Shalamov shock therapy briefly. Red Cross

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original - 4-5 hours

The plot of V. Shalamov’s stories is a painful description of the prison and camp life of prisoners of the Soviet Gulag, their similar tragic destinies, in which chance, merciless or merciful, an assistant or a murderer, the tyranny of bosses and thieves rule. Hunger and its convulsive saturation, exhaustion, painful dying, slow and almost equally painful recovery, moral humiliation and moral degradation - this is what is constantly in the focus of the writer’s attention.

To the show

Camp molestation, Shalamov testifies, affected everyone to a greater or lesser extent and occurred in a variety of forms. Two thieves are playing cards. One of them is lost to the nines and asks you to play for “representation”, that is, in debt. At some point, excited by the game, he unexpectedly orders an ordinary intellectual prisoner, who happened to be among the spectators of their game, to give him a woolen sweater. He refuses, and then one of the thieves “finishes” him, but the sweater still goes to the thieves.

Single metering

Camp labor, which Shalamov clearly defines as slave labor, is for the writer a form of the same corruption. The poor prisoner is not able to give the percentage, so labor becomes torture and slow death. Zek Dugaev is gradually weakening, unable to withstand a sixteen-hour working day. He drives, picks, pours, carries again and picks again, and in the evening the caretaker appears and measures what Dugaev has done with a tape measure. The mentioned figure - 25 percent - seems very high to Dugaev, his calves ache, his arms, shoulders, head hurt unbearably, he even lost the feeling of hunger. A little later, he is called to the investigator, who asks the usual questions: name, surname, article, term. And a day later, the soldiers take Dugaev to a remote place, fenced with a high fence with barbed wire, from where the whirring of tractors can be heard at night. Dugaev realizes why he was brought here and that his life is over. And he only regrets that he suffered the last day in vain.

Shock therapy

Prisoner Merzlyakov, a man of large build, finds himself in general labor and feels that he is gradually giving up. One day he falls, cannot get up immediately and refuses to drag the log. He is beaten first by his own people, then by his guards, and they bring him to the camp - he has a broken rib and pain in the lower back. And although the pain quickly passed and the rib has healed, Merzlyakov continues to complain and pretends that he cannot straighten up, trying to delay his discharge to work at any cost. He is sent to the central hospital, to the surgical department, and from there to the nervous department for examination. He has a chance to be activated, that is, released due to illness. Remembering the mine, the pinching cold, the empty bowl of soup that he drank without even using a spoon, he concentrates all his will so as not to be caught in deception and sent to a penal mine. However, the doctor Pyotr Ivanovich, himself a former prisoner, was not a mistake. The professional replaces the human in him. He spends most of his time exposing malingerers. This pleases his pride: he is an excellent specialist and is proud that he has retained his qualifications, despite a year of general work. He immediately understands that Merzlyakov is a malingerer, and anticipates the theatrical effect of the new revelation. First, the doctor gives him Rausch anesthesia, during which Merzlyakov’s body can be straightened, and a week later he undergoes the so-called shock therapy procedure, the effect of which is similar to an attack of violent madness or an epileptic seizure. After this, the prisoner himself asks to be released.

The last battle of Major Pugachev

Among the heroes of Shalamov’s prose there are those who not only strive to survive at any cost, but are also able to intervene in the course of circumstances, stand up for themselves, even risking their lives. According to the author, after the war of 1941–1945. Prisoners who fought and were captured by Germans began to arrive in the northeastern camps. These are people of a different temperament, “with courage, the ability to take risks, who believed only in weapons. Commanders and soldiers, pilots and intelligence officers..." But most importantly, they had an instinct for freedom, which the war awakened in them. They shed their blood, sacrificed their lives, saw death face to face. They were not corrupted by camp slavery and were not yet exhausted to the point of losing strength and will. Their “fault” was that they were surrounded or captured. And Major Pugachev, one of these not yet broken people, is clear: “they were brought to their death - to replace these living dead” whom they met in Soviet camps. Then the former major gathers equally determined and strong prisoners to match himself, ready to either die or become free. Their group included pilots, a reconnaissance officer, a paramedic, and a tankman. They realized that they were innocently doomed to death and that they had nothing to lose. They've been preparing their escape all winter. Pugachev realized that only those who avoid general work could survive the winter and then escape. And the participants in the conspiracy, one after another, are promoted to servants: someone becomes a cook, someone a cult leader, someone who repairs weapons in the security detachment. But then spring comes, and with it the planned day.

At five o'clock in the morning there was a knock on the watch. The duty officer lets in the camp cook-prisoner, who has come, as usual, to get the keys to the pantry. A minute later, the guard on duty finds himself strangled, and one of the prisoners changes into his uniform. The same thing happens to the other duty officer who returned a little later. Then everything goes according to Pugachev’s plan. The conspirators break into the premises of the security detachment and, having shot the duty officer, take possession of the weapon. Holding the suddenly awakened soldiers at gunpoint, they change into military uniforms and stock up on provisions. Having left the camp, they stop the truck on the highway, drop off the driver and continue the journey in the car until the gas runs out. After that they go into the taiga. At night - the first night of freedom after long months of captivity - Pugachev, waking up, remembers his escape from a German camp in 1944, crossing the front line, interrogation in a special department, being accused of espionage and sentenced to twenty-five years in prison. He also remembers the visits of General Vlasov’s emissaries to the German camp, recruiting Russian soldiers, convincing them that for the Soviet regime, all of them who were captured were traitors to the Motherland. Pugachev did not believe them until he could see for himself. He looks lovingly at his sleeping comrades who believed in him and stretched out their hands to freedom; he knows that they are “the best, the most worthy of all.” And a little later a battle breaks out, the last hopeless battle between the fugitives and the soldiers surrounding them. Almost all of the fugitives die, except for one, seriously wounded, who is cured and then shot. Only Major Pugachev manages to escape, but he knows, hiding in the bear’s den, that they will find him anyway. He doesn't regret what he did. His last shot was at himself.

Camp life is structured in such a way that only a medical worker can provide real help to a prisoner. Occupational safety is health protection, and health protection is life protection. The head of the camp and the guards subordinate to him, the head of security with a detachment of convoy service soldiers, the head of the regional department of the Ministry of Internal Affairs with his investigative apparatus, a figure in the field of camp education - the head of the cultural and educational unit with his inspectorate: the camp authorities are so numerous. The will of these people - good or evil - is trusted to implement the regime. In the eyes of the prisoner, all these people are a symbol of oppression and coercion. These people force the prisoner to work, guard him night and day from escapes, and make sure that the prisoner does not eat or drink too much. All these people daily, hourly tell the prisoner only one thing: work! Let's!

And only one person in the camp does not say to the prisoner these terrible, annoying, hated words in the camp. This is a doctor. The doctor says different words: rest, you are tired, don’t work tomorrow, you are sick. Only a doctor does not send a prisoner into the white winter darkness, into an icy stone face for many hours every day. The doctor is the prisoner’s defender by virtue of his position, protecting him from the arbitrariness of his superiors and from the excessive zeal of veterans of the camp service.

