“It’s the NKVD!” she screamed. Scared out of her wits, she ran headlong into the school. “Director! Director! They’re coming! They’re coming! Lord have mercy on us!”
Kulik, jumping up from behind his desk, hurried to the window. Peering outside, he whispered in a voice that was not his own, “It’s the Black Crow.”
“Oh, my God! Oh, my God!” Paraska clutched her chest. “Just when I thought things couldn’t get any worse! My Philip’s slipping in and out of consciousness. He’s at death’s door. My life’s a living hell and there’s no end in sight. What misfortune! What misfortune! And now of all things, the Black Crow!”
With each passing second the rumbling grew louder. At last the car swerved to the right and came to a screeching halt by the schoolyard fence. The front and back doors flew open and out came six NKVD men, all in long gray army coats with rifles strapped over their shoulders. One of them Kulik recognized immediately: Simon Stepanovich Sobakin. As he watched the men, he was convinced they had come for him. Why else would they have stopped at the school?
The NKVD men grouped together a moment, then hurriedly broke up into two groups: the first, under the command of a sergeant-major, started for the village, while the other, led by Sobakin, did not turn into the school as Kulik had expected, but made for Paraska’s house. When she saw that, Paraska’s face filled with dread and she shook like a leaf. A fearfully unnatural cry ripped from her throat, and half-hysterical, she threw herself outside, crying out the names of her children: “Lida! Maria! … God, no! Don’t harm my children!” Lifting her overcoat up to her knees, running through the deep snow, somehow she managed to catch up to the men just as they were about to open the door of her house. Weeping violently, she tried to push her way in front of them. “What do you want from us? We’re law-abiding citizens. We’ve done nothing wrong. My children! Please don’t harm my children!”
“Out of our way!” A heavy hand landed on her shoulder and pushed her aside. The alarm on her face intensified when she recognized the man standing over her. It was Sobakin.
“Why do you look so shaken up, my dear?” He gave her a mocking grin. “No need to be scared. Nothing is going to happen to you. Now come on, grab hold of yourself. Besides, we’re forever grateful to you. Remember on our last visit when you gave us that fine feast? That was most kind and generous of you.”
Clearing his throat, he spat between his feet, and motioned to his men to follow him inside.
Paraska’s children, seeing the strangers enter the house, were frightened and tried to hide. Three-year-old Danilo crawled under the table and screamed for his mother.
Sobakin walked across the room without saying a word. Slipping his hand into his leather shoulder bag, he brought out a piece of paper and read harshly, “Philip Semionovich Braskov! Does he live here?”
At the sound of her husband’s name, Paraska’s agony was indescribable. Looking frantically from one NKVD man to another, she said, “Philip, that’s my husband. He’s over there on the sofa. As you can see he’s very sick. I don’t expect him to make it to the morning.” Then with tears gushing from her eyes, her voice breaking, “Please, don’t harm him, I beg you. He didn’t do anything wrong.”
Sobakin stepped up to the dying man and poked him in the ribs with the butt end of his rifle. He said roughly, “Come on, get up, Philip Semionovich. Why haven’t you been reporting to work at the Bugsy-Dnieprovsky Canal? Our records show you’re deliberately trying to thwart its construction.”
“Lieutenant Sobakin,” pleaded Paraska, “he’s not conscious anymore. He doesn’t know what’s going on around him.”
A sneering voice shot out from across the room, “Not to worry, Paraska. Your Philip will be fine. We’ve prescribed the perfect remedy for him and you should be grateful to us. We’re sending him off to a health resort. I hear there are several really good ones in Siberia. Hah! Hah! Hah!”
With a wave of his arm, Sobakin ordered the two officers to remove Philip from the sofa. One grabbed hold of his legs, while the other slipped his hands under his shoulders. The dying man stirred slightly and let out a low moan. The movement was too much for him. Blood oozed from the corners of his mouth and his eyes rolled from side to side. Six-year-old Svetlana, who had been crouching behind a chest of drawers jumped out, and with a look of terror on her face, clutched at her father’s arm. “Papa! Papa! Wake up!”
