The Longest Winter

by Daphne Wright

  ‘Good of you, Adamson,’ was all Richard could manage to say.

  Then they went back so that Richard could say goodbye to the girls, and Bob, watching Evelyn’s small embarrassed smile, knew that she had guessed at least part of the conversation. When they were at last alone that evening she said to him:

  ‘Thank you for being so patient with Dick this afternoon.’

  Bob smiled at her with a new gentleness and said:

  ‘It wasn’t so hard. He was trying to do the right thing for you, and I’m with him on that.’ Then, in case she shared some of her brother’s embarrassment, Bob changed the subject: ‘Did you notice Dindin at supper?’

  Trying to control the ludicrous, inappropriate feelings that were seething in her mind, Evelyn shook her head meaninglessly.

  ‘I know. I hadn’t realised they were quite so close. I suppose he has been here quite a lot while you and I have been out; and he has taken her for rather a lot of walks since Sasha got ill.’ After a moment she controlled her voice and went on. ‘I thought he was just trying to be helpful, but obviously it was not quite so altruistic. I just hope that he recognises how vulnerable she is now. He may be amusing himself …’

  ‘Oh no,’ protested Bob. ‘That wouldn’t square at all with his notions of propriety.’ But Evelyn did not smile. There was too much at stake for her. He could hear bitterness in her voice when she said:

  ‘It’s different for men.’

  There was an arrested look in his dark-lashed hazel eyes as it dawned on him that she, too, might have thought he was trying to seduce her for fun and would then leave her as soon as he had what he wanted, but before he could find words careful enough to ask her, Tallie had called out from her bedroom:

  ‘Evie, Evie! Please come!’

  During the next few days, as Evelyn tried to persuade herself that Sasha was regaining some of his desperately-needed strength, Bob watched her and tried to find a way to talk to her. But he could see that she was too worried to listen to anything. All he could do for her while Sasha was so ill was to speed on the boat-builder and to chase Evelyn herself out of doors at least once a day while he sat with the child. She resisted leaving him as he became progressively weaker, but accepted Bob’s point that it would do Sasha no good at all for her to become cross and difficult through lack of fresh air and exercise.

  Two days after Dick had left for the battle, Evelyn took Tallie and Dindin down to the river. They knew that the furthest point of the advance was miles from Archangel, but in the hot, thick air of July there was nothing to muffle the boom of the guns. While Tallie paddled in the river, wincing at the sounds, Dindin stood like a figurehead looking down the Dvina, an expression of unfulfilled yearning on her face that made Evelyn forget all her irritation with the girl and want to strangle Dick.

  ‘Dindin,’ she said carefully, ‘don’t be too afraid for Dick. I’m sure he’s not in too much danger.’

  ‘How can you say that?’ burst out the girl. ‘He’s facing those cruel, wicked Bolos – and he might be … he might be killed. What would you have said if someone told you not to worry about John?’

  ‘Isn’t that a little different? You haven’t known Dickie for very long, Dindin, and in very artificial circumstances. You can’t know yet how each of you will feel when we’re back in England.’

  Dindin, who had heard nothing but patronising advice in that, turned back to stare blindly down the huge, slow-moving river and said:

  ‘I love him, and I belong to him.’

  Evelyn felt suddenly faint and put up her hand to her forehead.

  ‘Dindin,’ she said as calmly as she could, ‘What …? I mean, has he said anything … does he feel the same way?’

  ‘No,’ she said in a far-away voice. ‘But I know he loves me. He used to kiss me when he came while you and Bob were out and someone like him would never do that if he didn’t mean to tell me he loved me. Besides I could not feel like this if we weren’t both in love.’

