Oleg raised the rear window.
“How well is the factory preserved inside?”
“The main things should all be there. Before it was closed there were rumors that the machines might be sold off, so we anchored them.”
“What?”
“We buried the footings in concrete.”
“Way to go!” Oleg turned slightly toward his passenger. “And nothing happened after that?”
“During the war there was talk that Ragan would be taking it over. He was from another town, a mobster, so people kept their distance. But I guess he didn’t know what to do with it. The government made promises, too, but nothing happened.”
The silence of two men deep in thought and a third deep asleep filled the SUV.
Sobotka finally said, “So why invest?”
“We have a development plan.”
After a pause, Sobotka mustered the courage to say, “Our turbines are, you know . . . The ones used today are, how should I put it . . . smaller. Everything needs to be updated. And then you might need someone younger, someone who’s better informed.”
“Fair enough. But we will be making the same turbines. Type 83-N, right?”
Sobotka paused. “Ah, I see you know turbines.” He decided to stop being so cautious, because, though all of this came as a surprise, this last comment surprised him so much that it was as if the things he’d heard before no longer seemed the least bit surprising. Few people still knew about that type of turbine.
The 83-N? He’d almost forgotten it, himself. They had a nickname for each turbine, they didn’t call them by their technical names.
The 83-N. He remembered how at first they’d called it the osamdeset-troika, after the number 83, and soon shortened this to the nickname of ostroika, like eightree. So when Gorbachev introduced perestroika, somebody declared, “He copied us just like Edison copied Tesla!” Maybe this made no sense, but they told and retold the joke.
“Let’s visit the plant in the morning. Around ten?”
They dropped Sobotka off at his house.
When Sobotka slammed the back door, Nikola was roused from his slumbers, and as they were turning, the headlights lit incredible creatures in Sobotka’s garden.
“What kind of gremlins are these?”
“What?” Oleg had already turned the car.
“You can’t see them now.”
“Gremlins?”
“Well, not real gremlins. Something weird.”
“Okay, back to sleep, Niks.”
Sobotka jabbed at the lock several times with his key. When I wake up tomorrow, he thought, I won’t remember any of this.
• • •
A chilly morning, brisk.
Oleg was smoking out on the terrace, studying the town.
Down on the road, in the fresh snow, there was a man carrying sacks, walking his big black dog on a leash. The man had a lot of sacks and bags of all sizes—too many.
The man with the sacks was talking to his dog as if the dog were a naughty child.
Then, all of a sudden, he hollered something into the air.
After that he started running with the dog, romping, really, with the dog. Though, in fact, there’s no telling whether the dog’s having fun, thought Oleg. Because the man with the sacks is crazy, but maybe the dog isn’t.
Oleg was standing there, smoking, but all he saw were impressions lurking along the edges of language; he could have been said to be thinking, or musing (if he were, indeed, a character in a novel), but thought is a fickle thing, as are musings, so it takes a little violence for us to work them into sentences, following the convention of subject and predicate, the mechanics of grammar, and they’re only tenuously linked to the real world; I don’t really think in clear-cut sentences, these are my impressions from the outer edges of language, thought Oleg.
• • •
They entered the factory. The smell of dust. Hoots through the broken windows, high above, and then a departing flutter of wings.
There was frozen snow beside the wall, piled up from above. Morning winter light from outside, gloom. Long cobweb threads hung from the ceiling, linked between the pillars, like safety nets for trapeze artists. In the dim light, through the dust floating in the awful cold, Oleg thought he saw the engineer’s eyes go glassy with tears. He looked away and held back, letting Sobotka lead the way.
Sobotka would have preferred to be alone: to swear, to shout, to converse with the ghosts. He felt as if he might possibly bump into a younger version of himself—without the gray hair, with the shoulder-length hair and the sideburns; a man cockily driving a Polish Fiat 125 with a beautiful wife and a child who, he believed, would have a better life than he was living, and with the carefree smile of a golden boy who succeeds at everything he touches, a smile some confused with arrogance. While he was clearing away the cobwebs around the machinery they had long ago imported from Japan, and trying to stifle a coughing fit, Sobotka closed his eyes, and even though all he could hear were the sounds of his lungs, he felt as if he could hear the rumble of the machines. And it was as if he could see the people from his past. The hum of the machines vibrated in his inner ear.
He stared at the machinery in front of him and could see old Whiskers, who used to operate the Japanese equipment. Whiskers, who’d taught him once long ago, instructing him in how to do the job: Take it slow, we’re in no rush, doing it right is what matters, not speed.
He could see Slavko in his blue work smock, a pen and tester in his upper pocket.
Arman, the locksmith, whose curse was Damn the dirt beneath your feet!
He saw all the faces at once, frozen in time with the machinery.
He could see his old director, Veber, who often snorted at Sobotka; Veber thought Sobotka was full of himself, he and his whole generation. That man, always in a gray suit—the behind-the-scenes power of the Party, that’s how Sobotka saw Veber.
Sobotka remembered that clash he’d had with Veber in the eighties, when he was among those who organized a strike.
The director felt his own children had betrayed him.
“You’re turning your backs on me! I was the one who built this factory,” he shouted during a workers’ assembly.
“But we’re facing inflation, and our wages are stagnating!”
“Things start from above. The government has requested help from the IMF. Do you know what that means?”
Sobotka and the others succeeded in persuading the workers’ council to vote in favor of a strike. They struck for three weeks; Sobotka encouraged the people and spoke a lot. TV reporters came, and there were reports of the strike on the evening news. He felt like the hero from the Polish trade union, Solidarity. They were his role models: the electrician named Lech Wałęsa with the mustache, the whole lot of them.
At the time, he and his fellow workers were in a strange, euphoric state and didn’t sleep much.
Now, he looked toward the door to the section where the offices used to be, and he could see the silhouette of the woman, Zelda, he’d had a thing with during the strike—memory of her thighs came back to him and he suddenly felt a tension in his groin, which threw him off, he almost lost his balance and slowed to a stop.
He looked around.
A flutter of wings above him. One dark bird had been lying low; it flew around in jagged circles and then out through the glassless windows.
Oleg was standing behind him in the open hall, smoking. His assistant—what did he say his name was?—had his hands in his pockets and was looking up. Sobotka knew he shouldn’t mention anything about the strike to them. For decades, many had bragged about standing up to socialism, but he’d kept quiet about this for years. All in vain, however—everyone who was supposed to hire him since would ultimately remember that he’d been the head striker, he’d roused the workers. Who needed that kind of dissi
dent?
But back in the day they succeeded. Their strike was discussed in parliament, and the government conceded to their demands. He remembered well how the old director called him in to have a word and then—when Sobotka arrived—he stood up and said, “You seem to be doing a better job here than me. Want my job?”
At the time, he told this story many times, it worked well as an anecdote.
But he always skipped the part about how he felt as he left the office after the conversation.
4
WHILE HE WAS waiting, Veber sipped a glass of rakija. Somebody had written rakija for the soul with felt-tip pen on the bottle. He was an atheist, he mused, so maybe this was him being teased by the person who’d given him this triangle-shaped bottle with a braid of herbs long ago. He opened it now as if he were celebrating something.
He stared at the paper, still in the typewriter, on which he’d typed out his request for retirement that morning. He looked at the letter as if he were afraid to pull it out of the machine, so he left it there to marinate, like the medicinal herbs soaking in the rakija.
He thought again about their strike. How they’d seen him as someone on the other side. He’d lost his bond with them. In fact, he thought, he’d lost the bond he’d had with himself. With the way he used to see his role, back when he was envisioning his future.
This was the end of the story. The end was written and now was staring him in the face.
He should drink up everything and yank that paper out as if ripping off a bandage.
When Sobotka came in, Veber stood and said, “Nice mustache. Like the Polish guy, right?”
“A mustache like any other.”
“Well, you seem to be doing a better job here than me. Want my job?” There was something in his words that made Sobotka smile.
“No. How could I lead a strike then?”
“Yes, that would be tricky! I’m an old revolutionary, you know. And yet, I can’t lead a strike.”
Veber’s demeanor was usually far more formal, so Sobotka knew right away that he’d been drinking.
They sat facing each other.
“What can you do?” continued Veber. “We fought for a workers’ state and now we have to lead it.”
“I thought you were opposed to the strike.”
“I led strikes. Then I went to war and then, goddammit, we won. Victory complicates things, you’ll see.”
“You came into power after you won. Power doesn’t interest me.”
“Nice.” Sobotka heard the sarcasm and said nothing.
“And that’s exactly the problem.”
“What?”
“The problem is that you’ve removed me from power, yet you don’t want it. The problem is the people you’ll cede the power to!”
“No need to get all agitated.”
“Don’t you worry. I’m leaving, I’m retiring. Let’s drink to that!”
Sobotka suddenly realized he had really taken his director down, and felt a bit sheepish when Veber stood and raised his glass.
“Nothing personal,” said Sobotka.
They clinked glasses.
“You managed to fight for higher wages and I didn’t. What am I here for? Let me know as soon as you find someone to replace me. I don’t want them sending you somebody who doesn’t get it.”
Sobotka felt like the old man was trying to lure him out onto thin ice. Do you want to take my job . . . ? Let me know . . . “I’m not a part of the system, you know, I make no decisions,” said Sobotka.
“Tough luck, now you have to be responsible. You think somebody at the top will deal with this? You seem to believe in the system more than I do!”
Sobotka grinned with a touch of irony.
“You think: we’ve raised a ruckus and we’re done. Big Daddy will show up and handle everything. But I happen to know there’s no one to handle it. Now it’s your turn to run the show.”
“I’m not interested in power or politics,” said Sobotka firmly, meaning he wouldn’t join the Party, but there was no need to focus on that.
“Oh, so you don’t believe striking is politics? When I led strikes, that wasn’t my mind-set.”
Veber poured more rakija into both the glasses.
“I ought to get going,” Sobotka said.
“Where are you off to now? Do you have a plan? Tell me, what’s your plan, Mr. Wałęsa?”
