“Where are you traveling?”
The question took Wladek by surprise. “Moscow,” he said, holding his breath.
“So am I,” she said.
Wladek was already regretting the isolation of the car and the information he had given, meager though it was. “Don’t talk to anyone,” the doctor had warned him. “Remember, trust nobody.”
To Wladek’s relief the woman asked no more questions. As he began to regain his lost confidence, the ticket collector arrived. Wladek started to sweat, despite the temperature of minus 20 degrees. The collector took the woman’s ticket, tore it, gave it back to her and then turned to Wladek.
“Ticket, comrade” was all he said in a slow, monotonous tone.
Wladek was speechless and started thumbing around in his coat pocket for some money.
“He’s my son,” said the woman firmly.
The ticket collector looked back at her, once more at Wladek, and then bowed to the woman and left without another word.
Wladek stared at her. “Thank you,” he breathed, not quite sure what else he could say.
“I watched you come from under the prisoners’ train,” the woman remarked quietly. Wladek felt sick. “But I shall not give you away. I have a young cousin in one of those terrible camps and all of us who know about them fear that one day we might end up there. What do you have on under your coat?”
Wladek weighed the relative merits of dashing out of the carriage and of unfastening his coat. If he dashed out, there was no place on the train where he could hide. He unfastened his coat.
“Not as bad as I had feared,” she said. “What did you do with your prison uniform?”
“Threw it out of the window.”
“Let’s hope they don’t find it before you reach Moscow.”
Wladek said nothing.
“Do you have anywhere to stay in Moscow?”
He thought again of the doctor’s advice to trust nobody, but he had to trust her.
“I have nowhere to go.”
“Then you can stay with me until you find somewhere to live. My husband is the stationmaster in Moscow, and this carriage is for government officials only,” she explained. “If you ever make that mistake again, you will be taking the train back to Irkutsk.”
Wladek swallowed. “Should I leave now?”
“No, not now that the ticket collector has seen you. You will be safe with me for the time being. Do you have any identity papers?”
“No. What are they?”
“Since the Revolution every Russian citizen must have identity papers to show who he is, where he lives and where he works; otherwise he ends up in jail until he can produce them. And as he can never produce them once in jail, he stays there forever,” she added matter-of-factly. “You will have to stay close to me once we reach Moscow, and be sure you don’t open your mouth.”
“You are being very kind to me,” Wladek said suspiciously.
“Now the Tsar is dead, none of us is safe. I was lucky to be married to the right man,” she added, “but there is not a citizen in Russia, including government officials, who does not live in constant fear of arrest and the camps. What is your name?”
“Wladek.”
“Good. Now you sleep, Wladek, because you look exhausted and the journey is long and you are not safe yet.”
Wladek slept.
When he awoke, several hours had passed and it was already dark outside. He stared at his protectress and she smiled. Wladek returned her smile, praying that she could be trusted not to tell the officials who he was—or had she already done so? She produced some food from one of her bundles and Wladek ate the offering silently. When they reached the next station, nearly all the passengers got out, some of them permanently and some to stretch stiff limbs, but most to seek what little refreshment was available.
The middle-aged woman rose and looked at Wladek. “Follow me,” she said.
He stood up and followed her onto the platform. Was he about to be turned in? She put out her hand and he took it as any thirteen-year-old child accompanying his mother would do. She walked toward a lavatory marked for women. Wladek hesitated. She insisted and once inside she told Wladek to take off his clothes. He obeyed her unquestioningly, as he hadn’t anyone since the death of the Baron. While he undressed she turned on the solitary tap, which with reluctance yielded a trickle of cold brownish water. She was disgusted. But to Wladek it was a vast improvement on the camp water. The woman started to bathe his wounds with a wet rag and attempted hopelessly to wash him. She winced when she saw the vicious wound on his leg. Wladek didn’t murmur from the pain that came with each touch, gentle as she tried to be.
