Notes on the Cuff and Other Stories

by Mikhail Bulgakov

  Where am I going? Where? I'm wearing my last shirt. With crooked letters on my cuffs. And heavy hieroglyphs in my heart. I have deciphered only one of these mysterious signs. It says: woe is me! Who will interpret the others for me?

  *

  I lie like a corpse on pebbles washed by salt water. I am weak with hunger. My head aches from morning to midnight. Now it is night. I cannot see the sea, only hear it rolling. Surging to and fro. A tardy wave hisses. Suddenly three tiers of lights emerge from behind a dark promontory.

  The Polatsky is sailing to the Golden Horn.

  ……………………………………………………………….

  Tears salty as sea water.

  Saw a poet, one of the unknown. He was walking round Nuri Bazaar trying to sell his hat. The peasants laughed at him.

  He smiled shamefacedly and explained he wasn't joking. He was selling his hat because his money had been stolen. That was a lie. He'd been broke for ages. Hadn't eaten for three days. He confessed later, when we were sharing a pound of cheese. Told me he was on his way from Penza to Yalta. I nearly burst out laughing. But then I remembered: what about me?

  *

  My cup is full to overflowing. The "new head" arrived at twelve o'clock.

  He walked in and said:

  "Ve vill take a different path! No more of ziss pornographia: Vit Vorks Voe and The Government Inspector by Goggle. Boggle. Ve vill write our own plays."

  Then he got into his car and drove off.

  His face imprinted itself on my memory forever.

  *

  An hour later I sold my overcoat at the bazaar. There was an evening boat. But he wouldn't let me go. Understand? Wouldn't let me go!..

  *

  I've had enough! Let the Golden Horn shine. I'll never reach it. There's a limit to a man's strength. Mine's finished. I'm starving, broken! There's no blood in my brain. I'm weak and scared. But I won't stay here any longer. So ... that means ... that means ...

  14.

  GOING HOME

  Going home. By sea. Then by goods van. And if the money runs out — on foot. But I'm going home. My life is ruined. I'm going home!

  To Moscow! To Moscow!

  ……………………………………………………………………

  Farewell, Tsikhidziri. Farewell, Makhindzhauri. GreenCape, farewell!

  Moscow, 1923

  PART TWO

  THE MOSCOW ABYSS. TWANVLAM

  Pitch dark. Clanging. Rumbling. Wheels still turning, but slower and slower. Now they've stopped. That's it. The end to end all ends. Nowhere else to go. This is Moscow. M-O-S-C-O-W.

  A moment's attention to a long powerful sound swelling up in the darkness. Mind-splitting reverberations in my brain:

  C'est la lu-u-tte fina-a-le!

  ...L'lnternationa-a-a-le!!

  Here too. Just as hoarse and terrifying:

  The Internationale!

  A row of goods vans in the dark. The students' carriage had gone quiet...

  I took the plunge at last and jumped down. A soft body slipped away from under me with a groan. Then I got caught on a rail and fell even deeper down. Heavens, was there really an abyss below me?

  Grey bodies heaved monstrous loads onto their shoulders and flowed off.

  A woman's voice:

  "Oh, dear, I can't..."

  In the misty darkness I made out a medical student. She had travelled with me, hunched up, for three days.

  "Allow me to carry that."

  For a moment the black abyss seemed to shudder and turn green. How much had she got in there?

  "A hundredweight of flour... They trod it down."

  Staggered along, zigzagging, spots before the eyes, towards the lights.

  They broke into beams. The weird grey snake crawled towards them. A glass dome. A long roaring sound. Blinding light. A ticket. A gate. Exploding voices. Curses falling heavily. More darkness. More light. Darkness. Moscow! Moscow.

  The cart was loaded up to the church domes, to the stars in velvet. It clattered along, while the demonic voices of grey bodies cursed it and the man urging on the horse. A flock followed behind. The medical student's long whitish coat appeared now to one side, now to the other. But in the end we emerged from the tangle of wheels, and left the bearded faces behind. We rattled on over the potholed pavement. Pitch black. Where were we? What place was this? Never mind. What did it matter? Moscow was all black, black, black. Silent buildings stared tightly and coldly. A church loomed, looking confused and worried. It was swallowed up in the dark.

