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reached out to grasp Ippolit Matveyevich, but then fell back on to the
violet down quilt. Squeaking with fright, Ippolit Matveyevich ran to fetch
his neighbour. "I think she's dying," he cried.
The agronomist crossed herself in a businesslike way and, without
hiding her curiosity, hurried into Ippolit Matveyevich's house, accompanied
by her bearded husband, also an agronomist. In distraction Vorobyaninov
wandered into the municipal park.
While the two agronomists and their servants tidied up the deceased
woman's room, Ippolit Matveyevich roamed around the park, bumping into
benches and mistaking for bushes the young couples numb with early spring
love.
The strangest things were going on in Ippolit Matveyevich's head. He
could hear the sound of gypsy choirs and orchestras composed of big-breasted
women playing the tango over and over again; he imagined the Moscow winter
and a long-bodied black trotter that snorted contemptuously at the
passers-by. He imagined many different things: a pair of deliriously
expensive orange-coloured panties, slavish devotion, and a possible trip to
Cannes. Ippolit Matveyevich began walking more slowly and suddenly stumbled
over the form of Bezenchuk the undertaker. The latter was asleep, lying in
the middle of the path in his fur coat. The jolt woke him up. He sneezed and
stood up briskly.
"Now don't you worry, Mr Vorobyaninov," he said heatedly, continuing
the conversation started a while before. "There's lots of work goes into a
coffin."
"Claudia Ivanovna's dead," his client informed him.
"Well, God rest her soul," said Bezenchuk. "So the old lady's passed
away. Old ladies pass away . . . or they depart this life. It depends who
she is. Yours, for instance, was small and plump, so she passed away. But if
it's one who's a bit bigger and thinner, then they say she has departed this
life. . . ."
"What do you mean 'they say'? Who says?"
"We say. The undertakers. Now you, for instance. You're
distinguished-lookin' and tall, though a bit on the thin side. If you should
die, God forbid, they'll say you popped off. But a tradesman, who belonged
to the former merchants' guild, would breathe his last. And if it's someone
of lower status, say a caretaker, or a peasant, we say he has croaked or
gone west. But when the high-ups die, say a railway conductor or someone in
administration, they say he has kicked the bucket. They say: 'You know our
boss has kicked the bucket, don't you?' "
Shocked by this curious classification of human mortality, Ippolit
Matveyevich asked:
"And what will the undertakers say about you when you die?"
"I'm small fry. They'll say, 'Bezenchuk's gone', and nothin' more."
And then he added grimly:
"It's not possible for me to pop off or kick the bucket; I'm too small.
But what about the coffin, Mr Vorobyaninov? Do you really want one without
tassels and brocade? "
But Ippolit Matveyevich, once more immersed in dazzling dreams, walked
on without answering. Bezenchuk followed him, working something out on his
fingers and muttering to himself, as he always did.
The moon had long since vanished and there was a wintry cold. Fragile,
wafer-like ice covered the puddles. The companions came out on Comrade
Gubernsky Street, where the wind was tussling with the hanging shop-signs. A
fire-engine drawn by skinny horses emerged from the direction of Staropan
Square with a noise like the lowering of a blind.
Swinging their canvas legs from the platform, the firemen wagged their
helmeted heads and sang in intentionally tuneless voices:
"Glory to our fire chief,
Glory to dear Comrade Pumpoff!"
"They've been havin' a good time at Nicky's wedding," remarked
Bezenchuk nonchalantly. "He's the fire chief's son." And he scratched
himself under his coat. "So you really want it without tassels and brocade?"
By that moment Ippolit Matveyevich had finally made up his mind. "I'll
go and find them," he decided, "and then we'll see." And in his
jewel-encrusted visions even his deceased mother-in-law seemed nicer than
she had actually been. He turned to Bezenchuk and said:
"Go on then, damn you, make it! With brocade! And tassels!"
Having heard the dying Claudia Ivanovna's confession, Father Theodore
Vostrikov, priest of the Church of St. Frol and St. Laurence, left
Vorobyaninov's house in a complete daze and the whole way home kept looking
round him distractedly and smiling to himself in confusion. His bewilderment
became so great in the end that he was almost knocked down by the
district-executive-committee motor-car, Gos. No. 1. Struggling out of the
cloud of purple smoke issuing from the infernal machine, Father Vostrikov
reached the stage of complete distraction, and, despite his venerable rank
and middle age, finished the journey at a frivolous half-gallop.
His wife, Catherine, was laying the table for supper. On the days when
there was no evening service to conduct, Father Theodore liked to have his
supper early. This time, however, to his wife's surprise, the holy father,
having taken off his hat and warm padded cassock, skipped past into the
bedroom, locked himself in and began chanting the prayer "It Is Meet" in a
tuneless voice.
His wife sat down on a chair and whispered in alarm:
"He's up to something again."
Father Theodore's tempestuous soul knew no rest, nor had ever known it.
Neither at the time when he was Theo, a pupil of the Russian Orthodox Church
school, nor when he was Theodore Ivanych, a bewhiskered student at the
college. Having left the college and studied law at the university for three
years in 1915 Vostrikov became afraid of the possibility of mobilization and
returned to the Church. He was first anointed a deacon, then ordained a
priest and appointed to the regional centre of N. But the whole time, at
every stage of his clerical and secular career, Father Theodore never lost
interest in worldly possessions.
He cherished the dream of possessing his own candle factory. Tormented
by the vision of thick ropes of wax winding on to the factory drums, Father
Theodore devised various schemes that would bring in enough basic capital to
buy a little factory in Samara which he had had his eye on for some time.
Ideas occurred to Father Theodore unexpectedly, and when they did he
used to get down to work on the spot. He once started making a marble-like
washing-soap; he made pounds and pounds of it, but despite an enormous fat
content, the soap would not lather, and it cost twice as much as the Hammer
and Plough brand, to boot. For a long time after it remained in the liquid
state gradually decomposing on the porch of the house, and whenever his
wife, Catherine, passed it, she would wipe away a tear. The soap was
eventually thrown into the cesspool.
Reading in a farming magazine that rabbit meat was as tender as
chicken, that rabbits were highly prolific, and that a keen farmer could
make a mint of money breeding them, Father Theodore immediately acquired
half a dozen stud rabbits, and two months later, Nerka the dog, terrified by
the incredible number of long-eared creatures filling the yard and house,
fled to an unknown destination. However, the wretchedly provincial citizens
of the town of N. proved extraordinarily conservative and, with unusual
unanimity, refused to buy Vostrikov's rabbits. Then Father Theodore had a
talk with his wife and decided to enhance his diet with the rabbit meat that
was supposed to be tastier than chicken. The rabbits were roasted whole,
turned into rissoles and cutlets, made into soup, served cold for supper and
baked in pies. But to no avail. Father Theodore worked it out that even if
they switched exclusively to a diet of rabbit, the family could not consume
more than forty of the creatures a month, while the monthly increment was
ninety, with the number increasing in a geometrical progression.
The Vostrikovs then decided to sell home-cooked meals. Father Theodore
spent a whole evening writing out an advertisement in indelible pencil on
neatly cut sheets of graph paper, announcing the sale of tasty home-cooked
meals prepared in pure butter. The advertisement began "Cheap and Good!" His
wife filled an enamel dish with flour-and-water paste, and late one evening
the holy father went around sticking the advertisements on all the telegraph
poles, and also in the vicinity of state-owned institutions.
The new idea was a great success. Seven people appeared the first day,
among them Bendin, the military-commissariat clerk, by whose endeavour the
town's oldest monument-a triumphal arch, dating from the time of the Empress
Elizabeth-had been pulled down shortly before on the ground that it
interfered with the traffic. The dinners were very popular. The next day
there were fourteen customers. There was hardly enough time to skin the
rabbits. For a whole week things went swimmingly and Father Theodore even
considered starting up a small fur-trading business, without a car, when
something quite unforeseen took place.
The Hammer and Plough co-operative, which had been shut for three weeks
for stock-taking, reopened, and some of the counter hands, panting with the
effort, rolled a barrel of rotten cabbage into the yard shared by Father
Theodore, and dumped the contents into the cesspool. Attracted by the
piquant smell, the rabbits hastened to the cesspool, and the next morning an
epidemic broke out among the gentle rodents. It only raged for three hours,
but during that time it finished off two hundred and forty adult rabbits and
an uncountable number of offspring.
The shocked priest had been depressed for two whole months, and it was
only now, returning from Vorobyaninov's house and to his wife's surprise,
locking himself in the bedroom, that he regained his spirits. There was
every indication that Father Theodore had been captivated by some new idea.
Catherine knocked on the bedroom door with her knuckle. There was no
reply, but the chanting grew louder. A moment later the door opened slightly
and through the crack appeared Father Theodore's face, brightened by a
maidenly flush.
"Let me have a pair of scissors quickly, Mother," snapped Father
Theodore.
"But what about your supper? "
"Yes, later on."
Father Theodore grabbed the scissors, locked the door again, and went
over to a mirror hanging on the wall in a black scratched frame.
Beside the mirror was an ancient folk-painting, entitled "The Parable
of the Sinner", made from a copperplate and neatly hand-painted. The parable
had been a great consolation to Vostrikov after the misfortune with the
rabbits. The picture clearly showed the transient nature of earthly things.
The top row was composed of four drawings with meaningful and consolatory
captions in Church Slavonic: Shem saith a prayer, Ham soweth wheat, Japheth
enjoyeth power, Death overtaketh all. The figure of Death carried a scythe
and a winged hour-glass and looked as if made of artificial limbs and
orthopaedic appliances; he was standing on deserted hilly ground with his
legs wide apart, and his general appearance made it clear that the fiasco
with the rabbits was a mere trifle.
