Sapphire Skies (23 page)

I looked up from the novel for a moment and surveyed the sky. Valentin had left on a sortie with Colonel Smirnov and six other pilots to cover ground troops during an advance. By reading I could keep my mind off worrying about him. I wished that I’d gone as his wingman that morning. I could protect him from the Black Diamond if he was up there. And if for some reason I didn’t see the German in time, I would cover Valentin with my own plane and take the bullets for him.

The din of engines interrupted my thoughts, and Svetlana and I turned to see the planes returning. These days, to come back from a mission was triumph enough and I waited to see if the planes would do a victory pass over the airfield. But they landed straight away and from a high altitude. Something was wrong. I counted the planes: seven. One was missing. Whose?

I wasn’t supposed to leave my plane when I was in readiness-one but alarm bells were ringing in my head. I loosened my parachute and jumped down from the cockpit, straining my eyes to see the numbers on the planes. It was Colonel Smirnov’s Yak that hadn’t returned.

Valentin struggled out of his cockpit and staggered towards the hangar. He said something to Sharavin that made the mechanic’s shoulders slump.

‘Valentin!’ I called, running after him.

He turned, his face deathly pale. ‘Leonid … Colonel Smirnov … he went down in flames.’

Everything became hazy. I couldn’t speak. The look of despair in Valentin’s eyes was unbearable.

‘He fought to the end, Natasha,’ he said. ‘He aimed his plane for a German transport truck on his way down. I heard his screams on the radio as he was burning alive. He begged me to look after his wife and his infant son.’

A feeling, like a cold shadow, swept over me. ‘Valentin, did a fighter shoot him down or was it ground fire that got him?’

Valentin held my gaze. ‘It was the Black Diamond. The Black Diamond killed Colonel Smirnov.’

Valentin was made regimental commander and I was in a dilemma. The fighting had grown even more intense and Valentin needed every bit of his mental and emotional strength to focus on the task. Should I tell him about the Black Diamond in an attempt to alleviate my conscience, but risk him making errors in judgement that could cost other lives? I decided not to, for the same reason that I’d never told him about my father’s arrest and execution. Sometimes ignorance kept you safe. If I was arrested, at least Valentin could say that he didn’t know about my past or the Black Diamond. It wasn’t guaranteed to save him — but it might. I had no choice but to stay quiet.

Yet I was doomed.

I realised it one evening when I was heading towards my bunker after the last sortie of the day. Walking through a field of sunflowers to reach it, I caught a glimpse through the stalks of a black car on the other side and a man standing next to it, watching me. Our eyes met and my blood turned to ice. I knew the first time I saw him that I would not forget his gaunt face, red hair and cold eyes. It was the NKVD officer who had arrested my father.

As we stared at each other in recognition, I was tempted to fall to my knees and beg him to have mercy. If I must die, then let me die for the Motherland and not for crimes against the State. But when he turned away and climbed back into his car, I knew it was finished. My arrest warrant had been signed and my execution was imminent.

A
fter Natasha’s funeral, Orlov sat in a restaurant on Kutuzovsky Prospekt with his son, Leonid. Lost in his own thoughts, he hardly took in the orange interior or the cuckoo clock that chimed every fifteen minutes, or the smells of tobacco smoke and pork that lingered in the air. After fifty-seven years he had completed his quest: his beloved Natasha was buried and her honour restored. His work in space exploration was finished, his wife was dead, his son was a grown man. What was left for him now but to await his death? He wasn’t afraid of it. Orlov often thought that he had lived too long and should have died in the war like Natasha and Leonid Smirnov.

His son, sensing Orlov’s need for silence, ordered him beetroot salad and fish soup, and the grilled salmon with mashed potato for himself. He then occupied himself with reading the menu as if it were a fascinating novel.

