Constant Nobody

by Michelle Butler Hallett

  Defiance of what, Temerity asked herself, gravity? Wait. Is it joy despite command, joy in their own strength? Here?

  As the fading daylight played on the faces in the crowd, Temerity felt at once exhausted and energized, even feverish. On top of the hundred thousand Soviet citizens invited to the city, over thirty thousand foreigners attended the World Festival of Youth and Students, coming from North and South America, Europe, Africa, Asia, and Australia. Many of them wore their culture’s traditional clothes; others wore Western dress, collars open against the summer heat. The streets in and around Red Square smelled of sweat and musk, honey and smoke, pepper and wine, and sounded of laughter, shouts, and happy conversations. Temerity smiled as she paused near a brick wall to allow a crush of raucous and happy young people speaking in at least three different languages to pass by. This sense of freedom in Red Square, of all places, felt otherworldly, even dangerous.

  Intoxicating.

  Temerity wondered how her charges, two of her students from the West Language School being groomed for intelligence work, felt about this version of Moscow, so different from what they’d been taught. Both young women had stayed by her side during the festival’s opening night back on the twenty-eighth, but after that they kept getting lost in the crowds, or so they said. So long as they made it back to the hostel each night by twelve, Temerity refrained from complaint. She’d lectured them on not expecting men to remember any promises to obtain and use condoms — Soviet prophylactics did not enjoy a good reputation — or, God’s sake, to pull out in time. Temerity also made sure her students knew how to use their cervical caps, devices she’d helped them obtain without their parents’ knowledge. The students’ blushes and squirms, their frank disbelief that greying Miss West would know of such things, had made Temerity laugh.

  Many cafés and bakeries lined the streets, some of them looking very new and bare, and almost all of them kept tables and chairs outside. As she considered her choices, taking in displays of food, Temerity caught her reflection in a window. She wore a white scarf over her hair, a short-sleeved white blouse, dark blue trousers, and brown Oxfords with a low heel. Many other women also wore trousers, giving the lie to her handlers’ warnings — an attempt at tact, perhaps — that she might stick out in a crowd. Temerity understood something her handlers did not. Despite the dark glasses and the scars, despite the dent in her head, she could more or less disappear. Few men noticed a woman unless she could offer them something, even just the pleasure of her prettiness. Temerity, long past pretty and, she told herself, long past caring about it, might as well be invisible.

  Another wave of young women and men passed by, very close, and Temerity found herself hemmed in. She stumbled. A fair young man speaking German turned to ask Temerity in Russian if she’d twisted her ankle; she answered in Russian that she was fine. Walking faster, the youngsters soon passed on, and Temerity considered how twelve years before that young man would have been her enemy. Of course, he’d been a child during the war, hardly an enemy, a view of accident and innocence that Temerity had learned to keep to herself during the forties. Perhaps this young German man survived the attacks on Dresden or Berlin. Perhaps he’d been conscripted to fight in those final days; she’d seen photos of German boys too young to shave, wearing baggy uniforms and holding weapons, eyes huge. Perhaps his parents remained quiet Nazis while he rebelled. Perhaps he was related to Ursula Friesen. Nothing, Temerity told herself, would surprise her anymore.

  She adjusted her dark glasses as two uniformed KGB officers strolled past, faces not stern but mildly interested, helpful if asked, there only to maintain order, comrade. They’d changed their uniforms since the days when they were called NKVD, and no doubt many officers infiltrated the crowd in plainclothes. How many? Did they feel overwhelmed by the sheer number of people in Moscow for the festival? Temerity just kept herself from smirking. KGB feeling helpless? A delicious thought. Then again, a nervous and threatened KGB could be more dangerous. The Khrushchev Thaw, with its relaxed censorship and widespread release of political prisoners, who then saw their convictions expunged in a process called rehabilitation, had also eased, however slightly, international relations. Temerity, like many in the SIS, watched these developments with caution and muted hope.

  It’s still Moscow, Temerity told herself, echoing the warnings she’d given her students. Khrushchev is desperate to prove he’s not Stalin, but it’s still Moscow.

