Notes on the Cuff and Other Stories (7 page)

But they did. I'm not mad. They did,
dammit
!

Then where on earth had they got to?

Walking unsteadily, trying to hide my expression under
my eyelids (so they didn't grab me and take me away) I set off down the dark
corridor. And realised that something funny really was happening to me. In the
darkness over the door leading into a room which was lit, glowed letters of
fire, as if on a cinema screen:

1836

ON THE 25TH OF MARCH AN UNUSUALLY
STRANGE EVENT TOOK PLACE

I read no further, recoiling in horror. Stopping by
the barrier, I hooded my eyes even more and asked in a hollow voice:

"Excuse me, did you happen to see where ASS
Lit
.
has
gone?"

An irritable, gloomy woman with a crimson ribbon in
her black hair snapped:

"What ASS Lit... I don't know."

I closed my eyes. Another female voice said
sympathetically:

"Actually it's not here at all. You've come to
the wrong place. It's in
Volkhonka
."

I went cold all over, walked onto the landing and
wiped the sweat off my forehead. Then I decided to go back on foot across the
whole of
Moscow
to
Razumikhin's
and forget all about it. If I was
quiet and said nothing, no one would ever know. I could live on the floor at
Razumikhin's
place. He wouldn't drive me, a poor madman,
away.

*

But a last faint hope still lingered in my breast. And
I set off. I started walking. This six-storey building was positively
terrifying. It was riddled with passages, like an ant-hill, so you could walk
right through it from one end to the other without going outside. I hurried
along the dark twists and turns, occasionally wandering into niches behind
wooden partitions. The light bulbs were reddish and uneconomical. Worried
people scurried past me. There were lots of women sitting at desks. Typewriters
clattered. Notices flashed past.
Fin. Dept. Nat.
Mins
.
I reached well-lit landings, only to plunge
back into darkness again. At last I came to a landing and looked round dully.
The further I went, the less chance there was of finding that bewitched ASS
Lit. It was hopeless. I went down the stairs and into the street. When I looked
round, it was entrance
!...

A bitter gust of wind.
Heavy cold rain began to pour. I pulled down my
summer cap even further and put up my greatcoat collar. A few minutes later my
boots were full of water, thanks to the cracks in the soles. This was a relief.
Now I needn't kid myself that I would manage to get home dry. Instead of
slowing down my journey by hopping from stone to stone, I just waded straight
through the puddles.

ENTRANCE 2, GROUND FLOOR, FLAT 23, ROOM 40

In letters of fire:

QUITE RIDICULOUS THINGS ARE HAPPENING IN THE WORLD.
SOMETIMES THEY ARE TOTALLY IMPROBABLE: SUDDENLY THAT SELFSAME NOSE WHICH HAD
BEEN PARADING AROUND IN THE RANK OF STATE COUNCILLOR AND CAUSED SUCH A
COMMOTION IN THE TOWN, FOUND ITSELF BACK IN ITS PLACE AS IF NOTHING HAD
HAPPENED...
⁽²⁰⁾

*

Morning is wiser than eventide. That's true alright.
When I woke up the next morning from the cold and sat on the divan, ruffling my
hair, my head seemed a bit clearer!

Logically, had it existed or not? Of course it had. I
could remember my name and the date. It 'had just moved somewhere... So I would
have to find it. But what had those women next door said?
In
Volkhonka
...
That was nonsense! You could pinch
anything from under their very noses. I don't know why they keep them on at
all, those women. Egyptian plague!

I got dressed, drank the water I had saved in a glass
from yesterday, ate a piece of bread and one potato, and drew up a plan.

6 entrances times 6 floors = 36, 36 times 2 apartments
— 72, 72 times 6 rooms = 432 rooms. Was it feasible? Yes, it was. Yesterday 1
had walked at random along two or three horizontals. Today I would search the
whole building systematically vertically and horizontally. And find ASS Lit.
Provided it hadn't vanished into a fourth dimension. If it had, that really was
the end.

By the second entrance I came nose to nose with
Storn
!

Thank the Lord! A kindred spirit at last-It transpired
that yesterday an hour before I
arrived
the head of
admin, turned up with two workmen and moved ASS Lit.
to
entrance 2, ground floor, flat 23, room 40.

Our place was to be taken by the music section, ASS
Mus
.

"Why?"

"I don't know. But why didn't you come yesterday?
The old man got very worried."

"For goodness' sake!
How was I to know where you'd gone? You should have
left a note on the door."

"We thought they'd tell you..."

I gnashed my teeth.

"Have you seen those women? Next door..."

"That's true," said
Storn
.

