‘No words,’ she said fiercely; her eyes were blazing, her face was contorted: she looked like a hunting animal: ‘Don’t speak,’ she hissed: ‘Don’t talk to me! I don’t need your childish nonsense now. Just look, that’s all you need to do—look about you, keep your distance, stop plaguing me—say nothing—leave me in peace!’
*
After this Serghiana dropped from sight. Days passed. She left the hotel. When she came back there were strangers with her; I heard reports: how she was busy with her schemes and projects, how there were plans underway, political initiatives, and she was at the heart of things. Men and women with serious expressions were gathered at the tables in the hotel lobby; behind closed doors in the conference rooms meetings were held. Then, late one afternoon, I caught sight of Serghiana in the gardens. She was with Professor Leo. She called me over to them.
‘You’ve been very quiet,’ she said, her voice almost reproachful: ‘I’ve hardly seen you at all since our trip up the mountain. Has Josette been looking after you properly? And Egon? I hope he’s been helping to keep you occupied?’
She made a little gesture to the professor, as though to indicate how impossible it was that the cartoonist could be competent at anything.
‘I thought you were angry,’ I said to her. ‘You were so strange up there, that day: so unfriendly. Don’t you remember? You told me to keep quiet; you scarcely said anything to me at all.’
‘That’s right, my child,’ she said, quite calmly: ‘For me, it’s something like a religious experience, going to those peaks. I thought that would have been plain to you.’
‘I used to love the mountains, too, when I was your age,’ said Leo, affably, and he motioned to me to sit down by his side.
‘Really?’ I asked, in a sceptical voice: ‘Really, truly?’
‘It’s absolutely true,’ he said, then went on: ‘We used to always go to the Tatra Mountains for the summer holidays—to the Grand, in Tatranská Lomnica. My parents, my sisters and I. My father owned factories, but really what he wanted was to be an inventor. He told us he needed to take long mountain walks so he could think. He set out every morning, after breakfast—and I would try to go with him, but he always sent me back. Children and ideas don’t mix, he used to say. But I argued with him—I told him that ideas were like children, and children had ideas too.’
‘And were you a child, or an idea, to him?’ asked Serghiana.
‘Both, I imagine,’ he said, and laughed: ‘I knew even then that I was going to be a scientist. I wanted to prove myself to him: I was determined to show him what I could do. I used to go on expeditions along the walking tracks, alone, and collect the rocks with unusual shapes or coloured veins of mineral: I had a miniature prospector’s pick, and a little leather pouch with my initials on it where I could keep my finds.’
‘Yes,’ said Serghiana, in a nostalgic voice: ‘A family scene in the old homeland. An enchanted landscape, like a dream.’
Then she looked at me: ‘Have you ever been to the high Tatras? I don’t suppose you will, now—the door to that world’s just slammed shut.’
‘What do you mean?’ I asked.
‘Are you having trouble understanding what’s been going on?’ she said, sharply: ‘Or do you just not want to know? Life is loss—isn’t it, Leo? Am I not right? We lose everything: places, people, loves, hope. Best to lose them early. Don’t look at me like that! If you want someone to comfort you, my child, go and find Josette. But if you want me to tell you a story about these mountains—a story that means something—stay here with us.’
‘I’d prefer to stay here with you, Great-Aunt Serghiana,’ I said: ‘You know that.’
‘That’s better—brave, and strong, and solitary—that’s what I want you to be. Now listen.’
‘Don’t I always?’
‘Don’t test me! And let’s not weary our friend the professor!’
She gave Leo a glance to signal her exasperation.
‘But I understand,’ said Leo: ‘I was young myself once. And I also spent my days with adults when we were in the mountains: and by choice: but there was a desolation in that, as well as a kind of privilege.’
‘Leo—such unexpected depths of sentiment!’
She turned to me again: ‘When we were up on the summit together, at Cassons Grat, what impressions came to you: what did you feel?’
‘That you were upset—or unhappy.’
‘I don’t mean about me—I mean about being there—being up above the world. What’s the feeling that comes naturally?’
‘You say,’ I said.
‘Didn’t you feel how empty it was? How strong that sense is—the nothing behind the silence! I did: that’s the feeling that always takes hold of me when I go up into the high Alps. Emptiness. Pure absence: no sign of man; no sign of a presence beyond man. Nature’s inert there: it makes no difference how picturesque the view can be: how lovely, how symphonic, light and haze melting into each other, the mountains and the cloud banks like reflections of each other: the experience still leaves one bereft. But it wasn’t like that always: these peaks used to be full of life. It’s the same for me as for Leo: I can remember the Tatras as well. I spent a summer there—just one summer. It was like a dream of happiness for me. It was the last time I spent with my father…’
‘The revolutionary?’ I interrupted.
‘Yes, the revolutionary,’ she said: ‘Do you want to hear, or interrogate me? We would go for mountain trips together, and when we climbed at Bystrá, or walked the path to the Kriváň summit, the skies weren’t bare like these skies. There was life in the air; there was movement. I’m talking about the lammergeier: the vulture of the peaks—the ossifrage.’
She pronounced those words with great emphasis. I looked back at her.
