The Gradual (41 page)

I stayed where I was because although I had prepared carefully I could not be certain of my gradual calculations, on this one occasion when they mattered crucially to me.

The manoeuvring of the ship came to an end and for a few minutes nothing more appeared to be happening. I waited, feeling the wintry cold creeping around me. I had spent so long in the balmy heat of the Archipelago that I no longer had any tolerance of the cold. Before I set out on this I had made sure my clothes were weatherproof but even so I could feel the thickly falling snow building up on my shoulders and head. From time to time I shook myself like an old dog, and stamped my feet. My breath clouded around my head.

Two mobile cranes moved forward, bringing portable gangplanks towards the side of the ship’s hull. There was another delay while they were lined up and attached and the hatches on the ship were opened.

Finally, people began marching quickly down the covered ways from the interior of the ship, making the wooden structures shake and wave about. They tumbled out on to the concrete quay and once they were under the full impact of the falling snow they ran across towards the buildings.

They were all young men. None of them wore uniforms and nearly all were weighed down by their large packs of belongings. I went forward, tried to intercept some of them, but the weather was so cold and unpleasant that they pushed past me in their rush.

Finally, I managed to catch the arm of one young man and he swung around to face me. He was just a boy, hardly more than a teenager. He looked resentful that I had halted him. Everyone else was hurrying past.

‘Is this the 289th Battalion?’ I shouted at him.

‘Of course it is!’

Then he too pulled away from me and rushed on towards the dockside building.

I moved across so that I was halfway between the two companionways. I stood unprotected in the falling snow, anxiously swivelling my head from side to side, trying to spot Jacj, who must be somewhere in this crowd.

A man with a violin strapped against his back suddenly emerged from the gangplank on my right.

He was not a large man and was shouldered aside in the rush. He staggered on the compacted snow, where so many footsteps had already been stamped, and slithered forward, leaning down with an outstretched hand to prevent himself from falling. As he did so the violin case slid forward across the back of his head. I hurried across to him, put a hand beneath his elbow, pulled him upright. At first he tugged his arm away fiercely, glancing angrily at me.

‘Jacj! It’s me – Sandro!’

He looked back at me in surprise and then he clearly saw who I was. He grabbed me, hugged me. I put my arms around him, pulling him against me. I felt him trying to get his hands past my violin case, just as I was trying to get mine past his. We were like two bears, two bulked up wrestlers, grappling for an effective hold.

The snow came down on us but we stayed there. The other men continued to flood past but Jacj and I stayed holding on to each other until all the others had gone.

The snow was at last starting to slacken as Jacj and I walked back the way I had come. I led him towards the entrance to the metro station. Unlike those in the main part of Glaund City this one was crude and functional, with an automated ticket dispenser set behind a thick glass window and a gate which acted as a ticket barrier. The railway tracks were not deep below ground this far out from the city centre.

The ticket hall was empty as we hurried in – the snow outside was settling thickly. We brushed the loose snow off, rubbed arms and shoulders to try to instil some warmth. We kept looking towards each other curiously, recognizing, noticing the changes in our appearance that must have taken place. When he briefly removed his cap I could see how he had changed. He looked just as I remembered him, but his face was fuller, more mature. His hair was short in the military way. He was still not a big man but he looked stronger, healthier. More than forty years had passed. He looked as if he was still in his early twenties.

I could not help wondering what he was thinking about my appearance. I did not ask.

‘How did you know I was to be released today?’ Jacj said.

‘I looked it up,’ I said with a feeling that I had to avoid telling him the whole story for now. ‘Troop returns are announced in the newspapers.’

‘I thought they were going to cancel our demob at the last minute,’ he said. ‘Something weird was going on – I still don’t know what it was.’

‘What happened?’

He told me that for the last few days on the troopship they had been warned by officers that on arrival in Questiur the troops would be mustered in full uniform and they would march from the harbour through the streets, carrying their weapons, brandishing the colours, displaying their campaign medals. There would be cheering crowds to line the way. The rally would finish in Republic Plaza in the centre of Glaund City. They were going to be formally inspected by senior members of the ruling junta.

