Andrei Makine - A Hero's Daughter

One day in autumn he was unable to get hold of money for drinking. The cold wind kept his drinking companions at home; there was a new salesclerk working at the store now; his neighbors laughed and slammed the door in his face when he tried to borrow three rubles. For some time he wandered through the cold, dirty streets, then went home and took his best suit, complete with all the brass, out of the wardrobe. For a moment he studied the heavy gilded and silvered disks, fingering the cold metal, and removed the Order of the Red Banner of War. He did not have the courage to try to sell it in Borissov. People knew him too well here, and no doubt no one would be tempted. He went through his pockets, gathered up ll the change, and bought a ticket to Moscow. He sold his medal there for twenty-five rubles and got drunk.

After that he went to Moscow almost every week.

The one thing he never touched was his Gold Star. He knew he would never touch it.

So it was that when they went through his clothes at the sobering-up station in Moscow they found two "For Gallantry" medals and the Order of Glory second class, all wrapped in a scrap of crumpled newspaper. On it Ivan had written in ballpoint pen: "ten rubles" for each medal, "twenty-five rubles" for the Order, so as to avoid any mistakes in his drunken state – all the more because the sale would have to be made quickly in a dark corner. The duty officer informed the criminal investigation department of this find.

In the morning they let him go. He walked along slowly, not really knowing where he was going, taking in gulps of fresh, blue air through his parched lips, his eyes screwed up against the dazzling March sun. He only desired one thing: to buy a bottle of liquor quickly and, without a glass, drinking from the neck, choking on it, to ingest a few lifesaving drafts. He felt through his pockets and took out the medals and the Order, unable to believe his luck. "They haven't taken them," he thought happily. "Hey! Don't they search you anymore at that station…?"

The militiaman detailed to catch Ivan red-handed made his move too fast. Ivan had just unwrapped his treasure. The dealer had not yet taken out his money. He saw the militiaman in plain clothes looming up in front of them and began yawning in a bored manner. "My, my, little father, so those are war medals that you've got there! No, that doesn't interest me. That's a recipe for ending up in the clink, you know. It's not my bag."

The militiaman swore in frustration, flashed his red card and indicated to Ivan a car that was waiting for them.

That evening he went home to Borissov. At the police station they had decided not to pursue it. To begin with he had not been caught red-handed. Besides, he was a Hero, after all. He traveled back on an overcrowded train. Sweating heavily and dazed with exhaustion from standing in line in Moscow, people were carrying great bundles of provisions. March 8, International Women's Day, was drawing near. Standing there, squeezed against a creaking door, Ivan was absently drumming on the smooth, round medals in his pocket and thinking: "If only someone would speak to me… There they all are, with their sour faces… Their mouths shut tight and their bags crammed with fodder… It'd be good to kick the bucket here and now. They'd bury me and it'd be all over and done with. Spring's on the way now, the earth's good and soft already It thaws quickly…"

From Moscow they sent a report on Ivan to the District Committee of the Party. They recounted the episode at the sobering-up station and the trafficking in medals. The matter went all the way up to the Party's Central Committee. "How's this! The Hero of Stalingrad has become an alcoholic who sells his war medals! And just as we're coming up to the fortieth anniversary of the Victory!" Furthermore Gorbachev's magic tricks were turning out not to be magic tricks at all; heads were beginning to roll. It was Year One of the Gorbachevian Revolution.

From the Central Committee they had telephoned to the Regional Committee, from the Regional Committee to the District Committee. The reproaches snowballed. The Party District Committee Secretary, having received a warning shot, nervously dialed the number of the Regional Military Committee. Ivan was summoned to it by a simple notice. The officer who saw him instructed him to hand over his army documents and his Hero of the Soviet Union certificate. "They're going to stick another bit of anniversary scrap metal on me," thought Ivan.

Without even opening the army papers, the officer handed them back to Ivan; the Hero's certificate he tossed into the safe with a brisk gesture and slammed the thick little door shut.

"For the time being your certificate will stay with us," he said drily. And in grave tones he added: "In accordance with the instructions of the Party District Committee."

In a futile impulse, Ivan gestured toward the safe, as if reaching for the little door. But the officer stood up and shouted into the corridor: "Sergeant, escort this citizen to the exit."

At the District Committee Ivan thrust aside the switchboard «operator who tried to bar his way and burst into the Party Secretary's office. The latter was talking on the telephone and when Ivan accosted him with a shout he put his hand over the receiver and said in a low voice: "I'll have you thrown out by a militiaman."

Having finished his conversation he gave Ivan a nasty look and intoned: "We shall be addressing a request to the higher authorities, Comrade Demidov, to seek the revocation of your award as Hero of the Soviet Union. That's all. This interview is at an end. I shall detain you no further."

"It wasn't you that gave me that award and it won't be you that takes it away from me," muttered Ivan dully.

"Precisely. It's not my responsibility It's within the competence of the Supreme Soviet. That's where they'll review whether a depraved alcoholic has the moral right to wear the Gold Star."

Ivan greeted these words with a heavy shout of laughter.

"No. Not the Star. You won't take that away from me, you bunch of bastards. Even the Fritzes at the camp never found it on me. Though they searched me enough times! I screwed it into the palm of my hand. They shouted: 'Hands up!' And I spread my fingers but it stayed in place. Look! Like this!"

And with a bitter smile Ivan showed the Secretary the five points of the Star embedded in his palm. The Secretary was silent.

"That's how it is, Citizen Chief," repeated Ivan, who was no longer smiling. "What? You didn't know I'd been a prisoner of war? Well, no one knew. If it had come out I'd have been rotting in a camp at Kolyma long ago. Go ahead! Call the Military Committee. Let those rats do a bit of research. They might find a little two-month gap in '44. And as for the Star, you'll never take it from me. You'll have to rob my corpse for it…"

Ivan could not bring himself to go home. He dreaded seeing again the empty coat stand in the corridor, the gray pile of dirty linen, the washbasin yellow with rust. For a long time he walked around in the muddy spring streets, and when he noticed someone coming toward him turned aside. Then he made his way around the furniture factory, beyond which there was already an expanse of open country, and emerged in a wasteland that smelled of damp snow. Close by, beneath a layer of spongy ice, a stream murmured softly On the sloping verge the snow had already melted in places, uncovering dark, swollen earth. This earth gave way underfoot in a soft and supple manner. And once more it seemed to Ivan not frightening but warm and tender, like river clay.

"I've lasted too long," thought Ivan. "I should have gone sooner. They'd have buried me with full honors." He realized that throughout that time he had been hoping for a brutal and unexpected end, an end that would have happened of itself and would have swept everything into the void, the dead apartment, the dark entrance where drunkards lingered, himself. That was why he was destroying himself with such abandon, almost joyfully. But the end did not come.