Men in Space (2 page)

“Comrade pilot,” Spasiev shouts, pulling an airman’s cap down over Anton’s head, “fly us somewhere warm!”

“Have you heard the joke about the Russian pilot and the English pilot who both crashed on the same desert island?” Anton asks him.

“Go on.”

“The English one is looking through a telescope and he sees a St Bernard dog – one of those giant dogs with tiny barrels of rum tied to their necks – swimming towards the island. So the English pilot says: ‘Hey, look! It’s man’s best friend!’ And the Russian pilot grabs the telescope and looks through it and says: ‘Yeah, and there’s a dog with it!’ ”

There’s a pause, then both men bend over in laughter. They stay crumpled for a while, then look up at each other and immediately crumple again, the laughter growing louder, shoulders and backs shaking as they cough and sob over the joke. Spasiev’s banging on the table. Zhelyazkov’s leaning forwards on his stall’s canopy. Eventually he straightens up, pulls a hip flask from his combat’s pocket and holds it out to Anton.

“Man’s best friend!”

“Exactly. Oh, right. No thanks.”

“Lemonade?”

“Thanks, no.”

Zhelyazkov pulls a wad of cash out of another pocket and slaps it against Anton’s chest. Spasiev opens up a metal box and does the same. Anton counts both wads, then slips them into his dossier.

“Here, I’ve got another one. This American delegation goes to Moscow to visit a factory. So the Party tell the factory chief that American delegations are always asking about anti-Semitism in the Soviet Union, so to make sure he shows them some happy Jewish workers. The chief says: ‘But there aren’t any Jewish workers here, because you made me fire them all last year.’ So they say: ‘OK then, choose a worker and we’ll give him Jewish papers and we’ll call him Comrade Rubenstein, and when the Americans come he’ll show them his papers to prove he’s Jewish and he’ll tell them that he’s treated just as well as everyone else.’ So the chief goes off and picks out Comrade, I don’t know, say Comrade
Tabalov, and gives him the Jewish papers and tells him to answer to the name of Rubenstein and so on. So the American delegation comes and sure enough they ask the question about anti-Semitism in the Soviet Union, and the chief says: ‘Gentlemen, there is no anti-Semitism here. Our own Jewish comrade, Comrade Rubenstein, will tell you as much. Call Comrade Rubenstein!’ They wait, and wait some more, and some more still, and after ages the assistant chief comes back and whispers in the chief’s ear: ‘Chief! Comrade Rubenstein has emigrated to Israel!’ ”

This time the laughter’s forced.

“That’s Jews for you,” says Spasiev, prefacing his observation with a click of his tongue.

There’s an awkward silence. They think he’s Jewish too. He’s not: solid Orthodox. By thirteen he was bearing cups at Sveta Sofia. Uncle Stoyann would give him rosaries and Prayer Books on his birthdays.
I don’t speak English, but it doesn’t matter
, Stoyann told him as he met Anton for the last time before leaving on a religious visa for Philadelphia;
I’ll talk vulgate Latin with the other priests. That’s one language even you don’t speak!
Each time he steps into an Orthodox church, even here in Prague, the smell of incense and the dull chanting from the seats behind the altar usher him back into his childhood and, at the same time, summon up the tall buildings, gushing steam and stilted metros of Uncle Stoyann’s new home that he hasn’t made it to, not yet …

He’ll go up to the automat at Mústek, make a pick-up from Janachkov, then hop on the yellow line. Pleasantries first. To Zhelyazkov:

“The pop not selling so well?”

“Too cold.”

“You should sell coffee. Hot wine.”

“Tell Ilievski to sort it out with Saudek.”

“Saudek?”

“Runs the next patch.” Zhelyazkov jerks his thumb towards the stall five metres away. Steam is piping out of two large samovars. A board in front reads:
Káva, Čaj, Svařené Víno
. “Little Bulgaria ends here. It’s Czechs from here on up to Husova. They made Ili agree we won’t sell hot stuff.”

“Well, that’s capitalism. You’ll clean up come spring. I’ve got to go.”

