The Signal

by Vsevolod Garshin

Semyon Ivanonv's job was to walk up and down the railway track and repair it. His hut was ten kilometres away from a railway station in one direction and twelve in the other. The only houses nearby were the huts of the other track repair men. Semyon Ivanov's health was very poor.

Nine years before he had been in the war as servant to an officer. He was always hungry on the long marches of forty and fifty kilometres a day in the heat and the cold and the rain and the sun. There were bullets everywhere too but, thank God!, none hit him.

Semyon was once very near the enemy as well. For a whole week there was fighting with the Turks. There was only a deep valley between the two armies; and from morning till evening there was shooting. Three times a day, Semyon carried hot tea and his officer's meals from the camp kitchen to the valley. The bullets hit the rocks behind him. Semyon was very frightened and cried sometimes, but still he continued. The officers were pleased with him, because he always had hot tea ready for them.

He returned from the war with both his arms and both his legs but he still could not use his hands or feet because of rheumatism. He also had a lot of unhappiness in his life. He arrived home to find that his father, an old man, and his little four-year-old son had died. Semyon stayed alone with his wife. He could not do much. It was difficult to plough with rheumatic arms and legs.

He and his wife could no longer stay in their village, so they went to find jobs in new places. They had no luck anywhere. Then his wife went to work as a servant in someone's house and Semyon continued to travel about. One time, he happened to travel by train and, at one of the stations, he recognised the station-master. Semyon looked at him and the station-master looked at Semyon, and they knew each other. He had been an officer in the army in the same group as Semyon.

"You are Ivanov?" he said.

"Yes, sir."

"Why are you here?" Semyon told him everything.

"Where are you going?" "I can't tell you, sir."

"Idiot! What do you mean by 'can't tell you?'"

"I mean what I say, sir. There is nowhere for me to go. I must look for work, sir."

The station-master looked at him, thought a bit, and said: "Listen, friend, stay here a while at the station. You're married, I think. Where's your wife?" "Yes, sir, I am married. My wife is at Kursk, working in a businessman's house."

"Well, write to your wife and tell her to come here. I'll give you a free ticket for her to travel by train. There is a job as a track-repair man. I will speak to the Chief for you."

"Thank-you, sir," replied Semyon.

He stayed at the station, helped in the kitchen, cut wood and cleaned the garden and the platform. In two weeks' time his wife arrived and Semyon went to his hut with her. The hut was a new one and warm, with as much wood as he wanted.

There was a little vegetable garden and a little ploughed land too. Semyon was extremely pleased. He began to think of doing some farming, of buying a cow and a horse.

He was given everything he needed for his job — a green flag, a red flag, lamps, tools and nails; they gave him two books of rules and a train timetable.

At first, Semyon could not sleep at night and learnt the timetable by heart. Two hours before a train was coming, he looked over the track and sat on the seat at his hut, and looked and listened for the train. He even learnt the rules by heart, although he could only read by spelling out every word.

It was summer; the work was not difficult; there was no snow to clean and the trains did not come very often. Semyon went over his kilometre of track twice a day, fastened the nuts, looked at the water-pipes, and then went home. There was only one problem — he always needed the inspector's permission for every little thing he wanted to do. Semyon and his wife were beginning to get bored with this.

Two months passed and Semyon started to get to know his neighbours, the track-repair men on the left and right sides of him. One was a very old man. He did not move out of his hut very often. His wife did all his work. The other track-repair man, nearer the station, was a young man, thin, but strong. He and Semyon met for the first time on the line half-way between their huts.

Semyon took off his hat. "Good health to you, neighbour," he said.

The neighbour glanced at him. "How do you do?" he replied quickly and then turned and went away.

Later the wives met. Semyon's wife said hello to her neighbour, but she did not say very much back.

One time, Semyon said to her: "Young woman, your husband is not very talkative."

The woman said nothing at first, then replied: "But what is there for him to talk about? Everyone has his own business. Good-bye."

However, after another month or so they became friends. Semyon went with Vasily along the line, sat and smoked and talked about life. Vasily was usually quiet, but Semyon talked about his village and fighting in the war.

