A Hero's Daughter Part 6

One of the fellows, rolling his chewing gum around in his mouth took a step toward Ivan.

"Are you looking for a pair of crutches, too, Grandpa?"

And he gave Ivan a careless shove with his shoulder.

"That's enough. Leave it, Valera!" the other one intervened. "Let them go to h.e.l.l, them and their Victory! Look, that one's a Hero of the Soviet Union. Let's go. Here come the cops."

And then they swaggered off toward the subway.

Ivan held out his hand to the man on crutches. Shaking his hand in return, the latter, half embarra.s.sed and half mischievously, said: "Well, I recognized you right away, just now in the line, but I didn't make myself known to you. My, my. You've gone up in the world with your necktie and your Star... You must be a colonel at least, Vanya..."

"You're joking! I'm a general, old friend! Now... I remember your surname well enough. But I've forgotten your first name. Sasha? Yes, of course. Alexander Semyonov. It comes back to me now. As if I could forget those great big ears of yours. Do you remember? We were always pulling your leg about them. We said you'd have to have a gas mask made to measure. And then the sergeant used to tease you: 'Could you just tune in with your radar, Sasha, and find out if the Fritzes are coming over on a bombing raid?' But what about your leg? Where did you lose it? If I remember correctly, it wasn't serious, just a scratch. Back in the ranks we even used to say you'd done it yourself."

"You've got no right to say that, Vanyusha. Look, what happened to me I wouldn't wish on my worst enemy. I'll tell you about it, but come to my place. We'll have a chat over a gla.s.s or two. I can't stay here long, all the militia know me. They keep moving me on, as if I had the plague! Don't worry, you'll have time to get back to your Ya.s.senievo. Come on. It's my treat. I live in a kommunalka just around the corner."

In the little room there was a touching sense of order.

"Look, Vanyush, they'd hardly finished butchering me when my wife left me. The way it happened... you see... was it all started with one toe. It was smashed up by a bit of shrapnel. They applied a tourniquet, but good G.o.d, it was so cold do you remember? minus forty, and the leg froze. Then gangrene set in. They amputated my foot... They look again and it's already gone black farther up. Then they cut it below the knee and it's started to rot above the knee. They cut it still higher, just leaving a stump they can fix an artificial leg to. It didn't work. So then they took it back just below the stomach... But what's the good of dredging all that up? Come on, Vanya, let's drink to the Victory!"

"Well, what do you know! The guys used to tell ah kinds of stories about you... You see, there we were in the trench frozen to the bone. Your name would come up and we'd say things like: 'Just think, that b.a.s.t.a.r.d Semyonov... his toe was b.u.g.g.e.red up and now he's snug in bed with his wife under a warm quilt...' So that was the truth of it..."

'Yes, Vanyush. Believe me, I'd rather have had five years in the trenches than this. And I'd have been happy to spend all my life single. From the age of twenty... And now that's it. It's all over. You know, at the hospital they were bringing us in by the wagonload, in whole trainloads. They had just enough time to disembark us. And of course they were hacking us about in double-quick time. Do you know, they severed all the nerves at the base of my stomach? It was just as if they'd castrated me. What woman would have wanted me after that?"

Semyonov switched on the television.

"Oh, look. Misha Gorbachev's on again. I like him a lot, that joker. He's a smooth talker and it's all off the cuff. Now Brezhnev, toward the end, was almost tongue-tied; you couldn't help feeling sorry for the guy. Even though, when all's said and done, he was an absolute son of a b.i.t.c.h. When you think, he made himself a Hero of the Soviet Union three times over! All those medals he stuck on himself. While all I've got is one medal for the defense of Moscow plus all that anniversary ironware. And my pension's eighty rubles...!

"So how on earth do you survive?" asked Ivan in amazement.

"I survive because I've got the knack for it. I've a strong enough grip to make me the envy of anyone at all. It just happened to be today that I got myself stuck with those twp idiots. Normally it goes like clockwork. If you're a veteran, especially one on crutches, they give you tickets without your having to stand in line. You've hardly walked away from the box office and people come running after you. 'Sell us your tickets.' They'll take them off you at any price you like. And I owe something else to Gorbachev. He pa.s.sed the dry law, but how can people do without vodka? After seven in the evening people will part with twenty-five rubles for a ten-ruble bottle without batting an eye. Most of the hotel doormen know me: I do a good trade with them. Take a look at my stock, Vanya."

