All senior Soviet officials were like servants stealing from their employer’s storerooms. They would strike up deals to make it easier for them to steal and then go to the boss to report on each other in an attempt to keep their enemies from the feeding trough. This was the substance of their “struggle for a bright future.”
“You know, Alov, we were maybe a bit hasty to expel you from the Party,” said Drachenblut thoughtfully. “I can see you’re a reliable employee and a vigilant agent. We’ll send you out to Cuba to carry on the good work.”
Alov understood everything. His superior was prepared to turn a blind eye to any crimes committed by Babloyan and Rogov. Meanwhile, Alov, as an unwanted witness to those crimes, was to be dispatched abroad to keep his mouth shut.
Drachenblut picked up the telephone receiver. “Put me on to the administrative department of the People’s Commissariat for Foreign Affairs.
“Ah, good evening, Comrade Fyodorov. We need to send one of our men to Havana. Do we have a position as commandant? No? Well, then he can be a registrar. I’ll send him to you with a note from me, and you get him settled in, all right?”
He hung up the phone and turned to Alov. “You were dreaming about having your own room, weren’t you? Now you’ll have one with a view of the sea and palm trees. And take that woman of yours along too so she doesn’t make a nuisance of herself here.”
“So, you’re just going to let Rogov and Kupina go?” said Alov in a faint voice.
“Don’t worry about them,” said Drachenblut. “We’ll find them all right.”
Klim realized it was madness to take Tata away with him. What would Nina say when she found out he had decided to adopt another child, and the child of his former lover at that? Tata would run them all ragged with her awful character, but Klim could not bring himself to abandon her to her fate. If it had not been for Galina, the OGPU woman with the red hair would have maimed him for life.
They were in luck: there were seats left on the plane, and they passed through passport control and customs without incident.
A young airport employee led Klim and the girls out on to the airfield where a bright red blunt-nosed plane stood waiting.
“Isn’t it pretty?” cried Kitty in delight. “Just like a model plane!”
It was true; the airplane looked like nothing more than a toy. It was difficult to believe that this shed with wings would actually be capable of taking off.
Klim cast an anxious glance toward Tata, but thankfully, she said nothing.
At that moment, Friedrich jumped down from the cockpit. He was wearing a leather coat and a helmet with earphones.
“Good Lord!” he said when he saw Klim. “You’re still alive! And who are these young ladies?”
“These are my daughters.”
Friedrich looked nonplussed. “Ah well, you can tell me everything later. Let’s go into the cabin. We’re leaving in fifteen minutes. First stop—Smolensk, then Kaunas, then Konigsberg. And after that, it’s just a short hop to Berlin.”
In the cabin were four leather armchairs with headrests. There were hooks for coats on the walls and rolled-up blinds at the rectangular windows with rounded corners. In the back end of the plane, behind a barrier, various crates and suitcases were being loaded noisily. Every time a new piece of baggage was thrown on board, the plane would shudder and rock.
“It’s going to be noisy,” Friedrich told Klim. “Don’t forget to put in your earplugs. You’ll find them in the pocket in the sides of your seat. And if you get sick, use the paper bags.”
Tata and Kitty sat in an armchair together and spent a long time fiddling with the belt, trying to work out how to fasten it.
“Aren’t you afraid of flying?” asked Tata.
Kitty shook her head. “No.”
Lucky thing, thought Klim, sighing to himself. He was struggling to suppress a sense of dread. He had read so many reports of plane crashes in the papers!
The door flew open, and another passenger came on board.
“Oh, I see I won’t be flying alone!” he exclaimed in English, catching sight of Klim.
It was Oscar Reich. He was red in the face, his coat was undone, and his hat askew.
“I’m delighted to see you,” he said to Klim. “Are these your children? They’ll have a rough time of it, I’m afraid. These planes bounce you about terribly. I would never get into a plane for the life of me if I didn’t have urgent business to attend to.”
He put his briefcase under the seat and banged on the wall that separated the cabin from the cockpit. “Hey, Friedrich! Have you had the heating fixed? I almost froze to death last time I flew with you.”
A man with a shaved head appeared in the doorway.
“Yefim, come in and sit down,” Oscar patted the seat next to him. “You and I are flying with these young ladies today.”
Klim forced himself to shake both men by the hand. What bad luck to have to fly with Reich for company! He was glad, at least, that it would be noisy during the flight, so there would be no need for conversation.
“Ready everyone?” called Friedrich from the cockpit. “Off we go then!”
They reached Smolensk without mishap, not counting a sudden fit of tears from Tata, who had remembered that she had forgotten her father’s ashtray at home and that she had not said goodbye to her cat, Pussinboots. It had suddenly hit her that she was leaving Moscow forever and would never be able to go back home.
When the plane took off again, it began to bounce about horribly, and Tata was immediately sick. Kitty was frightened and began to cry, and Klim, at a loss as to what to do, tried to calm first one and then the other.
Oscar and Yefim screwed up their faces and moved their legs away squeamishly from the remains of Tata’s breakfast.
During refueling at Kaunas, Tata hid in the ladies’ lavatory, declaring that she would not get back into the plane for anything in the world. Klim was forced to carry her out—to the horror of the polite Lithuanian ladies in the queue.
“I’ve been kidnapped!” Tata yelled, bucking like a crazed calf.
Klim set her down on the ground. “Tata, look at me. Please, for goodness’ sake, don’t make my life even more complicated! I can’t leave you here. We’ve already crossed the border. If Kitty and I leave without you, where would you go?”
“I hate airplanes,” sobbed Tata.
Klim was sorely tempted to leave her with the Lithuanians. He understood the problem: Tata had had a difficult childhood, she had lost her mother, and now, she was flying to some unknown destination with a stranger—and a stranger she didn’t trust, at that.
Perhaps a Soviet orphanage would not have been such a bad option after all for Tata, he thought.
He took her hands and squeezed them tight. “I owe a huge debt to your mother. I promise I’ll look after you just as I look after Kitty. Just as long as you trust me, everything will be all right.”
Klim had already enough on his plate. There was a dull ache in his chest, and he was afraid it might be something serious. He was not enjoying being bounced around for hours in a small plane side by side with his worst enemy. And on top of that, only the day before, he had been held in a cell and subjected to torture. But none of this was likely to make Tata come to her senses. It was useless to expect any compassion or understanding from her.
She only calmed down eventually when Klim reminded her that it was a Young Pioneer’s duty to be strong and brave at all times.
“We’re going to Germany now,” he said sternly. “A capitalist country. We might face all sorts of dangers and deliberate provocations. I’m entrusting Kitty to your care. Whatever happens, you must make sure you get her to safety.”