Solovyov and Larionov Read online

  it is worth dwelling on several fundamental principles that are characteristic of this chain.

  According to Dupont, several factors determined our

  society’s advancement, with key roles played by an insufficient propensity for labor, an inclination for appropriating another’s property, and a heightened sense of justice. The cause-and-effect chain that had formed within the French

  researcher’s head finally coiled into a circle that she recognized, on second thought, as vicious.

  The state of affairs she depicted did not, in fact, seem

  rosy: appropriation of another’s property intensified—to an extreme—a sense of justice within society, which in turn

  sharply reduced the society’s propensity for labor. Needless to say, the latter circumstance could not help but stimulate an inclination for appropriating another’s property and that 580VV_txt.indd 18

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  automatically led to an even more heightened sense of

  justice and even less propensity for labor. It was within this context that Dupont examined the destructive Russian revolutions, the many-year rule of Communists (no less

  destructive, according to her assessment), and a whole series of other events.

  That combination of factors was combustible on its own

  (‘ Molotoff cocktail! ’ Dupont sighed), and was aggravated by a personal factor. A series of figures proceeding along

  Russian history’s teetering stage had managed to push the

  contradictions to extremes. In the French scholar’s view,

  president Boris Yeltsin occupied a special place among them and had obviously misused his skills as an orchestra

  conductor. The success of his Berlin performance made him

  so giddy that he thought of nothing but the conductor’s

  baton from then on. Under that baton’s light stroke, the

  appropriation of another’s property finally reached the point where the sense of justice was no longer intensifying and

  the propensity for labor was no longer decreasing. As far as Yeltsin’s decisive manner for problem-solving went, Dupont characterized it in her article ‘The Headless Horseman’,

  published in Sobriety and Culture in 1999, as a typical cavalry charge.

  There is no doubt that Dupont became entangled in a

  whole series of questions while forming her chain of causeand-effect. For example, she demonstrated an overt

  exaggeration of the role of the individual in history (it probably comes as no surprise that Dupont’s political views were staunchly de Gaullist), most likely brought on because the history she herself was working on was the history of a

  general. Beyond that, the dialectic of the necessary and the 580VV_txt.indd 19

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  accidental—which is so important for a correct assessment of historical events—became a stumbling block for her. She

  simply could not figure that out by using Russian history. At some point, she began to see that necessity was accidental in our country to a certain degree. In other words, she could not manage to distinctly formulate the reason behind

  Solovyov’s squalid existence. And so Dupont transferred all her irrepressible energy to something more consequential. She replaced her search for answers to Russia’s accursed questions with a search for funds for the young scholar’s needs.

  After brief reflection, the French researcher made an

  appeal to the All-Russian Scientific Foundation, with the

  vague hope that this particular institution was counterbalancing the government’s shortchanging of its scholars. After a short conversation in Moscow—people in the know had

  advised her to get in touch with the fund’s employees only in person—the foundation’s experts regarded the proposed

  research topic as insufficiently all-Russian. In saying their goodbyes, (‘There was a shadow of something left unsaid

  at our meeting!’ Dupont complained afterwards), they

  recommended their guest approach the Russian Foundation

  for Scientific Workers.

  They heard out Dupont more favorably at the Foundation

  for Scientific Workers, and even fed her tea with biscuits of the Stolichnye brand. Along the way, they asked if she was an employee or at least an expert at any kind of French

  foundation. Upon learning that Dupont had nothing to do

  with French foundations, they inquired of the researcher

  who exactly at the All-Russian Scientific Foundation had

  recommended she approach the Foundation for Scientific

  Workers, and asked what that person had said. Surprised

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  by the question and, above all, the questioner’s unusual

  tone, Dupont choked and they pounded her on the back

  until an ill-fated shard of one of the Stolichnye biscuits emerged from the Parisienne’s throat. They asked no further questions after that, helped her on with her coat, and

  gallantly kissed her hand. In Moscow, by the way, they do

  that no worse than in Paris.

  Dupont undertook a further attempt to help the

  Petersburg graduate student: she got in touch with the S.M.

  Solovyov Foundation by telephone. In Dupont’s mind, a

  foundation named for the great Russian historian could not refuse to support another historian, one who was both still young and bore the same surname. Oddly enough, in this

  case it was precisely the surname that became the stumbling block. Afraid of being accused of nepotism, there was a

  refusal on the other end of the line to even review an appeal of this sort. Astonished at the scrupulousness of Russian

  foundations, a pensive Dupont hung up the receiver.

