Edge of Eternity (72 page)

“Evie brought me to ask you a really big favor,” said Dave.

“Yeah,” said Hank, looking at Evie. “I was expecting you later.”

“Dave couldn't wait.”

Dave said: “We need a new song.”

“It's not a good time, Dave,” said Hank. Dave expected him to explain, but he did not.

Evie said: “Hank, is something wrong?”

“Yeah, actually,” said Hank.

Dave was startled. No one ever answered yes to that question.

Evie's feminine intuition was far ahead of Dave. “Is there someone in the bedroom?”

“I'm sorry, love,” said Hank. “I wasn't expecting you back.”

At that point the bedroom door opened and Anna Murray came out.

Dave's mouth fell open in shock. Jasper's sister had been in bed with Evie's boyfriend!

Anna was fully dressed in business clothes, including stockings and high heels, but her hair was mussed and her jacket buttons were misaligned. She did not speak and avoided meeting anyone's eye. She went into the living room and came back out carrying a briefcase. She went to the apartment door, lifted a coat off the hook, and went out without speaking a word.

Hank said: “She came round to talk about my autobiography, and one thing led to another . . .”

Evie was crying. “Hank, how could you?”

“I didn't plan it,” he said. “It just happened.”

“I thought you loved me.”

“I did. I do. This was just . . .”

“Just what?”

Hank looked to Dave for support. “There are some temptations a man can't resist.”

Dave thought of Mickie McFee, and nodded.

Evie said angrily: “Dave's a boy. I thought you were a man, Hank.”

“Now,” he said, suddenly looking aggressive, “watch your mouth.”

Evie was incredulous. “Watch my mouth? I've just caught you in bed with another girl, and you're telling me to watch my mouth?”

“I mean it,” he said threateningly. “Don't go too far.”

Dave was suddenly scared. Hank looked as if he might punch Evie. Was that what working-class Irish people did? And what was Dave supposed to do—protect his sister from her lover? Would Dave be expected to fight the greatest musical genius since Elvis Presley?

“Too far?” Evie said angrily. “I'm going too far now—right out of the fucking door. How's that?” She turned and marched away.

Dave looked at Hank. “Erm . . . about that song . . .”

Hank shook his head silently.

“Okay,” said Dave. “Right.” He could not think of a way to continue the conversation.

Hank held the door for him and he went out.

Evie cried in the car for five minutes, then dried her eyes. “I'll drive you home,” she said.

When they got back to the West End, Dave said: “Come up to the flat. I'll make you a cup of coffee.”

“Thanks,” she said.

Walli was on the couch, playing the guitar. “Evie's a bit upset,” Dave told him. “She broke up with Hank.” He went into the kitchen and put the kettle on.

Walli said: “In English, the phrase ‘a bit upset' means very unhappy. If you were only a little unhappy, say because I forgot your birthday, you would say you were ‘terribly upset,' wouldn't you?”

Evie smiled. “Bless you, Walli, you're so logical.”

“Creative, too,” said Walli. “I'll cheer you up. Listen to this.” He started to play, then he sang: “I miss ya, Alicia.”

Dave came in from the kitchen to listen. Walli sang a sad ballad in D minor, with a couple of chords Dave did not recognize.

When it ended, Dave said: “It's a beautiful song. Did you hear it on the radio? Who's it by?”

“It's by me,” Walli said. “I made it up.”

“Wow,” said Dave. “Play it again.”

This time, Dave improvised a harmony.

Evie said: “You two are great. You didn't need that bastard Hank.”

Dave said: “I want to sing this song to Mark Batchelor.” He looked at his watch. It was half past five. He picked up the phone and called International Stars. Batchelor was still at his desk. “We have a song,” Dave said. “Can we come to your office and play it to you?”

“I'd love to hear it, but I was just leaving for the day.”

“Can you drop in at Henrietta Street on your way home?”

There was a hesitation, then Batchelor said: “Yes, I could, it's near my train station.”

“What's your drink?”

“Gin and tonic, please.”

Twenty minutes later Batchelor was on the sofa with a glass in his hand, and Dave and Walli were playing the song on two guitars and singing in harmony, with Evie joining in on the chorus.

When the song ended he said: “Play it again.”

After the second time they looked at him expectantly. There was a pause. Then he said: “I wouldn't be in this business if I didn't know a hit when I heard it. This is a hit.”

Dave and Walli grinned. Dave said: “That's what I thought.”

“I love it,” Batchelor said. “With this, I can get you a recording contract.”

