The Four Winds of Heaven (69 page)

When Sonia announced this to her brother, Gino's face flushed a deep purple and he grasped the cell bars with anger. “I have fought the Germans, risked my life!” he exclaimed. “The Falkenhayn episode was totally different. Blumenfeld is not dying. He is an enemy, and Mama is behaving outrageously. I am glad that I am here—or I should be obliged to go to Olga's house to eat, in order not to have to sit in front of him at the table Mama shames me.”

Sonia said nothing. Conflicting emotions were warring within her: loyalty to her country and brother on the one hand, family tradition and devotion to her mother on the other. But a plan was forming in her mind, although she would never have outlined it to Gino.

When young Blumenfeld appeared the next day, Sonia made him welcome, and served a beautifully presented meal which considerably stretched the Gunzburgs' budget. There was fresh salad, cold fish, and boiled potatoes sprinkled with parsley, and for dessert, apples and a cheese. The officer smiled, his light eyes brightening with pleasure, and he began to relax. He told Mathilde that he had heard that his Aunt Rosa and Uncle Sasha had reached France, that Tania and her in-laws had gone to Basel, Switzerland.

It was over coffee that Sonia cleared her throat, and said, “Hans, a grave situation has arisen on account of my young brother's—impulsiveness. You are a lieutenant, an officer. Might it be within your power to help a member of our own family, who has acted foolishly? Gino is in jail because of a girl, really.” Then, without blushing, she began to recount Gino's actions, tempering them a bit, and smiling sweetly at the young man. “You see how overblown the case actually has been,” she finished, gazing with her pure gray eyes at Hans Blumenfeld. “And isn't it romantic, really?”

And so it was that on the following day, a joyful Gino appeared at the Gunzburg house. “They released me!” he cried. “And I don't know why. Did Nadezhda Igorovna convince them that I was not a criminal?”

“I wouldn't know,” his sister answered. “But some criminals are less dangerous than a fool in love.” And she turned her back, seemingly annoyed at him. His mother raised her eyebrows and shook her head in Sonia's direction. Don't cross her today, her blue eyes told him.

Even after her brother's return to the family, Sonia continued her visits to the prison. She brought the same basket, filled with whatever food they could manage, and casually deposited it in the hands of Mossia Zlatopolsky. “I am sorry that we couldn't help you, too,” she declared the first day. “But one favor was all that we thought we could curry from the enemy.” When she departed, Mossia thoughtfully shared the food with Vassya, who was indeed grateful. For both of them realized that Sonia could ill afford her generosity and that, had she learned of Vassya's connection with Gino at the front, she would surely have sacrificed her own portion to add more to the basket. Mossia felt within his heart that no one in the Gunzburg household knew of her continued visits, nor of the tidbits she put aside for him. It was a gesture of personal honor that Mossia cherished.

But the two prisoners had another visitor each morning, one Sonia never knew about. Every day, Gino came to see Vassya and Mossia, also bearing whatever scraps he could save. In order to preserve the dignity of the siblings' selfless acts, the two men never revealed to either Gunzburg what the other was doing. It is the indomitable Gunzburg spirit which must at any cost be salvaged from this strife, Mossia determined. Even if Russia herself perishes, these two young people, the Baron's children, must fight to survive. They are his greatest legacy on earth.

S
oon the Germans
began to relax their hold on Feodosia, and could hardly be bothered with such harmless men as Vassya and Mossia Zlatopolsky. The two men were released from jail, Vassya returning to his nearby farm, and Mossia going in search of his wife, Lialia. It was old Madame Zevina who announced to Sonia, Mathilde, and Johanna that she had heard that the Zlatopolskys had gone to Yalta, where members of his family had been staying. “It is strange that he did not stop to say good-bye to us,” Mathilde remarked, furrowing her brow. But Madame Zevina shrugged: “If he is indeed a gentleman, then he merely spared you a face-to-face encounter with his... vivid spouse.”

Sonia simply smiled. She was thinking of a racehorse that had won, against all odds.

