We're Flying (18 page)

Hallo-o, I called softly. There was no reply, and I walked through a pair of swing doors that had the words
Dining Room
over them in old-fashioned script. I found myself in a large room with two or three dozen wooden tables, all with upturned chairs on them. In the far corner of the room was an illuminated table with a woman
sitting at it. Hallo-o, I called out, a little louder than before, and walked across the room toward her. Even before I got to her, she was standing up and coming to meet me with hand outstretched in greeting, saying, Welcome, my name is Ana, we spoke on the telephone.

She had to be about my age, dressed like a waitress in black skirt and white blouse, with sleek, shoulder-length black hair. I asked if the hotel was closed. Not anymore, she said, and smiled. On her table was a plate of ravioli, half-eaten. Just one moment, said the woman. She sat down and, gulping it down, finished her dinner. It didn’t seem to bother her that I was standing there watching her eat. I hadn’t had anything to eat since lunch, and was starting to feel hungry, but I wanted to go to my room first, shower, and get out of my clothes. When she belatedly gestured toward a chair, I sat down facing the woman. Tell me about your work, she said. I told her once again what I was doing here. She wiped her mouth on the napkin and asked, What do you find so interesting about that? I shrugged my shoulders and said, I had been invited to the conference. Gender studies was hot at the moment. And why always women? she asked. I said I didn’t know, I supposed men were less interesting. She took a sip of wine and washed down the last of her food. I’ll show you to your room now.

In the lobby she disappeared behind the front desk and rooted around inside it. After a while she pushed a pad across to me and asked me to fill in the form. I wrote in my details. When I turned the page to look up the last few entries, she took the pad from my hand and put it away. Would you mind paying in advance? I said that was fine. Seven days full board, she did the math, that makes four hundred and twenty francs, including tax. She took the bills from me and said she would give me the change later. And a receipt please, I said. She nodded, emerged from behind the desk, and walked toward the wide stone staircase. Only now did I notice that she was barefoot. I picked up my backpack and set off after her.

She was waiting for me on the second floor at the start of a long, gloomy passageway. Do you have any special requests? she asked. When I said I didn’t, she opened the very first door and said, Then why don’t you just take this one here? I stepped into the room, which was smallish and without much in the way of furniture, except a poorly made bed, a table and chair, and a dresser with an old china basin on it containing a jug full of water. The walls were whitewashed and bare, except for a crucifix hanging over the bed. I headed straight for the French window that opened onto a tiny balcony. You shouldn’t go out there, said Ana from the corridor. I asked her where
she slept. What’s it to you? I just wondered. She looked at me crossly and said just because she was on her own here didn’t mean that I could walk all over her. I hadn’t had any ill intentions, and stared at her in surprise. I asked what time dinner was. She frowned, as though concentrating hard, then said I should just come when I was ready. Then she vanished, only to reappear briefly in the doorway and drop a set of sheets and a towel on the table beside me.

THE BATHROOM AND TOILETS
were at the far end of the corridor. I got undressed and stood under the shower, but when I turned on the tap, there was nothing but a faint gurgle. The toilet didn’t flush either. I went back to my room in my underwear, and washed with water from the jug and put on some clean clothes. Then I went downstairs, but there was no sign of Ana. Opposite the dining room was a somewhat smaller room, with
Ladies’ Saloon
over the door. There were a few armchairs in it—sheeted as well—and a big pool table. There was a white ball and a couple of reds on the green baize, and a cue leaning on the table, as though someone had just been playing. The next room, called
Smoking Room
, seemed to function as a library. Most of the books were old and dusty, by authors
I’d never heard of. Then there were a handful of classics, Dostoyevsky, Stendhal, Remarque, and in amongst them some tattered paperback American thrillers.

I went back out to the lobby and from there to the ballroom, which was bigger than all the others and completely empty, except for a rolled-up carpet. An old brass chandelier hung from the ceiling, which rested on fake marble pillars. It felt cool everywhere, and not much light came in through the closed shutters. In the kitchen downstairs it was even darker. There was a massive cast-iron stove that evidently ran on wood, and a sideboard loaded with dozens of used wineglasses and stacks of dirty plates, as though there had just been a banquet at the hotel. I went back up to the ground floor and then headed outside.

