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asks Pravdin.
    “What trouble?” she cries. “I’ve been certified.” When Pravdin looks confused, she elaborates. “I’ve been certified insane . It happened right after the Great Patriotic War, in February of forty-six to be exact. I had been writing letters for years about my husband; he was killed in the camps in thirty-nine or forty.” Mother Russia looks uncertainly at Nadezhda, who encourages her with a nod. “Yes, you see, it came about this way: there was a commission on some important matter and everyone voted yes except my husband, the lovely little idiot, who voted no. He knew what he was doing of course. Right after the vote he made his way back to our flat and packed a small bag with his toilet articles and some extra socks and underwear and books. I knew they would come for him that night because of the five black cats. I remember the footsteps, the knock at the door.” Mother Russia smiles sadly. Nadezhda puts a hand on her arm and Zoya pats it. “I wrote letters all through the thirtiestrying to find out if he was alive. Just before the war started the packages I sent to him every month began coming back marked ‘Deceased,’ and for some reason only the bureaucrats know, ‘No forwarding address.’ Then I started writing letters to clear his name. I wrote to everyone: to local party people, to the newspapers, to the judges. I wrote to the great mountaineer—”
    “Waak, waak, rev-lutions are verbose,” comes from the partly open door of Mother Russia’s room.
    “—the great mountaineer himself, and I even received an answer once, from what I supposed was a secretary, saying that Iosif Vissarionovich was occupied with the war and would get back to me when it was over. Well, he got back to me all right. They came to collect me in the middle of the night and carted me off to an asylum near Leningrad. I was there for three and a half years, and in a certain sense it was worth it. I can see that surprises you, doesn’t it? You see, when they tossed me back into the lake they certified me insane, which more or less gives me license to do as I please, write what I please to whom I please. They can’t touch me as long as I don’t hurt anybody because I’m legally insane!”
    Everyone is moved by the story: Mother Russia by the telling of it, Nadezhda and Pravdin by the listening to it. After a while Pravdin says, “I can guess those were hard years for you in the asylum.”
    “Oh, they were, I’ll admit it, difficult,” Mother Russia agrees. “The worst thing was the slamming of doors. I have a feeling that is threatening to become a theory: that the way you close doors shows in a profound sense what you think of the people inside. I imagine in the Kremlin they pad about on thick carpets and ease the doors closed so that you can’t even hear the latch click into place. In my asylum the insane people who claimed to be doctors would fling the doors shutas if it were an afterthought. Slam! Like that.” Mother Russia slaps the table and winces at the noise and the memory it evokes.
    Pravdin begins to clear away the dishes. Nadezhda scrubs up and sets them to drain. Mother Russia turns in; she is planning to take an electric train into the countryside the next day to pick mushrooms and wants to get an early start.
    “I’m pleased with our new attic,” she whispers to Pravdin as she goes, and stretches on her toes to kiss him on each cheek.
    Nadezhda invites Pravdin into her room for a nightcap. He settles awkwardly on the edge of the bed, which is covered with a quilt and embroidered pillows and serves as a couch. Nadezhda places an old Glenn Miller record on the phonograph, wipes it with a soft cloth, sets the needle in the first groove. She pours out two small cognacs, offers one to Pravdin. They click glasses and drink.
    The room is lighted by a Japanese paper lantern in one corner. On a low table near the bed is a large basket full of dried flowers from Lenin Hills. Pravdin picks up