The Laughter of Carthage (85 page)

I fell in behind a group of very old men in greasy European clothes who wore Turkish slippers on their feet. Each one carried a huge, mysterious bundle on his head. The procession turned a corner and began to ascend the steep lanes. A family group passed by, the women totally covered in black cloth, the men in fezzes and shapeless dresses. The leading boy raised a rush torch to light their way. I might have been in Jerusalem at the time of Christ. Rain was falling now and across the water Stamboul disappeared as if behind a discreet curtain. I hobbled back to the Grande Rue, understanding with perfect clarity that I was quite insane, yet incapable of freeing myself from the obsession. The single-mindedness which had allowed my genius to flourish at an early age, which had driven me safely through every danger, was abused in pursuit of a mere delusion. Did she really exist at all? Had she been a figment of my imagination, her face distorted by the café lights and my exhausted eyes into the likeness of Esmé? I had to find out. If I saw her again in different circumstances and she was not really Esmé, I would be satisfied. I told myself it would not be Esmé. The other possibility, that she was Esmé’s twin, was too fantastic.

Having calmed myself down, I returned home. There was a message from the Baroness. She was at Tokatlian’s. I would spend the evening with her. If only for a few hours, my Leda would surely help me forget this madness. I changed my clothes, groomed myself, and went directly to Tokatlian’s. She was seated at her favourite table on the second floor. She was plainly in some distress, but she became alarmed when she saw my wounded face. ‘What’s happened to you, Simka?’

‘Part of the job. I’ll be all right.’ I refused to discuss my cuts and bruises. There are few varieties of discretion which impress a woman more, yet almost invariably the simple cause of such secrecy is a man not wishing to admit being bested in a fight or otherwise made a fool of. To change the subject I asked after Kitty. The Baroness shrugged. Her daughter was bored. There were no suitable schools for the child and she could not speak the language well enough to take lessons with the German children’s governess. ‘She reads the few suitable Russian books we find. In the afternoons we walk in the park. Today we went up to the Russian embassy.’

I had heard it was bedlam there. She agreed. ‘People sleeping shoulder to shoulder in the old ballroom. No space left for the smallest baby. And fed like paupers from big soup tureens. It’s very sad, Simka. Those people are from the best families.’

‘They are alive.’ I had little sympathy for them. After all, I had issued many of them with their passports. This was better than anything they might have faced if they had stayed. ‘Unlike their Tsar,’ I added.

‘It depressed me terribly. And so many orphans. What would become of Kitty if something happened to me? There are thousands of human predators in this city. The police are useless. I was insulted twice, you know, on the way here. By Europeans! Nobody will accept authority. The British do their best, but one can’t always find the redcaps. And Marusya Veranovna’s taken to drink.’

I was tired. I suggested we go at once to our room above the apartment. She rose with alacrity, all her morbid, petty little concerns forgotten at the prospect of satisfying her lust. I used her with gusto. She offered herself up to any game I suggested. Women, as I well knew, only become downhearted when they do not receive enough attention; and I gave my Baroness the best attention possible. That night, lying beside her, I dreamed Hernikof the Jew and I were together on the ship. It was a steamship, but it carried the triangular sails of an old Greek warboat. Hernikof was in rags. Blood poured from a dozen wounds. I think the Baroness and Mrs Cornelius were present. Hernikof was accusing me of his murder and I did not know if I were guilty or innocent. I asked the others there what they thought, but they were concerned with the ship’s course and had no time for me. Hernikof pointed at himself. He smiled and said he forgave me. I tried to push him overboard, shouting that I had no need of his forgiveness, but at least I should earn it if he died now. I wanted him to be quiet, but he gripped the rail like an owl with its prey and stayed where he was, smiling that terrible religious smile. Then Kitty ran up and held out her hand to him. He took it and gently she led him off. I was jealous. I wanted to drown him and Kitty of all people had rescued him. The Baroness woke me. ‘You’re sweating dreadfully, Simka.’ I was shivering. She rearranged the bedclothes over me. Her naked body aroused me. It was huge and solid, yet soft, and I loved its smell. We made love until dawn and so once again drove the image of Hernikof entirely from my head, while keeping the ghost of Esmé, too, at bay. Leda knew how to be reassuringly silent; a quality younger women do not have. But by morning, after we had revived ourselves with cocaine, the obsession gradually returned with full force. Rather hastily, telling her I had business with another military person, I arranged to meet her for lunch at our usual table. Then, when I was sure she was on her way home, I returned to
La Rotonde.

