by Peter Corris
Men gathered in a circle and the two-up game started. They yelled as the pennies rose and fell, letting off steam, comrades in a great adventure. Carl felt at one with them. He scrambled off his bunk, feeling for the banknotes in his pocket.
Three years later Carl Gulliver was, physically and mentally, a different man. He had seen more fear and suffering and blood and death than a normal human being could comprehend. Gallipoli, he had thought, was as bad a place as men could make, but the Somme and Flanders were worse. He had been wounded in the jaw, in the right leg and arm. He had lost two toes from his left foot to frostbite and an exploding mortar at Passchendaele had permanently impaired the hearing in his right ear. He had lain semi-conscious in the freezing mud of a shellhole at Ypres and a rat had gnawed away the little finger on his left hand.
He counted himself lucky. He had seen unprotected men claw their eyes from their sockets and others vomit blood and pale, shredded lung tissue, but his gas mask had been effective. He breathed normally and he was alive, but he could not sleep for more than two hours at a time and he ducked instinctively at any noise louder than a handclap. The years in the trenches had bent him a little and he smoked so much he could scarcely taste food. He ate almost nothing and was, consequently, wasted and thin. His pale skin had a greyish tinge and his once fair hair had turned a sickly brown, the colour of the Flanders mud. He wore a reddish beard to cover the white scar on his jaw. He had a slight limp.
He was convinced that his books had saved him. He saw men throw their lives away in despair at the torments they were enduring. Instead he snatched minutes, seconds even, to read. He retained his excellent eyesight through all his tribulations and could read in the dimmest of lights. On his infrequent leaves and several hospitalizations he bought books, the more densely packed with words the better. He read Milton and Shakespeare, Hugo and Proudhon, Goethe and Marx, Tolstoy and Gogol. When he could not read he repeated memorised passages to himself, translated them backwards and forwards between four languages. Often he was unaware of his surroundings; he might have been crouched in a trench with the water seeping into his boots and the lice colonising his body hair, but his mind was free of it all, locked in theological debate with Newman, probing for weaknesses in Kant's metaphysics.
Carl no longer read for pleasure. He read in a desperate, anxious way, rapidly and impatiently, searching for meanings and explanations. He pursued the ambiguities of words through his several languages, trying to track down kernels of truth. He read for information and argument, passion and political purpose. He trusted nothing. He had been baptised in a Methodist chapel in Spitalfields, but the Gullivers in London scarcely attended church. The mild agnosticism he had acquired in the Thodey household had hardened into a resolute atheism. He read sceptically, trying to throw light on certain questions that changed, almost daily, in his mind. What are the proportions of good and evil in the world? Does luck exist? Is pain physical or mental? News of the success of the Bolshevik revolution had filled him with a kind of joy. Could freedom supplant tyranny?
On a practical level, Carl's abilities as a sharpshooter and message runner had contributed to his protection. Snipers were afforded cover and a kind of camaraderie developed between them. Carl had often fired dutifully at intervals, aiming at sandbags and wooden supports, and he knew that his German counterparts had done the same. As a runner, relaying messages between the trenches, he had been spared more than a few advances across territory jungled by barbed wire and made deadly by bombardment and machine gun fire. He had obeyed orders, volunteered for nothing, avoided promotion . . . and survived.
After the breach of the Hindenburg line and subsequent Allied successes, colonial troops were pulled out of the fighting as if the imperial power wanted to reserve the final triumph for itself. Carl did not care. He awaited the resumption of the slaughter and was shocked at the news of the armistice. He saw men around him weeping, getting drunk and scribbling frantic letters. He began letters to Dr Anderson, the Thodeys and Pavel and failed to complete them. But the attempt at writing helped him to order his thoughts. Four miles from Amiens, huddled over a fire with two tots of rum warming his blood against the winter cold, he made decisions. He would not go back to Australia; he would apply to be demobilised in Britain; he would go to Russia.
