7

‘These kids are on their way to fight and kill fascists,’ Jake Starr said snappishly that same morning at a meeting of responsables. ‘And I won’t lie to them. To the whole damn world, but not to them. I’ll steal, I’ll forge passports, I’ll even—I’ll do anything for the party, but I won’t lie to or steal from my comrades going to Spain.’

Fishface Marchand had just submitted a request from the Tech-Bureau. Comrade Jacques was to collect the passports from all arriving American volunteers to Spain. He was to inform them they would be held in safekeeping by the bureau until their return to France after the civil war’s end.

An obvious steal.

‘No,’ Starr said quietly. ‘I won’t do it.’

‘Don’t be naïve,’ Marchand said coldly.

‘But all Americans are naïve,’ muttered Heinz Brucker, the Hamburg dockwalloper pre-Hitler, a party pro. They called him the Liverwurst, pink white meat packed solid in transparent casein. He had worked in the German underground for two years, and the Paris assignment was a vacation before he went on to Spain. ‘They think revolutions are made by honest-to-goodness truth.’

‘Sssh,’ hushed Peter the Czech; Peter Rabbit, long pointy ears, timid brown eyes, frozen rabbit face.

The others in the room snickered, save for the English lady who bit her bruised lips.

Comrade Starr merely snapped, ‘Shut up!’ and the snickering froze.

Marchand stood, a parabola, reached for his coat, opened the door. Giving Jake one last chance, he said, ‘Is that your answer to the bureau?’

‘I told you once, I’ll tell you again: I’ll ask them for their passports, but I’ll explain that they are to be used by our agents, and to get them back, if they come out of Spain alive, they’ll have to go to the American consul and either inform on themselves or perjure themselves. Then if they give up their passports, they’ll be doing it voluntarily. That’s as far as I’ll go—no further.’

‘And you worked with Carl Vlanoc?’

‘Yes, I did. And that is none of your business.’

‘Then you’re not only arrogant, you’re a fool.’

Starr rose, banged on the table with his fist, and red in the face shouted, ‘You stinking fishfaced bureaucrat, I’ll hang you by your heels!’

Marchand stumbled through the doorway out of Starr’s reach, and the latter stood, feeling the idiot. It had been childish and he knew it. Wished he could retrieve it and do it another way. Too late. Lost his temper—what was eating him?

The others in the room said nothing, though Heinz found it difficult to repress a sneer.

Starr grabbed his coat and left. He had better hurry or he would end with his head in a noose coiled by Comrade Step’s agile strong fingers.

As he passed through the gate of the courtyard to the street, he felt a hand on his arm. It was Sarah. He stared at her coldly.

‘You were right,’ she said.

‘We’ll soon see,’ he bit out. A fine thing, receiving affirmation from the most bourgeois of them all. It was an apparatus matter and had nothing to do with her. He lengthened his stride, wanting to lose her.

She ignored his rudeness, kept pace with him. ‘Do you think it will rest there?’

‘No, Sarah. Now please go away.’

He was overwrought, this wasn’t like him, so she walked with him towards the Metro on Place du Combat. Since her hand had touched his sleeve she had not withdrawn it. Now it rested, a warm bird, in the crook of his arm. It felt good and he was glad she had ignored his bad temper, but he had work to do, and quickly, there was no time for this love bit. He had twenty kids holed up in Le Havre, another thirty were on the Atlantic headed for France, and if their passports were expropriated—it was nothing else but—they would never see them again. These damn bureaucrats—couldn’t they wait until the dead were buried?

At the Metro he excused himself, tried an apologetic smile, but it went awry and his face looked like a chipped gargoyle. ‘I’m sorry, Sarah, I have work to do.’

She withdrew her hand from his arm. He was caught up short by the void it left. Quickly, he took her hand and kissed the open palm, then left her standing in the middle of the Place du Combat near a kiosk plastered with posters reading in large black letters on a red background: SOLIDARITY. In six languages.

As he entered the Metro he saw she still stood there, lost, a bird in the wrong nest. He wanted to run to her, to take her in his arms; she looked forlorn, unhappy, truly lost. What the hell did she get herself involved with him for? He wanted to comfort her, to crush her warm soft body in his arms. Don’t worry, my love—not now he couldn’t, had work to do and he had to do it fast, because he was in trouble and he could be crushed, his warm body, and he knew it, because of this stupid, bureaucratic venality. The revolution wasn’t supposed to be like this, it was supposed to be barricades and flowing crimson pennants and a million people yelling hermanos hermanos hermanos as you marched down the Ramblas in Barcelona. In a couple of days there would probably be lots of dead Americans outside of Madrid—they would have plenty of passports without stealing and lying.

He located a telegraph office on rue Saint Honoré. ‘French dealers demand letters credit for consignment Stop Have refused Stop Await instructions today Stop Immediately Exclamation point Starr.’

