Penguin Lost

by Andrey Kurkov

  Khachayev crossed to the phone and dialled.

  “Answerphone,” he said wearily, replacing the receiver.

  “Try my flat,” suggested Viktor. “Nina will vouch for me. She knows about my penguin.”

  “Number?”

  He dialled.

  “Hello, Nina? … Where? … Who are you, then? Sonya?”

  He passed the phone to Viktor.

  “Sonya, it’s me, Uncle Viktor!”

  “In Moscow?”

  “No, a long way away. I’ve found Misha, but they may not let us go. It’s not easy to explain.”

  “Not let you go? How do you mean?”

  “Speak to the other uncle here. Perhaps he’ll believe you.”

  He passed the receiver to Khachayev.

  “Sonya, this uncle you’ve been talking to,” he said, eyeing Viktor, “do you know him well?”

  “He’s my Daddy.”

  “Daddy or uncle?”

  “Daddy. So you’ve got Misha.”

  “Yes. But which: uncle or Daddy?”

  “Are you going to let them go?”

  “Who?”

  “Uncle Viktor and Misha.”

  “Hang on, first you tell me–”

  “No. You promise you will let them go. Misha’s got a bad heart, in case you didn’t know.”

  “All right, I promise, but–”

  “Give your word, swear on the head of your mother!”

  “I give my word, I swear on the head of my mother I will let them go! Now will you answer my question!”

  “Viktor’s my second Daddy. My first went away and disappeared. But where’s Misha? Is he with you?”

  “No.”

  “When will you let them go?”

  “Soon. But that’s it for now. Goodbye, Sonya.”

  “Can I speak again to Uncle Viktor?”

  “Not at inter-city rates!” he snapped, replacing the receiver, then felled Viktor with a punch.

  “You have set me up,” he said, with no special rancour.

  “How?”

  “She – that little girl – got me to give my word.”

  “But will you keep it?” Viktor asked warily.

  “The word of a Chechen is worth a hundred of your promises … Do you understand?”

  In fear of another outburst of temper and hopes of relieving the tension, Viktor reached into his inner pocket, took out Sonya’s poster and laid it on the table.

  Picking it up, Khachayev examined Sonya’s penguin under the far from steady light of the chandelier, then spoke into his walkie-talkie.

  “Aslan will take you back,” he said.

  Viktor made as if to retrieve the poster, but Khachayev shook his head, opened the door and returned him to the care of the guard.

  59

  Aslan yawned. “Give him half an hour in the dog cage, then take him to Aza’s,” Khachayev had said. A funny sort of order, but as he’d learnt in the Red Army, an order was an order, and still was. Just that the amount of ferrying involved left so little time for sleep. But should the Alsatians make a meal of this Russian – as might be the idea – the run to Aza’s would be out, and sleep back on. But no, he’d have the body to take, to Aza’s, blood and all. Without Khachayev’s furnace there’d be Fed graves and headstones in the Chechen forests, there’d be monuments – such as he’d stood guard over in Treptow – federalizing Chechnya, destroying it. Khachayev had the right idea.

  Another half hour and they were there. The main gates were shut, but as there was a side gate giving access to the cage, he saw no need to rouse the place and go into explanations.

  At Aslan’s approach the dogs pricked up their ears, sniffed the air, but did not bark. They, like Chechens, were cunning. Without a sound they’d get you by the throat, and that was it.

  Aslan opened the door a little and squatted down. Dzhoka trotted lightly over, sniffed him, looked him in the eye.

  “How about some nice Russian meat?” Aslan asked, resisting the urge to stroke him. He and Dzhoka were equals. Told to seize, they seized.

  Aslan woke Viktor and led him to the cage, which was, Viktor saw though half asleep and through a flurry of snow, a metal cage about the size of Khachayev’s sitting room containing a number of roughly-fashioned dog kennels. Aslan jostled him through the door, and sleepily he took several steps forward. The door closed behind him, and turning he was in time to see Aslan glance at his watch and light a cigarette before heading back to the jeep.

