Vladimir Sorokin - The Blizzard

“When you fell trees, chips will fly,” said the doctor, remembering his great-grandfather’s favorite saying.

Garin’s great-grandfather, an accountant, often reminisced about the distant Stalin era, when that saying was popular with the authorities and the people.

Crouper made it through the bone and then, instead of white chips, greenish ones flew from under the axe.

“Aha! He had sinusitis…,” thought the doctor, squinting at the giant professionally. “Probably a vagrant. He was walking, drinking. Got drunk, stumbled, fell asleep. Froze …

“Russia…,” he muttered, and recalled how he’d once treated a giant who’d developed a hernia. The big one had been hired in Repishnaya for earthwork. He’d dug a foundation pit with his huge shovel, and then moved a barn and overexerted himself. When Garin, along with three volunteers, fixed the hernia, the big one howled, chomped on the chains that had been used to hold him fast to the floor, and roared:

“Don’t! Don’t!”

They fixed the hernia successfully that time …

“Chopped right through, tarnation.” Exhausted, Crouper straightened up, took off his hat, and wiped his face.

“Hmm…” A cloud had crossed the moon, and in the dim light the doctor examined the light stripe of the runner in the pit of the head. The giant’s face, disfigured by the axe, looked ominous.

“Shud we push it back?” Throwing down the axe, Crouper leaned against the nose of the sled.

“Let’s push!” The doctor leaned against the other side.

Crouper clicked, clucked, and cooed; the horses began stepping backward, and the runner slid out.

“Thank God!” the doctor sighed in relief.

Crouper dropped to his knees and felt the runner:

“Ay, damnation…”

“What is it?” The doctor leaned over and, as the moonlight returned, he could clearly see the broken runner, the point of which had remained forever in the maxillary sinus of the corpse. “Damn…”

“Broke off, that’s what it did.” Panting, Crouper blew his nose loudly.

The doctor instantly felt a chill.

“And what will we do now?” he asked with growing irritation.

Crouper said nothing, he just stood there breathing hard and sniffing. Then he picked up the axe:

“Gots to cut a runner and fix it to this one.”

“What, we won’t make it?”

“Won’t make it this aways.”

“We won’t make it on the second runner?”

“No, yur ’onor.”

“Why not?”

“The other one’ll get stuck in the snow—and that’ll be the end of it.”

The doctor understood.

“It broked off on account of it was cracked already.” Crouper sighed. “If it’d been in one piece it wouldn’t of broked off. But it was gonna break for sure.”

The doctor spat angrily, reached for his cigarettes, and remembered that they were all gone. He spat again.

“Alrighty, I’ll go look fer a crooked tree branch,” said Crouper, and headed off across the snow into the fir trees.

“Don’t be long!” the doctor demanded irritably.

“Depends on how it goes…”

He disappeared into the trees.

“Idiot,” muttered the doctor after him.

He stood near the ill-starred head awhile, then climbed onto the sled seat, wrapped himself in the rug, pulled his hat down all the way to his eyes, thrust his hands deep in his pockets, and sat motionless. The doctor could still feel the effect of the liquor, but it was beginning to pass, and he felt chilled.

“How absurd!” he thought.

And he quickly dozed off.

He began dreaming of a huge feast in an enormous, brightly lit hall, something like the banquet hall at the House of Scientists in Moscow. It was filled with acquaintances and strangers who had something to do with him, his profession, and his private life; people were congratulating him. They were happy for him, lifted their glasses high for toasts, spoke solemn grandiloquent words, and he, understanding neither the reason for this feast nor the meaning of the congratulations and excitement, forced himself to nod and respond to the congratulations, attempted to carry himself grandly with an air of certainty and joy, although he recognized the problematic nature of the whole affair. Suddenly one of the guests clambered onto the table, and everyone stopped and stared at him. Platon Ilich recognized the man as Professor Amlinsky, who had lectured on suppurative surgery in medical school. Amlinsky, wearing a tuxedo and an attentively tired expression on his beardless face, stood up straight, crossed his hands on his chest theatrically, and without a word began to dance a strange dance, striking the heels of his laced boots hard on the table; there was something ceremonial, sinister, and significant in the dance, which everyone there understood, and which Platon Ilich immediately guessed. He realized that the dance was called “Rogud” and that it was a commemorative medical dance, dedicated personally to him, Doctor Platon Ilich Garin, and that all these people gathered at the table had come to Garin’s wake. Terror seized Platon Ilich. In a trance, he watched Amlinsky dance with abandon, marking an ominous beat on the table with such force that the dishes jumped and clinked; he danced, making strange circular movements with his rear end and head, first crouching, then straightening up, nodding and winking at everyone. The miller’s wife sat near Platon Ilich. She was beautifully dressed; a spray of diamonds shone around her plump, well-groomed face. She was Amlinsky’s wife, and had been for a long time, as it happened. The air was fragrant with perfume and the smells of her smooth, well-tended body. Her vivid face drew close to Garin’s, and she whispered to him with a lewd smile:

“A meaty, pompous hint!”

The doctor woke up.

As soon as he moved, a ferocious shudder shook his body. Trembling, he lifted the hat from his eyes. It was dark and cold all around. Crouper was chopping something in the darkness. The moon had hidden behind clouds.

The doctor moved some more, but the shivers went through him so profoundly that he bellowed, and his teeth began to chatter. He was suddenly frightened. He had never experienced such terrifying, penetrating cold in his life. He realized that he would never get out of this accursed, endless winter night.

“L-lor-d-d h-h-have m-m-mer-cy…,” he began to pray, his teeth chattering so hard and fast it was as though someone had attached them to a motor made by the Klacker company.

Crouper continued to chop in the darkness.

“Lo-lo-lor-d-d … p-pro-t-tec-t m-me and lead-d m-me…,” the doctor moaned, trembling, as though in pain.

“There now…,” he heard Crouper mutter, and the chopping stopped.

While the doctor dozed, Crouper had found a small fir tree with a bent trunk in the forest; he had cut it down, chopped off the branches, attached it to the sled, and whittled it into a semblance of a runner. It wasn’t much to look at, was even ridiculous looking, but was quite capable of getting them to Dolgoye. It had to be nailed to the broken runner. And there was even the means: when Crouper had repaired the runner at the miller’s, he’d grabbed three nails.

“Shuda taken at least four,” he thought.

But he reassured himself aloud: “Three’ll do it.”

Noticing that the doctor was agitated and mumbling, Crouper went up to him:

“Yur ’onor, help me out.”

“L-lord … Lor-d-d…” The doctor shook.

“Cold?” Crouper realized.

After working, he wasn’t cold.

“St-st-start a f-fire…,” the doctor chattered.

“A fire?” Crouper scratched under his hat and looked up at the hidden moon. “That’s right, now … Cain’t see a darn thing … Won’t hit the nail…”