er. "I'm just rather
tired. Yes. Kindly bring me a glass of water."
     It  was a very sunny August day. This disturbed  the  Professor, so the
blinds were pulled down. One  flexible standing  reflector cast a pencil  of
sharp  light  onto the  glass table piled  with  instruments and lenses. The
exhausted Persikov was leaning  against the  back  of  his revolving  chair,
smoking  and staring through clouds  of smoke with dead-tired  but contented
eyes at  the slightly open door of the chamber inside which a  red  sheaf of
light lay quietly, warming the already stuffy and fetid air in the room.
     There was a knock at the door.
     "What is it?" Persikov asked.
     The door creaked lightly,  and in  came Pankrat. He stood to attention,
pallid with fear before the divinity, and announced:
     "Feight's come for you, Professor."
     The ghost of a smile flickered on the scientist's face. He narrowed his
eyes and said:
     "That's interesting. Only I'm busy."
     '"E says 'e's got an official warrant from the Kremlin."
     "Fate  with a warrant? That's a  rare combination," Persikov  remarked.
"Oh, well, send him in then!"
     "Yessir,"  Pankrat  replied,  slithering   through   the  door  like  a
grass-snake.
     A minute later it opened again,  and  a man  appeared on the threshold.
Persikov creaked  his chair and  stared at the newcomer over the  top of his
spectacles and over his shoulder. Persikov was very isolated from real life.
He was not interested in it. But even Persikov could not fail to  notice the
main  thing  about  the  man  who  had  just  come  in.  He  was  dreadfully
old-fashioned. In 1919 this man would have looked perfectly  at home  in the
streets of the  capital. He would  have  looked  tolerable in  1924, at  the
beginning. But in 1928 he looked positively strange. At a time when even the
most backward part of the proletariat, bakers, were wearing jackets and when
military tunics were a rarity, having been  finally discarded  at the end of
1924,  the newcomer  was  dressed in a double-breasted leather jacket, green
trousers, foot bindings and army boots, with  a big old-fashioned  Mauser in
the cracked yellow holster  at his side. The newcomer's  face made the  same
impression on Persikov as  on everyone  else,  a highly unpleasant  one. The
small  eyes  looked  out  on  the  world  with  a  surprised,  yet confident
expression,  and  there  was something unduly familiar about  the short legs
with their flat  feet. The face was bluish-shaven. Persikov frowned at once.
Creak'  ing  the  screw  mercilessly, he  peered  at  the  newcomer over his
spectacles, then through them, and barked:
     "So you've got a warrant, have you? Where is it then?"
     The newcomer was clearly taken aback by what he saw. In general he  was
not prone  to  confusion, but now he was confused. Judging  by his eyes, the
thing  that  impressed  him  most  was  the  bookcase  with  twelve  shelves
stretching  right  up to  the  ceiling and packed  full  of books. Then,  of
course,  the chambers which, hell-like, were flooded  with  the  crimson ray
swelling up  in the  lenses. And Persikov  himself  in the  semi-darkness by
sharp  point  of  the  ray  falling  from  the reflector looked  strange and
majestic  in  his  revolving  chair.  The newcomer  stared  at  him with  an
expression  in  which   sparks  of   respect  flashed  clearly  through  the
self-assurance, did not hand over any warrant, but said:
     "I am Alexander Semyonovich Feight!"
     "Well then? So what?"
     "I  have  been put in  charge  of the Red  Ray Model  State  Farm," the
newcomer explained.
     "So what?"
     "And so I have come to see you on secret business, comrade."
     "Well, I wonder what that can be. Put it briefly, if you don't mind."
     The  newcomer  unbuttoned  his  jacket and pulled out some instructions
typed  on splendid  thick paper. He handed  the paper to  Persikov, then sat
down uninvited on a revolving stool.
     "Don't push the table," said Persikov with hatred.
     The newcomer  looked round in alarm at the  table, on the far  edge  of
which a pair  of  eyes  glittered lifelessly like  diamonds  in a damp  dark
opening. They sent shivers down your spine.
     No sooner had Persikov read the  warrant, than  he jumped up and rushed
to  the telephone.  A few seconds later he was already saying hastily  in  a
state of extreme irritation:
     "Forgive  me... I just don't  understand...  How can it  be? Without my
consent or advice... The devil only knows what he'll do!"
     At that point the stranger, highly offended, spun round on the stool.
     "Pardon me, but I'm in charge..." he began.
     But Persikov shook a crooked finger at him and went on:
     "Excuse  me,   but   I  just  don't  understand.  In  fact,   I  object
categorically. I refuse to sanction any experiments with the eggs... Until I
have tried them myself..."
     Something croaked  and rattled in the receiver, and  even at a distance
it was clear that the  indulgent  voice on the phone was  talking to a small
child.  In  the end  a purple-faced  Persikov  slammed  down  the  receiver,
shouting over it at the wall:
     "I wash my hands of the whole business!"
