Beautiful Assassin (26 page)

In well-rehearsed if somewhat mechanical Russian, she said, “
Ya rada, chto vy priekhali
.” She was pleased we had come. Then in English, which the American captain translated for her, she said, “Welcome to the White House.”

After translating her words, the captain, smiling awkwardly, quickly slipped in: “Hello, again. She’s been practicing that all week,” he confessed. “I didn’t get a chance to tell you I work here as an interpreter.”

Following the introductions, Mrs. Roosevelt served us tea, chatting amiably with each of us in turn. Several times, Vasilyev jumped in to answer questions the First Lady had directed toward one of us. For instance, when she asked Viktor if he was eager to return to the fighting, Vasilyev replied by saying that as Soviet patriots we were all eager to return to the defense of the Motherland. After serving me, she reached out and rested her hand on my wrist. Her hands were plain and unremarkable, those of a common woman, save for one thing—a beautiful sapphire ring. “I’ve so been looking forward to meeting you, Lieutenant,” she said, smiling. She had narrow, slanting eyes, a weak chin, and buckteeth that protruded from her small, eager mouth. Yet she was pleasant-looking, and when she smiled her entire face beamed with unbridled joy.

“It is a pleasure to meet you…,” I said, pausing, unsure of how I should address her. The captain, who was translating what I said, came to my aid. “She prefers Mrs. Roosevelt,” he said.

“Thank you, Captain,” I said to him.

“I had no idea you were so young,” the First Lady exclaimed.

“Not so young. I am twenty-five, Mrs. Roosevelt.”

“I find that hard to believe,” she said with a mock frown. “You don’t look a day over seventeen.”

“I don’t feel seventeen,” I replied, forcing a smile. “In fact, I feel quite old.”

“It’s no wonder, after all you’ve been through. I must say, you’ve been an inspiration to all of us.”

“Thank you.”

“You’ve done more for the cause of women’s equality in one year than I’ve managed to do in my entire life.” Giving me what I would come to know as her characteristic grin, Mrs. Roosevelt then said something which the captain hesitated to translate. He stared at me, the merest hint of a smile on his own lips. For a moment I thought it was a joke between them, about which I was the object.

Finally the captain enlightened me. “Mrs. R thinks you’re very lovely.” When talking to me he would sometimes shorten her name to our “R.” I wasn’t sure if it was an expedient given the needs of translating or if he was on familiar terms with her. But as he said this about me, I felt my face redden. Not so much because of her compliment but because of the way the captain looked at me as he said this. His gaze lingered on me, as if he wanted to say something more.

“Tell her she’s being too kind.”

“No, not at all,” Captain Taylor interjected. “In fact, I agree with her completely.”

I happened to glance over at Vasilyev. He was staring curiously at the American soldier.

The First Lady chatted cordially with us for a while, asking about our trip and if we’d found America to our liking, and hoping that the oppressive summer heat wasn’t too hard on us. “It’s always so dreadfully hot here in August,” she said. The captain translated for her while Radimov did the same whenever one of us spoke, except for the ambassador, who, as I’ve said, spoke English fluently.

“How is Moscow this time of year?” she inquired.

With a smile, Ambassador Litvinov replied, “Still standing, madam.”

“Indeed,” concurred Mrs. Roosevelt. “In London, I saw firsthand some of the devastation caused by the war. Let me tell you, it gives one an entirely new appreciation for what you soldiers have gone through.”

“We merely fight for our homeland,” replied Gavrilov.

Mrs. Roosevelt then shared an amusing story about Foreign Minister Molotov’s visit to the White House.

“Your Mr. Molotov showed up with a loaf of black bread and a pistol in his suitcase,” the First Lady said with a high, fluttering laugh. “I guess he thought we might not have food and that Germans were prowling the streets of Washington.”

We all chuckled at this.

Soon Mrs. Roosevelt stood. “The president is about to give his radio address and would like to invite you all to attend.”

She led us down a corridor, pointing out portraits and other things of interest as she went. She then escorted us into what she called the Oval Office, where the president would be giving his address. The room was filled with people.

“I would introduce you to Franklin,” Mrs. Roosevelt said in an undertone to us, “but he doesn’t like to be disturbed before he goes on the air.”

