Olga prodded me forward into the parlour where we took our tea each afternoon, the samovar filling the room with clouds of steam. He stood beside the window looking out over the River Moskva, hands gripped behind his waist, a short man in a grey suit.
His hair was combed back, streaked with silver–grey. His uniformed guards stood at attention, their faces expressionless. They looked strangely incongruous standing against the fine wallpaper and wood panelling of the apartment walls. My legs wanted to turn and run, dragging me with them, but I forced them to be still. Think of Joachim’s face, I told myself. Imagine his fine nose, his dimples. His grin. Think of the books he gave you, the records smuggled in from America beneath his sweater. You must help him! I willed my feet to shuffle forward but I could not stop my hands shaking.
‘Uncle.’ He turned slowly towards me, his eyebrows lifted in surprise, as if he did not expect to see me standing in my own apartment. Perhaps he had thought I would run, leaving Joachim to his fate. Well, he was wrong. Still, I hesitated, my sandals touching the edge of the intricately patterned Turkish rug in the middle of the room.
I knew I should lower my eyes – everybody did so in his presence – but some part of me, some reckless part, made me hold his gaze. His eyebrows drew together, his bottom lip pushing out like a child’s. Then he began to laugh. The sound bounced off the walls, filling the room all the way to the high ceiling.
His body shook with laughter, his stomach wobbling beneath the grey fabric strained across it. I stood straight-spined, waiting for him to finish, uncertain what to do. Wiping tears from his eyes, he strode across the rug and embraced me. He had to raise up slightly on his heels to plant a kiss on my cheek. Although I had not inherited my mother’s creamy skin and pale hair, I had been blessed, or cursed, with her height.
‘Little Lyolka,’ he said, using the pet name he had invented for me as a child. His eyes shone. They were crinkled at the edges, his face more lined than I remembered from six months ago. ‘You are almost the image of your mother, do you know? Except for her hair. Your freckles, your nose . . . Everything. Even down to that look, the one she used to give me when I had kept your Papa working too late. I would bring him back here the next day – perhaps carried is a better word – and she would be standing here, just as you are, glaring at me, that same rebelliousness, those eyes . . .’
He leaned forward, his breath in my face, smelling of wine and meat. His fingernails dug into my arms, sharp pincers in my skin. I whimpered. I wanted to pull away, but I was caught, ensnared.
Without warning, he released me. I stumbled back, my heel catching on the edge of the rug. My ankle twisted one way, my foot another. The room spun as I crashed backwards, landing heavily on my backside, the wind knocked from my lungs.
My uncle looked away, his mouth a moue of distaste. He didn’t offer to help me to my feet. I had to roll onto my knees and push myself up.
‘You have been busy, I understand,’ he said, his tone sharp. ‘You have a boyfriend.’
I shook my head. My mouth tasted of iron; I had bitten my cheek when I fell. ‘No,’ I said. ‘Just a friend.’
My uncle snorted. ‘A friend,’ he mimicked. Sweat had broken out across his skin. Reaching into his pocket, he drew out a handkerchief, dabbing at his hairline. ‘Your mother had lots of friends. Did you know? She was most popular. One of my favourites. If she had not married your father, I might have asked her myself.’
‘Joachim,’ I said, pushing away the revulsion I felt at the possibility of my mother entertaining my uncle’s advances. ‘Please, Uncle. Is there nothing you can do for him? He has done nothing wrong. It was me. I was lonely. You know how I have tried to lead a quiet life, always observing your teachings, listening to those wiser than myself. I’m an adult now but I still make mistakes. I should have written to you first, asked permission. I . . .’ I swallowed. ‘I am begging you. Please, help him.’
His hand shot up so quickly I failed to see it, but I felt heat blossom in my cheek. He raised his hand again. This time I heard the smack of his palm against my skin as if it came from far away.
‘Help him? Help him?’ he screamed as my vision swam. ‘Your boyfriend is a Western spy! The Germans are threatening war and all you care about is fucking?’
The apartment was silent except for my breath, ragged and shallow. Tears forced themselves from my eyes and dropped onto the rug below, dotting the floral patterns.
