*
“Well, let’s be hearing what you’ve got me,” said Andrey Pavlovich, settling Viktor in an armchair.
“Nothing, actually.”
“How so?”
“It was all such feeble stuff – nut cases or con men trying it on.”
“But where the hell does that leave me, with a TV 1 interview the day after tomorrow advertising my generosity?”
“How about helping the orphanage we laid on the tree for?”
“What do they want?”
“Nothing.”
“So?”
“That’s why we could help.”
“Good point. Get on to them sharpish, find out what they need … Ring from here … You do have a phone at home?”
“Yes.”
He rang from the phone in the hall.
“Galina Mikhaylovna?”
“Yes, who’s that?”
“New Year, McDonald’s, remember?”
“So you’ve not forgotten us!”
“I’d like to know what you need. I might be able to help.”
“Oh my! I really don’t know … Bowls, mugs for the kitchen perhaps … The children have to eat in two shifts. Unbreakable would be good …”
“And on the teaching side?”
She gave a deep sigh.
“This is so sudden … Our text books are old … We’ve no TV – we had one, but it packed up a year ago … You must forgive me – it’s shameful, begging like this … When I should be applying in writing with the approval of District Education …”
“No need! Will you be there tomorrow?”
“Where else? I live next door. House with the green fence.”
“Till tomorrow at about 12.00, then.”
Andrey Pavlovich approved the purchases, telling Viktor to see what else the orphanage might need, and Pasha drove Viktor to Darnitsa where, in Children’s World, he bought 50 Pooh Bear enamel bowl-and-mug sets, the mugs identical with his from Chechnya. At Radio House, Lesi Ukrainki, a boxed Samsung television was added to the Pooh Bear cartons already on board.
89
As they turned off onto the snow-covered earth track, it was like entering an untravelled snowfield, and Sonya, sitting on the back seat with Misha, was wide-eyed at the beauty of it. When Viktor had said that he was going to the orphanage, she had insisted on going with him and bringing Misha. After all, she and Misha knew everyone there, she said. From time to time Viktor looked back at the two of them. The children would be delighted to see Misha. Good for Sonya! She had been quite right to insist.
Pasha gave the impression of feeling his way, relying on the marker poles and bare trees bordering the track for guidance. His face was tense, but every now and then something of his own pleasure in the scene shone through.
It was good to be doing good, Viktor thought, and he had Andrey Pavlovich to thank for the opportunity. For all the dark past hinted at by Igor Lvovich, and for all its showiness, Andrey Pavlovich’s benevolence sprang as much from a genuine desire to do good as from recognition of the need to adhere to some set of principles – like his pet Snail’s Law – in order to make fewer mistakes and keep clear of trouble. One had a choice. There was a Constitution that promised much but achieved little, its articles pathetic and unrealistic. The right to free medical care ended when old age and sickness began. Penguinologist Pidpaly, for instance, who could only be got to hospital by bribing ambulancemen. Snail’s Law promised nothing, beyond punishment for its infringement. And therein lay the life-attested truth and effectiveness of it.
At the orphanage they were received like old friends. There and then the children wanted to eat from their new bowls and drink from their new mugs. Water was brought from the well, bowls and mugs were rinsed, and 20 minutes later, all were consuming buckwheat porridge, and Pasha was taking snaps with his simple camera. Misha, temporarily at a loose end, buckwheat porridge not being to his taste, stood keeping Viktor under observation.
A stout old lady in an apron went around filling the new mugs with fruit juice from an enormous teapot.
“My Uncle Viktor’s got a mug like this, but he won’t let me have it,” he heard Sonya informing one of her new friends.
“But, I will,” he intervened.
“Honestly?”
“Chechen word of honour,” he said, but the point was lost on her.
The new television set was connected up, and with the help of one of the older boys adjusted and made to work.
“They’re not really that big,” Viktor confided to Sonya, after a Big Mac advert.
