Эльвира Барякина - Russian Treasures

“What do you want?” Klim asked, frowning.

Jacob thrust his nose from behind the file cabinet but backed off, seeing Fomin.

Fomin beckoned him. “Come in, you Jewish scum. What are you afraid of? I must say, it’s very interesting—I asked the cashier about the payment received from this man for an announcement that he put in my newspaper. It seems he didn’t pay a thing.”

Suddenly, crimson with rage, Fomin jumped to his feet. “I didn’t grant you permission to sit in my office, Mr. Argentinean. Get out!”

4

Sofia Karlovna had come back from her errand.

“Nina,” she said. “I’ve got my French passport, and I have a visa for you. But the French have rejected Mr. Fomin’s application—they only take families of their fellow-citizens on board. I don’t know how to break the news to him.”

Nina rushed to the telephone. His secretary told her that Fomin had called from his newspaper office and said that he wouldn’t be back until evening. Nina knew that something was wrong. During the last weeks, Fomin had not bothered to visit the editorial office at all, claiming that all of the White newspapers were obsolete now. There were no reliable sources of information, and the only people who still cared about appeals to patriotism and poems were the writers desperate to earn money.

Nina remembered that Fomin had been upset that morning but had refused to tell her what had happened.

“Sofia Karlovna, I’m going up to the editorial office,” Nina cried as she ran downstairs. “Shushunov, come with me to Serebryakovskaya Street.”

The bodyguard put on his cap. “Very good.”

Shushunov considered it beneath him to run errands for a lady and disliked it when Nina made him do so. Huge and brawny in a gray coat with cartridge belts slung across his chest, he reminded Nina of an impassive crocodile that might lie still on a beach one minute but the next minute spring to life and sink its teeth into you.

5

They got into the open automobile, and the driver started the engine.

“Any news?” Nina asked Shushunov to make a conversation.

The bodyguard spat over the side of the automobile. “They say they’re not going to evacuate any more men except the sick and wounded.”

Nina smiled bitterly. The big bosses liked to make grand gestures that looked good in the newspapers. In practice, this new rule would mean several thousand deaths. It was almost impossible to evacuate hospitals in all of the confusion with no transportation on hand. All that this new decree would do would be to cause delay and another round of corruption and trade in medical certificates.

Furiously honking, their automobile sped down the street.

Sofia Karlovna had said that she and Nina now had permission to board the French dreadnought the Waldeck-Rousseau. But how could they leave Fomin behind? After all, he had helped them so much by giving them food, shelter, and everything they needed.

If Fomin doesn’t leave this town, he’ll die, Nina thought.

There was nowhere to go from Novorossiysk with the Greens inundating the mountains and the Sukhumi Highway about to be cut off at any minute. Once the Bolsheviks came into town after long days on the march and desperate battles, they were bound to commit atrocities, massacring any men who had not managed to escape.

Outside of the editorial office, an excited crowd had gathered. A man at the center of the mob was being viciously beaten to the sound of jeers and catcalls.

Shushunov told the driver to stop the engine and got up on his seat to take a better view.

“It looks like they’ve caught another Bolshevik,” he said.

Nina also stood up to take a look, and the street swam before her eyes.

The angry mob was attacking the dark-haired man in a pack, hammering at him with their fists and kicking him, screaming like apes. The man, wearing a bloodstained British uniform, kept trying to get on his feet only to be forced back down to the ground.

Beside herself, Nina dug in her purse, took the small ladies’ pistol she had received as a gift from Fomin, and fired it into the air. The crowd froze.

“Shushunov,” Nina moaned, “for God’s sake—save that man! I’ll give you all I have.”

The bodyguard gave her a quizzical look, his cigarette between his teeth. He leaped to the ground and made his way through the hushed rabble with a businesslike air.

“Who’s this?”

“A Bolshevik,” someone said. “He was distributing leaflets.”

Shushunov glanced toward the driver. “Let’s take him to the counterintelligence office.”

Together, they threw Klim into the back seat.

Shushunov propped his foot on the running board of the automobile. “No rough justice, is that clear?” he barked, addressing the crowd. “If you catch a Bolshevik, bring him in for questioning. We know you’d like to kill him, but what if he has important information? Let him tell us who had sent him and why.” Shushunov got into the front seat and ordered to the driver, “Let’s go.”

1

All this time, Nina had felt as though she were trapped under the ice, and now, suddenly, she had been pulled into the sun. Her whole body trembling and her breath coming in gasps, she stared dumbstruck at Klim. He was here alive! Beaten black and blue but safe.

He had come to his senses and was gazing at Nina as though he couldn’t believe his eyes. He reached out to touch her, but she shook her head in fear. Shushunov and the driver must not find out whom they had just rescued.

Klim smiled knowingly.

“Alive—” Nina breathed with tears in her eyes.

The automobile pulled up to a shabby two-story building on Morskaya Street.

“Did you want to come here, ma’am?” the driver asked as he turned to Nina.

Only then did she realize that he really had taken her and Klim to the counterintelligence office. There was a guard at the door of the building and a long line of people waiting for news of imprisoned relatives. A Russian Imperial flag torn by the wind into three colored strips fluttered on the roof.

Nina tried to take money from her wallet, but her fingers refused to obey her. She thrust the wallet toward Shushunov. “Here, take it. You can share it between the two of you.”

Shushunov silently tucked her wallet into his chest pocket.

