Bend Sinister by Vladimir Nabokov
The same might be true of one’s personal existence as perceived in retrospect upon waking up: the retrospective effect itself is a fairly simple illusion, not unlike the pictorial values of depth and remoteness produced by a paintbrush on a flat surface; but it takes something better than a paintbrush to create the sense of compact reality backed by a plausible past, of logical continuity, of picking up the thread of life at the exact point where it was dropped. The subtlety of the trick is nothing short of marvellous, considering the immense number of details to be taken into account, arranged in such a way as to suggest the action of memory. Krug at once knew that his wife had died; that he had beaten a hasty retreat to the country with his little son, and that the view framed in the casement (wet leafless trees, brown earth, white sky, a hill with a farmhouse in the distance) was not only a sample picture of that particular region but was also there to tell him that David had pulled the shade up and had left the room without awakening him; whereupon, with almost obsequious apropos, a couch at the other end of the room displayed by means of mute gestures—see this and this—all that was necessary to convince one that a child had slept there.
On the morning after her death her relatives had arrived. The night before Ember had informed them of her death. Note how smoothly the retrospective machinery works: everything fits into everything else. They (to switch into a lower past-gear) arrived, they invaded Krug’s flat. David was finishing his velvetina. They came in full force: her sister Viola, Viola’s revolting husband, a half brother of sorts and his wife, two remote female cousins scarcely visible in the mist and a vague old man whom Krug had never met before. Augment the vanity of the illusive depth. Viola had always disliked her sister; they had seldom seen each other during the last twelve years. She wore a heavily blotched little veil: it came down to the bridge of her freckled nose, no further than that, and behind its black violets one could distinguish a brightness which was both voluptuous and hard. Her blond-bearded husband gently supported her, although actually the solicitude with which the pompous rogue surrounded her sharp elbow only hampered her swift masterful movements. She soon shook him away. When last seen, he was staring in dignified silence through the window at two black limousines waiting at the kerb. A gentleman in black with powdered blue jowls, the representative of the incinerating firm, came to say that it was high time to start. Meanwhile Krug had escaped with David by the back door.
Carrying a suitcase, still wet from Claudina’s tears, he led the child to the nearest trolley stop, and, in company with a band of sleepy soldiers who were going on to their barracks, arrived at the railway station. Before he was allowed to board the train for the Lakes, governmental agents examined his papers and the balls of David’s eyes. The Lakes hotel turned out to be closed, and after they had wandered around for a while, a jovial postman in his yellow automobile took them (and Ember’s letter) to the Maximovs. This completes the reconstruction.
The common bathroom in a friendly house is its only inhospitable section, especially when the water runs at first tepid, then stone cold. A long silvery hair was imbedded in a cake of cheap almond soap. Toilet paper had been difficult to get lately and was replaced by bits of newspaper impaled on a hook. At the bottom of the bowl a safety razor blade envelope with Dr. S. Freud’s face and signature floated. If I stay for a week, he thought, this alien wood will be gradually tamed and purified by repeated contacts with my wary flesh. He rinsed the bath gingerly. The rubber tube of the spraying affair came off the tap with a plop. Two clean towels hung on a rope together with some black stockings that had been, or would be, washed. A bottle of mineral oil, half full, and a grey cardboard cylinder which had been the kernel of a toilet paper roll, stood side by side on a shelf. The shelf also held two popular novels (Flung Roses and All Quiet on the Don). David’s toothbrush gave him a smile of recognition. He dropped his shaving soap on the floor and there was silvery hair sticking to it when he picked it up.
In the dining room Maximov was alone. The portly old gentleman slipped a marker into his book, stood up with a genial jerk and vigorously shook hands with Krug, as if a night’s sleep had been a long and hazardous journey. “How did you rest [Kak pochivali]?” he asked, and then, with a worried frown, tested the temperature of the coffee pot under its coxcomb cozy. His shiny pink face was clean-shaven like that of an actor (old-fashioned simile); a tasselled skullcap protected his perfectly bald head; he wore a warm jacket with toggles. “I recommend this,” he said, pointing with his fifth finger. “I find it is the only cheese of its kind that does not clog the bowels.”
He was one of those persons whom one loves not because of some lustrous streak of talent (this retired businessman possessed none), but because every moment spent with them fits exactly the gauge of one’s life. There are friendships like circuses, waterfalls, libraries; there are others comparable to old dressing gowns. You found nothing especially attractive about Maximov’s mind if you took it apart: his ideas were conservative, his tastes undistinguished: but somehow or other these dull components formed a wonderfully comfortable and harmonious whole. No subtlety of thought tainted his honesty, he was as reliable as iron and oak, and when Krug mentioned once that the word “loyalty” phonetically and visually reminded him of a golden fork lying in the sun on a smooth spread of pale yellow silk, Maximov replied somewhat stiffly that to him loyalty was limited to its dictionary denotation. Common sense with him was saved from smug vulgarity by a delicate emotional undercurrent, and the somewhat bare and birdless symmetry of his branching principles was ever so slightly disturbed by a moist wind blowing from regions which he naïvely thought did not exist. The misfortunes of others worried him more than did his own troubles, and had he been an old sea captain, he would have dutifully gone down with his ship rather than plump apologetically into the last lifeboat. At the present moment he was bracing himself to give a piece of his mind to Krug, and was playing for time by talking politics.
