‘Sometimes,’ he says carefully, ‘with children, it’s better if the doctor prepares the ground. Or perhaps a nurse, if there’s a nurse whom he particularly trusts. It’s very important that Gorya believes we’re trying to help him, otherwise he won’t have the right attitude to his recovery. As you know, children see things differently from us. They can be very pragmatic, in my experience, as long as we don’t ask them to look too far ahead.’
‘ “Pragmatic”!’ Volkov gives an astonished bark of laughter.
‘Yes. It may seem a strange word to choose; but that’s been my experience. It’s vital that things are explained to him clearly, as much as he wants to know. Children suffer such terrors from the things they imagine. For example, he needs to know that he won’t see or hear anything of the operation. He will not see his leg severed from his body. Forgive me, these things are very hard for a parent. He must understand that he will not be alone, but will be looked after at every stage.’ Andrei clears his throat. ‘Perhaps I shouldn’t say this. But in the siege, I used to tell the children who were brought into us that they’d been wounded in battle, exactly like the grown-up soldiers. I would tell your son that this too is a battle. After all, he might have been injured in the shelling when he was a baby, and lost his leg.’
‘Gorya was not in Leningrad during the war. My wife was evacuated shortly before he was born,’ says Volkov, as if denying some parental neglect on his own part. A taste of bitterness fills Andrei’s mouth. They got their own children out, while ours – but he mustn’t think like that. The patient is the one who matters.
‘Life deals us these blows,’ he goes on quietly, as if Volkov hadn’t spoken. ‘Gorya must fight for his health, like a soldier, and think of his scars as battle scars. And he must believe that this is how you think of it, too. He is not a cripple, but a wounded soldier whose courage makes you proud.’
Volkov’s looking at him intently now. Not accepting what he says, but not pushing it away either. It’s the strangest moment of intimacy.
‘Those children – you said that you still see them.’
‘Some of them.’
‘Do they work? Have they families?’
‘Some do.’
Volkov nods, lost in thought. He has sat down again by the desk and his fingers drum on its surface. ‘You talk to him,’ he says at last. ‘I’ll take his mother home.’
‘My clinic begins in a couple of minutes and will last until six. As soon as it’s finished, I’ll be able to go and talk to Gorya.’
Volkov looks at Andrei with such absolute surprise that Andrei realizes how rarely this man doesn’t get what he wants as soon as he even hints that he wants it.
‘Surely your clinic can wait.’
‘Explaining everything to Gorya may take some time. It isn’t something I would want to rush.’
Volkov’s cold, narrow stare doesn’t waver. ‘Very well. I’ll come in again tonight, after you’ve seen him.’
The clinic overruns, as clinics always do, but it’s not too bad. By six thirty the last patient has gone, and the nurse is busy putting the files away and preparing the sterilizer. From the waiting room comes the clang of a bucket. The cleaners are in there already with their mops and brooms.
Time to go. He’s so tired. He snatched a glass of tea between patients but it’s strong coffee he needs now. No time to go to the canteen. His stomach is growling with hunger.
‘Dasha, you haven’t got anything to eat, have you? I need to go straight to another patient.’
She pauses, carrying an armload of buff-coloured files. ‘I’ve got an Alyonka bar in my coat pocket. Hang on a minute.’
‘Don’t go giving me Ilyusha’s chocolate –’
But she’s gone, and back a moment later. ‘There you are. You should go to the canteen for some soup, though, a bit of chocolate won’t keep you going.’
‘No time, I’m late as it is,’ mumbles Andrei, eating the chocolate.
‘You’re too thin as it is. Doesn’t Anna feed you?’
‘She’s a wonderful cook. I’m just one of those types who doesn’t pay for feeding.’
‘Go on, eat the lot. Ilyusha gets plenty of chocolate. I’m too soft with him. You want to give them everything, don’t you?’
‘Yes. Thanks, Dasha, you’ve saved my life.’
