I wished now I had left with Volodya. A choking sensation came into
my throat and I felt like getting up and going out into the fresh air, but I
lay where I was, merely turning over onto my stomach with my face in
my hands. So that was that! Incredible though it was, I could not stop
thinking about it for a minute. The incredible thing about it was
Romashka, for I could not imagine him and Katya together. But what
made me think she had not forgotten me all this time? After all, we
hadn't met for so many years.
Valya was asleep and my going out would probably have awakened
him. But I did not feel like talking to him any more, and so I remained
lying on my stomach, then on my back, then again on my stomach with
my face in my hands.
168
Afterwards—it must have been round about seven—the telephone
rang and Valya jumped up, sleepy-eyed, and ran into the next room
dragging the blanket behind him.
'It's for you,' he said, returning a moment later.
'Me?'
I threw my coat over my shoulders and went to the telephone.
'Sanya!' It was the doctor speaking. 'Where've you disappeared to?
I'm phoning from the Executive Committee office. I'm handing over the
receiver.'
'Comrade Grigoriev,' said another voice. It was the Zapolarie police
chief. 'An urgent matter. You have to fly to Camp Vanokan with Doctor
Pavlov. Do you know Ledkov?'
Did I know him! He was a member of the regional Executive
Committee and one of the most respected men in the North country.
Everyone knew him.
'He's wounded and needs urgent medical aid. When can you fly out?'
'Within an hour,' I said.
'And you, doctor?'
I did not catch the doctor's answer.
'Instruments all in order? Good. I'll see you in an hour's time then, at
the airfield.'
CHAPTER TEN
THE FLIGHT
These were the people aboard the plane on the morning of March 5th
when we took off and headed northeast: the doctor, anxious-looking,
wearing dark glasses, which changed his appearance surprisingly, my air
mechanic Luri, one of the most popular men in Zapolarie or wherever
else in the Arctic he happened to appear for at least three or four days,
and myself.
This was my fifteenth flight in the North, but my first flight to a
district where they had never seen a plane before. Camp Vanokan was a
very remote spot on one of the tributaries of the Pyasina. The doctor had
been on the Pyasina before and said it should not be difficult to find
Vanokan.
A member of the E.C. had been wounded. It had happened while he
was out hunting—so it was believed. Anyway, the doctor and I had been
asked to ascertain in what circumstances this had happened. We should
arrive at Vanokan about three o'clock, before it grew dark. For an
emergency, though, we took with us provisions for three men to last
thirty days, a primus-stove, a flare gun with a supply of flares, a shotgun
and cartridges, spades, a tent and an axe.
169
As for the weather, all I knew was that it was fine at Zapolarie but
what it was like along our route I had no idea. There was no time to get a
report and no one to give it.
And so all was in order when we took off from Zapolarie and headed
northeast. All was in order, and I was no longer thinking about what I
had heard from Valya the night before. Below me I could see the
Yenisei—a broad, white band between white banks, along which ran a
forest, now closing in, now drawing back. I had a slight headache after
that sleepless night and sometimes there was a ringing in my ears, but
only in my ears, for the engine was working splendidly.
After a while I left the line of the river, and the tundra began-a level,
endless, snowy plain unrelieved by a single black dot, nothing whatever
to catch the eye...
Why had I been so sure that this could never happen? I should have
written to her when she sent me her regards through Sanya. But I had
not wanted to make any advances to her until I had proved that I was
blameless. You must never be too sure of a woman's love, however. Sure
of her loving you in spite of everything.
Snow, snow, snow, wherever you looked. There were clouds ahead,
and I climbed and drove into them. Better to fly blind than have this
endless, dismal, white waste under you which distorted perspective.
I bore Romashka no particular malice, though if he had been here at
the moment I should probably have killed him. I bore him no malice,
simply because it was impossible to associate that man with Katya, that
man with the scruffy thatch on his head and the flaming ears, who had
decided at the age of thirteen to get rich and was always saving and
counting his money. His wanting to marry her was just as senseless as
his wanting, say, to suddenly become a different person other than
himself, someone with Katya's candour and beauty.
We passed through the cloud-bank and entered another, beyond
which snow was falling. The snow glittered somewhere down below
under the sun, which was hidden from us by clouds.
My feet had begun to grow chilled and I regretted that I had put on a
pair of fur boots which were a little too tight on me. I should have put on
larger ones.
So my mind was made up—1 was going to Moscow. I would have to let
her know I was coming, though. I must write her a letter, a letter that
she would read and never forget.
We emerged from the layer of dark clouds, and the sun, as always