18
Carl travelled in the summer of his twenty-third year. It was 1919. The Allies harboured fear and hatred for the Soviet state, which had deserted them in their struggle against the might of Germany and had repelled their own invasions at Murmansk and Archangel. No facilities were provided for travel there. No boats left Britain for Russian ports, and Carl was obliged to travel overland. Europe was like a gaping wound with maggots crawling in the flesh. Towns and cities were devastated, roads and railways were cut, and everywhere people were on the move. It was as if half the population had been turned into gypsies. In fact Carl met gypsies for the first time in his life, travelled with them for a time and learned something of their strange language. Travel under adverse conditions was nothing new for the Romany people and many of the things they taught him—how to live off the country, board moving vehicles, cannibalise stolen bicycles, purify stagnant water—helped him to make his way north and east.
Years of soldiering had toughened him and he could walk all day without difficulty despite his limp. He slept outdoors most of the time because he was apt to wake yelling and trembling, to the great alarm of anyone who might be within earshot. Influenced by the gypsies, he abandoned cigarettes for a pipe. He regained some appetite and put on weight, although there was little to eat inside Russia except bread and soup. Still, when he stepped from the train which had taken him from Riga to Moscow, he was a desiccated figure, with a pale skin stretched tight over sharp bones. In the pocket of his jacket was a paper that had been hidden in the lining until he produced it at the Soviet border. The paper was signed by Maxim Maximovich Litvinov, Soviet diplomatic agent in Britain, and it introduced Carl Gulliver, 'a friend of the revolution'.
Letters had passed from London to Moscow. Carl was met by Ian Armstrong, a Scot who had deserted the Allied force that had invaded north Russia to oppose the Bolsheviks. Armstrong noted Carl's single canvas bag. with approval.
"You travelled light, comrade."
Carl stared at the massive dome of the terminus and the rushing crowds, a motley mixture of soldiers and civilians, swarming over the platforms and down onto the railway tracks. He had expected order and discipline and saw instead the same sort of chaos he had witnessed elsewhere. But he heard shouts and questions and answers in Russian—it was the first time he had heard the language spoken by more than a couple of people at once. He shook Armstrong's hand warmly.
Carl spoke in Russian. "I've dreamed of this moment."
Armstrong shook his head. "You'll have tae speak slower with me, lad. M' Russian's nae a patch on yours."
"I'm sorry."
"Aye, maybe you will be. They'll distrust you for it."
Carl shouldered his bag and the two men moved slowly along the crowded platform. Armstrong was a tall, rawboned man who did not hesitate to shove when he saw a gap. "Not the leaders, not Lenin or Trotsky, they speak English themselves. The others—they'll no' be able to talk freely in front of you an' whisper behind your back."
"Why should they whisper?"
"Have you not heard? There's enemies everywhere. The war here's no' yet won."
"I've been travelling. Out of touch."
They passed out of the Vindau station onto a busy street. The air reeked of factory smoke and petrol fumes, although there were more horse-drawn vehicles than motorized ones. Carl was surprised to see men and women pushing heavily loaded handcarts. Armstrong hailed a droshky and when they were settled, he waved his hand at the buildings. "Well, you're here now, comrade, and right in touch. What do you think of it?"
Carl loosened his collar. "It's hotter than I thought it'd be."
Armstrong laughed. "Aye, everyone thinks of ice and snow in Mos
cow. Me, I've been more sunburned in Russia than . . . in other places."
Carl nodded. He was used to men who didn't want to be specific about places they'd been. He noted that many of the buildings had not a single pane of glass intact and he remarked on it.
"That's the work of looters, mostly," the Scot said. "The distilleries were smashed by order. The reactionaries were getting the workers drunk and turning them against the police and the Red Guards. It was bad there for a while."
"What's the state of the city now?"
"There was more fighting here than people realize. It wasna all in Petrograd. Whole streets were flattened by our artillery. The most bourgeois streets, I'm happy to say. Och, it's all right. There's kids on the streets will cut your throat for a kopek but we had that in Glasgow."
Carl gaped at a Rolls-Royce cruising effortlessly past them. The big car's suspension smoothed out the rough ride the cobblestones were causing the droshky.
