Berezovo

by A J Allen

  Once through the window, he drew the overcoat after him. A pocket caught on a nail and he heard the cloth tear. Clad only in his boots and prison uniform, the cold was already entering his bones, but he forced himself to slow down. With trembling fingers he freed the coat and put it on. Pulling the window to, he fumbled in his pocket for the sharp knife, intending to slide its blade between the window and its frame, lift its catch and close it behind him. But as his fingers closed around the knife he heard something that sent him scurrying into the shadows beyond the lamplight. It was the unmistakeable sound of jingling harness and soft hoofbeats on snow. A moment later, six horsemen formed up in two columns rode around the opposite corner of the hospital and proceeded towards the distant intersection with Alexander III Street. It was the night guard.

  From the safety of the shadows, Trotsky watched the six riders disappear into the darkness, as he had watched them for the past three nights from the window of his room. The peasant Goat’s Foot had told him that they took the same route every night: leaving the barracks at eleven o’ clock, riding through the Jewish Quarter to the Fire Tower, where one of the men would be detailed off to relieve the sentry who had kept the evening watch. Then they would ride past the hospital, down Hospital Street, across Alexei Street to the intersection with Ostermann Street. From there they would turn left, following Ostermann Street until they reached the Bank, where another left turn would take them back across Alexei Street again and into Well Lane. Down Well Lane, across Market Square and then back into the barracks. There would not be another patrol until eight o’clock the following morning. Fastening his coat and pulling up his collar, Trotsky fought the excitement that was beginning to rise up within him. The appearance of the night patrol had reassured him that it was not too late after all.

  There’s still a long way to go, he told himself, but things are definitely going well.

  It took him another twelve minutes to reach the gate of the graveyard; twelve minutes of hurried stumbling across frozen streets and feeling his way along backyard alleys. The darkness which had protected him also served to deceive. Twice he took a wrong turning, misjudging distances; at night a pace, dictated by caution, was much shorter than a pace taken in the light of day. The intense cold had also impaired his judgement, draining the excitement that he felt, and leaving only the desire to pull on the gussi and the malitsa that the peasant had promised would be waiting for him.

  The heavy iron gate to the churchyard groaned as it swung on its hinges. Hatless and shivering from the cold, he pushed it shut too quickly, for it clanged loudly as it closed. Turning, Trotsky ran towards the shelter of the Church of the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary, glad at last to be able to move swiftly and, by so doing, to restore some of his lost body heat. He followed the wooden walls of the church until he was invisible from the Highway, hidden by the bulk of the building. High above him, the bell in the church tower began to toll midnight.

  There was no sign of Goat’s Foot. Slapping his arms around himself to create what body warmth he could, Trotsky settled down to wait.

  Chapter Twenty One

  Sunday 18th February 1907

  Berezovo, Northern Siberia

  Nina Roshkovskaya had long ago dispensed with the religious beliefs with which she had been brought up as a child. She had not, in Madame Wrenskaya’s phrase, “lost sight of God” but had chosen to look the other way; more willing to contemplate the fathomless nothingness of the abyss than to seek consolation from a God that, if Father Arkady spoke the truth, had destroyed her as part of His plan. This morning, however, she had returned to Him and prayed, beseeching His protection, not for herself but for her husband.

  There had been a time, early in her illness, when Nina had not been able bear Andrey’s touch; when she had resented and distrusted his healthiness. In her heart she had not believed that the wedding vows her husband had taken before God and her family would be strong enough to overcome the deeper animal instinct to abandon the weak and infirm. But Andrey had not left her or set her aside. He had stayed and nursed her and, contrary to her fears, they had become closer as their physical love had lessened; pain proving the effective antidote to passion. What she had only now realised was that her greatest fear was not that he would be taken from her by an unknown woman, or even by the taiga, but suddenly one morning, answering a knock at the door.

  Her prayers completed, she reached out for her husband. Helping his wife to her feet, Andrey supported her as she took several faltering steps back to her usual niche in the side wall of the crowded church. Noting her pallor as he lowered her into the alcove, he whispered to her.

  “Dearest, do you feel sick? Do you wish to leave?”

  In the gloom of the church, her pale face looked up into his.

  “No, no Andrey. We should stay until the end of the service.”

  Uncertain, he looked quickly at the rest of the congregation who stood before the priest chanting its responses.

  “Come on,” he said gently. “Let’s go home. Father Arkady will understand.”

  “No, please. Andrey, you should stay,” she said faintly.

  But he insisted and reluctantly she allowed him to raise her once more and guide her towards the door. After they had taken a few steps together, Dr. Tortsov appeared at her side.

  “Are you feeling unwell, Nina Vassilyevna?”

  She smiled and nodded her head weakly.

  “She’s feeling a little faint, Doctor,” said Roshkovsky. “If you could just support her other arm…”

  Together the two men bore her towards the door, the crowd making way for them as the chanting rose and fell.

  When they reached the door, Dr. Tortsov said:

  “Take my sleigh. Tell the driver to take you home and then return here. I shall call in this afternoon and prescribe her a tonic.”

