Here, beyond the mountain - is an OASIS!
On Wednesday, the thirteenth of September, I come back from Turkmenstan. The Moon is full and I can set off a real journey, but I’ve got some things to be settled here yet. I have to dictate all my works onto two types and give one of them to the trusted person in Ternopil for -25-preservation; I have to prepare the mixture of water and whey, provisions, to make a note-book with the magazines` cuts out of my favourite works, etc. No matter what, but I won’t be ready before Sunday, the 17-th of September. But the number seventeen is a taboo - it is said to bring bad luck.
So, I have only Monday, the eighteenth, left - the day of the Moon, and the Moon for me (being a Cancer) is a patron. Though Kost’ used to say, that fate had to be wrestled against, one shouldn’t also neglect the signs. If I depart on Monday, I’ll reach the frontier not earlier than on Thursday, the twenty first, so I’ll cross it at the day of Jupiter. Moreover, I’ll do it at the day-time, as there will be the autumn solstice at that time.
So, everything arises at my best. And the Moon still will be full enough - the third quarter is only over on September, 23, - and it will provide enough light.
…Ashkhabad, September, 20. Everything goes due to the plan. My suitcase with a bag inside has been put into the automatic luggage-cell. The only thing, bothering me, is that I haven’t had enough sleep, just some hour on the bench at the station: even the pill of seduxen didn’t help, because I was too overstrained. Besides, I’ve got some another bother here: I need to walk in search of industrial shops to get some tongs. I also ought to have a proper meal, but I don’t know the city completely. I haven’t got some other things prepared for the journey: I didn’t get a sheep’s skin and I didn’t take cellophane bags for a raft. But I bought a chlorophos “Taiga” and I’ll have no problems with mosquitoes at least.
The train goes to Dushanbe via Tedjen – my planned station. To Tedjen it`ll arrive at midnight, due to the local time - it suits me best. Although, between the stations of Dushak - the last frontier outpost - and Tedjen, there are three more stations, where I could already get off. But should I do that? How will they accept the stranger’s arrival at a small railway station? They would make some proper phone calls… I should rely on the circumstances.
… The day passed in bothers and it was not lacking bad signs: I didn’t manage to have a meal anywhere; I’ve just been given a helping of cut hen’s legs (beneath the knees) with macaroni, called “chehohbilly”. An offensive standing dish!
I also could not find the tongs anywhere, so I left
this idea alone: it is either sink or swim.
I bought the ticket to Tedjen, but I was rather probable to get off earlier to make it closer to the frontier. Before getting on the train, I take my suitcase from the luggage-room, draw my bag with all the odds and ends out and have the empty suitcase itself locked in the luggage-cell again. The staff-sword, wrapped into the paper, sticks out of the bag, but there’s nothing to be done here. I buy two more bunches of grapes to eat them in the carriage - and that’s all. I left Ashkhabad at half past eight, it wasn’t late yet, but it was of no success asking the conductor to make me some tea. He refused, though I was offering him a “ruble” (the Russian money) .
There are a few people in the carriage (a railway one with numbered berths), almost all of them are the Turkmen and I stand out for them a bit.
We pass by the frontier stations…. Somewhere between Ashkhabad and Dushak I was unpleasantly struck by a superpowerfull frontier searchlight, the operators direct onto the carriages for fun. When the light gets onto the mountain range of the Kopet-Dah, perhaps ten kilometers afar are illuminated with fantastic distinction – everyhing coud be perfectly seen in slight details. Its being so long-sighted is striking. What will I soon have to come through?
Here is Dushak. It’s the last check-up point. I keep my eye on the conductor, whether he will be observing the passengers after Dushak. No, he won’t. After we have only started, he locked himself in his compartment with some stranger to take tea. Your health, my friend.
Without delay, before the train’s arrival at the next station (a passing-track “the 76-th km”), I take my bag and go out in the end of the corridor, in order to be on the look-out. The exit door are open! Isn’t it a gift of fate?
But scarcely a few minutes have passed, when suddenly a young Turkman follow me, strip naked up to the waist and of the athletic construction, with a towel on his shoulders. He is wiping himself, pulling the towel by the edges and demonstrating his bicepses.
- Where are you going to? - He asks.
