Authors: Mikhail Bulgakov
Man becomes nobler in the lap of
nature. Alexander Se-myonovich too did not seem quite as unpleasant as in the
town. And he wasn't wearing that revolting jacket. His face had a bronze
tan,
the unbuttoned calico shirt revealed a chest thickly
covered with black hair. He had canvas trousers on.
And his eyes were calmer and kinder.
Alexander Semyonovich trotted excitedly down
the colon-naded porch, which sported a notice with the words "Red Ray
State Farm" under a star, and went straight to the truck that had just
brought the three black chambers under escort.
All day Alexander Semyonovich worked hard with
his assistants setting up the chambers in the former winter garden, the
Sheremetevs' conservatory.
By evening all was ready. A white
frosted arc lamp shone under the glass roof, the chambers were set up on bricks
and, after much tapping and turning of shining knobs, the mechanic who had come
with the chambers produced the mysterious red ray on the asbestos floor in the
black crates.
Alexander Semyonovich bustled about, climbing
up the ladder himself and checking the wiring.
The next day the same truck came back from the
station and spat out three boxes of magnificent smooth plywood stuck all over
with labels and white notices on a black background that read: "Vorsicht:
Eier!"
"Eggs.
Handle
with care!"
"Why have they sent so few?"
Alexander Semyonovich exclaimed in surprise and set about unpacking the eggs at
once. The unpacking also took place in the conservatory with the participation
of the following: Alexander Semyonovich himself, his unusually plump wife
Manya, the one-eyed former gardener of the former Sheremetevs, who now worked
for the state farm in the universal post of watchman, the guard doomed to live
on the state farm, and the cleaning girl Dunya. It was not
more friendly
and more homely. Alexander Semyonovich gave
the instructions, glancing avidly from time to time at the boxes which lay like
some rich present under the gentle sunset glow from the upper panes in the
conservatory. The guard, his rifle dozing peacefully by the door, was ripping
open the braces and metal bands with a pair of pliers. There was a sound of
cracking wood. Clouds of dust rose up. Alexander Semyonovich padded around in
his sandals, fussing by the boxes.
"Gently does it," he said to the
guard. "Be careful. Can't you see
it's
eggs?"
"Don't worry," croaked the
provincial warrior, bashing away happily.
"Won't be a minute..."
Wrr-ench.
Down came
another shower of dust.
The eggs were beautifully packed: first came
sheets of waxed paper under the wooden top, next some blotting paper, then a
thick layer of wood shavings and finally the sawdust in which the white egg-tops
nestled.
"Foreign packing," said Alexander
Semyonovich lovingly, rummaging around in the sawdust. "Not the way we do
it. Careful, Manya, or you'll break them."
"Have you gone daft, Alexander
Semyonovich," replied his wife. "What's so special about this lot?
Think I've never seen eggs before?
Oh, what big ones!"
"Foreign," said Alexander
Semyonovich, laying the eggs out on the wooden table. "Not like our poor
old peasant eggs. Bet they're all brahmaputras, the
devil
take
them! German..."
"I should say so," the guard agreed,
admitting the eggs.
"Only why are they so dirty?"
Alexander Semyonovich mused thoughtfully.
"Keep an eye on things, Manya.
Tell them to go on unloading. I'm going off to make a phone call."
And Alexander Semyonovich went to use the
telephone in the farm office across the yard.
That evening the phone rang in the laboratory
at the Zoological Institute. Professor Persikov tousled his hair and went to
answer it.
"Yes?" he asked.
"There's a call for you from the
provinces," a female voice hissed quietly down the receiver.
"Well, put it through then," said
Persikov disdainfully into the black mouthpiece. After a bit of crackling a
far-off male voice asked anxiously in his ear:
"Should the eggs be
washed.
Professor?"
"What's that? What? What did you
say?" snapped Persikov irritably.
"Where are you speaking
from?"
"Nikolskoye, Smolensk Province," the
receiver replied.
"Don't understand.
Never
heard of it.
Who's that speaking?"
"Feight," the receiver said sternly.
"What Feight? Ah, yes. It's you. What did
you want to know?"
"Whether to wash them.
