Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six

Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four

Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven

Chapter Twenty-Eight

mitri Dumatskoy sat on a wooden plank bed chained to the wall in an incarceration building attached to Cheka's Moscow Headquarters on Petrovka, not far from the Bolshoy Theatre. He was wearing the prison garb he was issued upon arrival: a coarse gray shirt with matching trousers, jacket and cap. He stared blankly across from him, a distance of one pace, to the wooden plank bed in the tiny cell. That bed was empty. Five minutes before, a man had sat on that bed staring blankly at Dmitri. The man had had his trial days before, and was waiting for his verdict to be carried out. Two guards had come for him. The man had gotten up off the bed and moved to the door where he turned toward Dmitri, and with the same blank expression on his face and in his eyes said, "They're going to shoot me now." Then, he disappeared beyond the door.

It was Sunday. Dmitri had been arrested at home on Friday afternoon. Zina was not permitted to accompany him to Cheka Headquarters. She protested bitterly and cried. Dmitri was on the verge of tears throughout the scene. Then, at the door, as the two Cheka operatives led him away, he did cry, profusely. Sasha was hysterical. There was growing concern that there could be something seriously wrong with the baby. Particularly in the last month, during all the problems the Dumatskoys were having, Sasha seemed to be crying far too much, eating and sleeping far too little. The presence of Ostavlyavich, Obyomov, and Feodosiya; compounded by Zina's questions about her relationship with Dmitri, which Sasha seemed to be able to sense, somehow - all contributed to a decline in the baby's health.

As Dmitri continued to stare at the empty plank bed in front of him, he wondered where Blok's poetry could be.

Nothing is reaching me from anywhere in this room. Not a line of verse, not a word. Is this a room? A little barred window up there to the left with something gray behind it. Ah, yes, the sky perhaps. Dmitri laughed and laughed. Then he stopped, as if caught at laughing when he shouldn't be laughing. His look became apologetic, then grave. He continued staring blankly. In his heart he knew that he had the status of a stranger in his own house. He and Zina had wandered into a desert of silence that hid a heart-breaking prospect lurking at the end of it. His thoughts he buried in that silence.

Nice fellows! Nikita and Fedka, I believe. Yes! One was from Kiev, no? I don't think I have the right, as a prisoner, to ask such questions anymore. No right any longer to analyze. Did someone tell me not to? Fedka, Nikita? Someone at my hearing? I lost my job for doing nothing wrong. That's it! Shall I be shot like that other fellow? Shpion will see to it! I must make preparations. We must leave Russia at once. Spring is next, so Zina and Sasha can pack light clothing for Germany. Professor Holtz can put us up for a while.

Dmitri's head suddenly began to pound violently. Sweat poured from every pore of his body. Then, he felt like he was freezing! He glanced to the left and perceived that blackness filled the space between the bars of the window. When his gaze was redirected to the wooden plank bed across from him, Dmitri saw that a reddish fog hovered there. He made a horrible face, and covered his nose and mouth with his right hand, as a disgusting stench seemed to come from the fog. Dmitri closed his eyes for a moment. When he opened them, V. V. Podly was sitting across from him on the wooden plank. From out of the fog, a hideously reddish smile began to form on Podly's thick lips. Dmitri felt himself shrink from the horror before him. He grew smaller and smaller in an attempt to escape his fear. Soon, he was hardly visible among the filth on the stone floor of the cell. Podly stood up. He was livid with anger. Had his prey escaped? Dmitri had been reduced to a speck of dust. Podly sprouted wings. Fangs extended from his rotted gums. His eyes boiled. He beat his wings violently, and the dust, dirt, and debris within the cell swirled around in cyclonic fury. Much of what had been in the cell blew out the barred window and scattered outside along Petrovka. Then, the cell burst into flames.

nya Drugo was putting dishes away in the apartment in Labaznaya. The Cheka clerk, Kariryev's wife, Tonya had cleared the table and washed all the supper dishes. She was sitting at the kitchen table smoking. Kariryev was down in the courtyard of the apartment complex helping his six-year-old daughter build a snowman. The other Kariryev child, a ten-year-old boy was in the living room of the apartment.

