But suddenly I didn’t feel like going there any more. I just wanted to be alone and to wander around in that sea of people, to walk around Kostelec in the afternoon heat and look at them, at those unshaven old men in rags, at those Greeks or Bulgarians or God knows what, at those dark-eyed and elegantly ragged Italians, at seedy-looking Frenchmen and reserved Dutchmen, at the girls of every shade in kerchiefs and rags, wretched, smiling, and dirty, at the endless waves of little Mongolians with their mute grins and the white SU on their backs – that’s what I really wanted to do. I wanted to stare at it all and be a part of it. But I also knew that I’d twice promised Benno that I’d be over and I couldn’t just not turn up. Christ, everything in my life always gets fouled up. Always. Every goddamn time. I always have to go somewhere else when I feel like staying where I am and I’ve always got to stay when it would be wonderful to go somewhere else. Something always turned up to make things come out wrong. But that was me. Me all over. Maybe I just wasn’t made for love or for happiness, for anything. I was just made to get through life somehow or other, to live it through and observe it and be a part of it, and to … But I didn’t know why else I’d been made except I knew there must be some other reason, that I had to be made for something more than just that, like for playing the saxophone, maybe. That was the best thing I could come up with but maybe there was something else, too, something even better. There had to be.
I crossed the railroad tracks and went past Dagmar Dreslerova’s house and saw her looking out the window, but I pretended I hadn’t seen her and walked right on past that block of apartment houses with all those hopeless little mica stars in the stucco and turned off towards the Manes house. I rang the bell at the garden gate. ‘Who’s there?’ said the mouthpiece. ‘Smiricky,’ I said, and the door buzzed and I went in and up the path and up the columned stairs to the front door. The path and the ground floor lay in the shadows of the apartment house next door, but the second and third floors basked in sunshine. It was a great place. Benno’s grandfather had built it, the millionaire Manes, about twenty years ago and it had lost none of the charm of the style of that time and it never left me with that feeling of showy luxury I got from the Heisers’s place. Maybe that was because I was so used to it. We’d often played there, either downstairs in the drawing room or up in Benno’s room which was plastered with pictures of Negro musicians and was next to Evka’s room with its big portrait of her painted by Rosta Pitterman. It was a great place. I went up the curving steps and opened the glass door. It was nice and cool in the drawing room. A potted palm stood at the bottom of the steps like at Heiser’s yet this one looked different and there were two wooden bears holding an umbrella rack. I was about to go upstairs to Benno’s room when the doors into the salon slid open and there stood Mrs Dvorackova, the old housekeeper.
‘Benno’s in the garden,’ she said.
‘Aha. Thank you,’ I said, and went into the salon. There was a piano in the little bay by the window. I went through the French doors on the right, through the dining room and out on to the sunporch which was drenched with light but not stuffy or hot. There sat Mrs Manesova and two of my Englishmen were sitting there in wicker chairs. The Englishmen – their jackets off, their green khaki shirts unbuttoned at the neck – looked very trim and clean as they sat there chatting in English with Mrs Manesova. Two siphons stood on the table and two bottles of pre-war whisky. I said hello and crossed the porch to the garden. There was Evka in a white silk bathing suit, playing ping-pong with one Englishman while another refereed. The ping-pong table was in the shade under a tree and Evka’s white bathing suit flashed brightly against the shadows. Three deck chairs had been set up out in the sun and there lay Benno, Helena, and another Englishman. Benno was in his bathing suit, too, and with his bulging belly and female-looking breasts he looked like a Buddha. A couple of beer bottles stood sweating on a little table. Helena, wearing a two-piece blue linen sunsuit, was sitting in the second deck chair and you could tell she must be pretty chubby, too. There was a little sausage roll of fat between where her halter ended and her shorts began, so I looked around again at Evka’s suntanned back and firm little fanny glistening in that silk bathing suit. The seam ran right down the middle so when Evka moved, each half glistened differently. The Englishman was sitting in his deck chair, smoking a pipe. He, too, had taken off his tie and unbuttoned his shirt. I walked over to the deck chairs.
