The Last Paradise

by Antonio Garrido

  “And it’s wonderful seeing you so happy, with so little.”

  “Who says it’s ‘so little’?”

  For a moment Natasha blushed, but then she let herself be carried along by the excitement of the children, who tugged on her uniform to make her keep dancing. Jack sat down and continued to enjoy the spectacle as night fell. When the kids collapsed exhausted, Natasha sat beside Jack, who celebrated her return by offering her a piece of his cookie. Her face flushed and her breathing labored, she nibbled on the treat and drank from her glass of water. She was out of breath but laughing heartily. Jack thought he caught a sense of well-being in her face that he had never seen before. He was about to tell her, when the farmer’s wife approached her husband and asked him to play the “Gliding Dance of the Maidens.” The woman crossed her hands over her chest and waited.

  “Listen to this,” Natasha whispered in Jack’s ear. “The music’s fabulous.”

  Jack nodded. The peasant farmer was silent while he carefully retuned the balalaika. He took off his hat and stroked the strings with a slight tremor. Then, accompanied by the crackling flames, he began to reel off a torrent of notes that seemed to bounce off one another to create the most nostalgic and heartfelt melody that Jack had ever heard. For a while, the music continued to fill the room with sadness and yearning, as if each chord were imbued with the fragrance of memory. When the farmer finished his performance, his moist eyes sought those of his wife, who was drying her own with a handkerchief. Though age had wizened the woman’s face, Jack could see that to the farmer she was as beautiful as the first day they’d met.

  “Fabulous, but sad,” Jack whispered back to Natasha.

  “It’s not sad. It’s a song about love. Melancholic, perhaps. But full of hope.”

  “Is that what the lyrics say?”

  “There are no lyrics. You hear the hope in your heart.”

  Jack contemplated the poverty that surrounded him. Even if these farmers loved each other with the immensity of the snowy plains around them, he couldn’t see how they could hold out any hope. When he shared his observation with Natasha, she gave him a pitying look.

  “That’s how we love in Russia, Jack. If you find true love, you never lose hope.”

  They said good-bye with another toast. The farmers toasted family, Natasha, and the Soviet Union, and Jack raised his glass to Natasha.

  Back in Gorky, Jack followed the doctor’s directions to central Cooperative Street.

  “This is where you live?”

  “Yes. It’s quite an old house, but pretty.” She gestured at the nineteenth-century façade of a two-story building.

  Jack nodded and looked at her for a few seconds in silence, not knowing what to say. The more he looked at the young woman, the more she captivated him. She remained in her seat, as if waiting for something to happen, but time just passed. Finally, she went to open the door, and Jack, seeing this, got out and rushed to do it for her.

  While she searched for the keys to her front door, Jack asked her when he would see her again. Natasha smiled. “Soon,” she replied, and kissed him on the cheek. Her lips burned his skin, and he searched for hers. For a few seconds, he savored them as if they were the first he’d ever kissed. Then they separated, embarrassed, mute.

  Back home, still in the American village, Jack was surprised at his behavior. He’d forgotten to ask her anything about her father, but instead had enjoyed one of the best evenings of his life.

  With the excuse of delivering a part for the Buick, Jack showed up at Viktor Smirnov’s dacha. He knew that Elizabeth was hiding away at Viktor’s house, and he wanted to tell her about Sergei’s plot against her uncle, thus enabling Wilbur Hewitt to evade the OGPU’s surveillance of him. When Jack got out of his car outside the ostentatious house, he prayed that his plan would work.

  Viktor, wearing a freshly starched brown uniform, cheered Jack’s visit, but paid more attention to the gleaming distributor for his Buick than to the limping American struggling to climb the steps leading up to his house. As ever, he offered him a glass of vodka while he asked about the repair. Jack, settled into an Empire-style chair, went into detail about the difficulties he’d encountered so that Smirnov would have to refill their glasses. He had to keep Viktor talking for long enough to give Elizabeth the opportunity to appear, so he changed the subject to the Russian’s love of guns. However, Viktor seemed to want to talk solely about cars. Only after a fifth drink did the Soviet sit on the sofa and rest his feet on a side table. Then he forgot about the cars and sat looking at Jack with a blank gaze, as if his brain had suddenly shut down. Jack supposed it was the effect of the alcohol and the suffocating heat coming from the stove in the center of the room. It was clear that Viktor could end the conversation at any moment, so Jack quickly praised his excellent taste, gesturing at the brightly colored arras that hung from the walls.

