scandal. The Party members at the embassy got together to try her. She pleaded that her underwear were her best clothes—and got off!”
A black cat, its hair slick from the rain, wanders by, pauses to rub against Pravdin’s trouser leg. Pravdin takes it as an omen but Nadezhda smiles, reaches down to touch its fur, then writes to Pravdin: “How very intelligent of it to be all black.”
A blond boy wearing an embroidered Cossack shirt passes on the gravel path behind the bench. “Such a beautiful shirt,” Nadezhda writes. “My grandfather used to wear such shirts.”
“You like it?” Pravdin demands. “Ho, comrade, for how much do you sell your shirt?”
The boy shakes his head. “I don’t sell it,” he replies seriously, “but I’ll trade it.”
“Trade it is a good idea,” Pravdin exclaims, pulling several Swiss watches from his briefcase. “For one of these you’ll have to throw in some cash.”
“I’ll trade my shirt for her shirt,” the boy grins.
Pravdin looks from one to the other in confusion but Nadezhda understands instantly. Leaping from the bench she strips off her shirt and holds it out to the boy. He studies her small pointed breasts for a delicious moment, then pulls his peasant shirt over his head and exchanges with her.
Nadezhda pulls on the embroidered shirt, which is much too big for her, and starts to roll up the sleeves. Pravdin turns away, red faced. The boy walks off with her shirt folded under his arm singing, “Why do girls like handsome boys?”
Climbing the narrow steel steps that lead to the top of the hill, Nadezhda asks Pravdin if he likes her new shirt.
“It is reasonably ugly,” he answers, still in a bad humor.
“How can something be reasonable and ugly?” she asks.
“It is a play on words.”
“You must not play with words,” she writes. “They are serious things, words.”
At the top Nadezhda rinses her feet in some clear rain puddles and dries them with a scarf, hoists herself up on the low wall to sit in the sun. Lomonosov University towers behind them, Moscow is spread out like a buffet before them: the thin needle of the TV tower, the Kremlin with the river twined around it like a vine, several Stalin gothics. Just across the river a soccer game is in progress in a giant bowl of a stadium, and every now and then a roar from the crowd drifts over the river.
“Explain if you can,” Nadezhda writes, “why it is you live the way you live?”
“I live the way I do, little sister, in order to live.”
Nadezhda dismisses the answer with an annoyed shake of her head.
Pravdin tries again. “When I came out of the camps, an old man of thirty-one is what I was. I had no skill, no profession; all I had was a notation in my workbook that I had served time, and another notation on my internal passport that I was Jewish. Between the two who would give me a job? Nobody would give me a job is who. So I threw away my workbook and became self-employed. The only way I could live was inside the Jewish cliché—as a hustler on the make. As long as I do what everyone expects me to do, I am left to my own devices. I also have a theory, if you want to know it, that I fulfill a very important function in our socialist paradise. I supply people who have money with something to spend it on.”
“You make yourself sound important,” Nadezhda notes on her pad.
“Important is what I am,” Pravdin says sourly. “I take from the rich and give to me.” And he bends down and scrawls in chalk along the sidewalk under Nadezhda’s feet:
Behind every fortune is a crime
(H. de Balzac: Pravdin once spent two months in solitary with a Balzac nut).
Nadezhda winds the sandal straps around her ankles, ties them, starts walking toward the Metro station.
“Thank you,” she jots on a slip that she offers to Pravdin.
Still annoyed about the exchange of shirts, he crumples the note without reading it. “How could you do such a thing?” he demands, tugging at the
A black cat, its hair slick from the rain, wanders by, pauses to rub against Pravdin’s trouser leg. Pravdin takes it as an omen but Nadezhda smiles, reaches down to touch its fur, then writes to Pravdin: “How very intelligent of it to be all black.”
A blond boy wearing an embroidered Cossack shirt passes on the gravel path behind the bench. “Such a beautiful shirt,” Nadezhda writes. “My grandfather used to wear such shirts.”
“You like it?” Pravdin demands. “Ho, comrade, for how much do you sell your shirt?”
The boy shakes his head. “I don’t sell it,” he replies seriously, “but I’ll trade it.”
“Trade it is a good idea,” Pravdin exclaims, pulling several Swiss watches from his briefcase. “For one of these you’ll have to throw in some cash.”
“I’ll trade my shirt for her shirt,” the boy grins.
Pravdin looks from one to the other in confusion but Nadezhda understands instantly. Leaping from the bench she strips off her shirt and holds it out to the boy. He studies her small pointed breasts for a delicious moment, then pulls his peasant shirt over his head and exchanges with her.
Nadezhda pulls on the embroidered shirt, which is much too big for her, and starts to roll up the sleeves. Pravdin turns away, red faced. The boy walks off with her shirt folded under his arm singing, “Why do girls like handsome boys?”
Climbing the narrow steel steps that lead to the top of the hill, Nadezhda asks Pravdin if he likes her new shirt.
“It is reasonably ugly,” he answers, still in a bad humor.
“How can something be reasonable and ugly?” she asks.
“It is a play on words.”
“You must not play with words,” she writes. “They are serious things, words.”
At the top Nadezhda rinses her feet in some clear rain puddles and dries them with a scarf, hoists herself up on the low wall to sit in the sun. Lomonosov University towers behind them, Moscow is spread out like a buffet before them: the thin needle of the TV tower, the Kremlin with the river twined around it like a vine, several Stalin gothics. Just across the river a soccer game is in progress in a giant bowl of a stadium, and every now and then a roar from the crowd drifts over the river.
“Explain if you can,” Nadezhda writes, “why it is you live the way you live?”
“I live the way I do, little sister, in order to live.”
Nadezhda dismisses the answer with an annoyed shake of her head.
Pravdin tries again. “When I came out of the camps, an old man of thirty-one is what I was. I had no skill, no profession; all I had was a notation in my workbook that I had served time, and another notation on my internal passport that I was Jewish. Between the two who would give me a job? Nobody would give me a job is who. So I threw away my workbook and became self-employed. The only way I could live was inside the Jewish cliché—as a hustler on the make. As long as I do what everyone expects me to do, I am left to my own devices. I also have a theory, if you want to know it, that I fulfill a very important function in our socialist paradise. I supply people who have money with something to spend it on.”
“You make yourself sound important,” Nadezhda notes on her pad.
“Important is what I am,” Pravdin says sourly. “I take from the rich and give to me.” And he bends down and scrawls in chalk along the sidewalk under Nadezhda’s feet:
Behind every fortune is a crime
(H. de Balzac: Pravdin once spent two months in solitary with a Balzac nut).
Nadezhda winds the sandal straps around her ankles, ties them, starts walking toward the Metro station.
“Thank you,” she jots on a slip that she offers to Pravdin.
Still annoyed about the exchange of shirts, he crumples the note without reading it. “How could you do such a thing?” he demands, tugging at the
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