“Forgive me for saying that, but I had to say it. I want to always tell the truth and only the truth, like you.”

“You want to be a maximalist with whom it is hard to be friends?” Iskra forced a smile.

“I don’t want you to leave while upset…” The front door slammed, and Vika exclaimed, “And here’s dad! And you’re not going anywhere, because we’re going to drink tea.”

Again there were sweets and cakes which were so strange to eat not for a holiday. Again Leonid Sergeevich joked and looked after Iskra, but he was pensive, pensively joked and pensively looked after Iskra. And sometimes, he fell silent for long moments, as if he was switching to some alternate inner channel.

“Iskra and I argued a little about happiness,” Vika said. “But we couldn’t figure out who’s right.”

“Happiness is having a friend who will not disavow you when the going gets hard.” Leonid Sergeevich said this almost to himself, as if he was still tuned to that inner channel. “And who is right and who is wrong…” He suddenly came alive. “What do you think, girls, what is the highest triumph of justice?"

“The full triumph of justice is our Soviet Union,” Iskra replied instantly.

She often used well-known phrases, but coming from her, they never sounded worn out. Iskra filtered them through herself, she believed in them passionately, and so even her most cliche phrasing sounded sincere. So no one sitting at the table so much as smiled.

“That is perhaps more of a triumph of a social order,” Leonid Sergeevich said. “I was speaking of the presumption of innocence. The axiom that a person does not need to give proof that he is not a criminal. That, on the contrary, the justice system is obligated to prove to society that a given person committed a crime.”

“Even if he admits to it?” asked Vika.

“Even when he swears it. A person is a very complicated kind of creature, and on occasion is prepared to take on someone else’s guilt with all sincerity. Through a weakness of character or, on the contrary, through its strength, due to a coincidence or circumstance, out of a desire to lighten the punishment by confessing, or even wanting to distract the court from a more serious crime. Although, excuse me, girls, it looks like I got carried away. I need to go.”

“You’ll be back late?” asked Vika, as usual.

“You will already be dreaming.” Leonid Sergeevich got up, neatly pushed his chair in, bowed to Iskra, winked mischievously at his daughter, and left.

On her way home, Iskra thought carefully about both the conversation about bourgeois mentalities and, especially, the one about the presumption of innocence. She really liked the name “presumption of innocence” itself, and she agreed with Leonid Sergeevich that this was the foundation of justly dealing with a person. And she was sorry, too, that she had not reminded Vika of this mysterious writer with the foreign surname Grin.

The heart-to-heart conversation she had expected and so needed had not happened: Vika’s confession that she did not love her not only upset Iskorka, but also galled her. And this was not simply a matter of pride (though it was that too), it was also because Iskra herself was drawn to Vika, sensing in her an intelligent, discerning young woman. She was drawn to the coziness of the large apartment, to the comfortable way their daily life was arranged, though if she was told this, she would furiously deny this weakness to the point of angry tears. But most of all, she was drawn to VIka’s father, to Leonid Sergeevich Lyuberetskiy, because Iskra herself had no father, and in her eyes, Lyuberetskiy was the most perfect of all possible fathers, albeit one that needed to be taught better a little. And Iskra would absolutely have taught him better, if only… But there could be no “if only” in reality, and Iskra did not engage in empty dreaming. So she was a little sad.

At home, Iskra was greeted by a cup of milk, a piece of bread, and a note. Her mom wrote that she would be conducting an important meeting, would be home late, and that her daughter should go to bed on time and not read novels in bed; the word “novels” was underlined. Iskra shared her dinner with the neighbor’s cat, checked that all her homework was done, and suddenly decided to write an article for the next issue of the school newspaper.

She wrote about trust for a person, even for a very small one, even for a first grader. About faith in this person, about the way that this faith grants wings, what miracles can be accomplished by a person who has faith that he is trusted. She remembered – very opportunely, she thought – Makarenko entrusting money to Karabanov, and what a wonderful guy Karabanov became after that. She explained the “presumption of innocence” and what it means. After reading it over and making some corrections, she made a clean draft and put it on her mom’s desk: she always ran her articles past her mom. Then she made her bed, turned off the lights – for some reason, she had recently become shy of changing with the lights on – put her nightgown on, turned the light back on and slipped under the covers. She took out a Dos Passos book she had hidden away, and began to read, listening alertly for the clatter of the front door.

Maybe because she had to listen for the door, maybe because the thoughts of guilt and innocence, of trust and distrust would not leave her head, maybe because her body, freed of her belt and bra, lived its own loose and relaxed life, maybe because of all those things at once, she did not manage to read for long. Carefully re-hiding the book, she lay down on her side, tucking her hand under her cheek, and immediately fell asleep.

It seemed to her that she was awoken instantly the moment she had begun to sleep. She opened her eyes: her mom was standing over her.

“Put on your housedress and come out to me.”

Iskra came out, yawning, warm and pink from sleep.

“What is this?”

“This? It’s an article for the newspaper.”

“Who told you to write it?”

“No one.”

“Iskra, do not lie, I am tired,” quietly said her mother, though she knew perfectly well that Iskra never lied, even to save herself from the soldier’s belt.