St. Petersburg Noir

by Julia Goumen

  Olya was happy. Finally, she didn’t just get to read her son a story for the night or sing him a song, but could carry on a more or less comprehensible conversation with him. She got the impression that Ilka was attempting to dig down to the truth of the matter. He didn’t just listen to everything that his mother told him, he comprehended, and it seemed that he even analyzed. Olya occasionally marveled at how Ilka remembered what she told him. That’s how it was—her son didn’t ask the same question twice, though often the next question followed the prior for the most logical reasons.

  Olya and Ilka would have long talks now. Ilka would ask, and Olya would start explaining whatever it was that interested him with pleasure. Neither he nor she grew weary of this.

  ~ * ~

  12.

  They began to search for a place. Various suggestions were made, but Peter Alexeyevich didn’t care for them. The only thing that could be agreed on was that the future museum must be located somewhere on Vasilyevsky Island. The question was where.

  One day Czar Peter was strolling around Vasilyevsky. The weather was fine—a rarity for Petersburg, which is accustomed to rains and the low-hanging gray sky. Only a gnat pestered him, but nothing could be done about it. Peter Alexeyevich was lost in his own thoughts when two pines, the likes of which he’d never seen, suddenly appeared before his eyes. The pines grew very near, and the fat branch of one had grown into the trunk of the other. Peter stopped before the trees—Siamese twins that had grown into one common bough; he touched the trunk with his hand, circled it, and grinned. The question of where the cabinet of curiosities was to be located had been decided.

  ~ * ~

  13.

  When Ilka was almost three, Olya decided to place him in daycare. Out of two daycares located not far from home, she chose the one that seemed best to her—anyway, there was no money for anything specialized, private, or extravagant, but here at least the nursery-governess who had a name found in stories and jokes, Maria Ivanovna, smiled in a kind way and Ilka seemed to like it. At the very least it didn’t scare him, even though he understood right away that Mama was handing him off to someone else.

  Ilka looked at Olya with woeful eyes and asked: “When are you coming back?”

  “Soon, my son, soon.” Olya suddenly had a feeling that her heart would tear apart.

  “All right,” Ilka said sadly. Taking Maria Ivanovna by the hand, he went off into a large playroom to join the other children.

  Olya wasn’t herself at work. It was one thing to leave her child with his grandmother, but another matter altogether to leave him with some nanny who is a stranger, even if she did have a kind expression. Olya was perpetually distracted, jumped each time the phone rang, made a ton of mistakes, and as soon as the workday was over, she sprang from her seat as though she’d been stung and raced in the direction of the daycare. Ilka was already waiting for her—calm, carefree, and full of new information. Olya calmed down.

  ~ * ~

  14.

  The future Kunstkamera building was placed under the direction of a German, Georg Johann Mattarnovi, who’d had a hand in the finishings of the Summer Palace where the collection was being housed for the time being. For some reason construction moved along slowly; it wasn’t easy. The years passed, yet still there was no building. For Peter Alexeyevich, the erection of Kunstkamera was one of the most important works of his life, but he didn’t live to see the completion of construction—he died seven years following the laying of the foundation stone, even though by his death just the walls had been completed. Then the architect died as well, and others carried on construction.

  After another year, they began moving the collection from the Summer Palace. Yet construction went on and on. Rumors spread that the Nevsky land was refusing to house a collection of dead monstrosities. But enlightened people didn’t pay attention to such rumors—they’d say the collection had been in Petersburg for years already, so there was nothing to talk about. And soon, the rumors dissipated to nil.

  ~ * ~

  15.

  In no time at all Ilka became Maria Ivanovna’s favorite and the soul of the daycare gang—as much as three- and four-year-old children can become a gang. An inquisitive, courteous, smart boy, Ilka never vexed anyone, knew a great deal, and was always polite and even-tempered. He took part in merry and noisy group games organically and happily, enjoyed racing around during outings, and didn’t really separate from those around him. He never caused mischief, nor raised a ruckus, nor cried without cause, behaved calmly during nap time, and ate whatever they served in the daycare cafeteria. Barely a day passed that Maria Ivanovna didn’t sing his praises to Olya, and Olya was utterly overjoyed.

  It was only later that she noticed her boy wasn’t really growing. Of course, he didn’t stay the same small size that he’d been the day Olya had brought him to daycare. But his height had radically slowed—when he and all those around him had turned four years old, Ilka was considerably shorter than the others. This was definitely something to worry about.

  Only then did Olya realize that she was recalling the nightmare that had changed her son’s character overnight all too frequently. But why she was remembering it was unclear.

  ~ * ~

  16.

  Soon after laying the foundation for Kunstkamera, Peter Alexeyevich decided to construct a special building in Petersburg specifically for the growing collection of anatomical and other curiosities. For research purposes, he visited the French port city of Calais, located directly on the strait of Pas-de-Calais. There, he met a man who was so tall that his height left the czar in a state of shock; Peter Alexeyevich was over two meters tall himself. In no time at all, Peter Alexeyevich prevailed upon the Frenchman to relocate to Russia in private service to the czar— he was appointed the position of chasseur.

