The Beginning of Spring

by Penelope Fitzgerald

  ‘There’s a new paper or a new journal starting up every day. And with a newspaper you’re printing so many identical units that you can go straight into large-scale unit costing.’

  ‘I don’t want to print newspapers,’ said Frank. ‘This firm has to be kept on a very delicate balance, so that it can be sold without loss and at short notice if the international situation gets worse.’

  ‘Or if your wife, Elena Karlovna, doesn’t return,’ said Bernov, nodding energetically. Evidently this was discussed even at Sytin’s. With quiet tact, Selwyn leaned forward.

  ‘How do you see our future, Bernov?’

  ‘Very simply. I’m glad you asked me. More pay for more efficiency. English and German firms have a system of merit rating for their workers. I don’t know if we shall ever accept that here. But you can start by increasing the fines for drunkenness, lowering the agreed payments for waiting time when the paper runs out and so forth, and, above all, no special cases, no humanitarian allowances. That’s what prosperity means. You’re giving everyone the money they deserve.’

  ‘But we mustn’t consider what money they deserve,’ said Selwyn. ‘Consider only whether we, the men of business deserve to have money to give to them.’

  Bernov’s face, so much more expressive than was good for him, crumpled up a little.

  ‘Of course, I’m only here as your cost accountant. Decisions are for the management only. Perhaps I ought to say, though, that the question of whether the management deserve their profits has no relevance to their economic performance.’

  ‘I’m sorry to hear you say that,’ Selwyn murmured. ‘Yes, truly sorry.’

  Frank saw that Bernov looked bewildered, and sent out to the Bar for something to eat. Zakuske were brought on a covered tray by the proprietor himself, anxious to discover what kind of scandal had been reported, or not reported, by his lodger, the night watchman.

  ‘Has he woken up?’ Frank asked.

  ‘He spoke of hearing shots when he was about his duties last night,’ said the proprietor.

  ‘Remember it’s a very noisy street.’

  Bernov ate rapidly and immediately began on a new proposition. At Sytin’s, and perhaps during the whole of his life, he must have been deprived of proper attention. ‘Look at the government expenditure this year! A hundred and ten million roubles on railways, eighty million roubles on education. Education means cheap printed books. They could be produced and even bound on the premises, using strong cartridge paper.’ Frank reminded him that in times of emergency cartridge paper was liable to run very short. Bernov began to tap with a silver pencil he’d got. In 1915, the year after next, there was to be an international printing fair in Berlin, the largest in history. These industrial fairs, in his opinion, were the guarantee of continuing peace in Europe. Russia must not be outdone. The small printing shops of Moscow, places like Reid’s, employing thirty to sixty people, must come to an agreement with the giants like Sytin’s and prepare a joint exhibit. By that time, Frank thought, he’ll have fretted himself to death.

  At four o’clock two old men, two of the oldest in the place, came up to the compositors’ room. They were collators, checking the order of the sheets, and seeing them, with the help of two boys and a bucket of water, through the hydraulic press. They had done the same work with the old screw press, and were never likely to do anything more difficult. Now they had an air of authority.

  They had exchanged their felt slippers, which they wore at work, for leather shoes, and in these they creaked across to the ikon corner and dragged out a table to stand in front of it. A third, even older man, this time from the store room, brought in a white cloth, two candles and two tarnished silver candlesticks. They spread the cloth, adjusted the creases, crossed themselves and bowed. Frank, coming out of his office, was asked to light the candles. As he struck a match he thought uncomfortably of Volodya, who must have brought his matches with him.

  The candlelight would have been more impressive if they’d turned out the electric light, but this was not important to the staff of Reidka’s, who had had a service of blessing when their electricity was installed, and were proud of it. With the lighting of the candles, however, they began to come silently in, not crowding, not touching each other, and all these people who would have fought fiercely to get ahead at the tram-stop, or on the bridges watching the ice, took their stand as though their places were marked out for them. As they faced the ikon they crossed themselves, striking the forehead, each shoulder in turn, then the breast.

