“You cannot quit the partisans. There is no quitting once you’re in.”
“Then shoot me dead right here. I refuse to be separated.”
“Lukas,” said Flint, “tell her I’m right.”
“I won’t do any such thing. You promised.”
“Yes, I did. But not to let you stay together right away. We need to disperse for a little while.”
“How long?” asked Elena.
“A few weeks at most. Now, come on.”
“Wait,” said Elena. She took Lukas by the hands. “Do you promise to come back for me?”
“I will. As soon as I can.”
“Don’t die. Be very careful not to get yourself killed or captured, if only for my sake. You owe me that.”
He kissed her, and then stepped into the other sleigh and sped down a branching road.
It had taken longer than a few weeks, but now he was going for her.
After drinking their glasses of samagonas, Petras and his wife regained their colour and set to business, laying out their stamps, inks, pens and papers. Lukas went out to join Lakstingala on sentry duty, finding him seated near the barn with his back against a haystack. Like a sailor, Lakstingala wore his stocking cap in all weather, even the summer heat. He was a comforting man to sit beside because, although he was compact, he seemed to contain great strength, a reserve of potential energy that he could harness if he needed to.
“The smell of hay always reminds me of harvests and afternoon naps. It makes me sleepy,” said Lukas, settling in beside Lakstingala. “Aren’t you afraid you’ll drop off?”
“I never fall asleep on sentry duty,” said Lakstingala. “If I did, I would have been dead long before this.”
They each knew many dead, in addition to Vincentas and Ungurys. Almost a dozen men had fallen that day in Merkine, and twice as many in the year afterward. New men came to join them, but Flint, Lakstingala and Lukas were among the veterans, men you could be sure of, not only because of their experience but also because of their luck. Caution and skill were important for survival, but so was luck. Why did some fall in a firefight and not others? At any moment the three dice of skill, caution and fate were tumbling; a partisan could control two of the variables, but not the third.
In the last year Flint’s band had broken into smaller units of five, very few with the knowledge of where the others had their bunkers. The era of bonfires and dancing in the forest was past, and as well the time of massive attacks upon towns and garrisons. The last really bold act had been the engagement party massacre in Marijampole. That act had been both gratifying and stupid. It lifted the spirits of the Lithuanians as word got out about it, but it excited a whole hornet’s nest of Reds, Chekists and slayers, who combed the woods looking for partisans.
The latest partisan battle was against the settlers, Red soldiers who were encouraged to demobilize in Lithuania and take up the farms abandoned by those who had been deported or fled to the West. Lukas wrote public proclamations in Lithuanian and Russian, warning them not to take up the farms, and then letters to the new settlers, giving them a month to vacate their land. Lakstingala led the enforcement brigades that frightened off the settlers, or executed them if they did not heed the warnings.
This type of fighting was more damaging to the soul than battles with Chekists or slayers. Sometimes the settlers resisted, barricading themselves into their houses and shooting it out. It was important to remember that these were the enemy, that they had been warned, that they could have surrendered with a white flag and been escorted with their wives and children out along the road. Still, it was hard to drop a grenade into a house with women and children inside.
Lakstingala and Lukas did not have that much in common, but they had been together in Flint’s band for almost two years, and so they had become comrades. It was easier to talk to someone like Lakstingala than it was to some to the newer recruits.
“What if the Reds come up on us from the other side of the haystack?” asked Lukas. “You won’t see them coming.”
“The rest of the American’s family is working in the fields that way. They’ll come running if anything’s up.” Lakstingala took out a pouch of tobacco and some papers. He rolled a cigarette but did not light it because of the haystack. The smell of the hay at his back reminded Lukas of home.
“Going to do a little travelling?” Lakstingala asked.
They compartmentalized each other’s lives, knowing some parts and staying intentionally ignorant of others. The question itself was a sign of their intimacy and comradeship.
“Personal business.”
“You’re a fool,” said Lakstingala without a moment’s hesitation and without a great deal of inflection.
“What do you mean?”
“Anything personal will put you at risk. You’ll be caught in a moment.”
“I’ll be careful.”
“There’s no being careful in a trap. Once you’re inside, they’ll spring it on you and that will be that. And you take this risk to see Elena?”
“That’s right.”
“You’d give her a better chance of survival by staying away from her. Don’t you think the Reds would love to catch the two of you together? You’d be a real prize. If they caught you alive, they’d put your photos on the cover of the local Pravda. If they killed you, they’d set your bodies up side by side in the market square and put a wedding veil on her body to satisfy their sense of humour.”
“You’re sounding a little too angry, my friend. I can’t help it that I’m in love.”
“What kind of love could that be? You hardly know one another. A few meetings and one mission and your head’s been turned.”
“People fall in love at a dance in one night. It happens.”
“No, you’re confusing comradeship with love.”
“You’re my comrade, but I don’t love you.”
“Don’t make fun of me. I’m serious.”
Lukas took off his hat and ran his fingers through his hair. “Look who’s talking about love! A bachelor soldier like you!”
“I’m no bachelor. I’m married.”
“What? You never told me that.”
Lakstingala shrugged. “You never asked me.”
Lukas looked at him with new interest. “I had no idea. And you’ve never seen your wife all these years?”
“Not much.”
“But a little, right?”
“A little,” Lakstingala conceded.
“So why do you begrudge me?”
“Because I’m worried that you’re turning soft just as things get harder, just when you should be getting tougher. We’re not the first ones to go into the woods, but we’ve lasted longer than anyone else. How are we going to survive unless we turn our hearts to stone?”
“I don’t understand you.”
“It’s not the Reds that worry me. It’s your feelings. Those are what are going to get you killed.”
“How is it possible to live without feelings?”
“It’s not, but you have to bury them in order to fight. If you become soft, you’ll see the eyes of his mother in every Red you kill and you’ll hesitate, and one day you’ll die yourself. The only feelings you should have are a thirst for revenge and righteous anger.”
Lakstingala looked at Lukas’s face, deeply tanned now in the summer, the eyes uncannily bright against the darkness of his skin. He could see a hint of a smile in Lukas’s eyes, and the condescension annoyed him.
“You take over sentry duty,” said Lakstingala. “I’m going for a smoke.”
Lukas couldn’t understand why Lakstingala was so angry. He was going to get his fiancée, and if possible show her to his parents before bringing her back to Flint’s band.