silent for a while. Then the girl
said, "What grade are you in?"
"The first."
"So am I." She beamed.
We were silent again.
"One of the girls in my class can wiggle her ears. We all envy her,"
she said.
"That's nothing! There's a fellow in my class who can spit and hit the
ceiling. He's this big! He can lay you flat with his right hand tied behind
his back. And if he hits a desk top with his fist he can crack it. Only they
won't let him do it. Otherwise, he sure as anything would."
We were silent again. An organ-grinder began playing a mournful song. I
looked around the yard in search of a topic for conversation. The house was
sailing through the sky. A large kite with a rag tail shot over the roof,
dipped, straightened and tugged away as it soared higher still.
"My buckle will never get yellow," I said to my own surprise, "because
it's nickel-plated. If you want to, you can touch it." I unbuckled my belt
and held it out to her. The girl touched the buckle politely. I became
bolder, took off my school cap and showed her where my first and last names
had been written in indelible ink inside the hatband to make sure it would
not get lost. The girl read my name.
"My name's Taya. My full name is Taisia Opilova. What do they call you
short? Lenny?"
"No, Lelya. Glad to know you."
"Lelya? That's a girl's name!"
"It is not. Lola is."
We thus became acquainted.
THE FIRST SCHWAMBRANIAN GIRL
From then on T, a free son of Schwambrania, climbed down the roof into
lilac valley each day. Taya Opilova was" fated to become the Eve of
Schwabrania. Oska was dead set against it. He said he wouldn't take a girl
into the game for all the pastries in the world. True enough, there had not
been a single girl Schwambrania until then. I tried to make him understand
that in any s respecting book fair maidens were always kidnapped and
rescued, and that r they could be kidnapped and rescued in Schwambrania,
too. Besides, I ha wonderful name for the first Schwambranian girl: Countess
Cascara Sagrada, daughter of Count Cascara Barbe. I had borrowed the name
from a back cove Niva and recalled that it had been described as "mild and
gentle". Oska fin had to agree, and so, little by little, I began
introducing Cascara, meaning Taya the customs and ways of Schwambrania. At
first she couldn't understand what was all about, but then gradually came to
know the history and geography of Big Tooth Continent. She was sworn to
secrecy.
I finally conquered her heart when I put on my cardboard epaulettes and
said I was going off to war with Piliguinia and would bring her back a
trophy.
I returned from my Piliguinian campaign the following day and galloped
along the roof, carrying my trophies: two cream-filled pastries. One for her
and one me. Oska had had a bite of mine.
I jumped off the wall and froze in my tracks. A strange boy dressed in
uniform of the Cadet School was walking up and down in the garden with Taya.
He was much older and taller than I. He had real shoulder straps, a real
bayonet in a holster, and was terribly stuck-up.
"Ah!" he said at the sight of me. "Is this your Schwambroman?"
Taya had told him all about it.
"Look here, you civilian boy," the cadet said in a very superior tone
of voice.
"How could you have given a young lady such a disgusting name? You know
what Cascara Sagrada is? It's, pardon the expression, constipation pills.
You filthy civvy! Anybody can tell you're a doctor's sonny-boy."
This was the last straw.
"Once a cadet always a cad!" I shouted and scrambled up the roof. I
threw half of the pastry at the cadet and then ate the other pastry and a
half.
I stretched out on the roof. I was very upset by what had happened. The
starling on duty was whistling overhead. I sailed away to Schwambrania,
proud and lonely, and the day, like a great ship, sailed into evening. The
sunset raised its red oars, and shadows as pointed as the tips of an anchor
fell upon the yard.
"To hell with everything!" I said.
But this did not apply to Schwambrania.
THE SPIRIT OF THE TIMES
THE THEATRE OF MILITARY OPERATIONS
A battle was raging in the house. Brother was set against brother. The
disposition of warring forces was as follows: Schwambrania was in Papa's
consulting office and Piliguinia was in the dining-room. The parlour was the
battle-field. The stockade for prisoners of war was in the dark foyer.
Naturally, as the elder brother, I was a Schwambranian. I was
advancing, protected by the armchair and a clump of potted rubber plants and
rhododendrons. My brother Oska had dug in behind the Piliguinian threshold
of the dining-room. He was shouting:
"Bang! Zing! Zing! I shot you dead twice, but you keep on crawling. I
say fins!"
"No, not fins! It's called a truce! And anyway, you didn't shoot me
dead, you just grazed me through."