“When we get you home, I’ll make a better job of those wounds,” she said, “but this will have to do for now.”
Then she saw the silver band, studied the inscription and looked carefully at Wladek. “Is that yours?” she asked. “Who did you steal it from?”
Wladek looked offended. “I didn’t steal it. My father gave it to me before he died.”
She stared at him again and a different look came into her eyes. Was it fear or respect? She bowed her head. “Be careful, Wladek. Men would kill for such a valuable prize.”
He nodded his agreement and started to dress quickly. They returned to their carriage. A delay of an hour at a station was not unusual and when the train started lurching forward, Wladek was glad to feel the wheels clattering underneath him once again. The train took twelve and a half days to reach Moscow. Whenever a new ticket collector appeared, Wladek and the woman went through the same routine, he unconvincingly trying for the first time in his life to look innocent and young; she a convincing mother. The ticket collectors always bowed respectfully to the middle-aged lady and Wladek began to think that stationmasters must be very important in Russia.
By the time they had completed the one-thousand-mile journey to Moscow, Wladek had put his trust completely in the woman and was looking forward to seeing her house. It was early afternoon when the train came to its final halt, and despite everything Wladek had been through, he was terrified, once again tasting the fear of the unknown. He had never visited a big city, let alone the capital of all the Russias; he had never seen so many people, all of them rushing around. The woman sensed his apprehension.
“Follow me, do not speak and don’t take your cap off.”
Wladek took her bags down from the rack, pulled his cap over his head—now covered in a black stubble—and down to his ears and followed her out onto the platform. A throng of people at the barrier were waiting to go through a tiny exit, the holdup created because everyone had to show identification papers to the guard. As he and the lady approached the barrier, Wladek could hear his heart beating like a soldier’s drum, but when their turn came the fear was over in a moment. The guard only glanced at the woman’s documents.
“Comrade,” he said, and saluted. He looked at Wladek.
“My son,” she explained.
“Of course, comrade.” He saluted again.
Wladek was in Moscow.
Despite the trust he had placed in his newfound companion, Wladek’s first instinct was to run, but because 150 rubles were hardly enough to live on, he decided to bide his time—he could always run at some later opportunity. A horse and cart were waiting for them at the station and took the woman and her new son home. The stationmaster was not there when they arrived, so the woman immediately set about making up the spare bed for Wladek. Then she poured water, heated on a stove, into a large tin tub and told him to get in. It was the first bath he had had in more than four years, unless he counted the dip in the stream. She heated some more water and reintroduced him to soap, scrubbing his back. The water began to change color and after twenty minutes it was black. Once Wladek was dry, the woman put some ointment on his arms and legs and bandaged the parts of his body that looked particularly fierce. She stared at his one nipple. He dressed quickly and then joined her in the kitchen. She had already prepared a bowl of hot
soup and some beans. Wladek ate the veritable feast hungrily. Neither of them spoke. When he had finished the meal, she suggested that it might be wise for him to go to bed and rest.
“I do not want my husband to see you before I have told him why you are here,” she explained. “Would you like to stay with us, Wladek, if my husband agrees?”
Wladek nodded thankfully.
“Then off you go to bed,” she said.
Wladek obeyed and prayed that the lady’s husband would allow him to live with them. He undressed slowly and climbed onto the bed. He was too clean, the sheets were too clean, the mattress was too soft and he threw the pillow onto the floor, but he was so tired that he slept despite the comfort of the bed. He was awakened from a deep sleep some hours later by the sound of raised voices coming from the kitchen. He could not tell how long he had slept. It was already dark outside as he crept off the bed, walked to the door, eased it open and listened to the conversation taking place in the kitchen below.
“You stupid woman,” Wladek heard a piping voice. “Do you not understand what would have happened if you had been caught? It would have been you who would have been sent to the camps.”
“But if you had seen him, Piotr, like a hunted animal.”
