Authors: Andrei Bitov
“Only my breast pocket.”
“Why are you always so afraid you’ll be suspected? Take pride. You’ve whipped up a pretty fierce fire—even if not worldwide. When Gogol cremated his dead souls, he froze for good.
{107}
Never did get warm.”
“He
himself
burned, as a live soul.”
“You think so?”
“I don’t think anything! It’s
my
novel that burned.”
“Your baby?”
“Exactly!”
“Your favorite?”
“You don’t understand these things.”
“These things, those things
…
What do
you
understand! Have you ever once given thought to anyone? understood anyone? You call me ‘
HE
’ and yourself ‘I’—is that fair? When we drink vodka, it’s us together, but when we puke, it’s me? What’s the big surprise if I don’t care
…
Your novel can go to blue blazes!
That’s
fair. Have it your way: I didn’t write it, you did. No skin off my nose. I should have your problems, Teacher.”
“That’s
…
how a master of old jokes would write it!”
“I can’t write.” His voice was unexpectedly gentle.
“You don’t say! Well, at last. You admit it.”
“I don’t mean in your sense. Not in the writer’s sense. I can’t sign my own name.”
“You’re kidding!”
But I knew
HE
wasn’t kidding this time. “Well, so you’ve helped me in other ways. You might have observed things. Remembered them. Since you’re so observant. Or you might have read a book about monkeys and told me about it—”
“I can’t read.”
“That either? You’re logical, though, in your own way.”
“Yes,” he said smugly, “character is my prerogative.”
“Prerogative
…
Where have you picked up these words. Like old jokes.”
“There you go again. I’m your wastebasket. But actually, that’s all you have left now, the crumpled things from the wastebasket that I’ve smoothed out.”
“You saved those!”
“Why, of course! Rough drafts—they’re a high for me. I can make them out without reading them. Like claim checks. Like streetcar tickets.”
“Do you really love me so?”
“So
…
”
HE
said scornfully. “Why must I love you
so
? Like loving a Jew. Can’t I just
love
? Is that too little, not enough? I hate you! But always more than you hate me. After all, I’m not as unfeeling—”
“As I am
…
Listen! Remember in that marvelous Georgian town, the time you got so drunk
…
the time you and I got so drunk
…
the time I and you
…
oh, anyway, the time we got drunk and I was dying, I’d been beaten up by the local Armenians for my pro-Georgian speeches, which they perceived as anti-Armenian
…
Remember?”
“Nah,” he said. “I don’t remember.”
“You don’t? You’re kidding
…
I lay there in my hotel room, dead drunk, beaten to death, dying. My heart kept stopping. I counted. It beat again after all. And now it failed to beat. I had died. No light, no corridor, no tunnel
…
A warm, nauseating darkness, like terror. Like being stuffed back into the womb. And then I was lying naked and washed, on my belly, but I saw the whole room, as if I were on my back. And I saw myself, me, hovering at the ceiling
…
Was that
YOU
?”
Now
HE
turned his other side to the conflagration, partly to cool the current side, partly to warm the previous one
…
“I remember a yellow lightbulb, with
YOU
circling around it. The light was peculiarly yellow, like a body
…
like
YOUR
body. And like mine. You were watching with such curiosity! As if seeing for the first time
…
Whom did you see?”
“Why are you trying to shake me, like a detective in a movie
…
”
HE
retorted lazily.
“Was that you or me? Did you return me to life, or did I return you?”
“I don’t remember.”
“You were flying above me, and you were very excited. And I was dead.”
“Sure. ‘Then in the desert you lay dead
…
’
”
{108}
“That fits—that’s how it looked. Only worse. In the bed. Or more accurately, on the bed. Because this was a corpse. The live man lay
in
the bed, the dead man
on
the bed. Don’t you agree?”
“We didn’t finish high school.”
“It’s not the grammar. I mean, there were two of them, identical, like twins, like two peas. A dead man and a live one. And they merged. It grew dark. I opened my eyes. It was dark. The dead don’t open their eyes. I groped in the darkness. And the first thing I felt was this object
…
Round, warm, and elongated. Hard. Standing upright. Don’t you remember?”