Klavdia, a girl from next door, was pining away in the foyer, that is
the stockade. She had been invited over especially to be a prisoner-of-war
and was, in turn, a Schwambranian or a Piliguinian Army nurse.
"Will you let me out of prisoner-of-war soon?" she said timidly, for
she had become very bored sitting around in the dark doing nothing.
"Not yet!" I shouted. "Our glorious forces have completed an orderly
retreat to pre-established positions under the overwhelming pressure of
enemy forces." I had borrowed the sentence from the newspapers. The daily
frontline dispatches were full of fine-sounding, vague expressions which
were used to conceal various military setbacks, losses, defeats and routs,
and all together they went under the grand heading of news from the "theatre
of military operations".
The glossy pictures in Niva portrayed fine, well groomed troops
ceremoniously carrying on a picturesque war. The generals' impressive
shoulders bore gilded clusters of epaulettes. Their tunics heaved with
galaxies of glittering medals. The brave Cossack hero Kuzma Kriuchkov was
shown accomplishing his great feat over and over again on pictures in
calendars, on cigarette boxes, post cards and candy boxes. He was shown
defeating a troop, a squadron, a whole regiment of Germans, and always with
a lock of hair curling out from under his rakishly tilted cap. Each school
service ended with a special prayer for the truly Christian troops. We
schoolboys wore patriotic tricoloured scarfs as we sold little Allied flags
in the streets, putting the coppers in collection boxes and proudly saluting
the trim officers.
The war eclipsed everything. "Louder the victory march! We are
victorious, and the enemy is on the run!" There were notices and manifestoes
everywhere. "The original has been signed by His Imperial Majesty." The war,
that great, beautiful, magnificent war, had captured our minds, our
conversation, our dreams, our games.
The only game we played was war.
The truce had ended. My troops were battling at the approaches to the
foyer. Annushka, who was a neutral, suddenly appeared on the battle-field,
demanding that Klavdia be released immediately, because her mother was
waiting for her in the kitchen.
We all said "fins", which meant a truce, and ran to the kitchen.
Klavdia mother, who was our neighbour's cook, always had a puffy, swollen
face. She was seated at the kitchen table. A grey envelope was lying in
front of her. She greeted us and picked it up gingerly, saying, "It's a
letter from your brother, Klavdia." He voice sounded strangely anxious. "Ask
the young man to read it to us. Dear Lon I hope he's all right."
I saw the sacred postmark: "From the Army in the Field". I accepted the
envelope solemnly. My fingertips filled with awe and excitement. It was a
letter from over there! A letter from the front lines! "March along, my
friends, to war, hussar bold and daring!"
I began reading in a bright, excited voice: "Dear Mother, I'm not going
to send this letter myself, because I was badly wounded, and my right arm
was amputate above the elbow...."
I was thunderstruck, I could not continue. Klavdia's mother screamed. H
dishevelled head fell upon the table top and she sobbed loudly. I wanted
very much to console her somehow, and myself, too, for I felt that the
reputation of t war had been badly damaged by this close scrape with gore,
and so I said hesitantly:
"He'll probably be decorated for this. Maybe he'll get a silver medal.
May he'll even get a St. George Cross."
Somehow, I felt I had not said the right thing.
A VIEW OF THE WAR FROM THE WINDOW
A dull algebra lesson was in progress. Our math teacher was sick, and
his classes had been taken over temporarily by the dullest of all possible
excise tax clerks w was dodging the draft. His name was Gennady Alexeyevich
Samlykov, and soon nicknamed him Old Nag.
Soldiers of the 214th Regiment were drilling on the square outside the
school. Their marching songs and the shouted commands of their officers
drifted through the open windows, confusing the algebraic formulas. "Hey,
Kitty, Kitty, Kitty, Madrid and Oporto!" they sang. "Line up! Count off!"
"Curly, curly, curly ringlets, little Curlylocks, you're mine!"
"Hup-two-three-four! Left! Keep your line straight!" "Come when the bugle
calls, brave men to battle!" "Watch your feet! Where the hell d'you think
you are? Stand up straight!"
"Yes, Sir!"
"Charge!"
"Ra-aa-aaay!"
This loud, rending "hooray" burst forth from their gaping mouths and
straining throats in a hoarse, salivery roar. Their bayonets sunk into the
dummy. Twisted strands of straw burst from the torn sack of a belly.
"Who's that looking out the window? Repeat what I just said,
Martynenko."
