Gone by Nightfall

by Dee Garretson

  I knew Zarja was stunned at the thought. “Please, Zarja,” I said. “We’re going to try to leave as soon as we can get everything organized. You have to go. Papa, I need to talk to the boys.”

  I left them, hoping she’d listen to reason. When I told the boys about Papa’s near arrest, Stepan turned very pale.

  “We’re all leaving the country,” I said to him, trying to sound like I was excited. “We’re going on a trip to the United States until it’s safe to come back. We’ll all be together. It will be fun, don’t you think? A real adventure.”

  He nodded, still pale, but his face wasn’t quite so tense. “And I thought you might like to tell the twins,” I said. “Do you think you can explain it to them for me?” I wanted him out of the way so I could talk about the passport problem. He nodded again and ran off, looking happy he got to be the one to bring news.

  Once he was out of earshot, I explained to Miles and Hap about the passports, talking so fast I wasn’t sure they followed it all. “While I’m working on getting them, you have to help Papa figure out what papers and things he needs.” I didn’t know what that would be, beyond money, but I hoped he did. “Put any papers he wants to save but can’t take with us in the attic. I hope they’ll be safe there.” I didn’t want to think what the house might look like in a year without Archer to manage it. “And you need to pack a bag that’s easy to carry.”

  I wanted to talk to Dmitri before I left the house again, so I decided to pack my own bag while I waited. I gathered what I thought I might need, including my nursing veil. I didn’t know how easy it would be to sell the jewels. If we didn’t have enough money to get all the way to the United States, I hoped I could at least work as a nurse to earn a little money no matter where we ended up.

  I opened the drawer of the dressing table where I’d put my mother’s jewels and looked down at them, knowing I couldn’t just carry them around in a bag. I’d heard people were constantly being asked to give up anything valuable, and the jewels were certainly valuable. I knew some women sewed jewels into hiding places in their clothes, but I didn’t have time for that, and I didn’t know how to take the stones out of the settings anyway.

  There had to be a way to keep them safe and out of sight. As I pondered the problem, the thought of keeping them out of sight stuck in my head and gave me an idea. I hurried to the schoolroom and began to pull things out of the cupboard. At the bottom of the pile, I found what I wanted: a set of trick boxes we’d used in a magic show to make small items disappear. Each box had a false bottom.

  I took them back to my room and fit in as many jewels as I could, bracelets and rings, then closed the false bottom and added some of my own trinkets, a few necklaces and a broach, to the main part of the box. If anyone looked inside, they’d think I’d brought the boxes to hold the trinkets. The necklaces were too big, so those I put in a small evening bag. The boxes and the evening bag went into the bottom of my larger bag.

  After that, I began opening the papers I’d taken, on the wild hope they might be records of some secret bank account in Paris or Boston, but they were just old records of my mother’s marriage to and divorce from her second husband and the original passport we’d used to come from Paris to Petrograd, with my mother’s name at the top and me and the two boys listed underneath. There were also some letters, including one from my father to my mother, which I quickly folded back up. I didn’t want to read it right then.

  The last paper was an even older passport made out in the name of Martha Winsor. I stared at it, and at the dates, and realized that it was my mother’s original passport when she moved from America to France before she’d married my father.

  Martha Winsor. Not Lise. I’d always suspected Lise wasn’t her real name because it didn’t sound American and she was so vague about her early life, but it was odd to have proof of it. I supposed it didn’t matter who she had been in an earlier life—she was Lise Mason to me—though I thought someday I’d like to find out more about what made her leave America and change her name. I added a photograph of her to the pile, and then I was done. I wanted to say goodbye to Raisa but I didn’t know if I could bear it.

  I heard voices, so I went out into the hall to see Celeste coming up the stairs.

  “What’s wrong?” I asked. She never came to the house. We always went there.

  “I wanted to say goodbye,” she said. “We’re shutting the theater and going back to Estonia. I couldn’t leave without seeing you.”