  “They’re becoming increasingly difficult to find,” said Viktor, his vanity perking him up. “The bourgeoisie lost everything. Everything, except their devilish ability to hide their wealth!” He roared with laughter.

  “I bet,” said Jack, humoring him. “And on the subject of bourgeoisie, I hear a true bourgeois gem has moved into your house . . .” He gave Viktor a conspiratorial wink, praying that the alcohol had dulled his senses sufficiently.

  “So you heard about it . . . Her uncle sent her here for protection.” He laughed. “Can you believe it? The farmer sending his best hen into the fox’s den! She is beautiful, but cold as an iceberg. If the truth be told, I wouldn’t trade the real gem in this house for that girl.” He gestured proudly at the splendid German-made stove in the middle of the room.

  “The man’s becoming delirious in his old age. All he wants to do is work instead of enjoying life.” Jack laughed, and he served Viktor another glass of vodka that he downed before it was filled. “Did you know? Tomorrow he’s celebrating forty years with the company.”

  “That long? Heavens! If I’d known, I’d have told Elizabeth to buy him a gift. Or send him to a madhouse.” He laughed.

  “Well, from what I hear, Hewitt isn’t well disposed to receiving recognition.” He laughed along with Viktor. “Which is why some of the guys in the American village are planning a party in his honor. I thought maybe Elizabeth could help us surprise him.”

  “That seems like an excellent idea! She’s resting right now, but I’ll let her know when she surfaces.”

  Jack felt his heart thump. If Viktor spoke to Elizabeth without him there, he’d find out that it was all a farce. “Honestly, I don’t know what the guys might do to me if I go back empty-handed. They’re excited about the celebration, and if we put off the preparations, everything could fall apart.”

  “All right. If you insist. I’ll get the help to call her down.”

  Jack let out a sigh of relief. The first part of the plan had worked, but he needed to speak to the young woman before Viktor discovered that Hewitt’s anniversary was a fabrication.

  When Elizabeth came down the stairs, Jack found her as breathtakingly beautiful as the day he saw her buying caviar at the salt-fish market. She was wearing a burgundy dressing gown that hugged her hips and danced over her knees as she descended. Jack couldn’t help remembering the night he’d enjoyed her body. Before Viktor could greet her, Jack approached her as quickly as his hip would allow. “If you want your uncle Wilbur to live, play along,” he whispered into her ear.

  Elizabeth winced. Viktor, seeing her response, lifted his feet from the side table and approached the two of them. “Is Elizabeth so attractive, she cured your limp?” he joked, switching to English, and he snatched the young woman from Jack’s side, holding her around the waist. He led her to the sofa and sat her down beside him. “You hadn’t said anything about your uncle’s anniversary.”

  Elizabeth looked at Jack, trying to find an answer in his eyes. “I forgot,” she managed to say in a thin voice.

  “When it comes to gifts, women only remember their own celebrations!�
�� Jack cut in, smiling in spite of the pain in his hip. “How could you forget that it’s your uncle’s fortieth anniversary as a Ford executive?”

  “Oh! I didn’t mean I’d forgotten. I meant I forgot to tell Viktor,” Elizabeth replied with such convincing confidence that for a moment even Jack believed her.

  “It seems Jack and some guys in the American village want to organize a surprise party, and they want you to help them with who knows what,” Viktor explained to Elizabeth. “By the way, if you want music, I could lend you my old phonograph.” He pointed at a contraption the size of a sewing machine, a flaring horn protruding from it. “It sounds like a litter of starving cats, but it would liven up the party.”

  Jack thanked him for the offer. The device was an American Edison model, similar to one he’d owned in Detroit. It had a crank that, by compressing a spring, turned a wax cylinder with grooves inside that reproduced the music. The sound, captured through a needle, was crudely amplified by the horn.

