Via Prague

Nothing Like The Sun

.
'You are nervous?' she asked. 'Don't worry, I'm a good driver.'
'I'm not nervous.' Stephan's hand clutched the leather handle over the window.
'Men are usually nervous when a woman drives.'
'No, really it's fine.'
He was nervous, though more about the day ahead. Alena had invited him to spend the day in Libohovice, where her grandparents owned a cottage. But first the two of them were to tour the village and castle and have lunch. It was a beautiful ride out to the village. Alena had picked Stephan up in her little red car and, with Lucie carefully packed into a carseat and Stephan in the passenger seat, Alena guided the car out of the busy suburbs and into the countryside.
The morning was grey and chilly. North of Prague they passed over flat farmland; in the distance near Melnik a single mountain broke the landscape, its peak only a dim watermark against the sky, and they talked in their old easy way, like the rolling waves of the Bohemian countryside
It was an hour-long drive, during which they passed other tiny villages, with their neat, stone houses, hardly changed in the past couple centuries, the churches and inevitable pubs and out into the rolling flat countryside again.
Libohovice consisted of a few narrow streets converging on a town square. That morning it looked quiet and desultory. They parked, got Lucie into a stroller, and Alena slipped on a bright red scarf that brought a brilliance to her auburn features. She smiled complacently when Stephan's glance complimented her.
'It's a little cold – so maybe it will be short tour,' she said lightly, taking the stroller.
Stephan wanted a smoke but stifled the urge and forced his thoughts away, focusing on the new surroundings. Missing were the noise and clamor of the city; a sleepy calm filled the streets with the exception of a few chirps and whistles from unseen birds.
The castle was just off the square. It was small – by castle standards – it was more like a mansion or chateau. Stephan thought vaguely that it resembled his conception of Gatsby's mansion, with its tall, flat-stone facade, staid and handsome, heavy oak door, and rows of large windows looking out onto a well-kept expanse of lawns and gardens.
'It's a pity we can't go inside,' Alena said. 'It's closed for winter, but if you want you can come again in the summer.'
'How old is it?' Stephan asked.
'I'm not sure. I think 11th Century.'
They roamed over the castle grounds, past an elaborate but somehow inappropriate greenhouse, a silent fountain, and over the grassy lawn that stretched several hectares down to the Ohre river. The river that morning was high from recent rains, and had a smudged, blurry look on the surface.
'It's from the mud,' Alena explained. 'Sometimes there is red clay also and the river is red.'
'I see where you get your complexion,' he smiled.
'Yes, maybe.'
'Ever go swimming in it?'
'Sometimes, when I was a child. Not today though, it's cold.'
Lucie had slept most of the way from Prague. Now she was awake and clamoring for food. Alena sat on one of several stone benches near the river and produced a bottle from her bag and a small jar of beets. Stepan watched her feed Lucie for a while, then turned his attention again to the river. A group of old men in heavy sweaters were fishing. Another old man, in a derby cab, and riding an old-fashioned green bicyle with a basket, passed languidly over the bridge.
'It's like something out of a fairy tale,' Stephan mused. His eyes roamed over the lawn and back to the castle, barely visible behind a grove of trees.
'What?' Alena had looked up from Lucie.
He repeated his impression, including in his sweep the river and parochial fishermen.
'Yes,' Alena said. 'Sometimes they make TV serials here – for children. Have you ever been to Karlstejn?'
He hadn't.
'No? Oh, you should! Maybe sometime we will go there. It's not far from Prague. There is a castle there too. Many Czech fairy tales are written about Karlstejn.'
Her phone beeped just then.
'Ano?' She said something rapid in Czech.
'Honza?' he asked, after she hung up.
'Mother. She says she will meet us at two.' She laughed. 'And she said tell Stephan there is no McDonald's near.'
'It's a pity.'It was just noon then, which gave them two hours. They walked through the park, along the river, chatting amiably, completing a wide circle that presently brought them back to the castle again. Stephan tried to peer in the windows but a small concrete moat kept the curious at a tactful distance.
'Yes, it's closed,' Alena said. 'Next time.'
'Next time.' Stephan took a step back and took in the entire facade again.
'I could see you living there.'
'- oh no,' Alena said hastily.
'No?'
She shivered with distaste.
'Too cold for me.'
'Yes, you prefer panalaky.'
'I suppose that's ironic, isn't it. But at least a panalaky is warm, well, usually. And you? You would live there?'
Stephan's eyes were still on the castle. He tried to imagine the people who had once lived there; lost summer evenings when perhaps guests stayed in the upper rooms, bright activities spilling out onto the lawn, where music and dancing and games went on late into the nights, with svetluska, or fireflies, alternating flashes with the shining eyes of the revelers.
'Maybe,' he said. 'Is it for sale?'
'I don't think so.' Alena laughed again.'But then everything is for sale now. In my friend's village there is one castle they use for a warehouse. You see it and it is full of boxes. I think it is a printing company. It's sad, in a way. But then at least they are still useful.'
'Is this one furnished?' Stephan asked.
'Oh yes, it's very nice.'
Stepan was thinking about what she'd said. The previous autumn he'd made a trip with a student to the mountains in Moravia. Along the way they'd passed another castle that was filled with boxes, and the student had made the same observation. Further down the road they'd passed a rotted factory, its empty interior visible through collapsing walls.
'We use castles for warehouses, and factories that make nothing,' Tomas had said, in his imperfect English. 'Only in Czech Republic.'
They'd both laughed, but later Stephan realized he'd wanted to add something to Tomas' remark, and here Alena's comment reminded him.
'It's not only here – everywhere it's the same,' he said.
'What?'
He shrugged, and told her about the Moravian trip. When he finished, Alena looked thoughtful.
'At least this one is still the same.'
'Would you ever come back here, I mean to the village?'
'No,' she said. 'It's nice here, relaxing. But there's nothing. No work or money. Most of the people here must drive to Prague for work. It's easier for me also with Lucie. We are close to the hospital, to everything. I want her to go to a good school. Here the school is bad because they cannot pay good money for teachers.'
'It's a pity,' he said.
'Yes, it's a nice village – but not for living.'

