Underground Soldier

by Marsha Forchuk Skrypuch

  Once, while warming my hands over an open fire with many others, I heard a familiar accent peppered in amidst the chatter — a woman’s voice — and she had to have come from Kyiv. I looked up and listened, trying to figure out which person the voice had come from. And then I saw her, a bone-thin woman who was nearly bald, although tufts of grey hair sprouted out wildly here and there. She held a potato on a stick over the flames.

  I walked around the fire until I was beside her, then crouched down.

  She looked at me warily. “I’m not sharing my food.”

  “I don’t want your food.”

  She looked at me again. “You’re from Kyiv too,” she said. “I can hear it in your voice.”

  “I am. But I left long ago. How about you?”

  “I was there until the bitter end,” she said. “One of the few who actually walked out alive.”

  “I was thinking of going there,” I told her. “To see if I can find my father. He was in Siberia. Or my mother. She was taken as an Ostarbeiter to Germany.”

  The woman studied my face in silence, then looked at her potato, turning it slowly so it would cook evenly. “Your mother would never go back to Kyiv,” she stated.

  “She would,” I said. “My whole family will go back. Otherwise, how will we find each other?”

  “The Soviets are running Kyiv now,” she said, her eyes still on the potato. “They’d punish your mother for her Nazi sympathies.”

  Poor woman, the war must have made her mad. “My mother doesn’t have Nazi sympathies. She was a victim of the Nazis.”

  “Do you think that matters to Stalin?” said the woman. “He’s made it clear: Anyone who survived the Nazi occupation is to be punished for not fighting hard enough.” She turned to me then. “Why do you think I’m fleeing west?”

  “But how will I ever find my father?” I asked.

  The look she gave me then was almost motherly. “Who knows?” she said. “But you won’t find him in Kyiv.”

  I didn’t entirely believe her, but didn’t want to argue. I got up, leaving her and her precious potato. Maybe it wasn’t possible to go back right this moment, but I wasn’t about to give up so easily. For now, I would keep going west. Perhaps I’d find Lida and Mama first, but I’d definitely be going back to be with Tato, even if they said it was dangerous. I couldn’t stand the thought of Tato going back home and finding his wife and son missing.

  * * *

  Hordes of ragged people walked along together. There was safety in numbers, that was certain, but there was also misery. The devastation of Martina’s country wrung my heart. And it made me wonder what might be left of Kyiv.

  After weeks of walking, we arrived at a vast cluster of American army trucks, refugees milling around, soldiers frantically passing out items of food, medics circulating among us to see who needed help.

  An American soldier reached into a bag and drew out an orange. “Eat,” he said to me, pointing to his mouth.

  I had seen oranges in the display window at the special grocery store in Kyiv where high-ranking party members shopped, but I had never tasted one. I was overwhelmed by this soldier’s generosity. I took a huge bite and nearly gagged.

  The soldier shook his head, took out another orange and bit into it just like I had, but then spat that small part out. He dug his thumbs into the hole he’d made and pulled back the skin. Then he popped a chunk from inside the orange into his mouth. I did the same. It was so tasty that I sat right down and devoured the rest of it.

  The American soldiers were trying to get all of us refugees into lineups. I walked up and down to figure out what was going on. At the front of the line was a series of desks, each with an American officer ready with pen and paper. Each officer had an interpreter; beyond that was a closed-in area with more refugees milling around.

  I got into the line of people speaking Ukrainian, then waited for hours until it was my turn, still thinking of that orange.

  “Where are you from?” the interpreter asked me in Ukrainian.

  “Kyiv.”

  “Your name?”

  “Luka Barukovich.”

  The officer wrote that down.

  “Age?”

  “Thirteen.”

  “What did you do in the war?”

  I was about to tell him about the UPA, but then I stopped. The Soviet Union was an Allied nation. Did this American soldier share information with the Soviets? What about the interpreter? Everything I did during the war would be regarded with suspicion by the Soviets, so I erred on the side of caution and answered with part of the truth. “I was in a work camp.”

  The interpreter said something to the officer in English. Then the officer stamped a paper and handed it to me. “Go through.”

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Safety

  Once I stepped beyond the partition, they made me strip and have a shower, then dusted me with lice powder. That brought back strong memories of my first day at the work camp with Lida, but this time when I came out, there was a set of soft new clothing for me to wear, and a pair of shoes that actually fit. It felt so good to be clean.

  It was safe in the displaced persons’ camp, and there was food — plenty of it, although it was sometimes strange. The Americans had quite a challenge feeding so many people, so we’d have baked beans for days on end, then other times warmed-up beef stew out of cans, then maybe nothing but bread and cheese. It didn’t bother me. After so much hunger over so many years, I could have eaten a well-salted shoe.

  The medics were having trouble keeping up with all of the refugees’ problems, mostly malnutrition, eye diseases, lung infections. But they also had to protect against things like cholera and typhus. Through an interpreter, I offered my help, but the Red Cross nurse just smiled. “We are here to help you.”

  That same nurse came up to me later as I leaned against a demolished truck, eating a piece of white bread. “Family. Find?” she asked, mispronouncing the Ukrainian words.

  I had no idea what she was trying to tell me. She took me by the elbow and guided me to a different Red Cross building. Another snaking lineup.

  “Stay,” she said. Then left.

  I waited in the lineup, eavesdropping on the conversations around me. Everyone in my line spoke Ukrainian.

  “What is this place?” I asked the woman in front of me.

  “The Red Cross,” she answered. “Surely you know that.”

  “Yes, it’s the Red Cross, but this isn’t a hospital.”

  The woman smiled. “This office isn’t to heal your body. It’s to heal your soul.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Your loved ones,” she said. “They can trace them for you.”

  Did that mean they would be able to find Mama and Tato and Lida? It seemed almost too good to be true.

  I was nervous by the time it was finally my turn. I sat down in front of a woman with lips painted the colour of blood. She had a name tag, but it was written in English.

  I held out my hand and said in Ukrainian. “I am Luka Barukovich. What is your name?”

  “I’m Jean Smith from Wisconsin,” she replied — in Ukrainian — as she tapped her name tag with an index finger. “But you can call me Genya.”

  “Thank you, Pani Genya,” I said. “Can you find my parents, my friends? I can give you their names …”

  “Hold on,” said Genya. She ripped some forms off a pad and placed them in front of me. “We need to fill out one of these for each of your loved ones. We’ll enter them onto our lists and circulate them through all of the DP camps. Then we hope for the best.”

  I picked up the pieces of paper and was about to leave, but Genya put one of her hands on mine. “It’s okay,” she said. “Stay here and I’ll fill them out with you.”

  I began with my father.

  “If he was taken to Siberia, we cannot help you,” she said. “Our records only extend to the areas that were occupied by the Nazis.”

  Her words hit me like a hammer. Of
course they wouldn’t know. They had defeated the Nazis, but not the Soviets. How would I ever manage to find Tato? “My mother was taken as an Ostarbeiter,” I said. “Can we start with her, then? Raisa Barukovich.”

  Genya’s face brightened and she began to fill out one of the forms. “Yes. Do you have any information on where she was taken?”

  “No, but I know when. She was taken from Kyiv during the last week in November 1942. The Nazis took us both at the same time, but we were put on two different trains.”

  “That helps a bit,” said Genya. “We’ll put it in our system.”

  “I am also looking for Lida Ferezuk.”

  “Is she also family?”

  “No. A close friend. She was in the same labour camp as me.”

  “But you would have been liberated at the same time.”

  “No,” I replied, considering how I would answer her. My escape from the camp and my time fighting in the Underground was something I didn’t want to talk about yet. On the other hand, I needed to give Genya as much information as possible. “If you show me a map, I can point out where the camp was.”

  Genya got up and looked around, then came back with a big map of the Reich. Thank goodness Margarete and Helmut had shown me their actual location. “There,” I said, my finger on an area close to the Oder River. “The work camp was somewhere in the countryside here. There was a bomb factory in a small town around there.”

  “That area is in Soviet control now,” said Genya. “But by the time they arrived, that camp was emptied and the bomb factory destroyed.”

  “What does that mean?”

  “Hard to say,” replied Genya. “Leave it with me.”

  * * *

  Time crawled in the days that followed, days that were some of the hardest I had ever lived through. I had become accustomed to action, to solving problems on my own. Now I was stuck waiting for others to do things for me. They gave me no responsibilities, and nothing to do. I felt so powerless.

  All June, I occupied my time finding other Ukrainian-speaking refugees. “Have you heard of Lida Ferezuk or Raisa Barukovich?” I would ask. They’d shake their heads, then list off their own loved ones.

  Other than that, I stood in lineups: for food, water, soap, showers. It got to the point that if I saw people lining up, I’d stand in line first and then ask what they were waiting for.

  It was difficult to find a place to sleep. Every nook and cranny of intact buildings and clear patch of ground had been claimed by someone. People would roll out their blankets and sleep just about anywhere. One night I slept in the back of a potato truck. Another time I slept sitting up, leaning against a wall.

  Our camp was just down the road from another and another and another. I marvelled that the Americans were able and willing and compassionate enough to help so many people. But how long could it go on? And without my parents or Martina or Lida, my life felt not worth living. Like so many others, I visited the other camps and asked everyone I met the same questions: Have you heard of Lida Ferezuk or Raisa Barukovich? Do you know where they are?

  People began tacking up slips of paper at the entrances to the camps. On each one was a notice about loved ones, then a message about where the letter writer could be found. These slips of paper multiplied, fluttering in the wind like the furry pelt of a strange animal. I added my own, and each morning I checked the papers at the gates of every camp in my area.

  Then one day, as I stood in a soup lineup, Genya came up to me, her eyes alight. “Why haven’t you come back to see me, Luka?”

  “I’ve been looking for my mother and Lida on my own.”

  “Well, come with me now. I have some information.”

  I followed her through a back door of the Red Cross building into what looked like a lunchroom for the staff. “Wait here,” she said. “I’ll be right back.”

  A man wearing a Red Cross badge on his white shirt eyed me suspiciously as he chewed on a cheese sandwich, but he didn’t tell me to leave.

  Genya came back, holding a manila envelope. As she sat across from me, she tore it open. “Twelve Ostarbeiters who were originally from Camp 14 …” She looked up at me. “That camp your friend was at has been labelled Camp 14 by the Americans. Anyway, these Ostarbeiters were relocated to Bavaria and were liberated by the Americans in April. According to our information, one of them was named Lida Ferezuk.”

  I was so surprised by what she said that it took me a moment to digest it. “Lida’s alive? And you know where she is?”

  “She was very ill and was being treated in an American hospital in Austria until a few days ago. We can take you to the DP camp that she was released to — it’s not that far from here. But remember, everyone goes from camp to camp, so I can’t guarantee that she’ll still be there.”

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Sun-washed Barn

  Genya got permission to drive me herself in a Red Cross van. “I’m dropping off supplies as well,” she said. “So it just makes sense to take you with me.”

  The road was crowded with refugees, some coming to our camp and others leaving. Genya blasted her horn and nudged forward. A few people moved, but others ignored her. Some carried ragged suitcases, others pushed wheelbarrows. One woman balanced a wicker basket filled with jam jars on her head. I figured I could walk faster than Genya drove, but didn’t want to hurt her feelings.

  She drummed the steering wheel impatiently with her fingertips. “You’d probably get lost if you walked.”

  That made me smile. If only I could tell her all the places I had been.

  I scanned the crowds as we inched forward. It was a good view from the high front seat of the van, so every time I saw a small girl with dark blond hair, I’d watch until I could see her face. My biggest fear was that Lida would leave her DP camp before I got there and I’d lose track of her forever. Genya and I travelled for what seemed like hours.

  “We’re here,” she said finally, drawing the van beside a crumbling stone entrance that was covered with the usual hundreds of fluttering papers — pinned to cracks, taped in a line, tied with string.

  “You’d like to check the papers, I imagine,” Genya said. “Good luck, and I hope you find your Lida.”

  “Thank you,” I said, giving her a firm handshake. I opened the door and stepped out of the van. Genya waved as she drove inside the complex to drop off her supplies. I didn’t stop to read the fluttering papers. I could do that any time. Right now I had to find Lida. But how could I do that, among these thousands?

  I walked down the dusty main roadway and looked carefully at each person I passed. What if Lida was taller now, or looked different after all this time? Would I even be able to recognize her?

  As I passed one cluster of people after another, I realized that this camp seemed more permanent than the one I had come from. Maybe it was because the network of stone buildings still contained discernible rooms. So what if they had no covering? Fractured families had settled into the corners of the large roofless rooms, some pitching makeshift tents for privacy, others living in the open, seemingly content with their invisible walls. A woman in a red bandanna crouched over a small charcoal fire that she’d lit in what had likely been a hallway, heating a lumpy, greyish liquid in a frying pan. A few buildings away, a grizzled old man sat on what was left of a stone wall and rocked a toddler as he sang a lullaby.

  When I got to the end of the main street, I walked up the next street, then turned and walked down the next. Every now and then, amid the hum of many languages, I’d hear people speaking Ukrainian. I’d stop and listen first, then ask if they knew Lida Ferezuk. No one did.

  I did not stop looking until it got so dark I could no longer see. Had Genya been mistaken? Or perhaps Lida had been here but had left for a different camp. The thought of being so close to her, yet losing her again, overwhelmed me with sadness. I found a grassy spot against a tumbledown wall and fell into an uneasy sleep.

  Early the next morning I felt a hand grip my shoulder. �
�Are you all right?”

  I opened my eyes. A saggy-jowled woman with wild grey hair thrust half a slice of bread into my hands. “There’s a lineup over there if you want more,” she said, pointing.

  I looked down at the bread, then back at the woman. It touched me that she would be so generous to a stranger. “Thank you.”

  “It’s a new day,” said the old woman. “Don’t waste it.” With that, she walked away.

  I took a bite of the bread and chewed it slowly. She was right. Time to get up and look for Lida.

  I walked up and down the same streets as I had the day before, stopping every time I heard someone speak Ukrainian. I would ask if they knew Lida Ferezuk. Just like yesterday, no one did.

  But then a woman said, “You should try our church. We are all drawn to it sooner or later.”

  “There’s a church?”

  “This whole place used to be a convent,” she said. “The chapel and church were destroyed, but we rebuilt ourselves a most beautiful Ukrainian church.” She pointed to a barn at the edge of the camp, under a bank of trees. “It’s there.”

  When I got closer to the barn I began to have doubts. The building was so lopsided that it looked like it might collapse any minute, but there was a well-trod pathway leading right to it, and the door was open.

  I stepped inside. Sunlight poured in from the holes in the roof, lighting up a rough wooden altar propped up on tin-can legs. In the centre of the altar was an ancient icon of the Virgin Mary. I gasped at the sight of it. So much had been stolen from us that could never be returned, but at least this icon had been reclaimed.

  On her knees before the altar was a small, thin girl with soft tufts of dark blond hair. I would have known her anywhere.

  I dared not breathe.

  Lida whispered a prayer to the Virgin and I heard a list of names. One of them was my own.