90
It was growing dark as they followed their own wheel tracks back to the main road, and just as they reached it, Viktor’s mobile rang.
“How did it go?” Andrey Pavlovich asked.
“Splendidly. Tears of joy all round.”
“As it should be. Tight-lipped smiles go with taking bribes. But listen, you’re not finished yet. Just write it all up, today’s beneficence, when you get home; see me tomorrow and we’ll decide where to place it.”
Sonya, he saw, was dozing, while Misha, head now on a level with hers, was gazing into the gathering dusk, raising his flippers in response to the lights of oncoming cars.
Back at the flat, they found Lyosha and Nina playing chess in the kitchen, or rather, Lyosha teaching Nina how to play.
“Is she good?” Viktor asked.
“I’d have made $100 a night if we’d been playing for money, which we weren’t, and didn’t even in the old days, not having any dollars.”
“Good man,” said Viktor.
Lyosha looked a little surprised, and while Nina gathered up the pieces, Viktor went to put the kettle on, still smiling.
“We’ve been waiting supper,” said Nina. “I’ve fresh sausage in the fridge, and can do you buckwheat porridge straightaway.”
As he washed in the bathroom, he was joined by Sonya.
“See, it’s like I said, he’s keen on Auntie Nina.”
“So?”
“So you’re in trouble,” said Sonya, tossing her head and marching from the room.
Supper went well. Even the cat looked in, but seeing Misha, withdrew to the corridor.
*
When all were in bed, Viktor settled down in the kitchen, brought up the typewriter, put paper in, and sat and stared.
After a while Misha rolled in like a drunken sailor, after barging the door open with his chest, and pressed against Viktor’s knee to be stroked.
It was strange being asked to write for a newspaper again, and straight journalism at that, with the sense and feel of the event as fresh in his memory as the joyous laughter of the children. And before he knew it, he was typing away, and in half an hour the article was finished. It was short, just four sides, about doing good and the need there was for it, a context in which Andrey Pavlovich was the more easily and sincerely portrayed, and his donation of a billiard table and artificial limbs lightly alluded to. Viktor read it through, and was just putting the typewriter back under the table when Sonya came in, sat on her stool and gazed at him intently.
“What’s wrong? Want a drink?”
She shook her head. “What’s that you’ve written?”
“About where we’ve been. For a newspaper.”
“So you’re back to being a journalist.”
“No.”
“Maybe I’ll be a journalist when I’m big. And sit up in the kitchen when everyone’s asleep.”
“You mustn’t – you wouldn’t want to be a soldier and go to war.”
“No, I wouldn’t.”
“You’d have to, as a journalist. You’d be taken on by some paper, given a pen instead of a gun, and told, ‘There’s the enemy, you go and write nasty things about him’. And you would, until you got killed or hurt.”
“Are nasty things what you’ve been writing?”
“No. I’ve written about the orphans we visited today.”
“And you can do that without having to be a journalist
?”
“Yes.”
“Good,” said Sonya, “I’m going back to bed.”
*
Early next morning, well before breakfast, he dressed, and without rereading it, rolled his article into a cylinder and slipped it into an inner pocket of his jacket.
It was snowing lightly, and with their little globes of light colouring the flakes yellow, the street lamps looked like dandelions. People were emerging from their blocks into the wintery dark and hurrying to work. There was something strange and unusual about these shadows bound for the bus stop, something of the Soviet past with its work discipline, punishments for lateness, and Heroes of Socialist Labour. Life had somehow re-established a daily rhythm. Factories were back in operation. Earth was again revolving, and all upon it astir and flourishing. Only clearly a different, parallel life – not his or even impinging on his. Daily rhythm was the refuge of all who neither noticed, nor cared to notice, what they didn’t like, convinced that what they read in papers or saw on TV couldn’t be true. Or more precisely, were glad not likely themselves to be murdered, being, not in business or seriously in debt, disinclined to fall victim to the new reality. And there they were, getting up, going to work, just as another, parallel world was going to bed.