In Paris it was noon; in New York early morning. He would have to wait a few hours. Found a café near by, nibbled on some cheese and bread, drank Pernods till he was half-tight. He was in trouble—so what? What could they do to him? Demote him and send him back to the rank and file? Perhaps that would suit him best. They would send him to Spain. Vlanoc would have a fit. Well, up his with a hammer and sickle. Greg, Joe, the battalion were probably in Albacete by now, being outfitted with guns, bullets, bayonets, helmets, even gas-masks—he would meet them at the front. He didn’t need any training. And Sarah? Now, why did she have to intrude? All woman and no feminine blackmail. After his rudeness she probably thought he had been lying that morning. No, she wouldn’t. She wasn’t simple-minded.

As he had sat on the bed, putting on his shoes, he had said, ‘You’re not just a woman to sleep with. I’ve been running around with an empty space inside me, and you’ve filled it. Amply,’ and he smiled. She was lying there, soft-bosomed and round-bottomed, her hair spread wildly over the pillow. ‘My love for you has filled me all up.’

‘It’s too soon to talk of love, Jake.’

‘I suppose,’ he said, feeling suddenly flat.

She touched his hand, and he looked at her. She was staring at him intently. ‘All of a sudden I know what my body was made for,’ she said. ‘To carry your weight. That seems to be its sole purpose in life.’

It sounded good, her saying that. He stood at the side of the bed, half-dressed, and she laughed. ‘Look, there he is, a jumping Jack.’ Without bothering to undress again, he gave her all his weight.

‘I love you, Sarah. I’ve known you for about six weeks now, that’s a long time.’

‘I’m sorry,’ she said wrinkling her brow, ‘but right now I feel terribly guilty and disloyal,’ and she moved from under him.

She would feel guilty, of course. ‘I understand,’ he avowed, rising to his feet. He finished dressing quickly and left.

Now he ate more cheese and bread, drank from his Pernod. Gently but obstinately she had filled the vacuum in his life. How was he going to dislodge her?… Ah, merde. It was good he would be leaving soon. He remembered Carl and Eva and the sadness and crying. Eva was his mother’s sister; Vlanoc had been her husband. It was late at night and they’d thought he was asleep, he was only a kid. Eva hadn’t seen Carl for four years; he had come home from China via Moscow and would be leaving again after a few days.

‘I can’t wait any longer,’ he heard Eva say to Carl. ‘I want to begin living and it’s impossible without my husband.’ Mein mann.

How sad it had sounded when Carl said, ‘Revolutions can’t wait for us to love—for us to live.’

Carl must have begun to wring his hands—that was the first time, the first visit, they had noticed that ugly little motion of his—for Eva said, ‘You cannot love, you cannot live,’ crying out, ‘because your hands are filthy with blood. It is not the revolution, it is the blood!’ She began to scream and wail, became so hysterical Carl had to slap her hard.

Then he heard his father holding his mother down in the next room. ‘Stay here! She has to settle it herself. It’s their life, and it’s not ours to interfere with.’

Oh! What was the use thinking about it now? He had Sarah to think about. He hoped she wouldn’t cry. Ah, women cry, so what. He was glad he had been honest with her, too. During the night he had told her the party came first with him. First, last and—she couldn’t say he hadn’t been as honest as she, could she? Perhaps he shouldn’t be so vain, she would be as glad as he that he was going soon. Maybe he would die. His stomach quivered involuntarily, curled. No, not me. I haven’t lived yet.

Ordered another Pernod. I’m drinking too much. Good for the soul. In trouble with the bureau, to wit, Comrade Step, ergo Joseph Stalin; and Carl Vlanoc, General Carlos Verdad, was in Murcia busy chasing down fascists and Trotskyites and with no time or inclination to bail out his boy. I am not only drunk, I am scared.

Hardly less than Sarah was. When Jake entered the Metro, once looking back, she felt her heart tremble. She stood for a moment gazing after him, her hand in mid-air, and she realized how truly frightened she was for him, for herself. Desire—pure desire. Is that all it was? Her knees were quivering, and she could feel the beating of her heart in the clamor of the midday traffic. A bicyclist stopped alongside, smiled gallantly. ‘Are you lost, M’mselle?’ ‘Non, M’sieur, merci.’ Not lost, merely mislaid.

She entered the station—where in the world was she going?—shook her head, stepped back into the street, struck her way north to Louis Blanc through the midday bustle. It’s not fair, Rolfe, you’ve never come to visit. I’m a woman and I desire a man. A man? Any man? A weight? No. One man—a big, burly young man who is being torn apart by the unity of opposites. Thinks the quickest way to heaven is via hell. ‘You’re not just a woman to sleep with,’ he had said. As if she didn’t understand. Oh, he always stripped her naked with his words or his eyes—she could swear when he looked at her she had gone completely mad and forgotten to wear her clothes. Ah, but a woman needs to be reminded that she’s a woman with a naked body. And she also was torn by the unity of opposites. Was marriage, and peace, and love so cheap? What more did she require in order to live? Aside from her life with Rolfe, the work she did had an intrinsic value. Is there a greater cause than that of freedom? Isn’t freedom and its meaning so much a part of man that it can no longer be stripped like skin from a living man’s bones without destroying him? And she was part of it. Not merely ingesting it through books and music and paintings, but doing. There was lots wrong with Rolfe’s politics, Jake’s, Vlanoc’s (Sarah never fully accepted it as hers), yet it gave one something greater than its parts: a chance to act; to do. And to do was Comrade Jake Starr.