My uncle watched me, his lip curled in disgust. His breathing had returned to normal. The only evidence that the exchange had cost him anything was the colour of his face, the skin mottled red.
‘Your boyfriend will be tried today,’ he said. ‘If he is found guilty of his crimes, Colonel Rumyanstev will have him sent to a labour camp up north.’ He smiled. Goading me. Waiting for me to beg again.
I turned away. I should argue, protest. Inside, I was screaming. But I knew it was too late to save Joachim. Nothing I said would make any difference now.
I felt the air stir against my scorched cheek as he huffed through his nose and strode past me. The guards moved away from the walls, their boots squeaking against the polished wood floors.
My knees trembled. Any moment, they would give way.
Beyond the window, the river moved slowly, the currents eddying past, leaves dancing on the surface. Sunlight sparkled on the Bolshoy Bridge, a dazzling steel construction erected only three years ago by one of Uncle’s favourite engineers. Although everyone had marvelled at its modern elements, I privately preferred the old stone bridge it had replaced. What have those stones witnessed, Olga would say to me as we strode along beside the horses with their carts that were always backed up across the embankments, their wheels interlocked when they tried to pass each other. What stories of old Russia would those mossy stones tell?
‘Lydia.’ I turned my head. My uncle had paused in the entrance to the hallway, flanked by his guards. ‘Your mother. You should know: she killed herself.’ His voice soared, an arrow shooting across the room. I felt the shaft of it burrow under my skin. He shook his head. ‘I am very sorry to be the one to tell you. She poisoned herself.’ He drew in a breath. He did not sound sorry. ‘But . . . you are an adult now, as you say. It’s time you knew.’
I stared at him.
It could not be true.
Whispers flew around in my head. Snatches of servants’ gossip. The world around me grew light and then dark, the furniture shrinking then swelling as if seen through a telescope. I remembered my mother’s corpse, her face surrounded by white roses. Her skin was unblemished, creamy and waxen beneath the light from the candles. I bent forward to kiss her farewell, her cheek soft beneath my lips, my nose filling with bitter almonds. Later, I had supposed I imagined it.
A sob escaped my mouth.
Satisfied at last, he left, his footsteps dying away, until I heard the door of the apartment close with a bang.
*
‘Don’t cry now, dear one. Think of Brave Vasilisa, the little cloth-maker’s girl who defeated the witch and defied the odds to marry the Tsar.’
Olga’s words floated down to me like feathers skating on the wind. I was lying on my stomach on the bed, my head in her lap, her fingers raking my hair. It was night time – I knew because the lamp on the table was lit – but I did not know the hour. It did not matter.
Night or day, Joachim was imprisoned. Tomorrow, he might be thrown onto a train, bound for a labour camp in the North. I would never see him again.
My mother was dead and those who knew the truth of her final moments had lied to me. My uncle was a tyrant. My face burned where he had struck me.
Olga’s fingers paused. I felt gentle tugging as she pulled apart a knot, untangling my hair with practiced ease. A dozen toys watched us from the shelves lining my room, reminders of the childhood I seemed unable to leave behind. Stuffed bears whose arms had once held chocolate boxes from the Lenin Chocolate Factory. A yellow puppy, watching me with mournful eyes, its fabric skin threadbare
, stitches loosened from repeated embrace. My red Pioneers scarf was looped about its neck, along with my badge on which the cheerful words ‘always ready!’ were emblazoned. Beside the toys sat trophies from my school days: awards for gymnastics, for singing, for writing letters to ‘our Father, our leader, the great Chieftain’ who would unite the Soviet countries to the same cause. On the wall near my picture of Lenin was a childish sketch I had done of Papa, what I could remember of him, and a large framed photograph of my Uncle Stalin, his face wreathed in a gentle, beatific smile. It was the same one issued to each student of Model School No. 25 at the graduation ceremony. The glass sparkled brightly in its wooden frame. Our maid cleaned it every day, polishing it to keep off the dust and coming in each afternoon to draw the shades so the sun would not fade the colour print.
I jerked my head sharply, turning away from it towards the bare wall. Olga’s fingers were still tangled in my hair, and I felt a few strands tear away, twisted from the roots. My scalp burned. Good.
