Judgment on Deltchev

CHAPTER TWO

Over much of South Eastern Europe the heaviest summer rains have fallen by early June, and the hardening mud of the roads is being grated into dust. The tinted walls of the villages glow in the strong sun, and the shadows on them are black and sharply defined. Only the higher Balkan peaks still have snow upon them. The corn is becoming tall and rich, and in the river valleys east of the Yugoslav frontier the fields of roses and white poppies that you see from the train are alive with blossom. But in the cities the air is humid, and the insects that swirl in the sunshine over the refuse in the streets or crawl from the dark recesses of hotel beds are in their lush heyday. At that time the human animal has a strange feeling of lassitude; strange because, although the body is sluggish, the mind is uneasily alert, as if it fears that something is being prepared for its discomfort.

I was met at the Central Station by my employer’s local representative. His name was Georghi Pashik.

I saw him standing on the platform as my train drew in: a short, dark, flabby man in rimless glasses and a tight seersucker suit with an array of fountain pens in the handkerchief pocket. Under his arm he carried a thin, black dispatch case with a silver medallion hanging from the zipper tag. He stood by a pillar gazing about him with the imperious anxiety of a wealthy traveller who sees no porter and knows that he cannot carry his own baggage. I think it was the fountain pens that identified him for me. He wore them like a badge.

I know a lot about Pashik now. I know, for instance, that the black dispatch case that he carried so importantly rarely contained anything but a stale meat sandwich and a revolver, that the seersucker suit was given to him when he was working in a Displaced Persons camp, that one of the fountain pens came from Passaic, New Jersey, and that those facts can be related directly to his death. I know now some of the ways in which his mind worked and of the strange fantasies that possessed it. Then, he was merely a name in conversation — ‘our man there, Pashik, will fix you up with all the permits you need’ — a figure waiting on a station platform. I was not expecting a man of destiny to meet me.

He shook my hand and smiled in a friendly way.

‘I’m delighted to know you, Mr Foster. Have you had breakfast?’

‘Not yet. It’s very kind of you to meet me.’

He gestured a denial. ‘I have my car outside. We’ll have to carry your luggage, Mr Foster. There are no porters at this hour.’

He spoke English well with an accent both foreign and American. He was not a prepossessing person. He had a plump, sallow face with several chins and a two days’ growth of beard, and his eyes, as brown and limpid as a spaniel’s, squinted slightly through the rimless glasses. He was businesslike and very courteous.

‘Good journey, Mr Foster?’ he asked as we walked out to his car.

‘Not bad.’

‘Any trouble at the frontier?’

‘No more than usual, I imagine.’

‘I’m very glad of that.’

In the station yard he put my suitcase in a battered Opel with no cushions on the back seats. He took my typewriter from me to put it with the suitcase and then paused, looking at it thoughtfully.

‘You know, Mr Foster,’ he said, ‘sometimes the authorities make a great deal of trouble for visitors who they think may not be favourable to the regime.’

‘Yes?’

‘Oh yes.’ He put the typewriter in the car and then, with his hand still on the carrying handle of it, turned his head. For a moment he seemed about to say something very important. It was on the tip of his tongue. Then he changed his mind. He shrugged. ‘Things are difficult right now, Mr Foster,’ he said. ‘I’m glad they made no trouble for you.’

He had an office in a building just off the Boulevard Marshal Sokolovsky. He called himself The Pan-Eurasian Press Service and represented a number of American and a few British newspapers whose proprietors had not found it necessary after the war to re-establish their own offices in the capital. He was energetic and gave an impression of efficiency. I had to be registered as a foreigner with the police and as a newspaper correspondent with the Ministries of the Interior and Propaganda; I also had to have a special permit for the trial. It was early evening before we had finished.