  Viktor stood alone in the falling snow, hardly daring to breathe, rooted almost tree-like to the spot, with five Alsatians regarding him from their kennels. If one charged, the others would follow. Had he time to escape? He didn’t dare look round at the door to see how it was fastened – the slightest movement might be his last. This, then, was how Khachayev kept faith. But similarly placed, might not he have done the same?

  But the dogs had not charged.

  Out of the corner of an eye, he saw something move. Without turning his head, he squinted to the uttermost, and saw, waddling to a food bowl by the kennels, a penguin. Bending, it picked something from the bowl. It wasn’t at all like Misha. It was some other penguin, shorter, thinner.

  “Misha!” he called softly, all else forgotten, and the penguin looked at him through the falling snow.

  Still the dogs did not move.

  The snow eased.

  He called again, louder.

  The penguin took several steps towards him, stopped, fixed him with his tiny button eyes for a while, then advanced and stared up at him.

  Seeing the dogs still sitting or standing, Viktor took a deep breath and slowly eased himself down to the penguin’s level.

  The penguin came closer.

  Heedless now of the dogs, Viktor reached out, stroked its breast, and feeling a long scar, knew at last that it was Misha.

  With Misha pressed against his knee, the past with all its warmth and sense of life worth living came flooding back. He reached out to smoothe Misha’s flippers, but drew his hand back, deterred by a sudden growling. Absurd though it seemed, the dogs were being protective. The absurd was here amazingly real. Life here was ruled by it.

  “Time to go,” came a voice.

  “Are we taking the penguin?” he asked, turning to Aslan. “Khachayev promised to release him.”

  “Hasn’t said anything to me about it. Come on.”

  Would surprises, the survival of this Russian not least amongst them, never cease?

  Viktor straightened up, and watched in amazement as Misha, or what remained of him, shuffled off to one of the kennels, and ducking awkwardly, entered it.

  No sooner were they clear of the village than Viktor fell asleep on his back seat. Glancing back at him, Aslan concluded that since the dogs had not set tooth in him, this was a Russian of the harmless sort. They weren’t wolves, Khachayev’s Alsatians – gutless slaves, and the sick were safe from them.

  60

  Woken by the cold, Viktor found himself lying fully dressed on his own bed at Aza’s, where Aslan must have deposited him. Seeing the window wide open, he jumped up and shut it. The bed that had been Seva’s was empty. He sat down for a moment on his own, then went and had a wash.

  The place seemed deserted, but outside, a fabulous carpet of snow sparkling in the sun sent spirits soaring, and thoughts back to the dog cage, finding Misha, and Khachayev’s promise to Sonya. Well done Sonya!

  He smiled. Now he had simply to wait for him to act upon it. Nothing difficult about that. It was like seeing in orders that your discharge was due. Bubbling with energy, he had a sudden urge to turn cartwheels, fling himself down, do press-ups – anything to let off steam, demonstrate that life went on. Passing the half-open door of Aza’s room, he took a peep inside, noting with interest the settee upholstered in leather cracked with age, the file-laden school desk, the occasional table with decanter and glasses, the ancient Sony radio.

  On top of the files was Aza’s ledger. Viktor went in and examined it. T
he names and places of birth were a geography lesson in themselves. Of the recent entries, 856 and 857, had dashes in lieu of both. 857 would have been Seva. To keep records was to breed secrets. He thought back to that dream where he, Seva and Sergey had been together on the yacht. Seva, yes, but why Sergey?

  Idly he leafed back through the pages, and there, for 13th of February 1997, in Aza’s round childish hand, he read with incredulity: Stepanenko, Sergey, Kiev.

  He banged the ledger shut and for a long while sat at the desk, reliving the picnic he, Sergey and Misha had enjoyed on the Dnieper ice, and their eventful New Year celebration at Sergey’s dacha, when Sonya had been with them.

  How very strange that he, having no idea of the existence of this private crematorium, should still have been both directly and indirectly linked with it by the urn on the window ledge in his kitchen in Kiev!

  61

  Two hours later as Viktor lay, vitality spent, staring at the ceiling and awaiting demob, Aza returned.

  “Up we get! Here’s Ginger to be taught the job. Work’s on its way. So teach him, or burn.”

  Ginger, Viktor learnt, as they crunched their way through the snow to the shed, was Vasya from Archangel in the far Russian north.