At this moment Father Theodore preferred "Japheth enjoyeth power". The
drawing showed a fat, opulent man with a beard sitting on a throne in a
small room.
Father Theodore smiled and, looking closely at himself in the mirror,
began snipping at his fine beard. The scissors clicked, the hairs fell to
the floor, and five minutes later Father Theodore knew he was absolutely no
good at beard-clipping. His beard was all askew; it looked unbecoming and
even suspicious.
Fiddling about for a while longer, Father Theodore became highly
irritated, called his wife, and, handing her the scissors, said peevishly:
"You can help me, Mother. I can't do anything with these rotten hairs."
His wife threw up her hands in astonishment.
"What have you done to yourself?" she finally managed to say.
"I haven't done anything. I'm trimming my beard. It seems to have gone
askew just here. . . ."
"Heavens!" said his wife, attacking his curls. "Surely you're not
joining the Renovators, Theo dear?"
Father Theodore was delighted that the conversation had taken this
turn.
"And why shouldn't I join the Renovators, Mother? They're human-beings,
aren't they?"
"Of course they're human-beings," conceded his wife venomously, "but
they go to the cinema and pay alimony."
"Well, then, I'll go to the cinema as well."
"Go on then!"
Twill!"
"You'll get tired of it. Just look at yourself in the mirror."
And indeed, a lively black-eyed countenance with a short, odd-looking
beard and an absurdly long moustache peered out of the mirror at Father
Theodore. They trimmed down the moustache to the right proportions.
What happened next amazed Mother still more. Father Theodore declared
that he had to go off on a business trip that very evening, and asked his
wife to go round to her brother, the baker, and borrow his fur-collared coat
and duck-billed cap for a week.
"I won't go," said his wife and began weeping.
Father Theodore walked up and down the room for half an hour,
frightening his wife by the change in his expression and telling her all
sorts of rubbish. Mother could understand only one thing-for no apparent
reason Father Theodore had cut his hair, intended to go off somewhere in a
ridiculous cap, and was leaving her for good.
"I'm not leaving you," he kept saying. "I'm not. I'll be back in a
week. A man can have a job to do, after all. Can he or can't he?"
"No, he can't," said his wife.
Father Theodore even had to strike the table with his fist, although he
was normally a mild person in his treatment of his near ones. He did so
cautiously, since he had never done it before, and, greatly alarmed, his
wife threw a kerchief around her head and ran to fetch the civilian clothing
from her brother.
Left alone, Father Theodore thought for a moment, muttered, "It's no
joke for women, either," and pulled out a small tin trunk from under the
bed. This type of trunk is mostly found among Red Army soldiers. It is
usually lined with striped paper, on top of which is a picture of Budyonny,
or the lid of a Bathing Beach cigarette box depicting three lovelies on the
pebbly shore at Batumi. The Vostrikovs' trunk was also lined with
photographs, but, to Father Theodore's annoyance, they were not of Budyonny
or Batumi beauties. His wife had covered the inside of the trunk with
photographs cut out of the magazine Chronicle of the 1914 War. They included
"The Capture of Peremyshl", "The Distribution of Comforts to Other Ranks in
the Trenches", and all sorts of other things.
Removing the books that were lying at the top (a set of the Russian
Pilgrim for 1913; a fat tome, History of the Schism, and a brochure entitled
A Russian in Italy, the cover of which showed a smoking Vesuvius), Father
Theodore reached down into the very bottom of the trunk and drew out an old
shabby hat belonging to his wife. Wincing at the smell of moth-balls which
suddenly assailed him from the trunk, he tore apart the lace and trimmings
and took from the hat a heavy sausage-shaped object wrapped in linen. The
sausage-shaped object contained twenty ten-rouble gold coins, all that was
left of Father Theodore's business ventures.
With a habitual movement of the hand, he lifted his cassock and stuffed
the sausage into the pocket of his striped trousers. He then went over to
the chest of drawers and took twenty roubles in three- and five-rouble notes
from a sweet-box. There were twenty roubles left in the box. "That will do
for the housekeeping," he decided.
An hour before the evening mail-train was due in, Father Theodore,
dressed in a short coat which came just below the knee, and carrying a
wicker basket, stood in line in front of the booking-office and kept looking
apprehensively at the station entrance. He was afraid that in spite of his
insistence, his wife might come to see him off, and then Prusis, the
stall-owner, who was sitting in the buffet treating the income-tax collector
to a glass of beer, would immediately recognize him. Father Theodore stared
with shame and surprise at his striped trousers, now exposed to the view of
the entire laity.
The process of boarding a train without reserved seats took its normal
and scandalous course. Staggering under the weight of enormous sacks,
passengers ran from the front of the train to the back, and then to the
front again. Father Theodore followed them in a daze. Like everyone else, he
spoke to the conductors in an ingratiating tone, like everyone else he was
afraid he had been given the "wrong" ticket, and it was only when he was
finally allowed into a coach that his customary calm returned and he even
became happy.
The locomotive hooted at the top of its voice and the train moved off,
carrying Father Theodore into the unknown on business that was mysterious,
yet promised great things.
An interesting thing, the permanent way. Once he gets on to it the most
ordinary man in the street feels a certain animation in himself and soon
turns into a passenger, a consignee, or simply a trouble-maker without a
ticket, who makes life difficult for the teams of conductors and platform
ticket-inspectors.
The moment a passenger approaches the right of way, which he
amateurishly calls a railway station, his life is completely changed. He is
immediately surrounded by predatory porters with white aprons and nickel
badges on their chests, and his luggage is obsequiously picked up. From that
moment, the citizen no longer is his own master. He is a passenger and
begins to perform all the duties of one. These duties are many, though they
are not unpleasant.
Passengers eat a lot. Ordinary mortals do not eat during the night, but
passengers do. They eat fried chicken, which is expensive, hard-boiled eggs,
which are bad for the stomach, and olives. Whenever the train passes over
the points, numerous teapots in the rack clatter together, and legless
chickens (the legs have been torn out by the roots by passengers) jump up
and down in their newspaper wrapping.
The passengers, however, are oblivious of all this. They tell each
other jokes. Every three minutes the whole compartment rocks with laughter;
then there is a silence and a soft-spoken voice tells the following story:
"An old Jew lay dying. Around him were his wife and children. 'Is Monya
here?' asks the Jew with difficulty. 'Yes, she's here.' 'Has Auntie Brana
come?' 'Yes.' 'And where's Grandma? I don't see her.' 'She's over here.'
'And Isaac?' 'He's here, too.' 'What about the children?' They're all here.'
'Then who's minding the shop?'"
This very moment the teapots begin rattling and the chickens fly up and
down in the rack, but the passengers do not notice. Each one has a favourite
story ready, eagerly awaiting its turn. A new raconteur, nudging his
neighbours and calling out in a pleading tone, "Have you heard this one?"
finally gains attention and begins:
"A Jew comes home and gets into bed beside his wife. Suddenly he hears
a scratching noise under the bed. The Jew reaches his hand underneath the
bed and asks: 'Is that you, Fido?' And Fido licks his hand and says: 'Yes,
it's me.' "
The passengers collapse with laughter; a dark night cloaks the
countryside. Restless sparks fly from the funnel, and the slim signals in
their luminous green spectacles flash snootily past, staring above the
train.
An interesting thing, the right of way! Long, heavy trains race to all'
parts of the country. The way is open at every point. Green lights can be
seen everywhere; the track is clear. The polar express goes up to Murmansk.
The K-l draws out of Kursk Station, bound for Tiflis, arching its back over
the points. The far-eastern courier rounds Lake Baikal and approaches the
Pacific at full speed.
The Muse of Travel is calling. She has already plucked Father Theodore
from his quiet regional cloister and cast him into some unknown province.
Even Ippolit Matveyevich Vorobyaninov, former marshal of the nobility and
now clerk in a registry office, is stirred to the depths of his heart and
highly excited at the great things ahead.
People speed all over the country. Some of them are looking for
scintillating brides thousands of miles away, while others, in pursuit of
treasure, leave their jobs in the post office and rush off like schoolboys
to Aldan. Others simply sit at home, tenderly stroking an imminent hernia
and reading the works of Count Salias, bought for five kopeks instead of a
rouble.
The day after the funeral, kindly arranged by Bezenchuk the undertaker,
Ippolit Matveyevich went to work and, as part of the duties with which he
was charged, duly registered in his own hand the demise of Claudia Ivanovna
Petukhov, aged fifty-nine, housewife, non-party-member, resident of the
regional centre of N., by origin a member of the upper class of the province
of Stargorod. After this, Ippolit Matveyevich granted himself a two-week
holiday due to him, took forty-one roubles in salary, said good-bye to his
colleagues, and went home. On the way he stopped at the chemist's.
The chemist, Leopold Grigorevich, who was called Lipa by his friends
and family, stood behind the red-lacquered counter, surrounded by
frosted-glass bottles of poison, nervously trying to sell the fire chief's
sister-in-law "Ango cream for sunburn and freckles-gives the skin an
exceptional whiteness". The fire chief's sister-in-law, however, was asking
for "Rachelle powder, gold in colour-gives the skin a tan not normally
acquirable". The chemist had only the Ango cream in stock, and the battle
between these two very different cosmetics raged for half an hour. Lipa won
in the end and sold the fire chief's sister-in-law some lipstick and a
bugovar, which is a device similar in principle to the samovar, except that
it looks like a watering-can and catches bugs.
