“Now, now, what’s all this?” said the doctor reprovingly. “How are we feeling today?”

“Abandoned,” said Galina and immediately regretted it.

Hearing this, the young doctor called the ward sister and scolded her for neglecting her patients.


Alov came to see Galina only on her fifth day in the hospital. No sooner had he entered the ward than he began to yell at her, calling her a hysterical fool. “Was it because of me you took it into your head to take an overdose?”

The other patients listened with baited breath, intrigued.

Alov grabbed Galina by the arm. “I need you right away. The doctor has told me you’re quite capable of getting up on your feet. We’re off to the Lubyanka.”

Alov glanced around at the other patients and leaned in to whisper in Galina’s ear. “We’re questioning your Rogov, and he won’t admit to anything. Do you think you can help us break him?”

Galina stared at Alov, dumbstruck. Klim had been arrested? But he was supposed to have left the country!

Alov pulled the blanket off her bed. “Come on. Get dressed! We’re expecting a purge any minute. It would be good to have some positive results before it starts.”

They got into the waiting OGPU car. As it drove off, Alov explained that for forty-eight hours now, Rogov had been “on the conveyer belt”—this was the name for constant questioning during which a “client” was passed between interrogating officers without being given space to breathe or gather his thoughts.

“The bastard’s digging in his heels,” cried Alov with feeling. “What we need you to do is to squeeze out Nina Kupina’s address from him. You’re on good terms with him, aren’t you? Right now, the Mincing Machine is working on him. Then, you can come in and explain in a nice voice that things will be better for him if he gives us an honest confession.”

The Mincing Machine was the nickname of a pale, shapeless woman who worked in the OGPU. She had a habit of talking about lofty subjects, knew many poems by heart, and even lavished care on her appearance—plucking her eyebrows and dying her hair with henna. From time to time, she was brought down into the OGPU cells. Nobody was as efficient as she at unmasking enemies of the state.

“Is Rogov being beaten?” asked Galina in a quiet voice.

Alov shook his head. “No, not really. I decided against it for now. We might need him for a show trial.”

Galina looked at her reflection in the window. That small, hazy ghost was all that remained of her. She had long since died, and now, she was being carried back on the wind to the places she had haunted in her lifetime.

Alov was talking about the coming purge and of how he had been in bed sick with a temperature for several days and was without time to memorize the History of the Soviet Communist Party.

He too was like a ghost, thought Galina. A ball of dull, pulsing energy. In order not to fade away altogether, he needed to take energy from other people, and just now, he was sucking it from Klim and Galina.

Alov was overcome by another fit of coughing.

“Just look at me,” he muttered as he wiped away the tears. “I feel as if I’m being turned inside out, and I don’t have a single pill left. Listen, Pidge. If you talk Rogov around for us, I’ll ask Drachenblut to get you your job back. What do you say?”

Galina nodded indifferently.

The car drove into the inner courtyard and stopped outside the OGPU prison. Alov jumped down into the snow.

“Come on. Quickly!” he called to Galina. “I still need to look through the materials from the fifteenth Party Congress after this. My head’s like a sieve these days—I can’t remember anything.”

They walked through the yard and down into the cellar. The warden, a snub-nosed young man in an outsized peaked cap, followed after them.

“How’s the Mincing Machine doing?” asked Alov.

“She’s doing her best, the old battle-ax,” grinned the warden.

They turned into a side corridor. Now, Galina could hear the sound of a woman screaming out a torrent of shrill abuse.

Alov looked at Galina with consternation. “What’s got into you, Pidge? You’re shaking all over. Are you sick?”

The warden stopped outside the room from which the screams were issuing and opened the door.

“Could you bring some hot tea for Galina, here?” Alov asked him. “She’s out of sorts.”

The warden nodded. “I’ll see to it.”

Alov patted Galina on the shoulder. “All right, I’m off. Let me know if you have any luck.”

5

Alov set off to the canteen, which was already full of employees from the Foreign Department.