In the café a few wretched Kurds were cleaning the floors and tables. The Syrian sat at the top of a stepladder, smoking a meerschaum and ostensibly supervising the Kurds. When I appeared he put the pipe carefully between his few black teeth and began to climb down. Without acknowledging me, he carried the ladder into the kitchens. One of the Kurds told me that no girls were expected for at least another hour. I asked him, in a dreadful mixture of languages, if they knew a little girl called Helena. She might be Polish, I said. To please me, they made a pretence of thinking. It was obvious they had no information and were embarrassed by my questions. Outside in the Grande Rue heavy rain poured down the gutters, rushed off roofs and filled the holes in the pavements. The streets became a mass of black umbrellas and oilskins. I sheltered under the striped, sodden canopy of the
Cafe Luxembourg
, then moved first to look in the window of Wick and Weiss’s well-stocked bookshop, then to stare at ornamental brass lamps and tables, poor copies of French Empire originals. Some of the cinemas and music halls had already opened. The occupying armies kept many such places going round the clock. The rain freshened Pera’s air, momentarily driving away the more unpleasant smells from Galata. Posters started to peel from the wooden sides of newsstands, from tobacco kiosks, pissoirs and tram shelters, as if the city were being magically prepared for a new layer of advertisements. A troup of Punjabis went up the steep hill at a trot, arms sloping. As in Batoum, the British had stationed great numbers of nigger soldiers in Constantinople, presumably because Moslems might be less likely to offend the Turks. It was a mistaken notion. Turks are more arrogant towards people they regard as their inferiors, particularly former citizens of the Ottoman Empire. I think they viewed the occupation of their city by blacks as a planned insult. It was bad enough for them to be bested by Greeks, but to be ordered about by Africans like the French Senegalese was inconceivably appalling to them. For all that they had fully earned every possible humiliation (their cruelty to subject races, particularly Armenians, was legendary) they still did not understand why they were being punished. In 1915, while the world was concerned with other things, they had marched some million Christian Armenians into the desert to die. Many still insist it was the logical thing to do (‘People forget those Armenians were very rich’). Your Turks remain the true descendant of bloody-handed Carthage. They never change. They join the United Nations to protect them when they invade Cyprus; they imprison innocent Christians; they bully and steal as thoughtlessly as any of their Hun forebears might have. History is not a book of rules, but its examples are too often ignored. By showing continued respect to Turks we are like that woman who believes repeatedly her brutal husband will reform. It is an indication of her optimism, but never a reflection of the man’s true character.

The rain eased enough to let me return to the
Pera Palas
where I bathed and changed. Then, with no word from Mrs Cornelius to make me alter my plans, it was time to go again to Tokatlian’s. I stopped at
La Rotonde
first. A few girls were there, and the redheaded Italian madame, but none of them had seen my Esmé. I said they would be rewarded if they discovered her for me, or could get her address. I believe they had the idea I wished to buy her and seemed very agreeable.

At the restaurant I found the Baroness again enjoying the attentions of Count Siniutkin. They might have been lovers. He lifted his handsome, scarred face to smile pleasantly at me. It would have helped me at that time if the Baroness had transferred her affections, or at least shared them with another, but I think she was still faithful. Count Siniutkin, in very good form, greeted me warmly. We discussed the campaign in Anatolia. The Greeks were finding some resistance, he said, mainly from irregular units similar to those I had described in South Russia. I told him I had known Makhno personally; I had observed Hrihorieff at close quarters and Petlyura himself had tried to enrol me. Siniutkin named a couple of bandit leaders. He called them ‘condottieri’. The most famous and most worshipped was someone called Çerkes Ethem. He was to Anatolia what Pancho Villa had been to Mexico. ‘Similar circumstances seem to throw up similar types, eh? Meanwhile the French are being hit very badly in Northern Syria.’ I was not interested in Turkey’s internal squabbles and listened only from politeness. ‘They’re fighting old-fashioned issues with old-fashioned means,’ I suggested. ‘A bandit on a big horse can’t achieve a thing. Can it really matter who wins? Every single one is an atavist.’

‘Some are more progressive than others,’ Siniutkin insisted mildly. His blue eyes studied me. ‘Modern weapons, after all, demand modern bank accounts.’

‘Not necessarily, Count. In Kiev some seven or eight years ago I designed and built an excellent cheap aeroplane. Thousands of them could have been made for the cost of a hundred conventional machines. An entire army could be made airborne with my plane.’ I was not one to boast but I had my point to make. Siniutkin was genuinely interested. ‘This plane was a success?’

‘Very much so. My maiden flight was witnessed by all Kiev. You must have read about it, even in Moscow.’ I smiled ironically.

‘I have a vague memory, yes. But surely your machine could have been used in the War?’