     Going back to the table, he picked  up the  warrant, read  it once from
top to bottom over his spectacles, then from bottom to top through them, and
suddenly howled:
     "Pankrat!"
     Pankrat  appeared in the  doorway  as  if  he had  shot up  through the
trap-door in an opera. Persikov glared at him and barked:
     "Go away,  Pankrat!" And Pankrat disappeared, his  face  not expressing
the slightest surprise.
     Then Persikov turned to the newcomer and said:
     "I beg your pardon. I will obey. It's none of my business.
     And of no interest to me."
     The newcomer was not so much offended as taken aback.
     "Excuse me," he began, "but comrade..."
     "Why do you keep saying  comrade all the time," Persikov muttered, then
fell silent.
     "Well, I never," was written all over Feight's face.
     "Pard..." "Alright then, here you are," Persikov interrupted him.
     "See  this  arc lamp.  From  this  you obtain by moving  the eyepiece,"
Persikov clicked the lid of  the chamber, like a camera, "a  beam which  you
can collect  by  moving the lenses,  number 1 here... and the mirror, number
2." Persikov put the ray out, then lit it again on the floor of the asbestos
chamber. "And on the floor you can put anything you like and experiment with
it. Extremely simple, is it not?"
     Persikov  intended to express irony and  contempt, but the newcomer was
peering hard at the chamber with shining eyes and did not notice them.
     "Only I warn you,"  Persikov went on. "You must not  put your  hands in
the ray, because from my observations  it causes  growths of the epithelium.
And whether they are malignant or not, I unfortunately have not yet had time
to establish."
     Hereupon  the  newcomer quickly put his hands behind his back, dropping
his leather cap, and looked at the Professor's hands. They were stained with
iodine, and the right hand was bandaged at the wrist.
     "But what about you, Professor?"
     "You can buy  rubber gloves at  Schwabe's on  Kuznetsky," the Professor
replied irritably. "I'm not obliged to worry about that"
     At  this point Persikov stared  hard at  the newcomer as  if through  a
microscope.
     "Where are you from? And why have you..."
     Feight took offence at last.
     "Pard..."
     "But a person should  know what he's doing! Why have you latched  on to
this ray?"
     "Because it's a matter of the greatest importance..."
     "Hm. The greatest importance? In that case... Pankrat!"
     And when Pankrat appeared:
     "Wait a minute, I must think." " Pankrat dutifully disappeared again.
     "There's one  thing I can't understand," said  Persikov.  "Why the need
for all this speed and secrecy?"
     "You've got me all  muddled  up. Professor,"  Feight replied. "You know
there's not a single chicken left in the whole country."
     "Well, what of it?" Persikov  howled. "Surely you're  not going to  try
and resurrect them all at the  drop of a hat, are you? And why do  you  need
this ray which hasn't been properly studied yet?"
     "Comrade Professor," Feight replied, "you've got me all muddled, honest
you have. I'm telling you that  we must put poultry-keeping back on its feet
again, because they're writing all sorts  of rotten things about  us abroad.
Yes."
     "Well, let them..."
     "Tut-tut," Feight replied enigmatically, shaking his head.
     "Who on earth, I should like to know, would ever think of using the ray
to hatch chickens..."
     "Me," said Feight.
     "Oh, I see. And why, if you  don't mind my asking? How did you find out
about the properties of the ray?"
     "I was at your lecture, Professor."
     "But I haven't done anything with the eggs yet! I'm only planning to!"
     "It'll work alright,  honest  it will," said Feight suddenly with great
conviction.  "Your  ray's  so  famous  it  could  hatch elephants,  not only
chickens."
     "Now listen here,"  Persikov said.  "You're not a  zoologist, are  you?
That's a pity.  You would make  a very bold experimenter. Yes, only you risk
... failure ... and you're taking up my time."
     "We'll give the chambers back to you. Don't you worry!"
     "When?"
     "After I've hatched out the first batch."
     "How confidently you said that! Very well! Pankrat!"
     "I've brought some people with me," said Feight. "And a guard..."
     By  evening  Persikov's study  was desolate.  The  tables  were  empty.
Feight's people took away the three big chambers, only leaving the Professor
the first, the small one which he had used to begin the experiments.
     The July dusk was falling.  A  greyness invaded the Institute, creeping
along the corridors. Monotonous steps could be  heard in the study. Persikov
was  pacing the large  room from window to door, in  the dark... And strange
though it  may seem all the inmates of  the Institute, and the animals  too,
were prey  to a  curious melancholy  that evening. For some reason the toads
gave a very mournful concert, croaking in  a most sinister, ominous fashion.
Pankrat had to chase a grass-snake that slipped out of its chamber, and when
he caught it in the corridor the snake  looked  as  if  it would do anything
just to get away from there.
