The Gardener from Ochakov

by Andrey Kurkov

  ‘To me!’ he whispered, because he had to drink to something.

  He swallowed some brandy, and a self-congratulatory smile spread across his face. Igor felt happy. Furthermore, he was brimming with every good quality he could think of. He was almost as virtuous as Mother Teresa! And there was nothing to stop him performing another good deed. All he had to do was put on the old police uniform, and it would instantly stop being old.

  ‘Ma, have we got any burnt-out light bulbs?’ he asked, glancing into the living room.

  Elena Andreevna looked up from the television.

  ‘What do you need them for?’

  ‘I just do.’

  ‘They’re in the shed, in the far right-hand corner.’

  When Igor opened the shed door, the bright light inside almost blinded him. Stepan was sitting on a stool directly beneath the light bulb that hung from the ceiling, reading a book. Igor stared at him, puzzled.

  ‘Good evening,’ said the gardener.

  ‘Good evening,’ answered Igor. ‘Sorry, I won’t be a minute . . .’

  He went to the far right-hand corner of the shed and immediately saw a bag containing about a dozen burnt-out light bulbs. What’s she keeping them for? he wondered, bending down. He chose two foreign bulbs with a matt finish, because their glass seemed a little thicker. Then he heard Stepan’s voice behind him.

  ‘I was thinking about going to a cafe a bit later. Would you like to join me?’

  ‘What do you mean?’ Igor didn’t understand.

  ‘We could have supper together,’ suggested Stepan.

  ‘No, I can’t, I’ve got to be somewhere.’

  ‘That’s a pity,’ said Stepan. ‘Well, can you recommend a good cafe?’

  ‘All the good cafes are in Kiev. As for round here,’ shrugged Igor, ‘I really don’t know what they’re like.’

  ‘Well, you should know! You live here, as do a thousand other decent people, all of whom are entitled to good cafes and restaurants.’

  Igor stared at Stepan, trying to work out whether the gardener was reprimanding him or simply being naive. Meanwhile, Stepan was eyeing the two matt light bulbs in Igor’s hands and wondering what his landlady’s son was up to.

  Back in his room, Igor got dressed in the old police uniform, fastening the belt and holster around his waist. He took the gun out of the wardrobe, where he’d hidden it from his mother’s curiosity. After trying it out at the barbecue, he now knew that it was a useless fake. On the other hand, if Igor had given Kolyan the gun when he’d asked, it might have frightened off his attacker.

  Igor turned the gun over in his hands, trying to decide whether or not to take it with him. He brought it to his nose and inhaled. Igor liked the smell of gun oil, and it was a good feeling holding this heavy toy, even if that’s all it was. Eventually Igor slipped the gun into the holster and found a bag for the light bulbs. He put Valya’s medication into the bag too, along with the pharmacist’s handwritten instructions. Holding the carrier bag, he glanced into the living room to let his mother know that he was going out. His mother wasn’t sitting in front of the television for once; she was at the ironing board, carefully ironing creases into a pair of trousers.

  ‘Ma! I’ve told you before! Nobody wears creases in their trousers these days!’ exclaimed Igor.

  ‘They’re Stepan’s,’ answered his mother. ‘He’s going somewhere in his suit this evening. It must be some-thing important!’

  ‘Yeah, I bet it is.’ Igor smiled. ‘I’m going out now, and I’ll be back tomorrow or the day after. Don’t worry about me.’

  As soon as he’d said this he closed the door and walked briskly down the hallway, the heels of his police boots knocking against the wooden floorboards. He heard his mother’s voice behind him but couldn’t make out what she was saying, nor did he try to.

  It wasn’t long before he’d left the house behind. The evening was wrapping the street in its dark cotton wool, muffling sounds and thickening the air. An old Moskvich car drove past, overtook Igor and turned into another street, disappearing from view.

  Igor quickened his pace. He wore a tense smile and all his thoughts, all his feelings, were focused on his impending immersion in another world. There was a different kind of meaning behind the windows and faces in this world, a different energy in its gestures and movements. The eyes of its inhabitants burned with a unique spirit, in both solemnity and joy.

