Memories: From Moscow to the Black Sea

5

EARLY morning. Rain.

Waiting in front of our house were three carts. Gooskin and Averchenko’s impresario were loading our luggage onto them.

“All right, Gooskin? All set for the journey?”

“Yes! We’ve got all our passes. And we’ve been promised an escort.” Gooskin sighed, then continued in a whisper, “Though it’s the escort that frightens me most!”

“But we need an escort—without one we’ll be robbed.”

“Isn’t it all the same who we’re robbed by? Whether we’re robbed by our escort or by somebody else?”

I agreed that it was, probably, all the same.

Two more carts pulled up. In one of them was a family with children and dogs. In the other, half-sitting, half-lying, was a very pale woman wrapped in a flannel shawl. Beside the cart was a man in a sheepskin coat. The woman looked very ill. Her face was completely still, her eyes staring straight ahead. Her companion was casting quick, anxious glances at her and seemed to be trying to stop anyone from noticing her, edging around the cart as he tried to shield her from our view.

“Dear, oh dear!” said the all-knowing Gooskin. “That’s that industrialist’s wife—the one who was robbed.”

“But what’s happened to her? Why does she look so ill?”

“She got stabbed in the side with a bayonet. But the two of them are doing their best to look as if she’s fit and healthy and has nothing to complain about, as if she’s just sitting there, journeying merrily along to the Ukraine—so I say we should go along with that and go sit with our things. Ri-ight?”

More carts appeared. In one of them sat last night’s singer, wearing a ragged little coat. The picture of innocence—and three suitcases (filled with yarn?).

We were going to be quite a caravan. So much the better—safety in numbers.

Finally our escort turned up—four young men with rifles. One of them barked, “Let’s get going! No time to waste!”—and off we went.

As we were leaving the shtetl, we were joined by a few more carts. Now at least a dozen strong, our caravan moved slowly on, the escort walking beside us.

It was all very dismal. Rain. Mud. Only damp hay to sit on. Ahead of us—the enigmatic border zone, all twenty-five miles of it.

We had covered about three miles. We were in the middle of nowhere, with only a ramshackle barn to our right, when all of a sudden we glimpsed six men in soldiers’ greatcoats, walking in single file across an empty field. Walking slowly, as if just out for a stroll. Our convoy came to a stop, though the greatcoats had given no indication of wanting anything from us.

“What’s up?”

I looked on as Gooskin jumped off the cart and walked briskly across the field, not toward the greatcoats, but toward the barn. Apparently in no hurry, the greatcoats turned toward the barn too—and everyone disappeared from sight.

“Diplomatic negotiations,” said Averchenko, walking over to my cart.

These negotiations lasted for some time.

Our guards, for some reason, took no part in them. On the contrary, having lost their air of authority and military bravura, they seemed to be hiding behind our carts. All very strange.

Gooskin returned, gloomy but calm.

“Tell me,” he said to my carter. “Are there going to be any turnings off this road?”

“No-ope,” my carter replied.

“If there’s a turning soon, then those young greatcoats will be able to cut across and intercept us again.”

“No-ope,” my carter said reassuringly. “Not in weather like this—they’re already on their way home to bed.”

Eight in the morning seemed early for bed, but we were happy to take his word for it.

The carter pointed to the right with his whip—there on the horizon were six figures, moving away from us.

“Right, let’s get going,” said Gooskin. “There may be more people wanting to talk to us.”

The guards emerged from behind the carts and, with renewed bravado, walked on beside us.

It was all very dismal.

We kept going, with few stops. To relieve the tedium, we swapped places now and again to pay social calls on one another. Unexpectedly, one of the guards started talking to us. I replied rather coolly and then said in French to Olyonushka, who was sitting beside me, “Best not to get into conversation with them.”

The guard gave a slight smile and said, “What makes you say that? I’ve known you for a long time. You read to us once at the Technological Institute.”[30]

“But… what on earth’s brought you to these parts?”

He laughed. “Did you really think we were Bolsheviks? We’d been hanging around there for days, waiting for a chance to get out. There are four of us—two students and two former officers. Today, when it turned out you needed an escort, none of the Bolsheviks would volunteer—they didn’t want to miss out on their daily plunder. We saw our chance. We volunteered. We had a word with the right people and said we’d help out—and so we have. The only thing that really bothered them was my friend’s gold tooth. They wanted to pull it out. But in all the rush I think they simply forgot about it.”

