YAO IS CALLING ME.
“The reporter is here.”
It’s still daylight, and the train is standing in a station. I get up, my head spinning, open the door a crack, and find my publisher waiting outside.
“How long have I been asleep?”
“All day, I think. It’s five o’clock in the afternoon.”
I tell him that I need a bit of time to take a shower and wake up properly so that I don’t say things I’ll regret later.
“Don’t worry,” Yao says. “The train will be here for the next hour.”
It’s lucky that we’re stationary: having a shower when the train is in motion is a difficult and dangerous task. I could easily slip and hurt myself and end the journey in the most ridiculous way possible—on crutches. Whenever I get into the shower, I feel rather as if I were surfing. Today, though, it’s easy.
Fifteen minutes later, I emerge, have a coffee with the others, and am introduced to the reporter. I ask him how long he needs for the interview.
“We can arrange a time. I thought I could travel with you until the next station and—”
“Ten minutes will do. Then you can get off right here. I don’t want to put you to any unnecessary trouble.”
“But you’re not—”
“No, really, I don’t want to put you to any trouble,” I say again. I should never have agreed to do this interview; I obviously wasn’t thinking straight when I said yes. My objective on this journey is quite different.
The reporter looks at my publisher, who turns away and stares fixedly out the window. Yao asks if the table is a good place for them to film.
“I’d prefer the space between the carriages, next to the train doors,” says the cameraman.
Hilal glances at me. That’s where the Aleph is.
Doesn’t she get tired of sitting at the same table all the time? Once she had sent me off into that place beyond time and space, did she, I wonder, stay in the compartment, watching me sleep? Well, we’ll have time enough to talk later.
“Fine,” I say. “Set up your camera. But, just out of curiosity, why choose such a small, noisy space when we could stay here?”
The reporter and the cameraman, however, are already heading for the end of the carriage, so we follow them.
“Why this tiny space?” I ask again, while they’re setting up the equipment.
“To give the viewer a sense of reality. This is where everything happens. People leave their compartments, and, because the corridor is so narrow, they come here to talk instead. Smokers meet up here. For someone else it might provide somewhere to hold a secret rendezvous. All the carriages have these vestibules.”
At the moment, the space is occupied by me, the cameraman, the publisher, Yao, Hilal, and a cook who has come to watch.
“Could we have a little privacy?” I ask.
A television interview is the least private thing in the world, but the publisher and the cook leave. Hilal and Yao stay where they are.
“Could you move a little to the left?” the cameraman asks.
No, I can’t. That’s where the Aleph is, created by the many people who have stood there in the past. Even though Hilal is keeping a safe distance, and even knowing that we would plunge back into that one point only if we were standing close together, I feel that it’s best not to take any risks.
The camera is running.
“Before we begin, you mentioned that interviews and publicity were not the main purpose of this journey. Could you explain why you decided to travel on the Trans-Siberian Railway?”
“Because I wanted to. It was a dream of mine as an adolescent. That’s all.”
“As I understand it, a train like this isn’t exactly the most comfortable mode of transport.”