The Secret History of Moscow (21 page)

"It's evening college for those who work,” Galina said. “Like me. I can be late a little."

Masha gave her a penetrating look, modeled so perfectly off their mother's that Galina had to laugh. “You really have to be taking this more seriously,” Masha said. “If you keep on like this, you'll never have an education, and I'll probably be married before you."

"Of course you will.” Galina laughed still. “You're the one who wants boys in the house."

Masha shrugged. “Galka,” she said thoughtfully. “Would you rather be deaf or blind?"

Galina weighed her options. “Deaf, I suppose. What about you?"

"Blind,” Masha said. “This way, Mom will have no choice but let me get a dog."

"You have it planned out, I see,” Galina said. She looked at her watch and sighed. “I have to get going, I suppose. Don't go blind just yet; maybe we can talk Mom into getting you a puppy."

Masha beamed. “Thanks, Galka. You know what I really want? I mean, besides the puppy?"

Galina looked out of the window, and saw her bus pass by. There would be another one; she sat down on the couch and kicked off her shoes. “What do you really want?"

Masha stared at the passing bus. “I want to be someone else."

"Who?"

Masha shrugged. “I don't know. Not me."

Then there was guilt again; Galina couldn't stop feeling that it was her fault also. Who would want to be a girl with a crazy sister and no brothers or a father? Who would want to be a girl with such a severe mother and silently disapproving grandmother, who constantly cooked fried potatoes, pies, borsch that tasted of frustration and suppressed anger? Who would want to be a girl in a house filled with damaged women, and no hope of ever becoming something else herself?

"I'm sorry,” Galina said. “You know, things can change. It doesn't have to be this way forever."

Masha nodded. “Go,” she said. “I love you, as much as forty thousand brothers."

Then the scene changed-they were in a darkened room, with sooted wooden walls. Masha was older now, but her eyes still watched Galina with a hopeful expectation. “You'll help me, won't you?"

"I've been doing nothing else,” Galina said. “I'm here looking for you, with a stupid cow and Koschey the Deathless, while Mom is home with your baby."

Masha looked confused for a second. “A baby?"

Galina nodded. “But we'll talk about that later… in person. Now just tell me where you are."

"I'm in a castle,” she said. “Although it doesn't look like a castle, but they tell me Peter the Great used to live here."

"Who are they?” Galina tried to keep her voice steady.

Masha shrugged. “I don't know. There are several of them, or maybe just one and he wears a different face every day."

"What do they want with you?"

"I don't know. They keep us here and send us, always send us to look and tell them what we saw. They have so many birds, and we see every corner of above and below. They take the images from our eyes and the memories from our heads, sounds from our ears and voices from our tongues… please come find me before we're all deaf and mute and blind."

* * * *

"Who has many faces and a castle?” Galina asked Zemun as soon as she woke up under Bayun's tree. Look at this, she thought; I'm talking in goddamn riddles. And I'm asking advice from a talking cow. And I talk to birds and cats. It's a good thing my schizophrenia is in remission.

"Hmmmm,” Zemun said. “Dvoedushnik, maybe. But who knows what other creatures lurk in this forest?"

"What do you mean?” Yakov interrupted. “I thought you all knew each other."

"Do you know every person in Moscow, or even in your neighborhood?” Timur-Bey countered. “When this place was formed, some chose to build a city. Others stayed in the forest. Didn't anyone tell you it's not safe here?"

"David did,” Yakov admitted. “He didn't say why."

"There's also something you might want to know,” Galina told Yakov. “Remember the house of Peter the Great in Kolomenskoe that Sergey mentioned? I dreamt that it was here, in this forest."

Sergey the rook hopped onto Galina's shoulder and peered into her face. “You mean to say that this forest is actually Kolomenskoe?"

"I don't think so,” Galina said. “But maybe there's a connection."

"Perhaps,” Koschey said. “I'm ashamed to say that I don't know anything here that belonged to any czars."

"I do,” Timur-Bey said. “And incidentally, that's not the same as the house in Kolomenskoe."

"How do you know that?” Zemun said.

"Because,” Timur-Bey said, “the one here ended up underground after its above version was burned by Napoleon."

Galina and Yakov traded looks. If one didn't think too hard about it, it almost made sense-Kolomenskoe and Peter the Great and the birds-but the moment one looked at the pieces directly they fell apart again, like bits of mosaic that formed a picture if looked at from a distance but a meaningless jumble up close.

