Rates of Exchange (47 page)

So Petworth finds some nice things to do. He goes to the advanced glass-blowing factory, and to the National Gallery, where the frenzies of Post-lmpressionism and Fauvism and the work of the
national Expressionist painter Lev Pric subside into the tidy narrative economies of socialist realism. He goes to the castle – ‘this time
really
the castle,’ says Marisja
Lubijova, toiling by his side – of Bishop ‘Wencher’ Vlam (1675–1753, according to the guidebook), filled with fine armour and displays of Slakan history, great wooden
furniture and elegant bedsteads. ‘Here the Bishop likes to have his pray,’ says Mari Lubijova, looking round a large, ornate, plastered bedroom, ‘I think he liked to have every
girl in the city. You see how God works for some.’ He goes to the Wicwok shop, to look at Scotch tweeds and tartans, and to the heimat shop, to look at, and buy, fine hand-made embroidery,
woodcarving, a small pot or two. He goes to parks where old people sit, and children play in groups under the regard of fat nannies in big, deep skirts. He goes to the great department store, MUG,
where the people go to inspect the prospect of shopping, and manages to buy there, with some of his remaining vloskan, a big glass decanter, finely made. He makes a visit to the puppet house; he
goes to the museum of old pianos. On some trips, Marisja Lubijova comes with him; sometimes, busy with her own unknown life in Slaka, she does not. He learns how to use the trams, buying tickets
from the stalls marked
UTTU
; he begins to make in his mind a rough map of the city, though it must be admitted that, when there is no guide to describe it, no voice to tell
its story, Slaka does not seem very different from any city anywhere else. The pink trams clatter, the men go by in khaki, the women in headscarves; the crowds stand outside the cinema in a bleak
line, waiting to see something called
Yups
. And if there are troubles, vague drummings of disturbance, then life seems normal. From time to time, using the greasy telephones in the stand-up
cafeterias where he catches a snack lunch, he tries to find out more, attempting to reach Mr Steadiman, at the Embassy, at home; but for some reason the telephone links seem to be severed. And once
in a while, with great caution, he tries the number that has been given him by Katya Princip; but the telephone rings and rings in what, even down the imperfect apparatus, seems to be an empty
room.

But on the third day, when he rises, and goes down to the lobby, to collect on his way to breakfast, the red-masted newspaper, he senses that something has changed. Then, over the slow
breakfast, he sees what the change is, a perfectly small one:
P’rtyuu Populatuuu
has become
P’rtyii Populatiii
again. The fresh breakfast menu has gone from the table, to
be replaced by a very old one, food-stained but in the words he had begun to learn when he arrived; the food is the same; and when he goes back upstairs to his room, to get ready for the events of
this national day, men are lowering down from the opposite building the big neon sign that says
SCH
’
VEPPUU
. Over the square, the flags wave, for today’s day of National Culture; Marisja
Lubijova, when she arrives in the lobby, wears a red carnation in her lapel, and seems full of excitement. ‘Well, it is your last day, and our day of happy rejoicering,’ she says,
‘It will be a good day, are you ready? Do you excite about our parade? I expect they will find a fine place for you.’ They leave the hotel to go out into packed and busy streets:
‘Oh, such a crowd on our special day,’ says Marisja Lubijova, ‘I hope I don’t lose you again. But I think you know the way now to Plazsci P’rtyii.’
‘Wasn’t it once called Plazscu P’rtyuu?’ asks Petworth. ‘Oh, was it really?’ asks Marisja Lubijova, ‘I don’t remember. Of course our language is a
little bit difficult.’ ‘Well, perhaps there was just a little confusion,’ says Petworth. But they come to the great square, whatever its name, and it has turned into a solid mass
of people, standing, pressing, moving, eddying. The armed men who are everywhere are everywhere: ‘Push, push,’ says Marisja, excitedly, ‘We have a special seat, of course. And now
do you see how well we love our writers and our teachers?’ And evidently they do, for it is clear that the people have come in their thousands: the soldiers and the waiters, the city-dwellers
and the peasants from the countryside, the old men and women and the schoolchildren, the tourists from the first world, and the second, and the third, and however many more there are – they
have all come and are standing together in the square.

