Chapter 10
Deep in the autumn of 1939, Mishin finally informed Braina that she was allowed to correspond with her relatives — but no more than one letter per month — and gave her the address of the orphanage where her children were being held. It was the first truly happy day in Braina’s life in a long time! She immediately sent the children the first message of news.
About three weeks later, Kim and Lena wrote back from Darievka, full of enthusiastic exclamations, affectionate words, questions, good wishes, and the repeated hopes of meeting.
Tears poured uncontrollably from Braina’s eyes as she read Lena’s repentant confession that only now she realized what a happiness it was to just live at home, with their family, with smart, caring, loving parents. And how she regrets that she foolishly did not appreciate it, capricious without reason, and sometimes even hurt her closest people in the world! Passionately and naively, the girl promised in the future, when the family came together again, to behave differently: to respect her parents, to take care of them, to be tolerant and tactful with all relatives and others.
Braina’s heart overflowed with sympathy, love, and gratitude for her dear daughter. How she wanted to press her to her heart, to comfort her!
Lena described in detail how she and Kim came to the orphanage, how they now live, study, and work. Then, with sincere delight, she went on to describe how the children were preparing for the 22nd anniversary of the October Revolution, how much love and gratitude they felt about their happy childhood to the great and wise leader, Comrade Stalin. Under the influence of official propaganda, the girl was completely oblivious to the blasphemous meaning of her words. She was proud to tell her mother that her own, Lena’s, poems about Stalin had been placed in the school newspaper:
“He is a man with the head of a scholar,
with the hands of a laborer,
He wears the clothes of a common soldier,
there is no father more beloved of the people!”
Completely unaware, Lena addressed these enthusiastic words to the one who had so awfully distorted her own fate, the fate of all her loved ones, and the fate of so many other decent and innocent Soviet people. The immature, naïve children’s lines reflected the worshiping that prevailed in the Soviet Union in those years, of the “great leader of all peoples,” practically the incarnate god-man.
In the barracks where Braina lived, this letter was the first news from the outside, interrupting a long, painful unknowingness, and furthermore the news from the children, for whom every woman’s heart ached the most. Strangers and acquaintances with tears in their eyes read and re-read the letter from Lena and Kim, which strengthened their hope for long-awaited good news from their own family. Many of the mothers of the friends Lena mentioned were in the same camp as Braina, and for them, this letter was no less joyful.
Even the poem dedicated to the leader was received with understanding and approval among the wives of “enemies of the people”. Braina repeatedly listened to them praise Lena for her patriotism and devotion to communism and Soviet power. The unfortunate women, repressed and humiliated, believed that Stalin knew nothing of the nightmare going on all over the country and that in fact, some “enemies” who had infiltrated the People’s Commissariat of Internal Affairs had brutally dealt with their husbands and then themselves. And if some of the female companions did not share this opinion and thought otherwise, they preferred to keep silent; for a real understanding of what was going on, it was easy to get an additional camp term.
With the beginning of the correspondence, Lena also cheered up; there was hope that the ridiculous charges against her parents would be reconsidered soon, that they would be acquitted completely and fairly, and that she would return to Minsk, to her former, such desired, normal life.
But a whole other year went by, and everything remained the same: her mother was in the same camp, not a word about her father, not a whisper! Lena began to think more and more seriously about the reasons for what had happened to her family, trying in vain to find an explanation. One day at school, right during class, these thoughts came over her spontaneously, and soon there appeared a new poem, “To Mother”.
You are not with me now,
You are far away now.
Why is it like that, I don’t know.
You are as pure as crystal,
You are true to the USSR,
I assure all the people of this!
You loved the country so much
And your work as well!
You tried so hard, teaching children,
So that their life path
Would be honest and clean!
You were wishing everyone good luck and happiness!
And now, for some reason,
You are there, far away.
Why is it like that, I don’t know.
To change the country,
There was no way you could
I swear it on my own head!
In Braina’s barracks, this poem was passed around to everyone, and her destitute friends, hardly holding back bitter tears, repeatedly rewrote it, memorized it by heart. Soon someone picked up a suitable motif for Lena’s poem – thus a new camp song was born, joining the many other ballads about love, separation, loyalty, and hope, created from the verses of prisoners and miraculously passed from one place of detention to another, and likewise from captivity – to freedom.
With each new letter from her daughter, Braina’s well-being and mood gradually improved. Lena’s sincere messages, full of love and tenderness, supplemented by touching scribbles and drawings from Kim, became the saving incentive, which was so needed by a mother’s soul tormented by adversity. A parcel from Ida, which had unexpectedly arrived from Minsk, added to her joy and which turned out to contain much needed warm clothes, soap, and sugar. They were accompanied by an address and a short note from Genya’s sisters.
