How this state has mocked us!

ANATOLY RYBAKOV

It was raining in Moscow. At Sheremetyevo, Kostya hailed a taxi. He would have liked to have let his friend know he was coming so Alania could pick him up from the airport, but he hadn’t been able to reach him. He’d been trying for over a week, but Alania remained elusive. Kostya hadn’t let that put him off, though. He still had enough friends in the Lubyanka; he would find him.

He had taken a room in the Hotel Mir, and on the way there he felt all the pressure of the past week, the discontent, the anger, ebbing away. As always when he approached this city, he felt safe. The city seemed to welcome him. And unlike Leningrad, no nightmares bound him to Moscow. This was where he had reached the pinnacle of his career. Achieved fame and respect. Those had been better times; times that he loved to recall.

After putting his luggage in his room, he had the taxi take him straight to the Sovietsky, the legendary restaurant you had to earn the right to eat in.

He ordered Crimean champagne, caviar blinis, fish in beetroot sauce. For a while, he let all his troubles fall away. Here, he was his old self: the powerful, generous Kostya who had everything under his control. To finish, he treated himself to a birch vodka, then headed off for Kutuzovsky Prospect — the most recent address he had for Alania.

He would talk to him; Alania, his good old friend, would back him up; he’d get everything straightened out. He would show these lickspittles who it was they were dealing with. If the worst came to the worst, Alania could write him a transfer letter, talk to the right people. And if there were no other way round it, Kostya would move back to Moscow. He would take Daria with him. She would have her school-leaving certificate soon, and she would get a decent university place here. He would rent a nice apartment near Sadovaya, an area he had always been particularly fond of.

He felt strong and full of vigour. It was the city that gave him this good feeling. He would make a fresh start. Leave that Georgian rabble behind and start dealing with professionals and honourable men at long last.

And he still had a few numbers in his address book. Of course, some of his former companions might now be wives and mothers, but others would still be happy to revive the good old days.

If his countryman Shevardnadze had risen to become First Secretary of the Georgian SSR and then Soviet Foreign Minister, then he, Kostya Jashi, could rise to similar heights. He just had to get in front of the right people.

From the back seat of the taxi, he looked out at the familiar streets and squares, the boulevards and buildings. Yes, here he had been happy, here everything had been all right. Elene had been here with him, and her love had belonged to him alone. He leaned back. The rain had eased off and the sky was clearing. The streetlamps were starting to come on.

He got out in front of a tower block. A new building that wasn’t familiar to him. Why had his friend come back, anyway? He soon found the nameplate. An old woman was just coming out of the block; he quickly slipped through the main door and took the lift to the ninth floor. He rang the bell. No one answered. Then he started knocking. Somehow he knew Alania was there. He knocked and called out:

‘It’s me, Kostya! Giorgi, are you there? I think you are. Come on, it’s me. I flew to Moscow, I have to see you.’

Suddenly he heard footsteps behind the door, and slowly the handle turned. A bald head appeared. Alania had aged a great deal. His cheeks were sunken; he had obviously lost weight, and it made him look even slighter and more frail than before. His lips were dry and cracked. And he was unkempt, although he had always placed such value on his appearance.

The flat was in disarray. Hasn’t been cleaned in a long time, thought Kostya. There were piles of unwashed crockery in the kitchen. The place smelled of alcohol and stale air. Alania fixed Kostya with his small eyes and tried to smile. Then he opened his thin arms and embraced his old friend.

‘I’ve been trying to reach you for over a week. Nobody could tell me anything. I didn’t know how else to get hold of you. I flew here to talk to you. I was sure I’d find you. Come on, you old bastard, give me another hug!’

Alania fetched a vodka bottle and, without asking, poured them both a glass of the clear liquid. ‘Vodka? You?’

Kostya tried to appear cheerful and ignore the mess.

‘Three more days. Then I’m gone. Forever,’ said Alania with a smile, raising his glass to Kostya.

‘What do you mean, gone? Gone where?’

‘A chess tournament in Holland. And then I’ll disappear. London.’

‘What are you talking about? You’re going AWOL?’

‘It’s all over, Kostya. All of it. I’m going back to London; nothing else matters now.’ He poured himself another glass.

‘Now then, Alania, I don’t like the sound of this at all — what are you going on about?’

‘If they catch me, they catch me. I don’t care.’

‘Hey, look at me. What on earth has got into you? Yes, of course I know things aren’t exactly going well for us — I mean, no wonder, just look at the scoundrels they’ve got on the Central Committee now — but that’s no reason to …’

‘It’s over, can’t you see? It’s over.’

‘Then retire, but stop talking such nonsense, my friend.’

‘We failed, Kostya. All of us. It was all for nothing.’

‘Hey, Gio, I really don’t like the sound of this. And why are you drinking, all of a sudden? You’ve never been a drinker!’

‘I sent people back. I forced hundreds of them onto boats and planes; I lied to them and made false promises. Some of them would die, I knew that, and I carried on all the same. It was my job. Some went straight to the camps. Most went to the camps. I did that. I sent people to their deaths, do you understand?’

‘Listen! They were deserters, enemies of the state, and traitors of the worst kind. What else could you have done but your duty? You served your country, Giorgi; you did nothing wrong! You acted out of loyalty and devotion to your country! And now you’re sitting in this pigsty feeling sorry for yourself!’

‘Do you remember when we were in Leningrad? How wonderful that was. We believed in what we were doing. We had so many plans.’ Alania suddenly slumped back in his chair, put down his glass, and stared out of the grimy window into the night. ‘It was all just lies, illusions. And that’s what we devoted our lives to. Don’t you understand, Kostya?’

The telephone started to ring. Alania didn’t move, as if he couldn’t hear it.

‘Gio, you should answer that.’

‘Like hell I will.’ His voice suddenly sounded angry. He shook his head and reached for the vodka bottle again. ‘This whole farce. Why aren’t you sick of it yet, why don’t you give it up? It’s a mystery to me.’

He poured himself another glass.

‘You shouldn’t drink so much.’

‘Drink? I shouldn’t drink so much? I should drink myself to death. I thought I was doing something meaningful by serving my country, I thought I … I’m not even worth spitting on. And you. Look at you. You …’

‘Now just you calm down!’

‘I don’t want to calm down. I’m going. I’m going to her.’

‘Her?’

‘Your sister.’

‘I don’t believe it… Don’t tell me, at your age, you … Oh dear God, not Kitty, please!’

‘She’s the only person who —’

‘You’re not going anywhere. You’ll turn down the trip. You’ll be off sick. I won’t allow you to make a fool of yourself. I mean: you, one of the KGB’s finest, getting caught somewhere in the West, trying to escape? I won’t allow it!’

‘Kostya, why won’t you understand? It’s finished; it’s over. There’s no mercy for our kind, one way or the other. And soon none of this is going to exist! Look around you!’

‘Alania, you’re being sentimental. You need to pull yourself together and get a grip on your life again. We’ll get through this together, we’ve survived worse things.’

‘And why are you here? To get me back on track?’ Alania suddenly snapped at him. ‘Do you want an interview at the Lubyanka? Things got a bit tricky for you at home, have they? Has the ground already started to shake in our homeland? You’re clutching at the wrong straw, my friend.’

‘Has something been going on all these years between you and Kitty?’

Kostya emptied his glass in one gulp. Something had to be done; this business was completely outrageous. Alania, Giorgi Alania, with his exemplary career, Kostya’s personal hero!

‘Was something going on? What do you think was going on? This shitty game of hide-and-seek, that’s what was going on. And I was blind enough not to understand that she was my only anchor. I’m going to seize my last chance — and you, you should, too.’

They must have entered into some kind of relationship, he and Kitty; it had been bound to happen after he’d spent so many years protecting her. Kostya might have known. His western, liberal sister must have put the idea in Alania’s head. Suddenly, a thought came to him: he shouldn’t stay here; he should take Alania to Tbilisi with him instead. Moscow had never been Alania’s city the way it had been Kostya’s. Alania was too unprepossessing, too quiet for the city; he challenged it too little. He was more suited to the south, with his sentimentality and the Georgian sing-song in his voice. Yes, he would take Alania with him and save him from himself.

‘You’re going to take a week or two off, and we’re going to fly to Tbilisi. I’ll take care of it tomorrow. This place isn’t doing you any good. Can’t you afford a better flat? No wonder you’re fading away here.’

‘Kostya, Kostya: steadfast and incorrigible, hmm? Have you heard about Afghanistan?’ Alania said. ‘A total disaster. You don’t want to know how many were killed — I mean the real number, not the official one. They’re going to pull our troops out in the next couple of years, because there’s nothing they can do there. The arms industry will be reduced to a minimum. Your fabulous nuclear submarines will be scrapped. They haven’t realised that their well-intentioned “good deeds” are just going to make everything worse. They can’t see that the criticism they’ve suddenly begun to allow will bring the whole house of cards tumbling down.’ He spoke thoughtfully, his face turned towards the window. ‘They’re still using these reforms to try to score points with the population, but they’re overestimating themselves. If you’re sitting on a dung heap, you shouldn’t let people go poking about in it. The road ahead is not going to be a peaceful one. As soon as they loosen their grip, everyone will start clamouring for their own piece of the pie and holding their hand out, but unfortunately there won’t be much left of the pie by then, Kostya. And if you don’t open your eyes soon, you’re going to be stuck inside this house of cards when it falls in on you. The West will applaud when the “evil empire” turns out not to be so evil, after all, and shows itself ready to cooperate. They’ll cry hurrah, because they aren’t sending tanks onto the streets. But the fucking tanks will be there, all right, it’s just that they won’t be sent out in the name of the Communist Party any more, and that’s the only thing the West cares about. The feeling that they were right all along, that they were tough and patient enough to wait until our glorious homeland drove itself into the ground. So, look around and open your eyes, my friend! Take some good advice from a friend. And, by the way, men like you, Kostya, are the worst at dealing with failure.’

Alania was speaking quietly again now, calmly. Kostya lowered his head, trying to focus on his goal, and not attribute any great significance to Alania’s words. He had to stop him; he had to save Alania, as Alania had once saved him. Alania would insist on his truth, and ruin himself. Kostya couldn’t allow that.

*

At about seven the next morning, when Alania had finally fallen into a drunken sleep, Kostya crept out of the flat and drove to the Lubyanka. His pass gained him access to the building, but he was sent to the waiting room and instructed to take a seat until the director arrived. Kostya tried not to show how offended he was. No one would have dared to make him wait in the old days. Well, his friend was right about one thing: the old days were no more. Another age had dawned.

It was only at around nine that Alania’s director appeared and ushered him into his office. Kostya introduced himself and told him that Alania was sick and in urgent need of a rest cure, and for this reason was unable to travel with the chess team. The stout young man with the rosy cheeks jotted something down in his notebook and nodded in agreement. Kostya mentioned that he had missed being in Moscow, in the hope that the man would ask where he had come from. And he did, but just as Kostya was getting into his stride and was about to tell him about his career and his history, the man — who was many years his junior — interrupted and excused himself, saying that he was very busy.

At the hotel, he dropped wearily onto the bed. Yes, times had definitely changed. No, not for the better, not for the better, he thought to himself, before falling into a deep sleep.

*

‘How could you?’ There was despair in Alania’s voice. ‘You were my best, my only friend.’

The ringing had jolted Kostya awake, and he crawled to the telephone. How had Alania found him, he wondered: he had left no address. Well — he was a man of great intelligence.

‘You were about to ruin your life. You should be thanking me for saving your neck.’

‘You haven’t saved anything, you’ve destroyed it all! I don’t have any more foreign postings this year. She’ll … she’ll never forgive me.’

It was dark in the room. What time was it? How long had he slept? This business with Alania was starting to get on his nerves. He switched on the bedside lamp.

‘Now listen here, Giorgi. Shut up and listen to me! You’re behaving like a sixteen-year-old. Wake up! You were about to throw everything away, and I stopped you. You’ll thank me for this one day! You need peace and quiet and good people who’ll take care of you. You need good food and fresh air. The day after tomorrow we’re flying to Tbilisi, and you can stay there for as long as you need to get back to your old self.’

Alania didn’t turn up at the airport. Kostya also missed the flight: he went back to Alania’s flat, but the door remained locked, and his incessant ringing, knocking, and shouting went unanswered.

The next day, Kostya boarded the plane to Tbilisi alone. Embittered, disappointed, brooding.

*

She hadn’t left the flat for two weeks. She’d even had her food delivered. Nor did she answer the phone, and even when Amy started a riot under her window and nearly got into a fistfight with the paparazzi lurking there, Kitty didn’t open the door.

That evening, she had a gig at a private club in Notting Hill, to raise funds for people infected with HIV. She had to go out. She had to force herself out. She had been standing in front of the wardrobe for half an hour, unable even to take out the necessary clothes and get dressed. A chauffeur was picking her up soon, in a limousine with blacked-out windows, to drive her to the club. That was good; she was sure she could have a little whisky in the car.

She had been reading the papers and thinking about the fact that the world was in the process of turning the page. That evening she would send her backing singers away and take to the stage alone, just her and her guitar. She wanted to be alone.

In the past two weeks she had spoken with Andro a lot. He was there all the time. Even when she couldn’t see him, she could sense him. But he hadn’t turned up since yesterday. Neither under her window nor in her head.

She found a black blazer and put it on over her bare skin. She tried to apply some lipstick, but her hand was trembling and she couldn’t draw a straight line. Not much longer now and she could get in the car and allow herself a drink. Another hour or two and she would have got through the evening. Just three songs to sing. Three songs she wanted to sing alone.

As they drove past Ladbroke Gardens she held her face out to the breeze, stuck her head out of the open window, felt the bitter, warming taste of whisky on her tongue. She leaned back. She knew she was losing her mind. In the last few days, she had even heard Mariam whispering in her ear. Heard her mother calling to her. And the previous night she had been woken by a tantalising scent. The smell of her grandfather’s hot chocolate.

‘Damn it all, I nearly died of worry. I didn’t even know if you were going to turn up today. What on earth is up with you? Were you ill? Why didn’t you open the door to me, or answer the phone? Those bloody photographers have been skulking around outside your house twenty-four hours a day. I almost lost it. Oh god, I’m so relieved you’re here.’

Amy, in a sparkling jumpsuit and too much make-up, came running up to her, put an arm around her shoulder, and steered her through the backstage area. Kitty wanted to sing Amy a hymn of gratitude. Wanted to kiss her hands and weep with emotion when she saw the stage prepared perfectly for her and the cough sweets Amy had placed ready in a bowl in the wings. But she didn’t have the strength. She would be lucky if she had enough strength for three songs.

At least there were no cameras this evening. It was a private event. She wondered how much they had already collected. For a good cause. Who even knew what a good cause was?

She clutched her guitar. Her most secure anchor in life. The lights dimmed. The sophisticated, wealthy audience regarded her with curiosity as she stepped into the cone of light on stage. She spoke a few words of greeting that Amy had asked her to say into the mic. Yes, donate, please, please donate! Then she closed her eyes. She sensed her. She was there. Fred Lieblich had come. She was standing down there somewhere, looking at her with her cat’s eyes. The woman who had come back to life — but life was much too restless: it hadn’t waited for her, for either of them.

She sang, and in the last song she raised her voice, higher and higher, until it cracked and a deep, beautiful silence took possession of her. She felt as if she were about to faint. It was so easy to disappear when so many eyes were on you. For the length of a song, it was possible to forget. Carried by the applause, she swam off stage, sank into a swivel chair in the dressing room, and laid her head on the make-up table. Amy fussed over her. Laughed; was delighted. Kitty didn’t listen to her. She looked at herself in the mirror. In the pitiless light of the make-up mirror. The wrinkles, the exhaustion, her attempt to outrun time. The bewilderment in her eyes. Luckily, Amy vanished from the dressing room again, to ‘do some networking’, as she called it, and left her there alone.

‘You’re not doing so well. Let’s get out of here.’

Fred was standing in the doorway. What a beautiful person, Kitty thought to herself, looking at her in the mirror, and what a waste.

‘I’m fine.’ Kitty straightened up.

‘You’re lying. I’ve got a car, and I’m sober. Let’s run away.’

‘Where to?’

‘Wherever you want.’

‘There’s nowhere I want to go.’

‘There’s always the sea.’

‘That’s too far.’

‘Doesn’t matter. Come on, I’m not going to gobble you up. You need some fresh air. Come on!’

They crept out the back way. Fred had parked an old van not far from the stage door. Amy must have got her a backstage pass; she would hardly have got into the club otherwise. In the van, Kitty was suddenly overcome by an incredible tiredness, and closed her eyes. She had brought only her guitar and a small handbag. She’d even left her coat behind.

‘You need to head for Eastbourne. I’ll tell you where to turn off,’ she told Fred, before falling asleep.

The journey of almost two hours completely passed her by. She hadn’t slept so well and so deeply for a long time, without nightmares jolting her awake.

‘So this provincial backwater is where Madame Jashi is making a home for her old age?’

Kitty slowly opened her eyes and heard Fred laughing.

‘Go left here; it’s the second turn-off on the right.’

She switched the light on. How long was it since she had last been here? When her sad friend had come to find her, arriving out of the blue and promising to return.

