The Complete Works of Isaac Babel Reprint Edition by Isaac Babel, Nathalie Babel, Peter Constantine

by Nathalie Babel, Peter Constantine Isaac Babel

  LUDMILA: I must warn you, Maria is the favorite here, and yet, believe it or not, our favorite went off to join the army.

  MUKOVNIN: What are you talking about, Ludmila, darling? She joined the army’s Political Propaganda Division.*

  DIMSHITS: Your Excellency—anything you want to know about the Political Propaganda Division, you ask me! They are soldiers too.

  KATYA [Taking LUDMILA to the side.]: I would not wear those earrings if I were you.

  LUDMILA: You think so?

  KATYA: Of course not. Don’t forget there’s that dinner afterward. . . .

  LUDMILA: Have no fear, ma chere. No need to teach a Viennese how to waltz. [She kisses KATYA.] Katyusha, you sweet, silly girl. [To DIMSHITS.] My boots. [She turns away and takes off her earrings.]

  DIMSHITS [Rushing to help her.]: At your service!

  [Sheputs on her boots, fur coat, and knitted wool kerchief.

  DIMSHITS eagerly bustles about, helping her.]

  LUDMILA: I still can’t believe that we haven’t sold all these things yet. Papa, don’t forget to take your medicine. And Katya, don’t let him do any work.

  MUKOVNIN: Katya and I are going to spend a cozy evening at home.

  LUDMILA [Kisses herfather on the forehead..]: How do you like my papa, Isaac Markovich? Isn’t he precious?

  DIMSHITS: The general is not a mere man, he is a jewel!

  LUDMILA: We are the only ones who truly appreciate him. Where did you leave Prince Hypolite?

  DIMSHITS: I left him outside the door. I ordered him to wait there, it’s a question of discipline. We’ll be there in a minute. So long, Nikolai Vasilevich!

  KATYA: Don’t drink too much.

  DIMSHITS: We won’t—there’s not much chance of that nowadays.

  * Polit-otdel, a political organ of the new Soviet government charged with the ideological education of the military during the Russian Civil War and the Russian-Polish War of 1920.

  LUDMILA: Good-bye, Papa, darling.

  [GENERAL MUKOVNIN escorts DIMSHITS and his daughter to the front hall; voices and laughter are heard. MUKOVNIN returns.]

  MUKOVNIN: What a charming and virtuous Jew.

  KATYA [Curled up at the edge of the sofa, smoking.]: They all seem to be somewhat lacking in tact.

  MUKOVNIN: Katya, darling! Where do you expect them to have picked up tact? They were only allowed to live on one side of the street, and if they ever crossed over to the other side, the police would immediately chase them back. That is how it used to be in Kiev on Bibikovsky Boulevard. So where do you expect them to have picked up tact? What is really surprising is their energy, their vitality, their resilience!

  KATYA: That energy has poured into Russian life. But we, after all, are different. Its all so foreign to us.

  MUKOVNIN: One thing that isnt foreign to us is fatalism. Another, that Rasputin and the German Czarina destroyed the Romanov dynasty. And yet nothing but good has come from that wonderful Jewish race, which has given us Heine, Spinoza, and Christ.

  KATYA: You used to praise the Japanese too, Nikolai Vasilevich.

  MUKOVNIN: The Japanese? They are a great nation, there is much we can learn from them!

  KATYA: It is clear enough who Maria takes after. You are a Bolshevik, Nikolai Vasilevich.

  MUKOVNIN: I am a Russian officer, Katya, and I ask the simple question: gentlemen, please tell me when it was that the rules of war became foreign to you? We tortured and murdered these people, is what I tell them, they defended themselves, they attacked, fighting with resourcefulness, circumspection, desperation—they are fighting in the name of an ideal, Katya!

  KATYA: An ideal? Im not so sure about that. Were unhappy, and it doesn’t look like that will change. We’ve been sacrificed, Nikolai Vasilevich.

  MUKOVNIN: So let them shake up Russia’s Vanyas and Petrushkas. That would be wonderful. Time is running out, Katya. Peter the Great, the only true Russian Czar, once said, “Delay is death!” What a maxim. And if this is so, my dear fellow officers, shouldn’t you have the courage to look at your field maps and figure out which of your flanks faltered, and where and why you were defeated? I have a right to look the truth in the eye, and I shall not renounce that right.

  KATYA: You have to take your medicine.

  MUKOVNIN: What I tell my comrades in arms, the men I fought shoulder to shoulder with is, “Tirez vos conclusion.s*—delay is death!”

