“We’ll take those rifles, please.” Filip tried to imitate Gajda’s tone—even and unconcerned but unquestionably authoritative.
“Tie their hands,” Filip ordered Makovec, who had followed him.
Another shot sounded, again in the distance.
Filip needed information. “How many men are inside this building?” he asked the guard who’d offered Novak a light.
The guard clenched his jaw and looked away.
Filip had spoken Russian since 1915. The man understood him; he was deliberately ignoring him. In normal circumstances, Filip might have let it slide, might have been gentle and persuasive, but Dalek’s life was on the line, and so were the lives of eleven others.
Filip grabbed the man and whipped him into the stone building hard enough to crack his head. The man winced. “How many of your comrades are inside the building?”
He still refused to speak.
Filip turned to the other Russian and repeated his question.
“Ten awake. Twenty asleep, rifles within reach.”
“And the prisoners? Are they still inside?”
The man nodded.
Filip turned to Novak, who seemed to have the best Russian of the four of them. “Take this one’s coat and hat so you’ll blend in. Guard the door. You too, Golova. Makovec and I will take our prisoners back.”
After removing the guards’ hats and coats, Filip and Makovec marched them off. “How many armed men are within an hour’s march of this building?” Filip asked the more talkative of the two Russians.
The man shrugged. “Five thousand.”
Five thousand? Filip’s stomach did a flip of trepidation. “Russians?”
“Two thousand are. The rest are Hungarian. They’d rather join us than stay in their prison camps.”
Filip and Makovec took their prisoners through the quarter with stone buildings, through a neighborhood with wooden buildings, and past a few Siberian-style huts. Filip kept up the questions. According to the captured guard, the Bolsheviks and their allies were armed much more thoroughly than the legionnaires. Unless Gajda had captured the armory—that might make things closer to even.
“Halt!” someone called in Czech. One moment, the street looked empty. The next, dozens of men appeared in doorways and windows, from alleys and behind fences.
Makovec greeted one and verified they were all on the same side. Filip handed over the prisoners and spoke with the sergeant in charge, reporting what they’d done at militia headquarters.
“Good. Now it’s time to free our brothers. Lead the way,” the sergeant said.
Filip steered a group of fifty back toward the building. Czech and Slovak guards now held several of the intersections they passed. Some had piled up furniture to make a barrier. Others used sandbags. But if the local Bolsheviks found out what they were doing, the Czechs and Slovaks were going to need even stronger defenses. Small arms fire cracked in the distance as they returned. They were running out of time.
A block away from militia headquarters, Filip’s group converged with another group of about the same size. More legionnaires. And they had come from the Bolshevik armory.
Filip took one of the offered rifles, a Mosin-Nagant with bayonet, and a pocketful of ammunition to go with it. They weren’t supposed to fire, but he assumed the sight of one hundred armed legionnaires would convince the men holding their brothers to either negotiate or surrender.
A Czech sergeant divided the men and sent groups to cover various points of the building. When the legion was in position, the sergeant yanked open the door. The bulk of the force fanned out behind him, Filip included, and sixty sharp, freshly commandeered bayonets shone in the light that flooded from the building.
“We’re here for our brothers.” The sergeant kept his rifle pointed at the ceiling, but with a motion of his hand, the rest of the men aimed at the handful of guards who’d come to investigate.
One of the red guards ran into an office. No one shot him. The wires had been cut, so he couldn’t call for help.
Legionnaires rushed into the building and infiltrated its rooms and corridors.
“Where are the prisoners?” the sergeant asked one of the guards as Filip and another Czech searched the man for weapons. They confiscated his revolver.
A knob in the man’s throat quivered as he looked at the force arrayed against him. “I’ll show you.”
Filip kept his eyes moving as they followed, wary of traps. The guard would be foolish to try anything other than complete cooperation, but he might not realize his building was surrounded and his communications were cut off.
When they reached their destination, the prisoners were locked in a cell, all crowded together. Filip would have expected the red guards to at least separate the officers, but perhaps the insult had been intentional. Voitsekhovsky was Russian, but he hadn’t joined the Bolsheviks. That made him an enemy.
Dalek stood and walked to the bars. He gripped them with both hands. “You’re late, Filip.”
Filip chuckled as Dalek’s face broke into a grin. The sergeant unlocked the cell and released the captured Czechs.
As dawn broke, another group of legionnaires joined them. With them was Soviet Commissar Sadlucky. His frown and pose showed displeasure and distaste, and he glared at Voitsekhovsky before reluctantly agreeing to negotiate with him. “This represents an attack against the Bolshevik government, and I will use all available means to ensure your punishment.”
“We have no hostility for the Bolsheviks.” Voitsekhovsky spoke with calmness. “The legion just wants to embark for France—with all its men.”
The men spoke back and forth, sometimes arguing, sometimes seeming to come to an agreement of sorts. Finally, Sadlucky relented. “If all your men leave for the train depot and stay out of Chelyabinsk proper, I think we can put this whole business behind us.”
Chapter Fourteen
The Czechoslovak Congress proceeded with their sessions, but tension with the local Soviet simmered during the week that followed the deadly confrontation between members of the legion and Hungarian war prisoners. Filip sat near the back of the train station waiting room, where the meetings were held. He wasn’t quite at ease, because the Bolsheviks were near, but nor was he unduly alarmed, because there had been no more outbreaks of violence since the rescue. Kral sat in front of the room with the other voting delegates. Dalek hadn’t arrived. Either he was still in the telegraph office, or he’d gotten distracted by his violin.
The chairman of the Russian branch of the Czecho-Slovak National Council, František Richter, addressed delegates and the audience. He wasn’t as bold as Filip would have liked. The Chelyabinsk incident had made it crystal clear that the Bolsheviks couldn’t be trusted.
The incident had also shown that the legion was perfectly capable of taking care of itself. If they had to fight their way to Vladivostok, so be it. It would take a force stronger than anything the Bolsheviks could currently come up with to stop them.
Dalek rushed into the room and let the door slam shut behind him. He marched directly to Chairman Richter, whispered something, and handed him a piece of paper. Then Dalek joined Filip in the back. Half the delegates followed him with their eyes.
“What’s that all about?” Filip asked.
“Comrade Trotsky forgot something very important.”
“What?”
“Whoever controls the railroad also controls the telegraph lines.” A mischievous grin spread across Dalek’s face. “We just intercepted his orders to all local Soviets from Moscow to Vladivostok.”
Richter finished reading the paper Dalek had handed him and cleared his throat. “The legion has intercepted a telegram from Comrade Trotsky, Soviet People’s Commissar for Army and Navy Affairs. In it, he orders local Soviets to forcibly remove us from our trains and disarm us completely. Then we’re to be compelled into the Red Army or labor battalions. My brothers, this changes things.”