Ilf and Petrov. The Twelve Chairs
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... it then!"Bender found a pair of scissors and in a flash snipped off the
moustache, which fell silently to the floor. When the hair had been cropped,
the technical adviser took a yellowed Gillette razor from his pocket and a
spare blade from his wallet, and began shaving Ippolit Matveyevich, who was
almost in tears by this time.
"I'm using my last blade on you, so don't forget to credit me with two
roubles for the shave and haircut."
"Why so expensive?" Ippolit managed to ask, although he was convulsed
with grief. "It should only cost forty kopeks."
"For reasons of security, Comrade Field Marshal!" promptly answered
Ostap.
The sufferings of a man whose head is being shaved with a safety razor
are incredible. This became clear to Ippolit Matveyevich from the very
beginning of the operation. But all things come to an end.
"There! The hearing continues! Those suffering from nerves shouldn't
look."
Ippolit Matveyevich shook himself free of the nauseating tufts that
until so recently had been distinguished grey hair, washed himself and,
feeling a strong tingling sensation all over his head, looked at himself in
the mirror for the hundredth time that day. He was unexpectedly pleased by
what he saw. Looking at him was the careworn, but rather youthful, face of
an unemployed actor.
"Right, forward march, the bugle is sounding!" cried Ostap. "I'll make
tracks for the housing division, while you go to the old women."
"I can't," said Ippolit Matveyevich. "It's too painful for me to enter
my own house."
"I see. A touching story. The exiled baron! All right, you go to the
housing division, and I'll get busy here. Our rendezvous will be here in the
caretaker's room. Platoon: 'shun!"
CHAPTER EIGHT
THE BASHFUL CHISELLER
The Assistant Warden of the Second Home of Stargorod Social Security
Administration was a shy little thief. His whole being protested against
stealing, yet it was impossible for him not to steal. He stole and was
ashamed of himself. He stole constantly and was constantly ashamed of
himself, which was why his smoothly shaven cheeks always burned with a blush
of confusion, shame, bashfulness and embarrassment. The assistant warden's
name was Alexander Yakovlevich, and his wife's name was Alexandra
Yakovlevna. He used to call her Sashchen, and she used to call him Alchen.
The world has never seen such a bashful chiseller as Alexander Yakovlevich.
He was not only the assistant warden, but also the chief warden. The
previous one had been dismissed for rudeness to the inmates, and had been
appointed conductor of a symphony orchestra. Alchen was completely different
from his ill-bred boss. Under the system of fuller workdays, he took upon
himself the running of the home, treating the pensioners with marked
courtesy, and introducing important reforms and innovations.
Ostap Bender pulled the heavy oak door of the Vorobyaninov home and
found himself in the hall. There was a smell of burnt porridge. From the
upstairs rooms came the confused sound of voices, like a distant "hooray"
from a line of troops. There was no one about and no one appeared. An oak
staircase with two flights of once-lacquered stairs led upward. Only the
rings were now left; there was no sign of the stair rods that had once held
the carpet in place.
"The Comanche chief lived in vulgar luxury," thought Ostap as he went
upstairs.
In the first room, which was spacious and light, fifteen or so old
women in dresses made of the cheapest mouse-grey woollen cloth were sitting
in a circle.
Craning their necks and keeping their eyes on a healthy-looking man in
the middle, the old women were singing:
"We hear the sound of distant jingling,
The troika's on its round;
Far into the distant stretches
The sparkling snowy ground."
The choirmaster, wearing a shirt and trousers of the same mouse-grey
material, was beating time with both hands and, turning from side to side,
kept shouting:
"Descants, softer! Kokushkin, not so loud!"
He caught sight of Ostap, but unable to restrain the movement of his
hands, merely glanced at the newcomer and continued conducting. The choir
increased its volume with an effort, as though singing through a pillow.
"Ta-ta-ta, ta-ta-ta, ta-ta-ta,
Te-ro-rom, tu-ru-rum, tu-ru-rum . . ."
"Can you tell me where I can find the assistant warden?" asked Ostap,
breaking into the first pause.
"What do you want, Comrade?"
Ostap shook the conductor's hand and inquired amiably: "National
folk-songs? Very interesting! I'm the fire inspector."
The assistant warden looked ashamed.
"Yes, yes," he said, with embarrassment. "Very opportune. I was
actually going to write you a report."
"There's nothing to worry about," said Ostap magnanimously. "I'll write
the report myself. Let's take a look at the premises."
Alchen dismissed the choir with a wave of his hand, and the old women
made off with little steps of delight.
"Come this way," invited the assistant warden.
Before going any further, Ostap scrutinized the furniture in the first
room. It consisted of a table, two garden benches with iron legs (one of
them had the name "Nicky" carved on the back), and a light-brown harmonium.
"Do they use primus stoves or anything of that kind in this room?"
"No, no. This is where our recreational activities are held. We have a
choir, and drama, painting, drawing, and music circles."
When he reached the word "music" Alexander Yakovlevich blushed. First
his chin turned red, then his forehead and cheeks. Alchen felt very ashamed.
He had sold all the instruments belonging to the wind section a long time
before. The feeble lungs of the old women had never produced anything more
than a puppy-like squeak from them, anyway. It was ridiculous to see such a
mass of metal in so helpless a condition. Alchen had not been able to resist
selling the wind section, and now he felt very guilty.
