A Partisan's Daughter (7 page)

They had a car that had been liberated from the Germans at the end of the war, an old Mercedes staff car with red seats that smelled wonderful and made you feel very lordly and disdainful when you drove about in it. It was powerful, but too grand to drive fast, and Roza’s father used to sit at the wheel looking straight ahead while he got overtaken by Skodas and Voskhod mopeds. He used it daily to go to his offices in Belgrade, and after work he would quite often be irritated to find it surrounded by tourists posing for photographs next to it. If anything went wrong, a tremendous fuss would have to be made before spares could be found or made up, and in the meantime they would have to use public transport, which Roza alleged would always smell of goats, baby vomit and raw onions. She was like a lot of the Labour politicians we used to have in Britain back then, such as Anthony Wedgwood Benn: she was a toff who approved of the common people as long as she didn’t have to mix with them.

She told me that there was an orchard nearby where she used to climb trees, and that was where she first started trying to write poems. I once sat for hours while she solemnly read her poems to me in Serbo-Croat, and then explained what they meant. It was pleasant watching her face as she read, because she was experiencing the emotions, her spirit shone out, and I liked being able to stare at her for a long time without her realising that I was admiring her. What struck me was how strange language is, when you don’t know what it means. She told me that the Bob Dylan Upstairs also wrote poetry, and I thought, “Oh dear.” Since I’ve known Roza I’ve struggled with modern poetry from time to time, but I confess that it often seems just like ordinary language cut up, or lists of cryptic crossword-puzzle clues. I need someone in the know to explain it to me. When I was at school we learned lots of poetry, but it was the dumdedum kind, with lots of rhymes, and the lines all the same length. I wasn’t kitted out for the modern stuff at all. Anyway, I never did read or hear any of the
BDU
’s poetry. He could be famous by now, for all I know.

I can understand why Roza might have wanted to spend hours up a tree, however. I did a lot of that when I was a boy. I went back recently and saw that the little tree I used to climb up has grown into a fairly large oak. I haven’t felt such a pang of lost time and painful nostalgia in many a year.

Anyway, once Roza got into trouble for cutting open hundreds of apples in this orchard after her bald grandmother told her a folk tale about an apple with a diamond in it. She was made to gather up all the dismembered fruit in a wheelbarrow and take it down the road to a piggery. Roza liked the same things about her orchard as I did about the one in Shropshire. Sunlight coming through the leaves. Field mice. Sparrows mating. Starlings or fieldfares settling all around you because they hadn’t noticed you. I said to Roza, “One day I’ll take you to the house in Shropshire where I spent a lot of my youth.” She was pleased by that, but in fact we never did get round to it. It’s difficult to get time off with a young retired Yugoslavian prostitute when you’ve got a Great White Loaf at home expecting you to lay paving slabs and take your daughter to the cinema while she knits. Everything that happened with Roza and me occurred in that derelict and filthy house in Archway, mostly in the basement, always before I went home to Limbo in glamorous Sutton.

One day Roza had an experience that she found very shocking, and it was brought about by a horse.

She was picking up windfalls when she felt a nudging at her shoulder, and then a tugging at her jumper. She cried out with shock, and the equally startled horse shied and cantered away, kicking up its hind legs and whinnying. It was a very big carthorse, and it had a mouthful of red wool that it had detached from Roza’s jumper.

She decided to run away, but a peasant woman turned up at the gate, huffing and puffing, and wanting to know if she had seen a horse, which was quite conspicuously nearby, eating apples.

The upshot of all this was that the hairy-faced old lady offered Roza a ride on the horse, and she was too terrified to refuse. It was difficult to mount such a big horse, and it had to be done by climbing on a gate first, but she was determined not to panic, and she stayed up there by clutching on to the mane. She thought it was trying to bite her feet, but the old lady said that it was just sniffing her to see who she was.

Off they went along the road, with the horse farting on account of the apples, which made Roza giggle, but did not impress the old lady, and they had gone quite a way before she said that she thought that this was probably far enough, otherwise it would take too long for Roza to get home, and anyway, it was about to rain.