The shadows of the tall old pines that stood some distance away from the Kurhaus had grown a little longer by now, and were just grazing the white walls. I walked once around the building. On one side was a small graveled area with a few metal tables and folding chairs lying about, and some deck chairs. There I finally saw Ana. I sat down next to her and asked her how she was enjoying the last few rays of sunshine. It’s been a long winter, she said, without opening her eyes. I looked at her. She had unusually heavy eyebrows and a strong nose. Thin lips gave
her face a hint of severity. Her legs were folded under her, and her skirt had ridden up a little. The top two buttons on her blouse were undone. I couldn’t get rid of the feeling that she was displaying herself to me on purpose. At that point she opened her eyes and ran her palm over her brow, as though to wipe away my gaze. I cleared my throat and said, The showers don’t work. Didn’t I tell you? And the toilet doesn’t flush either. You’ll just have to improvise, she said with a friendly smile, at least the snow has mostly gone by now. When does the season begin here? I asked. She said that depended on various factors. For a time we sat silently side by side, then she pulled herself up, straightened her clothes, and said, I thought you were looking for somewhere quiet to do some work. I’m not so sure about that anymore, I said, and when she stared at me questioningly, I wouldn’t mind getting something to eat. She said dinner was at seven, and she got up and left.

I WENT TO MY ROOM
to try to do some work. Distracted by my hunger, I went out on the little balcony to smoke a cigarette. I remembered that Ana had warned me not to use it, but it looked sturdy enough, only the iron railings were corroded and in some places rusted through. The gorge was directly under my feet, and I could hear
the loud rushing of the brook. When I turned, I saw Ana lying on the deck chair again, in the graveled area.

I was down in the lobby on the dot of seven. Shortly afterward, Ana came in from outside. Oh, it’s you, she said, you’d better come along. She led the way into the kitchen, lit an oil lamp, and led me into a small pantry stacked with cans of ravioli. Ravioli all right? she asked. Is that all you’ve got? Quickly she spun around, as though to see what the choices were, and then she listed them by heart anyway: Apple sauce, green beans, peas and carrots, tuna fish, artichoke hearts, and sweet corn. I said I’d take the ravioli. She reached down one of the cans and pressed it into my hand. Back in the kitchen, she showed me where to find silverware and plates, and handed me a can opener. Don’t lose it, we’ll be needing it. Is there anywhere I can heat it up? She furrowed her brow and said, Do you expect me to light the stove for the sake of that one single can? Anyway, I wouldn’t know how. What about some wine, then? I asked. She disappeared and came back with a bottle of Austrian white, which she set down in front of me. That’s extra, she said. Now enjoy your dinner, I’ll be upstairs.

She left me the lamp and walked confidently off into the darkness. I shook the cold ravioli out onto a plate and went upstairs to the dining room. It tasted truly awful, but at least it filled me up. I returned the empty plate to
the kitchen and left it on the side, with the other dirty dishes. I thought about leaving, but by now it was too late. So I sat in the library to work, with my laptop and bottle of wine. I found an outlet, but there was no power. The light didn’t work either. Luckily my laptop battery was full. I read back over my talk and saw that it needed less work than I thought. I tried to concentrate on the text, but I was tired from the long walk, the wine, and the unfamiliar altitude, and I kept dropping off. At ten o’clock I stumbled upstairs to bed through the pitch dark building, without having seen Ana again.

I RAN INTO HER
the following morning in the dining room with a plate of apple sauce in front of her. Help yourself, she said, and pointed to a big jar of the stuff on the table. I said I hadn’t managed to find a working outlet for my laptop and the lights weren’t working either, perhaps there was a fuse somewhere that had blown. We don’t have any power, said Ana, as though it was the most natural thing in the world. While I was still eating, she got up and left the room. A little later, I saw her disappearing between the trees with a towel and a roll of toilet paper.

My battery was dead, and seeing as I didn’t have a printout of my talk with me, there wasn’t much more I
could do. I read around in
Summer Folk
and in Gorki’s correspondence, and jotted down a few notes, but it didn’t make much sense. The sensible thing would be to leave as soon as possible. But instead of packing and looking for Ana, I went into the Ladies’ Saloon and played billiards. At noon, there was a table laid for two in the dining room. No sooner had I sat down than Ana came in with a can of ravioli. I put it in the sun to warm it up a bit, she said. It didn’t seem to be any warmer than the day before. Don’t you like it? she asked.