‘Hi.’
‘Hi,’ said Benno.
‘Hello, Danny,’ said Helena.
The Englishman got up. ‘Good afternoon,’ he said.
‘Well, how are you? Enjoying yourself here?’
‘Very much.’
‘Good. I just came over to see how you were getting along. I’ve got to be going though.’
‘How come? Where to?’ said Benno.
‘Oh … I’ve got some things to do and … and I’ve got to pick up those snapshots Berty took on Sunday,’ I said with sudden inspiration.
‘Hell, he could’ve taken our pictures, too,’ said Benno. ‘Sit down.’
I stretched out on another deck chair opposite them. A long volley of clicks came from the ping-pong table. I stared at Evka. She turned around to pick up a ball and saw me.
‘Hello, Danny,’ she said gaily.
‘Hello. How do you like your Englishmen?’ I asked.
‘They’re wonderful,’ she grinned and, as she bent for the ball, I gazed down the top of her suit. Then she straightened up and turned and I went on staring at that two-piece fanny of hers.
‘Hey, you dummy!’ I heard Benno say. I realized he was talking to me. I looked over at him.
‘What?’
‘Can’t you take your eyes off her for a minute and listen to what I’m telling you?’
I laughed.
‘You’ve got a great sister, Benno. I envy you.’
Benno said nothing.
‘I mean it. Evka’s terrific.’
‘Yeah, but she’s awful dumb.’
‘Benny!’ said Helena.
‘She’s dumb and you know it.’
‘Well, but there’s no need to talk about it like that.’
‘Anyway, she’s terrific,’ I said. ‘She really is, Benno. I’m serious. Isn’t she beautiful?’ I said, turning to the Englishman. I must have broken some chain of thought because he sat up with a jerk and, quickly and without thinking, said, ‘I beg your pardon?’
‘Isn’t she beautiful?’ I repeated, nodding at Evka. The Englishman beamed.
‘I’ll say she is!’ he said in ardent agreement, then started watching Evka, too.
‘See, you fool?’ I said to Benno. ‘Even foreigners appreciate her.’
‘All right, all right,’ said Benno. ‘I guess you’ve heard that the SS are supposed to get here tomorrow?’
‘What?’
‘The SS.’
‘Who said?’
‘They got word over at the brewery from Schörkenau. Somebody phoned. The old man told us.’
‘What’s going on, anyway?’
‘Well, the German Army’s on the run but the rear guard units are SS divisions. And they’re still fighting the Russians.’
‘Jesus.’
‘We’re really going to be in for it then.’
‘You think they’ll get all the way to Kostelec?’
‘Why not?’
‘Well, you don’t think maybe the Russians’ll finish them off first.’
‘I wouldn’t count on it.’
‘Yeah … well, maybe we’ll see some action around here after all.’
‘That we will.’
Neither of us said anything for a while. Then I said, ‘What’s your old man say about it?’
‘He’s scared shitless.’
‘Benny!’ Helena piped up automatically.
‘He’s scared, like everybody else.’
‘You think the army’s going to do anything?’ I asked, saying the word ‘army’ sarcastically.
‘Why do you th
ink they’re calling up everybody tomorrow?’
‘Yeah. Right,’ I said, and a chill ran down my spine. SS men! It was cool there in the garden with Evka bouncing around on the grass in her white bathing suit. So now things were really going to start happening. And suddenly I didn’t want it to happen.
‘What’re you going to do?’ I asked.
‘I’ll go over to the brewery tomorrow. Not much choice.’
‘I guess not,’ I said. We sat there, silent. ‘Jesus Christ,’ I said after a while.
Again we sat there in depressed silence. Then Benno reached over for a litre bottle of beer, snapped back the cap, and poured the beer into three glasses on the table.
