Archangel

by Gerald Seymour

  They too were waiting for a passenger.

  She was smaller than he had expected.

  She wore tight black trousers, a yellow jersey, and a blouse that was clean and had once been white. She had large round brown eyes. Her dark hair was cut short against her scalp. Her face was pale. She came boldly to the sliding door, but when it opened she hesitated, as if this were the final step to the new world, courage had fled her. She looked for a friend.

  The boy and girl who had been waiting bounced past Alan Millet.

  'Morozova . . .'

  irina . . .'

  'Alexei . . . 'Tasha . . . I hoped . . . I didn't know you would be here.'

  'We met every flight this week.'

  'They told us from Moscow that it would be Zurich, they didn't know which flight.'

  The boy and the girl and Irina Morozova made a bundle of closed, desperate hugging and kissing. Alan Millet felt powerless to intervene into the passion of the greeting. She was a small town pianist, she was a small time samizdat courier, big Mother Russia would not miss her. Every year they let out a few like her, he thought, because it was good for their statistics, it was good to throw in the faces of the visiting Congressmen.

  The bundle broke open. The boy held Morozova's hand, the girl had linked herself to Morozova's arm. As if it were hard for her, as if the act were unfamiliar, a happy wide smile split across Irina Morozova's face and her head was tilted first to the right and then to the left as she nuzzled cat-like, with affection against the boy and girl.

  'Miss Morozova, can I speak to you?' Alan Millet stepped forward. His hand was outstretched. He spoke in Russian.

  He felt strained, and in his mind was the face of a man sitting opposite him on a low stool in a London pub with a glass of beer and a sandwich for his lunch.

  The boy turned, annoyed. 'Are you a journalist? There will be a press conference tomorrow. The news agencies will be given the time and the address.'

  'I have to speak with you now, Miss Morozova.'

  She looked puzzled and the smile faded.

  The girl narrowed her eyes at Alan Millet. 'She's just come off the plane. Can't you leave her alone? You can ask her anything you want tomorrow.'

  'I'm not a journalist, Miss Morozova,' Millet persisted.

  'I'm from the British Foreign and Commonwealth Office.

  That's the equivalent of the Soviet Foreign Affairs Ministry.

  You were in Camp 3 at Barashevo, that's what I want to talk to you about.'

  The fear came to Morozova's face. Her silence seemed to ask if their long arm reached here, beyond the Customs and Baggage Hall at Zurich.

  'You've nothing to be frightened of, Miss Morozova, I promise you. You were in Camp 3 at the end of February . . . ?'

  'Leave her alone,' the boy snapped.

  'Miss Morozova, you were in Camp 3 at the time of the riot?'

  'You've no right to ask her such questions,' cried the girl.

  'Miss Morozova, when the riot happened there was an Englishman in the leadership. The Women's zone is beside the compound where the riot was . . . '

  'Michael Holly?' A small, nervous voice.

  'Michael Holly was the Englishman's name.'

  'Did you know Michael Holly?'

  i was . . . I was his friend. My name is Alan Millet.'

  'Before he died he kissed me. Before he died I said to him that I would be his witness, that I would never forget him.

  They shot him like a dog .. .'

  'We'll go and have some coffee.'

  Alan Millet took her arm. The boy and the girl fell back, leaves in the wind.

  He took a table far from the counter. Their elbows were on the table, their heads were hunched close together, and the coffee when it came grew cold, totally ignored. Irina Morozova spoke, Alan Millet listened. She talked for an hour. She talked of the office of Vasily Kypov, and the water supply of the garrison, and of the cut holes in the wire fences. She talked of the world of the zeks who sat down in the snow, and of helicopters screaming out of control, and of a tank ravished by the damage of an internal explosion.

  Around them the loudspeakers broadcast the news of arriving flights. Passengers gulped down their beers, swilled their soft drinks, ran for 'Departures'.

  She talked of a Kitchen building where the men were close packed, where some were wounded and mutilated, where the minute hand of a wall clock travelled over a final hour.

  She talked of a kiss, of the silence that followed his going, the crash of a single shot.

  'Why?'

  'The Authority had to be given a target for their vengeance after what had been done to them. He gave himself as their target. The zeks would have fought on for him, they would have been butchered. They loved him for the courage he had given to them.'

  'Did he win, is that an idiot question?'

  'The camp was destroyed. That night the flames could be seen the length of the Dubrovlag railway. On the morning afterwards the smoke could be seen by every man in every camp. I think he won .. .'

  'And his friends, what happened to them?'

  if you were his friend in London, you would not know the men who were his friends in Barashevo. Adimov who was a murderer is in Vladimir. Chernayev who was a thief is in Camp 9, Poshekhonov who was a fraud has been sent to Baku in the Azerbaidzhan SSR. Feldstein who was a dissident has gone to the Political camps at Perm, Byrkin too has gone to Perm. That is what I have heard. None of them were executed, they all lived because one man died. The Captain of KGB had given his word, and his word was honoured.

  That they kept their word, that too was a victory of a sort.'

  Alan Millet held his hand softly over Irina Morozova's clenched fist.

  'Your friends are waiting for you.'

  'Why was he there, Mr Millet?'

  'That's not the sort of thing I can discuss.'

  'Why?'

  '1 can't talk about that.'

  'You sent him?'

  'I sent him . . . myself and others.'

  She snatched her hand away. 'Do you know what that place is like, Mr Millet?'

  'I suppose I've a fair idea.'

  'And you left him there?'

  'We tried

  'Tried?'

  'We tried to get him out.'

  'And because you only tried, he died there.'

  'We did all we could.'

  'Find out what that place is like, Mr Millet, because you should know that before you send another man to Barashevo.'

  'I understand your feelings, Miss Morozova.' Millet sat miserably in his chair. 'It's been a hideous experience.'

  'They loved him at Barashevo. People he had not known before, they loved him.'

  Millet shuffled, looked around him. 'I think your friends want to go.'

  'I want to tell you one thing.'

  'Tell me.'

  'We heard the shot. We came out of the Kitchen. Holly was dead, near to the tank. The soldiers were coming into the compound. The zeks surrounded Holly's body. They were all around him. They linked their arms. There was ring upon ring of men around him. The soldiers could not get to him. They stood, stupid bastards, around the zeks, around the rings. The Colonel General came and then the Commandant and then the Political Officer, and told the zeks they could sleep on the floor of the Factory. The zeks didn't move, no man moved throughout the whole night, even the wounded stayed out in the compound for the whole night.

  Two men died. The zeks stood in the cold . . . do you know that cold, Mr Millet?. . . they stood in the cold for the whole night to protect the body. In the morning when the dawn came, some of the zeks spoke with the Colonel General.

  They asked one favour of him, they said it was a small thing to set on the balance scales against his life. I never before heard of a Colonel General who granted a favour to the zeks. This once, this one time alone, a favour was granted.

  When the day came the gates of the camp were opened and the strong men, those that had been Holly's friends, took him on their sho
ulders. The whole camp marched after them. They carried him to the cemetery, and all the zeks behind walked with their arms linked. The chain was never broken. They buried him in the cemetery, they walked back to the camp, they went into the Factory. A Procurator came that morning by air from Moscow and when he reached Barashevo they were all working, they were all in the Factory.'

  'Thank you, Miss Morozova.'

  'He asked me to be his witness.'

  She was crying into a small handkerchief. Alan Millet stood up. He left the money for two coffees on the table and walked away towards the ticket counters.

  Table of Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 24