The Russian Affair Part 23

TWENTY-EIGHT.

In the following days, the duty to carry out her mission for Kamarovsky merged, for Anna, with her need to talk to someone she could feel understood by. She thought about the mad coincidence that had made her and Alexey fellows in misery. Here was the jilted house painter, whose captain preferred his Siberian love, and there was the Deputy Minister, living on his own now that the influential cultural secretary wanted nothing to do with him. Had the consequences of all this turmoil not been so unsettling, Anna could have laughed at it. But they were, and so, one morning, heedless of her usual caution, she dialed the number of the telephone in the Drezhnevskaya Street apartment. The receiver was picked up on the second ring, and a m.u.f.fled voice said h.e.l.lo.

"Have I ... Is this Alexey Maximovich's apartment?"

"Anna?" said the voice on the other end.

"Yes. I apologize for disturbing you at this ... you sound strange."

"I'm brushing my teeth," he mumbled. Various sounds followed: the receiver being laid down, footsteps, running water. "All done," he said cheerfully.

"I apologize."

"No, I'm glad to hear your voice. If you only knew how glad, Annushka." Before she could reply, he suggested a meeting. "When do you have time? This evening? Tomorrow? Don't say no. Should we meet here ... no, that's not a good idea. Somewhere else, some magical place ... h.e.l.lo, Anna, are you still there?"

Now that the meeting she'd wanted to engineer was going to take place without any effort on her part, Anna became wary.

"Let me arrange something for tomorrow," he insisted. "Let me surprise you."

"That's not necessary."

"Of course it isn't necessary," he said with a laugh, "but it will make me happy. I'll send Anton to you. Shall we say around seven?"

Anna agreed, said good-bye, and hung up.

Bulyagkov b.u.t.toned his shirt, tied his tie in front of the mirror, and noted that his double chin was becoming more unsightly every day. He gazed nervously at the telephone; he was expecting a call and had purposefully kept the conversation with Anna short. His cheeks burned from the shaving; he went back into the bathroom and applied the French cream. As he was rubbing it in, the telephone rang again. Bulyagkov took a deep breath and answered the phone.

"Alexey Maximovich?" said an unpleasant voice on the other end of the line.

"Yes."

"Something's come up. How soon can you be in the Ministry building?"

He named a time and hung up. The caller's unwillingness to say anything more made Bulyagkov confident that the something that had come up was what he'd hoped it would be. He left his apartment, watched the black ZIL pull up at the curb, and climbed in. Anton drove out of the narrow street and onto the Chaussee.

At the Ministry, Bulyagkov was welcomed by a hastily formed committee and informed that the Minister had fallen ill overnight with a severe case of intestinal flu. His physician had made an initial diagnosis of food poisoning, but the Minister couldn't remember eating anything he shouldn't have. The exact cause of his condition was still to be determined, but in any case, he was confined to his bed and, according to the doctor's report, in no condition to travel to Stockholm.

"Cancel" was the Deputy Minister's response. Without the top man, he said, the excursion made no sense; an international research exchange without the Minister for Research was an absurdity.

The committee granted Bulyagkov's point but objected that preparations for the trip had already consumed a considerable amount of funding, and that moreover the members of the scientific delegation had all arrived in Moscow already; how great their disappointment would be if they were now sent back to their research stations. Finally, they weren't going to Sweden merely to present their own science; in return, they expected to receive interesting information about various Western technologies.

Bulyagkov remained adamant. He'd only seen to the organization of the visit to Sweden, he said; he was unprepared in the science of the various fields and considered himself incapable of giving a proper speech of greeting.

