Ivan Klima - My Golden Trades

After an hour my instructor, who until now had kept a keen eye on the track, the engine, and my actions, took out his lunch, leaned up against the wall by the locker, and poured himself a cup of tea. More than any words could have done, his actions expressed his confidence in my capacities as an engine driver.

At one of the stations the guard came into the cabin and, paying no attention whatsoever to me, as though having a guest driver were absolutely normal, he began to talk about people I couldn't have known, one of whom was a colleague who got so drunk on duty that he couldn't even stand up, and was in that state when an inspector found him.

The story interested me, but at the same time I couldn't really listen, though I gathered that nothing happened to the drunken engine driver; he had faked an acute attack of lower back pain, and who would be so cruel as to compel a colleague suffering from excruciating pain to submit to a breathalyser test?

It seemed to me that the two of them were enjoying themselves and not paying any attention to the track, but suddenly my friend called out, 'D'you see them? Now you can blow your horn at them.'

It was then that I noticed, at the level crossing we were approaching, a yellow and white automobile with the widely ridiculed letters on it.

'If only they could see you like this,' he laughed, 'those brothers of theirs, the ones who hung all that nonsense on you.'

I gave a blast on the horn. Perhaps I actually caught a glimpse of Her at that moment. At least I thought I saw Her sitting there: all bone, her favourite disguise, grinning and showing her teeth at me, while I flashed past. Now I was aware of the massive weight I was controlling, and I saw the wagons behind me in a bend in the tracks and I surrendered to the illusion that I was pulling them along with my own enormous power. I had crossed Her path.

'Can you brake a little? Were going downhill anyway,' he reminded me.

I understood why he had invited me, offered me the opportunity, for a moment at least, to cross paths with Her, so that I would know I was not battling Her alone.

'You forgot the alert button,' he said immediately afterwards, reproachfully.

In an instant I returned to my place and pressed the button, as a sign that I was still alive.

One

I DIDN'T GET to the institute until nine; they almost never had anything to deliver before then anyway. They seldom had much after nine either. It was summer and most of the employees were on holiday. Besides that, the mainframe computer in Strašnice was down, so there weren't even the usual reams of print-outs to deliver. I took the stairs to the office on the fourth floor. I don't trust the elevator; I see no reason why elevators should be exempt from the general state of disrepair that holds everywhere and, in any case, I like going under my own steam.

The office was usually occupied by the secretary and the manager. Both were young and sweet, and each was pretty in her own way and liked to chat. The mail, if there was any, would be laid out for me on the table beside the door. Today only the manager was in and my table was empty or, to be more precise, it held only a vase full of gladioli. I said hello, and the manager looked up. 'You needn't have come at all today,' she said by way of welcome.

But I love coming here,' I replied. 'I look forward to seeing you.'

She laughed. 'Have you heard the latest definition of socialism?' And she told me one of the many merciless

jokes against the system we live under, and against which we are forbidden to grumble, for it is allegedly the best, the most just and the most humane way of organizing human affairs. In return, I told her another definition.

The telephone interrupted our illicit diversion. When the manager hung up, she asked, 'Do you know how Julinka is doing?'

I didn't.

Julinka Vandasová was the wife of one of the programmers. I had never met her, but I knew what she looked like from the photographs her husband kept under a sheet of glass on his desk. She looked delicate and gentle. Yesterday she was operated on for a cyst that was supposed to be benign. She had two little girls and all the women in the institute were wondering how Mr Vandas would cope by himself. 'I called Chodov this morning,' the manager announced, 'but Peter hadn't come in yet. Are you going over there today?'

'If they have anything for me.'

'They don't,' she said. 'I've already asked. They've finished work now in Strašnice, and they say there's a terrible jam at the the mainframe in Vršovice.'

'Anyway,' I said, 'maybe something will show up there during the day.'

'Whatever you think. If I were in your place, I could. . ' and she began daydreaming about all the things she could do if all she had to do was run errands. 'If you're going there anyway, take this with you. Nobody reads it, of course, but it's just arrived.' She took several copies of the in-house journal from her drawer. And,' she said, getting up and walking over to the table, 'if you could give Vandas these and say they're for Julinka.' She took three gladioli

from the vase, wrapped them in a damp tea-towel and handed them to me. I slipped them, along with the bundle of magazines, into my pushcart.

'Oh, and Engineer Kosinová wants to give this to someone.' She handed me a three-year-old mail-order catalogue from Neckermann's.

Outside, I was enveloped in a wave of hot air. I hurried across to the shady side of the street and walked towards the Old Town Square. I was wearing light cotton trousers, a short-sleeved shirt and a pair of deer-skin moccasins I'd purchased years ago in Chicago. I'd forgotten all about them until recently, when I started this job, which involves a lot of walking, and I loved them because they were so light and soft. I "was in no hurry: no one was expecting the magazines, the three-year-old Neckermann catalogue could certainly wait as well, though the flowers would soon need water.

Two days before I had brought Mr Vandas several boxes of tape from Letna. He was sitting in his cubicle, but instead of looking at the monitor, he was staring into the forlorn, bulldozed meadow outside the window. There was a half-empty glass of wine in front of him. He asked me if I'd sit and have a drink with him. He'd taken his wife to the hospital that morning. 'You know, I felt strange when we said goodbye,' he confided. 'It didn't feel right, leaving her to the mercy of a stranger who would put her on a table and slice her open. I know,' he added quickly, 'it's what's best, but I think you should have the right to lie down and be cut open for someone else. I was afraid for her, too,' he admitted. 'Still am. For her, for the children — and I'm afraid for myself too. Know what I mean? You hear of someone dying of cancer and the first thing you know you're

checking to see if you've got the same symptoms. I wish things were fairer. For instance, everyone should be allotted a minimum life-span. Forty years, at least. As it is. . My cousin's little girl died late last winter. She wasn't even five. From the time she was three her days were numbered, and in the end, they were feeding her through tubes. We tried to find a healer at the last minute, but it was too late. The poor little thing was buried the first day of spring. The parents weep and what can you say? In the past, you could at least comfort them with the idea that they'd all meet again, but today? I told my cousin to be brave and she said: Why? I didn't know what to tell her. In fact I didn't know what she was really asking me. Not long ago we were driving along the highway to Hradec — Julinka was with me — and on one side of the road there was this brand new fence, a long wire fence, and do you know what was on the other side? Nothing. Weeds, an overgrown, empty field. No construction site, no military training ground, nothing. With this beautiful new fence around it. The fence was five kilometres long — I clocked it — and then suddenly it came to an end. All that nothing was only fenced in from one side. It was like a vision of what we are living through. Do you understand what I'm saying?'