  The Frenchman died in seven years’ time. By the decree of Peter Alexeyevich the giant’s skin was removed, tanned, and stuffed—the result was something like a tarantula. The Frenchman’s gigantic skeleton was situated next to it—and both the tarantula and the skeleton were immediately absorbed as components of the future museum.

  The Frenchman was called Nicolas Bourgeois, or Nikolai.

  ~ * ~

  17.

  Olya waited a long time—maybe it would right itself. But it didn’t. It seemed Ilka had stopped growing, just dead stopped. They decided to see a doctor. Through friends, they found a good endocrinologist—a gray-haired old man with attractive hands. He examined Ilka, ran every possible test, then disappeared. After a week he called—Olya felt as though the stress had caused her heart to stop beating. The endocrinologist said no pathologies had been found as far as health was concerned, and from a medical standpoint he had no explanation for the growth problem. That is, speaking strictly from the perspective of his own specialty. He advised not to waste energy worrying about it: “Ilka will probably begin to grow—this happens with children sometimes, they don’t grow, don’t grow, then suddenly they erupt, and then there’s no catching up to them.”

  The doctor’s words didn’t make Olya feel any better. Again and again, throughout the course of the next year, she took her son to various endocrinologists, each one better than the last, but all the doctors spoke as one—there are no problems with the boy’s health, he’s healthy as an ox, and it’s totally possible that his not growing is just the individual predisposition of this particular developing organism, and it could happen to anyone. Olya began to calm down a bit, although she occasionally cried at night—very softly, so that Ilka wouldn’t hear.

  Then the nightmares began.

  ~ * ~

  18.

  Over twenty years had passed since the death of Czar Peter Alexeyevich when a terrible fire occurred on the premises of Kunstkamera. The cupola burned atop the steeple, both the collection and library were badly damaged. Among the pieces lost was the skull of Nikolai Bourgeois. Time passed and the museum’s curators began to speak of strange occurrences. They recounted an enormou
s headless figure that wandered through the corridors of Kunstkamera by night, no doubt in search of something. And it was clear what he was searching for, the museum’s curators said, nodding.

  The specter of Kunstkamera, and that’s precisely what they called him, spent many long years wandering the dark halls of the museum finding no peace. Just as he’d disappear for a time, compelling his own existence to be forgotten, so he’d reappear.

  Later he began venturing beyond the confines of the premises. Not very far at first, but with time he ventured ever farther into the city, appearing here or there. True, no destruction came from him—he harmed no one, just frightened them. How they pitied him, this wretched one. Finally they decided something had to be done—they found a skull with no owner and attached it to the skeleton of the French giant. And the giant calmed down. At the very least he no longer appeared to people. Or perhaps it’s just that no one has spoken of it since.

  ~ * ~

  19.

  The first time it happened was almost immediately following his birthday, after they’d celebrated Ilka turning five. That night Olya was awoken by a blood-curdling howl that emanated from her son’s room. Olya sprang up and threw herself headlong at the cry. Ilka sat wailing on the bed, crammed into a corner. He couldn’t speak, only trembled.

  Olya got him to calm down with some difficulty, remaining nearby until he fell asleep. First thing in the morning her son explained that he’d awoken in the night with the sensation that someone was in the room. He’d focused his eyes on the wall and seen an enormous shadow cast by a strange figure. And he was scared that this person would take him, Ilka, away—but where was a mystery. He was afraid to go to sleep alone for several nights after and asked Mama to sit close by. Olya sat, stroking his head, gazing into the darkness.

  ~ * ~

  20.

  “Mama, he’s back.” Ilka sat, pressed into a corner of the bed with a blanket he’d gathered into an enormous heap, which was supposed to barricade him from whatever it was that his eyes were fixed on. “Son, Ilyusha,” Olya perched on the bed and embraced her son, “there’s no one here.”

  Ilka pressed against his mother and started to sob, his hand pointing to the wall across from them. “There he is.”

  Olya gazed into the dark—and was horror-struck. The enormous figure of a man was suspended midair before her. Olya screamed and covered Ilka’s eyes with her hand. At first the figure didn’t stir, but then it began to sway and, slowly, with seeming difficulty, float in the direction of the bed.

  “Don’t move!” Olya yelled. “Don’t move! What do you want?! Why have you come here?!” She was so frightened that she couldn’t figure out what to do. She was only aware that Ilka had stopped crying. “Go away!” screamed Olya. “Please, go away.” Then she began to cry, repeating through tears, “Go away, go away, please, don’t touch him, go away!”

  The figure stopped for a moment, hovering in the center of the room. Then it began moving in the direction of the bed again. Olya was crying, shielding her child, but there was nothing else she could do. What could she have done?