In other years, in the camp barracks, large printed notices hung on the wall: “Rights and responsibilities of a prisoner.” There were many responsibilities and few rights. The “right” to submit an application to the boss is just not a collective one... The “right” to write letters to relatives through the camp censors... The “right” to medical care.

This last right was extremely important, although dysentery was treated in many mine outpatient clinics with a solution of potassium permanganate and the same solution, only thicker, was used to lubricate purulent wounds or frostbite.

A doctor can officially release a person from work by writing it down in a book; he can put him in a hospital, assign him to a health center, or increase his rations. And the most important thing in a labor camp is that the doctor determines the “labor category,” the degree of ability to work, by which the work norm is calculated. The doctor can even submit for release - due to disability, under the famous article four hundred and fifty-eight. No one can force someone exempt from work due to illness to work - the doctor has no control over these actions. Only higher medical ranks can control it. In his medical work, the doctor is not subordinate to anyone.

We must also remember that control over the placement of food into the boiler is the responsibility of the doctor, as well as monitoring the quality of the prepared food.

The only defender of the prisoner, his real protector, is the camp doctor. He has very great power, because none of the camp authorities could control the actions of the specialist. If a doctor gave an incorrect, dishonest conclusion, only a medical professional of the highest or equal rank could determine this - again, a specialist. Almost always, camp commanders were at odds with their doctors - the work itself drove them in different directions. The boss wanted group “B” (temporarily released from work due to illness) to be smaller so that the camp would put more people to work. The doctor saw that the boundaries of good and evil had long been crossed here, that people going to work were sick, tired, exhausted and had the right to be released from work in much greater numbers than the authorities thought.

A doctor could, with a sufficiently strong character, insist on releasing people from work. Without the doctor's approval, not a single camp commander would send people to work.

A doctor could save a prisoner from hard work - all prisoners are divided, like horses, into “labor categories.” These labor groups - there were three, four, five of them - were called “labor categories,” although, it would seem, this is an expression from a philosophical dictionary. This is one of the witticisms, or rather, the grimaces of life.

Giving an easy category of labor often meant saving a person from death. The saddest thing was that people, trying to get a category of light work and trying to deceive the doctor, were in fact much more seriously ill than they themselves believed.

The doctor could give a rest from work, could send him to a hospital and even “sactify”, that is, draw up a certificate of disability, and then the prisoner was to be transported to the mainland. True, a hospital bed and registration with a medical commission did not depend on the doctor issuing the permit, but it was important to start this path.

All this and much more, incidental, daily, was perfectly taken into account and understood by the thugs. A special attitude towards the doctor was introduced into the code of thieves' morality. Along with the prison rations and the gentleman thief, the legend of the Red Cross became stronger in the camp and prison world.

“Red Cross” is a criminal term, and I am wary every time I hear this expression.

The thieves demonstratively expressed their respect for medical workers, promised them all their support, singling out doctors from the vast world of “frayers” and “stampers.”

A legend was invented - it still exists in the camps - of how a doctor was robbed by petty thieves, "syavki", and how big thieves found and with an apology returned the stolen goods. The Breguet Herriot is a real treat.

Moreover, they really didn’t steal from doctors; they tried not to steal. Doctors were given gifts - things, money - if they were civilian doctors. They begged and threatened to kill them if they were prisoner doctors. They praised the doctors who provided assistance to the thieves.

Having a doctor “on the hook” is the dream of every criminal company. The thug can be rude and impudent with any boss (he is even obliged to show this chic, this spirit in some circumstances in all its brightness) - the thug fawns over the doctor, sometimes grovels and will not allow a rude word towards the doctor until the thug sees that he They don’t believe that no one is going to fulfill his arrogant demands.

Not a single medical worker, they say, should worry about his own fate in the camp; the thugs will help him financially and morally: material assistance is stolen “flat cakes” and “shkers”; moral assistance - the thug will honor the doctor with his conversations, his visits and affection.

It's a matter of little things - instead of a sick fraer, exhausted by backbreaking work, insomnia and beatings, put a hefty pederast murderer and extortionist on a hospital bed. Put and keep him on a hospital bed until he deigns to be discharged.

There is little to do: regularly free the thieves from work so that they can “hold the king by the beard.”

Send thieves on medical vouchers to other hospitals if they need it for some of their thieves, higher purposes.

Cover up the malingerers-blatars, and the blatars are all malingerers and aggravants, with eternal “bridges” of trophic ulcers on the legs and thighs, with light but impressive incised wounds of the abdomen, etc.

Treat thieves with “powders”, “codeine” and “caffeine”, allocating the entire supply of narcotic drugs and alcohol tinctures for the use of benefactors.

For many years in a row I attended stages in a large camp hospital - one hundred percent of the malingerers who arrived on medical vouchers were thieves. The thieves either bribed the local doctor or intimidated him, and the doctor created a false medical document.

It often happened that a local doctor or local camp commander, wanting to get rid of an annoying and dangerous element in his household, sent thieves to the hospital in the hope that if they did not disappear completely, then his household would receive some respite.

If the doctor was bribed, this is bad, very bad. But if he was intimidated, this can be excused, because the threats of the thieves are not at all empty words. A young doctor and, most importantly, a young prisoner, Surovoy, who had recently graduated from the Moscow Medical Institute, was sent from the hospital to the first-aid post of the Spokoiny mine, where there were many thieves. Friends dissuaded Surovoy - he could refuse, go to general work, but not go to an obviously dangerous job. Surovy ended up in the hospital from general work - he was afraid to return there and agreed to go to the mine to work in his specialty. The authorities gave Severny instructions, but did not give advice on how to behave. He was strictly forbidden to send healthy thieves away from the mine. A month later, he was killed right at the reception - fifty-two stab wounds were counted on his body.

In the women's area of ​​another mine, an elderly woman doctor, Schitsel, was hacked to death with an ax by her own nurse, the thieves Kroshka, who was carrying out the thieves' sentence.

This is what the Red Cross looked like in practice in cases where doctors were not flexible and did not take bribes.

Naive doctors sought explanations for the contradictions from the ideologists of the criminal world. One of these philosopher-leaders was lying in the surgical department of the hospital at that time. Two months ago, while in the isolation ward, he, wanting to get out of there, used the usual infallible, but not safe, method: he covered both of his eyes - to be sure - with chemical pencil powder. It so happened that medical care was late, and the thug became blind - he was disabled in the hospital, preparing to leave for the mainland. But, like the famous Sir Williams from “Rocambole,” even the blind man took part in the development of plans for crimes, and in the courts of honor he was considered an indisputable authority. To the doctor’s question about the Red Cross and the murders of doctors in the mines by thieves, Sir Williams answered, softening the vowels after the hissing ones, as all thieves pronounce:

– There may be different situations in life when the law should not be applied. “He was a dialectician, this Sir Williams.”

