Lorimers at War

by Anne Melville

  And Robert would come home. There was no need to be frightened for him any more. The war was over.

  Part Two

  The Aftermath

  1919

  1

  The rumour that the war was over in Europe reached Kate early in 1919, three weeks before her baby was due. There had been similar rumours before, but this one was slower than the others to fade. At one time she would have greeted the news with thankful relief, but now it seemed more likely to increase the danger which would face her if her nationality were discovered. Both in Petrograd itself and in the Butyrky prison in Moscow a number of Englishwomen were under arrest for no crime other than that of being English. It was just conceivable that the allied powers which had provided troops for the Intervention might use the armistice as an excuse to withdraw. But far more likely was the probability that with the Germans defeated they would throw an even stronger force into the battle against Bolshevism – and at the same time the German surrender would increase the bitterness of those within Russia who believed that Lenin and the other Bolsheviks had conceded an unacceptable amount of Russian territory in the Brest-Litovsk Treaty. So the civil war was likely not only to continue but to increase in bitterness.

  That meant that there could be no hope yet of Vladimir’s return. Because the alternative was unthinkable, Kate had succeeded in persuading herself that he, like most of the other male passengers on the train, had become a conscript in the Red Army. He would have been careful not to do anything which would single him out from the others or suggest that he had once been a Tsarist officer. There was no reason why he should be in any greater danger than any other soldier; but she could not expect the western armistice to secure his release.

  Once that fact was clear in her mind, Kate realized that it was time for her to leave Petrograd and establish herself at the second rendezvous which Vladimir had suggested, near the home of his old nurse. There was in any case another good reason for leaving – that if she did not make the journey soon, she might be too weak ever to embark on it. She had not yet reached the point of starvation, but like everyone else in Petrograd she was fast approaching it. The granaries of the steppes and the orchards of the Crimea had been cut off from the city by an exceptionally hard winter. Shortage of fuel meant that few trains even began the long journeys needed to bring in supplies, and bandits and Cossacks alike ambushed and plundered whatever stocks did move. The smaller estates nearer to Petrograd had suffered from the disruption caused when the peasants divided into smallholdings the land confiscated from the nobles, but proved incapable of raising more than subsistence crops.

  For six weeks now, Kate had lived almost exclusively on a diet of boiled rye gruel and a thin fish soup made from herring heads – no one was able to discover where the more edible part of the herrings went. It was not a diet which she would have recommended to an expectant mother. For the sake of the baby, if for no other reason, Kate saw that it would be wise to leave. In the country at least there would be firewood to provide a little warmth, and it was bitterly assumed in the city that in defiance of orders the peasants had hoarded the cabbages and potatoes and were secretly cooking and eating them.

  With the decision made, Kate applied for leave, slightly exaggerating the imminence of the expected birth. It took little time to pack up her few possessions. For weeks looters had been roaming the city, ensuring that no one any longer owned more than he could keep in his own hands. Kate possessed only two treasures. Into the waistband of her skirt she had sewn the ring which Vladimir had given her after their marriage; it was the only jewel he had dared to take with him when he fled from his palace. With less concealment she carried her bag of surgical instruments. For the rest, when the time of her departure arrived she wore every article of clothing she owned and strapped a bedding roll on to her back. Ponderously huge, she left without regret her quarter share of the icy room which had been allocated to her by the hospital soviet and climbed on to one of the trams which was still running between high walls of snow.

  It was a journey into an uncertain future. As Vladimir had expected, the village of Tsarskoe Selo had changed its name after the murder of the Tsar and his family, but she had discovered where it was and ascertained that trains were still running to it. She had no idea, however, whether the Aminov palace was still standing. And an even greater doubt was whether she would be helped or denounced if she revealed any part of the truth to her husband’s old nurse.

  The wind when she arrived was bitterly cold and she could hardly drag herself from the station to the ridge on which the village was built. Had she not had a strong constitution she would have been dead long ago, and even as it was the weight of the baby and her undernourished state had brought her very near to collapse. Only anxiety forced her on. She dared not enquire for the Aminov palace by name, but instead asked anyone she met on the street what building she was passing at that moment. The colonnaded square and magnificent domed church still indicated what an elegant centre the village had once provided for the noble families who used it as a healthy escape from the Petrograd swampland; but their palaces, each in its own estate, were scattered through the surrounding countryside.

  At last a landmark enabled her to follow the directions which Vladimir had given her. As she trudged along the narrow track which had been beaten down through the snow, the light began to fade and she grew anxious at the possibility that she might have to retrace her steps in the dark. But the lodge, when it came into sight, was at least inhabited, even though it might prove to hold no welcome for her. The windows were obscured by frozen snow, but it was possible to see a gleam of light in the upper room.

  First of all she must look to see whether there was any message. The dead tree by the gate was easily identified, but Kate stared with dismay at the blackened slit in its trunk which Vladimir must once have used as his post box. It was far too high for her to reach. He, as a boy, would have been agile, climbing the tree next in the row and dropping down to the leafless branch which stretched jaggedly out like a pointing finger. But for her, now, such a climb was impossible. Could even Vladimir have managed it in such icy conditions? Kate set down her bedding roll and moved round the tree, looking for some lower hiding place which he might have used instead.

  There was nothing. Frantic with frustration, she fixed her eyes on the aperture, so near and yet so tantalizingly far. She found soft snow and carried it to pack round the trunk of the tree. She leaned her bedding against it and began to inch her way upwards. Her fingers touched the branch, searching for a hold. There was a crack in the surface and the wood was rotten; she pressed inwards, tightening her grasp, willing her arms to take the weight and allow her to pull herself upwards. But the bedding roll began to slip. She felt herself being stretched, uncertain whether to hang or to fall. Suddenly she was conscious of a violent pain, as though a horse had kicked her in the stomach; and at the same time she knew that the waters had burst and that the baby, too soon, was about to be born. She gave a single cry, of distress as much as of pain, and fell back to the ground.

  It was not a long drop, but she fell awkwardly and was unable to move. Her muscles, tense with the first contraction of labour, refused to relax themselves. She remembered how Vladimir had commanded her to groan when the Cheka had stopped the train. It had been only a pretence then, but now – when the sound of pain would have been justified and might have brought help – her body seemed too tightly clenched to allow even the smallest whimper to make itself heard. Perhaps she was unconsciously defending the unborn child, endeavouring for a little longer to protect it in the safe warmth of the womb.

  The black canopy of night unrolled itself above Kate’s head and the snow began to fall again. As the chill of the ground penetrated her clothing she shivered for a while. Then, little by little, she relaxed in the soft warmth of the snow. From time to time her muscles tensed again, forcing her breath out in a grunt of pain: but between contractions she felt herself sinking into unconsciousness.

>   It was still dark when she awoke, but instead of bright stars in a wide velvet sky the blackness was broken by a spark which she recognized as the smouldering tip of a pine-bark taper. She was wrapped so tightly in blankets that she could hardly breathe, but although her skin was sweating with heat, her bones felt cold. Her head too, seemed to be frozen, so that she needed to lie for a little while without moving while she tried to remember what had happened.

  As she struggled with her memory, so she absorbed the atmosphere. She was indoors, certainly, and to judge by the warmth which comforted her back she had been given the place in which any children of the house would normally sleep, on top of the big stove which served a country family for cooking and heat. There was a smell of smoke and uncured wolfskin, and the steady sound of a spinning wheel.

  Cautiously, in case her head should hit the roof, Kate tried to sit up, but was at once conscious of pain. Her hand, swaddled inside the blankets, moved to feel her swollen abdomen and found instead a tender flatness. Even then, alarmed and uncomfortable, she did not call out at once because she could not remember what language she ought to speak.

  The sound of spinning stopped and a candle came near. Standing on the ledge at the side of their stove, a peasant couple looked down at her.

  ‘I told you she was alive,’ the woman said; and then, to Kate, ‘He was sure you were dead, Comrade. But I said No, you were an icicle but icicles can be melted.’