  [He exits. Next door a Bach fugue is being played coldly and with precision on a cello. KATYA listens, then gets up and walks over to the telephone.]

  KATYA: Could you connect me with the District Headquarters? . . . Redko, please. ... Is that you, Redko? ... I just wanted to tell you . . . Dont forget you’re not the only man fighting for the Revolution, and yet you’re the only one who never has time to see a person ... a person at whose house you spend the night whenever you need to.... [Pause.] Take me out, Redko. Come and pick me up in your car. . . . Well, if you’re busy . . . No, I’m not angry. Why should I be angry?

  [She hangs up. The music stops. GOLITSYN, a lanky man in a soldiers jacket and leg wrappings, enters, carrying a cello.]

  KATYA: What did they tell you in the tavern—“Don’t play weepy tunes”?

  GOLITSYN: “Don’t play weepy tunes, don’t pull at our heartstrings.

  KATYA: They need something cheerful, Sergei Hilarionovich. People want to forget their worries, they want to rest. . . .

  GOLITSYN: Not all of them. Some ask for plaintive tunes.

  KATYA [Seats herself at the piano.]: What kind of audience do you have?

  GOLITSYN: Dockworkers from the Obvodny Canal.

  KATYA: I suppose you go to their trade union. . . . They give you some supper there, dont they?

  *“Draw your own conclusions.”

  GOLITSYN: Yes, they do.

  KATYA [Plays a popular tune.]:

  “Through wind and wave our ship sails free,

  As we throw the damn Whites to the fish in the sea. ”

  Try playing this. It should go down well at that tavern of yours.

  [GOLITSYN tries to play the tune, misses a few notes, then gets it right.]

  KATYA: Would it be worth me learning stenography, mon prince'? GOLITSYN: Stenography? I have no idea.

  KATYA:

  “I sit on a barrel crying tears of dismay,

  The boys dont want marriage,

  Just a roll in the hay.M

  They need stenographers right now.

  GOLITSYN: I wouldn’t know. He tries to follow her tune.]

  KATYA: Maria is the only true woman of all of us. She is strong, gutsy, a real woman. We sit around here sighing, while she’s happy in her Political Propaganda Division.... What have people come up with to replace happiness? There isn’t anything.

  GOLITSYN: Maria Nikolayevna has always sat in the driver’s seat. That’s always been her strong point.

  KATYA: And right she is.

  “Oh sweet little apple, whither did you roll?”

  And then, she is involved with Akim Ivanich.

  GOLITSYN [K tops playing.]: Who is this Akim Ivanich?

  KATYA: Their division commander, a former blacksmith. She mentions him in every letter.

  GOLITSYN: How do you know she’s involved with him?

  KATYA: I have read it between the lines, I’m certain of it. . . . Or should I maybe move to my family in Borisoglebsk? At least it’s home.

  You, for instance, you go to that monastery to see that monk—what was his name?

  GOLITSYN: Sioni.

  KATYA: Yes, to Father Sioni. What does he teach you?

  GOLITSYN: You just mentioned happiness. Well, he teaches me that there is no happiness in having power over people, or in this never-ending greed—this unquenchable greed.

  KATYA: Lets play, Sergei Hilarionovich!

  “I sit on my barrel,

  While the market hags bicker,

  Not a kopeck in my pocket But Tm thirsty for liquor. ”

  Sioni is a beautifu
l name.

  Scene Three

  LUDMILA and DIMSHITS in his hotel room. Bottles and the remains of their meal stand on the table. Part of an adjacent room is visible in which BISHONKOV, FILIP, and EVSTIGNEVICH are playing cards. EVSTIGNEVICH s little invalid cart has been placed on a chair; his legs, amputated above the knee, are jutting out.

  LUDMILA: Felix Yusupov* was as beautiful as a god—a tennis player, a Russian champion. Though his beauty was not really masculine enough . . . there was something doll-like about it. Well, I met Vladimir Bagalei at Felixs. Right to the very end the Czar simply could not understand what a gallant nature that man had. We used to call him the “Teutonic Knight.” Fredriks^ was a friend of Prince Sergei, you know Prince Sergei—he’s the one who plays the cello. That evening there was another surprise hors programme: Archbishop Ambrosii. The old man started flirting with me, can you imagine? He kept topping up my glass and peering at me with such a crafty, pious twinkle in his eye! At first Vladimir was not particularly impressed with me. “In my eyes you were only a snub-

  * Prince Felix Yusupov, 1887-1967, gained international notoriety for his involvement in the assassination of Rasputin.

