‘Well,’ said Pete, and he like smiled. ‘I’m nearly twenty. Old enough to be hitched, and it’s been two months already. You were very young and very forward, remember.’
‘Well,’ I liked gaped still. ‘Over this get can I not, old droogie. Pete married. Well well well.’
‘We have a small flat,’ said Pete. ‘I am earning very small money at State Marine
Insurance, but things will get better, that I know. And Georgina here-‘
‘What again is that name?’ I said, rot still open like bezoomny. Pete’s wife. (wife, brothers) like giggled again.
‘ Georgina,’ said Pete. ‘ Georgina works too. Typing, you know. We manage, we manage.’ I could not, brothers, take my glazzies off him, really. He was like grown up now, with a grown-up goloss and all. ‘You must,’ said Pete, ‘come and see us sometime. You still,’ he said, ‘look very young, despite all your terrible experiences.
Yes, yes, yes, we’ve read all about them. But, of course, you are very young still.’
‘Eighteen,’ I said, ‘Just gone.’
‘Eighteen, eh?’ said Pete. ‘As old as that. Well well well. Now,’ he said, ‘we have to be going.’ And he like gave this Georgina of his a like loving look and pressed one of her rookers between his and she gave him one of these looks back, O my brothers. ‘Yes,’ said Pete, turning back to me, ‘we’re off to a little party at Greg’s.’ ‘Greg?’ I said.
‘Oh, of course,’ said Pete, ‘you wouldn’t know Greg, would you? Greg is after your time. While you were away Greg came into the picture. He runs little parties, you know. Mostly wine-cup and word-games. But very nice, very pleasant, you know. Harmless, if you see what I mean.’
‘Yes,’ I said. ‘Harmless. Yes, yes, I viddy that real horrorshow.’ And this Georgina devotchka giggled again at my slovos. And then these two ittied off to their vonny word-games at this Greg’s, whoever he was. I was left all on my oddy knocky with my milky chai, which was getting cold now, like thinking and wondering.
Perhaps that was it, I kept thinking. Perhaps I was getting too old for the sort of jeezny I had been leading, brothers. I was eighteen now, just gone. Eighteen was not a young age. At eighteen old Wolfgang Amadeus had written concertos and symphonies and operas and oratorios and all that cal, no, not cal, heavenly music. And then there was old Felix M. with his Midsummer Night’s Dream Overture. And there were others. And there was this like French poet set by old Benjy Britt, who had done all his best poetry by the age of fifteen, O my brothers. Arthur, his first name. Eighteen was not all that young an age, then. But what was I going to do? Walking the dark chill bastards of winter streets after ittying off from this chai-and-coffee mesto, I kept viddying like visions, like these cartoons in the gazettas. There was Your Humble Narrator Alex coming home from work to a good hot plate of dinner, and there was this ptitsa all welcoming and greeting like loving. But I could not viddy her all that horrorshow, brothers, I could not think who it might be. But I had this sudden very strong idea that if I walked into the room next to this room where the fire was burning away and my hot dinner laid on the table, there I should find what I really wanted, and now it all tied up, that picture scissored out of the gazetta and meeting old Pete like that. For in that other room in a cot was laying gurgling goo goo goo my son. Yes yes yes, brothers, my son. And now I felt this bolshy big hollow inside my plott, feeling very surprised too at myself. I knew what was happening, O my brothers. I was like growing up.
Yes yes yes, there it was. Youth must go, ah yes. But youth is only being in a way like it might be an animal. No, it is not just like being an animal so much as being one of these malenky toys you viddy being sold in the streets, like little chellovecks made out of tin and with a spring inside and then a winding handle on the outside and you wind it up grrr grrr grrr and off it itties, like walking, O my brothers. But it itties in a straight line and bangs straight into things bang bang and it cannot help what it is doing. Being young is like being like one of these malenky machines. My son, my son. When I had my son I would explain all that to him when he was starry enough to like understand. But then I knew he would not understand or would not want to understand at all and would do all the veshches I had done, yes perhaps even killing some poor starry forella surrounded with mewing kots and koshkas, and I would not be able to really stop him. And nor would he be able to stop his own son, brothers. And so it would itty on until like the end of the world, round and round and round, like some bolshy gigantic like chelloveck, like old Bog Himself (by courtesy of Korova Milkbar) turning and turning and turning a vonny grahzny orange in his gigantic rookers.
But first of all, brothers, there was this veshch of finding some devotchka or other who would be a mother to this son. I would have to start on that tomorrow, I kept thinking. That was something like new to do. That was something I would have to get started on, a new like chapter beginning.
That’s what it’s going to be then, brothers, as I come to the like end of this tale. You have been everywhere with your little droog Alex, suffering with him, and you have viddied some of the most grahzny bratchnies old Bog ever made, all on to your old droog Alex. And all it was was that I was young. But now as I end this story, brothers, I am not young, not no longer, oh no. Alex like groweth up, oh yes. But where I itty now, O my brothers, is all on my oddy knocky, where you cannot go. Tomorrow is all like sweet flowers and the turning vonny earth and the stars and the old Luna up there and your old droog Alex all on his oddy knocky seeking like a mate. And all that cal. A terrible grahzny vonny world, really, O my brothers. And so farewell from your little droog. And to all others in this story profound shooms of lipmusic brrrrrr. And they can kiss my sharries. But you, O my brothers, remember sometimes thy little Alex that was. Amen. And all that cal.
Glossary of Nadsat Language
Words that do not appear to be of Russian origin are distinguished by asterisks. (For help with the Russian, I am indebted to the kindness of my colleague Nora Montesinos and a number of correspondents.)
*appy polly loggy – apology
baboochka – old woman
*baddiwad – bad
banda – band
bezoomny – mad
biblio – library
bitva – battle
Bog – God
bolnoy – sick
bolshy – big,
great brat, bratty – brother
bratchny – bastard
britva – razor
brooko – belly
brosay – to throw
bugatty – rich c
al – feces
*cancer – cigarette
cantora – office
carman – pocket
chai – tea
choodesny – wonderful
*chumble – to mumble
clop – to knock
cluve – beak
collocoll – bell
*crack – to break up or 'bust'
*crark – to yowl?
crast – to steal or rob;
robbery creech – to shout or scream
*cutter – money
dama – lady
ded – old man
deng – money
devotchka – girl
dobby – good
*dook – trace, ghost
domy – house
dorogoy – dear, valuable
dratsing – fighting
*drencrom – drug
*charles, charlie – chaplain
droog – friend
chasha – cup
*dung – to defecate
chasso – guard
dva – two
cheena – woman
eegra – game
cheest – to wash
eemya – name
chelloveck – person, man,
*eggiweg – egg
fellow
*filly – to play or fool with
chepooka – nonsense
*firegold – drink
*fist – to punch
*flip – wild?
forella – 'trout'
gazetta – newspaper
glazz – eye
gloopy – stupid