  “How about food?” he asked.

  “Vermicelli, and come Fat Friday, army tinned meat.”

  “Why fat?”

  “Because Thursday night’s a discount burning.”

  “Of what?”

  “Best I explain when we’re there.”

  And when there, Vasya listened open-mouthed, but quickly cottoned on.

  “Better a hot furnace than a cold pit,” Viktor threw in at some stage.

  “So you’ve been there.”

  His nod earned him greater deference.

  “So it’s feet first?”

  “Other way round. You use the legs to shove.”

  “How about a bit of heat now?”

  “Not till dark, because of the smoke.”

  When darkness fell, Vasya proved a quick learner.

  “And when’s Fat Friday?”

  “We’ll ask Aza,” said Viktor, having lost count.

  62

  Fat Friday fell two days later, producing a half-litre tin of pork to augment their vermicelli soup.

  “We had this when we were stationed at Mozdok,” Vasya said in surprise, examining the tin.

  After breakfast Viktor retired to bed, only to be woken at midday by the noise and vibration of two Sukhoy fighter bombers passing low overhead.

  Outside he found Aza taking his ease on a felled tree trunk.

  “Has Khachayev said anything about me?”

  “Should he have?”

  “He’s letting me go. He’s given his word.”

  “If he’s given his word, he will let you go.”

  “Where were Seva’s ashes put?”

  “Drum in the corner.”

  “Perhaps they should be sent to his home. Have we an address?”

  “We have, but no postal service. Not unless you fix something with the Feds and pay for it.”

  “I could, I suppose, or I could take them and post them from Kiev.”

  “I’ll give you his address. His are on top in the drum. No-one’s been added since him.”

  “I need a bigger bag,” Viktor said, thinking of having to carry Misha.

  “I’ll give you some canvas. You can make one.”

  Returning to his room, he got out a Marlboro carrier bag from under his bed, folded it neatly and put it in his jacket pocket. Vasya was asleep, and to judge from the movement of his lips and the half-smile on his face, dreaming pleasant dreams.

  He made his way to the shed and the well-filled drum of unclaimed ashes, got his carrier bag ready and fetched a spade. He half-filled the bag, and thinking that wasn’t quite enough, dug into the ashes again, this time striking something solid. He shovelled this spadeful into the bag, then plunged his arm in and fished out Seva’s gold brick, weighing a good seven kilos, if not more.

  He left the shed with the carrier bag in one hand and the gold brick in the other. Outside, he put the carrier down on the snow and wiping some of the ash from the brick, saw that it had precious and semi-precious stones embedded in it. He pushed the brick down into the ashes, and carried the bag in his arms for fear the handles would break.

  63

  Another Fat Friday came and went, and Viktor lost his appetite. He and Vasya had worked well together, harmoniously even, and Vasya had come on well, doing and saying nothing to irritate him. His response to Viktor was that of raw recruit to hardened old soldier. He did exactly what he was told, and Viktor made a good superior. As Vasya had put it early on, after life in his Mozdok unit and freezing and starving in the Chechen pit, here, offshore, with the nightly sauna of the shed, was a holiday. Only from time to time, the excessive dryness of the heat produced an unpleasant taste in the mouth forcing them out into the chilly night for a quiet chat with, whenever the Chechen sky cleared itself of cloud, a pause for silent contemplation. The stars of this winter sky were of the same magnitude as those of southern Ukraine or northern Archangel. They were common to all those stars, though Chechens refused to concede as much, despite having sun and moon in common with Russians and Ukrainians.

  Feds came and went with their corpses. Chechens put in a rarer appearance. Vasya’s pockets bulged with small dollar bills and rouble notes, at night a source of anxiety with the thieving of army life still fresh in his memory. Of his own anxieties and growing sense of grievance concerning Khachayev and his promise, Viktor said nothing.

  Then, stoking of passage stove completed and with Monday inclining to an early sunset, Viktor was about to join Vasya, who was sitting outside smoking, when the familiar jeep turned up, Aslan driving, Khachayev in the back.

  Dismissing Vasya to the furnace shed, Khachayev, in Viktor’s room, sat on Vasya’s bed and producing a half-litre bottle of cognac, lit the bedside candle.