Sobotka lifted his glass and drank it down, then lit a cigarette without asking permission, and said, “Okay, I, too, will be honest. You can’t forgive me for the strike and now you’re jerking me around.”
“I’m just asking for your plan.”
“If I had a plan,” said Sobotka, “that might mean big trouble for me.”
“Hey! We don’t lock up workers around here for striking. Luckily this isn’t Russia, or Albania.”
“But if I had a plan, this would be much more serious.”
“Oh. You’re afraid to say it?” Veber frowned and poured them another round.
“I didn’t say that.”
“What is it then? You are afraid to even think. So you don’t have a plan? Maybe you’re waiting to see how this plays out, like all you younger generations do.”
“If that’s so, then it’s your fault!” Sobotka said, even though he knew he was pushing the limits. “Who ever asked my generation anything? You’re in charge,” his ironic tone got the best of him, “you aging revolutionaries.”
“You’re right.”
Sobotka looked at him—he was nervous because of what he’d blurted out and expected a different answer.
“But things change, as you see,” continued Veber, “it’s all yours now, so self-manage! Do as you please. I’m sure you’ll be better at it.”
“We’ve already gone over this,” said Sobotka.
“Okay then, let’s drink and be done with it.”
The old man went over to the turntable, which Sobotka had spotted just then in the corner of the office, and put on a record. The scratch of the vinyl, classical music, an orchestra. Loud.
Sobotka sipped from his glass.
He looked at Veber, who was raising his glass, as if watching from a great distance.
He hadn’t expected Veber to appreciate this kind of music. It was an old dramatic piece, like a voyage on board a ship: strings, trumpets, kettledrums, horns. Veber lit a cigarette.
The smoke spread lazily around the office and the space of the music made the premises seem even bigger, deeper, and, maybe, darker. The old man was glancing over at his typewriter, his face relaxed now. Then he poured them more rakija, and to Sobotka—deafened by the music—it all seemed as if it were happening in slow motion, as if they were underwater.
“Spartacus.”
The beat of the music was speeding up and turning into a buoyant dance in which Sobotka imagined only women, nothing but women.
• • •
He left the office warmed by the rakija and paced the hallways as if he were Oedipus, thinking: I ousted him. He, Sobotka, had done in the old Party honcho who’d seemed untouchable, without hardly lifting a finger.
Fueled by the rakija, instead of just walking by Zelda’s office, in he goes. She stands and looks at him in silence, as if afraid of sounds: he shouldn’t show up like this, it’s not just her office. Luckily, her officemate isn’t there. But what is he doing? He’s locking the door and coming over: he’s moving quickly like an animal, and already he’s holding her. They shouldn’t be doing this, but he is doing it, and she is looking at him, scared of the imaginary boundaries, but she doesn’t protest, she says nothing, and he, too, is quiet—she can only hear his breathing.
She can hear only his breathing while they make love on the floor, and then the phone rings, it rings for a frighteningly long time in her ears, in her whole body; then it stops for a while bu
t starts ringing again, and it echoes—must be the manager, he needs her, only he can be so persistent.
Then silence.
He stopped, then sat on the floor.
She looked at him and said, “What, what?” Then she remembered where they were. When she stood and smoothed her skirt, she said, as if to herself, “Seriously?”
She looked at him: he was still sitting on the floor, his head thrown back, as if he were sitting in the sun, with golden hair and an expression full of an odd blankness.
She went to unlock the door and said, “We are in too deep.”
He watched her as he stood up and, for a moment, an odd sentence ran through his mind—Let us go together to where.
He knew these weren’t quite the right words, but he said them anyway.
Zelda arched her eyebrows and steered him toward the door. When he left the office, she sat down and for a moment repeated to herself, as if somebody older were speaking to her: Get a grip.
Her officemate, Hanka, came in and Zelda had the feeling that she knew. Maybe she’d run into Sobotka in the corridor, or maybe she had even tried to come in while the door was locked.
Hanka said, “So, my dear Zelda, what do you think—where is all of this going?”
“Who knows.”
“Oh, come on, you’re young, you have the good fortune of being able to go wherever you like.”
“Where would you go?”
“Me? If I were you: to Hollywood to see Richard Gere.”
They both laughed.
Zelda came from the big city; she’d only been here for six months. By having an affair with her, Sobotka stepped into a whole new, unknown world. Everything became so ambiguous, but in an exciting way. Maybe even the fact that he’d become involved so passionately in the strike had to do with her: a new personality was germinating inside him, and this personality wanted to be made known. He’d denied his life so far, and this freed him, like a blast of light. But now, as he left her office, he felt as if he didn’t exactly know where he was anymore. Everything was moving so fast, the world was dissolving and purifying momentarily before his eyes, as if a giant snowplow had just passed over it. What’s your plan, Veber had asked, and the question still rang in his ears, together with the loud music and the image of the swirls of smoke floating around the office, the rakija smell, Zelda’s smell, and that feeling that he’d stepped onto an unknown open space and didn’t know where to stop.
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