She felt chilled. Everything he’s done. By his own free will, yet twice as much by compulsion? —Where is he?
— Answer my question.
— You’ve got him. You’ve got him locked away. Taking your revenge for history, are you? He had nothing to do with you leaving Russia in 1917.
Ilya’s eyes shone with anger. —I shall be honest with you. I said I wished to strike him. Then I wanted to shoot him. In the thigh first. Then the testicles, then the gut, and finally in the face.
Temerity felt grateful for the cup, for something to hold. —He served eighteen years in the Gulag. Eighteen bloody years. Tell me, Mr. Ostrovsky, when will he be punished enough?
Ilya kept his voice soft. —Answer my question. Do you still want him?
— Yes, I want him. Where—
— Why have you taken such risks for one man?
Adjusting her glasses, Temerity let out a long breath. —Duty.
— To what?
She didn’t answer right away. —To love. Or at least to the idea of it. Not that you’d know it.
Ilya turned pale. —I’ve never told you what the Cheka did to my children in 1917. I had a daughter your age. And it was not very long ago. Not for me. Do not presume to lecture me on love.
Cups clinked against saucers.
Ilya picked up the teapot and poured more for them both. —This has been a difficult case. He’s cleared.
— What?
— We needed to confirm his claims. He’s cleared now. So are you. He’s free to go with you, if you will have him.
— Wait, I’ll be reinstated?
— So long as this Russian is in your life, you look compromised. At least one of my colleagues still thinks he might be a double agent, or that you are.
— But Freeman—
— Has retired. Quietly. In some disgrace. You must not forget, Miss West, that we’ve had traitors who hid their activities in the thirties, and you omitted a great deal about 1937.
Temerity studied the fork she’d used to eat the Battenberg and imagined stabbing it into Ilya’s neck. We. Who is this we? —How did you get involved?
— Language. I’m an interpreter, and his English is appalling.
Questions tumbled in her mind, yet she could not speak.
Ilya tapped his right temple. —He’s damaged. We were hard on him. We had to be. The debriefing might have been too much, after everything else.
Hearing the sound of running water from the kitchen, Temerity watched a stray piece of tea leaf sink to the bottom of her cup. —When can I see him?
— Whenever you wish.
— Now.
Ilya laid coins on the table to pay for the tea. —Come with me.
As they passed the window, Temerity noticed a car parked on the opposite side of the street. Ilya took her elbow and guided her there, opening a back door so she might step inside. Then he sat in the front passenger seat. The driver said nothing. Kostya, gaze fixed on the drizzle-smeared windshield, waited in the back. He wore a badly fitting suit, with a white shirt and no tie. More of his scalp showed, and the greying hair that remained defied comb and pomade and still fell in waves. His broken nose sat at a strange new angle.
Temerity sat next to him.
No one spoke.
She shifted her weight in the seat.
Still, no one spoke.
She sighed. —Gentlemen, I’ve drunk rather a lot of tea, and I need to find a ladies’ room. The one at the train station will do.
The driver stifled his chuckle as Ilya glared at him.
Temerity spoke with muted irritation and certainty. —Off we go, then.
Ilya gave a slow nod. The driver started the car.
Kostya said nothing until they’d boarded the train and Temerity closed the compartment door. He spoke in Russian. —Is this first class?
— Yes. We might even have it to ourselves. It’s just over two hours to Prideaux-on-Fen. Then we’ll take a taxi to the school.
He drew his fingertips over worn upholstery.
Outside, the train guards blew whistles and waved flags. The train lurched.
Temerity sat down, then retrieved cigarettes and matches from her handbag. — Here, I bought these at the station. Woodbines. The closest I can get.
Kostya sat across from her, lit a cigarette, a took a deep draw. —Not bad. A little weak.
She smiled. Then she considered his broken nose. Behind the glasses, her eyes widened.
Kostya, reading her raised eyebrows as disgust with him, gave a half-smile. —I was afraid you would turn me away.
— What? No, no.
— I worked so hard to stay in the present. The doctors kept advising that when I got back from Spain. Your past is your enemy. Stay in the present. I got through some of…in Lubyanka, I could sometimes slip into the past. Not this time. The only comfort in my past is the ghost of what I wanted for you and me. Why didn’t you tell me they would imprison me?
— How long have you been in England?
The train lurched again and pulled out.
— Kostya?
Tapping ash into a tray, he stared out the window, then at her. —I never knew when it was night. They always kept the lights on. I told them everything, every little thing I knew, right down to Little Yurochka and the size of Arkady Dmitreievich’s boots, and still they don’t trust me. Why didn’t you tell me?
She had no answer for him.
Kostya almost smiled. —I got him, in the end, that old White interpreter.
— Ostrovsky?
— Yes. You know him? The contempt for me in his face…he’d reduced me to tears and snot, and I said, Whether you believe me or not, I can never go home again. At least in Kolyma I was exiled within my own country, but now, I can never go home. Neither can you. He turned pale as snow and had to leave the room.
— He—
— Fuck him. I never want to hear another mention of him. I hope dogs eat his corpse.
— I can’t hate him, Kostya. He taught me to speak your language.
Kostya stared at her, then snorted. —Let me see your eyes.
— No.
— Why not?
— I said, no.
— Please?
After a moment, she pried off the glasses, looked at him.
He took in the scars, the damaged eye, and shrugged. —I’ve seen worse.
She put the glasses back on. —Ever the charmer.
— What is your real name?
She hesitated, said nothing.
— Nadia, please don’t cry.
— I can’t believe you’re here.
— I’m here. Right here, right now, I am with you. Let me prove it to you. Tell me your real name.
She took a breath. —Temerity.
— Doesn’t that mean—
— Yes, I know what it means. My middle name is even worse. Temerity Tempest West, in part because my Russian mother liked the sound of it.
Kostya leaned forward, clasped her hands in his, and tried out the name. —Temerity. Temerity.
— Without the Russian R. Call me Nadia, if it’s easier.
— No, I will call you by your name. Temerity. Temerity. Temerity.
He trilled the R harder and harder, keeping his face stern, until she laughed.
He lifted her right hand and kissed it. —I love that sound. I want to laugh, too, but I keep thinking of the dogs. In Kolyma. When it got to minus fifty, we did not have to work. We never saw a thermometer. One day, it was bright and still, I’m sure it was only minus twenty, yet we did not have to work. The guards let the dogs off leash, and they played in the snow. Romped and barked and chased one another. Yet they stayed within the barbed wire. Even the dogs knew not to run out to death. I feel like that. If I stay within the wire on this one special day, I’ll be safe. After sunset, it’s back to that White Russian interpreter, or the camp.