‘Like everyone else on the ship,’ Jacj said, ‘I have spent the last two days making sure my kit was in good order, my boots were polished, my rifle was cleaned. But this morning, first thing, the parade was suddenly cancelled. We were ordered to dress in our civilian clothes before disembarking, leave our kit and weapons on board and as soon as the ship docked we could make our own way home. An hour after we heard the order another ship came alongside, all the officers and NCOs transferred to it and we were left to our own devices. Apart from the crew of the ship there was no one left on board but squaddies.’

‘Have you any idea what made that happen?’ I said.

‘No – have you? Was there anything in the news?’

Of course I had no idea. I had been in Questiur for but an instant. Subjective time had vanished – I had been sailing a round trip, Petty Serque, Nelquay, Ristor. I could feel my stave where I normally carried it half concealed, tucked against my hip in a deep pocket, and clipped to my belt.

‘Any chance we could get some food, Sandro? They gave us nothing to eat this morning.’

‘I know a place in the centre of the city,’ I said.

My brother. My elder brother. Forty years had passed and Jacj looked as if he had aged by only four or five.

We bought two tickets from the machine and rode the metro into Glaund City. Because of our violin cases neither of us could sit comfortably on the hard little passenger seats, so we stood in the area by the doors, holding on to the overhead straps, close to each other. We kept glancing at each other, revealing our cautious brotherly regard, our curiosity, a growing awareness of the gradual changes brought by time, and the mysteries of ageing.

As we crossed Republic Plaza it stopped snowing altogether, and by the time we reached the café where I had often eaten during my trips to Glaund City the sun was shining weakly through a thin veil of cloud. It remained bitterly cold. The café was nearly full but Jacj and I found a small table in a corner by the counter. Everyone already in the café was making a lot of noise, talking excitedly amongst themselves and moving about to talk to people on other tables.

Jacj and I ordered what we both thought of as comfort food, the sort of thing we had enjoyed when we were kids: mostly fried, greasy, tasty, full of fat and carbohydrates, delicious.

I asked Jacj how long he had been away.

‘The full draft term: complete waste of time.’

‘Do you want to talk about what you’ve been going through?’

‘Going through?’

‘Were you in much danger?’

‘Only of dying of boredom. I’ve lost four and a half years of life, for absolutely nothing.’ He shook his head, put in a mouthful of food, and while he chewed he looked around the packed tables of the unpretentious little restaurant. ‘Is it always as busy as this?’ he said. ‘What about you? You look as if you’ve been in the sun.’

‘I’ve been away too. I’ve only just come back.’

‘Are you going to talk about it?’

‘Not really.’

He shrugged, went on eating. We had never had much to say to each other. All through boyhood we did different things in different ways, our only point of real and regular contact being the music we played together. We had been reunited less than an hour and we were taking each other for granted.

All that worry about him, the fear he might have deserted, might have gone missing, might have been killed in action. Here he was. Brothers can be awkward with each other.

‘Have you kept up the playing?’ I asked him.

‘Not as much as I would have liked. Soon after we were in a camp down south they took the violin away. We were going on exercises. That’s what I’ve been doing for more than four years, incidentally. Exercises, training, recognizing aircraft, marching about. No combat, no enemy. As far as I’m concerned the war is not happening.’ Another piece of overcooked sausage meat went in. ‘It hasn’t been so bad for the last year or so. I was given the violin back so I was able to practise. What about you?’

‘I’ve kept it up. I’m a composer now.’

‘I thought you might be. You were always interested in that.’

‘I’ll play you some of my records later,’ I said.

