Arina gave a very lifelike imitation of the charlatan and I smiled and said: ‘We leave people like that alone. They distract attention from the Others.’
‘Yes, I know, I know,’ Arina sighed. ‘I leave them alone, too . . . more or less. I might hex them with eczema on a tender spot . . . sometimes, if I get angry – just to teach them a lesson. And sometimes when I can’t take any more I feel like teaching them a serious lesson. But then I think: just what am I doing? We could end up boiling in cauldrons next to each other in hell – me because I deserve it, and her for sheer stupidity and greed!’
I scratched the tip of my nose. The conversation was getting interesting.
‘Do you seriously believe in hell?’
‘How can you believe in God and not believe in the devil?’ Arina asked. And the way she said it immediately made it clear that for her ‘God’ was written with a capital letter and ‘devil’ with a small one.
‘You believe in the cauldrons and griddles?’ I continued. ‘Forgive me if that’s a personal question . . .’
‘Not at all, what’s personal about it?’ Arina exclaimed in surprise. ‘I don’t believe in the cauldrons, of course, that’s a figure of speech . . .’
‘And the griddles?’ I asked, unable to resist.
Arina smiled.
‘Those too. But the system has to have a feedback loop, there has to be a reward for a righteous life and a punishment for a sinful one.’
‘What system?’
‘The relationship between the Creator and his creatures. Humans and Others, that is. And while humans have a choice, unfortunately we don’t – we’re all guilty and doomed to the torments of hell.’
This was getting more and more interesting.
‘Okay, so you believe in God, that’s your personal business,’ I said. ‘In actual fact, that’s not so very rare for an Other – but usually their view of God is more . . . er . . . humane.’
‘What has being humane got to do with God?’ Arina asked in surprise. ‘Humane attitudes are for human beings. That’s obvious even from the name.’
‘Okay, let’s accept that, but . . . You know, the usual idea is that God values people’s good deeds, their behaviour! You can be a magician, an Other, but still do good deeds . . .’
‘That contradicts the rules,’ Arina said strictly. ‘The Bible is quite clear, no ambiguous interpretations are possible – sorcery is evil. “Regard not them that have familiar spirits, neither seek out wizards, to be defiled by them . . .” or, more specifically: “There shall not be found among you any one that maketh his son or his daughter to pass through fire, or that useth divination, or an observer of times, or an enchanter or a witch, or a charmer, or a consulter with familiar spirits, or a wizard, or a necromancer. For all that do these things are an abomination unto the Lord and because of these abominations the Lord thy God doth drive them out from before thee . . .”’
‘Have you always been so smart?’ I asked. ‘So why did you go in for being a witch?’
‘What choice does a little peasant girl have?’ Arina asked, with a shrug. ‘Master Jacob didn’t ask me – not when he pulled my skirt up, and not when he shoved me into the Twilight. And once I’d become a witch, I had to live as a witch – there’s no way that can be fixed by praying.’
‘No way?’ I protested. ‘It seems to me that you underestimate the mercy of God.’
Arina shrugged again.
‘Perhaps you’re right,’ she agreed with surprising readiness. ‘Only I’ve done more than just work magic. There have been times when I’ve tormented people to death – starting with Jacob, my teacher. And that’s really bad – to kill teachers . . .’
‘But he raped you!’ I cried indignantly. ‘An underage girl!’
‘Phooey,’ said Arina, with a wave of her hand. ‘Big deal. He didn’t rape me, anyway, he seduced me. He gave me a sugarplum, as it happens. He hardly beat me at all. And as for me still being a little girl – times were different then, they didn’t check your passport, just looked to see if you had any boobs or not. If it hadn’t been Jacob the sorcerer, it would have been Vanka the shepherd or Yevgraf Matveevich the master who deflowered me . . .’
She thought for a second and added: ‘Most likely Vanka, I wasn’t really comely enough for the lord to summon me.’
‘And I was sure you killed your teacher for the rape,’ I said. ‘Remember what you wrote in your statement? “Lascivious brute” – I think that was it.’
