‘No, sir, I cannot ... I’ve forgotten.’
All my methods, my devices and comparisons were being shattered by this monstrous lack of understanding. But Yarmola’s longing for knowledge did not weaken at all.
‘If I could only write my name!’ Yarmola begged me bashfully. ‘I don’t want anything else. Only my name: Yarmola Popruzhuk—that’s all.’
When I finally abandoned the idea of teaching him to read and write properly, I began to show him how to sign his name mechanically. To my amazement this method seemed to be the easiest for Yarmola, and at the end of two months he had very nearly mastered his name. As for his Christian name we had decided to make the task easier by leaving it out altogether.
Every evening, after he had finished filling the stoves, Yarmola waited on patiently until I called him.
‘Well, Yarmola, let’s have a go at it,’ I would say. He would sidle up to the table, lean on it with his elbows, thrust his pen through his black, shrivelled, stiff fingers, and ask me, raising his eyebrows:
‘Shall I write?’
‘Yes, write.’
Yarmola drew the first letter quite confidently—P[2]. (This letter was called ‘a couple of posts and a crossbeam on top.’) Then he looked at me questioningly.
[2] The Russian P is shaped П, as in Greek.