Definitely Maybe (7 page)

“Not bad, not bad,” his soft voice said. “But you stopped, I see, at the most interesting spot.”

“I didn’t stop, I was stopped!”

“Yes,” said Vecherovsky.

Malianov struck his knees with his fists. “Damn, I could be doing so much work right now! But I can’t think! Every rustle in my own apartment makes me jump like a psycho … and then there’s that lovely prospect—fifteen years in a prison camp …”

He brought up the fifteen years yet again, always waiting for Vecherovsky to say “Stop imagining things, that won’t happen, don’t even think about it …” But this time, too, Vecherovsky said nothing of the kind. Instead, he started questioning Malianov at length and in detail about the phone calls: when did they start (exactly), where were they calling (well, just a few concrete examples), who called (man? woman? child?)? When Malianov told him about the calls from Weingarten, he seemed surprised and kept silent for a while, and then went back to his questions. What did Malianov say when he picked up? Did he always pick up? What did they tell him at the telephone repair service? By the way, it was only then that Malianov recalled that after his second call to the repair service that the wrong numbers stopped … But he didn’t have time to tell Vecherovsky about it because he remembered something else.

“Listen,” he said, becoming excited. “I completely forgot. Weingarten, when he called yesterday, wanted to know if I knew Snegovoi.”

“Yes?”

“Yes. I said that I did.”

“And he said?”

“And he said that he didn’t know him. But that’s not the point. What do you think, is it a coincidence? Or what? It’s a strange coincidence.”

Vecherovsky said nothing, puffing on his pipe. Then he went back to his questions. What was the story with the delivery? More detail. What did the guy look like? What did he say? What did he bring? What’s left of the delivery? The monotonous questioning depressed Malianov completely because he couldn’t understand what any of it had to do with his bad luck. Then Vecherovsky finally shut up and poked around in his pipe. Malianov waited and then began imagining how four men would come for him, all in black sunglasses, and how they would search the apartment, pulling off the wallpaper and demanding to know if he’d had relations with Lidochka, and not believing him, and then taking him away.

“What’s going to happen to me?”

Vecherovsky answered.

“Who knows what’s in store for us? Who knows what will be? The strong will be, and the blackguards will be. And death will come and sentence you to death. Do not pursue the future …”

Malianov realized this was poetry only because Vecherovsky lapsed into muffled guffaws that passed for satisfied laughter. That’s probably the sound H. G. Wells’s Martians made when they drank human blood; Vecherovsky guffawed like that because he liked the poem he had just read. One would think that the pleasure he derived from poetry was purely physical.

“Go to hell,” Malianov said.

And that prompted a second tirade—a prose one this time.

“When I feel bad, I work,” Vecherovsky said. “When I have problems, when I’m depressed, when I’m bored with life, I sit
down to my work. There are probably other prescriptions, but I don’t know them. Or they don’t work for me. You want my advice—here it is: Go and work. Thank God that people like you and me need only paper and pencil to work.”

Say that Malianov knew all that without him. From books. But it wasn’t that simple for Malianov. He could work only when he felt lighthearted and there was nothing hanging over him.

“Some help you are,” he said. “Let me call Weingarten. I’m still puzzled why he asked about Snegovoi.”

“Sure,” said Vecherovsky. “But if you don’t mind, move the phone into the other room.”

Malianov took the phone and dragged the wire into the next room.

“If you want, stay here,” Vecherovsky called after him. “I have paper and I’ll give you a pencil.”

“All right, we’ll see.”

Now Weingarten didn’t answer. Malianov let it ring ten times, then dialed again and let it ring ten more. What should he do now? Of course, he could stay here. It was cool and quiet. All the rooms were air-conditioned. He couldn’t hear the trucks and squealing brakes because the apartment faced the courtyard. And then he realized that that wasn’t the issue. He was simply afraid to go back to his own apartment. That does it! I love my home more than anything else in the world, and now I’m afraid to go back there? Oh, no. You won’t get me to do that. Sorry, but no way.

Malianov picked up the phone firmly and brought it back. Vecherovsky was sitting staring into the one piece of paper, quietly drumming on it with his expensive pen. The page was half covered with symbols that Malianov couldn’t understand.

“I’m going, Phil,” Malianov said.

Vecherovsky looked up at him.