"What can I get you?"
"Something for the hair."
"To make it grow, to remove it, or to dye it? "
"Not to make it grow," said Ippolit Matveyevich. "To dye it."
"We have a wonderful hair dye called Titanic. We got it from the
customs people; it was confiscated. It's a jet black colour. A bottle
containing a six months' supply costs three roubles, twelve kopeks. I can
recommend it to you, as a good friend."
Ippolit Matveyevich twiddled the bottle in his hands, looked at the
label with a sigh, and put down his money on the counter.
He went home and, with a feeling of revulsion, began pouring Titanic
onto his head and moustache. A stench filled the house.
By the time dinner was over, the stench had cleared, the moustache had
dried and become matted and was very difficult to comb. The jet-black colour
turned out to have a greenish tint, but there was no time for a second try.
Taking from his mother-in-law's jewel box a list of the gems, found the
night before, Ippolit Matveyevich counted up his cash-in-hand, locked the
house, put the key in his back pocket and took the no. 7 express to
Stargorod.
At half past eleven a young man aged about twenty-eight entered
Stargorod from the direction of the village of Chmarovka, to the north-east.
A waif ran along behind him.
"Mister!" cried the boy gaily, "gimme ten kopeks!"
The young man took a warm apple out of his pocket "and handed it to the
waif, but the child still kept running behind. Then the young man stopped
and, looking ironically at the boy, said quietly:
"Perhaps you'd also like the key of the apartment where the money is?"
The presumptuous waif then realized the complete futility of his
pretensions and dropped behind.
The young man had not told the truth. He had no money, no apartment
where it might have been found, and no key with which to open it. He did not
even have a coat. The young man entered the town in a green suit tailored to
fit at the waist and an old woollen scarf wound several times around his
powerful neck. On his feet were patent-leather boots with orange-coloured
suede uppers. He had no socks on. The young man carried an astrolabe.
Approaching the market, he broke into a song: "O, Bayadere, tum-ti-ti,
tum-ti-ti."
In the market he found plenty going on. He squeezed into the line of
vendors selling wares spread out on the ground before them, stood the
astrolabe in front of him and began shouting:
"Who wants an astrolabe? Here's an astrolabe going cheap. Special
reduction for delegations and women's work divisions !"
At first the unexpected supply met with little demand; the delegations
of housewives were more interested in obtaining commodities in short supply
and were milling around the cloth and drapery stalls. A detective from the
Stargorod criminal investigation department passed the astrolabe-vendor
twice, but since the instrument in no way resembled the typewriter stolen
the day before from the Central Union of Dairy Co-operatives, the detective
stopped glaring at the young man and passed on.
By lunchtime the astrolabe had been sold to a repairman for three
roubles.
"It measures by itself," he said, handing over the astrolabe to its
purchaser, "provided you have something to measure."
Having rid himself of the calculating instrument, the happy young man
had lunch in the Tasty Corner snack bar, and then went to have a look at the
town. He passed along Soviet Street, came out into Red Army Street
(previously Greater Pushkin Street), crossed Co-operative Street and found
himself again on Soviet Street. But it was not the same Soviet Street from
which he had come. There were two Soviet Streets in the town. Greatly
surprised by this fact, the young man carried on and found himself in Lena
Massacre Street (formerly Denisov Street). He stopped outside no. 28, a
pleasant two-storeyed private house, which bore a sign saying:
SECOND SOCIAL SECURITY HOME
OF THE
STAR-PROV-INS-AD
and requested a light from the caretaker, who was sitting by the
entrance on a stone bench.
"Tell me, dad," said the young man, taking a puff, "are there any
marriageable young girls in this town? "
The old caretaker did not show the least surprise.
"For some a mare'd be a bride," he answered, readily striking up a
conversation.
"I have no more questions," said the young man quickly. And he
immediately asked one more: "A house like this and no girls in it?"
"It's a long while since there've been any young girls here," replied
the old man. "This is a state institution-a home for old-age women
pensioners."
"I see. For ones born before historical materialism?"
"That's it. They were born when they were born."
"And what was here in the house before the days of historical
materialism?"
"When was that?"
"In the old days. Under the former regime."
"Oh, in the old days my master used to live here."
"A member of the bourgeoisie")"
"Bourgeoisie yourself! I told you. He was a marshal of the nobility."
"You mean he was from the working class?"
"Working class yourself! He was a marshal of the nobility."
The conversation with the intelligent caretaker so poorly versed in the
class structure of society might have gone on for heaven knows how long had
not the young man got down to business.
"Listen, granddad," he said, "what about a drink?"
"All right, buy me one!"
They were gone an hour. When they returned, the caretaker was the young
man's best friend.
"Right, then, I'll stay the night with you," said the newly acquired
friend.
"You're a good man. You can stay here for the rest of your life if you
like."
Having achieved his aim, the young man promptly went down into the
caretaker's room, took off his orange-coloured boots, and, stretching out on
a bench, began thinking out a plan of action for the following day.
The young man's name was Ostap Bender. Of his background he would
usually give only one detail. "My dad," he used to say, "was a Turkish
citizen." During his life this son of a Turkish citizen had had many
occupations. His lively nature had prevented him from devoting himself to
any one thing for long and kept him roving through the country, finally
bringing him to Stargorod without any socks and without a key, apartment, or
money.
Lying in the caretaker's room, which was so warm that it stank, Ostap
Bender weighed up in his mind two possibilities for a career.
He could become a polygamist and calmly move on from town to town,
taking with him a suitcase containing his latest wife's valuables, or he
could go the next day to the Stargorod Commission for the Improvement of
Children's Living Conditions and suggest they undertake the popularization
of a brilliantly devised, though yet unpainted, picture entitled "The
Bolsheviks Answer Chamberlain" based on Repin's famous canvas "The Zaporozhe
Cossacks Answer the Sultan". If it worked, this possibility could bring in
four hundred or so roubles.
The two possibilities had been thought up by Ostap during his last stay
in Moscow. The polygamy idea was conceived after reading a law-court report
in the evening paper, which clearly stated that the convicted man was given
only a two-year sentence, while the second idea came to Bender as he was
looking round the Association of Revolutionary Artists' exhibition, having
got in with a free pass.
Both possibilities had their drawbacks, however. To begin a career as a
polygamist without a heavenly grey polka-dot suit was unthinkable. Moreover,
at least ten roubles would be needed for purposes of representation and
seduction. He could get married, of course, in his green field-suits, since
his virility and good looks were absolutely irresistible to the provincial
belles looking for husbands, but that would have been, as Ostap used to say,
"poor workmanship". The question of the painting was not all plain sailing
either. There might be difficulties of a purely technical nature. It might
be awkward, for instance, to show Comrade Kalinin in a fur cap and white
cape, while Comrade Chicherin was stripped to the waist. They could be
depicted in ordinary dress, of course, but that would not be quite the same
thing.
"It wouldn't have the right effect!" said Ostap aloud.
At this point he noticed that the caretaker had been prattling away for
some time, apparently reminiscing about the previous owner of the house.
"The police chief used to salute him. . . . I'd go and wish him a happy
new year, let's say, and he'd give me three roubles. At Easter, let's say,
he'd give me another three roubles. . . . Then on his birthday, let's say.
In a year I'd get as much as fifteen roubles from wishing him. He even
promised to give me a medal. 'I want my caretaker to have a medal,' he used
to say. That's what he would say: 'Tikhon, consider that you already have
the medal.'"
"And did he give you one? "
"Wait a moment. . . . T don't want a caretaker without a medal,' he
used to say. He went to St. Petersburg to get me a medal. Well, the first
time it didn't work out. The officials didn't want to give me one. 'The
Tsar,' he used to say, 'has gone abroad. It isn't possible just now.' So the
master told me to wait. 'Just wait a bit, Tikhon,' he used to say, 'you'll
get your medal.' "
"And what happened to this master of yours? Did they bump him off?"
"No one bumped him off. He went away. What was the good of him staying
here with the soldiers? . . . Do they give medals to caretakers nowadays?"
"Certainly. I can arrange one for you."
The caretaker looked at Bender with veneration.
"I can't be without one. It's that kind of work."
"Where did your master go?"
"Heaven knows. People say he went to Paris."
"Ah, white acacia-the emigre's flower! So he's an emigre!"
"Emigre yourself. . . . He went to Paris, so people say. And the house
was taken over for old women. You greet them every day, but they don't even
give you a ten-kopek bit! Yes, he was some master!"
At that moment the rusty bell above the door began to ring.
The caretaker ambled over to the door, opened it, and stepped back in
complete amazement.
On the top step stood Ippolit Matveyevich Vorobyaninov with a black
moustache and black hair. His eyes behind his pince-nez had a
pre-revolutionary twinkle.
"Master!" bellowed Tikhon with delight. "Back from Paris!"
Ippolit Matveyevich became embarrassed by the presence of the stranger,
whose bare purple feet he had just spotted protruding from behind the table,
and was about to leave again when Ostap Bender briskly jumped up and made a
low bow.
"This isn't Paris, but you're welcome to our abode."
Ippolit Matveyevich felt himself forced to say something.
"Hello, Tikhon. I certainly haven't come from Paris. Where did you get
that strange idea from?"
But Ostap Bender, whose long and noble nose had caught the scent of
roast meat, did not give the caretaker time to utter a word.
"Splendid," he said, narrowing his eyes. "You haven't come from Paris.
