I thought of Stalin, my father Stalin, waiting for me to return. My cheek tingled, as if anticipating the strike of his hand. I had questions – so many questions – I wanted to ask him about my mother. But I knew he would not answer them. He was a monster. He had sent Joachim into exile. He had authorised the torture and execution of so many people, including members of his own family, while surrounding himself with men like Captain Volkov; people who were too afraid for their own lives to tell him no. Had my mother been afraid? Was that why she’d killed herself? Had she suspected he would one day turn on her; that her only way of protecting me would be to leave me with Olga?
A dull ache throbbed in my head. If my ‘father’ was truly mad, what hope did I have of surviving?
‘Comrade Volkova? Did you hear me?’ Lieutenant Lubov tapped the edge of the window.
‘Why shouldn’t we leave the complex?’ I said. I could not go back, but I would not be given a choice. I would be dragged back. I was not a person. I had no more freedom than the prisoners in the holding cells.
‘The operation I was telling you about… it is due to begin tonight. So, there may be a little disruption.’
‘What kind of operation?’
A muscle flickered in his cheek. ‘A standard one. Relocation of undesirables. Weeding out those who would help the Partisans – like the bandits you saw earlier today. Their families assist them. Their neighbours hide them and then tell bald-faced lies in the interrogation room. Not everyone complies easily, as you just heard. I would hate for you to be hurt or caught up in any resistance. I’ll be overseeing things at the train station. I won’t have time to check on you.’
Something snapped inside me. ‘I don’t need looking after!’ I said. ‘No matter what everyone may think. I appreciate your concern, Lieutenant. But I’m more than capable of taking care of myself. And I have Olga.’
‘Ah yes.’ His lips twitched. ‘The nursemaid.’ Straightening up, he glanced up at the high façade of the Grey House as if he could hear the Partorg calling him like a master summoning his dog, his voice an invisible beacon that only Lieutenant Lubov could discern. ‘I meant no offence. Simply thought you should know.’
Before I could say more, he walked away, his shoes clipping the cobblestones.
Pearl Pattern
Kati
Jakob and I drove home to the farm in silence. When we reached the house, Jakob switched off the engine and sat staring through the windscreen. I watched his expression darken as his gaze swept across the mouldy thatch on the roof and down to the house’s windows. A few months ago, a huge thunderstorm had swept over us, throwing hailstones like cannons and pouring rain down between the thatch to stain the floors. The largest hailstones had cracked the glass in some of the windows, leaving holes the size of my fist and a cobweb of fractured lines that radiated out towards the timber frames. Shawls had been stuffed into the holes – not delicate lace ones, but my mother’s thick old woollen ones with the frayed ends. Jakob’s gaze burned. He turned to me, his eyes narrowed in accusation.
‘Why didn’t you tell me?’
‘What good would it have done?’
Jakob shook his head, then climbed out of the car, slamming the door behind him and stalking into the house. I let myself out and went to the barn to release the sheep. As I heaved the barn doors apart, I tried not to see the broken windows, or the rust that peppered the iron door handles and left smears of blood-red speckles against my palms. It had been my father’s plan to renovate the farmhouse; he had been saving for years, storing all of his kroons in the Estonian National Bank, waiting until the time was right, until the farm could spare him. But when Papa had gone to line up outside the bank one day in March, he’d been informed that all our savings were now worthless. Kopeks had replaced cents, roubles instead of kroons. Estonian tender was now worth less than a withered apple skin.
I could hear my brother banging around in the rooms upstairs and wondered if perhaps I should go in and speak to him. But my parents would be home soon. He could say what he had to say to them without me. I was not his keeper. He was old enough to join the resistance group. Old enough to make his own choices.
I led the sheep outside into the paddock, watching their flickering tails. They were restless after so many hours cooped up inside. Grass stalks snapped beneath my boots as I drove them out to the very last paddock, the one furthest from the house. Let Jakob be the one to greet my parents when they returned from another degrading trip to the factories to give away our apples for the good of the state, I thought, switching the grass savagely with my birch stick. Let him be the one to tell Papa about his subversive activities. I could not shake the feeling of helplessness. We were at the centre of a storm; no matter which way the currents pulled, we were destined to follow. The peace I had experienced briefly at Aunt Juudit’s this morning was gone, the threads of it scattered like a shawl unravelling in the wind.
I saw Jakob emerge from the house and begin dragging things out of the barn, cleaning them with a rag and sudsy water. The timber crates made from sanded birch logs which we used for storing apples, to prevent them being jostled. The old milk canisters we filled with water and dragged inside when the frosts arrived so we had a source of water always and could avoid the shocking sting of the cold pump on our hands. When he lugged the old dogsled through the barn doors, I almost called out. It was still sturdy, despite many years of use, with enough room for two people to sit side by side with room for the crates behind. We had used it until last year to transport goods to our neighbours when the snow fell thickly. Rasmus Poska from town always hired his dogs out to us. But the Russians had seized them two months ago and slaughtered them for barking through the night. There would be no dogsledding this year.
Jakob slapped the rag against the side of the sled and scrubbed vigorously. Guilty, I thought. He feels guilty that he’s left all the farmwork to us, that he’s been at university all this time. I did not feel smug for being the one who had stayed while Jakob went ahead. When he glanced up at me, I turned away, unable to bring myself to tell him his efforts were wasted.
My anxiety about Mama and Papa increased as the day began to fade. I’d driven the sheep as close to the road as I dared, watching for a glimpse of Papa’s white lorry. The field here was mostly brown, full of stones and tangled bushes. The clover was so shrivelled that the animals did not nibble at the ground but huddled together in a knot, bleating with displeasure each time a truck roared past.
I stopped before my brother, squeezing my hands together. It was useless to pretend any longer. ‘Where are they?’
‘Perhaps they stopped in at Tartu.’
‘Why would they do that?’
‘I don’t know.’
I tried to still my racing heart as I handed my brother the birch switch. ‘Help me bring in the sheep. I’ll need to see to supper. If they aren’t home by then, we’ll drive back to Aunt Juudit’s and look for them.’
My brother frowned but took the birch switch and followed me, poking at the sheep, who tossed their heads and glared at him. When I commanded them, though, they began to move as a unit, their feet stirring up the mud, straining their necks as they shoved and jostled their way towards the farmhouse and the safety of their pens.
We had just reached the last field when I heard it – the distinctive splutter of the lorry’s engine.
I whirled around.
There it was, jerking across the ground, the tyres churning.
Sheep bleated around me, clamouring for protection. I broke through the circle of their warm fleecy bodies and ran towards the fence. I was up and down the other side before my father had even brought the lorry to a stop, careless of the way my muddy skirt slapped against my shins.