Tom Mccarthy: Men in Space

“Vodka?”

“No. Thanks. How much have you got there?”

“Ten thousand. Coffee, then?”

Janachkov’s always gone out of his way to be nice to Anton since the finger incident. He lends him porno videos, Bruce Lee films. Anton hasn’t told him that he doesn’t have a video, and wouldn’t watch porn or karate if he did.

“I’m late for meeting Ili. Got to rush.”

He’s carrying quite a loaded dossier now: there must be fifteen thousand crowns in it. Although there are free seats, he stands in the metro carriage, clutching it to his chest. Fifteen thousand crowns, plus — what, ten, twelve passports? Wouldn’t want to get picked up right now. He never has been, not in Prague. He was interviewed by the police back home, when he applied for permission to go to America. Visiting relatives? Shouldn’t be a problem. Just sign here, we’ll send these papers on to the DS … Then came the letter, one week later: due to his disloyal decision to request a US visa, his licences in both civil engineering and football refereeing were being revoked. There was a postscript, informing him of his statutory right to appeal against the decision and, attached, a form to fill out if he wished to do so. Did anyone ever appeal? He thought of doing it just to see if they’d go along with it, set up a sham appeals board for him, props, personnel and all, but Helena scotched that idea. It’s not a game, you know … But maybe that’s exactly what it was: a game, a rigged game. Nobody ever said that games had to be fun.

Palmovka. The buildings are more shabby around here. Stalls beside the road sell cigarettes, drinks, lotto cards. Anton walks past a compound from which ventilation shafts rise up. Facing this, there’s a small factory of some sort. The car market’s sunk to the right of the road just beyond this, fifty or so metres before the road rises up into Libeňský Most. From beside the tramlines Anton can see Ilievski standing by the entrance to one of the car dealers’ lots, beneath a string of tinsel flags that sparkle in the sunlight. He’s wearing a thick coat and inspecting a Mercedes. Milachkov’s kicking around behind him. Rambo’s weaving and darting around people’s legs. Ili will be talking car — the only reason he still deals in vehicles. They’re high-risk, low-yield when set against his other ventures, but he just loves being around cars and car people, talking car. He’s got two Mercs in his garage, plus the Skodas, which he lets his men run around in. He’s peering down into the bonnet, poking around with his fingers, as though he were some great physician and the Czech mechanic next to him a gangly junior houseman.

Anton walks down the stone steps from the road, shakes Mila’s hand and waits for Ilievski to finish. At the back of Ili’s head, the part mirrors won’t show him, his hair, already grey, is thinning out. His back is firm, well padded by the coat. Cashmere, light-brown. He’ll never see himself from that side either: the way he’d look to an assassin, sneaking up behind him. Does it ever occur to him, when he turns his back on everything — lost in contemplation of food, a woman’s body, the combustion engine — that the Russians, or the Yugoslavians, or the Czechs, might have his number? Maybe that’s why Mila’s always with him, standing just behind. But what if the Bulgarians themselves wanted him gone? A hit from inside his own outfit, one of his own men — his children, you could almost say: they’re all in their thirties; he must be fifty-something. Which one would it be, the parricide? Janachkov? Koulin, Milachkov himself? …

Ilievski pulls his head out from under the Mercedes’ bonnet and turns round. His skin is firm and leathery, grey in the jowls despite being close shaven. Around the eyes and temples are stiff wrinkles that Anton’s always thought of as repositories of some kind of wisdom, or power. The wrinkles intensify as Ilievski catches sight of him and smiles.

“Hey hey! Anton!” He wipes his right hand on a rag before he takes him by the arm and pulls him towards the car. “Look at this.”

Tubes, wires, cylinders. What’s he looking for?

“It’s pretty dirty, I suppose …”

“What? No, that’s just oil. It’s normal. Look there: the head gasket’s come loose. Pity — the rest of it’s in really good condition. What do you have for me there?”

He wipes his other hand while Anton opens up his dossier and fishes out the contents. Ilievski flips through the money, passes it to Mila, then shakes Koulin’s envelope.

“Registration documents?”

“Passports. And that’s a legal document from Branka.”

“Good, good. How’s Helena?”

“OK. Misses her children.”

“You know my offer’s still open. If ever …”

“She’s reluctant. To do it that way, I mean. But if she changes …”

“Sure. Come walk Rambo with me on the island.”

“Look over there!” says Milachkov. “There’s someone filming.”

It’s true. A man is walking by the rows of cars some twenty metres away, filming as he goes. He’s young and casually dressed: jeans, jumper, coat, red scarf …

“So what?” asks Ilievski, shrugging. “They’re always filming licence plates round here. Idiots.”

“Why?” says Anton. “I’d have thought it was a sound way of identifying …”

“Lesson one,” Ilievski announces, holding up his finger. “Mila: what’s the first thing you do to a stolen car?”

“Change the plates, Comrade,” Mila answers, in a high voice.

“Have a star, young pioneer.”

“But,” Milachkov steps out of character now, “they’re usually in uniform when they film here.”

Ili shrugs. “Maybe today’s the day they get their costumes washed.”

“I know a joke,” says Anton. “There’s this ship, this naval, say, destroyer, and it’s been at sea for maybe seven, eight months, and the men on it, the sailors, are all filthy, and they all want nothing more than just to take a bath and put on some fresh clothes. So one day the captain gathers them all together and says: ‘Men! I’ve got some good news and some bad news. The good news is that you’re all going to get a change of clothes.’ And the sailors all cheer. And the captain says: ‘The bad news is that you’re changing with him, you’re changing with him, you’re …’ ”

It’s easy. Milachkov’s dropped his case, he’s laughing so much. Ilievski’s thrown the rag onto the ground. The Czech mechanic stoops to pick it up, smiling politely, looking awkward. He must be in his early twenties. Anton translates the joke into Czech for him; he chuckles slightly at it — as though he’d been served cold leftovers. Milachkov says:

“Sparta game this Saturday?”

“What?” Anton asks, then: “Oh, yes. Against Košice. Right. Let’s go together.”

“Meet you in Bar Nine on Újezd beforehand. Half-past one.”

“ Perfektní .”

Ilievski’s started walking onto Libeňský Island. He whistles to Rambo; Anton jogs along to catch him up. The road is unpaved, bordered on one side by corrugated iron fencing which is listing with the gradient of the slope. Behind the fence, a few bare birch trees. Rambo runs back towards Ilievski and then turns around and scouts ahead of them, sniffing at tufts of grass and pools of oily water, shattering with his paw the thin sheets of ice resting on their surfaces.

“I love bright days in winter.” Ili’s looking up into the clear-blue sky. “Look, Anton: there’s the moon already.”

He stops, clasps his hand around Anton’s shoulder — firmly, so the fingers dig into the bone — and turns him round. The moon is hovering above the birch trees two thirds full, its surface faint and silvery-blue.