Liberated, meanwhile, to be born into another world.
– Paul-Eerik Rummo
I’m reading through Ingel’s letters again. I miss my girls. I feel a bit of relief knowing that things are going so well for them way out there. They’ve sent tons of letters. The last time people were sent to Siberia, they only sent one or two letters a year, and the news wasn’t good.
I should be cutting some wood for barrels. Now would be the right time to do it-the moon will start waxing soon and then it’ll be too late. When am I going to get the barrels made for the new house? When can I sing again? My throat will forget how to do it before long.
I can feel the full moon, and I can’t sleep. I should tell Liide it’s a good time to cut firewood. Wood cut on the full moon dries well. But that husband she’s got doesn’t understand these things-he doesn’t know any more about farmwork than Liide does about handwork. There was a hole in one of the socks Ingel made for me, and Liide stitched it up. Now it’s completely unwearable.
If only I had some of Ingel’s dewberry juice. Truman should have come by now. I feel like kicking the wall, but I can’t.
Hans Pekk, son of Eerik, Estonian peasant
The onions in the pot had softened enough-Aliide added sugar, salt, and vinegar. The horseradish made both Aliide’s and Zara’s eyes water, and Aliide opened the window to let the breeze in. Zara decided to ask a direct question. Maybe it would be best to start with Martin, not ask about Grandmother yet. Before she had time to think about it, the sound of a car approaching made both women jump.
“Are you expecting guests?”
“No. It’s a black car.”
“Oh my God, they’re here.”
Aliide slammed the front door closed and locked it. Then she hurried to latch the pantry and pull the curtains closed. “They’ll leave when they see that no one’s here.” “No, they won’t.”
“Of course they will. Why would they sit around in the yard if they can see that no one’s home? No one saw you come here. Or did they?”
“No.”
“Well, then. You just stay inside until tomorrow. In case they hang around the village. There’s no place to hang around anyway, in a half-deserted village.”
Zara shook her head vehemently. The men would know for sure that she was here if they saw that the house was empty. They would imagine she was hiding out here, they would break in and go through the whole house, and find…
“They’ll hurt you!”
“Calm down, Zara. Calm down. Now do as I tell you.” Considering her frailty, Aliide looked resolute, younger and older at the same time. Her gait as she walked to the cupboard was ordinary, her hand grasped the corner of the cabinet with practiced familiarity. “Come and help me.”
They dragged the cupboard away from the wall and Aliide tugged open a door.
Aliide thrust the hesitating girl into the little room and then put her hand to her chest. It was thumping. She couldn’t manage to make herself drink a whole mug of water, but she drank a little, wiped her face with a tissue, and tied a scarf over her head. Her hair had got so wet with sweat that it might have been suspicious if she left it uncovered-the men might think she was sweating from fear-if those were the men that were after Zara, that is. What if it was the boys who threw stones and sang songs outside her window in the car out there? What if they had decided to make one last trip to Aliide’s house and finish her off? She could hear the car approaching cautiously-the driver must have noticed the holes in the road.
In the little room, Zara stretched her arms out straight- her fingers touched the wall on either side. A smell of earth. Damp earth. Damp walls. Musty, low-oxygen air, mixed with mold and rust. Here she was. If they did something to Aliide, she might never get out. Would she shout then, here I am? No, she wouldn’t shout. She would remain here, and she’d never be able to tell Grandmother what it was like here now. Why did the time have to be cut so short? She should have been harder, a little more like Pasha. Pasha would get Aliide to say whatever he wanted. He would hit her, and she’d sing. Maybe Zara should have used those kinds of tricks, maybe then she would have found out why Aliide was so angry at Grandmother and why Zara’s mother claimed she didn’t have an aunt. If Aliide had been a little less kind, if she hadn’t poured her a cup of coffee from the percolator or made a bath for her, Zara could have been more aggressive. It had been such a long time since anyone had treated her that way. It had made her soft when she should have been hard; she should have remembered how little time there was and acted accordingly.
Zara pressed her ear to the crack of the door. Soon they would knock on the front door. Was Aliide planning to let them in?
Aliide opened the curtains, spread a magazine on the table, and poured herself some coffee, just as if she had been sitting there reading Nelli Teataja and eating breakfast, perfectly calm. Had the girl left any sign that she’d been in the kitchen? No, nothing. Aliide hadn’t even had time to pour coffee for both of them. If they’re coming, they might as well all come-Mafia thugs, soldiers-Reds and Whites -Russians, Germans, Estonians-let them come. Aliide would survive. She always had.
Her hands weren’t shaking. The shaking that had started that night in the town hall had ended when her body got old enough. Old enough that no one would ever bother her the way they did in the town hall. And since Talvi moved away she didn’t have anyone to feel afraid for. Aliide’s wrist shook. Fine, now she had someone in the little room again, someone to worry about. Firm-fleshed and silkycomplexioned, smelling like a young girl. And skittish like one, too. Had she looked like that back then? Had she held an arm in front of her breasts, been frightened by trivial things, looked wildly about at every sudden noise? Her stomach turned with disgust at the girl again.
The car seemed to be stopping at the edge of the field. Two unfamiliar men got out. They weren’t village boys. They weren’t boys at all. What were they up to out there? Admiring the landscape? Maybe they were sizing up the woods. They lit their cigarettes, unperturbed. Just like before. The men in the chrome-tanned boots were always calm at first. Aliide’s shoulder twitched. She put her hand on it. Her scarf was wet at the temples.
There was a knock at the door. Commanding blows. The blow of a man used to giving commands. Tomato and onion relish on the stove. A grater on a plate. Half a tomato unchopped. Aliide shoved the tomato and the knife among the shredded herbs and grabbed the grater. Everything in the kitchen looked like she was in the middle of canning, and she had panicked and spread the table to look like coffee hour. There was another blow to the door. Aliide pushed the horseradish plate to the side of the table where the drawer was-and in the drawer, Hans’s Walther-then she breathed in a lungful of horseradish fumes, and the burning spread, making her eyes water, and she wiped them dry and opened the door. The hinges squeaked, the curtains fluttered, the wind pushed through Aliide’s housedress, and she felt the metal door handle in her fingers. The sun shone sharply in the yard. A man greeted her. Behind him stood another man, older, who also greeted her, and Aliide smelled the scent of a KGB officer through the horseradish. It wafted toward her like a musty cellar and made the wind that blew in the door bitter. Aliide started to breathe through her mouth. She knew men like these. Men with that kind of posture, men who know how to punish a woman, and they were here to get a woman, and punish her. People with an insolent bearing, who smile broadly with gold teeth, stuffed into their uniforms, with their cap visors level, knowing that no one can deny them what they want. The kind of people who wear boots to trample anyone who gets in their way.
The younger man wanted to come in. Aliide stepped aside, went to sit on the side of the table where she had put the plate of horseradish, and put the grater down on the plate. Her left hand lay open on the oilcloth; her right hand was in her lap. It was a short distance from there to the drawer.
The man sat down without being invited and asked for some water. KGB didn’t come into the kitchen-evidently he was walking around the house. Aliide suggested he help himself from the pail-fresh water from the pump. “We have good water and a deep well,” Aliide said.
The man got up and swigged back a pailful of water. The horseradish was making his eyes water, too, and he rubbed them, his gestures becoming more peevish. Aliide was tense, her heart tightened, but the man chatted about this and that, sauntered carelessly around the kitchen, stopped at the cupboard door and kicked it open. The door struck the wall, and the wall gave a little. The kick of the boot shook mud onto the floor. The man walked to the doorway but didn’t go any farther into the house, he came back in the kitchen, strode over to the refrigerator and looked at the papers on top of it, stepped toward the sideboard and picked objects up off the shelf-took the lids off of jars, turned a coffee cup around in his hands, a Finnish shampoo bottle, Imperial Leather soap. Then he lit a cigarette-a Marlboro -and told her he was with the police. “Pasha Aleksandrovich Popov,” he said, and handed
Aliide his identification papers.
