The Combinations, page 8
Like the icecream cones, Němec thought. Hájek & Boušová. Soft banana,
strawberry, fruit of the loom, raspberry ripple, triple scoop. Ovocný Světozor.
Zmrzlina Praha…
‘My name,’ the old man explained, ‘I don’t believe we’ve been introduced.’
‘Němec,’ said Němec, reciprocating.
‘Ah,’ the old man nodded, as if there was something meaningful in it.
In the City, Němec considered, you met people all the time without ever
knowing who they were. Why should he be any different. One name or another,
it was all the same to him. They talked for a little longer, or rather this Hájek
talked. Němec found listening to him strange. The old man spoke in a quaint
* Codename “PRAVDA,” StB agent no. . [:]
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days-of-yore austrohungarianised dialect — a grammar of exile, half a century
removed. Despite himself, Němec grew curious.
As the old man soliloquised, his hands fidgeted with a small notebook.
Němec’s eyes followed the movements of his fingers as they turned the pages,
hunting for something he never seemed to find — page after page filled with
minute annotations, diagrams & a kind of Old World chess algebra. This Hájek,
Němec supposed, was possibly one of those autistics you were liable to come
across in public parks, solving crossword puzzles at four in the morning, pockets
stuffed with grubby newsprint, train tickets, lottery cards, each notable for some
auspicious date, or containing — somewhere — the multiple of a prime number,
or a reference to the colour blue.
His interest beginning to wane, it was just as Němec was mentally
preparing excuses to get away, thinking of the book on Mydlář he’d requested at
the Reading Room but not wanting to mention it in case of further convoluted
talk, when the old man started whistling to himself. It was a theme from
Mahler’s second symphony, the “Resurrection,” in Cm. La-si-sol-fa-la-do-la…
Der Mensch liegt in größter Pein!* Taken by surprise, & with no heed to potential
consequences, Němec found himself joining in.
* Or “Not.” 6Ê(=6Êx5Ô&*=6Êx5Æ)=6Êx [:]
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4
___________
THE PRODIGAL
An indifferent morning sometime in March. Year: .
Beneath an open window, in the courtyard of the Foreign Ministry, Jan
M, son of the Cheskoslovnikian Republic’s founding father* is discovered
spreadeagled in an advanced state of rigor mortis — the corpse too stiff, too
composed, to look natural, one hand outstretched, clutching the air — socks
with little black elasticised suspenders, cravat, red silk dressinggown over
blue&white striped flannel pyjamas — a minor footnote to a minor History.*
Official verdict: Suicide.
Another widow, another orphan.
No witnesses to say otherwise, of course: somatic shapes drifting out of
the City’s sleep, a face in a window, the bells of St Vitus tolling the hour
through coalblacked streets. By a wry coincidence, the bathroom whose window
M has apparently thrown himself from during the night is the exact same
bathroom formerly reserved (seems like only yesterday) for the “Blond Beast” —
that laconic & well-remembered Reichsprotektor (acting), R.T.E. Heydrich. By
a further & equally wry coincidence, sure to be remarked upon more than once
in the following days & weeks, it happens that the late M’s late garrulous pater
familias (while yet still only a measly teaching assistant in the Philosophy Faculty
of Charles University & before the said M’s having been so much as a twinkle in
the firmament of his matka’s Brooklyn-blue eyes (the unblushing virgin that she
was)) once penned a forgettable dissertation entitled Suicide as a Mass
Phenomenon of Modern Civilisation.
Call it a sign of the times. Any minute now the whole nation’d be doin’ it.
Doin’ it, doin’ it.
For M, at any rate, the hour hadn’t been long in coming: never much
more the Man of Destiny than a Venetian blind is, which a simple fidgeting of
strings can open or shut, to let in the full glare of daylight or cast an oblique
* As in Ma-sa-ryk, T.G. [:]
* All of which is completely true, if you discount the suspenders, the cravat, the sartorial
dressinggown… [:]
37
inner gloom (one day the blind stops working, the strings get stuck, the slats
skew sideways & the whole contraption of pulleys & springs has to be tossed
out, reinvented, replaced, with all the determination & inevitability of Progress,
of the dialectical-materialist march of Reason, of the One True Etcetera). But he
who’s unable or refuses to stand aside from the path of Progress, Reason & the
One True Etcetera? Can always be putsched ☟ hahaha.
Here the drama indicates an aside, a Polonius-moment behind an arras, a
fly-on-the-wall’s P.O.V. of the unfolding situation: picture an office in the
Castle with filing cabinets & desk, behind which, ear glued to telephone,
hunches M’s nemesis, paternal supplanter (so to speak), usurper of the royal
prerogative, Claudius to his Hamlet-father, satyr to Hyperion, the man sent not
to praise but to bury him — Stalin’s puppet, Klem Gottwald — already penning
his moniker on a batch of arrest warrants as he sings —
When I left my home and family,
my mammy said to me:
Son, it’s not how many Krauts you kill,
but how many poor souls you set free.
