pilfered_words

It all started when our minister found out that the prime minister had a computer on his desk. Naturally, our minister wanted the same computer his boss had. But the computer his boss had on his desk was an “Electronica-85”. At that point, we didn’t have anything better than the “Electronica”. It didn’t cost much. But getting it was a nightmare. The premier might have gotten it, but our minister just couldn’t manage it. Even though some other minister, the one that made the “Electronicas”, swore by everything holy to get him six of them in July of eighty five.

I bet you don’t even know why we needed six computers. All of us, on the other hand, knew perfectly well that for the Electronica-85 to work, you need five more of them for spare parts.

Anyway. This was in February of eighty five, when our minister was promised six computers by July. He immediately issued a directive to get everything done properly in a week’s time. By March first. The directive didn’t get sent to Chetaev until April. Chetaev, of course, knew perfectly that everything to do with computing should be sent on to our laboratory. But by the time he figured out that that was what computers were, June had come to an end. When Boris Borisych saw the directive, it was July.

What could you possibly do? Go to them and say, how come you sent out a directive with a March deadline in April, and then forgot about the computers too? No, people usually didn’t do that. I proposed that we send the ministry a plan for the development of the system over the next ten years or so. They could have easily confirmed it by accident. But Boris Borisych found a different solution. As soon as he saw that the deadline had passed a long time ago, he reported that the system was finished, explaining to the minister that we would need two more months after the computers were delivered. And I came up with the reason that we would need those two months: to insulate the computers with wire, so no one from the American embassy would be able to spy anything out. I had suggested it as a joke, it’s true, but Boris Borisych immediately approved it all. And that was the way our explanation was accepted up there.

The minister, having received the report that the system was ready, and having forgotten that we didn’t have any computers yet, reported to the premier that everything was completely fine. And the premier reported straight to their most important body, which they, for some reason, called the Political Bureau. And they decided to come and see how we had it all working.

I came into my boss’s office.

“Where’s Mitya?” he asked me.

“At home, I suppose,” I said, “sleeping after a night shift at the vegetable depot.”

“Call him immediately. No, wait. Listen carefully. The minister called. He said that in fifty minutes he will bring HIM here.”

“Who’s ‘HE’?” I asked.

Here Boris Borisych gave me such a look that I understood everything immediately - what could one possibly discuss with me, if I didn’t even understand the simplest things.

“Listen,” he said, “can you do anything?”

“But, Boris Borisych, don’t you know that we don’t have the ‘Electronica’, and who knows if we’ll ever have it?”

“Do you have … that one?” asked Boris Borisych, wrinkling his forehead.

“What ‘that one’?”

“You know, that one...”

“The ‘Iskra’, you mean?”

“Yeah, yeah.”

“What does the ‘Iskra’ have to do with it?” I asked.

Here he gave me that look again, and I immediately understood what he would have liked to say: “How can one work with people like this? Not only can they not think of anything themselves, but even when you have explained everything to them they can’t grasp it.”

Well, at that point I told him right away, sure, I understand, Boris Borisych. But what did I understand? The “Iskra” was, in theory, a personal computer. Even though you couldn’t lift it off the ground, that’s how heavy it was. And maybe also because it was bolted down dead tight. And our “Iskra” was missing some lamps or something, too. Because where they made these lamps, they only made eight of them instead of three hundred thousand. Although their minister promised our minister to make a ninth one, specially for us, in excess of the plan. But of course he immediately forgot about this.

I called Mitya. It was a good thing he hadn’t gone to bed yet. “Come right away,” I said, “you won’t believe what’s happening.”

Mitya arrived. I had by this point drawn a label saying “Electronica-85” and stuck it on the “Iskra”. And we decided to type up some tables, the more the better. Say, this factory completed one hundred fifty percent of its production plan, and that one only ninety nine percent.

Though I must say that releasing information like this, that a plan had only been ninety nine percent completed, that was something only the most complete dimwit would do. Usually everyone put down more. How much they put down depended on how much had been done in reality, and on how secure the director’s position was, and on lots of other things. Say, if the plan had been forty seven percent completed and the director had no influence anywhere at all, he would need to put down, modestly, one hundred one and two tenths percent. But if the director was a solid one, he could easily, even with seventeen percent, put down one hundred thirty four and seven tenths percent. And he’d be even more solid after that.

