One Night in Winter

by Simon Sebag Montefiore

  ‘What can I do for you?’ asked Satinov.

  ‘I’ll get straight to the point if I may,’ replied Senka. ‘My mother died two days ago.’

  The news punched Satinov in the solar plexus. ‘I’m so sorry.’

  ‘She died of cancer in Pyatogorsk, where my parents retired. She’d been ill for a while.’ Senka paused. ‘She asked me to deliver a package to you personally.’

  ‘Thank you. As a child you were closest to your mother.’

  ‘We continued to be close. Right until the end. You hadn’t actually seen her for a long time, I think?’

  ‘No, not really since 1945. You do look very like her, Senka, just as you did when you were a boy, the Little Professor.’

  ‘But you knew her well.’ It was not quite a question.

  ‘In a way.’ Satinov had never regretted staying with Tamriko, just as he had never considered leaving her. After his affair with Dashka, he had returned to become the man he had been before – on the surface, at least. The rigid life of the élite continued under Stalin and his successors, and everyone treated him as if he was still his reticent, cold former self. Yet all this time, Dashka had existed in his life like one of those unexploded Luftwaffe bombs they sometimes found, buried deep in someone’s garden yet still capable of destroying the entire neighbourhood. Over the years, he had realized that he had made a fool of himself with Dashka – and yet it was a folly that he would treasure all his life.

  ‘Well, this is what she asked me to deliver,’ said Senka awkwardly, proffering a package wrapped in brown paper and crisscrossed with string. ‘There! Duty done!’

  ‘Thank you again.’ Satinov was aware that his face was expression-free. After all, to hide his feelings was second nature to him.

  ‘Before I go, Comrade Satinov, may I ask you something? My mother’s arrest was such a blow to me as a child. But I never quite understood why she was arrested. You were in the leadership at the time. I wondered if you knew anything?’

  ‘Even we didn’t know everything. We only saw what Stalin wanted us to see.’

  ‘So you know she was arrested for lack of vigilance with state secrets and abetting an Enemy of the People. She was named again in the Doctors’ Plot for planning to murder some of the leaders medically and if Stalin hadn’t died . . .’

  ‘She’d have been shot.’

  ‘Yes. She thought she’d had a lucky escape. But could it have been something to do with my father?’

  ‘Possibly. Stalin arrested the wives of Molotov, Kalinin and Poskrebyshev.’

  ‘Well, my father’s been dead for twenty years now, and I sometimes wonder whether her arrest could have been connected to the Children’s Case.’

  ‘Also possible. She helped Benya Golden get the job at the school. Did you know they were at university together in Odessa?’

  Senka tilted his head, and Satinov was struck once again by his likeness to Dashka.

  ‘And then there’s this,’ Senka said. ‘Something’s always bothered me. Could it have been anything to do with me?’

  Satinov thought for a while. ‘Tell me,’ he said at last. ‘Did your mother ever talk about her patients at home?’

  ‘No. Sometimes she whispered to my father and I heard a couple of names.’

  ‘Such as?’

  ‘Well, there was Zhdanov, but everyone knew about his heart disease.’

  Satinov nodded. ‘You always knew quite a lot for a youngster, but then you were the Little Professor.’

  Senka’s answering smile was the very image of his mother’s. ‘Why do you ask if my mother talked about her patients?’

  ‘Just curiosity. She was so discreet.’ Satinov offered him a cigarette and took one himself. ‘It must have been quite an experience being arrested during the Children’s Case?’

  ‘Your Mariko was even younger.’

  ‘True, but she was only there for a short time. You spent much longer in Lubianka.’

  ‘It was frightening but I concentrated very hard, even though I was so young, on not getting my parents into trouble.’

  ‘You know we executed Komarov and Likhachev with Abakumov in 1954?’

  A look of distaste crossed Senka’s sensitive face. What does one expect from a liberal intellectual? thought Satinov.

  ‘They were thugs,’ he said. ‘After Stalin’s death, I read your interrogations in the KGB files. I have to say: they set you a terrible trap.’

  ‘They wanted me to incriminate my parents.’

  Satinov shook his head. ‘Our Organs were full of criminal elements in Stalin’s time.’

