When the Doves Disappeared (7 page)

“You’re not normal!”

Her chair fell over, the plywood scraping across the floorboards, and Juudit ran to the bedroom, closed the door behind her, pushed a chair under the latch. Their medicines were kept in a box in the washstand, but all she could find there was some Hufeland’s powder. She poured all of it into her mouth, grateful that Johan and his wife were away visiting relatives.

Her husband knocked on the door.

“Open up, darling. Let’s straighten this out.”

“Come with me to the doctor.”

“Is something troubling you?”

“You’re not a man!”

“Darling, you sound hysterical.”

His voice was patient. He spoke slowly, told her he was going to get her a glass of sugar water, like his auntie had always made when he was little and woke up from a nightmare. It would calm her down. Then they could talk about taking her to a nerve doctor.

JUUDIT MADE
an appointment at the Greiffenhagen private clinic. Doctor Otto Greiffenhagen was known for his competence with men’s diseases and his clinic was definitely the most modern one in town. If he couldn’t help her, no one could. At the appointment, Juudit’s voice cracked as she sputtered out her problem.

The doctor sighed. “Maybe you should both come in. Together. Or your husband could come alone, as well.”

Juudit got up to leave.

“Ma’am, there are various preparations you could try. A dose of Testoviron might help, for instance. But first I would have to examine your husband.”

But Juudit couldn’t get her husband to come to the clinic. There would be no Testoviron, no treatment of any kind. She would never fly in an airplane. Not long after that she stopped going to her English conversation group and abandoned the daily French practice she had taken up during her engagement, back when she’d thought that a pilot’s wife needed to be cosmopolitan and keep up her language skills.

Taara Village, Estland General Region, Reichskommissariat Ostland

W
E COULD HEAR
the rush and crackle of the sleigh from far off. My cousin Edgar was returning with great fanfare from his excursion to town. As soon as the sleigh came to a stop at the cabin, the flood of German stories would start. I knew that, and shut my mouth tight. That morning I had suggested in passing that we go to Rosalie’s. I had been there to help with the hog butchering, and I knew there would be fricadelle soup, which Edgar was fond of, but Mother had obviously already told him who else would be there. Edgar turned the offer down and went his own way. And his attitude toward his wife wasn’t the only reason I was angry. He didn’t know a thing about horses, so I went out to meet him, knowing he would leave it to me to take off the harness. My gelding was tired, his nostrils steaming. It was obvious he’d been driven too hard. Edgar had forgotten the oats, as usual—there were a couple of liters left in the feed bag, but at least some of the field hay I’d put in the sleigh the night before had been eaten. I left his excited greeting unanswered. He halted his steps halfway, the snow squeaking uncertainly under his feet. I didn’t care, I just led the gelding to the stable to get the packed
snow out of his hooves and give him a firm brushing on his flanks—the spot they call “the hunger pit,” his favorite spot for a rub. Edgar followed me, stomping his felt boots to get my attention. Clearly he had something he wanted to talk about. Whatever it was, it was hardly likely to have anything to do with the hay, so I didn’t care. The situation looked bad. Leonida had promised there would be enough hay for the winter, twenty bales’ worth, but already we were having to mix it with straw, although my gelding always poked around until he found the timothy hay. Things weren’t any better in the Armses’ stable. The Germans’ big horses had eaten everything, till the village animals were skin and bones, and I could hardly expect Edgar to fetch more feed on his trips unless I got Mother on my side. But she simply wouldn’t ask Edgar for anything. As soon as we’d reached our home province, I had seen how Edgar started pining for his auntie’s house. Mother’s smile had shone like a greased skillet when we arrived, and Edgar seemed relieved to find her in Rosalie’s good hands. He managed to get Leonida and Mother on his side about keeping his return a secret, too. They still hadn’t told their houseguests he was back—not even Edgar’s wife. Mother said Edgar could be arrested as a communist if he was seen in the village, which baffled me, since no communist would have suffered the kinds of misfortunes that we had at Simson Farm under the Soviets. I could understand why he’d wanted to hide his desertion when the Reds were still in charge, but what was the point now? Other men who’d left the Red Army were walking around the village, and those of us who’d been on Staffan Island had fought against the Bolsheviks. Mother, of course, didn’t want either of us to go to the front. She had weak nerves, and I couldn’t bring myself to contradict her when she was teary-eyed with fear. She was always so happy when Edgar came to look in on her. She would immediately fry up some salted meat for consommé or find some other delicacy to put on the table. Still, I knew Edgar must be up to something. He’d given himself a new name, Fürst, which was appropriately German, fine as a rayon shirt. I called him Wurst. I pressed him again about what he had to hide. Rosalie talked about sending a message to his wife, but Edgar forbade it, and Mother forbade it, and Leonida followed suit. The more time that passed, the harder it would be to tell Juudit he was back.

EDGAR WAS STILL
stomping his feet behind me. I was in no hurry, patting my horse’s side, grown thick and shaggy with winter, in the dimness of the stable.

“Aren’t you going to ask the news?” he said, rustling some newspapers he had taken out of his bag. He couldn’t wait until we went into the house; he started reading them aloud in the stable, straining to see in the light of the hurricane lantern. Two hundred and six political prisoners had been freed in Tallinn, as a Christmas present from the Commissar General for Estonia to the innocent wives and children who had fallen into difficulties because their family providers were imprisoned. Edgar’s voice was full of portent, his pale eyes taking on color.

“Are you listening? How many men would treat the families of their enemies so mercifully? Or are you still thinking about your tobacco field?”

I grunted in agreement before remembering that I’d intended to avoid talking about it with Edgar, who, in spite of all his shuttling back and forth, didn’t seem to have done much to promote the family’s interests. We hadn’t heard from my father, and our fields were still in the wrong hands. I couldn’t plant any potatoes even though three years’ worth of clover had put plenty of nitrogen in the soil, which was good for potatoes. The Germans had banned the growing of tobacco and even Rosalie couldn’t get any seedlings, but the bunglers the Bolsheviks had put on the Armses’ farm had been evicted and the section of land the Reds had confiscated belonged to the Armses again. I’d gone over to spray their fruit trees with Estoleum, which I’d advised them to buy early, just in case. Aksel was thankful for the tip. I was like a son to him, not just a future son-in-law. I’d told him that Estoleum was better than Paris green, that he’d get apples good enough to sell at the market, but that was all I managed to do for my bride—for my own home at Simson Farm, I couldn’t manage even that. This bothered me. Edgar had never learned a thing about farmwork, though he did know that cream fresh from the morning milking was good for weak lungs.

He continued reading the paper as I did the stable work. The war hadn’t changed him a bit. “ ‘We all still remember how the Bolshevik
propaganda painted the German National Socialists, and especially their Leader, as savages. They were hardly considered human.’ ” Edgar’s voice had risen, he wanted me to listen. “ ‘The aim of National Socialism is to unite all levels of society into one element, to strengthen the well-being of the people. The incitement of violent class resentment, this shocking bloodletting of one’s own people, is completely foreign to our movement. We strive to keep peace among the classes, and all are given the same right to life.… For our small nation, every individual is indeed as precious as every other.’ ” The gelding’s ears twitched.

“Stop it,” I said. “You’re frightening the horse.”

“Roland, don’t you see? The Commissar General has found just the words that the nation needs.”

I didn’t answer. Anger was hardening me into a pillar of salt. I could tell that my cousin had his own reasons for burnishing the Germans’ image. Maybe he wanted me in on some venture of his. But what did he need me for? I remembered how he had huddled in the cabin right after the Reds retreated, when the areas they had left were swarming with men from the destruction battalions, hiding out in fear for their lives, and Germans chasing them down. The special units had broken off from the Omakaitse—running like rabbits with everyone else, and the woods were filled with the smoke of gunpowder. Then I’d spotted two men nosing around our cabin. I recognized them. They had been with the Chekists who had surrounded the Green Captain’s troops. I remembered them because I was on watch at the time, had stared them straight in the face, would never forget them. They’d gotten away from me once, but they weren’t going to do it again. Edgar clapped a hand over his mouth when he saw the puddles spreading beneath their bodies in the yard. He looked exactly like he had as a boy the first time he saw the hogs slaughtered. He’d just come to live with us then. His mother, my mother’s sister Alviine, had sent him to our house in the countryside to toughen him up after his father died of diphtheria. She was worried about his anemia. He fainted. My father and I were sure that a sissy like that would never manage on a farm. But we were wrong. He managed very well, hanging on to my mother’s skirts. She had always wanted another child to keep her company, and the two of them took to each other. They were both supposedly sickly. We had another word for it: lazy.

When Edgar recovered from the sight of two dead bodies, he showed surprising initiative and said he would dispose of them. I doubted he could accomplish such a thing, but I helped him get the corpses into the cart and he hauled them away somewhere. The next day he came back looking shifty, with a poorly hidden grin on his face. He wasn’t in any hurry anymore to get to town until the fighting in the woods died down. I could tell he had invented some story about the bodies so that we’d be left in peace. Sooner or later the Germans would have started to wonder what Finland-trained spies like us were doing lurking around in a cabin in the woods if he hadn’t made some kind of deal with them, convinced them that they had nothing to fear from us. Maybe now was the time to ask what was going on between him and the Germans, but I couldn’t bring myself to talk to him about it. He would be so pleased if I showed some interest in his affairs, and I didn’t want to see the flattered look on his face. I saw that there was a knot in the reins, untied it, and went into the house to look for an awl and some waxed thread to splice it together. I felt the Hungarian leather, thought I ought to grease the harnesses, and the thought made me homesick for the fields, and frustrated. If the Germans weren’t able to return the land that the Russians took or bring back the people, they were of no use to me, no matter what my cousin said. I thought again about the tobacco field that some Bolshevik bastard had dumped night soil on to grow who knows what, and a horse with a hunger pit so deep that I couldn’t see how it managed to pull the wagon. Edgar didn’t notice things like that. When we were standing by the spoiled field, all he did was wonder at the smell. That field had once been our land, the Simson land, and that horse had once been my horse, a horse who’d worn a blue ribbon next to his ear at the agricultural fair year after year. I would have recognized that horse anywhere, and he recognized me, but we had to let the field be and let the horse go on his way.

Edgar followed me to the cabin, lit a lamp after rubbing the soot off its hood a bit, and continued reading aloud where he’d left off. Did he want me to approve of what he was doing? He wanted something from me, but what?

“You’re not listening,” he said.