‘Lascivious brute!’ Arina agreed. ‘And so he was. I washed for him and cooked for him, and in bed I tried with all my young girl’s might! But every month he went to the whorehouse, or seduced some society lady . . . I wept and wailed and hammered at him with my fists, but he just spread his arms and said: “Meine liebe Arina – you must understand that man is by his nature a licentious beast, disposed to seek conquests in the field of love. I sleep with you because it is useful for your instruction and training, but you have neither the body nor the experience to lay claim to my full attention.” Of course, I realised that he was right. Only I thought I’d filled out really well on my pupil’s rations, with my breasts way out here, and a backside like that! And I already knew how to satisfy a man in any way at all. But he still kept going off to others on the side! It was my birthday, I was thirteen, and he spent the day in the brothel! Well . . . I just couldn’t stand it. I challenged him to a duel, all fair and square. I hoped he would surrender and ask for forgiveness – I would have forgiven him. But he obviously couldn’t believe that I’d grown stronger than him, he fought to the death . . . and so . . .’
Arina sighed.
‘You’re not making fun of me, are you?’ I asked.
‘No, why would I?’ Arina replied. ‘You have to understand, Light One, that life is complicated, it’s not black-and-white, but coloured, in fine speckles. Of course, there are some who are villains to the depths of their soul, and some who are righteous through and through. But their kind don’t live long. And most are a mixture. Everything’s jumbled up together in people, and we came from people, and there’s no getting away from that . . .’ Arina turned to a hostess who was passing by and said, smiling: ‘Dearie, bring us something to eat, will you? Champagne for me and cognac for my beau.’
‘I don’t want it,’ I muttered.
‘Then champagne for him too,’ Arina said imperturbably.
CHAPTER 7
I WAS CERTAIN they would start to check us out at the airport. Naturally, we passed through passport control without any problems – the vigilant Taiwanese border guards saw non-existent Taiwanese visas in our passports, and the smart Taiwanese computers docilely swallowed their non-existent numbers. Arina dealt with it – to be honest, I would have preferred simply to pass through the control point while invisible, or walk in through the Twilight. But the Witch preferred to create the fake entry documents, muttering: ‘Just to keep my hand in . . .’ We hadn’t got any sleep in the plane after all, but we had drunk plenty of champagne and cognac, and our eyes were tired from watching films, so we were looking in really fine shape. All I personally wanted was to get to the hotel and collapse into sleep.
After passport control we passed through the control point for Others, and once again it all looked remarkably friendly. No one blocked our way: as we approached passport control we simply saw a poster that was only visible to our kind, politely inviting all Others to ‘visit the check room’. For humans, the poster had a far more frightening message – it declared that in Taiwan the penalty for importing narcotics was capital punishment, and if you had anything suspicious that had been left in your pockets by oversight, it would be best to drop it into the rubbish bin thoughtfully placed below the poster . . .
‘What remarkable trust,’ I said as we made our way towards the ‘check room’. ‘And what if we simply decided not to go? The way out’s wide open.’
‘Don’t be a dunce, charm-caster. I’m sure we’ve been followed from the moment we left the plane – or
rather, from when we were still on the plane.’
‘What makes you think that?’ I asked in amazement
‘Our hostess was a Light Other. Weak, only Seventh-Level. But we weren’t concealing ourselves – and I think we did right not to.’
The check room was tucked away closer to the exit, between the toilets and a souvenir stall. (I can’t imagine who would buy souvenirs when they’ve only just got off the plane, but there were a couple of strange individuals like that standing at the stall.) We walked through the door into a perfectly cosy little area with soft furniture, a tiny bar counter, its own toilet and a supervisor’s desk. In this case the term ‘reception desk’ would have been rather more appropriate. I really didn’t want to think of the two pretty girls behind the desk as supervisors. In Russian the word carries far too many bureaucratic associations. The girls were twenty at the outside, and they looked even younger than that: they both had pretty, smiling faces – but one was Light and the other was Dark.
That applied in the literal sense too – one of them had very thoroughly bleached hair.
In fact, no one tried to conceal the fact that we had been watched. As we walked in, the light-haired girl was just pouring a second glass of champagne. Arina laughed and directed my glance to the bottle with her eyes – I looked closer and realised it was the same sort that we had been served in the plane.
