The Forest of Souls

by Carla Banks

  And she would go home with him and help Mama feed the hens, or sort the eggs, or draw water from the well. And the summer wind would blow, soughing in the trees, and she would hear birdsong and the sound of the carts bringing the men back from the fields. Nearby, the hens scratched and clucked, and bees hummed in the flowers that grew round the door.

  And away in the distance, to the east, she heard the whistle of the train.

  7

  Jake parked his car in the road outside the Yevanov house. It was in a similar suburb to Marek Lange’s, from the same era, and built in the same style. But there, all similarities ended. Sophia Yevanova’s house was surrounded by a well-kept garden that had been planted with a view to year-round colour. As Jake walked up the drive–swept free of autumn leaves weeks ago–he admired the brilliant reds and greens of the dogwood, the yellow of the winter jasmine that climbed up the front of the house among the last leaves of the creeper, whose stalks were now almost bare.

  As he stepped through the front door, smiling his thanks to the woman who admitted him, he felt the warmth of the house envelop him. The hallway gleamed with polished wood. Vases of spring flowers on the hall table and windowsills dispelled the winter. ‘Good morning, Mr Denbigh.’ The woman, Mrs Barker, greeted him with the warmth that befitted a favourite. She led him through to the room at the back of the house where Sophia Yevanova customarily spent her days.

  She was confined to her chair, but she sat upright, as though she could rise from it with the ease of a dancer rising en point. In fact, she looked like a dancer, with the fine-boned delicacy of a classical ballerina, or like a sculpture or a painting, a work of art ravaged by time.

  As Jake was ushered through her door, she put down the tapestry she was working on–every time they had talked, her hands had been restlessly occupied–and held out her hand to him. For all her elegance and composure, he thought she looked poorly–paler and more tired than the last time he’d talked to her. The illness that had imprisoned her must be making its presence felt.

  ‘Miss Yevanova.’

  ‘Mr Denbigh. How good of you to call.’

  ‘My pleasure.’ The courtesy was the simple truth. He took pleasure in her company.

  Her dark gaze held his, then she smiled. ‘I will have tea, Mrs Barker.’ She raised an enquiring eyebrow at Jake, who nodded. ‘Mr Denbigh and I would like tea–the Darjeeling, I think. Thank you.’ The woman withdrew.

  Sophia Yevanova laid her tapestry carefully on the table and waited until the door was closed. ‘I thought I had told you enough stories to keep you occupied for longer than this, Mr Denbigh,’ she said. ‘I see I must try harder.’

  The last time he’d visited, they had talked about her life in Minsk as a girl, living in the shadow of Stalin’s terror. In a way, she was right. There was more than enough in everything she had already told him for a book, but so far, they hadn’t talked about the Nazi occupation. They’d touched briefly on the deaths of her fellow partisans, and her response had been unequivocal: ‘They are gone. I will not speak of such deaths.’

  He looked at the wall behind her chair. An icon hung there, its jewel-like colours gleaming from the shadows. It had been the one thing of value, ‘apart from my son’, that she had brought out of Belarus. She had smiled when she said that, her eyes going to the photograph on the side table that she kept within easy reach–her son, Antoni Yevanov.

  She’d told him the story. Passing by the church in Minsk after it had been looted by the fascists as they retreated from the Red Army, she’d seen the gleam of gold in the dirt and rubble, and found the icon–the virgin and child–intact and undamaged. It had been a sign. ‘I knew then that God was going to let me live, He was going to let me get away.’ She had brought the icon to England, and even in her darkest moments, she had never considered selling it.

  He was struck again by the shadows under her eyes, the parchment-like whiteness of her skin. ‘You look tired,’ he said.

  She arched her eyebrows at him. ‘If you tell a woman she looks tired, she will assume that you mean she looks old.’ He began to speak, but she raised her hand to stop him. ‘I am old. I am not foolish enough to pretend otherwise.’

  ‘I’ve got something I’d like you to see,’ he said.