They had lunch at a place called Pamplona, the biggest restaurant in the village. It's Spanish theme and decor contrasted with the rest of the village. Outside there were tables but they were covered in tarp for the winter. There was hardly anyone inside, so they got a good seat at a wooden booth that had pillow cushions for seats. The waitress was a high school girl, shy and obviously under the impression that they were a family of tourists on holiday. She seemed surprised when Alena greeted her in Czech, and looked over at Stephan with interest. He was amused at being mistaken for Lucie's father, but at the same time it left him feeling grand and assured, especially when he remembered the 5,000 crown note in his wallet. He told Alena to order whatever she wanted.
''It's OK,' he said. 'I'm rich today.'
'Are you sure?'
'Of course, and for the drive.'
Hearing in his tone that he wanted to return the hospitality, Alena smiled and returned to the menu. She ordered a grilled chicken with roasted potatos and cabbage, and a glass of merlot, while he chose the steak Dijon with a mug of Pilsner.
They were sitting catecorned in the booth, and when the lunch was served, on broad rose-colored plates, they moved closer together and talked about the meal, Alena occasionally trying to get Lucie to take a few bites of her potatoes. The child was bored with the potatoes so Alena reached in her bag for a pacifier and let her chew on that instead. Meanwhile, Stephan watched, noting again to himself how quiet the child was. He'd never seen such a quiet child, and mentioned it to Alena.
'Yes, she is usually,' Alena patted and smoothed her daughter's hair, and smiled at her. 'When her teeth started coming in last month it was bad. I was up with her many times in the night. I read in a book that if you use a blow drier it helps calm them. It's because it sounds like it did inside the belly.'
'Does it work?' Stephan asked.
'Yes, at least it did for a while. It doesn't really work now.'
'Maybe she's forgotten already.'
'Maybe.'
Presently Alena excused herself and took Lucie and, grabbing her bag, went to the toilet. The waitress came by and took the plates.
'Jistì nìco?' the girl asked.
'Ne, zaplatim, prosim.'
'The girl indicated the direction of the toilet.
'Dobry?'
'Ano.'
Alena came back with Bara a bundle in her arms. She'd changed Lucie into a pink jumper with a snow-white woolen cap on her head.
'Honza called,' she said absently, after the girl had come back with the bill and he'd paid.
'He wanted to know where I am,' she continued. 'He knows you are here and I think maybe he is a bit jealous.'
'Is everything alright?'
'I told him before he could come, but he said he was busy.'
'Maybe he's shy,' Stephan said generously.
'Yes,' Alena said. 'Most Czech people are this way. We are not always so comfortable with foreigners. He knows he would just sit here and not understand and you of course don't speak Czech.'
'I could practice --' Stephan offered.
'No,' Alena said. 'It's a pity though. You are here how long?'
'Nearly three years. I've known you for two.'
'Alena looked reflective.
'Yes, that's right. We've known each other two years. It's a pity you don't speak more Czech. But of course you an English teacher. You must speak English.'
'You're right though. You could teach me.'
'Alena laughed again.
'I don't think I would be very good teacher.'
'You'd be great.'
'How?'
'You're patient – that's most important. And you already speak good English.'
'Uvideme.'
'What?'
Uvideme. It mean's in Czech 'we'll see.'
He tried the word.
'No,' Alena laughed, and corrected him. 'Uvideme, make the 'y' sound on the 'e.'
He tried again, and a third time before he managed to get it.
'It's OK,' Alena said. 'I know, Czech is not easy language. Sometimes my friends will say, 'Why do we have to speak English? Why can't these foreigners speak Czech, this is Czech Republic!' They get really angry. They say,' Before we must speak German, and then Russian, and now English.' They say we are too tolerant, we should be strong and say, 'No, no, now we will speak only Czech.' But I say, 'if we only speak Czech no one will understand. And you cannot use Czech outside Czech Republic. We are a small country, not like America.'
'Padesat, padesat,' Stephan said, remembering Mira at Pavels.
'Yes, that's right. My grandmother, babicka, she says the same. Could be better, could be worse.'


Alena's mother was standing at the doorstep in front of the cottage when they drove up a half hour later.
It had been a quiet drive. Stephan had let Alena concentrate on the narrow, one-way country lane that led to the cottage. Several times she had to pull off the road to let a car coming from the other direction pass. He liked to watch her drive, and several times when she turned to check her hair came close and he could smell its clean, warm scent. On the right was a sloping embankment that looked through slender trees at rows of tiny cottages, some resembling miniatures constructed of matchsticks. But they were well-made and sturdy looking, and, at least to Stephan, who could find no other word, cozy. Alena agreed. 'Pohodicka, we say in Czech.'
Alena's mother let out a relieved cry when they got out of the car. To Stephan, it seemed the woman had harbored a suspicion that some harsh unforeseen disaster was awaiting them on the road, and was now relieved to see her daughter and her foreign companion arrive quiet safely. Now she rushed and made a fuss over Lucie, who was awake and looking with satisfied eyes over the commotion she'd caused. Stephan looked on quietly, waiting to be introduced.
Jirina, as her name was, was a stout, florid woman in her early forties, and she greeted Stephan cordially. Stephan could see nothing of Alena in her; where Alena was reserved, her mother was effusive, unrestrained; she had the Russian woman's thick nose, and her hair, once black, was flaked with grey. But it was clear the two women were close, even affectionate. 'I call her every day,' she told Stephan later. Jirina shook hands with Stephan and she seemed to approve of him, for she said, 'Ahoj,' the familiar greeting, and smiled cheerfully and urged them to come inside.
'Anglican?' he heard her ask Alena.
'American, mamcha.'
'American?' Jirina's eyes widened, and she looked at Stephan again.
'Ano,' Stephan allowed himself to say.
'Ah, USA! Kde?'
'California.'
'Calee-forniya!' Jirina looked at the word in the air and smiled at it. 'Ah, hezky, super!' Then she looked concerned and in Czech asked. 'Are you cold here?'
'Ne, ne. Dobry.'
'He's my teacher, mamcha. We spoke about him.' Alena put a protective hand on Stephan's shoulder. They had a quick discussion in Czech, of which to Stephan the word 'coffee' was comprehensible.
'Yes,' Alena answered a moment later. 'I told her we will wait until Babicka and Grandfather arrive. Otherwise we would just sit and talk and you wouldn't understand anything.'
'Are you sure?' Stephan wanted to be polite.
'Yes, and she wants to some time with Lucie and I need a break. So she can watch Lucie and we can go for a walk if you want.'
Mamcha was holding Lucie. She picked up her little hand and waved it for her as they walked away.
The morning had been místy and grey, but now a sliver of white-gold light made a deep crack in the charcoal sky, and the light fell crossways through the trees, lending to the neighborhood and unearthly hue, as though a photographer had slipped a gauze over the lens. A neighbor was burning a pile of leaves, and the smoke sent a slight melancholy driving through their nostrils as they breathed the heavy autumn air. There was a feeling they'd passed, walking alone together, visibly to another stage, and conscious of it, they walked slower and more deliberately.
Stephan was thinking it would be a fine moment to reach over and touch her auburn hair, and so he did, and Alena didn't mind, nor did she a moment later when he took her face in his hands, feeling its shape; their lips rushed to meet and in that moment the countryside, the strange light, the sounds in the trees, the melancholy smoke, everything melted away.
'Wow,' he said, after they'd awakened. 'Hezky.'
Her eyes were shining and happy. They kissed again and she crumpled against him and felt very warm and small against his chest. He noticed her lip was trembling.
'What is it?'
'I was just thinking, you will get what you want.'
'What?'
'You will get what you want, but if you do you will go away.'
'Nobody's going away.'
'Are you sure?'
'Udvideme.'
She smiled a little sadly, thought about something. A moment ago she'd thought of something, it was when he had touched her hair. She'd forgotten what it was, something important she wanted to tell him, and now she raced to find it, and in a moment, it came to her.
'I don't want a fairy tale, you know,' she raised her eyes and looked at him.
For a moment he didn't understand. When he did he was inclined to say, yes, yes you do, but a instinct told him to be quiet. She seemed to see something in him, because she relaxed and turned her face up to be kissed again, and so he did. He'd never seen her face so close before, he reckoned. Her irises were bright, almost mischievous. He saw the skin with its irridescence beneath the rose tan and saw it in a few years tightening over the high cheekbones that would fill out and sink, the fine structure of the nose that would sharpen like a birds, the forehead broaden and thicken.
'My mistress's eyes are nothing like the sun,' he found himself saying aloud.
'Co je?' She had been far away and her answer came automatically in Czech.
He smiled.
'Nic. Nothing.'

