‘Dunno that neither,’ said Marya Vasilyevna.
‘Was it you who talked to the old man?’ I asked Marya Vasilyevna.
‘Yesh,’ answered Marya Vasilyevna.
‘Then how come you don’t know when it was?’ I said.
‘It were two hourzh ago,’ said Marya Vasilyevna.
‘And what did this old man look like?’ I asked.
‘Dunno that neither,’ said Marya Vasilyevna, and went off into the kitchen.
I went to my room.
‘What if,’ I thought, ‘the old woman’s vanished? What if I go into my room – and there’s no old woman there. Oh my God, surely miracles must happen sometimes?’
I unlocked the door and slowly started to open it. Maybe it was only my imagination, but I felt overcome at once by the sickly smell of decomposition in progress. I peered round the half-open door and, for a moment, was rooted to the spot. The old woman was on all fours, slowly crawling towards me.
I let out a yell, slammed the door, turned the key and jumped across to the opposite wall.
Marya Vasilyevna appeared in the corridor.
‘Were you calling me?’ she asked.
I was so upset that I couldn’t answer and could only reply with a shake of the head. Marya Vasilyevna came up closer.
‘You were talking to shomebody,’ she said.
I gave another shake of the head.
‘Inshane,’ said Marya Vasilyevna, and went back to the kitchen, glancing round at me several times on the way.
‘Can’t just stand here. Can’t just stand here,’ I kept repeating to myself. This sentence had taken shape of its own accord somewhere within me. I said it over and over again until it reached my consciousness.
‘Can’t just stand here,’ I said to myself, but I went on standing there as if paralysed. What had happened was terrible, but what had to be done was perhaps still more terrible than what had taken place already. My thoughts were in a whirl, and all I could see was the malicious eyes of the dead old woman as she crawled towards me.
Burst into the room and smash this old woman’s skull in. That’s what needs to be done! I even looked around and was happy to see a croquet mallet which, for some unknown reason, had been standing in the corner of the corridor for many years. Grab the mallet,3 burst into the room and – thwack!
I was still trembling. I was standing with my shoulders hunched from the cold deep inside me. My thoughts jumped around, got in a tangle, returned to their point of departure and jumped around again, taking over new areas, while I stood and listened to these thoughts and it was as if I were removed from them and somehow not in command of them.
‘The departed,’ my thoughts explained to me, ‘are a troublesome lot. It’s not true to say they’ve gone to their rest – the dear departed give us no rest at all. They need to be watched all the time. Ask any mortuary attendant. Why, do you imagine, has he been put there? For one reason only: to stop the departed crawling all over the place. There have, while we’re on this subject, been some amusing incidents. I’ve heard of a departed who, while the attendant, on orders from his superiors, was washing himself in the bathhouse, crawled out of the mortuary and into the disinfection room and ate up a pile of bed linen. The disinfection team gave him a good thrashing, but they had to pay for the spoiled linen out of their own pockets. Another of the departed got into the maternity ward and gave the expectant mothers such a fright that one of them had a miscarriage there and then, and the departed pounced on the aborted foetus and gobbled it up. And when a brave nurse hit the departed on the back with a stool, he bit this nurse in the leg and she died soon afterwards of infection by corpse poison. Yes, the dead are a troublesome lot, and you need to be on your guard with them.’
‘Stop!’ I said to my thoughts. ‘You’re blathering. The dead are immobile.’
‘All right,’ my thoughts said to me. ‘Go into your room. In it you’ll find one of your immobile departed.’
An unexpected stubbornness spoke up inside me.
‘Yes, I will go into my room,’ I said decisively to my thoughts.
‘Just you try!’ my thoughts said to me mockingly.
This mockery utterly enraged me. I grabbed the croquet mallet and rushed towards the door.
‘Wait!’ my thoughts yelled at me. But I had already turned the key and flung open the door.
The old woman was lying by the threshold, her face buried in the floor.
Croquet mallet raised, I stood at the ready. The old woman wasn’t moving.
