The Snail on the Slope

by Arkady Strugatsky

  “And whose idea was it? Bootlicherson’s! That man keeps his eye on the ball. He has a gift!”

  “They shouldn’t have run in their long johns, though. It’s one thing to do your duty in your long johns; that’s honorable. But competing in your long johns—that seems to me to be a typical institutional blunder. I’m planning to write someone about it . . .”

  Peretz got clear of the crowd and slowly staggered down the empty street. He felt nauseated, his chest hurt, and he kept imagining those things over there in the boxes, stretching out their metal necks and watching the blindfolded, underwear-clad crowd with astonishment, making a futile effort to figure out the connection between themselves and the activities of this crowd, and of course being unable to do so, and their sources of patience, whatever they may be, running critically low . . .

  Kim’s villa was dark, and there was an infant crying inside.

  The hotel’s door was boarded up, the windows were also dark, and someone inside was walking around with a dark lantern. Peretz noticed some pale faces peeking cautiously out of the second-story windows.

  An endless cannon with a thick muzzle brake was pointing out the library doors, and the shed across the street was almost entirely burned down. People in cardboard masks, holding mine detectors, were wandering through the ruins, which glowed crimson in the firelight.

  Peretz headed toward the park. But a woman approached him on a dark side street, took him by the hand, and, without saying a word, led him somewhere. Peretz didn’t resist; he didn’t care. She was all in black, her hand was soft and warm, and her white face shone in the dark. Alevtina, thought Peretz. She’s been waiting for her chance, and she’s finally getting it, he thought frankly and shamelessly. And why not? She did wait. I don’t know why, I don’t know what it is she sees in me, but I was the one she was waiting for . . .

  They entered the house. Alevtina turned on the light and said, “I’ve been waiting for you here. I’ve waited a long time.”

  “I know,” he said.

  “Then why did you walk right past?”

  Why, indeed? he thought. Probably because I didn’t care. “I didn’t care,” he said.

  “Never mind, it doesn’t matter,” she said. “Have a seat, I’ll get everything ready.”

  He sat on the edge of the chair, put his hands in his lap, and watched her unwind the black scarf from around her neck and hang it on a nail—all of her plump, white, and warm. Then she retreated into the depths of the house, and he heard the hum of a hot water heater and the sounds of splashing water. He felt an intense pain in the soles of his feet, and he lifted his foot to take a look. The balls of his toes were raw and bloody, and the blood had mingled with the dust and dried into black crusts. He imagined how he’d put his feet into the hot water, and how it would really hurt at first, and then the pain would drain away and he would be at peace. I’ll sleep in the bath tonight, he thought. And she can occasionally drop by and add hot water.

  “Come here,” called Alevtina.

  He got up with difficulty—it seemed to him that all his bones creaked painfully at the same time—and limped along the orange carpet toward the door into the hallway. He went through the door and walked along the black-and-white carpet all the way to the end of the passage, where the bathroom door was already open wide. Inside, the blue flame of the hot water heater was already lit, and the heater was already humming busily, and the tiles gleamed, and Alevtina was bending over the tub and pouring various powders into the water. As he was getting undressed, tearing off his underwear, which was stiff with dirt, she whipped the water, creating a blanket of foam on top, and the snow-white foam rose above the edges of the tub, and he lowered his body into this foam, squeezing his eyes tightly shut in pleasure and from the pain in his feet, and Alevtina sat on the edge of the tub, looking at him with a tender smile—she was so kind, and so friendly, and she hadn’t said a single word about documents . . .

  She was washing his hair, and he was snorting and sputtering and thinking that she had strong, capable hands, just like his mom, and that her cooking was probably just as good as his mom’s, when she asked, “Want me to scrub your back?” He patted his ear a few times, to get the water and soap out, and said, “Of course!” She scrubbed his back with a rough loofah and turned the shower on.

  “Wait,” he said. “I want to stay in the bath a bit more. I’ll let this water out, fill the tub with clean water, and stay in the bath, and you should sit right here. Please.”

  She turned off the shower, went out briefly, and came back with a stool.

