ON THE OTHER HAND, there is something one can envy both the Armenians and the Azerbaijanis. They are not beset by worries about the complexity of the world or about the fact that human destiny is uncertain and fragile. The anxiety that usually accompanies such questions as: What is truth? What is the good? What is justice? is alien to them. They do not know the burden that weighs on those who ask themselves, But am I right?
Their world is small — several valleys and mountains. Their world is simple — on one side we, the good people, on the other they, our enemies. Their world is governed by an unambiguous law of exclusivity — us or them.
And if another world exists nevertheless, what might they want of it? Only that it leave them in peace. They need to be left in peace so as to thrash each other all the more thoroughly.
THE SUN AWOKE me in the morning. I jumped out of bed, walked to the window, and stopped, speechless. I was in one of the most beautiful corners of the world! It was like somewhere in the Alps, in the Pyrenees, in Rhodope, like Andorra, San Marino, or Cortina d’Ampezzo. Yesterday, because of the tension, I hadn’t noticed the panoramas surrounding me. Only now did I see what was unfolding all around. Sun, sun everywhere. Warm, but at the same time brisk, as in the mountains. Azure everywhere, intense, profound, limpid, cobaltlike. The air clean, crystalline, bright. Far away, up high — mountains crowned with white snow. And closer, also mountains, but green, a strong green, all awash in dwarf mountain pines, in wild grasses, in meadows, in mossy trails.
In this enchanting, luscious landscape are set the shabby, dilapidated concrete apartment blocks of Stepanakert’s neighborhoods, heavy, large slabs clumsily and sloppily assembled, slovenly, mean. In the place where I had spent the night the buildings form a closed quadrangle. Between them, between balconies, residents had stretched steel wires. Little pulleys move along the wires, with drying laundry attached to them. Manipulating the pulleys, one can keep one’s laundry in the direct line of sunlight all day — it will dry more quickly that way. Because there isn’t a great deal of room, some sort of timetable must be enforced, some sort of agreed-upon schedule delineating who can hang out how much of his laundry when. Judging by the laundry’s kind, composition, and appearance, one can discover a great deal about the intimate life of one’s neighbors. One can also obtain important shopping information. Where did the neighbor from across the way get such fine stockings? This network of wires stretched above the courtyard, above the trees growing here, is so inventive and intricate that probably only the local women know how to direct, skillfully and smoothly, this entire parade of shirts and slacks, underwear and stockings, that every now and then comes to life as it moves now forward, now to the side or back.
STAROVOYTOVA is returning to Yerevan, and, in the apartment where I am being hidden, the Armenians have been conferring since morning — what is to be done with me? How can I be gotten out of here? The reports brought back from the airport by various messengers sound dire. The military commander of Nagorno-Karabakh (a general whose last name I do not remember), wanting to allay the anger of Secretary Mutalibov and his allies in Moscow, has decided on a show of force: he will do everything to ensure that Starovoytova will never again want to set foot here, that she will depart in an atmosphere of intimidation and hostility. All cars along the road to the airport are being searched; the airport itself is swarming with soldiers; commandos have even been positioned along the runway.
I can see that my Armenians are nervous and are starting to quarrel. I do not understand the precise content of these disputes, but it is certain that they are about me, because every now and then they interrupt the discussions and let fly in my direction: “Get dressed in the uniform!” (I get dressed.) After a while: “No! Put on the civilian clothes!” (I put these on.) After another round of quarrels: “No! Get back in the uniform!” I obediently execute these contradictory orders because I discern that the situation is truly serious: I am in a trap. I will not be able to make my way to the plane through such a densely laid net.
THE MATTER IS further complicated by the fact that news of the arrival of Starovoytova (who is immensely popular here) has spread all over town, and a crowd is gathering in front of our building. If there is a crowd, then troops will soon appear; if troops arrive, they will start to inquire about why the crowd is gathering, et cetera; and thus they will follow the thread until they reach the spool — our hiding place. The Armenians are growing increasingly nervous; the temperature of their quarrels rises violently.
Finally one of the messengers arrives (it is that splendid bearded man who yesterday got me out of the airport) and tells the Armenians something. They fall silent at once and look out the window. After a time, one of them says to me: “You see that militia car with the rotating beacon?” On the roof of the car standing in front of our building a sky-blue beacon was slowly spinning round. “You will go downstairs,” says the Armenian, “you will push your way through the crowd, and you will get into the backseat of that car, behind the driver. You must make it look like you know exactly what you are doing.”
NOW, in the uniform of an Aeroflot pilot, I walk down to the courtyard. I see the faces in the crowd; I push my way through and walk straight to the militia car. Only the driver is inside, an Armenian sergeant. I sit down in the back and wait. Starovoytova appears and the crowd encircles her. Just then an army patrol pulls up — blonds, therefore Russians: the situation is becoming dangerous. Starovoytova cuts short the meeting and gets into the Volga standing to the side. Two militiamen, Armenians, get into the car I am sitting in, and a militia captain — also Armenian — takes the place next to the driver.
We pull out first, the Volga behind us. Patrols along the road — disoriented, because they are supposed to be checking every car, but this, after all, is a militia car, its siren blaring. We somehow manage to drive through the labyrinth of concrete blocks, and then through the raised barrier. The soldiers in these patrols are all young, tall blonds — Slavs. Blue-eyed, Russian-speaking.
Sun, heat. It is nearing noon.
The captain sitting next to the driver is very tense. He knows how much he is risking at this moment. I am thinking that the rest of us know it too. Although we are driving quite quickly, the road becomes a psychological Golgotha, elongating into infinity.
Finally — the airport. I see the parked JAK-40. The airplane is here! But what a long way we still have to go to get to it! We must still surmount the most difficult obstacle — the gate leading to the runway. Near the gate, a throng: commandos, officers. We stop some distance before it; the car carrying Starovoytova pulls up behind us. One of the militiamen gets out of my car, and she takes his place. We reach the gate and are immediately surrounded by soldiers. The captain takes out his identity card and says: “Captain Serovian from headquarters. I have orders from the military commander to drive Deputy Starovoytova to the airplane!” And he starts to repeat this over and over to the soldiers crowding at our windows. “Captain Serovian from headquarters. I have orders …” et cetera, et cetera.
Slowly, the soldiers step aside and raise the barrier. We are driving in the direction of the airplane when Starovoytova stops the car and says: “I will go say good-bye to the commander of the airport, and you meanwhile install Ryszard on the plane.”
Suren and Averik are standing by the steps leading to the aircraft. “Get into the cockpit,” says Suren (he says this softly, for the troops are everywhere), “sit down at the controls, and put on the headphones.” I board the plane and find a soldier inside, checking the walls and floor with a metal detector — he is searching to see that weapons haven’t been smuggled in.