The Book of Anna

by Carmen Boullosa

  In their meetings to plan their first act of violence, Clementine proposed putting a bomb next to the fortress where two legendary rebels were imprisoned, but they decided not to after thinking it over; it would be absurd, if not impossible.

  “Who would even care? We need to do something that has an impact on citizens, not on prisoners, it’s not worth the risk.”

  “What do we care about risks? Long live Nisan Farber!” Nisan Farber was an anarchist who stabbed a strike-breaking business owner and put a bomb in the police station, killing many, including himself.

  Later, Clementine suggested planting a bomb at the statue of Tsar Peter on his horse, but they replied, “Absolutely not! We’ll win only enemies doing that, it symbolizes the city!”

  “But the city has nothing to do with that statue!”

  “That’s what you think, Clementine, because you live with your head in the clouds, but the people of St. Petersburg think of him as the symbol of our city.”

  When she thought about the city, what came to mind were the slums near the port, a ring of misery that surrounds it, where the working class lives.

  “Then we should change the symbol to something that represents the people of St. Petersburg.” But she didn’t convince anyone. Someone suggested a café, someone else a hotel, they couldn’t agree. They couldn’t even agree on whether it should be a suicide bomb, to guarantee its success.

  “There’s no other way, the mistake is …”

  Clementine is the only one who believes it’s not necessary to take innocent lives, that the important thing is to draw attention to their cause through provocation—just not with collaborators or infiltrators.

  At last they come to an agreement about where they’ll plant the bomb. If they blow up the rails across the frozen river, they’ll grab the attention of most Petersburgians. It won’t be a suicide bomb. Clementine will plant it. They did a lot of strategizing and planning but didn’t take into account the possibility that the bomb might not work….

  Clementine arrives at her accomplices’ heated meeting. As she enters, she hears, “She didn’t pull the detonator, obviously.”

  She jumps to her own defense.

  “Of course I pulled the detonator, if I hadn’t the bomb wouldn’t have made the pathetic noise that it did. I only heard it because I have such sharp ears. Believe me, it sounded like a spoon landing on the floor.”

  “You weren’t the only one who heard it—”

  “But no one could tell where the sound was coming from—”

  “No one expected there to be a bomb on the tram—”

  “There wasn’t even an investigation—”

  “Are you sure?” Clementine asks.

  “Absolutely. I have it on authority from an excellent source.”

  “But it didn’t explode—”

  “It didn’t explode!”

  “I’m telling you it did—” Clementine defends herself again.

  “No, Clementine, it didn’t explode, it let one off!”

  “Silent but not deadly!”

  “A real stink-bomb, we made!”

  The anarchists begin to laugh. Their pent-up nerves momentarily turn them into a clutch of madmen, not activists.

  “I told you that sacrificing yourself to make sure the bomb detonates is the only way.”

  “Keep on dreaming!” Clementine says. “It wouldn’t have made so much as a hole in my dress even if I’d been holding it when it exploded. The bomb was faulty. It was poorly made.”

  17. In the Karenin Palace Kitchen

  In the Karenin Palace kitchen, all the staff has gathered, except Kapitonich. In their distress over Aleksandra’s escape, they’re all speaking at once, unable to hear each other. They speak over one another, their tones not of grief or jubilation but of worry. Because they’re so upset, they say things that they normally never would. The conversation slowly begins to evolve.

  “Say what you want, Madame Karenina was the salt of the earth. She died because of the opium drops she took to help her sleep. Poor thing, she had no relief from her torments…. Each night she took more.”

  “Opium kills.”

  “That wasn’t what killed her, it was what she did to keep from having children. That’s what did her in,” the old cook says.

  “What did she do to avoid getting pregnant?” It’s not an innocent question. The young woman who asks (Valeria) doesn’t want to have children if she can’t be sure they won’t be born into a life of misery. She breaks her back working in vain; she tries to save money but her efforts get her nowhere: the price of a tram ticket keeps going up, her husband’s salary (good old Matyushenko, who’s at sea on a submarine) doesn’t arrive regularly, her mother is ill….