Semyonov bent over on his chair and dragged a great dusty suitcase out from under the bed. Inside it, tightly packed together, were rows of bottles of all shapes and sizes, with labels of many colors.

"So you see, Vanyush, there's no need to hold back. Don't be shy. I've enough here for a whole regiment!"

But Ivan was no longer drinking. He already felt a pleasant and joyful numbness: already all the objects in this modest room radiated a warm well-being. He became voluble, talked about Stalingrad, the hospital, Tatyana. Semyonov was an excellent listener, did not interrupt him, made comments at the right moment and at the right moment expressed astonishment. In his bitter and turbulent life he had contrived to learn how to listen to people attentively. Everyone can tell stories but listening intelligently and without upstaging the speaker... now that is an art in itself!

Finally and without managing to conceal his delight, Ivan remarked: "And as for me, Sasha, I'm not here in Moscow for the celebrations. I'm here to marry off my daughter. Yes, old friend, just that. 'Come to Moscow, Dad. My fiance's parents want to meet you.' When you have to, you have to. 'And their family,' she says, 'is really top drawer: some in the diplomatic corps, others in ministries.' She's fixed me up very well, you see. I arrived here in an ancient suit I bought long ago in the days of old rubles."

"And your daughter, Vanyush, where does she work?" asked Semyonov, neatly opening a can of sardines.

Unable to conceal his pride but with offhand joviality, Ivan replied: "Well, you know, my daughter's a real highflier, Sasha. You could say she's in the diplomatic world, too. It's such a shame her mother didn't live to see her married. It'd have been a real thrill for her. Where she works is the International Trade Center. You've heard of it?"

"Sure I know it! It's over by the Trekhgorka textile works near the river. Gray skysc.r.a.pers, just like America. You'd think you were in New York. So what does she do there?"

"How can I explain? Well, let's say an industrialist or a financier arrives, you see. He comes to sign a contract, to sell us some stuff; well, my daughter meets him, and translates everything our people say to him. In fact, she goes everywhere with him. And do you know how many foreign tongues she knows, Sasha?"

Ivan began to count them off but Semyonov was already listening somewhat absently, simply nodding his head from time to time and murmuring: "Mmm, mmm..."

"Of course, it's a tiring job, that goes without saying," continued Ivan. "Everything's planned to the last minute: conversations, negotiations. And what's more, night duty sometimes. But on the other hand, as I'm always telling her, you're not forever being sprayed with sawdust and there's no stink of gas. And the pay's really good. I never earned that, not even when I was driving trucks long distance."

Semyonov was silent as he absently poked with his fork at a little gleaming fish on his plate. Then he glanced uneasily at Ivan and, as if he were talking to someone else, muttered: "You know, Vanya, it's a filthy business, if the truth be told."

Ivan was dumbfounded.

"Filthy? What do you mean by that?"

"By that I mean, Vanyush, that... but don't be angry... I have to tell you... it's not their tongues those interpreters use for their work there. They use something else. That's why they're well paid."

"Hey, Sasha! You shouldn't have drunk wine after vodka. Mixing the two's confused your brain. You're talking nonsense. It's laughable listening to you."

"Don't listen if you don't want to. But the fact is I'm telling you the truth. And what's more, I'm not drunk at all. Down there, buried in your countryside, you know nothing. But I traipse all over Moscow with my crutches, through all the entrance gates; so they can't fool me. 'Night duty.' Are you kidding? Those businessmen have their way with the interpreters. They're there to service them!"

"That's filthy gossip! So you are saying they're all prost.i.tutes?"

"You can call it what you like. There are prost.i.tutes in business on their own account. The militia hounds them from pillar to post. And then there are the others, the official ones, if you like. They're real interpreters, with diplomas, work permits, salary, the lot. By day they interpret and by night they service the capitalists in return for dollars."

Semyonov was growing heated, he had a tousled and angry air. "He's not drunk," thought Ivan, "and suppose what he says were true...?"

With a forced laugh he said: "But Sasha, why the devil would the State go in for this nasty business?"

