After Zenda

by John Spurling

  I sat down without even token applause. I thought, with relief, that I had junked my case, but Yelena told me afterwards that applause was out of place - this was business, not performance or ceremony. She herself showed no sign of relaxing after my speech as I did, pushing my chair back from the table and downing another glass of vodka. She leant her elbows on the table and fixed every subsequent speaker with her laser look, translating everything they said for my benefit, but often abbreviating verbose statements into a few salient points. It was a long session, in which every conceivable opinion for or against was expressed and in which Colonel Stavrilev hardly took part, except occasionally to quell an argument or lead a lost rambler back to base. Many of them put direct questions to me, especially about their degree of independence, their income and housing and their relationship to the Ruritanian Army. I improvised answers as best I could, explaining that my first job would be to re-draft the constitution and that since my power would rest on theirs we would be mutually supportive. I didn’t bother to make very careful replies, since I was sure that Yelena, translating them, would re-phrase or even re-invent them as necessary.

  At last, when the discussion had become tired and repetitive, the Colonel stood up and demanded a show of hands. There were five against, the odd abstention, but all the rest were in favour of restoring King Karel to his throne.

  Only as we reeled away towards dawn, after emptying every bottle in sight, to the rooms provided for us in the barracks, did Colonel Stavrilev murmur despondently:

  ‘Very few of our tanks actually work, you know.’

  25 The Ringmaster

  The trouble with the Cossacks’ tanks wasn’t just that they were old, but that they were tanks at all. Tanks - because they’re so heavy - break down and wear out extremely quickly. The best thing to do with a tank, the Colonel told me, is to keep it permanently in mothballs; the next best thing, if you absolutely have to take it about with you, is to carry it on a transporter. The guns on his tanks, he said, were excellent and in good condition, the armour-plating was fine, but the engines and tracks were rubbish. However, he reckoned that if I could give him until spring he might - by cannibalising the rest - have about thirty tanks operational. I asked him if he couldn’t at least put the rest in the field.

  ‘No, sir, the most we can put in the field, as I said, is thirty.’ ‘I meant,’ I said, ‘literally in the field - in a field - semi-camouflaged, to hide their defects not their presence, a half regiment of threatening hulks. Then the mobile tanks can keep the Ruritanian Army busy - preferably knock it out altogether - while the troops who would have been manning the hulks if they’d been operational can seize the airfield and the town - on foot, if necessary.’

  We were in the Colonel’s office the day after the decision-taking dinner, all of us in a bad state of health. The Colonel and I had straightforward hangovers, Yelena was exhausted. When she translated my suggestion, the Colonel, shaking his large head and occasionally banging it with his palm to stimulate the cells, took some time to master its details; then his shoulder-tabs began to wobble, his eyes watered, his body shook spasmodically and he laughed so loud and long that the whole thin-walled barracks must have heard it.

  ‘Ne seryoz.no!’ he finally managed to say. ‘Rozoomiyoo.’ He spoke at some length in Ukrainian to Yelena, who translated wearily and more briefly.

  ‘The Colonel thinks he understand you now, Karel. You want the Cossacks to frighten the Ruritanians to death, not shoot them. You want a Cossack circus instead of a battle.’

  She changed her tone, became more intense, almost pleading:

  ‘Is this what you really want, Karel?’

  ‘I think it is.’

  ‘You must be absolutely clear, because the Colonel says that if he prepares his troops for a circus he will not be able to make a change at the last moment and deliver a genuine crippling blow.’

  The Colonel spoke again and she translated:

  ‘On the other hand, he says he thinks you’re probably right -a circus is what’s needed. But he is worried about the airforce. He knows it’s very weak, but he doesn’t like the idea of a circus with no air cover at all. That could turn into a Roman circus, he says, with the Cossacks playing Christians.’

  I said I would try to neutralise the airforce and opted for the circus, but the Colonel still saw a problem.

