‘Okay, boys, take a seat.’
He gestured to the broken bits that almost covered the floor. Yuri picked out the biggest piece to sit down on, Peter almost sitting on his lap in his effort to stay as close as he could to him. There was one dusty chair and that was for the sergeant. He gave it a quick wipe with his grimy hand and asked, as he sat down, ‘Where were you boys off to anyway?’
Yuri answered him truthfully, ‘Nowhere really, sir. We walk around every day, looking for food and stuff.’
The sergeant was surprised, ‘Do you realise how dangerous that is? The Nazis are monsters; they wouldn’t spare your lives just because you’re children.’
Yuri resented being called a child but felt much too intimidated to complain.
The second soldier cleared his throat, ‘Sir?’ and pointed to his watch.
The sergeant nodded, ‘Yes, Rodimtsev, I know. Time, as usual, is against us’. He turned back to the boys, ‘The thing is, we suspect there to be a group of Nazis hiding out in the cellar, two buildings away from here. You were just about to pass by it when we saw you.’
Peter and Yuri glanced at one another. Peter looked so anxious that Yuri smiled at him to remind him they were safe here.
‘So, my problem is we cannot get near the building without risking men’s lives and we’ve lost too many already. We’d be seen immediately, and we need to know if it’s worth it. You know, if there are definitely soldiers there, how many they are, are there any wounded, or do they have many guns? You understand?’
‘Yes, sir,’ Yuri replied. In fact, he found all this fascinating. Up to now he had only been concerned with his and Peter’s existence, about what they would do every day and where they could go, forgetting there was a whole other life being lived by the soldiers here.
The sergeant beamed at him. ‘Good, good. Well, there is one way we could find out who we’re dealing with.’
Yuri nodded eagerly, but then felt a sudden chill when the man moved from beaming at him to beaming brilliantly at Peter. ‘We need somebody brave, about your size, to climb through a pipe, like a tunnel, that runs through the two buildings. At some point there will be a grill, or a hole, where you should be able to look down upon them.’
Yuri could hardly keep up with what was being said.
‘Do you think that you could be a big boy and help us. I’m sure you know how to count, don’t you?’
Peter looked at Yuri, and then at the sergeant, and announced solemnly, ‘I can count to twenty-two!’
The grumpy soldier rolled his eyes. ‘Pity’s sake!’
‘Hush, now,’ said the sergeant. ‘Show me how you can count, then.’
Peter let go of Yuri’s hand and stood up, and in a tiny voice, began at the beginning, ‘One, two, three…’ all the way to twenty-two.
‘Peter,’ muttered an incredulous Yuri, ‘Twenty-three comes next, like three comes after two.’
This information did not seem to interest the boy in the least and he sat back down again.
The sergeant, however, was satisfied, explaining, ‘Just knowing that there’s more than ten Germans would be a huge help to us.’
In spite of himself Yuri nodded again; what the man said made perfect sense however much he disliked the plan. ‘Sir,’ he asked, ‘Perhaps I could do it? I’m a good climber.’
The sergeant shook his head. ‘Afraid not, lad, you’re too wide.’
The sergeant understood the older boy’s concerns but did not bother to acknowledge them. That was the thing about war; one neither had the luxury of time nor a selection of cast-iron solutions. Once a decision was made there was nothing to do but put it in motion. So this usually kindly man ignored Yuri to concentrate fully on the timid child who looked to be the same age as his little Sasha. Stifling the thought that he would kill any man who would dare ask his child to do what he was asking of this boy, he focused on boosting Peter’s confidence, ‘So, what do you say, sonny? Do you want to crawl into the pipe and then come back and tell us what you see? You could do that, couldn’t you?’
Obviously, Yuri was more afraid for Peter than Peter was because he nodded his head and said proudly, ‘Yes, sir.’ Where was the scared little boy who couldn’t pee unless Yuri was with him?
The sergeant issued his instructions, ‘Now, you must be as quiet as can be. Just crawl very slowly, there’s no need to rush at all. It is so important that the Germans don’t hear you in the pipe.’ He stared at Yuri, beckoning him to back him up.
Yuri hesitated, unclear about his feelings, but one look at the sergeant’s face told him that this was going to happen no matter what. The least he could do was help Peter stay safe. He turned the boy to face him, ‘Listen, Peter, you cannot let the soldiers know that you’re there, and that you can see them, or they will be really, really angry with you. Do you understand?’
The little head bobbed up and down. ‘Yes, Yuri!’
‘Right, comrade. Let’s go then.’ The sergeant lifted him up and pretended to whisper, promising Peter that if he did a good job, he’d win a huge piece of sausage for both himself and his friend.
Peter flashed Yuri a smile of utter delight while Yuri felt a sudden sharp pain, as if his heart had been pierced right through.
‘Okay, boys, we have to go up the stairs to where the pipe is. Follow me.’
As they passed the exhausted group of soldiers, a couple of them quietly wished Peter good luck.
Heading up the broken steps, Yuri wasn’t at all convinced that Peter would go through with it, mostly expecting him to climb into the pipe, crawl a few inches forward and then come straight back to him, in tears. But he didn’t. In fact, Peter didn’t so much as glance in Yuri’s direction. Puffed out with the importance of having the sergeant place his trust in him, he simply climbed into the pipe, and disappeared almost immediately.
There was a nasty smell and it was dark, two things that normally would have stopped Peter in his tracks, but he wasn’t going to let them stop him now. In all his years – all five of them – he had never been asked to do something important for a grown-up. Larissa had once asked him to kiss her, which had felt important, but this was completely different. He knew he had surprised Yuri with his bravery and now he wanted to show the sergeant what he could do. Wondering how much longer the pipe was, he crawled forward using his elbows and knees, making sure to do so as quietly and carefully as possible.
He knew that the men he would be counting were the ones who had destroyed his home and taken his mother away from him forever. They were bad men, while the sergeant and his friends were the good ones, so they should be the winners. And that was what he was helping them to do: win.
A few minutes later, he heard muffled voices talking in a language he didn’t recognise which meant that they must be German. Holding his breath, he stopped moving but then remembered that he had to count the men, not just know that they were definitely there. What a silly boy he was. He almost forgot the most important thing. Edging himself forward again, he pretended he was a snail with a heavy shell and could only move very, very slowly. Snails never made a sound, no matter what. They didn’t whistle like birds, or click like beetles, or chirp like crickets. But could they hear stuff? And when their shells were taken off them they looked like lumps of grey snot. It felt like there was snot dribbling out of his nose but he was determined not to sniff. Instead, he used the back of his hand to wipe away whatever was there. Peter believed he was being an excellent snail and, on top of everything, he could listen to the soldiers below.