The Anonymous Novel

by Alessandro Barbero

  It was hot in the small kitchen, but the general did not find the heat uncomfortable, quite the opposite. He stirred the food with a wooden spoon, and then took another swig of whisky. What did the Master say? Your body and your tongue can be unbelievers; it is sufficient for your soul to be a good Muslim. The thread is very fine but it does not break, and from it hangs such a weight that would drag most men to hell. I wonder if it is true that all you need to escape Gehenna is faith; perhaps when there are many sins, faith can only alleviate the punishment but not eliminate it. The general thought that he would go to hell, and perhaps, as in the fable, God in his goodness would allow him every hundred thousand years to raise his head out of the fire, which is fuelled by men and stones, so that a maiden who comes down from paradise will wet his tongue with rosewater, and he will find the eternal torment bearable just because of that one reward. Who knows? The general was not very good at theology, but not every Muslim is required to follow the arguments of theologians; this, at least, was how the Master had reassured him. Because this, more than anything else, had tormented him when he first met Hadji Muhammad and had started to frequent the other brothers: compared with you, I am an ignorant man. In school, I studied Lenin and Stalin… But the Master had a wonderful response to this doubt too: “As you know, Bukharin had become the Party’s favourite without ever having understood dialectics, so equally a believer can get to heaven without ever knowing the subtleties of theology.” And the general had smiled, because he had understood that the other man was a good teacher, and he had no regrets about becoming his follower. How distant had become those days in which he interrogated an itinerant Islamic preacher who was already facing ten years in a concentration camp for parasitism and hooliganism, and he, Yusuf-zade, decided he would quote the Sura of the Pen: “On the nose We shall brand him” (Koran, LXVIII, 16), while rolling up his sleeves and relishing the idea of drawing blood! Men change, they stoop with age and their hair turns grey, and their women grow fat next to them, their breath becomes foul and they learn to dye their hair, and their sons grow up, listen to foreign pop songs and chew American gum. Men see all these things and they change inside; they no longer recognise what they had been at the age of twenty. And now this little girl turns up from Moscow – a snotty brat – and they let her into the archives; they let her read papers that no one was ever supposed to read, which refer to people who no longer exist! Their names might now belong to elderly men with grey hair, but those wolf cubs no longer exist, so why bring those dusty files out into the light?

  Why don’t you destroy them? his wife had said when, in a moment of weakness, he had confided in her. The general had smiled: that was the voice of inexperience. Do you not know that here in the Soviet Union nothing is ever destroyed, nothing? The last time files were destroyed was in Moscow in December of 1941, when booted officials and frightened secretaries were throwing armfuls of papers into the fire in the courtyard of the Lubyanka and outside all the other government offices, as they heard the enemy guns getting closer. After that, I can assure you, they haven’t destroyed a single sheet of paper, but it is a different matter when you’re actually looking for something. But that was his misfortune, and for some time his misfortunes appeared to have been piling up; perhaps he really had sinned too often.

  He took a troubled look at the glass which still contained the last few drops of whisky, and he wanted to pour it down the sink. But he didn’t like the idea of this, so he poured it instead into the pan where he was frying finely chopped lambs liver, and he watched it sizzle. There it would evaporate without sin. Yes, that’s just it, our misfortunes are multiplying; first, we get this investigating judge from Moscow, a bloody mischief-maker who sticks his nose in everywhere and finds out about everything – a big man with little cunning eyes behind his lenses who wants to know why a man was killed. This… Porphyry Petrovich sneaks in everywhere, asks questions and eventually ends up in the Accountant’s office. It took months of negotiations to reach an agreement, the deliveries of assault rifles were going very nicely and this guy almost ruins the whole thing… And when you’ve just sorted the whole matter out successfully, this other pain in the arse turns up. It looked like it was a trivial matter, but instead it blew up into something serious, and it could yet be your ruin. No, the general said to himself as he suddenly became very agitated, we have to sort this out – sort it out immediately! Well, let’s do as Musayev says; maybe he’s right. She wants to know about her grandfather… what’s his name? Parfyonov? Parsamov? Yes, yes, now I think about it, I probably can remember him: wasn’t it something to do with mineral water… Be that as it may, let’s give her what she wants; let’s take this corpse out of his tomb, just so long as the wretched woman leaves Baku! The lamb was cooking and giving off a warm, spicy and oily vapour, the pilaf was silently swelling up in the cooking pot, as each grain of rice absorbed the perfumed broth…

