Jacob's Ladder

13 A Major Year

(1911)

The year 1911 was wonderful from the start. Marusya spent Christmas with her brother Mikhail, who had arrived from Petersburg laden with presents and was dressed in the latest style of the urban capital, fashionably coiffed, with a small, neat beard and a waxed mustache. He had always been handsome, but now his appearance was almost provocative. Marusya felt a certain kind of ambivalence: It was exciting to walk down the boulevards with him. He piqued the interest of the ladies they encountered on their strolls. She found it pleasant that they looked at him, and at the same time at her, but there was some discomfort mixed into it. Her overcoat was old, a cut that had long gone out of fashion, and, added to that, it was too big for her. What embarrassed her even more than the unfortunate overcoat, however, was that she, a sophisticated and educated young woman, suffered for such a banal, unworthy reason.

Still, my hat is pretty, Marusya thought, brightening up—and then brought herself up short. What idiotic vulgarity! So the hat suits me. What does that matter? What significance does that have? What truly mattered was that Mikhail now talked to her about serious and weighty questions, as an equal, and not as if she were an empty-headed young lady.

Their house was filled with Mikhail’s friends every evening. All of them admired Marusya’s beauty: her gray eyes fringed with thick lashes so dark they looked tinted—never! how trivial and coquettish it would be to paint them!—and her delicate, graceful hands. Her coat may have been old and ugly, but a new dress had just been made for her out of wonderful woolen cloth bought at the manufactory of Isaac Schwartzman. It was purchased at a reduced price because the cut was undersized—only enough for a girl. But it was just enough to make something for Marusya, and Mama accompanied her, not forgetting to bring the tape measure. They figured out how to lay the pattern just so, to use the least amount of fabric, and she said she would manage to cut it. Mother deliberated for a long time, afraid to cut into the expensive material, pinning it on Marusya this way and that, but at last it became a dress that was both elegant and modest, and not at all coquettish—with a tie! Marusya now lacked only one thing—her own ample bosom that would fill out the bodice a bit and be somewhat visible from above. Her solicitous mother, who was endowed with her own impressive bosom, suppressing a smile, made some gathers here, and some tucks there, concealing the faults and enhancing the virtues (a small, neat waist) of her figure.

The month of January was like one long celebration. Marusya’s birthday was glorious; everyone came to congratulate her on her special day, even Jacqueline Osipovna. It was the first time in her life that Marusya had enjoyed such popularity. Every evening, someone invited her to the theater, or to a party, and—the crowning event—Jacqueline Osipovna invited her to a Rachmaninoff concert. Marusya had never attended such a momentous concert, and didn’t realize she would remember it to the end of her days, because such an event happens only once in a lifetime.

One more event took place—and again fate took a decisive turn with the help of Madame Leroux—in the middle of February. On the invitation of Jacqueline Osipovna, the legendary Ella Ivanovna Rabenek came to lecture at the Courses. A graduate of the Grunewald School established by Isadora Duncan, favorite of the great barefoot dancer and founder of one of the first schools of movement in Moscow, an actress who went onstage without shoes or stockings, scantily clad, a teacher of movement and rhythm in the Stanislavsky Art Theatre, she made her first appearance at the Froebel Courses in a formal man’s suit devoid of any feminine baubles or details, and wearing a flowery silk scarf, more suitable as upholstery fabric than as a lady’s garment. The audience was breathless with expectation. Marusya, who by this time had become a teacher in her own right and no longer rushed to meet the kindergarten children at seven in the morning but arrived at nine o’clock to lead her group in simple, unpretentious music lessons, had a revelation, as early as the first lecture, about why she was studying all this history and literature, anatomy and botany, why she listened to semi-incomprehensible discussions among adults and clever people, and why she went to theaters and concerts—it was to be able to study with the marvelous Mrs. Rabenek as soon as possible.

The lecture inspired her with awe. The names alone—Nietzsche, Isadora Duncan, Émile Jaques-Dalcroze—the rhythms of the world, the rhythms of the body … All these rhythms were encoded in music, which itself is the expression of the pulse of the universe. Marusya had not yet had time to learn about the creation of the “new human being” by listening to and perceiving these cosmic rhythms, but soon … soon … Of course, this was what Marusya dreamed about—becoming a new, free-thinking and -feeling human being, the New Woman, and helping others along this path. Oh, the presentiment of marvelous changes to come!