  Two in the morning. Where can I spend the night? All those houses! What could be easier... Just knock at any door. Could you put me up for the night? I can just imagine it!

  Voice of the medical student:

  "Where're you going?"

  "Don't know."

  "What do you mean?"

  There are some good souls in this world. "The person who rents the next room is still away in the country, see. You could stay there for one night..."

  "Oh, how kind of you. I'll find my friends tomorrow." Cheered up a bit after that. And it's funny, but as soon as I'd found somewhere to stay, I began to feel the effects of losing three nights' sleep.

  *

  Two bulbs fracture the shadows on a bridge. We plunge into darkness again. A street-lamp. A grey fence with a poster. Huge garish letters. Goodness, what's that word? Twanvlam. What on earth does it mean?

  Twelfth Anniversary of Vladimir Mayakovsky.

  The cart stopped. They took off some luggage. I stared at the word, entranced. A good word! And I, provincial wretch that I am, had sniggered in the mountains at the ASS head! What the blazes! But Moscow is not as black as its papooses. Sudden urge to imagine Vlam. Never seen him, but I know ... I know. He's about forty, very short and bald, wears glasses and is always dashing about. Short trousers turned up. Works in an office. Doesn't smoke. Has a large flat with portieres, now compulsorily shared with a lawyer, who is a lawyer no longer, but the commandant of a government building. Lives in a study with an unheated fireplace. Likes butter, comic verse and a tidy room. Favourite writer — Conan Doyle. Favourite opera — Eugene One-gin. Cooks himself rissoles on a primus-stove. Can't stand the lawyer-commandant, and dreams of getting him out some day, marrying and living happily ever after in five rooms.

  The cart creaked, shuddered, moved on for a bit, then stopped again. Neither storm nor tempest could daunt the immortal citizen Ivan Ivanovich Ivanov. By a building, which seemed in the darkness and fear to have about fifteen storeys, the cartload grew perceptibly thinner. In the inky blackness a figure rushed from it into an entrance and whispered: "What about the butter, Dad? And the lard, Dad? And the flour, Dad?"

  Dad stood in the darkness, muttering: "That's the lard, and the butter, and the wheat, and the rye..."

  Then out of the pitch dark flashed Dad's thumb, which peeled off twenty banknotes for the drayman.

  There will be other tempests. Raging tempests! And everyone may perish. But not Dad.

  The cart turned into a huge platform which engulfed the medical student's sack and my travelling-bag. And we sat down, legs dangling, and rode off into the darkness.

  HOUSE No. 4, ENTRANCE 6, 2ND FLOOR, FLAT 50, ROOM 7

  To tell the truth I've no idea why I crossed the whole of Moscow to get to this huge building. The document I had carefully brought with me from the mountain kingdom was valid for all six-storey buildings, or rather, for none.

  The cage of the dead lift in entrance six. Got my breath back here. A door with two notices. One says "Flat 50". The other an enigmatic "F. Arts". Must get my breath back again. My fate is about to be decided.

  I pushed open the unlocked door. In the semi-dark hall was a huge box full of papers and a grand-piano top. A room flashed past, full of women and wreathed in smoke. There was a short burst of typing. Silence. Then a deep voice said: "Meyerhold."

  "Where's ASS Lit.?" I asked, leaning on the wooden barrier.

/>   The woman by the barrier shrugged her shoulders irritably. She didn't know. The other one didn't know either. A long dark corridor. I groped my way along by guesswork. Opened one door — a bathroom. The next door had a scrap of paper nailed to it. Askew, one corner turned up. AS. Thank the Lord. Yes, ASS Lit. My pulse started racing again. Voices inside: mumble-mumble-mumble...

