The Monkey Link (29 page)

“That’s it! You’ve nearly guessed it. The question is, what is a drunk—dead or asleep? Out cold, out like a light
 
…
what
is
he?”

“Don’t you mean, honored colleague, that there’s life, there’s death, but there’s also
pause
?”

“Very close, Doctor. Should he be considered a corpse or a body?”

“It turns out a drunk is neither?”

“What is a drunk
 
…
There’s yet another complication to this question, Doctor. The question is, of what does a deadly sin consist—the sin, or death?”

“Perhaps the answer lies in how much he drank?”

“Well, yes. A drop kills a horse, a liter kills a man
 
…
Nevertheless, you’re not telling all, Doctor.”

“I think I’ve expressed myself quite clearly, honored colleague. Everything depends on the dose.”

“The dose
 
…
A lot is a lot, a little’s a little. That’s experience, not a thought. The principal condition is rhythm. In the beginning, time gave a shudder. Ticked and got started.”

“The time of the action? You think it’s like a clock?”

“There now, what kind of scientist are you! And you call yourself my colleague. That’s like
HIM
thinking he wrote us
 
…
You assume you’re smarter, do you? I see, I see. Then tell me, how long will this go?”

“How long?” Doctor D. automatically glances at his watch. Pavel Petrovich bursts out laughing, satisfied. He tosses up a flat little cobblestone and catches it.

The bay is as round as a plate. Overnight the sea has completely stilled and solidified. Replete and smooth, it is so abundant that it even curls up at the edges, like a kind of oversized jellyfish.

“Here, let’s play a game,” Pavel Petrovich says, getting set. “If you guess, the bottle’s on me. If you don’t, the bottle’s on you.”

“In the first place, how could I guess? And in the second place, where would I get a bottle?”

“As Napoleon used to say, in the second place is enough.”

“What does Napoleon have to do with it? Do you mean the cognac?”

“Your taste isn’t bad.” Pavel Petrovich laughs. “Let’s play for a Napoleon.”

“I’m not good for a Napoleon,” the doctor says, pulling out first a three-ruble note, then a five, then a one.

“Now, this is a man’s conversation. So, a bottle?”

The doctor still isn’t sure. “But you know, this is somehow
 
…
the last of my
 
…
Yesterday, you see, I also somehow
 
…
spent a fair amount
 
…
Colleagues, you understand
 
…
 
”

Pavel Petrovich sighs and flings the stone into the sea in a fit of temper, without looking. But the stone goes hopping over the thick water as if alive, like a frog. And hops thus all the way to the horizon.

“Doesn’t that remind you of anything?” Pavel Petrovich whispers mysteriously, leaning toward the doctor’s ear.

“Well, yes. Childhood, of course. I couldn’t do it. I could never get more than three skips. I was so envious of people like you!”

“Nonsense,” Pavel Petrovich mutters carelessly. “A matter of practice. Precision of gesture, no more. Still, I am a sculptor, you know.”

“You don’t say! I’ve never seen a live sculptor before—”

“You’ve seen a lot of dead ones, have you? No offense meant, it’s a joke. Ha, ha.”

“Oh, that’s all right. It’s not very unfunny.”

“You’re a fine fellow, Doctor. In any profession, a sense of humor can’t hurt. But you specialize in birds, if I’m not mistaken?”

“Birds, yes
 
…
How did you guess?”

“Why, I was sitting in the bushes and saw you admiring a feather. Creatures with a great sense of humor, they are.”

“You’ve noticed this, too? You don’t say! One really has to know them well.”

“I do know them pretty well. But don’t be so surprised, it’s just that I made a living from songbirds as a child. Now, you chose to speak ironically about clocks, Doctor. But you know, I didn’t throw a mere stone into the sea—I threw a visual aid
 
…
 
”

Pavel Petrovich holds the pause, relishing it, but Doctor D. holds it, too.

“You noted that the first skip was long, the second a bit shorter, the third
 
…
well, and so on. What does this mean?”

“Well, if you want to switch to mathematical language, it’s a linear graph of negative acceleration.”

“Really. I’ll have to remember that. But all the same, it’s a superficial description. Doesn’t this remind you of a clock pendulum?”

