Tatiana and Alexander: A Novel(141)

"For treason against the Motherland. For working for the enemy."

"Maybe they should have explained that they wereforced to work."

"They tried. But if they really didn't want to work for the Germans, why didn't they try to escape?"

"Maybe we could try to escape," said Ouspensky. "Huh, Captain?"

A Polish man came up behind them, laughed and said, "There is no escape. Escape to where?" Alexander and Ouspensky turned around. There was now a small crowd standing in the yard. The Polish man shook their hands and said, "Lech Markiewicz. Pleased to make your acquaintance. No escape, citizens. Do you know who delivered me into Soviet hands, all the way from Cherbourg, France?"

They waited.

"The English."

"And do you know who delivered my friend, Vasia over here, into Soviet hands, all the way from Brussels? The French."

Vasia nodded.

"And do you know who delivered Stepan into Soviet hands, all the way from Ravensburg, Bavaria, just ten kilometers from Lake Constance and Switzerland? The Americans. That's right. The Allies are helpfully returning us, millions of us, to the Soviets. In the transit camp I was in before this one, in Generated by ABC Amber LIT Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abclit.html

L?beck, north of Hamburg, there were refugees from Denmark and Norway. Not soldiers like you, and not forced labor workers like me, but refugees, made homeless by war, trying to find a place to hang their hat in Copenhagen. All returned to the Soviets. So don't talk to me about escape. Time for escape has long passed. There is nowhere to go anymore. All of Europe used to belong to Hitler. Half of Europe now belongs to the Soviet Union."

And he laughed and walked away, linking his arms with Vasia and Stepan.

But that night, Lech Markiewicz, an electrician by trade, shorted out the electrified fence and ran. He was not in camp the following morning. No one knew what became of him.

The convoys came each night to take the men away, hundreds by hundreds, and during the day, the camp was maintained as a waystation to somewhere else. They were fed badly, they were allowed a bath once a week, they were regularly shaved and deloused. Yet, little by little new Russians kept coming in, old Russians kept shipping out.

One late July night, Alexander and Ouspensky were woken with all their quartermates, told to pack what was theirs, and taken out to the back of the camp. Three trucks were waiting for them. They were all paired up and tied to their partners. Alexander was chained to Ouspensky. They were driven some distance in the night, Alexander guessed to a train station, and he was right.

CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

New York, August 1945

ON THE LOWER EASTSide, Tatiana, Vikki, and Anthony were strolling one summer Saturday, late morning, through the outdoor market under the El on Second Avenue. They were talking, like every person on the street, about the Japanese surrender a week ago following the atomic devastation of Nagasaki. Vikki thought the second bomb was unnecessary. Tatiana pointed out that the Japanese had not surrendered after Hiroshima. "We didn't give them enough time. Three days, what's that? We should have given them extra days for their imperial pride. Why else do you think they kept killing us these last three months even though they knew they would never win?"

"I don't know. Why did Germans? They knew their war was lost in 1943."

"That's because Hitler was a madman."

"And Hirohito, what was he?" Suddenly, Tatiana was stopped--no, besieged--by a family of what seemed like sixty. Actually it was six people, a husband, a wife, and their four teenaged children. First, they grabbed Tatiana's hands, then her arms, then enveloped her entire body.

"Tania? Tania? Are you there?" Vikki said.

Stroking Tatiana's hair, the woman murmured in Ukrainian. The man wiped his eyes and handed Anthony an ice cream and a lollipop, which Anthony took with a two-year-old smile and promptly dropped on the sidewalk. Generated by ABC Amber LIT Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abclit.html

"Who are these people?" Vikki asked.

"Mama knows a wot of people," said Anthony, tugging at Tatiana's skirt.

Straightening up, Vikki muttered, "That's certainly true. Just no men."

"Ice kweem, Mama. I want ice kweem."

The family talked to Tatiana in Ukrainian and she spoke Russian back to them. They kissed her hands and at last moved on. With Anthony, Tatiana and Vikki moved on, too.

"Tatiana!"

"What?"

"Are you going to explain to us the scene we just witnessed?"

"Anthony needs no explanation, do you, honey?"

"No, Mama. Need ice kweem."

After getting her son another ice cream and a lollipop, Tatiana glanced at Vikki and shrugged. "What? Slavic people very emotional."

"They weren't overreacting. They were genuflecting. I think they sprinkled gold dust at your feet. By their hand gestures alone, I could tell they were about to sacrifice their firstborn at your altar."

Tatiana laughed. "Listen, I tell you, it was nothing. Few months ago, they came in to Port of New York. The man had sent his wife and children at beginning of German occupation of Ukraine to Turkey. He was POW for two years, then escaped into Turkey and spent over year looking for them in Ankara. Finally found them in 1944. They arrived month ago in July in PNY without papers but in good health. But we getting too many refugees. The man, even without papers, could stay, because he do work, do something. Lay bricks, paint, whatever. But his wife can't sew, can't knit and can't speak English. She lived in Turkey for three years begging on streets for her children." Tatiana shook her head. "I wish they spoke bit of English. Everything would be much more easy. So what can I do? They were all going to be sent back." She leaned down, adjusting the baseball cap on Anthony's head and wiping the vanilla ice cream off his chin. "Imagine their reaction when I say husband can stay but rest have to go back. Go back where? they asked me. Go back to Ukraine? We escaped! We are going straight to camps, we are never coming out. Five women, do you know what would happen to us in camps? So what I can do, Vikki? I went and found mother job cleaning house for shop owner. The daughters become baby-sitters for shop owner's three young children. They stayed in Ellis until I got INS man to issue them temporary visas." Tatiana shrugged. "It's crazy over at Ellis, these days, crazy. They want to send everybody back. Just today, man was being sent back to Lithuania, and there was nothing wrong with him, he had little infection in his right ear! They put him in detention center, and tomorrow, he was going back just like that. Because his ear was red!" Tatiana was flushed in the face. "I found this poor thing, sitting in room bawling his eyes out. He said his wife had been in United States waiting for him for two years. They were tailors. So I checked his ear out--"