Dostoevsky in “Notes from the House of the Dead” notes with tenderness the actions of the unfortunate people who behave like big children, are carried away by the theater, and childishly and without anger quarrel with each other. Dostoevsky did not meet or know people from the real criminal world. Dostoevsky would not allow any sympathy to be expressed to this world.

The atrocities of the thieves in the camp are innumerable. Unhappy people are hard workers, from whom a thief takes the last rag, takes away the last money, and the hard worker is afraid to complain, because he sees that the thief is stronger than his superiors. A thief beats a hard worker and forces him to work - tens of thousands of people are beaten to death by thieves. Hundreds of thousands of people who were imprisoned were corrupted by thieves' ideology and ceased to be people. Something criminal settled in their souls forever, thieves, their morality forever left an indelible mark on the soul of anyone.

The boss is rude and cruel, the teacher is deceitful, the doctor is unscrupulous, but all this is nothing compared to the corrupting power of the criminal world. They are still people, and no, no, even humanity can be seen in them. The thieves are not people.

The influence of their morality on camp life is limitless and comprehensive. The camp is a completely negative school of life. No one will take anything useful or necessary out of there, neither the prisoner himself, nor his boss, nor his guards, nor involuntary witnesses - engineers, geologists, doctors - neither superiors nor subordinates.

Every minute of camp life is a poisoned minute.

There is a lot there that a person should not know, should not see, and if he has seen, it is better for him to die.

The prisoner learns there to hate work - he cannot learn anything else there.

There he learns flattery, lies, small and large meanness, and becomes an egoist.

Returning to freedom, he sees that not only did he not grow during the camp, but that his interests narrowed, became poor and rude.

Moral barriers have moved somewhere to the side.

It turns out that you can do mean things and still live.

You can lie and live.

You can promise and not keep your promises and still live.

You can drink away your friend's money.

You can beg and live! Beg and live!

It turns out that a person who has committed meanness does not die.

He becomes accustomed to loafing, to deception, to anger at everyone and everything. He blames the whole world, bemoaning his fate.

He values ​​his suffering too highly, forgetting that every person has his own grief. He has forgotten how to be sympathetic to the grief of others - he simply does not understand it, does not want to understand it.

Skepticism is still good, it is even the best of the camp heritage.

He learns to hate people.

He is afraid - he is a coward. He is afraid of repetitions of his fate - he is afraid of denunciations, he is afraid of his neighbors, he is afraid of everything that a person should not be afraid of.

He is mentally crushed. His ideas about morality have changed, and he himself does not notice it.

The chief becomes accustomed in the camp to almost uncontrolled power over the prisoners, learns to look at himself as a god, as the only authorized representative of power, as a person of a superior race.

A guard, who had people's lives in his hands many times and who often killed those who left the forbidden zone, what will he tell his bride about his work in the Far North? About how he beat hungry old people with a rifle butt who couldn’t walk?

A young peasant, imprisoned, sees that in this hell only the Urks live relatively well, they are taken into account, and the almighty authorities are afraid of them. They are always dressed, well fed, and support each other.

The peasant thinks. It begins to seem to him that the truth of camp life lies with the thieves, that only by imitating them in his behavior will he take the path of truly saving his life. It turns out there are people who can live at the very bottom. And the peasant begins to imitate the thugs in his behavior, in his actions. He agrees with every word of the thugs, is ready to fulfill all their instructions, speaks about them with fear and reverence. He hastens to decorate his speech with criminal words - not a single person, male or female, prisoner or free, who visited Kolyma, was left without these criminal words.

These words are poison, a poison that penetrates into a person’s soul, and it is with the mastery of the thieves’ dialect that the rapprochement of the fraer with the thieves’ world begins.

The intellectual prisoner is depressed by the camp. Everything that was dear is trampled into dust, civilization and culture fly away from a person in the shortest possible time, calculated in weeks.

The argument of the dispute is a fist, a stick. The means of coercion are a butt, a punch.

An intellectual turns into a coward, and his own brain tells him to justify his actions. He can persuade himself to do anything, join any side in the dispute. In the criminal world, the intellectual sees “teachers of life”, fighters “for people’s rights.”

“Plyukha”, a blow, turns an intellectual into an obedient servant of some Senechka or Kostechka.

Physical impact becomes moral impact.

The intellectual is scared forever. His spirit is broken. He brings this fearfulness and broken spirit into his free life.

Engineers, geologists, doctors who arrived in Kolyma under contracts with Dalstroy are quickly corrupted: a long ruble, the law is the taiga, slave labor, which is so easy and profitable to use, the narrowing of cultural interests - all this corrupts, corrupts, a person who has worked for a long time in the camp , doesn’t go to the mainland - he’s worthless there, but he’s used to a rich, prosperous life. This depravity is called in literature “the call of the North.”

The criminal world, recidivist criminals, whose tastes and habits affect the entire life of Kolyma, are largely to blame for this corruption of the human soul.

Shalamov V.T. Collected works in four volumes. T.1. - M.: Fiction, Vagrius, 1998. - P. 141 - 148

All rights to distribute and use the works of Varlam Shalamov belong to A.L.. Use of materials is possible only with the consent of the editors of ed@site. The site was created in 2008-2009. funded by the Russian Humanitarian Foundation grant No. 08-03-12112v.

Year of publication of the collection: 1966

Shalamov’s “Kolyma Stories” were written based on the writer’s personal experience; he spent thirteen years in Kolyma. Varlam Shalamov created the collection for quite a long time, from 1954 to 1962. First « Kolyma Stories” could be read in the New York magazine “New Journal” in Russian. Although the author did not want to publish his stories abroad.

Collection "Kolyma Stories" summary

In the snow

Varlam Shalamov’s collection “Kolyma Stories” begins with a question: do you want to know how they trample the road through the virgin snow? The man, cursing and sweating, walks ahead, leaving black holes in the loose snow behind him. They choose a windless day, so that the air is almost still and the wind does not sweep away all human labor. The first is followed by five or six more people, they walk in a row and step near the tracks of the first.

The first one always has it harder than everyone else, and when he gets tired, he is replaced by one of the people walking in the row. It is important that each of the “pioneers” steps on a piece of virgin soil, and not on someone else’s footprint. And it is readers, not writers, who ride horses and tractors.

To the show

The men played cards at Naumov's, a horse-driver. The guards usually did not enter the barracks of the horsemen, so every night the thieves gathered there for card fights. In the corner of the barracks, on the lower beds, blankets were spread, on which lay a pillow - a “table” for card games. On the pillow lay a recently made deck of cards, cut from a volume of V. Hugo. To make a deck you needed paper, a crayon, a loaf of bread (used for gluing thin paper) and a knife. One of the players tapped the pillow with his fingers, the nail of his little finger was incredibly long - criminal chic. This man had an appearance very suitable for a thief; you look at his face and no longer remember his features. It was Sevochka, they said that he performed “excellently” and showed the dexterity of a sharper. The thief's game was a game of deception, played only by two people. Sevochka's opponent was Naumov, who was a railway thief, although he looked like a monk. A cross hung around his neck, such was the fashion of thieves in the forties.

