by Ben Pastor
The stitches pulled and hurt when Bora sat. “I ask myself what I do not surmise at this point, Dr Bernoulli. I have it from a credible source that Oberstarzt Mayr received a less than stellar performance report while on the Western Front, for openly refusing to continue treatment of a badly burnt and mutilated pilot. During his unit’s stint near Pyatigorsk, casualties who could not be transported died coincidentally on the eve of being left behind.”
“So? As a philosophy major with an interest in ethics, you of all people should know there’s a higher law – higher than a physician’s oath, even.”
“I also know that Dr Mayr waited twenty-four hours or more to perform Platonov’s autopsy. During IC training, we were taught that some substances become undetectable in a corpse after a given lapse of time. Aconitine nitrate, for example, which a surgeon suffering from neuralgia might keep handy, or castor oil plant derivatives. All highly toxic if you only vary amounts and proportions by a hair.”
Bernoulli squinted behind his eyeglasses. “But if it was Mayr who carried out the post-mortem, what need did he have to wait? He could have lied to you about the toxicological findings all along.”
“Except that I could have asked for a second opinion and caught him in the lie. By waiting a safe amount of time, it would no longer make a difference.”
“Granted. Still, the rule of cui prodest seems to apply here: who stands to gain from killing one or the other high-ranking Soviet? From what you told me, Major, it doesn’t convince me that either one of the surgeons had a motive.”
“Unless they acted under orders, or could be blackmailed.” Bora stared at the whiteness pencilling the judge’s collar, a sign of the perfect shirt beneath his blouse. “Dr Mayr did mention blackmail at one point.”
“Spontaneously, or in reply to something you said?”
“To something I said. But he is rumoured to be politically unreliable.”
“Politically unreliable… So are the two of us, in a manner of speaking. I mean, when our findings relate to German crimes of war.” Bernoulli hinted a tight-lipped smile. “Does it make you uncomfortable that I’m saying this?”
“It makes me very uncomfortable, Judge.”
“And less than perfect, probably. Anyhow, why would the SS medical personnel at the first-aid station send someone to murder Khan Tibyetsky? Political unreliability scarcely applies to that quarter.”
“Well, one can exceed political zeal. My information is that the SS surgeon at Sumskaya, far from being a ‘bonesetter’ as Hauptsturmführer Mantau seems to think, was lately a euthanasia expert at the Central Office for Race and Resettlement.”
“Which doesn’t explain why Tibyetsky, who wasn’t even a subhuman Slav, should be done away with. Is this all you have in terms of evidence, Major?”
If I were a defendant in his courtroom, he couldn’t be more successful at making me tell. Will I regret trusting him? Bora had to force himself to look Bernoulli in the eye. “This morning’s accident to my vehicle – there was a time bomb involved. No doubt about it; I recognize an explosion when I see one. As far as I can make out, the charge was placed under the chassis, and timed to go off when I’d most likely be driving. I’d have been, too, if I hadn’t gone off the road shortly after leaving the hospital. I’ve got pieces of the clockwork mechanism there.”
Bernoulli glanced at the trunk, where Bora was pointing. He gave no sign of wanting to examine the fragments. Slowly, he said, “I take it you don’t believe it was Soviet sabotage.”
“Don’t know. It went off exactly half an hour after I’d had a rather heated exchange with Dr Mayr at Hospital 169.”
“Think of what you’re saying, Major! Did you only visit Hospital 169 in the morning?”
“No.”
“So where else did you stop?”
Bora lowered his eyes to Dikta’s small portrait. Her pouting young face had an incredible fairness under the narrow, inclined brim of her summer hat. In the silky shade, she was radiant. He’d taken the photo in Berlin two years earlier and it remained his favourite, although not hers. “After I signed off on a shipment of remounts, I drove by the first-aid station on Sumskaya, then to divisional headquarters, and then to the riverside fuel depot. There, I admit, I left the vehicle unattended for maybe a quarter of an hour, because they created some difficulty around my lack of gas rations. I carry Colonel Bentivegni’s special permit for extra fuel, but it didn’t fly with them until I’d made a couple of phone calls. Everywhere, excepting of course headquarters and the hospital, where all told I must have absented myself from the vehicle for half an hour, I stayed only a matter of minutes.”