  ‘He can give you a fine performance in Kapitsa,’ she said, ‘but he doesn’t think the tricks would work again for Strelsau. So if the Ruritanian Army is still in good order, undaunted and operational after Kapitsa, you might end up with only half your kingdom.’

  ‘I believe Kapitsa will be enough,’ I said.

  The end of winter was almost in sight and I left the Cossacks to prepare their circus and Yelena in hospital undergoing further tests, while I went back to Strelsau.

  The political situation had become very tense, with a large group of deputies - moderate Germans as well as Slavs - now snapping daily at the government’s heels. The inquiry was still being delayed with the excuse that it was difficult to find suitably unbiased people to conduct it. The truth was that the government wanted people biased their way but not generally known to be and there were no such people of sufficient standing.

  But they were all still focussed on Kapitsa. Because Karapata was in the hands of the guerrillas and all communications with the rest of the country severed, the bombing of the Sebrikov dam was ignored. It seemed to me that, properly presented, this neglected hard-line atrocity might damage the government and the President far more than Kapitsa.

  I phoned Clare Studebaker, introduced myself again as Ed Fenton - she was eager to take another story from him after the success of the first one - and suggested she ask for clearance to visit Bilavice.

  I myself would accompany her and see she was well received there. But I warned her not to identify me as Ed Fenton: I could perhaps form part of her team as a spare cameraman or driver.

  ‘But why should I go to Bilavice?’

  ‘Because you’ll find that the civilian population is suffering terrible privations as a result of the destruction of their power-supplies. These innocent people are being punished by the government for being hostages to the guerrillas. The Kapitsa scandal is really nothing compared to Sebrikov. I here might be some argument for bombarding a mutinous barracks, but surely none at all for destroying a dam and making war on the civilian population. If they don’t allow you into Karapata, you can say as much. If they do, you can get pictures and interviews and prove it.

  ‘What do you get out of this, Mr Fenton?’

  ‘Truth. Justice. Silly things of that sort.’

  Apart from any damage she might inflict on the government, I also wanted a meeting with Michael.

  My next move was to make contact with the Count. I knew he stayed in a hotel whenever he was in Strelsau and there were only three with four stars: the ‘Atena’, the ‘Frederik’ and the ‘Royal Elphberg’. I tried the last first and was told the Count was out but would be back later. I left a message with the receptionist that I’d wait for him in the foyer at six o’clock.

  ‘Your name, sir?’

  ‘Karl Marx.’

  ‘As in . . .?’

  ‘As in Das Kapital.’

  ‘I will see he gets the message, sir.’

  The receptionist’s sangfroid was exactly what I’d have expected from a hotel patronised by the Count.

  I was making these phone calls from Andrzej’s gym. He hadn’t recognised me when I first walked through his door in my awful fur hat and was even more astonished when I removed it. He’d known me, of course, only as a skinhead. Being a friend of Vladek’s, he’d visited the exhibition in the Palace of Youth and been very impressed with the waxwork and the story and personality of Rudolf Rassendyll. He’d even kept a copy of the magazine, one of whose glossy pages I’d seen, on the night of my swim in the River Volzer, pinned to the cabin-wall of the barge; and he brought it out of his office to show me. I admitted the lik
eness, explained the relationship and swore him to secrecy. He was an arch-royalist - probably all gym-instructors are - and more than happy, indeed much honoured, he said, to have me use his office as a base and sleeping-quarters for as long as I cared to. He told me the Flavia/Rassendyll exhibition was finished but he thought Vladek was due to have an exhibition of his own work there in early spring.

  I waited in the foyer of the ‘Royal Elphberg’ with my hat on until the Count appeared from the lift.

  ‘You simply cannot wear that dead cat in here, Karl Marx. The hotel will lose one of its stars.’

  I told him that without it I’d already been recognised once today.

  ‘This is a problem, yes,’ he said. ‘We are pregnant but not quite ready to reveal our big secret to the world. Perhaps another haircut? We have a barber’s shop on the premises.’

