Latest / Weird Fiction Audiobooks: Cosmic Horror, Strange Realities & Uncanny Tales / 🟡 Red Laugh (Full Audiobook) | Leonid Nikolayevich Andreyev

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🟡 Red Laugh (Full Audiobook) | Leonid Nikolayevich Andreyev · Weird Fiction Audiobooks: Cosmic Horror, Strange Realities & Uncanny Tales

• 0:01
  Speaker 1: Preface of The Red Laugh This is a LibriVox recording.
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Read by Ben
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: Tucker The Red Laugh by Leonid Andreev Translated by Alexandra
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: Linden Preface Leonidas Andreev, the author of The Red Laugh,
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: and of some volumes of short stories, was born at
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  Speaker 1: Oral in 1871. He studied first at the college of
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: his own town, then at St. Petersburg University. As a
• 0:40
  Speaker 1: student at St. Petersburg, he made a miserable livelihood by
• 0:43
  Speaker 1: giving infrequent lessons at wretched rates, and his first literary
• 0:48
  Speaker 1: efforts belonged to this period. His first short story, the
• 0:51
  Speaker 1: subject of which was, in fact, autobiographical, The Sorry Life
• 0:56
  Speaker 1: of the Poor Student, always half-starving, was derisively rejected. But
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: he gained entry into an important St. Petersburg review with
• 1:05
  Speaker 1: another and characteristic short story, Silence, and with it won
• 1:09
  Speaker 1: the attention of the Russian literary world. Now his popularity
• 1:13
  Speaker 1: in Russia almost transcends that of Gorky. Russian critics have
• 1:17
  Speaker 1: said of Andreev, as Victor Hugo said of the author
• 1:20
  Speaker 1: of The Fleur de Malle, that he has invented a
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  Speaker 1: new thrill. and Andreev seems indeed to be most at
• 1:27
  Speaker 1: home in a region of horror, though it is very
• 1:30
  Speaker 1: much psychologized horror. A horror full of fine shades. The
• 1:36
  Speaker 1: Red Laugh is a literary outcome of the late war
• 1:39
  Speaker 1: in Manchuria. It sets forth the anachronism of war, as
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  Speaker 1: that anachronism is felt by a writer of genius. End
• 1:48
  Speaker 1: of Preface Section 1 of The Red Laugh by Leonid Andreev.
• 2:00
  Speaker 1: The Slibbervox recording is in the public domain. Read by
• 2:03
  Speaker 1: Ben Tucker. Part 1. Fragments 1-3 Fragment 1. Horror and
• 2:13
  Speaker 1: Madness I felt it for the first time as we
• 2:17
  Speaker 1: were marching along the road. Marching incessantly for ten hours
• 2:21
  Speaker 1: without stopping, never diminishing our step. never waiting to pick
• 2:26
  Speaker 1: up those that had fallen, but leaving them to the
• 2:28
  Speaker 1: enemy that was moving behind us in a compact mass
• 2:31
  Speaker 1: only three or four hours later, effacing the marks of
• 2:34
  Speaker 1: our feet by their own. It was very sultry. I
• 2:38
  Speaker 1: do not know how many degrees there were, 120, 140
• 2:42
  Speaker 1: degrees or more. I only know that the heat was incessant,
• 2:47
  Speaker 1: hopelessly even, and profound. The sun was so enormous, so
• 2:52
  Speaker 1: fiery and terrible. that it seemed as if the earth
• 2:55
  Speaker 1: had drawn nearer to it, and would soon be burnt
• 2:58
  Speaker 1: up altogether in its merciless rays. Our eyes had ceased
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  Speaker 1: to look. The small, shrunk pupil, as small as a
• 3:06
  Speaker 1: poppy seed, sought in vain for darkness under the closed eyelid.
• 3:10
  Speaker 1: The sun pierced the thin covering and penetrated into the
• 3:13
  Speaker 1: tortured brain in a blood-red glow. But nevertheless, it was
• 3:18
  Speaker 1: better so, with closed eyelids. And for a long time,
• 3:23
  Speaker 1: perhaps for several hours, I walked along with my eyes shut,
• 3:27
  Speaker 1: hearing the multitude moving around me, the heavy, uneven tread
• 3:32
  Speaker 1: of many feet, men's and horses, the grinding of iron
• 3:37
  Speaker 1: wheels crushing the small stones, somebody's deep, strained breathing and
• 3:42
  Speaker 1: the dry smacking of parched lips. But I heard no word.
• 3:47
  Speaker 1: All were silent, as if an army of dumb people
• 3:50
  Speaker 1: was moving. and when anyone fell down, he fell in silence.
• 3:55
  Speaker 1: Others stumbled against his body, fell down and rose mutely,
• 3:58
  Speaker 1: and without turning their heads, marched on, as though these
• 4:02
  Speaker 1: dumb men were also blind and deaf. I stumbled and
• 4:06
  Speaker 1: fell several times, and then involuntarily opened my eyes, and
• 4:11
  Speaker 1: all that I saw seemed a wild fiction, the terrible
• 4:14
  Speaker 1: raving of a mad world. The air vibrated at a
• 4:18
  Speaker 1: white-hot temperature. The stones seemed to be trembling silently, ready
• 4:23
  Speaker 1: to flow, and in the distance had a curve of
• 4:26
  Speaker 1: the road. The files of men, guns, and horses seemed
• 4:30
  Speaker 1: detached from the earth, and trembled like a mass of
• 4:33
  Speaker 1: jelly in their onward progress. And it seemed to me
• 4:37
  Speaker 1: that they were not living people that I saw before me,
• 4:41
  Speaker 1: but an army of incorporate shadows. The enormous, near-terrible sun
• 4:46
  Speaker 1: lit up thousands of tiny blinding suns on every gun
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  Speaker 1: barrel and metal plate. And these suns, as fiery white
• 4:54
  Speaker 1: and sharp as the white-hot points of the bayonets, crept
• 4:57
  Speaker 1: into your eyes from every side. And the consuming, burning
• 5:01
  Speaker 1: heat penetrated into your body, into your very bones and brain.
• 5:07
  Speaker 1: And at times it seemed to me that it was
• 5:09
  Speaker 1: not a head that swayed upon my shoulders, but a
• 5:11
  Speaker 1: strange and extraordinary globe, heavy and light, belonging to somebody else,
• 5:18
  Speaker 1: and horrible. And then? Then I suddenly remembered my home,
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  Speaker 1: a corner of my room, a scrap of light blue wallpaper,
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  Speaker 1: and a dusty, untouched water bottle on my table, on
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  Speaker 1: my table which has one leg shorter than the others,
• 5:36
  Speaker 1: and had a small piece of paper folded under it,
• 5:40
  Speaker 1: while in the next room, and I cannot see them,
• 5:44
  Speaker 1: from my wife and little son. If I had had
• 5:47
  Speaker 1: the power to cry out, I would have done so.
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  Speaker 1: So wonderful was this simple and peaceful picture, hastening whether
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  Speaker 1: I knew not, but feeling now neither heat nor fatigue.
• 6:00
  Speaker 1: And I marched on thus for a long time through
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  Speaker 1: the endless mute files, past red, sunburnt necks, almost touching
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  Speaker 1: the helplessly lowered hot bayonets, when suddenly the thought of
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  Speaker 1: what I was doing Whether I was hastening stopped me.
• 6:16
  Speaker 1: I turned aside in the same hasty way, forced my
• 6:19
  Speaker 1: way to the open, clambered across a gully and sat
• 6:22
  Speaker 1: down on a stone in a preoccupied manner, as if
• 6:25
  Speaker 1: that rough, hot stone was the aim of all my strivings.
• 6:31
  Speaker 1: And then I felt it for the first time. I
• 6:33
  Speaker 1: clearly perceived that all these people, marching silently on in
• 6:38
  Speaker 1: the glaring sun, torpid from fatigue and heat, swaying and falling,
• 6:44
  Speaker 1: that they were all mad. They did not know whether
• 6:47
  Speaker 1: they were going. They did not know what the sun
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  Speaker 1: was for. They did not know anything. It was not
• 6:53
  Speaker 1: heads that they had on their shoulders, but strange and
• 6:56
  Speaker 1: terrible globes. There I saw a man in the same
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  Speaker 1: plight as I, pushing his way hurriedly through the rows
• 7:04
  Speaker 1: and falling down. There, another, and a third. Suddenly a
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  Speaker 1: horse's head appeared above the throng with bloodshot and senseless eyes.
• 7:12
  Speaker 1: and a wide-open grinning mouth that only hinted at a terrible,
• 7:17
  Speaker 1: unearthly cry. This head appeared, fell down, and for an
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  Speaker 1: instant the crowd stopped, growing denser in that spot. I
• 7:27
  Speaker 1: could hear hoarse, hollow voices, then a shot, and again
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  Speaker 1: the silent, endless marching continued. An hour passed as I
• 7:37
  Speaker 1: sat on that stone, but the multitude still moved on
• 7:40
  Speaker 1: past me. and the air and earth and the distant
• 7:43
  Speaker 1: phantom-like ranks trembled as before. And again the burning heat
• 7:48
  Speaker 1: pierced my body, and I forgot what for an instant
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  Speaker 1: I had pictured to myself. And the multitudes moved on
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  Speaker 1: past me, but I did not know who they were.
• 8:03
  Speaker 1: An hour ago I was alone on the stone, but
• 8:06
  Speaker 1: now I was surrounded by a group of grey people,
• 8:09
  Speaker 1: some lying motionless, perhaps dead. Others were sitting up and
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  Speaker 1: staring vacantly at those passing by. Some had guns and
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  Speaker 1: resembled soldiers. Others were stripped, almost naked, and the skin
• 8:22
  Speaker 1: on their bodies was so livid that one did not
• 8:25
  Speaker 1: care to look at it. Not far from me someone
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  Speaker 1: was lying with his bared back upturned. One could see
• 8:33
  Speaker 1: by the unconcerned manner in which he had buried his
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  Speaker 1: face in the sharp burning sand by the whiteness of
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  Speaker 1: the palm of his upturned hand, that he was dead.
• 8:42
  Speaker 1: But his back was as red as if he were alive,
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  Speaker 1: and only a slight yellowish tinge, like one sees on
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  Speaker 1: smoked meat, spoke of death. I wanted to move away
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  Speaker 1: from him, but I had not the strength, and tottering
• 8:56
  Speaker 1: from weakness, I continued, looking at the endless phantom-like swaying
• 9:01
  Speaker 1: files of men. By the condition of my head, I
• 9:04
  Speaker 1: knew that I should soon have a sunstroke too, but
• 9:07
  Speaker 1: I waited it calmly, as in a dream, where death
• 9:11
  Speaker 1: seems only a stage on the path of wonderful and
• 9:14
  Speaker 1: confused visions. And I saw a soldier part from the
• 9:17
  Speaker 1: crowd and direct his steps in a decided manner towards us.
• 9:21
  Speaker 1: For an instant, I lost sight of him in a ditch.
• 9:24
  Speaker 1: But when he reappeared and moved on towards us, his
• 9:27
  Speaker 1: gait was unsteady, and in his endeavors to control his
• 9:31
  Speaker 1: restlessly tossing body, one felt he was using his last strength.
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  Speaker 1: He was coming so straight upon me that I grew frightened,
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  Speaker 1: and breaking through the heavy torpor that enveloped my brain,
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  Speaker 1: I asked, What do you want? He stopped short, as
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  Speaker 1: if it was only a word that he was waiting for,
• 9:50
  Speaker 1: and stood before me, enormous, bearded, in a torn shirt.
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  Speaker 1: He had no gun, his trousers hung only by one button.
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  Speaker 1: and through a slit in them one could see his
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  Speaker 1: white body he flung his arms and legs about and
• 10:05
  Speaker 1: he was visibly trying to control them but could not
• 10:09
  Speaker 1: the instant he brought his arms together they fell apart
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  Speaker 1: again what is the matter you had better sit down
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  Speaker 1: I said but he continued standing vainly trying to gather
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  Speaker 1: himself together and stared at me in silence. Involuntarily, I
• 10:25
  Speaker 1: got up from the stone and, tottering, looked into his
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  Speaker 1: eyes and saw an abyss of horror and insanity in them.
• 10:32
  Speaker 1: Everybody's pupils were shrunk, but his had dilated and covered
• 10:37
  Speaker 1: his whole eye. What a sea of fire he must
• 10:41
  Speaker 1: have seen through those enormous black windows. Maybe I had
• 10:46
  Speaker 1: only imagined it. Maybe in his look there was... Only death.
• 10:52
  Speaker 1: But no, I was not mistaken. In those black, bottomless pupils,
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  Speaker 1: surrounded by a narrow, orange-colored rim like a bird's eye,
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  Speaker 1: there was more than death. More than the horror of death.
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  Speaker 1: Go away, I cried, falling back. Go away! And as
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  Speaker 1: if he was only waiting for a word, enormous, disorderly
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  Speaker 1: and mute as before, he suddenly fell down upon me,
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  Speaker 1: knocking me over. With a shudder, I freed my legs
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  Speaker 1: from under him, jumped up, and longed to run. Somewhere
• 11:25
  Speaker 1: away from men, into the sunlit, unpeopled, and quivering distance,
• 11:29
  Speaker 1: when suddenly, on the left-hand side, a cannon boomed forth
• 11:32
  Speaker 1: from a hilltop, and directly after it, two others, like
• 11:36
  Speaker 1: an echo. And somewhere above our heads, a shell flew
• 11:39
  Speaker 1: past with a gladsome, many-voiced screech and howl. We were outflanked.
• 11:48
  Speaker 1: The murderous heat Fear and fatigue disappeared instantly. My thoughts cleared.
• 11:54
  Speaker 1: My mind grew clear and sharp, and when I ran
• 11:57
  Speaker 1: up out of breath to the files of men drawing up,
• 11:59
  Speaker 1: I saw serene, almost joyous faces. Heard hoarse but loud voices, orders, jokes.
• 12:07
  Speaker 1: The sun seemed to have drawn itself up higher so
• 12:09
  Speaker 1: as not to be in the way, and had grown
• 12:11
  Speaker 1: dim and still. And again a shell, like a witch,
• 12:14
  Speaker 1: cut the air with a gladsome screech. I came up.
• 12:22
  Speaker 1: Fragment 2 Nearly all the horses and men. The same
• 12:27
  Speaker 1: in the eighth battery. In our twelfth battery, towards the
• 12:29
  Speaker 1: end of the third day, there remained only three guns,
• 12:32
  Speaker 1: all the others being disabled. Six men and one officer, myself.
• 12:37
  Speaker 1: We had neither slept nor eaten for twenty hours. For
• 12:40
  Speaker 1: three days and nights, a satanic roar and howl enveloped
• 12:44
  Speaker 1: us in a cloud of insanity, isolated us from the earth.
• 12:48
  Speaker 1: the sky, and ourselves. And we, the living, wandered about
• 12:51
  Speaker 1: like lunatics. The dead, they lay still, while we moved
• 12:57
  Speaker 1: about doing our duty, talking and laughing. And we were
• 13:01
  Speaker 1: like lunatics. All our movements were quick and certain, our
• 13:05
  Speaker 1: orders clear, the execution of them precise. But if you
• 13:09
  Speaker 1: would suddenly ask any one of us who we were,
• 13:12
  Speaker 1: undoubtedly we should not have been able to find an
• 13:14
  Speaker 1: answer in our troubled brains. as in a dream all
• 13:18
  Speaker 1: faces seemed familiar, and all that was going on seemed
• 13:21
  Speaker 1: quite familiar and natural, as if it had happened before.
• 13:26
  Speaker 1: But when I looked closely at any face or gun,
• 13:28
  Speaker 1: or began listening to the din, I was struck by
• 13:31
  Speaker 1: the novelty, an endless mystery of everything. Night approached imperceptibly,
• 13:38
  Speaker 1: and before we had time to notice it and wonder
• 13:40
  Speaker 1: where it had come from, the sun was again burning
• 13:43
  Speaker 1: above our heads. and only from those who came to
• 13:45
  Speaker 1: our battery we learnt that it was the third day
• 13:48
  Speaker 1: of the battle that was dawning, and instantly forgot it again.
• 13:52
  Speaker 1: To us it appeared as one endless day without any beginning,
• 13:56
  Speaker 1: sometimes dark, sometimes bright, but always incomprehensible and blind. And
• 14:02
  Speaker 1: nobody was afraid of death, for nobody understood what death was.
• 14:08
  Speaker 1: On the third or fourth night, I do not remember which,
• 14:11
  Speaker 1: I lay down for a minute behind the breastwork, And
• 14:13
  Speaker 1: as soon as I shut my eyes, the same familiar
• 14:15
  Speaker 1: and extraordinary pictures stood before them. The scrap of light
• 14:20
  Speaker 1: blue wallpaper and the dusty, untouched water bottle on my table.
• 14:25
  Speaker 1: While in the next room, and I could not see them,
• 14:28
  Speaker 1: were my wife and little son. But this time a
• 14:31
  Speaker 1: lamp with a green shade was burning on the table.
• 14:35
  Speaker 1: So it must have been evening or night. The pictures
• 14:39
  Speaker 1: stood motionless. and I contemplated it very calmly and attentively
• 14:42
  Speaker 1: for a long time, letting my eyes rest on the
• 14:46
  Speaker 1: light reflected in the crystal of the water bottle and
• 14:49
  Speaker 1: on the wallpaper, and wondered why my son was not asleep,
• 14:53
  Speaker 1: for it was night and time for him to go
• 14:55
  Speaker 1: to bed. Then I again began examining the wallpaper, every spiral,
• 15:02
  Speaker 1: silvery flower, square and line, and never imagined that I
• 15:07
  Speaker 1: knew my room so well. Now and then I opened
• 15:10
  Speaker 1: my eyes and saw the black sky with beautiful fiery
• 15:13
  Speaker 1: stripes upon it, then shut them again, and saw once
• 15:17
  Speaker 1: more the wallpaper, the bright water bottle, and wondered why
• 15:21
  Speaker 1: my son was not asleep, for it was night and
• 15:24
  Speaker 1: time for him to go to bed. Once a shell
• 15:28
  Speaker 1: burst not far from me, making my legs give a jerk,
• 15:31
  Speaker 1: and somebody cried out loudly, louder than the bursting of
• 15:34
  Speaker 1: the shell, and I said to myself,' Somebody' s killed!' but
• 15:39
  Speaker 1: I did not get up and did not tear my
• 15:41
  Speaker 1: eyes away from the light blue wallpaper and the water bottle. Afterwards,
• 15:46
  Speaker 1: I got up, moved about, gave orders, looked at the
• 15:49
  Speaker 1: men's faces, trained the guns, and kept on wondering why
• 15:53
  Speaker 1: my son was not asleep. Once I asked the sergeant,
• 15:57
  Speaker 1: and he explained it to me at length with great detail,
• 16:00
  Speaker 1: and we kept nodding our heads, and he laughed and
• 16:03
  Speaker 1: his left eyebrow kept twitching while his eye winked cunningly
• 16:06
  Speaker 1: at somebody behind us. Behind us were somebody's feet, and
• 16:12
  Speaker 1: nothing more. By this time it was quite light, when
• 16:16
  Speaker 1: suddenly there fell a drop of rain. Rain. Just the
• 16:20
  Speaker 1: same as at home. The most ordinary little drops of rain.
• 16:24
  Speaker 1: But it was so sudden and out of place, and
• 16:27
  Speaker 1: we were so afraid of getting wet, that we left
• 16:29
  Speaker 1: our guns, stopped firing, and tried to find shelter anywhere
• 16:32
  Speaker 1: we could. The sergeant, with whom I had only just
• 16:36
  Speaker 1: been speaking, got under the gun carriage and dozed off,
• 16:39
  Speaker 1: although he might have been crushed any minute. The stout artilleryman,
• 16:42
  Speaker 1: for some reason or other, began undressing a corpse, while
• 16:46
  Speaker 1: I began running about the battery in search of something,
• 16:49
  Speaker 1: a cloak or an umbrella. In the same instant, over
• 16:52
  Speaker 1: the whole enormous area where the rain cloud had burst,
• 16:57
  Speaker 1: a wonderful stillness fell. A belated shrapnel shot shrieked and burst,
• 17:03
  Speaker 1: and everything grew still. so still that one could hear
• 17:07
  Speaker 1: the stout artilleryman panting, and the drops of rain splashing
• 17:12
  Speaker 1: upon the stones and guns. And this soft and continuous
• 17:16
  Speaker 1: sound that reminded one of autumn, the smell of the
• 17:19
  Speaker 1: moist earth and the stillness, seemed to tear the bloody,
• 17:24
  Speaker 1: savage nightmare asunder for an instant. And when I glanced
• 17:28
  Speaker 1: at the wet, glistening gun, it unexpectedly reminded me of
• 17:31
  Speaker 1: something dear and peaceful. My childhood. or perhaps my first love.
• 17:38
  Speaker 1: But in the distance, a gun boomed forth particularly loud,
• 17:42
  Speaker 1: and the spell of the momentary lull disappeared. The men
• 17:46
  Speaker 1: began coming out of their hiding places as suddenly as
• 17:48
  Speaker 1: they had hid themselves. A gun roared, then another, and
• 17:52
  Speaker 1: once again the wary brain was enveloped by bloody, indissoluble gloom,
• 17:57
  Speaker 1: and nobody noticed when the rain stopped. I only remember
• 18:00
  Speaker 1: seeing the water rolling off the fat, sunken, yellow face
• 18:03
  Speaker 1: of the killed artillerymen, so I supposed it rained for
• 18:07
  Speaker 1: rather a long time. Before me stood a young volunteer
• 18:11
  Speaker 1: holding his hand to his cap and reporting to me
• 18:14
  Speaker 1: that the general wanted us to retain our position for
• 18:17
  Speaker 1: only two hours more, when we should be relieved. I
• 18:21
  Speaker 1: was wondering why my son was not in bed, and
• 18:24
  Speaker 1: answered that I could hold on as much as he wished.
• 18:28
  Speaker 1: Suddenly I became interested in the young man's face, probably
• 18:31
  Speaker 1: because of its unusual and striking pallor. I never saw
• 18:36
  Speaker 1: anything whiter than that face. Even the dead have more
• 18:39
  Speaker 1: color than that young, beardless face had. I suppose he
• 18:44
  Speaker 1: became terrified on his way to us, and could not
• 18:47
  Speaker 1: recover himself. And in holding his hand to his cap,
• 18:50
  Speaker 1: he was only making an effort to drive away his
• 18:52
  Speaker 1: mad fear by a simple and habitual gesture. Are you afraid?
• 18:58
  Speaker 1: I asked, touching his elbow. But his elbow seemed as
• 19:02
  Speaker 1: if made of wood. and he only smiled and remained silent.
• 19:07
  Speaker 1: Better to say, his lips alone were twitching into a smile,
• 19:11
  Speaker 1: while his eyes were full of youth and terror only,
• 19:14
  Speaker 1: nothing more. Are you afraid? I repeated kindly. His lips twitched,
• 19:21
  Speaker 1: trying to frame a word, and the same instant there
• 19:23
  Speaker 1: happened something incomprehensible, monstrous, and supernatural. I felt a drought
• 19:29
  Speaker 1: of warm air upon my right cheek that made me sway.
• 19:33
  Speaker 1: That is all. while before my eyes, in place of
• 19:35
  Speaker 1: the white face, there was something short, blunt, and red,
• 19:39
  Speaker 1: and out of it the blood was gushing as out
• 19:41
  Speaker 1: of an uncorked bottle, such as is drawn on badly
• 19:45
  Speaker 1: executed signboards. And that short, red, and flow something still
• 19:51
  Speaker 1: seemed to be smiling a sort of smile, a toothless laugh,
• 19:57
  Speaker 1: a red laugh. I recognized it, that red laugh. I'd
• 20:03
  Speaker 1: been searching for it, and I'd found it, that red laugh.
• 20:09
  Speaker 1: Now I understood what there was in all those mutilated, torn,
• 20:12
  Speaker 1: strange bodies. It was a red laugh. It was in
• 20:18
  Speaker 1: the sky. It was in the sun. And soon it
• 20:22
  Speaker 1: was going to overspread the whole earth. That red laugh.
• 20:28
  Speaker 1: While they, with precision and calmness, like lunatics. Fragment 3
• 20:36
  Speaker 1: They say there are a great number of madmen in
• 20:38
  Speaker 1: our army as well as in the enemy's. Four lunatic
• 20:42
  Speaker 1: wards have been opened. When I was on the staff,
• 20:46
  Speaker 1: our adjutant showed me. Section 2 of The Red Laugh
• 21:01
  Speaker 1: by Leonid Andreev This LibriVox recording is in the public domain.