  “The only one who knows what on earth madame was doing to keep herself from having children is Kapitonich.” That’s the cook again.

  “How on earth would Kapitonich know that? Impossible! It’s not a man’s business.”

  “They say he went out to get it for her because he’s the only one she trusted,” the cook says.

  “But that’s wrong, completely wrong! Because when she was living here, she didn’t use those ointments.”

  “Ointments?” It’s that young woman, Valeria, again, stopping the conversation because she’s got a personal interest. Many times she’s thought, as she’s mopping the floors, Madame (as they called Anna Karenina) probably tangled legs (that’s her husband’s expression—“Come on, sweetheart, let’s tangle legs” or “He’s already tangling legs” with someone or other) many times with Count Vronsky, not just once but a lot, yet she had only one child in three years…. And with Karenin she conceived just one boy in who knows how long…. To her, it’s obvious that madame didn’t have more children because she didn’t want them.

  “She wasn’t using anything, for God’s sake, stop talking about these evil ointments! She was a lady!”

  “Then why didn’t she have more children?” Valeria asks.

  “I don’t know. But Kapitonich didn’t work for her over there, he’s always worked in this house.”

  “She was such a good woman.”

  “Yes, she was.”

  “What are we talking about?” the cook asks. “Aren’t we all here because Aleksandra left? We have no idea what’s happened to her. Let’s hope she doesn’t fall into the hands of the tsar’s secret police….”

  “The Okhrana? That’s ridiculous!” Valeria says, laughing aloud, both innocent and ignorant.

  “It’s not ridiculous when you think about what her brother Vladimir was up to….”

  Magically, when she speaks his name, Vladimir appears. He hasn’t checked to see whether the kitchen is empty because he assumed no one would be awake at this hour. It’s not the first time he’s arrived in the middle of the night, opening the door to the street with his picklock.

  Knowing he can’t turn around and leave, he smiles and looks over this impromptu gathering, asking in a faux-shy, squeaky voice, “And Aleksandra?”

  “She went to find you!” the cook says.

  “Where? Where would she go to find me? I’m here!”

  “Wherever Father Gapon is, where else?”

  Vladimir has been killing time, pacing the freezing streets. He didn’t want to stay in the workshop where Clementine was once employed because it was true what she’d said: if someone heard the failed explosion and recognized her and made the connection, they’d come looking for her.

  His curiosity spurs him into motion. Carefully, he makes sure no one is following him; he walks up and down the street several times before leaving. He ambles aimlessly, until, a few blocks later, he heads toward the tram station where the rails cross the frozen Neva River. He sees it from a distance, marooned next to the jetty like a forgotten toy. He thinks, Unscathed! It’s unscathed!

  He approaches the station. There’s another man ahead of him, so lost in his own thoughts that he doesn’t realize the station is closed until he reaches the ticket window. “Damn i
t!” he says, “They’ve closed already! There’s no one here!”

  He turns abruptly to leave and almost bumps into Vladimir, who is pretending to walk distractedly too.

  “What’s happened?”

  “The tram’s not running anymore.”

  “Already?” Vladimir says innocently. “Maybe the conductor fell asleep.”

  Vladimir takes the man by the arm, and they walk along the jetty to the tram door. They inspect the tram’s interior. It’s empty, and all in one piece. Vladimir scrutinizes it, looking it over thoroughly. There’s not even a trace. He thinks, The bomb didn’t go off! Nisan Farber had the right idea, that’s why Nisan Farber blew himself up…. This thought burns in his mind. My Clementine….

  “I’ll have to cross the bridge on foot,” his temporary companion says. “Shall we go together?”

  “Good luck! I’ll wait.”

  Vladimir waves goodbye and heads off in the opposite direction. He’s still not ready to go to the Karenin Palace to ask his sister to take him in for the night. He can’t go anywhere near a Gaponist enclave. On Nevsky Prospekt, he joins the Saturday meeting of a communist cell whose motto is “Brave as madmen, we’ll take heaven by storm.” Protected by the son of a former minister of Tsar Alexander—the Liberator, who freed the serfs—the cell was where he first met Clementine, back when she was still at the workshop, when she agreed to organize the seamstresses to fight for their rights, before she was taken prisoner.

