Watson, Ian - Novel 11 (5 page)

 
          
By
now Baron Nikolai was in a transport of wrath. He grabbed Sidorov by the
lapels. “What the Devil are you talking about?” he shouted into the man’s face.

 
          
Our
turnip was shaken, but all the drink he had swilled gave him courage.

 
          
“You
smart Muscovites haven’t even heard! And it’s the greatest mystery of the age.”

 
          
“If
you don’t tell me, I swear I’ll beat you to a pulp!”

 
          
“The explosion that devastated the taiga.
The
visitor from space.
You haven’t heard.”

 
          
“Hang
on,” said I . . .

 
          
Because,
my celestial charmer, I
had
heard of
it—had you? I refer to the enclosed clipping from the
Siberian Herald
, which I originally intended for quite another,
‘hygienic’, purpose.

 
          
Sidorov
went on to spin us the tallest tale I’d ever heard, of huge destruction a few
hundred versts north of
Krasnoyarsk
up by the
Stony Tunguska
River
. I shall list his ‘details’ in a moment,
since I want to ask you quite seriously, Olga: What do you make of all this? My
telescopic tormentress, I request your frank scientific opinion . . .

 
          
A
YOUNG workman
was plucking idly at a
guitar, and singing to himself. A beefy-faced fellow at the next table ordered
a plate of meat croquettes. And Fedotik called out for another bottle of
Smirnov Twenty-One.

 
          
In
a moment of panic about the mounting bill, Anton clutched at his stomach. This
was a reflex he really must put a stop to! Where else could his money belt be?
It could hardly unbuckle itself and slide down his trouser leg.

 
          
“Hungry?”
enquired Fedotik.

 
          
“No,
I just felt as if . . . That’s to say . . .” Anton shook his head.

 
          
“It’s
easy enough to pick up bugs—nothing to be ashamed of,” remarked Sidorov.

 
          
Vershinin
eyed Sidorov sourly. “We’re all of us bugs on the backside of the world—some
more than others, eh?”

 
          
Since
his purchase of the springless carriage back in
Tomsk
, Anton’s money belt was lighter by a
hundred and thirty roubles. If this rattletrap got wrecked before he reached
Irkutsk
, or if he couldn’t sell it there, then he’d
be smashed . . . Everything cost twice as much as he’d bargained for. He still
owed Suvorin fifteen hundred roubles, to be paid off partly by writing
travelogues. The trouble was
,
journalism was like
trying to squeeze juice out of fleas’ genitals! What on earth could he write
about in the next one?

 
          
Perhaps
the problem had already solved itself. Rolling another cigarette, he listened
avidly to Sidorov’s tale of cosmic catastrophe . . .

           
“A hundred million trees, felled all
at once! Everything trembled and shook. Fountains of water gushed from the
ground, so they say. A hurricane roared through Kansk, and a tidal wave raced
up the Yenisey. The night
sky stayed bright for weeks—don’t
ask me why! And whole herds of reindeer were incinerated on the spot. Others
got scabs all over them—”

 
          
“What
sort of scabs?’’

 
          
But
Vershinin had lost patience. “Oh, turn the tap off. The world’s mad for putting
up with the likes of you. No wonder it gives a shrug now and then.’’

 
          
“No,
hang on,’’ said Anton. “This happened around Midsummer ’88, right?’’

 
          
As
he recalled, he had been at Lintvareva’s summer place at the time. Old
Pleshcheyev had been there too, forever burning incense to
himself—
just
as if the grand old man was some holy icon. His cigar fumes gave everyone else
a headache. So the party often strolled out into the park to clear their heads,
even at
midnight
.
And it had been so
bright.
Astonishingly bright.
All night
long—brighter than any moonlight.
Everyone had remarked on it at the
time . . .

 
          
“If
our celestial visitor had exploded on top of
Petersburg
, surely this would have spoken to our
society! But what can it tell us here—that God is angry with the taiga? It
tells us nothing at all. So nothing has changed . . . It’s too much for me,
Sir! I can adapt to ten trees falling down—but a hundred million? No, it’s a
joke. And nothing happens, nothing alters. We could have a revolution and
nothing would change.
Ever.
Ever.
Ever!’’

 
          
“I
don’t know about
that"
growled
Vershinin.

 
          
“Such
an immense event—and it failed to kill a single person. So far as I know.
That’s the kind of country we’re trapped in. Much better if it
had
killed a hundred or a thousand
people! Then somebody might take a closer look, and the condition of the
Siberian people might alter.’’ Sidorov held two trembling fingers a little way
apart.
“By this much.
But where did it have to happen?
Exactly where it was guaranteed to be ignored by everybody.
So it’s all a joke. What does it matter if a comet strikes the Earth?”

 
          
Once
more Sidorov leapt up, buttoned himself and repaired to the door to stand
staring up into the starry void.

 
          
Anton
thought sadly: ‘Our turnip’s seeing some decoration being pinned to his breast,
far away in
Moscow
. Yes, a jewelled star third class, to
honour the reporter of a fallen star! As he stares up into the firmament,
somewhere out there in infinite space fame awaits
him .
.

 
          
The
man returned, slumped down and groaned.

