It’d take whole shopfuls of bags of flour and sugar and fat to fill a park. In fact it’s not just a question of space, because you could never put all that food in the shops at once. So you have to think about the time it would take to use it all up. The number of days those shops would have been filled. Or even weeks.
But now it’s just – not there. All burnt up. Weeks and weeks of food. Months of it, maybe, for all Leningrad’s millions of mouths. Those Germans knew what they were doing. All gone, apart from the sugar in the soil, which our scientists are going to get out by a special process.
Aeroplanes coming in from Moscow now approach Leningrad from the north-west, to minimize the chance of German attack. They fly in low over swamp and forest. They skim Lake Ladoga. It’s come to this, that Russian planes fly like thieves in the night over their own land.
The plane tilts and banks. Layers of green and grey appear in the windows, then disappear. But Pavlov doesn’t look out of the window. He has briefly considered the possibilities of German attack or pilot error on this dangerous, unfamiliar route, and then dismissed them. He thinks about nothing except what needs to be thought about now, at this moment. His job is to take over the administration of all food supplies and distribution in Leningrad, in the present crisis. He is jotting down columns of figures, making lists. Reserves, military rations, civilian rations, rates of consumption. He has nearly three and a half million mouths to feed. The plane lurches. Tree-tops, much too close, punch into view. Pavlov straightens his paper, which has slipped sideways, and rapidly adds up another column.
‘We’ll be landing in five minutes.’
‘Excellent.’
The plane lands heavily, throwing its passengers back against their seats. They are here, in Leningrad. Whatever happens, they are part of it now.
15
Two sharp knocks on the door. It’s his signal.
‘Anna.’
The apartment smells of onions and his mouth floods with saliva. But she doesn’t ask him in. They stand in the tiny, stuffy hallway, just as they stood the first time he came here. Suddenly he is afraid that she is no closer to him than she was then. The breasts he has touched are hidden by her ugly jacket. Her face is pale, her lips dry.
‘I was just on my way out.’
He touches her cheek.
‘I’ve got to go straight away, Andrei. I’m late.’
She’s always late. Always on her way somewhere, rushed and frowning. The evacuation centre has closed, since there’s no question of evacuating anyone for the foreseeable future, now that all the railway lines that connect Leningrad to the rest of the country have been cut. She’s working in a labour battalion, building fortifications again, but this time they’re inside the city. Sector by sector, building by building, barricades are going up. Pillboxes, bunkers and machine-gun nests are being set up, trenches are being dug, and key defensive positions identified. A new map of the city is emerging, which has nothing to do with homes, shops, schools, parks or restaurants. It is to do with patrols at every crossroads, with mined bridges, with sight-lines, steel tank barriers, pillboxes, and the artillery positions which everyone calls Voroshilov hotels. Trams filled with sandbags are positioned to block junctions. Street names and house numbers have vanished from this map.
Even the trees in the parks have become something else. Now they are defensive positions, behind which a man can crouch, watching, alert, his cheek pressed against bark which is carved with lovers’ initials. Each prospect of stone and water yields a second meaning which seems to have been waiting, hidden, since the city was first conceived. Was it this that Peter had in mind when he built?
‘Let me see your hands/ says Andrei. He turns them over. ‘You must cover those blisters, and put some iodine on them. They’ll become infected if you get soil into them.’
‘They’ll soon harden.’
‘I’m trying to help you.’
‘I’m fine. Come in and see Kolya for a minute. He was asking when you were coming.’
‘But you haven’t got time.’
‘No.’ Suddenly she grabs him, pulls his head to her, and kisses his lips, running her tongue into his mouth. After a second she withdraws and nips the cushiony softness of his lip between her teeth. They rock together, their eyes shut. Anna draws away first, and rubs her cheek against his.