You've no doubt come from Kologriv to visit your deceased grandmother."
As he spoke, he tenderly embraced the caretaker and pushed him outside
the door before the old man had time to realize what was happening. When he
finally gathered his wits, all he knew was that his master had come back
from Paris, that he himself had been pushed out of his own room, and that he
was clutching a rouble note in his left hand.
Carefully locking the door, Bender turned to Vorobyaninov, who was
still standing in the middle of the room, and said:
"Take it easy, everything's all right! My name's Bender. You may have
heard of me!"
"No, I haven't," said Ippolit Matveyevich nervously.
"No, how could the name of Ostap Bender be known in Paris? Is it warm
there just now? It's a nice city. I have a married cousin there. She
recently sent me a silk handkerchief by registered post."
"What rubbish is this?" exclaimed Ippolit Matveyevich. "What
handkerchief? I haven't come from Paris at all. I've come from . . ."
"Marvellous! You've come from Morshansk!"
Ippolit Matveyevich had never had dealings with so spirited a young man
as Ostap Bender and began to feel peculiar.
"Well, I'm going now," he said.
"Where are you going? You don't need to hurry anywhere. The secret
police will come for you, anyway." Ippolit Matveyevich was speechless. He
undid his coat with its threadbare velvet collar and sat down on the bench,
glaring at Bender.
"I don't know what you mean," he said in a low voice.
"That's no harm. You soon will. Just one moment."
Ostap put on his orange-coloured boots and walked up and down the room.
"Which frontier did you cross? Was it the Polish, Finnish, or Rumanian
frontier? An expensive pleasure, I imagine. A friend of mine recently
crossed the frontier. He lives in Slavuta, on our side, and his wife's
parents live on the other. He had a row with his wife over a family matter;
she comes from a temperamental family. She spat in his face and ran across
the frontier to her parents. The fellow sat around for a few days but found
things weren't going well. There was no dinner and the room was dirty, so he
decided to make it up with her. He waited till night and then crossed over
to his mother-in-law. But the frontier guards nabbed him, trumped up a
charge, and gave him six months. Later on he was expelled from the trade
union. The wife, they say, has now gone back, the fool, and her husband is
in prison. She is able to take him things. . . . Did you come that way,
too?"
"Honestly," protested Ippolit Matveyevich, suddenly feeling himself in
the power of the talkative young man who had come between him and the
jewels. "Honestly, I'm a citizen of the RSFSR. I can show you my
identification papers, if you want."
"With printing being as well developed as it is in the West, the
forgery of Soviet identification papers is nothing. A friend of mine even
went as far as forging American dollars. And you know how difficult that is.
The paper has those different-coloured little lines on it. It requires great
technique. He managed to get rid of them on the Moscow black market, but it
turned out later that his grandfather, a notorious currency-dealer, had
bought them all in Kiev and gone absolutely broke. The dollars were
counterfeit, after all. So your papers may not help you very much either."
Despite his annoyance at having to sit in a smelly caretaker's room and
listen to an insolent young man burbling about the shady dealings of his
friends, instead of actively searching for the jewels, Ippolit Matveyevich
could not bring himself to leave. He felt great trepidation at the thought
that the young stranger might spread it round the town that the ex-marshal
had come back. That would be the end of everything, and he might be put in
jail as well.
'Don't tell anyone you saw me," said Ippolit Matveyevich. "They might
really think I'm an emigre." "That's more like it! First we have an Emigre
who has returned to his home town, and then we find he is afraid the secret
police will catch him."
"But I've told you a hundred times, I'm not an emigre."
"Then who are you? Why are you here?"
"I've come from N. on certain business."
"What business?"
"Personal business."
"And then you say you're not an emigre! A friend of mine . . ."
At this point, Ippolit Matveyevich, driven to despair by the stories of
Bender's friends, and seeing that he was not getting anywhere, gave in.
"All right," he said. "I'll tell you everything."
Anyway, it might be difficult without an accomplice, he thought to
himself, and this fellow seems to be a really shady character. He might be
useful.
Ippolit Matveyevich took off his stained beaver hat, combed his
moustache, which gave off a shower of sparks at the touch of the comb, and,
having cleared his throat in determination, told Ostap Bender, the first
rogue who had come his way, what his dying mother-in-law had told him about
her jewels.
During the account, Ostap jumped up several times and, turning to the
iron stove, said delightedly:
"Things are moving, gentlemen of the jury. Things are moving."
An hour later they were both sitting at the rickety table, their heads
close together, reading the long list of jewellery which had at one time
adorned the fingers, neck, ears, bosom and hair of Vorobyaninov's
mother-in-law.
Ippolit Matveyevich adjusted the pince-nez, which kept falling off his
nose, and said emphatically:
"Three strings of pearls. . . . Yes, I remember them. Two with forty
pearls and the long one had a hundred and ten. A diamond pendant . . .
Claudia Ivanovna used to say it was worth four thousand roubles; an
antique."
Next came the rings: not thick, silly, and cheap engagement rings, but
fine, lightweight rings set with pure, polished diamonds; heavy, dazzling
earrings that bathe a small female ear in multi-coloured light; bracelets
shaped like serpents, with emerald scales; a clasp bought with the profit
from a fourteen-hundred-acre harvest; a pearl necklace that could only be
worn by a famous prima donna; to crown everything was a diadem worth forty
thousand roubles.
Ippolit Matveyevich looked round him. A grass-green emerald light
blazed up and shimmered in the dark corners of the caretaker's dirty room. A
diamond haze hung near the ceiling. Pearls rolled across the table and
bounced along the floor. The room swayed in the mirage of gems. The sound of
Ostap's voice brought the excited Ippolit Matveyevich back to earth.
"Not a bad choice. The stones have been tastefully selected, I see. How
much did all this jazz cost?"
"Seventy to seventy-five thousand."
"Hm . . . Then it's worth a hundred and fifty thousand now."
"Really as much as that?" asked Ippolit Matveyevich jubilantly.
"Not less than that. However, if I were you, dear friend from Paris, I
wouldn't give a damn about it."
"What do you mean, not give a damn?"
"Just that. Like they used to before the advent of historical
materialism."
"Why?"
"I'll tell you. How many chairs were there?"
"A dozen. It was a drawing-room suite."
"Your drawing-room suite was probably used for firewood long ago."
Ippolit Matveyevich was so alarmed that he actually stood up.
"Take it easy. I'll take charge. The hearing is continued.
Incidentally, you and I will have to conclude a little deal."
Breathing heavily, Ippolit Matveyevich nodded his assent. Ostap Bender
then began stating his terms.
"In the event of acquisition of the treasure, as a direct partner in
the concession and as technical adviser, I receive sixty per cent. You
needn't pay my national health; I don't care about that."
Ippolit Matveyevich turned grey.
"That's daylight robbery!"
"And how much did you intend offering me? "
"Well. . . er . . . five per cent, or maybe even ten per cent. You
realize, don't you, that's fifteen thousand roubles!"
"And that's all?"
"Yes
"Maybe you'd like me to work for nothing and also give you the key of
the apartment where the money is? "
"In that case, I'm sorry," said Vorobyaninov through his nose.
"I have every reason to believe I can manage the business by myself."
"Aha! In that case, I'm sorry," retorted the splendid Ostap. "I have
just as much reason to believe, as Andy Tucker used to say, that I can also
manage your business by myself."
"You villain!' cried Ippolit Matveyevich, beginning to shake.
Ostap remained unmoved.
"Listen, gentleman from Paris, do you know your jewels are practically
in my pocket? And I'm only interested in you as long as I wish to prolong
your old age."
Ippolit Matveyevich realized at this point that iron hands had gripped
his throat.
"Twenty per cent," he said morosely.
"And my grub?" asked Ostap with a sneer.
"Twenty-five."
"And the key of the apartment?"
"But that's thirty-seven and a half thousand!"
"Why be so precise? Well, all right, I'll settle for fifty per cent.
We'll go halves."
The haggling continued, and Ostap made a further concession. Out of
respect for Vorobyaninov, he was prepared to work for forty per cent.
"That's sixty thousand!" cried Vorobyaninov.
"You're a rather nasty man," retorted Bender. "You're too fond of
money."
"And I suppose you aren't?" squeaked Ippolit Matveyevich in a flutelike
voice.
"No, I'm not."
"Then why do you want sixty thousand? "
"On principle!"
Ippolit Matveyevich took a deep breath.
"Well, are things moving?" pressed Ostap.
Vorobyaninov breathed heavily and said humbly: "Yes, things are
moving."
"It's a bargain. District Chief of the Comanchi!"
As soon as Ippolit Matveyevich, hurt by the nickname, "Chief of the
Comanchi", had demanded an apology, and Ostap, in a formal apology, had
called him "Field Marshal", they set about working out their disposition.
At midnight Tikhon, the caretaker, hanging on to all the garden fences
on the way and clinging to the lamp posts, tottered home to his cellar. To
his misfortune, there was a full moon.
"Ah! The intellectual proletarian! Officer of the Broom!" exclaimed
Ostap, catching sight of the doubled-up caretaker.
The caretaker began making low-pitched, passionate noises of the kind
sometimes heard when a lavatory suddenly gurgles heatedly and fussily in the
stillness of the night.
"That's nice," said Ostap to Vorobyaninov. "Your caretaker is rather a
vulgar fellow. Is it possible to get as drunk as that on a rouble?"
"Yes, it is," said the caretaker unexpectedly.