  “I feel good!” he said. “You know, I haven’t felt this good since I’ve gotten here.”

  “There we go,” she smiled. “And you kept not wanting to.”

  “How could I have known?”

  “Why do you need to know everything in advance? You could have just tried it. What did you have to lose? Are you married?”

  “I don’t know,” he said. “Not anymore, I think.”

  “I thought so. You must have really loved her. What was she like?”

  “She was . . . She wasn’t afraid of anything. And she was kind. We were both wild about the forest.”

  “What forest?”

  “What do you mean, what forest? There’s only one forest.”

  “You mean our forest?”

  “It’s not ours. It belongs to itself. Although maybe it is ours. But that’s hard to imagine.”

  “I’ve never been in the forest,” said Alevtina. “They say it’s a scary place.”

  “People are always afraid of what they don’t understand. I wish we’d learn not to be afraid of the things we don’t understand—that would make everything simple.”

  “And I think people should stop dreaming things up,” she said. “If people stopped dreaming things up, the world wouldn’t contain anything we didn’t understand. And you, Perry, are always dreaming up something or another.”

  “What about the forest?” he reminded her.

  “What about it? I’ve never been in the forest, but if I did find myself in there, I’d probably manage. Where there’s a forest, there are trails, and where there are trails, there are people, and when it comes to people, you can always figure something out.”

  “And what if there are no people?”

  “And if there are no people, then there’s no reason to be there. Stick to people, and you’ll be all right.”

  “No,” said Peretz. “It’s not that simple. When it comes to people, I’m not all right. I don’t understand people at all.”

  “My goodness, what don’t you understand? Give me an example.”

  “I don’t understand anything. That’s why I started fantasizing about the forest in the first place, by the way. But now I see that it’s no easier in the forest.”

  She shook her head. “You’re still such a baby,” she said. “How did you never figure out that there’s nothing in the world but food, love, and pride? Of course, they are all tangled together, but whatever thread you pull, you always arrive at either love, or power, or food.”

  “No,” said Peretz. “I don’t want that.”

  “Sweetie,” she said softly. “Who’s going to ask you? . . . Except maybe me—I’ll ask you, Perry: Why are you tying yourselves in knots? What on earth do you want?”

  “I don’t think I want anything anymore,” said Peretz. “I want to get far away from here and become an archivist . . . or an art restorer. Those are my only desires.”

  She shook her head again. “I don’t think so. You’re making everything too complicated again. You need something simpler.”

  He didn’t argue, and she got up.

  “Here’s a towel,” she said. “And here’s some underwear. Come on out, we’ll drink some tea. You can drink all the tea and eat all the jam you want, then you can go to bed.”

  Peretz had already let all the water out and was standing in the tub, drying himself with the huge, fluffy towel, when the glass rattled in the windows an
d he heard a distant, muted explosion. And then he recalled the machine repository and Joan, the silly, hysterical doll, and he shouted, “What was that? Where?”

  “They blew up the machine,” Alevtina replied. “Don’t be scared.”

  “Where? Where did they blow it up? At the machine repository?”

  Alevtina was silent a while—she was probably looking out the window. “No,” she said finally. “Why the machine repository? It was in the park . . . There’s the smoke . . . And just look at them all scurry around . . .”

  10.

  PERETZ

  The forest wasn’t visible. Instead, there were thick clouds beneath the cliff, stretching all the way to the horizon. It looked like a snow-covered ice field, full of ridges and snow barchans, with cracks and ice holes harboring bottomless depths, and if you jumped off the cliff, it wouldn’t be the ground or the warm swamps or the outstretched branches that rose up to meet you but hard ice, sparkling in the morning sun, lightly sprinkled with dry snow, and you’d stay there on the ice beneath the sun, dark, flat, and still. And come to think of it, it also looked like someone had thrown an old, well-washed white blanket over the tops of the trees.

