Nikita turned toward me, frowning slightly, and I hurried on, ‘I mean, we’ve all changed, but obviously we’ve still got a long way to go, or I have, in any case…’
He leant back in his chair. Even in the height of August he was still pale, and in the dark garden, in his white shirt, he looked almost ghostly. When he spoke we all fell quiet.
‘This week I suggest each of us devotes some thought to identifying what we have to do to become more measured, rounded characters. This will stand us in good stead in communal living. Each of you has thought hard about what made you a Revolutionary. Now you must try to identify the task that your story sets you. And how should each of us know what that is? Well, it’s quite simple. It is the thing that is hardest for you to do, the thing that terrifies you, that makes you feel least comfortable. Not something that is hard for your neighbour, which might be perfectly simple for you. But the one area that you think impossible for yourself.
‘Fyodor, for example – your task will be to exercise your imagination. You are a scientist, hard-working, logical, methodical – a list of your good qualities could go on for hours, we all agree. A free-flowing imagination, however, would probably not be on that list, don’t you think? This week I suggest you engage in some form of abstract self-expression – dance, art, music.
‘Marina, your task is to be spontaneous, irresponsible – to allow yourself to be silly.
‘Vera, yours is to identify what you really want – not just what others want of you.
‘Sonya? Yours is to forgive yourself. Set down your burden of guilt. You acted as best you could, in the circumstances. There are no Christ figures now to set ourselves up against and fail. You are flawed, as we all are, but you were honest, you showed courage. There’s an arrogance in guilt – it suggests you think you could, or should, be infallible. Let go of it.
‘And Gerty?’ He turned to where I was lurking in the corner, hoping to be forgotten, and I felt almost panicky at what he might say. He looked at me for a moment. ‘Yours is to believe that you are a full citizen of the world, as important as anyone else, as clever and as lovable. Be proud, be boastful this week, Gerty.’
A letter arrived from Mr Kobelev.
‘Dear children,’ Pasha read aloud,
‘I write to you like some Eastern potentate, sitting under the shade of a pomegranate tree. Liza and Dima are supposed to be doing their lessons at the table with me, although at this moment Liza is whistling to a lizard while Dima attempts to trap it under a box. They have a great desire to keep one as a pet, but so far the local lizard population, wily Tatars that they are, have had no difficulty evading them. Your mother is resting, but this morning she was gathering peaches in the garden. After a difficult first couple of weeks, her health is much improved by this move – we should have decamped years ago. We eat fruit from the trees, we sun ourselves, and apart from my sallies into Yalta to find out news, we see no one. In short, all is well with us. And how is it with you, my dearests? This letter is being carried to Moscow by an acquaintance of ours. Please telegraph c/o Yalta Central Poste Restante. I am afraid that your mother is worrying about you. My regards to Miss Gerty; tell her that her pupils are missing her.
‘You see?’ said Pasha to his sister. ‘You are feeling guilty for abandoning people, and all the time they are sunbathing and stuffing themselves with peaches and pomegranates.’
‘What wonderful news—’ I gulped down the lump in my throat. ‘You must have been so anxious about them.’
Sonya laughed and unexpectedly hugged me. ‘Dear Gerty, I know how much you have been worrying about them yourself. My mother, gathering peaches! And the little ones are having a real Crimean summer.’
I extracted myself a little awkwardly. We were picking raspberries together in the thicket at the back of the laundry house. Cool morning shadows lay across the yard and the birds were chattering and splashing in the water trough, but the sky was already its brazen, flat, August blue. As Pasha came out with the letter I had just been calculating that we might make two dozen pots of raspberry jam from this harvest, and another two dozen of blueberry, and later there would be blackberries, if only we could get hold of enough sugar – that would provide our vitamins for the winter.
‘We may not end up measured characters, but we’ll certainly be rounded, if you have anything to do with it,’ remarked Pasha. ‘I hope you’re feeling proud and boastful, Gerty.’
I laughed. ‘Yes – proud, boastful and rounded, that’s how I’m feeling.’
It was typical of Pasha to have noticed Slavkin’s words; I wondered if he had also noted their effect on me. Ever since that evening I had been feeling – what, exactly? Expectant, a little flustered, excited – I thought I knew what he wanted of me. I wondered when would be a good moment to approach him, whether I dared disturb him while he was working. Now, propelled by the good news from the Kobelevs, I decided to take the plunge.
‘My basket’s full. I think I’ll take these indoors and prepare everything for jam-making,’ I said casually. ‘Do you mind finishing off?’
I left the raspberries on the kitchen table and slipped quietly across the yard to the stable where Nikita was working on the Propaganda Machine. Whatever the commune thought of privacy, that day I wanted some time alone with him. I leant against the wall and watched him as he concentrated. He performed a little dance around the PropMash; bending down, twisting, fixing, standing back, contemplating, diving in again to drive in another nail. He was grinning to himself, occasionally laughing under his breath, muttering. I found myself smiling too. My stomach was fluttering.
It was not until he almost tripped over my feet that he noticed me.
‘Oh! Devils. What time is it? Is it dinner?’
‘No, no, I just wanted a talk with you, please, Nikita—’
‘Oh.’ Reluctant, he straightened up, keeping one hand on the metalwork as if still feeling the PropMash’s pulse.
‘Yes, I wanted to ask you to explain a little more about what you said. The task you gave me at the evening meeting on Friday, you know, about being… about being as important as anyone else.’
‘Of course.’ He frowned. ‘I thought it was clear – you were to remind yourself that you are a full citizen of the world. I meant you have a tendency towards servility.’
My heart sank, but I was determined to finish what I had come to say. That was the point, after all, wasn’t it? I should stick to my guns. ‘You also said I was as – as lovable as anyone else.’
He picked up a box of nuts and bolts and began sorting them intently. ‘Yes.’
‘Nikita, probably it sounds absurd, but I must tell you how deeply I still feel for you. I’m devoted to you…’ I was babbling. I took a breath and started again. ‘I can’t help hoping that perhaps, one day, when the commune has achieved its purpose, we might be again… you might feel—’
He interrupted, clearing his throat. ‘Comrade… is this necessary? We are all friends within the commune. There’s no need for this exaggerated type of… this emotional excess. We have made a promise to each other not only to be chaste, but to give up this type of romanticism. Let’s not mention this conversation again.’ He put out his hand for me to shake, but he avoided my eye. ‘All our energy must be for our work.’
I swallowed, not trusting myself to speak, hanging on to his hand.
He looked at me at last, and surely there was a little shred of feeling in his glance? ‘I do understand, Gerty. But you must see that that was a moment which passed. You’re making such progress, you know – don’t give up.’