     Late that evening the bell from Persikov's study rang. Pankrat appeared
on the  threshold  to  be greeted  by  a strange  sight.  The scientist  was
standing alone  in the middle  of  the study, staring at the tables. Pankrat
coughed and froze to attention.
     "There,  Pankrat," said Persikov, pointing at the  empty table. Pankrat
took fright. It looked in the dark as if the Professor
     had been crying. That was unusual, terrifying.
     "Yessir," Pankrat replied plaintively, thinking, "If only you'd bawl at
me!"
     "There,"  Persikov repeated, and his lips trembled  like a little boy's
whose favourite toy has suddenly been taken away from him.
     "You know, my dear Pankrat," Persikov went on, turning away to face the
window. "My  wife who  left  me  fifteen years ago  and  joined  an operetta
company has now  apparently died... So there, Pankrat, dear  chap... I got a
letter..."
     The  toads  croaked  mournfully,  and   darkness  slowly  engulfed  the
Professor.  Night  was falling. Here and  there white lamps went on  in  the
windows. Pankrat stood to attention with fright, confused and miserable.
     "You can go, Pankrat," the  Professor said heavily,  with a wave of the
hand. "Go to bed, Pankrat, my dear fellow."
     And so  night fell.  Pankrat left the study quickly on  tiptoe for some
reason, ran to his cubby-hole, rummaged among a  pile of rags in the corner,
pulled  out  an already opened  bottle  of  vodka  and  gulped down  a large
glassful. Then he ate some bread and salt, and his eyes cheered up a bit.
     Late that  evening, just  before midnight, Pankrat was sitting barefoot
on a bench in the poorly lit vestibule, talking to the  indefatigable bowler
hat on duty and scratching his chest under a calico shirt.
     "Honest, it would've been better if he'd done me in..."
     "Was he really crying?" asked the bowler hat, inquisitively.
     "Honest he was," Pankrat insisted.
     "A great scientist," the bowler hat agreed. "A frog's no substitute for
a wife, anyone knows that."
     "It sure isn't," Pankrat agreed.
     Then he paused and added:
     "I'm thinking of bringing the wife up here... No sense  her  staying in
the country. Only she couldn't stand them there reptiles..."
     "I'm not surprised, the filthy things," agreed the bowler hat.
     Not a sound could be  heard from the  Professor's study.  The light was
not on either. There was no strip under the door.


        CHAPTER VIII. The Incident at the State Farm

     There is  no  better  time  of  the  year  than mid-August in  Smolensk
Province, say. The summer of 1928 was a splendid one,  as we all  know, with
rains  just at  the  right time  in spring, a  full hot sun, and  a splendid
harvest... The apples on the former  Sheremetev family estate were ripening,
the forests were a lush green  and the fields were squares of rich yellow...
Man becomes nobler in the lap of nature. Alexander Se-myonovich too did  not
seem  quite  as unpleasant  as  in the  town. And  he  wasn't  wearing  that
revolting jacket. His  face  had a bronze tan, the  unbuttoned calico  shirt
revealed a chest thickly covered with black hair. He had canvas trousers on.
And his eyes were calmer and kinder.
     Alexander Semyonovich trotted excitedly  down  the  colon-naded  porch,
which sported a notice with the words "Red Ray State Farm" under a star, and
went  straight to the  truck that had just brought the  three black chambers
under escort.
     All day Alexander Semyonovich worked  hard with his assistants  setting
up the chambers  in the former winter garden, the Sheremetevs' conservatory.
By evening all was ready.  A  white frosted  arc lamp shone under  the glass
roof, the chambers were set up on bricks and, after much tapping and turning
of shining knobs, the mechanic who had come with the  chambers produced  the
mysterious red ray on the asbestos floor in the black crates.
     Alexander Semyonovich bustled about, climbing up the ladder himself and
checking the wiring.
     The  next day  the same  truck came back  from the station and spat out
three  boxes  of  magnificent smooth plywood stuck all over with labels  and
white notices on a black background that read:
     "Vorsicht: Eier!"
     "Eggs. Handle with care!"
     "Why  have  they  sent  so few?"  Alexander  Semyonovich  exclaimed  in
surprise and  set about unpacking the  eggs at once. The unpacking also took
place in the conservatory with the participation of the following: Alexander
Semyonovich himself,  his  unusually plump wife Manya,  the  one-eyed former
gardener of the former Sheremetevs, who now worked for the state farm in the
universal post of watchman, the guard doomed to live on the  state farm, and
the cleaning girl Dunya. It was not Moscow, and everything here was simpler,
more friendly and  more homely. Alexander Semyonovich gave the instructions,
glancing avidly from time to  time at  the boxes which lay  like  some  rich
present   under  the  gentle  sunset  glow  from  the  upper  panes  in  the
conservatory.  The  guard, his  rifle dozing  peacefully  by  the  door, was
ripping open the braces  and  metal bands with a pair of pliers. There was a
sound of cracking wood. Clouds of dust rose up. Alexander Semyonovich padded
around in his sandals, fussing by the boxes.
