Ice Trilogy (49 page)

“You’re strong.”

“Not stronger than you.” Vinogradov stood up, stretched out his hand. “Give me a call afterward, okay?”

“Of course.” Borenboim shook Vinogradov’s thin, firm fingers.

“And anyway, Bor, how come we hardly ever see each other? It’s like we’re some kind of hard-hearted workaholics.”

“What?” Borenboim asked cautiously.

“We never drink together, Bor. You and I’ve become totally heartless!”

Borenboim paled abruptly. His lips began to tremble. He clutched at his chest.

“No. I...have...a heart,” he enunciated firmly. And burst out sobbing.

“Borya, Bor...” Vinogradov rose halfway.

“I...h-have...a...a...a...h-h-heart!” Sobbing, Borenboim got the words out and then collapsed on his knees. “I haaaave...I haa...aaa...aaaa...veeee...aaaa!!”

Sobs wracked his body, tears sprang from his eyes. He bent over. Fell on the rug. Thrashed about in hysterics.

Vinogradov pressed a button on his phone.

“Tanya, quick, come here! Quick!”

Walking around the ornate table, Vinogradov leaned over Borenboim.

“Borka, hey pal, what’s going on...come on, we’ll find these assholes, don’t be afraid...”

Borenboim sobbed. Intermittent sobs merged into a hoarse wail. His face turned crimson. His legs jerked.

The secretary entered.

“Give me some water!” Vinogradov shouted at her.

She ran out. She returned with a bottle of mineral water. Vinogradov swigged a mouthful and sprayed it on the wailing Borenboim, who continued to wail.

“Do we have any tranquilizers?” Vinogradov held Borenboim’s head.

“Just aspirin,” muttered the secretary.

“No valerian drops?”

“No, Matvei Anatolich.”

“You don’t have anything...” Vinogradov wet a handkerchief and tried to place it on Borenboim’s forehead.

Borenboim howled and writhed.

“Jesus fucking...what the hell is thi
s
...?” Bewildered, Vinogradov smacked his lips, got down on his knees.

He began to pour the water from the bottle onto Borenboim’s red face.

It didn’t help. Convulsions shook the thin body.

“Something’s wrong here,” said Vinogradov, shaking his head.

“Did something bad happen to him?”

“Yeah, something real bad. He got sixty-nine thousand dollars transferred to him, and he doesn’t know who did it! A big disaster, shit!” said Vinogradov, smiling bitterly, losing his patience. “Borka! Come on, that’s enough, really! Enough!! Borya!! Stop! Quiet!!”

He began to slap Borenboim on the cheeks. Borenboim wailed even louder.

“Jeez, what the hell’s going on here?” Vinogradov stood up and stuck his hands in his pockets.

“Maybe some cognac?” the secretary proposed.

“Damn, everyone’s gonna come running now! Tanya, call an ambulance right now. They’ll give him a shot of something in the ass...I can’t stand this. I can’t listen anymore!”

He sat on the edge of the desk. He looked around, searching for a cigarette. Then remembered that he quit. He shook his hands in the air.

“What a way to begin the fuckin’ day...”

The secretary picked up the receiver. “What should I say, Matvei Anatolich?”

“Say that...the man has lost...”

“What?”

“His peace of mind!” Vinogradov shouted irritably.

14:55
,
Central Moscow, Mokhovaya Street

Lapin strolled from the Lenin Library metro station to the old Moscow University building. A backpack hung on his shoulder. Fine-grained snow sifted down from an overcast sky.

Lapin entered the cast-iron gates, looked in the direction of the “psychodrome” — a small square near the monument to Lomonosov. A group of students with bottles of beer stood there.

Skinny, stooping
Tvorogov
and small, long-haired
Filshtein
noticed Lapin.

“Lapa, come over here!” Filshtein waved.

Lapin walked over.

“How come you’re so early?” asked Tvorogov.