Next, the players had to argue and swear to set the bet. Naumov lost his suit and wanted to play for the show, that is, as a loan. Konogon called the main character to him and Garkunov demanded to take off his padded jacket. Garkunov had a sweater under his padded jacket, a gift from his wife, which he never parted with. The man refused to take off his sweater, and then the others attacked him. Sashka, who had recently poured soup for them, took a knife from the top of his boot and extended his hand to Garkunov, who sobbed and fell. The game was over.

At night

Dinner is over. Glebov licked the bowl, the bread melted in his mouth. Bagretsov kept looking into Glebov’s mouth, not having enough strength to look away. It was time to go, they walked onto a small ledge, the stones burned their feet with cold. And even walking didn’t warm me up.

The men stopped to rest; they still had a long way to go. They lay down on the ground and began to throw stones. Bagretsov swore, he cut his finger and the bleeding did not stop. Glebov was a doctor in the past, although now that time seemed like a dream. The friends were removing stones, and Bagretsov noticed a human finger. They pulled out the corpse, took off his shirt and underpants. Having finished, the men threw stones at the grave. They were going to exchange clothes for the most valuable things in the camp. Like this there was bread and perhaps even tobacco.

Carpenters

The next content in the collection “Kolyma Stories” contains the story “Carpenters”. He talks about how there was fog on the street for days, so thick that you couldn’t see a person two steps away. For two weeks the temperature had remained below minus fifty-five degrees. Potashnikov woke up with the hope that the frost had fallen, but this never happened. The food that the workers were fed gave energy for a maximum of one hour, and then I wanted to lie down and die. Potashnikov slept on the upper bunks, where it was warmer, but his hair froze to the pillow overnight.

The man grew weaker every day, he was not afraid of death, but did not want to die in a barracks, where the cold froze not only human bones, but also souls. After finishing breakfast, Potashnikov walked to the place of work, where he saw a man in a reindeer hat who needed carpenters. He and another man from his team introduced themselves as carpenters, although they were not. The men were brought to the workshop, but since they did not know carpentry, they were sent back.

Single metering

In the evening, Dugaev was informed that the next day he would receive a single measurement. Dugaev was twenty-three and everything that happened here greatly surprised him. After a meager lunch, Baranov offered Dugaev a cigarette, although they were not friends.

In the morning, the caretaker measured out the length of time for the man to work. Working alone was even better for Dugaev; no one would grumble that he was doing a bad job. In the evening the caretaker came to evaluate the work. The guy completed twenty-five percent, and this number seemed huge to him. The next day he worked together with everyone, and at night he was taken behind the base, where there was a high fence with barbed wire. Dugaev regretted one thing, that he suffered and worked that day. Last day.

The man was on watch to receive a package. His wife sent him several handfuls of prunes and a burqa, which they still could not wear, because it was not proper for ordinary workers to wear such expensive shoes. But the mountain ranger, Andrei Boyko, offered him to sell these cloaks for a hundred rubles. With the proceeds, the main character bought a kilogram of butter and a kilogram of bread. But all the food was taken away and the brew with prunes was knocked over.

Rain

The men had been working at the site for three days, each in his own pit, but no one had gone deeper than half a meter. They were forbidden to leave the pits or talk to each other. The main character of this story wanted to break his leg by dropping a stone on it, but nothing came of this idea, only a couple of abrasions and bruises remained. It rained all the time, the guards thought that this would make the men work faster, but the workers only began to hate their work even more.

On the third day, the hero’s neighbor, Rozovsky, shouted from his pit that he realized something - there was no meaning in life. But the man managed to save Rozovsky from the guards, although he still threw himself under the trolley after some time, but did not die. Rozovsky was tried for attempted suicide and the hero never saw him again.

Kant

The hero says that his favorite northern tree is cedar, dwarf. You could tell the weather by looking at the dwarf tree; if you lie down on the ground, it means it will be snowy and cold and vice versa. The man had just been transferred to a new job collecting elfin wood, which was then sent to the factory to make unusually nasty anti-scurvy vitamins.

They worked in pairs while assembling dwarf wood. One chopped, the other pinched. That day they failed to collect the quota, and in order to correct the situation, the main character’s partner stuffed a large stone into a bag of branches; they still didn’t check it.

Dry rations

In this “Kolyma Tale”, four men from the stone quarries are sent to cut down trees on the Duskanya spring. Their ten-day rations were negligible, and they were afraid to think that this food would have to be divided into thirty parts. The workers decided to dump all their food together. They all lived in an old hunting hut, at night they buried their clothes in the ground, leaving a small edge outside so that all the lice would crawl out, then they scorched the insects. They worked from sun to sun. The foreman checked the work done and left, then the men worked more relaxed, did not quarrel, but rested more and looked at nature. Every evening they gathered around the stove and talked, discussing their difficult life in the camp. It was impossible to refuse to go to work, because there was no pea coat or mittens; the document wrote “dressed for the season” so as not to list everything that was missing.

The next day, not everyone returned to camp. Ivan Ivanovich hanged himself that night, and Savelyev cut off his fingers. Upon returning to the camp, Fedya wrote a letter to his mother saying that he was living well and dressed for the season.

Injector

This story is Kudinov’s report to the head of the mine, where a worker reports a broken injector that does not allow the entire team to work. And people have to stand in the cold for several hours at temperatures below minus fifty. The man informed the chief engineer, but no action was taken. In response, the head of the mine offers to replace the injector with a civilian one. And the injector should be held accountable.

Apostle Paul

The hero sprained his leg and was transferred as an assistant to the carpenter Frisorger, who in his past life was a pastor in some German village. They became good friends and often talked about religious topics.

Frizorger told the man about his only daughter, and their boss, Paramonov, accidentally overheard this conversation and offered to write a wanted report. Six months later, a letter arrived saying that Frisorger’s daughter was renouncing him. But the hero noticed this letter first and burned it, and then another one. Subsequently, he often remembered his camp friend, as long as he had the strength to remember.

Berries

The main character lies on the ground without strength, two guards approach him and threaten him. One of them, Seroshapka, says that tomorrow he will shoot the worker. The next day, the team went to the forest to work, where blueberries, rose hips and lingonberries grew. The workers ate them during smoke breaks, but Rybakov had a task: he collected the berries in a jar and then exchanged them for bread. The main character, together with Rybakov, came too close to the prohibited territory, and Rybakov crossed the line.

The guard fired twice, the first warning, and after the second shot Rybakov lay on the ground. The hero decided not to waste time and picked up a jar of berries, intending to exchange them for bread.