• 21:07
  Speaker 1: Read by Ben Tucker. Part 1, Fragment 4. Coiled round
• 21:13
  Speaker 1: like snakes. He saw the wire, chopped through at one end,
• 21:17
  Speaker 1: cut the air and coil itself round three soldiers. The
• 21:21
  Speaker 1: barbs tore their uniforms and stuck into their bodies, and shrieking,
• 21:25
  Speaker 1: the soldiers spun round in frenzy, two of them dragging
• 21:29
  Speaker 1: the third, who was already dead, after them. Then only
• 21:33
  Speaker 1: one remained alive, and he tried to push the two
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: that were dead away from him, but they trailed after him,
• 21:39
  Speaker 1: whirling and rolling over each other and over him. Suddenly,
• 21:43
  Speaker 1: all three became motionless. He told me that no less
• 21:47
  Speaker 1: than two thousand men were lost at that one wire entanglement.
• 21:52
  Speaker 1: While they were hacking at the wire and getting entangled
• 21:54
  Speaker 1: in its serpentine coils, they were pelted by an incessant
• 21:58
  Speaker 1: rain of balls and grapeshot ashes. He assured me it
• 22:02
  Speaker 1: was very terrifying, and if only they had known in
• 22:05
  Speaker 1: which direction to run, that attack would have ended in
• 22:08
  Speaker 1: a panic flight. But ten or twelve continuous lines of wire,
• 22:13
  Speaker 1: and the struggle with it, a whole labyrinth of pitfalls
• 22:16
  Speaker 1: with stakes driven in at the bottom, had muddled them
• 22:20
  Speaker 1: so that they were quite incapable of defining the direction
• 22:24
  Speaker 1: of escape. Some, like men blind, fell into the funnel-shaped pits,
• 22:30
  Speaker 1: and hung upon the sharp stakes, pierced through the stomach,
• 22:34
  Speaker 1: twitching convulsively and dancing like toy clowns. They were crushed
• 22:38
  Speaker 1: down by fresh bodies, and soon the whole pit filled
• 22:41
  Speaker 1: to the edges and presented a writhing mass of bleeding
• 22:45
  Speaker 1: bodies dead and living. Hands thrust themselves out of it
• 22:49
  Speaker 1: in all directions, the fingers working convulsively, catching at everything.
• 22:55
  Speaker 1: And those who once got caught in that trap could
• 22:57
  Speaker 1: not get back again. Hundreds of fingers, strong and blind
• 23:02
  Speaker 1: like the claws of a lobster, gripped them firmly by
• 23:05
  Speaker 1: the legs, caught at their clothes, threw them down upon themselves,
• 23:10
  Speaker 1: gouged out their eyes and throttled them. Many seemed as
• 23:13
  Speaker 1: if they were intoxicated and ran straight at the wire,
• 23:17
  Speaker 1: got caught in it, and remained shrieking until a bullet
• 23:20
  Speaker 1: finished them. Generally speaking, they all seemed like people intoxicated.
• 23:25
  Speaker 1: Some swore dreadfully. Others laughed when the wire caught them
• 23:28
  Speaker 1: by the arm or leg and died there and then.
• 23:31
  Speaker 1: He himself, although he had nothing to eat or drink
• 23:34
  Speaker 1: since the morning, felt very queer. His head swam, and
• 23:39
  Speaker 1: there were moments when the feeling of terror in him
• 23:41
  Speaker 1: changed to wild rapture, and from rapture again to terror.
• 23:47
  Speaker 1: When somebody struck up a song at his side, he
• 23:49
  Speaker 1: caught up the tune, and soon a whole unanimous chorus
• 23:53
  Speaker 1: broke forth, He did not remember what they sang, only
• 23:57
  Speaker 1: that it was lively and a dancing strain. Yes, they sang,
• 24:02
  Speaker 1: while all around them was red with blood. The very
• 24:05
  Speaker 1: skies seemed to be red, and one could have thought
• 24:08
  Speaker 1: that a catastrophe had overwhelmed the universe. A strange disappearance
• 24:13
  Speaker 1: of colors. The light blue and green and other habitual
• 24:16
  Speaker 1: peaceful colors had disappeared, while the sun blazed forth in
• 24:21
  Speaker 1: a red flare light. The red laugh, said I. but
• 24:26
  Speaker 1: he did not understand. Yes, and they laughed, as I
• 24:30
  Speaker 1: told you before, like people intoxicated. Perhaps they even danced.
• 24:35
  Speaker 1: There was something of the sort. At least the movements
• 24:37
  Speaker 1: of those three resembled dancing. He remembers distinctly. When he
• 24:42
  Speaker 1: was shot through the chest and fell, his legs twitched
• 24:45
  Speaker 1: for some time until he lost consciousness, as if he
• 24:47
  Speaker 1: were dancing to music. And at the present moment, when
• 24:51
  Speaker 1: he thinks of that attack, a strange feeling comes over him,
• 24:54
  Speaker 1: partly fear, and partly the desire to experience it all
• 24:58
  Speaker 1: over again. I get another ball in your chest? asked I.
• 25:02
  Speaker 1: There now, why should I get a ball each time?
• 25:05
  Speaker 1: But it would not be half bad, old boy, to
• 25:07
  Speaker 1: get a medal for bravery. He was lying on his
• 25:10
  Speaker 1: back with a waxen face, sharp nose, prominent cheekbones, and
• 25:14
  Speaker 1: sunken eyes. He was lying, looking like a corpse and
• 25:18
  Speaker 1: dreaming of a medal. Mortification had already set in. He
• 25:23
  Speaker 1: had a high temperature. and in three days' time he
• 25:26
  Speaker 1: was to be thrown into the grave to join the dead. Nevertheless,
• 25:30
  Speaker 1: he lay smiling dreamily and talking about a medal. Have
• 25:34
  Speaker 1: you telegraphed to your mother?
• 25:36
  Speaker 2: I asked.
• 25:37
  Speaker 1: He glanced at me with terror, animosity, and anger, and
• 25:41
  Speaker 1: did not answer. I was silent, and then the groans
• 25:45
  Speaker 1: and ravings of the wounded became audible. But when I
• 25:49
  Speaker 1: rose to go, he caught my hand in his hot,
• 25:52
  Speaker 1: but still strong one, and fixed his sunken, burning eyes
• 25:55
  Speaker 1: upon me in a lost and distressed way. What does
• 25:58
  Speaker 1: it all mean, eh? What does it all mean? asked
• 26:01
  Speaker 1: he in a frightened and persistent manner, pulling at my hand. What? Everything,
• 26:08
  Speaker 1: in general. Now she's waiting for me, but I cannot.
• 26:12
  Speaker 1: My country. Is it possible to make her understand what
• 26:15
  Speaker 1: my country means? The red laugh, answered I. Ah, you're
• 26:22
  Speaker 1: always joking, but I am serious. It is indispensable to
• 26:25
  Speaker 1: explain it, but is it possible to make her understand?
• 26:29
  Speaker 1: If you only knew what she says in her letters,
• 26:31
  Speaker 1: what she writes, and you know her words are grey-haired,
• 26:36
  Speaker 1: and you... He looked curiously at my head, pointed his finger,
• 26:41
  Speaker 1: and suddenly breaking into a laugh, said, Why have you
• 26:43
  Speaker 1: grown bald? Have you noticed it? There are no looking
• 26:47
  Speaker 1: glasses here. Many have grown bald and grey, Look here,
• 26:52
  Speaker 1: give me a looking glass. Give me one. I feel
• 26:54
  Speaker 1: white hair growing out of my head. Give me a
• 26:57
  Speaker 1: looking glass. He became delirious, crying and shouting out, and
• 27:01
  Speaker 1: I left the hospital. That same evening, we got up
• 27:04
  Speaker 1: in entertainment. A sad and strange entertainment, at which, amongst
• 27:09
  Speaker 1: the guests, the shadows of the dead assisted. We decided
• 27:13
  Speaker 1: to gather in the evening and have tea, as if
• 27:15
  Speaker 1: we were at home, at a picnic. We got a semivar.
• 27:19
  Speaker 1: We even got a lemon and glasses and established ourselves
• 27:22
  Speaker 1: under a tree, as if we were at home, at
• 27:25
  Speaker 1: a picnic. Our companions arrived noisily in twos and threes, talking, joking,
• 27:30
  Speaker 1: and full of gleeful expectation, but soon grew silent, avoiding
• 27:35
  Speaker 1: to look at each other. For there was something fearful
• 27:37
  Speaker 1: in this meeting of spared men, in tatters, dirty, itching,
• 27:43
  Speaker 1: as if we were covered by a dreadful ringworm, with
• 27:46
  Speaker 1: hair neglected. thin and worn, having lost all familiar and
• 27:51
  Speaker 1: habitual aspect. We seemed to see each other for the
• 27:55
  Speaker 1: first time as we gathered round the samovar, and seeing
• 27:58
  Speaker 1: each other, we grew terrified. In vain I looked for
• 28:02
  Speaker 1: a familiar face in this group of disconcerted men. I
• 28:06
  Speaker 1: could not find one. These men, restless, hasty and jerky
• 28:11
  Speaker 1: in their movements, starting at every sound, constantly looking for
• 28:15
  Speaker 1: something behind their backs, trying to fill up that mysterious
• 28:18
  Speaker 1: void into which they were too terrified to look by
• 28:21
  Speaker 1: superfluous gesticulations, were new, strange men whom I did not know.
• 28:29
  Speaker 1: And their voices sounded different, articulating the words with difficulty
• 28:33
  Speaker 1: and jerks, easily passing into angry shouts or senseless, irrepressible
• 28:39
  Speaker 1: laughter at the slightest provocation. And everything around us was
• 28:43
  Speaker 1: strange to us. The tree was strange, and the sunset strange,
• 28:48
  Speaker 1: and the water strange, with a peculiar taste and smell,
• 28:52
  Speaker 1: as if we had left the earth and entered into
• 28:54
  Speaker 1: a new world together with the dead, a world of
• 28:58
  Speaker 1: mysterious phenomena and ominous somber shadows. The sunset was yellow
• 29:05
  Speaker 1: and cold, black, unillumined, motionless clouds hung heavily over it,
• 29:12
  Speaker 1: while the earth under it was black, and our faces
• 29:16
  Speaker 1: in that ill-omened light seemed yellow, like the faces of
• 29:19
  Speaker 1: the dead. We all sat watching the samovar, but it
• 29:24
  Speaker 1: went out, its sides reflecting the yellowishness and menace of
• 29:27
  Speaker 1: the sunset, and it seemed also an unfamiliar, dead, and
• 29:32
  Speaker 1: incomprehensible object. Where are we? asked somebody. An uneasiness and
• 29:39
  Speaker 1: fear sounded. in his voice. Somebody sighed. Somebody convulsively cracked
• 29:44
  Speaker 1: his fingers. Somebody laughed. Somebody jumped up and began walking
• 29:49
  Speaker 1: quickly around the table. These last days one could often
• 29:52
  Speaker 1: meet with such men. They were always walking hastily, almost
• 29:56
  Speaker 1: running at times, strangely silent, at times mumbling something in
• 30:01
  Speaker 1: an uncanny way. At the war, answered he who had laughed,
• 30:06
  Speaker 1: and again burst into a hollow, lingering laugh, as if
• 30:09
  Speaker 1: something was choking him. What is he laughing at? asked
• 30:13
  Speaker 1: somebody indignantly. Look here! Stop it! The other choked once more,
• 30:18
  Speaker 1: gave a titter, and stopped obediently. It was growing dark,
• 30:22
  Speaker 1: the clouds seemed to be settling down on the earth,
• 30:26
  Speaker 1: and we could with difficulty distinguish each other's yellow, phantom-like faces.
• 30:31
  Speaker 1: Somebody asked, And where's Fattylegs? Fattylegs, we called a fellow
• 30:36
  Speaker 1: officer who, being short, wore enormous, watertight boots. He was
• 30:41
  Speaker 1: just here now. Fattylegs, where are you? Fattylegs, don't hide!
• 30:45
  Speaker 1: We can smell your boots! Everybody laughed, but their laugh
• 30:49
  Speaker 1: was interrupted by a rough, indignant voice that sounded out
• 30:52
  Speaker 1: of the darkness. Stop that! Are you not ashamed? Fatty
• 30:56
  Speaker 1: Legs was killed this morning, reconnoitering. He was here just now.
• 31:01
  Speaker 1: It must be a mistake. You imagined it. Hey-ho, you there,
• 31:05
  Speaker 1: behind the samovar. Cut me a slice of lemon. And me.
• 31:08
  Speaker 1: And me. The lemon is finished. How was that, boys?
• 31:14
  Speaker 1: Sounded a gentle, hurt voice, full of distress and almost crying. Why,
• 31:18
  Speaker 1: I only came for the sake of the lemon. The
• 31:22
  Speaker 1: other again burst into a hollow and lingering laugh. and
• 31:26
  Speaker 1: nobody checked him, but he soon stopped. He gave a
• 31:29
  Speaker 1: snigger and was silent. Somebody said, Tomorrow we begin the
• 31:34
  Speaker 1: advance on the enemy. But several voices cried out angrily, Nonsense!
• 31:38
  Speaker 1: Advance on the enemy indeed! But you know yourself! Shut up!
• 31:42
  Speaker 1: As if we cannot talk of something else! The sunset faded,
• 31:46
  Speaker 1: the cloud lifted, and it seemed to grow lighter. The
• 31:49
  Speaker 1: faces became more familiar, and he, who kept circling round us,
• 31:53
  Speaker 1: grew calmer and sat down. I wonder what it's like
• 31:58
  Speaker 1: at home now, asked he vaguely, and in his voice
• 32:03
  Speaker 1: there sounded a guilty smile. And once again all became terrible, incomprehensible,
• 32:09
  Speaker 1: and strange, so intensely so that we were filled with horror,
• 32:12
  Speaker 1: almost to the verge of losing consciousness. And we all
• 32:16
  Speaker 1: began talking and shouting at the same time, bustling about,
• 32:19
  Speaker 1: moving our glasses, touching each other's shoulders, hands, knees, and
• 32:24
  Speaker 1: all at once became silent. giving way before the incomprehensible.'
• 32:28
  Speaker 1: At home?' cried somebody out of the darkness. His voice
• 32:34
  Speaker 1: was hoarse and quivering with emotion, fear, and hatred, and
• 32:39
  Speaker 1: some of the words would not come out as if
• 32:41
  Speaker 1: he had forgotten how to say them.' At home? What home? Why,
• 32:46
  Speaker 1: is there home anywhere? Don't interrupt me or else I
• 32:50
  Speaker 1: shall fire!' At home, I used to take a bath
• 32:52
  Speaker 1: every day. Can you understand? A bath with water. Water
• 32:56
  Speaker 1: up to the very edges. While now, I do not
• 32:58
  Speaker 1: even wash my face every day. My head is covered
• 33:01
  Speaker 1: with scarf. And my whole body itches. And over it, crawl. Crawl.
• 33:06
  Speaker 1: I'm going mad from dirt while you talk of home.
• 33:09
  Speaker 1: I'm like an animal. I despise myself. Cannot recognize myself,
• 33:13
  Speaker 1: and death is not at all terrifying. You tear my
• 33:16
  Speaker 1: brain with your shrapnel shots. Aim at what you will.
• 33:19
  Speaker 1: I'll hit my brain. And you can speak of home.
• 33:23
  Speaker 1: What home? Streets. Windows. People. But I would not go
• 33:27
  Speaker 1: into the street now for anything. I should be ashamed to.
• 33:30
  Speaker 1: You brought a semivar here, but I was ashamed to
• 33:32
  Speaker 1: look at it. The other laughed again. Somebody called out.
• 33:37
  Speaker 1: Damn it all, I shall go home.
• 33:38
  Speaker 2: Home? Home?
• 33:41
  Speaker 1: You don't understand what duty is. Home? Listen, he wants
• 33:44
  Speaker 1: to go home. There was a burst of laughter and
• 33:48
  Speaker 1: of painful shouts, and again all became silent, giving way
• 33:52
  Speaker 1: before the incomprehensible. And then not only I, but every
• 33:57
  Speaker 1: one of us felt that. It was coming towards us,
• 34:01
  Speaker 1: out of those dark, mysterious, and strange fields. It was
• 34:05
  Speaker 1: rising from out of those obscure, dark ravines where maybe
• 34:09
  Speaker 1: The forgotten and lost among the stones were still dying.
• 34:14
  Speaker 1: It was flowing from the strange, unfamiliar sky. We stood
• 34:18
  Speaker 1: around the dying-out samovar in silence, losing consciousness from horror,
• 34:23
  Speaker 1: while an enormous, shapeless shadow that had risen above the
• 34:26
  Speaker 1: world looked down upon us from the sky with a
• 34:29
  Speaker 1: steady and silent gaze. Suddenly, quite close to us, probably
• 34:36
  Speaker 1: at the commander's house, music burst forth. and the frenzied, joyous,
• 34:40
  Speaker 1: loud sounds seemed to flash out into the night in stillness.
• 34:46
  Speaker 1: The band played with frenzied mirth and defiance, hurriedly, discordantly,
• 34:50
  Speaker 1: too loudly, and too joyously, and one could feel that
• 34:53
  Speaker 1: those who were playing, and those who were listening, saw
• 34:58
  Speaker 1: as we did, that same enormous, shapeless shadow, risen above
• 35:04
  Speaker 1: the world, and it was clear the player on the
• 35:07
  Speaker 1: trumpet carried in himself in his very brain and ears,
• 35:11
  Speaker 1: that same enormous dumb shadow. The abrupt and broken sound
• 35:16
  Speaker 1: tossed about, jumping and running away from the others, quivering
• 35:20
  Speaker 1: with horror and insanity in its lonesomeness. And the other
• 35:24
  Speaker 1: sounds seemed to be looking round at it. So clumsily
• 35:28
  Speaker 1: they ran, stumbling, falling, and again rising in a disorderly crowd.
• 35:34
  Speaker 1: Too loud, too joyous. too close to the black ravines,
• 35:40
  Speaker 1: where most probably the forgotten and lost among the boulders
• 35:43
  Speaker 1: were still dying. And we stood for a long time
• 35:47
  Speaker 1: around the cold samovar and were silent. End of Section
• 35:53
  Speaker 1: 2 Section 3 of The Red Laugh by Leonid Andreev
• 36:06
  Speaker 1: This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Read by
• 36:09
  Speaker 1: Ben Tucker. Part 1, Fragment 5 I was already asleep
• 36:16
  Speaker 1: when the doctor roused me by pushing me cautiously. I
• 36:19
  Speaker 1: awoke and, jumping up, cried out as we all did
• 36:22
  Speaker 1: when anybody wakened us, and rushed to the entrance of
• 36:25
  Speaker 1: our tent. But the doctor held me firmly by the arm,
• 36:28
  Speaker 1: excusing himself. I frightened you. Forgive me. I know you
• 36:33
  Speaker 1: wanted to sleep. Five days and nights, I muttered, dozing off.
• 36:41
  Speaker 1: I fell asleep and slept, as it seemed to me
• 36:43
  Speaker 1: for a long time, when the doctor again began speaking,
• 36:46
  Speaker 1: poking me cautiously in the ribs and legs. But it
• 36:50
  Speaker 1: is very urgent. Dear fellow, please, it is so pressing.
• 36:54
  Speaker 1: I keep thinking. I cannot. I keep thinking that some
• 36:58
  Speaker 1: of the wounded were left. What wounded? Why... You're bringing
• 37:05
  Speaker 1: them in the whole day long. Leave me in peace.
• 37:07
  Speaker 1: It's not fair. I have not slept for five days.
• 37:13
  Speaker 1: Dear boy, don't be angry, muttered the doctor, awkwardly putting
• 37:16
  Speaker 1: my cap on my head. Everybody is asleep. It's impossible
• 37:20
  Speaker 1: to rouse anybody. I've got hold of an engine and
• 37:24
  Speaker 1: seven carriages, but we're in want of men. I understand.
• 37:28
  Speaker 1: Dear fellow, I implore you. Everybody is asleep and everybody refuses.
• 37:34
  Speaker 1: I'm afraid of falling asleep myself. I don't remember when
• 37:37
  Speaker 1: I last slept. I believe I'm beginning to have hallucinations.
• 37:41
  Speaker 1: There's a dear fellow. Put down your feet. Just one. There. There.
• 37:46
  Speaker 1: The doctor was pale and tottering, and one could see
• 37:50
  Speaker 1: that if he were only to lie down for an
• 37:52
  Speaker 1: instant he would fall asleep, and remain so without waking
• 37:55
  Speaker 1: for several days running. My legs sank under me, and
• 38:00
  Speaker 1: I am certain I fell asleep as I walked. So
• 38:03
  Speaker 1: suddenly and unexpectedly appeared before us a row of black outlines,
• 38:07
  Speaker 1: the engine and carriages. Near them, scarcely distinguishable in the darkness,
• 38:13
  Speaker 1: some men were wandering about slowly and silently. There was
• 38:17
  Speaker 1: not a single light either on the engine or carriages,
• 38:20
  Speaker 1: and only the shut ash box threw a dim, reddish
• 38:23
  Speaker 1: light onto the rails. What is this? I asked, stepping back. Why,
• 38:30
  Speaker 1: we are going in the trains. Have you forgotten we're
• 38:32
  Speaker 1: going in the train? muttered the doctor. The night was chilly,
• 38:37
  Speaker 1: and he was trembling from cold, and as I looked
• 38:40
  Speaker 1: at him, I felt the same rapid, tickling shiver all
• 38:42
  Speaker 1: over my body. Damn you! I cried loudly, just as
• 38:46
  Speaker 1: if you couldn't have taken somebody else. Hush! Please hush!
• 38:51
  Speaker 1: And the doctor caught me by the arm. Somebody out
• 38:54
  Speaker 1: of the darkness said, If you were to fire a
• 38:57
  Speaker 1: volley from all the guns, nobody would stir. They are
• 39:00
  Speaker 1: all asleep. One could go up and bind them all.
• 39:03
  Speaker 1: Just now I passed quite close to the sentry. He
• 39:05
  Speaker 1: looked at me and did not say a word, never stirred.
• 39:07
  Speaker 1: I suppose he was asleep too. It's a wonder he
• 39:10
  Speaker 1: does not fall down. He who spoke yawned and his
• 39:14
  Speaker 1: clothes rustled. Evidently he was stretching himself. I leaned against
• 39:19
  Speaker 1: the side of the carriage, intending to climb up, and
• 39:22
  Speaker 1: was instantly overcome by sleep. Somebody lifted me up from
• 39:26
  Speaker 1: behind and laid me down while I began pushing him
• 39:28
  Speaker 1: away with my feet. without knowing why. And again I
• 39:32
  Speaker 1: fell asleep, hearing as in a dream fragments of a conversation.
• 39:35
  Speaker 1: At the seventh first. Have you forgotten the lanterns? No,
• 39:40
  Speaker 1: he won't go. Give them here. Back a little. That's it.
• 39:43
  Speaker 1: The carriages were jerking backwards and forwards. Something was rattling. Something.
• 39:48
  Speaker 1: and gradually, because of all these sounds and because I
• 39:51
  Speaker 1: was lying comfortably and quietly, sleep deserted me. But the
• 39:55
  Speaker 1: doctor was sound asleep, and when I took him by
• 39:58
  Speaker 1: the hand it was like the hand of a corpse,
• 40:00
  Speaker 1: heavy and limp. The train was now moving slowly and cautiously,
• 40:06
  Speaker 1: shaking slightly as if groping its way. The student, acting
• 40:10
  Speaker 1: as hospital orderly, lighted the candle and the lantern, lighting
• 40:14
  Speaker 1: up the walls and the black aperture of the entrance,
• 40:16
  Speaker 1: and said angrily, Damn it! Much they need us by
• 40:20
  Speaker 1: this time, but you had better wake him before he
• 40:22
  Speaker 1: falls into a sound sleep, for then you won't be
• 40:25
  Speaker 1: able to do anything with him. I know by myself.
• 40:28
  Speaker 1: We roused the doctor, and he sat up, rolling his
• 40:31
  Speaker 1: eyes vacantly. He tried to lie down again, but we
• 40:34
  Speaker 1: did not let him. It would be good to have
• 40:37
  Speaker 1: a drop of vodka now, said the student. We drank
• 40:41
  Speaker 1: a mouthful of brandy, and all sleepiness disappeared entirely. The
• 40:45
  Speaker 1: big black square of the door began to grow pink,
• 40:47
  Speaker 1: then red. Somewhere from behind the hills appeared an enormous,
• 40:52
  Speaker 1: mute flare of a conflagration, as if the sun was
• 40:56
  Speaker 1: rising in the middle of the night. It's far away,
• 40:59
  Speaker 1: about twenty versts. I feel cold, said the doctor, snapping
• 41:04
  Speaker 1: his teeth. The student looked out of the door and
• 41:07
  Speaker 1: beckoned me to come up to him. I looked out.