Filshtein laughed. “Lapa lives on New York time! Mr. Radlov was asking about you.”

“Yeah. Like: Where does my pet hang out?” Tvorogov butted in.

“What?” Lapin asked in a gloomy voice.

“Got a hangover, Lap? Bring your paper? Gonna hand it in?”

“No.”

“We didn’t either!”

Filshtein and Tvorogov laughed.

“Gimme a swig.” Lapin took Tvorogov’s bottle and drank. “Is Rudik here?”

“Don’t know,” said Tvorogov, lighting a cigarette.

“Take a look in ‘Santa Barbara.’”
[1]

“Listen, is it true that his ancestors were in some kind of sect?”

“Hari Krishnas, I think,” said Tvorogov, blowing out smoke.

“No, not Hari Krishnas.” Filshtein shook his curly head. “Brahma Kumaris.”

“What’s that?” Lapin returned the bottle to Tvorogov.

“Brahma is one of the gods of the Hindu pantheon,” Filshtein explained. “You can ask Rudik what Kumaris is. They go to the Himalayas every year.”

“Him too?”

“Are you nuts?! He’s not into that stuff. He gets off on heavy metal. Hangs out with Spider. Why? You interested?”

“Just a little.”

“What were you up to yesterday, Lap, you get drunk or get laid?”

“I shot up too.” Lapin headed for the entrance.

He entered. Went up to the second floor. Walked through the empty smoking room. Walked through the open door of the men’s toilet. It was empty except for a hunchbacked cleaning woman of uncertain age. An overturned urn lay on the dirty floor in a puddle of urine. Cigarette butts, cans of beer, and other garbage were piled up nearby. The cleaning woman was moving the trash toward the trash bin with her mop. Lapin clucked in dissatisfaction. Noticing him, the hunchbacked woman shook her head accusingly.

“A lot of pigs. Trash and trash. No heart in you.”

Lapin winced. The hand that held the strap of the backpack unclenched. The backpack slipped from his shoulder and fell on the floor. Lapin let out a sob. His eyes quickly filled with tears.

“No!” he hissed.

He opened his mouth and let out a long, plaintive cry that rang in the empty toilet and burst into the hallway. Lapin’s legs gave way. He clutched his chest and fell backward.

“Ooooo! Oooo! Oooooo!” He gave a drawn-out wail.

The cleaning woman stared at him angrily. She set her mop in the corner. She walked around Lapin and limped into the hallway. Three students were heading for the bathroom, drawn by the cries.

“Granny, what’s going on?” asked one.

“Another drug addict!” The cleaning woman looked at them indignantly. “Who studies here these days? Fairies and drug addicts!”

The students stepped over Lapin. He moaned and sobbed, and every so often let out a lengthy scream.

“Shit, man. Typical withdrawal,” one of the students concluded. “Vova, call 03.”

“Forgot my cell.” Another was chewing gum. “Hey, who has a cell around here?”

“Oy, what’s wrong with him?” squealed a girl who had just come out of the women’s room and looked in.

“You got a cell phone?”

“Yes.”

“Dial 03, he’s in withdrawal.”

“Zhenia, maybe we shouldn’t?” One of the students began to doubt.

“Call, you idiot, he’ll croak here!” the cleaning lady screamed.

“Go fuck yourself...” The girl dialed 03. “What should I say?”

The student spit out his gum.

“Like in the song. Say: ‘Boy is crying’...”

12:00
,
Private Clinic, 7 Novoluzhnetsky Prospect

A spacious white ward with a wide white bed. White venetian blinds on the windows. A bouquet of white lilies on a low white table. A white television. White chairs.

Lapin, Nikolaeva, and Borenboim were asleep in the bed. Their faces were haggard and gaunt: there were circles under their eyes, their sunken cheeks had a yellowish tinge.

The door opened silently. The same plump, stooped doctor entered. He began to open the blinds. Mair and Uranov followed him in. They stood near the bed.