Still, what would become, perhaps, the most important event in her life occurred on the day Ella Ivanovna read her final lecture and gave a demonstration, with music. She changed her menswear suit for a short white tunic. There was nothing in her movements reminiscent of ballet. They were charged with freedom and energy, authenticity and daring. “This is me! This is utterly me!” Marusya felt with her whole body. After the lecture, she flew home as if on wings. Her posture and gait changed within a single hour—her back straightened out, her shoulders relaxed, her long, graceful neck seemed to grow even longer, and her feet seemed to glide over the ground as though on ice.

Mama was already asleep, and her father was sitting by the kerosene lamp in his nightcap, reading an old book in French. She had no one to whom she could communicate her newfound joy, her delight, her sense of light intoxication. She lay down in her angular room, a former pantry, and thought it would be impossible to fall asleep; but she fell asleep instantaneously. She rose early, easily, made her Swiss ablutions, adding a few drops of the Brocard eau de cologne that Mikhail had given her as a present, and put on her new pantaloons. She held her corset in her hands, then cast it away, determined never again to squeeze her body into the disgusting thing, the outmoded, disgusting thing, because since yesterday her body had wanted to be free—not constricted, bound up, but supple and lissome, Grecian …

She put on her old walnut-colored dress. Then, instead of the abhorrent overcoat, she put on a worn-out man’s double-breasted jacket, and a round fur hat with a shawl tied over it. When she looked into the mirror, liking very much what she saw, she thought, How charming that Marusya is! She laughed, because she remembered perfectly well which of Tolstoy’s marvelous heroines had said these words, delighted with the springtime and with her own youth.

It was after nine o’clock when she left home. The weather was sunny, but fairly cold. The air was clear and pure, and the feeling of lightness and freedom from yesterday returned to her; she smiled thinking about it. It turned out, however, that she was not smiling at her recollections from yesterday, but at a young man who was standing in front of the window of the watchmaker’s shop. He had curly reddish-brown hair and was wearing a student’s cap and overcoat. His face, not quite familiar to her, beamed with the same joy that filled Marusya.

“Maria! I despaired of ever seeing you again! Remember me? We met at the Rachmaninoff concert.”

Although nearly a month had passed, Marusya remembered. She immediately remembered the student who had given her his seat in the orchestra, and then walked her home. He had impressed her then as a very well-brought-up young man, and now, too, he behaved with deferential respect toward her.

“Will you allow me to accompany you?” he said, offering her his arm for her to lean on. The sleeve of his coat was made of delicate, expensive fabric.

“Where are you going?” Marusya herself didn’t know where she intended to go. She had no lessons today with the children, and there were still two hours before her lectures at the Courses began.

So they walked in the direction their feet carried them. Mariinsko-Blagoveshchenskaya Street, long and hilly, meandering up and down. Life still unfolded serenely, at a measured pace, on that street; but the peaceful days of the street, and indeed of the whole city, graced with its intricate, fanciful architecture, were numbered. Underground, the Revolution was already brewing, to be followed by civil war; and the near future—some weeks, at most—would bring with it the murder of the boy Andryusha, a murder committed “from personal motives” by who-knew-whom. If only he could have lived; but he was murdered, and the Beilis Affair was about to cover the local world in a poisonous, stinking fog. Nor had the assassination yet taken place of Prime Minister Stolypin by the terrorist Bogrov, who lived not far from here, on Bibikovsky Boulevard, though it was already being plotted. Lukyanovskaya Prison was expanding in all directions; the new buildings were all full, and countless people were incarcerated there, people still unknown to Jacob and Marusya: the Ulyanov sisters, and their brother Dmitry, and Dzerzhinsky, and Lunacharsky, and Fanny Kaplan. Very soon, through a little caprice of life, they would learn all these names, and many other names, and they would read books and play music together—for four hands, in unison—and all the novelties and discoveries in science and art they would breathe together, and this would fortify and deepen their impressions and sensations many times over.