  The violence of the anger she felt surprised Evelyn, but she could not shake it off. It was true that she had wanted Dick to distract Dindin from her imagined feelings for Bob Adamson, but that Dick, who had taken such a sanctimonious line with his elder sister, should now arouse this sort of feeling in a girl as unprotected as Dindin seemed unforgivable. Knowing so much of what Dindin must be feeling, Evelyn felt sorrier for her cousin than she had ever felt before and she wanted passionately to protect the girl from the doubt and misery she herself was experiencing every day. But the rage coursing through her must have coloured her voice, for when she tried to explain to Dindin that she must not build hopes that were too heavy for such slender foundations, the girl burst out:

  ‘Well, you wouldn’t let me fall in love with Bob when I wanted to and I need someone.’ Tears poured down her cheeks; ‘It isn’t fair, Evie. My brothers are fighting each other and may be dead now; Sasha is horribly ill; my parents are stuck in Shenkursk and they will probably be killed too. All the men I might have married are dead or far away. I haven’t anyone. I just didn’t know it would be like this. It’s even worse now. And if he’s killed what will I do?’

  ‘Dindin, I am so sorry,’ said Evelyn, trying to make her cousin sit down on the old pier beside her. Then she put an arm round her shoulders. ‘But you mustn’t be afraid. Although there have been lots of wounded in this campaign, hardly anyone has been killed. I am sure Dick will come back to you. And you are family, Dindin; we’ll always look after you. I’ve just been so worried about Sasha that I didn’t think how afraid you must be about – about the future. I am so sorry.’

  In Evelyn’s mind, the knowledge of what her brother had done so irresponsibly and selfishly nearly outweighed her fears about the battle that was being waged so audibly down the river. As soon as she had taken Tallie back to the flat and found Bob there, she asked him to go out with her, leaving the children in Dindin’s charge. She told him what she had learned and to her dismay his first reaction was to laugh.

  ‘Bob, it’s not funny at all.’ He sobered quickly and said:

  ‘For Dindin, no, not funny at all. But what a little tick to order you and me around so piously and at the same time start kissing the first available woman.’ He felt Evelyn stiffen alarmingly at his side and in a quite different tone said: ‘Now what’s the matter?’

  ‘It’s all so crude, Bob. It’s so horrible and what Dick has done is so wicked that it makes … Oh, I don’t know how to put it.’

  ‘I wish I understood what goes on in your mind,’ he said after a long pause, and then, exasperation getting the better of his determination to remain coolly friendly while she needed all her energies to deal with her anxiety over Sasha, added, ‘or that you could bring yourself to tell me.’

  Evelyn stood and looked at him. If only she could. Her lips parted as though she was about to speak. Then the thought of his embarrassment if he had to tell her that it was all over for him paralysed her. Tears of frustration welled into the corners of her eyes and he saw them.

  ‘I didn’t mean to worry you again, Eve,’ he said, contrition battling with anger in his voice. ‘Don’t think about it. I know you can’t. Come and see the boat anyway. They’ve started varnishing.’

  ‘That sounds as though they must have nearly finished,’ she answered, relieved to have so easy a subject to talk about. ‘Thank God, we’ll be able to get Sasha out of here.’

  ‘Yes. Tomorrow – or perhaps the day after – we’ll be able to take the boat out for a trial. Will you at least trust me enough for that?’

  ‘Oh, Bob, of course I trust you. I’ve told you so often. What can

  you mean? Oh, help, look at the time. I must get back. Samenev

  said he’d come at five.’

  The doctor looked graver than he had yet done as he pulled the sheet back up to Sasha’s chin and Evelyn did not dare ask him what the prospects were. He rubbed his beard for a moment or two and then turned to her and said:

  ‘It is getting dangerous. You
must watch him carefully. If … if he gets any weaker or he has trouble breathing you must send for me at once. Do you understand?’

  ‘Yes, Doctor. Do you mean …? Is he …?’

  ‘It is possible. Try to keep calm for his sake.’

  ‘Calm!’ she almost shouted, and then moderated her voice: ‘But what can I do? Isn’t there some medicine he should take? Oh, can’t you do something?’

  ‘Nothing. It is the body fighting back against the weakness. We have to wait to see if he will win.’

  ‘Will you talk to his sisters? I don’t think I could.’

  ‘Of course. Be brave now.’

  After that Evelyn did not even undress to go to bed once the girls and Bob had left her. She just sat by Sasha’s bed in the mocking light as the night hours dragged themselves out so torturingly slowly. His face was almost grey and his lips were pinched and cracked. He had been conscious for shorter and shorter periods in the last few days and as she watched him then she gave up hope.

