Daughters of the Night Sky(83)
She exhaled deeply and looked at each of our faces in turn, then pointed south down the path, in the same direction where the soldiers departed. They might be waiting for all of us behind any bush or tree, despite the fact that Polina, Renata, and I were their countrywomen. We’d insulted their pride, and at least the younger of them seemed the sort to exact revenge on any women who dared commit such a slight.
She led us to a house on the edge of town that would once have been described as quaint. It was fashioned from thin, rough-hewn logs and a few windows that would have let in the dappled forest sunlight had they not been boarded up to protect against stray bomb blasts and the eyes of lusty soldiers. She showed us inside the cottage, where two children with dirty-blond hair were playing on the unswept floor. At the sight of our uniforms, they jumped up and cowered in the far corner of the room. The little boy wrapped his arms around his sister, who wept onto the collar of his shirt. Though he could not have been more than seven years old, his nostrils flared and he looked at us defiantly.
“Your father or one of your brothers is here to keep an eye on things?” I asked, having noticed there was not another house within sight. The children’s raspy breathing seemed to calm as they parsed my German.
“No,” she said. “They’re gone. Drafted. My father died early on in France, and my brother was shot because he refused to—well, you understand.”
“I do.” More than a few of my own countrymen had met the same end when they refused to answer Stalin’s call, and Hitler was surely no more forgiving.
“How do you manage to keep yourselves out of harm’s way?” Polina asked.
“I don’t,” Heide said, her arms crossed and her chin tucked to her chest. “Such a thing is not possible. They come, and I am powerless to stop them from doing as they wish. Taking food, blankets—whatever it is they desire. For the sake of the children, I can only do my best to ensure they don’t have reason to kill me.”
In the stoop of her shoulders and the waver of her voice was a fatigue that sleep would not cure. The war had taken from her, but the aftermath had broken her.
“How many times has your home been raided?”
“Over and over,” she whispered. “I stopped counting.”
“Sweet Jesus,” Renata murmured, absentmindedly crossing herself, whispering “God bless and protect you” under her breath.
I emptied my bag of the rest of my rations—scanty though they were—onto the scarred wooden table that dominated the room. Polina and Renata followed suit, adding some tinned milk and two apples to my meager contribution to the family larder. The little boy’s allegiance was won over in a flash by the paltry offering. He untangled himself from his sister and raced to the table and snatched up an apple before his older sister could enforce rationing. His teeth sunk into the fleshy globe of fruit with an audible crunch. Juice dribbled down his chin from the upturned corners of his mouth.
“Selfish boy,” Heide chided. “Share with your little sister.” She turned to us. “That scamp is Klaus, and the little one is Veronika.”
Klaus nodded and skittered back to the corner, where the delicate girl of five or six years still stood, eyeing us as she would an unreliably trained wolf.
“Please be as careful as you can,” I bade Heide. “I’ll do what I can to bring back some more provisions for you, but I can’t promise anything.”
Heide uncurled from herself and grabbed me in an embrace. I returned her squeeze and pulled back. “This is nothing,” I said. “I wish I could do more.”
“It is everything,” she contradicted. “If all the Soviet women are like you, there may be hope for the future. Go home and civilize your men.”
Renata and Polina gave her their promises for a speedy return as well, and the children even favored us with their sticky kisses before we departed.
Nearly at once I sought out Polkovnik Ozerov, the commanding officer who was my direct superior. I relayed to him Heide’s situation and the danger she and the children faced alone.
“She is one of millions in that situation, Major Soloneva. We cannot protect them all.”
“But we can order the men to act like gentlemen, can we not?” I countered, taking a step closer to his desk.
“We can order whatever we like. It doesn’t mean we will have any success,” he said, heaving a sigh that bordered on the dramatic.
“Are you or are you not their commanding officer?” I spat.
“Watch yourself, Major. This war is not over yet.” He sat up straight in his chair, his expression now hard. “These men have been fighting with barely enough food to survive. They have slept in tents and trenches for the better part of four years. Who am I to deny them some comforts?”
“ Comforts? At what cost? The safety of innocent civilians?”
“Soldiers are never the only ones who suffer in war, and no civilian is eager to have one fought on his front porch. It’s a bad business, I’ll admit, but there is nothing to be done.”
I felt the blood pulsing in my face, the heat emanating from my pores. He suddenly became very concerned with the papers on his desk, but I did not allow him to escape my stare.
“If we cannot protect innocent women and children from our own troops, then what was the war for? Would you be so complacent if it were your wife? Your daughters? Your sons being manhandled by the Germans?”