  ‘No,’ I said. ‘I shall want all my hair quite soon now. You’ll have to put up with my hat or else we can talk in the street or in some hotel with no stars to lose.’

  ‘You are becoming exigeant, dear boy,’ he said, ushering me into the bar and ordering whiskies. ‘Does this mean you are beginning to feel confident of success?’

  ‘Who commands the airforce?’ I asked.

  ‘General Rischenheirn,’ he said. ‘He looks like a jockey, but his father flew for the Luftwaffe in the war and he belongs to an old family.’

  ‘You once asked me,’ I said, ‘If there was anything I wouldn’t want done in my name . . .’

  ‘I remember the occasion well. You gave a very equivocal answer - to the effect that you would never break anybody’s teeth for the fun of it. I had not asked you that.’

  ‘The question now,’ I said, ‘is what exactly you are able to do in my name?’

  ‘I begin to see the importance of your hat, dear boy. It is not a dead cat, but the magic Tarnhelm from Wagner’s Ring and has made you change shape altogether.’

  ‘I’ll tell you what I need,’ I said, ‘and then you tell me how much of it you can supply. If it seems to be enough, then I’ll show you my whole hand and we can judge whether the two hands together might make a grand slam.’

  ‘You are a bridge-player?’

  ‘Not a serious player, no.’

  ‘I am a very serious player. What am I playing for, Karl Marx? I know your stake, but what is mine?’

  I didn’t have time to reply. A tall man in a striped suit with thin slicked-down black hair and a long fleshy face had stopped behind the Count’s chair and was staring at me. I waited for him to go away, but he put his hand lightly on the Count’s shoulder and said:

  ‘Is this your bridge-partner, Count? Does he always wear his hat indoors in the best hotels? And the name you gave him is surely a witticism?’

  He didn’t smile. The heavy lines on his face all ran downwards, as if he never did. The Count seemed pleased to see him.

  ‘Join us, Helmut, please!’

  He gestured to the empty chair between us at our small table.

  ‘Karl Marx, this is General Practsin who - I think we are allowed to say in these days of democracy and open government - is head of Corpus. You know of Corpus? That is our nice new human name for the security service.’

  He summoned a waiter and ordered three more whiskies.

  ‘Now there are three of us, we can play Cut-throat Bridge,’ he said.

  ‘You haven’t introduced this gentleman in the hat,’ said Practsin, still staring at me.

  ‘He is not quite in society yet, Helmut,’ said the Count. ‘But Karl Marx is indeed and quite genuinely his name, if not his whole name.’

  ‘I recognise his face and especially his nose pretty well,’ said Practsin.

  ‘Where, I wonder, have you seen it before?’ said the Count lightly.

  ‘I am searching my memory.’

  ‘No need,’ said the Count. ‘I know everything about him, even to the reason for his hat, and what I know you shall know, Helmut, but not, please, on this occasion.’

  Practsin seemed satisfied and was silent as the waiter delivered the drinks. We clinked glasses.

  ‘This is a very lucky meeting,’ said the Count. ‘Are you dining here, Helmut? Will you join us?’

  ‘I’m afraid not, I’m meeting somebody else. Why is it lucky?’

  ‘Because Karl Marx here is in the secret of our plans for an exhumation in Zenda and I wonder how far we’ve got.’ He turned to me: ‘General Practsin has been so kind as to interest himself in the details on our behalf. His department, you will understand, can call on much experience and expertise in such matters, and it seemed to me a more productive way to go to work than by tedious routine applications through courts or local councils.’

  ‘There’s no difficulty,’ said the General. ‘It can be done whenever you like. But if there’s no immediate rush we may as well wait until the ground is softer.’

  The Count raised his eyebrows at me and I nodded,

  ‘Good, good,’ said the Count, ‘when the flowers are all springing, then, Helmut.’

  When he’d finished his whisky General Practsin shook hands with the Count, stared again at me and moved away with the ominous final remark,

  ‘A hat or possibly a cap.’