"Listen, Tikhon," began Ippolit Matveyevich. "Have you any idea what
violet down quilt. Squeaking with fright, Ippolit Matveyevich ran to fetch
his neighbour. "I think she's dying," he cried.
The agronomist crossed herself in a businesslike way and, without
hiding her curiosity, hurried into Ippolit Matveyevich's house, accompanied
by her bearded husband, also an agronomist. In distraction Vorobyaninov
wandered into the municipal park.
While the two agronomists and their servants tidied up the deceased
woman's room, Ippolit Matveyevich roamed around the park, bumping into
benches and mistaking for bushes the young couples numb with early spring
love.
The strangest things were going on in Ippolit Matveyevich's head. He
could hear the sound of gypsy choirs and orchestras composed of big-breasted
women playing the tango over and over again; he imagined the Moscow winter
and a long-bodied black trotter that snorted contemptuously at the
passers-by. He imagined many different things: a pair of deliriously
expensive orange-coloured panties, slavish devotion, and a possible trip to
Cannes. Ippolit Matveyevich began walking more slowly and suddenly stumbled
over the form of Bezenchuk the undertaker. The latter was asleep, lying in
the middle of the path in his fur coat. The jolt woke him up. He sneezed and
stood up briskly.
"Now don't you worry, Mr Vorobyaninov," he said heatedly, continuing
the conversation started a while before. "There's lots of work goes into a
coffin."
"Claudia Ivanovna's dead," his client informed him.
"Well, God rest her soul," said Bezenchuk. "So the old lady's passed
away. Old ladies pass away . . . or they depart this life. It depends who
she is. Yours, for instance, was small and plump, so she passed away. But if
it's one who's a bit bigger and thinner, then they say she has departed this
life. . . ."
"What do you mean 'they say'? Who says?"
"We say. The undertakers. Now you, for instance. You're
distinguished-lookin' and tall, though a bit on the thin side. If you should
die, God forbid, they'll say you popped off. But a tradesman, who belonged
to the former merchants' guild, would breathe his last. And if it's someone
of lower status, say a caretaker, or a peasant, we say he has croaked or
gone west. But when the high-ups die, say a railway conductor or someone in
administration, they say he has kicked the bucket. They say: 'You know our
boss has kicked the bucket, don't you?' "
Shocked by this curious classification of human mortality, Ippolit
Matveyevich asked:
"And what will the undertakers say about you when you die?"
"I'm small fry. They'll say, 'Bezenchuk's gone', and nothin' more."
And then he added grimly:
"It's not possible for me to pop off or kick the bucket; I'm too small.
But what about the coffin, Mr Vorobyaninov? Do you really want one without
tassels and brocade? "
But Ippolit Matveyevich, once more immersed in dazzling dreams, walked
on without answering. Bezenchuk followed him, working something out on his
fingers and muttering to himself, as he always did.
The moon had long since vanished and there was a wintry cold. Fragile,
wafer-like ice covered the puddles. The companions came out on Comrade
Gubernsky Street, where the wind was tussling with the hanging shop-signs. A
fire-engine drawn by skinny horses emerged from the direction of Staropan
Square with a noise like the lowering of a blind.
Swinging their canvas legs from the platform, the firemen wagged their
helmeted heads and sang in intentionally tuneless voices:
"Glory to our fire chief,
Glory to dear Comrade Pumpoff!"
"They've been havin' a good time at Nicky's wedding," remarked
Bezenchuk nonchalantly. "He's the fire chief's son." And he scratched
himself under his coat. "So you really want it without tassels and brocade?"
By that moment Ippolit Matveyevich had finally made up his mind. "I'll
go and find them," he decided, "and then we'll see." And in his
jewel-encrusted visions even his deceased mother-in-law seemed nicer than
she had actually been. He turned to Bezenchuk and said:
"Go on then, damn you, make it! With brocade! And tassels!"
Having heard the dying Claudia Ivanovna's confession, Father Theodore
Vostrikov, priest of the Church of St. Frol and St. Laurence, left
Vorobyaninov's house in a complete daze and the whole way home kept looking
round him distractedly and smiling to himself in confusion. His bewilderment
became so great in the end that he was almost knocked down by the
district-executive-committee motor-car, Gos. No. 1. Struggling out of the
cloud of purple smoke issuing from the infernal machine, Father Vostrikov
reached the stage of complete distraction, and, despite his venerable rank
and middle age, finished the journey at a frivolous half-gallop.
His wife, Catherine, was laying the table for supper. On the days when
there was no evening service to conduct, Father Theodore liked to have his
supper early. This time, however, to his wife's surprise, the holy father,
having taken off his hat and warm padded cassock, skipped past into the
bedroom, locked himself in and began chanting the prayer "It Is Meet" in a
tuneless voice.
His wife sat down on a chair and whispered in alarm:
"He's up to something again."
Father Theodore's tempestuous soul knew no rest, nor had ever known it.
Neither at the time when he was Theo, a pupil of the Russian Orthodox Church
school, nor when he was Theodore Ivanych, a bewhiskered student at the
college. Having left the college and studied law at the university for three
years in 1915 Vostrikov became afraid of the possibility of mobilization and
returned to the Church. He was first anointed a deacon, then ordained a
priest and appointed to the regional centre of N. But the whole time, at
every stage of his clerical and secular career, Father Theodore never lost
interest in worldly possessions.
He cherished the dream of possessing his own candle factory. Tormented
by the vision of thick ropes of wax winding on to the factory drums, Father
Theodore devised various schemes that would bring in enough basic capital to
buy a little factory in Samara which he had had his eye on for some time.
Ideas occurred to Father Theodore unexpectedly, and when they did he
used to get down to work on the spot. He once started making a marble-like
washing-soap; he made pounds and pounds of it, but despite an enormous fat
content, the soap would not lather, and it cost twice as much as the Hammer
and Plough brand, to boot. For a long time after it remained in the liquid
state gradually decomposing on the porch of the house, and whenever his
wife, Catherine, passed it, she would wipe away a tear. The soap was
eventually thrown into the cesspool.
Reading in a farming magazine that rabbit meat was as tender as
chicken, that rabbits were highly prolific, and that a keen farmer could
make a mint of money breeding them, Father Theodore immediately acquired
half a dozen stud rabbits, and two months later, Nerka the dog, terrified by
the incredible number of long-eared creatures filling the yard and house,
fled to an unknown destination. However, the wretchedly provincial citizens
of the town of N. proved extraordinarily conservative and, with unusual
unanimity, refused to buy Vostrikov's rabbits. Then Father Theodore had a
talk with his wife and decided to enhance his diet with the rabbit meat that
was supposed to be tastier than chicken. The rabbits were roasted whole,
turned into rissoles and cutlets, made into soup, served cold for supper and
baked in pies. But to no avail. Father Theodore worked it out that even if
they switched exclusively to a diet of rabbit, the family could not consume
more than forty of the creatures a month, while the monthly increment was
ninety, with the number increasing in a geometrical progression.
The Vostrikovs then decided to sell home-cooked meals. Father Theodore
spent a whole evening writing out an advertisement in indelible pencil on
neatly cut sheets of graph paper, announcing the sale of tasty home-cooked
meals prepared in pure butter. The advertisement began "Cheap and Good!" His
wife filled an enamel dish with flour-and-water paste, and late one evening
the holy father went around sticking the advertisements on all the telegraph
poles, and also in the vicinity of state-owned institutions.
The new idea was a great success. Seven people appeared the first day,
among them Bendin, the military-commissariat clerk, by whose endeavour the
town's oldest monument-a triumphal arch, dating from the time of the Empress
Elizabeth-had been pulled down shortly before on the ground that it
interfered with the traffic. The dinners were very popular. The next day
there were fourteen customers. There was hardly enough time to skin the
rabbits. For a whole week things went swimmingly and Father Theodore even
considered starting up a small fur-trading business, without a car, when
something quite unforeseen took place.
The Hammer and Plough co-operative, which had been shut for three weeks
for stock-taking, reopened, and some of the counter hands, panting with the
effort, rolled a barrel of rotten cabbage into the yard shared by Father
Theodore, and dumped the contents into the cesspool. Attracted by the
piquant smell, the rabbits hastened to the cesspool, and the next morning an
epidemic broke out among the gentle rodents. It only raged for three hours,
but during that time it finished off two hundred and forty adult rabbits and
an uncountable number of offspring.
The shocked priest had been depressed for two whole months, and it was
only now, returning from Vorobyaninov's house and to his wife's surprise,
locking himself in the bedroom, that he regained his spirits. There was
every indication that Father Theodore had been captivated by some new idea.
Catherine knocked on the bedroom door with her knuckle. There was no
reply, but the chanting grew louder. A moment later the door opened slightly
and through the crack appeared Father Theodore's face, brightened by a
maidenly flush.
"Let me have a pair of scissors quickly, Mother," snapped Father
Theodore.
"But what about your supper? "
"Yes, later on."
Father Theodore grabbed the scissors, locked the door again, and went
over to a mirror hanging on the wall in a black scratched frame.
Beside the mirror was an ancient folk-painting, entitled "The Parable
of the Sinner", made from a copperplate and neatly hand-painted. The parable
had been a great consolation to Vostrikov after the misfortune with the
rabbits. The picture clearly showed the transient nature of earthly things.
The top row was composed of four drawings with meaningful and consolatory
captions in Church Slavonic: Shem saith a prayer, Ham soweth wheat, Japheth
enjoyeth power, Death overtaketh all. The figure of Death carried a scythe
and a winged hour-glass and looked as if made of artificial limbs and
orthopaedic appliances; he was standing on deserted hilly ground with his
legs wide apart, and his general appearance made it clear that the fiasco
with the rabbits was a mere trifle.
