Anton the Quail

Anton the Quail is Makar’s adult son and a member of a family kept at the margins of village life. Known for speaking only to himself and refusing to answer others, he appears in the narrative as both an outcast and a source of danger: his silence separates him from the village, while his threats and participation in the household’s abuse make that isolation consequential.

Identity and Isolation

Anton is twenty years old, red-haired, pale-eyed, and without eyelashes. The villagers shun him as they do Makar. When someone addresses him, he looks at the speaker indifferently and turns away without replying. His nickname, Quail, comes from this habit: he speaks to himself but does not answer other voices. The name makes his withdrawal legible to the villagers, but it also marks the limits of what the narrative lets them know about him; he is chiefly presented through how he refuses ordinary exchange.

Life on Makar’s Farm

Anton lives with Makar and his sister, Ewka, on a farmstead set apart from the rest of the settlement. He looks after the family’s goats, milking them and taking them out to pasture. After Makar returns from successful sales, father and son drink and go to the goats’ quarters; Ditko, the trained wolfhound, is tied near the door to keep others away. Ewka fears that Makar and Anton will force her to spend time with them in the stable, and sometimes stays inside for days rather than face them. These details place Anton within a household governed by secrecy and intimidation, not simply outside village society.

The family’s isolation is also enforced by the threat of violence. Anton carries a hand grenade he found on a dead partisan and threatens anyone who bothers him, Makar, or Ewka. Makar, meanwhile, carries a long knife and is known for his accuracy with it. Their weapons help explain why villagers’ threats to drive the family out and burn its house do not go unanswered, while making the farmstead’s separation seem both social and defended.

The Boy’s Encounters with Anton

The unnamed boy narrator first comes to Makar’s farm after the village head fails to place him with other peasants. Later, while recovering and struggling to walk, he sees Anton lead the family’s he-goat to Makar’s room at night. The animal is dangerous enough that even Ditko avoids confronting it. From outside, the boy witnesses a disturbing episode involving Ewka, Anton, Makar, and the goat. The account establishes Anton’s involvement in the family’s abusive sexualized conduct without giving him an explanatory voice or an independent account of his actions.

Narrative Role

Anton remains defined by a stark contrast: he does not answer people, yet the grenade in his pocket speaks for him in threats; he is shunned by the village, yet helps sustain a household whose private conduct makes its isolation more than mere eccentricity. His silence does not make him a neutral observer within the family. Instead, the boy’s glimpses of the farm disclose a closed world in which routine labor, intimidation, and abuse coexist, while Anton’s own motives remain unspoken.