by Teffi
The maid ran up to the doctor.
“A telephone call for you, sir.”
The guests continued confusedly seating themselves. The doctor soon returned.
“Good heavens!” he exclaimed. “What sad news. Terribly, terribly sad. Our poor Gerbel has died under the knife. That was the hospital on the phone. He had appendicitis. He was operated on this morning by Professor Ivashov himself. The operation went well, but his heart couldn’t take it. He died at five o’clock this afternoon.”
Anna heard the words distinctly: “Gerbel has died under the knife.” She was standing, holding on to the back of the chair with both hands. And then something strange happened. The table and overhead light suddenly shifted to the right. She gripped the chair tightly; then, without letting go, she fell to the floor.
2
The blinds had been lowered on the windows and on the balcony door, but it was still hot in the office.
The furnishings were exactly what one expects in the office of a serious doctor, the director of a sanatorium. There were enormous bookcases; in one of them, behind a pane of glass, were all kinds of nickel instruments. The writing desk was as big as a double bed and on it were thick notebooks with stiff green bindings.
The doctor had a big nose and hair so smoothly pomaded that it looked as if a tub of black varnish had been poured over his head. His eyes were small, sharp and unpleasant. He rose slightly and offered Anna his hand. On the desk before him was a letter from Doctor Pamuzov—Anna had given it to the nurse that morning, to pass on to him.
“Sit down,” said the doctor; this was not an invitation but a command. “On this chair here, facing the light. Your name?”
“Anna Brunova.”
“What?”
“Brunova. Brown. Whatever. You already know, so why are you asking?”
“I’m asking so that I can hear how you reply. Your age? How old are you?”
“Thirty-five.”
“Does that mean forty?”
“No. It means thirty-eight.”
“Put the pencil down and stop fidgeting. You’re distracting me. Why did you say thirty-five?”
“Out of habit.”
“I see! Excellent. This habit indicates a desire to appear younger—better, in other words. It indicates a desire to do well in life. A normal, healthy desire. Now do you see why we insist on our patients answering our questions? Keep your hands still. What is today’s date?”
“It’s the twenty-eighth… no, the twenty-ninth. I can’t remember. Look, Doctor, I’m afraid this is all rather tedious. No normal person would answer you right away. Anyone who’s the least bit normal would be surprised by the irrelevance of your questions. They won’t be able to answer until they understand why you’re asking.”
“You don’t need to concern yourself with that,” said the doctor with an ironic little smile. “That’s already been taken into consideration. How are you feeling now? Are you sleeping well? Of course, you’ve had a terrible nervous shock and you need to recover.”
“A shock? Not at all. Obviously Doctor Pamuzov has shared his own conjectures with you. I’ve just been a bit under the weather and I need to have a rest. That’s why he sent me here.”
“Why is your hair cut so short? Or do you always wear it that way?”
“I had a fever; my hair was getting all matted. Then it got hard to brush. I was shedding hair all over the place. Good heavens! What does it matter to you? I’m healthy, I want a rest, and that’s all there is to it.”
“I shall be the one to judge the state of your health, not you.”
“I’m just so tired! So terribly, terribly tired!” Anna said. It took her a big effort to stop repeating these words. She wanted to go on and on repeating them, endlessly, for as long as she lived.
He looked at her carefully, then suddenly said, quite simply and softly, “Yes, I know, my dear. You’re fatigued by the road and the heat. It’s terribly close today. There’s going to be a thunderstorm. All my patients are on edge today. Go and have a good rest. Keep out of the sun and stay away from the beach. There will be time enough for that. Go along and lie down, my dear. Have you got a nice room?”
“It’s lovely.”
“Excellent. If you need anything, don’t be shy. Just let me know.”
The room really was lovely. It was on the third floor. The window looked directly out onto a tree, almost onto its crown, which was dense with leaves and very dark.
“What kind of a tree is that?” she asked the chambermaid.
“I’m not sure. It looks like a local rowan tree. Or else an acacia. Here in the Caucasus everything is different. Mind you don’t open the window—clouds of little bugs will come in off the tree.”
“I’m like a dryad, living inside a tree,” thought Anna. “But what’s this tree called? I think Rosalinda sounds right. Sweet Rosalinda, my new friend. How will we get on together?”
The night air felt very close. She opened the window, and clouds of bugs did indeed come into the room. She had to close it again.
That night she slept better than at home, but she knew it was only a matter of time until she got used to her surroundings. Then her thoughts would catch up with her.
Early in the morning she opened the window. One of Rosalinda’s boughs reached straight into the room. Anna took the bough in her hand like a rough and furry paw and squeezed it.
“Hello, Rosalinda. You have a warm paw. We’re going to live together.”
The day was unbearably close. It was impossible to stay indoors, so Anna went out to the market square.
