Pieter Waterdrinker - The Long Song of Tchaikovsky Street: A Russian Adventure

THE LONG SONG OF
TCHAIKOVSKY STREET

PIETER WATERDRINKER is one of the most successful authors in contemporary Dutch literature, praised for his compelling voice. He studied Russian at the University of Amsterdam, and was a long-time correspondent at the leading Dutch daily De Telegraaf . His work has often been translated and longlisted for awards, and the Dutch edition of The Long Song of Tchaikovsky Street was a major bestseller. He lives between Saint Petersburg and the South of France.

PAUL EVANS is a Welsh poet and writer. He has published poetry in Britain and Holland, and translations of Dutch poetry, drama, and fiction with Faber and Seren. His translated plays have been performed at The Old Vic and The Guggenheim. His latest poetry collection is Grand Larcenies (Carcanet, 2021).

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Published by Scribe 2022

Copyright Pieter Waterdrinker
Translation copyright Paul Evans

All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise) without the prior written permission of the publishers of this book.

The moral rights of the author and translator have been asserted.

So oder so ist das Leben Words by Hans Fritz Beckmann
Music by Theo Mackeben Copyright 1934 Ed. MGB U-Ton
All Rights Administered by Dreiklang-Dreimasken-Buehnen-Musikverlag
All Rights Reserved. International Copyright Secured.
Used by Permission of Hal Leonard Europe Ltd.

Scribe acknowledges Australias First Nations peoples as the traditional owners and custodians of this country, and we pay our respects to their elders, past and present.

978 1 925849 13 4 (Australian edition)
978 1 912854 07 3 (UK edition)
978 1 950354 88 7 (US edition)
978 1 922586 30 8 (ebook)

Catalogue records for this book are available from the National Library of Australia and the British Library.

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For Julia

Today, there are only happy hours

Hildegard Knef

CHAPTER ONE

One morning in late October 1988, this dapper-looking guy from Leiden asked me if I might be able to deliver 7,000-odd bibles to the Soviet Union. I still havent got a clue how he found me. Back then, there werent many people in the Netherlands who spoke Russian and had visited the USSR. Id only been once myself, more than seven years before. But if theres one thing that life has taught me, its that the way the world works is totally arbitrary.

I was twenty-six and Id just moved back in with my parents after living for more than a year on the Canary Islands and a little mountain village on the Spanish mainland. Now I was back in my dire childhood room, three and a half metres by two.

Can I come in for a moment?

The man had damp, black hair, carefully combed over to one side. His parting looked as if it had been branded with hot tongs. He was wearing a tan mac with matching buttons.

My parents arent home, I replied. Theyre in Haarlem, at the hospital.

He hadnt come to see them; hed come to see me.

Siderius, said the pre-war apparition.

A few seconds later, he was sitting on the couch, spreading out in his mac so that he resembled a bird of prey on its nest; he lit up a cigarette and blew the smoke out through his hooked nose.

I dont have very much time, Siderius began. And the matter Ive come about is quite simple. Could you take delivery of a shipment of Russian bibles in the Leningrad harbour in lets say three weeks?

The question was absurd, preposterous.

I nodded absently; the cigarette smoke floated between us like a blue lace curtain.

The Lord Our Father and Creator, who sent His Only Son into the world to save us, is in dire straits. The East is adrift. I assume youve been following. But just as in warfare, well rejoice only once victory is achieved. What Im about to tell you is secret, or, to put it in a way our friends at the KGB and the Stasi might understand, classified information ! Can I have a glass of water? I have to take my pills Gout, its the toothache of the joints. When I get an attack, I just want to die

When I came back from the kitchen, the man drained the glass with a grimace and then told me about something Id never heard of before: the large-scale, illegal transportation of bibles to the Eastern Bloc. Sometimes on the border between Finland and the Soviet Union people would release balloons with bibles strung to them, in the hope that these would come down somewhere in the realm of the Anti-Christ, the Red Empire founded by Lenin. But most religious contraband was distributed by road, using specially converted luxury cars, mini-buses, and the odd motorbike with sidecar, which the religious activists, generally of a Protestant persuasion, would drive to East Germany, Hungary and Romania.

It was pretty risky there was the threat of arrest and prison. The East German border guards, with their Alsatians, were feared the most. They were always ready and waiting to check under cars with mirrors, and tap the chassis with small hammers, searching out secret compartments, where seditious anti-socialist writings, porn or bibles might be stashed. The perfect cover was a family a happy, child-blessed family on its way to the fields, the woods or the beach for a holiday in the Model State. Siderius had often gone east as well, but hed had to quit the missionary work after his wife had fallen ill. The final approach to the border was always preceded by a prayer in Gods free and open country. And lo, the guards never once found a bible secreted behind a kitchen wall, or under the fold-away beds in his VW camper van.

So, youll do it?

Sideriuss right hand was gnarled with growths like big, red peonies. He twisted his wedding ring so forcefully that he seemed to want to tug it off.

What do you mean exactly?

Take delivery of the 7,000 bibles in Leningrad. You do speak Russian? You have been to the Soviet Union?

Siderius stared at me almost imploringly, a heavenly radiance in his deep-blue eyes.

The next day, Siderius was waiting for me outside Rotterdam Central station. We drove through the pounding rain to Pernis in a small car to meet the organisation. He began saying how the political plates in the east were shifting, like grain on a ship. But you have to understand the danger a ship at sea is in once the cargo in the hold comes loose? It could end up in a watery grave!

Siderius told me how, over the years, a bible-smuggling rivalry had grown up between the churches. He was Dutch Reformed himself, but among the reformed faiths various denominations had gone into business for themselves, even the Mormons and the Baptists.

Competition had kicked in.

The church council sees the situation as open warfare. Its now or never. The struggle and ammunition must be stepped up at the front. Smuggling bibles in by mini-bus just isnt getting the job done fast enough. Our Marxism-enslaved brothers and sisters must be provided en masse with spiritual nourishment, with hope and light. What Ill show you in a bit is only a trial delivery, 7,000 Russian bibles, cleverly concealed under a couple of tons of Zeeland spuds. If this mission is a success, there are 80,000 more waiting in a warehouse in Gouda, to go via Leningrad to Moscow, the Urals, and villages deep in Siberia. The other reformed churches are planning something with a ship too, but theyre keeping as quiet as the grave. Theyre so sly!