“That’s good,” said the pike calmly. “I like people like you. The other day, too, there was this case. Some guy bought me in the market and I had to promise him a tsar’s daughter. So there I am, swimming along in the river, full of shame, not knowing where to hide myself. Next thing, not looking where I am going, I barge right into a net. They lug me up. Again, I figure I’ll have to lie my way out. So what do you think the man does? He grabs me right across the teeth so I can’t open my mouth. ‘That’s the end,’ I thought. ‘Into the soup kettle with me—this time.’ But no. He clamps something on my fin and back in the water I go. See?”
The pike raised herself out of the bucket and placed a fin on the edge. At its base was a metal clamp on which I read: This specimen released in the Solovei River in the year 1854. Deliver to H.I.M. Academy of Science.
“Don’t tell the hag,” warned the pike. “She’ll tear it out with the fin. Greedy, she is, the miser.”
What should I ask her? I thought feverishly.
“How do you work your miracles?”
“What miracles?”
“You know—wish fulfillments.”
“Oh, that? How do I do it? Been taught from infancy, that’s how. I guess I don’t really know… The Golden Fish,6 she did it even better than I, but she is dead now. You can’t escape your fate.”
It seemed to me she sighed.
“From old age?” I asked.
“Old age, nothing! Young she was, and spritely. They dropped a depth charge on her, my fine friend. So belly-up she went, and some kind of vessel that happened nearby also sank. She would have bought herself off, but they didn’t ask. No sooner sighted, than blam with the bomb… That’s the way of it.” She was silent a while. “Well, then, are you going to let me go? It feels close somehow; there is going to be a thunderstorm.”
“Of course, of course,” I said, startled back to reality. “How should I do it? Throw you in, or in the bucket?”
“Throw me in, my good man, throw me in.”
Carefully I dipped my hands into the bucket and extracted the pike—it must have weighed in at around eight kilos. She kept on murmuring, “And how about a self-serving tablecloth or a flying carpet—I’ll be right here. You can count on me…”
“So long,” I said, and let go. There was a noisy splash.
For some time, I stood there gazing at my hands, covered with green slime. I experienced some kind of strange feeling. Part of the time an awareness came over me, like a gust of wind, that I was sitting on the sofa in the room, but all I had to do was shake my head and I was back at the well. The feeling dissipated. I washed in the fine ice-cold water, filled the car radiator, then shaved. The old woman was still out. I was getting hungry, and it was time to go to the post office, where my friends might be waiting for me even then. I locked the car and went out the gate.
I was unhurriedly sauntering down Lukomoriye Street, hands in the pockets of my gray GDR jacket, looking down at my feet. In the back pocket of my favorite jeans, crisscrossed with zippers, jingled the crone’s coppers. I was reflecting. The skinny brochures of the “Znanie” society had accustomed me to the concept that animals were incapable of speech. Fairy tales from childhood, on the other hand, had insisted on the opposite. Of course, I agreed with the brochures, since never in my life had I seen talking animals. Not even parrots. I used to know one parrot who could growl like a tiger, but human-talk he could not do. And now—the pike, the tomcat Basil, and even the mirror. Incidentally, it is precisely the inanimate objects that speak the most often. And, by the way, it’s this last consideration which would never enter the head of my great granddaddy. In his ancestral viewpoint, a talking cat would be a much less fantastic item than a polished wood box, which howls, whistles, plays music, and talks in several languages. As far as the cat goes, it’s more or less clear. But how about the pike? A pike does not have lungs. That’s a fact. True, they do have an air ballast bladder whose function as far as I know is not entirely understood by ichthyologists. My ichthyologist acquaintance, Gene Skoromahov, postulates that it is truly totally unclear, and when I attempt to reason about it with arguments from the “Znanie” brochures, old Gene growls and spits in contempt. His rightful gift of human speech seems to desert him completely…
I have this impression that as yet we know very little about the potential of animals. Only recently it became clear that fish and sea animals exchange signals under water. Very interesting pieces are written about dolphins. Or, let’s take the ape Raphael. This I saw for myself. True, it cannot speak, but instead it has this developed reflex: green light—banana; red light—electric shock. Everything was just fine until they turned on the red and green lights simultaneously. Then Raphael began to conduct himself just like, for instance, old Gene. He was terribly upset. He threw himself at the window behind which the experimenter was seated, and took to spitting at it, growling and squealing hideously. And then there is the story—“Do you know what a conditioned reflex is? That’s what happens when the bell rings and all these quasi-apes in white coats will run toward us with bananas and candies,”—which one ape tells the other.
