by Joseph Kanon
Nick stared at him, trying to catch up. Was he crazy? “You can’t do this.”
“Do you understand?” he repeated.
“You can’t just get on a train.”
“Yes. It’s the ticket that’s difficult. A Czech would get it early, with the visa. No one goes to Vienna at the last minute. But for you it’s easy.”
“No one goes to Vienna at all.”
“Russian Jews,” his father said. “They have exit visas. This is the train that connects to Vienna. It’s how they leave. Don’t worry, I have papers.”
“Yours?”
“Someone’s. They won’t bother me. Once I have the ticket I’m all right.”
“No risk at all.”
His father looked up at him but didn’t answer. “When you get to Vienna, stay at the Imperial. I’ll contact you. And don’t tell anyone you’re there-anyone.”
Nick dropped his cigarette and took him by the arms. “What’s going on? You can’t do this,” he said again. “What if it doesn’t work?”
“It has to. It’s not what I planned, Nick. But now we do it this way.”
“But why? This morning-”
When his father didn’t answer, it occurred to Nick, a chill like the night air, that it had always been the plan — not the elaborate exchange but an escape, clandestine like the rest of his life, drawing Nick in deeper, one story into another, until he was on a train platform buying a ticket, an accomplice. No risk at all, unless he was caught.
“What about your list?” he said. “Your documents?” Had he made that up too?
“There isn’t time now. But they’re also here,” he said, tapping his head. “It should be enough.”
If they exist at all, Nick thought. Now there were other papers, good enough to use on a train, insurance policies. How long had he had them?
But when he looked into his father’s face, he saw that the smooth confidence of the morning was gone. Now there was the worry he’d noticed earlier, something hasty and makeshift. A new plan, while Nick had gone dancing.
“What’s happened? Are you in some kind of danger?”
His father shook his head. “Not yet. I just have to do it differently.”
“Not like this. Let me go to Paris and-”
“No,” he said abruptly. “Go to Vienna. It’s important, Nick, please. Do this one thing for me. There’s no danger to you. A lost ticket-you can’t be blamed for that.”
“I wasn’t thinking about me.”
“No,” his father said, his eyes softening, as if he’d received an unexpected compliment. “So you understand?”
“How long do I wait in Vienna? If you don’t show up?”
“In that case you won’t have to wait at all,” he said, almost wry again. “But let’s hope for the best. It’s simple, Nick. Just keep your head. We’ll be all right.” He paused and looked around. “Well. We can’t stay here. You don’t want to be seen with me. Tell Anna to come out. Say I’m not feeling well.”
Nick raised his head to speak, but his father’s eyes were steady, pragmatic. There was nothing more to be said. Nick looked away. “I’ll get them.”
“Just Anna. You stay here.” A little smile. “Have another dance.”
When Nick moved from the wall, his father stopped him. “Nick?” he said, his voice anxious, then reached for him, a bear hug, no longer caring if anyone could see. The platform goodbye they weren’t supposed to have. He held Nick for a minute-the same clutch, unmistakable — then pulled away.
“What was that for?” Nick said, to cover his embarrassment.
“For luck. You always brought me luck, remember?” Sitting at his side while his father played poker with the other men, watching the cards, happy to be up late.
“Not always,” he said.
“Yes, you did.”
Inside, the band was still playing, the hall light and warm, as if nothing had happened. “Memories of You”, a romantic low-register solo, calming the crowd down after the raucous opening number. Anna left even before he’d finished his message, snatching her coat, an attentive nurse. Molly raised her eyes.
“Tired,” Nick whispered. “We’re on our own.”
She smiled, obviously pleased, and put her hand on his. He drifted with the music, relieved that they couldn’t talk. What could have happened? Something at the funeral? This morning there had been a plan. This was more like flight, the bag ready at the door. What had spooked him? “Goody, Goody”, a speakeasy song, fleshed out for the big band.
“You okay?” Molly said, looking at him.
