Glory

by Vladimir Nabokov

  “Have you come for long, Martin?” asked Mrs. Gruzinov with a smile, and hastened to lower her downy upper lip over her front teeth tinted with pink.

  “Generally speaking, yes. I must take a quick business trip to Berlin, and then I shall be back.”

  “Martin Sergeevich?” Gruzinov inquired, and after Martin had answered in the affirmative, dropped his eyes and once more repeated to himself Martin’s patronymic.

  “Well, you certainly have——?” said Mrs. Gruzinov, and her beautiful hands outlined the shape of a vase in the air.

  “No wonder,” Martin replied, “I worked on a farm in the south of France. Life is so peaceful there that one cannot help gaining weight.”

  Gruzinov pressed his finger and thumb to the corners of his mouth, a gesture which leant a somewhat peasant-woman expression to his substantial-looking, clean-featured face with a complexion so creamy as to suggest making toffee out of his cheeks.

  “I’ve got it,” he said. “The person’s name is Kruglov, he married a Turkish woman.” (“Come, sit down,” interjected Mrs. Gruzinov, and in two moves of her soft, generously perfumed body she made room for Martin.) “He happens to have a small zamindary in the south of France,” Gruzinov explained, “and I believe he makes a living by supplying the city with jasmin. Have you also been staying in the odorofacient region?” Martin told him the name of the nearest town. “That’s it,” chimed in Gruzinov. “That’s not far from where he dwells. Or maybe it isn’t. Are you attending the university in Berlin?”

  “No, I finished Cambridge.”

  “Very interesting,” said Gruzinov weightily. “They still have some Roman aqueducts there,” he continued turning to his wife. “Imagine, my dear, those Romans, so far from home, establishing themselves in a foreign land, and doing it, mind you, really well, comfortably, in patrician style.”

  Martin had not met with any particular aqueducts in Cambridge, yet he found it necessary to nod. In the presence of remarkable people, people with an extraordinary past, he always felt a pleasant excitement, and now was trying to settle how to derive the most from this new acquaintance. It turned out, however, that Yuri Gruzinov was not one to be easily put into that euphoric state of mind in which a man scrambles out of his own self, as out of a burrow, and sun-bathes in the buff. Yuri Gruzinov refused to scramble out. He was perfectly benevolent, and at the same time impenetrable; was ready to converse on any subject—natural phenomena or human affairs—but there would always be something about his talk that suddenly compelled his interlocutor to wonder if his leg was not being atrociously pulled by that appetizingly smooth, compact, dapper gentleman, whose icy eyes seemed somehow to be absent from the conversation. In the past, when Martin heard people tell of Gruzinov’s passion for danger, of his illegal crossings of the most perilous border in the world and of the mysterious rebellions he was said to spark in Zoorland, Martin imagined him as a man of powerful, aquiline aspect. But now, watching Gruzinov separate with a little plop the two parts of his spectacle case and hook on reading glasses of the plain, granny sort that might have suited the nose of an elderly carpenter with a yardstick folded in his blouse pocket—Martin realized that Gruzinov could not have looked different. His simplicity grading into a certain flaccidity of demeanor, the old-fashioned stylishness of his clothes (that striped flannel waistcoat for instance), his obscure jokes, his circumstantiality—all this formed a solid cocoon which Martin could not manage to tear. However, the fact of having met him almost on the eve of attempting a secret exploit struck Martin as a portent of its success. And Martin had been doubly lucky: for had he returned to Switzerland but one month later, Gruzinov would not have been there: he would already have been in Bessarabia.

