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gates.
Only once my friends and I climbed on to the stone coping of the railings and tried to see what was
going on round the mansion. As we stood barefoot on the rough sun-warmed granite, pressing our faces
against the iron railings, a tall, gaunt man in a long grey jacket popped up out of the garden and lashed at
me with a black silver-embossed walking-stick.
We scattered like frightened sparrows, afraid that the tall man might call up the Petlura guards to deal
with us. They would give us a taste of something worse than a walking-stick their long whips tipped
with bits, of lead.
I well remembered the face of the stranger cruel and scraggy and covered with yellow wrinkles. He
was said to be the brother of the countess, who had fled from somewhere near Kiev, to escape the
Bolsheviks.
So it was not for nothing that the Extraordinary Commission for Combating Counter-Revolutionary
Activities had arrested the countess when Petlura was driven out of the town. What happened to her
after that, I did not know.
Perhaps her brother was the husband of the local Rogale-Piontkovskaya, who, as Golovatsky put it,
was "luring the youth into her net..."
The day was still sultry, but there were many people about on the avenue. Holiday-makers in
skull-caps, broad-brimmed straw hats, or simply with wet towels wound round their heads, were
wandering home from the beach, bemused and exhausted by the heat. Some of them clustered round the
kiosks to buy cool buza, iced lemonade, and mineral waters. Others, mostly men, slipped into the
co-operative wine-shop on the corner, where they quenched their thirst with glasses of Azov wine.
Peering into the shops and lingering in front of their smart windows, I walked down the avenue, my
heels sinking into" the soft asphalt. Before knocking-off time I had found out from Gladyshev that
Rogale-Piontkovskaya's saloon was at 25, Genoa Street.
Suddenly I lost interest in all other passers-by except one who had popped up in front of me, as if
from nowhere. The soldierly bearing of the man in front struck me as being very familiar. But for his light
summer suit and soft panama hat with a broad blue ribbon, I should have rushed up to him at once and
greeted him as an old friend.
"But I've never seen him in civilian clothes before... His walk's the same though, and the way he holds
his head up!... He must have come here for a holiday! Yes, that's it! Why didn't I think of it before!"
Overtaking the man in the light suit, who had stopped in front of a chemist's shop-window stacked
with bottles and jars, I peered into his face.
Yes, it was him!
I stepped forward and touching his elbow said: "Hullo, Comrade Vukovich! How did you get here?"
With surprising coolness, as if he had been expecting me to approach him, the man with the face of
Vukovich turned round and said: "You must be mistaken, young man. . ." And he gave me a mocking
glance, as if pitying me for my foolish error.
I don't remember what I muttered in reply. It was not an apology. I must have said "Gosh!" or
something like that. And utterly confused, I walked quickly away, so as not to attract the attention of
bystanders. "Well, some people are alike, aren't they!" I thought. That man was just like Vukovich... If it
had been Vukovich, he would have been sure to say "hullo" to me. Specially after that long talk we had in
his office, when Nikita and I went to see him. Coming home, I decided not to tell the boys about my
blunder.
25, Genoa Street turned out to be quite an ordinary-looking house. From the ticket-seller in a plaid
frock who was laying out little books of tickets on her table I learnt that the dancing would begin in an
hour. Well, I wasn't going to hang about here all that time just to see their capers! I wandered slowly
down Genoa Street, towards the outskirts.
The street led me to a. district of little cottages, known as the Liski. All round me there were
allotments. I made my way along the edge of the settlement to the beach.
Tarred fishing smacks with lowered sails heaved at anchor near the shore. Nets were drying on the
seaweed-strewn sand. I felt the breeze from the open sea on my face mingled with the smells of smoked
fish, seaweed, and tar.
The deserted sandy beach stretched away towards Nogaisk. At the mouth of a ravine that ran down
to the sea stood a large villa with a red-tiled roof. The purple glow of the setting sun was reflected in the
windows that looked on to the Liski and the glass seemed to flame in the sun's nays. It was as if a fire
were raging inside the villa. I remembered the foundry men's tales about the former owner of the works,
John Caiworth, who had gone back to his home abroad, and decided that it must !be his villa I could see
in the distance. You had only to compare it with the little white cottages scattered along the sea shore to [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