She was at the pont over the muddy St Martin canal, and she stopped to stare into its blank waters, and she knew exactly who and what it was she wanted—and recognized she had lived every single day and night of the past several weeks knowing it would become reality.

She tore herself away from the blank waters of the canal and began quickly to retrace her steps to Place du Combat. She would wait for him in the office and let him know immediately upon his return that it was not merely an infatuation, it was not merely satisfying desire, it was satisfying the flawless weight of love.

Happy because she had at last arrived at a decision, she typed reports in her office as she waited for Jake. But the happiness became impatience as the hours of the day reeled past to the clicking of the keys and Jake did not appear. Impatience displaced by fear, an uncomprehending fear (for she still had not acquired a profound knowledge of the inner workings of the revolutionary party to which she gave adherence) as Comrade Step—himself—phoned.

Coldly, ‘Comrade Jacques? No? When he arrives, have him wait.’

Once, twice, three times—and no Jake. The gray silver of afternoon was grayed by the black of evening. Still no Jake.

Again the phone rang. Fearfully, she raised the receiver. ‘Jacques! No? The fool! When he comes—immediately! Yes?’

‘Yes, Comrade Stepanovich.’ She was terrified; the man hurled question marks and exclamation points like lethal weapons. Where in heaven’s name was Jake?

Rolfe Alan Ruskin that afternoon had crossed the channel. The weather had been nasty; the channel mean. The steamer arrived late. Now he rode in a taxi to the Tech-Bureau and was restless and frustrated with himself as if he were at fault for not having been able to control the fog, the sea itself. It was childish, he realized, and the realization further increased the frustration with himself. It seemed to feed on itself. There was this untidy business with Sarah. The British general secretary had told him. It had been very embarrassing to him at first, and at the end he had spoken as if that too were Rolfe’s fault. And Rolfe had wanted to apologize.

What nonsense! The organization brooked no frivolity. Rolfe had given his approval of Sarah’s assignment—more, had recruited her into the party. Here he was thinking only of the party, himself forgotten. There were violent revolutionary changes taking place within himself. He was expunging the individual ego, overthrowing its dominance, its monopoly control over his actions, and in so doing destroying centuries of tradition, the tradition of personal freedom which had helped form him as a man, and doing so for the universal good. To change the world totally was to change man totally, western man at any rate. Would he, Rolfe Alan Ruskin, be destroyed as well? The thought sickened him—or was it the nausea of the rough channel crossing? In a laboratory one is isolated from the world, intent only on the search for a specific truth. He was changing all that, was entering into the world, deep into its roots, in order to change it root and all for the general truth of man’s social existence. Before revolution could build it must destroy. Not only the old order, but the self. Still, when he had been informed that Sarah had a lover he had wanted to die. His lovely young Sarah, who never in the years he had known her had even gazed on another man coquettishly. She had been a good wife and a fine comrade—it was confusing, devastatingly confusing. First his son betrayed him, now his young wife. Yet the firmness with which the general secretary had spoken after the initial embarrassment had starched his spine. There could be no doubt: discipline had a salutary effect. What would Sarah say? He was certain she would be truthful … that it was only a nasty rumor.

For a moment he relaxed—it was only a rumor. No, they didn’t deal in rumors, facts were their tools. Of course, rumors were at times spread for good reason, and he couldn’t repress the cunning smile which insinuated itself between the frustration and fear, honesty cringing in some dark corner. He must accept the fact. Sarah had a lover. A young man.

Rolfe began to freeze. That mean wind on the channel had frozen his bones. Yes, a young man, an American comrade with powerful friends in the International—too powerful to reach. Now what was he thinking? To reach? A corrupt bourgeois practice. The American, he had been told, would cause no trouble, he was a disciplined professional—having his fling with Sarah, just another party woman to him, a camp-follower.

Rolfe felt a sharp pain in his chest, had a panicky yet hopeful thought he was going to have a heart attack. Sarah would nurse him. Nonsense. He would not have a heart attack, the Ruskin men had always had good hearts. Stout hearts. Lion hearts. He was proud of his heritage.

He had been frustrated, frightened. Now he became angry. Whether or not it was true she had a lover, they would command her to stop. ‘Stop, I say!’ he said aloud so the French cabbie snapped his head back to him, gave him a quizzical glance, snapped his head forward again before he lost control of the wheel. Rolfe ignored the man. He was angry. They would tell her they had great plans in mind for Professor Ruskin and his wife. Together they were a charming, personable couple. Teas would have to be given, cozy dinners, grand dinners. Not at once of course. Sarah would have to continue with her assignment in Paris, as he would have to continue with his in the academic life of England. But at the proper moment, at the proper historic moment, the plan would unfold. Professor Rolfe Alan Ruskin, Nobel laureate, staunch anti-fascist, would be put up by a committee of the arts and sciences for a seat in Parliament. As an independent, naturally.

He beamed. The frustration, like a cube of ice which had stuck in his throat, melted and slid down his gullet. The fear, like a puff of fog, dispersed.

