This was the gravest fallacy. For when infections like those in the Matveyev family are allowed to fester, the whole of society eventually suffers. The people who must cauterize the infections suffer. You and I suffer. And the greatest sufferers are our children, who are exposed to the infection before they are fully grown and morally strong. Everything we have built in our socialist society becomes tainted; everything we cherish.
This rottenness doesn't go completely unnoticed. Obnoxious youths are sometimes arrested and lectured. But too often without further action - because ‘no specific crime has been committed’. Thus even the People’s police too can forget their socialist obligations.
For what is hooliganism? Hooliganism is cynical actions committed as a barefaced challenge to society. Do the actions of Matveyeva express such cynicism? She behaved in full and conscious contradiction of our ethical principles. And her declaration as our ‘conversation was drawing to its wretched close summed up her brazen cynicism ‘I don’t understand what you’re going on about ’ she said, smirking. ‘Nothing can stop me from living the way of life I like.’
By goodness, she was right! No court, no police officer, no prosecutor, not you or 1 - no one could prevent her from being a prostitute, disgracing Soviet womanhood and pouring filth on our Motherland.
But I suggest that these insects can be controlled. Energetic application of the legal sanctions against hooliganism will stop good-for-nothings taking advantage of our indecisiveness.
It must be made clear that insulting and abasing the national dignity of the Soviet people is no less a social danger than a punch in the face. Soviet citizens should not be required to live with this stain on the honor of our womanhood and citizenship.
We are all responsible for the moral cleanliness of our capital. So we can hardly find it onerous to take a broom and sweep this riff-raff out of the city. Cleanliness is the first step to health, as the old saying goes. Besides, our air will be noticeably purer.
There was a time when I imagined something like this would be ‘romantic’. It was intrigue in a foreign land; I was involved with someone in danger. Now the article brought only a dizzy weakness. I had to rest before reading it again.
There was too much to take in; peripheral points struck 230
me first. The regular use of fabrication by the Soviet press: when Prague workers were needed to applaud the Kremlin’s invasion in August, Pravda coolly invented them and 'quoted’ their cheers for the Soviet tanks. Yet the report about Oktyabrina’s parents rang terribly true. Her daily references to cows and barns - 'pull the teats too hard, the milk will be sour’ and all the others - flashed to mind, followed by waves of understanding for who she was and was trying to become. Yellow fever in Omsk? Vodka was the disease; now her repugnance for it made grisly sense.
Otherwise, I could only guess what proportion the author had been deceitful as opposed to merely misinformed. He was a regular contributor of feuilletons, a well-liked genre which permits important topics to be treated from a supposedly personal point of view: the indignant citizen-journalist appeals to the authorities to put an end to some moral abuse. Of course the opposite was true: without directions from above, no Soviet reporter would dare suggest the police were too lenient. Nor would a major newspaper print an article of this length without high-level editorial - meaning governmental - instructions. These were undoubtedly issued in pursuance of the anti-hooligan campaign.
Within an hour, we’d uncovered the first major distortion. The fact was that Oktyabrina had been taken to Petrovka on suspicion of stealing drugs! Finding her in one of the hospital’s store rooms, the arresting policeman thought he’d uncovered something big. Oktyabrina was interrogated about narcotics for two days in Petrovka: once suspicion has been aroused, Moscow police - even more than most in the world - are loath to abandon it. The investigating officer did so only after the drug notion had completely disintegrated. He then transferred her -reluctantly - to an ordinary prison on less serious charges.
Kostya learned this through a former girl friend in the Moscow City Council. The author surely knew these facts, but failed to mention them lest they weaken his article. His feuilleton was typical in purpose as well as tone: it set the
stage for a trial intended as a public example.
I read it again that afternoon, then drove to the hospital for my own investigation. Something told me that Vladimir, the unmentioned key to the puzzle, was still there.
The younger man occupied the guardhouse. He'd have recognized me, even if I pretended to visit another patient. If I were seen climbing the fence, I'd be expelled from the country with nothing achieved. I abandoned hope of slipping into the hospital.
But not of finding out. When a story is vital in this country, one method sometimes works: interview the janitor or cleaning woman. Many won't understand the story’s significance, and therefore speak candidly. Others will know about the affair, but their attitude towards it may differ enough from the 'fine' to provide an important clue. At last I could use my professional skills for a story that mattered.
Vladimir’s ward number came back to me from the register the week before. I drove back to the point where Oktyabrina's mitten last peeked above the fence. This was a good position for intercepting everyone who’d left the hospital and was making for the solitary bus stop. The task began of finding someone who worked in Ward 4.
I might have given up after several hours had not patience at this game been rewarded before. Dusk descended early, but the snow diffused a greyish light. I was relieved that my message to Oktyabrina had been erased by fresh falls, until I caught the fallacy behind the thought. When the moon appeared, the patter of animals enlivened the woods.
I smoked a pack of Camels.
The information appeared in the form of three student nurses, chattering happily after a long shift. They were indeed from Ward 4, and solved the mystery of Oktyabrina’s arrest as I drove them home.
The girls talked in unison: Vladimir receiving extra attention from the moment he was put to bed ... his mother carping at everything in the ward, down to the Intourist 232
calendar with a well-endowed girl . . . her position in the Ministry of Education allowing her to choose her own visiting hours . . . Oktyabrina appearing gaily in the ward and Vladimir flushing with conflicting emotions.
‘It’s you/ he cried from his bed. ‘You’ve come! - but dearest, you must go away/
‘Calm yourself, Vladik/ said Oktyabrina. ‘You’ll be in marvelous shape soon. I know about hospitals - my mother practically ran one, after all.’
Far from calming himself, Vladimir raced into a series of exciting pleas: that Oktyabrina recognize the changes in him since her letter to Mama, that she return to him when he was well - but now leave, immediately. He had just overcome a sneezing fit when a woman with a muff entered the ward.
‘Summon the duty doctor, Comrade Nurse. And I’d like to see my son’s charts.’
When Vladimir’s mother recognized Oktyabrina, her first reaction was a surprising nervousness. Moreover, she vented her feelings not on Oktyabrina herself, but on the hospital staff. How dare they allow outsiders into the ward during nor-visiting hours. It was outrageous. . . . But she rather quickly drifted into her now familiar sermons about civic duty and reminders that when she was a Young Communist, people respected authority.
Someone recognized the moment to ease Oktyabrina from the ward, apparently ending the incident. But a moment later, Oktyabrina peeked into the doorway.