Purge

ago and brought back walking sticks as souvenirs, with Sigulda burned into them for decoration. Verochka had been pregnant at the time and couldn’t go with them, but they told her that the sanatoriums there were charming. And the Gauja River Valley! Lavrenti asked the way and told Pasha to take a detour to the end of the Gauja River cable railway.

They stopped the car far away from the ticket window, under the trees.

“Let the girl come with us.”

Zara gave a start and glanced at Pasha.

“Are you nuts? Get going! And don’t take too long!” “She’s not going to try anything.”

“Go!”

Lavrenti shrugged his shoulders at Zara as if to say maybe next time and went to the ticket window. Zara watched his retreating back and gulped in the smell of Latvia. There were white ice-cream wrappers on the ground. She could feel the children’s vacations and families’ shared moments, the bosoms of the party leaders’ wives’, the Pioneers’ zeal, and Soviet athletes’ sweat all lingering there. Lavrenti had said that his son had come here to train, the way the pride of the Soviet Union always did. Was his son a runner? Zara should start paying more attention to what Lavrenti said. It might be useful. She should get Lavrenti to trust her-he might make her his favorite.

Pasha stayed with Zara in the car, drumming the steering wheel with his fingers-whap whap whap. The three onion domes tattooed on his middle finger jumped. The year 1970 rippled with the rhythm, a faded blue number on each finger. A birthday? Zara didn’t ask. Now and then Pasha dug in his ear with a finger. His earlobes were so small that he actually didn’t have any. Zara glanced at the road. She wouldn’t be able to run that far.

“The boys from Perm are expecting us in Tallinn!” Whap whap whap.

Pasha was nervous.

“What the hell is taking him so long?”

Whap whap whap.

Pasha got out two warm bottles of beer, opened one, and gave it to Zara, who emptied it greedily. She felt an itch for the road outside the window, but Estonia was close now. Pasha jumped out of the car, left the door open, and lit a Marlboro. Their sweat dried in the breeze. A family walked by, the child singing, “Turaida pils,” a Latvian murmur, “frizetava,” the woman fluffed her dry-looking hair, the man nodded his head, “partikas veikals,” the woman nodded, “cukurs,” her voice rose, “piens, maize, apelsinu sula,” the man’s voice became angry, the woman’s eyes fell on Zara, who lowered her gaze instantly and pressed herself against the back of the seat, the woman’s gaze slid away without registering her, “es nesprotu,” the pressed pleats of her skirt fluttered softly, “siers, degvins,” her toes reached through the straps of her high-heeled sandals and touched the ground, they passed by, her broad hips swung away, and eau de cologne drifted from them to the car. An ordinary family, disappearing into the railway. And Zara still sat in the car, which smelled of gasoline. No, she couldn’t have yelled, couldn’t have done anything.

The road was deserted. The sun shone on the bushes. A motorcycle with a sidecar bumbled past; then the burning road was empty again. Zara fumbled in her bra for a Valium. If she took off running, would they shoot her in broad daylight or catch her some other way? They would catch her, of course. A girl riding a too-large bicycle came into view. She had on sandals and kneesocks, and there was a plastic basket on one side of her handlebars and a toy milk can on the other. Zara stared at the girl. She glanced at Zara and smiled. Zara shut her eyes. There was an insect crawling on her forehead. She couldn’t bring herself to brush it away. The car door banged open. She opened her eyes. Lavrenti. The trip continued. Pasha drove. Lavrenti took out a bottle of vodka and a loaf of bread, which he scarfed down between swigs from the bottle, wiping his mouth on his sleeve. A gulp of vodka, the sleeve, gulp, sleeve, gulp, sleeve.

“I went all the way to Turaida.”

“Where?”

“Turaida. You can see it from the embankment there.” “What embankment?”

“Where the cable car leaves from. Beautiful view. You can see to the other side of the valley from there. There’s a manor house and the Turaida castle.”

Pasha turned up the music.

“I went there by taxi. The manor house was a sanatorium -I took a taxi from there to Turaida.”

“What? Is that what took so long?”

“The taxi driver told me about the Turaida rose.”

Pasha hit the gas. Lavrenti’s voice trembled from vodka and emotion. Pasha turned the music up louder, probably so he wouldn’t be able to hear Lavrenti, who was leaning against Zara’s shoulder. The liquor on his breath smelled cold, but the voice that came pushing out of it was heavy with melancholy and longing, and suddenly Zara was ashamed of having recognized that in his voice. It wasn’t a person’s voice, it was her enemy’s voice.

“There was a grave there-the grave of the rose of Turaida. The grave of the faithful lover. A wedding couple was just leaving, and they left roses there. The bride had a white gown… They brought red carnations, too.”

Lavrenti’s voice broke. He offered the vodka bottle and Zara took a swig. Lavrenti dug the bread out from somewhere and offered her some. Zara broke off a piece. He had softened toward her. People pay less attention when they’ve softened. She might be able to slip out of Lavrenti’s hands. But if she tried to escape now, she would have to go somewhere else, not where Pasha and Lavrenti were going. And she couldn’t get there any other way.

Pasha laughed. “Does the rose of Turaida have blue eyes? Does she make the world’s best sashliki?”

Lavrenti’s bottle hit Pasha on the forehead. The car swerved suddenly to the edge of the ditch and then across to the other side of the road and back again.

“You maniac!”

Pasha got the car back under control, and the trip continued, with Pasha ranting about his plans for Tallinn.

“And casinos like they have in Vegas. You just have to be fast, you have to be the first-Tallinn lotto, Tallinn casinos. Anything’s possible!”

Lavrenti drank his vodka, chewed his bread, offered some to Zara, and the bass from the stereo shook the car more than the potholes in the road. Pasha went on and on about his own Wild West-that’s what Tallinn was to him.

“You idiots don’t understand.”

Lavrenti puckered his brow.

“Pasha’s heart misses Russia,” he said.

“What? You’re crazy!”

Pasha smacked Lavrenti, then Lavrenti smacked Pasha, and the car was headed into the ditch again, and Zara tried to hide on the floor. The car swerved and wove, the woods flew by, black pines, Zara was afraid, there was a slurp of liquor-soaked spit, the smell of Pasha’s leather coat, the fake leather seats of the Ford, the pine tree air freshener, the car rocking, the squabbling continuing until it leveled off and Zara let herself drift into a doze. She woke up as Pasha pulled into the yard of a business associate. Pasha spent the evening visiting with his associate; Lavrenti ordered Zara to come with him to his room and got on top of her, repeating Verochka’s name.

That night, Zara carefully removed Lavrenti’s hand from her breast, crept out of bed, and leaned against the window latch. It looked like it would be easy to open. The road visible between the curtains was a thick, enticing tongue. In Tallinn, she might be in the same old locked room again. Things were going to have to change someday.

The next day they came to Valmiera, and Lavrenti bought her some prianiki cakes, and they drove from Valmiera to Valga. Pasha and Lavrenti didn’t talk any more than was absolutely necessary. Estonia was coming closer. The road itched and beckoned, but Estonia was already near. And she wouldn’t run away. Of course not. She couldn’t.

When they came to the border at Valga, Pasha dug a crumpled map out of his pocket. Lavrenti snatched it away from him. “Don’t go through the checkpoint. Go around it.”