Archangel (28 page)

No excitement, Holly. Only the pain, only the waiting for the siren to reach out for them.

He missed little. He noticed everything that broke the pattern of the hut.

Mamarev had strolled with an inoffensive innocence the length of the aisle between the bunks.

As he had gone by the bunks he was watched but not spoken to. They all knew which was the 'stoolie' amongst them. And they tolerated him because his person was sacrosanct. He was protected by the death penalty, he was kept safe by the threat of the SHIzo block. A nine-year stretch - a stretch for taking a girl into a truck park. Loud and clear she'd said 'yes', till her fucking knickers were at her ankles. A nine-year stretch and they'd said they'd halve his time. He had been a clerk, he had worked in the offices of the administration of Transport in Novosibirsk. He was not a part of this place, he owed nothing to these creatures in the bunk beds of Hut 2, he owed it only to himself to get clear of this stinking cesspit camp.

Two bunks were empty when the ceiling lights were switched off. Adimov and Holly. He had seen them together earlier at the perimeter path, and now their bunks were empty.

The Englishman was nothing, he had no fear of the Englishman, but Adimov was different... Adimov carried a knife.

The trustie from Internal Order slept at the far end of the hut to the bunks of Adimov and Holly, a double bunk-frame to himself, and a curtain to shield him from the common zeks. Mamarev had allowed an hour to pass from the dousing of the lights before he slid from his bed and went on his toes towards the drawn curtain. A wraith moving along the rough-floored aisle of the hut. Let the bastard trustie inform on the bastard 'baron'. He drew the curtain aside, he insinuated himself behind it. He shook the shoulder of the sleeping man until he woke. He whispered into the ear of the trustie.

'There are two beds that are empty. Adimov's and Holly's. . .'

'You little shit

With the 'baron's' help the trustie could run an easy hut.

Not that they could be friends, of course, but they need not cross each other. A 'baron' was a bad enemy, even for a trustie.

'Two beds are empty. I've told y o u . , . what are you going to do?'

'Fucking strangle you, that's what I could do about it.'

'And lose your precious curtain, and Good Conduct, and your red stripe, and your fucking life.'

'Get back to your bunk. . . ' the trustie spat the words in a rare savagery.

The trustie heard the fall of the curtain, the drift of a light footfall. He had no choice. He pulled on his boots. He slipped into his anorak with the bright red band on the upper right arm. He switched on his torch and walked the length of the hut. He saw the two folded blankets. He cursed quietly, sadly. When he came back between the bunk ends his torch showed him Mamarev sitting upright on his mattress, smiling. No choice. The trustie opened the door of Hut z, bent his head and began to walk to the Guard House.

They had reached the railway line. Behind them were the blurred lights of Barashevo railway station. In front the twin rails stood out in the half-gloom between the black cloud and the whiteness covering the sleepers and chip stones.

Holly put his hand on Adimov's shoulder. 'Well done. . .

well done.'

Adimov did not reply.

The wind was at their backs. The sheets were pressed against their bodies. Two ghosts going north from the village along the railway track. Outside the confines of the camp Holly felt the terrible nakedness of the fugitive. And the little camp was exchanged for the big camp. It was a thousand miles to the perimeter path of the big camp. Into the night, into the driving snow, into the short horizon of the narrowing railway lines.

The sergeant was sprawled in a chair in front of the stove of the Guard House. His dog lay beside his feet close to the opened doors where the flames curled from the heaped coke. The sergeant was near to sleep, the dog snored. On a better night he would have gone out again, toured the fence a second time as midnight approached. Buggered if he would on such a night. Get himself soaked and half-frozen, and he could lose a good dog in a snow blizzard, get her cold again when she'd not dried out her fur, that was the way tc kill a good dog. The radio played quietly on the table besidt him. He had his tobacco. He had mugs of tea brought by one of the kids each time he shouted for it. Buggered if he'd go out again. His skis stood against the outside wall of the Guard House and they'd stay there.