  Soon after midnight, his breathing, which had been laboured but almost regular, started to change. Suddenly alert, she bent forward to feel his pulse; it was odder and fainter than ever. Forcing herself to leave him for a few minutes, she went to the curtained cubby hole where Bob slept.

  He woke at the first touch of her fingers on his face, and sat up instantly.

  ‘Eve, what is it? Is he worse?’ Her face answered him and he threw back the bedclothes.

  ‘You go back to him; I’ll go for Samenev. Go on back to Sasha. I’ll be as quick as I can.’

  She did as he said and sat down again by Sasha’s bed. The noise must have woken him out of his semi-conscious sleep, for she saw his dark eyes gleam in the white light.

  ‘Go to sleep, baby, I’m here.’

  ‘Don’t leave me ever, Evie,’ he said in a hardly audible voice.

  ‘I won’t, Sashenka. I won’t ever leave you.’ She thought he had drifted back into unconsciousness, but in a few moments he spoke again.

  ‘I wish Piotr was here.’

  Evelyn felt as though someone had her heart in a vice and was slowly tightening it. Doing everything she could to keep the sound of tears out of her voice, she said:

  ‘Do you miss them all so much, Little Dove?’

  ‘Only Piotr. I wish he was here.’

  It was anguish for Evelyn to be unable to give the child what he so much wanted at such a moment. She picked up his thin, floppy body and held him in her arms.

  Because her left hand lay over his heart, she knew the exact moment when it stopped beating.

  When Bob came back with Doctor Samenev twenty-five minutes later, they saw her holding the child to her breast, while her cheek lay on his hair. Samenev tried to take Sasha from her, but she tightened her arms defensively.

  ‘I must examine the child.’

  Without raising her head, Evelyn said:

  ‘There’s nothing to see now.’ The doctor did not understand and in a voice of exaggerated patience said:

  ‘If I’m to help, I must examine him. Lay him on the bed now, there’s a good girl.’ But Adamson was quicker.

  ‘Eve …’ he began, but could not go on.

  ‘Yes,’ she said, looking at them at last. ‘He’s dead.’ Then her face seemed to break up before their eyes.

  ‘He’s dead.’

  There was a cry from the doorway and Bob turned to see Dindin supporting her little sister, who seemed to have fainted. Both girls were barefooted and in their skimpy white nightgowns. The doctor went to help them, muttering:

  ‘Lucky I’ve plenty of bromide. They’ll all need it now.’

  Galvanised into action by the sound, Bob walked slowly towards Evelyn. He wanted to comfort her, to hold her as she held the child, but he did not dare touch her. Gently he spoke to her.

  ‘Eve, let me lay him on the bed.’

  She did not answer, but neither did she resist as he lifted Sasha’s limp body away from her. He put it down on the bed, straightening the limbs and then, as carefully as though the boy could still feel, he closed the eyelids. He stood looking down at the child. Feeling in his pocket for a handkerchief to wipe the corners of his eyes, he turned back to Evelyn.

  ‘Here,’ he said, the pity roughening his voice. ‘Take this.’ He offered her the square of linen.

  Obediently she took it and tried to staunch the tears that she could not control. When she took the handkerchief away they still fell.

  ‘It seems so unfair,’ she murmured as though to herself. ‘What had Sasha ever done?’

  ‘Ah don’t, Eve.’

  ‘I’m sorry.’

  The doctor came back just then, carrying his fat black bag and saying:

  ‘Poor girls – well at least they’ll sleep off some of the shock. And now, young lady, I want you to take a dose too, and then Mr Adamson and I will make some arrangements.’

  ‘You’re going to take him away, aren’t you?’

  ‘I must. In this season, it is not possible to leave him here.’

  Bob shuddered and watched anxiously as Evelyn got up and went to the bed. She brushed Sasha’s dark hair away from his pale forehead and then bent down to kiss his face.

  ‘It’s cold,’ she whispered. ‘Oh, Sasha, my baby, I’m so sorry … so sorry.’