I said I couldn’t do my work without electricity. She looked at me as if I was some kind of weakling and said, Surely you’ll find something to occupy yourself with. I have to hand in the manuscript in two weeks, I said. Why do people write such things, she said, who’s really interested? That’s not the point. I have a deadline, and I have to stick to it. She smiled mockingly and said, But you don’t even want to leave. Ana was right. I wanted to stay here, I didn’t know why, maybe it was for her sake. Don’t get your hopes up, she said, as though she’d read my mind.

FOR THE NEXT FEW DAYS
the weather remained fine, and I often lay out and dozed on one of the deck chairs. I read
a lot, and played billiards or solitaire. Ana was around, but each time I asked if she wanted to play cards with me or practice cannons, she would shake her head and disappear. When I went into the library, I would find her sitting there, staring out the window. I pulled a book off a shelf at random and started reading. If I happened to get to a bit I liked, I would read it out loud, but Ana never seemed to be listening.

After the jug in my room was empty, I washed in the stream every morning, the way Ana did. I hung back in the dining room until she was finished, and then I headed out. I had found a good spot, where the banks were flat and the stream had a quiet flow. In the soft earth I saw traces of bare feet, and assumed it was the same spot that Ana used as well. When I dipped my head in the ice cold water, it felt as though it was exploding, but after that I would feel refreshed for the entire morning. Only the noise of the rushing brook was starting to bother me a little. There was nowhere you could avoid it, even inside the hotel you could hear it everywhere. I kept thinking of Ana, the whole day we circled one another restlessly, to the point that I was often unsure who was tracking whom.

She didn’t cook and she didn’t clean, I even had to make my own bed. The only services she performed were
opening cans and setting the table. One time I remarked that I wasn’t exactly getting my money’s worth. Ana’s face darkened in a scowl. She said it would be better if I stopped wasting time on Maxim Gorki and started thinking about my own attitude toward women. That has nothing to do with it, I said, surely you can at least expect running water and electricity in a hotel. You’re getting much more than that, Ana snapped back. I didn’t know what she meant, but I was careful to stay off the subject in future.

I tried to imagine what the place would be like with visitors in summer, with the dining room packed, someone playing the piano, and children running up and down the corridors, but I couldn’t manage it.

The stack of dirty plates in the kitchen grew. One time I counted them. If Ana used three plates a day, then she must have been here all winter. I asked her if she was some kind of housekeeper. If you like, she said. I didn’t believe her, but by then it was a matter of some indifference to me why she was here.

FOR LUNCH WE
usually ate tuna with artichoke hearts, in the evening we lit a fire outside and heated a can of ravioli on a stone. The sun left the valley early and it got cold quickly, but even so we sat by the fire a long time in the
evening, drinking wine. We had barely exchanged a word all day, and while Ana wasn’t any more talkative than before, she did at least listen to me. I didn’t feel like talking about myself, I didn’t want to think about my home life, which seemed remote and irrelevant. So I started telling her about
Summer Folk
. She responded to the various characters as if they were real people: she got annoyed with Olga for complaining all the time and called the engineer Suslov a bastard. Varvara and her ravings about the writer Shalimov left her cold. How could she fall for such a man, she said indignantly, he’s just a bad seducer. What would a good seducer be like, then? I asked. He would have to be honest to the woman and himself, said Ana, and shook her head disapprovingly. Her favorite was Maria Lvovna. I knew the famous monologue from Act IV pretty much by heart, and was asked to recite it several times by Ana. We are summer folk in our country, we’ve traveled here from somewhere. We bustle about, look for some comfortable niche in life, we do nothing and we talk all the time. Yes, said Ana, we all need to change. We need to do it for our own sakes, too, I said, so that we don’t feel our awful solitude so much. Ana looked at me suspiciously, and said I wasn’t to start getting any ideas. You would fit well into the play, I said. In a letter, Gorki said all his female characters hate men and all his men
are rotters. Then you would fit into the play yourself, said Ana. By the flickering firelight I couldn’t be sure of her expression.