‘You never shave. Isn’t that always the story with us, no time to do anything or go anywhere? As soon as I wake up, I already feel as if I’ve been running all night. I never do anything properly. Last night I dreamed I was booked on to the Moscow train, but even though I knew it was leaving in less than an hour I had so many things to do that I couldn’t stop myself doing them. I was cutting up a blanket to make a lining for Kolya’s jacket, and my mother was standing in the doorway with her arms folded, watching me. And then she said, “Don’t you know what time it is, Anna?” just as she used to do when I was running round the apartment trying to find my homework on a school morning.’
‘Imagine if you could really be booked on to the Moscow train.’
There are no trains to Moscow any more. There are no trains to anywhere. They are both silent, thinking of ripped-up track, bombed trains, and sleepy stations full of yellow, gluey sunlight, where you used to step down into nowhere, and go walking. All those stations are occupied.
‘They brought in two little boys last night,’ says Andrei. ‘Brothers. They’d been sleeping in the same bed when their apartment was shelled. One of them had his legs crushed, the other had a ruptured spleen.’ He stops, and strokes her cheek. ‘I don’t think they’d have had much chance anyway, but all the theatres were full when they were brought in, so that was that.’
The children actually did not look like children. They were black with smoke, and their hair stuck out, crisp with heat from the fire which had torn through their apartment building.
‘Did you get the morphine delivery?’
‘It’s supposed to be coming in on a military flight tomorrow. Anna, please, don’t go for a minute. Let me hold you.’
He grasps her through the wadded cloth of her jacket. Her neck smells of flowers. Which flowers? He’s sure that he knows. He breathes in again, closing his eyes.
‘Anna, what perfume is that?’
‘It’s Marina’s soap. There’s only a sliver of it left.’
‘I’ll get you some more.’
She puts her hands on his wrists. ‘Andrei, please.
‘ You love me. Say you love me.’ He shivers at the softness of her hair, tickling his face.
‘It’s not the right time.’
He pulls back. Her face is sullen.
‘You think I can do everything,’ she says. Well, I can’t. I have Kolya in there, and my father. They’ve got to be fed, and kept clean, and their clothes have to be washed, and Kolya’s boots have holes in them. They’re too small anyway, but I can’t get another pair. I’ve got to find felt boots for him for the winter, or he’ll get frostbite, but God knows where I’ll get those. And now the bread ration’s going down again. I hear things –’
‘What things?’
She leans closer. Her frightened breath stirs in his ear.
‘It’s not just the bridges that are being mined. It’s everything. So – if the Germans do break through – they won’t find anything left. It’ll all be blown up. The whole city. Rather than let them ‘have it-’
‘That’s just a rumour,’ he says, so quickly that she knows he’s heard it, too. ‘How could we destroy Leningrad?’
‘The person who told me is a Party member. He was at school with me. He says they’re mining everything there in the northern sector. If they’re doing that there, then it must be the same across the whole city. There are detonators ready, just waiting…’
‘The whole city…’
‘Yes.’
They stare at each other.
‘But how can there not be Leningrad any longer? It’s impossible.’
‘Yes, it’s impossible,??
? says Anna. ‘But I believe him. He knew what he was saying. We’ll blow it up rather than let them have it.’
‘You can’t think about all that, Anna. You’ve just got to think about now.’
‘That’s what I’m trying to do. But then you come – and you wake everything up – and you make me feel things again, and I want to talk to you about them –’
‘That’s good, isn’t it? What’s the point of being alive if you don’t feel it? You might as well be under an anaesthetic’
‘Andryusha, it’s different for you. I’ve got my father, and Kolya. I’ve always had a child holding my hand, and I’m not even a mother. Sometimes I think I never will be. This’ll be my life, this’ll be what I have if we don’t all die. Don’t you understand? I’m not complaining, I’m just telling you how it is. They are my responsibilities. Look at my father. Do you think he’ll ever be –’
He sees her feel for the difficult word. Normal, perhaps. Himself. All right. All those shorthands women use to him when they come into the ward with their baskets of bread and soup clutched in rough, red-knuckled hands.
‘He won’t be able to work again,’ she says at last. ‘And he’ll need someone at home to look after him when I’m at work. I won’t be able to leave him alone. How can we afford that, on what I earn? Or is Marina going to stay? That’s good in a way, but on the other hand I’m never alone, I’ve never got time when someone isn’t wanting something, expecting something –’
‘You don’t need to think about it all now.’