  ‘The baby,’ said Kate. Her mouth was swollen, so that the words emerged indistinctly, but the woman understood.

  ‘Yes, you have a baby. A baby girl.’

  ‘Alive?’

  ‘Alive, yes.’ But the woman crossed herself as she spoke and Kate was afraid.

  ‘May I see her?’

  ‘She’s not here,’ said the man. He spoke more roughly than his wife. ‘Do you think we could feed two extra mouths?’

  ‘Be silent,’ said his wife. ‘How much food has the comrade taken from us? A spoonful of gruel, nothing more.’

  ‘Where’s my baby?’ said Kate. As well as being frightened, she was unhappy. She had so much wanted to experience the birth of her child but it had happened in the end without her knowledge, as though her body were only a machine.

  It was the man who answered again, in the same gruff voice. ‘At the orphanage. What better place? It seemed that she was an orphan in the moment she was born.’

  ‘Where is the orphanage? I must get her back.’ For a second time Kate tried and failed to sit up.

  ‘The orphans live in the old palace of the Aminovs,’ said the woman. ‘You can walk to it in ten minutes once you are strong enough. The child isn’t lost.’

  ‘But who will feed her? Who will look after her?’

  ‘The holy saints will provide. Go back to your chair, Ivan Ivanovich, and leave me to women’s work.’ She fetched a bowl of water and set it down near Kate’s head. But instead of washing her she leaned close and spoke in a whisper. ‘You’ve come from him, haven’t you? It’s twenty years since he last slipped his messages into that tree, the young rascal. But no one has ever used it since. I watched you searching before you fell. You were looking for a letter. Tell me I’m right. It’s his baby, is that right too?’

  Kate did not answer immediately. Vladimir had been right to warn her that even the most devoted old servant could no longer be trusted to remain faithful. It could be a trap on the part of a clever old woman to send her surly husband away before making a show of friendship.

  But she was probably not clever. And she had not yet abandoned her old faith. Now that Kate’s eyes were accustomed to the lack of light, she could see the icon in the corner. Besides, if the baby was alive, her life must have been saved by the old woman’s care, and who in such circumstances would harm a new-born child? If the baby was dead, Kate did not at this moment very much care what happened. ‘Yes,’ she whispered.

  ‘Don’t tell him,’ said the old woman, making it clear that on this occasion the emphatic pronoun referred to her husband. ‘He’s afraid of the Red Guards. But he’s not unkind. Truly, when he took the child away, he thought you were dead. Have you papers?’

  ‘Yes.’ Kate tried to fumble for her pocket but realized that her clothes had been taken off her. In any case, the woman gestured for her to be still.

  ‘Not for me. How should I be able to read them? But I can tell him that there’s no need of concealment. That will make his mind easier.’ Her hand moved bonily over Kate’s body, feeling her breasts. ‘And you have milk. Good. Then the little one will not be a burden. Sleep now. Tomorrow, in the daylight, we will bring your baby back to you.’

  2

  Eight days later, with baby Ilsa in her arms, Kate stepped over the threshold of the Aminov theatre palace. Once upon a time – and not so very long ago – it had been a miniature Versailles, surrounded by terraces and fountains and by a park planted with trees in the English fashion. Inside the dignified building with its classical design and pale yellow walls, Vladimir and his brother and sister, with their Russian nurse and French and English governesses, had spent much of their childhood, surrounded by every comfort and luxury. Alexa had sung here – less than ten years ago – to an audience of Grand Dukes and Duchesses, Princes and Princesses. Kate – even in those far-off days disapproving of privilege – had stared in amazement at the diamond bracelet which represented the fee for a single evening’s entertainment.

  Alexa would not have recognized the palace now. The theatre itself was made of wood, although the fluted pillars which pretended to support the high painted ceilings gave the impression of being marble. They alone – perhaps for that reason – had survived undamaged. Everything else had been pillaged. The chandeliers had probably been smashed only out of spite, but the draperies must have been useful for clothing. The wooden balustrade of the tiered gallery in which the audience sat had already been chopped down for firewood, and now the elaborately patterned parquet floor was being prised up, block by block, for the same purpose.