They began arguing again. With the feeling that something inside him was dying, Ivan realized that Semyonov was speaking the truth. And in his fear of believing him he jumped up, knocking over his gla.s.s, and with a hoa.r.s.e shout grabbed hold of the man. He let go at once, so pitiful and light did his crippled body feel. Semyonov began yelling: "You idiot, don't you understand? I'm trying to open your eyes. You strut about like a peac.o.c.k with your shining Star. You don't understand that we've been had. We'll go together tomorrow. I'll shpw you this 'night duty.' I know one of the guys in the cloakroom at the Intourist Hotel. He'll let us in... Yes, I promise you, they'll let us in, you'll see. I'll go without crutches, I'll take a stick. Here, take a look at this artificial leg I have..."

Semyonov scrambled off the chair onto the floor, rummaged under the bed and pulled out a metal leg with a huge black leather shoe. It seemed to Ivan as if he were living through a horrible and absurd dream. Semyonov let himself fall back on the bed and began to fit on his false leg, calling out: "I'm only a half-portion. What G.o.dd.a.m.ned good am I to anyone? They gave me the false leg for free. If you wear it for a day your stomach bleeds all week. But for you, Vanya, I'll put it on. Tomorrow you'll see, I'll show you what your Star's worth...Under a warm quilt with my wife, you said... Ha! Ha! Ha!"

The cloakroom attendant let them settle down in a dark corner, hidden behind the dusty fronds of a palm tree growing in a big wooden plant holder. From there could be seen the elevators, a small part of the restaurant, and, through the dark French doors, the rear courtyard filled with trash cans from the kitchen. Also visible were the two panels of the sliding doors to the inner entrance hall that opened automatically. That evening, possibly because of the wet snow, these doors were not working properly. They kept opening and closing all the time, with a mindless mechanical obedience, even when no one came near them.

Ivan was sitting beside Semyonov behind the palm tree, on the polished wooden planks that concealed the radiators. Semyonov was leaning sideways with his rigid leg stretched out. From time to time he gave explanations to Ivan in a low voice: "There, you see, in the bas.e.m.e.nt behind the cloakroom, they have a valyutka, a currency bar. It's reserved for capitalists. And the girls, of course. You see that couple there walking toward the elevator? And there, look at that tight-fitting dress. She's going to go with him. Ten minutes' work and she'll pocket what you used to earn in a month driving trucks."

Ivan saw people coming and going who were unusual not only in their language and clothes but even in the way they moved.

Silently the elevator doors opened and closed. A very young girl ran up to the cloakroom, meowing like a cat: "You wouldn't have a packet of Marlboros, would you?"

"He trades, that one. He's no fool," Semyonov explained to Ivan. "She doesn't want to spend her currency, and maybe she hasn't earned it yet. She's very young..."

A large, dazzling woman sailed past, her bosom opulent beneath a fine knit dress. She walked on heels so high and pointed that her calves looked as if they were tensed with cramp. A young man in an elegant suit, a newspaper in his hand, stopped near the cloakroom desk. He exchanged a few offhand words with the attendant, glancing now at people emerging from the lifts, now at those entering the hotel. "A guy from the KGB," whispered Semyonov.

Ivan was wearied by the uninterrupted parade of faces and the mechanical creaking of the malfunctioning door. The blond woman in the tight dress emerged from the elevator and made for the cloakroom. "Job done," thought Ivan. The woman put on some lipstick in front of the mirror and headed for the exit. Absently he watched her go.

At that moment Ivan saw Olya.

She was walking beside a tall man, whose face Ivan did not have time to notice, such was the fascination with which he was staring at his daughter. Olya was talking to her companion, relaxed and natural. Semyonov nudged Ivan with his elbow and murmured something to him. Ivan heard nothing. He felt a horrible tensing inside himself and a salty taste tightening his jaws. He understood he ought to react, leap up, cry out, but he could not. When he began to hear again he caught a remark of Semyonov's: "They're talking German, Ivan, can you hear...?"

At the same moment the elevator doors began to slide shut behind Olya and her companion. Reflected in the mirror in the cabin, Ivan saw a man's face with short gray hair, neatly trimmed. The elevator doors closed smoothly.