‘Don’t tell me you’ve been neglecting your study of the Old Testament! The dietary prescriptions: Leviticus 11:13. “And these are they which ye shall have in abomination…the eagle, and the ossifrage.” Do you remember seeing them then, Leo? Were they in the mountains, when you were a boy?’
‘Of course: I loved to watch them—they would soar forever, I used to imagine that they were flying to the sun.’
‘And those were your special favourites?’ I asked Serghiana: ‘Vultures?’
She looked at me. ‘By name they were birds of prey, it’s true,’ she said: ‘In a formal sense, if you have to classify—but not in any other. The moment I caught sight of them I was won over: how high they flew; how effortlessly! When they were aloft and tracing out their great circles they seemed to complete the sky. And they used to reign over these valleys as well. That’s the whole point of what I’m telling you: once they were everywhere. They were the symbol of the mountains—the guardians of the Alps.’
‘What happened to them?’ I asked.
‘It’s the old story. Can’t you guess? They were poised, and majestic: they were beautiful. Everything beautiful attracts hate—and the most fearsome raptors aren’t in the natural kingdom, they’re in the world of man. Whenever a child was lost in the mountains, or animals from a flock in the high pastures went missing, the vultures took the blame. They were wild, and free, and savage-seeming. They were turned into the enemy, the scapegoats, birds of ill omen—the fatal foe. Of course as soon as high-powered rifles came into use their numbers fell away. It didn’t take too long. There was an extermination campaign: teams of marksmen fanned out through the ranges and shot them down.’
‘They killed them all?’
‘And for no reason! Poor creatures! They don’t ever take live prey: they don’t even feed on carcasses. No! Not for them the vulgarity of flesh consumption. They survive entirely on a diet of bones. All the violence and the bloodshed is over long before the lammergeier flies. They have a different purpose: they absorb death, and the remains of the body, and make new life. They aren’t predators: not at all. They’re cleansing animals. They bring a new, pure order into the world.’
‘I think,’ said Leo,
uneasily, ‘that I detect a political metaphor lurking here.’
Serghiana gave him a cryptic smile: ‘Well,’ she said: ‘It’s certainly no coincidence it was western countries that found them threatening, and purged them from the sky.’
Leo had been glancing round as this exchange progressed.
‘No need to fret,’ said Serghiana: ‘No minders anywhere in your vicinity: the situation’s become much too confused for them!’
‘You could make a film about the vultures,’ I said.
‘Now there’s an idea,’ said Leo.
‘On the whole, it’s best to choose subjects you can actually show on screen,’ said Serghiana, rather caustically. ‘Rare birds that are only found at high altitude and that have gone extinct across most of their range wouldn’t be ideal. But maybe we shouldn’t rule it out. There might be potential: Czech directors won’t be making their own films for a while, we can be sure of that—and the Carpathian studios in Bucharest might agree to co-production. Leo—you could even be a technical consultant: you’ve developed a liking for film-sets, haven’t you?’
Leo turned to me, in a confidential manner. ‘Madame Serghiana was kind enough,’ he said, ‘to invite me, when I was lecturing in Zürich, last year. I was able to take my departmental colleagues: we drove down to the location on the lakefront where the filming was underway. For me, it was like a brief visit to another world: so many people, working to a single goal; so much excitement, such glamour in the air.’
Serghiana raised her eyebrows. ‘Glamour! In a film about Carl Gustav Jung and his archetypes: don’t be absurd!’
‘It was wonderful,’ said Leo: ‘When will it be coming out?’
‘There were problems,’ said Serghiana, now in a deadpan voice: ‘In fact, it turned into a nightmare as we went on. The state film companies fought with each other constantly. Midway through the shoot the lead actor became convinced that Jung had been reincarnated in him: he wanted to write his own dialogue. Then he had some kind of breakdown: we had to pull him out. We began looking for a substitute—we decided to cast several actors to play different aspects of Jung instead. In the end I had a great falling-out with the director. He was Yugoslav: you can imagine the risk I’d run in choosing him! It was a bad decision from the start. He wanted to make Jung’s dream about the Basel Münster the opening scene—and how, exactly, was he going to film that? I insisted that he bring in a narrator: he refused. We ran over our budget: the Culture Ministry stepped in. It was only through pure good fortune that I had another project—one with western backing—already underway.’
‘Really?’ said Leo: ‘What project? What investors, at a time like this?’
Serghiana looked at him. ‘My dear friend,’ she said, ‘your modest interest in my professional world seems to have deepened. I begin to wonder on whose behalf you ask me such specific questions.’
‘But, Madame Serghiana…’ he began.
‘Enough!’ she said. She turned to me and made a quick signal, a summons. In a flowing movement she rose from the table, took my hand and guided me away.
‘Vipers,’ she said to me under her breath as we walked off: ‘Vipers everywhere—and the most venomous are the ones closest to us. And to think I was actually on the point of trusting him. What a collaborator—a time-server, on the lookout for himself at every second!’
‘But you called him Uncle Leo when he arrived here,’ I said.
‘Titles mean the opposite of what they seem to mean—haven’t you learned that yet?’