Orlov turned over in his mind the last twenty-four hours before Natasha had disappeared, as if he might discover some fresh clue that he hadn’t recalled before. The death of Colonel Smirnov had hit him hard but he hadn’t allowed himself to grieve. He had an enemy to fight and a regiment that was now dependent on his leadership. There had been no time to rest as he coordinated attacks with other units, then flew missions himself. He’d hardly seen Natasha in those last days. She was one of the few surviving combat pilots with experience and he had relied on her to lead the most dangerous sorties.

The evening before she’d disappeared, Orlov had received an unexpected visitor. Spent from the day’s fighting, he had returned to his private bunker and switched on the light. The stature and moustache of the man who had been waiting in the dark weren’t familiar but the red hair and troubled eyes were. Orlov thought he was seeing a ghost. It was Fyodor, a man now, but unmistakable to Orlov, who had loved his brother.

‘I’ve done all I can to protect you,’ Fyodor told him. Orlov was too overwhelmed by the return of his brother to make sense of his words. It had been twenty years since he had seen Fyodor. What had happened to him in that time?

‘When you push the Germans back into their own country, don’t return over the border,’ Fyodor told him. ‘Get out. Do you understand what I’m saying? Don’t return to the Soviet Union. Take your fiancée with you.’

‘My fiancée?’

Fyodor leaned against Orlov’s desk and pulled the stub of a cigarette from his pocket. He lit it and offered it to Orlov. When Orlov declined, Fyodor took a few puffs before extinguishing the cigarette again.

‘Natalya Azarova,’ he said. ‘Don’t think we don’t know. We know everything.’

‘We?’ asked Orlov, sitting down on his bunk. His head was spinning.

‘The NKVD,’ replied Fyodor.

Orlov’s cool-headedness returned. So his brother was an NKVD agent? His gaze moved to Fyodor’s hands. They were trembling. His brother hadn’t come to reminisce about the past.

‘Stalin has wavered over signing an arrest warrant for Natalya Azarova many times,’ Fyodor continued. ‘He authorised her father’s execution without batting an eyelid, but he had a soft spot for her and left her alone. I don’t know why. He doesn’t show pity even for his own family. Natalya slipping through the cracks after her father’s death might have been overlooked, but for her to reappear as an ace pilot and heroine of the war is a provocation.’

Fyodor explained: ‘Her father was the chief chocolatier at the Red October factory. A harmless man who was in no way an enemy of the people. He was collateral in Stalin’s war of paranoia.’

Orlov had sensed that Natasha possessed a secret. But now the portrait of Stalin she hung above her bed was even more mystifying. Didn’t she know that Stalin was responsible for her father’s death?

‘Surely the NKVD isn’t planning to arrest her now?’ Orlov asked his brother. ‘She’s one of the top pilots of the air force! This regiment will go to pieces without her!’

Fyodor looked at him and sighed. ‘If only logic were part of it. But the Kremlin takes a different view. Children of enemies of the people aren’t supposed to amount to anything. Imagine if Natalya Azarova were to publicly announce that she is the daughter of a saboteur!’

Orlov rubbed his face. It was madness. Pure madness. Here they were on the point of defeating the Germans and Stalin was concerned about whether people were going to embarrass him or not.

‘Nothing will happen now,’ Fyodor said. ‘Natalya Azarova’s picture is pasted in the scrapbook of every schoolgirl. Stalin can’t afford to dishearten the Soviet people. But after the war … well, none of you heroes will be spared. I’ve been in Stalin’s inner circle long enough to know how he operates. You are competing with him for glory and he’ll get rid of you all. He’s already marked out Marshal Zhukov.’

‘Zhukov!’ Orlov stood and paced the floor. ‘Stalin should be kissing Zhukov’s arse! Every citizen saw that we were going to be attacked by Hitler’s forces sooner or later, but it came as a complete surprise to our great leader! If it wasn’t for Zhukov turning things around, the Germans would have finished us off by now!’

Fyodor grimaced. ‘Look, Valentin, the only person who will be credited with winning this war will be Stalin. The only heroes allowed will be dead ones.’

Fyodor picked up the jacket and hat he had left on Orlov’s desk.