“Which is all it takes for a trained hand to plant a bomb. I’m no connoisseur, but to my knowledge such charges can be timed to go off in several hours’ time. Theoretically, the device could have been primed yesterday. How many places did you visit since then, and how many times was your vehicle left unguarded? It’s still only circumstantial evidence, Major. The pursuit of justice requires more than that, and I can’t help you.”
“I believe I would have heard it ticking over a period of hours, but it makes sense.” The idea of having driven the day before from one Kharkov army store to the next in search of butter and sugar, and then to Larisa’s house on and off roads, with a bomb more than just theoretically waiting to explode under his seat, was a sobering one. Bora tried uselessly to imagine himself in Berlin with Dikta, the day of the photo. “Thanks for hearing me out, Dr Bernoulli. That’s a big help already.”
The stormy, declining hour enhanced the pallor of the judge’s shaven skull, the veins marking his temples making him look frailer than he was. He’d rested the briefcase on his lap, and toyed with the brass clasps, opening and closing them. “What will you do now without transportation?”
“I’m having my senior non-com drive up from Bespalovka to Borovoye in a captured GAZ-64 meant for the regiment. If I don’t find a mount in Merefa, I’ll have to ride one of the draught horses from my Hiwi’s droshky to meet him there. Even a draught horse is preferable to no horse at all.”
Bernoulli stood. Accompanied by Bora, he reached the doorstep, where he stopped to breathe the air. The wind had changed, however, and in lieu of the scent from the trees, wet gusts of air blew against the schoolhouse in advance of the rain. “There are more details about the Alexandrovka Mennonites I might be seeking for reasons of my own, Major. In case I need to see you again, will I find you here?”
Bora nodded. “If orders to the contrary don’t reach me before then, until the end of the month at least. It’s getting late, and it’s about to pour. May I suggest you spend the night with us, Dr Bernoulli?”
“Thank you, no. Regardless of the weather, I mean to reach Kharkov before dark.”
After Bernoulli left, Bora – for all his being a disciplinarian – chose not to make an issue of the sentry’s inattention. It meant in turn carelessness on his part, but after Stalingrad he had rare moments of invincibility; this was one such one, especially after surviving the morning’s incident. He opened his diary again, because he’d been in the process of verbalizing something relevant when the judge had entered the room.
Besprizornye (or besprizorniki) is a Russian term that indicates waifs, homeless and destitute children.
I first read it in Josef Roth’s Reise in Russland, a collection of the articles he wrote while travelling through the Soviet Union in the 1920s. It struck me then because the author described his subject as living on nothing but “air and misery”. Summing up what little I’ve heard about Krasny Yar’s mysterious dwellers – their lack of real weapons and the ghastly awkwardness of the murders, the choice of feeble or elderly victims, the pilfering pranks – I came to the conclusion that they are not Soviet partisans. It’s also very unlikely that they should be deserters (ours or Red), or civilians in hiding, who’d go out of their way to keep unnoticed. The small sandal Nagel found had the appearance of having lain in the Yar for more than a few weeks: it could belong to a gi
rl as well as to a male child. Besides, would the Kalekin boys wear sandals in the ice-melting season?
By exclusion, that leaves the possibility of one or more madmen (witness Kalekin’s head stuck on a pole) holing up in the Yar for the past generation, or else (given the cyclical nature of the murders, whose timing coincides with periods of serious crisis) a periodical frequentation of the woods by different groups, perhaps by stray youngsters, or besprizornye. After all, the man of the 241st reported seeing and being followed by a boy while at Krasny Yar.
Officially, I will not give an opinion until there’s real proof. Jotting down my notes this evening (it’s raining at last), I can easily imagine a band of wild, lawless youths who’ve survived the past two years of war as best they could, stopping at nothing to protect their turf. Why not? Some of Russia’s best and cruellest fighters are 17 years old or thereabouts. If I’m right, those presently at Krasny Yar have nothing to do with the crimes committed before 1941, much less with the rape and mayhem of the civil war days (that has to do with Makhno and the hidden valuables).
