappeared, and in his step there was more firmness, more assurance, than had ever before been the case.

"Let every man take a plank," he said, "and hold it in front of him. Then, should anyone fall in (which God forbid!), the plank-ends will catch upon the ice to either side of him, and hold him up. Also, every man must avoid cracks in the ice. Yes, and is there a rope handy? Here, Narodetz! Reach me that spirit-level. Is everyone ready? I will walk first, and next there must come – well, which is the heaviest? – you, soldier, and then Mokei, and then the Morduine, and then Boev, and then Mishuk, and then Sashok, and then Makarei, the lightest of all. And do you all take off your caps before starting, and say a prayer to the Mother of God. Ha! Here is Old Father Sun coming out to greet us."

Readily did the men bare their tousled grey or flaxen heads as momentarily the sun glanced through a bank of thin white vapour before again concealing himself, as though averse to arousing any false hopes.

"Now!" sharply commanded Ossip in his new-found voice. "And may God go with us! Watch my feet, and don't crowd too much upon one another, but keep each at a sazhen's distance or more – in fact, the more the better. Yes, come, mates!"

With which, stuffing his cap into his bosom, and grasping the spirit-level in his hands, Ossip set foot upon the ice with a sliding, cautious, shuffling gait. At the same moment, there came from the bank behind us a startled cry of:

"Where are you off to, you fools?"

"Never mind," said Ossip to ourselves. "Come along with you, and don't stand staring."

"You blockheads!" the voice repeated. "You had far better return."

"No, no! come on!" was Ossip's counter-command. "And as you move think of God, or you'll never find yourselves among the invited guests at His holy festival of Eastertide."

Next Ossip sounded a police whistle, which act led the old soldier to exclaim:

"Oh, that's the way, mate! Good! Yes, you know what to do. Now notice will have been given to the police on the further bank, and, if we're not drowned, we shall find ourselves clapped in gaol when we get there. However, I'm not responsible."

In spite of this remonstrance, Ossip's sturdy voice drew his companions after him as though they had been tied to a rope.

"Watch your feet carefully," once more he cried.

Our line of march was directed obliquely, and in the opposite direction to the current. Also, I, as the rearmost of the party, found it pleasant to note how the wary little Ossip of the silvery head went looping over the ice with the deftness of a hare, and practically no raising of the feet, while behind him there trailed, in wild-goose fashion, and as though tied to a single invisible string, six dark and undulating figures the shadows of which kept making themselves visible on the ice, from those figures' feet to points indefinitely remote. And as we proceeded, all of us kept our heads lowered as though we had been descending from a mountain in momentary fear of a false step.

Also, though the shouting in our rear kept growing in volume, and we could tell that by this time a crowd had gathered, not a word could we distinguish, but only a sort of ugly din.

In time our cautious march became for me a mere, mechanical, wearisome task, for on ordinary occasions it was my custom to maintain a pace of greater rapidity. Thus, eventually I sank into the semiconscious condition amid which the soul turns to vacuity, and one no longer thinks of oneself, but, on the contrary issues from one's personality, and begins to see objects with unwonted clarity, and to hear sounds with unwonted precision. Under my feet the seams in the blue-grey, leaden ice lay full of water, while as for the ice itself, it was blinding in its expansive glitter, even though in places it had come to be either cracked or bulbous, or had ground itself into powder with its own movement, or had become heaped into slushy hummocks of pumice-like sponginess and the consistency of broken glass. And everywhere around me I could discern the chilly, gaping smile of blue crevices which caught at my feet, and rendered the tread of my boot-soles unstable. And ever, as we marched, could the voices of Boev and the old soldier be heard speaking in antiphony, like two pipes being fluted by one and the same pair of lips.

"I won't be responsible," said the one voice.

"Nor I," responded the other.

"The only reason why I have come is that I was told to do so. That's all about it."

"Yes, and the same with me."

"One man gives an order, and another man, perhaps a man a thousand times more sensible than he, is forced to obey it."

"Is any man, in these days, sensible, seeing what a racket we have to live among?"

By this time Ossip had tucked the skirts of his greatcoat into his belt, while beneath those skirts his legs (clad in grey cloth gaiters of a military pattern) were shuffling along as lightly and easily as springs, and in a manner that suggested that there was turning and twisting in front of him some person whom, though desirous of barring to him the direct course, the shortest route, Ossip successfully opposed and evaded by dint of dodges and deviations to right and left, and occasional turns about, and the execution of dance steps and loops and semicircles. Meanwhile in the tones of Ossip's voice there was a soft, musical ring that struck agreeably upon the ear, and harmonised to admiration with the song of the bells just when we were approaching the middle of the river's breadth of four hundred sazheni. There resounded over the surface of the ice a vicious rustle while a piece of ice slid from under my feet. Stumbling, and powerless to retain my footing, I blundered down upon my knees in helpless astonishment; and then, as I glanced upstream, fear gripped at my throat, deprived me of speech, and darkened all my vision. For the whole substance of the grey ice-core had come to life and begun to heave itself upwards! Yes, the hitherto level surface was thrusting forth sharp angular ridges, and the air seemed full of a strange sound like the trampling of some heavy being over broken glass.

With a quiet trickle there came a swirl of water around me, while an adjacent pine bough cracked and squeaked as though it too had come to life. My companions shouted, and collected into a knot; whereupon, at once dominating and quelling the tense, painful hubbub of sounds, there rang forth the voice of Ossip.

"Mother of God!" he shouted. "Scatter, lads! Get away from one another, and keep each to himself! Now! Courage!"

With that, springing towards us as though wasps had been after him, and grasping the spirit-level as though it had been a weapon, he jabbed it to every side, as though fighting invisible foes, while, just as the quivering town began, seemingly, to glide past us, and the ice at my feet gave a screech and crumbled to fragments beneath me, so that water bubbled to my knees. I leapt up from where I was, and rushed blindly in Ossip's direction.

"Where are you coming to, fool?" was his shout as he brandished the spirit-level. "Stand still where you are!"

Indeed, Ossip seemed no longer to be Ossip at all, but a person curiously younger, a person in whom all that had been familiar in Ossip had become effaced. Yes, the once blue eyes had turned to grey, and the figure added half an arshin to its stature as, standing as erect as a newly made nail, and pressing both feet together, the foreman stretched himself to his full height, and shouted with his mouth open to its widest extent:

"Don't shuffle about, nor crowd upon one another, or I'll break your heads!"

Whereafter, of myself in particular, he inquired as he raised the spirit-level:

"What is the matter with YOU, pray?"

"I am feeling frightened," I muttered in response.

"Feeling frightened of WHAT, indeed?"

"Of being drowned."

"Pooh! Just you hold your tongue."

Yet the next moment he glanced at me, and added in a gentler, quieter tone:

"None but a fool gets drowned. Pick yourself up and come along."

Then once more he shouted full-throated words of encouragement to his men; and as he did so, his chest swelled and his head rocked with the effort.

Yet, crackling and cracking, the ice was breaking up; and soon it began slowly to bear us past the town. 'Twas as though some unknown force ashore had awakened, and was striving to tear the banks of the river in two, so much did the portion of the landscape downstream seem to be standing still while the portion level with us seemed to be receding in the opposite direction, and thus causing a break to take place in the middle of the picture.