Bitch Tamara

Moses was a blacksmith, he worked wonderfully, each of his products was endowed with grace, and his superiors appreciated him for this. And one day Kuznetsov met a dog, he began to run away from it, thinking that it was a wolf. But the dog was friendly and remained in the camp - she was given the nickname Tamara. Soon she gave birth, and a kennel was built for the six puppies. At this time, a detachment of “operatives” arrived at the camp, they were looking for fugitives - prisoners. Tamara hated one guard, Nazarov. It was clear that the dog had already met him. When the time came for the guards to leave, Nazarov shot Tamara. And then, while skiing down the slope, he ran into a stump and died. Tamara's skin was torn off and used for mittens.

Sherry-brandy

The poet was dying, his thoughts were confused, life flowed out of him. But it appeared again, he opened his eyes, moved his fingers, swollen from hunger. The man reflected on life, he deserved creative immortality, he was called the first poet of the twentieth century. Although he had not written down his poems for a long time, the poet put them together in his head. He was dying slowly. In the morning they brought bread, the man grabbed it with his bad teeth, but the neighbors stopped him. In the evening he died. But the death was recorded two days later, the poet’s neighbors received the dead man’s bread.

Baby pictures

That day they had an easy job - sawing wood. Having finished working, the squad noticed a pile of garbage near the fence. The men even managed to find socks, which was very rare in the north. And one of them managed to find a notebook filled with children's drawings. The boy drew soldiers with machine guns, painted the nature of the North, with bright and pure colors, because that’s how it was. The northern city consisted of yellow houses, shepherd dogs, soldiers and blue skies. A man from the detachment looked into the notebook, felt the pages, and then crumpled it and threw it away.

Condensed milk

One day after work, Shestakov suggested that the main character escape; they were in prison together, but were not friends. The man agreed, but asked for canned milk. At night he slept poorly and did not remember the working day at all.

Having received condensed milk from Shestakov, he changed his mind about running away. I wanted to warn others, but I didn’t know anyone. Five fugitives, along with Shestakov, were caught very quickly, two were killed, three were tried a month later. Shestakov himself was transferred to another mine; he was well-fed and shaven, but did not greet the main character.

Bread

In the morning they brought herring and bread to the barracks. Herring was given out every other day, and every prisoner dreamed of a tail. Yes, the head was more fun, but there was more meat in the tail. Bread was given out once a day, but everyone ate it at once, there was not enough patience. After breakfast it became warm and I didn’t want to go anywhere.

This team was in typhoid quarantine, but they still worked. Today they were taken to a bakery, where the master, out of twenty, chose only two, stronger and not inclined to escape: the Hero and his neighbor, a guy with freckles. They were fed with bread and jam. The men had to carry broken bricks, but this work turned out to be too hard for them. They often took breaks, and soon the master sent them back and gave them a loaf of bread. In the camp they shared bread with their neighbors.

Snake charmer

This story is dedicated to Andrei Platonov, who was a friend of the author and himself wanted to write this story, even came up with the name “Snake Charmer,” but died. Platonov spent a year on the Dzhankhar. On the first day, he noticed that there are people who don’t work - thieves. And Fedechka was their leader, at first he was rude to Platonov, but when he found out that he could squeeze novels, he immediately softened. Andrei retold “The Jacks of Hearts Club” until dawn. Fedya was very pleased.

In the morning, when Platonov was going to work, some guy pushed him. But they immediately whispered something in his ear. Then this guy approached Platonov and asked not to say anything to Fedya, Andrei agreed.

Tatar mullah and clean air

It was very hot in the prison cell. The prisoners joked that first they would be tortured by evaporation, and then torture by freezing out. The Tatar mula, a strong man of sixty years old, was talking about his life. He hoped to live in the cell for another twenty years, and in clean air for at least ten, he knew what “clean air” was.

It took twenty to thirty days for a person to become a goner in the camp. The prisoners tried to escape from prison to the camp, thinking that prison was the worst thing that could happen to them. All the prisoners' illusions about the camp were very quickly destroyed. People lived in unheated barracks, where in winter ice froze in all the cracks. Parcels arrived within six months, if they arrived at all. There is nothing to talk about money at all, they were never paid, not a penny. The incredible number of diseases in the camp left the workers no choice. Given all the hopelessness and depression, clean air was much more dangerous for a person than prison.

First death

The hero saw many deaths, but he remembered the first one he saw best. His team worked the night shift. Returning to the barracks, their foreman Andreev suddenly turned in the other direction and ran, the workers followed him. A man in military uniform stood in front of them, a woman lay at his feet. The hero knew her, it was Anna Pavlovna, the secretary of the head of the mine. The brigade loved her, and now Anna Pavlovna was dead, strangled. The man who killed her, Shtemenko, was the boss who several months ago broke all the prisoners' homemade pots. He was quickly tied up and taken to the head of the mine.

Part of the brigade hurried to the barracks to have lunch, Andreev was taken to give evidence. And when he returned, he ordered the prisoners to go to work. Soon Shtemenko was sentenced to ten years for murder out of jealousy. After the verdict, the chief was taken away. Former bosses are kept in separate camps.

Aunt Polya

Aunt Polya died of a terrible disease - stomach cancer. No one knew her last name, not even the wife of the boss, for whom Aunt Polya was a servant or “orderly.” The woman did not engage in any shady affairs, she only helped to arrange easy jobs for her fellow Ukrainians. When she became ill, visitors came to her hospital every day. And everything that the boss’s wife gave, Aunt Polya gave to the nurses.

One day Father Peter came to the hospital to confess to the patient. A few days later she died, and soon Father Peter appeared again and ordered a cross to be placed on her grave, and they did so. On the cross they first wrote Timoshenko Polina Ivanovna, but it seemed that her name was Praskovya Ilyinichna. The inscription was corrected under the supervision of Peter.

Tie

In this story by Varlam Shalamov, “Kolyma Tales,” you can read about a girl named Marusya Kryukova, who came to Russia from Japan and was arrested in Vladivostok. During the investigation, Masha’s leg was broken, the bone did not heal properly, and the girl was limping. Kryukova was a wonderful needlewoman, and she was sent to the “directorate’s house” to embroider. Such houses stood near the road, and the leaders spent the night there two or three times a year, the houses were beautifully decorated, paintings and embroidered canvases hung. In addition to Marusya, two more needlewomen worked in the house; they were looked after by a woman who gave the workers threads and fabric. For fulfilling the norm and good behavior, the girls were allowed to go to the cinema for prisoners. The films were shown in parts, and one day, after the first part, they showed the first again. This is because the deputy head of the hospital, Dolmatov, arrived late, and the film was shown first.

Marusya ended up in the hospital, in the women's ward, to see a surgeon. She really wanted to give ties to the doctors who cured her. And the woman overseer gave permission. However, Masha was unable to fulfill her plans, because Dolmatov took them away from the craftswoman. Soon, at an amateur concert, the doctor managed to see the boss’s tie, so gray, patterned, and of high quality.

Taiga golden

There are two types of zone: small, that is, transfer, and large - camp. On the territory of the small zone there is one square barracks, with about five hundred seats, bunks on four floors. The main character lies on the bottom, the top ones are only for thieves. On the very first night, the hero is called to be sent to the camp, but the zone foreman sends him back to the barracks.