  “No, no,” Nina murmured. “Please don’t go to any bother. It’s just the air and the smoke. It was very close. I shall be all right once I am home.”

  “I should still like to see you,” insisted the Doctor.

  “The Doctor is right, Nina,” agreed Roshkovsky.

  His wife sighed and then shook her head again.

  “Very well. But tomorrow. Yes, tomorrow. You look weary yourself, Doctor. You should take a rest too, you know.”

  Dr. Tortsov bowed and held the door open for them as they passed into the daylight.

  Leaving the church, the Roshkovskys stood for a moment on the steps: he trying to pick out the Doctor’s sleigh from the half dozen that were drawn up outside the church, she drawing the fur collar of her coat up around her elegant throat to protect herself from the freezing cold.

  “He’s beginning to look old, Andrey,” she said, half to herself.

  “There it is!” Roshkovsky said, beckoning to one of the sleighs. “Come on, we’ll soon… Oh!”

  Glancing up quickly, Nina Roshkovskaya caught the look of surprise in her husband’s face. Following his gaze, she saw a dark figure walking slowly and deliberately towards them down the middle of Alexei Street. The man’s features were indistinct, and even when he had come nearer, she did not recognise him as anyone she knew, but she could deduce from her husband’s stricken expression the identity of the approaching stranger.

  “No, Andrey,” she cried, gripping his arm desperately. “Come home, I beg you.”

  Her husband was not listening. He stood as if mesmerised, his eyes widening with disbelief as the figure approached them. The street was deserted; apart from the occasional muffled cough from one of the drivers and the singing from the church, the world seemed to have grown silent as if magnetised by the aura of menace emanating from the ragged figure in the roadway. When the man was no more than a dozen paces from the bottom step to the church, it halted. Beside her husband, Madame Roshkovskaya stifled the urge to cry out as, raising an arm, the stranger crooked a finger at Roshkovsky and, beckoned him to follow.

  “I must go,” said Roshkovsky weakly.

 
“No Andrey!” she begged him again. “Leave it to Colonel Izorov.”

  Seemingly deaf to her pleas, he propelled her down the step and hurried her towards the Doctor’s sleigh. All the time the man stood watching him, and remained silent. When at last his wife was safely seated in the sleigh and the driver had whipped up his team, Roshkovsky stepped back and, drawing back his shoulders, raised his eyes to meet Trotsky’s accusing stare.

  Turning, Trotsky set off down in the direction of the Town Hall, with Roshkovsky following him a few yards behind. The two men walked at an even pace, the distance between them neither lengthening, or shortening. When he came to the entrance to Well Lane, Trotsky changed direction and began heading diagonally across the breadth of Alexei Street. The snow that had fallen the night before crunched beneath their boots. When he had reached the Hotel New Century Trotsky pushed open the glass doors and entered without looking back. After a cautious glance towards the closed doors of the uchastok opposite, Roshkovsky followed suit. The exile’s stained coat, with its ripped pocket, hung from the coat stand outside the public dining room. Inside, Trotsky was sitting hunched at a table near the door. He did not look up when Roshkovsky sat down opposite him.

  “Well?”

  “I d… don’t understand,” stammered Roshkovsky. “You shouldn’t be here.”

  Slowly Trotsky raised his eyes and the land surveyor saw that they were ringed with black and that the pupils shone with an unhealthy, feverish light.

  “What happened, Roshkovsky?”

  Roshkovsky shrugged and watched helplessly as the man opposite him reached inside the frayed sleeve of his prison uniform tunic and with infinite slowness drew out a knife.

  “Start talking,” demanded Trotsky.

  “I tell you, I don’t know,” said Roshkovsky unhappily. “Goat’s Foot told me everything was arranged. You should be a hundred versts away by now.”

  “If you’ve double crossed me, Roshkovsky,” said Trotsky quietly. “You know I’ll have you killed, don’t you?”

  “Yes, yes, I know!” replied Roshkovsky, his voice rising in desperation. “But I haven’t! I swear to God I haven’t. Look,” he urged him, “let me go and see Goat’s Foot. I’ll find out what happened, I promise you. There’s obviously been some mistake.”

  “That’s an understatement.”

  “Perhaps he was being watched,” Roshkovsky suggested. “He’s always in trouble with the police. If he thought they were waiting for him, the last thing he would do would be to lead them to you.”

  “Go and see him then,” ordered Trotsky, “and tell him this. He’s got seventy roubles of mine, so either he keeps his side of the bargain or else…”

  He looked meaningfully down at the knife and then slipped it back into his sleeve.

  “Or else what?” Roshkovsky asked faintly.

  Trotsky smiled and leant forward.

  “Remember Gapon, the priest who led the march on Bloody Sunday?”

  Roshkovsky nodded.

  “Didn’t you ever wonder what became of him? He was a police spy.”

  Roshkovsky’s jaw fell open in surprise.

  “Father Gapon? A police spy?”

  “Oh yes! Worse than that, he also stole money intended for the Revolution. That was a crime against the People and he paid for it. My Finnish comrades caught him and strung him up in a corner of his apartment. I hear that it was over a fortnight before anyone found him and cut him down.”

  Roshkovsky swallowed nervously but said nothing.

