Andrea Bennett - Galina Petrovna's Three-Legged Dog Story

‘That’s very clever, Katya.’

‘I’m a clever girl, puppy. Now, where’s my hat?’

‘I left it in the copse. It fell off. I couldn’t bend down to get it. I’m sorry.’

Katya leant over to ruffle his hair, her fingernails light over his scalp. Then she set off to the copse to retrieve her hat. Mitya looked up for his butterfly in the branches of the linden, squinting in the sun as it prodded at his eyes through the protective green leaves. He couldn’t see it, but he knew it was there. He could feel it.

‘It’s wet, honey. What did you do to it? Did you pee in it? There was really no need—’

‘Katya, I need to tell you something.’ Mitya’s tone was urgent

‘What is it? Did you pee in it? You didn’t!’ Katya giggled, one hand to her mouth.

‘No, listen. It’s something… important.’ Mitya swallowed. His hands were shaking as if an internal earthquake were taking place.

‘OK, puppy. I’m your friend: you can tell me something important.’ She looked at him with her clear, wide eyes and a slight frown.

‘You know I’m an exterminator, right?’

‘Yes, I know that.’

‘You think I kill cockroaches and things, don’t you?’

‘Yes.’

‘That’s not right.’

‘Oh?’

‘Actually I… er…’

‘What?’

Katya stopped, and turned her head slightly as she heard a distant but rapidly nearing roar. Something big was coming along the track towards them, from the direction of town, kicking up clouds of dust and flies.

‘I kill dogs.’ It came out as a mutter, completely lost under the roar of the approaching engine.

‘What did you say?’ Katya turned back to him, mouth open.

Mitya lurched towards her and grabbed her arm just as an ancient red tractor rounded the corner behind them.

‘I kill dogs!’ he shouted at the top of his voice.

The tractor roared round the bend and lurched up the track, throwing dried mud and husks over the little car and scattering wildlife as it went.

‘Dogs?’

‘Dogs… I am… a controller… of canine infestations.’

There was a long pause. Katya shook her arm free of his and twisted her hands in front of her, then picking at a hangnail, and then biting it sharply.

‘But you—’

‘I’m sorry, Katya. I tried to tell you.’

‘Oh, really?’

‘Look at me?’

She looked at him with eyes that burnt.

‘All my life, it seemed like the right thing to do. Well, not quite all my life. But it seemed to be… my calling. I couldn’t bear to see dogs roaming the streets. Dogs, for me, meant disease, pain, fear.’

‘But you were saving those puppies the other night.’

‘Katya…’

‘You were saving them, yes?’

Mitya looked up into the tree and saw a flutter of blue wings.

‘Katya, I… I wasn’t saving them. I was going to gas them.’

She let out a small ‘Oh!’ and turned away from him.

‘But I didn’t, Katya! I saved them… because… something changed. I can’t explain.’

‘Try, Mitya. Try very hard to explain.’ Her voice was hard as winter, the soft lisp all gone, her eyes like chips of ice.

‘You were so tender with them. They reached for you like… like furry babies. And it reminded me about… things I haven’t thought about for years. When I was a child. And I remembered what it’s like to care. And suddenly I felt sorry for them. And I realized that it’s not their fault.’

‘You’re right. It’s not their fault. It’s ours.’

‘Katya, please… be my friend. Forgive me. I’ll explain everything to you properly later; I’ll answer all your questions, but just believe me: I won’t do it anymore. I’ll give up being Mitya the Exterminator.’

Katya frowned, ‘Well, that’s a fine aim, Mitya, but who will you be instead?’

Mitya thought for a moment, eyes probing the leaves and branches of the swaying tree above them.

‘I will be… a defender of animals. I will become… a defender of human kind, Katya, and of human kindness. I will… I will become a vet.’

‘A vet? Really?’ Katya squeaked, a smile splashing across her face despite herself, before it disappeared just as quickly. ‘You’re not serious. You’re trying to fool me. You don’t really want to be a vet.’

‘No, really. I am serious. I can do it. I was thinking about it all last night. My teachers always told me to use my skills for good… it’s not too late, is it?’

‘Well… I don’t know. Perhaps it’s never too late, Mitya? We all have to hope.’

‘Will you… can you forgive me, little girl? I promise I will never mislead you again. It is not something I wanted… to hurt you.’

‘Do you swear? That you will help animals, not hurt them?’

‘Yes I swear.’

‘And are you really my friend, Mitya?’

‘Yes, I swear, I’m really your friend.’

Katya took Mitya’s face in both her hands.

‘Then I am your friend. I forgive you. But don’t ever take me for a fool again.’

Mitya took Katya’s hands from his face and kissed both palms. ‘Thank you.’

‘OK, well, we’d better… we’d better get on for the SIZO. It’s nearly midday. And you have business.’ Katya led Mitya back to the car, and climbed into the driver’s seat. She spun the wheels, and the little car hopped back on to the dusty track, a plume of brown rising into the summer sky.

High up in the linden tree, the butterfly opened its wings, and closed them again, and sighed.

‘So, Zoya, are you feeling better?’

‘Yes, Galia, dearest, a little better, thank you.’ Zoya nodded carefully and shuffled her shoulders further into the nylon embrace of the airplane’s seat, looking small and old and frail.

It is true to say, Zoya had milked her indisposition for everything it was worth upon embarking on the process of taking her flight. She insisted on being provided with a wheelchair to bump her across the tarmac to the rather dog-eared Tu-154 that awaited them, and Galia thought at one point that she was going to insist on being carried up the steps to the plane’s passenger door too. However, happily for all concerned, a large and jolly baggage handler with last-night’s vodka still in his eyes had gently taken her arm and floated her up the stairs before she realized what was happening, popping her in through the passenger door rather like a magician producing a coin from behind an unsuspecting audience member’s ear. She had been left temporarily speechless, much to Galia’s relief.

Once on board, contrary to Galia’s promise, there were no little paper hand towels, or nuts, but there was beer, and Zoya availed herself of it as soon as the ‘fasten seatbelts’ sign had been snuffed out and the stewardess had squeezed herself along the gangway. The other passengers were mostly businessmen returning to the south following long-winded negotiations, or bare-knuckle bar fights. Galia was relieved to see that there was no livestock in the cabin on this flight. She had never forgotten one experience on the way back from the Urals when a number of geese had escaped their cage, which had been on the luggage rack above her head. Her hair had taken weeks to recover, and she still couldn’t look a goose in the eye. But times had moved on. Geese were now confined to the hold, or the toilet, depending on the airline.

‘So, my dear, if you are feeling a little restored, I need to talk to you: about Pasha.’

‘What do you mean, my dear?’ Zoya replied, eyes watering as she put down her can and burped delicately on to the back of her translucent hand.

‘I had a talk with Grigory Mikhailovich, Zoya, at the airport, and it wasn’t very nice.’