“There are a lot of falsified papers around,” Aliide said, shoving the papers back at him.
“Yes, there are,” Pasha said, and laughed. “Skepticism is sometimes healthy. But you know it would be best for you to listen to me now. For your own safety.”
“There’s nothing dangerous here.”
“Have you seen a strange girl?”
Aliide said she hadn’t and complained of the uneventfulness of the countryside. The man sniffed and narrowed his eyes to force the water out of them. Horseradish burned in the air. Aliide answered his gaze; she didn’t look away, didn’t look away. His lower eyelids reddened, mucus accumulated in the corners of Aliide’s eyes, and the staring continued until the man went to the door and opened it. The wind blew inside. Aliide’s shoulder twitched. The man stood in the doorway for a moment facing the yard, his leather coat puffed up in the breeze; then he turned his cold, soothed eyes, took a stack of photos out of his pocket, and spread them on the table.
“Have you seen this woman? We’re looking for her.”
Zara didn’t dare to move. The voices carried poorly to the room where she was, but they did carry. She heard Aliide speak Russian when she opened the front door, greeting them, being polite. Pasha said that they had driven a long way and they were thirsty, and kept chatting about one thing and another. The voices approached and receded, and then Aliide asked if his friend liked gardening. Pasha didn’t understand. Aliide said she could see his friend through the window walking around her garden. Lavrenti was, of course, checking out the house. It must be Lavrenti. Or maybe Pasha had come with someone else. Not likely. Pasha was used to Lavrenti’s behavior; he was a little simple, but you shouldn’t take any notice of it. Aliide hoped he wouldn’t trample her flower beds.
“Don’t worry, he likes gardens.”
Pasha’s voice suddenly sounded very near. Zara froze. “So have you seen any strange girl around here?” Zara held her breath. The dust caught in her dry throat.
She couldn’t cough, couldn’t cough. Aliide answered that the area had been calm-an outsider would have been noticed immediately. Pasha repeated his question. Aliide was startled by his stubborn persistence. A young girl? A strange young girl? Why in the world would she have seen her? Pasha’s words were unclear. He said something about light hair. Aliide’s voice could be heard clearly. No, she hadn’t seen any light-haired girl here. Pasha had a photo of the girl with him. Which photo? Was he going all around the country showing people a picture of her? What kind of picture? Pasha’s voice came near again and Zara was afraid her pulse would be audible through the wall. Pasha had such sharp ears.
“Do you have some reason to assume that the girl would be here?”
Pasha moved farther away, it seemed. The voice coming through the wall was fragmented.
“Look…”
Pasha wasn’t showing her those photos, was he? But what other photos would he have of her? And when Aliide saw them…
Suddenly Zara belched. The taste of sperm spread through her mouth. She quickly closed her lips. Could they hear her in the kitchen? No, she could hear the even murmur of Pasha and Aliide’s continuing conversation through the wallpaper. Zara was waiting for Aliide’s shocked exclamation, because there was no other way she could react when she saw the photos. Had Pasha already spread them on the table, slowly, one at a time, or was he just going to hand them to Aliide all at once? No, she was sure he would put them on the table like a game of patience, make Aliide look at them. Aliide would stare at them and see the expression Pasha had taught Zara, mouth open, tongue stretched out, and all the pricks. And then Aliide would tell him about her-of course she would tell him, she would have to tell him, because once she saw the photos she would hate Zara. She would see that filth and want it out of her house. It was going to happen now, it had to happen-soon Pasha would open the door and laugh, standing against the light, and it would all be over.
Zara withdrew to the back of the tiny room, right up against the wall, and waited. The darkness was burning, the stubble on her head was standing on end. Aliide had seen the pictures. The humiliation tickled and swarmed tightly under Zara’s skin, as if she were covered with tense, halfhealed wounds. Soon the door would fly open. She had to close her eyes, deep within the room, to think herself to someplace else, she was a star, an ear on Lenin’s head, the hairs of Lenin’s whiskers, pasteboard whiskers on a pasteboard poster, she was a corner of the frame of the picture, a chipped plaster frame, bent, in a corner of the room. She was chalk dust on the surface of a chalkboard, in the safety of the schoolroom, she was the wooden tip of a pointer…
The photographs were printed on Western photo paper; they had a Western sheen. Zara’s bright red lips shone dim against the oilcloth. Her stiff eyelashes spread like petals against the pale blue pearlescence smeared on the skin around her eyes. She had pink, swollen pimples, although her skin looked otherwise dry and thin. Her knitted collar was flopped over like someone had been tugging on it. “I’ve never seen her,” Aliide said.
The man didn’t let that bother him. He continued, his words thudding like a large man’s boots.
“The whole world’s looking for her right now.” “Oh? I haven’t heard anything about it, and I always have the radio on.”
“It’s being kept quiet on purpose. To draw her out.
The less she imagines we’re looking for her the less careful she’ll be.”
“Ah.”
“Ma’am, this woman is a dangerous criminal.” “Dangerous?”
“She has committed multiple offenses.”
“What kind of offenses?”
“This woman killed her lover in his own bed. And in a very cold-blooded manner.”
KGB came back from the garden, stood standing behind the younger man, and dug some more photos out of the pocket of his leather coat. They laid them on the table on top of the photos of Zara.
“Here is his body. Please look at these pictures and think again. Have you seen this woman?”
“I’ve never seen her before.”
“Please look at the photos.”
“I don’t need to. I’ve seen bodies before.”
“The girl seems very innocent, but after what she did to her lover… He was very attached to her, and the girl smothered him for no reason, put a pillow over his face while he was sleeping. You live alone here, don’t you, ma’am? You’ll be sleeping peacefully, having a sweet dream, and you’ll never wake from it. It could happen any night. When you least expect it, when you’re completely defenseless.”
Aliide’s hand fumbled under the hem of the oilcloth on the table. Her fingers crooked around the drawer handle ready to ease it open. She should have had the pistol ready on the chair. The horseradish burned white on the grater in front of her and covered up the smell of the Russian’s sweat. The man who called himself Popov leaned against the table and stared at her.
“All right. I’ll call you if she comes here.”
“We have reason to believe she will.”
“Why would she come here of all places?” “She’s a relative of yours, ma’am.”
“What stories you have!” Aliide laughed, and her laugh rippled across the rim of her coffee cup.
“The girl’s grandmother lives in Vladivostok. Her name is Ingel Pekk. Your sister. Most important, you should know that the girl speaks Estonian. She learned it from your sister.”
Ingel? Why was he talking about Ingel?
“I don’t have a sister.”
“According to our records you do.”
“I don’t know why you’ve come here making up stories, but I…”
“This woman, Zara Pekk, happens to have committed murder in this country, and she has no other contacts here as far as we know. Of course she’ll come here, to meet her long-lost relative. She’ll imagine you don’t know about the murder-there won’t be anything about it on the radio or in the papers-and she’ll come here.”
Pekk? The girl’s last name was Pekk?
“I don’t have a sister,” Aliide repeated. Her fingers relaxed, her hand flopped back into her lap. Ingel was alive. Pasha kicked over a chair. “Where is the girl?” “I haven’t seen any girl!”
The wind rustled the drying mint over the stove and stirred the marigolds lying on newspapers. The curtains fluttered. The man stroked his bald head and lowered his voice. “I’m sure you understand the seriousness of the crime this woman, Zara Pekk, has committed. Call us-for your own sake-when she comes here. Have a good day.” He paused at the door.
“Zara Pekk lived with her grandmother until she left to work in the West. She left her passport, wallet, and money at the murder scene. She needs someone to help her. You are her only option.” The powerlessness had knocked Zara to the floor.