“So you decided to turn us into hunted animals,” said the male voice. “Has anyone else seen him?”
“No,” said the woman, “I don’t think so.”
“Thank God for that. He must go immediately before anyone knows he’s here—it’s our only hope.”
“But go where, Piotr? He is lost and has no one,” Wladek’s protectress pleaded. “And I have always wanted a son.”
“I do not care what you want or where he goes, he is not our responsibility and we must be quickly rid of him.”
“But Piotr, I think he is royal; I think his father was a baron. He wears a silver band around his wrist and inscribed on it are the words—”
“That only makes it worse. You know what our new leaders have decreed. No tsars, no royalty, no privileges. We would not even have to bother to go to the camp—the authorities would just shoot us.”
“We have always wanted a son, Piotr. Can we not take this one risk in our lives?”
“In your life, perhaps, but not in mine. I say he must go and go now.”
Wladek did not need to listen to any more of their conversation. Deciding that the only way he could help his benefactress would be to disappear without trace into the night, he dressed quickly and stared at the slept-in bed, hoping it would not be four more years before he saw another one. He was unlatching the window when the door was flung open and into the room came the stationmaster, a tiny man, no taller than Wladek, with a large stomach and a bald head except for a few gray strands vainly combed but leaving the impression of a wig. He wore rimless spectacles, which had produced little red semicircles under each eye. The man carried a paraffin lamp. He stood staring at Wladek. Wladek stared defiantly back.
“Come downstairs,” the man commanded.
Wladek followed him reluctantly to the kitchen. The woman was sitting at the table crying.
“Now listen, boy,” the man said.
“His name is Wladek,” the woman interjected.
“Now listen, boy,” the man repeated. “You are trouble and I want you out of here and as far away as possible. I’ll tell you what I am going to do to help you.”
Help? Wladek gazed at him stonily.
“I am going to give you a train ticket. Where do you want to go?”
“Odessa,” said Wladek, ignorant of where it was or how much it would cost, knowing only that it was the next city on the doctor’s map to freedom.
“Odessa, the mother of crime—an appropriate destination,” sneered the stationmaster. “You can only be among your own kind and come to harm there.”
“Then let him stay with us, Piotr. I will take care of him, I will——”
“No, never. I would rather pay the bastard.”
“But how can he hope to get past the authorities?” the woman pleaded.
“I will have to issue him with a ticket and a working pass for Odessa.” He turned his head toward Wladek. “Once you are on that train, boy, if I see or hear of you again in Moscow, I will have you arrested on sight and thrown into the nearest jail. You will then be back in that prison camp as fast as the train can get you there—if they don’t shoot you first.”
He stared at the clock on the kitchen mantelpiece: five after eleven. He turned to his wife. “There is a train that leaves for Odessa at midnight. I will take him to the station myself. I want to be sure he leaves Moscow. Have you any baggage, boy?”
Wladek was about to say no, when the woman said, “Yes, I will go and fetch it.”
Wladek and the stationmaster stared at each other with mutual contempt. The woman was gone for a long time. The grandfather clock struck once in her absence. Still neither spoke and the stationmaster’s eyes never left Wladek. When his wife returned, she was carrying a large brown paper parcel tied with string. Wladek stared at it and began to protest, but as their eyes met, he saw such fear in hers that he only just got out the words “Thank you.”
“Eat this,” she said, thrusting her bowl of cold soup toward him.
He obeyed, although his shrunken stomach was now overfull, gulping down the soup as quickly as possible, not wanting her to be in any more trouble.
“Animal,” the man said.
Wladek looked at him, hatred in his eyes. He felt pity for the woman, bound to such a man for life.
“Come, boy, it’s time to leave,” the stationmaster said. “We don’t want you to miss your train, do we?”