• 41:10
  Speaker 1: At different points of the horizon, motionless flares of similar
• 41:14
  Speaker 1: conflagration stood out in a mute row, as if dozens
• 41:17
  Speaker 1: of suns were rising simultaneously. And now the dark was
• 41:22
  Speaker 1: not so great. The distant hills were growing more densely black,
• 41:27
  Speaker 1: sharply outlined against the sky in a broken and wavy contour,
• 41:31
  Speaker 1: while in the foreground all was flooded with a red,
• 41:34
  Speaker 1: soft glow, silent and motionless. I glanced at the student.
• 41:39
  Speaker 1: His face was tinged by the same red fantastic color
• 41:42
  Speaker 1: of blood that had changed itself into air and light.
• 41:48
  Speaker 1: Are there many wounded? I asked. He waved his hand.
• 41:52
  Speaker 1: A great many madmen, more so than wounded. Real madmen?
• 41:58
  Speaker 1: What others can there be? He was looking at me,
• 42:02
  Speaker 1: and his eyes wore the same fixed, wild expression, full
• 42:05
  Speaker 1: of cold horror that the soldiers had who died of sunstroke.
• 42:09
  Speaker 1: Stop that, said I, turning away. The doctor is mad also.
• 42:13
  Speaker 1: Just look at him. The doctor had not heard. He
• 42:17
  Speaker 1: was sitting cross-legged like a Turk, swaying to and fro,
• 42:20
  Speaker 1: soundlessly moving his lips and fingertips. And in his gaze
• 42:24
  Speaker 1: there was the same fixed, stupefied, blunt, stricken expression. I
• 42:29
  Speaker 1: feel cold, said he, and smiled. Hang you all, cried I,
• 42:35
  Speaker 1: moving away into a corner of the carriage. What did
• 42:37
  Speaker 1: you call me up for? Nobody answered. The student stood
• 42:42
  Speaker 1: gazing out at the mute, spreading glow. and the back
• 42:44
  Speaker 1: of his head with its curly hair was youthful, and
• 42:47
  Speaker 1: when I looked at him, I do not know why,
• 42:50
  Speaker 1: but I kept picturing to myself a delicate woman's hand
• 42:53
  Speaker 1: passing through that hair, and this image was so unpleasant
• 42:57
  Speaker 1: that a feeling of hatred sprang up in my breast,
• 43:00
  Speaker 1: and I could not look at him without a feeling
• 43:02
  Speaker 1: of loathing. How old are you? I asked, but he
• 43:08
  Speaker 1: did not turn his head and did not answer. The
• 43:11
  Speaker 1: doctor kept on rocking himself. I feel cold. When I think,
• 43:18
  Speaker 1: said the student without turning around, when I think that
• 43:21
  Speaker 1: there are streets, houses, a university... He broke off, as
• 43:26
  Speaker 1: if he had said all and was silent. Suddenly the
• 43:29
  Speaker 1: train stopped almost instantaneously, making me knock myself against the wall,
• 43:35
  Speaker 1: and voices were to be heard. We jumped out. In
• 43:38
  Speaker 1: front of the very engine upon the rails lay something,
• 43:41
  Speaker 1: a not very large lump, out of which a leg
• 43:44
  Speaker 1: was projecting. Wounded? No, dead. The head is torn off.
• 43:52
  Speaker 1: Say what you will, but I will light the headlight. Otherwise,
• 43:56
  Speaker 1: we shall be crushing somebody. The lump with the protruding
• 44:00
  Speaker 1: leg was thrown aside. For an instant, the leg lifted
• 44:03
  Speaker 1: itself up, as if it wanted to run through the air,
• 44:06
  Speaker 1: and all disappeared in a black ditch. The headlight was lit,
• 44:10
  Speaker 1: and the engine instantly grew black. whispered somebody, full of
• 44:15
  Speaker 1: silent terror. How was it that we had not heard
• 44:19
  Speaker 1: it before? From everywhere. The exact place could not be defined.
• 44:24
  Speaker 1: A groan, unbroken and scraping, wonderfully calm in its breath,
• 44:29
  Speaker 1: and even indifferent, as it seemed, was born upon us.
• 44:34
  Speaker 1: We had heard many cries and groans, but this resembled
• 44:37
  Speaker 1: none of those heard before. On the dim, reddish surface,
• 44:41
  Speaker 1: our eyes could perceive nothing, and therefore the very earth
• 44:44
  Speaker 1: and sky, lit up by a never-rising sun, seemed to
• 44:48
  Speaker 1: be groaning. The fifth verst, said the engine driver. That
• 44:55
  Speaker 1: is where it comes from. And the doctor pointed forwards.
• 45:00
  Speaker 1: The student shuddered and slowly turned towards us. What is it?
• 45:06
  Speaker 1: It's terrible to listen to. Let's move on. We walked
• 45:11
  Speaker 1: along in front of the engine. throwing a dense shadow
• 45:13
  Speaker 1: upon the rails. But it was not black, but of
• 45:17
  Speaker 1: a dim red color, lit up by the soft motionless
• 45:20
  Speaker 1: flares that stood out mutely at the different points of
• 45:23
  Speaker 1: the black sky. And with each step we made that wild,
• 45:27
  Speaker 1: unearthly groan that had no visible source grew ominously, as
• 45:32
  Speaker 1: if it was the red air, the very earth and
• 45:35
  Speaker 1: sky that were groaning. In its ceaselessness, and strange indifference
• 45:41
  Speaker 1: it recalled at times the noise of grasshoppers in a meadow,
• 45:45
  Speaker 1: the ceaseless noise of grasshoppers in a meadow on a
• 45:48
  Speaker 1: warm summer day. And we came upon dead bodies, oftener
• 45:54
  Speaker 1: and oftener. We examined them rapidly and threw them off
• 45:57
  Speaker 1: the rails, those indifferent, calm, limp bodies that left dark,
• 46:03
  Speaker 1: oily stains where the blood had soaked into the earth
• 46:06
  Speaker 1: where they had lain. At first we counted them, soon
• 46:11
  Speaker 1: got muddled and ceased. They were many, too many for
• 46:15
  Speaker 1: that ominous night that breathed cold and groans from each
• 46:19
  Speaker 1: fiber of its being. What does it mean? cried the doctor,
• 46:24
  Speaker 1: and threatened somebody with his fist. Just listen! We were
• 46:28
  Speaker 1: nearing the sixth verse, and the groans were growing distinct
• 46:32
  Speaker 1: and sharp, and we could almost feel the distorted mouths
• 46:35
  Speaker 1: from which those terrible sounds were issuing. We looked anxiously
• 46:39
  Speaker 1: into the rosy gloom, so deceitful in its fantastic light,
• 46:44
  Speaker 1: when suddenly, almost at our feet beside the rails, somebody
• 46:48
  Speaker 1: gave a loud, calling, crying groan. We found him instantly,
• 46:53
  Speaker 1: that wounded man whose face seemed to consist only of
• 46:56
  Speaker 1: two eyes, so big they appeared, when the light of
• 46:59
  Speaker 1: the lantern fell on his face. He stopped groaning and
• 47:03
  Speaker 1: rested his eyes on each of us and our lanterns
• 47:05
  Speaker 1: and turned. and in his glance there was a mad
• 47:09
  Speaker 1: joy at seeing men in lights, and a mad fear
• 47:12
  Speaker 1: that all would disappear like a vision. Perhaps he had
• 47:16
  Speaker 1: seen men with lanterns bending over him many times, but
• 47:20
  Speaker 1: they had always disappeared in a bloody, confused nightmare. We
• 47:24
  Speaker 1: moved on, and almost instantly stumbled against two more wounded,
• 47:29
  Speaker 1: one lying on the rails, the other groaning in a ditch.
• 47:33
  Speaker 1: As we were picking them up, the doctor, trembling with anger,
• 47:36
  Speaker 1: said to me, Well, and turned away. Several steps farther on,
• 47:41
  Speaker 1: we met a man wounded slightly, who was walking alone,
• 47:45
  Speaker 1: supporting one arm with the other. He was walking with
• 47:49
  Speaker 1: his head thrown back, straight towards us, but seemed not
• 47:53
  Speaker 1: to notice us when we drew aside to let him pass.
• 47:57
  Speaker 1: I believe he did not see us. He stopped for
• 48:01
  Speaker 1: an instant near the engine, turned aside, and went past
• 48:04
  Speaker 1: the train. You had better get in! cried the doctor,
• 48:09
  Speaker 1: but he did not answer. These were the first that
• 48:13
  Speaker 1: we found, and they horrified us. But later on we
• 48:17
  Speaker 1: came upon them oftener and oftener, along the rails or
• 48:21
  Speaker 1: near them, and the whole field, lit up by the
• 48:24
  Speaker 1: motionless red flare of the conflagrations, began stirring as if
• 48:28
  Speaker 1: it were alive, breaking out into loud cries, wails, curses,
• 48:32
  Speaker 1: and groans. All those dark mounds stirred and crawled about
• 48:38
  Speaker 1: like half-dead lobsters let out of a basket, with outspread legs,
• 48:43
  Speaker 1: scarcely resembling men in their broken, unconscious movements and ponderous immobility.
• 48:49
  Speaker 1: Some were mute and obedient, others groaned, wailed, swore, and
• 48:54
  Speaker 1: showed such a passionate hate towards us that we were
• 48:58
  Speaker 1: saving them, as if we had brought about that bloodily
• 49:03
  Speaker 1: indifferent night. and had been the cause of all those
• 49:07
  Speaker 1: terrible wounds, and their loneliness amidst the night and dead bodies.
• 49:13
  Speaker 1: The train was full, and our clothes were saturated with blood,
• 49:17
  Speaker 1: as if we had stood for a long time under
• 49:19
  Speaker 1: a rainstorm. of blood, while the wounded were still being
• 49:22
  Speaker 1: brought in, and the field, come to life, was stirring
• 49:26
  Speaker 1: wildly as before. Some of the wounded crawled up themselves,
• 49:31
  Speaker 1: some walked up tottering and falling. One soldier almost ran
• 49:35
  Speaker 1: up to us. His face was smashed, and only one
• 49:38
  Speaker 1: eye remained. burning wildly and terribly, and he was almost
• 49:43
  Speaker 1: naked as if he had come from the bathroom. Pushing
• 49:46
  Speaker 1: me aside, he caught sight of the doctor, and rapidly
• 49:49
  Speaker 1: seized him by the chest with his left hand. I'll
• 49:52
  Speaker 1: smash your snout, he cried, shaking the doctor, and added
• 49:55
  Speaker 1: slowly and mordently in a coarse oath, I'll smash your snout,
• 50:01
  Speaker 1: you rebel! The doctor broke away from the soldier, and
• 50:06
  Speaker 1: advancing towards him, cried chokingly, I will have you court-martialed,
• 50:10
  Speaker 1: you scoundrel! To prison with you! You're hindering my work! Scoundrel! Brute!
• 50:15
  Speaker 1: We pulled them apart, but the soldier kept on crying
• 50:17
  Speaker 1: out for a long time. Rabble! I'll smash your snout!
• 50:21
  Speaker 1: I was beginning to get exhausted, and went a little
• 50:25
  Speaker 1: way off to have a smoke and rest a bit.
• 50:28
  Speaker 1: The blood dried to my hands, covered them like a
• 50:31
  Speaker 1: pair of black gloves, making it difficult for me to
• 50:34
  Speaker 1: bend my fingers, so that I kept dropping my cigarettes
• 50:37
  Speaker 1: and matches. and when I succeeded in lighting my cigarette,
• 50:42
  Speaker 1: the tobacco smoke struck me as novel and strange, with
• 50:45
  Speaker 1: quite a peculiar taste, the like of which I never
• 50:49
  Speaker 1: experienced before or after. Just then the ambulance student with
• 50:53
  Speaker 1: whom I had traveled came up to me, and it
• 50:56
  Speaker 1: seemed to me as if I had met with him
• 50:59
  Speaker 1: several years back, but where I could not remember. His
• 51:03
  Speaker 1: tread was firm as if he were marching. and he
• 51:06
  Speaker 1: was staring through me at something farther on and higher up.
• 51:11
  Speaker 1: And they are sleeping, said he, as it seemed quite calmly.
• 51:16
  Speaker 1: I flew into a rage as if the reproach was
• 51:19
  Speaker 1: addressed to me. You forget that they fought like lions
• 51:23
  Speaker 1: for ten days. And they are sleeping, he repeated, looking
• 51:28
  Speaker 1: through me and higher up. Then he stooped down to
• 51:31
  Speaker 1: me and, shaking his finger, continued in the same dry
• 51:34
  Speaker 1: and calm way. I will tell you. I will tell you. What?
• 51:42
  Speaker 1: He stooped still lower towards me, shaking his finger meaningly,
• 51:47
  Speaker 1: and kept repeating the words as if they expressed a
• 51:49
  Speaker 1: completed idea. I will tell you. I will tell you.
• 51:54
  Speaker 1: Tell them. And still looking at me in the same
• 51:57
  Speaker 1: severe way, he shook his finger once more, then took
• 52:00
  Speaker 1: out his revolver and shot himself in the temple. and
• 52:03
  Speaker 1: this did not surprise or terrify me in the least.
• 52:07
  Speaker 1: Putting my cigarette into the left hand, I felt his
• 52:10
  Speaker 1: wound with my fingers and went back to the train.
• 52:14
  Speaker 1: The student has shot himself. I believe he is still alive,
• 52:18
  Speaker 1: said I to the doctor. The latter caught hold of
• 52:21
  Speaker 1: his head and groaned. Damn him. There is no room there.
• 52:27
  Speaker 1: That one will go and shoot himself too soon. And
• 52:30
  Speaker 1: I give you my word of honor, cried he angrily
• 52:33
  Speaker 1: and menacingly. I will do the same. Yes, and let
• 52:36
  Speaker 1: me beg you, just walk back. There is no room.
• 52:39
  Speaker 1: You can lodge a complaint against me if you like.
• 52:42
  Speaker 1: And he turned away, still shouting, while I went up
• 52:44
  Speaker 1: to the other who was about to commit suicide. He
• 52:48
  Speaker 1: was an ambulance man, and also, I believe, a student.
• 52:52
  Speaker 1: He stood, pressing his forehead against the wall of the carriage,
• 52:55
  Speaker 1: and his shoulders shook with sobs. Stop, said I, touching
• 53:00
  Speaker 1: his quivering shoulder. But he did not turn round or
• 53:03
  Speaker 1: answer and continued crying. And the back of his head
• 53:07
  Speaker 1: was youthful, like the other students. And as terrifying. And
• 53:13
  Speaker 1: he stood in an absurd manner with his legs spread
• 53:16
  Speaker 1: out like a person drunk who was sick. And his
• 53:19
  Speaker 1: neck was covered with blood. Probably he had clutched it
• 53:22
  Speaker 1: with his own hands. Well, said I impatiently. He pushed
• 53:28
  Speaker 1: himself away from the carriage and Stooping like an old
• 53:31
  Speaker 1: man with his head bent down, he went away into
• 53:33
  Speaker 1: the darkness, away from all of us. I do not
• 53:37
  Speaker 1: know why, but I followed him, and we walked along
• 53:40
  Speaker 1: for a long time away from the carriages. I believe
• 53:44
  Speaker 1: he was crying, and a feeling of distress stole over me,
• 53:49
  Speaker 1: and I wanted to cry too. Stop! I cried, standing still.
• 53:54
  Speaker 1: But he walked on, moving his feet ponderously, bent down,
• 53:59
  Speaker 1: looking like an old man with his narrow shoulders and
• 54:02
  Speaker 1: shuffling gait. And soon he disappeared in the reddish haze
• 54:07
  Speaker 1: that resembled light and yet lit nothing. And I remained alone.
• 54:12
  Speaker 1: To the left of me a row of dim lights
• 54:14
  Speaker 1: floated past. It was the train. I was alone, amidst
• 54:20
  Speaker 1: the dead and dying. How many more remained? Near me
• 54:25
  Speaker 1: all was still and dead, but farther on the field
• 54:29
  Speaker 1: was stirring as if it were alive, or so it
• 54:32
  Speaker 1: seemed to me in my loneliness. But the moan did
• 54:36
  Speaker 1: not grow less. It spread along the earth, high-pitched, hopeless,
• 54:43
  Speaker 1: like the cry of a child or the yelping of
• 54:46
  Speaker 1: thousands of castaway puppies, starving and cold, like a sharp, endless,
• 54:54
  Speaker 1: icy needle had pierced your brain, and slowly move backwards
• 54:59
  Speaker 1: and forwards, backwards and forwards.
• 55:03
  Speaker 2: This LibriVox recording is.
• 55:13
  Speaker 1: In the public domain. Read by Ben Tucker. Part 1,
• 55:26
  Speaker 1: Fragments 6 and 7. Fragment 6. They were our own men.
• 55:35
  Speaker 1: During the strange confusion of all movements that reigned in
• 55:38
  Speaker 1: both armies, our own and the enemy's, during the last month,
• 55:44
  Speaker 1: frustrating all orders and plans, we were sure it was
• 55:47
  Speaker 1: the enemy that was approaching us, namely, the Fourth Corps,
• 55:51
  Speaker 1: and everything was ready for an attack. when somebody clearly
• 55:55
  Speaker 1: discerned our uniforms. And ten minutes later, our guests had
• 55:58
  Speaker 1: become a calm and happy certainty. They were our own men.
• 56:04
  Speaker 1: They apparently had recognized us, too. They advanced quite calmly,
• 56:08
  Speaker 1: and that calm motion seemed to express the same happy
• 56:10
  Speaker 1: smile of an unexpected meeting. And when they began firing,
• 56:17
  Speaker 1: we did not understand for some time what it meant,
• 56:20
  Speaker 1: and still continued smiling. under a hail of shrapnel and
• 56:24
  Speaker 1: bullets that poured down upon us, snatching away at one
• 56:28
  Speaker 1: stroke hundreds of men. Somebody cried out by mistake, and
• 56:32
  Speaker 1: I clearly remember we all saw that it was the enemy,
• 56:36
  Speaker 1: that it was his uniform and not ours, and instantly
• 56:40
  Speaker 1: answered the fire. About fifteen minutes after the beginning of
• 56:43
  Speaker 1: that strange engagement, both my legs were torn off, and
• 56:48
  Speaker 1: I recovered consciousness in the hospital after the amputation. I
• 56:53
  Speaker 1: asked how the battle had ended, and received an evasive,
• 56:57
  Speaker 1: reassuring answer, by which I could understand that we had
• 57:00
  Speaker 1: been beaten. And afterwards, legless as I was, I was
• 57:05
  Speaker 1: overcome by joy at the thought that now I would
• 57:08
  Speaker 1: be sent home, that I was alive, alive for a
• 57:12
  Speaker 1: long time to come, alive forever. And only a week later,
• 57:17
  Speaker 1: I learned some particulars that once more filled me with
• 57:21
  Speaker 1: doubts and a new unexperienced feeling of terror yes i
• 57:26
  Speaker 1: believe they were our own men after all and it
• 57:30
  Speaker 1: was with one of our shells fired out of one
• 57:34
  Speaker 1: of our guns by one of our men that my
• 57:38
  Speaker 1: legs had been torn off and nobody could explain how
• 57:43
  Speaker 1: it had happened something occurred something darkened our vision and
• 57:48
  Speaker 1: two regiments belonging to the same army facing each other
• 57:51
  Speaker 1: at a distance of one verst, had been destroying each
• 57:54
  Speaker 1: other for a whole hour in the full conviction that
• 57:57
  Speaker 1: it was the enemy they had before them. Later on,
• 58:01
  Speaker 1: the incident was remembered and spoken of reluctantly in half-words, and,
• 58:06
  Speaker 1: what is most surprising of all, one could feel that
• 58:09
  Speaker 1: many of the speakers did not admit the mistake even then.
• 58:14
  Speaker 1: That is to say, They admitted it, but thought that
• 58:17
  Speaker 1: it had occurred later on, that in the beginning they
• 58:20
  Speaker 1: really had the enemy before them, but that he disappeared
• 58:24
  Speaker 1: somewhere during the general fray, leaving us in the range
• 58:27
  Speaker 1: of our own shells. Some spoke of it openly, giving
• 58:30
  Speaker 1: precise explanations, which seemed to them plausible and clear. Up
• 58:35
  Speaker 1: to this very minute I cannot say for certain how
• 58:38
  Speaker 1: the strange blunder began. As I saw with equal clearness
• 58:42
  Speaker 1: first our red uniforms, and then their orange-colored ones, and
• 58:46
  Speaker 1: somehow very soon everybody forgot about the incident, forgot about
• 58:51
  Speaker 1: it to such an extent that it was spoken of
• 58:53
  Speaker 1: as a real battle, and in that sense many accounts
• 58:57
  Speaker 1: were written and sent to the papers in all good faith.
• 59:02
  Speaker 1: I read them when I was back home. At first
• 59:05
  Speaker 1: the public's attitude towards us, the wounded in that engagement,
• 59:09
  Speaker 1: was rather strange. We seemed to be less pitied than
• 59:14
  Speaker 1: those wounded in other battles. But soon even that disappeared, too.
• 59:19
  Speaker 1: And only new facts, similar to the one just described,
• 59:23
  Speaker 1: and the case in the enemy's army, when two detachments
• 59:27
  Speaker 1: actually destroyed each other almost entirely, having come to a
• 59:30
  Speaker 1: hand-to-hand fight during the night, gives me the right to
• 59:33
  Speaker 1: think that a mistake did occur. Our doctor, the one
• 59:37
  Speaker 1: that did the amputation, a lean, bony old man, tainted
• 59:41
  Speaker 1: with tobacco smoke and carbolic acid, everlastingly smiled at something
• 59:46
  Speaker 1: through his yellowish-gray thin mustache, said to me, winking his eye,
• 59:52
  Speaker 1: You're in luck to be going home. There's something wrong here.
• 59:58
  Speaker 1: What is it?' Something' s going wrong. In our time it
• 1:00:02
  Speaker 1: was simpler.' He had taken part in the last European
• 1:00:06
  Speaker 1: war almost a quarter of a century back, and often
• 1:00:10
  Speaker 1: referred to it with pleasure. But this war he did
• 1:00:13
  Speaker 1: not understand, and, as I noticed, feared it.' Yes, there's
• 1:00:19
  Speaker 1: something wrong,' sighed he, and frowned, disappearing in a cloud
• 1:00:24
  Speaker 1: of tobacco smoke.' I would leave too, if I could.'
• 1:00:29
  Speaker 1: And bending over me, he whispered through his yellow-smoked mustache,
• 1:00:33
  Speaker 1: A time will come when nobody will be able to
• 1:00:36
  Speaker 1: go away from here. Yes, neither I nor anybody. And
• 1:00:43
  Speaker 1: in his old eyes, so close to me, I saw
• 1:00:46
  Speaker 1: the same fixed, dull, stricken expression. And something terrible, unbearable,
• 1:00:52
  Speaker 1: resembling the fall of thousands of buildings, darted through my head.
• 1:00:57
  Speaker 1: And growing cold from terror, I whispered, The red laugh.
• 1:01:03
  Speaker 1: And he was the first to understand me. He hastily
• 1:01:07
  Speaker 1: nodded his head and repeated, Yes, the red laugh. He
• 1:01:14
  Speaker 1: sat down quite close to me, and looking round began
• 1:01:17
  Speaker 1: whispering rapidly in a senile way, wagging his sharp gray
• 1:01:20
  Speaker 1: little beard. You are leaving soon, and I will tell you,
• 1:01:25
  Speaker 1: did you ever see a fight in an asylum? No? Well,
• 1:01:28
  Speaker 1: I saw one, and they fought like sane people. You understand?
• 1:01:33
  Speaker 1: Like sane people. He significantly repeated the last phrase several times. Well,
• 1:01:41
  Speaker 1: and what of that? asked I, also in a whisper
• 1:01:45
  Speaker 1: full of terror. Nothing. Like sane people. The red laugh,
• 1:01:54
  Speaker 1: said I. They were separated by water being poured over them.
• 1:02:00
  Speaker 1: I remembered the rain that had frightened us so and
• 1:02:02
  Speaker 1: got angry. You are mad, Doctor. Not more than you.
