'Collar,  Zina,' said  Philip Philipovich  softly,  'only don't  excite
him.'
     For a  moment  Zina's eyes had the  same vile look as Bormenthal's. She
walked up to the dog and with obvious treachery, stroked him.
     What're you doing ... all three of you? OK, take me if you want me. You
ought to be ashamed ... If only I knew what you're going to do to me . . .
     Zina  unfastened  his  collar,  the  dog shook  his  head  and snorted.
Bormenthal rose up in front of him, reeking of that foul, sickening smell.
     Ugh, disgusting . . . wonder why I feel so queer . . ., thought the dog
as he dodged away.
     'Hurry,  doctor,'  said Philip  Philipovich  impatiently.  There  was a
sharp, sweet smell  in the air.  The  doctor,  without  taking his  horrible
watchful eyes off  the  dog slipped his right hand  out from behind his back
and quickly  clamped  a pad of damp cotton wool over the dog's  nose. Sharik
went dumb, his head spinning a little, but he still  managed  to jump  back.
The doctor jumped after him and rapidly smothered his whole muzzle in cotton
wool.  His breathing  stopped, but again  the dog jerked  himself away.  You
bastard . . .,  flashed through his mind. Why? And  down came the pad again.
Then  a lake suddenly  materialised  in the  middle of  the  consulting-room
floor. On it  was a boat, rowed  by a crew of  extraordinary pink  dogs. The
bones in his legs gave way and collapsed.
     'On  to  the table!'  Philip  Philipovich boomed from  somewhere  in  a
cheerful voice  and  the sound disintegrated into  orange-coloured  streaks.
Fear vanished and gave way to joy. For two seconds the dog loved the man  he
had bitten.  Then the whole world  turned upside down and he felt a cold but
soothing hand on his belly. Then - nothing.
     The dog Sharik  lay  stretched out on  the narrow operating  table, his
head lolling helplessly  against a  white oilcloth pillow.  His  stomach was
shaven  and now Doctor Bormenthal,  breathing heavily, was hurriedly shaving
Sharik's head  with clippers that ate  through his  fur. Philip Philipovich,
leaning  on the edge  of the table,  watched the process through  his shiny,
gold-rimmed spectacles. He spoke urgently:
     'Ivan  Arnoldovich,  the most vital moment is when I enter  the turkish
saddle. You  must then  instantly pass me the gland and  start  suturing  at
once. If we  have a haemorrhage then we shall lose time and lose the dog. In
any case, he hasn't a chance .  . .'  He was  silent, frowning,  and gave an
ironic  look at the dog's half-closed eye, then added: 'Do you  know, I feel
sorry for him. I've actually got used to having him around.'
     So saying  he raised his hands as though calling down a blessing on the
unfortunate Sharik's great  sacrificial venture.  Bormenthal laid  aside the
clippers and picked up a razor. He lathered the  defenceless little head and
started  to shave it. The blade scraped across the  skin, nicked it and drew
blood. Having shaved the head the doctor wiped it with an alcohol swab, then
stretched  out the  dog's  bare  stomach and  said with  a sigh  of  relief:
'Ready.'
     Zina turned on  the  tap  over the washbasin and  Bormenthal  hurriedly
washed his hands. From a phial Zina poured alcohol over them.
     'May  I  go, Philip Philipovich?' she asked, glancing nervously  at the
dog's shaven head.
     'You may.'
     Zina  disappeared. Bormenthal busied  himself  further.  He  surrounded
Shank's head with tight gauze wadding, which framed the odd sight of a naked
canine scalp and a muzzle that by comparison seemed heavily bearded.
     The priest  stirred. He straightened up, looked at  the dog's  head and
said: 'God bless us. Scalpel.'
     Bormenthal took a short, broad-bladed knife from the glittering pile on
the small table and handed it to the great man. He too then donned a pair of
black gloves.
     'Is he asleep?' asked Philip Philipovich.
     'He's sleeping nicely.'
     Philip  Philipovich clenched his  teeth, his  eyes  took  on  a  sharp,
piercing  glint  and  with  a  flourish of his scalpel he  made a long, neat
incision  down the  length of  Sharik's  belly. The  skin parted  instantly,
spurting  blood  in several  directions. Bormenthal swooped like  a vulture,
began  dabbing  Sharik's wound with swabs  of gauze,  then gripped its edges
with  a  row  of  little clamps like sugar-tongs, and the  bleeding stopped.
Droplets of sweat oozed from  Bormenthal's forehead. Philip Philipovich made
a  second incision and  again  Sharik's  body  was  pulled apart  by  hooks,
scissors and little  clamps. Pink  and yellow tissues emerged,  oozing  with
blood.  Philip  Philipovich  turned the scalpel  in  the wound, then barked:
'Scissors!'
