Ancient Furies

by Anastasia V. Saporito

  “Yes, what is it?” I asked.

  Slowly now, one by one, the others were rousing, coming outside and straining to identify the rumble.

  “What time is it?” someone asked.

  “Almost 5 a.m. The sun will be up soon.”

  It was very dark, as it always is just before dawn. I went back inside because of the chill, sat on my windowsill, and wondered what the new day would bring. What could the rumble be? Gradually, everyone else came back inside. Nobody seemed alarmed, just puzzled as they returned to their beds to try to get a little more sleep, and I drifted back to sleep as well.

  Soon I was awakened again, this time by a very loud rumble and shaking of the window pane. It was light outside. The sun was already above the trees. I sat up and realized that I had not taken my dress off when we came inside. It was now 7:30. I rushed outside to find the highway below crowded with an endless line of huge tanks, the noise from them now much louder than the bombers. They resembled giant steel caterpillars moving slowly, coming from the direction of Mt. Avala and moving toward Belgrade, crushing the asphalt beneath them.

  “Oh, my God. The Germans are here. What’s going to happen now?” said Aunt Nadia as she emerged pulling on her bathrobe. The others followed, sleepy eyes quickly widening to reflect fear.

  “How many of them are there? The highway is filled with tanks as far as you can see,” someone said. Others stood wringing their hands and looking at the highway in disbelief.

  “I don’t know why everybody is in such a panic,” said Father. “After all, we are not being invaded by the “Hooligans,” the Bolsheviks. This is a highly intelligent nation with morals and integrity.”

  “Is it moral to take one country after another, leaving death and destruction all along the way?” demanded Sonya, who was obviously very frightened. Not knowing where Sergei was, she was beginning to fear the worst, especially now in the midst of an enemy invasion.

  “Asya, dear, there isn’t a drop of water in the bucket,” said Aunt Nadia. “We haven’t even brushed our teeth, and we have no water for tea.”

  I looked down at the highway and saw the tanks moving at a slow steady pace from the direction of Mt. Avala toward Belgrade. I could hear German soldiers speaking. It sounded as if they were at the well. With the bucket in my hand I hesitated, wishing someone else would go. But everyone simply stood there staring in the direction of the well.

  “All right, I’ll go and get the water.”

  As I started down the path toward Jovanka’s house, I could hear the soldiers talking below. They were not angry voices; I even heard light laughter. I walked close to the shrubbery at the bottom of the path and hid behind a large bush close to the well. I could see a huge tank in the yard, close to the well. Jovanka’s flower garden and its little white picket fence had been destroyed by the tank.

  Two soldiers in black uniforms holding guns sat on top of the tank. The huge cannon mounted on the tank pointed at the highway. The tank was as high as the farmhouse. Two other soldiers were at the well. They wore black trousers that looked like riding breeches tucked into shiny black boots. Their black shirts or tunics were lying on the ground as they washed at the well.

  I suddenly realized that I hadn’t had a bath in almost a week. “God,” I thought, “I haven’t changed my dress in a week. I’ve even slept in it a couple of nights. I wonder why Mother hasn’t complained about my appearance.”

  I remained crouching there behind the bush, trying to think of what would happen when I went to the well, trying to plan exactly what to do and how to act and asking myself, “Am I afraid? Yes, a little. Should I speak to the soldiers? No, I won’t. I don’t want them to know that I speak German. But will they shoot me? I haven’t seen Mirko or Jovanka. Have they been shot?” No, I reasoned, there has been no gunfire. “No, I mustn’t be afraid,” I told myself.

  Suddenly I remembered my appendix operation a few years before, and Father looking into my eyes as he said, “Remember, you are my daughter and you are a Russian, and we Russians are never afraid of anything,” and how I had jerked my hand from the nurse’s grasp to climb up on the operating table by myself to show the world my bravery, that I “was a Russian.” That little flashback gave me whatever courage I needed, and I stood to walk out from behind the bush.

