The Story of a Life

44

The Old Man with the Hundred-Rouble Ticket

It’s an old truth that people who are always on the move – engine drivers, sailors, pilots, chauffeurs – tend to be rather superstitious. And so were we, the conductors of the Moscow tramway system.

We were most superstitious when it came to an old man with a hundred-rouble note, the so-called Katerinka. The note was engraved with a magnificent portrait of Catherine the Great in a tight satin bodice.

To be fair, the old man was in fact quite pleasant – clean, kind and well mannered. In the pocket of his overcoat he always carried a perfectly folded copy of the Russian News, the beloved newspaper of the liberal upper classes.

The old man always boarded the tram early in the morning just as we were pulling out of the park and had nothing more than sixty kopecks of change on us. We were never given any more than that to start our day. He always got on and smiled impishly as he handed his hundred-rouble note to the conductor. Of course, the conductor never had enough change. But the old man never made a fuss and just quietly got off at the first stop and waited for the next tram.

The same interaction repeated itself with the following tram. And so, getting on and then off one tram after another, the old man rode to work for free day after day, month after month. There was nothing we could do about it.

It was always the exact same hundred-rouble note. We, the conductors working Line 8, had memorised its serial number – 123715. Sometimes we lost our temper with the old man and said: ‘Present your “Katerinka” 123715 and then get off.’ The old man was never offended. He happily presented the banknote to the conductor and then just as happily left the tram, hurrying so as not to be a bother to anyone. Such deviousness to avoid purchasing a ticket was unprecedented, yet even the fiercest of the conductors was helpless to stop him. But the reason we disliked the old man was not because of that ‘Katerinka’ but because, according to all the longtime conductors who had known him for years, he always brought bad luck. I experienced this myself four times while working on the trams. My first job, as a driver on the B Line, was awful. The trams had trailers, and the couplings were so old and worn that it was impossible to start up without jolting the trailers, which was always followed by loud curses from the passengers.

One day a white Chichkin milk truck cut in front of me on Smolensky Boulevard. It then proceeded to drive straight down the tracks, but exceedingly slowly, as if the driver feared spilling his load. I had no option but to slow right down as well, and soon was arriving late at all my stops, now crowded with angry passengers. It wasn’t long before another B tram caught up with me, followed by a second, then a third and finally even a fourth. All of them began rattling furiously. In those days, motorised trams had electric rattles, not horns. The entire line was jammed, but the milk driver just drove on in front of me and refused to clear off the rails.

And so we went down the entire length of Sadovaya-Kudrinskaya Street, past Tverskaya Street, Malaya Dmitrovka Street and Karetny Row. I rattled like mad, leaned out and cursed, but the driver’s only response was a few puffs of tobacco smoke from his window. By now the row of ‘Bugs’, packed with passengers and rattling around the Garden Ring, stretched as far as the eye could see. The drivers’ cursing shook the air. The wave of noise started at the very last tram, broke over me, and then rolled back in a mighty wave.

Driven to despair, I knew I had to act. As we started down the slope at Samotëka I switched the engine off and, gesticulating as though my brakes had failed, let the tram run free. With a deafening crash, we ploughed into the back of Chichkin’s milk truck. There was a sound something like a gunshot, and then the truck ended up on its side, pouring white smoke. The whiskered driver climbed out, pulled a police whistle from his pocket and began to blow with all his might. I had not seen this coming. Suddenly, two policemen, clutching their swords, began racing across Samotëchnaya Square towards the tram. The next day I found myself demoted from driver to conductor.

But this wasn’t the end of my misadventures. Soon after I was fined for sitting on the rear platform as we crossed Teatralnaya Square. Conductors were expected to stand here since the square was one of the busiest spots in Moscow and passengers were always hopping on and off even while the tram was in motion.

Some of us young conductors came up with a plan to get in a little rest on what was always an insanely busy day. It seemed clever at the time, but we were quite mistaken. We convinced the drivers to leave the last stop two or three minutes ahead of schedule and not be bothered with ‘maintaining the proper interval’ as mandated. The driver went at full speed until he caught up with the tram in front. We watched as all the waiting passengers climbed into that tram and we proceeded on empty and quiet. We could even sit down and read the newspaper. It seemed foolproof. But there was the proverbial banana skin. The plan was working so well that we decided to take three or four circuits around Moscow at a time to avoid having to pick up any passengers. Soon, our takings fell way below those of the other conductors. Our bosses became suspicious. In the end, they caught onto our little game and slapped us with heavy fines.

None of these troubles could be attributed to the old man with the hundred-rouble note. Yet one day he entered my carriage and his appearance struck me as more suspicious and threatening than ever – the old man was positively beaming at me. Perhaps this was because I had overlooked him, and he had managed to ride two stops for free. After he got off, the driver, a taciturn and morose fellow, slid open the door of his cabin with a loud screech and shouted down the length of the carriage to me: ‘Conductor, open your eyes! Look out for some sort of trouble!’ And then he slammed the door shut.

I kept a lookout for trouble the entire rest of the day, but nothing happened. I calmed down. At midnight we rolled out of Yaroslavsky station on our last round. The tram was almost empty, and everything seemed fine. I began humming a popular tune to myself: ‘Tell me, little birdie! Have you got some change for me …’

At Orlikov Lane a stout gentleman in an overcoat with a fashionable roll collar and an elegant bowler got on. Everything about him spoke of wealth and status: his slightly puffy eyes, the smell of fragrant cigar smoke, the white silk muffler of foreign make, the walking stick with a silver knob. He walked down the entire length of the tram, leaning heavily on his stick and moving uncomfortably like someone with gout, and then dropped into a seat by the exit. I went over to him.

