Calligraphy Lesson (6 page)

, that amazing, anthropod peahen, the only one that falls into a full five beats! There's something of the two-headed eagle to it and at the same time its soft half-ovals sit firmly on the line, like on a perch. It seems to clamp an unraveling world together—heaven and earth, east and west. It's elegant, perfect, and sufficient unto itself. And now, if the hand was true, if the pen didn't shake once, if everything came together, then, you won't
believe it, a miracle takes place at my desk! A sheet of ordinary paper breaks free and rises above events! Its perfection immediately yields an alienation, a hostility even, toward all that exists, toward nature itself, as if another, higher world, a world of harmony, had wrested this space from that kingdom of worms! They may hate and kill each other, betray and hang themselves there, but it's all just raw material for my penmanship, fodder for beauty. And during those astounding minutes, when you feel like writing nonstop, you experience a strange, inexpressible feeling. Truly, this is happiness!

Evgeny Alexandrovich, you're insane!

You don't understand, Anna Arkadievna. Going mad is the privilege of God's fools, a reward for the elect, but we are all being punished for something. The main thing is that there's no one to ask what for. Judge for yourself. Take my Kolya. When he went to Moscow to study, I was happy for him, my son, who had suddenly, imperceptibly, turned into a young man, a university student with a sparse, impatient little beard. Less than two months later I received a document, a notification, saying my son was under investigation, charged with murder. I dropped everything and rushed to Moscow. The investigator in charge of the case told me that my Kolya and his friend had attacked and killed some young woman. Kolya was caught, but the second youth slipped away. “Are you in your right mind?” I shouted. “Yes. The scoundrel has confessed to everything.” I didn't believe a word of it. I knew there had been some mistake, some horrible misunderstanding. Finally they allowed us a visit. Kolya hadn't changed at all. He was even wearing the same jacket. He'd just let his beard grow out. “Kolya, why did you confess?” I began. “After all, it wasn't you!” I thought he would throw his arms around me, cry, and tell me everything that had happened, but he started talking about which petitions I needed to write and to whom, asked me to remember
everything exactly and not get mixed up, and got angry when I couldn't seem to. That's what he said to me: “Father, wake up and remember this!” And he was beside himself that I hadn't brought any money. All I had with me were a few small bills. “Papa,” he said, “if you have money, you can live anywhere, even in prison.” And still I didn't believe the investigator or Kolya. I still don't. My boy could not have done that. He slandered himself. Out of fear. Someone had put the fear of God in him. But Kolya might have been trying to protect or save someone, too. At trial he was so nervous, he tried so hard to fight his fear, that instead he was brash, slouched in his chair, and answered questions with a smirk. When the witness, a janitor, got his testimony mixed up, Kolya actually started laughing. And he shrugged at his terrible sentence—fifteen years—as if to say, Imagine. He's just a little boy, a silly little boy, a child. As they were leading him away, he shouted, “Papa, don't cry. I love you!” The parents of the murdered girl were sitting right there in the courtroom. During the hearing the mother would start sobbing from time to time, and then the father would take her out of the room, but after a while they would return and take their seats again. The first day of the trial I went over to them and wanted to say something, I didn't know what—beg their forgiveness, plead for mercy—but they wouldn't let me say a word. “Get away!” the father shouted. I collected Kolya's things, wrote endless, pointless requests and petitions, and sat in reception rooms for hours just to clarify where they were sending him. I'd already made plans to visit him in the summer. Maybe they'd let me if I asked my boss for a special meeting. But that summer I got sick and took to my bed, and I never did take my trip to the distant and terrible Ivdel. Kolya's letters were brief: what to send in the package, where to write the next pointless mercy letter, as he put it. A year passed that way. At work they didn't know anything about Kolya, or maybe they were pretending
they didn't, because before that they would occasionally ask, “How's that son of yours?” and now it was all about cases, as if I'd never had Kolya. And then one day I was asked to stop in to see our Viktor Valentinovich. I went into his office and stood there, waiting, but he was clearly uneasy and started pacing around the room, asked me to have a seat, and for a long time didn't say anything. Then he mumbled, “Really, I don't even know how to begin this conversation. You see, the problem is that your son—” I interrupted him. “Yes, my Kolya was convicted, but he's not guilty of anything, it's a mistake, he slandered himself!” “Please, wait!” he put a document in front of me. “Your son has escaped.” For a long time after that I couldn't think clearly. Viktor Valentinovich brought me some water, put his hand on my shoulder, and said, “Get a grip,” and something else. Then he started saying Kolya would quite likely come home sooner or later, but regardless, he was a dangerous criminal and I as a decent man whose honesty no one doubted would let them know as soon as he showed up. “Yes yes, of course.” It felt like I was dreaming. I nodded and went to continue my writing. A long time has passed since that day, but still no Kolya. Sometimes I look out the window in the evening and it feels like he's somewhere nearby, in the darkness, behind the trees. He's hiding, afraid to come out. I open a small window and call out softly, so only he can hear, “Kolya! Kolya!”