They passed an old man in a red-flanneled shirt walking in the road. They exchanged formal greetings. Alena laughed quietly at Stephan, teasing him. She stepped lightly along the path now; her tennis shoes were very white against the dark earth, and she stepped carefully to avoid getting them dirty. With some distress she noticed his frock coat was covered in lint, and from time to time she brushed it. It was a shame, she thought unconsciously, a man of education – which he most assuredly was, should be turned out a little better. She liked his elegant frame, though typically she preferred larger-framed men like Honza.
But as they walked she didn't think these things. She felt bold, light and happy – clean. Not like that afternoon at the apartment. She realized now it had been merely an animal thing; they were both lonely and heartsick and they had satisfied something. Here everything felt resolved and healthy. And even if it turned out to be bad later, she reflected, , there had been this one true moment when everything was alright – fresh, clear, warm and lovely. It felt like stepping into a newly constructed home, when you knew you didn't have the money to buy it but could just imagine living in it and be on your way. She felt pleased and proud of him, of them both. That's why she'd laughed and teased him about the old man, because she realized he knew she was like that too.
'He understands,' she would have murmured to herself if Stephan wasn't there. 'He understood about the old man because I'm like that.'
'You like Czech people,' she said instead.
'Sometimes,' he said.
'Sometimes?'
'Padesat-padesat. This one woman in my building. She complained to the management because I never said 'Good day' to her. The manager came to my flat and spoke about it. 'Just say 'Dobry den' to her, please? You are not in LA. Here we greet people, it is polite.'
'Really?' Alena looked ahead and visualized the scene. 'And what happened?'
'Oh, the next day, I saw the old woman and said, 'Dobry den!' And she smiled and said, 'Ahoj!'
'But I guess it's important,' he reflected. 'She probably has no one to talk to.'
'She's probably lived in that building for 30 years,' Alena said. 'Sometimes I hate these people. They sit all day in their flat and do nothing and then complain that no one speaks to them, or they try to tell things about you. It's from the Communism, I think. People were afraid and they would spy on each other, because they felt safe if they informed on other people.'
'Crazy,' was all Stephan could say. 'But I suppose it's not much different from America. My hometown everybody knows everything about you. That's what we used to say.'
'It's the same everywhere,' Alena said, 'People are lonely.'
'We're not.'
They passed several rows of cottages. Alena pointed out several where she knew the families. Occasionally a car passed and waved. What struck Stephan was how well-cared for all the cottages were, with their potato gardens and strawberries and garlic. It filled him with a a happy peace and security. Here then was the old, warm world, the heart of a continent, that he'd scarcely known existed. True, it was also provincial. Behind the language lay the same hearts; he thought vaguely of the well-trimmed hedges on any well-to-do American suburb, but in that atmosphere with Alena it took on a a significance, one he could not quite put in words, but knew it to be true and worth the trouble of finding.
He laughed to himself, realizing that for Alena the scene must have been totally different. For her, it was merely home, not some dim, magical thing. She knew the names of these people, like Franta, she pointed out, who she used to play with. He was now a lawyer in Prague. His family had passed away and the cottage had been bought last year by a German businessman, to the outrage of some of the neighbors. He realized that for him, it was the dream made flesh; to be breathed and dreamed; For her it was a house to be lived in, and kept in order.
'It's horrible,' she said a moment later, as if speaking to his thoughts. She pointed out another cottage. A new family had moved in the previous year, and the grass was high and garbage overflowed from a bin. 'Horrible,' she repeated, and he couldn't help note the sharp line on her forehead as her eyes compared the mess with the tidiness of the surroundings. 'Some people don't understand,' she said. 'This is a community. We live together.'
Stephan didn't say anything.
They passed another neighbor, a ruddy-faced woman with a slight limp.
'She's been mushroom picking,' Alena said. 'There, you see? In her bag.' She laughed. 'When she gets home she will tell her husband, 'Oh, Alena was walking with some strange new man!'
'They have something to talk about.'
'It must all be very strange to you,' she said.
'No, it's not so strange.' He thought about what he was thinking earlier. 'It's nice to want to také care of something.' His eyes roamed the cottages.
'In Communism they were the only places we could go for privacy,' Alena said. 'And now, we are all so busy working. Many people come to get away. From Prague, the traffic and stress.'
'It's important,' she added.
They passed some boys who were cutting a tree. It was a small tree, barely six inches thick, and they took turns hammering away with a small ax until there was a loud crack and the biggest boy stepped on the trunk and snapped it the rest of the way. With exultant cries the boys took turns lording over their conquest. Alena and Stephan looked on and watched as the boys picked up the tree and with a triumphant air tossed it down an embankment, the routed tree tumbling end over end.
They walked on, and the boys voices faded as they went in search of new adventures, their voices blending with the bird cries and mist and other murmurings in the trees.

The coffee was ready when they returned to the cottage. When they arrived a bald, heavyset man was staning in the garden. He offered a small salute and bent to kiss Alena.
'This is Pepa,' Alena said. 'Ahoj, tati.'
The man gave Alena a bear hug, then turned and eyed Stephan with beady black eyes.
'Tesime,' Stephan said, taking the hand firmly.
'Anglican?' he asked, repeating his daughter's question.
'American,' Stephan, answering for himself this time.
'American!' Pepa's eyes widened.Suddenly, he turned eastward. 'Ruska – spatne!' He threw a curse to the invisible enemy, and for Stephan's benefit went into an elaborate pantomime which assurred Stephan, though it was in Czech, that those of the Russian nationality were not to be trusted.
'Come Pepa,' Alena interrupted. 'It's cold – we go inside.'
But Pepa stayed outside. During the hour or so they sat in the small dining room, the old man sat pacing outside. Jirina was on the floor with Lucie, who played on a blanket. A much older woman, introduced to Stephan as Babicka,, sat at a chair in the dining room. She was a petite, open-faced woman in her early nineties. She alert, cheerful, full of questions, and Stephan admired her energy. He scanned the interior of the cottage. The dining room had a small pull out table and wooden benches that could be pushed against the wall when not in use. The table was covered in a fresh, lemon-colored tablecloth and, besides the coffee, fresh soft homemade sugar cookies, which Babicka pressed both of them to eat.
'Both of you are too thin,' she remonstrated. Then, thinking of something, she pointed to the layer of soft fat around her waist and hips.
'Babicka wants to know,' Alena said. 'Are all American women fat like she is? You know we read that many American people are fat.'
At a loss, Stephan just nodded confusedly.
'And why are you in Czech Republic?' Babicka asked. He understood her and answered.
'Ne vim. I don't know.' Through Alena, he told her about California, his life there.
'He wanted adventure, babicka,' Alena said.
'Did you have some girl?' the old woman asked.
'No,' Stepan said.
Babicka glanced at Alena and beamed.with satisfaction, but Alena blushed. 'Would you like something, Babicka?'
'Dobry, dobry.' She looked at her great-granddaughter and then at Stephan, and said something in Czech to Alena.
'She asks, do you miss your family?'
'Sometimes,' he said. 'We speak on the phone. Znas Skype?'
Alena laughed, echoing his bad Czech.
'Skype. No, she doesn't. She's never used the Internet. Only last year we finally convinced her to use a mobile phone so that if she has problem she can call us. Right, Babicka?' She translated, but Babicka didn't answer. In a moment, she reached out and stroked Alena's hair.
'I could never survive without my Alena,' she said. 'If she moved far away from me I would cry.'
Alena was embarrassed again as she translated this, but she smiled and patted the old woman's hand.
'And your family?' This was a few minutes later. 'They approve of your decision?'
'Yes,' Stephan answered. 'But I left home very early. We spoke about it. In the end, they said, 'Go – if you don't like it you can always come home.'
After Alena had translated, the old woman eyed Stephan more closely, her sunken chin stretching into a meditative frown. Then she brightened and said something.
'She says,' Alena said. 'That in Czech we have a saying, 'The bird who doesn't leave the nest can never catch any eggs.'
Outside, the grandfather, Pepa, was still pacing. He seemed in a deep private conference, his black pupils now and again looking up to address the anxious, darkening sky.
'Jak se ma Pepa?' Stephan asked.
Alena the other women laughed.
'Oh, he is just a little shy,' Jirina said.
Afterward they helped Jirina put the dishes in the sink and the table and benches were inched back against the wall. It was very dark outside now, and the light from the cottage threw its share of light out into the soft darkness. In the air was the happy sentiment borne of relief and novelty. Aware that he'd been a success, Stephan checked his natural tendency to exult. He realized it was really Alena who'd pulled it off, brought together this strange communion of worlds. The cottages like miniature statuettes were delicate and charming, protected by the slender murmuring trees, the anxious groan of the sky, the surprising recognition in the faces – all of this she'd brought together. It occurred to him her head must be tired from switching languages back and forth, but when he asked her she smiled and said she felt fine. He noticed the others with contented faces were also looking at Alena, and he felt the depth of their fondness for her. She was the link, the one who held everything together. Stephan was invested suddenly, as they all were, with the desire to do something for her, something genuine, as concrete as a cup of coffee and yet as fantastically improbable as a castle.

