In the putty

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In the morning, a message was transmitted on the radio about the disease of President Gorbachev and the introduction of a state of emergency in the country. I went to Manezhnaya Square - the place where all the rallies then gathered. The space between the Moscow Hotel and the Manege building was filled with people. Many applied transistor receivers to the ears, afraid to skip important news. On the parapet of the underpass, risking to fall down, there were guys with homemade posters "Yeltsin calls for a way." Someone offered to cordon the Kremlin around the entire perimeter and not to release anyone out. Someone wrote on the asphalt: "Putcheists on trial."

On Mokhovaya Street, clanging with caterpillars and the smell of gasoline, a column of tanks and infantry fighting vehicles moved. Women fled for equipment, put ice cream, sandwiches, and leaflets of democratic forces in the hands of drivers. The soldiers in helmets with headphones sat on the armor and smiled bewildered. All this resembled festivities on the occasion of the military parade: the sun was shining, the gathered carried flags, flowers and ligaments of balloons, some held children and dogs.

At some point, the crowd began to chant: "All to protect the White House!" The column rushed towards the library. Lenin, then turned onto the Vozdvizhenka. Separate groups and companies poured into the stream from the gateway and lanes, like streams into the river. Folk aphorisms began to appear on the fences and walls of the houses along the new Arbat: “I scored a charge in a carcass of a pugo” and “a nightmare on Yazov Street”. In the area of ​​the Oktyabr cinema and the Cafe "Metelitsa" among the people of the people, it was no longer possible to push through, and people all arrived and arrived.

At the White House, Afghan veterans and Chopov employees formed a militia, breaking the system of volunteers into dozens. In the external ring of numbers stood harsh men in camouflage with machine guns, in the inner - unarmed Muscovites in Stroy detachment jackets and hiking windbreakers. Many people had moistened handkerchiefs on their faces - according to the former military, this helps in the case of a gas attack. A barge with sand, closing the passage to the ships and boats, stood across the Moscow River. Around the building of the Supreme Council from everything that was at hand - garbage tanks, logs, pieces of reinforcement, cobblestones, tires - barricades were erected.

According to him, planes with the Pskov paratroopers have already landed in Kubinka and the whole division of the Airborne Forces will disperse us. The only hope, he said, to the cavalrymen jumping to the help of the stables of the Bittsev hippodrome.

Among the defenders of the White House, I met a former classmate. He heard Boris Yeltsin’s performance from the Taman Division Tank corps and was confident in victory. Passing by the Cossack expressed doubt. According to him, planes with the Pskov paratroopers have already landed in Kubinka and the whole division of the Airborne Forces will disperse us. The only hope, he said, to the cavalrymen jumping to the help of the stables of the Bittsev hippodrome. A lady in a hat with a flower-a teacher-musician from Gnesinka-expressed confidence that everything will be fine, because the backup government is already operating in a secret control point located deep underground in the vicinity of Sverdlovsk.

From the side of the garden ring, automatic shooting was heard. A stream of tracing bullets flashed over their heads. There was a rumor that snipers had settled on the roofs, but no one knew which side they were on. A premonition of trouble hung in the air. An order was handed over to the loudspeaker to prepare for the battle. Citizens were asked to move away from the building - in case broken glass flew above. People took hands and closed a living chain, waiting for anything-a plaque of aviation, a tank attack, the attacks of special forces with “democratizers” batons. But time passed, and the Gacachepists all pulled the assault. It began to get dark. It charged small and tedious rain. Around the White House, bonfires were burning. The militias sat at the fire, listened to Okudzhava, Galich, Vizbor performed by lovers of the author’s song. To warm up from the inside, I went to Krasnaya Presnya for “yogurt for adults” - a plastic glass of vodka. A bright army missile hung above the zoo. Behind the fence screamed and howled animals who mixed up day and night.

The next two days turned into a cut from vivid impressions. Black vehicles on the garden ring in a garden ring. In the tunnel, a rumpled trolleybus with broken glasses is chaded. Boris Yeltsin appears in front of a huge crowd on the balcony of the White House, and on the sidelines, Yevgeny Yevtushenko composes poetry in honor of the victory over the putty. Before my eyes, Yuri Luzhkov reads a decree on the suspension of the Communist Party and seals the building of the CPSU Central Committee on Old Square. Vice-mayor broadcasts in a megaphone, as round as his bald head, losing his hand triumphantly with a clenched fist.

On Lubyanskaya Square, some desperate guy climbs onto the monument to Dzerzhinsky and throws a rope around the Chekist's neck. Several dozen people, clutching the ends, are trying to throw off a heavy monument. Iron Felix clings with the soles of the boots to the pedestal of the last strength. I don't want him to fall. I'm afraid that a sculpture weighing 11 tons will break the asphalt and crush the Lubyanka metro lobby of the metro station. By evening, a technique appears in the square. The monument is lifted by a tap, gently put on the ground, then tidied with slings, loaded into the body and taken away somewhere.

Then a monument to Sverdlov was dismantled. On the empty pedestal they wrote the word “executioner” and pasted a poster with Lenin, whose mouth was painted with red paint, like blood. The people with hammer and teeth chopped off pieces of memory from a granite block. The speakers took upstairs, each made a speech and gave way to the next. I remember the performance of an elderly person in boots and in a cap, with a large cruttle under his arm. Exactly the same character, a cold and smelled of Mahorka, could speak at revolutionary rallies in Petrograd 1917. The man spoke of sole power, freedom of speech, the dominance of state officials, the need to comply with laws and live in peace with the fraternal republics. Each time, reviewing photos taken during the coup, I think that all these topics are relevant today as well as a quarter of a century ago.