I hurried to the back entrance, where the bus that would take us to the train station was waiting. We were like little children about to be treated to a trip to the zoo, excited at what was ahead and nervous about going out into the big world. Vera and Vitaly gave me big hugs, and even Marina winked at me. The backbiting and competitiveness were gone. We were the lucky ones, and on us depended the reputation of the Kirov. In the excitement I forgot for a moment what I must do as soon as I reached Moscow. That is, I forgot until I noticed a strange man and woman standing beside our bus.
“Who are they?” I asked Vitaly.
“Secret police agents from the KGB,” Vitaly said. “They always accompany groups when they leave Russia. Never mind them. We have nothing to hide.”
Guiltily I exchanged looks with Vera, who appeared to be pale and subdued. “Tanya, don’t look in the direction of those agents, but I’m worried they know something about me.”
“What do you mean?” Surely they couldn’t read our minds and know we were planning to defect to France.
“Yeltsin has the government looking into my father’s business.”
I had long guessed that the Chikovs’ money came from some enterprise. Now I remembered how Grandfather had said that Yeltsin was cleaning up graft and corruption. “Surely that won’t affect you,” I said.
Vera shrugged. “I’ll tell you more later.”
Madame, dressed in a new suit and, miracle of miracles, wearing nylon stockings and high heels, gathered us like chickens and shepherded us onto the bus. At the last moment Maxim Nikolayevich hurried out of his Volga and clambered on board, a new silk scarf twisted dramatically about his neck; he was wearing some sort of jaunty beret that was meant to look Parisian. The bus took us down the Prospekt; past our apartment building; past the Gostiny Dvor, Leningrad’s department store, where I had wandered a hundred times picking out things I longed for but for which I never had the money; past the monument of Catherine the Great; across the Anichkov Bridge with its great bronze horses; past the bookstores where Sasha and I had looked for bargains, and at last to the Moscow station.
At the station everything was chaos. A hundred trains roared in and out each day. People pushed us out of the way, while the KGB agents stood to one side watching and Madame and Maxim Nikolayevich ran about keeping us in line. At last we settled into our compartments, stacking our suitcases and backpacks on the overhead racks. To save money we were traveling second class, so there would be no bunks to sleep on. For dinner there was a snack bar with sandwiches and soda. The good news was that the KGB agents were traveling first class.
With the agents a safe two railway cars away, Vera took me aside. “The government has sent men into Papa’s office to examine his books. I know, Tanya, that Papa buys and sells where he shouldn’t buy and sell, but still he is my papa and I’m worried. Just before we left, he gave me some jewelry to take to Paris. I’m to sell it. When I saw the KGB agents, I thought they were after me, but Madame said they always go on such trips.
“That is not the most important news,” Vera went on, her voice now in a whisper. “Papa and Mama are making plans to escape to Paris as well. They know they won’t be allowed to bring anything valuable with them—that’s why they gave the jewelry to me.”
All I could think of was how heartless the Chikovs were to put Vera in so risky a position. It was true that I, too, was taking a chance in carrying the letter for Grandfather, but that was in a noble cause; the Chikovs were endangering Vera only for money.
Vitaly called, “What are you two whispering about? You’re missing all the sights.” After that, to avoid suspicion Vera and I joined the others. For most of us in the troupe it was our first trip out of Leningrad. The August evening was hot, and we opened the windows and leaned out to see the scenery, getting cinders in our eyes and letting soot into the compartment. It was a wonder to have the country fly by, but by midnight the novelty of the trip had worn off and the compartment quieted. We curled up on the seats, resting our heads on our backpacks. Vitaly and Vera were sound asleep, but I shifted restlessly, thinking of the envelope that lay beneath my head, and of what would happen if it were discovered.