• 1:02:08
  Speaker 1: Not more than you in any case. He hugged his
• 1:02:11
  Speaker 1: sharp old knees and chuckled, and looking at me over
• 1:02:15
  Speaker 1: his shoulder and still with the echo of that unexpected
• 1:02:18
  Speaker 1: painful laugh on his parched lips, he winked at me
• 1:02:21
  Speaker 1: slyly several times. as if we too knew something very
• 1:02:25
  Speaker 1: funny that nobody else knew. Then, with the solemnity of
• 1:02:28
  Speaker 1: a professor of black magic giving a conjuring performance, he
• 1:02:33
  Speaker 1: lifted his arm and, lowering it slowly, carefully touched with
• 1:02:37
  Speaker 1: two fingers that part of the blanket under which my
• 1:02:40
  Speaker 1: legs would have been if they had not been cut off.'
• 1:02:43
  Speaker 1: And do you understand this?' he asked mysteriously. Then in
• 1:02:51
  Speaker 1: the same solemn and significant manner, he waved his hand
• 1:02:55
  Speaker 1: towards the row of beds on which the wounded were
• 1:02:58
  Speaker 1: lying and repeated, And can you explain this? The wounded?
• 1:03:05
  Speaker 1: said I. The wounded? The wounded, repeated he like an echo.
• 1:03:11
  Speaker 1: The wounded, legless and armless, with pierced sides, smashed in
• 1:03:17
  Speaker 1: chests and torn out eyes. You understand it? I am
• 1:03:21
  Speaker 1: very glad, so I suppose you will understand this also.
• 1:03:27
  Speaker 1: With an agility quite unexpected for his age, he flung
• 1:03:31
  Speaker 1: himself down and stood on his hands, balancing his legs
• 1:03:34
  Speaker 1: in the air. His white working clothes turned down, his
• 1:03:38
  Speaker 1: face grew purple, and looking at me fixedly with a
• 1:03:41
  Speaker 1: strange upturned gaze, he threw at me with difficulty a
• 1:03:45
  Speaker 1: few broken words. And this do you also understand? Stop,
• 1:03:53
  Speaker 1: whispered I in terror, or else I will cry out.
• 1:03:57
  Speaker 1: He turned over in a natural position, sat down again
• 1:04:00
  Speaker 1: near my bed, and, taking breath, remarked instinctively, Nobody can
• 1:04:05
  Speaker 1: understand it. Yesterday they were firing again. Yes, they were
• 1:04:11
  Speaker 1: firing yesterday and the day before, said he, nodding his
• 1:04:15
  Speaker 1: head affirmatively. I want to go home, said I in distress. Doctor!
• 1:04:21
  Speaker 1: Dear fellow, I want to go home. I cannot remain
• 1:04:24
  Speaker 1: here any longer. At times I cannot bring myself to
• 1:04:27
  Speaker 1: believe that I have a home, where it is so good.
• 1:04:32
  Speaker 1: He was thinking of something and did not answer, and
• 1:04:34
  Speaker 1: I began to cry. My God, I have no legs.
• 1:04:39
  Speaker 1: I used to love my bicycle so, to walk and run,
• 1:04:43
  Speaker 1: and now I have no legs. I used to dance
• 1:04:46
  Speaker 1: my boy on the right foot and he laughed, and now,
• 1:04:50
  Speaker 1: curse you all. What shall I go home for? I
• 1:04:53
  Speaker 1: am only thirty. Curse you all! And I sobbed and sobbed,
• 1:04:59
  Speaker 1: as I thought of my dear legs, my fleet, strong legs.
• 1:05:03
  Speaker 1: Who took them away from me? Who dared take them away? Listen,
• 1:05:08
  Speaker 1: said the doctor, looking aside. Yesterday I saw a mad
• 1:05:12
  Speaker 1: soldier that came to us, an enemy soldier. He was
• 1:05:16
  Speaker 1: stripped almost naked, beaten. and scratched and hungry as an animal.
• 1:05:20
  Speaker 1: His hair was unkempt as ours is, and he resembled
• 1:05:23
  Speaker 1: a savage, primitive man or monkey. He waved his arms about,
• 1:05:28
  Speaker 1: made grimaces, saying and shouted and wanted to fight. He
• 1:05:31
  Speaker 1: was fed and driven out again, into the open country.
• 1:05:35
  Speaker 1: Where could we have kept him? Days and nights they
• 1:05:38
  Speaker 1: wandered about the hills, backwards and forwards in all directions,
• 1:05:42
  Speaker 1: keeping to no path, having no aim or resting place,
• 1:05:46
  Speaker 1: all in tatters like ominous phantoms. They wave their arms, laugh, shout,
• 1:05:51
  Speaker 1: and sing, and when they come across anybody they begin
• 1:05:54
  Speaker 1: to fight, or maybe without noticing each other, pass by.
• 1:05:58
  Speaker 1: What do they eat? Probably nothing, or maybe they feed
• 1:06:01
  Speaker 1: on the dead bodies together with the beasts, together with
• 1:06:04
  Speaker 1: those fat wild dogs that fight in the hills and
• 1:06:08
  Speaker 1: yelp the whole night long. At night they gather about
• 1:06:11
  Speaker 1: the fires like monstrous moths or birds awakened by a storm,
• 1:06:16
  Speaker 1: and you need only light a fire. to have in
• 1:06:19
  Speaker 1: less than half an hour a dozen noisy, tattered, wild
• 1:06:22
  Speaker 1: shapes resembling chilled monkeys gathering around it. Sometimes they're fired
• 1:06:29
  Speaker 1: at by mistake, sometimes on purpose, for they make you
• 1:06:32
  Speaker 1: lose all patience with their unintelligible, terrifying cries. I want
• 1:06:37
  Speaker 1: to go home, cried I, shutting my ears. But new,
• 1:06:41
  Speaker 1: terrible words, sounding hollow and phantom-like, as if they were
• 1:06:45
  Speaker 1: passing through a layer of wadding, kept hammering at my brain.
• 1:06:50
  Speaker 1: They are many. They die by hundreds in the precipices
• 1:06:53
  Speaker 1: and pitfalls. They are made for sound and clever men,
• 1:06:56
  Speaker 1: in the remnants of the barbed wire and on the stakes.
• 1:07:00
  Speaker 1: They take part in the regular battles and fight like heroes,
• 1:07:03
  Speaker 1: always in the foremost ranks, always undaunted, but often turn
• 1:07:07
  Speaker 1: against their own men. I like them. At present, I
• 1:07:10
  Speaker 1: am only beginning to go mad, and that's why I
• 1:07:13
  Speaker 1: am sitting and talking to you. But when my senses
• 1:07:16
  Speaker 1: leave me entirely... I will go out into the open country.
• 1:07:20
  Speaker 1: I will go out into the open country, and I
• 1:07:22
  Speaker 1: will give a call. I will give a call. I
• 1:07:25
  Speaker 1: will gather those brave ones, those knights errant, around me,
• 1:07:30
  Speaker 1: and declare war to the whole world. We will enter
• 1:07:33
  Speaker 1: the towns and villages in a joyous crowd, with music
• 1:07:37
  Speaker 1: and songs leaving in our wake a trail of red,
• 1:07:39
  Speaker 1: in which everything will whirl and dance like fire. Those
• 1:07:43
  Speaker 1: that remain alive will join us. and our brave army
• 1:07:46
  Speaker 1: will grow like an avalanche and will cleanse the whole world.
• 1:07:49
  Speaker 1: Who said that one must not kill, burn, or rob?
• 1:07:54
  Speaker 1: He was shouting now, that mad doctor, and seemed to
• 1:07:57
  Speaker 1: have awakened by his cries the slumbering pain of all
• 1:08:00
  Speaker 1: those around him, with their ripped open chests and sides,
• 1:08:04
  Speaker 1: torn out eyes and cut off legs, the ward filled
• 1:08:08
  Speaker 1: with a broad, rasping, crying groan, and from all sides pale, yellow,
• 1:08:13
  Speaker 1: exhausted faces. some eyeless, some so monstrously mutilated, that it
• 1:08:20
  Speaker 1: seemed as if they had returned from hell, turned towards us,
• 1:08:25
  Speaker 1: and they groaned and listened, and a black, shapeless shadow,
• 1:08:30
  Speaker 1: risen up from the earth, peeped in cautiously through the
• 1:08:34
  Speaker 1: open door, while the mad doctor went on shouting, stretching
• 1:08:38
  Speaker 1: out his arms. Who said one must not kill, burn,
• 1:08:42
  Speaker 1: or rob? We will kill and burn and rob. We,
• 1:08:46
  Speaker 1: a joyless, careless band of braves, we will destroy all.
• 1:08:51
  Speaker 1: Their buildings, universities and museums, and Mary's children, full of
• 1:08:56
  Speaker 1: fiery laughter. We will dance on the ruins. I will
• 1:08:59
  Speaker 1: precariously the madhouse our fatherland all those that have not
• 1:09:03
  Speaker 1: gone mad our enemies and madmen and when i great
• 1:09:08
  Speaker 1: unconquerable and joyous will begin to reign over the whole
• 1:09:11
  Speaker 1: world its soul lord and master what a glad laugh
• 1:09:15
  Speaker 1: will ring over the whole universe The red laugh, cried I,
• 1:09:21
  Speaker 1: interrupting him. Help! Again I hear the red laugh. Friends,
• 1:09:26
  Speaker 1: continued the doctor, addressing himself to the groaning, mutilated shadows. Friends,
• 1:09:31
  Speaker 1: we shall have a red moon and a red sun,
• 1:09:34
  Speaker 1: and the animals will have a merry red coat, and
• 1:09:37
  Speaker 1: we will skin all those that are too white. That
• 1:09:41
  Speaker 1: are too white. You have not tasted blood? It is
• 1:09:45
  Speaker 1: slightly sticky and slightly warm, but it is red. and
• 1:09:49
  Speaker 1: has such a red, merry laugh. Fragment 7 It was
• 1:09:57
  Speaker 1: godless and unlawful. The Red Cross is respected by the
• 1:10:01
  Speaker 1: whole world as a thing sacred, and they saw that
• 1:10:05
  Speaker 1: it was a train full of harmless wounded, and not soldiers,
• 1:10:10
  Speaker 1: and they ought to have warned us of the mine.
• 1:10:13
  Speaker 1: The poor fellows, they were dreaming of home. End of
• 1:10:19
  Speaker 1: section four. Section five of The Red Laugh by Leonid Andreev.
• 1:10:32
  Speaker 1: This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Read by
• 1:10:36
  Speaker 1: Ben Tucker. Part one, fragments eight and nine. Fragment eight.
• 1:10:46
  Speaker 1: Around the samovar, Around a real samovar, out of which
• 1:10:50
  Speaker 1: the steam was rising as out of an engine. The
• 1:10:53
  Speaker 1: glass on the lamp had even grown dim. There was
• 1:10:56
  Speaker 1: so much steam. And the cups were the same, blue
• 1:10:59
  Speaker 1: outside and white inside. Very pretty little cups. A wedding present.
• 1:11:05
  Speaker 1: My wife's sister gave them. She is a very kind
• 1:11:08
  Speaker 1: and good woman. Is it possible they are all whole?
• 1:11:14
  Speaker 1: Asked I, incredulously. mixing the sugar in my glass with
• 1:11:17
  Speaker 1: a clean silver spoon. One was broken, said my wife absently.
• 1:11:23
  Speaker 1: She was holding the tap open just then, and the
• 1:11:25
  Speaker 1: water was running out easily and prettily.
• 1:11:28
  Speaker 2: I laughed.
• 1:11:30
  Speaker 1: What's it about? asked my brother. Oh, nothing. Wheel me
• 1:11:36
  Speaker 1: into the study just once more. You may as well
• 1:11:38
  Speaker 1: trouble yourself for the sake of a hero. You idled
• 1:11:41
  Speaker 1: away your time while I was away. But now that
• 1:11:44
  Speaker 1: is over. I'll bring you to order. And I began singing,
• 1:11:48
  Speaker 1: as a joke, of course. My friends were bravely hurrying
• 1:11:52
  Speaker 1: towards the foe. They understood the joke and smiled. Only
• 1:11:56
  Speaker 1: my wife did not lift up her face. She was
• 1:11:58
  Speaker 1: wiping the cups with a clean, embroidered cloth. And in
• 1:12:02
  Speaker 1: the study I saw once again the light blue wallpaper,
• 1:12:05
  Speaker 1: a lamp with a green shade, and a table with
• 1:12:08
  Speaker 1: a water bottle upon it. And it was a little dusty.
• 1:12:13
  Speaker 1: Pour me some water out of this. ordered I merrily.
• 1:12:17
  Speaker 1: But you've just had tea. That doesn't matter. Pour me
• 1:12:20
  Speaker 1: out some, and you, said I to my wife, take
• 1:12:23
  Speaker 1: our son and go into the next room for a minute, please.
• 1:12:27
  Speaker 1: And I drank the water with delight in small sips,
• 1:12:30
  Speaker 1: while my wife and son were in the next room,
• 1:12:32
  Speaker 1: and I could not see them. That's all right. Now
• 1:12:35
  Speaker 1: come here, but why is he not in bed by
• 1:12:38
  Speaker 1: this time? He is so glad you have come home. Darling,
• 1:12:42
  Speaker 1: go to your father. but the child began to cry
• 1:12:45
  Speaker 1: and hid himself at his mother's feet. Why is he crying?
• 1:12:49
  Speaker 1: asked I in perplexity and looked around. Why are you
• 1:12:51
  Speaker 1: all so pale and silent, following me like shadows? My
• 1:12:56
  Speaker 1: brother burst into a loud laugh and said, We are
• 1:12:58
  Speaker 1: not silent! and my sister said, We are talking the
• 1:13:02
  Speaker 1: whole time. I will go and see about the supper,
• 1:13:07
  Speaker 1: said my mother, and hurriedly left the room. Yes, you
• 1:13:12
  Speaker 1: are silent, I repeated. with sudden conviction.' Since morning, I
• 1:13:17
  Speaker 1: have not heard a word from you. I am the
• 1:13:19
  Speaker 1: only one who chats, laughs, and makes merry. Are you
• 1:13:23
  Speaker 1: not glad to see me, then? And why do you
• 1:13:24
  Speaker 1: all avoid looking at me? Have I changed so?'' Yes,
• 1:13:28
  Speaker 1: I am changed, but I do not see any looking-glasses about.
• 1:13:32
  Speaker 1: Have you put them all away? Give me a looking-glass.''
• 1:13:34
  Speaker 1: I will bring you one directly,' answered my wife, and
• 1:13:39
  Speaker 1: did not come back for a long time. And the
• 1:13:41
  Speaker 1: looking-glass was brought by the maid.' I looked into it,
• 1:13:44
  Speaker 1: and I had seen myself before in the train, at
• 1:13:47
  Speaker 1: the station. It was the same face, grown older a little,
• 1:13:51
  Speaker 1: but the most ordinary face. While they, I believe, expected
• 1:13:56
  Speaker 1: me to cry out and faint, so glad were they
• 1:13:59
  Speaker 1: when I asked calmly, What is there so unusual in me?
• 1:14:04
  Speaker 1: Laughing louder and louder, my sister left the room hurriedly,
• 1:14:08
  Speaker 1: and my brother said with calm assurance, Yes, you have
• 1:14:11
  Speaker 1: not changed much, only grown slightly bald. You can be
• 1:14:15
  Speaker 1: thankful that my head is not broken, answered I unconcernedly.
• 1:14:19
  Speaker 1: But where do they all disappear? First one, then another.
• 1:14:22
  Speaker 1: Wheel me about the rooms, please. What a comfortable armchair.
• 1:14:25
  Speaker 1: It does not make the slightest sound. How much did
• 1:14:28
  Speaker 1: it cost? You bet I won't spare the money. I
• 1:14:30
  Speaker 1: will buy myself such a pair of legs. Better. My bicycle.
• 1:14:35
  Speaker 1: It was hanging on the wall quite new. Only the
• 1:14:38
  Speaker 1: tires were limp for want of pumping. A tiny bit
• 1:14:40
  Speaker 1: of mud had dried to the tire of the back
• 1:14:42
  Speaker 1: wheel the last time I had ridden it. My brother
• 1:14:45
  Speaker 1: was silent and did not move my chair, and I
• 1:14:48
  Speaker 1: understood his silence and irresoluteness. Only four officers remained alive
• 1:14:55
  Speaker 1: in our regiment, said I surly. I am very lucky.
• 1:14:59
  Speaker 1: You can take it for yourself. Take it away tomorrow.
• 1:15:03
  Speaker 1: All right, I will take it, agreed my brother submissively. Yes,
• 1:15:07
  Speaker 1: you are lucky. Half of the town is in mourning,
• 1:15:10
  Speaker 1: while legs, that is, really. Of course, I am not
• 1:15:14
  Speaker 1: a postman, my brother stopped suddenly and asked. But why
• 1:15:17
  Speaker 1: does your head shake? That's nothing. The doctor said it
• 1:15:21
  Speaker 1: will pass. And your hands, too? Yes, yes, and my hands, too.
• 1:15:25
  Speaker 1: It will all pass. Wheel me on, please. I'm tired
• 1:15:28
  Speaker 1: of remaining still. They upset me, those discontented people. But
• 1:15:33
  Speaker 1: my gladness returned to me when they began making my bed.
• 1:15:36
  Speaker 1: A real bed. A handsome bed. that I had bought
• 1:15:39
  Speaker 1: just before our wedding four years ago. They spread a
• 1:15:43
  Speaker 1: clean sheet, then they shook the pillows and turned down
• 1:15:46
  Speaker 1: the blanket while I watched the solemn proceedings, my eyes
• 1:15:50
  Speaker 1: full of tears with laughing. And now undress me and
• 1:15:54
  Speaker 1: put me to bed, said I to my wife. How
• 1:15:57
  Speaker 1: good it is! This minute, dear. Quicker! This minute, dear. Why,
• 1:16:03
  Speaker 1: what are you doing? This minute, dear. She was standing
• 1:16:06
  Speaker 1: behind my back near the toilet table. and I vainly
• 1:16:09
  Speaker 1: tried to turn my head so as to see her.
• 1:16:12
  Speaker 1: And suddenly she gave a cry, such a cry as
• 1:16:14
  Speaker 1: one hears only at the war. What does it all mean?
• 1:16:19
  Speaker 1: She rushed towards me, put her arms round me, and
• 1:16:21
  Speaker 1: fell down, hiding her head near the stumps of my
• 1:16:23
  Speaker 1: cut-off legs, from which she turned away with horror, and
• 1:16:26
  Speaker 1: again pressed herself against them, kissing them and crying. What
• 1:16:30
  Speaker 1: have you become? Why, you were only thirty years old.
• 1:16:34
  Speaker 1: You were young and handsome. What does it all mean?
• 1:16:37
  Speaker 1: How cruel men are! What is it for? For whom
• 1:16:40
  Speaker 1: is it necessary? You, my gentle, poor darling, darling. At
• 1:16:46
  Speaker 1: her cry, they all ran up, my mother, sister, nurse,
• 1:16:50
  Speaker 1: and they all began crying and saying something or other,
• 1:16:53
  Speaker 1: and fell at my feet, wailing, while on the threshold
• 1:16:56
  Speaker 1: stood my brother, pale, terribly pale, with a trembling jaw,
• 1:17:00
  Speaker 1: and cried out in a high-pitched voice, I shall go
• 1:17:03
  Speaker 1: mad with you all! I shall go mad! while my
• 1:17:07
  Speaker 1: mother groveled at my chair and had not the strength
• 1:17:10
  Speaker 1: to cry but only gasped, beating her head against the wheels.
• 1:17:14
  Speaker 1: And there stood the clean bed with the well-shaken pillows
• 1:17:17
  Speaker 1: and turned-down blanket, the same bed that I bought just
• 1:17:21
  Speaker 1: before our wedding four years ago. Fragment 9 I was
• 1:17:29
  Speaker 1: sitting in a warm bath while my brother was pacing
• 1:17:32
  Speaker 1: up and down the small room in a troubled manner,
• 1:17:35
  Speaker 1: sitting down, getting up again, catching hold of the soap
• 1:17:39
  Speaker 1: and towel, bringing them close up to his short-sighted eyes,
• 1:17:43
  Speaker 1: and again putting them back in their places. At last
• 1:17:46
  Speaker 1: he stood up with his face to the wall, and
• 1:17:48
  Speaker 1: picking at the plaster with his finger, continued hotly, Judge
• 1:17:52
  Speaker 1: for yourself. One cannot teach people mercy, sense, logic. Teach
• 1:17:56
  Speaker 1: them to act consciously for tens and hundreds of years
• 1:17:59
  Speaker 1: running with impunity, and in particular to act consciously. One
• 1:18:04
  Speaker 1: can become merciless. lose all sensitiveness, get accustomed to blood
• 1:18:08
  Speaker 1: and tears and pain. For instance, butchers, and some doctors
• 1:18:11
  Speaker 1: and officers do. But how can one renounce truth after
• 1:18:16
  Speaker 1: one has learned to know it? In my opinion, it
• 1:18:18
  Speaker 1: is impossible. I was taught from infancy not to torture
• 1:18:21
  Speaker 1: animals and be compassionate. All the books that I read
• 1:18:24
  Speaker 1: told me the same, and I am painfully sorry for
• 1:18:27
  Speaker 1: all those that suffer at your cursed war. But time passes,
• 1:18:31
  Speaker 1: and I am beginning to get accustomed to all those deaths, sufferings,
• 1:18:34
  Speaker 1: and All this blood. I feel that I am getting
• 1:18:37
  Speaker 1: less sensitive. Less responsive in my everyday life. And respond
• 1:18:42
  Speaker 1: only to great stimulants. But I cannot get accustomed to war.
• 1:18:46
  Speaker 1: My brain refuses to understand and explain a thing that
• 1:18:49
  Speaker 1: is senseless and its basis. Millions of people gather at
• 1:18:53
  Speaker 1: one place and, giving their actions order and regularity, kill
• 1:18:58
  Speaker 1: each other. And it hurts everybody equally. And all are unhappy.
• 1:19:03
  Speaker 1: What is it if not madness? My brother turned round
• 1:19:07
  Speaker 1: and looked at me inquiringly with his short-sighted, artless eyes.
• 1:19:11
  Speaker 1: The red laugh, said I merrily, splashing about. I will
• 1:19:16
  Speaker 1: tell you the truth. And my brother put his cold
• 1:19:19
  Speaker 1: hand trustingly on my shoulder, but quickly pulled it back,
• 1:19:23
  Speaker 1: as if he was frightened at its being naked and wet.
• 1:19:27
  Speaker 1: I will tell you the truth. I am very much
• 1:19:29
  Speaker 1: afraid of going mad. I cannot understand what is happening.
• 1:19:34
  Speaker 1: I cannot understand it. and it is dreadful. If only
• 1:19:37
  Speaker 1: anybody could explain it to me, but nobody can. You
• 1:19:41
  Speaker 1: were at the front. You saw it all. Explain it
• 1:19:44
  Speaker 1: to me. Deuce take you, answered I jokingly, splashing about. There,
• 1:19:50
  Speaker 1: and you too, said my brother sadly. Nobody is capable
• 1:19:54
  Speaker 1: of helping me. It's dreadful, and I am beginning to
• 1:19:58
  Speaker 1: lose all understanding of what is permissible and what is not,
• 1:20:02
  Speaker 1: what has sense and what is senseless. If I were
• 1:20:05
  Speaker 1: to seize you suddenly by the throat at first, gently
• 1:20:08
  Speaker 1: as if caressing you, and then firmly and strangle you,
• 1:20:11
  Speaker 1: what would that be? You are talking nonsense. Nobody does
• 1:20:16
  Speaker 1: such things. My brother rubbed his cold hands, smiled softly,
• 1:20:20
  Speaker 1: and continued. When you were away, there were nights when
• 1:20:24
  Speaker 1: I did not sleep, could not sleep, and strange ideas
• 1:20:28
  Speaker 1: entered my head. To take a hatchet, for instance, and
• 1:20:31
  Speaker 1: go and kill everybody.' Mother, sister, the servants, our dog.'
• 1:20:35
  Speaker 1: Of course, they were only fancies, and I would never
• 1:20:39
  Speaker 1: do so.'' I should hope not,' smiled I, splashing about.'
• 1:20:44
  Speaker 1: Then again, I am afraid of knives, of all that
• 1:20:48
  Speaker 1: is sharp and shining.' It seems to me that if
• 1:20:50
  Speaker 1: I were to take up a knife,' I should certainly
• 1:20:52
  Speaker 1: kill somebody with it.' Now, is it not true?' Why
• 1:20:56
  Speaker 1: should I not plunge it into somebody, if it were
• 1:20:59
  Speaker 1: sharp enough?'' The argument is sufficient,' What a queer fellow
• 1:21:03
  Speaker 1: you are, brother. Just open the hot water tap. My
• 1:21:07
  Speaker 1: brother opened the tap, let in some hot water, and continued.