  The men stood on the right, the tea-woman and her assistant on the left, Frank and Selwyn, as usual, in the centre. Bernov had excused himself from the ceremony, and gone home, carrying quantities of paperwork.

  The whole assembly were turned to the right, with their eyes on the candles, which, like the oil for the ikon-lamp, were paid for by a voluntary weekly subscription from everyone over the age of sixteen. The ikon was not an old one. It was an example of a new photographic process which was said to be an exact simulation of oil painting, in reds and blues of excellent quality which neither time not lamp-smoke could darken, while the glittering halo of St Modestus and the letters of the alphabet in his bound book far outshone the ancient silver of the candlesticks. Those had come from the old house on the works site. Even there, Frank remembered, it had been thought unlucky to clean them.

  The yardman threw the door open and the familiar heavy-treading, heavy-breathing parish priest came in, followed by a deacon and a subdeacon. From the doorway he gave his blessing. They were taken into Frank’s office which, on these occasions, became a vestry. The priest came out in his stole, the deacons in their surplices. The censer was lit with a piece of red-hot charcoal from the canteen samovar. The fragrance of the smouldering cedar of Lebanon reached every corner of the room where men, women and children stood motionless.

  Some of them, Frank knew, were agnostics. The storekeeper had told him that, in his opinion, soul and body were like the steam above a factory, one couldn’t exist without the other. But he, too, stood motionless. The priest offered a prayer for the God-protected Tsar and his family, for the Imperial Army, that it might put down every enemy of Russia beneath its feet, for the city of Moscow and for the whole country, for those at sea, for travellers, for the sick, for the suffering, for prisoners, for the founders of the Press and the workers there, for mercy, life, peace, health, salvation, visitation, pardon and remission of sins.

  Because I don’t believe in this, Frank thought, that doesn’t mean it’s not true. He tried to call himself to order. Thomas Huxley had written that if only there was some proof of the truth of religion, humanity would clutch at it as a drowning man clutches at a hencoop. But as long as mankind doesn’t pretend to believe in something they see no reason to believe, because there might be an advantage in pretending – as long as they don’t do that, they won’t have sunk to the lowest depths. He himself could be said to be pretending now, still more so when he had attended the Anglican chapel, with the idea of keeping Nellie company. Why he had felt alarmed when Dolly told him that her teacher said there was no God, he didn’t know. The alarm suggested that as a rational being he was unsuccessful. Either that, or he had come to think of religion as something appropriate to women and children, and that would be sinking to a lower depth than Huxley had dreamed of. Perhaps, Frank thought, I have faith, even if I have no beliefs.

  The priest was giving a short address. ‘You are workers, and you are not only called upon to work together, but to love each other and pity each other. How can that be? You will say that you didn’t choose to work next to this man or that man, he happened to be there when I first arrived, it was accidental. But remember, if that thought comes to you, that there are no accidental meetings. We never meet by chance. Either this other man, or this woman, is sent to us, or we are sent to them.’

  The final blessing began. At the words ‘guard this place and this house and the souls of those who dwell there’ the doors opened again, and Tv
yordov walked in. Every head turned towards him, and then back again. He crossed himself and went to stand in silence, with his back to his frame.

  The priest held out a double-barred silver-gilt cross, the lower arm slanted to the right, representing the fates of the good and the bad thief. The congregation filed forward to kiss the cross, the men first, the two women after them. The tea-woman and her assistant kissed the priest’s hands also. Although they were probably the most devout souls in the congregation, they hurried away in a state of agitation. The pyerchestvo for the blessing of the ikon was entirely their responsibility, and while they were upstairs the glasses might somehow have been disarranged, or supplies of small cakes and pies put out which were supposed to be kept back till later. Tyvordov also kissed the cross, but not the priest’s hand.

  ‘Go on,’ Frank said to Selwyn. ‘I’ll be down later.’

  Selwyn nodded, and escorted the priest, the deacon and the subdeacon, towards the stairs to the tea-place. They would expect to be entertained, as usual, in the office, but there was no way, at the moment, of explaining the unwelcome change in the arrangements. The congregation followed, with the exception of Tvyordov, and the room filled with that peculiar silence, as though it was stretching itself, which follows when a great number of people have recently left. Frank confronted his chief compositor.

