Читаем Byzantium Endures полностью

And so on. It is the other side of the Cossack temperament. If he is not riding his horse into battle and slicing off heads, he loves to sing about the sadness of death and the loss of loved ones. In his deep, almost superstitious, respect for religion and his relish for mournful songs, he has something in common with the American negro. I make this observation, one familiar to those who know me, to show I have no racial prejudice. Acceptance of a race’s characteristics leads to an understanding not a hatred of that race. I am the first to say how much I respect the Jew’s brain. Nobody can doubt his cleverness or his ability to tell a good joke on himself.

It seemed a little chilly to me when we eventually arrived at Glavnaya Station, the main terminal of Odessa situated in the heart of the city. Yellow gas- and oil-lamps, as well as the glare of electrical bulbs, illuminated the massive enclave. It might have been a Michelangelo cathedral, with such a wealth of sights and smells I immediately felt twice as drunk as I had been. Shura showed his usual alacrity in getting us off the train. He waved a friendly farewell to Bikadorov and the lieutenants, made a deep, grave bow to the nuns, a sardonic genuflection to the old gentleman, then ushered me with astonishing speed through the crowd, through officials, ticket-collectors, soldiers, sailors, hucksters, painted ladies, family groups, Greeks, Hasidim, stiff-backed khaki Englishmen, and out into a street full of gaslight and shadow.

‘Shouldn’t we get a cab here, Shura?’ I remembered my mother’s instructions.

‘If you want to pay fifty kopeks for nothing,’ he said. ‘Anyway, they’ll be gone. Come on.’

Behind all the other smells of spice and perfume I could detect another scent which seemed borne on a Southern wind. It was salt. It was sweet ozone. I realised with heady enthusiasm that it was the sea.

Out of the night, like a beast from the ocean depths, came a two-car Odessa tram: cream and brass, with lights blazing. And then we were aboard it, our fares paid by Shura, sitting on the big wooden seats and peering through the windows. ‘You’ll see little but shit tonight,’ said Shura. ‘I’ll take you to some real sights tomorrow.’ He had asked for ‘the Goods Station’. Were we going to catch another train? ‘Just to the corner of Sirotskaya and Khutorskaya,’ he said. These were obviously thoroughfares. I did not want him to explain any more. I was enjoying the magic of a strange city and would have resented any description of its limits. I have always hated to be given a map to a new city, unless it is absolutely necessary.

Disembarking from the tram, we carried our bags across a cobbled street and along beside a park full of big trees. We crossed another street and entered a well-lit square consisting of large residential houses, flats and shops. At the steps of one of the houses we stopped. Next to the house was a set of offices bearing the surname of my great-uncle. We had arrived.

Shura led the way up the steps and pulled the bell. We were admitted by a dumpy maid who showed a friendly disrespect for my cousin. We entered a well-furnished parlour. Almost immediately a large, dark-eyed woman in a green silk dress billowed in on us. ‘You were to telephone, Shura! We’d have sent a cab or the carriage. How did you get here?’

‘Tram,’ was Shura’s laconic answer.

She was distressed, but smiled at him. ‘You should have waited for your Uncle Semya to order ...’

‘We’d be waiting still in that mob,’ Shura told her. ‘Have you seen it recently? It’s madness with the War on. Cabs? You’d be lucky.’

She patted his crew-cut. ‘Semya still has some business. He would have liked ... Ah, well...’

I lowered my bags to the carpet. She spread her arms. ‘Maxim!’ A sigh. ‘I am your Aunt Genia.’

We embraced.

‘We are so pleased, you know. And how is your dear mother?’

‘She is well, thank you, Aunt Genia.’

‘Such a burden. And such a brave woman. But so proud. Well, there is pride and pride.’

I accepted the praise, detecting no criticism of my mother. I was to guess, when I reviewed the past, that there had been rivalry between the women. Perhaps my Aunt Evgenia, my mother’s sister-in-law, had offered charity which had been refused. Perhaps they had even loved the same man, my father. Families are full of such ordinary jealousies. They are not even worth puzzling over. How some people will alter the past. I have seen mature men and women become utter fools in their attempts to pretend things happened in ways other than they actually did. We all like to see ourselves in a good light, of course, but the lengths to which some go are quite astonishing.

We sat for about twenty minutes in the parlour while Aunt Genia warbled on like a restful canary. I realised that my eyelids were beginning to droop just as she became a macaw:

‘Food!’