Monumental Propaganda (25 page)

60

The next day they went running again, ate, went out walking, and in the evening he took her to his room to finish off the Izabella and showed her an album of newspaper materials, including several interviews with him, three large articles and a huge number of small clippings. One of the articles was entitled “The Peaceful Workdays of a War Hero,” the second was titled “On the Approaches” and the third was “Nobody Is Forgotten, Nothing Is Forgotten”—the general's reminiscences about his fallen comrades, including Seryoga Zhukov. But the clippings were mostly announcements of various different meetings, gatherings, receptions and other solemn ceremonies in which General Burdalakov had participated, where his name stood alongside others, some of them important and famous.

They sat and drank their wine, reminisced about the war, talked about their illnesses, about the disruption of the balance of nature, about the indecent way young people behaved: walking down the street with their arms around each other, in shorts and sleeveless sarafans, bathing on the beach in clothes so skimpy they might as well go completely naked.

“And abroad,” said Fyodor Fyodorovich, “there are actually beaches where men and women go bathing in their birthday suits without feeling embarrassed of each other at all.”

As he spoke about this, he frowned and spat.

And then at last came the moment to which the relationship between Aglaya and the general had been inescapably leading. As if by accident, the general put his hand on her knee and turned his face to look away. She shuddered, froze and turned her face to look in the opposite direction.

“And the weather nowadays,” the general said, “keeps getting more and more unpredictable.”

“Yes,” she agreed monosyllabically.

“You should never eat mushrooms under any circumstances,” he said, and suddenly, without the slightest transition, he threw himself on her with the same frenzied energy with which, perhaps, he had taken Berlin. He threw her down on her back, dived under her skirt and grabbed hold of the elastic of her panties. Not anticipating such an impetuous attack, she instinctively began to resist. She thrust both her hands against the prickly top of his head and pushed hard against it, and at that very moment, the way these things happen not only in the movies, but also in real life, there was a loud knock on the door. He took fright and instantly recoiled in panic. He looked at Aglaya, then at the table, with all the food and drink that hadn't been eaten or drunk yet. There was nothing unnatural or illegal in the situation, especially since they were both supposedly free people. But they weren't free people; they were Soviet people, raised from their childhood in the awareness that their every desire could be instantly discovered, discussed, condemned and punished. In this particular case their travel warrants might be taken away, they could be thrown out of the sanatorium, exposed in the satirical journal
Crocodile,
threatened with a personal hearing or excluded from the Party, which for him would be a catastrophe, and for her . . . Well actually, for her it wouldn't mean a thing, but she was scared too.

And so when someone began knocking on the door, the general began hurriedly putting the table in order, and she bounded away from him toward the opposite wall, hastily adjusted her skirt and began gazing out of the window, as though that was why she had come here, to admire the evening view from someone else's window. Finally, Fyodor Fyodorovich went to the door, half-opened it and saw the concierge Polina, a fashion-conscious little lady with big breasts tautly restrained by a jersey sweater. She was holding a piece of paper.

“Message for you,” she said, and glanced into the room.

“Thank you,” said the general, attempting to block her view with his body, spreading his arms as though he was trying to fly.

“Do you need me to tidy your room?” asked Polina, trying to get a glimpse of something, if only under his armpit.

“What are you waiting for?” he asked.

“Are you going to write an answer or not?”

“I don't know yet.” Fyodor Fyodorovich suddenly remembered he wasn't a little boy, but a general, and a widower to boot; he was within his rights, he hadn't done anything reprehensible and it was nobody else's business what he was getting up to. “I'll read the note,” he said sharply, “and if necessary I'll call you. And if there's no need . . .” He pondered and, unable to think of a better way to continue, concluded: “If there's no need, I won't call you.”

He slammed the door in the concierge's face and went back to the little table, where his glasses were lying, muttering something under his breath. He picked up his glasses, read the note, and called to her: “Aglaya Stepanovna!”

She turned around and walked over to him, still confused and worried. He handed her the note without speaking.

“Can I use your glasses?” she asked, a little embarrassed that her eyesight also required support, then read, “Fedka, I'm in Novorossiisk, come immediately. L. Brezhnev.”

“And will you go?” she asked.

He looked at her in amazement, and she realized that she'd asked a dumb question.

Less than a quarter of an hour later General Burdalakov, in full dress uniform complete with decorations, gold shoulder straps and brocade belt, with a long greatcoat thrown over everything else, a tall Caucasian hat on his head, his briefcase in one hand and his standard in the other— just in case—went downstairs to the government Seagull limousine that was waiting for him.

61

The reason for General Burdalakov's being summoned so urgently was that the general secretary of the Central Committee of the CPSU, L. I. Brezhnev, being in Novorossiisk, had decided to celebrate his sixty-third birthday in the company of his wartime comrades. Leonid Ilich was born on December 19, just two days short of Stalin's birthday.

