by Jonathan Coe
‘There’s nothing to explain.’
‘Have you told her yet?
‘Told her what?’
‘About your wife. Your family.’
Thomas hesitated, and then said, without conviction: ‘Why should I?’
Tony shook his head in exasperation. ‘Thomas, I don’t want to think you’re a heel, because I like you. But that’s the conclusion I’m rapidly coming to. Either that, or you’re very, very confused. And naive. That girl is growing fonder and fonder of you, and sooner or later, she’s going to want more than a chaste peck on the cheek at the end of an evening.’
Thomas thought about this, and could not come up with a suitable answer. So all he said, in the end, was: ‘Oh, knock it off, can’t you?’
‘You’re getting tight,’ said Tony, surprised by the note of petulance in his friend’s voice.
Emily returned and lightened the mood at once with a spontaneous change of subject. ‘Darling,’ she said to Tony, ‘do you think that now would be a good time to talk to Mr Chersky about Angela’s dresses?’ Adding to Thomas, by way of explanation: ‘Back in New York I have this college friend, Angela Thornbury. She’s been working on the most stunning collection of evening wear, but what she really needs is a good shot of publicity. And I was thinking that Mr Chersky might be able to help.’
‘I don’t quite follow,’ said Thomas.
‘Well, he’s an editor, isn’t he? And he’s looking for stories for Sputnik.’
‘But he only wants stories about the Soviet Union.’
‘Well, I think that’s very narrow-minded of him. The whole point of this fair is to promote cultural exchange. What about an article comparing fashions in New York with fashions in Moscow? I’d be interested to read that, wouldn’t you?’
‘He’d put a slant on it – and your friend’s dresses wouldn’t come out well.’
‘I’m going to raise it with him anyway.’
And raise it she did, although Andrey’s response was more polite than anything else.
‘You know, in some ways it’s a good idea,’ he said. ‘Contrasting different ways of life in the East and the West. We could even extend it to all sorts of different subjects. Technology, for instance.’
At the sound of this word, Thomas looked across at him warily.
‘As I believe I said to you before,’ Andrey continued, addressing Tony now, ‘we are already preparing an article about Soviet advances in nuclear fusion. What would be interesting would be to compare our discoveries with those of the British.’
‘Well, you’re at perfect liberty to do that,’ said Tony. ‘As you know, we’re pretty transparent about our work. That’s part of our culture. The ZETA machine is there for all to see in the British pavilion.’
Andrey laughed. ‘A facsimile of the machine, yes. Very handsome to look at, but of limited interest to a real scientist.’
‘Of course. Much like the model of the Sputnik in your display.’
‘Precisely. Neither of us wants to give away too much. And why should we? That would be foolish. As always, West and East behave in exactly the same way. It’s just that you always insist on claiming the moral high ground, by pretending that the West is different.’
‘But we are different.’
‘Then prove it.’
‘How?’
‘By sharing some new information about the ZETA machine with our readers.’
Tony looked at him intently. Something in Andrey’s tone seemed to have rattled him.
‘I’ve a good mind to do that,’ he said. ‘If only to prove you wrong.’
‘Look, old man,’ said Thomas, laying a warning hand on his arm, ‘that’s a silly way of thinking.’
He was about to say more, when Anneke appeared. He stood up to greet her and there was a long moment of embarrassment, while he aimed a kiss at her cheek and she (unless he was imagining it, under Tony’s influence) offered her lips instead. As a result, the kiss landed somewhere in between.
‘I’m so sorry I’m late,’ said Anneke, blushing with pleasure to see him. ‘It’s been the busiest day . . .’
