34

Looking out through the wide-open window, he was listening to his wife’s last instructions. In those grim wartime days people going on long journeys equipped themselves as if they were polar explorers.

Ludmila was explaining exactly how she had arranged everything in his suitcase: the aspirin, the pyrethrum, the iodine and the sulfonamide;⁷³ the tins of butter, honey and lard; the little packets of salt, tea and powdered egg; the bread, the dried rusks, the five onions and the bag of buckwheat; the piece of soap, the reels of black and white cotton; the matches and the old newspapers he could use for rolling cigarettes; the spare batteries for his flashlight; the large thermos of boiled water; and the two half-litre bottles of vodka in case he needed to pay for important favours. She told him which foods he should eat first and which he could leave till the end of his stay. She also asked him to bring back the empty tins and bottles, since these were not easy to obtain in Kazan.

“And don’t forget,” she added. “The list of things to bring back from the dacha and the apartment is in your wallet, next to your passport.”

“I remember the first train journey I ever made on my own, during the Civil War,” Viktor replied. “Mama put some money into a special pouch and sewed it to the inside of my shirt. Then she sprinkled me from head to toe with tobacco, to keep off the lice, and told me again and again not to buy raw milk or sunflower seeds at any of the stations, and not to eat unwashed apples. The main dangers then were typhus and criminals.”

Ludmila didn’t reply. It annoyed her that Viktor was reminiscing, rather than thinking about their imminent parting. She felt that he was too casual about her well-being and that he didn’t appreciate all the trouble she went to over practical, domestic matters.

Then she put her arms around him and said, “Don’t get overtired, and give me your word to go straight down into the cellar if you hear an air-raid alert.”

Once the car had set off, Viktor forgot all his wife’s words of advice. The morning sun was shining on the trees, on the roadway still gleaming with dew, and on the brickwork, the crumbling stucco and the dusty windows of the buildings.

Postoev was already waiting out on the street. Tall, stout and bearded, he stood out from the rest of his family; he was a head taller than his wife, his daughter Alla, and his thin son, a pale-faced student.

Postoev got into the car. Leaning very close to Viktor, glancing a little warily at the protruding ears of the grey-haired driver, he said, “What do you think? Should we evacuate our families yet again? Some prudent fellows have been sending their families off to Sverdlovsk, or even to Novosibirsk.”

The driver looked back over his shoulder and said, “I’ve heard that a German reconnaissance plane flew overhead yesterday.”

“So what?” said Postoev. “We do the same—our reconnaissance planes fly over Berlin.”

The driver stopped at the railway station and the two passengers got out. They stacked their cases, ran their hands over the jacket pockets and looked suspiciously at three dishevelled, barefoot boys who had suddenly appeared. One offered to carry their belongings, but Postoev refused. One of the other boys then crossly asked for a cigarette.

A porter in a white apron appeared. He and Postoev eventually agreed on a price—fifty roubles and two kilos of bread off a ration card—and he began strapping their cases together. Postoev kept hold of one smart little suitcase, whispering to Viktor, “Do you think he’s all right? Can you see his number anywhere?”

Not even the bright morning sun could relieve the stern bleakness of the wartime railway station: children asleep on bundles and boxes; old men slowly chewing pieces of bread; women stupefied by exhaustion and the cries of their children; new recruits with large knapsacks; pale wounded soldiers; other soldiers setting off to join their new units.

In peacetime people had travelled for all kinds of reasons. There would be students on vacation or about to do a few months’ work during the summer; families setting off merrily on their annual holiday; intelligent, loquacious old women on their way to visit sons who had made their mark in the world; sons and daughters wanting to pay their respects to elderly parents. Many of these people were going to places where they had been born and raised.

But the atmosphere in wartime trains and stations was very different. There was a sadness and severity about the travellers.

Viktor was trying to make his way through the main hall when he heard a loud yell; in the general commotion, a woman from a kolkhoz had had her money and documents stolen. A boy in short trousers cut from a groundsheet was pressing up against her, seeking protection. He was wanting both to console and to be consoled; as for his mother, who was carrying a small baby, she was in despair: what was she to do—she was crying out—with no ticket, no money and no document from her kolkhoz?

