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Part Four

IN LIVE DEFIANCE

WORN OUT WITH TERROR AND MISGIVING

TATIANA wasn’t staying another second in Lazarevo by herself

She wrote Alexander ten letters, relaxed, upbeat, coical and seasonal She enlisted Naira Mikhailovna’s help in sending them to Alexander one by one, at an interval of one every week

She knew that if she just left without a word, the old ladies would write to Alexander or, worse, find a way to telegraph Alexander a frantichim of her disappearance, and if he were still alive to hear it, his uncontrolled reaction ht cost hi to get a job at the Lazarevo fish plant, whereto Molotov to work in the hospital Tatiana invited no arguot none

Naira Mikhailovna wanted to knohy Tatiana couldn’t send the letters straight from Molotov Tatiana replied that Alexander didn’t want her to leave Lazarevo, and he would be upset if he found out she orking in town She didn’t want to upset hi "You kno protective he can be, Naira Mikhailovna"

"Protective and unreasonable," Naira said, vigorously nodding She wasto enlist as a co-conspirator in what she saw as a plot to circureed to send hi sewn herself all new clothes, and having packed as many bottles of vodka and tushonka as she could carry, Tatiana set out early one ood-bye to the four old women Dusia said a prayer over her head Naira cried Raisa cried and shook Axinya leaned in and whispered, "You are crazy"

Crazy for hi dark brown trousers, brown stockings, brown boots, and a brointer coat Her light hair was tied in a plaid brown kerchief She wanted to draw as little attention to herself as possible She had sewn the dollars into an inseam flap on her trousers Before she left, she took off her wedding ring and threaded it through a braided rope she hadit inside her shirt, she whispered, "You’re just closer to h the woods out of Lazarevo, Tatiana passed the path that led to their clearing Stopping briefly, she thought about going down to the river and glancingone last ti -- was tooher head, she continued onward

There were sos she could not do

She had watched Alexander steal one look; she could not Since Vova had carried her trunk up the path over two o, Tatiana had not returned to the place where she had lived with Alexander Vova boarded up the s, put the padlock back on, and carried all of Alexander’s cut wood to Naira’s house

In Molotov, Tatiana first went to the local Soviet to see if there was any ly, there was!

She asked if there was any telegraetting soldier’s pay, itthe 1,500 rubles, Tatiana wondered ouldmoney but not write? Then she rerandrad Well, she didn’t care if she got thirty letters from Alexander all at once, one for each day of September

At the train station in Molotov, Tatiana told the Party do a dire shortage of nurses, ith the war and the hunger, and she was returning to help She showed him the employment stamp from Grechesky Hospital in her passport He didn’t have to know she had washed floors and toilets and dishes and sewed body bags For his help Tatiana offered him a bottle of vodka

He asked for the letter frorad Tatiana replied that the letter got burned, but here were her credentials from the Kirov factory, from the Grechesky Hospital, and here was a citation for valor in the Fourth People’s Volunteer Army, and here was another bottle of vodka for his trouble

He staht her ticket

Before she boarded her train, she went to see Sofia, as so excruciatingly slow, Tatiana felt herself aging as she waited Tatiana thought she would ed to procure the two photographs she had taken of Alexander and Tatiana on the steps of St Seraphi day Tatiana stuffed them in her backpack and ran to catch her train

The train she was departing on was much better than the one on which she had arrived It was a se southwest to Kazan Southas the wrong direction for Tatiana, who needed to be heading north But Kazan was a big city, and she would be able to catch another train Her plan was to soe across Lake Ladoga to Kokkorevo

As the train was pulling out, Tatiana looked across the road at the Kama in the far distance, obscured by pines and birches, and thought, will I ever see Lazarevo again?

She did not think so

In Kazan, Tatiana got on a train headed to Nizhny Novgorod -- not the Novgorod of her childhood and of Pasha, another Novgorod She was now less than 300 kiloht another train, this one a freight train heading northwest to Yaroslavl, and froda, Tatiana found that she could take the train to Tikhvin, but that Tikhvin was under constant and oppressive Ger to Kobona was apparently i knocked out of operation three to four times a day, with heavy loss of life and supplies Thank God for the train inspector, who sold her the ticket to Tikhvin and asto chat with her

She asked the inspector how the food was getting into the blockaded Leningrad if the Kobona route was blocked by German fire

After she found out, Tatiana decided to follow the food Froda she took a train headed for Petrozavodsk, far north on the western shores of Lake Onega, and siot off early, in Podporozhye, and walked fifty kilometers to Lodeinoye Pole, which was ten kiloa

In Lodeinoye Pole, Tatiana felt the earth ru underneath her feet and knew she was close

While stopping at a canteen to have some soup and bread, Tatiana overheard four transport drivers talking at the next table Apparently the Ger all their air power and artillery to the Volkhov front -- where Tatiana was headed The Soviet general Meretskov’s 2nd Army was only four kilometers away from the Neva, and the German field marshal Manstein was deter the river Tatiana heard one of the men say, "Did you hear about our 861st division? Could not move the Germans at all, spent all day under their fire, and lost 65 percent of itsofficers!"

