Arkadi Strugatsky - The Ugly Swans

This time the lobby was empty. Nobody was playing blindman's buff, nobody was jiggling his fat ass in a game of tag or sleeping in the armchairs. Everywhere there wore crumpled raincoats, and some joker had put a hat on a rubber tree. Victor climbed the carpeted staircase up to the second floor. Music blared. On the right half of the corridor, the doors leading to the Member of Parliament's suite were wide opened, exuding a rich odor of food, smoke, and overheated bodies. Victor turned left and knocked on the door to Diana's room. Nobody answered. The door was closed, but the key was in the keyhole. Victor walked in, turned on the light, and put the gin on the night table. He heard footsteps and looked out. A tall man in a dark evening suit was retreating along the corridor with a firm, wide step. He stopped at the mirrored landing, and, craning his neck, fixed his tie. Victor had time to observe his swarthy, faintly yellow eagle's profile with its sharp chin. And then something happened to the man: he let his shoulders sag, leaned slightly on one foot, and, swaying his hips in a repulsive manner, disappeared into one of the opened doors. "Fop," thought Victor, not quite sure of himself. "Went to take a puke." He looked to the left. It was dark.

Victor took off his raincoat. He left the room, locked the door, and went to look for Diana. "I'll have to look in at Rosheper's," he thought. "Where else could she be?"

Rosheper had a three-room suite. The first one contained the remains of a recent feast. The tables were covered with soiled cloths and piled up with dirty plates, ashtrays, bottles, and crumpled napkins. There was nobody left, except a single solitary bald head, dripping with sweat and snoring away into a gravy dish.

In the adjoining room all hell had broken loose. Half-naked girls, imported from the capital, were kicking their legs on Rosheper's enormous bed. They were playing some strange game with an apoplectically purple gentleman, his honor the burgomaster, who was diving into them like a pig into a pile of acorns, kicking and grunting with enjoyment. Among the other guests were his honor the police chief, out of uniform, his honor the city judge, eyes popping from nervous exhaustion, and some unknown hustling type dressed in lilac. The latter were competing furiously in a game of miniature billiards that had been propped up on a dressing table, while in the corner, slumped against the wall and arrayed in a filthy state uniform, sat the director of the middle school, smiling idiotically, his legs spread wide apart. Victor was on his way out when someone grabbed at his trouser leg. He looked down and took a step backwards. Beneath him, on all fours, was the Knight of the Orders, author of a widely circulated project for fish breeding in the Kitchigan Reservoirs, Member of Parliament Rosheper Nant.

"I want to play horsey," whined Rosheper. "Let's play horsey! Giddyyap!" He was beside himself.

Victor delicately freed his leg and glanced into the next room. There he saw Diana. At first he didn't even realize that it was her, and when he did he didn't like it. "Very nice," he thought. The room was full; men and women, all vague acquaintances, were standing in a circle and clapping. In the center of the circle Diana was engaged in a wild dance with the sallow faced fop, the owner of the eagle's profile. Her eyes burned, her cheeks burned, her hair flew above her shoulders, the devil himself was no match for her. The eagle's profile was trying his best to keep up.

"Funny," thought Victor. "What's going on?" Something was not quite right. "He's a good dancer, he's just a terrific dancer. He could teach dancing. He's not just dancing, he's demonstrating how it should be done. He's not even a teacher, he's a student at an exam, and he really wants an A. No, that's not it. Listen, pal, you're dancing with Diana! Can you really be unaware of that?" Victor made his habitual imaginative leap. "An actor is dancing on the stage, everything is fine, everything is the way it should be, without any wrinkles, while at home there is suffering ... no, not necessarily suffering, they're just waiting for him to return, and he's also waiting for the curtain to fall and the lights to go out... and he's not even an actor, he's an outsider, playing an actor who's playing another outsider, this time a real one. Can't she feel it? This is false. He's a mannequin. There's no closeness between them, not a drop of seduction, not a shadow of desire. They're saying something to one another, it's impossible to figure out what. Chitterchatter. 'Aren't you hot?' 'Yes, I've read it, it's marvelous' "

Then he saw Diana pushing aside the guests and running toward him.

"Let's dance," she shouted when she was still far away.

"Completely. I give him his bath."

Someone barred her path, someone else grabbed her hand, and she tore herself free, laughing, but Victor kept on looking for her sallow-faced companion. He couldn't find him, and that disturbed him.

Diana finally reached him, hooked her fingers in his sleeves, and dragged him into the circle.

"Come on, come on! They're all ours -- boozers, whoozers, losers. Show them how to do it! That fledgling can't do a thing."

She dragged him into the circle. Someone in the crowd shouted, "Hurrah for our writer Banev!" The stereo, silent for a moment, once again groaned and clattered. Diana pressed against him and then moved back; she smelled of perfume and wine, her body burned, and Victor was blind to everything but her face, aroused and beautiful, and her streaming hair.

"Dance!" she shouted, and he started dancing. "I'm glad you came."

"Right."

"Why are you sober? You're always sober when you shouldn't be."

"I'll get drunk."

"Today I need you drunk."

"You'll have me."

"So I can do whatever I want to with you. Not you with me, but me with you."

"Right."

She laughed, satisfied, and they danced in silence, seeing nothing and not thinking about anything. As in a dream. Or a battle. That's the way she was now -- like a dream, like a battle. Diana in one of her moods. Around them people were clapping and shouting, and somebody tried to cut in but Victor pushed him out of the way, and Rosheper gave a drawn-out cry: "Oh, my poor drunken people!"

"He's impotent?"

"Well?"

"Nothing happens."

"Oh, my poor drunken city!" moaned Rosheper.

Victor took her by the hand and led her away. The boozers and whoozers made way for them, stinking of liquor and garlic. At the door a thick-lipped punk with flushed cheeks said something rude, itching for a fight, but Victor told him, "Later, later," and the punk disappeared. Holding hands, they ran along the empty corridor. Without letting go of her hand, Victor opened the door, and, without letting go of her hand, locked it again from the inside. It was hot, it had become unbearably hot and close. The room pulsated around them, and then it became narrow and confining, and Victor got up and threw open the window. The damp black air poured onto his naked shoulders and chest. He got back onto the bed, fumbled in the darkness for the bottle of gin, took a swig, and handed it to Diana. Then he stretched out. To his left was a stream of cold air, and to his right it was warm, silky, and soft. Now he could hear that the carousing was still going on -- the guests were singing in chorus.

"How long are they going to keep at it?" he asked.

"At what?" said Diana sleepily.

"At this howling."

"I don't know. What difference does it make?" She turned on her side and put her cheek on his shoulder. "I'm cold," she complained.

They disentangled and crawled under the blanket.

"Don't sleep," he said.

"Uh uh," she mumbled.

"Are you happy?"

"Uh uh."

"What if we try your ear?"

"Uh-uh... Leave me alone, it hurts!"