“Which people?”
“Anyone you like. We could go to the Kryekurts’, They usually know what’s really going on.”
“You’re right. Let’s get dressed and go,”
“Don’t be ridiculous! It’s far too early. If we don’t watch out, people will be suspicious,”
“Yes, I suppose so. We don’t want to attract attention.”
They didn’t start out for the Kryekurts. place until after ten o’clock, but when they got there they saw they needn’t have worried about being too early. Apart from frequent visitors like Hava Preza and Musabelli, they found Lucas Alarupi, Mark and his fiancée already there. Alarupi was the former owner of what was once a little soap factory; it had now expanded to produce washing machines, shampoo and tooth-paste. Mark had the day off, as the concert that evening had been cancelled.
“Cancelled?” said Ekrem, as if to check he’d heard aright.
“Yes,” said Hava Preza. “No need to ask why.”
“It’s a good sign, I suppose,” said Hava Fortuzi.
“On the way here I saw a lot of official cars going towards the Chinese embassy, no doubt to offer condolences,’ said one of the others.
“I told you so,” whispered Hava Fortuzi to her husband. “The concert’s cancelled, the officials are going to register their condolences at the embassy… It’s going to be all right!”
Ekrem tossed his head and gazed at the shiny, sallow face of Lucas Alarupi. He’d heard a lot about him, and wondered why he was out visiting on a day like this. He must be a mine of information.
“Do you often come here?” Ekrem asked him, while the others went on with the general conversation. “I’ve been wanting to meet you for a long time.”
“I don’t go out very much,” answered the other. “We’re swamped with work, especially now, when we’re just coming up to the end of the quarter. And as well as production there are the committee meetings at Party headquarters, and socialist endeavour, and cultural activities, and all sorts of other things which may seem less important but which need a lot of attention. Eunning a factory involves a lot of problems, especially now, after the decisions taken at the last plenum of the Central Committee.”
Ekrem’s wife goggled, then looked round at the others as if to say, “Just listen to him!” She felt like shouting, “What’s all this about Party meetings and socialist endeavour? You’re jest a yesterday’s man like the rest of us I They don’t let you anywhere near your old factory let alone consult you about their problems! But Hava Preza gave her a look, and Ekrem nudged her, so she didn’t say anything.
“Well,” said Hava Preza to break the silence. “So you’ve got plenty to do and plenty of worries?”
“Of course,’ said Alarupi tonelessly. “As I said, carrying out the plan is only one of our problems. We also have to meet people with new ideas, evaluate pilot experiments, and so on. It sounds easy, but it takes a lot of doing.”
“He may be crazy himself,” Ekrem’s wife whispered to him, “but I don’t understand how the rest of you put up with his maunderings.“
“Ssh,” he said.
“But he’s in the same boat as we are, isn’t he? If not worse! No job, downgraded socially. So what’s all this about endeavour and committees?”
“I know, I know,” Ekrem answered, “But he believes, and wants to make other people believe, that things are back to what they were before …”
“But how …?”
The fact was, Alarupi had started to entertain this delusion when he heard that in China former factory owners had been made assistant managers of what had been their own firms, and were even allowed a share in the profits,
“I’ve always said that’s the most fantastic thing that ever happened, even in China,” said Ekrem’s wife.
“When it was announced he became a new man. It knocked him completely off-balance, and he started to spend all his time hanging round the factory. It’s his whole life. His briefcase is full of press cuttings about it, and graphs about the progress of the plan. At home he’s got a whole collection of wall newspapers, citations for workers’ awards, and so on. When things at the factory go badly he’s quite ill. If the Party criticizes it, he can’t sleep. In short, it’s the only thing he lives for.”
“Poor man!”
“Of course, he never forgets to calculate his share of the profits,”
“There you are!”
“Of course! What did you think?”
Hava Fortezi’ could -scarcely keep from laughing.
“Even so, he must be completely ga-ga.”
“Perhaps. I’d say he’s typical of our age - just an extreme example. Perhaps the most extreme in all…”
“In all Europe?” she interrupted.
“Maybe …What are you looking at me like that for?”
How else? Hadn’t she told herself only a few hours ago that her husband must be the only person in Europe to weep for Mao Zedong? And now here was another, hardly less extravagant oddity. What an age we live in, she thought. Ever since she’d left her youth behind, she’d always thought the world was going to the dogs. But she hadn’t expected it to go as fast as this!
“He’s a hybrid,” said Ekrem, continuing his whispered conversation with his wife. “A capitalist-communist hermaphrodite.”
“A loony, anyhow,” she answered. “I’d like to throw a bucket of water over him to bring him to his senses,”
“But why? He’s probably quite happy as he is,”
“Yes, dreaming! But we’re awake! Why should we have to suffer his nonsense, and without an anaesthetic!”
“It’s not his fault,” said Ekrem. “And anyway, perhaps it’s not just a dream. Perhaps it’s an omen, a sign of things to come!”
“No chance! It’s too late now for wool-gathering!”
At that she caught Hava Preza’s eye, which had been fixed on her reproachfully for some time because of the Fortuzis’ lengthy private parleyings.
Lucas Alarupi hadn’t noticed anything. He was still droning on.
“A fortnight ago we had a very good meeting with the star workers about exchanging jobs. We haven’t done so well with socialist endeavour, though, I'm sorry to say. The Party’s going to have something to say about that. Still, we can only do our best…”
People were surreptitiously shaking their heads. It was incredible to hear such talk in this room of all places. I wouldn’t have come if I’d known, thought Ekrem’s wife.
“But what do you say about what’s happened now?” Ekrem asked the former factory owner, trying to stem the flow, “Will Mao’s death change anything?’’
The other man shrugged,
“Difficult to say,” he answered. “It all depends on the struggle between the two factions that all the radio stations are talking about, Well have to see which side wins,’
“I wasn’t talking about China,’ said Ekrem, “I wonder what’s going to happen here,’
“Precisely …” Alarupi began.
“There’s no telling,” Hava Preza interrupted. “Some people say Mao did all he could to prevent relations between China and Albania deteriorating. Some say he did his best to undermine them,”
“What? Ill never believe such a thing!” protested Ekrem,
“Time will tell”
While they were exchanging theories about this, they heard the sound of a car drawing up outside.
“It’s the man upstairs,’ said Emilie, pointing to the ceiling.
“They’re worried. He looks very down to me,” said Hava Preza, who’d been peering out of the window.
“Let’s hope nothing awful’s going to happen.”
Then they heard footsteps going down the staks, and the sound of the car driving off.
Mark and his fiancée listened lethargically to the rest of them as they went on with their discussion. The girl’s grey eyes grew darker.
““Il fait froid,” she whispered to Mark, looking him straight in the eye.
He
was anxious to go into the other room, too. From there these debates and reminiscences sounded like an echo from another world, forming a mere background to their amorous exchanges.
“In a moment,’ he whispered. “Wait just a bit longer.”
Emilie served coffee, and they all sipped solemnly, still talking about Mao’s death. Every so often their eyes would turn to where the portrait of old Nerihan looked down at them from the wall
“Il fait froid,” murmured the girl again”.
Then without a word she and Mark both stood up, not looking at anything in particular. When they were in the other room she was silent for a while, then flung herself into his arms, shivering not from cold but from a feeling of emptiness and some other, indefinable sensation.
“God, is it always going to be like this?” she sighed.
It was not a sigh of despair, or of joy; nor did it signify any expectation either of better or worse. It was more like a question containing something of all those feelings. Would she always have to make love like this, amid whisperings about some foreign country (this was usually the subject of the conversations they could hear through the wall), and echoes of another woman saying "Il fait froid” during another winter?