‘Welcome to the land of Taiwan,’ the dark-haired girl said, leaning towards us in a half-bow. ‘Have you chosen the hotel in which you will stay, venerable Great Ones?’
‘The Shangri-La,’ Arina replied, accepting a glass.
‘Here is a card with the address, which you should show to your driver,’ said the dark-haired girl, holding out a small rectangle of cardboard to the witch. ‘Unfortunately, not all our drivers here know English . . .’
‘We are Others, and we can—’ I began, astounded at the absurdity of the situation – after all, we were speaking Chinese.
‘If you begin talking in Guoyu or Taiwanese, the driver will feel very awkward. The card indicates the approximate cost of the journey to the hotel in new Taiwanese dollars. If the driver demands a greater amount, pay him, and then call the phone number on the card to let us know.’
‘And then what will happen?’ I asked out of curiosity.
‘He will be sacked,’ the girl twittered. ‘And your money will be returned. May your stay in Taiwan be calm and joyful.’
‘Do we have to fill in any forms?’ I asked.
‘There is no need for that, Mr Gorodetsky,’ the girl replied in Russian – and not just in Russian acquired by magical means. Her speaking voice had the very slightest hint of an accent – just enough to add a little piquancy – and perfectly clear Moscow pronunciation.
I wondered whether, if I had been from St Petersburg, I would have been met by a girl who had studied or worked there.
Feeling slightly embarrassed, I finished my champagne, took the card, bowed briefly to the girl (now where did I get manners like that?) and then Arina and I left.
‘They do their job well,’ Arina said approvingly.
‘I like their approach to money-grabbing taxi drivers,’ I said, nodding in agreement.
‘Certainly. Although I should point out that frequently one taxi driver working here in Taipei feeds half of his mountain village. The temptation to rip off a tourist is very great . . . But I agree, it’s not good to abuse tourists. Especially if those tourists are us.’
‘And did you notice that their level of Power was screened?’ I asked. ‘Of course, I didn’t scan them actively . . .’
‘The Light One’s Third-Level,’ Arina replied as she watched out for a car. ‘But the Dark One’s a smart girl: she covered herself well. She had an interesting kind of amulet made of seaweed and fish skin . . . I didn’t get through her defences either. Come on, there’s the taxi stand.’
I’d been wrong about the airport. The serious talk was waiting for us at the hotel.
We took adjacent rooms. (Arina had enough delicacy not to suggest moving in together.) I looked over my room and stood for a minute at the immense French window that covered an entire wall, gazing out at Taipei as it was flooded by the lights of evening. The sight was astounding. And not at all because of the skyscrapers, although right in front of the hotel there was one that simultaneously resembled a Chinese pagoda and some exotic fruit, thrusting its pinnacle up into the sky. There are bigger skyscrapers in New York, Shanghai and Hong Kong.
The astounding thing here was the contrast. Taipei was not such a very tall city: on all sides there were entire neighbourhoods of buildings no more than three or four storeys high. The isolated high-rise structures should have looked alien here.
But the contrast was astonishingly harmonious. The old city, huddling down against the ground, looked like undergrowth, with the skyscrapers sprouting up through it. The low, far-from-modern buildings were not in the least ashamed of their appearance – on the contrary, they actually seemed to take pride in the glittering modern structures rising up from among them.
I involuntarily recalled the vociferous protest campaigns that had raged in St Petersburg when there were plans to construct a skyscraper there. All that hysterical howling about the destruction of the cultural environment, the disfigurement of the glorious line of the horizon, the possibility that unique seventeenth-century ruins, or even the camps of primeval human beings, might be buried under the skyscraper . . .
Yes, of course the mentality in St Petersburg is special, cultivated on the swamps by the damp, piercing wind. But I would quite happily have sent all the protesters to live for a month or two in an old Petersburg communal apartment block, with mouldy walls and narrow little windows. And then I would have asked them to vote on whether it was necessary and possible to erect modern buildings in an old city.