  Senka looked anxious. ‘At the time, I thought my solution had worked. But when they arrested my mother, I wasn’t so sure. I long to know if I was to blame for what happened to her next.’

  Satinov got up and went to his huge chrome safe. He opened it, brought out a heap of papers, and leafed through them. ‘I was looking at these the other day. And here it is, how clever you were. You see here? After your testimony: “Accusations not to be pursued.”’ He paused. ‘I was there when you came out. Do you remember?’

  ‘I do, very clearly.’

  ‘When you saw your mother sitting there in the waiting room, you were so excited. We could hear you talking about her; you were so proud of her!’

  Senka threw his head back just like Dashka. ‘That’s right!’

  Satinov clicked his fingers. ‘But then you said something else. I can almost hear it. What was it?’

  ‘Well, I said Mama was the best doctor in Russia.’

  ‘What else?’

  ‘That all the top people saw her!’

  ‘Ah – that was it,’ said Satinov, thinking back to his days in exile when he had almost wished Dashka ill for making him love her so much. There had been times too when he wondered if he personally had brought about her downfall. Now finally, Senka had solved things.

  What Senka had not known was that just before the Victory Parade in June 1945, Poskrebyshev, Stalin’s secretary, had made an appointment to see his mother. He had told her that he himself was not ill. Instead, he had driven her to a dacha where she had examined Stalin, diagnosed arteriosclerosis and a small heart attack, and advised at least three months’ rest. Aware that his frailty was the only obstacle to his supremacy, Stalin had never consulted her again. His doctors were the only people on earth who had any power over him, their diagnoses the only threat to his power.

  Now Satinov realized that Senka, who had so effectively protected his mama, had announced to a room full of Chekists: ‘Oh yes, she’s the best doctor in the world. She sees all the top people.’ Reported somehow by word of mouth, this had reached Stalin. All the top people! All? Stalin would wonder: Had she spoken about her top patient? This was more than enough to destroy her. Hence the charge: ‘Mishandling state secrets’.

  Satinov sighed; his arthritis was painful. He had been the only person Dashka had told. She hadn’t mishandled state secrets at all.

  ‘It couldn’t have been that, could it?’ asked Senka, anxious again.

  ‘Not at all. You managed to get out of there without saying a single thing wrong.’

  Senka relaxed visibly and his dark eyes glinted. ‘What a relief,’ he said. ‘Thank you. Now I really should be going.’

  Satinov stood up and offered his hand. ‘Did your mother say anything for me? About the package?’

  Senka looked into Satinov’s grey eyes for a long moment. ‘No. Nothing.’

  Satinov understood then that Senka knew about his love for his mother – and he was glad. Their story lived on.

  Wearing a blue cap, Andrei was driving a beige Lada up the drive towards an ugly government dacha, a wooden shooting lodge that looked like an oversized Swiss chalet. Four ZiL limousines were parked there as stately as royal barges. Two bodyguards, specimens of Homo Sovieticus, wearing overtight suits, fat brown ties and combover hairdos, came down the steps with the macho insouciance of KGB men on duty. Andrei showed them their identity cards for the fourth time
that hour, and the guards barked into walkie-talkies, returned their IDs and gestured towards Serafima.

  Andrei came round to open Serafima’s door. He watched her walk up the steps into the chalet. At the top of the steps, she looked back at him and smiled and raised her hand in a slight wave. Then she went inside.

  He sat listlessly for a few minutes. Fate had brought him Serafima, and now his marriage hung in the balance. Nikolasha and Rosa had died for the romantic delusion: totalitarian love as reckless melodrama and desperate possession, an orchestra of trumpets and thunderbolts. Now he saw clearly that the real poetry of love was a meandering river, an accumulation of accidents, the momentum of details.

  He reached on to the floor of the back seat and grabbed a wad of essays. Holding them against the steering wheel, he started to mark them with a red pen. Just after Stalin’s death, Director Medvedeva had hired him to teach Pushkin at School 801 where he was loved by generations of pupils for the flamboyant way he brought Onegin to life.