A slogan written in large letters on a piece of the same mouse-grey
woollen cloth spanned the wall between the windows. It said:
A BRASS BAND IS THE PATH
TO COLLECTIVE CREATIVITY
"Very good," said Ostap. "This recreation room does not constitute a
fire hazard. Let's go on."
Passing through the front rooms of Vorobyaninov's house, Ostap could
see no sign of a walnut chair with curved legs and English chintz
upholstery. The iron-smooth walls were plastered with directives issued to
the Second Home. Ostap read them and, from time to time, asked
enthusiastically:
"Are the chimneys swept regularly? Are the stoves working properly?"
And, receiving exhaustive answers, moved on.
The fire inspector made a diligent search for at least one corner of
the house which might constitute a fire hazard, but in that respect
everything seemed to be in order. His second quest, however, was less
successful. Ostap went into the dormitories. As he appeared, the old women
stood up and bowed low. The rooms contained beds covered with blankets, as
hairy as a dog's coat, with the word "Feet" woven at one end. Below the beds
were trunks, which at the initiative of Alexander Yakovlevich, who liked to
do things in a military fashion, projected exactly one-third of their
length.
Everything in the Home was marked by its extreme modesty; the furniture
that consisted solely of garden benches taken from Alexander Boulevard (now
renamed in honour of the Proletarian Voluntary Saturdays), the paraffin
lamps bought at the local market, and the very blankets with that
frightening word, "Feet". One feature of the house, however, had been made
to last and was developed on a grand scale-to wit, the door springs.
Door springs were Alexander Yakovlevich's passion. Sparing no effort,
he fitted all the doors in the house with springs of different types and
systems. There were very simple ones in the form of an iron rod;
compressed-air ones with cylindrical brass pistons; there were ones with
pulleys that raised and lowered heavy bags of shot. There were springs which
were so complex in design that the local mechanic could only shake his head
in wonder. And all the cylinders, springs and counterweights were very
powerful, slamming doors shut with the swiftness of a mousetrap. Whenever
the mechanisms operated, the whole house shook. With pitiful squeals, the
old women tried to escape the onslaught of the doors, but not always with
success. The doors gave the fugitives a thump in the back, and at the same
time, a counterweight shot past their ears with a dull rasping sound.
As Bender and the assistant warden walked around the house, the doors
fired a noisy salute.
But the feudal magnificence had nothing to hide: the chair was not
there. As the search progressed, the fire inspector found himself in the
kitchen. Porridge was cooking in a large copper pot and gave off the smell
that the smooth operator had noticed in the hall. Ostap wrinkled his nose
and said: "What is it cooking in? Lubricating oil?" "It's pure butter, I
swear it," said Alchen, blushing to the roots of his hair. "We buy it from a
farm." He felt very ashamed.
"Anyway, it's not a fire risk," observed Ostap. The chair was not in
the kitchen, either. There was only a stool, occupied by the cook, wearing a
cap and apron of mouse-grey woollen material.
"Why is everybody's clothing grey? That cloth isn't even fit to wipe
the windows with!" The shy Alchen was even more embarrassed. "We don't
receive enough funds." He was disgusted with himself.
Ostap looked at him disbelievingly and said: "That is no concern of the
fire brigade, which I am at present representing." Alchen was alarmed.
"We've taken all the necessary fire precautions," he declared. "We even
have a fire extinguisher. An Eclair."
The fire inspector reluctantly proceeded in the direction of the fire
extinguisher, peeping into the lumber rooms as he went. The red-iron nose of
the extinguisher caused the inspector particular annoyance, despite the fact
that it was the only object in the house which had any connection with fire
precautions. "Where did you get it? At the market?" And without waiting for
an answer from the thunderstruck Alexander Yakovlevich, he removed the
Eclair from the rusty nail on which it was hanging, broke the capsule
without warning, and quickly pointed the nose in the air. But instead of the
expected stream of foam, all that came out was a high-pitched hissing which
sounded like the ancient hymn "How Glorious Is Our Lord on Zion".
"You obviously did get it at the market," said Ostap, his earlier
opinion confirmed. And he put back the fire extinguisher, which was still
hissing, in its place.
They moved on, accompanied by the hissing.
Where can it be? wondered Ostap. I don't like the look of things. And
he made up his mind not to leave the place until he had found out the truth.
While the fire inspector and the assistant warden were crawling about
the attics, considering fire precautions in detail and examining the
chimneys, the Second Home of the Stargorod Social Security Administration
carried on its daily routine.
Dinner was ready. The smell of burnt porridge had appreciably
increased, and it overpowered all the sourish smells inhabiting the house.
There was a rustling in the corridors. Holding iron bowls full of porridge
in front of them with both hands, the old women cautiously emerged from the
kitchen and sat down at a large table, trying not to look at the refectory
slogans, composed by Alexander Yakolevich and painted by his wife. The
slogans read:
FOOD IS THE SOURCE OF HEALTH
ONE EGG CONTAINS AS MUCH FAT AS A HALF-POUND OF MEAT
BY CAREFULLY MASTICATING YOUR FOOD YOU HELP SOCIETY
MEAT IS BAD FOR YOU
These sacred words aroused in the old ladies memories of teeth that had
disappeared before the revolution, eggs that had been lost at approximately
the same time, meat that was inferior to eggs in fat, and perhaps even the
society that they were prevented from helping by careful mastication.
