The Town By The Sea

IN KHARKOV

The line was snowed up in places and our train did not reach Kharkov until evening, ten hours late. Crossing the street with some care, H walked down Yekaterinoslav Street towards the centre of the

city.

Lighted trams rolled past, scattering greenish sparks from their collector-arms.

"Evening Radio! Evening Radio! Latest report - from Rome! Mussolini still alive!" a little news-boy was shouting at the top of his voice.

The shop signs dazzled me. The windows were heaped with nuts, ginger, heaps of pastila, baskets of Caucasian salad, sultanas, dates, Antonovka apples, oranges and lemons wrapped in tissue-paper. On the door of a shabby two-storey house I noticed a wooden placard: Eva Kapulskaya's Delicious Dinners Home-Cooked in Pure Butter. Tasty. Simple. Cheap!!!

Delicious odours of roast lamb and garlic steamed through the open window of the cook-shop.

"O for some dinner!" I thought, and licked my lips. It was two days since I had eaten a hot meal. All the journey ;I had fed on sausage and cold milk—except for my little treat at Zhmerinka, of course.

Today I had hardly had anything to eat since morning... But on the very threshold of Eva Kapulskaya's fairyland I changed my mind. I didn't know yet what "cheap" meant. What was cheap for her, a private restaurant-keeper, might not be at all cheap for me. I must not waste public money. Who could tell how many days I might have to stay here!

Perhaps from hunger, my legs felt light as air and my head swam as if I had just come out of hospital.

I strode on, not knowing the way, but guessing that Yekaterinoslav Street would bring me to the centre. Splashes flew from under my feet—the pavement was covered with melting slush. What a good job I had borrowed Sasha's new galoshes for the journey!

The narrow side-street brought me out on to a broad square and before me I saw the yellow columned building of the All-Ukrainian Central Executive Committee. It was surrounded by little snow-sprinkled fir-trees that seemed to guard it. Now and then a hooting omnibus drove past; sledges with bear-skins thrown over the seats trotted by, their bells jingling. In the distance I could read sparkling letters in the sky—VISTI—the biggest government paper in the Ukraine in those days.

At that moment I remembered our little far-off border town and the school hostel on its quiet outskirts. Perhaps right now the chaps were talking about me, hoping that I would bring them good news. Perhaps they were still sitting on the long benches in the Komsomol club in Kishinev Street. Of course, they would be there now! Tonight they were holding a show. They had been rehearsing it a long time.

And what was more, there was going to be a musical scene called "Troika" with my friends in it—Galya Kushnir, Monka Guzarchik, Furman the "philosopher," and even Sasha Bobir.

I felt sad at the thought of not seeing the performance of our dramatics circle, and missing a chance of laughing with the other chaps at Sasha's acting. But as I stood there, on the square of this strange city, I knew that even though they were having a good time, my friends would be sure to remember me.

Peeping at the lighted windows, I wandered on to the next square—Rosa Luxemburg Square, it was called.

The latest edition of a Kharkov newspaper was pasted on a board near the House of Ukrainian Trade Unions.

A small head-line caught my eye:

MUSSOLINI ATTACKED

At 11 a.m. today an unknown elderly woman fired a revolver almost point-blank at Mussolini. He was coming out on to the ; Capitol Square from the building where the 5 International Congress of Surgeons is being held. The bullet grazed Mussolini's nostril.

The woman who fired the shot has been arrested.

"What a shot!" I thought. "No better than Sasha! Fancy getting that close to a dirty fascist like Mussolini and not finishing him off! She shouldn't have taken the job on, if she couldn't shoot. Grazed his nostril! ... So that's why the kid was shouting 'Latest report from Rome!' I wonder if there's anything more about it."

Next to the report from Rome there was a column about the outrages committed by the Bulgarian fascists on the Communist Kabakchiev. Below it I read that the airship Norway would soon be flying from Italy to Leningrad. In the centre of the next page, I saw a picture of a man with a beard. Above the picture was a head-line:

CURRENT TASKS OF THE PARTY

From the Concluding Speech of the General Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Ukraine at the Plenary Meeting.

I scanned the portrait of the General Secretary and noticed his kind, smiling eyes. Hadn't I seen him somewhere before? But of course—on the cover of the magazine Vsesvit in our hostel.

I strolled along the pavement, swinging my brief case. "I'm in Kharkov! I'm in Kharkov!" the thought drummed in my temples. People hurried past me and I tried to be like them in every way. I marched on confidently, showing no surprise at anything, and little by little I began to feel I was an old inhabitant of this large, capital city...

Ever since I had left the train, I had been pursued by the thought that Pecheritsa would suddenly pop up in front of me just as unexpectedly as he had appeared in my compartment.

A street sign was flashing on a building ahead of me:

New American Thriller!

SHARKS OF NEW YORK

Both parts in one programme

Nervous people and children not admitted

At the sight of this enticing notice I lost my head for the second time since I started on my journey. Forgetting all about my hunger, I made a bee-line for the cinema. When should I get a chance of seeing such an interesting film in our little town!

The box-office was in a dark, damp-smelling archway. From the commotion that about half a dozen lads were making round the box-office I realized that there were very few tickets left. A bit of shoving and pushing got me a place in the queue.

Clutching my brief case under my arm, I unfastened the safety-pins with trembling fingers. It would be my turn soon.