Paraska rushed to her daughter’s side, and scooping her up in her arms, kissed her face repeatedly. She cried, “He’s dead! Dear God, your father’s dead!”
Sobakin came forward, and touched his heels. He said matter-of-factly, “He’s cold, stone cold.”
The officers dragged the dead man across the floor, and threw him outside into the snow. Sobakin called after him, laughing, “Well, Philip Semionovich, you’ve gone and outsmarted us. You son-of-a bitch.”
Finished with Paraska’s house, the NKVD men, accompanied this time by Iofe Nicel Leyzarov, jumped into their black car and headed for the other side of the village, to the home of Hrisko Suchok. As they entered the gates of his yard, Hrisko, who had been splitting wood by the side of his shed, dropped his axe, and took several steps back. His heart beat wildly; he knew that something dreadful was about to happen to him. His only choice was to try to run. He turned and headed to the threshing barn. He frantically jumped over a low wattle fence, and rushed toward a grove of alders, hoping to lose himself in the thicket. The men ran after him, and, before he knew it, Suchok was surrounded. A single bullet ripped through the air and struck him in the nape of the neck. He fell to the ground dead. A red stain seeped into the snow. Sobakin stepped up to the corpse and kicking it onto its back, shouted to his comrades, “We just got ourselves another son-of-a-bitch!”
In the meantime Iofe and one of the officers stormed into Hrisko’s house, where they found his wife hiding behind the stove. She was frozen with fright, scarcely able to stand, looking like a cow about to be taken to slaughter. The officer pulled her out by the hair, and dragged her, screaming, into the Black Crow. Over and over she cried out the name of her son.
Inside the Black Crow it was dark. Sobbing and praying, it was not long before she realized she was not alone. Someone else was there, mumbling and whimpering. It was a woman in great distress, and she sounded very much like Marsessa Kunsia, who, disoriented as she was, had grasped the horror of her situation. Seeking the warmth of each other’s bodies, the women huddled together and wept.
A shroud of doom had fallen over Hlaby. The village was silent, but tense and restless. Paraska, pale and emaciated, moved like a zombie, and was no longer of any use to herself or to anyone around her.
For the next several days the villagers busied themselves washing the bodies of the dead, preparing them for eternity. Two pine boxes were quickly constructed and the dead men were laid inside. Twelve stocky young peasants with round pink faces, lifted them up on their shoulders, and slowly walked to the cemetery. The villagers trailed behind, chanting softly and weeping. Some carried long sticks with icons framed in colorfully embroidered cloths, while others clutched at crosses hidden inside their coat pockets. Once in the cemetery, standing over the freshly dug graves, one elderly villager took it upon himself to speak. He began in a low, doleful voice:
“Such is the funeral of Hrisko Suchok and Philip Braskov, the first in our village to be buried without a priest. May God bless them…. Our Father, who art …”
As the coffins were lowered into the ground, the sun appeared from behind a mass of clouds. It shone brilliantly and joyfully, and there was an unexpected warmth in its glow. A gentle breeze swept across the faces of the mourners. The hard winter was finally retreating. Spring was in the air.
CHAPTER 22
The great heaps of snow piled up on either side of the roads and on the walkways began to recede, and water dripped from the rooftops to gather in large pools. Trees and bushes had been freed of their winter covering; the ice on the Stryy River was melting along the shorel
ine. The village was slowly and surely showing signs of life.
With the promise of warmer weather came spring fever, and Kulik was feeling every bit of it. The long winter months had made him weary and crestfallen; he longed to get away, if only for a day. Although the horrific scenes from just a few days ago had severely dampened his spirit, something new seemed to be taking place within his young heart. Change was in the air and he was ready to embrace it with full force.
Pinsk! How long was it since he had been to Pinsk? The unknown awaited him there: all he could expect was the unexpected, since he was sure that the city had changed so radically in the past several months that it would seem like another place entirely. The puzzling and short-tempered Yeliseyenko of the People’s Commissariat of Education, was there, the enigmatic, attractive Zena, the repulsive Sobakin and, of course, the beautiful green-eyed Marusia. At the thought of Marusia his heart dropped. Had she really given herself to Sobakin, as Dounia Avdeevna had so relentlessly maintained, or did he still stand a chance with her? Perhaps love was still in the air. The prospect of seeing her again filled him with inexpressible joy, but it soon faded. No one, including Marusia, could be trusted.