At Independence Square, he popped into McDonald’s for a coffee and a doughnut, watched the world go by, then went on to Goloseyevo.
Arriving at 9.30, he found Andrey Pavlovich up and about in his tiger-pattern towelling dressing gown. Pasha not being in evidence, Andrey Pavlovich made coffee, which they drank in the kitchen.
“Odd sense of humour you’ve got, Viktor! Group of Friends? What sort of a signature’s that?
“Force of habit, it’s the pen name I wrote under.”
“Well, cross it out and be yourself.”
“I’d rather not.”
“Then think of a different pen name.”
For Group of Friends, he substituted Sergey Stepanenko.
91
Viktor sat late at night in the kitchen before a bachelor still life of vodka, jar of gherkins, sliced sausage and a newspaper open at an article, complete with photo, describing the charitable activities of State Deputy Andrey Pavlovich Loza. He read it through, and finding it exactly as written, he turned back to the front page, noted the patriotic yellow of Ukrainian and blue of Courier, sighed, and poured himself vodka.
Getting to his feet, he clinked his glass against Sergey’s urn.
“Your first publication – congratulations!” he whispered.
Pouring another vodka, he kept an eye on the door, expecting at any minute to see Misha standing there. Tonight, though, he seemed in no hurry to appear, as if reluctant to intrude on Viktor’s thoughts.
And certainly the paper and his article under the by-line of de facto deceased Sergey, both published by de jure deceased Igor Lvovich, his former Chief, provided food for thought. There was material there for something – a drunken theory, or a short story.
He mused, as he drank, on the fact that every week was losing him more of his freedom, or what remained of it. He was losing space in his own flat, and in process of losing himself, if he hadn’t done that already. Still, it wasn’t all gloom. He had Misha and Sonya, and was alive, de jure and de facto, and more validly vital than Igor Lvovich with his photograph-adorned grave already at the cemetery. The vodka, instead of making him drunk, was inspiring a desperate sense of loneliness. There was an air of menace in the silence of the flat, as if an ambush or trap were about to be sprung. His eyes returned to the door, and with a sudden urge to see what it concealed, he opened it, went out into the corridor and listened. Silence.
He looked into the sitting room. Lyosha was asleep and snoring gently.
“You awake?” he whispered foolishly.
“What’s up?”
“Come and have a drink.”
“What’s wrong?”
“Nothing. I’ve had an article published. Come and celebrate.” Viktor carried him through to the kitchen and sat him at the table. Misha came plip-plopping after them to make it a threesome.
“This isn’t like you,” Lyosha said, clearly concerned.
“I’m out of sorts. Not happy.”
“I see, hence the vodka cure. Which I tried for being unhappy. Actually, if there’s anything other than vodka I’d rather have it.”
Moved, Viktor jumped to his feet, looked in the fridge, then in the wall cupboard, and returned with a bottle of cognac.
“How about this?”
“Fine.”
Viktor poured the vodka from Lyosha’s glass into his own. They drank, and ate sausage and gherkins.
“Fed up with me – that’s it, isn’t it?” Lyosha asked abruptly. “After saving me from drink and taking me in … And, yes, I do fancy your Nina … But don’t worry – I am not that sort of a shit.”
“Hold on! Why shouldn’t you fancy her?”
“Because you and she sleep together.”
“I one side of the bed, she the other. So let’s drop that one.”
Viktor replenished their glasses. “Know anything about arm wrestling?”
Lyosha nodded.
“Care to demonstrate?”
Lyosha did, leaving Viktor to nurse his right arm. “I thought chess was your thing,” he said. “Your health as better man!”
“You said something about finding me work,” said Lyosha, sipping his cognac.
“I believe I have. Give me a couple of days.”
92
Out of the blue next morning, Igor Lvovich telephoned, full of praise for Viktor’s article, but disappointed that Viktor had not read more of his Ukrainian Courier.
“You must – I value your opinion. Again, you see, our paths converge.”
