By this time, we had reached the town hall. Light streamed from the basement windows of the town's
first model Komsomol cafe. The cafe had been opened quite recently by Komsomol members of the food- workers' group in the building that had once housed Barenboim's tavern. Hard-pressed by the finance department's high tax on private enterprise, Barenboim had surrendered, and the whole tavern, the cellars of which extended 'far under the town hall, had been handed over to the youth of. the town. Komsomol members from the town power station had put in new wiring, the public utility groups had painted the walls and put the floors in order, joiners from our school, under their instructor's guidance, had made fine tables for the new cafe; even we, foundry men, had cast a new stove for it, in our school foundry.
The first Komsomol cafe was the pride of every Komsomol member in our town, and not only because we had taken part in the making of it; we saw that this was the way to deal with the private traders and drive them for ever out of Soviet trade.
As we passed the cafe window, we noticed with pride the young waitresses in white aprons going to and fro between the tables we had made, taking the customers glasses of fragrant Chinese tea, coffee with whipped cream, and flavoured soda water in blue siphons. The cleanliness and order, and above all, the knowledge that no one would fleece you, attracted many customers to the cafe. Nearly all the tables were taken.
While we lingered near the cafe, the door opened and Vukovich and his wife came out. I raised my cap.
Vukovich smiled and gave me a very smart salute, not just a careless wave, but a real salute, with his fingers straight and touching the shiny peak of his frontier guard's cap.
'Who's that, Vasil?' Sasha asked curiously.
'That's. . . Comrade Vukovich,' I answered carelessly.
'You mean the Vukovich?' Sasha exclaimed, staring after the frontier guard enviously. 'And I never knew. . . But he saluted you. . .'
'What of it? He knows me well.'
'Didn't you see him when we were on duty at headquarters?' Petka asked.
'Er, no. . . I didn't,' Sasha mumbled.
And suddenly I remembered how Sasha had pretended to be ill, while Vukovich and Polevoi were trying to find out what could have happened to the unknown bandit. All the chaps had peeped out of the guard-room window to have a look at Vukovich; only Sasha had lain on the couch, making his teeth chatter and pretending he had an attack of fever...
'I say, chaps, what about going to the river tomorrow morning?' Sasha said suddenly. 'The water will be even colder in the morning.'
'Will it really!' Petka jeered. 'So you've lost the bet! All right, come on and treat us to some pop. With a double dose of syrup in it, mind you!'
'Hey, chaps!'
Jumping over a near-by fence, Furman and Guzarchik came running towards us.
.'Is. that how you've been getting ready for your tests!' Petka demanded.
'What tests!' bawled Guzarchik, who seemed to be madly excited about something. 'Tell us where we can find a map of the Ukraine.'
'There's one at school, you asses. In the cupboard in the office,' said Petka.
'What do you want a map for?' Sasha asked.
'I know it's in the cupboard,' Guzarchik shouted, ignoring Sasha, 'but the clerk's got the key to the cupboard and he won't be here till the day after tomorrow.'
'But what do you want a map for?' I asked. 'You're taking mechanics.'
'What for! Are you joking? Don't you know?' And clapping his hand to his forehead, Monya shouted: 'But you don't know anything, you duffers! We're going!!!'
'Going where?' Sasha exclaimed.
'Going, going, going!!! Hurrah! Vivat!' Monka roared, tap-dancing on the pavement.
'Talk sense, can't you!' I shouted at Guzarchik.
'We were sitting there swotting away at mechanics and suddenly we saw the postman. And in his hand there was a letter. A great big thing, with seals all over it. 'Where's your director?' he says. 'I've got a registered letter for him.' So we took the postman to Polevoi's room. Polevoi signed for it, but we didn't go away. We stood there waiting. Just as if we knew what was in it. 'Let's open it up quick, Comrade Polevoi,' I said. So we opened the letter and there were the passes!' And Furman, having babbled out the news, burst out coughing with excitement.
'Special meeting at the school in an hour's time!' Monka put in. 'Everyone's got to be there.'
'Where are the passes for?' Sasha demanded inquisitively.
'To factories all over the Ukraine. For us! Understand? From the Supreme Council of National AEconomy!' Furman rummaged in his pocket and dragged out a long slip of paper. 'I've copied them all down... Read it out, Guzarchik!'
'Odessa—two places...' Monka boomed with as much pride as if he himself had written out the passes and sent them to us.
'I'm going to Odessa, that's definite!' Sasha chimed in.
'Just the man they're waiting for!' said Furman sarcastically. 'They make soap there out of softies like you.'
'Don't you get cheeky!' Sasha retorted huffily.
'Keep quiet, Sasha!' Petka begged. 'Let a fellow read, can't you? ... Go on, Monka!'
'... The Toretsky plant, Druzhkovka—three places, Enakievo—four places, Grishino—two places... Furman, do you know where Grishino is? You never spent a night under a railway truck there, by any chance, did you?'
'No idea!' Furman grunted stolidly.
'... Makeevka—five places, Alchevsk—four places, Lugansk—one place. . . I say, Lugansk is a big town, I think, why are they sending only one there? Queer...'
'Go on, go on!' Petka said, nudging Guzarchik.
'All right... Kramatorsk—two, Zaporozhye—four, Mariupol—five... That's somewhere by the sea, I think.'
'Of course, it is,' our know-all Furman grunted, 'but the sea's very shallow there; you keep wading out, but it never gets deeper than your knees.'
'... Slavyansk—two places, Kiev—five places... Look at that, even to Kiev! That's a wonderful town! ... Bolshoi Tokmak—four...'
'Look here, it's a waste of time reading like this!' Petka interrupted. 'We're all in the dark... The thing is to go and find out what Bolshoi Tokmak is and where it is. You might choose, then.
'No one'll let you choose yourself,' said Furman.
'All the same,.. I want to know beforehand where I'm being sent,' retorted Petka. 'Let's go and find a map. Perhaps there's one in the Komsomol club? Let's go to the club, chaps! We'll have time before the meeting.'
The five of us rushed off to the club. We strode past the fading chestnut-trees, past the dense, shadowy park. Someone was singing to the soft notes of a guitar:
We ll dance the 'Carmagnole,' and may the fight go on!
We 'll dance the 'Carmagnole,' and may the fight go on. . .
How good I felt marching along to the tune of that song, knowing that all my fears were over!
The other chaps talked and joked. Only I had nothing to say. But my joy was greater than anyone's. We walked on past the shadowy park and I remembered Kharkov, the spring morning amid the melting snow on the university square, the bright sun dazzling my eyes, and now, just as then, my heart beat merrily. . .
'The man who sets himself no aim in life is good for nothing,' thus Polevoi began his speech at the special pupils' meeting in our locksmiths' shop. 'Such people,' Polevoi went on, 'are just guzzlers of society's bread. But you, lads, are the reserve of the working class, the only force that is capable of remaking the world in a new way. So every one of you, if he wants to be a real man, must keep on setting himself new aims in life. 'Who says I can't!' That's what you should tell yourselves whenever you run into difficulties. Train yourself to hate failure. And failures you will encounter, of course, on your path through life. You have known them here already. We were within a hair's breadth of being closed down. The enemies of the Ukrainian people—the nationalists, the hirelings of world capitalism-tried to harm the country's cause even here. And what happened? We found justice in Kharkov, at the Central Committee of the Communist Party. And here is the result.' As he said this, Polevoi lifted the bundle of passes from his table. 'These are the blue-prints of your future. But they may turn out to be nothing but useless