  And thus it was that Tanya’s second visit to the Boulevard of the Petroleum Workers was very different from her first one. Let’s be clear, the offices were exactly the same, and no different from any other police station: a small room, a cheap desk, and at that desk a seated policeman reading a newspaper. At the back of the room, there is the open door with the unmade camp bed, a football on the floor… But this time, the captain with the moustache, sideburns and sandals on his feet, does not stay in his cramped office under the portrait of Dzerzhinsky, but hurries to show her the way: the general in person, he says, would like to see you; it would be a great pleasure… And you don’t catch the name of the general, although you do feel that you’ve heard it somewhere else, but what can you do? You did not hear it and you don’t dare to have it repeated: that would be bad manners and when it comes down to it, what does it matter what the general is called?

  His office is not at all poky, perhaps a little funereal with that dark varnish on the wooden furniture, but not poky, you could not call it that. The desk is loaded with telephones: one black, one white and one red. Sitting behind the desk, there is an elderly man with a short, military-style haircut and an olive complexion. He is the general and he actually stands up and puts out his hand…

  “Good afternoon, Tatyana Borisovna!”

  Well, how do you answer that? They told you his name and patronymic, and you have not remembered them; of course it wasn’t a Russian name, and the patronymic was still less so, but what can you do? You cannot leave all the good manners to them…

  “Good afternoon,” Tanya went red in the face, and after a moment’s hesitation she sat down in the chair they offered her.

  “Right,” the general started off in a cordial tone, “we have asked you to come along for a discussion of what one might call an exceptional nature. You are, I think, conducting historical research at the Party archive?”

  Tanya nodded that she was: what’s coming next? A caress or a blow with a cleaver? On the desk just in front of her, there was a file that had yellowed with age. It must have been very old. What was it supposed to contain?

  “Well, now,” continued the general, “we know that you came here primarily in search of information about your grandfather…”

  But that’s not true, Tanya wanted to shout, but she restrained herself. She had expected all kinds of things, but not this. Now she was curious to see how it would all turn out.

  “We have therefore decided to meet you halfway. Your grandfather, as you know, was rehabilitated in 1956, together with all the other cadres in Azerneft who were condemned in 1949, but in the ruling on his rehabilitation there were, as was customary, no details of his trial or original sentence. It is quite legitimate that you want to know more! So here you are,” and he tapped his hand on the file, “this is your grandfather’s file.”

  Could it possibly be the same file? thought Tanya, but no. Firstly, the file is different, and they don’t know that I have already found it, otherwise they would have come up with something else. Clearly they have another copy, and perhaps they think it is the only one…
Or perhaps the contents are entirely different? Her curiosity got the better of her, and that was her good fortune; the general studied her through his narrowed eyelids and was starting to find her behaviour disconcerting: this young woman doesn’t even blink. Either she hasn’t understood or there’s something going on… But just then Tanya leaned forward and stretched out her arm with an eager expression: “May I see it?”

  The general put his hand on the file, “Hold on! Of course, I can’t show you the entire file. But I can show you this.”

  He opened the file and took out a card on which the now very familiar photograph had been glued. That poor photograph hanging on the wall at home, we took you from Baku to Moscow, but left so many of your little twins behind! The general placed the card with the police record on the table and cautiously pushed it towards Tanya without letting go of the edge, as though he was frightened of losing it. Tanya raised her eyes, and met his stare.