Getting a room of my own gave me a new lease of life.
They screwed a light bulb in ASS Lit. I found a ribbon for the typewriter. Then
a second young lady appeared.
"
Pise
.
appt
. clerk."

Manuscripts began to arrive from the provinces. Then
came
another splendid young lady.
A
journalist.
Very amusing, a good sport.
"
Pise
.
appt
.
as sec. of lit.
feuilletons
."

Finally, a young man turned up from the south.
A journalist.
And we wrote him our last "
Pise
." There were no more vacancies.
ASS Lit.
was
full up. And a real
hive of industry.

Twelve tablets of saccharine and that's all...

"The sheet or the jacket?"

Not a word about cash.

Went upstairs today.
The young ladies were very snappy with me. For some
reason they can't stand ASS Lit.

"Can I check our pay-roll?"

"What for?"

"I want to make sure everyone's on it."

"Ask Madame
Kritskaya
."

Madame
Kritskaya
got up,
shook her bun of grey hair and announced turning pale:

"It's got lost."

Pause.

"Why didn't you tell me?"

Madame
Kritskaya
, tearfully:

"My head's going round. You can't imagine what's
been going on here. Seven times I wrote out that pay-roll and they sent it
back. Said there was something wrong with it. And you won't get your pay
anyway. There's someone on your list who hasn't been officially
authorised."

*

To hell with the lot of them!
Nekrasov
and the resurrected
alcoholics.
I hurried off.
More corridors.
Dark.
Light.
Light.
Dark.
Meyerhold
.
Personnel.
Light
bulbs on in the daytime.
A grey army-coat.
A woman in wet felt boots.
Desks.

"Which of us hasn't been officially
authorised?"

Answer:

"None of you have."

But the best of it was that the founder of ASS Lit.,
the old man himself, had not been authorised. What? And I haven't either?
What's going on here?

"You probably didn't write an application?"

"I didn't what? I wrote four applications in your
office.
And handed them over to you personally.
Together with the one I wrote before that makes 113 applications in all."

"Well, they must have got lost. Write another
one."

This went on for three days. After that we were all
reinstated. And new authorisations were written.

I am against the death penalty. But if Madame
Kritskaya
is ever taken to face the firing squad, I'll go
and watch. The same applies to the young lady in the sealskin hat.
And
Lidochka
, the clerical assistant.

Get rid of the lot of them!

Madame
Kritskaya
stood there
with the authorisations in her hands, and I solemnly declare that she will not
pass them on. I could not understand what this diabolical woman with the bun
was doing here. Who would entrust her with work? This was Fate and no mistake!

A week passed. I went to the fifth floor, in entrance
4. They put a stamp on them there. I need another stamp, but for two days I've
been trying vainly to catch the Chairman of the Tariff-Valuation Committee.

Sold the sheet.

*

We won't get any cash for at least a fortnight.

*

There's a rumour that everyone in the building will
get an advance of 500.

*

The rumour's true. They've spent four days writing out
authorisations.

*

I took the authorisations to receive the advance.
Had everything.
All the stamps were in order. But I got so
worked up rushing from the second floor to the fifth that I bent an iron bolt
sticking out of the corridor wall.

Handed over the authorisations.
They'll be sent for endorsement to another building
at the other end of
Moscow
.
Then returned.
And then the cash...

Got paid today.
Cash!

Ten minutes before it was time to go to the pay desk,
the woman on the ground floor, who was supposed to put on the last stamp, said:

"It's not set out according to form. You'll have
to write another one."

I don't remember exactly what happened then.
Everything went hazy.

I seem to remember yelping something painfully. Like:

"What the hell's going on?"

The woman opened her mouth:

"How dare you..."

Then I calmed down. I calmed down.
Explained
that I'd been
het
up.
Apologised.
Took back what I'd said. She agreed to correct it in red ink. Scribbled:
"Pay cash." Squiggle.

I rushed to the cash desk. Magic words: cash desk!
Didn't believe it, even when the cashier took out the notes.

Then it suddenly hit me. Money!

From the drafting of the authorisation up to the
moment of receipt from the cash desk passed twenty-two days and three hours.

There was nothing left at home. No jacket. No sheet.
No books.

Got ill.
Through being careless.
Had
beetroot soup with meat today.
Tiny golden discs (fat) floating on top.
Three platefuls.
Three pounds of white
bread in one day.
And some pickled cucumbers.
When I
was full up, made some tea.
Drank four glassfuls with
sugar.
Felt sleepy. Lay down on the divan and dropped off.

Dreamed I was Lev Tolstoy at
Yasnaya
Polyana
.
Married to Sofia
Andreyevna
.
Sitting upstairs in
the study.
Had to write.
But
didn't know what.
People kept coming up and saying: