Dmitry hung up; that was it then. At that moment he would gladly have renounced his nationality and everything that went with it. Well, it was too bad about his suitcase, he would have to do without it. There was no way he was going to contact the Russian Embassy. He at least had his toothbrush and shaving things in his briefcase. He found a tailor’s shop and bought himself a spare shirt and two pairs of underpants and went to find a cheap hotel for the night.
He strode along the street. The more he thought about his suitcase, the more it bothered him. Had Tolya collected the suitcase himself or had he informed someone else? Perhaps the KGB would now be onto him. They knew he had not gone; they knew he was still in Buenos Aires. They might try to look for him; it was conceivable they might check every hotel. Or they might inform the police that he was missing, that he was ill, that he was off his head. But what would be the point, when they knew he couldn’t get a visa? Then he was afraid that the Brazilian plotters might be on to him again. They might now know that he had seen dos Santos – if that were so he wasn’t safe anywhere. He would do better just to go home.
Then he thought of Katie, waiting for him at the hotel in Mariscal Estigarribia, sitting on the bed in the darkness in some awful room, waiting and waiting, and him not coming. it wasn’t possible to do that to her; she would have gone there at some risk.
He went into a bookshop and looked in an atlas. There must be ways of crossing the Paraná. Wasn’t there a ferry between Posadas and Encarnación? They might not check on passports - his UN laissez-passer looked impressive. He was on a diplomatic grade. Would some local border guard even know it had to be visaed? Then he thought of Iguazú. He remembered reading somewhere that a lot of smuggling took place over the border, the immigration controls were very lax. Traffic crossed the river daily, between Brazil, Argentina, Paraguay, to work, to market; he could fly to Puerto Iguazú on the Argentine side. He could cross into Brazil. From Foz do Iguaçu there was another bridge into Paraguay. The distance from there to Asunción was about 400 kilometres, and about 600 kilometres to Mariscal Estigarribia. It might take as long as twelve hours, depending on the roads.
He went to a café, found a phone and rang Aerolineas Argentinas. Yes, a woman told him, there were flights to Puerto Iguazú in the morning, from the domestic airport. The earliest was at six-fifty. She could book it now, but it wasn’t full, there would be no problem. But Dmitry didn’t want to make a reservation. He imagined they might check all outward flights.
He went back into the street. He felt light-headed and dizzy from lack of sleep, he hadn’t eaten all day and the sun was very hot. He walked to the Palermo Park, picking up a sandwich and a cold drink on the way. He sat down under a tree and had some lunch, then he rested his head on his briefcase and shut his eyes. He woke up suddenly, completely disoriented; he looked at his watch to find it was five o’clock. His suit was crumpled, his head was pounding, he felt like a tramp. He thought he had better go and find himself a hotel.
Dmitry took a colectivo to one of the seedier areas of the city. Old low houses with dark courtyards lined the streets. He found himself a small hotel and took a room under a false name. The woman at the desk, who was about sixty, plump, but not completely unattractive, said lazily, ‘Passport?’
‘I don’t have one.’ He didn’t want to leave it in case they did check the hotels.
‘Any other identification?’
‘No.’
She looked at him shrewdly and then shrugged. She handed him a key. ‘Is it just one night?’
‘One night.’
‘You pay in advance.’
He paid and went upstairs. The room was horrible. It was cramped, badly papered, had a cracked washstand, and looked out over a dank courtyard. He lay down on the bed. A couple were having sex in the next room; the bed banged rhythmically against the wall and he could hear the woman groaning. It occurred to him that it might be a hotel used by prostitutes. He tried to blot the sound out but despite himself it aroused him. He decided to go and get a meal; he took his briefcase with him. On the way out the woman said, ‘Are you coming back?’
‘I’m coming back.’ But he thought he might find somewhere better.