  “But I know this photograph; we have one at home.” The general did not reply. Equally slowly he drew the card back and buried it once more in the file, but he did not replace the lid of the tomb. He continued to rummage around: he is moving around old bones, thought Tanya. And in a sense a skull was produced: another photograph, but Tanya had never seen this one. It was still Granddad, but without his glasses, thinner and completely bald – and wearing the drab, striped uniform of a prisoner. The general placed this photograph on the table too and pushed it towards her, but this time he covered a large part of it with his hand, so that she could hardly see the dead man’s face between the fingers. Tanya grabbed it and pulled it towards her, but he did not let it go.

  “You can’t do that,” said the general severely.

  “Why?” asked Tanya with surprise.

  “Is it not obvious? The prisoner’s number is discernable on his uniform, and that is information that cannot be divulged.”

  Tanya wanted to laugh and cry at the same time: so the state trembles at the idea of releasing such information! And you, stupid, thought you could ask permission to go into the archive…

  “As a special concession,” the general continued, “you could, if you wish, obtain a copy of this photograph, but with the number obscured, of course. Find a photographer and send him along to us; this is only right, as a family likes to treasure its mementos.” What a bastard, Tanya’s anger stirred in her blood. But I have you in my grasp and I want to know how far they have said you can go. Such a pity I can’t remember your name, so that I could better create this appearance of cordiality…

  “You’ll excuse me,” she muttered as she attempted to hide the fury that was boiling up inside her and to mask the emotion with at least a semblance of gratitude, “you’ll excuse me, but don’t we also have – I mean – the sentence and the charges?”

  “We do,” the general replied curtly and took out another sheet of paper from the file. Tanya tried to get a look at it, but the general covered it with his elbow.

  “But what are you doing, Tatyana Borisovna, do you want to copy other people’s work? We’re not sitting exams now,” he joked.

  “But at least a quick look!” implored Tanya holding a corner of the sheet of paper with her hand.

  “I can’t let you read it all – that is out of the question. But I will read the part of the preliminary investigation in which the charges are presented.”

  Still keeping his elbow firmly on the sheet of paper, the general studied it for rather a long time and then discovered a short passage. While covering all the rest with his hairy hands, he started to read aloud, “Question: So you were preparing a terrorist attack against Comrade Bagirov. Reply:

  Yes, I confess. Before the Soviet people and, in particular, the citizens of Baku, I am guilty of having plotted against Bagirov. Question: And who was aware of your intentions?

  … No, we’re not interested in this bit. I can however read you the sentence,” he declared as he quickly returned the piece of paper to its file, and replaced it with another even smaller one, little more that than a small square of carbon paper.

  “Parsamov Aleksandr Ivanovich… here we are: member of an anti-Soviet group, agent of the British and American secret services, involved in a terrorist organisation and the attempted assassination against the person of Comrade Bagirov. The military tribunal has found Parsamov A.I. guilty of the above charges. The defendant has been condemned to death by firing squad. The sentence,” the general lowered his voice for the conclusion, “has been carried out…” He went silent, narrowed his eyes and, like a conjurer, he had the miserable piece of paper disappear back into the file with a sudden movement of his hand. Tanya was a little perplexed and feared that the show was now over, and that they were about to throw her out without further ceremony.

  But she needed to keep up the pressure on this general, allow him no respite as she would never get another chance like this.

  “But couldn’t I take a look at the file? Here in front of you, and just for a few minutes.”

  “That would not be possible,” declared the general once more narrowing his eyes.

  “But why? Is it a state secret?”

  “But no, there is no secret of that kind,” retorted the other, who was losing his patience. “It is simply that there are professional secrets, which we cannot divulge.”

  “What, for instance?” Tanya insisted.

  “Well, the case number, the names of the investigating judges, the agents’ reports. There are various things…”

  Aha, the names: Mayzel, Mozhaisky… If only you were aware, general, that I know those names already, and I am reciting them in my head as I sit before you: Maslov, Sofronov, Rayzman! Still better: Geydar Alyev and the other guy – what was his name? Yusuf-zade? And at the very moment she remembered his name, Tanya felt her head swimming. It’s you! she thought. It’s you, that’s your name!