Orlov frowned. ‘You’re leaving?’

‘I have to. I took risks to come here so listen to my advice.’ Then, as he had done the day that he’d left Orlov at the orphanage, Fyodor embraced his brother and kissed his cheeks. ‘When you get over the Soviet border, don’t come back,’ he repeated. With those words, he again departed from Orlov’s life.

After Fyodor’s visit, Orlov recalled, he wanted to rush to Natasha’s bunker to warn her. He had no reason to stay in the Soviet Union; he would escape with her across the border when they entered Germany if that would keep her safe. But he was halted by an order from the air-control HQ. The entire regiment was to be ready for combat in a few hours. Things sounded ominous. Orlov spent the rest of the night marking maps with Captain Panchenko.

The following morning, he appointed Alisa leader of Natasha’s squadron and took Natasha as his wingman. He was acutely aware that he could be killed in the next couple of hours and he had to tell her what Fyodor had said.

The Germans didn’t attack in the morning as expected. What were they waiting for? The pilots sat in readiness-one in their planes on the runway, becoming tired and thirsty as the day grew hotter. The control sticks burned their hands when they touched them. They must move to a hut on the side of the runway, Orlov decided. It meant they would have to dash for their planes when they were called to combat, but he saw no point sending his pilots into the skies dehydrated and with white spots before their eyes when the time came.

In one way the delay was a stroke of good fortune because it would be easier to speak to Natasha in the crowded hut than it would be out on the runway. The regiment was used to Natasha and Orlov putting their heads together and talking softly. Orlov sat down next to her, ready to begin his explanation, but he was distracted by her obvious unease. Her fists kept opening and closing and there were dark circles under her eyes.

‘Are you unwell, Natasha?’ he asked her. ‘I can take Bogomolov with me instead.’

Natasha flinched at the suggestion she should be replaced. ‘No.’

Then for some reason Orlov could not comprehend, she started to talk about Stalin and the time she’d met him. Orlov should have kept his cool and heard her out, but he too was agitated. ‘Listen, Natasha,’ he said. ‘There is something you should know. Stalin personally signed your father’s execution order.’

Natasha’s face crumpled and a look Orlov had never seen before came into her eyes. She drew away from him and into herself. He immediately regretted his haste but what else could he have done? He had only a brief opportunity to destroy her misplaced faith in that madman. But it was too late for him to explain more. The order for combat came. They had to scramble.

Sharavin and Svetlana were waiting for them on the runway by the planes. They helped them into their parachute harnesses and into their cockpits. Orlov tried to catch Natasha’s eye but she wouldn’t look at him. She turned to say something to Svetlana but the flares went up. They headed down the runway as a pair and lifted into the sky. It was the last battle they would fight together.

‘You loved her, didn’t you.’

Orlov glanced up to see Leonid staring at him. The waitress arrived and placed their food before them. Orlov stalled for time by picking at his salad. When Natasha didn’t return, he’d searched for her frantically. He would have gone on searching even at risk to himself if the political officer, Lipovsky, hadn’t interfered and had him transferred to a regiment fighting in Romania. He looked at Leonid. His son was a grown man. No, more than a grown man, Orlov realised: he was ageing. Yet Orlov couldn’t separate his adult son from the boy he’d wanted to protect. He shifted uncomfortably, his natural aloofness and his wish to be kind to Leonid warring within him. If he wasn’t prepared to tell Leonid the truth now, when did he intend to do so? Then he realised that Leonid hadn’t asked a question; he’d made a statement.

‘How long have you known?’ Orlov asked him.

Leonid smiled with a tenderness that stabbed Orlov’s heart. ‘Papa, I’ve always known.’

Orlov’s lip quivered. He was uncomfortable with Leonid’s sympathy. He did not deserve it.

‘Your mother was a good woman,’ he said. ‘And your father was the best man I’ve ever met. I wish you could have known him.’

‘You’re the only father I’ve known,’ Leonid said.

