by Child 44
The nail was completely exposed. Holding the tooth in the palm of his hand, in case further excavation was necessary, Leo gripped the head of the nail but his fingertips were raw and he was unable to get a fix on it. He pulled his arm out, wiping the sweat and blood off his fingers, wrapping them in a shredded strip of shirt before trying again. Struggling to remain patient, he tugged at the nail, incrementally pulling it free from the plank. That was it: it was done. The third nail had been removed. He checked the wood, feeling for other nails, but there were no more, at least that he could find. He sat up, pulling his arm out of the hole.
Raisa sank both her hands through the hole, gripping the plank. Leo added his hands. This was the test. They both pulled. The top side of the plank lifted up while the bottom remained secured. Leo moved over, grabbing the end and lifting it as high as he could. Looking down, he could see the train tracks below the carriage. The plan had worked. Where the plank had lain there was now a gap of about thirty centimeters in width and over a meter in length, barely enough for a person to squeeze through, but enough all the same.
It would’ve been possible with the help of the other prisoners to snap the plank. But, worried that the sound would alert the guards, they decided against this. Leo turned to his audience:
—I need people to hold this plank up while we drop through the gap, down onto the tracks.
Several volunteers stood up immediately, coming forward and taking hold of the plank. Leo assessed the space. After they’d squeezed through, they’d fall straight down, directly underneath the train. The distance from the underside of the carriage down to the tracks was perhaps a little over a meter, maybe a meter and a half. The train was traveling slowly but still fast enough for the fall to be dangerous. However, they couldn’t wait. They had to go now, while the train was moving, during the night. When the train stopped at daybreak, they’d be seen by the guards.
Raisa took hold of Leo’s hands:
—I’ll go first.
Leo shook his head. He’d seen the blueprints of these prisoner transports. They faced one more obstacle: a final trap for prisoners about to attempt exactly this kind of escape.
—On the underneath of this train, at the very end, the last carriage, there are a series of hooks which hang down. If we fell onto the tracks right now and waited, as the last carriage passed overhead the hooks would snag us, dragging us with the train.
—Can’t we avoid them? Roll out of the way?
—There are hundreds of them, all of them hanging on wires. There’s no way we’d slip through. We’d get tangled up in them.
—What are we supposed to do? We can’t wait till the train stops.
Leo examined the two dead bodies. Raisa stood beside him, evidently unsure of his intentions. He explained:
—When you drop down to the tracks, I’ll throw one of these bodies after you. Hopefully it will land somewhere near you. Wherever it lands you’ll have to crawl to it. Then, once you reach it, lie under it. Position it exactly on top of you. As the last carriage passes overhead the body will get hooked and snagged. But you’ll be free.
He dragged the bodies close to the loose plank, adding:
—Do you want me to go first? If it doesn’t work then you should stay here. Any other death would be better than being dragged along by this train.
Raisa shook her head:
—It’s a good plan. It will work. I’ll go first.
As she was ready to climb down, Leo reiterated his instructions:
—The train isn’t moving fast. The fall will be painful but not too dangerous. Make sure you roll with the impact. I’ll throw down one of the bodies. You won’t have much time—
—I understand.
—You must collect the body. When you get it, put yourself underneath it. Make sure no part of you is exposed. If even one hook gets into you, you could be dragged along.
—Leo, I understand.
Raisa kissed him. She was shaking.
She squeezed through the gap between the planks. Her feet were dangling above the tracks. She let go of the plank and fell, disappearing from view. Leo grabbed the first body and lowered it through the gap, squeezing it through. The body dropped onto the tracks, out of sight.
RAISA HAD LANDED AWKWARDLY, bruising her side and tumbling. Disoriented, dazed, she lay still for a moment. Too long, she was wasting time. Leo’s carriage was already far away. She could see the body that he had thrown down and began to crawl toward it, moving in the same direction as the train. She glanced behind her. There were only three carriages until the end of the train. But she couldn’t see any hooks. Perhaps Leo had been wrong. There were now only two carriages left. Raisa still hadn’t reached the body. She stumbled. There was now only one carriage separating her from the end of the train. With only meters before the final carriage passed over her, she saw the hooks—hundreds of them, all attached to fine wires, at different heights. They covered the entire width of the carriage, impossible to avoid.
She got up, crawling again, as fast as she could, reaching the body. It was lying facedown, head nearest her. She didn’t have time to turn it around so she turned herself, lifting up the body and crawling under this man, positioning her head under his. Face-to-face with her attacker, staring into his dead eyes, she made herself as small as possible.
Suddenly the dead body was wrenched off her. She saw wires all around her, like fishing lines, each barbed with many jagged hooks. The body lifted up, as though alive, a puppet, tangled up, no longer even touching the tracks. Raisa remained lying flat on the tracks, perfectly still. She could see the stars above her. Slowly she stood up. No hook had caught her. She watched the train move away. She’d done it. But there was no sign of Leo.
AS HE WAS LARGER THAN RAISA, Leo had figured that he needed the bigger of the two dead men, he’d need more body mass to protect him from the hooks. However, this dead man was so large he didn’t fit through the gap in the planks. They’d stripped him in an effort to reduce his width, but he was too broad. There was no way to get him through the hole. By this point Raisa had been on the tracks for several minutes.