It was getting dark. He was overcome with a fierce desire to see Katie; no, not to see her, to make love to her. The violence of his desire frightened him. He suddenly thought, what am I doing? It had seemed to him that they had loved one another; that was why he was going to Paraguay. But he remembered all too clearly that by the end love had had very little to do with it. Why was he going? He couldn’t think that he could enter a country illegally and not face the consequences. What would the IAEA do? Already they were expecting him back tomorrow. His colleagues had been expecting him on the plane. He had not even thought to ring them or send a fax – he must do that in the morning. He could say he had been taken ill. Or that he had decided to take a couple of days’ holiday; they would be sympathetic, in view of what had happened.
He could ring Katie. He could ask her to come alone, he could meet her here in Buenos Aires. He went to find a call box. It didn’t work. He found another one. The phone rang and a man’s voice answered so he hung up. He started walking again. Abruptly he came to a halt. He had been walking, blindly, not aware of where he was going, and now he had no idea where he was. He was in a dark street; there were few street-lights. This was not a good part of town. He could be robbed and murdered. He could see, ahead of him, a shadow in a doorway. He turned and walked quickly back up the street. He walked faster and faster, then ran several blocks till he saw a street with bright lights and traffic; he jumped on the nearest colectivo, went to the back and stared out of the window.
The vehicle pulled out onto another main road. Now he recognised where he was; he was on the Avenida 9 de Julio. He got off at the next stop, found a café and ordered a drink. He saw a policeman walking past; almost instinctively, to hide his face, he turned his head away and put up his arm to run it through his hair. Then, suddenly, he put his head in his hands. He could not imagine how this had happened to him, walking like a madman across Buenos Aires, unable to go back to his sordid hotel, concealing his identity, afraid that out of every dark side street somebody would come to apprehend or kill him.
Taking hold of himself, he went and found another hotel; he had to bribe them to accept a reservation without a passport. He lay there on the uncomfortable mattress, listening to the sound of traffic roaring past and watching the pattern of the lights from the headlamps on the ceiling. Eventually he must have fallen asleep. Waking with a start, he realised his alarm was bleeping; he got shakily out of bed. He could hardly remember where he was and what he was doing; then he realised he had to catch the early morning flight to Puerto Iguazú.
He took a taxi to the airport. He had cut the journey a bit fine, and was afraid that he would be late and miss the flight. At the airport Dmitry saw from the departure board that the flight had a half-hour delay. He went to the desk and bought his ticket. Now he began to fret about the delay. The whole journey might take much longer than he thought. Supposing he were late, that Katie didn’t wait for him…
He sat on a plastic airport chair and looked out of the window at the huge expanse of the Rio de la Plata. Dawn was breaking; a red, hazy bar of light hung over the water, fading to gold above; in this light the water seemed black and solid, lumpy like molten rock. He sat and looked at it for a long time; then realised with a start that they were calling his flight. He thought, I shouldn’t go. This will lead to disaster. But he went and boarded all the same.
III
As soon as she had put the phone down, Katie began to regret her decision. It was not that she didn’t want to be with Dmitry; the moment she had received his faxed letter she knew that she wanted to be with him, that she only wanted the child so much because it was his child, and that he offered her an escape from what was clearly to her now a dead marriage. But to meet him here? To begin with, she had no idea how she was going to get to Mariscal Es
tigarribia. What kind of excuse could she make? Who could she get to take her? She supposed she could say she just wanted to go back to Asunción, but then Bob would urge her just to wait another day or so. Besides, there was no reason to go by road rather than by air. She wondered if she could just say that she was bored and wanted someone to drive her there so she could have a look around. Did that sound odd? Was it suspicious? Supposing Bob offered to go there with her?
The second thing that worried her was how Dmitry was going to get there. He might not be able to get a visa; he was a Russian and, despite the changes, Paraguay was still firmly anti-communist. Besides, the whole area was crawling with the military, they were extra vigilant because of the rocket project. But what if he did come and she wasn’t there?
She went upstairs and packed a few things into her shoulder bag. If she took any more they would be suspicious. Bob would be occupied with supervising the arrival of the rocket parts due in that day; he was in charge while Richter was in Europe. She decided not to tell him anything; she decided just to go.