"I've had a lot of sadness in my life," he said; "and I haven't lived long. God has not given me happiness."

Vasily Stepanych took the ash out of his pipe, stood up and said: "It is not luck which controls us in life, but other people. Man is the cruelest animal on earth. The wolf doesn't eat another wolf, but man will happily eat another man."

"Come, friend, don't say that."

"The words came into my mind and I spoke. All the same, there is nothing crueler than man. Everybody could live happily but some people are greedy."

Semyon thought a bit. "I don't know," he said; "perhaps it's like you say or perhaps it's what God wants."

"And perhaps," said Vasily, "it is a waste of time for me to talk to you. To say everything unpleasant is what God wants and to sit and suffer means you are an animal. That's what I have to say." And he turned and went off without saying good-bye.

Semyon also got up. "Neighbour," he called, "why are you getting angry?" But his neighbour didn't look round.

Semyon gazed at him until he disappeared. He went home and said to his wife: "Arina, our neighbour is an evil person."

However, they did not argue. They met again and discussed the same things.

"We're living in these huts because some men are greedy," said Vasily, one time.

"What's wrong with living in these huts? It's not so bad. You can live in them."

"Live in them! Bah, you!... You've lived long and learnt little, looked at much and seen little. What sort of life is there for a poor man in a hut? The rich are eating you and when you become old, they will throw you out just as they throw out old food – to feed the dogs. What pay do you get?"

"Not much, Vasily — twelve rubles."

"And me, thirteen and a half rubles. Why? The company rules say they should give us fifteen rubles a month and wood for fires and light. Who decides that you should have twelve rubles, or I must earn thirteen and a half? Ask yourself! And you say a man can live on that? You understand it is not a question of one and a half rubles or three rubles — even if they paid us each the whole fifteen rubles. I won't stay here long; I'll go somewhere, anywhere."

"But where will you go, Stepanych? Here you have a house, warmth, a little piece of land. Your wife is a worker."

"Land! You should look at my piece of land. Nothing on it. I planted some cabbages in the spring, just when the inspector came along.

"He said: 'What's this? Why have you not reported this? Why have you done this without permission? Throw them away. Three rubles fine!'"

Vasily was quiet for a while, smoking his pipe, then added: "I wanted to kill him."

"You get angry very fast."

"No, I don't, but I tell the truth and think. Yes, he will get a bloody nose from me. I will complain to the Chief. We will see then!" And Vasily complained to the Chief!

Once the Chief came to inspect the line. Three days later important people were coming from St. Petersburg and would use the line. They wanted to be sure everything was ready. Semyon worked for a week. He got everything in order, cleaned, mended and waited. Vasily also worked hard. The Chief arrived on a trolley. The trolley travelled at twenty kilometres an hour, but the wheels were noisy. It reached Semyon's hut and he ran out and reported just like a soldier!

"How long have you been here?" asked the Chief.

"Since the second of May, sir."

"Alright. And who is at hut No. 164?"

The traffic inspector (he was travelling with the Chief on the trolley) replied: "Vasily Spiridov."

"Spiridov, Spiridov... Ah! Is he the man you complained about last year?"

"He is."

"Well, we'll see Vasily Spiridov. Go on!" Semyon watched the trolley move away and thought, "There will be trouble between them and my neighbour."

About two hours later he started checking the track. He saw someone coming along the line. There was something white on his head. Semyon began to look more carefully. It was Vasily. He had a handkerchief on his head.

"Where are you going?" cried Semyon.

Vasily came quite close. He was very pale and his eyes had a wild look. He muttered: "To town — to Moscow — to the head office."

"Head office? You're going to complain, I suppose. Don't! Vasily, forget it."

"No, I will not forget. It's too late. He hit me in the face. I will never forget it as long as I live. I won't leave it like this!"

Semyon took his hand. "Give it up, Vasily. I'm giving you good advice. You won't make anything better."

"Make anything better! I know I won't make anything better. You were right. It's better for me not to do it, but I can't just accept this."

"But tell me, how did it happen?"