     "Gently does it," he said to the guard. "Be careful. Can't you see it's
eggs?"
     "Don't  worry," croaked the  provincial  warrior, bashing away happily.
"Won't be a minute..."
     Wrr-ench. Down came another shower of dust.
     The eggs were  beautifully packed: first  came sheets  of  waxed  paper
under  the wooden top, next some blotting paper, then  a thick layer of wood
shavings and finally the sawdust in which the white egg-tops nestled.
     "Foreign  packing,"  said  Alexander  Semyonovich  lovingly,  rummaging
around in the sawdust.  "Not  the  way we do it.  Careful, Manya, or  you'll
break them."
     "Have  you gone daft, Alexander Semyonovich," replied his wife. "What's
so special about this lot? Think I've  never  seen eggs before? Oh, what big
ones!"
     "Foreign,"  said  Alexander  Semyonovich,  laying the  eggs out  on the
wooden  table.  "Not  like  our  poor  old  peasant  eggs. Bet  they're  all
brahmaputras, the devil take them! German..."
     "I should say so," the guard agreed, admitting the eggs.
     "Only why are they so dirty?" Alexander Semyonovich mused thoughtfully.
"Keep an  eye on things, Manya. Tell them to go on unloading.  I'm going off
to make a phone call."
     And Alexander Semyonovich went to  use the telephone in the farm office
across the yard.
     That  evening  the  phone  rang  in the laboratory  at  the  Zoological
Institute. Professor Persikov tousled his hair and went to answer it.
     "Yes?" he asked.
     "There's  a call for you  from  the provinces," a  female  voice hissed
quietly down the receiver.
     "Well, put it through then," said Persikov  disdainfully into the black
mouthpiece. After a bit of crackling a far-off male voice asked anxiously in
his ear:
     "Should the eggs be washed. Professor?"
     "What's  that?  What?  What  did  you say?" snapped Persikov irritably.
"Where are you speaking from?"
     "Nikolskoye, Smolensk Province," the receiver replied.
     "Don't understand. Never heard of it. Who's that speaking?"
     "Feight," the receiver said sternly.
     "What Feight? Ah, yes. It's you. What did you want to know?"
     "Whether to  wash them.  They've  sent  a  batch of  chicken  eggs from
abroad..."
     "Well?"
     "But they're all mucky..."
     "You must be wrong. How can they be  'mucky', as you put  it? Well,  of
course,  maybe  a few, er,  droppings got stuck to them, or something of the
sort."
     "So what about washing them?"
     "No  need at  all, of course.  Why, are you  putting the eggs  into the
chambers already?"
     "Yes, I am," the receiver replied.
     "Hm," Persikov grunted.
     "So long," the receiver clattered and fell silent.
     "So  long," Persikov repeated distastefully to  Decent  Ivanov. "How do
you like that character, Pyotr Stepanovich?"
     Ivanov laughed.
     "So it  was him,  was it? I can imagine what he'll concoct out of those
eggs."
     "Ye-e-es," Persikov began maliciously.  "Just think, Pyotr Stepanovich.
Well, of course, it's highly possible that the ray will have the same effect
on the deuteroplasma of a chicken egg as on the  plasma of amphibians. It is
also highly possible that he will  hatch out chickens. But neither you nor I
can  say precisely what sort of chickens they  will  be. They may  be of  no
earthly use to anyone.  They may  die after  a day  or two. Or  they may  be
inedible. And can I even guarantee that they'll be able to stand up. Perhaps
they'll have  brittle  bones."  Persikov got  excited,  waved  his  hand and
crooked his fingers.
     "Quite so," Ivanov agreed.
     "Can  you guarantee,  Pyotr Stepanovich, that  they  will  be  able  to
reproduce? Perhaps that  character  will hatch  out sterile chickens.  He'll
make  them  as  big as a dog, and they won't have  any chicks until  kingdom
come."
     "Precisely," Ivanov agreed.
     "And such nonchalance," Persikov was working himself into a fury. "Such
perkiness!  And kindly  note that I  was asked  to instruct that scoundrel."
Persikov pointed  to the warrant delivered by Feight (which was lying on the
experimental table). "But how am I  to instruct that ignoramus when I myself
can say nothing about the question?"
     "Couldn't you have refused?" asked Ivanov.
     Persikov turned purple, snatched up the warrant and showed it to Ivanov
who read it and gave an ironic smile.
     "Yes, I see," he said significantly.
     "And  kindly  note also  that  I've been  expecting my shipment for two
months, and there's still  no  sign  of  it. But  that rascal  got  his eggs
straightaway and all sorts of assistance."
