‘Kononenko’s in the hospital now,’ Golubev thought calmly, and every cell in his body sang joyously, fearing nothing and confident of success. Kononenko’s in the hospital now. He’s passing through his hospital ‘cycle’ – one of the sinister phases of his metamorphoses. Tomorrow, or perhaps the day after tomorrow, Kononenko’s program would demand the usual victim. Perhaps all Golubev’s efforts had been in vain – the operation, the fearful straining of the will? Now he, Golubev, would be strangled by Kononenko as his latest victim. Perhaps it was a mistake to evade being sent to a hard-labor camp where they gave you a striped uniform and affixed a six-digit number to your back like an ace of diamonds? But at least you don’t get beaten there, and there aren’t a lot of Kononenkos running around.
Golubev’s bed was under the window. Opposite him lay Kononenko. Next to the door, his feet almost touching Kononenko’s, lay a third man, and Golubev could see his face well without having to turn his body. Golubev knew this patient too. It was Podosenov, an eternal resident of the hospital.
The door opened, and the orderly came in with medicine.
‘Kazakov!’ he shouted.
‘Here,’ shouted Kononenko, getting up.
‘There’s a note for you.’ The orderly handed him a folded piece of paper.
‘Kazakov?’ The name pulsed through Golubev’s mind. ‘He’s Kononenko, not Kazakov.’ Suddenly Golubev comprehended the situation, and a cold sweat formed on his body.
It was much worse than he had thought. None of the three was in error. It was Kononenko under another’s name, Kazakov’s name and with Kazakov’s crimes, and he had been sent to the hospital as a ‘stand-in’. This was even worse, even more dangerous. If Kononenko was Kononenko, Golubev might or might not be his victim. In such a case there was an element of chance, of choice, the opportunity to be saved. But if Kononenko was Kazakov, then there was no chance for Golubev. If Kononenko nursed only the slightest suspicion that Golubev had recognized him, Golubev would die.
‘Have you met me before? Why do you keep staring at me like a python at a rabbit? Or maybe like a rabbit at a python? How do you educated people say it?’
Konenenko sat on the stool before Golubev’s bed, shredding the note with his fingers and scattering the fragments on Golubev’s blanket.
‘No, I never laid eyes on you before.’ Golubev’s face was colorless, and his voice hoarse.
‘It’s a good thing too,’ said Kononenko, taking a towel from the nail driven in the wall above the bed and shaking the towel before Golubev’s face. ‘I was going to strangle this “doctor” yesterday.’ He nodded in the direction of Podosenov whose face was a picture of infinite horror. ‘Look what the bastard is doing,’ Kononenko said cheerfully, pointing with the towel in the direction of Podosenov. ‘See the jar under his cot? He’s mixing his own blood with his piss… He scratches his finger and drips in a little blood. Knows what he’s doing. No worse than any doctor. And the lab analysis shows he has blood in his urine. Our “doctor” stays in the hospital. Tell me, is a man like that worthy to live in this world?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘You don’t know? Yes you do. But yesterday they brought you in. We were together in the transit prison, right? Before my last trial. Then I went under the name of Kononenko.’
‘I never saw you before,’ said Golubev.
‘Yes you did. That’s when I decided. Better I do you in than the “doctor”. It’s not his fault.’ Kononenko pointed at Podosenov, whose circulation was slowly, very slowly, returning to normal. ‘It’s not his fault. He’s only saving his own skin. Just like you or me…’
Kononenko walked up and down the room, pouring the paper shreds from one palm to the other.
‘And I would have “fixed” you, sent you to the moon. And I wouldn’t have hesitated. But now the orderly brought this note… I have to get out of here quick. Our guys are getting cut up at the mine. They’re asking all the thieves in the hospital to help out. You don’t understand that kind of life… You don’t have the brains to be a crook!’
Golubev remained silent. He knew that life. But only from the outside looking in.
After dinner Kononenko checked out and departed from Golubev’s life for ever.
While the third bed was empty, Podosenov came over to Golubev’s bed, sat down on the edge at his feet, and whispered:
‘Kazakov is sure to strangle the both of us. We have to tell the head of the hospital.’
‘Go to hell,’ Golubev said.
Esperanto
A wandering actor who happened to be a prisoner reminded me of this story. It was just after a performance put on by the camp activities group in which he was the main actor, producer, and theater carpenter.
He mentioned the name Skoroseev, and I immediately recalled the road to Siberia in ’39. The five of us had endured the typhoid quarantine, the work assignments, the roll-calls in the biting frost, but we were nevertheless caught up by the camp nets and cast out into the endlessness of the taiga.
We five neither knew nor wanted to know anything about each other until our group reached the spot where we were to work and live. Each of us received the news of our future trip in his own way: one went mad, thinking he was to be shot at the very moment he was granted life. Another tried to talk his way out of the situation, and almost succeeded. I was the third – an indifferent skeleton from the gold-mine. The fourth was a jack-of-all-trades over seventy years old. The fifth was Skoroseev. ‘Skoroseev,’ he would pronounce carefully, standing on tiptoes so as to look each of us in the eye.
I couldn’t care less, but the jack-of-all-trades kept up the conversation.
‘What kind of work did you do before?’
‘I was an agronomist in the People’s Agriculture Commissariat.’
The chief of coal exploration, whose responsibility it was to receive the group, leafed though Skoroseev’s folder.
‘I can still work, citizen chief…’
‘OK, I’ll make you a watchman…’
Skoroseev performed his duties zealously. Not for a minute would he leave his post, afraid that any mistake could be exploited by a fellow prisoner and reported to the camp authorities. It was better not to take any chances.
Once there was a heavy snowstorm that lasted all night. Skoroseev’s replacement was a Gallician by the name of Narynsky. This chestnut-haired convict had been a prisoner of war during World War I, and he had been convicted of plotting to re-establish Austro-Hungary. He was a little proud of having been accused of such a ‘crime’ among the throngs of Trotskyites and saboteurs. Narynsky told us with a chuckle that when he took over the watch he discovered that Skoroseev hadn’t budged from his spot even during the snowstorm. Skoroseev’s dedication was noticed, and his position became more secure.
Once a horse died in camp. It was no great loss, since horses work poorly in the far north. But the meat! The meat! The hide had to be removed from the frozen carcass. There were neither butchers nor volunteers, but Skoroseev offered to do the job. The camp chief was surprised and pleased; there would be both hide and meat! The hide could be registered in the official report, and the meat would go into the general pot. The entire barracks, all of the village spoke of Skoroseev. Meat! meat! The carcass was dragged into the bathhouse, where Skoroseev skinned and gutted it when it had thawed. The hide stiffened again in the frost and was carried off to the storehouse. We never tasted the meat; at the last minute the camp chief realized that there was no veterinarian who could sign to give permission. An official report was made up, and the carcass was hacked into pieces and burned on a bonfire in the presence of the camp chief and the work gang leader.