by Alice Jolly
Around me, the whole building seemed to be turning in on itself. Did I hear shuffling, throats being cleared, doors closing? The little girl wobbled on that one leg, then ran away into her flat. From upstairs I heard a shout from Mrs Balashova and a grunt from her husband. Behind their voices a dull thump sounded. ‘Nyet, nyet, nyet.’ Another thump and a bottle or glass breaking. I thought of bones splintering, a thick hand gripping hair and yanking it out.
I ran up the stairs. The door opened three inches inwards, then slammed shut again. A roar and a shuffle came from inside. ‘Vsyo, khvatit, perestan’.’ That’s it, that’s enough. Stop. The door shuddered and started to open again. A hand appeared around the side, forcing it wider open. Mrs Balashova was trying to get out and her hand was about to be trapped. I flung my shoulder against the door but it didn’t move one inch. I looked down at those hands gripped around the door. Small, pale fingers, but covered with dark hairs – the fingers of a man.
I stepped back from the door, and stared. It couldn’t be Mr Balashov who was being hit. Men do not get hit by women. But as the door opened further it revealed a tired face with round glasses – the man I’d seen going up the stairs before, except now his glasses were skewed to one side. And under the line of his grey-brown hair was a new gash, vivid in the pallor of his face. Behind him stood a wall of floral material, topped by a balloon face and orange hair. A thick arm was locked around his neck. I needed to say something but I couldn’t remember a word of Russian.
‘What do you think you’re doing?’ My English voice sounded ridiculous but it made the woman release her grip. Mr Balashov pulled away and headed for the stairs. For a moment I stood face to face with him, his eyes looking straight into mine. We seemed to stand there for a long time before he dodged past me. Mrs Balashova made a growling sound then slammed the door shut. The sound of her husband’s footsteps faded in the stairwell. The silence around me was heavy after the struggle and shouting. I’d wanted to be heroic but instead I had the sense of having made some stupid mistake. As I walked back down the stairs, I noticed two smudged marks on the bottom step. In the harsh light I leant down to look at them. They were drops of blood from Mr Balashov’s head.
I picked up the rubbish bag and went back into our flat. Maya’s note was lying on the hall floor. When I looked at it again I didn’t see mauve paper, instead I saw the eyes of Mr Balashov. They should have been full of fear and pain but instead I’d seen a look which was oddly familiar – was it excitement, even exhilaration? I folded Maya’s letter up and went to the bathroom to deal with the hot tap. We always had a problem with it because it wouldn’t turn off properly and, as a result, the bathroom was always full of steam. Still those eyes were in my mind. I whacked the heel of one of Rob’s shoes against the tap, trying to get those eyes out of my head. I must phone Bill and Sarah, I thought. Surely they’ll know where to find a plumber? I started to make some supper but the kitchen seemed too small and cramped. My mind was spinning round and round.
I put on my coat and went out. The night was so cold that, as I stepped out of our building, I gasped. Behind me, a voice started to shout. It was the one-armed babushka who sat in a curtained cubicle at the bottom of our stairs. It was her job to watch everyone in the building, but Rob supplied her with biscuits and stale pastries from his office, so she was always quite friendly to us. ‘Dyevushka, ne vykhodi na ulitsu bez shapki.’ She was telling me that I mustn’t go out without a hat.
Pulling a woollen beret out of my pocket, I stretched it down over my ears. I waved good night to her, then stumbled across the courtyard past the remains of a dismantled Lada. When I reached the two-storey-high arch which led out into the street, I looked back at the windows of our block. My mind turned around – questions, questions, questions. And Mr Balashov’s eyes still staring inside my head.
10/38 Kutuzovskii Prospyekt, Moscow
December 1990
It shouldn’t have been possible just to walk into Maya’s building but it was. A man coming out held the door open for me, and then I crept past the floor lady as she snored gently behind her desk. The hall was the size of a tennis court with a grand chandelier and columns of dogmeat-coloured marble. I felt sure that until recently, this building must have been reserved for Party officials. An ancient lift was clanking upwards on a thick pulley but I thought that if I pressed the button I might wake the floor lady. So instead I took the wide marble stairs which led up beside the lift-shaft into darkness. A ray of light from a landing window touched on broken floor-tiles, a cracked marble step, the elaborate twists of a wrought-iron stair-rail. As I walked, I could hear my boots trudging on the steps and my breath beating in my ears. My hand searched the wall, touching dust, cracks, wiring, but never a light-switch.