The walls were panting, the floor gasped, the floorboards bulged with moisture. The wallpaper crackled. She felt the footsteps of a fly walking across her cheek. How could they see to fly in the dark?
Now Aliide knew.
They hadn’t heard anything from Ingel, so to keep Hans’s restlessness under control Aliide started to write letters in Ingel’s name. She couldn’t stand the questions he asked every day-had she heard anything about Ingel? had any letters come?-and the way he would speculate about what Ingel was doing at any given moment. Aliide knew her sister’s characteristic way of writing and telling stories, and it was easy to copy her handwriting. She wrote that she had found a reliable messenger and that they were allowed to get packages. Hans was delighted, and Aliide reported to him about all the things she’d managed to fit into the bulging packages to keep Ingel from any emergencies. Then Hans got the idea that he should send along greetings- something that would let Ingel know it was from him.
“Get a branch from the willow that grows by the church. We can put it in the package. The first time we met was under that willow tree.”
“Will Ingel remember something like that?” “Of course she will.”
Aliide fetched a branch from the nearest willow tree. “Will this do?”
“Is it from the church?”
“Yes.”
Hans pressed his face against the leaves.
“A wonderful smell!”
“Willows don’t have any smell.”
“Put a spruce branch in, too.”
He didn’t say why a spruce branch was so important.
And Aliide didn’t want to know.
“Has anyone else heard anything from Ingel?” Hans asked.
“Probably not.”
“Have you asked?”
“Are you crazy? I can’t run around the village asking about Ingel!”
“Ask someone you can trust. Maybe she’s written.” “I don’t know and I’m not going to ask!”
“No one will dare to tell you if you don’t ask. Because you’re married to that Commie pig. If you ask, they won’t think you’re…”
“Hans, try to understand. I will never mention Ingel’s name outside of this house. Never.”
Hans disappeared into the little room. He hadn’t shaved in weeks. Aliide started writing good news. What kind of good news could she write about?
First she wrote that Linda had started school and it was going well. She said there were a lot of other Estonians in her class. Hans smiled.
Then she wrote that they had found work as cooks, and so they always had food.
Hans sighed with relief.
Then Aliide wrote that because of their cooking work, it was easy to help others. That when people arrived at the kolkhoz, their lower lips would tremble when they heard what Ingel’s job was. That they would get tears in their eyes when they realized that she spent every day handling bread.
Hans’s eyebrows puckered up in distress.
That was a poor choice of words. It really emphasized a lack of food.
Next Aliide wrote that no one had a limited supply of bread. That the quotas had disappeared.
Hans was relieved. Hans was relieved for Ingel’s sake.
Aliide tried not to think about it. She lit a paperossi to get the smell of a strange man out of the kitchen before Martin came home.
The sound of the car receded. The door of the little room began to pound. The cupboard in front of it started to shake, the dishes on top of the cupboard rattled, the handle of Ingel’s coffee cup struck Aliide’s glass sugar bowl, and it shook, and the sugar, packed to the rim of the bowl, started trickling down. Aliide stood in front of the cupboard. The kicking had a young person’s energy and futility. Aliide flipped the radio on. The kicking intensified. She turned the radio up louder.
“Pasha is not with the police! And he isn’t my husband! Don’t believe anything he says! Let me out!”
Aliide scratched her throat. Her larynx felt loose, but other than that she wasn’t sure how she felt. Part of her had returned to that moment decades ago, in front of the kolkhoz office, when all the strength had flowed out of her legs and into the sand. Now there was only the cement kitchen floor under her. A frost spread from it into the soles of her feet, into her bones. It must have felt the same way in the camps at Archangel. Forty below zero, heavy fog over the water, dampness that seeped into your core, frozen eyelashes and lips, holding ponds full of logs like dead bodies, working in the ponds in water up to your waist, endless fog, endless cold, endlessness. Someone had been whispering about it at the market square. It wasn’t meant for her ears, but her ears had grown large and sensitive over the years, like an animal’s, and she had wanted to hear more. The speaker’s eyes, under a furrowed brow, were so dark that you couldn’t distinguish the pupil from the iris, and those eyes had stared at her, as if the person talking had realized that she could hear. It was in 1955, with the rehabilitation in full swing. She had hurried away, her heart pounding.
Fists and feet were pounding on the door. The fog above the cement floor dissipated. Had it come for revenge?
Had Ingel sent it?
Aliide went to the cupboard and picked up the sugar bowl, which was just about to fall off the edge.
Aliide felt a vibration as she was cleaning the cold cupboard. The dishes started to rattle, the honey jar clattered against the wood, and the cup on the edge of the cabinet fell on the floor and broke. It was Martin’s cup. There were fragments of it spread across the floor, and there was a crunch under Aliide’s galoshes as she stepped on the cup handle. Hans’s howling continued. Aliide tried to think. If Hans had lost his mind, did she dare go to the attic and open the door? Would he attack her? Would he rush out, run to the village, grab someone, and tell them everything? Had someone been in the barn and climbed up to the attic?
Aliide spat out spit blackened with coal, rinsed her mouth for a moment with some water, then licked her lips and went to the barn. The ceiling was shaking, the ladder swayed, and the lantern hanging from the ceiling was just about to spill. Aliide climbed the ladder to the attic. The bales of hay were jiggling.
“Hans?”
The howling stopped for a moment.
“Let me out!”
“Is something wrong?”
“Let me out of here! I know Martin isn’t home.” “I can’t open the door until you tell me what’s wrong.” Silence.
“Liide, honey, please.”
Aliide opened the door. Hans came staggering out. He was dripping with sweat, his clothes were wet, and his feet were battered.
“Something’s wrong with Ingel.”
“What? What makes you think that?”
“I had a dream.”
“A dream?”
“Ingel had a ladle in her hand, and someone was pouring soup into it, and a swarm of mosquitoes filled up the ladle before she could get any soup in it. I could taste them in my mouth, the taste of warm, sweet blood. And then Ingel was someplace else, the room was full of steam, and she started to take off her coat and it was full of lice-so full that you couldn’t see the fabric.”
“Hans, it was just a bad dream.”
“No, it wasn’t! It was a vision! Ingel was trying to tell me something! Her mouth opened a little and she looked right into my eyes and tried to open her mouth more, and I tried to make out what she was saying. But I woke up before I could hear what she was saying. I still had the taste of mosquitoes in my mouth and I could feel lice all over my body.”
“Hans, Ingel wrote to us that everything was all right, remember?”
“I tried to go back to sleep, to find out what Ingel was trying to say, but the lice were crawling on me.”
“You don’t have lice!”
Then Aliide noticed that Hans’s arms, neck, and face were covered with bloody scratches, and the tips of his fingers were red.
“Hans, listen now. You can’t have these attacks anymore. Do you understand? You’re putting everything in danger.”
“It was Ingel!”
“It was a bad dream.”
“I saw her!”
“It was a dream. Calm down now.”
“We have to get Ingel out of there.”
“Ingel is fine. She will come back, but you have to stay hidden until the time comes. What would Ingel think if she came here and saw you like this? Don’t you want her to have the same Hans that she married, when she comes back? Ingel isn’t going to want a lunatic!”
Aliide took Hans’s hand in her own and squeezed it. His icy fingers lay limp in her grasp. She hesitated for a moment, then she wrapped her arm around him. His muscles gradually softened, his pulse became even, and then… he put his hand on her shoulder.
“I’m sorry.”
“Don’t worry about it.”
“Liide, I can’t go on like this.”
“I’ll think of something. I promise.”
Hans’s hands squeezed her shoulders.
His body felt right, his hands felt like good hands.
