Face Me When You Walk Away (3 page)

Josef refused to accept the bait.

‘I thought I was to be allowed my honeymoon,' he said. Devgeny would expect protest and be suspicious if it were not made.

‘You were,' said Devgeny, in a voice showing it had never been the intention. ‘But as I said, things are happening a little faster than we anticipated.'

‘Like what?' demanded Josef, emphasizing the truculence.

‘Nikolai is on the Nobel prize short-list,' announced Devgeny.

‘We knew that weeks ago,' said Josef. He allowed the exasperation to leak into his voice. Devgeny was achieving too much superiority. ‘We're already engaged in negotiations with Western publishing houses.'

‘But we didn't know the other possibilities. There is a black American, Aaron Jones, whom no one thinks has much of a chance. I gather he's been listed for political reasons.'

‘Doesn't the whole thing degenerate into politics?' asked Josef. He had to interrupt, to prove he wasn't frightened. Devgeny ignored the question.

‘Nikolai,' he listed, like a quizmaster announcing prizes. ‘… Aaron Jones …'

He paused, theatrically. Fool, thought Josef.

‘… and Lin Tsai-Fu.' Devgeny was pleased at the effect upon Josef. ‘From Peking,' he continued. ‘His poetry and descriptive powers are said by those who've read him in the original to be magnificent.'

‘So …' began Josef.

‘So your task becomes incredibly important,' cut in Devgeny, uttering the thoughts that butterflied through Josefs mind. ‘It would be very unfortunate for a member of the People's Republic of China to be selected and feted as a better writer than a Russian …'

Devgeny smiled, looking straight at him, like a cat that has finally exhausted an elusive mouse.

‘The Nobel Foundation have intimated quite clearly that they wish to nominate Nikolai,' continued the Minister. ‘But they're nervous of another Solzhenitsyn problem. Before his name leaks out, they want a positive assurance from us that there'll be no difficulties.'

Josef stared across the table at him, cautiously. ‘The decision is irrevocable?'

‘Such suspicion, Comrade Bultova!' mocked Devgeny, still smiling. His teeth were green and discoloured near the gums, where he never bothered to clean them. Josef remembered his own had been like that when he had left the camp.

‘Just careful,' said Josef, preparing a defence. ‘I want it clearly understood by everyone what I am required to do.'

There was an unintended tinge of desperation in the statement. His eyes remained on the man facing him across the table, assessing his chances later of being able to establish his caution before any examining body. Only Ballenin would be honest, he decided. But his account would be overwhelmed by the other three. The flicker of fear returned. Poor Pamela, he thought.

‘So I will give them the assurance?' he queried.

‘Of course you will,' said Devgeny, like a schoolteacher addressing a particularly dull student. ‘But we expect much more of you …'

‘There is no way I can influence the actual selection, for God's sake,' erupted Josef.

Devgeny gazed at him, theatrically surprised. The tip of Josef's hysteria had just been visible.

‘I wasn't for a moment suggesting you could,' said the Minister, enjoying his superiority. ‘Please let me finish.'

Sweat pricked out on Josef's face. Devgeny would be able to see it and guess the fear, he thought.

‘It's been decided that Nikolai is a good Russian,' continued Devgeny. ‘He's someone of whom Russia feels proud.'

‘What's the point you're making?' probed Josef. He was irritated at Devgeny's determination to manipulate him and pride was fuelling his anger.

‘If Nikolai gets the award, he will become …'

He paused. He had waited a long time, Josef thought. He wanted to prolong it as long as possible.

‘… What's the expression your Western friends would use, Josef? A hot property?'

Josef sat without replying.

‘… Yes, that's it. A hot property. So as well as negotiating with the publishers in England and America with whom you've already established contact, we want you to accompany him on publicity tours to those countries.'

Surprise robbed Josef of response for several moments. Desperately he tried to isolate the snares that Devgeny was laying.

‘You're going to let Nikolai tour the West…?'

‘But it'll be easy for him. Josef,' broke in Devgeny. ‘He'll have you to guide him. And nothing can go wrong if you're looking after him, can it?'

