The Commissariat of Enlightenment (21 page)

Comrade Light shouted, “Action!”

The firing commenced before the two sets of extras had reached each other; first a single shot, then a second several moments later, followed by a roaring cascade of bullets. Men and women fell, but their companions believed they did so in pretense and surged ahead toward the Kremlin gate. Shouting gleefully, the director ordered a camera trained on the police guns. At the point of engagement one of the men posing as an angry worker slammed a board hard against the shoulder of a uniformed extra, bringing him to the ground. Lying on his side, the man withdrew a revolver—his own—from inside his coat and shot the attacker in the stomach. The extra staggered back, surprise distracting him from the pain, his hands around the wound. “I’ve been killed!” he
cried. The fellow next to him guffawed at the way he overplayed his injury and was then shot dead himself.

Light was cheering, pumping his arms to urge the two sides into closer contact. In less than a minute, the revolutionary extras began to flee, contrary to the demands of the script, but the initial footage was good.

The Cheka troops were just arriving as Astapov scrambled up the rise. Their commander looked to him for guidance, but Astapov told him to wait until the “angry workers and peasants” were completely routed—and then to disarm the “police” forcibly. The Chekist blanched at the disorder below, but saw that he couldn’t quell it with the troops on hand. It would all be over within two minutes, Astapov assured him, pretending confidence. Then he saw Chipolovsky below for the first time since the melee began, rallying the workers for another charge at the police. He was cockily wearing Stalin’s cap on the side of his head, as Stalin never did. Nor had Stalin ever led rioters into battle. “Workers of the world—” the actor shouted before being interrupted by a new round of gunfire. He fell back, his arms and legs splayed. That was the last of the demonstration. The rest of the mob panicked, womanly shrieks were heard as the extras ran over each other, and the deputized police extras chased them up the hill.

The newspapers, of course, would never report the gunfire and fighting that had disrupted the center of Moscow for several hours. Comrade Light’s film would never be made and most of the footage, seized by the Cheka, would never be shown beyond the Kremlin’s private screening rooms, where it would be shown repeatedly, first introduced as evidence in the investigation of the
riot, then as a test to identify lapses in the Kremlin’s security, a goad to motivate the Party to take uncompromising measures against counterrevolutionaries, and finally a hammer to be used against some of the high officials within the Commissariat of Enlightenment who had approved the film in the first place, but not all of them. A few surviving early frames of the film would make it into Soviet documentary histories, and then into the public imagination. Comrade Light would never direct another film.

No one would ever connect the events to Comrade Astapov, who that afternoon dissolved into the city’s swiftly reaching shadows. Stalin would not speak to Astapov about it and would never acknowledge that he had been the one seen reading the newspaper on Durnovski Lane.

Astapov knew, however, that Stalin had taken certain measures to erase testimony of Astapov’s presence in the Alexander Gardens. Their fortunes had become even more tightly linked now. It made sense. By chance and by device, everything they had done since the Count’s death had contributed to ensuring their mutual dependence.

1924

IN
a heartbeat everything comes crashing down: the glare off the corner of the samovar, the perceived weight of the linen press standing opposite the bed, the perceived solidity of the shadows, Nadezhda, good loyal Bobkin was with us when, Professor Koyevnikov, Proceedings of the Thirteenth Party, Hegel’s
Phenomology of Mind,
Stalin scheming, where’s Trotsky, the international situation, grain collection figures from, a film burlesque in Paris, Inessa at the, a very strange pain in, not severe, the snowy forest in the dead of winter, the dead, the aroma of mushroom soup, a letter to the Polish, reorganization of, when the Count died, Collected Works, the editor, Smolny, Smolny, Smolny, the little black kitten, warn the Central Committee about, so much left undone, avoid sentimentality at all costs, nanny Varvara, “I’m bored and I’m sad and there’s no one to lend a hand,” that’s Turgenev, decisive argument against, Kamenev and Bukharin unreliable, Inessa dead, possibility of revolt in, Meshcheryakov came to visit and no one gave him anything to eat!, Stalin scheming, I saw him in the doorway, how, Germany, crush the, Mother in Saint Petersburg, the Lutheran, thesis, anti-
thesis, synthesis. The roaring in your ears is like the ocean, predictably enough, and then it’s over, except for the paralysis. But this isn’t
it,
not yet. Koyevnikov has found my pulse. Everything, in its essential aspects, is just as before: I
think,
I
am.
Get to work.

