by David Szalay
When Grisha arrives with the vodka they let him have a shot, and he sits there sniffing it. His long hair comes down over the filthy collar of his jacket, and its lapels are covered with pins – presents from tourists, mostly from the fraternal nations, whom he met while working in a Crimean spa open to foreigners. He’s most proud of one a Canadian woman gave him, a little red-and-white Canadian flag. He says he’d like to go to Canada, France and Japan. He says in those countries everyone has their own car, even ordinary workers. ‘Well, I don’t know about France or Canada,’ Ivan says, ‘but Japan …’
Aleksandr has heard what follows innumerable times. To listen to Ivan, he thinks, opening his locker, you would suppose that he had lived in Japan for twenty years, not spent two heavily supervised weeks in suburban Tokyo, shuttling to and from his hotel and the Olympic stadium. Grisha, however, is obviously impressed. So are some of the others. Soon, in fact, everyone is listening to Ivan. He says that yes, the streets are filled with cars – and what cars! Of course, he points out sternly to Grisha, Japan is a vassal state of the USA, and as such not to be envied – he offers him a Golden Fleece, which Grisha timidly takes – but what cars! They start first time, travel smoothly, never stall or judder or squeak. They are spacious and fragrant. And so many of them! The Soviet Union, he says, must learn to make such cars.
8
IF YOU HAVE forgotten this, Ivan, let me jog your memory – it is a summer night in 1948. I am knocking on the door of your mistress’s flat. The stairwell smells of sewage. And the situation with Lozovsky is in a sort of stalemate. Suvorov, that odious obkom weasel, has said that he will not move him from his post. Suvorov – I don’t know if you know this, Ivan – Suvorov turned out to be an old university pal of Lozovsky’s. Sitting at his desk in his natty striped suit, smoking a foreign cigarette, he said to me, ‘Yes, we knew each other in the twenties.’ And he smiled his moustachioed smile. ‘Several lifetimes ago. I wasn’t in his league of course. He’s an extra ordinary talent. Extraordinary!’ The showy smile. ‘I’m not – I went into politics.’ He thought that was very funny.
I said, ‘You’ve known each other since then, since the twenties?’
He stopped smiling. ‘No, no, not exactly. We were friends at university. Then we lost touch. I ended up here. He stayed in Moscow, of course. Sometimes I saw his picture in the papers. When he won the Stalin prize, for instance.’
‘And then?’
‘Then, well, then he and his wife moved out here, with the university. In forty-one …’ In forty-one, as the Nazis sliced through our western districts, Moscow University was evacuated to Sverdlovsk. ‘We saw them socially, my wife and I,’ Suvorov went on, ‘until they moved to …’ He smiled and shook his head. ‘I forget the name …’
‘Metelyev Log.’
‘Yes. When was it? Forty-four?’
There was a small wooden box on his desk which he opened – it was full of foreign cigarettes, as fat and white as maggots. He offered me one – ‘No, thank you’ – then lit one himself, with a silver lighter. ‘In fact I tried to dissuade him from taking that job,’ he said, in a puff of smoke. ‘He wouldn’t listen.’
Why not?
‘He wanted it. He specifically asked for it.’
Why did he want it?
‘I don’t know.’
‘You must have asked him,’ I said politely. ‘If you tried to dissuade him from taking it.’
‘It doesn’t mean I got an answer!’ The smile faded. He shrugged. ‘I imagine it was to focus on his work,’ he said. ‘His scientific work. He felt he had a unique opportunity. He said that. Or something like that.’
‘A unique opportunity?’
‘Yes, a unique opportunity.’
‘What did he mean by that?’
‘You know,’ Suvorov said, ‘I have no idea.’
And since then, since Lozovsky moved to Metelyev Log, had he seen much of him?
He stuck out his lower lip and shook his head. ‘No,’ he said. ‘Not much.’ This seemed straightforward enough, until I asked him when he had last seen or spoken to Lozovsky. ‘Well …’ he said. ‘On Monday.’
‘Monday? This Monday?’
‘Yes.’
Now somewhat wary, Suvorov said, ‘Yes, I spoke to him on Monday. On the telephone.’
And what had he wanted?
He had wanted to warn his old friend, now a senior member of the obkom, that there might be a move to ease him out of his post at Metelyev Log, and that he did not want to be eased out of it, and that whatever story Suvorov might hear from the MGB, the reason they wanted him out was that he had not signed a form four-eighty in respect of one of his patients, and that he had not signed it for perfectly valid medical reasons. ‘And if that’s the case,’ Suvorov said, with a sad smile, ‘I don’t see what you want me to do.’
Mikhalkov took this unexpected move of Lozovsky’s personally. He was furious, and the immediate target of his fury was me. Why had I made such a mess of this simple task? Why didn’t I just do what he wanted? Why did I always find some new problem? I stood in his office, staring at the blue carpet. I was surprised how strongly he felt about the situation. I did not fully understand its importance to him. What was obvious was that Lozovsky had not signed the form because he did not think he needed to; he knew that he was on the nomenklatura, and that through his friend Suvorov the obkom would obstruct our efforts to move him.
For a week or two I heard no more about it. Then, one afternoon, I was summoned to Mikhalkov’s office.
‘You’ve got a journalist brother, haven’t you?’ he said.
‘Yes.’
‘I want you to have a word with him.’
And that is why I found myself trudging up the stairs to your mistress’s flat, Ivan. I’ve forgotten her name. Perhaps you have too. When I went to your flat, Katya told me that you were working late. Her face shone with sweat, and she was fanning herself with a folded newspaper. ‘And you – are you well?’ I said. ‘You shouldn’t smoke, you know.’ She let me take the papirosa from her hand. ‘You should look after yourself.’ I left, feeling implicated in your lies to her. I did not look for you at the newspaper offices. I knew I wouldn’t find you there.
I said to you, ‘Your wife’s eight months pregnant. Don’t you think you should be with her?’ I didn’t keep my voice down. I wanted your mistress and her neighbours to hear.
And you said, ‘It’s not your business. What do you want?’
We went outside and spoke in the street. It was a moonless night. A hundred metres away tall pale lights marked the intersection. Mosquitoes tormented us. And I told you there was a piece I thought you should write for the newspaper.
‘What piece?’ you said.
‘Something important.’
‘What?’ You were still irritable, and slightly suspicious.
I explained the situation to you. Not the situation with Lozovsky, of course. Not him specifically. The wider situ ation. You listened in silence. Negative foreign influences, I said, were starting to pervade the intellectual life of the Soviet Union. Nihilistic influences. Even in the sciences. Yes, even in the sciences. For an example one might point to the work of an eminent neuropsychologist living in Sverdlovsk oblast, Mikhail Naumovich Lozovsky …
And you said, ‘It’s not my sort of thing, Sasha.’
‘Let me finish. Mikhail Naumovich Lozovsky, who thinks the world is inherently meaningless. That meaning is a purely subjective phenomenon. He has written this, in scientific journals …’
This was true. Lozovsky had written that, in so many words. It was what Mikhalkov had found – a piece in a scientific journal, published in 1936.
‘Sasha,’ you said, ‘it’s not my thing.’
‘Do you understand what I’m saying?’
‘It’s not my thing, Sasha.’
‘Why not?’
‘It’s just not. I don’t know anything about it.’
As if that had ever stopped you in the past!
‘Don’t worry about that,’ I said. ‘I have some material for you.’
‘What material?’
‘About Lozovsky.’
‘What do you mean? What sort of material?’
‘Material. Facts.’
‘Facts?’
‘Of course. This is important,’ I said. ‘It’s going to be an important piece.’
You sighed. ‘Would I be able to speak to him?’
‘Lozovsky? No.’
‘Why not?’
‘Vanya …’
‘Why wouldn’t I be able to speak to him?’ You were petulant now.
‘Why do you need to speak to him? This is going to be an important piece, Vanya. Do you understand? What have you been working on? Interviewing Stakhanovites?’
That was what you did in those days, Ivan. You interviewed Stakhanovites. ‘Aleksey Tishchenko, along with his wife Zoya, arrived in Sverdlovsk in 1945 with all their possessions in a single suitcase made of newspaper. Now, only three years later, the couple own furniture, including …’ You know the sort of thing.
‘That must get pretty tedious,’ I said. ‘They’re all the same aren’t they, Stakhanovites …’
I think what I was saying must have upset you. I think that’s why you suddenly said, ‘I wrote that thing I told you about.’
