Waiting for the Dark, Waiting for the Light

'You don't think so?'

He shook his head. 'I don't see the slightest sign of his presence anywhere.'

'I'm sorry about that, Pavel.'

Now he ought to say: I am too, Alice. If I'd been able to see it then, our lives would have been different. But I could never believe that God was made man and let himself be crucified and then rose from the dead, or that centuries or thousands of years after my death I would rise again and return to my body to be judged for some actions lost in time. But it seemed absurd to talk to her about that. And besides, problems of dogma were not essential to her faith.

'When they tried Peter and me back then,' he recalled, 'they assigned me this old lawyer. When I got a year in jail, he told me: you're young, and it won't be easy, but you have to realize that what you can't avoid, you have to accept. There's no point in resisting the yoke. He told me that before the war, he'd been in America and watched them breaking in young colts on a ranch. The ones that resisted and bucked and kicked got beaten the hardest. At the time what he said made me angry. It seemed like a filthy morality he was preaching. But I've had many occasions to remember it since. I actually think he meant well.'

'It's a nice story,' she said. 'Except that we're not horses.'

FILM

I

The man from the archives is elderly and unremarkable. He's wearing an army shirt, black trousers and grey shoes. Ella is dressed completely in purple because she knows purple excites men. Despite his greyness, the man does indeed give her a hungry look, but he addresses her politely: my dear Mrs Fuková. He listens to what she has to say with an obliging expression, but his grey eyes are crafty.

'Of course, I know his films,' he says. 'He was one of our best documentary-makers. Hardly anyone was a match for him in his field, but now. . well, you understand.'

Ella is chilled by the little word 'was'. 'But he's not entirely banned,' she objects quietly. 'Occasionally they let him make something. He has the odd contract, but it's never the kind of film that lets him show what he can really do. It's very painful for him.'

'My dear Mrs Fuková, who said anything about a ban? No one is banned in this country. Your spouse is simply. . shall we say, not in favour at the moment.'

'That's why I asked your wife. I just thought you might be able to arrange something. I understand you choose films for the president to watch. If you were to send him one of his films. . ' Ella gropes for the right words. She's grown used to shady dealings in her shop, but even so, she feels oddly embarrassed and uncertain. Her husband—

who is not really her husband, and in whose interests she believes she is acting — has no idea that she's here. Still, she adds: 'We'd certainly make it worth your while.'

The man from the archives frowns, and she is suddenly worried. 'Of course, if you think nothing can be done, you can tell me straight out.'

'No, no, we'll think of something. I seem to recall your husband's film — from South America, or Mexico wasn't it?'

'Mexico.'

'Do you remember, Mrs Fuková, whether or not there's something in it about snakes?'

'Why, yes,' she replies eagerly. 'He did something on rattlesnake hunters.'

'Of course, now I remember. That's wonderful. We always send films about snakes to the Castle, mainly because the president's wife was interested.'

'But she's dead.'

'Comrade President maintains his old habits. At his age it's quite understandable.'

'Would you send him that film?'

'We'll try*. Of course, that's not really enough. He doesn't pay much attention to credits any more. We'll have someone draw his attention to the director's name. And if he shows an interest, then we might point out that the director isn't exactly — how did we put it? — in favour at the moment.'

'And do you think you could arrange that?'

'For you, I'll do everything I can.' And he moves closer to touch her hair as a sign of his compliance.

'We'd be terribly grateful to you, and as I say we'll certainly make it worth your while.'

'Don't mention it, Mrs Fuková. My wife enjoys shopping at your store. She's always full of admiration at the way you manage to come up with everything she needs.'

She thanks him once again and promises to try and find something really special for his wife. Then she leaves, feeling that she has accomplished something that might win her the right to use the name by which the archivist has addressed her.

Fuka, meanwhile, is filming a news feature in a notorious chemical factory, which seems like a modern

manifestation of hell. Because most of what they make here is secret, they show him the library, the showers, the clinic and a small timberyard between the buildings. They don't take him to the graveyard where the tombstones bear witness to the sudden deaths of young men and women— many on a single day. They introduce him to smiling female workers who speak in glowing terms of their miserable wages and their summer holidays in the company chalet. He manages to slip away from the filming and visit a building where workers are mixing an explosive liquid with large ladles in huge vats, aware that at any moment they might be blown through the roof, which has been specially constructed for this eventuality. He gazes in astonishment at this Boschean scene, aware of a gentle tingling in his spine, because his life too hangs by a thread.

When he returns to the crew, he finds someone else standing behind the camera, a colleague known to everyone as Little Ivan.

Little Ivan tells him he was sent over because they said Fuka had had to leave early. Someone has obviously got it wrong. Or, worse, no one has got anything wrong, they have merely decided to get rid of him.

Little Ivan reassures him that he has no personal interest in this job. It's hardly what you'd call a great environment here, and anyway he wouldn't want to complete a job that someone else has started. It's a question of principles.

Then why is he doing this?

What could he do? They ordered him to.

Fuka decides to call the studio management. By now he's convinced that there has been no mistake. True, he has a contract for this job, but what good is a contract in a country where the law is changeable and selectively applied?

As usual, he can't get through on the phone. He eventually calms down and decides what to do. They won't tell him anything over the phone. He'll deal with this in person.

The deputy director of the studio receives him in a friendly and even fatherly fashion. 'That wasn't really a job for you, with your abilities. . ' he says, and Fuka begins to think that he was wrong, that something unexpected has

happened, that a miraculous reversal has taken place. At last, they'd noticed his work.

'So what should I be doing?'

'You've made some interesting films. I remember the one about Mexico. That sequence about the rattlesnake hunters was brilliant.'

'I wanted to go back to Mexico, but you wouldn't let me.'

'Trips abroad are not my department.'

'They wouldn't let me,' he corrected himself.

'Others have to be given a chance too. You know how much a trip like that costs.'

'That film paid for itself. It was sold abroad.'

'No one's accusing you of anything. But you should try doing something like that here.'

'But you — they — turned down three of my ideas.'

'Is that so?'

'And I can't make a movie about rattlesnakes here.'

'Rattlesnakes are not the point. People are. You should find a good story.'

'You've just pulled me off something that might be called a good story. The conditions those people work in… '

'That's exactly what I'm talking about. You always look for the negative side of everything. That's not a good story; that's prejudice. I don't want to tell you what to think, but you know yourself that there are different ways of looking at everything.'