  t Count Vladimir Borisovich Fredriks, 1832-1927, descendant of a distinguished line of Baltic barons, was Czar Nicholas II’s Minister of the Imperial Court and Domains.

  nosed little girl,” he admitted, “si demesurement russe3 with flushed cheeks.” At dawn we drove out to the Czar’s palace at Tsarskoye Selo, left the car in the park, and rode on in a buggy. Vladimir drove it himself. “I could not take my eyes off of you all evening, Ludmila Nikolayevna.” “Of which Nina Buturlina is well aware, mon prince!9 I knew they were having a liaison—more probably a flirtation. “Buturlina, cest lepassed “On revient toujours a sespremiers amours, mon prince!9 Vladimir had never been accorded the title of Grand Duke, as he was the offspring of a morganatic marriage, and the Czarina refused to meet his family. Vladimir always called her “an evil genius.” Furthermore, he was a poet, naive, and had no head for politics. We arrived at Tsarskoye Selo. It was dawn. Somewhere, right over the pond, a nightingale was singing. Vladimir told me again: “Mademoiselle Boutourline cest le passed “The past, mon prince, has a tendency to return at times, and when it does, it does so with a vengeance.”

  [DIMSHITS turns out the light, pushes LUDMILA back onto the sofa, and throws himself on her: There is a struggle.

  She frees herself straightens her hair; her dress. ]

  BISHONKOV [Throws down a card.]: Try beating this!

  FILIP: Nope, no one can beat that!

  EVSTIGNEVICH: Well, they lead him up to the fence, his hands tied. “So, my friend,” they tell him. “Turn around!” And he tells them, “There’s no need for me to turn around. I’m a fighting man, finish me off as I am.” Their fence is just a tiny wattle fence, really, about hip high. It’s night, they’re at the edge of the village, beyond the village are the steppes, at the edge of the steppes is a forest—

  BISHONKOV [Throws down another card.]: That’s it! You’re out!

  FILIP: Not so fast!

  EVSTIGNEVICH: So they lead him out there and take aim. He is standing by the fence, and suddenly it’s as if he’d been snatched up from

  the earth, his hands still tied! It was as if God Almighty whisked him away. He jumped over the watde fence and off he scampered! They fired, but it was night, darkness everywhere, and he was running and dodging, so he got away.

  FILIP Puts down Ms cards.]: What a hero!

  EVSTIGNEVICH: A real hero! A great horseman. I knew him as well as I know you. He was on the run for half a year before they finally caught him.

  FILIP: So they finished him off?

  EVSTIGNEVICH: They did. It’s unfair, if you ask me. When a man manages to crawl out of the grave after coming face-to-face with his maker, it goes against the grain to kill him.

  FILIP: No one gives a damn nowadays.

  EVSTIGNEVICH: Its unfair, if you ask me. Its the law in every country in the world: if a firing squad misses you, then fortune has smiled on you and they set you free.

  FILIP: Not here they dont! Give them half a chance and they’ll finish you off.

  BISHONKOV: Yeah, give them half a chance—

  LUDMILA: Turn on the light!

  [DIMSHITS switches it on.]

  LUDMILA: I am leaving. [She turns around looks at DIMSHITS, and bursts out laughing.] Don’t pout. Come here. You have to understand—I must get used to you first.

  DIMSHITS: I’m not a boot one has to get used to.

  LUDMILA: I will admit that you have awakened within me feelings of warmth toward you. But these feelings need time to develop. Maria is about to come back on leave, and you will meet her. Nothing in our family is ever done without her. . . . Papa is well disposed toward you, but, as you yourself saw, he is helpless. . . . And then, there is much that still remains unresolved. Your wife, for instance.

  DIMSHITS: What’s my wife got to do with all this?

  LUDMILA: I am aware that Jews are attached to their children.

  DIMSHITS: What are you bringing that up for?

  LUDMILA: And that is why for the time being you must sit next to me quietly, and be patient.

  DIMSHITS: Since the day the Jews began waiting for the Messiah, they have been patient. Have another glass.

  LUDMILA: IVe already had too much.

  DIMSHITS: They brought me this wine from a battleship. The grand duke had a case on board.. ..

  LUDMILA: How do you manage to get all these things?

  DIMSHITS: I can get stuff where no one else can. Drink up.

  LUDMILA: Gladly—that is, if you sit there nice and quiet.

  DIMSHITS: Is this some synagogue, for me to sit nice and quiet or something?