- To Tedjen. I know, it’s too early yet, but it’s much cooler here, in the end of the corridor.
He peers at me suspiciously, and then opens the entrance door wide. He delays for a minute or two, but finally returns to the carriage.
Ugh! Everything has turned out well. I shut the door. It’s too striking breaking of the rules. And here is the passing-track .
The railway-guard’s lodge most likely is somewhere nearby, and here,in front of me, there is a row of poplar trees, there is no single -26- person around. The temptation is great. Should I take a risk and get off? I myself start marking time at the door, but the train starts and I am staying.
The passing-track is too small, and the local residents (and there are just a few houses here) are registered, so how could they accept a stranger’s arrival? No, I can’t take up such a risk.
Suddenly I draw my attention to the characteristic sound of the wheels rumble. What can it be? The bridge across the channel! I am on time to notice the water masses flowing beneath the bridge under an extremely power. And I was yet planning to wade the channel and did not even take the cellophane bags! Well, I declare. I’ll have to count upon crossing the channel through that very bridge, and it could be possibly guarded…
The station Takir comes next - it is quite a large village. I must make up my mind. Maybe, on getting off the train I should make my way in the direction opposite to the frontier, in order to deceive guards? It should be taken into consideration.
But unexpectedly luck looks my way. That’s the end to the train of trials, free way to the runaway!
The train stops two hundred meters before the station. The semaphore is closed. But the DOOR is open.
I am rushing to the bushes nearby.
The SEMAPHORE raises a hand parting.
- Good luck.
- Thank you, my friends.
The train sets off eastwards.
I am starting my way westwards.
A wide stream of the almost dried river stretches before me. I see lots of trees at the other side - a source of rank verdure, which impressed me so much. Though there was a lack of grass everywhere. Maybe, there was too little water here for it? From the mountain-path height I see, I could wade the river-bed by stepping the stones over. In reality it’s not a river any longer, but a net of plate streams, putting up a resistance to the sun.
Almost in the middle of a wide sand-bar I notice two old men in turbans, sitting by the bonfire, and a shaggy dog. The dog has instantly sniffed me.
- Bay, bay, - it gives not quite a strict bark and runs towards me. Should I point my staff sword against it? I finally do: haven’t I taken it as the protection against the dogs?
The old men hail the shaggy-haired dog and it, being quite satisfacted, calms down.
Only now I notice a flock of sheep twenty meters afar. What are they doing there? There is no single blade of grass around. I approach the shepherds.
- “Salaam Ale hem!” - I am greeting.
- “Ale hem Salaam!” - The grey beards are replying in chorus. But my knowledge of Turkish, their “Farsi”, is almost up with that. As a real polyglot I fire out in English:
- Do you speak English?*
The old men shake their heads.
- “Ta-ra-ba-ra”,- something incomprehensible one of them says finally, pointing his hand at the opposite side of the river. Only now, near the orchard, I notice a pise wall (“duval” in Turkish, as far as I remember) of a huge collective courtyard - a “fortress”.
“Obviously someone speaks English at this courtyard”, - I am interpreting that gesture to myself. Fine. I nod my head and start moving towards the buildings. I jump from a stone to a stone. I don’t feel thirsty at all, but I should have to show them, I’ve just come from the desert. I stoop over the stream and bucket some water with hands. The water is so-so; it would taste better, if I were thirsty. I come closer to the “fortress”. I define its sizes approximately: it’s almost a square court 50x30 meters; mud-walled huts without roofs are slicked to the walls inside. There is a gap in the wall instead of the gates. In the gap appears a woman (a Turkish one, I wonder?) with a string of coins on her breast and carrying a two-year baby.
- Do you speak English? - I repeat my sacramental phrase. She shakes her head but waves her hand, inviting me into the first mud-walled hut.
Finally, it occurs to me, how awkwardly I must look with a staff sword in my hands, so I leave it by the entrance and enter the house. The hut is lacking doors, two meters wide and three meters long, closer to the entrance there is the fire smouldering. To the right, at the further half of this room, there is a half-rolled “kashma”(sort of a rug). Nearby there’s a large cardboard bag. “It substitutes the trunk”, - I think. With a gesture the woman invites me to have a sit.
- “Ta-ra-ba-ra”tea? - She asks.
Oh, sure, tea.