Nina leaned over to Klim. “Can you walk?” she asked.

He nodded.

“Don’t tell anyone about what happened,” Nina said to Shushunov. “This man is my friend—I never expected to see him again in such circumstances. Leave us now, please.”

Wincing from pain, Klim got out, Nina slammed the door, and the automobile disappeared around the corner.

There was a tang of salt in the air, and they could see the blue-black waves with white crests behind the leafless trees on the embankment.

Nina glanced at Klim. “Let’s find a place to sit down.”

2

Nina was speechless. She wanted to say something, but all she could do was weep.

As usual, Klim made light of their miseries and even tried to joke. “Who were you aiming at when you fired into the air?” he asked. “Were you angry with the Almighty? I have to say that I was annoyed at Him too. Why is it that every time we see each other after a long separation, He tries to kill one of us?”

“Don’t be blasphemous!” Nina snapped. “Not now.”

He smiled. There was a huge bruise on his cheekbone and a gash above his eyebrow, but it was still Klim, her beloved husband.

They sat beside the water watching the sunlight glittering on the waves and the clouds parting like theater curtains.

Klim told Nina of his encounter with Fomin. “I suppose he must have been the one who paid those thugs to attack me.”

Nina was overcome with hatred and bewilderment. If Fomin cared about her so much, how could he try to take away from her the person she loved most? Then she felt fear. What could she and Klim do now? Where could they go? How could they get out of Novorossiysk? What if the driver or Shushunov were to tell Fomin that Nina had ransomed his enemy using his own money?

“I’ll tell you what we’ll do,” Klim said. “Today, you and Sofia Karlovna will board the French steamer. That way I’ll be sure that you’re safe.”

“I’m not going anywhere without you,” Nina said firmly. “We’ll get you documents. The French are evacuating relatives and families of their fellow countrymen. You’re my husband, so that means they’ll give you a visa.”

Klim smiled bitterly. “I’m not sure I count as a relative of a Frenchwoman, seeing as I’m the husband of her son’s widow. And I don’t have any documents—only a translator’s identification card that I was given by the British.”

“In any case, you can’t go back to the Froimans, and you won’t find another room at any price. There’s no alternative—you’ll have to stay in our attic.”

Klim stared at her. “What—in Fomin’s house?”

Nina nodded. “You’ll need to spend a few days in bed while Sofia Karlovna and I apply for your visa.”

“And meanwhile you’ll be downstairs with Fomin, will you?”

“Don’t talk nonsense!”

They argued briefly, but made up at once and began to give each other hasty, muddled promises. Nina wept, holding Klim tightly as she kissed his lips and unshaven cheeks.

“We have to go now,” she said, “or we won’t have time to arrange everything before Fomin comes back.”

3

Nina sent all of the servants on errands and went back to fetch Klim, who was waiting for her around the corner.

As they entered the house, Klim glanced at the dusty curtains and cramped, gloomy rooms cluttered with expensive but shabby furniture. “So, this is where you’ve been this time,” he said. “I’ve walked past this house a couple of times.”

Nina brought him to Sofia Karlovna’s room. “Look who I’ve found!”

The old countess dropped her lorgnette into her lap. “Klim, is it you?”

Nina told her what had happened.

“Are you out of your mind, bringing Klim here?” Sofia Karlovna cried. “What if Mr. Fomin finds out? He came back at lunchtime, and I told him that the French had refused him a visa. He was so angry that I thought he was going to kill someone.”

Nina took the revolver out of her purse and gave it to Klim. “Here,” she said. “You keep this just in case. Sofia Karlovna, you must go to Colonel Guyomard and tell him we’ve found Klim, and we’re—I mean, I am—not going to go anywhere without him. Klim doesn’t have a passport, but you’ll have to explain to them that it’s nonsense to ask for passports at a time like this.”

Nina rushed around the house making sure that Klim had something to eat, heating up water for his bath, and finding clothes he could change into. His whole body was covered with crimson bruises, and her heart sank when she remembered her own experience with peritonitis.

“Are you sure you don’t need to see a doctor?” she asked.

“Honey, I’m absolutely fine.”

They asked Sofia Karlovna to stay by the window and keep an eye out to see if anyone came to the house, but the old countess kept leaving her post to give Nina an earful about Fomin’s treachery.

“I would never have thought that he would attack anybody in such an underhand way.”

Klim winked at her. “Quite deplorable. If a gentleman is angry with another gentleman, the proper thing to do is to challenge him to a duel, not pay a bunch of lowlifes to do the job for him. Don’t worry. We’ll have a duel later.”

“Please stop it!” Nina pleaded.

“I don’t think Klim should stay in the attic,” Sofia Karlovna said, shaking her head in disapproval.

“Where do you suggest we go?” Nina asked. “Do you want us to sleep in the street?”

The attic was dusty and stuffy, and doves cooed behind the dormer window. Nina was worried that Klim wouldn’t be comfortable there. She brought him blankets, food, water, and a stack of old issues of the Niva, a wholesome family magazine. She stopped in the middle of the room, wondering what else she could do for him.

“At night, I’ll heat the stove so it’ll be warm from the chimney here,” she said. “Stay right above my room, and don’t worry about Fomin. He spends all his time at work, so we’ll be alone in the daytime. I hope the servants don’t find out about you.”

“Mr. Fomin is here!” Sofia Karlovna shouted from downstairs.

Nina kissed Klim on the cheek and made the sign of the cross over him.