     "It won't  do him any good,  Vladimir Ipatych. In the  end they'll just
give you back your chambers."
     "Well,   let's  hope   it's  soon,  because  they're  holding   up   my
experiments."
     "Yes, that's dreadful. I've got everything ready."
     "Has the protective clothing arrived?"
     "Yes, today."
     Persikov was somewhat reassured by this and brightened up.
     "Then I  think  we'll proceed like this. We  can close the doors of the
operating-room tight and open up the windows."
     "Of course," Ivanov agreed.
     "Three helmets?"
     "Yes, three."
     "Well then, that's you  and me, and we'll ask one of  the students.  He
can have the third helmet."
     "Grinmut would do."
     "That's the one you've got working on salamanders, isn't  it? Hm,  he's
not bad, but, if you don't mind my saying so, last spring he didn't know the
difference  between a Pseudotyphlops and  a  Platyplecturus," Persikov added
with rancour.
     "But he's not bad. He's a good student," Ivanov defended him.
     "We'll  have to  go without sleep completely for  one night,"  Persikov
went on. "Only you must  check  the gas,  Pyotr Stepanovich.  The devil only
knows what it's like. That Volunteer-Chem lot might send us some rubbish."
     "No, no," Ivanov waved his hands. "I tested it yesterday. You must give
them some credit, Vladimir Ipatych, the gas is excellent."
     "What did you try it on?"
     "Some common toads. You just spray them with it and they die instantly.
And another  thing, Vladimir Ipatych. Write and  ask the  GPU to send you an
electric revolver."
     "But I don't know how to use it."
     "I'll see to that," Ivanov replied. "We tried one  out  on the Klyazma,
just for fun. There  was  a  GPU chap  living  next to me. It's  a wonderful
thing. And  incredibly efficient. Kills outright  at a hundred paces without
making  a sound. We  were shooting ravens. I don't even think we'll need the
gas."
     "Hm, that's a bright idea.  Very bright." Persikov went into the comer,
lifted the receiver and barked:
     "Give me that, what's it called, Lubyanka."
     The weather was  unusually hot. You could see the rich transparent heat
shimmering  over  the  fields.  But the  nights  were  wonderful,  green and
deceptive.  The  moon made  the former estate of the  Sheremetevs  look  too
beautiful for words. The palace-cum-state  farm glistened as if it were made
of sugar, shadows  quivered  in the park,  and  the ponds had two  different
halves,  one a slanting column of  light, the other fathomless darkness.  In
the  patches of  moonlight  you could easily read  Izvestia, except for  the
chess section which was in small nonpareil.  But on nights like these no one
read  Izvestia, of  course. Dunya the cleaner was in  the woods  behind  the
state farm and as coincidence would have it, the ginger-moustached driver of
the  farm's battered truck  happened to be there too. What  they were  doing
there  no one knows. They were sheltering in  the unreliable shade of an elm
tree,  on the driver leather coat which was spread out on the ground. A lamp
shone in the kitchen,  where the two market-gardeners were having  supper, -
and Madame Feight was sitting  in  a white neglige  on the columned veranda,
gazing at the beautiful moon and dreaming.
     At  ten o'clock in the evening when the  sounds  had died down  in  the
village of Kontsovka behind the state farm, the idyllic landscape was filled
with the charming gentle  playing of a flute. This fitted in with the groves
and former columns  of the Sheremetev palace more than words can say. In the
duet the voice of  the delicate Liza  from The  Queen of Spades blended with
that of the passionate Polina and soared up into. the moonlit heights like a
vision  of  the  old  and yet infinitely  dear,  heartbreakingly  entrancing
regime.
     Do fade away... Fade away...
     piped the flute, trilling and sighing.
     The copses were hushed, and Dunya, fatal as a wood nymph, listened, her
cheek pressed against the rough, ginger and manly cheek of the driver.
     "He don't play bad, the bastard," said the driver, putting a  manly arm
round Dunya's waist.