     Like a  conjuring trick  the  instrument  materialised  in Bormenthal's
hand. Philip  Philipovich delved deep and with a few  twists  he removed the
testicles and some dangling attachments from  Sharik's  body. Dripping  with
exertion and  excitement Bormenthal leapt to a glass jar and removed from it
two  more  wet, dangling testicles,  their  short,  moist, stringy  vesicles
dangling like  elastic in  the hands of the professor and his assistant. The
bent needles clicked faintly 54

     against the clamps as the new testicles were sewn in place of Sharik's.
The priest drew back from the incision, swabbed it and gave the order:
     'Suture, doctor. At once.' He turned around  and  looked at  the  white
clock on the wall.
     'Fourteen  minutes,'  grunted Bormenthal through  clenched teeth  as he
pierced the flabby  skin with  his crooked needle. Both grew as tense as two
murderers working against the clock.
     'Scalpel!' cried Philip Philipovich.
     The scalpel seemed  to leap into  his hand as though of its own accord,
at which point Philip Philipovich's expression grew quite fearsome. Grinding
his  gold  and porcelain  bridge-work, in a single  stroke he incised a  red
fillet around Sharik's head. The scalp, with  its shaven hairs, was removed,
the skull bone laid bare. Philip Philipovich shouted: 'Trepan!'
     Bormenthal  handed   him  a  shining  auger.  Biting  his  lips  Philip
Philipovich began to insert the auger and  drill a complete circle of little
holes, a centimetre apart, around the top  of Sharik's skull. Each hole took
no more than five  seconds to  drill.  Then with  a saw  of the most curious
design  he  put its point into  the first hole and began sawing  through the
skull  as  though he were  making a lady's fretwork sewing-basket. The skull
shook and squeaked faintly.  After three minutes the roof of the dog's skull
was removed.
     The  dome of  Sharik's  brain was  now  laid bare - grey, threaded with
bluish veins and  spots of red.  Philip  Philipovich  plunged  his  scissors
between  the membranes and  eased them  apart.  Once a thin  stream of blood
spurted up, almost hitting the professor in the eye and spattering his white
cap.  Like a tiger Bormenthal  pounced  in with a  tourniquet and  squeezed.
Sweat streamed down his face, which  was growing puffy and mottled. His eyes
flicked to and fro from the professor's hand to the instrument-table. Philip
Philipovich was positively awe-inspiring. A hoarse snoring noise  came  from
his nose,  his teeth were  bared  to the gums.  He peeled  aside  layers  of
cerebral membrane and penetrated  deep between the hemispheres of the brain.
It was then that Bor-menthal went pale, and seizing Sharik's breast with one
hand he said hoarsely: 'Pulse falling sharply . . .'
     Philip Philipovich flashed  him a  savage look,  grunted something  and
delved further still.  Bormenthal snapped  open  a glass  ampoule, filled  a
syringe with the liquid and treacherously injected the dog near his heart.
     'I'm coming  to  the turkish saddle,'  growled Philip Philipovich. With
his  slippery, bloodstained gloves he removed Sharik's greyish-yellow  brain
from his  head. For a second  he glanced at  Sharik's muzzle  and Bormenthal
snapped open a second ampoule of  yellow liquid and sucked it into  the long
syringe.
     'Shall I do it straight into the heart?' he enquired cautiously.
     'Don't waste time asking questions!' roared  the professor angrily. 'He
could die five  times  over while you're  making up your  mind. Inject, man!
What are  you  waiting for?'  His face had  the look  of an  inspired robber
chieftain.
     With a flourish the doctor plunged the needle into the dog's heart.
     'He's alive, but only just,' he whispered timidly.
     'No time  to  argue whether  he's  alive or not,'  hissed the  terrible
Philip Philipovich. 'I'm at  the saddle.  So  what  if he does die  ... hell
..."... the banks of the sa-acred Nile" . . . give me the gland.'
     Bormenthal  handed  him a beaker containing a white blob suspended on a
thread in some fluid. With  one hand ('God, there's no one  like him  in all
Europe,'  thought Bormenthal) he fished out the dangling blob  and  with the
other hand, using  the scissors, he  excised a similar blob from deep within
the separated  cerebral hemispheres. Sharik's  blob he threw  on to a plate,
the  new  one  he inserted into the brain with  a piece of  thread. Then his
stumpy   fingers,  now  miraculously  delicate  and  sensitive,  sewed   the
amber-coloured  thread cunningly into place. After  that  he removed various
stretchers  and  clamps from  the  skull, replaced the  brain  in  its  bony
container, leaned back and said in a much calmer voice:
     'I suppose he's died?'
     'There's just a flicker of pulse,' replied Bormenthal.
     'Give him another shot of adrenalin.'
     The  professor replaced  the membranes over  the  brain,  restored  the
sawn-off  lid  to  its exact place, pushed  the scalp back into position and
roared: 'Suture!'
     Five  minutes later  Bormenthal  had sewn up  the dog's  head, breaking
three needles.
