“Me too,” said Olga. “I really would.”
She stood up, stretched, glanced out the window. It was getting dark. A stifling July evening crawled across New York and lights went on. But here in NoHo, as always, it was great in any weather. Olga pulled a cigarette out of her pack, walked over to the north window, which looked out toward the East Village, and lit up. So today she had read three more stories. There were more than four hundred on the site. She remembered many of them, and her thoughts kept coming back to them. These stories had now become the main book of Olga’s life, stakes sunk into the shaky, unreliable world that had taken her parents from her. She leaned on them for support. They wouldn’t allow her to wring her hands or collapse into depression. She could recite the names of people who had suffered from the ice hammer as though they were the names of brothers and sisters: Marie Couldefille, Edward Feller, Kozima Ilishi, Barbara Stachinska, Nikolai and Natasha Zotov, Iozas Normanis, Sabina Bauermeister, Zlata Boyanova, Nick Solomon, Ruth Jones, Bjorn Vassberg. They had all experienced torture by ice. All had writhed, coughed up blood, and lost consciousness from the excruciating blows. All had painfully returned to life, crying in anguish, inhaling the air with their crushed chests. All had tried, in vain, to find sympathy from friends and family, to prove that everything that had happened was the truth. And they had all crashed into a wall of incomprehension, just as they had with the ice...
Now these three had been added to them.
“They give everybody a shot of something to destroy their memory,” Olga thought to herself as she smoked, staring out the window. “But it doesn’t work on everyone. Or maybe they don’t have time to give everyone shots? Or...they think that the person is already dead? But I was alive. And Bjorn. And Barbara. And Sabina...”
The parrot coughed in his cage and ruffled his feathers. He spoke quietly: “Locomotive.”
Olga put out her cigarette and walked over to Fima. Her late father had taught the parrot the word “locomotive.”
“No, Fimochka, not a locomotive. An airplane. And, judging by everything, really soon.” Olga stuck her finger in the cage and stroked the parrot’s pink claw. “And you’ll be staying with Amanda again. Will you miss me?”
“Locomotive!” answered the parrot.
Khram and Gorn
Gorn came to on the second day.
His heart cried out the grief of six years of earthly life. His small body was exhausted. His face had grown thin and haggard. And he had matured. Now he was no longer a retarded boy, who had suffered a meaningless earthly life, but Light-bearing Gorn. Now he was prepared for great feats in the name of the Light. He was beginning his new path in life. A great path. All this time I was continuously near him. I retreated from his heart when it cried. I sat and watched. And protected him. Now that his heart had cleansed itself of the past, I could draw closer.
Gorn was waiting.
I placed my fingers on his eyelids. His eyes opened. And looked at me. They were the eyes of a brother. The most important brother of all. And I am the one who has to initiate him into the Brotherhood. His heart had calmed down. It was ready to heed.
And so, I began to speak with him.
Gorn’s heart is open. It desired. Its strength amazed me. It is a new strength. The Strength we have all been waiting for. I could help him.
I placed my heart as a Light-bearing shield between Gorn and the world. My old body became a shadow of the shining shield. The shadow of my body shades him from the world: It isn’t yet time! The world of the Earth lies beyond my stooped back. The round, inconstant, self-devouring, and dangerous world of the Earth drones behind my back. My back is a wide shadow. Gorn’s pure heart should not see the world: It isn’t time yet! It isn’t prepared to touch the world of the Earth. The ruthless world. Which devours itself. Which coagulates with the rage of self-destruction. My trembling hands shade continents. My bony fingers spread out, hiding cities. The meat machines coagulate under my wrinkled palms. Villages and tiny settlements, roads and mechanisms crowd behind my flaccid thighs, which preserve the scars of torture. My shoulders hide the terrible order of earthly armies. My head shades the countries of the north where we found so many of ours. I cover the violent world of meat machines with the shadow of my torso, turning my shining heart toward the long-desired brother.
I protect Gorn.
I protected Gorn.
I cherish Gorn.
I feed Gorn.
Gorn’s heart is opening in leaps and bounds. It flows with the radiance of desire. It demands. Its growth is swift. No one in the Brotherhood is so swift of heart as Gorn. No one burgeons with Light so rapidly. We are joyful. We shine and exult. Our hearts girdle the Newly Acquired one, shining with the joy of the Light. And the exultation of the Light fills the Brotherhood with ecstasy: We believe! Gorn forced us to place our faith in the Fulfillment. What our hearts dreamed of, spoke of in Great and Lesser Circles, moaned over in our sleep, whispered about on our deathbeds — had come closer! And Gorn brought it closer.
We will protect his heart and body.
