The Railway

by Hamid Ismailov

  “And they didn’t buy him a horse,” Kobil concluded. Blankly, the boy went up to him and boxed him on the ear. Kobil said nothing, and only Shapik, like a motor gradually gathering speed, began stuttering his “Bloody… Bloody fuck…!”

  The players were distracted for a moment, even though the game was nearly over. And then, instead of either winning the last nut or losing everything he had already won, little Sabir just grabbed the nut and ran off with it, shouting out, “Quick, Sabit, scarper!”

  Sabit had longer legs than Sabir and he dashed after his younger brother, but Kutr managed to trip him up. Sabit crashed down on top of Shapik. They started fighting; little Kutr was going for Sabit’s balls, but Sabit for some reason went for Shapik, who was completely innocent. And only a shout from Fatkhulla-Frontline put an end to all this. Kutr and Sabit rushed off in different directions, and Kobil and the boy were left on their own in the shade. Musayev walked by in the sun, muttering slogans. Then Kobil-Melonhead suggested they play films…

  And so the afternoon drew to an end, empty and useless. In the evening Satiboldi-Buildings and everyone from the mahallya began to gather in their house to cut carrots for the plov and get everything ready for the following day. Nabi-Onearm was one of the first arrivals and, being unable to do anything very useful with only one hand, he naturally began to organise those who came after him. He sat Tadji-Murad, Rizo-Zero and Faiz-Ulla-FAS down to cut carrots, and he sent Kun-Okhun and Timurkhan off to chop wood and break up coal. Tolib-Butcher began cutting up the sheep; Temir-Iul was put in charge of setting out the tables and benches; Fatkhulla-Frontline sent messengers round the mahallya so he could get an idea of how many guests would be coming; Garang-Deafmullah checked that everything was in place for the ritual; Tordybay-Medals brought his son Sherzod, who was going to take the place of the boy’s colt; and even Ortik-Picture-Reels, after showing one of his Indian films, turned up at midnight for a cup of tea.

  The women of the mahallya were working away in the inner rooms; only Oppok-Lovely had yet to return from the City, having gone there to invite her idolised but elusive Bahriddin to the feast. A little further down the street, in Aisha’s house, Saniya and Uchmah had sewed countless kerchiefs and napkins from calico they had requisitioned from the house of Soli-Stores. “Stolen goods are the strongest!” Aisha declared, finding that Soli’s calico was so sturdy that her scissors were growing blunter more quickly than she could dash to and from the little shop of Huvron-Barber, who was himself hard at work sharpening not only her scissors, but also the knives being used to cut carrot and onion, lean meat and fat, potato and pumpkin, melon and watermelon.

  In a word, the entire mahallya was at work. Even Uncle Monya, the hunchbacked Jew about whom no one knew anything at all, was applying a fresh coat of paint to his gate.

  By midnight, Rif the Tatar gravedigger, had dug a splendid fireplace. Over it hung a vast cauldron, big enough to cook the thirty-five kilos of rice that Murzin-Mordovets, accompanied by Zangi-Bobo and Mefody-Jurisprudence, had brought in his car from the Kok-Terek Bazaar. Murzin gave the bottle he had earned to Mefody, since he himself, as he put it, “would soon be back on the road chasing roubles.” Mefody united his immemorial trinity, and soon he, Kun-Okhun and Timurkhan were on their way to the station to perform their eternal ritual.

  That night the boy did not sleep. This, for once, was not because of a lack of supervision on the part of the adults, but at their insistence. It was essential to be tired for tomorrow’s circumcision, in order to get through it more easily – and there may have been other reasons as well. Many things, after all, were happening that night for the first time: it was the first time that Rokhbar was baking naan bread in Granny’s oven; it was the first time that Grandad wasn’t making fun of his friends Djebral the Persian from Shiraz and Fatkhulla the Tadjik from Chust, each of whom had only one eye, but on opposite sides of their faces. Instead of knocking their foreheads together, he was observing everything from the shadows with the dignity expected of a master of the house and whispering to his child-messengers, who transmitted his instructions to Nabi-Onearm, who then jabbered away for all he was worth…

