Finally the plane broke through the cloud banks, the turbulence vanished and the sight below pushed all thoughts of adolescent students out of Jennifer’s head. She was flying over the birch forests and ragged patchwork fields of the mighty Soviet Union. She gazed eagerly. An image formed easily in her imagination: two young women—her mother and her aunt—thin and desperate, still grieving the loss of their parents, tramping across this very landscape in 1945 following the path of the victorious troop convoys. How far had they walked to the Polish border? It must have been a wearying journey for the two refugees…
Suddenly a wedge of apartment blocks appeared on the horizon signalling the suburbs of modern Moscow. The plane circled once, the wing dipping to reveal wide straight highways, clusters of huts amid evergreen trees, and finally, the runways of Moscow’s Sheremetyev Airport.
“Hallelujah, we’re really here!” Paul exclaimed. Eve and Dawn giggled. David opened his eyes. A wave of relief flooded the passengers as the plane bumped to a halt. Applause broke out. One stewardess allowed herself a thin-lipped smile while the other busied herself in the galley.
The thunderstorm’s humidity hit them the moment the cabin door opened. The summer air was moist and the black clouds still rolled overhead, but for the group from Canada, now shuffling down the steps to the tarmac, no amount of bad weather could destroy this imperial moment. For some, such as Maria, it was a return to the land her parents spoke of, though not always fondly. For others, Jennifer included, it was their first glimpse of a powerful myth. She had never understood Winston Churchill’s quote about Russia—”a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma”—and suspected it was hyperbole, but as she stepped from the plane onto Soviet soil, she shivered. Churchill had met Stalin. He should know.
What was this country all about? She had first come to know it through the literature of long dead authors, Pushkin and Dostoevsky, considered dissidents in their time. Lately she had come to understand its dark underside through the secret writings of Alexander Solzhenitsyn, banned in the USSR, published in the west. Yet she had also studied its most glorious moments in the ecstatic language of its revolutionaries. Despite the ordeal of the landing, she felt eager, charged, ready to go everywhere, to see it all.

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excerpt

“Because you don’t want to face the consequences of not helping.” Shukshin glowered at the public official.
“What do you mean?” Pyotr became agitated. “Are you threatening me? If this is a joke it’s gone too far!”
“It’s no joke.” Pavel spoke again. “I need all of the documents: permits, propiska, passport, whatever is necessary, and I need them soon. As to why you should help me then I’m afraid it’s like Shukshin says. You don’t want others to know what we can tell them about you.”
Pyotr froze to his chair. It was not a joke.
To his surprise, Vera chimed in. They were all in it together. “You were seen…at the boathouse. You understand me?” He remained silent so she continued. “With the police chief’s wife—what’s her name, Tanya?—and we all know that the police chief would not like your activities with his wife, would he?”
Pyotr was stunned. It was all collapsing in front of him—the careful secrecy, the hidden assignations. “We…simply meet to talk. There’s nothing harmful….” He stopped. Vera was shaking her head. “We have photos,” and she pointed to a large American-style camera on the bed. “We took photos of you and Tanya together. Believe me, you were not just talking.”
“What! Devil take it! Give me those photos. You have no right…” He stood up, prepared to invoke some bureaucratic rule that would force them to comply—or what? Report them to the police? They sat politely while he worked through his tantrum, sputtered another oath or two and smacked the table with his fist. Finally he sat again and slumped in the chair.
“May I pour you another drink?” Vera inquired with a sweet smile as if he were a friendly visiting uncle. “I think it would be best to find the passport first, don’t you? That way we can make the other documents match whatever the name on the passport.”
“Yes, I suppose so,” Pyotr agreed at last. “I know of just such a widow who would probably give up a passport for a sum of money. I hope you people have some cash to pay her.”
“We’ll find the money,” said Pavel. “You find the goods.”
“And some cash for me, for my trouble in locating the passport,” the official continued. But Shukshin had only to glance at him quizzically and indicate the camera once more for Pyotr to understand that any cash benefit to him would not be forthcoming.

