We the Living (73 page)

She sat on the floor and folded shirts neatly, creasing every pleat, slipping them cautiously into the drawer on the palms of her two hands. One shirt had Leo’s initials embroidered on the breast pocket; she sat staring at it, without moving.

She did not raise her head when she heard the door opening.

“Allo, Kira,” said a voice.

She fell back against the open drawer and it slammed shut with a crash. Leo was looking down at her. His lips drooped, but it was not a smile; his lips had no color; the circles under his eyes were blue and sharp, as if painted on by an amateur actor.

“Kira . . . please . . . no hysterics . . .” he said wearily.

She rose slowly, her arms swinging limply. She stood, her fingers crumpling the hair on her right temple, looking at him incredulously, afraid to touch him.

“Leo . . . Leo . . . you’re not . . . free, are you?”

“Yes. Free. Released. Kicked out.”

“Leo . . . how . . . how could it . . . happen . . . ?”

“How do I know? I thought you knew something about that.”

She was kissing his lips, his neck, the muscles exposed by his torn shirt collar, his hands, his palms. He patted her hair and looked indifferently over her head, at the wrecked room.

“Leo . . .” she whispered, looking up into his dead eyes, “what have they done to you?”

“Nothing.”

“Did they . . . did they . . . I heard they sometimes . . .”

“No, they didn’t torture me. They say they have a room for that, but I didn’t have the privilege. . . . I had a nice cell all to myself and three meals a day, although the soup was rotten. I just sat there for two days and thought of what last words I could say before the firing squad. As good a pastime as any.”

She took his coat off; she pushed him into an armchair; she knelt, pulling off his overshoes; she pressed her head to his knees for a second and jerked it away, and bent lower, to hide her face, and tied his unfastened shoestring with trembling fingers.

He asked: “Have I any clean underwear left?”

“Yes . . . I’ll get it . . . only . . . Leo . . . I want to know . . . you haven’t told me . . .”

“What is there to tell? I guess it’s all over. The case is closed. They told me to see that I don’t get into the G.P.U. for a third time.” He added indifferently: “I think your friend Taganov had something to do with my release.”

“He . . .”

“You didn’t ask him to?”

“No,” she said, rising. “No, I didn’t ask him.”

“Did they ruin the furniture completely, and the bed, too?”

“Who? . . . Oh, the search . . . No . . . Yes, I guess they have. . . . Leo!” she cried suddenly, so that he shuddered and looked at her, lifting his eyelids with effort. “Leo, have you nothing to say?”

“What do you want me to say?”

“Aren’t you . . . aren’t you glad to see me?”

“Sure. You look nice. Your hair needs combing.”

“Leo, did you think of me . . . there?”

“No.”

“You . . . didn’t?”

“No. What for? To make it easier?”

“Leo, do you . . . love me?”

“Oh, what a question. . . . What a question at what a time. . . . You’re getting feminine, Kira. . . . Really, it’s not becoming. . . . Not becoming at all. . . .”

“I’m sorry, dear. I know it’s foolish. I don’t know why I had to ask it just then. . . . You’re so tired. I’ll get your underwear and I’ll fix your dinner. You haven’t had dinner, have you?”

“No. I don’t want any. Is there anything to drink in the house?”

“Leo . . . you’re not going . . . again . . . to . . .”

“Leave me alone, will you? Get the hell out, please could you? Go to your parents . . . or something . . .”

“Leo!” She stood, her hands in her hair, staring down at him incredulously. “Leo, what have they done to you?”

His head was leaning back against the chair and she looked at the quivering white triangle of his neck and chin; he spoke, his eyes closed, only his lips moving, his voice even and flat: “Nothing. . . . No one’s going to do anything to me any more. . . . No one. . . . Not you nor anyone else. . . . No one can hurt me but you—and now you can’t either. . . . No one. . . .”

“Leo!” She seized his limp, white-faced head and shook it furiously, pitilessly. “Leo! It can’t get you like this! It won’t get you!”