‘What thing?’
‘The strike. You know.’
There was a long silence. ‘You wrote it?’ You said nothing. ‘Why? WHY? I told you not to!’
‘I know –’
‘Why did you write it? Why did you do that? Don’t you understand?’
‘I understand –’
‘No, you don’t! What was the point? The piece wasn’t published. You’ve got to think. You’ve got a family now. What if you lose your job? What did your editor say?’
‘Nothing.’
‘Nothing? He’s said nothing to you about it?’
‘No.’
You seemed to think this was a positive sign. You were wrong. I said so. And then I said, ‘I have to tell you, Ivan, it would be in your interests to write this piece, the Lozovsky piece.’
‘What do you mean?’ you said sharply.
‘I’m not threatening you.’ I was upset that you had misunderstood me. I found your shoulder in the night. I was almost in tears. You may not have seen it, but you must have heard it in my voice. ‘Of course I’m not threatening you. I’m worried about you. The sort of name you’re making for yourself. Once you start to make that sort of name … You know what I’m talking about. This is an opportunity for you. That’s all I’m saying. Think about it. Please.’
You did know what I was talking about, and you did think about it. The tall pale lights of the intersection, a hundred metres off, stood in a snowstorm of insects.
‘Why do you want it?’ you said.
‘Why do I want it?’
‘Yes, why do you want it?’
‘What difference does it make?’
‘I want to know.’
‘Vanya …’
‘If I do it, I want to know. Why?’
When I said nothing, you sighed and said, ‘I’m tired, Sasha …’
‘They want Lozovsky out of his job.’
‘Who does? Why?’
‘What does it matter? It’s politics. They want him out. The obkom’s stuck its heels in. There’s a friend of his, something … It’s not very edifying. They want to get this material out. You don’t have to worry about that though. The story itself is totally sound. It’s not even about Lozovsky. Forget Lozovsky. He’s just an example of a wider phenomenon. That’s what the story’s about, and it’s very important.’
Your piece appeared on the front page of the ‘Urals Worker’ a week later. When you submitted it, the editor, not knowing what to do, phoned Mikhalkov – you yourself had told him to do this – and Mikhalkov, pretending to be unsure how to proceed, had pointed him to Veklishev. Having heard from the editor, Veklishev then phoned Mikhalkov with the name ‘Lozovsky’ and asked him who this was. Mikhalkov said he would look into it, and twenty-four hours later told Veklishev that he had looked into it, and found some quite worrying things. The unpublished newspaper piece seemed ‘spot on’, and in view of this, Mikhalkov said, it might be wise to move Lozovsky from ‘such a sensitive post’. One of Veklishev’s secretaries phoned the editor and two days later your piece was published. That weekend Veklishev went duck-shooting with Shestakov, who was then first secretary of the obkom. He mentioned the subject to him, and Shestakov – who had seen the story on the front page of the newspaper – said he would take it up with Suvorov, which he did. And ordered him to move Lozovsky from his post. Mikhalkov was all smiles.
Then the telegram from Moscow.
This was not expected. It took even Mikhalkov by surprise. ‘We got this today,’ he said, passing it to me. ‘Article 58.’ I.e. ‘Propaganda or agitation, containing an appeal for the overthrow, subverting or weakening of the Soviet power, and equally the dissemination or preparation or possession of literary materials of similar content.’ ‘I suppose they read the ‘Urals Worker’ in Moscow,’ he said. ‘Surprising as that may seem.’
I did not smile at this. I said nothing.
The next day I went to the procuracy, and took a number, and waited until a tired-looking official summoned me into his office, which was unpleasantly stuffy. The official – a stout old woman of a middle-aged man with a small moustache, and large patches of sweat in the armpits of his shirt – opened the window, and asked me to give him a short – he stressed the word ‘short’ – summary of the indictment. When I had finished, he went through the warrant line by line. Then he stamped it. We arrested Lozovsky the following week, when he was in town for a meeting at the oblispolkom.