Naturally, all of this is not that simple. The terminology has not been worked out. Under the circumstances, any attempt to resolve the questions involving the potential and psychology of animals leaves you feeling totally helpless. But, on the other hand, when you have to solve, say, a system of integral equations of the type used in stellar statistics, with unknown functions under the integral, you don’t feel any better. That’s why the best thing is to—cogitate. As per Pascal: “Let us learn to think well—that is the basic principle of morality.”
I came out on the Prospect of Peace and stopped, arrested by an unusual sight. Marching in the middle of the pavement was a man with flags in his hands. About ten paces behind him, engine revving and laboring, a huge white truck was drawing a gigantic cistern-like silvery trailer, from which issued wisps of smoke. Fire Danger was written all over the cistern, and busy little fire engines, bristling with fire extinguishers, were rolling along, keeping pace on its right and left. From time to time, mixing in with the steady roar of the engine, a different sound issued forth, somehow chilling the heart with a strange malaise. Simultaneously yellow tongues of flame spurted out of the cistern’s ports. The faces of the firemen, hats pushed low on their ears, were stern and manly. Swarms of children swirled around the cavalcade, yelling piercingly, “Ti-li-lee ti-li-lay, they’re caning the dragon away.” Adult passersby fearfully hugged the fences. Their faces clearly depicted a desire to save their clothing from possible damage.
“There they go with dear Unc,” a familiar raspy bass pronounced in my ear.
I turned around. Behind me, looking miserable, stood Naina Kievna with a shopping bag full of blue packets of granulated sugar.
“Trucking him off,” she repeated. “Every Friday they take him.”
“Where to?” I asked.
“To the test pad, old friend. They keep experimenting. Nothing else to do!”
“And whom are they taking, Naina Kievna?”
“What do you mean—whom? Can’t you see for yourself?”
She turned and strode off, but I caught up with her.
“Naina Kievna, there was a telephonogram for you.”
“From whom would that be?”
“From H.M. Viy.”
“What about?”
“You are having some kind of fly-in today,” I said, looking at her hard. “On Bald Mountain. Dress—formal.”
The old woman was obviously pleased.
“Really?” she said. “Isn’t that nice! Where is the telephonogram?”
“In the entry, by the phone.”
“Anything about membership dues in it?” she asked, lowering her voice.
“In what sense?”
“Well, you know, such as, ‘You are requested to settle your arrears from seventeen hundred…’” She grew quiet.
“No,” said I. “Nothing like that was mentione
d.”
“Well enough. And how about transportation? Will there be a car to pick me up?”
“Let me carry your bags,” I offered.
She sprang back.
“What do you have in mind?” she asked suspiciously. “You cut that out—I don’t like it. The bag he wants! Starting in young, aren’t you?”
No way do I like old crones, I thought.
“So how is it with transportation?” she repeated.
“At your own expense,” I gloated.
“Oh, the skinflints!” moaned she. “They took the broom for the museum, the mortar is in the shop, contributions are levied by the five-ruble bill, but to Bald Mountain—at your expense, please! The meter won’t read low, my good fellow, and then he has to wait…”
Muttering and coughing, she turned from me and walked away. I rubbed my hands and went off in my own direction. My suppositions were being borne out. The skein of wondrous events was getting tighter. And, shame to admit, but this seemed a lot more fascinating at the moment than, say, even the modeling of a reflex process.