  I closed my eyes and imagined the inside. This is what I saw. In the first room — a carpet, an enormous writing desk and a bookcase. Awesome silence. At the desk a secretary — probably one of the names I know from magazines. Then other doors. The section head's office. Even more awesome silence. Bookcases. Who's that sitting in an armchair? ASS Lit.? In Moscow? Yes, Maxim Gorky. The Lower Depths. Mother. Who else? Mumble-mumble-mumble. They're having a talk. Or perhaps it's Bryusov and Bely? (17)

  I knock lightly on the door. The mumble-mumble stops to be followed by a hollow "Come in!" Then more mumble-mumble. I turn the knob and it comes off in my hand. I'm petrified. A fine start to my career! Breaking the door knob! I knock again. "Come in!"

  "I can't!" I shout.

  A voice comes through the keyhole:

  "Turn the knob right, then left. You've locked us in..."

  Right, left, the door gives slightly, and...

  I'M TOP MAN AFTER GORKY

  I was in the wrong place! This couldn't be ASS Lit! A summer-cottage wicker chair, an empty wooden desk, an open cupboard, a small table upside down in the corner. And two men. One was tall and very young in a pince-nez. His puttees stood out. They were white, and he was holding a battered briefcase and a sack. The other man, greying and elderly with bright, almost smiling eyes, wore a Caucasian fur cap and an army greatcoat. The coat was covered with holes and the pockets were hanging in tatters. He wore grey puttees and patent leather dancing shoes with little bows.

  My lack-lustre gaze passed over the faces, then the walls, looking for another door. But there was none. The room with the broken wires had no windows. Tout. In a rather thick voice:

  "Is this ASS Lit.?"

  "Yes."

  "Could I see the head, please?"

  "That's me," the old man replied affectionately.

  He picked up a large page of a Moscow newspaper from the desk, tore a piece off, sprinkled some tobacco on it, rolled himself a cigarette and asked me:

  "Got a match?"

  I struck a match automatically, and then under the old man's affectionately enquiring gaze took the precious paper out of my pocket.

  The old man bent over it, and I racked my brains wondering who he could be. Most of all he looked like Emile Zola without a beard.

  The young man also read the paper over the old man's shoulder. They finished and looked at me with a kind of puzzled respect.

  Old man:

  "So you?.."

  "I'd like a job in ASS Lit.," I replied.

  "Splendid! Well, I never!" the young man exclaimed in delight.

  He took the old man aside and started whispering. Mumble-mumble-mumble.

  The old man spun round on his heels and grabbed a pen off the desk. The young man said quickly:

  "Write an application."

  I had an application in my breast pocket. I handed it over.

  The old man flourished the pen. It made a scratching sound and jerked, tearing the paper. He dipped it in a small bottle. But the bottle was dry.

  "Got a pencil?"

  I handed him a pencil, and the head scrawled:

  "Please appoint as Secretary of ASS Lit. Signed..."

  I stared open-mouthed at the dashing squiggle.

  The young man plucked my sleeve.

  "Hurry upstairs, before he goes. Quick."

  I shot upstairs. Barged through the door, tore across the room with the women and went into the office. The man sitting in the office took my paper and scribbled: "Appt. seer." Letter. Squiggle. He yawned and said: "Downstairs."

  I raced downstairs again in a tizzy. Past the typewriter. Then instead of a bass, a silvery soprano said: "Meyerhold. October in the Theatre..."

  The young man was storming round the old man and chortling.

  "Did they appoint you? Fine! We'll see to it. We'll see to everything!"

  Then he clapped me on the shoulder:

  "Don't worry! You'll get everything."

  I have always detested familiarity and always been a victim of it. But now I was so overwhelmed by what had happened, that all I could do was say weakly:

  "But we need desks ... chairs ... and at least some ink!"

  The young man shouted excitedly:

  "You'll get them! Good lad! You'll get everything!"

  He turned to the old man, winked at me and said:

  "He means business, that lad! Fancy asking for desks straightaway. He'll put things right for us."