Olga gasped. Her hand fluttered over my back, hovering like a bird afraid to land.
‘Why didn’t you tell me?’ My voice was muffled by her dress. ‘Why did you lie?’
There was silence. She’s thinking, I thought. Imagining how to phrase her lies so they are tastier, so I will swallow them like medicine. ‘Oh, my little Vasilisa . . .’ she said at last, her hand cupping the back of my head.
‘No.’ I sat up, shaking myself free from her grasp. ‘Don’t call me that.’
Olga’s face fell. She looked suddenly old in the lamplight, her skin like crinkled linen, her eyes dull buttons aged by time. A surge of pity and love rose up inside me. Along with my mother, this woman had raised me. Her stories were woven into every memory, her funny sayings and proverbs always in the back of my mind. My mother had hired her before I was born. Before she came to work as Mama’s trusted companion and confidante, Olga was married to a chef employed at the world-famous Hotel Metropol on Theatre Square. In the years before the Revolution, the Metropol had been the glamorous epicentre of life in Moscow, with film stars attended by uniformed bellhops, a restaurant with full silver service and a bar that played American jazz every night of the week. During the battle with the Tsar’s loyalists, Bolsheviks had shot out every window in the hotel’s expensive façade. The White Army had responded with force, peppering the streets with bullets. Some of the fleeing staff had been killed, including Olga’s husband. Bereft, Olga had taken up work as a cleaner at the House on the Embankment, and it was here that my mother met her. Each day, Olga would clean Mamochka’s rooms and tell her stories. Eventually, Mama gave her a job as her companion and her own room in our apartments. She could not bear to be without Olga and her stories, and when I was born, she had entrusted me to Olga’s care while she attended Party meetings and tried to improve her education with courses at the Industrial Academy. Olga was the closest thing I had to a mother. Hurting her was like sticking a needle beneath my own fingernail.
Sitting up, I took her hand and held it in my lap.
She sniffed. ‘I should have told you,’ she said with a sigh. ‘But it was not my decision to make, and your uncle, he made us all promise, swear, that we would keep it a secret from you. He said it was for your own good, that your mother’s memory should not be tainted by scandal. It was to protect you.’ Her mouth hardened. ‘Now I see he was saving it, to use it against you himself. How could he hurt you this way?’
Her voice made me look up sharply. Much worse had happened during the past few years. So many people had been arrested. Many of the ground floor apartments in our building were still empty, the residences sitting bare, their occupants held in Lubyanka accused of spying and feeding intelligence to the West. A sudden coldness crept over my skin.
I found myself thinking of Alyona Petrova; a quiet girl I had met four years ago at the Model School. Alyona and her parents had moved to Moscow so her father could pursue his work as a State Publisher. One morning she had simply failed to return to class. Rumours circulated that her father had been exposed for printing anti-Soviet pamphlets. And then there was the Vasiliev family from apartment 120. Every one of them – three daughters, two sons, wife and husband – had disappeared one cold winter night last year. Zoya told us that they’d been reported for criticising the Soviet regime and spreading rumours about Lavrentiy Beria, the powerful head of the NKVD. They had fled before they could be captured.
A new thought struck me. What if people like Alyona’s father and the Vasiliev family had been innocent, as Joachim was? Joachim was no spy and yet he had been accused. I knew now that he would be convicted, no matter the truth. Had Olga and I so blindly believed everything I was told that we had cut those neighbours from our lives and thoughts, ignoring the evidence before us? What if their crimes had not been crimes at all, but slights against my uncle and his friends? What if their imprisonment was nothing more than the will of a madman, bent on revenge? I felt sick with regret.
‘He must hate me,’ I said. ‘That’s why he keeps me here in this place. To control me.’
Olga said nothing. She tried to tug her hand away, but I held it fast.
‘Is that why Papa left?’ I said.
Olga’s eyebrows drew down. ‘Your father . . .’ She paused, her fingers plucking at her skirt. I knew she did not want to discuss it; it was something we did not speak of often, the way Papa had virtually disappeared after Mamochka’s death, leaving Olga and me to deal with the aftermath, travelling instead to the furthest reaches of Russia’s empire to carry out his duty. Now I wondered if there wasn’t another reason for his sudden absence. What if he had been sent away against his will?
