Lhaye’s cheeks flushed and she started to cry even as she struggled against it. Berta came over to her and put her arms around her shoulders. The smell of kerosene was overpowering.
“Lhaye… mein teiers, we’ll be all right. You’ll see. Please, let’s not argue anymore. We have so little time.”
“I’m afraid,” Lhaye sobbed, holding her sister close. “I don’t want you to go.”
Berta stroked her hair and brushed her forehead with her lips. “I know. I know.”
When Lhaye had collected herself, she walked Berta down the stairs and out to the sidewalk. There she said good-bye to Samuil, telling him to take good care of his mother. She kissed him and hugged Berta one last time, swallowing hard to keep back the tears. She said nothing to Pavel, because she blamed him for Berta’s reckless decision. After all, he had provided the money and the travel permits. As she watched them walk away, her dear ones, the last of her extended family, Berta turned back once and waved to her. She was crying. Lhaye couldn’t wave back. She could only stand there until they disappeared in the crowd.
THEY FOUND the station empty except for a few wounded soldiers on cots in the corner, an old woman and two young children, and a nursing mother sitting on a bench near the door. Berta knew they had just missed the train. Then, as if to confirm this fact, the passengers that weren’t able to find seats began trudging back in from the platform. Most were grim faced because they had been waiting for days and now they were going to have to wait even longer for the next one.
“You don’t have to stay with us,” Berta said to Pavel. “We’ll be all right. We’ll find a seat by the door and wait there.”
“No, I’ll take care of it.”
He left her standing there and walked over to the two militiamen by the platform door. They were dressed in greatcoats and lambskin papakhas emblazoned with a red star. At first she thought he was going to bribe them and was apprehensive because she had never bribed a Red Army soldier before. So it took her by surprise when, before he could say anything at all, they jumped to attention and saluted him smartly. “Comrade Commissar!” they said, nearly in unison.
“I want to see this woman on the train,” he said, glancing back at her.
“Yes, Comrade Commissar.”
He motioned to Berta and Samuil and they came forward and followed him out through the open doorway to the platform. Berta was dumbfounded. Clearly she had been wrong about Pavel. He was neither a thief nor a black marketeer. Now she didn’t know what to think about him.
Outside the air was frigid and smelled of smoke and grease. The rafters were filled with pigeons that wheeled overhead and fought over places to perch. Behind them the militiamen followed at a respectful distance; ahead the train idled on the tracks, a deep-throated rumbling coming from the engine. People were everywhere, sprawled on the roof and on the bumpers; every stair was taken, as was every seat inside.
“You are a commissar?” she asked, as they walked down the length of the train.
He looked weary and slightly annoyed. “I suppose I am.”
“Of what?”
“Does it matter?”
As they approached the last carriage, the militiamen went on ahead. The muzhiki saw them coming and moved off the steps so they could go inside. Berta could see them through the windows ordering two passengers out of their seats. They were peasants dressed in belted sheepskin coats. They got up without an argument, at first searching for another place to sit, but seeing none, gave up and left the train. The militiamen came back to report that the seats had been cleared. Samuil climbed the steps and went inside, while she stopped on the first and turned back to Pavel. But he was already walking away—looking as he always did: sour, exhausted, a disappointed man.
She saw him signal the engineer in the locomotive as he passed. A moment later the whistle blew, steam blasted out over the tracks, and the train lurched forward with such force that it sent the passengers in the aisles tumbling into each other. As the train began to move out of the station she climbed into the carriage and found her seat by the window. Soon the wheels were clanking over the switches and smoke was pouring out of the stack. She saw him through the glass, standing on the siding just beyond the platform. He was searching for her among the passengers at the windows. She thought he must have seen her. For in the next instant, Pavel Ossipovich Lepeshkin raised a hand to say good-bye.
SHE SPENT that day seated next to Samuil, looking out the window at the passing fields and farmhouses still wrapped in winter corn husks. The fields had lost most of their snow, revealing black patches of bare earth sparsely sprinkled in new green shoots. Occasionally, she would see a muzhik, his sturdy pony and his family struggling to free a cart that had gotten stuck in the mud. The roads were mired in it, as were the yards around the houses. The sun was getting warmer and the whole region seemed to be waiting for the fields to dry out so planting could begin.
The train stopped at every country station along the way, sometimes for hours at a time. The peasants were trading freely at these stations despite the new edicts. It took only a few steps around a corner to trade a length of fabric for a meat pie or a pouch of tobacco for a chicken or roasted hare. During one long wait Berta and Samuil got off the train, took a stroll through the little town, came back, brewed some tea, and made a picnic in the park by the depot.
That night Berta had a hard time sleeping. She and Samuil had made themselves as comfortable as possible, using their bundles for pillows, drawing their coats up around their shoulders, and settling in for the night. Samuil fell asleep easily, but Berta was kept up by an old man across the aisle whose choking snores rose above the clatter of the wheels. Finally she threw off her coat and got up. She stepped across the aisle and nudged the old man until he shifted position and quieted down long enough for her to fall asleep.
It was near dawn when the train suddenly lurched forward with a piercing screech and stuttered to a stop. The passengers were thrown into the seat backs in front of them, while those on the floor were sent tumbling into each other, their bundles and suitcases torn from their hands, women screaming, men grunting, children crying out in shock and pain. Berta hit her head on the seat back. Samuil flew against the window. The train came to a dead stop in the middle of an expansive field. Outside all was quiet except for the muffled cries of the passengers that sounded like the faraway roar of a river. Inside Berta and Samuil scrambled to their feet and started to retrieve their things. Others were also struggling to get up, calming children, rubbing elbows and heads, dazed and searching for their belongings.
“What happened, Mameh?” Samuil asked, once they had taken their seats again.
People in the carriage were beginning to ask the same question. One old man seated across the aisle held up a bloody rag that he had been holding to his nose. “It might be the Directory,” he said, referring to the Ukrainian troops.
“Or Hryhoriiv’s army,” said another voice from the back.
The Jews in the carriage fell silent at the mention of this name. Nykyfor Hryhoriiv was the bloodiest of the warlords. His army was notorious for the kind of pogroms they waged. If they had stopped the train, then the men would be dragged off and shot, their bodies mutilated and thrown into a ditch. The women would be raped until they died or went mad, and their children killed for sport.
A young man dressed in the uniform of a commercial high school student jumped to his feet. “I’ll go and see what I can find out.”
“Me too,” Samuil said, jumping up.