"Yes," said Kat. "With quite a few vushky."
"Well, I wouldn't want it to go to waste," her grandfather considered. "Perhaps I'll help you eat it."
Kat smiled to herself, thankful that she had been able to think of something her grandfather couldn't turn down.
CHAPTER 25
THE HEARING WAS being held in the Canada Life building in downtown Toronto and it started at 9 am sharp on January 11th. Kat and her mother and grandfather arrived forty-five minutes early and parked in the underground garage, then took the elevator to the fifth floor. As the elevator doors opened, Kat was dismayed to find that there were about a dozen people already waiting in the hallway outside the courtroom. Kat slipped one hand into her mother's and the other into her grandfather's, and then the three of them strode down the hallway with self-conscious determination to the huge double doors marked 5106. Kat let go of her mother's hand, then reached out to pull on the handle. The door was locked.
She turned around and faced the people. She noticed that most had been staring at her grandfather, but they quickly looked away when they saw that she was looking at them.
Danylo gripped her hand tightly, and when she looked at his face, she saw that his lips were a thin white line. She was afraid that he might collapse from the anxiety of the whole thing. She looked around to see if there was some place she could take him so he could sit down. There were three benches, but they were already filled. Guiding her grandfather by the elbow to the nearest bench, Kat looked down at the middle-aged man sitting closest to the end and asked, "Would you mind getting up so that my grandfather can sit?"
The man stared at her incredulously. "You want me to give up my seat for him?I don't think so."
A hush filled the hallway, and the onlookers regarded Kat, Orysia and Danylo. A vaguely familiar man's voice piped up. "Please sit here."
Kat looked gratefully over to where the voice came from, and was surprised to see Hung Nguyen, Lisa's father. Dr. Nguyen was already standing, and he motioned graciously to the bare spot on the bench that he had just vacated.
Danylo sat down gratefully.
"Thank you for coming," said Kat. She introduced Dr. Nguyen to her mother.
"And there are two people that I would like you to meet," said Dr. Nguyen, gesturing towards an elderly Vietnamese couple sitting on the bench next to Danylo. "These are my parents. When I told them about this hearing, they insisted on coming."
"That's wonderful, thank you," said Orysia. "But why are you so interested?"
"We're naturalized Canadians too," he explained. "This deportation law could just as easily be applied to us."
Orysia looked confused.
"We escaped the Communists in Vietnam. They considered us traitors because we fought against them. I have heard of stories being fabricated for vengeance. The Canadian government could just as easily deport us if they took that evidence as truth."
Just then, there was a clicking sound, and the huge double oak doors to the courtroom opened up from the inside. A woman in a blue suit stood there, keys in hand. "Come in," she said in a quiet voice.
The people who had been waiting stretched their legs, gathered their things, and walked in briskly, wanting to get good seats. Kat and her family and the Nguyens waited behind.
The blue-suited woman gestured towards Danylo. "I'll show you where to sit," she said, not unkindly.
Kat surveyed the room as they walked in. It reminded her of church. There were two rows of chairs on the right, then an aisle, and then five rows of chairs on the left. Kat noticed that all of the people who had been waiting in the hallway had already seated themselves on the left side, and that the blue-suited woman was ushering Danylo, Orysia and herself to the front of the right side.
Why were there only two rows on the right side, wondered Kat. Was there an assumption that the accused would have less supporters? In this case, it turned out to be true, and Kat was glad that the Nguyens had decided to attend.
Kat turned her attention to the front of the courtroom. The judge's bench was on a platform that was raised two levels from the ground. Mounted behind him on a soft green cloth was the Canadian coat of arms, looking cold and majestic. Beside it was a Canadian flag on a gold-coloured flagpole with a gold maple leaf on top. Directly in front of the judge's bench and one level lower sat two women at a shared bench. One was dressed in a black robe, and the other wore street clothing. Both had their eyes cast down and were reviewing notes in front of them.
A few feet in front and to the left and right of the women were two podiums with microphones. There was a wooden table attached to each podium, and then another wooden table behind. The tables were covered with stacks of books and bound notes and pens and paper. Kat recognized Mr. Vincent sitting at the table in front of her. He was wearing a black robe that made him look something like a priest. Beside him were two other lawyers: one a silver-haired woman, and the other, a man about the same age as Mr. Vincent. They too were wearing the antiquated black robes.
Kat looked over towards the other long table. There were three black-robed lawyers sitting over there. Kat noticed one, a young woman, who was appraising Danylo with cold superiority. What does she know that I don't, wondered Kat. She gave her grandfather's hand a reassuring squeeze.
Kat looked behind her and to the left to get a better look at the people who sat there. She saw the man who had refused to give up his seat to her grandfather. About ten unfamiliar people sat in the seats around him — elderly women with permed white hair and oversized eyeglasses, and men who were shrivelled and old. There was one familiar face: the lone protester.
A woman entered the courtroom and sat beside the protester. She was not much older than Kat. Her dark brown hair was pulled away from her face and was fastened with a clip. She grabbed the older woman's hand and squeezed it, then looked up and met Kat's gaze.
Kat stared back unflinching, then turned her attention to who was sitting on her grandfather's side. The Nguyens were directly behind her, Dr. Nguyen's mother tipped her head slightly in acknowledgement as Kat caught her eye. Kat's heart sank when she looked beyond the Nguyens and saw only empty seats behind. Were none of Danylo's friends coming to support him?
But just then, the blue-suited woman ushered in some more people. Kat recognized three elderly couples from the church. A few steps behind them was a middle-aged blonde woman in a business suit. She was accompanied by a younger man who also wore a suit. Kat recognized them as the president and vice-president of the local Ukrainian Canadian Congress. She breathed a sigh of relief. Their presence would give her grandfather moral support. Odd, Kat noted, her glance darting from one side of the courtroom to the other. These men and women looked so much like the ones on the other side that they could all have been siblings. But it was more than an aisle that held them apart.
"All rise," said a woman's voice.
Kat rose with everyone else, then watched as a door opened up below the flag and a man in a black robe with a gold mande walked into the room. The antiquated court garb made Kat think of the Inquisition.
"You may be seated," said the judge in a monotone voice as he took his place behind the raised bench. He perched a pair of black-framed reading glasses on the end of his nose and read from a paper in front of him.
Kat's head swam as the judge began to speak. Much of it didn't make sense to her, but some was very familiar. Her grandfather was being accused of "obtaining Canadian citizenship by false representation" because he had "failed to divulge collaboration with German authorities" and that he had "participated in atrocities against the civilian population during the period 1941-1943 as an auxiliary policeman in German-occupied Ukraine."