     There on the bloodstained pillow lay Sharik's slack, lifeless muzzle, a
circular  wound  on  his  tonsured  head.  Like  a  satisfied vampire Philip
Philipovich finally  stepped back, ripped off one glove, shook  out of it  a
cloud  of sweat-drenched  powder, tore off the other  one, threw it  on  the
ground and rang the bell in the wall. Zina appeared in  the doorway, looking
away to avoid seeing the blood-spattered dog.  With  chalky hands  the great
man pulled off his skull-cap and cried:
     "Give me a cigarette, Zina. And then some clean clothes and a bath.'
     Layino- his chin on the edge  of the  table he parted  the  dog's right
eyelids, peered into the obviously moribund eye and said:
     'Well, I'll be  ... He's not dead  yet. Still,  he'll die. I feel sorry
for the dog, Bormenthal. He was naughty but I couldn't help liking him.'

        Four

     Subject of experiment: Male dog aged approx. 2 years.
     Breed: Mongrel.
     Name: 'Sharik'.
     Coat  sparse, in  tufts,  brownish  with traces  of singeing.  Tail the
colour  of baked milk. On right flank  traces of  healed second-degree burn.
Previous   nutritional   state  -poor.  After   a  week's  stay  with  Prof.
Preobrazhensky -extremely  well nourished. Weight: 8 kilograms (!). Heart: .
. . Lungs: . . . Stomach: . . . Temperature: . . .
     December 23rd  At  8.05pm  Prof.  Preobrazhensky  commenced  the  first
operation of  its kind to be performed in Europe: removal under  anaesthesia
of the dog's testicles and their replacement by implanted human testes, with
appendages and seminal ducts, taken from a 28-year-old  human male,  dead  4
hours and 4 minutes before the operation and kept by Prof. Preobrazhensky in
sterilised physiological fluid.
     Immediately thereafter, following a trepanning operation on the cranial
roof,  the  pituitary  gland  was removed and replaced by  a human pituitary
originating from the  above-mentioned human male. Drugs used: Chloroform - 8
cc.
     Camphor - 1 syringe.
     Adrenalin - 2 syringes (by cardiac injection ).
     Purpose of  operation: Experimental observation by Prof. Preobrazhensky
of  the effect of combined  transplantation  of  the pituitary and testes in
order to study both the functional viability in a host-organism and its role
in cellular etc. rejuvenation.
     Operation performed by; Prof.  P. P. Preobrazhensky. Assisted by: Dr I.
A. Bormenthal. During the night following the operation, frequent  and grave
weakening of the pulse. Dog apparently in terminal state.
     Preobrazhensky prescribes camphor injections in massive dosage.
     December  24th am Improvement.  Respiration rate  doubled. Temperature:
42C. Camphor and caffeine injected subcutaneously.
     December 25th Deterioration.
     Pulse  barely  detectable,  cooling of  the extremities,  no  pupillary
reaction. Preobrazhensky orders  cardiac injection of adrenalin and camphor,
intravenous injections of physiological solution.
     December 26th Slight improvement. Pulse: 180.
     Respiration: 92. Temperature: 41C. Camphor. Alimentation per rectum.
     December  27th  Pulse:  152.   Respiration:  50.   Temperature:  39.8C.
Pupillary reaction. Camphor - subcutaneous.
     December   28th   Significant   improvement.   At  noon   sudden  heavy
perspiration. Temperature: 37C.
     Condition of surgical wounds unchanged. Re-bandaged. Signs of appetite.
Liquid alimentation.

     December  29th  Sudden  moulting  of  hair on forehead  and  torso. The
following were summoned for consultation:
     1. Professor of Dermatology - Vasily Vasilievich Bundaryov.
     2. Director, Moscow Veterinary Institute.
     Both stated the case to be without precedent in medical literature.
     No diagnosis established.
     Temperature: (entered in pencil).
     8.15pm. First bark.
     Distinct alteration of timbre and lowering of pitch
     noticeable. Instead of  diphthong  'aow-aow',  bark  now  enunciated on
vowels 'ah-oh', in intonation reminiscent
     of a groan.
     December 30th Moulting process has progressed to almost total baldness.
     Weighing  produced  the  unexpected  result  of 80 kg., due  to  growth
(lengthening of the bones). Dog still lying prone.

     December 31st Subject exhibits colossal appetite.
     (Ink-blot.   After   the   blot   the   following   entry  in  scrawled
hand-writing):  At   12.12pm  the  dog  distinctly  pronounced   the  sounds
'Nes-set-a'.
     (Gap in entries. The following entries show errors due to excitement):
     December   1st  (deleted;   corrected   to):  January  1st  1925.   Dog
photographed a.m.
     Cheerfully  barks  'Nes-set-a',  repeating  loudly  and  with  apparent
pleasure.
     3.0pm  (in heavy lettering): Dog laughed,  causing maid Zina to  faint.
Later, pronounced the  following 8  times  in  succession:  'Nesseta-ciled'.
(Sloping characters, written in pencil):
     The professor has  deciphered the word 'Nesseta-ciled' by  reversal: it
is 'delicatessen' . . . Quite extraord . . .