  ‘Well then, you must show it to me.’ The tea arrived, and she took care serving it. For her, tea was an important social ritual, poured from a silver teapot into white, translucent china.

  He took the photographs out of his wallet, and waited until she put her cup down on the occasional table beside her, then passed them to her. She studied the first one, the family standing outside the house, holding it away from her face. ‘There were many such,’ she said indifferently, handing it back to him.

  He watched her carefully as she gave the photo of the young man in uniform the same careful scrutiny. He thought her lips tightened a bit, but otherwise she displayed no emotion. ‘Old photographs,’ she said. ‘You have been doing your research, Mr Denbigh.’

  He nodded, not letting his disappointment at her lack of reaction show. He knew from past experience that she would sometimes appear to ignore something he said or something he asked, then return to it later when he’d given up hope of an answer.

  ‘So you are going to Minsk,’ she said.

  He’d told her about his planned trip. ‘I’m leaving after the weekend,’ he said. ‘Just for a few days. Where should I go?’

  She shook her head. ‘There is nothing left,’ she said. ‘Not of my city. I can’t advise you.’

  ‘I want to find the old city, what’s left. I can bring you back some photos, if you want. I could try and go to the village where you were sent when you were twelve.’

  She smiled faintly. ‘You are assuming I want to find my past,’ she said. ‘I left it behind years ago.’

  He nodded. He could understand that. ‘I’d like to hear more of your story,’ he said. ‘If you have time.’

  ‘Very well.’ The room was silent apart from the sound of the rain. The last time they had talked, she had given him a spare, unemotional account of her childhood in Minsk. Her parents had both been members of the communist party, but life in the city had been hard. There was poverty and deprivation throughout the country. ‘My father was a good party member,’ she had said. ‘He was also a good husband and a good man.’ She had ended her story when she was twelve, when her parents had sent her to live with relatives in a village on the outskirts of Minsk, Zialony Luh.

  ‘We lived in the aftermath of the revolution,’ she said now. ‘It was a terrible war. You know about the history?’

  He nodded. ‘I’ve read the books.’

  ‘The books…’ Her smile mocked knowledge gained that way. In the dull light of the afternoon, her face was a paler shadow among shadows. ‘I remember my last weeks in Minsk. It was winter, 1937. So cold. I have never known cold like it before or since. It was as if the world had frozen in the face of what was happening and all that was to come. I remember it was late and I was hurrying to get home. I was walking along the road near the building where the police worked–these were Stalin’s police, the NKVD. The building was just ordinary offices. Many people worked there.

  ‘And then I saw it. Narrow openings at the bottom of the walls. They were barred, but there was no glass. They made windows, of a kind, to the cellars. And that night, there was steam rising up, out through the bars, thick in the icy air. The breath of hundreds of people, crammed into the NKVD cellars, waiting…People they had arrested. Some people that I knew, maybe. How many were packed down there, I can’t imagine…’

  She looked at Jake. ‘Where did they go? The arrests never stopped.’

  There was only one answer to that question.

  ‘We knew,’ she said. ‘But no one talked about it, or not where they thought they might be overheard. But it got so bad in Minsk, the arrests. That was when my father decided to send me to Zialony Luh, on the edge of the Kurapaty Forest.’

  Kurapaty. Jake looked a
cross at her, but her eyes were fixed on the distance, as if she had forgotten he was there.

  ‘I had a cousin there, Raina. She was my age, and she was beautiful. These things matter to young girls, even in such…The young are very stupid. When I got there, Raina’s mother, my aunt, tried to send me back. “It’s bad here,” she said. But there was nowhere for me to go.’ She closed her eyes.

  ‘This is tiring you,’ Jake said. ‘You need to rest. We can do this another time.’