Soon the artists are brought into the barracks, one of them is a Harbin singer, Valyusha, a criminal, and asks him to sing. The singer sang a song about the golden taiga. The hero fell asleep; he woke up from a whisper on the upper bunk and the smell of shag. When his work assistant wakes him up in the morning, the hero asks to go to the hospital. Three days later, a paramedic comes to the barracks and examines the man.

Vaska Denisov, pig thief

Vaska Denisov could only avoid arousing suspicion by carrying firewood on his shoulder. He carried the log to Ivan Petrovich, the men sawed it together, and then Vaska chopped all the wood. Ivan Petrovich said that now he had nothing to feed the worker, but gave him three rubles. Vaska was sick from hunger. He walked through the village, wandered into the first house he came across, and in the closet he saw the frozen carcass of a pig. Vaska grabbed her and ran to the government house, the department of vitamin business trips. The chase was already close. Then he ran into the red corner, locked the door and began to gnaw on the pig, raw and frozen. When Vaska was found, he had already chewed half of it.

Seraphim

There was a letter on Seraphim’s table; he was afraid to open it. The man had been working in the North in a chemical laboratory for a year, but he could not forget his wife. Seraphim had two other prison engineers working with him, with whom he hardly spoke. Every six months the laboratory assistant received a ten percent salary increase. And Seraphim decided to go to a neighboring village to unwind. But the guards decided that the man had escaped from somewhere and put him in a barracks; six days later the head of the laboratory came for Seraphim and took him away. Although the guards did not return the money.

Returning, Seraphim saw a letter; his wife wrote about divorce. When Seraphim was left alone in the laboratory, he opened the director’s closet, took out a pinch of powder, dissolved it in water and drank it. It started to burn in my throat, and nothing else. Then Seraphim cut his vein, but the blood flowed too weakly. Desperate, the man ran to the river and tried to drown himself. He woke up already in the hospital. The doctor injected a glucose solution, and then unclenched Seraphim’s teeth with a spatula. The operation was performed, but it was too late. The acid eroded the esophagus and the walls of the stomach. Seraphim calculated everything correctly the first time.

Day off

A man was praying in a clearing. The hero knew him, it was the priest from his barracks, Zamyatin. Prayers helped him live like a hero, poems that are still preserved in his memory. The only thing that was not supplanted by the humiliation of eternal hunger, fatigue and cold. Returning to the barracks, the man heard noise in the instrumental room, which was closed on weekends, but today the lock was not hanging. He went inside, two thieves were playing with the puppy. One of them, Semyon, pulled out an ax and lowered it on the puppy’s head.

In the evening, no one slept from the smell of meat soup. The Blatari did not eat all the soup, because there were few of them in the barracks. They offered the remains to the hero, but he refused. Zamyatin entered the barracks, and the thugs offered him soup, saying that it was made from lamb. He agreed and five minutes later returned a clean pot. Then Semyon told the priest that the soup was from the dog, Nord. The priest silently went outside, vomiting. Later he admitted to the hero that the meat tasted no worse than lamb.

Domino

The man is in the hospital, his height is one hundred and eighty centimeters, and his weight is forty-eight kilograms. The doctor took his temperature, thirty-four degrees. The patient was placed closer to the stove, he ate, but the food did not warm him. The man will stay in the hospital until spring, two months, that’s what the doctor said. At night a week later, the patient was woken up by an orderly and told that Andrei Mikhailovich, the doctor who treated him, was calling him. Andrei Mikhailovich invited the hero to play dominoes. The patient agreed, although he hated the game. During the game they talked a lot, Andrei Mikhailovich lost.

Several years passed when a patient in a small zone heard the name of Andrei Mikhailovich. After some time, they finally managed to meet. The doctor told him his story, Andrei Mikhailovich was sick with tuberculosis, but he was not allowed to be treated, someone reported that his illness was false “bullshit.” And Andrei Mikhailovich traveled a long way in the cold. After successful treatment, he began working as a resident in the surgical department. On his recommendation, the main character completed paramedic courses and began working as an orderly. Once they finished cleaning, the orderlies played dominoes. “It’s a stupid game,” Andrei Mikhailovich admitted, he, like the hero of the story, played dominoes only once.

Hercules

For his silver wedding, the head of the hospital, Sudarin, was given a rooster. All the guests were delighted with such a gift, even the guest of honor Cherpakov appreciated the cockerel. Cherpakov was about forty, he was the head of the rank. department. And when the guest of honor got drunk, he decided to show everyone his strength and began to lift chairs, then armchairs. And later he said that he could tear off the rooster’s head with his hands. And he tore it off. The young doctors were impressed. The dancing began, everyone danced because Cherpakov did not like it when someone refused.

Shock therapy

Merzlyakov came to the conclusion that it was easiest for short people to survive in the camp. Since the amount of food given out is not calculated according to the weight of people. One day, while doing general work, Merzlyakov, carrying a log, fell and was unable to go further. For this he was beaten by the guards, the foreman, and even his comrades. The worker was sent to the hospital, he was no longer in pain, but with any lie he delayed the moment of returning to the camp.

At the central hospital, Merzlyakov was transferred to the nervous department. All the prisoner’s thoughts were about only one thing: not to unbend. During the examination by Pyotr Ivanovich, the “patient” answered at random and it didn’t cost the doctor anything to guess that Merzlyakov was lying. Pyotr Ivanovich was already anticipating a new revelation. The doctor decided to start with raush anesthesia, and if that did not help, then shock therapy. Under anesthesia, the doctors managed to straighten Merzlyakov, but as soon as the man woke up, he immediately bent back. The neurologist warned the patient that in a week he would ask to be discharged. After the shock therapy procedure, Merzlyakov asked to be discharged from the hospital.

Stlanik

In autumn, when it’s time for snow, the clouds hang low, and there’s a smell of snow in the air, but if the cedar trees don’t spread, there won’t be snow. And when the weather is still autumn, there are no clouds, but the elfin forest lies on the ground, and after a few days it snows. The cedar tree not only predicts the weather, but also gives hope, being the only evergreen tree in the North. But the dwarf tree is quite gullible; if you light a fire near a tree in winter, it will immediately rise from under the snow. The author considers dwarf dwarf to be the most poetic Russian tree.

Red Cross

In the camp, the only person who can help a prisoner is a doctor. Doctors determine the “labor category”, sometimes even release them, issue certificates of disability and release them from work. The camp doctor has great power, and the thugs realized this very quickly; they respected medical workers. If the doctor was a civilian employee, they gave him gifts; if not, then most often they threatened or intimidated him. Many doctors were killed by thieves.

In exchange for the good attitude of the criminals, the doctors had to admit them to the hospital, send them on travel vouchers, and cover up for the malingerers. The atrocities of thieves in the camp are innumerable, every minute in the camp is poisoned. Having returned from there, people cannot live as before, they are cowardly, selfish, lazy and crushed.

