They are racking their brains:
“Where are you, Russia? Where did you disappear? Who ruined you?”
Who, who… Everyone knows who… There’s no need to rack your brain…
My relationship with Mikhail Ivanych was simple and consistent. In the beginning, he often came to see me, pulling out bottles from his pockets. I would wave my arms in protest. He drank directly from the bottle, muttering in a steady stream. It was with some difficulty that I caught the gist of his extensive monologues.
What’s more, Misha’s speech was organized in a remarkable way. Only nouns and verbs were pronounced with clarity and dependability. Mostly in inappropriate combinations. All secondary parts of speech Mikhail Ivanych used at his sole discretion. Whichever ones happened to turn up. Never mind the prepositions, particles and conjunctions. He created them as he went along. His speech was not unlike classical music, abstract art or the song of a goldfinch. Emotions clearly prevailed over meaning.
Let’s imagine I said:
“Misha, perhaps you should lay off the sauce, if only for a little while.”
In response I’d hear:
“Tha’ maggot-faggot, God knows wha’… Gets a fiver in the morning an’ shoot to the piss factory… Advance is on deposit… How’sa imma quit?… Whatsa smart in’at?… Where’sa spirit rise.”
Misha’s overtures were reminiscent of the Remizov school of writing.*
He called gossipy women prattletraps. Bad housewives – majordodos. Unfaithful women – peter-cheetahs. Beer and vodka – sledgehammer, poison and kerosene. And the young generation – pussberries…
“Copper-trouble pussberries be hullabaplonking an’ God knows whatsa at the centre…”
Meaning – the young generation, the underage bums are causing trouble and God knows what…
Our relationship was clearly defined. Misha would bring me onions, sour cream, mushrooms and potatoes from his mother-in-law. And he vehemently refused to take money. I, in turn, gave him a rouble every morning for wine. And kept him from trying to shoot his wife, Liza. Sometimes putting my own life in danger.
So we were even.
I never did figure out what sort of man he was. He seemed absurd, kind and inept. Once he strung up two cats on a rowan tree, making the nooses with a fishing line.
“Breeding shebangers,” he said, “catervaulting about…”
Once I accidentally bolted the door from the inside and he sat on the porch till morning, afraid to wake me up…
Misha was absurd in both his kindness and his anger. He reviled the authorities to their faces, but tipped his hat when passing a portrait of Friedrich Engels. He cursed the Rhodesian dictator, Ian Smith, relentlessly, but loved and respected the barmaid at a local dive who invariably short-changed him:
“That’s the way things are. Order is order!”
His worst insult went something like this:
“You’re bending over for the capitalists!”
Once officer Doveyko took a German bayonet away from a very drunken Misha.
“Serving the capitalists, you scum!” Mikhail Ivanych raged.
One time when he was out, his wife and mother-in-law made off with his radio.
“They’ll still get no thanks from the capitalists,” assured Mikhail Ivanych.
Only about twice did he and I have a conversation. I remember Misha saying (the text has been slightly cleaned up):
“I was a pup when the Germans installed here. Truth be told, they did no harm. They took the chickens, old man Timokha’s pig, but they did no harm… And they hadn’t laid a finger on the dames. The skirts took offence, even… My old man cooked his own brew and traded it for food with the Nazis… They did fix the Yids and the Gypsies, though…”
“You mean, shot them?”
“Got rid of ’em for good. Order is order…”
“And you say they did no harm.”
“I swear to God, they done no harm. The Yids and the Gypsies – that’s the nature of things…”
“What have the Jews ever done to you?”
“I got respect for the Jews. I’d trade a dozen Ukey bums for one Jew. But Gypsies, I’d strangle the lot of ’em with my bare hands.”
“Why?”
“Whadda you mean why? You kidding?! A Gypsy’s a Gypsy!”
In July I began to write. These were odd sketches, dialogues, a search for the right tone. Something like a synopsis with vaguely outlined figures and themes. Tragic love, debts, marriage, writing, conflict with the authorities. Plus, as Dostoevsky used to say, a hint of greater meaning.
I thought this enterprise would erase my miseries. This had happened before, when I was starting out in my literary pursuits. I think it’s called sublimation. When you try to make literature take responsibility for your sins. A man writes King Lear and for the whole year he need not raise his sword…
Soon I sent my wife seventeen roubles. And bought myself a shirt – for me, an action without precedent.
There were rumours about some publications in the West. I tried not to think about it. After all, what do I care about what goes on on the other side? And that’s exactly what I’ll say, if they send for me…
I also mailed out a few IOUs to the effect that I’m working, will pay you back soon, apologies…
All my creditors reacted magnanimously: there’s no rush, I’m not pressed for money, pay me back when you can…
In short, life became balanced. It started to seem more sensible, more logical. After all, nightmares and hopelessness are not the worst things… The worst thing is chaos…
All it takes is a week without vodka and the fog clears. Life acquires a relatively sharp outline. Even our problems seem like natural phenomena.
I was afraid to ruin this fragile balance – I became rude when offered a drink, irritable if girls at the main office tried to start a conversation…
Pototsky said:
“Boris sober and Boris drunk are such different people, they’ve never even met.”
And yet I knew that this couldn’t continue for ever. You cannot walk away from life’s problems… Weak men endure life; courageous ones master it… If you live wrongly, sooner or later something will happen…
Morning. Milk with a bluish skin. Dogs barking, buckets jangling…
Misha’s hungover voice from behind the walclass="underline"
“Sonny, throw me a singleton!”
I emptied out my leftover change and fed the dogs.
Beyond the hill at the tourist centre the radiogram was playing. Jackdaws flew through the clear skies. Fog spread over the marsh, at the foot of the mountain. Sheep reposed in grey clumps on the green grass.
I walked through the field to the tourist centre. Yellow sand stuck to my boots, wet from the morning dew. The air from the grove carried chill and smoke.
Tourists sat under the windows of the main office. On a bench, covered with newspaper, sprawled Mitrofanov. Even asleep he was perceptibly lazy…
I walked up the steps. The tour guides huddled in the small hall. Someone said hello. Someone asked for a light. Dima Baranov said: “What’s the matter with you?”
Under a dreadful, horrific, repellent painting by the local artist Shchukin (top hat, horse, genius, endless horizon) stood my wife, smiling…
At that moment my miserable well-being came to an end. I knew what lay ahead. I remembered our last conversation… We were divorced a year and a half ago. This elegant modern divorce felt a little like an armistice. An armistice that didn’t always end with a flash of rockets…