The Secret Speech - Страница 41

The two primary towers, the vakhta, were strategically crucial, constructed on high wooden stilts. The guards had already pulled up the ladders, making it impossible to scale their positions. Protected behind thick log walls, the top of each tower housed podium-mounted machine guns capable of firing hundreds of rounds a minute, a collective firepower far greater than anything on the ground. Leo had to draw their fire away from the prisoners. He took aim at the guard tower directly ahead. There was little chance his shot would be accurate enough to penetrate the gap in the log walls. He fired twice, shuddering under the massive recoil of the rifle. They stopped firing at the prisoners, redirecting their volley of bullets at him.

Ducking down, crouched against the floor, Leo glanced at Sinyavksy. He was in the corner, reading the remaining pages of the Secret Speech, calmly, as if nothing were amiss while his office was torn apart by gunfire. He looked up at Leo, reading:

— Let my cry of horror reach your ears: do not remain deaf, take me under your protection; please, help remove the nightmare of interrogations and show that this is all a mistake!

Sinyavksy stood up:

— This is all a terrible mistake! This should never have happened!

Leo shouted at him:

— Get down!

A bullet hit the commander in the shoulder. Unable to watch him die, Leo jumped up, knocking him flat. Landing on his injured knees, Leo almost passed out with the pain. Sinyavksy whispered:

— That speech has saved my life.

Leo smelled smoke. He rolled onto his back, taking the pressure off his knees. He stood up awkwardly, moving to the window. There was no more heavy gunfire. Through the smashed window he cautiously surveyed the zona and saw the source of the smoke. Directly underneath the base of the cabin was a fire, flames climbing the structure. Barrels of fuel had been rolled underneath and set alight, the cabin roasting like a chunk of meat at the end of a skewer. For the men inside there was no escape. Unable to climb down the ladder, the guards tried to squeeze out through the gap in the log walls. The gap was too narrow: one man was stuck, wedged in, unable to go forward or back as the fire took hold. He began to scream.

The second tower was trying to protect itself from a similar fate: shooting at the prisoners carrying materials to build a fire. But there were too many convicts, coming from too many sides. Once they were underneath, there was nothing the guards in the tower could do except wait. A new fire was started. Both towers had been defeated. The balance of power had shifted. The prisoners now had control of the camp.

An axe cracked into the commander’s door, a second blow, a third, the steel end jutting through the timber. Before they had a chance to break through Leo put the rifle down and unlocked the door, stepping back, arms up, indicating surrender. A small force of prisoners stormed the room, brandishing knives and guns and steel bars. The man in charge regarded his captives:

— Bring them outside.

The prisoners grabbed Leo by his arms, hurrying him down the steps, herding him together with the guards that had been captured— their roles reversed. Battered and bloody, they sat on the snow watching the vakhta burn. Columns of smoke rose up, blocking out a wide streak of sky, announcing their revolution to the entire region.

SAME DAY

SCRUNCHING HIS FACE IN CONCENTRATION, Malysh studied the handwritten list. He’d been told it was composed of the names of the men and women Fraera planned to murder. Since he was unable to read, the list appeared to his eye as nothing more than a collection of unintelligible symbols. Up until recently it had never troubled him that he couldn’t read or write, able only to recognize the letters of his klikukha, making him little more literate than a dog recognizing the call of its name. For this reason, during his initiation he’d been savvy enough to insist that none of his tattoos contain words for fear that his fellow vory might exploit his ignorance and print something insulting. Though it was forbidden under penalty of death to create a false tattoo, an outright lie, that rule might not prevent them making a joke at his expense, calling him Little Prick, instead of Little One.

He was smart and he didn’t need a certificate or a diploma to prove it. He didn’t need to read or write. What good were those skills to him? He didn’t expect a teacher to pick a lock or throw a knife. Why should anyone expect a thief to read? While that reasoning still made sense to him, something had changed. Embarrassment was inside him and it had begun to grow since the moment Zoya had taken hold of his hand.

