Jacob's Ladder

by Ludmila Ulitskaya

  Seeing how solicitous everyone was toward her, Dusya, the servant, began calling Marusya “Princess.” But after the exaggerated burdens of pregnancy followed a truly difficult birth, which almost cost Marusya her life. She was in labor with her firstborn for two days. Professor Bruno, the head of the Faculty of Gynecology and Obstetrics, and the best surgeon in town, performed an operation that saved the life of both mother and child. After the operation, she began to hemorrhage, however, and her life hung in the balance for several more days.

  Jacob spent those terrible days in the public library on Alexandrovskaya Street. To try to understand what his wife was going through, he borrowed a volume of Surgical Obstetrics by Fenomenov. Here he encountered many unfamiliar words and horrifying pictures. He empathized and suffered with her, barely thinking about the child—the precious life of Marusya overshadowed the rest of the world, which seemed to be quaking under his feet.

  Sofia Semyonovna, cursing herself for her dismissive attitude about what she had thought were the exaggerated sufferings of her daughter-in-law during her pregnancy, now sat in her room with the woman’s prayer book in Yiddish, wept over it, and prayed, not according to the book, but as her own heart moved her to pray. Dusya ran to the Mariinsko-Blagoveshchenskaya Church, ordered a service for Marusya’s recovery, and lit a fat candle for her.

  Marusya was still suffering, but the esteemed Professor Bruno assured her that her current pain was only to be expected, that her life was no longer in danger, and that the best thing she could do now was to return home. The heating in the hospital was inadequate, and he felt she would recover more quickly amid the comforts of home. They did not show the baby to Marusya until the third day. She had never seen newborn babies, and was upset, having expected a pretty little child; this wrinkly bit of a thing, with its crumpled little face, inspired only pity in her. She began to cry.

  A week later, Jacob brought his growing family home with him, but here there were new difficulties to contend with. Though Marusya’s childlike breasts were swollen with milk by this time, her flat nipples refused to open, and seemed to want to lock in the milk for good. Expressing the milk was painful, and the newborn was too weak to suck the milk out of her breasts for himself. Mastitis set in, followed by fever. Breast-feeding was out of the question. During the first days, the child was saved by a precious can of Nestlé powdered milk, which they managed to get hold of in the impoverished city through their combined efforts. Sofia Semyonovna, with the help of her extended family, found a wet nurse—a young village girl with a seven-month-old soldier’s son named Kolya. She and Kolya were settled in Eva and Rayechka’s room, and they moved into the living room. The baby, named Genrikh, stopped crying. Now he spent most of his time next to the ample breast of the wet nurse, and started squealing whenever he was removed from her. Kolya, the nurse’s own child, didn’t object. He clearly preferred the porridge of milk and white bread crusts that the experienced Sofia Semyonovna cooked for him.

  Then Asya Smolkina, a relative of Marusya’s who was a certified nurse, showed up at their home. Always ready to offer medical assistance to her relatives, friends, and acquaintances, she worked as a surgical nurse in Kiev Hospital, where the wounded were transferred to undergo complicated operations that were impossible to carry out in the field hospitals. She rushed over to Marusya either early in the morning or late in the evening and made her compresses, applied lotions, gave massages, always wearing an expression that suggested it was an honor for her to be invited to their home. A week later, Asya managed to express the rest of the standing milk—it was excruciatingly painful—and bind Marusya’s breasts with a long linen wrapper, to kill the milk. She also massaged and manipulated her stomach, from navel to pubis, admiring the precise, evenly spaced stitches, which were Professor Bruno’s masterful handiwork. Asya idolized Marusya and was prepared to offer her medical services to her until the end of her life, if Marusya would permit it.

  For the first six months of Genrikh’s life, Marusya was sick and in pain much of the time. Little Genrikh had brought her many new difficulties. In the evenings, when Jacob returned home from the library (he couldn’t study at home any longer), they brought the baby to them. Jacob and Marusya put him on display, examining his tiny little hands and feet; they felt surprised by, and gradually grew accustomed to, the new member of their little family. The three of them passed the time in one another’s company until the little one began to cry. Then Sofia Semyonovna took him back to the wet nurse.