That night they lay together in the dark. Her mother had driven the old folks back and Lucie was asleep, at least for most of the night, and the cottage was full of the silence of the countryside. Unable to sleep, Stephan lay and listened to it. It seemed to him there was no other world now. All the others had slipped and fallen away. But then he remembered during the coffee and they'd asked about his mother. It was true what she'd told him. And yet he recalled that when they spoke she'd called him from a woman's home in Santa Monica. That's where she was for the time being, 'until I get my second wind.' She'd been waiting for that second wind for the past thirty years, ever since the divorce. But in that warm darkness he thought about her again, how his father, who'd met her in San Diego, after coming back from the war, had taken her to the small town in Maryland. It must have seemed the same to her, he thought. And yet it had all merely broken up and blown apart, and she, not strong, had been blown away with it. It made him sad to think about her – she'd called last time from a pay phone inside the woman's home and offered to send money, which he knew she didn't have, it was a gesture … It seemed she was still being whirled about on that strange annihilating wind, blown with the pieces of that lost world. He thought of Alena and how she didn't want fairy tales or castles, and admired her silently for it, Alena, who was wise enough to see what an utterly worthless thing a castle is, but who would never deny its right, even need, to exist.
But maybe it would be different for him. He would try now and make it better, and she would try and make it better for him.He reached for her in the dark and she was there, warm and breathing beside him. Yes, after all, it could be better. What was it she said? Or then it could be worse. Padesat, padesat.

In the morning she was already up when his senses oriented to the surroundings. He’d finally managed to fall asleep and somewhere near dawn they had both reached for the other and made love and he had a memory of something warm and bright passing between them and then going dark again. Alena was playing with Lucie on the floor, letting him sleep. For a little while he pretended to be sleep, listening to her voice, the occasional chirp or grunt from Lucie, gauging his feeling. Yesterday. Wait, yesterday? It seemed impossible, remote. Who were they? He thought about it, the blanket falling off his shoulder feeling the crisp morning air. They were two people again, or was it three? He heard a new sound and recognized it. Alena was brushing her teeth in the tiny bathroom. She had not dressed and he opened one eye and enjoyed looking at her. She was perhaps more lovely than ever. It wasn’t always like that with other women he’d known. The warm, bright feeling came over him again and he recognized her all at once.
Alena felt his glance and looked sideways, the toothbrush dangling from one side.
‘Dobry den,’ he called, adding the lilt from yesterday.
‘Cau,’ she said, smiling with the toothbrush still in her mouth, her voice funny.
‘Come here.’
‘Moment.’
She finished, rinsed her mouth in the sink, wiped her face with a towel. Generally she used very little make up, and stripped her face was slightly older, but it seemed to him more familiar.
‘Are you hungry?’ she asked.
‘Trošku.’
A smile stole over her face. She picked up Lucie and came and sat on the bed.
‘You look good,’ he said.
‘You look tired. I should get dressed.’
‘No, you look great.’
‘I am a happy naked momma.’
‘Yes, you are.’
‘No,’ she said, resisting his effort to pull her into bed. ‘Lucie is awake.’ With a small sigh, she gave in a little and let him kiss her. Lucie was looking at him and he laughed and patted her head. She had a curious odor of milk and soap.
He felt the old static there, but correctly guessed it was just the bright newness of the morning. They should do something practical and tangible, to restore a certain perspective; there hung in the air a peculiar unreality, like the fragments of dream left in the eyes upon awaking.
“We can have breakfast,’ Alena announced shortly. ‘And then I have small surprise.’
‘Really?’
‘After breakfast. You will see.’