"How? He examined everything, got down from the trolley, looked into the hut. I knew before that he was going to be strict and so I'd put everything right. He was just going when I made my complaint. He immediately cried out: 'Here's a Government inquiry coming and you make a complaint about a vegetable garden.' I lost my patience and said something — not very much, but it made him angry and he hit me in the face. I didn't move; I did nothing, just like what he did was perfectly all right. They went off; I washed my face and left."

"And what about the hut?"

"My wife is staying there. She'll look after things."

Vasily got up. "Good-bye, Ivanov. I don't know if I'll get anyone at the office to listen to me."

"Surely you're not going to walk?"

"At the station I'll try to get on a freight train and tomorrow I'll be in Moscow."

The neighbours said good-bye. Vasily was gone for some time. His wife worked for him night and day. She never slept but sat worrying and waiting for her husband. On the third day the Government inquiry arrived. An engine and two first-class cars but Vasily was still away. Semyon saw his wife on the fourth day. She was crying and her eyes were red.

"Has your husband returned?" he asked. But the woman, without saying a word, went away.

Semyon learnt when he was still a lad to make flutes out of a kind of reed. He made a number of them in his spare time and sent them with his friends to the bazaar in the town. He got two kopeks each for them. On the day following the visit of the inquiry, he left his wife at home to meet the six o'clock train, and started off to the forest to cut some sticks. About half a kilometre away, there was a big marsh where excellent reeds for his flutes grew. He cut a lot and started back home.

The sun was already low and he could only hear the birds and the noise of the dead wood under his feet. As he walked, he imagined he heard the sound of iron hitting iron, and he walked faster. There was no repair happening on the line. What did it mean? He came out of the woods and saw a man was on the track busy with something. Semyon began quietly to move towards him. He thought it was someone stealing the nuts on the track. He watched and the man got up, holding a crow-bar in his hand. He had moved a rail to one side. A mist swam before Semyon's eyes; he wanted to cry out, but could not. It was Vasily! Semyon ran to him.

"Vasily! My friend, come back! Give me the crow-bar. We'll put the track back; no-one will know. Come back!"

Vasily did not look back, but disappeared into the woods.

Semyon stood before the rail which was out of place. He threw down his sticks. A train was due; not a freight train, but one with passengers. And there was no way to stop it, no flag. He could not put the track back with his hands. He had to run to the hut for some tools. "God help me!" he murmured.

Semyon started running towards his hut. He ran and ran, falling every now and then. He was only a few hundred metres from his hut, not more, when he heard the church clock — six o'clock! In two minutes, No. 7 train was coming. "Oh, God! Save the passengers!" In his mind Semyon saw the train hit the loose track — and the engine would fall — and the third-class cars would be full... Little children... All sitting in the train now, never dreaming of danger.

"Oh, Lord! Tell me what to do!... No, it's impossible to run to the hut and get back in time."

Semyon did not run to the hut, but turned and ran faster than before. He was running blindly; he did not know what was going to happen. He ran as far as the track; his sticks were lying there. He got one and ran again. It seemed the train was already coming. He heard the noise; but he had no strength; he was exhausted, he could run no farther, and came to a stop about two hundred metres from the place. Then an idea came into his head, like a ray of light. He took off his cotton scarf, got his knife and pushed it in his left arm. The blood ran out like a hot river. He put his scarf in this and tied it to the stick he was carrying and lifted his red flag.

He stood waving his flag. He could already see the train but the driver could not see him — it was coming very close and a heavy train cannot stop in two hundred metres.

And the blood kept on running. Semyon pressed the sides of the cut together to close it, but the blood did not stop. He had cut his arm very deep. His head started to swim, black spots began to dance before his eyes, and then it became dark. He could not see the train or hear the noise. He thought only one thing: "I can't stand up. I'll fall and drop the flag; the train will not see me. Help me, oh God!"

Everything turned black in front of him, his mind emptied, and the flag fell; but the blood - coloured flag did not fall. A hand took it and waved it. The engineer saw it, shut the engine and reversed. The train stopped.

People jumped out of the cars. They saw a man lying, covered in blood, and another man standing next to him with a blood-coloured scarf on a stick.

Vasily looked around at everything. Then he said: "Take me. I broke the track!"