Tolkovyanov did not allow himself to smile, and with great tact and discretion tried to present some reasoned and sensible options.
On his way home, Kosargin passed the famous monument to the Warriors of the Revolution. It depicted some steep cliffs from which three heads projected—a worker, a soldier, and a peasant. The whole city, following the quip of some street comedian, called it “Zmei-Gorynych,” after the three-headed dragon of Russian folktales. (And truly, there was a certain resemblance.)
He had to smile. How the times do change!
~ * ~
Yes, indeed, things moved in the most unimaginable ways. Kosargin’s job was an example. There were always some thugs with shaven heads and submachine guns guarding the Organized Crime Office, but the office was a lot more sophisticated than that. Kosargin wasn’t stupid, by any means, but what wisdom did he have to impart to his onetime arrestee? Any smart person could not fail to realize that the system could solve nothing by itself: You might have the best cabin on the ship, but what did it matter if your ship was sinking?
The point is, are they capable of changing? Remember what Tolkovyanov was like at the interrogation. Still, there was no way a person could avoid thinking about the overall situation in Russia; that was true of today’s KGB people as well. It wasn’t always about oneself. Though these company men from Ellomas weren’t without brains either, and if they managed to gain some political power, they would soon quadruple their capital.
. . . And so they went on. Two months had passed since the attempt on his life, and all was well. The investors had confidence in their Transcontinental and were not about to pull out their investments; they even increased them. Large-scale farmers began coming in from the surrounding areas; they came to them for money, not to the state sources and not to the Financial Division.
Then, at the end of April, Easter came. Tanya was busy baking Easter cakes and coloring eggs, something she had not done before.
“Please,” Alyosha implored her, “this is all fine, but don’t color any eggs. I don’t want to touch any colored eggs. Easter cakes are fine, but don’t even think of having them blessed by a priest. I won’t eat them.”
“Why on earth not?” A stray curl was hanging on her forehead. “Granny always colored eggs and had the cakes blessed. What’s the matter, don’t you follow our religion?”
“Our religion?” She had never said anything like that before, but perhaps she was right. What other religion would I follow? And it might well be that religion can pull a person out of depression and despondency. Still, what did the blessing of Easter cakes have to do with it?
Tanya came to him and placed her cheek against his: “Don’t you realize that we were doomed? That we were saved by some Higher Power? What do you think was keeping us safe these past months, if not that Power?”
All right, one might say that. But there’s also the theory of probability. And theoretical variants in any experiment.
There was, however, a different kind of explosion, the Big Bang.
There were also Black Holes.
And there was the incomprehensible foresight of the DNA molecule.
~ * ~
A few days later, the attempted murderer went on trial. Even Kosargin was astonished: given that the accused had made a full confession and provided all the material evidence, he was sentenced not for attempted murder but for “illegal possession of a weapon” and given four years in a labor camp, and not even a strict regime camp.
Obviously, someone had given the wheels of justice a good bit of grease.
At this point, Tolkovyanov grew very alarmed.
He asked Kosargin to get him a copy of the photo of the accused’s brother-in-law from the police files. But it—that particular piece of evidence—had disappeared from the trial documents without a trace. It was still listed in the file index, however . . .
None of the names of the principal managers who had ordered the murder were mentioned in court, but they could not but be aware that Tolkovyanov knew. Then he ran across one of them on the street—ironically, near the university where he was going to sit in on a scientific conference as he sometimes still did. He forced himself to give him only a passing glance and to say nothing.
Should he flee somewhere abroad? This would be a way to save his wife, his son, and himself, of course. But Alyosha could not run away.
He would protect Tanya like some fragile piece of glassware. But he could not run away.
He was amazed at himself, walking around every day in this heavy bulletproof vest, a man with a submachine gun at his heels. He had taken a second apartment to give himself some room to maneuver . . . Who wasn’t getting killed these days? Lenders were being killed for one reason, borrowers for another. His head was whirling: deposits, investments, deductions, balances, taxes, propping up businesses. But within all this intense whirl, even when he was utterly worn-out, he maintained one indestructible and unmoving point within himself: that was to follow—by chance, by what he heard from someone else, by some scientific article he managed to glance at—the latest developments in physics. He heard rumors of successful experiments by a group of our scientists who were able to raise the octane level of gasoline through irradiation. A monumental discovery! It would reduce world demand for oil. The Arabs learned of it and rushed here to buy the invention and then stifle it. Our side did nothing to support them; the scientists didn’t care so long as they could line their own pockets. So they sold it.
But still, it was our people, Russians, who made the discovery! No, Russian science isn’t finished yet, nor is Russian know-how.