‘Have some,’ he said to me and handed one of the glasses to the Englishman.
‘Thank you,’ said the Englishman. We drank. The beer was warm but tasted good anyway. I drank off about half the glass in one gulp, then set it back on the table. Benno was still drinking. His Adam’s apple bobbed rhythmically and he tipped the bottom of the glass up to the sky. We fell silent again, then finally I said, ‘Well, I guess I better be going,’ and got up.
‘Don’t go yet,’ said Benno.
‘I’ve got to. I’ve got to do some things and I want to get a good night’s sleep.’
‘Well, then off you go.’
‘You’ll be there in the morning?’
‘Yes.’
‘What time?’
‘Stop at Haryk’s. I’ll meet you over there.’
‘What time should I be there?’
‘Around eight.’
‘All right,’ I said. I said good-bye to the Englishman and he sat up straight in his chair again and said good-bye, and I shook hands with Helena and Benno. Then I called out, ‘ ’Bye, Evka.’
She turned and stepped into the sunshine.
‘ ’Bye, Danny. Come back again,’ she said. That warmed my heart. I thought yes, definitely, I will come back. In the sunshine, all her lovely curves radiated a dazzling whiteness. I made a V-for-Victory sign and the Englishmen grinned.
‘See you later, boys,’ I said. I went through the house and down the sandy path out to the gate. This SS business really got on my nerves. But I shook my head to clear it and felt fine again. I knew Evka was in her white bathing suit in the garden behind me and that Irena wasn’t far away either in the County Office Building. The whole town was full of girls. And I knew I’d be coming back to the Maneses tomorrow or the day after or a couple of days anyway. And soon it would be summer and we’d all be going to the swimming pool. Then I remembered Mitzi. Life wasn’t so bad after all. Even if there wasn’t anything but that – and there wasn’t – life would be worth it. To hell with the SS. And maybe up in the mountains this summer or walking together through Prague, maybe Irena would give in, maybe I’d win her over yet. Or maybe I’d meet that unknown girl after all. Maybe life really wasn’t so bad. Then I remembered Berty and suddenly felt I had to have those snapshots. As if my life depended on them. So I could show off in front of Irena. So I could see how I looked with a gun. Snapshots were terrific. All they showed was what you could see in the picture – no words, no nothing, just the picture with nothing to get in the way. Pictures of girls always made a tremendous impression. If a guy shows some girl’s picture around, it’s kind of like a trophy, even if maybe he never got anywhere with the girl at all. It doesn’t make any difference. All he needs to do is let his friends take a look at a couple of pictures and put on a mysterious look. His friends will take care of the rest. They probably know there isn’t much to it and how it really is with girls’ snapshots, how easy it is to get one, but they’ll never let on because they like to show their pictures around, too, and it makes a guy feel good, a bit as if he’d really made out with all those girls whose pictures he had and that’s a very nice feeling. And that’s just how it was with that picture of me with the submachine gun. Nobody would know from my picture that they’d taken my gun away afterwards. I went through the park to Zizka Square and hurried through the underpass and took a short cut along the railroad embankment to Berty’s place. The side streets weren’t so crowded, but when I turned off into the ghetto, I came up against a whole herd of ragged people milling around the synagogue. A truck loaded with blankets stood parked at the curb and four guys were busily unloading the blankets and carrying them into the synagogue. Moutelik’s gleaming white apartment house stood at the corner, but their shop was closed. I went into their place and started up the stairs to the first floor. Through the stained-glass windows on the staircase which depicted various scenes of merchant life, the light streaming in from outside painted bright pictures on the yellow walls. I stopped to look at some of the figures – the half-naked Mercury and a muscular blacksmith – and suddenly thought of Mr Moutelik himself who looked just like a billiard ball with a belly. I met Helena Reimanova on the stairs. She was wearing her tennis dress and the colours from the windows made pretty patterns as they poured over her. I rang the doorbell at the Mouteliks. Their aged maid opened the door and told me that Berty was in the darkroom. I went back downstairs and rang the bell at the back entrance to the shop. After a while Berty’s brother Emil came to the door and let me in.
