The Last Season

by Roy MacGregor

  He goes completely through my wallet, card by card, picture by picture, coin by coin. He indicates, but not by example, that I am to remove my clothing. I take off everything but my underwear and the general goes through each piece as carefully as the first checker had worked over my equipment. He is scrupulous, fingering my lapels for consistent thickness, my boot-heels for cavities, even my belt for signs of restitching. But still he is not satisfied. He points to my underwear and I instinctively step out of them and hand them to him. But these he does not take. He points with a smile to the young soldier, who leans forward and seems to take them gratefully. He examines the underwear with even more intensity than the others. In his mind, with the general watching, he is rising through the ranks.

  The soldier finishes and places them on the stool I had been sitting on. I reach for them, but the general catches my wrist. “Nyet,” he says. With a circling finger he indicates I should turn around, and I do. Then I feel his hand on my shoulder, pushing me over. I bend. The soldier pulls the spotlight down and presses it so close to my butt that I can feels its heat and my hairs tickling. I feel hands, the soldier’s I know, insulting my cheeks, forcing my legs further apart as he searches. I wiggle out wider on my heels and stare straight ahead. The spotlight, now directly behind me, has cast my stance as a shadow on the far wall, my testicles hanging large as a feed bag.

  I know what Torchy would have done in this position, but I do not have the nerve. The light suddenly swings away and the general hands me my clothes so I can dress. But we are not through yet.

  In another room, down another hall, there is an interrogation room manned by a surly-looking man in Buddy Holly hornrims. I am told to sit and do.

  “Mr. Batterinski,” this new general says in perfect English, “what is the intention you have for this material?”

  “It’s just letters,” I say. “From my father. I suppose I’ll keep them and take them back to Canada with me.”

  “But why, then, bring such material into the Soviet Union?”

  “I didn’t even remember they were in the bag. I honestly never thought about them, I swear.”

  “Are you not aware, then, that you have here much material that would be considered harmful to the Soviet Union?”

  “A letter?”

  The new general peers down at his files, turns a page in Jaja’s memoirs and taps a section before turning it. It is Jaja’s account of his father’s death. I pretend to be reading it very seriously.

  “This happened over a hundred years ago,” I say.

  “On the contrary,” he says, “It did not happen, ever.”

  “But it’s just a letter. One man’s opinion.”

  “It is not the truth, Mr. Batterinski. But that is a small point. We found throughout the letters much seditious material, much to be concerned about.”

  “My father simply included them for my interest.” I say in a suck’s voice. I am beginning to see the only way out of this, to turn Batterinski into something Batterinski would despise. But I’m not going to get through unless I do.

  “I had nothing to do with them.”

  “Then you’re saying you don’t need it.”

  All I want is out. “No. I have no need of it.”

  From beneath, he pulls out a formal-looking document and scans through it. “This,” he says, “is merely a formality. You are saying you have no use for such material and had no intention of distributing it in the Soviet Union. We will put the letters where they will be safe.”

  “Then I’m okay to go ahead?”

  “Certainly. You simply have to sign these forms, that is all.”

  He turns to me and sets a thick pen down on the papers. With a pencil he indicates where I am to sign.

  I balk. “What is this?”

  “Simply a formality. A receipt.”

  “I like to know what I’m signing, though.”

  “You wish it read to you?”

  “Yes. Please.”

  He glances up quickly at the first general, then grandly picks up the document and begins reading — in Russian!

  Is this a joke? I look up at the gold-toothed general, but he is listening intently and nodding his head as if in agreement. I look at the woman translator, but her expression is as vacant and businesslike as Sister Agnes Marie on Ash Wednesday.

  “Wait!”

  He looks up, surprised. “Too fast for you?”

  “I don’t understand Russian.”

  “But the document is written out in Russian. I am reading it to you, as you asked.”

  “What does it say in English?”

  “The same thing.”

  “You won’t translate it.”

  “You will require no copy of it. This is for our files.”

  “Give me the pen.”

