Homesickness (38 page)

7

They were met at the airport by their guide—moon-faced, tub—who introduced herself as ‘Anna'. When she smiled which she did at every question and before each designated monument she showed a set of stainless steel teeth, a legacy of the thirties. But nice! Nice woman! The other day she had become a grandmother, she confided to Mrs Cathcart. She smiled. And for Gerald she went patiently through the long Russian alphabet, lighting up at each and every letter. As for Doug, whatever Anna or other Russians were like, he went deliberately out of his way to say hello to them, ponderously, showing there were no hard feelings, that communists were there and had to be recognised—a form of condescension.

In the parks and on the streets, Muscovites went about in singlets, trousers, sandals with dark socks: recent communist custom. Many of their women wore peasant blouses from the Ukraine which were all the rage then in Moscow. Long queues shuffled forward to buy ice-creams and the beer stalls on the footpaths were surrounded, almost hidden from view. In the parks grandparents sat on benches fanning themselves with faded newspapers. And unexplained bands played dented trumpets.

‘Before going to Red Square and our Kremlin,' Anna announced, after clicking her fingers, ‘we will try in here.'

They were standing outside the imposing ochre walls of a mansion in Botkinskaya Street. It could have been a Rome suburb: similar metal shutters and stately proportions. Pre-1917 it had been a well-known ballroom.

‘We have more to show,' Anna went on, ‘than what is printed on the calendars and postcards. What is it you say? “There is more than meets the eye.” This is correct.' She showed those teeth again and her eyes almost disappeared. ‘One of our countrymen has equated museums with forests, which is nice. Our Red Square and Kremlin will always be there tomorrow.'

‘Don't bet on it!' Garry cracked. Some of them turned; God, he could be boorish. Kaddok though had the information at his fingertips. ‘The Kremlin has been burnt down several times by marauding tribes.'

Doug slapped his forehead: ‘Postcards!'

‘I've made a note,' Mrs Cathcart nodded. To Anna she turned. ‘We intend sending friends postcards showing your country.'

It was an early reward; Mrs Cathcart made this clear by not smiling.

It was here that Sheila noticed the man across the street behind the broadsheet
Pravda
, like the man who leaned out from behind the fluted pillar in the hotel foyer. Staring, she said nothing. She went in with the group.

Gerald and Phillip North had been trying to translate the sign tacked up at a slight angle above the entrance:

‘Centre…' Gerald managed, moving his lips.

An ingenious slot device, working on an incline and requiring a kopeck, got them past the turnstiles. It had glass sides and they could see the copper disc rolling and tripping steel levers as it fell through a trapdoor, releasing springs, a horizontal ratchet lock and flashing lights.

Inside it was dark and cool, a relief. It was a Government hall.

Anna sat down and wiped her neck. She handed them over to the Ministry's permanent head who'd been standing there all the time. The two were so familiar they didn't bother to greet each other.

Appropriately slant-eyed this Slav had a pale blue eyeball rolling loose in one sloping socket, evidently out of control. Otherwise his face was immobile, distinguished for its large sadness. So many things in the world appear, recede! This one's nose leaked, sometimes corrected with the back of his hand, and his coat and black trousers were versts too short. On the other hand he was clearly devoted to his role. It had become his obsession, an end in itself. The Centre was an area of knowledge with clear perimeters—in that sense, a province. As Anna had smiled, ‘like our guides at the Museum of Atheism, the Museum of Curiosities, and of the Revolution. They think of nothing else. They're all the same.'

‘I was going to say,' said Borelli to North, ‘all museums amount to the same.'

Ha! This one had already launched into his spiel as they removed their shoes and put on the special felt slippers to protect the ballroom parquetry. But then, of course, so highly polished were the first corridors they found it difficult to walk. Brass rails had been fitted along strategic parts of the walls to assist the gingerly treading laughing ones, the girls; but the rails themselves were highly polished. To both Sasha who had taken North's hand, and Violet, it was like a child's game. Others began smiling and shuddering as they slithered behind the Russian bear. Joining in, Garry gave Sheila a small shove. Well, they were on holidays. Apparently the Russian was used to all this. He went on mournfully, easily, and told them the Centre of Gravity had been started during the Cold War.

He spoke excellent guttural English, considering. And they found his angle interesting.

‘Gravity is central to existence. Superficially'—pronounced with Slavic fluidity—‘the health of nations is dependent on it. Without it, the walls of our lungs would collapse; our blood pressure is set to balance it. We are all conscious of that. Nails would fall out from timbers. Beams fall on citizens' heads. Gravity is an experience. We feel. We are conscious. What is death but a loss of gravitation; a collapse. Back to the grave.'

‘Thirty-two feet per second, per second!' Kaddok said for no apparent reason.

‘We, in the Soviet Union, are infected with gravity. We are constantly investigating…ways of improving it, how to respect it. Hence the Centre.'

Kaddok wouldn't have seen the Russian's eyeball oscillating like the pale bubble in a builder's spirit level. Evidently he tried hard to fix his gaze upon them. He stood alongside a crude cartoon of a red-haired man dropping cannonballs from a leaning tower; but still his pupil kept rolling up and down. Next to it an etching showed an ancient Englishman holding an apple with a surprised expression, slightly foxed.

As Borelli and Louisa suddenly clutched at each other to avoid slipping on the floor the Russian sketched in Khlebnikov's correlation between gravity and time.