     January 2nd Dog photographed by magnesium  flash while smiling. Got  up
and remained confidently on hind legs for a half-hour. Now nearly my height.
(Loose page inserted into  notebook): Russian science almost suffered a most
serious blow. History of Prof. P. P. Preobrazhensky's illness:
     1.13pm Prof. Preobrazhensky  falls into deep faint. On falling, strikes
head on edge of table.
     Temp.: . . .
     The  dog  in  the  presence  of  Zina  and  myself,  had  called  Prof.
Preobrazhensky a 'bloody bastard'.
     January 6th (entries made partly in pencil, partly in violet ink):
     Today, after the dog's tail had fallen out, he quite clearly pronounced
the word 'liquor'.
     Recording apparatus switched on. God knows what's happening.
     (Total confusion.)
     Professor has ceased to see  patients. From 5pm this evening  sounds of
vulgar  abuse issuing  from the consulting-room, where the creature is still
confined. Heard to ask for 'another one, and make it a double.'

     January 7th  Creature  can now  pronounce  several words: 'taxi', 'full
up', 'evening  paper',  'take  one  home for  the  kiddies' and  every known
Russian swear-word. His appearance is strange. He  now only has  hair on his
head, chin  and chest. Elsewhere he is bald,  with flabby skin.  His genital
region  now  has the  appearance of an  immature  human  male. His skull has
enlarged considerably. Brow low and receding.
     My God, I must be going mad. . . .
     Philip  Philipovich  still  feels  unwell.  Most  of  the  observations
(pictures and recordings) are being carried out by myself.
     Rumours  are  spreading  round  the  town  .  . .  Consequences  may be
incalculable. All day today the whole street was full of loafing rubbernecks
and old women  . . . Dogs still crowding round beneath the  windows. Amazing
report in the morning papers: The rumours of a Martian in Obukhov Street are
totally unfounded. They have been spread by  black-market traders and  their
repetition will be severely punished.  What Martian, for God's sake? This is
turning into a nightmare.
     Reports in today's evening paper even worse - they say that a child has
been born who could play the violin from birth. Beside it is a photograph of
myself  with  the  caption:  'Prof.  Preobrazhensky  performing a  Caesarian
operation on the mother.' The situation is  getting out of hand ...  He  can
now say a new word - 'policeman' . . .
     Apparently Darya Petrovna was in love with me and  pinched the snapshot
of  me out  of Philip Philipovich's photograph album. After I had kicked out
all the reporters one of them sneaked back into the kitchen, and so ...
     Consulting hours are now  impossible. Eighty-two telephone calls today.
The telephone has been cut off. We are besieged by child-less women . . .
     House committee appeared  in full  strength,  headed by Shvonder - they
could not explain why they had come.

     January  8th  Late  this evening  diagnosis finally  agreed.  With  the
impartiality  of  a  true  scholar Philip Philipovich has  acknowledged  his
error:  transplantation of the  pituitary induces not rejuvenation but total
humanisation  (underlined three  times).  This does not, however, lessen the
value of his stupendous discovery.
     The creature walked round the flat today for the first time. Laughed in
the  corridor  after looking  at the  electric light.  Then,  accompanied by
Philip Philipovich  and myself, he went into the study. Stands firmly on his
hind (deleted) ... his legs and  gives  the impression  of a short, ill-knit
human male.
     Laughed in the study. His smile is disagreeable and somehow artificial.
Then he  scratched the  back  of  his  head,  looked round and registered  a
further,  clearly-pronounced  word:  'Bourgeois'.  Swore.  His  swearing  is
methodical,  uninterrupted  and  apparently  totally  meaningless.  There is
something mechanical about it - it is as if this creature had heard all this
bad  language  at  an  earlier  phase,  automatically  recorded  it  in  his
subconscious  and  now   regurgitates  it   wholesale.  However,  I   am  no
psychiatrist.
     The   swearing  somehow  has  a  very   depressing   effect  on  Philip
Philipovich.  There  are moments  when  he  abandons  his cool,  unemotional
observation of  new phenomena and  appears  to  lose patience. Once when the
creature  was swearing, for instance,  he  suddenly  burst out  impulsively:
'Shut up!' This had no effect.
     After his visit to  the study Sharik was shut up in the consulting-room
by  our joint efforts. Philip Philipovich  and I  then  held a conference. I
confess that this was the first time I had seen this self-assured and highly
intelligent  man at a loss. He  hummed a little, as he  is  in the  habit of
doing,  then  asked: 'What  are  we  going to  do  now?' He answered himself
literally as follows:
     'Moscow State Clothing Stores, yes . . . "from Granada  to Seville" . .
.  M.S.C.S., my  dear  doctor  . .  .'  I could not understand him, then  he
explained: 'Ivan Arnold-ovich, please go and buy him some underwear,  shirt,
jacket and trousers.'
