Tatiana and Alexander (32 page)

All around him was machine-gun fire. He couldn’t tell where it was coming from. Every round felt as though it were hitting his helmet.

His men were floating.

The Vistula was turning red. Alexander had to get to the other side. Once they were on dry land anything was possible. And
this
is better than Dolny, better than Pulawy? he thought.
Here
the German defenses are down?

In the water nothing seemed possible.

Ouspensky continued to shout, as always. This time it wasn’t directed at Alexander. “Look at them all screaming like a bunch of pussies! Who are we fighting? Men or girls?”

Alexander spotted one of his own men clutching a corpse. It was Yermenko.

“Corporal!” Alexander yelled. “Where is your battle partner?”

Yermenko lifted the dead body. “Right here, sir!”

Alexander could see that Yermenko was struggling in the water. Quickly Alexander swam to him and yelled at him, but Yermenko was still struggling. He was using the body as a float. “What the fuck is wrong with you?” Alexander yelled. “Drop the soldier, and swim!”

“I can’t swim, sir!”

“Oh, for fuck’s sake!” Alexander got Ouspensky, Telikov and Verenkov to help Yermenko across. They were all ten meters from the shoreline when from the nearby bushes on the beach out jumped three Germans. Alexander didn’t spend a second thinking. He fired; through the air they flew.

Then three more came. Then three more. He fired again and again. Four Germans jumped in the river and headed straight for Alexander, raising their weapons at him. Yermenko lunged in front of Alexander,
pointed his weapon at the Germans and mowed them down. Ouspensky, Telikov, and Verenkov formed a wall in front of Alexander. Ouspensky yelled, “Back, Captain! Stand back!” He shot from above the shoulder and missed.

Alexander lifted his Shpagin above Ouspensky’s head, shot from above the shoulder and did not miss. “If you miss, shoot again, Lieutenant!” he yelled.

But now five Germans were in the water, meters away, water up to their waists. Alexander kept shooting and trying to get closer to the beachhead. His men kept fighting off the Germans with the butts of their rifles and their bayonets, trying to get closer to shore, but they were having no luck. The wet band of them in the water were too exposed, and more and more Germans kept coming.

In battle, three out of Alexander’s five senses were heightened. He saw danger like an owl in darkness, he smelled blood like a hyena, he heard noises like a wolf. He never got distracted, he never got confused, he never became uncertain, he saw and smelled and heard everything. He did not taste his own blood, he did not feel his own pain.

On his flank he saw a flash of light and had just enough time to lurch forward, the bullet missing him by half a meter. The German soldier was so livid at missing at point blank range, he stabbed Alexander with his bayonet. He was aiming for the neck, but Alexander’s neck was too high for the German. The bayonet pierced him in the lower left shoulder, cutting into his arm. Alexander swung his weapon and nearly sliced off the German’s head. The man went down, but now there were five of them on top of him, and he with his arm bleeding took out his knife and his bayonet and fought them until they went down and Ouspensky got their guns. Now that they had weapons in each hand, they became a wall of bullets moving to the shore and they weren’t stopped.

There were no more Germans coming from the bushes, and there was no more firing, either. And suddenly all was quiet except for the panting of the still breathing, except for the death throes of the still dying, except for the bubbling of the river burying the dead.

Alexander’s men crawled out onto the sand.

Alexander wanted a smoke, but his cigarettes were wet. He watched the NKGB troops cautiously swim across the river, holding their rifles and mortars above their heads.

“Fucking pussies,” Ouspensky whispered to Alexander, who sat between him and Yermenko. Alexander didn’t say anything to Ouspensky, but when the NKGB got to the beach, he stood up and without saluting
said, “You should have taken the unmined bridge and walked across like the civilians you are.”

The NKGB man—not a scrape on him—stared coldly at Alexander and said, “Address me properly.”

“You should have taken the fucking bridge, comrade,” said Alexander, bloodied from the helmet down, holding on to his machine gun.

“I am a
lieutenant
in the Red Army!” the man shouted. “Lieutenant Sennev. Weapons down, soldier.”

