They took the early streetcar to the dock. The transport was to sail by barge to Odessa, they had been told, then travel by a succession of trains through Eastern Europe to its German destination. Papers checked, they sat on their luggage for hours in the open boat’s dank interior, talking little, watching other passengers walk the shaky plank and find places for themselves. Waiting.
Galina grasped the side of the boat for balance against the swaying of the antiquated vessel. It smelled of stagnant seawater and rotten fish, underlaid with something industrial, a clinging oily stench that stung the nostrils, unrelieved by the steady breeze from the sea.
“Never mind,” Ksenia said. “We are volunteers. We have good letters of introduction. Didn’t the officer who signed them promise us a farm assignment? It’s hard work, but it’s not factory labor. At least we’ll be in the country, in the fresh air.”
She rose and walked toward the prow, Ilya following a moment later. They stood looking past the harbor at the Black Sea, the gulls gliding in widening circles over its placid waters, a scroll of smoke from a passing freighter unfurling slowly in the cloudless sky. Above them, perched on the edge of its cliff, the celebrated Gull’s Nest Sanatorium kept vigil, the sea on one side and Yalta, their city, on the other. Ilya pushed his cap back, lit a cigarette. Ksenia tucked her hand under his arm. Neither spoke.
“What do I know of farm work?” Filip spat into the greenish foam lapping against the boat’s edge. I’m leaving all my hopes here, everything I love and wish for. Except… He looked at Galina.
She sat motionless, perched on two suitcases, her back not quite touching the damp side of the barge. Only her hands moved, the fingers weaving around each other as if of their own will, composing and delivering mysterious messages. My wife, he thought. Filip studied her face, the radiant beauty of it muted by an expression of such wistfulness, such sorrow, that he felt something shift in him, as if his heart had suddenly disclosed a previously dormant chamber, even as his mind struggled with the enormity of this moment. As though his childhood fell away then, and life, in all its ugliness and random unrelenting progress, crowded in.
All at once, he had so much to say. “Galya…”
“What?” she acknowledged, her stare fixed to the decaying boards at her feet.
The trip passed in a blur. Two armed German guards stood at either end of the barge, smoking and laughing together over the huddled travelers’ heads. Seasickness swept through the crowd, affecting most of the passengers; those who were not afflicted by the boat’s motion were sickened by the spectacle. Vomit was everywhere, slimy underfoot, sticking to shoes and luggage, cascading down people’s clothing in stinking patches that dried almost at once in the blazing afternoon sun.
Ilya was among the few who did not succumb; Ksenia held out longer than most by sheer force of will. Rocked by the slow progress of the barge through seas more turbulent than they appeared, Filip and Galina were able to retch over the side and avoid soiling their clothes.
They reached Odessa with the sun low in the sky, waited dockside while a dozen of their fellow passengers were put to work with buckets of seawater and stiff brooms, cleaning the boat for its return voyage. “Schnell, russischen Schweine. Pigs. Clean faster,” the guards shouted, while the idle crew looked on, stony-faced, showing neither compassion nor contempt.
Then it was on to the train station, passing through the city’s broad avenues, guards riding with semiautomatic weapons trained on the marching group. Like a grotesque parade that stopped traffic to let it through, ignored by pedestrians who thronged the wide sidewalks in their early evening rush to what? Home, dinner, family?
“If this is how they treat volunteers…,” Filip muttered, but no one replied or even looked at him.
And Odessa! He longed to break away from the humiliating transport march and have even one hour to explore this glittering city. There were no shortages here. The shops were full of goods. Their windows glowed and beckoned, spilling pools of yellow light into the streets filled with people. He watched their faces flicker, passing through light and shadow in a cinematic panorama, searched them in vain for the harried look everyone seemed to wear back home. Why can’t we stay here? There was bread in the bakeries, and cakes, too; meat in the butcher shops. A haberdasher displayed hats and neckties; stylish creations draped on dress shop mannequins tempted the eye. There were toys, furniture, Turkish carpets, glassware, jewelry. Why can’t we stay?
He wasn’t the only one to notice. He listened, head down to catch the remarks circulating through the shuffling crowd.
“Why is this city different? Look at all the goods they have.”
“It’s the Romanians. They’re in charge here.”
“Romanians? Aren’t they Nazis too?”
“Kind of. The Germans needed more troops in Europe, north and west of here, and on the Russian front, so they left the occupation of Odessa to their Eastern European allies.”
“But they’re just as bad! I’ve heard stories…”
“Was there ever a war without atrocities? Still, they run things here, not the Germans. Maybe they’re lazier, not so crazy for absolute control.”
“It can’t last. Odessa is a big city, with mountains to the west, where people can hide, and the coast, the seaport. Our Soviet Navy could lock that up and then what? No shipping. No goods, no munitions.”
“True, true. Pravda. But wouldn’t I like to stay a while. A man can make a living here, war or no war.”
Filip slowed down, shifted his suitcase to his other hand. He cast murderous glances at Ksenia’s rigid retreating back, saw Ilya list to one side under the weight of the trunk it was his turn to carry, his toolbox tucked under the other arm. Oh, yes. We can’t stay because we’re going to work on a farm. Isn’t that a stroke of good luck.
He wanted to forget the entire trip, couldn’t wait for it to be over. How he and Ilya took turns with the trunk, which, though small, was cumbersome and knocked against their shins; how the locks on Ilya and Ksenia’s suitcase gave way, and someone produced a length of rope to tie it closed, while the guards prodded the curious crowd and snapped insults and warnings. How they had all missed the evening train out of the city and had to spend the night at the station, propped up against each other, trying to sleep.
Leaving Odessa behind, the morning train took them past fields of wheat and rye, potatoes and cabbage, the country dotted with neat farmhouses alternating with dense stretches of deep loden evergreen forest. Factory smokestacks rose in the distance; warehouses, stone buildings, and churches flashed by the train windows.
It might have been idyllic, a picture of prosperity rising out of orderly, methodical practices and good management, but for the randomly cratered ground, fires smoldering here and there, the sight of women sifting through rubble, toting buckets of broken bricks, tugging at splintered boards. At the railroad stations, bands of boys hawked things taken from wrecked, abandoned houses, chased off by patrolling police only to reappear behind their backs. Why do people have to suffer when their leaders can’t agree? Galina thought, passing a few coins to a skinny boy in an oversized cap in exchange for a pair of apples.
At the Czech border they changed trains, their escort replaced by an SS junior officer and several local police.