  Tvyordov did not speak to him at once. As though he was starting on his day’s work, he took the covers off his frame and looked in pain, rather than in bewilderment, at the disorder. He picked up one or two letters from the violated upper case, and from habit let them fall into what would have been their right places. Then he took down his white apron, looked at the bullet-hole, put his finger through it and folded the apron neatly.

  ‘You sent word to me not to come. But I’ve never missed the service of blessing.’

  ‘You’ve never missed anything,’ Frank replied, ‘not since my father started this place, and all the work was hand-set.’

  He could hardly tell Tvyordov what he hadn’t told the police. He might, perhaps, have risked it if he had known what Tvyordov felt about students and about student activities, but he didn’t know.

  ‘I owe you some kind of explanation,’ he began at last, ‘for the state of your frame. It all happened yesterday evening.’

  ‘It’s not my frame,’ replied Tvyordov, ‘the frame belongs to the Press. The tools were mine, the sponge was mine, the apron was mine.’

  ‘Anything that was damaged will be replaced.’

  ‘That won’t be necessary. What happened doesn’t interest me. I shall never work in this room again. You’ll have to find someone to continue instructing my apprentice, and someone to wind the clock on Saturday evenings, and clean the glass on Monday mornings. Tomorrow I shall start downstairs with the monotype.’

  Onto the folded apron he put his composing stick, his setting-rule, his shears, the sponge, and the bodkin in its cork for removing wrong letters, and with two movements of his hands made them into a compact parcel. He was on his way out.

  ‘What are you going to do with those?’ Frank asked.

  ‘I shall throw them in the river.’

  17

  Charlie’s telegram said that he would arrive on the 31st of March. In Moscow that would be the 18th. The thaw would be nearly over, but the city’s sealed windows hadn’t yet been opened to let in the spring. Certainly he wouldn’t be seeing the country at its best. Frank’s hospitable instincts were disturbed. No shooting, no skating, but then Charlie didn’t shoot and couldn’t skate. No horse-market, but then Charlie wasn’t interested in horses. The light would still be too poor for decent photography, but then he never had any luck, anyway, with his snapshots. But how would Charlie compare Moscow in springtime with Norbury, where every green front hedge and back lawn must, by now, be shooting and putting out leaves? He might think, perhaps, that Nellie never ought to have been brought to Russia.

  The servants asked what must be prepared for their English visitor. Frank reminded them that he was English himself.

  ‘Yes, but you are Russian, you are used to everything Russian,’ said Toma, ‘you make mistakes, and you don’t mind our mistakes. God has given you patience, to take the place of your former happiness.’

  ‘Karl Karlovich will need plenty of hot water at all times, and a boiled egg every morning.’

  The 18th of March, the Feast of St Benjamin, was a general holiday. In a sense, this was convenient, as the Press would be shut, and there would be no difficulty about meeting Charlie.

  ‘Which of us are you going to take with you to the station?’ asked Dolly. ‘Our uncle will expect a warm welcome.’

  ‘I’m not taking any of you. He’ll have had a tiring journey, and when he gets here he’ll want a few quiet moments to take everything in.’

  He was making his brother-in-law sound like a sick man, and in fact Dolly asked whether uncle Charlie was quite right in the head.

  ‘Of course he is, but he might find it a bit confusing at first. He’s never gone in for travelling. Anyway, there’s nothing odd about wanting peace and quiet.’

  ‘Is he bringing Mother back with him?’ Ben asked in a perfectly level voice.

  ‘No.’

  ‘If Mother does come, will you have to get rid of Lisa?’

  Frank knew, rather than saw, that Dolly was sitting with her head turned away, as still as if she had been frozen.

  ‘I don’t much like that expression “get rid of”,’ he said.

  ‘Why not?’

  What did you get rid of? Frank thought. Epidemics of cholera, draughts, mice, political opponents, bad habits. Ben had meant no harm, of course, quite the contrary. ‘Get rid of’ had been a favourite expression of Nellie’s.