For a long time, the five men sat in complete silence.

Then Josef said, ‘Of course, there's no guarantee he'll get the award.'

The hope was too discernible and Devgeny smiled.

‘Oh, but that would be too bad,' said the Minister. We've made our minds up. I can't stress strongly enough how distressed we would be if China got an award we regard as ours.'

The nightmare that night was one of the worst. When he awakened in the Moscow apartment, he was unable to breathe and almost lapsed into unconsciousness before forcing air, by sheer strength of will, into his lungs. In the bathroom he discovered there were no sleeping pills. The briefcase in which he kept a supply when he was travelling was empty, too, so he dragged the padded quilt from the bed and sat, cocooned in it, staring out over the capital until the first fingers of dawn appeared, squeezing life into the city.

He could have commanded a king's ransom for a quilt as warm as this in Potma, he thought. He wondered if Medev had been brave and succeeded in the attempt he had been too cowardly to accomplish. Probably, decided Josef. Medev had always been the braver of the two.

3

The feeling between them was so real Pamela felt she could stretch out and touch it. Upon reflection, she supposed it had begun six nights before, immediately Josef had telephoned from Moscow saying he had to go the following day to Stockholm. But at first she hadn't noticed it. When it had begun to register, she had dismissed it as the gradual developing confidence of someone who had spend twenty-two years in a narrow, closed environment of a village two hundred miles from Kiev. Then the uncertainty had developed until she felt permanently uncomfortable with the man. She would go back to Moscow, she decided. Perhaps tomorrow. Or the day after. Certainly by the week-end.

‘Why are you so quiet?'

The remains of their meal lay between them and Nikolai fingered the wine bottle, staring at her over the rim. His new confidence irritated her.

‘No reason.'

‘Of course there is. Missing Josef?'

‘Naturally.' She tried to convey coldness.

‘Why naturally?'

‘My dear Nikolai,' she said, pompously, regretting the words as they came, ‘I don't really think it proper for a guest in my husband's house to examine whether or not I miss him.'

He laughed at her, genuinely amused.

‘My dear Pamela,' he mocked back. ‘You are exactly five years older than I am. You'd have to be at least twenty years my senior to speak like that.'

Embarrassed, she laughed with him. ‘I've still no intention of discussing Josef with you,' she said, primly.

‘Why not?'

‘Why should I?'

‘Because you're unsure of your marriage.'

For a moment, she was unable to reply.

‘What …?' she tried.

‘Oh come on,' he said, impatiently. ‘You're frightened of it. Of marriage. Of Russia. Of Josef … of Josef, most of all …'

‘I'm not.'

The denial came a little too swiftly. ‘Of course I'm slightly unsure … any woman would be. But it's only the strangeness of the country … getting used to it. It's nothing to do with my marriage.'

She didn't have to offer explanations, she thought.

Again he laughed. Then why were you apologizing so deeply the other day on the balcony?'

The blush came back. She felt it spread over her neck and chest and recalled the remark to Josef on the veranda the day he'd been summoned back to Moscow.

‘I don't know …'

‘Yes you do. You said you loved him. But that you were sorry. I think I know …'

‘I don't want to know what you think.'

She should create a scene and storm from the room, refusing to carry the conversation further. She remained seated. He lounged in the high-backed, curved chair, twirling his glass. He added to it from the bottle and gestured towards her. She shook her head. Never once did he take his eyes from her and determinedly she gazed back, refusing to be stared down.

‘If it embarrasses you, then I won't pursue it,' he said, dismissively.

‘It doesn't embarrass me,' she blurted out, instinctively.

‘What doesn't?'

She slapped her hands against the table. ‘Stop insulting me,' she said, angrily.

‘I'm very important to your husband,' he announced, incongruously.

‘Not as important as he is to you.'

Nikolai nodded, accepting the rebuke. ‘Why can't you make love to him?' he said, abruptly.

‘I …'

She had to go now. The only thing to do was to leave the room and tomorrow order him from the house. Was he important to Josef? He hadn't involved himself with writers before, she knew. And Nikolai seemed so sure of himself. He leaned across the table and added more wine to her glass. Slowly, she sipped it.

