The Russian Affair

THIRTY-SIX



Rosa’s apartment wasn’t very nicely furnished. She could have afforded good furniture, and she even knew the channels through which it could be procured, but she had no appreciation for it. A room and a half in the Arbat district, overpriced, viewless, and ugly to boot—that was Rosa’s residence. The bedclothes were seldom changed and the table was wobbly, with its veneer lifting up around the edges. She had no carpet—the floor covering was made of some synthetic fiber—and a single picture hung on the wall. The sofa served as a clothes closet. Thick dust covered the stove; Rosa didn’t like to cook and had never learned. A jar of prunes was in the sink, but she couldn’t remember why she’d bought it. On a shelf stood a few books, including a much-talked-about novel that she’d placed there, ready to be read, but it remained unopened. She came home only to watch television and sleep; if she had to attend to something important, she did so from her office at the newspaper, and she never had guests. When colleagues expressed interest in Rosa’s private life, she fobbed off their questions with insinuations. She was indifferent to people. Women didn’t interest her, because most of them thought of nothing but getting married and starting a family, and they asked no more of life than to wallow at home. Rosa hated men; she found it absurdly easy to see through the swaggering way they marked their territory. Russian men were ugly and inclined to corpulence, with fat thighs and unclean skin. They smelled so bad it could make you sick. There was a time when Rosa thought she’d like slender men with dark hair; a week in Rome had cured her of such romanticism. The men there, more agile than Russians, behaved like street mongrels, panted and howled after Rosa, made lewd movements, and didn’t give up even after being whacked on the nose. She despised good-looking men still more than those whose crudity and tactlessness made them loathsome right from the start. Men had always been blinded by Rosa’s beauty; when she was younger, the degrees of male primitiveness had amused her; these days, she considered her condescension justified. A dark line under the eyes, and already men’s heads turned in her direction; some shadow on the lids, a red mouth, and entire packs would change direction, cross the street, and follow her like children behind an organ-grinder. If in addition her dress was stretched tight over her bottom, if high heels presented her bosom and backside in their best light, men could no longer be differentiated from beasts. In her early twenties, Rosa had thought she could grow accustomed to being touched by animals. Her work and her curiosity about life had led her to disrobe in front of them and spend naked hours with them. As the years passed, however, her revulsion hadn’t diminished; on the contrary, it had grown with every guy.

Simultaneously with this growing awareness, the most abstract thing in the world had become, for the Khleb, the most important: She loved money, in whatever form it appeared. She liked banknotes in packets and preferred newly printed bills to used ones, and there were evenings when she would sit happily for hours in her ugly apartment and count her assets. Since the possibility of a sudden trip abroad could not be disregarded, Rosa had converted her “savings” partly into various foreign currencies but mostly into gold leaf. She arranged it in clear plastic folders, touched it for its color, and even laid the cool metal on her skin. Rosa undressed for gold and covered herself with thin sheets of it. Not only for lascivious reasons, but also for practical ones; should the day come when she would have to take flight, gold leaf could be hidden everywhere on her body, and who, Rosa asked herself, would dare approach so close as to discover her riches?

Tonight the desire had come over her, and she’d taken out all her treasure. The artistically printed paper money lay on the table. She’d set aside the rubles; only foreign currency counted. She placed pound notes next to Swedish kronor because of their similar dimensions. Rosa found German money cool, even repellent in its presentation; she didn’t like those cold-eyed faces. Dollars were ugly money, as lacking in interest and culture as the people that issued them. One good thing about dollars, however, was their uniform color. Rosa played with the green notes, smiled at the stupid heads printed on them, switched to the pounds, and ran her fingers over the British queen’s crown. She went to the sofa, stretched out on it, and opened a folder. She’d turned the heat up high, so even though she was completely naked, the temperature was comfortable. Delaying gratification, she thrust her hand into the folder and fingered her gold until she could stand it no longer, removed the first leaflet, and wrapped it around one calf. At first, she savored the coolness of the little sheets, but then she began to apply them more quickly. She wanted to transform herself into a golden mummy and rejoiced in the reflection of the gold every time her breast heaved.

As she stroked her throat with a golden leaf and laid it across her Adam’s apple, somebody rang her doorbell. She could feel the big vein pulsing—this was no ordinary visit. Since she lived on the fifth floor, she should have been able to hear footsteps on the stairs long before the doorbell rang, but whoever was outside had come silently. Because of her training and her familiarity with the way those people worked, Rosa knew what was happening. There must have been some twist she’d overlooked. She should have followed her first impulse, collected her gold and her money, and left the country. The decisive time had come, and she’d missed it. A long time before, she’d seen this moment in a dream: She was standing on a scaffold, and Kamarovsky looked up at her and told her he always won the game. Then he gave the signal, the trapdoor opened, and Rosa plunged through it and fell until the rope stiffened and her neck broke with a snap. Swaying in the wind, she watched the Colonel leave the place she recognized as the rear courtyard of the Lubyanka, where obstinate remnants of snow remained, even in spring. Sometimes, even as a dreadful accident is happening, one thinks it unreal or believes it can still be averted, and so Rosa remained on the sofa, completely covered with gold. The interval between the first and second ringing of the doorbell was incredibly long. Rosa was familiar with this technique, too: They didn’t want to strike terror into the delinquent’s heart prematurely; he should open the door without suspicion. She let the second ring fade away and forbade herself to hope that the visitors outside would simply leave.

Rosa raised her head. After all, everything was done; she’d known more of life than most people do. She’d been honored, feted, admired, she’d seen the world outside socialism, felt the frisson of evil, performed the reprehensible with a cool hand. She no longer expected anything new; from now on, life would repeat itself. Rosa stood up. Sweat and surface tension kept most of the leaves clinging to her; she stepped to the window and stood there like a golden statue. From outside the door, she heard the inconspicuous rustling with which her colleagues were searching for the right tool. They had to hurry. Soundlessly, Rosa opened one side of the casement window and, as she did so, saw her arm. Did she want to land on the street like a gold angel or strip off the gold leaf first? Why should she allow her stupid colleagues to enrich themselves with her savings? It would be better to let the people down on the ground find her as she was; they’d struggle with their scruples at first, but in the end they’d help themselves from her bloody corpse. She smiled, grabbed the window frame, heaved herself up with one foot on the radiator, and watched as several golden leaves fluttered away into the night.

With a sudden jolt, the apartment door gave way. Three men in uninspired raincoats entered the room and looked around. The sight of the money on the table held their eyes for an instant, but not long enough for Rosa to clear the windowsill. The first man caught her by the leg, the second sprang to his aid, and together they dragged her, naked, back into the room. While the men gazed at her in amazement, while the abhorrence she felt for them set in like a reflex, her reason told her that a period of unspeakable suffering lay before her.

She pointed to the money. “And what if I propose that you help yourselves?” she asked, making a pathetic effort.

“We’ll do that one way or another, Comrade.” The man grinned and opened his raincoat.