‘Is it serious? Is he faking?’ Komarov had asked the doctors. ‘If he dies here, you’ll all pay for it! We need him fit and back here as soon as possible.’
The doctors had taken him to the sanatorium on a stretcher wearing an oxygen mask, and brought him lemonade, bread and jam, tea and sugar. The food had given his mind the fuel it needed, but the steel jaws of this vile trap were sinking deeper into his leg with every moment.
Mama or Papa? How could he destroy either? How had it come to this? It was all thanks to that moron Demian, that weasel!
He considered the choice. Papa was so stern, so humourless. This was Bolshevik justice. Wouldn’t Papa understand and say, ‘The Party is always right,’ and, ‘Better shoot a hundred innocents to catch one enemy’? Papa would say, ‘You did the right thing, Senka. If the Party decides I’m guilty then I am guilty – and I did say that!’
Did Papa even love him? He had never shown it. His mama, on the other hand, did so every day. Yet surely her Jewish comments were less serious, so if he chose her, she wouldn’t be arrested? His father’s comments criticized Stalin himself, and Papa could lose his head for that.
Choose Mama and both parents would be fine. That must be the right decision. But what if this was a mine in the hidden minefield? What if it was more serious than he realized? Then he would have destroyed his own mother, the person he adored more than anything in the whole wide world and in all human history!
Senka’s calculations became colder and sharper. A false choice had been placed before him. He knew whichever parent he chose, the Organs would destroy them both, and the family with them. There must be a way out of the labyrinth.
Now he was sitting in the interrogation room and the courtesies, such as they were, were over.
‘Senka, give your testimony,’ said Colonel Komarov.
‘My brother Demian is more wrong than right,’ said Senka. ‘The words are right, but he’s muddled up the speaker.’
‘Just testify, boy, and stop trying to be clever. You may be only ten but on your twelfth birthday you can face the nine grams, the
‘I would never do that.’
‘I hope not. Speak now, boy.’
Senka straightened his back. He had made his choice. Now he had to make sure he got it right.
‘It’s simple, colonel,’ he said, speaking confidently and lucidly. ‘You have the quotations completely the wrong way round. It was my mother who was talking about the “Genius Boss”, not my father. My father has never ever spoken of the Head of the Soviet Government. Discretion is a religion with him. Everything that the Great Stalin does is correct. Papa regards himself as no more than a servant of the Party, the Great Stalin, the working class. He never uses the word Boss –
‘So who complained about the Genius Boss? Who
‘My mother complained, and the Genius Boss in our family is…
Komarov stopped writing and looked up. ‘But your mother was promoting Jewish-Zionist nationalism. She’s Jewish, isn’t she?’
‘Demian’s confused about that too. I remember it exactly. We were in the dacha and my father – not my mother – my father was complaining about “the Jewish compatriots round here” who need to find a place of their own. But he was talking about our neighbours.’
‘What neighbours?’
‘The Rozenblats, who are always asking to use our tennis court. In the end my father said, no, that was enough; from now on, the Rozenblats, “our Jewish compatriots round here”, needed to get their own place for next year. Papa was tired of sharing with them.’
Komarov ran his truncated fourth finger along his lips. ‘But your father’s not Jewish?’
‘No, my father was raised Russian Orthodox so
Komarov looked at Senka for a long time. Senka waited, his head throbbing. Would he be hit? Would he ever see his mother again? Then Komarov threw his head back and laughed.
‘You’re cleverer than I thought. And as it happens I have something for you. It’s from your mother.’
‘What is it?’
‘It’s a surprise. A nice one.’ He snapped his fingers. ‘Go now.’