What if the Kalekin boys (orphaned of their fathers and spoilt by their grandfather, as their mothers told me) ventured into the woods and were killed by contemporaries because they might tell of the hideout? What if the Kalekin boys themselves joined the gang instead, and (directly or indirectly) were involved in their inquisitive grandfather’s death? It would explain the presence of the wooden button at the spot where he was attacked.
Making a trophy of the severed head is no more aberrant than some practices already enacted on the Russian front, on both sides. Colonel von Salomon balks at fetishism, but out of superstition will not walk on the shady side of the road. Here we all have to do our utmost to keep sane: sanity is the exception, not a lack thereof!
Besprizornye or not, I plan to enter the Yar at the head of the regiment, without indicating the possible presence of youngsters to the officers and the men, as if it were a regular mopping-up operation. It can at the very least be an excellent exercise.
Note: Unless I’m mistaken, the FED camera factory in Kharkov, where Taras Tarasov worked for a time under educator–entrepreneur Anton Makarenko, employed rehabilitated waifs. I should take another look inside the little accountant’s suitcase, to see if there are references to besprizornye from Krasny Yar in the 1920s–30s labour force.
Addendum, written later on the same evening: I went through Tarasov’s musty old papers again. And because once in a while I must get lucky, I did find the carbon copy of a letter from Makarenko himself, dated 1928, where he indulges in a nifty bit of self-serving propaganda for his Labour Commune. He claims ever since 1920 to have returned “several youngsters” to civilized living, to the Soviet Union, and to dedicated manual labour from many (11) locations in the Kharkov region, including “the desolate patch of woods lately a refuge to them, and before them to the enemies of the Revolution and the State”.
He doesn’t mention the name of the place, but I’m willing to bet it’s Krasny Yar. The same process possibly took place in the 1930s, when the famine occasioned another round-up of waifs on the part of government agencies in Ukraine. Why couldn’t there be yet another batch of wild boys who took to the woods when we invaded this region?
It does not solve my problems – that is, it doesn’t tell me what was concealed in the Yar, and whether besprizornye have had or have anything to do with it. Nor does it help me solve Uncle Terry’s murder or disprove or confirm my suspicions about Platonov’s own timely death; much less understand who might want to blow me to kingdom come. At any rate, I should send a thank you note to the SPW half-track crew, whose nudge off the road saved my hide.
Shortly before midnight, when he was unsuccessfully trying to get to sleep, Hospital 169 called in. It was Dr Mayr, the last person Bora expected to hear from. Egregious times, Judge Bernoulli would say. The army surgeon sounded no friendlier than he’d been when they’d stormily parted ways in the morning. It’s interesting that he’s calling, Bora thought. He’s either very clever or very dull: if he’s behind it, asking about the car accident would give him away, so he won’t. On the other hand, there was an ambulance at the wreck; he might pretend to have heard about it from its driver.
Mayr premised that he was calling out of a sense of duty, and nothing else.
“I appreciate it, Herr Oberstarzt.”
“You don’t even know what I’m going to say.”
“Whatever it is, I appreciate your calling at such a late hour.”
“I’m on duty, Major.” In the dark, with rain falling outside, the surgeon’s tone came distant, resentful. Lightning caused static; sounds surged and waned. What he said next wholly surprised Bora. “An hour ago, when I went to pick up some glucose from my office cabinet, on a hunch I checked its other contents. As you know, we’re working at this building and local labourers have been coming and going for weeks. The glass cabinet in my office – I don’t know if you noticed – has no key, and doesn’t lock. Yes, it’s true of most of the furniture we inherited when we moved in. No keys, and locks that don’t work.” Mayr paused, but Bora didn’t step in with any observations of his own. “Well, a container of Russian-produced aconitine nitrate is missing from my personal supply.” Again, Bora kept silent. “This afternoon work began to install new windowpanes in my office. I was at my desk, but must admit I stepped out when the noise became particularly loud. You may be aware that I suffer from neuralgia; in any event, loud noises bother me. In the hallway, I never stood more than three steps from the door while the labourers hammered the old shutters out of their hinges. All the same, tonight I discovered the aconitine nitrate was gone.”
