and
makes us sit through a play at the Moscow Drama Theatre."
"How on earth did you find this Vyshimirsky fellow?" I asked.
"Very simple-his son goes to our school," Korablev replied.
CHAPTER SIX
STILL MORE COMES TO LIGHT
I never understood anything about bills of exchange-the word itself had
gone out of use when I started going to school. What's an "acknowledgment of
loan"? What's an "endorsement"? What's a "policy"? Not in the political
sense-everyone knows that. What's a "discount"?
When these and other banking terms occurred in books that I read it
always reminded me of the "Chambers" at Ensk-the iron seats in the dimly-lit
high corridor, and the unseen official behind the barrier to whom Mother had
bowed so humbly. It was a reminder of the old, long-forgotten life, which
gradually emerged from the dim past as Vyshimirsky unfolded to me the story
of his misfortunes.
We were sitting in a small room with a basement window through which I
could see a broom and a pair of legs-evidently belonging to the yardman.
Everything in this room was old-the rickety chairs held together with
strings, the dining table on which I leaned my elbow only to remove it at
once because the panel bade fair to drop off. There was dirty upholstery
material everywhere-on the window in lieu of curtains, on the shabby
covering of the sofa, and even the clothes hanging on the wall were covered
with the same stuff. The only new things in the room were some slats, reels
and coils of wire with which Vyshimirsky's son was occupied over a table in
a corner of the room. The boy was about twelve, with a round, sunburnt face.
He, too, was quite new, and as far removed from the world which his father's
story conjured up to me as heaven is from earth.
It was a long, disjointed tale, interspersed with references to bills
of exchange and discounts, and full of digressions and a good deal of
nonsense. Absolutely everything the old man had ever done in his lifetime he
put down to his credit as a service rendered "to the people". He made much
of his work as secretary to the Metropolitan Isidore, declaring that he had
an intimate knowledge of the life of the clergy and had even made a special
study of it in the hope that this might be "of benefit to the people". He
was prepared to blow the lid off this Metropolitan at any moment.
Another job he laid to his credit was with some admiral by the name of
Heckert. This admiral had "an insane son" and Vyshimirsky took him around
restaurants so that nobody should guess that he was insane, a fact which
"they tried to conceal".
Then he started talking about Nikolai Antonich, and I pricked up my
ears. I had been convinced that Nikolai Antonich had always been a teacher.
He was a typical schoolmaster. Even at home he was always lecturing, citing
examples.
"Nothing of the sort," Vyshimirsky said with a vicious grimace. "He
took that up when he was at the end of his tether. He was in business. He
played the stock-market, he was a stock-jobber. A wealthy man who played the
market and engaged in business."
This was the first piece of news. It was followed by a second. I asked
what connection there was between Captain Tatarinov's expedition and
stock-jobbing. What had made Nikolai Antonich take a hand in it? Was it
because it was profitable?
"He would have taken a still more willing hand in it if the expedition
had been to the next world," said Vyshimirsky. "He counted on that, counted
very strongly." "I don't understand." "He was in love with the Captain's
wife. There was quite a lot of talk about that at the time. Quite a lot. But
the Captain did not suspect anything. He was a fine man, the Captain, but
simple-minded. A regular sea-dog!" '
I was dumbfounded.
"Nikolai Antonich in love with Maria Vasilievna? Even in those days?"
"Yes, yes," Vyshimirsky repeated impatiently. "There were personal
reasons. Get me-personal? Personal, person, personality. He would have given
his whole fortune to have that Captain packed off to the next world. And
pack him off he did."
But love or not love, business was business. Nikolai Antonich did not
give up his fortune, on the contrary he doubled it. He took delivery of
rotten clothing for the expedition and pocketed a bribe from the supplier.
He took delivery of spoilt chocolate that smelt of kerosene, also in return
for a bribe.
"Sabotage, deliberate sabotage," said Vyshimirsky. "It was planned as
such!"
Evidently Vyshimirsky had not always held this negative view of the
plan, considering his part in it and the fact that Nikolai Antonich had sent
him to Archangel to meet the expedition and complete its fitting out.
This was where the power of attorney which Nikolai Antonich had shown
to Korablev first comes into the picture. Together with this document
Vyshimirsky had received money in cash and bills of exchange.
