The Concert (16 page)

But in fact, as everyone knew, the suggestion was rejected, Mao wouldn't agree to having the plane shot down. Why? The answer went without saying: he didn't share the anxiety of the others, for the simple reason that he knew something they didn't know. Then another question arose: what
did
the others know? And what
didn't
they know? Were those who suggested shooting the plane down so ill-informed as to think such a solution was possible? Didn't they know that the plane of the marshal supposedly invited to Peking was doomed never to land? You'd have to be very naive to believe they were ignorant. No, they were all perfectly well-informed: after all, it was they who'd prepared the trap in all its details
—
the take-off, the re-routing towards the Mongolian frontier, the bomb placed on board or the sabotage of the landing gear, designed to cause a fire. They knew all this. But still they suggested shooting the plane down.

Every so often Gjergj was consoled by the thought that he wasn't the first person to rack his brains over this affair. Hundreds of people must have followed that flight. To make the theory of attempted escape more plausible, all the airports in China had been put on alert. But just as on the plane itself those who were leaving or thought they were leaving all had different notions about what was really happening, so too did those who were still on the ground. Most of them - officers in charge of military airfields or rocket launchers, pilots ready for take-off, radar experts and so on
—
had been informed about the marshal's attempt to escape. But one thing they couldn't make out: why had there been no order from Peking to pursue his plane or even shoot it down? Even when the plane appeared on the radar screen the order didn't come. The pilots had difficulty holding themselves back — they longed to fall on their prey and tear it to pieces, and were afraid other pilots from another base might be given the chance instead. But soon, through some channel or another, the explanation came: Chairman Mao hadn't allowed the plane to be shot down. Apparently he'd said: “Let him go if he wants to!” This information filled some people with admiration (the great Mao dealt with a traitor as calmly as he might have brushed off a fly), and others with amazement (this was no joking matter, and the marshal, far from being a fly, knew all the state secrets…).

But a much smaller circle was in possession of quite a different set of facts: the summons to Peking, the attempted escape to Mongolia, and above all — yes, above all - the setting fire to the plane by means of a bomb or the sabotaging of the landing gear. They'd also had wind of the possibility that the marshal might be executed in the air. “If anything unforeseen happens, kill him on the plane!”

As soon as they heard the plane had taken off they heaved a sigh of relief. Thank goodness the whole business would soon be over now. That's what they thought at first. But soon, as the flight continued, they began to be assailed by doubts: wouldn't it be more efficient to bring the plane down with rockets? What if the time-bomb didn't go off, or the pilot managed to land the plane safely despite the sabotaged landing gear? (Hadn't there been many such cases?) How could they bear to let their prey slip through their fingers?

They probably went and told Mao about their anxiety. One of them added: “Even if Lin Biao were already dealt with — should the witnesses be allowed to survive?”

Mao heard them out patiently, but showed no sign of going back on his decision. Finally he answered curtly: “As I said before, let him go. If he's lucky enough get away in spite of the bomb and the sabotage, it means fate has decreed that he should live!”

They exchanged glances. This was his new style. They weren't used to it yet. It must be due to his spells down in the cave — they joked about these sometimes.

But their anxiety only increased. Mao had assured them the plane had been doubly sabotaged, by the planting of the bomb and the damaging of the landing gear, but they couldn't suppress their doubts. It wasn't that easy to sabotage a plane Lin Biao was travelling in!

Mao himself was perfectly at ease. For the simple reason that he knew another secret. Never mind the bomb and the damage to the undercarriage - Lin Biao was dead already. Killed not in mid-air, as their feeble brains might imagine, nor in the Mongolian desert, but on Chinese soil.

As they dithered around him trying to tell him their worries, Mao looked them over sardonically. They always forgot he came from a peasant background — and a peasant always trusts terra firma better than the sky. Could he possibly have been so reckless as to let Lin Biao fly around before he was killed? He couldn't afford such a luxury. That was why he'd said “Let him go!” so placidly, He'd known he was talking about a corpse.

