The Rise & Fall of Great Powers

by Tom Rachman

  With a fake ID and genuine manners, he trekked across Canada, sojourning in Calgary, Winnipeg, Toronto, and Montreal, where he befriended a group of traveling Australians. After obtaining a passport that falsely stated his age as eighteen, he accompanied them home. It was his first time on an airplane and his first time out of Canada. Venn worked odd jobs on the Queensland coast for a spell, then did a summer at a mobile abattoir in the bush, butchering livestock for farms too remote to get their beasts to a slaughterhouse. At seventeen, he followed the backpacker trail through Indonesia, then Vietnam, a country whose war he’d heard about since childhood. He worked in bars across Southeast Asia. At twenty-two—just a little older than Tooly was now—he arrived in Thailand, managed a bar in Pattaya, then moved to Bangkok, where he encountered an aging Russian exile, Humphrey, over a chessboard. At which point began their long association.

  Venn’s childhood at the periphery of the world had implanted a craving for its center, and he moved incessantly in search of vibrant locales. Over the past decade he’d tried Jakarta, Amsterdam, Malta, Cyprus, Athens, Istanbul, Milan, Budapest, Prague, Hamburg, Marseille, Barcelona, and now New York. His occupation changed as often as his location, from construction worker to supermarket butcher to club manager. He’d been the driver for a pawnbroker, the confidant of an aging mandarin, an independent contractor, an entrepreneur. He had no snobbery and worked lowly jobs, if needed. Yet the trajectory of his occupations charted a steady climb upward, as did the company he kept.

  When Tooly first met Venn, his confederates were charlatans and crooks, drawn to him like worms from damp ground. They had intrigued her once. But criminals only enchant those who haven’t known many. Soon she found most of them repellent. But these days Venn’s cohorts were young Wall Street professionals, mini-masters of the universe playacting like mobsters, pulling up in hired limos outside the Old Homestead, each ordering a porterhouse for two, huge serrated knives spurting medium-rare blood across the tablecloth, wads of cash smacked onto the check, nobody asking for change. They were bullies in their sphere, naïfs beyond. So they idolized Venn, a man who’d seen the truly unsavory, who’d met those with really dirty money. He knew how to reach the bad guys, what to do if caught in a bind, how to procure documents, how one moved assets and boomeranged them back to place of origin. He represented access to an underworld. At least, that was the illusion he sold.

  What rankled Tooly was how much time Venn had to spend in the company of creeps. “It’s the worst part about how we live,” he affirmed. “Always dealing with this awful outer circle of people. Hardly get to see my inner circle.”

  “Your inner circle? Who’s that?”

  “Well …” he said, pondering this, then smiling. “Actually, just you, duck.”

  It didn’t matter that others had status and rank; he cared nothing about that. How else to explain his years of kindness to her and Humphrey. Indeed, Venn was fondest of outcasts who, like himself, recognized the pretense everywhere. He was a man who took no part in society, never voted. He was a being wrought of his own will, belonging to nothing. He’d not known or cared which of those bearded men wandering through his childhood had been his father. As for his mother, he’d kissed her goodbye. Family meant nothing more than did random names in a telephone directory. The relations that counted were those of choice, which made friendship the supreme bond, one that either party could sever, and all the more valuable for its precariousness.

  He had no delusions about ending the long reign of fools in the world, yet he insisted on decency within the small realm that he could affect. She had seen him rent hotel rooms for addicts to whom he owed nothing, give loans to bums who would never pay him back. Once, he covered a flight home for a Filipina trafficked into prostitution in Cyprus. He intervened with great physical courage to protect the frail, such as whenever thugs bullied Humphrey, or the time a lustful drunkard in Prague tore off Tooly’s shirt. If Venn delivered violence, he did so without a shout or shove beforehand. He just struck. Aggression terrified Tooly. Yet she found herself wanting him to apply his violence sometimes, he alone imposing the justice that was everywhere absent.