Aliide would have given anything at that moment to be able to take him into the little room, right to the bed, take off his clothes covered in cold sweat, and lick the scent of death from his every pore.
Aliide had always trusted Hans to know how to behave, but she wasn’t sure anymore. What if he had more visions? What if he had them when Martin was home? Martin was at work during the day, but anyone from the village might come by the house. What if Hans refused to go to the attic? What if he made a fuss or ran out the door, maybe straight into the arms of the NKVD?
Aliide put together a little bundle and hid it in the entry behind some other things, women’s linens, things that Martin would never touch. She could grab it on her way out the door if she needed to. She was hardly likely to go out any other way. Unless Hans had an attack when she was in the bedroom and Martin was in the kitchen. She would have to climb out the bedroom window. Maybe she should make a second bundle. But even if she did have her little bundle with her, where could she go? Hans might shoot Martin the minute he opened the door to the room where Hans was hiding, but what good would that do? And what if they had guests? Even if she did get away, they would catch her before long, and interrogate her. If Martin found out, the first thing he would do would be to thrust her into the hands of the Chekists, there was no doubt about it, and the Cheka men would think Hans was Aliide’s lover, and they would want to know how and when and where. Maybe she would have to spell it out for them; maybe she would have to show them, take off her clothes and show them. They would be interested in the fact that Martin’s wife had a Fascist lover, and Aliide would have to tell them all about her Fascist lover, and since she was Martin’s wife, she would have to compare what she did with her Fascist lover to what she did with a man who was a respectable Comrade. Which one was better? Which one was harder? How do you fuck a Fascist pig? And they would all stand in a circle around her, with their cocks erect, ready to punish her, ready to educate her, ready to weed out any Fascist seed left in her body.
Maybe Martin would want to interrogate his wife himself-to show his friends that he had nothing to do with the affair. He would prove it with a heavy-handed interrogation and let fly with all the energy of a betrayed husband. And even if Aliide told them everything, they wouldn’t believe her, they would just keep going and keep going, and then they would summon Volli. What was it that Volli’s wife had said? That he was so good at his work, that she was so proud of him. When they couldn’t get a confession out of a bandit, they summoned Volli, and the confession arrived before dawn. Volli was so efficient. Volli was so skillful. There wasn’t a better public servant in all this great country of ours.
“I’m so proud of Volli,” the woman had whispered, as ardently as Aliide had once heard her talk of God long ago. The words had rolled out of her mouth like a little halo, and her mouth shone with gold. Gold that Volli got for her. “The best husband in the world.” Aliide observed Hans closely, his eyes and gestures. The beard hid a lot, but otherwise he looked the same as before, the same Hans. And then it happened again.
“Ingel appeared to me last night.”
Hans was quite calm.
“So you had another nightmare?”
“How can you call Ingel a nightmare?” His voice had changed suddenly. He glared at her, straightening up and putting his hands on the table. They were fists. “What did Ingel say?”
His fists relaxed.
Aliide had to be careful what she said.
“She called my name. That’s all. She was in the middle of some fog or steam. There were people behind her, crowded tight around a stove, so tight that some of their clothes were catching fire. Or maybe they were drying their clothes on the stove and they caught fire. I don’t know. I couldn’t see clearly. Ingel was in front. She didn’t pay any attention to the people yelling behind her. I smelled smoke. Ingel didn’t complain about it-she just stared straight at me and said my name. Then the steam rose up around her again, and only her head was showing, and she was still staring at me, without stopping, and then the steam dissolved again and she was standing surrounded by bunks. They were all along the walls and there was a man in the bunk next to Ingel’s touching himself. And on the other side of her there was a man on top of a woman, and Ingel was in the middle and people were walking by her. And she just stared straight at me and sighed and said my name again. She wants to tell me something.”
“Yeah, like what?”
“Aren’t you excited about this at all?”
Aliide had an unpleasant feeling. It was as if Ingel were there, right in the room with her. She saw Hans’s gaze move to the wallpaper behind her. She forbade herself from turning to look.
“Ingel’s not in any trouble. You’ve read her letters, haven’t you?”
Hans stared past her.
“Maybe she can’t tell us everything in her letters.”
“For God’s sake, Hans!”
“Don’t get worked up, Liide, honey. That’s just our Ingel. She just wants to see us and talk to us.”
Hans had to get a passport as soon as possible. He had to come to his senses. But if he did get away from here, what would Aliide do? Why shouldn’t she leave, too, take the risk, and leave? It might get them both killed, but was there any alternative?
The crows were screaming like lunatics in the yard. Läänemaa, Estonia
Zara put her ear to the crack of the door, but the kitchen was silent. Even the radio was mute, no sound but the pounding pain in her head. She had given herself a headache in the last few minutes by whacking her head against the door, which was stupid of her. She wasn’t going to get Aliide to open the door. Pasha and Lavrenti would come back, that was clear. But would they come inside? They would make Aliide talk. Maybe she would tell them voluntarily. Maybe she would ask for money from Pasha and use it to have her field plowed. She had been complaining that now that there was no liquor ration she didn’t have anything to pay the few able-bodied men who were left. Zara couldn’t guess what Aliide was up to. There was an apple and a couple of acorns in the pocket of the housedress Aliide had loaned her. Zara was keeping them as souvenirs for her grandmother, seeds from Estonia. Would she ever get to give them to her?
Zara stood up. Although the air was stifling, there was a draft coming in from somewhere. There were a quilt and some baskets in the corner, and there was enough space that she could move a little. She was afraid to explore the place with her hands, so she started with her feet first, poked at the baskets-something clinked behind them. She pulled the object toward her with her foot. It was a plate. Next to the baskets there were some papers, magazines. A vase. There were dried flowers in it. Above the vase there was a little shelf. On the shelf was a candlestick with the stub of a candle in it. Above the shelf was a nail with a frame or a mirror hanging from it. Zara’s fingers brushed against the shelf, and her thumb came to a bracket that had papers shoved behind it, the corner of a notebook. What was this room used for? Why was it hidden behind a cupboard?
Läänemaa, Estonia
Aliide went and stood outside the room and stroked the cupboard with her fingers, then the wall next to it; then she started to move the cupboard, slowly, centimeter by centimeter. She could hear the click of her vertebrae, her joints cracking. She felt her whole skeleton, as if her sense of touch had moved into her bones and left her flesh numb.
She was a relative. This Russian girl. A girl who looked Russian. This family produced Russian girls. Not just little Pioneers like Talvi, not just little girls with short skirts and big bows on their heads, but real Russians, the kind of Russians who came here looking for a better life, messing things up, wanting, demanding. Russians like all the other Russians. Linda shouldn’t have had children. Aliide shouldn’t have, either. No one in their family should have had children. They should have just lived their lives to the end.
Aliide straightened her back, left the cupboard where it was, poured herself a glass of vodka, and tossed it down her throat, then wiped her mouth on her sleeve. Like a Russian. She still didn’t know what to do or how this worked. She smelled spruce, and the birch water Ingel used to wash herself, to wash her hair-the heavy smell of birch that had always come wafting suddenly into the air whenever Ingel loosened her braids. Another glass of vodka didn’t dispel the stench of birch. Aliide felt sick to her stomach. Her thoughts dimmed again, they started sloshing around in her skull like it was an empty space, then they gelled for a moment, then sloshed around again. She noticed she was thinking of the girl as “the girl”-her name was strangely missing; she didn’t know how to use it. The girl’s fear had been real. Her escape must have been real. The Mafia men were real. And they weren’t interested in Aliide, just the girl. Maybe the Mafia men’s story was true, maybe fate had tossed the girl into Tallinn, and she had killed a customer and run away and hadn’t known where else to go. It was a believable story. Maybe the girl didn’t want anything. Maybe she didn’t want anything or know anything except that she had to get away. Maybe that’s how it was. Aliide certainly understood what it was like to just want to get away. It was Martin who had wanted to be political. Aliide never had, although she marched by his side. Maybe the girl’s story was as simple as that. But Aliide had to get rid of her- she didn’t want the Mafia coming here again. What should she do? Maybe she shouldn’t do anything.
