{"id":607,"date":"2008-06-20T10:50:33","date_gmt":"2008-06-20T17:50:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/index.php\/2008\/06\/natasha-by-vladimir-nabokov-from-the-new-yorker\/"},"modified":"2008-06-20T11:38:09","modified_gmt":"2008-06-20T18:38:09","slug":"natasha-by-vladimir-nabokov-from-the-new-yorker","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/2008\/06\/20\/natasha-by-vladimir-nabokov-from-the-new-yorker\/","title":{"rendered":"NATASHA by Vladimir Nabokov (Fiction from The New Yorker)"},"content":{"rendered":"

from The New Yorker<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

<\/a><\/span>
\nNATASHA\u00a0by\u00a0<\/span>Vladimir Nabokov<\/a><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

In the stairs Natasha ran into her neighbor from across the hall, Baron Wolfe. He was somewhat laboriously ascending the bare wooden steps, caressing the bannister with his hand and whistling softly through his teeth.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhere are you off to in such a hurry, Natasha?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cTo the drugstore to get a prescription filled. The doctor was just here. Father is better.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cAh, that\u2019s good news.\u201d<\/p>\n

She flitted past in her rustling raincoat, hatless.<\/p>\n

Leaning over the bannister, Wolfe glanced back at her. For an instant he caught sight from overhead of the sleek, girlish part in her hair. Still whistling, he climbed to the top floor, threw his rain-soaked briefcase on the bed, then thoroughly and satisfyingly washed and dried his hands.<\/p>\n

<\/a>Then he knocked on old Khrenov\u2019s door.<\/p>\n

Khrenov lived in the room across the hall with his daughter, who slept on a couch, a couch with amazing springs that rolled and swelled like metal tussocks through the flabby plush. There was also a table, unpainted and covered with ink-spotted newspapers. Sick Khrenov, a shrivelled old man in a nightshirt that reached to his heels, creakily darted back into bed and pulled up the sheet just as Wolfe\u2019s large shaved head poked through the door.<\/p>\n

\u201cCome in, glad to see you, come on in.\u201d<\/p>\n

The old man was breathing with difficulty, and the door of his night table remained half open.<\/p>\n

\u201cI hear you\u2019ve almost totally recovered, Alexey Ivanych,\u201d Baron Wolfe said, seating himself by the bed and slapping his knees.<\/p>\n

Khrenov offered his yellow, sticky hand and shook his head.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t know what you\u2019ve been hearing, but I do know perfectly well that I\u2019ll die tomorrow.\u201d<\/p>\n

He made a popping sound with his lips.<\/p>\n

\u201cNonsense,\u201d Wolfe merrily interrupted, and extracted from his hip pocket an enormous silver cigar case. \u201cMind if I smoke?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

[ click to continue reading story at newyorker.com<\/a> ]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

from The New Yorker NATASHA\u00a0by\u00a0Vladimir Nabokov \u00a0 In the stairs Natasha ran into her neighbor from across the hall, Baron Wolfe. He was somewhat laboriously ascending the bare wooden steps, caressing the bannister with his hand and whistling softly through his teeth. \u201cWhere are you off to in such a hurry, Natasha?\u201d \u201cTo the drugstore […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":26,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-607","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-literary-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/607","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/26"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=607"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/607\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=607"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=607"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bigjimindustries.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=607"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}