He glanced at Krymov.

'Do you think Chuykov just swore at him?' He burst out laughing. 'No, he gets sworn at by me every day. He came back with his front teeth knocked out.'

'Yes,' said Krymov slowly. This 'yes' was an admission that the dignity of man didn't always hold sway on the slopes of Stalingrad.

Then Guryev held forth about how badly the war was reported in the newspapers.

'Those sons of bitches never see any action themselves. They just sit on the other side of the Volga and write their articles. If someone gives them a good dinner, then they write about him. They're certainly no Tolstoys. People have been reading War and Peace for a century and they'll go on reading it for another century. Why's that? Because Tolstoy's a soldier, because he took part in the war himself. That's how he knew who to write about.'

'Excuse me, comrade General,' said Krymov. 'Tolstoy didn't take part in the Patriotic War.'

'He didn't take part in it – what do you mean?'

'Just that,' said Krymov. 'He didn't take part in it. He hadn't even been born at the time of the war with Napoleon.'

'He hadn't been born?' said Guryev. 'What do you mean? How on earth?'

A furious argument then developed – the first to have followed any of Krymov's lectures. To his surprise, the general flatly refused to believe him.

57

The divisional commander asked Major Byerozkin about the position with regard to house 6/1. Should they withdraw?

Byerozkin advised against it-even though the building was indeed almost totally surrounded. It housed observation posts of great importance to the artillery on the left bank, and a sapper detachment able to prevent any further attacks by German tanks. The Germans were hardly likely to begin a major offensive without first liquidating this little pocket of resistance – their tactics were predictable enough. And with a minimum of support the building might be able to hold out for some time and disrupt the German strategy. Since the telephone cable had been cut repeatedly, and since signallers were only able to reach the building during a few hours in the middle of the night, it would be worth sending a radio-operator there.

The divisional commander agreed. During the night Political Instructor Soshkin managed to get through to house 61 with a group of soldiers. They brought with them several boxes of ammunition, hand-grenades, a radio set and a very young operator, a girl.

On his return the following morning, Soshkin said that the commander of the detachment holding the house had refused to write an official report. 'I haven't got time for any of that rubbish,' he had said. 'I give my reports to the Fritzes.'

'I can't make head or tail of what's going on there,' said Soshkin. 'They all seem terrified of this Grekov, but he just pretends to be one of the lads. They all go to sleep in a heap on the floor, Grekov included.

and they call him Vanya. Forgive me for saying so, but it's more like some kind of Paris Commune than a military unit.'

Byerozkin shook his head. 'So he refused to write a report. Well, he is a one!'

Pivovarov, the battalion commissar, then came out with a speech about people behaving like partisans.

'What do you mean – "like partisans"?' said Byerozkin in a conciliatory tone. 'It's just independence, a show of initiative. I often dream of being surrounded myself – so I could forget all this paperwork.'

'That reminds me,' said Pivovarov. 'You'd better write a detailed report for the divisional commissar.'

The divisional commissar took a serious view of all this. He ordered Pivovarov to obtain detailed information about the situation in house 6/1 and to give Grekov a good talking-to then and there. At the same time he wrote reports to the Member of the Military Soviet and to the head of the Army Political Section, informing them of the alarming state of affairs, both morally and politically, in house 6/1.

At Army level, Soshkin's report was taken still more seriously. The divisional commissar received instructions to sort the matter out with the utmost urgency. The head of the Army Political Section also sent an urgent report to the head of the Political Section for the Front.

Katya Vengrova, the radio-operator, had arrived in house 6/1 during the night. In the morning she reported to Grekov, the 'house-manager'. As he listened, Grekov gazed into her eyes; they seemed confused, frightened, and at the same time mocking.

She was round-shouldered and she had a large mouth with pale, bloodless lips. Grekov paused for a moment when Katya asked if she could go. A number of different thoughts, all quite unrelated to the war, flashed through his head: 'By God, she's pretty… nice legs… she looks frightened… I guess she's mother's little girl… How old is she…? Eighteen at the most… I just hope the lads don't all pounce on her…' His final thought was quite unrelated to those that had gone before: 'Can't you see who's boss here? Haven't I driven those Fritzes up the wall?'

'There isn't anywhere for you to go,' Grekov said at last. 'Just stay by your transmitter. We'll find you something to send soon enough.'

He tapped the transmitter and glanced up at the sky where German dive-bombers were whining and humming.

'Are you from Moscow?' he asked.

'Yes.'

'Sit down. We're quite without ceremony here. It's like being in the country.'

Katya stepped to one side; crumbled brick squeaked beneath her heels. She could see the sunlight glinting on the machine-gun barrels and on the dark metal of Grekov's German pistol. She sat down, looking at a pile of greatcoats beneath a ruined wall. For a moment she felt surprised that all this no longer surprised her. She knew that the machine-guns in the breach in the wall were Degterevs; that the captured Walther took eight bullets, that it was powerful but difficult to aim; that the greatcoats in the corner belonged to soldiers who had been killed and that the corpses hadn't been buried very deep – the general smell of burning blended with another smell that had already become all too familiar. And her wireless-set was just like the one she had worked with in Kotluban – the same dial on the receiver, the same switch. She remembered the times in the steppes when she had looked into the dusty glass of the ammeter and tidied her hair, smoothing it back under her cap.

No one spoke to her; it was as though she had nothing to do with the wild and terrible goings-on around her.

But when one grey-haired man started swearing – he seemed from the conversation to be a mortar man – Grekov chided: 'Softly now! That's no way to speak in front of our girl.'

Katya winced – not because of the old man's foul language, but because of the way Grekov had looked at her. Even though no one said anything to her, she knew that the atmosphere had changed since her arrival. She could feel the tension with her skin – a tension that didn't evaporate even when they heard the whine of dive-bombers, followed by explosions and a hail of broken brick.

By now Katya had grown used to falling bombs and the whistle of shrapnel, but she felt as confused as ever by the heavy male looks that bore down on her here.

The night before, the other girls had commiserated with her. 'It sounds quite terrifying there,' they had said.

A soldier had taken her to Regimental Headquarters. She had sensed at once how close she was to the enemy, how fragile life had become. People themselves seemed suddenly fragile – here one minute, gone the next.

The officer in command had shaken his head sadly and said: 'How can they send children like you to the front?' And then: 'Don't be frightened, my dear. If anything's not as it should be, just inform me over the radio.'