We went on further.

We came to a copse. A wooden fence was blocking our way. Two German soldiers were standing by a gate. Not far from the gate was a barrack.

“Not the most welcoming of Guten Tags!” I said.

“Quarantine!” Gooskin explained gloomily. “Wonderful!”

Out came a somewhat more important German, wearing a somewhat darker greatcoat. He told us that we had to spend two weeks in quarantine.

Gooskin explained in his outlandish German that we were the most famous writers in the world and that we were “all so well that God help us—and Herr Officer too, of course!” And why would the officer want to waste quarantine space on us when there were others who needed it more?

But the German failed to understand what was in his best interests. He went back, slamming behind him the small wicket gate through which he had first emerged.

“Gooskin! We’re not going to have to turn back, are we?”

“Pah!” Gooskin answered contemptuously. “Back! Why turn back when we need to go forward? There’s always a way—you just have to look for it. All of you stay where you are! I’ll make a start.”

His hands behind his back, he started pacing up and down, looking attentively into the sentries’ faces. He walked past them once, then again, then a third time.

“What the hell’s he playing at?” Averchenko wondered aloud.

Trustingly and obediently, our entire caravan waited.

After walking past the sentries a fourth time, Gooskin made up his mind. Stopping beside one of them, he said, “Well?”

The sentry, of course, said nothing, but his eyes slid to one side. Once, twice, a third time… I looked across the road and caught sight of another German behind some bushes, innocently examining a branch of an elder tree. Gooskin didn’t look at this German but, like some bird of prey, began slowly circling around him. Then they both disappeared deeper into the wood.

Gooskin was not gone for long. Emerging from the wood, he announced loudly, “Nothing for it. We must all turn back.”

And so we obediently turned back. Obediently but with good cheer, because we had faith in the genius of Gooskin.

We went back the way we had come. After about a quarter of a mile, we turned off into the wood. Gooskin then jumped down from the cart and strode off, looking alertly around him.

We glimpsed a German greatcoat. Somewhere in the bushes. Gooskin homed in on it.

“You stay where you are!” he shouted out to us. “I won’t be long!”

This round of negotiations did not take long. Gooskin reappeared, now accompanied by two friendly Germans who, with both words and gestures, were explaining the path we should follow to avoid the quarantine post.

We did as they said and happened on another German. This time it took only a couple of minutes to reach an understanding. Next we happened on some peasant or other. We thrust a few coins at him too, just in case. The peasant took the coins, but he stood there for a long time, gazing after us and scratching behind his left ear with his right hand. It seemed we needn’t have bothered.

In the evening we saw the lights of Klintsy, the large Ukrainian shtetl that was our goal. Our caravan was already bumping along the cobbled street when, for the last time, Gooskin jumped down, ran up to a passerby and held out some money to him. First surprised, then frightened, the passerby shied away and refused the money.

And we understood that the zone, this enigmatic border zone, now truly did lie behind us.

Klintsy was a large shtetl with a railway station, cobbled streets, stone houses, and even, here and there, electric lighting.

Klintsy was full of people like us. Getting across the border was evidently not the end of the story. It did not entitle a person to roam freely about the Ukraine. Here too one had to run around getting all kinds of papers and documents from all kinds of bureaus and offices. All this took time—and so Klintsy was packed full of travelers.

We wandered about, seeking a haven. One by one, carts peeled off and disappeared. In the end, all that was left of our caravan was its head: our own little family of carts—wet, dirty, and despairing.

It was slow going. Gooskin walked beside us on the pavement, knocking on doors and shutters, asking if we could stay the night. Beards and hands were thrust out of windows. Gesturing and waving in different ways, they all refused us.

We sat there in silence, blank and downcast, chilled to the marrow. It was as if Gooskin had loaded three carts with worthless junk and was now trying to sell this junk to people who merely shooed him away.

“Yes,” said Olyonushka, as if guessing my thoughts. “He’s carting us around as if we were young calves! But then why shouldn’t he? We’re not much different from calves—all we want is something warm to drink and a place to lie down for the night.”