  *

  Appt. Seer. Heavens! ASS Lit. In Moscow. Maxim Gorky. The Lower Depths. Sheherazade. Mother.

  *

  The young man untied the sack, spread a newspaper on the table and poured about five pounds of lentils onto it. "That's for you. A quarter of the food ration."

  I PLUG IN ASS LIT

  Historians of literature, take note:

  At the end of 1921 three people were engaged in literature in the Republic: the old man (dramas; he turned out not to be Emile Zola, of course, but someone I didn't know), the young man (the old man's assistant, whom I didn't know either — poetry) and myself (who hadn't written a thing).

  Historians, also note: ASS Lit. had no chairs, desks, ink, light bulbs, books, writers or readers. In short, nothing.

  And me. Yes, I rustled up from nowhere an antique mahogany writing-desk. Inside I found an old, yellowing, gold-edged card with the words: "...ladies in semi-decollete evening dress. Officers in frock-coats with epaulettes. Civilians in uniform tail-coats, with decorations. Students in uniform. Moscow. 1899."

  It smelt soft and sweet. A bottle of expensive French perfume had once stood in the drawer. After the desk a chair arrived. Then ink, paper, and finally a young lady, sad and pensive.

  On my instructions she laid out everything that had been in the cupboard on the desk: some brochures about "saboteurs", 12 issues of a St. Petersburg newspaper and a pile of green and red invitations to a congress of provincial sections. It immediately began to look like an office. The old man and the young man were delighted. They clapped me on the shoulder affectionately and vanished.

  The sad young lady and I sat there for hours. Me at the desk and she at the table. I read The Three Musketeers by the inimitable Dumas, which I had found on the floor in the bathroom. The young lady sat in silence, occasionally heaving a deep sigh.

  "Why are you crying?" I asked.

  In reply she started sobbing and wringing her hands. Then she said:

  "I've found out that I married a bandit by mistake."

  I don't know if anything could surprise me after these two years. But at this I just stared blankly at her...

  "Don't cry. Things like that do happen."

  And I asked her to tell me about it.

  Wiping her eyes with a handkerchief, she told me she had married a student, enlarged a photograph of him and hung it in the drawing-room. Then a detective came, took one look at the photograph and said it was not Karasev at all, but Dolsky, alias Gluzman, alias Senka Moment.

  "Mo-ment..." the poor girl said, shuddering and wiping her eyes.

  "So he's gone, has he? Well, good riddance to him."

  But this was the third day. And still nothing. Not a soul had come. Nothing at all. Just me and the young lady...

  I suddenly realised today: ASS Lit. isn't plugged in. There's life overhead. People walking about. Next door too. Typewriters clattering away and people laughing. They get clean-shaven visitors too. Meyerhold's fantastically popular in this building, but he's not here in person.

  We have nothing. No papers, nothing. I decided to plug ASS Lit. in.

  A woman came upstairs with a pile of newspapers. The top one was marked in red pen
cil "For ASS Fine Arts".

  "What about one for ASS Lit.?"

  She looked at me in fright and did not answer. I went upstairs. To the young lady sitting under a notice that said "secretary". She listened to me, then looked nervously at her neighbour.

  "That's right, ASS Lit..." said the first young lady. "There is a paper for them, Lidochka," said the second. "Then why didn't you deliver it?" I asked in an icy tone. They both looked worried. "We thought you weren't there."

  *

  ASS Lit. is plugged in. A second paper has arrived from the young ladies upstairs. A woman in a kerchief brought it. Asked me to sign for it in a book.

  Wrote a memo to the Service Department: "Give me a car."

  A man came two days later and shrugged his shoulders.

  "Do you really need a car?"

  "More than anyone else in this building, I should say."

  I managed to find the old man. And the young one too. When the old man saw the car and I told him he had to sign the papers, he gave me a long look, ruminating.

  "There's something about you. You should apply for an academician's food ration."

  The bandit's wife and I started drafting an official claim for payment of salary. ASS Lit. was firmly plugged into the mainstream now.