He nodded, forcing himself to smile. Why was happiness so hard to fake? Everybody else was beaming, a kind of collective euphoria. This was the way his father had sat, not even hearing the music. He grinned. In case they could be seen from the balcony.
The band was brought back twice, and even when the curtain was down people kept clapping, reluctant to leave the party. They followed the crowd back to Wenceslas, where it spilled down the long street, clumping at tram stops and the few bars still open for a late drink. Molly wanted to go on to Laterna Magika-‘We can still catch the end’-and because they wouldn’t have to talk there either he went along, his arm around her shoulder, not giving anything away.
It was in a cafe at the bottom of the square, off Narodni Street, and the minute he walked in he knew it was a mistake. The dark room, smoky, filled with shadows, was the part of him he’d been trying to push away. They couldn’t take a table without interrupting the show, so they stood at the bar in the dark, and Nick found himself scanning the room, looking at faces to see if any of them were looking back.
The mimes worked in front of a bright spot, forming shadows against a screen, like children making rabbit ears on the wall with their fingers held up to a lamp. The play between the actors and their own larger shadows caused a trick of the eye, a clever chiaroscuro, but all Nick saw were the shadows, dancing, then elusive, sliding toward the edge until you could no longer see where they ended and the real dark began. The customers, sitting at cabaret tables, gave off the same effect, sometimes visible in the light, then vanishing into the recesses. No wonder the Czechs liked Goodman, the bright lights and the simple, bouncy music. This was the native product, all shadows, a city practised at fading into doorways.
He went into the men’s room, grateful for the light. A man, cigarette dangling, stood at the urinal, so he went into the stall. What if there was someone in the stall tomorrow? What did he do, keep going back until it was empty? He pulled the chain, looking up at the flush box mounted on the wall. He’d imagined a toilet with a back, a convenient shelf. Where did you leave the ticket, on the paper dispenser? Why had his father changed his mind? The man at the urinal said something in Czech over the plywood wall, hearty, maybe a joke about the effects of beer on the bladder, but it could have been anything. What if someone spoke to him? Nick just nodded to him blandly when he came out, not even stopping to wash his hands, afraid of being caught out by language. He pushed open the door to a round of applause.
“Aren’t they wonderful?” Molly said brightly. “There’s one more set. Want to sit?”
“No. Do you really want to stay?”
“You don’t like mimes. Here, finish this.” She handed him a brandy. “Ten minutes, okay?”
He took a long pull on the drink to burn away his mood. When he looked up over the glass, a shadow had come out of the wall.
“We meet again,” Marty Bielak said. “You seem to be everywhere tonight.”
“That makes two of us.”
“Well, a nightcap.” He held up his glass. Where else had he been? The Alcron. The Cafe Slavia. The legman making his rounds. Items for tomorrow’s column. Just like the old days. The Stork. The Blue Angel. Another iron curtain joke. Cafe society was still alive here, lounge lizards and all.
“They’re terrific, aren’t they?” Bielak said, nodding toward the mime troupe. “I never get tired of them.”
“You’ve seen them a lot?”
“Well, there aren’t so many clubs here.” He took a drink, standing closer. “I see you met one of our local celebrities.” Prodding. “At the concert. He didn’t introduce himself?” Insistent now, close.
Nick wasn’t sure what to answer. How would it be reported? But Bielak was waiting, his lips wet with drink.
“Yes,” Nick said finally. “I thought he was in Moscow.”
Bielak nodded, his air confiding. “He married a Czech. A bourgeoise.” The term threw Nick, some bizarre leftover from the old party meetings, those hours of dialectic and self-discipline. But Bielak didn’t hear it as an anachronism, and when he saw Nick’s look, he said, “Of course, not now.”
“I didn’t know,” Nick said vaguely.
“What did he say? I’d be curious.” He had leaned even closer, his whole body a kind of insinuation.
“Not much. How I liked the concert,” Nick said. But this wasn’t going to be enough. “I think he was a little disappointed that I didn’t recognize him.”
