Death And The Penguin, page 6
Viktor stared aghast, unable to take it all in.
“So it’s not the end of the world,” he said at last.
“Why should it be? Just because we’re one little group with government connections the fewer? Relax. You’re out of it, and if you’re not, you’re only very indirectly in. Let’s have some coffee.”
The Chief phoned the order to his secretary, then looked hard at Viktor, thoughtfully biting his lip.
“No wife? No girlfriend?”
“Not at the moment.”
“Bad,” said the Chief with a half-humorous shake of the head. “Women are the strength of the male nervous system. Time you took your nerves in hand … Still, just my little joke.”
The secretary brought coffee.
Viktor took half a spoonful of sugar, but the overstrong coffee was still bitter, making him think of his recent trip to Kharkov.
“Do I have to go to Odessa?” he asked suddenly, remembering their pre-Kharkov conversation.
“No,” replied the Chief. “Someone’s very much anti our getting involved in the provinces … Still, we’ve enough to be getting on with here. So no need to worry. Look at me, serene as a tank, even though they’ve just murdered my driver! Believe me, life’s not something to be concerned about.”
Seeing the Chief in his expensive suit, French tie, solid gold tie-pin, and director’s chair, Viktor doubted whether he did, in fact, set so little store by life.
“Before New Year we must split a bottle together, you and I, eh? Unless you’d rather not?”
“All for it,” answered Viktor.
“Good.” The Chief got to his feet. “I’ll be in touch.”
27
Stepan Yakovlevich Pidpaly lived on the ground floor of a grey Stalin-baroque block near Svyatoshino Metro station. Stamping the snow off his feet, Viktor rang the bell.
Lengthy spyhole scrutiny followed, then a trembly old man’s voice asked, “Who do you want?”
“Stepan Yakovlevich,” said Viktor.
“Who are you?”
“I got your address at the zoo,” explained Viktor. “I’ve come about penguins.”
The apparent idiocy of this explanation notwithstanding, the door opened, and an unshaven, not so very old-looking man in a blue woollen tracksuit invited him in.
He went through into a spacious living room in the middle of which was an old-fashioned round table with chairs.
“Sit down,” said his host, looking elsewhere.
“Interested in penguins, are you?” he went on, now looking squarely at Viktor, at the same time feeling for and retrieving an old dog-end from the grubby table cloth. The hand descended below the table then came up without the dog-end, and rested on the cloth.
“I’m sorry to trouble you,” began Viktor, “but I wanted to ask if maybe you had any books on penguins.”
“Books?” Pidpaly countered, looking pained. “Why should I? I’ve got my own unpublished works … I’ve studied penguins for more than 20 years.”
“So you’re a zoologist?” said Viktor as deferentially as he knew how.
“Penguinologist, more like, though it’s not a speciality you’ll find listed, of course.” His tone softened. “Still, what’s your interest in penguins exactly?”
“I have one, but know nothing about them. I’m worried in case I’m doing something wrong.”
“You have, have you? Splendid! Where did you get him?”
“From the zoo, a year ago. When smaller animals were being given away.”
Pidpaly frowned. “What species?”
“King, I think. Called Misha. Fully grown, about as tall as this table.”
“Misha!” Pidpaly pursed his lips, scratched his stubble. “From our zoo?”
“Yes.”
“Well I never! But why take on a sick one? There were seven of them, I remember. Adèle, Zaychik – they were the younger, fit ones.”
“What’s wrong with him?”
“Depressive syndrome. Bad heart. I’d say congenital. So that’s where he got to,” he said sadly with a sigh.
“What can be done about it? Can he be treated?”