Desperate, Leo lowered his head though the gap. He could see a body caught at the end of the train. Was it Raisa or the dead man? It was impossible to tell from this distance. He had to hope it was the dead man. Adjusting his plan, he supposed that if he positioned himself correctly he could escape underneath this tangled body. It would have caught all the hooks in that section. He’d be free to pass underneath it. He said good-bye to the other prisoners, thanked them, and dropped onto the tracks.
Rolling close to the enormous steel wheels, he pulled himself away, facing the end of the train. The body in the wire was rapidly approaching, tangled up on the left-hand side. He positioned himself accordingly. He could do nothing but wait, making himself as small and as flat as possible. The end of the train was nearly over him. He lifted his head up off the ground just long enough to see that it wasn’t Raisa. She’d survived. He had to do the same. He lay down flat and closed his eyes.
The dead body brushed over him.
Then, a pain—a single stray hook caught his left arm. He opened his eyes. The hook had cut through his shirt, into his flesh. With only a fraction of a second before the wire went taut, pulling him along, he grabbed hold of the hook and tugged it out, taking a clump of skin and flesh with it. He clutched his arm, feeling dizzy as blood seeped from the wound. Staggering up, he saw Raisa hurrying toward him. Ignoring the pain, he put his arms around her.
They were free.
MOSCOW
SAME DAY
VASILI WASN’T WELL. He’d done something he’d never done before—he’d taken time off work. Not only was such behavior potentially dangerous, it was out of character. He’d rather be ill at work than ill at home. He’d managed to rig his accommodation arrangements so that he was, for the most part, able to live alone. He was married, of course; it was unthinkable that a man could remain single. It was his social duty to have chil
dren. And he’d followed the rules accordingly, marrying a woman with no opinions, or at least none that she expressed, a woman who’d dutifully given birth to two children—the minimum acceptable if no questions were to be asked. She and the children lived in a family apartment on the outskirts of the city while he occupied an inner-city work address. He’d arranged this ostensibly so that he might have his pick of mistresses. In fact, he partook in extramarital affairs only very occasionally.
After Leo’s exile to the Urals, Vasili had petitioned to move into Leo and Raisa’s apartment, apartment 124. He’d gotten his wish. The first few days had been enjoyable. He’d ordered his wife to the spetztorgi, the restricted shops, to buy fine food and drink. He’d held a work party in his new apartment, no wives allowed, where his new deputies drank and ate and congratulated him on his success. Some of the men who’d served under Leo now reported to him. Yet despite all these ironies and the delicious reversal of fortune he hadn’t enjoyed the party. He felt empty. He no longer had anyone to hate. He no longer had anyone to scheme against. He was no longer irritated by Leo’s promotion or efficiency or popularity. There were other men that he competed with, but the feeling wasn’t the same.
Vasili got out of bed and decided he’d drink himself better. He poured a large measure of vodka and stared at the glass, swishing the liquid from side to side, unable to raise it to his lips. The smell made him feel sick. He put the glass down. Leo was dead. Soon he would receive official notification that the two prisoners had not arrived at the destination. They’d died en route as so many did, after getting into a fight over shoes or clothes or food or whatever. It was the final defeat of a man who’d humiliated him. Leo’s very existence had been a kind of perpetual punishment for Vasili. So, then, why did he miss him?
There was a knock. He’d expected the MGB to send men to authenticate his illness. He walked to the door, opening it, seeing two young officers standing before him.
—Sir, two prisoners have escaped.
He could feel the dull ache inside him vanishing as he said the name:
—Leo?
The officers nodded. Vasili was feeling better already.
TWO HUNDRED KILOMETERS EAST-SOUTHEAST OF MOSCOW
SAME DAY
THEY WERE HALF-RUNNING, half-walking, constantly looking behind them—their speed depended on whether fear or exhaustion had the upper hand. The weather was in their favor: weak sunshine and thin clouds, not too hot, at least compared to the inside of that carriage. Leo and Raisa knew from the position of the sun that it was late afternoon but had no way of knowing the exact time. Leo couldn’t remember where or how his watch had been lost or if it had been taken. He estimated they had at the most a four-hour head start on their guards. A rough calculation put their speed at eight kilometers an hour while the train had been moving not much more than an average of ten, putting a distance of some eighty kilometers or so between them. That was a best-case scenario. It was possible the guards might have been alerted to the escape much sooner.
They broke out of woodland into open countryside. Without the cover of trees they were visible for kilometers. They had no choice but to continue, exposed as they were. Seeing a small river at the bottom of an incline, they adjusted direction, picking up speed. It was the first water they’d come across. Reaching it, they dropped to their knees, drinking greedily, cupping their hands, scooping it into their mouths. When this wasn’t enough, they submerged their faces. Leo joked:
—At least we’ll die clean.
The joke had been misjudged. It wasn’t enough that they do their best to stop this man. No one would appreciate their attempt. They had to succeed.
