Kolyma Tales (26 page)

Prison ostracism is a weapon in the war of nerves. And God help the man who has had to endure the demonstrated contempt of his fellow inmates.

But if some antisocial citizen is too thick-skinned and stubborn, the cell leader has another, still more humiliating and effective weapon at his disposal.

No one can deprive a prisoner of his ration (except the investigator, when this is necessary for the ‘case’), and the stubborn one will receive his bowl of soup, his portion of kasha, his bread. Food is distributed by a person appointed by the cell leader; this is one of his prerogatives.

Bunks line the walls of the cell and are separated into two rows by the passageway leading from the door to the window. The cell has four corners, and food is served from each of them in turn. One day it is served from one corner, and the next day from another. This alternation is necessary to avoid upsetting the already hypernervous prisoners with some trifle, such as which part of the thin prison soup they will receive, and to guarantee that each has an equal chance of getting thicker soup, at the right temperature… Nothing is trivial in prison.

The cell leader declares that the soup can be served and adds: ‘And serve the one who doesn’t care about the committees last.’

This humiliating, unbearable insult can be repeated four times a Butyr day, since there is tea for morning and evening, soup for dinner, and kasha for supper.

A fifth opportunity presents itself when bread is distributed.

It is risky to appeal to the wing commandant in such matters, since the entire cell will testify against the stubborn one. Everyone lies – to a man – and the commandant will never learn the truth.

But the selfish person is no weakling. Moreover, he believes that he alone has been unjustly arrested and that all his cellmates are criminals. His skin is thick enough, and he doesn’t lack stubbornness. He easily bears the brunt of his cellmates’ ostracism; those eggheads and their trick will never make him cave in. He might have been swayed by the ancient device of physical threat of violence, but there are no physical crimes in Butyr Prison. Thus, the selfish one is about to celebrate his victory – the sanction has proved futile.

The inmates of the cell and their leader, however, have at their disposal one more weapon. The cells are checked each evening when the guard is changed. The new guard is required to ask if they wish to make any ‘statements’.

The cell leader steps forward and demands that the ostracized man be transferred to a different cell. It is not necessary to explain the request; it simply has to be stated. No later than the next day, and perhaps even earlier, the transfer is sure to be carried out, since the public statement relieves the cell leader of any responsibility for discipline in the cell.

If he were not transferred, the recalcitrant man might be beaten or killed, and such events involve repeated explanations by the guard to the commandant and to still higher prison officials.

If an investigation of a prison murder is conducted, the fact that the guard was warned is discovered immediately. Thus, it is judged best to accede to the demand and not resist making the transfer.

To be transferred to another cell, not brought in from the ‘free world’, is not a very pleasant experience. This always puts one’s new cellmates on their guard and causes them to suspect that the transferred person is an informer. ‘I hope he’s been transferred to our cell only for refusing to participate in the committee,’ is the first thought of the cell leader. ‘What if it’s something worse?’ The cell leader will attempt to learn the reason for the transfer – perhaps through a note left in the bottom of the waste-basket in the toilet or by tapping on the wall, using the system worked out by the Decembrist, Bestuzhev, or by Morse Code.

The newcomer will receive no sympathy or confidence from his new comrades until an answer is received. Many days pass, the reason for the transfer is clarified, passions have quieted down, but the new cell has its own committee and its own deductions.

Everything begins again – if it begins at all, since the newcomer has learned a bitter lesson in his former cell. His resistance is crushed.

There were no Committees for the Poor in Butyr Prison until clothing and food packages were forbidden and commissary privileges became practically unlimited.

The committees came into being in the second half of the thirties as a curious expression of the ‘personal life’ of prisoners under investigation, a way for those who had been deprived of all rights to make a statement as to their own continuing humanity. Unlike the ‘free’ world ‘outside’ or the camps, society in prison is always united. In the committees this society found a way to make a positive statement as to the right of every man to live his own life. Such spiritual forces run contrary to all prison regulations and investigatory rules, but they always win out in the end.

A stick tapped on the window, and Golubev recognized it. It was the riding-crop of the section chief.

