The Slynx

by Tatyana Tolstaya

  "I got it… well, I just got it. We have a big library at home."

  They poured some more rusht. The Oldeners didn't look at Benedikt, and they didn't look at each other. They stared at the table.

  "Special Reserves," said Lev Lvovich.

  "A spiritual treasure trove," corrected Nikita Ivanich.

  "But I've already read everything," said Benedikt. "I, well, I have a favor to ask. Maybe you have something to read, no? I'll be careful… no spots, nothing. I respect books."

  "I don't have any books," replied Nikita Ivanich. "I truly don't. Would I lie?"

  "I could give you mine, for a little while… Kind of like an exchange. If you'll be careful… Wrap them in something… a cloth or rags… I have good books, they don't have any Illness or anything…"

  "Interlibrary with Leviathan. I wouldn't get involved."

  "You're in a conspiratorial phase… Where are your democratic values?"

  "We shouldn't cooperate with a totalitarian regime…"

  Benedikt waited for the Oldeners to stop their gibberish. "What do you think, Nikita Ivanich?"

  Nikita Ivanich waved his hands around like he hadn't heard the question. He poured some more mead. It went down smoothly…

  "I have interesting books," Benedikt tempted them. "About women, and nature, and science too… they tell you all sorts of things… You were talking about freedom-well, I've got one about freedom too, about everything. It teaches how to make freedom. Should I bring it? Only you have to be careful."

  "Really?" Lev Lvovich said with interest. "Whose book?"

  "Mine."

  "The author, who's the author?"

  Benedikt thought.

  "I can't remember right off. I think It starts with Pl."

  "Plekhanov?"

  "No…"

  "It couldn't be Plevier?"

  "No, no… Don't interrupt… Aha! It's Plaiting and Knitting Jackets. 'When knitting the armhole we cast on two extra loops for freedom of movement. We slip them on the right needle, taking care not to tighten them excessively.'"

  "We've always known how to tighten things excessively around here…" said Lev Lvovich with a grin.

  "So should I bring it? It's all right?" said Benedikt, rising.

  "Don't bother, young man."

  Benedikt had been sly: he himself didn't like Plaiting very much-it was a boring sort of essay; but he thought maybe it would do for Oldeners-who knows what they like? He himself liked Embraces better. Since he'd already gotten up, Benedikt pushed the door open to let in some of the blizzardy air-they'd smoked up the place something fierce. He wanted to keep an eye on Teterya: Had he gone and committed Freethinking, and crawled up into the sleigh? There was a bear skin there, and sometimes the stinking scum did that: he'd get up under the skin to get warm, and after that just try airing it out! Degenerators have a strong smell: dung, straw, unwashed feet. No, he hadn't crawled in, but what was he doing? He was standing on his legs. He'd taken the felt boots off his hands and was scratching swear words onto the pillar that said "Nikitsky Gates."

  "Teterya!!!" Benedikt croaked. "You hairy rat! I see everything!"

  He immediately darted back on all fours, as if he hadn't been doing anything, and raised his leg on the pillar as if to say, yeah? I'm just relieving myself, the way we do. I'm pissing.

  "You pig…"

  Nikita Ivanich looked out over Benedikt's shoulder. "Benya! Why don't you invite your comrade inside? Good Lord, he's outside and in such cold weather!"

  "Comrade? Nikita Ivanich! That's a Degenerator! Don't tell me you haven't seen Degenerators before!"

  Lev Lvovich hadn't taken a liking to Benedikt: he looked at him with disdain and kept his mouth squinched to one side. He also got up from the table, crowded behind the Stoker's back, and looked out. "Appalling exploitation…" he muttered.

  "Call him, call him into the house! That's inhumane!"

  "But he's not a human! Humans don't have felt boots on their hands!"

  "You have to look at it more broadly! Even without him the people is incomplete!" Lev Lvovich instructed.

  "We won't argue about definitions…" The old man wrapped a scarf around his neck… "Who are you and I…? Bipeds without feathers, with articulate speech… Let me out, I'll go and invite him… What's his name?"

  "He answers to Teterya."

  "But I can't speak to an adult like that… What's his patronymic?"

  "Petrovich… Don't be crazy, Nikita Ivanich, watch out, for God's sake!!! Invite a Degenerator into the izba? He'll muck the whole place up. Wait!"