  He checked its condition. He’d repaired a number of similar phonographs at the Dearborn Dance Society, so if he needed to, he could probably mend Viktor’s device. The problem was that he hadn’t planned to hold a party at all, but with Viktor insisting, and so that his ruse wouldn’t be discovered, he accepted the offer good-naturedly.

  The opportunity to be alone with Elizabeth presented itself when Viktor announced that he was going upstairs to find some old cylinders. As soon as he was gone, Jack quickly whispered Sergei’s plans for her uncle Wilbur. The young woman listened openmouthed to his every word.

  “I swear it’s true. Sergei wants to lock up your uncle, and he’s hired me to find the evidence to justify it. I can’t speak to him, so you have to warn him as soon as possible.”

  “And what’re we going to do? This is awful, Jack.”

  “I don’t know yet. Tell your uncle to gather as much money as he can without arousing suspicion, and to carry on as normal, as if nothing were happening, until I can speak to him. I’ll contact some friends to see if they can get us passports.”

  “And the party you were talking about, what’s that for?”

  “I needed an excuse to speak to you without making Viktor suspicious, and it was all I could think of.”

  “But Viktor’s protecting us. That’s why I’m staying here.”

  “We can’t trust anybody. As well as he’s treating us, Viktor is still OGPU,” he whispered in her ear. “Careful, here he comes!”

  The Soviet official came down carrying a box full of cylinders about the size of cans of vegetables. “There’s a bit of everything: waltzes, jazz . . . It’s been a few years since I used it.”

  “They’ll do just fine. Thank you,” said Jack.

  “Good. And as for your uncle’s party, what idea for a surprise have you suggested to our good friend Jack, honey?”

  Elizabeth was at a loss for words.

  “I haven’t asked her yet,” Jack cut in, “but with the phonograph and his niece in attendance, I’m sure Hewitt will enjoy it.”

  “Perfect! Then I’ll have it sent to the village. In the meantime, we’ll have some fun choosing what to wear to the celebration, right, Elizabeth? We’ll finally be going to one of those American parties you so sorely miss.”

  Back in the American village, Jack cursed himself for being so stupid. He now had less than twenty-four hours to organize a fake party right under the nose of an officer of the secret police.

  29

  To organize the party, Jack decided to call on the same gang that he’d chosen to set up the store. Joe Brown, Miquel Agramunt, Harry Daniels, and his son Jim all accepted the job offer as if they’d won the lottery. Sergei Loban had them relieved from their previous duties without losing their salaries, and they would receive a small daily supplement and a special discount on the food sold at the store. As for the reason for the celebration itself, Jack had pretended that it was for the opening of the store to make sure that enough guests attended. Once they were all drunk, he would be able to get a toast to Wilbur Hewitt out of them with little trouble.

  Joe Brown soon showed his worth in the role of store manager that Jack had assigned to him. Within ten minutes of his appointment to the position, he’d already organized a cleaning crew to clear up the old spare-parts store, the contents of which still needed to be moved out. He then improvised some display stands using wooden crates, and placed on them a couple of butchered pigs that Miquel Agramunt had obtained from his contacts. For his part, Harry Daniels, his wife, and his sons prepared the wooden chairs, the central fireplace for an enormous gridiron, and garlands made from strips of cardboard and pieces of colored sacking. Despite the cost of the occasion, Jack thought it was money well spent. He’d invited Ivan Zarko to the party, and if he could distract the Soviet guards, he would take the opportunity to introduce him to Wilbur Hewitt so they could discuss the cost of the counterfeit passports.

  Though the party was advertised for six o’clock, a group of onlookers had already gathered at the door to the warehouse in the icy November cold before five. Jack saw through the window that the partygoers included some of his fellow passengers on the SS Cliffwood, and seeing them huddled together to ward off the cold, their gaunt faces brightened by the touch of excitement they felt at attending a party where they could put something hot in their bellies, he wondered how many of them dreamed of being back in America at that moment.

