From the bridge, and so far as I could see, unattended, I made my way towards the foot of the hill, through narrow, silent streets and past the high blank walls of St Nicholas's Church. Ahead of me, as I walked beneath a low colonnade, a pub's light spread out across the cobbled pavement and glowed saffron across the arched ceiling above me. Two men, perhaps sent out, continued a heated discussion, prodding and tugging at each other and paying no attention to me as I, walking by, hoped their disagreement didn't suddenly escalate into something even more physical. It didn't, and I was able to pass by without any involvement. The men, having evidently made their point, slapped each other on the backs and returned to their beer.
I reached lower Nerudova, it's length before me rising up against the dark flank of the Castle hill, and climbed slowly. It was now pleasantly cool, the day having finally lifted it's thick warm and airless cloak.
'Time and the bell have buried the day...'
Half way up I waited again, as I had at the bridge. There were fewer people about than during the day, but the shadows were deeper and darker.
Marta's apartment was on the third floor of a building opposite the Shwarzenberg palace and the castle steps. The windows glowed with light. At last, there was some sign of life. I had tried twice before to find her during the day, wondering initially if it was the correct location, if perhaps I had misremembered the address, wondering if she may not be in Prague at all.
I looked up at the ochre colored building from across the street, looked again along the gloomy Nerudova sloping down and away, and crossed into the building.
Marta stared at me from the doorway with her large brown eyes. 'You are Zuzana's friend?' She looked again at the small note, written in Czech, that I had given her: '...he is our friend - love from Zuzka'. 'You have come from London... to talk to Seifert?' A look, a mixture of bewilderment at this sudden, unexpected arrival from 'the West' and faint bemusement at the extent of his ambition, crossed her face. She opened the door to let me in. There, sitting comfortably with a coffee, was a man in his mid thirties, about Marta's own age, and a boy of about eight or nine in his pajamas, sitting at a table and leafing through a book. The man nodded.
'London?' he said. I detected a slight shake of the head at this evidently interesting fact.
'Yes' I said.
'Ok' he said. 'From London.'
Marta put a spoonful of tea leaves into a cup and poured boiling water. 'Sorry, Czech way, I know' she said apologetically. 'No tea bags.'
'Your husband and son?' I said.
'My friend and my son. You know Seifert is quite ill,' said Marta, 'and it will be difficult, he is watched all the time.'
We meet the following morning in the Little Town district, in a cafe near the Lichenstein Palace. An elderly, slightly stooping man in green overalls and carrying a broom crosses slowly in front of the old baroque palace building, which housed a school for Communism. He enters it's courtyard and disappears from view.
'That man,' says Marta, 'he was very important member of government until recently. Now he sweeps their floors.'
'So' says Marta, ' you want to make interview with our famous poet.'
'A short film,' I say. 'An acceptance for Stockholm. He probably won't go, we know, like Walensa last year.'
'You made a film with Walensa?'
'In the crypt of a church in Gdansk,' I reply, 'though it was never shown, apparently.'
'But you have camera?'
I turn away from the other tables and take a small 8mm camera from my jacket pocket. She looks amused.
'On that? she said smiling, 'it looks like toy.'
'I hope so,' I said.
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