"That’s nothing!" another exclaiust-Septe in action? One hundred and thirty thousand!"

"Is that a lot?" said another "In Moscow--"

"Out of one hundred and fifty thousandto other people’s discussions But she needed just a little bitup a conversation with the truck drivers, she found out that food barges departed on Lake Ladoga just south of a small town called Syastroy, about ten kilometers north of the Volkhov front Syastroy was about a hundred kilometers south fro to ask the men for a ride but didn’t like the sound of theht, and the way one of them looked at her, even with her brown plaid kerchief

She wiped hershe was carrying Alexander’s loaded P-38

It took Tatiana three days to walk the hundred kilometers to Syastroy It was early October and cold, but the first snow had not fallen yet, and the road was paved Many other people walked along with her -- villagers, evacuees, itinerant far to the front She walked for half a day next to one as returning froh He looked as forlorn as Alexander ht a ride fro roar of heavy bo the earth underneath her feet as she walked, her pack on her back, her eyes to the ground No h the potato field in Luga It was better than sitting in the train station in Luga, realizing that the Ger until Tatiana was dead It was better than that, but not round

She walked even at night -- it was cals She would walk for another few hours and then find a barn to sleep in One night she stayed with a family who offered her dinner and their oldest son She ate the dinner, passed on the son, offering money instead They took it

Ten kiloht on the Volkhov River, Tatiana found a se about to take off across the lake around the horn of Novaya Ladoga The longshore the rope She waited as the plank was just about to go up and then ran up to the man and told hi out five cans of haly at the vodka Tatiana asked hio to see her dying rad Tatiana knew this was a dire time for local people Most of their relatives who had lived in Leningrad were either dead or dying The dockhand gratefully kept the vodka and waved her on "Warning you, though -- it’s a bad passage Too long in the water, and the Ger"

"I know," she said "I’e came to Osinovets, north of Kokkorevo, where Tatiana offered the rest of her tushonka -- four cans -- and another bottle of vodka to the truck driver as taking food to Leningrad He let her sit in the front with him and even shared some bread with her as they drove

Tatiana stared out theWas she really going to be able to go back to her Fifth Soviet apartrad?

She shivered She didn’t want to think about it The driver dropped her off at Finland Station in the north of the city She took a tram back to Nevsky Prospekt and walked horad was sad and ehttime, and the streets were poorly lit, but at least there was electricity Tatiana ood ti But as she walked, she saw three saps where s and doors had once been

She hoped her building on Fifth Soviet was still standing

It was Still green, still drab, still filthy

Tatiana stood for a fewfor the thing Alexander called courage

The courage to go back up the stairs that led to the two empty rooms where six other hearts had once lived Rooms filled with jokes and vodka and dinners and small dreams and small desires and life

She looked up and down the street Across Grechesky the church still stood, untouched and unbooing into their buildings, co home from work Just a few people, maybe three The pave her nose

It was for hi, and it called to her

He was going to be her courage

She nodded to herself and turned the handle The dark green hallway s, Tatiana sloalked up three flights of stairs to her colossy brown door

The apartment was quiet There was no one in the front kitchen, and the doors to the other rooms were closed All closed, except for Slavin’s, whose door was slightly ajar Tatiana knocked, looked in

Slavin was on his floor, listening to the radio

"Who are you?" he said in a shrill voice

"Tania Metanova, reed

"Were you here during the War of 1905? Oh, did we give those Japs hell" He pointed his finger to the radio "Listen, listen carefully"

Just the sound of the metronome, beat beat beat

Quietly she backed away The Russians lost that war Slavin looked up from the floor at her and said, "You should have corad last month You would have been safer"

"Don’t worry," she said "If you need anything, I’ht down the hall"

There was no one in her kitchen either To her surprise, the door to her hallway and her two rooms was unlocked In the hallway on her sofa she found two strangers, atea

Tatiana stood for aat thea and Stanislav Krakov They were both in their forties; he was paunchy and spottily balding, she was sain

"Who are you?" de at her

Tatiana put down her backpack "These are a quickly explained that they had lived on Seventh Soviet and Suvorovsky "We had a nice apartment, our own apartment," she said "Our own bathroo was bo in Leningrad because of so a and Stanislav in the Metanov rooa "They’ll find us our own apartht, Stan?"