Dave put down his guitar, stood up, and shook hands with Batchelor to seal the deal. “We're in business,” he said.

Mark took a long sip of his drink. “Did Hank just write the song on the spot, or did he have it in a drawer somewhere?”

Dave grinned. Now that they had shaken hands, he could level with Batchelor. “It's not a Hank Remington song,” he said.

Batchelor raised his eyebrows.

Dave said: “You assumed it was, and I apologize for not correcting you, but I wanted you to have an open mind.”

“It's a good song, and that's all that matters. But where did you get it?”

“Walli wrote it,” said Dave. “This afternoon, while I was in your office.”

“Great,” said Batchelor. He turned to Walli. “What have you got for the B side?”

•   •   •

“You ought to go out,” Lili Franck said to Karolin.

This was not Lili's own idea. In fact it was her mother's. Carla was worried about Karolin's health. Since Hans Hoffmann's visit, Karolin had lost weight. She looked pale and listless. Carla had said: “Karolin is only twenty years old. She can't shut herself up like a nun for the rest of her life. Can't you take her out somewhere?”

They were in Karolin's room, now, playing their guitars and singing to Alice, who was sitting on the floor surrounded by toys. Occasionally
she clapped her hands enthusiastically, but mostly she ignored them. The song she liked best was “Love Is It.”

Karolin said: “I can't go out, I've got Alice to look after.”

Lili was prepared to deal with objections. “My mother can watch her,” she said. “Or even Grandmother Maud. Alice's not much trouble in the evenings.” Alice was now fourteen months and sleeping all night.

“I don't know. It wouldn't feel right.”

“You haven't had a night out for years—literally.”

“But what would Walli think?”

“He doesn't expect you to hide away and never enjoy yourself, does he?”

“I don't know.”

“I'm going to the St. Gertrud Youth Club tonight. Why don't you come with me? There's music and dancing and usually a discussion—I don't think Walli would mind.”

The East German leader, Walter Ulbricht, knew that young people needed entertainment, but he had a problem. Everything they liked—pop music, fashion, comics, Hollywood movies—was either unavailable or banned. Sports were approved of, but usually involved separating the boys from the girls.

Lili knew that most people of her age hated the government. Teenagers did not care much about Communism or capitalism, but they were passionate about haircuts, fashion, and pop music. Ulbricht's puritan dislike of everything they held dear had alienated Lili's generation. Worse, they had developed a fantasy, probably wholly unrealistic, about the lives of their contemporaries in the West, whom they imagined to have record players in their bedrooms and cupboards full of hip new clothes and ice cream every day.

Church youth clubs were permitted as a feeble attempt to fill the gap in the lives of adolescents. Such clubs were safely uncontroversial, but not as suffocatingly righteous as the Communist Party youth organization, the Young Pioneers.

Karolin looked thoughtful. “Perhaps you're right,” she said. “I can't spend my life being a victim. I've had bad luck, but I mustn't let that define me. The Stasi think I'm just the girl whose boyfriend killed a border guard, but I don't have to accept what they say.”

“Exactly!” Lili was pleased.

“I'm going to write to Walli and tell him all about it. But I'll go with you.”

“Then let's get changed.”

Lili went to her own room and put on a short skirt—not quite a miniskirt, as worn by girls on the Western television shows watched by everyone in East Germany, but above the knee. Now that Karolin had agreed, Lili asked herself whether this was the right course. Karolin certainly needed a life of her own: she had been dead right in what she said about not letting the Stasi define her. But what would Walli think, when he found out? Would he worry that Karolin was forgetting him? Lili had not seen her brother for almost two years. He was nineteen now, and a pop star. She did not know what he might think.

Karolin borrowed Lili's blue jeans, then they made up their faces together. Lili's older sister, Rebecca, had sent them black eyeliner and blue eye shadow from Hamburg, and by a miracle the Stasi had not stolen it.

They went to the kitchen to take their leave. Carla was feeding Alice, who waved good-bye to her mother so cheerfully that Karolin was a little put out.

They walked to a Protestant church a few streets away. Only Grandmother Maud was a regular churchgoer, but Lili had been twice previously to the youth club held in the crypt. It was run by a new young pastor called Odo Vossler who wore his hair like the Beatles. He was dishy, though he was too old for Lili, at least twenty-five.

For music Odo had a piano, two guitars, and a record player. They started with a folk dance, something the government could not possibly disapprove of. Lili was paired with Berthold, a boy of about her own age, sixteen. He was nice but not sexy. Lili had her eye on Thorsten, who was a bit older and looked like Paul McCartney.