After all, love of one’s country doesn’t simply mean that you want to preserve as many tottering old ruins as possible. Otherwise the whole of North America would live in Indian wigwams and the log huts of the first settlers; London would consist entirely of the Victorian and Edwardian buildings so dear to the heart of the tourist, but not so very comfortable on the inside; and as for Africa and Asia – well, enough said . . .
I looked at the soaring skyscrapers and thought that I was beginning to understand the Chinese a little bit better. The ones living on the mainland and the ones on this island.
And I even envied them a little.
I opened my suitcase, took out some clean underclothes and walked into the bathroom. Everything was very stylish. There was even a little television set standing on a shelf beside the sink. An expensive business: all these televisions for bathrooms require insulation against damp and they cost big money. I once wanted to put one like that in our bathroom at home, to watch the news while I was getting washed, shaving and brushing my teeth, but the price put me right off the idea.
I picked up the television – it was absolutely tiny, only twelve inches wide. I could easily lift it with one hand. I turned it round.
At the back I saw microcircuits glittering behind the holes in a standard plastic cover. How come? The guests get washed, splash water about, take hot showers, fill the bathroom with clouds of steam – and there’s a TV set standing here, with no insulation? It’ll blow a circuit! It might last a year, but that circuit will still blow! Why hadn’t they put in an expensive one, a proper one?
Well, for the same reason that they don’t demolish old buildings until they fall down on their own, an inner voice whispered to me. A special TV would cost two thousand dollars. One like this barely costs a hundred. Surely it’s far simpler to change it once every year or so than invest money in technology that rapidly becomes obsolete?
I put the television back down, switched on the BBC and stepped into the shower, realising that, for all my lack of sophistication, I had managed to grasp an intriguing point that was very far from our Russian mentality. Back home there either wouldn’t be a TV in the bathroom o
r there would be an insanely expensive one, and the price of the room would rocket by fifty per cent. We don’t like disposable items. We can still remember how to mend nylon tights, wash plastic bags and go to fetch the milk in a can. We can find a multitude of uses for an empty yogurt carton – from growing seedlings to storing small change.
To some extent Russia has unexpectedly found itself marching in step with the countries of the West and their obsession with ecology, economising resources and recycling. Not because the green movement is popular here, but because of this centuries-old habit of economising. Only, as often happens in Russia, we take everything to absurd extremes – in both directions: the same people who darn their tights also buy hugely expensive cars and domestic appliances . . .
I wonder if that’s a plus or a minus for us, I thought as I sluiced myself down under the shower head. Take this shower, for instance. The head’s not cheap, probably quite expensive, in fact, with its tiny little holes for the water and valve for sucking in air. Self-indulgence? Not exactly. A shower like this uses about half as much water as mine in Moscow does. But we’ve only just realised that water costs money – and a lot of it! No one really appreciates what they have in abundance, so we Russians have never really valued or cared for our forests, rivers and natural environment – or even ourselves, basically. The attitude in that old one-liner ‘Shall we wash these children or have new ones?’ is still around, only nowadays we Russians take care of the children . . . but not of ourselves. What has to happen to us before we understand that we have to take good care of everything we have, of every tree in our boundless forests, every little stream that isn’t even marked on the maps, every village with only five households, every soldier drafted into the army, every man in the street toiling under his dreary daily burden? What will it take to change us? Communism didn’t change us – it valued people in words, but even then not all of them, and only as cogwheels in a single, integrated mechanism. Democracy didn’t change us: on the contrary, it gave us all the freedom to hate each other. What is it that we want? Maybe, like the Jews thousands of years ago, only pain and death, to lose our state and be scattered throughout the world, despised and oppressed by other nations – maybe only that will allow the Russian nation to come to its senses and recover its unity. To unite, but not as it has united in the past – without counting the losses or acknowledging the cost of victory – but on some other level? All great peoples have to suffer catastrophes sooner or later, to pass through their own national holocausts: this is a lesson known by China, which was once dying of opium addiction and has been torn apart, and by Germany, which suffered defeat in two wars and the disgrace of Nazism. And it should also be remembered by Russia, which has suffered fratricidal revolutions and bloody wars . . .