He’s managed to speak to both Brodskaya and the anaesthetist during the afternoon. The anaesthetist is going to see the boy later. Brodskaya was her usual cool professional self, as if this were a patient like any other. There are no blood-clotting or infection problems that might affect the operation, and the boy’s general health is good. They can go ahead tomorrow morning. In fact, she’s already got him booked in at ten thirty. The only problem was a shortage of matching blood – he’s O Negative – but she’s got that organized now. ‘It’s about time for another campaign on blood donations,’ she observed, frowning. ‘Supplies of the rarer groups should never be permitted to run down like this.’
Brodskaya really was admirable, he thinks now as he swallows the last of the chocolate. Disinterested, thorough and determined not to be panicked into anything less than her professional best. He only hopes he can match her … But the boy will be asleep if he doesn’t get moving.
‘Thank you, Dasha,’ he says again. Dasha gives him a quick warm smile and then goes on with what she’s doing. ‘See you tomorrow.’
‘See you tomorrow,’ she says, without looking up from the files.
Andrei recognizes the policeman, and he’s sure that the policeman recognizes him. It makes no difference.
‘Your papers.’
After he’s checked them he opens the door grudgingly, as if Andrei were trying to obtain entry on false pretences.
The boy is lying back against his pillows, watching the door. His eyes widen and a faint look of pleasure comes into his face as he sees that it’s Andrei. ‘I’ve seen loads of doctors today,’ he says. ‘They keep coming in and going out, and coming in and going out.’
‘You remember that I told you a lot of tests might be necessary.’
‘To make me well,’ says Gorya immediately. ‘Is my dad coming?’
‘I think he’s coming later.’
‘Mum went home. She usually always stays with me but Dad said she had to go home and rest.’
‘Probably a good idea.’
Andrei sits down in the bedside chair, in Gorya’s line of sight. ‘I have something to tell you, Gorya,’ he says, keeping his eyes on the child’s face. Instantly, a shadow of fear moves in the boy’s eyes. ‘The small operation you had. You remember what it was for?’
‘Taking out a little piece of the tumour so they could examine it in a laboratory,’ replies Gorya. Brodskaya has done her work well.
‘Yes. The surgeon looked carefully at your tumour –’
‘It’s not my tumour!’
‘All right. She looked at the tumour and took out some cells for the pathologist to examine – do you know what cells are?’
‘No.’
‘They’re like the building blocks that make up your body. But sometimes cells grow that don’t build your body or help it. Instead they harm it. They make swellings, which keep growing bigger, like the one in your leg. And these swellings damage the healthy parts of your body until they can’t work any more.’ He pauses. Gorya says nothing, but he licks his lips. ‘We could tell from the swelling on your leg, and from the X-rays, that a tumour was growing there. When tumours grow inside you they can hurt you very badly. That’s why they have to be removed.’
‘Then why didn’t that doctor take all of it out?’
‘Because she couldn’t. It’s too big. It’s deep in the bone and it has grown into the soft parts of your leg. Gorya, you have to understand that this tumour is very serious. If it’s left, it can stop you from living.’
Gorya’s face contorts with what looks like anger. ‘But I can’t stop living. I’m not old enough.’
‘No. You’re only ten, and we want
you to have many more years of life. We have to get rid of that tumour before it can grow any more, and make other tumours grow too. You understand, Gorya, it’s deep in your leg. It can’t be removed without taking away part of your leg.’
The angry look fades, as if a hand has been wiped over the child’s face. He stares at Andrei. After a long silence, a look of numb, shocked comprehension steals over his face. ‘What part?’ he whispers.
‘The part of your leg that goes from just above your knee. Here.’ He points on his own leg.
‘But my foot is on that part.’
‘I know.’
The boy is beginning to tremble. Suddenly and without warning, he throws himself across the bed, away from Andrei. His head buries itself in the pillows. His fists come up, covering his ears. He gives one small moan of pain, and then no more.
‘Gorya. Gorya!’
‘I can’t hear you,’ comes the child’s muffled voice.