Sarah, his lovely wife and ardent comrade, would stand with him on the dais as he spoke. That’s what the general secretary had said. They would make a splendid couple, and there must be no breath of scandal. They would put a halt to this idiocy. Besides, the general secretary had also said, if she balked, Starr would not. Starr was a selfless, dedicated comrade. If Starr would not—and the British leader had smiled cunningly and not concluded the sentence, merely smiled, and he had returned the smile in kind. My God, they were ruthless. It chilled his spine: and thrilled him. In this day and age one must be ruthless. He too could be ruthless.

But it would not be necessary with Starr. He thought of Comrade Starr as one of those legendary revolutionary heroes he had encountered occasionally at the King Street offices of the party: silent men, powerful men, iron-disciplined men who knew no fear, who performed their work in the dark, alone, fearlessly. Rolfe envied Starr and hoped he also one day would become a legend in the movement. Was he not descended from crusading knights, from men who had fought in England’s great battles, had helped to mold its destiny as a world power? Now he would add to their valorous history—and at a higher level of history.

He was shaken from his revery by the cab’s lurching stop. These damn French drivers, discourteous, slovenly. A national characteristic. No order.

The cab paid and sent off, Rolfe entered the austere Romanesque structure of the Technical Bureau on rue de Chabrol for his engagement with Comrade Stepanovich.

As day became night an hour later, he closed the door of the building behind him, his shoulders squared, his grand aristocratic head held high, a swashbuckling swing to his stride. He descended the stairs, a broad-shouldered, burly young man ascended. They passed with a comradely nod, since each was aware that only comrades crossed this door’s threshold, each unknown to the other.

As Rolfe sat in the cab he had hailed he kept marveling at the honor which had just been bestowed him. He, too, was going to be a hero. How quickly they worked, how efficiently. That man Stepanovich was a dynamo, the new socialist man. It would take a few days, and then, and then—his head whirled. As the cab turned into Place du Combat, reality abruptly asserted itself. In a few minutes he would be standing before Sarah. He came to a quick decision. He would speak quietly with her, maintain his composure. There would be no dreadful scene. It was not becoming to a man of his position. In any event, he despised scenes, they were untidy. Words were spoken which flew off into space aimlessly. They were modern, rational people. Jealousy bespoke a possessiveness of another’s body as though it were private property, a relic of a society rooted in the holiness of Adam Smith.

As he climbed the rickety stairs to Sarah’s office, his heart began to beat furiously. Hat in hand he ran his fingers through his thin gray hair, made a courageous effort to control his excited breathing, soon he would see his lovely Sarah, hold her in his arms. Oh, my God, he loved her, she was his very life.

He entered the office, saw her. ‘Sarah!’ he cried hoarsely, his eyes momentarily blinded by tears.

As they embraced, husband and wife, to his exquisite pleasure, she wept.

At the cable office earlier that afternoon, Jake Starr, fully and completely drunk, received a reply from New York. ‘Your refusal approved Stop’—he heaved a deep wet sigh—‘Inform French dealers letters credit being cashed in Base.’ Albacete. Why the dirty bastards. Stealing—comrades—on their way to front—to die. Damn them—who the hell comrades going to die. Romantics, just stupid romantics. Bastards. Must go to Stepanovich. Must show him cable. Drunk, drunk. Catch hold. Think. Stepanovich holds noose. Tighten noose. Dead Jake Starr—dead revolutionary hero. Best kind, dead heroes. Ha ha. Everybody screwed. Screwed tightly dead. Catch hold of yourself. Must save neck for revolution. Hell with scum. Went and lost cherry at the altar of Stepanovich’s noose. Ta ra. Catch hold. Bolshevik will. Stop playing fool. Will. Will!

With the preciseness of a guilty drunk he stalked through a heavy drizzle to the Metro. In the subway he concentrated totally on becoming sober. And as he stood at the bottom of the flagstone steps to the gaunt structure which housed the Tech-Bureau, he was sober. He instructed himself before he mounted the stairs to be courteous and obedient to his superior. No more trouble, he merely wanted to get to Spain. The cable would soften Stepanovich’s anger. How much, he didn’t know. Still, he was one of Vlanoc’s men, and that counted for a lot, unless, of course, they were out to give a little squeeze to Vlanoc too. One never knew. He would apologize if necessary, beat his breast, utter words of self-criticism, he knew the party catechism by heart. As he climbed the stone steps, he spied the tall lean figure of Ruskin immaculate in tweed topcoat and shining Scotch grain brogues leaving the building. We even have the rich on our side, Jake thought, as he passed the man. All kinds.

When he stood before Stepanovich, he was relaxed, even a bit obsequious.

Marchand was also present, but he sat, as did the boss. Stepanovich had a lean cold face under heavy curly black hair. When he smiled, which was rarely, he showed a mouthful of rotten teeth like chipped chiclets; when he was silent, also rarely, he had a habit of biting on his thumb.

So Jake stood; they sat.

