Tatiana and Alexander: A Novel(128)

"Don't you remember getting bathed and deloused when they first brought us here?" asked Alexander.

"Yes. They don't want to interrogate us filthy. They bathe and delouse us as a matter of course."

"Indeed they do, Lieutenant. They also, while you're naked, as a matter of course make sure you aren't Jewish. If you were, I guarantee you would not be here."

In the meantime, there were rumors of grave American losses in H?rtgen Forest near the Ardennes in Belgium and of carnage and bestial fighting and no relief or capitulation in sight.

Each morning Alexander worked, repaired, built, supervised other prisoners, and each afternoon he repaired the barbed wire fence on the perimeter of the camp, or the windows in the broken compounds, or cleaned empty weapons, anything to keep his hands busy. For that he was fed a bit better. But it wasn't enough. Pasha reminded Alexander of his own experience in the prisoner camp at Minsk, where the Germans, unable to figure out what to do with all those Soviets, just let them all die.

"Well, they can't let all the Allied POWs die."

"Oh, they can't, can't they? What are we going to do, chase them straight to hell to hold them accountable? I say we try to escape again. You repair that stupid f*cking fence all the time. It's constantly falling down." Generated by ABC Amber LIT Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abclit.html

"Yes, but now they have a sentry watching just me."

"Let's kill him and run."

"It's Catholic Christmas tomorrow. Can we not kill him on Christmas perhaps?"

"Since when are you so religious?" asked Pasha.

"Oh, the Captain and God go back a long way," said Ouspensky, and both he and Pasha laughed at Alexander's expense, which he thought was better than the enmity that existed between them all other hours of the day.

They were given extra coal to heat their barracks rooms for Christmas. They were also given a bit of vodka. There were twenty officers in their quarters. They drank and played cards, and chess, and then got drunk enough to sing rowdy Soviet songs, "Stenka Razin" and "Katyusha," and were all unconscious by morning.

The day after Christmas, the sentry was sick and they didn't have to kill him. He was sick and he fell asleep on the job. So they ran again, but it was winter and hard to get anywhere. The only trains were military trains. They caught one such train and were apprehended by a policeman at the very next stop, who thought their stolen uniforms were too ill-fitting. By the time they were returned to Catowice, the sentry was dead of pleurisy before he could be shot for dereliction. The three of them were called to Commandant Kiplinger again.

"Captain Belov, you see I run my camp very lax. I don't care what you do. You want work, I give you work. You want more food, if there is some, I give it to you. I let you run around the whole camp, I don't watch you as long as you stay within the boundaries. I think that's fair, you obviously don't think so, and under your command these two fools follow like sheep. Well, now you're done, you're leaving. I told you last time, you try it once more and you're finished here. Didn't you believe me? I don't want any problems with you. Don't you know they shoot us for losing prisoners under our command?"

"Where are we going?"

"To a place from which there is no escape," Kiplinger said with satisfaction. "Colditz Castle."

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

New York, January 1945

ON NEW YEAR'S DAY, Tatiana went across the bay with Anthony for a solitary walk, and then met up with Vikki to go skating in Central Park. They took a bus uptown and finally stopped at the corner of 59th Street and Sixth Avenue. Tatiana sent Anthony and Vikki into the park, saying she had to run a quick errand.

She went to a phone booth near the Plaza Hotel. She waited a few moments, fingering the dimes in her pocket. She took the dimes out and counted them, though she knew how many she had. Finally she dialed a number. Generated by ABC Amber LIT Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abclit.html

"Happy New Year, Sam," she said into the phone. "Is this bad time?"

"Happy New Year, Tatiana. This is fine, I was catching up on some urgent work at the office today."

She waited. She held her breath.

"I have nothing for you," he said.

"Nothing?"

"No."

"They did not contact you--"

"No."

"Not even about me?"

"No. They're probably busy with other things, like how best to carve up Europe."

She breathed out. "Silly of me to keep calling, making it uncomfortable for you."

"I don't mind. Really. Call again in a month."

"I will. You are really too kind to me. Thank you." Tatiana hung up and waited a few seconds, her head pressed into the cold metal frame of the phone.

Finally Tatiana agreed to find an apartment to share with Vikki. The girls moved in together in January of 1945. Tatiana had found a three-bedroom, two-bathroom, rent-controlled place on Church Street on the sixth floor. It was very close to Bowling Green and Battery Park. From her living room window she could see New York Harbor and Lady Liberty, and Ellis Island if she went out onto the fire escape.

The apartment cost the girls fifty dollars a month, and though Vikki said in the beginning that she was not used to working to pay the rent instead of buying new clothes, they were both quite happy in the new place. Tatiana because there was a place finally to put all the books she was buying, and because her son finally had his own room, and because she herself had her own room. Mostly that was just brave talk. Tatiana slept with her son, her blankets and pillows on the floor next to Anthony. She said when he stopped nursing, she would go to her own bedroom. At eighteen months, he stopped nursing. She remained on the floor.