Bob hung around the house all morning, waiting for the expected flight. Katie was tense and irritable, trying hard to keep up a semblance of normality; finally she told Bob she felt sick and went to lie down on the bed. The rocket parts arrived on the plane at two o’clock. She saw them unloading the numbered steel tubes and start to assemble them. Bob would be fully occupied for several hours; the problem was that he had a view of the house and all he had to do was look up to see her leave.
She went and found one of the drivers, a small, middle-aged man known as Mito, sitting sipping a can of gaseosa under a tree.
‘Mito, I have to go and get something from Mariscal Estigarribia. How long will it take to get there?’
Mito looked blank. ‘Maybe one, one-and-a-half hours.’
‘So there’s time to get there and back before dark?’
‘Sí, of course.’
‘Could you bring the car round to the back of the house?’
‘Now?’
‘Yes, now.’
He did as he was asked. Katie left a note for Bob saying she was feeling ill and going to Asunción and to call her there tomorrow. She said she was sorry but she couldn’t stand it in the Chaco any longer and she didn’t want to disturb his work; she told him not to worry. Bob must have noticed the jeep leaving, but she saw no reason for him to suspect she was in it and no-one took any notice of them.
It was hot, very hot. The jeep bumped around on the unmetalled roads, and Katie began to feel anxious about the pregnancy. It took just under an hour and a half to reach Mariscal Estigarribia. They drove round in the heat and dust looking for the hotel. When they found the Hotel Alemán Katie’s heart sank. It was a low wooden building at the side of the road with a plastic Coca-Cola sign outside, a porch with some wagon wheels, and no sign of life. Katie walked round into the courtyard. Some tired-looking banana trees with tattered leaves leaned against the wall, and a few chickens were scratching in the dust. Three grubby, half-naked little girls ran out and stared at Katie. Then they started laughing and ran back in through an open door.
Katie asked the driver to wait outside. He was used to that; he would sit there waiting in the car all day unless told otherwise. She wondered what she should say to him. She didn’t want him to go back; he would tell Bob where she was. In the end she went out and told him he could go off and get himself a drink or something and come back at seven. Then she went back to the hotel and called out to see if anyone was there.
She walked through the open door and into what appeared to be the dining room; sparsely furnished with metal chairs and plastic-covered tables. A man came out of the kitchen. He was wearing only a pair of baggy shorts over which a beer gut protruded.
‘Can I help you? We have single or double rooms, breakfast included, all air-conditioned.’ He spoke Spanish with a heavy German accent.
Katie said, in German, ‘Just one room, for me. Someone may be joining me later.’
‘Then you need a double; let me show you.’ The rooms were in another building across the courtyard. He led her into one; it was reasonably clean, but small and absolutely basic; just two small, hard beds and a massive air-conditioner on the wall. The man turned it on; the noise was terrible. He switched it off again. ‘There is a bathroom,’ he said, indicating a door at the side. ‘The other rooms are smaller and cheaper.’
‘No; this will do,’ said Katie.
‘My name is Feldman; welcome. You are not German, but you speak it very well. Where are you from?’
‘I am English,’ said Katie, ‘But I lived in Vienna.’
‘Would you like anything to eat?’
She had a plain supper of grilled meat, rice and manioc. At seven, the driver came back. Katie said, ‘I’m not feeling very well. I don’t want to drive back. We’ll stay the night here – I can get you a room.’ She was embarrassed by him. She didn't want him to see Dmitry if he arrived. She wondered if there was anywhere else she could send him.
‘Don't worry, I will sleep in the car,’ said Mito. Katie went back to the hotel room and sat on the hard bed in the darkness. At this point she wanted only to cry; she didn’t think that Mitya would come and she was afraid of Bob coming after her. She worried about what would go through his mind; he would be anxious rather than suspicious; he would ring Asunción, find she had not arrived, and then what would he do? He would be crazy with worry. Perhaps she should call him and say where she was, that she’d felt ill and decided to stay here; but he might come to find her. Then if Mitya arrived, there would be a dreadful scene.
