Berezovo: A Revolutionary Russian Epic

“I can’t leave the dining room,” replied the waiter plaintively. “I work in the dining room only. I am not allowed upstairs or to leave the hotel. Those are the orders of the proprietor.”

“But can’t you see?” exclaimed the Mayor’s wife impatiently. “This is an exception.”

The waiter shook his head and smiled apologetically at her.

“No exception,” he said confidently. “Only proprietor can make an exception.”

“Then you must ask him!”

The waiter’s smile grew broader. He held his hands palms outward as if appealing to her to see reason.

“Proprietor not here.”

They were joined by the head waiter.

“Good afternoon, Madame Mayoress!” the older man greeted her smoothly. “What a pleasure to see you here.”

“Oh Sasha, I am so glad to see you!” responded Madame Pobednyeva. “I have been trying to explain to this fool here that I have an appointment to see Fyodor Gregorivich but he won’t listen.”

The head waiter held up one hand to interrupt her.

“One moment please, Madame.”

Turning to his subordinate, he regarded the young waiter sternly.

“Stepan, your customers are waiting and your tables are a disgrace! Return to the dining room at once and clean them up.”

Bristling, the younger man looked as if he was on the point of argument but the older waiter imperiously cut him short.

“We will speak more of this later!” he said loudly for Madame Pobednyeva’s benefit. “And remember what I told you before…”

Taking the younger man firmly by the arm he led him away towards the dining room.

“Don’t let the suka staraya mess you up,” he added, lowering his voice. “There will be plenty of tips tomorrow and you will want to be in on it.”

“Fat blyad!” muttered Stepan.

“Absolutely!” agreed the head waiter.

Pausing only to propel his young subordinate through the dining room doors, he turned on his heel and made his way back to the proprietor’s office. Madame Pobednyeva was standing by the desk. In her hand she held a piece of paper.

“Thank you, Sasha,” she said loftily, adopting a tone she believed the head waiter would recognise as being appropriate for a lady of breeding addressing a favoured and trusted servant. “A most unfortunate young man. I have come to see Fyodor Gregorivich. I have an appointment. We are meant to be discussing the seating plan for tomorrow’s luncheon.”

The head waiter regarded her with a sad smile that expertly mixed understanding and sorrow.

“I regret, Madame, that Fyodor Gregorivich is not here at this precise moment.”

Madame Pobednyeva’s eyes narrowed.

“Now don’t you start!” she warned him in a coarser tone. “Do you know where the hell he is?”

The head waiter hesitated, recognising the impracticality of admitting that he did indeed have knowledge of where his boss was: namely that he was in a room on the upper floor of the hotel spying on the fornication of two the town’s most prominent citizens. On principle he always tried to avoid telling outright lies to the Hotel’s customers.

“No,” he said reluctantly, “but I am sure that he must have been delayed on only the most pressing business, otherwise he would never have kept you waiting.”

He paused again and then, moving nearer to the Mayor’s wife, continued in a lowered voice, “May I tell you something in confidence, Madame?”

“Of course, Sasha,” Madame Pobednyeva assured him.

“Well as you know,” explained the head waiter quietly, “tomorrow’s luncheon is a very important occasion and we, that is all the staff, feel tremendously honoured that the Mayor has chosen to host the event at our hotel.”

“Well? Go on.”

“There are certain… security procedures that have to be put in place when we have such an important political event. Some of these are so secret that not even I or Boris Gennadyevich, our head chef, know about them. It is quite possible that Fyodor Gregorivich has just now been called to an urgent meeting at the uchastok with Colonel Izorov to discuss these very sensitive arrangements and, of course, is unable to…”

He left the sentence unfinished, allowing the Mayor’s wife to paint her own picture in her mind and to reach her own conclusions.

“You are quite right,” she agreed. “It would have to be something very secret to prevent Fyodor Gregorivich from being here to meet me.”

“Very secret,” agreed Sasha with a deferential bow, “and very, very sensitive.”

His expressions of grateful appreciation at the Mayoress’s understanding were cut short by her next pronouncement.

“I will wait here until he returns.”

“Alas, no,” said the head waiter quickly. “A thousand apologies but that would not be suitable. A lady like yourself being kept waiting in his office, like a common tradesman… Fyodor Gregorivich would never forgive me!”