Seated at table in addition to the old women were Isidor, Afanasy,
Cyril and Oleg, and also Pasha Emilevich. Neither in age nor sex did these
young men fit into the pattern of social security, but they were the younger
brothers of Alchen, and Pasha Emilevich was Alexandra Yakovlevna's cousin,
once removed. The young men, the oldest of whom was the thirty-two-year-old
Pasha Emilevich, did not consider their life in the pensioners' home in any
way abnormal. They lived on the same basis as the old women; they too had
government-property beds and blankets with the word "Feet"; they were
clothed in the same mouse-grey material as the old women, but on account of
their youth and strength they ate better than the latter. They stole
everything in the house that Alchen did not manage to steal himself. Pasha
could put away four pounds of fish at one go, and he once did so, leaving
the home dinnerless.
Hardly had the old women had time to taste their porridge when the
younger brothers and Pasha Emilevich rose from the table, having gobbled
down their share, and went, belching, into the kitchen to look for something
more digestible.
The meal continued. The old women began jabbering:
"Now they'll stuff themselves full and start bawling songs."
"Pasha Emilevich sold the chair from the recreation room this morning.
A second-hand dealer took it away at the back door."
"Just you see. He'll come home drunk tonight."
At this moment the pensioners' conversation was interrupted by a
trumpeting noise that even drowned the hissing of the fire extinguisher, and
a husky voice began:
'. . . vention .. ."
The old women hunched their shoulders and, ignoring the loudspeaker in
the corner on the floor, continued eating in the hope that fate would spare
them, but the loud-speaker cheerfully went on: •
"Evecrashshsh . . . viduso . . . valuable invention. Railwayman of the
Murmansk Railway, Comrade Sokutsky, S Samara, O Oriel, K Kaliningrad, U
Urals, Ts Tsaritsina, K Kaliningrad, Y York. So-kuts-ky."
The trumpet wheezed and renewed the broadcast in a thick voice.
". . . vented a system of signal lights for snow ploughs. The invention
has been approved by Dorizul. . . ."
The old women floated away to their rooms like grey ducklings. The
loud-speaker, jigging up and down by its own power, blared away into the
empty room:
"And we will now play some Novgorod folk music."
Far, far away, in the centre of the earth, someone strummed a balalaika
and a black-earth Battistini broke into song:
"On the wall the bugs were sitting,
Blinking at the sky;
Then they saw the tax inspector
And crawled away to die."
In the centre of the earth the verses brought forth a storm of
activity. A horrible gurgling was heard from the loud-speaker. It was
something between thunderous applause and the eruption of an underground
volcano.
Meanwhile the disheartened fire inspector had descended an attic ladder
backwards and was now back in the kitchen, where he saw five citizens
digging into a barrel of sauerkraut and bolting it down. They ate in
silence. Pasha Emilevich alone waggled his head in the style of an epicurean
and, wiping some strings of cabbage from his moustache, observed:
"It's a sin to eat cabbage like this without vodka."
"Is this a new intake of women?" asked Ostap.
"They're orphans," replied Alchen, shouldering the inspector out of the
kitchen and surreptitiously shaking his fist at the orphans.
"Children of the Volga Region?"
Alchen was confused.
"A trying heritage from the Tsarist regime?"
Alchen spread his arms as much as to say: "There's nothing you can do
with a heritage like that."
"Co-education by the composite method?"
Without further hesitation the bashful Alchen invited the fire
inspector to take pot luck and lunch with him.
Pot luck that day happened to be a bottle of Zubrovka vodka,
home-pickled mushrooms, minced herring, Ukrainian beet soup containing
first-grade meat, chicken and rice, and stewed apples.
"Sashchen," said Alexander Yakovlevich, "I want you to meet a comrade
from the province fire-precaution administration."
Ostap made his hostess a theatrical bow and paid her such an
interminable and ambiguous compliment that he could hardly get to the end of
it. Sashchen, a buxom woman, whose good looks were somewhat marred by
sideburns of the kind that Tsar Nicholas used to have, laughed softly and
took a drink with the two men.
"Here's to your communal services," exclaimed Ostap.
The lunch went off gaily, and it was not until they reached the stewed
fruit that Ostap remembered the point of his visit.
"Why is it," he asked, "that the furnishings are so skimpy in your
establishment?"
"What do you mean?" said Alchen. "What about the harmonium?"
"Yes, I know, vox humana. But you have absolutely nothing at all of any
taste to sit on. Only garden benches."
"There's a chair in the recreation room," said Alchen in an offended
tone. "An English chair. They say it was left over from the original
furniture."
"By the way, I didn't see your recreation room. How is it from the
point of view of fire hazard? It won't let you down, I hope. I had better
see it."
"Certainly."
Ostap thanked his hostess for the lunch and left.
No primus was used in the recreation room; there was no portable stove
of any kind; the chimneys were in a good state of repair and were cleaned
regularly, but the chair, to the incredulity of Alchen, was missing. They
ran to look for it. They looked under the beds and under the trunks; for
some reason or other they moved back the harmonium; they questioned the old
women, who kept looking at Pasha Emilevich timidly, but the chair was just
not there. Pasha Emilevich himself showed great enthusiasm in the search.
When all had calmed down, Pasha still kept wandering from room to room,
looking under decanters, shifting iron teaspoons, and muttering:
"Where can it be? I saw it myself this morning. It's ridiculous !"
"It's depressing, girls," said Ostap in an icy voice.
"It's absolutely ridiculous!" repeated Pasha Emilevich impudently.
