‘So, you stay here?’
‘Yes, we stay here.’ Alison still hadn’t looked at anyone.
‘I got them a television,’ said Charlie.
‘How marvellous,’ I said, and then I worried that I hadn’t conveyed any sarcasm and that Alison would think I meant it. ‘I need to explore the area. I could take Bobby out with me.’
Her head jolted up. ‘Yes. Yes, please.’
‘OK. I can do it tomorrow.’
‘Yes, yes. Tomorrow.’ She looked at me, as if trying to work out what the catch was. I smiled.
Charlie seemed to be waiting for her to change her mind. ‘Are you sure that works?’ he asked her.
‘Yes.’ She flapped her hand at him.
I said, ‘Noon?’
‘Noon.’ Alison closed her eyes and a small smile flickered on her lips. The record ended and the stylus lifted itself off, and back to the rest.
‘High noon it is, then,’ said Charlie.
He looked at Kit and raised his eyebrows. I anticipated some attempt to talk me out of this. Kit looked back at him, and when Charlie lowered his head and Kit’s expression changed, I realised that he fancied Charlie. I looked away. I was drinking too much wine. Alison was examining my face, as if she knew something too.
‘Do you go to the Metropol often to eat?’ I asked her.
‘Hardly ever.’
‘Is it hard to get a babysitter?’
‘Charlie has a constant string of secretaries who seem willing.’
Everything about this man made me feel sick. I had to get the subject away from him, but he had tentacles everywhere. His knee was beginning to hurt my own, like a bruise. He filled my glass again. He looked at Alison, who kept her head down, then back at Kit, who nodded at another unspoken comment. It reminded me of the Metropol. A different subject at last.
‘Did you see the woman in the purple hat when we were at the Metropol? I wondered if she was English.’
Alison nodded. ‘That’s Eva Mann.’
Charlie let his cutlery fall to the plate. ‘OK, that’s enough about work.’
What did it have to do with work, I wondered. And Mann? My mind had automatically gone to the booklet author, and Eva was similar to E. V.
‘Let’s put some more music on,’ said Charlie.
He lit another cigarette, and I watched him flick through maybe twenty albums before he pulled out Never a Dull Moment.
‘Can’t go wrong with Rod Stewart,’ he said.
I said nothing, but flicked my eyes to see Alison’s reaction. Her eyebrows were raised and it caught me as so comical that I laughed.
‘You don’t like him?’ asked Charlie.
‘Not much,’ I said. ‘I’m more into Cat Stevens.’
He went back to his stock. ‘Simon and Garfunkel?’
I waved my hand in a ‘sort of’ motion.
‘Andy Williams?’
‘No.’
‘Credence Clearwater Revival?’
‘They’re OK.’
Charlie clearly thought that was as good as it would get, and put on Green River. He sat back down, looking shaken.
‘Maybe your tastes are getting old,’ said Alison. ‘The young people aren’t as impressed as they used to be.’ It was the first real smile I’d seen from her. ‘Martha is too young for your records.’ ‘They are all classics,’ Charlie mumbled.
‘Charlie has his brother ship over the most popular albums at great expense so he can keep his finger on the pulse. Like the classic, 20 Dynamic Hits.’
‘Well, we have this on now, which Martha does like, so that’s fine.’
Alison was on a roll. ‘And 20 Fantastic Hits has The Osmonds and Chelsea Football Club.’
‘It was a successful compilation which got to number one for five weeks,’ said Charlie.
Alison laughed.
‘Christopher has only got classical music,’ I said. ‘I think I prefer that.’
‘You can’t go out of date with classical,’ Kit said. He sounded apologetic.
Charlie put his cigarette out and pushed his chair back. ‘Shall we go out onto the balcony for a cigar? The ladies can tidy up.’
They went out and pulled the door closed behind them.
‘Oh dear,’ I said, ‘I don’t think I played the part Charlie had written for me.’
Alison moved to his stool and filled my glass and her own. ‘You’re not what I was expecting either. The wives here are generally one type, quiet and keeping their head down. It’s like they all went on a course.’
