An American in the Gulag

by Alexander Dolgun

  I asked him about suki and chestnyagi and he laughed. “Suki are a creation of the MVD,” he said. “Those bastards can’t stand the way the lyudi have organized themselves, and they’ve been trying for years to break us up.”

  I was struck by his emphatic use of the word lyudi, which is the plural of chelovek, and can mean The People. As he continued to talk, I gathered that this was the way the urki described themselves and that when he had called me a chelovek, telling the rest of the cell that a Man is sleeping, he had in effect made me an honorary member. Later I realized that all the urki, the criminals, normally reserved the words chelovek and lyudi for dramatic occasions when a little self-glorification was in order. Valentin usually used the word urki, which is pure underworld slang and has no English equivalent. “You see,” he said, “somehow the MVD consider us enemies of the people, like the fascists. We’re loyal Soviets. We don’t want to overthrow the system, for God’s sake. We just happen to be in a different field of endeavor; we get a very good living from the system. We don’t stir up trouble like these other worthless scum” (waving an arm at the groups of politicals who watched us curiously as we went by). “We just do what we can and stick together and if there is another war we’ll help out the best way we can and so on and so on. But the urki are organized and the fascists are not. You can see that. We get the guards to sell the stuff we liberate from new arrivals, and we split with them, and they buy us good food and tobacco in town and make sure that we have what we need. Their commanders tried to wipe that out by punishing the guards they caught, but it never worked and they know it won’t. So they tried another plan.

  “They went into the camps and began to terrorize some of the less staunch urki by violence and threats, you know, until they had some of the poor guys so cowed they’d do anything. Then they were very cunning, those bastards. They forced some of these urki to do jobs that were absolutely against the code of the underworld.”

  “What jobs?”

  “Anything that helped the prison. You must never help build a prison wail or put up barbed wire. No self-respecting urka will ever do that; the rest would rub him out. So they forced them to break their own unwritten laws, do you see? Forced them to be a foreman in a work project. Absolutely taboo. Every chelovek knows that.

  Accept a job like that and you’ve practically committed suicide. These were the suki, then. They had to be separated from the rest of the criminals or they’d have been rubbed out fast. The suki are the MVD’s converts. The chestnyagi, the unconverted, hate their guts.

  “So the MVD always separates the two groups when there’s an eta p. They don’t want their precious converts wiped out. All the same the war goes on in camp. Any time a suka is discovered, he usually loses his head.”

  “Literally? Somebody cuts his head off?”

  “That’s right. Or strangles him. It’s the code.”

  “By the way, that’s a very fine hat you’re wearing,” he said parenthetically. “Is it American?”

  I told him the story of the hat and how it had saved my life.

  “It’s very fine,” he said warmly. “Here, let me see how it feels on me.” He tried it on. It fit pretty well and looked superb with his flashy suit. “I certainly like that hat,” he repeated.

  I was not feeling bright and I failed to get the message, but for the moment he let the matter drop, though he wore the hat through the rest of that first morning’s exercise.

  From time to time other lyudi would come up to Sashka the Trump, who walked around the yard in front of us, never very far from his chief. They would speak to him in a low voice and sometimes he would shake his head and then the fellow would go away, and sometimes he would nod and come and tug Valentin’s elbow and speak to him quietly in his ear, and Valentin would listen and either nod thoughtfully or give Sashka the Trump a firm double pat just above the elbow, or else say a few words back to him in an equally confidential tone. I never heard any of these exchanges, but Valentin explained to me that they were sometimes information about movements of people or goods, sometimes intelligence about developments in the camp, sometimes disputes about the division of spoils that he was called upon, as pakhan, to render judgment on. He said they tried to keep all these things quiet unless something came up that needed larger discussion, and there was a tradition of respecting the pakhan’s confidentiality that simply was not broken.

  I felt badly tired out by the exercise period and took a nap when we got back in. When I woke up, I saw a lot of expectant faces looking in my direction. I was enjoying the prominence. I asked for a drink and a deputy brewed some more explosive chifir. Then I indicated to Valentin that I was ready. He gathered my audience, passed me a lighted cigarette, and nodded to me to go ahead. I thought I would try something a little shorter, so I told them a short story I was sure they would love. I cannot now remember whether it is fiction or whether I read it in a newspaper or a magazine, but I have a feeling that it really happened. It is about a movie company coming to New York to make a film about a bank robbery. They negotiate at length with a major bank to get permission to film the bank. They arrange with the NYPD to provide lots of cops to keep traffic from bothering them and keep passersby from interfering when they see the guns and the masked bandits and all the rest. They set up cameras and lights on the appointed day and then calmly go ahead and rob the bank under the unconcerned eyes of New York’s finest, who think all along that they are protecting a bunch of actors and technicians from public harassment, and that all the screams and yells from inside the bank after the getaway cars drive off are part of the act.