Roza didn’t want to go, and she made the woman promise to let her ride the horse again. It was apparently called “Russia” because it was very big, a complete liability, and always going where it wasn’t wanted. She sprained her ankle getting off, and after the tears were duly wiped, she started to limp home.

She was only halfway there when the wellhead broke with a clap of thunder, and down fell the rain. Her ankle hurt too much to run, and the water was beginning to fall very heavily, so she made for a little barn that was at the side of the road. It was heaped with bales of straw, and she climbed up on them despite being frightened of rats.

She said that she mostly felt very disappointed about having to get off the horse, and annoyed about being caught in the rain, and at first was more puzzled than alarmed by catching sight of a hand sticking up out of the straw. It was like a yellow claw, with papery skin.

She moved some straw away, and the long and short of it is that she found a dead tramp. Fortunately she thought he was asleep, and her first instinct was not to wake him up, as that would have been bad manners. He was wearing a placard around his neck, on which was scrawled:
“Survivor of Jasenovac. Hero of the Resistance.”
He had a medal with a red ribbon pinned to his chest, his mouth was open and his lips were blue. He had a white beard, speckled with vomit. Next to him was a brown bottle, which later turned out to have had carbon-tetrachloride industrial dry-cleaner in it. Roza said that when she sniffed at the empty bottle she thought it smelled very nice. Luckily it was all gone, so she didn’t get to take a swig of it.

She tried conversing with him, but did eventually realise that he was dead. At that point she went out in the rain and limped home, regardless.

Her parents were furious with her, mostly because of their own anxiety. They were in their coats and hats and were just about to set out looking for her. It was particularly bad for her father because thunder made him feel as if he were back under bombardment. It took her a little while to persuade them that there really was a dead man in the barn down the road, and they accused her of telling tales and told her to stop telling lies. What ultimately persuaded them was her odd assertion that the dead man’s name was “Survivor of Jasenovac,” since she couldn’t possibly have thought that one up on her own.

When the police took away the body, they finally identified it as being indeed that of a beggar and one-time resistance fighter, who had been captured and put into the extermination camp at Jasenovac. I looked it up and discovered that this was a place where the Croats had killed about thirty-five thousand Serbs. The Gestapo had inspected it and been shocked. Some of the staff were Franciscan monks. When Yugoslavia finally fell apart, I was one of those people who weren’t particularly surprised. Roza always said that it would, after Tito died. I didn’t believe her at first, though; we’d all been told that it was a multicultural paradise, positively purulent with harmony and sweet understanding.

Roza said that the reason she still got upset about the tramp was that you could be a hero and survive in hell, and get awarded the Partisan Star, and then still die like a rat, and it’s just another day, and nothing’s changed. Roza said that the episode gave her horrible feelings about the futility of life’s struggles. I remember another time when she said that if you felt that life was futile, it had a liberating effect, because then you were prepared to do almost anything. I remember talking to a philosopher in a bar once. He was another one who was delaying going home to his wife. He advised me that I should never be frightened of failure, because one day I was going to die anyway.

I told her, “I found a dead man once. It was under an archway in King’s Cross.” I don’t know why I told Roza that. It wasn’t even true. I don’t often tell lies on impulse. There was a song that all the kids with guitars were singing at the time, and one of the verses was about “one more forgotten hero, and a world that doesn’t care.” It was called “The Streets of London,” or something, and it was all about derelict old people. I must have got the idea from that.

She exhaled some smoke and said, “I saw another dead man. He was only just dead.”

I didn’t ask her to explain. Just then I had to get home to Sutton. It was my wife’s birthday, I hadn’t yet finished my rounds, and I was running out of reasonable excuses. I only remembered her remark later. When Roza said goodnight at the door she put her hands on my shoulders and briefly laid her head on my chest. I thought, “I’m making progress,” and I went away feeling pleased with myself. I’d saved about a hundred pounds by then, and was still wondering what to do with it. I was feeling disgusted and irritated with myself that I had ever thought of offering it to Roza.

