Chapter 1 In which Mrs Milica gains ingress to the Colonel's house ...

you got milk for the children?” I was up to my neck now! How the hell could I tell him
that you had to get up at three o’clock in the morning for a bottle of milk? That you had
to queue up for so long that you used to start growing mould? “I regretfully have to
announce that I don’t have any children, comrade General Secretary of the Commun…”
“Whoa there! That’s no good, Moldavian, not to have any children. What kind of lathe
operator are you if you don’t have any children? Aren’t you even a little bit ashamed?
Didn’t I say at I don’t what plenary meeting that you all have to make children, so that
at least then you’d be doing something?” “Forgive me, comrade Secretary General…”
“Go home and make children, otherwise I’ll take the Dacia back. As easily as I gave it
to you, just as easily I’ll take it back. You don’t mess with me,” says he. I bowed my
head like a naughty schoolboy. What the hell could I say? “Or maybe you’ve got a
problem with your little piston?” At first, I didn’t even know what he was talking
about, but I got the gist quickly enough. “No, comrade Secretary General…” “Look, if
you have any problems with your little piston, just you tell me! I’ll take you to a doctor,
he’s a Thai, he boils all kinds of herbs from over there and makes you drink this potion,
it has a horrible taste, a bit like whiskey, but after that you’ll swear that you’re a
jackhammer, nothing short! You’ll break concrete!” “No, not me… Comrade Secretary
General…” “Look, don’t be ashamed! You come, you tell me, and it’ll get sorted.
What the hell! You’ve got to put your back into the demographic problem.” That’s
what he said, I swear. I liked The-Bullet-Riddled-One for that bit, a real committee lad.
Lena was horrid though, I’m telling you. She didn’t even enter the room the whole time
I was there, and he had guests as well, didn’t he? But as for the demographic question,
that really was no joke. You should have seen how it got his hackles up… He said
something else about the national interest and the patriotic duty of both sexes, but I
can’t remember what, because I’ve never been good at history. But let me tell you what
happened to a friend of mine because of the demographic problem, so that you’ll see it’s
no joking matter. His wife goes into town one day in a great hurry, because she’s heard
that they’ve got toilet paper somewhere or other. They lived in a village nearby. Right
enough, they had toilet paper, but only twelve rolls per person, and there was a queue
long enough to make you want to go hang yourself. His poor wife queues for some four
hours and gets her ration of arse-paper. But when she gets home, surprise-surprise, in
the thick ply, which was rough enough to make you bleed when you wiped, she finds all
these little fragments of Holy Scripture: “Romans 13”, “ly Ghost”, “tthew” and so on.
The eyes of the whole family were bulging out as big as onions. After that, they found