  Erkki is livid. He sits in his usual spot, directly behind the driver of the grey and red Intourist bus, then stands to tap a reddened finger on his wristwatch as I board to the cheers of the rest of the team.

  “Two and a half hours!” he says, shaking “We’ve missed our dinner.”

  I ignore him and acknowledge, instead, the cheers. It is almost like being back in Philadelphia, but the difference is that I have myself felt for the first time the terror of intimidation. Erkki returns a half-chewed hangnail to his mouth and I push down toward an empty seat at the back, shaking hands and accepting backslaps as I go. They think I did it deliberately, to rub the Russian’s face in it. I am glad there was no one to see me weaseling free, treating Jaja’s years of work like it was nothing more than a day-old newspaper, signing something that may be a full confession for all I know. But what choice did I have? I sit down and close my eyes, discreetly counting the pulse in my wrist. It feels like a bare electrical wire.

  Our hotel is in the northwest end of the city, and it is necessary to travel the entire length of Leningrad’s main street to get to it. There is little traffic. The guide, a short, grumpy woman with the air of a Grade one teacher about her, barks continuously into the microphone: hothouses for tomatoes in the winter, don’t take any photographs of the factories, this a war memorial, that a war memorial, and, yes, Leningrad suffered so. Tough titty! She ought to have gone through what I just went through.

  After a while I stop listening and stare out at thick, dismal people standing forever at bus stops, lining up at what I can only presume to be stores — even in Renfrew they would barely pass as seed and feed warehouses — or people simply walking aimlessly, one hand in a pocket, the other around a small string bag with goods wrapped inside the way Poppa used to have his hams done when he went in to town.

  Timo has raved about this place for two weeks, though. It must be like Poppa and his damned kiska kajanka, blood sausage with groats, which he makes every Thanksgiving from a hog’s head, fresh blood and the large intestine of the porker. No one else will touch it, but to Poppa it’s the most divine eating of the year. Timo’s Leningrad is obviously also an acquired taste.

  Timo and I have adjoining rooms on the eighth floor of this marble maze and we go up together, passing from the elevators down a snaking hall and past the eyes of a miserable old bitch sitting in a corner with a simple table and a large pad of printed material. As we pass, she checks us off.

  “What gives?” I say to Timo.

  “She’s a dezhurnaya.”

  “A what?”

  “You’ll get used to them. They’re everywhere.”

  I stare at her and slowly she lifts her head, hooded grey eyes — the eyes of Batcha — folding up the way the headlights of a Corvette used to.

  “Is she some kind of agent?” I say when we near our rooms.

  “Sort of. Everyone is here.”

  My room is on the side facing the Gulf of Finland. If only my room were high enough and the gulf narrow enough I would jump, I swear. Why did I ever come here?

  I toss my bag into the closet and leave immediately, desperate for that drink Timo and I have been planning. Just as I come out the door an awk
ward-looking man in a crummy brown suit — Lou Myles wouldn’t even try it on his hubcaps — sweeps around the snaking corridor and turns sideways as he drifts past, watching me. I watch him continue down the hall to where the next snake will take him out of view, and I am still staring when he turns suddenly and looks back, again startled by my catching him. I kick at Timo’s door. He answers foaming at the mouth, toothbrush in hand.

  “This place is crawling with spies,” I say.

  Timo laughs. “From which side?”

  “I’ve just seen one. What do you call them? Their secret police?”

  “KGB.”

  “I thought that was who we were playing.”

  “No. That is SKA.”

  “Anyway, I saw one.”

  Timo thinks it’s a great joke. “Oh, how do you know?”

  “I know cops. He looked like a cop.”

  “All Russians look like cops. They kill off all the babies that smile.”

  “Don’t put me on, Timo. I’m serious. You still up for that drink?”

  “I am, yes,” he says tossing the toothbrush so it lands in the sink. His mouth he wipes with his hand.

  We go down the curving halls toward the elevator, again past the frowning old woman, who checks again on her pad. But this time I do not look. I have had enough today already without imagining Batcha. For all I know she could be gone already. Ding, dong. The bitch is dead. I sincerely hope so.

  We do not get into the elevator, as I expect. Instead Timo leads me to the next section beyond and through the swing doors to a small cafeteria with a deep line of drunk and soon-to-be-drunk customers coming up like they’re in McDonald’s to pick up champagne or vodka or beer or some of the tiny snacks from beneath the counter.

  “Hoy!”

  It is Pekka’s shout. Through the smoke I make him out in the far corner with several other members of the team and we go over into a flurry of forced cracks about me trying to snuggle Western propaganda into the poor innocent Soviet Union.

  I say it once and once only: “I don’t find it funny.” And from behind I sense Timo signalling that they should knock it off. Timo picks up the drinks, two beers for me and a full bottle of vodka, which he deposits in the booze kitty in the centre of the table. I pour the drink, thick, brown beer, so clouded that you can’t see through it.

  “Jesus Christ! This tastes like toad piss!”

  They all laugh, a bit too hard because I am coach.

  “Just watch yourself,” Timo says knowingly, nodding toward the beer.

  I laugh. “No one tells an Ontario bushboy how to drink beer.”

  Soon, in a fog of smoke there are five empty beer bottles before me and I am beginning to sink. I think at first it is the heat, or perhaps the ordeal at the airport was more exhausting than I had thought. I look at Timo across from me, good old Timo who wanted to stay with me. Look at him there — grinning, sweating, the glass up, the glass down, up, down — shit! He’s fading in and out on me. I wave my hand in front, hoping to clear the smoke.

  “Strong beer, is it not, Bats?” he says.

  “It’s not the beer. Look. I’ve only had five.”

  He taps the bottle. “Twenty percent alcohol.”

  “Gwan!”

  “It is. Another?”

  I shake my head, stomach rising to accept what’s really causing me to feel this way. “What time’s the game?” I ask, desperate to steady myself with a new topic.

  “Eight tomorrow,” someone says.

  “You still coming on Timo’s tour, Felix?’ Timo asks.

  “You bet. But first some sleep, eh?”

  I wave a small farewell and break free of the bar, its sound receding like the bark of a dog to a passing car. The eighth floor is clear, silent, but I find it tough going, the way the hallway seems to whip toward my room. First my left shoulder rides along the plaster, then my right bumps on the opposite side, and all I have been doing is walking in a perfectly straight line. Beyond the elevators the old woman sits, her face rising to note me with censuring eyes, an old wrinkled face hand moving in the pale light of her desk lamp to certify my existence.

  “I’m home, Momma!” I shout.

  No reaction. I stop directly in front of her desk, bending down toward her.

  “Hey, come on, Momma. How’s about a little nookie when you knock off for the night, eh? Room 814. Come on down, Momma!”

  She stares up slowly, the headlight eyes rising, the face turning in a scowl, the face turning into Batcha.

  “Batcha! I thought you were supposed to be dying, for fuck’s sake! Aren’t you?”

  She says nothing. I blow kisses as I pass down the hall, slamming painfully into the first large twist of the walls. I bounce off, cursing, and look back again, but she has forgotten me and is staring down into her check pad. I know she will have much to write down.

  At the first door my KGB agent in his crummy brown suit is walking toward me. He opens the door and holds it, trying to look courteous. He nods a hello.

  “Fuck yourself, Pinko!” I shout as I push through. I am sick of them all. Why can’t they leave me alone, the bastards. What did Jaja say that has them so fired up they’ve got half their force out on the Batterinski case?”

  “My great-grandfather was killed by you cocksuckers!” I scream at him, walking away backwards. He tries to look like he does not understand, but I know better. They wouldn’t put anyone on me who didn’t speak English. He knows. He knows all about the Batterinskis, you can bet on that.

  Okay, cool yourself, Bats. Slow-down time, okay ... there, that’s working. I know I have had too much beer, but I needed it. I can still think. I’m not stupid. I know precisely what’s going on. I turn and he is still staring at me. I stop at room 818, two doors down from my room, and pretend to be a drunk stumbling for his key. I see him watching, still pretending not to understand, but carefully matching the suspect with his cell number. I drop the key. I look back, he shrugs and is gone through the fire doors and around a twist in the hallway. I scoop up the key and hurry down to 814, slipping in quickly, efficiently.

