No sooner had the drinking party disappeared around the corner than the bellowing vocals started up again, accompanied by strains of the mandolin …
Then they came upon two privates.
‘The oldest guys in the group … but I mean, they’ve had us spearheading … out in Vieljärvi, fuck … He chickened out, the Sarge, I mean, but I said gimme that goddamn submachine gun … left eighteen of ’em lyin’ there …’
Then they saw their first civilian resident. It was a woman, dragging her mattress God knows where, looking harried and frightened. She was an old woman, wearing all thirty of her handkerchiefs on her head, boots on her feet and a quilted overcoat tied with a woolen sash. The woman frantically quickened her step as some drunk who had been walking toward her from the opposite direction started walking beside her, slurring strangely, ‘Maatuska … maatuska … Russki mama, babydoll. Kuksitnaataa … Finski kuksitnaataa … Liepuska … finski bread for you … yepatnaataa me need fuck you … yeputtaa yeputtaa …’
The frightened woman sped up, but the man persisted by her side, repeating his words over and over. He took the woman by her wrist and patted her bottom, ‘Russki Maatuska … Good Bessie … yeputtaa …’
The woman slipped inside some building, leaving the baffled forest warrior to stand in the street and recover from his disappointment. He was a large man and big-boned. A reddish beard covered his face. His shirt glistened with grime and half of its buttons were open, the other half being absent entirely. A large triangular swath of fabric was torn out of the knee of his cargo trousers. He’d rolled his trouser-legs up twice and his wool socks peeked out from underneath.
The man shoved his powerful fists into his pockets and started to stagger away, bellowing, ‘Onward! Marshal Mannerheim cries … aim between the Russki’s eyes …’
Kariluoto had already taken a few steps toward the man when the latter had taken hold the woman, but he abandoned the effort once he saw her escape into the building. He felt ashamed, and angry. These people … these people … where did these people come from?
But the sight of the woman had brought Sirkka to mind. This woman was already on the older side, and looked a little Santa Claus-esque with all those clothes wrapped around her, but the sight of her had made Kariluoto’s thoughts drift to women nonetheless, and thus, quite naturally, to Sirkka. So exquisite was his relationship with the girl that he could think of nothing ugly in connection with it. In his mind’s eye, he saw only that lovely, slender face, those slim shoulders and bosom, which he had occasionally brushed up against, by accident. His whole body shuddered as a sharp longing flooded through him. When, oh when would they grant leave?
What a marvelous thought. Home – a conqueror of Petroskoi. He knew he would be promoted soon. Lieutenant Kariluoto. A youth of twenty who had taken over command when the Company Commander fell and succeeded in putting down the enemy attack. Yes, this was Petroskoi. Maybe they already knew, back home.
Kariluoto looked back. The company was marching double-file behind him. ‘Finns March into Petroskoi.’ How many times had he heard his father and his friends talking about Eastern Karelia, even when he was a child? Of these kindred people, sighing beneath the yoke of foreign rule, whose liberation was the duty of the Finnish nation – a duty that should never leave their thoughts. They ought to think about it at mealtimes, at work, ponder it while preparing for bed; and during the night, visions of it ought to fill their dreams. And now it was here.
They were liberating Karelia.
A rowdy group of men carrying boxes and bundles on their backs came around the street corner. Kariluoto was so absorbed in his thoughts, however, that he didn’t pay any attention to them. His battalion hadn’t yet taken over the guarding of the city, anyway, so it wasn’t their responsibility to arrest drunks just yet.
Shots and yells rang out. Bonfires were still ablaze over in Ukkossalmi, lighting up the autumn sky with bloody curls of light.
Petroskoi descended into the darkness of her first night as a Finnish city.
‘Laadaadaa dee daadaallalalaallaa … daa deedeedaadeedeedaadada … and I’m saying to the doctor … you take a piss in those bottles, mister …’
The keg had been destroyed, but the men had managed to get the liquor into buckets, which they were now lugging toward their lodgings.
IV
Life was good as an occupation unit. A fellow could explore the city at will and amass all kinds of fascinating experiences – such as rounding up all the city’s madmen after some drunken soldier released them all from the mental hospital, for example. If they were liberating the city, he protested, they were supposed to free everybody behind bars! That was his story, and what could you do? The explanation was perfectly logical. Walking the streets, they were amazed to encounter young Russian men wearing civilian overcoats over their army uniforms: fellows who had abandoned their units and taken it upon themselves to resume life as civilians. The Finns couldn’t really hold it against them – seeing as they would happily have done the same.
The men had been explicitly ordered to protect the houses against theft, but what difference did it make who owned each old vinyl record, Russian string instrument, button and knick-knack these thieves rounded up? There wasn’t anything decent to be found in the whole town. They had to protect the residents, but once the keg of liquor had been destroyed and almost all the other units had left the city, life was so quiet that even that wasn’t much of a burden. They tried to make friends with the local residents, who took a little while to get over their initial shyness, but then began interacting with them quite freely.
