His friends crowded round him, rubbed his shoulders. —He’ll come back, Mikko. Your father will come back.
— Mikko, it’s all right.
— Mikko, it was just a game.
Eyes clenched shut, Mikko struck the others with fists. —Shut up. Shut up!
The boys stepped away from him, looked at one another, ran down the stairs.
Mikko squinted into the dusty light, saw only Comrade Bush looking down on him. He raised his right forearm over his face, as in defence, and he whispered in excellent Russian. —Leave me alone.
Ursula patted Temerity’s shoulder. As they both backed away from Mikko, the electricity returned and all the lights burned bright, too bright. Filaments blew, and the electricity vanished again.
Mikko ran after the other boys. —Wait!
Temerity shut her eyes. —Ursula, I need to lie down.
— Your room’s not sealed. Perhaps they forgot after arresting you from my room. They gave you back your handbag?
Temerity recalled checking the handbag at Lubyanka. All her Margaret Bush papers, her Margaret Bush passport, her cash, her hundred-gram slab of chocolate, even the compact, perfume, and cervical cap, lay within. —I’ve no doubt they manhandled every little thing, but it’s all there.
— Then you’re being watched.
— Comrade Quiet and Comrade Subtle? Yes, they’re parked outside.
No voices from the radio speakers, no voices from the rooms: the silence clung like ash.
— Margaret?
Leaning on the jamb, Temerity unlocked the door. —I’m just tired.
Ursula said something about returning in a few moments, so Temerity left the door ajar. Stooped, bent as if bearing a child on her back, she shuffled to the bed and, with some difficulty, perched there.
How can sitting hurt so much?
Ursula returned, carrying a metal bowl, a cloth, and a scrap of soap. —The water’s only tepid. It’s the best I could do.
The lining of Temerity’s blouse, weighted by the hidden passport, clung to her skin. —Please, leave me alone. Just for the moment.
— What is this? We shower together.
Light glinted off the bowl, reminding Temerity of Spain. All right, Tikhon, I’ve got about as much of the corruption as I can manage. —Let me undress myself!
Ursula took a step back. —Those pigs.
— No, nobody touched me. Just the stool. It’s nothing. I’m sorry.
Ursula turned down the covers on Temerity’s bed. —Stop apologizing. It’s far more than nothing. Now let me help.
Temerity held up her hands, showing her palms, and Ursula could not quite read the gesture: submission, or warning?
Fingers trembling, arms slow, Temerity unbuttoned her blouse. Shook it out. Folded it. Placed it in the middle of her pillow. Chin high, mouth stiff, she reached behind her back and unhooked her brassiere, an item of clothing that had elicited some envy in the shower room. She leaned forward, and the brassiere slid to her lap, cups and straps in disarray. Then, in some echo of being a child at bath time, in some dull surrender to mercy, she raised her arms.
Ursula washed and dried Temerity’s neck, shoulders, and armpits. Then she kissed Temerity on the forehead, whispering for her to lie down.
Temerity fastened her bra again and slipped on the soiled blouse, aware of its smell. Rolling down her stockings and prying off her shoes, she scowled. —How did my feet get so swollen?
— The stool-sitting. It’s very bad for the circulation. I’ll leave you in peace if you promise to lie down.
— I promise.
Eyelids heavy, Temerity walked Ursula to the door, kissed her on the cheek, and then, even as Ursula opened her mouth to say something else, shut and locked the door.
On the bed, she lay on her side, clenched her body into a tight ball, and tugged the covers up to her chin. Safety and solitude at last.
She wanted to scream into her pillow.
She couldn’t make a sound.
Later, her dreams smelled of iron and copper and spice, of blood.
— How much have you had to drink?
Perched on the side of his bed, Kostya giggled, cleared his throat. He’d stripped down to his undershirt but still wore his galife pants, and they looked huge and absurd. —Rough day, Comrade Doctor. I took a few glasses as soon as I got home.
— And a few more before you got here? Alcohol thins the blood and interferes with the healing of wounds. Keep still. How bad is the pain?
— I’m fucked in the mouth and one-third demented. Quite mild, really. Just fix it.
Efim took a step back. —You need to rest.
— I’ll rest when I’m dead.
— That attitude will not help you.
— Look, when you wear this uniform, then, and only then, may you advise me on my work. Not before.
Efim studied Kostya’s face; the scowl lines cut deep. —Untreated pain wears down the mind. It’s like grit in the gears, and the works seize.
— A startling insight. Can you help me, or not?
— Will you allow me?
After a confused moment, Kostya nodded.
— I’ll be right back.
As his flatmate rustled in his bedroom, and then ran water in the bathroom, Kostya thought about electric lights. The switch for the bathroom light also operated a lamp on Efim’s bedroom wall. If Efim turned off the lamp, then the bathroom switch wouldn’t work at all. They had come to an understanding, if a reluctant one on Kostya’s part. Night visits to the bathroom would be unlit. Not that this bothered Kostya. He’d long overcome his childhood fear of the dark, and he often worked at night, so why would darkness ever frighten him? He told himself he merely disliked how the unlit bathroom reminded him of sleeping in the Basque graveyard in Spain, and in the catacombs in Odessa.
Efim returned to Kostya’s room and prepared the injection, brooding on the visit to the lab of one NKVD sergeant Yury Stepanov. After Stepanov’s departure, Efim had discovered the disturbing absences of two batches of an experimental hypnotic drug. One version could be added to a drink, though it left a salty taste; the other formula would be injected into a vein. Each bottle’s label gave clear instructions. The formulae, however, remained problematic. Stupefied prisoners, at first compliant, soon became too disoriented to give their own names and succumbed to a frightening state, walking in circles, sometimes able to answer simple questions and follow instructions but otherwise, even at gunpoint, talking nonsense. Six to twelve hours later, depending on dose and route of administration, the prisoners endured severe headache, vertigo, and vomiting. Afterwards, they remembered almost nothing.
And to whom might Dr. Scherba complain about missing experimental drugs likely stolen by an NKVD officer?
Efim tied a tourniquet around Kostya’s arm. —My day was long. Make a fist. Release it. Make a fist again. You’ll feel a pinch. Don’t move.
Kostya hissed at the prick and the burn. The two men counted to sixteen, one-two, three-four, five-six, as though counting the beats of a heart. On seven, Kostya felt a lick of relief. On ten, he lay down.
Efim took his pulse. —Better?
— It still hurts.
— I gave you the full dose. Come home drunk again, and I’ll leave you to writhe on the floor.
Kostya’s head lolled on the pillow. —Such excellent bedside manner. What do you do all day, Scherba?
— I work.
— But what is it you do?
Efim disassembled the needle and syringe. —Is this how you question criminals, with such subtlety? How long were you in surgery with those wounds?
— I don’t know.
— General anaesthetic can affect the memory.
— The clinic had no general anaesthetic.
Efim felt ill. He kept his voice mild. —Oh?