ended up in a cell.
The sergeant looked me in the eye and said:
‘Stay here and wait!’
I looked right back at him, without concealing my hatred.
‘What the fuck am I waiting for? What’s the meaning of all this?’
‘For the end of the world, you piece of shit! If I tell you to wait, you wait and don’t ask questions. I’m the one who decides what you have to wait for!’
With that, the sergeant gestured to the soldier to close the door and marched off triumphantly.
Before locking me up, the soldier came closer and asked me:
‘What’s your name, kid?’
His voice seemed calm and not mean.
‘Nicolay,’ I replied softly.
‘Don’t worry, Nicolay, you’re safer in here than with them . . . Rest up; in a few days they’ll take you to the train that will take you to Russia, to your future unit . . . Have they told you where you’re going yet?’
‘The colonel said he’s assigning me to the saboteurs . . .’ I replied in an exhausted voice.
There was a pause, and then he asked excitedly:
‘The saboteurs? Holy Christ, what happened? What did you do to deserve that?’
‘I had a Siberian education,’ I replied, as he closed the door.
*
I was locked in that cell for three days.
There were lots of other people in the temporary prison, and every now and then I could hear them. Some would groan; many were silent; one was always begging for food. They passed us our rations, horrible stuff, in vacuum-packed bags. You couldn’t tell what was in them; the biscuits were all crumbs, probably smashed by something heavy. As the guard later confessed, the people ‘waiting for the train’ like me got the packs that had been damaged in transit.
‘But this food is disgusting, my friend, give me something better, just once. I don’t know – a piece of fruit?’ I was always asking the guard for extras, and once in a while he’d get me an apple, a peach, a couple of prunes.
‘Don’t be picky, kid. You have to get used to eating whatever’s around . . . Those dogs, in the place you’re going, they definitely won’t be waiting for you with piping hot dinners! You’ll see, the day will come when you’ll remember these biscuits as being the best thing in the world . . .’ He wasn’t being mean, although it was obvious that he was a little scared of me.
Every so often he’d open the little window and chat with me for a while. He asked me where I was from, about my family, and why my parents hadn’t paid the recruitment office to get me exempted from service. I was honest with him; I told him about my life and about my neighbourhood, Low River, and before long a sort of trust had been established between us.
I took care of my business in the latrine in the corner by the window. I was already familiar with the smell – it was the same as jail – but here I had no cellmates who smoked who could give me a match to burn some paper.
I asked the guard if he could give me anything and through the window he tossed me a bag of white powder, a bathroom disinfectant. I used it, but within half an hour the chemical odour became so strong it hurt to breathe – it was as if they’d thrown me into a vat of ammonia. I nearly passed out and I cursed with every breath.
On the evening of the third day, the guard told me that our train had arrived and would take us away that night.
I had decided to try to escape during transit.
I thought that if they put me in a jeep, I could jump out as it left the base.
At about midnight I heard a great racket, a car engine, and some voices. They started to open the cell doors one by one, calling out our names. Soon they opened the door to my cell, and in the corridor I saw a young officer staring at me. From the little stars on his epaulettes I could tell that he was a lieutenant. He called my name, his voice calm. When I replied, ‘Yes, that’s me!’ he responded in a tired but amicable tone:
‘From now on, boy, it’s better if you learn to reply like a real soldier. When you hear your name called, you should only say “Yes, Sir!” You understand?’ He looked at me with humility; it almost seemed as if he were asking me to do him a favour. Since I was thinking of escape, I decided to play along. I stood up nice and straight, like I thought soldiers were supposed to stand in front of a superior, and with a voice full of energy I said:
‘Yes, Sir!’
‘That’s it, very good. Now go to the door, there’s a truck waiting for you.’ And he turned to the next cell. I stared hard at his back and yelled:
‘Thank you, Sir!’
He waved his hand lazily, without looking at me, as friends do when they part ways after spending the day together.
From the hall, I could see a military truck in the courtyard, and two soldiers with their rifles aimed at me.
‘You! Get in the truck. Now, now!’ one of them shouted in my face.
I knew very well that once I was in there I wouldn’t have another chance to escape. I froze, as if struck by lightning. I still couldn’t believe that what was happening to me was real.
‘Get in the truck, I said! What, are you deaf?’ he taunted, pointing his rifle at me.
I had no choice, and so I got in. Twenty men climbed in behind me, then the armoured door closed and the truck took off.
Inside it was so dark you couldn’t see a thing. Some of them were speaking, asking questions: Where is the train? Is it far away? As if wherever the train was made any difference. Some of the men were calm; they said they already knew where they had been assigned. One said:
‘I don’t care. My father knows the commander at the base they’re sending me to. He set it all up; I’ll hide out for my whole term of service. I’ll pass the time with the country girls . . .’
As I listened to them talk, I realised that none of them felt responsible for his own life. I was surrounded by children. For many of them, military service was their first opportunity to be on their own, without their parents coddling them. It was a new experience, they said, an adventure. I couldn’t believe my ears. They were losing two years of their life doing something that none of them would ever have chosen to do, and in spite of all that they were happy.
After a few hours, we reached the railway station. It was enclosed by a red brick wall with heavy barbed wire on top. It reminded me of the sorting yard in the central prisons. The train was there on the tracks, with a long row of sleeper cars. Floodlights from the towers illuminated a square full of young men, like me, dressed in civilian clothes. Some carried bags, as if they were going on a holiday. There were guards everywhere, some with dogs; it was just like when they’d taken me to jail. I lost all hope of escape.
My only thought at that moment was procuring a toothbrush and a few other things I needed – I’d left the house without imagining