 
          
“I’m
missing my chance—all for the want of a few hundred roubles ... I really ought
to get up an expedition, don’t you see? Not one of your dilettante outings, but
a real scientific expedition equipped with a theodolite and stuff.
Moscow
’s
the starting point for that. No one’s
interested here—they’ve all forgotten. But how can I go to
Moscow
without good evidence? And how can I get
good evidence till after I’ve been to
Moscow
? I appeal to you, Gentlemen, will you lend
me ten roubles?”

 
          
“Aha!”
exclaimed Vershinin. “Now we see him in his true colours.”

 
          
Dr
Rode smiled wanly. “Gentlemen, perhaps a small experiment might be conducted
at this juncture, to discover scientifically what this poor wretch will do with
the money? Will it be Smirnov vodka, do you suppose?
Or
Koshelev?
We could bet on the outcome—the loser pays the bill.”

 
          
“Here,
have some anyway.” In an apparent fit of bonhomie Fedotik slopped a few fingers
of vodka into an empty glass. “Go on: a man needs a drink.” But then he teased
the glass towards Sidorov, as though he might hook it back again.

 
          
Like
a cat pouncing on a pigeon, Sidorov snatched the glass and drank. Abruptly he
began to cry, his tears diluting the remaining spirit.

 
          
“How
can I visit
Tunguska
till I’m able to raise an expedition? How
can I raise an expedition without going there first, to prove the need for
one?”

           
Fedotik nodded sagely. “Those indeed
are the horns of his dilemma.”

 
          
“I’ve
only spoken to people who have in turn spoken to eye witnesses. You have to
discount a lot, sometimes. These people talk of giant rats, the size of
cows, that
burrow underground. You and I, Sirs, know that
those are the corpses of mammoths frozen in the undersoil . . . But the trees,
ah the trees! A hundred million laid low in an instant. What have logic and
morality to do with that? It’s an accidental circumstance, Sirs. We come into
our life by accident. We often leave it by accident. In between is a chapter of
accidents.”

 
          
Fedotik
nudged Vershinin. “No doubt about it, he’s a Superfluous Man.”

 
          
“And
it’s all as nothing to this endless earthly monster: our own country. She
swallows the incident as a cow swallows a fly. How true that disaster strikes
where nobody sees or hears it! In the circumstances, happiness is quite
impossible.”

 
          
“A
Superfluous Man,” repeated Fedotik, delighted with this insight.

 
          
“Does
it matter if a comet strikes the Earth?
Yet for it to happen,
and
be ignored
—because the only
people who can think are three thousand versts away—it’s a joke that passes
endurance.
And there’s an even greater joke. . . If this hadn’t happened
in the back of beyond, if it had struck Petersburg full in the face—chastising
that rich, uncaring city!—in that case the whole world would have known. But
I—!
But I—!”

 
          
“You
would have been nobody, then,” Anton said gently. “You would have had nothing.”

 
          
Sidorov
stared at him blearily. “So you do understand? You’re my true brother.”

 
          
Doubtless,
reflected Anton, they were brothers—in dishevel- ment. His own coat stank of
tar, and Sidorov’s coat was equally filthy. Their boots were a disgrace. Anton
tipped back his head, abstracting himself.

 
          
Here
was an interesting case indeed. The man had been taken over by an event, which
hadn’t
quite
dropped into his lap. He
had been presented—from outer space, would you believe?—with a grand ambition.
In another man’s case this might have been an obsessive desire to retire to a
farm and grow his own gooseberries or something. But in this instance
desolation
commanded him—and he could no
more leave this part of
Siberia
than a prospector in the
Yukon
could desert the rumour of the Motherlode. Presumably his life could
only go downhill from here . . .

 
          
Suppose
Sidorov did raise the wherewithal to travel to
Moscow
? What could he possibly show to anybody
there? All those tumbled trees he spoke of were unknown except to the migrating
birds, which alone knew the scale of this land . . . and to a few tribesmen who
didn’t exist within Russian society.

 
          
“Obsession,”
Anton said softly, as if it was the title of a tale yet unwritten.

 
          
Fedotik
heard him. “Once a man’s obsessed, there’s nothing you can do about it! Take my
word for it.” He cocked an imaginary gun at the ceiling. “Bang, bang, down they
come.” He laughed guilelessly.

 
          
And yet,
thought Anton . . . What if it
were
all true? What if one of the greatest mysteries in the
history of the world really had happened not so far from here? But no one was
paying attention . . . It was as though the Crucifixion took place, and everybody
was away in the country.

 
          
“I
may as well be a convict in exile,” went on Sidorov gloomily. “
Siberia
isn’t a real place. It’s so much stuffing
in between the Urals and the Pacific. Yet how petty my crimes are—compared with
the taiga! And how petty everything is . . .” Ineptly he fumbled with his coat
buttons.

 
          
Anton
reached out and touched the suffering man on the arm.

 
          
“Look,
Ilya Alexandrovich, I just happen to be writing a series of articles for
New Times
in
Moscow
—”

 
          
At
that very moment a loud
twang
sounded
through the room—as though some cosmic clock had chimed in the inn, or as if time
itself
had suddenly snapped in two. Briefly the room
fell silent, till the note had died away.

 
          
“Sod
it!” swore the guitar player, one of whose strings had snapped.

 
          
“That’s
right,
New Times"
Anton said
excitedly.