At this point, however, the Eclair fire extinguisher, which had been
hissing the whole time, took a high F, which only the People's Artist,
Nezhdanova, can do, stopped for a second and then emitted its first stream
of foam, which soaked the ceiling and knocked the cook's cap off. The first
stream of foam was followed by another, mouse-grey in colour, which bowled
over young Isidor Yakovlevich. After that the extinguisher began working
smoothly. Pasha Emilevich, Alchen and all the surviving brothers raced to
the spot.
"Well done," said Ostap. "An idiotic invention!"
As soon as the old women were left alone with Ostap and without the
boss, they at once began complaining:
"He's brought his family into the home. They eat up everything."
"The piglets get milk and we get porridge."
"He's taken everything out of the house."
"Take it easy, girls," said Ostap, retreating. "You need someone from
the labour-inspection department. The Senate hasn't empowered me . . ."
The old women were not listening.
"And that Pasha Melentevich. He went and sold a chair today. I saw him
myself."
"Who did he sell it to? " asked Ostap quickly.
"He sold it. . . that's all. He was going to steal my blanket. . ."
A fierce struggle was going on in the corridor. But mind finally
triumphed over matter and the extinguisher, trampled under Pasha Emilevich's
feet of iron, gave a last dribble and was silent for ever.
The old women were sent to clean the floor. Lowering his head and
waddling slightly, the fire inspector went up to Pasha Emilevich.
"A friend of mine," began Ostap importantly, "also used to sell
government property. He now lives a monastic life in the penitentiary."
"I find your groundless accusations strange," said Pasha, who smelled
strongly of foam.
"Who did you sell the chair to?" asked Ostap in a ringing whisper.
Pasha Emilevich, who had supernatural understanding, realized at this
point he was about to be beaten, if not kicked.
"To a second-hand dealer."
"What's his address?"
"I'd never seen him before."
"Never?"
"No, honestly."
"I ought to bust you in the mouth," said Ostap dreamily, "only
Zarathustra wouldn't allow it. Get to hell out of here!"
Pasha Emilevich grinned fawningly and began walking away.
"Come back, you abortion," cried Ostap haughtily. "What was the dealer
like?"
Pasha Emilevich described him in detail, while Ostap listened
carefully. The interview was concluded by Ostap with the words: "This
clearly has nothing to do with fire precautions."
In the corridor the bashful Alchen went up to Ostap and gave him a gold
piece.
"That comes under Article 114 of the Criminal Code," said Ostap.
"Bribing officials in the course of their duty."
Nevertheless he took the money and, without saying good-bye, went
towards the door. The door, which was fitted with a powerful contraption,
opened with an effort and gave Ostap a one-and-a-half-ton shove in the
backside.
"Good shot!" said Ostap, rubbing the affected part. "The hearing is
continued."
CHAPTER NINE
WHERE ARE YOUR CURLS?
While Ostap was inspecting the pensioners' home, Ippolit Matveyevich
had left the caretaker's room and was wandering along the streets of his
home town, feeling the chill on his shaven head.
Along the road trickled clear spring water. There was a constant
splashing and plopping as diamond drops dripped from the rooftops. Sparrows
hunted for manure, and the sun rested on the roofs. Golden carthorses
drummed their hoofs against the bare road and, turning their ears downward,
listened with pleasure to their own sound. On the damp telegraph poles the
wet advertisements, "I teach the guitar by the number system" and
"Social-science lessons for those preparing for the People's Conservatory",
were all wrinkled up, and the letters had run. A platoon of Red Army
soldiers in winter helmets crossed a puddle that began at the Stargorod
co-operative shop and stretched as far as the province planning
administration, the pediment of which was crowned with plaster tigers,
figures of victory and cobras.
Ippolit Matveyevich walked along, looking with interest at the people
passing him in both directions. As one who had spent the whole of his life
and also the revolution in Russia, he was able to see how the way of life
was changing and acquiring a new countenance. He had become used to this
fact, but he seemed to be used to only one point on the globe-the regional
centre of N. Now he was back in his home town, he realized he understood
nothing. He felt just as awkward and strange as though he really were an
emigre just back from Paris. In the old days, whenever he rode through the
town in his carriage, he used invariably to meet friends or people he knew
by sight. But now he had gone some way along Lena Massacre Street and there
was no friend to be seen. They had vanished, or they might have changed so
much that they were no longer recognizable, or perhaps they had become
unrecognizable because they wore different clothes and different hats.
Perhaps they had changed their walk. In any case, they were no longer there.
Vorobyaninov walked along, pale, cold and lost. He completely forgot
that he was supposed to be looking for the housing division. He crossed from
pavement to pavement and turned into side streets, where the uninhibited
carthorses were quite intentionally drumming their hoofs. There was more of
winter in the side streets, and rotting ice was still to be seen in places.
The whole town was a different colour; the blue houses had become green and
the yellow ones grey. The fire indicators had disappeared from the fire
tower, the fireman no longer climbed up and down, and the streets were much
noisier than Ippolit Matveyevich could remember.
On Greater Pushkin Street, Ippolit Matveyevich was amazed by the tracks
and overhead cables of the tram system, which he had never seen in Stargorod
before. He had not read the papers and did not know that the two tram routes
to the station and the market were due to be opened on May Day. At one
moment Ippolit Matveyevich felt he had never left Stargorod, and the next
moment it was like a place completely unfamiliar to him.