CHAPTER 10
TANKS IN THE STREET
At eight in the morning, yawning and stretching, we hurried off of the train and onto the bus that would take us to our Moscow hotel. We pushed against one another to get next to a window and view the city we had heard so much about. Moscow was larger and busier than Leningrad, with wide streets crowded with automobiles. Madame pointed out the Bolshoi Theater, and we all agreed it was not as handsome as the Kirov. Suddenly the Kremlin was in front of our eyes. How we stared. The Kremlin had started out as an ancient fortress whose towered brick walls still stood. Behind the walls were the buildings we knew from our school days, when every child learned about the Kremlin. We saw Assumption Cathedral with its brightly colored domes and the bell tower of Ivan the Great. Inside Red Square was the Lenin mausoleum where Lenin lay preserved in his glass coffin like some exotic tidbit in a jar.
In front of the Kremlin I could see a part of Red Square with the cathedral of St. Basil the Blessed and another great cathedral that had been turned into the State History Museum. Just ahead of us was the platform where each year, on the anniversary of the revolution, Stalin had stood to review miles of soldiers and weapons. Vitaly asked, “Tanya, what’s wrong? You look a little green.”
“I’m just carsick,” I said. “First the train and then the bus.” I wasn’t carsick at all. I was frightened of what I had agreed to do. Though Stalin had been dead for nearly forty years, just the thought of how he had sent millions to their deaths for opposing him both frightened me and made me more sure than ever that I must carry out my promise to Grandfather. But the city was so large. How would I get from our hotel to the parliament building? The task seemed impossible.
The bus was traveling along the Moscow River and passing a large green space. “Gorky Park,” Madame said. “And here on Novy Arbat Street is our hotel. The tall building over there is the trade center, and just beyond it that huge white building is the parliament, where Yeltsin and our deputies are at work. Now everyone off the bus, and don’t forget to look around to be sure you have all your things.”
The parliament building was right there in front of me! I had no excuse now for not delivering the letter. I hugged my backpack to me and followed the others off the bus. The first chance I had, I would slip out of my room and head for the parliament. The sooner I got it over with, the sooner I could breathe again.
As we crowded into the lobby of the hotel, I felt someone fling herself at me and give me a crushing hug. “Natalia!” I cried.
“Tanya, as soon as I knew you would be staying here, I camped out in the lobby. I’ve been waiting for hours to be sure I would be here to greet you. Oh, Tanya, I am so happy. I’m in the Moscow Choreography School. The ballet mistress says I am doing well, and one day I will be sure to dance with the Bolshoi. I go everywhere in Moscow. I know a little café in the Arbat where we can have breakfast.”
“Natalia, give me a chance to catch my breath. I have been up all night. I couldn’t sleep in the train. I’ll just catch a few winks and meet you for lunch. We don’t have anything scheduled until the performance of the Bolshoi tonight.” There was nothing I wanted more than to hear of Natalia’s adventures with the Bolshoi, but I had made Grandfather a promise, and I meant to keep it.
Natalia looked like a wounded puppy. “Listen,” I said, “here is a special letter Uncle Fyodor has sent to you, and at lunch I’ll give you all the news of the shelter.” Reluctantly Natalia let me go, and I followed Vera up to the hotel room I was to share with her. I thought having a whole room just to ourselves was a miracle, but Vera complained that there was no television set and no phone. “The soap in the bathroom is cheap. Why don’t they put us up in a decent place?”
“Vera, you are spoiled. It seems like heaven to me.” Never had I had a bathroom all to myself. I th
ought of soaking in a lovely bath with no one pounding on the door for a turn, but I settled for splashing some water on my face. “I have to run out for a few minutes. I’ll be right back.”
“I’ll come with you. There’s no reason to stay in this dreary place.”
“I just want a few minutes by myself, Vera. I’ll be right back. Anyhow, wouldn’t it be better for you to stay here with your jewelry, where it’s safe? You don’t want to take any chances.”
I ignored Vera’s puzzled look and hurried out of the room. In the lobby I saw the two KGB agents loitering by the door. As I walked past them, the woman said, “You seem eager to go out.”
“I forgot my lipstick,” I said.
“You couldn’t borrow some?” the man asked.