Although there was a good deal of waiting about in the various offices we visited, as well as the ordinary opportunities for conversation, our relationship did not progress during the day. For the most part he remained courteous but reserved, avoiding all discussions of Deltchev or the trial on the grounds, plainly insufficient at times, that we might be overheard, and introducing me to officials with a measured politeness that took no responsibility at all for my subsequent behaviour. He had very much the air of the man on the spot who, while giving the specialist from the head office all reasonable assistance, feels entitled to suspect that the results may not justify the trouble taken. This I could well understand; indeed, I would have shared the suspicion. What puzzled me as the day wore on was the growing realization that, understandable and appropriate though his attitude might be, it was only partly a disguise for professional jealousy and that he had some quite different anxiety about me to conceal. It manifested itself in curious ways: sudden bursts of cordiality followed by strained silences, moments when I looked up to find his brown myopic eyes contemplating me furtively, as if to assess my bank balance, and other moments, like that at the station, when he changed his mind about what he was going to say as he opened his mouth to say it. Evidently some bad news had arrived for me while I had been travelling, or he had a request to make that I would be likely to receive badly. The thought bothered me. Unfortunately, I already had a bad conscience about Pashik. I disliked him because of his smell.

I had become aware of it when we entered his car at the station. It was sour and musty and at first I was not sure whether it came from the car or its owner. I don’t think that I have an unduly fastidious nose or that the stinks of urban humanity specially distress me. I have known other people afflicted with what is daintily called body odour without disliking them. Yet Pashik I did dislike. Perhaps it was that the personality expressed by his appearance and manner — the suit, the American glasses, the dispatch case, the touch of complaisance — did not in some peculiar way allow for a bad smell. I remember that when I found that he was the source and not his car, I took note of those with whom we came in contact in case what I was finding offensive was the body smell of a city rather than that of one particular inhabitant. But no; it was Pashik. And then, unreasonably, I had begun to dislike him and so was at a disadvantage for what followed.

The sun had not yet set, but the shadows of a church spire and the dome of a mosque stretched like a finger and thumb across the St Mihail Square when we left the Propaganda Ministry for the last time that day and walked back to Pashik’s car; but I had my permit for the trial.

He waved my thanks aside mock-modestly.

‘We do what we can, Mr Foster.’ He had one of his moments of cordiality. ‘If you do not mind coming with me and waiting while I clear up at my office, I will then take you to dinner. There is a special restaurant I use.’

I would have liked to refuse; instead, I thanked him again.

There was a minute ante-room to his office, with a frosted glass door on which were painted the names of all the newspapers he represented. The list was long and imposing, and after it the office was an anticlimax. It contained a desk, a table, two chairs, and several filing cabinets. The window looked out on a tall fire escape well. It admitted warm stagnant air and a grey twilight that left the corners of the room in darkness. Standing on one of the filing cabinets and framed as importantly as if it were a picture of his wife was a publicity photograph of Myrna Loy, with a reproduction of her signature on it.

He turned on the desk lamp and began to go through a pile of message flimsies. Most of them he crumpled and tossed aside; two or three he scribbled on and handed to a youth with a glazed peak cap who had been awaiting his return; others he clipped together in a folder. When he reached the last of the messages, he gave the youth some money and sent him off. Then he picked up the telephone and had a conversation, to me quite unintelligible, with a woman whose voice I could hear vibrating tinnily in the receiver. It ended with a brief crescendo of negatives. He stood up and began to tidy the desk. He was frowning and ill at ease.

I watched him from the darkness outside the ring of light shed by the desk lamp. His small hands no longer moved surely. He was making up his mind to a difficult task. He stopped tidying to look out at me. Then he sat down again, leaned back, and, taking out a packet of American cigarettes, began to open it.

‘Mr Foster,’ he said very carefully, ‘there is a matter about which I have not yet spoken to you.’

Here it was.

‘Yes?’

He kept his eyes on the cigarette packet. ‘The matter of censorship. You know there is a strict censorship here, of course?’

‘I was told so.’

‘In the ordinary way the procedure is that I submit the matter to the censorship office and then file it as a cable or airmail it.’

‘I see.’

‘That is in the ordinary way.’ He laid peculiar emphasis on the words.

‘You mean that you would like me to give my stuff to you for submission to the censorship and onward transmission. Is that it?’

He did not reply for a moment or two and began to rock slowly on the back legs of his chair. ‘Mr Foster, these are not ordinary times here in this country,’ he said.

I waited. His glasses, reflecting the light of the desk lamp, winked steadily as he rocked. He went on, ‘As I understand it, your articles may contain satirical matter hostile and derogatory to this regime.’

‘They might do so, yes.’

He shook his head solemnly. ‘I can tell you now, Mr Foster. That’s out. Right out.’

‘Well, we’ll see.’

‘Didn’t they warn you at head office that things might be difficult here?’