The Prospect of Peace was now deserted. A gang of kids were loitering at the cross street, apparently playing tip-cat. Catching sight of me, they quit the game and took off in my direction. Sensing unfavorable developments, I passed them quickly and bore off toward downtown. Behind my back a stifled and excited voice exclaimed, “Stilyaga.” I quickened pace. “Stilyaga,” bawled several at once. I was almost running, pursued by yells of, “Stilya-aga! Spindle-legs! Papa’s Pobeda-driver…” Passersby were looking at me with compassion.
In such eventualities, it’s best to dive into some refuge. I dived into the nearest door, which turned out to be a food store. I walked up and down the counters, assured myself that there was plenty of sugar, and found the choice of sausages and candies rather limited, which was amply compensated by the variety of fish products surpassing all expectations. Such appetizing and variegated salmon! I had a glass of soda water, and scanned the street. The kids were gone. Thereupon I left the store and continued my journey.
Presently the grain stores and log-cabin fortresses came to an end and were replaced by modern two-storied houses, interspersed with small parks. In the parks, small children were running about, old women were knitting warm things, and old men were playing dominoes as if for keeps. A spacious square turned up in the center of town, surrounded with two- and three-story buildings. It was paved with asphalt, punctuated in the center by the greenery of a garden. Above it rose a large red poster titled Honor Roll and several smaller posters with plotted curves and diagrams. I discovered the post office right there, in the square. The fellows and I had agreed that the first one to get to the town would leave a note with his coordinates in general delivery. There was no note, and I left a letter with my address and instructions on how to find the cottage on hen’s legs. Next I decided to have breakfast.
Circling the square, I found a cinema playing Kozara; a bookstore, closed for inventory; the town hall with several dusty cars in front; the Hotel Frigid Sea, without vacancies as per usual; two kiosks with soda and ice cream; one general goods store, No. 2; an agricultural goods store, No. 18; dining room No. 11, which opened at noon; and a buffet, No. 3, closed without explanation. Next I observed the town police station and had a chat in its open doorway with a very young policeman about the location of the gas pump and the state of the road to Lezhnev.
“But where is your car?” inquired the policeman, looking around the square.
“Over with some people I know,” I replied.
“Aha, with acquaintances…” he said meaningfully. I felt he took note of me. Timidly I bowed off.
Next to the three-storied building of the local fisheries co-op, I finally located a small, clean tearoom, No. 16/27. It was a pleasant sort of place. There weren’t too many customers, but those were indeed drinking tea, talking about simple and comprehensible things such as that over by Korobetz the little bridge had finally fallen in and one had to ford the stream; that it was a week since they had removed the Main Motor Vehicle Inspection Station at the fifteen-kilometer milepost and that, “The spark is a beast—it will knock an elephant down—but won’t do its job worth a damn.” There was a smell of gasoline and fried fish. Those who were not involved in conversation were eyeing my jeans, and I was happy to recall that on my rear there was a highly professional spot—the day before yesterday I had sat down most propitiously on my grease gun.
I took a full plate of fried fish, three glasses of tea, three sandwiches, paid up with a heap of the coppers from my crone friend (“Been out begging on the church steps.” muttered the cashier), and settled in a cozy corner and proceeded to eat, enjoying the sight of those hoarse-voiced, heavy-smoking types. It was a pleasure to take in their sunburned, wiry, independent countenances with that I’ve-seen-it-all look, and watch how they ate with appetite, smoked with appetite, and talked with appetite. They were making use of their free time to the last second before the long hours on a bumpy, tiresome, dusty road in their hot and stuffy cabs under a hot sun. If I weren’t a programmer, I would surely become a driver, and, of course, of no light-weight truck or even a bus, but of some freight monster with a ladder to the cab and a small crane for changing a wheel.
The neighboring table was occupied by a pair of young men who didn’t look like drivers, and for this reason I didn’t pay them any heed at first. Just as they didn’t notice me, either. But as I was finishing my second glass of tea, the word “sofa” floated into my consciousness. Then, one of them said, “…In that case it doesn’t make sense to have the hen’s-legs cottage at all,” so I began to listen. To my regret, they spoke quietly, and I had my back to them, so I couldn’t hear too well. But the voices seemed familiar.