The committee resorted to flattery. It declared emphatically that the Deputy Minister, with his background in the natural sciences, was the only person versed in all the department's interests. And even should he be compelled to improvise, he knew a lot more about chemistry, mathematics, or nuclear physics than any other official in the Ministry. Without naming the Minister, Bulyagkov's colleagues evoked his relative competence and made clear their belief that, when it came to science, the chief couldn't hold a candle to his deputy. Their adulation reached such a level that Bulyagkov stood up, walked pensively around the conference room, and stopped at the big window. He looked down to the street, his view of it already blocked here and there by a canopy of leaves. Alexey knew what his colleagues feared above all: They feared that his refusal could result in their being deprived of the amenities offered by a trip to the West. They weren't interested in science; they kept their eyes fixed on their privileges as Soviet representatives.

"What about the speech to the Swedish Academy?" he asked, acting hesitant again.

"Why not give the speech that was written for the Minister?"

"I can do that only if I do it in his name."

"Of course! Good idea! Respectful gesture!" some of the officials cried. They saw a ray of hope, but Bulyagkov announced that he would accept the mission only on condition of a unanimous resolution of the Chamber. This proviso was met with agitated objections: The scheduled departure was only forty-eight hours away, and it would be impossible to convene the entire Chamber in such a short time. The Deputy Minister appreciated that, but he insisted that there be a memorandum recording the proceedings in detail and ratified in writing by the members of the Politburo. His colleagues, feeling that success was near, promised to provide him with such a doc.u.ment, and then someone remembered that two of the high-ranking comrades had profited from the spring weather and taken a jaunt to the Black Sea.

While the committee was discussing how the required memorandum could be ratified "telegraphically," Bulyagkov was overcome by a serenity that he'd long had to do without. He'd a.s.sessed the men around him correctly and laid so many obstacles in their way that his departure would arouse no suspicion. These Russians, with their panicked need to shed the most flattering light on their performances in the little positions they'd striven so doggedly to occupy, would do everything to persuade him to agree to something that had been his plan from the very beginning. In these minutes, he saw the future in a larger dimension, and despite pangs of anxiety before the unknown, he felt that he was simultaneously at the end and at the beginning of something. He thought warmly about Anna's call, shook off a brief moment of suspicion about her motives, and considered the possibilities for the following evening. He wanted their date to be splendid and affectionate, impressive and intimate. When he thought of the right place, he cracked a narrow smile. He announced to his colleagues that he would await further developments in his office. By way of precaution, he would have the Minister's twenty-six-page speech of greeting sent to him, but he especially wanted to contact the Minister by telephone and offer him his sympathy and best wishes for a speedy recovery. The comrades in the conference room hailed this gesture.

TWENTY-NINE.

The narrow street behind the Mozhaisk Chaussee was now so brightly lit at night that getting into the car under cover of darkness was no longer a possibility. While Anna watched the ZIL approaching, it occurred to her that in spite of all the changes, this one thing had remained constant; she might have broken up with Alexey, but Anton was still picking her up and bringing her to her unflappable lover.

"As punctual as clockwork," Anton said in his melodious voice.

"I've never said this to you, but you would have made a first-rate singer." She had her heart on her sleeve.

"To be honest, Comrade, I've done that." He turned around and drove onto the crepuscular boulevard.

"You're a singer, Anton? Really?" She laid her arm along the top of the seat, almost touching his shoulder.

"Once upon a time."

"In a chorus?"

"It was a provincial troupe. We brought a quite respectable performance of Boris G.o.dunov to the stage. I was Boris."

"Anton, I'm amazed!" She tried to picture the inconspicuous, always clean-shaven man costumed as the imposing, bearded G.o.dunov. "Why did you give it up?"

"There were several reasons ..." He looked at her in the rearview mirror. "And I'd rather not talk about any of them."

Anna took the lipstick out of her purse, re-reddened her lips with the help of her reflection in the window, and pushed her hair behind her ears. There she was, being driven to her Arctic wolf, as happy and excited as if she hadn't told him, not a very long time ago, that it was all over. "Where are we going?" Anna asked, closing her purse.