Each morning my hands wake up Gorn’s body. And my heart wakens his young, powerful heart. Sisters pick Gorn up and carry him into the room of Ablutions. The sisters wash his body with the purest water, infused with flowers and grasses. They dry him with silken fabrics. They anoint him with oils. They dress him in clothes woven of mountain plants. The sisters give Gorn tea to drink, made from grasses of the taiga, which give calm and strength. They offer him the fruits of tropical trees.
His body grows.
But his heart grows much faster.
His heart grows stronger. It feeds off the Light. He learns the first words of the heart language. He sucks in words from our hearts. In Gorn’s heart the immeasurable power of the Light grows stronger. Even my strong and experienced heart restrains this onslaught with great difficulty. Gorn wants to embrace everything right away. But he cannot contain it all. He craves with ferocity. It is my lot to quench the thirst of his heart. And I do this with extreme caution, so as not to harm him. Or the Brotherhood. For I understand who Gorn is for us. Brothers and sisters on all the continents understand this. Their hearts are shining. Hands are joining. Lesser, Middle, and Great Circles are forming. They flare in the dark gloom of earthly life, sending us heart Light. We accept it. It strengthens our hearts. We share the Light with Gorn.
I guard Gorn.
I preserve Gorn.
I fill Gorn.
I hold Gorn.
And the Light in his heart grows and expands.
Gorn’s heart gradually fills with Light. But knowledge of the world of Earth I move aside for Gorn: It is still early! It is not time! Only when his heart is strengthened may he touch the world. Which we created. In which we went astray. Only a full heart can see the world. And understand its essence.
I prepare Gorn’s heart for the most important.
Bjorn and Olga
A very tall blond man wearing a lemon-yellow T-shirt and white shorts strode vigorously through the crowd, pulling a red suitcase rattling after him.
“There he is! What a beanpole!” Olga thought as she quickly finished her grapefruit juice and put six shekels down on the bar.
The blond man approached. He smiled cautiously. In the photograph he sent Olga by e-mail his chin seemed heavier and his neck less muscular. On the blond man’s upturned nose drops of sweat mingled with freckles.
“Odin v pole voin,” he painstakingly pronounced the passwords in a deep, chesty voice.
“Kräftskivan,” Olga replied, sliding off the tall metal barstool.
Her small heels touched the floor.
“Two and a half heads taller than me,” she noted to herself, stretching out her small hand. “Hi, Bjorn.”
“Hi, Olga!” He smiled even wider.
Olga firmly shook his huge, sweaty palm with her small hand.
“I didn’t expect you to be so tall,” she said in English. She noticed the word KRÄFTSKIVAN curving around a re
d crab on his yellow shirt.
“Six foot seven,” he answered honestly. “And where’s your red hair?”
“Sometimes you need to change something about yourself,” Olga said, donning her dark glasses, heaving the strap of her bag onto her shoulder. “Well, let’s go, shall we?”
The Swede spoke English with a typical Scandinavian accent; Olga with an acquired American one.
Not noticing her heavy bag, he turned his head. “And where is...”
“Follow me.” Olga moved decisively to the exit. “What is Kräftskivan?”
“The holiday of the crabs,” said Bjorn, catching up with her in two steps, his suitcase clattering behind him.
“You mean when they eat them?”
Bjorn nodded with a smile, and added, “I already translated your password from Russian. That is, someone helped me translate it: One soldier can win the war.”
“Wonderful!” said Olga, tossing her head back. “Now you know the principle of my life.”
They went out into the dry, hot July air. They got in a taxi. Olga slowly pronounced the address in Petah Tikva in Hebrew.
“Off we go,” the driver answered in Russian, smiling at Olga in the mirror.
Not the least bit surprised, she took out a cigarette. “May I smoke in the car?”
“We’re not in America, are we?” The driver grinned. “Smoke to your health, as much as you want, take deep breaths.”
“Thank you.” She lit up.
“He is from Russia?” Bjorn asked.
“Yes.” Olga opened the window despite the air conditioner and turned her face to the warm breeze.
“Here there are many people from Russia.” Bjorn shook the fair head on his long, sturdy neck.
“Yes.” Olga flipped the ash into the air. “There are a lot of people from Russia here.”
They rode in silence to Petah Tikva. Zipping past a hilly, sun-drenched landscape, the car entered dusty, scorching Tel Aviv. After winding through the streets, the driver stopped near an unusually long building.
Bjorn tried to pay, but Olga beat him to it, handing the driver a fifty-shekel bill.
“Are you a feminist?” Bjorn asked, extracting his large body from the car.
“Not anymore.” Olga looked at the rosy-white three-story building stretching half the block.
She went over to a small limestone stoop. Large brass numbers, 1-6-7, hung on the door. Olga rang the bell. After a moment, a pretty woman about fifty years old opened the door.
Ice Trilogy Page 61
