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PROLOGUE

Moscow, November 11, 1918

"Marina Ivanovna, do you want a job?"

My lodger flew in, X, a communist, the gentlest and most ardent.1

"You see, there are two: at the bank and at Narkomnats. . . and actually (snapping of the fingers), for my part, I would recommend that you . . ."2

"But what do you have to do? I don't know how to do anything."

"Oh, everybody says that!"

"Everybody says it, I do it."

"In short, as you see fit! The first job is on Nikolskaya St., the second right here, in the first Cheka building."3

I:"?!"

He, wounded: "Don't worry! No one is going to make you execute anybody. You'll only be making lists."

"Making lists of the executions?"

He, irritated: "Oh, you don't want to understand! As if I were inviting you to join the Cheka! People like you aren't needed there . . ."

I: "We're harmful."

He: "It's the Cheka building, the Cheka has left. You probably know it, on the corner of Povarskaya and Kudrinskaya streets, in Lev Tolstoi it was (a snap of the fingers) . . . the house of. . ."

I: "The Rostovs' house. I accept. What's the name of the institution?"

He: "Narkomnats. The People's Commissariat of Nationalities."

I: "What do you mean, nationalities, when it's supposed to be the International?"

He, almost boasting: "Oh, more than in tsarist times, I assure you! ... So then, it's the Information Section of the Commissariat. If you agree, I'll talk to the director right away, today." (Suddenly doubtful): "Though, actually . . ."

I: "Just a moment, it isn't anything against the Whites is it? You understand . . ."

He: "No, no, it's completely mechanical. Only, I must warn you, there are no rations."

I: "No, of course not. How could there be in a respectable institution?"

He: "But there will be trips, perhaps they'll raise the pay . . . And you definitely don't want the bank job? Because in the bank . . ."

I: "But I don't know how to count."

He, thoughtfully: "And Alya, does she know how?"*

I: "Alya doesn't know how either."

He: "Yes, then the bank is hopeless . . . What did you call that build-ing?"

I: "The Rostovs' house."

He: "Perhaps you have War and Peace? I would love to. ... Though actually. . ."

I'm already flying down the staircase at breakneck speed. A dark corridor, the former dining room, another dark corridor, the former nursery, the cabinet with the lions... I grab the first volume of War and Peace, knock over the second volume nearby, glance at it, forget, sink into forgetfulness . . .

*

"Marina, X left! Just after you went out! He said that he reads three newspapers a night and also a little paper and that he won't have time for War and Peace. And for you to call him tomorrow at the bank at 9 o'clock. And also, Marina," (a blissful face) "he gave me four pieces of sugar and —just imagine — a piece of white bread!"

She lays them out.

"Did he say anything else, Alechka?"

"Just a moment. . ." (she wrinkles her brow) "... yes, yes, yes! sa-

*Alya is four and a half years old.

bo-tage . . . And he also asked about Papa, have there been any letters. And he made such a face, Marina, a grimacing one! As if he wanted to get mad on purpose . . ."

*

The 13th of November (a good day to start!). Povarskaya St., the house of Count Sollogub, "Information Section of the Commissariat of Nationalities."

Latvians, Jews, Georgians, Estonians, "Moslems," some sort of "Mara-Maras," "En-Dunyas" — and all these are men and women in short, fur-lined vests with inhuman (ethnic) noses and mouths.

And me, who has always felt unworthy of these hearths (burial vaults!). Of clans.

(I'm talking about houses with columns and my timidity before them.)

*

November 14th, the second day of my job.

Strange job! You arrive, set your elbows on the table (fists against cheekbones) and rack your brains: what to do to make the time pass? When I ask the director for work, I note a certain hostility in him.

*

I'm writing in the pink hall — pink all over.

There are marble window bays, two huge hanging chandeliers. Small things (like furniture!) have disappeared.

*

November 15th, the third day of my job.

I'm compiling an archive of newspaper clippings. That is: I rephrase Steklov, Kerzhentsev, reports about prisoners of war, the movements of the Red Army, and so forth, in my own words.4 I rephrase once, I rephrase twice (I copy from the "journal of newspaper clippings" onto "cards"), then I glue these clippings onto enormous sheets. The newspapers are delicate, the type barely visible, then add captions in lilac pencil, and then the glue — it's utterly pointless and will return to ashes even before it's all burned.

There are different desks here: Estonian, Latvian, Finnish, Moldavian, Moslem, Jewish and several entirely inarticulate ones. In the morning each desk receives its share of clippings, which it then processes over the course of the day. I see all this clipping, labeling and pasting as endless, convoluted variations on one and the same, very meager, theme. As though a composer had it in him to invent only one musical phrase, and he had to fill about thirty reams of musical notation paper — so he "vari-ates": and we variate.

I forgot to mention the Polish and Bessarabian desks. I, not without justification, am the "Russian" desk (the assistant of either the secretary, or perhaps of the director).

Each desk is — grotesque.

To my left are two dirty, doleful Jewesses, ageless, like herring. Further on: a red, fair-haired Latvian woman, also frightening, like a person turned into a sausage: "I knew khim, such a sveetie. Khe partissipated in ze plot, und now zey haf zentenced khim to be shot. Chik-chik." . . . And she giggles with excitement. Wears a red shawl. The fat, bright, pink display of her neck.

The Jewess says: "Pskov is taken!" I have the tormenting thought: "By whom?!!"*

To my right — two people (the Oriental table). One has a nose and no chin, the other has a chin and no nose. (Who is Abkhazia and who is Azerbaijan?)

