Antanas Sileika - Underground

“Yes.”

They had come to the end of the rue St-Antoine where it met the vast traffic circle at the Bastille, a major hub that gathered up the cars and redistributed them.

It was oddly heartening to know that Lozorius had asked for him by name, but Lukas fought down the satisfaction of it. Charismatic types were appealing but could not really be trusted. They put you in danger. Unfortunately, knowing this did not diminish their appeal.

“Have you ever seen the column at the centre of this square?” Zoly asked.

“Not up close.”

“Let’s take a look.”

Lukas followed Zoly through the thin night traffic out to the column, which did not look like much at all in the dark. Zoly stopped to talk there.

“Well?” he asked. “Do you think you would consider going in again?”

“For Lozorius’s sake?”

“For the sakes of your colleagues. Say, Flint?”

“Do you know if he’s still alive?”

“I don’t know that he’s dead.” Zoly was watching the people who were standing around the column, mostly boulevardier types looking for action on the street.

“I do feel a sense of loyalty to them.”

“So you should. You took an oath to follow orders.”

“But I also took an oath before my wife. Who’s to say which oath is more important?”

“The one that came first.”

“You’re talking like a lawyer. I did what I could. I tried hard to get back on my own terms in the first year. Now my life has moved on.”

“Lucky you. And what do you intend to do with this glorious freedom of yours? You studied to be a teacher back in Lithuania, and in literature. Lithuanian literature! Don’t make me laugh. The only type more useless than you out here is a Lithuanian lawyer. There is no life for you unless you join the army or get a factory job. I can’t see you in either one, somehow. Besides, what’s more important than your country?”

“I don’t need to establish my patriotic credentials with anyone, least of all you. I was in Lithuania during all three occupations and I lived underground in bunkers for months at a time. I’ve killed more men than most soldiers, and many times I’ve come close to being killed myself. And meanwhile, what are you? A former diplomat. One of the grey men who takes a paycheque from the British and a pat on the head from the Swedes and tells himself he’s doing it for his country.”

A gang of five singing youths with arms over one another’s shoulders walked up to the column. Zoly touched Lukas on the elbow. They walked on. He didn’t seem to be upset by what Lukas had said. They strolled up the boulevard Beaumarchais.

“I don’t suppose money would interest you, would it?” asked Zoly. “Not that there’s all that much, but I know Monika isn’t working while she’s in school. If you went away, she could use something to help pay the bills.”

“If I went away, she certainly could use money. But that’s not the point, is it? Since I’m not going away, the question is academic.”

“Anyway, she’s a resourceful woman. Did you ever wonder how Monika came to see you speak?”

“You mean back in Germany, the first time we met?”

“Yes, I do. There were no other people there from France. There were no visitors from Italy. There were no people from any country but Germany, hardly anyone from another occupation zone. How do you think she ever got the travel documents to visit the camp in the first place?”

“She said she wanted to hear me speak.”

“And I don’t blame her. You were a very big star, the partisan hero. You made Lozorius a little jealous, you know. I think that’s why he went back into Lithuania so quickly. He didn’t really want you outshining him.”

“And that’s why you insisted that I report to him if I went back in then, right? To discourage me?”

“Oh yes. He had a need to be in charge. He must be in trouble if he’s asked for you now.”

“What kind of trouble could he be in?”

“I can’t really go into much detail until you commit.”

“But it doesn’t sound like I’m going to do that, does it?”

The street became seedier as the boulevard Beaumarchais changed to the boulevard du Temple and they drew closer to the Place de la République. Prostitutes called out to them from the other side of the street.

“There is one bit of information that Lozorius passed on that I think you should have, no matter what you choose to do.”

“What’s that?”

“It’s about your wife.”

“What about her?”

“Your first wife.”

“Yes?”

“Elena is alive.”

It took Lukas a few moments to understand what Zoly had said.

“Alive? Alive where?”

“Not in Siberia. Elena is in Lithuania. She was very badly wounded and put in a prison hospital.”

“Is she in prison, then?”

“Flint broke her out. She’s in Lithuania, and she’s free, but she’s in hiding.”

Lukas stopped and looked at Zoly. They were almost at the Place de la République.

“When did you find out about this?”

“A couple of weeks ago, but I couldn’t get here any sooner.”

Lukas slapped Zoly across the face, so hard that his gold-rimmed eyeglasses and the cigarette he was about to raise to his lips went flying. After a moment’s shock Zoly tried to say something, but Lukas slapped him again. He was going to do it a third time but Zoly raised his hands to protect himself, and Lukas took him by the lapels and pushed him back against a tree and then pulled him down to the earth.

“Tell me everything you know.”

“That’s about all of it.”

“Who told this to you?”

“Lozorius.”

“How did he get word out?”

“It was in his last radio transmission.”

“What else did he say?”

“Just that he needed you and that your wife was still alive. He said the set was damaged by water. It wouldn’t work properly.”

“Any more transmissions?”

“Two garbled ones.”

“Is it really him?”

“The radio operator on this end says it’s him. He can tell. Each person develops his own style on the telegraph key and Lozorius has his. It can’t be copied.”

“Has he been captured and turned? Is it a trap?”

“We don’t know.”

“So it could be a lie.”

“Anything is possible. We don’t know.”

Lukas slapped him again.

“Why are you hitting me now? What was that for?”

“For lying to me.”

“Do you hit everyone who lies to you?” Zoly asked. He rose when Lukas released him and retrieved his eyeglasses, and once they were back on, a little crooked, he looked for the cigarette that had been knocked from his hand. He picked it up from the sidewalk, reached into his breast pocket for a box of matches and lit it. He looked up at Lukas. “It might be time to reconsider the various vows you’ve taken.”

THEY SAT IN CHAIRS across from one another, a half-empty bottle of wine between them, but Lukas’s glass was untouched. The window to the courtyard was open and he could hear the children murmuring outside in the cobblestoned yard. What did children that age have to talk about so intensely and so quietly?

Secrets, probably, and confidences. From the very beginning one veiled and unveiled truths, and reality changed accordingly.

Lukas wanted the wine in the glass on the table before him, but he was resisting it. Already the luxury of wine seemed to belong to another world, a kind of dream world he had been living in until Zoly reappeared.

Lukas thought about things he had not thought about for a long time. Whether Flint and Lakstingala were still alive. Whether there was any news of his parents. Above all, how it was possible that Elena was still alive when Flint had seen her body lying on the earth outside the bunker.