I smiled amiably. ‘They said that you might be, Mr Pashik.’

He stopped rocking. ‘Oh now, Mr Foster, please. You don’t at all understand. The censorship is very powerful here. For writing matter antagonistic to the People’s Party regime you would be liable under the February decrees to imprisonment and a heavy fine.’

‘Yes, but only liable.’

‘I agree. In your case there would naturally be no question of enforcing the decree, but your permit for the trial would certainly be cancelled and you would have a very disagreeable interview with the police.’

‘I could make an article out of that, too.’

His lips tightened. ‘Obviously your papers would be confiscated, Mr Foster. If it amuses you to write articles so that they may be confiscated, that is your affair. I am concerned with practical newspaper work.’

He had me there; I was not. But I felt that at the moment he was not either. I thought he was trying to show me how helpless I should be without him. I said, as calmly as I could, ‘Very well, you’re the paper’s representative here and you tell me it’s very difficult. I understand. Now, how do we get over the difficulty?’

I had to wait while he lit a cigarette and blew smoke at the end of it like a bad actor pretending to think. ‘You could try going down into Greece over Saturday night and Sunday and sending your work from there.’ He blew some more smoke. ‘Of course, the police would guess what you were attempting. An American on a Chicago paper tried it.’

‘Yes?’

Now he looked directly at me. ‘He just wasted a lot of time, Mr Foster. Of course he had no written matter when they searched him at the frontier; it was memorized; but they made difficulties about his visa, took his passport away to get it fixed, and kept him at the frontier station for a week. He had a very uncomfortable time.’

‘I see. Well, now you’ve told me how it can’t be done, what’s the answer?’

He was rocking again. ‘There is no answer, Mr Foster. Other ways have been tried. The crews of foreign airliners were used as couriers for a while, but no longer. It is too dangerous for them. I have tried to make all this clear to the head office, but what is real here does not seem so in New York and London.’

‘In fact, you think it’s a great waste of time my being here at all.’

‘No, I do not say that.’

‘In effect you say it.’

‘You misunderstand me. I am in favour of these articles. This trial is dramatisch… er-’ He broke off, feeling for the word.

‘Theatrical?’

‘Yes, theatrical. Thank you. The trial of a political leader on ideological grounds is most theatrical to Western ways of thinking. So I say that to have a distinguished playwright, such as you, Mr Foster, write matter about the Deltchev trial is a very cute editorial idea. I am myself looking forward to reading the series. But — ’ he leaned forward impressively — ‘you cannot write it here and send or take it out of the country; that is, not unless you paraphrase the Propaganda Ministry’s official matter and get every page stamped by the censorship. You must resign yourself to that.’

‘But-’

‘See the trial, Mr Foster, memorize’ — he stabbed his forehead with a finger to show me where — ‘and then go home and write your articles. That is what you must do.’

For a moment or two I did not answer.

I had been in a train for four days and had had very little sleep on the journey. I had arrived at seven o’clock that morning in a strange city under a hot sun and in a sticky, enervating atmosphere. I had left my luggage in a hotel that might, for all I could remember of the geography of the streets, be a hundred yards away or three miles from where I was now; and even if I found the hotel and remembered the room number, I would not know how to ask for the key. I had trailed round cafes and government offices, listening to conversations that concerned me conducted in a language I did not begin to understand, at the heels of an aggrieved, self-important eastern European with fat hips and a bad smell. I had a blister on the sole of my right foot and a grimy face. I was also hungry and well on the way to wishing I had not come. Now I was being told that the fact that I had come at all was a pity, but that if I behaved myself and cared to waste my time, I might stay and see the fun. Or so it seemed to me then. I felt myself losing my temper and then managed to wait until the moment had passed before replying. I tried to keep my voice level.

‘Mr Pashik, you know as well as I do that these articles are meant for publication during the trial as a commentary on it. They’d be useless afterwards.’

‘Do you think so?’ He looked knowing. ‘Deltchev will be condemned to death. Your articles will be part of the campaign against the sentence.’

‘That’s not what I was told. I was asked to send the stuff in as I did it.’

‘And why?’ He threw up his hands, smiling with teeth like salted almonds. ‘In case you, Mr Foster, the distinguished playwright, should find time to enjoy yourself on the expense account, or get an idea for a new play about life behind that sinister Iron Curtain and forget your commission. Editors treat us all like children.’