Huge Martynenko, alias Hefty, tore his eyes from the window and
lumbered to his feet.
"Well, what did I just say?" Old Nag persisted. "So you don't know?
Well, what is the squared sum of two cathetuses?"
"It's ... uh...." Hefty mumbled and suddenly winked at us and said:
"It's right face ... count off ... plus doubled ranks."
We all burst out laughing.
"You get an T for that! Go stand by the wall!"
"Yes, Sir!" Hefty snapped and did a military turn at the wall. We all
grinned. Our penpoints screeched.
"Leave the room immediately, Martynenko!"
"Parade step ... eyes on the lectern ... down the hall... march!" Hefty
rasped.
"This is abominable!" Old Nag shouted as he jumped to his feet. "I'll
put your name down in the Ledger! You'll be left after school!"
"Curly locks, curly locks...." a snatch of song drifted in through the
window. "What the hell do you think you're doing? You're to stand at
attention with a full pack for three hours.... Curly locks, curly locks...."
FIRST GUN, ACHOO!
Cr-rack! went something inside the wood-burning stove behind the
blackboard. Cr-rack! Bang-bang! One of the boys, knowing Old Nag's fear of
guns and shooting, had put some cartridges inside the tiled stove. The
teacher blanched as acrid fumes seeped into the room. He ran behind the
blackboard, stepping on what seemed to be a crumpled piece of paper. The
boys held their breath. Bang! The paper exploded, making Old Nag jump a yard
off the floor. No sooner had the sole of his other shoe come down again than
it caused another explosion. The boys, convulsed with silent laughter, began
sliding off their seats to disappear under their desks. The enraged teacher
turned to face the class and saw no one. Not a soul. We shook from the
laughter under our desks.
"Scoundrels!" Old Nag screamed. "I'll put you all down!" He tiptoed
cautiously towards the lectern. The soles of his shoes were smoking. He
picked up his snuff box, a true friend in hard times, but since he had
unwisely left it on the windowsill in the corridor for a moment before the
lesson had begun, we had long since added a pinch of gun-powder and pepper
to it.
Old Nag's quivering nostrils drew in the fiendish mixture. For a moment
he just stood there. His mouth was wide open and his eyes seemed to be
popping out of his head. Then a terrible, earth-shattering sneeze shook his
body.
Once again the classroom became inhabited. Our laughter made our desks
shake. Then Hefty raised his hand and said, "Second gun! Fire!"
"Ah-ah-choo!" the unfortunate Old Nag compiled.
"Third gun...."
"Pshoo! Ah!"
The door opened unexpectedly. We rose, as the principal entered. He had
been attracted by the sound of the shooting, our ribald laughter and the
teacher's hysterical sneezing.
"What's going on here?" His voice was steely as he took in Old Nag's
crimson face and the angelic countenances of the rows of boys.
"They.... Oh! Ah!" Old Nag attempted to speak. "Pshoo! Ah!"
At this point the monitor decided to intercede. "He just keeps on
sneezing, Sir!"
"I haven't asked you for an explanation!" The truth of the matter began
to dawn on him. "Insufferable wretches! Come to my office, Gennady
Alexeyevich."
Old Nag stumbled along after the principal, sneezing all the way.
He did not return to the classroom.
We had got rid of Old Nag for good.
THE CLASS COMMANDER AND THE COMPANY SUPERVISOR
"There's a smell of gunpowder in the air!" the grown-ups were saying
and shaking their heads.
The smell of gunpowder snaked through the classrooms, making them
inflammable. Every desk became a powder magazine, an arsenal and storeroom.
Each and every day there were new entries in the Deportment Ledger.
"The school inspector has taken from Vitaly Talianov, a fourth-grade
pupil who attempted to run off to war and was apprehended at the pier, a
Smith and Wesson revolver and bullets, and a tea kettle he stole from the
ragman, who has identified it. His parents have been notified.
Nikolai Shcherbinin, a second-grade pupil, was found to have concealed
in his desk: one officer's shoulder strap, a sword knot, a package of
gunpowder and a hollow metal tube of unknown purpose. His satchel contained:
a piece of a bayonet, a toy revolver, one spur, a soldier's tobacco pouch, a
cockade, a beanshooter and a hand grenade (discharged). He has been left
after school twice for three hours each time.
"Terenti Marshutin, a fifth-grade pupil, fired off a home-made gun
during the lesson, breaking a window and fouling the air. He insists it was
an accident. He has been expelled for a week."