The surprise turned out to be Karlštejn. After a languid hour over breakfast, they’d showered and dressed, Stephan sitting with Lucie while Alena put on a smudge of lipstick and blush. She dressed in a white turtleneck and white trousers, a bright red scarf around her neck bringing out the radiant gold-turning, red-turning color of her hair. It was Sunday morning, his favorite time of the week, and standing there full of that fresh radiance, she seemed to embody everything he liked about it.
They loaded Lucie into the car and set out. Overnight it had grown colder, and a light snow had fallen, the rolling farmlands covered in a thin white blanket, the potato fields and corn fields, fallow now, had a bleak distant feeling.
‘Jak se maš?’ he asked facetiously. She was watching the road.
‘Dobrý,’ she said without looking at him. He could see she was absorbed by the countryside, now and again glancing down at Lucie, who played with a plastic ring, chewing on it absently. Not wanting to clutter the calm with a lot of chatter, he followed Alena’s gaze. They passed Mìlník, with its castle steeple peaking out over the farmland from a blurred hillside.
‘There are nice wine cellars there,’ he observed.
‘Co? Oh yes. Sometime we can go. You remember Pepa? From yesterday? He has some friends there who have a wine cellar. He would enjoy that.’
It was about an hourlong drive. The roads were lethargic and wet from melted snow. The sun was coming out and it shone in their faces. In the evening the roads would be lit up with the searching eyes of cars heading back to Prague , the fragrant, anxious twilight, satisfaction mingled with a faint regret. But that was later. Now it was still only morning, the drive and the ride ahead, and the surprise and being alone together. They reached a river, lazy and winding through the farmlands, houses and cottages sunk into the soft earth. Here the river was nearly still and hazy, though further on it hit the breakers and leaped and ran a metallic blue-grey. They passed a country inn and the road bent and wound up a hill and back down toward a train station. Slowing, Alena turned to Stephan and smiled.
‘Do you know where you are?’
He looked and read a blue sign over the station.
‘Wow. Really?’ He looked at her.
‘It’s the surprise,’ she said. ‘We were talking about it yesterday. You must see it, a very important place in Bohemia . You can’t see the castle from here. We must park and walk over that bridge and walk there.’
He had borrowed one of her brothers’ old coats. It was thick, outdoorsy and comfortable. Even with the sun out it was still a bit chilly, and the other people walking had coats and woolen hats. They walked in groups, some languidly, others with purpose toward the bridge, an old heavy iron bridge, the sunlight failing to penetrate its dull, charcoal color. It was nearly noon. Stephan was pushing the stroller, and Alena walked free beside him, casting a glance now and again at Lucie, tucking her blanket. ‘She’ll fall asleep soon,’ she said. At that moment the child was peering intently at Stephan.
‘She’s probably thinking, ‘Who is this?’ he said lightly to Alena. He reached to shake her hand, but she squirmed and uttered a short bark.
‘She has her own mind,’ Alena said, watching.
‘Like her mother.’
Alena smiled but didn’t say anything. She was thinking vaguely about Honza. Usually on Sundays they went and visited relatives, and he brought the boys along. They had been quite a family, the weekends he had the boys anyway. After the last argument over Dasha he’d left again, and she hadn’t seen the boys since. Miloš and Jan. With a pang she remembered the older one, Miloš, had started grammar school that fall, and she’d helped Honza get supplies. She realized she missed the boys. They had gone Christmas shopping. Honza had wanted to buy only things for school, but it was she who had insisted on the DVD player. ‘They can’t just have practical things. It’s Christmas, something fun is important, too.’ She’d told him that and he’d finally agreed. She was thinking of these and other things during the drive, that’s why she was quiet. She was aware of Stephan’s discomfort but it was normal. He had a nervous temperament, she noticed that, something lost and searching in his gaze, like he was looking for something or something had been taken from him. It irked her a little that even now he should still be unsure of himself. What else could a woman give that she had not already given, she asked herself. Still, she was not entirely sure either, and it bothered her. She liked to be sure of things, like most women, to act from a clear and sensible purpose. It was nice to fall sometimes, to drift, like it had felt early that morning when she had felt all wan and lovely, like she was sixteen again, her hair spilling over her shoulders and feeling them dissolving in that wan hour. It was a little like their old chats, when an hour or two passed without their scarcely noticing. She’d told him then of her childhood, growing up in the village. Travel to the West was forbidden then, and she and her friends on weekends near the German border they went mushroom picking and they would have fun in the forest stepping back and forth across the border. Like that … yes, it had been, lovemaking that had felt like a returning from somewhere, something playful and dark with flashes of enchanting light. But that was in the night. The day was something different, and she knew by instinct how to assign values. But then he’d been nervous at the start of yesterday too, during the drive and she’d teased him about it and everything had come out alright in the end. So maybe this day too would turn out alright.
She watched him. They were crossing the bridge and he was looking out at the river. Yes, keep looking that way, she wanted to tell him. Don’t look at me. It m He’d once showed her a photo taken during a visit to Ireland . In the photo he’d looked young, confident, standing on a high cliff overlooking the Atlantic , poised to take charge of a continent that beckoned over the horizon. Like that, she thought. He looked handsome, with the just the right level of conceit mixed with wonder. He turned and saw her smiling and he returned the smile with his awkward grin, and looked down at Lucie, who had fallen asleep. He patted her chest. He was saying some little words. What were they? Alena wondered. Doesn’t matter. He was trying very hard. She liked it and yet she didn’t like it. There, she could have said, like this. No, not like that. If you want to know how to love me, learn to love her because the way to me is through her now, it must be.
Alena considered, wondering if what she thought was really true or fair. She’d long outgrown the capacity for self analysis, and from an early had a quick and sure instinct that she trusted. What she’d said earlier about Lucie was true. Lucie was still incalculable, unformed; true, she was quiet and behind her eyes lay a field of knowing and seeing that with a happy laugh Alena recognized as her own, and yet there were other times it was something else entirely. That’s why she’d said what she said. And since Honza left she and Lucie had known many mornings and afternoons and evenings together, sometimes busy, sometimes lonely, the long heavy hours. Daughter had found in Mother the image that formed the world, and sought it, but in the past month Alena had sensed another quality rising in her, something wholly foreign and beyond her. It at once worried and assured her. She had wanted her daughter to be something lovely and fresh and new, with a mother’s instinctive selfishness making no compromises in her conception; in these shadowed moments, it seemed the promise was there, but she had to remind herself that she could not hold on too tightly. She hoped she would be strong and independent rather than lovely. At first the baby had resembled Honza only, with only Alena’s natural calm, but in the past few months the hair as it grew shifted until it had taken on her red-gold color and the eyes, a cirrilean blue had clarified with her own watchfulness. Alena wanted time now, the long hours, to stand back and watch the unknown thing as it grew and see what turns it made. Maybe that was why she forced – did she force? – the fight with Honza. She’d wanted to clear confusion, his indecision, away, so she could focus on it.
And that’s why she regarded Stephan with a certain irritation. She listened to him groping for the right pitch with Lucie, offering a hand that was at times unsure, but other times tender and strong. When he got it right something in her smiled and glowed, but this didn’t happen often.
They crossed the bridge, and now they rounded a short bend, passing an overgrown cemetery. The stone heads groaned from the hill, and some of the people stopped to take pictures. Around the bend and suddenly the whole village of Karlstejn rose out of the valley, the eye as it roamed, however, quickly shot up to the castle, remote and grand, on a mountain high over the village. It was a true fortress, with high walls that seemed to grow out of the rock, and its towers gleamed and looked benignly upon all the surrounding kingdoms.
They were both cheered by the site of the village, and the friendly feeling of the people walking around them. It took away the peculiar loneliness that had absorbed them on the drive. The single main street went up and around the side of the mountain up to the castle, which was closed for reconstruction.
‘Shall we go all the way up?’ Stephan asked.
‘Yes, of course. It’s closed, but at least there is a nice view, and a wax museum if you want.’
It was a very small village and they walked the main street quickly, passing the curio shops and restaurants, which posted menus outside in English and Czech and Russian, the last a reminder that, even twenty years after the great change, the Russians hadn’t really gone away. Rather, they’d exchanged soldiers’ uniforms for business suits, their guns for briefcases and laptops. Here was the fertile, soft country. Stephan thought he could understand the lure the land held for passing empires. The Germans had claimed it in ’38 as part of Hitler’s dream of a reunited Sudentland. Later the Russians had come, ousting the Germans and, after the war, when at Yalta a new world was carved up, had claimed it as Slavic land. After the revolution for a brief, exalted moment the Czechs had felt united and alone again – but the celebration was short, there was work to be done, and before they knew it another revolution had upturned the country, the great waves of tourists and investors, all of whom sought to make new claims and bold vistas.
He spoke his thoughts aloud to Alena, who listened and nodded.
‘Yes, there are still many here,’ she said. ‘Especially in Karlovy Vary . You know it? The health resort. We say it is a Russian town.’
She smiled bemusedly.
‘Well, everyone wants to come to Czech Republic .’
Because of you, he wanted to say, but didn’t. He was conscious of embarrassing her. He was still measuring himself in his relation to her. They had entered another stage, but were aware that the feeling of perpetual holiday soon grows wearisome – detached from everything, being alone and lonely together, both desired now to be rooted to something firm, even mundane, as a reminder to themselves of that other world passing around them.
The climb up the mountain took about half an hour. They walked deliberately, Alena insisting on taking the stroller for a bit, passing other families, students and backpackers. Another young woman with a stroller nearly bumped into them on the sidewalk, and they both moved to make way. With a sharp word in an unintelligible language the woman moved on.
‘She was rude,’ Stephan remarked.
‘She doesn’t look very happy,’ Alena said. ‘She thinks because she has a baby all the rest of the world should behave differently. I don’t like these women. They shouldn’t have babies.’
‘You’re not like that.’ Stephan looked at her with admiration.
‘No,’ Alena looked serious. ‘When I lived in America as an au pair the mother was always unhappy.’
‘Was she young?’
‘Yes, about thirty. Every day she said, ‘I am old now because of the baby,’ ‘I am fat and ugly now because of the baby.’ ‘My husband is never home and I am home alone waiting, crying because of the baby.’ I never understood this. The baby is only a baby. So usually I was with the baby and she was sitting, watching TV and crying. When I came home to Czech Republic the baby wouldn’t stop screaming.’
‘Poor kid.’
‘Yes, it’s a pity. I think about him sometimes.’
‘You don’t keep in touch?’
‘No, he was only a baby. He wouldn’t remember me. It’s better.’
A feeling of pride welled up in him. He reached over to stroke her hair. She let him and smiled a little.
‘We’re almost there,’ she said.

