The Balkan Trilogy

by Olivia Manning

  The Pringles had been invited to dine that evening with a Jewish couple who, granted a visa to the United States, wanted to know how to conduct themselves in the English-speaking world. Invitations of this sort were frequent. Though Guy knew no more about the States than he had learnt from American films, he was always happy to give advice, but Harriet was becoming bored with listening to it. She said: ‘You go. They don’t really want me,’ for at the back of her mind was the intention to see Sasha again.

  As she climbed up the iron ladder to roof-level, she was startled by the grandeur of the sky from which plumes of puce and crimson had been pulled downwards by the setting sun. The concrete glowed like marble, but for all the richness of the light the air was heavy, almost thunderous, though thunder was rare here.

  Sasha was sitting on the parapet, an intent and solitary figure, scribbling on something. As she stepped up on to the roof, she saw him lift his head and stare towards the cathedral which, built on high ground, overlooked the city. Its golden domes were afire now and the whole building stood like an embossed enamel against the luminous darkness of the lower sky.

  At the sound of her step, he jerked his head round and his face brightened at the sight of company, so she ceased to feel any need to account for her visit.

  She asked where the dog was.

  He said: ‘It didn’t live here. Despina was keeping it for someone. Now it has gone home.’

  ‘Do any of the servants sleep on the roof?’

  ‘No, there’s no one but me.’

  As she had thought, these advertised ‘second servant rooms’ were merely an attempt to smarten the jerry-built, ill-planned block. No one needed or could afford the extra staff.

  She felt sorry for the boy alone up here. She put the apricots on the parapet and said: ‘Those are for you,’ then she looked at his sketch of the cathedral done on the concrete with a lump of rough charcoal Despina had found for him somewhere. She said: ‘It’s quite good.’

  ‘Is it?’ he asked eagerly. ‘You really like it?’ so surprised and trusting of her judgement that she felt ashamed of her unthinking praise, and looked at it again. It was boldly done, the rough surface of the parapet giving the lines a comic distortion.

  ‘Yes, it is good,’ she confirmed her own judgement and he smiled in naïve pleasure.

  ‘If you like this,’ he said, ‘you’d like some things I saw in Bessarabia. They were super.’

  As she hoisted herself on to the wall, she asked: ‘Where were you in Bessarabia?’

  He had been on the frontier, in a fortress that was as bare, cold and ill-lit as it would have been in the Middle Ages. There was nothing at all in the district but a village that comprised two rows of desolate huts with a pitted mud track running between. The whole area had been raided so often, it was like the environs of a volcano: only the most desperate would make a home there. In winter it had been swept by gales and blizzards and in spring, when the snow melted, it became a quagmire.

  ‘The village was jolly queer,’ he said. ‘All the people living there were Jews.’

  ‘Why did they live there, of all places?’

  ‘I don’t know. Perhaps they’d been driven out of everywhere else.’

  She had imagined she would have difficulty in persuading him to talk about his experiences, but it seemed he had already put them at a distance. He had adopted Guy and Harriet in place of his family so, feeling protected again, he could chat away as though nothing had ever happened in his life to check his confidence. While he talked, she wondered at the simplicity of a nature able so rapidly to regain itself.

  ‘And what about these things you saw? Were they drawings?’

  ‘No. Paintings. They were shop-signs.’

  He described the Jews of the villages – the men gaunt wraiths in their tattered caftans, the women wearing black woollen wigs over heads shaven because they suffered from some skin disease which had died out elsewhere. They were sly and obsequious, and Sasha, who had always known Jews who were the richest members of the community, had been amazed to find any as debased as these.

  ‘They couldn’t even read,’ he said. ‘They were terribly poor – but they could do these paintings.’

  ‘What were they like?’

  ‘Oh – sort of fantastic. People, animals and things, in the most super colours. I’d always go and look at them when I could.’

  He spoke as though the shop signs had been his only entertainment and she asked: ‘Did you have any friends in the army?’

  ‘I knew a boy in the village. His father kept the place where the soldiers went to drink ţuică. It was just a room, very dirty, but all the soldiers said the man was an awful crook and making lots of money.’