  The wind on the roof swept Tooly’s hair across her face. “Is there something I could do at this place?”

  “There aren’t really jobs,” he answered. “It’s not that kind of situation.”

  “What about a project for the two of us?”

  “Our friendship is the project, as far as I’m concerned.” He looked down at the street. “What you need to do,” he said, “is go into advertising, like those girls downstairs.”

  “Shut up,” she said, laughing.

  In recent years, in recent countries, Venn had alluded to a project—that they’d soon work together, as she had longed to do since childhood. In fact, they had done small jobs when she was little, though it had taken her a while to realize it. He’d have her knock on strangers’ doors in new cities and ask to use the toilet. A minute later, he’d knock himself, claiming breathlessly to be the father of a lost little girl—had she come this way? He entered, touchingly relieved to find his girl, accepting a glass of water with thanks and making his targets’ acquaintance. By the time these strangers offered him something—say, a place to stay or a job—they practically forced it upon him. People loved his company, just wanted his presence.

  For her help, Venn used to treat her at the best hotel restaurant in whichever city they found themselves. On the way, he stopped at a junk shop and bought them elegant used overcoats, then led her into the opulent eatery, waitstaff gliding before them to a table—it was his lovely daughter’s birthday, Venn declared, so treat her like royalty! He spun further yarns, captivating the management and drawing Tooly into his fibs. They consumed oysters and champagne (she sipping from his glass), pheasant and roast potatoes, cheese plates, and as many sweets as she pointed to on the dessert trolley. Once coffee and brandy had been ordered, Venn chaperoned her toward the washrooms. In hotel restaurants, these were typically outside the dining area through the lobby. Only after a few such banquets did Tooly grasp why they always went straight through the rotating lobby door, onto the sidewalk, and away. A steaming coffee and a glinting brandy snifter arrived at their table, along with the vast bill folded discreetly on a silver tray. That charming man and his adorable daughter must be in the washrooms still, the waitstaff reasoned. Nothing to worry about—they’d return. After all, those overcoats still hung from their chairs.

  As Tooly grew older, she witnessed other shortcuts: how one might vacation for nothing by befriending a shy local of the opposite sex, earning free room and board, even a tour guide for a few days. Another game involved posting reward signs for a lost key inside a tourist-jammed train station. She put on a hiker’s backpack (stuffed with Humphrey’s laundry) and sought out the smokers—always easiest to start a conversation with. Any mean-faced jerk was her preference, the more unpleasant the better. She borrowed his lighter, sparked a cigarette, and complained that she had to fly home early because her grandma had fallen ill in Florida. While stepping away to the vending machines, she entrusted her backpack to the guy, then returned with a look of astonishment and something in her palm: Hey, is this that key on the reward posters? At a phone booth, they called the posted number. Frantic with excitement, the key’s owner promised to drive over immediately with the generous cash reward; he’d arrive in an hour. Alas, Tooly couldn’t wait—she had her flight to catch. However, the man on the phone (Venn) demanded that she wait. Appearing befuddled, she thrust the phone at her new acquaintance. Venn told him that this girl had just agreed on five hundred dollars for the key—give her the money now and I’ll refund you as soon as I arrive. Hell, I’ll quadruple it, if you stay put: two thousand in cash, plus the five hundred you gave the girl. Her unpleasant new companion sprinted to the closest ATM (Tooly helpfully pointing it out), and withdrew as close to five hundred dollars as possible. She gave him the key and hastened to the cab stand—no time for the airport train now! W
hen, after an hour or two, the guy was still waiting, he irritably tried the number on the reward posters. It rang and rang.

  But such high jinks had dwindled away—Venn came to see them as cheap, as did she. And he was occupied with more legitimate endeavors now. Yet he looked after her all the same, arranging her travel to each new city, finding lodgings for her and Humphrey. Weeks might pass without word from Venn. Then he’d phone. His voice—grin audible—immediately erased her disappointment that he’d not been in touch.

