Tatiana and Alexander (10 page)

With Stepanov, 1943

WHEN ALEXANDER OPENED HIS
eyes—did he open them?—it was still black, still cold. He was shaking, his arms around himself. There is no shame in dying in war, in dying young, in dying in a cold cell, in saving your body from humiliation.

Once, when he was convalescing, Tatiana asked without looking at him as she was dressing his wound, did you see the light? And he replied, no, he had not seen.

It was only a partial truth.

Because he had heard…

The gallop of the red horse.

But here all the colors had run dry.

As if in a stupor, Alexander dimly heard the sliding of the metal bolt, the turning of the key. His commander, Colonel Mikhail Stepanov, came into his cell with a flashlight. Alexander was hunched in the corner.

“Ah,” said Stepanov. “So it’s true. You
are
alive.”

Alexander wanted to shake Stepanov’s hand, but he was too cold and his back was too sore. He did not move and said nothing.

Stepanov crouched by him. “What in the world happened to that truck? And I saw the Red Cross doctor’s death certificate for you myself. I told your wife you were dead. Your pregnant wife thinks you’re
dead
!”

“Everything is as it should be,” replied Alexander. “It’s good to see you, sir. Try not to inhale. There is not enough oxygen here for both of us.”

“Alexander,” said Stepanov. “You didn’t want to tell her what was happening to you?”

Alexander shook his head.

“But why the truck explosion, the death certificate?”

“I wanted her to think there was no hope for me.”

“Why?”

Alexander didn’t answer.

“Anywhere you go—I will go with you,” Tatiana says. “But if you are staying, then I’m staying, too. I’m not leaving my baby’s father in the Soviet Union.” She bends over an overwhelmed Alexander. “What did you say to me in Leningrad? What kind of a life can I build, you said, knowing I have left you to die—or to rot—in the Soviet Union? I’m quoting you back to you. Those were your words.” She smiles. “And on this one point, I will have to agree with you.” She lowers her voice. “If I left you, no matter which road I took, with ponderous clatter indeed, the Bronze Horseman would pursue me all through that long night into my own maddening dust.”

He couldn’t tell that to his commander. He didn’t know if Tatiana had left the Soviet Union.

“You want a smoke?”

“Yes,” replied Alexander. “But can’t here. Not enough oxygen for a smoke.”

Stepanov pulled Alexander up to his feet. “Stand for a few minutes,” Stepanov said. “Stretch your legs.” He looked at Alexander’s bent-sideways head. “This cell is too small for you. They didn’t expect that.”

“Oh, they did. That’s why they put me here.”

Stepanov stood with his back to the door, while Alexander stood across from him.

“What day is it, sir?” asked Alexander. “How long have I been here? Four, five days?”

“The morning of the sixteenth of March,” said Stepanov. “The morning of your third day.”

Third day!
Alexander thought with shock.

Third day!
Alexander thought with excitement. That would probably mean that Tania…

He didn’t continue with his thoughts. Very quietly, almost inaudibly, Stepanov leaned forward and Alexander thought he said, “Keep talking loudly, so they can hear, but listen to me so that I can laugh with you when you come back in the clover field, and I will show you how to eat clover.”

Alexander looked at Stepanov’s face, more drawn than ever, his eyes gray, his mouth turned down with sympathy and anxiety. “Sir?”

“I didn’t say anything, Major.”

Shaking off the hallucination in his head, of a meadow, of sun, of clover, Alexander repeated in a low voice, “Sir?”

“Everything’s gone to shit, Major,” whispered Stepanov. “They’re already looking for your wife, but…she seems to have disappeared. I convinced her to go back to Leningrad with Dr. Sayers, just as you asked me. I made it easy for her to leave.”

Alexander said nothing, digging his nails into the palms of his hands.

“But now she’s gone. You know who else disappeared? Dr. Sayers. He had informed me he was going back to Leningrad with your wife.”

Alexander dug his nails harder into his palms to keep himself from looking at Stepanov and from speaking.

“He was on his way to Helsinki, but he was supposed to have gone to Leningrad first!” Stepanov exclaimed. “To drop her off, to pick up his own Red Cross nurse he had left in Grechesky hospital. Listen to me, are you listening? They never reached Leningrad. Two days ago his Red Cross truck was found burned, pillaged and turned over on the Finnish-Soviet border at Lisiy Nos. There was an incident with the Finnish troops and four of our men were shot and killed. No sign of Sayers, or of Nurse Metanova.”