  In-fucking-genius!

  Cold water on my face seems to clear things a bit. I would use my finger and intentionally throw up, but I am sure the beer will soon pass.

  Outside I hear men’s voices. Russian. Not Finnish. Not English. But Russian. They seem to be standing there talking. And then they are gone, undoubtedly waved down the hall by the next crew. I am under surveillance. The generals at the airport have contacted the KGB and everyone from the doorman to the old lady whatchamacallit is on to Batterinski. Assholes. They’ll have no more luck with me than they’ll have with any Batterinski.

  Silent as breath I lift the desk chair and then the arm chair and pile them against the door. I then put the round coffee table on its side, forcing it so it wedges between the larger chair and the bed, which is itself anchored to the wall. The writing desk I also wedge in between the small closet and the edge of the door. Just let them try. Just let them try and get another Batterinski.

  Timo and I are standing overlooking the memorial cemetery to the siege of Leningrad, and though he appears obviously pained by the view, he cannot possibly know what I feel. Head thick as a stump and as sore as if someone’s tried to split me with a dull axe. And my damn knee — I haven’t been able to straighten it since I jumped up for Timo’s morning call and ran straight into the upturned coffee table. But at least it kept the fuckers out.

  Timo speaks slowly, low. He tells me of the three quarters of a million Krauts kicking the shit out of the city for nine hundred days, the full million Russians bombed, shot or, more often, just starved to death. It’s comforting for a Pole to know that once in a while at least the dogs turned on each other.

  He stands in front of the memorial flame and surprises me with great, fat tears dropping off his cheeks, while I stand thinking only how much the gas smells like eggs we sometimes misplaced in Jaja’s coop and could only find with our noses. He shows me what they call
the graves. Not even a name. Nothing. Just dates, one for each year: 1941, 1942, 1943, 1944. Four numerical grave markings, each expected to say something special about more than a half-million faceless, nameless corpses.

  For this, Timo cries. But I am a Pole and I feel I cannot cry for Russians.

  I try to imagine Ig in a grave with two hundred thousand others, him screaming for his Jaja and everyone else shouting at the same time, drowning him out, trampling him as they storm toward whatever false reward they had imagined. Ig lying there with feet kicking him, hair in his mouth, limbs breaking, rotting, stinking, chewed by rats, maggots at his eyes, and him still thinking that Jaja is going to somehow find him and reach down and pull him up. Wash him, maybe, and send down to Hatkoski’s for some new hair, maybe a new toque, a few spoonfuls of Nestlé’s Quik, a bottle of Pure Spring ginger ale to whet the whistle....

  Ig: 1966.

  What does that say? Tell me that.

  I close my eyes, though I know the image comes from within. I open my eyes and the blur tells me they are wet. I walk off from Timo, so he will not see.

  Timo takes me to the Rembrandt room of the Heritage museum, a big pink palace on a river so filthy a worm wouldn’t know whether to dig or swim. To me the pictures seem like faded Xeroxes, each identical one even duller than what has gone before. But Timo babbles on. He looks at paintings as if they were television screens, active, with breasts bouncing, guns shooting, people falling. For his sake, only for his sake, I make a single effort.

  In the picture I’m looking at there is a boy in rags and he kneels with one torn sandal hanging off his foot. He is leaning into the comfort of an old man with several shadowed figures, four I can make out, looking on from behind. They have looks of pity on their faces. I check the placard. The Return of the Prodigal Son, c. 1665. I try all different approaches to the painting to try and please Timo. I examine every small detail, but so much of it is as fogged, murky and dense as the river outside the window. I stare carefully at the boy but cannot really see him at all. His face is turned slightly to the right and there are no clear features to make out, only a hint of discomfort. I look again at the old man, his forehead high, nose long, eyes shrouded and kind, beard beginning black but growing to white, full and tangled. I stare and stare and stare again; and then, twenty-five years released in a blink, I see who the old man is.