Kirov had never set eyes upon so much weaponry before. Mixing with the smell of dampness, gun oil, and new paint from the ammunition crates was the sharp musty odour of sweat, tobacco smoke and the marzipan reek of ammonite explosives.
Several men were also crammed into this space. The only one dressed in full military uniform was a Red Army officer, perched on a flimsy chair and swathed in a bandage which covered one side of his face. Blood had soaked through along the line of his jaw.
There were two others, each of them garbed in a mixture of military and civilian clothing. Straggly and unkempt beards ranged across their filthy, wind-burned cheeks.
Partisans, thought Kirov, fear and curiosity mingling in his mind as he studied the assortment of captured German boots, Russian canteens and civilian coats so patched and ragged they belonged more on scarecrows than on men. The partisans were festooned with weapons. Grenades, knives and pistols hung from their belts and cross-straps like grotesque ornaments.
The focus of their attention was a large, bald man wearing a grey turtleneck sweater, who sat at the back of the room at a desk which had been cobbled together from a door torn off its hinges and balanced on two empty fuel drums. The man’s thick, dark eyebrows stood out sharply against his hairless face and his anvil-like hands lay flat upon the paper-strewn surface, as he if expected it all to be blown away by a sudden gust of wind. Beside the papers stood a candle in a wooden bowl and a civilian telephone, gleaming like a big, black toad upon the desk.
One by one, the men turned and stared at Kirov. The eyes of the partisans narrowed with contempt as they caught sight of the red bullion stars sewn to each of Kirov’s forearms, indicating his status as a commissar.
‘Colonel Andrich,’ said Kirov, addressing the wounded officer.
But it was not the officer who answered.
‘I am Colonel Andrich,’ said the man in the turtleneck sweater, ‘and you must be Major Kirov.’
Kirov slammed his heels together. ‘Comrade Colonel!’
‘I am quite busy at the moment,’ said Andrich, ‘so if you will excuse me, Commissar. .’ Without waiting for an explanation from Kirov, the colonel turned his attention back to the partisans. ‘As I was saying, we can protect you.’
‘The only people we need protection from are yours!’ replied a tall and sinewy man, whose sheepskin jacket was held tightly about his middle by a leather belt whose buckle bore the insignia of an SS officer, grey eagle and swastika surrounded by the words, ‘Meine Ehre Heisst Treue’ — My Honour is Loyalty. ‘Who is speaking for us in Moscow? What about the Central Partisan Command?’
Andrich tried to reason with the man. ‘Comrade Lipko, I have already explained to you that Partisan Central Command was abolished last month. As far as Moscow is concerned, the question of what should happen to the partisans has already been decided.’
‘Not by us,’ said Lipko.
‘That’s why I’m here,’ Andrich’s voice was filled with exasperation. ‘Moscow has sent me as proof that you have not been forgotten. There is now a Central Staff of the Partisan Movement, with departments represented by the Army, the Party and by the NKVD. It’s all under the direction of Panteleimon Ponomarenko. He is an expert on partisan issues.’
‘Then why are we speaking to you?’
‘Do not forget that I was once a partisan. For two years, I fought alongside you, until I agreed to return to Moscow and meet with those who are now deciding your fate, and the fate of all partisans.’
‘That’s right,’ sneered the other partisan. He had a slightly upturned nose wedged into a square face and small, vicious eyes, like those of a wild boar Kirov had seen, gutted and hanging upside down outside the stable of his father’s tavern. ‘You went to Moscow, far from the guns of the enemy.’
To Kirov, it seemed that this conversation had already been going on for a long time, and also that it was getting nowhere. As if to confirm Kirov’s assessment, Andrich raised his fist and smashed it down on the desk. ‘But then I came back, Comrade Fedorchak! Because Moscow knew that you would only speak to someone who truly understood what you had lived through. And, for myself, I knew that we would need someone to speak for us, or else we’d face oblivion. Why else would I be here, in this basement full of bombs, instead of safe in Moscow?’
‘And when it is over,’ demanded Lipko, ‘and we have been disarmed or else are lying dead somewhere out in the forest, what will you do then?’
‘I will return to Moscow,’ replied Andrich, ‘to work with Central Staff. There, I will have direct contact with Comrade Stalin. Through me, he will hear your voices and will be aware of your concerns.’
‘Central Partisan Command!’ spat Fedorchak. ‘Or Central Staff of Partisan Movement! What’s the difference? Do you think that by changing your name, you can fool us into thinking that you are different people? You’re all the same. You always have been. It’s men like you who came here in the twenties, ordering the farms to be collectivised and telling us how bright the future looked. And how did that work out? Ten million dead from starvation! And if we did do what you’re asking? If we laid down our weapons and disbanded, what then?’
‘All partisans who are eligible would be immediately enlisted in the Red Army. They would receive uniforms, weapons, food and they would be paid.’
‘What does it mean to be eligible?’ asked Lipko. ‘Who are those you don’t consider eligible and what will happen to them?’
‘I’ll tell you,’ answered Fedorchak. ‘It’s what all of us here already know.’
‘And what is that?’ asked Andrich.
‘That former prisoners of war, who escaped from captivity and joined the partisans, are being sent straight to the Gulag. And the same thing goes for anyone who’s not already a member of the Communist Party.’
‘How do you answer that?’ demanded Lipko.
Kirov glanced nervously around the room. From the looks on the faces of these partisans, it seemed to him that if the colonel didn’t provide them with a satisfactory answer, they would finish this conversation with gunfire.
For a moment, it appeared that Andrich was at a loss for words. But then he breathed in, slowly and deeply, and at last began to speak. ‘Not everyone’s motives in joining the partisans have been as clear and pure as yours. There are men who collaborated with the enemy, who are still collaborating, and who must now answer for their crimes. If you imagined it to be different, then you are simply being naive. And you are also being naive if you do not consider the alternative to what I’m offering. What do you think that Red Army Command is going to do? Allow heavily armed gangs to roam about freely in the newly reconquered territory? No! They are making you an offer to join them and if you turn them down, they are going to come in here and wipe you out. You can’t just turn around and vanish back into your secret lairs. They’ll burn your forests to the ground. In a matter of months, you’ll have nowhere left to hide.’
‘The Germans made the same threats back in 1941,’ remarked Fedorchak. ‘Now they’re gone and we’re still here. Maybe we’ll take our chances.’
‘The Fascists gave you no choice except to fight them or to fight against each other,’ explained Andrich, ‘but what I’m offering you is a way to not only survive but to be remembered as heroes in this wretched war. Victory is almost in sight. Why not share in the return of everything we have been fighting for?’
‘We did not fight so that everything could go back to the way it was before. We are fighting so that things might finally change. No more collective farms. No more forced conscription. No more arrests and executions simply to fill quotas set by Moscow. This whole countryside is one mass grave, and it’s not just our enemies who have done this.’ Now Fedorchak levelled a finger at Kirov. ‘It’s men like him as well.’