Having received such an unexpected invitation, Burdalakov began wondering frantically what he could give the important birthday boy for his special day, remembered the dagger, picked it up and hesitated: Should he give him this or not? The inscription on the blade worried him a lot. But since the general had nothing more suitable with him (and how could you give anything unsuitable to a man like this?), he put the dagger in his briefcase anyway—and set off.

It was already late evening when the general's car passed through the green gates with red stars that had opened before it and drove into the grounds of the government dacha not far from Novorossiisk. Once inside the gates, the car halted immediately. A duty officer in a waterproof cape that concealed his shoulder straps approached the general and requested him to show his documents. A full moon hung above the grounds of the dacha, shining so brightly you could read a book by it. And in addition, there was a spotlight by the gates. But the officer also switched on his pocket flashlight, checked the photograph against the face and asked: “Was this taken a long time ago?”

“Why, do I look older?” Burdalakov asked coquettishly.

“Your I.D. needs renewing,” the officer said, and asked his next question. “Are you carrying a weapon?”

“Of course not!” Burdalakov assured him. “Where would I get a weapon?”

“And what's in the briefcase?”

“Ah, in the briefcase!” Burdalakov began fussing with the locks, trying to open them. “There's nothing in the briefcase. What could there be in the briefcase? A change of underclothes, socks . . . Ah yes!” He remembered at the very moment when the briefcase came open. “There's that as well. You see, that . . . In there.”

“Give it here!” The officer's hand dived into the briefcase and grabbed hold of the dagger. He stuck his flashlight in his pocket without turning it off and drew the dagger out of its sheath. He looked closely at Burdalakov. “You said you had no weapons.”

“But that's not a weapon,” Burdalakov objected. “What kind of weapon is that?”

“Then what is it?”

“This?” asked Burdalakov, the way he used to answer the teacher who asked him questions in class when he was a child. The teacher would point to the Kamchatka Peninsula on a big map and ask: “What's this?” And in reply the young Burdalakov would ask: “This?” Hoping that a hint would fall from the heavens. He asked the very same question now.

“Surely this is a weapon?” the officer asked.

“No, it isn't,” said the general, becoming even more flustered, “it's not a weapon at all, it's a birthday present for Leonid Ilich.”

Another officer came over, evidently with a higher rank, but that was also concealed under a waterproof cape. He asked what the problem was. The first officer explained. The second officer took the dagger, began inspecting it and asked curiously: “What does ‘Killer of enemies' friends' savior' mean?”

“I don't know that myself,” the general said ingratiatingly. “Maybe it's just a turn of phrase, or a Georgian folk saying. It's an old dagger.”

“Yes, I can see it wasn't made today,” said the soldier, and sighed for some reason. Then he thought a bit longer and said: “I tell you what, Comrade General, you leave this item with us, we'll look into things and get it back to you safe and sound.”

“But no later than tomorrow morning,” Burdalakov cautioned him.

“No later than that,” the soldier agreed. “Perhaps even this evening.”

And he saluted, allowing the car to proceed.

The main dacha was a separate structure of white stone with columns, standing on top of the bluff running down to the sea, and there were several more modest cottages scattered here and there around the grounds. As Burdalakov was getting out of the car, a maid—or a “nanny,” as they called them here—came running over to him, a woman about fifty years old, wearing glasses, with a tall hairstyle, looking like some high-class lady from the movies about prerevolutionary Russia.

“My name's Aunty Pasha,” she said, although she was better suited to be the general's niece. She took the briefcase from him and led him to a room on the second floor.

It was quite a good room, with a large wooden bed, a Record television and a washbasin.

“You'll have breakfast tomorrow in the main building, supper's already over, but I brought you that”—she pointed to the bedside table—“some goulash, cheese pancakes and kefir. There's tea in the corridor, in the big urn.”

“And conveniences in the yard?” asked Burdalakov, not attempting to conceal his disappointment.

“Why no,” Aunty Pasha reassured him. “On the first floor. As you go downstairs, it's the second door on the left. And the next door is the shower room.”

And taking the three-ruble note he gave her, she left.

Feeling tired after his journey, the general didn't eat any supper; he opened up the bed, took off his uniform and put on his pajamas. He thought about going out to relieve himself but changed his mind. The washbasin was high and he had to hike himself up on tiptoe. Perhaps because a helicopter flew over the roof just at that moment, the general didn't hear the door creak, and when he heard someone clear his throat and looked around, he was overcome by such terrible embarrassment he wanted to disappear through the floor. Standing there in a civilian suit with a large number of decorations pinned to it, smiling with his hands held behind his back, was Leonid Ilich Brezhnev.

“Oh!” Burdalakov said, mortified, as he hastily concealed the offending weapon. “I'm sorry . . . I was just . . .”

“Don't worry about it,” said Ilich. “Everybody does it. As the saying goes: ‘Only a fink doesn't piss in the sink.'” He brought his hands out from behind his back, and Burdalakov saw his dagger in one of them. Brezhnev put the dagger on the table and clasped Burdalakov in his arms, slapping him at length on the back and mumbling about how glad he was to see him.