  He was maddening, he was unpredictable, he was late. But he always arrived in the end. So, she waited.

  “Any brilliant new ideas?” she asked.

  “Lots, duck. But what are yours?” He gazed across at the rooftops. “I brought you here to see these kids downstairs—your age, more or less—coming up with things. You don’t want to end up like Humph. Need to make your own propulsion.”

  Humphrey sent those ridiculous letters on her behalf (“Attention New York Times: I have young lady you must be interest in….”) because he was certain of her quality. Venn was more measured, and that wounded Tooly. But he was correct: she had produced nothing. Humphrey always claimed that the tumult of the twentieth century had ruined his prospects, that he’d been “cornered by history.” But Tooly had grown up in an era of relative calm, after all the proper history had ended. She’d been too young to understand the hoopla of the Berlin Wall falling or the protests in Tiananmen Square, her awareness dawning around Operation Desert Storm and the L.A. riots, countries splitting up and ruining all the maps, then the O. J. Simpson trial, a computer that beat humankind at chess, the cloned sheep named Dolly, an English princess dying in a car crash, the most powerful man in the world fornicating with an intern. They were scattershot events, none relating to any other, and certainly not to her.

  What, she wondered, would it have been like to live in an important era? How would she have acted during world wars? Humphrey had raised her with World War II and Soviet totalitarianism as the signal events—that history was her place and time, far from the banality of this peace. These days, it was as if the whole world, even New York City, aspired only to be Seattle. She wished the present would impose itself on her and determine her course.

  “Come,” Venn said, leading her back downstairs.

  As they strode along Canal Street, he said nothing. She wanted him to speak, so that she might learn his mood—Tooly hated this quiet (though traffic blared beside them). Hated being useless to him, offering nothing. She had achieved things in this city, slipping into a few homes. But to what end? For a few minutes’ company? To peek at how college kids lived? Quizzing that student on 115th Street had produced nothing. He’d been harmless, which was the problem: you meddled with bastards, not with some shy kid.

  Venn scanned for a free taxi, his attention shifting to the next appointment. This encounter was about to end. A long wait till the next.

  She’d hoped this would be a full day together, the beginning of a fresh adventure with him—at the very least, a long meal or a long walk. But it was over already. With a presentiment of her coming solitude, she watched him.

  But hang on. Don’t disappear.

  “I did do one thing,” she blurted.

  Before intending to, Tooly found herself describing Duncan and mentioning Xavi and Emerson—even the guy downstairs with the pig. To make herself sound industrious, she inflated everything, sketching a setting that was fat with potential. “I realize they’re only in college,” she said, “but they must have parents.”

  “Most people do, you’ll find.”

  “I got tons of stuff on them.” She searched her coat pockets for the crumpled ball of newsprint where she’d jotted notes upon leaving that apartment. She read aloud her scribbled fragments, watching Venn for the detail that would snag him, sharpen his gaze.

  None did.

  “Sorry,” she said.

  “Don’t apologize to me, duck. Never any need for that,” he said. “Look, if you want, keep digging around up there. Or give the boy lawyer a call sometime, see what comes of it.”

  “I’m so stupid—I don’t even have his number.”

  “How’d you manage that?” he asked, chuckling.

  “You say I’m not supposed to write numbers down anymore!” Contrary to his preferences, Tooly had long kept a little phone book. She crossed out every number after they left a city, but he still preferred that they only memorize information—after all, the people they encountered were not necessarily types one wished to be connected to in writing.

  “So you did get his number,” he asked, “but can’t recall it?”

  “I didn’t even ask,” she admitted. “I hate getting numbers. They want mine back, and I never know what to say.”

  “Say you’re moving and don’t have a new phone line installed yet.”

  “Hey,” she exclaimed, nostrils flaring, “that’s what you always tell me!”

