Beneath the Darkest Sky Page 24

  “Not surprising,” said Homer.

  “Maybe his brother did something wrong,” I said.

  “And,” said Robert, ignoring me, “when my comrade exited the embassy, NKVD scared the hell out of him, telling him to never be seen there again. Like Homer said, they have all of the embassies blanketed, looking for counterrevolutionaries. Don’t ever try to report someone missing! If they go missing, it’s not our problem! And these show trials are frightening, too. Important Russians are being tried and convicted left and right. Look at what happened to that splendid writer at Izvestia, Karl Radek. Don’t you see what’s happening, Prescott?”

  “Yeah, Prescott,” said Homer. “These trials are disturbing. I’ve attended many at the House of the Unions myself.”

  “Did you see any niggas on trial?” I sarcastically said, taking a drink of wine.

  Homer looked at me crossways.

  “I think it’s more complicated than we realize,” I said. “Yes, people are being arrested, but just as Premier Molotov once told me, people get arrested in New York City, too. There’s a battle for the soul of the Soviet Union going on here, the old hands versus the new.”

  “Two years ago,” said Homer, sipping his wine, “you sounded like this man I knew named Prescott Sweet. Now you sound like your wife.”

  “Well,” I said, “she’s a lot smarter than me, and this country has done nothing but treat my colored wife like a queen, my colored children as human beings, and my colored behind as something more than a nigger, so I guess I’m guilty of being blind, naïve, foolish, ignorant, and maybe even unsympathetic to men and women who are being arrested for committing crimes against a State that knows far more than I about people’s loyalties.”

  “Looks like you’ve done found a certain mood,” said Wayland, crossing his legs.

  “I’m tired of not being selfish,” I said. “The white man built our country, America, off of being nothing but just that—selfish. At least here I can have the audacity to be selfish and not get lynched for it. And to your point, Robert, do you ever stop to ask yourself why your black ass is still making tools and going home at night to a warm bed? And make no mistake, when you pull back the curtain in your bedroom, you won’t see any burning crosses or white men in sheets on horses yelling, ‘You uppity coon! How dare you order other toolmakers around and talk to our white women at the bars! How dare you act smart! You ain’t no educated engineer! You’re an abomination! Go back to Africa!’”

  “Hell,” said Homer, raising his eyebrows, “the only thing you have left to say, Prescott, is, ‘Can a brutha get an amen?’ ”

  The four of us laughed hesitantly, breaking a bit of the tension.

  “Thank you, Homer,” I said, looking at my watch, realizing the children had now been asleep for two hours. “Did all of that jive with you, Robert?”

  “Yes, I guess. But I don’t go to bars.”

  Homer, Wayland, and I looked at him and wanted to laugh. Robert was ever the engineer, only taking in the facts and calculating them accordingly. I loved him.

  “Where did you find this nice furniture, Prescott?” said Wayland, looking around. “It certainly doesn’t look like anything sold off by some wealthy Russian of yesteryear.”

  “No,” I said, looking at our empty plates, the fried chicken, mashed potatoes, and carrots I’d cooked completely devoured. “My friend Dorene Ellington has a particular passion for interior design. She considered it her pet project to furnish this place. All of it was shipped in from London and Paris. The Ellingtons are in Argentina now, but when they were living in Moscow, they spent at least two days a week here, so she certainly got to enjoy it.”

  “It’s very bourgeois,” said Robert, “which is wonderful, as far as I’m concerned, delightful to look at, but I wonder how the blue tops would interpret it, that’s all.”

  “You’ve told me this before, Robert,” I said. “The last time you were here.”

  “Please!” said Homer. “It’s much plainer in taste than that czarist shit I see in all the supposed proletariat homes of most State officials. All that gold and maroon! This décor here is nothing but dark wood chairs and floors, brown and cream upholstery, and pristine white walls. Makes for a very clean, crisp look, I must say, quite foreign to Moscow. And shoot! Your wife’s framed paintings hanging everywhere provide just the right amount of color to accentuate it all. NKVD would consider it a Socialist Realism paradise.”

