Life And Fate (Orange Inheritance)

‘My dear grandfather,’ he said to Mostovskoy. ‘I’m a mere milksop. I’ve no more right to criticize you than a major has to criticize a colonel-general. But still, let me be quite frank with you: fraternizing with Yershov is a mistake. He’s politically dubious and he has no military understanding whatsoever. He likes giving advice to colonels, but he has the mentality of a lieutenant. You should be on your guard with him.’

‘You’re talking nonsense, your excellency,’ said Mostovskoy.

‘What do you expect?’ wheezed Gudz. ‘Of course I’m talking nonsense. But yesterday I was informed that twelve men from the general barracks have enrolled in this accursed Russian Liberation Army. Do you realize how many of them were kulaks? What I’m saying isn’t just a personal opinion. I was instructed to say this by a man of considerable political experience.’

‘You don’t happen to mean Osipov, do you?’

‘And what if I do? A theoretician like you will never be able to understand the swine we have to deal with here.’

‘What a strange conversation this is,’ said Mostovskoy. ‘Sometimes I begin to think there’s nothing left of people except political vigilance. Who’d have thought we’d end up like this?’

Gudz listened to the wheezing and bubbling of his bronchitis and said: ‘I’ll never live to see freedom. No.’ There was something terrible about the sadness in his voice.

Watching him walk away, Mostovskoy suddenly slapped himself on the knee. Ikonnikov’s papers had disappeared – that was why he had felt so anxious after last night’s search.

‘God knows what that devil’s gone and written. Maybe Yershov’s right and he is a provocateur. He probably planted the papers on me on purpose.’

He went over to Ikonnikov’s place. He wasn’t there and his neighbours had no idea what had happened to him. Yes, damn it – he should never have spoken to that holy fool, that seeker after God.

And as for Chernetsov – what if they had always done nothing but argue? What difference did that make? What was the use of such arguments? And Chernetsov had been there when Ikonnikov handed over the papers . . . There was a witness as well as an informer.

‘You’re a bloody fool – hobnobbing with scum and then throwing your life away when you’re needed to fight for the Revolution,’ he said bitterly to himself.

In the washroom he bumped into Osipov. Under a dim electric light he was washing his foot-cloths in a tin trough.

‘I’m glad you’re here,’ said Mostovskoy. ‘I want to talk to you.’

Osipov nodded, looked round and wiped his hands on his sides. The two of them sat down on the cement ledge by the wall.

‘Just what I thought. The rascal certainly gets around,’ said Osipov when Mostovskoy began to talk about Yershov’s plans.

‘Comrade Mostovskoy,’ he said, stroking Mostovskoy’s hand with his damp palm, ‘I’m amazed at your decisiveness. You’re one of Lenin’s Bolsheviks. Age doesn’t exist for you. You’re an example to us all.’

He lowered his voice.

‘Comrade Mostovskoy, we’ve already set up a military organization. We’d decided not to tell you about it prematurely so as not to risk your life. But there’s no such thing as old age for a comrade of Lenin’s. Still, there’s one thing I must say: Yershov is not to be trusted. You must look at it objectively. He’s a kulak. The repressions have soured him. All the same, we’re realists – and we know that for the time being we can’t get on without him. He’s won himself a cheap popularity. You know better than I how the Party has always made use of people like that for its own ends. But you ought to be aware of our opinion of him: we trust him only so far, and only for the time being . . .’

‘Comrade Osipov, you can trust Yershov all the way. I’m sure of him.’

They could hear the water dripping onto the cement floor.

‘Listen, comrade Mostovskoy,’ said Osipov slowly. ‘There can be no secrets from you. We have one comrade who was sent here by Moscow. I can tell you his name: Kotikov. What I’ve been saying is his view of Yershov, not just my own. For us Communists Kotikov’s directives are law – orders given to us by the Party, orders given to us, in exceptional circumstances, by Stalin himself. But we can work with this godson of yours, this “master of men’s minds” as you’ve christened him. We’ve already decided that. What matters is to be realistic, to think dialectically. But you know that better than anyone.’

Mostovskoy remained silent. Osipov embraced him and kissed him three times on the lips. There were tears in his eyes.

‘It’s as though I were kissing my own father,’ he said. ‘And I want to make the sign of the cross over you, just like my mother used to do over me.’

Slowly the feeling that had tortured Mostovskoy, the sense of life’s impossible complexity, was melting away. Once again, as in his youth, the world seemed clear and simple, neatly divided into friends and enemies.

That night the SS came to the special barracks and took off six men, Mikhail Sidorovich Mostovskoy among them.