Together in Paris

4.

He would never have believed to end up that way.
Feverish, tensed, closed into his coat, which now seemed not to keep him as warm as it did before. His blood rushed through his veins as his dark eyes, hidden by the shadow of the branches of a tree, observed an elegant, rapid in her movements girl just across the street. She swept the snow away from the mystic Nevskij Prospekt, right in front of the headquarters, her head down, wearing a soldier hat on her blonde locks that fell over her shoulders.

He wanted to get closer, to call her by her name, but he didn't have the strength to do so. He just stood there, leaning against a wall not too far from the immense entrance door and staring at her. The fever weakened him, the power that had usually tightened his muscles had now abandoned him, forcing him to stand next to the wall to support his weak body; he felt like he was on a ship miles and miles away from the mainland, a ship that swayed over the rough sea. And she, unaware of him, moved her broom back and forth, pushing the snow to the side of the road. She seemed to dance.
She lifted her right foot slightly if she pushed to the left, and the left one if she pushed to the right, and the small blasts of the engines of the cars that passed by now and then were her soundtrack. Her lips were constantly moving, and though he was quite far from her, he believed he could hear her words.

"The caviar, the Stroganoff, the Samovar, the feathered hat, the cousin drank, the Duke was short and here a wart and there a cat; the horse's name was Romeo, so tell me something new!"

They didn't make sense to him. They sounded like whispers of non-existent spirits, who insistently cradled him during that journey. And again, in the pocket of her coat, he could see that little red notebook peeping out of the brownish fabric, casting sparks of light when the rays of the icy spring sun clashed with its golden decorations. It seemed to call him, to force him to come closer, to tear it from the girl's hands and to read what was written into its pages, whether she wanted him to or not. He had tormented himself on that notebook since he had left the Yusupov Palace. Anya wasn't rich or affluent, so he couldn't be sure she could be able to read or write. Also because, as Stalin adored to say, a woman does not need education.

If he had been in charge, he would have beaten him to death.

A strange shock ran through him, he closed his heavy eyelids, unnerved by his thoughts: what was happening to him? Was he really judging his beloved Russia?
Taking care of the people wasn't his competence. He just had to obey orders, nothing more. He had to find Vladimir and Dmitry.

But how?

A burst of rifle made him jump, indistinct moans reached his ears. He raised his head, a small flock of birds soared, frightened: someone had been made an example. He looked down, saddened, although without knowing the motivation of his deep emotion. But, to him, the matter of the examples was beginning to get heavier and heavier day by day.
But how could he say it to his superiors?
How could he say it to himself?

He had once been member of the firing squad.
He had enrolled shortly after his father's death in 1919. It had been a traumatic event: even though he never told anyone, he perfectly knew his father had committed suicide. And the grief in his life had become greater when, just a few days after his father's disappearance, his mother had died too, devastated by the loss of her husband. He had been totally alone, at the time. All he could cling to had been Russia, both as a country and as a government idea. He had then joined up with some of his playmates and had inserted his data into the state military leverage cards, choosing immediately the Bolshevik faction without any hesitation thanks to the powerful charm of Lenin. But he hadn't taken part to the Civil War that had cursed Russia for four years, from 1918 to 1922.

He had been placed among the guards of the headquarters, instead, and had been given a very simple task compared to the hard training done at the leverage camp: he simply had had to inspect whoever went through the Smol'nyj's doors. Man or woman, they had to pass under his hands and eyes before of entering.
In 1921, he had been placed in the patrol platoon, turning into a spy. He had wandered around St. Petersburg for years, exploring and getting to know every single trait of the city, haunting criminals and traitors like a fox in a henhouse.
He had therefore been urged to take part in the firing squad.
They had put a shotgun in his hand, pushed him in line with other eleven boys and taught him to wait for the supervisor's order to pull the trigger, to destroy lives with his own hands. He had noticed in a terribly short time how unfit he was for that role, but he had remained silent, accepting what the government had imposed on him.
On Lenin's death, he had become a supervisor. And when Stalin had gotten to the power in 1927, he had found himself being the Deputy Commissioner of the KGB, the Russian secret police, without even having the time to understand what had changed in the meantime.