Fall of Giants

Earlier that day, Grigori and Isaak and their comrades had overrun a deserted German position, and Grigori had noticed that their trenches had a kind of zigzag at regular intervals, so that you could not see very far along. Lieutenant Tomchak said the zigzag was called a traverse, but he did not know what it was for. He did not order his men to copy the German design. But Grigori felt sure it must have a purpose.

Grigori had not yet fired his rifle. He had heard shooting, rifles and machine guns and artillery, and his unit had taken a good deal of German territory, but so far he had shot at no one, and no one had shot at him. Everywhere 13 Corps went, they found that the Germans had just left.

There was no logic to this. Everything in war was confusion, he was realizing. No one was quite sure where they were or where the enemy was. Two men from Grigori’s platoon had been killed, but not by Germans: one had accidentally shot himself in the thigh with his own rifle and bled to death astonishingly quickly, and the other had been trampled by a runaway horse and never recovered consciousness.

They had not seen a cook wagon for days. They had finished their emergency rations, and even the hardtack had run out. None of them had eaten since yesterday morning. After digging the trench, they slept hungry. Fortunately it was summer, so at least they were not cold.

The shooting began at dawn the next day.

It started some distance away to Grigori’s left, but he could see clouds of shrapnel burst in the air, and loose earth erupt suddenly where shells landed. He knew he ought to be scared, but he was not. He was hungry, thirsty, tired, aching, and bored, but he was not frightened. He wondered if the Germans felt the same.

There was heavy gunfire on his right, too, some miles to the north, but here it was quiet. “Like the eye of the storm,” said David, the Jewish bucket salesman.

Soon enough, orders came to advance. Wearily, they climbed out of their trench and walked forward. “I suppose we should be grateful,” Grigori said.

“For what?” Isaak demanded.

“Marching is better than fighting. We’ve got blisters, but we’re alive.”

In the afternoon they approached a town that Lieutenant Tomchak said was called Allenstein. They assembled in marching order on the outskirts, and entered the center in formation.

To their surprise, Allenstein was full of well-dressed German citizens going about their normal Thursday afternoon business, posting letters and buying groceries and walking babies in perambulators. Grigori’s unit halted in a small park where the men sat in the shade of tall trees. Tomchak went into a nearby barbershop and came out shaved and with his hair cut. Isaak went to buy vodka, but returned saying the army had posted sentries outside all the wine shops with orders to keep soldiers out.

At last a horse and cart appeared with a barrel of fresh water. The men lined up to fill their canteens. As the afternoon cooled into evening, more carts arrived with loaves of bread, bought or requisitioned from the town’s bakers. Night fell, and they slept under the trees.

At dawn there was no breakfast. Leaving a battalion behind to hold the town, Grigori and the rest of 13 Corps were marched out of Allenstein, heading southwest on the road to Tannenberg.

Although they had seen no action, Grigori noticed a change of mood among the officers. They cantered up and down the line and conferred in fretful huddles. Voices were raised in argument, with a major pointing one way and a captain gesturing in the opposite direction. Grigori continued to hear heavy artillery to the north and south, though it seemed to be moving eastward while 13 Corps went west. “Whose artillery is that?” said Sergeant Gavrik. “Ours or theirs? And why is it moving east when we’re going west?” The fact that he used no profanity suggested to Grigori that he was seriously worried.

A few kilometers out of Allenstein, a battalion was left to guard the rear, which surprised Grigori, since he assumed the enemy was ahead, not behind. The 13 Corps was being stretched thin, he thought with a frown.

Around the middle of the day, his battalion was detached from the main march. While their comrades continued southwest, they were directed southeast, on a broad path through a forest.

There, at last, Grigori encountered the enemy.