At this moment Father Theodore preferred "Japheth enjoyeth power". The
drawing showed a fat, opulent man with a beard sitting on a throne in a
small room.
Father Theodore smiled and, looking closely at himself in the mirror,
began snipping at his fine beard. The scissors clicked, the hairs fell to
the floor, and five minutes later Father Theodore knew he was absolutely no
good at beard-clipping. His beard was all askew; it looked unbecoming and
even suspicious.
Fiddling about for a while longer, Father Theodore became highly
irritated, called his wife, and, handing her the scissors, said peevishly:
"You can help me, Mother. I can't do anything with these rotten hairs."
His wife threw up her hands in astonishment.
"What have you done to yourself?" she finally managed to say.
"I haven't done anything. I'm trimming my beard. It seems to have gone
askew just here. . . ."
"Heavens!" said his wife, attacking his curls. "Surely you're not
joining the Renovators, Theo dear?"
Father Theodore was delighted that the conversation had taken this
turn.
"And why shouldn't I join the Renovators, Mother? They're human-beings,
aren't they?"
"Of course they're human-beings," conceded his wife venomously, "but
they go to the cinema and pay alimony."
"Well, then, I'll go to the cinema as well."
"Go on then!"
Twill!"
"You'll get tired of it. Just look at yourself in the mirror."
And indeed, a lively black-eyed countenance with a short, odd-looking
beard and an absurdly long moustache peered out of the mirror at Father
Theodore. They trimmed down the moustache to the right proportions.
What happened next amazed Mother still more. Father Theodore declared
that he had to go off on a business trip that very evening, and asked his
wife to go round to her brother, the baker, and borrow his fur-collared coat
and duck-billed cap for a week.
"I won't go," said his wife and began weeping.
Father Theodore walked up and down the room for half an hour,
frightening his wife by the change in his expression and telling her all
sorts of rubbish. Mother could understand only one thing-for no apparent
reason Father Theodore had cut his hair, intended to go off somewhere in a
ridiculous cap, and was leaving her for good.
"I'm not leaving you," he kept saying. "I'm not. I'll be back in a
week. A man can have a job to do, after all. Can he or can't he?"
"No, he can't," said his wife.
Father Theodore even had to strike the table with his fist, although he
was normally a mild person in his treatment of his near ones. He did so
cautiously, since he had never done it before, and, greatly alarmed, his
wife threw a kerchief around her head and ran to fetch the civilian clothing
from her brother.
Left alone, Father Theodore thought for a moment, muttered, "It's no
joke for women, either," and pulled out a small tin trunk from under the
bed. This type of trunk is mostly found among Red Army soldiers. It is
usually lined with striped paper, on top of which is a picture of Budyonny,
or the lid of a Bathing Beach cigarette box depicting three lovelies on the
pebbly shore at Batumi. The Vostrikovs' trunk was also lined with
photographs, but, to Father Theodore's annoyance, they were not of Budyonny
or Batumi beauties. His wife had covered the inside of the trunk with
photographs cut out of the magazine Chronicle of the 1914 War. They included
"The Capture of Peremyshl", "The Distribution of Comforts to Other Ranks in
the Trenches", and all sorts of other things.
Removing the books that were lying at the top (a set of the Russian
Pilgrim for 1913; a fat tome, History of the Schism, and a brochure entitled
A Russian in Italy, the cover of which showed a smoking Vesuvius), Father
Theodore reached down into the very bottom of the trunk and drew out an old
shabby hat belonging to his wife. Wincing at the smell of moth-balls which
suddenly assailed him from the trunk, he tore apart the lace and trimmings
and took from the hat a heavy sausage-shaped object wrapped in linen. The
sausage-shaped object contained twenty ten-rouble gold coins, all that was
left of Father Theodore's business ventures.
With a habitual movement of the hand, he lifted his cassock and stuffed
the sausage into the pocket of his striped trousers. He then went over to
the chest of drawers and took twenty roubles in three- and five-rouble notes
from a sweet-box. There were twenty roubles left in the box. "That will do
for the housekeeping," he decided.
An hour before the evening mail-train was due in, Father Theodore,
dressed in a short coat which came just below the knee, and carrying a
wicker basket, stood in line in front of the booking-office and kept looking
apprehensively at the station entrance. He was afraid that in spite of his
insistence, his wife might come to see him off, and then Prusis, the
stall-owner, who was sitting in the buffet treating the income-tax collector
to a glass of beer, would immediately recognize him. Father Theodore stared
with shame and surprise at his striped trousers, now exposed to the view of
the entire laity.
The process of boarding a train without reserved seats took its normal
and scandalous course. Staggering under the weight of enormous sacks,
passengers ran from the front of the train to the back, and then to the
front again. Father Theodore followed them in a daze. Like everyone else, he
spoke to the conductors in an ingratiating tone, like everyone else he was
afraid he had been given the "wrong" ticket, and it was only when he was
finally allowed into a coach that his customary calm returned and he even
became happy.
The locomotive hooted at the top of its voice and the train moved off,
carrying Father Theodore into the unknown on business that was mysterious,
yet promised great things.
An interesting thing, the permanent way. Once he gets on to it the most
ordinary man in the street feels a certain animation in himself and soon
turns into a passenger, a consignee, or simply a trouble-maker without a
ticket, who makes life difficult for the teams of conductors and platform
ticket-inspectors.
The moment a passenger approaches the right of way, which he
amateurishly calls a railway station, his life is completely changed. He is
immediately surrounded by predatory porters with white aprons and nickel
badges on their chests, and his luggage is obsequiously picked up. From that
moment, the citizen no longer is his own master. He is a passenger and
begins to perform all the duties of one. These duties are many, though they
are not unpleasant.
Passengers eat a lot. Ordinary mortals do not eat during the night, but
passengers do. They eat fried chicken, which is expensive, hard-boiled eggs,
which are bad for the stomach, and olives. Whenever the train passes over
the points, numerous teapots in the rack clatter together, and legless
chickens (the legs have been torn out by the roots by passengers) jump up
and down in their newspaper wrapping.
The passengers, however, are oblivious of all this. They tell each
other jokes. Every three minutes the whole compartment rocks with laughter;
then there is a silence and a soft-spoken voice tells the following story:
"An old Jew lay dying. Around him were his wife and children. 'Is Monya
here?' asks the Jew with difficulty. 'Yes, she's here.' 'Has Auntie Brana
come?' 'Yes.' 'And where's Grandma? I don't see her.' 'She's over here.'
'And Isaac?' 'He's here, too.' 'What about the children?' They're all here.'
'Then who's minding the shop?'"
This very moment the teapots begin rattling and the chickens fly up and
down in the rack, but the passengers do not notice. Each one has a favourite
story ready, eagerly awaiting its turn. A new raconteur, nudging his
neighbours and calling out in a pleading tone, "Have you heard this one?"
finally gains attention and begins:
"A Jew comes home and gets into bed beside his wife. Suddenly he hears
a scratching noise under the bed. The Jew reaches his hand underneath the
bed and asks: 'Is that you, Fido?' And Fido licks his hand and says: 'Yes,
it's me.' "
The passengers collapse with laughter; a dark night cloaks the
countryside. Restless sparks fly from the funnel, and the slim signals in
their luminous green spectacles flash snootily past, staring above the
train.
An interesting thing, the right of way! Long, heavy trains race to all'
parts of the country. The way is open at every point. Green lights can be
seen everywhere; the track is clear. The polar express goes up to Murmansk.
The K-l draws out of Kursk Station, bound for Tiflis, arching its back over
the points. The far-eastern courier rounds Lake Baikal and approaches the
Pacific at full speed.
The Muse of Travel is calling. She has already plucked Father Theodore
from his quiet regional cloister and cast him into some unknown province.
Even Ippolit Matveyevich Vorobyaninov, former marshal of the nobility and
now clerk in a registry office, is stirred to the depths of his heart and
highly excited at the great things ahead.
People speed all over the country. Some of them are looking for
scintillating brides thousands of miles away, while others, in pursuit of
treasure, leave their jobs in the post office and rush off like schoolboys
to Aldan. Others simply sit at home, tenderly stroking an imminent hernia
and reading the works of Count Salias, bought for five kopeks instead of a
rouble.
The day after the funeral, kindly arranged by Bezenchuk the undertaker,
Ippolit Matveyevich went to work and, as part of the duties with which he
was charged, duly registered in his own hand the demise of Claudia Ivanovna
Petukhov, aged fifty-nine, housewife, non-party-member, resident of the
regional centre of N., by origin a member of the upper class of the province
of Stargorod. After this, Ippolit Matveyevich granted himself a two-week
holiday due to him, took forty-one roubles in salary, said good-bye to his
colleagues, and went home. On the way he stopped at the chemist's.
The chemist, Leopold Grigorevich, who was called Lipa by his friends
and family, stood behind the red-lacquered counter, surrounded by
frosted-glass bottles of poison, nervously trying to sell the fire chief's
sister-in-law "Ango cream for sunburn and freckles-gives the skin an
exceptional whiteness". The fire chief's sister-in-law, however, was asking
for "Rachelle powder, gold in colour-gives the skin a tan not normally
acquirable". The chemist had only the Ango cream in stock, and the battle
between these two very different cosmetics raged for half an hour. Lipa won
in the end and sold the fire chief's sister-in-law some lipstick and a
bugovar, which is a device similar in principle to the samovar, except that
it looks like a watering-can and catches bugs.