‘I shall not list my frustrations now, Count Siniutkin. Enough to say the plans were submitted to the War Department in St Petersburg, together with several other inventions of mine, and the Tsar’s moribund bureaucrats did what they knew best. They ignored them. Of course I received no acknowledgement. But others were not so slow in seeking my help. One of my machines helped in the last defence of Kiev. Were it not for the cowardice of the nationalists, it would have turned the day. Petlyura thought so.’

Count Siniutkin had become enthusiastic. His features, in spite of the scar, were full of boyish excitement, ‘By God, Pyatnitski, you could make a fortune!’

‘That would be incidental. If I can in some way improve the condition of the ordinary man, I shall be happy. One must live, but first and foremost I am dedicated to the creation of a better future.’

‘I can see why you and Kolya were such friends.’ He was admiring. ‘Sometimes you sound just like him.’

‘We had much in common.’

‘I should have thought the Bolsheviks would have wanted you to stay in Russia. Even they understand the value of innovative engineers.’

‘I would never help Lenin or Trotski take the blood of innocents. Any reasonable government would be welcome to my inventions. But I refuse to serve tyrants.’

Siniutkin leaned towards me. His face had become earnest. ‘I wish you the very best of luck, Pyatnitski.’ He began to frown, then, and become abstracted. I think he had seen someone he knew downstairs. With a bow to us both, he stood up. ‘I hope to talk again.’

‘Little genius!’ The Baroness patted my cheek. She had disguised the bags under her eyes with powder. She wore a tiny hat with a fashionable half-veil and rather more perfume than usual. Perhaps through indirect association she was losing the appearance of a beautiful young matron and taking on the appearance of an upper-class woman of the world. ‘I think you have impressed our Count. I love to hear you talk your machine talk, though I understand hardly a word. But think how much better you would do in Berlin!’ I had caught, as usual, her drift and patted her hand. She sighed. it is very difficult with Kitty. The Germans resent my absence. I tell them I’m nursing an old friend, but they suspect the truth. We must leave Constant as soon as possible, Simka.’

‘I am due to meet a man this afternoon.’ I assured her. ‘I might have some news, in fact, by tonight.’

‘You won’t abandon us, my dear?’ This was overly dramatic. She had no easy means of expressing her real fears. ‘Of course not.’ I stroked her arm and handed her the menu. As we ate an inferior borscht and some stuffed cabbage leaves, my eye went rather too frequently to the street outside. Rain rushed down the plateglass windows distorting the appearance of the pedestrians, most of whom began to resemble those varieties of half-men who populate Classical mythology; then, once or twice, I was half convinced I had glimpsed Esmé. I knew I was behaving ridiculously, pursuing the phantom of what was almost certainly a creature of my own invention. I concentrated on my food, but the Baroness, noticing my agitation, asked casually after Mrs Cornelius. I made some conventional reply and tried to think clearly. I knew I was suffering from mild concussion and lack of sleep. I would be a fool to become the slave of such a ridiculous delusion and obviously I had made a mistake in
La Rotonde.
If I found Helena she would prove to have dyed hair, a swarthy skin, green eyes and be about twenty. But, for all this reasoning, my willpower was inadequate to act upon it and again I left Tokatlian’s hastily, having made some vague promise to meet Leda soon, and crossed the street to take up my familiar position at the
Rotonde
bar. Girls came in, shaking umbrellas and wet cloaks. Some greeted me. Some tried to sit with me. I dismissed them. The Syrian gargoyle emerged from his sleeping-quarters and scowled to himself when he saw me. I ordered a drink from him and won him over with a large tip. His wizened features relaxed; he looked up at me and offered me a smile of astonishing, almost convincing, sweetness. We were once more part of the same alliance, if not exactly friends. I sipped absinthe and watched the crowd. The band played a bizarre mixture of Turkish accordion music and American jazz; men and women stepped onto the tiny wooden dance-floor and moved like marionettes, jerking back and forth to inexpert syncopation, imitating some dance they had seen demonstrated only in a poor quality cinema-film. Sonia arrived, shook her head at me as a sign she had no information, then left on the arm of an elderly Italian officer. I dozed over my drink. I considered writing a letter to Kolya. I knew I should at least leave a message at the
Palas,
but convinced myself the boy would know where I was if he could not find me at Tokatlian’s. I walked into the little back room where the Syrian changed money at a disgusting rate and bought a few English sovereigns. To remain alert I sniffed up a large quantity of his overpriced cocaine before returning to the absinthe and boredom of cheap fragrance, soft shoulders, bobbed hair and shiny frocks. What I sought now was blonde curls and petticoats, pink skin and honest blue eyes.