Ivan tried to get up but was overcome with such a fit of trembling that his knees gave way. And once more he felt a salty lump in his throat. He had never before experienced such a painful, almost physical pang. He did not realize that what he was suffering from at this moment was a kind of jealousy.

Semyonov tugged at his sleeve, exclaiming in a muted voice: "Vanya, Vanya, what is it? What's the matter with you? You've gone as white as a sheet..."

Stunned, Ivan gazed at him without seeing him and, unable to control a quivering at the corner of his mouth, breathed softly: "That's my daughter."

4.

"He's called Wilfried Almendinner... No, not 'Almendinner,' what am I saying? Almendinger... There's a surname for you! A real tongue twister! We're going to take a great interest in him. Svetlana was supposed tq be looking after him. But she's on sick leave, you see. As to conversation, don't worry. To begin with, your German is perfectly adequate, and in any case he speaks Russian. He was here in the war. He was taken prisoner in the Ukraine and learned the language while they were rebuilding Leningrad. I'm telling you this, Olya, to give you a certain amount of background, so you can prepare yourself a little psychologically But when you're talking to him, of course, you're not supposed to know this. In any case you know your business and you don't need me to remind you of it."

Vitaly Ivanovich took a cigarette from the pack and lit it. He had a weary and disappointed air. Ever since the winter he had been looking forward to the blissful torpor that awaited him on the beach at the KGB's vacation home beside the Black Sea. And suddenly everything was turned upside down, the spring and summer vacations had been put back to the fall and the order had been given to prepare for the International Festival of Youth and Students.

"They're all going to be gathering here, the whole pro-Communist rabble," Vitaly Ivanovich swore internally. "And because of them, I'll have no vacation. What bizarre routines we're falling into. Almost every year there's something: one year it's the Olympic Games, then it's conferences, now this festival... They come here to make love. It's 'Workers of the world, copulate!' This festival's a farce! If only I could take my leave in September, at least I could go mushroom picking. But no! I'll get it around the new year..."

Vitaly Ivanovich pulled a face, stubbed out his cigarette in the ashtray, and went on with a sad smile: "That's right, Olya, we're going to take a great interest in him. He comes here as the representative of a firm of chemical products, but he has links with the secret services, we know that for certain. In fact, for a time he was an expert on military affairs, but that's just for your information. We think he's going to make a contact. So it's not impossible that someone may pa.s.s doc.u.ments to him. It would be very helpful for us to be able to examine his briefcase. Clearly that can only be done at night, you understand. Of course, customs will check him with a fine-tooth comb when he leaves. But before they get to customs they generally have time to encode it or learn it by heart or even entrust it to the diplomatic pouch. So you see your role is crucial, Olya. He arrives on May the third and leaves on the seventh. He'll be staying at the Intourist."

Olya pa.s.sed on the German's briefcase, a smart black attache case, for inspection the very first night. It was an object of quality and price, like all the things this man used.

Olya waited until he was breathing regularly and slipped out of bed. She knew he would sleep deeply for at least two or three hours. The sleeping draft was added to the c.o.c.ktail. At the table in the restaurant, as if she had just happened to think of it, Olya would exclaim: "Oh! I completely forgot! They do a c.o.c.ktail here you know, it's a rather... Russian-style combination absolutely delicious."

If for any reason the "subject" refused, the waiter would bring exceptionally salty caviar. In the bedroom, after the delights of love had made him breathless, the foreigner would take eager drafts of the cool wine thoughtfully poured out by his attentive companion.

Olya took a large black plastic envelope out of her bag, put the German's briefcase into it and closed the zipper. Then she placed the envelope close to the door, gently withdrew the key from the lock and went over to the telephone. She dialed twice and, without waiting for the customary "h.e.l.lo," murmured "Forty-six" and hung up. Two minutes later the lock clicked softly, the door opened slightly and a hand deftly seized the black envelope. To avoid falling asleep, Olya did not lie down she sat in an armchair.

Almendinger was lying on his back, stretched out fully, his great bony hands crossed on his chest. The neon light from the street silvered his face. It was a face that resembled a mournful plaster mask. And it now seemed impossible that the petrified folds of this mouth should, only a few minutes ago, have sought and touched her lips, those hands held her body.

