The Complete Works of Isaac Babel Reprint Edition by Isaac Babel, Nathalie Babel, Peter Constantine (103 page)

removing her corset, her stockings, and her bloomers Even you,

Yasha, might well blush and not know where to look.

[LUDMILA laughs out loud, throwing her head back.\

VISKOVSKY: She left 16 Furshtadskaya Street. .. . Where were her footprints for me to kiss? Where were they? But let us hope that Akim s voice rings deeper than that of a papal choirboy. . . . What do you think, Ludmila Nikolayevna?

LUDMILA: You put something in this vodka, Viskovsky! My head is spinning. . . .

VISKOVSKY: Come here, girly. [He grabs her shoulders and pulls her toward him.] How much did Dimshits pay you for that ring?

LUDMILA: What are you talking about?

VISKOVSKY: Its not your ring, its your sister s. You sold a ring that wasnt yours.

LUDMILA: Let me go!

VISKOVSKY [Pushes her through a side door.]: Come with me, girly!

[DORA and KRAVCHENKO remain alone in the room.

In the window, the slow beam of a searchlight.

DORA, pujfy and disheveled, leans over to KRAVCHENKO and kisses his hands, babbling and moaning. FILIP, with his scarredface, comes tiptoeing in unhurriedly on his bare feet, and quietly takes the wine, sausage, and bread from the tabled]

FILIP [In a low voice, his head bent to the side.]: You dont mind, do you, Yasha?

[KRAVCHENKO shakes his head, and FILIP carefully tiptoes out] DORA: You are my sunshine! My life! My everything!

[KRAVCHENKO remains silent. He hears steps outside. VISKOVSKY enters, smoking a cigarette, his hands shaking. The door to the adjacent room is open. LUDMILA is lying on the sofa, crying.]

VISKOVSKY: Calm down, Ludmila Nikolayevna. Youll get over it.

DORA [In broken Russian.]: Jacques, I want our room. . . . Take me to home, Jacques!

KRAVCHENKO: In a minute, Dora.

VISKOVSKY: One for the road, Comrades?

KRAVCHENKO: In a minute, Dora.

VISKOVSKY: One for the road—to all the 1-ladies . . .

KRAVCHENKO: This is very bad, Captain.

VISKOVSKY: To all the ladies, Yasha!

KRAVCHENKO: This is very bad, Captain.

VISKOVSKY: What is very bad, if I may ask?

KRAVCHENKO: Men with the clap should not sleep with women, Mr. Viskovsky.

VISKOVSKY [In a military tone.]: Would you care to repeat that?

[Pause. LUDMILA stops sobbing]

KRAVCHENKO: What I said was: men infected with gonorrhea— VISKOVSKY: Remove your glasses this instant, Kravchenko! I am going to punch your ugly mug.

[KRAVCHENKO pulls out his revolver.]

VISKOVSKY: Fine, if thats the way you want it!

[KRAVCHENKO fires. Curtain. Behind the curtain: shots, falling bodies, a womans scream.]

Scene Five

At the MUKOVNIN S’ apartment. The OLD NANNY is lying curled up on a trunk in the corner. She is asleep. A lamp casts a pool of light onto the table. KATYA is reading a letterfrom MARIA to MUKOVNIN.

