Amerika

by Brauna E. Pouns

  After coffee and brandy had been served, Samanov rose to his feet. “In Russia, where as most of you know I come from, we have a saying. Actually we have a great many sayings, most of them untranslatable. But the one I have in mind is something like this. Make your adversary a friend and together you will plant a field. Make him a slave and you cannot bury him enough times.”

  His guests smiled politely, not quite sure what the point was.

  “Unfortunately, we do not always follow our old sayings,” Petya quipped, and everyone laughed.

  Everyone, that is, but Peter Bradford. He did not understand how a trip to Chicago that morning had somehow led to this lavish dinner in a mansion outside Washington.

  “As you all know,” Petya continued, “it is our wish to hasten the day when we return to our own homeland and leave the rebuilding of America to our American friends. Tonight we have an honored guest who will help us reach that goal more quickly. Kindly join me in a toast to the first governor-general—the Governor-General of the Central Administrative Area, or Heartland, Mr. Peter Bradford!”

  Samanov lifted his glass. Everyone at the table stood and did the same. Peter, unsure what he should do, got to his feet. He saw Andrei and Marion smiling at him. Andrei seemed genuinely pleased; Marion’s smile was more calculating. All around him the most important men and women in America were studying him, toasting him, repeating his name. It might have been a politician’s dream come true.

  But that was not how Peter felt.

  He felt trapped.

  Halfway across America, Devin was having a very different kind of dinner at a tiny table in a small, cramped kitchen. At this dinner, powdered milk was drunk rather than champagne and hearth-baked yams had to stand in for prime ribs. But the company was good, a jovial young man named Clayton Kullen and a black minister, Reverend James Blackstone and his wife, Melanie.

  “So there are five of us, hiding in a cave,” Clayton was saying. “And we hear shooting, I peek out and see this fellow here, running like crazy, and the railroad police are after him, guns blazing, and pretty soon I see that he’s headed straight for us, bringing the police with him. So I yell, ‘Hey you, go find your own cave!’ ”

  Everyone laughed. “That’s not quite true,” Devin said quietly. “He hid me in his cave. Or else I’d probably be dead.”

  “I don’t know,” Clayton said. “You looked like a pretty fast runner.”

  Reverend Blackstone had been studying Devin carefully as Devin busied himself with a yam, very much aware of the scrutiny. “You say you’re headed for Chicago?” he asked.

  Devin nodded.

  “Chicago’s the wrong way,” the minister said. “Most folks through here are headed the other way.”

  “What’s your identification number?” Clayton asked abruptly.

  Devin froze; the activity at the table stopped. Clayton smiled gently.

  “How long?” he asked.

  “Not long,” Devin admitted.

  “Family in Chicago?”

  Devin kept eating. Finally he said, “My children. I’m going to . . .”

  He didn’t finish the sentence. He didn’t know how to.

  “To what?” Clayton pressed. “To see them? Join them? Kidnap them?”

  “Clay, leave the man alone,” Melanie said.

  “It matters what kind of help he needs. What he wants to do.”

  “I’ll start with seeing them,” Devin said. “Look, I’d appreciate your help. Maybe if you can just point me in the right direction.” He stood up, anxious to keep moving, uncomfortable with their curiosity.

  “Sit down,” the minister said. “Finish your dinner. Some of us get real put off when people don’t finish their dinner.”

  Melanie Blackstone smiled and touched Devin’s arm. He sat back down.

  “You’ve climbed aboard the oldest railroad in America, mister,” the minister said. “The underground railroad. Used to help slaves, a hundred-odd years ago. Runs in all directions. All hours. More reliable than Amtrak. God works in mysterious ways.”

  Devin stared at the man uncertainly.

  “What he’s saying,” Clayton added, “is that we can get you to Chicago a lot faster and safer than you could on your own—if you got there at all.”

  “I appreciate it,” Devin said.

  “Devin Milford,” Melanie said. “It took awhile to make the connection. You’re thinner, and you didn’t used to have the beard.”

  Devin shook his head guardedly. “I’m sorry. It’s a mistake some people make.”

