The Laughter of Carthage (39 page)

Happily I could leave the Grion’s party early, with Kolya. We said we must discuss engineering problems. At Neuilly, after we had taken some of Kolya’s new cocaine supply, he asked after Esmé. If she continued with her bouts of illness he thought I should engage the specialist he recommended. ‘But possibly she simply suffers from the
malaise du papillon
.’ I wondered what on earth he meant by ‘the butterfly sickness’. He refused to elaborate, adding: ‘You should be prepared, Dimka, to let her go her own way soon.’

This seemed to me a revelation of unexpected jealousy on Kolya’s part. ‘She has everything she wants! Every freedom she requires. Anything else and she would have it. You know that, Kolya. She’s a child. I have a duty to protect her. Perhaps, when she, too, reaches twenty-one, I’ll marry her. That’s all I expect.’

Kolya was impressed, I think. He agreed there were certain comforts in marriage. He always spoke affectionately of his own wife. He loved her as thoroughly as I loved Esmé. But we were becoming too melancholy. He got up, putting on his clothes. ‘Come along, young Dimka, we’ll go to a decent party now.’

We drove in my Hotchkiss to a nightclub in the Rue Boissy d’Anglais, although it was already two in the morning. Here Kolya felt at ease. It was full of painters and poets. The garish green, red and purple murals were in the latest cubist styles. The music had a frenetic high-pitched neurotic, fitful quality, associated with the current Russian ballets. I was nervous of seeing Seryozha there, for the place seemed crowded with Russians from Kolya’s past; exorcised ghosts lending their sociopathic talents to the general chaos. Here men two-stepped openly with other men. Many women wore tailcoats and had their lascivious arms round young girls. All kissed, squeezed, stroked and touched as they danced. Kolya boldly ordered ‘C et C’ from the waiter and the mixture was brought at once: a magnum of champagne and a little test tube of cocaine. We were almost immediately surrounded by acquaintances, pressing in on our table from the semi-darkness. Some I knew quite well, from our nights at
The Scarlet Tango
and
The Harlequin’s Retreat.
They might have come straight from a Petersburg club to this Parisian version without even changing their eccentric clothes. They had seemed harmless enough in those old days, but politicians and gangsters hid amongst them. I assumed the same was true in Paris. Certainly some, who seemed mere clowns, would soon try to squeeze the throat of their protectress Mademoiselle Liberty.

From that unsettling den we went on to a private party where Mistinguett and half the artistes of the Casino de Paris were giving impromptu performances. I was enjoying a ridiculous song about going up in an aeroplane when soft hands fell on my arm. A well dressed man, dark-eyed and swarthy, smiled at me in uncertain recognition. To my surprise (for he seemed French) he addressed me in Russian. He was from Odessa, but was no one I had known well.

‘Stavisky,’ he said, shaking my hand. ‘We arranged a little business some years ago. You were a boy then. You haven’t changed.’ I now remembered him from a single meeting. Through my cousin Shura he had been the man buying cocaine off the Dutch dentist at whose surgery I eventually met Mrs Cornelius. Stavisky’s clothes had been more flamboyant in those days, the clothes of an Odessa dandy, though even then he was living in Paris.

‘You’re doing well for yourself, it seems.’ I was pleased to see him. He grinned. ‘I can’t complain. And you, too. This airship racket’s a winner, eh?’

Although I disliked him calling my project a racket, I had become used to Parisians’ dismissive slang so was not offended. We had a vodka and grenadine together, for old time’s sake. He hoped to see me around, he said. If I had any more patents, I must let him know. As he returned to his own table I asked if he knew anything of Shura. ‘I can tell you exactly where he is. Running a little operation down in Nice. I saw him a week ago. Shall I give him a message?’

‘Just that I’m in Paris. He can find me via the airship works at St-Denis.’

‘I’ll tell him.’ Stavisky winked. ‘You don’t want to pay these prices.’ He pointed at the remains of our cocaine. ‘Come to me next time. I give special rates to friends.’ He waved and disappeared into the jigging disturbance surrounding us. He was a good-hearted soul who would rise to eminence in the next few years, but was already marked as expendable to the conniving politicians who, Jews themselves, would brand him a Jew. They would have him shot down in a little shack in the Swiss mountains. In some ways, I suppose, I should feel grateful for the events which followed, although I did not welcome them at the time. If I had stayed in Paris longer, I, too, might have met Stavisky’s fate.

The original signs did not seem particularly disturbing. On January 30th there was a strike at the airship sheds. All engineers and fitters demanded higher wages. This was a blow, simply because I believed relations with our workmen excellent. We stood shoulder to shoulder in pursuit of a common ideal. Some Socialist agitator doubtless would be at the root of it. There was an emergency meeting of the Board. M. de Grion said we must certainly refuse all demands. Already these saboteurs were insidiously poisoning the roots of French society. It would not merely be against our immediate interest to capitulate, it would be against the interests of all decent people. Understanding his principle, I was nonetheless alarmed by its implications. Our schedule was threatened. We had promised to complete in a year. Our prospectus announced a maiden voyage in November 1921, a regular service by January 1922. To stop work now would be madness. We could not afford to break the rhythm of our progress. It would be more than just losing a week or two: there must be unity between designers and engineers at all levels. De Grion was sympathetic, but his argument won the day. Only Kolya and myself voted against a resolution refusing negotiations with the workers.