KATYA: “At dawn the bugle from squadron headquarters wakes me. By eight I have to be in the Political Propaganda Division, Fm in charge there—I edit the articles of the divisional newspaper, I run the literacy classes. Our reinforcements are all Ukrainians. They remind me of Italians, the way they talk and act. Russia has been suppressing and destroying their culture for centuries. In our house in Petersburg, opposite the Hermitage and the Winter Palace, we might as well have been living in Polynesia for all we knew anything at all about our people! Yesterday I read aloud in class the chapter in Papas book about the murder of Czar Paul. It was so clear that the Czar deserved his fate that nobody in class questioned it. What they asked me instead—in their typically forthright way—was about the disposition of the regiment, the rooms in the palace, which regimental guard it had been that had stood watch that night, who were the conspirators, and in what way the Czar had wronged them. I keep hoping that Papa will come out here in the summer, as long as the Poles don’t start acting up again. You will see a new army, Papa, new barracks, quite the opposite of what you are describing. In summer our garden here will be green and blossoming, the horses will regain their strength in the pastures, and their saddles will have been mended. I have already spoken to Akim Ivanovich, and he has agreed that you should come. Lets hope that youll be well enough. Its night now. I came off duty late and climbed the worn, four-hundred-year-old stairs to my room. I live up in the tower, in a vaulted hall that was once Count Krasnicki s armory. The castle was built on a ledge below which a river flows. Meadows stretch into infinity, with a misty forest wall in the distance. There are lookout niches on every floor of the castle from which the approaching Tatars and Russians were observed, and from which boiling oil was poured onto the heads of the besiegers. Old Hedwig, the housekeeper of the last Krasnicki, cooked me some dinner and lit the fireplace, deep and black as a dungeon. The horses are stomping and dozing in the park below. Kuban Cossacks are sitting around a fire, eating and singing. The trees are covered with snow, the oak and chestnut branches hang heavy, and an uneven, silver blanket is lying over the snowy walks and statues. The statues are still unscathed—youths throwing javelins, and nude, frozen goddesses, their arms curved, their hair flying in waves, their eyes blind. Hedwig is dozing, her head shaking, the logs in the fireplace flare up and crumble. The centuries have made the bricks of this building resonant as glass, and they sparkle with gold as I sit here writing to you. I have Alyoshas photograph beside me on the table. My comrades here are the very people who didn’t think twice about killing him. I was with them just a few minutes ago, working to set them free. Am I doing the right thing, Alyosha? Am I fulfilling your command to live a life of courage? The immortal essence of Alyosha keeps egging me on. It is late, but I cannot sleep. An inexplicable fear for you and a dread of my dreams keep me awake. I see pursuit, torture, and death. I live a strange dichotomy: closeness to nature and anxiety for you. Why does Ludmila write so rarely? A few days ago I sent her a paper signed by Akim Ivanovich, stating that as I am on active duty the authorities have no right to requisition my room at home. Furthermore, we must see to the official document allowing Papa to keep his library. If the document has expired, it has to be renewed at the Peoples Commissariat for Education at Chernishev Bridge, room 40. I would be so happy if Ludmila were to settle down and start a family, but the man should be a frequent guest at our house so that Papa can get to know him; Papas heart wont deceive him. And Nanny should meet him too. Katya keeps complaining about Nanny, saying that she isnt doing any work. Katya, Nanny is old. She has raised two generations of Mukovnins. She has her own opinions and feelings about things, and she’s no simpleton. I always felt that she did not have much of a peasant’s soul in her, though if you think about it, what did we, tucked away in our Polynesia as we were, know about the peasantry? I hear that finding provisions in Petersburg has become even harder, and that the rooms and linen of everybody who is not working are being requisitioned. I am ashamed that we here at the front are living so well. Akim Ivanovich has taken me hunting twice, and I have a horse, a Don Cossack horse ” 

[KATYA raises herhead.\ So you see how well things stand, Nikolai Vasilevich? [MUKOVNIN covers his eyes with hispalms.] Dont cry. . . .

MUKOVNIN: I am asking God—we all have a God of our souls—why he gave me, egotistical, foolish man that I am, such wonderful children as Maria and Ludmila.

KATYA: But that is good, Nikolai Vasilevich. There is no need to cry.

Scene Six

A police station at night. A DRUNK lies huddled under a bench. He is waving hisfingers in front of his face and holding a conversation with himself A thickset OLD MAN is dozing on the bench. He is wearing an expensive raccoon coat and a tall fur hat. The coat is open wide, revealing the old mans bare, gray chest. A POLICE INSPECTOR is cross-examining LUDMILA. Her fur hat is askew,, her hair disheveled\ and her coat has been tugged off one of her shoulders.

INSPECTOR: Name?

LUDMILA: I want to go home.

INSPECTOR: Name?

LUDMILA: Barbara.

INSPECTOR: Fathers name?

LUDMILA: Ivan.

INSPECTOR: Where do you work?

LUDMILA: At Laferme, the tobacco factory.

INSPECTOR: Your union card.

LUDMILA: I dont have it on me.

INSPECTOR: Why are you dealing in smuggled goods?

LUDMILA: I’m a married woman. ... I want to go home!

INSPECTOR: What makes you want to deal in smuggled goods? Have you known Brilyov for a long time?

LUDMILA: I do not know any Brilyov. I have never heard of him. INSPECTOR: Brilyov signed for the shipment of thread that passed through you to Gutman. Where did you stash the thread? LUDMILA: What are you talking about? What do you mean, stash? INSPECTOR: Y11 tell you right away what I mean by stash! [To a policeman!] Call in Kalmikova!

[Thepoliceman brings in SHURA KALMIKOVA, the maid in the hotel at Nevsky Prospekt, 86, where DIMSHITS and his men are staying.\

INSPECTOR: Are you a hotel maid?

KALMIKOVA: I am just standing in for someone else.

INSPECTOR: Do you recognize this woman?

KALMIKOVA: I most certainly do.

INSPECTOR: What can you tell me?

KALMIKOVA: I can answer your questions—her father’s a general.