So I packed my bags, brushed my cap,
ran as far as I could go —
and found a cosy place to nap
till the last act of the show.
I wore a rose for Božena Němcová
in the summer of ’ —
when we rode into Golem Town,
and raised the red flag high!
Now we’ve packed away the do-gooders
all off to Terezín —
and strung the rest up by the neck,
to show ’em what “patriot” means!
Oh, mammy, mammy, I love youuuuuu!
I’ll save the nation, don’t you fret!
I’ll make you proud of your little pet!
I promise I’ll be truuuuuue!
Fastforward to the coronation scene: Gottwald in the Presidential suite flanked
by grinning cronies, Vlado Clementis & Rudolf Slánský — they’re breaking out
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the Bolinger & caviar, entertained by a troupe of little Red Army cheerleaders in
brown mini-shorts, beige stockings, Cossack boots — albastone-bright flash of
sturdy thigh — breasts bobbing & swaying in the glare of a dozen chandeliers.
Some wit has put an Offenbach recording on a wind-up gramophone & now
there’s a lot of high-kicks & jaunty leg-wagging, all in jest of course — a little
joke at the expense of the outmoded bourgeoisie, blind in sheer denial of the
historical forces even now overrunning them.
‘Our victory on the road of Revolution has been won!’ Gottwald bellows,
slapping his thigh.
Slánský grabs hold of the nearest cheerleader & whoops her into his lap,
pinching a nipple to shrieks & giggles. Clementis finds the whole thing gut-
clenchingly funny, but Gottwald goes on bellowing all the same, oblivious
apparently to the effect all this is having on his moment of gravitas —
‘But we shall continue our fight against Philistinism! There are still men
in official positions today who haven’t the least idea of the spirit of Revolution.
We shall ruthlessly get rid of them if they dare try to put their reactionary ideas
into practice! For WE are the incorruptible guardians of the fulfilment of the
Revolution!’
Another champagne cork POP!s & ricochets between the chandeliers, like
a pinball earning bonus points, before whizzing out of nowhere to hit one of the
Red Army cheerleaders PING! in the eye — a redhead who, stunned for a
moment, just stands there, knock-kneed, mouth doing a Clara Bow pout that
has Clementis even more in stitches. There’s a good chance someone’s spiked his
drink, but they’re not letting on. Who cares? It’s three years to the day since the
Nazis got the boot & the last democretinously elected parliament of
Cheskoslovnikia has just rubberstamped the Ninth-of-May Constitution —
anointing thusly this most high & hallowed first Gottwaldian dynasty. Oh yes,
there’s plenty to celebrate.
Õ
On such a day as this a young graduate, name of Tomáš Hájek (Jnr.) — son of
an archivist of identical name (Snr.), formerly of the National Literary Museum,
since deceased, cause of death: severe trauma of the spinal column with
brainstem separation — sets off south-by-southeast on a diesel train for
Schnitzelstadt, his personal muses in tow: Alžběta Seifertová, his soon-to-be
39
wife, & Elsbeth von N____, their mutual companion, daughter of Eldrich von
N____, son of Gaspar von N____, late of Greiffenberg, Silesia, where they used
to make dancing puppets before the Bolsheviks came.
Picture them: fugitives in black&white à la Carol Reed, hours waiting at
the border, the by-now routine cross-examinations, sweating it out in sardine-
canned thirdclass compartment, the stale garlic & pork sausage stench of
exhaustion, cheek-by-jowl with fleeing Hungarians, Italians, Romanians —
identity papers of dubious provenance, blackmarket passports, exit visas —
armed with a dozen different vocabularies for baksheesh payable in Neutral
Swiss francs, Bolshevik roubles, Imperialist pounds sterling, Capitalist dollars
hidden in shoes, cloth caps, brassieres… — the guard’s sour vodka breath, eyes
redrimmed scrutinising each of their faces as he deliberately smudges the stamp
on their transit passes to destinations more remote — the felt unease of a
subterfuge about to be undone — panicked thoughts flashing back to other train
journeys, other border-crossings — anxiety mounting to outright suspicion at the
sound of the conductor’s whistle — It must be a trick! They can’t really be letting us
get away with this?