They walked along the peaceful Mariinsko-Blagoveshchenskaya Street and conversed for the first time. In some strange way, their talk unfolded almost without verbs, a single recitation of names and sighs, inhales and exhales, and occasional interjections: Tolstoy? Yes! The Kreutzer Sonata? No, Anna Karenina! Oh yes! Dostoevsky? Of course! Demons! No, Crime and Punishment! Ibsen! Hamsun! Victoria! Hunger! Nietzsche! Yesterday! Dalcroze? Who? No, never heard of him! Rachmaninoff! Ah, Rachmaninoff! Beethoven! Of course! Debussy? And Glière? Magnificent! Chekhov? Dymov? Korolenko! Who? Me, too! But The Captain’s Daughter! What happiness! Lord! Unbelievable! Never before anything like it! Jewish? Sholom Aleichem? Yes, the house next door! No, Blok, Blok! Nadson? Gippius! Never read her! Oh, but you must, you must! Ancient history! Yes, the Greeks, the Greeks!

This was how they walked to the Botanical Garden. Then Marusya remembered that she had to go back soon, that she needed to go to Bolshaya Zhitomirskaya, because her lecture was starting soon and she would be late. He laughed and said that it was already too late for him, he had missed his altogether, and that today was the happiest day of his life, because what he had only guessed at had come to pass, and a thousand times better than he had guessed it might be … They didn’t part until evening. They walked around the entire town, and came out at the Dnieper, and passed some time in St. Sophia Cathedral.

Yet again there was the same recognition, the coincidences in the very depths of their souls, of their most secret and elusive thoughts. And where? In church! Who can you tell about it? It’s a mystery! Maria! The Child! Yes! I know! Be quiet! Impossible! Yes, my Nikolai! Nikolai! I sometimes turn to him! Oh yes! No, what baptism! No! Why? It’s a connection! Well, naturally! Never! Abraham and Isaac! Horrible! But the cross! But the sign! But blood! Yes! Me, too! And the fresco? It’s my favorite! Very favorite! Musicians! Yes, but the bear! Of course! Of course! The hunt is marvelous! And these musicians! Minstrels and clowns! This dance! King David?

He was handsome in a special way—not a way that appealed to everyone, but he was handsome to her. She liked his heavy chin with its dimpled cleft, and his neat mouth, determined, without any youthful plumpness, and you could see that, though he shaved closely, if he let his beard grow it would be coarse and thick. His eyes were clear; his face was pink with health; and even in his uniform you could tell he was broad-shouldered and narrow-waisted, with no extra flesh anywhere, absolute masculine clarity and definition.

She was more than beautiful—infused with spirit! Her lacy wool shawl barely concealed her sunken cheeks; there was nothing superfluous in her features, carved by a gifted sculptor, or, rather, etched by an engraver or an artist—Beardsley, perhaps. Slightly muted tints, pastel, lighter than air. Air—that was her element! No flesh and bones, nothing weighty—angels are made of such stuff as she is! Yes, angels …

The next day, they met again. Marusya told him that soon she would be graduating from the Froebel Courses, and she already knew what she wanted to continue studying. She told him everything she knew about the great dancer and her protégée, and about the rhythm that no one hears, in which is the key to everything, because outside this rhythm there is no life. You have to know how to catch the rhythm, and you can learn how to do it. It doesn’t matter what path you choose, but without this pulse, without the grand metronome, nothing is possible. And these years of study were only a preparation for what she was now ready to devote herself to … Precisely, only this!

Yes, yes, I understood that very well when I was still a child. I was sick with tonsillitis, and I was standing by the window with a bandage around my throat, and I was counting the falling autumn leaves, and I knew that the pain was echoed by each falling leaf that touched the ground. I couldn’t explain it to anyone, and you’re the first one I’ve ever known who is able to understand it … Not Mama, of course … Oh no, not Mama … She’s not at all … Yes, yes … They’ll never understand … Although their love, yes … But such understanding … Such oneness … And music? Music! That’s where the metronome of life is! The pulse! The meaning!

Every day, they walked through the city hand in hand, spending every spare moment together, and Jacob was happy and somewhat overwhelmed by this abundance of happiness. Marusya was happy, too, but also scared that it might all suddenly disappear. They discussed this as well, but he assured her that they would hold on to it, preserve it, and that she could count on him, put her faith in him, because he had had everything he might need in life except her. Now that they had found each other, it was all so simple. They lived on neighboring streets … Yes, Rachmaninoff, of course, Rachmaninoff!… It would be criminal not to hold on to the golden fish, the firebird, because everything had acquired meaning, a significance that was missing up until now. Now it had become clear why the world needed music, and all the sciences, and all the arts, because without love everything loses all meaning. Now the meaning was obvious, and not limited, but general, and pedagogy wasn’t isolated from life, it was invented precisely for the purpose of teaching people to be happy—and statistics, and political economy, and mathematics, to say nothing of music, were meant for one thing only, and that was to generate happiness.