Bora breathed in. A risky move: he’s more cool-headed than I thought. True or not, the story allows him to come across as an innocent and helpful bystander, while in practice it doesn’t make any difference to my understanding of Platonov’s end. “Is anything else missing?”
“A nearly empty pack of cigarettes, which I’d left in the pocket of my gown on the clothes stand.”
“I mean from the cabinet, Dr Mayr.”
“Nothing else.”
“And when was your last neuralgia attack?”
“My last – somewhere in mid-April. Here, I marked the date on my desk calendar: 17 April.”
“Actually, then, there’s no telling how long the substance has been gone from the cabinet. Am I correct?”
Mayr’s answer, coming through in waves, at times drowned out by low crackling noises, only partially agreed. “The cigarettes were taken this afternoon. It’s a fact that we’ve had native workers in the hospital for nearly two months. A few odds and ends have gone missing. Searching the men when they leave for the day is of little use: in other cases, we surmise they must have dropped what they’ve stolen out of the window, to a pal waiting below. After all, aconitine nitrate may be dangerous, but remains a valid antineuralgic, especially these days.”
Bora felt it useless to comment. It was all too timely and one-sided, this announcement that of all the medications in the cabinet, only aconitine had been taken. For all his brusqueness, an edge in the surgeon’s voice revealed his anxiety to make up, when in fact it had been Bora who had asked questions beyond the limits of good grace. He’s sounding me out. Pretending that he had nothing to do with Weller’s repatriation isn’t enough, and he’s adding weight to the scale. Was he counting on the well-placed explosive, and doesn’t know what to do now? Mayr fears I’ll put a crimp in his protégé’s Sunday homecoming – something which I am already actively pursuing. All the more since his own upcoming furlough to Germany follows a week from that date.
Keeping on the vague side was preferable at this time, and Bora excelled at it. He said, “Well, Herr Oberstarzt, I do thank you for the information. Good night.”
“Good night my foot, Major! Is this all you have to say? You dropped a rock in the pond this morning with your conjectures, and can’t pretend indifference now.”
The thunder was becomin
g loudest on the side of Oseryanka, as the storm pivoted counterclockwise around Kharkov, its centre. Bora listened to the rain. If he wants to play, I’ll play, but he’ll regret it. “Why didn’t you tell me you asked District Commissioner Stark to write to the General Army Office Medical Inspectorate so that Master Sergeant Weller would be repatriated?”
“I wouldn’t have asked you to track him down if I knew he would be travelling home!”
“Unless you had an interest in keeping quiet about your request.”
“That’s nonsense! I was hoping Weller would remain under my wing so that I could help him recover from his Stalingrad trauma. I have no confidence they’ll be able or willing to assist him once he’s back with thousands of others as traumatized as he is. If he’s to enter a medical career, he needs to stay in the field with a good mentor, not flee home and indulge his melancholia – which I know is a temptation for him.”
“Herr Oberstarzt, your name is specifically mentioned in a letter sent to the Medical Inspectorate.”
The confused stammer at the other end of the line had nothing to do with the bad connection. Mayr was searching for words, or thinking out loud. The only intelligible phrases that came Bora’s way were, “You’re free to think what you will. I have nothing to do with this, and I’m not even pleased Weller is home-bound.”
“Forgive me if I doubt you, Dr Mayr. You’re speaking to someone who was in Stalingrad from start to end. I’ve seen colleagues, including a surgeon, kill themselves. I have friends whose kin were left to die in their filth when their units withdrew. Few sights were spared those of us who survived, whether or not we served in the sanitary corps. And I’m sure it’s a hell of a lot better to have medical personnel put you to sleep than to rot in your own pus and excrement. There will be an investigation, Herr Oberstarzt, so you might as well tell me. I’m more capable of silence than most.” Static filled the lack of response on the surgeon’s side. Bora counted to ten in his mind before saying, “Let me rephrase the question for you, Dr Mayr: did you send Weller back to Germany because he discovered that aconitine nitrate was used on my prisoner?”