‘I’m coming,’ Golubev shouted through the window as he pulled on his pants and buttoned the collar of his shirt. At that very moment the chief’s messenger, Mishka, appeared on the threshold of the room and in a loud voice pronounced the usual formula with which Golubev’s work day began:

‘The chief wants you!’

‘In his office?’

‘In the guardhouse.’

But Golubev was already walking out the door. It was easy working with this boss. He wasn’t cruel to the prisoners and, although he inevitably translated any delicate matters into his own crude language, he was intelligent and knew what was what.

True, at that time it was fashionable to show that you had been ‘reforged’ by the new world, and the chief simply wanted to stick to a safe channel in an unfamiliar stream. Perhaps. Perhaps. Golubev didn’t give it any thought at the time.

Golubev knew that his boss – his name was Stukov – had been in a lot of hot water with the higher-ups in camp, that a number of accusations had been leveled at him, but he didn’t know either the essence or the details of those investigations that had been abandoned.

Stukov liked Golubev for not accepting bribes and for his aversion to drunks – for some reason Stukov hated drunks… Probably he also liked Golubev for his boldness.

A middle-aged man, Stukov lived alone. He loved all sorts of news about technology and science, and stories of Brooklyn Bridge made him ecstatic. But Golubev couldn’t talk about anything even resembling Brooklyn Bridge.

Stukov, however, could learn about that sort of thing from Miller, Pavel Miller – an engineer, convicted of counter-revolutionary activity. Miller was Stukov’s favorite.

Golubev caught up with Stukov at the guardhouse.

‘All you ever do is sleep.’

‘No, I don’t.’

‘Did you know they brought in a new group of prisoners from Moscow? They came through Perm. I tell you, you were asleep. Get your crew and let’s go pick out the ones we need.’

The section stood on the very edge of the non-convict world, at the end of a railroad spur. From there human shipments were sent on through the taiga on foot, and Stukov had the right to select the men who were to be left behind.

Stukov had magical insight, tricks from the area of applied psychology, tricks that he had learned as a supervisor who had grown old working in the labor camps. Stukov needed an audience, and Golubev was probably the only one who could appreciate his extraordinary talent. For a long time this ability seemed supernatural to Golubev – until the moment when he realized he also possessed the magic power.

The camp office permitted them to retain fifty carpenters in the section. The men were lined up in front of the chief, not in a single row, but three and four deep.

Stukov walked slowly down the line, slapping his riding stick against his unpolished boots. From time to time his hand would rise.

‘Come forward… you. And you. No, not you. You, over there…’

‘How many have we got?’

‘Forty-two.’

‘OK, here’s eight more.’

‘You… you… you.’

While the names of the men were copied down, their personal files were also separated out. All fifty were well acquainted with axe and saw.

‘Thirty mechanics!’

Stukov walked down the line, slightly frowning.

‘Come forward… you… you… You, get back. What were you arrested for, theft?’

‘Yes, citizen chief, for theft.’

Thirty mechanics were selected without a single mistake.

Ten clerks were needed.

‘Can you pick them out by appearance?’

‘No.’

‘Let’s go, then.’

‘You, come forward… you… you…’

Six men came forward.

‘That’s all the bookkeepers there are in this group.’

They checked the files, and they were right; that’s all there were. They selected clerks from other groups that arrived later.

This was Stukov’s favorite game, and it amazed Golubev. Stukov was himself as delighted as a child by his magical power and was unhappy whenever he lost his sense of confidence. He didn’t make mistakes, but simply lost confidence and then he would stop the selection process.

Each time Golubev watched with pleasure this game that had nothing to do with cruelty or malicious joy at another’s misfortune.

Golubev was amazed at this knowledge of people and the unbreakable tie between body and soul.

He had witnessed these demonstrations of his boss’s magic power many times. There was no special trick to it – just years of experience in working with convicts. Convict clothes smooth out differences, but that simply lightens the task: to read the profession of a man in his face and hands.

‘Who are we going to pick out today, sir?’