Lawyers' conspiracy

Further in our collection “Kolyma Stories” a brief summary will tell about Andreev, a former student of the law university. He, like the main character, ended up in the camp. The man worked in Shmelev’s brigade, where human waste was sent; they worked on the night shift. One night the worker was asked to stay because Romanov had called him to his place. Together with Romanov, the hero went to the department in Khatynny. True, the hero had to ride in the back in sixty-degree frost for two hours. Afterwards, the worker was taken to the authorized Smertin, who, as before Romanov, asked Andreev whether he was a lawyer. The man was left overnight in a cell where there were already several prisoners. The next day, Andreev sets off with his guards on a journey, as a result of which his fingers freeze.

Varlam Shalamov

Dinner is over. Glebov leisurely licked the bowl, carefully scraped the bread crumbs from the table into his left palm and, bringing it to his mouth, carefully licked the crumbs from his palm. Without swallowing, he felt the saliva in his mouth thickly and greedily enveloping the tiny lump of bread. Glebov could not say whether it was tasty. Taste is something else, too poor compared to this passionate, selfless sensation that food gave. Glebov was in no hurry to swallow: the bread itself melted in his mouth, and melted quickly.

Bagretsov's sunken, shining eyes gazed incessantly into Glebov's mouth - no one had such a powerful will that could help take his eyes off the food disappearing in the mouth of another person. Glebov swallowed his saliva, and immediately Bagretsov turned his eyes to the horizon - to the large orange moon crawling into the sky.

“It’s time,” said Bagretsov.

They silently walked along the path to the rock and climbed onto a small ledge that went around the hill; even though the sun had recently set, the stones, which during the day had burned the soles through the rubber galoshes worn on bare feet, were now cold. Glebov buttoned up his padded jacket. Walking did not warm him.

- How far is it still? – he asked in a whisper.

“Far away,” Bagretsov answered quietly.

They sat down to rest. There was nothing to talk about, and there was nothing to think about - everything was clear and simple. On the platform, at the end of the ledge, there were heaps of torn stones and torn and dried moss.

“I could do it alone,” Bagretsov grinned, “but it’s more fun with two.” And for an old friend... They were brought on the same ship last year. Bagretsov stopped.

“We have to lie down, they’ll see.”

They lay down and began to throw stones aside. There were no large stones here that could not be lifted or moved by two people, because the people who threw them here in the morning were no stronger than Glebov.

Bagretsov cursed quietly. He scratched his finger and was bleeding. He sprinkled sand on the wound, tore out a piece of cotton wool from his padded jacket, pressed it - the bleeding did not stop.

“Poor clotting,” Glebov said indifferently.

- Are you a doctor or what? – Bagretsov asked, sucking the blood.

Glebov was silent. The time when he was a doctor seemed very far away. And was there ever such a time? Too often that world beyond the mountains, beyond the seas seemed to him like some kind of dream, an invention. The minute, the hour, the day from getting up to going out was real - he didn’t think further and couldn’t find the strength to guess. Like all.

He did not know the past of those people who surrounded him, and was not interested in it. However, if tomorrow Bagretsov declared himself a doctor of philosophy or an air marshal, Glebov would believe him without hesitation. Was he ever a doctor himself? Not only the automaticity of judgments was lost, but also the automaticity of observations. Glebov saw Bagretsov sucking blood from a dirty finger, but said nothing. It only slipped into his consciousness, but he could not find the will to answer in himself and did not look for it. That consciousness that he still had and which... perhaps it was no longer human consciousness, had too few facets and was now aimed at only one thing - to quickly remove the stones.

- Deep, perhaps? – Glebov asked when they settled down to rest.

– How can it be deep? – said Bagretsov. And Glebov realized that he had asked nonsense and that the hole really couldn’t be deep.

“Yes,” said Bagretsov.

He touched a human finger. The big toe poked out of the stones - it was clearly visible in the moonlight. The finger was not like the fingers of Glebov or Bagretsov, but not in that it was lifeless and numb - in this there was little difference. The nails on this dead finger were cut, it itself was fuller and softer than Gleb’s. They quickly threw away the stones that covered the body.

“Very young,” said Bagretsov.

Together they hardly pulled the corpse out by the legs.

“How healthy,” said Glebov, out of breath.

“If he weren’t so healthy,” said Bagretsov, “he would have been buried the way we are buried, and we wouldn’t have to come here today.”

They unbent the dead man's arms and pulled off his shirt.

“And the underpants are completely new,” Bagretsov said with satisfaction.

They also stole my underpants. Glebov hid a wad of laundry under his padded jacket.

“You better put it on yourself,” said Bagretsov.

“No, I don’t want to,” Glebov muttered.

They put the dead man back into the grave and threw stones at it.

The blue light of the rising moon fell on the stones, on the sparse taiga forest, showing every ledge, every tree in a special, not daytime form. Everything seemed real in its own way, but not like during the day. It was like a second, nocturnal, appearance of the world.

The dead man's underwear warmed up in Glebov's bosom and no longer seemed alien.

“I’d like to light a cigarette,” Glebov said dreamily.

- Tomorrow you will smoke.

Bagretsov smiled. Tomorrow they will sell their linen, exchange it for bread, maybe even get some tobacco...

Varlam Shalamov

Shock therapy

Even in that fertile time, when Merzlyakov worked as a groom, and in a homemade cereal jar - a large tin can with a punched bottom like a sieve - it was possible to prepare cereals for people from oats obtained for horses, cook porridge and with this bitter hot mash to stifle and appease hunger , even then he was thinking about one simple question. Large mainland convoy horses received a daily portion of government oats, twice as large as the squat and shaggy Yakut horses, although both carried equally little. The bastard Percheron Grom had as much oats poured into the feeder as would be enough for five “Yakuts”. This was correct, this was how things were done everywhere, and this was not what tormented Merzlyakov. He did not understand why the camp human ration, this mysterious list of proteins, fats, vitamins and calories intended for absorption by prisoners and called the cauldron sheet, was compiled without taking into account the living weight of people. If they are treated like working animals, then in matters of diet they need to be more consistent, and not adhere to some kind of arithmetic average - a clerical invention. This terrible average, at best, was beneficial only to the short, and indeed, the short reached it later than others. Merzlyakov’s build was like a Percheron Grom, and the measly three spoons of porridge for breakfast only increased the sucking pain in his stomach. But apart from rations, the brigade worker could get almost nothing. All the most valuable things - butter, sugar, and meat - did not end up in the cauldron in the quantities written on the cauldron sheet. Merzlyakov saw other things. The tall people died first. No habit of hard work changed anything here. The puny intellectual still lasted longer than the giant Kaluga resident - a natural digger - if they were fed the same, in accordance with the camp rations. Increasing rations for a percentage of production was also of little use, because the basic design remained the same, in no way designed for tall people. In order to eat better, you had to work better, and in order to work better, you had to eat better. Estonians, Latvians, and Lithuanians were the first to die everywhere. They were the first to get there, which always caused comments from doctors: they say that all these Baltic states are weaker than the Russian people. True, the native life of Latvians and Estonians was further from camp life than the life of a Russian peasant, and it was more difficult for them. But the main thing was something else: they were not less hardy, they were simply larger in stature.

