Эльвира Барякина - Russian Treasures

Then Lubochka appeared in the corridor as solicitous as a gardener tending her plants. “Sablin, have you taken your medicine? Don’t forget, please. And put your gloves on when you go outside, or your hands will get cold.”

Imagine that we did manage to escape, thought Sablin. After traveling for weeks on a lice-ridden train in constant danger of being robbed or killed, imagine that they got as far as the frontline and survived the shelling and the raids. When everything was over, would he regret his decision? Would he go out of his mind with longing for Lubochka, for Nizhny Novgorod, for his job? There, on the other side of the frontline, Sablin couldn’t just walk into a hospital and say, “Take me on as a surgeon.”

What would happen to him there? How could he find a place for himself? And what use would he be to anyone there anyway as lame, shy, and unsociable as he was?

1

There was no point getting up before nine o’clock. It was still dark, and there was no electricity in the mornings.

With his hard-earned pay from his work on the Nizhny Novgorod Commune, Klim could afford half his breakfast: carrot tea and a piece of bread cut from a frozen loaf he had bought two weeks earlier for a hundred rubles. The other half—a slice of lemon, butter, and cheese—came courtesy of his generous cousin.

Lubochka smiled at his hesitation. “Are you ashamed to be taking gifts from me? Look at it this way—perhaps God is fond of you and using an intermediary to make sure you have lemon for your tea.”

“God must have a dubious sense of humor,” Klim said. “If He really wanted to send me provisions, He should have sent Admiral Kolchak with his White Army. After all, to judge by the Red propaganda posters, the admiral has seized all the food in Russia, including champagne and sausages.”

“At the moment, your Admiral Kolchak is stuck somewhere near the Ural Mountains,” Lubochka said as she poured herself a cup of tea. “He wouldn’t be able to get to Nizhny Novgorod in time for dinner, let alone breakfast.”

Klim left the house at eleven.

Perhaps it was true that everyone else in the world was descended from monkeys, he thought, or from Adam and Eve, but the Soviets must have had hamsters for ancestors. They were all constantly on the lookout for food and squirreling it away—if not into cheek pouches, then into bags and knapsacks.

Klim himself was no exception. There was a very good vegetarian canteen on the way to his newspaper office, and he usually dropped in when he could. The prices there might have been outrageous, but it was the only establishment in Nizhny Novgorod where you could eat without a union card or a special pass.

Unfortunately, the canteen was closed because it had been burglarized the previous night.

Klim decided to go to the Journalists’ House.

But he was out of luck. When he got there, he found an enormous queue of desperately hungry people, most of whom looked as though they could never have even read a newspaper article, let alone written one.

“Our oven isn’t working,” announced the cook, appearing on the porch. “It’ll be at least an hour before it’s fixed.”

There was nothing for it but to go into work.

It was awfully cold in the editorial office. Klim’s colleagues were already busy warming up homemade ink with their breath.

“Klim, you’re late,” said Zotov, a young man with a somewhat vague job description who always kept a watchful eye on his coworkers and informed his superiors about everything that went on. Anton Emilievich—who had a good nose for useful people—held him in high regard.

Zotov pulled a red pencil from his pocket and walked over to a large cardboard sign on the wall. On one side of the sign was the slogan, “Praise to honest workers.” Below was a list of all those who came into work before Zotov and left after he did. The other side proclaimed, “Shame on idlers and loafers.” Naturally, Klim Rogov’s was the first name on this list.

Zotov put yet another big black cross next to Klim’s name and announced that all of the editorial staff had to sign up for a volunteer workday.

“Where are you sending us this time?” Klim asked. “To a sweets factory?”

The office girls laughed. “You wish! We’re being sent to unload freight cars.”

“Then I’m afraid I’m busy.”

Zotov wasn’t sure he could force Comrade Rogov to sign up to compulsory “voluntary” work because not only was Klim technically a foreigner but also apparently personally acquainted with Trotsky.

With a determined look, Zotov set off to see Anton Emilievich’s office. He spent some time inside airing his grievances. As a result, Anton Emilievich gave his nephew a very public reprimand so that nobody should accuse him of nepotism.