Step had his little black book open before him on the highly glossed Empire desk, but he wasn’t reading it, he had it all in his mind. Memorized cold. He began simply enough, speaking in his coldly quiet voice, listing the numerous infractions of discipline Starr had committed, from the petty to the most heinous, which of course had been his calling Vlanoc a murderer in Havana. (Though Carl had understood and expected the novice’s reaction, he of course had found it necessary to include the incident in his report. Carl Vlanoc took his job seriously.) As Comrade Step enunciated each breach of discipline, he concluded in his customary manner. ‘Yes?’

‘Yes, Comrade Step.’

‘… Threatened to hang Comrade Pierre on a wall hook. Yes?’

‘Yes, Comrade Step.’

Now Stepanovich had concluded but for the latest. He snorted, Jake catching a glimpse of a couple of chipped chiclets, gray at the edges. ‘When I give an order,’ he began, and it was then Starr handed him the cablegram.

Step read it quickly, tossed it aside. ‘That doesn’t settle it, does it? Yes?’

‘It doesn’t, no; yes, Comrade Step.’ Just play it straight, Starr, you’ll soon be out of here. Sarah’s at the hotel by now, probably waiting, wondering.

Stepanovich studied Jake Starr, his thumb being ground down by rotten teeth. He read Starr’s face easily. Arrogant Jew, the independent kind. Meanwhile, Marchand stared into space. Now Stepanovich curled his lips contemptuously. ‘The American party—melon heads, soft and mushy. Never in the entire history of the revolution has there been a more stupid, mendicant, inane, sentimental, venal leadership.’ Yes, Comrade Step. ‘I give the orders! Yes?’

‘Yes, Comrade Step.’

‘You’ve been a good comrade, Vlanoc thinks highly of you, it seems you think so yourself.’ Then like a power saw, ‘But no one is that good. No one. Not even Vlanoc.’ And he laughed, the chipped chiclets rattling in that red box of a mouth.

Jake stood rigidly, staring at the picture of Stalin on the wall behind Comrade Step. They don’t like Carl either, it seems. I’ll have to let him know.

Stepanovich observed him coldly, decided to use a little terror. He pounded his desk, machine-gunned words, for a moment Jake thought—hoped—a chiclet would yank itself loose and stick in the man’s throat. The terror exhibited, stowed in the cooler, Step stopped play-acting, and got down to business. ‘Have you ever heard of Comrade Rolfe Alan Ruskin, my dear Comrade Fool?’

Jake twitched. What was this?

‘Have you, Comrade Starr?’

‘Yes, of course.’

‘And you have read the reports?’

‘Yes. Comrade Stalin said he is one of the new men, that he is worth an army to the party.’

‘And you have dared twiddle his piece of baggage between her legs?’

Jake’s mouth went dry as every muscle in his body tensed. Catch hold. Scum. He groped in a grab bag. ‘She held me off. I did try.’

‘You more than tried, Starr.’

Comrade Concierge told Comrade Fishface told Comrade Step. Vlanoc, the old wise man, had said to be careful. Comrade Fool is right. ‘She loves her husband, is loyal to him. There will be no trouble. She believes marriage vows are made to be honored, not broken.’

Step’s mouth dropped, the chiclets rattling, and a laugh beginning at his feet and roaring its way upward like flame through a flue convulsed him. ‘Vows are made—’ Choking, he jumped from his chair and had to lean against the wall behind him, all the while stamping his feet, making such a racket that two guards ran into the room, for it sounded as if he were being strangled. Marchand had risen and was pouring him a glass of water, as Jake stood at attention before the desk hoping the man died.

The convulsions over, the guards dismissed, Marchand reseated, Stepanovich stood behind his desk, a sly smile on his still trembling lips, tears running from his eyes, seeing Jake Starr in decadent bourgeois cubist fragments. ‘We don’t want a scandal, Starr. Her husband’s being appointed scientific consultant to the Spanish Republic. It’s a great coup for us, since they don’t know he is one of ours. It’s good we were watching you and her. Another week and she probably would have been demanding a divorce which of course the control commission would never have granted. We want a good, solid bourgeois couple in a high position. Understand?’

‘I understand.’ Jake felt the tension go.

Stepanovich smiled. ‘Relax, Starr. No harm’s been done. Tell me,’ he grinned, ‘is she a good lay?’

His guard down, caught unawares, Jake quickly leaned across the desk, the revolution attracted all sorts of trash, and raised his huge fist impatient to knock a couple of chipped chiclets loose into that flapping red box. Comrade Step, a brave man, merely jutted his jaw and stared coldly into Jake’s angry green eyes. And Jake remembered the revolution was the altar of his life, what the hell was he so indignant about. He straightened, lowered his fist. ‘I’ll report this little conversation to the central committee of the Comintern, Comrade Step. There’s a point at which even a leading comrade must stop.’

Stepanovitch shrugged imperceptibly. Worked with Vlanoc a year and still a naïve fool. Quietly, he said, ‘You’ll leave tonight for Spain. Report to the office in Figueras. At the fort. Don’t speak to her again. Pick up your papers in the front office.’

Jake Starr nodded, and left.

Behind him Stepanovich sucked his thumb; his brain whirled and whizzed, clanged and tolled. The total on the white tape revealed itself clear and precise.

