The Russian Interpreter

‘I can understand,’ he said, ‘that many people, many perfectly ordinary people, have an interesting story to tell. No one’s experience of life is valueless.’

Proctor-Gould glanced at Manning.

‘You see it,’ he said, ‘don’t you, Paul?’

‘I’m not sure,’ said Manning. ‘I suppose it’s something to do with the need to establish one’s concept of identity, by concrete examples. Is that right?’

‘On the right lines, anyway,’ said Proctor-Gould. ‘I think it’s something that anyone in the West would understand immediately. I’m not preaching, Sasha, but in a sense our interest in personalities is the ultimate expression of our belief in respect for the individual.’

‘Of course,’ said Sasha, ‘we have had the so-called cult of personality here….’

‘Our personalities are not in positions of power, Sasha. A respect for pure personality without function – that’s what we are aiming at.’

Sasha blinked rapidly.

‘In this country,’ he said, ‘as I believe I once told Paul, a man feels needed. Surely to need someone is the greatest respect you can pay him?’

‘To need him, Sasha? To need him for some purpose? For what he can do? For the contribution he can make?’

‘Exactly.’

‘Isn’t that a rather sordid interest, Sasha? To need a man because you can make use of him is to treat him as a tool, as an object. It’s exploitation. We say that a man is to be respected not for what he can do for us, but for being the man he is.’

‘And you believe this of all men?’

‘In theory. In practice we take certain public personalities as symbols of mankind in general, and we attach our respect and interest to these representatives.’

Sasha brooded until the soup arrived.

‘Anyway,’ said Proctor-Gould, ‘the important thing is whether you’d like to come over to England yourself and let me handle you.’

‘You really think I’m one of your personalities?’

‘I think I could make you one.’

Sasha sighed.

‘I wonder,’ he said. ‘I wonder. I should like to visit England. But at first sight, I must tell you frankly, being a personality in your sense seems to me a little like being a prostitute.’

‘A prostitute, Sasha?’

‘Offering my person for hire.’

Proctor-Gould’s soup spoon had halted half-way to his mouth in astonishment at ‘prostitute’. Now he put it carefully back in the soup and fixed Sasha with his special gaze.

‘I honestly don’t think that’s right, Sasha,’ he said. ‘If it’s like anything, it’s like an artist offering himself to the public through his art.’

‘Would you agree to become a personality yourself, Gordon?’

Proctor-Gould stared at Sasha for some moments, pulling at his ear. Then he suddenly lowered his gaze to the silver university.

‘It’s a funny thing,’ he said, ‘but no one’s ever asked me that before. I’ve never thought about it.’

He gazed at the skyscraper for a long time, pulling at his ear as if he would drag it out by the roots. Sasha and Manning watched him over their soup spoons.

‘I think I would,’ he said at last. ‘I think I would. But I see it’s not an entirely straightforward choice.’

‘No,’ said Sasha, ‘it’s not. But your ideas are certainly interesting, Gordon. I should like my colleagues in the Faculty to meet you. Perhaps I could arrange a little dinner some time?’

‘I should like that, Sasha. Very much.’

‘Perhaps towards the end of term? Will you still be here then?’

‘Until June at least, Sasha.’

‘All right. Meanwhile I shall think about your offer.’

Afterwards, Manning walked back with Proctor-Gould towards his hotel through the cool spring night.

‘You won’t get him, you know,’ said Manning.

‘I think I will, Paul.’

‘He’ll always put his obligations first.’

‘But what will he consider his obligations to be? He’s an ambitious man, you know.’

‘Ambitious?’

‘I think so, Paul. I should know – I am myself. That’s why we get on so well together. Anyway, we shall get that dinner out of him, if nothing else. It’s rather convenient, as a matter of fact – I have a number of messages and presents for people in your Faculty.’

‘You never said.’

‘No.’

They were outside the Hotel National.

‘Will you come up for a late-night Nescafé?’ asked Proctor-Gould. Manning shook his head.

‘I hadn’t thought about Sasha being ambitious,’ he said, as they hesitated on the pavement. ‘But he’s a good man, you know.’

‘Oh, yes.’

‘Are you good, do you believe, Gordon?’

Proctor-Gould shrugged his shoulders.

‘It’s a question I ask myself,’ he said.

9

Manning fell in love, in a way. It was on a suburban train, on the Mozhaisk line, and the girl was sitting in the seat opposite him. She was not, as he had envisaged, sunburnt and wearing a slight cotton dress. She was pale, with very fair hair, and she was wearing a quilted anorak and thick trousers. So was Manning himself, and almost everybody else in the carriage. They were going on a rally or ramble organized by the Faculty Sport Club in the forest outside Moscow under Sasha’s leadership.

‘Which is it, Paul?’ Proctor-Gould had asked Manning when Sasha invited him. ‘A rally or a ramble?’