  She took his hand and rubbed it between her own as though to warm it. Then she laid it on his chest, brought the other up to cover it and moved away.

  Bob released the breath he had been holding and went to pick up the body. As he lifted it, he said:

  ‘Eve, I shall come back as soon … as soon as I can.’

  She nodded and went back to her chair, to sit staring out of the small dusty window. When she heard them go slowly down the steep, wooden stairs, she whispered to herself: ‘Shall I ever be allowed to love anyone?’

  When Bob got back, his mind full of the horror of carrying the empty body of the child to Samenev’s hospital mortuary, where it would be disembowelled and eviscerated in the post-mortem, Evelyn was still sitting where they had left her. She turned at the sound of his step and what he saw in her face drove all his own misery out of his mind.

  ‘Eve,’ he said, his heart breaking for her. ‘Eve, don’t. It’s over for Sasha now; all the pain. He’s free now.’

  ‘But don’t you see? I did it. If I hadn’t been in Russia, I don’t suppose they’d ever have let the children come to Archangel, and if they hadn’t he’d never have got malaria at all.’

  ‘Eve,’ he was beginning as he groped for words that might comfort her. He knelt down beside her chair.

  ‘Don’t be angry with me now!’ she cried out as she saw his face. ‘I couldn’t bear it.’

  ‘I’m not angry, dearest child. I couldn’t be,’ he murmured, cradling her exhausted body and stroking her hair. ‘Lean against me, Eve. I can’t stop it hurting, but I want to help.’

  ‘John, Tony, Sasha: who else is going to die? Oh, help me, Bob. Why does something awful happen to people I love? What’s going to happen to you?’

  He had thought so much about what she might one day say to him and what he could say to her that it had never occurred to him that she would admit her feelings at a moment when he could neither make love to her nor ask her to marry him. With his very real sorrow for Sasha mingling with the relief that she cared as he had always hoped she would come to care for him, he held her as gently as he could and said:

  ‘Evelyn, nothing’s going to happen to me. Listen to me and believe it. I love you. I won’t leave you ever, for anything. I promise you that, and you can trust me. Don’t try to say anything. Just rest against me now. The pain will ease.’ He rocked her gently until she relaxed and then he carried her to the bed.

  He sat beside her for the rest of the night, and every time he saw her eyes open, he took her hand and talked to her until she could relax again.

  Chapter Twenty-one

  They were allowed to bury Sasha the next day, as soon as Samenev’s post-mortem was over.

&n
bsp; When they set off for the cathedral, the temperature was well over seventy-five degrees and to Evelyn it seemed the cruellest of ironies that Sasha, who had hated the darkness and the cold of the winter almost more than any of them, should be buried on this cloudless, hot, sunny, perfect afternoon. She felt a little better once they reached the cathedral, for although its exterior was white, gaily painted with frescoes, and topped with glittering golden domes, the inside was cavernous and dark. Candle flames flickered on the dark gilt mosaics and incense-smoke wreathed above them.

  There were no seats and as she knelt down on the cold, stone floor, Evelyn was thankful that she was able to do this small thing for Sasha: to remember him in this formal way. John had had no funeral and the knowledge of his smashed body lying undiscovered in Flanders added horror to unhappiness. Kneeling there with her cousins on one side and Bob on the other, his shoulder almost touching her own, she tried to lay aside all the feelings of anger and resentment at fate to remember the happy hours she had spent with Sasha, with her brother Anthony, and with John. It seemed the only way to give anything back. She was not sure that she believed in any kind of afterlife, but just in case there was another world she wanted to launch Sasha into it with cheerfulness, not on a tide of lamentation.

  Bob was so close to her that he could feel the sudden relaxation in her tense body and he was glad. During the morning, as he grappled with the practicalities of interment in Archangel and tried to find some way of getting a message through to Shenkursk, he had got back some of his sense of reality and no longer felt as though it was their own child who had died. The sharpest pain was over for him, but it had left him with a mess of regrets, and a determination to get Evelyn out of Archangel and away from the place of Sasha’s death as soon as possible.