The Rift

by H Schmidt

  Billy remembered the words when he asked Boris what the wiring was for. “They did not tell me. One of the men said it was for two special guests. One would be arriving soon. The others laughed.”

  “Did they say anything about the two guests?”

  “No, and I did not ask. With such people, you learn not to ask questions.”

  Billy had spent the afternoon with Boris, asking him to describe whatever he could remember about the palace. After they had finished, Billy had pieced together what he knew. Built fifty years ago, it was situated to the south of the Baltic and northeast of Lake Narva. The Bay of Narva provided protection for the sailing vessels during the summer months, when the royal family would visit for two weeks each year. The palace was kept open during the summer for guests of the court who wanted to enjoy its elegance.

  The point of land faced east. The palace was pentagonal in shape. One of the two main entrances for the guests was for those arriving by sea. It was that entrance that Billy was facing, not a hundred meters away. The main entrance faced the main body of land to the west. He had learned in Narva that many of the guests traveling by sea preferred to dock their vessels in the deeper Narva harbor, and traveling by land, entered from the west.

  The palace had four floors above ground. Billy saw the windows on the second floor. Friederich was behind one of those windows. He had finished his work at the steps. Mentally, he checked what he carried. The guncotton and three of the hand grenades were now in place under the stairs. The weight of what he carried was not a problem, only twenty-five kilos. The problem was sound. He still had almost thirty individual pieces all made of metal. He had done his best to tie them together, but moving without any sound would be impossible.

  He looked in the direction where Boris told him the service entrance would be. The rain was heavier now. As he straightened up, he saw a figure cross in front of the lighted window. On summer maneuvers at West Point, Billy had discovered that his night vision was worse than most of his classmates. To compensate he had learned to look for movement out of the corners of his eyes, hoping that an enemy was not in a position where they could see him and he couldn’t see them. His most effective response was to avoid situations where night vision might be critical. Here, he had no choice. Less than three hours to daylight.

  Moving as slowly as he could to avoid creating movement of the things he carried, he worked his way forward. Another guard moving in the same direction, away from the service entrance. There were at least two on the grounds. He stopped, trying to detect any movement where he headed. Hoping that no one was watching, he moved to the left of the guest entrance then crouched below the window line. He was among the shrubs now, providing cover from any guards who might be patrolling the grounds. Beyond the next window, he could see the service entrance. Would it be locked? As he reached the entrance, he waited. He could see no movement. Crouching as he walked, he reached the round handle. It would not move.

  He pulled out the thin metal bar and worked it into the space between the door and the jamb. Holding onto the knob with his left hand and pushing slowly with his right, he felt the bolt slide away from the jamb. He eased the door open, and slipped inside. He waited again, listening and letting his eyes adjust. To his right, a stairway went down, to his left, he could see the second floor landing.

  He carefully removed the semiautomatic pistol from its holster. He chambered a round, placing his finger outside the trigger housing, and began to work his way up the stairs. He listened for sounds of footfalls and voices. Once, he stopped, thinking he heard the sounds of boots on a hard floor. He listened to the sounds, which seemed to be moving away from him. As he approached the landing, he thought he heard muffled voices. The voices were close to the landing. He could see the light under the door off the stairwell. That was the door he would have to open to get to Friederich.

  He stood at the door. Slowly turning the handle, he found it was not locked. What if the persons on the other side had seen the knob turn? Another thought occurred to him. What if they had moved Friederich? What if he wasn’t there? The answer came quickly. He would look until he found him. He would not leave without his brother.

  He recalled what Boris had told him. The door opened into a long hall. He knew from the description that the left side of the hallway contained rooms facing the docks. The right side of the hallway was a short wall with a wooden railing. Halfway down the hall on his right was a stairway from the first floor. At the base of the stairway was the great open space where guests entered through the west entrance. All around that open space, which rose two stories, were great rooms including the dining room and areas to entertain the guests who mixed during the two gala weeks during the summer. Marble columns spanned the great room parallel to the west entrance.

  Stuffing magazines from his Browning into his belt, returning his Colt to its holster, he turned the knob, took a deep breath, and threw the door open. The hallway was dimly lit. Two guards stood before the doorway of the first room. At first, he raised one finger to his mouth, asking them to be quiet, hoping he could get them into Friederich’s room. Billy saw the panic in the eyes of one guard and put his finger on the trigger. As the guard shouted, a quick burst dropped both of the men.

  ---

  Friederich found it hard to sleep in the soft bed. He had tossed and turned, thoughts and images passing across his mind; not dreams, but thoughts and images at the edge of sleep. As the first burst of fire occurred, he was on his feet. Accustomed to sleeping with his pants and shirt on, he rose, and without realizing it, got into his boots as he heard his name.

  “Friederich, it’s Billy.”

  He was caught between joy and the age-old need to scold a younger brother for so foolhardy an act. He swung the door open as Billy yelled at him.

  “Here.” Friederich caught the Colt. “Careful, the safety is off.” Billy pointed to one bag on the floor. “There are clips in there. Now, open the other one. Get out the masks and the gas canisters.”