  The last time Clementine attended a meeting of the Take Heaven by Storm cell, she bid them goodbye, saying, “If you really want to seize heaven, you must have a strategy or they’ll strike back. We must seize heaven with our hands. To heaven with our hands!” The gathering listened, thinking she was crazy; Vladimir, on the other hand, fell for her. Or into her hands….

  Vladimir shows up and is received without any fanfare, as if he’s still a regular. He sits down to listen. They’re arguing about whether they should join tomorrow’s march with Father Gapon—some say no, others say yes, including a woman named Alexandra Kollontai. She talks in such a moving way that he wants to speak his own mind, but they won’t let him get a word in, he’s lost his place here, he has no right to speak or vote, and they won’t let Kollontai’s right-hand man speak either; Kollontai herself has now left to attend another meeting. Vladimir watches the voting; the ones who don’t want to seize heaven with their hands will march with the Gaponists tomorrow not to seize heaven Vladimir thinks, but to beg. He realizes his Clementine is speaking through his conscience.

  After watching them vote and agree on a meeting point, he wanders through the streets awhile longer before going to the Karenin Palace, where we’ve just seen him arrive.

  18. We’ll Give Our Lives!

  Father Gapon, surrounded by a halo of followers, gives his last speech for the day. In a hoarse voice, he repeats, “I’m a priest only inside the church. Here, I’m a man like any other.”

  His entourage has heard him make his pitch a thousand times, but in his exaltation, he can’t stop, and his faithful followers don’t want him to.

  Aleksandra is one step behind him. She’s fretting. She doesn’t know a thing about Vladimir; they tell her not to worry, but without any specifics. She regrets leaving the Karenin Palace without permission. What for? she asks herself. If I’m not even able to search for my brother…. She’s afraid of losing her job, but most of all, she wants to know what has happened to him.

  “I must go find Vladimir,” she says insistently.

  But they keep telling her the same thing: Vladimir is fine, she doesn’t need to worry.

  “Will I see him where we’re going?”

  “Probably not, but anything’s possible. Calm down, it’s all right.”

  They come to a place where beggars have built run-down shacks and bonfires; most of them live outdoors. Aleksandra has been put at the front of the group, surrounded by the men who escort Gapon wherever he goes, his lieutenants. Father Gapon repeats the same speech he’s been making all day long, “We have come to see you, Father, seeking justice and protection.” The crowd repeats what he says: “We’ve fallen into poverty, we’re oppressed, we’re crushed by an unbearable burden of work, we’re insulted, we’re treated like slaves, it’s inhuman…. Isn’t it true, comrades?”

  Father Gapon’s only friend, Rutenberg, steps up to the podium again, mentions weapons, and everyone suddenly becomes a pacifist. It’s identical to his previous speech.

  “Will anyone bear arms tomorrow? Is anyone bearing arms tonight?”

  “Nobody! No one!” the crowd shouts in unison.

  Aleksandra goes along, feeling the crowd’s contagious fervor, she’s caught it, too, she’s possessed like everyone else. Without even realizing she’s doing it, she begins shouting in unison with the feverish crowd, “We’ll give our lives!” “We swear!” “We curse them! We curse them!”

  19. The Karenins Take Dinner

  The Karenins continue their discussion into the wee hours. It has nothing to do with the extraordinary quality of an oil painting that is exceedingly lifelike in its depiction of one human being. The canvas is brave and compelling in its expression of the conflicts and contradictions of an individual, uniting them all in one image. There are a number of reasons why it’s such a pleasure to look at, as was its model. It has the gift of beauty, just like Anna. But Anna’s beauty provoked a desire to possess it; it was irresistible to anyone susceptible to its charms. Although the canvas is scrupulously faithful to its model, that’s not why it’s so mesmerizing. Delicate, it invites contemplation of the color, the fabric, the craftsmanship of a hypothetical creature, capturing her beauty without her sensual magnetism, making the viewer introspective. It’s a classic. Its creator, Mikhailov, had no idea what he would achieve when he painted it. He exceeded his ambitions, and how. He knew he had done a good job, and he was well paid in return. That’s all—but all is nothing compared to this vertiginously beautiful painting.