From that point I became the incredulous witness to a crazy, uncheckable avalanche. Within a month half our people had deserted to other jobs. It was impossible to proceed without a full team; the hiring and training of new personnel would take ages. M. de Grion remained unmoved. I told him his obstinacy threatened to ruin us. I saw my dreams collapsing once again, at the very moment I thought them most secure. Gradually stories began to appear in the more obscure newspapers. The Transatlantic Aerial Navigation Company was in trouble and seeking funding from the government. Shareholders had begun to sell their stock. By April there were even a few who spoke of suing. At least one scandal sheet described

Kolya and myself as ‘a pair of Russian charlatans bamboozling the French public with a fraudulent engineering scheme’. Increasing numbers of reporters would appear at my door, night and day, to demand if there was truth in these rumours. Was the Company on the edge of bankruptcy? I was frantic. I could not answer. I explained I was a scientist, not a financier. The scheme was solidly founded because my ship was the most advanced of its kind. Given the chance to complete it, I would show the world. I blamed the strikers for their short-sightedness. This was a red rag to the Bolshevik press, of course. They ran headlines indicting half the eminent business men of France (as well as ‘White Russian entrepreneurs’) as deliberately perpetrating a fraud. The Airship Company’s shares became worthless overnight. M. de Grion told me sadly he would have to resign from the Board. Only Kolya stood by me, attempting to persuade people to stay, for without them the Company would surely collapse. ‘Why throw away a goldmine when all that’s needed is a little more digging?’

They would not listen. I was disgusted with them.

At home, Esmé scarcely understood what I meant when I described this betrayal, our difficulties. Why must we consider moving again, giving up the car, dismissing the servants? I asked her to try to make sense of our household accounts. Earlier, to give her a feeling of purpose, I had put her in charge of our food and clothing purchases. She cried, saying it was beyond her. It was for me to decide what to do. I lost my temper. She should pull herself together. It was an emergency! I took my rage out on a child. I stormed from the house, walking up and down our street for half an hour until I was in control of myself. But when I returned she had gone. The servants said she had left in a car, that was all. I was not unduly worried.

Kolya and I dined together. He found the news upsetting but superficially was taking it better than I. He showed me a packet, received at the office that afternoon. He placed it in my hand. ‘What is it?’

‘Escape,’ he said, ‘If we need it. Luckily, I’d anticipated requiring these if we wanted to be on the
Rose’s
maiden flight.’

Opening the envelope I found a brand new French passport in my name, stamped with an entry visa for the United States, ‘It’s all quite above board.’ Kolya was reassuring. ‘M. Dalimier helped. Don’t you remember signing that form just before Christmas?’

I had signed so many. In general I was worrying about things bearing my signature, not knowing how many had made me personally responsible for the fate of our firm. I recalled nothing specific.

‘Well, we were all very busy then,’ he said.

‘And is there a passport for Esmé?’

‘She’s a minor. Unlike you she had nothing to prove her Russian nationality or, indeed, her identity. But her passport will come through soon, I’m sure.’

The new documents, placed in my breast pocket, seemed to protect my heart. ‘But how shall we keep the Company going, Kolya? Every other director has resigned. None any longer own stock, including your father-in-law. We’re the only major shareholders.’

‘Oh, indeed.’ With two pale fingers he pushed his plate away. He took a sip of claret, ‘It was cleverly done, eh? I wonder if they ever thought the ship would really get this far?’

I could not follow him and said so. He gave me a friendly, sardonic smile and sighed. ‘Dimka, I think you and I have been set up as the front to a stock swindle. Why else did nobody warn us? No tip to unload our shares. No suggestion we resign.’

‘But the whole disaster was the result of a strike,’ I pointed out. Kolya touched the back of my hand with his palm. ‘A strike, my darling, is easily arranged. Once arranged it can be maintained to the advantage of the management, rather than the workers.’

Still at a loss, I shrugged and shook my head. ‘The strikers were bribed?’

‘The Devil doesn’t always carry a red flag, Dimka. Sometimes he pays a proxy. Agitators can be bought, particularly if they’re professionals. Once tempers are high the working men hold their ground. Capital holds its ground, and someone makes a fortune from an airship which will never fly.’

‘But who? I have bills unpaid. No salary. Rent. Various debts. Servants. I’ve hardly a penny in real cash.’

‘Same here, little one. M. de Grion seems solid enough, doesn’t he? And his friends?’

‘He wouldn’t let you down, surely. He has the scandal to consider. His daughter would suffer.’

‘I’m quite certain if I seem seriously hurt by the Company’s crash it will actually look better for him. Later my wife will receive a present. I shall no longer have capital of my own. And all will be satisfactory again. For him, the situation’s ideal. He might have planned it in every detail. However, I think it was a solution. He’d hoped to get large government grants, other contracts. This is his way of writing off his losses.’

‘So only ordinary shareholders suffer.’

He looked hard into my eyes, as if telepathically trying to convey his message. ‘And you, dear Dimka. There are also outstanding Company bills. Wages unpaid to office staff and specialists. Engineering firms, raw materials, rent. It probably comes to at least a million.’

I was dizzy with shock. I could hardly speak, Surely, I asked, I was not personally responsible for every debt! Kolya gripped my arm. ‘But the scandal of bankruptcy will attach itself primarily to you. The yellow press is already blaming “foreigners”. They’ll have a perfect victim in you. A foreign swindler? Possibly a Bolshevik agent. The anti-Semites will have a field day, too.’

‘I’m not a Jew! Nor a Communist!’

‘How will you prove it?’ Kolya spoke persuasively. He was trying to bring the realities of my position home to me. I knew an investigation of my antecedents, traced back to Odessa if nowhere else, would provide proof to anyone determined to make me out a liar and a thief. Nonetheless I resolved to fight any such insinuation. It was in my interest, ultimately, to do so. ‘I know lawyers. I’ll prove my innocence, Kolya!’

Prince Petroff was unenthusiastic. ‘You’ll need money for that. I’ll help, but I have limited means now. Is there anyone who’d lend you a large sum?’