If nobody missed the girl, Aliide could seal up the air holes to the little room.
Something swelled up in Aliide’s brain. The curtains flapped like crazy, the clips that held them jingled, and the fabric snapped. The crackle of the fire had faded, and the tick of the clock remained, beneath the sound of the wind.
Everything was repeating itself. Even if the ruble had changed to the kroon and there were fewer warplanes flying over her head and the officers’ wives had lowered their voices, even if the loudspeakers on the tower at Pika Hermanni were playing independence songs every day, there would always be chrome-tanned boots, some new boots would arrive, the same or different, but a boot on your neck nevertheless. The foxholes had been closed up, the shell casings in the woods had tarnished, the secret dugouts had collapsed, the fallen had rotted away, but certain things repeated themselves.
Aliide felt like lying down, laying her heavy head on a pillow. The door to the little room was on her right; the girl inside had quieted. Aliide lifted the kettle of tomatoes and onions off the stove and put it on the floor-the jars should be filled up hot-but such a big chore felt impossible, the stones on her earrings were heavy, and the crows’ racket came all the way inside. She managed to put the horseradish in the jars, pour vinegar over it, and screw on the lids. She would have to do without the tomatoes, and the garlic still waiting to be ground. She washed her hands in the used water, wiped them on her hem, and went out to sit on the bench under the birch trees where she had planted gladiolas, the Russians’ flower. The noise of the crows continued farther off, in the silver willows.
The girl really was a better liar than Aliide ever had been. A master.
She had almost started to like her.
Hans’s granddaughter.
She had Hans’s nose.
What would Hans have wanted her to do? To take care of the girl, like he had wanted her to take care of Ingel?
Hans’s gaze turned inward. On the days when he could spend more time in the kitchen, when Martin was away for the night, he would be engrossed in counting the leaves or playing with Pelmi. Sometimes he would give Aliide a sly look, press his chin to his chest, and wrap his arms around himself as if he were trying to protect something inside him. Aliide rattled the jars, checked on her tinctures, tried to get Hans to drink what she felt were appropriate teas, simmered them all day, but Hans didn’t care for them, and Aliide tried not to be nervous, waved a dishcloth, poked at the fire in the stove, bustled and puttered, did laundry, and fed the chickens so much that when they’d emptied their dish they would doze the whole following day.
Hans didn’t tell Aliide about his visions anymore. Maybe her behavior had annoyed him, or maybe he was afraid that Aliide would be a threat to them if she knew about them. Aliide tried to think of a way to ask him about it, but she didn’t know how. How’s Ingel? Have you seen Ingel lately? No, nothing worked. And she had no way of knowing how he would react if she brought up the question in the wrong way.
Hans had to be out of here before winter came. In the winter, she wouldn’t be able to escape through the attic window-it would leave tracks in the snow. She could steal a blank passport from the militia, but would he know how to fill it out so that it would look authentic? Should she find someone who would know how? Where could she find such a person? What kind of news would it be if a party organizer’s wife was arrested in a dugout in the woods, looking for a counterfeiter? Or if a story got out that she was running around the village asking where to find the best man to make a passport? No, they should get a real passport from someone living. Or get someone to lose one.
“Hans, if I get you a passport…”
“If? You promised you would.”
“Will you do what I tell you to do and go where I tell you to go?”
“Yes!”
“They need all kinds of workers in Tallinn. And the factories have their own dormitories. I doubt I could arrange an apartment for you, there’s such a shortage, but I could get you a place in the dormitory. The railway, the shipyards, there are all sorts of possibilities. And if you bring the dormitory housekeeper and manager a pig from the kolkhoz, they won’t even ask what kind of man you are. And I can come visit you in Tallinn. Just think of it, we could go for walks, to the park, along the shore, anywhere at all! We could go to the movies! Imagine that, you could walk around there, just like any other free man! Be outside, see people…”
“Someone would recognize me.”
“No one would recognize you under that beard.” “It’s surprising what people will recognize-the tilt of the neck, the way you walk.”
“Hans, it’s been years since anyone’s seen you. No one will remember. Admit it, Hans, it sounds wonderful.” “It sounds wonderful.”
He looked at Ingel’s chair.
It was as if he were winking at it.
Aliide grabbed her work coat from the hook and went to the barn. She kept her eye on the nearby pitchfork when Hans came after her and climbed up to the attic. Salty sweat trickled through her eyelashes, and she could taste manure in her mouth. She used the fork to fill the wheelbarrow and then climbed up to push the bales of hay back in front of the attic-room door. Her back popped again as she pushed them in place. What was it that Leida Haamer did when her son started coming to her in her dreams? He had been surrounded in his dugout and tried to escape, tried to run away without any boots. He was buried without his boots, too. Every night Leida had the same dream, that her son was complaining that his feet were cold. Maria Kreel had advised her to get some boots that were her son’s size, and the next time there was a funeral in the village, Leida should put the boots in the coffin and include a tag with his name on it. The nightmares had stopped when she got the boots and the name tag into the grave. But Ingel was alive. How did it work with a living person? Or did the visitations from Ingel’s spirit mean that she was no longer alive?
That evening Aliide took the piece of Ingel’s wedding blanket she had saved and shoved it up the stovepipe so that it would be thoroughly smoked.
Evening dimmed the kitchen, and Aliide sat in her place, in her own chair. Had Ingel told the girl? Of course not. Or Linda? No. Of course not. That would be even more insane. But the girl had lied. What kind of help did she expect from a relative who didn’t even know she was family? Or had she intended to tell Aliide but then changed her mind? Did Ingel know she was here? And what about the photo-had the girl lied about that, too? Had she brought the photo with her, had she got it from Ingel?
The rooster crowed. The clock ticked. The tea mushroom in its jar seemed to be staring at her, although it looked more like a shelf fungus thrown in a jar than it did an animal. She could hear a scratching on the floor in the secret room; it sounded just like her old dog Hiisu’s claws. The Mafia men might come back again. If she didn’t open the door they would break it down. They would burn the house down. For all she knew they were right there on the other side of her woods. Maybe the girl had realized that her relative in Estonia would soon own some woods and thought she could sell it in Finland. Maybe she was using the Mafia men to take care of it and the whole business had gone awry. Had Ingel sent her to make the land deal? Maybe the girl had been gullible and thought she was going to get money from the Mafia men that belonged to her but then realized they were going to take it all. Anything was possible. Everything was up for sale in this country now.
She had to remain calm. She would get up from her chair now, turn on the lights in the kitchen, close the curtains over the windows, lock the door, go to the secret room and open it, and let the girl out. It wouldn’t be so difficult. Aliide was much more tranquil than she might have been in this situation. Her heart hadn’t stopped, her thought process was bumpy, but she wasn’t absolutely unhinged. She was in her right mind, even though she’d just learned that Ingel was alive-assuming that the Mafia men were telling the truth.
What had Ingel told the girl about her?
Russian or not, the girl had Hans’s chin.
And she was quick to slice tomatoes and quick to clean berries.
The next time the movie men came to town, Aliide told Martin she’d like to go with him. Martin was delighted- the last time they came she had stayed home with an asthma attack.
“Will you take me dancing afterward?”