“…no thesis…the sofa only…”
“…to such a hairy one…”
“…sofa…the sixteenth stage…”
“…with only fourteen stages in transvection…”
“…it’s easier to model a translator…”
“…does it matter who’s tittering!”
“…I’ll make a gift of a razor…”
“…we can’t do without the sofa…”
At this point, one of them began to clear his throat, and in such a familiar way that I associated it instantly with last night and I turned around, but they were already on their way to the exit—two big men with square shoulders and strong, athletic necks. For some time, I could see them through the window as they crossed the square, circumnavigated the garden, and disappeared behind the diagrams. I finished my tea and sandwiches and also went out. There you have it. The mermaid didn’t excite them. The talking cat did not intrigue them. But they couldn’t do without the sofa… I tried to remember what that sofa looked like, but nothing unusual came to mind. A proper sofa. A good sofa. Comfortable. Except when one slept on it, one dreamed of a strange reality.
It would have been good to return home at that point and get into all those sofa affairs in earnest. To experiment a bit with the shape-shifter book and have a heart-to-heart talk with Basil the tomcat and poke around the hen’s-legs cottage to see if there were other interesting things in it. But the car was also waiting there for me, which necessitated both a DC and a TS. I could put up with DC—it was only the Daily Care, calling for the shaking out of floor mats and the washing of the body with a stream of water under pressure, which washing, incidentally, could, in case of necessity, be performed by the substitute method of ablution with a watering can or a pail. But the TS…that was a frightening concept for a neat person on a hot day. Because TS was none other than Technical Service, which technical service consisted of my lying under the car with the grease gun and gradually transferring its contents to the grease fittings and equally well to my person. It’s hot and stuffy under a car and its undercarriage is covered with a thick layer of dried mud… In short, I was not very anxious to go home.
Chapter 4
Who has permitted himself this diabolical jest? Seize
him, and tear off his mask so that we may know whom we shall hang this morning from the castle wall.
E. Poe
I bought a two-day-old Pravda, drank a glass of soda water, and settled down on a bench in the park, in the shade of the Honor Roll. It was eleven o’clock. I looked through the paper carefully. This took seven minutes. Then I read the article about hydroponics, the feature about the doings in Kansk, and a long letter to the editor from the workers of a chemical plant. This took altogether twenty-two minutes.
Perhaps I should visit the cinema, I thought. But I had already seen Kozara, once in the theater and once on television. So I decided to have something to drink, folded the paper, and stood up. Of all the copper collection from the old hag, there remained only a single five-kopeck piece. Finish it up, I decided; had a glass of soda with syrup, got a kopeck back, and bought a box of matches in the adjoining stall. There was nothing else to do downtown. So I started off at random—into a narrow street between store No. 2 and dining room No. 11.
There were almost no pedestrians. A huge dusty truck with a rattling trailer passed by. The driver, head and elbow stuck out of the window, was tiredly scanning the Belgian block pavement. Descending, the street turned sharply to the right, where the barrel of an ancient cast-iron cannon, frill of butts and dirt, was stuck in the ground. Soon the street ended at the cliff by the river. I sat a while on the edge admiring the landscape, then crossed over to the other side and strolled back to the center of town.
Curious, where did the truck go? I thought suddenly. There was no way down the cliff. I started looking around, searching for a gate, and then discovered a small but very strange-looking building squeezed in between grim brick warehouses. The windows of the lower story were set with iron bars, and the bottom halves were painted white. As to doors, there weren’t any. I noticed this at once because the usual sign, which is normally placed next to the gates, was here hung between two windows. It read: Academy of Sciences, U.S.S.R., Srits. I went back to the middle of the street. Sure enough—two stories with ten windows apiece and not a single door. Warehouses to the right and left. Srits, thought I. Scientific Research Institute of TS. Meaning what—Technology of Security, Terrestrial Seismology? The cottage on hen’s legs, it occurred to me, is a museum of this SRITS. My hitchhikers are probably also from here. Also those two in the tearoom… A flock of crows took off from the roof of the house and began circling about, cawing loudly. I turned around and started back toward the square.