The boys rattled when they walked, for the pockets of each were full of
cartridge shells. We collected them on the firing range beyond the cemetery.
The wind played tick-tack-toe among the graves. The rabbit-ears of the
windmills protruded from behind the hill. An Army camp languished on the
small plain. The 214th Infantry Regiment was displaced in wooden barracks
there. The wind carried the smell of cabbage soup, cheap tobacco, boots, and
other glorious aromas of the army's rear guard.
The pupils of the Pokrovsk Boys School and the privates of the 214th
Infantry Regiment had established firm business ties and were carrying on a
brisk trade. We passed our sandwiches, cucumbers, apples and various other
civilian dainties through the barbed-wire fence of the camp, and in return
received such coveted items of army life as empty magazines, buckles,
cockades and torn shoulder straps. Officer's shoulder straps were especially
prized. Sidor Dolbanov, an N.C.O., traded me a tar-specked lieutenant's
shoulder strap for two ham sandwiches, a piece of chocolate and five of my
father's Triumph cigarettes.
"I'm giving you this real cheap," he said during the transaction. "I'm
only doing it because you're a friend of mine. The way I see it, you
schoolboys are doing your hitch just like us. They make you wear uniforms
and drill, too. Right?"
Sidor Dolbanov was a great one for discoursing on education. "Except
that military science takes a lot of brains, so's you can't compare it to
your schooling," he philosophised as he wolfed down our sandwiches. "Yes,
sir, this isn't 'rithmetic or algebra, or any such like. You tell me this if
you're so smart: how many men are there in a regiment?"
"We didn't study that yet," I said, feeling very embarrassed and not
knowing the answer.
"That's what I mean. What about your class commander, boys? Is he a
mean old bitch?"
"He's very strict. He'll make you stand by the wall, put your name down
in the Black Book or keep you hours after school for nothing at all."
"What a louse! Which makes him just like our company commander."
"Do you have a company supervisor, too?"
"No, he's no supervisor, he's a bitch of a commander. He's hell on
wheels, that's him, Lieutenant Gennady Alexeyevich Samlykov."" "Old Nag!" I
gasped.
SOLDIER BOYS
The older boys of. our school were strolling down Breshka Street with
some junior lieutenants. Although it was against school rules, an exception
had been made for our glorious Army officers. Soldiers saluted them. The
older schoolgirls who helped roll bandages made eyes at them. We were green
with envy.
One day the school inspector entered our classroom during a lesson. His
beard looked kindly and reverential,
"The first contingent of wounded from the front lines has just arrived.
We are going to welcome them. You there, in the back rows! I'm talking to
you! Tutin! I'll leave you after school for an hour, you dummox! Now, as I
was saying, the entire school will go out to welcome our glorious soldiers
who ... ah ... have suffered so, defending the tsar and the Christian faith.
In a word, line up in pairs! And I want you to behave properly outside, you
cutthroats, savages, jailbirds! Anyone who doesn't will be sorry he was ever
born."
The streets were crowded and ablaze with tricoloured flags. The wounded
were being transported, one man to a vehicle, in the decked-out carriages
belonging to the town's wealthy citizens, with an aristocratic lady from the
local philanthropic society dressed as an Army nurse supporting him. The
procession resembled a wedding train. Policemen saluted it.
The wounded were put up in a new dispensary housed in a former primary
school. The flustered ladies were in charge there. A gala concert was to be
held in one of the large wards. The wounded men, freshly-shaven, washed,
perfumed, surrounded by pillows and boxes of candy, sat in embarrassed
silence, listening to the bombastic speeches of the town fathers. Some of
the men were holding crutches that had been adorned with bows.
Shvetsov, a fourth-grade boy, recited a poem entitled "Belgian
children". Six second-grade boys were lined up behind him to accompany his
recital with various tableaux. The Zemstvo inspector's daughter played "The
Skylark" by Glinka on the piano. The wounded fidgeted and seemed
uncomfortable. The last to perform was the town druggist, an amateur poet
and tenor. Then a tall young blond soldier rose from one of the cots and
cleared his throat shyly.
"Speech! Speech!" everyone shouted, applauding loudly.
When the noise finally died down, the soldier said, "I'd like to
say.... Doctor, Sir, and ladies and gentlemen, and nurses, and everybody
else. Uh, we're very grateful to you for all this, for everything, but we'd
rather, I mean, we've been travelling for three days and three nights, and
we haven't had any sleep, and that's what we really need."