One or two of the men had already found himself a girl – Rahikainen first, obviously. His urban existence was like a chapter unto itself. It was as if everything in that conquered city had been made expressly for him – scraps, hungry residents, women, labyrinths, massive army depots. He played the businessman to a T. Not so much because it would get him anything in particular as because it was just his mode of operation. He didn’t know what to do with himself unless he had some scheme or other in the works. And here, where greater opportunities presented themselves to the enterprising entrepreneur, well – he pounced. His principal operation consisted of procuring food for the hungry inhabitants, generally against payment in the form of young women’s services. He scrounged up some icons for some art-connoisseur military official, even if he did think the man was nutty to give him money for those mildewy pictures. The older and less entrepreneurial privates could safely turn to him with their needs regarding women, as he already knew all the ones willing to sell themselves for bread. He sold the mother of his own seventeen-year-old ladyfriend to some guy from the veterinarian unit in exchange for two packs of cigarettes.
They enjoyed life. They had no duties to perform, save the occasional round on guard duty. And the fact that they were cleaning out a Russian barracks for their housing indicated that this state of bliss was likely to continue.
The city was no longer Petrozavodsk, nor even Petroskoi – it was now Fort Onega, Finland. Lenin’s statue had been replaced by a Finnish field cannon, and their ownership was established throughout the town in every possible way.
Rokka, Hietanen and Vanhala were walking the streets shoulder to shoulder, routinely failing to salute the officers they happened across. All sorts of occupying units had turned up in the city, and admittedly their general comportment was such that our friends would have happily been thrown in the brig before demonstrating their respect toward such individuals. They had passed by several officers without incident when a certain captain approached them from the opposite direction, having
spotted them from quite a way off. When the trio pretended not to notice him, he stopped and said, ‘What’s this? Why don’t you salute?’
The Captain was wearing a peaked cap, shiny boots and spurs. He’d pulled the brim of his cap down slightly over his eyes, so its edge cut a ‘menacing military line’ across the upper half of his face. His self-important air seemed to center around his pursed lips, which emanated a kind of pinched, forced militarism.
The man’s formality and gruff, military air exacerbated the men’s already hostile attitude. At first they said nothing, so the Captain repeated, with increasing irritation, ‘Answer me! For what reason do you fail to salute your superior?’
Rokka started to smile. It was that same subtle, shifty smile that signaled he was feeling mischievous. And indeed, it made the Captain fly into a rage, particularly when Rokka replied, ‘We didn’t notice ya.’
‘What are you grinning at? Notice! In that case, it’s a matter of even greater concern! An NCO who can’t see a superior officer in the same street! How are you going to see the enemy out on the terrain?’
Rokka’s face fell. He tilted his head to the side and, holding up his finger in a performance of utmost seriousness, began, ‘Now you lissen here, Cap’n. We got this situation here that rides on colors. Now me, I don’t see shades a gray so well. But brown, well, brown’s no problem, so I git on just fine with the enemy. But our own officers’s all dressed in gray, so you see, I don’t always notice ’em. That’ssa root of it all. Now shiny things I do see, so I spotted those spurs a yours right off – don’t you worry ’bout that. I sure done noticed how spankin’ sparklin’ you are, Cap’n, yesssiree.’
‘What’s your unit? What is your unit? Name! Tell me your name!’ The Captain was suffocating with such fury that he couldn’t properly formulate the command he was trying to issue, and instead just kept repeating, ‘Unit! Unit!’
‘Kuopio Kicksled Company! Heeheehee!’ Vanhala wasn’t typically one to be so bold, but Rokka’s example had inspired him to slacken the reins a bit and anyway the opportunity was just too tempting to resist.
‘I’m placing all three of you under arrest. To the main guard station. March!’
‘We’re gonna make a run for it, fellas. Vanhala … gimme the records.’
Vanhala was carrying a gramophone and a packet of records, so Rokka snatched the latter to lighten his load. Hietanen and Vanhala realized that Rokka wasn’t joking, and that they were about to make a break for it. A few yards up ahead, a tumble-down alleyway turned off the street, as if made to order. They disappeared down it, leaving the Captain in the street screaming, ‘Stop them! Stop them! Haaaa … alt!’
The trio dashed down the block, crossed the next street, turned a couple of corners, and figured they were safe. Breathless and panting, Rokka declared, ‘Shame to run out on a fella like that, but I sure ain’t takin’ an arrest for sumpin’ as stupid as’sat. Would’a grown into such a stink, we’d a been two weeks tryin’na git out of it.’
They stole backward glances now and again as they continued on, but there was no sign of anybody on their tail.
The Captain himself hadn’t attempted to chase them, and the privates walking in the streets made themselves scarce on hearing his shout. There was no question that they sided with the trio and were not about to turn them in, even if they feigned trying for the sake of appearances.
Vanhala giggled with delight. It was the first time he’d pulled one over on an officer. ‘Diversion operation successful! Heeheehee!’
‘But what are we gonna do about this fellow?’ Hietanen gestured toward the Lieutenant Colonel heading toward them, sitting astride his thoroughbred horse and looking around him, evidently enjoying the splendor of his own magnificence.