  My story was a sensation! Every time my cigarette went out I was handed a fresh one. Sometime in the afternoon, hot water appeared from somewhere, and we had fresh tea. When the midday soup came Valentin shredded some excellent Baltic cheese into it with his famous hunting knife, and I found it a delicious dish. Hardly anyone in my audience moved as I spun out the story and dropped a little hint here and a little hint there so that they could think they were guessing at the ending without being steered there by me. When I came to the punch line, the getaway, and the picture of the cops standing around with their faces getting redder and redder when they finally found out what had happened, there were deep chuckles of satisfaction. One of the shestyorki, the deputies, kindling a toothbrush-handle fire for more tea, slapped me on the back and said they certainly hoped I had more where that came from. I was a hit and I loved it. But my throat was sore from talking so long and smoking so much, and I explained that I would have to let it rest until the evening.

  They were disappointed as hell and started a clamor for another story right away—it was too long until the evening, what the hell did I think they were feeding me so well for? It was all said in a good-natured way, but they meant it all the same, and I was relieved when Valentin intervened and decreed that I should indeed rest my voice and build up my strength for a good all-night session. So I declined the chifir, which would have kept me awake. I climbed up onto my reserved spot again and caught a little sleep, and then just sat quietly with Valentin for the rest of the afternoon and nibbled white bread and bacon and listened to his advice on prison life and his bits of lore and his secrets for getting on.

  He said, for example, that if I ever heard guards m a transfer prison talking about India, to avoid going there because that was the cell where the urki were who collaborated with the guards, and it meant that politicals would be put in it for a few minutes “by mistake” (because in most cases politicals and professionals were segregated). By the time the “mistake” was discovered and rectified the poor political would be very much poorer.

  I said, “Valka, you go where they send you. How could I get out of it?”

  “Oh, faint, fall down, something like that, get sick, just don’t go.”

  “And if I can’t stop them putting me in such a cell?”

  “Oh, that’s easy.”

  All the other urki listening to this chuckled and exchanged knowing looks.
“Go ahead, pakhan, tell him,” one said.

  “Of course! He is my brother, after all,” Valentin said expansively.

  “Now, Sasha,” he said to me, “if you saw a clean white handkerchief lying in the mess by the piss barrel over there, would you wipe your dirty feet on it?”

  “Of course not,” I said. I wondered what he was driving at. Everyone else laughed when I said it.

  Valentin said emphatically, “Of course you would!” and laughed very gaily, and all the rest laughed again at my bewilderment.

  “Listen, Valka, is this some kind of riddle or something? I don’t get it,” I said.

  I was embarrassed about it.

  “Just remember what I said,” Valentin answered. He was still chuckling. His eyes were very merry and he was clearly teasing me. He would not say any more about the riddle.

  When supper came, I was again asked if I wanted extra helpings, and again I ate them greedily. Then I was almost overcome with sleep. I told Valentin and the others I would sleep for an hour or two, until dark perhaps, and that suited them. I think they liked stories in the dark best of all, even though there was a bright light over the far end of the cell. I started out with what seemed like a comfortable and refreshing sleep. But after about an hour I was awakened with terrible cramps in my belly. I knew exactly what was happening, and it alarmed me a good deal because of a scene I remembered vividly from the day before. All that greasy bacon and the pressure of those many dishes of watery porridge had begun to exact a price. There would be no trip to the toilet for at least another eight or ten hours, and I had seen what happened if you tried to use the barrel.

  .1 decided to confide in Valentin. I beckoned to his deputy and asked if I could speak to the pakhan. Sashka the Trump went prowling off in the chaotic cell and came back with Valentin. I whispered in his ear the way I had seen Sasha do it. “Valka, I’ve got a terrible attack of diarrhea. What’ll I do!”

  He was silent a moment. He looked very grave. Then he said quickly, “Anything happen yet?”

  “Not yet, but I can’t hold out long.”

  Valentin turned and beckoned to his deputy and they put their heads together for a moment, then looked at me, then called over the two other deputies. They conferred not more than half a minute, and I could see that my friend was giving orders. The others nodded. Valentin came back to me. He said, “Can you sing?” I was getting used to puzzles from him. I said, “Yes, so what?”

  “Good,” he said with a mischievous smile. “Go with them.”

  Sashka and the two deputies helped me across toward the barrel. When we got there, they hoisted me up to the edge of it and made a sort of human screen in front of me, so that my head appeared above their shoulders but the lower part, of my body was concealed. They began to sing a ribald song about drinking and women. “Sing!” one of them told me.

  “I don’t know the words!”

  “Just open your mouth and pretend you do,” he shouted.

  I was struggling to lower my pants. I certainly did not want to fall backward. F got my pants down. Things started to work. Suddenly they all lit up cigarettes at once and puffed away furiously as they sang. After a while I said, “Thanks. We can go back now.”

  I was out of breath with suppressed laughter. I had a good smoke and a cup of cold tea, and then Valentin’s inner circle gathered around, and for a teaser I told them a short story called “The One Million Pound Note.” They loved anything about money. Then I started an Ellery Queen mystery that I remembered fairly well, and it lasted through the night. Every hour and a half or so the deputies and I would repair to the urine barrel for a smoke and a round of loud and vulgar singing. And that’s how we got through the night.

