A hunk of bread and an onion with a pinch of salt will last a soldier the whole day.
But with him it's different. Now you've got to get him some milk, now you've got to boil an egg for him, and he can't get along without something hot.
But I had my work to do.
So I plucked up my murage and left him in the care of my friend's wife. Well, he just cried all day, and in the evening ran away to the elevator to meet me.
Waited there till late at night.
"I had a hard time with him at first.
After one 'ny tiring day we went to bed when it was still light. He used to be always chirruping like a sparrow, but this time he was very quiet.
'What are you thinking about, son?' I asked.
He just looked up at the ceiling.
'What did you do with your leather coat, Daddy?'
And I'd never had a leather coat in my life!
I had to get round it somehow.
'Left it in Voronezh,' I told him.
'And why were you so long looking for me?'
So I said:
'I looked for you, sonny, in Germany, in Poland, and all over Byelorussia, and you turned up in Uryupinsk.'
'Is Uryupinsk nearer than Germany?
Is it far from our house to Poland?'
We went on talking like that till we dropped off to sleep.
"But do you think there wasn't a reason for his asking about that leather coat, mate?
No, there was a reason behind it all right.
It meant at some time or other his real father had worn a coat like that, and he had just remembered it.
A kid's memory is like summer lightning, you know; it flashes and lights things up for a bit, then dies away.
And that was how his memory worked, like the flashes of summer lightning.
"We might have gone on living another year in Uryupinsk together, but in November I had an accident. I was driving along a muddy road through a village and I went into a skid. There happened to be a cow in the way and I knocked it over.
Well, you know how it is- the women raised a hullabaloo, a crowd gathered round, and soon there was a traffic inspector on the spot.
I asked him to go easy, but he took my licence away.
The cow got up, stuck its tail in the air and went galloping away down the street, but I lost my licence.
I went through the winter as a joiner, and then got in touch with an old army friend- he works as a driver in our district- and he invited me to come and stay with him.
You can do joinery work for a year, he says, then you can get a new licence in our region.
So now my son and I, we're on the march to Kashary.
"But even if I hadn't had that accident with the cow, you know, I'd have left Uryupinsk just the same.
I can't stay in one place for long.
When my Vanya gets older and he's got to be sent to school, I expect I'll knuckle under and settle down.
But for the time being we're tramping the Russian land together."
"Does he get tired?" I asked.
"Well, he doesn't go far on his own feet; most of the time he rides on me.
I hoist him on to my shoulder and carry him. When he wants to stretch his legs, he jumps down and runs about at the side of the road, prancing around like a little goat.
No, it's not that, mate, we'd get along all right. The trouble is my heart's got a knock in it somewhere, ought to have a piston changed. Sometimes it gives me such a stab I nearly get a black-out.
I'm afraid one day I may die in my sleep and frighten my little son.
And that's not the only thing. Nearly every night I see in my dreams the dear ones I've lost.
And mostly it's as if I was behind barbed wire and they were on the other side, at liberty. I talk about everything to Irina and the children, but as soon as I try to pull the barbed wire apart, they go away, seem to melt before my eyes. And there's another funny thing about it. In the daytime I always keep a firm gTip on myself, you'll never get a sigh out of me. But sometimes I wake up at night and my pillow's wet through."
From the river came the sound of my friend's voice and the splash of oars in the water.
This stranger, who now seemed a close friend of mine, held out his big hand, firm as a block of wood:
"Good-bye, mate, good luck to you!"
"Good luck and a good journey to Kashary!"
"Thanks.
Heh, sonny, let's go to the boat.
The boy ran to his side, took hold of the corner of his jacket and started off with tiny steps beside his striding father.
Two orphans, two grains of sand swept into strange parts by the tremendous hurricane of war. ... What did the future hold for them?