“Too much?” But Bielak seemed pleased. “Yes. He used to be famous, you see.” He shook his head. “Nobody remembers, do they?” Delighted somehow, a press agent watching a falling star.
“We have to go,” Nick said, signaling to Molly.
“So soon? They’re not finished.”
“No, but I am. We have to be up early.”
Why had he said that? Bielak, however, was smiling, amused.
“Young people,” he said. “In my day, we could dance all night.” So he had watched. Was still watching. “One more drink?” Was it possible he just didn’t want to go home? The empty apartment.
“Thanks, some other time. Molly?”
Bielak nodded and raised his fingers from the glass in a kind of wave. “I’ll see you around,” he said, his voice pleasant, not sinister at all.
Back in the street, Nick was rattled. A chance meeting? What if he was around tomorrow? In the lobby. At the station itself. As they walked along the street he found himself looking to the side, expecting shadows to move. It’s simple, his father had said. But it wasn’t. A quarrel with Molly? Who would believe it? Not Bielak, making his rounds. Nobody just got on a train, not here. Why risk it, all of a sudden? He started picking the story apart, uneasy.
Later it was worse. When Molly fell asleep curled next to him, he stared at the street light on the ceiling, looking for microphones that might not be there. You always brought me luck. Something was wrong. And what would Vienna be like? More cat and mouse. He wanted to turn his mind off, sleep, but instead he lay still with dread, awake with night fears, the ones that didn’t even have names.
He shaved without running the water, careful not to wake her, and dressed quietly in the dim light. He put a few things in the small canvas bag, then crossed over to the desk and took her passport out of her purse. Both of them were leaving, a better story. No quarrel. She’d be late. When the floorboards creaked he stopped, but she didn’t move, a mound under the covers. He turned the knob slowly, so that when he finally closed the door behind him there was only a soft click. In the hall a maid stared at him as if she’d caught him coming out of someone else’s room, but he nodded and whispered ‘ Dobre rano’ when he passed, just an early bird. He went down the stairs. The lobby was empty, but just in case he paused and took out his street map, a tourist plotting his walk, his head still down as he passed through the revolving door.
It was early, just a few people on their way to work, but he turned off Wenceslas at the first corner and took a series of side streets to circle back to the bottom of the square. Nobody was following. Near the Powder Tower he caught a tram, and watched out the window as it traveled back across Wenceslas, past the hotel, the doorman yawning. He walked to the university and headed left toward the station. The back streets, oddly, seemed less safe, without a crowd to hide in, but he kept going, one more deliberate wrong turn, then a glance at the map, another street, and he was there, the creamy art nouveau facade, vaulting shed behind, Wilsonova Street half filled now with sleepy commuters. Policemen stood near the doorways, looking bored, guns at their sides. No one looked at him.
The woman at the ticket booth said something in Czech and repeated it until Nick tried his little bit of German: ‘ Zwei nach Wien.“ She took the passports and examined them, checking against sheets in a looseleaf binder, then leaned forward to look to his side, evidently expecting to see Molly. When she spoke Czech again, he gestured with his hands to indicate that she was following. The woman said something again, then, seeing his blank expression, gave it up, shrugging and stamping the tickets. Life was too short, even here. She took the money, grumbling at having to make change. ” Pet.“ He stared and she repeated it, then grudgingly took a slip of paper and wrote ’5‘, pointing toward the platforms. He nodded, thanking her in German, and moved away, putting the tickets in his pocket. That was it, as easy as he had said.
He walked across the hall toward the platforms, glancing around. Coffee stalls, newspapers. Any station. He found the men’s room. Was there another one? A man stumbled out, obviously drunk, still zipping his fly. Inside was a row of stalls and sinks, urinals against the wall. He stood for a minute, too nervous to pee, then opened the door to the first stall. He couldn’t leave the ticket yet, not for an hour, but there was a shelf, easy.