Raisa focused on Leo’s injury. The gash wasn’t closing; it wouldn’t stop bleeding, too much of the skin and flesh had been ripped. The strip of shirt they’d tied around it was now soaked with blood. Leo unpeeled the shirt:
—I can put up with it.
—It’s leaving a powerful scent for the dogs.
Raisa stepped out of the river, approaching the nearest tree. A spider web had been spun between two branches. Very carefully she broke the web with her fingers, transferring it whole and laying it across the ripped flesh of Leo’s upper arm. Immediately the blood seemed to solidify upon touching the thin silver lines. She worked for several minutes, searching for more webs, finding them, collecting them, and layering them, until the injury was crisscrossed with silky threads. By the time she’d finished the bleeding had stopped.
Leo watched her tend to his injury:
—We should follow this river for as long as possible. The trees are the only cover and the water will hide our smell.
The water was shallow, knee deep at the deepest point. Not fast enough or powerful enough so that they could float and drift with the current. Instead they had to walk. Hungry, exhausted, Leo knew there was only so long they could keep this up.
While guards were indifferent to whether prisoners lived or died, escape was unpardonable. It made a mockery not only of the guards but of the entire system. No matter who the prisoners were, no matter how unimportant, their escape made them important. The fact that Leo and Raisa were already classified as high-profile counterrevolutionaries would make their escape a matter of countrywide significance. Once the train had come to a stop and the guards had noticed the dead body caught up in the wire, a count would be done of all the prisoners. The escapees’ carriage would be identified; questions would be asked. If answers weren’t given prisoners might be shot. Leo hoped that someone would be sensible enough to tell the truth immediately. Those men and women had already done more than their share to help them. Even if they confessed there was no guarantee that the guards wouldn’t make an example out of the entire carriage.
The hunt would begin along the tracks. They’d use dogs. A pack of trained dogs traveled with every train, kept in far better conditions than the human cargo. If a sufficient distance had been established between their point of escape and the point at which the search began, then the beginning of the scent trail would be difficult to find. Considering that they’d been on the run for maybe three-quarters of a day without sight of their pursuers, Leo could only presume this was the case. It meant Moscow would have been notified. The search would be broadened. Trucks and cars would be mobilized, the possible escape area divided up into grids. Planes would scour the countryside. Local military and security organizations would be informed, their efforts coordinated with national organizations. They would be hunted with a zeal that went far beyond professional duty. Rewards and bonuses would be offered. There was no limit to the manpower and machinery thrown after them. He should know. He’d been involved in these hunts himself. And that was their only advantage. Leo knew how their hunts were organized. He’d been trained by the NKVD to operate unseen behind enemy lines, and now the enemy lines were his own borders, borders he’d fought to protect. The size of these searches made them heavy-handed, difficult to manage. They’d be centralized, vast in sweep but inefficient. Most importantly, he hoped they’d target the wrong area. Logically Leo and Raisa should be heading to the nearest border, toward Finland, the Baltic coast. A boat was their best chance of getting out of the country. But they were heading south—through the very heart of Russia, toward the city of Rostov. In this direction there was almost no chance of freedom, no promise of safety at the end.
Walking through the water, moving at a much slower pace, they frequently stumbled and fell. Each time it was harder to get up. Not even the adrenaline from being hunted could sustain them. Leo was careful not to let the web wash off his arm, keeping it raised. So far neither of them had spoken about their predicament, as though their existence was on too short a leash even to make plans. Leo guessed that they were about two hundred kilometers east-southeast of Moscow. They’d been on the train for almost forty-eight hours. Speculatively, this put them somewhere near the town of Vladimir. If he was right then they were now traveling in the direction of Ryazan. Ordinarily from this point, traveling by tr
ain or car, Rostov was at least a twenty-four-hour journey south. However, they had no money, no food; they were injured, dressed in filthy clothes. They were wanted by every national and local State Security apparatus.
They came to a stop. The river flowed in between two halves of a small village, a collective farm. They stepped out of the water, some five hundred paces upstream from the huddle of houses. It was late, light was fading. Leo said:
—Some of the villagers will still be working; they’ll be on their land. We can sneak in, unnoticed, see if we can find some food.
—You want to steal?
—We can’t buy anything. If they see us, they’ll hand us in. There’s always a reward for escaped prisoners, far more than these people make in a year.
—Leo, you’ve worked in the Lubyanka for too long. These people have no love of the State.
—They need money like everyone else. They’re trying to survive like everyone else.
—We have hundreds of kilometers to cross. We can’t do it alone. We just can’t. You must realize that. We have no friends, no money, nothing. We have to convince strangers to help us—we’ll have to sell them our cause. That’s the only way. That’s our only chance.
—We’re outcasts, harboring us will get them shot, not just for the individual who helps us but the entire village. State officials wouldn’t think twice about sentencing all of them to twenty-five years, deporting the whole population, children included, to a northern encampment.
—And that’s exactly why they’ll help us. You’ve lost faith in the people of this country because you’ve been surrounded by the people in power. The State doesn’t represent these villages, it doesn’t understand them, and it doesn’t have any interest in them.