  After that the two of them were alone. Tenderness gave way to passion. Their mutual desire was as strong as ever, and fear of causing pain spurred the discovery of new ways of touching, new kinds of intimacy. Marusya, despairing at how disfigured her stomach was, covered it with her nightgown; but Jacob said that the stitches were particularly dear to him. He told her that the stitches not only did not spoil her looks, they bound the two of them together. They were a mark of her heroic deed, and she meant even more to him with them than without them. The dream of a family with many children had been foolish and empty: he would never again allow her to undergo such suffering.

  Jacob kissed the wound that was suddenly right next to his lips, his fingers touched the moist forbidden depths, and for the first time in their relations they discovered not only the smell but also the taste of each other … They again began to talk about things that were in no way related to their ever more complicated domestic life. They made plans, and more plans for the future.

  When the future arrived, it was not at all the one they had envisioned or hoped for. Things were going from bad to worse on the front. In the fall of 1916, after he had secured his teaching position at the Commercial Institute, Jacob was called up, and transferred from the reserves to active army service. He was sent to Kharkov, to the Second Sappers Reserve Battalion, in which there was a company orchestra. This was not the kind of music he longed for, but a rifle was even less enticing. He was stranded in Kharkov for a long time. The war turned into revolution, and revolution into civil war. Now frontiers and fronts lay between him and his family, and their communications were sometimes disrupted for many months.

  30

  Endings

  (1988–1989)

  Nora had known for a long time already that no year ever ended uneventfully. The last weeks of December always brought surprises—both good and bad—as though all the events that were supposed to happen during the course of the year ran out of time and piled up in a heap during these pre–New Year’s days. On December 16, Taisia came over with a box of chocolates and a huge bale, out of which she pulled a checked blanket clearly of Scottish provenance. While Nora was still blinking in astonishment, Taisia dexterously put the teakettle on to boil.

  It had already been two years since she left Nora’s and returned home. After two years of red tape and other ordeals, Lena had finally received a visa to go to Argentina and was now living in a small town in Mendoza Province, where her swarthy husband worked as an engineer in a winery—something his impoverished family in Buenos Aires couldn’t even dream of. Taisia had received twelve letters in two years from her daughter—strange, incomprehensible letters, from which she could derive only one thing: that Lena wasn’t dancing the tango in Argentina. Six months earlier, a letter arrived that made things absolutely clear: Lena was expecting a baby, and she wanted her mother to come help her out in the first months. It was astonishing that Taisia, who was usually a chatterbox, had never said a word to Nora about this invitation. Taisia had received her visitor’s visa, printed on fancy paper covered with official stamps, from the Argentinian consulate, had bought a ticket without saying a word, and two days before her departure had come to inform Nora about it. The chocolates and the blanket were, thus, goodbye presents, and Nora, bewildered, ate two sickly-sweet chocolates in a row; they seemed to stick in her throat. She couldn’t wrap her head around the fact that Taisia, whom she considered to be a straightforward, trustworthy person, had so deceived her. It was as though she had n
ow discovered a hidden layer in Taisia, some inexplicable insidiousness in her behavior, a completely unwarranted furtiveness.

  Nora still couldn’t bring herself to ask the question that most perplexed her: why did Taisia conceal her plans for so long, why did she wait until two days before the departure to tell Nora about it? Afraid she would start to cry from hurt and confusion, Nora got up and went over to her desk, where she began rooting around in a drawer. She took an unattractive gold ring with faceted alexandrite that had belonged to Grandmother Zinaida out of a little wooden box and placed it in front of Taisia—a memento. Taisia put it on her finger and burst into tears.

  “Oh, Nora … But it’s gold! And it fits perfectly. You won’t regret it? But I shouldn’t really take it … It’s so valuable!” She took it off, and put it on again. And smiled, and wiped her nose, and went to kiss Nora.

  “I don’t know what I’ll do without you and Yurik, Nora.”

  Get lost, Nora thought. You’re such a fake.

  Out loud she said, “When are you coming back?”

  “Soon, soon. I’ll only be gone for three months,” Taisia said.