“The milkman,” he said, “told me this morning that posters have been put up all over the village inviting the population to celebrate spontaneously the restoration of complete order. A plan of conduct is suggested. We are supposed to collect in our usual holiday haunts, in cafés, in clubs and in the halls of our corporations and sing communal songs in praise of the Government. Directors of civic ballonas have been elected for every district. One wonders of course what people who cannot sing and who do not belong to any corporation are expected to do.”
“I dreamed of him,” said Krug. “Apparently this is the only way that my old schoolmate can hope to associate with me nowadays.”
“I understand you were not particularly fond of each other at school?”
“Well, that needs analysing. I certainly loathed him, but the question is—was it mutual? I remember one queer incident. The lights went out suddenly—short circuit or something.”
“Does happen sometimes. Try that jam. Your son thought highly of it.”
“I was in the classroom reading,” continued Krug. “Goodness knows why it was in the evening. The Toad had slipped in and was fumbling in his desk—he kept candy there. It was then that the lights went out. I leaned back, waiting in perfect darkness. Suddenly I felt something wet and soft on the back of my hand. The Kiss of the Toad. He managed to bolt before I could catch him.”
“Pretty sentimental, I should say,” remarked Maximov.
“And loathsome,” added Krug.
He buttered a bun and proceeded to recount the details of the meeting at the President’s house. Maximov sat down too, pondered for a moment, then pounced across the table at a basket with knakerbrod, bumped it down near Krug’s plate and said:
“I want to tell you something. When you hear it, you may be cross and call me a meddler, but I shall risk incurring your displeasure because the matter is really much too serious and I do not mind whether you growl or not. la, sobstvenno, uzhe vchera khotel [I should have broached the subject yesterday] but Anna thought you were too tired. It would be rash t
“Go ahead,” said Krug, taking a bite and bending forward as the jam was about to drip.
“I perfectly understand your refusal to deal with those people. I should have acted likewise, I guess. They will make another attempt at getting you to sign things and you will refuse again. This point is settled.”
“Most definitely,” said Krug.
“Good. Now, since this point is settled, it follows that something else is settled too. Namely, your position under the new regime. It takes on a peculiar aspect, and what I wish to point out is that you do not seem to realize the danger of this aspect. In other words, as soon as the Ekwilists lose hope of obtaining your co-operation they will arrest you.”
“Nonsense,” said Krug.
“Precisely. Let us call this hypothetical occurrence an utterly nonsensical thing. But the utterly nonsensical is a natural and logical part of Paduk’s rule. You have to take this into consideration, my friend, you have to prepare some kind of defence, no matter how unlikely the danger may seem.”
“Yer un dah [stuff and nonsense],” said Krug. “He will go on licking my hand in the dark. I am invulnerable. Invulnerable—the rumbling sea wave [volna] rolling the rabble of pebbles as it recedes. Nothing can happen to Krug the Rock. The two or three fat nations (the one that is blue on the map and the one that is fallow) from which my Toad craves recognition, loans, and whatever else a bullet-riddled country may want to obtain from a sleek neighbour—these nations will simply ignore him and his government, if he … molests me. Is that the right kind of growl?”
“It is not. Your conception of practical politics is romantic and childish, and altogether false. We can imagine him forgiving you the ideas you expressed in your former works. We can also imagine him suffering an outstanding mind to exist in the midst of a nation which by his own law must be as plain as its plainest citizen. But in order to imagine these things we are forced to postulate an attempt on his part to put you to some special use. If nothing comes of it—then he will not bother about public opinion abroad, and on the other hand no state will bother about you if it finds some profit in dealing with this country.”
“Foreign academies will protest. They will offer fabulous sums, my weight in Ra, to buy my liberty.”
“You may jest as much as you please, but still I want to know—look here, Adam, what do you expect to do? I mean, you surely cannot believe you will be permitted to lecture or publish your works, or keep in touch with foreign scholars and publishers, or do you?”
“I do not. Je resterai coi.”
“My French is limited,” said Maximov dryly.
“I shall,” said Krug (beginning to feel very bored), “lie doggo. In due time what intelligence I have left will be dovetailed into some leisurely book. Frankly I do not give a damn for this or any other university. Is David out of doors?”
“But, my dear fellow, they will not let you sit still! This is the crux of the matter. I or any other plain citizen can and must sit still, but you cannot. You are one of the very few celebrities our country has produced in modern times, and——”
“Who are the other stars of this mysterious constellation?” queried Krug, crossing his legs and inserting a comfortable hand between thigh and knee.
“All right: the only one. And for this reason they will want you to be as active as possible. They will do all they can to make you boost their way of thinking. The style, the begonia [brilliancy], will be yours, of course. Paduk will be satisfied with merely arranging the programme.”
“And I shall remain deaf and dumb. Really, my dear fellow, this is all journalism on your part. I want to be left alone.”