When I reached the fourth floor, I stopped. On the landing above, light shone through an open door. I hesitated, went up to the level of the door, stopped and looked in. Pale blue wallpaper with gold stars – I remembered it from the night of the party. I moved closer and heard a rustling sound. I could see Maya’s dyed black hair and the skirt of her long velvet dress. But a twist of blonde hair lay against her shoulder, and blood-coloured nails were pressed against her back. Feet interlocked, and I saw an angle of white cheek. I felt blood rise to my face, and I backed away, but in the darkness my boot struck against the stair-rail. I stumbled down the stairs, but then, hearing footsteps above, I turned back, making an inadequate pretence that I’d just arrived.
‘Who’s that?’ An edge of panic sounded in Maya’s voice.
‘Sorry, sorry. I should have telephoned.’ I stepped forward into the light.
‘Oh Eva – my God. You scared me half to death.’
‘Sorry, sorry. I’ll go …’
‘No, no. It doesn’t matter. Not at all. Do come in.’ Maya waved her hand in an extravagant gesture of welcome and I stepped into the hall. The blonde woman raised her hand to tidy her hair.
‘Eva, you remember Estelle, don’t you?’
Estelle turned around, as though she’d only just realized I was there. Her face was flushed and her lipstick smudged. She was pretending that she couldn’t quite place me. ‘Oh yes, of course.’ She looked me up and down as though I was something that should be put out with the rubbish. ‘Yes, perhaps I do remember. At the party. You work for some … charity?’
‘It’s not a charity, actually …’
‘Sadly, Estelle’s just going.’ Maya gave another grand wave of her hand, this time to usher Estelle out of the door. But the woman wouldn’t be hurried. She leant forward and planted a kiss close to Maya’s mouth. As she whispered something in her ear, her red nails flickered against Maya’s cheek. Then another long kiss, before she swept out of the flat, located the light-switch without any difficulty, and clattered away down the stairs.
‘Really, I could come back another time.’
‘Not at all.’ Maya gave a dismissive shrug as she shut the door. ‘You re-e-ally mustn’t take any notice of Estelle.’ She slid my coat from my shoulders and I took off my boots. On a table, a gold clock under a glass dome chimed seven. Beside it, a photograph showed a young man in a pin-stripe suit with a vicious smile. The sitting room was just as I remembered it – dusty, exotic, cluttered. I was sure I could still smell the cigarette smoke and stale alcohol left over from that night. What was it Rob had said – quaint? That was just the sort of thing he would say.
Maya led me close to a low lamp, and stared down into my face. ‘Dre-e-adful,’ she said. ‘You look absolutely dre-adful.’ It was true I hadn’t slept properly for the last couple of weeks, and was as tense as a violin string, but I didn’t think I looked that bad.
‘It won’t do at all. Harvey told me – living in some ghastly place, trying to save the world.’ She steered me into the kitchen. ‘Food. I think that’s where we need to start.’ Everything in the kitchen was coated with dust and grease, but my stomach leapt as I watched Maya’s shaky hands piling food on to a tray. White bread rolls, Brie and thin sli
ces of ham, a jar of mayonnaise, muffins, yoghurt and fruit. She made me a cup of coffee and poured me a fish-tank glass of vodka. ‘Carry that tray,’ she said, and I followed her back into the sitting room.
I spread butter on a white bread roll then filled it with mayonnaise, Brie and ham. Thank God for Stockman’s or whatever foreign-currency shop she’d got it all from. While I ate, Maya complained about Russia. And all this was done in the name of equality, she said. But actually this was the least equal country you could ever find. A half-mile queue for petrol and Party officials could just cut in front of everyone else. In what other country would you find that? And everybody talking now about the Mafia. ‘But there’s been the Mafia for ye-e-ars,’ she said. ‘They just happened to be called the Communist Party.’