Engrossed in these thoughts, he reached Marx and Engels Street. Here he
re-experienced a childhood feeling that at any moment a friend would appear
round the corner of the two-storeyed house with its long balcony. He even
stopped walking in anticipation. But the friend did not appear. The first
person to come round the corner was a glazier with a box of Bohemian glass
and a dollop of copper-coloured putty. Then came a swell in a suede cap with
a yellow leather peak. He was pursued by some elementary-school children
carrying books tied with straps.
Suddenly Ippolit Matveyevich felt a hotness in his palms and a sinking
feeling in his stomach. A stranger with a kindly face was coming straight
towards him, carrying a chair by the middle, like a 'cello. Suddenly
developing hiccups Ippolit Matveyevich looked closely at the chair and
immediately recognized it.
Yes! It was a Hambs chair upholstered in flowered English chintz
somewhat darkened by the storms of the revolution; it was a walnut chair
with curved legs. Ippolit Matveyevich felt as though a gun had gone off in
his ear.
"Knives and scissors sharpened! Razors set!" cried a baritone voice
nearby. And immediately came the shrill echo;
"Soldering and repairing!"
"Moscow News, magazine Giggler, Red Meadow."
Somewhere up above, a glass pane was removed with a crash. A truck from
the grain-mill-and-lift-construction administration passed by, making the
town vibrate. A militiaman blew his whistle. Everything brimmed over with
life. There was no time to be lost.
With a leopard-like spring, Ippolit Matveyevich leaped towards the
repulsive stranger and silently tugged at the chair. The stranger tugged the
other way. Still holding on to one leg with his left hand, Ippolit
Matveyevich began forcibly detaching the stranger's fat fingers from the
chair.
"Thief!" hissed the stranger, gripping the chair more firmly.
"Just a moment, just a moment!" mumbled Ippolit Matveyevich, continuing
to unstick the stranger's fingers.
A crowd began to gather. Three or four people were already standing
nearby, watching the struggle with lively interest. They both glanced around
in alarm and, without looking at one another or letting go the chair,
rapidly moved on as if nothing were the matter.
"What's happening?" wondered Ippolit Matveyevich in dismay.
What the stranger was thinking was impossible to say, but he was
walking in a most determined way.
They kept walking more and more quickly until they saw a clearing
scattered with bits of brick and other building materials at the end of a
blind alley; then both turned into it simultaneously. Ippolit Matveyevich's
strength now increased fourfold.
"Give it to me!" he shouted, doing away with all ceremony.
"Help!" exclaimed the stranger, almost inaudibly.
Since both of them had their hands occupied with the chair, they began
kicking one another. The stranger's boots had metal studs, and at first
Ippolit Matveyevich came off badly. But he soon adjusted himself, and,
skipping to the left and right as though doing a Cossack dance, managed to
dodge his opponents' blows, trying at the same time to catch him in the
stomach. He was not successful, since the chair was in the way, but he
managed to land him a kick on the kneecap, after which the enemy could only
lash out with one leg.
"Oh, Lord!" whispered the stranger.
It was at this moment that Ippolit Matveyevich saw that the stranger
who had carried off his chair in the most outrageous manner was none other
than Father Theodore, priest of the Church of St. Frol and St. Laurence.
"Father!" he exclaimed, removing his hands from the chair in
astonishment.
Father Vostrikov turned purple and finally loosed his grip. The chair,
no longer supported by either of them, fell on to the brick-strewn ground.
"Where's your moustache, my dear Ippolit Matveyevich?" asked the cleric
as caustically as possible.
"And what about your curls? You used to have curls, I believe!"
Ippolit Matveyevich's words conveyed utter contempt. He threw Father
Theodore a look of singular disgust and, tucking the chair under his arm,
turned to go. But the priest had now recovered from his embarrassment and
was not going to yield Vorobyaninov such an easy victory. With a cry of "No,
I'm sorry," he grasped hold of the chair again. Their initial position was
restored. The two opponents stood clutching the chair and, moving from side
to side, sized one another up like cats or boxers. The tense pause lasted a
whole minute.
"So you're after my property, Holy Father?" said Ippolit Matveyevich
through clenched teeth and kicked the holy father in the hip.
Father Theodore feinted and viciously kicked the marshal in the groin,
making him double up.
"It's not your property."
"Whose then?"
"Not yours!"
"Whose then?"
"Not yours!"
"Whose then? Whose?"
Spitting at each other in this way, they kept kicking furiously.
"Whose property is it then?" screeched the marshal, sinking his foot in
the holy father's stomach.
"It's nationalized property," said the holy father firmly, overcoming
his pain.
"Nationalized? "
"Yes, nationalized."
They were jerking out the words so quickly that they ran together.
" Who-nationalized-it? "
"The-Soviet-Government. The-Soviet-Government."
"Which-government? "
"The-working-people's-government."
"Aha!" said Ippolit Matveyevich icily. "The government of workers and
peasants?"
"Yes!"
"Hmm . . . then maybe you're a member of the Communist Party, Holy
Father?"
"Maybe I am!"
Ippolit Matveyevich could no longer restrain himself and with a shriek
of "Maybe you are" spat juicily in Father Theodore's kindly face. Father
Theodore immediately spat in Ippolit Matveyevich's face and also found his
mark. They had nothing with which to wipe away the spittle since they were
still holding the chair. Ippolit Matveyevich made a noise like a door
opening and thrust the chair at his enemy with all his might. The enemy fell
over, dragging the panting Vorobyaninov with him. The struggle continued in
the stalls.