"Well, I’er unoccupied" She looked around the hallway Alexander had cleaned the place so well, she thought with sadness

"Yes? And where are we supposed to go?" asked Stan "We are registered with the council to stay here"

"What about the other rooms in the communal apartment?" she asked The other rooms -- where other people had died

"They’re all taken," said Stan "Listen, why are we still talking about this? There’s enough space here You can have a whole room to yourself What’s to coh," she said

"Actually, no," said Stan, continuing to drink his tea "Both roohed joylessly "You are not being a good proletarian, coa said, "Stan and I are Party reat," said Tatiana, suddenly feeling very tired "Which rooa and Stan had taken her old room, where she had slept with Dasha, with Mama, with Papa, with Pasha It was also the only room with heat Deda and Babushka’s old room had a broken stove in it

Even if the stove weren’t broken, Tatiana had no wood to heat it

"Could I at least have my bourzhuika back?" she asked

"And e use?" said Stan

"What’s your naa said, "Tania, why don’t you move the little cot to the wall near where the stove is on our side? The wall is wara, stop, you know my back is bad," snapped Stan "She can move it herself"

"Yes," said Tatiana She h to sandwich Pasha’s little cot in between the back of the sofa and the wall

The arm

Tatiana slept for seventeen hours covered by her coat and three blankets

After waking, she went to the Soviet council housing corad "What did you come back for?" the wo out documents for a new ration card "We’re still under blockade, you know"

"I know," said Tatiana "But there’s a shortage of nurses The war is still on" She paused "Soht?"

The older wooing to lift their eyes and look at ht Tatiana Just one person "Summer was better," the woet potatoes"

"That’s all right," Tatiana said, twinging with pain, re the potato counter Alexander had built in Lazarevo

With her ration card in hand, she went to the Elisey food store on Nevsky She couldn’t bear to go back to the store on Fontanka and Nekrasova where she used to get the fao In Elisey it was too late for bread, but she did get some real milk, some beans, an onion, and four tablespoons of oil For a hundred rubles she bought a can of tushonka Since she wasn’t working yet, her bread ration was only 350 graet a job

Tatiana looked for a bourzhuika but had no luck She even went to Gostiny Dvor shopping center, across fro there She had 3,000 rubles left of Alexander’s ladly spent half of it on a bourzhuika to keep her war of food Tatiana walked across Nevsky, past the European Hotel, down Mikhailovskaya Ulitsa, crossed the street into the Italian Gardens, and sat on the bench where Alexander had told her about A started, not even when she saw shelling down Mikhailovskaya and across Nevsky She watched a bomb fall on the pavery when he finds out I’ home But she wanted him alive; she didn’t care if he killed her She had seen Alexander’s te their last days in Lazarevo How Alexander got sane -- if Alexander got sane -- after he left her, Tatiana did not know

She went back to work at Grechesky Hospital She had been right The hospital was in dire need of help The administration officer saw her former Grechesky employment stamp, asked if she had been a nurse, and Tatiana replied that she had been a nurse’s aide and that it would take her no time at all to brush up on her skills She asked to be placed in the critical care unit She was given a white uniform and followed a nurse named Elizaveta for one nine-hour shift and then a nurse named Maria for another nine-hour shift The nurses did not lift their eyes to Tatiana

But the patients did

After teeks of working eighteen-hour days, Tatiana was finally given her own rounds and a Sunday afternoon off She got up her courage to go to Pavlov barracks

2

Tatiana needed just a word that Alexander was all right and where he was stationed

The sentry at the gate was no one she knew; his naer to help She liked that He checked the roster of all the soldiers currently at the barracks and told her that Alexander Belov was not there She asked if he knehere the captain was The guard replied with a sht as far as you know?" she asked

The guard shrugged "I think so, but they don’t tellher breath, Tatiana asked if Dimitri Chernenko was still alive

He was Tatiana exhaled Burenich said Chernenko wasn’t at the garrison at present, but that he constantly came and ith supplies

Tatiana tried to think of who else she knew "Is Anatoly Marazov here?" she asked

He hat luck

In a few ate

"Tatiana!" He seelad to see her "What a surprise to see you here Alexander had told me you evacuated with your sister" He paused "I’m sorry about your sister"

"Thank you, Lieutenant," she said, her eyes welling up involuntarily She was extremely relieved If Marazovwas all right

"I didn’t mean to upset you, Tania," Marazov said

"No, no, you haven’t upset eway

"You want to walk around the block?" Marazov asked her "I have a few minutes"

They strolled with their coats buttoned to Palace Square

"Are you here to see Dimitri? He’s not in my unit anymore"

"Oh, I know," she said, and stammered Could she keep all the lies in her head? Hoould she have known about Dimitri? "I knoas injured I saw him at Kobona a few months back" And if she wasn’t here to see Dimitri, as she here to see?

"Yes, he’s now on this side Running Unhappy about that, too I just don’t knohat he wants the war to give him"

"Are you still inAlexander’s destroyer company?"