THE SPIRIT OF THE TIMES
Soldiers were being flogged in the barracks. One officer called another
an Armenian mug at the Officer's Club, and the insulted man shot the
offender point-blank, killing him on the spot. By now the wounded were being
brought in any which way and dumped wherever there was available space.
Then our forces took Peremyshl. A crowd of shopkeepers, shady
characters from the suburbs and a few officials walked through the streets
with a portrait of the tsar like an icon at the head of the column. They
infected the air with howling tricoloured flutterings and the sour stench of
raw liquor. It was quite as if some celebration were being warmed up over a
spirit burner.
Once again the school inspector went from classroom to classroom
carrying his solemn, parted, victorious beard as majestically as if it were
a gonfalon.
We poured out onto the porch of the school building to greet the
demonstrators and, at a signal from the principal, we cheered. There was
something disgusting about the bellowing crowd of demonstrators. It seemed
that they needed but a little push to start rioting and killing. We felt as
if a mindless, suffocating, insurmountable force was engulfing us. It was
like being on the bottom of a pile during a free-for-all, squashed under a
great, crushing, suffocating weight, unable to expand your lungs to cry out.
However, it all ended without incident, not counting a call that night
to my father, to save the life of a "patriot" who had got drunk on wood
alcohol.
The demonstration made an indelible impression on Oska, that great
confuser of things, imitator and day-dreamer, who always managed to find a
new meaning for each object, seeing in each its second soul. His great
passion at the time was an old toilet seat. First, he stuck a samovar pipe
through the hole and made believe it was a Maxim machine-gun. Then he put
the toilet seat on his hobby horse, and it served as a yoke. Though this was
not exactly in the best of taste, still, it was permissible. However, the
day after the demonstration Oska organized a Schwambranian demonstration in
the yard, and this one was truly blasphemous. Klavdia had attached someone's
long drawers with ties at the ankles to a floor brush to serve as a
gonfalon. Oska carried the ill-fated toilet seat, which now served as a
frame for the portrait of the tsar, Nicholas II, Ruler of all Russia, which
he had cut out of a magazine.
The indignant janitor handed the demonstrators over to Papa and
threatened to inform the police, but was quickly pacified by a tip.
"Children are very sensitive to the spirit of the times," the grown-ups
said meaningfully.
The spirit of the times, an offensive spirit, seeped into everything.
WE RECEIVE MILITARY TRAINING
That winter the boys of our school and the girls of the Girls School
were all taken to the Army camp to be shown a mock battle. It was a cold,
snowy day.
A colonel explained the battle to the ladies of the philanthropic
society. The ladies warmed their hands in their muffs and oh-ed and ah-ed,
and whenever a shot was fired they clapped their hands to their ears.
However, the battle was very unimpressive and certainly did not resemble the
battle scenes pictured in Niva. Black shapes were crawling across the field.
Fires dotted the scene, blending to produce a smokescreen. Then other fires
were lit. We were told these were signal fires.
From a distance the cross-firing, as it advanced along the lines,
sounded like a pennant flapping in the wind. The stench of the trenches was
overpowering.
"They're attacking," the colonel said.
The dark shapes were running and shouting "Hooray!" very
matter-of-factly.
"The battle is over," the colonel said.
"Which side won?" the spectators inquired, having understood nothing.
The colonel was silent for a moment and then said: "That side." Then he
looked up and warned everyone: "The bomb-thrower is about to go into
action."
Indeed, it did and very loudly at that. The ladies became frightened,
the cabbies' horses bolted, and the cabbies cursed in the direction of the
sky.
The battle was over.
The company that had taken part in the action passed in formation, led
by a sly-looking junior lieutenant. When they came abreast of us the
soldiers burst into a dirty song with a practiced air, some of them
whistling shrilly and straining their cold throats.
The girls exchanged glances. The boys roared. One of the teachers
cleared his throat. The fat headmistress of the Girls School became
indignant.
"Lieutenant!" the colonel shouted. "What's going on? Stop the singing."
Bringing up the rear, stumbling in boots that were much too large and
becoming entangled in the long flaps of his great-coat was a small, puny
soldier. He tried to keep in step, hopping and skipping to keep up, but
still fell behind. The boys recognized him. He was the father of one of the
poor boys.
"Hey, look at that dopey soldier! His son's in the third grade. There
he is!"
Everyone laughed. The little man picked up the flaps of his greatcoat
and set off at a trot as he tried to catch up with his company. His head
bobbed at the end of his long neck. His son stood on the sidelines, staring
at the ground. His face was covered with red blotches.