“Klim, we have a team here. You behave as though you’re not part of that team.”

To hell with them, Klim thought and went off to the accounts department. He was more interested in when they would get the promised delivery of cabbage from the Journalists’ Union.

The woman in the accounts department told him that the cabbage would be coming in tomorrow. However, it wouldn’t be given to the journalists but to the guards outside the newspaper office. A machine gun detachment had been assigned to protect the Nizhny Novgorod Commune in case the Whites should take it into their heads to seize the newspaper.

Klim wasn’t at all in the mood for work. All he wanted was to go home and sit by the warm stove. Nevertheless, he went over to his place by the windowsill next to a frozen rubber plant, sat down on his broken-backed chair, and unfastened the top button of his overcoat. Today, he had to write a letter from a worker in a steel factory wishing Comrade Lenin a speedy recovery.

The resulting letter was as full of emotion as a passionate love poem. If Lenin had only known how many fervent lines Klim had dedicated to him, he might have shown his gratitude by issuing Comrade Rogov the pair of shoes he needed so badly. But how would the great and glorious Soviet leader ever find out about the heroic labors of a humble journalist?

There was a flutter among the female members of staff as the military instructor, a handsome man in a fur hat, came into the office. The newspaper workers sat themselves down in a circle to listen to him. Klim noticed that the proofreaders were wearing lipstick. Where do you even get ahold of lipstick these days? he wondered.

The instructor read out “Order #4 of the Military Affairs Committee”:

Forthwith, all Soviet office employees are to learn revolutionary songs. The singing of ideologically empty songs from the prerevolutionary period is prohibited.

No one came forward to say they knew any revolutionary songs.

“Then we shall write down the lyrics,” ordered the instructor.

But this was impossible since the ink was still frozen.

“Then we’ll learn the songs by heart,” he declared.

By the time they had gotten to the second verse, the military instructor was also shivering with cold. “That’s all for today. Any questions?”

The proofreaders raised their hands.

“If the authorities don’t allocate us firewood to heat the editorial office,” Zotov interrupted, “I shall resign and go to the frontline.”

Zotov was just bluffing, of course. But it would be good, thought Klim, if the bluff paid off and something was done about the heating.

As night fell, the editorial staff went home. On his way back, Klim visited the Journalists’ House again. People were still queuing in front of the closed doors.

“When are they going to open the canteen?” Klim asked.

“We don’t know.”

“Why are you waiting then?”

“Just in case.”

A grubby-faced street boy came up to Klim and winked at him. Klim needed no further explanation. He was to follow the boy to a side street where a citizen keen to keep a low profile would be waiting to do business with him.

It was a good thing these days to look young and healthy and, therefore, well-off. The street boys who worked for the bagmen would pick you out of the crowd and take you to where you could buy coveted supplies: buckwheat, bread crumbs, or even birch logs for the fire. Those who looked shabbier had to rely on the canteens because all of the markets had been shut down. At the same time, anyone who looked wealthy ran a greater risk of being knocked over the head in a dark alley. So, Klim followed the boy with no idea of what was waiting for him around the corner.

2

“Sofia Karlovna! Can it really be you?”

The old countess put her finger to her lips. She gave the boy a tip and waited until he had dashed off before shaking Klim by the hand.

“There was a Cheka man standing in the queue,” she said. “He was the one who searched our house. I was afraid he might recognize me if I went any closer. Tell me, how are you?”

Though the old countess had aged considerably, she still cut an impressive figure in her worn moleskin overcoat, velvet hat, and white headscarf. She was pulling her bags along using a child’s sled.

“Nina and I have been looking for you everywhere,” said Klim.

The old countess’ face lit up. “So, Nina is still alive? I lit a candle in her memory after I read in the newspaper that poor Zhora and Elena had been shot. I thought the Cheka had killed Nina too.”

Klim told her everything that had happened.

“So, you helped her escape arrest?” the old countess gasped. “You must come and visit us. I live with Anna Evgenievna now. Do you know her? She’s a wonderful lady. There aren’t so many of her kind left these days.”