  As I approached the well I was stunned by the appearance of the soldiers. They were tall, blond, and lanky. They were now putting their tunics on, and as I came closer I could see a silver skull on their caps. The tunics were jet black and matched the breeches. One collar had a silver skull to match the one on the cap, and on the other side the collar had a stylized silver ss. I realized that this must be one of the ss Panzer Divisions that we had heard so much about on the radio. As I drew near the well, the soldiers moved off and wandered around the tank.

  The highway was crowded with other tanks that kept moving slowly toward Belgrade. Mirko came out of the house with a large box that he carried to the tank and handed to one of the soldiers. The soldier looked into the box and said in German, “Ah, it’s a beautiful ham. We’ll eat well tonight. Thank you.” Mirko turned without a word—I don’t think he understood German—and returned to the house. As Mirko reached his house, I finished filling my bucket and started back up to our house.

  “Have you talked to them? Are they in the city already? Where are our soldiers? Why didn’t they fight?” The questions seemed to come from everywhere at once.

  “I didn’t speak to them; I just tried to listen to what they were saying. They weren’t mean to me. They didn’t even speak to me.”

  The whole village had come to life by then. Soldiers seemed to be everywhere, rifles menacingly at the ready. Two soldiers soon came to the house, and Mother spoke to them, as polite as she had been to everyone all her life.

  “We need to search through the house,” one of them said, “and we may need quarters.”

  “You may certainly search, but the house is already filled, as you will see for yourself.” Mother replied.

  “Do you all speak such perfect German?” the soldier asked as Mother led him into the house. “Are you German, perhaps?”

  “Heavens, no,” Mother replied with a small pout, a curious mix of pride and distaste on her face. “We are Russian.”

  This early in the progress of the war, Germany still honored an alliance with Soviet Russia, and her answer may have unwittingly won us a brief reprieve.

  “Well, I do see that the house is quite full, but we will be establishing a temporary watch post behind the house. I see that the whole village is in view from here.”

  “That you may do,” Mother said, as though her permission mattered.

  The two soldiers left, but returned in only a few minutes with more soldiers that moved a lot of equipment to the ridge behind the house. In what seemed no time at all a tower of sorts was being erected, while the two who had inspected our house remained in our yard.

  “Have your troops reached Belgrade yet?” Father asked.

  “Today Belgrade, tomorrow Athens, then . . .” one of them responded with a shrug and a smile. “You know what the Fuehrer said—‘Heute gehőrt uns Deutschland, morgen die ganze Welt.’ So we’re on our way.”

  “How long are you going to stay here?” Father asked.

  “What do you mean ‘how long’? This all belongs to Germany now. We’re here to stay.”

  The soldier’s words were followed by an awkward silence.

  “Is this your daughter?” the other soldier asked, looking now more closely at me. “She is very blonde. I was going to say she looked German until I noticed those black eyes. Do you speak German?” he asked, turning to me. I ignored the question and moved toward Father, to stand close and partly behind him. I had extremely light blonde hair, and this was the first of several times that I would be mistaken for being German.

  The tower was erected very quickly, and the two soldiers left the yard to take their posts in the tower. Later that morning a soldier came to the house wi
th a handbill that announced a curfew. Everyone was to be inside by 4:00 p.m. daily. Violators would be shot. By midafternoon, lookout posts had been set up all around the village.

  That afternoon, as we sat inside the house, a sudden rumbling noise accompanied violent shaking as dishes clattered and a loud crash was heard at the front wall. Frightened, I rushed out to see a huge tank lumbering past the house. The tank had effectively destroyed the gravel road that led to the cornfield at the top of the hill and had damaged our house. A section of the mud brick exterior wall had cracked and partly collapsed beneath one of the front windows.

  Two tanks patrolled the highway constantly, and occasional gunshots were heard. The Germans set up their headquarters in the villa that had served both as home to the local police chief and as the police station. I never saw the local police chief again.

  Aunt Nadia and General Nazimov changed their minds about staying. The appearance of the Germans increased Aunt Nadia’s concern for Kolya and Yura. The boys would now be encountering German patrols constantly, and she was adamant that they return immediately to be closer to them. They left early the following morning.

