June, 1941
Pskov
They could see only the roof of the Pskov train station above the mob that surrounded it. Notices posted on every building advised all evacuees to identify themselves at a registration office. Upon doing so, they would be issued documents entitling them to food and shelter. They hadn’t had food or water on the road since the attack.
“Not necessarily here in town,” Lily remarked.
“Somewhere east of the Urals, they mean,” Rachel added.
“You’ll be my sister. Rachel Kroger sounds right.”
“We look so much alike.”
Sunburnt skin peeled off Rachel’s face and neck. Lily’s skin had become so dark she looked Asian.
“There’s also the minor detail that there’s no record of my ever having entered the country.”
“So? Can’t records get lost during a war?”
After drinking brackish water from an open trough, they took turns waiting in the single line that snaked for blocks outside the registration office. After five hours they got inside. Clerks sat sweating behind desks in the humid room; no breeze came through the open windows.
While Rachel stayed in the background, Lily spoke to the clerk, explaining that she and her sister were Swedish citizens. The clerk directed them to another office on the ground floor; there, as Rachel stood beside her, Lily repeated her story and the second clerk went to a desk and searched through a thick sheaf of cables.
“Lily Kroger?” He pulled out several sheets.
“And Rachel.”
“We’ve got some here for you but there’s nothing about a sister.”
“There must be a mistake.”
The clerk shook his head. “Someone named Samuel Kroger has been sending cables to every railroad junction west of Moscow. No mention of anyone but Lily Kroger. And you fit the description given . . . except for the sunburn.”
“Yes, but—”
“I can get you on a train at midnight.” Rachel looked up at the clock on the wall. It was 3 p.m. “But your sister will have to wait until you get to Moscow and straighten this out.”
As he prepared Lily’s travel voucher, Rachel studied the clerk’s face. In his early forties, balding, he had a pronounced slump to his shoulders, dark stains under his armpits, and an odor of mildew about him. An emotional appeal to this bureaucrat would be futile.
“We board as soon as the train comes in. If I were you I’d cross over to the platform now.”
“We?”
“Yes. All documented civilians are being evacuated tonight.”
He spoke in a matter-of-fact tone that made Rachel want to lean across the counter and slap him.
He handed Lily a packet. “Guard this with your life. There are hundreds outside who would think nothing of killing you to get these papers.”
“When will the rest be taken out?” Lily asked.
“As soon as possible.”
Lily put the documents into her shirt. They went out into the empty corridor. In spite of their situation, they broke into a fit of laughter.
“Let’s get something to eat,” Lily suggested. “Then we’ll find a way to get you onto that train.”
But outside, in the hot sun, when Lily presented her identification, they told her she would have to cross over before she could eat.
“You’ll have to do it,” Rachel said. “Let’s find a place along the fence where I can wait.”
Topped with barbed wire, the fence extended along the tracks for a thousand yards. Soldiers posted every hundred feet also guarded its western extremity, where a small guard house stood. On the other side, those who had been allowed onto the platform waited with their backs turned to the fence.
They picked a spot about three-quarters of the way to the guard house. The ranks of those to be left behind thinned out there, for the heart of the mob centered near the crossover point.
“I’ll get some food and bring it down to you. Don’t worry, I’ll find someone who can help us.”
Lily put her arms around Rachel and they hugged each other.
“If you have . . .” Rachel stopped herself.
“What?”
“Nothing. You’d better go.”
“I’m going to count the steps I take to get back to the station so don’t stray.”
“I won’t.”
Rachel watched Lily take measured steps along the fence. She was reminded of their childhood days when she and Lily had gone to the movies together. Whenever Lily went to the bathroom, she counted the number of rows in order to find her way back.
She had started to tell Lily to leave her behind if she must; but fear had stopped her. She didn’t want to be left alone here.
At first she stayed close to the fence, but after an hour she moved away and sat on the ground. Her feet and legs ached and her parched throat burned. At its worst now, the heat pushed her down and smothered her in its suffocating embrace. She fell asleep without realizing it and awoke in a panic, for it was night.
She went to the fence. The train had come in. It sat gleaming silver in the darkness, steam shooting out from its undercarriage. Certain that Lily had come back for her and then left, she moved along the fence, eyeing the empty platform. Everyone had boarded. “Lily! Lily!” Her voice carried across the deserted concrete and crashed against the shining shell of the train. She could see heads through the window, but the passengers avoided looking out.
Rachel turned to the faces that surrounded her. “What time is it?”
“Eleven!” The answer provoked fresh cries of outrage.
