was serious they laughed a whole lot more. 'If there's one thing you'll never go hungry for, Georgian,' they told him, as they pushed him into the back of the van, 'it's snow.' That was how he learned he had been sentenced to fifteen years' hard labour in the Kolyma territory.
KHRUSHCHEV amnestied a whole bunch of Gulag prisoners in fifty-six, but nobody amnestied Papu Rapava. Papu Rapava was forgotten. Papu Rapava alternately rotted and froze in the forests of Siberia for the next decade and a half- rotted in the short summer, when each man worked in his own private fever-cloud of mosquitoes, and froze in the long winter when the ice made rock of the swamps.
They say that people who survive the camps all look alike because, once a man's skeleton has been exposed, it doesn't matter how well-padded his flesh subsequently becomes, or how carefully he dresses - the bones will always poke through. Kelso had interviewed enough Gulag survivors in his time to recognise the camp skeleton in Rapava's face even now, as he talked, in the sockets of his eyes and in the crack of his jaw. He could see it in the hinges of his wrists and ankles, and the flat blade of his sternum. He wasn't amnestied, Rapava was saying, because he killed a man, a Chechen, who tried to sodomise him - gutted him with a shank he'd made from a piece of saw. And what happened to your head? said Kelso.
Rapava fingered the scar. He couldn't remember. Sometimes, when it was especially cold, the scar ached and gave him dreams.
What kind of dreams?
Rapava showed the dark glint of his mouth. He wouldn't say.
F ift een years...
They returned him to Moscow in the summer of sixty-nine, on the day the Yankees put a man on the moon. Rapava left the ex-prisoners' hostel and wandered round the hot and crowded streets and couldn't make sense of anything. Where was Stalin? That was what amazed him. Where were the statues and the pictures? Where was the respect? The boys all looked like girls and the girls all looked like whores. Clearly, the country was already halbway in the shit. But still - you have to say - at least in those days there were jobs for everyone, even for old zeki like him. They sent him to the engine sheds at the Leningrad Station, to work as a labourer. He was only forty-one and as strong as a bear. Everything he had in the world was in a cardboard suitcase.
Did he ever marry?
Rapava shrugged. Sure, he married. That was the way you got an apartment. He married and got himself fixed up with a place.
And what happened? Where was she?
She died. It was a decent block in those days, boy, before the drugs and the crime.
Where was his place?
Fucking criminals...
And children?
A son. He died as well. In Afghanistan. And a daughter.
His daughter was dead?
No. She was a whore.
And Stalin's papers?
Drunk as he was, there was no way Kelso could make that question casual and the old man shot him a crafty look; a peasant's look. Rapava said softly, 'Go on, boy. Yes? And Stalin's papers? What about Stalin's papers?'
Kelso hesitated.
'Only that if they still existed - if there was a chance - a possibility -'You'd want to see them?' 'Of course. Rapava laughed. 'And why should I help you, boy? Fifteen years in Kolyma, and for what? To help you spin more lies? For love?'
'No. Not for love. For history.' 'For history? Do me a favour, boy!' 'All right - for money, then.' 'What?'
'For money. A share in the profits. A lot of money.
The peasant Rapava stroked the side of his nose. 'How much money?'
'A lot. If this is true. If we could find them. Believe me: a lot of money.
THE momentary silence was broken by the sound of voices in the corridor, voices talking in English, and Kelso guessed who this would be: his fellow historians - Adelman, Duberstein and the rest - coming back late from dinner, wondering where he'd got to. It suddenly seemed overwhelmingly important to him that no one else - least of all his colleagues - should know anything at all
KHRUSHCHEV amnestied a whole bunch of Gulag prisoners in fifty-six, but nobody amnestied Papu Rapava. Papu Rapava was forgotten. Papu Rapava alternately rotted and froze in the forests of Siberia for the next decade and a half- rotted in the short summer, when each man worked in his own private fever-cloud of mosquitoes, and froze in the long winter when the ice made rock of the swamps.
They say that people who survive the camps all look alike because, once a man's skeleton has been exposed, it doesn't matter how well-padded his flesh subsequently becomes, or how carefully he dresses - the bones will always poke through. Kelso had interviewed enough Gulag survivors in his time to recognise the camp skeleton in Rapava's face even now, as he talked, in the sockets of his eyes and in the crack of his jaw. He could see it in the hinges of his wrists and ankles, and the flat blade of his sternum. He wasn't amnestied, Rapava was saying, because he killed a man, a Chechen, who tried to sodomise him - gutted him with a shank he'd made from a piece of saw. And what happened to your head? said Kelso.
Rapava fingered the scar. He couldn't remember. Sometimes, when it was especially cold, the scar ached and gave him dreams.
What kind of dreams?
Rapava showed the dark glint of his mouth. He wouldn't say.
F ift een years...
They returned him to Moscow in the summer of sixty-nine, on the day the Yankees put a man on the moon. Rapava left the ex-prisoners' hostel and wandered round the hot and crowded streets and couldn't make sense of anything. Where was Stalin? That was what amazed him. Where were the statues and the pictures? Where was the respect? The boys all looked like girls and the girls all looked like whores. Clearly, the country was already halbway in the shit. But still - you have to say - at least in those days there were jobs for everyone, even for old zeki like him. They sent him to the engine sheds at the Leningrad Station, to work as a labourer. He was only forty-one and as strong as a bear. Everything he had in the world was in a cardboard suitcase.
Did he ever marry?
Rapava shrugged. Sure, he married. That was the way you got an apartment. He married and got himself fixed up with a place.
And what happened? Where was she?
She died. It was a decent block in those days, boy, before the drugs and the crime.
Where was his place?
Fucking criminals...
And children?
A son. He died as well. In Afghanistan. And a daughter.
His daughter was dead?
No. She was a whore.
And Stalin's papers?
Drunk as he was, there was no way Kelso could make that question casual and the old man shot him a crafty look; a peasant's look. Rapava said softly, 'Go on, boy. Yes? And Stalin's papers? What about Stalin's papers?'
Kelso hesitated.
'Only that if they still existed - if there was a chance - a possibility -'You'd want to see them?' 'Of course. Rapava laughed. 'And why should I help you, boy? Fifteen years in Kolyma, and for what? To help you spin more lies? For love?'
'No. Not for love. For history.' 'For history? Do me a favour, boy!' 'All right - for money, then.' 'What?'
'For money. A share in the profits. A lot of money.
The peasant Rapava stroked the side of his nose. 'How much money?'
'A lot. If this is true. If we could find them. Believe me: a lot of money.
THE momentary silence was broken by the sound of voices in the corridor, voices talking in English, and Kelso guessed who this would be: his fellow historians - Adelman, Duberstein and the rest - coming back late from dinner, wondering where he'd got to. It suddenly seemed overwhelmingly important to him that no one else - least of all his colleagues - should know anything at all
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