Daylight flooded the ward.

“But they’re still sleeping soundly,” said Mair.

“They’ll wake up soon,” the doctor said with certainty. “The cycle, the cycle. Tears, sleep. Sleep and tears.”

“There was a problem with the kid?” asked Uranov.

“Yes.” The doctor stuck his hands in the pockets of his blue robe. “The other two were sent to hospital 15, as usual. But they initially thought he was a drug addict. So we had a bit of a hassle with the transfer.”

“Did he really shoot up?”

“There’s a needle track on his left arm. But no, he’s not a drug addict.”

They stood silently.

“Tears...” said Mair.

“So what — tears?” The doctor straightened the blanket over Borenboim’s chest.

“They change faces.”

“Well, if you cry for an entire week!” chuckled the doctor.

“I still don’t understand why people always call the ambulance when someone starts sobbing uncontrollably. Why don’t they try to calm them down themselves...” said Uranov thoughtfully.

“It’s frightening,” the doctor explained.

“How...wonderful it is.” Mair smiled. “The first weeping of the heart. It’s like...the first spring.”

“You remember yourself?” The doctor shook his massive head. “Yes, you blubbered like a Beluga whale.”

“You remember?”

“Now, now, my dear, it was only some nine years ago. I remember your graybeard, too. And the girl with the dried-up hand. And the twins from Noginsky. Doctors have a good memory. Don’t we?” He winked and laughed.

Mair embraced him.

Borenboim stirred. He moaned.

Lapin’s pale hand flinched. His fingers closed. And opened.

“Perfect.” The doctor glanced at the white clock. “When they’re together, the cycle evens out. All right, then! Hurry up, ladies and gentlemen!”

Mair and Uranov left quickly.

The doctor stood for a minute, turned, and followed after them.

The nurse, Kharo, silently pushed a wheelchair into the room.

A skinny old lady sat in the wheelchair.

She wore an old-fashioned, light blue dress. Her head was covered by a pillbox hat with a blue veil. Blue stockings stretched over unbelievably thin legs ending in blue patent-leather boots.

The old woman unclasped the wrinkled, dried-up hands on her knees and lifted her veil.

Her narrow, thin, wrinkled face was filled with extraordinary bliss. Her large blue eyes shone young, smart, and strong.

Kharo left the room.

The old woman looked at the three, who were awakening.

When all three had awoken and noticed her, she spoke in a quiet, even, calm voice.

“Ural, Diar, Mokho. I am Khram. I welcome you.”

Ural, Diar, and Mokho looked at her.

“Your hearts wept for seven days. This weeping is in grief and shame for your previous, dead life. Now your hearts are cleansed. They will no longer sob. They are ready to love and speak. Now my heart will speak the first word of the most important language to your hearts. The language of the heart.”

She stopped speaking. Her large eyes closed halfway. Her sunken cheeks turned slightly rosy.

The three in the bed shuddered. Their eyes also closed halfway. A slight convulsion crossed their haggard faces. The features of these faces came to life, blurred, and shifted, abandoning their usual expressions, which had been conditioned by the experience of their former life.

In agony, their faces began to be revealed.

Just like the buds of wild plants, dormant for decades in cold and timelessness.

Several moments of transformation passed.

Ural, Diar, and Mokho opened their eyes.

Their faces shone with a rapturous peace.

Their eyes sparkled with understanding.

Their lips smiled.

They were born.

I had just turned twelve when the war began.

Mama and I lived in Koliubakino, a small village with only forty-six houses.

Our family wasn’t very big: Mama, Grandma, Gerka, and me. My father left for the war right away on June 24. No one knew where he went, where he ended up, or whether he was even alive. There were no letters from him.

The war went on and on somewhere. Sometimes at night it thundered and boomed.

But we lived in the country.

