small for my age that time.
71
The only teachers who attended this meeting were Korablev and
Nikolai Antonich. Korablev made a rather impressive speech, first
congratulating us briefly on the formation of the Group, then criticising
us at length for being poor pupils and hooligans. Nikolai Antonich also
made a speech. It was a fine speech, in which he greeted the Branch
representatives, whom he described as the young generation, and ended
up by reciting a poem of Nekrasov's.
After the meeting I met him in the corridor and said: 'Good morning,
Nikolai Antonich!' For some reason he did not answer me.
In short, all was in order, and I don't know what made me suddenly
change my mind about going to the Tatarinovs and decide to meet Katya
in the street the next day and give her the modelling-knife and clay she
had asked for. Within half an hour, however, I had changed my mind
again.
The old lady answered the door, but kept it on the chain, when she
saw me. She seemed to be debating with herself whether to let me in or
not. Then she quickly opened the door, whispered to me:
'Go into the kitchen,' and gave me a gentle push in the back.
While I hesitated, rather surprised, Nikolai Antonich came into the
hall, and seeing me, he switched on the light.
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'A-ah!' he said in a suppressed voice. 'You're here.'
He gripped my shoulder roughly.
'You ungrateful sneak, scoundrel, spy! Get out of this house and stay
out! Do you hear?'
His lips drew back in a snarl and I caught the glint of a gold tooth in
his mouth. This was the last thing I saw in the home of the Tatarinovs.
With one hand Nikolai Antonich opened the door and with the other he
threw me out onto the landing like a pup.
CHAPTER TEN
I GO AWAY
There was nobody in the Children's Home, nobody in the school.
Everyone had gone out—it was a Sunday. Only Romashka wandered
about the empty rooms, counting something to himself-probably his
future wealth-and the cook in the kitchen sang as he prepared dinner. I
settled myself in a warm cosy corner by the stove and fell to thinking.
Yes, this was Korablev's doing. I had tried to help him, and this was
how he had repaid me. He had gone to Nikolai Antonich and given me
away.
They had been right-Nikolai Antonich, and the German-cum-French
teacher and even Likho, who had said that Korablev shed 'crocodile
tears' at meetings. He was a cad. To think that I had been sorry for him
because Maria Vasilievna had rejected him!
Romashka was sitting by the window, counting.
'Goodbye, Romashka,' I said to him. 'I'm going away.'
'Where to?'
'Turkestan,' I said, though a minute before that I had not had a
thought about Turkestan.
'You're kidding!'
I slipped off the pillow-case and stuffed all my belongings into it—a
shirt, a spare pair of trousers, and the black tube which Doctor Ivan
Ivanovich had left with me long ago. I smashed all my toads and hares
and flung them into the rubbish-bin. The figure of the girl with the
ringlets on her forehead who looked a little like Katya went in there too.
Romashka watched me with interest. He was still counting in a
whisper, but with nothing like his previous fervour.
'If for one ruble forty thousand, then for a hundred rubles...'
Goodbye school! I would never study any more. What for? I had been
taught to read, write and count. What more did I need? Good enough
for me. And nobody would miss me when I was gone. Maybe Valya
would remember me for a moment, and then forget.
'Then for a hundred rubles four hundred,' Romashka whispered.
'Four hundred thousand per cent on a hundred rubles.'
But I would be coming back. And Korablev, who would be kicked out
of the school, would come to me moaning and begging me to forgive
him. No fear!
Then suddenly I recollected how he had stood by the window when I
called on him, staring into the yard, very sad and a little tipsy. It
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couldn't be him, surely? Why should he have betrayed me? On the
contrary, he had probably given no sign, pretending not to know
anything about that secret council. I was wrong to suspect him. It wasn't
him at all. Then who could it be?
'Ah, it's Valya!' I suddenly said to myself. 'When I got back from the
Tatarinovs I had told him everything. It was Valya!'
But Valya, I remember, had started snoring in the middle of my story.
Besides, Valya would never do a thing like that.
Romashka, maybe? I looked at him. Pale, with red ears, he sat on the
window-sill, multiplying away like mad. I fancied that he was watching
me furtively like a bird, with one round flat eye. But he knew nothing,
how could he?
Now that I had firmly decided that it was not Korablev, there was no
sense in going away. But my head was aching and my ears were ringing,
and somehow I felt that I had to go, I couldn't stay, not after Г had told
Romashka I was going.
With a sigh, I picked up my bundle, nodded to Romashka and went
out. I must have been running a temperature, because on going out into
the street I was surprised to find it so cold. But then, while still in the