9
SUMMER HAS BURNED itself out in dust and yellow grass. Unseen, weightless, its dead insects accumulate under the furniture. The Icelandic police will soon make their report. They have spent the night searching the Laugardalshöll Sports Exhibition Palace – dismantling furniture, probing wall cavities, prising up floorboards. Searching for electronic devices. Yesterday, Yefim Geller – Spassky’s second – made a public statement in which he accused the Americans of using such devices to interfere with Boris Vasilyevich’s brain. Members of the American delegation, he said, were often to be found in the hall when chess was not being played.
And something is evidently wrong with Boris Vasilyevich’s brain. In photographs he looks haunted and hollow-eyed. Sleepless. Profoundly troubled.
Following Fischer’s extraordinary error, he won the first game, and Fischer did not even turn up for the second, thus forfeiting it. 2–0, and it was Fischer, not Boris Vasilyevich, who seemed to be psychologically disintegrating. Only a long, pleading phone-call from Henry Kissinger, it is said, prevented him from leaving Iceland.
In very strange circumstances, however, Fischer won the next game. It was played, at his insistence, in a small, stuffy room normally used for table tennis.
Once more in the main hall, the fourth game was drawn, though Boris Vasilyevich should probably have won it, and his failure to do so was ominous. Especially when Fischer won the next two games to take the overall lead. In the second of these games, he took Spassky totally by surprise by opening with c4. It was the first time in his life that Fischer had opened with anything other than e4. Spassky seemed stunned, shocked, unable to think straight, and was torn to shreds. And when, following this, he stood and joined in the applause, Aleksandr, listening in Sverdlovsk, wept at his magnanimity, and knew in his heart that the match was over. Two games later, Fischer extended his lead to 4–2.
Pleading ‘illness’, Spassky then took a few days off. Then he played a sad, desultory draw. He was in distress. When he lost the tenth game, it was even suggested in Moscow that the match might be stopped. Boris Vasilyevich himself insisted on playing on. His psychological problems seemed so severe that it surprised everyone when he won the eleventh game. The twelfth was a tense stal
emate. Fischer won the next, and four more draws followed. Then Yefim Geller made his intervention, and the Icelandic police went in.
Very solemnly, they are making their report. Aleksandr turns up the volume. They say that they have found … no electronic devices. They have found nothing – nothing except, in one of the lighting fixtures … two dead flies. They invite the US and Soviet delegations to examine these flies …
He switches off the radio.
Of course there were no electronic devices. You do not need electronic devices to interfere with someone’s brain. Fischer has been interfering very effectively with poor Boris Vasilyevich’s brain for a month and a half without them. His insistence that the third game be played in the table-tennis room was the turning point. The room was not adequately soundproofed and street noise filtered in – Spassky’s people blamed his defeat on that. But it was not the street noise in itself that upset Boris Vasilyevich. It was Fischer. Since then, it has not been a matter of sport so much as pure psychological warfare, something to which Fischer’s particular type of egomania lends itself well. To be fair-minded, however, to be honest and straightforward, is an insupportable weakness. And Boris Vasilyevich is unquestionably all of those things.
Aleksandr sits down on the sofa. There is a tingle in the hinterland of his nose, his throat is tight. It will be the first time since 1948 that the world chess champion is not a citizen of the Soviet Union; then, the FIDE tournament in Moscow was won by Mikhail Botvinnik – he was not even a professional chessplayer; he was a working Soviet engineer. A sober proletarian. A Stalinist, and as steely as poor Spassky is soft.
The next morning he takes a tram to the Rastorguyev-Kharitonov Park. Empty on a weekday afternoon in early autumn – the last week of August, and suddenly there is an autumnal tone to things – it is still substantially the same as it was in 1948. The man-made lake echoing the monochrome sky, the white rotunda on the island. The trees starting to lose their leaves. It has been years since he has seen the place. He stops on the path near the water’s edge. The surface of the lake is a green so dark it is almost black; further out, the inverted world of sky and encircling trees. Was it here, on this spot, that it happened? Somewhere near here. There is no sign of it now. The place has taken no imprint from the event. He stands there for a minute – an observer might think he had lost something – and then walks on. Making his way under the trees, he finds the place where the Pobeda was parked. There are new buildings in the street, and the trees are very much larger than they were. They were small then, little more than saplings; and as slowly as the hour hand of a watch, their shadows moved. Lieutenant Ivanov started the engine and trundled the Pobeda forward until it was once more immersed in them. He turned the key. The engine hiccuped, whimpered, was silent.