Suddenly there was a crack and both front legs broke on simultaneous'y.
The opponents completely forgot one another and began tearing the walnut
treasure-chest to pieces. The flowered English chintz split with the
heart-rending scream of a seagull. The back was torn off by a mighty tug.
The treasure hunters ripped off the sacking together with the brass tacks
and, grazing their hands on the springs, buried their fingers in the woollen
stuffing. The disturbed springs hummed. Five minutes later the chair had
been picked clean. Bits and pieces were all that was left. Springs rolled in
all directions, and the wind blew the rotten padding all over the clearing.
The curved legs lay in a hole. There were no jewels.
"Well, have you found anything?" asked Ippolit Matveyevich, panting.
Father Theodore, covered in tufts of wool, puffed and said nothing.
"You crook!" shouted Ippolit Matveyevich. "I'll break your neck, Father
Theodore!"
"I'd like to see you! " retorted the priest. "Where are you going all
covered in fluff? " "Mind your own business!"
"Shame on you, Father! You're nothing but a thief!" "I've stolen
nothing from you."
"How did you find out about this? You exploited the sacrament of
confession for your own ends. Very nice! Very fine!"
With an indignant "Fooh! " Ippolit Matveyevich left the clearing and,
brushing his sleeve as he went, made for home. At the corner of Lena
Massacre and Yerogeyev streets he caught sight of his partner. The technical
adviser and director-general of the concession was having the suede uppers
of his boots cleaned with canary polish; he was standing half-turned with
one foot slightly raised. Ippolit Matveyevich hurried up to him. The
director was gaily crooning the shimmy:
"The camels used to do it,
The barracudas used to dance it,
Now the whole world's doing the shimmy."
"Well, how was the housing division?" he asked in a businesslike way,
and immediately added:
"Wait a moment. Don't tell me now; you're too excited. Cool down a
little."
Giving the shoeshiner seven kopeks, Ostap took Vorobyaninov by the arm
and led him down the street. He listened very carefully to everything the
agitated Ippolit Matveyevich told him.
"Aha! A small black beard? Right! A coat with a sheepskin collar? I
see. That's the chair from the pensioner's home. It was bought today for
three roubles."
"But wait a moment. . . ."
And Ippolit Matveyevich told the chief concessionaire all about Father
Theodore's low tricks.
Ostap's face clouded.
"Too bad," he said. "Just like a detective story. We have a mysterious
rival. We must steal a march on him. We can always break his head later."
As the friends were having a snack in the Stenka Razin beer-hall and
Ostap was asking questions about the past and present state of the housing
division, the day came to an end.
The golden carthorses became brown again. The diamond drops grew cold
in mid-air and plopped on to the ground. In the beer-halls and Phoenix
restaurant the price of beer went up. Evening had come; the street lights on
Greater Pushkin Street lit up and a detachment of Pioneers went by, stamping
their feet, on the way home from their first spring outing.
The tigers, figures of victory, and cobras on top of the
province-planning administration shone mysteriously in the light of the
advancing moon.
As he made his way home with Ostap, who was now suddenly silent,
Ippolit Matveyevich gazed at the tigers and cobras. In his time, the
building had housed the Provincial Government and the citizens had been
proud of their cobras, considering them one of the sights of Stargorod.
"I'll find them," thought Ippolit Matveyevich, looking at one of the
plaster figures of victory.
The tigers swished their tails lovingly, the cobras contracted with
delight, and Ippolit Matveyevich's heart filled with determination.
CHAPTER TEN
THE MECHANIC, THE PARROT, AND THE FORTUNE-TELLER
No. 7 Pereleshinsky Street was not one of Stargorod's best buildings.
Its two storeys were constructed in the style of the Second Empire and were
embellished with timeworn lion heads, singularly reminiscent of the once
well-known writer Artsybashec. There were exactly seven of these
Artsybashevian physiognomies, one for each of the windows facing on to the
street. The faces had been placed at the keystone of each window.
There were two other embellishments on the building, though these were
of a purely commercial nature. On one side hung the radiant sign:
ODESSA ROLL BAKERY
MOSCOW
BUN ARTEL
The sign depicted a young man wearing a tie and ankle-length French
trousers. Ift one dislocated hand he held the fabulous cornucopia, from
which poured an avalanche of ochre-coloured buns; whenever necessary, these
were passed off as Moscow rolls. The young man had a sexy smile on his face.
On the other side, the Fastpack packing office announced itself to
prospective clients by a black board with round gold lettering.
Despite the appreciable difference in the signs and also in the capital
possessed by the two dissimilar enterprises, they both engaged in the same
business, namely, speculation in all types of fabrics: coarse wool, fine
wool, cotton, and, whenever silk of good colour and design came their way,
silk as well.
Passing through the tunnel-like gateway and turning right into the yard
with its cement well, you could see two doorways without porches, giving
straight on to the angular flagstones of the yard. A dulled brass plate with
a name engraved in script was fixed to the right-hand door:
V.M. POLESOV
The left-hand door was fitted with a piece of whitish tin:
FASHIONS AND MILLINERY
This was also only for show.
