Mari Saat - The Saviour of Lasnamäe

Clear… light… white…

But she didn’t understand, she was incapable – couldn’t conceive how to imagine it. Like at school when she was small, it took a while before she realised how the letters combined to make a word… And who could imagine it? Who could possibly imagine that you might love a murderer just as you love your own dear little daughter?

Spring was in full bloom and a starling would sing in the early mornings in the chestnut tree behind the bins. It could quite easily have been mistaken for a nightingale because in the distant, bush-covered wasteland, not yet overcome by urban sprawl, nightingales would sing as high summer approached, but Natalya and Sofia both knew this starling – was it actually a starling, not a thrush? It was black with a yellow beak and appeared every year when the snow was still lying, or if the thaw had come, it would be forever scurrying across the slushy ground to clear it of everything edible. But this starling had no fear of spring sleet, it hugged the bins, somehow escaping the cats’ claws and now, every morning before dawn, affirmed with the piercing notes of a penny whistle that he was still alive and still ready to fight for its mate and its chicks and its chestnut tree.

Natalya Filippovna listened to his song, but it did not bring her joy or yearning as it had in previous springs. The feeling it gave her was as if the song was reaching her through a silence; to tell the truth it didn’t actually reach her, but instead drowned, died away into the silence, the emptiness… Much as she saw and heard everything and understood everything, the “everything” lay beyond the great silence that enveloped her… “That is just so lovely! Mum, come and listen! It’s so – not even a flute comes close. Our starling!” called Sofia – and what’s more, she agreed with her daughter wholeheartedly, but that didn’t stop the song feeling strange and far away… Perhaps that was how things were meant to be; after all, her life was already as good as over. She was pushing fifty; the only thing that she had to think about still was ensuring that her daughter got an education. She must keep both feet on the ground. She must provide for herself; study Estonian conscientiously every evening so that when her eyes were no longer good enough for electronics, or her fingers could no longer move nimbly enough, or there was another crisis in electronics, she could find a job working in a shop, say, find a decent job so that when Sofia had grown up and become independent, she would not be a burden to her. And she really did study hard: the only channels she watched on the telly were the ones in Estonian, and sometimes the ones in Finnish because Sofia wanted to watch a film they were showing. The films were mostly in English with Finnish subtitles so Natalya would try to decipher them – it was completely crazy because although the letters were the same as in Estonian, everything was twice as long written down and Natalya only ever managed to decipher two or three words before the next lot were on the screen. It was easier to listen to the news in Finnish. It was fairly similar to Estonian but more relaxed. As a rule, all Finnish broadcasts felt more relaxed. Estonian broadcasts barked at you rapidly as if they were forever wanting to say that if you couldn’t cope, then it was no one’s business but your own. If you couldn’t cope they’d write you off… But the Finns spoke as if they wanted to calm you: everything is OK, we’ll get there, just take things calmly… The only bad thing was that the two languages became a jumble and when Sofia told her to reply to something in Estonian, a mishmash would often emerge, making Sofia laugh and tell her that the way she talked was the way Estonians spoke Finnish – half in Estonian, half in Finnish…

And then one evening Kiira phoned and straight out said hello from Vova and said that Vova had invited her, Natalya, to his flat. Natalya felt a stern coldness envelop her heart and with the same sternness in her voice replied quickly that she no longer wanted to hear anything about Vova and she would never do that job again…

“Calm down,” chided Kiira, “don’t be so touchy! Vova’s not asking you to come to work, his wife’s back at it, she’s bellyaching about it but she’s back at it – money doesn’t grow on trees. It’s just that there’s a punter, just the one, who won’t go with her any more and just wants to see Natalya, just meet her and that’s what I, Kiira, on behalf of Vova, am now trying to arrange – although it’s not directly any responsibility of Vova’s and it’s nothing to do with Kiira. Nothing at all. But you have to meet people halfway when it’s an emergency like this.”

At that Natalya’s heart escaped her stern grasp as if it had slipped loose, and then started to flutter.

“I don’t know…” she murmured, bemused, when Kiira persisted, “I don’t want to, I don’t have time for any punters… I have my own job…”

But Kiira kept on cajoling – there was nothing to fear and nothing indecent, all you’ll do is sit down for a while, have a cup of tea, a chat. The punter just wants to chat, get things clear, I can come with you if you like… Natalya listened through a fog of sound filling her ears, and her body was being washed now by waves of heat and now by waves of cold…

And so she agreed to go to Vova’s on Thursday evening – Thursday had to be convenient for the punter and at the same time she was calm, there were no other punters, she could sit down calmly and have a cup of tea…

The three days before Thursday evening – as well as the whole of the day on Thursday – felt like a terribly long journey on an express train: her feelings hurtled through her, ever changing, like pictures flashing past a train window – happiness, trepidation and unexpected, unfounded sadness, and fondness and suspicion… They all hurtled around inside her while she had to sit in her place at a work bench or distractedly choose food in the shop or peel potatoes at home… Sometimes she smiled privately but tried immediately to wipe it away… And she sensed that everyone else was happier and was smiling all the time, and Sofia had started to laugh again and chat and seemed to have forgotten about the rat and those horrible boys who more likely than not had taken her money – or probably would have, if she hadn’t given it to them… Better not to think about them.

Natalya had intended to wear the same silk blouse with the red and gold flowers but then began to waver – she’d already waited once in vain. She dressed simply in a black skirt and her grey sweater; it was a tidy sweater, solid, and when all was said and done she wasn’t going on a date, was she? At least she mustn’t make that kind of impression. Even so she dabbed some perfume behind her ears, on her wrists, under her arms… The perfume was ancient, the one she’d brought back from Crimea. She used it only a couple of times a year, when she went to the theatre with Sofia to see the ballet, The Nutcracker or Swan Lake . She always tried to go to the theatre once a year with Sofia, and sometimes also when she was struck with a yearning for the warm, blue, sighing sea… But she tried to be careful with it, she wouldn’t be able to afford anything like it these days. Yet the scent in the bottle firmly stoppered with a cork had lasted nevertheless.

Vova and his wife Ira had stowed the tea table in the living room between the deep easy chairs and the sofa. A beautiful bouquet of flowers stood in a vase on the table, providing shade to a brandy bottle, glasses, teacups, a flask and a bowl of biscuits… In one of the easy chairs sat Jaakko – the Finn, her very first punter, who was cold and greasy like a lizard and looked like one too – bald and colourless. He stood up quickly, as soon as Natalya came through the door, but then just stood there by his chair, ill at ease.