"I was sworn to silence on that subject." Anton drove a short distance along the Smolensk Quay, avoided Kalinin Prospekt, and took the Garden Ring to Mayakovsky Square; on the left and on the right, Gorky Street glittered. He stopped in front of a building that Anna knew only by name and accompanied her inside. They crossed an elegant beige foyer. The staff of the Peking Hotel nodded to Anton as he accompanied Anna to the elevator, pressed the b.u.t.ton for the top floor, and stepped back. The doors closed on his friendly face and moments later opened on an elegantly furnished vestibule. In the reflection of a gold-framed mirror, Anna saw Bulyagkov coming toward her. He was wearing a three-piece suit of dark wool that made him look thinner. Before either spoke the first word, Alexey embraced the painter, and they stood for a while in the little foyer with their arms around each other.

"Where are we?" She wiped lipstick from the corner of his mouth.

"Through a piece of especially good luck, I got the tower."

"The tower?" She let him lead her inside and stood before the most beautiful view she'd ever seen. Not far away, she recognized the tall buildings of MSU, the Moscow State University; Gorky Street was like a long wedge of light. Anna could see the Kremlin, with its glowing red star, and behind it the narrow streets where old wooden buildings pressed close to one another.

"Usually, this is a privilege granted only to the inner circle," Alexey said. "Or to foreign guests of the State."

"How wonderful," Anna said, embracing him a second time.

"People will think we're still a couple. The food in the Peking is supposed to be very respectable indeed." He tried to draw her into the dining niche, where a light meal awaited them.

"I don't want to eat now," she said, standing her ground. "I'd like to enjoy the moment."

"And might your enjoyment be enhanced by a little something to drink?" He pointed to a battery of bottles. "Even I don't know what some of this stuff is," he said, picking up a bottle at random. "You sounded so urgent on the telephone." He turned around. "Why?"

"Leonid left me."

It was so easy to say that, without tears, without loading the sentence with unhappiness. Alexey, however, seemed much shaken and inattentively set down the unopened bottle, which fell over onto the plush carpet but did not break. "But how can he ... it's impossible," was all he managed to say.

"A whole year of separation is a long time." She found it amusing that she had to break the news gently to him. "There are beautiful women in Siberia, too."

"Siberia? I thought it was Sakhalin."

She told him about Leonid's furlough and his cowardly refusal to tell her the truth to her face.

"Wasn't he supposed to be granted his right of abode in Moscow this year?"

"Apparently, there are charms that can compete with that." Anna was pleased to think that she appeared strong and relaxed, while the news was having an amazingly strong effect on Alexey.

"I can only tell you how sorry I am," he said. He picked up the fallen bottle.

"Why? What does that change for you ... or for us?"

"A great deal," he answered warmly. "I would have liked to know that everything was sorted out for you." He fell silent, uncorked the dark beverage, and sniffed it. "Old port wine, I believe. Give Leonid time." He took two inverted gla.s.ses from a shelf. "In a few months, everything could be back the way it was."

"A few months." It sounded worse when he said it. "So now we're fellows in misery," she observed, shifting without a preamble to the other subject she wanted to talk about.

"What do you mean?" He poured some wine and tasted it.

She waited until he'd swallowed. "Why are you getting a divorce, Alexey?"

He stared pensively at the bottle, as if it were an object of great interest. "Kamarovsky?" he asked in an undertone. Anna nodded. All at once, the Deputy Minister's features relaxed. "Well, of course-the brotherhood must find that just fascinating."

"You never spoke a word to me about it. Why the sudden separation?"

"Nothing lasts forever." He could tell from her look that this trite observation wasn't going to satisfy her. Bulyagkov realized how close he'd let Anna get to the truth. If she wanted to, she'd be capable of correctly identifying the connections linking various events. He could act like a lumbering old bear, but now there were some holes in his coat, and Anna could already see through them. The splendors and delights of the Peking Hotel hadn't blurred her sight. Nor was her own pain leading her to talk only about herself; no, Anna looked more alert than ever. Bulyagkov considered this without fear and without any weakening of his feelings for her; but for the first time, he saw that the house painter represented a risk. "Medea and I will go our own ways from now on. There's absolutely no drama, you understand?" He went up two steps into the alcove and sat on a long couch with curved armrests. "Remember, I told you I was going on a trip?"