‘Why haven’t you looked into the kindergartens? Don’t the embassies run something like that?’
‘I have looked at it, but it’s Anglo-American, and full of American children. Ghastly. He’d pick up all sorts there. But it’s all been a bit much recently. Maybe I need to think again.’
‘Well, I’ll come around tomorrow and we’ll see how it goes.’
‘You’ll really come? Bobby is a handful. That’s the polite way of saying it.’
‘I’ll live. I want to have a walk around, and this is a good excuse. In the morning, I have my first Russian lesson. Do you speak Russian?’
‘I don’t see any Russians.’ Alison drained her glass.
‘Shall I help you get this washing up done?’
‘No.’ She yawned and rested her head on her hand.
There was a burst of laughter from outside on the balcony. Charlie had an appreciative audience once more.
When I looked back to Alison her eyes were closed. I looked out to the balcony. I could hear the murmur of Kit’s voice as he leaned back, his face to the sky. Charlie was looking directly at me, not smiling, just staring. Charlie was going to be a problem.
9
Two days ago, it had been 24 degrees. This morning it was cold. I went out onto the balcony over the wood behind our apartment and shivered. It had snowed a little, and the trees looked frosty. It was May so the heating was off, and couldn’t be put on until the whole building was switched back on. I started to think properly about how I was going to cope in the real winter.
I’d just made a cup of tea when someone knocked on the door. I froze and crept towards the door. I was imagining police or burly Russian soldiers, but when I opened the door, it was to a slender woman in a black roll-neck top and grey wool skirt.
‘Galina Dmitrievna Belinskaya.’
I stared at her.
‘UPDK.’
I shook my head.
She shifted her weight and sighed. ‘Russian lessons. I am your teacher.’
‘Ah, sorry, yes. Come in.’
I stood aside for her to pass me, but she stepped over the threshold and crouched down. I took a step back to watch as she removed her shoes. She looked so young, hardly old enough to be a teacher. Her reddened fingers struggled with the knots of the double tied laces. She stood up and handed me her coat, smelling fresh with cold. I fumbled to close the door, and hung her coat up.
She slid on tiny slippers and smoothed her hair, tied back in a tight ponytail. ‘Shall we?’
I led her into the front room. I moved my teacup to the kitchen and sat down. Two lessons a week of two hours’ duration by this language professor from the university, with my background in Classics? I’d be speaking Russian in no time.
‘Zdravstvuyte.’
A word I recognised. I sidestepped it in my usual way. ‘Dobroe utro.’
Galina leaned forward, her finger pointing to me. ‘You repeat what I say.’ Her finger pointed to the table. ‘This is not conversation, it is lesson.’
My heart sank.
I thought about my failings as I left the apartment and turned right to walk along Leninsky Prospekt. One of the most embarrassing moments was not being able to say where I lived, not because I didn’t know it in Russian, but because I didn’t even know it in English.
‘What if you are lost?’ Galina had said. ‘You think everyone will know who you are?’
I recited it to myself. Leninsky Prospekt, area
121, building number 1. Three buildings with twenty-four floors: there were a lot of people on our little corner of Leninsky. I should definitely have known which building it was. Had Kit given my parents the address in Russian or English? I hadn’t had a letter yet. It took three weeks, Kit said. I had sent one to my parents, and one to David, although I had no hopes of hearing back from him.
I looked at my watch and started to speed up a little. The two and a half miles had taken no time in the car, but I hadn’t thought about the distance until half past eleven. At least it wasn’t too warm to rush.
I tried to make sense of my lesson with Galina. I’d had great hopes that I might be good at this, with a working knowledge of Latin, no matter how poor I was in Greek. The Greek would have served me better, with its links to Cyrillic. No ‘a’ or ‘the’, no ‘H’, and the alphabet was bewildering. I was never going to learn Russian.
I got to a crossroad and crossed over to the other side. Left onto Lobachevskogo and right onto Vernadskogo Prospekt. I couldn’t get lost, I repeated to myself. Vernadskogo ran parallel to Leninsky, before tapering back towards Leninsky, right by my apartment. I just had to break Moscow into manageable sections.