Yakov apparently felt the same way-he shook his head and sighed. “Think we're getting closer?” he asked Galina.

She nodded. “I don't care about the puzzles,” she said. “I just want my sister back; you can have the rest."

Yakov produced an uncertain smile. “That sounds like a bargain,” he said.

14: Napoleon

The world used to make sense; Yakov remembered that much. And yet, here, underground, he couldn't avoid the thought that the apparent sense and order was just a result of his wistful optimism. It also occurred to him that the closer he found himself to evil, the harder it was to maintain the illusion of a sensible universe.

He resented the vague and abstract quality of evil-it was always in the plural, be it thugs or

communists or Chechen terrorists. It was never a person with a face and a possibility of affixing blame, at least not after some time passed; only then could evil be identified and labeled as such, but who could believe something after so much time had passed? And after living underground and hearing the denizens’ stories he started to doubt that historians on the surface ever got the real meaning of anything.

Now, he felt lost among dreams and speculations, in a dark forest so big that the initially sprawling and overwhelming underground city became but a speck lost in a mosaic of trees-some frozen and leafless, others just starting to sprout their first sticky leaves: a patchwork of seasons and-Yakov suspected-times. And somewhere deep within the forest there was a palace of the czar who had abandoned Moscow for St Petersburg. And within this palace there were birds who used to be people but were now subjugated to some unknown but menacing enemies-numerous, faceless, like any other evil.

Timur-Bey led them, following landmarks only he could see; he sometimes stopped to look closely at a tree trunk or a patch of grass, or to rub the delicate skeleton of a fallen leaf between his small dry palms.

"What is he doing?” Yakov whispered to Galina. “What is he looking for?"

"I don't think he's looking for anything,” Galina whispered back. “I think he's praying."

"Praying? Who's here to pray to?” He heaved a sigh and fell silent, suddenly overtaken by the thought that here, underground, there was no one to hear his prayers. He was never particularly religious, despite his mother's efforts to make him go to church and to consider his soul. Still, there was a certainty that if he ever had the fancy to pray there would be someone to listen; at least his mother assured him that it was so. Here, there was instead the bleak knowledge that all the gods that had any power were dead, and he was instead at the mercy of strange creatures with unclear motives. It was no wonder then that he looked to Galina for support.

But she seemed preoccupied. Ever since the dreams of her sister started, she grew more distant and anxious by the day, as if a part of her strained ahead, leaving behind the rest that couldn't keep up. “It's like a bad dream,” she told Yakov. “You know the ones when you're trying to run but can't or only move very slowly?"

He nodded. “I think everyone has those."

"It's strange, isn't it,” Galina said. “It's not like anyone ever had an actual experience of running in molasses. I wonder where this dream comes from."

"Walking through mud,” Yakov said. “The place I used to live, there was so much mud, especially after the rains started. There was construction everywhere."

"Sounds like my neighborhood,” Galina said. “There used to be an apple orchard, and now it's just dirt and railroad."

"I remember,” Yakov said. “I'm just two streets down from you, by the supermarket and the liquor store."

"And the glass factory,” Galina said. “The one Sergey talked about. Isn't it strange, how we lived so close and yet never knew what was going on there, with thugs and magic?"

"I suppose. But isn't it even stranger that there's a whole damn world under our feet, and

nobody knows about it?"

"Yeah,” Galina said, her forehead furrowing in the habitual pattern of narrow lines that were getting permanently entrenched in her smooth skin. “But someone has to know. The KGB probably does-how can they not?"

Yakov shrugged; he did not share Galina's conviction although he had encountered this particular belief many times-perfectly reasonable people often believed that the KGB was all-knowing, and ascribed to them a superhuman competence. It made it easier to swallow that way, he supposed; if the evil was all-knowing and all-powerful, one could not be too hard on oneself for being a victim. And there was comfort in this belief in the omnipotence of the KGB-not always pleasant, perhaps, but better than the alternative; who wanted to live in fear of a mere shadow?

Yakov sighed. “Maybe not. This place… even if someone knew about it, who would believe it? I'm here, and even I expect to wake up at any moment. It's so weird that I don't even know how to act most of the time… I met my dead grandfather, for crying out loud. I don't get it how you can be like this."

"Like what?” Galina looked toward the ground under her walking feet.