I gave him a withering look. “It wouldn’t be the right shade.” He shrugged as if I were too frivolous to bother with.
Once outside on the street with all the rushing cars and with people pushing rudely by me, I lost heart. I was ready to turn back when I noticed a large number of police on the streets. Rounding a corner, I saw a tank lumbering right down the center of the street as if it were a trolley car. Something was happening. I hurried along. The great white parliament building loomed over me. I made myself walk past the security guards as if I belonged there. At the desk I asked to see Lev Petrovich, showing the woman the official letter Grandfather had given me with the petition to ask for more money for our Leningrad ballet.
The woman behind the desk glanced at the petition and said, “The deputy is too busy to see you on such a small matter. I’ll see that the petition is passed along.”
“Please, just let the deputy know who I am. I am sure he is expecting me and has a photographer all ready to take a picture for the Leningrad newspaper. He will be very angry if you send me away.”
The woman gave me a suspicious look. “If he bites off my head for bothering him, it will be your fault.”
She dialed a number and read out my name. With a disappointed look she indicated the bank of elevators. “It seems he will see you,” she said. “Tenth floor.”
When I reached the tenth floor, a tall, thin man with glasses resting on the end of his nose was waiting at the elevator to greet me. He ushered me by some secretaries and pulled me into his office. “I had a phone call from Georgi Mikhailovich telling me that his granddaughter was visiting Moscow and would stop by to request money for something or other. I knew he couldn’t speak freely over the phone and guessed that you would have something of importance for me.”
The man looked so intently at me, I was sure he could see into my backpack. I quickly handed him the letter, which he read at a gulp, nodding and repeating yes, yes as he went along. He must have been encouraged by what he read, for when he was finished, he smiled at me and said, “You were brave to bring this, Tanya.”
“Lev Petrovich,” I said, “I saw a tank on the street just a minute ago.”
“I believe the coup is under way. We guessed it would come while Gorbachev was out of town, but we had no idea it would come so soon.” He let out a sigh, so deep it must have traveled all the way up from his toes. “It may be that you have arrived in Moscow on the very day Russia loses her chance for freedom.”
There were shouts. One of the secretaries called, “Lev Petrovich, come and look!”
We hurried to the window. There, crawling along on the street looking like a parade of giant beetles, were scores of tanks. Just behind them was a long line of trucks loaded with soldiers.
Someone switched on a radio. A man with the voice of an angry schoolmaster announced that Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev, on vacation in the Crimea, had been replaced because of ill health. Power was being transferred to the vice president and to something called the Committee for a State of Emergency.
Lev Petrovich said, “That committee will be made up of the army and the KGB and the Communist party. They probably have Gorbachev under arrest. Now our only hope is the president of Russia, Boris Yeltsin, if he hasn’t been arrested as well.”
We could see hundreds of people pouring out of houses and buildings. They were gathering around the parliament building, shouting and shaking their fists at the tanks. The soldiers’ guns at the ready kept the people from getting too close.
A moment later there was a great roar and the sound of breaking glass. The tanks were firing on the parliament! We dropped to the floor. After a moment everything was silent. When no more shots were fired, we slowly got up, everyone looking embarrassed at having been frightened. We brushed ourselves off and went back to the windows to see what our fate would be.
“If we are ever to have democracy in this country,” Lev Petrovich said, “it must come from this building and on this day.” For a moment he forgot the drama outside the building and turned to me. “I am sure you had no idea you would find yourself in the middle of a battle, but I have no doubt that any grandchild of Georgi Mikhailovich will know how to be brave.”
There was a shout from the hallway. “Yeltsin is here!” We crowded into the hallway, and there hurtling toward us, two stairs at a time, was a giant of a man, his hair uncombed, his shirt half out, and wearing under his jacket a heavy military-looking vest that I guessed at once must be bulletproof. “They lied to the soldiers,” he cried, “telling them they were being sent into Moscow to round up draft dodgers. Even so, some of the soldiers may go along with the coup, but there will be soldiers who will come over to our side. I am sure of it.”