S
onia and Gino
carefully perused the newspapers, which were not accurate, spouting German and communist propaganda. But these tabloids were all that were available to them, and they were eager to know what was occurring in the rest of the country. News of Ossip could not reach them, and if Hans Blumenfeld had not told them of Sasha, Rosa, and Tania, they might have thought them dead in Petrograd and Kiev. News from abroad was nonexistent, except to relate German exploits in the final throes of the world war—distorted exploits, naturally, for the Central Powers were, in fact, faring badly.

One event, however, did come through the propaganda, about a political murder which took place in July in Ekaterinburg, deep in Siberia. Brother and sister regarded each other, sick and frightened: the Tzar and his wife and four children had been shot and killed by the communists. “A purge,” the tabloid had called it. Gino sat with his chin upon his clenched hands, thinking of his beloved country. He had been less of a Tzarist than his parents, brother, and sister Sonia. They had been true aristocrats. He thought of himself as a well-educated, simple man with the instincts of an intelligent peasant or soldier. He sat and pondered the fate of his Russia, and wept. The death of the Tzar signified the end of a truly Russian tradition, embedded in its land and in its people.

Cut off from everything that had given meaning to his existence, and fiercely set against fighting his own countrymen, Gino de Gunzburg felt as though a maelstrom were storming all around him. Chaos reigned, blood was shed, but at this particular place in the Crimea he was isolated from its direct effects. He might actually have been living in another nation. A logical, sensible young man, a young man imbued with strong principles, he could not sort out the confusion or his own part in it. He felt that the only ordered aspect of his life was centered around his mother and sister, and Olga, of course. She too was strangely at loose ends, not knowing how best to proceed with life.

Clutching at the first sign of safety, Olga and Gino felt that the best thing for them was simply to proceed with their lives, thereby lending a measure of sanity to their families too. After much discussion, therefore, the two young people resolved to enter the University of Simferopol in the fall. As soon as Alexander Zevin wrote that he had found lodgings for everyone, Gunzburgs and Pomerantzes made their way from Feodosia to the larger city, which was the capital of the Crimea. Zevin had rented a pleasant house for Nadezhda Igorovna and her daughter, who could afford it. But, knowing the tight straits in which the Gunzburgs now found themselves, with no resources but the small remains of the 1917 harvest, he took for them the living room and alcove of a large house which was being opened to boarders.

This residence belonged to a widow, Madame Solovéichik, who had once been of the wealthy gentry but whose income had greatly diminished. At one time, she had lived from the proceeds of her nearby farm in Beshterek, but now the communists were sending groups of the Cheka to collect much of her livestock and vegetables for the feeding of their own party members in the cities. Her income had therefore much declined, and she had begun to take in paying guests.

The house was large but had only a single story, and it already contained two families when the Gunzburgs arrived. Sonia and Gino cheered up their mother and ignored Johanna's complaints, converting the sitting room into a room for the three women, who would sleep on a couch and two cots, and preparing a third cot for Gino in the alcove, with a pinned-up sheet to separate him from the women, as a curtain.

Madame Solovéichik did not provide meals for her guests, but she allowed the Gunzburgs to use her kitchen facilities. Everyone ate together in the vast dining room, and the dinners were animated. Apart from her live-in boarders, Madame Solovéichik had with her an aged friend of ninety-two who, not wishing to accept charity, tended the enormous samovar all day long in a small storeroom; and also an impoverished lady of society who had become her housekeeper. Two schoolteachers came to supper, and an old poetess as well. Mathilde enjoyed these people and Sonia and Gino sometimes joined one of the boarder families, whose daughter played the piano and knew the youth of Simferopol. But the Gunzburgs were still in mourning for David, and did not dance. Besides, Gino spent most of his evening hours with Olga, working on their Greek or their history homework. And Sonia, after her household chores, was frequently tired.

Gino was serious about his studies, and, as his French and German were flawless, he took home translations for some of his professors to add small amounts of money to the family funds. Sonia, when there was time, occasionally accompanied her brother and Olga to a particularly intriguing lecture. But she had discovered that Alexander Zevin's wife owned a typewriter, and three or four times a week Sonia would walk to her house to practice on her machine.

The younger Madame Zevina was also an excellent pianist, and since Sonia had not had occasion to play for a long time, she would sit down with her hostess after her typing sessions and indulge in that pastime fraught with memories, four-handed piano. Together, Sonia and Ekaterina Zevina attacked classical symphonies, opera partitas, overtures, military marches,
Peer Gynt,
and many pieces by Schumann, Grieg, Saint-Saëns, and Tchaikovsky. They would play for two full hours, during which time Sonia forgot that she was poor, that her brother Ossip had disappeared, that her former governess did not miss a single chance to harass her. She forgot that the Solovéichik stove had only four burners for more than four boarders, and that each time she had to go to the bathroom she would return to find that one of the other ladies had substituted a pot of her own for Sonia's, and that the soup or barley which she had been boiling had been relegated to a cold corner of the stove, where it had begun to congeal.

It was to Ekaterina Zevina that Sonia admitted, one afternoon, “The last time that I played four-handed piano my heart very nearly broke.” But she did not elaborate, and she spoke these words as if she had been discussing the weather. Madame Zevina sighed, and thought: For someone like Sonia, this is tantamount to a confession. She pressed Sonia's fingers expressively.

Madame Solovéichik had a small dog, Kaffa, who loved Sonia more than anyone and followed her around, sniffing nosily. Sonia would sometimes find upon arriving at the Zevins' that Kaffa was still at her heels. The two Zevin daughters would scoop her into their arms like a fuzzy ball, laughing. Sonia was grateful for their easy affection and acceptance of her, and to show her gratitude she began to teach the two girls stenography. So, on the days when she visited the Zevins' house, Sonia would seldom return until suppertime.

One winter day, upon awakening, Johanna de Mey discovered that she had caught a chill. She shivered and sneezed from her reddened nose, and within days seemed to become as thin as a wraith. It was Sonia who sat by her bed, nursing her.

Nadezhda Igorovna Pomerantz traveled a good bit between her rented house in Simferopol and her mansion in Feodosia, to make certain that some of the moneys from her business came to her after all, in spite of interference from the Germans and the Cheka. Of course, with the signing of the Armistice between the Allies and the Central Powers in November 1918, she no longer feared the enemy. But the Cheka sent members constantly to collect revenues. When she would go to Feodosia, Johanna's face would light with joy, and her aquamarine eyes, the only remnants of her once extraordinary beauty, would fill with moisture. Now that she was ill, she tossed upon her pillow, pulling strands of hair through nervous fingers, coughing for Mathilde. But Sonia said calmly, “Mama has gone to stay with Olga, for Nadezhda Igorovna is out of town. I did not want Mama to catch your cold, Juanita. She has been weak of late.”

The sick woman sat up, her thin face distorted. “You?” she shrieked. “I might have known that you would separate us! If it isn't that ill-bred woman from Feodosia, then it is you, Miss Priss! Or are you in cahoots with the snake-haired Sappho, you ignoble girl?”

“You are echoing a tiresome refrain,” Sonia replied. She plumped her governess's pillow and took up the book from which she had been reading aloud. But Johanna snatched it from her fingers, and hurled it across the room. Sonia raised her eyebrows questioningly, and folded her arms over her chest. “Now what is it?” she sighed.

“I'm not… going to allow Gino to marry that girl!” Johanna cried hysterically. “Mathilde will never permit it so long as I can prevent her.” She smiled malevolently at Sonia. “Do you remember Kolya's mother, who was unsuitable? I showed your mother the foolishness of it, and you see? He did not marry you. Like Anna. I made Mathilde see how wrong it was for that Berson boy to keep calling, without openly declaring himself. He never
did
declare himself, did he? No, Gino will not have that girl, any more than you had your handsome Kolya Saxe. I shall see to it.”

“We were all fools and weaklings,” Sonia said as calmly as she could. “But Gino is strong, and he is a man. You never hurt Ossip, did you?”

“No,” she replied. “Ossip was passive and obedient. There was no need for interference. But I hurt your father. Never forget it, little girl.”

“I'm not about to,” Sonia whispered. Her face was completely white, and there was not the slightest touch of red to her lips. She went to the fallen book, flipped through its pages, and found her place. She resumed her seat by Johanna's side and began to read: “ ‘So, Celine thought, depositing the brown chiffon scarf upon the sofa...' “

Her voice, clear and strong, rang through the small sitting room until the clock in Madame Solovéichik's kitchen struck twelve thirty. Sonia placed the book face down upon Johanna's cot, and rose to make luncheon. “Make sure not to burn my food,” the sick woman said. Sonia nodded and left the room. In the hallway she leaned against the wall, rubbing her temples with tremulous fingers. No, she thought, I shall not cry. Never again for her. Clenching her fists, she walked quickly into the kitchen.

She had learned a new way of cooking oats. Instead of simply boiling the cereal, she whisked it in a dry pan over the fire for ten minutes, and only then poured it into the boiling water. This was Johanna's preferred method, and Sonia went through the steps of this more troublesome procedure, grilling the oats first. But when she brought the bowl to her governess, the woman rose on her elbow and began to shout, in her shrewish tones, “You have purposely done this, serving me what I detest above all, and preparing it in such an odious manner! You did this to be mean, because your mother is not here to protect me! You don't know what more to invent against me. One of these days, you will poison my food, I know it positively. There, you little monster, you plain little sparrow—see what I do with your meal!” She called Kaffa, the small dog, who had been, once again, at Sonia's heels. To the girl's humiliation, Johanna placed the bowl on the floor before the dog, gloating while Kaffa lapped up the oats. Sonia uttered not a word. She swallowed hard, and kept her eyes on the dog. When Kaffa had finished her snack, Sonia took the empty bowl and returned it to the kitchen. But, as she walked, she wept.

That evening, she took her brother aside and said, “Why don't you marry Olga, as soon as possible? She is so much in love with you.”

“What's come over you?” Gino asked. “Are you all right?”

“I'm worried, that's all. I'm… afraid. I want to make certain that nothing prevents you from marrying Olga. You do want to, don't you?”

Her brother chuckled softly. “Olga is very young, Sonitchka, and we are in the midst of such bad times. I'm going to sign up with a White regiment, when a decent one forms here. I'd rather wait until all that's behind us before proposing to Olga. Besides, I have no money. I don't want her to think I want her because she still has some. Give us a little time, Sonia.”

Inexplicably, his sister broke down and began to cry, and when he took her in his arms, he did not know why he was comforting her. Poor Sonitchka. What kind of existence was this for a society girl from Petrograd?

The Gunzburgs no longer were in official mourning for Baron David by the end of 1918. A year had elapsed since his death, but Sonia had no wish to wear bright clothing or to dance. She was too busy to fuss over pleasure or appearance. She felt that she deserved her moments at the Zevin piano, for they relaxed her taut nerves and enabled her to face each day as it came. In December she had discovered a new outlet for her passionate idealism. A battered White force had reclaimed Simferopol from the Red troops, and a canteen had been set up for the officers in the kitchen and dining room of the Hotel de l'Europe, the largest such establishment in the city. Nadezhda Igorovna and Olga, Mathilde, Sonia and Johanna all signed up to help serve the men. Every woman was asked to serve at least one luncheon and one supper per week, but still Sonia thought that, compared to the rigors she had endured packaging food for the prisoners of war, this was a small thing indeed.

In the meantime, the young men had formed a night watch, as in Feodosia, and Gino took an active part in it. The guard was divided into two watches, the first from eleven at night until two in the morning, the second from two until six. The weather had grown cold and this duty was most arduous, frequently taking place in the snow or in glacial windstorms. Gino spoke to the officers in the city, and learned that a General Kutepov was recruiting White soldiers in the Isthmus of Perekop, where the fighting was fiercest and the Whites were attempting to hold off a new onslaught from the Reds in the north of the peninsula. He considered this carefully, then when he picked Olga up at the officers' canteen at seven one evening, he took her for a long walk in the dusk.

At first they said nothing, merely synchronizing their footsteps. She was clad in a tawny woolen coat with a fur collar and fur trim at the sleeves and hem, and she wore a toque of similar fur on her golden curls. He thought, absurdly, that his sister might never again possess a fur, and for a moment he felt disheartened. But Olga placed her hand upon his arm, and once again he was secure in the knowledge of her love for him. Not looking at her bright hazel eyes he said, “I have reached a decision, Olga. I am going to have to fight for my fellow Russians. I hope that if there is a God, he will forgive me.”