And as if on cue, a branch-line comes into view with cattle-cars backed up
as far as the naked eye can see — sweating faces visible through the slatted
doorways, illegals & undesirables to be shipped back for reprocessing north to
Terezín or south to Mauthausen — the old Nazi holiday camps doing overtime in
the name of redemption, reparation & the revamped National Idea. They’re
shunted past sidings crowded with the women & children who’ve waited sleepless
days & nights for a train, & will be made to wait a while longer yet — loose piles
of confiscated luggage spilling from the backs of drab troop transports — the
Displaced Persons enclosure with faces peering out from blankets behind a
crosshatching of barbed wire — snaking lines of Sudeten refugees advancing
slowly on foot along disused tracks overgrown with nettles — morose guardtowers
keeping watch over scorched-earth Landschaften strewn with war wreckage…
One-by-one the depressing bits of scenery slip from sight like set-designs
dragged offstage by hands unseen, till what’s left are the longed-for rolling apple-
green pastures, Christmas-tree groves & quaint little farmhouses strangely
undisturbed by the total absence of livestock. Gradually a sense of relief comes
over the compartment’s motley of escapees — but not for long — as the
greenery peters-out into military encampments, once more giving way to doubt
& the renewal of apprehension — & from apprehension to foreboding as the
train shunts from one Occupied Zone to the next & back again, causing
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everything to be repeated, the whole rigmarole of passports checked, visas
stamped, selective confiscations & the general whittling away of the bribe
economy, till they’re left bartering cufflinks, earrings, bread, old pairs of boots.
Their tormentors would like nothing better than to spit in all their faces
— these parasites, fleas jumping ship — to put the boot in, get each of them
alone in the baggage car for a bit of good cheer, eh? A truncheon in the kisser, a
rifle-butt in the arse, a bit of the ol’ rape&rapine. Even when all’s said & done
there’re still permissions to approach, supplications to be made, the public
apology for one’s very existence, atonement for crimes committed, real or
imputed, by virtue of race or class or a wrong facial feature — seeing themselves,
the stigmata of a guilty conscience, handed over to a mob on any one of the
dozen station platforms they’ve passed already — heads shaved, tarred &
feathered, paraded through the streets, pelted with excrement, the long shadow
of doubt & accusation they’ll never be allowed to crawl out from under, when
even to’ve survived’s a criminal offence: life’s from-now-on (when will it end?)
little whormiliations.
SCHNITZELSTADT SÜDBAHNHOF
A sight for sore eyes. Hard to believe they’ve actually arrived — a hundred miles
in a hundred hours, Golem City a lifetime away by now, they’ll hardly recognise
themselves, or it, ever again. Climbing down onto the platform like the
disembarkation from the Ark — how it must’ve felt all those ages ago, forty days
& nights believing the world had come to its Final End, when, just about to give
up, there’s little old God on his mountain-top, perched above the waves,
grinning like a one-man welcoming committee — Nice day for it, what?
They stand there clutching their bags, breathing in the atmosphere of
diesel & wishfulfilment as the other passengers push on past in a rush to get
somewhere or just away from where they’ve been. At the end of the platform a
pair of day-labourers is hauling down an eight-foot-high banner —
WILKOMMEN! BIENVENUE! WELCOME!
— rain&soot-streaked, dangling red on white from the gloom of coalblacked glass
& steel girder — greyed & fraying tricolour, unionjack, stars&stripes bunting —
leftovers from some brass-hat’s last visit, in further evidence of which: a bandstand
with sagging red, blue & white crêpe, the odd trampled bit of yellow streamer,
41
drifts of confetti tending eastward across the concourse. Even the second-hand on
the station clock looks worn-out & at any moment about to expire.
The instant the train disembarks, a human tide surges along the platform,
pushing & shouting, hoisting baggage aloft — whatever remains of it — onto
shoulders, heads, to squeeze through, every specimen of humanity suddenly &
most redolently there — informers scanning the faces of the newly arrived,
undercover agents, military cops, widows & orphans waiting for husbands &
fathers still unreturned, Zionist middlemen, blackmarketeers, hawkers, scam-
artists, taxi drivers, pickpockets & panhandlers, birds of prey on the lookout for
carrion, rag&bones men, the hopeful & the homeless. Opposing tides mingle,
eddy, knots of turbulence smoothing out into flows that carry onwards &
outwards, to the streets, the tram lines, the Belvedere Gardens grey-silhouetted in
feeble afterduskings — a couple of lost souls here & there floundering about, a
blind-beggar rattling a tin cup, a one-armed, one-legged War veteran dragging
himself from bin to bin, stump doing a bit of a Charleston as he digs through the
trash, & over there a pair of scrofulous street urchins in oversized lederhosen going
into a — yep — barefoot tapdance & even whistling a tune from Easter Parade.
It’s the cue for the station master, conductors, porters, train drivers &
engineers to enter from the wings singing the chorus from We’re a Couple of
Swells, but the soundtrack isn’t working, so you’re stuck having to make do with
a bit more realism instead — shades of drab & grey, starved faces, rats scuttling
along the tracks, a man’s suitcase spilling open full of old newspapers,
altercations that melt away as soon as they begin, the weary settling onto
benches, the unsuspecting into shady lockerrooms where who-knows-what illicit
deals are at this very moment being transacted.
Standing apart from all this you watch & wait, getting the situation into a
type of perspective, sizing-up the immediate options — behind you now the
Parkinson’s stammer of a departing locomotive, a megaphone’s hiss & feedback.
The city’s unfamiliar, but not because you haven’t been here before — the War’s
changed everything, the whole place a wreck, unlike where you’ve just arrived
from (all the barricades taken down, might never’ve been there, the Old Town