Sniffing angrily, the old man fished several bills out of the chest of
drawers. A bill of exchange, broadly speaking, was a receipt for money
stipulating that it was to be paid back at a stated time. Only this receipt
was made out on thick state paper, which had watermarks and an expensive,
impressive look. Vyshimirsky explained to me that these bills circulated in
place of money. But they were not exactly money, because the "drawer" might
suddenly declare that he had no money to meet them.
This left openings for all kinds of sharp practices, and Vyshimirsky
accused Nikolai Antonich of one such swindle.
He accused him of having sent him, along with the power of attorney,
bills of exchange which were no good, because the drawers were insolvent and
unable to pay, and Nikolai Antonich had known this beforehand. Vyshimirsky
did not know this and took the bills for money, all the more as the drawers
were merchants and other people who were considered respectable in those
days. He did not know this until the schooner had set sail, leaving debts to
the amount of forty-eight thousand. Nobody, of course, would negotiate these
dead bills.
And so Vyshimirsky had had to pay these debts out of his own pocket.
Afterwards he had had to pay them over again, because Nikolai Antonich
brought an action against him and the court or- dered Vyshimirsky to repay
all the monies which had been remitted to him in Archangel.
Of course, I have given only the gist of this story. The old man spent
two hours telling it, and kept getting up and sitting down during its
narration.
"I fought the case all the way to the Senate," he wound up grimly. "But
I lost it."
That was the end of him, because his property came under the hammer.
His house-he had a house-was sold too, and he moved into smaller rooms. His
wife died of grief, leaving him with young children on his hands. Then, when
the Revolution came, he found himself in a single room, the one he was now
obliged to live in. Or course, this was "only temporary", because "the
government would soon appreciate his services to the people at their true
worth". Meanwhile, he was obliged to live there, and he had a grown-up
daughter who knew two languages and couldn't get married owing to the
cramped space they lived in-there was no room in it for the husband. But he
would move out as soon as he got his special pension.
"I'll move anywhere, to a Disabled Persons' Home if need be," he said
with a gesture of bitter resignation.
Obviously, this grown-up daughter of his was very keen of getting
married and wanted him to move out.
"Nikolai Ivanovich," I said to him, "may I ask you one question? You
say that he sent this power of attorney to you in Archangel. How did he get
it back again?"
Vyshimirsky stood up. His nostrils dilated and the tuft of grey hair on
his head quivered with anger.
"I threw the paper in his face," he said. "He ran out to get me some
water, but I didn't stay to drink it. I had a fainting fit in the street.
Oh, what's the use of talking!"
I heard him out with a painful feeling. There was something sordid
about this story, as sordid as everything else around me in that room, so
that all the time I felt like washing my hands. It had seemed to me that our
talk would yield further evidence proving me in the right, evidence as new
and surprising as the sudden appearance of this man himself had been. And so
it did. Nevertheless, it was annoying to think that this new evidence was
contaminated with dirt.
Then he started off again about his pension, saying that they were
bound to give him a special pension, seeing that he had an employment record
of over forty-five years. One young man had already called on him and
collected his papers. He, too, was interested in Nikolai Antonich, by the
way, but he did not call again.
"He promised to do something for me," said Vyshimirsky, "but he never
came again."
"Interested in Nikolai Antonich?"
"Yes. He was interested, to be sure he was."
"Who was it?"
Vyshimirsky spread his hands.
"He called several times," he said. "I have a grown-up daughter, you
know, and they sat together talking and drinking tea. Getting acquainted,
you know."
The shadow of a smile crossed his face-evidently this acquaintance had
raised certain hopes.
"Well, well," I said. "And he took some papers away, you say?"
"Yes. To help get my pension, a special pension."
"And he inquired about Nikolai Antonich?"
"Yes, he did. He even asked whether I knew anybody else. Whether
anybody else knew what this ugly customer had been up to. I put him on to
one man."
"That's interesting. Who is that young man?"
"A respectable-looking man, too," said Vyshimirsky. "He promised to do
something. He said he had to have all those papers to get me a pension. A
special pension."
I asked what his name was, but the old man could not remember.
"Something with a 'sha' in it," he said.