  During their conversation, Sergei lays out all the reasons why he can’t stand to have the portrait of his mother on view for all and sundry to see. Claudia argues otherwise. At some point during the night, Sergei says it would be acceptable if the picture were exhibited as Portrait of a Woman, without disclosing the identity of the model. Claudia argues that it will cause a scandal no matter what. “People will gossip one way or another. They’re idle and lazy, they don’t have anything better to do. They neglect their children, loll about in messy rooms, and keep themselves busy with slanderous rumors.”

  On the other hand, they could sell the portrait and buy something big…. “A boat? Or a motorcar like Prince Orlov’s?” She’s trying to distract him. “Land in Texas? An Italian villa?”

  The painting could fetch a price that would make many a dream possible. Then they would gain the tsar’s good graces by allowing the portrait to be part of the exhibition, and in noticing them, he might grant Sergei the government post he’s been wanting for some time. And from that post, many decorations would follow. The painting would help Sergei’s career, not hinder it.

  All Claudia’s arguments eventually disarm Sergei, and in his exhaustion, he gives in. Claudia decides that she’ll send a letter in the morning thanking the tsar for the invitation to include the piece in the imperial collection and requesting that an expert appraise it to be sure it has sufficient artistic merit for the honor of being exhibited in such a museum. If it’s not a masterpiece, the canvas doesn’t deserve to become part of the imperial collection.

  PART TWO

  BLOODY SUNDAY

  Sunday, January 9, 1905

  20. Anya Karenina without Aleksandra

  At Anya’s house, Sunday gets off to a chaotic start. Aleksandra’s absence disrupts life at the Karenin Palace. Anya’s room becomes the scene of a great quest: no one can find the bow for her skirt, the right color hat, or the petticoat that matches, or the collar, the blouse, the dress. They change Anya’s outfit four times, without being able to co
mplete one of them. The clock is ticking, servants come and go, yet Anya remains undressed. In the kitchen, breakfast still isn’t ready. It’s Sunday, but no one can go out to pray. Kapitonich is the most out of sorts; he doesn’t know when he should go and wait by the door, and his knees hurt from standing so long without taking a rest in his room.

  Aleksandra appears to be extremely disorganized, but chaos is her element, and in it, she’s like a fish in water, finding things effortlessly while anyone else drowns in her turbulent wake. Those who go looking will find no trace of things: a pair of shoes hides a shawl, a corset hides a comb, a skirt hides a pair of knickers, and a belt hides a bottle of ink for writing calling cards. And no one has even attempted to do Anya’s hair yet; that’s Aleksandra’s forte.

  21. The Karenins’ Reply to the Tsar

  That Sunday, January 9, Claudia answers the tsar early, immediately after breakfast, in a style that is anything but bold and direct. Her letter says that nothing would make them happier than to see the portrait of Anna Karenina in the imperial collection, “an inconceivable privilege.” They feel that, out of duty, they must ask an expert’s opinion of the portrait, since they themselves are incapable of judging whether it has any artistic value, and the Hermitage “is without a doubt the best collection of paintings in the world” (it was a good collection, but this phrase was pure flattery). The canvas is at the disposal of anyone capable of judging whether it deserves this honor; let them come and see it.

  The note is elegantly written (it doesn’t mention money, for that you have to read between the lines), and Sergei almost likes it: it’s so dignified, and it gives the tsar an option to decline. It may be that the portrait is poor quality, truly unworthy, without any artistic or financial value, a mere topic of gossip, in which case it wouldn’t be worth removing from storage. With any luck, Sergei thinks, it will remain facing the wall where Claudia says it lives like a punished child.