TEN

Miss Radic

Beware of getting a disengaged heart.

I
had an embarrassing encounter in the local library. It was a little dingy place, which is how I like libraries to be. I’d gone in to read up about Yugoslavia, and I found a book called
A Concise History of the Yugoslav Peoples.
I was going to read it in the library, because I wasn’t a member yet, and couldn’t take it away. I had a notebook with me so that I could record the more interesting details and memorise them.

The newspapers were full of stuff about the Yorkshire Ripper, but I was sitting at a table reading about the Battle of Kosovo.

Someone tapped me on the shoulder. When I looked up, I saw it was Chris, and my face started to burn. I was so confused and embarrassed. He kissed me on the cheek. “Hi,” he said. “I called round at your place, but you weren’t there, so I thought I’d come here and while away the time. I thought I’d pop in and see if they’d got anything on Yugoslavia.” He leaned over and looked at my book, and said, “I see that you’ve got just the thing.”

I was expecting him to ask me awkward questions as to why I was reading about my own country, but he didn’t. It probably didn’t strike him as strange at all. I suppose that lots of people read histories of their own countries. It was just me feeling as though I’d been caught out, looking for stories. It also seemed strange to come across him out of context, like meeting one of your teachers in the street at a weekend.

“I’d better let you finish it first,” he said. “I can always order it from the library in Sutton.”

I said, “Well, let’s go back to my place, now that we’ve met up.” We went for a stroll first, and watched old ladies feeding birds. He said, “Have you ever noticed how many city pigeons have only got one foot, or have a foot that’s mangled?”

I said that I hadn’t, but from that day to this I’ve noticed it a lot.

I used to enjoy teasing Chris by being very frank. I think he was often appalled. I was testing him, to see how far I could go. I wonder if he was ever puzzled about why I told him personal things in such detail, things that normal people would keep to themselves, or that girls would only tell to their best friend or their sister. More often than not I’d mix up these revelations with the sort of information that people bore you with at parties.

Once I told him about my favourite teacher, who was called Miss Radic.

I was the kind of pupil who always knows everything already, so I got easily bored in class. I could read before I even went to school, and was always putting my hand up and going, “Me, Miss! Me, Miss!” every time the teacher asked the class a question, and when I got told off for overeagerness I’d go on strike and cross my arms and sulk, and then the teachers would tease me and say, “What? Don’t you know the answer, Roza?”

I mostly enjoyed school. It was nice being delivered there in the big Mercedes when not many other people had cars at all. My father used to make me empty out my pencil case every morning before we went, to make sure that I had the full complement of pencils and things. He used to say, “The more you work now, the less you’ll have to work later.”

At school I got thrown in the prickly hedge, and people took rubber bands and fired folded paper in class, and there was a fashion for punching people in the upper arm to see if a big bruised area could be created. Once there was a spastic boy who was so cruelly teased and persecuted that he took to injuring himself so that he wouldn’t have to go to school. Chris said to me that it sounded as if my communist Yugoslavian education had been exactly the same as his capitalist English one.

“What are those things that you make points on pencils with?” I asked him once, because my English had some gaps in it. I didn’t learn it in the usual way.

“A pencil sharpener?”

“Yes,
OK
, pencil sharpener. I stole one from my friend at school.”

“Did you?”

“It was very pretty. It was wood, and it had a little painting on it, and so I stole it.”

“Yes?”

“And I never did use it because I felt too much shame about myself.”

“You gave it back, I suppose?”

I thought I’d tease him a bit and so I looked at him as if he were mad, and said, “No, of course not. I’ve still got it. I’ll show you one day.”

“And you’ve still never used it?”

I shook my head, and blew out smoke. I thought, “I wonder what he’ll make of that,” but he didn’t say anything. Chris often didn’t comment about what I said, because he was worried about making the right impression.

“I like you,” I said, “because you listen. I tell you anything, but you don’t get shocked, you just listen.”

“I do get shocked,” he admitted, “a bit.”