A few people told her off, saying she should have kept her eyes peeled. Others said they’d have gladly given the thief a good kicking, or beaten him to death; when everyone is suffering, it’s easier to curse a pickpocket than to comfort his victim. Others told her to go and look in the rubbish bins, in case her documents had been thrown away. Most people simply tried not to notice her.

As Viktor walked by, following the porter, the woman looked at him and, for a moment, fell silent. She might have been thinking, as her eyes met Viktor’s, that this man in a hat and a white raincoat had come to help her, to provide her with a ticket and fresh documents.

In the second hall there was a drunk, staggering to and fro. He was bored, his bulging eyes full of hatred and anguish. He sang and swore, tried to dance, shouted out threats and knocked into people. He was alone in the crowd. No one wanted to join in and sing with him; no one even bothered to take offence. He wanted to escape from his own anguish—that was why he had got drunk. He wanted to hit someone or be hit by them, anything to get away from himself, but no one was willing to co-operate.

The drunk caught sight of the porter with the suitcases. He saw the rosy-cheeked man with the beard and his companion with the long nose and the white raincoat. He let out a cry of joy—these were just the kind of people he needed. But once again he proved unlucky. He stumbled and fell. By the time he was back on his feet, the three men had had their tickets checked and made their way onto the platform.

“It’s too much,” said Postoev. “I can’t bear all this. Next time I’m going by plane, even if I do have a weak heart.”

A locomotive under full steam laboured into the station, followed by a line of dust-covered carriages. An attendant, mistrustful of passengers wanting to board at intermediate stations, began examining tickets. The already-established passengers—engineers from factories in the Urals and commanders just discharged from hospital—were jumping out onto the platform and asking, “Where’s the market—is it far? Where can I get drinking water? Heard any news bulletins? Where can I buy salt? How much are apples here?” And they rushed off into the main building.

Postoev and Viktor got into their carriage; the moment they glimpsed the strip of carpet, the dusty mirrors and the seats’ pale blue covers, they felt calmer. The racket outside was no longer audible. Nevertheless, their peace and comfort was by no means untroubled; here in the carriage it might seem like peacetime, but everything outside still spoke of disaster and lacerating grief. A few minutes later there were some slight jolts as a new locomotive was coupled on. The commanders and the Urals engineers came hurrying back, some gripping the handles of kettles and mugs, some with armfuls of tomatoes or cucumbers, some pressing parcels of flatbreads and fish to their chest.

And then came the painful moment when everybody was impatient for the train to get underway, when even those now leaving their home and their loved ones wanted to move—as if anything were better than staying where they were.

A woman out in the corridor, having already lost all interest in Kazan, said thoughtfully, “The attendants say we’ll be in Murom by this afternoon. I’ve heard onions are very cheap there.” “Read the latest news bulletin?” came a man’s voice. “I saw the names of places I know. Any day now the Germans will get to the Volga.”

Postoev changed into his pyjamas, put an embroidered skullcap over his bald patch, cleaned his hands with eau de cologne from a faceted flask with a nickel top, combed his thick grey beard, fanned his cheeks with a chequered handkerchief, leaned back in his seat and said, “Well, it seems we’re on our way now.”

Weighed down by anxiety, Viktor tried to distract himself by looking first out of the window and then at the pink cheeks of Postoev. Postoev had received greater official recognition than his younger colleague. His mannerisms, his booming voice, the little jokes with which he put people at ease, the stories he told about well-known scientists, referring to them simply by their name and patronymic—all these never failed to impress. The nature of his work meant that he was often—more often than any of his colleagues—called upon to meet people’s commissars and the directors of famous factories, public figures on whom the country’s economy depended. His name was known to thousands of engineers; many institutes of higher education used his textbook. When they met at conferences and important meetings, he treated Viktor as a friend—and Viktor enjoyed this, gladly taking the opportunity to sit down next to him or to go for a walk with him during a break. When Viktor admitted this to himself, he would feel angered by his own pettiness and vanity, but it’s difficult to remain angry with oneself for long and so he would start to feel angry with Postoev instead.

