David Robbins - War of the Rats - A Novel of Stalingrad

“No, I not take your food. You soldiers.”

Chekov pushed the soup at Chebibulin.

“And you are Atai Chebibulin,” he said, “father of hero Sakaika. Here.”

Chebibulin looked into Chekov’s eyes. Tania watched closely. She saw the fearlessness of age in the old man’s face. She understood the nature of his courage, knew it to be simple resignation. He had nothing left to lose now that he had lost his son, nothing left except the days that make up a life that has given up its gravity. Tania looked at Chekov. She saw him match the old man’s stare, the daring of youth in his eyes, with not enough of life seen yet to understand what he stood to lose. She knew the hearts of both men, believed she had both of them beating inside her. She imagined that these two men kneeling in the center of the bunker, facing each other, were the two sides of a magic mirror. These are my two sides, she thought; I want to live, I want to die. She closed her eyes.

“No,” she heard Chebibulin say, “I not take your food. Tell me I not Donkey.”

Zaitsev answered. “You are not Donkey, Atai,” he said. “I make you a hare. You are fast and brave, and a friend.”

Tania opened her eyes. She smiled at Zaitsev, who was not looking at her.

“Yes?” Chebibulin looked at Chekov.

Chekov shrugged. “Yes.”

“Then I give you this.” Chebibulin reached into his coat for another bottle of vodka. He sat it on the floor.

Kulikov snapped his fingers. He popped his index finger against his throat, the Russian signal for vodka thirst. Chekov tossed the bottle to him. Kulikov pulled out the rag cork and tipped the bottle up.

Chebibulin lifted the empty soup canister, leaving the filled bowls on the floor. He hefted the container over his back and pushed the blanket aside, making to leave.

“Good night, hare,” Zaitsev said. “Travel safely.”

With his hand holding up the blanket, Chebibulin looked back at Zaitsev. “With all this drinking in your hares,” he said, “it’s OK. I stay Donkey. T’ank you.”

CAPTAIN IGOR DANILOV WALKED UNDER THE RLANKET, letting it slide off him as he stepped sideways into the bunker. He kept his hands jammed in his pockets, shaking his shoulders from the night chill outside. Tania was surprised to see the speed with which the little commissar could shimmy his body. He was like a horse or a Tatar dancing girl. She smiled at the image of a round, dark, and hairy Danilov in a veil.

“Mail call,” the commissar said. “The Hare has a letter.” He held up two wrinkled envelopes and dropped one in Zaitsev’s lap. According to Red Army custom, letters were to be read aloud so the gathered soldiers could share in the sentiments from home. The reader was allowed to edit bad news or sensitive words but was obliged to read out the bulk of the letter. Though mail was rare here on the front, Shaikin’s wife had managed to get several letters through. She and his children had been transported from their home in Georgia to the far east, to Novosibirsk in Siberia, part of Stalin’s industrial migration to save the Soviet Union’s factories from the Germans. She had become Tania’s favorite correspondent, telling her husband and, unwittingly, many in the sniper unit, about her garden, the poor quality of fabric available for the children’s clothes, the ominous beauty of the Siberian autumn and other details of life far from the fighting. Now Tania leaned forward in interest to learn who was writing to Vasily Gregorievich Zaitsev.

He fingered the envelope, seeming to admire it for the ardors of its journey to him. He held the letter with both hands.

“It’s from my unit in the Pacific navy. From Vladivostok.” All eyes were on him and his first letter. The Hare read:

“Dear Vasha:

We have been reading about you in In Our Country’s Defense. Who could have foretold our little friend, the clerk, would become such a hero?”

Zaitsev’s glare darted above the paper. The snipers looked at each other. Tania looked quickly from Shaikin to Kulikov. Both dammed back laughter.

“Yes,” Zaitsev said calmly, “I was a clerk. That means I can add and subtract and I know the entire alphabet. Do you mind?”

Zaitsev cleared his throat for silence. “…such a hero,” he repeated, looking up once more.

“We are here on the rim of the world, remembering you with affection and drinking toasts in your name. We keep up with your accomplishments through the newspaper and have a tally sheet posted on the kitchen wall. Every time you are mentioned in the paper, we drink that night to the latest number of your Nazi kills. You have gotten us all very drunk, Vasha, but we can stand more. We read where you still wear your navy shirt. Never forget, Vasha, you are a sailor like us. Your strength comes from the blue waves and the white foam, no matter how far from us you are fighting. We know you and your comrades will stop the Nazis in Stalingrad. Victory will be won. Good luck. We embrace you here.”

Zaitsev folded the letter into the envelope. According to custom, the snipers applauded. Tania thought, He’s not embarrassed by the attention. He’s gotten used to the spotlight.

Zaitsev sat, and Danilov stepped to the middle of the room, holding high the second, unclaimed letter.

“I have a letter here from a girl in Chelyabinsk. She has written on the envelope instructions that this must go to the bravest soldier. Who would that be?”

Tania looked around the bunker. Her eyes settled on Anatoly Chekov. He, like her, had not received a letter since leaving his home. His family was in the Ukraine, behind German lines. Anatoly often talked with Tania about his worries, knowing that she, too, had family in an occupied republic. Lately he’d shown signs of strain. The ripples of tension circled his eyes and played on his brow and lips. The ugly scene with Chebibulin; that was not the brave, easygoing poacher. Chekov was cracking. Tania and Shaikin had talked about it just the morning before, how his drinking had increased and his moods swung unpredictably. They spoke of the solitary regimen of the sniper, how it was so different from the foot soldiers’. Not enough sleep, constant assignments into danger along the front line, the brooding presence of competition amongst the snipers—despite Zaitsev’s and Danilov’s attempts to keep the unit free of it and dedicated to socialist ideals— and the killing. Even silently, from a great distance, you saw the magnified blood, the flailing of the unsuspecting. All this tired the spirit. Tania knew how barren was the place inside where the sniper turned for relief. It was as jagged and bleak as the bombed city waiting outside in the cold night. There was no break in the pressure, no release other than pulling the trigger. Over the past few weeks, Chekov had quelled the visions by trapping them in a bottle. Yet all the hares liked him despite his drinking. The liquor never quenched his courage even when it clouded his good humor.

“Anatoly!” Tania called out. “The letter is his, of course.” Heads nodded, Zaitsev’s, too.

Danilov walked to Chekov’s place on the floor. His legs were splayed in front of him; the toes of his boots shook nervously. Danilov handed down the letter and motioned Chekov to rise.

Chekov fingered the envelope. After a halting glance at the snipers, he tore the letter open.

“‘Dear brave soldier.’” He paused and looked behind him at the vodka bottle resting next to his journal.

“Read, Anatolushka,” Shaikin prompted him. “We want to hear what your new girlfriend says.”

Chekov licked his lips and continued:

“My name is Hannah. I do not know who is reading this letter, but I am sure you are the bravest one if it was given to you.