On March 1st in the evening I was in Martin Ruhemann’s flat chatting with him and his wife. We talked about the opening of the station and the scientific work it would have to do. Martin complained that there were so few really talented youngsters at the Institute.
“For political reasons they won’t take any more foreigners and their own people aren’t good enough,” he said. “They can do routine work all right, but creative work will always be beyond them. And as for new discoveries...”
“Once the station is in operation, Martin, you’ll find it will attract the best from all over the country. Working and living conditions will be better here than anywhere else. And the work offers greater prospects to an ambitious youngster.”
“It will be a long time before we get that far,” he said pessimistically.
We discussed the world political situation, and in particular the civil war in Spain, but we deliberately avoided Russian affairs. Later in the evening Ruhemann turned to me suddenly:
“Supposing they do arrest you after all, Alex, what can I do for you? It’s just as well to be prepared for all eventualities.”
“They’re obviously not going to arrest him now,” put in Barbara. “I think you’re right, Barbara,” I said slowly. “I feel they would have acted before if they were going to.”
At that moment the telephone bell rang and Martin Ruhemann answered it.
“It’s for you, Alex,” he said.
“For me!” I exclaimed in surprise, and I took the receiver.
“We have called on you on a business matter,” said an unknown voice in Russian. “We are in your flat now. Come back at once.”
I put down the receiver and turned to the Ruhemanns.
“They’re arresting me after all,” I said. “That was the G.P.U. They’re waiting for me now. Goodby.”
Their flat was in the same block as mine, but it had a different entrance. When I went down to the street I thought of flight. I had only to turn to the left instead of to the right, go to the station and take the next train to Moscow. No, the G.P.U. would immediately set up a hue and cry if I failed to turn up within a very few minutes and their patrols at the station would be informed. But I could go to a station farther down the line and board the Moscow train there. Useless, I thought. Quite useless.
Marcel opened the door to my ring. His face was white, and he stammered out only: “G.P.U.” Behind him a man in uniform appeared in the entrance hall almost at once, and pushed him to one side.
“Are you Alexander Semyonovitch Weissberg?” he demanded.
“I am.”
“Born on October 8th, 1901?”
“Correct.”
“We have orders to search your flat.”
“May I see your warrant?”
“Certainly.”
He showed me the document and I read “Warrant for Search and...” He kept a large thumb firmly over the rest, and so I still didn’t know whether it was merely a search or a search and an arrest. A second G.P.U. officer came in from the other room.
“How many rooms do you occupy here?” he asked.
“This room is mine. That one is this comrade’s with his wife and child, and the third room is used by us jointly.”
He turned to Marcel.
“Will you serve as witness?”
Marcel agreed and they began a very thorough search of my room and our joint room. They examined all papers, numbered all letters and finally got me to sign them all. There were two hundred and fifty separate items.
“Why must I sign each one separately?” I asked.
“So that no one can say that anything had been added afterward.”
The search lasted over two hours. Lena came in and asked if I would like something to eat. The lieutenant in charge, Drescher I think his name was, invited me to sit down and take my meal in peace. My nerves were so taut that I could hardly swallow a mouthful. When they had finished searching the two rooms Lieutenant Drescher turned to Marcel and said politely:
“Would you allow us to search your room, Comrade? We haven’t any special authorization to do so, but as you live in such close touch with Citizen Weissberg we think it necessary.”
Marcel nodded agreement. All the time I was wondering whether they were going to arrest me. Somehow I found it difficult to believe. I was about to leave the room, but Lieutenant Drescher stopped me.
“I’m sorry, but you must stay here, Alexander Semyonovitch. I have no right to make a search except in the presence of a witness.”
“Citizen Lieutenant,” I said, “is the order you showed me signed by the Prosecutor?”
“Of course,” he replied. “We never do anything without previous sanction.”
And he showed me the warrant again, which was all I wanted. Unfortunately, he still kept his thumb over the part that interested me. It was, of course, signed by the Prosecutor.
By half-past one their search was finished. They packed up all the papers together with certain books, foreign newspapers and my passport, and then they got me to sign a long statement setting out the results of the search.
They also carefully examined all photographs and they took away one in which my wife appeared together with the Commissar for War, Voroshilov. She had organized a section of the Moscow Exhibition, and Voroshilov always was keen on having himself photographed with good-looking women.
Marcel had to countersign the statement as a witness. Then the lieutenant turned to me.
“Get your personal things together, Citizen.”
So there it was!
“Where are you going to take him to?” asked Lena almost aggressively.
“But, Lena,” I intervened, “you realize what’s happening.”
She put her arms round my neck and began to weep bitterly. I did my best to calm her and so did Marcel and the G.P.U. men.
“How long will you keep him?” she demanded through her tears.
“He might come back tomorrow, but on the other hand it might be a month or two. But don’t worry, he won’t be treated unjustly.”