And she launched into a long explanation about a Dutch couple who had become separated from their six-year-old daughter at the fair, and how she and some of the other hostesses had spent two hours looking for the little girl, only to find her sitting outside – of all places – one of the straw huts in the pavilion of the Belgian Congo, staring as if hypnotized at one of the half-naked natives as he stood and shivered in the unaccustomed chill of a North European summer evening. Thomas nodded and smiled at every stage of the story, even though he was far more interested in what Tony and Andrey were saying, because the Russian would not drop the subject of the ZETA machine, and Tony seemed, if anything, to be encouraging him to pursue the matter further, and Emily was glancing from one to the other, looking increasingly concerned, and the more Thomas listened, or rather half-listened, through the curtain of Anneke’s interminable guileless monologue, the less he liked what he heard, especially when he heard Tony saying that he had always wanted to visit Moscow, and Andrey saying that his home would always be open to him, and Emily saying how wonderful it was that two people from opposing countries could join together in friendship like this, and how it just showed that international politics was a lot of hogwash, and Tony agreeing, and saying that it proved what he had always thought, that the nuclear arms race was an expensive and dangerous waste of time, and he didn’t believe the Soviet Union had any aggressive intentions towards the West at all, and anyway what was so great about the Western way of life, it was all based upon materialism and inequality, and Communism might not be perfect but neither was it the aberration that people made it out to be, and Andrey said, Yes, at last!, a Westerner who understands, and clasping him around the shoulder he declared that he was One of Us, and then all three of them drank more vodka, and poured some more for Thomas, and after another couple of glasses he realized that this stuff was strong, I mean really strong, much stronger than the stuff they had been drinking before, and he dimly realized that he didn’t have much grasp on what was going on any more, but he did notice that Emily had her arm round Tony’s waist, or rather – and this was odd – around Andrey’s waist, and soon afterwards he felt the comforting touch of Sylvia’s arm around his own waist, except that – and this was also odd – it was actually Anneke’s, because Sylvia was hundreds of miles away in London, but then, what did it really matter, the whole evening was turning out to be so jolly, and these were all such lovely people, and here was yet another lovely person, that nice Mr Carter from the British Council, coming over to join them, and sitting down beside them, and saying something to him, only he never actually knew what he had said, because Mr Carter sitting down was the last thing he could remember, he could remember nothing at all after that: not until he woke up early the next afternoon, in a strange hotel room, with the worst headache he had ever experienced and a craving for cool water and a taste in his mouth that made him want to retch.
Wilkins
With a considerable effort of will, Thomas raised his aching body onto one elbow and looked blearily around the room.
The slightly moth-eaten velvet curtains were still drawn, and it took a few seconds for his eyes to become accustomed to the dark. Soon, enough shapes were visible to make him sure that he had no idea where he was. A wave of panic rushed through him and he sat up sharply. His head pounded with the sudden movement. Fumbling in the half-dark, he found the switch of a bedside light and turned it on.
The room was plainly furnished and far from luxurious. From the bathroom Thomas could hear the sound of a dripping tap. He was fully clothed. He swung his legs over the side of the bed and stood up, moving more carefully than before, aware that any sudden movements of his head would trigger more pain. He walked over to the window – a matter of only two or three steps – and drew back the curtains. But th
e view from the window did not tell him very much. He saw only a grey, rainswept back alley, separating him from a brick wall by just a few feet. Even now it was difficult, from the quality of the light, to judge what hour of the day it might be. He glanced at his watch. It was a quarter to three.
After running his head under the cold tap for a minute or two, checking in the pocket of his jacket (which was hanging in the wardrobe) to see if his wallet was still there, and taking a final glance around the room to make sure that none of his possessions had been left on any of the surfaces, Thomas quietly opened the door and stepped out into a narrow, thinly carpeted corridor. He pocketed the key and eased the door shut behind him. Everything was quite silent. There was no maid in the corridor, vacuuming the carpet or carrying clean sheets from one room to another while breezing past him with a cheerful ‘Bonjour’. He had rarely experienced a silence so profound.
Not being able to find any lift, he descended three flights of stairs and finally came upon a mean, narrow little vestibule. The lighting was poor and there was nobody sitting behind the reception desk. Thomas rang the bell. Before long a lank, gangly-looking fellow with a sallow complexion emerged from a doorway at the rear. He was eating a sandwich.
