188
PARTISAN REVIEW
I laid my palm on the back of his broad hand , which was
crisscrossed with a fascinating network of delicate blue blood vessels
and blotched with patches of brown pigmentation, like a landscape
of rivers and hills, and asked him how he was . Your father fixed me
with his hard, piercing eyes , and his enchanting face darkened . Sud–
denly he chuckled as though he had seen through my little scheme
but had decided to forgive me. Then he turned serious , frowned,
and demanded that I tell him if there is any pardon for Dostoevsky;
how was it possible that such a man of God "could beat his wife all
through the winter and then get drunk and play cards like a beast
while his baby is dying?"
Here he was apparently shocked at his own bad manners . He
snatched the chrysanthemums out of the yogurt glass , hurled them
disgustedly over his shoulder, pushed the glass toward me, and
asked me if I would care for some champagne . I raised the glass to
my lips - there were petals and dust floating on the murky liq–
uid - and pretended to take a sip. Meanwhile your father wolfed
down the remains of his cake . When he had finished it I took out a
hankie and brushed the crumbs from his beard. He responded by
stroking my hair and declaiming in tragic tones: "The wind,
krassavitsa,
the autumn wind, all day long stealing into gardens. Ho,
and its conscience is not clear! It knows no rest! Banished! And in
the night they start to ring the big bells. Soon snow will be falling,
and
we-dayosh/-will
ride on." Here he lost his way. He fell silent .
He gaped slightly, with a cloud of sadness on his face .
"And your health is all right, Volodya? The pains in your
shoulder have gone?"
"Pains? Not me! I don't have pains-he does. I heard tell that
he's alive, that he talked on the radio even.
If
I was in his place I
would marry a wife and immediately make her have a dozen babies ."
"Whose place, Volodya?"
"You know, that little fellow, whats-his-name. That one . The
little brother. Binyomin. The one who used to wander around in
front of the Arab village of Budrus with the first flock of sheep from
the settlement. Binyomin, they used to call him. Described to the life
in Dostoevsky! Even truer than he was in
realia!
I was in
realia
also,
but as a swine. We had another one there-Sioma. Sioma Axioma,
we used to call him. He was one in million. Not one ounce of swine
in him. He came from my hometown. Shirky. Minsk Region.
Realia
could not forgive him, and it killed him with love for woman. He
took his own lovely soul with my revolver. Could I do something to