‘Yes, I suppose that’s true.’ Orlov opened the serviette, which had been folded like an opera fan, and placed it on his lap. ‘A poor excuse for one,’ he muttered. ‘I was always working.’

The men fell into silence as they ate. Orlov thought about his brother again. For years he had thought Fyodor must have defected to the West, or that he was still with the secret police protecting him, because Orlov was never arrested. Then, when Orlov was selected to train pilots for the space program, he was given access to his brother’s file. He discovered that in 1943, not long after Fyodor had visited him at the airfield, his brother’s body was found floating in the Moscow River. In his pocket was a list of the people he’d arrested over the years, with the words ‘Forgive me’ written next to each. Stepan Vladimirovich Azarov’s name was on it. With Fyodor’s death, Orlov lost the last member of his family.

‘Khrushchev wasn’t insane like Stalin, but he was ruthless,’ he said. ‘When your mother’s cousin defected to the United States and wrote critical things about the Soviet Union, Khrushchev wanted revenge. He persecuted other members of the family.’

‘Khrushchev liked you,’ said Leonid, repeating the story his mother must have told him. ‘So you married Mama to save her — and me.’

Orlov sighed. He was like a prisoner in his own head. He was full of remorse and yet he’d done the best he could at the time. He had helped Yelena financially after the war and made attempts to be a father figure to Leonid, but her critical situation needed decisive action. Natasha had been missing for ten years by then. Orlov had never let go of the hope that she would return to him, but he thought she would understand why he’d had to marry Yelena and adopt Leonid. He couldn’t bear for Colonel Smirnov’s wife to end up in a labour camp and his son sent to an orphanage. But it hadn’t been easy. He had found it difficult to be physical with Yelena, although she was still a young woman and must have yearned for affection. He felt unfaithful to Natasha and as though he was betraying Leonid’s father.

‘I’ve wasted my life,’ Orlov said.

Leonid looked surprised. ‘You were one of the developers of the space program. You made the impossible happen. You are a fighter-ace hero of the war —’

‘What do those things matter?’ Orlov interrupted, pushing aside his soup. ‘I was a terrible father and an inadequate husband. I was never there for either of you.’

‘You’re hard on yourself,’ replied Leonid. ‘You risked your position to save us. Yes, you were often away working in a job that you weren’t allowed to talk about, not even to your family. But there were good things too. You always spoke gently to Mama and kindly to me, you took me on adventures in the woods around our dacha, and you encouraged me to do well at school.’

‘Dear God, Leonid! A nanny could have done those things for you! I wanted to … be more involved but I felt paralysed.’

‘Maybe as a child I wished you had been around more, but now I’m a father myself I understand. No matter what good parents we hope to be, we will always have our own human frailties to deal with. You did your best. You lost your family in the Civil War, you were brought up in an orphanage, you only knew military life, you fought in a war where twenty-seven million of your countrymen died, including the woman you loved. Considering all that, it’s amazing you turned out to be so decent!’

Orlov looked at Leonid incredulously. Who was this fine, compassionate man? Was this little Leonid all grown up? Orlov appraised his son with new eyes.

‘You are all Yelena,’ he said. ‘I’m glad you had each other. If what I did kept the two of you together, then maybe I didn’t waste my life after all.’

Leonid drove Orlov back to his apartment. They were silent on the journey, but when Leonid parked outside the building and opened the door for his father he said, ‘Irina wants you to come to live with us. I’d like that too.’

Orlov waved off the suggestion. ‘Leonid, I’m eighty-three years old. Your family doesn’t want some useless old man hanging around.’

‘
Your
family,’ said Leonid. ‘And yes we do. Nina and Anton often talk about you. They would both like to know you better.’

Orlov was bewildered that Leonid could be so generous to him. He didn’t intend to take up the offer, but something in him wanted to hug his son, to thank him for his forgiveness.

After Natasha disappeared he had never confided to anyone that he had loved her, although of course Yelena guessed it. He was grateful Leonid had allowed him to admit it. Somehow it made him feel Natasha was alive again.