He made a half-circle through the hall to make sure it was the nearest toilet, then bought a coffee, wishing he hadn’t come so early. Would the teller keep an eye on him? The newspapers were Czech. Rude Pravo, Red Truth. He walked out onto the empty platform, feeling conspicuous, then sat on one of the benches near the gate where he could see both platform and waiting hall. Where would his father be? There was nowhere to hide here. He’d walk straight to the men’s room. Nick would follow. In an hour he’d be gone.
He had nothing to read, and in any case English might be noticed, so there was nothing to do but smoke and look at his watch, a pantomime of waiting. A soldier came up, machine gun pointing down, and spoke. Nick froze. Was he asking to see his papers? Then the soldier repeated it and made the sign for a match and Nick, grateful, handed him the disposable lighter. He looked at it curiously before he passed it back, an artifact from the West, then moved on to the next platform. But whom was he guarding? The hall was deserted except for the grim commuters, and Nick wondered what it had been like before, loudspeakers announcing the overnight expresses, wagons-lits connecting Europe. Now nobody went anywhere.
A man in a hat and a boxy suit, carrying a satchel, walked out on the platform. One passenger, at least. Nick followed his shoes. Not Western. Maybe a businessman heading back to Brno. Did the train stop before Vienna? There must be a border check, a customs search, rifling through the bags of the anxious Russian Jews. Too busy to bother his father. A cleaning man in a blue smock swept his way nearer, looking over at him, interested. Nick got up and went to the men’s room again.
This time he could pee. He was alone, he could leave it now, but what if someone else found it? Why hadn’t they set an exact time? He washed his hands and went back to the bench. A suburban train had pulled into the next platform, and people were moving off as if they were still asleep. Otherwise, it was the same as before, the soldier circling, the man in the suit waiting. Another man was on the platform now, pacing. Nick sat looking from one to the other. They all moved in silence, almost orchestrated, like the Laterna Magika. A train attendant checking a pocket watch walked out to the end of the platform. Any one of them could be someone else, waiting for his father. Two older women and a young man, one suitcase. Who was leaving? The boxy suit moved back toward Nick’s bench, glancing over at him, then circled back. Would they know his father by sight? He used to be famous. Molly would be up now, wondering where he’d gone. But he couldn’t leave a note. He’d get a taxi back.
When he saw the train coming in he began to panic. This was cutting it close. A ten-minute layover. But maybe that was right. A sleight of hand, quick. Where was he? There was a slow screech as t
he train stopped, doors banging open, a few people getting off, handing a suitcase down through the window. The people waiting on the platform began to move toward the train. He couldn’t just stand there. Had he missed him somehow? He went back to the men’s room. Maybe he was waiting.
The first stall was closed, feet visible underneath. He stood at the sink. It would have to be now. The whistle would go any minute. If he came now, Nick would have to hand it to him, tell him to run. He turned off the tap. Come on. And then it occurred to him that the feet were his father’s, holding the stall. Of course. He’d been waiting all this time and now was late, Nick’s fault. Nick darted over and pushed open the door, ready to hand him the ticket. A curse in Czech. A man, his pants down around his ankles, glared in surprise, then yelled. “Sorry,” Nick said, yanking the door closed.
He ran out of the room and stood at the head of the platform. He’d have to pass this way, see Nick, not bother with the men’s room. Just take the ticket and go. Nick looked around, frantic, then down at his watch. Not this close. It was stupid. They’d notice. The boxy suit and the pacer were gone, settled in the car. Only the attendant was now on the empty platform, looking at him. Nick turned to the waiting hall. He’d be running across the room now, late, accidentally bumping into Nick, snatching the ticket before anyone could see. The soldier was coming back, smoking again. Then Nick heard the whistle and jumped, swiveling his head between the train and the hall. The soldier looked at him. The train was beginning to move. There was no one near, no one running. Nick looked at his watch-what else did you do when someone was late? When the soldier came up to him and said something, Nick turned his palms up and shrugged. She had missed it. Then he turned and saw the train sliding out, the attendant waving as it passed him, faster now, on its way to Vienna.