‘I know you can’t. But listen to me all the same.’ Andrei speaks in the gentling voice he used to use when Kolya had a tantrum or a nightmare. ‘Listen, Gorya. You won’t be awake when it happens. You’ll be fast asleep and you’ll see nothing and feel nothing. When you wake up there’ll be a big bandage on your leg. You’ll start to get better. There are people here who will teach you to walk again on crutches, and a bit later on you’ll be fitted for a prosthesis – an artificial leg.’
There’s a squeak of trolley wheels from the corridor. A nurse doing the evening drug round. Don’t let her come in, not now. As if the nurse hears him, the squeaking dies away up the corridor. Why don’t they put some oil on those wheels? But perhaps it’s better for the patients to have some warning –’
‘Gorya.’
Gorya turns. His face is drawn with pain. It must have hurt a lot to throw himself across the bed like that. His lips are pressed tight together, and his skin is so pale it looks waxy.
‘Let’s get you more comfortable. Keep still while I put the cage back in place. You need to get the weight off your dressings.’
Andrei takes a little time over fixing the cage and rearranging the bedclothes. ‘There, that’s better. When the nurse comes I’ll ask her to make up your bed –’
‘I want to keep my tumour instead!’ Gorya bursts out. ‘I told you it doesn’t hurt. I’ll tell my dad and he’ll take me out of here.’
‘It doesn’t work like that,’ Andrei says. ‘The tumour won’t let you live. You want to live. So the only thing to do is get rid of it.’
Gorya slumps against his pillows. His chest heaves but there are no tears. He won’t have taken it in, not yet, thinks Andrei. Knowledge like this is too bad to come all at once. It sinks in gradually, stage by stage, like the realization that someone is dead.
‘I can’t – I can’t –’
‘What can’t you?’
‘I can’t – I can’t –’
‘Gorya, stop this. Take a deep breath and now tell me properly.’
‘I can’t ever be in the A team,’ says Gorya in a rush, and begins to cry.
At last, exhausted, Gorya allows Andrei to wipe his face and give him a drink of water.
‘He’ll be so angry with me. The running track cost so much money. He said if I got into the A team it would be the proudest day of his life.’
What Gorya doesn’t say, but clearly thinks, is that there’s no chance of his father ever being proud of a boy with one leg. And his mother won’t be able to stop crying, he’s sure of that. She’ll cry and scream and then his father will get angry.
‘You don’t know how angry he gets,’ Gorya mutters, glancing sideways at Andrei.
‘You mustn’t worry about that. It’s not your responsibility.’
But Gorya only shrugs wearily, as if he’d expected more of Andrei. We both know how things are, what’s the point of pretending?
‘We have to make you better.’
‘Yes, because it’s your job,’ Gorya points out. ‘But I’m not going to let you cut off my leg. I don’t care, I’ll run away and you won’t ever be able to catch me.’
He’s only ten. Death must seem impossibly distant. It can’t weigh against the fact of having your leg cut off, now, in this hospital, by people who said they were here to make you better. Andrei decides to play his last card.
‘Gorya, you will have to be a man. A soldier. I’m sure you’ve seen men who fought for our Motherland in the Great Patriotic War. Some of them have lost a leg, or an arm, but they are alive. If you ask them, they’ll tell you that life is much more important than the leg which they’ve lost. You must be brave now, and make your father proud of you.’
He’d believed all these words when he said them to Volkov earlier, but now, with Gorya, they taste ugly and useless. A child wants to run about and play. He’s not a soldier.
Gorya looks down, picking at the sheet. ‘He’ll never be proud of me,’ he mutters. When he looks up again Andrei sees that his face is empty of hope. The talk of running away is over. He knows that he can’t stop what’s going to happen.
Volkov will be here soon, and maybe his wife too. Andrei needs to see them first, before they go in to Gorya. Oh, yes, he’s the doctor and he can sort it all out. Tell the mother not to cry, tell the father to pat the boy on the back and say one leg more or less won’t make any difference to him. You’re such a fine doctor, you’ve got the answers to everything.
‘Will it be you doing it?’ asks the boy.
‘What?’
