Shadow of a Hero Read online

  ‘You’ll do what you’re told,’ snapped Momma, and then, ‘I’m sorry, darling. I don’t want him worrying about you. Don’t you see?’

  Letta pulled herself together.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ she managed to say. ‘Whatever you want . . . It’s just . . .’

  Then Van came rushing through the doors, hair tousled, a smear of dirt down one cheek, but with glittering eyes and a fizz and fever in his movements.

  ‘Oh, there you are!’ cried Momma. ‘That’s wonderful! How did you get in?’

  ‘Climbed,’ he said. ‘Some of the gang gave me a leg-up to a bedroom window round at the side. Isn’t this terrific? Isn’t this just what we wanted! They couldn’t have done it better for us if we’d asked them!’

  Quite unaware of the appalled hush that filled the room, he rushed to the window and stared out. It was almost light now, with the stars gone and the topmost points of the ridges on either side of the valley tipped with the first rays of the sun. Below them stretched the shadowy slopes and lower still came the tiles and stone of the cathedral, not warm red and gold as they would be at noon but dull brownish and grey. And then, below everything, the immense, dark, roaring crowd.

  ‘You’re not going to ask if we know anything about what’s happened to Grandad?’ said Poppa quietly.

  Van turned, making at least a pretence of shame.

  ‘Oh yes, of course. I’m sorry. Anyone know where they’ve taken the old boy?’

  Poppa told him the news.

  ‘That sounds all right,’ he said. ‘Provided they haven’t beaten him up or anything. If they just ship him out.’

  ‘If they’ve got any sense at all they’ll send him straight back,’ said Poppa.

  ‘Well, let’s hope they haven’t got any sense at all,’ said Van. ‘This is just what we wanted. Otto Vasa’s going to make a speech to them in a bit. They asked me downstairs to check that was OK with you. He’ll need the balcony.’

  There was another silence. Momma and Poppa and Steff looked at each other. Letta could see they didn’t like it at all, but it was difficult for them to say anything. They’d always kept out of Varinian politics, partly not to make things difficult for Grandad and partly because it wasn’t their sort of thing.

  ‘What’s going on?’ whispered Mollie, who hadn’t been able to follow Van’s rapid Field. Letta told her.

  ‘Is this a committee decision?’ she said. She was talking about the main Festival Committee, who’d run everything so far.

  ‘No time for that,’ said Van. ‘Anyway, it’s not just culture any more. And we’ve got to strike while the iron’s hot.’

  There was a knock on the door and two men came in with the podium Grandad had used, and microphones. The loudspeaker system was still in place because there was going to be a closing ceremony in the Square before they all went home. Again Momma, Poppa and Steff looked at each other. Poppa shrugged unhappily and stood aside to let the men through. They opened the central windows, and when the crowd outside saw the podium going into place, their steady angry roar swelled up and rose in pitch. Van strode across to one of the side-windows to watch, but the rest of the family moved to an inside corner of the room.

  ‘I want no part of this,’ said Poppa.

  ‘I think we’re stuck,’ said Momma.

  ‘What do you think Grandad would like us to do?’ said Steff. ‘You met this Vasa chap, didn’t you, Poppa?’

  (They’d all seen him, of course. He’d seemed to be everywhere throughout the festival, always with the same big, benevolent smile and booming voice. Sometimes his wife had been there too, looking like a film star, with a fixed, winsome smile on her lips.)

  ‘He was perfectly polite,’ said Poppa. ‘Momma didn’t care for him.’

  ‘I thought he was gruesome,’ said Momma. ‘I wouldn’t trust him an inch.’

  ‘That’s what Minna Alaya told me,’ said Letta.

  They looked at her in surprise, and she was just about to explain when the doors burst open again and Otto Vasa himself stood there, looking huge and stern, with four or five other men behind him. After a moment’s pause he strode across to them and shook hands, first with Poppa and then with the others.

  ‘This is a terrible business,’ he said. ‘I grieve for you, Mrs Ozolins. My wife sends her condolences. Once again these swine have shown that they are no better than the Germans, no better than the Communists.’