During dinner at the restaurant he had talked a good deal, joking and correcting her mistakes. He bore himself with such worldly ease and there was such precision in all his words and gestures that Olya had no need to act. It felt as if he knew the scenario quite as well as her, that the allocation of roles suited him and in no way discomfited him. It even felt as if it was all so familiar to him that he was intent on making the most of this May evening, the presence of this young escort, as unexpected as she was inevitable, and of the chance, possibly for the last time in his life, to a.s.sume the rewarding role of social lion.

With smiling grace he talked about trips he had made, knowing that for his young companion the names of Venice or Naples had the same exotic ring as that of Eldorado. Generally in such recitals Olya used to detect a note of superiority, be it open or covert, on the part of those who lived on the other side of the Iron Curtain. Almendinger's stories were different. For example, in Italy he had for the first time in his life heard a cats' concert. A s.a.d.i.s.tic Neapolitan had gathered up a dozen cats, had arranged them according to their voices, putting them into tiny cages fitted inside a piano. He had inserted needles into the felt on the hammers so that every time the keys were struck they p.r.i.c.ked the cats' tails. The wretched animals each emitted a different sound and their wailing blended into a horrible and pitiful symphony. The s.a.d.i.s.tic pianist had almost been lynched by the members of the local branch of the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals.

After telling, this story Almendinger threw Olya a somewhat sheepish glance.

"I shouldn't be telling you about such horrible things. After all, we Germans have the reputation among you as a people somewhat lacking in humanity. Yes, that war... When I think that in '41 I could see the Kremlin towers through my binoculars! And now I can see them from my bedroom window. It truly is as the Bible says: 'Die Wege Gottes sind unergrundlich.' G.o.d's ways are unfathomable. Have you ever come across that expression?"

He fell silent, his gaze lost somewhere among the cups and plates. Remembering the part she had to play, Olya suggested with exaggerated animation: "Oh listen, Wilfried! I'd completely forgotten. They have an absolutely delicious c.o.c.ktail here..."

Never before had those words seemed so loathsome to her. It was just at the moment when they brought the c.o.c.ktail that he began to talk about the Germany of his childhood.

"You know children these days have a great many toys. But all these toys are too cold, too how can I put it? technological. When I was a child I had a collection of miniature lighthouses. The top of each one unscrewed and inside there was sand. Each contained a different kind of sand that came from a different beach in Europe..."

Almendinger lay there, his arms folded, his face motionless, now and then emitting a sigh, a brief moan. He knew he would have to remain lying there like that for an hour, or maybe two. He had heard Olya standing stock-still above him, listening to his breathing, then telephoning. He had also heard the door open and close again. He somewhat regretted having chosen to remain stretched out on his back. On his side, with his face hidden in the pillow, it would have been easier. On the other hand, by slightly opening his eyes he could observe what was happening in the room. But even this was of little interest to him. Within his attache case, a few pages of anodyne disinformation had been slipped with professional dexterity into the middle of a wad of scientific doc.u.ments. This should smooth the path for his successor as he made a start in Moscow. What Almendinger was preparing to take away with him boiled down to four columns of figures learned by heart.

While he was talking about his childhood collection of lighthouses and their sand, he had been slowly bending the straw in his c.o.c.ktail gla.s.s with his thumb. The gla.s.s stood behind the bottle of champagne and the carafe of water. Olya could not see it. He drew gently on the straw and slipped the end of it into an empty gla.s.s.

"And then," Almendinger went on, "my cloudless childhood came to an end, alas. I turned into a clumsy great oaf, a nasty little monster. One day I poured out all the sand into one small heap on the lawn. I mixed it ah up."

Olya, who was listening attentively and dreamily, asked in surprise in German: "Warum?"

Almendinger smiled. She suddenly seemed so young to him!

"Und warum sind die Bananen krumm?" he asked her, laughing. "Why are bananas bent?" After that he remarked: "This c.o.c.ktail is quite excellent. I must remember its name. What did you say? ' Moscow Bouquet'? Ah! A very good name for it..."

He put the straw to his lips. The last drops of delicate pink foam were disappearing from the bottom of the gla.s.s.