At the top of Karlova Anton glances into the window of the Prague House of Photography and sees a girl sitting at a desk. On a wall hook behind her hangs a leopard-skin, or possibly fake-leopard-skin, jacket. She catches his eye, smiles. Does he know her? Shy, he presses on, crosses Staroměstské Náměstí and walks up Melantrichova. The sky’s blue now, with small clouds hovering round its edges to the northwest, over Letná. Anton enters the Korunní Automat, sails past the roast-chicken counter and makes for the cake-and-coffee section. There they are, camped out around tables: money changers. Czechs and Poles, Algerians and Moroccans, Russians, Turks. Shouting figures and exchange rates to each other; laughing, arguing, jostling; shunting their clients from one table to the next; swapping cigarettes and calculators; re-exchanging money back among themselves between transactions; hop ping from one language to another, to a third, a fourth – as though words, too, had negotiable value. Anton picks out Janachkov, who’s hitting hard on two North Africans, shoving a napkin with some kind of algorithm written on it in their faces: wants them to buy zlotys. He sees Anton, breaks off his negotiations, reaches into his trouser pocket, takes out a wad of five-hundred-crown notes and hands it to him.

“Vodka?”

“No. Thanks. How much have you got there?”

“Ten thousand. Coffee, then?”

Janachkov’s always gone out of his way to be nice to Anton since the finger incident. He lends him porno videos, Bruce
Lee films. Anton hasn’t told him that he doesn’t have a video, and wouldn’t watch porn or karate if he did.

“I’m late for meeting Ili. Got to rush.”

He’s carrying quite a loaded dossier now: there must be fifteen thousand crowns in it. Although there are free seats, he stands in the metro carriage, clutching it to his chest. Fifteen thousand crowns, plus – what, ten, twelve passports? Wouldn’t want to get picked up right now. He never has been, not in Prague. He was interviewed by the police back home, when he applied for permission to go to America.
Visiting relatives? Shouldn’t be a problem. Just sign here, we’ll send these papers on to the DS …
Then came the letter, one week later: due to his disloyal decision to request a US visa, his licences in both civil engineering and football refereeing were being revoked. There was a postscript, informing him of his statutory right to appeal against the decision and, attached, a form to fill out if he wished to do so. Did anyone ever appeal? He thought of doing it just to see if they’d go along with it, set up a sham appeals board for him, props, personnel and all, but Helena scotched that idea.
It’s not a game, you know …
But maybe that’s exactly what it was: a game, a rigged game. Nobody ever said that games had to be fun.

Palmovka. The buildings are more shabby around here. Stalls beside the road sell cigarettes, drinks, lotto cards. Anton walks past a compound from which ventilation shafts rise up. Facing this, there’s a small factory of some sort. The car market’s sunk to the right of the road just beyond this, fifty or so metres before the road rises up into Libeňský Most. From beside the tramlines Anton can see Ilievski standing by the entrance to one of the car dealers’ lots, beneath a string of tinsel flags that sparkle in the sunlight. He’s wearing a thick coat and inspecting a Mercedes. Milachkov’s kicking around behind him. Rambo’s weaving and darting around people’s legs. Ili will be talking car
– the only reason he still deals in vehicles. They’re high-risk, low-yield when set against his other ventures, but he just loves being around cars and car people, talking car. He’s got two Mercs in his garage, plus the Skodas, which he lets his men run around in. He’s peering down into the bonnet, poking around with his fingers, as though he were some great physician and the Czech mechanic next to him a gangly junior houseman.

Anton walks down the stone steps from the road, shakes Mila’s hand and waits for Ilievski to finish. At the back of Ili’s head, the part mirrors won’t show him, his hair, already grey, is thinning out. His back is firm, well padded by the coat. Cashmere, light-brown. He’ll never see himself from that side either: the way he’d look to an assassin, sneaking up behind him. Does it ever occur to him, when he turns his back on everything – lost in contemplation of food, a woman’s body, the combustion engine – that the Russians, or the Yugoslavians, or the Czechs, might have his number? Maybe that’s why Mila’s always with him, standing just behind. But what if the Bulgarians themselves wanted him gone? A hit from inside his own outfit, one of his own men – his children, you could almost say: they’re all in their thirties; he must be fifty-something. Which one would it be, the parricide? Janachkov? Koulin, Milachkov himself? …

Ilievski pulls his head out from under the Mercedes’ bonnet and turns round. His skin is firm and leathery, grey in the jowls despite being close shaven. Around the eyes and temples are stiff wrinkles that Anton’s always thought of as repositories of some kind of wisdom, or power. The wrinkles intensify as Ilievski catches sight of him and smiles.

“Hey hey! Anton!” He wipes his right hand on a rag before he takes him by the arm and pulls him towards the car. “Look at this.”

Tubes, wires, cylinders. What’s he looking for?