     The  flute was being played by none other than the manager of the state
farm himself,  Alexander  Semyonovich  Feight,  who, to do him  justice, was
playing  it  beautifully.  The  fact  of  the  matter  was  that   Alexander
Semyonovich had once  specialised  in  the flute.  Right up to  1917  he had
played  in the well-known  concert ensemble of the maestro Petukhov, filling
the  foyer  of  the  cosy  little   Magic  Dreams  cinema  in  the  town  of
Yekaterinoslav  with its sweet notes every evening.  But  the  great year of
1917,  which broke  the  careers of so many, had swept Alexander Semyonovich
onto  a new path too.  He left the Magic Dreams and the dusty  star-spangled
satin of its  foyer  to  plunge into  the open  sea  of war  and revolution,
exchanging  his flute for a  death-dealing Mauser. For a  long  time  he was
tossed  about  on waves which  washed him ashore, now  in the Crimea, now in
Moscow, now in Turkestan, and even in Vladivostok. It  needed the revolution
for Alexander Semyonovich to realise his full potential. It  turned out that
here was a truly great  man, who should  not be allowed to waste his talents
in  the  foyer of  Magic Dreams, of course.  Without going into  unnecessary
detail, we shall merely say that the year before, 1927, and the beginning of
1928 had found Alexander Semyonovich in  Turkestan  where  he first edited a
big  newspaper  and  then,  as  a  local  member  of  the  Supreme  Economic
Commission,  became   renowned  for  his   remarkable  contribution  to  the
irrigation  of Turkestan. In 1928 Feight came to  Moscow  and received  some
well-deserved  leave.  The  Supreme  Commission  of the organisation,  whose
membership card this provincially  old-fashioned man  carried with honour in
his pocket, appreciated his  qualities and  appointed  him  to a  quiet  and
honorary post.  Alas and alack!  To the  great misfortune  of the  Republic,
Alexander  Semyonovich's seething  brain did  not  quieten  down. In  Moscow
Feight learned of Persikov's discovery,  and in  the rooms  of  Red Paris in
Tverskaya Street Alexander Semyonovich had the brainwave of using the ray to
restore  the Republic's poultry in a month. The Animal  Husbandry Commission
listened to what he had to say, agreed with him, and Feight took his warrant
to the eccentric scientist.
     The concert over the glassy waters, the grove and the park  was drawing
to a close, when something happened to cut it short. The dogs  in Kontsovka,
who  Should  have  been  fast  asleep by  then, suddenly set  up a  frenzied
barking, which gradually turned  into an excruciating general howl. The howl
swelled  up, drifting  over  the fields, and was answered  by a high-pitched
concert from the million frogs on the ponds.  All  this was so ghastly, that
for a moment the mysterious enchanted night seemed to fade away.
     Alexander Semyonovich put down his flute and went onto the veranda.
     "Hear that,  Manya? It's  those  blasted dogs... What  do you think set
them off like that?"
     "How should I know?" she replied, gazing at the moon.
     "Hey,  Manya,  let's  go  and  take a  look  at  the  eggs,"  Alexander
Semyonovich suggested.
     "For goodness sake, Alexander Semyonovich.  You're  darned  crazy about
those eggs and chickens. Have a rest for a bit."
     "No, Manya, let's go."
     A bright light was burning in  the conservatory. Dunya came in too with
a  burning  face  and  shining   eyes.   Alexander  Semyonovich  opened  the
observation windows carefully, and they all began peeping into the chambers.
On the  white asbestos floor lay neat rows  of bright-red eggs with spots on
them. There was total silence in the chambers, except for the hissing of the
15,000 candle-power light overhead.
     "I'll hatch those chicks out alright!" exclaimed Alexander  Semyonovich
excitedly, looking now through the observation  windows  at  the  side,  now
through  the wide ventilation hatches  overhead. "You'll  see. Eh? Don't you
think so?"
     "You know what,  Alexander Semyonovich," said Dunya, smiling.  "The men
in  Kontsovka think you're the Antichrist.  They say  your eggs are from the
devil. It's a sin to hatch eggs with machines. They want to kill you."
     Alexander Semyonovich shuddered and turned  to his  wife.  His face had
gone yellow.
     "Well, how about that? Ignorant  lot! What can you do with  people like
that? Eh? We'll have  to fix up a  meeting  for them, Manya. I'll  phone the
district centre tomorrow for some Party workers. And I'll give 'em a  speech
myself.  This place needs a bit of working over alright.  Stuck  away at the
back of beyond..."
     "Thick as posts," muttered  the guard, who  had  settled  down  on  his
greatcoat in the conservatory doorway.
     The  next  day was heralded by some strange and inexplicable events. In
the early morning, at the first glint of sunlight, the groves, which usually
greeted the heavenly body  with a strong and unceasing twitter of birds, met
it with total silence. This was noticed by absolutely everybody. It was like
the  calm before a storm.  But no storm followed. Conversations at the state
farm  took on  a  strange  and  sinister  note  for  Alexander  Semyonovich,
especially  because according to the well-known Kontsovka trouble-maker  and
sage nicknamed Goat Gob, all the birds had gathered in flocks and flown away
northwards from Sheremetevo at  dawn, which was quite  ridiculous. Alexander
Semyonovich  was  most upset and spent  the whole day putting  a phone  call
through to the town of Grachevka. Eventually they promised to send him  in a
few days' time two speakers on two subjects, the international situation and
the question of Volunteer-Fowl.