‘Twenty carpenters. I also got a telegram from headquarters to pick out those who used to work in the secret police,’ Stukov smirked, ‘and who were convicted for non-political crimes. That means they’ll go back to their desks. What do you think of that?’

‘I don’t think anything. Orders are orders.’

‘Did you figure out how I picked out the carpenters?’

‘Well…’

‘I just picked out the peasants. Every peasant is a carpenter. I get good laborers from among the peasants. And I don’t make mistakes. But how can I pick out a member of the secret police? I don’t know. Maybe they have shifty eyes? What do you think?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘Neither do I. Maybe I’ll learn by the time I’m old and ready to collect my pension.’

The group was mustered, as always, along the row of railroad cars. Stukov made his usual speech about work and the system of work credits, stretched out his hand, and walked twice along the railroad cars.

‘I need carpenters. Twenty of them. But I’ll pick them myself. Don’t move.’

‘You, come forward… you… you… That’s all of them. Get out their files.’

The chief’s hand felt for a slip of paper in his jacket pocket.

‘Stay where you are. There’s one other matter.’

Stukov held up the slip of paper.

‘Have any of you worked in the secret police?’

Two thousand convicts remained silent.

‘I ask you, did any of you work in the secret police?’

From the rear rows, pushing his neighbors aside with his fingers, a thin man made his way to the front. He really did have shifty eyes.

‘I worked as an informer, citizen chief.’

‘Get the hell away from me!’ Stukov said with contempt and delight.

Yes, Golubev offered this bloody sacrifice. A piece of meat was cut from his body and cast at the feet of the almighty god of the camps. To placate the god. To placate him or to deceive him? Life repeats Shakespearian themes more often than we think. Did Lady Macbeth, Richard III, and King Claudius exist only in the Middle Ages? Shylock wanted to cut a pound of flesh from the body of the merchant of Venice. Is that a fairy tale? Of course, the appendix is but a worm-like spur of the cecum, a rudimentary organ that weighs less than a pound. And, of course, conditions of absolute sterility were observed in offering the bloody sacrifice… The rudimentary organ turned out to be not rudimentary at all, but essential, functional, life-saving.

The end of the year fills with anxiety the lives of those prisoners who feel insecure about their positions (and who of the convicts feels secure?). The victims of this sense of insecurity were primarily those convicted under Article 58 of the Criminal Code – political prisoners. After years of hungry, cold work in the mines they had won the ephemeral uncertain happiness of a few months, a few weeks of work in their chosen profession or any service position – bookkeeper, orderly, doctor, laboratory assistant. They managed to get a position intended for civilians (there were no civilians) or common criminals (common criminals didn’t prize these ‘privileged jobs’ since they could always find that type of work, and therefore they frequently got drunk and worse).

Staff positions were filled by persons sentenced under Article 58 of the Criminal Code, and they did their work well. And without hope. For as soon as a commission arrived, they would be removed from their jobs and the head of the camp would be reprimanded. The head of the camp in his turn never wanted to spoil his relations with the senior commission, and removed in advance all those with no right to such privileged jobs.

A good camp head would wait for the commission to arrive, let the commission do its work, remove anyone who had to be removed, and leave. It was not a time-consuming process and anyone not removed would remain, remain for a long time – for a year, till the next December. For a half-year at least. A less capable camp head, a more foolish one, would remove such persons in advance so as to be able to report that everything was in order. The worst camp heads, those who had the least experience, would conscientiously carry out the orders of their superiors and not permit persons condemned under Article 58 to work with any instrument other than the pick and wheelbarrow, the saw and the axe. Such camp heads were the least successful. Such camp heads were quickly fired.

Commission raids always occurred toward the end of the year. The higher-ups had their own shortcomings in the control of their operations, and they tried to make up for them toward the end of the year. And they would send commissions. Sometimes they would even come themselves. They would get travel expenses, and the positions under their control would receive individual attention. All they had to do was make a ‘check’ indicating that orders were being carried out. It was just a matter of shuffling from one foot to the other, riding around and on occasion showing their temper, their strength, their magnitude.