"Like all this… like it's real. You're taking it seriously."

"I have to,” she said. “My sister is here. And you… after I saw what the boatman did to you, I think you're taking it pretty seriously too."

"I don't want to talk about that.” Yakov picked up his pace. He looked at the trees, long beards of Icelandic moss undulating in the wind, the dark needles of black spruces casting a deep shadow over the narrow path, and felt deeply unsettled, just like he did under the unblinking gaze of the boatman when the icy fingers of his mind probed and sifted through Yakov's memories. And just on the edges of them, a sound stirred-a thin piercing cry, tearing the night silence apart like a sharp needle, and then falling silent. The night seemed so much quieter and colder now than before that cry started, and the hole left by the removed memory ached, like the phantom limb of a mutilated soldier.

Timur-Bey seemed to be nearing the goal-he stopped less, and forged ahead down the path overgrown with brambles and lamb's ear. Zemun followed closely behind, trampling down the vegetation with her hooves to make the way passable for the rest, although Yakov suspected that Koschey was far too inured to such minor obstacles to pay attention, and that Zemun's effort was for Yakov's and Galina's benefit.

The forest around them changed again, as it did many times on this journey. The trees changed from spruces to birches, and light played across their golden heart-shaped leaves. The path also widened, as if it had been recently traveled. The air opened up around them, and Yakov realized how suffocated he felt under the closed canopy of the spruces. Birches were so much nicer, so much more pastoral-they reminded him of the ubiquitous sentimentally patriotic paintings, always with birches and blue skies, always about the transcendent quality of the Russian forests and other natural habitats. But right now, he was glad to see them.

The clearings gaped at them from the right and left, soft succulent meadows of long rich grass, sharp sedges fringing the wet meadow margins where a brook gurgled in its gentle idiot tongue.

"Wait,” Timur-Bey whispered, and kneeled to examine footprints in the soft ground.

Yakov was not an experienced tracker, but even he could see that the meadow was thoroughly

trampled.

"These are bare feet,” Timur-Bey pointed. “And these-not quite bare, but quite close. It looks like their boots are falling apart."

Sergey flapped his wings and hopped awkwardly to the ground. He half-hopped, half-ran to Timur-Bey's side, peering at a deep oval depression filled with murky swamp water. “This is the butt of a rifle,” he said.

"Or a musket,” Timur-Bey agreed. “Didn't they use to say that the bullet is stupid and the bayonet is wise?"

"Maybe a musket,” Sergey said. “My point is, we should probably be quiet and not attract attention."

"Maybe they're friendly,” Zemun said.

"They have guns,” Koschey said. “Not that it bothers me, but you fleshbags should probably keep it under advisement. Bare-footed men with large guns are rarely in a good enough mood to chat before shooting."

"I don't like this,” Galina said.

The rook squawked with laughter. “The large gun part or the men part?"

"Oh, leave her alone,” Yakov said.

"I'm just saying,” Sergey said. “You don't like men much, do you?"

Galina shifted her shoulders uncomfortably and slouched. “No. What's your point?"

"Enough,” Yakov interrupted. “This is really not a good time.” It was true, of course; at the same time, Yakov did not particularly relish the subject. He knew Galina; she had grown up the same way he had-without a father, among women hardened by bitter life experience. She had no reason to feel any differently than she did, and yet he felt guilty the moment that ‘no’ left her lips. Like it was his fault somehow-but then again, he had left his wife. Or perhaps it was she who had left him; he couldn't remember anymore, not through the cobwebs of lies and rationalizations and retellings of the same story over and over to himself, until the details took on the shape of his words, and the words themselves became the truth and the substance, their underlying memory forever lost, like the wax mold of a death mask.

They moved along the road, under the sparse cover of the trees. The shadows of thin branches and leaves weaved in patterns of light and dark, breaking up and concealing the shapes of people and the cow that moved below them. The meadows disappeared, supplanted by patches of rough scrub-bushes and goldenrods, willow herbs growing through the charred remains of some long-forgotten buildings.

The trees receded, and they stood between the overgrown ruins and a tall palisade, made of thick and long logs fitted together side by side, their sharpened ends threatening to pierce the distant sky. They could not see what was hidden behind the fence, only a curlicue of smoke rising from behind it, and a strong smell of burnt wood tainting the air so strongly Yakov tasted it on the back of his throat.

"Something's burning,” Galina said.