Written: Unknown date, by S. Podyachev
First Published: Moscow Pravda, November 25, 1921
Source: The Living Age, April-June, 1922.
Translated: Unknown
Transcription/Markup: Brian Reid
Public Domain: Soviet History Archive 2005. This work is completely free.
VASILY VASILICH TRUXIN, former innkeeper and shopowner, was singeing a slaughtered pig in a ravine outside the village, and near him, not so much helping as hindering, was busied a poor peasant, Anizim Puzir, a short man with white eyebrows and lashes, dressed in some sort of woman's garment.
A little way off stood a horse hitched to a sledge, and in the sledge was Grishka, son of Vasily Vasilich, a lad of twelve who resembled his father in face and manner.
The air was still and mild. Slowly and silently flakes of snow were falling from the low gray clouds. It was morning. Over the village was smoke, for the peasants were just kindling their fires. Somewhere far away in the forest, down in the ravine, a bell was ringing; and the sound of this bell, lingering and sweet, broke gently and tenderly upon the old order; and it seems to me that soon you, Vasily Vasilich, will again be raised to your high position as you were before. You'll get back your inn and everything else. Then there will be again some place for the orthodox Christian to rest - to warm himself, to think things over, and to hear a kind word. We're wild beasts and crazy so long as they govern us.'
'Stop, stop those cursed words! Get busy over there, you sheep! Now there's an economic policy. But you don't understand anything - philosopher!'
'What's that? Something new again? A decree? Again everything to be taken away from us? "Give, otherwise you'll lose it"?'
'Silence! Do you want to be shot, I say?'
'Things won't get on their feet that way. Our life is worse than that of your pigs there, by God! You gave him enough to eat before you killed him, at least; but what about us?'
'We have to teach you, fools! You're simpletons, devils! Good people do everything for you, and you don't understand what's good and crawl into the noose. Well, why are you living? What have you got? You look at me - they stripped me of everything because I was a bourgeois, and knew how to skin you devils, to get money from you. The poor peasants, heavens above, stripped me. They confiscated my property, they took away my money, everything. And look at me - I'm alive. You have to know how to do things. I lived before the revolution and I am living now, and I will go on living. The policy is now economic - all right, coöperation - all right. I wouldn't fail with any sort of a policy. Look what a pig I have. I knew how to feed it. And what have you?'
'Where could we get anything? How can we get pigs, if we are, as you may say, worse off than pigs? We aren't you.'
'What do you mean, "we aren't you"? Take a tighter hold, devil. You've held yourself down, old woman. What more of a prick do you need? What's the matter with life? It isn't life that 's bad, but you devils yourselves. What do you lack? Everything's yours. Did you use to live better than you do now? It was all the same trouble - you didn't have anything. You can't wash a black dog white. Do you expect that I will do something for you when you yourself are idle? Are you counting on other people? I don't count on other people, I count on myself. And I live and will live. They took away from me everything, even the cross - and I didn't say anything. What of it? Take, and I'll find something again. I am still a necessary person. And I didn't get angry. I praised them, called them fine fellows, comrades! They've put all the riffraff to work. Work and you'll eat, don't work and you won't. Fine! Do you remember how I lived, eh?'
'How could I help remembering? You had the most capital of anyone - an inn, a store, and all the rest.'
'And I lived in comfort. I knew how to get the kopeks. It used to be that what I wanted was mine. I didn't think of work. I didn't know how to use a plow. I didn't know how to handle a scythe, or how to load a cart. People used to do all that for me. But lately they knocked me down from that place, they stripped me, they humbled me, and showed me my place. And I thought to myself, "Stand up, Vaska: Get to work, if you want to live! Your easy days are gone." And I took hold and learned to plow and reap and lay a fire. I learned everything, brother, and now cutting up a pig doesn't bother me. Now I'm still living no worse off than other people. I am contented. I couldn't be better off. That is why, brother, I am satisfied with the present order and respect the administration of Lenin Ilich. He has opened my eyes. He has taught me to live. He has showed me where a pig has his tail. You can live behind his back. He has the earth at work. He is carrying on his policy as far as be can. But his efforts are all for nothing because you fools hinder the thing. You stop for no reason at all, like an unruly horse. You have to soothe it and cajole it and spur it on, but it keeps drawing back until it throws you into the gutter. There is the road before you. But what is the use of talking to you? Give me your knife - throw me here that little stick! Oh, you with your talk, look what you've done - you've burst open the back of the neck! Oh, the devil take you! You only hinder. There's one thing, if you don't do anything I won't give you a piece just for nothing. There's an economic policy for you, brother. H-mm. Let me exchange it for grain.'
'You are joking, Vasily Vasilich. What grain have I got?'
'Oh, you sly devil. You're also a free citizen. But you haven't anything, and won't have, because you are not a master but a workman. You never do anything by yourself. We always have to spur you on, show you, stick it in front of your nose, give you a cut with the whip, and say "take it, rascal!" You look at me. Here I am - look! I used to be a kulak (rich peasant), a bourgeois. They took everything away. They made away with capital. They thought: "He's done for!" But now, here I am, again on my feet, and you, naked and hungry as you have been, so you'll die. Ha, ha! Bite on that! Ho, ho, ho! Go to the devil! You've tired me. Yes, by God, Grishka, bring the horse here. The job is done. Let's go home and roast a piece of meat. He, ho, ho! Here I am - look at me - ho, ho, ho!'