Tatiana and Alexander: A Novel(139)

"What does the ad for them read in Times Square? We passed it the other day."

"I don't know. I think it reads,`Planter's peanuts: a bag a day for more pep.' "

"Exactly. Very good. Now, if you had your way with that line, it would read,`bag day for more pep.' Do you see the difference?"

"No." With a straight face.

"Oh, God."

Tatiana turned away and smiled. She got out a bottle of Coke from her bag and passed it to Vikki, saying,"`Drink Coca Cola. A pause that refreshes.'"

"Very good!" Vikki said, her eyes, her teeth gleaming at Tatiana.

Anthony did not find a snake but did become exhausted by his search efforts. He climbed onto the car, onto Tatiana's lap, dusty, hands grimy, and nuzzled his head into her chest. She gave him a drink of water.

Sitting close against Vikki with Anthony cradled on her lap, Tatiana said, "Quite beautiful, no?"

"Your son?" Vikki leaned over and kissed him. "Yes. The desert's barren." She shrugged. "It's nice for a change of pace. I wouldn't want to live here, there's nothing but cacti."

"In spring all wildflowers bloom to life. It must be even better here in spring."

"New York is beautiful in the spring."

Tatiana didn't say anything at first. Then she said, "The desert is amazing--"

"Desert is okay. Have you ever seen a steppe?"

Tatiana paused before replying. "Yes," she said slowly. "It's not this. The steppe is cold and bleak. Here, yes, it's over ninety degrees now, but in December, near Christmas, it will be seventy. The sun will be high in sky. It won't be dark. In December, all I will wear for cover is long-sleeve shirt."

"What do they wear in this Arizona in the winter?" Dasha asks Alexander.

"A long-sleeve shirt."

"Now I know you're telling me fairy tales. Tell them to Tania. I'm too old for fairy tales."

"Tania, you believe me, don't you?"

"Yes, Alexander."

"Would you like to live in Arizona, the land of the small spring?" Generated by ABC Amber LIT Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abclit.html

"Yes, Alexander."

"So?" said Vikki. "It's broiling here right now. We're going to become scrambled eggs if we don't start driving."

Tatiana shuddered briefly, to shake off the memories. "I'm just saying. It's nothing like steppe. I like it here."

Shrugging, Vikki said, "But Tania, it's the middle of nowhere."

"I know. Fantastic, isn't it? No people anywhere."

"That's fantastic?"

"A little...yes."

"Well, I can't imagine anyone wanting to buy this land or live here."

Tatiana cleared her throat. "What about your friend?" she said.

"Which one?"

"Me."

"You want to live here?" Vikki paused and turned her head. "Or do you want to buy this land?" she said incredulously.

Quietly, Tatiana said, "Imagine I purchased some saguaro cactus and sagebrush land in Sonoran Desert."

"Not for a second."

Tatiana was silent.

"Did you buy this land?"

Tatiana nodded.

"This very land?"

She nodded.

"When?"

"Last year. When I come here with Anthony."

"I knew I should have come with you! Why? And with what?"

"I liked it." She looked at the expanse of earth stretching out to the mountains. "I never own anything in my life. I bought it with money I brought with me from Soviet Union." With Alexander's money. Generated by ABC Amber LIT Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abclit.html

"But God, whythis land?" Vikki looked at her. "I bet it was cheap."

"Itwas cheap." It cost only four lives. Harold's. Jane's. Alexander's. And Tatiana's. Tatiana pressed Anthony closer to her chest.

"Hmm," Vikki said, studying Tatiana. "Are you going to be full of these kinds of surprises? Or is this it?"

"This is it." Tatiana smiled and didn't say anything after that but stared west into the valley, into the sunset, into the mighty saguaro cactus, into the desert, into four thousand eight hundred and fifty dollars that had bought ninety-seven acres of the United States of America.

CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

Out of Colditz, April 1945

THE AMERICANS LIBERATED COLDITZin April after three days of fighting, or so it was rumored, for though Alexander heard the gunfire, he saw only a handful of Americans out in the courtyard. He managed to approach a group of them, asking for a cigarette, and, while bending over the lighter flame, he said to one private in English that he was an American named Alexander Barrington and maybe if his story checked out, he could be helped?

And the U.S. soldier laughed and said, "Yeah, and I'm the King of England."

Alexander opened his mouth and Ouspensky came up to ask for a cigarette himself.

Alexander thought he would have another chance, but there was to be no other chance, because very early the next morning after the American liberation, Soviet officials, a general, two colonels, a deputy associate foreign minister or something, along with a hundred troops, came into Colditz to take the seven Soviet men "to join up with their brothers in the victorious march on defeated Germany."