“That’s a good one!” Pidpaly laughed. “They don’t treat people nowadays, let alone penguins! What you must realize is that our climate’s fatal to creatures from the Antarctic. The best thing for him, of course, would be to be living where he belongs. You mustn’t take it amiss, and I’m clearly talking rubbish, but if I were a penguin and found myself in these latitudes, I’d do myself in. Imagine the torment of living where it’s up to 40°+ in summer and occasionally down to -10° in winter, when you’ve got two layers of fat protecting you against intense cold, to say nothing of hundreds of blood vessels doing the same. Just imagine: you get superheated internally. You burn up … Practically all penguins living in zoos exhibit depressive syndrome … And they tried to tell me penguins had no psychology. I proved it! And I’ll prove it to you! And as to his heart: what heart would tolerate superheating to that extent?”
As Viktor listened, Pidpaly became more and more worked up, and waved his arms about ever more wildly. From time to time he switched to rhetorical questions, pausing briefly to catch breath before continuing. Never had Viktor received such an earful: period of incubation … physiology … mating peculiarities … Eventually, with a headache coming on, he knew he must somehow arrest the flow.
“Excuse me, but may I read what you’ve written?” he interposed, exploiting one of Pidpaly’s periodic rhetorical questions. “On penguins, I mean.”
“Of course,” said Pidpaly slowly. “As long as I get it back.”
Going into the next room – which, seen through the open door, was clearly a study – he bent over a great writing desk and rummaged in one of the drawers. At long last he straightened up and came back with a fat loose-leaf file.
“Here we are,” he said, putting it down on the table. “It won’t all be of interest, of course, but if some of it is, I’ll be happy.”
“May I perhaps do something in return?” asked Viktor, anxious to show appreciation, but uncertain how.
“Yes,” confided the penguinologist quietly, “what you could do, when you return my manuscript, is bring a couple of kilograms of potatoes.”
28
Two weeks passed. Sonya grew accustomed to the new flat and asked less often about Daddy. Viktor became accustomed to Sonya, as he had earlier to Misha. But he often thought of her father, having no idea what was happening to him, or even if he was still alive.
The window looked out on winter. Some evenings, when it was dark and not many people were about, he took Sonya and Misha for a walk. They strolled the waste area by the three dovecotes, snow crunching beneath their feet. Sometimes stray mongrels came running up to Misha, and instead of barking, sniffed this strange, unresponsive creature in silence. Waving her arms and puffing out her cheeks, Sonya would rush at them and off they would run, leaving her happy.
Viktor had read the whole of Pidpaly’s manuscript. A lot of it was beyond him, but he had still discovered useful things. He made a note of the most important pages and had them photocopied at the nearest bookshop, after which he put the manuscript in a prominent place in the kitchen, to be returned in the near future.
Work was also advancing. The folder he had received from the Chief had been duly processed, and twelve new obelisks lay on the window ledge awaiting their appointed hour. They had given him trouble, the Chief’s underlinings having proved too extensive for the obelisk as elaborated and perfected by Viktor. It had meant altering the rhythm, adding pace, and presenting the underlinings as brief biographical inserts, which made them look more like quotes from an indictment.
With this batch completed, he was struck for the first time by the thought that only one of his obituaries – an unplanned one – had had as subject an unsullied victim, with no fact or hint suggestive of a dubious past. Yuliya Parkhomenko, the singer, was who he had in mind. But now he had his doubts. He recalled the allusion to involvement in the disappearance of another artiste … And her love for the late Yakornitsky … No. The pure and sinless did not exist, or else died unnoticed and with no obituary. The idea seemed persuasive. Those who merited obituaries had usually achieved things, fought for their ideals, and when locked in battle, it wasn’t easy to remain entirely honest and upright. Today’s battles were all for material gain, anyway. The crazy idealist was extinct – survived by the crazy pragmatist …
District Militiaman Sergey had phoned a number of times, and the previous Sunday they had been for another picnic on the Dnieper ice, only now with Sonya. A pleasant time had been had by all. Misha swam to his heart’s content in the broad ice-hole. Viktor and Sergey drank cognac-laced coffee, lying on the same quilted blanket. Sonya had the Pepsi Cola and sweets that had been bought for her. And all three watched the ice-hole from which Misha would leap as if bitten, becoming airborne for a metre or so before landing, comically, on the ice, and hurrying back to the blanket. Sonya would towel him solicitously, and he would then comically pick his way back to the hole.