After nearly two weeks of being forced by Housing Commissar Podly to share her apartment with those four people, Anya was beginning to actually like them and enjoy their company. Although Anya was still deeply depressed, sad and angered over her husband's death, her suicidal ideation had abated somewhat. She had decided to go back to work at the Red Rooster, throw herself into the job, and take on more responsibilities, if available, even if it meant working during some part of the day. The Kariryevs were neat and clean, the children - Sofya and Anton, well behaved and pleasant. Tonya Kariryev was quiet and meek. She was almost forty years old, plump, with dark eyes and dark skin. She was originally from the republic of Georgia. She admired Anya for being so independent, having a rather exciting job out among so many interesting people. And she was very sympathetic to Anya's tragedy.

Zina and Sasha had been to the apartment that afternoon for a late dinner. Sasha cried most of the time. He took very little to eat. Zina was beside herself with anxiety. She also ate very little that afternoon. And with her husband in jail, her mental state, as well as physical health were rapidly deteriorating. Zina decided to go home, try to put Sasha to sleep and get some rest herself. Early the next morning she would go to Cheka headquarters and demand to see her husband, and find out what was going to happen to him.

The sun was setting in the clear sky. The angle of the rays showed Moscow to be a precious, shimmering jewel. The onion domes and cupolas of its churches were alive with a plethora of color. Moscow's blues, greens, roses, and silvers in a faded bouquet looked like something represented in the nerveless tempera of an old crumbling wall. And volume behind volume, the vegetation was massed, issuing up images like a vast mirage. It all seemed to vibrate from the hum of centuries. Soon the darkness would cause the Kremlin's structures to become portentous medieval silhouettes. Little Anton Kariryev had Anya's binoculars and was standing at the big window looking out at the spectacle. Suddenly, he began yelling to his mother in the kitchen,

"Mama, mama, smoke, fire! I see smoke, fire."

Anya got into the living room before Tonya.

"What is it, Anton? What do you see?"

Anton removed the leather strap from around his neck and handed the binoculars to Anya.

"Out there! See, see, smoke and flames! Where is it? What's wrong?"

The boy was jumping up and down in a seizure of excitement. When his mother came into the room, he continued to shout about what he had seen. Anya could see the smoke with her naked eyes. She zeroed-in on the source. She knew the city so well as it appeared to her from the window.

"A little to the north of the Bolshoy Theatre, let me see, could be Petrovka. Petrovka! The Cheka jail! Dmitri is there. Oh no, Zina."

"Your telephone is out of order! I called this afternoon, but, so I came to your house. I had to. Your father and some cronies, they were very drunk and nearly unintelligible, mumbling something about the fact that you were visiting someone with the baby. And that Dmitri had been arrested!!?? For what? How awful for you! I just wanted to see you, to set up a lesson, to see you. But now? Can it be that the world is truly mad? If only we could all set sail for the Aegean and never come back...Zina..."

The unsigned note had been slipped under the door to the Dumatskoys' apartment. Zina recognized the handwriting immediately: Uchitelnitsky. She began crying when she read the words, "...I had to see you..." And then nearly lost her composure to the extent that she almost dropped Sasha - when the Aegean Sea was mentioned.

Zina was alone in the apartment. Ostavlyavich, Obyomov, and Feodosiya had gone out to a tavern on Komsomolskaya soon after Zina and Sasha arrived home. Sasha couldn't stop crying. He seemed to be very ill. But Zina was so absorbed in Uchitelnitsky's note that she seemed oblivious to that fact. At that time, she put him in his cradle. She walked around the apartment in a daze, clutching the note and crying from time to time. Soon, Sasha's wailing became intolerable to her.

"Stop it, stop it for the sake of Christ! Do you hear!" she screamed, "I can't think with your carrying-on. I'm going mad!"

Zina collapsed to the floor. She cupped her hands over her ears to shut out the noise of her baby's distress.