And now, lying there in the darkness of his bedroom, he reflected that everything in this world was strangely linked. That mixing of the sands had come back to him one night in a trench near Moscow. It was appallingly cold. The soldiers crowded round the stove. The red-hot metal burned their hands, while their backs grew hard and stiff like bark under the piercing snow squalls. Above their heads the icy stars twinkled. And close by, in similar trenches, crouched their enemies, the Russians. But these men, savages that they were, did not even have a stove.

"Tomorrow, or the day after tomorrow," he was thinking, "we'll be in Moscow. We'll have dealt with Russia. It'll be warm and clean. I'll get a medal..." A solitary flare went up, momentarily eclipsing the starry sky. Then their eyes had adjusted to the dark once more. And once more the stars began to shine and the deep black of the sky was restored. Trying to think of nothing, he reached out toward the stove, mentally repeating: "Tomorrow we'll be in Moscow. It'll be warm, and clean..." But the thought he was trying to keep at bay returned. It returned not in words but in a vivid, instinctive flash: this snow-filled ditch dug in the earth, floating away into the dark of the night, among the stars. And all of them in this ditch, who have already seen death, who have already killed. And over there in a similar ditch, covered in h.o.a.rfrost, those whom they will have to kill. And this stove into which all the heat in the universe is concentrated that night. And the grains of sand from all the sh.o.r.es of Europe mixed up together in a little grayish mound on the lawn in a German town that has recently come to know the whistle of falling bombs...

In the bedroom the silence of the night reigned. Only from time to time the hiss of a car disappearing up Gorky Street and apart from that, somewhere up on another floor, the short, sharp creak of a floorboard. From the Kremlin tower came the airborne melody of the chimes, then three solemn and measured strokes.

Olya was comfortable in her armchair. She observed the German as he slept and with difficulty restrained an incomprehensible impulse to approach the bed on tiptoe and run her hand lightly over that plaster mask and bring it back to life.

Almendinger was automatically counting the vibrant strokes from the chiming clock in the tower: "One, two, three. Three o'clock... They're spending a long time searching. They're testing it by radio, they're listening with a stethoscope. No, it's better not to think about it. Once you focus your mind on it for a minute you realize the totally phantasmagoric nature of everything around us. The night... and them. They've put their gloves on and now they're fingering, reading, taking photos. Red-eyed, yawning, their shirt sleeves rolled up. And I'm lying here stupidly motionless. I who, forty years ago, lay on the frozen earth, dreaming of warmth and rest in Moscow... And her. She's still so young; I have a daughter older than her. She sits there in her armchair, waiting for that idiotic briefcase. Absurd!"

Once more he remembered how, as a prisoner, he had been led through the streets of Moscow in that interminable column with other German prisoners. On both sides of the road, the people of Moscow stood on the sidewalk, staring at the gray tide of soldiers with somewhat wary curiosity. After them, following in their footsteps, came a slow-moving water cart, more or less symbolically washing the streets of the capital clean of the "Fascist plague." It suddenly seemed to Almendinger that he was starting to picture the faces of the Muscovites standing in the street, to hear s.n.a.t.c.hes of their conversation...

The door lock clicked softly He realized he had fallen asleep for a moment. Furtive footsteps glided over the carpet, the attache case returned to its place beside the desk. As he fell asleep Almendinger felt the coolness of a light palm upon his face. But he was already so engulfed in his sleep that all he could do was to turn his face with closed eyes toward this hand, and smile, already dreaming, and murmur a few words in German.

By noon it was very hot in the colorful streets, awash with people and sunlight. You could already smell the summer, the scent of hot dusty asphalt.

Ivan walked along slowly, dazed by the noise from the streets, the scorching sun, the red patches of the slogans, flags, and banners. The words of the pa.s.sersby the honking of the cars and, above all, the blinding glare of the sun caused him acute pain. It seemed to him that it would take only a word, or a little laugh, and his head would explode. He tried not to look at the bustling pedestrians. He had an impulse to stop and shout at them: "Shut up, won't you?" or to hit someone, so that for a moment, at least, the noise splitting his brain might cease.

In his suit and raincoat he was horribly hot. He felt his shirt and pants sticking to his skin and his throat smarted from a dry tickle. But he walked on like an automaton, without taking off his raincoat, in the hope that at the next turning a cool breeze would at last be blowing and these noisy outbursts of merriment would fade away.