They sat there almost till dusk, then had to hurry across the grey-blue ice of the frozen Dnieper to the Zaporozhets, parked as before, by the lower Monastery Gardens.
After which the week began again as usual, except that Viktor was conscious of additional concerns now that he was responsible for Sonya, and they began to eat better as a consequence. He took to buying German fruit yogurts and fresh vegetables, and the penguin’s fare included frozen shrimps, which he relished.
“Why haven’t you got a telly?” Sonya asked one day. “Don’t you like cartoons?”
“No, I don’t,” said Viktor.
“I do,” the little girl answered gravely.
New Year approached. Trees decorated with toys appeared in the shops. In Kreshchatik Street they were assembling the National Tree from smaller firs. People were looking more relaxed, and the papers contained hardly anything about shootings or bomb blasts. It was as if the whole of Kiev, regardless of profession, was on holiday.
Viktor had already bought Sonya’s New Year present and hidden it in a cupboard. It was a Barbie doll. Together they selected a little fir tree with a base, took it back to the flat and decorated it with ribbons and old toys found in the attic.
“Do you believe in Grandfather Frost?” he asked once.
“Yes,” she said in surprise, “don’t you?”
“Yes,” said Viktor.
“Wait for New Year – he’s bound to bring you something,” she promised.
29
Leaving Sonya at the flat, Viktor shopped at the food store, and travelled out to Pidpaly’s.
Again it was a blue-tracksuited Pidpaly who came to the door, and he was barefoot.
“All for me?” he asked, delightedly examining Viktor’s edible gifts. “You really shouldn’t have.”
At the bottom of the bag, under all the purchases, was the penguinologist’s file, which Viktor handed back with thanks.
“Any use to you?”
“A great help.”
“Sit down. I’ll make some tea,” said Pidpaly, bustling about.
It turned out to be green. Pidpaly passed it to him in a bowl, setting down a little box of chipped sugar of heaven alone knew what provenance, such as Viktor had seen only in old films.
Snapping off a piece, he washed it down with the tea, and took a sly look at the little box.
“Doesn’t spoil, you see,” said Pidpaly, following the direction of his gaze. “Ages back I bought three loaves, and I’ve still got some … Time was, there was more shape, more taste to things. Remember Capital Meat Loaf?”
Viktor shook his head.
“Missed out on the time of abundance, you have,” said the old man regretfully. “Every century there’s five years of abundance, after which everything goes to pot … You won’t see the next five, I’m afraid – I certainly won’t. But I did at least come in for one lot. How’s the penguin?”
“Fine,” said Viktor. “You remember you mentioned penguin psychology.”
“I do indeed.”
“Just how much do they understand?”
“They’re quick to distinguish mood – in people and other animals, of course. Apart from that, they’re very unforgiving. They’ve also a good memory for anything good. But their psychology, you understand, is far more complex than, say, a dog or a cat’s. They’re more intelligent, more secretive; capable of concealing feelings and affections.”
Having drunk his tea, Viktor jotted down his telephone number on a piece of paper.
“If you want anything, ring,” he said, handing it to the penguinologist.
“Thank you, thank you. And you ring, too, and come and see me.”
As the old man got up, Viktor again noticed that his feet were bare.
“Won’t you catch cold?” he asked.
“No,” Pidpaly assured him. “I do yoga. I’ve a book with photographs – all Indian yogis go barefoot.”
“Only because India has no winter, and shoes are expensive,” Viktor said, letting himself out. “Goodbye.”
“Happy New Year!” called Pidpaly after his departing visitor.
30
Waking very early a few days before New Year, Viktor noticed three large brightly wrapped parcels under the tree in the living room. He looked in at Sonya. She was still asleep.