  Drunken excitement seemed to accelerate the dark time of day. The familiar lights of the Ochakov Wine Factory soon appeared in the distance. When Igor was about two hundred metres away, the green gates opened and the old lorry came out. It turned and drove off towards the town, its headlights illuminating the road ahead. Just as Igor reached the edge of the square, the gates creaked again and opened slightly. A young lad carrying a sack of wine over his shoulder stuck his head out. He turned and waved to the guard, and the gates closed again after him.

  Igor peered closely at him. The lad was about the same height and build as Vanya, but there was something different about his posture and the way he was moving. It wasn’t Vanya. The lad carrying the leather wineskin took several steps towards the road, then stopped and adjusted his burden. Igor emerged from under the trees.

  ‘Hey!’ he called out to the lad. He wanted to ask him about Vanya.

  Turning round sharply at the sound of his voice, the lad threw the wineskin from his shoulder and leapt into the darkness.

  ‘Come back!’ called Igor. ‘There’s nothing to be afraid of!’

  Everything was quiet. The only sound to be heard was the crackling of branches coming from the direction in which the lad had disappeared, and it was growing more and more distant.

  ‘Little devil!’ Igor shook his head, annoyed. He walked over to the abandoned leather sack. He prodded it with the toe of his boot and watched it wobble as the wine sloshed about inside. He looked around again.

  He was holding a carrier bag full of light bulbs and medicine, and there was a sack of stolen wine at his feet. Everything was dark and quiet. What was he supposed to do now? Should he leave the wine there?

  Igor sighed deeply and placed the carrier bag next to the wineskin. Then he squatted down, lifted the leather sack and hoisted it onto his shoulder. He was sure he felt his shoulder joint crunch under the sudden and unfamiliar burden. Igor grabbed the carrier bag and stood up with a jerk. The wineskin heaved and trembled as though it were alive, and it seemed to be trying its best to slip off his shoulder.

  ‘Not a good start,’ Igor muttered to himself and set off along the familiar road to the town. His right shoulder ached. Igor tried to carry the wine over his left shoulder, but the sack just wouldn’t stay on it.

  Giving the familiar gate a shove, Igor went into Vanya Samokhin’s yard. He put the sack down carefully on the doorstep and caught his breath, then looked up at the dark, sleeping windows of the house.

  He went round behind the corner of the house and rapped on the glass with his knuckles. Vanya’s sleepy face appeared in the window. He rubbed his eyes with his hands and peered out.

  ‘Open up, it’s me!’ Igor said quite loudly, bringing his face as close as he could to the glass.

  Eventually Vanya spotted his guest and went to let him in.

  ‘Where did you get that?’ he asked in surprise. His eyes were fixed on the sack of wine that Igor had lowered onto the wooden floor in the hallway.

  ‘From your factory,’ said Igor, with a tired smile. ‘I was waiting for you there, and another lad came out instead of you, carrying that.’ He nodded at the sack. ‘I was going to ask him about you, but when I called out he just ran off. I couldn’t leave evidence of the misappropriation of socialist property there in front of the factory gates, could I?’

  Igor was surprised at how easily the right words flew out of his mouth this time.

  ‘So, did I do the right thing?’ he asked Vanya.

  Vanya shrugged. ‘It must have been Petka, my co-worker,’ he said. ‘It’s his sa
ck.’ He squatted down near the wine. ‘We need to give it back. A leather sack like that costs more than a hundred roubles.’

  ‘Return stolen goods to a thief? Maybe you’d like me to hand this embezzled wine back to him in person, right now?’

  Vanya didn’t answer. In the dim light of the hallway, Igor could see him pouting childishly.

  ‘If he’s your friend, you can give it back to him yourself,’ said Igor.

  ‘No, I’ll tip the wine out first, then give the sack back,’ whispered Vanya. ‘I feel bad for him, though, he’s really unlucky.’

  ‘And you’re lucky, are you?’ Igor asked snidely.

  ‘Yes, I am,’ Vanya answered firmly. ‘I’ve got my own camera, and Mother and I eat cutlets on Sundays. We’re doing well.’

  ‘Ah, that reminds me . . .’ Igor looked into the carrier bag and took out two light bulbs. ‘Here, these are for your mother.’