Then his grown-up daughter came in. I could see now why there was such
a hurry to get her married. It was going to be a problem, not because there
was "no room for a husband" but because to that lady's nose. It was a
terrific nose, and it kept sniffing and snuffling with an alarmingly
predatory air.
I greeted her politely, and she ran out, reappearing some minutes later
looking quite a different person. She was wearing a normal dress now in
place of that Arab burnous thing she had had on when she came in.
We fell into conversation, talking first about Korablev, who was the
only acquaintance we had in common, then about his pupil, who was still
fiddling about in his comer with his reels and coils and paying no attention
to us whatever.
"Anyuta, what was the name of that young man?" her father asked
timidly.
"What young man?"
"The one who promised to get me my pension."
Anyuta's nose twitched and her lips quivered, and a variety of
expressions crossed her face. The strongest was indignation.
"I don't remember-Romashov, I think," she answered carelessly.
CHAPTER SEVEN
"WE HAVE A VISITOR!"
Romashka! Romashka had been to see them! He had promised the old man
assistance in getting him a special pension, he had paid court to Anyuta
with the nose! In the end he had disappeared, taking some papers with him,
and the old man could not even remember what kind of papers they were. At
first I thought this was some other Romashov, some other man by the same
name. But no, it was the same one. I described him in detail, and Anyuta
said venomously:
"That's him!"
He had paid court to her, that was clear. Afterwards he had stopped
paying court, otherwise she would not be calling him the names she did. He
had got out of the old man everything he knew about Nikolai Antonich. He was
collecting information. What for? Why had he taken from Vyshimirsky those
papers, which only went to prove one thing-thai before the revolution
Nikolai Antonich had been no teacher, but just a mean stock-jobber?
I came away from Vyshimirsky with a reeling head. There could be only
two solutions here-either that his purpose was to destroy all traces of this
past, or to get some sort of hold over Nikolai Antonich.
A hold over him? But why? Wasn't he his pupil, his most devoted and
loyal pupil? He had always been that, even at school, when he eavesdropped
on the boys to hear what they were saying about Nikolai Antonich and then
reported it to him. No, he was acting on instructions! Nikolai Antonich had
asked him to find out what Vyshimirsky knew about him. It was a "plant". He
had sent Romashov to take away the papers which might prove damaging to him.
I went into a cafe and had some icecream. Then I had a drink of
something-some mineral water. I felt very hot and kept thinking and
thinking. After all, many years had passed since Romashka and I had parted
after finishing school. At that time he had been a nasty piece of work, a
mean, cold soul. But he was sincerely devoted to Nikolai Antonich-at least,
so we thought. Now I wasn't so sure. He may have changed. Perhaps, without
Nikolai Antonich knowing it, out of pure devotion to him, he had decided to
destroy papers which might cast a reflection on the good name of his
teacher, his friend?
No, he would never do anything merely out of devotion to that man.
There was some other motive behind this, I was sure. But I couldn't make out
what that motive was. I could only go by the old set of relations which had
existed between Nikolai Antonich and Romashka, as I knew very little about
their present relations.
It might have been some very simple motive, something to do with
promotion. Nikolai Antonich, it should be remembered, was a professor, and
Romashka was his assistant. It might even be money-even as a schoolboy his
ears used to burn at the mere mention of money. Something to do with his
salary perhaps.
I phoned Valya. I wanted to consult him, seeing that he had been
visiting the Tatarinovs in recent years, but he was not at home. He never
was when he was most needed!
"No, it's not salary or a career," I went on thinking. "He'd get these
by other, simpler means. You only have to look at him." It was time to go
home, but evening was only just drawing in, a lovely Moscow evening so
unlike my evenings at Zapolarie that I felt a desire to walk back to my
hotel, though it was a good distance away.
And so I sauntered off, first in the direction of Gorky Street, then
down Vorotnikovsky Street. Familiar places! I had passed my hotel and
continued down Vorotnikovsky, then turned off into Sadovo-Triumfalnaya, past
our school. And from there it was a stone's throw to 2nd Tverskaya-Yamskaya,
where a few minutes later found me standing in front of a familiar house. I
looked through the gate and saw a familiar tidy little courtyard and a
familiar brickbuilt woodshed where I used to chop wood for the old lady. And
there was the staircase down which I had tumbled head over heels, and there
the door with the brass nameplate on which was inscribed in fanciful
lettering: "N. A. Tatarinov".