• 1:21:11
  Speaker 1: Then again, I am afraid of crowds, of men, where
• 1:21:15
  Speaker 1: many of them gather together. When of an evening I
• 1:21:18
  Speaker 1: hear a noise in the street, a loud shout, for instance,
• 1:21:22
  Speaker 1: I start and believe that a massacre has begun. When
• 1:21:26
  Speaker 1: several men stand together, and I cannot hear what they
• 1:21:29
  Speaker 1: are talking about, It seems to me that they will
• 1:21:31
  Speaker 1: suddenly cry out, fall upon each other, and blood will flow.
• 1:21:34
  Speaker 1: And you know... He bent mysteriously towards my ear. The
• 1:21:39
  Speaker 1: papers are full of murders. Strange murders. It is all
• 1:21:45
  Speaker 1: nonsense that there are as many brains as there are men.
• 1:21:49
  Speaker 1: Mankind has only one intellect, and it is beginning to
• 1:21:52
  Speaker 1: get muddled. Just feel my head, how hot it is.
• 1:21:56
  Speaker 1: It is on fire, and sometimes it gets cold and
• 1:21:59
  Speaker 1: everything freezes in it. grows benumbed and changes into a terrible,
• 1:22:03
  Speaker 1: dead-like piece of ice. I must go mad. Don't laugh, brother.
• 1:22:08
  Speaker 1: I must go mad. A quarter of an hour has passed.
• 1:22:11
  Speaker 1: It's time for you to get out of your bath.
• 1:22:14
  Speaker 1: A little bit more. Just a minute. It was so
• 1:22:17
  Speaker 1: good to be sitting again in that bath and listening
• 1:22:20
  Speaker 1: to the well-known voice without reflecting upon the words, and
• 1:22:23
  Speaker 1: to see all the familiar, simple, and ordinary things around me.
• 1:22:28
  Speaker 1: the brass, slightly green tap, the walls with the familiar pattern,
• 1:22:33
  Speaker 1: and all the photographic outfit laid out in order upon
• 1:22:36
  Speaker 1: the shelves. I would take up photography again, take simple,
• 1:22:40
  Speaker 1: peaceful landscapes and portraits of my son walking, laughing, and playing.
• 1:22:46
  Speaker 1: One could do that without legs. And I would take
• 1:22:48
  Speaker 1: up my writing again, about clever books, the progress of
• 1:22:52
  Speaker 1: human thought, beauty, and peace. Ho, ho, ho! roared I,
• 1:22:57
  Speaker 1: splashing about. What is the matter with you? asked my brother,
• 1:23:02
  Speaker 1: growing pale and full of fear. Nothing. I am glad
• 1:23:05
  Speaker 1: to be home. He smiled at me as one smiles
• 1:23:09
  Speaker 1: at a child, or on one younger than oneself, although
• 1:23:12
  Speaker 1: I was three years older than he, and grew thoughtful,
• 1:23:17
  Speaker 1: like a grown-up person or an old man who has
• 1:23:19
  Speaker 1: great burdensome old thoughts. Where can one fly to? he asked,
• 1:23:24
  Speaker 1: shrugging his shoulders. Every day, at about the same hour,
• 1:23:28
  Speaker 1: the papers closed the circuits, and all mankind gets a shock.
• 1:23:32
  Speaker 1: This simultaneousness of feelings, tears, thoughts, sufferings, and horror deprives
• 1:23:36
  Speaker 1: me of all stay, and I am like a chip
• 1:23:38
  Speaker 1: of wood tossing about on the waves, or a bit
• 1:23:41
  Speaker 1: of dust in a whirlwind. I am forcibly torn away
• 1:23:44
  Speaker 1: from all that is habitual. There is one terrible moment
• 1:23:47
  Speaker 1: every morning, when I seem to hang in the air
• 1:23:50
  Speaker 1: over the black abyss of insanity, and I shall fall
• 1:23:53
  Speaker 1: into it. I must fall into it. You don't know all, brother.
• 1:23:56
  Speaker 1: You don't read the papers, and much is held back
• 1:23:58
  Speaker 1: from you. You don't know all, brother. I took all
• 1:24:02
  Speaker 1: his words for rather a gloomy joke, the usual attitude
• 1:24:06
  Speaker 1: towards all those who, being touched by insanity, have an
• 1:24:09
  Speaker 1: inkling of the insanity of war, and gave us a warning.
• 1:24:13
  Speaker 1: I considered it as a joke, as if I had
• 1:24:16
  Speaker 1: forgotten for the moment, while I was splashing about in
• 1:24:18
  Speaker 1: the hot water, all that I had seen over there. Well,
• 1:24:23
  Speaker 1: let them hold things back from me. But I must
• 1:24:26
  Speaker 1: get out of the bath anyway, said I lightly. And
• 1:24:29
  Speaker 1: my brothers smiled and called my man, and together they
• 1:24:32
  Speaker 1: lifted me out of my bath and dressed me. Afterwards
• 1:24:35
  Speaker 1: I had some fragrant tea which I drank out of
• 1:24:37
  Speaker 1: my cut-glass tumbler, and said to myself that life was
• 1:24:41
  Speaker 1: worth living, even without a pair of legs. And then
• 1:24:45
  Speaker 1: they wheeled me into the study up to my table,
• 1:24:47
  Speaker 1: and I prepared for work. Before the war, I was
• 1:24:51
  Speaker 1: on the staff of a journal, reviewing foreign literature, and now,
• 1:24:55
  Speaker 1: disposed within my reach, lay a heap of those dear,
• 1:24:58
  Speaker 1: sweet books in yellow, blue, and brown covers. My joy
• 1:25:02
  Speaker 1: was so great, my delight so profound, that I could
• 1:25:05
  Speaker 1: not make up my mind to begin reading them. And
• 1:25:08
  Speaker 1: I merely fingered the books, passing my hand caressingly over them.
• 1:25:12
  Speaker 1: I felt a smile spread over my face, most probably
• 1:25:16
  Speaker 1: a very silly smile, but I could not keep it
• 1:25:19
  Speaker 1: back as I contemplated admiringly the type, the vignettes, the
• 1:25:23
  Speaker 1: severe beautiful simplicity of the drawings. How much thought and
• 1:25:28
  Speaker 1: sense of beauty there was in them all. How many
• 1:25:30
  Speaker 1: people had to work and search. How much talent and
• 1:25:33
  Speaker 1: taste were needed to bring forth that letter, for instance.
• 1:25:37
  Speaker 1: So simple and elegant. So clever, harmonious, and eloquent in
• 1:25:41
  Speaker 1: its interlaced lines. And now I must set to work.
• 1:25:46
  Speaker 1: said I, seriously, full of respect for work. And I
• 1:25:50
  Speaker 1: took up my pen to write the heading, and, like
• 1:25:52
  Speaker 1: a frog tied to a string, my hand began plunging
• 1:25:56
  Speaker 1: about the paper. The pen stuck into the paper, scratched it,
• 1:26:01
  Speaker 1: jerked about, slipped irresistibly aside, and brought forth hideous lines, broken, crooked,
• 1:26:07
  Speaker 1: devoid of all sense. And I did not cry out
• 1:26:10
  Speaker 1: or move. I grew cold, and still, as the approaching
• 1:26:14
  Speaker 1: terrible truth dawned upon me while my hand danced over
• 1:26:18
  Speaker 1: the brightly illuminated paper and each finger shook in such hopeless,
• 1:26:23
  Speaker 1: living and sane horror as if they, those fingers, were
• 1:26:26
  Speaker 1: still at the front and saw the conflagrations in blood
• 1:26:30
  Speaker 1: and heard the groans and cries of indescribable pain. They
• 1:26:35
  Speaker 1: had detached themselves from me, those madly quivering fingers. They
• 1:26:39
  Speaker 1: were alive. They had become ears and eyes and, growing
• 1:26:44
  Speaker 1: cold from horror, without the strength to move or cry out.
• 1:26:48
  Speaker 1: I watched their wild dance over the clean, bright, white page,
• 1:26:53
  Speaker 1: and all was quiet. They thought I was working, and
• 1:26:57
  Speaker 1: had shut all the doors so as not to interrupt
• 1:26:59
  Speaker 1: me by any sound. And I was alone in the room,
• 1:27:03
  Speaker 1: deprived of the power of moving, obediently watching my shaking hands.
• 1:27:10
  Speaker 1: It is nothing, said I aloud, and in the stillness
• 1:27:13
  Speaker 1: and loneliness of the study, My voice sounded hollow and
• 1:27:18
  Speaker 1: nasty like the voice of a madman. It is nothing.
• 1:27:22
  Speaker 1: I will dictate why Milton was blind when he wrote
• 1:27:25
  Speaker 1: his Paradise Regained. I can think, and that is the
• 1:27:28
  Speaker 1: chief thing. In fact, it is all. And I began
• 1:27:32
  Speaker 1: inventing a long, clever phrase about the blind Milton. But
• 1:27:35
  Speaker 1: the words got confused, fell away as out of a
• 1:27:39
  Speaker 1: rotten printing frame. And when I came to the end
• 1:27:42
  Speaker 1: of the phrase, I had forgotten the beginnings. and I
• 1:27:45
  Speaker 1: tried to remember what made me begin and why I
• 1:27:47
  Speaker 1: was inventing that strange, senseless phrase about Milton and could not.
• 1:27:52
  Speaker 1: Paradise regained, paradise regained, I repeated and could not understand
• 1:27:57
  Speaker 1: what it meant. And then I saw that I often
• 1:28:01
  Speaker 1: forgot very many things, that I had become strangely absent-minded
• 1:28:05
  Speaker 1: and confused, familiar faces, that I forgot words even in
• 1:28:10
  Speaker 1: a simple conversation. and sometimes remembering a word I could
• 1:28:14
  Speaker 1: not understand its meaning, and I clearly pictured to myself
• 1:28:18
  Speaker 1: my daily existence. A strange, short day, cut off like
• 1:28:23
  Speaker 1: my legs, with empty, mysterious spaces, long hours of unconsciousness
• 1:28:29
  Speaker 1: or apathy about which I could remember nothing. I wanted
• 1:28:34
  Speaker 1: to call my wife, but could not remember her name,
• 1:28:37
  Speaker 1: and this did not surprise or or frighten me. Softly
• 1:28:42
  Speaker 1: I whispered, Wife. The incoherent, unusual word sounded softly and
• 1:28:49
  Speaker 1: died away without bringing any response, and all was quiet.
• 1:28:56
  Speaker 1: They were afraid of disturbing me at my work by
• 1:28:58
  Speaker 1: any careless sound, and all was quiet. A perfect study
• 1:29:06
  Speaker 1: for a savant. Cozy, quiet, disposing one to meditation and
• 1:29:12
  Speaker 1: creative energy. Dear ones, how solicitous they are of me,
• 1:29:17
  Speaker 1: I thought tenderly. An inspiration, sacred inspiration, came to me.
• 1:29:23
  Speaker 1: The sun burst forth in my head. and its burning
• 1:29:26
  Speaker 1: creative rays darted over the whole world, dropping flowers and songs,
• 1:29:31
  Speaker 1: flowers and songs. And I rode on through the whole night,
• 1:29:34
  Speaker 1: feeling no exhaustion, but soaring freely on the wings of mighty,
• 1:29:38
  Speaker 1: sacred inspiration. I was writing something great, something immortal. Flowers
• 1:29:44
  Speaker 1: and songs, flowers and songs. End of section five. Section
• 1:29:57
  Speaker 1: 6 of The Red Laugh by Leonid Andreev This LibriVox
• 1:30:04
  Speaker 1: recording is in the public domain. Read by Ben Tucker.
• 1:30:12
  Speaker 1: Part 2. Fragments 10-12 Fragment 10 Happily, he died last
• 1:30:20
  Speaker 1: week on Friday. I say happily and repeat that my
• 1:30:24
  Speaker 1: brother's death was a great blessing to him. a cripple
• 1:30:27
  Speaker 1: with no legs, palsied, with a smitten soul. He was
• 1:30:32
  Speaker 1: terrible and piteous to his senseless creative ecstasy. Ever since
• 1:30:37
  Speaker 1: that night he wrote for two months, without leaving his chair,
• 1:30:40
  Speaker 1: refusing all food, weeping and scolding whenever we wheeled him
• 1:30:44
  Speaker 1: away from his table even for a short time. He
• 1:30:47
  Speaker 1: moved his dry pen over the paper with wonderful rapidity,
• 1:30:51
  Speaker 1: throwing aside page after page and kept on writing and writing.
• 1:30:56
  Speaker 1: Sleep deserted him. and only twice did we succeed in
• 1:30:59
  Speaker 1: putting him to bed for a few hours thanks to
• 1:31:01
  Speaker 1: a strong narcotic. But later, even a narcotic was powerless
• 1:31:06
  Speaker 1: to conquer his senseless creative ecstasy. At his order, the
• 1:31:11
  Speaker 1: curtains were kept drawn over all the windows the whole
• 1:31:13
  Speaker 1: day long, and the lamp was allowed to burn, giving
• 1:31:16
  Speaker 1: the illusion of night, while he rode on, smoking one
• 1:31:20
  Speaker 1: cigarette after another. Apparently he was happy. and I never
• 1:31:25
  Speaker 1: happened to meet any healthy person with such an inspired face.
• 1:31:29
  Speaker 1: The face of a prophet or of a great poet.
• 1:31:33
  Speaker 1: He became extremely emaciated with the waxen transparency of a
• 1:31:36
  Speaker 1: corpse or of an ascetic, and his hair grew quite gray.
• 1:31:41
  Speaker 1: He began his senseless work, a comparatively young man, but
• 1:31:45
  Speaker 1: finished it an old one. Sometimes he hurried on his work,
• 1:31:49
  Speaker 1: writing more than usual, and his pen would stick into
• 1:31:52
  Speaker 1: the pages and break. but he never noticed it. At
• 1:31:55
  Speaker 1: such times one durst not touch him, for at the
• 1:31:58
  Speaker 1: slightest contact he was overtaken by bits of tears and laughter,
• 1:32:02
  Speaker 1: but sometimes, very rarely, he rested blissfully from his work
• 1:32:06
  Speaker 1: and talked to me affably, each time asking the same questions.
• 1:32:11
  Speaker 1: Who was I? What was my name? And since when
• 1:32:14
  Speaker 1: had I taken up literature? And then he would condescendingly tell,
• 1:32:19
  Speaker 1: always using the same words, what an absurd fright he
• 1:32:21
  Speaker 1: had had at the thought that He had lost his
• 1:32:24
  Speaker 1: memory and was incapable of work. And how splendidly he
• 1:32:28
  Speaker 1: had refuted the insane supposition there and then by beginning
• 1:32:32
  Speaker 1: his great immortal work about the flowers and songs. Of course,
• 1:32:37
  Speaker 1: I do not count upon being recognized by my contemporaries,
• 1:32:41
  Speaker 1: he would say proudly and unassumingly at the same time,
• 1:32:44
  Speaker 1: putting his trembling hand on the heap of empty sheets.
• 1:32:47
  Speaker 1: But the future, the future will understand my idea. He
• 1:32:52
  Speaker 1: never once remembered the war or his wife and son.
• 1:32:56
  Speaker 1: The mirage of his endless work engrossed his attention so
• 1:32:59
  Speaker 1: undividedly that it is doubtful whether he was conscious of
• 1:33:02
  Speaker 1: anything else. One could walk and talk in his presence.
• 1:33:07
  Speaker 1: He noticed nothing, and not for an instant did his
• 1:33:09
  Speaker 1: face lose its expression of terrible tension and inspiration. And
• 1:33:15
  Speaker 1: the stillness of the night when everybody was asleep and
• 1:33:18
  Speaker 1: he alone wove untiringly the endless thread of insanity He
• 1:33:23
  Speaker 1: seemed terrible, and only his mother and I ventured to
• 1:33:27
  Speaker 1: approach him. Once I tried to give him a pencil
• 1:33:30
  Speaker 1: instead of his dry pen, thinking that perhaps he really
• 1:33:33
  Speaker 1: wrote something, but on the paper there remained only hideous lines, broken, crooked,
• 1:33:40
  Speaker 1: devoid of any sense, and he died in the night
• 1:33:43
  Speaker 1: at his work. I knew my brother well, and his
• 1:33:47
  Speaker 1: insanity did not come as a surprise to me. the
• 1:33:51
  Speaker 1: passionate dream of work that filled all his letters from
• 1:33:53
  Speaker 1: the war, and was the stay of his life after
• 1:33:57
  Speaker 1: his return, had come into inevitable collision with the impotence
• 1:34:02
  Speaker 1: of his exhausted, tortured brain, and bring about the catastrophe.
• 1:34:08
  Speaker 1: And I believe I have succeeded in reconstructing with sufficient
• 1:34:11
  Speaker 1: accuracy the successive feelings that brought him to the end
• 1:34:15
  Speaker 1: during that fatal night. Generally speaking, All that I have
• 1:34:20
  Speaker 1: written down concerning the war is founded upon the words
• 1:34:23
  Speaker 1: of my dead brother, often very confused and incoherent. Only
• 1:34:28
  Speaker 1: a few separate episodes were burst into his brain so
• 1:34:31
  Speaker 1: deeply and indelibly that I could cite the very words
• 1:34:34
  Speaker 1: that he used in telling me them. I loved him,
• 1:34:38
  Speaker 1: and his death weighs upon me like a stone, oppressing
• 1:34:42
  Speaker 1: my brain by its senselessness. It has added one more
• 1:34:46
  Speaker 1: loop to the incomprehensible that, envelops my head like a web,
• 1:34:50
  Speaker 1: and has drawn it tight. The whole family has left
• 1:34:54
  Speaker 1: for the country on a visit to some relatives, and
• 1:34:57
  Speaker 1: I am alone in the house, the house that my
• 1:35:00
  Speaker 1: brother loved so. The servants have been paid off, and
• 1:35:05
  Speaker 1: only the porter from the next door comes every morning
• 1:35:09
  Speaker 1: to light the fires, while the rest of the time
• 1:35:11
  Speaker 1: I am alone and resemble a fly caught between two
• 1:35:15
  Speaker 1: window frames. Footnote. In Russia, the windows have double panes
• 1:35:20
  Speaker 1: during the winter for the purpose of keeping out the cold.
• 1:35:24
  Speaker 1: End of footnote. Plunging about and knocking myself against a
• 1:35:29
  Speaker 1: transparent but insurmountable obstacle. And I feel, I know, that
• 1:35:34
  Speaker 1: I shall never leave the house. Now, when I am alone,
• 1:35:38
  Speaker 1: the war possesses me wholly, and stands before me like
• 1:35:41
  Speaker 1: an inscrutable mystery, like a terrible spirit to which I
• 1:35:45
  Speaker 1: can give no form. I give it all sorts of shapes,
• 1:35:50
  Speaker 1: of a headless skeleton on horseback, of a shapeless shadow
• 1:35:54
  Speaker 1: born in a black thundercloud, mutely enveloping the earth. But
• 1:35:59
  Speaker 1: not one of them can give me an answer and
• 1:36:01
  Speaker 1: extinguish the cold, constant, blunt horror that possesses me. I
• 1:36:07
  Speaker 1: do not understand war, and I must go mad like
• 1:36:10
  Speaker 1: my brother, like the hundreds of men that are sent
• 1:36:13
  Speaker 1: back from there. And this does not terrify me. The
• 1:36:17
  Speaker 1: loss of reason seems to me honorable, like the death
• 1:36:20
  Speaker 1: of a century at his post. But the expectancy, the
• 1:36:25
  Speaker 1: slow and infallible approach of madness, the instantaneous feeling of
• 1:36:30
  Speaker 1: something enormous falling into an abyss, the unbearable pain of
• 1:36:34
  Speaker 1: tortured thought. My heart has grown benumbed. It is dead,
• 1:36:39
  Speaker 1: and there is no new life for it but thought.
• 1:36:41
  Speaker 1: It is still alive, still struggling, once mighty as Samson,
• 1:36:47
  Speaker 1: but now helpless and weak as a child, and... I
• 1:36:52
  Speaker 1: am sorry for my poor thought. There are moments when
• 1:36:54
  Speaker 1: I cannot endure the torture of those iron clasps that
• 1:36:57
  Speaker 1: are compressing my brain. I feel an irrepressible longing to
• 1:37:01
  Speaker 1: run out into the street, into the marketplace, where there
• 1:37:05
  Speaker 1: are people, and cry out, Stop the war this instant
• 1:37:08
  Speaker 1: or else! But what else is there? Are there any
• 1:37:14
  Speaker 1: words that can make them come to their senses? Words
• 1:37:19
  Speaker 1: in answer to which one cannot find just such other
• 1:37:21
  Speaker 1: loud and lying words? Or must I fall upon my
• 1:37:25
  Speaker 1: knees before them and burst into tears? But then hundreds
• 1:37:31
  Speaker 1: of thousands are making the earth resound with their weeping.
• 1:37:36
  Speaker 1: But does that change anything? Or perhaps kill myself before
• 1:37:40
  Speaker 1: them all? Kill myself? Thousands are dying every day, but
• 1:37:45
  Speaker 1: does that change anything? And when I feel my impotence,
• 1:37:49
  Speaker 1: I am seized with rage, the rage of war which
• 1:37:52
  Speaker 1: I hate. Like the doctor, I long to burn down
• 1:37:56
  Speaker 1: their houses with all their treasures, their wives and children,
• 1:38:00
  Speaker 1: to poison the water which they drink, to raise all
• 1:38:04
  Speaker 1: the killed from their graves and throw the corpses into
• 1:38:06
  Speaker 1: their unclean houses, onto their beds. Let them sleep with them,
• 1:38:11
  Speaker 1: as with their wives or mistresses. Oh, if only I
• 1:38:15
  Speaker 1: were the devil! I would transplant all the horrors that
• 1:38:18
  Speaker 1: hell exhales onto their earth. I would become the lord
• 1:38:22
  Speaker 1: of all their dreams, and when they cross their children
• 1:38:25
  Speaker 1: with a smile before falling asleep, I would rise up
• 1:38:27
  Speaker 1: before them a black vision. Yes, I must go mad.
• 1:38:31
  Speaker 1: Only let it come quicker. Let it come quicker. Fragment
• 1:38:38
  Speaker 1: 11 Prisoners, a group of trembling, terrified men. When they
• 1:38:45
  Speaker 1: were let out of the train, the crowd gave a roar.
• 1:38:48
  Speaker 1: the roar of an enormous, savage dog whose chain is
• 1:38:50
  Speaker 1: too short and not strong enough. The crowd gave a
• 1:38:53
  Speaker 1: roar and was silent, breathing deeply while they advanced in
• 1:38:56
  Speaker 1: a compact group with their hands in their pockets, smiling
• 1:38:59
  Speaker 1: with their white lips as if currying favor, and stepping
• 1:39:03
  Speaker 1: out in such a manner as if somebody was just
• 1:39:05
  Speaker 1: going to strike them with a long stick under their
• 1:39:08
  Speaker 1: knees from behind. But one of them walked at a
• 1:39:11
  Speaker 1: short distance from the others, calm, serious, without a smile,
• 1:39:16
  Speaker 1: and when my eyes met his black ones I saw
• 1:39:18
  Speaker 1: a bare open hatred in them. I saw clearly that
• 1:39:21
  Speaker 1: he despised me and thought me capable of anything. If
• 1:39:25
  Speaker 1: I were to begin killing him, unarmed as he was,
• 1:39:29
  Speaker 1: he would not have cried out or tried to defend
• 1:39:32
  Speaker 1: or right himself. He considered me capable of anything. I
• 1:39:38
  Speaker 1: ran along together with the crowd to meet his gaze
• 1:39:41
  Speaker 1: once more, and only succeeded as they were entering the house.
• 1:39:45
  Speaker 1: He went in the last, letting his companions pass before him,
• 1:39:49
  Speaker 1: and glanced at me once more. And then I saw
• 1:39:53
  Speaker 1: such pain, such an abyss of horror and insanity in
• 1:39:57
  Speaker 1: his big black eyes, as if I had looked into
• 1:40:00
  Speaker 1: the most wretched soul on earth. Who is that with
• 1:40:04
  Speaker 1: the eyes? I asked of a soldier of the escort.