  But however the boy tried to stay awake and keep an eye on everything – since that was what Granny had told him to do – all the same, towards morning, after eating piping hot naan bread straight from Rokhbar’s oven, he sat down where Grandad used to store huge black watermelons during the winter and curled up for a moment on the cotton hulls. He could hardly have slept long – probably it was no more than the tiniest scrap of sleep – but while he was asleep he saw many things: he was deep in a palm forest, with no sky to be seen at all, and he happened upon a tree stump swarming with wasps – and then from behind this stump appears Rokhbar, who turns out to be Nabi-Onearm, who is sucking his one hand, which has been dipped in either pain or honey. “I’m the beekeeper,” Granny says to Oppok-Lovely, who for some reason has lost not her hand but her leg. “Let’s dip your willy in this.” The boy feels frightened, sees Shapik weeping and Sabir and Sabit laughing, then hears the words, “Come on, try these on…” When his amputated willy turns in his hands to a pen, he thinks sadly about the colt that was meant to save him, but all he can see by the tethering post is a ladder… and then he sees the very same ladder in Rokhbar’s oven shed and he hears Granny’s very real voice: “Come on, try these boots on…”

  The boy sat on the bottom step of the ladder and, only then remembering his dream, began to try on the new boots.

  “They’re not too small, are they?”

  “What good is it to me that the world is so big if my boots are too small?”156 the boy said in a voice hoarse from lack of sleep. The women burst into laughter, and Rokhbar slapped her baker’s glove against her thigh as she said, “A real little young warrior!”

  He walked off in his new boots, which really were a little tight for feet that had spread out during a barefoot summer, but they were gently and snugly tight, as if long barefootedness had made his feet grow a protective sheath. As he walked out of the gate, they made a knocking sound against the five-kopek piece cemented into the ground for good fortune; it was as if his feet were pure bone.

  It was already dawn, a quick summer’s dawn. Izaly-Jew’s cocks woke Lyuli-Ibodullo-Mahsum’s donkey, and Lyuli-Ibodullo-Mahsum’s donkey woke the cows on the Samarasi Collective Farm. The old war veteran Fatkhulla-Frontline excused himself for half an hour and drove his veteran sheep to the scrubland by the Salty Canal. Last of all, the Koreans’ pigs started grunting; their smell, which had ripened during the night, was carried by the dawn breeze towards the station, where Akmolin was hooting and a sleepy Tadji-Murad was frightening equally sleepy crows with his whistle. And along with the dawn, though the sun was still below the horizon, the guests began to arrive for their plov.

  The first, on his own, still all wrinkled and curled up from the night cold, was Rakhmon-Kul, one of the sons of Chinali; Garang-Deafmullah welcomed him with a prayer, and the two of them shared a bowl of plov. Then came the two drivers – Murzin the Mordovian and Saimulin the Chuvash; they had decided to fill up a little before setting out on their journeys. After that Dolim-Dealer, Oppok-Lovely’s heir, brought four men who worked as weighers at the Kok-Terek Bazaar. Next Tadji-Murad, whistle in hand, brought Akmolin, who had left his shunter in the siding opposite the little shop of Yusuf-Cobbler; then Yusuf-Cobbler himself wandered in, wearing his green embroidered Margilan skullcap in honour of the plov he was about to eat and bowing to all sides to be sure not to miss anyone. Then came: Huvron-Barber; everyone from the cotton factory; the Tatars from the wool factory; eleven Korean footballers about to set out for a friendly match against their fellow-countrymen at the “Political Section” collective farm; and Lyuli-Ibadullo-Mahsum. Next, holding his hand just below his heart in Uzbek fashion, came Master-Railwayman Belkov. Garang-Deafmullah was no longer able to keep up with saying a prayer to welcome each guest, and so Fatkhulla-Frontline – who
had returned from taking his sheep to pasture – and Nabi-Onearm – waving his one hand Shiite-style157 as he greeted Ezrael, the son of the Persian Huvron-Barber – had to help him out, saying prayers of welcome in separate corners of the room. After being welcomed, each guest was served plov; they ate decorously, drank a lazy cup of green tea, listened to another prayer from either Tolib-Butcher or Kun-Okhun – who had sobered up after performing his nocturnal duty towards Mefody-Jurisprudence – and then got to their feet and set off to work.

