Caleb Crain - Necessary Errors

The four of them climbed a spiral staircase that rose behind and around the cylindrical cage of an unmoving elevator.

“And you didn’t believe me,” Annie said at the third story, where the burble of talk and clinking glasses met them.

“What do you mean, the Russians sent him here?” Jacob asked.

“They gave him a position at the international students’ center on Vinohradská, the one that looks like an unpleasantly large spider,” Henry replied. “The one Parliament voted last week to shut down. A web of the KGB, they called it, in an allusion to the architecture. As it was, in fact.”

“Is Hans KGB, then?” Thom asked. “He seems to want to give that impression.”

“If he were, I don’t think they would have left him here,” Henry said softly. “But don’t say I said so.”

“Och, it’s so full of espionage, Prague, to hear you talk,” Annie commented. “Bags I the entrance fees.” She rummaged in her purse for bills.

Trumpets and other horns sounded through two tall, hot rooms, set in an L along two sides of the building. The band sat on risers in one end; in front of them and continuing around the corner of the L were staggered a double row of long gray linoleum tables with metal legs, such as might be set up in a school gym in America on election day. So loud was the music in the band’s room that Jacob and his friends felt it fluttering against the skin of their faces. They turned the corner into the L’s farther leg, where it was possible to talk, and Henry waved to a stout blond-pink man with curly hair, who had to be Hans.

“Henry, my fellow!” the man said. Henry submitted to a hearty embrace. “I am drinking sekt. I hope you will join me.”

“What’s sekt?” Jacob asked. Even in this room one had to speak at a certain volume.

“Ah, the American,” Hans commented.

— If you please, four glasses and another bottle, Henry asked a waiter in Czech, matching the rhythm of his request to that of the waiter, who was hurriedly collecting empties at their table’s far end.

Brass and jabber were flooding the room and rising around the gatherings of drinkers and rendering each gathering an island. Scattered among the tables were a few young Westerners like themselves, unshaven but freshly showered, who had probably chanced upon the club thanks to the placard in the street. But for the most part, the rooms were full of Czechs — some intent upon the music, others flowering with the beer into an openheartedness rarely shown in public. They seemed even happier than the Czechs who drank at U , and Jacob realized that the music had brought them. Middle-aged rather than young, they regarded one another with the familiar boldness of those who have grown up together.

“Are you pleased about Denmark, then?” Henry asked. The Danish team had defeated Spain the night before.

Hans was loud and precise in his satisfaction. Under this cover, Annie leaned in to ask, “Have you seen your man since we came back? What’s his name again?”

“Luboš. Yes. It went well.”

“And what do you make of this fascist government?” Hans asked, addressing the group generally.

“Do you mean the coupon plan?” Henry asked.

“It’s plunder, of course,” Hans said, answering his own question. “I am surprised that they have waited so many months.”

Hans’s eagerness to put forward his opinion reminded Jacob of Daniel. Hans’s features were rounder; his skin, paler and thicker. “You think it’s a bad idea?” Jacob ventured, despite not knowing what the coupon plan was. Under the sweetness of the sekt there was a metallic tang, which was a sort of provocation.

“Of course. It’s lottery capitalism, without disguise.” His tone was contemptuous.

“Well, they haven’t passed the law yet,” Henry said, by way of conciliation.

There was a silence until Thom asked, “What is this coupon plan, then? I seem to have overlooked it in my careful study of the Czech press.”

“Yes, I’d like to know as well,” Annie seconded. “We’re quite benighted, aren’t we,” she added, in solidarity.

Jacob looked to Henry, in the hope that Henry would save him from having to admit he had no idea what it was, either. Somehow the presence of Hans involved Jacob’s pride.

“It is an organized plan to steal the nation’s assets,” Hans pronounced, and there was a further silence.

Then Henry mildly — almost apologetically — explained that the coupon plan was a scheme for privatization. Small businesses were to be auctioned starting in January, but since there wasn’t enough private capital among Czechs and Slovaks to buy large businesses, they couldn’t be sold off the same way. The plan was to give every citizen vouchers, also called coupons, which could be used to bid on shares of large industries such as the national carmaker and the national brewery. Because the vouchers could be traded, it was hoped that they would instantly create a sort of meta — stock market. Critics worried that the common people would not know which companies were of any value and might be tricked into surrendering their vouchers too cheaply or end up with shares in dud companies.

“The danger is what you call insider trading,” said Hans, “an evil that you have under such excellent control in the West.”

Henry laughed politely.

“But you can’t want the state to keep the large industries,” Jacob protested, thinking he saw a flaw in Hans’s position.

“I can want that, as it happens. Socialism is not yet illegal in this country, whatever the case in yours. The working classes built the heavy industries with their labor, and they have the right to own them.”

“But they will own them, it sounds,” said Annie. “I don’t suppose we will be granted any vouchers? As workers here?”

“I’m afraid not,” Henry answered.

“No, I didn’t think so,” Annie said.

“The workers will not own them under such a system,” Hans corrected. “There is no better means for workers’ ownership than the state, led by the Communist Party.”

At this, Henry involuntarily glanced around; fortunately, however, no Czechs were in earshot. It was as if the expatriates had on their hands a drunk who had started to reminisce about a heartbreak, and they felt the responsibility of preventing him from starting a fight to console himself. Oblivious, and with a show of magnanimity, Hans topped up everyone’s glass. Annie tried to refuse but didn’t pull her glass away quickly enough. “If you insist,” she yielded.

“But where are the insiders to do the insider trading?” Jacob asked. He felt in him the combativeness that Daniel had used to arouse. “I mean, there aren’t any anymore, right? After the revolution.” Daniel was beautiful and Hans was not, so Jacob was hitting back lazily, a little wildly.

“Are you joking?” Hans asked. “Havel’s castle is full of lackeys and opportunists.”

“How do you know that?” Jacob challenged.

“There’s also the possibility that the Communists themselves will act as insiders,” Henry suggested. “State Security did quite a bit of industrial espionage.”

“Are you on about spies again?” Annie asked, drawing a Sparta out of her purse.

“We must hope that they, at least, will keep faith with their ideals and their training,” Hans said stiffly.

“Are you joking?” Jacob asked.

There was a flash of anger in Hans’s eyes, and it immediately shamed Jacob. Hans was on the losing side; he would soon be unemployed. It was unkind to embarrass him. It was even a betrayal of sorts, because he was Henry’s friend.