Erika Holzer - Freedom Bridge

Zurich is an old friend.

It was a long walk down the hill from the Dolder Grand Hotel to the center of the city, but Anna knew she wouldn’t notice the distance.

She never had. How many times had she walked up and down this hill and along these streets just to pass the time? To make the waiting easier?

Because Zurich had been the mid-point—a bridge that straddled Berlin and New York. Germany and America.

It had been hard, the waiting in Berlin, because there had been so much to wait for.

For fear to be abated with every passing day by the growing conviction that she was safe from the long arm of Soviet retribution. For the visits of the young American surgeon she had met in Berlin, who had assisted in Kolya’s operation. For the surgeon to complete the last days of his two-year training program under the greatest heart surgeon in Germany, perhaps in all of Europe.

Then it was on to Zurich and more waiting.

For papers to come through which “proved” she was a native-born German. More papers which “documented” that the young surgeon was the father of her three-year-old son, Kolya. And, finally, for two American passports. One for Anna Petrovsky, the other for Kurt Brenner.

The day they set sail for the United States, the captain had married Anna Petrovsky to Max Brenner, the doctor whose surgical skills had helped save her son’s life. The man who had given her son an opportunity to live that life to the fullest.

Kurt had never fully achieved that goal , she thought . His spectacular achievements—and they were spectacular—had always been marred by a need for approval and a taste for flattery.

He’d been flattered by his first invitation to a widely publicized medical exchange in the Soviet Union—had accepted without telling her in stubborn defiance of her request that he never set foot in the U.S.S.R. She had made him back down by the sheer force of her will, making it unnecessary to tell him things she thought he was better off not knowing.

“You’re unreasonable,” he’d said to her then—and many more times since. “What have the communists ever done to you that you should detest them so?”

Nothing special , she thought now . Nothing the communists haven’t done to countless others.

Through the years, she had persisted in her refusal to enlighten him—a mistake, she realized now.

Worse than a mistake. A monstrous injustice.

But for you, Kolya, I would have returned to the Soviet Union. But for you I would not have abandoned your brother, Kiril. I would not have left him with a sister who was an Enemy of the People and in no position to protect him.

As snow began to fall, Anna trudged up the hill to the hotel, tortured by the thought that she had never made inquiries about what had become of her middle son, Kiril. Max had convinced her that any attempt to make contact would have been painful, possibly futile—and worse, it might have endangered Kiril’s life. Max had been right, of course. But that was a long time ago.

By the time Anna had re-climbed the hill, she’d made her decision.

It would be unsettling to set foot on German soil after narrowly escaping the Nazis so many years ago, but the truth about her son’s lineage was long overdue.

What better time, what better place, than tomorrow’s Medicine International symposium in West Berlin?

As Kiril and Adrienne approached the executive jet that would return them to East Berlin, they were met by the pilot, who apologized profusely. There was a mechanical problem. One of the red wing lights was not illuminating and a short circuit indicator was appearing on the instrument panel. Dr. and Mrs. Brenner were welcome to board and wait with the pilot for the problem to be diagnosed and corrected, after which the Zurich airport would clear the plane for takeoff.

Kiril and Adrienne climbed the jet’s staircase, practically fell into some seats, and were soon asleep. Several hours later, the pilot gently nudged Kiril. The problem had been diagnosed as a burned-out circuit breaker, the part unavailable until now. The red wing light was functioning, the short circuit indicator normal. All that remained before departure was for the Brenners to fasten their seat belts.

“Will you please tell me your plan?” Adrienne implored as soon as their plane took off.

“I’ll tell you this much,” Kiril said evenly. “If anything goes wrong, you’ll wish you had stayed in Zurich.”

Lost in their own thoughts, neither one spoke for the rest of the flight.

At the sound of wheels jolting onto the runway, Kiril and Adrienne undid their seat belts. The plane rolled to a stop near an empty office building adjoining the terminal, and they prepared to disembark.

As he helped Adrienne out of the plane, Kiril could see an East German staff car that looked like an American Crown Victoria waiting for them on the tarmac.

Luka Rogov was in the driver’s seat.

Aleksei, rumpled and red-eyed from lack of sleep, surveyed them silently.

The office they entered, obviously having once belonged to some clerk, smelled of empty beer bottles. Papers were all over the desk and floors. Wastebaskets were overflowing. File cabinet drawers yawned open, as if they’d been ransacked. Paper clips, staplers, unopened mail—the detritus of a once-busy place—was everywhere.

As the others stood around surveying the mess, Kiril began clearing debris off the chairs, making space for the four of them to sit.

He pulled out a chair for Adrienne.

She sat down and cleared her throat. “Where is my husband, Colonel Andreyev?”

“So you know.” Aleksei sounded weary. “I found out barely an hour ago. Your husband is in good hands. He’s recovering from the effects of a large dose of Valium.”

He turned to Kiril. “You played your part to perfection,” he said in Russian. “I know what you did in Zurich—what you told the Western press. Dr. Brenner told me about the elaborate preparations you made to defect. What I don’t know is why you came back.”

“I’ll tell you as long as we include Mrs. Brenner in the conversation by speaking English.”

“Aren’t we chivalrous,” Aleksei said drily—but in English.

“Actually, it was Adrienne Brenner who realized something which hadn’t occurred to me when I took her husband’s place. I’d just assumed you and your KGB pals would capitulate in the wake of all that publicity. That you’d send her husband back on the next plane. But, as she pointed out, I had managed to fool her —his own wife—so how hard could it be for you to convince a worldwide audience that her husband’s defection was real? Dr. Brenner was in your custody. All you had to do was keep feeding him drugs and parade him before the cameras every once in a while.”

Aleksei smiled. “My compliments, Mrs. Brenner. You are a very discerning woman.”

“Perhaps you should compliment me for knowing what Dr. Brenner’s ultimate fate will be. You will take him to Moscow where he’ll be installed in some nondescript cardiac hospital—if he’s lucky. More likely, he’ll disappear in the Gulag.”

“Consider yourself complimented as well, Little Brother. But I still can’t grasp why you came back.”

“Once I realized what I’d inadvertently set in motion, I had no choice but to return,” Kiril continued as if he hadn’t been interrupted. “And since I’m under no illusions about what’s going to happen to me—”

Adrienne gasped. “You’ve traded your life for Kurt’s?”

Ignoring her outburst, Kiril said, “Just so you know, I explained most of the story to his parents in Zurich last night shortly before we left. They’re expecting their son in Zurich tomorrow. You have no choice but to let him go. I’ve no idea what the blackmail was about—something that happened a long time ago when he was in the army. But whatever Brenner was so desperate to hide, it can’t be enough to hold him here. If it ever was,” Kiril added caustically.