‘You’re studying General Larionov, if I’m not mistaken?’ said Temriukovich.
‘I am,’ said Solovyov.
He took a few steps toward Temriukovich.
‘I read a folkloric text way back when,’ said Temriukovich, ‘and a strange thought occurred to me: might it be connected with the general?’
Temriukovich fell silent. Solovyov could neither confirm nor even deny the academician’s thought. He could only nod respectfully. Temriukovich approached him, right up close, and Solovyov smelled his rotten breath.
‘How do you regard strange thoughts?’ asked Temriukovich.
‘Well…’ Solovyov backed away slightly. ‘Do you happen to remember where you saw that text?’
‘Where I saw it?’ Temriukovich suddenly burst out laughing. ‘Do I remember? Well, of course I remember: Full Russian Folklore Collection. Entries for 1982. Part two of that year’s volume. Starting on approximately page 95.’
Temriukovich’s face fell. He turned slowly and walked off down the hall.
Solovyov heard him say, ‘Maybe my suggestion will help that young man.’
Despite the academician’s hunch, the young man doubted the utility of the information he had acquired. He remembered it, though, when he happened to be at the public library, so decided to have a look at the Full Russian Folklore Collection. Much to his surprise, he really did discover the text Temriukovich had referred to, in the second of two volumes of entries from 1982. It began, in complete accordance with the citation, on page 95 and ended on page 104. It had been recorded by participants of a folklore expedition, from the words of 89-year-old Timofei Zhzhenka, a resident of the village of Berezovaya Gat in the Chernigov Oblast’s Novgorod-Seversky region.
Timofei Zhzhenka told the folklore expedition’s participants about events of some long-ago war. Commentaries to the text spoke of the impossibility (as commonly happens in folklore) of clarifying what war was actually involved. The publishers were inclined to regard its time of action as the epic period, though they also pointed out, in all honesty, that there was a definite obstacle to that sort of conclusion.
They had in mind the mention of the railroad, something that, as a rule, was not in epic texts. Futhermore, the narrative opened by referencing a railroad station—Gnadenfeld, where the events described unfold—something uncharacteristic of folklore. Just that name made Solovyov grab hold of the embossed cover of Full Russian Folklore Collection with both hands.
Timofei Zhzhenka used ornate dialectical expressions to describe a summer night when two armored trains stopped, almost simultaneously, at the aforementioned station. Two generals emerged from the two armored trains; this looked fully folkloric. Each of them presumed the station was in his troops’ hands and pensively ( they had things to think about, explained Timofei Zhzhenka) took a walk next to his armored train. Suddenly, one general ( the general that was ours, according to Timofei’s scant definition) recognized the other in the light of a station streetlamp. Without emerging from the darkness, he signaled to his valet, who was with him, and they crossed under the carriage to the second armored train.
Meanwhile, the second general put out his cigarette with the toe of his boot and began going up into his own train carriage. When he was standing on the carriage’s platform, he gave the guards permission to go to bed. They did not need to be told twice; they disappeared into the next carriage. The guarded man went to his quarters. A minute later, there was knocking at the second general’s door.
‘What do you want?’ He opened the door abruptly and was pushed inside.
‘So we meet after all,’ said the one who entered.
He placed the barrel of a Nagan revolver to the forehead of the carriage’s master and commanded the valet take the other’s weapon.
‘I’m not afraid of you,’ uttered the man who had been disarmed.
‘Sit,’ said the one who had entered, nodding at a chair that stood by a small round table. Several sheets of paper lay on it, under a spill-proof inkwell. For some reason, there was no pen. The carriage’s master awkwardly (uncomfortably, Timofei characterized it) slid down the back of the chair to its seat. Perched on the edge, he laid his hands on the sheets.
‘You won’t dare shoot.’
‘Why?’
‘Because my guards will come running if there’s a shot.’
Beads of sweat covered his forehead.
‘I don’t think so,’ said the one who had entered. He took a watch from his breast pocket and opened it with a barely audible clink. ‘A train with our wounded will pass through this station very soon. It’s a very long train…’
‘I don’t give a shit about you.’
‘Nobody will hear a thing.’
The watch returned to the pocket with a click. A light tremor could already be sensed under their feet.
‘You feel that? That’s our wounded coming. Of course many are deceased, too.’
The sound swelled. The eyes of the one at the table froze on the inkwell. The medical train reached the station and the station was drowning in its rumbling. The inkwell began coming into resonance with the train and set off on an unhurried journey across the table. It began trembling hard. It turned on its axis and advanced inexorably toward the edge. The man at the table grabbed the inkwell and hurled it at the wall with all his strength when it was about to fall off.
‘Damn it, why the hell aren’t you shooting?’
Shards scattered in all directions. The inkwell shattered to the floor in thousands of little glass pieces. It had cracked through the unbearable noise. The last carriage of the medical train rumbled past outside. In the absolute silence that followed, the general answered the question that had been posed, ‘Because death is incapable of teaching anything.’
He let his valet go ahead and followed him. He closed the door behind himself without a sound.
When Solovyov went outside, he felt like he was overflowing with new knowledge. He was afraid of spilling it. He thought he seemed too fragile for this knowledge and could easily smash, like the inkwell.
When recording folklore, a text like this truly could be taken as folkloric: everything depended on the force of expectation. The narration was conducted in a good vernacular language. It took on a rhythm through its multiple repetitions. And what could have been recorded in the village of Berezovaya Gat but folklore, anyway?
That was the reasoning of those who published the text. In a commentary to the publication, they called upon the reader not to worry about certain details from modern history that were undoubtedly present in the story. The researchers determined its plot to be ancient to the highest degree. In elaborating on their point, they indicated that in this case they regarded the narration of the judge Ehud’s murder of Moab king Eglon as a precursor.
Despite the bloodless finish to Zhzhenka’s narration, the commentary’s authors took notice of its high degree of resemblance to the biblical narration in the Book of Judges. As examples, they offered the high status of the characters, intrusion into their apartments, and the complete nonparticipation of their guards. It would have been naïve to suppose, pointed out the commentary’s authors, that such an ancient text would not undergo any changes when reproduced.
A line of reasoning like that was legitimate. It could, seemingly, satisfy the most demanding researchers, not to mention numerous specialists in the field of textual deconstruction. It did not satisfy Solovyov. The historian knew something the folklorists who wrote the commentaries did not know: Timofei Zhzhenka was General Larionov’s valet in 1920.
Solovyov decided to walk home. He was deliberating over whether a folkloric text could be considered a historical document. And, strictly speaking, was that text folkloric?