‘Why won’t you consider it?’ he asked.
‘No.’
‘But why?’
She hesitated.
‘Not now. It’s too soon. And there’s still Honza --‘ she broke off. They had been sitting in the grass at the foot of the castle walls. From there they could see far down beyond the village, the tiny train station and road and out into the farmlands.
‘But are you happy?’ he asked.
She considered.
‘Yes,’ she said. ‘It is lonely sometimes. But I want to focus on Lucie. I told Honza I cannot have this back-and-forth. I want to have a family or I want to do it myself.’
‘And me?’
She shook her head.
‘I don’t really know you.’
‘We’ve known each other two years!’
‘That’s true.’ Her eyes roamed over the horizon. She was thinking about it. Two years. Well, that was some time, wasn’t it? And it was true, she had a certain feeling about him, he was familiar. But she realized then that she’d never actually considered what he had asked. Stephan was looking down at something in the village. She tried to follow his eyes. He had that look in them again she liked, but this time she resisted.
‘I think you would get bored,’ she said.
‘What do you mean? I like you – and I like Lucie. It’s nice being with you.’
‘Yes, like this. But every day?’ She looked at him lightly mocking him. ‘And what about China ?’


‘I don’t know.’ He was angry with her, and he wondered why.
‘Is it because I’m American? I mean, a foreigner?’ he asked tentatively.
‘No. I mean, it is pity you don’t speak Czech. But it isn’t that really. It’s just –‘ She didn’t have an answer.
‘Is it money? Are you worried about that?’
She shrugged. With a gesture of impatience she waved him off.
‘I don’t know,’ she said finally. ‘Let’s not talk about it anymore now.’
It really was lovely afternoon, and she had determined to enjoy it. But she looked at him again. She saw through his anger, which was fading, and saw that he was only sad.
‘Don’t be sad,’ she said, reaching over and suddenly on an impulse kissed him. But it irritated him to think she felt pity for him.
‘Do you miss your family?’ she asked.
‘Sometimes.’
‘Why don’t you go and see them?’
How could he tell her? He hardly knew the answer himself.
‘You know you can always go home,’ she said.
‘I am home,’ he said. ‘At least, that’s the way it feels sometimes, especially with you.’
‘No,’ she said. ‘You are just feeling romantic. I know you. You need adventures, something new.’
‘Why don’t you come to China with me? You and Lucie.’
She smiled, but after a moment dismissed the idea.
‘It would be great,’ he continued, warming up to the idea.
‘No,’ Alena said. ‘I couldn’t. I am not so young and free anymore. I would miss my family. And I want Lucie to know them.’
As she said this though she considered what he had said. For a moment, the Bohemian countryside flared with the aroma of the Far East , the molten factories and burgeoning preposterous skyscrapers, the sea of faces. It was too many people. When she was young she had liked it, but now she didn’t like it. Part of their mutual fondness had grown out of their travels, their talks peppered with capital cities and novelties. It gave their talks – Honza was at work and they sat in her kitchen with coffee – the atmosphere of worldliness, and after the pregnancy and she’d gone into confinement, she’d missed it.
‘Mamèa says you should come over more,’ she heard herself saying. ‘She says it must be hard for you.’
‘It’s not so bad.’ He was looking down at the village. ‘But I’d like that.’
‘She likes you. She never really liked Honza.’
He didn’t say anything, remembering a rule gleamed from somewhere that if the mother likes the man, the daughter usually doesn’t, but then stopped and remembered the close affection he’d seen between them the day before.
A group of tourists, two families, appeared, making their way along the wall, talking in strident voices.
‘Slovak people,’ Alena said. She looked over at Stephan.
‘It must be nice,’ she reflected. ‘You are free. You can go places and never worry. Like Paris . I think you will be happy there.’
At that moment, to Stephan the city of light was something abstract, unreal, and the coming trip held none of the charm it had always held for him. The outside world seemed something colorless, devoid of magic. There was only here, in the grass, with the sun high up and the sounds in the village below, and this girl, sitting beside him and telling him things he could not hear, for he had heard them so many times the words had long lost their resonance.
‘I could be happy here,’ he said.
A ghost of a thought that failed to resolve passed through Alena’s mind. She watched the Slovak tourists. They were all standing together for a group picture, and now another group of people were coming and the hill was suddenly gay and noisy, breaking the spell of intimacy, and the wind was picking up, coming up the hill and blowing the grass.
‘We should go,’ Alena said, standing up. ‘Lucie will be cold.’

They had lunch in a pub in the village. There was a party inside, and men in traditional white shirts and black trousers played bright folk tunes on accordions and a tuba. They had xx, the traditional Czech dish of pork, cabbage and dumplings. They were both wind-blown, tired from the walk and the discussion, filled with the food and they listened as the music filled them both with new longings and imaginings. A vague anxiety was floating through Stephan’s thoughts. He thought about getting back to Prague , the work ahead the following day. He wanted to get away too and be by himself – he was used to solitude and usually preferred it, she was right about that; he wanted to be able to carefully sift through the day and the things that had happened so he could see things clearly. Alena, sensing this and wanting the same, looked at him kindly.
‘I think maybe you are tired of me,’ she said.
‘No, not at all.’
‘Yes, maybe a little.’
‘No.’
‘We can go if you want.’
‘When you want. I’m not in a hurry. It’s nice here.’

It was late afternoon when they arrived back in Prague . The city appeared strange and new, as though it had been off doing busy and great things, but to Stephan, thinking about the weekend, it seemed they had a secret, and it drew them together, and possessing the secret, looked out at the passing city with a faint smugness. She dropped him at his flat. He’d wondered if she would invite him over but she’d said she had to get up early and take Lucie to the doctor.
‘It’s just her back, you know how it is curved a little.’ They both looked down at Lucie. ‘The doctor wants to show me some exercises.’
‘So when can I see you?’
‘Maybe in a few days. I’m not sure. I want to concentrate on Lucie and her exercises. This was nice though.’
He leaned over Lucie and kissed her, but formally. Her thoughts were sharp and immediate. Since arriving in the city, a change had come over her manner. She was focused on the immediate, the drive home through the center, evening things to be done, a new week to prepare for.
‘Be a good girl,’ he said.
She laughed.
‘Be a good boy!’
He watched as her little red car disappeared down the street. It was still early. There had been rain earlier and the streets were still wet. It was a pity in a way, there was still so much unused beauty. But he was conscious too of relief; his chest loosened. He could go upstairs and try to work for a while, or read – but suddenly the thought of the empty flat revolted him. There was Pavels, then, where Gordon and the others might be and he could ask about the business. Or a walk, maybe up through the park at Žižkov. The beer gardens were closed for winter, but it would be nice to stroll among the trees and look at interesting people and their dogs. There might be a Bohemians match at the stadium in Vrsovice, where the big-bellied guys beat leather and plastic drums and sang ‘Bily Zeleny’ in strident, imbibed voices. And there was, after all, Paris . There was really so much to have and to look forward to, and yet – what was that strange emptiness in the dusk? She was right. He was free and still young enough to dream and explore. He remembered laying beside her, and the thought he’d had, but now he couldn’t remember exactly what it was. It had seemed a bold and true thing, and he would do well to remember it, that and other things she’d said. As he walked he tried to remember and some of it came back, other parts irrecoverable, covered in mist, whirled on by a strange wind, one that he was aware of now, picking up through the trees as he headed down the hill to Pavels.

