‘Of course.’ She had on new perfume. There were roses in it and it seemed to promise summer. For a few moments, while she went over to tell her servant that she would be gone for a while, I was reminded of my childhood, of the scent of lilac in Kiev at springtime, of cornfields and poppies and picking long-stemmed wild-flowers in the gorges with Esmé. I would have given anything to have returned for a little while to that relaxed state of innocence which had been completely destroyed in less than an hour, when I found Esmé in the anarchist’s camp and she was laughing about what had become of her. She had been raped so many times, she said, she had callouses on her cunt. It would never again be possible to be sweetly, ordinarily, carelessly in love. I longed for that foolish happiness. I longed to re-experience it with my Leda, to believe our union unique, eternal. But it was impossible. With the exception of Mrs Cornelius, women were now a threat to my well-being. They betrayed one’s finer feelings. I trusted men no better; but one did not as a rule put one’s heart into the hands of a man. And children, as I was to learn again and again, can be the worst betrayers of all.
The Baroness returned in good spirits, with her pass. When I got to the saloon, however, I had to join a line of about ten people. I was immediately behind the odious Hernikof who turned and once again insisted on addressing me in tones of uncalled-for intimacy, lie would not be put off. He was telling me something about relatives he hoped to find in Batoum, the rumour that both Whites and Reds were ransoming Jews in order to finance their campaigns, that the Allies were discussing the idea of some Utopian Zionist State between Russia and Turkey to act as a kind of buffer against the Bolsheviks; so much nonsense I made myself deaf to it. Meanwhile Mr Larkin, long-faced and serious as always, with frowning concentration and glittering bald head, had seated himself at a little card table and busily checked papers or wrote short letters on sheets with the name of the ship stamped at the top. He spent far too long with Hernikof, but at last I received my own pass and he was quick enough, for of course he recognised me. A simple enough letter informing whomever it concerned that the undersigned. Maxim A. Pyatnitski, was travelling on His Majesty’s Merchant Ship Rio Cruz from Odessa to Constantinople and had been granted permission to stay ashore in Batoum until five hours before the ship was due to leave port. I had to sign at the foot of the page and take my ordinary identity papers with me. ‘The five hours bit is to be on the safe side,’ said Mr Larkin. ‘You shouldn’t have any trouble if you’re a little late.’
By the time I rejoined my Baroness, the coast was in sight, the rain had lifted and the horizon was beginning to brighten. ‘Won’t it be wonderful if there’s sunshine?’ She was animated. ‘They say it’s possible to have very warm days even at this time of year.’
I could not believe the British would abandon Batoum. ‘Maybe we should think of settling there,’ I said, phrasing as a joke my genuine distress at leaving Russian soil; distress which I knew she shared. She made a cheerful, fatalistic gesture. ‘Let’s enjoy the hours we have for what they are, not for what they might be.’
I decided to break the news to Mrs Cornelius. She was dressing when I knocked on the cabin door. ‘Jes’ give us arf a mo’ ter get me knickers on.’ She was looking extremely well, with her face flushed and her eyes bright, and she had on an orange dress. I told her I was going ashore to see Batoum for a day or so, hoping to look up one or two old friends.
‘I’ll prob’bly bump inter yer, then.’ She grinned as she drew on her fox-fur wrap. ‘I waz thinkin’ o’ poppin’ over ther side fer a bit meself.’ She laughed at my expression. ‘Yer don’ mind, do yer?’
It had not occurred to me she would want to leave the ship. I could do nothing but nod, shrug, smile, pack a change of clothes into my small folding bag and agree that we should think of having dinner somewhere together in Batoum. She was the last person I wanted to know of my liaison with the Baroness. I left the bag on my bunk and returned to the forward deck.
The water had grown suddenly blue and the clouds overhead had broken into white masses moving rapidly away to the North. As they rolled, the water became brighter, the ship’s brass and woodwork glittered in the sun and we were like a golden barge afloat on a silver sea. Almost immediately everyone was out on deck, standing along the rails, removing clothing, chattering and laughing, like clerks and factory girls on a works outing. The wake of the ship broke behind us, cream foam on royal blue, and ahead were the snowy Caucasian peaks, the verdant slopes of the foothills, the contours of forests, even the faint suggestion of Batoum itself; hints of white and gold and grey, as the ship changed course and began to head directly for the shore.
