“While Dounia was carrying on like that, you could see that she was enjoying herself and feeling self-important. She believed that her new position as schoolteacher was a great mission to educate the poor illiterate peasant children of the marsh, to show them the light.
“Right after her little speech, Cornelius broke through of the crowd and rushed up to her. He rummaged through his pockets and pulled out a large silver key tied with a red ribbon. ‘Dounia Avdeevna, I present you with a key to the Morozovich school.’”
Kulik listened to Sergei’s account, dumbfounded and disturbed. What would the level of education be like for the children with a teacher like Dounia? Her appointment by the Party was a complete farce, and as far as he could see, its aim could only be to destroy the existing culture and widen the tide of Russification. He found it too painful to think about, so he tried to change the subject.
“I believe you mentioned you have had some form of higher education?” he said to Sergei.
“Yes, I graduated from a gymnasium in Pinsk just over two years ago.”
“Have you ever thought of teaching? As it happens, we’re short a couple of teachers. Three classrooms in the left wing are still empty and they’ll most likely be assigned to higher grades, probably grades five and six. What do you think, would you like to try your hand at it? To tell the truth, our working together will make life a little more bearable here. Please say you’ll consider it.”
Sergei paused, but not for long. He smiled broadly.
“Actually, I have a confession to make — the reason I came to see you tonight was to ask you about this very thing.”
“Well, then it’s settled.” Kulik was very pleased.
Glancing at his watch, he noticed it was well past midnight. The two men shook hands and bade each other goodnight.
CHAPTER 3
Beyond the village, at the top of a steep hill, camouflaged by dense fog, was a large manor house. It was three stories of whitish gray stone with an expansive veranda and a galvanized iron cornice. The tall arched windows on the first level were boarded up with sheets of scrap wood, and the front and back doors were nailed shut by crisscross wooden beams. There were two huge wooden signs in the yard reading KEEP OUT. Next to the house on the left stood a barn with goats, sheep, bulls and milking cows. Farther down on the slope of the hill beneath an elderberry bush was a chicken coop, and attached to it, a makeshift tumbledown turkey roost. Thick chestnut trees encircled the property and lined the driveway, and their branches, already bare, snapped and creaked in the cold autumn breeze.
Yesterday Olivinski was the owner of the large house on the hill, its lord and master, and today he was gone. With one heavy blow the new regime destroyed his little paradise, turning it to smoke and dust. Everything had been transformed and all its past glory abruptly ended.
It was an unparalleled time in history. Revolution had changed the destiny of so many, so suddenly, and so decisively: the farmlands were being ripped away from the bourgeoisie and given to the peasants, kolkhozes were popping up everywhere, and in the cities, the factories and government offices had become the property of the new regime. Nothing like it had ever been seen before. The poor, the hungry, and the oppressed would now, for the first time ever, enjoy happiness and plenty, and all thanks to their new Russian liberators.
To the right of the manor house, in a garden patch overgrown with milkweed and wild grasses, there appeared a large, strange bird, foreign to these parts. It was a peacock, whose wide, resplendent train was on full display as he strutted through the garden, wailing like a screech owl. His long, drawn-out cries rose above the fields and traveled into the heart of the village, to come back as a muted echo.
As the sun rose, the fog lifted and the morning countryside was brought into full view. Almost all the villagers had gathered before the broad wooden gates of the manor house. The new regime had promised them that the big house on the hill was no longer a symbol of misery and repression: it was now a bastion of hope.
Everyone knew that the Olivinski manor was home to a superior breed of cattle imported from Holland, to the finest pigs, and the best roosting chickens to be found anywhere. The poorest peasants huddled together, carrying empty sacks and baskets, some even came with rickety old wheelbarrows and broken-down handcarts. They were awaiting Iofe Nicel Leyzarov, who yesterday had made the following announcement:
“Comrades, in the name of Stalin and the Bolshevik Party, the riches of the Olivinski estate will be handed out to the people. We will first distribute it among the poorest of the poor. As you all know, Olivinski was a very rich and powerful man and stopped at nothing to get what he wanted. And how do you suppose he got that way? By the toil and sweat of the masses. You have suffered enough, people. Today marks the beginning of the end, and by this time tomorrow everything that was his will be yours. And the poorest will benefit the most. They will have so many eggs they won’t know what to do with them all, they’ll be up to their elbows in sausages and backfat, and there will be enough milk to feed an army. Tomorrow, dear people, is your day of reckoning! Remember, a pledge given by a Bolshevik is as solid as the written law itself.”
When Leyzarov’s speech ended, there were such outbursts of joyful, hysterical cheering that the ground shook as if from an earthquake.
That morning a woman banged on Kulik’s door. She was in her early thirties with a very pale, almost glassy complexion, hollow cheeks and dark-ringed eyes. Her name was Paraska Braskovia, and she was the new school cleaning woman finally assigned by Cornelius. Her shabby overcoat and oversized worn leather boots made her poverty evident at once.
“Director! Director!” she cried at the top of her voice. “Get up! You’ve got to help me! Come to the manor house with me. Please get up before everything is given away. I beg you!”
Kulik had been sound asleep; he flipped over onto his side and threw his pillow over his head to muffle the sound of her voice. He called out, “Do you know what time it is? It’s barely six o’clock. Just go to the meeting and find a spot near the front gates. You’ve got nothing to worry about, you’ll get what you deserve.”
But Paraska only banged harder. “Director, don’t go back to sleep, I need your help. I can’t get through. I’ve already tried and the crowd is too big. Oh, I’m completely beside myself! Please, you’ve got to help me.”
As Paraska’s voice grew louder and more insistent, Kulik rolled over and reluctantly pulled himself out of bed. Rubbing his eyes, he shouted, “Give me a couple of minutes. I’ll be right with you.” Then under his breath, “Oh, that insufferable woman!”
Hardly giving him time to button his shirt and put on his trousers, she banged again. “Hurry, Director, hurry! When the mob sees you at my side, they’ll make way for me. Just one word from the headmaster of the school, and the Representative of the District Committee will present me with the finest milking cow. Just you wait and see!”
Paraska was convinced that the headmaster’s position in the village could really help her case. He would explain to the officials her desperate situation and how she barely had enough to make ends meet. He would tell them how miserable and hopeless her life was, that her husband was deathly ill, probably on the brink of death, that she had no money or possessions, and that her five small children were barefoot and hungry most of the time.
Opening the door at last, Kulik, avoiding her eyes, agreed to accompany her to the manor house. They made their way out of the cold, gray village. The road, completely deserted, was one long stretch of mud, barely passable. From time to time the silence was broken by vague noises from the surrounding fields.