Eventually, by the gates of a newly built two-story house, Gooskin entered into so animated a dialogue with an elderly Jew that our carters stopped the horses. Experienced as they were, they understood that this might be leading to something. The dialogue was intensely theatrical. One moment—all sinister whispers; the next—frenzied yells. Both parties spoke at the same time. And then, at a moment when they were both waving their arms in the air and shouting what seemed like the most terrible of curses, making Olyonushka cling to me and shout, “They’re going to throttle each other!”—at this alarming moment Gooskin calmly turned toward us and said to the carters, “Well, go on. What are you waiting for? Drive into the yard.”

While the old man began to open the gates.

The house we now entered was, as I have said, new. It had electric lighting, but the layout of the rooms was unusual—the front door opened straight into the kitchen. We, as honored guests, were taken further, but the owners themselves—the family who must have built this mansion—appeared to have gotten stuck in the kitchen. The whole of this huge family huddled together there, on beds, chests and benches and on blankets spread out on the floor.

The head of the family was an old woman. Next came the old woman’s husband—the tall bearded man who had let us in. Then the daughters. Then the daughters’ daughters, the daughters’ husbands, the son of the son’s wife, the son’s daughters and some kind of a shared grandson whom they were all bringing up together, with much love and shrieking.

The first thing we did, for form’s sake, was to ask the old woman how much she would be charging us. This truly was just for form’s sake—there was nowhere else we could have gone.

The old woman pulled a mournful face and threw up her hands: “Ach, don’t talk money! How can anyone make money out of the misery of others? Out of the misery of those who have nowhere to lay their head! We have enough space and we have all we need (here the old woman turned to one side and spat, to ward off the evil eye), so what do we want with your money? Go and rest, my daughter’s daughter will give you a samovar and anything else you need. But first of all, get yourselves dry. And don’t worry about anything. What do I want with money?”

Moved by her words, we made eloquent protests.

I studied this remarkable woman. As her faith required, she was wearing a wig—or rather, a piece of black cloth with white stitching to represent a parting.

“No,” Averchenko said to Gooskin. “We can’t possibly take advantage of such magnanimity. We absolutely must make her see reason.”

Gooskin smiled enigmatically.

“Huh! You really don’t need to worry on that score. Believe me!”

None of us was more deeply moved than Olyonushka. With tears in her eyes, she said to me, “You know, I think God has sent us on this journey to show us that there are still kind, magnanimous people in the world. Here we have a simple old woman. She is not rich but she is gladly sharing with us her last mite. Though we are complete strangers to her, she has taken pity on us!”

“An astonishing old woman,” I agreed. “And, most astonishing of all, she doesn’t really… she doesn’t have a particularly nice face.”

“Yes, it just goes to show. One really mustn’t judge by appearances.”

We were both so moved that we even turned down the offer of fried eggs. “Poor old woman… giving us her all and everything!”

Meanwhile Gooskin and the old man, wasting no time, set about the complex task of trying to obtain all the necessary passes and documents—so we could be sure to be on our way in the morning.

First, the old man went off somewhere on his own. Then he came back to fetch Gooskin and take him along too. They came back together—and Gooskin went off again on his own. Then Gooskin came back and announced that the authorities required me and Averchenko to present ourselves to them, without delay.

It was already eleven o’clock and we wanted to go to bed, but what could we do? Off we went.

We had only the vaguest idea what kind of authority to expect. Commandant, commissar, Cossack junior officer, clerk, provincial governor…“Here we are—at your bidding!” We were long accustomed to being without rights; we no longer even inquired where we were being dragged to, whom we had to see next or why. Olyonushka was right—we were little different from calves.

We came to an official-looking building. Something between a post office and a police station…

In a small whitewashed room, an officer was sitting at a table. By the door stood a soldier. A new kind of uniform, which meant they must be Ukrainians.

“Here you are!” said Gooskin and stepped aside.

Our patron—the old woman’s husband—took up position by the door, looking very alert indeed. At the first hint of trouble, he’d be off in a flash.

The officer, a young blond fellow, turned toward us, studied us attentively and, all of a sudden, broke into a broad, joyful, and astonished smile.

“So it’s true? Say who you are.”

“I’m Teffi.”

“I’m Averchenko.”

“The Teffi who used to write for the Russian Word?”

“Yes.”