  She looked at him with wry amusement. ‘I think you should listen while you can. I may be ashes next time we meet. It is just–it was so long ago, but when I talk about it, it is like yesterday.’ She was quiet for a moment, then she began speaking again. ‘It was the trucks. I remember the sound of the trucks. They went by into the forest, all afternoon, all evening. My aunt kept the shutters closed tight. “It’s cold,” she said, and sealed the gaps with rags. But that night, something woke me. I was sharing Raina’s bed. I crept out, careful not to disturb her. I wrapped my shawl around myself against the cold, and I pulled away the rags and opened the shutters. And then the sounds I had half heard were clearer. It was a dry sound, over and over: klop-klop-klop and quiet. Then klop-klop-klop again. And a moaning sound that went on and on in the night, and sometimes a cry that muffled into silence. I knew the sound of gunfire. We all did. But this was so…regular, so…methodical. And then Raina woke up and she closed the shutters and pulled me back to the bed.’ Her face was mask-like, frozen with memory.

  ‘But my aunt couldn’t keep the shutters up, and all the time, day and night, the trucks rattled along the road, and we heard the sounds. We were in the forest, Raina and I, the day the guns stopped firing. But that was many weeks later.’

  Jake sat back in his chair, letting the tension that had developed in his shoulders relax. As she had spoken, the past had touched the present. He had felt the ice of that winter, seen the steam rising from the breath of the prisoners crammed into the cellars, looked with her into the shadows of the forest.

  A knock at the door ended the silence. Miss Yevanova came out of her reverie and picked up her embroidery. ‘Yes?’ she said.

  The nurse, Mrs Barker, came in. ‘There’s been a message for you,’ she said. ‘From Miss Harley.’ She looked at Jake as she spoke.

  Jake made to stand up, but Miss Yevanova waved him back to his seat. ‘And she says…?’

  Mrs Barker looked anxious. ‘It’s as she told you,’ she said. ‘They’ve…taken the action she warned you of.’

  ‘I see.’ Miss Yevanova sat very still. Her voice was cool and level, but the colour had left her face. ‘It is only what we expected,’ she said.

  Mrs Barker caught Jake’s eye with an implied warning. He gave her an imperceptible nod, and looked again at Miss Yevanova. ‘I’ll…’ he began.

  She interrupted him. ‘There is no need for you to leave, Mr Denbigh.’ She turned to Mrs Barker. ‘Did Miss Harley…?’

  ‘She said she’d phone as soon as she had any news,’ Mrs Barker said. ‘And I really think…’

  Miss Yevanova raised her eyebrows. ‘That is all, Mrs Barker.’

  She waited until the housekeeper had left, then turned to Jake. He saw that some colour had returned to her face. ‘I will tell you another story, Mr Denbigh. And then you will tell me what you think.’ He started to speak, but she silenced him with a raised hand. ‘Listen. The phone call, the message, was about the son of a close friend–a friend who is now dead. My son Antoni has no children. I think of Nicholas sometimes as the grandchild I do not have. He…’ She stopped speaking, and sat very still for a moment before she resumed her story. ‘I was warned that this was going to happen, but I hoped it would not. There is no easy way to say this. Nicholas has been arrested on a charge of murder.’

  Murder? Jake looked at her blankly. ‘What happened?’

  Her voice had the same dry distance as when she recounted the stories from her past. ‘Early this morning, a woman was found dead in a house in the Derwent Valley. It is an isolated location, and Nicholas was working there. It is an irony that I helped him to get the job. I was concerned at once that the police might believe he was implicated–he was there, you see, and they prefer an easy solution. That phone call was from my solicitor. As I feared, Nicholas has been arrested.’

  ‘Have they charged him?’

  She shook her head. Her expression was bleak. ‘But they will, if they can. He makes a convenient suspect. I have little faith in them.’

  It was true enough–they could get it wrong. Jake thought about some of the cases he’d come across. But if they’d arrested this man there had to be more to the story than the simple outline she had given him. He realized that there must be something she wanted him to do, or she wouldn’t have told him. ‘How can I help you?’ he said.

  Her gaze was steady. ‘Mr Denbigh, you have professional contact with the police, do you not?’

