Gone by Nightfall

by Dee Garretson

  “I will.” My hand shook. I put my other hand up to steady the glass. As soon as she was out of the room, I set the glass back down.

  Dmitri was pacing around, which was uncomfortable to watch, since he was in obvious pain with each step. “Where is this journalist?” he asked.

  “I suppose he’s still there interviewing people.”

  “He didn’t see you home?” Dmitri stopped pacing. He sounded angry.

  “I didn’t need him to do that, and he wanted to do his job.”

  Dmitri muttered something I couldn’t make out and then started pacing again. “What’s the situation on the streets? Is it getting worse?”

  “Yes, or at least there are more and more people out. I never expected anyone to attack a café, though. It’s not like there was that much food in there.”

  He stopped his pacing and sat down next to me. “They didn’t just attack it for the food. It’s rumored that Russians who are secretly working to promote the German cause go there to meet.”

  I’d heard about the pro-German Russians. They were the faction that wanted Russia to sign a peace treaty with Germany and concede lands to the Germans as a way to end the fighting. I couldn’t believe they sat in Pekar’s over tea and cakes planning ways to bring down the government, not caring what that meant for everyone who lived in Russia. Not caring about giving away parts of Russia. Not caring that the Germans might turn on us, deciding they wanted the whole of Russia. If Dmitri hadn’t been there, I would have cursed them and cursed the war.

  I closed my eyes, wanting not to think about any of it for a little while. I heard Dmitri get back up.

  “Where are you going?” I blurted out. I didn’t want him to leave.

  “I thought you had fallen asleep. You should rest.”

  I forced myself to sit up. I knew we couldn’t stay there all day in the little cocoon of safety, just him and me, even if I gave in to the sleep that was trying to creep over me. “No, I need to get ready to go to the hospital.”

  “I’ll walk with you,” Dmitri said.

  I wanted to say yes, but I didn’t want him to think I was scared to go out again. “No, thank you. I’ll be fine.”

  “I know you will, but I want to.” He took a step toward me and his leg gave way. I jumped up and tried to catch him, but I wasn’t strong enough, and we both went down. Dmitri cried out. I moved away, afraid I was somehow in the way and making the pain worse.

  He sat up and pounded on the floor, his face twisted in frustration. “I’m so sorry,” he said. “I can’t do anything with this cursed leg.”

  “You’re doing more than enough, sticking it out here. And you know your leg will get better.” I got up, wanting to offer him a hand but afraid it would make his frustration worse.

  He pulled himself up. “Perhaps I won’t walk with you. I’ll only slow you down.”

  “Do you like to skate?” I asked. “I mean, would you like to skate when you’re better?”

  He frowned, and I realized I’d probably confused him by suddenly talking about skating. “I only said I’d go with Carter because I wanted to be outside,” I added. “It’s not like … it’s not like I wanted to skate with Carter in particular, but I do like it.”

  His face relaxed, and I thought maybe he understood what I was trying to say, even though I hadn’t said it very well.

  “I do like to skate,” he said. “Very much.” He paused. “Charlotte Danielovna, would you like to go skating with me sometime?”

  “I’d love to,” I said. “But I’ll warn you. I like to skate fast—very, very fast.”

  He smiled. “So do I. I think we’d be well matched.”

  Before I left, I tried to find Miles to tell him my plans, but both he and Hap had gone out on errands for Zarja. I decided I could talk to them that night, and we’d tell Papa at the same time. I’d take a few days off from the hospital to get the arrangements worked out. When I set off for the hospital a little while later, I was warm with the thought of someday skating with Dmitri. The incident at the café already seemed like it was in the distant past. I’d read that that happened to some people—once you were safe after a horrible event, your mind worked to convince you it was long ago.

  As I walked, I saw that the streets had emptied out of almost everyone except soldiers and the police.

  On the way there I passed a group of new conscripts, peasants ordered into the city to train to fight. Soldiers with bayonets walked along on either side, “escorting” them to make sure they didn’t run away. The men carried teakettles and small trunks or bags of their possessions. Some were even younger than Peet, and none appeared eager.

  I knew from Ivan that in the early days of the war, men and boys had jumped to join up, but that had changed as the war dragged on. Once they were actually at the front, the incompetence of the leaders led to thousands and thousands of deaths. The ones who did survive were faced with shortages of ammunition, food, and even boots. I’d seen many former soldiers hobbling around Petrograd because their toes had been amputated from frostbite. The truth of the situation spread until no one wanted to join up voluntarily any longer.

  My mood darkened at the thought, and by the time I got to the hospital, I wished I could have stayed home. I had to explain multiple times, to the nurses and the patients, what had happened to my face. I tried to act as if it were just a random act, especially for the patients.

  All of them were worried about their families and concerned that the situation was only going to get worse. I noticed we had nine empty beds, and when I asked Galina, she said some women had insisted on going home, and no new patients had arrived.

  The afternoon dragged on, and I got home late again. Hap was the only one in the sitting room.

  “Where is everyone?” I asked.

  He didn’t look up from his drawing. “Stepan went to bed and Dmitri said he had to go out. Papa went to some dinner. Yermak drove him.”

  “And Miles?”

  Hap didn’t answer.

  I twisted my fingers together, trying to keep my voice even. “Hap, tell me.”

  He threw down his pencil. “Don’t yell at me. He wouldn’t let me go with him.”

  “Why didn’t you stop him?” I heard myself yelling but I couldn’t stop it.

  “What am I supposed to do? Sit on him to keep him here? Or run after him out in the streets?”

  I’d just assumed Miles would be more careful once he knew the baron was suspicious. I couldn’t believe I’d been so wrong. I pushed down the panic that was threatening to overwhelm me. “Do you know where he went?”

  “No, but whatever he’s doing, I’m sure he is with Peet. Do you want me to go look for him?”

  “No, I’ll do it. Stay here.” I didn’t want Hap involved at all.

  I grabbed my coat and ran back outside, ignoring Osip’s questions. It was snowing heavily and there were no droshkies, but I managed to flag down a delivery cart after the driver saw me waving money. I told him the address of the theater, thinking Celeste would be in the office there and she might know something.

  When I got to the theater, there was a sign on the door that it was closed for the night due to an electrical problem. I went into the apartment building next, but Hugo wasn’t in his usual place. I felt a prickle of unease. The door to his room stood open, so I peeked in. He was lying on the camp cot, struggling to sit up.

  “I heard the door.” His voice was wheezy. “Just give me a minute.”

  “It’s all right. It’s Charlotte Mason,” I said. “You don’t have to get up. I was just worried when I didn’t see you at the door.”

  He got up anyway, adjusting his coat as he shuffled out into the hall. “The Tamms are all out,” he said.

  “Are you sure? I think my brother might be here.”

  He shook his head. “No, not tonight. They went to see a performance at another theater since they couldn’t open. You should go home.” His eyes shifted to the front door. “Go home,” he repeated. “Go now.”


  There was something wrong. Hugo didn’t sound like himself.

  “Was my brother here earlier?”

  Hugo shook his head again. He still wouldn’t look at me.

  Something was definitely wrong. “You know my brother’s health isn’t good. I need to find him and take him home. Are you absolutely sure you haven’t seen him tonight?”

  Hugo glanced again at the door and then back at me. “They’re in a different apartment, he and Peet. Number twenty-eight. You should take him home right now. The ones in twenty-eight, they’re not your kind of people.”

  I ran up the stairs, dread filling me. Anger, too. Anger at Miles for putting himself in such danger. At the door to the apartment I could hear several voices all talking at once, but I couldn’t make out if one of them was Miles. I had to knock several times until someone pulled open the door.

  “Victor, you’re late,” a young man with a scruffy beard said. He took a step back when he realized I wasn’t Victor and then came out in the hall, pulling the door closed behind him. “Who are you?”

  “My brother might be here. I need to talk to him.” My words were tumbling over themselves. I almost said Miles’s name, and then I remembered he’d claimed they didn’t use real names. I pointed at my hair. “He looks like me. Red hair.”

  He put his hand back on the doorknob. “He left.”

  I grabbed hold of the edge of the door. “Wait. Hugo downstairs said he was here.”

  “He was here, but he wouldn’t stop coughing.” The man rolled his eyes as if it were Miles’s fault. “He and the boy he was with left a while ago.” He yanked the door free of my hand as he went back into the apartment and shut it in my face.

  I hoped they’d gone to the Tamms’ apartment but when I knocked there, no one answered. “Miles? Peet? It’s Charlotte. I need to see you.” Still no answer, and I couldn’t hear anyone inside the apartment. I pounded on the door in frustration. I had no idea where else they might be.

  Voices came from the bottom of the stairs.

  “Stand aside!” someone ordered, and then I heard boots clomping up the stairs. I caught a glimpse of a policeman with several other men behind him. My heart jumped, but I made myself walk away from the Tamms’ door, down the hallway as if on my way to my own apartment, trying not to panic.

  “You, girl! Stop!” A man yelled.

  It was time to panic. I ran. I heard more yelling but I kept running until I came to the back stairs. I almost went down the stairs and then decided it would be smarter to go up. I pushed myself to go faster and faster until I reached the top floor, gasping for breath as I came out of the stairwell. I listened. There was no sound coming from below, so I moved out into the hallway.

  I’d never been on that floor before, but Celeste had said it contained some small single rooms for rent. The hallway was dark and narrow, and there was a strong smell of cabbage and onions. I heard a few voices behind the doors but saw no one.

  I went back to the stairwell and waited, hardly daring to breathe, hoping no one would come up the stairs.

  I don’t know how long I stood there, but when no sounds had come for a long time, I decided I’d go back down one flight and see if I could tell what was happening. I crept down the stairs as quietly as I could and saw that that floor was empty too. I kept going until I came to the second floor. Still no one, but as I looked down the hall I saw that the door to 28 was open and a single shoe lay in the hall. There were no voices.

  I made myself walk toward the apartment even though I knew there would be no one inside. It was too quiet. I’d heard that after a police raid, they took everyone to the prison at the Peter and Paul Fortress until they could determine if you were guilty or innocent, though once they had you there, you were almost always guilty.

  As I got closer, the only sound I heard was the bubbling of a samovar. I put my hand on the door frame to steady myself and then looked inside. There was no one there. The room was in chaos. Some of the furniture had been tipped over and the drawers to a chest had been taken out and flung on the floor.

  My stomach turned over when I saw splatters of blood on the carpet. If Miles and Peet hadn’t left early, it might have been their blood. I had to find where they’d gone.

  I went downstairs to find Hugo asleep on his bed, snoring loudly. There was a half-filled bottle of vodka on the floor next to him. I understood then, even though I didn’t want to believe it. It was the only explanation. Hugo had tipped off the police. Someone like him would not have been able to get hold of a bottle of vodka himself. The czar had outlawed alcohol at the beginning of the war, though of course wealthy people still had access to it. Hugo wasn’t wealthy. Someone had given him the bottle. He’d told the police about the people in number 28 and they’d given him the bottle as payment.

  The full force of what had happened hit me. The men who had been arrested would be interrogated, and they’d be tortured until they revealed everything they knew. It would be a miracle if no one described Miles and Peet well enough that they’d be identified. Miles and Hap didn’t have a week to get ready to leave. They needed to go as soon as we could get them out of the city.

  I ran out of the building and down the street, nearly crying with relief when I found a droshky for hire a few blocks away. All the way home I was making and discarding plans, trying to think of the best way for them to leave the city. When the droshky pulled up in front of our door, I got out and paid the driver and then turned around to go inside, but stopped when I saw someone coming toward me. Even if he hadn’t had the cane, I would have known it was Dmitri.

  As he reached me, an automobile came down the street, the headlights so bright I couldn’t really see the vehicle behind them. I assumed it would go past us, but it stopped right in front of the door, and a man got out. It was the baron.

  Chapter Twelve

  I SHRANK BACK as if I could disappear.

  “Don’t you want to see him?” Dmitri asked in a low voice.

  “No, I never want to see him.” Whatever reason the baron had for visiting us, it couldn’t be good.

  The man walked toward us slowly, as if he were out for a stroll. “Good evening, Count Lieven,” the baron said to Dmitri when he got close enough, ignoring me. “I’ve been concerned that I haven’t heard from you. Please accept my condolences.”

  “Thank you.” Dmitri’s voice was cool.

  “You’re a count?” I asked him. My brain was so befuddled by everything that I couldn’t think. I felt like I should have known he was a count.

  “As of yesterday. My great-uncle in Paris died,” Dmitri said.

  I remembered then Papa talking about the great-uncle and how after the man’s own grandson had died, Dmitri became his heir. I hadn’t thought about it at the time, but I realized that meant Dmitri would inherit not only property and money, but the title as well.

  “It’s very late, Baron,” Dmitri said. “If you are here to see the general, I’d suggest you shouldn’t disturb him. He hasn’t been feeling well.”

  I didn’t know what he meant by that. Had Papa had another spell that I didn’t know about?

  “No, I didn’t come to see the general,” the baron replied. “I came to see if Miss Mason was home. I rather thought she might be out or just arriving back here. Getting back from a meeting, perhaps?”

  “No,” I managed to choke out. I hated that the baron made me so nervous. I tried to think of a place to say I’d been. “I was at the Tamm Theater,” I said and then realized I shouldn’t have picked that place. If he checked, he’d find out there had been no performance.

  The baron gave that same self-satisfied smile I’d seen before. “Oh, and then did you stop in apartment twenty-eight in the building next to the Tamm Theater? I heard a report of a young woman with red hair who got away when the police raided a nest of radicals just a short while ago.”

  “She wasn’t there,” Dmitri said. “She was with me. We didn’t stay for the whole performance at the Tamm.” He put
his arm around me. I was so startled, I almost pulled away from him.

  The baron noticed my reaction. He looked back and forth between us. I realized my hair had completely fallen down at some point. I could only imagine what the baron was thinking. Dmitri pulled me closer, and I tried to relax as if I was used to it, leaning into him a little.

  “Where did you go when you left there?” the baron asked.

  “It’s none of your business,” I snapped.

  “It’s all right, Lottie,” Dmitri said smoothly. “No reason he can’t know. We were at the Crooked Mirror with some of my university friends.”

  I tried not to show my surprise. The Crooked Mirror was a midnight cabaret in a cellar under a gaming club. I’d never been, though Raisa and I and some of our other friends had always wanted to go. No parent would have approved, and we hadn’t been able to convince anyone’s older brothers or cousins to take us.

  The baron tipped his head as he examined my face. I was glad the glow from the streetlights was so weak.

  “So if I visit the club to ask questions, they’ll confirm you were there with Miss Mason?” the baron said to Dmitri.

  “Yes, though they won’t know her name.” Dmitri sounded bored with the whole conversation. “This was her first time there, and I didn’t bother to introduce her to the staff. It was as crowded as usual. Now, is there anything else? I’m sure the general’s daughter would like to go inside.”

  I don’t know if Dmitri’s new title had anything to do with the baron’s reaction, but I was relieved when he didn’t press us any more about our activities.

  “I’ll say good night then, though I may visit you again tomorrow.” The baron nodded and got back into the automobile.

  I shivered. Dmitri tightened his arm around me. We waited until the baron drove off to move. Osip must have been watching out the window, because he opened the door before we’d gone up the first step.

  “Is everything all right?” he asked.

  “Yes, is Miles home?” I asked.

  “He arrived about fifteen minutes ago. He was coughing quite a bit.” I could hear the worry in Osip’s words.