Alexander said nothing. He wanted to pick up his heart from the floor. But it was dark, and he couldn’t find it. He heard it roll away from him, he heard it beating, bleeding, pulsing in the corner.

Stepanov lowered his voice another notch. “And Finnish troops shot and killed, too.”

Silence from Alexander.

“And that’s not all.”

“No?” Alexander thought he said.

“No sign of Dr. Sayers. But…” Stepanov paused. “Your good friend, Dimitri Chernenko, was found shot dead in the snow.”

That was small comfort to Alexander.

But it was
some
comfort.

“Major, why was Chernenko at the border?”

Alexander did not answer. Where was Tatiana? All he wanted to do was ask that question. Without a truck how could they have gotten anywhere? Without a truck what were they doing—walking on foot through the marshes of Karelia?

“Major, your wife is missing. Sayers is gone, Chernenko is dead—” Stepanov hesitated. “And not just dead. But shot dead in a
Finn’s uni
form
. He was wearing a Finnish pilot’s uniform and carrying Finnish ID papers instead of his domestic passport!”

Alexander said nothing. He had nothing to hide except the information that would cost Stepanov his life.

“Alexander!” Stepanov exclaimed in a hissing whisper. “Don’t shut me out. I’m trying to help.”

“Sir,” Alexander said, attempting to mute his fear. “I’m asking you please not to help me anymore.” He wished he had a picture of her. He wanted to touch her white dress with red roses one more time. Wanted to see her young and with him, standing newly married on the steps of the Molotov church.

The fear, the stabbing panic he felt prohibited Alexander from thinking of Tania past. That’s what he would have to learn to do: forbid himself from looking at her even in his memory.

With trembling hands he made a sign of the cross on himself. “I was all right,” he finally managed to say, “until you came here and told me my wife was missing.” He began to shiver uncontrollably.

Stepanov came closer to Alexander. He took off his own coat and gave it to him. “Here, put this around your shoulders.”

Immediately he heard a voice from the outside yell, “It’s time!”

In a whisper, Stepanov said, “Tell me the truth, did you tell your wife to leave with Sayers for Helsinki? Was that your plan all along?”

Alexander said nothing. He didn’t want Stepanov to know—one life, two, three, was enough. The individual was a million people divided by one million; Stepanov did not deserve to die because of Alexander.

“Why are you being so stubborn? Stop it! Having gotten nowhere, they’re bringing in a new man to question you. Apparently the toughest interrogator they have. He has never failed to get a signed confession. They’ve kept you here nearly naked in a cold cell, and soon they’ll come up with something else to break you; they’ll beat you, they’ll put your feet in cold water, they’ll shine a light in your face until you go mad, the interrogator will deliberately tell you things you will want to kill him for, and you need to be strong for all that. Otherwise you have no chance.”

Alexander said faintly, “Do you think she is safe?”

“No, I don’t think she is safe! Who is safe around here, Alexander?” Stepanov whispered. “You? Me? Certainly not her. They’re looking everywhere for her. In Leningrad, in Molotov, in Lazarevo. If she is in Helsinki, they’ll find out, you know that, don’t you? They’ll bring
her back. They were calling the Red Cross hospital in Helsinki this morning.”

“It’s time!” someone yelled again.

“How many times in my life will I have to hear those words?” Alexander said. “I heard them for my mother, I heard them for my father, I heard them for my wife, and now I hear them for me.”

Stepanov took his coat. “The things they accuse you of—”

“Don’t ask me, sir.”

“Deny them, Alexander.”

As Stepanov turned to go, Alexander said, “Sir…” He was so weak he almost couldn’t get the words out. He didn’t care how cold the wall was, he could not stand on his own anymore. He pressed his body against the icy concrete and then sank down to the floor. “Did you see her?”

He lifted his gaze to Stepanov, who nodded.

“How was she?”

“Don’t ask, Alexander.”

“Was she—”

“Don’t ask.”

“Tell me.”

“Do you remember when you brought my son back to me?” Stepanov asked, trying to keep his voice from breaking. “Because of you I had comfort. I was able to see him before he died, I was able to bury him.”

“All right, no more,” said Alexander.

“Who was going to give that comfort to your wife?”

Alexander put his face into his hands.

Stepanov left.

Alexander sat motionlessly on the floor. He didn’t need morphine, he didn’t need drugs, he didn’t need phenobarbital. He needed a bullet in his fucking chest.

The door opened. Alexander had not been given any bread or water, or any clothes. He had no idea how long he had been left undressed in the cold cell.

A man came in who apparently did not want to stand. Behind him a guard brought in a chair and the tall, bald, unpleasant-faced man sat down and in a pleasant-sounding nasal voice said, “Do you know what I’m holding in my hands, Major?”

Alexander shook his head. There was a kerosene lamp between them.

“I’m holding all your clothes, Major. All your clothes and a wool blanket. And look, I’ve got a nice piece of pork for you, on the bone. It’s still warm. Some potatoes too, with sour cream and butter. A shot of vodka. And a nice long smoke. You can leave this damn cold place, have some food, get dressed. How would you like that?”

“I would like that,” Alexander said impassively. His voice wasn’t going to tremble for a stranger.

The man smiled. “I thought you would. I came all the way from Leningrad to talk to you. Do you think we could talk for a bit?”

“I don’t see why not,” Alexander replied. “I don’t have much else to do.”

The man laughed. “No, that’s right. Not much at all.” His non-laughing eyes studied Alexander intently.

“What do you want to talk about?”

“You, mostly, Major Belov. A couple of other things.”

“That’s fine.”

“Would you like your clothes?”

“I’m sure,” Alexander said, “that to a smart man like yourself, the answer is obvious.”

“I have another cell for you to go to. It’s warmer, bigger and has a window. Much warmer. It must be twenty-five degrees Celsius in there right now, not like this one, it’s probably no more than five Celsius in here.” The man smiled again. “Or would you like me to translate that into Fahrenheit for you, Major?”

Fahrenheit? Alexander narrowed his eyes. “That won’t be necessary.”

“Did I mention tobacco?”

“You mentioned it.”

“All these things, Major—comfort things. Would you like any of them?”

“Didn’t I answer that question?”

“You answered that question. I have one more for you.”

“Yes?”

“Are you Alexander Barrington, the son of Harold Barrington, a man who came here in December of 1930, with a beautiful wife and a good-looking eleven-year-old son?”

Alexander didn’t blink as he stood in front of the sitting interrogator. “What is your name?” he asked. “Usually you people introduce yourselves.”

“Us people?” The man smiled. “I tell you what. You answer me and I will answer you.”

“What’s your question?”

“Are you Alexander Barrington?”

“No. What is your name?”

The man shook his head.

“What?” said Alexander. “You asked me to answer your question. I did. Now you answer mine.”

“Leonid Slonko,” said the interrogator. “Does that make any difference to you?”

Alexander studied him very carefully. He had heard the name Slonko before. “Did you say you came from Leningrad to talk to me?”

“Yes.”

“You work in Leningrad?”

“Yes.”

“A long time, Comrade Slonko? They tell me you’re very good at your job. A long time in your line of work?”

“Twenty-three years.”

Alexander whistled appreciatively. “Where in Leningrad?”

“Where what?”

“Where do you work? Kresty? Or the House of Detention on Millionnaya?”

“What do you know about the House of Detention, Major?”

“I know it was built during Alexander II’s reign in 1864. Is that where you work?”

“Occasionally I interview prisoners there, yes.”

Nodding, Alexander went on. “Nice city, Leningrad. I’m still not used to it, though.”

“No? Well, why would you be?”

“That’s right, why would I? I prefer Krasnodar. It’s warmer.” Alexander smiled. “And your title, comrade?”

“I’m chief of operations,” Slonko replied.

“Not a military man, then? I didn’t think so.”

Slonko bolted up, holding Alexander’s clothes in his hands. “It just occurred to me, Major,” he said, “that we are finished here.”

“I agree,” said Alexander. “Thanks for coming by.”

Slonko departed in such an angry rush that he left the lamp and the chair. It was some time before the guard came in and took them.

Darkness again.

So debilitating. But nothing so diminishing as fear.

This time he didn’t wait long.

The door opened and two guards came in and ordered him to come with them. Alexander said, “I’m not dressed.”