“I’d like to send Father some,” Shura said on the fly, though the thought had only just occurred to her.
“Go ahead, send something to Ivan Lukyanovich. Here, take some more.” Again he put his hand in the drawer and drew out a wad of bills. He was amused that he had switched wives, but that he still had the same father-in-law.
“Thank you, Art. Father hasn’t been doing too well recently.”
The next day Shura sent Masha to the Central Telegraph Office to dispatch the money to her father in Ugolnoe. Even though Masha was not even eighteen, she knew her way around the city far better than Shura did. Lisa had twice taken Masha with her to Moscow. The last time Masha had stayed with Lisa in a rented apartment for a month and a half, and she had wandered the streets alone from morning till evening. She liked walking around alone and getting to know the city.
Now Masha was hurrying to the telegraph office to send the money. After that she planned to go to Red Square to visit Lenin’s Mausoleum, if she was lucky enough to get in. But the window she needed at the telegraph was closed. A spurious, hand-lettered sign dangled in front of the window, reading: “Maintenance break. Back in fifteen minutes.” Masha stood in line for fifteen minutes, then left, walking toward Red Square. Nothing had changed in the past three years; only, it seemed to Masha, there were now more people. Suddenly, Red Square opened out in front of her. Her thoughts leapt back to Ugolnoe, to her friends Kate and Lena. If only they could see all this beauty with their own eyes.
When I settle down here, I’ll invite them. First Lena, then Kate, Masha decided.
The line at the Mausoleum seemed to go on forever, so Masha headed in the direction of GUM, the state department store. There she found another line, spilling out the side doors. A girl of about Masha’s age took a pair of boots out of a long white box and showed them to another girl. The other girl went pale with envy. The sight took Masha’s breath away, too; she had never seen such boots! Tall, reaching almost to the knee, they had a small heel. They were made from beautiful brown suede. Her grandfather, who was good at leatherwork, would never have been able to make anything like this.
Masha had never been subject to secret passions or mad longings, but now she was burning inside. She would have given anything for those boots. Unfortunately, she had nothing to give. At that moment, she had even forgotten about the money wrapped up in a handkerchief in her pocket, secured with a safety pin.
“Are you last in line? I’m after you!” a girl with a big hairdo said, nudging her.
That was when Masha remembered about the money—she had a hundred rubles with her! And it seemed she was already standing in line; there was even someone behind her.
She stood there for four hours. Twice a rumor spread down the line that they had run out of boots. It turned out that there were no more size 37s, but other sizes were still available. By the time Masha got to the front of the line, all the boots were gone, both large and small. But mounds of boxes were stacked on the counter. Women who didn’t have any ready cash were writing layaway checks, valid for two hours, and rushing off to fetch the money. Whoever didn’t manage to redeem the boots within the allotted time would lose them forever—other anxious women, their happiness almost within reach, were clamoring to buy them, bills clutched in their sweaty fists. Masha was one of them. And she was in luck. The long cardboard box with the soft, brown creatures inside was hers. The whole way home her hand kept straying into the depths of the box, to touch the tender flanks enveloped in darkness …
You have absolutely lost your mind, Masha told herself; but she couldn’t do anything about it. Riding on the commuter train back to the dacha in Tarasovka, her new home, she started crying. What would she say now to Mama, to Artur? She had spent her grandfather’s money on boots, it was shameful! What in the world was she going to tell them?
Before she got to the house, she stopped. The solution was a simple, though provisional one. She darted through the gate and crept over to the corner of the yard, near the outhouse, where she buried the box in a large pile of last year’s leaves.
Shura was so worried that her daughter might have gotten lost in the city that she didn’t chide her for being late. She merely asked whether the money had been sent, and Masha nodded her head.
“I got mixed up, Mama. I got out at the wrong station. And then I went to look at the university.”
Masha lied so convincingly that she even surprised herself. The following morning, Shura and Artur went to the hardware store. Shura wanted to fix up the house. Artur didn’t welcome the idea, but he was so mild-mannered that he had agreed, especially since Shura was doing all the work herself—from hanging the wallpaper to whitewashing the ceilings. Lisa had always laughed at her, saying that Shura could satisfy her sexual needs with a good floor mop, while Lisa herself needed a good … and Lisa didn’t hesitate to say it.
When they had left and Masha was alone, she dragged the box out of the pile of leaves and carried it into the house, clutching it to her chest. She drew the boots out of the box, wiped off the soles of her feet with her palms, and tried stuffing her bare feet into the boots; but they wouldn’t fit. She found her mother’s socks in a suitcase, put them on, and tried pushing her feet in again. They were a tad too tight; they pinched. But since the leather was as soft as a baby’s skin, she was able to get her feet inside them.
Feet swell up in summer, when it’s humid; winter is drier. Masha consoled herself with this thought. Still, she decided to stuff them with a wad of paper, to stretch them out a bit.
She looked everywhere, but all she could find were dirty newspapers. How could she put those inside her heavenly boots? Then she looked under the table, and saw there was a thick packet of just the right kind of paper—the sheerest onionskin. Masha crumpled up one page at a time, rolled them all into tiny balls, and stuffed the boots up to the very top. She used up the whole packet of paper. They stood up straight and tall, as if there were living legs in them. Masha rubbed a boot against her cheek—just like a baby’s skin. “Dorndorf” was written on the box. Where was this Dorndorf? In Germany? In Austria? And where would she hide them now? Certainly not outside, in the pile of leaves by the outhouse …
She thought and thought. She decided she couldn’t keep them inside the house, either; instead, she took them to the outhouse. There was a high shelf, right up by the ceiling, draped with cobwebs. No one ever looked up there. Two empty paint cans had been left on the shelf and forgotten. Masha checked the surface to make sure it was dry. It was: a sturdy sheet of tar paper covered the roof of the outhouse, and even hung over the side.
I’ll get a job, Masha thought. I’ll earn some money and send it to Grandpa, and no one will ever know. Winter will come, and I’ll be wearing my boots! And college? Well, I’ll just apply to get in the following year.
This was the revolution that happened in Masha’s head in the space of one day. And even her heart felt lighter. She had graduated from high school, almost with honors. She had planned to enroll in college right away, and get married, and eventually get an apartment in Moscow so as not to be a burden to her mother and her uncle. But the boots pushed back all her plans by a year. She shoved the box back into the very corner of the shelf, and put the empty paint cans back in front of it. No one would ever find it there.
Artur and her mother didn’t get home until much later. They had gone all the way to Pushkino, to a big store where they’d bought the wallpaper and paste, and whitewash for the ceiling and windows. They returned toward evening. Shura was happy, beaming like a copper kettle. She bustled in, carrying the big rolls of wallpaper by herself. Artur followed leisurely behind, with a weary and perpetually good-natured air.