by D. R. Bell
5 December, 1941
It’s only the three of us: Nastya, Andrei, and I. We have no food supplies left, it’s just the bread rations. Andrei is in bed most of the time; we force him to get up and walk around once a day. Nastya’s breathing is shallow, it takes all her strength to bring in a bucket of water. We manage with one bucket a day. There is enough fuel left for perhaps two weeks. We are skeletons, covered by yellow skin with red spots. Our unwashed bodies smell, our breaths sour. Because we wear hats all the time, our hair is dirty and matted. It is freezing cold, the thermometer outside the window is stuck at -40 degrees. My feet are so swollen, it’s difficult to squeeze them into the boots. Nastya massages them at night, I am embarrassed that she handles my grimy stinky feet.
Makar and I continue our patrols. Have to walk carefully, for ice is hiding treacherously under the snow. You fall, break your ankle, you are done for. My beautiful city is now a majestic graveyard. The wind howls through the canyons of stone, piercing us to our bones. Today I saw a man sit on a bench, then slowly roll over and fall. He became one of many frozen corpses, lining the streets like statues. Bare blue legs protrude from snow drifts. Life and death coexist right in front of our eyes; there is only a thin line between the two. People show little emotion. All they talk about is food. It’s mostly a city of women, as men and children die faster.
Winter days are short. I leave in the dark, come back in the dark, crawl onto the mattress where Nastya and Andrei are bundled up. Sometimes I write in this diary, but we are down to the last candle and we have no fuel for the wick lamp. Burzhuika gives out heat, but no light for reading. We try to sleep as much as possible, to save our energy. We still hand crank the radio, listen to occasional music, reading of poetry. Olga Berggoltz read her new work today:
My dear neighbor,
Let’s sit down and talk,
Just the two of us.
Let’s talk about peace,
The peace we want so badly.
Almost six months of war,
Of bombs falling from the dark sky,
Shuddering earth, collapsing buildings,
Tiny rationed slice of bread
That weighs as little as a feather.
To live under siege,
To listen to deadly whistle of bombs,
How much strength do we need,
How much hatred and love.
But mostly it’s a “click, click, click” sound of the metronome, the heartbeat of the starving, frozen city. We are not living, we are surviving one day at a time.
What happened to his mother, my grandmother? There were four of them and now only three. It must be in the missing pages. Flight attendants are distributing food. It’s a long day, and I take a break to eat, then go back to the diary.
9 December, 1941
In addition to the water, Nastya takes responsibility for getting our bread rations. It’s a dangerous assignment; people will look to steal your coupons and your bread. Every morning, she goes to the bakery. As she leaves, Nastya carefully locks the door and tells Andrei to not open for anyone.
I convinced Makar to alter our patrol route to pass the bakery. Sometimes we see Nastya in the bread line, and she smiles at us. “Pretty girl,” says Makar.
Yesterday I had a day off. We took Andrei to the Puppet Theater. They only perform during the day now, when the Germans eat their lunch and stop shelling us for a while. There were more adults than children in the frozen theater. For the first time since we took him, I saw Andrei laugh.
I broke the crank handle of our radio. We have to get a new one, but we have nothing to trade for it.
Another torn page here.
17 December, 1941
Today, our apartment building took a hit from an artillery shell. The apartment of our third-floor neighbor is now laid bare: sofa, burzhuika, half of the bookcase, pictures on the wall. The people that lived there are dead. Our apartment has been spared, except all the windows have been shattered, and we have nothing to close the gaping holes with.
The building is not safe, but it’s dark, and we have nowhere else to go. We spent the night in our place. The wind is shrieking and the whole building is complaining. Andrei is crying, “We are going to die…” Nastya cradles him, says, “If we do, we’ll die together.” We are all on the death row, we just don’t know the exact time. My soul has been exhausted. I’ve never prayed, I’ve been told that religion is the opium for the masses, but I am praying tonight: “God, please get us through this night. Let us see the light of day.”
18 December, 1941
Ivan Mershov arranges for us to move to an empty apartment on Malaya Sadovaya. The previous occupants have all died. He gives me the rest of the day off.
We move the burzhuika, the radio, and a few of our possessions using Andrei’s sled. The good news is that the new apartment has furniture that we can burn, as all of ours is gone. The other good news is that we find two boxes of candles. I light one up. Our shadows sneak along the walls. And the best news is that the apartment has a radio. I crank it up and we sit around the little wooden box, listening to the news of our victories near Moscow. It is strange to be in someone else’s home. But home is not a physical place any longer; it’s where the three of us, the burzhuika, and the radio are. Like this candle, it’s a flicker of life in the sea of death.
So that’s how we ended up in our apartment on Malaya Sadovaya. They had to move after their place was hit in a bombardment. Sixty plus years ago, and now I am talking to Evgeny Zorkin about selling the place.