‘I want to stop this conversation.'

‘Why?'

‘Because you're rude and impudent and because there's no reason for continuing it.'

‘Why haven't you asked me to leave in the last six days, since Josef has been gone?'

Oh God, she thought, he imagines I'm attracted to him.

‘Because …' Pamela paused, confused. His sudden change of attitude bewildered her.

‘Because you didn't want me to go,' completed Nikolai, positively.

‘You're playing with me.'

‘What?'

‘You're acting out some part,' she accused. ‘Like an experiment.'

He smiled. ‘Perhaps you're right.'

‘Then I find it offensive. And I think you should go.'

‘All right,' he said. He gulped his wine, spilling a little, then stood up.

‘I didn't mean now,' she protested, lamely. She looked at her watch. It was after eleven. ‘There's no way you can get back to Moscow tonight.'

‘You could drive me.'

‘I don't choose to become a chauffeuse at half-past eleven at night after drinking nearly a bottle of wine.'

He sat down and emptied the second bottle of imported Volnay into her glass.

‘Please stop it,' she pleaded.

‘Stop what?'

‘Oh don't. You know what I mean.'

She swallowed, trying to conceal the nervousness from Nikolai by dabbing her lips with her napkin.

‘I didn't mean to upset you,' he said, appearing contrite. ‘I was rude. Please forgive me.'

He smiled openly and again he was the guileless, shy young man she had met two weeks before.

‘I'm so unsure of myself,' he blurted, suddenly.

She waited, her bewilderment growing. Was he a lonely, scared man, seeking friendship? Or was it part of the game she had earlier accused him of playing?

‘Sometimes,' he went on, ‘I almost wish it hadn't happened to me.'

He was stirring his wine with his finger. She'd seen someone do that in a film, years ago. She tried recalling the title and failed. It had been a bad film, she remembered, full of phoney mannerisms.

‘Why?' she asked.

He smiled at her. ‘Because I don't know if I can do it …'

He halted, ashamed that he was badly expressing himself. It seemed difficult for him to continue. ‘People expect so much of me. And I know it's it's going to get I want the prize, God how I want it. But I'm terrified. Anyone who wins the Nobel prize must be a special person. I don't feel special. Just frightened.'

‘Josef can help you.'

‘He can tell me what knife to use and what wine glass to pick up and how to address important people,' agreed the writer. ‘But that's like putting on a cloak to hide a hole in your trousers.'

He sipped his drink.

‘Do you know?' resumed Nikolai. ‘At home they thought I was the village idiot.'

Pamela laughed, knowing he meant her to. It wasn't an act, she concluded. He did need a friend.

‘Why?'

‘Because I scribbled in books,' he said. ‘The local party secretary, a man called Georgi Polenov, actually came to the house to complain. He said I was setting a bad example, refusing to work. If I were excluded from the co-operative, then others would want the same privileges.'

Nikolai stopped, staring at her. ‘They wanted me to work in the fields,' he remembered, disbelievingly. ‘I was supposed to drive a machine that packed wheat during the harvest. Every time I tried, I broke it.'

It was difficult not to laugh again. Thank God, thought Pamela, for the napkin.

‘I was lucky, meeting Polenov,' said Nikolai. ‘He was a refined man, mourning the old era.'

He poured brandy into her glass. It seemed pointless to object.

‘The only way he could do it was through his pretension to literature,' said Nikolai. ‘He would even, at times, refer to Dickens and Shakespeare as if he had read them, which I'm sure he hadn't. But he had read Amalrik and Solzhenitsyn in
samizdat …
'

He stopped, like someone helping another across stepping-stones in an eager river.

‘Do you know of
samizdat
, the underground method of printing and circulating prohibited material?' he asked.

Again Pamela stifled a laugh. For the first time in his life, she thought, he was talking confidently to someone.

‘I had heard of it,' she said. Then, allowing him the indulgence, she added, ‘But I was never quite sure what it meant.'