'There is no leather in Zhitomir', Lariosik was saying perplexedly. 'Simply none to be had at all, you see. At least of the kind of leather I'm used to wearing. I sent round to all the shoemakers, offering them as much money as they liked, but it was no good. So I had to . . .'
As he caught sight of Elena Lariosik turned pale, shifted from foot to foot and for some reason staring down at the emerald-green fringe of her dressing-gown, he said:
'Elena Vasilievna, I'm going straight out to the shops to hunt around, and you shall have a new dinner service today. I don't know what to say. How can I apologise to you? I should be shot for ruining your china. I'm so terribly clumsy', he added to Nikolka. 'I shall go out to the shops at once', he went on, turning back to Elena.
'Please don't try and go to any shops. You couldn't anyway, because they're all shut. Don't you know what's happening here in the City?'
'Of course I know!' exclaimed Lariosik. 'After all, I came here on a hospital train, as you know from the telegram.'
'What telegram?' asked Elena. 'We've had no telegram.'
'What?' Lariosik opened his wide mouth. 'You never got it? Aha! Now I realise', he turned to Nikolka, 'why you were so amazed to see me . . . But how . . . Mama sent a telegram of sixty -three words.'
'Phew, sixty-three words!' Nikolka said in astonishment. 'What a pity. Telegrams are very slow in getting through these days. Or to be more accurate, they're not getting through at all.'
'What's to happen then?' Lariosik said in a pained voice. 'Will you let me stay with you?' He looked around helplessly, and it
was at once obvious from his expression that he liked it very much at the Turbins' and did not want to go away.
'It's all arranged', replied Elena and nodded graciously. 'We have agreed. Stay here and make yourself as comfortable as you can. But you can see what a misfortune . . .'
Lariosik looked more upset than ever. His eyes became clouded with tears.
'Elena Vasilievna!' he said with emotion, 'I'll do everything I can to help. I can go without sleep for three or four days on end if necessary.'
'Thank you.'
'And now,' Lariosik said to Nikolka, 'could you please lend me a pair of scissors?'
Nikolka, so amazed and fascinated that he was still as dishevelled as when he had woken up, ran out and came back with the scissors. Lariosik started to unbutton his tunic, then blinked and said to Nikolka:
'Excuse me, I think I'd better go into your room for a minute, if you don't mind . . .'
In Nikolka's room Lariosik took off his tunic, revealing an extremely dirty shirt. Then armed with the scissors he ripped open the glossy black lining of the tunic and pulled out of it a thick greenish-yellow wad of money. This he bore solemnly into the dining-room and laid on the table in front of Elena, saying:
'There, Elena Vasilievna, allow me to present you with the money for my keep.'
'But why are you in such a hurry?' Elena asked, blushing. 'You could have paid later . . .'
Lariosik protested hotly:
'No, no, Elena Vasilievna, please take it now. At difficult times like this money is always extremely necessary, I understand that very well!' He unwrapped the package, from which a woman's picture fell out as he did so. Lariosik swiftly picked it up and with a sigh thrust it into his pocket. 'In any case it will be safer with you. What do I want it for? I shall only need to buy a few cigarettes and some canary seed for the bird . . .'
For a moment Elena forgot about Alexei's wound and she was so favourably impressed by Lariosik's sensible and timely action that a gleam of cheerfulness came into her eyes.
'Maybe he's not such a booby as I thought he was at first', she thought. 'He's polite and conscientious, even if he is a bit eccentric. It's an awful shame about the dinner service, though.'
'What a type', thought Nikolka. Lariosik's miraculous appearance had driven the gloomy thoughts from his mind.
'There's eight thousand roubles here', said Lariosik, pushing the packet across the table, which from the color of the money looked like scrambled eggs with chopped chives. 'If there's not enough we'll count it again and I'll write home for some more.'
'No, no, that doesn't matter, later will do', replied Elena. 'I'm going to tell Anyuta right away to heat the water so you can have a bath. But tell me - how did you come here? I don't understand how you managed to get through.' Elena began to roll the money into a bundle and stuff it into the huge pocket of her dressing-gown.
Lariosik's eyes filled with horror at the memory.
'It was a nightmare!' he exclaimed, clasping his hands like a Catholic at prayer. 'It took me nine days . . . no, sorry, was it ten? Just a moment. . . Sunday, yes, Monday . . . No, it took me eleven days travelling here from Zhitomir!'
'Eleven days!' cried Nikolka. 'You see?' he said reproachfully, for some reason, to Elena.
'Yes, eleven days. When I left the train belonged to the Hetman's government, but on the way it was taken over by Petlyura's men. One day we stopped at a station - what's it called now? Oh dear, I've forgotten . . . anyway, it doesn't matter . . . and there if you please, they wanted to shoot me. These troops of Petlyura's appeared, wearing pigtails . . .'
'Blue ones?' Nikolka asked with curiosity.
'No, red . . . yes, red ones . . . and they shouted: "Get out! We're going to shoot you on the spot!" They had decided I was an officer, hiding in a hospital train. And the only reason I had been able to get on that train was because Mama knew Doctor Kuritsky.'
'Kuritsky?' Nikolka exclaimed meaningfully. 'I see . . . our Ukrainian nationalist friend. We know him.'
'Yes, that's him ... it was he who brought the train to us at Zhitomir . . . God! I started to pray, believe me. I thought this was the end. And d'you know what? The bird saved me. I wasn't an officer, I said, I was an ornithologist, and I showed him the bird. I'm a bird-breeder, I said . . . Well, one of them punched me on the back of the neck and said "All right, bird-man, you can go to hell for all I care!" The insolence! As a gentleman I ought to have killed him, but I could hardly . . . you understand . . .'
'Elena', came a weak voice from Alexei's bedroom. Elena swung round and ran out without waiting to hear the rest of the story.
#
On December 15th, according to the calendar, the sun sets at half past three in the afternoon, so by three o'clock twilight began to settle on the apartment. But at that hour the hands on Elena's face were showing the most depressed and hopeless time on the human clock-face - half past five. The hands of the clock were formed by two sad folds at the corners of her mouth which were drawn down towards her chin, whilst in her eyes, depression and resolution had begun their struggle against disaster.
Nikolka's face showed a jagged, wavering twenty to one, because Nikolka's head was full of chaos and confusion evoked by the significant enigmatic words: Malo-Provalnaya . . .', words spoken by the dying man in the fighting at the crossroads yesterday, words which somehow had to be deciphered no later than the next few days. The chaos and difficulties had also been evoked by the puzzling and interesting figure of Lariosik falling from the sky into the Turbins' life and by the fact that a monstrous, grand event had befallen them: Petlyura had captured the city. Petlyura, of all people - and the City, of all places. And what would happen in it now was incomprehensible and inconceivable even to the most intelligent of human minds. One thing was quite clear - yesterday saw the most appalling catastrophe: all our forces were thoroughly beaten, caught with their pants down. Their blood shrieks to