  After all that had happened, I was so numb I didn’t even feel shocked. Everything I loved about Petrograd was being chipped away bit by bit. I told myself I wanted them to be safe too, and that meant they needed to leave the city as well.

  “How are you going to get there?” I asked. “I thought it was hard for people to leave.”

  “The authorities have said Estonians can get exit visas easily, and they are encouraging us to go home because of all the shortages. I think it’s because we’re foreigners to them, and they don’t want us here any longer.”

  That did shock me. There were so many Estonians in Russia; they were part of the culture. How could they not be wanted?

  “We’ll come visit you in Estonia,” I said, my voice catching. “If you want us to.”

  “You know you’d always be welcome. You’re like a daughter to us.” She hugged me. “I’ll pray for you,” she said. “I have to go. We’re trying to leave tonight.”

  I nodded and put on a smile. “Be safe.” I watched her go and the tears started to fall. I let them, until there were none left. Everything was happening too fast and not fast enough.

  I went downstairs to wait for Dmitri, trying to think only of the days ahead. I wasn’t going to think of anything else, I told myself. When he came in, he looked terrible. We went into the sitting room and he closed the door.

  “What is it? Tell me!” I clasped my hands together and squeezed them, bracing myself.

  He rubbed his face, and when he spoke his voice was trembling. That scared me more than anything. “There is a new law that was instituted today,” he said. “No one in the nobility will be allowed to travel out of the country. They are to stay here and either work for the state or be tried for their crimes against the people. It’s bad, Lottie. That means your stepfather can’t leave, and technically, neither can Stepan or the twins.”

  Chapter Nineteen

  I SAT DOWN, feeling as if a weight were pushing me into the floor. I couldn’t get my breath. It felt like my throat was closing up and all the air in the room had disappeared.

  “Lottie! Lottie!” Dmitri was shaking me.

  I looked up at him.

  “Do you feel faint?” he asked. “You look like you’re going to be sick.”

  I shook my head. “I didn’t believe Maria when she said the nobility would be put in prison. I can’t believe they aren’t letting children leave.”

  Dmitri sat down beside me and took my hands. “I’d tell you and Hap and Miles to go without them, but I know you won’t.”

  “No, I won’t.” I stood up. Enough was enough. “I was already planning to find a way to get them fake passports and exit visas.” I explained what I’d learned at the embassy. “We’re still going to get them fake paperwork. Stepan, too. We’ll change their names! No one will know they are part of the nobility. I mean, how important is the name you are born with anyway?” I laughed, feeling almost as giddy as the twins. “Martha, Lise, it’s all the same person.”

  “Are you all right?” Dmitri frowned. “You’re not getting a fever, are you?”

  “No. And Papa isn’t staying behind either. I have an idea. We have to talk to Yermak.”

  Dmitri followed me down to the kitchen and I explained it all. Yermak went to his room to get what we needed. His clothes were far too big for Papa, but they made Papa look more like an old dvornik who’d once been an actor than an esteemed general of the imperial army.

  “Are you sure, Lottie?” Papa asked more than once.

 
; “I’m sure,” I said. “It’s the only way. It will just be temporary, only until we can figure out our next move.”

  I convinced Dmitri to stay behind at the house while Papa and I went to the Tamms’.

  When we got there, I explained what we wanted, and Celeste dragged out Hugo’s trunk and got out his identification papers.

  “I don’t know if this is going to work,” Celeste said. “There will be a record that Hugo died.”

  “Dmitri says it’s chaos right now, and the place where they keep the death certificates is different from where they issue the exit visas. No one is going to check. I know it. Papa looks enough like Hugo that they’ll believe these are his papers.”

  Kalev looked at Papa and then at the picture of Hugo. He whistled. “She’s right, Celeste. It’s going to work.” He put his hand on Papa’s shoulder. “Just don’t speak much. Your accent isn’t Estonian.”

  “I would like an exit visa,” Papa said, sounding as if he’d just arrived from Estonia. He chuckled. “I’ve listened to many accents over the years,” he added in his normal Russian accent.