“Perhaps,” he answered faintly. Neither of them could decide whether they liked things as they were, or if they dreamed of a better world together.
Silva was late getting to the office, and when she did arrive she asked if she could leave early to go with Gjergj to the airport.
“Is he going away again?’ asked her boss. “Where to?”
“Where do you think?” said Silva, “China,”
“I presume it’s got to do with Mao’s death?”
“I suppose so.”
Linda was following all this with bated breath.
“You spend your life at the airport,” she said to Silva when the boss had gone out of the room.
“Do you know who I saw there the last time? I forgot to tell yoe at the time, I saw Victor Hila’s chinaman, with his foot in plaster!”
“Really?”
Linda felt herself blushing, and didn't know how to hide it. As for Silva, she was troubled too, at the thought that her friend might ask her what she’d been doing at the airport.
Bet at that point the boss came back and their conversation was interrupted.
At eleven o’clock Silva said goodbye to both her colleagues and left the office. When she got home, Gjergj wasn’t yet back from the foreign ministry, and after wandering around for a bit she sat down on the settee in the sitting room, her hands clasped in her lap. Then she remembered how her mother used to say it brought bad luck to sit with your hands like that, and she hastily unclasped them. She wished Gjergj weren’t going on this trip. For two, perhaps three weeks the apartment would seem silent and empty without him, and the life she and Brikena led there alone would seem very dreary. Then she told herself she was being unfair: the separation would be much worse for him than for them.
There was a ring at the bell, and she hurried to open the door. It was Gjergj.
“How did it go?” she asked.
He gave her a look that seemed to say, “What a question!” She noticed he was carrying his briefcase, and realised that her secret hope that the trip might be cancelled at the last minute had been in vain.
“Let’s go,” he said. “I’m a bit late.”
They hardly spoke on the way to the airport, Silva gazed at the wet road and the heaps of rotting leaves on either side. What awful weather to die in, she thought.
The airport was full of Chinese with their eyes full of tears. She saw Skënder Bermema’s wife waving at her from a little way off.
“What are you doing here?” Silva asked, going over.
“I’m waiting for Skënder. He’s coming home today. What about you?”
“Just the opposite,” said Silva, looking to see if her husband had got through the customs yet. “Gjergj is leaving.”
“Really? He’ll probably fly out on the plane Skënder flies in on.’’
“Perhaps. Frankly, I’m not very keen on this trip!”
Skënder’s wife didn’t know what to say to that. They looked at one another for a moment, their smiles fading, though their sympathy did not.
Gjergj reappeared, and they all chatted quite cheerfully for a bit about the coincidence, but Silva couldn’t quite conceal her uneasiness.
“You shouldn’t harbour such thoughts,” Gjergj teased. “I know it’s because the trip’s connected with a death, but the coffin isn’t going to be on our plane, you know!”
“Thank goodness for that at least!” Silva exclaimed.
“The plane’s late,” said Skënder Bermema’s wife, looking at her watch. “It ought to have landed some time ago.”
She was looking less animated now, as if she’d suddenly realized that while the other two were joking about anxiety, it was she who now had the right to be feeling worried.
“It’s a beastly night,” said Gjergj. “No wonder the plane’s late. Why don’t we have a coffee or something?”
They found a table and ordered coffee, A female voice announced that the plane had been delayed by bad weather, but would be arriving in ten minutes. The whole place began to stir. Some people got up from their tables and went over to the window to watch the plane land.
In due course the plane emerged heavily from the clouds. The interval between the time when the wheels touched down on the landing strip and the moment the aircraft came to a halt outside the terminal seemed endless. The passengers started coming down the gangway. Most of them were Chinese, and as they came nearer you could see their eyes were red with weeping. They must have heard about Mao’s death during the flight.
“Look, there he is!” cried Skënder’s wife, waving, though he was still a long way off.
