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Valentyn tensed and sat up. “I can’t just pick up and leave, it’s not that simple. Going to Lvov is a very serious matter and we must think it over carefully.” Then, trying to reason with her, “It’s very difficult to come to any sort of agreement with you, Efrosinia. All you ever do is curse and holler, and you even do it in front of company. And as far as Lvov is concerned, do you realize it’s over five hundred kilometers away?”

“Five hundred kilometers!” Efrosinia couldn’t contain herself. “Don’t tell me you’re scared of a measly five hundred kilometers!”

The violence of their shouting escalated and the young people in the living room began having trouble hearing each other. With every outburst Kulik found himself more shocked, while Sergei, shrugging and lowering his head in embarrassment, muttered, “After a while one gets used to it.” Marusia seemed not to be affected in the least; she began to fuss with her hair.

As the shouting intensified and became obscene, Kulik found it unbearable. He got up, gathered his things and bade a quick farewell. As he was heading for the door, he heard Valentyn’s voice shoot across the room, “Louder, old woman, why don’t you scream louder. Go on, wake up the entire neighborhood!”

“Why, you old bull!” she shot back. “You moan and groan for half the day and the other half you sleep. What, pray God, did I ever do to deserve a husband like you?”

Then came more outbursts and Efrosinia started to call her husband every foul name she could think of. Dishes went crashing to the floor, there was a heavy thud, then a loud bang.

Marusia had seemed oblivious to what was going on. Now, without uttering a word, she pulled herself up from the sofa, and walked a little unsteadily across the room to the kitchen door. Opening it a crack, she called out quietly, “Mother, you must calm yourself, please. Your valerian drops are in the top dresser drawer by your bed. Shall I go and get them for you?” Then to Kulik and Sergei, “Poor Mother, she has a heart condition. I do worry about her so.”

CHAPTER 8

During his two-week stay in Pinsk, Kulik rented a small garret in a house on Zaliznitsa Street. It was cold and drafty, with a low, musty ceiling and faded, water-stained walls. The furniture was in keeping with the room: a cot covered with worn but clean linen, a painted chest of drawers, and, by the door, an old wooden chair. The one window, not much bigger than a small picture frame, overlooked the busy street, the sounds of which filled the room night and day. Heavy armored trucks rolled by one after the other, and every few minutes one could hear the clamoring of troikas. People shouted nonstop. It felt as if the room existed in the middle of a train station at some busy crossroads.

Standing by the window, Kulik found himself thinking of Marusia, Sergei’s green-eyed cousin. Her beauty was truly startling, and it was difficult for him to imagine how such a lovely creature could be found in a drab provincial town like Pinsk. Her poise and grace could rival that of any woman in Vienna or Berlin.

But she had a cold and capricious personality, and seemed to treat people, especially men, with a certain disrespect. She had a classic Ukrainian face, high cheekbones, deep-set eyes, an upturned nose, but her soul was foreign. She had clearly lost any sense of her own self and all too readily accepted the ways of an aggressive alien culture. She spoke only Russian, frequented only Russian cinemas, and read only Russian books and newspapers. She had slipped so far away from her own people that she showed contempt for them when they were mentioned.

Kulik felt uneasy, and questions gnawed away at him. How could he have allowed himself to become helplessly attracted to a girl so misguided and so aloof? He felt almost as if some spell had been cast over him, one he could not fight.

And he wondered about Pinsk. What had it become? Where did its glory go? It had so readily succumbed to a brutal, insatiable power, bowing and bobbing to its every whim. He thought of Cornelius, Efrosinia, Valentyn, Marusia…. They all want Ukraine to become part of the USSR, he thought, and all Ukrainians to become Russians. An unredeemable strain of weakness runs through their veins and they are heading for a cataclysmic end. Don’t they see they are being systematically destroyed, so that in the end it will be easier to declare them all part of a single Russian people?

A light snow was falling, dusting the streets where a procession of tanks and trucks were passing directly beneath him, all in the same direction. He thought in anguish, Pinsk, you have become a lost city. It’s as if you have landed at the bottom of a raging inferno. The deeper Kulik delved into these thoughts, the thicker the air in the room became. He felt dizzy, stumbled over to the chair by the door and sat down, his head dropped between his shoulders like a limp cabbage. After five or ten minutes, taking several long, deep breaths, he began to feel revitalized. He got up slowly, and put on his overcoat and cap.

He set out for the city center. The roads were full of potholes, and the small wooden houses lining either side showed signs of decay, even abandonment. On occasion, dim light from oil lamps glowed through tiny curtained windows, where faint, barely perceptible movement could be detected.

Further along, coming upon the old Jewish quarter, he passed several inns, all stucco, two stories high and built in the shape of matchboxes. Peasants traveling to Pinsk from surrounding villages to sell their wares in the marketplace often came here to spend the night in exchange for eggs, grains and other products. These inns, always bustling with life and activity, were now silenced. The window panes were knocked out, the walls had become cracked and stained, in some places even showing bare laths, and over the doors, boarded and padlocked, the respective signs had been torn down. The extent of destruction was evident everywhere, and it had a profoundly upsetting effect on Kulik. As he continued down the road, everywhere he looked he saw more of the same.

After crossing several intersections, he finally reached the city center. Turning left, he entered Lahishenska Street, a lovely, broad, tree-lined avenue with shops, restaurants and government buildings. He remembered coming as a young boy to Lahishenska with his father, strolling up and down its walkways and lanes, admiring the fine architecture and enjoying the hustle and bustle of city life. Passersby had greeted each other amicably. Kulik had always loved his visits here; they were a welcome escape from the dreariness of village life.

But now Lahishenska was overrun with army trucks, armored cars and tank units. They roared non-stop in both directions over the rough surface of the reddish cobblestones, their blinding headlights tearing into the night. Kulik stood back and watched, angry and astonished. The entire city had become transformed. Militiamen in long gray overcoats with satchels under their arms whirled past him, small groups of rank-and-file workers rushed in and out of buildings, chattering urgently, pulling large bundles behind them, and there were shabbily dressed laborers going to work in nearby shipbuilding yards or metal-working factories, carrying lunches wrapped in newspapers. Everywhere, on building walls, on fences, in entranceways, were pictures of Stalin.

Kulik walked over the dirty snow, his head down, overhearing snatches of conversation, all in Russian. No one paid any attention to him; he felt like a stranger among strangers in a strange city, one that had once been dear to him. Almost overnight Pinsk, the beautiful ancient port city, had undergone a complete transformation.

After walking to the end of Lahishenska, Kulik turned right onto Market Square, where there was a magnificent stone church in the baroque style, its elaborate tower twisted into curves. The intricate plasterwork on the numerous arches glowed like exquisite, exotic jewels. Kulik did not know the entire history of this church, but he did know that it had housed Polish Jesuits, and before that, prior to the 1914 war, it had been in the hands of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church.