  Party First Secretary Buri-Bigwolf brought Gilas’s First Veteran, who had only recently been released from the Gulag; this, of course, was Mullah-Ulmas-Greeneyes – the husband of Oppok-Lovely and brother-in-law of the late Oktam-Humble-Russky, the town’s First Bolshevik. Vying with Buri-Bigwolf, Tordybay-Medals brought Gilas’s Senior Inhabitant, blind old Hoomer. Hoomer fussed about for a while and asked confusedly to be introduced to the culprit. When the boy went up to him, the frail and transparent old man put his calico bag to one side, whispered something in the boy’s ear and, patting him on the head, gave him some kind of amulet – earth from under Gilas’s first railway sleeper, or a sliver of the first brick from the cotton factory, or maybe a bit of paper sewn into a black velvet triangle – and pronounced a blessing. Hoomer, however, gave off a smell of chloroform and valerian; the boy was quick to move away from him, and the old man – thank God – was taken off to eat plov with Mullah-Ulmas-Greeneyes, who was smiling the stupid smile of a man who is never quite sure what language he will be addressed in.

  At eleven o’clock it was the turn of the women to eat; they were served the remains of the plov and a freshly cooked pea soup. But by then the boy no longer knew who was coming and who was going. He had to go next door to Aisha-Nogaika, to wash in a tub before the ritual. It was bad enough to have to bathe in a tub under the supervision of Auntie Aisha and of Janna-Nurse, who poured water over him and rubbed him down with a loofah – but what he hated still more was the way all three widows kept darting about, one bringing him a little jug, another a little towel, another some more warm water, each of them considering it their duty to wash his willy – which had wrinkled up out of embarrassment – and to crack some joke at its expense. And then, after he had been washed and dried all over, Auntie Uchmah turned away to blow her nose and then touched his willy again with snotty fingers – as if his willy were a handkerchief! Ugh! And then her snot dried over his foreskin and even after he had been dressed up in his holiday finery the boy kept trying to wipe away this crust with the help of his satin trousers, but they just slid over it, making his willy swell and somehow expanding Uchmah’s revolting trail.

  As he came out of Aisha’s house, he saw that the other boys were all playing nuts under Huvron-Barber’s cherry trees: Kutr, Shapik and Hussein, Sabir and Sabit, Kobil-Melonhead, Kara and Borat… Just before one o’clock, when he was feeling hungry and sleepy, someone gave him a small cup of vile, bitter cognac, saying it was medicine. Then he was given a handful of raisins and placed on the back of Uncle Sherzod, who was going to take the place of the colt and whirl him around the bonfire.

  The memory of his brief dream stung the boy’s heart and he put his arms round Sherzod’s strong neck. They went out into the yard. The fire was not yet burning properly. Someone hurried off to fetch a stack of papers they remembered seeing in a bag on the floor; but the papers wouldn’t burn. Bakay said they should throw paraffin on the fire, but there wasn’t any; children were sent to get some petrol off Murzin or Saimulin, but the two drivers had already left; in the end someone ran to the garage by the level crossing and came back with not a can of petrol but a whole drum. They threw some on and there was a burst of flame, giving off the same sickening heat that the boy could already feel building up inside him; then he and Sherzod began circling the bonfire.

  The fire burnt. The flames seized sheets of paper and carried them up into the air. All the children except Hussein and the two lyuli came running to watch Kakhramon Dadayev – whom Oppok-Lovely had hired in the City – playing five tambourines at once.

  The fire burnt. As he passed by, old Alyaapsindu saw that his shadow was dancing even though his body was barely moving; but for the help of Rizo-Zero, he would have fallen to the ground in shock.

  The fire burnt. Sabir and Sabit led Hussein towards the Zakh Canal, while Hussein’s father, Huvron-Barber, sharpened Garang-Deafmullah’s razor for the circumcision.

  The fire burnt. Blind Hoomer returned to his musty home and felt a sharp pain in his chest as he discovered that he had left behind the calico bag of papers that he never allowed himself to be parted from. But there was no one to help: Nakhshon had gone away to take part in some trial of Crimean Tatars, and the Young Pioneers were all on holiday.

  The fire burnt. The staring, whirling faces made the boy feel more and more sick: Uchmah, who had covered his willy with snot; Janna-Nurse, who hadn’t wiped off this snot; Tolib-Butcher, who was pressing up, in the dense crowd, against the plump bottom of the half-blind Boikush; Tadji-Murad, Boikush’s son, who still had his whistle round his neck and who chose not to notice what was going on because Tolib-Butcher set aside two kilos of boneless meat for him every week (the boy’s granny got the bones from this portion).

