“A certain comrade whom many will recognize, neglects to turn off the light when leaving the rest-room. Electricity costs money to the Soviet State, comrade.”
“We hear that Comrade Kira Argounova is lacking in social spirit. The time is past, Comrade Argounova, for arrogant bourgeois attitudes.”
She stood very still and heard her heart beating. No one dared to ignore the mighty pointing finger of the Wall Newspaper. All watched it carefully and a little nervously, all bowed reverently to its verdict, from Nina and Tina up to Comrade Voronov himself. The Wall Newspaper was the voice of Social Activity. No one could save those branded as “anti-social element,” not even Andrei Taganov. There had been talk of a reduction of staffs. Kira felt cold. She thought that Leo had had nothing but millet for dinner the night before. She thought of Leo’s cough.
At her desk, she watched the others in the room, wondering who had reported her to the Wall Newspaper, who and why. She had been so very careful. She had never uttered a word of criticism against the Soviets. She had been as loyally enthusiastic in her work as Comrade Bitiuk herself, or as nearly as she could imitate her. She had been careful never to argue, nor to answer sharply, nor to make an enemy of anyone. Her fingers counting rapidly volumes of the works of Karl Marx, she asked herself helplessly, desperately: “Am I still different? Am I different from them? How do they know I’m different? What have I done? What is it I haven’t done?”
When Comrade Bitiuk left the office, which happened frequently, work stopped. The staff congregated around Tina’s typewriter. There were eager whispered conferences about the co-operative that gave the loveliest printed calico that made the loveliest blouses, about the Nepman’s stand in the market that sold cotton stockings “so thin it’s just like silk,” and about lovers, particularly Tina’s lovers. Tina was considered the prettiest in the office, and the most successful with men. No one had ever seen her little nose without its whitish coat of powder; there was a strong suspicion in the office that she blackened her eyelashes; and several different masculine figures had been seen waiting to take her home after work. The girl with the leather jacket, being a Party member, was the undisputed leader and final authority in all their discussions; but in matters of romance, she conceded first rank to Tina. She listened with a superior, condescending smile that did not hide her eager curiosity, while Tina whispered breathlessly:
“... And Mishka rang the bell and here was Ivashka in his underdrawers and I hear Elena Maximovna — that’s the tenant in the next room — I hear Elena Maximovna say: ‘A guest for you, Tina,’ and before I know it, here’s Mishka walking right in and Ivashka in his underdrawers — and you should’ve seen Mishka’s face, honest, it was better than a comedy show — and I think quick and I say: ‘Mishka dear, this is Ivan, the neighbor, he lives with Elena Maximovna and he wasn’t feeling well, so he came in for an aspirin tablet,’ and you should’ve seen Ivashka’s face, and Elena Maximovna she says: ‘Sure, he lives with me. Come on back to my room, darling.’ And do you think that louse Ivashka refused?”
The young man who was a Party candidate did not join these conversations, but stayed modestly at his desk, listening intently and remarking once in a while: “You comrades women! I bet you say things that a serious citizen who is a Party candidate shouldn’t even hear.”
They giggled, flattered, and rewarded him with friendly glances.
Kira stayed at her desk and went on with her work, and did not listen. She never talked to anyone outside of business matters. If any glances were thrown at her occasionally, they were not friendly.
She wondered with a cold feeling of panic whether that was what they resented, whether that was her arrogant bourgeois attitude. She needed this job. Leo needed this job. She had made up her mind to keep it. She would keep it.
She rose and walked casually to Tina’s desk. The little group noticed her presence by a few cold, astonished glances and went on with their whispers.
She waited for a pause and said suddenly, irrelevantly, forcing all of the artificial enthusiasm she had learned into her flat, unsteady voice: “Funny thing happened last night. My boy friend — he quarreled with me because ... because he had seen me coming home with another man ... and he ... he bawled me out terribly ... and I told him it was an old-fashioned bourgeois attitude of proprietorship, but he ... well ... he quarreled with me....”
She felt her blouse sticking to the cold spot between her shoulder blades. She tried to make her voice as gaily flippant as Tina’s. She tried to believe the story she was inventing; it was strange to think of the fantastic boy friend offered to those prying, hostile eyes, and of the Leo whom Irina had drawn naked as a god.
“... and he bawled me out terribly....”
“Uh-huh,” said Nina.
The girl in the leather jacket said nothing.
“In the Kouznetzky market,” said Tina, “I’ve seen them selling lipstick, the new Soviet lipstick of the Cosmetic Trust. Cheap, too. Only they say it’s dangerous to use it. It’s made from horse fat and the horses died of glanders.”
At twelve-thirty the office closed for lunch. At twelve-twenty-five, Comrade Bitiuk said: “I shall remind you once more, comrades, that at one-thirty, instead of reporting back to the office, you are to report at the Smolny Institute to take part in the demonstration of all the workers of Petrograd in honor of the delegation of the British Trade Unions. The office will be closed this afternoon.”
Kira spent her lunch hour standing in line at the co-operative to get bread on her employee’s ration card. She stood motionless, in a blank stupor; a movement or a thought seemed too far away, far in a world where she did not belong any longer. The locks of hair under her old hat were white with frost. She thought that somewhere beyond all these many things which did not count, was her life and Leo. She closed her eyes for one swift second of rest with nothing but his name. Then she opened her eyes and watched dully, through lids heavy with white-frosted lashes, puffy sparrows picking horse dung in the snow.
She had brought her lunch with her — a piece of dried fish wrapped in paper. She ate it, because she knew she had to eat. When she got the bread — a two-pound brown square that was still fresh — she smelled its comforting, warm odor and chewed slowly a piece of crust; the rest, tucked firmly under her arm, was for Leo.
She ran after a tramway and leaped on just in time for the long ride to the Smolny Institute at the other end of the city, for the demonstration of all the workers of Petrograd in honor of the delegation of the British Trade Unions.
Nevsky looked as if it were a solid spread of heads motionless on a huge belt that rolled slowly, carrying them forward. It looked as if red banners, swollen like sails between two poles, were swimming slowly over motionless heads, the same heads of khaki caps, fur caps, red kerchiefs, hats, khaki caps, red kerchiefs. A dull beating filled the street from wall to wall, up to the roofs, the crunching, creaking, drumming roll of many feet against frozen cobblestones.
Tramways stopped and trucks waited on corners to let the demonstration pass. A few heads appeared at windows, stared indifferently at the heads below and disappeared again: Petrograd was used to demonstrations.
WE, TOILERS OF PETROGRAD, GREET OUR BRITISH CLASS BROTHERS! WELCOME TO THE LAND OF THE SOVIETS WHERE LABOR IS FREE!
THE WOMEN OF THE STATE TEXTILE PLANT NUMBER 2 PLEDGE THEIR SUPPORT TO ENGLAND’S PROLETARIAT IN ITS STRUGGLE WITH IMPERIALISTS
Kira marched between Nina and Comrade Bitiuk. Comrade Bitiuk had changed her hat to a red kerchief for the occasion. Kira marched steadily, shoulders thrown back, head high. She had to march here to keep her job; she had to keep her job for Leo; she was not a traitor, she was marching for Leo — even though the banner above her, carried by Tina and the Party candidates, said: