Exiles in the Garden (27 page)

Andre paused here, his expression resigned. He took the cigarette pack from his pocket, looked at it, and put it back. Also, he said, I was able to ignore politics. Politics was not a part of the mountain air. Politics was elsewhere, vanished along with Hitler and Stalin. Yugoslavia was restless, but Yugoslavia is always restless, so little space, so many tribes. Yugoslavia is an unnatural state but it is beautiful all the same. We had no television and no newspapers. I was done with politics anyway. But you cannot remain incognito forever, Andre said. There are too many people in the world and they are always traveling and eventually an acquaintance arrives at the resort. She doesn't recognize me but I recognize her because I make it my business to look closely at our travelers. She is the wife of an old comrade. She is alone. I'm the sort of fellow, as I'm sure you understand, who is naturally curious. When I have an itch I scratch the itch. So when she arrives at my chairlift I say to her,

How are you, Sonja?

She looks at me, bewildered.

It's Andre, Sonja.

Of course she thinks she has seen a ghost. I thought she would faint.

Andre?

Yes, Andre.

I heard a rumor—

That I was alive after all?

Yes, that was the rumor. I didn't believe it.

As you can see, Sonja. Here I am.

Unchanged, she said.

Yet you did not recognize me.

Do you always wear your ski mask, Andre? Indoors as well as out?

So I closed the chairlift and we walked in the cold to the village for lunch, a lunch that lasted most of the afternoon as Sonja brought me up to date. Her husband, Rolf, my old friend, is dead. Two of her three sons have said goodbye to her and immigrated to America. They went to Detroit to work in the auto industry. She does not know the whereabouts of her youngest boy but she fears he is involved in the Prague underworld. He sends her money every month, she says, and as she talks I remember this child—now a middle-aged man—as sweet-tempered and shy, everyone's favorite. Sonja asks me if I know about the Prague underworld and I say I do not. She tells me that Prague now is worse than it was under the Soviets, and then she paused and said that hers was a generational attitude. Young people seem to thrive in Prague, the films, the music and the dancing, the sex. We had sex, too, but not so much music and dancing. We did not have the money for music and dancing and if we did have the money music and dancing were not permitted or at least not permitted to excess. Amusement generally was discouraged, but we found a way, didn't we, Andre? I would say we reached a separate peace, Sonja said. She brought me the news of all our mutual friends, many of them gone, most of the rest living here and there on the margins. She herself lived in a village in Bohemia. There are still a few around who would love to see you, Sonja said. Your name comes up all the time. They say you were the best, Andre.

I'm retired, I told her.

What are you retired from, Andre? She said this with a smile.

Politics, I said.

Did I mention politics?

You were about to, I said.

I heard you were in Russia, she said.

I was, I told her.

She nodded, an expression of sympathy, and did not inquire further. The details of the camps were well known and my story did not differ in any important way from the other stories. She said, I would like to tell our friends that you're back among us. That the rumor is true. That you live here. Allow me to do this. It would mean a great deal to them to see you again. You look well, by the way.

I lead a healthy life, I told her.

How long have you been here?

Years, I said.

Living alone? she said.

Oh, yes.

That's not like you, Andre.

I told you, I said. I'm retired.

Retired from life? she said.

Something like that, I said.

So I may tell the others?

I would appreciate it if you didn't, I said.

You're content, then, with your chairlift and your skiing lessons.

For the moment, I said.

Very well, she said. I understand.

Of course she didn't understand. There's a limit to understanding. Extreme situations do not yield to understanding. She sympathized and that was enough. We seemed to have run out of conversation. I am sure that if a stranger had stepped into the restaurant he would have taken us for an old married couple, together so long we did not have to speak to make ourselves understood. Coffee grew cold in our cups but still we did not move. Sonja was staring out one window, I out another. The waiter dozed at a table in the corner. Something remained to be said but I did not know what it was. Finally Sonja looked up.

Do you remember Dusko? Of course you remember Dusko, she said, everyone knows Dusko the busybody. She went on and on about Dusko, leading up to something, I couldn't imagine what. Then she said that Dusko was back on the battlefield, our battlefield, the one her husband Rolf and I occupied during World War Two. He had been at it a year or more investigating the killings. The word Sonja used was "atrocities." Dusko was methodically driving from village to village collecting evidence, searching for documents, interviewing everyone in sight. A number of villagers remembered the German occupation very well and that was the focus of Dusko's inquiry. They were eager to tell of their privations, the cruelty of the Germans and the atmosphere of violence everywhere in the district. And in the course of his interviews, Sonja said, he turned up evidence of atrocities committed by our commando, Rolf's and mine. You know Dusko, she said, he's tireless. He'll go to the ends of the earth if he has to.

Who's paying him? I said.

A writer, Sonja said.

What kind of writer? I asked.

An American historian, Sonja said. The historian is writing a book on forgotten atrocities of World War Two in Europe. He's compiled quite a list, mostly Nazi atrocities. But Nazi atrocities are a dime a dozen, they're not news. But he thinks he's on to something fresh with your commando, your international brigade doing the Lord's work in Yugoslavia. So he and Dusko are retracing your line of march, your orders, where you went, what you did, and who you did it to. A neglected episode, the historian calls it. That's according to Dusko.

I looked at my watch. Time to go.

It would be good if you would have a word with Dusko, Andre. Your word would carry weight with him. It's monstrous, what he's doing.

I have no interest in Dusko, I said.

That's not the point, Andre. Dusko has an interest in you.

And poor Rolf, she added.

I can't bear it.

Andre smiled into the darkness, poured schnapps once more, and lit a cigarette. Alec leaned forward in his chair, rapt, waiting for the rest of the story. But Andre had said all he was prepared to say. The story hung there like the smoke from his cigarette, slowly dispersing in the balmy air. Lucia nervously turned her wedding ring and stared at her father.

What did you do, Papa?

Hush, Andre said. Enjoy the evening.

I can't enjoy the evening, Lucia said.

I'm tired, Andre said. I've talked too much.

I don't know what to think, Lucia said.

Andre shrugged and began to rock in his chair. He blew one smoke ring after another and took a swallow of schnapps, shuddering. All the houses round and about had lights burning, television's electric glow visible in every living room. A settled community, Alec thought. What must they think of the inhabitants of Goya House? From far away came the bleat of an ambulance siren.

Did you find Dusko? Alec asked.

It wasn't hard, Andre said. It was like following the tracks of an elephant. Dusko and his historian were not careful. Nor discreet. They made enemies wherever they went because they excited suspicion. No one knew what they were after really. The American had an unfortunate manner. I had never met anyone like him before until I came here and began to watch American television, news programs and quiz shows. He seemed to think he was bringing enlightenment to these peasant communities and they were somehow obligated to tell him whatever they knew. And a few did. There were many scars from the war and the scars have not healed. They will never heal. I believe Dusko and the historian were in some danger owing to the indiscreet way they went about things, their brusque questions and insistence on answers. Dusko should have known better. But he was being very well paid and I think in some sense he was seeking absolution for his own actions in the war. Or, I should say, his inaction. So they were in a spot of trouble when I arrived. I don't think they knew how much trouble. When Dusko saw me he nearly collapsed. He pretended not to know me. He pretended not to know my name.

Dusko has had a loss of memory, I told the historian.

No wonder, so many years ago. But I'm sure, on reflection, he'll recall our long and complicated friendship.

I bring regards from Sonja.

Sonja told me of your project and now I'm here to help.

After you, I said, ushering Dusko and the historian into their car, a green Land Rover piled high with expensive luggage, food in tins, and a case of whiskey. The American historian was quite young, I would judge not yet fifty years old, too young to have known the war. I directed them to one village after another, describing the actions of my commando. I spared nothing. I told them everything in my memory. Along the way I helped them interview the old people who had been present. Once or twice my name came up, not always in a flattering way. I did nothing to prevent them telling their stories nor did I disclose my identity to them. Once or twice I was able to help them along, innocently asking questions about this bridge or that rail line. The farmhouse where the Nazi headquarters was. Many times the old people answered falsely or incompletely, at least according to my memory of events. We drove from one district to another with the aid of a map someone had given the historian. I was with them for almost half a year and at the end of that time they had a fairly complete picture of our orders, where we went, what we did, and who we did it to. Also, they had a fairly complete picture of the Nazis, what they did, and who they did it to. I wanted them to know the war in the round, the atmosphere at the time, the hatred we felt one to the others. How the cost in lives diminished year to year until at the end of the war the cost was negligible. Hardly any cost at all. There were so many dead that the battlefield seemed to us like a bonfire, and the dead so many stray twigs fed into it. They had no more significance than that. We killed anything that moved. So did they. We both did terrible things. They killed many more because they had many more men and heavy weapons. But that was the only reason. I walked Dusko and his historian through each action, where we were, where they were, how the matter progressed, and the results. I described our tactics, their tactics, and the advantages and disadvantages of each. I described also the civilians who were caught up in it. They had nowhere to go. For them we were like a great natural disaster, a hurricane or a flood, except there was no high ground. And at last the fascists caught us. They killed most everyone in the commando. We had nowhere to run. But five of us survived and the other four died in the prison camp in Poland. We five were greatly surprised that they did not shoot us where we lay but I think they wanted us to experience a German prison camp. The camp would be the great punishment. I wanted Dusko and his American historian to understand the world we lived in, its limits and its excesses, how things went day to day, and the kind of man you became. But in the end they did not understand any more than Sonja understood. Any more than you understand. So I was left with sympathy. I wanted them to know that no one could judge us. No one had the right. No one who was not there with us day to day. Perhaps God will judge us. But we doubted that God would take the trouble.

Andre fell silent again and gave an enormous yawn.

Lucia said, Was the book ever published?

No. It was never written.

The historian took your advice, then.

Andre shook his head. No. He died. When Andre saw the look on Lucia's face he smiled fractionally and added, Natural causes. He worked and worked on the book, worked on it for years. But in the end he could not write it. In any case, he didn't. From time to time he would pass me a letter via Dusko, questions about this or that event. Trivial questions, I thought. Dates, times of day, the nutritional value of the rations we ate, the color of a man's eyes. Then the letters stopped. Dusko sent word that the historian was dead. A little after that Dusko died and the matter was closed.

All this time Andre had been talking directly to his daughter, watching her reactions to his account.

The silence lengthened. Alec said, What was the historian's name?

Andre said, Holder.

Jimmy Holder, Alec said. I knew him. He was one of the foreign correspondents on the paper I worked for. He went to Vietnam, one tour after another. He couldn't get enough of it. He was one of those who was unable to forget the war. He quit the paper to write books, military histories. Successful books.

That was his name, Andre said. He continued to look at Lucia, whose eyes were downcast. He was uninterested in the biography of Jimmy Holder. As he said, the matter was closed. Yet one fact of Andre's tale was in error. The historian did not die of natural causes. He took his own life after his wife died. He himself was in poor health and could not manage without her. That was the explanation that went around.

I knew him quite well, Alec said. Lucia did, too.

Andre shook his head, tapping his earpiece; evidently he did not hear Alec clearly. He turned to Lucia and asked some question about Nikolas. Alec slipped off into reverie, remembering Jimmy Holder. Everyone liked him, a hard-drinking raconteur who did not approve of Alec's refusal to photograph the war. Such a refusal gave all journalists a bad name and served only to fortify the right wing, and he implied that Alec's reputation would suffer also. Everyone had to pay his dues. When Alec quit the paper Jimmy Holder said he had made the right decision. Despite the disagreement they remained friends, though they saw less and less of each other as time went on. Alec was bemused at the coincidence and had difficulty imagining Jimmy, overweight and hung-over, charging around Yugoslavia with Andre. Coincidence seemed epidemic in the news business, friendships replicating the news itself, so often repetitive, reductive, and inclined to formula.