My trembling had stopped and my thoughts were flowing clearly and logically. I was in command of my thoughts.
‘First, close the door!’ I commanded myself.
I removed the key from the outside of the door and put it into the inside. I did this with my left hand, still holding the croquet mallet with my right hand and not once taking my eyes off the old woman. I turned the key in the lock and, stepping carefully over the old woman, reached the middle of the room.
‘Now I’ll get even with you,’ I said. I had come up with a plan, the one usually adopted by murderers in crime novels and newspaper reports: I wanted simply to hide the old woman in a suitcase, take her outside the city and dump her in a bog. I knew one such place.
My suitcase was under the sofa. I dragged it out and opened it. In it were a few odds and ends: some books, an old felt hat and some torn underwear. I laid everything out on the sofa.
Just then the outside door slammed loudly, and it seemed that the old woman shuddered.
I jumped up at once and grabbed the croquet mallet.
The old woman is lying there peacefully. I stand up and listen. It’s the engine driver, he’s just come back, I can hear him walking about his room. Now he’s walking down the corridor towards the kitchen. If Marya Vasilyevna tells him about my insanity, there’ll be trouble. What a devilish nuisance! I must go along to the kitchen too and reassure them by appearing normal.
I stepped over the old woman again, placed the mallet just by the door so that, when I came back, I could pick the mallet up before I’d even entered the room, and went out into the corridor. I could hear voices in the kitchen but I couldn’t make out the words. I closed the door to my room behind me and cautiously made my way to the kitchen: I wanted to know what Marya Vasilyevna and the engine driver were talking about. I walked quickly down the corridor, slowing down as I approached the kitchen. The engine driver was talking – evidently about something that had happened to him at work.
I went in. The engine driver was standing there with a towel in his hands and talking, while Marya Vasilyevna sat on a stool and listened. Seeing me, the engine driver waved his hand.
‘Greetings, Matvey Filippovich, greetings!’ I said to him, and went through to the bathroom. So far, everything was calm. Marya Vasilyevna was used to my strange ways and might even have forgotten the incident in the corridor.
Suddenly it dawned on me that I had not locked the door. What if the old woman crawls out of the room?
I spun round but remembered myself in time and, so as not to alarm the others, walked through the kitchen with calm steps.
Marya Vasilyevna was tapping on the kitchen table with one finger and saying to the engine driver, ‘Shplendid! Shplendid! I’d have whishled too!’
My heart sinking, I went out into the corridor, then almost ran to my room.
From outside, everything seemed quiet. I went up to the door, half-opened it and looked inside. Just as before, the old woman was lying there calmly, her face buried in the floor. The croquet mallet was still standing there by the door. I seized the mallet, went into the room and locked the door behind me. Yes, the room definitely smelt of corpse. I stepped over the old woman, went up to the window and sat in the armchair. So long as I don’t get ill from this smell that may only be faint but is none the less already unbearable. I lit my pipe. I felt a little nauseous and my stomach was slightly aching.
But what am I doing just sitting here? I must act quickly, before this old woman�
��s gone completely rotten. But, whatever I do, I must be careful how I stuff her into the suitcase because that’s just the moment she might take a bite out of my finger. And I don’t want to die of infection by corpse poison – no, thank you!
‘Hey!’ I exclaimed suddenly, ‘I’d like to know what you’re going to bite me with. Where are those teeth of yours?’
I leaned over in the armchair and looked into the corner on the far side of the window where I reckoned the old woman’s false teeth ought to be. But her false teeth weren’t there.
I fell into thought: maybe the dead old woman had been crawling about my room in search of her teeth? Maybe she had even found them and stuck them back in her mouth?
I took the croquet mallet and poked about in the corner with it. No, the false teeth had disappeared. Then I took a thick flannelette sheet out of my chest of drawers and went over to the old woman. I held the croquet mallet in my right hand, at the ready, and in my left hand I held the flannelette sheet.