  Nora’s project with Tengiz was pending; all her plans were falling through.

  Maybe I should have Mama come stay for a few weeks, Nora thought.

  She didn’t have time to ask her. Not two days had passed since Taisia’s departure when Andrei Ivanovich dropped by. He was alone, without Amalia. Nora immediately sensed something was amiss. And it was worse than she could ever have suspected.

  Amalia had cancer.

  “Where is the tumor?”

  “It’s … everywhere. They didn’t find just one tumor. It’s all over. She’s … she’s on her way here. She just went to the hairdresser.”

  Andrei Ivanovich choked up. He was pale, and his hands trembled. Nora sat silently, designing a set for the immediate future in her mind. She would prepare Amalia’s old room for her and drag in the old bed, call the plumber right away to repair all the faucets and the toilet tank, free up the one-door wardrobe for her mother’s belongings, buy some potted plants—the way Mama loved it. She didn’t get any further than that in building her plans, because an indescribable nightmare loomed. She would have to tell Yurik. Poor thing, he loved both of them so much. Sometimes it seemed he didn’t love anyone but them. Nora thought about the dogs that her mother would probably want to bring here with her. Then she stopped herself.

  “Andrei Ivanovich, maybe they made a mistake?”

  “No, there’s no mistake. It has already—what’s it called?—metastasized. I can feel myself that things are bad with her. Not a day goes by when I don’t wonder: Why her? Why not me? I would give anything if I could trade places with her.”

  Soon Amalia arrived, with a traditional flowery shawl over her head, her nails painted red. Nora stared at her in astonishment: it was the first time in her life she had ever seen her mother wearing nail polish. She was a first-rate draftsman; long fingernails were considered inappropriate in her profession. Amalia started laughing.

  “Nora, I realized that I couldn’t appear before the doctor with hands looking the way they did. They’d think I was a cook or a housepainter and not offer me the proper treatment.”

  Was this a case of extreme self-possession, or simple incomprehension?

  “Mama, move back home with me. You are officially registered at this address. The municipal hospitals are better, after all. Tusya’s cousin runs the department at the Herzen Institute; we can arrange for you to get treated there.”

  “I’ve already thought about it. I understand the situation, of course, dear. They were about to suggest I get treated out where we live, in the country, not here where I am registered. But we’ve already been to the municipal oncology clinic, and they gave me a referral.” Amalia began to rummage through her purse, but Nora stopped her.

  “How do you feel, though? Are you in pain?”

  “You won’t believe it, but I just had a sore throat—I thought it was tonsillitis. I kept gargling, and gargling. I felt it on one side, as usually happens with tonsillitis. But it kept hurting and wouldn’t get better. I thought maybe it was my tooth; I’ve had problems with it on that side of my mouth for a long time now. Then my glands swelled up—here, take a look.” And she moved aside her scarf, which had been tied in a jaunty bow.

  How sweet and youthful she was! But she was already over seventy. The hair at her temples had only just started turning gray, and it was growing out in tight little ringlets. She was still pretty; she had almost no wrinkles on her face. Only her neck betrayed her age—it was crepey and lined. She had lost weight in the last half year, and this suited her. Nora was suddenly overcome by such a strong rush of love for her—she had never felt anything like it. It was like water bursting out of a tap. Or fog covering a mountain. Or a downpour on a quiet day.

  “Did Andrei tell you? Today the doctor told me an operation wasn’t necessary. I thought they’d just cut it out and that would be it. She says that I have to consult some professor or other, and that chemotherapy is the best way to go. It’s more effective, you see.”

  Amalia stayed overnight, and Andrei Ivanovich went home to feed the dogs.

  And so Amalia returned home, to the place she had lived since she was born. For Nora, a new life began. She spent a lot of time with her mother, but now things were different from before. Amalia was like an honored guest at Nora’s house. Andrei Ivanovich came every day and stayed for an hour or two, having spent six or eight hours on the road.

  Nora drove her mother around to her doctors’ appointments. Amalia was quiet and submissive. Her eyes looked anxious, and her movements were uncertain. She no longer laughed out loud at the slightest provocation. Nora missed this almost gratuitous laughter, which had so irritated her before.