Behind me sits a seventeen-year-old child —pink, healthy, curly-headed (a white Negro), easy thinking and easy loving, a real live Atenais from Anatole France's The Gods Thirst, the one who arranged her skirts so carefully in that fateful carriage — "fiere de mourir comme une Reine de France."

Also — a type of institute class-supervisor lady ("an inveterate theatergoer"), also — a greasy, obese Armenian woman (chin resting on

*Only later did I understand: "taken" is of course: "by us!" If it were the Whites — then it would be: "surrendered." (M.Ts.)

chest, impossible to say what's where), a mongrel in student uniform, also an Estonian doctor, sleepy and a born drunk . . . Also (variety!) a doleful Latvian woman, all sucked dry. Also . . .

*

(I'm writing at work)

A typographical error:

"If foreign governments would leave the Russian people in peaces," and so forth.5

The Hemld of Poverty, Nov. 27, No. 32.

I, in the margins: "Don't worry! They'll wait a bit — and they'll leave!"

In the performance of my duties I paraphrase, in my own words, a newspaper clipping on the necessity of having literate people on duty in train stations:

"Day and night, literate people should be on duty in train stations in order to explain the difference between the old order and the new order to those arriving and departing."

The difference between the old and new orders:

The old order: "A soldier came by" . . . "We made pancakes" . . . "Our grandmother died."

Soldiers still come, grandmothers die, only no one makes pancakes anymore.

*

An encounter.

I'm running to the Commissariat. Supposed to be there at nine — it's already eleven: I stood on line for milk on Kudrinskaya St., for salted fish on Povarskaya St., for hemp-seed oil on the Arbat.

There's a lady in front of me: ragged, skinny, with a bag. I come up alongside her. The bag is heavy, her shoulder bowed, I feel the tension of her arm.

"Excuse me, ma'am. May I help you?"

Frightened flight:

"Oh, no . . ."

"I'd be glad to carry it, don't worry, we'll walk together."

She gives in. The bag really is hellish.

"Do you have far to go?"

"To Butyrki, I'm bringing a package."6

"Has he been in long?"

"Quite a few months."

"No one to vouch?"

"All Moscow would vouch for him —that's why they won't let him out."

"Young?"

"No, middle-aged . . . Perhaps you've heard of him? The former town governor, D-sky."7

*

I had the following encounter with D-sky. I was fifteen and cheeky. Asya* was thirteen and insolent. We were visiting a grown-up friend. There were lots of people. Father was there. Suddenly, the doorbell: D-sky. (And the answering ring: "Well, D-sky, hold on!")

We are introduced. He's kind, charming. I'm taken for a grown-up, and asked whether I like music. And father, remembering my antediluvian wunderkindness:

"What do you mean, why of course! She's been playing since she was five!"

D-sky, politely:

"Perhaps you'd play something?"

I, putting on a show:

"I've really forgotten everything. I'm afraid you'll be disappointed . . ."

D-sks courtesy, the guests' persuasion, father's insistence, the friend's fright, my acquiescence.

"But first, if you don't mind, let me play four hands with my sister to work up my courage."

"Oh, of course."

I go up to Asya and whisper in my own language:

"Wi(pi)rwe(pe)erde(pe)nTo(po)nlei(pei)te(pe)rspi(pi) . . ."8

Asya can't take it.

*My sister. (M.Ts.)

Father: "What are you up to, you little imps?" I —to Asya: "Scales, backward!" To my father: "Asya's being shy."

*

We begin. My right hand is on re, the left on do (I'm playing bass). Asya's left hand is on re, her right on do. We start toward each other (I — from left to right, she —from right to left). At each note a thunderous double-voiced count: One and two and three and . . . Deathly silence. After about ten seconds, father's uncertain voice:

"Ladies, why so . . .monotonous? How about something a bit more lively?"

Without stopping, in unison:

"This is just the beginning."

*

Finally my right and Asya's left hand meet.

We rise with gleeful faces.

Father — to D-sky: "Well, what do you think?"

And D-sky, rising in turn: "I thank you. It was very distinct."

*

"Moi sluzhby" was first published in Sovremennye Zapiski, no. 25 (1925).

1: My lodger flew in, X, a communist. Henryk Sachs (1880-1937), a Polish Communist, who was secretary to Feliks Dzerzhinsky.

2: And at Narkomnats. The People's Commissariat on Nationalities (Narodnyi komissariat po delam national'nostei), which functioned between 1917 and 1924), was headed by Stalin. The building Tsvetaeva worked in later became the headquarters of the USSR Writers Union.

3: In the first Cheka building. The Cheka (Chrezvychainyi Komitet), or Extraordinary Committee, was the precursor to the KGB. It was founded and headed at the time by Feliks Dzerzhinsky.

4: I rephrase Steklov, Kerzhentsev. On Steklov, see notes to "Free Passage." Platon Mikhailovich Kerzhentsev (1881-1940) was a journalist and an activist in the Soviet government and Communist Party.

5: If foreign governments would leave the Russian people in peaces. The typographical error in Russian is: "ostavili v pomoe russkii narod," i.e., "in the garbage," instead of "v pokoe," "in peace."

6: To Butyrki, I'm bringing a package. Butyrskaya prison, in central Moscow.

7: The former town governor, D-sky. Vladimir Fedorovich Dzhunkovsky (1865- 1938?)

8: Wi(pi)r we(pe)erde(pe)n. Tsvetaeva is speaking to her sister in German "pig Latin."