'Sergeant, the Internal Order prisoner from Hut 2 wishes to speak with you . . . '

The sergeant straightened, swung in his chair to face the Duty Orderly. His fingers flicked nervously at the buttons of his tunic. The dog stirred. When the sergeant saw the snow-covered, muffled shape of the trustie framed by the doorway he felt the premonition of crisis.

i am sorry to disturb you, sergeant. I thought you should know. Two men are missing from Hut 2.'

'So tomorrow you have the Englishman?'

'Tomorrow I have him.'

'You've played it strangely, I'll say that Rudakov, bloody strangely . .. and now you are to be rewarded for your eccentricity.'

'For each fish there is a different bait.'

'And when you've milked him, will he be on his way?'

'He thinks so, that's what he believes.'

The Commandant laughed. Major Vasily Kypov shook in merriment and his shoulders heaved and his jaw wobbled, and the burst of his amusement splayed out over the small front garden of Yuri Rudakov's bungalow. Rudakov laughed with him, and the cigars glowed from the porch. On the road beyond the white-painted palisade the Commandant's driver started the engine of the jeep.

'That's what he believes . . . That's very good . . . very funny. Bloody spy. An excellent evening, Rudakov. I'm more than grateful to your wife. Fine meal, and damn good hospitality afterwards . .. Won't be forgotten, not by me.

Shit, we dented those bottles.'

Kypov swayed against Rudakov. The Political Officer wondered how the Commandant would negotiate the snow-bound path to the gate.

it's been my pleasure and my privilege to entertain you, Major. Vasily, please. . . Again my best wishes and my thanks to your wife.'

He made it to the jeep, not easily, but he arrived. The lights sparked, the engine roared-Rudakov smiled, sweetly, privately, went back into the bungalow and locked the front door. He was hurrying now.

Through the living-room and the kitchen to turn off the lights, to make up the fire for the night, to peel off his tunic and kick off his shoes. The bedroom was in darkness. He could hear Elena's breathing, erratic and excited. More of the scent that he had bought for her, that she knew he liked her to wear. Shaking out of his trousers wriggling from his shirt, discarding his socks. Elena would have sensed his mood, known the anticipation that gripped him while the banalaties were traded with a boring fool on the front porch. Her arms greeted him, slender and naked. Naked as her breast and her stomach aand her thighs. He swam beneath the bed duvet, he slid over the sheets warmed by her body. Beautiful, wonderful, dry, clean skin resting, rolling against his. Her hands finding the sinew in the small of his back, his fingers scouring for her nipples. Her hands diving over the flatness of his belly, his fingers plunging for the richness of heat and moisture and opened legs. Her hands holding and squeezing, his fingers prying and searching.

And he had sat with the file open, with the typed words battering his mind, when this was waiting for him. Idiot, Y u r i . . . her mouth was over his, her tongue forced his back.

There was a whisper in her ear, an entreaty. He began to climb onto her, to submerge her beneath him.

He heard the siren.

Turn the bastard thing off • • •kill it. But the siren at Camp 3 can never be switched off- It must scream its course.

The softness had fled Elena. He felt her rigid against him. A new sound with the siren call, sharper and more urgent. He might have sobbed, and Elena pulled the bed clothes around her as he reached for the telephone.

'Rudakov . . . '

He listened.

The hand that had gloried in the skin of Elena was now white and clenched on the telephone. Abruptly he replaced it, then sagged back onto the bed. Though the room was dark his hands covered his face. For a full minute he lay quite still on the bed, not caring to cover his nakedness, then he dragged himself from the coverlet and started a hapha-zard search across the floor for the items of his uniform. He let himself into the living-room where he would dress.

Because Elena Rudakov's head was deep beneath her pillow he did not hear her weeping.

He had lost a jewel, a jewel that would have adorned his crown.

On the railway line, beyond the reach of the village lights, two men heard the far cry of pursuit, the siren's howl, and tried to run faster.

There had been a long night of confusion in the hut.