This section of Leninsky had thick lines of trees on both sides of the road. I turned left onto Lobachevskogo and realised the trees didn’t stop. The road cut right through a small forest. I couldn’t quite get my head around Moscow, or my bit of it. It was a mix of wide roads built for giant armies and what looked like ancient forests. It made me feel as if this really was a place of magic, even with all the concrete blocks and tiny apartments and queues for bread. My nervousness was balanced by excitement. It was staying inside and close to home that was the problem. Whenever I went out, I knew there was something special here.
I knocked on Alison’s door. She was red-cheeked and looked exhausted. Bobby was sitting quietly, cross-legged, in the hall, shoes and coat already on.
‘Sorry I’m late,’ I said.
‘Never mind,’ said Alison, her teeth clenched. ‘You’re here now. Bobby, this is Martha.’ He didn’t move. She dragged Bobby up by one arm and pushed him out the door. ‘Off you go. Take your time. Behave yourself, Bobby.’ She closed the door.
I looked down at Bobby. He was round-faced, and his dark blue eyes held mine with an unnerving confidence. I was being assessed.
‘So,’ I said, ‘fancy going to a forest?’
He shrugged.
‘OK.’ We walked down the stairs, and I wondered whether I should be holding his hand. Did four-year-olds need to be guided like that? I decided to let him choose. When he took off and I had to chase him along the dual carriageway twice, I decided not to let him have any other choices.
‘Just hold my hand until we get to the forest, OK?’
He scowled. We crossed Lobachevskogo and took a path across the open park towards the trees. He started wriggling, trying to twist his hand from mine. I crouched down.
‘Bobby, I need you to listen to me. It’s very important.’
He twisted his face away so I knew he didn’t want to be seen to listen.
‘I need you to stay near me because I’ve been here before and I know that the bears in this wood are very hungry.’
Now he looked at me, eyes wide and mouth slightly open.
‘Do you know what a bear looks like?’
He nodded.
‘So, we have to keep close together.’
His eyes narrowed as he weighed me up. I kept my face as still as possible until he slowly nodded. I let go of his hand and he made a little fuss, holding it as if injured. Then his eyes narrowed again and he ran towards the trees full pelt, before stopping and waiting for me to catch up with him. I smiled, letting him lead.
Did he speak? His angry silence was unnerving and he was bound to notice an absence of bears at some point. I just hoped there wouldn’t be any big dogs running around.
We walked into the trees. There was still a dusting of snow in the dark hollows and the coolness of the shade made me shiver. Bobby walked in front but he was very aware of me, looking back now and then. It was a long, straight track, but it had been made by feet rather than a prepared surface. I’d noticed that the woods behind my apartment had dead straight paths, designed. I preferred these purposeful tracks in the silence of birch and pine. The rosebay willow herb was starting to achieve some height, and I saw a butterfly which had survived the snow.
The occasional bird fluttered from a branch. I caught the monochrome flap of a magpie, and could hear a woodpecker somewhere. I looked in the top branches, wondering what kind it was, but I couldn’t spot it. I looked down and Bobby wasn’t there. I turned in a circle, but he was so small that most of the tree trunks would have hidden him. I listened but there was no tell-tale crackle of twigs. He must be on a path. I ran in the direction we’d been heading, only to find there was another path which doubled back on ours. I ran ahead. Three choices, left and right, and straight out onto a road.
I undid my jacket and tried to calm my breathing. I knew I should shout for him, but the forest was oppressive and I didn’t trust my voice to carry. Hooligans, drunks, who knew what was hidden here?
I spoke as normally as I could. ‘Bobby, are you with the bears?’ No answer. Which way would he go? He would have tried to keep an eye on me, at first, anyway. I doubled back on the other path, my heart hurting and the breaths stuttering in my throat. I couldn’t even ask anyone if they’d seen him, I couldn’t shout for help. I was running when I found another path turning left. I stopped. All that way with no turns, and now there was nothing but choices.