“Just wait!” he imagined himself saying to someone. But saying to whom? The image of the person was blurred, but it was someone vile and hateful. “We’ll get back on our feet once again!”
Still, it seemed that it was not the banker Tolkovyanov who was to restore Russian science. The government had established a foreign currency “corridor” to channel exchange rates, cutting down the furious gambling and huge profits. The state allowed banks to multiply but had no thought of supporting them. New regulations were coming to govern the banks’ capitalization, liquidity, and stability. The weaker banks were now on their last gasp. The market for securities partially guaranteed by the state was still holding up, however. Those who had very distinguished clients were managing, but Tolkovyanov did not fawn upon these changelings from the former party bureaucracy who barely deigned to give him a nod. And then the most serious thing: his partner-friends, forced into a tight corner, began having disagreements and then even split. What had happened to the enthusiasm they had all felt just so recently, when they were expanding on the leaven of their own success, when they chatted like old friends, happily placing their beer mugs on those silly mats made of enlarged hundred-dollar bills? Now there was one disagreement after another: No, that’s not the way to build up capital; no, that’s not where we should be spending. First Rashid, then the others asked to withdraw their shares, which represented most of the bank’s resources. Money had brought them together, and money had driven them apart.
These quarrels were more unsettling than the decline of their business. Gloom settled over him.
When money is involved, there’s no limit to the passion and the thirst for vengeance.
The circle of Alyosha’s friends grew smaller. The whole situation in the world of finance had become a dark forest; you never knew when a pit might open beneath your feet or a dagger be thrust in your back. He carried on by guesswork: He bought a building in the city market; he set up two stores; he set up a dozen money exchange booths. But he was short of working capital and needed more credit. Where should he turn? He went to ask Yemtsov, one of his backers in the past and a man who knew he had to encourage a new generation.
Yemtsov had always supported him, but with a jolly familiarity.
“So, the greenhorn’s here. Tell me, how’s your little half-assed moneymaker doing?”
He was now almost seventy, yet he still had
the same vitality, the same eye for the ladies, and the same agile body and mind. And how had he been able to survive all this? To fall from such heights . . .
Yemtsov recognized no obstacles: We’ve charted our course and off we go, no room for the gutless! We’ve hit a wall? So we’ll find a way around it.
“You’re stuck, are you? Need some help? Well, that’s possible.”
But what if you’re not yet thirty? And they can kill you any day? And your friends are deserting you? And how many more mental convolutions will it take to find your way through this ever-changing labyrinth? Will you ever be able to get out of it?
And so he went on, lamenting the passing of the hope-filled years of his youth, his two years in the Physics Faculty before the army. Perhaps he should have stood his ground then and not changed direction. Perhaps he shouldn’t have given in to temptation. He could see a light, far off in the distance, and it was growing dimmer.
Yet a faint light persisted.
1996
<>
~ * ~
NO MATTER WHAT
1
Supper for the reserve regiment was served at six in the evening, even though lights-out did not come until ten. Someone had correctly figured that the men would get by without any more food that way, and would sleep through until morning.
Lights-out may have been at ten, but no amount of political reading could match up against the long, dark November evenings, and the lights in the barracks were dim besides. So the soldiers were allowed to hit the sack earlier, and night inspection was done earlier, too.
Lieutenant Pozushan was company commander, a straight arrow not so much from service (they had been hurried through military school), but from his internal sense of duty, and the present dread moment for the Soviet Union. Bitterly he swallowed the radio news accounts from Stalingrad. We were barely holding them back, it seemed, and the lieutenant even wished their regiment had been sent there. He could find no peace on these dull evenings, could not even sleep. And tonight, as the hours dragged on to midnight, he up and went to inspect company quarters.
All quiet with the first and second platoon—only the dim blue light of the tinted bulbs. The stoves were already dark and had cooled. (The rooms were heated with tin stoves, with makeshift ducts leading out the windows. The old basement furnace had long stood dormant.)
At the third platoon, not only was the stove still hot, but five of the men sat huddled around it, bundled in their dark, padded jackets and pants, butts right on the floor.
The lieutenant entered—they flinched. And jumped up.
The lieutenant attached no meaning to this at first, but let them sit, just scolded them quietly, so as not to wake the others: Why weren’t they asleep? And where did they get the firewood?
Private Harlashin answered right away: “Woodchips, comrade lieutenant. Picked them up over at the target range.”
Well, all right.
“And why aren’t you sleeping? Got too much strength? You better save it for the front.”
They hemmed and hawed; nothing clear.
Ah, it’s their business, after all. Probably telling each other stories about girls or the like.