These Jews, no matter how harsh the discipline, underneath they wear their independence like underwear of skin. He thought a while, ignoring Marchand who sat like a frozen fish. The best way to temper steel is with fire. Vlanoc was too close to the snot—besides, Vlanoc, the old washerwoman, could himself use a little spurring. Aaa, these Jewish comrades (Vlanoc, like Jake Starr, had stopped thinking of himself as a Jew at the age of eighteen, he was a bolshevik) reminded one of the boastful fly in the Russian fable. Having sat on the ear of an ox which had pulled a plow through frozen soil, the fly could boast it too had plowed. Comrade Step smiled sadly at the image of the Russian people who like oxen broke the soil for the eventual harvest of a new world. He sucked his thumb, bit his nail, jarred a loose tooth, the pain a screech! Well, he was one of those who held the reins—at least today, he thought, removing his thumb from between his lips, for tomorrow who knows, the revolution’s so erratic. He caught himself, glared quickly over his right shoulder at the image of The Brightest Sun behind him on the wall—glimpsed again the clear precise total on the white tape. The young snot would never learn their discipline.

Aloud he muttered one word. ‘Roegen.’

And from the corner of one cold yet satisfied eye he noticed Marchand flip a fin, then lower his protuberant eyes. To himself Step smiled. Roegen. Would make Vlanoc jump too, like an old stud its tender belly raked by a sharp cossack spur. Stepanovich smiled, the edges of his teeth where the enamel had eroded showing a softish gray. Roegen, the Hungarian assassin. Also, the shiteater.

The young fool would learn or die.

Sarah Ruskin, haggard, hair a ruin, frantically searched for a taxi in the rainswept Place du Combat. She must inform Comrade Step that it was all—what? It was not a lie and it was not the truth. They had slept together one night—it was after all their own affair. They had been thrown together so constantly it had been a marriage of sorts, without the biology—what was she saying? There had been great desire and they had succumbed. That did not mean she was going to leave her husband and it did not mean Jake Starr had asked her to. They both had understood it was a passing fancy. An infatuation she herself had called it. Rolfe was mad—literally mad. Jake had told her the party came first, last and always. He was married to the party. And Rolfe was insane. What would they do to Jake?

‘I know about Starr, Sarah, and I find—find it difficult knowing you do not love me,’ were the first words Rolfe spoke after she had stopped weeping and they stared into one another’s eyes.

‘But I do love you, Rolfe, and there was, there has been …’ She was a bad liar.

‘Please, Sarah, you were observed.’

She should be angry, but he looked all at once so frail, so utterly destroyed. In his way he loved her deeply. But she must tell him the truth. ‘Not love, Rolfe. We—yes, we did. One night. It was nothing, Rolfe, an infatuation.’ Oddly, she felt like a liar. She raised her eyes to Rolfe, recognized the pain, his face was a startling white, his hands trembled, his lips. She swept him into her arms, embraced him violently, attempting to warm him with her love, her body. For a few minutes his trembling became worse, but slowly it eased off, and she could feel strength returning to his body. She kissed him and he responded.

They gazed at each other. He had control of himself now, and he stared deeply into her. ‘Sarah,’ he said quietly, ‘you treat me like a child. You are not telling me the complete truth.’

The complete truth. Was it painted on her face like a big political poster? Could it be read so easily? ‘The truth is that I desired him, we lived very closely for some five weeks, we became infatuated, and last night we—well, we slept together. There’s no more to it. Nothing more to tell.’

Now that she had told him what it had seemed he wanted to hear, he began to tremble violently again. First pain, then anger distorted his face; his great nose was like a white yacht pitching through a rough surf. ‘I’m a power in the party,’ he drilled harshly, and it sounded so completely unreal and alien to him she had to keep reminding herself it was Rolfe, her husband, whom she had hurt terribly, ‘and he will be made to suffer!’

It hurt to hear him speak this way. ‘For what, Rolfe? You asked for the complete truth. He has done nothing—nothing that any young man wouldn’t do. We have done nothing which should alter our relationship. What do you mean he will be made to suffer? You have never consciously hurt anyone in your life. That is not like you.’ She could see he really wasn’t listening.

‘You’ve never known my anger, Sarah.’

‘Come with me to Stepanovich so I can tell him there was nothing. Jake is a decent, considerate young man—completely devoted to his cause—it was I who wished to smash—Rolfe, for heaven’s sake, I am utterly confused, I don’t know what I’m saying any more. I love you. You are my husband.’

‘You love him, I can see it in your eyes. He will regret it.’

‘Even if I did,’ she almost wished to acknowledge it, ‘would you have him punished? We are civilized human beings, or at least up till now I’ve thought so—perhaps Step is a barbarian, but we’re not.’

‘Comrade Stepanovich is a most enlightened man. He was very understanding. He is a true son of the revolution, a rational man who does not permit sentimental drool to come between himself and his duty to the party. Starr is an anarchist—perhaps even a Trotskyite.’

‘You lost your senses? Becoming untidy?’ She knew what hurt him most.

He blanched. ‘He’ll be disciplined for this, I will see to that.’

‘Are you permitting your injured vanity to corrupt you? I always believed you to be a man of integrity.’

