It occurred to him that they were talking about him as if he wasn’t there. The four white faces above him seemed to be revolving, receding from him as they spiralled. The motion made him feel giddy; the acrid taste of nausea flooded his throat. One of the Czechs said something to his father, but the words were too faint for Hugh to catch.
His body crumpled into darkness.
‘It is all arranged,’ Madame Hase said.
Alfred Kendall pushed aside the remains of his breakfast. After last night, he had a splitting headache and Madame Hase’s voice made it worse.
‘When can he start?’
‘This morning. I told him Hugh would come every day except Sunday, between nine in the morning and five in the afternoon. He can have his lunch there – that will be included in Dr Spiegel’s salary. Hugh can go to and from the apartment by tram. It is an easy journey – the number seven will take him almost from door to door.’
‘I hate to think what this is going to cost.’
Madame Hase sat down and reached for Kendall’s coffee pot. ‘Spiegel’s in no position to bargain. Besides, if money is short we can use one of the diamonds to cover these extra expenses. I know a jeweller who will give us a good price.’
‘But that money is for—’
‘The diamonds are there for a purpose. They may legitimately be used for anything which helps to achieve that purpose. We can’t afford to have Hugh under our feet for the next week or so. You made a good start with Jan and Bela last night, but we still have a long way to go.’
‘I’d better tell Hugh.’ Kendall pushed back his chair. ‘There’s no need for me to come, is there?’
Madame Hase put down her coffee cup and reached for her cigarette case.
‘The less Spiegel knows the better. This time I’ll take Hugh. Afterwards he can travel to Zizkov and back by himself. How is he this morning?’
Kendall shrugged. ‘None the worse for wear as far as I can see.’
‘He is upstairs?’
‘In our room, mooning around as usual. I’ll bring him down.’ He glanced around the dining room and lowered his voice still further. ‘Look here, are you sure we can trust this Spiegel chap? He’s not one of your lot, is he?’
Madame Hase squinted at him through a cloud of smoke. ‘Ludvik Spiegel was a friend of my father’s. He’s a man of no account – a learned fool. I can twist him round my little finger.’
When they reached the terminus, Hugh followed Madame Hase out of the tram. She led him in silence down a narrow street lined with small factories. Without warning she turned left through an archway. Hugh found himself in a large, rectangular courtyard, around which was an eight-storey block of flats.
Dr Spiegel lived in a top-floor apartment whose door gave on to the communal balcony. The balcony was an obstacle course of clothes lines, dustbins and bicycles.
‘This is not a nice neighbourhood,’ she said over her shoulder to Hugh. She rapped on Spiegel’s door. ‘You must not talk to people on your way here.’
The door opened with a screech of hinges.
‘Good morning!’ boomed Dr Spiegel.
He was a tall, thin man whose beard straggled over his bow tie. He ushered them into what was evidently his living room. It was crowded with dark-stained furniture and there were piles of books on most horizontal surfaces.
Madame Hase declined to sit down. She spoke rapidly in Czech to Spiegel; it sounded as if she was reeling off a string of orders. She left abruptly, without even glancing at Hugh.
‘Pan Kendall, we must introduce ourselves,’ Spiegel said in English. He held out a bony hand with ragged nails. ‘How do you do?’
‘How do you do, sir?’
Hugh and his tutor shook hands ceremoniously.
Dr Spiegel tilted a chair, sending a pile of newspapers to the floor. ‘Please sit down. I would advise you to keep your coat on for the time being. I do not light the stove in the mornings. You must pardon me for forcing you to share the brunt of my domestic economies.’
For the next five minutes, Spiegel strode up and down, his frock coat flapping behind him, describing with nostalgia his experiences in the British Museum reading room at the turn of the century. Hugh felt himself relaxing.
‘And now, Mr Kendall, we must consider our curriculum. We need not trouble with English, since I’m sure you know more about your delightful language than I could ever do. I think we may safely ignore mathematics and the natural sciences for much the same reason. Latin and Greek, on the other hand … But I forget my manners: I should begin by asking your opinion. Is there something that you would like to learn which is within my competence to teach?’
For a moment Hugh said nothing. His mind was full of what had happened yesterday. It wouldn’t have been so bad if he could have understood what the two men were saying.
‘I’d like to learn Czech.’
‘Indeed? An interesting choice. You think you may be here for some time?’
‘I don’t know, sir. But I’d like to know more of what’s going on.’
‘That, my dear Kendall, is a desire which does you credit. Most people prefer to know less rather than more. I wonder if we should add German to our syllabus? It is a language which is often heard in Prague. And of course you will need to have an idea of the historical background. Languages are not static things; they exist in time; they grow, flourish, and decay like organic matter. In a word, languages are alive. Like plants, their development is intimately connected with the soil and climate in which they grow.’ He smiled at Hugh, revealing an ill-fitting set of discoloured false teeth. ‘Yes, I think we have our modern trivium: Czech, German and history.’
Hugh looked blankly at him. Dr Spiegel appeared not to notice.
‘You will remember, of course, that the trivium provided the foundations of learning in the Middle Ages. Every scholar began with its three subjects, the essential tools of grammar, rhetoric and logic. But – mutatis mutandis, as it were – other subjects are essential if one is to live in contemporary Prague. It is most unfortunate, but these days one must be practical. At least I am well qualified in this respect: my mother was Czech, my father a Sudeten German, and my lifelong study has been history.’
Dr Spiegel stirred in his chair. His mouth moved as if he was talking silently to himself. He pulled out his watch and consulted it. His hand shook so much that he had to steady it against his leg.
‘Before we begin, I think we should drink a toast to our joint enterprise.’ He peered anxiously at Hugh. ‘Would this meet with your approval?’
Hugh nodded. It seemed a little early for elevenses, but perhaps the routine was different in Czechoslovakia.
Dr Spiegel went into the next room; before the door closed, Hugh caught a glimpse of a sink piled high with crockery. The door’s catch failed to engage and the door swung six inches back into the kitchen. Hugh saw his tutor take a brown, unlabelled bottle from a wall cupboard; he took a long swallow from it and put it away. When he returned to the living room, he was carrying another bottle and two large teacups, neither of which had saucers.
‘Glass breaks so easily,’ Dr Spiegel said apologetically. Taking great care to avoid spillages, he poured precisely the same quantity of a translucent golden fluid into each of the cups. He raised his cup in salute and drank with solemn concentration. Hugh took a sip and blenched: the taste was bitter.
Dr Spiegel refilled his own cup. ‘Czech, of course,’ he remarked suddenly, ‘is a Slavonic language in origin, though much influenced by German. It emerged as an independent language