  They could hear men on the stairs from the main hallway. Billy dashed to the edge of the short wall, then wheeled to fire from his left shoulder, the Browning on fully automatic. Within seconds, he had sprayed the stairway, dropping men as they charged, sending others scurrying down the stairs. As he reached for a second magazine, he felt Friederich’s hand with a gas mask in it press against his side.

  “Follow me, Friederich.”

  Billy opened the door that led to the service entrance. As he did, he heard shouts at the bottom of the stairs. Grabbing one of the grenades, he let it bounce down the stairs and closed the door. The concussion shook the walls. “Your plan to go down the stairs, Billy?” Billy nodded. “Yes.”

  Friederich tossed the first tear gas canister, which hit the marble floor with a flat sound. The tear gas fumes spread quickly. Billy threw a second, Friederich a third. They looked at the floor below. The stairwell was clear. Suddenly the wall in front of them began to disintegrate. Both dived to the far wall, where they had kept Friederich. The angle of the firing protected them, but kept them from the stairwell. The firing stopped.

  “They’re coming up the main stairway, Billy.”

  Friederich motioned Billy to bring his Browning forward, to be able to fire before they got to the top of the stairs. Suddenly, Friederich dashed around Billy to take a position on the other side of the stairway. As he did, Billy saw the tops of their heads appear. He waited until the men made their charge. The burst cut down most. One got through and turned to the right away from Billy. Friederich shot him as he turned. They could hear the steps being cleared.

  Friederich started to raise his head when the firing started again. Ripping at the wall, ripping the outside wall only a meter above their heads. They were safe but they had to find a way to get the gunner. Billy crawled back to the satchel and pulled out one of the three fragmentary grenades he had left.

  Friederich worked his way back to Billy. “Their machine gun is located to our left. It cannot reach th
e other end of the hall. Hand me two of those grenades.”

  Like most American infantry weapons, Friederich was familiar with the serrated American fragmentary grenades. Crisscrossed with raised squares, the oval-shaped explosives ripped apart at detonation, sending the raised metal fragments in a full circle. Friederich stuck his automatic into his belt, filled his pockets with magazines, and crawled to the far end of the hallway. As he did so, a burst of fire raked the walls, sending debris and dust on top of him.

  Friederich raised his head, and rifle and pistol shots caused him to pancake. Working his way toward the stairway, Billy watched as he rose and tossed the grenade. The machine gun started to fire, then the explosion shut it off.

  Friederich crawled over to his brother. He smiled and put his hand on his shoulder. More than his brother, he understood battle situations. He knew this one was futile. With the machine gun silenced, their chances were better. But to get down those stairs, with the number of rifles down there, was close to an impossibility. Friederich remembered his amazement watching men attack against solid walls of machine gun fire and somehow make it through. Most did not.

  Billy heard the man first. He wheeled his Browning and was about to fire when he saw it was an old man. The man was calling for them to come over there.

  “I will go, Billy, you stay and cover the stairs. They will try again.”

  ---

  Vladimir Renner remembered Alexander II. He was a handsome man, very kind. He was killed when Vladimir was only sixteen. He remembered how his own father, who had served the czar, had wept. He had asked why they would kill such a good man, who had done so much for his people. Young Vladimir had served the new czar then, who was a harder man, who distrusted everyone. Then, when Czar Nicholas was taken away, Vladimir felt as if the whole world had collapsed. He had lived at the palace most of his life. Life was good. In the summers, the whole family worked long hours to satisfy the whims of the royal family and its guests. But when the frosts came until they were gone in early summer, life was very easy. At first, it was as if the world had forgotten them. No one came even when the air had warmed. Vladimir had kept the staff busy, telling them the czar would soon be here.

  But that summer, only government officials came, telling them that the czar was gone. Vladimir was ordered to continue to maintain the palace. The summer went. The new men came in December. At first there were only a small number. They called the staff together and told them the czar would never return, that the Council of People’s Commissars now spoke for Russia. Their leader announced that they would now take orders from the new director of the Narva Soviet. They asked who was in charge of the staff. Trembling, Vladimir Renner stepped forward.

  The man who spoke to him was shorter than Vladimir, who was tall and thin like his father. Vladimir remembered his face, almost beet-red, with tiny eyes, like a pig’s. He told Vladimir that he was relieved of his duties and would report to him in the morning for new duties. He dismissed him in front of the other staff, who looked away as Vladimir stepped back. Since December, Vladimir had suffered the humiliation of being a common servant, ordered to do the most demeaning tasks, cleaning the toilets, the grease pits in the kitchen, scrubbing the floors. He had found that many of the staff who had been so loyal and hardworking before treated him with the same disdain as the director.

  He had watched them bring in the German officer. The morning after he was brought in, soldiers arrived at the palace, most quartered in the stables, some in the palace itself. One day, a staff car with a red flag waving from each side of the engine hood stopped at the main entrance. Someone said it was the new commander of the Cheka, the organization that sought saboteurs and other enemies of the revolution. Vladimir guessed that all that had happened was because of the German officer. He wondered who he could be.

  The soldier who came into the bathroom looked at the former director of the household staff cleaning the toilet bowls. He walked up to one Vladimir had cleaned, and peed on the floor next to the bowl. Vladimir could tell he had been drinking. For reasons the old man did not understand, the young soldier singled him out when he got drunk.