     January 9th The  creature's vocabulary is being enriched  by a new word
every five minutes (on average) and, since this morning, by sentences. It is
as if they had been lying frozen in his mind, are melting and emerging. Once
out, the word remains  in  use.  Since yesterday  evening  the  machine  has
recorded the following: 'Stop pushing', 'You swine', 'Get off the bus - full
up', 'I'll show you', 'American recognition', 'kerosene stove'.
     January10th The creature was  dressed. He took to a vest quite readily,
even laughing  cheerfully. He  refused underpants,  though, protesting  with
hoarse shrieks:
     'Stop  queue-barging, you bastards!'  Finally we dressed him. The sizes
of his clothes were too big for him.
     (Here  the   notebook  contains  a   number  of  schematised  drawings,
apparently depicting the  transformation of a  canine into a human leg.) The
rear  lialf of the skeleton of  the foot  is lengthening.  Elongation of the
toes. Nails. (With appropriate sketches.)
     Repeated  systematic  toilet  training.  The  servants  are  angry  and
depressed.
     However,  the creature is  undoubtedly intelligent.  The experiment  is
proceeding satisfactorily.

     January llth Quite reconciled to wearing clothes, although was heard to
say, 'Christ, I've got ants in my pants.'
     Fur on  head  now thin and  silky; almost indistinguishable  from hair,
though  scars  still  visible in parietal  region. Today last  traces of fur
dropped from his  ears.  Colossal appetite.  Enjoys  salted herring.  At 5pm
occurred a significant  event: for the first time the words  spoken  by  the
creature  were  not  disconnected  from  surrounding  phenomena but  were  a
reaction  to  them.  Thus  when  the  professor said  to  him,  'Don't throw
food-scraps on the floor,' he  unexpectedly replied:  'Get stuffed.'  Philip
Philipovich was appalled, but recovered and said: 'If you swear at me or the
doctor again, you're in trouble.' I photographed Sharik at that moment and I
swear that he understood what the  professor said. His face clouded over and
he gave a sullen look, but said nothing. Hurrah - he understands!

     January 12th. Put  hands in pockets. We  are teaching him not to swear.
Whistled,  'Hey,  little  apple'. Sustained  conversation.  I  cannot resist
certain  hypotheses:  we must  forget  rejuvenation for the time  being. The
other  aspect  is  immeasurably  more   important.   Prof.  Preobrazhensky's
astounding experiment has revealed  one of  the secrets of  the human brain.
The mysterious function of the pituitary as an adjunct to the brain  has now
been  clarified.  It determines human  appearance.  Its hormones  may now be
regarded as the most important in the whole organism - the hormones of man's
image. A new  field has been opened up to  science; without  the  aid of any
Faustian retorts  a homunculus has been  created.  The surgeon's scalpel has
brought to life a new  human entity. Prof. Preobrazhensky-you are a creator.
(ink blot)
     But I digress ... As stated,  he can now sustain a conversation.  As  I
see  it, the situation is as follows:  the implanted pituitary has activated
the speech-centre in the canine brain and words have poured out in a stream.
I do not  think that we  have before  us a newly-created brain but  a  brain
which  has been  stimulated to develop. Oh, what a  glorious confirmation of
the theory  of  evolution! Oh,  the sublime  chain  leading from  a  dog  to
Mendeleyev the great chemist! A  further hypothesis  of mine  is that during
its canine  stage  Sharik's  brain  had  accumulated  a massive  quantity of
sense-data. All the  words which  he used initially were the language of the
streets which he had picked up and stored in his brain. Now as I  walk along
the streets I look at every dog I meet with secret horror. God knows what is
lurking in their minds.
     Sharik can  read. He can read (three exclamation marks).  I  guessed it
from  his  early use  of  the word  'delicatessen'. He could read  from  the
beginning. And  I even  know the solution  to  this puzzle - it lies in  the
structure of the canine optic nerve. God alone knows what is now going on in
Moscow.  Seven black-market traders are  already  behind bars for  spreading
rumours that the  end of the  world  is imminent and has been caused by  the
Bolsheviks.  Darya Petrovna told me about  this  and  even named the  date -
November  28th, 1925,  the day of St Stephen the Martyr, when the earth will
spiral off into infinity. . .  . Some charlatans are already giving lectures
about it.  We have started such a rumpus with this pituitary experiment that
I  have had to leave my flat. I  have moved in with Preobrazhensky and sleep
in  the waiting-room with Sharik. The consulting-room has been turned into a
new waiting-room. Shvender  was  right.  Trouble is  brewing with  the house
committee.  There  is not a  single glass left, as he will  jump  on  to the
shelves. Great difficulty in teaching him not to do this.
     Something  odd  is happening  to  Philip.  When  I  told him  about  my
hypotheses and my hopes of developing Sharik into an intellectually advanced
personality, he hummed  and hahed, then said: 'Do  you really think so?' His
tone  was ominous. Have I made a mistake? Then he had an idea. While I wrote
up these case-notes, Preobrazhensky made  a careful study  of the life-story
of the man from whom we took the pituitary.
