Chapter 19
At the direction of the Soviet authorities, each year several children who had reached the age of 14 were sent from the orphanage to various educational institutions of the state system of labor reserves, where adolescents were trained for labor professions. Usually, the orphanage authorities tried to use this opportunity to get rid of grade repeaters or the weakest students.
Kim found himself among the repeaters in the seventh grade because he was in Namangan, and he did not show up for the math exam retake on the appointed date. However, he was about three months away from reaching the age of 14, and he could have ensured for himself to remain in an orphanage if he wanted to. But Kim was actually glad that he wouldn’t have to suffer a second year in 7th grade, and he was told that he would be fed much better at the school than in the orphanage.
In Atkarsk he was enrolled in a group of steam-locomotive mechanics, given a uniform, a certificate, and a place in the dormitory. So began the difficult process of learning the locksmithing trade, and then the repair of steam locomotives.
The educational process was well organized. Theoretical and practical training exercises were conducted in equipped classrooms and training workshops by experienced engineers and professional masters. The classes were held in strict, almost military discipline. But the living conditions turned out to be worse than in the orphanage. The dormitory was dirty–theft and hooliganism were rampant. In winter, the central heating radiators were often left cold and in order to keep warm, they had to sleep together on one bed, covered with a vacant mattress. The food at the school, both in quantity and quality, was indeed much better than at the orphanage because the supply rate of rations for students was equal to that of workers, but the oppressive feeling of hunger still did not disappear.
Not far from the school building, near the train station, there was a small market, which the locals called a lousy bazaar for some reason. From morning until late evening, the old women there sold fresh summer vegetables, fruits, and berries to passengers from passing trains, and in winter they sold pickles, fried sunflower seeds, and hot, ruddy potato pies with an amazing smell. The old women were also always ready to trade their pies for such useful items as coal, salt, chalk for whitewashing, and even bricks, which were often transported on the open platforms of freight trains.
On his way from the dormitory through the station tracks to class, Kim sometimes managed to stealthily grab a couple of lumps of anthracite or a few handfuls of salt from the platform, into a bag he had prepared in advance. And for this, he regularly got three or four, or even five pies at the market.
One spring morning, as usual, while walking along the station tracks, Kim noticed a platform loaded with salt on a freight train. Without thinking much, he jumped onto the platform but had barely begun to fill his bag when a man in military uniform grabbed him firmly by his clothes. The soldier paid not the slightest attention to Kim’s pleas for forgiveness and release, and escorted him to the police headquarters at the train station.
The old, tired officer on duty began to draw up a report of the incident, but when it was revealed during the questioning that Kim had come to the school from an orphanage, he abruptly put the paper aside. He remarked irritably that if the case were allowed to proceed, he would face several years in a penal colony under martial law for stealing state property, and that it would cost nothing there to ruin a young person’s life!
With these words, he suddenly inquired whether Kim had not also hidden salt on his bosom, and ordered him to unbutton and lift up his shirt. As soon as Kim complied with the demand, he received a powerful blow to the solar plexus with a fist, and was thrown against the wall. He was numb with pain for a few minutes, gulping air frantically like a fish thrown onto dry land, but when he barely regained consciousness, he was happy to hear that he could now go to school, and the lesson he had received was worth remembering forever.
The incident had a significant effect on the teenager. Though he did not leave his trade on the railroad, he now tried to negotiate with the guards in advance.
His studies were successful. Kim eagerly mastered locksmith work and studied the structures of steam locomotives. Brought up in the spirit of Soviet patriotism, he was even proud of the fact that soon he would join the ranks of the working class – the most advanced unit of the country’s socialist society. At the school, it did not feel as strongly and openly Judeophobic as it did at the Petrovsky orphanage; however, common antisemitic remarks along with foul language, which had become indispensable in the lexicon of working people, were also widely used by the students. These expressions kept Kim in constant tension, and although they weren’t addressed to him personally, because of them he felt like a stranger in the collective. The only person Kim became strong friends with was Volodya Velikanov, a quiet, serious, honest boy. Volodya came from a large peasant family. Hardship and hard work had developed in him an independence and a strong character beyond his years. They both turned out to be great lovers of reading books, which provided a special interest to their communication.
In Atkarsk, Kim resumed regular correspondence with Braina. After their separation, it took only a short time for his blunt intransigence to disappear without a trace, and he clearly felt how much he missed in-person communication with his mother.
He realized how unfair, heartless, and cruel he had been to his already long-suffering mother when he had so stubbornly and foolishly rejected her many delicate attempts to achieve a mutual understanding. In his letters, Kim sincerely repented of this and fervently promised that after graduation, when they were again reunited, he would try to provide her with a quiet, poverty-free life. Braina responded by insisting that he should think about further education, and that she would help him with that as much as possible.