The night came back to him in confused s.n.a.t.c.hes, with the hallucinatory insistence of that bare bulb at the ceiling. As soon as he began to remember, the light from it swelled, became ever brighter, even harsher, and burned his eyes even more than the May sunshine. With his eyes half closed, Ivan pressed on.

He remembered how, after returning to Semyonov's room the night before, they had pulled out the suitcase, with its store of liquor, from under the bed and begun to drink. Ivan drank without saying a word, ferociously, constantly fixing Semyonov with his heavy, hate-filled stare. This look frightened Semyonov, who blurted out in a low voice: "What do you expect, Vanya...? We've been taken for a ride like filthy pigs in a farmyard! Good G.o.d! They stuck all those medals on our chests and we were complete a.s.sholes. We were happy. Hero! Just you try showing your face in that bar where the Fritzes drink. They'll sweep you away with a yard broom. Even if you were a Hero three times over..."

Then through the mists of the alcohol, without being able to hear himself any more, Ivan was shouting something at Semyonov and thumping on the table with his fist. This thumping was suddenly echoed by a furious banging on the door and the shrill voice of the woman in the next room: "Semyonov! I'm going to phone the militia. They'll take you away, you and your drunken pal! You're waking the whole house with your din..."

Semyonov went out into the corridor to do some explaining. Ivan remained alone. There was complete silence now. From the ceiling the lemon-yellow bulb threw stark shadows: the bottles on the table, Semyonov's crutches at the head of the bed. Somewhere above the rooftops the strokes of three o'clock rang out...

Coming toward Ivan were retired army officers who had put on their full dress uniforms in honor of the celebrations. They were decked out in the armor plating of their decorations. Ivan stared almost in horror at their swollen necks, their cheeks pink from shaving, their monumental torsos, tightly swathed in belts and cross straps. From a gigantic banner a soldier, a sailor, and an airman beamed formidable smiles beneath a fluorescent inscription: "Long live the fortieth anniversary of the Great Victory!" Ivan wanted to stop and to shout out: "This is all rubbish. It's a great big con!" He'd have liked one of the pa.s.sersby to shove him or insult him, or a fat army officer to puff out his scarlet neck and start spitting out something threatening at him. Oh, how he would have responded to them! Reminded them of how all these bloated ex-officers had been lurking to the rear of the lines, pointed out the American trademarks sported by the arrogant young whippersnappers walking past him.

But no one shoved him. On the contrary, at the sight of his Star shining on the lapel of his jacket, people stepped aside to let him pa.s.s. Indeed, when Ivan crossed the road where it was not allowed, the militiaman refrained from blowing his whistle, averted his head and looked the other way With his energy flagging, Ivan turned down an alley and saw a cl.u.s.ter of trees at the bottom of it. But when he got to the end he found himself in a noisy and cheerfully animated avenue. Once again a vivid banner caught his eye: "1945-1985. Glory to the Victorious Soviet People!" Ivan stopped, screwed up his eyes, and groaned. His brow and eyelids became damp, he felt weak at the knees. A water cart drove by, enveloping him in a smell of wet dust: a huge Intourist coach sailed past with smoked-gla.s.s windows, behind which well-groomed ladies with silvery hair could be seen. Ivan retraced his footsteps.

At that moment above the gla.s.s door of a store he sensed, rather than read, in bulbous black lettering: "Beriozka." Without thinking, guided by an intuition about what would happen and antic.i.p.ating it with spiteful glee, he went in.

A pleasant half light prevailed in the store. The cool temperature produced by the air conditioning was disorientating. Lightly clad tourists were talking among themselves beside a counter. A shower of shrill, discordant notes rang out, followed by a shout of laughter: one of them was buying a balalaika.

Ivan stopped near the counter. His gaze, scarcely taking in objects, slid over Palekh lacquer boxes, bottles of scotch whiskey, brightly colored alb.u.m covers. Two salesclerks watched him attentively. Finally one of them, unable to hold back, said softly but very distinctly and without even looking in his direction: "This store, Citizen, is reserved for foreign visitors. Payment here is only in hard currency." And to show him that the conversation was at an end and that he had no more business there, she said to her colleague: "I think those Swedes have made their choice. Stay here, I'll go serve them."