September, 1944
Tashkent
Like water evaporating from a pond, the stacks of paintings disappeared over the summer months; by September all of them, including the Talsi mural, were gone, hidden by Alisher—with Mitya’s help—in a place Rachel would never know.
With that burden lifted from her shoulders, she had been able to devote herself to Avilov’s project. The rejection of her first drawings hadn’t stymied her; she had been complimented that the committee found her designs too radical. Without rancor she had gone back to work on a new set, treating the whole affair as a sort of exercise, like a pianist practicing scales.
She spent many hours observing the Uzbek craftsmen at work. Not only had they mastered entirely new—to her—techniques in ceramics, they also shared a different view of the artist: solidarity, not solitary. Creativity and creative action were part of the fabric of their everyday life. This ran counter to the role of the artist her father had taken from Kandinsky and given to her: a seer or high priestess whose vision separated her from society. The creative imagination was the wellspring for the Uzbek community and it fired their approach to everything from cooking to building design.
Meanwhile, as she grappled with her changing artistic self-image, the project assigned to her by Avilov kept her skills sharp without taxing her creative energy too dearly. She was certain the war would be over before she would be required to devote herself body and soul to a memorial and she would be a distant memory by the time it was erected.
Rachel still worried about Zip Uk. He was the sort of man whose obsession would deepen because of failure. He had trapped her in a net, but somehow she had escaped through a hole he couldn’t find. He would keep searching mentally for the mural that had vanished until his self-humiliation would drive him to return. It was only a matter of time.
* * *
Zip Uk proved her right when he appeared, unannounced, at the workshop on a cloudless September day. This time she happened to be in Mitya’s office; with the end of the war now in sight, they spent hours talking about ways that she could escape from the Soviet Union once victory was declared.
All activity ceased as Zip Uk made his way to Vodogolin’s office.
Mitya jumped up and confronted him, his fists clenched. “If you’re here to wreck the place again, I can save you a lot of skin off your knuckles—there’s nothing here.”
Rachel remained seated, avoiding Zip Uk’s glance.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Zip Uk said. “I want to speak to her alone.”
“Why?” Mitya demanded.
“I’m having trouble sleeping. I keep seeing images from a painting, but it’s one I know I’ve never seen before.”
There was no sarcasm in his voice. He’s insane, Rachel thought.
“So what do you want from Rachel? Sounds to me like you need to talk to a fortune teller.”
“I thought I’d describe the images to her—perhaps she can give me some idea what they are.”
Mitya glanced at Rachel.
“I don’t think I can help you,” she said dryly.
Zip Uk looked toward the open door to what had been her fake studio. To have replaced all the hidden canvases with dummies would have been impossible, so she had decided to say that Avilov had obtained a storage depot for her in Moscow where she would be going at the war’s end.
Zip Uk’s eyes were focused on the window opposite the door. “They’re gone!”
He marched into the studio and paced the length of the wall. Mitya went to the doorway, cautioning Rachel to stand back. “We’ve sent them to Moscow for storage.”
“No!” Zip Uk cried. “Your lies won’t work this time. I’m arresting both of you for your conspiracy. Now I have my proof!”
“You’re insane. You never saw a single painting. You saw nothing. No one will believe you.”
Zip Uk smashed his balled fist into the wood. He charged out of the studio, colliding with Mitya. He flung him across the room, sending him crashing into easels and tables.
“Mitya!” Rachel cried. She went to his aid, but Zip Uk pulled her back and slammed her against the wall. The back of her head felt as if an egg had been cracked on it and its contents spilt down her neck. She saw Mitya, dazed and clearly in pain, pull himself up using the edge of a table as a crutch. The other artists were cowering, avoiding looking in her direction. With one hand gripping Rachel’s throat and his knee in her gut, Zip Uk tried to grab her right hand, but she kept it pinned behind her back. But he caught her elbow in the iron vise of his grip. “Let me have your hand or I’ll snap it like a twig.”
Rachel let her right hand slide out from behind her back. He took it and gently held it. “Tell me where the paintings are or you’ll never draw again.”
Behind them, Mitya rummaged about in the wreckage, casting aside tubes and bottles of paint, brushes. He picked up a metal object.
Zip Uk loosened the pressure on Rachel’s throat. “Take your time,” he sneered. Rachel gasped, gulping air into her burning lungs. Her vision was blurred, but she saw a pear shape hobbling towards them. Kill him, she thought, please kill him.
“Let her go,” She heard Mitya command.
“Or you’ll do what,” Zip Uk jeered, not even looking at Mitya.
“I’ll put your left eye out.” She saw Mitya raise the pointed tip of the calligraphy pen at an angle an inch in front of Zip Uk’s eye.
Uk’s glance shifted from her to the tiny metal arrow poised to enter his eyeball. His body seemed poised to leap at Mitya; but Rachel could see that his eye was tearing.
He relinquished his grip and Rachel sank to the floor, gagging.
“Now walk to the door, slowly.”
Zip Uk did as he was told, the arrow still poised firmly in place.
“I’ll find them,” Uk vowed.
“Next time, I’ll kill you,” Mitya replied.
Mitya took the arrow away and Zip Uk involuntarily reached up to his eye. A swift, sharp kick caught him in the middle of his back and sent him out over the stairs; she heard him roll down them.
Mitya ran back to Rachel, wrapped her head in a towel, and carried her out the rear door to his jeep.
“My head,” she moaned. Her vision was still blurred and towel was wet with her blood.
“I’m going to get you to a doctor. But not one Zip Uk ever heard of. It’s time you disappeared.”
They were moving and each jolt brought a fresh blooming of pain in her skull. She recognized the melon fields and the railroad tracks as they rode along a dirt road.
The jeep stopped in the shade of a linden tree. Mitya lifted her out; cradling her in his arms, he rolled from one foot to the other as he ran across the field.
The darkness was closing in now, drawing about her like a sack. The last thing she saw was the doorway to a shack and she recognized it.
“Alisher won’t like this.”
“No, he probably won’t,” Mitya replied, as she felt herself slip away.