"Katya, I've come to see you. You won't drive me away, will you?"
Afterwards Katya said that she realised at once the moment she saw me
that I was "quite different" from what I had been the other day outside the
Bolshoi Theatre. One thing she couldn't make out, though-why, coming to see
her so suddenly and looking "quite different", I never took my eyes off
Nikolai Antonich and Romashka the whole evening.
That was an exaggeration, of course, but I did glance at them now and
again. My brain that evening was working at full exam-time pressure and I
guessed and grasped things at a bare hint.
I forgot to mention that before leaving the cafe I had bought some
flowers. I had walked to the Tatarinovs' house carrying a bunch of flowers
and felt rather awkward. Ever since the days Pyotr and I had stolen
gillyflowers from the gardening beds at Ensk and sold them for five kopecks
a bunch to people coming out of the theatre, I had never walked through the
streets carrying flowers. Now that I had come, I should have given the
flowers to Katya. Instead, I put them down on the hall table beside my cap.
I just have shown some agitation, though, because when I spoke I
couldn't keep the ring out of my voice. Katya looked at me quickly straight
in the face.
We were about to go into her room, but at that moment Nina Kapitonovna
came out of the dining-room. I bowed. She looked at me blankly and nodded
stiffly.
"Grandma, this is Sanya. Don't you recognise him?"
"Sanya? Bless my heart! Is it really?"
She threw a startled look over the shoulder, and through the open door
of the dining-room I saw Nikolai Antonich sitting in an armchair with a
newspaper in his hands. He was at home!
"How do you do, Nina Kapitonovna!" I said warmly. "Do you still
remember me? I bet you have forgotten me."
"No I haven't. Forgotten! Nothing of the sort," the old lady answered.
We were still embracing when Nikolai Antonich appeared in the doorway.
It was a moment of renewed mutual appraisal. He could have ignored me,
as he had done at Korablev's anniversary party. He could have made it plain
that we were strangers. Finally, he could have shown me the door if he had
dared. But he did none of these things.
"Ah, our young eagle?" he said affably. "So you've come flying in at
last? And high time too."
And he held his hand out to me unhesitatingly.
"How do you do, Nikolai Antonich."
Katya looked at us in surprise, and the old lady blinked dazedly, but I
was tickled - I now felt up to any talk with Nikolai Antonich.
"Well,'well... That's fine," Nikolai Antonich said, regarding me
gravely. "It seems only yesterday that we had a boy, and now he's an Arctic
pilot, if you please. And what a profession to have chosen too! Good for
you!"
"Quite an ordinary profession, Nikolai Antonich," I said "Just like any
other."
"Any other? What about self-control? And courage in dangerous
situations? And discipline? Not only service discipline, but moral
discipline, too-self-discipline, so to speak."
It made me feel sick, as of old, to hear these bombastic, well-turned
phrases of his, but I listened to him with courteous attention. He looked
much older than he had at the anniversary party and his face was careworn.
As we passed into the dining-room he put an arm round Katya's shoulders, and
she drew away with a barely perceptible movement.
In the dining-room sat one of the Bubenchikov aunts, which one exactly
I couldn't make out. My last encounter with the two of them had been a
rather stormy one. Anyway, this aunt now greeted me quite nicely.
"Well, we're waiting," said Nikolai Antonich, when Nina Kapi-tonovna,
fussing timidly around me, had poured me out some tea and moved up to me
everything that lay on the table. "We're waiting to hear some tales of the
Arctic. Flying blind, permafrost, drifting , icefields, snowy wastes!"
. "Nothing to write home about, Nikolai Antonich," I answered
•[)] cheerily. "Just icefields as icefields go."
Nikolai Antonich laughed.
"I once met an old friend who is now working in our trade delegation in
Rome," he said. "I asked him: 'Well, what's Rome like?' And he answered:
'Nothing much. Just Rome.' "
His tone was condescending. Katya was listening to us with down--A cast
eyes. To keep the ball JroLlmg Istarted talking about the Nentsi, about the
Arctic scenery, and even my flight to Vanokan with the doctor. Nina
Kapitonovna wanted to know whether I flew very high, and this reminded me of
Aunt Dasha's letter which I had received when still at school at Balashov:
"Since it's not your lot to walk on the ground like other people, then I beg
you, Sanya dear, to fly low."