“I don’t do that, myself.”
“Fool. The object wasn’t part of my body.”
“Well, all the more, then!”
“Fool! It was the neck! The neck of a clay jug, filled with red wine!”
“Well?” He was interested. “And what happened?”
“What do you think happened? I touched it caressingly.”
“Well?”
“And applied myself!”
“And threw up.”
“No, I didn’t, I drank my fill and was resurrected. I turned on the light. Note that it wasn’t on. Note that it wasn’t nearly so yellow. But I was stark naked, and I’d been bathed, and the jug hadn’t been there before! Did you bring it?”
“The Georgians sent it to you, for your anti-Armenian speeches.”
“No, it was
YOU
!”
“Typical delirium.”
“Delirium
…
Illiterate, but how you pick up the words.”
“From you. But tell me, what happened next?”
“Next
…
Next I summoned you, and you drank the rest.”
“Better you’d croaked,” he said, resentful again. “This whole act, who’s it for? What’s this role you’ve assigned to me? You create, you write and read, you’re as spiritual as Beethoven
…
Me, I just drink and sleep and
…
Why, you’re like Venichka, you don’t even go to the bathroom. And I haven’t even got a proper name! Slavery. That’s the only thing your kind have managed to invent! Slavery!”
“My kind?”
“People!”
“And what are
YOU
?”
“You know.”
“Not an angel?”
“I never said that
…
”
“Did you think that up yourself, about slavery?”
“I suppose
you
did? Where would you get
MY
experience? You always talk down to me, but in fact you
hold
me down. To the role of pig, drudge, scum. I swear, it’s like you’re taking revenge.”
“Why?”
“You know.”
“I don’t know!”
“Because I’ve got spirit, and you don’t! Because I’ve got talent, and you don’t! Because I’m the one the women love!”
“So that’s why we’re quarreling. A woman!”
“I’m not about to quarrel with you. You’re no rival of mine!”
“That’s a fact. Strange
…
It just occurred to me! Listen! Why is it we’ve never fallen in love with the same woman?”
“Your women never appealed to me. And you were shy with mine.”
“Do you think so?”
“What’s to think.”
“Well, but was there never one who would have suited us both?”
“That’s called love.”
“Well, but have we never loved?”
“
I
have, but you haven’t.”
“Because you didn’t share with me. Kept it all for yourself!”
“Who, me? But all my efforts were on your behalf!”
“Oh, come off it! But don’t we have the same soul for both of us? She’s not yours or mine, is she?”
“Mine!”
“Exactly. Animal!”
“Computer!”
“Listen, aren’t you sorry for our gentle soul? We batter her, we’ve worn her out completely—”
“We tear her to pieces, crumple her, wipe our feet on her!”
“We’ve dragged her down, humiliated her—”
“Screwed her!”
“We should be sorry for her, not ourselves—”
“It’s too late to be sorry. We must save her!”
“A live soul—”
“Barely alive!”
“Not rejoicing, not exulting—”
“No wonder. Hardly breathing!”
“Is this good?”
“This is not good.”
“But who’s to blame?”
“You!”
“There you go again! When was the uprising of the slaves in Egypt?”
“Twenty-seven fifty B.C.”
“You remember!”
“How could I forget! Old Mr. Ivanov! When he wanted to pull a
D
up to a
C,
he always asked that question. And you were a
D
student, a lively little boy. It was only later that you became this slaveholding, self-righteous pain in the neck. This mediocrity.”
“Fool. I’m not the only one in trouble, you know—
YOU
are, too. What are we to do, if there’s one of her for two of us? Can’t have a duel! If I shoot you, I’ll hit myself.”
“You’ll miss. It’ll be suicide.”
“What are you doing, egging me on? Look out, I’ll shoot myself, so as not to miss—and hit
YOU
for sure!”