We were given headphones so that the president’s address could be translated for us. Mr. Roosevelt sat behind a large desk and spoke into a microphone, his head jerking this way and that for emphasis. He talked about the war effort and the strong unity that existed among America’s allies. How together we would defeat the fascists and the Japanese Imperialists. And then he spoke of something he referred to as the “four freedoms”—freedom of speech, freedom of religion, freedom from want, and freedom from fear. Things that our enemies did not grant to their citizens. As I listened to him, I wondered how my own country was any different from those we were fighting against. I remembered my teacher Madame Rudneva, telling me that our government filled people’s heads with lies and that they used fear to stifle anyone who disagreed, and I felt even more strongly now just how right she’d been. Then I thought about Vasilyev’s comment, how the Americans were our allies now, with its dark implication for a future in which we might actually be enemies. Would the alliance between our two coun
tries turn out as the one between Germany and my own country had? As I pondered these things, I thought how it was easier being a soldier, with your enemy so obvious, the dangers so clear-cut.

When the president was finished, Mrs. Roosevelt brought us up to meet him. From behind the desk one couldn’t see the wheelchair he sat in. But now, seeing him in it, it took me a little by surprise, the fact that this powerful man was paralyzed, with stick-thin legs and a haggard look to him. Here was the great Roosevelt, Stalin’s counterpart, whom I’d once seen in a Soviet newspaper sitting in the back of a convertible automobile, wearing a top hat and smoking a cigarette in a long cigarette holder, looking very much the epitome of capitalist success. Yet this man looked rather ghostlike, his face gaunt, his rather sad-looking eyes sunken with dark circles beneath them. He appeared almost a wasted caricature of himself. When he stood to greet us, he had to have support from two men on either side of him to help him out of the chair. Below his pant cuffs, I noticed the leg braces.

“Franklin, I’d like you to meet some brave soldiers,” his wife said, introducing each of us. When he came to me, he took my hand and said, “It is a pleasure to meet you, young lady.” His grip, however, was not that of an invalid but rather that of a man in robust health. He smiled at me, his features suddenly becoming animated. I could see the handsome young man he had once been. “Not only a deadly shot but the very picture of loveliness. Tell me, how did you like my speech?”

“I liked it very much indeed, Mr. President,” I replied.

“Excellent! I’m delighted to hear that. Sadly, it is your generation that has inherited the problems of mine, and it’s a pity that we ask for such terrible sacrifices from young people like yourself. I’m told you’ve just come from the Russian front.”

“Yes, sir. We all have,” I replied.

“Are things as grim as we’ve been hearing?”

I shot a quick glance at Vasilyev. He gave me the sort of circumspect look a music teacher might give to his prize student before some important competition, as if to remind him to hit certain notes correctly.

Right then, however, someone standing next to the president whispered something into his ear.

“Unfortunately, young lady, I’m told I have a meeting with your ambassador,” Mr. Roosevelt said. “But my wife tells me you’ll be joining us for dinner tonight. I’d love to continue our conversation. Cheers.”

The First Lady led us back to the room where we’d had tea. She turned to me and, through Captain Taylor, said, “I’ve arranged for a private luncheon where you and I can have a chance to get to know each other better, Lieutenant Levchenko. Woman to woman.” Then turning to Vasilyev she said, “Nothing that would be of much interest to you men.”

Vasilyev paused for a moment, then said, “Of course, madam. I will send along our interpreter.”

“That won’t be necessary, Mr. Vasilyev,” Mrs. Roosevelt said with a dismissive wave of her hand. “Captain Taylor will accompany us. Besides, you’ll need your interpreter. Tommy,” she said to her assistant, “see that the gentlemen are fed. They must be hungry. We shan’t be gone long.”

Then Mrs. Roosevelt linked her arm in mine and led me out of the room, with Captain Taylor following close behind. We headed upstairs to what turned out to be her sitting room. We sat facing each other on elegant wing chairs, with the captain seated to my right. On the low coffee table between us there was an assortment of foods, including several Ukrainian dishes—
kolach, mlyntsi, vareniky,
and
salo
. I hadn’t eaten much for breakfast and found myself suddenly ravenous.

“I had the cooks prepare a few things from your country. Please, help yourself.”

I took a plate and tried one of the
mlyntsi,
with sour cream on top. I hadn’t had any potato pancakes in a very long time.

“I hope it’s to your liking.”