  We all stared at him. I’d never heard Papa do accents before.

  “I’d almost forgotten I used to entertain the boys in my regiment by imitating them,” he said. “They came from all over, so I had many to choose from. They got so much amusement out of such a little thing. You all look so surprised. Perhaps I should have gone on the stage instead of into the military.” He chucked me under the chin. “Close your mouth, Lottie. You’re going to catch flies.”

  I felt like I was looking at a man I’d never met before, or a man with many lives behind him.

  “If you want a job in your retirement, you have one waiting for you,” Kalev said, still looking stunned. “I’m going to start a new theater when we get home.”

  “Perhaps I will.” Papa shook Kalev’s hand and kissed Celeste on the cheek. “Perhaps I will. Thank you.”

  Papa and I headed to the passport-control office and waited in an enormous line, the longest one yet. The building was filthy and full of people who were just sitting on the floor not doing anything. When it was his turn, Papa set down Hugo’s passport and repeated the exact words he’d said at the Tamms’. The man stamped it without even looking up. Papa was about to pick up the paper when I saw what the stamp read.

  “No, wait. That’s the wrong stamp. He’s not going back to Estonia. He’s going to America.”

  “No, we’re only issuing those exit visas to Americans and Canadians. Estonians go to Estonia. He can get a stamp in Estonia to go to America. Next!” The man waved at the woman behind us.

  I felt panic rising and threatening to spill out. “But why? Why do you care where they go?”

  He rolled his eyes at me. “I don’t care, but that’s the rule. Now move out of the way or I’ll call a guard. Next!”

  We went outside. I couldn’t speak, though I tried several times. It was as if I couldn’t put the words in the right order. Papa had gone very pale, and I was afraid he was going to have another attack, but when he saw how upset I was, he put his arm around me.

  “Don’t worry, Lottie. I’ll be fine here. You take the children and go, and when I can leave, I’ll meet you somewhere.”

  “No!” I said so loudly people passing by turned to look at us. “You can’t stay here!” I lowered my voice. “You’ll be arrested and sent to prison.” I pointed at the paper. “Go to Estonia! Once you are there, you can get a different set of papers or something, and then maybe you can get to Paris and from there you can arrange passage to get to America.” I tried to keep the panic down. I didn’t see how he could do all that by himself, but he had to get out of the country.

  He was shaking his head the whole time I was talking, so I added the only thing I could think that might convince him. “Think of what Mama would do. She wouldn’t stay here. She’d pretend to be someone else until she got to where she wanted to go.”

  He stood there, motionless. A few tears ran down his face.

  “Papa, please. We’re not leaving unless you leave too.”

  “You’re right,” he whispered. “She wouldn’t give up.”

  I then did something I wondered if I’d regret later. “Go now to the Tamms. They’re leaving tonight. Go with them. Don’t come home. It’s not safe. The militia could come back at any time.”

  “But, but, I have to say goodbye to everyone.”

  I steeled myself. “No, it will only make it harder on the children. We’ll meet up as soon as we can. I’ll tell them that.” I started to cry too. I didn’t know if we’d ever see him again. “Please, I don’t think I can bear to see you say goodbye to them.” The tears turned to sobs.

  He hugged me more tightly. “Please don’t cry, little Lottie. You’re right, it’s better this way for all of us. I wouldn’t want my little chickabiddies to see me cry. I’ll go now.”

  I found a droshky for him and watched him go, feeling like our entire life in Russia was going away with him.

  When the droshky disappeared around a corner, I leaned back against the wall. All I wanted to do was go home and sleep for days, but I knew in a few hours I wouldn’t even have a bed to sleep in. I headed for home, not wanting a droshky, so I could have a little time before telling the others what was happening. I had to keep myself together for all our sakes.

  The men from the militia were back, waiting outside the door when I got there. “He’s not here,” I said. “Wait as long as you like. I don’t care.” I rang the bell and Hap opened the door.

  “We’re coming in to wait out of the cold,” one of the men said as he tried to follow me inside.

