Red Square (35 page)

Chapter Twenty-Nine

The morning was bright, dry, with not a cloud in the sky. Arkady and Max strolled the same route he had taken the night before. Irina was at the gallery, helping with the installation of the show.

   
Max was the sort of animal that basked in the sun. He wore a suit the colour of butter. In the windows they passed he looked as if he were being importuned by his companion for loose change, a meal, a business opportunity. Then he would put his hand on Arkady's arm as if to say, 'Look at this raffish friend I have in tow.' Their eyes would meet, and in the small black centre of his irises Arkady could read that Max had not slept with Irina during the night, and that his bed had been no more comfortable than Arkady's bare floor.

   
'It's a developers' dream,' Max said. 'This side of Berlin always had the grandeur. University, opera, cathedral, the great museums were always in East Berlin. We Soviets built as many monstrosities as we could, but we never had the money or the energy of capitalist developers. West Berlin has shops with the highest real-estate value in the world. Imagine the value of East Berlin. See, without knowing, we Russians saved it. This is literally metamorphosis, this is East Berlin crawling out of its cocoon.'

   
Friedrichstrasse was different in the daylight. In the dark, Arkady hadn't seen how many government offices were gutted. One was a wooden front with painted windows around the foundation of a Gallery Lafayette that was taking its place. Another was swaddled in five storeys of heavy canvas. Though the street was relatively empty compared to the Ku'damm, from every direction came the sound of a hidden traffic of earthmovers, pile-drivers, cranes.

   
Arkady asked, 'Do you own the building we stayed in last night?'

   
Max laughed. 'You're too suspicious. I look for vision, you look for fingerprints.'

   
There were still Trabis under the lime trees, but they were outnumbered by VWs, Volvos, Maseratis. Out of open buildings floated the dust of sheet rock and the whine of electric drills. Whitewashed windows bore announcements of future offices of Mitsubishi, Alitalia, IBM. Across the street at the Soviet embassy, the steps were empty and the windows were dark. On a side street, a café had set white chairs and tables on the pavement. They sat and ordered coffee.

   
Max checked his watch, a diver's chronometer with gold links. 'I have an appointment in an hour. I'm the agent for the building you slept in. For a former Soviet,' real estate is almost the redemption of life. Do you have any investments?'

   
'Aside from books?' Arkady asked.

   
'Aside from books.'

   
'Aside from a radio?'

   
'Aside from a radio.'

   
'I inherited a gun.'

   
'In other words, no.' Max paused. 'Something can be arranged. You're intelligent, you speak English and a little German. With decent clothes you'd be presentable.'

   
A coffee pot came with poppyseed rolls and strawberry jam. Max poured. 'The problem is, I don't think you appreciate how much the world has changed. You're a specimen from the past. It's as if you'd arrived from ancient Rome, chasing someone who offended Caesar.

   
Your idea of a criminal is to say the least, out of date. To stay, you'd have to let go of all that, to erase it from your mind.'

   
'Erase it?'

   
'Like the Germans. West Berlin was levelled, so they started afresh and built it into a showcase of capitalism. Our response? We built the Wall, which of course was a pedestal for West Berlin.'

   
'Why don't you invest in West Berlin?'

   
'That's thinking in the past. Frankly, West Berlin is nothing. It's an island, a club for freethinkers and draft dodgers. But a united Berlin will be the capital of the world.'

   
'That does sound visionary.'

   
'It is. Forgive me for saying so, but the Wall was an even larger reality than your investigation. Now the Wall has gone and Berlin is finally free to bloom. Think of it: over two hundred kilometres of Wall erased, an extra thousand square kilometres in the centre of Berlin to be developed. It's the greatest real-estate opportunity of the second half of the twentieth century.'

   
There was such conviction in Max's eyes that Arkady realized he had encountered a salesman. Max was selling the idea of the future, and it was compelling. Evidence of the future lined the street. Urgent sounds of it echoed everywhere. The only silent building was the Soviet embassy hulking like a mausoleum above the trees.

   
Arkady said, 'Does Michael share this vision of yours? For a man who is the radio station's deputy director for security, he welcomed you back pretty quickly.'

   
'Michael is a little desperate. If the Americans drop the station he'll be left with a European lifestyle and no particular skills. He doesn't have a graduate degree in business administration; he simply has a Porsche. If he can adapt to a new situation, so should you.'

   
'How would I?'

   
'Your investigation got you here. What you do from this point on is an entirely different question. Do you go forward or do you turn back?'

   
'What do you think?'

   
'I'll be honest,' Max said. 'It wouldn't matter to me except for Irina. Irina is part of Berlin. She stands to benefit. Why do you want to take that away from her? She's never had a chance to enjoy money.'

   
'She can do that with you, enjoy money?'

   
'Yes. I don't describe myself as a completely innocent person, but fortunes are not made with "thank you" and "please". I bet that when the wheel was invented, it rolled over someone.' Max wiped his mouth. 'I understand the hold you have on Irina. Every émigré feels guilty about somebody.'

   
'Really? Who do you feel guilty about?'

   
A good salesman was not discouraged by rudeness. Max said, 'It's not a matter of morality. It's not even a matter of you or me. It's just that I have the capacity to change and you don't. Maybe you're a heroic investigator, but you're a figure from the past. There's nothing for you here. I want you to be honest and ask yourself what's best for Irina, going forward or going back?'

   
'That's up to Irina.'

