Onto the dry snow that crunched underfoot like sand. In the woodshed, she opened her coat and without a second’s hesitation we began paddling strenuously like two sailors swept by a powerful gust off the deck and into dark, cold water.
Who had given her the ring that turned loosely around her finger? In what strange language was she whispering so urgently? What was that intoxicating scent on her skin?
AX (see: HAND AX).
B
BABIONKI (бАбИОНКИ). There are, of course, women — or mujeres as I might prefer to call them — in Muscovy, but there are BABIONKI, as well, and these latter are superior. They wear their hair in a tight bun at the back of the neck and can generally be found in the bazaars, haggling at the top of their lungs, arms akimbo, over the price of a kilo of figs. They are very sweet albeit somewhat hardened by life in the IMPERIUM. Not every woman, I hasten to clarify, is worthy of the title. Both nerve and temperament are prerequisite. BABIONKI are much more commonly found among women of the people, though a number of female intellectuals, slightly derailed by the novels of Françoise Sagan, are also BABIONKI, as if consubstantially. When, upon arriving at a rendezvous in fine spirits and with every intention of sailing carefree through an inconsequential romantic interlude (our erudite commentary on Aubrey Beardsley at the ready), we discern, behind an elegant pair of glasses, the glint of a pair of BABIONKI eyes, it is highly advisable to retract the hand — though it may be halfway on its journey toward the skirt — indefinitely postpone this particular siege, and slip down the back stairs, giving thanks to merciful God all the while for the warning.
As a biological entity (they give suck to their offspring, which is a highly irrational mode of conduct) the BABIONKI eluded the rigid state control exercised by the IMPERIUM. In consequence, they’ve been the victims of perfidious defamation campaigns. But the BABIONKI, as “free men,” до одного места about that — which is to say, les importa un rábano or, in other words, “they don’t give a radish” (or a “fig” or a “good goddamn”).
BADEN-BADEN. I wanted to visit the apartment not far from the Astoria that F.M. once rented, now a museum. My visit coincided with that of a group of high school students who were studying Преступление и наказание (Crime and Punishment, the only one of F.M.’s books that is required reading in the schools). They were there for a class outing that included: a) the itinerary of RASKOLNIKOV prior to his crime; b) the slum where the pawnbroker and her half-sister Lizaveta lived; c) Hay Square, and a tour of the writer’s private world: whipped cream for breakfast, the (very ugly) stippled wallpaper in his study, the goose quill from which sprang the imaginary life of Dmitri Karamazov, the heavy oak desk — indirect cause of F.M.’s death (“he ruptured an aneurysm trying to move it,” the guide informed us in a whisper) — the pendulum clock stopped forever at four a.m., January 28, 1881. .
A scant hour later I abandoned the museum feeling completely empty. It was always the same story. A few years earlier, I, too, had redone my room in a wallpaper that was frankly appalling. But I hadn’t managed to extract anything from its infinitely repeated design, whereas F.M., as all of us know, did. How to explain such widely differing results for two writers who both proceeded from such essentially similar wallpaper?
I. Next to the coat check, on a counter, the twelve volumes of his complete works were on sale. I paused to leaf through a copy of the diaries in the vain hope of chancing upon some answer to my question. As I was preparing to depart, I was intercepted by a very neat elderly little man wearing a woolen vest of 1953 or 1957 vintage who clicked his heels in military fashion.
“Allow me. I see that your interest is real. When I encounter a visitor who is truly interested, I take the trouble. . You can see. .”—and he held out a binder with the following inscription, in gilded letters, on its cover: Dostoyevsky, F. M., Dossier. “To tell you the truth, no one commissioned this investigation, not officially, so to speak. . But please, forgive me, may I invite you to. . That is, if you happen to have the time, of course. Perfect. Not far from here, just around the corner, as they say. An ideal spot for discussing the matter.”
We emerge onto the street. Just a slight movement of our shoulders allows us to go back twenty, fifty, a hundred years with no difficulty whatsoever: to break through the threshold’s flimsy partition and cross cleanly over an entire historical period. (Heavy, thick, larvaclass="underline" a cannonball’s blind trajectory.) We descend into a tavern on Vladimirskaya Ploshchad: warm beer and drunkards sprawled on the tables, off to a decidedly bad start on their day. We take over a table beneath a large barred window, our heads at street level. Hundreds of feet pass by interminably as we sit conversing below.
“I would like to make one thing clear from the beginning. What I’m going to tell you is not, to any degree, the product of my imagination. Fyodor Mikhaylovich spent four years in the Omsk prison camp, the кáторга, I understand that well. The sinister influence, the indelible mark it left upon the young writer’s soul. . For when else did Dostoyevsky develop his scandalous affinity for games of chance: enormous sums of money wagered, hands still clutching the playing cards at dawn? A vice, please keep in mind, that in my day would have earned him a far lengthier prison sentence, or even расстрел, as you are surely aware.”
(But of course! Rasstrel, the pretty word: the convict barefoot in the snow, the signal, the nine flashes of gunpowder!)
“Well then, my fine gentleman, after all these years, what is the result today? That this compulsive gambler, lover of roulette and all forms of gaming, has a museum devoted to him in Saint Petersburg, and three more across the Union. Just think of that! But better yet: listen to me, sir, judge for yourself to what point. .
“‘Dostoyevsky, F. M., born in Moscow on 30 December, 1825. From his earliest youth. .’ No, let’s skip that part and go straight to page 20: ‘During his first trip abroad, in 1853, already an adulterous spouse (María Dimitrieva, his first wife, lay dying in Tver), F.M. evinces an excessive affinity for gambling.’ Listen to this: in BADEN-BADEN, his lover (Apollinaria Suslova, the Polina of Игрок, The Gambler) writes in her diary: ‘F.M. plays roulette constantly and in general his conduct is far from responsible.’ That very same night she adds, ‘F.M. has lost a lot of money and is very worried. We are left without funds for the journey.’ Can you imagine? Truly catastrophic. I shall go on: F.M. spends three days in BADEN-BADEN, from 21 to 24 August, 1863, gambling at the casino. He wins 5,000 francs, a fabulous sum for that era, which he loses the same night. That year he gambles in Wiesbaden and in Rome. Finally, after his return from Italy, he bankrupts himself entirely in Hamburg. A note in Miss Suslova’s diary confirms it: ‘Received letter from F.M. yesterday. He has lost all his money gambling and begs me to send him more funds. I have no money either. I just gave everything I had to Mme. Mir. I’ve resolved to pawn my watch and chain.’
“Shameful conduct! And can you believe that this report of mine has been circulated to various powerful entities with no result whatsoever! You cannot imagine the harm it does us, this worship of false idols. I saw those children, God’s little angels, innocently, without anyone to warn them. . Well, and the worst of it, what is truly horrendous. .”