  A group of people of all ages, children to elderly, dressed in various manners, now placed their arms around one another’s shoulders, formed a circle, and began to dance, two steps right, one step left. Most of the dancers smiled, though one frowned when he saw Temerity.

  Suspicious of the dark glasses, perhaps.

  A scent of freshly baked bread wafted, and Temerity followed it to a nearby bakery window. A young woman who gazed at the crowd with a mix of longing and fear, a samovar steaming behind her, hung bubliki on a string. The first bublik collided with the wooden X at the string’s bottom, and then the others quickly piled on. Then the young woman tacked the string to the ceiling. Temerity, reminding herself of her doctor’s orders to cut back on starches, paid for a bublik. She first declined, then accepted the offer of an extra honey drizzle and a dip into poppy seeds, almost dizzy with anticipated pleasure. The long war years and her demanding work, both at Bletchley Park and then with MI19, interrogating prisoners of war, had left her thin. Since the end of rationing on meat and cheese a few years before, she’d gained nearly two stone. Her body seemed determined to store every possible calorie as fat. She refused to admit that the changes in her waist and hips bothered her — mere vanity, as silly as worrying about the grey hair. Her thickened ankles, however, she preferred to hide under loose trousers.

  Biting into the bublik, she smeared honey and poppy seeds over her lips. Then she found a table and sat down. A tram passed, packed with yet more young people who stuck their arms and faces out the windows and called happy greetings to all. Visitors to the festival enjoyed free travel on the buses, trams, and metro. Temerity had even travelled the 1935 Sokolnicheskaya metro line, one stop at a time, getting out at each station to sketch. As the train pulled into Vasilisa Prekrasnaya, she almost decided to stay aboard. Then she peered at the huge mosaic; Bilibin’s Vasilisa still dominated the space. Just as the train doors started to close, Temerity leapt out. The train departed, people streamed past, and soon she stood alone. She considered following them up the stairs to see if Kostya’s block of flats had changed; sweat chilled her armpits. Then she stretched out to touch Vasilisa’s hand, the one holding the lantern made of a skull and holy fire.

  She could not reach it.

  It was never Vasilisa who was too small, she decided. It was me.

  Unable to ascend those stairs, unable to sketch, imprisoned by her failures, Temerity had waited and then caught the next train.

  A man on stilts and dressed in a top hat and tails passed by, leaning over and greeting everyone he met in French, English, and Russian. —I am Pierre from Cameroon. And who are you? I am so happy to meet you. Yes, hello, I am Pierre from Cameroon. Who are you?

  A young woman replied in French that she was Joie from Laos, supplying the obsolete term French Indochina when Pierre frowned and said he did not know of Laos. She climbed up on Temerity’s table then, her feet among ashtrays and crumbs, and took Pierre’s hands. —We have shrugged off the chains of imperialism. Someday soon, your country will, too.

  They held hands and stared into each other’s eyes.

  Wobbling on his stilts, Pierre blinked back tears. —Let me get down from these things, and we can talk properly.

  As Joie helped Pierre remove the stilts, Temerity stood up to leave them the table. Neither of them noticed her. They already stroked each other’s hands.

  Honeyed bublik filling her mouth, Temerity sat down at the next little table. The energy from the crowd took on a new edge, one delicious and dangerous, as sexual attractions blossomed and inhibiti
ons fell aside. The circle dance stopped, and the dancers parted a moment to allow two violinists, a man and a woman, to inhabit the centre space. The woman, about Temerity’s age, gave spectators a demure smile. The man, balding with jowly cheeks, kept his face neutral. Temerity thought she recognized him; the memory of his name slipped away. Both musicians raised their violins; the man nodded; the woman began.

  Bach’s Double Violin Concerto in D Minor, first movement. Without orchestral backup, it sounded bare yet courageous — exquisite.

  The violinists, sharing glances, seemed to know and trust each other. Sweat glistened on the man’s bald head and dripped down the back of his neck; a flush reddened the woman’s cheeks and throat. They finished, and in the silence before the crowd could react, the man addressed the woman as Comrade Orlova, and thanked her.