  When Lisa came, a little after the rest of the household, for her weekly wages, he asked her how long she was going to stay with them.

  ‘How can I answer that?’ she said, counting her money carefully. ‘I can’t answer it.’

  ‘You might say “as long as I want to”.’

  ‘It would have to be “as long as I’m wanted”. That I don’t need to tell you.’

  Frank unlocked another drawer in the desk. ‘Look, here are your papers, here’s your internal passport. I’m supposed by law to keep them here, but I’m giving them back to you. You’re free to go when you want to, when you need to. You can say now, “I shall stay as long as I want to.” But I very much want you to stay, Lisa Ivanovna.’

  Charlie, wrapped in plaids and mufflers, expected, perhaps understandably, to be taken straight from the station to Lipka Street, but Frank put the luggage in charge of a porter, and avoiding the stationmaster, whom he felt he couldn’t face just at the moment, propelled Charlie into the refreshment room.

  ‘Do they have tea here?’ Charlie asked.

  ‘Charlie, I want you to tell me about Nellie.’

  ‘What, immediately? I haven’t had much opportunity to wash, you know, since we crossed the border.’

  ‘How’s Nellie?’

  Charlie sighed. ‘I’ve got bad news for you, but no, wait, you’re rushing me a bit, I haven’t expressed myself rightly, there’s nothing to be alarmed about. As far as I know, Nellie’s perfectly well, it’s only that she’s not with me, she’s not in Norbury.’

  ‘You mean you’ve come all this way to tell me you don’t know where she is?’

  ‘She’s not in material want, Frank, that I do know.’

  ‘I should hope not. I sent off some money straight away.’

  ‘Yes, that arrived by post, before she did. I gave it to her pretty well as soon as she arrived. I thought she was just back for a visit, you see, although I’d heard nothing from her for quite a while. She only stayed the night, stowed away her bags in the attic, where they still are, by the way, then she was off again.’

  Frank ordered some tea. ‘Where is she now?’

  ‘She’s school-teaching, Frank. She’d still have her certificate, of course. Don’t ask me where, because I
don’t know. I mean that she wrote me that she was at a school, and she can’t be learning at her age, so she must be teaching. No address, she sent the letter poste restante to the tobacconist at the end of the road. Perhaps you remember him?’

  ‘Can’t you make the tobacconist say where it came from?’

  ‘It wouldn’t be right to persuade him to break a confidence. That’s what he’s paid for, really, to destroy the covering envelope. Besides, he’s a Wesleyan.’

  ‘I see.’

  ‘I’ve brought her letter, if you want to look at it.’

  ‘No, Charlie. It wasn’t written to me.’

  Charlie straightened himself in his chair, stirring the lemon in his tea, determined to get used to foreign customs. Well, he’ll have to say it right out now, thought Frank, feeling sorry for him.

  ‘Frank, was there any kind of disagreement between you and Nellie?’

  ‘Did you ask her that?’

  ‘Yes, but I didn’t get an answer. She wasn’t short with me, like she often used to be, I don’t mean that. If I had to describe her, I’d say she was half-asleep, like a woman dreaming.’

  ‘Did she say anything about the children?’

  ‘I did, but she didn’t.’

  ‘What did you say?’

  ‘I asked her what arrangements she’d made about the kiddies. She didn’t answer that, either.’

  ‘Did it strike you that, if she was like a woman half-asleep, she might have lost them?’

  ‘No, Frank, it didn’t, or I’d have been terror-struck. And after all, she hadn’t lost anything else.’

  Charlie had come sixteen hundred miles to give what after all, had turned out to be very little information. He had had to disturb the habits of a lifetime, take the London, Brighton & South Coast Railway into London, get his visa from the Russian consulate, change his money into marks and roubles, confront the border inspections, lose his books (Raffles and Sentimental Tommy) and his pack of patience cards, both of which had been confiscated by the customs at Verzhbolovo. ‘Surely there couldn’t have been much harm in a pack of cards?’ Frank explained that playing cards were a state monopoly, and the proceeds went to support the Imperial Foundlings Home. ‘Well, that shows the Tsar’s heart is in the right place,’ said Charlie.