The snow had been falling for weeks, stranding anything wheeled and leaving a single-horsed sled to be pulled alone through the silenced streets of Kharkov, the capital of the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic. Rubbish fires burned here and there, unattended. Their smoke hung, reluctant to rise. The few passersby looked away at the gliding vehicle, plausibly fearing that it transported some manner or agent of bad luck. Chests were furtively crossed. In the sled a human figure lay swaddled in robes and blankets, within which the lit end of a cigarette was visible, glowing in January like a June bug.

The sled halted at a massive European-style house built early in the past century, with a slate mansard roof and tall front windows. The figure in the back wrestled himself out of the blankets and descended from the vehicle. His cigarette was still lit. The man said a few words of command to the driver and with difficulty crossed the snowy pavement to the door. He hammered at the door with absolute peremptoriness, a learned skill. A lackey wrapped in a long, patched white shirt appeared. The visitor spoke briefly and showed a certain document. The servant promptly allowed him in, muttering apologies for the winter. He too avoided the visitor’s direct glance and slinked away into the hallway shadows.

The front room was unheated, preserving the snow on the visitor’s boots. The fireplace appeared not to have been used once that fierce winter; nor were the electric lamps lit, though power
had recently been restored to this neighborhood. The scattered pieces of furniture in the room were old and neglected. A single chair stood off to the side, its antimacassar trailing threads. The parquet was buckled and uncarpeted. With so many homeless that winter, Comrade Astapov wondered why the house had not yet been expropriated by the gorkom.

Someone emerged from the shadows. In dramatic contrast with his surroundings, the man was well maintained, even dapper, with a short mustache and round eyeglasses framed in delicate gold wire. His hair had been combed back. His smile was not quite warm enough to hide his apprehension.

“Comrade,” he said. He didn’t recognize Astapov at all.

“Comrade professor,” the visitor responded, stiffly nodding.

The two men paused for a moment, each waiting for the other to speak. As a Party official, Astapov held the advantage. “Please come this way,” the professor said at last.

The other rooms in the house were scarcely less chilly than the front parlor. A distinctive chemical odor reached Astapov’s nostrils, immediately familiar despite the epic interval since he had last encountered it. The two men passed through an insulated door into a darkened chamber, which led to another door and into a vividly lit room, at once recognizable as a modern medical cabinet, equipped with laboratory tables and gas taps, as well as some small pieces of equipment whose purposes could not be guessed at. A series of water faucets and small basins were arrayed along the whitewashed far wall and on the counters various large corked bottles contained some dense, luminous emerald liquid. Everything in the room, which perhaps had once been a kitchen, was tidy and in good order.

Professor Vorobev raised his arms. “Twenty years of medical research! Comrade, this is a laboratory unequalled anywhere in
the world—not in Germany, not in France. This is one-of-a-kind equipment, invented here in Kharkov. As I can show you, I’ve pioneered procedures that go far beyond contemporary bourgeois science. In fact, it’s only with the assistance of the peasants and the workers that this laboratory has achieved such success. My procedures are purely
Soviet
procedures.”

“I’m sure,” Astapov said, smiling coldly. “I presume some of this was developed in Bulgaria?”

Vorobev grimaced.

“A full investigation was done by the gorkom and the state police,” he declared. The gorkom was the city’s Bolshevik committee, its de facto ruling body. “My bona fides and loyalties have been sworn to by Comrades Muller, Gumenchenko, and Shulevits. You understand, Comrade, it was a very confused time, the city was being shelled by both sides. One day we’d hear that the Whites intended to conscript all men under the age of 65. The next we were told that the Reds were shooting everyone with a university degree. Even those of us with proletarian loyalties didn’t know where to turn. The entire city was in flight. Sofia was the most logical destination, I had professional contacts there, they offered me the possibility of continuing my research…But I always harbored the ambition of returning to Kharkov and serving the Revolution. And, as you can plainly see, I have!”

Astapov surveyed the laboratory, especially the unfamiliar machinery. He noted the items of foreign manufacture and abstractedly caressed a small retort. The medical cabinet extended into a series of chambers that had once served as parlors and pantries. The rooms were lit with a flat green radiation derived from the same region of the spectrum as the color of the fluid in the jars. Their walls were hung with obscurely drawn anatomical diagrams.
He entered the last room, which was even cooler than the others, and halted at the threshold. On an examination table lay a naked man with a long brown gash in his abdomen.

“Pardon me,” said Vorobev, coming up behind Astapov. “I was engaged in a routine organ extraction. It’s all in my application to the gorkom. My studies for the past two years have involved systematic preservation on an organ-by-organ basis. The organs vary in their response to any specific procedure. Soft tissue is especially difficult.”