I told them how Misha Golomb had got hold of that letter and how, ever
since then, whenever I put on my flying-helmet, the boys at the airfield
used to shout from all sides: "Sanya, don't fly Ugh!"
Misha started a comic journal at the school entitled Fly Low. It ran a
special section called: "Flying Techniques in Pictures" with verses like
this:
It's good to glide when you get height,
Don't try daisy-clipping, though,
Don't risk your life on any flight,
Take Auntie's advice and fly low.
I must have made it a good story, because everyone laughed, loudest of
all Nikolai Antonich. He held his sides with laughter. His face turned pale
- it always did when he laughed.
Katya hardly sat at the table. She kept getting up and disappearing for
long periods in the kitchen, and I had an idea that she went out in order to
be alone and think things out. She had that sort of look when she came back
into the room. On one such occasion she went up to the sideboard with a
biscuit barrel and evidently forgot what she had gone there for. I looked
her straight in the eye and she answered with an anxious puzzled look.
Nikolai Antonich must have noticed our exchange of glances. His face
clouded and he began to speak still more slowly and smoothly.
Then Romashka arrived. Nina Kapitonovna answered the doorbell and I
heard her say to him in the hall in a tone of timid malice:
"We have a visitor!"
He lingered in the hall for quite a time, preening himself, no doubt.
When he came in he did not show the slightest surprise at seeing me.
"Ah, so that's who your visitor is," he said with a sour smile. "Very
glad. Very glad to see you, very glad." His face belied his words. If
anybody was glad it was me. From the moment he came in I watched his every
movement. I did not take my eyes off him. What kind of man was he? How had
he turned out? What was his attitude to Nikolai Antonich, to Katya? He went
up to her and started chatting, and every movement, every word of his was a
sort of riddle which I had to guess there and then, while my eyes kept
drilling his face and I kept thinking about him.
Now that I saw them together, him and Katya, I could have laughed-so
insignificant did he look beside her, so ugly and meanly. He sounded very
sure of himself when he talked to her, "too sure" I made a mental note. He
passed some humorous remark to Nina Kapitonovna, but nobody smiled. "Not
even Nikolai Antonich," I made another mental note.
The two started talking shop, something to do with a student's thesis,
which Nikolai Antonich considered poor, and Romashka considered good.
This was done, of course, to stress the fact that my presence meant
nothing to them. I preferred it that way, if anything, because I was now
able to sit and watch them, listening and thinking.
"No," I said to myself, "this is not the old Romashka, who was even
proud of being at the complete beck and call of Nikolai Antonich. He talks
to him in a slighting tone, almost offensive, and Nikolai Antonich answers
wearily, wincing. Theirs is a difficult relationship, and Nikolai Antonich
finds it irksome. I was right. Romashka had not been acting on his behalf.
He had not taken those papers from Vyshimirsky in order to destroy them. He
had done it so that he could sell them to Nikolai Antonich-that was more
like him. And must have demanded a pretty stiff price too. That is, if he
had sold them and was not still haggling."
Katya asked me something and I answered her. Romashka, who was
listening to Nikolai Antonich, glanced at us uneasily, and suddenly an idea
passed slowly through my mind and seemed to step a little to one side of the
others as if waiting for me to come up closer. It was a very weird idea, but
quite a valid one for anybody who had known Romashov since childhood. At the
moment, however, I could not dwell on it because the thought was chilling
and would not bear thinking of. I merely glanced at it, as it were, from the
side.
Then Nikolai Antonich went into his study with Romashka and we were
left with the old ladies, one of whom was deaf while the other pretended to
be deaf.
"Katya," I said quietly, "Korablev asked you to call on him tomorrow at
seven. Will you come?"
She nodded.
"Was it all right, my coming here? I wanted to see you ever so badly."
She nodded again.
"And please forget that evening when we last met. It was all wrong.
Consider that we haven't met yet."
She looked at me in silence with a puzzled expression.