  “That’s too bad,” Reverend Blackstone said. “Because I’d sure like to shake that man’s hand someday.” Clayton smiled. “Okay, let me put it this way. I have friends in Chicago who can find out where Devin Milford’s children are. Now does that interest you?”

  Devin started to smile. They all began to laugh.

  * * *

  Not long after Petya Samanov’s toast to Peter, the guests began to say good night.

  Peter and Andrei were Samanov’s houseguests, there in the mansion, and they settled before the fire in the downstairs study with a bottle of brandy between them. Peter had taken a sip or two; Andrei was drinking heartily.

  “Do you realize this brandy was put down just as Hitler was rising to power in Germany?” he said.

  “If it’s older than I am, I kind of lose interest,” Peter said. He didn’t want to talk about brandy; he wanted to talk about his role, this crazy new position he had been thrust into, but Andrei wouldn’t give him the chance.

  “You’re not intrigued by history—the twists and gyrations.” Andrei smiled. “A communist and a capitalist drinking spirits from the time of fascism’s greatest power. At that very time Stalin, that great fascist, was, under the guise of socialism, murdering millions and imprisoning millions more. I’m partial to this year. It was also the year my grandfather died in the Gulag.” He took a quiet sip of brandy, as if drinking a silent toast.

  Peter watched, suddenly feeling sympathy for this man. “I’m sorry, I don’t know what to say,” he said quietly.

  Andrei shrugged. “My grandfather is now a hero of the Soviet Union, an honor posthumously bestowed. Stalin is dead and discredited. My grandfather is dead and recredited. And his grandson is one of the few responsible for elevating Mother Russia at last—to its position as the only true power in the world.”

  He raised his glass and drank. Peter did not.

  Andrei smiled at him. “I wouldn’t drink to that either, if I were you.”

  Andrei sighed and poured himself another glass of brandy. He offered one to Peter, who shook his head. “Never trust a man who won’t get drunk with you,” Andrei muttered, staring at Peter. “We learn how to survive, even become the power we hated. You will too. We both have our share of problems. Ours is that seventy-five years of communism have produced a people who wish to be led. A people who know in their bones that to make decisions is to court disaster. We control the world and we don’t have any competent people to run it.”

  He stood up and warmed himself before the fire. After a moment he raised his glass again. “To my honored grandfather,” he said. “Posthumously rewarded—died—suffering—disgraced—filled with hate and hopelessness—in great pain—alone—just he and the hard frozen ground of Lyubyanka.”

  Andrei lifted his glass. After a moment, Peter stood and lifted his as well. They drained the glasses, then stood in silence for a while. Peter heard a peal of laughter from upstairs. Marion ought to be laughing, he thought; she’s wearing the czarina’s emeralds.

  “Andrei, I’d like to talk about politics. About me. About this new job. I feel like I’m a pawn on somebody else’s chessboard.”

  Andrei grinned. “Yes, we must talk. You have the job, now what does it mean? First of all, there is one bit of news that must be broken to you.”

  Peter braced himself for the worst—and got it. “Marion Andrews is to be your deputy, and intimate adviser on political matters.”

  �
�That’s a hell of a thing to throw at me. What if I don’t want the job on those terms?”

  “Don’t overreact. She’s smart. Obviously she’s well connected. Use her.”

  “Use her? She’s got her own agenda, her own ambitions. I don’t trust her.”

  Andrei looked Peter full in the face. “And we don’t trust you,” he said. “To be precise, senior officials in the foreign ministry in Moscow do not trust you. You are not a party man. Thus you are uncontrollable, untrustworthy. Marion, on the other hand, is committed to ideology and to her own hunger for power. Those are qualities they understand in the Kremlin. They see you as not having enough at stake.”

  “I have my country at stake,” Peter said stiffly. Andrei shrugged. “I have persuaded General Samanov, and he, somewhat against his better judgment, has persuaded the Kremlin that you are the right man. But he needs a guarantee, security.”

  “What if I won’t do it?”

  “Someone else will. Someone less capable. Less humane.”

  “It would set your timetable back.”