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excerpt

While the unlikely duo of Hank and Lona had been parting company, Jennifer and Volodya had also stood in the shadow of the exit sign once again making their goodbyes.
“Lona offered to take me to New York with her,” Volodya told her, “but I refused…”
“Of course,” Jennifer replied stiffly. “It would mean yet another border crossing and you don’t want that, now do you?”
Volodya’s face creased in a huge grin. “That’s not the reason I refused, my amazing woman,” he said.
He was teasing her, she realized. He doesn’t know what thin ice he’s skating on.
“She said she will contact me when my painting is sold. Ech, but I don’t think she will—if the painting sells for more than she paid me, then why would she let me know? She’s a business woman, right?”
He took Jennifer’s hands in his, kissed them, hoisted his backpack onto his shoulders and walked backwards through the automatic doors still holding her gaze. Then he vanished into the humid Montreal evening.
In Vancouver, it was obvious that some of the baggage had been inspected yet again. Jennifer saw almost a full roll of sticky tape covering the top of Chopyk’s suitcase as if the bag had not closed properly after the Customs had poked through it. She couldn’t help but feel sorry for him. One student missing and three artworks smuggled. Whatever happened, it had been the trip of a lifetime—though just not a lifetime she would care to repeat.
“Whoever goes through first should look for our bus,” called Chopyk. “Probably the driver will hold up a sign.” It seemed like yesterday when she had been the first one through the gate at Sheremetev and the adventure had begun. This time, she lagged behind, reluctant to face the world. Carefully, she propped her things up on a baggage cart. When she finally passed through the sliding doors right behind Linda, she noticed someone waving, someone with black bristly eyebrows and an armful of flowers. The man was not waving at Linda. It had been so long since they had been together, and so much had happened to her in the last three weeks, that she almost did not recognize her estranged husband.
“Michael, what are you doing here?” Despite herself, a full, warm feeling dispelled the black cloud, if only for a moment.

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excerpt

Volodya hung back to the end of the line. Jennifer knew now that he would not flee; he would brazen it out. Besides, he had the passport. Soon David was there beside her, as always, to support her.
“Pull yourself together,” he urged her, glancing at her worried frown. “You haven’t been implicated in anything.”
“They’ll ship him back to the Soviet Union.”
“No, I think it’s Lona that’s going down today.”
She was just beginning to calm down when one of the Americans approached her with a shout. “Hey, Jen. Why are they beating up on your guy?”
She could feel the blood rush away dizzyingly. “What do you mean?” Her voice had faded to a whisper.
“They’ve got him by that desk as if he’s gonna be there for life.” The man laughed crudely. “He doesn’t look like a terrorist with that little pointy beard.” With a huge sense of relief, Jennifer realized he was talking about Chopyk as “her guy.” Not Volodya. David let out a long breath. He was thinking the same thing.
The time crawled by. The line snaked through the shabby building with most of the passengers being released to mill about on the apron in front of Jennifer.
As Jennifer remained at her post, Volodya finally appeared from the building walking carefully, nervously, but his eyes held that same light of triumph as they had just a few brief hours ago. He joined her, wordless. David shook his hand.
The very last people to exit the building were Chopyk and Lona who had linked arms. Her face was crumpled like that of a pouty child. Chopyk stared straight ahead and explained nothing as he passed the group. They were ushered to their plane. Volodya resumed his seat beside Jennifer. The plane took off.
Once again, someone had spoiled the party and the tension filled the stuffy cabin. A swarthy young man—Kazak or Uzbek, maybe—walked down the aisle, stared at Lona with interest and finally addressed her in thickly accented English. Jennifer could not hear the exact words but soon the man had insinuated himself into the vacant seat beside the blonde who still looked dazed. He’s either security keeping an eye on her, or she’s found yet another admirer. At least, this time, the trouble was not about her, Jennifer thought with relief.

