1908, LVIV, LYCHAKIV STREET When it began to grow dark, he could hold back no longer, and asked the guest to leave. Actually, he wasn’t quite a guest. For the young man with long blond hair and darting eyes, who had simply become ensconced in the neighboring room, had not arrived on a business or private visit. He wasn’t personally acquainted with the snub-nosed fellow. They had never met before. The owner of the apartment had nothing against the fellow personally: anyone else might have been sitting there in place of this Russian lad. Someone who was black-haired, blond, red-haired, or even bald. It didn’t upset him that the snub-nosed fellow was smoking cheap rollyour-owns, rather than fairly decent factory-made cigarettes produced in Vynnyky1. The tobacco industry in the provinces had lately come a long way, the newspapers were even heralding that they were planning to produce their own cigars soon. No worse than those from Cuba, but much cheaper. Although, the urban aristocracy would still rather pay more for the original, rather than for a locally produced product equal in quality... To hell with them, those cigarettes: people like this young man in the adjoining room were far from being snobbish. They were quite indifferent to what the market had to offer and its quality. Having grown used to smoking cheap tobacco, they would continue to do so until the day they died. Even if the world went topsy-turvy. And by the way, it was coming to that. At the turn of this new twentieth century everything everywhere seemed suddenly to have gone mad, rushing forward, as if trying at all costs to win 1 Vynnyky – referring to the state-owned Vynnyky Tobacco Factory, founded in the late 19th century in the town of Vynnyky, now a suburb of Lviv. The factory became the main industrial enterprise in the city, providing jobs and contributing to the development of Vynnyky.
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A N DR I Y KOKOT I U K HA