“Of course. I have to administer an exam tomorrow, but I’ll be home all day today. Call me or drop by.”

“All right.”

He went downstairs slowly; there was no rush. I’ll brew up a cup of strong tea, sit in the kitchen; Kaliam will climb up into my lap; I’ll pet him, sip my tea, and try to sort this out calmly and soberly. Too bad we don’t have a TV; it would be nice to spend the evening in front of the box watching something mindless, like a comedy or some soccer. I’ll play solitaire; I haven’t done that in ages.

He came down to his landing, found his keys, turned the corner, and stopped. His heart had sunk somewhere into the vicinity of his stomach and was beating slowly and rhythmically, like a pile driver. The door to his apartment was open.

He tiptoed up to the door and listened. There was someone in the apartment. He could hear an unfamiliar man’s voice and a response in an unfamiliar child’s voice …

Excerpt 10.…
strange man was crouching on the floor and picking up the pieces of a broken glass. There was also a boy of five or so in the kitchen. He was sitting on the stool, his hands under his thighs, swinging his legs and watching the man pick up the pieces.

“Listen, buddy,” Weingarten shouted when he saw Malianov, “where did you disappear to?”

His huge cheeks were ablaze with a purple glow, his olive-black eyes were shining, and his thick tar-black hair was disheveled. It was apparent that he had had quite a few already. A half-empty bottle of export Stolichnaya stood on the table amid all kinds of goodies from the delivery crate.

“Relax and take it easy,” Weingarten continued. “We didn’t touch the caviar. We were waiting for you.”

The man picking up the pieces stood. He was a tall, handsome man with a Viking beard and the beginnings of a potbelly. He smiled in embarrassment.

“Well, well, well!” Malianov said, entering the kitchen and feeling his heart rise from his stomach and return to its proper place. “I believe the expression is ‘my home is my castle’?”

“Taken by storm, old buddy, taken by storm!” Weingarten shouted. “Listen, where did you get such good vodka? And those eats?”

Malianov extended his hand to the handsome stranger,
and he extended his, but it was full of broken glass. There was a small, pleasant moment of discomfort.

“We’ve been helping ourselves here,” he said with embarrassment. “I’m afraid it’s all my fault.”

“Nonsense, here, throw that in the garbage.”

“Mister is a coward,” the boy said clearly.

Malianov shuddered. And it looked as if the others did too.

“Sh, sh,” the handsome man said, and waved his finger at the boy in warning.

“Child!” Weingarten said. “You were given some chocolate, I believe. Well, sit there quietly and chomp on it. And do not add your two cents’ worth.”

“Why do you say I’m a coward?” said Malianov, sitting down. “Why do you insult me?”

“I’m not insulting you,” the boy said, observing him as though he were a rare specimen in the wild. “I was just describing you.”

Meanwhile the stranger got rid of the glass, wiped his hand with his handkerchief, and extended his hand.

“Zakhar,” he introduced himself.

They shook hands ceremoniously.

“To business!” Weingarten bustled, rubbing his hands together. “Get two more glasses.”

“Listen, fellows, I’m not drinking any vodka,” Malianov said.

“Then we’ll drink some wine,” Weingarten concurred. “You still have two bottles of white left.”

“No, I think I’ll have some cognac. Zakhar, would you be so kind as to get the caviar and butter from the refrigerator … and everything else. I’m starving.”

Malianov went over to the bar, got the cognac and glasses, stuck his tongue out at the chair that had been occupied by the Tonton Macoute, and came back to the table. The table
was groaning under the spread. I’ll eat my fill and get drunk, thought Malianov. I’m glad the guys came over.

But nothing went the way he had planned. No sooner had he finished his drink and settled down to eating a piece of bread spread thick with caviar than Weingarten said in a completely sober voice:

“And now, buddy, tell us what happened to you.”

Malianov choked.

“What are you talking about?”

“Look,” Weingarten said. “There are three of us here, and each of us has had a run-in. So don’t be embarrassed. What did the red-haired guy say to you?”

“Vecherovsky?”

“No, no, what does Vecherovsky have to do with it? You were visited by a tiny man with flaming red hair, wearing a deathly black outfit. What did he tell you?”

Malianov bit off a piece that filled up his whole mouth and chewed without tasting it. All three stared at him. Zakhar looked at him in embarrassment, smiling meekly, even glancing away from time to time. Weingarten’s eyes were bulging and he looked ready to start shouting at the drop of a pin. And the boy, hanging on to his melting chocolate, was staring intently at Malianov.