  Meanwhile, the figure had stopped very close by. The giant floated above the floor, so that he had to bend his head to keep from knocking it against the ceiling. Ilka didn’t stir, only shuddered occasionally. Olya didn’t stir either; she’d stopped crying and it seemed that she’d folded into herself from fear. The figure hung in the air a bit longer, then slowly circled around the bed and stopped again. He extended his fleshless hand and touched Ilka’s head. Ilka noticed nothing; Olya’s hand covered his eyes, and Olya thought that at any moment her heart would burst from her chest. But it didn’t burst. The figure of the giant hung suspended in air another moment, then dissolved. He never appeared again.

  After that Ilka began to grow, and everyone knows what people say is the cause.

  <>

  ~ * ~

  HOTEL ANGLETERRE

  by Vladimir Berezin

  Hotel Angleterre

  Translated by Amy Pieterse

  H e was staring at the ceiling, his feet up on the desk. It was an absurd habit he’d picked up from the Americans, but had now come to love. The plaster molding overhead had started to crack in the seventh year of the revolution, forming an intricate pattern that seemed to augur something. Whether it augured well or ill was unclear. The longer he stared at it, the more it resembled a man with a sack and bludgeon, or a rider with a sword.

  He lived in the middle of an enormous city, in a hotel whose windows were beleaguered with monuments. Nearby was a church that had taken many years to build. Now that it was finished, time sought to undo its fate, and everyone said it would soon be closed down.

  In light of all that had already happened in this city, it seemed a new life was in store for the church. And he had heard about life here during the siege and the civil war.

  Shpolyansky was the one who had told him. A well-known graphic artist had drawn Shpolyansky right here. In the portrait, one of Shpolyansky’s buttons is loose, hanging by a thread. He had grown bald, and quite suddenly. He talked about the city abandoned by the government in 1918. Demoted as the capital, the city continued to live according to its old habits for a time. Then its most illustrious inhabitants started leaving. It was that old law of nature: when the lid is removed from a pot, the fastest molecules of water begin to escape, and the pot cools down. During the recent war, the city cooled down quickly.

  And so he lived in a hotel, built by an unknown architect. The building had undergone reconstruction several times, but one thing didn’t change: the architect was still unknown.

  Obscurity seemed to consolidate the mystical power of the place, so nobody was surprised when a famous industrialist—a foreigner, one of the wealthiest people in the empire—died in one of the rooms.

  Now the empire was gone, and the golden epaulettes of the capital had been torn from the city. It stood before enemy fire like a demoted officer on the breastwork.

  The city was still enormous, but it had been dying for several years.

  A crazy old woman had wandered the streets, announcing to all and sundry that there would be three floods, the first one in 1824. One hundred years later, a second flood would occur; and a hundred years after that, a third would submerge the domes of the doomed city once and for all. Then the floodwaters would subside, taking everything with them: the cupolas, the crucifixes, and the buildings themselves. Where the city once stood, there would be flat marshland, overgrown with osier for the rest of time.

  And the old woman went up to one of the statues, the one prancing on the square, its back turned to the river. Twirling about in her foul-smelling skirts, she ate something from the palm of her hand. The hotel’s inhabitants watched her in fear, as belief in the prophesy grew within them like grass through pavement.

  Grass had indeed sprung up in many streets after the revolution, especially those paved with hexagonal wooden tiles. The grass grew tall, and goats grazed here and there, as they did in the Roman ruins. The goats were especially numerous in the outlying districts.

  Shpolyansky told him about those times, and his stories were permeated by a foreboding of flight. Later, Shpolyansky did in fact flee. He escaped across the ice on the Gulf of Finland to a different part of the empire, which had gained independence. Many fled that way, and the first to do so was the father of the revolution himself. Now he was the one they were fleeing. The city was empty, and the grass grew taller.

  Shpolyansky spoke feverishly, saying that in the demoted city people’s wounds did not heal and women had stopped menstruating.

  All around the hotel, new times were afoot and streets were being renamed. No one knew for certain what the street beneath his feet was called.

  Shpolyansky’s friend Dragmanov liked to quote two poems about the large church that was visible from the windows of the hotel.

  “This temple serves two kingdoms: above, of brick; below, of marble.” But they rebuilt the church almost immediately, he said
, so the words had been changed: “This temple serves three kingdoms: marble, brick, and devastation.”

  Dragmanov included these poems in his novel, and the novel seemed very promising. The church had long been a place of central importance to the city. The square derived its name from it, the massive black church looming through the cold mist. But the man with his feet on the desk in the hotel room couldn’t think about the novel.

  He felt changes in the air acutely. And change was definitely on its way. The city that floated past the Angleterre like flood-waters was pliant and soft—always the case before a change of fate. The city was fluid like the dark waters of the river, or the shadowy water of the gulf pulsing beneath the ice.

  It will flow for another hundred years, until the prophesy is fulfilled and the bronze horseman rides on the water as though on solid ground, until the waves swallow the Finnish rock beneath him.