‘Oui?’
‘Bonjour, monsieur,’ said Thomas; then chided himself for sounding so deferential. He was about to adopt a far more authoritative tone when he realized that he had no idea what he wanted to ask. ‘Erm, je voudrais . . . le check-out?’ he concluded, with a feeble rising note of interrogation.
‘Room number?’ said the receptionist.
Thomas had to look at his key. ‘Three-one-two.’
The man took the key and thumbed through a card index on his desk. Then he glanced up at Thomas and said: ‘Nothing to pay.’ He was about to disappear again into his rear doorway when Thomas – himself about to make for the front door and the street outside – turned, hesitated and said: ‘You mean – my bill has been paid?’
‘Yes.’
‘By . . . by whom? – If you don’t mind my asking.’
The man sighed, and looked again through his card index.
‘Monsieur Wilkins.’
‘Wilkins?’
‘Wilkins.’
Thomas and the receptionist stared at each other for a few seconds in silence. There were many questions Thomas wanted to ask now, but he suspected that he would be wasting his time.
‘Did you enjoy your stay?’ the receptionist asked.
‘Yes. Yes, it was . . . very comfortable.’
‘Bien.’
The man took another bite of his sandwich, and withdrew. Thomas turned and walked out onto the street.
In the course of the last few weeks, he had paid very few visits to the centre of Brussels, which was where he now appeared to be. He didn’t recognize his surroundings at all. A walk of a hundred yards or less brought him out on a wide boulevard, lined with shops and cafés, where two busy lanes of traffic were moving in both directions. The sun was by no means bright – in fact it was having trouble breaking through a wall of ashen clouds – but it was enough to make Thomas wince and close his eyes. Looking into the distance, he saw what seemed to be a taxi rank, and hurried towards it. He told the taxi driver to take him to the Motel Expo at Wemmel.
The taxi ride seemed to make his headache and nausea worse than ever. It was as much as he could do to raise himself out of the car and count out the notes for his fare. Once the car had gone, he slunk past the bored, inattentive figure of Joseph Stalin in the reception hut and began to trace the familiar path back to his temporary home. Threading his way between the breeze-block cabins, twice he had to stop, in order to lean against a wall, regather his strength and wait for a feeling of dizziness to pass. It took him several fumbling attempts to get the key to turn in his own lock.
Thomas had hoped to regain some sense of normality by returning to his cabin that afternoon. But soon after he stepped inside, he discovered something more disconcerting than anything he had experienced on this already disconcerting day.
The first sign that anything was amiss came when he went into the bathroom to run water over his head again. He noticed that Tony’s toothbrush was gone. So was his toothpaste (the new, special stripey sort), his razor and shaving cream – in fact his entire sponge bag. Rushing back into the bedroom, Thomas flung open the wardrobe door and found that Tony’s half of the wardrobe was entirely empty. Shirts, ties, jackets, underwear – all missing. He looked under the bed, where Tony kept his suitcases. They had been removed as well.
Thomas sat down on his own bed and ran a hand nervously through his hair. He realized that he was shaking, and breathing much too heavily. Something strange was going on here, and he didn’t like the look or the feel of it. Not at all.
There was a knock on the door, and then it was pushed open (Thomas had left it ajar). And there stood the latest in today’s series of surprises.
‘Anneke!’ he said. ‘What are you doing here?’
‘The man at the gate told me your cabin number,’ she said. ‘I thought I should come by before I started work.’
‘But why?’
‘I wanted to see that you were all right. I was worried about you.’
She came a few steps further inside. Thomas realized that there was nowhere for her to sit. Embarrassed, he cleared away the pile of dirty laundry that covered the only chair in the room: a plain, uncomfortable, wooden affair, not at all suitable for lounging in, or indeed receiving visitors.