He was already turning to leave, but suspected something. Up this late? And they certainly hadn’t been expecting him. And the fire in the stove was weak—it could hardly warm them.
“Oderkov, open the door.”
Oderkov sat right by the door of the stove, but gave a blank look: What door?
“Oderkov!”
Among them the lieutenant discerned junior sergeant Timonov, their section commander.
The soldiers froze. No one moved.
“What is this? Open it, I said.”
Oderkov lifted his arm as though it were made of lead. Took the turn-handle, strained to lift it.
All the way to the end.
And with no less strain he pulled on the door, and pulled some more.
Inside the stove, amidst the glowing coals, was a round, soot-stained, standard-issue mess pot. A steam odor poured into the room, cutting through the foul air of drying stockings.
“What are you boiling?” asked lieutenant Pozushan, still just as quietly, not to wake the platoon, but very strictly.
It became clear to the five of them that he would not drop it. No avoiding an answer.
Timonov got up. Not very firmly. Arms at his side, but squirming. One step closer to the lieutenant, to be all the quieter: “Sorry, comrade lieutenant. We were on mess hall duty today. Grabbed us a few raw potatoes.”
Of course! Pozushan only now realized it: Their battalion was on duty today and tomorrow. He had forgotten that the supply sergeant ordered a team to work the mess hall. And so they went.
A darkness slid, not over the lieutenant’s eyes, but into his breast. Like silt muddying the water. Like dirt.
Not swearing at them outright but with a pained voice, he let out a plea to the fighting men, all of them now on their feet: “Are you nuts? Do you have any idea what you are doing? The Germans are in Stalingrad. The country is starving. Every grain gets counted! And you?”
What else to say to them, so mindless, ignorant, and unconscientious? What else to infuse into their backward heads?
“Timonov, take out the pot.”
With the mitten that lay nearby, Timonov took the red-hot handle and, trying not to nick the coals, carefully lifted and pulled out the pot.
The bottom of the black pot was still covered with spots of glowing ember.
The embers burned out. Timonov held on.
The other four awaited their demise.
“An offense like this, why, this is grounds for court-martial!” said the lieutenant. “Very simple and easy: Just hand your names to the Political Department.”
Something else unpleasant now tugged at him. Oh yes, that’s it: Timonov was the one who had come to the lieutenant to ask if the regiment would write to his collective farm in Kazakhstan in defense of his family; they were being hounded for something. Pozushan couldn’t remember what for, but it was clear he couldn’t help; the regiment commanders would never sign a paper like that.
It came together oddly somehow. Either it made Timonov all the guiltier, or maybe less so.
The potatoes were boiling in their skins. Looked like about twenty of them, small ones.
And they gave off a teasing smell.
“Go pour out the water in the sink and bring the pot back. Quickly.”
Timonov went, but not quickly.
In the dim light, the lieutenant scanned the faces of his silent fighting men. Their expressions were gloomy, complex. Biting their lips. Eyes down, or to the side. But outright repentance—no, he couldn’t read it on any of their faces.
Heavens, what is this coming to?
“If we go off stealing government property, how are we going to win the war? Just think about it!”
Dull and impenetrable they stood.
Yet this is with whom we march. To victory. Or to defeat.
Timonov returned with the pot. One could not even tell if all the potatoes were still in it.
Those undercooked potatoes.
“Tomorrow we sort this out with the commissar,” said the lieutenant to the other four. “To bed.” But to Timonov: “Come with me.”
In the hallway he ordered him: “Wake the supply sergeant, and put the pot in his custody.”
He himself could hardly get to sleep afterward: a horrible episode, and in his own company! And he had almost missed it. Maybe this had occurred before? Lawlessness and theft are all around, and he didn’t even suspect it, just learned of it by chance.
In the morning he closely interrogated supply sergeant Guskov. The latter swore that he knew nothing. Why, nothing even remotely similar had ever happened in the company.
Looking into Guskov’s perceptive countenance, his little mobile eyes, Pozushan for the first time wondered: That trait, which he so liked in Guskov—his organizational capacity, prudence, and quick resolution of
any difficulties that arose, all of which greatly eased the job of a company commander—could cheating also be a part of that trait?
Still early, before breakfast, the lieutenant went to battalion commissar Fatianov. This was a crystal soul, remarkably pleasant, straightforward, with big clear eyes. He conducted excellent political instruction with the men, not by rote, not in a mechanical voice.
Their battalion staff were assigned to two little rooms in a small house, across the wide square, which was used to place the entire reserve regiment in general formation, when necessary, or for marching drills.
Apricot Jam: And Other Stories Page 36