Oska was waiting for me impatiently when I got home, for he wanted to
hear all about the battle.
"Was there a lot of shooting?"
"I never knew war wasn't one bit nice at all," I replied.
A DAPPLED GREY
The year was drawing to a close. It was vacation time. On December 31,
1916, our parents went to a New Year's party. Before leaving. Mamma
explained to us at length that "New Year's is not a children's party at all,
and you must go to bed at the usual time".
Oska tooted a sailing signal and sailed off to Schwambrania for the
night. Meanwhile, my friend and classmate Grisha Fedorov came to visit me.
We cracked nuts and played lotto for a while. Then, having nothing else to
do, we went fishing in Papa's fishbowl. Finally, we got bored of this, too,
turned off the light, sat down by the window and, after warming the pane
with our breath, made little holes on the frozen glass and looked out into
the street.
The moon was shining, and dull blue shadows lay across the snow. The
air was full of powdery, brilliant glitter. The street seemed magnificent.
"Let's go for a walk," Grisha said.
However, it was against school rules to be seen out on the street after
seven o'clock in December. Our supervisor Seize'em would go out hunting
schoolboys each night, stomping up and down the streets to find them.
I immediately imagined Seize'em pouncing on us from behind some corner,
his gold eagle-crested buttons glittering as he shouted:
"Silence! What's your name? Stand up straight!"
Such an encounter was nothing to look forward to. It meant a poor mark
for deportment and being left behind in an empty classroom for four hours
after school. Perhaps there would even be something else in store as a New
Year's surprise. Seize'em was a great one for such things.
"Don't worry, he's probably at some New Year's party himself," Grisha
said.
"He's probably stuffing himself someplace."
It didn't take much coaxing for me to give in. We put on our overcoats
and dashed out.
The town's small hotel and the Vesuvius Restaurant were both located
not far from our house. That evening the Vesuvius seemed to be erupting.
Streams of light poured forth from the windows, while the earth trembled
from the dancing within.
At the hitching post outside the hotel we saw an elegant high sleigh
with a velvet seat and a fox-lined lap rug. The runners were of figured
iron. A large dappled grey horse was harnessed to the curved lacquered
shafts. It was Gambit, the famous pacer and the best trotter in town. We had
no trouble recognizing both the horse and the carriage, for they belonged to
Karl Zwanzig, a very wealthy man.
"WHOA" IN GERMAN
At that moment I had a wild idea.
"You know what, Grisha?" I said, turning cold at my own boldness.
"Let's go for a ride. Zwanzig won't be ready to leave for a long time. We'll
just ride as far as there and around the church, and back again. I know how
to drive."
I didn't have to say it twice, A minute later we had unhitched Gambit,
climbed up onto the high velvet seat and wrapped the furry rug around our
legs,
I picked up the firm, heavy reins, clicked my tongue as cabbies did,
cleared my throat and said in a deep voice: "Giddiyap! Go on, boy!"
Gambit turned, rolled a large eye at me and looked away. I even
imagined he had shrugged contemptuously, if horses did such things.
"I bet he only understands German," Grisha said. Then he shouted: "Hey!
Fortnaus!"
This made no impression on Gambit, either. Finally, I smacked him hard
with the twisted reins. The very same second I was thrown back. If not for
Grisha, who caught me by the belt, I would have sailed right out of the
sleigh. Gambit surged forward and was off. He hadn't bolted. He was trotting
swiftly as he always did, with me grasping the reins tightly as we sped
along the deserted street. What a shame that none of our friends were there
to see us!
"Let's call for Atlantis. He lives right around that corner. We still
have plenty of time," I said and tugged at the left rein. Gambit turned the
corner obediently. There was Atlantis' house.
"Hey, there! Whoa!"
But Gambit did not stop. No matter how hard I pulled at the reins, the
pacer paid no attention to me. He kept on trotting swiftly. Atlantis' house
was soon left far behind.
"Let's not call for him, Grisha. He's not much fun. Let's call for
Labanda instead. He lives over there." I had wound the reins around my hand
in advance and now braced my feet against the front board.
But Gambit did not stop outside Labanda's house either. I was beginning
to worry.
"Listen, Grisha, do you know what to do to make him stop?"
"Whoa! Stop!" he shouted as loudly as he could. We pulled on the reins
together.
However, the powerful pacer paid no attention to our shouts or to the
pull of the reins. He kept trotting faster and faster, racing us along the
dark streets.