Inside the fashions-and-millinery workroom there was no esparterie, no
trimmings, no headless dummies with soldierly bearing, nor any large heads
for elegant ladies' hats. Instead, the three-room apartment was occupied by
an immaculately white parrot in red underpants. The parrot was riddled with
fleas, but could not complain since it was unable to talk. For days on end
it used to crack sunflower seeds and spit the husks through the bars of its
tall, circular cage on to the carpet. It only needed a concertina and new
squeaky Wellingtons to resemble a peasant on a spree. Dark-brown patterned
curtains flapped at the window. Dark-brown hues predominated in the
apartment. Above the piano was a reproduction of Boecklin's "Isle of the
Dead" in a fancy frame of dark-green oak, covered with glass. One corner of
the glass had been broken off some time before, and the flies had added so
many finishing touches to the picture at this bared section that it merged
completely with the frame. What was going on in that section of the "Isle of
the Dead" was quite impossible to say.
The owner herself was sitting in the bedroom and laying out cards,
resting her arms on an octagonal table covered by a dirty Richelieu
tablecloth. In front of her sat Widow Gritsatsuyev, in a fluffy shawl.
"I should warn you, young lady, that I don't take less than fifty
kopeks per session,' said the fortune-teller.
The widow, whose anxiousness to find a new husband knew no bounds,
agreed to pay the price.
"But predict the future as well, please," she said plaintively. "You
will be represented by the Queen of Clubs." "I was always the Queen of
Hearts," objected the widow. The fortune-teller consented apathetically and
began manipulating the cards. A rough estimation of the widow's lot was
ready in a few minutes. Both major and minor difficulties awaited her, but
near to her heart was the King of Clubs, who had befriended the Queen of
Diamonds.
A fair copy of the prediction was made from the widow's hand. The lines
of her hand were clean, powerful, and faultless. Her life line stretched so
far that it ended up at her pulse and, if it told the truth, the widow
should have lived till doomsday. The head line and line of brilliancy gave
reason to believe that she would give up her grocery business and present
mankind with masterpieces in the realm of art, science, and social studies.
Her Mounts of Venus resembled Manchurian volcanoes and revealed incredible
reserves of love and affection. The fortune-teller explained all this to the
widow, using the words and phrases current among graphologists, palmists,
and horse-traders.
"Thank you, madame," said the widow. "Now I know who the King of Clubs
is. And I know who the Queen of Diamonds is, too. But what about the King?
Does that mean marriage?" "It does, young lady." The widow went home in a
dream, while the fortune-teller threw the cards into a drawer, yawned,
displaying the mouth of a fifty-year-old woman, and went into the kitchen.
There she busied herself with the meal that was warming on a Graetz stove;
wiping her hands on her apron like a cook, she took a chipped-enamel pail
and went into the yard to fetch water.
She walked across the yard, dragging her flat feet. Her drooping
breasts wobbled lazily inside her dyed blouse. Her head was crowned with
greying hair. She was an old woman, she was dirty, she regarded everyone
with suspicion, and she had a sweet tooth. If Ippolit Matveyevich had seen
her now, he would never have recognized Elena Bour, his former mistress,
about whom the clerk of the court had once said in verse that "her lips were
inviting and she was so spritely!" At the well, Mrs. Bour was greeted by her
neighbour, Victor Mikhailovich Polesov, the mechanic-intellectual, who was
collecting water in an empty petrol tin. Polesov had the face of an operatic
Mephistopheles who is carefully rubbed with burnt cork just before he goes
on stage.
As soon as they had exchanged greetings, the neighbours got down to a
discussion of the affair concerning the whole of Stargorod.
"What times we live in!" said Polesov ironically. "Yesterday I went all
over the town but couldn't find any three-eighths-inch dies anywhere. There
were none available. And to think-they're going to open a tramline!"
Elena Stanislavovna, who had as much idea about three-eighths-inch dies
as a student of the Leonardo da Vinci ballet school, who thinks that cream
comes from cream tarts, expressed her sympathy.
"The shops we have now! Nothing but long queues. And the names of the
shops are so dreadful. Stargiko!"
"But I'll tell you something else, Elena Stanislavovna. They have four
General Electric engines left. And they just about work, although the bodies
are junk. The windows haven't any shock absorbers. I've seen them myself.
The whole lot rattles. Horrible! And the other engines are from Kharkov.
Made entirely by the State Non-Ferrous Metallurgy Industry."
The mechanic stopped talking in irritation. His black face glistened in
the sun. The whites of his eyes were yellowish. Among the artisans owning
cars in Stargorod, of whom there were many, Victor Polesov was the most
gauche, and most frequently made an ass of himself. The reason for this was
his over-ebullient nature. He was an ebullient idler. He was forever
effervescing. In his own workshop in the second yard of no. 7 Pereleshinsky
Street, he was never to be found. Extinguished portable furnaces stood
deserted in the middle of his stone shed, the corners of which were
cluttered up with punctured tyres, torn Triangle tyre covers, rusty padlocks
(so enormous you could have locked town gates with them), fuel cans with the
names "Indian" and "Wanderer", a sprung pram, a useless dynamo, rotted
rawhide belts, oil-stained rope, worn emery paper, an Austrian bayonet, and
a great deal of other broken, bent and dented junk. Clients could never find
Victor Mikhailovich. He was always out somewhere giving orders. He had no
time for work. It was impossible for him to stand by and watch a horse . and
cart drive into his or anyone else's yard. He immediately went out and,
clasping his hands behind his back, watched the carter's actions with
contempt. Finally he could bear it no longer.