“Remember that woman with the two children, back at the station?” Viktor asked.

“Yes, I can almost see the poor soul right now,” Postoev replied, as he took his suitcase down from the rack above. In the sincere, serious tone of a man who fully understands someone else’s feelings, he added, “Yes, my friend, things are difficult, very difficult—but we need to preserve our strength.” And then, wrinkling his brow, “How do you feel about a bite to eat? I have some roast chicken.”

The train reached the bridge over the Volga. It began to clatter and rumble like a village cart passing from a dirt track onto a cobbled road.

Down below lay the river—pitted from the wind, all sandbars and shallows; it was impossible even to make out which way it was flowing. From up above, it seemed grey, ugly and turbid. Long-barrelled anti-aircraft guns had been mounted in gullys and on small hillocks. Two Red Army soldiers were carrying mess tins along the trenches; they didn’t so much as glance at the train.

“Probability theory tells us that the chances of a German pilot managing to drop a bomb on our bridge from a plane flying in a gusty wind at high speed and high altitude are almost zero. So there’s nowhere safer during an air raid than on a strategic bridge,” said Postoev. “But I do hope we don’t get caught in an air raid in Moscow. To be honest with you, that’s something I’d rather not even think about.” Postoev looked down at the river, thought for a moment and added, “The Germans are nearing the Don. Will they soon be looking down at the Volga just like we are? The mere thought of it makes my blood run cold.”

From beyond the wooded island

To the river wide and free.⁷⁴

Their neighbours, it seemed, had also started thinking about the Volga. And after Stenka Razin, there was no stopping them. Next came:

I’ve planted my garden—

It’s for me to water it.

I’ve loved my beloved—

It’s for me to forget him.

After talking about his children and life in Kazan, Postoev said, “I like to study my travelling companions and there’s something I’ve often noticed: during the first part of the journey people talk about their domestic concerns, about life in Kazan. But when we reach Murom something changes. From then on people talk not about what lies behind them but about what lies ahead in Moscow. A man on a journey, like any solid body moving through space, moves from the sphere of gravitational attraction of one system to that of another. You can verify this by observing my own behaviour. In a minute or two I’ll probably fall asleep. When I wake up, I’m sure to start talking about Moscow.”

And he did indeed fall asleep. Viktor was surprised to discover that he slept like a baby—without the least sound. Postoev was built like a warrior; Viktor would have expected him to snore loudly.

Viktor looked out of the window. He felt more and more excited. This was his first journey since leaving Moscow in September 1941. He was deeply moved by what in peacetime would have seemed ordinary enough: he was on his way back to Moscow.

Viktor’s everyday concerns had faded away and the tension of his thoughts about his own work—a tension that seldom left him—had relaxed, but this did not grant him the sense of peace he usually experienced during a long and comfortable journey. Instead, he felt troubled by thoughts and feelings that had previously been crowded out.

He felt bewildered, taken aback by the force of feelings still not fully felt and thoughts he had yet to think through. Had he expected this war? What kind of man had he been when it began? And he thought about two men to whom his memories of the last weeks of peace were closely linked: Academician Chepyzhin and Professor Maximov, whom Nadya had mentioned the previous evening.

A whole year had gone by, the longest year of his life—and now he was on his way to Moscow. But he still felt anxious at heart, and the news bulletins were very grim indeed, and the war was now nearing the Don.

Then Viktor thought about his mother. Whenever he had told himself that she had perished, it had been without his truly believing it, without his believing it in his heart of hearts . . . He closed his eyes and tried to imagine her face. For some strange reason, the faces of those closest to you can be harder to imagine than the faces of distant acquaintances. The train was going to Moscow. He himself was on his way to Moscow!

With a sudden sense of joy, Viktor felt certain that his mother was alive, that in time he would see her again.