LITMIR.BIZ

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beginning to fill up with the most exemplary of the clerks. He quickly joined their disorderly ranks, and his outfit immediately lost all its strangeness. The man in sandals was an office worker, and almost every office worker in Chernomorsk followed an unwritten dress code: a night shirt with sleeves rolled up above the elbows, light, orphanage-style pants, and those same sandals, or canvas shoes. Nobody wore a hat. One could occasionally spot a cap, but a mane of wild black hair standing on end was much more common, and a bald, sun-tanned pate, glimmering like a melon lying in the field and tempting you to write something on it with an indelible pencil, was more common still.

      The organization where the man in sandals worked was called The Hercules, and it occupied a former hotel. Revolving glass doors with brass steamboat handles propelled him into a large, pink marble hallway. The elevator was permanently moored on the first floor, and it served as an information booth – one could already see a woman’s laughing face inside. Having run a few steps, thanks to the momentum given to him by the door, the newcomer stopped in front of an old doorman, who was wearing a cap with a golden zigzag, and asked cheerily:

      “So, old man, are you ready for the crematorium?”

      “Ready, my friend,” answered the doorman with a broad smile, “ready for our Soviet columbarium.”

      He even waived his hands in excitement. His kindly face showed a willingness to submit himself to the fiery ritual at any moment.

      The Chernomorsk authorities were planning to build a crematorium – along with a space called a columbarium, for funeral urns – and for some reason this novelty, courtesy of the municipal cemetery department, delighted the citizens to no end. Maybe they thought the new words – crematorium and columbarium – were funny, or maybe they were particularly amused by the thought that a human body can be burned like a log. Either way, they pestered elderly people in the streets and on streetcars with comments like: “Where are you charging off to, old woman? To the crematorium?” Or: “Let the old man pass, he’s off to the crematorium.” Surprisingly, the old folks liked the idea of cremation very much, and they responded good-naturedly to all jokes on the subject. In general, all that talk about dying, which was previously considered inappropriate and impolite, had come to enjoy universal popularity in Chernomorsk and was considered as entertaining as Jewish and Armenian jokes.

      The man skirted a naked marble woman that stood at the bottom of the stairs, an electric torch in her raised hand, and threw a quick annoyed look at the poster that said, THE PURGE OF THE HERCULES BEGINS. DOWN WITH THE CONSPIRACY OF SILENCE AND CRONYISM. Then he climbed the stairs to the second floor. He worked in the Department of Finance and Accounting.

      It was still fifteen minutes before the official start of the workday, but the others – Sakharkov, Dreyfus, Tezoimenitsky, Musicant, Chevazhevskaya, Kukushkind, Borisokhlebsky, and Lapidus Jr. – were already at their desks. They weren’t worried about the purge at all, and repeatedly reassured one another that they weren’t, but lately, for some reason, they had started coming to work earlier and earlier. Taking advantage of the few minutes of free time, they were chatting loudly among themselves. Their voices boomed across the huge hall, which was once the hotel’s restaurant. Its oak-paneled ceiling, which was covered with carvings, and the murals of frolicking dryads and other nymphs, with dreadful smiles on their faces, were evidence of its past.

      “Have you heard the news, Koreiko?” Lapidus Jr. asked the new arrival. “You really haven’t? Then you won’t believe it.”

      “What news? Good morning, Comrades,” said Koreiko. “Good morning, Anna Vasilevna.”

      “You can’t even imagine!” said Lapidus Jr. gleefully. “Accountant Berlaga is in the nuthouse.”

      “Are you serious? Berlaga? He’s the most normal person in the world!”

      “Was the most normal until yesterday, but now he’s the least normal,” chimed in Borisokhlebsky. “It’s true. His brotherin-law called me. Berlaga has a very serious mental illness, the heel nerve disorder.”

      “The only surprising thing is that the rest of us don’t have this nerve disorder yet,” remarked old Kukushkind darkly, looking at his co-workers through his round, wire-rimmed glasses.

      “Bite your tongue,” said Chevazhevskaya. “He’s always so depressing.”

      “It’s really too bad about Berlaga,” said Dreyfus, turning his swivel chair towards the others.

      The others silently agreed with Dreyfus. Only Lapidus Jr. smirked mysteriously. The conversation moved on to the behavior of the mentally ill. They mentioned a few maniacs, and told a few stories about notorious madmen.

      “I had a crazy uncle,” reported Sakharkov, “who thought he was simultaneously Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. You can imagine the ruckus he raised!”

      “The only surprising thing,” said old Kukushkind in a scratchy voice, methodically wiping off his glasses with the flap of his jacket, “the only surprising thing is that the rest of us don’t yet think that we are Abraham.” The old man started puffing, “… Isaac…”

      “And Jacob?” asked Sakharkov teasingly.

      “That’s right! And Jacob!” shrieked Kukushkind suddenly. “And Jacob! Yes, Jacob. We live in such unnerving times… When I worked at the banking firm of Sycamorsky and Cesarewitch they didn’t have any purges.”

      Hearing the word “purge,” Lapidus Jr. perked up, took Koreiko by the elbow, and pulled him toward the enormous stained-glass window, which depicted two gothic knights.

      “You haven’t heard the most interesting bit about Berlaga yet,” he whispered. “Berlaga is healthy as a horse.”

      “What? So he’s not in the nuthouse?”

      “Oh yes, he is.”

      Lapidus smiled knowingly.

      “That’s the trick. He was simply afraid of the purge and decided to sit this dangerous period out. Faked mental illness. Right now, he’s probably growling and guffawing. What an operator! Frankly, I’m envious.”

      “Is there a problem with his parents? Were they merchants? Undesirable elements?”

      “Yes, his parents were problematic, and he himself, between you and me, used to own a pharmacy. Who knew the revolution was coming? People took care of themselves the best they could: some owned pharmacies, others even factories. Personally, I don’t see anything wrong with that. Who knew?”

      “They should have known,” said Koreiko icily.

      “That’s exactly what I’m saying,” agreed Lapidus quickly, “people like this do not belong in a Soviet organization.”

      He gave Koreiko a wide-eyed look and returned to his desk.

      The hall was filled with employees. Flexible metal rulers, shining and silvery like fish scales, abacuses with palm beads, heavy ledgers with pink and yellow stripes on their pages, and a multitude of other pieces of stationery great and small were pulled out of desk drawers. Tezoimenitsky tore yesterday’s page off the wall calendar, and the new day began. Somebody had already sunk his young teeth into a large chopped mutton sandwich.

      Koreiko settled down at his desk as well. He firmly planted his suntanned elbows on the desk and started making entries in a current accounts ledger.

      Alexander Ivanovich Koreiko, one of the lowest-ranking employees of the Hercules, was approaching the very end of his youth. He was thirty-eight. His brick-red face sported white eyes and blonde eyebrows that looked like ears of wheat. His thin English mustache was the color of ripe cereal, too. His face would have looked quite young had it not been for the rough drill-sergeant’s jowls that cut across his cheeks and neck. At work, Alexander Ivanovich carried himself like an army volunteer: he didn’t talk too much, he followed instructions, and he was diligent, deferential, and a bit slow.

      “He’s too timid,” the head of Finance and Accounting said, “too servile, if you will, too dedicated. The moment a new bond campaign is announced, he’s right there, with his one-month salary pledge. The first to sign up. And his salary is a measly forty-six rubles a month.

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