September, 1944
The Pripet Marsh
“Here they come, Koz,” Stephen said. The horse stood rigid, his head cocked at an angle, his ears pointed. The marsh grew silent and the grasses shook from the reverberation. The sky suddenly filled with bombers displaying the red star.
The flights continued day after day. Their incessant drone was joined by the rumble of artillery. After two weeks without cessation, Stephen knew the Red Army was on its way to victory and it was time for him go to Tashkent.
He had preserved the tattered remains of his clothes for this day. Koz watched him change, donning the clothes of Illya Radek. “How about you, Koz? Do you want to stay here and live the good life or rejoin the military?”
After packing enough dried fish to last a few days, Stephen made a last trip to the spring. He drank deeply and filled a deerskin bag with the clear water. “This is it, Koz. Make up your mind.” The horse had followed him to the spring and now stood at the edge of the clearing. He stared as Stephen set out on foot; but he didn’t move. “I don’t blame you one bit, Koz. If I were you I’d stay here too. With luck, you’ll live to be a hundred.” Stephen stroked the horse’s head and went on his way.
He reached the northeast rim of the marsh that night, and the following morning, he began walking due north across the dry plains. He carried the saddlebags over his shoulder and attached to his snake-skin belt were the two deerskin bags, one filled with fish, the other with water. His boots had crumbled into dust and the dry land pounded his feet. Instead of the sounds of marsh life he heard only the ever increasing roar of guns.
On the third day he met units of Rokossovsky’s lst Belorussian front. As strange as he appeared to them—a scarecrow in rags whose long scraggly beard nearly reached his navel—they were even more astonishing to him. Stephen couldn’t believe he was looking at the Red Army, for these soldiers were individually better equipped than whole squadrons had been two years earlier. He realized that if he told them the truth they would think him mad. Exactly.
“I was with the First Cavalry Corps, Third Brigade,” Stephen exclaimed, upon being taken to the duty officer. “I was Colonel Kozlov’s personal aide.”
The officer examined him very closely, holding his head back. I must stink of the swamp, Stephen thought.
“The Colonel died in battle.” Stephen related. “I’m on my way to Tashkent to meet my sister. But I’m sick—malaria. I need to see a doctor.”
Stephen could see that the officer saw him as one of those crazies who wandered about the countryside. Somehow, he had found his way out here.
“No matter. You won’t be seeing any more action. You’ll be taken back in a hospital truck.”
“Thank you, sir.”
Stephen walked slowly to the truck that would take him back to Smolensk and eventually to Tashkent.