Putting these negative thoughts aside, Kulik placed Ivashkevich in charge of the school, and hitching a wagon ride with a local peasant, made for Pinsk. There were several school matters for him to settle there; for example, more pencils were needed, the calligraphy workbooks had been used up, there was no more ink, and several slates needed to be replaced. He also intended to ask Yeliseyenko why a new teacher had not yet been assigned to replace Haya Fifkina.
In Pinsk, the wagon lumbered slowly through a winding residential street, then looped round a corner and entered Market Square. On the east side of the square stood the Roman Catholic Church, and on the north side was a wall of small dim shops with signs over the doors, but with their windows boarded up, barred, or covered with faded newspapers and various proclamations. There were no bakeries, the fabric shops had disappeared, the fish stores, the fruit markets … The soul of the town was gone, it was hardly a place to visit, let alone to live. Even the passersby seemed drab and dull. Although Kulik was grateful to be out of the village if only for a day, he yearned to be some place else entirely, another city, another part of the world.
Kulik thanked the driver for the lift and slipped him a few rubles. A handful of peasant carts had already collected, not in the middle of the square as they had used to do every Tuesday and Friday, but along the sides, against the church wall. He was disheartened to see how dead the place was, especially on a Friday morning. It used to be so vibrant, so full of life! The fruit and vegetable stalls, the sound of cattle, the endless barrels of pickles and salt herring—all gone, along with the troops of little children laughing and chasing each other through the square, and the townspeople haggling with peasants over prices.
As Kulik was crossing the square, a broad-shouldered peasant with a face shaped like a potato, hurried toward him, and flashed open his oversized coat to expose huge pockets sewn into the lining from scraps of fabric. Each pocket held various items: in one there were perhaps six eggs, in another a slab of salt pork, and in still another a chunk of stale black bread.
“How about some eggs today?” the man asked eagerly. “I’ll give you a good price, they’re fresh this morning.”
Kulik politely declined and continued on his way. After a while another man came up behind him, rolling a small makeshift handcart on wheels.
“Good morning to you, sir,” he called out, tipping his cap. “May I interest you in some finery today?” Turning his cart to face Kulik, he showed remnants of coarse fabric and various nondescript odds and ends, including some cheap jewelry. “Maybe you’d like to trade your watch for some fine linen?” The peddler pulled out several pieces of cloth and held them up. “A little something for the wife, perhaps?”
Kulik walked on. The morning was bright and cheerful and the air sweet with the fragrance of spring. As he was about to turn down one of the side lanes, he heard a man and a woman arguing loudly about something.
“I’ll give you five rubles,” the man shouted.
“Five rubles! Hah!” the woman shot back. “That’s not nearly enough.”
“Well, then here’s six!”
“Six? Not on your life! You can keep your six, I want ten!”
Kulik stopped. It was Valentyn, shaking his head and gesticulating at a middle-aged peasant woman.
“Ten rubles!” he yelled at her. “For what? A handful of half-rotten garlic?”
“Citizen Bohdanovich!” Kulik hastened toward the old man. “How goes it?”
Valentyn’s eyes lit up. “Ivan! Ivan Kulik! Good to see you, young man! What brings you to our fair town?” Then, frowning, “I hope you’re not looking to buy some garlic. This woman here wants ten rubles for three heads. It’s nothing short of highway robbery!” He shrugged. “As you’ve probably noticed, there’s not much to buy in the market these days. Everything is empty and locked up. Such are the times we live in now.”
Delighted to find a familiar friendly face, Kulik invited the old man to have a drink with him. He knew a tavern nearby where they could have a comfortable chat. But. when they stopped before the shabby two-story building, Kulik’s smile faded. The place was padlocked. They looked at each other gloomily. Kulik was quick to make another suggestion. “There’s a rather pleasant spot just a few minutes from here. When I came to Pinsk for the teachers’ conference, I went there several times. I could use a bite to eat. What do you say?”