CHAPTER EIGHT
TRUE TO A MEMORY
What was that idea? I thought about it the whole evening until I fell
asleep. The next morning I awoke with a feeling that I had not slept at all
for thinking.
The whole day was like that. With this thought in my mind I went to the
Northern Sea Route Administration, to the Geographica Society and to the
office of a journal devoted to Arctic affairs. At times I forgot about it,
but only as though I had simply left it outside the door and then come out
and run into it again like an old acquaintance.
Towards the evening, tired and irritable, I arrived at Korablev's. He
was working when I came, marking exercise books. Two high stacks of them lay
on the table and he sat there in his spectacles reading them, his poised pen
coming down from time to time to pitilessly underline mistakes. I couldn't
imagine where this work had sprung from, this being holiday-time and the
school closed. But even at holiday-time he found something to do.
"You go on with your work, Ivan Pavlovich, and I'll sit here a bit. You
don't mind? I'm tired."
For a while we sat in complete silence, broken only by the scratching
of Korablev's pen and his angry growls. I had never noticed him growling so
angrily while he worked.
"Well, Sanya, how goes it?"
"I'd like to ask you one question, Ivan Pavlovich."
"Go ahead."
"Do you know that Romashov has been visiting Vyshimirsky?"
"I do."
"And do you know what he went there for?"
"I do."
"Ivan Pavlovich," I said reproachfully. "I can't make you out,
honestly, I can't! Knowing such a thing and never telling me a word!"
Korablev regarded me gravely. He was very serious that evening-
probably a bit nervous, waiting for Katya, and not wanting me to see that he
was.
"There are many things I haven't told you, Sanya," he retorted.
"Because although you're a pilot now you're still capable of kicking
somebody in the face."
"That was ages ago! An idea has come to me, Ivan Pavlovich. Of course,
I may be wrong. So much the better."
"There you are, getting excited again," said Korablev.
"No I'm not. Don't you think that Romaska might have demanded of him
... might have said he would keep his mouth shut if Nikolai Antonich helped
him to marry Katya?"
Korablev did not answer.
"Ivan Pavlovich!" I yelled.
"Getting excited?"
"I'm not. What I can't understand is how Katya could let him even
entertain such an idea. Katya of all people!"
Korablev took a turn about the room with a thoughtful air. He removed
his spectacles and his face looked sad. I caught him glancing several times
at Maria Vasilievna's portrait, the one in which she was wearing the coral
necklace. It stood in its old place on the desk.
"Yes, Katya," he said slowly. "Katya, whom you do not know at all."
That was something new. I did not know Katya?
"You don't know how she has been living all these years. But I do,
because I've ... because I've taken an interest in her," Korablev said
quickly. "All the more because nobody else seemed to have been taking much
interest in her."
That was a dig at me.
"She was very miserable after her mother died," he went on. "And there
was another person at her side who was just as miserable, if not more so.
You know whom I mean."
He meant Nikolai Antonich.
"A very experienced and complex person," he continued. "A terrible man.
But he did really love her mother all his life. And that's saying a lot. Her
death brought the two closer together. That's a fact."
He lit a cigarette and his fingers shook slightly as he struck a match
and then gently laid it in the ashtray.
"Then Romashov came on the scene," he went on. "Let me tell you that
you don't know him either. He's another Nikolai Antonich, but cast in a
different mould. For one thing, he's energetic. Secondly, he's entirely
without morals, good or bad. Thirdly, he's capable of taking a decisive
step, that's to say he's a man of action. And this man of action, who knows
what he's after, comes one fine day to his teacher and friend and says to
him: 'Nikolai Antonich, would you believe it-that Grigoriev fellow turned
out to be quite right. You did swindle Captain Tatarinov's expedition.
What's more, there are quite a number of shady things you're reticent about
when answering personnel questionnaires...' Nina Kapitonovna overheard this
conversation. She did not know what to make of it, so she came running to
me. I got it right, though."
"That's interesting," I said.
There was a pause.
"As to what happened next," Korablev continued, "you can judge by
results. You know Nikolai Antonich-he doesn't do things in a huny. Probably
this was first put to him half in a joke, casually. Then more and more
seriously and repeatedly."
"But, Ivan Pavlovich, he cannot have persuaded her, can he?"
