Mao’s hand was still on the rock, as if he had no doubt that the earth had begun to tremble and that a cataclysm was about to take place up above.
That’s the whole difference between you and me, said he, looking in the direction where he supposed Europe, the ancient Greeks, and the whole of white humanity to be.
3
THOUGH SILVA WALKED as fast as she could, she still arrived at the ministry slightly late for work.
Greeting, as she rushed past, a porter almost invisible behind his window, she hurried on up the stairs, and in the first-floor corridor almost collided with Victor Hila, an old acquaintance she hadn’t seen for a long time,
“How are you?” she asked him, still out of breath. “To what do we owe the pleasure?”
He looked at her rather vacantly, and only then did Silva notice how tired and depressed he looked, and how ill-shaven.
“I’m here on business,” he muttered with a vague wave of the hand. “Can you tell me where the chief vice-minister’s office is?”
“I’ll take you there. Come along.”
She led the way, glad to be of help. Though she didn’t see him very often now Ana was dead, she tried to be nice to him, as to all the friends whom the two sisters had once had in common and who now represented a subtle link with the past.
“Here we are, Victor,” she said kindly.
He mumbled his thanks and knocked at the door without even offering to shake hands.
He must be out of sorts or upset about something, she thought as she made her way to her own office. Such behaviour would have offended her, coming from anyone else; but not from him…
“Good morning,” she said as she opened the door.
“Good morning, Silva,” answered her boss.
His addressing her by her first name suggested he hadn’t noticed she wasn’t on time, but as she hung up her raincoat she apologized anyway.
“I’m afraid I’m a bit late…”
Linda, looking over from her desk, treated her to a mischievous wink. She’d done her hair differently, and looked even younger than before. She’s only twenty-three, thought Silva as she opened a drawer and took out the files she needed. Why must she try to make herself seem younger still?
No one spoke. It was now, first thing in the morning, that the silence that usually reigned in government offices weighed most heavily on the people that worked there, preventing them from exchanging a few words about what they’d done the night before, repressing their comments on the latest interesting bit of news. The panes in the tall baroque windows seemed to filter out all the interesting whims and fancies of the weather, admitting only such light as was needed to work by. Beneath his sleeked-back hair the boss’s smooth expanse of brow hung motionless over his desk. Silva, sitting close to Linda, could feel almost physically how eagerly her friend longed to turn and talk to her.
As the morning wore on, Linda’s impatience communicated itself to Silva, and every time the phone rang or someone knocked at the door they both waited with bated breath for their boss to be called away.
But though he answered several phone calls they never heard him say, “Very well — I’ll be right along.” Then, when they’d almost given up hope, he just got up of his own accord and left the room.
“Thank goodness!” said Linda as soon as he’d gone, “I don’t feel a bit like work today.”
“I like your hair-do — it suits you!”
Linda’s face lit up.
“Really?”
“When I came in just now I thought to myself, ‘Why does she want to look even younger than she is?’“
“I’m not as young as all that!”
“You don’t know how lucky you are!” Silva exclaimed. “My God, if you’re not young, what am I?”
Linda looked at her.
“Well, I wouldn’t mind changing places with you,” she said.
“What?” exclaimed Silva, feeling herself start to blush for some reason or other.
Linda smiled.
“I said I wouldn’t mind changing places.”
“You must be joking!”
“No — I mean it.”
Silva knew her cheeks were still flushed. Why was she being so foolish?
Luckily the door opened, and in came a plump secretary from the protocol department.
“Brr! Isn’t it cold today!” said the newcomer. Then, putting her hand on the radiator: “Your heating’s working! It’s freezing in our room! Where’s your boss?”
Linda kept her eyes on the door until it was safely closed behind the intruder, then turned back to Silva again.
“Curiously enough,” she said, “I really did mean what I said just now. But it’s not all that strange.”
“I think we’d better drop the subject,” Silva answered, who really had no idea what she was saying.
“Why?” asked Linda, with a mixture of cajolery and regret.
There was another knock, a more peremptory one this time, and without waiting for an answer a head appeared round the door.
“All Party members to meet at ten!” it announced. “Oh, sorry! There aren’t any here, of course!”
The door was briskly shut again, and the voice could be heard receding along the corridor, repeating, “Short meeting of Party members at ten…”
That’s how they’ll announce the meeting at which Arian is expelled, thought Silva, and was immediately engulfed in a wave of sorrow. He’d said it was bound to happen soon; he didn’t think there was any hope of avoiding it. You know, Silva, he’d told her, expulsion is the mildest possible punishment in a case of this kind. There had been neither regret nor resentment in his voice — that was what had frightened her most. “A case of this kind” — she kept repeating to herself. But what kind of case was it? “What is it really all about?” she’d asked him for the umpteenth time. But his answer had been as reticent as ever.
From the corridor there came the muffled sound of doors opening and shutting. Perhaps it was the official still going round calling the meeting. Silva felt a pang. What if, unknown to her, the meeting dealing with Arian’s case had been held already, and she knew nothing about it? No, that was impossible, she thought. Even if Arian himself hadn’t let her know, Sonia would have done so. Unless…
The door opened and the boss came in, looking even more gloomy than usual. He couldn’t help assuming this expression whenever a Party meeting was announced during working hours. He wasn’t a Party member himself, and it was common knowledge that this stood in his way. “What do you expect? — I haven’t got a red one,” he would say to his friends, referring to the Party card, whenever the question of his promotion came up. Caught up in the routine of office life, absorbed in the giving of orders to his subordinates and by his owe position as boss, he could usually forget that he wasn’t a member of the Party, and thought others forgot it too. But when, as today, someone announced a Party meeting, he felt horribly uncomfortable. His embarrassment lasted all the time the meeting was in progress, for he was afraid of coming face to face with someone who’d exclaim in astonishment — and this had actually happened several times — “Good heavens, why aren’t you at the meeting? Oh, sorry — I was forgetting…You’re not a member, are you?”
These really were his worst moments. He never knew what to do. To avoid being found in his office he would go and wander round the corridors, sometimes managing to disappear altogether. He felt worst of all at open meetings of the Party, when, after the customary pause, the secretary would say, “Would comrades who are not Party members kindly excuse us? We have a few internal matters to discuss.” Then, wishing that the ground would open and swallow him up, he would hang his head and slink out with the rest, the picture of dejection and humiliation, as if to say, “You’d have done better not to ask us to come at all.” After such scenes he would go on feeling mortified for a couple of days at least.