"Yes?" She followed him to the couch.

"I leave tomorrow. I'm leading the delegation to Stockholm." A mischievous look flitted over his face. "Why not come with me to the city where it's never hot, not even in summer?"

Her voice became unusually clear. "You're leading the delegation? I thought the Minister himself ..."

Bulyagkov moved away from her. There was a short, aggressive silence.

"The Minister has fallen ill. An unforeseeable indisposition. Therefore I have to take his place."

"What's wrong with him?"

"He's got some stomach or intestinal problem. That is to say, he's puking his guts out. Maybe he ate something he shouldn't have."

"It's remarkable that he's come down with whatever he's got barely two days before such an important mission." He turned his head, and she stopped talking.

"You think he's not really sick?"

"Don't you know?" While Anna drank the heavy port, while he bent her back a little and kissed her temples, while she scrutinized the first-cla.s.s wallpaper, whose seams were as good as invisible, she was tormented by the question of how Alexey could already have known a week ago that he was going to go on the trip if the Minister had fallen unforeseeably ill only yesterday.

"So you're off to Stockholm." As Anna cast about for a solution, she was slowly absorbed by the thought that Medea's fate and hers were beginning to resemble each other. She noticed that Alexey wasn't stopping at a little friendly snuggling and in fact had skillfully opened the hooks and pulled down the zipper on her skirt. Anna tried to hold on to her thoughts and resisted giving in to his caresses. Before her mind's eye, she pa.s.sed in review the persons who were keeping the wheels of this whole business spinning. The Minister and his Deputy, Medea, and Lyushin, too, belonged among them, and of course Rosa and the Colonel, but as hard as Anna tried to give to each of them a shape in keeping with his or her function, they soon merged with the amorous play that Alexey was drawing her into. For the first time, he exposed himself to her, removing his jacket and vest and undoing his trousers. With his tie hanging over his shoulder, he surged over her, bracing his elbows against the couch's dainty backrest and keeping one foot on the floor. Surprised and excited, she accommodated him. Actually, she had come looking for consolation from her paternal friend, and now the old fellow, her wolf, was on top of her, penetrating her with his piercing eyes, kissing her earnestly, offering her his heavy body. The wallpaper had a pattern of crowns, which Anna found peculiar-obviously a failure of oversight when the choice was made. The crowns-dark blue against a pale red background-looked a little like flowers, too. Maybe, she thought, the paperhanger had hung the wallpaper wrong, and blossoms had become crowns. She whispered Alexey's name, and since the armrest was bruising her spine, she let herself slip to the floor. He lay on his back and, unembarra.s.sed and playful, allowed Anna to caress him, raising his head to watch what she was doing; the lights of the capital shimmered behind her.

The tower, Bulyagkov thought; the pleasure of being with her here, with time and place joined in the best possible relationship. Coordination had ever been his greatest talent. He was humbly grateful to Anna, and he loved her for the year and nine months she'd given him.

THIRTY.

