Byzantium Endures (18 page)

I looked up at her warm, fat body, her plain, concerned face. I decided that Wanda was the girl I needed. Wanda would never make herself available to more than one man. She would be grateful that she had a man at all.

‘Only in love,’ I replied heavily. ‘A girl turned out to be unfaithful.’

‘That’s terrible. Dear Maxim!’ Feminine sympathy seeped from her pores like sweat. ‘Who on earth could do such a thing to you? What a bitch she must be.’

I remember a pang or two at this description, but when I considered the situation I decided Katya had been more cynical than I had guessed. I made some attempt to defend her, remembering Shura’s words. ‘She’s just weak ...’

‘Don’t you believe it, Maxim dear. Not a word. Weakness is a wall women hide behind. And it’s a wall, I assure you, as strong as steel. You’ve been deceived.’

‘By a Jewish harlot,’ I said.

This seemed to make her hesitate. I think she was a little upset that I had been sleeping with a Jewess.

‘Never again,’ I said.

‘She didn’t give you anything ... ?’

I shook my head.

Wanda sat on the bed and began to stroke my dusty hair. She helped me off with my overcoat and my jacket.

In time, as these things go, she helped me off with the rest of my clothes. Then she undressed and climbed into the narrow bed beside me. Her soft, yielding flesh, her massive breasts, her great, warm private parts, her bottom, like two comfortable cushions, her strong, engulfing legs and arms, her wide, hot mouth, all brought immediate relief to my anguish. I began to congratulate myself that I had not only recovered from my pain but that I would always have another woman waiting. So different was Wanda from Katya that it was almost like making love to a different species. Slender, boyish girls like Katya and huge, peasant girls like Wanda, each has her virtues. To know a hundred women is to know a hundred different forms of pleasure. I was lucky to understand this while still so young.

Rising from the damp and overheated bedding, Wanda said she had duties in the house. She kissed me. She asked me if I felt better. She told me she had been a virgin. She had always loved me. Now I would not need to go out for my consolations. With an awkward wink and a blown kiss, she left me. I slept for an hour or two and woke to find the room in cold, pale twilight. I thought, now that my temper had cooled, of going to visit Katya. The prospect of having two lovers, as she had had, pleased me. But I realised it would be hard to accomplish. Wanda was in a position to watch - and watch jealously - my every move.

I felt vengeful towards Shura. I had confided in him. I had told him I loved Katya. He had given me cocaine, white clothes, ivory, to distract me from his dark plots. He had pretended to be my friend and mentor in the ghetto and had exposed me to its worst aspects. All the while he had laughed up his sleeve. I could not beat him in a fight. He was too strong. I could not go to the police and say he was a criminal. I had been involved in some of those crimes, as had friends of mine in the Moldovanka. Not that I regarded them any more as friends. Probably they had all known about Shura’s making a fool of me and been amused. I had been treated as a
naïf.
A village idiot. There must be half-a-dozen good stories about Max the Hetman all over Odessa. I had lost face. I wondered how I could in turn humiliate Shura. Nothing came to mind. He was too certain of himself. Anything I did he could turn to his advantage. There was only one person to whom he owed something, whom he respected (aside from Misha the Jap) and that was Uncle Semya. I grinned to myself. It would be nothing less than dutiful to go to Uncle Semya and ‘warn’ him of Shura’s involvement in crime. My uncle would be horrified. He would send for Shura. He would punish him. It was an ideal revenge because it showed me in a good light and Shura in a bad one.

I turned my attention to Katya. I might be able to involve her in the revenge by mentioning her to Uncle Semya as the hussy who had led my cousin into evil ways. But Uncle Semya was not shocked by such things. He was tolerant of young men who sowed their wild oats. What would he think if I told him Shura was Katya’s pimp? It would not make Uncle Semya take reprisals on Katya. Somehow I would have to work out my own revenge on Katya.

I am not very proud of those thoughts. But I was a hurt youngster believing himself utterly betrayed by his friends and by a race. I behaved in a bigoted fashion. I have not a bigoted bone in my body. My dislike of Jews, my anger at being identified with them, was because we Ukrainians were inundated by Jews. The Revolution was directly inspired by Jews. To be a Slav in Odessa was to be in a minority. As a member of a minority, I am anxious to disassociate myself from those of Oriental origin who control our press, our publishing, our radio and television stations, our industry, our engineering plants, our financial world. How many Ukrainians occupy such positions in England?

Katya could quite easily be reported to the police. But that would mean her arrest and deportation (since she and her mother were from Warsaw), possibly her imprisonment. Even in my most vengeful moments I balked at my little Camille of the ghetto going to prison. Also I wanted a more personal revenge.

I remembered the clown from Magasin Wagner which now lay smashed on her floor. I would send her another Christmas present. From an unknown admirer. I knew she hated spiders: spiders horrified her more than anything. I would collect together a huge box of them and I would send it to her, wrapped in wonderful paper. She would open it on Christmas Eve and her screams would bring the whole Moldovanka down about her ears.

In the meantime I was distracted from my vengeance. Lovely, simpering Wanda brought me tea and cake, stroked my body and made herself familiar with my private parts as if she saw them as being quite independent of me, as if she played with a tame mouse, or a snake, which she would kiss, fondle and laugh at. She had something Katya had never possessed: while Wanda made love to me I could continue to exist in my private mind, keep myself to myself. It is a great advantage of such girls. I have always valued it.