They've sent a batch of chicken eggs from abroad..."
"Well?"
"But they're all mucky..."
"You must be wrong. How can they be
'mucky', as you put it? Well, of course, maybe a few, er, droppings got stuck
to them, or something of the sort."
"So what about washing them?"
"No need at all, of course. Why, are you
putting the eggs into the chambers already?"
"Yes, I am," the receiver replied.
"Hm," Persikov grunted.
"So long," the receiver clattered
and fell silent.
"So long," Persikov repeated
distastefully to Decent Ivanov. "How do you like that character, Pyotr
Stepanovich?"
Ivanov laughed.
"So it was him, was it? I can imagine
what he'll concoct out of those eggs."
"Ye-e-es," Persikov began
maliciously. "Just think, Pyotr Stepanovich.
Well, of course, it's highly possible
that the ray will have the same effect on the deuteroplasma of a chicken egg as
on the plasma of amphibians. It is also highly possible that he will hatch out
chickens. But neither you nor I can say precisely what sort of chickens they
will be. They may be of no earthly use to anyone. They may die after a day or
two. Or they may be inedible. And can I even guarantee that they'll be able to
stand up. Perhaps they'll have brittle bones." Persikov got excited, waved
his hand and crooked his fingers.
"Quite so," Ivanov agreed.
"Can you guarantee, Pyotr
Stepanovich, that
they will be able to reproduce? Perhaps
that character will hatch out sterile chickens. He'll make them as big as a
dog, and they won't have any chicks until kingdom come."
"Precisely," Ivanov agreed.
"And such nonchalance," Persikov was
working himself into a fury.
"Such perkiness!
And
kindly note that I was asked to instruct that scoundrel."
Persikov pointed to the warrant
delivered by Feight (which was lying on the experimental table). "But how
am I to instruct that ignoramus when I myself can say nothing about the
question?"
"Couldn't you have refused?" asked
Ivanov.
Persikov turned purple, snatched up the
warrant and showed it to Ivanov who read it and gave an ironic smile.
"Yes, I see," he said significantly.
"And kindly note also that I've been
expecting my shipment for two months, and there's still no sign of it. But that
rascal got his eggs straightaway and all sorts of assistance."
"It won't do him any good, Vladimir
Ipatych. In the end they'll just give you back your chambers."
"Well, let's hope it's soon, because
they're holding up my experiments."
"Yes, that's dreadful. I've got
everything ready."
"Has the protective clothing
arrived?"
"Yes, today."
Persikov was somewhat reassured by this and
brightened up.
"Then I think we'll proceed like this. We
can close the doors of the operating-room tight and open up the windows."
"Of course," Ivanov agreed.
"Three helmets?"
"Yes, three."
"Well then, that's you and me, and we'll
ask one of the students. He can have the third helmet."
"Grinmut would do."
"That's the one you've got working on
salamanders, isn't it? Hm, he's not bad, but, if you don't mind my saying so,
last spring he didn't know the difference between a Pseudotyphlops and a
Platyplecturus," Persikov added with rancour.
"But he's not bad. He's a good
student," Ivanov defended him.
"We'll have to go without sleep
completely for one night," Persikov went on. "Only you must check the
gas, Pyotr Stepanovich. The devil only knows what it's like. That
Volunteer-Chem lot might send us some rubbish."
"No, no," Ivanov waved his hands.
"I tested it yesterday. You must give them some credit, Vladimir Ipatych,
the gas is excellent."
"What did you try it on?"
"Some common toads.
You just spray them with it and they die instantly.
And another thing,
Vladimir Ipatych.
Write and ask the GPU to send you an electric
revolver."
"But I don't know how to use it."
"I'll see to that," Ivanov replied.
"We tried one out on the Klyazma, just for fun. There was a GPU chap
living next to me. It's a wonderful thing.
And incredibly
efficient.
Kills outright at a hundred paces without
making a sound.
We were shooting ravens. I don't even think we'll need
the gas."
"Hm, that's a bright idea.
Very bright."
Persikov went into the comer, lifted the
receiver and barked:
"Give me that, what's it called,
Lubyanka."
