I scrutinized everything at the clinic, clutching at my head. The amount of dead cells is beyond description.
The scariest thing is that I don’t have the slightest notion of the direct reason for cell death in Innokenty.
Of course it’s clear in general terms that it’s the freezing, but what’s the mechanism? What’s the specific mechanism for what is happening? Intervention is impossible without a distinct understanding of that.
And it all began as a ‘success story’…
Everything was in perfect order after the thawing. They did tomography on Innokenty when he was still unconscious. The tomography machine was in working condition then…
An important question: what to say to the Platonovs?
Or not say? And if I say something, should it be to both of them? One of them?
To whom?
[INNOKENTY]
I went to the archive today. They practically greeted me with ceremonial bread and salt. They apparently feel a kinship with me: I myself am nearly an archival phenomenon. They inquired as to what historical period interests me. It’s not a historical period that interests me, it’s people. Plus the sounds, smells, and manners of expression, gesticulation, and motion. I remember some of those things, but have already forgotten others. Definitely forgotten. When I said that, they coughed a bit and smiled. It’s possible they thought I had not yet fully thawed. They asked me to clarify the years. Well, I say, roughly 1905 through 1923. For Petersburg. And 1923 through 1932 on Solovki. They sent a red-headed employee with the surname Yashin into the storeroom for ‘cartons.’
A carton is a large box with archival materials. Yashin brought several of them, concerning various periods. In each carton there lay an inventory. I opened the inventory of the first carton and got lost in it. There were listings of institutions and their employees, archives of clerical offices, instructions from the powers that be, and even a selection of newspaper clippings. After delivering all that, Yashin continued to stand some distance away, and I felt his sympathetic gaze on the back of my head.
His sympathy turned out to be enterprising. In the end, Yashin approached me and offered his help. He asked what names interested me most of all.
‘For you these names won’t –’ I began but Yashin interrupted.
‘Write a list and the estimated years of activity for those people. How about a list of ten people to start?’
What were Terenty Osipovich’s active years? Everything is, however, more or less clear about Terenty Osipovich: his journey ended at the Nikolsky Cemetery. And my strange comrade Skvortsov? Skvortsov who was banished from the line in starving Petrograd. The same age as the century. And Voronin from the Cheka? I felt his activity to the fullest, with every cell in my body. Skvortsov and Voronin, two dissimilar birds who flew through my life… I wrote down ten names and gave them to Yashin.
TUESDAY [NASTYA]
I keep thinking about Platosha’s health. I’m feeling anxious. These fears seem almost funny to me during the day but at night, not so much. What actually causes them? Nothing. Nothing! Geiger has some concerns that I hope will come to nothing. But they’ve scared me.
This morning I went to ‘brush my teeth’: I shut myself in the bathroom and sobbed soundlessly. I turned on the water to be sure it couldn’t be heard. I even blew my nose without trumpeting sounds – I just quietly wiped off the snot – because people blow their noses when they cry.
Although they also blow their noses for no particular reason.
[INNOKENTY]
Yashin called and said he had found information about Ostapchuk.
‘Write this down.’
‘I’m writing.’
Ostapchuk, Ivan Mikhailovich. Born 1880. Worked as a watchman at Pulkovo Observatory from 1899 until 1927.
(In 1921,I add for my part, he and I were knocking together display boards at no. 11 Zhdanovskaya Naberezhnaya. While lying on pieces of wood, we drank murky homebrew sent to him from his wife’s relatives in the village.)
And so, in 1927, he leaves for that same village: Divenskaya, which, by the way, is located not far from Siverskaya. He is leaving, I think, from pure fear, because he has a presentiment of the Terror. It apparently seems to Ostapchuk that it is easier to survive the Terror in the village. If that is the case, then Ostapchuk was laboring under a misapprehension.
Several months later, they arrest him in the village for anti-Soviet agitation and propaganda. One of the pieces of evidence of that activity was the knocking together of agitational display boards on a sunny May day in 1921. It turns out that materials declared by the investigation to be anti-Soviet had been hung on those boards later. I, too, could have fallen within the investigation’s field of vision by taking part in preparing the display boards, but somehow I did not. Was it because I was incarcerated for murder by that time? Doubtful. If I were the investigator, I would have done the opposite, connecting one case with the other since a murderer is without doubt the best candidate for pursuing anti-Soviet agitation.
Now the most interesting part: anti-Soviet agitator Ostapchuk ended up on Solovki in early 1932. Might we have met? Theoretically yes, if Ostapchuk had been sent to the Laboratory for Absolute Zero and Regeneration in the USSR. But they did not send him there and our fates drifted apart again. He returned to Leningrad in 1935 and got work at his good old Pulkovo Observatory, where he worked right up until his death, which followed in 1958.
Yashin learned all that from Ostapchuk’s personal dossier, which was preserved in the materials of the Pulkovo Observatory. In those same papers, he found an indication of Ivan Mikhailovich’s cemetery plot, too: Serafimov Cemetery. Appreciating the employee’s dedication during his life, the observatory did not forsake him after his death, either. According to Yashin, the institution’s financial reports preserve not only the bill for constructing a memorial stone, but also bills for wreaths and flowers for the deceased’s grave. Receipts every five years for buying ‘silver-tone’ paint figure into things, too, evidencing regular touchups to the fencing. In the upper right-hand corner of the stone is chiseled an inscription, in Latin unknown to Ostapchuk: Per aspera ad astra.[11]
[GEIGER]
Today I spoke with Nastya. I explained everything to her. Rather, I explained everything that I could because I myself understand little.
I won’t write here about the medical side of things. I’ve been describing that in the medical records these past few days so repeating it now would be stupid somehow. Especially stupid since my description contains only questions.
Nastya sensed that and panicked. She grabbed my arm right away. She was in hysterics.
It’s good it’s that way. It would be worse if the emotions were internalized. It’s much more difficult to come out of that state.
I’m in a foul mood. A doctor shouldn’t become attached to a patient. That’s worse for both.
It’s just that Innokenty isn’t a patient to me. After I successfully pulled him alive out of the liquid nitrogen, he’s become something like a son to me. It sounds pompous but that’s how it is. Especially since I don’t have a son. Or a daughter.
I wonder if Nastya will inform Innokenty about what’s happening with his brain. I didn’t forbid her anything. Even I don’t know whether to inform him or not.
And if he asks? Well, if he asks, then… I don’t know that, either. I seem to have studied him well, but I can’t size up his reaction. If he’s to be informed, it would probably be better if Nastya did it.
I’m looking at my arm now: there’s a bruise – she grabbed me for real. And she’s for real, too. Despite all that silly giddiness in her head.