“You bet I’ll take my little mushroom dancing!” The auditorium was hot, and Aliide chose a place for them near an open window. They could hear the chug of the generator outside. Aliide tried to ascertain how many of the vineyard men were there and which of them would be the most apt to lose their passport today, with Aliide’s help. Happy people marched across the screen in a May Day parade, the leaders of the Kremlin were assembled on the rooftop to wave at the people, and the people waved back. Maybe Koka Heino? A simple man who’d got his papers from the Seevaldi office long ago, and a small invalid’s pension. The documentary ended, and the feature film, Generation of Victors, began. What about Kalle Rumvolt? No, Kalle lived in the kolkhoz, and his place of residence would be on the passport. Aliide didn’t know who to choose, couldn’t make up her mind-after all, she wasn’t sure who had files kept on them or what kind of checkpoints a person would have to go through in Tallinn. Maybe they would call her, in spite of the honey and ham, and check to see just what man this man was. And Hans couldn’t go to the militia here to get it stamped, not under any circumstances. The whole idea was crazy. Why are you leaving the area? Where are you going? Lord knows what would happen if Hans came in there and proceeded to fill out the forms on behalf of Kalle Rumvolt or, worse yet, met someone at the office who recognized him. The whole plan was a dud from the start, and Aliide was as foolish as the movie man, licking that milkmaid sow all over with his eyes as she stood in the back of the room adjusting her hairdo flirtatiously with her strong arms, the flesh that clung to them fluttering in time with her heart, so quick to tremble.
They needed a Tallinn passport.
The movie ended and the dancing began. Buzzing and bustling, the smell of liquor from somewhere. The tittering milkmaid once again hanging around near the movie men. Aliide found it hard to breathe. The whole stupid scheme made her want to cry. She told Martin she wanted to go home and wove her way through the crowd and out. She stopped in the yard to catch her breath, and then it happened. The fire. She heard Martin yelling orders, and people came churning out of the building. Confusion. Martin tried to organize the chaos, and the projector mechanic was carried out coughing and put down right in front of Aliide. The projector mechanic was from Tallinn. The projector mechanic was in his shirtsleeves.
The projector mechanic had taken off his wool jacket before the film began, wrapped it around his arm while the milkmaid looked on, drooling. Where would a movie man, a man who moved around all the time, keep his passport, if not in his breast pocket?
Aliide rushed back into the building.
Läänemaa, Estonia
The cupboard was heavy, heavier than it had been before. She had to drag the unconscious girl out by her feet. The girl’s fingernails were shredded and her fingertips were bloody; there were bruises on her forehead.
“Why did you come here?” The question beat in Aliide’s chest, but she couldn’t get it out. She didn’t really want to know. The men would be here soon; she had to wake the girl up. Hans’s chin exactly. She threw water from the bucket over her. The girl curled up in a fetal position, then sat bolt upright.
“Grandmother would like some seeds. Estonian seeds. Snapdragons.”
She should shoot the girl.
Hans’s gun was still hidden in the table drawer.
“It was an accident. It really was! I was in Estonia, and I remembered that I had relatives here. Grandmother had mentioned the name of the village. And when I realized that I had relatives here, I thought that it was a way to escape, that there was at least someone in the country who could help me. Aliide was the only name I knew. I didn’t even know if Aliide would be here, but I couldn’t think of anything else to do. Pasha brought me to Estonia.”
Or maybe she should coax her back into the little room and leave her there.
Or give her to the Mafia. Render unto the Russians what belongs to the Russians.
“I didn’t have any choice! What they did to the girls… The way they…If you had seen how they… They took pictures of everything and they said that they would send videos home to Sasha, to everybody, if I tried to get away. They must have done it by now.”
“Who’s Sasha?”
“My boyfriend. Or he was, anyway. I shouldn’t have killed the boss. Now everyone at home knows and I can never go back there…”
“You could never look Sasha in the eye.”
“No.”
“Or anyone else.”
“No.”
“And you would never know, when you passed people on the street, if they had seen those pictures. They would look at you, and you would never know if you’d been recognized. They would be laughing among themselves and looking in your direction, and you wouldn’t know if they were talking about you.”
Aliide shut her mouth. What was she talking about? The girl stared at her.
“Make some coffee,” Aliide said. She opened the front door and slammed it shut again.
Läänemaa, Estonian Soviet Socialist Republic
“Ants Makarov, son of Andres.” Hans tried out his new name. “And I just have to register for an apartment and go to work?” “Exactly.”
“You’re an amazing woman.”
“It’s just a question of organization. It cost one pig. And a couple jars of honey.”
Aliide gave Hans a pile of Communist leaflets and ordered him to read them on the train on the way to Tallinn. “And then keep them in your room where people can see them.”
Hans put down the leaflets and wiped his hands on his pants.
“Hans, you need to be believable! And you need to go to meetings and participate!”
“I couldn’t do that.”
“Yes you could! I’ll use the horse cart to take you to the station. You can hide among the market bundles so no one in the village will see you and wonder who the strange man is with me. Then you just hop on the train. I’ll come to see you and bring you any news.”
Hans nodded.
“Will you be all right here?” he asked.
Aliide turned back to the stove. She hadn’t told Hans about the plan she had started to hatch after she’d arranged his passport. She would divorce Martin and apply for release from the kolkhoz, say that she was going to go to school, get herself a good profession, and then come back. Everyone would vote for that without hesitation-they needed educated workers at the kolkhoz. It would be a weighty enough reason to free her from this serfdom that they called a commune. Then she would take up painting or go to work for the railway-they had dormitories, too. And she could take classes in the evenings, maybe enroll in night school. All the workplaces were in favor of study. Then she could be near Hans, and they could go for walks, and go to the movies, and things like that, and everything would be wonderful-they wouldn’t see anyone they knew on the street, they wouldn’t be surrounded by barking dogs, everything would be new, and there wouldn’t be a smell of Ingel anywhere. Hans would finally see what a wonderful woman his Liide really was. And if the mere promise of a passport had got Hans to show some backbone, what would a whole new life do? Of course Aliide didn’t know how Hans would react to the fact that the streets of Tallinn were swarming with Russians, that half the workers in the factories seemed to speak Russian, but once he got a taste of wind and sky he wouldn’t feel so bad about what was lost, would he? He could stand the Russians, make a few little concessions? Aliide’s new shoes were waiting in the back of the wardrobe. She would leave her old shoes on the train on the way to Tallinn. The new ones had high heels-she wouldn’t need to put a piece of wood in the hole in her overshoes where the high heel should go anymore.
They had just come home from the veterinarian. Martin had taken him a bottle of liquor, and the doctor had given them the papers telling the sausage factory to take their cow, which had been sick for a long time and had died that morning. Martin sat down in the front room to read. Aliide took off her scarf, went into the kitchen, and turned on the light.
There was blood on the floor.
“Does my hubby want a nightcap?”
That suited Martin. He was already picking up a copy of Voice of the People.
Aliide made him a stiffer drink than usual. She didn’t put Maria Kreel’s mixture in it-instead she took out a packet of powder she’d gotten from Martin’s watch pocket. He had shown it to her once-he got it from the men at the NKVD, and it didn’t taste like anything. Later Aliide had replaced his powder with some flour, and now she put the whole packet’s contents into his drink.
“My little mushroom always knows what I want,” Martin said approvingly as he took the glass from her. He tossed back the drink in one gulp and bit off a piece of rye bread. Aliide went to do the dishes. Martin’s newspaper fell on the floor.
“Tired already?”
“Well, I guess I am getting sleepy.”
“You’ve had a long day.”
Martin got up, stumbled toward the bedroom, and flopped down on the bed. The straw in the mattress rustled. The metal bedsprings squeaked. Aliide went to look at him-poked at him-he didn’t move. She left him lying there with his shoes on, went back to the kitchen, closed the curtains, and started to rub her hands with goose fat.
“Is there anyone here?”
“Liide…”
The voice came from the back of the kitchen, from a corner of the cupboard, behind a basket of potatoes. Aliide pushed the things out of the way and pulled Hans out from behind them. His shoulder was bloody. Aliide opened his coat.