  "Terenty Petrovich," the Stoker said, leaning over into the snowdrift, "kindly come in to the izba! Come sit at the table and warm up!"

  The deranged Oldeners unhitched the Degenerator, took off his shaft, and led him into the izba. Benedikt spat.

  "Please, let me have your reins, I'll help. Hang them on the nail."

  "They'll filch the bear skin! No one's watching the hide," screamed Benedikt and ran to the sleigh. Just in time: two Golubchiks had already wrapped the bear skin in a rug and thrown it on their shoulder. Everyone would have done the same-why not? Who leaves goods like that in the middle of the street without an owner nearby! Seeing Benedikt, they ran into a lane with the rug. He caught up with them, gave them a thrashing, and recovered the goods, huffing and puffing. Oohh, what thievery!

  "… I came home, everything was quite civilized, the floors were covered with goddamn Polish varnish!" cursed a soused Teterya. "I took off my shoes, put on my slippers, and there was figure skating on the tube. Irina Rodnina! A double lux… Maya Kristalinskaya was singing. She gets on your nerves, doesn't she?"

  "I…" objected Lev Lvovich.

  "I, I, I, it's always I. T is just a letter of the alphabet! Gone to seed under Kuzmich, Glorybe! He's let everyone go to pot, frigging dwarf! Reading books, all a bunch of smart alecs all of a sudden! Under Sergeich you wouldn't have done all that reading!"

  "Excuse me, but I beg to differ!" Lev Lvovich and Nikita Ivanich broke in, interrupting each other. "Under Sergei Sergeich there was utter terror! He trampled the rights of the individual!… There were arrests in broad daylight! Have you forgotten that more than three were forbidden to gather at one time?… No singing or smoking on the streets!… Curfew!… And what happened if you were late to the recount?-And the uniforms…"

  "There was law and order under Sergeich! All the terems were built! All the fences! They never held up Warehouse packages! A basket for holidays, my ration was fifth category, and I got a postcard from the local committee!…"

  "You've got it all mixed up, all confused… postcards were before the Blast!… But just remember-a mere forty years ago private mouse-catching was forbidden!"

  "… A co-op apartment in Skabl… in Sviblovo," said Te-terya, tripping over his own tongue, "five minutes from the metro. A park zone, you got me? We weren't a bunch of rabi-noviches living in the center!… They were right to put you all in jail!"

  "I beg your pardon… we're talking about Sergei Sergeich!"

  "… They stick a pair of glasses on and then they start thinking!… I won't let you weeds hit me with a wrench. Don't you shake your beard at meeee! Abraham! You're an abraham! The government gives you a quota and you're supposed to stay within it… Jeezus F… Christ… and not go wagging your butts in front of a bunch of foreigners…"

  "But-"

  "Gone and multiplied like rabbits, shit! Supposed to be two percent and not a cent more so you don't crush the working class!… Who ate all the meat? Epstein! Huh? Who bought up all the sugar… and we're supposed to make hooch from tomato paste, right? Isn't that right? You're a hitler! There's no Zhirinovsky for you guys anymore!"

  "But-"

  "Made your son a nice liddle blue shoot, suit, a hunnert percent wool! Then you made a deal to sell the Kuriles to Reagan!… Not an inch will we yield!…"

  "Terenty Petrovich!"

  "I said not one inch!… We won't give up the Kuriles… And you can stick your pil
lars up your rear end! You parasites, tried to turn the country into a museum. Pour gasoline over you and-just one little match!… and your ppppparliament, and your books, and your academic Ssssssakharov! And…"

  "Now you've done it, you s.o.b.!" A crimson Lev Lvovich suddenly hauled back and punched him. "Don't you dare touch Andrei Dmitrich!!!"

  There wasn't any Andrei Dmitrich in the izba; but that happens when you drink too much: your eyes see everything double, and strange figures and faces watch you from the corners. Then you blink-and they're gone.

  "You bastard!" shouted the Head Stoker as well. "Get out of here!"

  "Don't touuuuch me!" Teterya yelled, flailing his furry elbows. "Help! They're beating Ruuuusssssians!"

  "You prison slime… Terrorist! Tie him up!"

  They knocked over the table and the jug rolled away. Benedikt jumped in too, and helped them tie the drunken pig with the reins; they rolled him up, threw him outside in the snow, and kicked him for good measure.