-“Adji” tea, - I instantly recall another Turkish word (“adji” -27-
tea is strong one, which should be drunk snacking with a sugar).
The woman adds something resembling the bark to the glow and fans the fire. She puts a little kettle onto special stones and a rather large piece of sugar suddenly appears from somewhere. She cracks it into small pieces skillfully.
People start entering the hut. Some of them are only peering through the door’s gap.
One of them, a tall, grey bearded and dignified old man comes in and takes a seat next to me on the kashma. The shepherds also come in for a while. I make another attempt to communicate with them in English, but this time it is useless again.
- Please, send a police for, - I recall the phrase, perfect as for its grammar construction. – A police, a police. - Let them send any policeman for, he will surely understand something. The shepherds are leaving.
Meanwhile the tea has boiled and the woman is serving it to me and to the dignified old man. I take to drinking tea gladly, but without any sugar: I’ve already had so much sugar by taking glucose for the last day and a half, that now I feel sick. But the woman is, however, surprised at my having refused to take sugar: wasn’t it me to ask for an“adji”tea? It`s impossible to drink a tea, like that,without suggar.
I am quick-witted to draw out a bottle with the pills of glucose remained, pour some pills out in the hand and hand them in to the baby on the woman’s lap. I myself put one pill into the mouth and demonstrate to the baby how tasty it is by my facial expression. I again draw my attention to the woman’s string of coins.
I remind of a handful of the communist coins with two iron rubles among them, and draw them out of the pocket.
I pour them out near the woman. She accepts the gift gladly and I, in the meantime, come across a real treasure in my pocket: a small white plastic figure of a little rhinoceros.
How did this nice toy happen to get to me? It has happened long before my departing for Iran. I was going by a provincial bus somewhere in the region of Zolochiv, when suddenly, at the last stop, I noticed this wonderful bauble. I also remembered its price, indicated on the figurine’s leg: seven copecks. I put it into the pocket without hesitation, because none had been seating there long before. Almost subconsciously I thought at that moment, that I could present it to some child.
I have barely handed in the figurine to the baby, it yelled with satisfaction. It put it into his mouth immediately, - less someone should take it away.
Cheese! I’ve also got cheese; I haven’t even touched it during my journey. Within the first day I swept away all the fruit inhabitants of my bag, and there, as in the Noah’s Ark, each beast have a pair: two apples, two peaches, two oranges, two tomatoes. I ate almost the whole bottle with pills of glucose too. But cheese was left. I draw out a cellophane package and hand it in to the woman. To my surprise she takes it without any special enthusiasm and puts it aside.
Meanwhile the woman tries to ask me something, I am lucky to draw out of her speech one word, known to me: “Dushak”.
- Ah, sure, sure, - I nod my head. - Turkmenistan, Ashkhabad, Tedjen, Dushak.
The whole commune nods their heads with satisfaction: in the recent historical past all that was so approachable for them, their own.
- I come from Ukraine, - I am growing bold. - Ukraine, Kyiv, - I am pointing at myself. They look at me without understanding, but I was not even expecting them to know Ukraine. But to be on the safe side, I decide to draw a piece of the map of the world, from Ukraine to Iran. I take a small piece of paper and draw familiar contours, explaining: here is Turkmenistan, here is Iran, the Caspian Sea, the Caucasus, the Black Sea, Turkey, and Istanbul (in Ukrainian I pronounced it “Stambul”)...
- Oh, Istanbul, - they nod me. This word is well known to them. Well let it be Istanbul. - And here, - I point a little more northwards of the Black Sea, - is Ukraine. I`m - Ukraine. – I point at myself again.
- “Shuravi”(in this way “USSR” is called in Iran), - they nod me in answer.
Who knows what your “shuravi” is, but to the North of the Black Sea - there is Ukraine.
Suddenly I hear some fuse, made in the doorway, and see two military soldiers with rifles and the officer with a gun, dropping inside.
-Stand up! – The command is heard.
Eight kilometers separate me from the “76-th” railway-pass. At my watch it’s about midnight. Without hesitation I move back along the railway, by the cart-track. Three times the light of the search-lights of the goods trains make me rush into bushes and lay down still there, as the bushes are too feeble. I was fumigated with dust and I felt causticity in my -28- throat. In the long run high growth appears ahead along the channel. The country-road turns to the left of the railway, and I rush along it headlong: ahead, quite near, there is the bridge and, it is, probably, guarded. I ought to have the channel, further of that bridge, examined, to equip myself for a march, and decide on the way of crossing the channel.