  You and that framed photograph on the wall, which she recognised for the first time since coming into the office.

  There you are, the two of you – the cat and the fox, but thirty years older, grey-haired and with gold teeth… Now it all falls into place – everything! The attempted robbery, and now all of a sudden the doors thrown open and the good manners: they are hoping that I haven’t got THAT FAR yet and they want to stop me first. One way or another: it is all the same to them… But what will be their next move, once they realise that their efforts have been wasted? Tanya forced herself to continue the conversation in order to overcome the panic that was running wild within her: THEY are cunning, let’s hope they cannot read your thoughts!

  “Could I transcribe the documents you have read me?” she stammered.

  “Absolutely not,” the general snapped, “this is a special favour we are doing for you, but this is material that can never be divulged: can you see the stamp?” and he smiled as he showed her the file cover: “Strictly confidential! Indeed, we would ask you not to speak to anyone about our conversation; if it became known that we are so helpful, everyone would be coming along to bother us, don’t you think?”

  While he was talking, the general was looking Tanya in the eye, and for some reason he was not at all happy with what he saw. It was now clear that something was not quite right. He knew that expression and he had encountered it many times in his life: it was the expression of someone who is acting as though nothing has happened but at the same time is refusing to swallow the bait. There was no doubt about it: the girl in front of him was smiling, shaking her head gently and not taking the bait – she did not believe his honeyed words. As he observed that heavily-built but insignificant young woman – neither fat nor thin, neither ugly nor beautiful – and yet fully a match for him, the general finally lost his patience and decided to bring the whole thing to a close.

  “Well,” he exclaimed, “I think that I have been very open with you, perhaps overly so. Today I have given you some of my time… Was there anything else you wanted to know?”

  Tanya drew back and instinctively grabbed her bag. “Me?<
br />
  No, nothing. What else could be of interest? And you’re right, I have taken up far too much of your time.”

  She got up, and she didn’t even notice that the general had held out his hairy hand. She ran out of the office and down the stairs, and then as far away as she could get from that cursed Boulevard of the Petroleum Workers. And there was just one idea in her head: right or wrong, she had to get away from Baku immediately. It doesn’t matter that I haven’t finished looking through all the forty boxes, and besides there were only five or six left. I’ve found out what I could and now I have to get out of here. When is the first train?… And she did not know that a few months earlier a judge, whom she had never known and whose name she had never heard mentioned, had acted in exactly the same manner after having had a conversation with General Yusufzade.

  XXIII

  Tricks of the heat

  Moscow, August 1988

  The heat in the Avtozavodsky District during August is enough to kill you. That’s hardly news, I hear you say, and where exactly can you go in Moscow to avoid the debilitating heat of August? People flood into the parks and wallow in the swimming baths: they even dunk their feet in the Moscova River, whose waters, it has to be said, should not be stirred up even with a stick, especially in summertime.

  People queue up en masse at the drinking fountains and the water trucks filled with kvass that can be tapped off. There they are in sandals and vest with their white skin and hair straying all over it, and after having had a good drink they are sweating like pigs, their hair stuck to the foreheads and their armpits simply dripping… Okay, so it’s like that in all the Moscow districts, particularly on a day like today, with a grey sky hanging over us like a shroud. If the thermometer didn’t touch forty degrees at midday, then it wasn’t far off.

  The worst of it is the humidity, which really does make it hard to breathe: the alveoli of the bronchi get stuck together, or whatever else is working away in there; the water condenses in the lungs, and when you breathe, you feel like you’re drowning. And so some old man alone in his poky little room really does croak while his children and grandchildren are soaking in a swimming pool. Just the other day, they found one in Tatarovo – a veteran who had had his feet soaking in a basin and was there on the floor in his pants and vest; he had been fanning himself with a newspaper and then came the heart attack… But we’re not interested in the other districts of the capital, no sir! We’re only interested in the Avtozavodsky District with its ugly, ten-story apartment blocks and only the occasional tree, a consumptive lime or an anaemic birch, half suffocated by the smog down in those concrete cavities they call courtyards.