The weather was unusually hot. You could see
the rich transparent heat shimmering over the fields. But the nights were
wonderful, green and deceptive. The moon made the former estate of the
Sheremetevs look too beautiful for words. The palace-cum-state farm glistened
as if it were made of sugar, shadows quivered in the park, and the ponds had
two different halves, one a slanting column of light, the other fathomless
darkness. In the patches of moonlight you could easily read Izvestia, except
for the chess section which was in small nonpareil. But on nights like these no
one read Izvestia, of course. Dunya the cleaner was in the woods behind the
state farm and as coincidence would have it, the ginger-moustached driver of
the farm's battered truck happened to be there too. What they were doing there
no one knows. They were sheltering in the unreliable shade of an elm tree, on
the driver leather coat which was spread out on the ground. A lamp shone in the
kitchen, where the two market-gardeners were having supper, and Madame Feight
was sitting in a white neglige on the columned veranda, gazing at the beautiful
moon and dreaming.
At ten o'clock in the evening when the sounds
had died down in the village of Kontsovka behind the state farm, the idyllic
landscape was filled with the charming gentle playing of a flute. This fitted
in with the groves and former columns of the Sheremetev palace more than words
can say. In the duet the voice of the delicate Liza from The Queen of Spades
blended with that of the passionate Polina and soared up into.
the
moonlit heights like a vision of the old and yet
infinitely dear, heartbreakingly entrancing regime.
Do fade away... Fade away...
piped
the flute,
trilling and sighing.
The copses were hushed, and Dunya, fatal as a
wood nymph, listened, her cheek pressed against the rough, ginger and manly
cheek of the driver.
"He don't play bad, the bastard,"
said the driver, putting a manly arm round Dunya's waist.
The flute was being played by none other than
the manager of the state farm himself, Alexander Semyonovich Feight, who, to do
him justice, was playing it beautifully. The fact of the matter was that
Alexander Semyonovich had once specialised in the flute. Right up to 1917 he
had played in the well-known concert ensemble of the maestro Petukhov, filling
the foyer of the cosy little Magic Dreams cinema in the town of Yekaterinoslav
with its sweet notes every evening. But the great year of 1917, which broke the
careers of so many, had swept Alexander Semyonovich onto a new path too. He
left the Magic Dreams and the dusty star-spangled satin of its foyer to plunge
into the open sea of war and revolution, exchanging his flute for a
death-dealing Mauser. For a long time he was tossed about on waves which washed
him ashore, now in the Crimea, now in Moscow, now in Turkestan, and even in
Vladivostok. It needed the revolution for Alexander Semyonovich to realise his
full potential. It turned out that here was a truly great man, who should not
be allowed to waste his talents in the foyer of Magic Dreams, of course.
Without going into unnecessary detail, we shall merely say that the year
before, 1927, and the beginning of 1928 had found Alexander Semyonovich in
Turkestan where he first edited a big newspaper and then, as a local member of
the Supreme Economic Commission, became renowned for his remarkable
contribution to the irrigation of Turkestan. In 1928 Feight came to Moscow and
received some well-deserved leave. The Supreme Commission of the organisation,
whose membership card this provincially old-fashioned man carried with honour
in his pocket, appreciated his qualities and appointed him to a quiet and
honorary post. Alas and alack! To the great misfortune of the Republic,
Alexander Semyonovich's seething brain did not quieten down. In Moscow Feight
learned of Persikov's
discovery,
and in the rooms of
Red Paris in Tverskaya Street Alexander Semyonovich had the brainwave of using
the ray to restore the Republic's poultry in a month. The Animal Husbandry
Commission listened to what he had to say, agreed with him, and Feight took his
warrant to the eccentric scientist.
The concert over the glassy waters, the grove
and the park was drawing to a close, when something happened to cut it short.
The dogs in Kontsovka, who
Should
have been fast
asleep by then, suddenly set up a frenzied barking, which gradually turned into
an excruciating general howl. The howl swelled up, drifting over the fields,
and was answered by a high-pitched concert from the million frogs on the ponds.
All this was so ghastly, that for a moment the mysterious enchanted night
seemed to fade away.