  “True. And that could be dangerous for your hope for America, as well as mine.”

  Peter, still angry, still embittered by the games the Russians were playing, asked, “And what is your hope for America?”

  Andrei’s reply was entirely sincere. “To salvage as much as possible,” he said.

  Word of the SSU maneuvers had spread fast through the county. At dawn the courthouse square was deserted. Even Herb ’n Betty’s Cafe was closed, for the first time in memory.

  At precisely 7:00 a.m., the main gate of the SSU barracks swung open and locked in place. Inside the compound, four black attack helicopters rose into the

  air, then hovered above the road. Then, with a low rumble, the entire battalion came racing out toward the gates—attack vehicles, light tanks, snowmobiles, armored personnel carriers, all directed by Helmut Gurtman in his command vehicle. Just after clearing the gate the column split, the snowmobiles and all-terrain attack vehicles speeding across the fields, heading directly toward the town of Milford.

  They raced through the courthouse square at forty miles an hour. Ward Milford, watching from the sheriffs office, felt himself tremble—their speed and sound were menacing, even to him.

  The convoy roared past the Bradford house on the edge of town. Scott watched openmouthed. Amanda and Jackie stood in the doorway close together, their faces fearful

  Moments later the speeding vehicles passed the Milford farm. Will ran out into the yard. “Sons of bitches,” he yelled, shaking his fist. Alethea, watching from an upstairs window, began to sob.

  It was a gray, cloudy morning. The day’s first stirrings had begun at the exile camp: two men started the outdoor cook fires; a child entered one of the outdoor privies; & woman hung wash on a line. Suddenly the roar filled the camp. People emerged from their tents and shacks to search the sky. With the stoicism of those who have been through catastrophes before, they reacted not with panic but only with quiet resignation.

  Helmut took his place at the crest of the hill, east of the camp. He studied the scene with a kind of pleasure, a smile playing across his gaunt face. He held out his hand and a sergeant gave him a flare. He sent the flare soaring above the exile camp; it cast an eerie red glow, as in medieval paintings of hell.

  Responding to the flare, a long fine of attack vehicles, each filled with armed troops, shot down the hill from the east and formed a phalanx facing the camp. The troops raced across the creek to the camp, weapons at the ready, awaiting their orders. The people began to back away from them, just as Helmut sent up a second Hare.

  The flare still hung in the dark sky when the four helicopters came swooping in low from the west. They hovered over the camp, banked, and returned to circle, dip, and perform intricate maneuvers above the terrified Exiles. They dropped ever lower, until people Hopped on their bellies for safety. The raging wind from their blades had blown down many of the tents, and wet snow swirled crazily on the agitated ground. Children screamed but their cries could not be heard above the roar of the engines; their openmouthed faces were mute masks of terror.

  Finally the helicopters took up positions at the four comers of the camp, hovering there like sentries. There was a moment’s respite. Mothers clutched their children as men searched for weapons and routes of escape.

  Dieter Heinlander stood outside his trailer with his wife, gazing across the creek at the row of troops. “What are they going to do?” Gerta asked.

  “Perhaps that is all,” Dieter said. “An exhibition, to scare us, to show their strength.”

  Gerta asked in despair, “Have we not suffered enough?”

  It is the nature of the beast, Dieter thought, and held her closer.

  Then Helmut shot off the third flare and a wave of tanks roared over the hill from the west: a dozen great black monsters in a perfectly straight line, picking up speed as they moved down the slope toward camp.

  The Exiles began to scream, running everywhere, but there was no escape. The tanks to the west, the line of armed men to the east, the hovering helicopters standing guard—all were ready to crush anyone who fled the camp.

  A tank reached a tent high on the hill and demolished it with ease.

  A young man ran from one tank into the path of another and was crushed.

  A woman, running with a baby in her arms, tripped and fell. A tank ran over her leg and her child was thrown screaming to the ground.

  Trailers were tumbled over and shacks crushed. An old man tried to beat on the side of a tank with a hammer and was thrown senseless to the ground. The troops across the creek began to fire into the air. One of the demolished shanties was ablaze and smoke filled the air. The noise was deafening: the wheeling and smashing. But another sound, more fearsome, resounded: the mounting cries of the Exiles.