‘Why are you saying that? Are you saying that because he’s going to die? Is that what you’re trying to tell me?’
‘No, Anna, of course not.’
‘Well… I’m sorry, Andrei. I get angry. I’m not angry with you, but you see why I can’t let myself think about other things now. I can’t think about how I feel.’
‘You want to. I know you want to.’
‘Yes, but that’s not the point. Anybody can give way sometimes.’
‘For God’s sake, Anna, what’s that supposed to mean?’
‘I don’t know how to say it. It’s this. You make me weak. I’m afraid of it. I’m afraid you’ll weaken me.’
‘I would never let you get pregnant. You know how careful I am.’
‘That’s wonderful. That solves all my problems. Doesn’t it occur to you that not being pregnant really isn’t all that much to hope for out of life?’
‘Anna,’ he says, in the tone she loves. Two drawn-out syllables, as if he doesn’t want to let go of her name: An—na. ‘Anna. Let’s not quarrel.’
‘I know. But you should be with your patients, and I should be digging ditches.’
‘In a minute.’
‘You know I want you to stay. You know that.’
‘Yes.’
‘But we have to make sacrifices.’
‘Mm.’
He is unbuttoning her jacket. Her breasts are squashed by the tight, ugly blouse she’s wearing to match the ugly jacket. He undoes the buttons of the blouse, and there is the warm, deep crack between her breasts. He touches the line where her tan ends, then slides his hand down and finds her nipple. She kisses him, arching her back so that her breast fills his hand. Then she says, ‘Marina, Kolya and my father are all within three metres of us. They can even hear us breathing.’
‘You don’t want to make any more sacrifices.’
‘You know I do. But I can’t. I must go.’
He watches her as she buttons up her blouse. She glances up and smiles a sudden, naked smile.
‘It’s so stupid, isn’t it? All the things we want, and all the things we could have – and we might never be able to have any of them. You remember Katinka, the girl who died – the one I told you about? She was outraged by the idea that she might be going to die. Because that wasn’t what she’d been promised. After all, she was only fifteen, and all her life everything had gone so well. Death was something that happened to other people, like failing an exam.
‘Sometimes I think we should do everything, now, all at once, without stopping to think, because this might be the only time we’ve got. And I don’t know if I hold back because I’m sensible, or because I’m scared.’
‘I would never hurt you.’
You might. And I might hurt you. I don’t want any of that to happen.’
‘It won’t happen.’
‘But sometimes I think I’m better on my own, Andryusha. Safer. I know this will sound stupid, because as you see I’m surrounded by people all the time. But I’ve always felt as if I were alone – no, that’s not right, I mean on my own – ever since my mother died.’
He folds his arms around her. He wants to make them so close that there is no room for words to come between them. In the little hallway, silent, they’re safe.
In the next room Marina Petrovna is making onion soup and listening to Radio Leningrad, while Kolya sprawls on the floor drawing pictures of tanks. His tanks are tiny, like insects crawling across white paper. There are houses and streets in his picture, but no people.
There is a smell of onions and sickness in the room. Kolya’s father lies on the sofa, exhausted by the effort of getting out of bed. From time to time he sips from the glass of tea beside him. There is the tea-glass. There, his hand. Slowly, by an immense effort of will, he joins one to the other. The glass shakes as he lifts it to his lips. The tea slops, but doesn’t spill. He sucks in a little. Sweet, sweet. Suddenly the effort of holding the glass outweighs the bliss of sugar. He puts it down, and lets himself sink on to the pillows Marina has packed around him. He feels himself falling, but with another effort he steadies himself. He is on the sofa. There are his legs, under the blanket. Everything is just as it should be. He patrols his thoughts until it is safe to relax and watch his son.