     The evening  brought some more surprises.  Whereas in  the morning  the
woods had fallen silent, showing clearly how suspiciously unpleasant  it was
when the trees were quiet, and whereas by midday the sparrows from the state
farmyard had also  flown off somewhere,  that  evening there was not a sound
from the  Sheremetevka pond  either. This  was quite  extraordinary, because
everyone for twenty  miles around  was  familiar with  the  croaking of  the
Sheremetev frogs.  But now they seemed to be extinct. There was not a single
voice  from the pond, and the  sedge  was silent. It  must be confessed that
this really upset Alexander Semyonovich.  People  had  begun  to talk  about
these happenings in a most unpleasant fashion, i.e., behind his back.
     "It  really is  strange,"  said  Alexander  Semyonovich to his  wife at
lunch. "I can't understand why those birds had to go and fly away."
     "How should I know?" Manya replied. "Perhaps it's because of your ray."
     "Don't be so silly, Manya!" exclaimed  Alexander  Semyonovich, flinging
down his spoon. "You're as  bad as the  peasants. What's  the ray  got to do
with it?" "I  don't know. Stop pestering me." That evening brought the third
surprise. The dogs began howling  again  in Kontsovka and how! Their endless
whines and angry, mournful yelping wafted over the moonlit fields.
     Alexander  Semyonovich  rewarded  himself  somewhat  with  yet  another
surprise, a  pleasant one this time, in the conservatory. A constant tapping
had begun inside the red  eggs  in the  chambers. "Tappity-tappity-tappity,"
came from one, then another, then a third.
     The  tapping in the eggs was  a triumph for  Alexander Semyonovich. The
strange events in  the  woods and on  the  pond were immediately  forgotten.
Everyone gathered in the conservatory,  Manya,  Dunya,  the watchman and the
guard, who left his rifle by the door.
     "Well,   then?   What   about   that?"   asked  Alexander   Semyonovich
triumphantly. Everyone put  their ears  eagerly  to the doors of  the  first
chamber.  "That's  them tapping  with  their  little beaks,  the  chickens,"
Alexander Semyonovich went on, beaming. "So you thought I wouldn't hatch out
any chicks, did you?  Well, you were wrong, my hearties." From an  excess of
emotion  he slapped  the guard on the shoulder. "I'll hatch chickens that'll
take your breath away. Only now I must keep  alert," he added strictly. "Let
me know as soon as they start hatching."
     "Right you are," replied the watchman, Dunya and the guard in a chorus.
     "Tappity-tappity-tappity,"  went one  egg,  then another,  in the first
chamber. In fact this on-the-spot spectacle of new life being born in a thin
shining shell was so  intriguing that they all  sat  for a long  time on the
upturned empty crates, watching the crimson  eggs  mature in  the mysterious
glimmering  light. By  the time they went  to bed it  was  quite  late and a
greenish night had spread over the farm and the surrounding countryside. The
night was  mysterious, one might even say frightening,  probably because its
total  silence was broken now and then by the abject,  excruciating howls of
the dogs in Kontsovka. What on earth had  got into those blasted dogs no one
could say.
     An unpleasant surprise  awaited Alexander Semyonovich the next morning.
The  guard was  extremely  upset and kept putting  his  hands  on his heart,
swearing that he had not fallen asleep but had noticed nothing.
     "I can't understand it," the guard insisted. "It's through no fault  of
mine, Comrade Feight."
     "Very  grateful  to  you,  I'm  sure," retorted  Alexander  Semyonovich
heatedly. "What do you think, comrade? Why were you put on guard? To keep an
eye on things. So tell me where they are. They've hatched out, haven't they?
So they must have run away. That means you  must have left the door open and
gone off somewhere. Get me those chickens!"
     "Where  could  I have  gone?  I know my job." The guard  took  offence.
"Don't you go accusing me unfairly, Comrade Feight!"
     "Then where are they?"
     "How  the blazes should I know!" the guard  finally exploded. "I'm  not
supposed  to guard them, am I? Why  was I  put on duty?  To see  that nobody
pinched  the chambers, and that's what I've done. Your chambers are safe and
sound.  But  there's  no law that says I  must chase  after  your  chickens.
Goodness only knows what  they'll be  like. Maybe you won't be able to catch
them on a bicycle."
     This  somewhat deflated  Alexander Semyonovich. He  muttered  something
else, then relapsed  into a state of perplexity. It was  a  strange business
indeed. In the first chamber, which had  been switched on before the others,
the two  eggs at the  very base of  the ray had broken open. One of them had
even rolled to one side.  The empty shell was lying on the asbestos floor in
the ray.
     "The devil only knows," muttered  Alexander Semyonovich.  "The  windows
are closed and they couldn't have flown away over the roof, could they?"
     He threw back his head and looked at some big holes in the glass roof.
     "Of course, they couldn't,  Alexander Semyonovich!" exclaimed Dunya  in
surprise.  "Chickens can't fly.  They must be here somewhere.  Chuck, chuck,
chuck," she called, peering into the corners of the conservatory, which were
cluttered with dusty flower pots, bits of boards  and other rubbish.  But no
chicks answered her call.