The zeks lay on their beds as they had been ordered and were drowned by the blazing ceiling lights. None were to leave their beds. The counting had been long ago; now they lay submissive on their mattresses, witnesses to the anger of the high and mighty of the camp who came to inspect the insult of two empty bunks and two folded blankets. The zeks were forbidden to talk, but they watched each move of the investigators. Ever since the siren had awakened them the zeks had been alert to the drama of the night. The Commandant had come, glowered at the unused mattresses, stalked the length of the hut, departed, and had returned. The Political Officer had been three times to Hut 2, as if some factor in the outrage of escape had first eluded him, and there was fury on his face for every time that he stamped the boards of the hut to the far wall where guards and warders stood, useless as statues.

Each man in the hut read the message. Escape was the great weapon. Escape was a cudgel that whipped across the shoulders of the men of authority. The anger of Vasily Kypov, the fury of Yuri Rudakov, were twin witnesses of the wound that had been done to them. He would have been a brave man who sniggered in their hearing, an idiot man who smirked in their sight. The zeks were silent, the zeks averted their eyes from the faces of the men in authority.

All the men in the hut would reckon that they knew Adimov. Only a few could claim to be familiar with the Englishman.

Chernayev from his bunk watched the two camp officers who would co-ordinate the hunting down of Holly and Adimov, and against his vest was the letter that he had been charged to hand to Rudakov when the late afternoon came.

Byrkin who in his time had been a Petty Officer and so was familiar with command and instruction saw the pacing frustration of the Commandant. Poshekhonov turned to his pillow and pretended to sleep so that he might better hear the whispered conversations of Kypov and Rudakov when they came close to the mother heat of the stove.

'Right under the corner tower they went out.' A snapped accusation from Rudakov.

'Under a tower?. . . and the tower was manned?'

'Of course it was manned . . .'

'You have a trail?'

'Something that is nothing. We have a trail that is under twenty centimetres of snow. Two sets of wire cut, and then a trail to the woods on the north side . . . If we have the dogs out blundering in the trees in darkness we screw all the scent that's left. If we leave it till first light we have another twenty centimetres sitting on the scent . . . it's a bloody shambles.'

'How could that happen?'

Vasily Kypov spoke almost to himself, as if the question bemused him.

He won no charity from Rudakov.

'They had wire-cutters. They went out underneath a tower. I'm not responsible for fence security . . . '

'Holly was yours. You were responsible for him. Full enough last night with your boasts of success.' Kypov flared in retaliation, and the memory of hospitality received a few hours earlier fled.

if he had not been able to walk out of your camp - to walk through two wire fences and over a wooden fence -

then he would have been mine.'

'You should have observed your man better.'

'You should have secured your perimeter. Isn't that what they teach the serving officer?' Rudakov sneered.

'They'll singe us for this.'

'They'll have our arses.'

Kypov cocked his head, peered out through the window into the stinging snowfall.

'Where can they go?'

'How can they go anywhere? They can only run, freeze, starve.'

'There will have to be an inquiry.'

'When a prisoner escapes there is always an inquiry. They will say that escape is not possible from an efficiently run camp.'

'The search parties will start at dawn.'

Kypov bit at his lip, tucked his chin to his chest, and stamped out of the hut into the last moments of the night.

Trailing behind him were his Adjutant and a radio operator whose set crackled static across the compound.

Rudakov stood by himself close to the stove. He felt the frail, local warmth.

They were all watching him, but if he raised his eyes all would turn away. He was hated here. Scum, weren't they

. . . ? They could be beaten till they fell, they could be starved till they tumbled, but to the moment of death they would hate, loathe him. He understood the source of that strength. Holly and Adimov had given it to them. An escape through two wire fences, and over a high wooden fence, and under a watch-tower. He felt a private wound. He had offered freedom to Michael Holly and had been given an obscenity for a reply. Rudakov threaded between the guards and the warders to the far end, to the empty bunks. He crouched beside Feldstein's.

'Did you know, Feldstein?'

'Know what, Captain?'

'Don't piss with me, did you know?'

'Would I tell you, Captain, if I had?'

'Do you want to go to the SHIzo block?'

' I . . . I did not.'

'Why did they go?'

'You want to know?' A grimness in Feldstein's voice.

'I want to know.'

'They had the courage to say that what happens in a Concentration Camp is not inevitable, is not irreversible.