‘Hi,’ I said. ‘Is Berty downstairs?’
‘Yeah,’ he said and went back to his toys and puppet theatres. I saw he’d been taking apart some kind of a little machine; it was spread out all over the counter. I opened the door to the cellar and turned on the light. I went down the steps and came to a narrow little passageway between piles of crates and sacks and bundles. A lightbulb shed a little light from the ceiling. I headed through the yellow gloom to the back where Berty had fixed up his darkroom. It was kind of a booth made out of beaverboard and covered with black paper. A sign hung on the door: NO ADMITTANCE. I knocked.
‘Just a second!’ someone called from inside and you could hear a rustle of papers and the clap of boxes being shut. Then Berty opened the door. He was wearing a black smock.
‘Oh, hello. You came for your pictures?’ he said, and he bared his teeth at me like he did for customers in his father’s store.
‘Yeah. Are they ready?’
‘Sure. Would you like to see them?’
‘Well, if you’ll show me – sure.’
I went inside. It was a tiny little room with a work table on which the enlarger stood and three basins for developing fluid, the fixing bath, and water. Over the table there was a shelf for bottles and boxes and, over the shelf, three lightbulbs: one white, one red, and one green. A little cupboard stood against the wall on the left. Berty opened the cupboard and took out an envelope. The light of the low lamp on his work table, angling up from below, threw huge shadows on the opposite wall of the darkroom.
‘Here you are,’ said Berty. ‘Come over here.’
We went over to the table and Berty spread out the snapshots. There were six of them – exactly the number I’d ordered. I looked at them. They were excellent pictures. Grey and sombre. You could tell the weather had been bad that day. There I stood with my submachine gun, my hair slanting down over my forehead a little. The submachine gun itself came out so clear you could almost count the screws and it had a real metallic sheen. I inspected the gun first and then myself – standing there in the foreground in just the right posture. Behind me and a little off to one side, you could see Benda with his submachine gun and fireman’s helmet and Franta Kocandrle’s back with a rifle slung across it. Over my left shoulder the long pale pins of a couple of bazookas jutted up. The background was a grey blur but I stood out sharp and clear against it, and I looked just like I really do and with the hair in my eyes and that submachine gun in my hands I looked pretty impressive. I don’t think I’d ever seen a better snapshot of me – not even the one showing me with my saxophone because a professional photographer had taken that one and he’d practically flattened us with all his spotlights so we all wound up looking as if we’d never seen our instruments before in our lives. This picture was worlds better. It mad
e a strong impression. Berty was an artist. Or at least he had a marvellous camera. Actually, I guess it was the camera that counted. Anyway, the pictures were great.
‘Very nice, Berty,’ I said.
‘They came out pretty good, didn’t they? Actually, I had to lighten it a bit at the edges but nobody’s going to notice that.’
‘I can’t even see it myself. No. They’re great. How much do I owe you?’
‘Well, the charge for postcard-size pictures is two crowns and I’ll throw in the developing free so that would make it twelve crowns altogether.’
I took out my wallet and handed him the money. When it came to money, Berty had no friends.
‘Well, thanks very much,’ I said.
‘You’re quite welcome,’ Berty said, flashing his best salesman’s smile. ‘If it’s nice tomorrow, we might try a few more over at the brewery. Will you be there?’
‘Sure. It looks like you may have an awfully busy day tomorrow.’
‘I took nearly one hundred and fifty pictures today,’ he said with a satisfied smile.
‘Really?’
‘Yes. Refugees. Some day those pictures may be very valuable.’
‘I’m sure they will be,’ I said, remembering Mr Machacek’s history. Those pictures would be a real goldmine for him! ‘You know they’re expecting the SS to get here tomorrow?’
The Cowards Page 26