  Yes, thought Andrei Kurbsky, he and Serafima owed so much to the clandestine generosity of decent people who had the courage to spread the warmth of kindness even in the age of ice. But they owed most to Benya Golden, and not just a love of poetry. They had named their son Benya, and their daughter Adele, after Pushkin’s verse that Benya had recited to Serafima. And Andrei always started his classes with Benya’s words: ‘Dear friends, beloved romantics, wistful dreamers . . .’

  Serafima was escorted through the shooting lodge, into the gardens and to the edge of the birch woods. Dapper and slim, Frank Belman waited for her in a camel-hair coat, a spotted Hermès tie, yellow slacks and a pair of Gucci loafers. He turned and came towards her, stopping a step away. She did not know what she expected him to do – but he offered her his hand formally.

  ‘I’m so glad you came,’ he said. ‘I hope you didn’t mind that I contacted you . . .’

  ‘No, I wasn’t surprised,’ said Serafima. ‘I knew we’d meet again one day.’

  ‘I’m speaking English because I know you’re an English teacher.’

  ‘How well informed you are.’

  ‘Can we walk through the woods? English was your favourite subject, along with Pushkin.’

  ‘You have a good memory.’

  ‘Of course.’

  He seemed very assured, this prince of capitalist America, much more confident than the young, faltering Frank she remembered. She was not sure that any part of her Frank remained in this suntanned, grey-haired statesman and millionaire. There is nothing for me here, she thought.

  ‘It seems a long time ago,’ he went on.

  ‘Yes.’ She felt disappointed and yet relieved as she realized she wanted to go home. How could she end this tactfully?

  ‘You know I’m married with four children now?’ he said.

  ‘I’m pleased for you.’

  ‘And you?’

  ‘Yes, I’m also married and I have two children.’

  He nodded. ‘You look wonderful.’

  ‘You seem a real American plutocrat.’ She forced a smile. ‘One of those villains we read about in our propaganda!’ She paused. ‘Frank, I’m pleased to have met you again, I really am – but I think I should go now.’

  Frank looked most concerned. ‘Did I say something wrong? There’s so much I want to ask you.’

  Serafima stepped back. ‘I feel the same way. There’s much to say but really there’s nothing. So if you don’t mind, I’ll leave now.’

  Satinov closed the doors of his study where so many important events of his life had taken place. At this desk Stalin had called to tell him the Nazis had invaded. Here he’d heard that his son Vanya had been killed. In that Venetian mirror he had seen himself crying about Dashka as he comforted Tamriko after the arrest of their children. Here Mariko had shown him her Moscow School for Bitches the day she came out of prison, Marlen had introduced his parents to his fiancée, and George and his wife had presented their baby son to him. Now he sat in his leather chair and looked at the package that seemed to him to have a faint glow like a lamp deep under the ice.

  He cut the string, imagining Dashka, with her short fingers and plump gold-skinned wrists, tying these knots. Later he and Brezhnev would be negotiating the future peace of the world with the Americans. But now he could think of nothing but the woman he’d once loved so deeply. He remembered how, for a long time after Dashka had gone, his life with Tamara and the children had felt like a becalmed ship, no longer tossed by the drama of towering waves and roaring winds, and he had wondered if this was death until he realized this hushed serenity was the beginning of his return to happiness . . .

  Inside the package was a green uniform, immaculately folded, somewhat faded, a book and some smaller objects. First he looked at the book: Chekhov’s Complete Short Stories, a cheap edition from 1945. Instinctively he opened it at ‘The Lady with the Little Dog’ to read the page that she had once sent him but when he reached the place, the page was missing and there was just a jagged edge. This was the very book she had used to tell him that she loved him – and she had kept it all these years.

  Next he drew out the uniform, his hands shaking as much as they had when he had first laid his hands on her body and gradually unwrapped her so that he could touch her glowing skin. He stood up so that he could examine the uniform, and then unfolded it piece by piece on the floor like a body. Here was the tunic with the red cross and medical corps insignia, cinched at the waist, a green blouse, a khaki skirt, its hem turned up a little more than allowed by regulations, a pair of black silk stockings, one pair of plain army boots, a blue beret – and, pinned onto the tunic’s lapel, a little Red Cross medical badge. He looked down at each item, utterly bowled over by the thought that had gone into this last present, by the sensuality of the woman who had kept all this, and by the boundless joy of knowing that she had always loved him, all this time.