‘Here, please,’ he said, gesturing towards the bed. Anneke sat down there, smiling secretly to herself, while he perched awkwardly on the chair.
‘So,’ she said, looking around with the same smile on her face, evidently enjoying the novelty of the situation, ‘Now I see why you and Tony have been getting to know each other so well and so quickly. It’s very . . . intimate. What happens when either of you wants to bring one of your romantic conquests back here?’
‘But that’s just the point,’ said Thomas. ‘I mean, that isn’t the point . . . The point is that Tony seems to have gone. None of his things are here any more.’
‘Gone?’
‘Vanished. Disparu.’
Anneke reflected. ‘Perhaps he has just gone to work?’
‘With his toothbrush? And all his clothes? And two suitcases?’
‘That is very strange,’ she admitted, frowning.
‘Look – exactly what happened last night?’
‘To you? Or to Tony?’
‘Both. Me, first of all, I suppose.’
‘Well . . .’ She leaned forward, and looked into his eyes. It was a look full of concern, and full of affection, which touched him deeply: although he did not realize this, or reflect upon it, until some time afterwards. ‘I think . . . I had the impression . . . that you were very drunk.’
‘Obviously. Did I do anything terrible, like stand on the table and start dancing to the strains of the balalaika, or anything like that?’
‘Not at all. You fell asleep. On my lap. It was rather sweet, I have to say. Everybody thought so – not just me.’
‘Everybody?’
‘Yes. Tony, and Miss Parker, and Mr Chersky, and Mr Carter.’
‘Carter? Was he there?’
‘Yes, he was. Don’t you remember him joining us? In fact he was the one who started to get concerned, when we couldn’t wake you up.’
Anneke explained how Mr Chersky and Mr Carter had finally managed to half-carry, half-drag Thomas out onto the street. Mr Carter had then called a taxi and taken Thomas away – presumably to the hotel – while Mr Chersky had shortly afterwards returned and rejoined them in the bar.
‘After that,’ she said, ‘I began to feel very tired. And now that you were gone, I did not really want to be there. I was going to stay the night in the hostel that some of the hostesses use in Laeken. So Tony and
Miss Parker and Mr Chersky escorted me there. They were very loud and very happy. They were singing songs all the time. Children’s songs, Mr Chersky said, from the Young Pioneers camp at Artek. And then when they had seen me to my door they all said goodnight and then Tony said to Mr Chersky, “Come on, we have to show you those designs.” And off they went, into the night. The three of them.’
Thomas looked at her in horror.
‘Designs? What designs?’
‘I’ve no idea. I thought you might know.’
Thomas ran a hand through his hair again. Could this be as bad as it looked?
‘Wait a minute!’ he said. ‘They were talking about designs earlier. Emily’s friend is a dress designer. They were trying to get Andrey to feature some of her fashions in his paper.’
‘Really?’ said Anneke. ‘When I was there, all they seemed to be talking about was that machine. The one that Tony’s been working on.’
Thomas thought about this. It was true. He tried to recall again the details of last night’s conversation, but everything was too blurred. Why had he allowed Andrey to ply him with drink like that? He should have known when to stop. His head was still aching, and his thoughts would not come into focus. He needed coffee, strong coffee.
Anneke was watching him still, her eyes brimming with sympathy. They looked at each other for a moment. The sun must have been struggling through the clouds, because her hair and her face were illuminated, briefly, by a passing, brighter glow admitted through the skylight in the roof of the cabin. She looked so beautiful. Thomas wanted to reach across and kiss her.
‘We should go,’ he said.
‘Yes. I’m expected at work.’
‘I’m going to stop by the British pavilion and make a few enquiries. There’s bound to be some perfectly rational explanation for all this.’
But Thomas’s confidence was misplaced. When he reached the British pavilion he found something even more alarming. One of the exhibits was missing.
‘Excuse me,’ he said to one of the assistant curators, in a voice which he could hardly stop from shaking, ‘but . . . where’s it gone? The ZETA machine?’