The market was already over. In the empty stalls were the remains of spoilt plums and tangerines. The ground was littered with banana skins and there was a smell of hot dust. The dust got between your teeth and it felt gritty, like fine sugar. In the middle of the square was a group of people, standing in a circle and roaring with laughter. Anna went up to them. In the centre of the circle, swaying slowly from side to side as she walked, was a she-bear. She was a dirty, brownish black, as shabby as an old doormat on which many people had wiped their boots. In the bear’s nose was a ring attached to a chain. Her handler was a huge, black-nosed man whose cheeks were covered with brownish-black fur like the bear’s.
Jerking the chain a little, he was saying, “Well, now, Shura Ivanovna, show us how the ladies walk in the park.”
The bear held one paw up behind her head and shimmied from side to side. The spectators guffawed, the little boys squealed. Shura Ivanovna opened wide her enormous lilac maw; it was evident that she enjoyed being liked.
“Shura Ivanovna,” said Anna to the bear, “We’re sisters, you and I! We’re both artistes. Does the approval of your audience matter a great deal to you? My dear, my darling! Once it mattered to me, too.”
“Now, Shura Ivanovna,” said the handler, “ask the ladies and gentlemen to give us a few million so we can get ourselves some beer and some cake.”
Once again Shura Ivanovna opened wide her lilac maw. Turning one paw over, she held out a narrow, bare Gypsy’s palm. Enormous and clumsy, letting out little growls, or perhaps grunts, she made her way around the circle.
For some reason Anna was beginning to feel uneasy and sad. She turned round and headed back for the sanatorium.
She passed a boarded-up lemonade stand. A torn yellow poster pasted to its side was hanging down like the ear of an ancient elephant. Even a trifle like that could harbour such unexpected sadness. It must have reminded her of something. Of course, the smart thing to do would be to think of something else and not let herself remember.
And then something dreadful made her stop. At the entrance to the sanatorium stood the youth who looked like an albino mouse, the youth who had been at that dinner party. This was nothing so very dreadful in itself—but it was dreadful that this youth should have come here…
She turned away, drew her head down between her shoulders and slipped in through the door. How terribly her heart was pounding. There was no good
reason for it. Only nerves. And even though nothing had happened, she knew she would find it difficult to calm down now.
It was quiet in her room, and after being outside it seemed rather dark.
On the table lay a large bouquet of roses, wrapped in silky paper, with a letter.
My beloved Anna Brown!
Press these roses to your face. Don’t be afraid. You do not know me and you never will. Tonight I am leaving. I have not missed a single one of your concerts. I was more than listening; I was also watching you. I love you, Anna Brown.
N.
Anna read this strange letter and suddenly found herself weeping.
“Why am I weeping?”
Then she remembered reading about a zoo where the animals had hardly been given anything to eat. A commission was sent to investigate. When the vet entered one of the cages and began stroking a dying lioness, the beast became hysterical. Those of us who have been tortured cannot be treated with kindness: scorn and the scourge are our oxygen. Tenderness we cannot bear.
She didn’t even unwrap the bouquet. She dropped it into one of the chest drawers, then lay down and began to think.
“I won’t, of course, go down to dinner. The albino mouse is there. In fact I should probably leave. It’s no good talking to the doctor. He’ll keep saying it’s nervous shock. Pamuzov has written to him about how I fainted when I heard a certain person had died. So I guess I’ll go home. In the mornings the pigeons will be moaning up on the rooftops. The piano with its yellow teeth will be sitting and waiting. The phone there won’t ring. And it’s all for the best, of course, because everything’s hopeless. What’s stopping me? What’s stopping me from living? I am not, after all, mad. I know full well that it’s not my fault. That is, to their way of thinking, it’s not my fault, because they don’t know. And even if they did know, they wouldn’t accept it. But I know that I did it. So what of it? Yes, I did it. Because I wanted to. I reduced six steps to four. And then I put an end to the whole wretched business…”
The room had become dark. Or had she fallen asleep without noticing? She did this sometimes. And on waking, she immediately entered the same train of thought, as if she’d had the same thoughts in her head even in her sleep.
It was dark. The air was black and dense. The day had been especially close. There was going to be a thunderstorm. Nights like this were called sparrow nights: if a sparrow flew up into the electricity-filled air, it would die and fall straight to the ground.
She had to keep on thinking. At least once she had to think everything through right to the end.
Why was I so sure that he was drifting away from me? Well, there were any number of signs. Why didn’t he call after me as I was leaving? There are two possible answers. Either he was deeply hurt and he was waiting for me to make the first move—after all, I’d said I would phone in a few days. Or else he was glad to be rid of me so easily. I was gone, and good riddance! Without any scenes or drawn-out explanations. But no, that can’t be right. He couldn’t not have asked himself questions. He couldn’t not have wondered why I was acting the way I did. Which means the first answer is the right answer. He was deeply hurt. He was waiting for me to make the first move. But it was impossible for me to make that move, because it would just have led to more of the same—suspicions and presentiments and despair. No, everything’s fine as it is. There was only one way out, only one door. And I opened it.
Rosalinda’s shaggy paw was brushing against the glass. A breeze?
Anna went to the window. In the blackness outside, the black boughs were motionless, scarcely discernible against the sky. The boughs were perfectly still. Just one leaf, right by the window, was pulsing strangely. It was quivering. Just one, like the vein in Anna’s throat.