He seized her hand and flung it aside. “Will you ever come down to earth? What do you want? Want me to sing of life with little excursions to the G.P.U. between hymns? Afraid they’ve broken me? Afraid they’ll get me? Want me to keep something that the mire can’t reach, the more to suffer while it sucks me under? You’re being kind to me, aren’t you, because you love me so much? Don’t you think you’d be kinder if you’d let me fall into the mire? So that I’d be one with our times and would feel nothing any longer . . . nothing . . . ever . . .”

A hand knocked at the door.

“Come in,” said Kira.

Andrei Taganov came in. “Good evening, Kira,” he said and stopped, seeing Leo.

“Good evening, Andrei,” said Kira.

Leo raised his head with effort. His eyes looked faintly startled.

“Good evening,” said Andrei, turning to him. “I didn’t know you were out already.”

“I’m out. I thought you had reason to expect it.”

“I did. But I didn’t know they’d hurry. I’m sorry to intrude like this. I know you don’t want to see any visitors.”

“It’s all right, Andrei,” said Kira. “Sit down.”

“There’s something I have to tell you, Kira.” He turned to Leo: “Would you mind if I took Kira out—for a few minutes?”

“I certainly would,” Leo answered slowly. “Have you any secrets to discuss with Kira?”

“Leo!” Her voice was almost a scream. She added, quietly, her voice still trembling: “Come on, Andrei.”

“No,” said Andrei calmly, sitting down. “It isn’t really necessary. It’s not a secret.” He turned to Leo. “I just wanted to spare you the necessity of . . . of feeling indebted to me, but perhaps it would be better if you heard it, too. Sit down, Kira. It’s perfectly all right. It’s about his release from the G.P.U.”

Leo was looking at him fixedly, silently, leaning forward. Kira stood, her shoulders hunched, her hands clasped behind her back, as if they were tied. She looked at Andrei; his eyes were clear, serene.

“Sit down, Kira,” he said almost gently.

She obeyed.

“There’s something you should know, both of you,” said Andrei, “for your own protection. I couldn’t tell you sooner, Kira. I had to be sure that it had worked. Well, it has. I suppose you know who’s really behind your release. It’s Pavel Syerov. I want you to know what’s behind him—in case you ever need it.”

“It’s you, isn’t it?” asked Leo, a faint edge of sharpness in his voice.

“Leo, keep quiet. Please!” said Kira, turning away not to see his eyes watching her.

“It’s a letter,” Andrei continued calmly. “A letter he wrote and you know what that was. The letter had been sent to me . . . by someone else. Syerov has powerful friends. That saved him. But he’s not very brave. That saved you. The letter had been destroyed. But I told him that I had photostats of it and that they were in the possession of friends who would send them to higher authorities in Moscow—unless you were released. The case is killed. I don’t think they’ll ever bother you again. But I want you to know this, so that you can hold it over Syerov’s head—if you need it. Let him think that you know the photostats are in good hands—and on their way to Moscow, if he makes one step in your direction. That’s all. I don’t think you’ll ever need it. But it’s a useful protection to have, in these times—and with your social record.”

“And . . . the photostats?” Kira whispered. “Where are they actually?”

“There are no photostats,” said Andrei.

A truck thundered in the street below and the window panes trembled in the silence.

Andrei’s eyes met Kira’s. Their eyes met and parted swiftly, for Leo was watching them.

It was Leo who spoke first. He rose and walked to Andrei, and stood looking down at him. Then he said: “I suppose I should thank you. Well, consider me grateful. Only I won’t say that I thank you from the bottom of my heart, because in the bottom of my heart I wish you had left me where I was.”

“Why?” Andrei asked, looking up at him.

“Do you suppose Lazarus was grateful when Christ brought him back from the grave—if He did? No more than I am to you, I think.”

Andrei looked at him steadily; Andrei’s face was stern; his words were a threat: “Pull yourself together. You have so much to live for.”

Leo shrugged and did not answer.

“You’ll have to close that store of yours. Try to get a job. Better not a very prominent one. You’ll hate it. But you’ll have to stick to it.”

“If I can.”

“You can. You have to.”

