She looked at him with contempt. “Your attitude is terribly hostile and imperialistic, Comrade Inspector. You’re putting on airs as if you’re well-read, but you don’t fool me, you’re a fake. I wouldn’t be surprised if you never went past grade five. Do you always attack women as if you were a general?”
Paspelov was completely unprepared for her degree of insolence. “Do you realize whom you are speaking to? This, Dounia Avdeevna, could cost you your job! I am the school inspector and I was sent here by the People’s Commissariat of Education.”
Dounia rushed back at him. “School inspector, hah! You’re nothing more than a flea! You were born a flea and you’ll die a flea!”
“How dare you!” Paspelov could not believe his ears. “You’re an illiterate and vulgar creature, you have no place in a school, let alone becoming a candidate for Deputy of the Village Soviet. I will be certain to brief Yeliseyenko, the school superintendent, on the mess here. Then we’ll see who the flea is!”
At this fiery moment, to Boris’s great surprise, as if out of nowhere, two government officers entered the room. They were both in official army uniforms and their chests and lapels were heavily decorated. Revolvers dangled from their holsters. The taller of the two, Paspelov noticed, was carrying what appeared to be a bottle wrapped in brown paper.
“Dounia!” Kokoshin rushed to her, and looked into her face with concern. “What’s going on in here? We heard all the racket from outside. Is everything all right? Have you been waiting for us long?” Then catching sight of the inspector standing against the wall, he raised his brows suspiciously. “Who’s that?”
“His name’s Boris Paspelov. And he’s been harassing me all afternoon. It’s a good thing you came when you did. He was just about to hit me.”
At that moment Paspelov felt rather dizzy. It was precisely then that he realized whom he was dealing with and how dangerous the situation was that he had created for himself — it hit him like a ton of bricks. He had battled with the wrong person; it was now obvious Dounia Avdeevna had friends in high places, and these friends, with just a wave of her hand were capable of bringing him down. Wiping his forehead, swallowing hard, he gathered his belongings quickly and made for the door. In a faint voice, he bade farewell and hastened to his car.
Dounia shouted after him sarcastically, “Good day to you too, Comrade Paspelov. Who’s the flea now? Hah! Hah! Hah!”
The sun was setting, and a harsh and bitter wind coming in from the north piled the snow in large heaps against the schoolyard fence. It was so cold outside one could hardly breathe. With his hands trembling upon the steering wheel, the snow-covered countryside rushed past Paspelov, who felt he was having a bad dream. He knew it was the beginning of the end for him. His ascent up the Party ladder had stopped before it had gotten started, thanks to Dounia Avdeevna, future Deputy of the Village Soviet of B.S.S.R.
CHAPTER 21
One day Ohrimko Suchok’s grandmother appeared in Hlaby and took him to her house in a faraway settlement somewhere beyond Kolodny, in the heart of a deep forest. She brought him there to make him a winter coat from wool she had spun herself. Although Ohrimko’s grandmother was planning to bring him home in just a few days, Kulik already found himself missing the boy. He had an empty feeling, and he thought how glad he would be to see the boy come breezing through the door of the school, his big bright eyes shining and a broad smile on his face.
But thoughts of the boy became intertwined with other thoughts, grave and serious, and he began to feel uneasy. He could not understand or put into words what was troubling him. He missed Ohrimko, and felt as if the boy’s absence would trigger something horrible and disastrous.
When Ohrimko had been gone for two days, Paraska came out of her small wooden house some time before noon, and crossed the road to the school. The day was cold and blustery. It was late March, but it felt more like the middle of January. Dressed in a ragged overcoat two sizes too large for her, and with a crudely spun shawl wrapped around her head, she suddenly stopped in the road and strained her ears to listen. There was a peculiar sound coming from the near distance — it was the rumbling of a motor car, coming closer and closer, toward her. What she saw made her heart thud. It was a car, but not just an ordinary car. It was an enclosed black police car.
“It’s the NKVD!” she screamed. Scared out of her wits, she ran headlong into the school. “Director! Director! They’re coming! They’re coming! Lord have mercy on us!”
Kulik, jumping up from behind his desk, hurried to the window. Peering outside, he whispered in a voice that was not his own, “It’s the Black Crow.”
“Oh, my God! Oh, my God!” Paraska clutched her chest. “Just when I thought things couldn’t get any worse! My Philip’s slipping in and out of consciousness. He’s at death’s door. My life’s a living hell and there’s no end in sight. What misfortune! What misfortune! And now of all things, the Black Crow!”
With each passing second the rumbling grew louder. At last the car swerved to the right and came to a screeching halt by the schoolyard fence. The front and back doors flew open and out came six NKVD men, all in long gray army coats with rifles strapped over their shoulders. One of them Kulik recognized immediately: Simon Stepanovich Sobakin. As he watched the men, he was convinced they had come for him. Why else would they have stopped at the school?
The NKVD men grouped together a moment, then hurriedly broke up into two groups: the first, under the command of a sergeant-major, started for the village, while the other, led by Sobakin, did not turn into the school as Kulik had expected, but made for Paraska’s house. When she saw that, Paraska’s face filled with dread and she shook like a leaf. A fearfully unnatural cry ripped from her throat, and half-hysterical, she threw herself outside, crying out the names of her children: “Lida! Maria! … God, no! Don’t harm my children!” Lifting her overcoat up to her knees, running through the deep snow, somehow she managed to catch up to the men just as they were about to open the door of her house. Weeping violently, she tried to push her way in front of them. “What do you want from us? We’re law-abiding citizens. We’ve done nothing wrong. My children! Please don’t harm my children!”
“Out of our way!” A heavy hand landed on her shoulder and pushed her aside. The alarm on her face intensified when she recognized the man standing over her. It was Sobakin.
“Why do you look so shaken up, my dear?” He gave her a mocking grin. “No need to be scared. Nothing is going to happen to you. Now come on, grab hold of yourself. Besides, we’re forever grateful to you. Remember on our last visit when you gave us that fine feast? That was most kind and generous of you.”
Clearing his throat, he spat between his feet, and motioned to his men to follow him inside.
Paraska’s children, seeing the strangers enter the house, were frightened and tried to hide. Three-year-old Danilo crawled under the table and screamed for his mother.
Sobakin walked across the room without saying a word. Slipping his hand into his leather shoulder bag, he brought out a piece of paper and read harshly, “Philip Semionovich Braskov! Does he live here?”
At the sound of her husband’s name, Paraska’s agony was indescribable. Looking frantically from one NKVD man to another, she said, “Philip, that’s my husband. He’s over there on the sofa. As you can see he’s very sick. I don’t expect him to make it to the morning.” Then with tears gushing from her eyes, her voice breaking, “Please, don’t harm him, I beg you. He didn’t do anything wrong.”