     (Loose page inserted into the notebook.)
     Name: Elim Grigorievich Chugunkin. Age: 25.
     Marital status: Unmarried.
     Not a Party member, but  sympathetic to the Party. Three  times charged
with theft and acquitted - on the  first occasion for lack of  evidence,  in
the second case saved by his social origin, the third  time put on probation
with a conditional sentence of 15 years hard labour.
     Profession: plays  the balalaika in bars.  Short, poor physical  shape.
Enlarged  liver  (alcohol).  Cause  of  death:  knife-wound  in  the  heart,
sustained in the Red Light Bar at Preobrazhensky Gate.

     The  old man continues to study Chugunkin's case exhaustively, although
I cannot understand  why. He grunted something about the  pathologist having
failed  to  make  a complete examination of Chugunkin's body. What  does  he
mean? Does it matter whose pituitary it is?

     January 17th Unable  to make  notes for several days,  as I have had an
attack  of  influenza.  Meanwhile  the  creature's  appearance  has  assumed
definitive form:
     (a) physically a complete human being.
     (b) weight about 108 Ibs.
     (c) below medium height.
     (d) small head.
     (e) eats human food.
     (f) dresses himself.
     (g) capable of normal conversation.
     So much for the pituitary (ink blot).
     This concludes the notes on this case. We now have a new organism which
must be studied as such. appendices: Verbatim reports of speech, recordings,
photographs. Signed: I. A. Bormenthal, M.D.
     Asst. to Prof. P. P. Preobrazhensky.


        Five
     A winter afternoon in late January,  the  time before supper,  the time
before the  start of evening consulting hours. On the  drawing-room doorpost
hung a sheet of paper, on which was written in Philip Philipovich's hand:


     <i>I forbid the consumption of sunflower seeds in this flat.
     P. Preobrazhensky</i>
     Below this in big, thick letters Bormenthal had written in blue pencil:
     Musical instruments may not be played between 7pm and 6am.
     Then from Zina:
     When  you  come back tell  Philip Philipovich that  he's gone out and I
don't know where to. Fyodor says he's with Shvonder.
     Preobrazhensky's hand:
     How much longer do I have to wait before the glazier comes?
     Darya Petrovna (in block letters):
     Zina has, gone out to the store, says she'll bring him back.
     In  the dining-room there  was a cosy evening feeling, generated by the
lamp on  the sideboard shining beneath its dark cerise  shade. Its light was
reflected in random shafts all over the room, as the mirror was cracked from
side to side and had been stuck in place with a criss-cross of tape. Bending
over the  table, Philip Philipovich was absorbed in the large double page of
an open newspaper. His face  was working with  fury  and through  his  teeth
issued a jerky stream of abuse. This is what he was reading:
     <i>There's no doubt that it  is his illegitimate (as  they  used to say in
rotten bourgeois society) son. This is how the pseudo-learned members of our
bourgeoisie amuse  themselves. He will  only keep  his seven rooms until the
glittering sword ofjustice fi'ashes over him like a red ray. Sh . . . r.</i>
     Someone  was hard at work playing a rousing  tune  on the balalaika two
rooms away and the sound of a series of intricate variations on 'The Moon is
Shining'  mingled  in  Philip  Philipovich's  head  with  the words  of  the
sickening newspaper article. When he  had read it  he pretended to spit over
his shoulder  and hummed absentmindedly through his teeth: ' "The moo-oon is
shining . .  .  shining bright . . .  the moon  is shining . . ."  God, that
damned tune's on my brain!'
     He rang. Zina's face appeared in the doorway.
     'Tell him it's five o'clock and he's  to shut up. Then tell him to come
here, please.'
     Philip Philipovich sat  down  in an  armchair beside his desk, a  brown
cigar butt  between  the  fingers  of  his  left  hand. Leaning against  the
doorpost there stood, legs crossed, a  short man  of unpleasant  appearance.
His hair grew in clumps of bristles like a stubble field and on his face was
a  meadow of unsliaven fluff. His brow was  strikingly low. A thick brush of
hair began almost immediately above his spreading eyebrows.
     His jacket, torn under the left armpit, was covered with bits of straw,
his  checked  trousers  had a hole on  the  right knee and the left  leg was
stained with violet  paint.  Round  the man's neck was  a poisonously bright
blue  tie with a gilt tiepin. The  colour  of  the  tie was so  garish  that
whenever Philip Philipovich covered his tired eyes and gazed at the complete
darkness of the ceiling or the wall, he imagined he saw a flaming torch with
a blue halo. As soon as he  opened  them he was  blinded again, dazzled by a
pair of patent-leather boots with white spats.
     'Like galoshes,'  thought Philip Philipovich  with disgust.  He sighed,
sniffed  and  busied himself with relighting his  dead cigar. The man in the
doorway stared at the professor with lacklustre eyes and smoked a cigarette,
dropping the ash down his shirtfront.
