The Road by Vasily Grossman Read Free Book Online

“We’re not going out anywhere today, we’re going to stay at home.”
    He sat Ksenya down on his knee, put an arm around her shoulder, and began telling her stories.
    “Sit still now, be a good girl,” he would say every time she tried to get down. In the end Ksenya sat still, snuffling occasionally as she watched this talking uncle.
    By the time Vera Ignatyevna got back, it was already four o’clock. There had been a lot of people in the shops.
    “Why are you looking so sulky, Ksenya?” she asked in a startled voice.
    “Why shouldn’t I look sulky?” Ksenya answered. “Maybe I’m hungry.”
    Vera Ignatyevna hurried into the kitchen to prepare supper; Lev Sergeyevich carried on entertaining their little guest.
    After supper, Ksenya asked for a pencil and some paper, so she could write a letter. “But I don’t need a stamp,” she added. “I’ll give it to Lidka myself.”
    While Ksenya was writing, Vera Ignatyevna suggested to her husband that they all go out to the cinema, but Lev Sergeyevich did not like this idea. “What on earth are you thinking of, Vera? The crowds tonight will be terrible. In the first place we won’t be able to get tickets. In the second place, it’s the kind of evening one wants to spend at home.”
    “It’s our good fortune to spend all our evenings at home,” retorted Vera Ignatyevna.
    “Please don’t start an argument,” snapped Lev Sergeyevich.
    “The girl’s bored. She’s used to being with other people all the time. She’s used to being with her friends.”
    “Oh, Vera, Vera,” he replied.
    Later in the evening they all had tea with cornel jam, and they ate a cake and some pastries. Ksenya enjoyed the cake very much indeed; Vera Ignatyevna felt worried, put her hand on the little girl’s tummy, and shook her head. Soon afterward the girl’s tummy did indeed start to ache. She turned very sullen and stood for a long time by the window, pressing her nose to the cold glass. When the glass became warm, she moved along a little and began to warm another patch of glass with her nose.
    Lev Sergeyevich went up to her and asked, “What are you thinking about?”
    “Everything,” the girl answered crossly, and went back to squashing her nose into the glass.
    In the orphanage they were probably about to have supper. There hadn’t been time for her to receive her present, and she was sure to be left something boring, like a book about animals. She already had one of those. Still, she’d be able to do a swap. This Auntie Vera was really nice. A pity she wasn’t one of the staff. The girls who’d stayed behind in the orphanage were going to spend all day riding about in a truck. As for herself, she was going to become a pilot and drop a gas bomb on this strange Uncle Lyova...There were some quite big girls out in the yard...they were probably from group seven.
    She dozed off on her feet and banged her forehead against the glass.
    “Go to bed, Ksenka!” said Vera Ignatyevna.
    “I butted the glass just like a ram,” said Ksenya.
    Lev Sergeyevich woke up in the night. He put out a hand to touch his wife’s shoulder, but she wasn’t there.
    “What’s up? Where’s my darling Verochka?” he thought in alarm.
    He could hear a quiet voice coming from the sofa, and sobs.
    “Calm down now, you silly thing,” Vera Ignatyevna was saying. “How can I take you back at night? There aren’t any trams, and we’d have to walk all the way across Moscow.”
    “I kno-o-o-w,” answered a deep voice, in between sobs. “But he’s so very dismable.”
    “Never mind, never mind. He’s kind, he’s good. You can see
I’m
not crying!”
    Lev Sergeyevich covered his head with the blanket, so as not to hear any more. Pretending he was asleep, he began quietly snoring.

A Young Woman and an Old Woman *

    Stepanida Yegorovna Goryacheva, head of a department of anAll-Union People’s Commissariat, was leaving for the Crimea that evening. Her vacation began on August 1, but since