Tom Smith: Secret speech

Raisa hurried across the wet silk, falling over, scrambling up and reaching the nearest shop. The door was locked. The tank was close behind. She swung the brick, smashed the window-large shards falling around her. She clambered inside just as the tank reached the beginning of the frothy silk. Raisa looked back, convinced the tank would ride across this unsophisticated obstacle with ease. But it immediately lurched to the side, no longer gripping, chomping up the slippery silk. There was no traction, no control. Looking up at the rooftop, Raisa saw the waiting forces amassing-a volley of Molotov cocktails crashed down around the tank, streaking it with fire. The tank angled its turret toward the tops of the building, firing a shell. Unable to control its position, the shell missed, racing into the sky.

Raisa hurried farther into the shop. The walls began to shake. She turned around. Through the smashed window she saw the tank veering toward her. She dived to the floor as the tank crashed into the shop front, the turret spiking through the ceiling above her, walls crumbling. The tank was wedged to a standstill.

In the smoke and dust, Raisa picked herself up, stumbling toward the back of the ruined shop, reaching the stairs only to hear the insurgents coming down from their rooftop positions. Caught between the tank and the descending force, she retreated behind the shop counter, drawing her own gun. With her eye level just above the counter, she saw a Soviet soldier open the tank’s hatch.

The insurgents arrived. Raisa caught sight of a machine gun carried by a young woman wearing a beret. The woman cocked her gun, raising it toward the Russian soldier, ready to fire. The young woman was Zoya.

Raisa stood up. Reacting to the movement, Zoya swung around, aiming the gun at her. Face-to-face after five months, surrounded by swirling brick dust and smoke, the machine gun sagged in Zoya’s hands as though it had become impossibly heavy. She stood dumb, mouth open. In the background the grimy-faced Russian soldier, perhaps no more than twenty years old, exploited the opportunity. He pointed his gun at Zoya. Reacting instinctively, Raisa aimed her TT-33, pulled the trigger, firing several shots; one hit to the young man’s head, flicking it back.

In disbelief at what she’d done, Raisa stared at the soldier’s body, her gun still pointing. Pulling herself together, aware that there was very little time, she looked back at Zoya. Stepping forward, she took hold of her daughter’s hands:

– Zoya, we have to go. Please, you trusted me before, trust me again.

There was conflict in Zoya’s expression. Raisa was pleased-there was something to work with. About to make her case, Raisa paused. Fraera had appeared at the bottom of the stairs.

Raisa pulled Zoya aside, taking aim. Caught unaware, Fraera didn’t defend herself. Raisa had a clear shot. She hesitated. In that moment she felt the barrel of a gun pressed against her back. Zoya was pointing the gun directly at her heart.

Having spent several hours looking for Raisa, fearing that she might be hurt, Leo finally understood that she must have left him in order to find Zoya. She didn’t believe Zoya would come home with him. Running in an attempt to catch up with her, he arrived at the Corvin cinema, the place where Zoya had been sighted. The cinema was a defensible oval building set back from the street, connected by a pedestrian walkway that had been blocked off and fortified. A fighter approached. Karoly had been left far behind, unable to keep up. Without his translator, Leo was saved from questioning by the arrival of a Soviet T-34 tank, now in the insurgents’ hands, a Hungarian flag hanging from the turret. The fighters surrounded it, cheering. Pushing through the crowd, Leo raised the photograph of Zoya. After examining the photograph one man pointed down the boulevard.

Leo set off running again. The boulevard was empty. He stopped, bending down-the entire street was covered in ripped silk. Patches of the silk were burnt through, smoldering, while others were soaking wet. He saw where the captured tank had veered off the street and smashed into a shop front. The corpses of four Soviet soldiers were heaped on the ground. None of them was much older than twenty.

There was no one else around.

Raisa closed her eyes, concentrating on the noises in the surrounding rooms-people running, shouting, items being dragged, orders being barked in Russian and Hungarian. Injured men and women cried out in pain. One room was being used to carry out crude treatments for injuries sustained in the fighting; another served as a mess hall for Fraera’s band of insurgents-the smell of antiseptic mingling with the smells of cooking, fried meat and animal fat.

Escorted from the tank at gunpoint, Raisa had barely paid attention to where she was being led, focused entirely on Zoya as she’d marched ahead, striding like a soldier, gun over her shoulder-the gun that she’d just pointed at Raisa’s heart. Arriving at an apartment block set back from the street and accessed through a passageway, Raisa had been taken to the top floor, hustled into a small room that had been hastily stripped bare and improvised as a cell.

The walls began to shake. Heavy armor was passing close by. Raisa peered through the small window. There were skirmishes in the street below. Directly above her head was the sound of feet on tiles, snipers moving into position. Raisa crouched by the wall farthest from the window, exhausted, hands over her ears. She thought about Zoya. She thought about the young Soviet soldier she’d killed. Finally, she allowed herself to cry.

Hearing footsteps outside the room and a key in the lock, Raisa stood up. Fraera entered. Whereas before, in Moscow, she’d been unruffled and in control, she now appeared tired, strained by the pressures of her operation.

– So, you found me…

Raisa’s words trembled with anger:

– I’m here for Zoya.

– Where’s Leo?

– I’m alone.

– You’re lying. But we’ll find him soon enough. This is not a large city.

– Let Zoya go.

– You speak as though I stole her. The truth is I rescued her from you.

– Whatever problems we had as a family, we love her. You don’t.

Fraera hardly seemed to register the observation:

– Zoya wanted to join me, so I allowed her to. She is free to do whatever she likes. If she wishes to go home with you, she can. I won’t stop her.

– It’s easy to win a child’s favor by allowing them to do whatever they want and telling them whatever they want to hear. Give her a machine gun; tell her she’s a revolutionary. It’s a seductive lie. I don’t believe she loves you for it.

– I don’t ask her to. You and Leo, on the other hand, you demand love. You’re both obsessed with it. And the truth is that she was miserable living with you, whereas she’s happy with me.

Over Fraera’s shoulder, at the end of the corridor, Raisa could see an injured man spread on the kitchen table. There were no doctors, little equipment to speak of, bloody rags and pots of boiling water.

– If you stay here, you are going to die. Zoya is going to die with you. Fraera shook her head:

– Concern for her well-being is no proof that you’re a parent. The fact is, you’re no more her mother than I am.

Raisa awoke. The room was dark and cold and she shivered, pulling the thin bedding around her. It was night. The city was quiet. She hadn’t expected to sleep but as soon as she’d lain down her eyes had closed. There was a plate of meat and potatoes on the floor, deposited while she’d been asleep. She reached out, pulling the plate closer. Only now did she notice the door was open.

Standing up, walking forward, she glanced into the hallway. The corridors were empty. To escape would be a matter of leaving the apartment, descending the stairway, then exiting to the street. Was it possible that Zoya had opened the door and broken the lock, wanting to help while at the same time concealing her involvement? The enterprise demonstrated stealth and skill, yet it was based upon a false assumption. Raisa wasn’t here to escape: she was here to bring Zoya home. Zoya would understand that. The method was inconsistent with her character, circumspect while she was bold and brash.