“Ha-a! I used to read it all the time! And I used to read Averchenko too, in Satirikon.[31] Ha-a! Well this is a miracle! I thought this scoundrel here was lying. And then I thought he might not be. And that this might be my one chance to set eyes on you. I’ve never been in Petersburg and, to be honest, this was a chance I couldn’t let slip. Ha-a! Well, I’m overjoyed. I’ll send you both your travel passes this very day! Where are you staying?”

At this point the old woman’s husband moved away from the door and recited his address, testifying to its authenticity with the words, “So help me God!”

We thanked the officer.

“So we can leave tomorrow, can we?”

“If you want to. Unless you’d like to stay here for a little while. We’ve got everything here and plenty of it. We’ve even got champagne.”

“Now that does sound good,” Averchenko said wistfully. “Almost too good to be true!”

The officer rose to show us out. Only then did we notice the distraught look on Gooskin’s face.

“But you’ve forgotten the most important thing of all!” he said in a tragic whisper. “The most important thing of all! My own travel pass. Mr. Officer! I too am from their company, and there are three others. They can’t possibly get by without me! They’ll tell you that themselves. What will become of them? I tell you, it will be like the last day of Pompeii, right here on your doorstep!”

The officer looked at us questioningly.

“Yes, yes,” said Averchenko. “He’s accompanying us—and there are three others. Everything he says is true.”

“I shall be glad to be of service.”

We said our goodbyes.

Gooskin complained bitterly all the way back: “How could you? Forgetting Gooskin’s pass! The most important thing of all! Wonderful! Ri-ight?”

Back home, calm, content, and sleepy, we sat down around the samovar that had been heated by one of the daughters’ daughters. Now that the intensity of our feelings about the self-sacrificing old woman had subsided a little, Olyonushka and I accepted the offer of fried eggs.

“Well, we can at least get her to allow us to pay for our food, even if she refuses to accept money for anything else. We don’t want to have to starve to death just because she’s such a wonderful person.”

“And that Gooskin’s so unpleasant. Smirking like an oaf and telling us we don’t need to worry on that score. What does he care?.”

Our room was nice and warm. After the cold wind, our cheeks were burning. It was time to go to bed—almost twelve. Then a young man burst in. I think it was the son of the son’s wife.

“Someone from the office is here—asking for Pan Averchenko.”[32]

“They haven’t changed their minds, have they?”

“And we thought everything had been settled!”

Averchenko went out into the kitchen. I followed.

There, surrounded by a frightened crowd of the daughters’ daughters stood a Ukrainian policeman.

“Here are your travel passes. And the officer also wishes to give you this.”

Two bottles of champagne!

Who’d have thought there could be such magic in a visit from a Ukrainian policeman?

We clinked our cups of warm champagne.

How high the wheel of fortune had raised us! Electric lighting, corks flying toward the ceiling, and cups—yes, we were drinking from teacups—foaming with champagne.

“Oufff!” Gooskin let out a sigh of contentment. “I have to admit it, I was scared halfway to death!”

Morning in Klintsy.

The day is somewhat gray, but quiet and reassuringly ordinary—just like any other autumn day. And the rain too is ordinary, not like the despairing rain, the rain as bitter as tears, that only two days before had been watering those bloodied remains by the embankment.

We stay in bed late. Our bodies are worn out, our souls dozing…

But we can hear voices from the kitchen. People bustling about. Plates clattering, somebody being scolded, somebody being told to get out of the way, somebody else defending them, several loud voices all shouting at once… The sweet symphony of simple human life…

“And where are the plates, I ask you. Where are the plates?” a high solo soars above the chorus.

“A vuide Moshke?”[33]

Then an intricate duet, something like “Zoher-boher, zoher-boher!”[34]

And a rich contralto solo:

“A mishigene kopf.”[35]

Ever so cautiously the door begins to open. A small dark eye examines us through the narrow crack. And disappears. A gray eye appears a little lower down, then disappears too. Then, much higher up—another dark eye, enormous and astonished.

The daughters’ daughters were, it seems, waiting for us to awake.

It was time we got up.

Our train wasn’t leaving until the evening. We would have to spend the whole day in Klintsy. This, we feared, would be boring. The town was so very calm—and calm was something we were no longer used to. We could not have complained of boredom two days before this.