“It’s delicious,” I said. “My mother used to make them.”

“Wonderful. I wanted to make you feel right at home. This place can be rather intimidating,” she said, glancing around the room. “May I call you Tat’yana?”

“Of course, Mrs. Roosevelt.”

“I would like us to be friends.” She poured me some tea. “And eat some more. Heavens, you are so far too thin, Tat’yana.”

Then she indicated for the captain to help himself to the food as well.

“There now. This is much better. Just us girls,” said Mrs. Roosevelt, winking at the captain. He smiled sheepishly as he said the words to me.

“When I first read about you,” Mrs. Roosevelt explained, “I told Franklin, now there’s a woman I want to meet. Ready to get in there and mix it up with the boys. I think I would be just scared to death if someone were shooting at me. Aren’t you afraid?”

“I must confess, madam, that many times I am afraid too.”

“It’s not the absence of fear that makes one truly brave,” Mrs. Roosevelt advised as she sipped her tea. “It’s confronting one’s fears. You are just the sort of woman this world is going to need not only to win this war but in remaking the world afterward. I know Franklin is very much looking forward to talking to you.”

“He is?”

“Yes. He wants to know all about what it was like at the front. A firsthand account. But I shall leave that to him. I’d rather know a little about you, Tat’yana.”

“What is it would you like to know?”

“What are your interests? That is, when you’re not shooting Germans,” she said, with that same light, tremulous laugh I’d heard before. “What did you do before the war?”

As she spoke I thought she reminded me of someone, though I couldn’t put my finger on who it could be. I told her how I had been a student, that I liked hiking in the mountains, skiing, running track.

“Sounds like you were a regular…”

Captain Taylor fumbled for a moment trying to find a Russian equivalent for what she’d said. “Mrs. R. says you are a
tomboy
.”

“What is tomboy?” I asked.

“A girl who behaves like a boy.”

I frowned, not sure I liked being called that. “You mean
lesbiyanka
?”

“No, no,” he said, with a chuckle. “In our country a tomboy is a girl who is tough, unafraid to do what boys do.”

“Where did you pick up a love for shooting, Tat’yana?” Mrs. Roosevelt asked.

“From my father. He taught me to shoot a gun when I was a little girl. He thought all Soviet girls should be able to protect our country from its enemies.”

Mrs. Roosevelt tilted her head at an angle. “He sounds like a man ahead of his time. What are your other interests, my dear?”

“Poetry,” I offered.

“Really? Who are your favorite poets?”

I hesitated, wondering if I should tell her that my favorites—Tsvetaeva and Yesenin, and of course my beloved Akhmatova—had fallen out of official favor. That was probably something Vasilyev would frown on. So instead, I replied with, “I’ve read a little of your own Emily Dickinson.”

“You don’t say. I just adore her work,” replied Mrs. Roosevelt. “Let’s see. It’s been a while. ‘Because I could not stop for Death/He kindly stopped for me.’”

“‘The carriage held but just ourselves/And Immortality,’” I replied in English.

Mrs. Roosevelt laughed that high fluttering laugh of hers and clapped her hands gleefully. “Bravo.”

“My English not so good,” I said.

“No, you recited it perfectly. Didn’t she, Captain?”

Captain Taylor glanced over at me and said in Russian, “You must have had a good teacher.”

It was then, of course, that I knew of whom Mrs. Roosevelt reminded me. While she looked nothing like her, the First Lady had the same sort of vitality and charm, the same disarming candor, as Madame Rudneva, my old friend.

“I’m told that you write some verse yourself,” Mrs. Roosevelt said.

I stared cautiously at her, wondering how she’d found that out, if, as with Vasilyev and the
chekisty,
the Americans knew all sorts of things about me, too.

“I dabble a bit,” I replied.

“Good heavens. In addition to all your other accomplishments, you’re a poet too. I must say, you’re a very accomplished young lady. Well, I hardly consider myself a poet, but I manage to scribble a few words. I write a daily newspaper column. What I’d like to do is to have you write a piece about your war experiences.”

“I don’t know,” I said.

“I think it would open the eyes of many Americans. We don’t know much about your country or the war on the Eastern Front. They need to know how bad things are. To hear it firsthand. Besides, it would do wonders for our women to see what you’ve managed to do. What a woman is capable of when she’s given the opportunity. Don’t you agree?”