  The fire burnt. Sabir and Sabit led Hussein to the deserted bank of the Zakh canal, dived into the water and called to Hussein to come in after them. Hussein, forbidden to swim by the strict beliefs of his Shiite family, stripped naked and stepped cautiously into the water. First out of mischievousness, then out of intoxication with their own power, Sabit and Sabir began pushing Hussein under. Hussein cried out. “Shut up or I’ll fuck you!” shouted little Sabir; his elder brother, already tormented by wet dreams at night and a constant need to masturbate during the day, shuddered from the rush of blood to his head and his cock and said, “Now we can bugger him!” Hussein was crying; they pushed him back under.

  Exhausted, Hussein said he didn’t mind what they did – as long as they took him out of this icy water that was already filling his innards and making him want to vomit. On the bare bank, pushing his face into the thick hot dust and spreading him out “like a crayfish,” Sabit burnt Hussein’s aching and pulsating arse with his quick ejaculate, after which Sabir wriggled about on top of him while Sabit knelt on the ground, gripping Hussein’s head between his knees and pinning his arms as he howled and vomited; Hussein’s face was covered with saliva, tears and snotty semen.

  When the still semen-less Sabir finally got off him, Hussein’s battered arse let out a stream of diarrhoea and pressurised gas. Enraged by this, the two brothers tied the boy’s hands behind his back with his T-shirt and tied his trousers round his ankles.

  “I’ll kill you! I’m still going to kill you!” Hussein howled. Sabir and Sabit caught sight of old Zangi-Bobo in the distance, gathering mint to enrich the nasvoy he made from tobacco and chicken droppings; they took fright and tried to stuff Hussein’s shirt into his mouth. Hussein bit Sabir’s hand till it bled, but Sabit kicked him hard in the eye and, while Hussein was recovering, succeeded in gagging him. Hussein could hardly breathe for snot and blood, and his whole body was in convulsions.

  “Careful, he’s dying,” said Sabir in fright, “Let’s throw him into the water!” shouted his elder brother.

  They tried to lift Hussein but only managed to remove the tie from his legs. In the end they just rolled him along the bank and pushed him, covered in dust and blood, into the water.

  Hussein struggled still more convulsively and the gag came out of his mouth. He gasped in air and let out a wild cry.

  “Throw a stone at him!” squeaked Sabir, seeing Zangi-Bobo jumping about in the distance. Sabit began looking for stones to throw at Hussein’s choking head. The first stone turned out to be earth; on hitting the head, it spread into a dirty stain on the slowly moving water. The second stone missed, but the third was well aimed; there were no more shouts or gurgles, and the head disappeared
beneath the water. And it was not long before the bloody puddle on the surface of the Zakh canal had faded away.

  Sabit was still holding a stone in his hand. Sabir was trembling. “Are you going to dive in too?” Sabit asked him. Sabir trembled still more and shouted, “Dive in yourself, you bastard!” Then he began to run along the bank, afraid that Sabit had decided to kill him too. Sabit, afraid that Sabir would tell everyone what had happened, ran off after his brother. And only Zangi-Bobo saw the two boys, who were letting out blood-curdling cries as they tore along the steeply gullied bank.

  The boy vomited onto Sherzod’s back. There were shouts and squeals all round, competing with Kakhramon Dadayev’s five tambourines. Someone screamed; someone rushed up to the boy; someone hurried to put the fire out. There was general mayhem. The boy was carried out of the circle, but he went on vomiting. Even when he seemed to have vomited up every drop of cognac and every last raisin, he went on vomiting yellow, bitter bile.

  “Now! Now!” someone shouted – and he was carried under the trees and into the house. On the way, his hands were tied tight – as were his ankles, now released from their boots. Then he was thrown half-unconscious onto a soggy bed and someone huge and merciless pulled down his trousers. With his last gasp of vision the boy saw faces pressed against the window – Janna-Nurse and her niece Natashka, and Shapik’s mother Uchmah, and Kobil-Melonhead and Kutr and… a sharp pain, like the crest of a wave of shame, lifted him high, high, high above the ceiling, high above the blue sky and the dazzling yellow sun, right into the darkness into which Kitov had flown.