  Temerity joined the applause.

  A man placed a glass of tea before her, the podstakannik’s filigree dulled steel in the shapes of comets and stars. — Bubliki are too dry to eat plain.

  As she flinched, she noticed his withered left arm first, then the old wounds on his neck and ear. The cheekbones looked stronger, the flesh beneath them sunken and seamed. His hair had thinned, though not receded much, and the pomaded waves showed as much white as black. The skin of his face looked very coarse, as if pockmarked, or left unprotected for many winters. He wore a white shirt, collar spread and sleeves rolled up past his elbows, old black trousers, belted tight and much too big for him, and thin-soled shoes.

  He held a second glass of tea. —May I sit down?

  After a moment, Temerity nodded.

  Kostya settled himself in a chair opposite Temerity, lit a cigarette, and angled his chair so he, too, might look onto the crowd.

  Neither spoke for several minutes.

  Temerity struggled not to stare at him. By far, the safest thing to do: walk away from him and not look back. As I should have done at the Bilbao docks. Pretend her memory had flared: thoughts of Kostya not always welcome, might interrupt Temerity several times a week. Pretend she felt nothing, give him only the cool appraisal due an enemy. Pretend she understood and embraced her duty in this moment and not only acknowledge Kostya’s existence but also glean information from him. Yes, that would be her only interest in this strange matter. Information, the reason she’d come to Moscow in ’37, and the reason she sat eating a bublik in Moscow now.

  Still looking at the crowd, Kostya spoke first. —It’s happened. It took a while, but it finally happened. I’ve lost my mind. Maybe it’s flu. Fever dreams. Either way, you’re not real. You don’t exist.

  The strength of her voice surprised her. —Oh, I exist.

  Then she reached across the table to stroke his hand. He flinched, glancing at her in fear, then looked away as he lit a second cigarette from the embers of his first.

  Temerity found herself wishing he’d instead light two cigarettes and offer her one.

  He exhaled, and smoke curled around his face. The crowd before them surged, the violinists and dancers of a moment ago now gone. —What the barrelling fuck are they doing?

  Temerity felt quite defensive and protective of the youngsters. She snapped her answer. —Celebrating.

  — Celebrating what?

  — Being alive.

  He looked at her, eyes cavernous, then resumed studying the crowd.

  So did Temerity.

  A young couple in front of them embraced, kissed. Those around them smiled and cheered them on. Then someone shook the kissing woman’s shoulder and warned her of the approach of police officers keen to disrupt such displays. The couple separated and blended into the crowd, and seconds later, two more young men in KGB uniform approached at a stroll, eyes focused on the middle distance as if unconcerned.

  Temerity took a good swallow of tea before she spoke. —I thought you were dead.

  — Yes, I’d guessed that much. You’re crying.

  — Tea’s too hot. Scalded my mouth.

  He passed her a dingy handkerchief. —You weep over tea?

  She accepted the handkerchief and dabbed at her face around the glasses. —I suppose you think I weep over you?

  — No.

  Another group formed a circle around two American delegates who offered to demonstrate something called boogie-woogie. They announced they’d need more room. A third American took a harmonica from his pocket and played a fast tune.

  Kostya stroked the table near Temerity’s hand. —When I got too hungry or cold to sleep, I would imagine your eyelids and count the freckles there, and then I’d imagine how more freckles appeared over time and count them, too. I’d draw little constellations. Let me see your eyes.

  — No.

  — Nadia…

  Her voice deepened. —I said no.

  Ignoring the dancers, Kostya bowed his head. Then he looked up and stared at Temerity, seeking something.

  Noticing this, she twitched some of the headscarf aside so he might see the dent in her skull. —Steel plate.

  He said nothing.

  She faced him again, almost smiling. —I was hospitalized for two years. I couldn’t talk for a while. When I got my speech back, I kept slipping into other languages. Oh, and I had to take rather a lot of sulpha.

  He laughed. Just once. It sounded like the yelp of a beaten dog. Then he spoke in a lighter tone as though resigned to a joke at his expense. —I shouldn’t even be here.