INSPECTOR: Does she work?

KALMIKOVA: She steams up men, thats her job.

INSPECTOR: Does she have a husband?

KALMIKOVA: Yeah, she got married in the bushes—she’s got quite a few husbands. One of them spent a whole night in the outhouse because of her teeth.

INSPECTOR: What teeth? What are you going on about?

KALMIKOVA: She knows perfectly well what teeth.

INSPECTOR \To LUDMILA.]: You been arrested before? How many times?

LUDMILA: I have been infected. ... I am ill.

INSPECTOR [To KALMIKOVA.]: We need to ascertain how many times she’s been arrested before.

KALMIKOVA: That I don’t know. I can’t tell you that. I can’t tell you what I don’t know.

LUDMILA: I am exhausted. . . . Let me go home!

INSPECTOR: Calm down! Look at me!

LUDMILA: My head is spinning. . . . I’m going to faint.

INSPECTOR: Look at me!

LUDMILA: My God, why do I have to look at you?

INSPECTOR [Furious.]: Because I haven’t had any sleep for five nights, that’s why! Do you understand?

LUDMILA: Yes, I understand.

INSPECTOR [Moves closer to her, grabs her by the shoulders, and looks into her eyes.]: How many times have you been arrested?

Scene Seven

At the MUKOVNIN S * apartment. There are shadows on the walls. GOLITSYN is praying in front of an illuminated icon. The NANNY is sleeping on the trunk.

GOLITSYN: Verily, verily, I say unto you, except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone: but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit. He that loveth his life shall lose it; and he that hateth his life in this world shall keep it unto life eternal. If any man serve me, let him follow me; and where I am, there shall also my servant be: if any man serve me, him will my Father honor. Now is my soul troubled; and what shall I say? Father, save me from this hour: but for this cause came I unto this hour.

KATYA [Comes up to him silently, stands next to him., and rests her head on his shoulder.\. I always meet Redko at the headquarters in what used to be an antechamber. Theres an oilskin sofa there. I go in, Redko locks the door, and afterward he unlocks it.

GOLITSYN: I see.

KATYA: I am going home to Borisoglebsk, mon prince.

GOLITSYN: That would be for the best.

KATYA: Redko keeps lecturing me on whom to love, whom to hate. He says that the law of big numbers is now in effect. But I, you see, am a small number. What do I matter?

GOLITSYN: But you do matter.

KATYA: Yes, I do matter! I should count! I am free now, Nanny. . . . Wake up. Please wake up. You’d sleep right through the Second Coming!

NEFEDOVNA [Raises her head.\. Where’s Ludmila?

KATYA: Ludmila will be back soon, and I’m leaving town, so there’ll be nobody to give you a hard time.

NEFEDOVNA: Why give me a hard time? What is there for me to do? I was born to be a nanny, hired to raise children, but there are no children here. The house is full of women, but there’s not a single child in sight. One’s gone off to fight a war, as if there’s no one else who can do the fighting, the other one is roaming around lost. What kind of a house is this to be without children?

KATYA: We’ll have some children by Immaculate Conception.

NEFEDOVNA: All you girls do is talk! You think I don’t see what’s going on? With you girls, nothing ever amounts to anything.

GOLITSYN: Go to Borisoglebsk, they need you. It’s a wasteland there, with beasts devouring each other.

NEFEDOVNA: Look at the Molostovs—two-bit merchants, but they saw to it that their nanny was given a pension. Fifty rubles a month! Prince, why don’t you see to it that I get a pension too?

GOLITSYN [Lights the makeshift tin stove.]: No one would listen to me now, Nanny. I have no connections these days.

NEFEDOVNA: But they were just two-bit merchants!

[MUKOVNIN enters. The front door opens, and MUKOVNIN staggers back at the sight of FILIP, large and shapeless, hooded and wrapped in rags. Half of FILIP i face is covered in raw scar tissue. He is wearing felt boots.]

MUKOVNIN: Who are you?

FILIP [Moves closer.]: One of Ludmila Nikolayevnas acquaintances. MUKOVNIN: How may I help you?

FILIP: There has been a small disaster, Your Excellency.

KATYA: Did Mr. Dimshits send you?

FILIP: Yes, he sent me. The whole thing started from nothing.

KATYA: What about Ludmila Nikolayevna?

FILIP: They were all there together.... They were having a little fun, Your Excellency, but things got out of hand. Captain Viskovsky and, well, Kravchenko ... they went at each other, both were a little tipsy— GOLITSYN: General Mukovnin, let me have a word with our Comrade here.

FILIP: Its not like anything special happened. It was a misunderstanding. Both were a little tipsy, both had weapons—