At the same time, and yet eight hours later, Leonid detached himself from Galina after a long embrace. He couldn't use the dawn as an indication of how early or late it was; at that time of year in the North, dawn lasted half a day. She'd been sad the previous night; with greater detail than usual, she'd described her efforts to save an old man's life. He was a nomad by birth and a day laborer out of necessity, he had no place to stay, and the approach of the warmer season was his only prospect. But the nine months of winter had so consumed his strength that when the police picked him up in a tractor hangar, he'd collapsed and lost consciousness. When they brought him to the hospital, the police lieutenant had snidely remarked that it didn't look as though there was much to be done for him. Galina had given him a cardiotonic injection, put him in a clean hospital bed, and hooked him up to an intravenous drip. He was given chicken broth and bread. During the night, however, he'd undergone a remarkable transformation. Instead of drawing new courage to face life from the care and security he was receiving, the man had relaxed his grip on the last bands that held his existence together and, in the truest sense, surrendered. Combed and fed, and closely observed by the nurses, he'd appeared like a man resolved on his own death. His heartbeat and breathing slowing down, the man had lain there with a queer smile on his face and looked first at the worried night nurse and then at Galina. She'd cried out to him, begging him to stop acting like that and go on living. When his breathing stopped, Galina had considered a tracheotomy, but a comment made by the most senior station nurse had tipped the scales in favor of letting him go. He knows his time has come, the nurse had said. He'd died around eleven o'clock in the evening; his death was registered, and barely an hour later, his body had been transferred to the crematorium.

Leonid quietly rolled out of bed. It must be around five in the morning, he thought; he was supposed to muster the men for roll call at six. That didn't leave him much time, because the road to the base wasn't snow-free yet.

While he dressed, his eye fell on a cartoon in a magazine: A man, hanging over a pit where predatory teeth snap up at him, feels the branch he's clinging to breaking and remarks, "Good thing everything in life is temporary." As he left the house, Leonid wondered whether that wasn't exactly the situation he was in: unstable and temporary. Everything could change completely again at any time. Or could he start to look upon his hours with Galina, their nights in Yakutsk, as the beginning of a new future?

Anna's silence regarding his letter relieved him. At the same time, he found it unfathomable that she hadn't called or sent him a telegram or written. It wasn't in her nature to let things slide.

While Leonid waited in front of the house for the transport vehicle to pick him up, he was annoyed at both the women to whom he'd given control of his fate. Hadn't it been because of pressure from Anna that he'd moved away from Moscow, where he could have had a good life in an agreeable division? Didn't she bear the chief responsibility for the confusion that everybody-including, unfortunately, Petya-now had to deal with? And what about Galina's obstinacy in wanting to live here, of all places, here where her roots were and nowhere else? A good surgeon could find a position anywhere, including Moscow. Leonid had shaped a future for himself, but in reality, didn't it look as though he was letting the women make the decisions he should have been dictating to them? Was he a weak man, "henpecked," as in the old Yakutian fairy tale?

The captain stood still. The sense of being trapped and the shock of realizing how deep his doubts ran had made him shiver. He'd read and reread a great many fairy tales of late; of the three books in Galina's library, two were medical books, and the third was a collection of Siberian legends and fairy tales. In "The Tale of the Henpecked King," the king of the birds-the eagle-obeys his domineering wife's command to build her a special nest for her brooding time. He summons the birds of every kind, has a hole drilled in the beak of each one, and binds them together, so that Madam Eagle can brood comfortably on their plumage. When he counts the bound birds, he ascertains that one, the owl, is missing; he sends out messengers and has the owl brought before him. The owl excuses his absence by explaining that his eyes aren't fit for flying in daylight, and that night travel takes a great deal of time. However, he declares, on his way, he's had a chance to look around and see what's going on in the world. This makes the eagle curious; he wants to know whether the dead outnumber the living on the earth.

"If you count those who are asleep as dead," the owl replies, "the dead are in the majority."

"Is it more often day than night?" the eagle asks, and the owl replies, "If you count the dark Siberian days as nights, it's more often night than day."

"And now, tell me," the eagle continues. "Are there more men or more women on our earth?"

The owl thinks for a moment and answers, "If you count the henpecked men as women, there are more women on the earth."

The king of the birds starts, realizing that in order to be of service to his wife, he has tortured his fellows. Without hesitation, he sets all the birds free; in all their variety, they soar heavenward. And so it is that the owl, alone among birds, has no holes in its beak.