A soldier blocks the way, in a beret, with a gun and a radio transmitter; Lubijova shows him a pass, and they climb up wooden steps onto a viewing stand. ‘You see we have a good
place,’ says Lubijova, as they go up high, ‘You are an important visitor. From here you will see everything.’ Petworth looks across the great masses, a man not used to them. There
is a little rain in the air, and some hold up umbrellas, some black, some plastic and transparent, so that they have the effect of a great pebbled beach. But more important than the umbrellas are
the flags that are waving from side to side: red flags, blue and green flags, white and brown flags. ‘Oh, don’t you like the flags?’ says Lubijova, ‘Please don’t think
of all the nice shirts they would make. We like them very much on our special occasions.’ And above the flags in the crowd are the great banners flapping on the poles; and above the banners
and the bunting are the great photographs, those realistic images of constructed seriousness. ‘Do you recognize them?’ asks Lubijova, ‘Comrade Marx, Comrade Lenin, Comrade
Brezhnev, Comrade Grigoric, Comrade Vulcani?’ ‘What happened to Comrade Wanko?’ asks Petworth ‘I don’t think I remember this Wanko,’ says Marisja Lubijova,
‘Of course it is hard for you to remember names in another language.’ ‘And who is Vulcani?’ asks Petworth. ‘Well, there you see him,’ says Marisja Lubijova,
‘Look, down the stand. The men of the Party take up their positions.’ Petworth looks along the stand, and sees faces he knows: Felix and Budgie Steadiman, she in a great green garden
party hat, are waving at him. And there, in the middle, right in the centre of things, is Tankic, grinning in his plastic Homburg hat. ‘Oh, Tankic, where does he stand?’ asks Marisja,
craning to see, ‘That is what we come to look for. Oh, that is nice; they must have made him the Minister of Culture! And that is Vulcani beside him, with the Russian minister. Don’t
you think he is a handsome president? Oh, don’t you excite? And now they have come, the parade will begin.’

From round the comer, where the Palace of Culture stands, there comes a noise of martial music; then, through the strip in the centre, which the armed men keep clear, there comes, for some
reason, a row of rocket launchers, and a tank or two. Behind the tanks comes a marching procession: ‘First the musicians,’ says Lubijova. At the front there steps a military band;
behind the band are musicians of another kind, carrying violins and French horns and bassoons and cymbals. Then behind them there come, in great quantities, children in leotards, all of them
carrying bunches of flowers which they wave, in ceremonial fashion, from side to side in rhythm, first to the left, then to the right. The smallest children are in the front, and then the sizes
grade upward, toward the adult. ‘They are the lovers of revolutionary culture,’ says Marisja Lubijova, ‘And now, look, the academicians, our very best scholars.’ And now
there marches, behind the children through the square, a very solemn body of men, eminent in their grey hair and neat suits. Among them it is possible to see a very familiar figure, Professor Rom
Rum, his topcoat loose on his shoulders, a medal on his lapel, a sash across his chest. The barriers to the side break, to let through a bevy of small children, all carrying bouquets of flowers;
they hand the flowers to the eminent men, and Professor Rum bends to kiss one on the cheek. ‘I hope you treat also so your professors and your writers,’ says Marisja Lubijova, ‘It
shows how we like to value them. Oh, yes, look please, here come next our professors. I expect you will remember some of them from your travels.’

The professors, it must be admitted, march somewhat raggedly, like a poor conscript army following on from the élite troops the academy has managed to muster. Their armaments, too, seem
less: a few have sashes, and one or two have medals, but others attempt to define their rôle by holding up, like winners of a world cup, their trophies, which are in the form of books. Among
them it is indeed possible to recognize a number of familiar faces, like a reprise of the recent past. For Mrs Goko from Slaka is there, marching sturdily, and beside her the little assistants Miss
Bancic and Miss Mamorian, as well as the big Mr Picnic, who still wears his sunshades and carries his camera. Professor Vlic from Glit has somehow, despite the troubled air-routes, managed to be
there, transporting himself somehow from one side of the country to the other; and there too are all the short stout lady professors from the Restaurant Nada, holding up great big bunches of
flowers. ‘And which are the people I didn’t meet?’ asks Petworth, ‘The ones from Nogod and Provd?’ ‘Oh, I don’t think I see them,’ says Marisja
Lubijova, ‘I expect there has been just a little confusion. But see, look, there is your good old friend, I think? Of course he has to be there.’ Petworth looks around, and then sees, a
little to the side, as if he has a procession of his own to march in, none other than Dr Plitplov. He steps out in his suit and his white sportshirt, with a blazon on the pocket, and holds rather
low down over his head a big black umbrella; conspicuous in his chosen inconspicuousness, he slinks by the saluting stand, where Vulcani salutes his intellectual troops.

‘And now the writers!’ cries Lubijova, as another large company emerges from the corner beside the Palace of Culture. ‘Such a lot of them,’ says Petworth, staring at the
large massed company. ‘Of course,’ says Lubijova, ‘You know we are literate country. Of course some are journalists and some make only translations, but here too are many poets
and novelists. Do you impress?’ The writers, men and women, step out; the children run out from the crowd to give them flowers; there is applause from the crowd. ‘Oh, and there walks
your little princess,’ says Marisja Lubijova, ‘So she is in Slaka.’ And there, indeed, toward the back, walks Katya Princip, looking very well. Despite the rain that is falling
increasingly, she still wears her sunglasses, pushed back into her blonde hair, and is clad in the familiar batik dress. Her expression, as Petworth tries to stare into it, is clear. Around her the
writers walk; and, though not generally known for their skill with flags, they all carry little flags, and wave them from side to side, now to the left, now to the right, with a regulated
efficiency. Above them blow the bigger flags, the banners on the poles, red, blue and green, white and brown. And higher still, over the whole display, unbelievably big against the tiny faces of
the marchers down below (at whom, or rather at one of whom, Petworth is looking), are the greater faces, some goatee-ed and some pincenez- ed, some moustached and some bearded, some stern and
clean-shaven, of Marx and Lenin, Engels and Grigoric, Brezhnev and Vulcani, those writers of history without whom the present occasion would not have been possible. The writers go off toward the
lower end of the square, past Grigoric’s tomb; the batik dress disappears into the mass; ‘Oh, look, now here the painters,’ cries Lubijova, tugging at Petworth’s arm.

II

It is Petworth’s last day in Slaka, and tomorrow he flies; so, as the crowds disintegrate, carrying their flags, and they all leave Plazsci P’rtyii, it makes sense
to tell Marisja Lubijova that he would like to take the afternoon to himself. He takes his lunch in a stand-up cafeteria, looking out into the hotel square where men are putting up a new sign that
says
SCH
’
VEPPII
; the word is changing in Slaka. Then he goes to the greasy telephone, finds a number written on a small slip of paper, and carefully dials it. ‘Da?’ says a voice
at the other end. ‘Katya Princip?’ he asks. There is a pause; then the voice says, ‘Oh, really, is it you?’ ‘Yes, it’s me,’ says Petworth. ‘And you
have made a good tour?’ says the voice, ‘You go to many places in my country? But now you are back, someone told me.’ ‘Yes,’ says Petworth. ‘And did you learn
anything, I hope so, you were not here for fun,’ says the voice. ‘I don’t know,’ says Petworth. ‘And do you wear still that stone?’ asks the voice,
‘Perhaps you have lost it.’ ‘No, I still have it,’ says Petworth, ‘It’s here.’ There is another pause, and then the voice says: ‘And now do you want
to know the end of the story of Stupid?’ ‘I do,’ says Petworth. ‘Wait, I think,’ says the voice, ‘You know we cannot go back there to that place, the one with
the lift. Things are not very easy now, I told you how it might be. You are all right?’ ‘Yes,’ says Petworth. ‘You know I like to see you very much,’ says the voice.
‘And I you,’ says Petworth. ‘Of course, we are in the same story,’ says the voice, ‘Listen, there is a place, if you can find it. Do you know where is the Cathedral,
to Saint Valdopin?’ ‘Down by the power station?’ asks Petworth. ‘Near to the river Niyt?’ says the voice, ‘Well, can you go there, we say at three o’clock.
You have your watch? Go inside there, be somewhere near the altar, wait for me. You can find it, you won’t be lost?’ ‘I can find it,’ says Petworth. ‘I waited
here,’ says Katya Princip, ‘I knowed you would telephone to me. Of course I am a witch.’ ‘Yes,’ says Petworth. ‘And I will witch you again,’ says Katya,
‘So, go there, wait for me.’

Petworth goes out into the square, buys a ticket from the stall that is marked
LITTI
, and gets on board a pink tram that is marked
VIPNU
. It is
crowded in the tram, filled with children carrying flags and flowers from the morning celebrations. Gradually the tram empties, as it takes its route out over the Bridge Anniversary May 15, and
rattles down the boulevards toward the new workers’ apartments; Petworth is almost the only one left when it reaches the end of the line, to turn in a circle in the marshy land near to the
power station and the river Niyt. At first sight, the cathedral close to is not impressive, but he walks up the steps toward its massed blackened brick. He is very early, so he walks to the side,
and finds the entrance to the crypt; paying his vloska, he goes down into the deep stone rooms where the gallery of ikons hangs. He looks for a long time at the dark strained faces, staring out
from the paint, the tempera, the gilding, uttering the pain, the faith, the love behind their sacred stories. It is nearly three, time to look for the person he wants so much to meet again; he goes
outside, and walks to the great curved porch, scattered with confetti from a recent wedding. He steps inside, into the great solemn darkness, everywhere lit by spluttering beeswax candles, which
scent the air. From the central dome comes more light, falling over painted canopies and the plaster, silver and gold of the great long altar; the altar is set far forward in the nave, as if to
protect deeper mysteries within. The cathedral is almost empty; a few, a very few, old ladies in shawls kneel in the side chapels under lit candles; a small number of tourists wander about in the
half-dark, with cameras slung round their necks; somewhere in the darkness, a priest is intoning.