  Sasha described the boy, thin, white-faced, in a black skull-cap, knickerbockers that fastened below the knee and black stockings and boots. Tufts of red down were appearing on his glazed white cheeks, and red ritual curls hung before his ears. ‘You never saw anyone look so funny,’ Sasha said.

  ‘But all the Orthodox Jews look like that,’ Harriet said. ‘Surely you’ve seen them down the Dâmboviţa?’

  Sasha shook his head. He had never been near the ghetto area. His aunts would not allow him to go there.

  ‘Did you speak to the boy?’ Harriet asked.

  ‘I tried, but it wasn’t much good. He only spoke Yiddish and Ukrainian, and he was very shy. Sometimes he’d run away when he saw me in the street.’

  ‘But hadn’t you friends among the soldiers?’

  ‘Well …’ Sasha sat silent for some moments, staring down and rubbing the palm of his hand on the rough edge of the wall. ‘Yes, I did have a friend.’ He spoke as though making an admission painful to him. ‘He was a Jew, too. He was called Marcovitch.’

  ‘Did he run away with you?’

  Sasha shook his head, then after a moment said: ‘He died.’

  ‘How did he die?’

  Sasha said nothing for some minutes, and she saw there was an area of experience, unnaturally imposed upon his natural innocence, to which he would not willingly revert. She said persuasively: ‘Tell me what happened.’

  ‘Well …’ He spoke casually, like one old in knowledge. ‘You know what it is like here. If anything happens, they say: “It’s the Jews.” In the army it was the same. They blamed the Jews for Bessarabia. They said we called in the Russians because of the new laws against us. As though we could!’ He looked at her and laughed. ‘Just silly, of course.’ His self-conscious attempt at sophistication made her realise how young he was.

  ‘Did they ill-treat you?’ she asked.

  ‘Not very much. Some of them were quite decent, really. It was beastly for everyone, being conscripted. The barracks were full of bugs. When I first went there I was bitten so much, I looked as though I had measles. And every day maize or beans, but not much. There was money for food, but the officers kept it.’

  ‘Is that why you ran away?’

  ‘No.’ He picked up his charcoal and began darkening the lines of his drawing that had started to disappear with the light. ‘It was because of Marcovitch.’

  ‘Who died? When did he die?’

  ‘After we were ordered out of Bessarabia. We were on the train and he went down the corridor and he didn’t come back. I asked everyone, but they said they hadn’t seen him. While we were waiting at Czernowitz – we stayed on the platform three days because there were no trains – they were saying a body had been found on the railway-line half-eaten by wolves. Then one of the men said to me: “You heard what happened to your friend, Marcovitch? That was his body. You be careful, you’re a Jew, too.” And I knew they’d thrown him out of the train. I was afraid. It could happen to me. So in the night, when they were all asleep, I ran down the line and hid in a goods train. It took me to Bucharest.’

  While they were talking, the sound of the last post came thin and clear from the palace yard. The sunset clouds had stretched and narrowed and faded in the sky, leaving a zenith of clear turquoise in which a
few stars were appearing. The square below was lit not only by its lamps but by a reflection from the sky that was like a sheen on water.

  She thought she had made Sasha talk enough and Guy might soon be back. She slid down from the wall and said: ‘I must go, but I’ll come again.’ Before she left, she handed Sasha the paper. ‘It says your father’s trial starts on August 14th. The sooner it is over, the better. After all, he may be acquitted.’

  Sasha took the paper, which could not be read in this light, and said: ‘Yes,’ but his agreement was simply politeness. He knew as well as she did that the law required Drucker’s conviction before his oil holdings could be forfeit to the Crown. What hope then of an acquittal?

  As she set out across the roof area, Sasha went to his hut. When she turned to descend, she could see he had already lit his candle and, kneeling, was bent over the paper that was spread on the ground before him.

  7

  Yakimov saw the great yellow car outside the Legation as soon as he turned into the road. The hood was down, hidden beneath a panel, so there was nothing to break the long, fine line from nose to tail. His eyes filled with tears. ‘The old girl herself,’ he said. As he added: ‘I love her,’ he scarcely knew whether he referred to the Hispano-Suiza or to Dollie, who had given it to him.