Wladek followed the man out of the kitchen, hesitating as he passed the woman. He touched her hand, feeling the response. Nothing was said; words would have been inadequate. The stationmaster and the refugee crept through the streets of Moscow, hiding in the shadows, until they reached the station. The stationmaster obtained a one-way ticket to Odessa and gave the little red slip of paper to Wladek.
“My pass?” Wladek said defiantly.
From his inside pocket the man drew out an official-looking form, signed it hurriedly and furtively handed it over to Wladek. The stationmaster’s eyes kept looking all around him for any possible danger. Wladek had seen those eyes so many times during the past four years: the eyes of a coward.
“Never let me see or hear of you again,” the stationmaster said: the voice of a bully. Wladek had heard that voice many times in the last four years.
He looked up, wanting to say something, but the stationmaster had already retreated into the shadows of the night, where he belonged. Wladek looked at the eyes of the people who hurried past him. The same eyes, the same fear; was anyone in the world free? Wladek gathered the brown paper parcel under his arm, adjusted his hat and walked toward the barrier. This time he felt more confident. He showed his pass to the guard and was ushered through without comment. He climbed on board the train. It had been a short visit to Moscow and he would never see the city again in his life, though he would always remember the kindness of the woman, the stationmaster’s wife, comrade … . He didn’t even know her name.
Wladek stayed in the general-class car for his journey. Odessa was much less distant from Moscow than Irkutsk, about a thumb’s length on the doctor’s sketch, 800 miles in reality. While Wladek was studying his rudimentary map, he became distracted by another game of pitch-and-toss which was taking place in the car. He folded the parchment, replaced it safely in the lining of his suit and began taking a closer interest in the game. He noticed that one of the gamblers was winning consistently, even when the odds were stacked against him. Wladek watched the man more carefully and soon realized that he was cheating.
He moved to the other side of the car to make sure he could still see the man cheating when facing him, but he couldn’t. He edged forward and made a place for himself in the circle of gamblers. Every time the cheat had lost twice in a row, Wladek backed him with one ruble, doublin
g his stake until he won. The cheat was either flattered or aware he would be wise to remain silent about Wladek’s luck, because he never once even glanced in his direction. By the time they reached the next station, Wladek had won fourteen rubles, two of which he used to buy himself an apple and a cup of hot soup. He had won enough to last the entire journey to Odessa, and pleased with the thought that he could win even more rubles with his new safe system, he silently thanked the unknown gambler and climbed back into the train, ready to pursue this strategy. As his foot touched the top step, he was knocked flying into a corner. His arm was jerked painfully behind his back, and his face was pushed hard against the car wall. His nose began to bleed and he could feel the point of a knife touching the lobe of his ear.
“Do you hear me, boy?”
“Yes,” said Wladek, petrified.
“If you go back to my car again, I take this ear right off. Then you won’t be able to hear me, will you?”
“No, sir,” said Wladek.
Wladek felt the point of the knife breaking the surface of the skin behind his ear and blood began trickling down his neck.
“Let that be a warning to you, boy.”
A knee suddenly came up into his kidneys with as much force as the gambler could muster. Wladek collapsed to the floor. A hand rummaged into his coat pockets and the recently acquired rubles were removed.
“Mine, I think,” the voice said.
Blood was still coming out of Wladek’s nose and from behind his ear. When he summoned the courage to look up, he was alone; there was no sign of the gambler. He tried to get to his feet, but his body refused to obey the order from his brain, so he remained slumped in the corner for several minutes. Eventually, when he was able to rise, he walked slowly to the other end of the train, as far away from the gambler’s car as possible, his limp grotesquely exaggerated. He hid in a car occupied mostly by women and children and fell into a deep sleep.
At the next stop, Wladek didn’t leave the train. He undid his little parcel and started to investigate. Apples, bread, nuts, a shirt, a pair of trousers and even shoes were contained in that brown-papered treasure trove. He changed into his new clothes. What a woman, what a husband.
Kane and Abel/Sons of Fortune Page 10