The landscape was extraordinarily beautiful; a panorama of wooded hills and green valleys softened by the hazy sunshine. It seemed we had moved magically from the dead of winter into the simple fullness of spring. Flights of birds passed over dense forests. We saw pale smoke rising from pastel houses: a scene of astonishing peace for which we had been completely unprepared. People giggled and shook their heads like lunatics. More than one adult began to weep, perhaps in the belief we had been transported to Paradise. Gulls cackled in vulgar welcome and flung themselves into our rigging. The note of the engine grew brisker and merrier. Now we saw the ochre line of a long stone mole, the industrial buildings of an oil-harbour, the coaling-stations, the white quayside beyond, the sparkling domes of churches and mosques. British and Russian ships were tidily at rest alongside the landing-stages. Batoum was not a large town. She lacked the grandness of Yalta or the military solidity of Sebastopol, but in that haze, with her gilded roofs and her flags, she was infinitely more beautiful than any city we had ever seen. To us, used to uncertainty, destruction, death and danger, she looked at once fragile and permanent; a haven of security. She lay in a bay surrounded by densely wooded hills, with no major roads leading into her and only a railway connection with the rest of Russia. Her Oriental appearance made us feel that we had already reached our goal, that we were in legendary Constantinople, and we began to act is if this were indeed our ultimate destination. I was now genuinely tempted to have my trunks unloaded, to put down roots in soil which was, albeit Asian Russia, nonetheless still Russia. I have no idea what the result would have been had I followed my impulse. I nowadays sometimes wish I had chosen to leave the Rio Cruz there and then; but I was full of Mr Thompson’s praise, of dreams of my great scientific career in London. I suppose I would have been frustrated in Batoum within a month. It was a beautiful oasis in a turbulent world; it would be years before its character was completely destroyed under Stalin. Yet it was not really the resting-place for a man who dreamed of gigantic aerial liners, of flying cities, and who carried in his wallet a new means of harnessing natural power.
Slowly the Rio Cruz eased her way into a space between a French frigate and a Russian merchantman, throwing her lines to waiting British sailors on the quay. Water slapped against warm stones smeared with bright green weed and rainbow oil. I smelled Batoum. I smelled damp foliage and roasting meat and mint and coffee. Palm-trees marched along her promenade; she had wide parks, public gardens full of feathery bamboo, eucalyptus, mimosa and orange trees; her streets were crowded with calm, dark buildings, the colour of vine-leaves, of rusty stone, brick or stucco. And flying high over what was obviously the public architecture near the centre of town, were the reassuring banners of two Empires, the Russian and the British. At dockside huts and customs houses smart Royal Navy bluejackets with carbines and bandoliers stood guard. The quayside was spotlessly clean. Polished brasswork and fresh paint was everywhere. I heard the hoot of motor-traffic, the clatter of trams, the familiar bustle of ordinary city streets. Through the lines of trees I made out hotels and shops, pavements populated with a mixture of races and classes. There were Russian, British and French uniforms, Moslem turbans and Greek fezzes, Parisian tailor-mades and Turkish tarbooshes. The Revolution had temporarily improved the life of Batoum, giving her an intellectual and fashionable element she had never previously possessed. I felt like a hound on a leash as I hurried to collect my little bag and wait impatiently at the side as the gang-plank was lowered. My pleasure was spoiled only by Hernikof’s fat body sweating and eager (doubtless he had worked out a means of turning a profit while in Batoum) pressing against mine. He winked at me. ‘A bit of a treat this, eh? Makes a change from stamping passports in Odessa, I shouldn’t wonder.’ Chilled by his casual intimacy with my past, I refused to be drawn and was hugely relieved when sailors and soldiers at last arranged themselves on the quay, barricades were drawn about the disembarking area, a desk was situated beside the gang-plank, officers checked one another’s clipboards, shook hands, and finally the signal was given for passengers to come ashore. I was first down the bouncing causeway, well ahead of Hernikof, my coat flying, my collar open as I began to appreciate the heat. My gloves in my hand, my hat on the back of my head, I grinned like a chimpanzee at British officials who carefully inspected my papers, then handed them back to me. Abstractedly I nodded and mumbled at the Russian officer who searched through my bag and returned it. I almost sang to the Ukrainian NCO who again looked at my papers and checked my name and description in the large ledger he carried. He was a gigantic, fat man with handle-bar moustaches and a kindly manner. ‘Be careful, friend,’ he murmured when I stepped at last through the final barricade and breathed the sweetly exotic air of Batoum. ‘A good many people here don’t accept there’s a closed season for boorzhoos.’ I turned to look at him sharply. He sounded like a Red. But he grinned. ‘Just a well-intentioned word.’