The dance steps were energetic, with much clapping and twirling. Lili was pleased to see Karolin entering into the spirit of the dance, smiling and laughing. She already looked better.

But the folk dancing was only a token, something to talk about in response to hostile inquiries. Someone put on “I Feel Fine” by the Beatles, and they all started to do the Twist.

After an hour they paused for a rest and a glass of Vita Cola, the East German Coke. To Lili's great satisfaction, Karolin looked flushed and happy. Odo went around talking to each person. His message was that if anyone had any problems, including issues about personal relationships and sex, he was there to listen and give advice. Karolin said to him: “My problem is that the father of my child is in the West,” and they got into a deep discussion until the dancing started again.

At ten, when the record player was switched off, Karolin surprised Lili by picking up one of the guitars. She gestured to Lili to take the other. The two had been playing and singing together at home, but Lili had never imagined doing it in public. Now Karolin started an Everly Brothers number, “Wake Up, Little Susie.” The two guitars sounded good together, and Karolin and Lili sang in harmony. Before they got to the end, everyone in the crypt was jiving. At the end of the song, the dancers called for more.

They played “I Want to Hold Your Hand” and “If I Had a Hammer,” then for a slow dance they did “Love Is It.” The kids did not want them to stop, but Odo asked them to play one more number, then go home before the police came and arrested him. He said it with a smile, but he meant it.

For a finale they played “Back in the USA.”

E
arly in 1965, as Jasper Murray prepared for his final university exams, he wrote to every broadcasting organization in the USA whose address he could find.

They all got the same letter. He sent them his article about Evie dating Hank, his piece on Martin Luther King, and the assassination special edition of
The Real Thing.
And he asked for a job. Any job, as long as it was in American television.

He had never wanted anything this much. Television news was better than print—faster, more engaging, more vivid—and American television was better than British. And he knew he would be good at it. All he needed was a start. He wanted it so much it hurt.

When he had mailed the letters—at considerable expense—he let his sister, Anna, buy him lunch. They went to the Gay Hussar, a Hungarian restaurant favored by left-wing writers and politicians. “What will you do if you don't get a job in the States?” Anna asked him after they had ordered.

The prospect depressed him. “I really don't know. In this country, you're expected to work for provincial newspapers first, covering cat shows and the funerals of long-serving aldermen, but I don't think I can face that.”

Anna got the restaurant's signature cold cherry soup. Jasper had fried mushrooms with tartar sauce. Anna said: “Listen, I owe you an apology.”

“Yes,” said Jasper. “You damn well do.”

“Look, Hank and Evie weren't even engaged, let alone married.”

“But you knew perfectly well that they were a couple.”

“Yes, and I was wrong to go to bed with him.”

“You were.”

“There's no need for you to be so bloody sanctimonious. It's uncharacteristic for me, but it's just the kind of thing you'd do.”

He did not argue with that because it was true. He had on occasion gone to bed with women who were married or engaged. Instead he said: “Does Mother know?”

“Yes, and she's furious. Daisy Williams has been her best friend for thirty years, and has also been extraordinarily kind to you, letting you live there rent-free—and now I've done this to her daughter. What did Daisy say to you?”

“She's angry, because you caused her daughter such pain. But she also said that when she fell in love with Lloyd she was already married to someone else, so she does not feel entitled to too much moral indignation.”

“Well, anyway, I'm sorry.”

“Thank you.”

“Except that I'm not really sorry.”

“What do you mean?”

“I went to bed with Hank because I fell in love with him. Since that first time, I've spent almost every night with him. He's the most wonderful man I've ever met, and I'm going to marry him, if ever I can nail his foot to the floor.”

“As your brother, I'm entitled to ask what on earth he sees in you.”

“Other than big tits, you mean?” She laughed.

“Not that you aren't good-looking, but you are a few years older than Hank, and there are about a million nubile maidens in England who would jump into his bed at a snap of his fingers.”

She nodded. “Two things. First, he's clever but undereducated. I'm his tour guide to the world of the mind: art, theater, politics, literature. He's enchanted by someone who talks to him about that stuff without condescending.”

Jasper was not surprised. “He used to love to talk to Daisy and Lloyd about all that. But what's the other thing?”

“You know he's my second lover.”

Jasper nodded. Girls were not supposed to admit this sort of thing, but he and Anna had always known about each other's exploits.

