top of the notice.
While the people strolled about the hall, I went outside for a breath of fresh air. At the entrance I met Lika.
'Good evening, Lieutenant,' she said, offering me her hand. 'Thank you for the invitation.'
'Good evening,' I pretended not to notice her sarcasm. 'Did you like the show?'
'It was very unusual. And funny. There's never been anything like that at the club before... Are you going home?' She looked at me from under her thick eye-lashes and, as if afraid that I might say 'no' added quickly: 'Do see me home, please. My companion took offence and ran away.''
'I know.'
'And now you're gloating? It was rather cruel. Do you think he really enjoyed going to Genoa Street? Everyone goes there because it's so dull at the club. . . Are you going to see me home?'
I looked at Angelika. Her big, rather slanting eyes were so full of appeal that I could not refuse. I went with her.
'What do you mean 'dull,' Lika? That's silly. You talk as if your Zuzya were a little baby who needed a nurse to play with him. Do you think he gets through one book a year?'
'He doesn't,' said Lika and laughed. 'You're quite right about that.'
'There you are!' I said heatedly. 'A chap who never bothers to think and keeps his brains in his feet will feel bored everywhere.'
'But tell me, Vasil, what made you spare me in this Charlestoniada of yours? All the time I was expecting to see myself among that dreadful lot.'
'We wanted ... we thought...' I muttered, trying to avoid the direct answer. And then I blurted out: 'It was mainly the young people from the works we wanted to influence.'
'What you really mean is that you consider me past any 'education,' don't you?' And Lika looked at me so intently that I felt embarrassed.
'I didn't say that,' I muttered, and thought to myself: 'There she goes again, trying to make it a personal issue.'
We were walking along the deserted street that led to the sea, and I felt annoyed because this was not at all how I'd planned to spend the evening. Had I been polite, I should have tried to amuse the girl walking at my side, but I kept a stubborn silence.
My thoughts were far from Angelika. Still fresh in my mind was the excitement of the days when all of us, a gay team of young workers, helped by the older men from the works, had been making reapers for Nikita Kolomeyets and clearing the space in the foundry for the new machines.
And what a lot of work lay ahead of us! Flegontov had related how Komsomol members in Leningrad were trying to increase productivity. We wanted to make use of their experience. We'll put up a Lost Minutes screen in our foundry and mark on it every single minute lost through inefficiency, then Kolya Zakabluk will count up how much these minutes cost us... We'll plant out trees and flower-beds in the grounds... There's so much to be done!
As if sensing my thoughts Angelika asked quietly: 'Am I bothering you?' : 'No, why?'
'Why are you trying to avoid me?' 'Our outlook on life is too different,' I said frankly. 'I quite agree with you, but you must admit it's wrong to regard a person only from one angle.' 'What do you mean?'
'Well, take for instance the way you look at me. 'Here's a silly, whimsical girl who leads an easy life under her father's wing!'— that's what you're thinking, isn't it?' There was a tone of sadness in Angelika's voice.
'But how can I think differently, Lika, if you yourself. . .'
But she did not let me finish and said passionately: 'You like to condemn everything irrevocably,
Vasil! You won't try to understand a person who may have a worm eating at his soul. You mustn't 'be like that! Thai time on the boat it was enough for me to say, 'I'm waiting for a lucky chance,' and you immediately reproached me. You didn't even try to understand what I really meant. I know very well that you consider me one of those helpless creatures whose sole desire is to get married. But I wish you'd understand that a future like that won't satisfy me. I don't want to be like those fat merchants' wives who only find pleasure in 'stuffing themselves with food, dolling themselves up, and going out with their husbands on Sundays to show off and gossip about other people...'
Lika's frank words knocked me right off my balance.
'What do you want then?' I asked helplessly.
She shook her head and murmured thoughtfully: 'If only you knew how I hate this suffocating provincial life!'
'You're wrong again, Lika,' I retorted. 'It's your own fault if you choose your friends from the dregs. There are good people in the town as well. You shouldn't lump everybody together like that. Take our works, for example. Think how many decent, clever, interesting people there are there. What's 'provincial' about them?'
We sat down on the sea wall, not far from the spot where I had first seen Angelika.
Far out in the bay lay a foreign ship, her portholes gleaming. It was being loaded with grain from big shalandas that had come out from the shore. We could hear the noise of the winches mingled with the sound of the foreign speech and the tramp of sailors' feet on the brightly lit deck.
Lika was the first to speak.
'Look here, Vasil, I know there are quite a lot of interesting people in town who would give me strength and an aim in life if I'd let them. But at the moment I'm talking to you about my own surroundings...' Her voice trembled. 'May I be frank with you?'
'You can try, I like frank people.'
'And you promise not to spread a lot of talk about what I say?' She looked at me rather strangely and I realized that she wanted to tell me a secret.
'Why should I do that?'
'I trust you, Vasil... You see, Father and Mother think that this isn't going to last ... I mean Soviet power and all that...'
'Well, you do surprise me, Lika! Do you think I didn't know that without you telling me. One talk with your father was enough.'
'You realized that, did you? Well, there it is. He was very frank with you. At least, more so than with others...
You see, my parents have convinced themselves that this just can't last, that they've got to sit and wait for it to come to an end, like a shower of rain. And all the people they know think the same. 'Not much longer now. . .' that's what they all say, those gossiping women who come round to see my mother. First they placed their hopes on Wrangel, then on General Kutepov. Once there was a rumour that Petlura had joined forces with Makhno, and that a whole army would be landing in Tavria to save Russia from the Bolsheviks. Mother even started counting up her tsarist government bonds...'
This was too much for me and I said grimly: 'That'll never happen, they'll go bald waiting for it, like your Zuzya in our show. They'll just waste their lives and Soviet power will still be here, strong as ever.'
'Let's get one thing settled right away, Vasil: Zuzya's no more 'mine' than he is 'yours.' ' She sounded hurt. 'Let me finish what I was saying...' And she looked at me fixedly.
'Go on then,' I said.
'Well, these women spend days on end at our house, gossiping about one thing and another, about the weddings that were held there, how some person called Edwards got married to a Rogalikha, how many glasses the guests broke when they got drunk. Their whole life's a memory! I hear the same thing day in, day out, and I think to myself: 'What has all this got to do with me? They've nothing left except their memories, but I want to live! And I could have a real future.' '
Moved by the sincerity in Lika's tone, I asked more gently: 'Why did you argue with me before?'
'Oh, that was just my stupidity! Just to be argumentative.'
'That never gets you far,' I said.
'Do you think I don't realize that?' she said in the same sincere tone. 'Of course I do! That's why I repented and sent you that note. That's why I've come to you now.
It's the first time I've ever admitted myself wrong to anybody, obstinate creature that I am...'
'My opinion, Lika, has always been that it is better to tell a person the truth straight out than to coddle him