  The thickness of the atmosphere made it difficult at first to see the whole of the former auditorium. Smoke from a fire which smouldered in the middle of the hall mingled with the smells of cabbage and urine and body sweat. Stepping carefully over the bodies of children who lay alive but unmoving on the floor, Kate began to explore the building, her eyes widening in horror as her rough count of the inmates increased. The old woman, whom she had already learned to call babushka, had told her that the old name of Tsar’s Village had been changed to that of Children’s Village because as many of the parentless children of Petrograd as could be found were sent up to this higher area for their health. Kate held her baby even more tightly in her arms than before, realizing that if she had died, this would have been Ilsa’s home.

  Her explorations brought her in the end to what had once been a kitchen. On the only bed she had so far seen – its iron frame having presumably survived because it could not be burned – a middle-aged woman lay dead. A girl of about twelve or thirteen sprang to her feet at Kate’s approach, almost attacking her in despair and agony.

  ‘You’re too late!’ she cried. ‘It’s three days since I sent the message. How could she keep alive so long? Three days!’

  ‘The message didn’t come to me,’ said Kate. ‘Who is in charge here?’

  ‘Who is there, now that she has gone?’ The girl began to wail, as though for the first time admitting the death which must have taken place twenty-four hours earlier.

  ‘But so many children! They can’t just be abandoned. Hush now, don’t cry. If I’m to help you, you must help me first. Tell me how you came to be here. And when you last had food. And how many of the children are sick. But first of all, tell me your name.’

  The girl’s name was Vera; between sobs she told her story. Her father had been killed at the front; her mother had died of typhus. She had been one of the first to be sent to the Aminov palace, and was amongst the oldest. There had been about eight hundred orphans in the building two month
s earlier, but almost all of them had had influenza. At first they had nursed each other, but by now they were all too weak. Vera did not know how many had died. Comrade Nina, the woman who lay dead on the bed, had done her best to provide rations for the children, but since she had become ill three weeks earlier they had had only what they could steal.

  ‘Did she ever tell you who it was who allowed her the rations? Did the food come through the Red Guard or from the District Revolutionary Committee?’ It was impossible for a stranger in any area to know whether the civil or military authority was locally in control, and important not to guess wrong.

  Vera shook her head. But it was to the Red Guards that she had gone for help three days before. They had seemed kind enough, promising to pass on her message for a doctor to visit Comrade Nina and to arrange for a supply of food. But no doctor had arrived. They had given her a sack of frozen potatoes on the spot, but the man who offered to drag the sack back for her had stopped on the way and demanded to be paid for his trouble. When Vera had explained that she had no money, she had learned that a different kind of payment was envisaged.

  At the memory she began to wail again. Kate comforted her briefly, but too much needed to be done for time to be wasted on what was past. Responsibility would provide the best distraction for Vera.

  ‘I want you to look after my baby,’ she said, putting Ilsa in the girl’s arms as she spoke. ‘She’s very tiny and very precious to me, but I’m sure I can trust you to take good care of her while I go into the village and talk to the Revolutionary Committee. I’ve just fed her, so she’ll be happy with you for the next three hours. And you can feel sure that I shall come back. I’m going to look after all of you here – and you will be my chief helper.’

  She spoke more confidently than she felt. But the need was so great that action of any kind was bound to lead to some improvement. An hour later she was locked in argument with the chairman of the committee, a young railway engineer, as he pointed out the impossibility of finding food where no food existed and Kate reminded him of the community’s responsibility to the children of their dead comrades. They both spoke with passion and the argument would have become heated had Kate not remembered how dangerous it was in these times to make enemies. Even under a self-imposed restraint, however, she could see that her arguments were having some effect. By mid-afternoon she was back at the palace, congratulating Vera on her success as a nursemaid and collecting a group of the oldest children to act as her aides.