  ‘My father’s just telephoned from Paçek,’ said Momma. ‘It looks as if they’re putting him on a plane back to England.’

  ‘They will say anything,’ said Mr Vasa, dismissively. ‘So great a man, so noble. After all that he has done and suffered for Varina. Now you must come with me. You must be at my side. You must show your faces to the people at this hour of their need.’

  Poppa was about to say something but Mr Vasa simply gripped him by the elbow, put his other arm round Momma’s shoulders, and, without exactly dragging them, marched them towards the window. Mollie looked at Steff. He hesitated, as if he might have refused to follow, but just as Momma stepped onto the balcony she turned and gave a pleading backward glance, so they all trailed out behind.

  The roar of the crowd rose still further, reached a steady, raucous pitch and stayed there. The sunlight had moved halfway down the hillsides, but as the sky brightened the mass of people below seemed darker than ever, with the white bars of the Varinian flags which they waved looking like flecks of foam on a stormy lake. Mr Vasa took up his position at the microphone and motioned the others to the places where he wanted them, Momma on his left, and then Poppa, and then Letta and Nigel; on his right Van, then Mollie, then Steff. He ran both hands through his thick blond hair, which looked like a natural, unthinking movement, but still bushed it out into a romantic, golden mane, and then held up his arms for silence. Letta remembered Grandad doing the same five days ago. Gradually the roaring died away.

  ‘My friends, my countrymen . . .’

  He paused for the roar of voices to crash out, and waited impressively for silence.

  ‘Five days ago those self-same words were spoken from this balcony by our great leader, Restaur Vax . . .’

  Another bellow of voices, one huge voice.

  ‘Five days ago it was a time of hope. After a lifetime of suffering, his suffering, our suffering, we were together again, one people.’

  Again the roar, but this time changing, getting a rhythm, becoming a chant yelled defiantly from ten thousand throats.

  ‘Unaloxatu! Unaloxotu! Unaloxistu!’

  Again, and again, and again. Ten thousand fists punching the air in rhythm to the chant. Mr Vasa with both arms raised, conducting the chant until, with a wide-sweeping gesture, he cut it short.

  ‘Our rulers pretend to be democrats. They hold elections. We send Varinians to their parliament. They say they will listen to us and do what we, the people, want. But these are words. What have they given us? When have they listened to us? How are they better than that swine Ceauşescu, these rulers who come like thieves in the night and snatch an old man from his bed? This is not words. This is what they do! Why? Because they are afraid!’

  By now the yelling was almost continuous, but he carried on, bellowing above the din. At times Letta, though she was only a few feet away, could barely hear what he said, but it didn’t matter. He could have said almost anything, provided he’d said it in that harsh, aggressive bark, in those snapped-out sentences, with his clenched fist smashing down on the podium to hammer the points home.

  Letta loathed him. She hadn’t realized it was possible to hate anyone as much as this. She glanced up at Steff and saw that his face was stern and angry, and Mollie’s too, but Van beyond them was tense and thrilled.

  ‘. . . in what dark prison, in what torture-cell, does Restaur Vax, that good old man, now lie? What are they doing to him, my countrymen?’

  She felt sick. She was going to faint. Wasn’t there anyone in the roaring crowd below who could see what a liar he was? Momma had told
him, only ten minutes ago, that Grandad was all right and they were probably going to put him on a plane to England . . .

  She couldn’t bear it any more, but turned and slipped away behind the others and back into the room. A man said something to her but she simply shook her head and pointed and let him take her arm and help her to the bathroom door.

  She went through and locked it and then stood gripping the basin with both hands, with her head bowed over the bowl, wondering if she really was going to be sick. After a while she decided she wasn’t, so she sat on a chair with her fingers in her ears, trying to blot out the roar. Then it struck her that Momma might miss her and be worried, and then that she was ashamed of herself for running away when the others were all sticking it out, and she didn’t want to be caught skulking in the bathroom, at least, so she unlocked the door, still not having made up her mind whether she could face going back out onto the balcony.

