The ataman slammed the tabletop with the palms of his hands. The shot glasses bounced from the shock. ‘Pontus! Pontus! Stop! Where do you get this from? I tell you, I’ve hit a rough patch. I can’t help you!’
Beg tipped the contents of the second glass into his mouth, then wiped his lips with the back of his hand. ‘That truck …’ he said.
‘Was almost empty,’ the ataman said, raising his voice. ‘Packaging material. A couple of pallets of laundry detergent. It wasn’t worth the effort. You want detergent? For the white stuff? For coloureds? It’s all yours.’
‘White goods and electronics,’ Beg said. ‘According to the waybills.’
‘A little bit, almost nothing. Not worth the trouble.’
But Beg knew that in the next few days the bazaar would be flooded with washing machines, blow-dryers, and CD players. Miele, Braun, Sony; brand stuff, no junk. The ataman didn’t want people asking about where it came from, any more than about the firearms and hard drugs you could get here without much trouble.
Beg shook his head slowly. ‘There was a present left along the road; someone came and unpacked it. It would be unpleasant if we had to take it back.’
The ataman snorted and sputtered, then turned his head towards the bar and shouted: ‘Vladimir!’
Vladimir came to the table. At a nod from his boss, he produced an envelope from his inside pocket.
‘Pontus,’ the ataman said, ‘you’re taking me to the cleaners again. Here, buy something pretty for your girl.’
Beg put the envelope away and stood up. He said: ‘You know, I just might take her to the seashore.’
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
In search of fortune
There were thirteen of them. Whispered assignations had brought them to the warehouse. The afternoon was hot and muggy. What they wanted most was to be invisible; even their shadows were a nuisance to them.
They were brought together in a little office high up at the back of the warehouse. Men came in now and then, handing out bottles of water and rolls of biscuits. They would have to make do with that, but for no longer than twenty-four hours. Each of them was allowed to take along one bag of possessions. A woman wept; she had had to leave behind a suitcase with songbooks and a tablecloth her grandmother had embroidered.
The men were brusque, unrelenting.
There was a black man in the group; the others couldn’t keep their eyes off him. He sat apart from the rest and seemed not to notice their obtuse stares. He was carrying a little bundle on a strap — all his possessions were rolled into that.
His presence raised fundamental questions. Where did he come from? How did he get here? What was his name? Where was he going?
Questions no one asked him.
They were led to the truck. At the front of the trailer was the space where they would hide, a crevice left between plastic-wrapped pallets. There was a bucket in which they could relieve themselves. There was to be no smoking, and complete silence under all circumstances. Those who owned a mobile phone had to hand it over.
The boss of the operation wore a white tracksuit; gold glistened at his wrists and collar. His BMW was parked beside the truck, the door open, music blasting. Behind them the rest of the cargo was loaded as they covered their ears against the roar of the forklift in the trailer.
Slowly they disappeared in shadow. They would not only be silent; they would hold their breath and cease to exist until they were across the border.
The voices outside became muffled, and the tailgate closed. Someone pounded on it with a hard object. They tried to fathom the darkness, but their eyes found no hold.
When the engine started, a shiver ran through the trailer. The truck idled for a while, then began moving. A sharp turn — it was leaving the lot. A little later they were rolling smoothly down the road. Their thoughts grew a little calmer. They were all going to be fine; they would slip through the eye of the needle and act as though good fortune were a personal friend. Why should they be caught? Why not others? There were countless like them — let good luck turn its back on those others for once! No one needed it more than they did!
But every time the truck braked, their hearts leapt into their throats.
The trip would take about twelve hours, the man had said. Sometimes the luminous dial of a wristwatch would light up faintly. They had no idea how long twelve hours lasted in the dark. It was an endless, sleepless night. The clock that ticked in here was not the same as the one outside. The hour and minutes hands became bogged down; they dragged across the dial like flies caught in molasses.
A few times already, the boy has thought he is going to wet his pants, but each time the urge goes away. He shakes some life into his sleeping leg and looks down the row of others, leaning with their backs against the pallets. Shadows. Insubstantial, thin as air. He doesn’t know them, these others. As far as he can tell, there is one couple; the rest are on their own.
He knows that they are blazing trails for their families, their villages, their communities. Travelling in their footsteps is an invisible company of fathers, mothers, brothers, sisters, aunts and uncles, nieces and nephews. All hope is focused on them. They are the pioneer vegetation. You can submit them to anything — hunger, thirst, heat, and cold — and they will survive it all.
The boy thinks about his father and mother, and about his brother, who isn’t strong enough to make the journey. Endlessly far away, they are now. He knows he can’t go back. His road travels in only one direction.
He wept when they told him. Dry your tears, his mother said. You want to be a man, don’t you? A man carries what rests on his shoulders, and doesn’t complain.
The boy clenched his teeth and stopped crying.
It had still been dark, the morning he left. A stranger gave him a ride; they drove down into the valley in a rattling pickup and saw it slowly grow light behind the mountains. The man dropped him at the bus station and hoped that God would be with him on his way.
