* cart driver
Viy
Early in the morning, as soon as they rang the resounding seminary bell that hung by the gates of the Brotherhood Monastery in Kyiv, schoolboys and bursaks would come hurrying in crowds from all parts of the city.1 Grammarians (first-year students), Rhetoricians (second-year), Philosophers (third-year), and Theologians (seniors), with their notebooks under their arms, would make their way to class.2 The Grammarians were still quite small; as they walked they shoved each other and quarreled in thin little soprano voices; almost all of them wore torn or stained clothes, and their pockets were constantly full of all sorts of trash, like knucklebones, little whistles made out of feathers, half-eaten pies, and sometimes even tiny little sparrows, one of which, when it suddenly started cheeping during a particularly quiet moment in class, would earn its patron a pretty painful slap on both hands with a ruler, or sometimes a whipping with a cherrywood switch. The Rhetoricians walked along in a more respectable way: Their clothes were often completely intact, but on the other hand their faces were almost always adorned by a rhetorical trope: either one of their eyes would be so swollen it was climbing up the forehead, or there’d be a big blister instead of a lip, or some other marking; they talked and swore among themselves in tenor voices. The Philosophers’ voices were a whole octave lower; there was nothing in their pockets except strong shag tobacco. They didn’t store anything up, but just devoured whatever came their way right on the spot; sometimes you could smell their pipes and vodka so far off that a tradesman walking by would stop and sniff the air like a hunting hound for a good long while.
The marketplace would usually just be starting to get going at that hour, and the market women selling bagels, rolls, watermelon seeds, and poppyseed cakes would tug at the garments of those walking by, as long as they were made of fine cloth or some kind of cotton material.
“Young gentlemen! Young gentlemen! Look here! Look here!” they would call from all directions. “I have bagels, poppyseed cakes, fancy cakes, fine loaves! I swear they’re fine! Made with honey! I baked them myself!”
Another would lift up a long, twisted roll and cry, “Here’s an icicle! Young gentlemen, buy an icicle!”
“Don’t buy anything from that one. Look how nasty she is—her nose is ugly, and her hands are dirty…”
But they were afraid to tug at the Philosophers and the Theologians, because the Philosophers and the Theologians always liked to take things just to sample, and they’d grab a whole handful at a time.
After arriving at the seminary, the whole crowd would disperse to their classes, which were in low-ceilinged but spacious rooms with small windows, wide doors, and grubby benches. The classroom would suddenly be filled with the humming of many different voices: The senior students serving as auditors would be listening to their pupils read out their lessons; the ringing soprano of a Grammarian would hit a resonance with the glass in the small windows, and the glass would reply with almost the exact same sound; in the corner a Rhetorician would be droning, and his mouth and thick lips looked as if they should have belonged to a Philosopher at the very least. He droned in a bass voice, and all you could hear from a distance was “Boo… boo… boo…” While they were listening to the lessons, the auditors would look with one eye under the bench, where they could see a roll, or a fruit dumpling, or some pumpkin seeds peeking out of the pocket of the bursak under their charge.
When this whole scholarly crowd had managed to arrive early or when they knew that the professors would be later than usual, by unanimous consent they would make a plan for a fight, and everyone had to take part in the fight, even the monitors who were supposed to ensure the orderliness and morality of the whole student estate. Two Theologians would usually decide how the battle was to proceed: whether each class year was supposed to stand up for itself or whether they were to divide into two halves: the bursa and the seminary. In any case, the Grammarians would start first, and as soon as the Rhetoricians got mixed up in it, the Grammarians would run away and stand on higher ground to watch the battle. Then the Philosophers with their long black mustaches would enter in, and finally the thick-necked Theologians, in horrible wide trousers. Usually it would end with Theology beating everyone, while Philosophy, scratching its sides, would be crowded into the classroom and disperse to the benches to take a rest. The professor, who had participated in similar fights himself, would come into the class and in a single second recognize from the flushed faces of his students that it had been quite a fight. At the same time that he was beating the fingers of Rhetoric with a switch, in another classroom another professor would be working over Philosophy’s hands with wooden paddles. The Theologians were treated in a quite different manner: As the professor of Theology put it, they got poured out to them a measure of marrowfat peas, which consisted of blows from short leather whips.
