My wish for delay was in part to be granted. The train was late. Because of snow-drifts on the line, precedence given to military trains, and the general inefficiency of the railway company, whose best men were now engaged in war-work, we stopped frequently. The temperature never became absolutely uncomfortable but the saloon-car with its stove grew crowded and eventually we put on our top-coats and returned to our seats. The actress remained in the saloon, drinking cognac. We were brought frequent tumblers of tea to console us. By dawn the old lady in black had begun to shiver. At last the train moved slowly forward between high banks of snow. It was impossible to see anything but snow. It was as if we travelled through a brilliant ice-cavern, a tunnel whose roof was illuminated by glowing grey felt.
Even as we crawled forward (we were only a few miles from Kiev) the snow came down again. Great sheets of it fell vertically. There was no wind. I was very tired, but I went to the observation platform behind the guard’s van and looked back at the line. There were two dark parallel tracks in it created by the wheels of the train. Even as I watched they began to fill. It was as if the whole of the past, the entire landscape behind us, were being erased. I had a feeling of freedom which quickly gave way to a sense of loss. I remembered Odessa in the summer; the quick, babbling people, the gaiety of it all, the wit, the kindness, the comradeship. This blizzard had fallen on that Odessan summer like a final curtain. The Frost Gods were taking vengeance on those who, for a few short months, had dared to be happy.
A little later, as if celebrating escape from disaster, we came steaming and whistling into Kiev. The station seemed bleak, though as crowded as ever. The great baroque pillars where pigeons nested, the stone walls and ceilings, the looming renaissance bas-reliefs, all gave an impression of coldness. With my bag (containing new clothes and gifts) I stepped down onto the platform, bewildered once more by the rush of the porters, the shouts of the passengers, the sense of panic which seized everyone the moment the train had stopped. But now I had no Shura to guide me.
I began to walk as best I could through this press. I ignored porters, vendors, touts. I had some idea of getting the tram to Podol and from there walking or getting another tram home. As I reached the main entrance and saw people fighting for cabs, crushing one another to get on the trams, I felt a terrible regret at the absence of Shura and his comradeship. I was never really to know such warmth and spirit again. I went past the terminus. The roofs and streets were piled with snow. There were braziers on the pavements, bundled-up old snow-sweepers, peasants selling hot tea and chestnuts, troikas going past. It was familiar. I hated it. I had in a strange way become a person without a context. We Russians will do anything to ensure ourselves a context. If slavery is the only one offered us, we will accept it rather than have none at all. It is what Kropotkin realised. It is why the Red Napoleon, Lenin, and his gang were so successful.
As a stranger, I looked at the city which I had left a few months ago and in which I had been raised. As a stranger, I did not enjoy what I saw. The War had already begun to affect us. The people were not as friendly, or at least as gregarious, as those in Odessa. There were not the smiles, the rapid exchanges, the gestures full of ambiguous meaning. So I thought.
I made my way to what was then called Stolypinskaya. If I walked along this street, it would eventually lead me to Vladimirskaya and St Andrews, where I would be able to get an ordinary tram all the way home. I was anxious to avoid the crowds. I had turned into Stolypinskaya, with its tall, yellow buildings which, with snow at top and foot, resembled a kind of unappetising seedcake, when I heard a shout behind me. I gripped my suitcase and felt a touch or two of anxiety until, turning, I realised it was Captain Brown, a hobbling old bear in black fur, rushing after me. ‘Maxim! I thought I’d missed you. Didn’t you get the message?’