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excerpt

Ivan Nikolaevich, the second rate agent. Still, she wanted the director to know that she had been correct in her suspicions.
“Da, da, yes, of course,” nodded the functionary, pawing through his desk drawer searching for something. The man’s an idiot, she thought. This is the quality of worker who stands guard over the country! Saints preserve us, as my old grandmother used to say. Finally, the man produced another form, this one on blue paper. “In order to use the official phone line, you must fill in this form.”
“Phone him now!” Natasha raised her voice in hopes that the supervisor would hear her and look out his door. “I’m not filling in one more form!”
The man’s expression did not change but this time he abandoned the new form, picked up the receiver and asked her for the number. After some dialling, waiting and dialling again, he announced that he could not get through. He replaced the receiver quietly. “The supervisor will attend to your complaint tomorrow,” he told her.
Natasha struggled to control her breathing. “Tomorrow WILL BE TOO LATE. She’s passing through the line now; I can see her from here.” Indeed, Lona had already slipped through the passport control while they had been on the phone. The young man’s face creased in a troubled frown. “Very well, comrade. I will take the name of the tourist and her flight number and pass it on to the customs officials myself.”
Now we’re getting somewhere, Natasha thought. “I’ll go with you,” she said aloud. She took a certain perverse pleasure in being in on the moment of discovery. Of course the poor fool Chopyk would be angry with her…
“I’m sorry, comrade, that will not be possible,” the guard replied. “It is not permitted to pass through that door into the airport again. You must leave by the fire exit.” He gestured at a door on the far side of the room. “It is a regulation. Thank you and good day.”
Natasha drew herself up to her full five feet, four inches, cast one more withering glare at the man, and stalked toward the fire exit and out of the lives of the tour group from Canada.
“Documents, please.” Jennifer watched as Lona, standing in front of her, tensed at the command. She could feel her own apprehensiveness growing as she waited, her toes behind the yellow line. This first barrier marked Passport Control was a preview to the inspection room.

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excerpt

Ivan Nikolaevich, the second rate agent. Still, she wanted the director to know that she had been correct in her suspicions.
“Da, da, yes, of course,” nodded the functionary, pawing through his desk drawer searching for something. The man’s an idiot, she thought. This is the quality of worker who stands guard over the country! Saints preserve us, as my old grandmother used to say. Finally, the man produced another form, this one on blue paper. “In order to use the official phone line, you must fill in this form.”
“Phone him now!” Natasha raised her voice in hopes that the supervisor would hear her and look out his door. “I’m not filling in one more form!”
The man’s expression did not change but this time he abandoned the new form, picked up the receiver and asked her for the number. After some dialling, waiting and dialling again, he announced that he could not get through. He replaced the receiver quietly. “The supervisor will attend to your complaint tomorrow,” he told her.
Natasha struggled to control her breathing. “Tomorrow WILL BE TOO LATE. She’s passing through the line now; I can see her from here.” Indeed, Lona had already slipped through the passport control while they had been on the phone. The young man’s face creased in a troubled frown. “Very well, comrade. I will take the name of the tourist and her flight number and pass it on to the customs officials myself.”
Now we’re getting somewhere, Natasha thought. “I’ll go with you,” she said aloud. She took a certain perverse pleasure in being in on the moment of discovery. Of course the poor fool Chopyk would be angry with her…
“I’m sorry, comrade, that will not be possible,” the guard replied. “It is not permitted to pass through that door into the airport again. You must leave by the fire exit.” He gestured at a door on the far side of the room. “It is a regulation. Thank you and good day.”
Natasha drew herself up to her full five feet, four inches, cast one more withering glare at the man, and stalked toward the fire exit and out of the lives of the tour group from Canada.
“Documents, please.” Jennifer watched as Lona, standing in front of her, tensed at the command. She could feel her own apprehensiveness growing as she waited, her toes behind the yellow line. This first barrier marked Passport Control was a preview to the inspection room.

https://draft2digital.com/book/3562892