Who had put them there? Sonya or Grandfather Frost?
He washed, went to the kitchen, and there on the table was an envelope.
This, on top of an uneasy night’s sleep, was the limit.
He remembered dreaming he had been hiding from someone at dead of night in a strange flat, listening tensely to a silence occasionally broken by faint footsteps and the squeaking of doors. The envelope was sealed. He cut off one end with scissors, and clearly written in block-capitals, read:
HAPPY NEW YEAR! MY THANKS FOR SONYA. HER PRESENTS AND YOURS ARE UNDER THE TREE. NAMESAKE’S PRESENT IS IN THE FREEZER. HOPING NEW YEAR WILL BRING YOU SOME RELIEF. SORRY I CAN’T POP IN …
TILL THEN – MISHA.
Viktor looked around, bewildered, as if expecting to see who had brought it.
He went and tried the door. It was, as usual, double-locked on the inside.
Shrugging, he returned to the kitchen. What had occurred was as inexplicable as it was blatant, and left him totally perplexed. His locks no longer protected him, whether sleeping or awake, and in case of danger would be useless.
He was not so much alarmed as amazed.
Outside, cottony snow was gliding down at an angle to the wind.
31
When Sonya woke, she was delighted to find presents under the tree.
“You see!” she said. “Grandfather Frost! He could come again.”
Viktor gave a knowing smile.
After breakfast Sonya wanted to open her presents, but he stopped her.
“Mine’s there too,” he said, squatting down in front of her, “but it’s only the 29th! Two more days to go!”
Reluctantly she agreed to wait.
While Sonya busied herself telling Misha a fairy story in the bedroom, Viktor made coffee, then sat, cup in hand, at the table facing the window.
The year that was ending had brought much that was strange into his life. And it was ending strangely, engendering mixed feelings and thoughts. Loneliness had given way to a kind of semi-loneliness, a kind of semi-dependence. His own sluggish life force had borne him as on a wave to a strange island, where suddenly he had acquired responsibilities and money to discharge them. Remaining, in the process, remote from events and even from life itself, he had made no effort to grasp what was taking place around him. Until recently, with the arrival of Sonya. And even now, life around him was still dangerously unfathomable, as if he had missed the actual moment when the nature of events might have been fathomed.
His world was now him, Penguin Misha and Sonya, but so vulnerable did it seem, this little world, that should anything happen, it would be beyond his power to protect it. Not for lack of a weapon or karate skills, but simply because, containing no genuine attachment, no sense of unity, no woman, it was too ready to crumble. Sonya was someone else’s little girl temporarily in his care, his penguin was sickly and sad, and under no obligation to show gratitude doggy-fashion, wagging his tail after fresh-frozen fish.
His reflections interrupted by the phone, he went back to the living room to answer it.
It was the Chief.
“Coming round for half an hour. All right?”
“Fine,” said Viktor.
He peeped into the bedroom. Sonya and the penguin were standing facing each other.
“Have you understood what I’ve said?” she was asking, and her tone was insistent.
They were, he now saw, much the same height.
“Very well,” said Sonya, “and then I’ll make you a new suit in quite a different colour …”
Smiling, he tiptoed away. An hour later the Chief arrived, and spent a long time shaking snow from his long overcoat before finally coming in.
“Happy New Year!” he said, putting down a heavy carrier bag.
They went through into the kitchen, where Igor Lvovich pulled from his bag a bottle of champagne, a lemon, a couple of tins and several packages.
He called for a cutting board and knives, and together they sliced sausage, cheese and baguette. After which Viktor fetched glasses.
“Got a cat, have you?” the Chief asked, noting the fish head in the bowl on the little bedside table by the stove.
“No, a penguin.”
He laughed. “You’re joking!”
“I’m not. Come and see.”
Viktor took him to the bedroom.
“And who’s this then?” asked the Chief, seeing the little girl. “Didn’t you say you weren’t married?”