At that moment there was a sudden interruption. The main door of the café burst open and a group of young people came rushing in, all laughing. A flow of icy cold air swept in with them. The noise level in the room exploded. They shouted across the room to the people at one of the tables. ‘
Hurry up! – Starting soon!
’ Other people in the room with us shouted back. I could not catch what they said but they all appeared to know each other. Someone pushed back a chair and stood up. Some of the men whistled loudly. Three young women let out high-pitched yells. One of them had a compressed-air siren and released a long squawk, which was so loud it made my head ring. Soon almost everyone but us was standing up. The door remained open. I could see that in the street outside a huge crowd was pouring down towards Republic Plaza. More noise and confusion out there in the cold. Amplified music was playing. I saw a big truck go slowly down in the direction of the square, and it was festooned with coloured banners and streamers. Someone was standing precariously at the back, leaning against the side, shouting through a bullhorn. People started leaving the café, throwing down money for what they had been eating.

The four young people who were on the table next to ours also began to leave, scraping back their chairs, grabbing their coats, talking across the room to others.

I leaned across to them.

‘What’s going on?’ I said.

The woman who had been sitting close to me answered. ‘Haven’t you heard?’ she said loudly, over the din.

‘Heard what?’

‘Where have you been – on another planet?’

‘Yes – sort of. What’s happening?’

‘She’s dead! She’s gone! It’s all over!’

I immediately sensed who she meant but I said, ‘Who’s dead?’

With her fists raised triumphantly, the woman said, ‘Madam! Someone got to her!’

‘When was this?’

‘Last night! There’s been a coup! The bitch is dead! The junta has collapsed and there’s going to be an election.’

Jacj and I finished up and paid for our food but by the time we left the café we were the only ones left. We followed the crowd down to Republic Plaza, which was already packed with people. The mood was infectiously happy. A band had been set up close to the monumental entrance to the Glaund People’s Museum and they were playing heavy rock, which I had rarely heard in Glaund. Many people were dancing to it, leaping around, waving their arms, trying to stay upright on the slippery ground. It remained bitterly cold, but the sun was still thinly shining.

Jacj and I stood at the edge of the huge ceremonial concourse, watching the celebrations. More and more people were flooding in from all sides. Cheering kept breaking out. Lights were being set up. Television vans had appeared.

Jacj said, ‘Did you know this was going to happen?’

‘No,’ I said. I pointed towards the roofs of the buildings surrounding the plaza, most of which were government offices or departments. On every building the dour flag of the Glaund Republic was flying at half mast. ‘This is the day,’ I said, ‘when I knew exactly what was going to happen. But I didn’t know about this.’

We watched the crowd for a while longer but we were not really a part of it. We walked away into a quieter part of the town, went to the railway terminus.

The train to Errest was almost empty. Jacj and I stacked our violins and our other bags in the luggage area and sat down close together. By the time the train began moving the day was coming to an end under a mass of dark cloud. It looked to me as if more snow was about to fall. In Glaund at this time of year it usually was.

The train was warm and it travelled along speedily.

Jacj said, ‘Where are we going?’

‘Home,’ I said. ‘Where else?’

‘You mean—’ He sounded thoughtful, and there was a long silence. Then he added, ‘Where do you mean?’

‘Home. Where we lived.’

‘And Mum and Dad?’

‘I don’t know,’ I said. ‘Do you know exactly how long you’ve been in the army?’

‘The period of service was four and a half years. A bit more than that because they don’t count the induction period. But I was demobbed exactly when I was expecting it.’

Four and a half years? What was happening four and a half years after Jacj went away? And everything that happened after four and a half years – ahead of us, events still to come?

I said, ‘I think Mum and Dad will be expecting you.’

‘Is there anything you’re not telling me? It sounds as if there is.’

‘No – but I’ve been away too. I haven’t seen them for a long time.’

‘What about Djahann? Is she still there at home?’

‘I don’t know,’ I said again. ‘She was when I left. But there’s a lot I don’t know. Almost everything, in fact.’

‘How long have you had that beard? It makes you look older. Last time I saw you, you were just a kid.’

‘You too,’ I said. ‘You’ve put on weight.’

‘You’ve lost some. You were getting a bit plump when I joined the army, you know that?’