“It’s pretty dirty, I suppose …”

“What? No, that’s just oil. It’s normal. Look there: the head gasket’s come loose. Pity – the rest of it’s in really good condition. What do you have for me there?”

He wipes his other hand while Anton opens up his dossier and fishes out the contents. Ilievski flips through the money, passes it to Mila, then shakes Koulin’s envelope.

“Registration documents?”

“Passports. And that’s a legal document from Branka.”

“Good, good. How’s Helena?”

“OK. Misses her children.”

“You know my offer’s still open. If ever …”

“She’s reluctant. To do it that way, I mean. But if she changes …”

“Sure. Come walk Rambo with me on the island.”

“Look over there!” says Milachkov. “There’s someone filming.”

It’s true. A man is walking by the rows of cars some twenty metres away, filming as he goes. He’s young and casually dressed: jeans, jumper, coat, red scarf …

“So what?” asks Ilievski, shrugging. “They’re always filming licence plates round here. Idiots.”

“Why?” says Anton. “I’d have thought it was a sound way of identifying …”

“Lesson one,” Ilievski announces, holding up his finger. “Mila: what’s the first thing you do to a stolen car?”

“Change the plates, Comrade,” Mila answers, in a high voice.

“Have a star, young pioneer.”

“But,” Milachkov steps out of character now, “they’re usually in uniform when they film here.”

Ili shrugs. “Maybe today’s the day they get their costumes washed.”

“I know a joke,” says Anton. “There’s this ship, this naval, say, destroyer, and it’s been at sea for maybe seven, eight months, and the men on it, the sailors, are all filthy, and they
all want nothing more than just to take a bath and put on some fresh clothes. So one day the captain gathers them all together and says: ‘Men! I’ve got some good news and some bad news. The good news is that you’re all going to get a change of clothes.’ And the sailors all cheer. And the captain says: ‘The bad news is that you’re changing with him, you’re changing with him, you’re …’ ”

It’s easy. Milachkov’s dropped his case, he’s laughing so much. Ilievski’s thrown the rag onto the ground. The Czech mechanic stoops to pick it up, smiling politely, looking awkward. He must be in his early twenties. Anton translates the joke into Czech for him; he chuckles slightly at it – as though he’d been served cold leftovers. Milachkov says:

“Sparta game this Saturday?”

“What?” Anton asks, then: “Oh, yes. Against Košice. Right. Let’s go together.”

“Meet you in Bar Nine on Újezd beforehand. Half-past one.”

“
Perfektní
.”

Ilievski’s started walking onto Libeňský Island. He whistles to Rambo; Anton jogs along to catch him up. The road is unpaved, bordered on one side by corrugated iron fencing which is listing with the gradient of the slope. Behind the fence, a few bare birch trees. Rambo runs back towards Ilievski and then turns around and scouts ahead of them, sniffing at tufts of grass and pools of oily water, shattering with his paw the thin sheets of ice resting on their surfaces.

“I love bright days in winter.” Ili’s looking up into the clear-blue sky. “Look, Anton: there’s the moon already.”

He stops, clasps his hand around Anton’s shoulder – firmly, so the fingers dig into the bone – and turns him round. The moon is hovering above the birch trees two thirds full, its surface faint and silvery-blue.

“That only ever happens in the winter.” Ilievski releases
Anton as he says this; they move on. “It’s the way the earth is facing. Tilted back, away from the sun. We wouldn’t see that if we were in, for example, Australia.”

“I like it too,” says Anton. “The moon out when it’s still light. You don’t know if it’s day or night.” There’s a song with that phrase, but in English.
Don’t know if it’s …
Dylan? No, Hendrix. For the next few metres, the lyrics play through Anton’s mind, a muted soundtrack:
Excuse me, while I kiss the sky …
They’ve come to a house set off the road. One storey, whitewashed plaster walls. Must have been built in the Fifties, Sixties, pretty typical suburban architecture – only its front wall, the north-facing one, has been replaced by sheets of glass. As they clear the house, a lawn drifts into view. On the lawn, spread all across it, sculptures stand, sit, lie. Some of them, still intact, show soldiers waving flags as they advance heroically across invisible battlefields, or overalled men and women holding aloft hammers and sickles, as though displaying them to some crowd long since dispersed. Others, fallen, show workers bending over lathes or blowing glass through long, trumpet-like tubes that nestle in the grass. Some are broken: there’s a gymnast swinging round the handles of a pommel horse, but his arms have snapped off at the wrist, leaving him rotating in the wrong dimension, through the lawn’s surface …