20 December, 1941
I killed a man today. It was at the end of our patrol. We heard a woman screaming and ran to the sound. She rushed out of a dark alley, collided with Makar; they both fell. A man charged after her, big, well-fed, carrying an ax. Seeing us, he turned around and ran back into the alley. Without thinking, I pulled the rifle off my shoulder and shot at him. He staggered, dropped his ax, but continued moving. I ran after him and shot him again, this time for good. The woman explained that she took a shortcut trying to get home before dark and the man jumped out of a door, tried to grab her, missed and then went after her. Another cannibal…the city is now full of them.
I felt sick when I got home, my teeth were chattering. I told Nastya what happened; she held me and cried. “He was no longer human,” she said. “Hunger took his mind.”
Was it really like this? Did people turn into cannibals? I was walking these streets just a couple of days ago; it’s hard to imagine someone coming at you with an ax to kill and eat you.
24 December, 1941
For the last three days, Makar and I were on a new kind of patrol: going through apartments. We would go into freezing caves that were rooms, check who is alive. In many places, the whole families were dead in their beds. Sometimes, we would find places where parents died but children were still alive. We would take them to a hospital, for evacuation out of the city over the frozen Ladoga Lake.
One of the days, we check buildings along the frozen Fontanka River. There are signs of artillery bombardment everywhere. The Horse Tamers statues are gone from the bridge, Makar says they’ve been buried in the nearby Anichkov Palace. The ice of the river is covered with people. When I look closer, I realize that these are corpses, left there by the relatives that had not strength to get them all the way to a cemetery. Most are wrapped in shrouds, but some have been stripped of warm clothing.
In our new apartment with its supply of candles, I started reading Andrei one of my favorite books, The Count of Monte Cristo. He listens, transfixed, as poor innocent Edmund Dantès is condemned to life imprisonment. Andrei asks how big the food portions were in the Château d'If prison; I reply they are similar to our rations.
The book takes our minds off hunger. Our little extra supply from the cinema has run out. We live on the mattress by the burzhuika stove, swathed in blankets. Getting up in the morning is so hard. Sometimes I just want to stay on that mattress, not move, slip into nothingness. I force myself to get
up for Nastya and Andrei. The three of us, bound by an invisible bond.
We try to keep the radio on; Nastya winds it up with whatever little energy she has. There is still a daily reading of poetry or occasional music, but mostly it’s the metronome ticking. I feel a mystical connection to it – as long as the metronome is beating, we are alive. It’s like a tiny beam of light in the midst of darkness.
Supply from the cinema? More pages are gone. Where are they? Were they used to light the burzhuika in 1941?
31 December, 1941
At the end of our patrol, Makar gives me a box of cookies wrapped in a paper. When I protest, he waves me off. “You have a child to care for. My wife’s been saving this for him. Happy New Year!”
We have our little celebration. Nastya saved a little bit of tea, and we open a can of ham and spread it on three pieces of bread. There were eight of us just a few weeks ago, only three are now left, one from each family. We listen to the broadcast from Moscow, which has not fallen, and we cheer the New Year hoping that’s the year we’ll break the blockade. Olga Berggoltz is on the radio:
It will come,
The bright day of victory,
Of quiet, and peace,
And aroma of fresh bread.
Hope is everything. So many times this winter I wanted to die. I kept going only for Nastya and Andrei. This night, I want to live.
The plane’s captain announces we are an hour away. I have to stop; I am overcome with emotion and can’t read anymore. I’ll finish the diary later.
I get to my apartment by 4 p.m. It’s been just over three days since I left home. A few voicemails on my answering service, only two of significance: one from Sarah wondering about my well-being; one from Jennifer, my daughter, asking when I’ll come to visit. I want to talk to both of them.
But first I look up Mary Gorossian, the travel agent we’ve used. I figure, correctly, that she works during the summer Saturdays.
“Mary, hi, it’s Pavel Rostin. Remember me?”
“Of course, how are you? I am so sorry…”
Evidently, everyone in our Connecticut town knows about my bad fortune. “Thank you. Look, do you remember me bringing in my father last year? He needed to make some changes to his itinerary and I left him with you while I was doing shopping in town.”
“Yes, I remember him. He was a dear, trying to use his little dictionary to explain things.”
“Do you remember what he wanted?”
“Yes, I do, it was kind of unusual. He had a ticket to Los Angeles, but he wanted to get to Santa Barbara. He was not sure about renting a car and driving, so he asked me to arrange for a commuter plane and a hotel.”
“Santa Barbara? Did he explain why? He was not a wine country type person…”
“Well, that’s what was so unusual – he wanted a place near the Santa Barbara Police Department.”
“What?”
“Yes, my reaction exactly! I’ve been a travel agent for eight years and nobody ever asked me for a hotel near a police department. But I found him a nice little place called The Garden Inn only a block away, booked him for two nights. I also checked on a taxi service from Santa Barbara airport to the hotel.”
“Do you know where his was going after these two nights?”
“I am sorry, I don’t remember. He already had his itinerary, I only helped with the Santa Barbara trip.”
I thank Mary and hang up. The Santa Barbara Police Department? What was my father doing?
I call Jennifer. She screams in delight, “Dad!” and my heart melts. I don’t know if it’s a special father-daughter connection, but Jennifer and I always have been close. I think Karen has been a bit jealous about it.