Our house was on the outskirts. Our family name was Samsikov, but in the village manner we were called the Outskirts, because we had lived forever at the edge of town, my great-grandfather and grandfather, everyone had always lived at the edge of the village; that’s where they built their huts.

I grew up a sensible girl, I did everything around the house, helped my elders if something had to be cleaned or made. Back then, everyone in the village worked, from the tiniest to the oldest. That’s the way things were done, there weren’t any shirkers.

I understood that it was hard for Mama with Father gone. Although things had been even harder with him: he drank a lot. Before the war began, he worked in timber for a while. He and the forest warden sold timber on the sly, and drank up the proceeds. He was a binger. And he had a mistress in the next village. She was fat, with a large mouth. Polina.

The Germans arrived in our village in September ’41, and they set themselves up. They stayed there until October of ’43. They stayed for two years.

The soldiers were rear-line forces, not battle troops. The fighting ones went farther on — to capture Moscow. But they never did.

Our Germans were mostly about forty years old; they seemed like old men to me, since I was just a girl. They stayed in the peasant houses, all over the village. Their officers lived in the village council building. Things were all right with these Germans around, in two years they didn’t kill anyone, but when they retreated they did burn our village. Well, that was the order they were given, it wasn’t their own idea.

They were intelligent men, and practical.

The day after they came they started building a privy. Our village had never ever had any privies before this. Everyone went “out in the yard” — you’d squat somewhere and that was it. Grandma would go in the cowshed, where the cow stood. Mama — in the garden. Us kids — wherever we needed to. You’d squat by a bush — and that was that! No one in the village had any privies, it never occurred to anyone to build one special. The Germans kept on building, and Grandma laughed: Why waste all that hard work, the shit ends up in the ground anyway!

But Germans are Germans: they like order.

As soon as they arrived they started building privies and benches. Next to the houses, like they were planning on living with us for a long time.

They would throw some food our way — that helped. They had corn, flour, and tins of meat. They even baked their own bread — they didn’t trust us. Were they afraid we’d poison them?

They had schnapps. I didn’t try it, I was just a girl. But I did try beer for the first time in my life that winter.

They had their own Christmas; they all gathered in the village council. Mama and some of the other women cooked pork, chickens for them; they fried potatoes in lard, and baked white rolls from their flour. They put everything on the table. The other girls and I crawled up on the stove and watched. Then the Germans rolled out a small barrel, stuck a sort of copper faucet in it, and began pouring beer into mugs and glasses. It was yellowish and foamy. They drank, then they sang and swayed back and forth. It went on and on till nighttime. They drank schnapps too. I watched from above. One German gave me a mug: Drink! I tried the beer. It had a strange taste. But I remembered it. So there you go.

All in all, life was cheery with the Germans. It was kind of interesting: Germans! They were completely different, and they were funny. Three of them lived with us: Erich, Otto, and Peter. The settled in the house and we moved into the bathhouse. The bathhouse was brand new; father had built it of thick logs, it would warm up good and hot.

The Germans occupied the house. They were an odd bunch! They were all about forty. Otto was fat, Erich was small and had a hook nose, and Peter was a beanpole, wore glasses, and had flaxen hair. Erich was the shittiest: he was always displeased. Do this for him, bring that. He’d say nothing or mumble something. He loved to fart. He’d fart, mumble, and head off into the village.

Otto was the kindest and funniest. Mama and I would make them breakfast in the morning, and he’d wake up, stretch, look at me and say, “
Nun, was gibt’s neues
, Varka?”

At first I just smiled. But then Peter-with-the-glasses taught me some words, and I always answered, “
Überhaupt nichts
!”

Otto would roar with laughter and go take a leak.

Peter was always lost in thought, he had “his head under a pillow,” as Grandma would say. He’d go out, sit on the new bench, and smoke his long pipe. He’d sit, smoke, and swing his leg. He’d stare at something, just sitting there like a bump on a log, and then suddenly sigh and say, “
Scheiss der Hund drauf!
”

He also loved to shoot crows. He’d go out into the orchard with a gun — and bang away, until the glass shuddered.

