Sashenka by Montefiore Simon Sebag

Author:Montefiore, Simon Sebag
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Transworld

18

At her apartment in the Granovsky, Sashenka was playing with the children in the playroom. Carolina, the nanny, had made them toast and peach jam for tea and was now frying calf’s livers for supper. Vanya was meant to be home by seven but he was late, and Satinov and his heavily pregnant wife, Tamara, had already arrived for dinner.

‘What is it?’ Satinov had asked, as soon as he saw her anxious face.

‘Hercules, may I show you our new car downstairs?’

Sashenka knew that Satinov understood this code perfectly. Leaving the doll-like Tamara with the children, they took the lift down to the courtyard where an array of the most dazzling limousines were parked under the watchful eye of the janitor and an NKVD guard. Granovsky was now such a bosses’ residence that it had its own wooden guardhouse.

A gaggle of elderly men and women sat in a half-circle of canvas chairs in the evening light, warmed by the hot asphalt – the mottled men in trilbys, white vests and shorts, displaying creased old bellies and white-furred chests, the swollen women in cheap sandals and sundresses with floppy hats, broad in hip, white skin burning raw. The men were reading the newspapers or playing chess, while the women talked, pointed, laughed, whispered and talked more.

At their centre was Marfa, Vanya’s fishwife of a mother, a cheerful walrus in a straw hat.

‘Hey, there’s my daughter-in-law,’ Marfa cried out raucously. ‘Sashenka, I’m telling them about the May Day party and who turned up at the dacha. They can’t believe it.’

Her father-in-law, Nikolai Palitsyn, an old peasant, pointed proudly at Sashenka. ‘She talked to HIM!’ said Nikolai. ‘HIM!’ He raised his eyes to heaven.

‘But HE mentioned how much he admired Vanya!’ added Vanya’s mother.

Sashenka tried to smile but Vanya’s parents were a source of danger. The courtyard was in its way quite select: these were all the parents of bosses but any gossiping was reckless, and could prove fatal.

‘Hello, Comrade Satinov,’ called out the old Palitsyns.

Satinov waved, impeccably smart in tunic and boots.

‘I’m showing Hercules the new car,’ Sashenka said. ‘Can you believe them?’ she whispered. ‘How can we shut them up?’

‘Don’t worry, Vanya will keep them quiet. Now tell me what’s happened,’ he said.

‘Mouche called. They’ve arrested Gideon. I thought it was all over except for a few special cases. I thought …’

‘Mostly it’s over but it’s our system now. It’ll never be over. It’s the way we make our USSR safe, and we’re living in such dangerous times. Probably it’s nothing, Sashenka. Gideon’s always been a law unto himself. He’s probably got drunk, told a stupid joke or groped Molotov’s sourpuss wife. Remember: do and say nothing.’

A Buick drew up and the driver opened the door.

‘It’s Vanya.’

Sashenka was not surprised to see her husband looking bleary, unshaven and exhausted – it was the hours he worked, and the stress.

‘What is it?’ he asked, before he even kissed Sashenka or greeted Satinov.

‘I’m going upstairs to play with the children,’ said Satinov.

‘Did you know

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