One of the dancers, with bare legs, had pinned a green doll in her hair and cross-belted herself with two red fox furs tied at the back by their tails.
All the male dancers were Charlestoning in narrow, pipe-like trousers that seemed in danger of splitting at any moment.
The audience quickly guessed who was represented by a man with greying hair parted in the middle and plastered flat with hair-cream. He was dressed in cream flannels and a grey jacket, and his face had been darkened with a thick layer of powder mixed with black grease. The grey-haired dancer's face positively glistened. On his arm dangled a carved walking-stick.
Without a doubt this was Mavrodiadi the lawyer. Half-Greek, half-Turk—no one knew how he had come to be in Tavria—Mavrodiadi patrolled the noisy Avenue at a certain hour every day. Many were the pairs of shoes he must have worn out on its pavements. In winter he would sit in an office somewhere coining money by giving legal advice to private traders on how to avoid paying their heavy taxes, or wangling inheritances for maiden aunts, and when spring came round, as soon as the first holiday-makers appeared, he would creep out on to the Avenue again. There he would get acquainted with young girls new to the town, read their palms and tell their fortunes with cards, go down to the beach with them, and lie about by the water's edge until dusk in his red fez with a black tassel. In the evening, after taking a turn along the Avenue, he would march off to the saloon swinging his walking-stick, kiss Madame's hand and dance until midnight.
But the most dangerous thing of all was that this old rake enjoyed the company of young people.
We hoped that Mavrodiadi's clientele would be considerably reduced after this evening, for the best way of exposing rakes and swindlers is to ridicule them in public.
At that moment, yet another belated pair of dancers popped out of the wings. The audience roared—a girl with her hair done in a bird's nest on the back of her head had walked in accompanied by Zuzya Trituzny!
He had been fitted out with checked trousers, but they reached only to his knees, like football shorts. He was wearing orange football boots, so that nobody could have any doubts as to who he was meant to be. Everything had been copied—Zuzya's favourite hair style with rubicund neck bare almost to his pate; the bow-tie adorning a stiff collar. And all his mannerisms were there too—the affectedly polite inclination of his head, the sentimental, doe-eyed staring into the eyes of his partner. Abandoning the' Charleston from time to time, Pasha the carpenter, who was acting Trituzny, would pretend to be dribbling a football and bellow out all Zuzya's favourite foreign' words and football terms—"shoot!", "s'il vous ptaitl", "ach, charmant!", "aujour d'huil", "off-sidei".. .
Never in his life could Zuzya have felt so foolish as he did that evening. On the football field he would have been far more at ease. Even if he had missed a shot at an open goal, the blunder would have been quickly forgotten, for the spectators' attention would have turned to the other players. But here Zuzya twisted and squirmed in full view of the audience for rather a long time.
At first the real Trituzny, recognizing himself in his double, snorted and, shrugging his shoulders contemptuously, started talking to Angelika. But when Pasha the carpenter approached the footlights and called out Zuzya's favourite phrases, the footballer with the cannon-ball shot realized that he was being made fun of in a rather unpleasant way. He began to blush. His neck turned purple, his lips hardened in a straight line. He tried to sit still as if nothing had happened, but more and more of the audience fixed their eyes on him. At last the, works director turned round in his direction and burst out laughing. Zuzya could stand it no longer. Twisting in his seat, he whispered something to his neighbour. Angelika smiled and shook her head. Zuzya grabbed her hand, obviously trying to lead her out of the hall. But with surprising calm Angelika took her hand away and again shook her head, continuing to watch the stage attentively.
Zuzya shrugged his shoulders offendedly, and letting his seat bang, walked towards the exit. He strode down the long passage between the rows. His long pointed shoes squeaked and people's heads turned as he passed. Some winked, others whispered the hateful phrases after him, but the final blow came from Pasha himself. Seeing that the dandy whom he was imitating was retreating, Pasha stepped up to the footlights with his girl friend in the tunic and shouted after Zuzya: "Au revoir!"
Then, sweeping Pasha aside, Madame Rogale-Piontkovskaya herself burst on to the stage. She ran up to the footlights, stirring up the dust with the hem of her old-fashioned dress sewn together out of overalls. Surveying the audience through an ivory lorgnette, Madame began a slow dance.
Who would have thought that this amazing likeness to the mistress of the dancing-class was not an actress but my friend Petka Maremukha!
Petka's hair had been transformed into grey ringlets and his plump cheeks had received a liberal coating of rouge. With paper clips Petka had fixed bits of cut-glass from a lamp shade to the lobes of his ears. The result was the living image of Madame! Only when Petka's husky bass began a monologue did we guess who it was.
Speaking to her dancing pupils and patting their shoulders,. Petka chattered away at about the speed of the Charleston.
"How are you getting on, my dears? Missing your Mummikins? Don't miss anyone, don't be sad. I'll teach you not to think. . . Why should you study and think of the future and read books? There's no need! It's terribly bad for you! Dance! Think with your feet! Like I'm doing, look at me. That's the way! That's the way! One-two! One-two-three! Hot it up, maestro!..."
Holding up his voluminous skirts, Petka began to perform amazing antics. It might have been a chechotka, it might have been a Ukrainian' gopak. But that did not matter.
He went over to the piano, and brushing the pianist aside, sat down at the instrument himself. And just as. his fingers touched the keys, an invisible band picked up the melody.
Although Petka swayed from side to side and worked the pedals, everyone realized that he was not playing, and gradually forgot about him.
The dancers quickened their pace in time with the music. Each pair danced in their own fashion. One of Madeleine's heels broke. She came down with a crash, pulling her partner, a lanky fellow with a pointed moustache, down on top of her. In the scramble that followed the girl with the fox furs had the green doll torn out of her hair and an elegant dandy attempted surreptitiously to hide it in his pocket. Trituzny (alias Pasha) left his tunic girl and started dancing with another. His insulted partner rushed at her rival with clenched fists. Madame Rogale-Piontkovskaya dashed up to separate them. In the confusion the dancers gave way to all their petty feelings. From stiff, stuck-up dummies they turned into yelping, whining creatures, jostling and abusing one another. Someone trod on Mavrodiadi's foot. But still he went on dancing, brandishing his walking-stick at his offender.
One after another the girls in high heels began to look down at their feet. Painful grimaces appeared on their faces. While they danced they tried to stick their fingers in their heels to gain a little relief.
At this point an obliging pair of hands appeared from the wings and placed a sign-post and a little bush on the edge of the stage. The sign-post had many arms, on which were written: "To the Liski," "To Sobachaya Gully," "To Matrosskaya Settlement," "To Kobazovaya Hill". . . The dancers made a dash for the cherished "grove." And then the audience saw more or less what Golovatsky and I had seen, when we were sitting on the park bench under the acacias. The girls pulled off their tight shoes, hopped about barefoot round the sign-post, uttering cries ofjoy and relief, then ran off home.