“Yes!” said Silva. “He’s with the other chap …”
Skënder Bermema kissed his wife several times. The tenderest kisses are those of husbands returning from China, thought Silva, Through the noisy crowd that had come to greet the travellers, she saw that C— V— had a bruise on his cheek. It seemed to puzzle his friends, who were evidently asking him how he came by it. She was tempted to ask the same question. But a second or two later she had forgotten all about it.
Silva got home at about three o’clock. Brikena had put the lunch on, and was waiting.
“Did Father get off all right?” she asked.
“Yes.”
Brikena was clearly disappointed that they hadn’t taken her with them to the airport. After a moment she said:
“Uncle Arian phoned,’’
“Did he? What for?”
Brikena shrugged.
“Did he sound all right?”
“I think so. He wanted to speak to Father. Perhaps to wish him bon voyage,”
“I expect so,” said Silva, feeling relieved.
They ate almost in silence. The apartment seemed unnaturally quiet. While Brikena did the washing up, Silva wandered round the rooms, not knowing what to do with herself. Usually, when Gjergj went away on a mission, she and Brikena embarked on some kind of work in the house that couldn’t easily be done except when he wasn’t there, such as washing the curtains or remaking the mattresses. But this time Silva didn’t feel like doing anything like that. She wasn’t even tempted by the big trunk in which she kept family possessions that had been passed down from generation to generation. Often, when Gjergj was away, she and her daughter would spend hours poring over bits of embroidery, the white dress and tiara which three generations of Krasniqi brides had been married in, and innumerable other mementos.
Silva went out on the balcony; walked along between the clotheslines, with their multi-coloured plastic pegs waiting for the sheets to be hung out to dry; and had a look at the lemon tree. But she couldn’t take any interest in the lemon tree either. She realized that the date for spraying it with insecticide was long past. She sighed. All the tedious things one was supposed to bother with??
?
She went back inside. Brikena was crouching down by the book. case in the living room. She felt a day like this called for some unusual occupation, and as her mother hadn’t said anything about the trunk or the mattresses, she’d, decided to look at some of the family albums. Silva sat down quietly beside her and watched. Brikena’s fingers looked more slender than usual, perhaps because of the care with which she was turning the pages. Silva thought of all the things they might be doing: seeing to the curtains or, the mattresses, admiring ancient embroidery. But a voice inside her told her to leave the afternoon as it was: empty. Perhaps it would find some way of filling itself.
15
EVERY EVENING SINCE Gjergj had gone away, Silva waited impatiently for the television news to see what was happening in China. But it was all very confused. They usually began with various speculations about what was going to be done with Mao’s remains. Some people said the body was going to be embalmed, others disagreed, and the commentators tried to link what was going to happen to the corpse with whether or not the Maoist line was still going to be followed in China. But it was obvious that all these generalities represented merely a transition to less important items of news, so when Silva heard the presenter talk of a “confused situation” and a “state of uncertainty”, she stopped listening for a while and used the interval to ask Brikena:
“Did anyone call from the foreign ministry?”
“No,” said her daughter.
Never had any of Gjergj’s absences seemed so long. Reason told Silva not to worry. As a foreigner he wouldn’t be involved, whatever might be happening in China. But Silva couldn’t help remembering his description of the charred walls of the British embassy in Peking, just opposite the Albanian embassy.
After they’d discussed every possible theory about developments in China, the television pundits would come back to the less ephemeral subject of the embalming.
In everyday life, conversation tended to concentrate on much the same topics. People started referring to ancient Egyptian mummies, even citing names like Ramses II and Tutankhamen, though in the past the dates of the Pharaohs had made them fail their history tests. The talk would then move on to schoolboy japes and anecdotes about examinations, and this would lead them back to Mao’s corpse again. There was always some worshipper of the past to maintain that the skills of our distant ancestors had never been surpassed in certain fields, and that there certainly wasn’t anyone today to rival them in the art of embalming.