The flat was heated by huge radiators which stood like toast-racks under the windows, and I soon felt so cooked that I took off two jumpers and sat there in my T-shirt. Even then, my legs were too hot in their woollen tights. I felt embarrassed by my greed but couldn’t resist a second bread roll, and then a third. I wondered if Maya had fed my father like this on his visits to London.
‘Go on,’ Maya said. ‘Have as much as you want.’ She didn’t eat herself but lit a cigarette. The coffee turned out to be tepid but I drank it anyway. Maya had finished her rant about Russia and was telling me about her work. She was really retired, she said, but she still had links with some galleries.
‘You’ve got some wonderful pictures.’ I spoke through a mouthful of cake.
‘So kind of you to say so, my dear, but I have to be honest – they’re not ne-e-arly as good as they look. Of course, when I knew I was going to come back here, I thought perhaps I’d find some lost Kandinskii hidden in a cellar, and actually some interesting things a-a-re turning up. But nearly everything I’m shown is fake. But then sometimes, I can’t stop myself, and I finish up buying the odd thing anyway. Because I do always ra-a-ther like fakes, don’t you?’
‘Yes, I like fakes as well.’
I didn’t know why I’d said that. Was it even true? Maya gave my foot a prod with her walking stick and poured more vodka into my glass. ‘I can’t see you properly there. Come and sit near me.’ I positioned myself at the end of the sofa but still she beckoned me closer. As I edged towards her, she fixed me with those exaggerated eyes. ‘So tell me – you’re in lo-o-ve?’
The cup in my hand trembled on its saucer. I put it down on the table, dropped the teaspoon, fumbled around on the floor looking for it. Of course I wasn’t in love, whatever was she talking about? Then I realized what she meant. ‘Oh, Rob. Yes, of course. In love. Yes.’ I placed the teaspoon back on the saucer. It seemed that the vodka was already ringing in my head. I took a deep breath, sat back in my chair, folded my hands. ‘Yes, in fact you might remember Rob. His mother was my father’s cousin.’
‘Oh, Amelia? Oh, really? So he’s the son. Oh, now I see. And she was married to – King Midas?’
‘Yes, Guy Kingmuiden.’
‘Oh yes, I remember. And she became involved in all that political trouble in Rhodesia, didn’t she? And then went crazy and got herself killed.’
‘Well, not exactly …’
‘And Guy writes books now, doesn’t he, on some obscure subject?’
‘The origins of languages.’
Maya picked up the vodka bottle and poured herself a glass. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘At the party I fear I said a-all the wrong things.’
‘No, no. Not at all.’
‘I just didn’t understand that you hadn’t heard from your father. And I didn’t realize that you – well, I thought your mother would have talked to you.’
‘She did talk. But only really to complain that he never sent any money.’
Maya took a long drag on her cigarette and shook her head. ‘Typical. Typical. That’s crazy, my de-a-ar. Crazy. I mean, she could have sold the house at any time. And in total, the paintings would be worth half a million.’
My mouth opened and shut. My mother had always told me that only a few of his early paintings were any good.
‘Half a million – at le-e-ast. And he was only re-e-ally at the beginning of his career. I mean now, if one wanted to sell them … He has been rather forgotten, but at the time … one can’t imagine now the impact they had. All that enthusiasm he had for Mexico and the Mayan culture, and all of his ideas about the shaman, and the ancient astrologers. All of that came out in his paintings. Really, he was trying to touch on some other, unseen world. To have some communication with …’ Maya shook her head and sighed. ‘People must have written to your mother suggesting ideas for exhibitions. I’m sure I even wrote to her myself, ye-e-ars ago …’
I couldn’t believe we were sitting here talking about my father. A key rattled at the front door and we heard ponderous footsteps in the hall. Harvey cleared his throat and entered the room. He was a solidly built American, open-faced, tanned, with silver-grey hair. It seemed as though he should be wearing a Stetson, cowboy boots, and guns on his belt. Russia – just another frontier to be conquered.