  The car was now seven years old, but he had taken care of it as he had never taken care of himself. He opened the bonnet and examined the engine. When he closed it, he patted the stork that flew down-drooping wings from the radiator cap. He walked round the car, noting that the body was dusty but no worse, and the pigskin leather of the seats was in ‘good shape’. ‘Bless the old Jugs,’ he thought. ‘They haven’t treated her so badly.’

  He spent so long rejoicing over the car that Foxy Leverett noticed him from a window and came out to give him the keys.

  ‘She’s a beaut,’ said Foxy.

  Even during the days of triumph in Troilus, Yakimov had not received much attention from Foxy, who accorded the same offhand goodwill to everyone. Now, acknowledging a compeer in the owner of a Hispano-Suiza, he became voluble: ‘Went like a bird. The worst road in Europe, but she did a steady sixty. If I hadn’t got the Dion-Bouton, I’d make you an offer.’

  ‘Wouldn’t sell her for a king’s ransom, dear boy,’ Yakimov said, adding with a hint of hauteur: ‘In this part of the world I’d never get what she’s worth. The chassis alone cost two and a half thou, sterling. Body by Fernandez. Wonderful work. Had one before this. Lovely job. Body built all of tulip wood. You should have seen it. Had m’man then, of course. He kept it like a piece of Chippendale.’

  Yakimov talked for some time, too elated to feel the sweltering sunlight. Foxy, his hair and moustache the colour of marigolds, his eyes as blue as the eyes of a china doll, turned peony-pink under the heat. When Yakimov paused he cut short his reminiscences by saying: ‘I put two hundred litres in the tank at Predea. There’s plenty left.’

  ‘I’m in your debt, dear boy.’ Yakimov became more subdued. ‘Don’t know what I owe, but it’ll all be settled when m’remittance shows up.’

  ‘That’s all right,’ said Foxy.

  His nonchalance prompted Yakimov to try his luck: ‘Like to get her cleaned, dear boy. Wonder if you could spare a thou?’

  Foxy’s moustache twitched, but, trapped and making the best of it, he pulled out some notes and handed one over.

  ‘Dear boy!’ Yakimov took it gratefully. ‘Y’know,’ he said, ‘if you’d get me a C.D. plate, there’s no end to the stuff we could run in and out. And not only currency, mind you. There’s a demand here for rhino horn – aphrodisiac, y’know. You can get it in Turkey. And hashish …’

  With a guffaw of derisive laughter, Foxy turned on his heel and shot back into the chancellery.

  Yakimov climbed into the car and started it up – the Hispano was an extravagance: despite its size and power it was designed to seat only two persons – and as he gazed along the six-foot bonnet, he saw his status restored and his old glory returned to him. He had not driven for eleven months. He took himself to the Chaussée for a trial run. Discomposed at first by the delirium howl of passing cars, he steadily regained his old confidence and felt the impulse to outstrip them. He rounded the fountain at the extreme end of the Chaussée, then, returning, pressed down on the accelerator and saw with satisfaction that he was touching ninety. Unperturbed by the klaxons that bayed about him like a hungry pack, he swung into the square, circled round it and stopped outside the Pringles’ block. Having had no tea, he was, he realised, a trifle peckish.

  After tea he dressed in such items of decent clothing as remained to him. In the Athénée Palace that morning, he had noticed the main rooms were being decorated for a reception.

  The Rumanians these days were in a buoyant mood, for the Hungarian ministers had left Munich apparently having achieved nothing. When this was reported, Hadjimoscos soberly told his circle: ‘The Führer said to them: “Do not forget, I am Rumania’s father, too.” Such a sentiment is very gratifying, don’t you think? Baron Steinfeld tells me it is thanks to the fine fellows in the Iron Guard that we stand so high in German favour.’

  To Yakimov the Guardists were merely the murderers of Calinescu. He had been amused by the fact they claimed still to be led by a young man two years in his grave. He seized upon this mention of them to make a joke: ‘I take it, dear boy, you refer to the non-existent members of the totally extinguished party which is led by a ghost?’