"He doesn't understand Russian!" Grisha said in a scared voice. "And we
don't know what 'whoa' is in German. Nobody ever taught us that. You know,
he'll just keep on going. We can't stop him."
"We don't want to ride any more! Stop!" we both shouted.
But Gambit kept on stubbornly.
HORSE WORDS
I tried to recall everything I knew about talking to horses and
everything I had ever read about it.
"Whoa! Stop, boy! Come on, dove!"
But, as ill luck would have it, I kept thinking of expressions the
likes of which could only be found in some saga, things such as: "0, you
wolf's repast, 0, you sack of grass" or, worse still, expressions to make a
horse go faster: "Git up!... Let's see some life in you!... Here we go!"
Having used up my vocabulary of horse words, I tried some camel words.
"Tratrr, tratrr... chok, chok!" I shouted, imitating the camel drivers.
But Gambit did not understand camel talk.
"Tsob-tsobeh, tsob-tsobeh!" I croaked, recalling the Ukrainian ox-cart
drivers.
That didn't help either.
The bell on Trinity Church began to strike One, two, three times.... It
struck twelve times.
That meant we had ridden into the New Year. Were we just going to go on
driving down the streets like that for the rest of our natural lives? When
would the confounded horse stop?
The moon shone down on us mysteriously. The stillness of the empty
streets, where one year had just ended and another had just begun, seeked
menacing. Were we doomed to riding in this sleigh forever?
I had become panic-stricken.
Suddenly, two rows of highly-polished brass buttons glinted in the
moonlight, appearing from around a corner. It was Seize'em. Gambit was
racing straight at him.
I dropped the reins in terror.
"Silence! What's all the noise about? What's your name? Stand still,
stupid!" Seize'em shrilled.
Then a miracle happened.
Gambit froze in his tracks.
HAPPY NEW YEAR!
We tumbled out of the sleigh, raced around the horse and, drawing
abreast of the supervisor, tipped our caps politely, grasping the patent
leather visors with our fingertips to bare our unruly heads as we bowed low
to Seize'em, saying: "Good evening, Seize ... Caesar Karpovich!" in unison.
"Happy New Year, Caesar Karpovich!"
Seize'em drew his pince-nez slowly from a case which he took out of his
pocket and settled the lenses on the bridge of his nose.
"Aha!" he beamed. "Two friends. I recognize you! Lovely, just lovely!
Excellent! Magnificent! Now we'll just write both your names down." At this
he took his famous notebook from the inner pocket of his overcoat. "We'll
write down both names. First one, then the other, and they'll both be left
after school as soon as vacation ends. Four hours each, and no dinner. Four
hours for one, and four hours for the other. Happy New Year, children!"
Then Seize'em stared at the sleigh. "One moment, boys. Have you Herr
Zwanzig's permission to take his sleigh? Hm?"
We interrupted each other in our haste to assure him that Herr Zwanzig
had actually asked us to take Gambit for a run to warm him up a bit.
"Excellent," he murmured. "We'll all go back together now and see
whether you are telling the truth or not. Come."
The very notion of finding ourselves in the fiendish sleigh again was
so terrible that we suggested he ride alone, promising to walk along beside
him.
The unsuspecting supervisor clambered up onto the high seat. He tucked
the luxurious fur rug around his legs, picked up the reins, yanked them and
clicked his tongue. When this had no effect, he let the reins fall lightly
on Gambit's bad that very moment we were tossed aside. Clumps of snow flew
into our faces. When we had brushed the snow from our eyes and shaken the
snow off our clothes the careening sleigh was just disappearing around a
bend, with our unfortunate supervisor hanging on for dear life and bellowing
something unintelligible.
Meanwhile, Herr Karl Zwanzig, Gambit's owner, came pounding arc another
corner. His coat was unbuttoned and his tie was askew. He was roaring the
top of his voice: "Help! Morder! Poleez! Shtop dem!"
We could hear a police whistle in the distance.
We never tried to find out how it all ended. Seize'em never said a word
of the night's adventure when we returned to school after our vacation.
Thus did the New Year begin. It was now 1917.