Maya introduced me although we’d met on the night of the party. His dry hand folded around mine. ‘Well then, here you all are.’ For a long moment he shuffled from one foot to the other, standing near to Maya, then he headed for the door, making some excuse about work.
‘You know, I have one of your father’s paintings,’ Maya said. ‘Would you like to see?’ As she led me down the corridor, my head swayed from the vodka. She took me to the room where I’d first met Jack. It seemed to be her bedroom as well as her office, but there was no sign of Harvey there. On a table beside the bed, an ashtray was overflowing with cigarette ends, their smell mingled with a cloying scent of perfume. An emerald-green scarf lay draped across the end of the unmade bed.
Maya laid down her stick and shuffled a canvas out from the pile which was propped against a bookcase. Then she asked me to help her to turn it around and stand it against the wall. A vivid mass of clashing colours and jagged shapes confused my eyes. Then I began to see objects within it. I saw mouths, clouds, a man with a raised knife. This was Abraham poised to sacrifice his son. Amidst the tortured slashes of red and yellow, only the faces of Abraham and Isaac were clear. Abraham looked up towards the heavens, offering up the murder he was about to commit. So this was a picture painted by my father. To look at it seemed to me an invasion of his privacy. I felt suddenly tired and sat down on the crumpled bedcover.
‘Of course, this one is quite untypical,’ Maya said. ‘It’s one of the last paintings he ever did. Or at least I assume so, unless he’s still painting now. It was shown in that last exhibition – early January 1967. He was turning back to Christian images at that time.’
Maya came to sit beside me. I didn’t want to look at the painting because I couldn’t imagine how the man who painted it could ever have lived at Marsh End House with my mother. My fingers fiddled with the fringe on the emerald-green scarf. Maya was lost in the painting, her face alight. ‘Oh, I do so miss your father.’ Tears brimmed in her eyes. ‘It’s such a shame that you can’t remember. He was so-o full of life. And he was someone one could always talk to. You know, for me it was like …’ She searched for the words.
‘Like someone you knew before you were born.’
She turned to look at me, her eyes clicking open. ‘Yes. Maybe like that.’ She laid a hand on my arm. ‘Oh, my de-e-ar, it is such a shame you never knew him. And he loved you so very dearly.’
I looked back at the picture and my head swirled with colour and vodka. Maya rested a hand on my shoulder. I looked down to see my fingers twisting the fringe on the emerald scarf. Maya curled a strand of my hair, then moved close to me, gathering up all of my hair in her hands and holding it back from my face. ‘You should wear your hair tied back, you know. You shouldn’t hide a face like that.’ Embarrassed, I avoided her eyes although I could feel her breath on my face.
My hand stroked the fringe of the scarf. ‘Try that on,’ she said. ‘I th
ink it would be your colour.’ She stood me in front of the mirror, and, folding the scarf into a triangle, she knotted it around my neck. The wool was tender against my skin and when I looked in the mirror I didn’t look like my normal self at all. So my father had loved me. Of course he had.
A door slammed and Harvey cleared his throat. I stepped back from the mirror. ‘I should go. I’m sure you want to spend some time with Harvey.’
‘Oh no. Not at a-all. You shouldn’t think that. Harvey likes me to have my female friends.’
I started to take the scarf off.
‘Oh no,’ Maya repeated. ‘You must keep it. Have it as a pre-e-sent.’ Her hands gathered the scarf up and rearranged it, bunching it closer to my neck. ‘Better like this, I think. Yes, it re-e-ally suits you.’ She leant forward and kissed my cheek. ‘You should wear it for your friend Mr Flame.’
‘Who?’
She didn’t answer but watched me with raised eyebrows.
‘He’s not my friend. I hardly know him.’
‘But of course. And he’s much too old for you. He has quite a reputation with women, I’m told.’
‘I’m going out with Rob.’
‘Oh yes, so you are.’ She considered me with narrowed eyes. ‘But isn’t it always nice to have other friends?’ Again her hands adjusted the scarf. ‘What I’m saying, my dear, is that you don’t know the value of your own currency. You should spend it before it drops.’
I looked away, promising myself that I wouldn’t let this conversation go any further. I shrugged my shoulders, examined my fingernails. ‘So you know him well?’