  The question didn’t arise. As she was going through into the main room, Otto Vasa came striding in from the balcony, wearing a grand, heroic look. A small, dark man with a moustache was waiting for him. Neither of them noticed Letta. The small man made a rapid thumbs-up gesture. Mr Vasa dropped the hero mask for an instant and winked like a smug schoolboy, then turned, stern and serious, to help Momma gallantly through the door.

  LEGEND

  The Danube Pilot

  NOW SELIM PASHA sent for his Captains and said, ‘Restaur Vax holds Potok and all Varina north of the Danube. Soon the Sultan will hear of his doings, and he will send armies with generals, and he will say to us who live here, “Why have you allowed our rest to be disturbed by a mere bandit?” And he will take from us our estates, and our sons he will send to his galleys and our daughters to harems, and our names will be no more.’

  The Captains said, ‘We cannot fight Restaur Vax, though we are many more than he. He is too strong in his mountains, where he knows the goat-paths and the paths of the hunter, and can fall on us unawares.’

  Selim said, ‘Then we must bring him across the river to our own lands, where the mountains are less, and strange to him. Go now through the land with your bazouks, and demand of the people more taxes than they can pay, and when they refuse punish them with great cruelty, so that they cry out to Restaur Vax to come to their aid.’

  As he commanded, so it was done, until the West Varinians sent word to Restaur Vax saying, ‘Come to our aid, or we are no more a people.’ And Restaur Vax said, ‘We will go.’ But his chieftains said, ‘Selim will set watch on the river and send his bazouks against us while some of us are yet on the water and those who have landed are as yet unready.’

  Restaur Vax said, ‘We will cross in the dark of the moon.’

  His chieftains said, ‘This is madness. Who crosses the Danube in the dark of the moon? Only the hardiest pilots, and how can we trust them? All the pilots are Serbs and Bulgars.’

  Restaur Vax said, ‘Let boats be gathered at Vosh. Selim will no doubt send us a pilot.’

  And so it was, for a man came to Restaur Vax saying, ‘I am the hardiest pilot on all the river, from the White Mountains to the Inmost Sea. I will lead you over in the dark of the moon.’

  Restaur Vax looked into his eyes and said, ‘You are a fine man. I guess you have many fine sons.’

  The pilot said, ‘I have three fine sons.’

  Restaur Vax, still holding his gaze, said, ‘I trust they are well.’

  The man said, ‘They are indeed well.’

  But Restaur Vax saw his eyes narrow as he spoke, and by that he knew that the man’s sons stood at that very hour in Selim Pasha’s courtyard, with ropes around their necks. Nevertheless, he told him that he should be their pilot, and they settled a price, and gave him food and wine. But as the man ate, Restaur Vax said to Lash the Golden, ‘Have this man watched in secret, and bring me word of all that he does.’

  Then Restaur Vax took his horse and rode on the banks of the Danube, some kolons below Vosh, studying the further shore for a landing-place. On the second dusk, as he rode, he saw an old woman rowing towards the shore, but the current was swift with rains and she was weary with rowing, for she was indeed old, and in her struggle she let go of an oar and it was swept away. She, too, would have been swept away had not Restaur Vax ridden his horse out along a sand-pit and plunged into the river and thrown her a rope and so towed her ashore.

  Then the old woman thanked him, but still she wept and said, ‘Now I have lost an oar, and I shall never see my sister again, for the winter is near and the current is already too great for me, and before the ice forms hard my sister will be dead, with no woman to care for her.’1

  Restaur Vax said, ‘Mother, you are old to be crossing this great river alone. Are you not afraid?’

  She answered, ‘All my life I have lived by the river. I was born on the further shore, and on this shore I was married and widowed, and on the further shore I would wish to die, only I have no means to carry my goods across and now I have lost an oar. But I know this river as a farmer knows his fields. If I had my strength I could cross it in the dark of the moon.’

  ‘So you shall cross it,’ said Restaur Vax. ‘You and your goods. Soon I will send some friends, with a fine boat. They will load your goods aboard and then they will bring you to Vosh to wait for me.’

  ‘Nothing is given for nothing,’ said the woman. ‘I am old, but no fool. Why should you do this for me, who have nothing to give you?’