   
'See, Renko, that's an admission that you do know the right answer. Of course the decision is up to Irina. The point is, you and I know what's best. We just came from Moscow. We both know that, even if she goes back, I can protect her better than you. I doubt you'd survive a day back there. So we're speaking of an emotional regression, aren't we? The two of you as poor but loving refugees? With the Soviet embassy trying to deport you? I think you'd need an influential sponsor and, frankly, no one comes to mind but me. The moment you decide to stay you'd have to drop your investigation. Irina would leave you in an instant if she thought you'd stayed for anything else but her.'

   
'If you know that, why haven't you told her I was after you?'

   
Max paid homage with a sigh. 'Unfortunately, Irina still has a high opinion of your abilities. She might think you were right. We're on the horns of a dilemma - you on one horn, me on the other. We're coexisting. That's why morality is so beside the point. That's why we'll have to work out some arrangement.'

   
After Max paid the bill and left, Arkady went alone through the trees to the Brandenburg Gate, where Victory wore her daytime tint of verdigris. Swifts circled around her, feeding on insects. He slipped among tourists to the meadow. Although his shoes and cuffs were damp, a summer warmth radiated from the ground. The grass had tassels of white flowers and miniature ripples of insects escaping from each footfall. Bees rushed between balls of clover, making up for the down time of wet weather. A cycle path had been laid out; cyclists in helmets and skin-tight outfits rode in single file, flying like flags on a motorcade. Were they aware that they were trespassing on the site of Max's New Berlin?

Since he had time, Arkady walked the Ku'damm to Zoo Station. He felt as if he had fallen into an army of East Berliners who had invaded in good order but had fallen apart at the first pavement display of running shoes. West Berliners retreated behind the railings of cafes, and even there they were pursued by Gypsies with tambourines and babies. A pair of Russians pushed a rack of uniforms. Arkady picked over an assortment of pieces of the Wall with documents attesting to their authenticity. On another table he found an autopilot and altimeter from a Red Army helicopter. He supposed he might find the entire helicopter if he went up and down the Ku'damm long enough. He arrived at Zoo Station right at noon and called Peter's number. This time there was no answer.

   
Overhead, a train had arrived, releasing yet more regiments of Ossies down the steps to the street. Out of indecision, Arkady was swept up by the crowd and marched across the street to the base of the memorial church, grey and shattered as a tree trunk struck by lightning, where backpackers sprawled on the stairs to watch a street magician. A Japanese tour bus aimed a broadside of cameras.

   
The old Berlin had been divided in half and ruled essentially by Russians and Americans. He hardly saw an American tourist now. Maybe he could stay as a statue, he thought:
The Last Russian
, posed as if he were trying to sell a pin of Lenin.

Arkady was returning over the meadow when he saw four sections of the Wall left standing like gravestones. So Max was wrong, he thought; not everyone wanted to erase the Wall and turn without pause to the cash register. Someone thought a memorial was appropriate.

   
Next to the section was a construction crane with a double-jib for tall buildings. About seventy metres up, at the crown of the top jib, the block and tackle held a square basket. Against the sky Arkady saw a figure climb over the edge of the basket and jump. Arms and legs spread, he plunged through the air and disappeared behind the sections.

   
Arkady walked over quickly. Closer, the sections were each four metres square and elaborately spray-painted with every colour of peace symbol, and airbrushed with Christs, gnostic eyes, prison bars, names and messages in different languages. Behind the cement slabs people sat at tables set on gravel. A sign said,
jump caf
É
.

   
A van offered sandwiches, cigarettes, sodas and beer. The customers were bikers, some older couples with dogs leashed to their chairs, a pair of businessmen dark enough to be Turks and a circle of teenagers, the sun sparkling on the rivets of their jackets.

   
The jumper, a boy in a tank top and fatigues, was swaying upside down a few feet above the ground. Arkady realized that he had never hit it and that he was connected by elastic cords running from his ankles to the top of the crane. The jib lowered to let him settle on the earth, hands first. He released the cords and staggered dizzily to his feet to applause from the bikers and tribal whoops from his friends.

   
Arkady was interested in the two businessmen. Their suits were good, but they had massed bottles of beer on their table in a gluttonous volume. They had thick bodies and slouched with their heads tucked in a familiar attitude. Though they sat looking away from him, one of them had memorably ugly hair, long at the back, short at the sides with an orange fringe on top. Though they didn't clap, they watched with close attention.

   
A second figure was still in the cage high above the tables. He pulled in the loose cords and seemed to sit down. A moment later, he climbed on to the edge of the cage and balanced himself with one hand on a cable. A schnauzer yapped and its owner plugged its mouth with wurst. The figure on the cage looked as if he was trying to pick a place to land.

   
'
Dvai
!' shouted the man with the bad hair, fed up with waiting. 'Come on!' The way fishermen shout when someone is slow pulling a net.

   
The figure jumped. He dropped with his arms and legs windmilling. This time Arkady saw cords playing out loosely behind. He assumed that careful calculations took into account the weight of the jumper, the distance to the ground, the full extension of the cords. The face hurtling down was white, eyes first, mouth peeled open. Arkady had never seen anyone so full of second thoughts. He heard an audible chord as the elastic went taut, then the diver was rising, in reverse, a quarter of the way back. He bounced lower, more slowly and more crazily. Now his face was red and the oval of his mouth resumed human shape. Two girls in leather jackets ran forward to help their hero down. Everyone else applauded except for the two businessmen, who laughed so hard they coughed. The one with the hair leaned back to catch his breath. He was Ali Khasbulatov.