“Not in general, no. Well, unless you hang the stone on a thread—”

“Oh, but why hang it, Doctor? That’s like the Armenian riddle, you know: it hangs, it’s green, and it cheeps. You know the riddle? Good, good. But your mathematical point, about acceleration, is exactly what I had in mind. When the pendulum gets to the end, what does it do?
It
 
…
stops.
And in order to stop, what does it do?
It
 
…
slows
 
…
down.
Do you follow?”

“Naturally. The damping of the pendulum.”

“Damping. Excellent! And what does that imply?”

This time, too, they both hold the pause.

“It implies that even a clock, in order to run, must stop, every second. Unlike time! A clock is mere rhythm, no more. It arbitrarily beats out the twenty-four hours for us. It doesn’t measure time. Every thoughtful person knows this. But a clock isn’t so naive as that same thoughtful person believes. You, for example. Do you think I felt offended by you? I felt offended for the clocks. The master craftsmen.”

“Master craftsmen? I in no way touched on craftsmen. A clock is a clock. It runs.”

“That’s exactly it! How does the master craftsman differ from the scientist? He has
feel
ing! Clocks
 
…
 
” Pavel Petrovich snorts disdainfully. “What other article has man complicated so unnecessarily as clocks? How hasn’t he decorated them! What chimes, what repeaters! And what hasn’t he crafted them from! Crystal clocks, porcelain clocks, gold clocks, straw clocks. Water clocks! Man has—well, he’s simply made clocks from everything. Finished one, started another. Why? Even in our own century, when there are no craftsmen left, only industry, what clocks haven’t we invented! Already it’s hard to recall the ones we had in our youth. Remember how proud we once were: anti-magnetic, shock-resistant, waterproof
 
…
Where are those windmills today? Now even the electronic clock is yesterday
 
…
Now it has a radio, a computer, and a television built in. Why so much?”

The doctor still isn’t taking the bait. And Pavel Petrovich goes on.

“Because, and only because, what people measure by the clock is not
time
, but their
relationship
to it! A clock is a ritual cult object, not a practical one. You’re late or on time, not because you use a clock, but because you need something or you don’t.”

“Bravo!” the doctor responds. “That’s true. You’re right about late arrivals. Speaking of which, I’ve been engrossed in our conversation, and now I’m late. Where are we going, by the way?” And indeed, the round bay on which they met is no longer visible. A long, boring strip of shore stretches ahead, and the rim of the sun has already thrust up from behind the mountains.

“You’re late?” Pavel Petrovich says cheerfully, greeting this as his own victory over time. “Good, good. You’re not too upset, I take it. But where was it you needed to go?”

“Oh, my colleagues wanted to show me some sort of relict grove and then take me to see the monkeys—”

“The relict grove!” Pavel Petrovich exults. “Why, that’s exactly where we’re going. You may not even be late. We’ll even meet them all there.”

“Still, it’s an amusing twist. We got talking about clocks and forgot about time.”

“Remarkable! A remarkable twist! We haven’t even begun to talk about time. Now that you’re not in a hurry, we can talk a while. If this interests you, of course.”

“How do you come to have such an interest in clocks? Is it professional? Are you interested in them as a sculptor?”

“A sculptor
 
…
Amusing. I can see the scientist in you. Your observation is accurate. Thanks for the idea. But of course. Above all, a clock is a sculpture. A conventional kinetic sculpture, if I may use the language of the avant-garde. A monument to time, as it were. To what else has man erected so many monuments? Lenin and Stalin together didn’t dream of so many. I once had occasion to repair a clock with Lenin—”

“What? Is there a Lenin monument with a clock?”

“Oh, no, a regular mantel clock, it struck the Kremlin chimes. I was working as a watchmaker then—”

The doctor laughs happily. “I think you’ve made a monkey of me, Pavel Petrovich.”

“Oh, but no, my dear fellow. You don’t believe me, but it’s true, I did work as a watchmaker. So I haven’t made a monkey of you yet. Would you like me to? Let’s play this game. If you guess how many skips, you owe me a bottle. If you don’t guess, I owe you.”

“Excuse me, how do you mean? I don’t follow. If I guess, I
lose
?”

“How truly distrustful you are. Truly the scientist. Your logic suffocates you. You yourself said you couldn’t guess. I’m offering you more advantageous conditions. Risk-free, from your point of view, I might say. Well?”

Pavel Petrovich is already holding a suitable stone.

“Well, all right.” The doctor chuckles. “Do you really want to lose, rather than win?”

Pavel Petrovich looks sad. “Yes, I want terribly to lose. But I never lose. Believe me, it’s actually boring.”

