The Russian Interpreter

by Michael Frayn

  ‘Oh, yes.’

  ‘It seems so to me, I must say. I’m glad you agree. I’d be very grateful, Paul, if you’d go to the Kiev Station some time before the dinner this evening and get that case out of the left luggage office for me.’

  Manning sipped a little of his beer. It tasted like dilute Syrup of Figs.

  ‘I’m afraid I don’t believe you, Gordon,’ he said.

  ‘I think you do, Paul.’

  ‘Why did you tell me the other version?’

  Proctor-Gould sighed.

  ‘Once I’d admitted that one of the books contained something – which I should never have done – I had to go on and complete the story. At the time it didn’t seem to matter what you thought of me as a result, provided only that (a) you believed the story, and that (b) it wasn’t the truth. I obviously made rather too good a job of it; you not only believed the story – you struck moral attitudes about it. Now that you’ve forced me to tell you the true version I want your solemn oath that you will not divulge it to anyone – not hint at it – not even refer to it obliquely when you are back in England. Will you give it me, please?’

  He was leaning close to Manning. It reduced his height, so that he was looking up into Manning’s face, his earnest brown irises underlined by the whites and the pink rim beneath them. On either side of the two Englishmen the line of jawbones champed up and down, the guzzling Adam’s apples wobbled stolidly on.

  ‘It’s ridiculous to give my word,’ said Manning, ‘if I don’t believe the story.’

  ‘I want your word whether you believe it or not.’

  ‘All right, then,’ said Manning reluctantly. It seemed to him that in giving his word he was also implying his acceptance of the story. He would have liked to make it clear to Proctor-Gould that he reserved his opinion, but it seemed a hopelessly complicated point to explain to those straightforward brown eyes.

  ‘You swear?’ said Proctor-Gould.

  ‘Yes, yes.’

  ‘“I swear”?’

  ‘I swear.’

  Proctor-Gould straightened up.

  ‘Even if you’re not convinced,’ he said, ‘I hope I’ve managed to sow doubts. In any case, Paul, I don’t think you’d really give your pal Konstantin the means of blackmailing me, would you? After all, come wind, come rain, we are fellow-countrymen. In fact we’re fellow-Johnsmen.’

  He smiled at Manning ruefully.

  ‘I’m not coming the old blood-is-thicker-than-water, I assure you,’ he said. ‘All the same, one does have a certain undeniable leaning towards one’s compatriots, doesn’t one? One doesn’t deliberately set out to sell them into the hands of foreigners.’

  Manning swallowed the rest of his beer. It made him shudder. Proctor-Gould, he noticed, had not even touched his.

  ‘I’ll think about it,’ he said.

  36

  The faculty looked curiously unimpressive around the dinner table, thought Manning. Ginsberg, Romm, Rubeshchenskaya, Skorbyatova, even Korolenko himself – they all seemed tamed and domesticated among the starched napery, the ranks of crystal glasses and the podgy wives. The personalities which were so distinctive on the dusty lecture rostrum each day had faded, the repertoire of famous mannerisms laid aside. For one thing, they were all dominated by the architecture of the room. It was in one of the banqueting suites of the university skyscraper. Pillars of veined blood-red soapstone supported complex funereal urns. Fluted gilt columns flowered into clusters of flambeaux. Triple-tiered chandeliers hung down from the dark upper air. Amidst it all, mere lounge-suited flesh and blood looked pallid and unsatisfactory.

  Manning felt as pallid as the others looked. He was very tired, brought low by the strains of the last few days. Mrs Skorbyatova was saying something to him. He could not be bothered to take it in. He would have liked to lower his head until his chin was resting discreetly on his chest, and then close his eyes for five or ten minutes. It occurred to him that he was starting to get noticeably drunk. Well, to hell with it.

  Romm was on his feet, holding up his glass. Another toast. ‘The London School of Civic Studies.’ How did the London School of Civic Studies come into it, so far away around the bend of the world? Never mind. Pick up the little vodka glass. Lift. Clink against Mrs Skorbyatova’s glass on his left, and Mrs Loyeva’s on his right. Mumble. Tip draught down throat in one blazing, fuming stream. Hold breath. Drink mineral water before the suffocating fumes rose and choked him. Already the waitresses were recharging the glasses for the next toast.