  ‘You are richer than you know,’ he answered. ‘You have half my country to give me. I am Restaur Vax.’

  At that she blessed him, and said she would do all that he wished.

  When Restaur Vax rode back to the mountains he asked Lash what their pilot had done.

  Lash said, ‘He has built a signal fire on the point above Vosh, which cannot be seen from the quayside. Furthermore he has sent word to his brother to come to him.’

  ‘All goes well,’ said Restaur Vax. ‘Now this we must prepare, and this, and this. Let it be seen to.’

  As the dark of the moon came near, Restaur Vax and the chieftains and their men, all save a few, travelled to Vosh, for they knew that Selim had spies still north of the river. Those few took a boat to the widow’s house and loaded her goods and gear aboard while it was still day, and then she went willingly with them to Vosh. As night came on they all gathered at the quay and boarded the boats which lay ready, and set sail, calling from boat to boat so that they should not be lost to each other. The pilot went with them, but when they were well clear of the quay, his brother ran to the place where the fire was laid ready, and lit it, as a signal to Selim on the further shore that the crossing had begun.

  Then Restaur Vax put his pistol at the pilot’s head, as did the chieftains to those who were steering the other boats, and the old woman stood beside the tiller and said this way, or that, and so brought them down to the place where the boat lay with the old woman’s goods aboard. That they took also, and then crossed the river, still calling softly from boat to boat, and with the old woman still standing by the tiller and saying this way, or that, until she had brought them to the landing-place below her sister’s house.

  It was still then night, so they made ready for battle, and the sister’s son guided them by goat-paths and the paths of the hunter to the landing-place opposite Vosh, where Selim lay in wait.

  Then in the dawn the Captain of Artillery fired her cannon upon the bazouks, who had lain waiting all night and now slept, and Restaur Vax and the chieftains and their men fell upon them with pistol and with sword and slew them. Only Selim escaped, in a swift boat down the river, and fled to the Sultan in Byzantium, who fell into a rage at the news he brought and threw him into his deepest dungeon.

  But Restaur Vax and the chieftains went hither and yon through the mountains and fell upon the bazouks wherever they were, before they could gather themselves into one army, and slew them.2 And until all was done Restaur Vax gave orders that a guard was set on the house where the old woman now lived with her
sister, to see that none should trouble them.

  1 The encounter with the old woman may be borrowed from The Adventure of Prince Ixil, an ancient magical romance, now lost, apart from a few fragments.

  2 The crossing of the Danube for the winter campaign of 1823–4 was accomplished by means of a ruse. Apart from exaggerations of her own role, the account in Marie McMahon’s Memoirs tallies with several of the details in the Legend.

  AUGUST 1990

  THE CAR DROVE right out to the furthest corner of the airport, where a plane was waiting, guarded by a dozen soldiers. When they climbed aboard they found Grandad sitting with his eyes closed at the back of the first-class compartment. He looked old and ill, but smiled and let himself be kissed and patted their hands, but then he lay back and closed his eyes again while the plane taxied round to the terminal to pick up the rest of the passengers.

  The passengers were in a very bad mood, as they’d been kept waiting six hours for Momma and Letta to arrive. Two soldiers with guns stood beside the cabin crew and watched them keenly as they shuffled past. The soldiers left only when the doors were about to shut for the plane to leave.

  It was evening, and as the plane climbed Letta could see further and further into the west, across a vast, already darkening landscape to the final barrier of mountains, hard-edged against fiery-banded sky. Some of that was Varina, she knew. One of those distant hummocks could be Mount Athur. She wondered whether she would ever see it again.

  There was no-one else in the first-class compartment, so they had a stewardess to themselves. She stood and went through the motions with the usual plastic smile while the safety instructions were read out on the intercom, in French and English and Romanian. When the seat-belt sign went off she came and asked if they would like anything to drink. It took Letta a long moment to realize that she had spoken in Field.

  Grandad opened his eyes and smiled. The stewardess glanced swiftly to see whether any of the other cabin staff were in earshot and whispered, ‘Unaloxistu.’ There were tears in her eyes.