She went on: “Well, I was with Sebastian almost four years. In that length of time, a girl learns a lot. Hank knows very little about sex, because he's never kept a girlfriend long enough to develop real intimacy. Evie was his longest relationship, and she was too young to teach a man much.”

“I see.” Jasper had never thought this way about relationships, but it made sense. He was a bit like Hank. He wondered whether women thought him unsophisticated in bed.

“Hank learned a lot from a singer called Mickie McFee, but he only slept with her twice.”

“Really? Dave Williams shagged her in a dressing room.”

“And Dave told you?”

“I think he told everyone. It may have been his first shag.”

“Mickie McFee gets around.”

“So, you're Hank's love tutor.”

“He learns fast. And he's growing up quickly. What he did to Evie, he will never do again.”

Jasper was not sure he believed that, but he did not voice his misgivings.

•   •   •

Dimka Dvorkin flew to Vietnam in February 1965 along with a large group of Foreign Ministry officials and aides, including Natalya Smotrov.

It was Dimka's first trip outside the Soviet Union. But he was even more excited about being with Natalya. He was not sure what was going to happen, but he had an exhilarating sense of liberation, and he could tell she felt the same. They were far away from Moscow, out of range of his wife and Natalya's husband. Anything could happen.

Dimka was feeling more optimistic in general. Kosygin, his boss since the fall of Khrushchev, understood that the Soviet Union was losing the Cold War because of its economy. Soviet industry was inefficient, and Soviet citizens were poor. Kosygin's aim was to make the USSR more productive. The Soviets had to learn how to manufacture things that people of other countries might want to buy. They had to compete with the Americans in prosperity, not just in tanks
and missiles. Only then would they have a hope of converting the world to their way of life. This attitude heartened Dimka. Brezhnev, the leader, was woefully conservative, but perhaps Kosygin could reform Communism.

Part of the economic problem was that so much of the national income was spent on the military. In the hope of reducing this crippling expense, Khrushchev had come up with the policy of peaceful coexistence, living side by side with the capitalists without fighting wars. Khrushchev had not done much to implement the idea: his quarrels in Berlin and Cuba had required more military expenditure, not less. But progressive thinkers in the Kremlin still believed in the strategy.

Vietnam would be a severe test.

On stepping out of the plane, Dimka was assailed by a warm, wet atmosphere unlike anything he had experienced. Hanoi was the ancient capital of an ancient country, long oppressed by foreigners, first the Chinese, then the French, then the Americans. Vietnam was more crowded and more colorful than any place Dimka had ever seen.

It was also split in two.

Vietnamese leader Ho Chi Minh had defeated France in the anticolonial war of the fifties. But Ho was an undemocratic Communist, and the Americans refused to accept his authority. President Eisenhower had sponsored a puppet government in the south, based in the provincial capital of Saigon. The unelected Saigon regime was tyrannical and unpopular, and was under attack by resistance fighters called the Vietcong. The South Vietnamese army was so weak that now, in 1965, it had to be propped up by twenty-three thousand American troops.

The Americans were pretending that South Vietnam was a separate country, just as the Soviet Union pretended that East Germany was a country. Vietnam was a mirror image of Germany, though Dimka would never dare say that aloud.

While the ministers attended a banquet with North Vietnamese leaders, the Soviet aides ate a less formal dinner with their Vietnamese opposite numbers—all of whom spoke Russian, some having visited Moscow. The food was mostly vegetables and rice, with small amounts of fish and meat, but it was tasty. There were no female Vietnamese
staffers, and the men seemed surprised to see Natalya and the two other Soviet women.

Dimka sat next to a dour middle-aged apparatchik called Pham An. Natalya, sitting opposite, asked the man what he hoped to get from the talks.

An replied with a shopping list. “We need aircraft, artillery, radar, air defense systems, small arms, ammunition, and medical supplies,” he said.

This was exactly what the Soviets were hoping to avoid. Natalya said: “But you won't need those things if the war comes to an end.”

“When we have defeated the American imperialists our needs will be different.”

“We would all like to see a smashing victory for the Vietcong,” said Natalya. “But there might be other possible outcomes.” She was trying to broach the idea of peaceful coexistence.

“Victory is the only possibility,” said Pham An dismissively.

Dimka was dismayed. An was stubbornly refusing to engage in the discussion for which the Soviets had come here. Perhaps he felt it was beneath his dignity to argue with a woman. Dimka hoped that was the only reason for his obstinacy. If the Vietnamese would not talk about alternatives to war, the Soviet mission would fail.