  Suddenly he fell to his knees and lay full length on the uniform. He raised the blouse to his face and recognized her scent, Coty, from all those years ago.

  ‘Hello, it’s me!’ she said in his ear.

  ‘Hello, me,’ he said, tears streaming down his cheeks.

  He did not know how long he lay there, struggling for control. But after a while, he got to his feet and brushed himself down, went to the fireplace and fed the material into the flames. He left the tunic until last. He unclipped its medical badge and slipped it into his trouser pocket. As he raised the tunic to his lips for the last time, something heavy fell out of it and he looked down: it was her stethoscope. Old-fashioned, leather. He checked there was nothing left in the fire, but he placed the stethoscope on his desk.

  There was a knock on the door: it was his young adjutant.

  ‘Time to leave for the American Embassy in five minutes, comrade marshal.’

  ‘Very good,’ said Satinov.

  ‘Your wife and daughter are back, comrade marshal.’

  ‘Thank you.’

  When the door was closed again, he went to the man-sized chrome safe in the corner of his office, unlocked it and brought out the yellowed page, torn long ago from a Chekhov story. Opening the book, he reunited the page with its torn edge, matching each tear on the paper to its other half. Then he closed the tome sharply. He smiled. The page and the book were reunited finally – just as he and the lady with the little dog could never be. He squeezed the book into the shelf next to his desk and his hand was still resting on it when Tamriko came into the study to kiss him.

  She noticed the stethoscope immediately: ‘That’s new,’ she said. ‘From the war perhaps?’

  ‘Yes,’ he said, ‘just something from the war. A veteran medic sent it to me.’

  ‘A veteran?’ She glanced at him acutely. ‘Are you going to keep it?’

  ‘May I?’ he asked.

  ‘Yes, of course. You must. What a lovely thing to have. A keepsake.’

  ‘Goodbye, Frank,’ said Serafima, offering her hand coldly.

  ‘Goodbye.’
He offered his hand too. ‘Dear enchantress.’ She stood frozen to the earth. ‘You know I do remember. Everything,’ he said softly.

  ‘Me too.’ She broke into a smile. ‘Then you will appreciate that I teach Hemingway, Edith Wharton, Galsworthy.’

  The names of these authors seemed to strike him as hard as the word ‘enchantress’ had struck her: he looked away from her and the air between them seemed to change.

  ‘Our code!’ His voice had grown husky. ‘Serafima, I never forgave myself for your arrest and your time in the camps. It took me years to find out what had happened. Of course I didn’t believe that you were really ill on the train, but there was nothing more I could do. We couldn’t ask your family without putting them in danger and I felt so guilty that I had ruined your life. It’s only now with détente that I could enquire about you. Thank God you survived, but what I really want to say is . . .’ He paused and took her hands. ‘. . . will you forgive me for what happened?’

  Serafima could hardly speak. ‘There’s nothing to forgive. You were the greatest blessing in my life. You still are. You always will be.’ She looked at him, remembering the way he always greeted her with his trademark two-fingered salute, brimming with excitement at seeing her again. ‘When did you marry?’

  ‘Nineteen fifty-one. I waited for you for six years.’

  ‘I was still in the Gulags then.’ She imagined his diamond engagement ring on the finger of another woman, his wife, the mother of his children. Yet she had released him on that snowy night with Dashka. She, the ghost, had no right to it.

  ‘You know, I still often find myself saying aloud: “Missing you, loving you, wanting you,”’ he said.

  ‘So do I,’ she whispered. ‘I thought of you . . . I thought of you every day in the camps. When I looked at the sun at midday and the northern star at midnight.’

  ‘Not a day passes when I haven’t remembered you, Serafimochka.’

  ‘And I you, Frank,’ she said. ‘But we’re both married, and we both have families we love.’

  ‘You’re right,’ he said, reaching into his pocket as if he was looking for something. ‘But shouldn’t we keep in contact?’