I took a breath to scream for him, and saw him, crouched down a little way up the path. I was going to strangle him when I stopped feeling faint.
I walked up behind him, and he gestured for me to get down.
‘Bears,’ he whispered, his eyes bright, and pointed with a stubby finger through the trees.
Three men were at the bottom of a tree, two of them asleep on the ground and the other leaning up against it, finishing a bottle which was wrapped in a paper bag.
‘Bears,’ I whispered back. ‘Well spotted, Bobby.’
He looked at me and grimaced. ‘You’re all sweaty.’
‘I’m quite hot now.’ I shrugged my jacket off and tried to flap some cold air under my jumper. ‘Which way should we go so the bears don’t see us?’
Bobby pointed and we crept away. Now that he’d scared me silly, we’d broken the ice. We saw trolls and imps, chased a butterfly (possibly a fairy) and kept an eye out for more bears.
‘Maybe next time,’ I said.
‘We can come back?’
‘There are lots of forests to explore. There’s another one over on my road.’ I pointed back in the direction we’d come from. We were nearly back.
‘And there’s one on my road.’ He pointed past his apartment block. ‘I can see it from the window.’
‘Let’s go back and have a drink now, though.’
‘We can take a picnic.’
‘Maybe Mummy can come.’
He looked at me. I could see Charlie in his sneer.
‘She didn’t hold my hand on the roads, and we saw bears.’
‘So you had a good time.’
Bobby nodded.
‘The television is on. Go and sit down.’
Alison went into the kitchen to put the percolator on: bulbous steel bowls in the style of a futuristic space colony, topped with the Atomic label in black and white. I liked to think that cosmonauts would use this. I waited in the hall, expecting to be told off, but Alison gestured for me to follow him. Bobby was sitting in front of the television watching a programme about farming. Occasionally, he looked over at me and gave a little smile. He looked exhausted. Alison brought back the coffee in delicately painted teacups.
‘The coffee is British, don’t worry. We get it from the embassy. Russian coffee can be anything, from acorns to roots. If you have the money, it’s not in stock. If it’s in stock, you don’t w
ant it. These teacups are for the export market, not for the people who live here. Don’t you need new ones?’
‘It’s not important.’
‘Ha. You’re like the Russians. They never apologise for what they don’t have. They think it’s anti-communist, being concerned with private property.’
I wasn’t sure if she was insulting me, so I smiled.
‘We have some old saucepans you can take. Charlie says Kit’s kitchen is empty.’
‘Thank you. Did Charlie visit Kit much? Before I came.’
Alison turned away. ‘He said he did.’
I had to change the subject. Everything that came out of my mouth was wrong. ‘Do you know many Russians?’
‘No. I told you, I don’t see any. I just know what Charlie tells me. We had a cleaner, but she didn’t last long.’
Her face looked strained as she aimed for nonchalant. I changed the subject.
‘Why didn’t he let me ask about Eva Mann last night? Who is she?’
Alison sat down at the table. ‘I’m not sure. She’s British, and she works as a translator. Novels, mostly, but some poetry. Nothing famous.’
‘So, why won’t they talk about her?’
Alison sipped her coffee, and frowned. ‘She married a Russian, I think. There was some trouble in Berlin, but I don’t know what it was about. She’s not “one of us”, that’s for sure. I haven’t met her, but I’ve seen her around. She doesn’t go to any embassy parties, which is odd as most British people end up there occasionally, just to talk English with no one listening for a change. Have you seen Mrs Highfield yet?’
‘The ambassador’s wife? Christopher gave me a letter from her, inviting me to call, but I haven’t yet.’
‘Oh. She won’t like that.’
‘I don’t really want to be an embassy wife. I don’t have to, surely?’
‘It makes this run more smoothly if you let Emily Highfield take charge, I know that. Her Russian is excellent too.’
I drank my tea. ‘Can you understand any Russian?’
‘Some bits and bobs. I had lessons before we came. Didn’t you get offered that?’
The Wolves of Leninsky Prospekt Page 6