“You went to the woods, didn’t you?”
“Liide…”
“Not to Tallinn.”
“I had to.”
“You promised.”
Aliide got some alcohol and gauze and started cleaning the wound.
“Were you caught?”
“No.”
“Are you sure?”
“Liide, don’t be angry.”
Hans grimaced. They had been surrounded. It was the perfect ambush. He had been shot, but he got away. “Did they catch everyone else?”
“I don’t know.”
“Did you tell anyone in the forest about me?” “No.”
“There are a lot of NKVD agents in the woods. I know, because Martin told me. One of them even came here on his way to look for someone whose group had been infiltrated. They have poisoned liquor. You could have told them what you know.”
“I didn’t drink any liquor with anyone.”
Aliide examined his shoulder. Her hands came away red. They couldn’t consult a doctor.
“Hans, I’m going to get Maria Kreel.”
Hans stared back at her and smiled.
“Ingel is here. Ingel will take care of it.”
The bottle of alcohol fell from Aliide’s hand. Shards and liquor spread across the floor to the baseboards. She wiped her brow, smelled the blood and liquor. A rage rushed inside her, and her knees sagged. She opened her mouth but didn’t know how to form sentences; just a muffled sputter and a squeak came out, her ears shut tight. She fumbled for the back of a chair, held on to it until her breath started to flow, and when it did Hans had fainted. She just had to keep her mind focused, handle the situation. She knew how to handle situations. First she had to drag Hans into the little room; then she had to go to the Kreels. She grabbed Hans under the arms. Something peeped out of his coat pocket.
A notebook. She let go of him and picked it up.
I don’t know what to think. I’m reading Ingel’s most recent letter. I got it today, and I got the last one two days ago. Ingel writes about remembering the willow trees at home, particularly one of them. At first it really made me smile. It would be a good thing to think about until the next letter, that willow. Maybe I would be reminiscing about it at the same time that Ingel was. Then I realized that there was something wrong. Ingel’s letter had a worn, well-read look about it. Why was the envelope so clean? The last time people were taken away and letters started coming, they didn’t even have envelopes. I hope it’s just that one of the messengers put the letter in an envelope, but my heart won’t let me believe it.
I’m comparing the signature to the one in the family Bible. Ingel wrote Linda’s name and birthdate there. The handwriting’s not the same. It looks the same, but it’s not the same.
Liide brought me a bottle of liquor. I don’t want to look at her. I don’t dare tear up the letters, although I’d like to. Liide might ask where they were, and then what would I tell her? How can I ask her about it? I just feel like hitting her.
Hans Pekk, son of Eerik, Estonian peasant
Liide’s arranged everything. She got me a passport. I’m sitting here leafing through it wondering if it can really be true. But it is true. I went ahead and promised Aliide that I wouldn’t go into the forest, that I would go to Tallinn to live in a dorm. Liide wrote down the address for me and gave me a lot of instructions.
I’m not going to Tallinn. There are no fields there, no forests. What kind of a man would I be in the city?
Sometimes I feel like aiming this Walther at Liide.
My mind has been perfectly clear for a long time. I just want to see Linda again.
Ingel would have put more salt in the gravy.
Hans Pekk, son of Eerik, Estonian peasant
Aliide realized she was yelling, but she didn’t care anymore. She threw the water pail on the floor, smashed a jar of Red Moscow perfume, and scattered a pile of Soviet Woman sewing patterns. She would never sew any of those Tallinn dresses, never walk hand in hand with Hans along the Viru Gate, carefree because she would never encounter those men, beautiful because the people she passed didn’t recognize her. She would never do those things with Hans that she’d dreamed of these last few months as she lay next to Martin while he snored. Hans had promised! Aliide yelled until her voice ran out. What did it matter if Martin woke up? What did it ever matter to anyone? What did anything matter anymore? Everything was shattered. All the trouble she’d been through! All the striving! Collecting fines from people for not having children! All the enormous work she’d done, all the sleepless nights, every day of her life wasted by fear, the stink of Martin’s flesh, her endless humiliation, endless lies, endless writhing around in Martin’s bed, constantly trembling, the underarm shields in her rayon dress squishing with the sweat of fear, the dentist’s hairy hands, the viscous glaze over Linda’s eyes after that night, the lights, the soldiers’ boots-she would have forgiven all of it, forgotten all of it, for just one day in a park in Tallinn with Hans. That’s why she had taken care of her skin, cleansed her face with Red Poppy soap, remembered to rub goose fat on her hands several times a day. So she wouldn’t look like a country girl. They wouldn’t have been interrogated even once; they would have been left in peace, but that didn’t matter to Hans. All she had asked for was one little moment together in the park. She had fed him and clothed him and warmed his bathwater, got a new dog to protect him, brought him his newspapers, carried up bread and butter and buttermilk, knit him socks, arranged his medicines and liquor, written the letters, done everything to make him happy. Had Hans asked even once how she was doing? Had he ever been worried about her? She had been ready to wipe the slate clean, let everything go, forgive all the shame she had endured for his sake. And what did he do? He lied!
Hans had never had any intention of walking with Aliide in the parks of Tallinn.
And then there were those letters… Hans had lost consciousness. Aliide pressed her foot against his shoulder, but he didn’t move.
She went to check on Martin. He was in exactly the same position as before. He couldn’t have woken up in the meantime. Aliide had left an empty bucket next to his boots in case he woke up. The clatter would have warned her. The bucket was in exactly the same spot where she’d left it, a hand’s width from the washstand.
Aliide went back into the kitchen and checked Hans’s condition, took his cigarette case out of his pocket-the three lions had faded-and lit one of his hand-rolled paperossis. Air rushed into her lungs, and the smoke made her cough, but the situation seemed clearer.
She washed her hands.
She poured the red water into the slop bucket. She took some valerian and sat down and smoked another cigarette. She went over to Hans.
She took a medicine that she’d made for bad dreams out of the cupboard and opened Hans’s mouth.
He woke up coughing and sputtering. Some of the bottle’s contents trickled onto the floor.
“This will make you feel better,” Aliide whispered.
He opened his eyes, looked past Aliide, and swallowed.
She lifted his head in her arms and waited.
Then she got a rope, tied his hands and legs, and dragged him into the little room hidden behind the kitchen. She threw his diary in after him and took Ingel’s cup off the shelf and put it in her apron pocket.
She put a blanket over him.
She kissed him on the mouth.
She closed the door.
She sealed up the door with paste.
She blocked the air holes.
She pulled the cupboard in front of the door and went to clean the blood from the kitchen floor.
But what if what Martin’s brother said is true? How will Liide manage here with Martin when Ingel and I are gone? Things could go badly for her, and I certainly wouldn’t want that. Does she know that if Martin’s brother’s stories are true, Martin could suffer a fate as terrible as his brother’s? And so could she. I tried to ask her if Martin had said anything about his brother. She probably thought I was crazy asking questions like that. She believes everything Martin says. Supposedly he’s so in love with her that he would never lie to her.
I asked Ingel for advice when she was here, but she just shook her head, she couldn’t say anything, or maybe she didn’t want to. I told her that I do know there are other reasons that Liide doesn’t want to let me into her room, besides the fact that it’s a long way to the attic if anyone were to come. I glanced in there one time. Pelmi had started barking, and Liide told me to go straight to the attic, and she went out in the yard-the rag seller was arriving on his horse. But I peaked into her room, and there was a cake dish on the washstand. It was just like the one Theodor Kruus had-I remembered it well, because he was so proud of it. I walked over to it to make sure, and I saw a pair of earrings lying on the cake dish-precious stones in gold fittings. And a mirror had appeared, too-a mirror as big as a window.