On holidays the seminarists and bursaks would travel around to people’s homes with puppet theaters. Sometimes they would perform a play based on a Bible story, and in those cases there would always be some Theologian who was almost as tall as the Kyiv bell tower, who would distinguish himself by playing Herodias or the wife of Potiphar, the captain of the guard in Pharaoh’s palace.3 As a reward they would receive a piece of canvas, or a sack of millet, or half a boiled goose, all that sort of thing.
This whole scholarly tribe, both the seminarists and the bursaks, who felt a kind of hereditary hostility toward each other, were extremely poor in means of support and at the same time were unusually gluttonous, so that it would be quite impossible to calculate how many dumplings each of them could put away at dinner; thus the voluntary contributions of well-to-do property owners could hardly suffice. So a senate consisting of Philosophers and Theologians would send out some Grammarians and Rhetoricians under the leadership of a Philosopher—and sometimes he would participate himself—with sacks on their backs, to empty out other people’s vegetable gardens. And pumpkin porridge would appear in the bursa. The senators would gobble so many watermelons and melons that the next day the auditors would hear not one but two lessons from them: one came from their mouths, and the other rumbled in the senators’ stomachs. The bursaks and the seminarists wore long cassock-like garments, which reached to this very day, a technical term meaning “below the heels.”
The most festive event for the seminary was the school vacation—the time starting in June when the bursaks would usually disperse to their homes. Then the whole highway would be strewn with Grammarians, Philosophers, and Theologians. Whoever did not have a haven of his own would go to visit the home of one of his comrades. The Philosophers and Theologians would set off on condition, that is, they undertook to teach or prep the children of well-to-do people, and in return they would receive a new pair of boots and sometimes also a frock coat for the coming year. This whole gang set off together in a camping party. They would boil porridge for themselves and sleep out in the fields. Each one of them dragged a sack in which there was one shirt and a pair of foot wraps. The Theologians were particularly thrifty and careful: In order not to wear out their boots, they would take them off, hang them on poles, and carry them on their shoulders, especially when there was a lot of mud. Then they would tuck up their wide trousers to their knees and fearlessly splash through the puddles.
As soon as they caught sight of a farmstead off in the distance, they would immediately turn off the highway and, when they neared a farmhouse that was built a little bit better than the others, they would stand in a row in front of the windows and start to sing a canticle at the top of their voices. The owner of the farmhouse, some old peasant Cossack, would listen to them for a long time, arms akimbo, then he’d start sobbing bitterly, turn to his wife and say, “Wife! These students are singing something that must be very intelligent. Bring them some fatback and whatever else we have!” And a whole bowlful of filled dumplings would be poured into the sack. A decent-sized piece of fatback, a few round loaves, and sometimes even a tied-up chicken would find a place in the sac
k together. Fortified by this supply, the Grammarians, Rhetoricians, Philosophers, and Theologians would continue on their way. The farther they went, however, the smaller their crowd became. Almost all of them had dispersed to their homes, and the only ones who remained were those whose parents’ nests were farther away.
Once during such a journey, three bursaks turned off the highway in order to stock up on provisions at the first farmstead they could find, because their sack had long since been emptied out. They were the Theologian Khalyava, the Philosopher Khoma Brut, and the Rhetorician Tiberius Gorobets.4
The Theologian was a strapping, broad-shouldered man with an extremely strange disposition: He would never fail to steal anything that was lying around near him. Moreover, he was of an extremely gloomy character. When he got drunk, he would hide in the tall weeds, and the seminary authorities would have a difficult time finding him.