“Rosalinda! You’re not in pain, too, are you?”
She ought to go downstairs, where there were people. Here it was rather frightening.
But downstairs was deserted. Evidently everyone had already gone to their rooms. There was only the sound of soft, ragged chords coming from the small drawing room. Anna pushed open the door and went in.
The room was almost dark, apart from a tiny lamp by the grand piano. The albino mouse was leaning an elbow on the keyboard and weeping. Then he wiped his eyes and his nose, and, picking out the chords, he began to sing softly:
My bright little budgerigar was dying.
He was not the cleverest of birds.
I have heard of birds of many words,
But your dear name was my bird’s only word.
And as he lay dying, he bequeathed to me
His longing for a brighter, finer sun
Than any in the world. He bequeathed to me
Your name, his single word, his one and only one.
He reached the end and once again began to weep.
“Didn’t he hear me coming in?” wondered Anna. “The poor, queer thing.”
“Young man!” she called out. “What are you so upset about?”
He let out a loud shriek.
“Oh! You frightened me! It’s not a good thing to frighten me.”
“Forgive me. Why are you weeping?”
“I’m weeping because the bright little budgerigar has died.”
“Did you really have a budgerigar, or did you invent it for the song?”
“No, it never even existed. And that’s even more painful. If it had lived in the real world and then died, it would be different. But it was living only inside of me. Not even that. It wasn’t even living, it only died inside of me, and that’s almost more than I can bear.”
He blew his nose miserably.
“You’d better go,” he said with a sob. “You wouldn’t understand anyway. And I want to go on suffering. I beg you, please go.”
She turned round and went through the empty dining room and out onto the terrace. To the right, beside the kitchen door, something was clanking and seemed to be groaning. She went up closer. It was the she-bear, Shura Ivanovna. She had been chained to a tree and was walking round it in circles. She would take a few steps in one direction, the chain would grow taut and pull, and she would bellow and turn back. Then she would take a few steps in the opposite direction, the chain would grow taut again—and again it would pull at her and again she would bellow and turn back. She must have been going back and forth like that for some time, unable to believe what was happening and continuing to hope that maybe, this time, the chain wouldn’t stop her.
“Shura Ivanovna! Shura Ivanovna!” Anna said. “Do you really still have hope? You have to choose where to draw the boundary—only then can one live. The only people in the world who are truly living are those who have managed to draw a boundary round evil. The strong in spirit used to withdraw from the world into the desert. Because earthly life can never grant a complete and elevated joy, they renounced it. They withdrew into caves and catacombs, accepting suffering and death—but what they did not accept was this loathsome world, with its niggardly joys. How full of anguish you are, Shura Ivanovna, you poor, unfortunate creature! It hurts me to look at you!”
She went back inside and wandered the dark rooms until she found the stairs and went up to her room.
How was she going to live through this sparrow night? She didn’t have the strength. There was a little box full of morphine in case her neuralgia flared up. Nothing was hurting now. But she had a lot of morphine. Forty ampoules. Enough for a long rest. An eternal rest.
She went to the window.
There were Rosalinda’s paws, still black as black—and, just as before, a single leaf was quivering and pulsating.
What does one need to overcome the despair that floods the world?
They say that a scorpion surrounded by a ring of fire will thrust its sting into its own breast. It kills itself. It chooses, of its own free will, to put a limit to its suffering.
What a dreadful black night! In the distance there was a flash of lightning. Like someone quickly opening and closing their eyes.
Sh
e reached out and pushed aside the sturdy, springy bough. Now the sky was visible. And the stars—large, small, near, far. There were even the kind that can be felt but not seen.
Yes, the scorpion imposes its will. But what if…
A terrible suspicion flashed through her mind, like the lightning that had only a moment ago lit up the black world.
What if it wasn’t the will of the scorpion? What if it was the will of the one who had surrounded the scorpion with the ring of fire? “Not a hair from his head shall fall unless He wills it.”1
She threw back her head and pushed the black branches even further away. Her eyes swept across the thousand-starred expanse of the incomprehensible and merciless heavens.
“So this is who has surrounded me with a ring of fire!”
She released the branches and turned round. Thoughtfully she lit the lamp and took the small box out of her suitcase.
“So be it. May the scorpion thrust its sting into its own breast.”
She smiled bitterly, as if she were weeping, the corners of her mouth turned down.
“If that’s the way it is, then may Thy will be done.”
1952
Notes
1 The quotation is a paraphrase from 1 Samuel 14:45.
AND TIME WAS NO MORE
“JUST ONE left till morning.”
What does this mean? I keep repeating the words in my head. They’ve got stuck there. I’m fed up with them. But this often happens to me. A sentence or part of a tune will get stuck in my head and won’t leave me alone.
I open my eyes.
An old woman is kneeling down on the floor, lighting the little stove. The kindling crackles.
And my stove is crackling away.
It lights up my bed in the corner
Behind the bright-coloured curtain.
How often I’d sung those lines.
The bright-coloured bed curtain is gathered into pleats; light is shining through its scarlet roses.