So you’re rich? Good. You can lend me a thousand.’ Gordon’s face lit into a smirk.
‘Sure.’
‘Just for a day or two.’
Stephan laid a crisp bill on the table. With a slight flash of discomfirt Gordon pocketed the money.
‘I’d have preferred outside,’ he said. ‘But thanks, mate. All my money’s tied up in the licensing at the moment. But it should go through by the end of the week.’
‘Then what?’
‘Then I meet the investors.’
‘Well, don’t worry about it.’
‘’Really, thanks, mate.’
It was noisy and smoky at Pavels. All the regulars were there. The old guy Mira waved from the bar. He came over, proudly pointing at his feet, which were clad in a brand new pair of two-toned, wing-tipped patent leather shoes.
Gordon and Stephan admired, nodded in approval.
‘Al Capone!’ Mira cried proudly. ‘Fifty crowns.’
‘Fifty? Where?’
‘A man in the street.’ He tipped his rum in a salute and went back to the bar.
‘So it’s coming along then?’ Stephan asked. He was still filled with the weekend with Hana, but in that atmosphere he found it easier to let it drift as it wanted through his thoughts.
Gordon didn’t answer. He was busy rolling a cigarette. In a moment, he looked up and tipped a wink. It was a way he had. He had handsome, well-made dark features. He gave off a quiet, brawny impression, even though he really had a light, compact frame. Once he’d told how in Australia he’d taken on a boxer in a bar. ‘He worked me over pretty good, but that’s because we were inside a closed space. Outside I might have had a chance.’ On the other hand, he wasn’t agressive – far from it. Rather, he had that reserved, peaceable disposition, but also a certain danger lurked in the eye you only saw at certain moments. That’s why Stephan waited for him to answer.
‘—yeah, mate.’ Gordon finished rolling and looked up. There was a shine in his eyes.
‘So it’s good?’
‘Should be ready by the end of the month.’
‘Open?’
‘Well, no, mate. But we’ll definitely have the license and most of the remodeling we’re doing it now. We’ll have a little party then, to try it out. First one’s free. Oh, and I want to show you something.’
‘Yeah?’
‘When you get back from Paris .’
‘Why do I have to wait.’
‘You’ll see. You’ve never been there before. You’ll see. When you get back we’ll talk.’
It was a late night. Kyle, the Englishman, dropped by for just a minute. ‘I’m trying to stay off the piss these days.’ He went to the bar and spoke to Pavel and got something and then with a sort of farewell was off. Mira came back. He was perpetually nervous and shy, but they understood it was just because they were foreigners. With the others he was more sure of himself, and everyone liked him. He was a retired mechanic, in his mid-sixties, living on a 9,000 crown a month pension. Pavel liked him, as he did most everybody, and frequently had him do odd jobs around the bar, for which he paid him and stood him a few shots of rum.
When Mira sat down, Gordon rose to leave. ‘Sorry, mate – just saw Krystina pass outside. She knows I’m here.’
‘I thought this place didn’t exist.’
‘It does now.’
‘She’s seen you?’
‘Yeah, mate.’
‘So? Invite her in.’
Gordon dismissed the idea.
Gordon’s hedging amused Stephan. At first, his secretive behavior had led Stephan to draw a mental picture of Krystina as a frowsy, dominating woman in her middle age. But when they had finally been introduced, just after Christmas, he’d been surprised. She was 26, tall, elegantly dressed, a raven-haired beauty with sparkling eyes and a nose that was once called aqualine.
‘So anyway, mate,’ Gordon said. ‘I gotta spend some time with the missus.’
‘See you then.’
Mira, not understanding, thought he had somehow offended Gordon, who rushed to assure him.
‘No, no, sorry old man. The woman –‘ he jerked a thumb in the direction of home, which Stephan knew to be just around the corner.
‘Woman?’ Understanding, Mira laughed. ‘The Great Dictator!’
‘Right, mate.’ He shook hands. ‘Thanks for the money, mate. Tomorrow.’
He was gone and Stephan drank his beer. Presently Mira grabbed his bag and produced a couple of books. They were hardcover, in very good condition. One was a travel guide for Slovakia , circa 1925. At Mira’s insistence, Stephan flipped through the yellowing pages, which detailed lovely illustrations of the Tatry Mountains .
‘Very nice,’ Mira said, running a fond eye over the page and inviting Stephan to do the same.
‘It is nice,’ Stephan said. ‘Hezky.’
The book was a Hemingway novel, translated into Czech. Then Mira reached in his bag again and this time produced a menu, circa 1985.
‘Beer – one crown.’ Mira’s eyes roamed over the menu.
‘One crown!’ Mira’s eyes looked into Stephan’s to see if the magnitude reached him. ‘And now –‘ he looked around for a contemporary menu. ‘Now it’s shit!’
‘Shit.’
The old man went around the bar showing the menu to other people. Most of them were young Czechs and they looked up from joints they were rolling or passing and offered polite interest. Then Mira tapped his feet anxiously, returned to the seat and inquired for a cigarette.
‘Thank you very much,’ he said in his hit-and-miss English. With the cigarrette a new thought occurred to him, for he turned again to Stephan with a raised finger.
‘Yesterday –‘ he said. ‘Yesterday, I –‘ he broke off, vexed. ‘Jak se øekle anglicky. Moment.’ He went up to the bar and asked Pavel for the word he was looking for. There was a little conference. Nobody knew. Pavel looked over at Stephan and shook his shoulders. ‘Sorry.’
‘Nic. It doesn’t matter.’ Mira returned to his seat.
It was probably a very good story, for Mira had a lively sense of humor – Stephan had talked with him many times and he could read it in the flashing black eyes that leaped back and forth, animating his face.
‘Sorry,’ Mira said. ‘No good English.’
‘No good Czech. ’ They clinked glasses. It occurred to Stephan he really had wanted to hear the story. He was still vaguely occupied with Alena and the weekend, and felt the story coming from Mira would throw it all in some unexpected light.
Mira was grinning.
‘Sorry Charlie!’ he cried.
‘What?’
‘Sorry Charlie!’
Understanding now, Stephan laughed with him.
‘Rozumim.’
Later Pavel put on an old Czech film from the Sixties, in technocolor. It was about an old magician. As they watched, Mira grabbed Stephan’s elbow.
‘Very great Czech actor,’ Mira said, pointing at the beared, top-hatted magician on the screen, who at that moment was in the process of pulling many fantastic things out of his hat.
‘Who is he?’
‘xx
Stephan tried the name a few times, to help remember it.
‘Very good,’ Mira repeated. ‘Classic.’
Stephan wished there were subtitles. It was a pity many of the old Czech films didn’t have them. Before he’d never really bothered, and now he wished he had. Some expat he was! At least Hemingway had bothered to learn French. But there had never really seemed to be a reason before, not until that disconcerting weekend, when everything had suddenly came alive. He thought about Pepa, the grandfather, pacing outside, holding his anxious private conference with the twilight. In his memory of it now, Pepa was saying something, and he would have liked to have known what it was the old man was talking about – just as he’d wished he could understand about the thing that had happened to Mira yesterday. Wait – yesterday?