“And I am a captain!” Alexander shouted back, lifting up the weapon with his good arm. “Captain Belov.” One more word, and Alexander was going to see how many rounds his Shpagin still had in it.

The man stood down and motioned his men to leave the beach and follow him into the woods, cursing under his breath.

What was left of Alexander’s men stayed on the beach. He wanted to assess the damage to his battalion (he was afraid it was more like a platoon now) but the medic, a Ukrainian by the name of Kremler, came to take a look at him. He washed out the arm gash with carbolic acid and poured sulfa powder right into the wound to disinfect it further. “It’s deep,” was the only thing Kremler said.

“You have thread for stitches?”

“I have a small spool. We have many injured men.”

“Just give me three stitches. To hold it together, that’s all.”

Kremler sewed him, cleaned his banged-up head, and gave him a drink of vodka and a shot of morphine in the stomach. Afterward Ouspensky came and stood in front of him. “Captain, may I have a word?”

Alexander was sitting on the sand, having a smoke. The morphine was making him sleepy. He looked up. “First I’m going to have a word with you. How many men down?”

“All of them. We have thirty-two privates left, three corporals, two sergeants, one lieutenant—that would be me—and one captain—that would be you.” Ouspensky said the last grimly.

“Yermenko?”

“Yes.”

“Verenkov?”

“Neck wound, shell grazing on stomach, lost the fucking glasses you gave him, but yes.”

“Telikov?”

“Broken foot, but yes.”

“How in fuck’s name did he break his foot?”

“He tripped.” Ouspensky was not smiling.

“What’s the matter? Are
you
all right?”

“I’m fine. My head has been bleeding out my brains for two hours.”

“Did you start out with a significant amount, Lieutenant?”

Ouspensky crouched in front of Alexander. “Sir, I must tell you that I’m never one to second-guess my commanding officer, but I feel I’m not speaking out of turn if I say, what happened there—what you let happen there—was fucking lunacy.”

“You’re second-guessing me, Lieutenant.”

“Sir—”

“Lieutenant!” Alexander stood up. His wound was oozing blood out of the bandage. “We had nowhere else to go.” He paused. “And we crossed the river, didn’t we?”

“Sir, that’s not the point. Konev’s 29th armored division is supposed to be a day behind us. We could have waited. Yet we went into the water, into direct fire, we did not wait, we did not recon, we did not try to knock them out of position first, we just fucking went! And more to the point—
you
just went.
You!
The only thing between all of us and instant death, you led us into the mouth of the Germans and lost nearly all of our men, and now you’re sitting on the ground, half dead yourself, pretending you don’t know why I’m raging!”

Alexander pressed his hand into the bandage and said, “You can rage all you want, Lieutenant, but don’t do it in my presence. I wasn’t going to sit and wait for Konev’s men. He takes days to get here, there is no element of surprise, the Germans reinforce even more, and in the end, we get sent in first anyway. Except the Germans have more time to build up their defenses. We had to move out. Now we’ll regroup, but we’re in the woods. And we’ve cleared this path for Soviet reinforcements, Soviet armies. They’ll thank us in their own ungrateful, grudging way.” He smiled. “I guarantee you, we’re the first Soviet men across the Vistula.”

Ouspensky glared at him incredulously.

“We didn’t do so badly. We didn’t do great. We’ve lost men before, Lieutenant. Do you remember last April in Minsk? We lost thirty men de-mining one fucking field, not getting across a crucial river in Poland.”

“Sir, you sent us into their rockets with nary a bullet!”

“I told you to hold your weapon above your head as you crossed.”

“We have forty men left!”

“Are you counting the twenty NKGB?”

“Forty men and twenty pussies!”

“Yes, but we pushed the Germans away from the river bank. They’ve retreated into the woods. When we proceed into the woods, we will proceed with reinforcements.”

Ouspensky shook his head. “We can’t fight in the woods. I will not fight in the woods. It’s completely different warfare in the woods. You can’t see dick.”

“No, you can’t. I’m sorry I can’t make war more palatable for you.”

“We lost our tank. The only thing that protected
you.
”

“Me.”

“Oh, Mother of Christ!” Ouspensky exploded. “You act as if you are fucking immortal, but you are not—”

“Do not,” Alexander said loudly, “raise your voice to me, Ouspensky, do you understand? I don’t give a shit what kind of liberties I allow you, I will not allow you this one. Do I make myself clear?”

“Yes, sir,” Ouspensky said, quieter and stepping away. “You are still not fucking immortal, sir. And your men
certainly
aren’t, but I don’t give a shit about the men. It’s you we can’t replace. And I’m supposed to be here to protect you. How can you engage in hand-to-hand combat in the water when you are supposed to be in the rear? What do you think you are made of, Captain? Until just now when I saw you bleed red blood like the rest of us, I wasn’t sure.”

“It’s not my blood,” Alexander said.

“What?”

But Alexander shook his head.

“What’s going to happen to us in the woods?”

“We are going to go into the mountains of Holy Cross. There’s a good chance we will run out of ammunition because the Germans are better supplied. Konev will order us to fight until we die. That’s what the penal battalion means. That’s what being a Soviet officer means.”

Ouspensky stared blankly at Alexander. “And coming here—this is your winds of fucking destiny blowing at your back?”

“Yes. Because there is just one thing, Lieutenant, that the Red Army overlooked.”

“What’s that, sir?”

“I,” said Alexander, “have no intention of dying.”

Barrington, August 1944

“
WHERE ARE WE GOING
?” Vikki said. “And
why
? I don’t want to take the train to Massachusetts. I don’t want to go so far. What is it with you and these train trips? You just came back from Arizona, isn’t that enough? It’s raining, it’s miserable, and I worked a double shift yesterday and I work another double on Monday. Can’t I just stay home? Grammy is making her lasagna. I have to do my nails and iron my dress and my hair, and did you hear, women are shaving their legs and under-arms now. It’s all the rage. I was going to try. They told me that at Lady Be Beautiful, where by the way you promised me you were going to come with me. Why do we have to go anywhere? Couldn’t I just stay home and have a bath?”

“No. We have to go,” said Tatiana, pushing Anthony in the carriage, and pushing Vikki in the back.

“Why do I have to go with you?”

“Because I don’t want to go alone. Because my English is not so good. Because you my friend.”

Vikki sighed.

She sighed for five hours on the train, all the way to Boston. “Vikki, I counted. That was three sighs per mile. We went two hundred and forty miles. That’s seven hundred sighs.”

“That wasn’t sighing,” Vikki said petulantly. “That was breathing.”

“Exasperated breathing, yes.” She wished for her brother. Pasha would have gone with her and never uttered a word of misery, he would have just been stoic by her side. Her sister would have complained though, much like Vikki was doing. “I should’ve asked Edward,” Tatiana muttered, covering up Anthony. It was raining in Boston, too.

“Why didn’t you?”

“Can you
not
let me know every single thing you feeling at all times? I don’t want to know that you grouchy about doing me favor. Just do it, and stop complaining.”

Vikki stopped sighing.

The girls took a cab from Boston to Barrington since there were no local trains. The cabbie said, “That will be twenty dollars, going all that way.”

Vikki gasped, then yelped as Tatiana squeezed her thigh. “That will be fine,” Tatiana said to the cab driver.

“Twenty dollars? Are you crazy?” The girls settled into the back of the cab with Anthony on Tatiana’s lap, and the taxi screeched off. “It’s half a week’s pay for me. How much do you get paid?”

“Less than that. How you think we going to get there?”

“I don’t know. By bus?”

“Well, too far to walk to bus.”

“But it’s going to be twenty dollars more to get back.”

“Yes.”

“Can you tell me now what we’re doing?”

“We going to visit one of Anthony’s relatives.” She knew she shouldn’t do it, Sam had told her she shouldn’t, but she could not help herself. For some reason she felt it was going to be all right. Besides, she might soon need a favor from one of Anthony’s relatives.