‘You speak of integrity? And it is not my vanity. I view these sexual matters as a scientist. It is the decision of the party. He is not to see you or speak to you and you are not to see him or speak to him again.’ Did she really love this man?

‘Enough, Rolfe. I am going to Stepanovich this moment.’

He followed her quickly and interposed himself between the door and her. There were red spots like rust marks on his white nose. ‘Don’t make a fool of me, Sarah.’

‘You are making a fool of yourself. I’ll merely tell Stepanovich the truth. Jake and I were merely—’

‘Were merely!’ Speaking slowly, emphasizing each word, her husband said, ‘He will certainly regret his little love affair, my dear.’ The door behind him opened and a young woman, a secretary from down the hall, entered, only to stand suddenly paralyzed from embarrassment at the sight of these two angry people. In slow motion Rolfe patted his tie, pulled down his jacket, observed with satisfaction the high polish of his shoes, and, flipping the brim of his hat—for the fresh young pretty face stared—jauntily made his exit, nonchalantly saying over his shoulder, ‘I will wait for you at your hotel, Sarah. We must return to London; we leave for Spain in a fortnight.’ Very proudly he added as he turned to face his wife and the young girl, ‘I have been appointed scientific adviser to the Spanish Republic.’

Sarah barely heard a word he spoke, she was obsessed with a desire that he leave, that he disappear, vanish from the face of the earth. Jake! What would they do to him?

Ushered, half soaked, into Stepanovich’s office, she saw that he paced behind his desk with a controlled tension that was frightening. Hurriedly she searched with her eyes about the room for Jake Starr, but he was not present, gone, she wondered, where?

‘Yes?’ Stepanovich asked curtly, continuing unabated his tense pacing.

‘I’ve come to explain—’

‘No explanations, Comrade Sarah,’ he said calmly enough. ‘Biology’s biology. The matter is out of our hands now.’ In the hands of God, she thought. ‘Return to your hotel, your husband’s waiting.’ He saw she still wished to speak. ‘Please go,’ he said, impatience thinning his lips.

Sarah held her ground. ‘I’ll go when I have concluded. Comrade Starr was no more culpable than I. It was merely, well, a passing fancy.’ She no longer believed it herself. ‘He himself told me there could be nothing more. He is totally committed to the party.’

Stepanovich halted his pacing to stare at her. How absurd that a revolutionist had to waste his time on the flirtations of middle-class women. ‘It is expected of him. Of you, too. And hereafter no passing fancies, please. The party will in the future let you know for whom to spread your legs. Goodnight.’

Sarah stood petrified with shock and disgust. She had humiliated herself, but that had not been enough. She felt immersed in filth.

Stepanovich smiled his eroded smile, wondering how she would look spread out beneath a man. A guard entered to his right and he nodded at him to lead Sarah from the room.

From the Tech-Bureau, Jake Starr went directly to the hotel. Rolfe Ruskin, waiting for Sarah’s return, hearing his footsteps on the stairs, opened the door, thinking it was she, Jake saw him, recognized who it must be—as did Rolfe. They nodded to each other, and Rolfe closed the door and Jake went into his room. Sarah was obviously not present, and Jake wondered where she was. He washed, changed clothes, packed his bag, he thought perhaps he should go to the man, say something to him, apologize for having hurt him. But what could he possibly say? Sorry, Comrade Ruskin, for having slept with your wife? No, it was best left alone. Though if Ruskin wished him harm he could hardly blame him.

The humiliation he had suffered at Step’s hands bit at him. It had been unnecessary. Stupid. Inhuman. He hoped Sarah would be spared—she wasn’t built for this kind of discipline. Dammit, where was she? What was keeping her? It was perfectly all right that the party should make these petty decisions, but that did not mean humiliations were painless or palatable. When he had made his decision to become a professional activist, he had understood these personal affronts would be part of the game. In the past he had learned to accept them, and would again. To be an activist one has to live in the world, not outside it, enveloped completely in oneself. That philosophy professor who had encouraged him to do graduate work had been contemptuous of his desire to be both a part and a molder of history.

‘First of all, you are vulgarizing Marx. Secondly, you are neglecting the importance of your own inner compulsions, desires, needs—and no man can do that and get away with it. Thirdly, if you attempt to change life without even making an attempt to understand your very own, your very self, you are gambling against great odds—the loser not merely yourself but perhaps a goodly number of others.’ Well, all right, he had accepted the gamble. For the chance to be part of a movement dedicated to uprooting the old social order with its chaos and injustice, he had to accept the risk of losing his personal liberty, even his life. Those in this world who wanted to move, to change, to discover, always had to take chances. Everything he had done since having made his decision had been in preparation for Spain. His personal feelings mattered little—or Sarah’s for that matter. Or Ruskin’s … For the briefest moment it occurred to him that he had no right to risk anyone else’s life but his own, but he hurriedly turned the thought aside. Tomorrow he would be in Spain. What would Roegen do to him? Not kill him. Not for this idiocy. They did not kill aimlessly. Vlanoc had repeated this a hundred times. ‘Nothing without purpose. Words, deeds, everything must be done with one thought in mind: advancing the time for seizing power.’ The worst Roegen could do was exactly what he, Jake, wanted: send him to the front. It seemed he had waited for this opportunity a lifetime. So to hell with own feelings. He loved Sarah—she had been wrong, it was no infatuation for him. He knew himself too well. When he committed himself, he went all the way. No half measures. He loved Sarah fully, deeply—he had known it quickly and found it impossible to forget her for a moment. She filled his inner life.

