And a Plenum was in season from dawn until the time the liquor stores opened up. It was broad-based and revolutionary-spirited, but since all four of our Plenums in order not to get them mixed up, to number them: First Plenum, Second Plenum, Third Plenum, and Fourth Plenum.
The entire First Plenum was devoted to electing a President, i.e., to electing me as President. This took us some two minutes, no more. So all the rest of the time was eaten up by debate on a purely speculative theme: Who’ll open up the store earlier – Aunt Masha in Andreevo or Aunty Shura in Polomy?
Sitting on my presidium, I listened to the debate and thought, debate is absolutely necessary – but decrees are much more necessary. Why are we forgetting that which should be the crowning labor of any revolution – the issuing of decrees? For example, a decree obligating Aunty Shura in Polomy to open her store at six in the morning. Nothing could be simpler: invested with the power, we undertake to force Aunty Shura to open her store at six in the morning instead of nine-thirty. Why didn’t this occur to me before?
Or, for example, a decree concerning land: transferring to the people all the land in the district, all acreage and all movable property, along with all alcoholic beverages and without any requital? Or this: resetting the hands of the clock two hours forward or an hour and a half back, or any way whatever. Then demanding that the word “devil” be spelled with a capital D, or cancelling some letter altogether – it’s just a question of which one. And, finally, forcing Aunty Masha in Andreevo to open her store at five-thirty instead of nine.
Thoughts crowded into my head, so much so that I started to feel sad and called Tikhonov off behind the scenes, where we drank some Caraway vodka and I said:
“Hey listen, counselor!” “Well, what?”
“Oh, nothing. You’re a shitty counselor, that’s what.” “Find another one.” Tikhonov was offended.
“That’s not the point, Vadya. The point is this: if you’re a decent counselor, sit down and write decrees. Have another little drink, sit down and write. I heard that you have not restrained yourself after all, that you pinched Anatole Ivanych’s thigh. What are you up to? You want to start a terror campaign?”
“Oh, what the… Just a little…”
“And what sort of terror are you undertaking? White terror?” “Yes.”
“It’s in vain, Vadya. However, OK, right now’s not the time. It is necessary to write a decree first, if only one stinking decree. You have paper and pen? Sit down and write. And then we’ll have a drink and go on to a declaration of human rights. And only then comes the terror. And then later we’ll have a drink and, as Ilich put it, study, study, study.”
Tikhonov wrote two words, had a drink, and sighed:
“Yes-s-s… I muffed it with my terror… Well, really, in our affair it’s impossible not to make mistakes, because our affair is unheard-of and new, and consider that there are no precedents, it’s true, but…”
“Aw, what kind of precedents are they? They’re nothing. Nonsense. Than flight of the bumblebee, the amusement of spoiled grown-ups – not any kind of precedents… The calendar – what do you think? Should we replace it or leave it as it is?”
“Oh, better leave it. As they say: don’t poke around in shit or you’ll start smelling.”
“You put it correctly, we’ll leave it as is. In you I have a brilliant theoretician, Vadya, and that’s good. Should we close the Plenum or not? Aunty Shura in Polomy is already open. She has some Rossiiskaya, they say.”
“Close it, of course. Anyway, tomorrow morning the Second Plenum will take place. Let’s go to Polomy.”
Aunty Shura in Polomy really did have some Rossiiskaya. In connection with this, as well as in expectation of punitive raids from the Regional Center, it was decided to move the capital temporarily from Cherkasovo to Polomy – that is, twelve versts deeper into the territory of the Republic.
And there, on the next morning, the Second Plenum, devoted to the issue of my resignation from the Presidency, was declared open.
“I am getting up from the President’s chair,” I said. “ I spit in the President’s chair. I feel that the President’s chair should be occupied by someone who looks so shot from drink that you couldn’t touch his face with a three-day beating. Do we actually have anyone like that?” “We don’t,” the delegates answered in unison. “Take me, for example, couldn’t you touch mine with a three-day beating?”
Everyone looked at me a couple of seconds and then answered in unison: “We could.”
“So there you are,” I continued. “We’ll get along without a President. We’d better do this: let’s everybody go into the meadows and make some home-brew, and lock Borya up. Since he’s a person of high moral qualities, let him sit there and set up the office.”
My speech was interrupted by an ovation, and the Plenum was closed down. The neighboring meadows lit up with the blue fire of the stills. I alone did not share the general animation and optimism. I moved from fire to fire with a single alarming thought: why wasn’t anyone in the world willing to have anything to do with us? Why such silence in the world? The district is in flames, and the world is silent because it is holding its breath, perhaps, but why has no one extended his hand – not from the east, not from the west? What’s become of King Olaf? Why don’t regular units crush us from the south?
Quietly I led the counselor to the side – he reeked of home-brew. “Do you like our revolution, Vadya?”
“Yes,” Vadya answered. “It is feverish but it is beautiful.” “So… But about Norway, Vadya, about Norway, what’s new?” “Nothing so far… But what do you care about Norway?
“What do you mean, what do I care? Are we in a state of war with Norway or are we not in a state? Everything is tuning out pretty stupid. We’re fighting with her, but she doesn’t want to with us. If they don’t start bombing us by tomorrow, I’ll sit down again in the President’s chair and then you’ll see what’ll happen!”
“Sit,” Vadya answered. “Who’s stopping you, Erofeevkins?” If you want to, go ahead…”