In order to give her something to do I asked her to help me pack my things. I took as much underlinen as I could, warm socks and a pair of fur-lined boots which did up with zip fasteners. I had bought them at Bata’s during my last visit to Prague and they had created a minor sensation in the Soviet Union. In addition I took a bedcover lined with wadding, a plaid rug and a pillow.
“But, Citizen Weissberg, all this is quite unnecessary,” said the lieutenant. “You will be supplied with everything you need. And should there be anything further your friends can bring it to you.” “Can they take away anything which proves to be unnecessary?”
“Certainly.”
“In that case I prefer to take too much rather than too little.”
I don’t know what instinct of self-preservation made me so determined, but I hardly think I should have survived the three years I was to spend in prison without the warm things I took with me. Many prisoners perished because they happened to have been arrested in summer and had no warm clothing when the winter came. The few things they were actually given were totally inadequate.
“I shall be back soon,” I said in a confident tone when the time came to say good-by. “Innocent people don’t stay long in prison in the Soviet Union.”
That was for the benefit of the G.P.U. men. For myself I had no illusions.
Lena wanted me to say good-by to her little Alex. I was very fond of the child, who had been named after me, and I went to his cot. The G.P.U. men accompanied me tactfully. I looked down at the little fellow as he slept and I rather envied him.
When you grow up everything we’re now suffering will be all over, I thought. There’ll be no fighting, no suspicion and mistrust, no secret police and prisons.
I embraced Lena and shook Marcel warmly by the hand, and then we went off, one G.P.U. man in front leading the way and the other behind me bringing up the rear.
We went out into the sparkling night, and by cha
nce we met Latishev coming home from the Institute. He had apparently been working late. He stared at me and my two companions in horror but said nothing. So the Institute will know all about my arrest tomorrow, I thought. We walked through the park and took a tram. Apparently, I wasn’t important enough for a car.
This time I needed no propusk to get into the G.P.U. building. They took away my money, my fountain pen, my pocket knife, my watch, my suspenders and my shoelaces. How careful they are to preserve my life, I thought. I was given two receipts, one for the money and the other for my case, which was taken off to the storeroom. I wanted to take the bedcover and one or two other things with me, but the commandant refused.
“You can have everything you want later. It must all be examined first.”
A guard led me up two flights of stairs to the second floor, where a warder took charge of me. I was put in a cell and the door slammed behind me. I was a prisoner. It was a fair-sized cell with two windows, and it was very clean. The entire furniture consisted of a field bed and a small cupboard. There was no one else in the cell so I sat down on the edge of the bed and began to think things over. Gradually I grew calmer. At last I should be told the reason for my arrest and have a chance of destroying the web of lies and intrigues which had closed in around me, of dissipating all suspicion.
I had sat there for perhaps half an hour when the wicket opened in the ‘cell door and the warder’s head appeared. He beckoned me over.
“What is it?” I asked.
“Ssssh,” he hissed. “You must talk in undertones here. Lie down now. All prisoners must be in bed at nights. You’ll have to get up at six o’clock and it’s three o’clock now.”
Obediently I undressed and got into bed.
CHAPTER 3—The Inner Prison of the Kharkov G.P.U.
IT WAS STILL DARK WHEN I WAS WAKENED BY THE SOUND OF A BELL.
I had no idea what time it was and so I knocked on the cell door. The warder came but he refused to give me any information so I went back to bed again. Shortly afterward the wicket opened and I was told to get up. About half an hour after that it opened again and a hunk of bread was handed through. Later I learned that it was exactly five hundred grammes, or something over a pound. After that came a bowl of tea and a piece of sugar. I say tea, but in reality it was hot water slightly colored with some herb which was certainly not tea. A few minutes later the cell door was opened and the warder led me along a lengthy corridor with cell doors on either side, to the lavatory. Down below was the courtyard in which we exercised; above was the office department where prisoners were interrogated. The warder locked the door of the lavatory behind me and I had a few minutes in which to attend to my needs and to wash myself. Prisoners were taken out for this purpose mornings and evenings. For intermediate needs there was a bucket in the cell.
When I returned to my cell I had time to examine it more closely. Both windows were barred and faced north, as I was able to tell from the shadows. Below was a large courtyard bounded on either side by wings of the G.P.U. building. At the far end, about fifty yards away, was a concrete wall topped with barbed wire. Rather nearer was a sentry, who was relieved every two hours.
I sat down on the edge of the bed and waited to be called out for interrogation. My feelings were mixed but I was impatient for the interview. I wanted to know at last what they really suspected me of having done. On the other hand, I feared any decision. None of my friends and acquaintances who had been arrested had ever been released, though they were certainly every bit as innocent as I was. The thought did not inspire me with much confidence.
I waited in vain for hours. At midday the wicket opened again, but it was not to call me for interrogation. The warder handed through a metal dish and a spoon. A little later the food came. It consisted of a dish full of cabbage soup in which there was not the slightest trace of meat or fat. I ate it, though nervous excitement had robbed me of all appetite.