About a year and a half ago, Merzlyakov, after scurvy, which quickly overwhelmed the newcomer, happened to work as a freelance orderly in a local hospital. There he saw that the choice of dose of medicine was made by weight. Testing of new drugs is carried out on rabbits, mice, guinea pigs, and the human dose is determined based on body weight. Doses for children are less than doses for adults.

But the camp ration was not calculated based on the weight of the human body. This was the question, the wrong solution of which surprised and worried Merzlyakov. But before he completely weakened, he miraculously managed to get a job as a groom - where he could steal oats from horses and fill his stomach with them. Merzlyakov already thought that he would spend the winter, and then God willing. But it didn't turn out that way. The head of the horse farm was removed for drunkenness, and a senior groom was appointed in his place - one of those who at one time taught Merzlyakov how to handle a tin grinder. The senior groom himself stole a lot of oats and knew perfectly how it was done. In an effort to prove himself to his superiors, he, no longer needing oatmeal, found and broke all the oatmeal with his own hands. They began to fry, boil and eat oats in their natural form, completely equating their stomach to that of a horse. The new manager wrote a report to his superiors. Several grooms, including Merzlyakov, were put in a punishment cell for stealing oats and sent from the horse base to where they came from - to general work.

While doing general work, Merzlyakov soon realized that death was near. It swayed under the weight of the logs that had to be dragged. The foreman, who did not like this lazy forehead (“forehead” means “tall” in the local language), each time put Merzlyakov “under the butt”, forcing him to drag the butt, the thick end of the log. One day Merzlyakov fell, could not get up immediately from the snow and, suddenly making up his mind, refused to drag this damned log. It was already late, dark, the guards were in a hurry to go to political classes, the workers wanted to quickly get to the barracks, to get food, the foreman was late for the card battle that evening - Merzlyakov was to blame for the whole delay. And he was punished. He was beaten first by his own comrades, then by the foreman, and by the guards. The log remained lying in the snow - instead of the log they brought Merzlyakov to the camp. He was released from work and lay on a bunk. My lower back hurt. The paramedic smeared Merzlyakov’s back with solid oil - there had been no rubbing products in the first-aid post for a long time. Merzlyakov lay half-bent the entire time, persistently complaining of pain in his lower back. There had been no pain for a long time, the broken rib healed very quickly, and Merzlyakov tried to delay his release to work at the cost of any lie. He was not discharged. One day they dressed him, put him on a stretcher, loaded him into the back of a car and, together with another patient, took him to the district hospital. There was no X-ray room there. Now it was necessary to think about everything seriously, and Merzlyakov thought. He lay there for several months, without straightening up, was transported to the central hospital, where, of course, there was an X-ray room and where Merzlyakov was placed in the surgical department, in the wards of traumatic diseases, which, in the simplicity of their souls, the patients called “dramatic” diseases, without thinking about the bitterness of this pun.

“Here’s another one,” said the surgeon, pointing to Merzlyakov’s medical history, “we’ll transfer him to you, Pyotr Ivanovich, there’s nothing to treat him in the surgical department.”

– But you write in the diagnosis: ankylosis due to spinal injury. What do I need it for? - said the neuropathologist.

- Well, ankylosis, of course. What else can I write? After a beating, not such things can happen. Here I had a case at the “Grey” mine. The foreman beat up a worker...

“Seryozha, I have no time to listen to you about your cases.” I ask: why are you translating?

“I wrote: “For examination for activation.” Poke it with needles, activate it - and off to the ship. Let him be a free man.

– But you took pictures? Violations should be visible even without needles.

- I did. Here, if you please, see. “The surgeon pointed a dark film negative at the gauze curtain. - The devil will understand in such a photo. Until there is good light, good current, our X-ray technicians will always produce such dregs.

“It’s truly dreary,” said Pyotr Ivanovich. - Well, so be it. - And he signed his last name on the medical history, consenting to Merzlyakov’s transfer to himself.

In the surgical department, noisy, confused, overcrowded with frostbite, dislocations, fractures, burns - the northern mines were not joking - in a department where some of the patients lay right on the floor of the wards and corridors, where one young, endlessly tired surgeon worked with four paramedics: all they slept three to four hours a day - and there they could not closely study Merzlyakov. Merzlyakov realized that in the nervous department, where he was suddenly transferred, the real investigation would begin.

All his prison-like, desperate will had long been focused on one thing: not to straighten up. And he didn’t straighten up. How my body wanted to straighten up even for a second. But he remembered the mine, the breath-choking cold, the frozen, slippery stones of the gold mine, shining from the frost, the bowl of soup that at lunch he drank in one gulp, without using an unnecessary spoon, the butts of the guards and the boots of the foreman - and found the strength in himself not to straighten up . However, now it was already easier than the first weeks. He slept little, afraid to straighten up in his sleep. He knew that the orderlies on duty had long been ordered to monitor him in order to catch him in deception. And after being convicted—and Merzlyakov also knew this—followed being sent to a penal mine, and what kind of a penal mine should it be if an ordinary mine left such terrible memories for Merzlyakov?

The next day after the transfer, Merzlyakov was taken to the doctor. The head of the department asked briefly about the onset of the disease and nodded his head sympathetically. He said, as if by the way, that even healthy muscles get used to it after many months of an unnatural position, and a person can make himself disabled. Then Pyotr Ivanovich began the inspection. Merzlyakov answered questions at random when pricking with a needle, tapping with a rubber hammer, or pressing.

Pyotr Ivanovich spent more than half of his working time on exposing malingerers. He understood, of course, the reasons that pushed the prisoners into simulation. Pyotr Ivanovich himself was a recent prisoner, and he was not surprised by either the childish stubbornness of the malingerers or the frivolous primitiveness of their fakes. Pyotr Ivanovich, a former associate professor at one of the Siberian institutes, laid down his scientific career in the same snow where his patients saved their lives by deceiving him. It cannot be said that he did not feel sorry for people. But he was a doctor more than a person, he was a specialist first and foremost. He was proud that a year of general work had not knocked the specialist doctor out of him. He understood the task of exposing deceivers not at all from some high, national point of view and not from a moral standpoint. He saw in it, in this task, a worthy use of his knowledge, his psychological ability to set traps into which, to the greater glory of science, hungry, half-crazed, unhappy people would fall. In this battle between the doctor and the malingerer, the doctor had everything on his side - thousands of cunning medicines, hundreds of textbooks, rich equipment, the help of a convoy, and the vast experience of a specialist, and on the patient’s side there was only horror of the world from which he came to the hospital and where he was afraid to return. It was this horror that gave the prisoner the strength to fight. Unmasking yet another deceiver, Pyotr Ivanovich experienced deep satisfaction: once again he receives evidence from life that he is a good doctor, that he has not lost his qualifications, but, on the contrary, has honed and polished them, in a word, that he can still do...