"What can I get you?"
"Something for the hair."
"To make it grow, to remove it, or to dye it? "
"Not to make it grow," said Ippolit Matveyevich. "To dye it."
"We have a wonderful hair dye called Titanic. We got it from the
customs people; it was confiscated. It's a jet black colour. A bottle
containing a six months' supply costs three roubles, twelve kopeks. I can
recommend it to you, as a good friend."
Ippolit Matveyevich twiddled the bottle in his hands, looked at the
label with a sigh, and put down his money on the counter.
He went home and, with a feeling of revulsion, began pouring Titanic
onto his head and moustache. A stench filled the house.
By the time dinner was over, the stench had cleared, the moustache had
dried and become matted and was very difficult to comb. The jet-black colour
turned out to have a greenish tint, but there was no time for a second try.
Taking from his mother-in-law's jewel box a list of the gems, found the
night before, Ippolit Matveyevich counted up his cash-in-hand, locked the
house, put the key in his back pocket and took the no. 7 express to
Stargorod.
At half past eleven a young man aged about twenty-eight entered
Stargorod from the direction of the village of Chmarovka, to the north-east.
A waif ran along behind him.
"Mister!" cried the boy gaily, "gimme ten kopeks!"
The young man took a warm apple out of his pocket "and handed it to the
waif, but the child still kept running behind. Then the young man stopped
and, looking ironically at the boy, said quietly:
"Perhaps you'd also like the key of the apartment where the money is?"
The presumptuous waif then realized the complete futility of his
pretensions and dropped behind.
The young man had not told the truth. He had no money, no apartment
where it might have been found, and no key with which to open it. He did not
even have a coat. The young man entered the town in a green suit tailored to
fit at the waist and an old woollen scarf wound several times around his
powerful neck. On his feet were patent-leather boots with orange-coloured
suede uppers. He had no socks on. The young man carried an astrolabe.
Approaching the market, he broke into a song: "O, Bayadere, tum-ti-ti,
tum-ti-ti."
In the market he found plenty going on. He squeezed into the line of
vendors selling wares spread out on the ground before them, stood the
astrolabe in front of him and began shouting:
"Who wants an astrolabe? Here's an astrolabe going cheap. Special
reduction for delegations and women's work divisions !"
At first the unexpected supply met with little demand; the delegations
of housewives were more interested in obtaining commodities in short supply
and were milling around the cloth and drapery stalls. A detective from the
Stargorod criminal investigation department passed the astrolabe-vendor
twice, but since the instrument in no way resembled the typewriter stolen
the day before from the Central Union of Dairy Co-operatives, the detective
stopped glaring at the young man and passed on.
By lunchtime the astrolabe had been sold to a repairman for three
roubles.
"It measures by itself," he said, handing over the astrolabe to its
purchaser, "provided you have something to measure."
Having rid himself of the calculating instrument, the happy young man
had lunch in the Tasty Corner snack bar, and then went to have a look at the
town. He passed along Soviet Street, came out into Red Army Street
(previously Greater Pushkin Street), crossed Co-operative Street and found
himself again on Soviet Street. But it was not the same Soviet Street from
which he had come. There were two Soviet Streets in the town. Greatly
surprised by this fact, the young man carried on and found himself in Lena
Massacre Street (formerly Denisov Street). He stopped outside no. 28, a
pleasant two-storeyed private house, which bore a sign saying:
SECOND SOCIAL SECURITY HOME
OF THE
STAR-PROV-INS-AD
and requested a light from the caretaker, who was sitting by the
entrance on a stone bench.
"Tell me, dad," said the young man, taking a puff, "are there any
marriageable young girls in this town? "
The old caretaker did not show the least surprise.
"For some a mare'd be a bride," he answered, readily striking up a
conversation.
"I have no more questions," said the young man quickly. And he
immediately asked one more: "A house like this and no girls in it?"
"It's a long while since there've been any young girls here," replied
the old man. "This is a state institution-a home for old-age women
pensioners."
"I see. For ones born before historical materialism?"
"That's it. They were born when they were born."
"And what was here in the house before the days of historical
materialism?"
"When was that?"
"In the old days. Under the former regime."
"Oh, in the old days my master used to live here."
"A member of the bourgeoisie")"
"Bourgeoisie yourself! I told you. He was a marshal of the nobility."
"You mean he was from the working class?"
"Working class yourself! He was a marshal of the nobility."
The conversation with the intelligent caretaker so poorly versed in the
class structure of society might have gone on for heaven knows how long had
not the young man got down to business.
"Listen, granddad," he said, "what about a drink?"
"All right, buy me one!"
They were gone an hour. When they returned, the caretaker was the young
man's best friend.
"Right, then, I'll stay the night with you," said the newly acquired
friend.
"You're a good man. You can stay here for the rest of your life if you
like."
Having achieved his aim, the young man promptly went down into the
caretaker's room, took off his orange-coloured boots, and, stretching out on
a bench, began thinking out a plan of action for the following day.
The young man's name was Ostap Bender. Of his background he would
usually give only one detail. "My dad," he used to say, "was a Turkish
citizen." During his life this son of a Turkish citizen had had many
occupations. His lively nature had prevented him from devoting himself to
any one thing for long and kept him roving through the country, finally
bringing him to Stargorod without any socks and without a key, apartment, or
money.
Lying in the caretaker's room, which was so warm that it stank, Ostap
Bender weighed up in his mind two possibilities for a career.
He could become a polygamist and calmly move on from town to town,
taking with him a suitcase containing his latest wife's valuables, or he
could go the next day to the Stargorod Commission for the Improvement of
Children's Living Conditions and suggest they undertake the popularization
of a brilliantly devised, though yet unpainted, picture entitled "The
Bolsheviks Answer Chamberlain" based on Repin's famous canvas "The Zaporozhe
Cossacks Answer the Sultan". If it worked, this possibility could bring in
four hundred or so roubles.
The two possibilities had been thought up by Ostap during his last stay
in Moscow. The polygamy idea was conceived after reading a law-court report
in the evening paper, which clearly stated that the convicted man was given
only a two-year sentence, while the second idea came to Bender as he was
looking round the Association of Revolutionary Artists' exhibition, having
got in with a free pass.
Both possibilities had their drawbacks, however. To begin a career as a
polygamist without a heavenly grey polka-dot suit was unthinkable. Moreover,
at least ten roubles would be needed for purposes of representation and
seduction. He could get married, of course, in his green field-suits, since
his virility and good looks were absolutely irresistible to the provincial
belles looking for husbands, but that would have been, as Ostap used to say,
"poor workmanship". The question of the painting was not all plain sailing
either. There might be difficulties of a purely technical nature. It might
be awkward, for instance, to show Comrade Kalinin in a fur cap and white
cape, while Comrade Chicherin was stripped to the waist. They could be
depicted in ordinary dress, of course, but that would not be quite the same
thing.
"It wouldn't have the right effect!" said Ostap aloud.
At this point he noticed that the caretaker had been prattling away for
some time, apparently reminiscing about the previous owner of the house.
"The police chief used to salute him. . . . I'd go and wish him a happy
new year, let's say, and he'd give me three roubles. At Easter, let's say,
he'd give me another three roubles. . . . Then on his birthday, let's say.
In a year I'd get as much as fifteen roubles from wishing him. He even
promised to give me a medal. 'I want my caretaker to have a medal,' he used
to say. That's what he would say: 'Tikhon, consider that you already have
the medal.'"
"And did he give you one? "
"Wait a moment. . . . T don't want a caretaker without a medal,' he
used to say. He went to St. Petersburg to get me a medal. Well, the first
time it didn't work out. The officials didn't want to give me one. 'The
Tsar,' he used to say, 'has gone abroad. It isn't possible just now.' So the
master told me to wait. 'Just wait a bit, Tikhon,' he used to say, 'you'll
get your medal.' "
"And what happened to this master of yours? Did they bump him off?"
"No one bumped him off. He went away. What was the good of him staying
here with the soldiers? . . . Do they give medals to caretakers nowadays?"
"Certainly. I can arrange one for you."
The caretaker looked at Bender with veneration.
"I can't be without one. It's that kind of work."
"Where did your master go?"
"Heaven knows. People say he went to Paris."
"Ah, white acacia-the emigre's flower! So he's an emigre!"
"Emigre yourself. . . . He went to Paris, so people say. And the house
was taken over for old women. You greet them every day, but they don't even
give you a ten-kopek bit! Yes, he was some master!"
At that moment the rusty bell above the door began to ring.
The caretaker ambled over to the door, opened it, and stepped back in
complete amazement.
On the top step stood Ippolit Matveyevich Vorobyaninov with a black
moustache and black hair. His eyes behind his pince-nez had a
pre-revolutionary twinkle.
"Master!" bellowed Tikhon with delight. "Back from Paris!"
Ippolit Matveyevich became embarrassed by the presence of the stranger,
whose bare purple feet he had just spotted protruding from behind the table,
and was about to leave again when Ostap Bender briskly jumped up and made a
low bow.
"This isn't Paris, but you're welcome to our abode."
Ippolit Matveyevich felt himself forced to say something.
"Hello, Tikhon. I certainly haven't come from Paris. Where did you get
that strange idea from?"
But Ostap Bender, whose long and noble nose had caught the scent of
roast meat, did not give the caretaker time to utter a word.
"Splendid," he said, narrowing his eyes. "You haven't come from Paris.
