“Can men have a real talk if women are sitting with them?” says a baffled Jakub. “Don’t women keep interrupting? How does it work?”
Kresan sees that the man from afar is embarrassed by the questions.
“Oh, well,” he says, lifting his precious plastic cup for a toast. “Other lands, other customs! Have it your way, Urban! Women, you can drink, too; come and join us. Today the world is upside down, so be it! As we have such special guests, even the old ways can all be topsy-turvy!”
Urban gallantly pours for the ladies. The ladies giggle; it’s a very odd situation for them. They squat round a little table, their postures hinting that they’re ready to leap up at their master’s slightest gesture, and they get on with their work.
“Let’s drink to our friends, the foreign Slovaks!” says old Kresan, raising his cup. “To the great leader Telgarth, who shed his blood in the fight for our Slovak cause and who made our small, but heroic nation world-famous! And let’s drink to Urban, his friend, who’s also come to help Slovaks! He, too, must be very brave.”
Urban is even more embarrassed.
“Yes, he’s very brave,” Freddy agrees. “Almost as brave as me.”
The women feel their presence is unwanted and move to the kitchen corner. Unused to strong drink, they feel cheerful and animated. They slice meat for the guests and giggle madly.
“And what sort of work do you do in your country, Urban?” asks Kresan. “What do you live on?”
“I’m in business,” says Urban and he too finds this word somewhat strange. “I own a company.”
“What’s that?” Kresan asks Freddy.
“He leads people,” says Telgarth. “He has lots of people under him. Not as many as you do, but plenty. These people work for him and he looks after them.”
“Oh,” nods Kresan with approval. “Then we’re the same. And how many people does he look after?”
Embarrassed, Urban sips his drink. Now Kresan and Telgarth are talking about him as if he were deaf and dumb, or mad.
“About two score,” says Telgarth. “And besides, he also has under him people that he doesn’t look after directly, but who work for him.”
“Independent herders,” Kresan shows he understands.
“Right,” Freddy agrees. “A long time ago, before I came here, I used to work with him. We owned a company together.”
“We still do…” Urban remarks.
“We still do,” Telgarth concurs. “But I’m giving it up. My place is here. I want to fight our beloved freedom. And then for recognition for our nation by the whole world.”
“You speak wisely, by God!” shouts Kresan and puts a delicacy in his mouth. “They’ll see what Slovaks are made of!”
Urban feels sick. He’s bathed in cold sweat and wants to vomit. His eyes pop; he hopes to quell the storm in his guts by sheer willpower. In the end, he can’t hold back: a hand over his mouth, he runs from the yurt.
Outside, a blizzard rages. Urban vomits and the wind blows it away from his mouth. It knocks him off his feet; his head lands in sour-tasting snow. It is hard to get up under the wind’s attack, but he finally manages to clamber back to the yurt.
“That’s all right,” Telgarth tells him. “Do you want to go to bed?”
Urban shakes his head. He has got drunk suddenly, not gradually as after drinking good quality distillate. A big wheel is spinning him round. Even with his eyes open wide, he feels in danger of plunging into the deep darkness. He holds on to Kresan’s hand even while sitting.
“Good drink, isn’t it?” the old Kresan laughs. “It shakes you up real good, doesn’t it?”
“And how many Junjans have you killed so far, Urban?” Kresan’s youngest son Jakub asks admiringly.
Urban shakes his head. He wants to say something, but only wheezing comes out from his mouth.
“None so far,” says Telgarth. “But he’s helping us in another way. And when we retake Űŕģüllpoļ, he’ll be indispensable to us.”
At the urging of his host’s family, Urban has to recount his anabasis from Polyarny to here, including the characters of Kostya and Stalin’s grandson. He tells it like a funny story and his inebriated listeners do in fact laugh merrily. This encourages Urban and he invents grimaces and voice distortions that the real characters did not have. His days spent waiting by the track are re-enacted like a Chaplin turn.
“Oh, by God, Urban, you’re a riot,” says Kresan when Urban’s account is over: he laughs as he pours another round.
The women serve them and can’t help giggling now and again, stifling the giggles in their furs.
The alcohol has got into the blood of Cila, a bolder nubile girl, as strong as a mare, with snow-white teeth, a free spirit.
“You’re more fun than those government mercenaries a few weeks ago who tried to fuck all our girls in a row.”
Urban’s chokes: he is still not used to such words not being thought obscene by Junjan Slovaks.
Freddy calmly gnaws at a bone.
“Are you saying,” he asks, striking while the iron is hot, “they were after you, too?”
“Not me,” says Cila. “I hid from them and they didn’t see me. But they nearly fucked Žofa here. And they nearly fucked Mariena, too.”
“And where were your menfolk?” asks Urban, automatically adopting the Junjan Slovaks’ archaic language.
“Out in the tundra, hunting wolves,” says Maria. “By the time Cila had warned them, we’d almost been fucked. They were Russians paid by the Junjans to fight Slovaks.”
“We ran back; we were late, but still in time,” says Jakub. “It was only a small unit.”
“They’re buried out in the tundra,” Kresan adds between two helpings, not taking his eyes off his plate of reindeer meat, “shoved into a leather sack, and then straight into the ground.”
“It must have been hard work, digging a pit in this frozen ground,” Urban notes in admiration.
“Well, it took them two days to dig it,” laughs Kresan.
“And you could hear them whining under the earth two more days,” says Jakub.
“True,” sighs Kresan. “Russian mercenaries are tough.”
“How many times has Geľo told you, ‘No heroism’?” Freddy says angrily. “We need you for other things, uncle Kresan. What if Tökörnn Mäodna found out? He’d come and wipe out the entire settlement.”
“He hasn’t found out a thing,” says Kresan. “He’ll think they’ve vanished without a trace. The tundra is big. Wolves may have attacked them, or perhaps Ökötöm-kökötom, the snow monster.”
“What if they’d radioed that they were at your place?” asks Urban.
“Radios don’t work here in the tundra,” says Telgarth. “Something underground and in the mountains here bends and jams the waves.”
He turns to Kresan and says sternly, “But you took pointless risks.”
“Should we have let them fuck our women and daughters?” says Kresan defensively.
“Better fucked than dead,” says Freddy. “Tökörnn Mäodna wouldn’t play games with you. He’d shoot everyone in the settlement. He’s done it more than once. I know him, I was captured by him, but I got away. But never mind. Let him come now. We’re ready for him!”
There is a moment’s silence. Kresan is quiet. Urban reaches for the roast meat and cuts off a piece.
“Help yourself!” Kresan becomes a host again. “Nobody’s suffered. The mercenaries just vanished in the tundra. Who’ll find out we did it?”
“And we’ve given you their weapons,” says Jakub. “They’re quite new, never used. They just fell in the snow once.”
Jakub gets up, goes to the nearest corner screened by a fur curtain and soon returns with a Kalashnikov in his hands.