I knew Papa still cared for me; he wrote a few times a year to tell me where he was stationed, what his life was like. My situation was not unusual for the daughters of bureaucrats. I knew one girl, Natalya Kruglova from apartment 280 in the ninth entrance, whose mother had died in childbirth. She had been raised entirely by her nanny and an army of servants while her father, a General, moved on to remarry and spend time with his new family in the Ukraine. At least my father had not left me completely behind. At least he had kept me informed of his whereabouts and sometimes responded to my questions about life outside of Moscow.
The last letter he’d sent had been postmarked Tartu. I’d been excited to receive it, aware of my mother’s connection to Estonia, wondering if my father recalled the warm memories Mamochka had shared about her birthplace or if he’d had time to visit the coastal town of Haapsalu where she had lived until my grandparents brought her here. I had filed the letter in my desk, wedged between two books, the paper creased over many times. It had, sadly, not contained any stories about Mamochka or about Haapsalu, but perhaps those memories were too painful for him to speak about. Instead, he had described his work as Partorg of the area and the surrounding parishes, detailing the poor conditions in which the Estonians had lived before the Soviets arrived; their farms bare, empty of workers to maintain them and harvest produce; the local government full of corrupt officials skimming money from funds that should be used to educate the less fortunate. In return, I had sent him a clipping from Pravda about the way the Baltic populations had welcomed the Soviets with open arms, praising Stalin and sending him good wishes in the form of poems and stories. Although Papa had been too busy to respond, I liked to imagine him smiling as he received my package, perhaps reading my letter over breakfast before he put on his uniform and climbed into the car waiting to take him to his office. We might not be physically close, but I was convinced there was a tenderness in his letters that remained unchanged all through the years. He still signed his letters, Your loving Papochka.
‘I don’t know,’ Olga said at last. ‘Your papa thought you would be safer here. It’s not easy, the life of a police captain. Moving about wherever you are sent. Your papa does love you, that I do know. Sometimes love is complicated, though. When you were younger, you would host parties in his honour and all your toys would be police captains a
nd lieutenants. Do you recall?’
I did. I remembered making my toys drink cups of milk while I watched my parents dance from beneath a table during a garden party my uncle was hosting in the Kremlin’s gardens. My uncle had asked my mother to dance. I could still see her fine pale hair caught up in an elegant chignon on the top of her head and hear the bell-like notes of her laughter as Uncle swirled her around, the flash of her teeth as they caught the dazzling light from the nearby fountain.
My vision swam with unshed tears.
‘You should rest,’ Olga said, heaving herself off the bed. ‘Your face will be sore tomorrow, I expect. Worse. I will send Zoya for some cold cuts to reduce the swelling.’ Gently cupping my chin, she inspected me. She ran her thumb lightly beneath my half-swollen eye but I still winced. Olga clicked her tongue. ‘Such a man it is who beats young girls. Ah. But to say such things is not wise. Even the walls in this place have ears.’ She turned to go but stopped with one hand on the door. ‘Don’t think too harshly of your papa or your mother,’ she said. ‘She was a beautiful woman but she was sad. Always homesick. You remember the stories she used to tell you, her Estonian tales. She always had to hide such things from your uncle. She did not dare remind him of her Baltic heritage. It was a sore point, with your uncle; the lost countries.’ Olga tilted her head, her eyes thoughtful. ‘Now that the Baltics belong to Russia again, I suppose he would not care.’
She let the door fall closed with a click.
I lay back on my bed, thinking about Joachim in Lubyanka, wondering if even now he was shivering on the concrete floor of his cell or whether he was already in a smelly boxcar travelling north to one of the barren oblasts. Wherever Joachim was, it was my fault. I squeezed my eyes closed, trying to shut out the images of his arrest that kept repeating themselves over and over. I knew I should sleep but what point was there? When I woke up Joachim would still be missing – I knew that not only would I never see him again, but I would never know his fate – and I would still be prisoner to my uncle’s whims.
Lace Weaver Page 7