“But I’m going to pick at random—and you’ve lost.”

“Oh, how I’d like to hope!”

“Well, as you wish.”

“Well?” Pavel Petrovich freezes in the posture of the “Youth Pitching Horseshoes.” “Remember, in Pushkin? ‘Briskly the youth took a step, And he crouched with one hand on his knee
 
…
 
’
 
”

“Well, eight.”

Pavel Petrovich throws.

“One, two, three
 
…
 
” Doctor D. counts. “Six, seven
 
…
 
”

The stone suddenly halts and sinks—like a stone—to the bottom. As if diving. As if alive.

“Eight,” the doctor says, with a somehow childish plaintiveness.

“It’s even hard to conceal how distressed I am,” Pavel Petrovich says, accepting the money from the doctor. He disappears in the bushes.

And the doctor, deep in thought, scratches his nose.

It’s hard to say exactly what he is thinking. We are eavesdropping and spying, no more. But his expression is eloquent. On first thought, the prospect of a drinking spree makes his nose itch, as usual. On second thought, he is not such a fool as to hope for Pavel Petrovich’s return. On third thought (there being no hope), he hadn’t planned on drinking first thing in the morning. Why, he had even run down to the sea with the intention of having a swim at dawn. He fully looks the beachgoer, although basically he doesn’t care for either swimming or sunbathing, since by occupation he spends his whole life on the beach. So he can take it or leave it. Lest his research associates succumb to laziness, he must set an example: at home he doesn’t swim or sunbathe. But here it’s a different matter. Here he can indulge. He is wearing shorts, tennis shoes, and a silly little cap with a long visor, with a towel around his neck. And he hasn’t even gotten his swim. That odd man
 
…
On first thought, Doctor D. has never met anyone like him before. On second thought, the man is suspiciously reminiscent of something—far in the past, but it happened to the doctor himself
 
…
Doctor D. tries, and simply can’t recall. Suddenly abandoned by Pavel Petrovich, he strolls along the water’s edge, along the shore—always in profile, in profile, bobbing his head and picking up his tall, thin legs—and his long visor further emphasizes his resemblance to the subject of his studies, the bird. Thus he strolls and meditates, and this time we can definitely state that he is meditating on Pavel Petrovich, because he is hunting up the flattest stones on the whole pebbled beach and trying to throw them, but they just won’t skip for him. Again, they sink like stones: straight to the bottom.

And now he laughs, content with his loss.

Resolutely he strips to his underpants, in order to take his swim at last, then and there. But having undressed he does not go in the water. He sits down and looks at the sea, once more somehow contriving to be sideways to us.

Thus he sits naked, like a big plucked bird, and now he is probably comparing the seas: his own sea, a northern one, the Baltic, with this southern sea, the Black. No comparison! A deficiency of birds. No sand. The gray color of the pebbles in the littoral zone ruins everything. It’s not just the fauna, somehow things are worse here with the flora, too. Still, he has to walk as far as the so-called relict grove. Before
 
…

Before the sun hits the beach. It has already fully risen from behind the mountains and hangs above them like the moon. It lights the whole sea, and the sea becomes truly
black.
Black as oil, as mercury, as amalgam, as a mirror
 
…
as shoe polish, as a shined shoe. Something of that sort. The doctor changes his mind about swimming.

He vacillates a moment longer, whether to return or to walk ahead. Toward where the relict grove is. If that odd man wasn’t lying
 
…
But even if he wasn’t lying, how far is it?

He sees a bird at last. It’s only a seagull. But still.

And he walks toward where the seagull is. Ahead then, not back. He paces like a crane, his visor nodding northward.

Why has he come here? Strictly speaking, to play hooky. To have a swim. He doesn’t feel like swimming. The relict grove and the upcoming excursion to the monkeys don’t interest him all that much. The monkeys don’t interest him because he has no expert knowledge of them. They hold some interest for him only in connection with the human population. Apropos of this, ever since a certain moment (again, somehow mysteriously connected with Pavel Petrovich—he does have something to do with this!), he has more and more often been thinking forbidden thoughts. Unprofessional ones, but so alluring
 
…
He has suddenly discovered that, if he is honest, he has long since lost interest in thinking about birds. Only one animal is interesting to think about—man. And the more interesting, the more terrifying. Or rather, the more terrifying, the more interesting. This is his scientific adultery.