• 1:40:08
  Speaker 1: An officer, a madman. There are many such. What is
• 1:40:12
  Speaker 1: his name? He does not say. And his countrymen don't
• 1:40:16
  Speaker 1: know him. A stranger they picked up. He has been
• 1:40:19
  Speaker 1: saved from hanging himself once already. But what is there
• 1:40:22
  Speaker 1: to be done? And the soldier made a vague gesture
• 1:40:25
  Speaker 1: and disappeared in the door. And now this evening I
• 1:40:30
  Speaker 1: am thinking of him. He is alone amidst the enemy,
• 1:40:34
  Speaker 1: who in his opinion are capable of doing anything with him.
• 1:40:38
  Speaker 1: And his own people do not know him. He keeps
• 1:40:41
  Speaker 1: silence and waits patiently for the moment when he will
• 1:40:46
  Speaker 1: be able to go out of this world altogether. I
• 1:40:50
  Speaker 1: do not believe that he is mad, and he is
• 1:40:53
  Speaker 1: no coward. He was the only one who held himself
• 1:40:57
  Speaker 1: with dignity in that group of trembling, terrified men, whom
• 1:41:01
  Speaker 1: apparently he does not regard as his own people. What
• 1:41:05
  Speaker 1: is he really thinking about? What a depth of despair
• 1:41:08
  Speaker 1: must be in the soul of that man who, dying,
• 1:41:12
  Speaker 1: does not wish to name himself. Why give his name?
• 1:41:16
  Speaker 1: He is done with life and men. He has grasped
• 1:41:19
  Speaker 1: their real value and notices none around him, either his
• 1:41:23
  Speaker 1: own people or strangers, shout, rage, and threaten as they will.
• 1:41:29
  Speaker 1: I made inquiries about him. He was taken in the
• 1:41:32
  Speaker 1: last terrible battle, during which several tens of thousands of
• 1:41:35
  Speaker 1: men lost their lives, and he showed no resistance when
• 1:41:39
  Speaker 1: he was being taken prisoner. He was unarmed for some
• 1:41:43
  Speaker 1: reason or other, and When the soldier, not having noticed it,
• 1:41:46
  Speaker 1: struck him with his sword, he did not get up
• 1:41:49
  Speaker 1: or try to act in self-defense. But the wound, unhappily
• 1:41:54
  Speaker 1: for him, was a slight one. But maybe... he is
• 1:42:00
  Speaker 1: really mad? The soldier said there were many such. Fragment
• 1:42:07
  Speaker 1: 12 It is beginning... When I entered my brother's study
• 1:42:12
  Speaker 1: yesterday evening, he was sitting in his armchair at his
• 1:42:15
  Speaker 1: table heaped with books. The hallucination disappeared the moment I
• 1:42:19
  Speaker 1: lighted a candle, but for a long time I could
• 1:42:22
  Speaker 1: not bring myself to sit down in the armchair that
• 1:42:24
  Speaker 1: he had occupied. At first it was terrifying. The empty
• 1:42:28
  Speaker 1: rooms in which one was constantly hearing rustlings and crackings
• 1:42:33
  Speaker 1: were the cause of this dread. But afterwards I even
• 1:42:37
  Speaker 1: liked it. Better he than somebody else. Nevertheless, I did
• 1:42:43
  Speaker 1: not leave the armchair the whole evening. It seemed to
• 1:42:46
  Speaker 1: me that if I were to get up, he would
• 1:42:48
  Speaker 1: instantly sit down in my place. And I left the
• 1:42:52
  Speaker 1: room very quickly without looking round. The lamps ought to
• 1:42:56
  Speaker 1: have been lit in all the rooms, but was it worthwhile?
• 1:43:00
  Speaker 1: It would have been perhaps worse if I had seen
• 1:43:03
  Speaker 1: anything by lamplight. As it was, there was still room
• 1:43:06
  Speaker 1: for doubt. Today I entered with a candle. and there
• 1:43:10
  Speaker 1: was nobody in the armchair. Evidently it must have been
• 1:43:14
  Speaker 1: only a shadow. Again I went to the station. I
• 1:43:18
  Speaker 1: go there every morning now, and saw a whole carriage
• 1:43:21
  Speaker 1: full of our mad soldiers. It was not open, but
• 1:43:26
  Speaker 1: shunted onto another line, and I had time to see
• 1:43:29
  Speaker 1: several faces through the windows. They were terrible, especially one,
• 1:43:35
  Speaker 1: fearfully drawn, the color of a lemon, with an open
• 1:43:38
  Speaker 1: black mouth and fixed eyes, It was so like a
• 1:43:41
  Speaker 1: mask of horror that I could not tear my eyes
• 1:43:44
  Speaker 1: away from it, and it stared at me the whole
• 1:43:47
  Speaker 1: of it, and was motionless, and glided past together with
• 1:43:51
  Speaker 1: the moving carriage, just as motionless, without the slightest change,
• 1:43:57
  Speaker 1: never transferring its gaze for an instant. If it were
• 1:44:02
  Speaker 1: to appear before me this minute in that dark door,
• 1:44:05
  Speaker 1: I do not believe I should be able to hold out.
• 1:44:08
  Speaker 1: I made inquiries. There were twenty-two men. The infection is spreading.
• 1:44:14
  Speaker 1: The papers are hushing up something, and I believe there
• 1:44:17
  Speaker 1: is something wrong in our town, too. Black, closely shut
• 1:44:22
  Speaker 1: carriages have made their appearance. I counted six during one
• 1:44:25
  Speaker 1: day in different parts of the town. I suppose I
• 1:44:28
  Speaker 1: shall also go off in one of them one of
• 1:44:31
  Speaker 1: these days. And the papers clamor for fresh troops and
• 1:44:35
  Speaker 1: more blood every day. I am beginning to understand less
• 1:44:39
  Speaker 1: and less what it all means. Yesterday I read an
• 1:44:42
  Speaker 1: article full of suspicion, stating that there were many spies
• 1:44:45
  Speaker 1: and traitors amongst the people, warning us to be cautious
• 1:44:50
  Speaker 1: and mindful, and that the wrath of the people would
• 1:44:53
  Speaker 1: not fail to find out the guilty. What guilty? And
• 1:44:57
  Speaker 1: guilty of what? As I was returning from the station
• 1:45:01
  Speaker 1: in the tram, I heard a strange conversation, I suppose
• 1:45:05
  Speaker 1: in reference to the same article. They ought to be
• 1:45:09
  Speaker 1: all hung without any trial, said one, looking scrutinizingly at
• 1:45:13
  Speaker 1: me and all the passengers. Traitors ought to be hung, yes.
• 1:45:17
  Speaker 1: Without any mercy, confirmed the other. They've been shown mercy enough.
• 1:45:23
  Speaker 1: I jumped out of the tram. The war was making
• 1:45:26
  Speaker 1: everybody shed tears, and they were crying, too. Why? What
• 1:45:30
  Speaker 1: did it mean? A blood mist seemed to have enveloped
• 1:45:34
  Speaker 1: the earth, hiding it from our gaze. and I was
• 1:45:37
  Speaker 1: beginning to think that the moment of the universal catastrophe
• 1:45:40
  Speaker 1: was approaching. The red laugh that my brother saw. The
• 1:45:46
  Speaker 1: madness was coming from over there, from those bloody, burnt-out fields,
• 1:45:51
  Speaker 1: and I felt its cold breath in the air. I
• 1:45:54
  Speaker 1: am a strong man and have none of those illnesses
• 1:45:56
  Speaker 1: that corrupt the body, bringing in their train the corruption
• 1:46:01
  Speaker 1: of the brain also. But I see the infection catching me,
• 1:46:06
  Speaker 1: and half of my thoughts belong to me no longer.
• 1:46:10
  Speaker 1: It is worse than the plague and its horrors. One
• 1:46:13
  Speaker 1: can hide from the plague, take measures, but how can
• 1:46:16
  Speaker 1: one hide from all penetrating thought that knows neither distances
• 1:46:21
  Speaker 1: nor obstacles? In the daytime I can still fight against it,
• 1:46:26
  Speaker 1: but during the night I become, as everybody does, the
• 1:46:30
  Speaker 1: slave of my dreams. And my dreams are terrible, and
• 1:46:36
  Speaker 1: full of madness. End of section six. Section seven of
• 1:46:47
  Speaker 1: The Red Laugh by Leonid Andreev. This LibriVox recording is
• 1:46:52
  Speaker 1: in the public domain. Read by Ben Tucker. Part two,
• 1:46:58
  Speaker 1: fragments thirteen through fifteen. Universal mob fights, senseless and sanguinary.
• 1:47:06
  Speaker 1: The slightest provocation gives rise to the most savage club law, knives, stones,
• 1:47:12
  Speaker 1: logs of wood coming into action, and it is all
• 1:47:15
  Speaker 1: the same who is being killed. Red blood asks to
• 1:47:18
  Speaker 1: be let loose, and flows willingly and plentifully. There were
• 1:47:24
  Speaker 1: six of them, all peasants, and they were being led
• 1:47:27
  Speaker 1: by three soldiers with loaded guns, in their quaint peasant's dress,
• 1:47:32
  Speaker 1: simple and primitive like a savage's, with their quaint countenances.
• 1:47:36
  Speaker 1: that seemed as if made of clay and adorned with
• 1:47:38
  Speaker 1: felted wool instead of hair, in the streets of a
• 1:47:41
  Speaker 1: rich town, under the escort of disciplined soldiers. They resembled
• 1:47:46
  Speaker 1: slaves of the antique world. They were being led off
• 1:47:50
  Speaker 1: to the war, and they moved along in obedience to
• 1:47:53
  Speaker 1: the bayonets as innocent and dull as cattle led to
• 1:47:56
  Speaker 1: the slaughterhouse. In front walked a youth, tall, beardless, with
• 1:48:03
  Speaker 1: a long gooseneck at the end of which was a
• 1:48:05
  Speaker 1: motionless little head His whole body was bent forward like
• 1:48:09
  Speaker 1: a switch, and he stared at the ground under his
• 1:48:12
  Speaker 1: feet so fixedly as if his gaze penetrated into the
• 1:48:15
  Speaker 1: very depths of the earth. The last in the group
• 1:48:18
  Speaker 1: was a man of small stature. bearded and middle-aged. He
• 1:48:23
  Speaker 1: had no desire of resistance, and there was no thought
• 1:48:26
  Speaker 1: in his eyes. But the earth attracted his feet, gripped
• 1:48:30
  Speaker 1: them tightly, not letting them loose, and he advanced with
• 1:48:34
  Speaker 1: his body thrown back as if struggling against a strong wind.
• 1:48:38
  Speaker 1: and at each step the soldier gave him a push
• 1:48:40
  Speaker 1: with the butt-end of his rifle, and one leg, tearing
• 1:48:44
  Speaker 1: itself from the earth, convulsively thrust itself forward, while the
• 1:48:48
  Speaker 1: other still stuck tightly. The faces of the soldiers were
• 1:48:52
  Speaker 1: wary and angry. Inevitably they had been marching so for
• 1:48:56
  Speaker 1: a long time. One felt they were tired and indifferent
• 1:49:00
  Speaker 1: as to how they carried their guns and how they marched,
• 1:49:04
  Speaker 1: keeping no step with their feet turned in like weary countrymen,
• 1:49:09
  Speaker 1: The senseless, lingering, and silent resistance of the peasants seemed
• 1:49:12
  Speaker 1: to have dimmed their disciplined brains, and they had ceased
• 1:49:16
  Speaker 1: to understand where they were going and what their goal was.'
• 1:49:20
  Speaker 1: Where are you leading them to?' I asked one of
• 1:49:24
  Speaker 1: the soldiers. He started, glanced at me, and in the
• 1:49:29
  Speaker 1: keen flash of his eyes I felt the bayonet as
• 1:49:31
  Speaker 1: distinctly as if it were already at my breast.' Go away,'
• 1:49:36
  Speaker 1: said the soldier.' Go away, or else!' The middle-aged man
• 1:49:40
  Speaker 1: took advantage of the moment and ran away. He ran
• 1:49:44
  Speaker 1: with a light trot up to the iron railings of
• 1:49:46
  Speaker 1: the boulevard and sat down on his heels as if
• 1:49:49
  Speaker 1: he were hiding. No animal would have acted so stupidly,
• 1:49:53
  Speaker 1: so senselessly. But the soldier became savage. I saw him
• 1:49:58
  Speaker 1: go close up to him, stoop down and, thrusting his
• 1:50:01
  Speaker 1: gun into the left hand, strike something soft and flat
• 1:50:04
  Speaker 1: with the right one. And then again, a crowd was gathering.
• 1:50:08
  Speaker 1: Laughter and shouts were heard. Fragment 14 In the eleventh
• 1:50:15
  Speaker 1: row of stalls, somebody's arms were pressing closely against me
• 1:50:19
  Speaker 1: on my right and left-hand side, while far around me
• 1:50:22
  Speaker 1: in the semi-darkness stuck out motionless heads tinged with red
• 1:50:26
  Speaker 1: from the lights upon the stage. And gradually the mass
• 1:50:30
  Speaker 1: of people, confined in that narrow place, filled me with horror.
• 1:50:34
  Speaker 1: Everybody was silent, listening to what was being said on
• 1:50:38
  Speaker 1: the stage or perhaps thinking out his own thoughts. But
• 1:50:42
  Speaker 1: as they were many, they were more audible for all
• 1:50:45
  Speaker 1: their silence than the loud voices of the actors. They
• 1:50:50
  Speaker 1: were coughing, blowing their noses, making a noise with their
• 1:50:53
  Speaker 1: feet and clothes, and I could distinctly hear their deep,
• 1:50:57
  Speaker 1: uneven breathing that was heating the air. They were terrible,
• 1:51:01
  Speaker 1: for each of them could become a corpse, and they
• 1:51:04
  Speaker 1: all had senseless brains. In the calmness of those well-brushed heads,
• 1:51:10
  Speaker 1: resting upon white, stiff collars, I felt a hurricane of
• 1:51:13
  Speaker 1: madness ready to burst every second. My hands grew cold
• 1:51:18
  Speaker 1: as I thought how many and how terrible they were,
• 1:51:20
  Speaker 1: and how far away I was from the entrance. They
• 1:51:24
  Speaker 1: were calm, but what if I were to cry out, Fire!
• 1:51:27
  Speaker 1: And full of terror I experienced a painfully passionate desire,
• 1:51:31
  Speaker 1: of which I cannot think without my hands growing cold
• 1:51:34
  Speaker 1: and moist. Who could hinder me from crying out? Yes,
• 1:51:39
  Speaker 1: standing up, turning round and crying out, Fire! Save yourselves! Fire!
• 1:51:45
  Speaker 1: A convulsive wave of madness would overwhelm their still limbs.
• 1:51:49
  Speaker 1: They would jump up, yelling and howling like animals. They
• 1:51:53
  Speaker 1: would forget that they had wives, sisters, mothers, and would
• 1:51:57
  Speaker 1: begin casting themselves about like men stricken with sudden blindness,
• 1:52:01
  Speaker 1: in their madness throttling each other with their white fingers
• 1:52:04
  Speaker 1: fragrant with scent. The lights would be turned on, and
• 1:52:08
  Speaker 1: somebody with an ashen face would appear upon the stage,
• 1:52:12
  Speaker 1: shouting that all was in order and that there was
• 1:52:14
  Speaker 1: no fire, and the music, trembling and halting, would begin
• 1:52:18
  Speaker 1: playing something wildly merry. But they would be deaf to everything.
• 1:52:22
  Speaker 1: They would be throttling, tramping, and beating the heads of
• 1:52:25
  Speaker 1: the women, demolishing their ingenious, cunning headdresses. They would tear
• 1:52:32
  Speaker 1: at each other's ears, bite off each other's noses, and
• 1:52:36
  Speaker 1: tear the very clothes off each other's bodies, feeling no shame,
• 1:52:40
  Speaker 1: for they would be mad. Their sensitive, delicate, beautiful, adorable
• 1:52:45
  Speaker 1: women would scream and writhe helplessly at their feet, clasping
• 1:52:50
  Speaker 1: their knees, still believing in their generosity, while they would
• 1:52:55
  Speaker 1: beat them viciously upon their beautiful, upturned faces, trying to
• 1:52:59
  Speaker 1: force their way towards the entrance. For men are always murderers,
• 1:53:04
  Speaker 1: and their calmness and generosity is the calmness of a
• 1:53:07
  Speaker 1: well-fed animal that knows itself out of danger. And when
• 1:53:13
  Speaker 1: having made corpses of half their number, they would gather
• 1:53:16
  Speaker 1: at the entrance in a trembling, tattered group of shame-faced
• 1:53:19
  Speaker 1: animals with a false smile upon their lips. I would
• 1:53:24
  Speaker 1: go on the stage and say with a laugh, It
• 1:53:27
  Speaker 1: has all happened because you killed my brother. Yes, I
• 1:53:32
  Speaker 1: would say with a laugh, It has all happened because
• 1:53:35
  Speaker 1: you killed my brother. I must have whispered something aloud
• 1:53:39
  Speaker 1: for my neighbor on the right-hand side moved angrily in
• 1:53:42
  Speaker 1: his chair and said, Hush, you are interrupting. I felt
• 1:53:46
  Speaker 1: merry and wanted to play a joke. Assuming a warning
• 1:53:49
  Speaker 1: severe expression, I stooped towards him. What is it? he
• 1:53:54
  Speaker 1: asked suspiciously. Why do you look at me so? Hush,
• 1:53:59
  Speaker 1: I implore you, whispered I with my lips. Do you
• 1:54:03
  Speaker 1: not perceive a smell of burning? There is a fire
• 1:54:07
  Speaker 1: in the theater. He had enough power of will and
• 1:54:13
  Speaker 1: good sense not to cry out. His face grew pale,
• 1:54:16
  Speaker 1: his eyes starting out of their sockets and almost protruding
• 1:54:19
  Speaker 1: over his cheeks, enormous as bladders. But he did not
• 1:54:23
  Speaker 1: cry out. He rose quietly and, without even thanking me,
• 1:54:27
  Speaker 1: walked totteringly towards the entrance, convulsively keeping back his steps.
• 1:54:32
  Speaker 1: He was afraid of the others guessing about the fire
• 1:54:35
  Speaker 1: and preventing him getting away. Him, the only one worthy
• 1:54:39
  Speaker 1: of being saved. I felt disgusted and left the theater also. Besides,
• 1:54:45
  Speaker 1: I did not want to make known my incognito too soon.
• 1:54:49
  Speaker 1: In the street, I looked towards that part of the
• 1:54:51
  Speaker 1: sky where the war was raging. Everything was calm, and
• 1:54:56
  Speaker 1: the night clouds, yellow from the lights of the town,
• 1:54:58
  Speaker 1: were slowly and calmly drifting past. Perhaps it is only
• 1:55:03
  Speaker 1: a dream, and there is no war, thought I, deceived
• 1:55:07
  Speaker 1: by the stillness of the sky and town. But a
• 1:55:10
  Speaker 1: boy sprang out from behind a corner, crying joyously. A
• 1:55:14
  Speaker 1: terrible battle! Enormous losses! By-listed telegrams! Night telegrams! I read
• 1:55:20
  Speaker 1: it by the light of the street lamp. Four thousand dead.
• 1:55:24
  Speaker 1: In the theater, I should say, there were not more
• 1:55:27
  Speaker 1: than one thousand. And the whole way home, I kept repeating,
• 1:55:31
  Speaker 1: four thousand dead. Now I'm afraid of returning to my
• 1:55:35
  Speaker 1: empty house. When I put my key into the lock
• 1:55:38
  Speaker 1: and look at the dumb, flat door, I can feel
• 1:55:41
  Speaker 1: all its dark, empty rooms behind it, which, however, the
• 1:55:45
  Speaker 1: next minute a man in a hat would pass through
• 1:55:48
  Speaker 1: looking furtively around him. I know the way well. But
• 1:55:53
  Speaker 1: on the stairs I begin lighting match after match until
• 1:55:57
  Speaker 1: I find a candle. I never enter my brother's study,
• 1:56:01
  Speaker 1: and it is locked with all that it contains. and
• 1:56:04
  Speaker 1: I sleep in the dining room, whether I have shifted altogether.
• 1:56:08
  Speaker 1: There I feel calmer, for the air seems to have
• 1:56:11
  Speaker 1: still retained the traces of talking and laughter and the
• 1:56:14
  Speaker 1: merry clang of dishes. Sometimes I distinctly hear the scraping
• 1:56:18
  Speaker 1: of a dry pen, and when I lay down on
• 1:56:22
  Speaker 1: my bed... Fragment 15 That absurd and terrible dream. It
• 1:56:30
  Speaker 1: seemed as if the skull had been taken off my
• 1:56:32
  Speaker 1: brain and Bared and unprotected, it submissively and greedily imbibed
• 1:56:36
  Speaker 1: all the horrors of those bloody and senseless days. I
• 1:56:40
  Speaker 1: was lying curled up, occupying only five feet of space,
• 1:56:44
  Speaker 1: while my thoughts embraced the whole world. I saw with
• 1:56:48
  Speaker 1: the eyes of all mankind and listened with its ears.
• 1:56:52
  Speaker 1: I died with the killed, sorrowed and wept with all
• 1:56:55
  Speaker 1: that were wounded and left behind. And when blood flowed
• 1:57:00
  Speaker 1: out of anybody's body, I felt the pain of the
• 1:57:03
  Speaker 1: wound and suffered. Even all that had not happened and
• 1:57:07
  Speaker 1: was far away. I saw as clearly as if it
• 1:57:09
  Speaker 1: had happened and was close by, and there was no
• 1:57:12
  Speaker 1: end to the sufferings of my bared brain. Those children,
• 1:57:17
  Speaker 1: those innocent little children, I saw them in the street
• 1:57:21
  Speaker 1: playing at war and chasing each other, and one of
• 1:57:24
  Speaker 1: them was already crying in a high-pitched, childish voice, and
• 1:57:28
  Speaker 1: something shrank within me from horror and disgust. And I
• 1:57:33
  Speaker 1: went home, Night came on, and in fiery dreams resembling
• 1:57:37
  Speaker 1: midnight conflagrations, those innocent little children changed into a band
• 1:57:42
  Speaker 1: of child murderers. Something was ominously burning in a broad
• 1:57:48
  Speaker 1: red glare, and in the smoke there swarmed monstrous, misshapen
• 1:57:53
  Speaker 1: children with heads of grown-up murderers. They were jumping, lightly
• 1:57:58
  Speaker 1: and nimbly, like young goats at play and were breathing
• 1:58:01
  Speaker 1: with difficulty like sick people. Their mouths, resembling the jaws
• 1:58:06
  Speaker 1: of toads or frogs, opened widely and convulsed. Behind the
• 1:58:11
  Speaker 1: transparent skin of their naked bodies, the red blood was
• 1:58:14
  Speaker 1: coursing angrily. And they were killing each other at play.
• 1:58:19
  Speaker 1: They were the most terrible of all that I had seen,
• 1:58:21
  Speaker 1: for they were little and could penetrate everywhere. I was
• 1:58:26
  Speaker 1: looking out of the window, and one of the little
• 1:58:27
  Speaker 1: ones noticed me, smiled, and with his eyes asked me
• 1:58:31
  Speaker 1: to let him in. I want to go to you,
• 1:58:34
  Speaker 1: he said. You will kill me. I want to go
• 1:58:40
  Speaker 1: to you, he said, growing suddenly pale, and began scrambling
• 1:58:44
  Speaker 1: up the white wall like a rat, just like a
• 1:58:47
  Speaker 1: hungry rat. He kept losing his footing, and squealed and
• 1:58:52
  Speaker 1: darted about the wall with such rapidity that I could
• 1:58:54
  Speaker 1: not follow his impetuous sudden movements. He can crawl in
• 1:58:58
  Speaker 1: under the door, said I to myself with horror. And
• 1:59:02
  Speaker 1: as if he had guessed my thought, he grew thin
• 1:59:04
  Speaker 1: and long, and waving the end of his tail rapidly,
• 1:59:07
  Speaker 1: he crawled into the dark crack under the front door.