  The next day in the yard Valentin made a further gesture of his confidence in me. He told me about his escape plan and invited me to join it. I was thrilled. My heart began to beat wildly. Halfway through his explanation of the plan I had another attack and had to dash to the latrine shed and beg to break into the line-up. When I came back he went on and explained how the latrine was to be our takeoff point. He had already managed to stack in a pile some of the long iron pipes that were lying beside it. The plan was to hide in the latrine building and at night use the pipes to pole-vault over the wall. I said I would have to build up some strength first, and he agreed that we should wait for that to happen because he really wanted my company.

  “I’ll tell you honestly why I admired your hat so much, Sasha,” he said with a very frank look, but an amused look as well. “I wanted it for my escape. I figured with a hat like that I would look like some big party official and nobody would ever accost me. But if you come along it will work for all of us. And that is not why I invited you. I just thought about it while you were telling us that mystery story overnight. I like you a lot and I think you should join us.”

  I thought about that for a while. I said, “What kind of a life could I have outside, though? I’d be a fugitive all my days.”

  “I’ve been a fugitive a lot of my days, you know,” Valentin said. “It’s not so bad. I escaped from the orphanage after my parents ...”

  He stopped and walked in silence for a while. Then he said, “The truth is my parents were party members. They got caught up in some plot or other. I never knew what it was all about. As far as I know, they behaved like perfectly normal people: But they were arrested for treason and then they were shot, so they must have done something terrible.”

  I could not believe that naiveté. I said, “Lots of perfectly innocent people were shot during the purges, surely you know that!”

  He looked quite offended. “Stalin would never permit that!” he said emphatically. I realized that he was completely serious so I let it drop. It was then that I knew he must believe that I was a spy and therefore used to all kinds of fugitive and clandestine ways. My knowledgeable tales of criminal life in America must have reinforced his impression. I decided to let it ride for the moment.

  “Valka,” I said, “how much time have you done in prison all together?”

  “If you count the orphanage, which I certainly do, almost twenty years.”

  “And you’re not forty yet.”

  “Thirty-eight, that’s right. I made my first escape when I was eleven.”

  “But isn’t that a terrible life?”

  “I miss my women. And wine. I miss wine a great deal. But you can see that I live very well in prison. It never lasts very long. And when I get out there is no way that I can have the women and the wine and the good suits unless I live my life with the urki.” He gave a short, ironic laugh. “Can you imagine me working in an office? I’d be crazy! That’s the real slave labor. We’ve got a very good malina, a hide-out, right here in Kuibyshev. There’s a girl waiting there for me. I’ll take my chance, and I hope you’ll cast in with me. It can be very good, our life.”

  I said I would and we shook hands on it. We walked the yard hand in hand.

  There is nothing homosexual about this in the Soviet Union. Men who are good friends do it openly, and it is perfectly natural. The same with women.

  When we came back to the cell a bizarre game was in progress. Two of the shobla yobla had their pants off and were lying with their buttocks in the air on an upper bunk. Another stood by with a pack of matches. Every so often one of the guys on the bunk would say, “Now,” and the third guy lit a match and held it over his pal’s behind while he passed gas and a blue methane flame shot up in the air. The politicals looked disgusted, while some of the younger shobla yobla laughed and applauded. My own digestion seemed to have settled down. Through that day, rather than telling stories as such, I answered questions about crime in America, the electric chair, the FBI, weapons, the careers of outstanding criminals, the techniques of safe-breaking (I was hardly an expert, but Valentin expressed polite interest so I kept on with it).

  Then Valentin would tell one of his exploits, how he had stolen a whole carload of sugar—I think it was sixty tons—and sold it at a very goo
d price. Others would, in effect, ask permission and then recount some of their exploits. One tots some grisly stories of how prisoners mutilated themselves if they heard they were to be transported to a particularly notorious camp such as Kolyma in Siberia. One, he said, shaved dust from an indelible pencil with his moika, put the dust in his eye, and deliberately blinded himself. The eye ulcerated and had to be removed. And still they sent him to Kolyma. Another nailed his scrotum to the bunk and yelled, “Kill me, you bastards! Take me away, kill me!” They simply pulled out the nail with a claw hammer, poured iodine on it, and put him on the train.

  Several of the younger guys talked sadly and sentimentally about their mothers. Most of these men were tattooed, some quite extensively, and many of them had MOTHER on the back of a hand, or a forearm. Valentin asked me about my mother. I said, “I don’t know. She’s in Moscow I suppose. She hasn’t been very well. I have no way of communicating with her and I don’t know whether she even knows what’s happened to me.”

  “Write her a letter.”

  I laughed bitterly at the cruel joke.

  “I’m serious,” Valentin said. “Listen, don’t you think I can get it out? Write her a triangle. Now! Come on.” And he told Sashka to get a piece of paper and a pencil.