being keen on football, what's wrong with that? Who of us isn't! Some go in for pigeons, others prefer football. The chief doctor down at the sanatorium, is he a fan? Of course, he is! The harbour master, Captain Sabadash? Of course! Madame Kozulya? Not half! That one from the dancing-school... what's her name.. . Madame Rogale- Piontkovskaya? Nuts on the game! Even Lisovsky the priest, as soon as there's a match, he shuts up his church and goes off to the ground with his old woman.. . Our town's such a crazy place!'
Gladyshev had mentioned a name that took me back at once to the old days, in far-off Podolia.
'That Rogale-Piontkovskaya you mentioned, she isn't a countess by any chance, is she?' I asked.
'Goodness knows whether she's a countess or not, but she's certainly the queerest fish in this part of the world,' Gladyshev replied.
'Rules the roost up at the dancing-school,' Luka added.
'Well, why are we sitting here, friends, talking ourselves dry?' Volodya exclaimed suddenly. 'What about going to Chelidze and having a glass of beer, eh?'
'We'd better go, hadn't we, Vasil?' Sasha whispered to me. 'They'll be offended if we don't.'
'Komsomol members going to a pub?' I thought. 'Is that right? On the other hand, our new friends may really think we're too soft for their company, or too tight-fisted! And after all, what's a glass of beer!'
But my tired limbs had the last say, and remembering that I had to be at work again in the morning, I replied: 'We're not sure... Tomorrow...'
'Don't bother the lads, Volodya,' Luka intervened unexpectedly. 'They're young, they haven't got used to the work yet. If they aren't careful, they really will oversleep. Let 'em go home! And you, lad,' Luka turned to me, 'don't be too scared of your mate. He grumbles and barks, but on the whole he's a fair old chap, he's not chasing you for nothing. You'll be all the better for it, tougher!... Well, so long till tomorrow!'
We parted, and Volodya, who was the first to go out of the garden into the street, struck up a song.
A few paces from the crowded 'Avenue,' the town was as deserted and quiet as a village in the middle of the night. The flowers were smelling sweetly, and in one of the garden hedges, just by the road, a quail began to twitter. *
'Does your sweetheart know you used to play football for the factory-school team, Vasil?' Petka asked slyly.
'Who are you talking about?'
'None of that!' Petka chortled. 'As if you didn't know!'
'What's her name, Vasil?' Sasha asked.
'I've forgotten.'
'He's forgotten already, hear that, Petka?' Sasha mocked. 'I think I'd better remind you, as you're so forgetful. An-ge-li-ka! Make a note of it, please.'
'What kind of name is it—An-ge-li-ka?' Petka drawled, revelling in my confusion. 'Never heard of it before. Very queer name! Must be foreign.'
'Of course, it's foreign,' Sasha said, taking his cue I from Petka. 'Why do you think she said 'merci' to us?'
'Yes, all bourgeois types say 'merci' and 'pardon,''
Petka agreed.
I walked on in silence, listening patiently while my friends ripped my reputation to bits.
Far out at sea, the red and green running lights of the Felix Dzerzhinsky rose and fell as the ship steamed away round the breakwater. If only I had known then whom that ship was taking across the dark Azov Sea to Yalta!... Had I but known, I should have dashed off to the harbour long ago...
AT TURUNDA’S
The more I was drawn into the life of the works, the less I worried about that phrase 'you'll catch on.' Time flew past quickly land something new happened every day. Today, a few minutes before dinner-time, Golovatsky had come up to my machine. It was strange to see him amid the dust and noise of the foundry in a well-fitting suit— not to mention that tie of his. If I had been secretary of the works 'Komsomol organization, I should have thought twice about appearing in the foundry in such a get-up. Here were men doing physical work, and he turned up looking like a tailor's dummy! But Golovatsky seemed quite at ease as he shook hands with Naumenko and nodded a greeting to Luka and Gladyshev.
'Come to see your charge, Tolya?' Luka asked.
'How's he taking to things? Facing up to the job?' Golovatsky replied, and gave me a searching look with his keen grey eyes.
'Hot stuff! Soon be catching up with Uncle Vasya!' Luka said hurriedly, and picking up a finished mould, darted off with it to the moulding floor.
Turning to Gladyshev and Naumenko, Golovatsky said: 'I told him he'd catch on, but he looked a bit put out when he heard we did our moulding by machine.' And with another glance at me, he said confidingly: 'Come in and see me at dinner-time, Mandzhura...'
'You seem to know Golovatsky very well,' I said to Luka when the secretary disappeared behind the piled mould-boxes.
'He's one of us. We brought him up here in the foundry. We accepted him for the Party here, when Lenin died in 1924,' Luka said, and I realized that my neighbour was a Communist.
'You mean Golovatsky used to work in the foundry?'
'He did that! What are you surprised at? On the cementation furnaces. Until he came, there wasn't a dirtier- looking crowd in the whole works than those cement boys. The rust from the ore even used to get in their hair. You could tell a lad from the cement furnaces a mile away. But now, why, they come away from work clean as you could wish! And why? On Party Committee instructions Golovatsky got the Komsomol members together for voluntary work and they fitted the place up with hot showers and two cupboards for every worker to keep his clean and dirty clothes in. Now, as soon as it's knocking-off time, they're under those showers. To see them going home, when they've washed and put on clean clothes, you'd think they'd been reading books all day instead of casting metal in those furnaces...'
Luka's words made a deep impression on me. I went to see Golovatsky at the Komsomol office in a friendly mood, not at all expecting him to greet me with a reproach.
'It's a very good thing that you've caught on to things and got to know all about machine-moulding so quickly, but why hold yourself aloof from the other young workers?'
'How do you mean—aloof?' I asked, sitting down on a creaky chair.
'Well, it's as plain as daylight. Half the chaps simply don't know you yet, they just haven't any idea what sort of a fellow you are. And I don't mean chaps outside the Komsomol. Even the Komsomol members don't know you've got la Komsomol membership card in your pocket. Last time you were in here, you gave me a glowing account of your social work at school and I was very pleased. 'Here's a smart lad come to give us a hand,' I thought...'
'But I had to get the run of things,' I said guiltily, feeling that there was a lot in what the secretary said.
'You've got the run of things now, I hope?'
'Yes, I have now...'
'Well, that's something,' Golovatsky said more gently. 'And now I'd advise you to set about getting to know all the young workers in the foundry as soon as possible. Find out their likes and dislikes, what they're interested in. . . You see, because of its casting, the foundry is the only shop in the works that often finishes work long before the general knocking-off time. What does that mean? It means that the young fellows in the foundry get more free time than anyone else. But do you find many of them at the metal workers' club of an evening? Very few! It's a disgrace, but unfortunately it's a fact. But at Madame Rogale-Piontkovskaya's hops there are masses of them...'
It was the second time recently that I had heard that familiar name and I could not help interrupting the secretary.
'Who is this Madame Piontkovskaya?'
'A chip off something that's been smashed for ever,' Golovatsky said, drumming his long fingers on the top of