Several days later, having covered versts of city streets in the town where they were both born, while walking along the beautiful river in which they had both gone swimming as children: Do you not agree, Marusya, that the word “river” should be masculine, as it is in German: der Fluss? Well, like our word “stream” … “Dnieper”—even the name is masculine, is it not? Not like “Volga,” which is feminine … They skipped up the hills and down through the flats of the ancient city, showing each other their favorite places, growing so intimately acquainted with one another that there didn’t seem to be any more room for delving into each other’s souls. And this was such an unequivocal preface to a supremely happy future life that even kissing was frightening, as though it might scare away the still greater happiness that awaited them. Nonetheless, at night, Jacob, sprawled out on his bed, hugged his pillow tight and promised himself that tomorrow he would kiss Marusya. But tomorrow he backed down, afraid to shake her trust in him, to offend her by introducing something lowly into their high-minded, noble friendship. Marusya waited and prepared herself for this new step in their relations, but did nothing to hurry the event.

It was still early in the year 1911; the end of February arrived. Their happiness was undiminished, and even put out new shoots, fresh green leaves. This major year, 1911, picked up definition and speed at a dizzying pace. At the beginning of March, Jacqueline Osipovna said that she had exchanged some letters with Ella Ivanovna Rabenek, who was inviting Marusya to come to Moscow for an audition, for the classes in plastique danse flore—movement and dance. Marusya, feeling a lump forming in her throat—her whole life, this lump appeared at moments of strong emotion, through the heightened functioning of the thyroid gland, as a doctor would explain to her many years later—said she would go, no matter what.

Afterward, things happened as though in a fairy tale. Her brother Mark arrived from Petersburg to visit his family. Mikhail visited more often, so his visits seemed less momentous. Mark was only home for four days, and Marusya, from his very presence in the house, noticed how much everything had changed since he had left home. The whole apartment seemed to have shrunk, and, most surprising, her parents themselves seemed to have become more diminutive. They had never been large people, but when Mark, tall and broad, stood next to his father and bent his head down to him, and his father craned his neck, lifting his handsome head up to Mark, Marusya almost cried, realizing how much older her parents had grown in the last five years. Mark moved in an aura of prosperity and success. He announced that he was moving to Moscow, where he had been appointed to a new position. Now he would be working as an attorney in an insurance company; it was a challenging job, and they were offering him a large salary. He had already rented a furnished apartment in Moscow, and, by the way, the apartment had two bedrooms, so Marusya could come whenever she wished to stay with him. She gasped and said she was ready to leave immediately. There was no “let’s wait and see”—everything simply took off—and the next day he bought the train tickets. He put them on Marusya’s desk—two long, stiff cardboard tickets, and two pale-green slips of paper, the reservations for the sleeping car.

On the evening of the same day, Marusya met Jacob and, beaming, told him she would be going to Moscow for an audition with Rabenek herself. Jacob was not glad. He took her hand, held it, then pressed it hard—not so that it hurt, but the gesture was charged with meaning.

“You’re leaving for Moscow? We have to say goodbye?”

“It’s only for a few days,” she said, and realized that she wasn’t telling the truth. If Ella Ivanovna accepted her, if she could find the money for the classes, she would stay in Moscow. It had never even entered Marusya’s mind before that her departure would mean she wouldn’t see Jacob for a long, long time.

“I will wait for you to come back, if you ever decide to return,” he said with a somewhat theatrical gesture, himself aware of the theatricality, and wincing at his own hypocrisy.

“No, no, don’t say that! After all that binds us together”—she didn’t say what “all” was, because they were bound both by spiritual discussions and by a deep attraction, which seemed somewhat shameful to both of them—“we will never lose each other.”

They sat in the Royal Garden. Marusya was in a hurry—she needed to pack her traveling bag and run to say goodbye to Madame Leroux. Jacob struggled, because he had still not been able to carry out his intention—to kiss Marusya. He said to himself, It’s now or never, turned to her, moved his face close to hers, and kissed her … cheek. It was not at all what he had been dreaming about all those weeks. She laughed and said, “Later, later … Now please walk with me.”