This dead old woman made me feel both fear and disgust. I raised her head with the mallet: her mouth was open, her eyes had rolled upwards and the whole of her chin, where I had kicked her, was covered by a large dark bruise. I looked into the old woman’s mouth. No, she had not found her false teeth. I let her head go. Her head fell and knocked against the floor.
I spread the flannelette sheet out on the floor and pulled it right up to the old woman. With my foot and the croquet mallet, I turned the old woman first onto her left side, then onto her back. Now she was lying on the sheet. The old woman’s legs were bent at the knees, and her fists pressed to her shoulders. Lying on her back like a cat, the old woman seemed to be preparing to defend herself against an eagle swooping down on her. Quick, away with this carrion!
I wrapped the old woman in the thick sheet and picked her up in my arms. She was lighter than I had expected. I lowered her into the suitcase and tried to close the lid. Here I expected all kinds of difficulties, but the lid closed relatively easily. I locked the suitcase and stood up again.
The suitcase is standing in front of me, looking perfectly respectable, as if it contains clothes and books. I took it by the handle and tried to lift it. Yes, it was, of course, heavy, but not excessively so. I could certainly carry it to the tram.
I looked at my watch: twenty past five. I sat in the armchair, to rest a little and smoke a pipe.
Evidently the saveloys I’d eaten that day had been a bit off; my stomach was aching more and more. Or maybe it was because I had eaten them raw? Or maybe my stomach-ache was purely from nerves?
I sit and smoke. And minute after minute goes by.
The spring sun shines in through the window, and I screw up my eyes against its rays. Then it hides behind the chimney of the building opposite, and the chimney’s shadow runs along the roof, flies across the street and falls on my face. I remember how this time yesterday I was sitting and writing a story. Yes, here it is: squared paper and, in tiny writing, the words, ‘The miracle worker was tall.’
I looked out of the window. The cripple with the artificial leg was walking along the other side; his leg and stick were knocking loudly. Two workers and an old woman were holding their sides and roaring with laughter at the cripple’s ridiculous gait.
I got up. It’s time! Time to be on my way! Time to take the old woman off to the bog! But I need to borrow some money from the engine driver.
I went out into the corridor and up to his door.
‘Matvey Filippovich, are you there?’ I asked.
‘Yes,’ answered the engine driver.
‘Excuse me then, Matvey Filippovich, you don’t happen to have any spare cash, do you? I get paid the day after tomorrow. You couldn’t lend me thirty roubles, could you?’
‘I could,’ said the engine driver. And I heard him jangling keys, opening some box or other. Then he opened the door and handed me a new red thirty-rouble note.
‘Thank you very much, Matvey Filippovich,’ I said.
‘It’s nothing, don’t mention it,’ said the engine driver.
I put the money in my pocket and went back to my room. The suitcase was calmly standing in the same place.
‘Off you go now, without delay,’ I said to myself.
I picked up the suitcase and left the room.
Marya Vasilyevna saw me with the suitcase and called out, ‘Where are you going?’
‘To my aunt’s,’ I said.
‘Are you coming back shoon?’ asked Marya Vasilyevna.
‘Yes,’ I said. ‘I just have to take some clothes over to my aunt. I might even be back tonight.’
I went out onto the street. I got to the tram without mishap, carrying the suitcase first in my right hand, then in my left.
I got in at the front of the rear car and beckoned to the conductress, so she’d come and take the money for my ticket and luggage. I didn’t want my single thirty-rouble note to be passed from hand to hand all the way down the car, and I couldn’t bring myself to leave the suitcase and go up to the conductress myself. The conductress came over to me and told me she had no change. I had to get off at the next stop.
I stood there in a rage, waiting for the next tram. My stomach was aching and my legs slightly trembling.
And suddenly I caught sight of my sweet young lady; she was crossing the street, not looking in my direction.
I grabbed the suitcase and rushed after her. I didn’t know her name and couldn’t call out to her. The suitcase was terribly in the way; I was holding it in front of me with both hands, and my knees and stomach were knocking against it. The sweet young lady was walking quite fast and I felt I’d never catch up with her. I was soaking with sweat and running out of strength. The sweet young lady turned into a side street. When I got to the corner, she was nowhere to be seen.