  Peretz looked around him, found a stone, tossed it from one hand to the other, and thought, This spot by the precipice really is nice—there are stones aplenty, and the Administration feels far away, and you’re surrounded by wild thornbushes and untouched sun-bleached grass, and some little bird is even daring to chirp, only it’s best if you don’t look to the right, where a magnificent four-person lavatory is suspended over the precipice, its fresh paint gleaming insolently in the sun. True, it’s a good way off, and if you wanted to, you could force yourself to pretend that it’s a gazebo or some kind of scientific pavilion, but it’d still be much better if it weren’t there at all.

  Maybe this new lavatory, erected during the turbulent night, was the reason the forest was hiding beneath the clouds. Then again, probably not. The forest wouldn’t cover itself up all the way to the horizon because of such a trifle—when it comes to people, it’s seen much worse.

  At least I’ll be able to come here every morning, thought Peretz. I’ll do as I’m told, I’ll perform calculations on the broken arithmometer, I’ll conquer the obstacle course, I’ll play chess with the garage foreman, I’ll even try to learn to like drinking buttermilk—it can’t be that hard, if most people have managed. And in the evenings (and during the nights), I’ll go see Alevtina, eat raspberry jam, and lie in the Director’s bath. There’s something to that, he thought: I’ll dry myself with the Director’s towel, I’ll wrap myself in the Director’s bathrobe, and I’ll warm my feet in the Director’s wool socks. And twice a month I’ll visit the biological research station to receive my salary and my bonus, and it won’t be the forest I’m coming to see but only the biological research station, and not even the biological research station, per se, but the pay office, and I won’t be going to a rendezvous with the forest, or going to war with the forest—I’ll simply be there to receive my salary and my bonus. And in the mornings, in the early mornings, I’ll come here to watch the forest from a distance, and to throw stones at it, and someday, somehow, something will happen . . .

  The bushes behind him rustled and parted. Peretz glanced cautiously over his shoulder, but it wasn’t the Director, it was still Bootlicherson. He was holding a thick folder, and he stopped a good distance away, looking down at Peretz with his damp eyes. He clearly knew something, something very important; he was bringing here, to this precipice, strange, disquieting news that no one but him had heard yet—but it was already clear that the past had ceased to matter, and that everyone would now be asked to contribute according to his or her abilities.

  “Hello,” he said, and bowed, pressing the folder to his hip. “Good morning. How did you sleep?”

  “Good morning,” said Peretz. “Fine, thank you.”

  “Humidity is at seventy-six percent today,” Bootlicherson informed him. “It is currently seventeen degrees Celsius. There is no wind. Cloud cover is zero.” He approached silently, his arms glued to his sides, and, leaning his entire upper body toward Peretz, continued: “W is equal to sixteen today.”

  “What’s W?” asked Peretz, rising.

  “The spot count,” Bootlicherson quickly replied. His eyes rapidly shifted back and forth. “Sunspots, that is,” he said. “Sunssss . . .” He fell silent, staring Peretz in the face.

  “Why are you telling me this?” Peretz asked with antipathy.

  “I apologize,” Bootlicherson quickly replied. “It won’t happen again. So, then, humidity, cloud cover . . . err . . . wind speed . . . Should I also stop reporting on planetary oppositions?”

  “Listen,” Peretz said gloomily. “What do you want from me?”

  Bootlicherson took two steps back and bowed his head. “I apologize,” he said. “It’s possible that I interrupted you, but I have some paperwork which requires . . . so to speak, your immediate . . . your personal . . .” He tried to hand Peretz the folder, holding it like an empty tray. “Would you like me to report?”

  “You know what?” Peretz said in a dangerous voice.

  “Yes, yes?” said Bootlicherson. Without letting go of the folder, he started hastily rummaging through his pockets, apparently looking for his notebook. His face turned blue, as if from the strenuous effort.

  What an idiot, thought Peretz, trying to get a grip on himself. What more can you expect from him? “It’s not funny,” he said as calmly as he could. “Do you understand? It’s stupid and it’s not funny.”

  “Yes, yes,” said Bootlicherson. He was hunched over, pressing his folder to his hip with his elbow, and he was frantically scribbling in his notebook. “Just a moment . . . Yes, yes?”