‘Nevertheless, the articles are expected.’

‘No, Mr Foster, they are not. I sent a cable to head office saying that they will not be available until you return.’

‘I think you should have consulted me before you did that.’

‘I am responsible, Mr Foster.’

There was a thin-lipped silence. Then I said, ‘Mr Pashik, are you a member of the People’s Party? I didn’t think to ask you before.’

He smiled again, but the American accent became more pronounced. ‘Ah, Mr Foster, you are mad at me. I don’t blame you. I will be frank with you.’

‘Good.’

‘If there is any trouble with the censorship over anything that goes out of this office, it will be closed up. That means that I will be closed up, finished. I am responsible.’

‘Then you’ll still be responsible if the articles are published after the trial.’

‘Ah, no. If the Propaganda Ministry admits you to the country, it is their affair if you produce hostile matter when you leave. While you are here the responsibility rests with this office that you should not prejudge the trial by sending hostile matter.’ He shrugged. ‘It is no doubt for them an expedient. For myself, I am hostile to the regime; but I have been expelled for my opinions before, and Pan-Eurasian, representing twenty-seven foreign newspapers, has a responsibility to others besides your editor. So you see I must play ball with the regime, Mr Foster.’

I did not know quite what to say. My impulse was to take the trial permit from my pocket, put it on his desk, and say that I would leave in the morning. Certainly that is what he hoped I would do. It was only my awareness of disliking him for a poor reason that made me hesitate. He pushed the cigarettes toward me.

I shook my head. ‘When did you send that cable?’

‘Four days ago, Mr Foster.’

‘Why not before?’

‘It was not certain that you were coming.’

‘It was settled three weeks ago that I was coming.’

‘I did not know that.’

‘Have you had a reply?’

‘Yes, Mr Foster.’

‘May I see it, please?’

‘Certainly.’ He opened a drawer in the desk and brought out a cable and put it in front of me. I read:

Your 109 of 6 June understood advise Foster and arrange air passage London soonest close trial.

‘You could have shown me this before,’ I said.

‘I did not realize that you did not trust me, Mr Foster,’ he replied gently. ‘The cable only says to advise you of something and secure an air passage for you. It does not explain what I have been telling you. You still have to believe that I am telling you the truth.’

His smile said that this was the moment when I should feel silly and apologize. Perhaps it was the smile that prevented my doing so. Instead, I said, ‘I take it that the other foreign correspondents will be under the same restriction?’

‘If they are hostile to the regime they will have to be equally discreet.’

‘That story about the American who tried to go to Greece for the weekend — I suppose you made that up in case I thought of the idea myself and didn’t tell you.’

‘It was a way of warning you that the method was known.’

‘You go at things in rather a roundabout way, don’t you?’

He looked at me thoughtfully. ‘One gets in the habit of it, Mr Foster,’ he said, and then paused. ‘Roundabout ways are sometimes safer. However’ — his expression changed and he stood up expansively, his smell billowing around him — ‘it is good to meet a person who cares for frankness. We can understand one another.’ He smiled cheerfully. ‘We shall get on well, Mr Foster. We can help each other, and that is as it should be. I will show you.’

He went over to a filing cabinet in the outer darkness, opened one of the drawers, and began to search through it.

‘You know, Mr Foster,’ he murmured as he picked through the files, ‘being expelled from a country is not dignified and not at all rewarding. For a few hours you are the brave man who dared to tell the truth. But the next day, when the handclasp of friends is forgotten, you are just another reporter without a job.’

He came back to the desk with an untidy bundle of papers and a large envelope.

‘When did it happen to you?’ I asked.

‘Italy, 1930. I was a married man then, too,’ he said. He hesitated for an instant, then stuffed the papers into the envelope and handed it to me with the rueful smile of a rich uncle for the rascally nephew whom he likes.

‘The office file on Yordan Deltchev, Mr Foster. It will help you.’

‘Thank you.’

‘Please.’ He put up a protesting hand. ‘I want to help you, Mr Foster. And I want you to know that I want to. And that is frank. Avanti! Now we go to dinner, eh?’

That night I was too tired to sleep. For a while I tried to do so; then I gave up, switched on the light, and began to read the file Pashik had given to me.

At that point I still had the illusion that I could report the Deltchev trial.