• 1:59:11
  Speaker 1: But I had time to hide myself under the blanket,
• 1:59:14
  Speaker 1: and heard him searching for me in the dark rooms,
• 1:59:17
  Speaker 1: cautiously stepping along with his tiny bare feet. He approached
• 1:59:22
  Speaker 1: my room very slowly, stopping now and then, and at
• 1:59:26
  Speaker 1: last entered it. but I did not hear any sound,
• 1:59:30
  Speaker 1: either rustle or movement for a long time, as if
• 1:59:34
  Speaker 1: there was nobody near my bed. And then somebody's little
• 1:59:37
  Speaker 1: hand began lifting up the edge of the coverlet, and
• 1:59:41
  Speaker 1: I could feel the cold air of the room upon
• 1:59:43
  Speaker 1: my face and chest. I held the blanket tightly, but
• 1:59:47
  Speaker 1: it persisted in lifting itself up on all sides, and
• 1:59:51
  Speaker 1: all of a sudden my feet became so cold, as
• 1:59:55
  Speaker 1: if I had dipped them into water. Now they were
• 1:59:58
  Speaker 1: lying unprotected in the chill darkness of the room, and
• 2:00:03
  Speaker 1: he was looking at them. In the yard behind the house,
• 2:00:07
  Speaker 1: a dog barked and was silent, and I heard the
• 2:00:10
  Speaker 1: trail of its chain as it went into its kennel,
• 2:00:13
  Speaker 1: but he still watched my naked feet and kept silence.
• 2:00:17
  Speaker 1: I knew he was there, by the unendurable horror that
• 2:00:20
  Speaker 1: was binding me like death with a stony, sepulchral immobility.
• 2:00:25
  Speaker 1: If I could have cried out, I would have awakened
• 2:00:27
  Speaker 1: the whole town, the whole world. But my voice was
• 2:00:32
  Speaker 1: dead within me, and I lay submissive and motionless, feeling
• 2:00:37
  Speaker 1: the little cold hands moving over my body and nearing
• 2:00:40
  Speaker 1: my throat. I cannot! I groaned, gasping, and waking up
• 2:00:47
  Speaker 1: for an instant, I saw the vigilant darkness of the night,
• 2:00:51
  Speaker 1: mysterious and living. And again, I believe I fell asleep
• 2:00:56
  Speaker 1: Don't fear, said my brother, sitting down upon my bed.
• 2:01:00
  Speaker 1: And the bed creaked, so heavy he was dead. Never fear.
• 2:01:05
  Speaker 1: You see, it is a dream. You only imagine that
• 2:01:07
  Speaker 1: you are being strangled while in reality you are asleep
• 2:01:10
  Speaker 1: in the dark rooms, where there is not a soul
• 2:01:12
  Speaker 1: and I am in my study writing. Nobody understood what
• 2:01:16
  Speaker 1: I wrote about, and you derided me as one insane.
• 2:01:19
  Speaker 1: But now I will tell you the truth. I am
• 2:01:22
  Speaker 1: writing about the red laugh. Do you see it? Something enormous, red,
• 2:01:29
  Speaker 1: and bloody was standing before me, laughing a toothless laugh.
• 2:01:34
  Speaker 1: That is the red laugh. When the earth goes mad,
• 2:01:37
  Speaker 1: it begins to laugh like that. You know, the earth
• 2:01:41
  Speaker 1: has gone mad. There are no more flowers or songs
• 2:01:45
  Speaker 1: on it. It has become round, smooth, and red like
• 2:01:48
  Speaker 1: a scalped head. Do you see it? Yes, I see it.
• 2:01:53
  Speaker 1: It is laughing. Look what its brain is like. It
• 2:01:57
  Speaker 1: is red like bloody porridge and is muddled. It is
• 2:02:01
  Speaker 1: crying out. It is in pain. It has no flowers
• 2:02:06
  Speaker 1: or songs. And now, let me lie down upon you.
• 2:02:11
  Speaker 1: You are heavy and I am afraid. We the dead
• 2:02:16
  Speaker 1: lie down on the living. Do you feel warm? Yes.
• 2:02:23
  Speaker 1: Are you comfortable? I am dying. Awake and cry out.
• 2:02:29
  Speaker 1: Awake and cry out. I am going away. End of
• 2:02:34
  Speaker 1: section seven. Section eight of The Red Laugh by Leonid Andreev.
• 2:02:47
  Speaker 1: This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Read by
• 2:02:51
  Speaker 1: Ben Tucker. Part two, fragments sixteen through eighteen. Fragment 16
• 2:03:01
  Speaker 1: Today is the eighth day of the battle. It began
• 2:03:05
  Speaker 1: last Friday, and Saturday, Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday
• 2:03:09
  Speaker 1: have passed. And Friday has come again and is gone.
• 2:03:14
  Speaker 1: And it is still going on, both armies. Hundreds of
• 2:03:17
  Speaker 1: thousands of men are standing in front of each other,
• 2:03:20
  Speaker 1: never flinching, sending explosive, crashing projectiles without stopping. In every instant,
• 2:03:27
  Speaker 1: living men are turning into corpses. The roar and incessant
• 2:03:31
  Speaker 1: vibration of the air has made the very sky shudder
• 2:03:34
  Speaker 1: and gather black thunderclouds above their heads, while they continue
• 2:03:38
  Speaker 1: to stand in front of each other, never flinching and
• 2:03:41
  Speaker 1: still killing each other. If a man does not sleep
• 2:03:45
  Speaker 1: for three nights, he becomes ill and loses his memory.
• 2:03:50
  Speaker 1: But they have not slept for a whole week and
• 2:03:51
  Speaker 1: are all mad. That is why they feel no pain,
• 2:03:54
  Speaker 1: do not retreat and go on fighting until they have
• 2:03:57
  Speaker 1: killed all to the last man. They say that some
• 2:04:00
  Speaker 1: of the detachments came to the end of their ammunition,
• 2:04:02
  Speaker 1: but still they fought on using their fists and stones
• 2:04:05
  Speaker 1: and biting at each other like dogs. If the remnants
• 2:04:09
  Speaker 1: of those regiments return home, they will have canine teeth
• 2:04:12
  Speaker 1: like wolves. But they will not return. They have gone
• 2:04:16
  Speaker 1: mad and die, every man of them. They have gone mad.
• 2:04:21
  Speaker 1: Everything is muddled in their heads and they cease to
• 2:04:24
  Speaker 1: understand anything. If they were to be turned round suddenly
• 2:04:28
  Speaker 1: and sharply, they would began firing at their own men,
• 2:04:31
  Speaker 1: thinking that they were firing at the enemy. Strange rumors,
• 2:04:36
  Speaker 1: strange rumors that are told in a whisper, those repeating
• 2:04:39
  Speaker 1: them turning white from horror and dreadful forebodings. Brother, brother,
• 2:04:44
  Speaker 1: listen what is being told of the Red Laugh. They
• 2:04:47
  Speaker 1: say phantom regiments have appeared, large bands of shadows, the
• 2:04:51
  Speaker 1: exact copy of living men. At night, when the men
• 2:04:55
  Speaker 1: forget themselves for an instant in sleep, or in the
• 2:04:58
  Speaker 1: thick of the day's fight, when the bright day itself
• 2:05:00
  Speaker 1: seems a phantom. They suddenly appear, firing out of phantom guns,
• 2:05:05
  Speaker 1: filling the air with phantom noises. And men, living but
• 2:05:10
  Speaker 1: insane men, astounded by the suddenness of the attack, fight
• 2:05:13
  Speaker 1: to the death against the phantom enemy. Go mad from horror,
• 2:05:18
  Speaker 1: become grey in an instant, and die. The phantoms disappear
• 2:05:22
  Speaker 1: as suddenly as they appear, and all become still. while
• 2:05:26
  Speaker 1: the earth is strewn with fresh, mutilated bodies. Who killed them?
• 2:05:32
  Speaker 1: You know, brother, who killed them. When there is a
• 2:05:35
  Speaker 1: lull between two battles and the enemy is far off,
• 2:05:39
  Speaker 1: suddenly in the darkness of the night there resounds a solitary,
• 2:05:42
  Speaker 1: frightened shot, and all jump up and begin firing into
• 2:05:46
  Speaker 1: the darkness, into the silent, dumb darkness, for a long time,
• 2:05:51
  Speaker 1: for whole hours. Whom do they see there? WHOSE TERRIBLE
• 2:05:56
  Speaker 1: SILENT SHAPE FULL OF HORROR AND MADNESS APPEARS BEFORE THEM.
• 2:06:01
  Speaker 1: YOU KNOW, BROTHER, AND I KNOW, BUT MEN DO NOT
• 2:06:04
  Speaker 1: KNOW YET. BUT THEY HAVE A FOREBODING AND ASK, TURNING PALE,
• 2:06:09
  Speaker 1: WHY ARE THERE SO MANY MADMEN? BEFORE THERE NEVER USED
• 2:06:13
  Speaker 1: TO BE SO MANY. BEFORE THERE NEVER USED TO BE
• 2:06:17
  Speaker 1: SO MANY MADMEN, THEY SAY, TURNING PALE, TRYING TO BELIEVE
• 2:06:22
  Speaker 1: THAT NOW IT IS AS BEFORE. and that the universal
• 2:06:26
  Speaker 1: violence done to the brains of humanity would have no
• 2:06:28
  Speaker 1: effect upon their weak little intellects. Why, men fought before
• 2:06:34
  Speaker 1: and always have fought, and nothing of the sort happened.
• 2:06:37
  Speaker 1: Strife is a law of nature, they say with conviction
• 2:06:40
  Speaker 1: and calmness, growing pale nevertheless, seeking for the doctor with
• 2:06:44
  Speaker 1: their eyes and calling out hurriedly, Water! Quick, a glass
• 2:06:47
  Speaker 1: of water! They would willingly become idiots, those people. only
• 2:06:52
  Speaker 1: not to feel their intellect reeling and their reason succumbing
• 2:06:55
  Speaker 1: in the hopeless combat with insanity. In those days when
• 2:06:59
  Speaker 1: men over there were constantly being turned into corpses, I
• 2:07:03
  Speaker 1: could find no peace and sought the society of my
• 2:07:05
  Speaker 1: fellow men. And I heard many conversations and saw many
• 2:07:10
  Speaker 1: false smiling faces that asserted that the war was far
• 2:07:14
  Speaker 1: off and in no way concerned with them. But much
• 2:07:17
  Speaker 1: oftener I met naked, frank horror, hopeless, bitter tears, and
• 2:07:22
  Speaker 1: frenzy cries of despair, when the great mind itself cried
• 2:07:25
  Speaker 1: out of man its last prayer, its last curse, with
• 2:07:29
  Speaker 1: all the intensity of its power. Whatever will this senseless
• 2:07:33
  Speaker 1: carnage end? At some friends, whom I had not seen
• 2:07:37
  Speaker 1: for a long time, perhaps several years, I unexpectedly met
• 2:07:41
  Speaker 1: a mad officer, invalided from the war. He was a
• 2:07:46
  Speaker 1: schoolfellow of mine, but I did not recognize him. If
• 2:07:50
  Speaker 1: he had lain for a year in his grave, he
• 2:07:52
  Speaker 1: would have returned more like himself than he was then.
• 2:07:54
  Speaker 1: His hair was grey and his face quite white. His
• 2:07:59
  Speaker 1: features were but little changed. But he was always silent
• 2:08:03
  Speaker 1: and seemed to be listening to something. And this stamped
• 2:08:07
  Speaker 1: upon his face a look of such formidable remoteness, such
• 2:08:11
  Speaker 1: indifference to all around him, that it was fearful to
• 2:08:14
  Speaker 1: talk to him. His relatives were told he went mad
• 2:08:17
  Speaker 1: in the following circumstances. They were in the reserve while
• 2:08:21
  Speaker 1: the neighboring regiment was ordered to make a bayonet charge.
• 2:08:25
  Speaker 1: The men rushed, shouting hurrah so loudly as almost to
• 2:08:28
  Speaker 1: drown the noise of the cannon. And suddenly the guns
• 2:08:32
  Speaker 1: ceased firing, the hurrah ceased also, and a sepulchral stillness ensued.
• 2:08:38
  Speaker 1: They had run up to the enemy and were charging
• 2:08:41
  Speaker 1: him with their bayonets. And his reason succumbed to that stillness.
• 2:08:47
  Speaker 1: Now he is calm and people make a noise around him,
• 2:08:49
  Speaker 1: talk and shout. He listens and waits. But if only
• 2:08:53
  Speaker 1: there is a moment's silence, he catches hold of his head,
• 2:08:56
  Speaker 1: rushes up to the wall or against the furniture, and
• 2:08:58
  Speaker 1: falls down in a fit resembling epilepsy. He has many relations,
• 2:09:03
  Speaker 1: and they take turns and surround him with sound. But
• 2:09:07
  Speaker 1: there remain the nights, long, solitary nights. But here his father,
• 2:09:13
  Speaker 1: a gray-haired old man, slightly wandering in his mind too, helped.
• 2:09:17
  Speaker 1: He hung the walls of his son's room with loudly
• 2:09:19
  Speaker 1: ticking clocks that constantly struck the hour at different times,
• 2:09:24
  Speaker 1: and at present he is arranging a wheel resembling an
• 2:09:26
  Speaker 1: incessantly going rattle. None of them lose hope that he
• 2:09:30
  Speaker 1: will recover, as he is only twenty-seven, and their house
• 2:09:34
  Speaker 1: is even gay. He is dressed very cleanly, not in
• 2:09:37
  Speaker 1: his uniform. Great care is taken of his appearance, and
• 2:09:40
  Speaker 1: he is even handsome with his white hair. young, thoughtful face,
• 2:09:45
  Speaker 1: and well-bred, slow, tired movements. When I was told all,
• 2:09:50
  Speaker 1: I went up and kissed his hand, his white, languid hand,
• 2:09:54
  Speaker 1: which will never more be lifted for a blow, and
• 2:09:57
  Speaker 1: this did not seem to surprise anybody very much. Only
• 2:10:00
  Speaker 1: his young sister smiled at me with her eyes, and
• 2:10:03
  Speaker 1: afterward showed me such attention that it seemed as if
• 2:10:06
  Speaker 1: I were her betrothed, and she loved me more than
• 2:10:08
  Speaker 1: anybody in the world. She showed me such attention that
• 2:10:12
  Speaker 1: I very nearly told her about my dark, empty rooms
• 2:10:15
  Speaker 1: in which I am worse than alone. Miserable heart that
• 2:10:18
  Speaker 1: never loses hope. And she managed that we remain alone.
• 2:10:23
  Speaker 1: How pale you are, and what dark rings you have
• 2:10:26
  Speaker 1: under your eyes, she said kindly. Are you ill? Are
• 2:10:31
  Speaker 1: you grieving for your brother? I am grieving for everybody,
• 2:10:36
  Speaker 1: and I do not feel well. I know why you
• 2:10:39
  Speaker 1: kissed my brother's hand. They did not understand. Because he
• 2:10:44
  Speaker 1: is mad, yes? Yes, because he is mad. She grew
• 2:10:51
  Speaker 1: thoughtful and looked very much like her brother, only younger.
• 2:10:55
  Speaker 1: And will you? She stopped and blushed, but did not
• 2:10:58
  Speaker 1: lower her eyes. Will you let me kiss your hand?
• 2:11:03
  Speaker 1: I kneeled before her and said, Bless me. She paled slightly.
• 2:11:08
  Speaker 1: drew back and whispered with her lips, I do not believe.
• 2:11:14
  Speaker 1: And I also. For an instant her hand touched my head,
• 2:11:20
  Speaker 1: and the instant was gone. Do you know, she said,
• 2:11:24
  Speaker 1: I am leaving for the war. Go, but you will
• 2:11:28
  Speaker 1: not be able to bear it. I do not know,
• 2:11:32
  Speaker 1: but they need help, the same as you or my brother.
• 2:11:36
  Speaker 1: It is not their fault. Will you remember me? Yes,
• 2:11:39
  Speaker 1: and you? And I will remember you, too. Goodbye. Goodbye forever.
• 2:11:48
  Speaker 1: And I grew calm and felt happier, as if I
• 2:11:51
  Speaker 1: had passed through the most terrible that there is in
• 2:11:53
  Speaker 1: death and madness. And yesterday, for the first time, I
• 2:11:57
  Speaker 1: entered my house calmly, without any fear, and opened my
• 2:12:01
  Speaker 1: brother's study and sat for a long time at his table.
• 2:12:05
  Speaker 1: And when in the night I suddenly awoke as if
• 2:12:07
  Speaker 1: from a push, and heard the scraping of the dry
• 2:12:10
  Speaker 1: pen upon the paper, I was not frightened, but thought
• 2:12:14
  Speaker 1: to myself almost with a smile, Work on, brother, work on.
• 2:12:19
  Speaker 1: Your pen is not dry, it is steeped in living
• 2:12:21
  Speaker 1: human blood. Let your paper seem empty. In its ominous
• 2:12:25
  Speaker 1: emptiness it is more eloquent of war and reason than
• 2:12:28
  Speaker 1: all that is written by the most clever men. Work on, brother,
• 2:12:32
  Speaker 1: work on. And this morning I read that the battle
• 2:12:36
  Speaker 1: is still raging. And again I was possessed with a
• 2:12:40
  Speaker 1: dread fear and a feeling of something falling upon my brain.
• 2:12:45
  Speaker 1: It is coming. It is near. It is already standing
• 2:12:50
  Speaker 1: upon the threshold of these empty, light rooms. Remember. Remember me,
• 2:12:57
  Speaker 1: dear girl. I am going mad. Thirty thousand dead. 30,000 dead.
• 2:13:08
  Speaker 1: Fragment 17. A fight is going on in the town.
• 2:13:13
  Speaker 1: There are dark and fearful rumors. Fragment 18. This morning,
• 2:13:20
  Speaker 1: looking through the endless list of killed in the newspaper,
• 2:13:24
  Speaker 1: I saw a familiar name. My sister's affianced husband. An
• 2:13:29
  Speaker 1: officer called for military service at the same time as
• 2:13:32
  Speaker 1: my dead brother was killed. and an hour later, the
• 2:13:37
  Speaker 1: postman handed me a letter addressed to my brother, and
• 2:13:40
  Speaker 1: I recognized the handwriting of the deceased on the envelope.
• 2:13:44
  Speaker 1: The dead was writing to the dead. But still it
• 2:13:48
  Speaker 1: was better so than the dead writing to the living.
• 2:13:52
  Speaker 1: A mother was pointed out to me who kept receiving
• 2:13:55
  Speaker 1: letters from her son for a whole month after she
• 2:13:57
  Speaker 1: had read of his terrible death in the papers. He
• 2:14:00
  Speaker 1: had been torn to pieces by a shell. He was
• 2:14:04
  Speaker 1: a fond son, and each letter was full of endearing
• 2:14:07
  Speaker 1: and encouraging words and youthful, naive hopes of happiness. He
• 2:14:12
  Speaker 1: was dead, but wrote of life with a fearful accuracy
• 2:14:16
  Speaker 1: every day, and the mother ceased to believe in his death.
• 2:14:20
  Speaker 1: And when a day passed without any letter, then a
• 2:14:23
  Speaker 1: second and a third, and the endless silence of death ensued,
• 2:14:27
  Speaker 1: she took a large, old-fashioned revolver belonging to her son
• 2:14:30
  Speaker 1: in both hands and shot herself in the breast. I
• 2:14:35
  Speaker 1: believe she survived, but I am not sure. I never heard.
• 2:14:41
  Speaker 1: I look at the envelope for a long time and thought.
• 2:14:44
  Speaker 1: He held it in his hands. He bought it somewhere.
• 2:14:48
  Speaker 1: He gave the money to pay for it. And a
• 2:14:51
  Speaker 1: servant went to fetch it from some shop. He sealed,
• 2:14:55
  Speaker 1: and perhaps posted it himself. Then the wheel of the
• 2:14:58
  Speaker 1: complex machine called Post came into action, and the letter
• 2:15:02
  Speaker 1: glided past forests, fields, and towns everywhere. passing from hand
• 2:15:06
  Speaker 1: to hand but rushing infallibly towards its destination. He put
• 2:15:11
  Speaker 1: on his boots that morning, while it went gliding on.
• 2:15:15
  Speaker 1: He was killed, but it glided on. He was thrown
• 2:15:18
  Speaker 1: into a pit and covered up with dead bodies and earth,
• 2:15:21
  Speaker 1: while it still glided on past forests, fields, and towns,
• 2:15:27
  Speaker 1: a living phantom in a gray stamped envelope. And now
• 2:15:31
  Speaker 1: I was holding it in my hands. Here are the
• 2:15:34
  Speaker 1: contents of the letter. It was written with a pencil
• 2:15:37
  Speaker 1: on scraps of paper and was not finished. Something interfered.
• 2:15:43
  Speaker 1: Only now do I understand the great joy of war.
• 2:15:46
  Speaker 1: The ancient primitive delight of killing man. Clever, scheming, artful man.
• 2:15:52
  Speaker 1: Immeasurably more interesting than the most ravenous animal. To be
• 2:15:56
  Speaker 1: ever taking life is as good as playing at lawn
• 2:15:59
  Speaker 1: tennis with planets and stars. Poor friend, what a pity
• 2:16:03
  Speaker 1: you are not with us. but are constrained to wary
• 2:16:06
  Speaker 1: away your time amidst an unleavened daily existence? In an
• 2:16:10
  Speaker 1: atmosphere of death, you would have found all that your
• 2:16:13
  Speaker 1: restless noble heart yearned for. A bloody feast! What truth
• 2:16:17
  Speaker 1: there is in this somewhat hackneyed comparison? We go about
• 2:16:21
  Speaker 1: up to our knees in blood, and this red wine,
• 2:16:24
  Speaker 1: as my jolly men call it in jest, makes our
• 2:16:26
  Speaker 1: heads swim. To drink the blood of one's enemy is
• 2:16:30
  Speaker 1: not at all such a stupid custom as we think.
• 2:16:32
  Speaker 1: They knew what they were doing. The crows are cawing.
• 2:16:36
  Speaker 1: Do you hear? The crows are cawing. From whence have
• 2:16:39
  Speaker 1: they all gathered? The sky is black with them. They
• 2:16:41
  Speaker 1: settle down beside us, having lost all fear, and follow
• 2:16:44
  Speaker 1: us everywhere. And we are always underneath them, like a
• 2:16:47
  Speaker 1: black lace sunshade or a moving tree with black leaves.
• 2:16:51
  Speaker 1: One of them approached quite close to my face and
• 2:16:53
  Speaker 1: wanted to peck at it. He thought, most probably, that
• 2:16:56
  Speaker 1: I was dead. The crows are cawing, and this troubles
• 2:17:00
  Speaker 1: me a little. From whence have they all gathered? Yesterday
• 2:17:04
  Speaker 1: we stabbed them all sleeping. We approached stealthily, scarcely touching
• 2:17:09
  Speaker 1: the ground with our feet, as if we were stalking
• 2:17:11
  Speaker 1: wild ducks. We stole up to them so skillfully and
• 2:17:15
  Speaker 1: cautiously that we did not touch a corpse and did
• 2:17:18
  Speaker 1: not scare one single crow. We stole up like shadows,
• 2:17:23
  Speaker 1: and the night hit us. I killed the sentry myself,
• 2:17:27
  Speaker 1: knocked him down and strangled him with my hands so
• 2:17:30
  Speaker 1: as not to let him cry out. You understand, the
• 2:17:33
  Speaker 1: slightest sound, and all would have been lost. But he
• 2:17:36
  Speaker 1: did not cry out. He had no time, I believe,
• 2:17:39
  Speaker 1: even to guess that he was being killed. They were
• 2:17:42
  Speaker 1: all sleeping around the smoldering fires, sleeping peacefully as if
• 2:17:46
  Speaker 1: they were at home in their beds. We hacked about
• 2:17:49
  Speaker 1: us for more than an hour. hour, and only a
• 2:17:50
  Speaker 1: few had time to awake before they received their death blow.
• 2:17:55
  Speaker 1: They howled and of course begged for mercy. They used
• 2:17:58
  Speaker 1: their teeth. One bit off a finger on my left hand,
• 2:18:03
  Speaker 1: with which I was incautiously holding his head. He bit
• 2:18:07
  Speaker 1: off my finger, but I twisted his head clean off.
• 2:18:12
  Speaker 1: How do you think? Are we quits? How they did
• 2:18:15
  Speaker 1: not all wake up I cannot imagine. One could hear
• 2:18:19
  Speaker 1: their bones crackling and their bodies being hacked. Afterwards we
• 2:18:24
  Speaker 1: stripped all naked and divided their clothes amongst ourselves. My friend,
• 2:18:29
  Speaker 1: don't get angry over a joke. With your susceptibility you
• 2:18:32
  Speaker 1: will say this savors of marauding. But then we are
• 2:18:36
  Speaker 1: almost naked ourselves. Our clothes are quite worn out. I
• 2:18:39
  Speaker 1: have been wearing a woman's jacket for a long time
• 2:18:42
  Speaker 1: and resemble more than an officer of a victorious army.