  41

  The walks they took: to the Waterfall; to Ste. Claire; to the Grotto where once a hermit had lived. And back. September 1924 was especially fair. There might be a wet fog in the morning but by noon the world would delicately scintillate in the sun, the tree trunks would be glossed, blue puddles would shine on the road, and the sun-warmed mountains would be discarding their misty raiment. Mrs. Edelweiss walked in front with Mrs. Gruzinov; Gruzinov and Martin followed. Gruzinov strode along with pleasure, leaning firmly on his homemade stick and resenting it if anyone stopped to admire the view: he maintained that views destroyed the rhythm of the ramble. It happened once that a sheepdog dashed out of a farmyard and stood, growling, in their path. Mrs. Gruzinov said “I’m scared” and hid behind her husband’s back, and Martin took his mother’s cane out of her hand, while she tried to pacify the dog by emitting in its direction sounds used in Russia to urge on the horses. Alone Gruzinov did the right thing: he pretended to pick up a stone from the road, and the dog at once jumped away. A trifle, of course, but Martin cherished that kind of trifle. On another occasion, thinking that Martin had trouble walking without a stick up a very steep path, Gruzinov produced a jackknife from his pocket, selected a suitable sapling, and, wielding the knife with great precision, skillfully and silently manufactured a walking stick for him. It was smooth and white, still living, still cool to the touch. Another trifle, but somehow that stick seemed to smell of Russia. Mrs. Edelweiss found Gruzinov delightful and once told her husband at lunch that he simply must make friends with the man, that Gruzinov had become a legendary figure among émigrés.

  “No doubt, no doubt,” Uncle Henry replied pouring vinegar over his salad, “but he is an adventurer, and does not quite belong to our set. But, of course, invite him if you want.”

  Martin regretted that he would not hear Gruzinov engage Uncle Henry in a conversation about the despotism of machines and the materialism of our age. After lunch Martin followed Uncle Henry into his study and said, “I am leaving on Tuesday for Berlin. May I have a word with you?” “What makes you gad about like that?” asked Uncle Henry with displeasure, and added, rolling his eyes and shaking his head, “Your mother will be extremely upset—you know it yourself.” “I am obliged to go,” Martin continued. “I have a matter to settle.” “An affair of the heart?” Uncle Henry was curious to know. Martin shook his head without smiling. “What then?” muttered Uncle Henry examining the tip of a toothpick he had been using for some time to conduct excavations. “Well, it’s about money,” said Martin firmly enough. “I want to ask you for a loan. You know that I earn well in the summer. I shall repay you then.” “How much?” asked Uncle Henry, his face assuming a pleased expression, and moisture filming his eyes. He loved to show Martin his generosity. “Five hundred francs.” Uncle Henry’s eyebrows rose. “Ah, a gambling debt, isn’t it?” “If you are disinclined——” began Martin looking with hatred at the way Uncle Henry sucked his toothpick. Uncle Henry took fright immediately. “I have a rule,” he said in a conciliatory tone of voice. “One should never expect frankness from a young man. I was young myself, and I know how rash a youth can be. It is only natural. But games of chance should be——Wait, wait, where are you going? I’ll give you, I’ll give you what you want, only too happy. And as to repaying——” “Exactly five hundred then,” said Martin. “And I shall be leaving on Tuesday.”

  The door opened slightly. “May I come in?” asked Mrs. Edelweiss in a thin voice. “What kind of secrets are you having together?” she continued a little archly, shifting her gaze from son to husband. “Why can’t I be told?” “It’s still the same subject—those Brothers Petit,” answered Martin. “By the way, he is leaving on Tuesday,” said Uncle Henry and put the toothpick in his waistcoat pocket. “What, so soon?” she said plaintively. “Yes, so soon, so soon, so soon,” her son replied with unwonted irritation, and walked out of the room. “He’ll go crazy without a job,” observed Uncle Henry, commenting on the noise of the slammed door.