The Germans made three things in our village: ropes, sleigh runners, and wooden plows.

That is, our village people did all the work, and the Germans kept an eye on things and sent the stuff off somewhere. Mama and the other women went out to collect the bast, weave the ropes, and the old men and young fellows bent the sleigh runners and cut the plows. Iliukha Kuznetsov, an armless deserter, explained: This is so the bombs in the boxes don’t bump around and blow up.

Our three Germans really loved milk. They went crazy over it: as soon as Mother or Grandma milked the cow, before it was even strained, the Germans would be pushing into the cowshed.

“
Ein Schluk
, Masha!”

They called Mama Gasha. They called me Varka. But they called all our other girls Mashas. They were just crazy about their milk...! They’d almost get up under the cow with their cups. There wasn’t any hurry — they drank all the milk anyway! But they were in a rush so the fresh milk wouldn’t cool down, they liked to drink it warm. They’d make a big fuss. We laughed.

So that year passed, and then the Red Army began to attack. The Germans ran off.

They had two orders: burn all the villages, and take all the young people with them to work in Germany. They only gathered up twenty-three people from the whole village. The rest ran off or hid. I didn’t bother for some reason. I don’t know why, but somehow I just didn’t want to run anywhere. And where could you run to anyway? There were Germans everywhere. We didn’t have any partisans. And it was scary in the forest.

Mama didn’t say anything to me, either. She didn’t even cry: she was used to everything. She wailed when they burned our house. But she wasn’t very afraid for the children. And we were sort of numb, too, we didn’t know what was happening, where they’d take us and why. No one cried. Grandma kept on praying and praying that we wouldn’t be killed. They let me go. But Gerka stayed with them, he wasn’t even seven yet.

They quickly gathered us in a column. Mother handed me father’s padded coat and managed to slip me a chunk of lard. But I lost the lard on the road! What a laugh!

I can’t figure out how it fell out of my pocket! That piece weighed about three pounds...

Later I dreamed about that lard. Dreamed I grabbed hold of it, but it was like the oat pudding they boil up for wakes — it slipped between my fingers!

We walked on foot with the Germans to Lompadi, where the railroad was. There they put us in this big farm building where they used to keep the collective farm cattle, but the Germans had also taken the cattle back to Germany. There were about three hundred of us from the entire region crowded in that place, all young guys and girls. They stationed guards so we wouldn’t run off. Took us out only when we had to go. We stayed there for three whole days.

The Germans were waiting for a train to load us up and send us off. This train was coming from Yukhnov and collecting all the others like us. It was a special train, just for young people.

It was pretty cold at that farm — it was late autumn, there was already a ton of snow, the roof had holes in it, and the windows were covered with boards. There wasn’t any stove. They fed us baked potatoes. They’d bring in a tub, set it in the middle; we’d grab the potatoes, laugh and eat, all of us grimy! And somehow everyone was happy: we were all young! We weren’t afraid of anything, we never even thought about death.

The front wasn’t far away. At night when we lay down, we could hear the guns firing:
boom, boom, boom
!

Then the train came. It was huge, with thirty-two cars. It had been going for a long time and was already full. So they started pushing us into the cars: girls separate, boys separate. There were already plenty of our people there. Then it finally hit us. Everyone was suddenly afraid, and the girls started crying: What will happen to us? Maybe they’ll murder us all!

I began to cry too though I rarely cried.

They shoved us in and slid the doors shut. The train headed west. There were about fifty of us girls in the car, but no benches, no bunks. The straw on the floor was soaked in piss; the corner was piled with shit. There was one tiny little window with a grate. It stank. Thank god, at least it was freezing cold; the shit in the corner froze solid. In the summer we’d have all suffocated from the stench.