"Sanya, Sanya, what a funny chap you are! Would I be telling you all
this if he had? But who knows? He would have got his way in the end,
perhaps, the way he got-"
I understood what he was going to say: "The way he got Maria Vasilievna
to marry him."
I did not know whether to stay or leave-it was already seven o'clock
and Katya might ring the bell at any moment. I found it physically hard to
tear myself away from him. I watched him sitting there smoking, his grey
head bowed and his long legs stretched out, and thought how deeply he had
loved Maria Vasilievna and how unlucky he had been and yet how true to her
memory he had remained-for that was why he had watched over Katya so
carefully all those years.
Then he suddenly said that I had better go.
"It will be easier for me to talk to her."
He saw me to the door and we took leave of each other till the
following day.
It was still quite light when I went out into the street. The sun was
setting and its rays were reflected in the windows on the opposite side of
Sadovaya.
I stood at the entrance looking down the street in the direction from
which Katya should be coming. I must have been waiting a long time, for the
windows darkened one after another from left to right. Then I saw her, but
not where I had been looking. She had come out of a side street and was
standing on the pavement, waiting for the cars to pass. A sudden fear
assailed me as I watched her crossing the road, wearing the same dress she
had worn when we met outside the Bolshoi Theatre and looking very sad. She
was quite near me now, but she walked with her head down and did not see me.
As a matter of fact I did not want her to see me. I wished her mentally good
cheer and all the best I could wish her at that moment, and I followed her
with my eyes all the way to the door. She disappeared inside, but mentally I
followed her. I could see Korablev coming forward to meet her, trying hard
to appear calm, and taking a long time fitting a cigarette into his long
holder before starting to talk.
Now the windows were darkening quickly and the glow of sunset lingered
only in the two end windows of the block facing me.
It was only eight o'clock and I did not feel like going back to my
hotel yet. For a long time I sat in a little public garden facing the
entrance to our school. I went into the courtyard several times to see
whether the light had gone on in Korablev's flat. But they were talking in
the twilight, Korablev speaking while Katya listened in silence.
The sight of those dark windows brought back to me another
conversation, when Korablev, suddenly jumping up, had paced the room
restlessly with hands clasped on his chest. And Maria Vasilievna had sat
there, erect, her face immobile, patting her hair from time to time with a
slim hand. "Montigomo Hawk's Claw, I once used to call him." Now white
rather than pale, she sat in front of us, smoking incessantly, the ash
everywhere-even on her knees. She was calm and motionless, only now and
again gently tugging at the string of coral beads round her neck as if it
were choking her. She feared the truth, because she did not have the
strength to stand up to it. But Katya was not afraid to face the truth, and
all would be well when she learnt it.
The light had been on now for quite a time, and I saw Korablev's long
black silhouette on the blind. Then Katya's appeared alongside, but soon
moved away, as though she had uttered a single long sentence.
It was now quite dark outside, and that was good, because it was
becoming awkward, my sitting so long in that garden and getting up from time
to time to look at the windows.
Then all of a sudden Katya came out of the house alone and walked
slowly down Sadovaya.
She was going home, no doubt. But she did not seem to be in any great
hurry. She had something to think about before returning home. She walked
along, thinking, and I followed her, and it was as if we were alone, all
alone, in the vast city-Katya walking along and I following without her
seeing me. The trams clanged as they dashed out into the square, and cars
throbbed as they waited for the red traffic light to change, and I was
thinking how hard it must be to keep your mind on anything amid that hideous
noise-it was more likely to put you on the wrong track, make you think the
wrong things. Not the things we all needed-I, and she, and the Captain, had
he been alive, and Maria Vasilievna, had she been alive-all the living and
the dead.
CHAPTER NINE
IT IS DECIDED - SHE GOES AWAY
It was already quite light in the hotel room. I had left the light
burning, and I suppose that was why I looked rather pale in the mirror. I
felt chilly and little shivers ran up my spine. I lifted the receiver and
dialled a number. For a long time there was no answer, then at last I heard
Katya's voice.
"Katya, it's me. You don't mind my ringing you so early?"
She said she didn't mind, though it had only just gone eight.
"Did I wake you up?"
"No."
I hadn't slept that night and was sure that she had not slept a wink
either.
"May I come and see you, Katya?"
