had taken notes.
Emil looked back and saw only soldiers with rifles and women with shopping bags. But what he saw didn’t matter; they knew whose path he was following.
The Russian soldier smiled at the women. He was a flirt. The women smiled back as necessary when he asked them why they wanted to leave the Soviet sector, where all their needs would be met. Sometimes he asked to see their papers, then, with a wink, flicked them back. “ Nachste?
Emil handed over his passport. Close up, the soldier wasn’t so young, and he remembered Lena’s conviction that these were just peasant boys who wanted their mothers. Lost children. The boyman looked him up and down and spoke in Russian. “A long way from home, Comrade?”
Emil took out his green Militia certificate, which was half in Russian, and handed it over. “Yes, Comrade.”
The soldier shifted his rifle so that the barrel no longer pointed at the ground. “What kind of business do you have with the Americans?”
The badge was useless, but the soldier might not know this. “Just visiting the enemy, Comrade. Taking a look.”
The soldier pursed his lips as he read the certificate carefully, then handed it back. “Not much to see over there,” he said. “Stalingrad, that’s a city.”
Emil folded the Militia certificate back into his jacket.
“They’re different here,” said the soldier confidentially. “They don’t understand the value of gifls. “
Emil understood. He put his hand in his pocket and spoke loudly. “Thank you very much, Comrade! Your assistance is appreciated.”
He held out his hand to shake, and the soldier, uncertain, took it. When he felt the Ostmarks slide into his palm, his features relaxed. He stood straight, at attention. “May your business long serve the interests of the victorious proletariat!”
“That’s my aim, Comrade,” said Emil, and after five long steps he passed a sign that told him he was in the American sector.
A thick-boned GI asked in clotted German what his business was.
He had an impulse to bribe again, but he’d heard about the Americans. They were fat, rich people for whom a bribe was no temptation. Certainly whatever meager bribe he could afford.
“Tourism.”
The GI nodded at the soldier he’d just left. “What did you show him? That green thing.”
Emil looked back at the Russian, who was busy flirting with some more women, then back at the humorless American. He handed his Militia certificate over, and saw, in a flash, prisons and interrogations. His weak stomach trembled, but he forced it to settle. Just a little war tourism. No one could prove otherwise.
The soldier frowned at the cyrillics. He was young, and Emil wondered if the Americans came from farms like the Russians, and if they also felt lost on this side of the Atlantic, buried deep in bomb-scarred Europe. The soldier took Emil’s passport and badge to a gray guardhouse and spoke with an officer inside. After a moment, the officer, now holding the IDs, stepped out and waved for Emil to follow him. He had wind-chapped features that Emil attributed to American plains in states he had heard of: Kansas, Missouri.
When he looked back, Emil saw the round-faced Russian boy staring from the other side of the Gate, looking as though he had been had.
Thin, white hair stuck out from beneath the officer’s cap. They were beside each other now, approaching a dirty white trailer that, when the door was opened, smelled of scalded coffee. A small iron stove burned in the corner. The officer took off his cap-he was bald on top-and poured coffee from a thermos. He held out a cup, but Emil shook his head. They sat on either side of a small kitchen table covered by a piece of lace.
“Speak English?”
Emil shook his head. “ Deutsch, Russkii.”
“So you’re from the People’s Militia,” the officer said in unbelievably smooth, fluent Russian as he laid the two IDs on the table. Emil wondered how a farmer had learned such fine Russian. “Does this mean you’re investigating something in our sector?”
Emil faltered. His stomach was tearing itself up. The nervousness had come upon him as soon as he had stepped into this room. And now the American officer saw right through him.
But what was he really hiding?
He was hiding everything, because trust was not an option.
“A murder?” the American guessed. “It does say homicide here.”
He had a kind face, but Emil knew from experience that this was impractical evidence.
Again: What did he have to hide?
“A murder,” said Emil. “Yes.” He spoke in clipped syllables, trying to hide his sudden despair.
The farmer-officer pressed his lips together as he nodded. “Are you an agent of Soviet Intelligence? MVD? MGB?”
“What?”
“You heard me.” The kindness had slipped from his features.
“I’m not. I’m neither.”
The officer sipped gingerly and considered Emil a moment. The iron stove kept the trailer very warm. “Tell me about your case.”
His stomach was furious, tumultuous. “I’m afraid I can’t.”
“Why not?”
Emil raised his palms helplessly. “I don’t know much myself. And what I do know is questionable.” He rubbed his face, the adrenaline now exhausting him. Maybe it was the fatigue making him say so much. “This is my dilemma,” he told the American. “What I do know may be of more value than I realize. But not necessarily of value to my case. So I can’t share any of it. Do you understand?”
The officer did, Emil could see this. He leaned back in his chair, nodding, spreading his feet as wide as they would go in the cramped quarters, but said, “Please explain.”
He shifted so his stomach could expel the gasses building inside it, then felt the sharp old wounds. “If I tell you something that is of more value than I realize,” said Emil, “I could be in trouble with my own government. Or with the Russians. As soon as I step back over that line, I could be shot.”
“Nothing would leave this room,” said the American officer. “You can trust that.”
Emil leveled a cool gaze on him, but his empty stomach was a writhing acid pit. “I can t trust that.”
The officer licked the inside of his mouth, rapped his knuckles on the tabletop, then glanced out the window. “What about them, then?”
“Who?”
“The Soviets.” He leaned forward. “You can t be too happy with them, now can you? They marched into your country and set up a puppet dictatorship. You do know this, right? They rewrite history like it’s their own goddamn Tolstoy novel.” He paused to let it sink in. “You’re not a fool, I can tell that. You don’t think that Mihai of yours is doing anything other than listening to his Moscow phone for orders-do you?”
Emil heard his grandfather muttering in his skull, but shrugged it off. “No country’s perfect.”
The officer almost shouted: “That’s what drives me crazy about you people! You’ve got the lowest standards in the world.”
“We’re never disappointed.”
He laughed a big, American laugh, and patted his big hand on the shaking table. Outside, a dented green Opel pulled up. “All right, Emil Brod of the People’s Militia,” he said as he handed back the passport and certificate. “Have a good stay in the American sector. Excuse our lack of electricity. Another gift from your Soviet friends.” He smiled. “And remember. You hurt anyone under our care, and you’ll have the United States up your ass.”
A man got out of the Opel’s passenger’s side and stood waiting.
Emil’s stomach cleared suddenly, then sank. He was so slow. He took too much at face value. The officer had been holding him here, waiting.
“Are they taking me away?” asked Emil.
“What? Them?”
Emil waited for an answer.