  The confusion that had engulfed our family with the bombing and invasion was replaced in just a few days with at least a semblance of order. Father, horrified to realize that I was wandering alone through the village, told me that this was far too dangerous and gave strict orders that I was to stay only around the house. I remember feeling like a trapped animal. I longed for something, but did not know what, and I needed someone to talk to. I wondered if the bombing had destroyed Trécha Zhénska, if my teachers were alive. And I thought often of Kristina. Every day I prayed that she would come back to us.

  Father’s strength and determination to maintain an air of normalcy, coupled with my restriction to our house and yard, insulated me from the chaos surrounding us, but not completely. Our house had a good view of the highway and the German military vehicles that moved constantly toward Belgrade, crowding the road as far as we could see. German troops searched throughout the farms and took all the food they could find.

  About four days after the arrival of the invasion force, Father announced that the three of us would return to the city the following morning to try to resume our lives. Aunt ’Lyena was to remain at the house in Yaintse, and Aunt Sonya would remain with her to provide help and companionship. Early next morning Aunt ’Lyena walked with us to the path that led down to the highway. She didn’t seem to mind staying behind in Yaintse, and we embraced warmly.

  As the three of us reached the highway, just the thought of the long, long trek ahead of us began to tire me. Tanks, motorcycles, and military trucks moved steadily along the highway, their occupants shouting sometimes friendly, sometimes insulting remarks. I didn’t understand how they could feel superior because they had destroyed our city and killed so many people who had been unable to defend themselves. God must be on their side, I told myself, because He had let it all happen. My feet began to ache, and I felt as though I could not take another step.

  Military trucks and motorcycles sped past us so closely that they seemed to almost touch my skirt, and I began to wish that one of them would run over me so that I could just forget everything and leave it all behind. I don’t know how Mother found the strength to walk as far as we had come. As we reached the outskirts of Belgrade, I looked up to see an ancient, dilapidated truck, lacking a windshield, coming slowly toward us. It stopped just in front of us on the other side of the road, and Yura and Kolya jumped out.

  “Now this is what I call timing,” Kolya exclaimed. “I just stole this truck.” He paused to correct himself as he noticed the stern look on Father’s face. “I mean I just borrowed it from an empty, bombed out garage. Come on, get in. I was on my way to pick you all up. Your house is standing. In fact, Shenoyna Street and your whole neighborhood escaped damage. They,” he motioned toward the German trucks speeding past, “must have preserved the nicest sections for themselves.” Kolya was joking, but his remark would prove prophetic in another year or so.

  Yura jumped into the rear and helped Mother climb in, and I sat in front between Father and Kolya as he turned the truck around to head into the city. Black smoke still hung over the central area.

  “Really, Asya,” Kolya began. “I drove by your house, and it hasn’t been touched. Your school has some damage. One wing of Trécha Zhénska was hit, but the rest of it seems fine.”

  “What about your house, Kolya? Has there been any damage there?” Father asked.

  “One bomb fell just in front of the house and broke some windows. Some of the doors are jammed, but the house is still livable. One terrible thing is that there are so many bombs that didn’t explode. They’re a real danger because they are hidden. There’s no telling where they are. A couple of them exploded right near the garage where I got this truck.

  “This was the only truck still intact when I got there. As soon as I bring you home, I’m going to return it. Oh, guess who is back?”

  “Back where?” I asked.

  “At your house. Kristina. She came back two days ago. She knew you were all right since the house was undamaged. She knows that I went to rescue you, milady,” he said bowing comically.

  The news that Kristina had returned and was waiting for us at home made everything else seem less terrible. I had prayed so often that she would come back to us that I was convinced that God had answered my prayers and was watching over us. Suddenly Kolya swerved, the truck almost running into a pile of debris in front of us.

  “Kolya, we’ve come through a lot and we’re all still in one piece, so let’s try to stay that way,” Father said, smiling at him.

  “Besides,” I added, “it would hurt my ego something terrible to be killed in a raggedy old truck like this.”