  He took a deep breath, and began to examine the faces around the table. Rubeshchenskaya was talking to Korolenko. Her plain, honest face bobbed up and down, wagged from side to side, raised its eyebrows, talked and talked. Korolenko listened in silence, motionless and expressionless. Now Rubeshchenskaya had stopped, and was looking at Korolenko interrogatively. The spasm lifted the right-hand corner of his mouth for an instant. As if it were an acknowledgement she smiled and nodded, and went on talking.

  On the other side of Rubeshchenskaya sat Proctor-Gould. Then a little sharp-faced woman with grey hair, who was probably Mrs Korolenko, and next to her, Sasha. Proctor-Gould and Sasha were leaning forward to talk to each other across Mrs Korolenko. Sasha was listening anxiously, blinking a little, as if frightened of missing a word. Proctor-Gould was speaking with little smiles, and chopping motions of his right hand. Occasionally he turned his head a little more sharply, and directed one of the smiles at Mrs Korolenko. She acknowledged each of them with a small, unamused smile of her own, making no attempt to understand the English conversation.

  Manning realized that Mrs Skorbyatova was looking at him, a humorous expression on her large, oval face.

  ‘Don’t you think so?’ she was asking.

  Manning laughed politely.

  ‘I suppose I do,’ he said.

  He couldn’t take his eyes off Proctor-Gould’s face. It was as familiar as an old sock, so familiar that it embarrassed him. It was like seeing one’s mother at a school speech day. How could anyone take that homely face seriously? At any moment Proctor-Gould would pull his ear. As if by telepathy, he pulled it at once – a long, surreptitious, caressing tug. Oh God, it was shaming to watch!

  Among the flowers on the table in front of Proctor-Gould lay four books, neatly stacked. He had come to Manning’s room in Sector B just before the dinner and selected them from the suitcase which Manning had brought back from the station.

  ‘Thank you, Paul,’ he had said. Manning had shrugged. Proctor-Gould had looked as if he was going to say something else about Manning’s decision to cooperate, then changed his mind and glanced perfunctorily about the room instead.

  ‘Nice place you’ve got here.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Your own bathroom?’

  ‘Shared with the room next door.’

  ‘Very well arranged. A bit different from poor old John’s.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘It’s odd, really, Paul. I’ve never seen your room before. You must invite me out here some time and show me over the whole building.’

  A formal occasion. But now, in public Manning felt that the burden of intimacy was not quite so easily laid down. Proctor-Gould had humiliated himself in front of him with his deceit. It made a continuing claim upon him.

  Ginsberg was on his feet, proposing a toast to friendly cooperation in the field of human administration. Up glass. Clink Skorbyatova, clink Loyeva. ‘Field of huministration.’ Down vodka. Gulp mineral water. Ah. Belch. Excuse me. Ah.

  Korolenko was standing up. Another toast? Scarcely – glasses not yet recharged. Speech, undoubtedly. Was indeed already speaking. But what was he saying? Manning found it almost impossible to focus his mind on the words.

  ‘… sometimes falls to our lot to have the pleasure of welcoming into our midst one whose aims and aspirations are entirely in accord with the spirit of peaceful co-existence. Such a one is undoubtedly our distinguished and respected guest Proctor-Gould….’

  Korol
enko stood with his hands behind his back, erect and exact, speaking in a quiet level voice without expression of any sort, apart from the regular stresses with which he marked the passage of time. This was his Essential Attributes of the Soviet Administrator voice, characterized by its complete dissociation from sense and matter, uncontaminated by the personal interest which he took in such questions as barring the admission of unauthorized persons to the Faculty canteen. Occasionally, on one of the stressed syllables, he would rock gently forward on to his toes, as soldiers do on long parades to keep their blood in circulation. Everyone sat straight in his chair, staring into space with glazed eyes, stunned with respect and boredom and vodka. Manning tried to imagine Korolenko drunk. It was difficult. He visualized him with his brother officers in some derelict commandeered house in occupied territory, impassively tipping back vast quantities of spirit at the end of the day. It made no difference. Perhaps he became even more erect, more expressionless. Perhaps his eyelids came down a little. Perhaps he renounced speech altogether, until the occasional sardonic spasm was the only sign of continued life….