He had sent a telegram to Odessa. Because of the War it had not arrived until I had left. I was to have waited near the gate of the platform where he would meet me. He had no transport, so we continued to walk along the Stolypinskaya together. He insisted on carrying my bag. He said he had been waiting several hours, because of the train being so late. He thought I must be exhausted, but of course I had been far more comfortable than had he. He looked older. His face had become almost a modern artist’s idea of a face, all in bright reds and blues. But I was glad to see him, even if he did smell of vodka. My mother had been desperately ill. Between them he and Esmé had nursed her to health. Now she was ‘sitting up and complaining’, drinking soup and no longer ‘getting ready to meet the Reaper’. I had had no idea, of course, that she had been so ill. I assumed her influenza to have been relatively mild. But there had been something of an epidemic in the poorer districts. Many had died, said Captain Brown. Esmé had not written to tell me this because she had not wanted me to worry. He had written to Uncle Semyon asking that I not be informed of the danger. She was much better now and anxious to see me. He commented on my fine clothes - ‘a little too smart for Kiev, eh?’ - and on my complexion which was at once healthier and ‘more mature’. I had cut down radically on the cocaine. I now no longer used it daily. The supply in my luggage might be the last I was to find for some time. I must treasure it.
We took a Number 10 tram up to our district. The streets of Podol below looked meaner and dirtier, even with the snow, and the people were wretched compared to those I had known in the Moldovanka. My dislike of Jewish poverty, Jewish passivity, Jewish greed, Jewish pride, welled within me, but I suppressed it. I had been shown kindness, too, by Jews. There were, I’ll argue to this day, Jews and Jews. In aggregate, however, they can be depressing. Our little street was piled with snow-drifts taller than me. Through them channels had been cut to doorways, and along the middle of the road. It seemed horribly seedy. I felt depressed as we turned into the building where I had spent most of my life. We climbed stairs smelling of cabbage and over-brewed tea, of kvass and sour dumplings. We entered the apartment and its oppressive darkness - the blinds were half-drawn - where my mother lay on her couch pulled close to the black iron stove. Esmé, pale and weary and as sweet as ever, ran forward to take my hand, leading me to my mother. Mother coughed the most horrible racking cough I have ever heard. She spoke in the croaking tones I had learned to recognise from past illnesses of all kinds; it was her ‘ill’ voice.
‘Maxim, my dear son. Such a joy! I thought we’d never meet in this world again.’
I embraced her, letting her kiss me on my face while I kissed her cheeks. She smelled strongly of embrocation. She was swathed in layer upon layer of bodices and blouses and shawls and I must admit that I was, after the style and good living of Odessa, just a little repulsed. The room was extremely warm. I broke free, in the end, and patted her head. She winced. I stopped patting and said to Esmé, ‘You have been so good. I was sorry to hear of your father. You are a princess.’
She blushed. It was almost as if she wished to curtsey to me. ‘You’ve become so manly, Maxim. Your manners! A prince, at least.’ She spoke with slight irony, but I was flattered.
A great, expressive cough came from where my mother was propped. ‘He must eat!’
‘I have the broth ready.’ Esmé disappeared into the next room and came back with a pot which she placed on the stove, ‘It’s warm. It will not be long.’
I looked miserably at the old familiar pot. The smell from it was no longer appetising. The pot had sustained me since I was weaned. It had been filled, as it were, by my mother’s sweat. I recalled the turnips and onions and beets and potatoes which had gone into it. And I longed for that spicy, tasty, Odessa food. The variety of bortsches, and yushkas, the kuleshnik, the schipanka, the zatirka, kulish and rassolnik, the herrings and boiled sturgeon and sardines, the roast meats with sauerkraut and prunes and buckwheat hash.
‘You must be hungry,’ said my mother.
‘I ate on the train,’ I said. ‘There was a lot of food. I’m not hungry. Don’t worry.’
‘There’s meat in the soup,’ she said. ‘Chi
cken. You must eat.’ She began to cough again, from the chest, her eyes watering.
‘I’ll eat later,’ I said, ‘I brought you a present.’ I was embarrassed because I had nothing special for Captain Brown. I produced the black and red shawl I had bought for my mother.
‘It’s beautiful,’ she said. ‘Real silk. Is it from Semyon?’
‘It’s from me,’ I said, ‘I earned the money.’
‘Earned? How?’
‘Bills of lading,’ I said. ‘A profit on cargo.
‘You’re going to work in Semya’s office?’
‘This was a private matter,’ I told her. ‘Here Esmé. What do you think?’