  “What are you writing in there?” asked Peretz.

  Bootlicherson looked at him fearfully and read, “June fifteenth . . . Time: seven forty-five AM . . . Location: by the precipice . . . But this is preliminary . . . It’s a draft . . .”

  “Listen, Bootlicherson,” Peretz said in irritation. “What on earth do you want from me? Why do you keep following me? I’ve had it up to here with you!” (Bootlicherson kept scribbling.) “I’ve had enough of your stupid jokes, and I’m sick of you spying on me. You’re a grown man, you ought to be ashamed of yourself . . . Stop writing, you idiot! It’s stupid! You should wash your face or go get some exercise—just take a look at yourself, the state of you! Ugh!”

  He began to buckle his sandals, his fingers trembling in rage. “It must be true what they say about you,” he huffed, “that you poke your long nose into everyone’s business and write down everything you hear. I’d thought it was just your dumb jokes . . . I didn’t want to believe it, I can’t stand that kind of thing, you’ve really got some nerve!”

  He stood up and saw that Bootlicherson was standing at attention, and that there were tears streaming down his face.

  “What’s the matter with you today?” Peretz asked, frightened.

  “I can’t . . .” Bootlicherson mumbled, sniveling.

  “You can’t what?”

  “I can’t exercise . . . It’s my liver . . . I have a doctor’s note . . . And I can’t wash my face either.”

  “Oh, for the love of God,” said Peretz. “If you can’t, then you can’t, I didn’t mean anything by it . . . Come on, seriously, why do you keep following me? Try to understand, for God’s sake, it’s annoying . . . I have nothing against you, but please understand—”

  “I won’t do it again!” Bootlicherson cried out ecstatically. The tears on his cheeks had instantly dried. “Never!”

  “Oh, leave me alone,” Peretz said wearily, and began making his way through the bushes. Bootlicherson lumbered behind him. An aged clown, thought Peretz. A holy fool . . .

  “It’s a matter of urgency,” muttered Bootlicherson, breathing heavily. “Only a pressing need would compel me . . . Your personal attention . . .”

  Peretz glanced back. “What the hell!”
he exclaimed. “That’s my suitcase, give it back, where did you get it?”

  Bootlicherson put the suitcase down and was about to open his mouth, which was twisted from shortness of breath, but Peretz wouldn’t listen and grabbed the handle. Then Bootlicherson, without having managed to say a word, lay belly down on the suitcase.

  “Give me back my suitcase,” said Peretz, growing cold with rage.

  “Never!” croaked Bootlicherson, his knees skidding in the gravel. The folder was getting in his way, so he put it in his mouth and put both his arms around the suitcase.

  Peretz tugged with all his might and the handle broke off. “Cut this nonsense out!” he said. “Immediately!”

  Bootlicherson shook his head and mumbled something inarticulate. Peretz unbuttoned his collar and looked around in bewilderment. For some reason, there were two engineers wearing cardboard masks standing nearby in the shadow of an oak tree. Meeting his eye, they drew themselves up and snapped their heels. Then Peretz, glancing around like a hunted animal, started hurriedly walking down the path out of the park. I thought I’d seen it all, he thought feverishly, but this is something else . . . It’s like they are all in cahoots . . . I need to get away, get away! But where can I go?

  He exited the park and was about to go to the cafeteria, but Bootlicherson, filthy and terrible, blocked his way again. He stood there with the suitcase on his shoulder, his blue face was covered in something that might have been either water, or tears, or sweat, his wandering eyes were covered in a white film, and he was pressing the folder, which still bore the marks of his fangs, to his chest. “Not here, please,” he croaked. “I implore you . . . your office . . . it’s unbearably urgent . . . and to preserve the chain of command . . .”

  Peretz bolted away from him and ran away along the main street. The people on the sidewalk were standing ramrod straight, their heads thrown back and their eyes popping out of their heads. A truck speeding the other way braked with a horrible squeal and crashed into a newsstand, and people with shovels poured out of the back and began to line up into two columns. A guard walked past him in goose step, holding his rifle at “present arms.”