  “Tell your moujik friend,” continued Trotsky, “that it must be tonight, or my money back. And fix up somewhere else for us to meet. Last night I nearly froze to death in that graveyard. Come to me after you have seen him and tell me what he said.”

  “I dare not!”

  “Just do it.”

  “No, I can’t,” Roshkovsky insisted. “If Colonel Izorov hears that I have visited you, he’ll know something is up.”

  Trotsky shrugged dismissively.

  “Look,” went on Roshkovsky quickly, “are you going to the play tonight at the barracks? Many of the exiles will be there, so it won’t look suspicious. I’m on the committee, so I have to go. I’ll meet you in the interval and tell you what Goat’s Foot said.”

  “What time does it begin?”

  “The music starts at eight o’clock, the curtain rises at eight thirty. Come in a few minutes after, when it’s dark and no one will notice you. They’ll all be watching the stage. I’ll look out for you.”

  Trotsky thought it over, weighing the matter in his mind. Every hour’s delay put a strain on his already taut nerves, but the evening meeting would give him the chance to sleep through the afternoon and get back some of the strength he had lost during his ordeal the night before.

  “All right. Tonight it is,” he told Roshkovsky. “One more thing. You’ll have to do something about that damned tower.”

  “What, the Fire Tower?”

  “Yes. You can see the countryside for ten versts around.”

  “But what are you suggesting?”

  “Create a diversion. Set fire to your house if you have to. I don’t care. Just take care of it.”

  He stood up and, clapping a hand on Roshkovsky’s shoulder with a force that made him flinch, said:

  “Until tonight, then.”

  Chapter Twenty Two

  Sunday 18th February 1907

  Berezovo, Northern Siberia

  Sitting at the lunch table, Dr. Tortsov was roaring with laughter as Chevanin concluded his imitation of the luckless Hospital Administrator’s dress rehearsal the previous day.

  “And,” continued his assistant, “when Maslov pressed the birdcage on him and he dropped it, I thought I would die. It was the funniest thing in the world.”

  “Vasili, is it true,” Yeliena asked, “that when you went onstage afterwards, you found a soldier’s boot?”

  “It’s true as God is my witness,” confirmed the Doctor, “and it was a good sized boot too. One of the men must have thrown it. Obviously a lover of the theatre. Fortunately for us, it missed.”

  “Why do you say fortunately?” asked Chevanin.

  “If we had lost our leading man in the second play, who would take the part tonight?”

  “Just think,” mused Yeliena, “after tonight, it will all be over.”

  Chevanin’s brow creased with anguish as if her words stabbed him to the heart.

  “Well, there is no reason why it should be,” he said. “We could always produce another play during the summer. What do you say, Vasili Semionovich?”

  The Doctor slowly shook his head.

  “Another play? People are usually too busy in the summer to bother with such things. And I for one have had enough of dramatic productions to last me a lifetime. Not that it hasn’t been fun.”

  “You have genuinely enjoyed yourself?” asked Yeliena solicitously.

  “Oh yes, I suppose so. Being a doctor is more than mending broken arms and delivering babies, as Anton Ivanovich will soon learn if he hasn’t already. You stand in danger of becoming immune to suffering. You see pain every day until it becomes such an old acquaintance – I almost said an old friend – that you can find yourself nodding to in the street and think nothing more of it. Just for once, to bring joy and laughter, even unintentionally, instead of anxiety, to people’s lives… that is worth something.”

  He sighed, and looked at both of them.

  “I used to think it was more important than that, but it isn’t.”

  Yeliena clasped her husband’s right hand.

  “It’s only an illusion, isn’t it?” she said, looking meaningfully at Chevanin. “Real life goes on. The play ends and the stage is dismantled and the actors go back to living their ordinary lives.”

  “But we are real, aren’t we?” asked Chevanin plaintively. “I mean, the three of us. When the curtain goes down and the audience goes home, they will carry with them the memory of what we have done. That, at least, will last, i
f nothing else does.”

  Stretching out his left hand, the Doctor laid it gently on Chevanin’s arm.

  “That perhaps is the greatest of God’s blessings,” he said kindly. “We forget the suffering and remember only the good times, however silly or foolish they might be. Without that, life would be unbearable, wouldn’t it, Lenochka?”

  Yeliena did not answer.

  * * *

  Later that afternoon Colonel Izorov lay in bed beside his wife, one arm tucked behind his head, the other cuddling her warm body. An enigmatic smile played on his lips. His wife watched his face, her eyes half closed. Drawing an arm out from beneath the blankets she affectionately traced his smile with her fingers, withdrawing it quickly when he nipped playfully at her fingers. She stroked the bristles on his cheek and chin softly.

  “What are you thinking about?” she asked softly.

  “Nothing important. I was thinking about the play tonight.”

  His wife stroked his chin again and sighed.

  “Don’t mention it! I have no idea what I can wear,” she said.

  Turning his head, he kissed her hand absentmindedly and said nothing.

  “It will be freezing in the barracks hall. Matriona Pobednyeva is sure to wear her new outfit again. Everything I have is either old or worn out.”

  “I’m sure you will find something to wear.”