  Vladimir could feel the young man breathing over him. He screamed in pain as the rifle butt slammed into his kidney. Vladimir turned to see the man holding his penis, grinning down at him.

  “You do not like me pissing on the floor, old man? Well, why don’t I piss on you?”

  He threw up his hand to protect his face, feeling the warm spray on his arm when both heard it. The soldier whirled and headed for the door, buttoning his pants as he did. As he pushed the door open, Vladimir watched the man grab his chest as he fell back inside. He looked at the soldier, who stared at him, fear in his eyes. The old man put his face close to the soldier, and spat.

  Crouching on the floor against the corner farthest from the door, he could hear the young soldier cry for his mother, and the noises of war outside. For a moment, it was quiet, then shouts and screams as the firing on the floor began again. Silence, then the sound of a machine gun, which he had heard only once when Imperial soldiers had tested one on the grounds. Inside the palace, the firing made the walls and floor tremble. An explosion shook the room. His eyes burned as the tear gas worked its way into the vents, then out into the bathroom. Vladimir wondered if it were the czar’s army returning to throw the Soviet soldiers out. He worked his way to the door, and slowly opened it. Outside, he could see two men. One was dressed as a peasant, the other was the German officer who had been brought in a week ago. The sounds of the bullets ripping through the short wall and the walls of the bedrooms made him wince. Smoke was beginning to rise to the second floor. He could smell the cordite from the spent shells lying on the hallway floor. Three soldiers lay still in front of him. He did not know these two men, but he hated their enemy. He knew how many soldiers were on the grounds. There was no way they could hold them off or get past them unless he helped.

  Friederich reached Vladimir, staying low. “I can help you, sir.”

  Friederich looked at the man, seeing the quiet dignity in his face despite the ragged clothes that he wore. Vladimir shouted over the firing, which seemed to have gotten louder, despite the loss of the machine gun.

  “I have worked here for forty years. I know a way out.”

  Friederich knew their situation was desperate. He decided they had no choice but to trust the old man. He beckoned to Billy. Billy grabbed the satchel which still held two tear gas canisters and two grenades. As he crossed in front of the stairs, he emptied a clip, the Browning on automatic. Friederich reached into the satchel and grabbed the last of the two tear gas canisters. Pulling the pins, he lobbed them onto the stairs, listening to them bounce as they released the gas.

  Vladimir hurried past the bathrooms into a large interior room that looked like it was being used by the Soviets for storage. Beckoning the two men inside, he closed the door behind him, then moved the bolt to lock it. Billy grabbed the torch he carried, then beckoned to the old man to turn off the light he had switched on. Outside, the firing started up again. Soon, they knew, the firing would stop and they would be on the second floor landing.

  As Vladimir pointed, Billy aimed the light at a wall which held shelves filled with books and files. Reaching behind a book, the Russian hit a switch which caused the wall to pivot on a rod placed vertically from the stationary wall above the shelves through the shelves into a gearbox in the floor. Moving quickly, the old man stepped to a wall switch which illuminated stairs leading down. The firing had stopped.

  Vladimir knew they would shoot him, possibly his family if they found out. Perhaps, these two will help bring back the czar. He turned to the two men who were watching him closely.

  “Follow the stairs until you reach a door, which is hidden under a rocky ledge near the water. When you come out, you will see the docks on your right. If you can get hold of one of the boats...You are safe in the passage. Perhaps you can wait until tomorrow night. They will search the beach now.”

>   “Are you coming with us?” It was Billy, who wanted to help the old man. “My family is here. If they find I am gone, they will kill them. Goodbye.” “Good luck, old man. We will not forget you.” The old man looked at the thin face of the tall, blonde officer. When the czar was here, he had seen so many who looked like him.

  The old man turned. Pushing the button which closed the wall, he moved quickly to the door, listening. Hearing nothing, he slipped out of the door, into the bathroom, and returned to the farthest corner in the room, watching. The soldier had stopped breathing. He could hear men in the hall. The tear gas burned his eyes.

  Some of the lights had burned out, but it was easy to find their way. They ran down the steps, which dropped steeply. They had to hurry. The Soviets would begin to search the grounds. The grade began to lessen now.

  “It cannot be too far, Friederich. The center of the palace cannot be more than one hundred fifty meters from the water.”

  They saw the door. As they reached it, Friederich pulled at the latch which locked it from the inside. It did not move.

  “Stand back.”

  Billy checked the safety on the Browning, then taking it with both hands, hit the latch sharply with the rifle butt. He stepped back. Friederich tried again. It broke loose. The heavy steel door moved slowly when Friederich grabbed the handle. Wide enough now, he slipped through then made his way through the rock overhangs. Stopping when he saw the narrow beach, he waited for Billy. Billy closed the door carefully, hoping it might save the old man. They could hear shouts above them. The rain was heavier now. The wind had increased, blowing from the south into their faces.

  “Friederich, cover me with the Browning.” Billy handed him the rifle and the clips he carried. There were only five left. “Don’t let them get on the stairs.”