  LUDMILA: I must say, this frock coat you are wearing is the kind I imagine one would wear to a synagogue. Frock coats, Isaac, darling, are worn by headmasters at graduation ceremonies, and by merchants at memorial dinners.

  DIMSHITS: Til stop wearing frock coats.

  LUDMILA: And then those tickets. Never buy front-row tickets. It’s the mark of a social climber, a parvenu.

  DIMSHITS: I am a social climber.

  LUDMILA: But you have an inner nobility, and that makes all the difference. However, your name is unfitting. When we put our announcement in the papers, the Izvestia, for instance . . . you could, you know, change Isaac to Alexei. Do you like Alexei?

  DIMSHITS: I like it. [He turns out the light again, and throws himself on LUDMILA.]

  EVSTIGNEVICH: The two of them are at it.

  FILIP [Listens.]: It looks like she’s finally . . .

  BISHONKOV: I like Ludmila Nikolayevna best of all. She treats you like a person, which is more than I can say for some of those other hags around here . . . She even remembers my name.

  [VISKOVSKY enters the room, stands behind EVSTIGNEVICH s back, and watches the cards being played^]

  LUDMILA [Tearingfree.]: Call me a cab!

  DIMSHITS: Yeah, right away! Like I got nothing better to do!

  LUDMILA: Call me a cab this minute!

  DIMSHITS: Its thirty below zero outside—you wouldn’t send a rabid dog out in such weather.

  LUDMILA: All my clothes are torn! How can I show myself at home like this?

  DIMSHITS: You made your bed, now lie in it!

  LUDMILA: How vulgar! You’re knocking on the wrong door.

  DIMSHITS: Just my luck.

  LUDMILA: I told you I have a toothache, an unbearable toothache!

  DIMSHITS: That’s apples and oranges. What’s teeth got to do with things?

  LUDMILA: Will you find me some drops for my toothache? I am suffer-ing!

  [DIMSHITS exits. He bumps into VISKOVSKY in the adjacent room.

  VISKOVSKY: Congratulations.

  DIMSHITS: Her teeth’s hurting her.

  VISKOVSKY: That can happen.

  DIMSHITS: What can happen is that they don’t hurt.

  VISKOVSKY: It’s all an ac
t, Isaac Markovich. It’s definitely all an act.

  FILIP: The toothache is an invention of hers, Isaac Markovich, and not a real toothache at all.

  LUDMILA [Fixes her hair in front of the mirror; Singing a song, she walks about the room, regal cheerful, flushed,.]

  “My sweetheart is a man who is tall and brash,

  My sweetheart is a man both gentle and cruel,

  He thrashes and whips me with a silken lash ...”

  DIMSHITS: I’m not a boy—a lot of time has passed since I last was a boy!

  VISKOVSKY: Yessir!

  LUDMILA [Picks up the telephone.]: 3-75-02. Papa, darling, is that you?

  . . . I’m very well. . . . Nadia Johanson was at the theater with her husband. Isaac Markovich and I are having dinner. . . . You must see Spessivtseva, she’s far better than Pavlova!... Did you take your medicine? You must go to bed.... No, your daughter knows exact-

  ly what she is doing. . . . Katya, darling, is that you? ... I am following your instructions, ma chere. Le manege continue, j'ai mal aux dents ce soir.4 [She walks about the room, singing, and patting her hair into place.

  DIMSHITS: She shouldn’t be surprised if Im not home next time she comes around!

  VISKOVSKY: Well, its up to you, after all.

  DIMSHITS: Because, though I don’t mind other people asking about my wife and children, I won’t take that sort of thing from her! VISKOVSKY: Yessir!

  DIMSHITS: For your information, these people don’t deserve to tie my wife’s shoelace! Not even her shoelace!

  Scene Four

  In VISKOVSKY room. He is wearing riding breeches and boots, but no jacket. His shirt collar is undone. There are bottles on the table—there has been much drinking KRAVCHENKO, a tiny, flushed man in a military uniform, is lounging on the sofa with MADAME DORA, a gaunt woman dressed in black wearing large dangling earrings and with a Spanish comb in her hair.

  VISKOVSKY: Just for one deal, that’s all, Yasha!

  T was possessed by one power alone,

  A single passion, a passion that consumes

  KRAVCHENKO: How much d’you need?

  VISKOVSKY: Ten thousand pounds sterling. For one deal. You ever seen sterling pounds, Yasha?

  KRAVCHENKO: All that cash just for thread?

  VISKOVSKY: Forget the thread! We’re talking diamonds. Three carat, blue water diamonds, clean, no sand. That’s all they take in Paris.