They were all tearing their hair out, trying to guess what was going to happen. They had heard that the purge was to be led by Ivanov, an elderly martinet from the Central Control Commission, and Drachenblut had been appointed as second in command. Nobody knew the name of the last of the troika, a commission of three. Those who worked in the Foreign Department were praying it would not be somebody from Yagoda’s camp.

Alov sat down at the table and took out his chit sheet—a card folded in quarters. So, here were directives on the development of the first five-year-plan… and the plan for collectivization… and the fight with Trotskyism…

Good grief, who needed all this? he wondered. Why couldn’t they let people work in peace?

Alov looked at the clock on the wall. Would Galina manage to get the information they needed in time? Drachenblut was sure to ask about Rogov.

I ought to tell the Mincing Machine to use all the means at her disposal, Alov thought. To hell with sentiment! I have to save my own skin.

Just as he had got up to go back down to the prison, Eteri Bagratovna came rushing in, her face flushed.

“Comrades, the purge is about to start! The Commission has already gathered.”

Everyone began talking noisily all at once. “Who’s the third member of the Commission?”

The secretary looked around at the assembled employees. “The third member will be Comrade Babloyan.”

The officers all clapped and cheered. Babloyan was an easygoing sort who often helped the Foreign Department. Like all top Party officials, he held down several posts at once and organized the work of Soviet trade unions abroad, an activity that brought with it many material benefits.

“Drachenblut’s a smart one!” exclaimed Valakhov with admiration. “So, that’s where he’s been these last few days—drinking vodka with Babloyan and luring him over to our side.”

“Excellent!” Zharkov rubbed his hands together. “Babloyan hates Yagoda as much as we do. It won’t be in his interests to destroy us.”

Alov, it appeared, was the only one not delighted at the news. He was suddenly struck by the thought that Babloyan had deliberately put himself forward to carry out the purge to get rid of Alov and take Dunya for himself.

6

The bolt rattled shut after Galina. She took a step toward the drooping figure sitting motionless in the chair.

“We haven’t finished yet!” barked the Mincing Machine as she glanced angrily toward Galina. Her red fringe bristled over her forehead like the comb of a rooster.

“I can take over for you,” said Galina in a faint voice.

She went up to the table and, steeling herself, took a look at Klim. He sat with his head bowed low. His ashen face wore the stubble of several days, his hair was stuck together in clumps, and his lips chapped.

Klim stared at Galina with an anguished expression. “Hello.”

Galina flinched. What was going on in here? Had they all gone mad?

The Mincing Machine pulled a pistol from her belt. Pushing Galina aside, she rushed up to Klim. “What did I hear you say? Are you looking for a girlfriend in here? Is that it?”

She put the barrel of the gun under Klim’s chin and pushed upward, making him throw back his head. Galina noticed a long, thin contusion on his neck—it looked like the mark of a garrote.

The next moment, the Mincing Machine smashed Klim in the solar plexus. He gave a muffled groan and doubled up, gagging.

“Alov said you weren’t to beat him!” cried Galina.

The Mincing Machine turned at the sound of Galina’s voice. She put down her pistol on the desk and thrust her chest forward menacingly in Galina’s direction.

“And just who do you think you are? Perhaps you’d like me to smash your face?”

The door opened, and the warden came in with a glass of tea. “Here you are. Careful. The water’s boiling.”

The Mincing Machine took the glass. “Merci.”

As soon as the door closed behind the warden, she went up to Klim and pressed her foot down on his.

“Now, listen. This is the last time I’m going to ask this. Where is Kupina hiding?”

She undid the buttons on Klim’s shirt and put her hand inside it, fumbling at his chest.

“Make your mind up while all this down here is still soft and warm. Or I’ll pour boiling water on you, and there won’t be an inch of skin left.”

Klim flinched.

“Stop!” sobbed Galina.

“So, you won’t speak?” said the Mincing Machine in a sing-song voice as she raised the glass. “This calls for operational intervention.”

But before Klim’s tormentor could do any more, Galina grabbed the pistol from the desk and shot her in the head.

7

As Klim was bundled back into the holding cell, a deathly hush fell, and the inmates stared at him in horror.

He staggered to the basin, but his hands were shaking so badly that he was unable to turn on the tap.