She couldn’t know that he was illiterate. Maybe she presumed the worst, seeing him as little more than a chiffir-addicted thug. He didn’t care. She should be more worried about whether he was going to slit her throat rather than pass judgment on him. He was winding himself up. Breathing deeply, he returned his attention to the names in front of him — the retired Chekists. He knew from listening to Fraera that the list contained names, addresses, and a description of each individual’s crimes — whether they were an investigator, an interrogator, or an informer. Running a dirty thumbnail over each line, he could identify which column contained their names: that was the column with the fewest words. The column with numbers in it: that was their address. And by deduction the final column, which contained the most words, must be the description of their crimes. Who was he trying to fool? This wasn’t reading. This wasn’t even close. He threw the list down, pacing the sewer tunnel. It was her fault — that girl, she was the reason that he felt like this. He wished he’d never seen her.

Unsure what he was going to do, he ran along the tunnel, entering their stinking lair. Fraera claimed they were living in the remains of an ancient library, the lost library of Ivan the Terrible which once held a priceless collection of Byzantine and Hebrew scrolls. Illiterate and hiding in a library — the irony had never occurred to him before, not until Zoya arrived. Ancient library or not, he considered their base little more than a network of ugly, damp stone chambers. Avoiding the others, who were drinking as always, he made his way silently toward Zoya’s cell.

He retrieved the footstool and stood on it, looking through the bars. Zoya was asleep in the corner, curled up on her mattress. There was a lantern hanging from the ceiling — out of reach, always lit so that she was under constant scrutiny. Immediately Malysh’s anger changed. His eyes drifted over her body, watching her sleep, the slow rhythm of her chest rising and falling. Though he was a vory he was also a virgin. He’d murdered but he’d never had sex, a source of great amusement to the others. They teased him, saying if he didn’t use his prick soon it would get infected and fall off and he’d be nothing more than a girl. After his initiation they’d taken him to a prostitute, pushing him into the room and closing the door, ordering him to grow up. The woman had been sitting on the bed, bored, naked, goosebumps on her arms and legs. She’d been smoking a cigarette — a long stub of ash arching off the end — and all Malysh could think about was whether the hot ash was going to fall on her breasts. She’d tapped it onto the floor and asked what he was waiting for, nodding at his crotch. He’d fumbled at his belt, taking it off and then putting it back on again, telling her he didn’t want to have sex, she could keep the money just so long as she said nothing to the others. She’d shrugged, told him to sit down, they’d wait five minutes and then he could go, no one would believe he could last longer than that anyway. They’d waited five minutes. He’d sat on the bed and then he’d left. As he’d walked down the corridor, preparing his lie, she’d called out to the others that they’d been right. He’d chickened out. The vory had cackled like witches. Even Fraera had seemed disappointed in him.

Hearing someone behind him, Malysh spun around, drawing his knife. His hand was caught, fingers gripped, the knife taken from him. Closing the blade and handing him the knife back, Fraera leaned over his shoulder, looking into the cell:

— Beautiful, isn’t she?

Malysh didn’t reply. Fraera looked down at him:

— It’s rare that anyone is able to sneak up on you, Malysh.

— I was checking on the prisoner.

— Checking?

He blushed. Fraera put her arm around him, adding:

— I want her to accompany you on your next job.

Malysh looked up at Fraera:

— The prisoner?

— Use her name.

— Zoya.

— She has more reason than most to hate Chekists. They murdered her parents.

— She can’t fight. She’d be useless. She’s just a girl.

— I was just a girl, once.

— You’re different.

— So is she.

— She might try and run away. She’d shout for help.

— Why don’t you ask her? She’s listening.

There was a silence. Fraera called into the cell:

— I know you’re awake.

Zoya sat up, turning to face them. She spoke out:

— I didn’t claim that I wasn’t.

— You are brave. I have a proposition for a brave young girl. Do you want to accompany Malysh on his next assignment?