‘Have you ever considered,' said the rasping voice, ‘the peculiar relationship between gravity and perspective, between gravity and coincidence, and gravity and rainbows?'

The world and its multifarious objects! Its many laws and items to consider; the relationships to inter-relate.

Gravity and coinc—

Garry Atlas thought he knew. ‘Right!' He nodded. ‘I'm with you.'

Lines of chance, trajectory of bombs, slapstick films. History's nagging central question: if a falling tile had killed Lenin in Zurich would the Revolution still have taken place? If yes, tick. No, place a cross. Moving bodies and nations attract, collide.

This guide's pronouncements combined with his enormous grave head, locally mobile with the dissident eye, held them in a new reflective mood. To Louisa whispering to Borelli and touching his hand, he was among the saddest men she had ever seen. At any rate the idea was to take it slowly, one slipper after the other, gingerly, at the same time listening, keeping an eye on him. Most things were worth a pause; and they soon forgot about the outside world.

‘Several other examples of gravity have been classified,' he was saying.

The sinking foundations of the mansion had given the far end of the room a glistening declivity, similar to some of the decrepit ballrooms said to be still operating in Vienna. A row of heavy chandeliers increased the stately feeling, as did the gold leaf, and the wallpapers in chevronian tatters.

Here were specific examples of gravity, including Specific Gravity. They were propped against or tacked onto the walls; some were suspended from the ceiling. Other things stood in the middle—isolated objects. Ambling over, their Russian leaned forward with an interested air as if he had never seen them before.

A sequence of photographs demonstrated in black-and-white the rise and fall of the German empire. Standing in rubble a Russian private pointed to the fallen statue of the Third Reich, the fierce eagle still clutching the wreathed swastika. From the very beginning the emblem had been encircled by a wreath.

The guide almost smiled; it didn't suit him.

‘Gravity makes everything eventually come back to earth,' he said.

Other exhibits made Sasha and Louisa frown and turn away.

The trajectory of shrapnel, of rockets; the flight path of heavy bombs. Photographs. Those taken at night could have been displays of fireworks. Destroyed in Russia during the war were 89,500 bridges, 4,100 railway stations, and 427 museums.

Mrs Cathcart here slipped over, her thick legs tucking under, and muttering had to be helped up. ‘Where were you?' she hissed at Doug.

The guide took no notice.

The clear correlation between gravity and time was demonstrated, perhaps rather obviously, by a line of synchronised hourglasses. Detecting their interest the guide again almost smiled.

‘A central image,' said he. ‘It never fails. Is gravity therefore connected to magnetism? We have a fascination watching time running out before our very eyes.'

Sasha yawned.

A common household tap had been pressed into service. All but Sasha and Mrs Cathcart squatted with the guide and studied the Pavlovian drip. The crystalline stretch grew, hovered swollen, pulled by gravity, and burst into tears. Pause. It began again.

Born the diplomat, Garry had to gurgle and cross his eyes. ‘I can't stand it! Chinese water torture! I'm going crazy!'

‘Oh dry up.' That was Violet. But she stopped smiling when Hofmann laughed.

The Russian carelessly observed, ‘Water is woman.'

‘What does he mean?' Louisa whispered.

Borelli pursed his lips. ‘He means rivers; that they are always beautiful. Rivers are subtle but strong, and have no sharp corners. They also flow one with nature, are life-giving.' (He was wracking his brains; glancing at Louisa who was smiling. She wasn't properly listening.) ‘And men are always wanting to conquer rivers and discover their source. Treacherous undercurrents.'

She squeezed his arm. ‘You're making that up.'

‘I think your husband's watching.'

‘Certain cities suddenly become centres of gravity,' the Russian bellowed. Certain people gravitate. ‘It used to be Vienna, Paris, Berlin. Now they tell me it is New York and Sydney.'

‘Sydney?'

Gerald gave such a laugh the Russian looked surprised.

‘So I am told.'

‘What about Moscow?'

‘The Olympic Games'll put you on the map,' said Doug.

The Russian said in a low voice. ‘Not Moscow. Not yet. I don't think so yet.'

‘Hey!' Doug stared down at his thigh and everyone began laughing.

His car keys on their silver chain began climbing out of his pocket. A small but powerful red wall magnet had been mounted at waist level to demonstrate the similarity between gravity and magnetism.

Other movements then caught the eye.

In the middle of the room an angled pink blur signalled by a perpendicular waving arm as Sasha slid down an ordinary slippery dip or children's slide. At its base Mrs Cathcart stood firm, an overseer.

‘Go on, Mrs C. Have a go!' Garry called as they went over; but then Ken Hofmann, a satellite as usual, slipped and grappled with the nearest, Borelli holding Louisa, bringing them down, Gerald too, his spectacles bumping off his nose, and Kaddok in the midst accustomed to trips and spills, cupping his camera and held his other hand out to the floor. And the writhing heap of five slowly began sliding, as in a dream, towards the end wall—such was the polish and angle of the Moscow floor—until Hofmann amid the high laughter of Sasha and Violet, both on top of the ladder, grabbed at and held the first rung of the steps.

First to extricate, Gerald began savagely cursing.

The ursine Russian had kept ambling unconcerned back to the side wall, a proven path, pointing with his crumpled arm at the laziness of nature—a basic truth which, according to him, passes unobserved by most people.

‘Look at waterfalls,' he suggested, as the others eventually made their way back. Excellent photographs of seven great waterfalls. ‘And the course of every river in the world. They go only where they can, naturally, without fuss.'