“Don’t you threaten me. My situation couldn’t be more solid! Yes, I’m scum. But I’m alive. I say my prayers. But you, what have you accomplished? What have you achieved, I ask you. Only indifference. Do you imagine you’ve improved yourself, matured, shed vices? All you’ve done is shed unnecessary vice, because it fell off by itself. You haven’t become better—you’ve only become worse. You’ve covered up your ugliness, you don’t display the sore. You’re a mask. My mask.”
“Why do this
today
, when my novel has burned up, when at last I feel some sort of emotion, as you understand it—why be angry with me
today
, when at last you ought to pity me?”
“But when else could I say anything to you!? You don’t hear anyone!
…
Why have you told me this, why? As though you
…
you
…
”
“Come now, come now
…
Don’t cry. It’s the other way around. More likely,
YOU
…
”
“I’m just your coat hanger. You’ll drape yourself on me, no ironing needed. You’ll drip dry, assume a shape, which, take note, you don’t have, by definition. You’ll start acting vain again, as if nothing had happened. Sanctimonious prig!”
“Without my sanctimoniousness, you’d be a drunken old sot!” “Thanks a lot. That’s just what I’m having no luck with! No way can I be a drunken old sot!”
“Now don’t go off half cocked.”
“Say, would you have any left?”
“I’ve been wanting to ask you—”
“You? Ask me? I don’t have any.”
“Look, I’m asking you who don’t have any
…
asking you as my conscience, my soul, not as my slave
…
did
I, this time, write it well?”
“You! again you! always you! and once more you!”
“We. Did
WE
pull it off?”
“How to tell you
…
On the whole, it wasn’t bad.”
“On the whole
…
! What do
YOU
know.”
“You forget, I simply can’t read. But I have to feel for both of us.”
“Have you reversed roles? Why, you
are
a slave! Give you freedom, and you’re already on my back!”
“See, you’re putting me down again.”
“You’re quick. Caught me. Well, I’m sorry. I agree. I know it myself. They’re not
Dead Souls.
Let them burn. Live ones give more heat.”
“Oh, don’t be intimidated by Gogol,” he said dreamily. “You had some glorious pages!”
“Truly? Do you think so?”
“I do. Dead souls are burned as firewood. Live souls burn with their own fire! This was the best thing we
…
you
…
You’ll see—this will be a historic conflagration! The Hotel Abkhazia is only the match. Someday you’ll say: I saw
how it all began.
”
“You set the fire?!”
“Suppose I did
…
”
“And
YOU
say this to me! Son-of-a-bitch Herostratus!
{109}
A lot of honor this will
…
It was sheer laziness! You just didn’t take the kettle off!”
I made a dash to save the manuscript, but
HE
grabbed my arm. H
E
had always been stronger than I.
I cowered and howled in pain.
“Really, was the thing so very precious to you?” he asked, as if in surprise. “Wait a minute.”
But I did not succeed in restraining him. I simply wasn’t strong enough.
He vanished in the smoke and the fire.
He was agile as a monkey. An instant later I spotted him on a third-floor balcony. Impossible to see clearly
…
But who else could it have been?
The muzzle was aimed straight at my forehead, and somehow this reassured me. Because the muzzle was too large, or because we’re used to seeing it more often in the movies than in real life. Strange that a piece like that could also shoot, and not merely in order to intimidate. A submachine gun is somehow more dangerous, a pistol still worse, but nastiest of all is a knife
…
Yet they had knives and submachine guns, too, these soldiers who had abandoned their APCs to stretch their legs, smoke a cigarette under the clear sky, and lounge against the warm August armor, and their faces were also unfrightening with regard to the submachine gun and combat knife, which they didn’t even plan to use, which they were merely supposed to wear like badges and chevrons, but looking at them you could have no faith that they wouldn’t fire the cannon when the order came. The businesslike courtesy of their gestures and tone in contacts with civilians was such as to suggest that they had been briefed not to yield to provocation. They were executing this first order well, which meant they were also capable of firing the cannon. The public conversed freely with them, and from the car it appeared they were making some arrangement for this evening, after
…
I liked the soldiers. Unexcitable. They had nothing against the people whom they would be ordered to shoot.