He’s going to be good at drawing, like Anna. But he’s coming to the stage when they aren’t satisfied with those sweeping, intuitive early drawings which we adults think are so wonderful. He wants to learn. How do you draw eyelashes? How do you draw a man so he looks as if he’s really running? For a while his drawings won’t be as good as they are now. He’ll be struggling and he’ll get cross with himself and hurl his paper into the bin. I remember that stage so well, with Anna. ‘That’s beautiful,’ we’d say, but she’d screw up her face and say, ‘No, it’s not. It’s all wrong. It’s rubbish. I’m going to tear it up.’
Vera thought it might help if she had drawing lessons, even though she was only seven. And it turned out to be just the right thing. She stopped getting into a ‘rage with herself, and all her enthusiasm came back. I would never have thought of the drawing lessons, but Vera had a feeling for things like that.
When the sun gets as far as that cushion there, I can go back to bed. But not before.
But the terrible thing about coming back to life is that you can’t be at peace any more. There are a thousand things to torment you. Before, I didn’t mind what happened. I could let it all slip away. I didn’t listen to the radio, even though Marina has it on all the time. But now I’m afraid, just like everyone else. When Marina takes the boy down to the air-raid shelter, I’m afraid that I’ll never see them again. I lie here: that’s all I can do. I listen to the anti-aircraft guns and sometimes I can hear planes. They aren’t our fighters. They drum above the roof and I find myself praying even though I never pray. Always the same words: if it falls, let it be a bomb, not an incendiary. The sheets stick to me with sweat.
I am not afraid of bombs. But if an incendiary took hold here, I wouldn’t be able to get away. I’m afraid of that.
Last night I dreamed of Marina and the child. They were trying to wade towards me through a river which was full of fire instead of water. But he slipped and went down and then he floated away, slowly at first then faster and faster, with the fire lapping around his head. Marina kept on looking at me. I knew she wanted to tell me why she hadn’t rescued him. It was because it was too late for him. He would suffer too much if he was brought up into th
e air again.
When I woke up I was wet with sweat and the guns were still crackling They drop phosphorus bombs. Water can’t put out phosphorus: it burns and burns. Last night there was a terrible screaming that went on and on, and I think it was that which made me dream about Kolya, and the fire. Marina says they weren’t human screams. A bomb hit the zoo and the animals were wounded. Some of the cages were blown open and the animals were running up and down the streets. I suppose they had to be shot in the end.
Marina says they’re not selling any food off the rations now. The restaurants are closed. She sits on my bed and tells me how many potatoes we’ve got left, how many onions, how many grammes of lard. She counts them over aloud, then counts them again. We both enjoy it. If she stops, I ask her more questions. ‘How many potatoes did you say exactly, Marina?’
Kolya loves peeping into the store-cupboard and seeing how many jars there are. He doesn’t try to touch anything. He stares solemnly for a while, and then he says, ‘We’ve got lots of food, haven’t we, Marina?’ She answers, ‘Yes, we’re very fortunate,’ and he nods, satisfied, and goes back to his game.
There’s been further bombing of food stocks, but no one knows exactly where. Now we know that they don’t just want to defeat us. They want to destroy us. Nothing in Leningrad matters to them at all. Not a stone, or a child. Carthage must be destroyed.
But there’s freedom in knowing it. We can’t make deals with them any more. So much for our pact. We have no choice left. We have to resist.
So I get out of bed and lie on the sofa for two hours. Doesn’t sound much like resistance, does it? Wouldn’t it terrify the Germans to know that Mikhail Ilyich Levin is staying alive, and repeating poetry to himself.
Onegin, do you remember that hour
Picked by fate for our meeting
In the alley, in the garden…?
I can recite page after page. I close my eyes, and it’s as if I had the book in front of me. I go through the section where Tatyana is lost in her dream. The plains, the fir trees, the ghostly light and the creak of her footsteps through the snow: all these come to me so powerfully that it’s as if I’d never really read about them or thought about them before. I almost say aloud that I’m sorry I didn’t understand until now. My eyes fill with tears, and I don’t know why. But I know that it’s by these things, and nothing else, that we survive. Poetry doesn’t exist to make life beautiful. Poetry is life itself.