  ‘Oh, I’ve never seen this kind before!’ Fascinated, Vanya examined the matt white glass of the light bulbs. ‘Are they really bright?’

  ‘They were,’ said Igor.

  ‘Thank you, Mother will be delighted! Why don’t you go through and lie down? I’m just going to sort this wine out.’

  Igor went into ‘his’ room, took his boots off and put the bag containing Valya’s medication on the floor next to the sofa. Then he fetched the quilted blanket, which was folded up on a nearby chair, and settled down on the familiar protruding springs.

  The door creaked open and Vanya’s silhouette appeared.

  ‘Here,’ he whispered. ‘Take this, to help you sleep.’

  The contents of the glass shone with a strange matt gleam. Igor took the wine and drank it in two gulps. As he felt the familiar sour taste wash over his tongue, he was suddenly overcome with the desire to sleep. The springs seemed to yield beneath him, until he no longer felt them at all.

  The dawn chorus infiltrated Igor’s subconscious early the following morning. He opened his eyes. Several bicycles went past the house, then he heard the creaking of a cart’s wheels. The snorting of the horse was replaced immediately by two women’s voices, approaching rapidly then fading away.

  Igor stood up, smoothed down his uniform and pulled on his boots. He walked over to the window. The world beyond was bathed in bright golden sunlight, giving the impression that it was still summer. Only the yellowing leaves on the trees gave the true season away.

  ‘Igor,’ Vanya said from the doorway, ‘Mother says breakfast is ready.’

  Igor turned round. Vanya was already dressed.

  He and Vanya sat down at the kitchen table, and Igor introduced himself.

  ‘Thank you so much!’ Aleksandra Marinovna turned from the stove to look at her guest. ‘Thank you so much! I can’t tell you how grateful I am! I’ve got so much darning to do, and it’s funny but the light bulbs never seem to burn out. The shop took a delivery of Azerbaijani light bulbs a year ago, so I stocked up, and they’re still going strong. It’s quite astonishing! Here, I’ve made semolina and crackling.’

  She ladled out three helpings of thick semolina, then added pieces of crispy pork fat from a small frying pan.

  ‘Would you like some more salt?’ she asked.

  ‘No, thanks,’ said Igor, picking up his spoon.

  ‘Well, I’m having some – that’s how I like it!’ She took her place at the table and seasoned her semolina generously.

  ‘It’s time for me to start my shift,’ said Vanya, glancing at Igor. ‘Will you be here this evening?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Igor, savouring the taste of the semolina and crackling.

  ‘I wanted to talk to you,’ Vanya went on. ‘I’ve really enjoyed using the camera. I’ve taken five more films for you.’

  Igor stared at Vanya in surprise. An idea suddenly occurred to him.

  ‘Is there a film in the camera at the moment?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘You can take some photographs right now!’

  ‘The semolina needs to cool down anyway,’ said Vanya, getting up from the table.

  He came back with the camera and took a photo of Igor. Then he took one of Igor at the table with his mother, then his mother took one of Vanya and Igor. Finally Igor took one of Vanya and his mother, but only after Vanya had adjusted the lens.

  ‘I’ll be back by nine o’clock tonight,’ said Vanya. Then he stood up, nodded and left the kitchen.

  Aleksandra Marinovna brewed some tea.

  ‘I’m being so lazy today,’ she said with a smile. ‘I should have left for the market two hours ago, but then I saw the light bulbs. I couldn’t believe it! I wanted to thank you straight away but Vanya said that you arrived late last night, so we didn’t want to wake you . . . But now I really must go. Don’t forget to pull the door shut when you go out.’

  Still smiling gratefully, she finished her tea then went out into the hallway and started getting ready to go to the market. Igor followed her and was surprised to see four heavy bags, full of three-litre bottles of wine.

  ‘You’re not planning to carry all that by yourself, are you?’

  Aleksandra Marinovna glanced indifferently at her burden.

  ‘Why not? It won’t be the first time!’ she said with a shrug.

  ‘Why don’t you buy a cart or some kind of trolley?’ suggested Igor. ‘It would be a lot easier.’

  ‘Oh, no!’ Vanya’s mother waved her hand dismissively. ‘People would judge us for it. They’d accuse us of having ideas above our station. It’s harder this way, but at least we know our money is earned honestly.’