One of the daughters’ daughters came and asked us what we would like for lunch.

Olyonushka and I looked at each other and said with one voice, “Fried eggs.”

“Yes, fried eggs and nothing else.”

The daughter’s daughter went out again, looking surprised and maybe even displeased. The kind old woman must have been wanting to spoil us.

“Yes,” said Olyonushka, “for us to abuse her generosity would be unforgivable.”

“Of course. And there’s certainly nothing cheaper than eggs. Although one doesn’t really want fried eggs two days running.”

Olyonushka glanced at me reproachfully, then looked down at the floor.

Averchenko appeared, bringing something wonderful—a whole pile of apples.

Olyonushka then went out for a walk herself. She came back full of excitement and said, “Guess what I’ve brought?”

“Don’t know.”

“Guess!”

“A cow?”

“Don’t be silly. Guess.”

“I can’t. The only thing I can think of is a cow…. Or a candelabra?”

“Nothing of the sort,” she said triumphantly—and placed a bar of chocolate on the table. “There!”

The actress with the little dog went over to the table, her eyes on stalks. Her little dog was no less surprised—it sniffed the chocolate and gave a little yelp.

“Where’s it from?” we began to interrogate her.

“You won’t believe it—you’ll think I’m joking. I simply bought it at a little stall. And nobody asked anything at all. I didn’t need any papers, and I didn’t have to line up. I just saw it in the window, went in and bought it. Real Boreman’s chocolate.[36] Look!”

How strange life can be—someone walks down the street, feels like eating some chocolate, goes into a shop and—“Yes Madame, here Madame, as you wish Madame.” And there are people everywhere. They can see and hear everything that’s going on, yet nobody seems in the least bothered—as if all this is completely normal. Who’d have believed it!

“And it was just an ordinary stall?”

“Yes, just an ordinary little stall.”

“Hmm! And you don’t think it’s some trap? Well, let’s try some of this chocolate. And when we’ve finished it, we can buy some more.”

“Only I probably shouldn’t go there again myself,” said Olyonushka. “Let someone else go—otherwise it might look suspicious…”

Olyonushka was right. One can’t be too careful.

Once the first surge of delight and elation had passed, we all began to feel bored again. How were we going to pass the time until evening?

The little dog was whining. Her owner was darning her gloves and grumbling about something.

Olyonushka was in one of her moods: “No, this really can’t be the right way to live. We should learn how to live without trampling the grass. Today we’re having fried eggs again, which means still more destruction of life. One should plant an apple tree and live only off its fruit.”

“Olyonushka, darling,” I say. “Just now you polished off a good dozen apples in one sitting, without even thinking about it. A single apple tree won’t last you very long, will it?”

Olyonushka’s lips were trembling. She was about to start bawling. “You’re laughing at me. Yes, I ate a dozen apples, but so what? What ups… what really upsets me… that I’ve sunk so low… lost all self… self-control…”

At this point she began to sob. She truly did lose all self-control. Her mouth fell open and, like a child, she began to howl: “Boo-hoo, boo-hoo!”

Averchenko didn’t know what to do.

“Olyonushka!” he said gently. “Don’t get so upset! It won’t be long till we get to Kiev. Then we can plant your apple tree for you.”

Olyonushka carried on weeping inconsolably.

“Honest to God, we will. And the apples will ripen just like that—Kiev has a wonderful climate. And if there aren’t enough for you, then we can buy a few more. Just now and again. Just now and again, Olyonushka! All right, we won’t buy any more apples, only please stop crying!”

“It’s all the old woman’s fault for being so saintly,” I said to myself. “Olyonushka now sees all of us—herself included—as vile, callous, and petty-minded. Ach, ach, ach…”

The door gave a quiet creak, interrupting my troubled thoughts.

Another eye!

The eye peeps in, then disappears. A quick scuffle behind the door. Another eye, very different. It peeps in, then disappears. And yet another. This eye is bold enough to allow a nose to follow it into the crack.

A voice behind the door asks impatiently, “Ri-ight?”

“There,” replies the eye. And disappears.

What on earth was going on?

We watched.

There was no doubt. People were taking turns to peep into our room.

“Maybe Gooskin’s making them pay to see us,” said Averchenko.