The train crawled along slowly, stopping often. Some of us sat, some stood, like herrings in a barrel.

We began to talk. That made things easier. Some older girls nearby told me about their lives. They were from Medyn, city folk. Their fathers had died in the war; one had deserted, then worked as a
polizei
and blown himself up with a grenade: he touched the wrong part of it and that was that. He took out a couple of people’s eyes along with him.

One girl, she was eighteen, had lived with a German. Her mother lived with a German too, so they lived all right. This Tanya fell in love with the German, and when his division was moved and went on to Belorussia, she ran six versts alongside and kept howling: Martin! Martin! Then some officer got tired of her, took out his pistol, and shot at her feet. Three times. Then she left them alone.

Two women in our village also lived with Germans. They liked it fine. One of them always had tins and corn flour. She got pregnant after a while.

The girls in the car said that we’d be taken to work in Poland or Germany. Half the girls wanted to go to Germany, and half to Poland. The ones who wanted to go to Germany thought that there was no front there and a lot of food. And the ones who wanted to go to Poland said that the Germans would be defeated anyway and there would be war everywhere, so it was better to go to Poland, it would be easier to escape. They had big arguments.

There were four girls from Maloyaroslavets, committed Komsomol members; they had wanted to join the partisans but didn’t make it in time. Now all they could think of was how to get out of here, away from the train. But the Germans didn’t take us out for nature’s calls, and they didn’t feed us at all: How could you feed such a crowd?

We pissed right on the floor, on the straw. It all ran out through the cracks. And we made our way to the corner, to the pile, to take a shit. Everyone stood with their back to it, crowding away from it. They threw straw on the shit. One girl, a half-wit, sat nearby. She sang all kinds of songs. She was a village idiot, but the Germans took her, too, since she was young. She wasn’t afraid of the smell of shit. She sat next to that pile, picking lice out of her hair and singing.

The worst part was when the train stood still for a long time at substations, or in the middle of a field. We’re moving, moving, and then — screech! We stop. And stand there — for an hour, then maybe another. Then we’d creep on along.

We crawled across all of Belorussia that way.

We slept sitting up. We’d lean against one another and fall asleep...

Then the girls woke us up and said: We’ve entered Poland. It was early, early in the morning. I made my way to the little window and looked out: it was kind of cleaner there, prettier. There were fewer troops. Neat little houses. Very few burned ones.

Everyone started talking about how near Katowice there was a big camp for workers. There were only Russians, and from there they sent everyone all over Europe. Europe was very big, and in every corner there were Germans, in all the countries. At the time I didn’t know anything about Europe: I had only managed to finish four years of school. I just knew that Berlin was the capital of Germany.

But the girls from Medyn knew everything about Europe and talked about different cities, though they’d never been to them, either. That Tanya, the one who ran after Martin, said that Paris was the best of all. Her Martin had fought there. He told her how beautiful it was and what delicious wine they had. He gave her schnapps to drink. And he gave her a scarf. But she left him, it was all so stupid.

One girl said that we would all be herded into an underground factory where they sewed clothes for the Germans. Right now all across Germany there was an emergency secret order to sew a million padded jackets for the eastern front. Because they were getting ready to attack Moscow, and the Germans’ overcoats weren’t very warm. That’s why they were retreating. As soon as there were a million padded coats they would put them on the best divisions and those troops would jump into new tanks and make for Moscow. A
polizei
she knew had told her all about it.

Then the Komsomol girls started screaming that she was a rat and a traitor, that the Germans hadn’t been able to take Moscow in ’41, they’d frozen in their overcoats — and rightly so. And when the Red Army finally smashed the Germans, they’d bring Hitler to Moscow, straight to Red Square, and they’d hang him by his feet across from the Mausoleum; they’d hang traitors like her right next to him. They said Comrade Stalin would demand an account from everyone: people who had surrendered, people who’d licked the Germans boots, and women who’d laid down under Germans.