The next day, Marusya was sitting in a second-class compartment, in a window seat, next to her brother Mark, with a respectable married couple sitting across from them, older Kievans on their way to Moscow for a family celebration. They talked deferentially to her brother. The conversation was inconsequential, completely vapid, but very genteel. Marusya watched her brother silently, with the same merry spite that had been so characteristic of her in her childhood, but which had diminished somewhat during the years of her studies and her pedagogical activities.

Thus, Marusya and Jacob parted for the first time. Although she regretted every day spent apart from him, the trip to Moscow, a city she had never visited before, and the opportunity to experience the highest achievements of world culture (which is how she envisioned this trip for herself), was something she wasn’t willing to pass up. Poltava was as far as she had ventured beyond Kiev, and the dreams and visions she and Jacob shared about traveling together to Germany, to Italy, to France, paled in comparison with this first real journey. In short, her great life plans had already begun to be realized. It was a pity that Jacob could not be with her this time, but this was nonetheless the start of that great and serious shared life that they had summoned up so quickly in their minds and hearts. It was the first way station on the road they had mapped out in such great detail in their imaginations.

Marusya looked out the window, intoxicated by the breathtaking speed at which the train moved, almost flying over the ground, and feasting her eyes on the sights flashing by. She thought of it as a humble prelude to the enormous adventure of life, in which she had already found love, and her studies. Learning to understand the world, and active, exciting creative endeavor, all lay ahead.

At the station in Moscow, her brother hired a cab, and soon they arrived at an enormous building on Myasnitskaya Street, unprepossessing by Kiev standards, with a gloomy aspect and no intriguing architectural details or flourishes. It had towering entrance doors that looked like they were made for a giant. Inside was a vestibule, a mirror, and an elevator, behind a severe wrought-iron door of simple design.

Her brother was immediately waylaid by a huge gentleman in a fur coat, who slapped him on the back amiably and began talking in a voluble, lisping stream of words. Marusya turned away tactfully so as not to disturb their conversation. Mark nodded to her gratefully, called out, “Just a second,” and stepped aside with the gentleman. They talked for quite a while, but Marusya was not at all bored. She watched the people entering and leaving. Some people got into the elevator; others chose to walk up the broad, shallow staircase. This building made the first and most lasting impression on Marusya during her visit to Moscow: the men and women who bustled through the lobby dressed differently, rushed headlong, with purpose and confidence, and spoke rapidly, animatedly, as though they were all actors. The house itself was “modern,” and the people who lived there were “modern,” and the whole of life in Moscow was also “modern.” From the very first, it was clear to Marusya that Moscow was where she had to live, not in provincial old Kiev, stuffy and second-rate. Jacob should finish his studies and come live here. Both of them would live here together, in a house just like this one, and they would have a “modern” life, not a vulgar, pokey existence among Jewish relations, craftsmen, merchants, and bankers.

Her brother finished his conversation with the man in the fur coat, ending it in a strange way, with some sort of double handhold and a clap. Mark grabbed Marusya under the arm and guided her not to the lift but to the stairs, saying, “Hurry up, hurry up, Marusya. The elevator is too slow, and we’re just on the second floor.”

The apartment was wonderful, and also, in keeping with the whole building, unique, with an enormous alcove, and wood paneling—but no kitchen, just a stovetop in a small recess. There was, however, a real bathroom. Mark took some papers out of a desk drawer and whistled under his breath while he perused them. Then he picked out a clean handkerchief and said, “Marusya, I’ve got to rush. I’ll be home in the evening; here’s a key, here’s some money; don’t do anything foolish.”

When she was alone, Marusya stood for a while in front of the window, which was protected by wrought iron in a simple, stylized pattern. She imagined how she would look, with her upswept hair held by a velvet ribbon, if someone outside could see her. On the opposite side of the street, there was an identical gloomy building, but the snow that had just started to fall obscured the view into the windows. That meant no one could see her, either. Marusya fixed her hair, securing it more firmly under the ribbon. She exchanged her old dress for a skirt and a roomy blouse cut in the latest fashion, put on her little boots and an unseasonably light coat. She had left the despised winter coat at home; there was no place in her new life for that frightful old thing.