  This line of reasoning seemed strange to Igor, but also made a kind of sense.

  Igor tried to lift two of the bags. They were so heavy! He felt pathetic. How on earth did she plan to carry all four of them? Two in each hand?

  ‘I’ll help you,’ Igor nodded at the bags. I don’t see how you’re going to manage them by yourself.’

  They left the house five minutes later. Unlike her son, Aleksandra Marinovna clearly had no qualms about accepting help from a police officer. She carried her two bags easily. Unaccustomed as he was to physical exertion, Igor barely managed to keep up with her. He was carrying the other two bags, each of which contained three three-litre bottles of wine, plus the carrier bag with Valya’s medication. His wrists and shoulders were already aching, and he eyed Vanya’s mother enviously from behind as she took it all in her stride. Several passers-by greeted her courteously and glanced sideways in his direction, which made Igor feel even more uncomfortable – as though he were this capable woman’s poodle or dachshund, doomed to follow her everywhere, wagging his little tail.

  He wanted to pause and catch his breath, but she showed no sign of stopping, and Igor couldn’t bring himself to ask for a break. That would have meant admitting defeat, capitulating before a woman. Just then he noticed a group of about twenty schoolchildren coming towards them, all holding little red flags. They were being led by their teacher, who was young and pretty in an earnest, respectable way. She had an honest face and a neat little nose, and her eyes were shining. Her lilac dress was tied at the waist with a sash of the same fabric, accentuating her slim figure.

  ‘Detachment, halt!’ she commanded, and the children stopped at once.

  ‘Can you see what our police officers do?’ she asked, looking warmly at Igor, who was struggling to keep the smile on his face.

  ‘They help the elderly,’ answered a little girl with two big white bows in her hair.

  ‘Exactly!’ answered the teacher. ‘Who wants to be a police officer when they grow up?’

  Several of the boys immediately put their hands up, holding their red flags aloft. Igor noticed that they had gold hammers and sickles on them.

  ‘What about you, Kashenko?’ asked the teacher.

  Her question was directed at a chubby boy with slightly bulging eyes. Igor glanced at him as he drew alongside the group and continued walking.

  ‘I’m going to be a builder,’ answered the boy.


  ‘Detachment, march!’ called the young woman, once Igor had passed.

  The children’s chattering faded away – or, rather, was drowned out by the approaching noise of the market. Aleksandra Marinovna reached her stall, put her bags down and pushed them under the counter with her foot.

  ‘Oh, thank you so much!’ she breathed.

  Her face was damp with sweat. This was some consolation to Igor, whose hands were buzzing like high-voltage wires.

  ‘If you need to go back to the house during the day,’ whispered Vanya’s mother, ‘just lift the door up a bit by the handle and give it a push. Then it’ll open.’

  ‘It’s all right, I won’t be back until this evening,’ replied Igor. He said goodbye and moved away to the side. As he caught his breath, he watched Aleksandra Marinovna take her white overall from one of the bags and put it on. She adjusted her hair, glanced into a little mirror, then took three bottles out of one of the bags and put them on the counter in front of her.

  ‘Home-made red wine, natural home-made wine!’ she cried, casting a proprietorial eye over her little section of the market, as though she were personally in charge of it. ‘Perfect for parties, perfect for funerals! Try before you buy! You won’t find better!’

  Igor looked along the wine section. Vanya’s mother seemed to be the youngest and most animated of all the sellers. There were several old women on either side of her, all of whom had bottles or jars of wine on the counters in front of them. At the end of the row an old man was hunched over two old-fashioned glass demijohns.

  Once he was fully recovered, Igor headed for the fish section. The sellers there were more vociferous, and in the chorus of voices he immediately recognised Valya’s. His feet automatically quickened their pace.

  ‘Good morning,’ said Igor, stopping at her stall. A thin woman of about forty with braids wound tightly around her head stood directly in front of Valya.

  ‘Good mornings start at six o’clock, not nine!’ Valya retorted with a smile. She looked back at the woman with the plaits. ‘I’ll let him know,’ she assured her. ‘Don’t worry, he’ll bring it back!’