  Grinning, he shut his eyes, lids flickering. Tooly frowned, meaning for him to see when he looked up. Instead, he walked on. She couldn’t stop herself hurrying after. “You idiot,” she said, threading her arm under his, inhaling the wet-wood scent of his sweater.

  Venn was busy reviewing the scrap of scribbled notes about the students—how had he even taken that from her? “This paper smells like peanut butter.”

  “My sandwich was in there,” she said, grabbing it back. “See—never worry about me writing stuff down; I can always eat the evidence.”

  He burst into laughter, which caused such a surge of joy in her.

  “It’s decided,” she announced. “I’m going back up there. And I’m getting something useful for us from these college kids. Okay? Just tell me what you’d like.”

  “Little duck, you know what works.”

  Venn touched her cheek, causing her to fall silent. He entered a taxi, leaving her alone on the caterwauling street.

  2011

  SHE PASSED JUST ONE HIKER in the Black Mountains that morning, a small boy with a large rucksack who mumbled a greeting that Tooly cheerfully returned. It didn’t seem like the world up here. The villages below remained attached to modern life. But the hares and sheep darted away whichever the century, whatever excitation swept the valleys, whether menfolk were conscripted, if decades later they reminisced of war, if long after that their widows sat alone for supper.

  In the distance down the ridge, something caught her attention. A group of walkers, maybe. But they were approaching too fast. Dirt bikes? She squinted. Those weren’t people but ponies, the wild ones that roamed these hills. They were a mile away but galloping—in two minutes, they’d be on her. The path was only as broad as a car, with thick brush on either side and sharp slopes beyond. The ponies grew distinct now, about twenty of them. She waded into knee-high bracken. Could the animals veer off the path and trample her even there?

  But upon arrival they had slowed to an amble, scarcely glancing at this strange human observing them from the brush. They grazed before her, foals between mares, a chestnut youngster on twig legs, a heavy-gutted gray stallion with tail swishing. Tooly held still—a thrilling arm’s length from wild animals. She tried to memorize this instant, all the more urgently because there was nobody to share it. Once, she had read a story in which a man, dying in an asylum, sees “a herd of deer, extraordinarily beautiful and graceful,” run across his imagination. If this moment returned to her years hence, what would she recall? A memory of having wanted to remember?

  Abruptly, she turned from the ponies, striding down the steep hillside, tripping through bracken, speeding to the point of danger. It was futile, she knew, to ruminate.

  “Desperately trying to reach you,” Duncan had written. “Can we talk about your father???” What gave a boyfriend from a decade before the right to bludgeon her with punctuation? Her father had been beaten and robbed in New York, Duncan explained via Facebook messages. Whatever falling-out she’d had with the man, she needed to fly out immediately and help. Well, yes—th
at sounded reasonable. Except that Tooly had no idea who this father could be.

  She had never mentioned any relative when she and Duncan were together. But after he lost touch with her in New York, it transpired, Duncan had gone looking for her, only to find her father living at a storage space near the Gowanus Expressway. The old man conveyed nothing about Tooly’s whereabouts—instead, he had made Duncan play chess.

  And, with that, she knew this “father” could only be Humphrey.

  Little stirred her as did thoughts of the past. Starting with—well, how to describe what had happened? She didn’t consider it a kidnapping. What, then? Taken from home, left in the care of a stranger, moved around the world. Those events had seemed to be heading toward some purpose, only for everything to collapse in New York.

  The lack of a proper ending gnawed at her still, no matter how she had tried to forget. For years, she had awaited Venn’s return. She had moved from one country to another, taken on lovers, changed jobs, yet retained the expectation of another life—a wormhole through which she’d one day slip, rescued by his company. Only upon buying the shop had she suspended this. It had been crushing, then almost a relief: no longer wandering, no longer believing herself distinct from those she walked among. Instead, she came to consider herself rather less worthwhile than average. As Venn had done, she razored away the unnecessary: companions, conversation, affection. She understood now all that he’d once said to her, and longed to tell him so.