‘Free travel!’ the man said curtly. He didn’t bother looking at me, but was staring out of the window at the lights of the city.

‘Your pass!’ I said, just as curtly.

He raised his puffy eyes and gave me a look of contempt. ‘You ought to know who you’re dealing with, young man,’ he said angrily. ‘I’m Mayor Bryansky.’

‘Unfortunately, it’s not written on your forehead,’ I shot back. ‘Show me your pass!’

The mayor flew into a temper and refused. I stopped the tram and asked him to get out. He refused to budge. At this point, the other passengers graciously decided to weigh in on the matter.

‘He’s no mayor!’ came a mocking voice from far back in the tram. ‘The mayor has his own carriage and pair. Everyone knows that. Some mayor he is!’

‘Mind your own business!’ shouted the man in the bowler.

‘Heavens! What a loud voice he has!’ an old woman with a bag of apples said nervously. ‘The rich are all like that – too cheap to spend five kopecks on a ticket. That’s how they make their pile, by saving a kopeck here and there.’

‘Maybe he’s broke,’ joked a young man in a cloth cap. ‘I’ll pay for his ticket. Here, conductor! And give him the change so he can buy himself something to eat.’

In the end the outraged mayor got out, slamming the door so hard behind him that all the glass shook. For this the driver delivered a string of comments addressed to the man in reference to his bad manners, his hat and his fat mug.

Two days later I was summoned by the head of the Miussky Yard, a humorous man with an enormous red beard who said in a loud voice: ‘Conductor 217! This is your second reprimand. Sign here! Fine, and now go and light a candle to Our Lady of Iversk for getting you off so lightly. Who ever heard of such a thing? Tossing the mayor out of the tram! And at night, and on Third Meshchanskaya Street no less, where a man isn’t safe even by day!’

He demanded that I tell him every last detail of the entire story with the mayor. So I did, making sure to also tell him about the old man with the hundred-rouble note and how we conductors were all convinced he was bad luck.

‘I’ve heard about this old devil,’ said the head of the yard. ‘I wish we could find some way to trip him up.’

The conductors of Line 8 had been dreaming about this for a long time. Each of us had our plan, including me. I told it to the yard head, and he just laughed. Nevertheless, the next morning I was given one hundred roubles in small notes, for which I had to sign. I waited three days for the old man. On the fourth day, he finally appeared. Not suspecting a thing, the usual calm, innocent smile on his face, he got in and handed me his ‘Katerinka’. I took it, turned it over, examined it in the light, and then tucked it into my satchel. His jaw dropped with surprise. I slowly counted out ninety-nine roubles and ninety-five kopecks, counted it one more time to be certain, and then handed the old man his change. He presented a terrifying sight – his face was black with rage, and his eyes yellow with bile. I would have been afraid to run into him in a deserted alley. He silently took the change, stuffed it uncounted into his coat pocket, and headed towards the door.

‘Where are you going?’ I asked him politely. ‘You finally have a ticket. Now you can ride as much as you like.’

‘Bastard!’ the old man spat. He opened the front door and got off at the next stop, no doubt out of habit. When the tram started up, he whacked the outside of the door as hard as he could with his heavy stick and yelled once more: ‘Bastard! Swindler! I’ll show you!’

I never saw him again after that. Some of the conductors, however, did claim to have seen him again, walking briskly to his office, a neatly folded copy of the Russian News stuck into the pocket of his overcoat. The hundred-rouble note (serial number 123715) was mounted, like a trophy, on a special notice board behind a wire cage typically used for official notices. It hung there for a few days. The conductors crowded around to have a good look at it and laugh. I gained a dubious reputation for resourcefulness. This reputation saved me from being fired when an inspector caught me giving a free ride to twenty armed men.

It was nighttime. Soldiers in battle dress – with cartridge boxes, rifles and tightly belted brand-new greatcoats – got on at Yaroslavsky station. Bearded men with weather-beaten faces, they were reservists, fresh up from the country and intimidated by big, unfamiliar Moscow. They were on their way to Brestsky station, and from there to the front. Three of them were accompanied by their wives, whose faces were muffled up to their eyes in their shawls. They clung to their men’s coat sleeves and didn’t say a word. Neither did the soldiers. I had committed two offences. Not only had I allowed the soldiers and their wives to ride for free, but I had also permitted armed men onto the tram, which was strictly forbidden.

An inspector got on at Yekaterinskaya Square.

‘You needn’t bother checking,’ I told him. ‘The soldiers don’t have any tickets.

‘Charging it to the king of Denmark, are you?’ he asked matter-of-factly.

‘Yes, that’s right, the king of Denmark.’

‘A nice state of affairs,’ he muttered as he took down my number and then jumped off without waiting until the next stop.

Soon after I was summoned again to the depot’s red-bearded head. He looked at me for a long time, raised his eyebrows quizzically, and then appeared to come to a decision. ‘You’, he said, dropping his usual informal ‘ty’ for the formal form of address, ‘are incapable of working with passengers. That’s obvious! My Lord, you already have three reprimands!’

‘Well, fine then, fire me.’

‘That’d be easy. But that’s not the point. I’m going to transfer you to our nighttime hospital service instead. You’ll pick up the wounded at the stations and deliver them to the various hospitals. You’re a student, right?’

I told him I was and accepted. I was grateful, for this work seemed nobler than the exhausting daily tussle with passengers, tickets and change. Relieved, I handed over my satchel to the foreman and went home. I walked along Bolshaya Gruzinskaya Street. The gaslights flickered in the wind. The night air smelled faintly of gas and seemed to presage changes, travel and new adventures.