  The Count looked delighted with the encounter.

  ‘A good person for you to meet, Karl Marx - especially informally. General Practsin is not a bundle of jokes - both his parents were murdered by the communists when he was still a boy and he has much to forgive. I shall have to give him a full account of your adventures in due course, probably quite soon, because we don’t want him acting independently. But if you can persuade him, when the time comes, that not all Slavs are incarnate fiends, I think he will prove a reliable partner.’

  He beckoned the waiter and asked for a menu.

  ‘But before we were interrupted I asked you a question to which I require a most specific reply. What is my stake, Karl Marx?’

  ‘I can’t think of anyone I’d rather have as prime minister,’ I said, ‘but I don’t fancy the kind that stands in front.’

  The waiter brought two menus and a wine list.

  ‘You are wearing the Tarnhelm. See what you would like for supper - this is the best restaurant so far east - you would have to go to the far side of Asia to find a better. The minister w ho stands in front, you know, is more of a protection and easier to get rid of. The eminence grise is protected by the throne and more likely to be a permanent feature.

  ‘I hope we shall both be permanent features.’

  ‘Let us drink to that!’

  ‘These Generals,’ I said, ‘are they al! close confederates?’

  ‘Which generals do you mean?’

  ‘Rischenheim and Practsin in particular.’

  ‘Not close, no.’

  ‘It occurred to me that if Rischenheim fell foul of Corpus, it might be necessary for his whole staff and organisation to be drawn into the investigation. But who then would be able to deploy the airforce in an emergency?’

  We had a long working dinner together. The food and wine were as good as I’d ever had and I said I was proud to have a first-class hotel named after me.

  ‘How did you know? The name has been changed.’

  ‘I mean my new, my future name.’

  ‘Ah yes. But that was my little joke - as part-owner. Its previous name was the Karl Marx . Of course, one can never make better jokes than history does all on its own.’

  ‘I used to think history very boring.’

  ‘That was because conventional people taught you to think of it as serious facts. But it’s really only irony on a long time-scale. You are a prime example, dear boy: a joke played by time on Ruritania and I do really believe now, after all you tell me, that time means to give us the punch-line.’

  Clare Studebaker put the government on the spot with her request to visit Bilavice. They couldn’t admit they didn’t currently control Bilavice, since they’d consistently played down in public the successes of the guerrillas; nor did
they want an influential foreign journalist telling the world - and indeed Ruritania itself indirectly - what they’d done to the Sebrikov dam and the power-supplies of their own people; but they couldn’t absolutely forbid her to go because that would look as if they didn’t control Bilavice and had made war on their own people. So they tried hard to dissuade her - dwelling on the winter roads and the dangers of terrorist action - saying that these people were completely ruthless and unpredictable and would not respect her nationality or her credentials as a journalist or even her sex. They hinted - this was rich - that the last British journalist to go there had not been heard of since. Who was this? she asked them; they replied that it was an unconfirmed rumour and it would be wrong to alarm the man’s relations until they had more information. Finally, when she rejected all discouragements, they gave her permission to travel to Bilavice by road - the train service was temporarily discontinued - but warned her that the army authorities on the border would make their own assessment of the situation and might have to turn her back for her own safety. In other words, she could drive to a check-point and drive back again.

  All this obstacle-making, of course, only made Clare the keener to go and, since the Ruritanian Army was too small to guard every possible crossing-point, it wasn’t that difficult. To avoid any of the obvious bridges over the Volzer we only had to leave Strelsau from the other side of the river and take a circuitous route along minor roads. This made the trip much longer but, travelling in the first of our two Japanese 4X4s with Clare, that didn’t bother me. She treated me now with more respect and I spent much of the journey telling her in English - the rest of our party were Ruritanians and only spoke German - about my early adventures with the Ruritanian Army of the True Faith, up to the point at which I narrowly escaped execution as a mercenary.

  ‘And you escaped,’ she said, ‘because that just happened to be the day the Second Regiment chose to mutiny?’