Rachel saw no use in trying to reach the station. Thousands converged upon it like bees to a hive. She walked back down the line, stopping where she guessed Lily had left her. She clung to the fence like a prison inmate, her fingers reaching through.
At the station, soldiers suddenly moved into the mob, creating a narrow corridor that led back to the registration office. Bureaucrats raced through the chute like cattle; a roar of protest assailed them. The mob surged against the soldiers but couldn’t break through. Seconds later, the escapees were safely ensconced on the other side and boarded the train in full view of the mob.
Rachel saw the slump-shouldered clerk climb aboard. She wanted to turn away, but as with the bombing on the road, she felt she had to open her eyes to all of it, no matter how agonizing. So even as she silently cursed him and his species, she added him to her mental sketchbook.
Once all the bureaucrats had boarded, a fitful silence overtook the crowd. Like worshipers in a great cathedral, they stood in awe before the train as it shuddered to life, waiting for their deliverance.
The train moved slowly out of the station. Rachel sat with her back to the fence and closed her eyes as the mob wailed in despair. Tears welled up in her eyes.
Lily had left her. She sat on the train right now, and before she reached Moscow the Germans would overrun Pskov. If they didn’t kill her they would enslave her.
She looked at the empty tracks. First Mother. Then, Father. Michael. Soon her turn would come. Another victim. She hated that word; she found even its sound repulsive. No. She couldn’t accept it. Lily had gone but the soldiers were still here. They would retreat. She would do what women had always done to survive war.
She heard footsteps on the other side of the fence. Her section was deserted, everyone having moved down to the station. A soldier approached her. “Follow me,” he whispered, pointing towards the guard house.
Rachel followed. Was this how it happened? They came looking for women in the night and took you across?
Upon reaching the guard house, she heard a door open, voices, and a sliver of light shone on the ground. “Come inside.” She entered the hut, prepared to do whatever the soldiers asked of her.
Lily waited for her. Rachel shook her head in disbelief. “I’m sorry,” Lily said, seizing her hands and kissing her. Rachel shuddered, torn between gratitude and rage. “I couldn’t risk being seen with the soldiers and they wouldn’t go back for you until the train had left.”
“I was so sure you had gone.” She wanted to pound Lily and hug her at the same time.
“I would never leave you behind. Never.” She looked toward a tall dark-haired soldier who stood nearby. “I’ve told Captain Panofsky you would do some portraits of his brave men, and they’d be fine enough to hang in the Hermitage.”
Stunned, Rachel could only smile woodenly. “All I need is pencil and paper.”
“Pencils we have,” Panofsky said. “No guns, but plenty of pencils. The paper, I’m sorry to say is not what you’re undoubtedly accustomed to.”
“Before I do anything, I have to go to the bathroom. And have something to eat.”
The toilet was in a room the size of a broom closet. Lily followed her in and stood over her. “Why are you angry with me?”
“I believed you were on that train.”
“Don’t blame me for your lack of trust.”
Trust. The word punctured Rachel’s anger. “You’re right, Lily. I hate depending on anyone.”
“We’ll both have to get used to it.”
Rachel nodded. She finished and stood up. “Your Captain is very handsome.”
“Don’t give me so much credit. We didn’t do anything except talk. All very sentimental and upright.”
Rachel smiled. “Now I make a few hundred mothers happy and we get out of here.”
“You said it, Picasso.”
When they came out, Panofsky offered them chairs at a wooden table with elbow-worn edges. Soldiers brought Rachel hard bread and moldy cheese. But she ate both gratefully and drank deeply from a jug of cold water, spilling some onto her hands and rubbing it onto her scorched face and neck. As she ate, Panofsky told them that they would be given seats on a military train scheduled to leave at dawn.
“But Captain,” Rachel jested, “you don’t know if I can draw a straight line.”
“Can you?”
“If I’m drawing Russian faces, I won’t need to.”
Panofsky laughed. “If I had your face I’d be scornful too.”
“What’s left of it,” Rachel said. But she was pleased by his flattery. “I better get started. Do you want your table or can I use it?”
“You can have a corner. Perhaps a bit more if we like your work.”
Drawing on the blank sides of train schedules, she sketched portraits through what remained of the night. She worked fast but the line of waiting soldiers never ended. At first she commanded the center of attention, but once the novelty wore off, the card game recommenced. She knew nothing of poker, but she found the slap of cards, the long silences, the expressions of delight or dismay to be relaxing accompaniment. She made her portraits as flattering as possible; yet in her own mind she drew the soldiers as they were, many of them youths no older than Stephen, their innocence decaying before her eyes.
