Yet he could think about nothing else.
One of hundreds on an errand in Lubyanka, he descended to the cells.
The one electric light bulb in the cell, caged, cast feeble light and mocked time, stretching it so it split and surrendered all meaning. Two steady leaks ran down the walls and pooled and spread on the floor, leaving no spot dry. Temerity lifted her nodding head. Since arriving near three, she’d perched on a wooden stool, the only piece of furniture in the cell, with no idea of how much time had passed. She struggled to think past confusion and fear. Pain interrupted. Stool-sitting, a standard method for softening those already deemed co-operative, exhausted body and mind with minimal effort from an interrogator, and it left no marks. She knew how it worked. It still hurt.
An officer had confiscated her watch, as she expected, but had not, despite a pat-down, discovered the Temerity West passport in the lining of her blouse. As the night wore on, Temerity had cried, to her disgust, blown her nose on the inside of her blouse, cried again, reminded herself that her period had ended the week before, so some small comfort there, then reviewed her cover story in minute detail. She left the small circle of light to pace the floor to stretch her back and check if maybe this time a patch of floor looked dry enough to sit on. The leaks flowed, and liquid almost breached her shoes. She returned to the stool, repeating this cycle many times throughout the night. When she kept still on the stool, fatigue and sleep took over. The soft edges of dreams interfered with her thoughts, these dreams no less anxious than her reality. As her balance slipped, her head would jerk upright.
The heavy cell door swung open, letting in muffled yells, cries, thuds. Down the hall, another cell door opened, another woman screamed, and that heavy door banged shut. Kostya stood at the edge of the open door, obscured, he knew, by shadow. Here, at this moment, in this created space, the prisoner would squint and peer, struggle to see.
Temerity did so.
No supplication in her eyes. Confusion and fear, Kostya noticed, and anger, even outrage, but no supplication. The slouch in her back as she perched on the stool betrayed her pain and fatigue. Kostya could smell soured sweat and a tang very common in the cells: dread. He could also smell perfume, faint, something spicy and floral. Incense? Iris?
Temerity shut her eyes, hoping to soothe the dryness, opened them again. Shiny boots and galife pants, gymnastyorka, shoulder sling, portupeya and holstered weapon, and that cap, topped in a blue reminiscent of the sky reflected in a dirty puddle: her NKVD interrogator. Lubyanka remained true. This cell and her presence in it remained true. It was no dream.
The officer turned to the guard outside and murmured instruction. The guard questioned something. The officer repeated his instruction in an irked tone, and the guard apologized, addressing the officer as Senior Lieutenant. Then, still speaking to the guard outside, the senior lieutenant made his voice friendly, soothing. —At ease. Long night? You look like you’d kill your own grandmother for a glass of vodka. Best I can do is tell you to get some tea, yes? Lock me in, get your tea, and then just wait outside. I’ll signal when I’m done.
She knew the voice. Denied it, dismissed the very idea.
The door thudded shut, the lock engaged, and the officer took off his cap and stepped into the light.
He’d lost the beard and cut his hair, short back and sides, plenty of length on top and swept back with pomade. The green eyes, the cheekbones, the voice: all unmistakable.
Kostya looked around the cell, stepped back into shadow, and gave a short sigh. —Nowhere for me to work?
— I am not in charge of furnishings, I promise you.
He put his cap back on. —You have no leave to speak. You may get down from the stool.
The assertion of authority: right on schedule. Temerity slipped off the stool, stumbled, got her balance, and avoided the worst of a puddle. She took no pride in recognizing patterns of interrogation, because right now the patterns didn’t matter. In another country, this man had aimed his Nagant at her head, only to spare her. Then she’d helped him with evacuees. And now they’d met once more, in a Lubyanka cell. Questions, so many questions, tumbled in her mind. Giving them voice would only sharpen the danger.
Kostya opened the pouch on his portupeya and retrieved something that glinted. He held it beneath the caged light bulb, and the glare bounced off the object and into Temerity’s eyes. —Is this yours?
— Is what mine?
His boot soles tapped and splashed as he strode toward her. —This British-made wristwatch.
Her vision cleared enough to let her see fear in Kostya’s eyes, then the wristwatch lying on his outstretched hand. —I believe it is. My initials are engraved on the back, MB.
He softened his voice, sounding courteous. —A cherished gift?
— My father gave it to me when I turned sixteen.
— How old are you now?
— Twenty-two.
He almost murmured, as though sharing a secret. —Those initials look like they were engraved last week. Why are you here?
Disorientation, step by step: Temerity could have written the script. Her knowledge changed nothing. Margaret Bush, Mildred Ferngate, Temerity West, or by any other name? Trapped. And what a coup for an up-and-coming NKVD officer, to expose her.
Except he must then explain why he’d spared her.
Temerity decided to play her strength. She took the tone of an offended memsahib, an upper-class British woman appalled by widespread incompetence in a foreign land and tasked with putting things right. —Now listen to me. I was arrested for no reason, and I demand—
Kostya raised his eyebrows, then held up a hand. —No, no demands, just answers. Why are you in Moscow?
— As I told the officer who arrested me, I am with Comintern, and I teach language classes to children.
— I see. Back on the stool, please.
— Pardon me?
— Back on the stool!
She hurried to obey, and the night’s familiar pain returned.
He lowered his voice but kept the tone sharp. —You speak excellent Russian. Now put your watch back on.
She did this, saying nothing.
Dizzy, feeling he stood on the edge of a great fall, Kostya reached for his cigarettes. He’d omitted the British nurse from his report. Now she sat before him, the only explanation for her presence being the obvious one: she was a foreign spy. Under a beating, she’d scream soon enough about meeting Kostya before, and while such an allegation would be considered ridiculous, it would be investigated, and well, look at that, Nikto was in Spain, and why have you not mentioned this woman before, comrade? Is it because you’re both working together?
He shook out a cigarette and pointed it at her. —Comrade Bush, you’re frightened. That makes me think you’re guilty.
— This pretty picture would frighten Joan of Arc.
Kostya lit a match. —She burned.
— She did.
He shook his match dead. —Travelled abroad before now?
Words cluttered her mouth. This human contact, any human contact, after the arrest and the long wait, contact with someone she’d already met, even someone who remained a threat, felt crucial, even precious. It left her weak. —Of course I’ve gone abroad.
Kostya held smoke in his lungs, waited.
— I travelled to India when I was eighteen, with my aunt.
He exhaled. —India?
— My aunt thought I needed a husband.