— Good morning, comrades. I am Senior Lieutenant Nikto.
No one raised an eyebrow at the surname, and all replied at once. —Good morning, Comrade Senior Lieutenant.
— Let’s make this quick, comrades, as we’re all a bit busy this week.
Grim chuckles.
— I shall divide you into six squads of three, and…wait, who’s not here?
A soft knock on the door. Seventeen men cleared their throats, sucked their teeth, clicked their tongues. Waited.
Kostya, too, waited, almost too long to keep his dignity. Then he recalled it was his task and privilege, as the commanding officer in the room, to order someone to open the door. He decided to do it himself.
— Katelnikov. Forgive me, comrade. I thought I scheduled this meeting for ten o’clock. You prefer it for five past, yes?
Red-faced, Matvei stared at the toes of Kostya’s boots. —I am sorry, Comrade Senior Lieutenant. I only just got the memo. I had night duty, and I got delayed in the cells.
— Go stand with the others. I don’t want to waste any more time. So, as I said, squads of three focused on a better plan. Yes, Comrade Sergeant Kamenev?
Gleb lowered his hand and cleared his throat. —I don’t know about you, Senior Lieutenant, but I’ve got a timetable to meet.
Surprised at Gleb’s interruption and surly tone, close to insubordination, Kostya inclined his head to the older man and decided to speak with deference and respect. —Do you refer, Gleb Denisovich, to the timetables Comrade Captain Kuznets handed out?
— Yes.
— And do you not think I attended that same meeting, Gleb Denisovich? That same meeting where Comrade Captain Kuznets gave me two timetables?
Some appreciative laughter. Gleb inclined his own head to Kostya, also in respect, and some apology. Matvei looked up from the floor.
Kostya ignored Matvei’s gaze. —So we’ve established that everyone is busy, yes, with quotas to fill? Good. Now, sometimes when we’re on a raid, it’s inevitable we’re going to wake someone up.
Matvei turned pale.
Kostya felt a prickle in his belly, almost like electricity. Easy, so easy, to hold Matvei Katelnikov up as an example, let his fellows laugh at him, let shame flog him to better results.
No.
— We’re not here to frighten innocent citizens. So I want to see a redoubled effort on getting the correct flat number. Check our propiska lists against the Directory for All Moscow.
Silence.
A blond officer shifted his weight from foot to foot, pointing to a side table. —Ah, yes, well, with respect, Comrade Senior Lieutenant Nikto, I mean, which directory, 1936 or 1937? My last commanding officer kept complaining how the ’36 directory is out of date.
Gleb stopped chewing on his moustache. —Has anyone even seen a ’37 version?
Kostya noticed copies of the ’36 directory on a side table. He knew what Gleb meant: the rumours about why no 1937 Moscow telephone directory had appeared, that too many people had disappeared. The ’36 directory now functioned less as a guide to the living and more as a list of the disappeared and the dead. He let out a long breath, aware as he finished of perhaps sending the wrong signal. A competent commanding officer would not show exasperation or fear over something as trivial as a telephone directory. —Comrades, Moscow is growing rapidly. The publishers of the directory simply can’t keep up. This is why we must also check the propiska permits. Now, comrades, check my list to find your new team—
Five bangs on the door: many of the men flinched.
Scowling, Kostya reached for the doorknob; he ended up catching it as the door swung open. —Comrade Captain Kuznets, good morning. Come in.
— Good morning, Comrade Senior Lieutenant Nikto. I have a treat for you men today, a distinguished visitor.
Vasily Blokhin entered the room. He held up his hands, palms out, as though blessing the faithful. —At ease, comrades, at ease. I just want a moment of your time. Comrade Captain Kuznets is new to this department, yet already he brags about you.
— A moment, Vasily Mikhailovich. I should introduce you. We’ve got so many new men. Comrades, this is the head of Kommandatura, Comrade Commandant Blokhin.
Kostya and the others saluted.
Boris clapped Vasily on the shoulder. —And I promise you, comrades, he does not enjoy his nickname.
Vasily frowned, then shook Boris off. —Nickname?
A muscle twitched in Boris’s cheek. —Leather Man.
Vasily’s laugh sounded dull, rehearsed. —Apron and gauntlets, right. Comrades, I must protect my uniform. Unless one of you has found a laundry service that can reliably shift blood?
More laughter, brittle and loud.
Boris’s face relaxed, and Kostya could not tell which emotion induced his own nausea: fear, anger, or guilt.
Vasily gestured to the men, then to Kostya. —You’re in good hands here with Comrade Senior Lieutenant Nikto. Don’t disappoint him, or, well…
He extended his index and middle fingers and cocked his thumb to mime pointing a gun at Kostya’s face.
Kostya stared back at him.
Vasily kept his hand steady; his eyes seemed to retreat further behind the heavy lids.
Boris released a word from his lips, as though kissing someone, so quiet: —Bang.
Vasily lowered his hand. —I’ve got another appointment.
— This way, Comrade Commandant.
They left, and Kostya closed the door behind them, taking a deep breath. An exercise, just an exercise. For me, and the men.
When he turned to the others, eighteen sets of wide eyes dropped their gaze to the floor. Embarrassed for their commanding officer, or frightened for themselves? Kostya could not tell.
Angry now, he pinned a list to the wall. He wanted to nail it there. The pin, bent, fell to the floor. Matvei found him another pin, handed it over.
— Thank you, Katelnikov. I’ve put you all in new teams, shaken it up. Maybe we can get different results this way, and even if we don’t, at least when senior command asks us if we tried new teams, we can say why yes, of course, comrade.
Low laughter.
— Any questions?
Feet tramped on the floors outside and above, and water squealed in the pipes.
— We reconvene in seventy-two hours. Let’s see some real progress on those tables, yes? Dismissed.
Relishing the solitude, Kostya leaned back in his desk chair. His officemates remained on schedules opposite his, and he rarely saw them. Even so, today he’d closed his office door to mute the racket of other people so he might concentrate. His right hand ached, distracting him from the fiery pain in his left shoulder. He’d written three different fake confessions to three different crimes, wrecking, espionage, and the all-purpose anti-Soviet activities, each confession just over five pages long, with blanks left for the names of anyone else the prisoner might denounce. The anti-Soviet activities confession had come out too balanced, too poetic, with compound-complex sentences no prisoner would utter after a beating. Kostya rebuked himself. It’s a tool, not a work of art. This is not story time.
Scowling, he locked the templates in a desk drawer and took out his cigarettes. A timid knock sounded on his closed office door, one-two, one-two, like that of the tsar’s servants in Lieutenant Kizhe.
Kostya shook his match dead. —Come in.
The caller turned the knob, met resistance.
Kostya hurried to open the door. —I am sorry, comrade. This door is tricky. Katelnikov. What can I do for you?
Matvei’s eyes widened. The courteous, even collegial, tone in the senior lieutenant’s voice after the fuck-up with the flats left Matvei feeling much more at ease. He passed Kostya a note. —Comrade Major Balakirev needs your assistance in the cells.