Читать книгу Uncle Rudolf - Paul Bailey - Страница 8

Am I attempting to stave off the prospect of my second childhood? Why else, I ask myself, should I now be writing about my life with Rudolf Peterson, who was born Rudi Petrescu? Walking the five miles back from the dentist’s today, at my usual brisk pace, in light rain, I realized that I had said goodbye to his receptionist in Romanian. La revedere: these were my last words to my father, spoken with a sob as the train drew out of the Gare du Nord in Paris, on the morning of the twenty-third of February, 1937. I went on waving to him until he and I were out of each other’s sight. Although I was sad to be parted from him, I was also happily innocent of his impending plan to disappear.

—Your uncle will take care of you, Andrei. For the time being – weeks, maybe months. No longer, dear one, I promise. This will be a holiday for you. Rudi is an amusing man. He will make you laugh. He has stories at his fingertips.

My father entrusted me to the care of a guard, with whom he communicated in French and a few, telling signs. The man nodded his understanding of the task ahead of him, muttering Oui, Monsieur and Je comprends and, finally, Merci beaucoup, Monsieur when he accepted the francs my father offered him. He was to deliver me, petit Andrei – Andrei, Andrei, my father repeated – into the hands of Maestro Rudolf Peterson, who would be waiting for his nephew on the station platform in London. Then my father produced from the inside pocket of his best overcoat a photograph of my uncle dressed, I think, as a pirate, with a bandanna on his head, large rings in his ears and a cutlass in his belt. My father entreated the guard to study the maestro’s face, and nothing else. The man did so, and smiled. The maestro, my father insisted, would be wearing ordinary clothes. Not très ordinaire, but ordinaire. No earrings; no sword. The man nodded vigorously, still smiling.

—La revedere, Tata, I managed to say, although I was choking with fear and anticipation. I did not want this holiday. I wanted to be with my mother and father, from whom I had never been separated. Yet I also wanted to meet my famous Uncle Rudolf – to listen to the stories he had at his fingertips; to have him sing for me.