“You have relatives in the United States?”

“I don’t. He does. I need you with me for support. If I need help, I will pinch arm really hard, like this.”

“Ouch!”

“Right. Until I do, you stand there, and smile, and say nothing.”

An hour later they were at Barrington. Tatiana paid and the girls got out. Barrington was a white town with black shutters and green oaks lining the clean streets. It was homey and peppered with white spires peeking out over the trees. There were some open shops along Main Street, a hardware store, a coffee shop, an antiques gallery, and a few women on the streets. None of them were pushing carriages—no young babies in sight except for Tatiana’s Anthony.

“Did you just spend more than two weeks’ salary on his trip?” asked Vikki, taking out a brush for her tangled hair.

“Do you know how much money I spent to come to here from England? Five hundred dollars. Was that worth it?”

“Absolutely. But to come
here
?”

“Just push carriage for me.”

“Wait, I’m busy.” Vikki continued brushing.

Tatiana glared at her.

“Oh, all right.”

“Let’s go and ask where Maple Street is.”

From the newspaper shop on the corner of Main, they learned that Maple was just a few blocks away. In the rain they walked there.

“Hey, something just occurred to me,” Vikki said. “The town is named Barrington, and your last name is Barrington. Is that a coincidence?”

“That
just
occurred to you? Stop. We here.” They stopped at a large white colonial clapboard house with black shutters, and overripe maples in the front yard. Up the brick walk they went, came up three steps, and stopped at the doorbell. They stood without ringing it.

“What are we doing?”

Tatiana couldn’t get her courage up. “Maybe we should leave,” she said.

“Are you joking? All this way, to leave?” Vikki rang the bell herself. Tatiana left Anthony’s carriage at the foot of the steps and she held her son in her arms.

The door was opened by a stern-looking, properly dressed, perfectly coiffed, older woman. “Yes?” she said in a brusque voice. “You’re collecting? Hold on, let me get my purse.”

“We not collecting,” Tatiana said quickly. “We come—I come to speak to Esther Barrington.”

“I’m Esther Barrington,” said Esther. “Who are
you
?”

“I—” Tatiana hesitated. She held out her boy. “This is Anthony Alexander Barrington,” she said. “Alexander’s son.”

Esther dropped the keys she was holding in her hands. “Who
are
you?”

“I am Alexander’s wife,” said Tatiana.

“Where is he?”

“I don’t know.”

Esther’s face turned red. “Well, I’m not at all surprised. To
think
you would have the nerve to come here, to my house! Who do you think you are?”

“Alexander’s wife—”

“I don’t care who you are! Don’t you shove your son in my face, as if suddenly I’m supposed to care. I am very sorry for you—” Her stern voice belied Esther’s wretched expression. “Very sorry, but you have nothing to do with my business.”

Tatiana took a step back. “I’m sorry,” she said. “You’re right. I just wanted you to—”

“I know what you wanted! You’re bringing me your bastard child. What? That’s going to make it all better?”

“Make what better?” said Vikki.

Esther didn’t reply to Vikki as she continued to raise her voice. “Do you know what your father-in-law said to me as he left my house for the last time fourteen years ago? He said,
My son is none of your business, cunt
. That’s what he said to me! My flesh-and-blood nephew, my Alexander none of my business. I wanted to help them, I said I would keep the boy while he and his wife went to train-wreck their lives in the Soviet Union, but he spat on my offer. He didn’t want any part of me, of our family. He never wrote to me, never telegraphed. I never heard from him.” She paused, panting. “What’s the bastard doing now, anyway?”

“He is dead,” Tatiana said faintly.

Esther couldn’t even mouth an “Oh.” Her hands clutching the door-knob, she staggered back, and said, “Well, fine. Don’t you, whoever you are, come to me now and tell me your stranger son is
my
damned business.” With her trembling hand Esther slammed the door as loudly as she could and the girls were left standing on the porch.

“Hmm,” said Vikki. “How did you expect that to go?”

Trying hard not to cry, Tatiana turned around and walked back down the steps. “Better than that, I think.”

What had she expected? She didn’t know the relations between Alexander’s father and aunt before the Barringtons left the United States, but she was sure of one thing from Esther’s reaction: Esther knew nothing—not about her brother, not about her sister-in-law and not about Alexander. And really, that was the only thing Tatiana had come to find out—whether Esther had any information that might help Tatiana. She didn’t. Tatiana was done. The promise of distant family, of perhaps a familial bond for her son, was too much of an intellectual intangible for Tatiana at a time when she was single-mindedly set on just one thing—finding out the truth about what happened to Alexander.

She placed Anthony back in the carriage, and they walked down the path to the street. “Fourteen years,” Vikki said. “You’d think she’d get over it. Some people have such long memories.”

Slowly they made their way back to town. “Hey, what was that word?” Tatiana asked. “What did Alexander’s father call her when he left?”

“Never mind. Ladies don’t use that kind of language. Our Esther has a bit of the soldier in her. Someday I’ll teach you the bawdy words in English.”

Tatiana said, “I know bawdy words in English.” Quietly. “Just not that one.”

“How would you know anything? Dictionaries don’t have them. Phrase-books don’t have them.” Vikki prodded her. “Not any phrase-books I’ve ever seen.”

“I once,” said Tatiana, “had very good teacher.”

They were on Main Street when a car pulled up to the sidewalk and Esther jumped out, her makeup long gone, her eyes red, her gray coiffed hair disheveled. She went in front of Tatiana.

“I’m sorry,” Esther said. “It was a shock to see you. And we had never heard a word from my brother since he left America. I didn’t know what happened to them. No one in the State Department would tell us a thing.”

Back at the house, the girls were fed to bursting with ham and bread and ham soup, and were given coffee, and Anthony was put upstairs into a bed, barricaded on all sides, and allowed to nap.

For someone who had harbored a grudge for over a decade, Esther cried like the wife of the hanged when Tatiana told her about her brother and his wife, and Alexander.

She insisted that the girls stay until Sunday, and the girls did. Esther was a decent woman. She herself had no children, was sixty-one, a year younger than Harold, and the only surviving Barrington. Her own husband had died five years earlier, and Esther now lived alone with Rosa, her housekeeper.

“Was this where Alexander lived?” Tatiana kept her eyes on Esther, afraid to look around, afraid she might see a vestige of a child Alexander.

Esther shook her head. “His house is about a mile away from here. I don’t speak to the people who live in it now, they’re right snobs, but if you want I could drive you past there so you can take a look.”

“They had woods behind their house?”

“Not anymore,” Esther replied. “All houses there now. The woods were nice. Alexander had a friend—”

“Teddy? Or Belinda?”

“Is there any part of his life you don’t know?”

“Yes,” said Tatiana. “The present part.”

“Well, Teddy died in ’42, in the Battle of Midway. And Belinda became a frontline nurse and is now in North Africa. Or Italy. Or wherever those troops are now. Poor Alexander. Poor Teddy. Poor Harold.” Esther shook her head. “Stupid Harold. His whole family ruined, and that boy—that golden, unbelievable boy—do you have a picture?”

Tatiana shook her head. “He remained what he was, Esther. You haven’t heard from him, then?”

“Of course not.”

“Or anything about him?”

“Not a word. Why?”

Tatiana struggled up. “We really must be going.”

On the train to New York, Vikki stared out the window.

“What’s wrong, Vik?”

“Nothing. I was just thinking,” said Vikki, “that when I first met you, except for that faded scar on your face, you seemed like the least complicated person I had ever met.”

Staring at her boy, Tatiana put her hand on Vikki’s leg. “I’m not complicated,” she said. “I just need to find out what happened to my husband.”

“You told me and Edward he was dead.”

Tatiana stared out the window as the train whizzed through the wet summer Massachusetts countryside.

Have you been looking for me? she had once asked him, and he replied, All my life
.

She said nothing further as she put her head back on the seat and, stroking Anthony’s head, shut her eyes until they were in Grand Central Station.