Klarissa-Larissa Mayorova - The Suitcase

‘Under Rzhev it was. There I got into a real meat grinder. I lay in the forest. Bullets whistled over my head, sideways, behind my back. I thought, so, that’s it: now the stray bullet, the bloody fool, will get me. Abruptly everything went quiet. Still, I didn’t get up. Some time had passed, and I heard someone breathing so fast, right into my ear. I looked up and saw a dog standing next to me, and the earth was covered with blood all around. There were more corpses on the ground than there were trees. I got up and wandered, the dog followed me. Abruptly, the dog stopped and walked in the opposite direction. I followed it. It led me to a severely wounded soldier. I raced to help him, but he only said, ‘Save the dog. I beg you. He’s special. He’d saved about five hundred men. Delivering a field first-aid kit to the wounded soldiers, that’s all that the dogs do. But this one by himself had dragged the injured men on sled-drags to the dugout during this winter. Totally white, he stays unseen on the snow. Bullets whistle, but he keeps crawling forward. Nothing can get him. His name’s Rudy.’ I gave him my word that I’ll keep this dog. And by that evening, the soldier had died.

There was so little life in Palych’s body that Vera could not hear him breathing – therefore, she did not notice and missed his last breath. Man’s tortured look stared fixedly somewhere in the distance. Vera observed his frozen gaze but continued muttering something inaudible, trying to understand at what second of her story his life ended. She touched his face with her hand and closed the man’s eyes. As a doctor, Vera must state the time of death, but still, instead, she continued babbling and squeezing his thin, lifeless hand with her trembling fingers.

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Translator’s note: Volokushi is a particular means for transporting goods, used by orderlies and nurses in the Great Patriotic War for the wounded Red Army soldiers’ transportation from the battlefield to the aid station or hospital. It resembled a sled and consisted of curved runners, covered with fabric and fastened with metal strips.

Translator’s note: Military nurses of the Soviet Union during World War II wore a triangular bandage, while a medical cap was considered a piece of the male medical form.