Astapov murmured politely in assent and approached the body. It had belonged to a very large man. The figure was stitched and cut in places and an eye socket gaped. In death the face had gone soft and had lost all expression. It suggested now only a general Orientalism.

“Is he from the morgue?”

“Yes, surely. The gorkom gave permission,” the professor insisted. “I have the documents right here—”

“I’m not from the gorkom.” Astapov turned and crouched before one of the jars, which rested on a long, unpainted wooden table. He peered into the murk and found himself face to face with a small terrier, afloat with its eyes closed, its legs gently spread. Astapov pulled away abruptly, though in fact he was not revolted or in any way vexed by the sight. The gesture was more of a memory of once being capable of repulsion. He planted himself before the professor. “I’m from Moscow,” he announced.

“Moscow,” Vorobev echoed. “I’m honored. Kharkov is honored.”

“You subscribe to several foreign periodicals,” Astapov said. “
Annals of Necrology,
for example.
Monatsschrift für Anatomie und Histologie.
”

Vorobev replied forcefully. “Every single one of them is a professional journal. They’re received also by the Academy of Sciences in Moscow.”

“And you receive foreign correspondence.”

“From professional colleagues. Some bourgeois, but Ilich himself has said that we have much to learn from European science.”

Astapov nodded—this was the correct answer—and passed among the tables, drumming his fingers on them. Pieces of raw meat floated in white ceramic pans. The moist, plutonic odor of the chemicals was overwhelming and then in a moment Astapov was accustomed to it.

“How much of this equipment is absolutely vital to performing the procedure?”

Vorobev reddened. “I’ve been through this already with the gorkom. Comrade Muller has vouched for my political reliability and my scientific credentials. This is not some
kiosk
you can pick up and move to the next block! This is an established laboratory, with fragile and irreplaceable equipment imported from abroad at my own expense. I’m doing important scientific work, and if the Party wishes for it to continue…”

He trailed off.

“I told you,” said Astapov. “I’m not from the gorkom. I’m simply asking you, what do you need to take with you?”

“Take with me where?”

Astapov didn’t reply at once. He turned away and walked around the room, gazing at its furnishings. It was a well-appointed laboratory, with dark wainscotting and brass lighting fixtures.

“Do you have other specimens, besides that creature?”

“Yes, of course,” said Vorobev. “But Comrade, please, state your business. If you’re not from the gorkom…”

Astapov had reached a wall of oak cabinets, their shallow draw
ers stacked horizontally. This was, he realized now, what he was looking for. The drawers were neatly labeled, with distinctive flourishes at their numerals’ terminal points. Each was designated by a year, going back in time from top to bottom, 1923, 1922, 1921…Astapov stopped when he reached 1910. He stooped and seized the handle. The drawer, lined in plush purple velvet, slid out silently.

Inside the drawer lay an infant, a little boy. He was completely unclothed, his skin pink, his penis purple, his lips parted as if in a kiss. His eyes were closed and his large round head was sheathed in a layer of slick black hair. Astapov touched the boy’s chest, which bristled with a blondish lanugo. The skin was soft and pliant, unpleasantly so.

“The nineteenth of November, 1910, New Style,” Vorobev said. “One of my most successful early procedures. I’ve made several advances in technique since then, of course. As I’ve explained to Comrade Muller, alkali content and the proximity to the moment of death are vital—”

Astapov interrupted. “A Party train is at our disposal. It’ll take us to Moscow. We’ll arrive sometime tomorrow morning. Collect what you need to perform the procedure: your equipment, the proper fluids…” Astapov paused, his list exhausted. “Take the baby too. Other officials may need to examine it. And of course whatever personal items you may require. We have to leave at once.”

“That’s impossible. By what authority—”

“By the authority of the Central Committee,” Astapov announced, exaggerating. His authority derived from a single member of the Central Committee.

Vorobev fell silent and turned ashen. He gazed at the visitor, taking his measure again.

“Is Ilich…?” he murmured.

Astapov nodded and turned away. Vorobev probably believed that this was so the Moscow comrade could hide his tears. Indeed Astapov had turned away to dissimulate his response to the prospect of Ilich’s death. But the response, which would have been evidenced by the faint smile he was brutally trying to suppress, was complicated and confused, and in some portion at least, it approached joyous delirium. The baby. Astapov heard music: patriotic, martial, devout. The baby encompassed certain grand possibilities, vastly more possibilities than it could have entertained in the few moments of life when its future as a bastard Russian peasant had flickered before it. The music thundered in his ears.