“Fellows,” Malianov finally said. “What red-haired man are you talking about? Nobody like that came to visit me. My visitors were a lot worse.”

“Well, tell us,” Weingarten said impatiently.

“Why should I tell you?” Malianov was incensed. “I’m not making a secret out of it, but what are you trying to pull here? Tell me first! And by the way, I’d like to know how you found out that anything had happened to me in the first place!”

“You tell me and then I’ll tell you,” Weingarten insisted stubbornly. “And Zakhar will tell his.”

“You both tell first,” Malianov said nervously, making himself another sandwich. “There’s two of you against one of me.”

“You tell,” the boy commanded, pointing at Malianov.

“Sh, sh,” Zakhar whispered, completely embarrassed.

Weingarten laughed sadly.

“Is he yours?” Malianov asked Zakhar.

“Sort of,” Zakhar answered strangely, looking away.

“His, he’s his,” Weingarten said impatiently. “By the way, that’s part of his story. Well, Dmitri, come on, don’t be shy.”

They confused Malianov utterly. He put his sandwich aside and started talking. From the very beginning, from the phone calls. When you tell the same horrible story twice in the space of two hours, you begin to find its amusing side. Malianov hadn’t even noticed how he was going at it. Weingarten began giggling, revealing his powerful, yellowish eyeteeth, and Malianov seemed to have made it his life’s work to get a laugh from Zakhar, but he never did manage it. Zakhar smiled distractedly and almost pityingly. But when Malianov got to the part about Snegovoi’s suicide, it wasn’t a laughing matter anymore.

“You’re lying!” Weingarten said hoarsely.

Malianov shrugged. “If you want to think so, that’s your prerogative,” he said. “But his door has been sealed, you can go and see for yourself.”

Weingarten sat in silence for some time, drumming his fingers on the table, his cheeks quivering in rhythm, and then he got up noisily, looking at no one, squeezed between Zakhar and the boy, and stomped away. They could hear the lock smack open; the smell of cabbage soup wafted into the apartment.

“Oho, ho-ho-ho,” Zakhar muttered glumly.

The boy immediately offered him the messy chocolate bar, demanding:

“Take a bite!”

Zakhar obediently took a bite and chewed it. The door slammed and Weingarten, still avoiding looking at any of them, squeezed back to his chair, gulped down a shot of vodka, and said hoarsely:

“And then?”

“There’s no more. Then I went up to Vecherovsky’s. The creeps left, and I went up there. I just got back.”

“And the redhead?” Weingarten asked impatiently.

“I told you, you blockhead! There was no redhead!”

Weingarten and Zakhar looked at each other.

“All right, we’ll assume that’s the truth,” said Weingarten. “That girl, Lidochka. Did she make any offers?”

“Well, I mean,” Malianov laughed nervously, “I mean, if I had wanted to, I could have.”

“Jeez, you jerk! I don’t mean that. All right, what about the investigator?”

“You know, Val, I’ve told you everything, just as it happened. Go to hell! I swear, a third grilling in one day!”

“Val,” said Zakhar indecisively, “maybe this really was something different?”

“Don’t be a fool! How could it be something else? He has work; they don’t let him do it. What else could it be? And besides, his name was mentioned.”

“Who mentioned my name?” Malianov asked, with a sense of foreboding.

“I have to pee,” the boy announced in clear bell-like tones.

They all looked at him. He examined them one by one, climbed off the stool, and said to Zakhar:

“Let’s go.”

Zakhar smiled sheepishly, said, “Well, let’s go,” and they disappeared behind the bathroom door. They chased Kaliam off the toilet seat.

“Who mentioned my name?” Malianov asked Weingarten. “What’s all this about?”

Weingarten, head bent, was listening to what went on in the toilet.

“Hell, Gubar’s really gotten stuck,” he said with some sort of sad satisfaction. “Really stuck!”

Something churned slowly in Malianov’s brain.

“Gubar?”

“Yeah. Zakhar Gubar. You know, even twisting someone around your finger …”

Malianov remembered. “Is he in rocketry?”

“Who? Zakhar?” Weingarten was surprised. “No, I doubt it. He’s a master craftsman. Though he does work in some closed place.”