Pay no attention to me, Evgeny Alexandrovich, I just remembered something that happened yesterday. You don't know whether to laugh or cry. You know Zhdanov? Well, you've seen him at our house—a second cousin twice removed and a dreadful self-centered fool. I happened to be home alone. My husband had gone on an inspection tour, little Sasha was with his grandmother, and Vova's been in college for two months. Out of the blue, Zhdanov showed up. “Larochka,” he said with a leer, “I came to have my way with you!” “What's this, Zhdanov? Has passion got the
better of you? You know I never thought of myself as a femme fatale!” “Passion? Hardly. It's just that you talk so much about morality that this will be my last argument in our debate. I came merely to tempt you and lead you into sin, that's all.” “But you're repulsive, Zhdanov!” I told him. “Believe me, that doesn't matter!” and he reached under my skirt. I wanted to laugh, slap him, pour water over his bald head, but I was overtaken by apathy, passivity. I can't explain. It all just happened, moreover I felt nothing, absolutely nothing. Zhdanov grunted and wheezed and growled. Then he stretched out across the bed, flopping his belly to one side, and lit up. I said, “What a smart aleck you are, Mishenka! I just might go and fall in love with you!” And he said, “What do you mean? I love my wife and children.” He finished smoking and reached for me again. Suddenly there was a noise in the front hall. Before I could figure out who it might be, my husband was standing in the doorway. Dead silence. Finally Zhdanov said, “Well, time for me to go!” and started pulling on a sock. My husband hemmed and hawed in a strange, old womanish voice. “Didn't you see the telegram? I left it by the mirror. Vova's coming home today. They gave him leave.” “And here he comes!” Zhdanov said, pointing out the window. Indeed, Vova was opening the gate, wearing his uniform—smart, grown-up, handsome. We rushed to get dressed. Zhdanov couldn't seem to find his other sock, so he put his boot on his bare foot. My husband made the bed. I didn't even have time to put my dress on properly, let alone comb my hair! Vova fell on my neck immediately and then started hugging his father and then hugged Zhdanov. “Uncle Misha! Lord, how glad I am you're here! I love you all so much!” He grabbed a plate of pirozhki and started cramming them into his mouth, one after another, poor kid. I broke down in tears, kept kissing his prickly nape, his coarsened hands, his pimply cheeks, his sweat-soaked tunic. Zhdanov wanted to leave, but Vova wouldn't let him.
“Oh no, Uncle Misha, you're staying for dinner!” Vova told stories nonstop about the barracks, his idiot commanders, how you have to eat everything with a spoon and you practically have to fight to get an apple for dessert. The three of us behaved as if nothing special had just happened. And maybe nothing so terrible had. Before Vova could finish his cup he jumped up from the table, plopped down on the sofa, shut his eyes, and sighed. “God, this is great!”