  Time hung suspended….

  Now Korolenko was lifting a volume bound in white leather from among the flowers on the table in front of him, and holding it up while he spoke, wagging it slightly like a swollen forefinger at each stress. Now he was turning to Proctor-Gould, who was standing up uncertainly, unable to understand the Russian. Korolenko was handing him the book. Now he was clapping, and both sides of his mouth were elevated in a smile.

  They all applauded. Korolenko offered a toast to Proctor-Gould. Everyone gulped it down and turned to his neighbour to start talking hurriedly and meaninglessly in his relief that the speech was over.

  ‘Well, well,’ said Mrs Skorbyatova.

  ‘There we are, then,’ said Manning.

  Someone was calling his name.

  ‘Paul! Paul!’

  Where …? Ah, Proctor-Gould. The familiar old face was thrust towards him across the table.

  ‘Paul,’ it said, ‘I’m going to make a speech. Would you oblige with your usual skilful services?’

  ‘Tiny bit drunk, Gordon,’ said Manning.

  ‘Little hazy myself, to tell you the truth. Never mind – all add to the gaiety of the occasion. Come round and stand next to me.’

  Manning got to his feet. The room keeled steadily over to port. Christ. He took hold of the edge of the table and waited for it to come back on to the level. Not funny. Didn’t know I was quite as bad as that.

  He edged his way round the table, holding on to the backs of the chairs, until he reached Proctor-Gould’s. All right now. Lean myself on the back of the chair like this. Be as steady as a rock.

  ‘All right?’ asked Proctor-Gould, looking up at him.

  ‘Ready when you are.’

  Proctor-Gould cleared his throat and stood up. Immediately the chair capsized under Manning’s weight and deposited him on the floor.

  ‘Are you all right?’ asked Sasha anxiously, helping him up, among the applause for Proctor-Gould.

  ‘Fine.’

  ‘Sure you’re all right, Paul?’ This was Proctor-Gould.

  ‘Perfectly.’

  Proctor-Gould turned back to the table.

  ‘Dean Korolenko, Mrs Korolenko, ladies and gentlemen,’ he said. ‘It is indeed a great honour, of which I am very conscious, to be invited to share with such a distinguished body of men and women an occasion of this nature. I am not myself, of course, a member of the international fraternity of administration experts. I am a humble British businessman, and my only claim upon your time and attention is that I have been entrusted with a number of commissions from my many friends in the learned institutions engaged on similar work in Britain.’

  He stopped, and half-turned towards Manning to wait for the translation. Manning blinked. What the hell had Proctor-Gould been saying? He couldn’t remember the half of it.

  ‘He’s very pleased to be here,’ he said uncertainly. ‘At an occasion of this nature he recalls that he has many friends in learned institutions engaged on similar work in Britain.’

  Proctor-Gould was frowning at him.

  ‘What do you think you’re up to, Paul?’ he whispered.

  ‘Got the general sense of it,’ muttered Manning defensively.

  ‘You were speaking English. Do you realize that?’

  ‘Gordon, I wasn’t!’

  ‘You were.’

  ‘Was I?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Oh God.’

  He hurriedly tried again in Russian, and the speech continued. But the more he translated, the more obsessed he became with his lapse, and the insight it had given Proctor-Gould into his standards of accuracy as an interpreter. And the more he worried about that, the less he heard or remembered of what Proctor-Gould was saying, and the more he had to improvise. It was like a nightmare in which his appalled gazing back at each last disaster brought him blundering into the next.

  Now Proctor-Gould was taking up the four books from the table one by one and presenting them.

  ‘For Professor Rubeshchenskaya,’ Manning heard himself translating, ‘a small memento from her friends in the department at Edinburgh…. For Sasha Zaborin, a volume of his beloved Schubert songs from his old pupils Michael Sloane and Trevor Westland…. For Dean Korolenko, a bound volume of the Proceedings of the Institute of Civic Studies, from the Director and staff of the Institute … And lastly …’

  But for whom the last volume was destined Manning didn’t quite catch. He was in the process of descending from the remoteness of the sky into a chair which had somehow appeared to catch him.