‘This round, we pass,’ Rokka said, slipping into the jargon of the card-player as he ducked through an archway. Hietanen and Vanhala followed and together the three of them watched as the Lieutenant Colonel rode by.
Continuing on their way, they found themselves walking behind two army officials and an army chaplain who were chatting away animatedly as they walked in front of them. ‘… but at first glance it would appear that the Vepsians have been best at retaining their national character …’
‘The most reasonable thing to do would be to let the Orthodox faith die. Since Bolshevism has worn it down so much already. All efforts at resuscitating religious life should be carried out along Lutheran lines. From now on, all children’s baptisms should be left to the evangelical faith. Of course, it’s not a question of religious persecution, just managing things in a natural way …’
‘You have to distinguish between different kinds of Russians. The whole resettlement issue will probably be resolved very quickly once the Germans take control of all of European Russia.’
The army chaplain and the military officials turned down another street. There was some sort of Army Bureau in the building on the corner, and a private was standing in the courtyard holding a horse harnessed to a church buggy. A lieutenant and a beautiful Lotta emerged from the building, and the Lieutenant bowed to the Lotta in a rather exaggerated display of cordiality, saying, ‘If your graciousness would deign to step in? I would like to request the honor of showing you Fort Onega, Finland, from the height of a church buggy.’
The Lotta laughed as she stepped into the buggy and said, ‘You’re hopeless … Oh, wouldn’t I?’ The driver clicked his heels to attention and handed the reins to the Lieutenant, then they set off on their drive, the buggy jerking about on its springs.
‘Well, I’ll be darned …’ Rokka said, chuckling. He sniffed love in the air, and the whole thing gave him a hearty laugh.
Then they stopped and stared at a sight that quickened the metabolic functions of their whole bodies. A Finnish cleaning unit of young women was coming down the street toward them. They were a group of student volunteers who had come to clean the city. They moved as a group, and even attempted to march in step with one another, though without much success. They managed to get it just close enough so that you could tell what they were trying to do. The girls wore brown overalls, wooden shoes and garrison caps that didn’t quite cover the ‘wildly unruly’ locks of hair peeking out around the edges. Their clear, girlish voices sang, ‘Russkis won’t stink up Finland for long …’
The trio watched them wistfully, in so far as men of their nature can accommodate feelings of wistfulness. Even Rokka gazed keenly after the girls, though he was the father of three.
‘Let’s go see Veerukka, fellas. We got our ladies too,’ Rokka said, and the others were happy to follow.
There was one place they went to meet girls. It was entirely innocent, though, as the girls there did not tolerate advances of any sort. There were three of them: one Russian and two Karelians. The men would come and play Vanhala’s gramophone for the girls, who would in turn perform Russian dances for them, which they were more than happy to watch.
‘But hey, wouldja let me go get some bread first? I’ve still got a few pieces. I wanna take ’em to Tanya and Alexei.’
There were two orphans living in the same building as the girls, whom Hietanen had taken under his wing like adopted children. The children would rush out to meet him whenever they saw him coming, and Hietanen was in the habit of bringing them whatever food he could get his hands on. Which was why he now wanted to go and get something to bring, so he wouldn’t have to disappoint them. Rokka and Vanhala understood the whole thing very well and readily agreed.
When they got back to their lodgings, Hietanen realized that he actually had very little bread left, so he deci
ded to go ask Mäkilä for the next day’s rations in advance. A spat between Rahikainen and Mäkilä was underway in the storeroom when he got there, as Mäkilä had accused Rahikainen of snitching sugar from his supply.
‘Aw, please, Pops. I couldn’t care less about your storeroom. I got bigger bags to dip into round here if I want.’
‘Chuh … well, that’s no secret.’
‘Hey, listen,’ Hietanen broke in. ‘Gimme my rations for tomorrow, wouldja? I need ’em.’
‘It is not distribution time right now. And besides, there’s too much bread floating around this city.’
‘Look, I’m just asking for my own rations.’
Mäkilä forked them over, mumbling about bread and women so pointedly that Rahikainen thought it a splendid opportunity to take matters into his own hands. ‘’Fit’s makin’ ya jealous, Pops, I can help you out. I’ve got just the girl. Only speaks Russian, but you don’t need much language for that. And knockers like you’ve never seen.’
Mäkilä didn’t respond. He just cleared his throat and retreated into his storage cupboard looking mortally offended. But Rahikainen hurried after Hietanen, asking ‘What kind ya got?’
Hietanen smiled mysteriously and whispered, ‘By God, there’s not another girl like her! Used to be some kind of big cheese in these parts. Part of the Young Communists’ League, or something like that.’
‘Naw … I got one just like that too. But it’s true, what I was telling Mäkilä. If you’re ever in need, or you know somebody who is, I’m happy to take care of it. Not askin’ much in return, either. She’s a little roly-poly maybe, but whew! those knockers. Like two little piggies with their backsides in the air.’