While Nina was still showering, Lyosha viewing winter through a balcony door obligingly vacated by Misha, and Sonya applying mascara to her brows from Nina’s make-up set, Viktor prepared to breakfast alone. He cut bread, fried an omelette, and was about to eat when he saw Misha eyeing an empty bowl, and gave him the last piece of cod from the fridge.
He’d no sooner finished his omelette than Sonya in denim pinafore dress and white tights appeared, and making sure the bathroom shower was running, whispered in Viktor’s ear:
“It’s all right – they had a most terrible row yesterday, really shouting.”
“Who did?”
“Auntie Nina, Uncle Lyosha. So you’ve no need to worry.”
Viktor laughed, and Sonya looked hurt.
“Who shouted most?” he asked, concerned.
“First Auntie Nina, then Uncle Lyosha, then both together.”
“So all’s well.”
Again a hurt look and something approaching a glare.
“Look,” he said gently, “if Auntie Nina and Uncle Lyosha row, it’s because they mean something to each other. If they didn’t, they wouldn’t.”
“So they’re still keen on each other?”
Viktor shrugged.
“Oh, you’re impossible!”
“You still love me, don’t you?”
“Of course I do, you’re my Uncle-Daddy.”
“So that’s all right, then.” He patted her on the head. “And if you like, today or tomorrow, we’ll go to a café and talk.”
“I’d like that.”
Enter Nina in Viktor’s dressing gown, hair in a towel.
“You off somewhere?”
“Work”
“The bath outlet’s leaking. We need a plumber.”
“Lyosha can ring Maintenance.”
She nodded. “Seen the cat?” she asked, as if reminded by the sight of Misha.
Viktor shook his head.
“She asked to go out last night, and isn’t back,” said Nina whisking off to the bedroom.
*
En route to Goloseyevo, Viktor checked at the café for e-mail and was pleased to find one from Mladen.
The yacht was the Vesna, and he was to bring light but warm clothing, and over
and above his contribution, spending money in dollars. Any last minute purchases could be made in Split before sailing.
This he acknowledged, then, consulting the Split website, noted that while Great Britain, Rumania, the USA, Holland and other Western countries were competing for the European Arm Wrestling Championship, the old Soviet Union was not.
From the Internet café he walked freshly fallen snow to the Old Kiev Cellar, bought a coffee and sat down to think. His head, even after a night’s drinking, was clear and bursting with ideas.
Coffee forgotten, he got to his feet, thumbed a lift, and 20 minutes later, arrived at Andrey Pavlovich’s.
93
Sipping coffee and looking perplexed, Andrey Pavlovich was so slow to cotton on that Viktor almost lost hope of gaining his interest.
“Look,” he said, “what I take on, must be big – football club, basketball club, something like that …”
“But they’ve all been bought and are damned expensive to run. This is cheap, cheerful, and benevolent – support for the sporting disabled!”
“How many to a team?”
“Five or six including the captain, plus trainer.”
“Trainer? Do they need any training?”
“Of course, and he sees they keep fit and don’t get drunk.”
“Let’s have another look at that sheet of yours.”
*
Viktor gave him the computer print-out.
“I’ll think about it, test the water,” said Andrey Pavlovich. “You go about your business. I’ll get back to you on your mobile.”
Viktor was in a café on P. Sagaydachny Street when Andrey Pavlovich rang.
“Where are you?”
“Podol.”
“Where in Podol?”
And when told, he said, “Stay put,” and 30 minutes later turned up in an ankle-length sheepskin and a deerskin cap.
“You’re dead right,” he declared, ordering coffee and cognac from the waitress. “I spoke to a friend. ‘You’re a brain,’ he told me, ‘worth good money’, – as if I didn’t know!” He slapped Viktor on the shoulder. “So yes, we’ll have a team, and you’re responsible, OK? We start a club, qualify as Arm Wrestling Federation, with me as President, just as soon as we’ve decided on a name and aims. So?”
Penguin Lost Page 19