She hadn’t had time to ask her brother how to find Maly Kharitonievsky Lane, so she asked the doorman downstairs. He told her it was nearby and explained how to get there. Marusya was not even surprised at the coincidence that her brother’s apartment was just a stone’s throw from the Courses. In five minutes, she had reached an imposing house with huge windows on the first two floors; that was where the Courses were held. She had arrived right on time—the students were getting ready for their class, and Ella Ivanovna herself was standing by the door to the room, dressed in a light-colored tunic, with her hair swept up, like Marusya’s. It was usually painful for Marusya to talk to people she didn’t know, but this time she approached the teacher without any timidity, surprising even herself. She mentioned the recommendation from Madame Leroux.

“Yes, yes, I remember.” Rabenek let Marusya go ahead of her into the room, and she followed. “You sit and watch the class for now. We’ll talk afterward.”

The room was fairly large, with a raised stage and enormous windows lining one entire wall. There was a rug on the floor, and the walls were covered with white fabric. A small black piano was pushed up almost against the wall. Then a young lady with a powerful build came in and moved the instrument out into the room. She pulled out the round swiveling stool, opened the piano, and began playing some quiet music that was unfamiliar to Marusya. Jacob would have recognized the piece and known the composer, of course.

Marusya looked around unsuccessfully for a chair, then went out into the hallway to search for one. She didn’t find one there, either. While she was wandering through the hallway, a flock of young girls appeared in the room, barefoot, wearing short tunics. Ella Ivanovna began to address them, but they seemed not to be listening to her. They milled aimlessly about, over the stage, stretching their arms and legs casually, spontaneously, without any coordination with one another. The musical accompaniment continued quietly.

“Now, then; here we are … Natasha, Natasha, I’m saying this again for your benefit—every movement is made with the least expenditure of energy. You lift your arms beginning from your wrists, from the elbows; you need only a slight tension of the shoulder muscle, and all the other muscles are completely relaxed. This is the foundation of all foundations. Free your arms from unnecessary tension and your movements will become fluid, natural. Stop. Freeze. You must feel the weight of your arms, of your body, the weight of its extremities … Natasha, look at Eliza … Yes, like that … In this way, the unity destroyed by our unnatural clothing and absurd customs is restored. The plastique that we observe on antique vases, in Greek sculpture, returns to us. We have lost it. Raise your arm, lift your knee, twist your torso! Better, that’s better already … Fine, now everyone stop. The rope, please!”

Marusya, who never found a chair, stood by the door at first. Then, so that she could better hear Ella Ivanovna’s words, which were muffled somewhat by the music, she moved along the wall and sat down on the floor, tucking her legs up under her. She already knew about antique sculpture from Ella Rabenek’s lecture, about bas-reliefs, and about the inner logic of gesture. Now her whole body ached, so urgently did her arms, her legs, and her back long to respond to the music, to skip and jump, to express themselves without words.

Meanwhile, they tugged on the rope, and Rabenek herself ascended the stage. She waved her hand at the accompanist and called out a single name, unfamiliar to Marusya: “Scriabin, please!” The pianist began to play some other music, different from any she had ever heard before. Ella Ivanovna jumped over the rope with a strange, slow movement, as though she were rolling over it. Then everyone began to jump, but not ignoring the still-resounding music. Now the teacher requested that the music cease, and each one carried on according to her inner rhythm.

“Search for your own rhythm, your very own rhythm.”

They all pranced about the stage, together, and individually, and Marusya took off her little boots and went up to prance with them.

“Excellent! Excellent! Here’s true artistic talent!” Ella Ivanovna said, praising Marusya. Marusya, filled with lightness and strength, galloped about with all the girls until the break.

During the break, Ella Ivanovna came up to Marusya.

“One of the girls will give you a tunic in the changing room, and you may continue the lesson with us.”

That evening, Marusya wrote a letter to Jacob. She told him that she had passed the test, that in the fall she would begin training in the Rabenek studio, and that they had to do everything possible to move to Moscow, because she was sure of it: their future life was bound up with this city.

This was the first letter of that long correspondence that continued for twenty-five years—the correspondence, carefully tied up in a bundle, that had lain on the bottom of the willow chest in the communal apartment on Povarskaya Street until Marusya’s death, and had then migrated to Nikitsky Boulevard, to the home of her granddaughter, Nora, where it waited to be read.