After a pause she said: "Yes."
A plumpish girl with fair hair coiled round her head opened the door to
me. She was a complete stranger to me, and when I asked her, "Is Katya at
home?", she blushed and answered, "Yes."
I took a quick step forward, not knowing where I was going, only
knowing that it was to see Katya, but the girl checked me with a mocking.
"Not so fast, Commander, not so fast!"
Then she started to laugh, so uproariously and explosively, that I
could not but recognise her at once.
"Kiren!"
Katya came out of the dining-room just as Kiren and I stepped towards
each other over some suitcases in the hall and all but fell into each
other's arms, had not Kiren shyly backed away, so that I merely shook her
hand.
"Kiren, is it really you? What are you doing here?"
"It's me all right," Kiren said, laughing. "But please don't call me
Kiren. I'm not such a ninny now."
We began pumping each other's hand again vigorously. She must have
spent the night with Katya, because she was wearing a dressing gown of hers,
from which the buttons kept flying off while we did the packing. Two open
suitcases stood in the hall and we packed away in them linen, books, various
instruments-everything, in short, that was Katya's in that house. She was
going away. I did not ask where. She was going away. It was all decided.
I did not ask because I knew every word that had passed between her and
Korablev, every word she had spoken to Nikolai Antonich on her return.
Nikolai Antonich was out of town, somewhere at Volokolamsk, but all the same
I knew every word she would have said to him had she found him at home on
her return from Korablev's.
She walked about determined and pale, talking in a loud voice, giving
orders. But hers was the calm of a person with a bruised mind, and I sensed
that it was best not to say anything. I just squeezed her hands hard and
kissed them, and she responded with a gentle pressure of her fingers.
If anybody was flustered, it was the old lady. She greeted me coldly
with a mere nod and swept past me haughtily. Then she suddenly came back and
with a vindictive air thrust a blouse into the suitcase.
"Ah, well. It's all for the best."
She sat in the dining-room for quite a time, doing nothing but
criticising the way we packed, then suddenly ran out into the kitchen to
tell the maid off for not having bought enough of something or other.
It did not take us long to pack Katya's things. She had few belongings,
though she was leaving a house in which she had spent most of her life.
Everything there belonged to Nikolai Antonich. She did not leave a thing of
hers behind, though. She did not want any overlooked trifle to remind her
that she had once lived in that house.
She was taking the whole of herself away-her youth, her letters, her
first drawings, which Maria Vasilievna had kept, her Helen Robinson and The
Century of Discovery, which I had borrowed from her in my third form.
In my ninth form I had borrowed other books from her, and when their
turn came she called me into her room and shut the door.
"Sanya, I want you to have these books," she said with a break in her
voice. "They're Daddy's, and I've always cherished them. But now I want to
give them to you. Here's Nansen, and various sailing directions and his own
book."
Then she led me into Nikolai Antonich's room and took the portrait of
the Captain down from the wall-that fine portrait of the naval officer with
the broad forehead, square jaw and light, dancing eyes.
"I don't want to leave him this," she said firmly, and I carried the
portrait into the dining-room and carefully packed it away in a bag
containing pillows and a blanket.
It was the only thing belonging to Nikolai Antonich which Katya was
taking away with her. If she could she would have carried away with her from
this accursed house the very memory of the Captain.
I don't know whom the little ship's compass-the one that had once
caught my eye-belonged to, but I slipped it into one of the suitcases when
Katya was not looking. It had belonged to the Captain in any case.
That was all. It must have been the most deserted place in the world
when, the packing done with and coats over our arms, we took leave of Nina
Kapitonovna in the hall. She was staying behind, but not for long-only until
Katya had moved into the room which her institute was giving her.
"It's not for long," the old lady said, then she broke down and kissed
Katya.
Kiren stumbled on the stairs, sat down abruptly on the suitcase to
prevent herself from tumbling down, and burst out laughing. "You ninny!"
Katya said crossly. I followed them down and pictured to myself Nikolai
Antonich coming up the stairs, ringing the door bell and listening to what
the old lady had to tell him. I saw him pass a trembling hand over his bald
head and cross into his study with dragging footsteps. Alone in an empty
house.
And he will realise that Katya would never come back.
CHAPTER TEN SIVTSEV