     The  clock  on  the  wall  beside a  carved  wooden grouse  struck five
o'clock.  The inside of the clock was still  wheezing as  Philip Philipovich
spoke.
     'I think  I  have asked  you  twice  not to sleep by  the stove in  the
kitchen - particularly in the daytime.'
     The man  gave  a hoarse cough as though he  were choking on a  bone and
replied:
     'It's nicer in the kitchen.'
     His  voice had an  odd quality, at once muffled yet resonant, as if  he
were far away and talking into a small barrel.
     Philip Philipovich shook his head and asked:
     'Where on  earth  did you get that  disgusting thing  from? I mean your
tie.'
     Following the direction of the pointing finger, the man's eyes squinted
as he gazed lovingly down at his tie.
     'What's disgusting about  it?' he said. 'It's a very  smart  tie. Darya
Petrovna gave it to me.'
     'In that case Darya  Petrovna  has  very  poor  taste. Those boots  are
almost as bad. Why did you get such  horrible shiny ones? Where did you  buy
them?  What did I tell you? I  told you  to find yourself  a  pair of decent
boots. Just look  at them. You don't mean to  tell me that Doctor Bormenthal
chose them, do you?'
     'I  told him  to get  patent leather ones. Why  shouldn't I  wear them?
Everybody  else  does.  If you go down  Kuznetzky  Street  you'll see nearly
everybody wearing patent leather boots.'
     Philip Philipovich shook his head and pronounced weightily:
     'No more sleeping in  the kitchen. Understand? I've never heard of such
behaviour. You're a nuisance there and the women don't like it.'
     The man scowled and his lips began to pout.
     'So what? Those women act  as though they owned the place. They're just
maids,  but you'd  think they were commissars.  It's  Zina  -  she's  always
bellyaching about me.'
     Philip Philipovich gave him a stern look.
     'Don't you dare talk about Zina in that tone of voice! Understand?'
     Silence.
     'I'm asking you - do you understand?'
     'Yes, I understand.'
     'Take that trash off your  neck. Sha  . .  . if  you saw  yourself in a
mirror you'd realise what a fright it makes you look. You look like a clown.
For  the hundredth time - don't throw  cigarette ends on to the floor. And I
don't  want to  hear  any  more  swearing  in  this  flat!  And  don't  spit
everywhere! The spittoon's over there. Kindly  take better aim when you pee.
Cease all further conversation with Zina.  She complains that you lurk round
her room at night. And don't be rude to my patients! Where do'you think  you
are - in some dive?'
     'Don't be  so hard on me. Dad,'  the  man suddenly  said  in  a tearful
whine.
     Philip Philipovich turned red and his spectacles flashed.
     'Who are you calling  "Dad"? What impertinent familiarity! I never want
to hear that word again! You will address me by my name and patronymic!'
     The man flared up impudently: 'Oh,  why can't you lay off? Don't spit .
. . don't smoke  . . .  don't go  there, don't do this, don't  do that . . .
sounds like  the rules in a  tram. Why don't you leave  me alone, for  God's
sake? And why shouldn't I call you "Dad", anyway? I didn't ask you to do the
operation, did I?' - the man barked indignantly - 'A nice business -you  get
an  animal,  slice his  head open  and  now you're sick of  him.  Perhaps  I
wouldn't have given permission for  the operation. Nor would . . . (the  man
stared up at the ceiling as though trying  to remember a phrase he  had been
taught) . . . nor would my relatives. I bet I could sue you if I wanted to.'
     Philip Philipovich's eyes grew quite round and  his cigar  fell out  of
his fingers. 'Well, I'll be . . .' he thought to himself.
     'So you  object to having  been turned into a human being,  do you?' he
asked,  frowning  slightly. 'Perhaps  you'd  prefer to  be  sniffing  around
dustbins again? Or freezing in doorways? Well, if  I'd known that I wouldn't
. . .'
     'So  what if I had to eat out  of  dustbins? At least it  was an honest
living.  And supposing I'd died on your operating  table? What d'you  say to
that, comrade?'
     'My name  is Philip  Philipovich!' exclaimed  the  professor irritably.
'I'm not your comrade!  This is monstrous!' ('I can't stand it much longer,'
he thought to himself.)
     'Oh,  yes!' said the man  sarcastically,  triumphantly  uncrossing  his
legs. 'I know! Of course we're not comrades! How could we be? I didn't go to
college,  I don't  own a  flat  with  fifteen rooms and a bathroom. Only all
that's changed now - now everybody has the right to . . .'
     Growing  rapidly  paler,  Philip  Philipovich  listened  to  the  man's
argument. Then the creature stopped and swaggered demonstratively over to an
ashtray with a chewed butt-end in his fingers. He spent a long time stubbing
it out, with a look on his face which clearly said:  'Drop dead!' Having put
out his cigarette he suddenly clicked his teeth and poked his nose under his
armpit.
     'You're  supposed to  catch  fleas  with your  fingersV  shouted Philip
Philipovich in fury. 'Anyhow, how is it that you still have any fleas?'