My head hurts all the time-sometimes it feels like it’s going to split in two. Ingel brought me some headache medicine. There’s half a tub of salted meat left and a little water in the can. Ingel always brings me some more, but Aliide won’t.
Hans Pekk, son of Eerik, Estonian peasant
Zara had just grabbed the percolator when she heard a car drive up. She ran to the window and closed the curtains. The doors of the black car opened. Pasha’s bald head appeared. Lavrenti’s head appeared on the other side, more slowly. Almost reluctantly. Aliide stood in the middle of the yard leaning on her cane. She adjusted the knot of her scarf under her chin and pulled her shoulders back.
There was no time to think. Zara ran to the back room and turned the iron latches on the window. They were stiff as she moved them up and down. She wrenched at the sash handle, and the window slid down suddenly. A spider ran away among the patchy, blistered wallpaper. Zara opened the outer window as well. The spiderweb broke, and dead flies jiggled between the window frames. Nightfall and the chirping of crickets greeted her. Grandmother’s photo. She had forgotten it. She rushed back into the kitchen. The picture wasn’t on the table. Where could Aliide have put it? No-there was no way she was going to guess where it was. She ran back into the other room, jumped out the window into the peony bed. A few stems broke-luckily not too many. Maybe Lavrenti wouldn’t notice. Zara shoved the lace curtains back inside the house, pulled the window shut, and ran to the garden, past the early golden apple tree, the onion apple tree, the bee’s nest, and the damson and plum tree. Her legs were feeling the run already. One bare foot sank into a mole’s burrow. Should she go the same way she’d come, past the silver willow trees, or would it be better to go straight across the fields?
She went around the back corner of the garden to where she could see the front yard. Pasha’s BMW was sitting right in front of the gate. She couldn’t hear or see anyone. Where had they gone? Lavrenti was sure to come and look at the garden at any moment. She grabbed the chainlink fence and hauled herself over it. The metal screeched. She froze where she stood, but she didn’t hear anything. She could make out Pasha’s tire tracks on the overgrown road on the other side of the fence. She crept toward the house, ready to run at any moment, and when she’d got close enough she looked through the birch trees and the chain links into the yellow light of the kitchen window and saw Aliide slicing bread. Then Aliide picked up some plates from the dish rack and brought them to the table, turned toward the dish cupboard, puttered with something there, came back to the table with the milk can-from the Estonian days, that’s what Aliide had said. Pasha sat chatting and popping something into his mouth-apple preserves, judging by the color of the jar. Lavrenti looked at the ceiling and blew smoke playfully, directing it up and down as it came out of his mouth. The look on Aliide’s face was so ordinary that Zara couldn’t interpret it-as if her grandchildren had come to visit and she was just offering them a sandwich like a grandma should. Aliide laughed. So did Pasha-he was in on the joke. Then he asked her something and she went to fetch a basket from the pantry. It had tools in it. It didn’t seem possible, but Pasha started to fix the refrigerator!
Zara held on to the birch tree to keep herself upright- her head seemed to churn. Did Aliide plan to expose her? Was that what this strange little play was about? Did she plan to sell Zara to them? Had Pasha given her money? What were they talking about? Was Aliide just playing for time? Should she take the time to figure it out? She should be leaving, but she couldn’t. The crickets chirped and the night grew, little animals ran in the grass, and lights went on in faraway houses. There was a rustling from a corner of the barn, a rustling that moved to her skin. Her skin was rustling, and a broken gate creaked wearily in her head. What was Aliide going to do?
After the interminable meal and the repair of the refrigerator, Pasha got up and Lavrenti followed him. They seemed to be saying good-bye to Aliide. The yard light came on and the front door opened. All three of them came outside. Aliide remained standing on the steps. The men lit cigarettes, and Pasha looked at the woods as Lavrenti strode toward the flower beds. Zara backed up into the shadows.
“You have some fine woods, ma’am.”
“Isn’t it nice? The Estonian forest. My forest.” Bang.
Pasha’s body collapsed at the foot of the steps. Another bang.
Lavrenti was lying on the ground.
Aliide had shot them both in the head.
Zara closed her eyes, then opened them. Aliide was examining the men’s pockets, taking out their guns and their wallets and a little bundle.
Zara could tell that it was a roll of dollar bills.
Lavrenti’s boots still shone. A soldier’s boots.
It was only when Zara heard the crash of glass and wood that she remembered she’d brought an object with her from the little room. She’d been squeezing the trunk of the birch too hard-shards of glass and pieces of black-painted wood fell out of her pocket. It wasn’t a mirror, although she had thought it was when she saw it in the little room. It was a picture frame. She couldn’t see it clearly in the moonlight, but among the cracks in the glass was a photo of a young man in an army uniform. She could just barely make out the writing on the back: Hans Pekk, August 6, 1929.
She had slipped the frame into the notebook that she’d found. She carefully brushed away the bits of glass-on the corner of the notebook was the same name: Hans Pekk.
I wonder if that’s what Martin is still doing here in the countryside. Why is he here, if he’s on such good terms with the party? Shouldn’t he be some kind of honcho in Tallinn by now? That’s the impression I got from Liide, anyway-that all of those people are in powerful positions now. Doesn’t Liide wonder about it at all? Or are they going to Tallinn and she doesn’t want to tell me? I’ll try asking her again about Martin’s brother-but she always acts strange when I start talking about Martin. She gets all aggravated, acts as if I were accusing her of some evil deed.
Salt herring makes me thirsty. I wish I had some of Ingel’s beer. I can’t tell day from night in here. I miss the sunrise over the fields. I listen to the birds hopping around on the roof and I miss my girls. I don’t know if I have a single friend left alive.
Hans Pekk, son of Eerik, Estonian peasant
The taillights receded into the distance. The girl had been in such a hurry that it had been easy to get her into the taxi, although she kept muttering something. Aliide had reminded her that someone might come looking for Pasha and Lavrenti at any moment-the need to hurry was as urgent as ever. It would be best if she made it to the harbor before anyone started wondering where the men had disappeared to.
If the girl made it home, she would tell Ingel that the land she lost long ago was waiting for her. Ingel and Linda could get Estonian citizenship. They could even get a pension and, once they had a passport, the land. Ingel was coming back, and Aliide couldn’t do anything to stop her anymore. And why wouldn’t the girl survive? They’d found her passport in Pasha’s pocket, and the roll of dollars would pay for a lot more than a taxi to Tallinn-like an expedited visa so she wouldn’t have to find a truck to hide in when she got to the harbor. The girl’s eyes had been wide, like a skittish horse, but she would be all right. The taxi driver had got such a thick wad of bills that he wouldn’t ask her any questions about her trip.
Since she was a descendent of Ingel and Linda, she could get an Estonian passport, too. She wouldn’t ever have to go back to Russia. Should Aliide have told her that? Maybe. Maybe she would figure it out for herself.
Aliide went into the back room and got a paper and pen. She was going to write Ingel a letter. Tell her she could get all the papers she needed to come back at the notary, that she and Linda could move in at any time. She told her the cellar was full of jam and preserves, made according to their old recipes. It turned out she had become quite good at it, even if Ingel had never believed in her cooking skills. She’d even become a braggart about it.
She could see Pasha and Lavrenti’s boots through the doorway.
Were the boys already on their way here-the ones who sang the songs? Did they already know that Aliide was alone now?
Aino’s boys could get her some gasoline. She would give them all the liquor in the cabinet and anything else they wanted in the house. Let them take it all.
She put her notebook of recipes in the envelope with the letter.
She would send the letter tomorrow, then get the gasoline and douse the house with it. After that, she would have to tear up the floorboards in the little room-it would be hard, but she could do it. Then she would lie down beside Hans. In her own house, beside her own Hans. She might get it done before the boys came, or did they plan to do tonight whatever it was they planned to do?