saw the local Christ begin to whirl and cross himself. My heart started pounding, for the radeniye had begun. A huge whoop went up from the celebrants, and the choir started chanting faster, louder.
“He will come!” shouted the local Christ as he whirled and whipped himself with a rag.
“We are ready!” shouted a man, jumping forward and starting to spin as well.
The hooded man pressed himself closer, whispering in the din to me, “Do not worry. There’s nothing to be afraid of. You are one of us now, and that is good. We are all one family!”
Bozhe moi. I could hear the lust in his hushed voice, sense it in his close presence, feel it in the warm breath that spilled over me. What did he want?
“Do not worry, Maria, I am here,” he said. “Change will come soon, and soon you must run from the city, this Western seat, without looking back!”
I cowered in terror.
A woman screamed, “He will come to the People!”
Another shouted, “He is of us!”
“We are of Him!”
In the flickering candlelight the entire congregation leaped into the middle of the room, formed a large circle, and started slowly moving from right to left. The choir half cried, half sang some special song. In response, the throbbing congregation cried to the heavens. Someone started screaming. Two men slapped their knees to the beat of the chant. The local Christ shouted an incoherent prayer. Bit by bit, the circle of celebrants began to move faster and faster.
The hooded man took me by the arm. “Come, we must join them!”
I was shaking more than ever, and the tears rolled freely from my eyes. “Please, no! I can’t! I…I…”
He stopped and gently, gingerly, touched me on the shoulder. “But there’s nothing to fear!” He grabbed the top of his hood and started to pull it up. “Maria, I wouldn’t let anything happen to you!”
First his chin appeared, then that sweet mouth. I couldn’t believe it. And when I realized who it really was, when I saw him standing before me, I collapsed sobbing in his arms. It couldn’t be.
“Sasha!”
“There’s nothing to worry about! I’m here,” he said desperately, wrapping his good arm around me and holding me and kissing me on the head. “Sweet one, my Maria, I won’t let anyone hurt you!”
“But how…” I tried to talk but couldn’t. “I mean, you’re here… How…what…oh, I thought…I thought-!”
“Everything’s okay, even wonderful!” he said, with a huge grin.
“But how-”
“You mean you didn’t know?”
“Know what?”
“That I’d be here, that I belong here? And who I am, and-don’t you understand? Isn’t that why you’re here? Don’t you know? I would have told you-I wanted to-but I couldn’t. Secrecy is my greatest commandment.”
“Sasha, what are you saying?”
“I’m a flying angel. I travel from ark to ark, carrying news and warnings to and from other groups. That’s why I was going to your village when we first met, why I asked so many questions about your father, and that’s why I had to flee so quickly-to carry the news of the attack on your father to the other groups.”
“You mean you’re not a revolutionary?”
“Of course I am! What does revolution mean but to turn, to whirl, to twirl? And that’s what we must do, turn everything around. We must get rid of the foreigners. God and tsar, they are all that matters. Your father is remarkable, for he not only abhors wealth and possessions, he has done the impossible, he has made it to him, Tsar Batushka. Your father connects us as no other peasant ever has to the Almighty’s Own Anointed!”
“But…”
One of the celebrants shouted, “Oh, the Spirit!”
“Descend upon us!” yelled another.
They were all singing now. And all dancing, too, moving, gyrating, always circling right to left, crying to the heavens, begging for mercy, delivery, love. One person whipped another person with a rag, the local Christ whipped himself, and Madame Lokhtina, sweat streaming down her face, shouted gibberish.
“And your arm-what happened? How were you hurt?” I asked.
“There are two arks here in Petrograd, and when I was visiting the other one, we were raided by the police. I shouldn’t have come to your house-that put your family in danger-but I needed your father’s healing…I needed you.”
I hadn’t realized how abandoned I had felt, how lonely and ordinary. But now…now he was here, and I kissed him. I fell into him and kissed his lips and mouth as deep and hard as I could.
Then Sasha grabbed me by the hand and pulled me forward, saying with a big smile, “We must dance!”
Yes, I was dirty and wanted to be cleansed. I wanted to be rid of everything but this moment. So dance we did, joining the group in joy and ecstasy. We all held hands and spun and cried out. I stared into Sasha’s lovely brown eyes and saw them staring back. We turned and twisted. And as I moved and twirled I felt my worries and fears and impurities begin to lift from my shoulders. I stepped faster, spun more quickly, and, yes, I felt everything start to fly away, as if I were shedding something filthy and confusing.
Someone dropped from the group, falling into the middle on his knees and whipping himself with a wet rag. Sasha’s head fell back, and he bellowed out something in Indian or in the language of Jerusalem.
“Rente rente funtritut!” he cried at the top of his voice. “Nodir lisentran entrofit!”
I had no idea what he was saying, but I understood what he meant, what he was searching for, for he was seeking nothing more than that which all the narod wanted: freedom and love and spirituality, the sense that no man was above another, and the absolute knowledge that every man of every level had the capacity to cast away his sins and become at the very least Christlike. I wanted all that too. As I spun and cried out, as I shook and trembled, my sweat began to fly from my brow and my flaxen gown became soaked with perspiration. Someone in the middle twirled and whirled so fast that he flew to the side, falling on his knees, screaming.
“Oh, the Lord! He is close!”
“Oh, Brother! Oh, Brother!”
“Alleluia!” shouted the local Christ, completely drenched with sweat and twirling faster than ever. “I feel it! He is coming!”
I broke loose and started spinning and turning, my gown twirling wide, my hair flying. I felt every dark thought, every doubt, every sin, seeping from my being, emptying through my pores. Sweat gushed from me, washing everything impure from my body and soul. Suddenly a gigantic whoosh-a kind of spiritual beer-poured into me and lifted me up. I raised my hands and felt something divine rain down from the heavens and swim through and around me, a power greater than any I had ever felt. What was it? What godly force was overtaking us all?
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Sasha spinning and smiling, his face turned to the heavens. Yes, he was here, we were together, all would be well.
“Oh, Spirit Lord!” sobbed someone.
“Alleluia!”
“Rejoice, for He has come!”
And then Sasha was grabbing me with his one good hand and pulling me along. My body had stopped spinning, but my head could not.
“Oi!” I shouted, tumbling into him.
“Come, my love,” he gasped, pulling me along.
I closed my eyes, feeling like a cloud blowing through the sky-yes, a cloud, blowing right into him.
“Brothers! Sisters!” cried the local Christ. “I sense it! The Holy Spirit has come! God has poured Himself into me!”
A woman screamed. A man collapsed on the floor.
Half running, Sasha led me into the side room. We went there, into that little space, and while the rest of the congregation spun and sang and cried out, we began kissing. He pressed me against the hard brick wall, and his soft lips flew across my mouth, my ear, my neck. My body flushed with a desire I had never known or even expected, and I wanted him as I never wanted anything else. Every bit of inhibition had been spun away, and I felt nothing but love and desire, heat and want. He dove downward, burrowing his face between my breasts, rubbing,