Afterward I sat on the edge of my bed and waited again. Gradually the loneliness closed in. Later on I was to experience situations which amounted almost to physical torture, but even that seemed preferable to absolute isolation.
The warders were forbidden to exchange an unnecessary word with their prisoners. We had neither books nor newspapers to occupy our minds. I had no pencil and no paper. Once a day a warder came to take me down to the yard for exercise, but although there wasn’t another soul in sight, he refused to say a word in answer to any of my questions. My first interrogation after my arrest took place a fortnight later. It seemed like an eternity.
The isolation system in a Russian prison aims at cutting off prisoners not only from the outside world but from each other, and it reaches a degree of efficiency which can hardly be imagined by anyone who has not experienced it. It was in charge of a special department that was constantly thinking out new measures to make it more effective. In all big towns there is an “inner prison” which is in the headquarters of the G.P.U. in the center of the town, and a much bigger prison, which is usually in the suburbs. Only a few hundred special prisoners are kept in the inner prison, men whom the G.P.U. wishes to hold in complete isolation. The regime in the bigger prisons is not so strict, and when the mass arrests began in the autumn of 1937 the isolation system was inevitably weakened. Prisons built for perhaps eight hundred now held as many as twelve thousand, and there was a constant coming and going. The average length of time a man spent in Kharkov prison was between three and four months. New prisoners meant news from outside: political news and personal news from friends and relatives. By 1939 the isolation regime had been re-established in these mass prisons. In the special inner prisons of the G.P.U. it was never at any time relaxed.
To give some idea on how effective this isolation was, I must anticipate a little. On the day war broke out I was in a cell of the inner prison in Kiev with six others. I learned about the outbreak of war only at the end of October, and by that time I was already in the Moscow Butyrka prison. The window of our cell was covered with a metal boxlike casing and daylight came through only at the top. The electric light burned in our cell day and night. However, they couldn’t keep out the noises, and in the first days of September, 1939, I became firmly convinced that something unusual was going on in the outside world.
“It’s war,” I said one day to my fellow prisoners. “I’m certain of it.”
They took no notice of what I said. The next day was lavochka day, the day on which prisoners, if they had any money to their credit in the prison account, could buy whatever the prison shop had to offer. This time there was neither sugar nor soap to be had.
“You mark my words,” I said obstinately. “It’s war.”
My insistence irritated the others. General Bogutzky, a one-armed hero of the civil war, dismissed the idea with scorn.
“What makes you think so, Alexander Semyonovitch?” he wanted to know. “We’ve just signed a pact with the Germans so how can there be war?”
A new prisoner had come in from Chernigov the week before and told us about the Russo-German Pact.
“I don’t know, Grigori Ivanovitch,” I replied, “but I’m certain there’s something very unusual going on outside. Haven’t you noticed that far more soldiers are marching through the streets and that far fewer return in the evening than go out in the morning?”
Every morning columns of soldiers passed the prison. From the sound of their marching and the volume of the singing we could tell more or less how many there were. They probably spent the day in field exercises and they returned to their barracks in the evening. I had never previously noticed any difference in their numbers mornings and evenings, but lately it had become very obvious. My companions began to pay attention to the sounds and they were soon compelled to admit that I was right. Perhaps many of the men were entraining for the front. In addition, many men passed in both directions during the day as well now.
“And then there’s the disappearance of soap and sugar,” I pointed out. “Kiev is a sugar center and
such a shortage is simply grotesque. Either people have started hoarding sugar because it keeps, or the Government has cut down supplies because it’s stock-piling for war.”
The others were impressed despite themselves, but there was no means of checking the accuracy of my theory. On September 1939, I was transferred to Moscow and kept in solitary confinement. Then a young secretary of one of the district committees was put in with me, but he knew nothing. A week after that came a big Mongolian with a stoop and restless eyes, who spoke very bad Russian. He said he was a Commissar of the Bashkir Workers’ and Peasants’ Inspection. He had been a herdsman and had joined the Party in 1917. He had been brought from Ufa to Moscow for examination, and on the way the prisoners in his batch had managed to get hold of a newspaper.
“War has broken out,” he told us. “We’ve carved up Poland with Germany. The Germans are at war with France and England.
We decided that his information was a scare and he was very insulted, but there were always many rumors current among prisoners and I had long ago decided to believe nothing unless it was confirmed independently.
A little while after that a new prisoner arrived. Owing to our long confinement our faces were grayish green in color, but this man was bronzed. He took one look at us, went over to a corner and sat down without saying a word. That sort of thing hadn’t happened in my experience since 1937. At first very few people had realized what was happening and so new prisoners would often refuse to have anything to do with their cellmates. They knew they were innocent and they supposed they had come there by mistake. The rest of us they took for counterrevolutionaries, spies, White Guardists, enemies of the people and what not. Since then news had leaked both in and out, and public opinion had come to realize that the arrested men really were innocent. However, this fellow still didn’t seem to know—and it was 1939.
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