The house seemed lost in a sleeping-beauty slumber. The night was clear and warm. They could hear the sea. Kitty instantly felt better. Fred lit a cigarette and stood outside the door.

‘Let’s go down to the water. I’ve got big torches and blankets. There are some dried peaches left, and some good Scotch.’

Fred agreed enthusiastically.

They made their way to the sea with the torches. It took them a while to walk the narrow path along the steep cliffs and down to the beach, where they spread the blankets on the damp sand and stretched out. It was so frighteningly peaceful and quiet. The sharp sickle of the crescent moon bathed the water in a yellowish light.

Fred touched her, her hand wandering up Kitty’s spine. Then she took Kitty in her arms. Kissed her face. Stroked her skin. Kitty let it happen. It felt good. It felt like coming home. The stars were sprinkled across the sky like tiny freckles. They lay together. They brushed the hair from each other’s foreheads. Kitty took Fred’s face in her hands and looked at her, committing her to memory.

‘It’s my turn now,’ said Fred Lieblich.

A few metres away, at the foot of the cliff, Kitty saw Andro standing; she rubbed her eyes, tried to concentrate on Fred’s face, but he was still there. He had returned. She sensed his presence with every fibre of her body.

‘What is it?’ asked Fred, grasping her wrist. ‘Are you cold?’

‘No, it’s fine.’

‘I want to know what’s wrong. I want to be there. For you. Please, let me.’

‘Let’s just be here, you and me, that’s all.’

‘Yes.’

‘Yes what?’

‘We can go to Vienna.’

‘Vienna.’

‘I could show you some beautiful places, if they’re still there, and we can drink the best hot chocolate in the world.’

‘I doubt that.’

Fred laid her head in Kitty’s lap and dreamed herself away, to the Vienna of her childhood. Before she learned what it sounds like when you cut a body down from a rope. She sipped the good Scotch Kitty had brought. Later, she couldn’t remember when exactly she had fallen asleep.

*

Kitty took off her clothes. She wanted to be naked. Free. She folded her underwear. Neatly, as her mother had taught her when she was a little girl. Andro was standing behind her, watching. Then she stepped tentatively into the cold water. The waves pounded against her skin, made her suppress the cries she wanted to let out; she dived under. The water carried her out. In the distance she could still see the light of the torches, the blanket, the woman lying on it, until everything fused together into a tiny bright dot.

Andro was swimming behind her. Kitty swallowed water. The waves were high; they rocked her to and fro, tossed her out and back again. She was afraid, but only briefly, only until Andro’s face appeared before her again. Darkness lay over the water; she couldn’t see anything in front of her and she was disorientated. Even the light vanished into the distance. Then, suddenly, something gleamed beneath her feet. Little fish, a shoal of little fish was circling her. It made her laugh out loud.

This is happiness, thought Kitty: happiness. Like afternoon sweat on our skin after we made love, back then, the first time. The last song tonight, and the gratitude in Amy’s eyes. The loneliness of Giorgi Alania, which I ended for one second of his life when I held him. The bus journeys across America. These fish beneath my feet, this moon above me, these cliffs, these waves, and the fear, vanishing.

She circled her arms in the emptiness. There was no shore any more. No earth. Just nothingness, and the little fish, swimming with her, and the endless water.

Kostya’s laughter, when she managed to make him laugh. Andro’s soft kisses on her lips. Cherries, which always gave her a stomach ache. Her mother’s worry lines, at the exact centre of her forehead. The songs. The concert in Amsterdam, the incredible excitement that had greeted her. Had she earned it, this happiness? If all these people knew what she had done, would they go on buying her records and singing her songs?

She went under; she could feel her strength leaving her.

‘Mariam?’ She reached out her hand. ‘Did it hurt? What was it like? Does it hurt?’

They stood me against the wall. Then the first shot came. And then another. I think there were three; they do it to make sure. It was quick. I didn’t feel much. Don’t worry.

Mariam’s voice echoed in her head.

‘I don’t want you to hate me, Mariam.’

How could I hate you, Kitty? Don’t you remember how good things were when we were together?

‘It wasn’t good. It was hell on earth.’

Don’t talk nonsense. Remember. We lived, Kitty. We were there.

Kitty couldn’t reply. Her lungs were already filling with water. But the fish swam around her and shone with a fantastic green light.

*

Her body was pulled from the water three hours after Fred Lieblich alerted the coastguard. She hadn’t drifted very far. She’d never been a good swimmer, and it hadn’t taken long for her strength and breath to fail her.