Yes, you're quite right. Nothing so terrible! There was a silly embezzlement case that crossed my desk. This cashier, you see, a respectable type, a decent-looking man, had embezzled a lot of money. He denied all the charges and said he'd been put up to it by his thief of a boss. All in all he behaved like any honest man insulted by suspicions would. The whole case was proceeding toward acquittal. The defense presented spotless references and letters of praise for his many years of honest service. The man also won people's sympathy because his wife and three identically dressed sons were sitting in the courtroom in the front row. From time to time the father would buck them up, say something loudly across the entire courtroom—that they shouldn't cry, that he would certainly be acquitted because there was justice in this world, it could not fail. In essence, the entire case boiled down to a single note of a few lines submitted by the investigation. It had allegedly been written by the defendant and was proof of his guilt. Burinsky himself, the famous expert, was called in specially from Moscow to testify. Everything hinged on his opinion. So on the third day, I think, the case got to the point of his expert testimony. Burinsky rose—a large, stern, majestic man two heads taller than everyone else. Robinson himself would have envied that head of hair and beard. Everyone held their breath, gazing at the celebrity. He paused and then growled resoundingly, “This is the note.” Burinsky shook the sheet of paper over his head. “And this is a handwriting sample.” He shook another
sheet. “And here is my conclusion. This man is innocent!” Pandemonium! The courtroom burst into applause and people were practically hugging each other. Burinsky sat back down and began raking his beard with an indifferent look on his face. A few formalities remained. The note, the letter, the handwriting taken for a sample, and the expert analysis lay on my secretarial desk. I couldn't believe my eyes. Both were written by the same person. “Wait a minute!” I exclaimed. “What do you mean? This is the same hand!” I felt the eyes of the entire courtroom on me. “Just look. Here and here!” Burinsky tossed back his gray curls and asked in amazement. “What are you actually implying?” “Look here. Can't you see?” I began explaining. “Just take the sweep of the pen. In handwriting the most important thing, after all, is the connection between letters. You can't forge or alter that. Just look at the
m
,
n
, and
. They're all drawn with their bottoms downward, like the
u
. And believe me, this is a sure graphological sign of goodness, openness, and emotional gentleness. These letters, on the contrary, were written with arches and betray secrecy and mendacity. Notice,” I continued, “both in the note and in the letter, the pressure is not firm. No sooner does the pen touch the page than it encounters the paper's resistance, and an inevitable struggle ensues. A pen pressed into the paper reflects urge, will, obstinacy, contrariness, and belligerence. Here, rather, the hand is yielding, a sure sign of susceptibility, impressionability, sensitivity, delicacy, and tact. In both the letters are small, which indicates a sense of duty, self-restraint, and love for hearth and home. Note also how fat the letters are and how open they are at the top of the vowels. Altogether this is proof of credulity, peaceableness, a highly developed capacity for sympathy and deep attachment. Moreover, I dare say that this person possesses both taste and a sense of beauty. Just look at the elegant but perfectly unadorned capitals, at the wide, almost verselike left margin, at the indent, which starts nearly halfway across
the page. The letters are almost not connected to each other, indicating a contemplative, lofty nature, detachment from the mundane, and a rich mental life. A signature without any flourishes indicates intellect. Oh, you have before you an exceptional person. Just look at the incredibly unique shape of the letters. Do they not, all else aside, betray a single patrimony for the neat letter and the messy note? The purely outward, superficial dissimilarity can be explained simply: the note was written in the dark, hence the interlacing of the uneven lines and the blind muddle of suddenly looming letters and words. You see, even a moment's inspection of these letters is enough to be convinced of their kinship. You have before you brothers and sisters in ink, twins from a single pen! This hook over the
alone is priceless, taking a running start and sliding into the question mark! And how could you ever confuse the adjacent
pinned to it? Or this
, which keeps trying to latch onto its neighbor? And the