So Mitya and I decided to make it seem like there was information flowing to us, right at that moment, from all the factories in the country. But then, as luck would have it, the “Iskra” stopped working completely, and we were only able to type up one single chart, and of all that the “Iskra” had, the only things working were the on-off button and the monitor brightness regulation handle.

By that point, the black cars had arrived. We looked, and there was our minister, helpfully explaining something to some guy. The guy was very old, of course, but nothing out of the ordinary. It was only the neck, maybe, that gave him away. It was very sturdy. Like all of them had. And the number on his car had three zeros at the beginning.

For those that don’t remember anything anymore or never knew it, I’ll say that there was a fair amount of cars around with one zero, and they had all kinds of bosses riding in them. Two zeros meant members of government, and folks called them member-rides. And three zeros I only saw that once.

So these three-zero guys came up to us, and we began explaining how our system worked.

“This,” I said, “is the report of the Ural Mining and Metallurgical Integrated Works. The plan for the extraction of black shale is one hundred twenty percent complete.”

“That is,” Mitya said, “twenty percent in excess.”

Here I twisted the brightness handle there and back. The picture disappeared and then came right back.

“And this,” I said again, “is the report of the Ural Mining and Metallurgical Integrated Works. The plan for the extraction of black shale is one hundred twenty percent complete.”

“That is,” Mitya said, “twenty percent in excess.”

Here I twisted the handle again and elbowed Mitya in the side.

“And this is the report of the Ural Mining and Metallurgical Integrated Works,” said Mitya. “The plan for the extraction of black shale is one hundred twenty percent complete.”

“That is,” I said, “twenty percent in excess.”

We looked at them. Looked like everything was fine.

Snatching, surviving, shiftiness - those they were always good at. Memory and intelligence, though - those were a little worse.

“So where does this computer usually belong?” asked the old guy.

Here our minister shone:

“In my office,” he said.

“And how does the the information from the factories get there?” asked the old guy.

“Over the wires,” said the minister, without batting an eyelash.

The old guy was terribly happy. Then they went to Chetaev’s office. And in a couple hours, Boris Borisych called Mitya and I to his office and said the old guy was delighted and gave a review of the system as a unique phenomenon. And that he said that this was the first computer in the country in service to the people, and requested that the creators of the system be thanked and informed of his admiration. And the old guy also said that the system had no analogue, not only in the country, but also, it seemed, abroad, and he told Chetaev to nominate it for the State Prize on the spot.

“Wait, Ilya,” said Boris Borisych, “Aren’t you going on vacation today?”

“Yes,” I said, “I have a train in an hour and a half.”

And then all my thoughts started going in a completely different direction. I remembered I had all of the train tickets, that I myself would not be going on the train, because I needed to drive the car down. And, as usual, I would be driving it at night. I remembered how Kirill asked me:

“So you won’t be late this time? Do you remember how you let us down last time?”

“Almost let you down,” I clarified.

“Almost let us down,” agreed Kirill.

Last time, I got to the train as it was departing. And I ran after it with bulging eyes. The guys noticed me and rushed into the corridor. And I could already see someone jostling the conductor away from the doors. In one hand, I had three empty flasks, and in the other only one, but half-full of honey. And I tried to throw them into the open door of the train on the run. And the one that had honey, by some miracle, fell down, under the train. And I yelled something. And everyone yelled. And some passenger, not one of us, being frightened, pulled the emergency brake.

I also remembered that I still needed drop by home to get my stuff. And that, even though there was still about a month until the move, it was clear even now that there was no way we would get more than four people for it. And I remembered lots of other things like that. And I heard Boris Borisych ask:

“Where are you going, anyway?”

“The countryside,” I said, “the bee-farm.”

“To rest, then? That’s good. Go, rest.”

“I’ll run off, then?” I said.

“Run, run,” said Boris Borisych.

And I ran off to rest.