  42

  When Martin entered the hotel garden whose sight bored him now, he found Gruzinov by the tennis court, on which a rather lively game was in progress between two young men. “Look at them—skipping like two goats,” Gruzinov said. “We used to have a blacksmith in K
ostroma who was marvelous at tag-bat, he could belt a ball over the belfry or beyond the river—just like that. If we had him here, he would beat these lads hollow.” “Tennis rules are different,” Martin remarked. “He would have given it to them—rules or no rules,” Gruzinov retorted calmly. A silence. The knock of tennis balls. Martin slitted his eyes. “The blond one has a rather classy drive.” “You’re a funny boy,” said Gruzinov and patted him on the shoulder. At that moment his wife appeared, gracefully swinging her hips. She noticed two English girls whom she knew and proceeded to navigate in their direction. “Yuri Timofeich,” Martin said, “I would like to consult you about something highly important and confidential.” “Be glad to oblige. I’m as mute as a grave.” Martin looked around and hesitated. “Let’s go to my room,” suggested Gruzinov.

  The hotel room was cluttered with objects, darkish, and imbued with Mrs. Gruzinov’s perfume. Gruzinov threw open the window—for one instant he resembled a large dark bird spread against a golden background, then sunlight invaded the floor in one stride, stopping short at the door which Martin had noiselessly closed behind him. “The room is a mess, I’m afraid, hope you don’t mind,” said Gruzinov with a sidelong glance at the double bed disarranged by the midday siesta. “Take that armchair, my friend. These little apples are sweet as sugar. Help yourself.” “Actually, I wanted to talk to you about the following matter: I have a pal who plans to cross illegally from Latvia to Russia——” “Take this one, with the blush,” interposed Gruzinov. “I keep thinking,” continued Martin, “can he make it or not. Let us suppose he has thoroughly studied a topographic map, but that is not sufficient, there are sure to be frontier guards, intelligence agents, spies, all over. I wanted to ask you—well—for some pointers.” Gruzinov, his elbow propped on the table, was eating an apple, turning it around, taking a crunching bite out of it, now here now there, then turning it again to select a new point of attack. “And why should your pal want to go roaming there?” he inquired with a rapid glance at Martin. “I don’t know, he keeps it a secret. I believe he wants to visit some relatives in Ostrov or Pskov.” “What kind of passport?” asked Gruzinov. “Foreign passport, he is a foreign citizen, Lithuanian or something.” “Then what’s the matter—do they refuse to give him a visa?” “That I don’t know. I believe he does not want to have any visa, he means to do it his own way. Or maybe, indeed, they do not give him permission to enter.” Gruzinov finished his apple and said, “I keep looking for that special taste which our ‘antonovka’ apples have. Sometimes I think: there, I’ve found it, but then I smack it more carefully, and no, the tang is not the same. Visas are a complicated business, generally speaking. Did I ever tell you how my brother-in-law outsmarted the American quota?” “I thought you might want to give some kind of advice,” said Martin lamely. “An odd thought! Surely your pal knows it all better.” “And yet I’m a little worried about him,” Martin said softly. He reflected with sadness that the conversation was turning out to be very different from what he had imagined, and that Gruzinov would never tell him how he had crossed the border so many times. “And no wonder you do worry,” said Gruzinov, “especially if he is a novice. However, one can always find a guide there.” “Oh no, that would be dangerous!” exclaimed Martin, “One might run into a traitor.” “Naturally, one has to be cautious,” Gruzinov agreed, rubbing one eye and studying Martin through fat pale fingers. “And, of course,” he added in a dullish voice, “it’s very important to know the locality.”

  Here Martin quickly produced a rolled-up map. He knew it by heart, had often amused himself by copying it from memory—but for the moment he had to conceal his knowledge. “You see, I have even provided myself with a chart,” he said breezily. “For some reason it seems to me that Nick will cross here, for instance, or else here.” “Ah, so his name is Nicolas,” said Gruzinov. “I’ll note it, I’ll note it. This is a fine map. Wait a bit”—(the spectacle case was produced, the glasses gleamed). “Let’s see, what scale is this? Oh, good. Here’s Carnagore, here’s Torturovka, right on the border. I had a chum—also Nick by a strange coincidence—who once waded across this river here and went that way there; and another time he started from here and then all the way through the wood—it’s a very dense wood, called Rogozhin, and then, if one turns northeast——”