They walked to the stone building with its grimy façade. Kulik glanced through the paned windows and was relieved to see that the place was filled with people. They were huddled around long wooden tables covered with white tablecloths, talking, laughing, eating and drinking. The air was thick with tobacco smoke. The atmosphere seemed different from the way it had been when Kulik had visited it several weeks earlier. When they entered, a stocky woman in a uniform with epaulettes came up and blocked their way. She wanted to know whether they had trade union passes. Kulik was astonished by the request.
“Sorry.” She shook her head. “This tavern is for trade union workers only. You’ll have to take your business elsewhere.”
They walked through dirty puddles of melted snow, past several ramshackle hotels and a string of dusky shops, all boarded up. Before long they tried another tavern, but there too they were required to show passes to prove they were workers from the railroad or shipbuilding yards.
Kulik thought, “A new hierarchy has been established, and in the world’s first classless society!”
Old Valentyn, as if picking up on Kulik’s thoughts, grumbled under his breath, “Before the war all you needed to go to a tavern was money. Why, you could practically drink together with a general!”
At last they were able to enter a small building called People’s Tavern, where they ordered a bottle of wine and some black bread and sausages. The only other patrons were several men and a woman sitting in the far corner sharing a pot of beer, talking quietly. When the food and drinks arrived, Kulik asked, “Well, my good friend, tell me, how are things with Lonia? Has he come home yet?”
“Lonia, Lonia.” Valentyn’s face clouded and he sighed deeply. “It’s a complete mystery to us. He writes often enough, but he still hasn’t found his way home. My old lady is beside herself with worry. Even I’m starting to believe there’s something wrong. And to make matters worse, Marusia insists his letters are forgeries.”
Kulik was genuinely surprised by the news. “When I got your letter with my money, I assumed everything was going well and that Lonia was finally on his way home.”
Valentyn finished his glass of wine, and quickly started on another. He became bitterly sarcastic.
“My two women have involved themselves with a knight in shining armor. And some knight in shining armor he’s turned out to be! He’s like a hawk after a hen; the hen flaps her wings and tries to get away, and the hawk swoops dow
n and grabs her by the neck. One second and ‘snap!’ it’s all over.”
Kulik refilled the glasses. “Is it serious between Marusia and Sobakin? I understand they’re quite the pair. I thought there would be a wedding by now, that you’d have yourself a Russian son-in-law.”
“No, God forbid!” The old man’s eyes flashed. “Sobakin will never get his hands on my daughter, not if I have anything to do with it. Besides, there can never be a wedding.”
“How can you be so sure of that?”
“Because the son-of-a-bitch is married. He has a wife and children, two boys and a girl, in Moscow. Marusia found this out from a friend of hers.” He drained his glass. “Sobakin’s a swine. First he promised to bring Lonia home to us, but those were just empty words; he was trying to worm his way into Marusia’s heart. He gave her expensive gifts, God knows where he got them—a bottle of French perfume, a fur coat, a skirt, and then … time for Marusia to pay him back. Lucky thing she got away from him unharmed, if you know what I mean, but just by the skin of her teeth. From the very start Sobakin had something terrible in mind for her.” He shook his head. “My Marusia should have known better. How long it took her before she got wise to him, and what a price she had to pay!”
A long silence followed. Valentyn rested his elbows on the table, and stared at his drink. “We haven’t heard the last of Sobakin, not by a long shot. And on top of it, he rents rooms in the house next door to ours. Every night he returns from the Zovty Prison with blood on his hands. The tortures our people endure in there! Sobakin is the Devil personified.” Then looking at Kulik, with regret, “I told Marusia over and over, from the very start, that you would have made a better suitor. But unfortunately every time I mentioned your name, she just rolled her eyes and laughed. I don’t know what’s wrong with that girl. She never listens to a thing I say.”
Kulik winced. Trying to maintain his composure, he shrugged and said, “I’m really not interested in your daughter. She wanted a Muscovite and that’s what she got. I’m sorry things didn’t work out for her; though. Naturally, I wish her the best.”
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