Before dawn, Captain Panofsky reluctantly called a halt to her work. “This kind of drawing is nothing to you,” he declared, “but you’ve given these men a gift they’ll cherish the rest of their lives.” The now-crowded hut resounded with cheers.
Panofsky then took her aside. “When you get to Moscow I want you to contact this man.” He handed her a slip of paper with a name and address on it. He also gave her an envelope. “Inside is a letter I’ve written to introduce you. He’s in charge of a poster unit. He’ll put you to work and get you a place to stay.”
“Thank you. I owe you my life, Captain.”
“Nonsense. You are going to play a big part in helping us with this war.”
“If you say so.”
Rachel glanced at the name. Mitya something or other. What better way to locate Stephen than from the inside, she thought. She could obtain a position that would give her a safe haven for the rest of the war and allow her to search for him. Possibly even Michael.
The train came in while it was still dark and stopped well before the station. Rachel and Lily boarded the last car before the sun rose. As Panofsky’s pets, soldiers attended to their every need, providing them with snacks and water while keeping their presence a secret from those on the other cars.
At dawn the train pulled out. Rachel looked back at the terrified faces of those still trapped behind the fence. Though the soldiers had gone, they didn’t charge the platform.
“When I was on the other side I hated the lucky ones for being too cowardly to look at me.”
“Looking won’t do them any good. They don’t want pity. They want out.”
Plagued by long delays, they managed to travel only fifty miles by sundown. Their car grew quiet as darkness came across the sky.
“All those years we spent together,” Rachel said. “We never imagined anything like this could ever happen to us.”
“Remember the first time we met,” Lily said. “I was four and you were seven. All you talked about was shoes. I wanted to play outside, but you wanted to spend the day in your mother’s closet.” Lily smiled. “It was love at first sight for me—not Stephen, but your mother. Elizabeth was so beautiful. She was standing on the terrace, watching us play in the garden, back in the shade to protect her skin from the sun, wearing her cream silk peignoir. I thought she was a princess. I had never seen eyes like hers. Those perfect emeralds. I wanted to be her. I wanted to grow up and have her nose and her lips. I would have switched places with you in a minute.”
“What else do you remember?” Rachel put her head on Lily’s shoulder.
“When we played together we had fun. But when Stephen joined us for outdoor games like hide-and-seek, you hated it if he won. You were so jealous.”
“Was I? I don’t remember that at all.”
“Well you were. And then, I’ll never forget how you asked me to be your clothes dummy. You put together outfits from your mother’s clothes and made me model them.”
“That I remember.”
“Those were the happiest days of my life,” Lily said. “When the fathers were busy and Kitty and Elizabeth took us on outings—picnics, up to the mountains, to the shore. We used to sing for hours in the car.”
Rachel could hear her mother’s voice in her memory. “They were so young.”
“When Elizabeth took you to Paris I wanted her to be my mother more than anything in the world. What was it like?”
In the spring and fall Elizabeth had taken her there to buy clothes. They stayed each time in the same suite at the Ritz. Always they ate their first and last dinners at La Tulipe, a small restaurant in the Rue de Valois whose chef greeted them like members of his family. In the morning they ate croissants and fruit in their suite and then took a long walk before the stores opened. What had they talked about? She only retained the sound of Elizabeth’s voice, not the words. Then the stores would open and the real Paris, the city she adored came to life. They had a list for each day. Whether Chanel or Vionnet, they were personally met at the door and feted like royalty. They spent thousands, all of it from her mother’s inheritance. Yes, she had loved the clothes and the shoes especially, but most of all she had loved the stores themselves, full of color and motion, as magical to her as the ballet stage had been to Degas.
She came out of her reverie, realizing that Lily waited for her to answer.
“They must be wonderful memories. Tell me.”
Rachel began and the details came alive: Names, faces, the herbs and flowers that decorated so many windows in the spring, the gardens and the aroma of bread baking that came from the corner patisseries. Those years filled the hours as they rolled east across the plains of Russia, now solid black under the night sky.
When the sun rose Lily was asleep. Rachel watched the light fill the landscape, outlining the fields and trees, then each leaf and lastly the different shades of brown, yellow and green. She had avoided thinking about Elizabeth’s death, but now she remembered her laying near the greenhouse and her grief bloomed fresh as the morning light. She acquiesced, saying, “Mother. Mother. Mother.” She felt the touch of Elizabeth’s fingertips in her hair as she tied a ribbon, luxuriating in the scent of her favorite perfume, Joy.
Then it passed. She carefully reached over to Lily and ran the tip of her finger over her lips. Pulling down the shade, she settled back into the renewed darkness and went to sleep.