“Ration cards — they’re for Soviet employees only. And for students. We get only two ration cards. Just two cards for the family — and it isn’t easy. Victor’s student card at the Institute and Irina’s at the Academy of Arts. But I’m not employed anywhere, so I get no card, and Vasili....”
She stopped short, as if her words, running, had skidded too far. She looked at her husband, furtively, a glance that seemed to cringe. Vasili Ivanovitch was staring into his plate and said nothing.
Maria Petrovna’s hands fluttered up eloquently: “These are hard times, God have pity on us, these are hard times. Galina, do you remember Lili Savinskaia, the one who never wore any jewelry except pearls? Well, she’s dead. She died in 1919. It was like this: they had nothing to eat for days, and her husband was walking in the street and he saw a horse that fell and died of hunger, and there was a mob fighting for the body. They tore it to pieces, and he got some. He brought it home and they cooked it, and ate, and I suppose the horse hadn’t died of hunger only, for they both got terribly sick. The doctors saved him, but Lili died.... He lost everything in 1918, of course.... His sugar business — it was nationalized the same day when our fur store....”
She stopped short again, her eyelids trembling over a glance at Vasili Ivanovitch. Visili Ivanovitch said nothing.
“More,” said little Acia sullenly and extended her plate for a second helping of millet.
“Kira!” Irina called brightly across the table, her voice very clear and loud, as if to sweep away all that had been said. “Did you eat fresh fruit in the Crimea?”
“Yes. Some,” Kira answered indifferently.
“I’ve been dreaming, yearning and dying for grapes. Don’t you like grapes?”
“I never notice what I eat,” said Kira.
“Of course,” Maria Petrovna hurried on, “Lili Savinskaia’s husband is working now. He’s a clerk in a Soviet office. Some people are taking employment, after all....” She looked openly at Vasili Ivanovitch and waited, but he did not answer.
Galina Petrovna asked timidly: “How’s ... how’s our old house?”
“Yours? On Kamenostrovsky? Don’t even dream of it. A sign painter lives there now. A real proletarian. God knows where you’ll find an apartment, Galina. People are crowded like dogs.”
Alexander Dimitrievitch asked hesitantly: “Have you heard what ... about the factory ... what happened to my factory?”
“Closed,” Vasili Ivanovitch snapped suddenly. “They couldn’t run it. Closed. Like everything else.”
Maria Petrovna coughed. “Such a problem for you, Galina, such a problem! Are the girls going to school? Or — how are you going to get ration cards?”
“But — I thought — with the NEP and all, you have private stores now.”
“Sure — NEP, their New Economic Policy, sure, they allow private stores now, but where will you get the money to buy there? They charge you ten times more than the ration cooperatives. I haven’t been in a private store yet. We can’t afford it. No one can afford it. We can’t even afford the theater. Victor’s taken me to a show once. But Vasili — Vasili won’t set foot inside a theater.”
“Why not?”
Vasili Ivanovitch raised his head, his eyes stern, and said solemnly: “When your country is in agony, you don’t seek frivolous recreations. I’m in mourning — for my country.”
“Lydia,” Irina asked in her sweeping voice, “aren’t you in love yet?”
“I do not answer indecent questions,” said Lydia.
“I’ll tell you, Galina,” Maria Petrovna hurried and coughed, choked, and went on, “I’ll tell you the best thing to do: Alexander must take a job.”
Galina Petrovna sat up straight, as if she had been slapped in the face. “A Soviet job?”
“Well ... all jobs are Soviet jobs.”
“Not as long as I live,” Alexander Dimitrievitch stated with unexpected strength.
Vasili Ivanovitch dropped his spoon and it clattered into his plate; silently, solemnly, he stretched his big fist across the table and shook Alexander Dimitrievitch’s hand and threw a dark glance at Maria Petrovna. She cringed, swallowed a spoonful of millet, coughed.
“I’m not saying anything about you, Vasili,” she protested timidly. “I know you don’t approve and ... well, you never will.... But I was just thinking they get bread cards, and lard, and sugar, the Soviet employees do — sometimes.”
“When I have to take Soviet employment,” said Vasili Ivanovitch, “you’ll be a widow, Marussia.”
“I’m not saying anything, Vasili, only....”
“Only stop worrying. We’ll get along. We have so far. There are still plenty of things to sell.”
Galina Petrovna looked at the nails on the walls; she looked at her sister’s hands, the famous hands that artists had painted and a poem had been written about — “Champagne and Maria’s hands.” They were frozen to a dark purple, swollen and cracked. Maria Petrovna had known the value of her hands; she had learned how to keep them in sight constantly, how to use them with the pliant grace of a ballerina. It was a habit she had not lost. Galina Petrovna wished she would lose it; the soft, fluttering gestures of those hands were only one more reminder.
Vasili Ivanovitch was speaking suddenly. He had always been reticent in the expression of his feelings. But one subject aroused him and then his expressions were not restrained: “All this is temporary. You all lose faith so easily. That’s the trouble with our spineless, snivelling, impotent, blabbering, broad-minded, drooling intelligentsia! That’s why we are where we are. No faith. No will. Thin gruel for blood. Do you think all this can go on? Do you think Russia is dead? Do you think Europe is blind? Watch Europe. She hasn’t said her last word yet. The day will come — soon — when these bloody assassins, these foul scoundrels, that Communist scum....”
The door bell rang.
The old servant shuffled to open the door. They heard a man’s steps, brisk, resonant, energetic. A strong hand threw the dining-room door open.
Victor Dunaev looked like a tenor in an Italian grand opera, which was not Victor’s profession; but he had the broad shoulders, the flaming black eyes, the wavy, unruly black hair, the flashing smile, the arrogantly confident movements. As he stopped on the threshold, his eyes stopped on Kira; as she turned in her chair, they stopped on her legs.
“It’s little Kira, isn’t it?” were the first sounds of his strong, clear voice.
“It was,” she answered.
“Well, well, what a surprise! What a most pleasant surprise! ... Aunt Galina, younger than ever!” He kissed his aunt’s hand. “And my charming cousin Lydia!” His dark hair brushed Lydia’s wrist. “Sorry to be so late. Meeting at the Institute. I’m a member of the Students’ Council.... Sorry, Father. Father doesn’t approve of any elections of any sort.”
“Sometimes even elections are right,” said Vasili Ivanovitch without disguising the paternal pride in his voice; and the warmth in his stern eyes suddenly made them look helpless.
Victor whirled a chair about and sat next to Kira. “Well, Uncle Alexander,” he flashed a row of sparkling white teeth at Alexander Dimitrievitch, “you’ve chosen a fascinating time to return to Petrograd. A difficult time, to be sure. A cruel time. But most fascinating, like all historical cataclysms.”
Galina Petrovna smiled with admiration: “What are you studying, Victor?”
“Institute of Technology. Electrical engineer. Greatest future in electricity. Russia’s future.... But Father doesn’t think so.... Irina, do you ever comb your hair? What are your plans, Uncle Alexander?”
“I’ll open a store,” Alexander Dimitrievitch announced solemnly, almost proudly.