There are voices in the background.
“Sweetheart, where are you?” I ask.
“We are in Laguna Beach, in grandpa’s and grandma’s house. Mom and Simon are here. So are Uncle Roger and Aunt Toni. Dad, where are you?”
“I am in New York.”
“Are you going to come over and see us?”
I hesitate. I don’t really want to visit my in-laws, but I do want to see my children. And Karen. And I probably should go visit the Santa Barbara Police Department.
“I’ll try to. I’ll give you a call beforehand. Are you all done with your classes at USC?”
“Yes, I am done! I’ve got a 3.7 average!”
“I am so proud of you. I love you.” I have to stop because tears well in my eyes.
“I love you, too, Dad. I miss you, please come see us soon.”
“I will sweetheart, I will.”
I have to take a couple of deep breaths after hanging up. She is in my in-laws grand estate, overlooking the ocean. My in-laws are loaded from the chain of automotive dealerships that my mother-in-law inherited. My father-in-law parlayed the money into a long political career. He became a congressman in 1984, and over twenty years has built a network tied by mutual favors. “Uncle Roger” is their only son, with political aspirations of his own. “Aunt Toni” is Roger’s wife and the only person in this family I have a human connection with. No, that’s not fair. I had a deep connection with Karen. I am not sure if it’s completely broken or there is still a strand holding us together.
I call Sarah next. She sounds genuinely happy to hear from me. I tell her a little bit about my last three days and say I want to find out more about Martin.
She sighs theatrically. “You are just using me to get the dirt on your ex-partner. Well, I am a willing participant, happy to oblige. You had a rough week, so give me your address and I’ll be over 8-ish with dinner and more.”
As I hang up, I realize that I am really excited to see her.
I search through the boxes I brought in and dumped in the corner of my small apartment when I moved here from Connecticut. I am looking for the original agreement establishing the Grand Castle Rock investment fund that Martin and I managed into the ground. The official name of the primary investor was the New Treasury Island ELP, based in the Caymans. I have to find who really was behind this. In looking through the Blackberry’s “Rolodex,” most people there would no longer take my calls now that I am tainted with a scent of failure.
I come across Jack Mikulski’s name…the risk manager at the investment bank where I worked before getting involved with Martin. The old curmudgeon has been pushed aside into a position where no one would listen to him, because he kept warning of the risks of leverage, accumulating collateralized debt obligations, and other strategies that were generating enormous profits – and bonuses. He has not been pushed out completely because he knew where too many bodies have been buried, just made irrelevant. “The old Cassandra” became his nickname. Well, Jack was one of very few that called me after the Grand Castle Rock investment fund collapsed. I always liked him and I think he liked me back.
I dial Jack’s cell phone number.
“Hello?”
“Jack? This is Pavel Rostin.”
“Pavel? How are you? I am sorry about your fund; you got a pretty raw deal there.”
“Thanks, you told me earlier. Jack, look, I want to find out more about the main investor into our fund, the one that caused the liquidation.”
“Hmmm, where are they based?”
“The Caymans.”
“Oh, that’s a tough one.”
“That’s why I am calling you.”
He cackles. “Flattery will get you everywhere. How about lunch next week?”
“I may need to fly out to California. Can we meet tomorrow?”
“You are a pushy SOB; you need something and you want it on a Sunday! I’ve got a life, you know?”
The line is quiet, Jack must be thinking. Finally, he sighs:
“All right, you have helped me in the past with these crazy formulas that you quants were making up. I owe you one. I have someone in mind to help; let me check and I’ll call you back tomorrow morning.”
I give him my number and hang up, grateful for not being told to go and pound sand or wo
rse.
The intercom rings; Sarah is downstairs. Funny how we ended up in the same Murray Hill neighborhood. It’s relatively inexpensive for Manhattan and conveniently located. A great place to hide amongst millions of people. She energetically sweeps into the apartment, declaring, “Chinese food, a bottle of wine, and a pretty girl!”
Despite surface cheerfulness, I detect a note of anxiety in her voice. I am anxious, too; I am excited to see Sarah and am not sure what it means.
While I was gone, Sarah changed her hairstyle: her dark hair is now cut short, framing her oval face and diamond-shaped eyes. I think every woman in my life has a facial feature that makes her stand out. In Sarah’s case, it’s her lips, full and bow-shaped.
I provide a partial story of my trip while we eat, omitting the story about the package. I am not sure how to explain my suddenly strong interest in Martin.
Sarah is a smart girl, she sees that I am not telling her everything. “So why exactly did you come back so quickly?”
“The Russian investigator insinuated that my father may have been murdered, and that I am a suspect. I did not want to hang around.”
“Wow! You said it looked like a suicide.”
“Yes, and the man in the morgue said so as well. But I was still weary.”
“And how is Martin connected to this?” she asks incredulously.
“I don’t know.” I shrug. “There is probably no connection. But I had time to ask myself some questions that I probably should have asked much earlier.”
She sips the wine, thinks about it, then says, “OK, you are my FWB, I’ll tell you.”