“Alone is the wrong word!” cried Maximov, flushing. “You are not alone! You have a child.”
“Come, come,” said Krug, “let us please——”
“We shall not. I warned you that I would ignore your irritation.”
“Well, what do you want me to do?” asked Krug with a sigh and helped himself to another cup of lukewarm coffee.
“Leave the country at once.”
The stove crackled gently, and a square clock with two cornflowers painted on its white wooden face and no glass rapped out the seconds in pica type. The window attempted a smile. A faint infusion of sunshine spread over the distant hill and brought out with a kind of pointless distinction the little farm and its three pine trees on the opposite slope which seemed to move forward and then to retreat again as the wan sun swooned.
“I do not see the necessity of leaving right now,” said Krug. “If they pester me too persistently I probably shall—but for the present the only move I care to make is to rook my king the long side.”
Maximov got up and then sat down in another chair.
“I see it is going to be quite difficult to make you realize your position. Please, Adam, use your wits: neither today, nor tomorrow, nor at any time will Paduk allow you to go abroad. But today you can escape, as Berenz and Marbel and others have escaped; tomorrow it will be impossible, the frontiers are being stitched up more and more closely, there will not be a single interstice left by the time you make up your mind.”
“Well, why then don’t you escape yourself?” grunted Krug.
“My position is somewhat different,” answered Maximov quietly. “And what is more, you know it. Anna and I are too old—and besides I am the perfect type of the average man and present no danger whatever to the Government. You are as healthy as a bull, and everything about you is criminal.”
“Even if I thought it wise to leave the country I should not have the faintest idea how to manage the business.”
“Go to Turok—he knows, he will put you in touch with the necessary people. It will cost you a good deal of money but you can afford it. I too do not know how it is done, but I know it can and has been done. Think of the peace in a civilized country, of the possibilities to work, of the schooling available for your child. Under your present circumstances——”
He checked himself. After an exceedingly awkward supper the night before he had told himself he would not refer again to the subject which this strange widower seemed so stoically to avoid.
“No,” said Krug. “No. I am not up to it [ne do tovo] for the moment. It is kind of you to worry about me [obo mne] the way you do, but really [pravo] you exaggerate the danger. I shall keep your suggestion in mind, of course [koneshno]. Let us not talk of it any more [bol’she]. What is David doing?”
“Well, you know what I think at least [po kraïneïmere],” said Maximov, picking up the historical novel he had been reading when Krug came in. “But we are not through with you yet. I shall have Anna talk to you, too, whether you like it or not. She may fare better. I believe David is with her in the kitchen garden. We lunch at one.”
The night had been stormy, heaving and gasping with brutal torrents of rain; and in the starkness of the cold quiet morning the sodden brown asters were in disorder and drops of quicksilver blotched the pungent-smelling purple cabbage leaves, between the coarse veins of which grubs had made ugly holes. David was dreamily sitting in a wheelbarrow and the little old lady was trying to push it along on the muddy clay of the path. “Ne mogoo! [I cannot],” she exclaimed with a laugh and brushed a strand of thin silvery hair away from her temple. David tumbled out of the wheelbarrow. Krug, not looking at her, said he wondered whether it was not too chilly for the boy to go about without his coat, and Anna Petrovna replied that the white sweater he had on was sufficiently thick and comfy. Olga somehow had never much liked Anna Petrovna and her sweet saintliness.
“I want to take him for a good long walk,” said Krug. “You must have had quite enough of him. Lunch at one, is that right?”
What he said, what words he used, did not matter; he kept avoiding her brave kind eyes to which he felt he could not live up, and listened to his own voice stringing trivial sounds in the silence of a shrivelled world.
She stood watching them as father and son went hand in hand towards t
Broken clusters of mountain ash corals lay here and there on the chocolate-brown road. The berries were puckered and soiled, but even if they had been juicy and clean you certainly could not eat them. Jam is a different matter. No, I said: No. To taste is the same as to eat. Some of the maples in the silent damp wood through which the road wandered retained their painted leaves but the birches were quite naked. David slipped and with great presence of mind prolonged the slide so as to have the pleasure of sitting down on the sticky earth. Get up, get up. But he kept sitting there for another moment looking up with sham stupefaction and laughing eyes. His hair was moist and hot. Get up. Surely, this is a dream, thought Krug, this silence, the deep ridicule of late autumn, miles away from home. Why are we here of all places? A sickly sun again attempted to enliven the white sky: for a second or two a couple of wavering shadows, K ghost and D ghost, marching on shadowy stilts, copied the human gait and then faded out. An empty bottle. If you like, he said, you can pick up that Skotomic bottle and throw it hard at the trunk of a tree. It will explode with a beautiful bang. But it fell intact into the rusty waves of the bracken, and he had to wade in after it himself, because the place was much too damp for the wrong pair of shoes David was wearing. Try again. It refused to break. All right, I shall do it myself. There was a post with a sign: Hunting Prohibited. Against this he hurled the green vodka bottle violently. He was a big heavy man. David backed. The bottle burst like a star.