Meanwhile, once again she found herself in distress.
In the spring of 1945, the war with Nazi Germany finally ended in victory, and the evacuees began to return to their native homes. Betya, together with the military school, moved to Moscow, and then Genya and Raechka left for Minsk. Braina did not want to part with them, but as a former repressed person she was forbidden from living in Minsk.
Trouble seemed to be just waiting for the right hour, to again fall upon the lonely defenseless Braina. First of all, she found herself almost completely without food, because she had lost her daily ration of food, which had been delivered by Genya from the orphanage canteen. The earnings from knitting were barely enough to buy bread on ration cards. Braina was saved from complete exhaustion by the mulberry trees that grew in abundance in the yards and alleys. There were always a lot of fallen berries on the ground beneath them, and the Uzbeks were allowed to pick them up without any restrictions. The berries were large and very sweet, and boiling them in water turned out to be like a fragrant tea. But hunger and emotional distress caused an aggravation of the old camp illness: her arms, shoulders, and back began to ache, and now and then she would have bouts of weakness and dizziness. Knitting with aching hands was excruciating, but overcoming pain and hunger, Braina continued to make shawls — it was her only income!
This went on for several difficult, hopeless weeks, but the day came when Braina was a little lucky.
While collecting mulberries, she met and got into a conversation with a similarly poor woman from Belarus. Sincerely sympathizing with Braina, she advised her to collect apricot pits on the streets and secretly told her the address of a buyer, who pays 4 rubles in cash for a kilogram of these pits. Braina immediately took the kind advice, and in a short time collected more than a kilogram of pits and went to the specified address. The five rubles she earned were just enough for a large corn flatbread. From that day on, the collection of pits that lay around everywhere in the city, became Braina’s second regular income after knitting. And as soon as her nutrition and mood improved, the sickness slowly receded.
Gathering pits, Braina began to go to the reading room of the city library to rest. It was always warm, cozy, clean, there were newspapers and magazines on free tables. She would sit by the window, lay the bag of pits beside her, and enjoyed the reading and comfort. Her unassuming appearance at first alarmed the library staff, but gradually they got used to it, got to know Braina better, and, appreciating her erudition, willingly talked to her about literary topics.
A few months passed, and one day, late in the fall, Braina accidentally met in the library a somewhat familiar teacher from the orphanage where Genya had worked before leaving. The woman was genuinely surprised and happy to see her. She said that at the pedagogical council of the orphanage, many times they remembered Braina in connection with the numerous unsatisfactory grades of students in math and Russian, but no one even presumed that she had stayed in town after Genya left, so they did not try to find her.
Two or three days after the meeting in the library, along with this teacher the principal of the orphanage herself came to Braina’s kibitka. At her request, Braina without concealment told her about herself and her situation, as usual expecting that after that the visitors would leave.
But the principal emphatically stated that she was not afraid to take responsibility for Braina and offered her a permanent job as a teacher, in order for her to provide her constant help and support in the studies of the high school students. At these words, Braina could not hold herself back and burst into tears – these were tears of gratitude for the human trust shown to her by the official Soviet leader for the first time since her arrest.
The women calmed her down and took her, almost holding her under their arms, to the orphanage. There she was reoutfitted in new clothes, fed, and introduced to the children, with whom she was to spend a lot of time from now on. Braina perceived all of this as a magical fairytale miracle — so unexpected was the realization of her seemingly already impossible dream of returning to the profession of teaching, which from a young age had become her calling for life.
Selflessly and persistently, Braina took up the task assigned to her. Not only did she spend her weekdays, sometimes even her weekends at the orphanage, studying, talking, or playing with the children; she visited the school, seeking more than a teacher’s attentive attitude toward the students who had recently fallen behind in their studies, but now had decided to be corrected.
It did not take long for the children to appreciate the sincere goodwill, efficiency, selflessness, and extensive knowledge of their new teacher, to whom they responded with touching affection and care. Braina felt true joy and satisfaction that her teaching experience was bringing tangible benefits to these disadvantaged boys and girls.
Among her new circle of friends, she forgot about her personal troubles. Braina was respected and valued by the orphanage staff for her modesty, dedication, and simplicity of attitude. The results of her hard work were not long in coming — from month to month the progress of the children under Braina’s care improved markedly. The principal did not forget to recognize her merits with commendations, bonuses, and pay raises.
Braina finally had the money with which she could afford at the bazaar to buy decent clothes, shoes, some furniture, cooking utensils, dishes, and even to send small remittances to Kim. In her kibitka, there was now always a small supply of sweets and fruit for the children, who in the morning on their way to school would run to Braina Borisovna for a delicacy. On weekends, Braina sometimes per her old habit visited the reading room, and there discussed literary news with old acquaintances, and relaxed over her reading.