‘You know.’ Gorya makes an odd tentative motion with his left hand. Andrei realizes that he’s imitating the sawing of a log.
‘No, I’m not a surgeon. It’ll be Dr Brodskaya who does the operation. She’s very good. You’ve seen her, she’s the one who did your biopsy. You remember: she has her hair in a bun, and glasses.’
‘I don’t like her. Dad says she’s a Jew.’
‘She’s an excellent surgeon,’ says Andrei. The child can’t be blamed; he’s only parroting what he’s heard at home.
‘Can you be there as well?’
‘Not in the operating theatre, because it has to be very clean and they don’t need extra people around who aren’t helping. But if you like, I can come and see you before. You remember the room where they gave you anaesthetic to make you go to sleep?’
‘Yes.’
‘I could be there.’
‘If she tries to hurt me, you’d stop her, wouldn’t you?’
‘Gorya, that would never happen. She’s a doctor. Her job is helping people, not hurting them.’
‘My dad says you’ll always find a Jew at the bottom of every nest of spies and saboteurs.’
‘It would never happen, Gorya. You’re safe here. All the doctors who work in this hospital have made a promise to do everything they can to help the patients, and nothing to harm them.’
‘Have they?’
‘Yes.’ Gorya’s face relaxes a little. Andrei stands up. ‘I have to go now. Your mother and father will be here very soon.’
‘But you’ll come back tomorrow?’
‘Yes.’
‘You promise?’
‘I promise.’
‘That means you have to do what you say. Have you got a boy
at home?’
‘Yes, I have a boy at home.’
‘What’s he called?’
‘Kolya.’
‘Kolya. Is he older than me or younger?’
‘Older. He’s sixteen.’
‘And he’s your only son?’
‘Well – he lives with us as my son, but in fact he’s my wife’s younger brother.’
‘Oh,’ says Gorya, animated now, ‘then you haven’t got a son.’
‘I think of Kolya as my son.’
‘But he isn’t really,’ murmurs Gorya, on a faint note of satisfaction. His colour is better. If you didn’t know, you’d never guess this boy had just been told he had to have an amputation.
8
‘It’s done, then?’ says Anna.
> ‘Yes. What’s that you’re sewing?’
Anna has given up trying to hide the dress from Andrei until the day of the ball. There’s not enough time to work on it if she does that, and besides, it doesn’t seem important any more.
‘You know. It’s my dress for the ball.’
‘The ball. Of course.’
He looks exhausted.
‘The stew needs another hour. How about a glass of tea?’
‘Have we got any of that Stolichnaya left?’
She pauses for a fraction of a second then says easily, ‘Yes, I think there’s about quarter of a litre.’
Usually they open the vodka bottle only when there are guests. Anna pours a measure and hands the glass to Andrei, who tosses it back. She raises her eyebrows. He nods, and she pours another measure. This time he holds the glass in his hand, swirling the vodka gently.
‘It’s all right,’ he says, ‘you can put the bottle away.’
She puts the vodka on the table. Comments rise to her mind, such as This isn’t like you or Must have been a bad day, but she rejects them. Instead she smiles. ‘It’s almost finished,’ she says. ‘Would you like to see me in it?’
‘Yes.’
She picks up the heap of cloth and makes for the door to Kolya’s room.
‘Why can’t you put it on in here?’
‘It won’t be a surprise.’
‘But I like seeing you get undressed.’
‘I know you do. Enjoy your vodka, I’ll be back in a minute.’
The fabric still smells of new cotton, even after all that time put away in the chest. She pulls off her skirt and jumper, carefully slips the neck over her head and wriggles into the dress. It feels too tight, and she panics for a second before realizing that the fabric is rucked at the waistband. Carefully, she pulls it straight. The bodice and waist fit closely, as they should, and the skirt is just as full as she hoped. She moves her hips, and the skirt sways. Perfect. She runs her fingers through her hair. A dress like this needs a full petticoat, lipstick, high heels and fine stockings. Never mind, Andrei will get the idea.
The fabric moves against her legs as she goes to the door.