Armstrong grunted. "Cheka, most likely. Bloodsucking secret police. I hope your papers are in apple-pie order, comrade."
Carl fingered the paper signed by Litvinov. It had been like a magic wand at the border, but would it have the same effect here? He shrugged. Life was uncertain. Who knew that better than he? He grinned at Armstrong. "The secret police? They're everywhere. Probably had them in Glasgow too, Jock."
"Aye," Armstrong said. "I suppose they're nae worse here than anywhere else."
Armstrong relaxed as Carl sat calmly beside him, asking an occasional quiet question. The Scot, starved for congenial company, became almost chatty, and Carl learned that the country was still almost on a war footing. Food shortages were grave; power was rationed; looters and black marketeers were summarily shot.
"But ye'd be surprised," Armstrong said. "They tell me the Bolshoi ballet school at Theatre Square's still open and the horses're running."
"Horses?"
"Aye. The Skatchki racetrack's operating and I hear the betting concession is privately owned."
"I don't recall much in Marx about gambling," Carl said.
Armstrong signalled the driver to stop. "The Whites were mad for it. I'm against it myself."
Bitterness had crept into Armstrong's voice when he spoke of the Whites. Not until January of the following year would the White admiral Kolchak be captured and executed, and the conflict with Poland would continue for another two years. Armstrong's talk of the White armies and the border wars worried Carl because his only practical experience was in soldiering. He feared that he could be useful only as a soldier to the new socialist country he admired and wished ardently to serve, but a soldier was the very last thing he wanted to be. He voiced the fear to Armstrong as the Scot was settling him into his room. Carl's first home in Russia was on the fourth floor of a barrack-like building on Sukharov Square in the shadow of Moscow's giant twin water towers.
"Dinna worry," Armstrong said. "They'll have other uses for you than at the thick end of a rifle."
"What do you do?"
Armstrong ran the tap over the cracked, stained basin in the draughty room. He nodded, satisfied with the thin, brown flow. "I do this. I help men like yourself find roofs and keep them supplied with bread an' cabbage."
"What about tobacco?"
Armstrong grinned. "Aye, we're all o' one mind on that. Lenin an' Trotsky an' all."
Carl need not have worried that he would become,once again, a piece of solid flesh to be thrown against meatmincing machine guns. The day after his arrival in the capital he went before a committee that subjected him to a rigorous ideological and linguistic examination.
"You speak Tsarist Russian, not Marxist Russian," the chairman told him.
"I'm sorry," Carl said. "I learned from old books and from a man who left Russia many years ago."
"His name?"
Carl was alarmed. "Vladimir Pavel," he blurted.
The chairman's pen scratched. "What do you want to do, Comrade Gulliv . . . Gulliver?"
Carl would later think back on this interview as a miniature of his life in the Soviet Union. A barked command followed by an invitation to speak like a free man. There was a balance in it that suited his nature and tapped deep levels of energy and ability in him.
At first, his linguistic abilities were of most use to the state. He translated political messages received from and despatched to foreign countries. He acted as an interpreter for the steady stream of foreigners who were making representations to the Bolsheviks—French and English trade unionists, German industrialists, American journalists and film makers, even the occasional eccentric philanthropist. Early in this phase of his career occurred a brief but important meeting. An official beckoned Carl across from his desk and he was awestruck to find himself in the presence of the stocky, bald, sharp-eyed President of the Council of People's Commissars. Lenin leaned heavily on a cane and held his head oddly, a legacy of the assassin's bullets that had severely wounded him the year before. He said nothing, but inclined his head stiffly towards the man with whom he had been speaking.
"Hugh Williams." The accent was Welsh. Carl shook Williams's hand. "Does Mr. Lenin speak English or what?"
"He does," Carl said, smiling at the singsong lilt in the voice. "I think it's your accent giving him trouble."
"And who might you be, then?"
"I work here, comrade." Carl had been instructed not to give his name to foreigners, and his natural diffidence made this easy for him. "Tell me what you have to say and I'll try to help."