"Next! What row?" the ticket-seller snapped at me from her box.

At last I got the second pin undone. Glancing over my shoulder all the time, I pulled the wad of money out of my pocket. As I took two ruble notes out of the wad, I felt someone was watching me.

Two suspicious-looking fellows in check caps pulled low over their eyes were lounging near the box-office.

"Pickpockets!" I thought and pushed the wad of notes deeper into my jacket pocket. Thrusting the change into the pocket of my chumarka and grabbing the little blue ticket, I charged after the lad who had been in front of me in the ticket queue.

"Hurry up, dearie—it's just starting!" said the ticket-woman, tearing my ticket with one hand and releasing the wooden turnstile with the other.

As soon as I got into the buzzing hall, the lights went out and a bluish beam from the projector pierced the darkness. I trod on someone's foot. "Good-heavens, what a bear!" A voice hissed irritably. Trying not to look at the owner of the voice, I plumped down in the first vacant seat. . . Ten minutes passed... I forgot I was in Kharkov, I even forgot it was dark outside and I had nowhere to spend the night.

... The New York gangsters—terrible hairy fellows, with brutal faces, broken noses and square jutting chins, roamed about the screen with huge Colts and Brownings. They filed through steel bars, cracked open fire-proof safes, chased each other on express trains, aeroplanes, speed-boats and cars, shooting down their rivals point-blank in a practised way that made you think they even enjoyed doing it.

I felt as if I had been shot through in ten places, and by the time the terrible spectacle was over I could scarcely understand why I was not dead. Only when I got outside, hot and excited and glad to be still alive, did I remember that I had nowhere to stay the night.

It was all because of that train getting into 'Kharkov so late! If it had arrived earlier, when it was still daylight, I could have gone to the Komsomol club and they would have found me a bed in a hostel. But now where could I go?

The light under the archway had already been extinguished and the people were feeling their way out in darkness, treading on one another's heels.

"Stop pushing for God's sake!" said a voice behind me and at that moment someone gave me a tremendous shove in the back.

"What are you pushing for?" I said, turning to a lanky fellow in a cap pulled down over his eyes.

"Beg your pardon, it wasn't me, it was him," and the lout, grinning impudently, nodded to his neighbour.

Then someone shoved me again. And what a shove! I nearly dropped my brief case. And suddenly someone crushed my foot with his heel. I jumped with pain.

But deciding that I had better not make trouble, I gripped my brief case firmly and struggled out of the dark archway into the- lighted street.

What a bunch of louts! Must have learnt their tricks from those American gangsters! That's what they came to the film for. . . Spoiling other people's galoshes!

The station buffet was still open and I decided to have a snack and then doze on a bench until dawn.

The air of Kharkov had made me ravenous, and as I went up to the glass counter I was already groping in my jacket pocket. Suddenly I remembered that after buying my cinema ticket I had not pinned my pocket up again.

Oh! I felt my legs sag under me. The glass chandelier hanging from the stuccoed ceiling swam before my eyes. . .

My pocket was empty!

"Steady," I told myself. "The main thing is not to panic. Pull yourself together!"

With sad, hungry eyes :I gazed at the grinning mouth of a pike on a salad dish, then crept miserably away from the counter.

"Steady on, don't get excited!" I tried to reassure myself. "You've just got your pockets mixed."

Going over to the window-sill, I tossed my brief case on to it and rummaged through my pockets with trembling fingers. But all in vain—the money had gone, gone with the Sharks of New York.

In the pocket of my chumarka I found the crumpled ruble and coins that the ticket-seller had given me for change. But what were these in comparison with the wealth that had been stolen from me! It must have been those scoundrels in the check caps who had taken it!

But how should I get home?

"Keep it up along the sleepers!" I remembered the words of a long-forgotten song.

Yes, along the sleepers. . . There was nothing for it. I would do a day's work here and there for the kulaks on the road. I would work as a farm-labourer and get back!

Perhaps I could sell my chumarka?. . . But who would buy a ragged old thing like that?

When we were in a tough spot Nikita had advised us to remember the old sea saying: "Rub your nose and you'll get over it." I scratched my nose so hard that I nearly took the skin off. But it didn't help a bit!...

Should I send Nikita a telegram asking for help? Just one word—"robbed!" and the address—"Kharkov Station —To be called for"?... But what a row it would cause at school! "Look at that!" they would say. "We've sent a fool! Instead of sticking up for us, he's been wasting our money!

Just a wool-gatherer!" And wouldn't Tiktor gloat!

No, I mustn't send a telegram.

I must find my own way out of the mess. It had been my fault and I must take what was coming to me! Now I realized the truth of Nikita's advice, when he used to tell us: "Mind you never have anything to do with those Harry Peels and Rudolph Valentinoes. They're poison. Those films are a school for bandits. They can't lead a man to any good!"

How right he had been! What on earth had made me go and see those "Sharks"!. . . It wouldn't have mattered if I had never even heard of them!... What could I do? How could I get out of this mess? And the money they had stolen! A small fortune!

I started to count the change that the thieves had left me. A ruble forty kopeks. Not very rich! But it was enough for bread and soda water. I would stick it out for a couple of days somehow, get everything done, then bilk my way home. I would creep under the carriage seat and lie there quietly so that the conductor wouldn't notice me. Or perhaps I could jump a goods train.