Ismail Kadare - The Concert

Chewing her lip, she tried to piece together the conversation, guessing at the part she couldn’t hear.

“What?” Skënder almost yelled down the phone. He seemed as frantic as she was. “What?”

“What’s up?” she wondered. He was frowning more and more heavily. The person at the other end must be telling him something terrible. She seemed to feel her pulse slacken.

“What?” he bellowed again, waving his free hand impatiently. “Frankly, I don’t understand…No, really …If you’re supposed to be in charge…What? …No! …No offence meant, but I’m sorry I bothered you…”

Silva felt a bit better again. If Skënder was ready to lose his temper the situation couldn’t be all that bad. He was now holding the receiver away from his ear. And soon he hung up, looking at Silva with a distant smile.

“Very odd,” he said. “This chap starts by giving me an earful of tittle-tattle, then tries to tell me we have to approach the matter theoretically! And to think he’s an old friend of mine!”

“Didn’t he know anything?”

Skënder shrugged.

“Who knows? I couldn’t make him out any better than you could, and you didn’t even hear what he said! He wriggled like an eel!”

Silva would have liked to ask him who it was, but by now he was flicking nervously through the telephone directory. Eventually he found the number he was looking for.

Silva didn’t understand any more of the second phone conversation than she had of the first. Then Skënder rang someone else, who was out, but the person who answered gave him another number.

“Hallo — is that the Political Office?”

Silva felt she would never escape from this maelstrom of calls. Was she going to have to listen to them for hours without being any the wiser?

“How are you?” he was now asking someone. “You know why I’m calling…”

Silva held her breath as she listened to his brief preamble. The silence that followed at the other end was almost tangible. Then the other person spoke. Skënder listened, gazing abstractedly at the little table on which the phone stood.

“Why get into a state about them?” he said, obviously echoing what he’d just heard. “I don’t know about anyone else, but I’m interested in him because he’s a friend of mine. A very close friend, do you get me? These things happen in the army? What do you mean by that?…We civilians attach too much importance to them?…No, I don’t think that’s true…Anyhow, I get the message. You don’t know much about it either…No, no — don’t bother…Goodbye!”

He put the phone down and smiled at Silva as before.

“Funny they’re all so vague,” he said, as if to himself. “I’d almost say they’re worried. Why are we civilians taking such an interest? …Yes, very odd … One can’t help thinking …It’s almost as if…”

“Perhaps it’s got something to do with China?” Silva said gently, to help him finish his sentence.

“China? No, no …I was thinking of something else…Ah well,… Just theories…maybe they’re all nonsense.”

He lit a cigarette and started pacing round the studio. He seemed to be staring into space. The same as ever, thought Silva. But perhaps it was because they never changed, he and Besnik Struga, that they were still her friends.

As she watched him going over to the bookcase, his back now turned, she suddenly felt that an exactly similar scene had probably taken place before, here in this studio, in the silent dusk — between him and Ana.

Forgetting a Woman … She knew that story of his almost by heart. Frédéric had asked for it to be read out during the divorce proceedings. Everyone said Skënder had dedicated it to Ana. Although it was set in a hotel room, Silva was convinced the scene it depicted had taken place here in this studio.

Skënder turned and walked over to his desk as if looking for something, but gave up and came and stood in front of Silva with his hands in his pockets.

“What a pity I’ve got to go abroad, I’m sere I’d have been able to solve the mystery.”

“You’re going away?” she said, not sure she’d heard right, “Where to?”

He smiled almost guiltily.

“Can’t you guess? To China?”

“China!” exclaimed Silva. “Really?”

“Really and truly. Apparently this is the last delegation. The last swallow of summer.”

Silva stared at the fringe on the rug at her feet. The last swallow of summer, she repeated to herself as he went on about the make-up of the delegation. They’re all flying away, she thought sadly. And heaved a sigh.

Almost as soon as she got to the office next morning, her boss told her she had to go on a mission to the north of the country. She concluded at once that this was the first act of reprisal against her, after the business about her brother. With a haste she was ashamed of whenever she thought of it later, she assumed it was the prelude to a transfer, or else to out-and-out dismissal.

“Me?… I’ve got to go to the north?” she stammered, frowning, as if to say, Why, what have I done?

Her boss looked back at her in surprise,

“Eh?” he exclaimed, “if you can’t manage it …if you’ve got some good reason …”

“No,” she replied coldly. Her tone implied that it was quite possible for her to go, but she’d like to know why she was being sent.

It was as if a huge mass had suddenly formed in her head, preventing all normal thought. But after a few seconds, something inside her struggled fiercely to escape from that lethargy. It wasn’t the first time she’d been sent on a mission…No, it wasn’t the first time,… Perhaps that was why…

“If you’ve got some reason for not going, you can stay,” her boss was saying. She’d have liked to interrupt: “You know the reason perfectly well!” But what would be the point? She herself would never have claimed that the business about her brother was a valid excuse for not going. A few seconds ago she’d been imagining just the opposite…

“As you wish,” the boss went on, “It was Linda I was thinking of, mainly — she’ll be lonesome all on her own…”

It was only then that Silva noticed her colleague’s expression, Linda was gazing fixedly at her: it was plain she couldn’t understand her friend’s attitude, and was upset by it. How awful of me! thought Silva, If the others hadn’t been there she’d have buried her face in her hands. Why had she flared up like that? The more she thought about it, the more ashamed she was. The boss had told her about the mission in a perfectly natural manner — why had she let her nerves get the better of her and dreamed up all that nonsense? Yet as the same time she did feel rather sorry for herself. At this rate she was going to end up with a nervous breakdown…

“I’m sorry — please forgive me,” she said to her boss, without looking at him. “Of course I can go! I could go today! There’s no reason why not.”

The boss waved his hands. He seemed embarrassed, too.

“You needn’t go if you don’t want to. In fact, maybe …I hadn’t really thought of that, to tell the truth…”

“No,” she said firmly. “That’s no reason not to go. Perhaps the opposite. Especially as Linda will still be here…”

She turned to her friend, who smiled for the first time, though apparently she had no inkling of what lay behind these exchanges.

“As you like,” said the boss. “Personally I’ve always enjoyed these trips to the hydro-electric power stations ie the north. You see a new world, you learn about new things. You’ll have two comrades with you from the planning office, and an expert on seismology,’

Linda, her eyes still reflecting the hint of a smile, looked from Silva to their boss as if afraid their conversation might relapse into unpleasantness. But Suva’s expression was peaceful again, and Linda could breathe freely.