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on to the square.
"Wait, Tiktor, let's. . ." Petka began, but I checked him: "Let him go... He's up to his old game again."
"Bit of a handful, that lad!" the driver said indignantly, shaking his head. " 'Bourgeois luxury!' I like that!
Why I wouldn't drive a bourgeois for a million rubles. I was a partisan myself once..."
"Well, how much is it to the centre?" I interrupted him. "Oh, I'll take you for fifty apiece." "Too much,"
I said. "Try some bargaining, Petka!" "How much will you pay then?" the driver asked hurriedly.
"Twenty kopeks each," Petka grunted.
"All right, it's a deal," the driver agreed. "Better than nothing!"
He put Petka's basket and kettle in the break and was about to pick up my wooden case, when I
stopped him and said to the chaps: "Why should we take our things? Let's leave them at the station. Then
we'll have our hands free."
"Won't they get stolen?" Petka asked.
"Who'll steal them, fat head! The state will be looking after them," I assured him.
The receipt for our luggage was entrusted to Petka, and our treasurer remembering how I had been
robbed in Kharkov, plunged the precious document deep info his pocket, glancing warily at the swarthy
driver.
We took our seats and the break clattered gaily over the cobbles.
Stone gutters brimming with yellow water stretched along both sides of the road. Low white cottages
with red or grey tiled roofs stood back from the road in clean little yards sprinkled with sand and small
sea-shells.
Here and there we glimpsed grape-vines, apricots and young cherry-trees through the fences.
Flower-beds blazed with nasturtiums and peonies.
We stared curiously at the first street of the town where we were to live and work.
On a sign-board fixed to a corner house I read: "Avenue of the Thirteen Communards," and again I
was reminded of our border town and the special detachments.
"Been having a lot of rain?" Petka asked the driver. "Ever since the storm started. Must be the third
day," said Volodya, checking the bay horse. "Yesterday we had hail. Great big stuff. More like
buck-shot than hail! Knocked the young grapes about."
"But before that was it hot?"
"Africa!'-' the driver replied. "I was in the sea most of the day. Sweltering it was. Look how brown I
am."
The driver's words cheered us up. So the wind and the puddles in the street were temporary things. If
we couldn't find a place to live, it wouldn't be so bad to sleep the night on a park bench.
The familiar figure of Tiktor loomed ahead. He was walking into town with long, heavy strides,
carrying his green suit-case on his shoulder.
He had insisted on walking just to show that he did not want to have anything to do with us. But all
the same we felt bad about it. He was one of us and there he was, plodding along on foot, carrying his
luggage. We really were like a lot of pot-bellied old businessmen jogging along in this flashy break!
Petka, who was more soft-hearted than any of us, could not help whispering:
"Let's whistle him, chaps, shall we?"
"We can whistle him," I said, "but he'll only show off all the more. Forgotten what he was like on the
journey? He wants us to lick his boots. Nothing doing!"
"Vasil's right," Sasha agreed. "Yasha thinks he's the only pebble on the beach.. . Let him ask for a lift
himself, if he's tired."
But Yasha had no intention of stopping the break. He walked on with his head high. The wind ruffled
his blonde forelock that bunched out proudly under his grey cap. His eyes were narrowed fiercely. Tiktor
pretended not to notice us at all.
Volodya spat. " 'Bourgeois luxury!' Bah! The young devil! Thinks I'll get rich on his twenty kopeks!
Carry your luggage, you skinflint... Do you come from the same place as him, lads?"
"Round about there," I answered evasively, reluctant to tell a stranger about our personal relations.
"Come to stay at the holiday home, I expect?" the driver asked, whipping up his horse.
"What makes you think that?" Sasha said in surprise. "Savages, eh?"
"What do you mean, 'savages'?" I asked indignantly. "That's what we call 'em. Holiday-makers who
don't book anything in advance. You'll rent a room in some private house, I suppose, and lie on the
beach sunning yourselves for a month or two. Is that it?"
Embarrassed by the driver's curiosity, I said sternly: "We've come here to work. We passed out from
a factory-training school in our own town and have been sent to work at the Red Lieutenant Schmidt
Works. Is there a place of that name here?"
" 'Course there is! Used to be the John Caiworth Works. But they haven't taken anyone on for a long
time. Our own folk are -at the office every day asking for work."
We exchanged glances.
"Unskilled, I suppose?" Petka asked worriedly.
"All kinds. Unskilled and skilled. But if you've been sent, may be..." [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]