  ‘I have done.’ He’d done his share of crime reporting, and he’d kept his contacts up. Cass worked for the local force in a civilian capacity. But he needed to disillusion Miss Yevanova at once about any ability he might have to influence events. ‘I can’t change what’s happening,’ he said.

  ‘I’m aware of that,’ she said. ‘But I would like to know what the police are planning, how their minds are working. I want to know why they suspect Nicholas.’

  Was she asking him to investigate the crime? ‘Maybe a private detective…’ he began, but she shook her head impatiently.

  ‘I have every confidence in the solicitor I have instructed. But the police worry me. I want to know what they are thinking, how they are interpreting what they find. Are these questions you could ask?’

  It wouldn’t be the Manchester force dealing with it. He ran his list of contacts through his mind. He had some ideas about who he could approach. ‘Give me the details,’ he said. ‘I’ll see what I can do.’

  As he stood up to leave, she handed back the photographs. ‘Why did you show me these?’ she said.

  ‘I need to know where they were taken. I thought you might be able to help me.’

  ‘The first one is a peasant house. As I told you, there were many such. I have no idea where it might be. But this one–’ Her fingers touched the photo of Marek Lange, the young man standing proudly in his uniform. ‘I can tell you about this one.’ Her face looked sad. ‘It was taken in Minsk.’

  Sophia Yevanova sat watching the fire. The coals shifted, scattering ashes on to the hearth and sending sparks flying up the chimney. The evening was drawing in and the shadows pooled in the corners of the room. She looked up at the icon on the wall, then her eyes went back to the red glow at the heart of the dying fire.

  She sometimes thought that all the comforts around her were no more than ramparts she had built against the past, walls that she had braced and strengthened over the years.

  Sometimes those years seemed closer than the present. When she had talked to Jake Denbigh, she felt as though she was walking again under the trees of Kurapaty. She had felt the leaf-mould under her feet, and smelled the pine resin on the breeze. Just for a moment, she had been afraid to open her eyes, in case she would find herself back there.

  And now the shifting coals were drawing faces in the flames. She watched, and didn’t watch, for the face she was afraid she might see and the face she still, after all these years, wanted to see, the face of the man she had loved, the face of her son’s father, dead so many years before.

  The cushions on her chair had slipped, and her back was starting to ache. She made herself sit up straighter. The discomfort was a useful antidote to fatigue, and she could feel her leg starting to twitch and jump, a sure sign that she was tired.

  She heard the sound of doors opening and closing, of people talking in the corridor, Mrs Barker’s low voice, and the authoritative tones of her son. She listened to them with a resigned amusement–did they think she was deaf as well as ill? Antoni was asking about Jake Denbigh’s visits, somethin
g he’d paid little attention to before, and Mrs Barker was telling him, in her muted, self-effacing way, about the events of the day. Antoni would not be pleased. He was not a patient man–but then she hadn’t brought him up to be patient.

  She heard his footsteps moving along the corridor as he came to greet her. She switched on her light and picked up her sewing. She didn’t want him to find her sitting idle in the dark. It would worry him. She sat up straighter, ignoring the stab of pain in her back, and smiled as the door opened.

  ‘Antoni,’ she said, holding out her hand.

  He took it and looked down at her, his face shadowed. ‘You look tired,’ he said abruptly. ‘I understand that journalist visited you again today.’

  ‘He is a pleasant young man.’ She shifted to ease her discomfort. ‘I enjoy talking to him.’

  He made an impatient sound and went down on one knee to rearrange her cushions, positioning them so that they supported her back. ‘Better?’ He assessed her with his eyes. ‘Good. It’s the man’s profession to make himself pleasant. Mrs Barker, I can understand, but I thought that you would be impervious to the power of a smile.’

  ‘I will have plenty of time to resist young men with charming smiles when I am in my grave. In the meantime, allow me the few small vices I can still enjoy.’ She studied his face as she spoke. He was the one who looked tired. His eyes–suddenly she was looking into his father’s eyes, and had to drop her gaze before he could see her expression change–his eyes looked weary and shadowed.