  “This color scheme is what my wife likes, Wayland,” I said, sipping my red wine. “Our home on Strivers’ Row in Harlem had a similar décor. Dorene also happens to like the chocolate against white, so she and my wife had a ball picking items out. Dorene and Bobby sure are missed. And our children were so close to theirs.”

  “Speaking of missed,” said Robert. “I went by to see B the other day and she acted like I was with NKVD. When I asked about Lovett and when she’d last seen him, the look on her face went cold. She said she hadn’t heard from him at all. She said my guess was as good as hers.”

  “You know,” said Homer, “I went by there recently and she said the same thing to me. It’s concerning. Sounds like Lovett done found him a new wife down in Kuybyshev!”

  “You act surprised,” said Wayland. “Y’all know Lovett wasn’t ever one to sit still. Shoot, he probably finally got the State to let him leave for Cuba or Canada, places he’s been before. Probably found him a Cuban wife. Or, for that matter, he’s probably back in Dallas or New York City signing up new Party members. And hell, if there’s one thing I’ve learned about Lovett, he’s the last brother in the world any of us needs to worry about.”

  19

  Magadan, Russia

  October 1938

  IT HAD TAKEN TWO MONTHS FOR KOSKINEN’S LETTER ABOUT MY POTENTIAL spy mission to be met with a response. And it had come in the form of a cable from Moscow. Koskinen hadn’t sent the original letter as a telegram because of its sensitivity, which made sense. What he probably hadn’t expected was to be completely left out of the loop when the Kremlin responded.

  I was approached by a guard on a Wednesday morning while standing in the soup line with Lovett and James. He simply told me to come with him and I was led to a black vehicle, then driven down toward the shipping docks. Before we actually reached them, however, we turned left, well on this western side of the rocky cliffs. Navigating a narrow, tree-lined road, we stopped in front of a small, red-painted, stone building and exited. The inside of the building consisted only of a ten-by-ten room, which was dimly lit and had a large, square table in the middle. At the far end sat three important-looking men, all of them dressed in sharp, army green, military-style uniforms and hats.

  “Come!” said the guard, leading me to a chair directly across from them, my back to the door. “Sit, zek!” the guard continued, and as I did, he stayed standing beside me.

  “Ostav’ nas!” said the serious man sitting in the middle.

  “Yes, Director Pavlov,” said the guard, doing as he’d been ordered and exiting, leaving the four of us alone now.

  “Mne skazali, chto vy govorite Rossii,” said this man named Director Pavlov to me.

  “Yes, that is correct,” I said in Russian, noticing how much thicker he was built than the other two. “I do speak Russian.”

  “Well, then you will understand when I tell you that my name is Karp Aleksandrovich Pavlov,” he said, the other two staying quiet, all three sitting tall. “I am the director of the Dalstroi. It is not every day that I am asked by the Kremlin to handle such matters as this. The cables I received were very specific. I have received five alone in the past two days. A lot. Yes?”

  “Yes,” I said.

  “This entire situation is unique and complicated. But I’m sure you can help us sort it out.”

  “I can,” I said.

  “I have a fairly decent understanding of what you have proposed. But I have a few questions. Where does this Comrade Ellington believe you to be living right now? Does he know that you were a
rrested?”

  Before answering, I thought of Koskinen. Knowing he had helped me send the few letters to Bobby that I’d sent, and being solely responsible for suggesting that I tell Bobby that I was currently living in Leningrad, I had to think fast. I was sure they hadn’t a clue of Koskinen’s handiwork, and perhaps if they found out, he’d be in big trouble.

  “No,” I said. “He does not know that I was arrested. He must think I’ve just finished touring with my wife.”

  “Touring?”

  “Yes,” I lied. “Just before being arrested in Moscow, I had sent him a letter telling him that, beginning in December, we would be traveling with our children over the next six months—at least—to attend various art exhibits throughout Europe, and maybe even America, as she’d received many requests from some prominent art aficionados. Dealers! These people were offering to pay for our expenses, too.”