In two hundred meters I halt and start getting to the water, through the growth of the rush. It is approximately five or six meters wide, but what is its depth? I get back and on reflecting a while, I decide to search for a footbridge.
I get equipped according to the plan: I place the tape with the recorded works into the “pocket”, I’ve sewed to the football-shirt in advance; fasten the straps to the bag and get it shouldered. The paper wrapping and a tape-box dug into the pit, I have found nearby. I take the staff sword into my right hand.
“I am ready, my Fate. Make your attack…! “- As far as I remember, there is something like that in my favourite letters of Seneca, I’ve got in my bag.
I`m coming along the channel cautiously in direction of the bridge and notice a dark mass in front of the channel.The country-roud set in this direction too.
Having approached carefully, I come across a landing-stage, made of planks, and a laid up BARGE. And I was going to take the liberty to cross a ford here! There’s nothing to do here: I have to go to the railway bridge. I see the buildings of some object, most likely of an industrial one, looming in the distance. I suddenly hear the dog barking furiously from there. In a moment I can hear the door creaks, followed by a shrill dog’s yelping. “Such thankfulness for a faithful service”,- I reflect upon, without lacking my delight. The dog stops barking.
I walk out to the railway, squat onto the sleepers and look attentively
into the distance along the railway.
No guards, no watch-box can be seen. I keep moving forward, with fear, having bent myself as arc.
I pass the bridge luckily, run off the embankment and proceed running, trying to be between the industrial object to the left (the DOG) and the stational buildings to the right. For some reason or other, the house to the left can still be observed in the distance, without removal. It’s where the “four-legged friend” is. I am running as fast as I can.
-HORSERADISHINTOYOURNOSEMASTERIWARNEDYOU.
-29-
That’s enough. It’s some hallucination. I’m running for almost half an hour already, but to the left and behind the lights of the buildings can’t get remote in no way… It’s the “effect of the night lights”, - I surmise at last. I thrust the staff sword into the ground and turn to the compass with luminescent face and a needle - an invaluable thing under such conditions. I define the direction to the South-West, identify it with a certain constellation and look at my watch: it’s only past two. There are three more hours before dawn. I need to walk away as far as possible into the heart of the desert. I swallow some pills of glucose, take some water after them, and start skipping along. It’s so dark, that I can’t see the ground beneath my feet not more than a meter further, but luckily the locality is smooth and solid - there is no hill or a little pit.
More often than once in an hour I amend my route by the compass, according to the stars: they are moving, such naughty things, they can’t stay still. I remember about it, for I’ve spent much time in order to comprehend this celestial mechanics. A useful hobby, it has proved useful…
The advantages of the smooth, bleak surface of the desert, that used to have helped me so much at my night march, turn a threat, the moment the flood-time of the dawn gushes out into the desert from the East. Where do I have to lie down? I am running the last hundreds of meters in panic. Finally I come across an excavation, about ten centimeters deep with a few stalks here and there. It’s quite a satisfactory one, under such conditions.
Having already lain down, I sprinkle “Taiga” around me and fix four wires-holders with hooks on their ends. I hang up the cloth, especially prepared for that and it turns to be quite a satisfactory shade for my head. I swallow a pill of seduxen, but I can’t fall asleep, so in an hour I take another one.
A slight doze is seizing me, but an unexpected factor overpowers the chemicals’ influence: a powerful car roar echoes in my temples with horror.
They are coming to take me, I have been noticed!
- Oh, I am glad to see you! - I greet the guests with a big-toothed smile. Such uncommon reaction of mine to their strict command bewilders the warriors slightly and they direct their weapon downwards.
- Who are you? Where did you come from? - Asks the officer, having gathered together the remains of his strictness.
- I am a former political prisoner of the Soviet Union Bohdan Klymchak. I am Ukrainian. - I declaim the learnt phrases. - I want to beg an ambassador of Great Britain in Teheran to give me a political refuge.
On realizing finally, I won’t be of any threat to them, the warriors take away their guns. In quite a different tone the officer proposes: