“Oh, Tatiana! How many times do I have to tell you? He lost his citizenship in 1936.”
“No, he did not. Sam, I have to go. I have patients. I will talk to you tomorrow.”
“Of course you will.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
The Nuremberg Trials, February 1946
“COME ON, LET’S GO out,” Vikki said petulantly. “What are you listening to that for? Let’s go to a movie, or a coffee bar, or for a walk.” She pounded the kitchen table. “I’m so tired of it. We’ve been listening to it for months. We’re never getting a television, I just want you to know that.”
Tatiana had her ear to the radio as she was listening to the audio transcript of the Nuremberg trials.
“I’m not listening just for sake of something to do,” said Tatiana, turning up the radio. “I’m listening because it’s riveting.”
“Do you see me riveted? The war is over, they’re all guilty, they’re all to be hanged, when is enough enough? It’s been going on for months. The generals have all been convicted. These are just the lackeys. I can’t take much more.”
“Can you go for walk?” Tatiana said without turning her head. “Go now, and stay out for two hours.”
“You’ll be sorry if I leave for good.”
“Yes. But not if you leave for two hours.”
Vikki, with a harrumph, sat in the chair next to her. “No, no. I want to hear.”
“They’re talking about my Leningrad,” said Tatiana. “Listen.”
In the criminal plans of the Fascist conspirators, the devastation of the capitals of the Soviet Union occupied a particular place. Among these plans the destruction of Moscow and Leningrad received special attention.
Intoxicated by their first military successes, the Hitlerites elaborated insane plans for the destruction of the greatest cultural and industrial centres dear to the Soviet people. For this purpose they prepared special Sonderkommandos. They even advertised their “decision” in advance.
It is necessary to note that such expressions as “raze to the ground” or “wipe from the face of the earth” were used quite frequently by the Hitlerite conspirators. These were not only threats but criminal acts as well.
I shall now present two documents which reveal the intentions of the Hitlerite conspirators.
The first document is a secret directive of the Naval Staff dated 22 September, 1941. It is entitled “The Future of the city of Petersburg.” In this directive it is stated: “The Fuehrer has decided to wipe the city of Petersburg from the face of the earth” that it is planned to blockade the city securely, to subject it to artillery bombardment of all calibres and by means of constant bombing from the air to raze the city to the ground. It is also decreed in the order that should there be a request for capitulation, such a request should be turned down by the Germans.
The second document is also a secret directive of the Supreme Command of the Armed Forces dated 7 October, 1941, and signed by the defendant Jodl. I read into the record a few excerpts from this letter:
“…The Fuehrer again came to the conclusion that a capitulation of Leningrad or later of Moscow is not to be accepted even if it is offered by the enemy…”
And further, the next to last paragraph of this page:
“…Therefore, no German soldier is to enter these cities. By the fury of our fire we must force all who try to leave the city through our lines to turn back. We cannot take the responsibility of endangering our soldiers’ lives in order to save in their entirety all Russian cities, nor that of feeding the population of these cities at the expense of the German Homeland.”
The Hitlerite conspirators began to put their criminal ideas regarding the destruction of Leningrad into effect with unprecedented ferocity.
I read:
“As a result of the barbarous activities of the German Fascist invaders in Leningrad and its suburbs, 8,961 household and adjoining buildings—sheds, baths, etc.—with a total volume of 5,192,427 cubic metres were completely destroyed, and 5,869 buildings with a total volume of 14,308,288 cubic metres were partially destroyed. Completely destroyed were 20,627 dwellings, with a total volume of 25,492,780 cubic metres, and 8,788 buildings, with a total volume of 10,081,035 cubic metres were partially demolished. Completely destroyed were 295 buildings of cultural importance, with a total volume of 844,162 cubic metres, and 1,629 buildings with a total volume of 4,798,644 cubic metres were partially ruined. Six buildings dedicated to religious sects were completely, and 66 such buildings partially, destroyed. The Hitlerites destroyed, ruined and damaged various kinds of buildings valued at over 718,000,000 rubles, as well as industrial equipment and agricultural machinery and implements worth over 1,043,000,000 rubles.”
This document establishes that the Hitlerites bombed and shelled, methodically and according to plan, day and night, streets, dwelling-houses, theatres, museums, hospitals, kindergartens, military hospitals, schools, institutes and streetcars, and ruined the most valuable monuments of culture and art. Many thousands of bombs and shells hammered the historical buildings of Leningrad, and its quays, gardens and parks. For the bombardment of Leningrad, there was in the batteries a special stock of munitions supplied over and above the average, to an unlimited amount…All the gun crews knew that the bombardment of Leningrad was aimed at ruining the town and annihilating its civilian population.
Vikki said to Tatiana, “Did you know any of this when you were there?” “I didn’t know any of it,” Tatiana replied. “I lived through all of it.”
GENERAL RAGINSKY: Mr. President, in order to exhaust fully the presentation of evidence in regard to the subject-matter of my report, I ask your permission to examine witness Josif Abgarovitch Orbeli—
Tatiana dropped the cup of tea she was drinking, and it fell on the tile floor and broke, and Tatiana fell on the floor, too, on her knees, and began to pick up the pieces, every moment or so emitting cries of such distress that Vikki, who was nearby, jumped up, backed away and said in a stunned voice, “What’s wrong with you?”
Tatiana waved her off with one hand, her other hand holding a ceramic shard which covered her mouth as she continued to listen to the bare echo that was the radio broadcast as it ceaselessly continued. A crash on the road, but the radio still plays music, still transmits sounds no matter how incongruous it is that the ear can somehow hear, that the brain can somehow listen—
—Orbeli will testify in regard to the destruction of the monuments of culture and art in Leningrad.
Q. What is your name?
A. Josif Abgarovitch Orbeli.
Q. Witness, will you tell us, please, what position you occupied?
A. I was Director of the State Hermitage Museum—
Tatiana groaned in pain.
“What?” Vikki said with alarm. “What?”
“Shh”—
Q. Were you in Leningrad at the time of the German blockade?
A. Yes, I was.
Q. Do you know about the destruction of monuments of culture and art in Leningrad?
A. Yes.
Q. Can you tell us in your own words facts that are known to you?
A. I was an eye-witness of the measures undertaken by the enemy for the destruction of the Hermitage Museum. During many long months these buildings were under systematic air bombardment and artillery shelling. Two aerial bombs and about thirty artillery shells hit the Hermitage. The shells caused considerable damage to the building, and the aerial bombs destroyed the drainage system and water conduit system of the Hermitage.
Artillery shells caused considerable damage to the Hermitage and to the surrounding areas.
Q. In what part of Leningrad were these buildings—in the south, the north, the south-west or south-east section?
A. The Winter Palace and the Hermitage are right in the centre of Leningrad on the banks of the Neva.
Q. Can you tell me whether near the Hermitage and Winter Palace there are any industries, particularly armament industries?
A
. So far as I know, in the vicinity of the Hermitage, there are no military enterprises. If the question meant the building of the General Staff, that is located on the other side of the Palace Square, and it suffered much less from shelling than the Winter Palace. The General Staff building, which is on the other side of the Palace Square, was, so far as I know, hit only by two shells.
Q. Do you know whether there were artillery batteries, perhaps, near the buildings which you mentioned?
A. On the whole square around the Winter Palace and the Hermitage there was not a single artillery battery, because from the very beginning steps were taken to prevent any unnecessary vibration near the buildings where such precious museum pieces were.
Q. Did the factories, the armament factories, continue production during the siege?
A. I do not understand the question. What factories are you talking about—the factories of Leningrad in general?
Q. The Leningrad armament factories: did they continue production during the siege?
A. On the grounds of the Hermitage, the Winter Palace, and in the immediate neighborhood, there were no military concerns. They never were there and during the blockade no factories were built there. But I know that in Leningrad munitions were being made, and were successfully used.
Q. Witness, the Winter Palace is on the Neva river. How far from the Winter Palace is the nearest bridge across the Neva river?
A. The nearest bridge, the Palace Bridge, is about fifty meters from the Palace, at a distance of the breadth of the quay, but, as I have already said, only one shell hit the bridge during the shellings; that is why I am sure that the Winter Palace was deliberately shelled. I cannot admit that while shelling the bridge, only one shell hit the bridge and thirty hit the nearby building.
Q. Witness, those are conclusions that you are drawing. Have you any knowledge whatsoever of artillery from which you can judge whether the target was the Palace or the bridge beside it?
A. I never was an artillery man, but I suppose that if German artillery was aiming only at the bridge then it could not possibly hit the bridge only once and hit the Palace, which is across the way, with thirty shells. Within these limits I am an artillery man. (Commotion in the court.)
Q. One last question. Were you in Leningrad during the entire period of the siege?
A. I was in Leningrad from the first day of the war until 31 March, 1942. Then I returned to Leningrad when the German troops were driven out of the suburbs of Leningrad.
GENERAL RAGINSKY: We have no further questions.
THE PRESIDENT: The witness can retire. (The witness leaves.)
Tatiana looked up at Vikki from the floor and then struggled up to the table where she put her head down and closed her eyes. Vikki’s hands were on her back.
“I’m all right,” she mouthed inaudibly. “I need one minute.”
Alexander, to the last.
Orbeli standing in the street, saying goodbye to his crates.
Tatiana had been very moved by his face. She never forgot it.
It was these crates he was looking at with such heartbreak, as if they were his vanishing first love.
“Who is that man?” Tatiana asks.
“He is the curator of the Hermitage Museum.”
“Why is he looking at the crates that way?”
“They are his life’s sole passion. He doesn’t know if he is ever going to see them again.”
Tatiana stares at the man. “He’s got to have more faith, don’t you think?”
“I agree, Tania. He’s got to have a little more faith. After the war is over, he will see his crates again.”
“The way he is looking at them, after the war is over he will have to bring them back single-handedly,” she replies.
Tatiasha—remember Orbeli.
Orbeli was in Alexander’s eyes as Tatiana sprinted away from him in Morozovo hospital, flickered away with nary a thought, barely a look back, ta-da, darling, and be well, oh, and tell me about that Orbeli another time, Shura, tell me about him next time you see me, and one last time she turned around, laughing, and saw Josif Abgarovitch Orbeli in his eyes. She could never put her finger on his expression. Now she knew.
Every day I stand at the edge of your bed, and I salute you. I’ll see you, Major. Sleep well. And you say, I’ll see you, Tania.
I walk away. You call back to me, and I turn around, my trusting eyes on you.
You say to me, in your bravest voice, deep and calm, your stoic voice, you say to me, Tatiasha—remember Orbeli.
I frown for a second, but not even a tick goes through me because I’m so busy and you’re so calm and Dr. Sayers calls me. And I say, Shura, darling, I have to run, tell me tomorrow, and now I know—you can’t speak anymore, you’ve used it all up. You are mute and you nod, and I blithely mosey through the beds, and at the drab doors I turn around carelessly, one last time, and here I stop.
And there I am going to be.
Orbeli.
In the February night, in the aqua silence, Tatiana sat on the cold fire escape, wrapped in Alexander’s cashmere blanket, and smelled the ocean air beyond her, as Manhattan flickered beneath her.
You will find a way to live without me. You will find a way to live for both of us, Alexander had said to her, once.
She knew now, knew for certain what she had long feared, long suspected: Alexander had handed her his life and said, this is for you. I cannot save myself, I can only save you, and you have to go and live your life the way you and only you were meant to live it. You have to be strong, and you have to be happy, and you have to love our child, and eventually, you have to love. Eventually, you have to learn to love again, and to smile again, and to put me away, you have to learn to hold another man’s hand, and kiss another man’s lips. You have to marry again. You have to have more children. You have to live your life—for me, for you. You have to live it as we would have lived it. All in one word: Orbeli.
Things were clearer in war: right, wrong, so easily defined, so easily defiled. Peril, absolution, privation. Emotion, anguish, passion.
I see him clearly, even in peace.
Oh—but how much life I have to mask him.
How many traditions, celebrations. Christmas, Thanksgiving, Easter, Labor, Columbus, Independence, and birthdays birthdays birthdays, every one, even mine, the cursed mine, the twisted mine, the suffering mine, the gold mine. Celebrations, food, sunshine, warmth. From dawn to dusk I fill my life with life.
With all the things he wanted for me.
My foundation is buried underneath the building, tall with windows and high with rafters; the foundation covered by trees and shrubs, pansies in the winter, tulips in the spring and my heart is covered too, healed, concealed. Sometimes I run my hand over my chest and in the running of the hand over my heart, the nerves send a small sharp shudder through my body to my brain, a shudder slightly longer than a breath, a long breath. In, out, hold. Breathe out:
Alexander.
Forgive me for leaving you to the dogs of war, for being so quickly willing to believe in your death. I was slow to love, but quick to abandon you.
Where is he? Where is the splendid horseman, my gold ring and my chain, my black bag and my brightest day?
And here Tatiana was, sitting by the bay, wanting her life to begin, to end, but she was not ended, and she was not begun.
The truth was, she was nowhere.
This stage, how long did it last? And would there ever come a time when she wasn’t in a stage anymore? When she was just in life?
Before finding Alexander’s Hero of the Soviet Union medal? No.
After finding Alexander’s Hero of the Soviet Union medal? No.
After Paul Markey, no.
And never again after Orbeli.
The soul was at war.
She wanted one word from him? Here it was.
I am trying to send you to a place where you will be safe. Don’t despair, he was saying, and have faith.
But what to do now? Somet
hing had to be done, must be done, but what?
Whatever she did, wherever she went, it meant leaving behind her son. Was that not folly? Was it not lunacy? Was it not madness?
It was all those things.
To go and leave her son behind? What would Alexander say if he were to find out she had left his son to go traipsing through the world looking for him among its horror stores?
Tatiana sat motionless and smelled the air, smelled the water, smelled the sky, tried to find Perseus in the sky and couldn’t, tried to find the full moon in the sky and couldn’t. It was late and the moon was under cloud cover.
Her baby boy needed his mother.
Did he need his mother more than Alexander needed his wife?
And was that the choice?
Was the choice between the father and the son?
Was she abandoning one for the other?
She had to entertain the possibility she would not be back. Was that the life she was prepared to give her child?
All she had to do was stay where she was, go on as she was.
But there was no Tatiana here. Tatiana remained with Alexander. Her arms were around him in Lake Ladoga, where she lay down with him every night. Her arms were holding him bleeding out into the Lake Ladoga ice. She could have let go of him then, could have given him to God; God was certainly calling for him.
But she didn’t.
And because she didn’t, she was here in America, sitting on the ledge of the rest of her life. It certainly felt that way, that seminal moment where she knew that whatever her decision, her life would take either one course or it would take another.
One way the path was plain and vivid.
And the other was black and fraught with doubt.
To stay was to accept the good.
To go was to embrace the unknowable.
To stay was to make his sacrifice not be in vain.
To go was to go into death.
Could she accept life without him?
Could she imagine life without him? Maybe not now, but could she imagine herself in ten years’ time, in twenty years’ time, in fifty years’ time? Could she imagine herself being seventy and without him, married to Edward, having Edward’s children, sitting with Edward at the long table?
Tatiana and Alexander: A Novel Page 50