  “Any glasses?”

  Viktor brought Pooh Bear mugs.

  “Pity no penguins,” said Khachayev, pouring for them both. “Now listen. You go first solo, together’s not on. From Taganrog you make your own way, and I’ll call within a fortnight.”

  “You’ve got my number?”

  “And Andrey Pavlovich’s. So drink up!”

  He poured Viktor another.

  “Good luck!”

  Viktor felt suddenly he couldn’t care less. Thoughts, wishes ceased to exist. The future became a haze. Another minute and his past would vanish, he would no longer remember who he was, where he was from or his place of birth. There were now two candle flames where there had been one. The bed rocked beneath him like a raft or yacht in heavy seas. He rolled forward, then back, banged his back against the wall, then his head in a way that made the wound in his temple throb.

  “Put him in the jeep,” Khachayev ordered Aza and Aslan who came running to his call. “And don’t forget his things. Probably under his bed.”

  “It’s heavy,” said Aza, dragging Viktor’s home-made bag out.

  “Open it.”

  Putting it on the bed, Aza undid the three greatcoat buttons fastening it, and was about to rummage inside, when Khachayev passed him the Pooh Bear mug.

  “Stick that in and do the bag up. We don’t poke about in other people’s things.”

  Aza put the bag on the floor behind the driver, Khachayev got in beside Aslan, and the jeep drove off, retracing its furrows in the snow.

  *

  Three hours later the jeep stopped and switched off its headlights. Three helicopters flew over towards the mountains, Khachayev followed the sound, leaning back against the jeep, grim-faced. A little later, a minivan displaying a red cross on a green background drew up, two Russians in battle fatigues got out, exchanged greetings, then transferred Viktor and his canvas bag to their minivan.

  “Three boxes of Spanish disposable syringes and some super antibiotic three days from now,” said one of the Russians
. “Bring them?”

  “Yes,” said Khachayev, “but first get this chap away, safe, sound, and with his gear intact exactly as I’ve promised.”

  The Russian nodded.

  Shortly after, the vehicles went their separate ways, each retracing its own tread marks in the snow. Overhead, the clouds parted and a steely wedge of moonlight shone forth.

  64

  For the sake of physical and psychological wellbeing, some frontiers are best crossed in the state of unconsciousness that was Viktor’s entering and leaving Chechnya. But the ticket clerk at Taganrog station took one look at him, and shook her head, sorely tempted to inform this young man that two weeks ago a nephew of hers had died of a drugs overdose in Nikolayev.

  Having more than an hour to kill, he spotted a beer kiosk, and beside it, an inebriated old man selling dried fish.

  Totting up his roubles, Viktor decided he could indulge himself. Still unsteady on his feet, he bought a bottle of Baltika and a dried fish. The beer went down easily, the fish less so. A second bottle left him inclined to stay on here by the beer kiosk, until an idle glance at the clock betrayed that he had ten minutes to catch his train.

  “Hi, don’t forget your bag!” cried the dried fish man, and Viktor, slowed by the weight of it, only just made the train in time.

  65

  Kiev was freezing. The sixteen-hour journey largely spent sleeping, had banished the effects of whatever drug he had been given. Squatting, he felt in his bag, encountered cold metal, and had a good look. The gold brick lay at the bottom, no longer wrapped, with, he had been amazed to find, the Pooh Bear mug. That the brick should have survived road block checks and got through customs at the Russo-Ukrainian border, beggared belief. It was all there: credit card, both passports, and a wad of the small-value dollar bills regarded with suspicion in Kiev and usually rejected.

  Washing his hands in the station toilet and seeing himself in the mirror, hairy, head in filthy bandage, he marvelled that he’d not been pulled in by the Taganrog militia.

  He washed his face, and had another look in the mirror. He must get home quick before he did get pulled in. But what was this? Three medals pinned to the breast of his jacket! Someone’s idea of a joke. On the point of removing them, he thought better of it, shoved his hands into his pockets and in one of them found a card – a creased and grubby army pass in the name of Kovalyov, Sergey Fyodorovich, Sergeant. The photo could, at a pinch, have been him.