The correspondence with her relatives soon took over all of Braina’s thoughts, dulling the grievous experiences of camp life. Her conviction revived and strengthened, that the cumulative meaning of her life was to endure, to survive imprisonment, and then to reconnect with her children, to find Joshka, and to do everything possible to help him!
Lena described the place where their orphanage was so colorfully and in such detail that before going to sleep, lying with her eyes closed on the bunk, Braina vividly imagined how she arrived in Shpola, then headed to Darievka, walked through the neglected park to the old mansion, climbed to the second floor and among the other children searched with their eyes for Lena and Kim. She joyfully rushes forward to hug them, but does not have time: everything disappears in an instant, like a mirage… And again her life is just the camp, barracks, the endless dreary grayness of everyday life…
In her return letters to her children, Braina mentioned neither the harsh conditions in which she was situated nor her emotional distress, because she did not doubt that the vigilant censorship would not allow “slander against the Soviet order” – all letters to and from the country were carefully screened – and that as a punishment they could ban her correspondence again.
And she did not want to upset the children either. She, a devoted and caring mother, and a professional educator, was weighed down by the guilt of not taking part in their upbringing. Therefore, as soon as the correspondence began, she began to persistently draw Lena and Kim’s attention to the eternal themes of good and evil, regularly discussing with them the good and bad qualities of people, referring to books she had read earlier and to new Soviet films that were occasionally shown in the camp club.
Analyzing the behavior of literary and movie characters, their positive or negative deeds, Braina was certainly interested in the opinions of her children and thus unobtrusively tried to influence their way of thinking, to bring up kindness, decency, and honesty in them. And from their sincere responses, she learned more deeply who they had become during the two years of forced separation. Lena discussed these vital issues with her mother with interest, talked about them with Kim, and was happy to note that they were all like-minded.
Braina constantly asked the children to write to her more about their lives, their studies, everyday life, work, hobbies. These details were very important to her: everything that Lena reported brought relief and joy. Braina could be assured about her children’s relationship; they never quarreled, were friendly, and attached to each other. Lena devotedly cared for her brother, and was always ready to help him with advice and action. The room where she lived with her friends became a safe space for Kim and a refuge from the sometimes overly aggressive and rambunctious boyish escapades. Their studies at school were easy for both of them, and Braina’s children went on from class to class with unwavering accolades.
Kim and Lena at the Darievsky orphanage. 1940
Both loved to read, although they had different approaches towards reading. Lena selected books according to the school curriculum or on the recommendation of the librarian. She took her time reading slowly, thinking for a long time, making notes.
Kim read everything he could get his hands on: fairy tales, adventures, fiction, novels, short stories, novellas… He started reading at the age of 9. He discovered for himself an enormous, diverse, and extraordinarily appealing world in books. Reading became not just a hobby, but a real passion for the boy.
Very great attention in the orphanage was paid to labor work and discipline. All the pupils, from small to big, had to work without any exceptions. Every day started with cleaning the premises. On Saturdays, the children also cleaned windows, took blankets, pillows, and mattresses out into the yard, and shook them to get rid of dust. After school, they tidied up the classrooms, worked in the vegetable garden, orchards, and in winter they cleared all the driveways and paths of snow. The older children were on duty in the kitchen and dining room, and taking care of the animals in the barnyard.
During the summer vacations, the orphans worked in the fields and orchards of the neighboring collective farm, gathering the remaining ears of grain after the harvest, harvesting vegetables, potatoes, and beets. They were told about the duty to work both in their classroom lessons and at pioneer assemblies, and during educational talks, which constantly glorified the free, joyful work of a conscious, active Soviet citizen, a master of one’s land, a builder of communism.
Lena took these appeals very seriously, tried to perform any task assigned to her carefully and conscientiously. She even did not refuse to clean the pigsty, which invariably caused nausea. “I have no moral right to refuse if such work is also necessary for our society,” the girl reasoned in a letter to her mother. Braina both felt sorry for and approved of her noble, sincere daughter.
Whenever the opportunity was possible, Lena and Kim tried to cheer each other with gifts. On days when Lena was on duty in the kitchen, Kim would go there at the appointed time, and Lena would bring him either a delicious bone with a fair amount of meat on it, or an oven-baked, sweet as honey, sugar beet.
In the summer in the orchards, little Kim often played the role of a living scarecrow; with a rattle and a broom on a long stick, he drove away voracious birds from the ripening cherries, apples, and pears. On such days, he provided Lena and her friends with the best juicy fruits.
In the fall of 1940, Lena had her first heartfelt secret; she met a young man, a student at the Kyiv Pedagogical Institute. And this is how it happened.
