Our Woman in Moscow(105)

Underneath those letters, a list of names—PETREL, BEAR, EAGLE, PEGASUS, LION, ELEPHANT, HORSE, RAT. All of them are crossed out except the last two.

“What’s this?”

“It was found on the floor of the cafeteria after lunch. It appears someone had dropped it.”

Lyudmila hands the note back to Grievskaya. “Well? What does this have to do with Marina? Her name’s not on the list.”

“No. These are code names, Comrade Ivanova. That is plain even to those of us not engaged in intelligence work. But one of our teachers has identified the handwriting as that of your daughter. Who, as we have already established, left school early today, without authorization. What is more, two additional students are absent without leave today—one of whom we have long suspected of subversive opinions—which suggests . . .”

Grievskaya’s voice trails away. She looks expectantly at Lyudmila.

“Suggests what, Comrade?” Lyudmila says. “What do you imply? I see nothing but some ordinary high spirits among young people, which is regrettable but hardly subversive.”

Grievskaya removes her spectacles and folds the arms together. She speaks tiredly, as one who’s repeated this lesson too many times already. “Out of little acorns, oak trees grow. As you very well know, Comrade, whose business it is to fell these oak trees. Would it not be preferable to root out the acorns before they can secure themselves in the soil and begin to sprout?”

Of course! Lyudmila wants to scream. Of course it’s preferable—everybody knows this—Lyudmila believes wholeheartedly in the necessity for rooting out stubborn, rebellious acorns as aggressively as possible.

But this is not an acorn. This is Marina! This is her daughter, a human being, not a goddamned acorn!

“I confess, I’m surprised that you would presume to deliver me a lecture on this subject, Comrade Grievskaya,” Lyudmila says, in the silky voice she uses to interrogate suspected oak trees. “A little like the arithmetic teacher presuming to instruct Einstein on calculus?”

Grievskaya shrugs her shoulders. “I am giving you the facts, Comrada Ivanova. I’m confident you will know how to use them. You are, after all, the child’s mother. You are responsible for her. Her character reflects upon your reputation.”

“My daughter is the most brilliant student in her class.”

“In a few days, school will close for the summer, and Marina will join the youth camp at Ekaterinburg, isn’t that right?”

“That’s correct.”

“Then I will dare to offer you a piece of advice, Comrade Ivanova, because I have directed this school for many years, and I well understand how nature softens us and makes us blind to the true character of our offspring. Believe me, I am entirely sympathetic to your plight.”

Rage boils up inside Lyudmila. She presses her lips together so it doesn’t escape in some catastrophic eruption.

Grievskaya continues. “Here at my school, I prefer to address these infractions quietly, within the walls of my office, in conversations with parents. I find it’s the most efficient and effective solution, when the child is so young and his character still so soft and easily corrected. As you know, however, youth camp is different. The children are old enough to have some responsibility for themselves. They will be expected to understand the consequences of their actions, and it is the duty of the instructors at the camp to report any subversive behavior not to the parents of the child in question, but to the Soviet state. Do I make myself clear?”

It would be so easy to lean forward and apply some pressure to a certain point in Grievskaya’s neck that would render her unable to speak further. It would be so easy to return to Moscow Centre and make a telephone call or two that would ruin Grievskaya’s life, if not end it entirely by the most agonizing means possible.

But despite the rage that still boils in Lyudmila’s chest and stomach and sizzles its way to the tips of her fingers and toes, she comprehends that Grievskaya is not altogether wrong. In fact, she speaks the truth. Were Marina to be caught at the youth camp engaging in any kind of activity deemed contrary to the principles of communism, or subversive to the Soviet state, it would be a serious matter indeed. Lyudmila would not have the luxury of sitting in an office with the camp director to discuss some gentle measures to correct her daughter’s character. Lyudmila would have to strain every nerve, call in every possible favor, to remove the stain on Marina’s official record. And—knowing Marina—that wouldn’t stop her daughter from doing it again.

And again.

Indeed, as Lyudmila sits in her chair and locks her gaze with Grievskaya’s gaze in some kind of silent, powerful duel, a terrible future seems to open up before her—a future she has willfully ignored for the past few years, while Marina dropped hint after hint, offered glimpse after glimpse. Honestly, you couldn’t blame Marina. Lyudmila can blame only her own blind eyes for this oversight.

She rises from the chair and holds out her hand. “Perfectly clear, Comrade Grievskaya. Now, if you will excuse me, I must return to my work.”



When Lyudmila opens the door to her office at Moscow Centre at a quarter past four, Anna Dubrovskaya jumps from the chair at her desk. Her sallow face sags with relief.

“Thank goodness you’re here,” she says. “Comrade Vashnikov has been asking for you for the past hour. He says he has some very serious news to share with you, and he refused to tell me what it was.”