Uncle Meksut did his best to comfort the women and even proposed a toast to victory, to our sons and to the safe return of all of them. Uncle Meksut was the soul of hospitality; his house was always filled with guests, and now that the grapes had already been harvested here in the valley, the season of lengthy toasts was just beginning.
Mama sat quietly, not touching a thing. I felt sorry for her and would have liked to comfort her, but the role I had chosen for myself did not permit any such display of weakness.
A bowl of steaming grits, some roast chicken and even a glass of wine were set before me now. Mama shook her head disapprovingly at the wine, but Uncle Meksut said that macharka was as harmless as grape juice and that I was no longer a child.
I had finished relating my adventures and was still sucking the meat from the last of the chicken bones when suddenly I felt sleep coming over me — a sleep as sweet and golden as macharka, the first wine of the season. I dozed off at the table.
Mama returned from Baku some ten days later. It turned out that my brother had not been wounded at all, but was merely homesick. He had decided that he had to see at least one member of the family before being sent off to the front and, as usual, he got his way. He was the prankster in our family and such a stunt was completely in character.
IV
It was about ten in the morning and already beginning to get hot when I arrived in the village of Walnut Springs. The bus let me off and continued on its way, leaving a trail of dust behind it.
I began walking in the direction of the kolkhoz office, only too happy to be able to stretch my legs after the long bus ride. I was in a good mood and fairly brimming with reportorial zeal.
Next to the kolkhoz office I noticed two elderly Abkhazians seated in a patriarchal pose under the mighty canopy of a walnut tree. One of them held a staff in his hand, the other a walking stick. I was surprised and delighted to observe that the hooklike curve at the top of the staff exactly matched the hooklike contour of its owner’s nose, while the straight and simple line of the walking stick held by the second old man was equally in keeping with his straight, Roman nose. I nodded to the old men in passing and they politely bent forward, as if half rising to greet me.
“That’s the new doctor, I expect,” said one of them after I had passed by.
“He looks more like an Armenian to me,” said the other.
The kolkhoz administration was housed in a two-story wooden building. The offices were on the second floor, while the first floor was given over to the kolkhoz store and to various storerooms whose doors were bolted with heavy padlocks. The door to the store was open, and from inside came the sound of female laughter.
An old battered car was parked out front, and I gathered that the kolkhoz chairman was in his office.
Tacked to the front wall of the building was an announcement written in ink-stained letters which read as follows:
THE GOATIBEX IS OUR PRIDE AND JOY
A lecture to be given by Vakhtang Bochua, doctoral candidate in archeology, active member of the Society for the Advancement of Scientific and Political Knowledge, and chairman of the Society for the Preservation of the Treasures of Antiquity.
The lecture will be followed by a showing of the film The Iron Mask.
So Vakhtang was already here or about to arrive! I was delighted at the thought of a reunion with our renowned joker and changalist. I hadn’t seen Vakhtang in more than a year, and although I had heard he was doing well, I had no idea that he had already become a doctoral candidate in archeology, much less an authority on goatibexes.
Here I should explain that the word changalist, which seems to be used only in Abkhazia, signifies a person who likes to drink at others’ expense. The verb zachangalit’, derived from this word, means to latch onto someone and take control, not necessarily for the purpose of a free drink, but sometimes in a broader sense.
Actually, most of us didn’t mind treating Vakhtang, since wherever he went he always created a mood of noisy, unrestrained gaiety. Even his appearance was full of comic contradictions: he was a native of the Caucasus, but as fair as the fairest Swede; he had the gloomy and massive head of a Nero, but was good-natured and gentle; he could be as pushy and resourceful as any State procurement agent, but was a historian and curator by profession.
Following his graduation from the Institute of Historical and Archival studies, Vakhtang had worked for several years as a tour guide. Then he had published a short book entitled Among the Flowering Ruins which had become a favorite with our tourists. “And with foreign tourists,” Vakhtang would inevitably add whenever the subject came up in his presence, which it almost always did since he himself was sure to bring it up.
We Abkhazians had often gotten together during our student days in Moscow, and there was never a party that took place without Vakhtang. In this respect, as in many others, he showed an extraordinary sense of timing. If, for example, one of us happened to receive a package from home, Vakhtang never had to be informed of the fact but would automatically appear in the dormitory of the student in question before the latter even had a chance to open his package.
“Stop the proceedings,” he would shout from the hall. Then as he came bursting into the room, he would overwhelm the unfortunate recipient with a torrent of eloquent but meaningless words.
One sensed the operator in him even then, but he was a gay, impudent and artistic sort of operator — and really quite harmless and good-natured except on those rare occasions when he personally had to foot the bill.
With my mind on Vakhtang I made my way up the wooden stairs and entered the kolkhoz office, which consisted of a single long, cool room partitioned in half by two wooden railings. To my left, a stout, unshaven individual sat dozing at his desk. Sensing that someone had entered, he half opened one eye and briefly took cognizance of my arrival. Then, his curiosity satisfied, he dozed off again. He was like a sleepy tomcat which half opens one eye at the sound of dishes clattering in the distance, only to close it once he realizes that this clatter has nothing to do with the beginning of a meal.
To my right, several accountants were industriously clicking away on their abacuses. Occasionally, when one of them would click too loudly, the dozing individual would half open the same eye and then amiably close it again. One of the accountants got up from his desk, walked over to the metal cabinet and took a folder from it. Only as he turned away from the cabinet did I suddenly realize that this accountant was a girl dressed in a man’s suit. I was struck by the expression on her face; it was as sad as a dried-up well.
At the far end of the room the imposing figure of the chairman loomed from behind a large desk. He was talking on the telephone. He looked me over with cool curiosity and then averted his eyes, apparently intent upon what was being said at the other end of the receiver.
“Hello,” I said in Russian, not addressing anyone in particular.
“Hello,” the girl answered softly, slightly raising her sad face.
I didn’t know what to say or do next. It would have been embarrassing to interrupt the chairman while he was still on the phone, but it was equally embarrassing just to stand there doing nothing.