  Hadjimoscos stared coldly at Yakimov a moment before he said: ‘Such quips are not de rigueur in these times,’ and paused impressively before adding: ‘They are not even safe.’

  Yakimov was used to Hadjimoscos’ changes of mood and had to accept them. That morning he had listened in silence while the reception was discussed with a respect he found bewildering in view of the fact no one present had been invited. It was to be an Iron Guard reception, held in defiance of the King, to promulgate the growing power of the party.

  ‘Under the circumstances,’ Hadjimoscos said, with knowing complacency, ‘it is not surprising that people like us, members of the old aristocracy, have received no official invitation, but I am confident it will be indicated to us that our presence is desired.’

  Yakimov was surprised that any sort of gathering could be given in defiance of the King, but told himself: ‘Hadji is pretty cute. Hadji knows which way the wind blows,’ and that evening, although he had not been invited, he prepared to attend the reception himself.

  The hotel was only a hundred yards away, but when he set out he took the Hispano as an earnest of past opulence, a visa to better times. As he drew up outside the hotel, Baron Steinfeld was arriving with Princess Teodorescu, both in full evening dress, and he was a trifle disconcerted, not having realised the occasion merited such a rig, but was gratified to see the Baron eyeing the Hispano with interest.

  The Princess had not recognised Yakimov since last September, when Hadjimoscos had brought him to her party; but now she lifted the tail of one of her silver-fox furs and waggled it playfully as she called to him: ‘Ah, cher prince, you have been a long time out of sight.’ Yakimov sped towards her and kissed her hand in its rose-coloured glove. The Princess was noted for the directness of her approach and now, without preamble, she said: ‘Cher prince, I want so much tickets for the Drucker trial.’

  In the failing light, the runnels of her handsome, haggard face seemed filled with ink. Her eyes, within their heavily darkened lids, were fixed avidly on Yakimov as she explained: ‘I received, of course, my two-three tickets, but always my friends are asking me: “Please get for me a ticket.” What can I do? Now you, mon prince, are journalist. You have many tickets, isn’t that so? Do for me a little favour. Give me two-three tickets!’

  The tickets for the trial had been allotted to persons of importance, who now were selling them for enormous sums to persons of less importance. Yakimov, needless to say, had none, but he smiled happily. ‘Dear girl, of course, I’ll do what I can. ’Fraid I’
ve given mine away, but I’ll get more. There are ways and means. Leave it to your Yaki.’

  ‘But how kind!’ said the Princess and as a mark of favour she off-loaded her foxes into Yakimov’s arms. Delighted by this hot and heavy burden, he said: ‘We must get a lead for these, dear girl,’ and the Princess smiled.

  As they strolled to the hotel, the Baron said: ‘It is remarkable, don’t you think, that the Germans have not yet made their invasion of the British Isles?’ His tone suggested that it was not only remarkable but unfortunate. When Yakimov said nothing, the Baron went on: ‘Still, there are grave newses from England. They say that racing under Jockey Club rules has been given up. Clearly all is not well there.’ He turned appealingly to Yakimov. ‘Surely it is time to end this foolish disagreement between our great countries. You are a prince of old Russia: cannot you induce your English friends to turn their armours against the Soviets?’

  Yakimov looked as though he could, but did not feel he should. ‘Don’t want to start any more trouble, do we?’ he said. They had reached the red carpet and then he was able to change the subject. ‘Bit of a do on, I see.’

  ‘A reception given by the Iron Guard leaders,’ said Steinfeld. ‘An important occasion. Horia Sima is to be present.’

  The vestibule was banked with carnations, tuberoses and ferns. A notice informed the public that only ticket holders would be admitted to the main salon, which could be seen through the glass doors already very crowded. Hoping to identify himself with the occasion, Yakimov said: ‘I hear that my dear old friend Freddi von Flügel has been appointed Gauleiter in Cluj. He has asked me up to stay with him.’

  ‘Gauleiter? Indeed! A position of power,’ said Steinfeld, but the Princess was less impressed: ‘Surely,’ she said, ‘you are an Englishman? Is it correct, in time of war, to visit the enemy?’