I walked quietly up to the door and flung it open.

About fifteen people, maybe even more, sprang back and did their best to squeeze behind the stove. They were clearly not part of the family—the daughters’ daughters and other family members were all going about their household chores with particular zeal, as if to emphasize that they had nothing to do with these outsiders. As for Gooskin, he was standing alone, innocently picking bits of loose plaster from the wall.

“Gooskin! What’s going on?”

“Oh, nothing much—just people being inquisitive! ‘What do you want to look at writers for?’ I asked them. ‘If you really must look at something, then look at me. So what if they’re writers! You’re not going to see inside them and on the outside they’re no different from me. Ri-ight? How could they be any different?”

Had Gooskin been selling tickets? I wondered. Or had he been letting everyone in for free—like a pianist practising on mute keys so that his fingers don’t lose their agility?

We went back inside, closing the door more firmly.

“I don’t know,” said Olyonushka. “Do we really have to deprive them of their entertainment? If they’re that interested, why not just let them look?”

“Yes, you’re right,” I agreed quickly, afraid she might start bawling again. “Really, we should have put on even more of a show for them. We could have got Averchenko to stand on his head. Then we could have held hands in a circle and danced round him, while your fellow actress sat with her little dog on top of the wardrobe calling out ‘Cuckoo! Cuckoo!’”

In the afternoon, after the first serving of fried eggs (there would be yet more before our departure), the old woman’s husband came and entertained us. In all my life I have never met anyone so gloomy. He neither trusted the present nor had faith in the future.

“It’s nice and peaceful here in Klintsy.”

He hung his head dejectedly.

“Peaceful enough. But who knows what tomorrow will bring?”

“The apples you have here are delicious!”

“Good enough. But who knows what tomorrow will bring?”

“You have a lot of daughters.”

“A lot of daughters—yes. But who knows…”

Since none of us knew what tomorrow would bring, we were unable to reply. And so our conversations with this old man always took the form of brief questions and answers, dense with philosophical implication, somewhat like Plato’s dialogues.

“You have a lovely wife,” said Olyonushka. “And you are, I think, all kind and good people!”

“Kind, good. But who…”

With a sudden gesture of despair he turned around and walked out.

After our second serving of fried eggs we packed our things; the husbands of the daughters’ daughters dragged our luggage along to the station; we said emotional goodbyes to everyone and went out onto the porch, leaving Gooskin to handle the most delicate aspect of our departure—payment. We told him he really must get the family to accept our money. If he failed, the best thing he could do—Olyonushka and I were agreed—was to put the money on the table and make a swift exit. And we added that if the saintly old woman chased after him, he should run all the way to the station without a backward glance. We’d meet him on the platform. She was, after all, an old woman; she wouldn’t be able to catch up with him.

We waited anxiously.

Through the door we could hear their voices—Gooskin’s and the old woman’s, one at a time, then both together.

“No!” Olyonushka said in distress. “He’s simply not up to it. Matters like this require tact and sensitivity.”

Then a sudden wild shriek. Gooskin.

“He’s gone mad!”

He was shrieking loud, wild words.

“Gelt?” we heard. “Gelt?”

And the old woman began to shriek too. The same word: “gelt.”

And then silence.

Gooskin rushed out. He looked awful. He was bright red, soaked in sweat, his mouth all twisted. His bootlaces were undone and his collar had broken free of its stud.

“Let’s go!” he commanded grimly.

“Well, did she take the money?” Olyonushka asked with timid hope.

Gooskin’s whole body began to shake: “Did she take the money? Just try stopping her! I’d understood long ago that she was out to fleece us, but to fleece us so royally—may never the sun set again if ever I have heard the like of it!”

When angered, Gooskin would launch out into the most complex of rhetorical figures. There were occasions when we really had no idea what he was talking about.

“I told her in plain language—you, Madame, must have woken yourself up, Madame, from the wrong side of bed, Madame. So I suggest we wait until you’ve slept your way through it. Yes, I put it to her straight.”

“But did you pay her the right amount?” we asked anxiously.

“Indeed I did! A lot more than the right amount. Do I look like the kind of person who doesn’t pay? No, I’m the kind who pays.”

He said all this with pride. And then, a little inappropriately, he muttered, “Though really, of course, it’s you who’ll be paying.”