  He went over the final details. After burning for a few hours, the fire lit over some sheet metal positioned on the ground had warmed the inside of the warehouse and was beginning to turn into a mountain of embers like little volcanoes bursting with lava. Miquel Agramunt had steeped the pigs in oil, pepper, salt, and rosemary, ingredients from his homeland that he’d managed to find in Ukraine, and which, according to the Catalan, would give the pork an excellent flavor. To accompany the food, he had made a drink typical of his country, consisting of a mixture of red wine, baking powder, lemon rind, sugar and cinnamon, and which he called by the strange name sangría. It was delicious. While the Daniels family busied itself putting up the last homemade garlands, Jack inspected the music cylinders that Viktor had supplied. The oldest ones, made of solid carnauba wax, reproduced tracks just a minute or two long, but the newer ones, made of Bakelite, contained modern hits and extended to four minutes. He inserted a Bing Crosby cylinder in the phonograph, turned the handle to wind up the mechanism, and positioned the needle on the helicoid groove that turned at a hundred revolutions a minute. The powerful voice of the American singer suddenly flooded the warehouse, for a moment turning the drab building into a Detroit nightclub. Only the dancers were missing.

  He thought of Natasha. He’d have loved to spend the party with her, but when he called to invite her, he was told that she was operating on patients that evening. As he listened to the music, he couldn’t help remembering their kiss, fleeting yet intense and true.

  At exactly six o’clock, Jack adjusted his bird’s-eye jacket, took one last glance at the gigantic “American Store” sign, which Jim Daniels had neatly written in the red, white, and blue of the national flag, and drew back the bolt to officially open the shop. The guests waiting outside, enticed by the lively music and the smell of barbecued meat, greeted their host and poured in to claim a spot near the fire.

  Before long, the haggard forms that ten minutes earlier had been waiting outside were transformed into a merry band of compatriots who sang and smiled again. The main topic of conversation was how much they missed their country. Dances from the hills played on the fiddle alternated with the American tunes that emerged as if by magic from Smirnov’s phonograph. As he mingled among the guests, Jack came across Walter and Sue holding hands. When he saw them, he greeted them warmly and encouraged them to dance, but Sue barely smiled and Walter looked away. Jack kept trying, but he was unable to break through their coldness.

  “You haven’t moved yet,” were his friend’s first words.

  Since Walter had begun working for the OGP
U, it was as if he hardly knew Jack. Perhaps he was bitter at Jack’s financial success, or maybe he’d never been as good a friend as he made out. Ultimately, their friendship was that of two classmates, and that had been ten years ago. Jack looked at Walter’s new Soviet jacket on which he’d pinned a little cardboard tag that read “Fordville Head of Security.” He didn’t know what to think.

  When they turned away from each other, he tried to push those thoughts from his mind. Walter was his friend, he’d saved him in New York, and he didn’t deserve Jack’s suspicion.

  Half an hour later, Ivan Zarko and his nephew appeared. Following the agreed-upon script, they quickly intermingled with the relatives of some of the Soviet women who’d married American workers. Soon after, Wilbur Hewitt arrived, accompanied by his niece, Elizabeth, and her protector, Viktor Smirnov. Unlike on other occasions, Elizabeth’s presence barely registered with Jack: he put it down to his feelings for Natasha. As for Hewitt, Jack saw that the industrialist would play his role to perfection, returning the affection and greetings from the other guests. After a prudent length of time, Jack went to meet him, wearing a salesman’s smile. “Forty years of service! I hope to be able to say the same one day!” he said to Hewitt, giving him a firm handshake.

  “It’s an honor to have worked for a great American company for so long. Some party you’ve organized!”

  “I hope you enjoy it. Come in and try some of Miquel’s specialties. Viktor, welcome.”

  Viktor Smirnov returned Jack’s greeting and went to mix with the guests with a look of disdain, as if just brushing against them would forever ruin his immaculate uniform. Hanging from his arm, Elizabeth accompanied him, sporting a stunning cobalt-blue dress that contrasted with the modest attire of the rest of the partygoers. Hewitt let them go ahead and took the chance to approach Jack, who walked behind them with the help of a crutch. “Where did you get this harebrained idea?” he whispered. “If the Soviets dig up my professional background, they’ll see that I’ve been at Ford for only twenty-five years.”