‘Damn that old woman!’ I hissed, throwing my suitcase down on the ground.
The sleeves of my jacket were soaking with sweat and sticking to my arms. I sat down on the suitcase and, taking out my handkerchief, wiped my neck and face with it. Two boys stopped in front of me and began staring at me. I put on a calm face and looked intently at the nearest gateway, as if I were waiting for someone. The boys were whispering together and pointing at me. I was choking with wild rage. If only I could infect them with tetanus!
And so, because of these obnoxious boys, I stand up, pick up the suitcase, walk with it to a gateway and glance inside. I look surprised, get out my watch and shrug my shoulders. The boys watch me from a distance. I shrug my shoulders once more and look inside the gateway.
‘Strange,’ I say out loud. I take the suitcase and carry it to the tram stop.
I get to the railway station at five to seven. I buy a return ticket to Lisy Nos and get into the train.
There are two other people in the carriage. One is evidently a worker; he is tired and has gone to sleep, his cap pulled over his eyes. The other, still quite young, looks like a village dandy; he is wearing a pink Russian shirt under his jacket and he has a curl of hair on his forehead, sticking out from beneath his cap. He is smoking a cigarette, in a bright green plastic holder.
I place the suitcase between the seats and sit down. My stomach cramps are so bad that I have to clench my fists not to groan with pain.
Some citizen or other is being led down the platform by two policemen to the police station. He walks with his hands behind his back and his head drooping.
The train moves off. I look at my watch: ten past seven.
Oh, what a pleasure it will be to dump this old woman in the bog! Only it’s a pity I didn’t bring my stick with me – the old woman’s sure to need a bit of a push.
The dandy in the pink shirt is studying me insolently. I turn my back on him and look out of the window.
My stomach is racked by terrible spasms; I grit my teeth, clench my fists and tense my legs.
We pass through Lanskaya and Novaya Derevnya. I glimpse the golden top of the Buddhist pagoda, then the sea.
Then I jump up,
forgetting everything around me. Taking very short steps, I hurry to the toilet. An insane wave is rocking and spinning my consciousness.
The train slows down. We’re coming in to Lakhta. I sit there, afraid to move a muscle, scared I’ll be thrown out of the toilet at the station.
If only the train would get going! If only the train would get going!
The train gets going, and I close my eyes in delight. Oh, these moments can be as sweet as any moments of love. All my strength is summoned up, but I know this will be followed by a terrible collapse.
The train stops again. Olgino. The same torture again.
But now it’s a matter of phantom urges. There’s cold sweat on my forehead and a slight chill fluttering around my heart. I get up and stand for a while, my head pressed to the wall. The train travels on, and the swaying of the carriage feels very pleasant.
I gather all my strength and stagger out of the toilet.
The carriage is empty. The worker and the dandy in the pink shirt must have got out at Lakhta or Olgino. I walk slowly towards my little window.
And suddenly I stop and stare stupidly in front of me. The suitcase isn’t where I left it. I must be by the wrong window. I leap to the next window. No suitcase. I leap back, I leap forward, I run up and down, I search each side of the carriage, I look under the seats, but there is no suitcase anywhere.
But how can there be any doubt about it? Of course, while I was in the toilet, my suitcase was stolen. Hardly surprising!
I sit there bug-eyed and for some reason I remember the cracking sound of the enamel coming off Sakerdon Mikhailovich’s burning hot saucepan.
‘So where’s all this got me?’ I ask myself. ‘Now who’s going to believe I didn’t kill the old woman? I’ll be arrested today, either right here or else back in the city, at the main railway station, like that citizen I saw walking along with his head drooping.’
I walk to the end of the carriage. The train’s coming in to Lisy Nos. The white posts bordering the track flash by. The train stops. The steps on my carriage don’t reach the ground. I jump down and walk towards the station building. It’ll be half an hour till the next train back.
Russian Short Stories from Pushkin to Buida (Penguin Classics) Page 42