  ‘You’ll feel better sitting down,’ said a gentle, anxious voice. Manning could see Sasha’s thin, wind-blown hair somewhere at the edge of his field of vision.

  ‘Come over a bit funny,’ he said.

  ‘You’ll be all right.’

  ‘Making a fool of myself.’

  ‘Russian hospitality. It happens to everyone.’

  Events became confused, as if in another world. Manning had an impression of applause, of glasses clinking, of laughter. At some stage the chairs were pushed back. People were moving about. Faces bent over him.

  ‘Hallo,’ he said to them, smiling.

  One of the faces was Korolenko’s.

  ‘Your friend Lippe,’ it seemed to be saying, ‘is ill. She was found in the street. She was taken to the First City Hospital.’

  ‘Thank you,’ said Manning.

  More faces. People leaving the room. Other people coming into the room. Manning caught a glimpse of Proctor-Gould. Old Gordon seemed to be in a bad way as well. Two men in overcoats were holding his elbows. His face was very white.

  Then arms were placed under his own armpits, lifting him to his feet, helping him towards the door.

  ‘Thank you,’ he said. ‘Very kind. Bit tricky at the moment.’

  He swivelled his head to see who it was helping him. Not anyone he knew. Two men in overcoats. Friends of friends, perhaps.

  Outside the door in one of the great marble corridors of the university, he saw Sasha. He was talking to another man in an overcoat, looking over the man’s shoulder and frowning anxiously at Manning.

  ‘Sorry, Sasha,’ said Manning.

  Farther on down the corridor Konstantin was hovering.

  ‘Sorry, Kostik,’ said Manning. ‘Ashamed to be seen by you in this condition. I truly am.’

  Konstantin shook his head and waved his hand deprecatingly.

  ‘Never kept our appointment,’ said Manning. ‘Sorry, Kostik.’

  Konstantin was left behind. They were going down a broad staircase. People were staring. Manning’s feet muddled up the edges of the stairs, tumbling over them inertly. He felt infinitely sad and ashamed.

  ‘Sorry,’ he told the men who were holding him. ‘God, I’m sorry!’

  He began to cry.

  Outside the night was blessedly cool and dark. Down, down the unending flight of ceremonial stai
rs to the roadway. He was being put into the back of a car. Then the car was full of silent men in overcoats, smelling of scent and cigarettes and sweat.

  ‘Put his head down,’ said one of them, as the car accelerated across the piazza. ‘He’s going to be sick.’

  37

  Manning’s acclimatization to captivity was softened for him; on the first day the prison took its place as one more of the after-effects of drunkenness – intimate, timeless, and unreal. By the second day it already felt natural, and indeed inevitable.

  There seemed to be no one else in his section of the prison. From the little exercise yard where he was taken for an hour each morning he could sometimes hear the noises of human activity – a shout, someone laughing, a bucket scurring along a stone floor. But he saw no one except the warders who unlocked him and brought him his food. The food was not very much worse than it had been in the Faculty canteen. He was still wearing his own clothes, though his belt, tie, watch and money had disappeared, and the laces had been removed from his shoes. Someone had fetched a few of his belongings and placed them in his cell; he had his own toothbrush and his own shaving tackle, though the blades had gone. Each morning he was unlocked and allowed to slop along in his unlaced shoes to the ablutions at the end of the corridor – a lavatory without a seat or a door, and a sink with a cold tap and a block of hard, cheese-coloured soap. The duty warder fitted one of his confiscated blades into the razor for him, and waited while he made his toilet. All he lacked was a towel. By some administrative oversight, none of his own towels had been included with his belongings, and none was issued by the prison, so that he was forced to dry his hands on his one spare handkerchief, which quickly became sodden.

  His sense of isolation and unrelatedness was increased because he did not know where the prison was. He was fairly certain that it was not the Lubianka, where foreign prisoners were usually taken. The outside of the Lubianka was like a large office block, and people said the cells were underground. His own cell was on the first floor, and so far as he could see from the exercise yard the building was more like some sort of old-fashioned penitentiary. He was not even sure that he was still in Moscow. The car ride had seemed to last an eternity. All he could remember about it was being repeatedly, shamefully sick.