The Russians Collection

by Michael Phillips

  “I don’t know what to say, Daniel—”

  “Just say you’ll give me another chance. I can’t say what might come of it, but I don’t think it was mere coincidence that we ran into each other here.”

  “I agree. And I never had any other intention but to give our . . . friendship another chance.” Her slight hesitation over the word friendship went unnoticed by Daniel, but Mariana could not prevent herself from wondering if they would ever be more than friends.

  Daniel gave her a relieved grin and they walked a little farther in relaxed silence before Mariana spoke.

  “So, Daniel, what have you been up to since I last saw you?”

  “Working. You know what a slave I am to my typewriter.” He paused, obviously not comfortable talking about himself. “My father died.”

  “Oh, Daniel, I’m so sorry. Recently?”

  “Four years ago. Actually, he died while I was en route to the States from Russia.”

  “So, you didn’t get to see him?”

  He shook his head. “I’ll always regret that. I suppose I am a very wealthy man now—although I really don’t care about any of that.”

  “No, you never did. All you wanted was to be a reporter.”

  “My priorities are a bit more balanced since you last saw me, but I must admit my job is still very important to me. I almost quit, though, when I found out about my father. He never approved of my aspirations to be a reporter and wanted me to work with him—or at least do something more respectable than being a newspaper hack. For a while I felt I owed it to him to become an executive in the steel company that is now half mine. You know, sort of a penance for my rebellious life.”

  “You must have been miserable.”

  “It was pure agony. I’ll never understand why my brother loves it all so much. After a year I was going crazy.”

  “Then you quit?”

  “Not exactly. I was ready to, even if I had to go through the rest of my life feeling guilty. But I was spared that when I found a letter from my father. He had written it with the intention of giving it to his lawyer to pass on to me in the event of his death, but it never got that far and was lost for a time. I found it while sorting through his papers after his death. In it he told me how proud he was of my accomplishments at the newspaper, and that he could never be so cruel as to expect me to give up something I obviously loved and had a talent for in order to please him. I carry that letter with me everywhere I go. I know it sounds silly, especially for someone like me who never needed to rely on the praise of others for my confidence. But there is something immensely gratifying about a father’s praise, probably because we so seldom hear it.”

  He paused and made a visible effort to lighten the serious mood of the conversation. “So, the world of journalism need suffer no longer from my absence. I’ve been in Manchuria several months now. When hostilities broke out it was only natural for the Register to send me, with my experience in Russia and in China during the Boxer Uprising.”

  The rest of their trek passed quickly, in spite of Mariana’s weariness. They talked about their lives; they laughed over old memories. They even walked in comfortable silence, neither one needing to say a word. Mariana thought it was the most pleasant walk she had ever taken.

  They reached the field hospital shortly after sunset. Mariana hated to leave Daniel, but she was too tired to visit any longer. After dinner they said good-night, and Daniel promised to join her for breakfast in the mess tent the next morning.

  Mariana settled into her bunk in the nurses’ quarters for the night. But the tent was stifling, and in spite of her fatigue, she couldn’t sleep. She tossed and turned for a while, then finally gave up and began writing a letter home.

  The full moon shone through the open tent flap, giving enough light for her to see by. She had just mailed a letter from Mukden a few days ago, but so much had happened since then. She wrote a whole page, but as she began a second, her eyelids drooped. Her pen fell from her hand onto the canvas floor, and she slept soundly the rest of the night, dreaming of Mama and Papa and the izba in Katyk. Only once did Daniel enter her dreams. He was harvesting a field of grain, sickle swinging high over his head; but he was dressed in his American suit with waistcoat and bowler hat.

  9

  Daniel felt good when he left Mariana that first night. Being with her had been almost like those wonderful days in Russia. How easy it had been to share his heart with her. He had never told anyone else the things he told her about his father.

  Perhaps that made it all right that he hadn’t told her everything.

  He had really wanted complete honesty between them, especially since he had botched it so badly last time. But he was afraid that telling her everything about that terrible time surrounding his father’s death would reveal some weaknesses—things even he hadn’t fully come to accept.

  He had shared enough so that she would know what an impact it had on him. But he said nothing about the true depth of emotions he had felt, or how he’d tried to cope with them.

  What occurred on that blustery November day when he stepped clear of his ship’s gangway in New York was simply too personal to reveal.

  Daniel could still visualize his brother’s grim face greeting him from the dock. One look at William, and he had known he was too late.

  “I’m sorry, Daniel,” William said. “He tried to hang on until you got home.”

  “When was it?”

  “Two days ago.”

  Daniel couldn’t speak. He had never lost anyone before—in fact, his life had always been somewhat of a carefree lark. His mother had died so soon after his birth that he had been spared the kind of grief he now experienced. The greatest loss he had known had been Mariana. Odd, that one loss should come so quickly on the heels of the other.

  At that moment, he couldn’t think of anything but the terrible emptiness he felt. During the journey home, he had given considerable thought to what he would say to his father when he saw him. Daniel wanted to tell him how he admired him and wanted to be like him, and how his love for writing was not so much out of rebellion as it was his way of forging his own path through life, make his own personal mark—just as his father had. He had rehearsed many speeches, imagined his father’s encouraging responses.

  Now all his words were useless. What do you say to a corpse? He would get no acceptance, no forgiveness, from a dead man.

  “Listen,” Daniel said to his brother, “do you mind if I find my own way home? I’d like to walk for a bit.”

  “Are you sure you’ll be okay?”

  “Yeah. It’s just a shock, you know.”

  Daniel walked up and down the streets of New York that day, but all the walking in the world could not fill that empty hole in him. His steps took him to the Brooklyn Bridge—ironically appropriate, he thought, for he had come here before his trip to Russia to sort out the events of his life. His father had arranged for the assignment to Russia, in hopes of making a responsible man of his rowdy son. Had the plan been successful?

  Archibald Trent certainly wouldn’t have been pleased about the fiasco with Mariana. He would have liked Mariana and thought Daniel an immature lout for using her so.

  But maybe, Pop, you would have been a little proud of how I owned up to my mistake. I probably wouldn’t have done that before.

  Now, Daniel would never know. That was the worst thing of all about death—it was so final. He desperately wanted to reach out and grab his father back.

  I’m not finished with you, yet, Pop!

  Tears filled Daniel’s eyes. He felt silly standing in the middle of that busy bridge, crying like a kid. He wished there had been some fog like on that other day to hide his desolation, his emptiness.

  Then he thought of Mariana. He needed a friend now, as he had never needed one before. He needed to hear her voice. She would know just what to say, and somehow her gentle, understanding words would ease his pain. And that’s when he realized just what he had lost in Mariana—not a gi
rlfriend or a potential wife, but a friend. She was the only real friend he’d ever had. He probably wouldn’t have had to say a word to her—she would have known what he was going through.

  Mariana would, no doubt, have offered him her faith. But even Daniel knew that someone else’s faith didn’t do a fellow a whole lot of good. If only he could have the kind of peace she had—serenity, he had called it in his ill-fated article. If only he could dredge up something from that empty hole in his heart. If only he had listened closer to Mariana back in Russia. But it’s hard to care about such things when your life is rosy—and it’s too late when the thorns start to prick you.

  Is it really too late? he asked himself that day. Maybe not. But what good would faith do now, anyway? Would it bring back his father?

  Daniel couldn’t answer those questions, but he determined to try. If there was something out there that he was missing, something that would spread a balm over his wounds and fill the chasm in his heart—well, it was certainly as critical to track down as a news story. His editor at the Register had often compared Daniel to a scrappy little dog, gripping a news story with his sharp teeth and not letting go until it was his.

  On that bridge, as he had before, Daniel reached a significant milestone in his life. He became a seeker.

  Since he was not the most introspective of men, his path sometimes became obscured by the more mundane aspects of life. When his father’s death necessitated some crucial decisions, he sometimes forgot about his resolve and fell into old habits. But he did ask questions about religion, and he attended church and talked to the minister. He even read a Bible. He wrote to Mariana, too, and almost gave the whole thing up when she didn’t respond.

  As time passed he seemed to need something more than ever. His life was steadily deteriorating. Thinking that God would probably want him to give up the newspaper and do what his father had wanted him to do all along, Daniel quit the Register. His brother found him an office in the Trent Building, and he tried to settle into the life of an industrialist—whatever that was. Paperwork, board meetings, analyzing charts and graphs of markets and trends—how could anyone find this satisfying, or even interesting? Most days, the greatest enjoyment Daniel had was pitching wads of paper into his trash can.

  The only positive aspect of this period was that the more miserable he became, the more he attended church. Then one day he asked himself if God really intended for him to be this miserable. The God Mariana always talked about didn’t seem to be the kind who meted out misery. The words she used to describe her life of faith were joy, peace, contentment.

  If he was trying to seek what God wanted, why didn’t he have any of those things?

  One morning Daniel was greeted by his brother as he entered the office.

  “Daniel, do you have those reports ready for the board meeting today?”

  Daniel slapped his forehead. “I forgot. I’ll get right on them. When’s the meeting?”

  “You’ll never get them done in time.” William shook his head. “Daniel, I was really proud of you when you came into the firm. But sometimes I think your heart isn’t in it. This is what Father wanted most in life, to see us working together in the company he built. Don’t you care if his company remains successful? What would he think about your attitude? You were too late to please him while he lived—the least you can do is to try now.”

  Daniel isolated himself in his office, locking the door against intruders. He dropped his head into his hands, and though no tears actually came, he was filled with agony. His father wanted him in the business; his brother wanted it; God seemed to want it. No one cared about what he wanted.

  “Well, I’ve had it with you all!” he shouted to the empty room. “Tomorrow, I’m tendering my resignation. I don’t care if I go to hell for it; I don’t care if my brother hounds me about respecting the dead. I’m through trying to please others.

  “And, God, if you don’t like it, then show me some other way! But it better be something I can live with.”

  That very night their accountant requested some of Archibald Trent’s personal papers—apparently some items in the will were being disputed by Archibald’s sister. Daniel spent the evening searching through his father’s house, and he stumbled upon the letter. With so many business matters to be dealt with, it was not surprising that this letter, in a plain white envelope, had been overlooked. But Daniel couldn’t refrain from wondering if its timely appearance had something to do with his rather belligerent prayer that morning.

  The letter was from his father, addressed to Daniel.

  Dear Daniel,

  I have never thought myself to favor one son over the other. But I have to confess that my heart always had a slightly softer place in it for you. Perhaps it was because your mother died in bringing you into the world, making you the closest part of her I had to cling to. Perhaps, too, it is because I’ve had to agonize over you so much more than your brother. He always did what was expected of him, but you fought every step of the way. You clutched at your independence and your identity as if it were gold. In short, you are so much like I was in my younger years that it is frightening—and pleasing.

  Unfortunately, I didn’t realize the pleasing aspect of this until lately. But now, as I lie here on my bed, I feel my mortality tugging away at me. A man has to be pleased to know he is leaving behind an image of himself. I regret all the years I tried to force you into a different mold. If someone had done that to me I would have done just what you did. I would have pursued what I wanted, anyway.

  Well, son, they say I am a very sick man. I may not live long enough to see you again. This meager scrap of paper will have to suffice to communicate my heart to you. Please forgive me my mistakes. Know that I only wanted your good. I can tell from your letters that going to Russia was a good thing for you, so perhaps I did one thing right. I have read your work and realize that you are, unquestionably, where you belong—at least in the right profession. I am proud of you. I’m afraid I haven’t told you that enough, but now, more than ever, I want you to know this. And you have my blessing—not that you ever really needed it!—to do the work that is obviously dearest to your heart. I would be the last to rob the world of such a talent. The most important thing to me is that you are happy, content. I can die in peace as long as I know that.

  Daniel resigned from his father’s company and got his old job back at the Register. And his fledgling faith was greatly bolstered. He rode high on a kind of spiritual euphoria—for a while. But as his life began to get back on track, with accompanying contentment, he began to slip back into old routines and patterns. One thing led to another, and now he just didn’t remember to think much about God. His work once more became his joy and contentment. Occasionally he would think about how the Lord had brought him through that tough time in his life, and he told himself he’d get out that Bible or go to church. But something always seemed to get in the way of his admirable intentions. Before long he was too ashamed to think about the Lord—and thus have to admit to God that he was not much of a Christian.

  Now Daniel was afraid to admit that to Mariana. It was best to ignore it altogether. What Mariana didn’t know wouldn’t hurt . . . them. He didn’t purposely set out to deceive her; it was just natural for him to leave the spiritual matters out of his account. He had been doing it quite well these last two years, after all.

  10

  Summer in St. Petersburg was sultry and warm. Anna and Sergei had seriously considered an invitation from Sergei’s father, Viktor, to spend the season with him in the Crimea, but in the end decided that they had to keep their distance from the Fedorcenkos. An occasional visit by Viktor when he was in the city was no problem, but anything more extensive could cause unwanted questioning. Sergei could never let his guard down, never forget that he was still a fugitive. It was harder, of course, now that his relationship with his father had been restored, and Viktor had been healed of the burden of guilt and shame he had borne for so many years. But if anyone disco
vered that Sergei Christinin was actually Sergei Fedorcenko, he would be sent back to Siberia—or worse.

  Sergei even had a new pride in his family name and heritage. He did not often speak of it, but Anna had sensed in him lately a regret that he could not pass on to his sons the name and prestige of his family. Yuri and Andrei by rights were both princes of Russia, yet they lived in a poor flat that did not even belong to them, dressed in patched hand-me-downs and often dined on nothing more than black bread and kasha. Sergei had once extolled such a simple life, but much had changed since those idyllic days in old Katyk.

  Anna knew Sergei did not envy the rich or wish to trade places with them. But as his sons grew, he saw their great potential, and the sad possibility that, like so many of the poor in Russia, they would be crushed, mind and spirit, beneath the weight of their poverty.

  Anna understood Sergei’s fear. Yet their sons were different from the peasant boys in Katyk and the children of the workers here in the city. They might not be able to claim their princely titles, yet they had been raised with all the fierce pride and independence of every Fedorcenko prince before them. Granted, she and Sergei had liberally balanced this with Christian humility, but their boys were unlikely to become downtrodden, drunken Russia peasants simply because their aristocratic blood was denied.

  Maybe she was just a proud matushka, but her sons were special. At fourteen and twelve, Yuri and Andrei had already mastered Anna’s knowledge of math, science, and grammar, and were nearly as proficient as she in history and geography. For years, Anna had been teaching them herself. Now they were ready to move on. Sergei worked with them when he could, but financial necessity forced him to concentrate on the students he tutored for pay.

  Nevertheless, the children were not suffering in their poverty. Misha, the Cossack guard who had befriended Anna years ago when she was a maid to Princess Katrina, had remained their faithful friend through nearly three decades. Thanks to him, they had been rescued from the wretched life of factory work. He had helped them find a home with Raisa Sorokin and her daughter, Talia. Three years ago they all had to move to a less expensive flat, but they were still in the same fairly decent neighborhood. And they were more fortunate than many in the city—only their two small families occupied the three-bedroom flat. Raisa and Anna had become like sisters, and the children were inseparable friends. To part company now would be like ripping a family apart. But there was no reason for that to happen; they were content and happy.