Another advantage to Wanda, of course, was that she had slept with nobody else. She was clean. I did not have to take precautions with her. This was a relief. That night I did little but scheme against Shura and Katya. Uncle Semya had to go out to dinner, so I was not in a position to betray either Shura or myself. After our meal, Aunt Genia played some popular Jewish melodies on her gramophone. Wanda and I made an excuse and retired early. I was in a far better position with her than I had been with Katya. With Wanda, the relationship between Katya and myself was reversed. I became the teacher, instructing my wonderful, passive pupil in every delicious debauchery.

My enjoyment of Wanda nonetheless left me with a passionate determination for revenge. I began to collect the spiders for Katya’s Christmas present. Soon I had about a dozen in an old tea-box. But I wanted more. So that they should not fight and devour one another I found various insects and fed the spiders every evening. Wanda did not know what I kept in the box. I refused to tell her. In the meantime I purchased gifts to present at Christmas Eve dinner. My uncle did not celebrate the Season elaborately. Like my mother he had little use for formal church services. The day before Christmas Eve I asked to see Uncle Semya in his study. He was rather distracted. The War, of course, was making his business difficult. The partial blockade had delayed certain important shipments. I determined to get my revenge on Shura as quickly as possible. Uncle Semya stood behind his desk, his back to the window. He wore a heavy black frockcoat and a black cravat.

‘I have distressing news, Semyon Josefovitch,’ I began, it is my duty to tell you what it is. You, of course, must take whatever action you think fit.’

This amused him. His mood of distraction appeared to lift. He asked me to sit down in one of the hard, cane-bottomed chairs he favoured. He leaned back in his own leather-padded chair and lit a Burma cheroot. The room began to fill with heavy, oily smoke.

‘I hope you are not in trouble, Maxim.’

‘I hope so, too, uncle. My mother would be horrified if she learned what had happened.’

‘Happened?’ He became more alert.

‘Or almost happened, I suppose. I believe Shura to be involved with crooks.’

He was surprised. He put his cheroot into his brass Persian ashtray. He scratched his head. He produced a thin, puzzled smile. ‘What makes you think so?’

‘He is mixed up in the rackets. He could be working with Misha the Jap.’

‘Misha the what?’

‘The Jap. A notorious bandit in the Slobodka district.’

‘I believe I’ve heard of him.’

This was no surprise. Misha’s exploits were the raw material of all the popular papers in Odessa. He had even been mentioned in the Nick Carter and Sherlock Holmes dime-novel pulps we had in those days.

‘He is a kidnapper,’ I said, ‘a hold-up man. He forces local people to pay him protection money. If they don’t, he shoots them or burns their shops. He deals in drugs. In prostitution. Illegal alcohol. He owns cabarets, taverns. He bribes police-inspectors, city officials, everyone.’

Uncle Semya became amused again. ‘Such a Jew should join the Black Hundreds.’

‘And he recruits young lads,’ I continued. ‘Of all races. Ukrainians, Katsups, as they call Russians, Greeks, Armenians, Georgians, Muslims, anyone. He has a web like a—’ I felt uncomfortable ‘— like a spider.’

‘Heaven preserve us! Are you sure this bandit doesn’t just exist in your Pinkerton magazines?’

I told him I spoke the truth. ‘And,’ I added, ‘he has Shura in his grip.’

‘I cannot believe it.’

‘Shura tried to recruit me, too. He used me as an interpreter. I went aboard an English ship. He bought drugs.’

Uncle Semya turned his head away. He looked through the window. There was a yard with an entrance into the alley running between the houses. He watched a small child balancing on the wall. The child fell off and disappeared. He turned to look at me again, ‘I think you’re mistaken, Maxim. Shura works for me.’

‘Of course he carries messages between the ships and merchants and keeps a look-out for good cargo when it’s unloaded. But for the rest of the time he works with crooks, prostitutes. There’s a place called Esau’s. A Jewish tavern. Perhaps you’ve heard of it?’

‘I don’t often visit taverns in Slobodka.’

‘It’s a terrible place. Shura has slipped into bad company. He tried to involve me, too. I refused and now he’s angry with me.’

‘You had an argument?’

‘I objected morally to his life.’

‘He’s a young bohemian. You, too, have been living such a life.’

‘There’s a difference, Semyon Josefovitch, between bohemianism and criminality.’

‘And young people do not always recognise it.’ He waved a tolerant hand.

I was disappointed. ‘I think Shura should be sent away from Odessa.’

‘To where? To Siberia?’ He sounded the word slowly and sardonically.

‘Possibly to sea. It would do him good. The education.’

‘Did he ask you to tell me this?’

‘Not at all.’ Shura would hate to be removed from Odessa, from Katya. With Shura gone I should have both Wanda and Katya. Even when Katya opened the box of spiders she would not know it was from me. I could resume where we had left off. The notion of sending Shura to sea had been an inspiration.

‘Shura isn’t much of a sailor. Also, we are at war...’ Uncle Semyon re-lit his cigar.

‘Think what he would learn.’

‘Have you told him you were coming to me?’

‘No, Semyon Josefovitch.’

‘It might have been more manly to have done so?’

‘He needs an adult to tell him.’

‘And you’ve mentioned this to no other adults?’

‘Only yourself.’

‘I will speak to Alexander. But you must keep this a secret, Maxim.’