So Lin Biao and his wife and son had died, like the vast majority of human beings, on earth. On a landing strip or in a hangar in some remote airfield. Or else they were liquidated even more coldbloodedly inside the marshal's official residence, as they were taking a stroll round the garden after breakfast. They were shot with a machine-gun through the iron railings, and their bodies were put in a van and driven to the little military air-base. There the bloody corpses were lashed to their seats in the waiting plane.

If Mao was so calm it was because he knew all that. Bet he had never confided in anyone except Zhou Enlal. The reason for his silence was simple: he was protecting his owe prestige. He felt that the planting of a bomb on a plane and the sabotage of its landing gear were strategems which might have damaged his reputation, whereas a ground operation was something quite different. He hadn't even spoken about it to Jiang Qing. Zhou was seriously ill and hadn't got long to live, so the secret was safe with him. As for the killers, they would soon follow their victims to a place where they could tell no tales.

Meanwhile the little army plane was flying over northern China. Deep silence reigned on board. No questions were to be heard, no gunshots — only the monotonous purr of the engines. The bullets which were soon to put the whole world in a turmoil were already in the bodies. Every so often the corpses, now beginning to cool, would slip down off the seats. One of the killers had probably thought it enough to fasten them into their seat belts.

Gjergj felt a tremor go through the giant plane, and leaned towards the window. The lights had gone on asking passengers to fasten their seat belts. They were apparently about to land. Night was falling; the tiny purple-glinting windows far below seemed to belong to another planet. The plane was bumping more often now. Gjergj ‘s ears were hurting. The ground was coming closer and closer, and he found himself glancing towards the place beneath the wings where the landing gear would soon emerge, with a faint jolt that would run right through the fuselage.

What a relief! This torture would soon be over. He was sure that as soon as the plane had touched down he would be free of all these chaotic obsessions. But the landing was taking a very long time. The mauve lights of the airport building vanished to the right, as if they'd fallen into an abyss. Was he still going to have to keep churning up the same old jumble of thoughts in his skull, when after all the whole affair could be reduced to the story of a dead body being thrown over the Chinese frontier?

Yes, that's it, he thought, his temples throbbing as the air in the cabin was depressurized. The story of a dead body being dumped. In the old days, bandits used to leave the bodies of their victims at their enemies' door. Mao dumped them at the door of the nearest super-power. Tossing corpses into forts and citadels in order to terrorize the defenders was a custom as old as time. He remembered, too, how the ashes of the false Dmitri of Russia were shot over the Polish border in a cannonball. All quite typical of such countries. And hadn't Mao threatened them in exactly those terms when he said, “I'll scatter your corpses in the air?”

The body of the plane creaked loudly as it descended through the semi-darkness. Gjergj was still holding his briefcase on his lap. The metal buckles gleamed faintly. The Soviets had been just as mysterious over Beria. He'd vanished more than twenty years ago, and his disappearance was still an enigma. People said there wasn't even any trial or firing squad — he was just killed at a meeting of the Politbureau. One version said somebody had strangled him with his bare hands. Then the body was hastily buried. Whereas he, the amazing Mao, airily tossed corpses from one country to another as if with a catapult.

Why can't I get these images out of my mind, thought Gjergj. Again he peered out of the window, but all he could see was the damp impenetrable darkness. Where had the earth gone? How much longer were they going to have to wander around in space? He leaned his head against the cool glass, feeling the plane's vibration run right through him. Then suddenly, a long way in front of him, he saw a multitude of little lights, not only mauve but also red and green and blue, winking and flickering in the darkness. He felt his heart grow warmer, he was filled with a delightful languor. The plane's wing blotted out the lights on the ground for a moment, but he sat on with his forehead pressed to the glass as if he could still see them. His thoughts had drifted home again to his loved ones. Their faces, wreathed in smiles, succeeded one another in his memory until for some reason or other it came to a halt on ae episode he hadn't remembered for a long time. What he recalled was his first moment of real closeness to Silva, in an avenue strewn with dead leaves
-
he still didn't know its name. It lay between the main boulevard and Elbasan Street, and they'd just come away from an evening party - they hardly knew one another as yet. Under the streetlights the yellow leaves stretched out like a sumptuous expanse of gilding glowing with the patina of time. They noticed a scrap of paper amongst the leaves — a piece from a musical score, with the notes still legible. He pointed at it. “Look, some Mozart!” he said. She laughed. He glanced at the dark buildings bordering the avenue: “I think this is quite near the hostel for music students.”

The memory of this interlude was almost painful. Gjergj thought of the moment just before they made love, when her eyes were about to cast off sight just as her body was about to strip itself of clothes. Then came the moment when he was bending over her white belly and that which was waiting, unbearably intense, below…

The heavy fuselage jolted when the plane touched down on the landing strip. The engines shrieked as the pilot throttled back. Multicoloured lights quivered frenziedly on either side. “How wonderful to be going back!” he exclaimed. In three days' time he would be in Tirana. The plane slowed down, panting heavily. What airport was this, then? He looked around in the hope of seeing some name among the lights, but they still jigged about drunkenly and were dumb. Anyhow, what did it matter? The main thing was that he would soon have left ail this behind. Then he remembered that he hadn't even sent his family a telegram. How could he have forgotten? But never mind, it still wasn't too late. He peered out of the window again in search of a name. The stewardesses had just announced something…But how did one write a wire in these parts — in Latin characters or Arabic?

The plane came to a stop at last, and the passengers got ready to disembark.

Gjergj smiled to himself as he stood up. He was going to send that telegram anyhow, even if it had to be written in Egyptian hieroglyphics. Silva got the telegram the next day. It was growing dark and she was tidying up the refrigerator when there was a ring at the door. Then she heard Brikena calling from the hall:

“A telegram, Mother! I think it's from Father…”

After a moment's surprise she straightened up and ran out into the hall. Brikena had already opened the envelope and they both pored over the wire, reading it out almost in unison: “Arrive Thursday German plane. Fondest fondest love.”

“How lovely!” cried Brikena, clapping her hands.

At first they could think only of the message, reading it over and over and scrutinizing the date-stamps which said when it had been dispatched and when received. Then they rushed to consult Brikena's atlas to find the town it had been sent from.

“He's still miles away!” said Brikena when they'd located it.

A few moments later their apartment, which had been so quiet lately, suddenly came to life again. The lights were on in all the rooms. Silva went from refrigerator to stove and then to the cupboard in which she kept the crockery, where she promptly forgot what she'd come for. “What sort of cake shall we make?” Brikena asked. Of course, that was what Silva had gone to the cupboard for! But it was still too soon — he wouldn't be home for another couple of days. They had plenty of time for everything. But if Brikena wanted to they could make the cake today. Silva was so happy she didn't know what to do with herself. At one point she found herself wandering aimlessly around the apartment. Then, rather than starting on something that needed to be done and then putting it down again unfinished, she just picked up the telegram and went through it again slowly, as if to trying to read something between the lines. Her smile froze when she came to the words, “Fondest fondest love”, wondering why they made her feel vaguely anxious. What does it mean? she thought - and found herself crying out to something deep inside herself: “What's the matter with me?” Nothing, replied the gulf within, But the uneasiness remained, distant, vague. Anyhow, that fit of sentiment wasn't a good sign.

In the end, the gulf within delivered its answer. Silva hadn't been able to repress the memory of a very distressing funeral. The man being buried had died in a plane crash on the way back from China, and the man's wife had said to Silva: “I don't know - his last letter was so emotional I was quite disturbed …”

Nonsense, Silva told herself - the post-office people often duplicate words in a telegram. She knew this wasn't really true -they only repeated dates or figures. But why was she letting herself get upset like this?