You've no doubt come from Kologriv to visit your deceased grandmother."
As he spoke, he tenderly embraced the caretaker and pushed him outside
the door before the old man had time to realize what was happening. When he
finally gathered his wits, all he knew was that his master had come back
from Paris, that he himself had been pushed out of his own room, and that he
was clutching a rouble note in his left hand.
Carefully locking the door, Bender turned to Vorobyaninov, who was
still standing in the middle of the room, and said:
"Take it easy, everything's all right! My name's Bender. You may have
heard of me!"
"No, I haven't," said Ippolit Matveyevich nervously.
"No, how could the name of Ostap Bender be known in Paris? Is it warm
there just now? It's a nice city. I have a married cousin there. She
recently sent me a silk handkerchief by registered post."
"What rubbish is this?" exclaimed Ippolit Matveyevich. "What
handkerchief? I haven't come from Paris at all. I've come from . . ."
"Marvellous! You've come from Morshansk!"
Ippolit Matveyevich had never had dealings with so spirited a young man
as Ostap Bender and began to feel peculiar.
"Well, I'm going now," he said.
"Where are you going? You don't need to hurry anywhere. The secret
police will come for you, anyway." Ippolit Matveyevich was speechless. He
undid his coat with its threadbare velvet collar and sat down on the bench,
glaring at Bender.
"I don't know what you mean," he said in a low voice.
"That's no harm. You soon will. Just one moment."
Ostap put on his orange-coloured boots and walked up and down the room.
"Which frontier did you cross? Was it the Polish, Finnish, or Rumanian
frontier? An expensive pleasure, I imagine. A friend of mine recently
crossed the frontier. He lives in Slavuta, on our side, and his wife's
parents live on the other. He had a row with his wife over a family matter;
she comes from a temperamental family. She spat in his face and ran across
the frontier to her parents. The fellow sat around for a few days but found
things weren't going well. There was no dinner and the room was dirty, so he
decided to make it up with her. He waited till night and then crossed over
to his mother-in-law. But the frontier guards nabbed him, trumped up a
charge, and gave him six months. Later on he was expelled from the trade
union. The wife, they say, has now gone back, the fool, and her husband is
in prison. She is able to take him things. . . . Did you come that way,
too?"
"Honestly," protested Ippolit Matveyevich, suddenly feeling himself in
the power of the talkative young man who had come between him and the
jewels. "Honestly, I'm a citizen of the RSFSR. I can show you my
identification papers, if you want."
"With printing being as well developed as it is in the West, the
forgery of Soviet identification papers is nothing. A friend of mine even
went as far as forging American dollars. And you know how difficult that is.
The paper has those different-coloured little lines on it. It requires great
technique. He managed to get rid of them on the Moscow black market, but it
turned out later that his grandfather, a notorious currency-dealer, had
bought them all in Kiev and gone absolutely broke. The dollars were
counterfeit, after all. So your papers may not help you very much either."
Despite his annoyance at having to sit in a smelly caretaker's room and
listen to an insolent young man burbling about the shady dealings of his
friends, instead of actively searching for the jewels, Ippolit Matveyevich
could not bring himself to leave. He felt great trepidation at the thought
that the young stranger might spread it round the town that the ex-marshal
had come back. That would be the end of everything, and he might be put in
jail as well.
'Don't tell anyone you saw me," said Ippolit Matveyevich. "They might
really think I'm an emigre." "That's more like it! First we have an Emigre
who has returned to his home town, and then we find he is afraid the secret
police will catch him."
"But I've told you a hundred times, I'm not an emigre."
"Then who are you? Why are you here?"
"I've come from N. on certain business."
"What business?"
"Personal business."
"And then you say you're not an emigre! A friend of mine . . ."
At this point, Ippolit Matveyevich, driven to despair by the stories of
Bender's friends, and seeing that he was not getting anywhere, gave in.
"All right," he said. "I'll tell you everything."
Anyway, it might be difficult without an accomplice, he thought to
himself, and this fellow seems to be a really shady character. He might be
useful.
Ippolit Matveyevich took off his stained beaver hat, combed his
moustache, which gave off a shower of sparks at the touch of the comb, and,
having cleared his throat in determination, told Ostap Bender, the first
rogue who had come his way, what his dying mother-in-law had told him about
her jewels.
During the account, Ostap jumped up several times and, turning to the
iron stove, said delightedly:
"Things are moving, gentlemen of the jury. Things are moving."
An hour later they were both sitting at the rickety table, their heads
close together, reading the long list of jewellery which had at one time
adorned the fingers, neck, ears, bosom and hair of Vorobyaninov's
mother-in-law.
Ippolit Matveyevich adjusted the pince-nez, which kept falling off his
nose, and said emphatically:
"Three strings of pearls. . . . Yes, I remember them. Two with forty
pearls and the long one had a hundred and ten. A diamond pendant . . .
Claudia Ivanovna used to say it was worth four thousand roubles; an
antique."
Next came the rings: not thick, silly, and cheap engagement rings, but
fine, lightweight rings set with pure, polished diamonds; heavy, dazzling
earrings that bathe a small female ear in multi-coloured light; bracelets
shaped like serpents, with emerald scales; a clasp bought with the profit
from a fourteen-hundred-acre harvest; a pearl necklace that could only be
worn by a famous prima donna; to crown everything was a diadem worth forty
thousand roubles.
Ippolit Matveyevich looked round him. A grass-green emerald light
blazed up and shimmered in the dark corners of the caretaker's dirty room. A
diamond haze hung near the ceiling. Pearls rolled across the table and
bounced along the floor. The room swayed in the mirage of gems. The sound of
Ostap's voice brought the excited Ippolit Matveyevich back to earth.
"Not a bad choice. The stones have been tastefully selected, I see. How
much did all this jazz cost?"
"Seventy to seventy-five thousand."
"Hm . . . Then it's worth a hundred and fifty thousand now."
"Really as much as that?" asked Ippolit Matveyevich jubilantly.
"Not less than that. However, if I were you, dear friend from Paris, I
wouldn't give a damn about it."
"What do you mean, not give a damn?"
"Just that. Like they used to before the advent of historical
materialism."
"Why?"
"I'll tell you. How many chairs were there?"
"A dozen. It was a drawing-room suite."
"Your drawing-room suite was probably used for firewood long ago."
Ippolit Matveyevich was so alarmed that he actually stood up.
"Take it easy. I'll take charge. The hearing is continued.
Incidentally, you and I will have to conclude a little deal."
Breathing heavily, Ippolit Matveyevich nodded his assent. Ostap Bender
then began stating his terms.
"In the event of acquisition of the treasure, as a direct partner in
the concession and as technical adviser, I receive sixty per cent. You
needn't pay my national health; I don't care about that."
Ippolit Matveyevich turned grey.
"That's daylight robbery!"
"And how much did you intend offering me? "
"Well. . . er . . . five per cent, or maybe even ten per cent. You
realize, don't you, that's fifteen thousand roubles!"
"And that's all?"
"Yes
"Maybe you'd like me to work for nothing and also give you the key of
the apartment where the money is? "
"In that case, I'm sorry," said Vorobyaninov through his nose.
"I have every reason to believe I can manage the business by myself."
"Aha! In that case, I'm sorry," retorted the splendid Ostap. "I have
just as much reason to believe, as Andy Tucker used to say, that I can also
manage your business by myself."
"You villain!' cried Ippolit Matveyevich, beginning to shake.
Ostap remained unmoved.
"Listen, gentleman from Paris, do you know your jewels are practically
in my pocket? And I'm only interested in you as long as I wish to prolong
your old age."
Ippolit Matveyevich realized at this point that iron hands had gripped
his throat.
"Twenty per cent," he said morosely.
"And my grub?" asked Ostap with a sneer.
"Twenty-five."
"And the key of the apartment?"
"But that's thirty-seven and a half thousand!"
"Why be so precise? Well, all right, I'll settle for fifty per cent.
We'll go halves."
The haggling continued, and Ostap made a further concession. Out of
respect for Vorobyaninov, he was prepared to work for forty per cent.
"That's sixty thousand!" cried Vorobyaninov.
"You're a rather nasty man," retorted Bender. "You're too fond of
money."
"And I suppose you aren't?" squeaked Ippolit Matveyevich in a flutelike
voice.
"No, I'm not."
"Then why do you want sixty thousand? "
"On principle!"
Ippolit Matveyevich took a deep breath.
"Well, are things moving?" pressed Ostap.
Vorobyaninov breathed heavily and said humbly: "Yes, things are
moving."
"It's a bargain. District Chief of the Comanchi!"
As soon as Ippolit Matveyevich, hurt by the nickname, "Chief of the
Comanchi", had demanded an apology, and Ostap, in a formal apology, had
called him "Field Marshal", they set about working out their disposition.
At midnight Tikhon, the caretaker, hanging on to all the garden fences
on the way and clinging to the lamp posts, tottered home to his cellar. To
his misfortune, there was a full moon.
"Ah! The intellectual proletarian! Officer of the Broom!" exclaimed
Ostap, catching sight of the doubled-up caretaker.
The caretaker began making low-pitched, passionate noises of the kind
sometimes heard when a lavatory suddenly gurgles heatedly and fussily in the
stillness of the night.
"That's nice," said Ostap to Vorobyaninov. "Your caretaker is rather a
vulgar fellow. Is it possible to get as drunk as that on a rouble?"
"Yes, it is," said the caretaker unexpectedly.
"Listen, Tikhon," began Ippolit Matveyevich. "Have you any idea what