‘Alexei! Are you back, Alexei?’
In his sleep he’d heard the ringing and thought himself again in the hospital. But now an accompanying rapping at the door brought him to, and he turned out. He turned out in Ponomarenkos’s fine woollen dressing gown. It was eight o’clock in the morning.
‘One minute, I’m coming!’ he called, as the rapping continued.
‘Alexei! It’s good to hear you again. Welcome back, Alyosha!’
‘Yes, but it’s not Alyosha,’ he said. He was smiling as he opened the door. Kolya Khodyan was a smiler; sometimes taciturn, always temperamental, mainly a smiler. He smiled at difficulties. All this had been worked out.
‘Oh.’ A little old lady in carpet slippers was gazing at him. Her face was lined and like a tabby’s, and it was now gazing up in astonishment at the startling Siberian native with his shaven head. ‘Isn’t Alexei here?’
‘No, he’s still at the Black Sea. He lent me the place for a while. He can’t come just yet.’
‘Is he in trouble there?’
‘No trouble! He’s enjoying himself.’
‘Ah. A girl, is it?’
‘A beauty. Don’t worry about him.’
‘Again — that bad boy! But you — excuse me — you’re —?’
‘Khodyan. Nikolai Dmitrievich — call me Kolya,’ Porter said, and warmly shook her hand. He hadn’t stopped smiling. ‘You don’t know me, but I know you, Anna Antonovna. I know everything about you! He never stopped speaking about you down there.’
‘He did? At Batumi he spoke of me?’ The old lady was delighted.
‘All the time. He said you kept him like a prince here. He said you’d do the same for me. So here I am!’
The old lady did not have many teeth but all of them were now radiantly on display in her smile.
‘Well, well,’ she said, and nudged his arm. ‘But he could have dropped me a line at least. If only to say you were coming. I’ve got his mail here, I’ve been emptying his box, he left me the key.’ Over her arm he now saw she had a string bag stuffed with papers, magazines mainly, by the wrappers. ‘He didn’t have an address when he left. Does he want it sent on now?’
‘No, no. He knows it’s only his magazines. Keep them for him,’ Porter said. ‘And meanwhile keep me like a prince.’
The old lady was peering past him into the room. ‘Well, the usual mess, I see. I thought it was him banging about — I’m just next door. You want me to start now?’
‘No, I’ll take a shower first,’ Porter said. He hadn’t investigated Khodyan’s cases yet and wanted to do so without the old babushka’s scrutiny. There was a sharp look on the catlike face. He hadn’t been banging about. He had made no noise at all. She most have spotted the light come on before he’d drawn the curtains last night.
She asked, ‘Have you anything to eat here?’
‘I brought something with me, enough for now. I won’t waste time. I want to run down to the port office.’
‘Ah, you’re on boats, too?’
‘Boats?’ Porter said. Some of the sunshine faded from his smile. Ponomarenko was supposed to be a truck driver.
‘The trucks. You’re not a driver?’
‘Ah, you know our slang!’ It was as well that he did himself now. The first example of the casual dangers. ‘Sure. On the boats. How are things shaping here this season?’
‘The usual mess at the beginning — they’re running in all directions. But the ice is nearly right. They’ll be glad of you. You’re not from these parts, then — Kolya, is it?’
‘Kolya. No — from Chukotka, the Magadan circuit. But I go anywhere — a boat’s a boat.’
‘Of course — you boys! Well, give me a knock, Kolya. You want the same arrangements to carry on: wash, clean, get in the shopping?’
‘Everything. Whatever you did before, old lady, do it again. You’ll tell me what you need and I’ll leave the money.’
‘And if I find anything?’ Her eyes were still roaming the little apartment. ‘Return it? Or?’
‘Let me take a shower, a mouthful of coffee,’ he pleaded, ‘and I’ll come and see you.’
But he was thoughtful as he closed the door behind her. It wasn’t till he was in the bathroom and his eyes fell again on the bra and the panties that it occurred to him what the ‘or’ meant. There would be a claimant for these goods.
That was another thing they hadn't told him.
24
The Tchersky Transport Company, at this season, had the running of Green Cape. The river had frozen, not solidly as yet, but solidly enough for all the shipping to have vanished. The half-mile length of dock showed no trace of a gangplank, and would not show any for eight months. Now it was crammed with freight, the last frantic unloading of ships that had dashed for open water before the ice trapped them.
Not only the dock but the sheds that lined the dock were crammed; and the huge warehouses on the hill above the dock, acre upon acre of them; all crammed. Through this one small Arctic opening all north-east Siberia was supplied: its gold and diamond mines, its processing plants and power stations, and all the industrial settlements that had developed round them.
In the short summer, when the Kolyma flowed, barges carried the supplies south, for distribution through the river’s tributary system to east and west. But that was in summer, and in the south. Up here no long-distance tributaries ran to east or west. To east and west the area was impassable in summer, and had to wait for winter.
In winter the Tchersky Transport Company took over.
On the steep hill above the dock, Porter watched them doing it. From here he could see the spread of warehouses on top as well as the frenetic activity below. Below, some dozens of teams were at work freeing the crates jamming the dock. The crates towered crazily, dumped one on top of the other as the ships had hurried to leave. Snow had fallen and an icecap had formed, freezing the stacks together. The bulky figures, earflaps down in the bitter wind, were chipping them apart, while cranes and forklifts shifted them on to trucks. A steady stream of trucks was grinding uphill and churning into the storage area. Here the loads were being stowed under the last of the cover — a roofed and pillared overhang extending the length of the warehouses.
He watched for some time, and then turned and trudged through the rutted snow to the administrative block. He had identified it immediately, a squat two-storey building on short piles at the beginning of the warehouse row.
In the dismal morning all the lights were on inside, and the draughty foyer bustled with activity. Clusters of men were going from one wall roster to another; others gathered round the samovars, talking and smoking. He stood for a while, jostled on all sides, and presently made his way to a double set of glass doors at the end. He peered through to a large room filled with desks. Men and women were writing, phoning, passing papers to each other over glasses of tea. He couldn’t make out anyone noticeably managerial, and turned away to get himself some tea at a samovar. There were no glasses here, just paper cups and a drum of somewhat grubby lumps of sugar. He reached for a couple of lumps, and as he turned jostled another man, spilling his tea.
He apologised.
‘It’s nothing.’ The man wiped his leather jacket.
‘Some crush here!’
‘Start of the season. Nothing’s rolling. You new here?’
‘Just got in. Is Bukarovsky still here?’
‘The road manager? Sure. Upstairs.’