The narrow transom window in our barrack hut was broken, and every evening before we went to sleep we would see a beautiful rainbow of light spawned by the crack in the glass, a long peacock's tail suddenly flooding the cluttered interior of our dwelling for a few minutes, slipping along toward the nails where our earth-stained clothes hung. One evening this solar spectrum did not materialize. We were at the end of June, the angle of the sun's rays had changed. Nobody said anything, but I frequently saw glances straying toward our "cloakroom," now left in shadow. Having been completely forgetful of time, that salutary forgetfulness the steppe bestowed on us, we suddenly remembered that this was the last summer we would spend together.
The next morning, very close to the line of the canal, we came upon a wooden cross with a helmet hanging from one of its arms. We gathered around it, intrigued by the anonymity and loneliness of this tomb amid the immensity of these plains blinded by the sun. What we were used to seeing were mountains of concrete celebrating death, gilded inscriptions, effigies of heroes. Here, just two lengths of birchwood with cracked bark, a mound long since leveled by the winds. Strangely enough, the sight of this tomb provoked no distress, offered no invitation to share pain. There was even something light and ethereal, almost carefree, about the cross. Its presence at this spot (why just here and not two hundred miles to the north or south?), the human randomness of its presence, seemed to indicate that what really mattered was happening somewhere other than beneath this rectangle of earth…
On the other side of the channel a supervisor called out to us: "Look alive! We're off now! There's a ceremony…" It was the hallowed formula for our work as extras.
It got off to a bad start this time. We took five hours to reach the site, and, disguised as Pioneers bold and true in our red neckerchiefs, we began to wait, cooped up in the bus at the side of a road. Evidently they were not certain whether they would need us or not. In the old days we would have hatched a rebellion, demanded bread, simulated a collective attack of diarrhea. That day each of us remained alone with his thoughts, some trying to sleep, others taking refuge in the memory of a special day, a special smile. The supervisors seemed more than usually on edge. Yet, according to the rumors, all that was involved was the visit of a general. And we had seen field marshals, even a cosmonaut…
An official in a dark suit suddenly climbed onto the steps of the coach and uttered a kind of whispered shout: "Quick! Get out! They're coming. Quickly! Fall in!" He had a red face, seemed panic-struck.
They led us on the double up to a broad terrain at the top of a hill that was already surrounded by several detachments of young extras. One corner of this living frame appeared to be empty; they filled the breach with our troops. When we were installed there I glanced behind us. In the distance, the empty window frames of a half-finished building were clearly visible. So we were there to hide it from the visitors… What we had to do now, as we all knew from past experience, was to sink as rapidly as possible into a torpid state that would make us impervious to the burning heat of the sun, thirst, and the absurd duration of the ceremony. To concentrate on the shape of a cloud that was gradually, very gradually, growing longer…
Suddenly a swift tensing of muscles around me jerked me out of my drowsy state. Thanks to our communal existence, we had synchronized reflexes. I brought my eyes into focus, observed the open space. A crowd of notables, doubtless the town's administrators, was already present, looking toward the other end of the field, where there was a break in the surrounding line of white shirts, leaving a broad way in. All my comrades' eyes were fixed on this opening. Quite a large group of people was approaching at a steady pace, as always happened in ceremonies of this kind; so far there was nothing extraordinary about this procession…
All at once I saw what was extraordinary.
My first impression was the most unlikely and yet the most accurate: "The Lilliputians leading the captured Gulliver…" The man walking at the center of the group was at least a head taller than all the others. Or rather, his head and shoulders were visible above the bobbing motion of the faces surrounding him. I looked for the glint of a general's gold braid, a cap with the kind of insignia I imagined from the generals' uniforms in our army. But the giant who, from the very first moment, was at the heart of the ceremony, wore a dark suit devoid of any hint of rank. Only perhaps in his gait, in his rather stiff way of planting his feet on the ground, in the firm carriage of his body, was there something military about him. Moreover, as he drew closer, I perceived that it was not his exceptional height that gave him his central position, but his way of shaping the space around him.
I could already see his face, with an expression reminiscent of a wise and disenchanted old elephant, and eyelids that lifted slowly to reveal a penetrating gaze of surprising vitality. Very close to me I suddenly heard someone murmur with admiring apprehension: "Did you see the nose on him?" This powerful eminence was a source of fascination in the land of the steppes, where the flat faces of Asia prevailed. But the enthusiastic whisper in fact portended something else: the arrival of such a man was bound to give rise to something of a sensation.
And the sensation was forthcoming. A man with a kolkhoz director's banal features emerged from the group of town notables and walked toward the old giant, who had stopped with his entourage in the middle of the space. Although we were standing at attention I had a sense of a slight creaking of vertebrae: all necks were being craned toward an incredible spectacle.
For the director of the kolkhoz, or the man who looked like one, was carrying an enormous sturgeon, holding it by its gills. It looked rather as if he were dancing with the monstrous fish, whose mouth was poking into his face and whose tail was trying to wrap itself around the calves of his legs. The creature's weight compelled the dancer to lean his body backward and walk with jerky steps, as if in a strange, swaying tango. He was already drawing close to the giant. Everyone held their breath.
When they were a few paces apart, an optical illusion occurred. The sturgeon began to shrink, to seem less long, less heavy. Finally, when the gift took its place in the guest's hands, the silvery body of the fish seemed almost slender. It was displayed to the audience as a fine fishing trophy, held aloft without apparent effort. The beaming giant's strength was applauded. Then a top administrator, all the way from Moscow, stepped up to the microphone and began speaking, his eyes fixed on the typewritten sheets.
I saw neither the speaker nor the crowd of notables. I had just solved the tall old man's real mystery. At that moment, having entrusted the fish to one of his aides, he had taken advantage of the noise of the ovation, and with a conjuror's dexterity, all the while approving with his head the words his entourage were addressing to him, which he was not listening to, he had slipped his right hand into his jacket pocket, taken out a handkerchief, and rapidly wiped his fingertips, which were no doubt sticky from the sturgeon's slime. I was possibly the only person to have observed his action, and this detail, once noted, gave me the feeling that I had discovered his secret: it was his solitude. He was surrounded, acclaimed, lent himself with grace to all these diplomatic games, he even accepted the slimy monster and knew, by instinct, for how many seconds he should show the gift before handing it to his aide-de-camp. He was utterly present. And yet very much apart, in a profound, pensive solitude.