“I'm so glad, honestly I am, genuinely glad!”

“I'm very glad too,” said Burdalakov.

“But of course you're glad, that's what your rank requires,” Brezhnev joked, “but my gladness is worth more. And I'm glad to see you because I value front-line friendship. Here in Russia, when you occupy a high position, everyone seems to love you with an undying love and you can never tell who really loves you and who's just toadying. But our friendship's been tried in the fire, as the saying goes. I see you're not getting any fatter. Are you on a diet or something?”

“I go running, Leonid Ilich. And I advise you to try it. Every morning forty minutes of jogging till the second sweat, and you won't have any— begging your pardon—tummy at all.”

“Tummy!” Brezhnev repeated. “That's not a tummy, it's a brute of a belly. A working man's callus, as the saying goes. Only when can I go running, eh? And another thing, if I start to run, an entire platoon of security guards will set off after me. What I came to see you about was this. My head of security brought it to me. He's been vigilant ever since last year's attack. ‘Just to be on the safe side,' he said, ‘we confiscated it from the general.' Well, I tore him off a strip or two. I told him: ‘My friend brought me this, not Charlotte Corday.' I can guess what you brought it for.”

“You're right,” said Burdalakov. “Only I wanted it to be a surprise . . .”

“It can't be helped,” said Brezhnev with a shrug. “We'll have to do without surprises. I had a good look at it already. It's a valuable piece.”

Making no attempt to deny that it was valuable, Burdalakov told Brezhnev who it had belonged to before.

“Yermolov?” Brezhnev repeated respectfully. “Well I never!” Covetous of everything that glittered and never having assuaged this desire, he stroked the flat of the dagger's blade tenderly. “As we say back home in Ukraine: You can tell when you get your hands on the real thing. And just look at that tiger! Frightening! Rrrrrrr!” He growled at the tiger and laughed happily at his own joke.

Touched by his present, Leonid Ilich hugged the general, slapped him on the back and promised him the dagger would take its place on the wall of his dacha among the valuable exhibits of his weapon collection. At the same time his attention was caught by the strange inscription: KILLER OF ENEMIES' FRIENDS' SAVIOR. What's that? What does that mean? How are you supposed to understand that? Does it mean you have to kill the savior of your enemies' friends?”

“I've been puzzling my head over that, Leonid Ilich, but I simply can't figure it out.”

“Perhaps it means that if you can kill the person who shelters your enemies' friends, then they'll turn against him . . . But no,” the general secretary of the Central Committee of the CPSU contradicted himself, “no, I think this means something else. You know what, this is a Georgian dagger, isn't it? Let's take it over to my place and find the Georgian minister of the interior and ask him, he ought to know. Come in your pajamas. Just put your coat on and we'll go.”

The moon hung overhead like an illumination flare; there was a pale light emanating from the neon streetlamps. The entire space that was open to view appeared to be absolutely deserted, but appearances were deceptive—there were secret service agents concealed behind almost every bush.

“A full moon again,” said Brezhnev, disgruntled. “I used to love the full moon, but not anymore. Ever since the Americans landed on it, I can't bear the sight of it. I even think I can see them crawling around up there, like cockroaches.”

“It bothers me a different way,” said Burdalakov. “I remember the war. I have to go out on reconnaissance, but there's a moon. Galls me so at times, I want to shoot it down with an antiaircraft gun.”

There was no need to look for the Georgian minister. He was in the foyer of the main building, playing chess with his adviser, a long-legged man with a mustache.

“Ah, Edward!” Brezhnev exclaimed happily. “You're just the man we need.”

Brezhnev showed the minister the dagger, pointed out the inscription and asked him what it could mean. The minister turned the dagger over in his hands and passed it on to his adviser. He looked at it, ran his thumb-nail along the sharp edge and commented that it was damask steel, then he looked at the name of the steel-smith.

“Oho!” he said. “It's a genuine Meladze.”

“Who?” asked Brezhnev.

“Otar Meladze, a famous weapon-maker. In Georgia we used to call him the Stradivarius of the armory.”

When he heard that, General Burdalakov began to think he might have been a little too hasty with his present. But he consoled himself with the calculation that for a present like that he might even receive a third star for his shoulder straps.

“Ha-ha,” Brezhnev laughed, “I'm beginning to feel like Oistrakh.”

“Why Oistrakh?” asked Edward the minister. “You're our Paganini.”

“That's going too far,” said the leader, lowering his eyes shamefacedly, but it was obvious that he was pleased by the comparison. “But what does this inscription mean?” he asked the adviser.

“Well, I think . . .” the adviser said, and began thinking hard. “I think there's an apostrophe instead of a comma here. It should say: ‘Killer of enemies—comma—friends' savior.' Remember Pasternak's line: ‘Victory— comma—defeat distinguish ye not.'”

“Aha!” said Brezhnev. “So it's really all very simple.”