The Matiushin Case Read Free Page A

earache and the army doctor, accustomed to simplicity, performed an irrigation and an inflation, probably damaging Matiushin’s eardrum. At the time no one attached any importance to the fact that he became hard of hearing in one ear. However, many years later, at his first army medical exam, Matiushin was unexpectedly rejected because of his hearing. His loss of hearing was declared incurable, although he had grown accustomed to it in everyday life long ago, it didn’t cause him any problems, and he was healthier and stronger for his age than his peers.
    When he learned that his son had been declared unfit for military service, Grigorii Ilich didn’t say anything for days, not even wishing to notice his son’s presence in his house. He broke his silence with the words:
    â€˜He can’t serve! Then what can he do, the little invalid? I thought there was going to be an army doctor in the house, but we’ve got a sponger instead …’
    When his father gave up thinking about him and stopped believing in him, for some reason Matiushin felt better. He was prepared simply to work, without being afraid of getting dirty, and not come first in everything – which his father had been afraid of all his life. For Matiushin, study and the path into the future were replaced by his job, but he chose the first trade that came to hand, a dirty and unattractive one – as a machine fitter. His father let him drop out of school without saying a word but despised him, jeering even when Matiushin gave his honestly earned wages to his mother.
    â€˜Look here, our breadwinner’s home! To feed the lice.’
    As for Yakov, their parents sent him thirty roubles a month and no reproaches were heard. Grigorii now recognised his own likeness only in his elder son – and in his heart he started growing attached to this thought, feeling an unexpected weakness for Yakov. In his final year Yakov didn’t visit Yelsk. He informed his father in a letter that during his leave he was going to join a construction brigade in order to earn some money. They were sending him money every month from home and he had a stipend at the college as well, and how much did anyone really need in a barracks? And so Grigorii Ilich grew dejected. In autumn another letter arrived: Yakov informed his parents that he had married. He sent a photo of the wedding and a letter in which he explained drily that he hadn’t wanted to involve his parents in the expense or to bother them, and that was why it had turned out this way.
    In his heart, the father was glad that Yakov had reasoned like that. At that time Grigorii Ilich had developed a passion for saving money, amassing it in his Savings Bank book so that even Alexandra Yakovlevna didn’t really know how much of it had piled up. Everything was turned into savings which he was too greedy to spend unless it was on himself: on his beloved Japanese spinners and fishing line, and once a Finnish sheepskin coat was bought, because he was afraid of taking sick in the winter in his ordinary coat. By that time the family was living off the state: Grigorii Ilich received a special food allowance as a member of the Municipal Party Committee and an army ration too. Alexandra Yakovlevna took care of the household. She already had to do everything at home herself or with her son’s help – Grigorii Ilich strictly forbade her to use his soldiers, and if the question came up he would say:
    â€˜You’ve got that deaf one, rope him in.’
    A rather stingy money order was sent off in response to the newly-weds’ letter. No matter how closely they studied the photo that had been sent, the only person they could make out clearly was their son Yasha. They stood it in the china cabinet – yet another little icon that they could be proud of – and the young couple came to Yelsk and paid their respects to the father a year later.
    â€˜Everyone, this is my Liudmila!’