The Philosopher Khoma Brut was of a cheerful disposition. He loved to lie around and smoke his long-stemmed pipe. When he was drinking, he would always hire musicians and dance a trepak.5 He would often get a taste of the marrowfat peas, but always showed philosophical indifference, saying, whatever will be, will be.
The Rhetorician Tiberius Gorobets was not yet old enough to grow a mustache, drink vodka, or smoke a pipe. All he had was a forelock, and therefore his character had not yet been developed; but judging by the big bumps he often had on his forehead when he appeared in class, it might be supposed that he would become a good warrior. The Theologian Khalyava and the Philosopher Khoma often pulled him by his forelock as a sign of their patronage, and they made use of him as their deputy.6
It was already evening when they turned off the highway. The sun had just set, and the warmth of the day still remained in the air. The Theologian and the Philosopher walked in silence, smoking their pipes; the Rhetorician Tiberius Gorobets was knocking the heads off the roadside thistles with a stick. The road wound through scattered groups of oak and hazelnut trees that covered the meadow. Declivities and small green hills, as round as church domes, sometimes crisscrossed the plain. Visible in two places, a field full of ripening grain was a sign that a village must be somewhere nearby. But it had been more than an hour since they had passed the swaths of grain, and still they had not seen any dwellings. The twilight had completely darkened the sky, and only in the west could one see a pale remnant of crimson radiance.
“What the devil!” the Philosopher Khoma Brut said, “it really seemed like there was a farmstead nearby.”
The Theologian looked silently around, then again took his pipe in his mouth, and they all continued their journey.
“Honest to God!” the Philosopher said, stopping again. “You can’t see so much as the devil’s fist, it’s so dark.”
“Maybe a farmstead will appear a little farther along,” the Theologian said, his pipe still in his teeth.
But meanwhile night had fallen, and a rather dark night. Small storm clouds intensified the darkness, and judging by all appearances, neither stars nor moon could be expected. The bursaks noticed that they had gone astray and had long ago wandered off the road.
The Philosopher groped with his feet in all directions and finally said abruptly, “Where’s the road?”
The Theologian was silent for a moment, and after thinking it over, he said, “Yes, it’s a dark night.”
The Rhetorician went off to the side and tried to find the road by crawling on all fours, but his hands just kept going into foxes’ holes. All around was nothing but the steppe, which seemed never to have been traversed by anyone. The travelers made yet another effort to move forward, but they encountered the same wilderness everywhere. The Philosopher tried calling out to someone, but his voice died away on all sides and encountered no response. Only a little while later did they hear a faint moaning that resembled the howling of wolves.
“Look, what are we going to do?” the Philosopher said.
“What do you think? We’ll spend the night in the field!” the Theologian said and reached into his pocket to get his tinderbox and light up his pipe again. But the Philosopher could not consent to this. He had the habit of putting away a twenty-pound hunk of bread and about four pounds of fatback before bed, and at this point he was feeling a kind of unbearable solitude in his stomach. Besides, despite his cheerful disposition, the Philosopher was somewhat afraid of wolves.
“No, Khalyava, that’s not possible,” he said. “How can we just lie down and stretch out like dogs, without eating anything to keep up our strength? Let’s keep trying. Maybe we’ll stumble on some kind of dwelling place and at least drink a glass of vodka before bed.”
At the word “vodka,” the Theologian spat to the side and said, “You know, you’re right, there’s no reason to stay out here in the fields.”
The bursaks started walking on ahead, and to their immense joy, they could hear barking in the distance. They listened attentively to hear what direction it was coming from, and then they set out more confidently. After walking a little while, they saw a light.
“A farmstead! Honest to God, a farmstead!” the Philosopher said.
His supposition did not deceive him: Very soon they in fact saw a small farmstead consisting of just two huts in a single courtyard. A light was burning in the windows. A dozen plum trees stuck up from behind a lath fence. When they looked through the gaps in the wooden gates, the bursaks saw a courtyard filled with chumaks’ wagons.7 Now there were a few stars peeping out in the sky.