     The  whole staff  spent about  two hours  running  round  the farmyard,
looking for the runaway chickens and found nothing. The day passed  in great
excitement. The duty guard  on  the chambers was reinforced by the watchman,
who  had strict orders to look through the chamber windows every  quarter of
an hour  and call Alexander Semyonovich  if anything happened. The guard sat
huffily by the door, holding his rifle  between his knees. What with all the
worry Alexander Semyonovich did not have lunch until nearly two. After lunch
he  slept for an hour or  so  in the cool  shade  on  the former She-remetev
ottoman,  had a refreshing drink of the farm's  kvass and slipped  into  the
conservatory to make sure everything was alright. The old watchman was lying
on his  stomach  on some  bast  matting  and staring through the observation
window of the first chamber. The guard was keeping watch by the door.
     But there was a piece of news: the eggs in the third chamber, which had
been switched on  last, were making a kind of gulping, hissing sound,  as if
something inside them were whimpering.
     "They're hatching out alright," said Alexander Semyonovich. "That's for
sure. See?" he said to the watchman.
     "Aye, it's most extraordinary," the latter replied in a  most ambiguous
tone, shaking his head.
     Alexander Semyonovich squatted by the chambers for a while, but nothing
hatched out.  So he  got up, stretched and announced that he would not leave
the  grounds, but was going for a  swim in the  pond  and  must be called if
there were any developments. He went into the palace to his bedroom with its
two narrow iron bedsteads, rumpled bedclothes and piles  of green apples and
millet on  the floor for the newly-hatched chickens,  took a  towel and,  on
reflection, his flute as well to play at leisure over the still waters. Then
he  ran  quickly  out  of  the  palace, across  the  farmyard  and down  the
willow-lined  path to  the pond. He walked briskly, swinging the towel, with
the  flute under his arm. The sky shimmered with heat  through  the willows,
and his  aching body begged to dive into the water.  On the right  of Feight
began a dense patch of burdock, into which  he spat en passant. All at  once
there was a rustling in the tangle of big leaves, as if someone was dragging
a log. With a sudden sinking feeling  in  his stomach, Alexander Semyonovich
turned his head towards the burdock in surprise. There had  not been a sound
from the pond for two days.  The rustling stopped, and above the burdock the
smooth  surface  of the pond flashed invitingly with  the  grey roof of  the
changing hut.  Some  dragon-flies darted to and  fro  in front of  Alexander
Semyonovich. He was about to turn off to the wooden platform, when there was
another rustle in the burdock accompanied this time by a  short hissing like
steam  coming out of an engine. Alexander Semyonovich tensed and  stared  at
the dense thicket of weeds.
     At  that moment the voice  of Feight's wife rang  out,  and  her  white
blouse flashed in  and  out through  the raspberry  bushes.  "Wait  for  me,
Alexander Semyonovich. I'm coming for a swim too."
     His wife  was  hurrying to  the pond, but Alexander Se-myonovich's eyes
were  riveted on the burdock and he  did not reply. A greyish olive-coloured
log had  begun to rise out of the  thicket,  growing ever bigger before  his
horrified  gaze. The log seemed  to be covered  with wet yellowish spots. It
began to straighten up, bending and swaying, and was so long that it reached
above a  short  gnarled willow. Then the top of  the log  cracked, bent down
slightly,  and  something  about the height of  a  Moscow electric lamp-post
loomed over Alexander Semyonovich. Only this something was about three times
thicker  that  a  lamp-post and  far  more beautiful  because of  its  scaly
tattooing.  Completely mystified, but with  shivers running down  his spine,
Alexander Semyonovich looked at  the top of  this  terrifying lamp-post, and
his heart almost stopped beating. He  turned to  ice on the warm August day,
and everything went dark before his eyes  as  if he were  looking at the sun
through his summer trousers.
     On the  tip of  the log  was a head. A flattened,  pointed head adorned
with a round yellow spot on an olive background. In the roof of the head sat
a  pair  of  lidless  icy  narrow  eyes,  and  these   eyes  glittered  with
indescribable malice. The head moved as if spitting  air and the whole  post
slid back into the burdock, leaving only the eyes which  glared at Alexander
Semyonovich  without blinking.  Drenched with sweat, the latter uttered five
incredible fear-crazed words. So piercing were the eyes between the leaves.
     "What the devil's going on..."
     Then  he remembered about fakirs... Yes, yes, in India, a wicker basket
and a picture. Snake-charming.
     The  head  reared up  again,  and the body began  to uncoil.  Alexander
Semyonovich raised his flute to his lips, gave a hoarse  squeak and, gasping
for  breath,  began to play the  waltz from Eugene  Onegin. The eyes in  the
burdock lit up at once with implacable hatred for the opera.
     "Are you crazy, playing in this heat?" came Manya's cheerful voic