The boy took a bus westward, and by that evening was already further from home than ever. He ran through the words of counsel he’d been hung with like talismans. Don’t talk to strangers. Give policemen a wide berth. Be frugal. Avoid the company of people with red hair.
Around his neck was a string bearing an oval of blue glass, to protect him against the evil eye.
He slept in a corner of a bus station. He sat curled up against the wall, hiding himself in the shelter of his arms.
A guard woke him. He took him along to a cafeteria close to the terminal and bought him a spicy pastry and a cup of tea. The first buses of the day pulled in as an awesome blue unfolded across the sky. The boy slurped at his tea and felt protected for a time.
The guard gave him directions and he travelled on. In the next city he went looking for a coffeehouse called ‘Darius’. Strangers pointed the way.
He asked the barman about Nacer Gül. That was the name drummed into him; if he forgot that name, he was lost.
The man showed him to the back, where he waited amid buckets and crates for Nacer Gül to arrive. Gül was the gatekeeper; no one crossed the frontier into the other world without him. The boy waited until his thoughts died down and he forgot time.
With a great ruckus — the stamping of feet, and a bossy voice — Nacer Gül made his appearance at last. The door swung open. His head was shaven, like the children in the boy’s village. Perched on his forehead was a large pair of sunglasses.
‘You’re late, boy. We almost left without you.’
He laughed. The boy didn’t move a muscle.
‘The money,’ Gül said.
The boy held out the bundle to him, and his ringed fingers rustled through the banknotes. Gül stuck the wad in the pocket of his tracksuit. Money was something he dealt with offhandedly; it flew to him on obedient wings, so that he didn’t have to
do a thing. The boy would remember everything he saw. This was how he would be some day — the money would fly into his pockets, too, and his mother would be proud of him, of her son who had made a long journey and triumphed over circumstance.
The darkness of the trailer deepened; night must have fallen almost. A river of asphalt rolled by beneath them, the road never ending. At times they fell asleep with their backs against the cargo, but most of the time they stared wide-eyed into the darkness. Everything will turn out all right. God is with us.
Those who once possessed proof of identity now possessed it no longer. Nacer Gül had said they should tear up their papers. It was better to arrive without an identity in the country of refuge. A person with no name or origin overwhelms the protocol. Procedures bog down; the chance that you’ll be allowed to stay increases. And so they destroyed the papers they had gone to such ends to obtain. Everything was formless now, except for the words of Nacer Gül, which were solid as coinage.
Now they are no one anymore. The woman who had to leave behind her suitcase looks back on her life in surprise and sorrow. She lives with her back to the future; the gentle glow of nostalgia has already spread over the memories of her hard life back there.
The men are willing to forget. They would, if they could, have placed not only their money and their fate in Nacer Gül’s hands, but their memories, too. They want to move on. They are prepared to lose themselves, to chop their lives in two like a worm.
Countries and continents had once stood open to those seeking their fortunes, borders were soft and permeable, but now they were cast in concrete and hung with barbed wire. Like blind men, travellers by the thousands probed the walls, looking for a weak spot, a gap, a hole through which they might slip. A wave of people crashed against those walls; it was impossible to keep them all back. They came in countless numbers, and each of them lived in the hope and expectation that they would be among the ones lucky enough to reach the far side. It was the behaviour of animals that travel in swarms, that take into account the loss of individual members but will survive as a species.
The truck slowed. They saw the whites of each other’s wide-open eyes. The truck crept forward; they heard voices, men’s voices, and the barking of dogs when the truck stopped. The motor was still running. How could they have imagined they were invisible? Nothing but thin sailcloth separated them from the border guards and the dogs. How could the animals not smell their acrid sweat of fear, not hear their pounding hearts? At any moment the tailgate might open, and the men would come in with a flood of light at their backs. All the way at the back they would find them, drained with fear.
What was going on out there? Why were they laughing? Was it about them? Were they prolonging the torment on purpose?
A beam of light bored its way in boldly, as though taking a quick look around before the men themselves would enter. Everything resonated with the idling of the engine. The men seemed to be going away. Slowly the boy stood up; the man beside him grabbed at his arm to stop him, but the boy was already beyond reach. He squeezed his way through the crack between two stacks of pallets and stood, almost pressed against the sailcloth. On tiptoe, he looked through a rip in it, then pulled his head back quickly. A little later he looked again, longer this time. Then he crept back to his spot, careful not to stumble. His heart hopped about like a frog in his chest. He sat and held his face in the crook of his arm to muffle his heavy breathing. They heard the truck door slam. Hope sprang up. Then the voice outside came back. Dogs barked wildly, as though they had smelled blood.
The border guards were now so close that they could make out almost everything. Oh, the urge to just stand up and walk out, to put an end to the shrill fear. A sneeze, a cough, and all would be lost. Their lives had contracted to this narrow ledge: they could fall or they could reach the other side, but they had no say in it.
A shout, and the truck’s door slams. Motion! The truck is moving, slowly at first, and then faster and faster. The tires zoom in abandon over the asphalt; none of the travellers dare to think the impossible.