  — Alive?

  Kostya gestured to the crowd applauding the American dancers and lowered his voice beneath the noise. —That, too.

  — I…Kostya…

  A smirk tugged at his mouth. —A Britisher lost for words?

  — What happened to you?

  He answered in a workaday manner, drumming his fingertips against his cigarette pack. —Kolyma. Twenty-five years. I served eighteen. I’m rehabilitated now. Please stop crying.

  — How can you be so calm?

  — You know nothing of life here. Nothing.

  — That’s not true. I—

  — Wolf ticket.

  — What?

  Kostya tapped out another cigarette. —See? You still have trouble with the idioms. In all this…freedom, is that what we call it? In all this, I’m stuck with a wolf ticket, my record of conviction. I’m pardoned for the crimes, yet can’t shake off the conviction. I can’t get a permit to live within a hundred kilometres of Moscow. I live in Voronezh and work in a factory. I check other people’s paperwork. It’s calm. I’ve got my own flat. Well, it’s one room, but it’s my room. I don’t share it with anyone. I like that. Someone found out about my languages. I think I know how. Two men came to see me at work and told me to come with them. First, they brought me to my flat to pack a bag, then they made sure I got on a train to Moscow, where two more men meet me and escort me to…where I used to work. I’m a roaming interpreter. I check in twice a day to report anything interesting. Once the festival is done, it’s back to Voronezh.

  — Check in with whom?

  — Whom do you think?

  Then Kostya nodded toward a man of maybe thirty-five, his face stern, his civilian clothes ill-tailored. He looked fearful, as though examining a leak that might become a flood.

  Plainclothes KGB, Temerity concluded, and he might as well have it stamped on his forehead. Then she recalled how she’d entered the country in 1937 as Margaret Bush — but had she left under the name Temerity West? Was there a record? God’s sake. —Wait, they took you back? Did you tail me?

  — Fuck, no! No, I just…found you.

  — But—

  Kostya beckoned her closer, and he murmured. —Listen, will you? I’m Berendei now, just a low-level informer. Nikto and his papers no longer exist. Only trouble is a man I knew back in the thirties. Little Yurochka’s done well for himself. He’s a major now. He tracked me down in Voronezh and told me how things would work. If I don’t deliver reports, either in Voronezh or Moscow or anywhere else he wants to send me, I’ll be shot. Specifically, I’ll be shot in the g
ut first and left on the floor a while before getting shot in the head. Turns out I don’t want to die. I thought I did. I’ve had a long time to think about death. They didn’t arrest me right away in ’37, so I had a chance to shoot myself, get it over with. I couldn’t. In the camps, I stopped eating. They had us damn near starved anyway; I thought I’d just hurry it along. The first time I surrendered to a bowl of fish bone soup. The second time…why am I even trying to tell you this? Fucked in the mouth, what does it matter? Eating felt like too much trouble. I got very emaciated, a dokhodyaga. I didn’t care. The camp doctor told me I was days from death. He got me assigned to work under him, like an orderly. Sometimes I’d take dictation. He convinced me to eat again. All those chances to die, yet here I am. Efim told me I was addicted to deceit. I thought it was hope. I refused to let myself die, Nadia, because I felt such joy with you in those moments when we could pretend not to worry. Because I love the freckles on your eyelids.

  His voice cracked out, and he sipped some tea.

  Temerity remembered all the smells of that Moscow flat, the whiteness of the walls, and her vision of Kostya living with her in England. Overwhelmed, she dropped the bublik to the ground. Pigeons surrounded it. When she spoke, she surprised herself. —I’m not quite the same person.

  — Neither am I.

  At the next table, Pierre parted from Joie, promising to meet her later as he got his stilts back on. Then he smiled at Kostya. —Hello. I am Pierre, from Cameroon.

  — I’m Konstantin. Welcome to Moscow, comrade.

  Pierre’s wide smile seemed contagious, for Kostya smiled back. Temerity recognized how little she’d seen him smile. She also noticed his missing teeth and the length of those that remained.