  We both burst out laughing—the laughter bringing relief.

  “You know, Kolya,” I said thoughtfully, “sometimes I think that this is all just a bad dream. That tomorrow when I wake up I’ll still see the beautiful streets, all the chestnut trees and fountains, and all the buildings standing just as I remember them.”

  “Yes, it would be nice if it were only a dream,” he answered wistfully.

  Kolya had to stay alert for standing water that might hide a bomb crater and to make frequent detours because the streets were blocked with debris or furniture that people tried to salvage. At almost every turn, people milled like ants about the ruins of buildings that had been their homes just a few days before, crying as they dug, trying to salvage anything that might be left. Covered bodies lay on the sidewalk, close to the curb, awaiting identification and removal. Just ahead of us, two torn and bloody bodies were being carried to the street, and I quickly turned my face away.

  “Kolya,” I asked, “what is that terrible sweet odor? It’s almost sickening.”

  “That’s the dead that are still buried in the rubble. That sweet smell is from decaying bodies.”

  It was an odor that would remain in my nostrils and that I would encounter many times in the next few years.

  “My God! Haven’t they found all the poor dead ones yet?”

  “No, they are finding them all the time. Why, it will take weeks to dig out all the bodies, and the dumb curfew slows up everything.”

  “They have a curfew here in the city, too?”

  “And how! The Germans are shooting us down like flies. The city is under martial law. If someone is on the streets after curfew, they don’t ask questions. They just shoot.”

  “Careful, Kolya,” Father cautioned, just before an unexploded bomb blew up immediately in front of the truck on the driver’s side. Kolya swerved and managed to safely stop the truck. But blood was running down the side of his head.

  “Kolya, Kolya, are you badly hurt?” I cried, pulling out a handkerchief to begin wiping blood from his ear and face as he slumped slowly forward on the steering wheel.

  “Papa, Papa, Kolya has been hurt!”

  Papa was out and over to the driv
er’s side in a second, examining the wound. “It looks like shrapnel just above his ear.” He pushed Kolya to the center and took the wheel of the truck. “We have to find a doctor or a hospital.”

  Father sped through the streets to a hospital he knew was close by, only to find it guarded by German soldiers who turned us away. He sped to another only to meet the same response.

  “Hold his head and press that hankie on the wound,” he said. “I’ll find a doctor someplace.”

  I moved Kolya’s head to rest on my shoulder and looked in horror as blood dripped down over my blouse and skirt. “Hurry, Papa. He’ll die.”

  “Russkii Dom!” Father exclaimed. “They always have a doctor or at least a nurse on hand for the children in the orphanage.”

  Papa drove so fast through the streets that I was afraid the old truck would turn over. We reached the orphanage in what must have been only minutes but seemed like hours. Papa blew the horn as we stopped, and the sound of the old horn brought back that curious “memory,” or dream, just as it always did. A nurse rushed out at the sound.

  “Is someone hurt?” she called.

  “Yes. Quickly,” Papa said, lifting Kolya from the seat.

  Mother, distraught because of Kolya’s wound, remained in the truck with Yura as we brought Kolya inside. Father carried him to a room where the nurse could examine him. I waited outside the room, looking down the hallway, and walked toward an old nurse seated at a desk outside one of the offices.

  “Where are all the children?”

  “When we heard that the war was threatening, we made arrangements to send all the children to Switzerland and then on to Paris.”

  I had forgotten that.

  “Have they already arrived?” I asked, thinking of Aljona, remembering that she had been sent to Paris on the same train.

  “We don’t know. We haven’t been able to get any information.”

  As Belgrade became embroiled in disputes between Nationalist Serbs and those who wanted to cooperate with the Nazi request for free transit through Yugoslavia, and as the threat of hostilities grew, the Russkii Dom Orphanage placed all the children on a train bound for Paris and the Russian émigré community there. The train was rerouted because of unexpected hostility and then stopped by the Soviet army. All the children were identified as Russian, taken from the train, and sent to the Soviet Union.