It was a beautiful apron, embroidered with intricate stitching. It had come from Wagner’s. Esmé clapped her hands with pleasure. Her blue eyes widened as she inspected the embroidery. I had chosen well. It went perfectly with her colouring, her blonde hair. I found a packet of ‘Sioux’ tobacco in the bottom of my suitcase. I was by no means an habitual smoker. I decided to give this to Captain Brown. He was delighted. ‘This is the best imported American tobacco,’ he said. ‘Virginian. You don’t often get hold of it. I have seen where it is grown, you know, in the Southern States of America. Miles of fields, full of niggers picking the weed, and singing. Beautiful music, particularly in the distance. I once crossed America from Charleston to Nantucket. By the railroad. I’ve seen New York, though I was only there a few hours. And Boston, too. And Washington. And Chicago, where I still have friends.’ He fondled the tobacco and I was glad I had given it to him. He was the most pleased of all. ‘It’s strange,’ he continued, ‘that I should have wound up here.’ He began to say something in English in a low tone. I only caught a few words and part of a phrase which had something to do with ‘worthless relatives in Inverness’. At some stage in his life he had written to his family asking if there was ‘a berth’ for him. He had received no reply. He claimed to be the black sheep of his family, though it was hard to see why. He was the next best thing to a father to me and a loving husband to my mother.
‘The War is producing many shortages.’ Captain Brown pocketed the tobacco. ‘Everything is hard to get. I suspect profiteers. Hoarders. Things are worse, I gather, the further North and West you go. People from Moscow say we’re lucky.’
‘They’ve always been envious of Ukraine,’ said Esmé. ‘Father believed the Germans were fighting the entire War just to annex this part of the Empire. We’ve the best industry, the most food, the best ports. It stands to reason.’
‘Your father knew what he was talking about, Esmaya.’ Captain Brown tried to lean against the stove without burning himself. ‘I speak as a soldier. They want Russia as far as the Caucasus which they’ll split with Turkey. You can be sure some power-drunk Hun and some scheming Musselman have made that decision already. Why else should Turkey enter the War?’
‘We fought back the Tatar hordes,’ I said, ‘It should be an easy matter to drive the Germans and Turks from our borders.’
‘God is with Russia,’ said Esmé. ‘We always win in the end. We always shall.’
‘I’m sure you’re right.’
This discussion was terminated by a terrible fit of coughing. My mother, her hair streaming about her white face just as if she were having one of her nightmares, flung herself half off the couch. Paroxysms of coughing threw her body this way and that. She gasped for something, holding herself steady on the floor with one hand, gesturing with the other.
‘Water?’ said Esmé.
‘Medicine?’ said Captain Brown.
I made to help her up. She shook in my arms. It was a peculiar, spasmodic shaking, as if at first she tensed herself, then released the muscles she had tensed. Her teeth began to chatter.
‘Should we send for a doctor?’ I asked.
‘It sounds callous,’ said Captain Brown, ‘but he will only charge money to tell us what we know. Your mother has become overexcited at the prospect of her only son being returned to her. She speaks of you all the time. She is proud of you, Maxim.’
‘Proud,’ gasped my mother. ‘Have some soup.’ I could tell that she felt both concern and pleasure.
‘You must sleep, Yelisaveta Filipovna,’ Esmé told her. She produced a bottle of chloroform, saying to me, ‘She has waited all night for you. You were expected sooner.’
‘The train,’ I told her. ‘The War.’
Noisily, almost greedily, my mother accepted the spoon. Soon she had fallen back on her pillows and was snoring. I looked miserably around the room. It now seemed impossibly small and cluttered. I saw my shelf. I had once enjoyed sleeping on my shelf. Now I longed for a bed, no matter how tiny. A bed with a white sheet on it and white pillows.
