Lorimers at War (37 page)

Alexa would not have recognized the palace now. The theatre itself was made of wood, although the fluted pillars which pretended to support the high painted ceilings gave the impression of being marble. They alone – perhaps for that reason – had survived undamaged. Everything else had been pillaged. The chandeliers had probably been smashed only out of spite, but the draperies must have been useful for clothing. The wooden balustrade of the tiered gallery in which the audience sat had already been chopped down for firewood, and now the elaborately patterned parquet floor was being prised up, block by block, for the same purpose.

The thickness of the atmosphere made it difficult at first to see the whole of the former auditorium. Smoke from a fire which smouldered in the middle of the hall mingled with the smells of cabbage and urine and body sweat. Stepping carefully over the bodies of children who
lay alive but unmoving on the floor, Kate began to explore the building, her eyes widening in horror as her rough count of the inmates increased. The old woman, whom she had already learned to call
babushka
, had told her that the old name of Tsar's Village had been changed to that of Children's Village because as many of the parentless children of Petrograd as could be found were sent up to this higher area for their health. Kate held her baby even more tightly in her arms than before, realizing that if she had died, this would have been Ilsa's home.

Her explorations brought her in the end to what had once been a kitchen. On the only bed she had so far seen – its iron frame having presumably survived because it could not be burned – a middle-aged woman lay dead. A girl of about twelve or thirteen sprang to her feet at Kate's approach, almost attacking her in despair and agony.

‘You're too late!' she cried. ‘It's three days since I sent the message. How could she keep alive so long? Three days!'

‘The message didn't come to me,' said Kate. ‘Who is in charge here?'

‘Who is there, now that
she
has gone?' The girl began to wail, as though for the first time admitting the death which must have taken place twenty-four hours earlier.

‘But so many children! They can't just be abandoned. Hush now, don't cry. If I'm to help you, you must help me first. Tell me how you came to be here. And when you last had food. And how many of the children are sick. But first of all, tell me your name.'

The girl's name was Vera; between sobs she told her story. Her father had been killed at the front; her mother had died of typhus. She had been one of the first to be sent to the Aminov palace, and was amongst the oldest. There had been about eight hundred orphans in the building two months earlier, but almost all of them had had influenza. At first they had nursed each other, but by
now they were all too weak. Vera did not know how many had died. Comrade Nina, the woman who lay dead on the bed, had done her best to provide rations for the children, but since she had become ill three weeks earlier they had had only what they could steal.

‘Did she ever tell you who it was who allowed her the rations? Did the food come through the Red Guard or from the District Revolutionary Committee?' It was impossible for a stranger in any area to know whether the civil or military authority was locally in control, and important not to guess wrong.

Vera shook her head. But it was to the Red Guards that she had gone for help three days before. They had seemed kind enough, promising to pass on her message for a doctor to visit Comrade Nina and to arrange for a supply of food. But no doctor had arrived. They had given her a sack of frozen potatoes on the spot, but the man who offered to drag the sack back for her had stopped on the way and demanded to be paid for his trouble. When Vera had explained that she had no money, she had learned that a different kind of payment was envisaged.

At the memory she began to wail again. Kate comforted her briefly, but too much needed to be done for time to be wasted on what was past. Responsibility would provide the best distraction for Vera.

‘I want you to look after my baby,' she said, putting Ilsa in the girl's arms as she spoke. ‘She's very tiny and very precious to me, but I'm sure I can trust you to take good care of her while I go into the village and talk to the Revolutionary Committee. I've just fed her, so she'll be happy with you for the next three hours. And you can feel sure that I shall come back. I'm going to look after all of you here – and you will be my chief helper.'

She spoke more confidently than she felt. But the need was so great that action of any kind was bound to lead to some improvement. An hour later she was locked in
argument with the chairman of the committee, a young railway engineer, as he pointed out the impossibility of finding food where no food existed and Kate reminded him of the community's responsibility to the children of their dead comrades. They both spoke with passion and the argument would have become heated had Kate not remembered how dangerous it was in these times to make enemies. Even under a self-imposed restraint, however, she could see that her arguments were having some effect. By mid-afternoon she was back at the palace, congratulating Vera on her success as a nursemaid and collecting a group of the oldest children to act as her aides.

None of them was over twleve and all of them were shabby and emaciated. Starvation had made some bright-eyed and others dull and apathetic but they all lacked energy and Kate saw few signs of intelligence. Patiently she explained to them several times how she proposed to put them into pairs and give each pair the responsibility for one room of the palace. They must bring her a report on the number of children in their room and say how many were dead, how many were ill, how many were hungry, how many were healthy.

While they were gone Kate – with Vera's help – drew a rough plan of the palace on the whitewashed wall of the kitchen, for she had no paper. She wrote in the numbers they brought her, she supervised the removal of those who were dead, she made quick plans for future organization. In the evening she went back to the committee, this time in full session.

‘The children will become robbers,' she said. ‘For three weeks already they've eaten only what they could steal. They've taken food which the peasants provide for their horses and they've burrowed into farm store rooms. Until now they've gone out in twos and threes, but they're becoming desperate, Comrades. If nothing is done you'll have an army of young bandits on your hands, organized
and violent. If the peasants have food, it's better that they should surrender it to a legal authority.'

Kate knew well enough that this was already happening. Every town dweller in Russia believed that the countryside was full of hoarded food. Seizure was taken as a matter of course; only distribution was under debate.