Deeper and deeper into the night they drive. They know for sure now that they’ve crossed the border! Cautiously, they admit impressions of the luck they may have had.
A man leans over to the boy and whispers in his ear: ‘What did you see?’
‘Soldiers,’ the boy whispers back. He thinks for a moment, then leans over to the man’s ear again. ‘A fence, and cars.’
The man passes on the report to the others, a silver line of melody going from one ear to the next, their excitement filling the darkness. It’s hard to keep the joy inside their bodies.
Each of them sits in the dark with his own imaginings, impatient, wanting to trade in a life as contraband for that of a person who decides for themselves where to go and where to stop, when to talk and when to be silent.
The truck slows again, this time to negotiate a curve, and then travels along a dirt road. They crawl along a bumpy track for an eternity, until the vehicle stops at last. Someone fumblingly lowers the tailgate, and coolness billows into the trailer.
‘Hey!’ a man shouts. ‘Come on. We’re there.’
They shake the sleep from their legs, stretch, and climb over the cargo towards freedom.
It is a clear, chilly night. The driver hands out cigarettes with a grin. ‘I almost pissed myself!’ he says a few times in a row. ‘You people thought you were up shit creek back there, but what about me?’
Awkward as cattle leaving their shed in spring, they stand beneath the freshly scrubbed span of stars, and feel reborn.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Behind the names
‘Your feet,’ Zita said. He lifted his feet. The nozzle of the vacuum cleaner slid beneath them.
A little later, she asked: ‘What’s this? Can I put it away somewhere?’
Beg looked up. On the table was a package wrapped in newsprint.
‘It’s for you,’ he said. ‘A gift.’
‘Pontus!’
‘It’s nothing much.’
Zita frowned. ‘As long as you don’t go figuring …’
‘I’m not figuring anything.’
‘In a few days.’
‘I know.’
‘All right.’
She unwrapped the present.
‘A hairdryer,’ she said. ‘How sweet.’
‘You deserve it.’
Her hand brushed his shoulder. Then she went into the kitchen, holding the hairdryer. Her butt had a nice wiggle to it, he thought; he liked looking at it. Her hair had once been black, but lately it had become streaked with grey. It wouldn’t be long before she could forget about having a child. Sometimes he begged her for it, during the night’s embrace. ‘A child. Of our own. You and me. Why not?’ He heard the sadness in her laugh. ‘Come on, Pontus, don’t say that.’ She rolled to one side, he crawled up behind her and cupped a breast in one hand, beneath the nightie. More than having his lust sated, it was this he wanted: to feel her breathing slow and deepen, to wrap one hand around a breast and press his loins pleasantly against her backside. That was how he slipped into sleep, reassured. But not a night with Zita went by without him being awakened by her conversations with her mother in the other world. They would chatter about this, that, and the other. Beg could put up with anything from Zita, except for that jabbering about so-and-so’s illness, ‘And did you know that Vaida’s got another bun in the oven? Number seven already! Poor soul. But she’s holding up well. You know what they say: God fits the back for the burden.’
He couldn’t sleep through that, not with all the earplugs in the world, and so he would retreat to the living room until mother and daughter fell silent. He sat in the dark, smoked a cigarette, and had another drink while Zita’s voice sounded from his bedroom.
‘Pontus, the phone!’ Zita shouted from the bathroom. He was already
in the living room, staring at the phone as it rang. No one ever called him at home. He got up from his chair and walked over to it, expecting the thing to suddenly stop when he got there.
He picked up the receiver and listened, as though to the sea roaring in a shell.
‘Pontus? This is Eva.’
His sister’s voice. A foolish poignancy. The only other survivor of his past, she had taught him to read; come to think of it, what hadn’t he learned from her in those early years?
‘Pontus? Say something.’
‘Hello, Eva. How are you?’
‘What did you call about? Tadeusz says you called.’
‘That’s right … I was going through my book … An old address book … I saw your name and I thought … well, why not.’ He was silent for a moment. ‘That’s pretty much it.’
‘Ah, I see,’ his sister said. ‘Well, things are going well here, thanks. All things considered.’
Silence rushed into the gap between them.
‘Tadeusz is going to school to become a mechanic,’ she said then. ‘The security business turned out not to be his thing.’
Beg was relieved to find her less defensive than her son.
‘He kept falling asleep all the time.’
‘Who?’
‘Tadeusz. The night shifts were too much for him.’
A lazybones, just like his father, Beg thought.
Eva still drove a streetcar; it hadn’t been easy for her, working such irregular hours and raising a child alone, but now that Tadeusz was grown up she was her enjoying her independence.
‘No man for me, never again,’ she said. ‘All a bunch of big babies.’
They didn’t talk about the things that had created the rift between them; they both wanted to ignore that. Maybe, Beg thought, the cause had become trivial. Maybe she was as lonely as he was.
He brought up the song about Rebekka and the roses, and said: ‘I sing it sometimes, it’s so weird, it just popped into my mind. Do you remember it?’
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