But Mitya might not come; she would go back to Asunción in the morning and wait for him there. After a while she began to think this was the best thing. She didn’t know what to say to him; she was nervous of how she would respond to him; she didn’t want to make love to him here, she felt it would somehow be wrong, as if real love could not exist in such sordid surroundings. Why ever hadn’t she said she would meet him in Asunción? But even now he was probably on the road.
She lay down. She couldn’t sleep. She kept listening out for any sound, any car pulling up outside, that might be Bob, or might be Dmitry. She kept looking at her watch. Hours went past, so slowly that the night was endless. It was dreadfully hot, oppressive, as if there might be a storm, but she couldn’t bear the noise of the air-conditioner. For the twentieth time she looked at her watch; it was nearly midnight.
Then she heard the sound of a car and voices outside.
The flight from Buenos Aires to Puerto Iguazú took just under two hours. Coming down, once they had descended through the cloud, the plane banked over the Iguazú Falls; Dmitry could see them spread out before him in the jungle, clouds of white spray rising up out of the foaming water.
Most of the people on the plane were tourists; from the airport buses ran to the cataracts and across the border to Foz do Iguaçu in Brazil. The sky was overcast and the air was damp as Dmitry climbed into the Brazil-bound bus. He glanced impatiently at his watch. It was eight-thirty. The bus carried him along a straight road through the sub-tropical jungle. Before the bridge the customs officials and police showed no interest in checking passports but waved them through; this bode well, thought Dmitry, for crossing into Paraguay.
It began to rain. Foz do Iguaçu, especially without sunlight, was a depressing place. The traffic was jammed, the skyscrapers loomed behind the huge hoardings, everywhere people were scurrying to work, their thin shirts soaked by the rain. At the bus station Dmitry did not know what to do next. He stood with his briefcase in his hand, wondering whether it was best to get another bus or try to get a lift in a private car. He hovered there, unable to decide. This was absurd; he should turn back; this really was the point of no return.
He walked in the rain down towards the bridge. He was wet through, but it didn’t matter, it was so warm. The rain eased; a moist wind blew in his face. Across the river the new town of Ciudad del Este sprawled in front of him, hideous with its towe
r blocks, building sites and shanty towns. The road sloped down to the bridge; underneath it ran the Paraná, unexpectedly narrow in its deep channel through the red earth.
A steady stream of traffic crossed the bridge; most of it seemed to be waved through without a hitch, at least on the Brazilian side. Dmitry turned around and held out his arm to hitch a lift. The first few cars sped past; then a large lorry; then a battered car with Paraguayan number-plates pulled up. Dmitry asked, in Spanish, ‘Can you take me across the bridge?’ The man shrugged and Dmitry opened the door and got in. The driver started the car. The steering seemed wobbly and the engine made an unhealthy noise.
‘Where are you going?’
‘Only to Ciudad del Este.’
‘American? German? Tourist?’
‘Tourist, yes.’
‘You have been to see the cataracts?’
‘Sí.’ They were a major tourist attraction; people must cross the border all the time to see them. He thought, if they ask to see my passport I could tell them I'd been over to the Iguazú Falls and left my passport behind in the hotel.
They crossed to the Paraguayan side and the frontier police did not take the slightest notice of them. The driver pulled up and said, ‘You want to get out here?’ Dmitry nodded. He felt like laughing; it was absurd that he had expended so much energy over the question of how he was going to cross the border. The car drove off leaving a trail of noxious fumes and Dmitry set out in search of a bank and a garage from which to hire a car.
It was late afternoon by the time he reached the outskirts of Asunción. He drove into the centre, and was surprised to see a yellow tram trundling down the middle of the road; it reminded him instantly of Vienna. Another tram came up behind him; he had to drive onto the pavement to avoid it. He felt confused, so tired he could no longer drive safely. He thought that if he didn’t get anything to eat or drink he would collapse. He parked the car behind a stand of yellow taxis and wandered down the street.
The Rocket Man Page 27