“Oh, it’s being polite, is it? You don’t let me see, about how shocked you are? In my country everyone says that the English are hypocrites, because they’re always pretending, but I think it’s because the manners are too good.”

“Well, it’s very interesting, listening to you. I don’t want you to stop, so I don’t look shocked, even if I am. These days I feel like an old man. Nobody’s interested in someone like me. Youngsters look at me and I know they’re thinking that I’m a retarded dinosaur with one foot in the grave. The thing about being me and being forty is that I feel I’ve got to offer something extra, because no one would be interested in me otherwise. Probably I’m just being stupid. The world’s gone beyond my opinions, if you know what I mean. I feel old-fashioned when I get shocked, and I don’t like it.”

“
OK
,” I said, “I’ll tell you something. When I got my first hair…down there…I didn’t realise it was mine, and I pulled at it, and I only realised it was mine when it hurt.”

He definitely was shocked. “Why did you tell me that?”

“Are you shocked?”

He reflected a moment, and denied it. “No, not really, I’ve got used to you trying to shock me. The most surprising thing was when you said something about sleeping with your father.”

“I’ll tell you more about that one day, if you like. Would you like it?” I leaned forward and smiled in a way that was suggestive. He looked a little angry. “I can’t help feeling that you’re playing games with me. You tease me. You know, sometimes, Roza, I wonder what’s going on. Sometimes I feel like the idiot in a spy book.”

I was alarmed. I didn’t want him to be angry and give me up. I didn’t know what to say. In the end I just got up and went and poured myself more coffee. When I came back I put my hand on his arm and said, “Sorry.” I could feel his pleasure at being touched by me, and he smiled up at me a little weakly, and said, “Oh, it’s nothing. Really, it’s me who’s sorry.”

I said, “Please don’t give up on me, I couldn’t bear it.”

“Why would I do that?”

“People do, sometimes.”

He looked at me and I was sure that he was in love with me. He said, “I don’t think I could ever give up on you.” I kissed him on the forehead, like a daughter. It’s nice to have someone you can be affectionate with, and you know they’re not dangerous. I was getting feelings too. I could sense them bubbling up. I kept wondering what it would be like if we were lovers, and whether I’d be jealous of his wife. I thought I probably wouldn’t. You don’t get jealous of the zookeeper who keeps the monkey in the cage. If I were going to be jealous of her, I would have started already.

“I was going to tell you about Miss Radic,” I said.

“Oh yes?”

“She was a great teacher. She told me all about women’s things, having periods and getting breasts and that kind of thing. If she hadn’t, I think I wouldn’t have known anything.”

“My teachers were all paedophiles, sadists, and megalomaniacs,” said Chris. “I had a wonderful education, though. I can count to a hundred in Latin. I had a teacher who’d been in Africa, and now there’s nothing I don’t know about Zulus. He started every geography and history lesson with ‘When I was out in Africa…’ ”

“Did anyone teach you about being a man, you know…men’s things?”

“Not really. When we left school the headmaster advised us that if anyone should try to interfere with us, we should kick him in the balls. If he’d told us that before, there would have been a couple of masters with aching groins. As for the facts of life, I learned most of the basics the moment I went to school, from the other boys.”

“Oh,” I said, “I didn’t have any pervert teachers. Miss Radic was nice. My mother wasn’t much good, though. When I had my period she just got worried about the sheets. Miss Radic patted me on the head and said congratulations. And she told me not to get a disengaged heart.”

“A disengaged heart? What’s that supposed to mean?”

“It’s about sex and love,” I said. “She meant I should keep them together.”

“And did you?”

I felt some pain inside, and said honestly, “No, I didn’t keep them together. I never did anything right.” I laughed and shook my head. “I’ve been crap.” I stopped and lit another cigarette, and then I said, “When Miss Radic told me about the facts, I cried, and I said, ‘I don’t want to have one of those things put inside me and get pregnant.’ Miss Radic laughed and hugged me to her chest. She had her spectacles on a cord round her neck, and I felt them pressing into me, all hard and strange.”

Chris said, “It’s funny what memories we choose to keep.”