He was dressed, his bag was packed, he was wasting time. Where in the world could she be? Stepanovich had ordered him not to speak to her. Pure rhetoric. Step was playing out the game. If Ruskin loved his wife so much, why hadn’t he once come to visit her? Sarah wasn’t made of ice—he remembered what she had said that very morning, now I know what my body is made for!

No use waiting around. The ticket they had given him was for a first-class sleeper—only the best for a man ordered to report to Roegen. He smiled. Steak and potatoes for the condemned’s last meal. Roegen the assassin, he was called. Also the shiteater. ‘Why do you call him that?’ he had asked Vlanoc. Laughter. ‘None of your business. Learn not to ask questions like that.’

He picked up his bag, put out the light, his body refusing to hurry. Would go to the station, get a bite to eat, board the train, go to sleep. In the morning, there would be the Pyrenees. His heart leaped. Where was she! In the next room he could hear Rolfe Ruskin pacing back and forth. Was he wondering too?

He left his room, strode across the balcony, feeling Ruskin’s eyes on him, slowly descended the stairs, said good-bye to Comrade Concierge, her weightlifter’s shoulders hunched noncommittally. Marchand’s apparatus.

It had stopped raining, was dark and quiet. He stopped at the corner, put his bag down, debated whether to take a cab or use the Metro. Looked at his watch. Eight thirty. Had lots of time to kill. Oh, stop fooling yourself. You’re waiting for her. Accept it. You want to say good-bye.

He stepped into a doorway, lit a cigarette and decided to wait, feeling simultaneously defeated and elated.

Sarah, numbed and confused, walked slowly from Chabrol towards the hotel. A long walk but time was meaningless. Rolfe waited, she did not care. Let him wait. They had said Jake was leaving that very night and she wondered if he had.

Her shoulders as she walked trembled. She had come face to face with a reality she had not known existed. The party will let me know for whom I am to spread my legs.

She hastened her step. Her husband waited. In her room. Maybe that night he would want to sleep with her. She could still smell his clean male scent. His? Jake’s. After he had left that morning she had turned and kissed the pillow on which he had couched his head. A romantic schoolgirl. She did not give herself to a man lightly. Never had. Said from the vastness of her experience. She smiled. Becoming a real woman of the world. They would tell her whose pillow to kiss, whose scent to smell. She wished she could make the whole affair smaller than it was. She loved Rolfe. She loved Jake Starr. She hated herself. The coin is here, the coin is there, the coin can be anywhere.

She held back the tears.

Reality transformed dream into reality. She passed the dimly lit doorway where Jake stood waiting. He gripped her shoulders firmly, whirled her about, and she was in his arms, her back against the wall. ‘Sarah, Sarah,’ he whispered between kisses. And she bit at his lips, her heart pounding mercilessly, her head dizzy. ‘Sarah,’ he whispered, ‘my love.’ She became faint, heavy in his arms.

‘We can’t do it against the wall,’ he laughed. ‘It’s against the law.’

She laughed now, too. ‘I would do it anywhere with you,’ she said softly.

He held her at arm’s length, breathing heavily. ‘Even against the wall?’ he asked, his hand falling against her breast, gently caressing her.

Then she remembered, stiffened. And he remembered, too. Let her go.

‘Your husband’s up there,’ he said, nodding in the direction of the hotel.

‘I know.’

‘Tell me where you’ve been?’

She told him down to the very last humiliation.

‘He’s a barbaric son-of-a-bitch, Sarah. Forgive him. Forgive us. Sometimes the bureaucrats get carried away. Forget it.’

‘You forget it,’ she said coldly. ‘I shan’t.’ He merely stood speechless before her in the little vestibule. They were close. He wanted to take her in his arms again. Then with impossible imperturbability, impassivity even, she said, ‘You will be careful, won’t you?’

‘Sure, I’ll be careful.’ Right then he wanted to die.

‘The best soldier is a live soldier is what you always tell them.’ She smiled wryly.

‘Yes.’

‘We will be in Valencia, or do you know?’

‘I know.’

‘Will you write?’ she asked softly.

‘No. Neither will you,’ he said forcefully. Didn’t she understand?

She wanted to be angry, tried to be angry. ‘Are we permitted to think about each other?’ Words which should have been said with bitterness, sarcasm, they sounded vacuous, blank. He only shrugged, she could feel he was slipping away, would soon no longer be present. In truth, so was she.

‘No,’ he said humorlessly.

‘So be it.’

His bag in one hand, her elbow in the other, he led her out to the street. They were strangers now.

‘It’s time to go,’ he said quietly. ‘Good-bye, Sarah.’

‘Good-bye, Jake.’

He started to move towards her, stopped. They touched fingers, their last embrace.

He headed towards the Metro, and she to the hotel. Before he turned the corner, he waved, but it was too late. She had already entered the hotel.