  Finally, at the suggestion of colleagues, she appealed to

  some famous entrepreneur or other, allegedly a man of

  contradictions who mixed market speculation with philan-

  thropic activity. It is entirely possible that the contradictions were exaggerated since, according to information that

  reached her later, philanthropic activity inexplicably turned out to be one of the most profitable income items of his

  entrepreneurship. Whatever the case, Dupont approached

  him with a long letter, in which she noted the thoroughness of the scholar’s work and enumerated, among other things,

  the corrections the latter had entered with regard to

  manpower in the subunits.

  To the addressee’s credit, he did not force Dupont to wait 580VV_txt.indd 21

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  long for an answer. His letter offered the highest appraisal of Solovyov’s industriousness and attention to detail. The philanthropist then went on to point out that data for 1920

  offered no relevance for him since he was predominantly

  interested in information about armies currently in opera-

  tion.

  Needless to say, even such a gallant rejection could not

  suit a person whose colleagues had nicknamed her mon

  general. Dupont set off on another attack and wrote the patron a far more voluminous letter. This letter examined, in the most detailed fashion, the essence of each of the

  adjustments Solovyov had entered, with historical parallels and brief statistics regarding comparable subunits of

  European armies. As for the relevance of the data, the

  enterprising philanthropist was introduced to an extremely ancient point of view, according to which all history repeats itself. After subjecting the designated theory to constructive criticism,
Dupont nonetheless stipulated that she certainly did not exclude the possibility of certain recurrences. The only point with which the French researcher categorically

  refused to agree was the possibility (even theoretical) that a second General Larionov could appear on the peninsula.

  In concluding her letter, so there would be no omissions,

  she even specified that people of the general’s sort are born only once every thousand years.

  It is unknown what had the greater effect here—the digres-

  sion into the territory of the philosophy of history, the French researcher’s resoluteness in standing up for her position, or the actual volume of the letter—but the entrepreneur-philanthropist answered with approval. He even joked agreeably in his response that the researcher’s observation regarding a 580VV_txt.indd 22

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  general of Larionov’s sort might exclude the possibility of such a general appearing in the near future but it instilled certain hopes for the period following the year 2882. In expectation of that blessed epoch, he was designating that Solovyov receive, throughout his graduate studies (i.e. for three years), a stipend that was small but adequate for a modest life. This was a genuine victory.

  Solovyov was stunned by the news of the stipend. He

  knew nothing of the efforts being made by the French

  woman on his behalf and felt genuinely happy when he

  heard about the gift. The phrase saying the stipend was

  designed for a modest life could not cloud his joy. On the one hand, Solovyov’s life had always been modest, but on

  the other, he supposed, justifiably, that his notions of

  modesty differed mightily from his benefactors’ notions. As informed as they were, they could not even guess the extent of the modesty of a scholar’s life in Russia.

  ‘You should go to Yalta,’ Dupont told the scholarship recipient. ‘I’ve looked high and low at everything in the capitals, but I’ve never made it all the way to Crimea. If there’s something new to be found anywhere, it’ll be in Yalta.’

  She said that at the beginning of July. Solovyov spent

  about three weeks systematizing his papers. During that

  process, it emerged that there would be a conference (that, by some strange coincidence, was supposed to be funded

  by the S.M. Solovyov Foundation) in Kerch in August—

  General Larionov as Text—and so, despite the event’s quirky title, Solovyov sent in his topic for a paper.

  Feeling prepared for work under Crimean conditions,

  Solovyov appealed to the director of the institute for permission to travel for his work. Judging by the director’s pensive 580VV_txt.indd 23

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  chewing at the temple of his eyeglasses, Solovyov grasped

  that such work-related travel was not being granted to him uncontested. And here the young scholar began feeling

  awkward when he remembered, for the first time in three

  weeks, that Yalta was a resort city. Solovyov began explaining his motives for the trip with a vehemence unusual for an

  academic institution (in his agitation, he even forgot to

  mention the conference) but the director relaxed his toothy grip on his glasses and waved them in the air in agreement.

  After all, in recent years, work-related travel had been

  unfinanced due to lack of funds and involved nothing more

  than permission to be absent from the institute. Solovyov

  received that permission.

  He left the institute’s ostentatious building and headed,

  unhurried, in the direction of Tuchkov Embankment. On

  a whim, he turned down a side street, and ended up in a

  café. Solovyov could not remember when he had last been

  in a café and ascertained, with some surprise, that his life was becoming less modest. Solovyov viewed the dinner he

  ordered for himself that evening as a farewell meal. He

  already had a train ticket and could feel it (not without

  pleasure) when he put his hand into his jacket pocket.