Someone called, “The television and radio stations have been taken over.”
“We will have to find another way to get the truth out,” Yeltsin said. “We have to tell them that Gorbachev is under arrest in his dacha in the Crimea, but that the president of Russia, me, Boris Yeltsin, is right here on duty in the parliament. I and all the deputies will fight to the death to preserve Russia’s new freedom. Everyone in the city must come out and support us.
“Lev Petrovich, get your people together and print a leaflet—print thousands of them.” Yeltsin began to dictate the words for the leaflet:
Storm clouds of terror and dictatorship are gathering over the whole country. The enemy must not be allowed to bring eternal night. Citizens of Russia, I believe in this tragic hour you can make the right choice. The honor and glory of Russian men of arms shall not be stained with the blood of the people.
Before I knew it, I was gathering the leaflets as they came from the printing machine. I ran down the stairway to the entrance, where people were grabbing the leaflets to post all over the city. When soldiers stopped us, we carried the leaflets to all the offices and flung them out the windows to the people who waited below.
The streets were a solid sea of people, thousands and thousands of people. Some were approaching the tanks and arguing with the soldiers. Some were putting flowers in the gun barrels. Yeltsin wanted to talk with the people, but even though he had his bulletproof vest, everyone was afraid of snipers. “They would like nothing better than a chance to shoot you down, Boris Nikolayevich,” Lev Petrovich warned Yeltsin.
Down below us a microphone had been hastily put up. One after another, speakers stood up and addressed the crowd, urging them to oppose the coup. Surprisingly, the soldiers and the tanks did nothing to stop them.
“Look!” someone cried. “There is Rostropovich!” The most famous cellist in the world, a man who had been exiled from the Soviet Union but who had come back from America for a visit, was standing there waving a Kalashnikov rifle. “I love you,” he shouted to the crowd. “I am proud of you.” The soldiers didn’t dare shoot at the man who was famous all over the world.
After seeing Mikhail Rostropovich, nothing could hold Yeltsin back. Yeltsin said, “I’m going out there.” He combed his unruly hair, put his necktie back on, and strode out the front door. We hung out of the windows, holding our breath. He was a large and easy target. One bullet and there would be no one to rally around, no one to lead the country into real freedom. The soldiers were standing up in their
tanks watching Yeltsin approach. The crowd was shouting and cheering. I stopped breathing.
Yeltsin paused in front of a tank. Suddenly he was climbing up the side of the tank, his big awkward body supported and pushed by a churning crowd. The soldier in the tank not only did not stop him, but amazingly even gave him a hand up. Yeltsin was astride the tank and waving to the crowd. People swarmed around the tank. “Citizens of Russia,” he shouted above the roar. He urged the soldiers not to take part in the coup, and he appealed to the whole country to support democracy. From everywhere came the shout of “Yeltsin, Yeltsin.” He climbed down and came inside, his hair tousled, sweat running down his face.
As we watched from the window, we were amazed to see that some of the gunners on the tanks were turning the barrels of their guns away from the parliament building. A great cheer went up, and we all hugged one another.
We printed leaflets all afternoon without stopping. It was only when someone mentioned that we had not had anything to eat that I realized I was starving. A deputy named Nemtsov had an idea. “The American embassy is close by. I’ll give them a call and tell them we have no food. Surely they will understand that we are fighting for democracy in here.”
Within an hour a van drove up with the name of the United States on it. There was some discussion between the soldiers and the driver, but at last the driver and his helper got permission to bring the food into the parliament. We sat around, the men in shirtsleeves, the women with their shoes kicked off, gobbling down sandwiches and watching the television. All the news had been cut off. Incredibly, Moscow TV was showing a movie of the Bolshoi Ballet dancing Swan Lake. For a moment I forgot where I was and sat there intent on the performance of the prima ballerina. The others were all talking about the coup in worried tones. Finally Lev Petrovich asked, “Tanya, at what are you staring?”
The Turning Page 9