  When the tanks had completed their sweep, a moment’s peace settled over the devastated camp. Families found one another, and comfort was given to the wounded. Then the tanks wheeled about and made a second rim through the camp. This time some of the Exiles just sank to the ground and did not resist.

  To Helmut, watching from the hillside, the attack had a marvelous symmetry. The Exiles saw chaos, but from his vantage point he saw only perfection: two clean, regimented lines that did not waver or break. His forces had not gone there to kill, only to execute this elegant maneuver, and if people died, it was because they had panicked or resisted.

  He fired yet another flare, and within minutes his force had withdrawn, as abruptly as it came, leaving behind the dead and dying of the broken camp. Helmut climbed into his vehicle and, without a glance at the devastation below, drove away across the fields toward the barracks.

  Peter was having breakfast on a bright, glassed-in porch that overlooked the rolling hills of northern Virginia. Three horses gracefully grazed in the distance on the emerald carpet of green. As he finished his coffee, an attractive woman in a Soviet army uniform, a member of General Samanov’s staff, entered and smiled at him.

  “On your call to Milford, sir. There seems to be a problem. We cannot get through.”

  “What’s the matter?”

  She shrugged. She spoke with a fight accent and was a bit plump but very pretty. “Lines down?” she asked. “It is common.”

  Peter poured more coffee. He decided he’d try to reach home later. It couldn’t be that hard.

  As the convoy roared back to the barracks, past the Milford and Bradford homes, through the deserted courthouse square, hundreds of townspeople wondered what it had left in its wake.

  Alethea was in her kitchen piling together all the clean sheets she could find; she had heard the cries from over the hill, the gunshots, the raging helicopters, and she had no illusions about the fate of the exile camp.

  Will Milford appeared in the doorway. He had his parka on. “I’m going out,” he said. “Nobody locks me in my own house all day.”

  Alethea crossed the room, still clutching the pile of sheet
s, and kissed him, “They’re squatters, Dad,” she said.

  He scowled at her. “Just ’cause I don’t want ’em on my land don’t mean I’d let ’em die like dogs. Let’s go!”

  He grabbed the first-aid box from the table and marched out the door.

  Tears welled in Alethea’s eyes. She quickly followed.

  “The red phone was busy and the other one was just dead,” Amanda said.

  “Didn’t he say he’d call?” Jackie asked.

  Amanda went to the kitchen window and looked over the fields in the direction of the exile camp. “He said he’d call when he got the chance.”

  Scott asked, “What do you think they did?”

  “God, I don’t know,” Amanda cried. “I wish your father was home.”

  Suddenly she knew she must do something. She walked to the closet and grabbed her parka and boots.

  “Mom!” Jackie cried.

  Amanda sat down and started tugging at one of the boots. “You two stay here. I’ll be back as soon as I can.”

  “Mom, you can’t go out there,” Jackie said. “Scott?”

  “Come on, Mom. They’ll be checking the roads.”

  “At least wait till you talk to Dad,” Jackie urged.

  Amanda stood up, zipping her parka. “I trust you to stay here until I get home,” she said. “Don’t worry about me.”

  She kissed Jackie and turned to kiss Scott. “I hate to ask a sixteen-year-old kid to kiss his mother ...”

  He walked over to her and gave her a quick kiss.

  Then she hurried out the door, before she changed her

  mind.

  At the exile camp, Alan Drummond had set up a field hospital in what remained of the bam that had been used as a community center. Its floor was littered with the dead and dying, and outside the carnage seemed to extend forever.

  Several fires still smoldered, sending ghostly wisps of smoke across the ruined landscape. Bodies lay unmoved. Mothers searched the debris for their children as children cried helplessly for lost parents. One man, Ms head bloody, crawled slowly in an ever-widening circle. An unofficial system of triage had emerged, as the dying were left to die and those with a chance of life were canied to Alan Drummond’s hopelessly overworked medical center.