  A month later, Amalia was admitted to the hospital. Now Nora brought her soup and pomegranates, watching her mother grow weaker and more diminished from one day to the next, becoming more and more like a frightened child. Andrei Ivanovich found homes for the dogs, got rid of the horse, and moved in with Nora.

  Now Nora spent less time at the hospital. She saw how her mother perked up when Andrei Ivanovich entered the ward, and felt the old jealousy that she had experienced as a child. Then the doctors sent Amalia home—to give her a break from the treatment, as they said. She started feeling better. It turned out that the chemotherapy had not helped at all; her blood was destroyed, but the doctors insisted that she continue with this sadistic treatment. They prescribed a very expensive foreign drug called vincristine, which Tengiz managed to get hold of in Germany. He was in Düsseldorf to stage The Death of Tarelkin, a production Nora had dreamed up and designed, though she had been unable to accompany Tengiz.

  The love fest between Amalia, dying of a fatal disease, and Andrei Ivanovich, helpless to do anything to prevent it, played out in the next room, behind a tightly closed door. The door to the second bedroom was also constantly closed, but from it escaped snatches of melodies that Nora was already sick of—Beatles, and more Beatles. She already knew every song by heart, both text and melody, because Yurik sang them all, imitating now Lennon, now McCartney. Fairly accurate renditions. Nora asked her mother one day whether the music disturbed her.

  “What music?” she asked, and Nora realized how far she had already traveled from this world.

  For three and a half months, Andrei Ivanovich held fast to Amalia’s arm. For three and a half months, he carried her to the bathtub, washed her, wiped her dry, dressed her again, put her to bed, and lay by her side. If he was absent, she began to cry, and there was nothing Nora could do to comfort her. But when Andrei Ivanovich returned, Amalia took his hand and held it, and calmed down immediately. Then she fell asleep. Like a nursing child who was given the breast.

  From time to time, the doctor from the polyclinic came, measured her blood pressure, and ordered blood tests. Then the nurse came. When the nurse came for the last time, Andrei Ivanovich happened not to be at
home. Nora took her into her mother’s room. Amalia lay on top of three pillows, sitting almost upright. She held out her withered hand trustingly, and the nurse stabbed her finger with the needle. From the incision it made oozed a transparent reddish-yellow drop. Nora started in horror—the red blood cells had died.

  When the nurse left, Nora returned to her mother. She was smiling the smile of a child. Her teeth were the same as Yurik’s—bright white, a bit uneven at the sides. They were the most alive thing in her dry, diminished little face.

  “What do you think, child—if they give me an invalid’s pension, will it increase by much? Because, the way it is now, we can’t raise dogs for money anymore.”

  On the evening of that same day, she went into a coma, and only woke up once, in the middle of the night. Seeking Andrei Ivanovich with her eyes, she said, “Have you had your dinner, Andrei?”

  For another whole day her breathing was labored, spasmodic; then it stopped. It was in the predawn hours. Andrei Ivanovich held her hand until it grew cold. Nora’s tears poured down her face, and from Yurik’s room came strains of “Yesterday.” For some reason, she felt there should be silence. She opened her son’s door and said, “Yurik, Grandmother died.”

  He kept on playing the song. When he finished it, he said, “I sensed it.”

  And so he played his Beatles until morning, and for the first time in years, these sounds were not jarring to Nora’s ears. They didn’t irritate her in the least. In his breaking, thirteen-year-old voice, at the top of his lungs, he sang “Your Mother Should Know,” “I Want to Hold Your Hand,” “She’s Leaving Home.” The music suddenly seemed appropriate and necessary. It was astonishing: he didn’t say a word, but the music that had irritated Nora a hundred times over sounded bitterly sad, and even exalted.

  Andrei Ivanovich remained by Amalia’s side, holding the hand of his beloved wife, and Nora had no desire to make practical decisions and plans: requiem service–funeral repast … It was all meaningless and in vain … What a pity that I didn’t love her as I should, that I couldn’t forgive her her love, that I didn’t understand her giftedness, her genius and uniqueness, which she invested almost solely in this love …