  “No, you’re not.” I slammed the door in his face and locked it.

  Dmitri and Miles had come out of the sitting room into the hall. Everyone was staring at me. “Where’s Osip?” I asked Hap.

  “He’s gone. He said he wasn’t going to wait around for some woman to order him to move furniture around and then not pay him. I gave him some money, though we didn’t have much after Papa gave some to Yermak and Zarja.”

  “Are they gone too?”

  “Yes,” Miles said. “Zarja wanted to wait to say goodbye, but Yermak said they had to go. I asked her to take the rabbits with her. We obviously can’t take them to the United States.”

  The rabbits had been the last thing on my mind. I was glad Miles had taken care of them.

  “The twins cried when they said goodbye to everyone. Zarja cried too, but not about the rabbits,” Hap added. “Was that a good idea to slam the door on that man? Where’s Papa?”

  I burst into tears. Dmitri put his arms around me and I choked out the story between sobs. At first Hap was angry at me, but after he saw how miserable I was, he finally came over and patted my back. “I’m sorry, Lottie, don’t cry anymore. We’ll see him again.”

  “Yes, no more tears. Let’s get out of this place before we’re kicked out,” Miles said. “Dmitri has been telling us about how we’re going to get some forged papers for the little ones. We’ve been trying to figure out how much money we have and how much we’ll need. Papa had some laid out on the desk that he was going to take, so we’ve got that. We’ll take the memoir now too. Papa will want it when we see him again. How much do you have?” he asked me.

  I wiped my face. Miles was right. No more tears, at least not for the moment. “I’ve got a better idea about the passports. Meet me in the schoolroom.” I ran up to my own room and got the passport that we’d come to Russia on. When I got to the schoolroom, I laid it on the table. “I worked this all out. We can add Stepan and Nika and Sophie to this with some American-sounding names. There’s room underneath Hap’s name. They have no way to check if it’s accurate. We just have to write in the names to match the other handwriting.”

  I pointed at the precise writing of some long-ago official. “Hap, you have the best handwriting. I’m sure you can match this. Then we’ll take it to the American embassy and tell them our mother is dead so we need a new one wi
thout her name on it. They don’t know us there, or at least the ones who do this sort of thing are usually young and come and go from Russia. Whoever is there now probably knows nothing of Mama and her history.”

  I’d been talking so fast, I had to stop and take a few breaths. “And finally, we take this to the Russian office and get an exit visa.” I sat back so I could see their reactions, thinking I was happy for the first time that the American community had paid no attention to my mother. The fewer Americans who knew us, the better.

  Dmitri picked up the paper and smiled. “Yes, that’s brilliant, Lottie. I suspect the American embassy is in as much chaos as everywhere else, since so many people are trying to leave. Do you think you can do it, Hap? You’ll have to write over the old date too.”

  “Of course!” Hap jumped up and went to look at his collection of drawing supplies. “The ink is faded, so if I mix a little brown into regular ink and dilute it with water, I think I can match it that way. Once I get the ink right, I can practice the writing.”

  Seeing a plan put into motion made me feel much better. It took more than an hour, but Hap eventually had writing that looked exactly like the old script. We’d decided to use Americanized names for the children because we could convince them it was a game to play for going to the United States.

  Stepan was easy. He became Stephan, and we decided to keep Sophie’s given name, Sofiya, but just change it to the English spelling, though I knew she’d be disappointed she didn’t get a new name. Nika’s was more difficult. Since we rarely called her by Veronika, we decided we needed something closer to Nika. We had several choices but finally settled on Nickie.

  “We’ll have to make her name Nicole on the passport though, because Nickie is just a nickname,” I said.

  We all sat quietly while Hap got ready to do the writing. He dipped a pen in the ink mix and then stopped. “I can’t do this with everyone breathing down my neck. Go away.”

  When we went out in the hall, I realized that the house had been remarkably quiet for a long time. “Where are the twins and Stepan?” I asked, horrified at all they could have gotten up to in the time we’d been talking.