Back at her flat, Alena passed a routine evening. Honza called, and they’d agreed to meet on Tuesday. Her younger brother called; he and his wife, married the previous June, had had ‘their first real fight.’ It was something over his spending money on Tipsport! and she wanted a holiday in Croatia . After that she’d taken a bath with Lucka, and in the warm bath let her thoughts drift. She wasn’t really thinking about Stephan. There were other things, but now and again she formed a picture of him. She realized it was difficult in his absence to really recollect him. There was the worn frock coat, the tobacco-stained finger, the perpetural look of fatigue and worry around the eyes, but then he had a nice smile. She suspected he idealized her, and the weekend, and it bothered her. There had been other men who liked her that way. She remembered, when she was 15, a much older man used to follow her home. Always generous in nature, one day she’d allowed the man to approach her. He was very nervous and explained he wanted to take her picture. He’d invited her back to his house and then, with various fumbling phrases, eventually managed to convey that he wanted to take nude photos. She’d said no, and then he’d frightened her by trying to kiss her. She surprised herself by firmly resisting, and the man had crumpled and started crying, and she ran away. That was in Libohovice.
With Honza it was all very unexpected. After she came back from America, all radiant and fresh at 23, her mother had said, in so many words, that she’d grown used to living alone – this was just after the divorce – and that Alena had better start looking after herself. So she’d answered an ad in the newspaper for a flat near Nusle. The man who met her at the flat, who introduced himself as Honza, was not necessarily handsome. He was broad-shouldered, balding and rather clumsy-faced. And yet from the moment their hands met to shake a current had passed between them. She took the flat,, and by the end of the week he’d returned to check on her and somehow ended up staying the night. He moved in not long afterward. In the beginning she hadn’t asked much about Dasha, and had been inclined to be tolerant. She’d had very few relationships – her relations with men up to then had mostly been sisterly. There was Franta, who she used to help with his homework, her younger brothers, and of course her father after the divorce. During Communism he was a high-ranking official, a solid party member with many contacts. Contacts and good-standing were everything then, and so they’d had a comfortable life, taking holidays in Croatia and Yugoslavia . He was able to help many people through his influence. But then after the great change, the revolution, and the old government resigned he lost his position. Most of his old contacts fled West, taking vast amounts of the state’s capital with them. He found an office job at a printing company, but after a few weeks gave it up. He became depressed, sunk into himself. Everyone was busy. He took the bitterness out of his lost status on his wife, her mother, and their arguments had been one of the main reasons why she’d applied for and accepted an au pair job with a family in America (Why didn’t she stay in America ? She didn’t know)
She lent her father money many times. Eventually he’d found another job and changed his address, but refused to give it to anybody, a kind of perversion forced by his bitterness. Sometimes Alena wouldn’t hear from him for months, and then when he did call it would be several days in a row, his voice angry and full of reproaches, or else drunk and maudlin, telling her about his loneliness and how nobody cared about him. She was the only one he could talk to, he said. At her brother’s wedding, this just after she’d had Lucka, she’d seen her father for just five minutes. He was sober, aloof and he’d looked at his granddaughter without comment.
She never knew which mood to expect, and because of this had grown somewhat obstinate in her feelings. Her father, so it seemed to her, lived like some grand, exiled king – that’s exactly what he seemed like to her, and that now he felt he had been robbed and waited for the world to restore to him that lost kingdom. She’d communicated some of this to Stephan during their long, afternoon talks. He’d been interested, as he was in Czech history. Inwardly Alena compared Stephan to her father. They walked alike, tall and proud. No, he wasn’t like her father, she decided. Her father was of the old type. Strong but cold. He could command respect, but not love, and yet inside she knew somewhere she did love him, her sense of duty demanded it, and yet it was a curious, mishapen love – it left her strained and exhausted.
With Honza everything had been open and warm and fine in the beginning. Later when they were both getting up at 5 in the morning and coming home from work at 10 or 11, they had stopped talking and they were both tired all the time. They wanted to restore a flat that Honza’s mother left him, it was just outside Prague , and were planning to rent the flat in Nusle to students and use that money for the other flat.
He’d looked forward to her having Lucka. He said he had been too busy working when Milos and Jan were growing up and now he wanted to do better this time. Except he hadn’t.
She still remembered with a shock the call and he said he’d decided, at least for now, to stay with Dasha, that he needed time ‘to get things straight.’ Lucka was four weeks old then. Alena, bristling, had said getting things straight is fine when you’re 20 but not when you’re 38 and raising a family. But in the end, she had relented. Why? She didn’t want quarrels, nor tension, around Lucka. More than that, as she’d told Stephan, the indecision, that wore away at her most of all, for her own constitution was made differently, and generally knew exactly what was called for and necessary.
It was in that lull, that waiting period, with Honza’s indecision, that Stephan called. She hadn’t seen him since the baby. She invited him over for coffee and he’d met Lucie, and they’d talked in their old easy way. She’d invited him again, and this time he’d stayed for dinner and it was then that the unexpected things had happened, that were counter to her nature.
She’d looked forward to his old, easy open company. He wasn’t connected to her life in anyway except those chats, and she found him pleasing; from the beginning a mutual sympathy and regard had flitted between them. She was working at the cosmetics company then and was taking English lessons and the agency had sent him ... that was two years before. So it was all very unexpected.
The water was getting cold, and she got out and dried Lucka with a heavy white towel. Lucka still didn’t like baths; it was the only time she really raised a fuss. She raised one now, shivering and crying, but she quieted down after she was dressed in pajamas. Focused on Lucka, Alena forgot about the other things for a while. But later, as she lay in bed, some of them came back ... it seemed all the values were reversed, confused. She was 33. At the same age, her mother had already had three children.
She thought about a conversation she’d once had with Stephan. They’d read an interview with the filmmaker David Lynch, whom they both admired. ‘For me,’ Lynch said. ‘The most important thing is work. It allows me to have my set up.’ It struck Alena that for Stephan these words carried an ambient resonance – she knew by then he was offering to build a world (not knowing that she already had one – and that he wanted to impress upon her some important thing connected with these words. But she’d been less impressed.
‘It seems to me he lives only for himself,’ she’d told Stephan.
‘But don’t you see? It allows him to have his set up. He is free to do what he wants.’
But for Alena, family was the most important thing.
‘But I guess maybe my own work isn’t so important,’ she’d conceded.
Maybe that was it, she reflected. Everything was changing so fast. Every day in Prague she encountered signs of a vast and heady transformation. New flats and shopping centers, most of it fast and cheap, and everywhere a profusion of colors and accents – most English but also Hungarian, Ukraine, Polish, even Italian, Irish, Japanese and French. Just twenty years ago, when she was a girl, it was impossible. In America she’d seen it and taken it all for granted – all ‘ America ’ – the place where breathless, discordant, unknown wild things were supposed to happen, not in other places. At home in Libohovice what she’d said to Stephan was true, it was a community, and now everyone was busy – she wasn’t exactly frightened, but just at the moment, rather dizzy and a little sad. The weekend? It had been nice ... she was tired though. She set the alarm for six. Lucka would have her appointment early.