  "I had a chrome faucet in Sviblovo!" they could hear from the snowstorm. "And you can't even get it up, you queers!…"

  If this one is quiet, what is Potap like?

  SHA

  Bright thoughts ascend In my heart's battered torch And bright thoughts descend By a dark fire scorched.

  "Under Sergei Sergeich there was law and order," said Benedikt.

  "You said it," replied Father-in-law.

  "No more than three people gathered at a time."

  "No way."

  "But now everybody's too smart for their britches, they read books, they've gone to seed. Fyodor Kuzmich, Glorybe, has let everything get out of hand."

  "Words of gold!" Father-in-law exclaimed joyfully.

  "Sergei Sergeich built fences, but What've we got nowadays?"

  "A crying shame!"

  "Holes everywhere, fences falling down, the people's path is overgrown with dill!"

  "That's right!"

  "A useless weed, no taste, no smell!"

  "Not a smidgen."

  "People hang underwear and pillowcases on the pushkin, and the pushkin-is our be all and end all!"

  "Right down to his itty bitty toes!"

  "He's the one who wrote the poems, not Fyodor Kuzmich!"

  "Never a truer word spoken."

  "He's higher than the Alexander column!"

  "Oh, my dear, the column can't compare!"

  "But Fyodor Kuzmich, Glorybe, is only knee high to a grasshopper! And he wants to be the Greatest Murza, Long May He Live. Sits right down on Olenka's lap and makes himself at home!"

  "Yes, yes… tell me more…"

  "What do you mean, 'yes and tell me more'?"

  "Take the next step, think it through."

  "Think what where?"

  "What does your heart tell you?"

  Benedikt's heart wasn't telling him anything. His heart was dark, dark as an izba in winter when all the candles have gone out and you live with your hands outstretched. There was an extra candle somewhere, but just try and find it now in the pitch dark.

  You stumble and your hands fumble, they're blind, frightened: who knows what you might find or touch, not seeing what it is. Your soul will freeze: What's this? There's never been anything like this in the izba. What is it?

  Your insides are like to pop with fear and you throw the thing away, whatever it was… You stand there, petrified, scared to breathe… Scared to take a step… You think: If I move, I'll step on it…

  Carefully… sideways… along the edges… against the wall. One step, two steps… and you make it to the door. You yank the door open and run as fast as your legs will carry you!

  You collapse under a tree or next to the fence; everything inside is pounding. Now you have to pull yourself together, ask someone for coals or maybe a candle. If they give you a candle it's easier, not so scary; you'll go back to the izba and take a look.

  What was that thing? And there doesn't seem to be anything there.

  Nothing at all.

  Could be your neighbors were playing a trick on you, the jokesters: while you were out, they put who knows what there, to ruin your reason with fear; and while you were running back and forth, trying to get some fire, they go and fetch whatever it was they stuck there. So there's nothing there now, and you never know what it was.

  His heart wasn't telling him anything. But his head-yes, his head was telling him something. That's why reason is up there in the head. His head told him that a long time ago, before his wedding-yikes, ages ago-when he was still a wild young man, an uneducated greenhorn with a tail and no sense, he saw a book at Varvara Lukinishna's place. He couldn't remember what book it was, big or little, or what it was called: the fear and the strangeness made it so he didn't understand anything at the time, he only understood that he was scared stiff.

  Now, of course, as an educated man, sophisticated, you might say, he'd know how to appreciate such a treasure. He'd fondle it, turn it over, count the number of pages and see what the letters were like: big or small. Is it a quick read or not? Having read it, he'd know which shelf to put it on, with a kiss.

  Now, refined and wiser, he knew that a book is a delicate friend, a white bird, an exquisite being, afraid of water.

  Darling things! Afraid of water, of fire, They shiver in the wind. Clumsy, crude human fingers leave bruises on them that'll never fade! Never!

  Some people touch books without washing their hands!

  Some underline things in ink!

  Some even tear pages out!

  And he himself used to be so barbaric and clumsy, such a Cro-Magnon, that he rubbed a hole in a page with a spit-covered finger! "And the candle by which Anna read a life full of alarm and deceit…" Idiot. He'd rubbed a hole in it, Lord forgive him. It was the same as if you'd found the secret glade in the forest by some miracle-all covered in crimson tulips and golden trees- and finally embraced the sweet Princess Bird, and while embracing her you'd gone and poked your dirty finger in her bright, self-admiring eye!

