Two hours later, they joined Harriman in the dining room for a late lunch. The situation was awkward in the extreme, but Harriman, the consummate diplomat, merely said, “Let’s all enjoy this lovely meal, without any political discussion. We’ll have time for that later, perhaps on our evening walk.” He swept his glance across the ceiling and around the room, and Alexia nodded understanding.
They ate potato and leek soup, chatting about Russian and American culinary traditions. Alexia remarked on the military diet and its recent enrichment with Spam. After a comfortable hour of small talk, the ambassador reiterated that the garden air was much fresher than inside and suggested they go for a stroll.
Mia threaded her good arm into the sleeve of her jacket, and Alexia buttoned it across the bandaged one. It was a tender, caring gesture, and for Mia, who thought of herself now as the protector, it felt odd.
Outside, the ambassador got immediately to the point. “It’s clear to me that Miss Kramer’s investigation, which was supposed to improve the Lend-Lease supply chain, has instead uncovered corruption at very high levels at the Kremlin. Unfortunately, revelation of this corruption would endanger negotiations between both our governments, so we must suppress the information.”
“We’re beyond the issue of corruption, Ambassador,” Mia said, but Harriman raised a hand.
“Please let me finish. At the heart of the scandal is Mr. Molotov, who attempted to have Miss Kramer murdered and may still do so.” He turned toward Alexia. “As the condition for her silence, Miss Kramer required that you be reprieved and brought back safely to Moscow. That leaves us here with the question of what we shall do with you.”
“It’s really up to you, Alexia,” Mia said. “Molotov handed you over, but he wasn’t happy about it. I think at this point, you have only two choices. You can declare your loyalty to country above all and go back to the battalion to finish your sentence, although you’re already tainted by association with me, so you may still be in trouble. Or you can… well, I have to say it. You can defect.”
“Defect.” Alexia winced, as if tasting the word in all its bitterness. “I never would have considered it.”
“I know. And I’m so sorry to have involved you in this whole mess. You were a good soldier and a loyal communist. I’ve taken that all away from you.”
Alexia exhaled. “No. All you really took away was my political innocence. You made me suspicious. When we arrived near Warsaw, where the Poles were rising up against the Germans, we were ordered to stand down, to let the Germans wipe them out. Only then could we advance and defeat the Germans on our terms. That didn’t seem right. Then I kept thinking of what Molotov did to you. So many things go on among our leaders that we don’t know about, that we would hate if we did know. I love this land, would still fight and die for it, and I’m still a communist, but I feel no loyalty to Stalin and his men.”
“Does that mean you’re willing to defect?” Ambassador Harriman asked coldly.
“It means I understand my choice is to return to the field and probably die for a government I can’t trust, or to betray it. Both make me terribly depressed.”
Harriman offered no sympathy. “I’m sorry if it depresses you. But you must choose, because if you want to defect, we have to plan for you to do so, and, ironically, it must be done legally. That is, the embassy can’t be part of an escape plan. We have to see to a discharge from active service and an exit visa. Only Molotov can issue those.”
“What are my chances if I go back?”
“To the penal battalion? Even if you survive and return to a normal unit, you’d remain a threat to Molotov because of what you know, and I’m sure he wouldn’t tolerate that. You’d be very easy to eliminate at the front.”
Alexia seemed to slump. “Well then. I agree to go to America. I’m not sure what I’d do once I got there, though.”
Mia felt her own disappointment growing. This was not what rescue was supposed to be like. “Please don’t worry about that part. I have a friend, a journalist, who thinks you’d have a good chance to get a job teaching Russian. You said you were already a teacher before you enlisted, so that should be an easy transition.”
Alexia resumed strolling, and the others kept pace with her. “Me, teaching in a school in America. I suppose that’s no stranger than Mia being a sniper in the Red Army, is it?” She murmured quietly, as if to herself, “Father Zosima would certainly approve of that.”
Consummation, Mia thought. Such a powerful word, suggesting a long, passionate courtship, a great drama of reunion, and an ecstatic joining. The war had brought them no end of drama, in which the suffering and sacrifices were all terribly real, but when Mia looked at Alexia across the table, it was rather with a sense of serenity that she knew they would belong to each other that night.
And because she knew, she didn’t need to hurry. They shared a quiet evening with the ambassador and some of his staff, exchanging the small talk they’d all become adept at making under the Soviet bugs. The conversation was a back-and-forth in both Russian and English. Alexia listened when the others spoke English, sometimes seeming to catch a phrase, and other times looking quite bewildered. They would have time enough to deal with that, Mia thought.
When the cook offered a late-evening meal of sandwiches, Alexia ate ravenously, making up for the deprivations of the battlefield.
Around eleven, the ambassador slid his chair back and announced his day was over and that he would meet his guests again at breakfast. One of the staff invited them for a card game, but Mia begged off with the explanation of fatigue.
Their rooms were adjacent at the end of the corridor. Mia had planned to slip across the way into Alexia’s room, but Alexia arrived first. She glided across the room to sit next to Mia on the bed and, without a word, took hold of her head and kissed her on the lips.
It was a simple, straightforward kiss, hard and full on her mouth, and though passive, Mia was quickly excited. Finally she broke the kiss and spoke softly into Alexia’s ear. “They may have bugged this room as well. We must whisper everything.”
“What should I whisper? That I’ve waited almost a year for you to kiss me again?”
With half-closed eyes, Mia brushed her lips over Alexia’s cheeks, which smelled deliciously of the embassy’s Ivory soap and reminded her of home. “I’ve waited, too. I even came back to Medved when the ambulance was destroyed, because of you. And finally we’re together. Alone and safe.”
“Yes, alone and safe,” Alexia repeated. “So now what are you going to do to me?” She punctuated her question with another fillip of her tongue at the corner of Mia’s mouth.
Mia responded with little half kisses, lingering only a second. “What would you like me to do?”
Alexia’s hand crept up into Mia’s hair, caressing her head, drawing her forward. “All those things you hinted at in that trench at Pskov, which made my heart pound so that I fired too soon.”
Mia drew back. “It was you who fired first?”
“Yes, but I lost my concentration and missed him. Then the German fired toward the flash and hit you. It was my fault you were shot. I’m so sorry.”
“But it was my fault for talking all that nonsense about kissing when we were supposed to be taking aim. And you left your post because of me, too.”
“There was so much blood that I had to get you out of there. I didn’t even mind so much being put under arrest for that, except they wouldn’t tell me if you were dead or alive.”