‘I’m not sure I understand,’ I said.
‘I’ll explain it all to you, later. In years ahead you’ll look back on these times and everything that’s happening around us will be clear to you: painfully clear. What makes people do what they do, and what makes them say the things they say.’
‘Is it politics?’
‘Yes—politics again.’
She let go of my hand, and looked down at me. She drew me nearer, and, absent-mindedly, affectionately, she stroked my head and ran her fingers through my hair. I pulled away from her.
‘You don’t care for that? You should relish the days when those around you want to smooth your hair, not fire a bullet into the base of your skull.’
I stepped back. ‘That’s a cruel thing to say,’ I said.
‘My child,’ she said then, in a serious voice: ‘Listen to me now! Don’t you understand: you’re my hope. I want you to fly free—to escape all this: not be trapped, not be caught by who you are and where you come from. I want you to know everything. I want you to be as wide as the horizon and as deep as the sky. I’m not trying to hurt you with my harshness: I’m trying to make you whole.’
We made our way back in silence through the hotel, and upstairs, to her floor.
‘Come in with me,’ she said: ‘What’s wrong? Have you used up all your conversation?’
‘I’ve never been into your room before,’ I said.
‘Don’t be ridiculous—it’s just a hotel room, like any other.’
She gave me an encouraging prod and escorted me into a vast, elaborately furnished space: it was a corner suite, with doorways leading off into further corridors—a cavern, more than a room. At the far end stood a dining table and a grand piano, both bearing vases full of flowers. There were banks of armchairs and sofas, with coats and jackets draped over them. In one corner was a large work desk, its surface covered by documents and sheaves of typescript; old, ill-folded newspapers and magazines were heaped to overflowing on a low table. The French doors looked out on a wide verandah. Through them I could see two men sitting at a table, talking and gesturing, stealing brief glances in our direction.
‘Don’t pay any attention to them,’ said Serghiana: ‘They’re the cultural attachés from the embassy: we’ve got some business to go through. Here—sit with me for a while.’
She cleared away a pile of folders from an armchair to make room. ‘Push all that away,’ she said. ‘All those papers—they don’t matter.’
‘What are they?’
‘Nothing—just radio reports and film scripts.’
‘Great-Aunt Serghiana,’ I asked: ‘How did you actually become a film-maker?’
‘I’m not a film-maker,’ she replied: ‘Making films is the easy part. That’s what directors do. I produce them. I organise them, and find the money to pay for them. It’s completely different!’
‘How did you become a producer, then?’
‘That’s an easy question to answer: I married a director.’
‘Is he going to come here too?’
‘God, no! I didn’t stay married to him. I don’t stay married to anyone for very long.’
‘Was he a good film-maker?’
‘Very—that was one of his problems. And he was a perfectionist: that didn’t help either. Moscow wasn’t the right place for him. He went off to the United States. He works there now.’
‘Why don’t you go there too?’
‘I don’t think that would be a good idea. I have my own projects. I make a bridge between two worlds—between two systems. It’s exactly the way Egon was describing it to you. The art’s in the East, the money’s in the West—I bring them together—and I can only do that when I’m midway between the two.’
‘Somewhere like here.’
‘It’s ideal here, yes—but these are strange times. No one can really tell what’s going to happen in the long term: that’s why the people you see around us are so on edge. Everything could be destroyed for me at any moment.’
‘And then you could go back to books,’ I said, encouragingly.
She raised her eyebrows.
‘I thought they were what you loved most.’
‘They are. Of course they are. Books are everything to me—and films, the cinema, almost nothing: except in one respect. Books are simple in their texture; films are hybrid. Even the most complex, ambitious book you could ever read goes down a single channel. Everything’s passed through the written word: from word to min
d, from the writer’s pen to the reader’s heart. Everything’s made from the simplest building bricks, from letters, from words and sentences. But cinema has several distinct channels—images, sound, text, music too. You can run them together, or set them against each other. You can make the viewer feel different things at once—and that brings it close to our experience of life. Division, contradiction, emotions that provoke their opposites! You know the way being aware of your sadness can make you feel a kind of joy—a sombre joy—and being happy and knowing that your happiness is fleeting can lead you to the edge of despair.’
‘Can it?’
‘That’s something to live through, really,’ she said: ‘To find out for yourself, not to learn about from someone else. And you will. When you’re a child, you don’t always know what you feel—feelings flow through you, but they don’t have labels yet. In a way it doesn’t matter what they are, it just matters that they’re strong, that they sweep you away. Then, in time, you learn the words for them, and words come like a fence or a fortress wall to protect you from feeling too much. They file feelings away; you start to think before you feel. You describe your emotions to yourself. You enter the long twilight of adulthood.’
There was a knocking, insistent, at the door. In came Daru, elegantly dressed, with Josette just behind him and an older man, grey-haired, sharp-featured, in their train.
‘Here she is—the impresario of our troubled times,’ said Daru, and stretched out his hands to Serghiana in exaggerated greeting.
He glanced round the room, and fixed his eyes on me. ‘You—here—and not in the nursery! While your protectress, not content with culture, is breaking into politics!’
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