Sorokin, Vladimir - Day of the Oprichnik

I see Batya’s mobilov blink red. Indirect conversations are forbidden during the repast. We all turn off our mobilovs. A red signal means His Majesty is calling. Batya puts his solid gold mobilov to his ear, and it jingles against his bell earring.

“At your service, Your Majesty.”

Everyone in the refectory grows quiet. Batya’s voice is the only sound:

“Yes, Your Majesty. I understand. We’ll be there right away, Your Majesty.”

Batya stands up, looks us over quickly:

“Vogul, Komiaga, Tiaglo, with me.”

Ah. By Batya’s voice I can sense something has happened. We stand, cross ourselves, and leave the refectory. By Batya’s choice I understand— an affair of the mind awaits us. Everyone chosen has a university education. Vogul studied the workings of the treasury in St. Petrograd; Tiaglo specialized in book manufacturing in Nizhny Novgorod; and I joined the oprichnina from my third year at the history department of Moscow’s Mikhailo Lomonosov State University. Actually, I didn’t join…You don’t join the oprichnina. You don’t choose it. It chooses you. Or, more precisely, as Batya himself says when he’s had a bit to drink and snort: “The oprichnina pulls you in like a wave.” Oh, how it pulls you in! It pulls you in so fast that your head spins, the blood in your veins boils, you see red stars. But that wave can carry you out as well. It can carry you out in a minute, irrevocably . This is worse than death. Falling out of the oprichnina is like losing both your legs. For the rest of your life you won’t be able to walk, only to crawl…

We go out in the yard. From the White Chamber to His Majesty’s Red Palace is just a stone’s throw. But Batya turns toward our Mercedovs. So that means we’re not going to chat in the Kremlin. We all get into our cars. Batya’s Mercedov is distinguished—wide, bug-eyed, squat, with glass three fingers thick. It’s high quality work by Chinese masters, custom-made on special order, what they call te tzo dei . On the front hood is the head of a German shepherd, on the back a steel broom. Batya drives toward Savior Gates. We fall in line behind him and drive out through a cordon of Streltsy. We cross Red Square. Today is a market day; peddlers take up most of the square. The hawkers shout, saloop men whistle, bread sellers boom, the Chinese sing. The weather is sunny, nippy; there was a good snow during the night. The main square of our country is cheerful, musical. As a boy I witnessed an entirely different Red Square—grim, stern, frightening, with a big pile of granite housing the corpse of the Red Revolt’s maker. At that time a cemetery of his henchmen stood nearby. A gloomy picture. But His Majesty, our little father, tore down the granite box, buried the corpse of the squint-eyed rebel in the ground, and demolished the cemetery. Then he ordered the Kremlin walls to be painted white. And the main square of the country became genuinely krasny— red as in krasivo , beautiful. And thank God.

We drive toward the Hotel Moscow, along Mokhovaya Street, past the National Hotel, past the Bolshoi and Maly theaters, past the Metropol Hotel, and onto Lubianskaya Square. That’s what I thought: the conversation will take place in the Secret Department. We drive around the square past the monument to Malyuta Skuratov. Our forefather stands there in bronze, dusted with snow, short, stocky, stooping, with long arms; he gazes intently from under overhanging eyebrows. For centuries he has watched over Moscow with the Ever-Watchful Eye of the State; he watches us, the heirs of the oprichniks’ Great Work. He watches silently.

We drive up to the left gates; Batya honks. The gates open, and we enter the inner courtyard, park, and get out of our Mercedovs. We enter the Secret Department. Each time I walk under its gray marble arches, with their torches and stern crosses, my heart skips and then starts to beat differently. It’s an out-of-the-ordinary, special beat. The beat of the state’s Secret Work.

A dashing, fit lieutenant in a light blue uniform greets us and salutes. He accompanies us to the elevators, which carry us to the topmost floor, to the office of Terenty Bogdanovich Buturlin, the head of the Secret Department, a prince, and a close friend of His Majesty. We enter the office—first Batya, then the rest of us. Buturlin greets us. He and Batya shake hands; we bow to our waists. Buturlin’s expression is serious. He shows Batya to a chair, and sits down across from him. We stand behind Batya. The head of the Secret Department has a menacing face. Terenty Bogdanovich is no joker. He loves to monitor important, complex, critical state affairs, to uncover and undermine conspiracies, catch traitors and spies, smash subversive plots. He sits silently, looking at us, fingering his carved bone beads. Then he says one word:

“Pasquinade.”

Batya waits. We freeze and don’t even breathe. Buturlin looks at us searchingly, and adds:

“On His Majesty’s family.”

Batya turns in the leather armchair, frowns, and cracks his large knuckles. We stand absolutely still. Buturlin gives a command, and the blinds on the office windows are lowered. A kind of twilight fills the room. The head of the Secret Department gives another command. Words are pulled up from the Russian Network; they hang in the dim light. The letters are iridescent, burning in the dark:

by Well-Meaning Anonymous

WEREWOLF AT A FIRE

Firemen are looking,

The police are looking,

Even priests are looking

Through our capital city.

They’re seeking a Count,

Whom they haven’t yet found,

Nor ever have seen,

A Count round about age thirty-three.

Of medium height,

Pensive and glum,

He’s smartly attired,

In tails and cummerbund.

Cut in the signet ring

On his finger,

A hedgehog of diamond gleams and glims,

But not a whit more is known about him.

Nowadays,

Counts are oft

Pensive and glum,

Stylishly garbed,

In tails and cummerbund.

They adore the alluring

Dazzle of diamonds,

The dolce vita

Is just waiting to find them.

Who is he?

Whencesoever?

What manner of beast

The count whom they seek

In our

Capital city?

What hath he done,

This chic aristocrat?

Here’s what Moscow’s salons

Say to that!

Once, a Rolls-Royce

Wound its way,

All round Moscow.

A Count most forlorn,

Who resembled an owl,

Rode in it alone.

Sullenly squinting, morosely he yawned,

While humming an air

from a Wagner song.

All of a sudden,

In a glass ’cross the lane,

The Count

Spied a Marquess,

Encircled by flame.

A swarm of idlers,

Crowded the pavement,

The ancestral mansion

Was fully ablaze.

Gloating, the loafers

Ogled fire and pitch,

After all, such abodes

Were just for the rich.

Out of the cozy Rolls-Royce

The Count raced.

Ne’er a moment he wasted,

He cut through the rabble,

Of miserable swine,

Making very good time,

Then up, up, up,

Up the drainpipe

He climbed.

The third floor,

The fourth,

The fifth…

Then the last one,

Engulfed by the fire.

Out came piteous cries,

Then moans growing fainter—

Flames were now licking

The balcony sides.

Pale and quite naked,

Framed by the window,

The Marquess fluttered

In fantastical plumes;

Then a flare of the fire,

’Midst the dove-colored fumes,

Did illumine her milky white breast

On the pyre.

His hands strong and lithe,

The Count drew himself up,

Then with all of his might,