  Gruzinov’s speech became lively and he talked faster and faster, prodding the map with the point of a safety pin which he had unbent, and in one minute he had traced half-a-dozen itineraries, and continued to spill out the names of villages, and to conjure up invisible footpaths; and the more animatedly he spoke, the clearer Martin could see that Gruzinov was making fun of him. From the garden two feminine voices called Gruzinov’s name with the first syllable accented instead of the second. He looked out. The two English girls wanted him to come and have ice cream (he was popular with young ladies, for whose benefit he assumed the character of an easygoing simpleton). “How they like to bother me,” Gruzinov said, “I never eat ice cream, anyway.” It seemed to Martin for an instant that sometime somewhere the same words had been spoken (as in Blok’s play Incognita), and that then as now he was perplexed by something, was trying to explain something. “Now here’s my advice,” said Gruzinov, dexterously rolling up the map and handing it back to Martin. “Tell Nicky to stay at home and find something constructive to do. A nice fellow, I’m sure, and it would be a pity if he lost his way.” “He knows everything better than I do,” replied Martin vengefully.

  They went down into the garden. Martin forced himself to keep smiling and felt hatred for Gruzinov, his cold eyes, his smooth impenetrable forehead. One thing, however, gladdened him: the talk had taken place, was now in the past; true, he had been treated like a schoolboy—never mind, to hell with Gruzzy, Martin’s conscience was now clear, he could now pack his things and leave in peace.

  43

  On the day of departure he woke up very early as he used to on Christmas morn in his childhood. Observing an English custom, his mother would have stolen into the nursery in the middle of the night to hang a stocking stuffed with presents at the foot of his bed. For the sake of complete credibility she would put on a cotton-wool beard and her husband’s bashlyk. If Martin had happened not to be sleeping, he would have seen St. Nicholas with his own eyes. Then, in the morning, with lamps switched on and glowing a dull yellow under the gloomy gaze of the wintry St. Petersburg dawn (that brown sky over the dark house across the street, those façades, those cornices traced in white by the snow), Martin would palpate his mother’s long crackling stocking tightly packed to its top with little parcels that could be distinguished through its silk; with bated breath he would thrust in his hand and begin pulling out and unwrapping tiny toy animals, and diminutive bonbonnières which represented only an introduction to the full-size present—an engine with carriages and tin rails (of which huge eights could be constructed) waiting for him in the drawing room. Today also a train was waiting for him; it would be leaving Lausanne toward evening to reach Berlin next morning by nine. Mrs. Edelweiss felt quite sure that the only purpose of his trip was to see the Zilanov girl; she had noticed that no letters arrived for him from Berlin and was tormented by the thought that perhaps the Zilanov girl did not love Martin enough and would make a bad wife for him. She did her best to make his departure as cheerful as possible, concealing under a somewhat feverish animation her anxiety and sorrow. Uncle Henry, who suffered from a swollen cheek, remained morose and untalkative throughout dinner. Martin looked at the pepper caster Uncle Henry was reaching for, and it struck him that this was the last time he would see it. The pepper caster was in the shape of a fat manikin with perforations in his bald silver head. Quickly Martin transferred his gaze to his mother, taking in her slender pale-freckled hands, her delicate profile and the slightly raised eyebrow (as if she were amazed by the sight of the rich ragout), and again he told himself that this was the last time he would see those freckles, that eyebrow, that dish. Simultaneously all the furniture in the room
, and the rainy view in the window, and the clock with its wooden dial over the sideboard, and the enlarged photographs of bewhiskered frock-coated worthies in their black frames, everything in short seemed to break into tragic speech demanding attention before the impending separation. “May I accompany you to Lausanne?” asked his mother. “Oh, I know you don’t care to be seen off,” she hastened to add as she saw Martin wrinkle his nose, “but I would not go just for the sake of seeing you off, I would merely like to go for a ride, and besides I have to buy a few things.” Martin sighed. “All right, I shan’t go if you do not want me to,” said Mrs. Edelweiss with exceptional gaiety. “I stay behind when I’m not invited. But you are to wear your warm overcoat, on this I insist.”