The committee proved sympathetic enough in principle. Its chairman explained that one official orphanage had been established a year earlier in the palace formerly belonging to the Tsar. No one had realized how many children, drawn by the promise of shelter but failing to secure admission to the main orphanage, had established themselves in the neighbouring palaces of the old nobility. It seemed incredible to Kate – whose months in Petrograd had been regularly disturbed by official searches and checks and head-counts, with a continuing survey of papers and permits – that the men responsible for local administration should not have known the extent of the problem, but she accepted that this was the case as she saw them in turn accepting her right to speak for the inhabitants of the old palace.

In theory, at least, the battle was won. For one more night the children would have to exist on promises, but a supply of cabbage would be sent up the next morning and as soon as Comrade Katya supplied a written list naming all the living children a regular ration would be allotted.

With success in sight Kate tried to relax and found herself unable to move. She had started the day still weak from childbirth and from the hypothermia which had followed her collapse in the snow, and had committed herself to a timetable which was emotionally and physically exhausting. She was conscious of the blood draining from her face and the strength leaving her muscles as she tried, but failed, to stand.

The chairman of the committee looked at her curiously.

‘You're not well, Comrade. When did you yourself last eat?'

Kate was reluctant to mention her stay with the old lodgekeeper's wife. So many actions these days which were innocent and even kind could cause trouble. Instead she muttered something about the recent birth of her baby.

‘Then you will eat at my house before you return,' he said. ‘My wife too has had a child and she assures me that every meal she takes herself keeps two people alive.'

For a moment Kate hesitated. Ilsa would be sleeping now, but would she be safe with Vera as the thirteen-year-old grew sleepy herself? And was it right to eat when the orphans were starving? The answers came quickly. Whatever food she was offered could not rob them in any way, and it was certainly true that an undernourished mother would not be able to breastfeed her baby for long. She accepted the invitation with gratitude.

The soup contained scraps of bacon fat, and there was bread on the table; it was a feast. But Kate dared not relax, for she found herself being interrogated as she ate – about the future as well as the past. It was necessary to come to a quick decision, and what she decided was that she would stay with the orphans. Their need for someone like herself was desperate. Kate knew herself to be capable of organization; and once she had obtained the basic essential of food and warmth, her medical skill would also be needed. It would be worthwhile work – and it would have the inestimable advantage of keeping her in the place which Vladimir had chosen for their reunion, without any of the suspicions which would have been aroused had she continued to visit the lodge without excuse.

But it was one thing to come to a decision and another thing to obtain permission. Since the first heady days of the Revolution Kate had had plenty of time to realize that a desire to do a particular job was often regarded as the most absolute disqualification. So when she was asked
about her plans, she took care to mention her medical qualifications but replied in the properly orthodox manner.

‘I shall be expected to return to Petrograd. My leave from the hospital was only granted so that I could travel to relations for my confinement. The baby came early, before I had reached them – and as a result I shall not be expected back for another three weeks. So I can afford to spend a little time here. I see the need to stay longer. But naturally my official duties as a citizen of Petrograd must come first.'

‘I shall apply for your transfer,' he said abruptly. ‘You are more use to us than to them. Your papers, please.'

Kate knew better than to go anywhere without them and had no doubts about handing them over to be inspected. Every move increased her security by distancing her from the time when she had been identifiable as an English doctor. Her marriage certificate had given her an official Russian name and Sergei's documentation had ensured that her qualifications and transfer to the appointment in Petrograd were thoroughly authenticated. This man, although brusque, would not be looking for discrepancies but seeking to use her medical skills for the benefit of his community. Even before he nodded and moved the dishes off his end of the table so that he could laboriously copy down details and prepare a letter, Kate recognized that – for the moment – she was safe. And Vladimir's child would be safe with her.

Peace had come to England in drab dress. Even now, in 1920, with the second anniversary of the Armistice approaching, people in the London streets seemed shabby to Frisca's critical young eye, and the November sky was heavy with damp grey clouds. She stared down from the window of Robert's study, waiting for him to come home, depressed by what seemed a conspiracy of gloom against her.

Yet even when her spirits were low, Frisca herself illuminated the unlit room. There was a brightness about her which no temporary depression could subdue. Her golden hair and pale, clear complexion caught the eye, and an exuberance of personality, penetrated even her present sulkiness, uplifted the spirits of anyone who met her.

Frisca herself was well aware of the impression which she made even on strangers, and as a rule she traded on it shamelessly. But for the moment she was concerned to preserve the resentment she felt against her mother. She turned towards the door as she heard her cousin coming up the stairs, but did not move towards him.

A year earlier she would have rushed into his arms, demanding to be hugged and kissed. What held her back today was more than the sense of grievance which she was about to pour out. Ever since she was a baby Frisca had made it clear that Robert was her hero. Over and over again she had told him that she loved him. It had only been after her thirteenth birthday that she had begun to suspect that she
did
love him, in a manner quite
different from anything which her earlier extravagance of compliment might suggest. And so – although her mother would have found the fact difficult to believe – Frisca had grown shy in Robert's presence.

Robert, it seemed, had not noticed any change. But then Robert himself had changed in the year which he spent as a prisoner of war. Frisca had been at Blaize on the day he returned there. She had found herself staring at someone who was almost a stranger, looking far older than his twenty-four years, with the skin stretched tightly over the bones of his face and his sunken eyes withdrawn and blackened with tiredness. His hair had only just begun to grow again after the shaving made necessary by a series of operations. Its bright red waves, which she had once loved to ruffle, had been replaced by a prickly stubble, with a small circle of baldness remaining to indicate the entry point of the bullet which had so nearly cost him his life.