For almost a week I was to live in that apartment while my mother alternately coughed and snored, or occasionally broke into one of her old familiar nightmares. Esmé, at least, slept on the shelf, while I had her mattress in the other room. It was not quite so bad as I had expected. At least I had a degree of privacy, though the cooking utensils and food were kept near me. Water was fetched from a pump on the landing below, but we had a sink and drainage. We shared a lavatory with the drunken couple next door. The couple were only about twenty, but dedicated alcoholics. When the stricter drink laws came in, they continued to be as inebriated as ever. They were drinking all kinds of bad alcohol. Eventually both of them died a few months after I had gone to St Petersburg. At that time, however, they disturbed me every night.
I spent some of my first day taking a walk with Esmé. I retailed a censored version of my adventures. She was impressed. I elaborated some anecdotes: going aboard the English tramp, for instance, and encountering Greeks and laskars. In the main it was enough to tell her about all the wonders: the pleasure resorts of Fountain and Arcadia, the sideshows at the fair, more impressive than any we ever saw at the Contract Fair in Kiev, the myriad ships and races. She took my arm as we wandered through the muffled white streets into the grounds of St Kyril’s, where it was deserted save for an old snow-clearer, swathed in felt, who seemed to be there for our convenience alone. We stood looking down over the grey and yellow world and I spoke of the turquoise Odessa seas, the luminous days, the warm-hearted, quick-witted people. Esmé clutched my arm so tightly and listened so attentively that I began to suspect she had designs on me. But that was a terrible thought. Esmé was pure; above such desires. At least, she was unaware of any desires and her gestures were innocent. I pulled away from her. We continued to walk. Kiev seemed small and provincial compared with Odessa, for all that this was our major city. I missed the sea, the sense of the world beyond the water waiting to be visited. I told this to Esmé when she asked if I were glad to be home.
‘I want the opportunity for escape,’ I said. ‘My soul has the scent of foreign parts. I want to travel. I want to build machines in which we shall all be able to sail through the air. Remember when I flew, Esmé?’
‘I remember.’
‘We shall both fly. I shall go to Petersburg and get my diplomas. Then I shall possess the authority I need to convince the sceptics. Then I shall go to Kharkov and get finance. Then I shall build all kinds of flying machines: passenger liners, individual planes, everything. And gyro-carriages. And sailing-dirigibles which can land on water or fly, depending on the whim and needs of the pilot.’
‘You will be famous,’ she said. ‘Kiev will honour you. You will have your name in the newspapers every day, like Sikorski.’
Sikorski was in St Petersburg already. Having abandoned the ideas he had borrowed wholly from Leonardo da Vinci, he was no longer experimenting with helicopters. I had dropped a similar line of research as being impractical. Another idea, involving the use of a cyclist powering his own propeller, was taken up some fifty or sixty years later. Sikorski never replied to my letter offering him fifty per cent of the profits if he helped me develop the invention. His plans had become more grandiose. He was virtually the inventor of that terrible weapon, the bombing aeroplane. Too late, however
, to give Russia the air-supremacy she needed. We could have transferred the theatre of operations into the upper atmosphere. We should no longer have had to depend on unreliable, untrained peasants whose empty heads were fitting repositories for Red propaganda. Stalin, ‘the Man of Steel’, has been blamed for a great deal. But Stalin, like Ivan the Terrible before him, realised the worth of encouraging Russians to rely on purely Russian brains and skill. Sikorski, in disgust, soon went to America to earn a fortune and an exaggerated reputation. Other Russians simply never got the credit they deserved. Stalin knew what Russian aeronautic expertise was worth. We needed someone of his ilk at the time of the First War. Then, ironically, we should not have found ourselves saddled with him later.
Of course, I said little of this to Esmé as we walked through the St Kyril gardens, in the last week of 1914. I had a certain gift for predicting the development of engineering ideas, but I was no Cagliostro!
During the week I was at home I was pleased to see my mother improving. Soon she was able to move about the flat. Uncle Semyon, it seemed, had granted her a pension. ‘He wants a gentleman in the family.’ My mother flourished his letter. ‘He will do anything to see you succeed.’
Byzantium Endures - [Pyat Quartet 01] Page 15