     'You  don't  think I breed  them  on purpose,  do  you?' said the  man,
offended. 'I suppose fleas just like me, that's all.' With this he poked his
fingers through the lining of his jacket,  scratched  around  and produced a
tuft of downy red hair.
     Philip Philipovich  turned his gaze upwards  to  the plaster rosette on
the ceiling and started drumming his fingers  on the desk. Having caught his
flea, the man sat down in a chair, sticking  his thumbs behind the lapels of
his  jacket.  Squinting  down at the parquet, he  inspected his boots, which
gave  him  great  pleasure.  Philip  Philipovich  also looked  down  at  the
highlights glinting on the man's blunt-toed boots, frowned and enquired:
     'What else were you going to say?'
     'Oh, nothing, really. I need some papers, Philip Philipovich.'
     Philip Philipovich  winced. 'H'm  . .  . papers, eh? Really, well . . .
H'm . . . Perhaps we might . . .' His voice sounded vague and unhappy.
     'Now, look,' said the man firmly. 'I can't manage without papers. After
all you know  damn well that people who don't have any papers aren't allowed
to exist nowadays. To begin with, there's the house committee.'
     'What does the house committee have to do with it?'
     'A lot. Every time I meet one of them they ask me when I'm going to get
registered.'
     'Oh, God,'  moaned Philip  Philipovich. '  "Every time you meet  one of
them ..." I can just imagine what you tell them. I thought I told you not to
hang about the staircases, anyway.'
     'What  am I -  a  convict?'  said  the  man in amazement. His  glow  of
righteous indignation made even his fake ruby tiepin light up.  "Hang about"
indeed! That's an insult. I walk about just like everybody else.'
     So saying he wriggled his patent-leather feet.
     Philip  Philipovich said nothing, but  looked  away. 'One must restrain
oneself,' he  thought,  as  he  walked over  to  the sideboard  and  drank a
glassful of water at one gulp.
     'I  see,'  he said rather  more  calmly. 'All right, I'll overlook your
tone  of voice  for the moment. What does your precious house committee say,
then?'
     'Hell, I don't know exactly. Anyway, you needn't be sarcastic about the
house committee. It protects people's interests.'
     'Whose interest, may I ask?'
     'The workers', of course.'
     Philip  Philipovich  opened his eyes  wide.  'What makes you think that
you're a worker?'
     'I must be - I'm not a capitalist.'
     'Very well. How does the  house committee propose to  stand up for your
revolutionary rights?'
     'Easy. Put me on  the register. They say they've never heard of anybody
being allowed  to live  in  Moscow without  being registered.  That's  for a
start. But the most important thing  is an identity card. I don't want to be
arrested for being a deserter.'
     'And  where, pray, am I supposed to register you? On that tablecloth or
on my own passport? One must, after all, be realistic. Don't forget that you
are  . . .  h'm, well. . . you are  what you might call  a ... an  unnatural
phenomenon, an artefact . .  .' Philip  Philipovich  sounded less  and  less
convincing.
     Triumphant, the man said nothing.
     'Very well. Let's assume that in the end we shall have to register you,
if only to  please this house committee of yours. The  trouble is - you have
no name.'
     'So  what?  I can easily  choose one. Just put it in the newspapers and
there you are.'
     'What do you propose to call yourself?'
     The man straightened his tie and replied: Toligraph Poligraphovich.'
     'Stop  playing  the  fool,'  groaned Philip Philipovich.  'I  meant  it
seriously.'
     The man's face twitched sarcastically.
     'I  don't  get it,'  he  said ingenuously. 'I  mustn't swear. I mustn't
spit. Yet  all you ever do is call me names. I suppose  only professors  are
allowed to swear in the RSFSR.'
     Blood rushed to Philip Philipovich's face.  He filled a glass, breaking
it  as he did so. Having drunk from  another  one, he thought: 'Much more of
this, and he'll start teaching me how to behave,  and he'll be right. I must
control myself.'
     He turned round, made an exaggeratedly polite  bow  and said with  iron
self-control: 'I  beg your pardon. My nerves are  slightly  upset. Your name
struck me as a  little odd, that is all. Where, as a matter of interest, did
you dig it up?'
     'The house committee helped me.  We looked in the calendar. And I chose
a name.'
     'That name cannot possibly exist on any calendar.'
     'Can't  it?'  The  man grinned.  'Then  how was  it I found  it  on the
calendar in your consulting-room?'
     Without getting  up Philip  Philipovich leaned over to the knob  on the
wall and Zina appeared in answer to the bell.
     'Bring me the calendar from the consulting-room.'
     There  was  a  pause.  When Zina  returned  with  the  calendar, Philip
Philipovich asked: 'Where is it?'
     'The name-day is March 4th.'
     'Show me . .  .  h'm  . . . dammit, throw the  thing into the stove  at
once.'  Zina, blinking with fright, removed the calendar. The man  shook his
head reprovingly.
     'And what su