The Lacuna

The kitchen retains good light and air, extending outward as it does on the Allende Street side to enclose the back of the courtyard. The masons agreed to leave windows open for ventilating the wood fires in the stoves, after voluble argument from Perpetua, who warned of cocineras ahumados, the kitchen girls smoked like hams. Perpetua is confused and worn out from the changes, and resigned to her new position as assistant to a male head cook, HS, who vows to do his best by this duty. This kitchen is a wonder, with its extravagance of blue and yellow tile, woodstoves as long as divans, and the welcome sight of large wooden tables for rolling out dough. It will be a pleasure preparing the daily repast here for the visitors, and any feasts required for evening gatherings.

Household directives noted here: No food from unknown sources to be served, under any conditions. No unknown person to enter the house. HS is to assist the Visitor with typing and correspondence (recommended by Diego R.) and to retain this written record of events (requested by Sra. Frida). The first report from Coyoacán is here complete for the week Jan. 9–16, submitted for inspection.

19 January

The Coyoacán house is proving a good accommodation. Old houses have their wisdom. Despite the bricked-up exterior, the main rooms are comfortably lit by the courtyard. That jungle enclosed by high blue walls is a comforting world for visitors who are not at great liberty to roam elsewhere. Perpetua is taking care with her lilies and figs; it remains a cheerful world, in no way resembling a prison. Perpetua said Guillermo had this house built for his family more than thirty years ago, and through all those years no one saw a need for turning it upside down, until now. (Her resentment of the current upheaval is understandable.) The deep adobe walls keep a good temperature all day. The contrasts between this house and the modern one built by the Riveras in San Angel are many, most particularly their kitchens. But on that subject no opinion is given here.

Sra. Frida’s choice of blue walls is greatly approved by all here.

A note on meal preparations: The visitors prefer tea over coffee. Another exceptional preference is unsweetened bread cut into thin slabs, toasted in the oven until somewhat hard, as if stale. Otherwise they are generally agreeable to normal foods. Natalya made plain their disinterest in pickled fish, after a long Norwegian winter of almost nothing else. They request mashed turnips and a green vegetable unknown to these parts, translated by Van as “the Sprouts of Belgium.” Tomorrow Perpetua will be driven into the city on a search, as the Melchor market here has neither tea nor turnip. But they are adapting well to customary foods: sugared fritters, baked guava, and fermented cream are all favored. This morning they took enchiladas with eggs, and tea.

On days when no special meals are scheduled, all hands go to helping Lev unpack and arrange his study. He is curious about Mexico: the altitude of mountains, population of the city, its history, and so forth. Perpetua on her trip to town is to fetch the Geographic Atlas owned by HS, from his mother’s apartment. It is outdated but will serve for now; Pico de Orizaba has not changed its height in a decade.

Lev communicates with help from the secretary Van, since Lev’s Spanish and English are rudimentary, and clever Van seems to speak everything possible: French, Norwegian, Russian. He claims both French and Dutch as native tongues. He makes a point of moving the largest crates, insisting no extra help is needed in Lev’s office. It can’t be argued really; Van is tall and strong as an ox. (Though more handsome.) He complains sometimes in English about the “native typist,” apparently not realizing HS also has two native tongues. But Lev is agreeable to having an extra fellow to help him. Plainly, Van has a habit of protecting his chief from outsiders, which is natural. He first became Lev’s assistant in France, where they lived from 1933 until 1935. That was before Norway. Prior to that, Lev and Natalya were hiding in Istanbul, and before that, Kazakhstan. Lev Davidovich has been living in exile under threat of death since 1927. “I am a man in a very large world,” he said slowly today, “with a very small place to be.”

Mexico is fairly good sized, sir. You’ll see.

Van said, “He’s speaking metaphorically. He means that he lives in the planet without a passport.”

21 January

A telegraphed message came this morning, delivered by Diego wearing his holster and gun. The message was in a code. Lev spent many hours in his study working it out, rejecting even Van’s offers of help, with Natalya the whole time walking between the study and the kitchen, pulling on her fingers, making Perpetua burn the milk. The message concerns the son in Paris. Van says there are two sons; the younger was taken to prison camp three years ago, almost certainly dead. Two daughters are also dead.

Lev is not very sure of the message except for one important part: the telegram is definitely from Lyova, so he is alive. They have a code for his identity that is known to no one else on earth, not even Natalya. Lev speculates that GPU killers in France have tried to assassinate Lyova, and we can expect the newspapers to report him killed. To spare distress, he wanted his parents to know he is alive, in hiding.

They seem little spared from distress, though. If her son escaped murder this time, Natalya asks, what about the next? Lev rages that his children have done nothing to earn a death sentence from Stalin. The younger one, Sergei, only ever cared for books, sport, and girls, but ended in a concentration camp. “And now Lyova. His crime is to be the son of his father. Who can change the things that brought him into the world?”

23 January

Diego arrived early, upset, with the bundle of newspapers he receives by special post. Two report the death of Lyova, as predicted, but they know this is false. There is worse news yet: headlines declaring L. D. Trotsky found guilty of crimes against the Soviet Union. His trial in Moscow has been going on for weeks, with the accused in absentia. Van says Lev petitioned to go there and stand trial, for the chance to defend himself, but Stalin wouldn’t lift the exile order. The aim of the trial is to discredit anyone who ever spoke against Stalin. Some of Lev’s friends are also declared guilty: men named Radek, Piatakov, and Muralov, all three imprisoned now in Moscow.

The charges are strange and diverse: derailing trains, collaborating with Rudolf Hess and the Nazis, acting as agents of the Japanese emperor, stealing bread. Attempting to assassinate Stalin by poisoning his shoes, and his hair cream.

Stalin uses hair cream?

“Careful, lad,” said Lev. “That knowledge alone could get you the firing squad.”