  “Of course,” said Director Pavlov. “She sells one of her expensive paintings in their bourgeois galleries and they take a nice percentage. These capitalists always arrange to come out on the better end. Continue.”

  “Apparently,” I said, “some of the important Russian artists who admired my wife’s work had spread the word about her paintings to Paris and London. The requests started flooding in. Socialist Realism was being viewed as a mysterious, fresh form apparently. All things Soviet Union are probably still viewed as mysterious and attractive to the outside world. Anyway, we were set to do a lot of European traveling beginning in December as far as Bobby was concerned.”

  “I see,” said Pavlov, nodding. “Maybe this Ellington thinks you are all in Berlin now.”

  The three of them looked at one another and wryly smiled.

  “Maybe,” I continued lying. “I had told him that our plan was to settle down in Leningrad upon our return to the Soviet Union, a country we absolutely fell in love with. So, he might be anxiously awaiting word from me now, but he is certainly not worried. He’s a very busy man who’s probably been doing a lot of traveling himself.”

  “The Kremlin would like for you to clarify one thing,” said Pavlov. “They need to confirm that he will be stationed in Germany as you’ve suggested.”

  “Let’s send him a cable,” I said.

  “Of course,” said Pavlov.

  “This will be a long and expensive cable message,” I said.

  “It’s okay,” said Pavlov. “We are paying for it.”

  “It should originate from Leningrad,” I said. “It should say, ‘Dear Bobby, I hope this message finds you, Dorene, and the children in good health. I have finally returned to Leningrad after being gone a bit longer than I’d originally anticipated.’ ”

  “Stop,” said Pavlov, handing a paper and pen to the man to his left. “You must write this down in English while you continue speaking to us in Russian. Then we can cable it to the Kremlin with specific instructions.”

  As the man with the pen and paper stood and walked around the table toward me, I continued writing the lie in my mind. I knew that when Bobby saw the words “finally returned to Leningrad after being gone longer than I’d originally anticipated,” he’d simply think I was referring to the lucrative engineering job at the port here at Nagaev Bay that I’d written to him about, per Koskinen’s orders.

  “Write down what you’ve already shared,” said Pavlov, as the man set the paper and pen in front of me and returned to his chair. “Then begin talking again when you’re ready to add on to the message.”

  “Okay,” I said, jotting it all down quickly.

  “You write fast,” said Pavlov. “This is good.”

  “Thank you. I’m finished and ready to continue.”

  “We are ready, too.”

  “Okay,” I said, my head down, as I prepared to continue writing in English while speaking in Russian. “The message should go on to say, ‘Loretta and the children are also exhausted. All of the art exhibits and travel have been taxing on their bodies.’ ”

  I paused for a second, recalling exactly what Koskinen had ordered me to write regarding Loretta and the children while I was supposedly working at Nagaev Bay. My mind had grown cloudy over what exactly I’d written down some nine months ago. After a few more seconds, I remembered that Koskinen had said, “Tell Bobby, however, that your wife is traveling with her paintings a lot with the children.” This, of course, had been supposedly happening while I was working at Nagaev Bay.

  “Sorry for the pause, Director Pavlov,” I said. “The message will then say, ‘I wish you were here in person for me to tell you this next bit of news. It is quite sad, I must say. I’ve tried like hell to reason with Loretta over the past three weeks, but there’s no changing her mind. She has asked for a divorce. No warning whatsoever. She claims to have wanted it for years, but hadn’t known how to tell me. Her emotion toward me has gone completely cold. It’s clearly over.

  “‘I guess now that her art has taken my place, she no longer loves or needs me. I also found out that she’d been secretly sending postcards to an art professor here in Leningrad from the various towns that hosted her exhibits. Perhaps she loves him. I look forward to going into more depth with you regarding this painful issue, and am actually hoping you will soon be taking that possible position at the embassy in Berlin at year’s end, as I would love to assist you. And I need the job.