  Varvara Lukinishna said that Nikita Ivanich gave her the book. So, he was caught out in a lie, the old man! You do have books, you old drunk, you hide them somewhere, bury them, won't let good people read them… They aren't in the izba, Benedikt knew that izba like the back of his hand, he'd spent a lot of time there… They aren't in the shed, we carved the pushkin in the shed… There's only rusht in the pantry… In the bathhouse maybe?

  Benedikt thought about the bathhouse and got mad. He could feel his face puffing up with anger: the bathhouse is damp, books would mildew there. Here he'd come, asking nicely, offering to trade. He'd brought a valuable present. He didn't begrudge anything; he sat with the Oldeners for half a day, listened to their nonsense-but no, they had to go and lie, had to pretend, and pull the wool over his eyes, look away, brush him off, deny everything. No, no, not us, we don't have any books, don't even bother to look for any!…

  And they invited that stinking bastard, that Degenerator, to sit at the table with them. Yes, Terenty Petrovich. What do you think, Terenty Petrovich? Would you care for some rusht, Terenty Petrovich? They fed him and got him drunk, and then they got mad at him for some reason, and threw him out in the snow like a sack of turnips… Served him right, of course.

  But they treated Benedikt the same way: they laughed and left him with nothing to show for his trouble…

  The old man said: the heavens and the heart, it's all the same, and you remember that. What's in the sky? There's darkness and blizzards, stormy whirlwinds. In summer, stars: the Trough, the Bowl, Horsetail, Nail Clippings, the Belly Button, there are tons of them! They're all written down in a book, he said, and that book lies locked behind seven gates, and that book holds the secret of how to live, only the pages are all shuffled… and the letters aren't like ours. Go and look for it, he said. Pushkin looked for it, and you go and look too. I'm looking, I'm looking, just think how many people I've shaken down: Theofilactus, Eensy Weensy, Zuzya, Nenila the Hare, Methuselah and Churilo, the twins; Osip, Rev
olt, Eulalia, Avenir, Maccabee, Zoya Gurevna… January, Ulcer, Sysoy, Ivan Pricklin… They caught them all with the hook, dragged them across the floor, all of them grabbed the tables and stools, all of them howled bloody murder when they were taken away to be treated… Noooooo, that is, doooooon't…!

  What do you mean, don't? It says: Books shouldn't be kept at home, and whoever keeps them shouldn't hide them, and whoever hides them should be treated.

  Because everything's gotten out of hand under Fyodor Kuzmich, Glorybe. And who grabbed the main book and hid it-the one where it says how to live? Roach Efimich had books with letters that weren't like ours right out in plain view, two dozen of them, all clean and dry. Is that where the precious writings are? Probably not. Nikita Ivanich said they're locked behind seven gates, in a valley of fog… So keep on thinking, Benedikt…

  Go and hitch up Teterya. To make sure he wouldn't swear the whole time or give anything away, so he'd keep his mouth shut, Benedikt made him a plug, that is, a gag: you take a rag, roll it up, tie it with a string, and stuff it in between the blabbermouth's teeth; then you fasten it around the ears. And off you go, at a gallop, but without songs!

  "Where ya going so late, Benny?"

  "I've got, I have to… go talk about art…"

  From the threshold of the gate Let the wilting beauty gaze Whether gentle or depraved Whether spiteful or quite chaste.

  Who cares about her charming hands! Who needs her bed's warm heat Come on, brother, let's retreat, Let's soar above the sands!

  But the weather is bad: the air is heavy and full of alarm. The blizzard is rotten, like it was mixed with water, and the snow no longer sparkles as it did, it sticks to things. On the corners, at the crossroads, on the squares, the people stand around in bunches -more than three at a time. They huddle, looking at the sky or talking, or just standing there fretting.

  Why is there unrest among the people?… He just passed two Golubchiks with worried faces, their eyes flitting back and forth. Others run past, waving their hands. And those guys over there were chatting, then they ran back in their houses and slammed the gates. Benedikt stopped in the sleigh, watching people he knew. Poltorak whizzed by like a wheel and was gone: he has three legs, you could never catch up with him.