"It's to do with modernising the coal mines here." Williams spoke at length on methods of draining mines and improving the operations of extraction. Lenin listened carefully and quickly mastered the accent, appealing to Carl only for enlightenment on a few words and phrases. He asked questions in his guttural but accurate English. His voice, also affected by his recent wounds, was breathy and harsh.
"Thank you, Comrade Williams. Very helpful to us."
Lenin shook hands with Williams and nodded his thanks to Carl before moving away. He glanced back as Carl and Williams shook hands.
"I did not catch your name, comrade," Williams said.
Carl smiled and went back to his desk. He was surprised to find Lenin standing beside him a few minutes later.
"You need a name, comrade. People do not like to deal with nameless men."
"My name is Carl Gulliver, Comrade President."
"Mine is Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov. I mean a revolutionary name. Gulliver's Travels, a book by the English writer, Swift."
"He was Irish, Comrade President."
Lenin's eyes flashed angrily behind his spectacles. "So Swift is bystryi in Russian. You are very swift with your information. A good name for you, Comrade Bystryi."
"Yes, Comrade President. Thank you."
Lenin used the name when mentioning Carl to another bureaucrat, and it stuck. Dealing with experts in all branches of industry, agriculture and economic management gave Carl Bystryi a breadth of knowledge and expertise that was quickly recognised by the members of the committees overseeing the reconstruction of the Russian economy. He was co-opted to serve as secretary to bodies as various as the Committee on Motor Traffic Planning and the Committee for the Rehabilitation of War Veterans. He quickly absorbed the Russian practice of treating every post as a personal as well as public benefit. He learned to drive a motor car and he received first-class treatment for his own disabilities.
Armstrong's prediction that he would be worked hard and mistrusted was borne out. As a foreigner, Carl was kept clear of all matters with a direct political import. He was instructed to report any approaches to him that smacked of intelligence gathering or giving, and he obeyed the order to the letter. No sensitive political material crossed his desk and he was ordered from the room when discussions turned from practicalities to policy. This irked him and he complained to Armstrong, who had become his friend and to whom he gave Russian lessons.
The two men sat hunched over the coal fire in Carl's two-room flat on Entuziasto
v Road. As a secretary to busy committees, he rated two rooms. It was a practical matter. He needed space for books and writing materials, light to write by in the daytime, a fire to permit him to work at night so he would be prepared for his morning meetings. His flat had to be on an accessible road, not too far from the administrative offices in the centre of the city. Not too many floors above street level, because the messengers who delivered papers and sealed envelopes to him had only so much strength. On the other hand, as a single man, he needed only a narrow bed, and a twentieth share in a toilet and bathroom was generous. All this had been explained to him when he was given the key. The explanation was unnecessary because the allocation of resources, the planning of budgets, the fitting of things and people into spaces, had become his work and his obsession.
"They don't trust me," Carl said. He poured the last of the tea into the glasses. If he broke a glass it would be months before he could get another.
Armstrong carefully shredded hard-packed tobacco on an enamel plate with his pocket knife. "What can you expect, laddie? The country's surrounded by wolves looking to tear its throat out."
"Volki," Carl said. "We're talking Russian here."
"Bugger Russian," Armstrong said. He packed his pipe and pushed the plate towards Carl. "We're men talking here. Christ, it's cold!"
"Losing heart, Jock?" Carl carefully mixed his dottles with the fresh tobacco, leaving some for Armstrong.
"I'm not. We're living in the future right here. I'm sure of it, an' the centuries o' misery an' want'll seem like they happened on another planet."
"Aye."
"Dinna mock me, lad."
"No, Ian, I know you're right. I just . . ."
"You want to be loved, son?"
Carl laughed. "I want to be trusted."
"They'll come to it, and you'll know when."
"How?"
"You'll see. Meanwhile, what you need is a woman. Now, that's where I can help you. How long since you had a woman?"
Carl had not repeated his experience with the Sydney whores in any of the cities he had been in since. "Five years," he said.