  “ ‘The best thing I can do right now is grant Loretta at least a clean separation and leave, because the children can’t bear to see us argue anymore. From Berlin, maybe I can meet them every other month in Riga. They love riding the train. Please cable me back straightaway at this telegraph office and direct it to the new Leningrad office I’ve listed above.’”

  Before I continued writing, I looked up and asked Pavlov, “What is the address?”

  “We’ll take care of that,” he said.

  I nodded and continued talking and writing. “The conclusion of the message should say, ‘I will be stopping by the telegraph station daily until I hear from you. Your true friend, Prescott.’”

  I looked up and set the pen down. The three men were staring at me with deadpan faces. Maybe they were trying to catch up to my thinking.

  “You judged correctly,” said Pavlov. “You knew we would never let your family leave the prisons with you. But now this divorce explains to your comrade why they will not be joining you in Berlin. Now we just have to cable this to the Kremlin. They will study it and then forward it to the offices in Leningrad. From there it will be cabled to the embassy in Argentina, and then you must hope your comrade is indeed going to Berlin. If he is, your little plan just might get you out of here. Clear?”

  “Yes.”

  “But make no mistake. If you were to arrive in Berlin and decide to have your American government try to negotiate your family’s release, all of them would be killed immediately. Just a hint of any sort of inquiry by your government, even by President Roosevelt himself, about the condition of your family, would cause their deaths. Don’t ever try to get clever, Negro zek.”

  “I want to say right up front,” I said, forming a lie in my mouth, “that the important intelligence I gather will be worthy of everyone’s time and consideration. I am no fan of America. It’s a country that will forever hate the Negro.”

  “They love their ropes and white sheets,” said Pavlov. “What else do you have to say about the mission?”

  “Well,” I said, preparing to ask two questions I already knew the answers to. “Do you know which camp my wife and daughter are being held at? And where is it located?”

  Pavlov shuffled some papers in front of him, reading one. “They are being held at the MR4 Labor Camp over closer to Finland. It’s near the town of Kirovsk, which is on the Kola Peninsula.”

  “Thank you,” I said.

  “What else?” he said.

  “I have three requests right up front,” I said. “I believe Bobby will respond within the week. And based on his wife’s relationship with President Roosevelt, I am almost certain his origi
nal wish to be stationed in Berlin by the end of 1938 will be granted. It had been all but guaranteed long ago. Argentina was just a transition posting.”

  “Your three requests,” said Pavlov. “What are they?”

  “One!” I said. “As soon as you receive word from Bobby that Berlin is an affirmative, I want to be moved to the camp where my wife and daughter are being held. I want to confirm, with my own eyes, that they’re alive. Meanwhile, I can wait at that camp until we receive word from Bobby that he’s arrived in Berlin.”

  “Continue,” he said.

  “Two, my son must leave here with me and be allowed to remain at the camp with his mother. He is developing one sickness after another, and I worry about his long-term health. Three, I would like for a particular zek comrade of mine, Lovett Fort-Whiteman, to be allowed to remain here in Magadan and not be sent to the mines. Once I have completed the mission, I ask that Fort-Whitman be released along with my family.”

  “The Kremlin will decide whether to accept your preconditions,” said Pavlov.

  “Thank you. All I ask is that the assignment have a specified time length, one that would assure all of our releases in no more than one year. Otherwise Stalin must certainly know they will die in the camps if kept inside much longer than that. I can gather plenty of intelligence in twelve months.”

  “Stop,” said Pavlov. “You are repeating word for word all of the terms that were in Commander Koskinen’s original letter to the Kremlin. You must have it all memorized. I can’t blame you, but we know most of this already.”

  “Sorry,” I said, realizing I had indeed memorized everything word for word. Hell, I’d been walking around like a robot for weeks.

  “You must know,” said Pavlov, “I would very much like to take you behind this building and shoot you in your fucking black face. And if consideration of this mission weren’t being handled at the very top level, from our Great Stalin himself, I would do just that. I’m known as a madman. Everyone from the mines to this coast believes me to be so! Have you heard this?”