‘The latter is impossible, Varvara Alexeevna,’ said Botkin dismissively. ‘We cannot all live as wealthy aristocrats. That is the way to perpetuate the disparities of the current system, merely transferring the privileges of the few to a different elite. And so, inevitably, the production of equality necessitates a process of levelling off. We will all meet in the middle somewhere, I imagine.’
‘And there will be no more fine things?’
‘Everything that is necessary will be provided. There will be no more want. Still and all, this. .’ Botkin turned and pointed at the clock. ‘This is not a question of necessity. It is luxury. For sure, there will be no more luxury.’
‘And what will become of all the fine things that already exist?’
‘They will be destroyed.’
‘What purpose does that serve?’
‘It clears the way. It educates. It punishes.’
‘And I will be punished for owning this clock? You know I was given it as a fee by a countess who had fallen on hard times and got herself into trouble. You could say it was redistribution in action. At any rate, I worked long hours to earn that clock, and all the other nice things you see here.’
‘You will fall into the category of education, rather than punishment. You are essentially suffering from a misguided aspiration. You aspire to the decadent practice of connoisseurship which you have appropriated from another class. It would be better that you did not.’
‘But is it not a form of social revolution when people such as I can own such objects?’
‘And in the meantime there are millions who cannot afford to feed their families. Are you aware, Varvara Alexeevna, that men died to produce luxuries like this?’
‘You go too far, Alyosha Afanasevich!’
‘Not at all. The process of laying on the ormolu involves the evaporation of mercury, which causes first the insanity and then the premature death of the artisans involved. In France, a more enlightened country than ours I think, the process was long ago declared illegal.’
‘The clock is over a hundred years old. The man who made it is certainly dead, whether prematurely or not. His oppression will not be lightened one iota by smashing it.’
‘Surely you are familiar with the Catechism? The revolutionist knows only one science: the science of destruction. Before we can establish a new order, we must destroy everything associated with the old. Your precious clock falls into that category. It must be swept away.’ Botkin appeared carried along by his own words. Although he had so far restrained himself, he now reached out and lifted the clock from the mantelpiece.
Varvara Alexeevna shrieked.
Botkin’s eyes were gleeful. ‘I see now it is my duty to destroy it. As it is your duty to rejoice in its destruction.’
It was at that moment that the long-awaited knock at the door was finally heard. The clock between Botkin’s hands indicated the time to be twenty-one minutes past twelve. For some reason, Botkin was distracted by the time, perhaps by its numerical symmetry. The moment for destroying it passed. He returned it to the mantelpiece.
Kirill Kirillovich went to see to the door. He returned a moment later with Tatyana Ruslanovna. The room became energised at her entrance.
‘You!’ cried Botkin. ‘You are the representative of the central committee?’
‘Does that surprise you?’
‘No. It pleases me immensely. It delights me.’
‘It is a good thing,’ agreed Varvara Alexeevna. ‘You are a woman,’ she added, to explain her position more clearly.
Tatyana Ruslanovna turned her attention to Virginsky. ‘And so, my friend, what have you done?’ Her smile was kindly.
‘I have struck at the heart of the administration.’
‘Hardly the heart. But you have struck one of its prominent limbs.’
‘Yes, but he should have made clear the political aspect of his act, should he not?’ insisted Kirill Kirillovich. ‘If he had been dragged off shouting “Long live the Revolution!” the crime would have had more of an impact. As it stands, it is possible for the authorities to represent it as the isolated action of a lone madman. He should have stayed to make clear his position as a revolutionist.’
‘The central committee is of the view that Pavel Pavlovich acted correctly in saving himself. In allowing Porfiry Petrovich’s attacker to remain at liberty, the authorities reveal their ineptitude. It increases public terror. The central committee is of the view that all our people must co-operate in keeping Virginsky out of the authorities’ reach. This is now a priority. For the time being, he will remain here.’
‘Here?’ Kirill Kirillovich screwed up his face distastefully. ‘Who is to pay for his food?’
‘You are. Sacrifices are required. This will be yours. You will also supply him with clothes, preferably a workman’s. You, Pavel Pavlovich, are advised to do whatever you can to change your appearance. Grow a beard. Adopt a different gait. You will be surprised what a difference a change in gait can effect. You will also be supplied with a false passport, of course. As soon as this is ready, we will move you out of Petersburg.’
‘I don’t want to move out of Petersburg.’ Virginsky’s voice was childishly petulant.
‘It doesn’t matter what you want.’
He tried to affect a more reasonable tone: ‘But I can be more use here.’
‘It is hard to see how you can be any use at all to us now, other than as an idea, a phantom. That is the only reason we are determined to keep you safe. There is also the consideration that we cannot be sure you will not betray us if you are arrested.’
‘I would hope that I have proven myself on that score,’ protested Virginsky.
Tatyana Ruslanovna did not reply. And the smile that flickered briefly over her lips was hard to interpret.
A new man
He slept on the sofa in the main room of the apartment. More accurately, he lay down on it and closed his eyes intermittently. After a while, it was hard to distinguish between the swirling grey fuzz of the room around him, and the non-dimensioned darkness, streaked with flaring lights, that he entered when he closed his eyes. Both were filled with the ticking of the ormolu clock, meting out the hours with inhuman patience. He found its measured insistence oppressive, and began to wish that Botkin had made good on his threat to destroy it. He self-consciously framed the intention that, before the end of his stay in the apartment, he would smash the infernal clock himself, if no one else did. He laughed wildly into the darkness, his eyes straining with defiance at the boundless obscurity of the night. It seemed that he was capable of anything now. Soon, however, he became irrationally afraid of the clock. He imagined that it had grown to gigantic size, and that its hands were swinging axes, as sharp as guillotine blades. He knew at that moment that he was asleep, and dreaming. And as soon as the realisation struck him, he woke up. The reality of his situation was immediately depressing. He felt trapped, as indeed he was. He imagined eternity as a nocturnal room like this, with an unseen clock tapping relentlessly at the darkness. He began to count the ticks of the clock, and for some reason that made him feel a little better.
He knew that he would not get to sleep again that night. But that decisive realisation was also somehow liberating. He settled down to address the turmoil of his thoughts, without being distracted by the anxieties of insomnia.
Surprisingly, perhaps, he found himself thinking about Prince Dolgoruky; or, more specifically, about his demon. He imagined it there in the room with him, squatting foully on its haunches, leering in the darkness. He could not quite believe in it. When he tried to put a face to it, his mind — peculiarly — supplied the face of Porfiry Petrovich. And so it was a demon with pale, almost translucent skin, with a face as feminine and cunning as a peasant woman’s, with eyes the colour of ice and transparent lashes flickering restlessly over them. He sensed the bulbous prominence at the back of its head, and was repelled by it.