Natalya was not easily deflected from her purpose. She now said: “Military victory most certainly is
not
the only possible outcome.” Dimka found himself feeling proud of her gutsy persistence.

“You speak of defeat?” said An, bristling—or at least pretending to bristle.

“No,” she said calmly. “But war is not the only road to victory. Negotiations are an alternative.”

“We negotiated with the French many times,” An said angrily. “Every agreement was designed only to gain time while they prepared further aggression. This was a lesson to our people, a lesson on dealing with imperialists, a lesson we will never forget.”

Dimka had read the history of Vietnam and knew that An's anger was justified. The French had been as dishonest and perfidious as any other colonialists. But that was not the end of the story.

Natalya persisted—quite rightly, since this was the message Kosygin
was undoubtedly giving Ho Chi Minh. “Imperialists are treacherous, we all know that. But negotiations can also be used by revolutionaries. Lenin negotiated at Brest-Litovsk. He made concessions, stayed in power, and reversed all those concessions when he was stronger.”

An parroted Ho Chi Minh's line. “We will not consider negotiations until there is a neutral coalition government in Saigon that includes Vietcong representatives.”

“Be reasonable,” Natalya said mildly. “To make major demands as preconditions is just a way of avoiding negotiations. You must consider compromise.”

An said angrily: “When the Germans invaded Russia and marched all the way to the gates of Moscow, did you compromise?” He banged the table with his fist, a gesture that surprised Dimka coming from a supposedly subtle Oriental. “No! No negotiations, no compromise—and no Americans!”

Soon after that the banquet ended.

Dimka and Natalya returned to their hotel. He walked with her to her room. At the door, she said simply: “Come in.”

It would be only their third night together. The first two they had spent on a four-poster bed in a dusty storeroom full of old furniture at the Kremlin. But somehow being together in a bedroom seemed as natural as if they had been lovers for years.

They kissed and took off their shoes, and kissed again and brushed their teeth, and kissed again. They were not crazed with uncontrollable lust: rather, they were relaxed and playful. “We've got all night to do anything we like,” Natalya said, and Dimka thought those were the sexiest words he had ever heard.

They made love, then had some caviar and vodka she had brought with her, then made love again.

Afterward, lying on the twisted sheets, looking up at the slow-moving ceiling fan, Natalya said: “I assume someone is eavesdropping on us.”

“I hope so,” Dimka said. “We sent a KGB team over here at great expense to teach them how to bug hotel rooms.”

“Perhaps it's Pham An listening,” Natalya said, and giggled.

“If so, I hope he enjoyed it more than the dinner.”

“Hmm. That was kind of a disaster.”

“They'll have to change their attitude to get weapons from us. Even Brezhnev doesn't want us involved in a massive war in Southeast Asia.”

“But if we refuse to arm them, they could go to the Chinese.”

“They hate the Chinese.”

“I know. Still . . .”

“Yes.”

They drifted off to sleep and were awakened by the phone. Natalya picked it up and gave her name. She listened for a while, then said: “Hell.” Another minute went by and she hung up. “News from South Vietnam,” she said. “The Vietcong attacked an American base last night.”

“Last night? Only hours after Kosygin arrived in Hanoi? That's no coincidence. Where?”

“A place called Pleiku. Eight Americans were killed and a hundred or so wounded. And they destroyed ten U.S. aircraft on the ground.”

“How many Vietcong casualties?”

“Only one body was left behind in the compound.”

Dimka shook his head in amazement. “You've got to give it to the Vietnamese, they're terrific fighters.”

“The Vietcong are. The South Vietnamese army is hopeless. That's why they need the Americans to fight for them.”

Dimka frowned. “Isn't there some American big shot in South Vietnam right now?”

“McGeorge Bundy, national security adviser, one of the worst of the capitalist-imperialist warmongers.”

“He'll be on the phone to President Johnson right now.”

“Yes,” said Natalya. “I wonder what he's saying.”

She had her answer later the same day.

American planes from the aircraft carrier USS
Ranger
bombed an army camp called Dong Hoi on the coast of North Vietnam. It was the first time the Americans had bombed the north, and began a new phase in the conflict.

Dimka watched in despair as Kosygin's position crumbled, bit by bit, during the course of the day.

After the bombing, American aggression was condemned by Communist and nonaligned countries around the world.

Third World leaders now expected Moscow to come to the aid of Vietnam, a Communist country being directly attacked by American imperialism.