• 2:18:48
  Speaker 1: By the by, you are, I believe, married, and it
• 2:18:51
  Speaker 1: is not quite right for you to read such things.
• 2:18:54
  Speaker 1: But you understand. Women.
• 2:18:58
  Speaker 2: Damn it.
• 2:18:59
  Speaker 1: I am young and thirst for love. Stop a minute.
• 2:19:03
  Speaker 1: I believe it was you who was engaged to be married.
• 2:19:06
  Speaker 1: It was you, was it not, who showed me the
• 2:19:07
  Speaker 1: portrait of a young girl and told me, She was
• 2:19:10
  Speaker 1: your promised bride. And there was something sad, something very
• 2:19:15
  Speaker 1: sad and mournful underneath it. And you cried. That was
• 2:19:19
  Speaker 1: a long time ago, and I remember it but confusedly.
• 2:19:23
  Speaker 1: There's no time for softness at war. And you cried.
• 2:19:27
  Speaker 1: What did you cry about? What was there written that
• 2:19:30
  Speaker 1: was as sad and mournful as a drooping flower? And
• 2:19:34
  Speaker 1: you kept crying and crying. Were you not ashamed, an officer,
• 2:19:39
  Speaker 1: to cry? The crows are calling. Do you hear, friend?
• 2:19:43
  Speaker 1: The crows are calling. What do they want? Further on
• 2:19:47
  Speaker 1: the pencil-written lines were effaced, and it was impossible to
• 2:19:50
  Speaker 1: decipher the signature. And strange to say, the dead man
• 2:19:54
  Speaker 1: called forth no comparison in me. I distinctly pictured to
• 2:19:58
  Speaker 1: myself his face, in which all was soft and delicate
• 2:20:01
  Speaker 1: as a woman's. The color of his cheeks, the clearness
• 2:20:04
  Speaker 1: and morning freshness of the eyes, the beard so bushy
• 2:20:08
  Speaker 1: and soft, that a woman could almost have adorned herself
• 2:20:10
  Speaker 1: with it. He liked books, flowers, and music, feared all
• 2:20:16
  Speaker 1: that was coarse, and wrote poetry. My brother, as a critic,
• 2:20:21
  Speaker 1: declared that he wrote very good poetry, and I could
• 2:20:25
  Speaker 1: not connect all that I knew and remembered of him
• 2:20:27
  Speaker 1: with the cawing crows, bloody carnage, and death. The crows
• 2:20:34
  Speaker 1: are cawing. And suddenly, for one mad, unutterably happy instant,
• 2:20:39
  Speaker 1: I clearly saw that all was a lie, and that
• 2:20:42
  Speaker 1: there was no war. There were no killed, no corpses.
• 2:20:47
  Speaker 1: There was no anguish of reeling, helpless thought. I was
• 2:20:51
  Speaker 1: sleeping on my back and seeing a dream, as I
• 2:20:54
  Speaker 1: used to in my childhood. Silent, dread rooms, devastated by
• 2:20:59
  Speaker 1: death and terror, and myself with a wild letter in
• 2:21:03
  Speaker 1: my hand. My brother was living. They were all sitting
• 2:21:07
  Speaker 1: at the tea table, and I could hear the noise
• 2:21:10
  Speaker 1: of the crockery. The crows are cawing. No, it is
• 2:21:15
  Speaker 1: but true. On happy earth it is true. The crows
• 2:21:21
  Speaker 1: are cawing. It is not the invention of an idle
• 2:21:24
  Speaker 1: scribbler aiming at cheap effects or of a madman who
• 2:21:28
  Speaker 1: has lost his senses. The crows are cawing. Where is
• 2:21:34
  Speaker 1: my brother? He was noble-hearted and gentle and wished no
• 2:21:36
  Speaker 1: one evil. Where is he? I'm asking you, you cursed murderers.
• 2:21:42
  Speaker 1: I'm asking you, you cursed murderers. Crows sitting on carrion. Wretched,
• 2:21:47
  Speaker 1: imbecile animals before the whole world. For you are animals.
• 2:21:54
  Speaker 1: What did you kill my brother for? If you had
• 2:21:57
  Speaker 1: a face, I would give you a blow upon it.
• 2:21:59
  Speaker 1: But you have no face. You have only the snout
• 2:22:02
  Speaker 1: of a wild beast. You pretend that you are men,
• 2:22:05
  Speaker 1: but I see claws under your gloves and the flat
• 2:22:08
  Speaker 1: skull of an animal under your hat. Hidden beneath your
• 2:22:11
  Speaker 1: clever conversation, I hear insanity rattling its rusty chains. And
• 2:22:16
  Speaker 1: with all the power of my grief, my anguish, and
• 2:22:20
  Speaker 1: dishonored thought, I curse you, you wretched, imbecile animals. End
• 2:22:27
  Speaker 1: of section 8 Section 9 of The Red Laugh by
• 2:22:36
  Speaker 1: Leonid Andreev. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain.
• 2:22:43
  Speaker 1: Read by Ben Tucker. Part 2. Fragment The Last. We
• 2:22:51
  Speaker 1: look to you for the regeneration of human life, so
• 2:22:55
  Speaker 1: shouted a speaker holding on with difficulty to a small pillar.
• 2:22:59
  Speaker 1: balancing himself with his arm and waving a flag with
• 2:23:01
  Speaker 1: a large inscription half-hidden in its folds, down with the war.
• 2:23:06
  Speaker 1: You who are young, you whose lives are only just beginning,
• 2:23:10
  Speaker 1: save yourselves and the future generations from this horror, from
• 2:23:13
  Speaker 1: this madness. It is unbearable. Our eyes are drowned with blood.
• 2:23:18
  Speaker 1: The sky is falling upon us. The earth is giving
• 2:23:20
  Speaker 1: way under our feet. Kind people! The crowd was buzzing enigmatically.
• 2:23:26
  Speaker 1: and the voice of the speaker was drowned at times
• 2:23:28
  Speaker 1: in the living, threatening noise. Suppose I am mad, but
• 2:23:33
  Speaker 1: I am speaking the truth. My father and brother are
• 2:23:36
  Speaker 1: rutting over there like carrion. Make bonfires, dig pits and destroy,
• 2:23:41
  Speaker 1: bury all your arms, demolish all the barracks, and strip
• 2:23:45
  Speaker 1: all the men of their bright clothes of madness. Tear
• 2:23:49
  Speaker 1: them off. One cannot bear it. Men are dying. Somebody
• 2:23:54
  Speaker 1: very tall gave him a blow. and knocked him off
• 2:23:57
  Speaker 1: the pillar. The flag rose once again and fell. I
• 2:24:02
  Speaker 1: had no time to see the face of the man
• 2:24:04
  Speaker 1: who struck him, as instantly everything turned into a nightmare.
• 2:24:09
  Speaker 1: Everything became commotion, became agitated and howled. Stones and logs
• 2:24:15
  Speaker 1: of wood went flying through the air. Fists that were
• 2:24:19
  Speaker 1: beating somebody appeared above the heads. The crowd, like a living,
• 2:24:23
  Speaker 1: roaring wave, lifted me up, carried me along several steps
• 2:24:27
  Speaker 1: and threw me violently against a fence, then carried me
• 2:24:30
  Speaker 1: back and away somewhere, and at last pressed me against
• 2:24:34
  Speaker 1: a high pile of wood that inclined forwards, threatening to
• 2:24:38
  Speaker 1: fall down upon somebody's head. Something crackled and rattled against
• 2:24:43
  Speaker 1: the beams in rapid dry succession. An instant stillness. And
• 2:24:48
  Speaker 1: again a roar burst forth, enormous, open-mouthed, terrible in its
• 2:24:52
  Speaker 1: overwhelming power. and then the dry, rapid crackling was heard again,
• 2:24:58
  Speaker 1: and somebody fell down near me with the blood flowing
• 2:25:00
  Speaker 1: out of a red hole where his eye had been,
• 2:25:04
  Speaker 1: and a heavy log of wood came whirling through the
• 2:25:06
  Speaker 1: air and struck me in the face, and I fell
• 2:25:08
  Speaker 1: down and began crawling, whether I knew not, amidst the
• 2:25:12
  Speaker 1: trampling feet, and came to an open space. Then I
• 2:25:16
  Speaker 1: climbed over some fences, breaking all my nails, clambered up
• 2:25:19
  Speaker 1: piles of wood, One pile fell to pieces under me
• 2:25:22
  Speaker 1: and I fell amidst a cataract of thumping logs. At
• 2:25:26
  Speaker 1: last I succeeded with difficulty in getting out of a
• 2:25:29
  Speaker 1: closed-in space. While behind me all crashed, roared, howled, and crackled,
• 2:25:35
  Speaker 1: trying to overtake me. A bell was ringing somewhere. Something
• 2:25:39
  Speaker 1: fell with a thundering crash as if it were a
• 2:25:42
  Speaker 1: five-story house. The twilight seemed to have stopped still, keeping
• 2:25:47
  Speaker 1: back the night. and the roar and shots, as if
• 2:25:51
  Speaker 1: steeped in red, had driven away the darkness. Jumping over
• 2:25:55
  Speaker 1: the last fence, I found myself in a narrow, crooked
• 2:25:58
  Speaker 1: lane resembling a corridor between two obscure walls, and began running.
• 2:26:04
  Speaker 1: I ran for a long time, but the lane seemed
• 2:26:06
  Speaker 1: to have no outlet. It was terminated by a wall,
• 2:26:11
  Speaker 1: behind which piles of wood and scaffolding rose up black
• 2:26:15
  Speaker 1: against the sky. and again I climbed over the mobile,
• 2:26:20
  Speaker 1: shifting piles, falling into pits, where all was still and
• 2:26:24
  Speaker 1: smelt of damp wood, getting out of them again into
• 2:26:28
  Speaker 1: the open, not daring to look back, for I knew
• 2:26:30
  Speaker 1: quite well what was happening by the dull reddish color
• 2:26:33
  Speaker 1: that tinged the black beams and made them look like
• 2:26:35
  Speaker 1: murdered giants. My smashed face had stopped bleeding, and felt
• 2:26:40
  Speaker 1: numbed and strange, like a mask of plaster, and the
• 2:26:44
  Speaker 1: pain had almost quite disappeared. I believe I fainted and
• 2:26:48
  Speaker 1: lost consciousness in one of the black holes into which
• 2:26:50
  Speaker 1: I had fallen, but I am not certain whether I
• 2:26:53
  Speaker 1: only imagined it or was it really so, as I
• 2:26:57
  Speaker 1: can only remember myself running. I rushed about the unfamiliar streets.
• 2:27:02
  Speaker 1: They had no lamps, past the black death-like houses for
• 2:27:05
  Speaker 1: a long time, unable to find my way out of
• 2:27:08
  Speaker 1: the dumb labyrinth. I ought to have stopped and looked
• 2:27:11
  Speaker 1: around me to define the necessary direction, but it was
• 2:27:15
  Speaker 1: impossible to do so. The still, distant din and howl
• 2:27:19
  Speaker 1: was following at my heels and gradually overtaking me. Sometimes,
• 2:27:24
  Speaker 1: at a sudden turning, it struck me in the face,
• 2:27:27
  Speaker 1: red and enveloped in clouds of livid, curling smoke. And
• 2:27:32
  Speaker 1: then I turned back and rushed on until it was
• 2:27:34
  Speaker 1: at my back once more. At one corner I saw
• 2:27:37
  Speaker 1: a strip of light, then disappeared. at my approach. It
• 2:27:42
  Speaker 1: was a shop that was being hastily closed. I caught
• 2:27:46
  Speaker 1: a glimpse of the counter and a barrel through a
• 2:27:48
  Speaker 1: wide chink, but suddenly all became enveloped in a silent
• 2:27:52
  Speaker 1: crouching gloom. Not far from the shop I met a
• 2:27:56
  Speaker 1: man who was running towards me, and we almost collided
• 2:28:00
  Speaker 1: in the darkness, stopping short at the distance of two
• 2:28:04
  Speaker 1: steps from each other. I do not know who he was.
• 2:28:10
  Speaker 1: I only saw the dark, alert outline. Are you coming
• 2:28:14
  Speaker 1: from over there? he asked. Yes. And where are you
• 2:28:18
  Speaker 1: running to? Home. Ah, home? He was silent for an
• 2:28:25
  Speaker 1: instant and suddenly flung himself upon me, trying to bring
• 2:28:28
  Speaker 1: me to the ground. and his cold fingers searched hungrily
• 2:28:32
  Speaker 1: for my throat but got entangled in my clothes. I
• 2:28:35
  Speaker 1: bit his hand, loosened myself from his grip, and set
• 2:28:38
  Speaker 1: off running through the deserted streets with him after me,
• 2:28:41
  Speaker 1: stamping loudly with his boots for a long time. Then
• 2:28:45
  Speaker 1: he stopped. I suppose the bite hurt him. I do
• 2:28:50
  Speaker 1: not know how I hit upon my street. It had
• 2:28:53
  Speaker 1: no lamps either, and the houses had not a single light,
• 2:28:55
  Speaker 1: as if they were dead. And I would have run
• 2:28:59
  Speaker 1: past without recognizing it if I had not, by chance,
• 2:29:02
  Speaker 1: lifted my eyes and seen my house. But I hesitated
• 2:29:06
  Speaker 1: for some time. The house in which I had lived
• 2:29:09
  Speaker 1: for so many years seemed to me unfamiliar in that
• 2:29:12
  Speaker 1: strange dead street, in which my loud breathing awakened an
• 2:29:16
  Speaker 1: extraordinary and mournful echo. Then I was seized by a
• 2:29:20
  Speaker 1: sudden wild terror at the thought that I had lost
• 2:29:22
  Speaker 1: my key when I fell, and I found it with difficulty,
• 2:29:26
  Speaker 1: although it was there all the time in the pocket
• 2:29:28
  Speaker 1: of my coat. and when I turned the lock, the
• 2:29:31
  Speaker 1: echo repeated the sound so loudly and extraordinarily, as if
• 2:29:36
  Speaker 1: all the doors of those dead houses in the whole
• 2:29:38
  Speaker 1: street had opened simultaneously. At first I hid myself in
• 2:29:43
  Speaker 1: the cellar, but it was terrible and dull down there,
• 2:29:48
  Speaker 1: and something began darting before my eyes, so I quietly
• 2:29:51
  Speaker 1: stole into the rooms. Groping my way in the dark,
• 2:29:55
  Speaker 1: I locked all the doors, and after a short meditation
• 2:29:58
  Speaker 1: decided to barricade them with the furniture, but the sound
• 2:30:02
  Speaker 1: of the furniture being moved was terribly loud in the
• 2:30:05
  Speaker 1: empty rooms and terrified me.' I shall await death thus.
• 2:30:11
  Speaker 1: It's all the same,' I decided. There was some water,
• 2:30:16
  Speaker 1: very warm water in the water jug, and I washed
• 2:30:19
  Speaker 1: my face in the dark and wiped it with a sheet.
• 2:30:22
  Speaker 1: The parts that were smashed galled and smarted much, and
• 2:30:27
  Speaker 1: I felt a desire to look at myself in the looking-glass.
• 2:30:31
  Speaker 1: I lit a match, and in its uneven, faint light,
• 2:30:35
  Speaker 1: there glanced at me from out of the darkness something
• 2:30:37
  Speaker 1: so hideous and terrible that I hastily threw the match
• 2:30:41
  Speaker 1: upon the floor. I believed my nose was broken. It
• 2:30:46
  Speaker 1: makes no difference now, said I to myself. Nobody will mind.
• 2:30:53
  Speaker 1: And I felt gay, with strange grimaces and contortions of
• 2:30:56
  Speaker 1: the body, as if I were personating a thief on
• 2:31:00
  Speaker 1: the stage. I went into the larder and began searching
• 2:31:02
  Speaker 1: for food. I clearly saw the unsuitableness of all my grimaces,
• 2:31:07
  Speaker 1: but it pleased me so, and I ate with the
• 2:31:10
  Speaker 1: same contortions, pretending that I was very hungry. But the
• 2:31:14
  Speaker 1: darkness and quiet frightened me. I opened the window into
• 2:31:18
  Speaker 1: the yard and began listening. At first, probably as the
• 2:31:21
  Speaker 1: traffic had ceased, all seemed to me to be quite still,
• 2:31:25
  Speaker 1: and I heard no shots. But soon I clearly distinguished
• 2:31:29
  Speaker 1: a distant din of voices. Shouts. The crash of something falling.
• 2:31:35
  Speaker 1: A laugh. The sounds grew louder perceptibly. I looked at
• 2:31:41
  Speaker 1: the sky. It was livid and sweeping past rapidly. And
• 2:31:47
  Speaker 1: the coach house opposite me. And the paving of the streets.
• 2:31:51
  Speaker 1: And the dog's kennel. All were tinged with the same
• 2:31:54
  Speaker 1: reddish glare. I called to the dog, softly.
• 2:32:00
  Speaker 2: Neptune!
• 2:32:01
  Speaker 1: But nothing stirred in the kennel, and near it I
• 2:32:04
  Speaker 1: distinguished in the livid light a shining piece of broken chain.
• 2:32:09
  Speaker 1: The distant cries and noise of something falling kept on growing,
• 2:32:12
  Speaker 1: and I shut the window. They are coming here, I
• 2:32:16
  Speaker 1: said to myself, and began looking for some place to
• 2:32:19
  Speaker 1: hide myself. I opened the stoves, fumbled at the grate,
• 2:32:24
  Speaker 1: opened the cupboards. They would not do. I made the
• 2:32:29
  Speaker 1: round of all the rooms, accepting the study into which
• 2:32:31
  Speaker 1: I did not want to look. I knew he was
• 2:32:35
  Speaker 1: sitting in his armchair at his table, heaped with books,
• 2:32:39
  Speaker 1: and this was unpleasant to me at that moment. Gradually
• 2:32:43
  Speaker 1: it began to appear that I was not alone. Around
• 2:32:46
  Speaker 1: me people were silent, moving about in the darkness. They
• 2:32:51
  Speaker 1: almost touched me, and once somebody's breath sent a cold
• 2:32:54
  Speaker 1: chill through the back of my head. I asked in
• 2:32:59
  Speaker 1: a whisper, but nobody answered. And when I moved on,
• 2:33:03
  Speaker 1: they followed me, silent and terrible. I knew that it
• 2:33:07
  Speaker 1: was only a hallucination because I was ill and apparently feverish,
• 2:33:11
  Speaker 1: but I could not conquer my fear, from which I
• 2:33:14
  Speaker 1: was trembling all over, as if I had the ague.
• 2:33:18
  Speaker 1: I felt my head, it was hot as if on fire.
• 2:33:22
  Speaker 1: I had better go there, said I to myself. He
• 2:33:26
  Speaker 1: is one of my own people, after all. He was
• 2:33:29
  Speaker 1: sitting in his armchair at his table, heaped with books,
• 2:33:33
  Speaker 1: and did not disappear as he did the last time,
• 2:33:35
  Speaker 1: but remained seated. The reddish light was making its way
• 2:33:39
  Speaker 1: through the red drawn curtains into the room, but did
• 2:33:42
  Speaker 1: not light up anything, and he was scarcely visible. I
• 2:33:46
  Speaker 1: sat down at a distance from him on the couch
• 2:33:48
  Speaker 1: and waited. All was still in the room, while from
• 2:33:53
  Speaker 1: outside the even buzzing noise, the crashing of something falling
• 2:33:57
  Speaker 1: and Disjointed cries were borne in upon us, and they
• 2:34:01
  Speaker 1: were nearing us. The livid light became brighter and brighter,
• 2:34:06
  Speaker 1: and I could distinguish him in his armchair, his black,
• 2:34:10
  Speaker 1: iron-like profile outlined by a narrow stripe of red.' Brother!'
• 2:34:15
  Speaker 1: I said, but he kept silence, immobile and black, like
• 2:34:21
  Speaker 1: a monument. A board cracked in the next room and
• 2:34:25
  Speaker 1: suddenly all became so extraordinarily still, as it is when
• 2:34:29
  Speaker 1: there are many dead. All the sounds died away and
• 2:34:33
  Speaker 1: the livid light itself assumed a scarcely perceptible shade of
• 2:34:37
  Speaker 1: deathliness and stillness and became motionless and a little dim.
• 2:34:43
  Speaker 1: I thought the stillness was coming from my brother and
• 2:34:45
  Speaker 1: told him so. No, it is not from me, he answered.
• 2:34:51
  Speaker 1: Look out of the window. No. I pulled the curtains
• 2:34:55
  Speaker 1: aside and staggered back. So that's what it is, said I.
• 2:35:01
  Speaker 1: Call my wife. She has not seen that yet, ordered
• 2:35:04
  Speaker 1: my brother. She was sitting in the dining room sewing
• 2:35:08
  Speaker 1: something and, seeing my face, rose obediently, stuck her needle
• 2:35:12
  Speaker 1: into her work and followed me. I pulled back the
• 2:35:15
  Speaker 1: curtains from all the windows and the livid light flowed
• 2:35:18
  Speaker 1: in through the broad openings unhindered, but somehow did not
• 2:35:22
  Speaker 1: make the room any lighter It was just as dark,
• 2:35:26
  Speaker 1: and only the big red squares of the windows burned brightly.
• 2:35:30
  Speaker 1: We went up to the window. Before the house there
• 2:35:33
  Speaker 1: stretched an even, fiery red sky without a single cloud, star,
• 2:35:38
  Speaker 1: or sun, and ended at the horizon, while below it
• 2:35:43
  Speaker 1: lay just such an even, dark red field, and it
• 2:35:47
  Speaker 1: was covered with dead bodies. All the corpses were naked
• 2:35:52
  Speaker 1: and lay with their legs towards us, so that we
• 2:35:54
  Speaker 1: could only see their feet and triangular heads, and all
• 2:35:58
  Speaker 1: was still. Apparently they were all dead, and there were
• 2:36:02
  Speaker 1: no wounded left behind in that endless field.' Their number
• 2:36:07
  Speaker 1: is growing,' said my brother. He was standing at the
• 2:36:11
  Speaker 1: window also, and all were there, my mother, sister, and
• 2:36:15
  Speaker 1: everybody that lived in the house. I could not distinguish
• 2:36:18
  Speaker 1: their faces, and could recognize them only by their voices.
• 2:36:23
  Speaker 1: It only seems so, said my sister. No, it's true,
• 2:36:29
  Speaker 1: just look. And truly there seemed to be more bodies.
• 2:36:34
  Speaker 1: We looked attentively for the reason and found it. At
• 2:36:37
  Speaker 1: the side of a corpse where there was a free space,
• 2:36:40
  Speaker 1: a fresh corpse suddenly appeared. Apparently the earth was throwing
• 2:36:44
  Speaker 1: them up, and all the unoccupied spaces filled rapidly and
• 2:36:49
  Speaker 1: the earth grew lighter from the light pink bodies. that
• 2:36:52
  Speaker 1: were lying side by side with their feet towards us.
• 2:36:56
  Speaker 1: And the room grew lighter, filled with a light pink,
• 2:37:01
  Speaker 1: dead light.' Look, there's not enough room for them,' said
• 2:37:06
  Speaker 1: my brother. And my mother answered,' There is one here already.'
• 2:37:11
  Speaker 1: We looked round. Behind us on the floor lay a naked,
• 2:37:14
  Speaker 1: light pink body, with its head thrown back. And instantly
• 2:37:19
  Speaker 1: at its side there appeared a second and a third,
• 2:37:22
  Speaker 1: and the earth threw them up one after the other,
• 2:37:27
  Speaker 1: and soon the orderly rows of light pink dead bodies
• 2:37:30
  Speaker 1: filled all the rooms they are in the nursery too
• 2:37:35
  Speaker 1: said the nurse I saw them we must go away
• 2:37:40
  Speaker 1: said my sister but we cannot pass said my brother
• 2:37:46
  Speaker 1: look and sure enough They were lying close together, arm
• 2:37:51
  Speaker 1: to arm, and their naked feet were touching us. And
• 2:37:55
  Speaker 1: suddenly they stirred and swayed and rose up in the
• 2:37:58
  Speaker 1: same orderly rows. The earth was throwing up new bodies,
• 2:38:03
  Speaker 1: and they were lifting the first ones upwards.' They will
• 2:38:07
  Speaker 1: smother us,' said I.' Let us save ourselves through the window.''
• 2:38:11
  Speaker 1: We cannot!' cried my brother.' We cannot! Look what is there!'
• 2:38:19
  Speaker 1: Behind the window, in a livid, motionless light, stood the
• 2:38:23
  Speaker 1: red laugh. End of Section 9 End of The Red
• 2:38:32
  Speaker 1: Laugh by Leonid Andreev