THE LEDGER FOR FEBRUARY
ALL ABOUT THE ROUND GLOBE, IMPORTANT NEWS AND A SMALL SEA
Mamma and Papa had just gone visiting. The front door slammed. The
draught made the doors fly open all through the house. We heard Annushka
turn the light off in the parlour. Then she went back to the kitchen. There
was an eeriness in the quiet that settled on the house. The clock in the
dining room ticked loudly. The wind rattled the windows. I sat down at the
table and pretended to be doing homework. Oska was drawing steamships. There
were very many of them, each had smoke pouring from its stacks. I took his
red-and-blue pencil and be colouring the pronouns in my Latin book, making
all the vowels red and all consonants blue. Suddenly Oska said,
"How do people know that the Earth is round?"
I knew the answer to that question, because it was on the first page of
geography book, and I went into a long explanation about a ship sailing far.
away until it disappeared completely beyond the horizon. Since you couldn't
sit any longer, it meant the Earth was round.
My explanation did not satisfy him.
"Maybe the ship sank? Huh? Maybe it just sank."
"Don't bother me. Can't you see I'm doing my homework?" I continued
colouring the pronouns.
All was silence again.
"I know how people know the Earth's round."
"I'm glad you do."
"Well, I do! It's because the globe is round. There!"
"You're a round-headed ninny, that's what."
Oska pouted. Trouble was brewing. Just then the telephone rang in our
fat consulting room. We raced to be the first to get there. The office was
dark, deserted and scary. I turned on the light. The room immediately
changed its appear;
like a developed negative. The windows had been light, but now they
became dark. The panes had been black, and now they were white. Most
important, however, office no longer frightened us. I picked up the receiver
and spoke in Papa's sc voice:
"Hello?"
It was our favourite Uncle Lyosha, phoning from Saratov. He had not
been us in ages. Mamma had told us that he had gone very far away, but Oska
had eavesdropped and learned that, strangely, he had been put in prison for
against the tsar and the war. Now he had apparently been released. That was
news!
"When are you coming to see us?" we shouted into the phone.
"I will soon," he replied, and I could hear him chuckle. "I want you
Mamma and Papa that I phoned and said there's been a revolution in R There's
a Provisional Government now. The tsar's abdicated. Repeat what I he said to
me, and he sounded excited.
"How did it happen?" I shouted.
"You're too little to understand."
"No, I'm not! Not if you tell me. I'm in the third grade."
And so our uncle, speaking from Saratov on the other side of the Volga,
went on hurriedly to explain the meaning of the war, the revolution,
equality and fraternity to me.
"Are you all through speaking?" a voice interrupted. "Your time is up."
Click! We were disconnected. I stood there, feeling as if I had
suddenly become about three years older, feeling that I was about to burst
from excitement.
I glanced at Oska. He seemed terribly embarrassed. "Shame on you!
What's the use of you knowing the Earth's round?"
"I held in all the time you were talking. It was an accident."
I ran to the kitchen. Annushka had a visitor. He was a wounded soldier
she knew, a man who always looked sullen. There was a small silver St.
George Cross on his chest. I shouted excitedly:
"Annushka! First of all, there's been a revolution, and freedom, and no
more tsar! And, secondly, Oska wet his pants. Find him another pair." I
related everything my uncle had just told me. Then Annushka's soldier-friend
stood up. His left arm was in a sling. He embraced me with his right arm. I
was stunned. He squeezed me hard as he said:
"That's the best piece of news you could have brought us! I can't even
believe it." Then he shook his big fist at someone outside the window and
added, "You'll get what's coming to you now! Our time's come!"
I looked at the window, but saw no one. Meanwhile, the soldier was
saying,
"Pardon me, young man, but this is the best news I've ever heard.
Why.... Good Lord.... Thanks a million!" He sounded as if there was a lump
in his throat.
A DIRECT LINE
I went to the dining-room, got up on a chair and knocked on the brass
cover of the stove's air duct. It served as a direct line to Anna and Vera
Zhivilsky who lived upstairs and whose stove was directly above ours. If I
knocked on the cover of our duct they could hear me. I could hear Anna's
voice in the duct.
"Hello!"
"Hello, Anna! I have some great news! There's been a revolution, and
there's a soldier here right now."
"You don't know what I have! Guess."
"Has there been another revolution someplace?"
"No! My godmother gave me a set of doll dishes, and it even has a
creamer."
I slammed down the receiver... that is, I slammed the brass lid shut.
No, they would never understand. I put on my fur hat and coat quickly and
ran to my friend next door. My Latin homework would have to be done some
other time.
SEIZE'EM CHASES THE MOON, OR WHAT THE LEDGER SAID OF THIS
There was a smell of spring in the air. The sky was studded with stars
that glittered like the buttons on the school inspector's tunic. I dashed
d