  Without a doubt, August was the most apt month for

  work-related travel to Yalta.

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  Solovyov traveled south the very next day, on a train from St. Petersburg to Simferopol. Needless to say, trains were not the young historian’s usual means of transportation. His life had taken shape in such a way that anyone capable of reading palms would have seen a railroad line parallel to Solovyov’s lifeline. The trains that streaked past the small station called Kilometer 715 were the first to reveal to him the existence of a large and fancy world beyond the station’s limits.

  Solovyov’s first recollections of smells and sounds were

  attached to the railroad. Locomotive whistles woke him up

  in the mornings and the rhythmic clacking of wheels lulled him to sleep at night. His bed vibrated slightly when trains went by and his ceiling was streaked with the reflections of the lights in the compartments. As he dropped off to sleep, he stopped distinguishing exactly where that smooth but

  loud movement was coming from—here or outside. The

  iron knobs at the head of his bed jingled rhythmically and the bed slowly gathered speed, carrying Solovyov off to

  cheerful childhood dreams.

  Solovyov learned to read using the placards on long-distance trains. It is worth noting that it was the trains’ swiftness 580VV_txt.indd 25

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  that brought about his speed-reading skills, which later eased his perusal of publications about the general: those publications were just as numerous as they were fantastic. It was from those same placards that Solovyov first learned of the existence of a series of cities to which the rails under his own windows ran, leading due north on one side and due

  south on the other. The station called Kilometer 715 lay in the middle of the world.

  Solovyov watched the trains with Leeza Larionova. After

  walking up the steps to the platform, they would sit down

  on a bench that had lost its color long ago and begin their observations. They loved it when the long-distance trains

  reduced their speed near the station. Then they could discern not only the placards but also rolled-up mattresses on bunks, tea glasses in special metal holders, and—most important of all—passengers who represented the mysterious world from

  which the train had come. It was not that they were glad for the trains because they were longing for a world unfamiliar to them; more likely, the very idea of ‘long-distance’ captivated them.

  Their regard for the electric local trains and freight trains that occasionally streaked past the station was calmer. The people on the locals were more or less familiar to them,

  but as far as the freight trains went, well, there were no people on them at all. These were the longest and dullest

  of trains. They consisted of tank cars filled with oil, flatcars burdened with lumber, or just closed-up boxcars.

  By a very early age, Solovyov knew the schedule for all

  the trains that went by the station. This information, which some might think capable of becoming a useless burden,

  played a considerable role in the future historian’s life. For 580VV_txt.indd 26

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  one thing, Solovyov was inculcated with a taste for valid

  knowledge—this may be why the young historian’s regard

  for the mythology surrounding General Larionov was subse-

  quently so unforgiving—from the very beginning of his />
  conscious life. For another, a faultless mastery of the

  schedule cultivated in Solovyov a heightened perception of time, a real necessity for a genuine historian. The schedule used numbers that were never round. Nowhere in those

  figures were there approximate denotations such as after lunch, in the first half of the day, or around midnight. There were only 13:31, 14:09, 15:27. These unkempt fringes of

  time were as tousled as existence itself and possessed a very specific sort of beauty: the beauty of verity.

  Solovyov’s mastery of the schedule was not accidental.

  His mother worked as a controller at a crossing adjacent to the station. And though there was not much of anything

  to control there (the crossing could go unintersected by cars or trucks for days), Solovyov’s mother would lower the

  crossing gate three minutes before any train appeared, put on her uniform jacket, and step out onto the control booth’s little balcony. There was something captain-like in her unnaturally straight figure, her motionlessness, and her stern facial features. Sometimes the din of a train would wake Solovyov up in the middle of the night and he would look out the

  window at his mother. Her resolute standing, baton raised, held him spellbound. It was like that, in profile, that she imprinted herself upon his memory, amidst the train’s

  rumbling and its flickering lights. When Solovyov read later about churches in abandoned northern villages and how a

  priest in that area ministered to an empty church, he thought that referred to his mother, too. Her selfless service, without 580VV_txt.indd 27

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  any visible goal, continued, unvarying, like the sunrise.

  Regardless of changes in government, time of day, or

  weather conditions.

  It was weather conditions, however, that turned out to

  be fatal for her. One frosty winter night, she was chilled to the bone and contracted pneumonia. She initially treated it with vodka and honey. From time to time, her mother,

  granny Solovyova, would take the baton and head out to

  substitute for her daughter at the crossing. Some time later, when the patient became worse, the old woman massaged