"Where do you think you're going?" he used to shout in a horrified
voice. "Move over!"
The startled carter would move the cart over.
"Where do you think you're moving to, wretch?" Victor Polesov cried,
rushing up to the horse. "In the old days you would have got a slap for
that, then you would have moved over."
Having given orders in this way for half an hour or so, Polesov would
be just about to return to his workshop, where a broken bicycle pump awaited
repair, when the peaceful life of the town would be disturbed by some other
contretemps. Either two carts entangled their axles in the street and Victor
Mikhailovich would show the best and quickest way to separate them, or
workmen would be replacing a telegraph pole and Polesov would check that it
was perpendicular with his own plumb-line brought specially from the
workshop; or, finally, the fire-engine would go past and Polesov, excited by
the noise of the siren and burned up with curiosity, would chase after it.
But from time to time Polesov was seized by a mood of practical
activity. For several days he used to shut himself up in his workshop and
toil in silence. Children ran freely about the yard and shouted what they
liked, carters described circles in the yard, carts completely stopped
entangling their axles and fire-engines and hearses sped to the fire
unaccompanied-Victor Mikhailovich was working. One day, after a bout of this
kind, he emerged from the workshop with a motor-cycle, pulling it like a ram
by the horns; the motor-cycle was made up of parts of cars,
fire-extinguishers, bicycles and typewriters. It had a one-and-a-half
horsepower Wanderer engine and Davidson wheels, while the other essential
parts had lost the name of the original maker. A piece of cardboard with the
words "Trial Run" hung on a cord from the saddle. A crowd gathered. Without
looking at anyone, Victor Mikhailovich gave the pedal a twist with his hand.
There was no spark for at least ten minutes, but then came a metallic
splutter and the contraption shuddered and enveloped itself in a cloud of
filthy smoke. Polesov jumped into the saddle, and the motor-cycle,
accelerating madly, carried him through the tunnel into the middle of the
roadway and stopped dead. Polesov was about to get off and investigate the
mysterious vehicle when it suddenly reversed and, whisking its creator
through the same tunnel, stopped at its original point of departure in the
yard, grunted peevishly, and blew up. Victor Mikhailovich escaped by a
miracle and during the next bout of activity used the bits of the
motor-cycle to make a stationary engine, very similar to a real one-except
that it did not work.
The crowning glory of the mechanic-intellectual's academic activity was
the epic of the gates of building no. 5, next door. The housing co-operative
that owned the building signed a contract with Victor Polesov under which he
undertook to repair the iron gates and paint them any colour he liked. For
its part, the housing co-operative agreed to pay Victor Mikhailovich Polesov
the sum of twenty-one roubles, seventy-five kopeks, subject to approval by a
special committee. The official stamps were charged to the contractor.
Victor Mikhailovich carried off the gates like Samson. He set to work
in his shop with enthusiasm. It took several days to un-rivet the gates.
They were taken to pieces. Iron curlicues lay in the pram; iron bars and
spikes were piled under the work-bench. It took another few days to inspect
the damage. Then a great disaster occurred in the town. A water main burst
on Drovyanaya Street, and Polesov spent the rest of the week at the scene of
the misfortune, smiling ironically, shouting at the workmen, and every few
minutes looking into the hole in the ground.
As soon as his organizational ardour had somewhat abated, Polesov
returned to his gates, but it was too late. The children from the yard were
already playing with the iron curlicues and spikes of the gates of no. 5.
Seeing the wrathful mechanic, the children dropped their playthings and
fled. Half the curlicues were missing and were never found. After that
Polesov lost interest in the gates.
But then terrible things began to happen in no. 5, which was now wide
open to all. The wet linen was stolen from the attics, and one evening
someone even carried off a samovar that was singing in the yard. Polesov
himself took part in the pursuit, but the thief ran at quite a pace, even
though he was holding the steaming samovar in front of him, and looking over
his shoulder, covered Victor Mikhailovich, who was in the lead, with foul
abuse. The one who suffered most, however, was the yard-keeper from no. 5.
He lost his nightly wage since there were now no gates, there was nothing to
open, and residents returning from a spree had no one to give a tip to. At
first the yard-keeper kept coming to ask if the gates would soon be
finished; then he tried praying, and finally resorted to vague threats. The
housing cooperative sent Polesov written reminders, and there was talk of
taking the matter to court. The situation had grown more and more tense.
Standing by the well, the fortune-teller and the mechanic-enthusiast
continued their conversation.
"Given the absence of seasoned sleepers," cried Victor Mikhailovich for
the whole yard to hear, "it won't be a tramway, but sheer misery!"
"When will all this end!" said Elena Stanislavovna. "We live like
savages!"
"There's no end to it. . . . Yes. Do you know who I saw today?
Vorobyaninov."
In her amazement Elena Stanislavovna leaned against the wall,
continuing to hold the full pail of water in mid-air.
"I had gone to the communal-services building to extend my contract for
the hire of the workshop and was going down the corridor when suddenly two
people came towards me. One of them seemed familiar; he looked like
Vorobyaninov. Then they asked me what the building had been in the old days.
I told them it used to be a girls' secondary school, and later became the
housing division. I asked them why they wanted to know, but they just said,
Thanks' and went off. Then I saw clearly that it really was Vorobyaninov,
only without his moustache. The other one with him was a fine-looking
fellow. Obviously a former officer. And then I thought. . ."
At that moment Victor Mikhailovich noticed so...