“Do I?” said Leo, and Kira saw his eyes watching Andrei closely.

She asked: “Andrei, why did you want to tell us about Syerov’s letter?” “So that you’d know in case . . . in case anything happened to me.”

“What is going to happen to you, Andrei?”

“Nothing . . . Nothing that I know of.” He added, rising: “Except that I’m going to be thrown out of the Party, I think.”

“It . . . it meant a lot to you, didn’t it . . . your Party?”

“It did.”

“And . . . and when you lose something that meant a lot to you, does it . . . make any difference?”

“No. It still means a lot to me.”

“Will you . . . hate them for it . . . for throwing you out?”

“No.”

“Will you . . . forgive them . . . some day?”

“I have nothing to forgive. Because, you see, I have a lot to be grateful for, in the past, when I belonged to—to the Party. I don’t want them to feel that they had been . . . unjust. Or that I blame them. I can never tell them that I understand. But I would like them to know it.”

“Perhaps they may be worried . . . although they have no right to question you any longer . . . about a life they may have broken . . .”

“If I could ask a favor—when they throw me out—I’d ask them not to worry about me. So that . . . in the Party annals . . . I won’t become a wound, but a bearable memory. Then, my memories will be bearable, too.”

“I think they’d grant you that . . . if they knew.”

“I’d thank them . . . if I could.”

He turned and took his cap from the table and said, buttoning his jacket: “Well, I have to go. Oh, yes, another thing: keep away from Morozov. I understand he’s leaving town, but he’ll be back and starting some new scheme. Keep away. He’ll always get out of it and leave you to take the blame.”

“Shall we . . . see you again, Andrei?” asked Kira.

“Sure. I’ll be very busy—for a while. But I’ll be around . . . Well, good night.”

“Good night, Andrei.”

“Wait a minute,” said Leo suddenly. “There’s something I want to ask you.”

He walked to Andrei, and stood, his hands in his pockets, his lips spitting the words out slowly: “Just why did you do all this? Just what is Kira to you?”

Andrei looked at Kira. She stood, silent, erect, looking at them. She was leaving it up to him. He turned to Leo and answered: “Just a friend.”

“Good night,” said Leo.

The door had closed, and the door in Lavrov’s room, and in the silence they heard the door in the lobby opening and closing behind Andrei. Then Kira tore forward suddenly. Leo could not see her face. He heard only a sound that was not a moan and not quite a cry. She ran out of the room, and the door slammed shut behind her, and the crystals of the chandelier tinkled softly.

She ran down the stairs, out into the street. It was snowing. She felt the air like a scalding jet of steam striking her bare neck. Her feet felt very light and thin in their open slippers in the snow. She saw his tall figure walking away and she ran after him, calling: “Andrei!”

He wheeled about and gasped: “Kira! In the snow without a coat!”

He seized her arm and jerked her back into the house, into the dim little lobby at the foot of the stairs.

“Go back! Immediately!” he ordered.

“Andrei . . .” she stammered. “I . . . I . . .”

In the light of a lamp post from across the street, she saw him smiling slowly, gently, and his hand brushed the wet snowflakes off her hair. “Kira, don’t you think it’s better—like this?” he whispered. “If we don’t say anything—and just leave it to . . . to our silence, knowing that we both understand, and that we still have that much in common?”

“Yes, Andrei,” she whispered.

“Don’t worry about me. You’ve promised that, you know. Go back now. You’ll catch cold.”

She raised her hand, and her fingers brushed his cheek slowly, barely touching it, from the scar on his temple to his chin, as if her trembling finger tips could tell him something she could not say. He took her hand and pressed it to his lips and held it for a long time. A car passed in the street outside; through the glass door, the sharp beam of a headlight swept over their faces, licked the wall and vanished.

He dropped her hand. She turned and walked slowly up the stairs. She heard the door opening and closing behind her. She did not look back.

When she returned to her room, Leo was telephoning. She heard him saying: “Allo, Tonia? . . . Yes, I just got out. . . . I’ll tell you all about it. . . . Sure, come right over. . . . Bring some. I haven’t got a drop in the house. . . .”