Olga Chaplin: The Man from Talalaivka: A Tale of Love, Life and Loss from Ukraine

Chapter 12

Ashot of fire seared through him as the ancient syringe penetrated deep into his left arm. Peter knew it had to be sodium pentothal, the truth drug. Stalin’s NKVD had been culled, streamlined, given extraordinary powers. The senior secret police bureaucrat leaned patiently against a grubby table. The serum took little time to do its work. No point in teasing out superfluous material. Wait for the truth to be revealed. His patience will pay off.

Peter knew he had only seconds to warn Mikhaelo, to prepare him for the inevitable. He had to take the brunt of the interrogation, divert the secret agents’ attention from his friend. Blank terror registered in Mikhaelo’s eyes. Younger than Peter, he was less experienced, less worldly than his trusted friend. Peter’s army and veterinary experience had exposed him to lethal drugs, and their consequent effect on brain and body. This truth drug could kill its victims. He hoped, irrationally, that these were experienced agents. They might give more measured doses of the drug, not kill their victims outright.

“Divitsa xloptsi,” he called out, his voice confident, official, his colloquialism ‘fellows’ authenticating his Ukrainian origins. “Be reasonable. You can see from the documents we’re on official business. No need to examine my assistant here. I can confirm anything you want to know about my mission.” He felt the serum taking hold, constantly shooting pain like an electric charge. The NKVD men watched, and waited. “We had some bad vodka to keep warm, and missed our last stop at Omsk. We need to get back to headquarters in Romny, in our Sumskaya Oblast. We’re already behind schedule. These blasted trains. We never know when they’re arriving.” Peter prayed he had thrown enough doubt to slow down, or even soften the interrogation.

The senior NKVD agent rifled through Peter’s briefcase again and scrutinised the documents, then frowned. There were so many changes in the Oblasts these days. It was difficult to discriminate genuine from forgery. There was little proof of espionage with these men. And they were leaving to return to Soviet Russia. Still the doubt persisted. Eyes half-closed, the senior agent gave a moment’s reflection: eyed his captives coldly, impassively. His nostrils widened, sniggered exasperation. The cat had its mouse. The game might as well begin. He nodded to his junior. Mikhaelo screamed, shock and fear overtaking him as the syringe came at him.

It was too late for Peter to plead further. The truth drug was doing its deadly work. He was hallucinating, drowning in a huge whirlpool, monsters enveloping him, talking at him through an ocean of foghorns. His brain felt as if it had exploded. His eyelids fluttered, trying to clear his vision and brain. To no effect. He sensed his mouth moving, but couldn’t comprehend what he said. He, too, spoke through incomprehensible foghorns. The burning sensation in his arm had surged through his body, penetrated the circuitry of his brain. It was in over-drive, over-kill.

One current of his brain told him he was related to Nikita Khrushchev, Stalin’s right-hand axeman in the Ukraine. “You do know, fellows,” he cockily exploded, “that Khrushchev is my kym, my godfather, don’t you? How else do you think I’d be entrusted on our Bolshevik Party business so far from Romny?” His mind raced to the absurd. “And Kaganovich! It was he who suggested this journey anyway!” His voice almost broke in explosive conviction.

He had no cognition of their response. There was more fumbling through documents. The senior NKVD bureaucrat picked up the telephone receiver, paused without dialing, then slowly returned it to its cradle. He signalled to his junior. They spoke in muted tones, observing their prisoners. The interrogation had not gone well. Their prisoners had no recollection of any counter-revolutionary activity. Except for their stupidity in drinking bad vodka, common these days, there was no hardcore evidence they were a danger to the Party, or to the NKVD. Their mission was unusual. But the seasoned NKVD apparatchiks knew the Oblast headquarters decreed ridiculous undertakings these days, just to outdo each other to demonstrate their loyalty at the Central Party meetings. Stalin himself had been Commissar of Nationalities and travelled throughout Russia, wreaking havoc. Though highly unlikely, it was just possible, in these crazy times, Khrushchev had sent trusted ‘connections’ to check on ‘orders’ in these Oblasts. These idiots had gained nothing by their trip: no black market money, gold, or precious stones, the currency of illicit travel. It was frustrating. Innocent or guilty? Either way, their limited serum was wasted on these two drunken idiots.

Peter sensed, rather than understood, that he and Mikhaelo were being dumped outside the station, in the dark. The train’s engine was heaving in readiness, steam gushing in the icy air, billowing around them, inadvertently protecting and warming them and hiding them from guards on the platform. He pulled at Mikhaelo’s arm, held on to him as they crawled towards an open goods carriage and, hauling themselves in, they lay shivering violently from the cold and serum. Next moment, someone outside heaved the heavy door shut. They were prisoners, but at least they were on the train. The carriage jerked. The train was moving, returning to civilisation.

In the safety of darkness, the life-long friends slept, arm over arm, the deadly serum doing its work in the continuing nightmare. Demons tormented them as they slept in a drugged state, amid piles of sooty used sacks and supplies. Too afraid to raise their heads at Omsk, they lay semi-comatose until they saw civilisation. They gauged it was Ekaterinburg. Though the carriage was partly warmed by putrid steam from the massive locomotive, they were frozen and near starvation. The sodium pentothal had weakened them. They could not survive without food or water. The rancid scraps of rotting cabbage and beetroot leaves amongst the sacks were negligible, would not sustain them.

Ironically, their weakened condition aided their survival. Their depraved appearance, rags on body and feet, leaning heavily on makeshift rods, elicited kindness from unlikely passers-by on the station platform. This was still the Siberia of mystique and superstition, from whence Rasputin had emerged to cure the young Tzarovich, to break the Romanov curse. Religion may have been outlawed by the Bolsheviks, but the people’s hearts and minds had not much changed. “Hospode Pomelyue, Hospode Pomelyue,” Peter, still hallucinating, whispered in priestly liturgical blessing as each passer-by gave a morsel of food or a kopek. These tiny portions, yet so generous in these hard times, might just see them back to their own Sumskaya Oblast.

Saint Nikolas must have passed over them, pointing the direct route to the safety of the Ukraine, and Romny. Just in time. Hallucination and deep sleep had given way to shaking and starvation. Sub-zero temperatures froze them. Once he was assured his friend had survived, Peter let down his own defences. He was gripped by fever, and began to slip in and out of consciousness. He was vaguely aware of Mikhaelo crying, of people calling out, of being transported in some form of vehicle. Life slipped into a different phase yet again. No longer any monsters, or demons. Just quiet, muted sounds. And the sound of medical instruments. Sometimes pale-garbed people murmured, moved in a blur around him. He knew not how long he lay there. At times, he became aware of being raised, something gently sweet oozing between his cracked lips: natural antibiotic, honey, precious and costly. Still time passed. Several times heavenly white figures beckoned him to the light: he moved closer towards them, somehow came back. Months passed. Time passed. Time stood still. He was no longer certain where he was. Who he was.