“I know it. You’re the envy of all the guys at school.” Borya lit a cigarette.
“Including you?”
“Everybody loves Galya. Can you do this?” He inhaled deeply and blew out a perfect smoke ring. They watched it float, growing larger and thinner, its shape shifting this way and that before dissipating into the air.
“No. You’ll have to show me how.”
Most days, Borya would be at the house when Galina returned from work. She would find them playing chess in the yard or poring over Filip’s stamp albums at the little table in the parlor, their heads, the dark and the fair, almost touching.
She envied them their bond, wished she, too, had a friend of the heart. But she had never been one to share girlish confidences; in the troubled times of their existence, everyone lived the same marginal, hardscrabble life. There was nothing to confide.
She was sure Filip and Borya never talked about their inmost feelings—what man would do that? Theirs was an easy, companionable friendship, born of shared interests and aspirations, unfettered by excess sentiment or unreasonable expectations.
Once, Borya brought firewood, dragging the roughly sawed logs from a young tree behind him like a sled on a rope. Filip, seated at the chess board, studying yesterday’s unfinished game, looked up. “Why?” he said, his hand hovering over a pawn, then moving it decisively to block Borya’s rook.
“To repay your mother-in-law for some of the meals you share with me.”
“Huh. Where did you get it?”
“Where the trees grow.” He stood at the board, took the pawn with his knight. “Check.”
Filip groaned. “In the park?”
“No, city boy. In the forest. Trees grow in the forest.”
Ksenia entered the yard from the kitchen, wiping her hands on her apron before reaching for the ax. “Let me do that, Ksenia Semyonovna.” Borya took the ax from her hand. “You go have a cup of tea.”
“How nice you are, Borya. No news?” They knew his parents had been arrested weeks ago, without a word of explanation.
Borya shook his head and went on chopping, expertly splitting the logs into stove-sized wedges. “Give me a hand here, Filip. Stack these over there.”
Filip rose reluctantly from the game. He stacked the firewood near the door, handling the rough edges gingerly to avoid splinters. “Ai, holera,” he swore, when the inevitable happened. He regarded the wobbly woodpile with malevolence, sucking the side of his thumb. “My queen took your knight. It’s your move.”
A month or so after Borya turned eighteen, his visits stopped, as did his school attendance. His name did not appear in the list of examination results posted on the announcement board. Maybe he forgot to wear his lucky green tie, Filip thought. He realized that with all the disruptions in his friend’s life, he no longer knew where to look for him.
He missed his chess partner, the easy banter they had enjoyed. Galina was sweet, and he loved being married to her, but she was always busy. His in-laws treated him well enough, but he certainly couldn’t talk to them. He saw his own mother two or three times a week, in the afternoons, and his father only on special occasions. He’ll turn up, he told himself, trying not to imagine all the things that could have caused Borya to vanish. It was not an uncommon occurrence.
And then he saw him.
Filip had had an especially pleasant day. Rising late, he’d made his way to his mother’s apartment. She gave him tea and baklava, then surprised him with a small square of Swiss chocolate.
“Mama, where did you get this? How?”
“Your father brought it. I don’t ask,” Zoya replied. “More tea?”
She gave him a little money, “for the house.” He happily spent it on a tiny packet of Australian stamps. Even Galya will like these, he thought, eager to get home and examine his treasure, the animals in their curious exotic oddity, the sere desert landscape so alien to his own.
On the streetcar, he got a seat next to the open window, away from the crush of people, with their parcels and their children, in the aisle. He raised his face to the warm breeze and thought again about the chocolate, how it had felt on his tongue, how the melting richness had filled his mouth with something like ecstasy, leaving behind a nugget of hazelnut, a delicious surprise.
And then there Borya was, threading his way through the crowd on the sidewalk, wearing a dark shirt, looking a bit disheveled, his hair longer than Filip had ever seen it.
“Hey, Bor’ka!” Filip shouted, his joy at seeing his friend making him reckless. “Hey! How are things in the woods? Finding any mushrooms?”
Borya’s head snapped back as if he’d been slapped. He froze, then ran, elbowing people out of his way, turning out of sight around the next corner.
Filip felt a sudden chill. Nu, durak, he scolded himself. What a fool. How could anyone know he’d been remembering the firewood Borya had brought, like Father Christmas dragging a tree through the streets to delight happy children? What a stupid, stupid thing to say.
He got off at the next stop and walked the rest of the way home, trying to shake off the echo of the hastily shouted words. “Balda. Durak. Idiot,” he mumbled, then stopped. I only wanted to talk to him, he thought. That’s all. Maybe no one had noticed; there were so many people, all busy with their own concerns. No doubt he was berating himself for nothing. Forget it, he decided, and told no one.
Two weeks passed. Filip and Galina, making their way home in the early evening, were caught in a roundup, herded along with dozens of others toward the main square.
“What do you think—” Galina started to say.
“More regulations. As if they don’t already have us by the throat,” he replied. “Be quiet.”
In the square, backlit by the descending sun, two men hung from the lampposts, their necks broken, their bodies rotating slowly in the air. A gasp swept through the crowd, sharp and instinctive, followed by nervous, expectant silence.
“When did this happen?” Filip asked of no one in particular.
“About an hour ago,” said a voice from the crowd. “They went away, but they won’t let us leave until they’re done with us. All the streets are blocked.” This tragedy was clearly not over.
“Kakoi uzhas,” Galina whispered, blanched and trembling at the horror. But Filip did not hear, nor was he aware of her hand, the fingers digging into his arm in panicked recognition.
One of the men was short and stocky. He had Tatar features, with silky hair black as crow’s feathers that glinted in the sun. He was dressed in green sharivari, the cloth of the loose trousers flapping in the evening air. The other one, long legs dangling closer to the ground, wearing scuffed and muddied cheap leather shoes, was Borya.
“No,” Filip breathed, denying the evidence of his eyes. He felt the blood drain from his head, then rush back in, thundering in his ears; his body shuddered with ice and fire in a fever of contradictions. For a moment, all went black, but he did not fall, supported by helping hands of strangers on every side. He opened his eyes.
A dozen black-shirted SS men entered the square from a side street, swastikas emblazoned on the doors of their truck. The crowd parted to let them through. Two held the swaying body still while a sergeant, standing on the vehicle’s roof, his legs spread wide for balance, lettered the word PARTISAN in thick, rough brushstrokes of red paint across their shirts, first on one and then on the other.
The rest of the men took up positions around the square, each cradling a semiautomatic weapon against his chest. No one doubted they needed only the slightest hint of a provocation to open fire.
The lieutenant surveyed the operation from the bed of the truck. He was tall and blond, his classic Aryan features contorted in a grimace of fury and contempt. He turned, sweeping his eyes over the crowd like an actor reaching out to every member of his audience; the sun, now low in a purplish-yellow sky, caught on the lightning bolt insignia pinned to his collar.
“If you fight against der Führer, we will find you,�
� he shouted. He took the dripping brush from the sergeant and waved it in an arc, spraying drops of red paint over their heads like a ghoulish benediction. “We know who you are. Now go home.”
In the morning, Filip went back. They had both had a restless night filled with disturbing dreams; Galina moaned and, once, cried out in her sleep, clutching his hand so tightly it hurt. Filip rose at first light, slipped quietly out of the house. The executed men were still there, swollen black tongues protruding from their parted lips; the damning word on their backs blazed like fresh blood in the rising sun.
Someone had taken their shoes. Filip stared numbly at the bare feet, the skin a ghastly greenish-gray threaded with ropy blue veins, toenails opaque as ram’s horn.
He moved on, so as not to attract attention. He would not see his mother today. She would sense his rage, probe his ineffable sadness, understand his fear. He did not want to be understood. He walked to the sea, stood a long time at the retaining wall, watched the waves crash and recede until the rhythm calmed his mind a little. He tried to think of other things: the impending university exam, his father’s birthday next week, the book of German verse he had left open on the floor near his and Galina’s bed. Nothing could obscure the question he knew would nag him for the rest of his life, like an embedded splinter too deep under the skin to remove yet impossible to ignore. Am I to blame?
PART III
Maksim
1
THE FIRST THING Galina noticed was the limp. She watched him approach from the end of their street, bareheaded, a long heavy coat draped over his shoulders in spite of the warmth of the late May afternoon, his eyes cast down as if choosing his path with care. Yes, it was definitely her brother, and he was definitely limping, one foot dragging noticeably behind the other as he made his way in her direction.
“Maksim!” she shouted and ran to meet him, a string-tied parcel of dried beans dangling from her waving hand. “Maksim,” she repeated, stopping in front of him, blocking his way forward.
“It’s you,” he said, raising his head. His look combined weariness, relief, and disappointment.
“You’re so pale! We thought . . .”
“You thought I was dead. Well, perhaps I am.”
“That’s not funny,” she said, even though his expression held no hint of humor. “We had no letter from you since early October. How could we know . . . Anyway, you’re home. Kiss me.” She giggled, surprised at her own impulsiveness. She leaned in closer and offered her cheek, trying not to flinch at his stale unwashed odor.
“Here, in the street?” He stepped back, as if afraid she might embrace him.
“You haven’t changed. Give me your hand, then. No, not the left,” she protested. “Balda. Never the left, you fool.”
He withdrew the hand, concealed it under his coat, but didn’t offer the right. “Is there food at home? I have not eaten since . . .”
“I will go and tell Mama. Come as fast as you can.” She ran off, disappearing into the alley that led to the apartment courtyard.
“She has cut her hair,” he said out loud, noting the absence of her maiden’s braid. Bah, that’s a country custom, he completed the thought. Many girls cut their hair now, when they want to. It doesn’t mean they’re married.
Ksenia was waiting just inside the door, her face wet with tears. “My son,” she breathed when he entered the room. “Syn moi, syn,” she intoned, holding his face in both her hands, kissing the unshaven cheeks three times in the traditional Russian greeting. “So thin,” she said. She embraced him, pushing the overcoat from his shoulders onto the floor.
From the kitchen doorway, they both heard Galina gasp, then burst into tears. When Ksenia stepped back, releasing Maksim, she saw the empty folded sleeve pinned to the right shoulder of his shirt. “Bozhe moi.” She crossed herself, then made the sign of the cross in the air between them. “My God. Your arm. How you have suffered.”
Maksim bowed his head, accepting the blessing. When he looked at her, his own eyes were brimming. He whispered, “Mama, I am so hungry.”
They sat with him while he ate bread, buckwheat kasha, briny salted cucumbers and onions. “We have heard nothing from you in more than seven months.” Ksenia finally broke the silence, stacking the empty dishes in front of her. “Tell us what happened to you. Where are your things?”
“Then you don’t know. I wrote to you after I left Kharkov, but you don’t know. I have no things, only my papers, the clothes I’m wearing, and these lapti.” He pushed out his feet, showing them the straw slippers tied around his ankles with strips of rags. “A farmer gave them to me, out of pity for my bare feet.”
“Where are your books?” Galina cut in, remembering his extreme possessiveness. “Your notebooks?”
“Who knows? I have no need of them now.” His voice was dull, with no hint of his former irritation at her questions. “I served as a medic in an army field hospital near Moscow. There was heavy fighting. Many died.” He paused. No one spoke. “Many died,” he repeated.
“Where is your uniform, son, your boots?” Ksenia placed the dirty dishes in a washbasin, put water on for tea.
“I had no uniform, just an armband with a red cross on it. Everything was in short supply. Still is, I’m sure. So much confusion. The hospital was bombed in transit, moving from one location to another. I could not see the logic in it. How could it be in a safe place and still close enough to treat the frontline wounded? Anyway, we were bombed. I was hurt.”
“That’s it? ‘We were bombed. I was hurt.’” Galina set a cup of tea in front of him, her tone rising with indignation. “As if it’s an everyday occurrence.”
Maksim stared at her with dead eyes. “It is an everyday occurrence.”
“Never mind, children,” Ksenia stepped in. “There will be time for talking, now you are home. Whatever happened, you survived.”
“I survived,” he echoed, his voice hollow.
They sat in silence for several minutes, the women’s questions frustrated by his wooden expression. When his chin dropped to his chest in exhaustion, Ksenia stood up. “You need to sleep, son. Use our bed. Your father will not return until tomorrow.”
Maksim rose. “I need to wash a little first. Is there a clean shirt I can use?”
“Filip has two or three, about your size,” Galina offered. “We’re married now. We took your room.”
“I meant to ask you about the ring,” he mumbled, “but it slipped my mind. Thank you, Mama. I can manage.” He took the water bucket from his mother in his left hand, the towel draped over his shoulder, and headed for the inner courtyard. In the doorway, he turned. “My boots,” he said. “I traded them to a band of Partisans in the woods, along with your socks, Galya, for some bread and fish. They had no use for a one-armed fighter with a limp.”
2
LIFE TOOK ON a kind of routine, the kind of routine that makes ample allowances for the unexpected. Galina rose early to work more hours in the toy shop, and willingly took on a larger share of household duties.
After finishing tenth grade and receiving his diploma, Filip slept late every day; he had abandoned the pretense of looking for work after a few fruitless weeks, claiming the need to prepare for the upcoming university examinations. Most days, he spent an hour or two at the library before dropping in on his mother. She would be waiting with hot tea or fresh lemonade.
“How is it you always have sugar, Mama? We see it only rarely, and then my mother-in-law hoards every grain. Even when we use it, nothing tastes sweet.”
“Every household has its own rules,” Zoya said judiciously, dipping a stale bread crust into her tea. “And your father is fortunate. Party membership still has a few benefits.”
“Hm.” Filip preferred to remain noncommittal. It was not a matter of ideology. But what if the Germans won the war? The Soviet Partisans had spread the word of the victorious Red Army defense of Moscow, the Fascists beaten back at the city gates. But Ukraine was still firmly under occupation, both majo
r cities, Kharkov and Kiev, now under enemy control. The war could end in a truce, with parts of the Soviet Union remaining under Nazi rule. He had read enough history to know that national boundaries were moveable and arbitrary, governed by shifting allegiances, secret agreements, games of chance played by the gods.
He said none of this to his mother, or to anyone. Zoya wanted only the return of religious freedom, so she could attend church services openly without fear of compromising her husband’s position. Ksenia believed (and Ilya, too, he suspected), along with an ardent minority, in the restoration of the Romanov monarchy—a position he considered too ridiculous to warrant discussion. It was best to wait, see how things turned out.
What was it his friend Vova had said, just before running off to find a Red Army unit to join beyond the occupied territory? “Why, you’re nothing but an opportunist! You believe in nothing.”
“I believe in money in my pocket, meat for my dinner, sugar in my tea. And the right to be left alone,” Filip had replied. “That’s what I believe.”
“Have you forgotten Borya? How many of us must die so that you may be ‘left alone’? You are living a fantasy, my friend. Nothing comes without a price.”
Forgotten. Could he, would he ever forget? Not just the sight, the spectacle of their friend and classmate strung up from a lamppost, turning in the wind like so much dirty laundry. The doubt, the agonizing flashes of conscience had cast an indelible shadow over Filip’s life. Even if he was not guilty, he knew he would never again be innocent.
“I have forgotten nothing. But I can’t help feeling it was a pointless death, brave as it was. He gained the status of a folk hero here in his hometown, but what has he accomplished? Whose life has been improved by his sacrifice?”
Vova had made an impatient sound, something between a grunt and a sigh. “Borya has earned his place among the saints of the new revolution. Many have died, die every day, out of the public eye, hunted like animals in the woods, fleeing the site of one last explosion, one final act of sabotage. His sacrifice will inspire fresh generations of fighters. He stood up for something. That’s what I must do, too.”
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