There was a tradition in the orphanage – every year at the end of August, before the beginning of the new school year, the celebratory “Pioneer bonfire” was held. For that occasion, in the evening, the whole orphanage staff would gather on a big clearing in front of a high pyramid of dry poles and brushwood, which had been prepared in advance. The director would make a report about the results of the summer period, about the tasks for the coming academic year, then the distinguished pioneers were awarded diplomas and gifts, and then, followed by amicable applause, they lit a bonfire. Dry branches quickly ignited and the fire rapidly flew to the top of the pyramid, making the children shout in delight. Soon the burning pyramid was collapsing, shooting up a shower of sparks to a new explosion of the delight of those present. When the fire calmed down, the amateur performances would begin, such as poetry readings, songs, dances, sports demonstrations. Usually, such a celebration lasted more than two hours and ended with a tea party with candy and cookies.
In 1940, guests from the pioneer camp for the children of railroad workers, which was located near to the orphanage, were invited to the traditional bonfire. The camp counselors were students from Kyiv. During the course of the concert, Lena sang the song “My comrade is flying away to a faraway place…” from the movie “The Combatants”, which was recently released. Everybody liked the performance, clapped a lot, shouted “Encore!”
Then one of the invited pioneer counselors came up to her, said he loved this song very much and complimented Lena for her emotional and soulful performance. Lena, of course, was pleased to hear kind words from a mature handsome guy. They got to know each other.
The young man turned out to be a final-year student of the Kyiv Pedagogical Institute, Veniamin Kushnirov. After meeting him for the first time and before the camp closed, Lena met him several more times, and together they wandered through the paths of the park, having many frank conversations.
Venya surprised Lena with his serious judgments about life, literature, and art. Just like Lena, he had a high opinion of the movie “The Combatants” and the actor Mark Bernes performance in it. However, when they talked about the hero of the book “How Steel Was Tempered”, which Lena had read three times and still couldn’t praise it enough, he didn’t seem very passionate, calling Pavka Korchagin a figment of the fantasy of a romantic of the revolution, though he admitted that the book was interesting.
The young people told each other confidentially about their fates. Venya’s parents were Party officials in Leningrad. After Kirov’s murder, when arrests began in the city, they hurriedly sent their 14-year-old son to Rostov to the home of an aunt, a lonely non-party teacher, strictly ordering him not to give any signs about himself and not to contact them until they reached out first. Sometime later, Leningrad acquaintances told the aunt that Venya’s parents were arrested and nothing has been heard from them for six years.
When it was time to obtain a passport, his aunt managed to arrange for Veniamin to be recorded as Russian and for the Jewish surname Kushnir to have the ending “ov” added to it. So he became Kushnirov, and now, thanks to these amendments, he was successfully graduating from the pedagogical institute, intending to teach in a rural school near Rostov. Veniamin hoped that this way he would obtain for himself the opportunity to live and work more or less peacefully.
Conversations with Veniamin also made Lena think about her future. She was in her final year of the 10th grade and she was to receive her passport with a graduate certificate in the following year, 1941, and then leave the orphanage to begin an independent life.
There was no doubt in Lena’s mind that she would need to continue her education at an institute to get a good occupation. She also understood that she would have to combine her studies with work in order to have the means to live. After consulting with her relatives, Braina, Genya, Solomon, and Ida, Lena concluded that the best thing would be to return to Minsk and enroll at the university or the Pedagogical Institute there. In Minsk, she would live with Ida, her family would help her get a job, and later she would take Kim out of the orphanage to wait together for their mother to return.
Such a plan seemed quite feasible, and Lena, among other things, reported it to Venya Kushnirov, with whom she now regularly corresponded at his request. In response, Venya unexpectedly invited Lena to come to him with Kim, promising to help her with her studies, work, and accommodation. He admitted that he liked Lena and expressed the hope that they would intertwine their fates in the future if she agrees.
Lena, though flattered by such an offer, especially since Venya also made a good impression on her, firmly replied that she was not yet ready to accept it, and therefore rejects it, and how the relationship between them would develop, as the saying goes, only the future will show.
The year 1941 came. The situation in the world day by day was becoming more and more tense. Nazi Germany had already invaded many European countries, including France, was at war with England, and from various sources, there were numerous warnings about Hitler’s plans to attack the Soviet Union. But Stalin stubbornly refused to believe them, considering them provocations, and stalled taking the necessary defensive actions.
The loudspeakers still played the bravura songs and speeches glorifying the might of the invincible Red Army, and in the movie “If Tomorrow There Is War”, the glorious Soviet cavalry, with sabers drawn, pursued and crushed the enemy in their own territory. A similar mood prevailed among the people. So Lena, like most Soviet people, made her plans, counting solely on a peaceful future. Meanwhile, the terrible war was already at the very threshold.