“Come on, brothers, don’t lag behind! No matter what, we have to get a place for the night!”
Together the three learned men knocked at the gates and shouted, “Open up!”
The door of one of the huts creaked, and a moment later the bursaks saw before them an old woman in a sheepskin coat.
“Who’s there?” she cried, coughing faintly.
“Let us in, Granny, to spend the night. We’ve lost our way. It’s as nasty out in the field as in a hungry belly.”
“And what kind of folk are you?”
“We’re harmless folk, the Theologian Khalyava, the Philosopher Brut, and the Rhetorician Gorobets.”
“I can’t,” the old woman grumbled. “My farmyard is full of people, and all the corners of my hut are occupied. Where would I put you? And you’re all such strapping and healthy lads! My hut would collapse if I tried to fit you in. I know these Philosophers and Theologians. If you start taking in drunkards like that, pretty soon you won’t even have a farmyard. Get out! Get out! There’s no room for you here.”
“Have mercy, Granny! How can it be that Christian souls should perish for no good reason? Put us wherever you like. And if we do something or somehow or something else, then may your arms wither away or God knows what else happen to you. How about that!”
It seemed that the old woman was relenting a bit.
“All right,” she said after thinking it over, “I’ll let you in, but I’m going to put you in different places. Otherwise I won’t feel easy at heart if you’re lying together.”
“Whatever you like; we won’t argue,” the bursaks answered.
The gates creaked open, and they went into the farmyard.
“Say, Granny,” the Philosopher said as he followed the old woman, “if we could just, as they say… Honest to God, my stomach feels as if somebody were riding on wheels in it. I haven’t had even a wood chip to eat since early morning.”
“Look what he wants!” the old woman said. “I don’t have anything, nothing of the sort, and I haven’t lit the stove today.”
“But we’d pay for all of it,” the Philosopher continued, “we’d pay you properly tomorrow, in hard cash.”
“Yeah,” he continued quietly, “like hell we’ll pay you!”
“Go on, go on, and be happy with what you’re given. The devil himself brought me such sensitive young gentlemen!”
The Philosopher Khoma got completely depressed when he heard these words. But suddenly his nose caught the scent of dried fish. He
looked at the Theologian’s wide trousers as he walked alongside and saw a huge fish tail sticking out of his pocket: The Theologian had already managed to filch a whole carp off one of the wagons. And since he had done this not out of any self-interest but solely out of habit, and had completely forgotten about his carp and was now looking around to see what else he could swipe, determined not to miss out on even a broken wheel—Khoma the Philosopher stuck his hand into the Theologian’s pocket as if it were his own, and pulled out the carp.
The old woman found different places to lodge the bursaks. She put the Rhetorician in the hut, she locked up the Theologian in an empty pantry, and for the Philosopher she allocated a sheep pen that was also empty.
As soon as he remained alone the Philosopher ate up the carp in a single minute, then inspected the wattled walls of the pen, pushed away with his foot the snout of a curious pig who had stuck her nose in from the neighboring pen, and turned onto his other side in order to fall into the sleep of the dead. Suddenly the low door opened, and the old woman came into the pen, all bent over.
“What do you need, Granny?” the Philosopher said.
But the old woman came walking right toward him with her arms outstretched.
“So that’s it!” the Philosopher thought. “No way, my dear, you’re too old.” He moved away a little, but the old woman again came right up to him without ceremony.
“Listen, Granny!” the Philosopher said, “it’s fast time now, and I’m the kind of man who won’t violate the holy fasts for a thousand gold pieces.”8
But the old woman spread her arms and tried to catch hold of him, without saying a word.
The Philosopher got frightened, especially when he noticed that her eyes were flashing with a kind of unusual glitter.
“Granny! What’s wrong with you? Go away, go away, and may God be with you!” he shouted.
The Nose and Other Stories Page 4