“You’d rather we both perish?” she cried. “Is that what you would prefer? You’d prefer all the suffering, all the sacrifice, and no Leningrad at the end of it?” She shook him. “Are you out of your mind? You must go! You will go, and you will build yourself a new life.”

Alexander pushed her away and walked a few strides from her. “If you don’t keep quiet,” he said, “I swear to God, I am going to leave you here and go”—he pointed down the street—”and I will never come back!”

Tatiana nodded, pointing in the same direction. “That’s exactly what I want. Go. But far, Shura,” she whispered. “Far.”

“Oh, for God’s sake!” Alexander yelled, slamming his rifle on the ice. “What kind of crazy world do you live in? What, you think you can come here, fly in on your little wings, and say, all right, Shura, you can go, and I just go? How do you think I can leave you? How do you think it’ll be possible for me to do that? I couldn’t leave a dying stranger in the woods. How do you think I can leave you?”

“I don’t know,” Tatiana said, crossing her arms. “But you better find a way, big man.”

They fell quiet. What to do? She watched him from a distance.

“Do you see how impossible it is what you’re saying?” Alexander said. “Do you even see, or have you completely lost your senses?”

She saw how impossible it was what she was saying. “I’ve completely lost my senses. But you must go.”

“Tania, I’m not going anywhere without you,” he said, “except to the wall.”

“Stop it. You must go.”

He yelled, “If you don’t stop—”

“Alexander!” Tatiana screamed. “If you don’t stop, I am going back to Fifth Soviet and I’m going to hang myself over the bathtub, so you can run to America free of me! I’m going to do it on Sunday, five seconds after you leave, do you understand?”

They stared at each other for a mute, unspeakable moment.

Tatiana stared at Alexander.

Alexander stared at Tatiana.

Then he opened his arms, and she ran into them; he lifted her off her feet, they hugged and did not let go. For many silent minutes they stood on the Fontanka Bridge, wrapped around each other.

At last Alexander spoke into her neck. “Let’s make a deal, Tatiasha, all right? I will promise you that I’ll do my best to keep myself alive, if you promise me that you’ll stay away from bathtubs.”

“You got yourself a deal.” Tatiana looked into his face. “Soldier,” she said clutching him, “I hate to point out the obvious at a time like this, but still… I need to point out that I was completely right. That’s all.”

“No, you were completely wrong. That’s all,” Alexander said. “I said to you that some things were worth a great sacrifice. This is just not one of those things.”

“No, Alexander. What you said to me—your exact words to me—was that all great things worth having required great sacrifices worth giving.”

“Tania, what the hell are you going on about? I mean, just for a second, step away from the world in which you live and into mine, for a millisecond, all right, and tell me, what kind of life do you think I could build for myself in America knowing that I left you in the Soviet Union—to die—or to rot?” He shook his head. “The Bronze Horseman would indeed pursue me all through that long night into my maddening dust.”

“Yes. And that would be your price for light instead of darkness.”

“I’m not paying it.”

“Either way, Alexander, my fate is sealed,” Tatiana said without acrimony or bitterness, “but you have a chance, right now, while you are still so young to kiss my hand and to go with God because you were meant for great things.” She took a breath. “You are the best of men.” Her arms were around his neck, and her feet were off the ground.

“Oh, yes,” said Alexander, clamping her to him. “Running to America, abandoning my wife. I’m just fucking priceless.”

“You’re just impossible.”

“I’m impossible?” Alexander whispered, setting her down. “Come on, let’s walk a bit before we freeze.” She held on to him as they stepped slowly through the trampled snow down Fontanka to the Field of Mars. Silently they crossed the Moika Canal and walked into the Summer Garden.

Tatiana opened her mouth to speak, but Alexander shook his head. “Don’t say a word. What are we even thinking, walking through here? Let’s go. Quick.”

Their heads bent and his arm around her, they walked quickly down the path among the tall, bare trees, past the empty benches, past the statue of Saturn devouring his own child. Tatiana remembered that the last time they were here in the warmth, she had yearned for him to touch her, and now in the cold she was touching him and feeling that she did not deserve what she had been given—a life in which she was loved by a man like Alexander.

“What did I tell you then?” he said. “I told you that was the best time. And I was right.”

“You were wrong,” Tatiana said, unable to look at him. “The Summer Garden was not the best time.”

She was sitting on his bare shoulders in the water, waiting for him to throw her over into the Kama. He wasn’t moving. “Shura,” she said, “what are you waiting for?” He wasn’t moving. “Shura!”

“You’re not going anywhere,” he said. “What kind of man would throw off a girl sitting naked around his neck?”

“A ticklish man!” she shouted.

Exiting through the gilded iron gates on the Neva embankment, they headed mutely upriver. Weakening by minutes, Tatiana took Alexander’s arm and slowed him down. “Can’t walk our streets with you anymore,” she said hoarsely.

From the embankment they turned to Tauride Park. They passed their bench on Ulitsa Saltykov-Schedrin, walked a little farther along the wrought-iron fence, stopped, stared at each other and turned around. They sat down in their coats. Tatiana sat for a minute next to Alexander, then got up and climbed into his lap. Pressing her head to his, she said, “That’s better.”

“Yes,” he said. “That’s better.”

Silently they sat together on their bench in the cold. Tatiana’s whole body struggled with heartbreak. “Why,” she whispered into his mouth, “why can’t we have even what Inga and Stan have? Yes, in the Soviet Union, but together twenty years, still together.”

“Because Inga and Stan are Party spies,” replied Alexander. “Because Inga and Stan sold their souls for a two-bedroom apartment, and now they don’t have either.” He paused. “You and I want too much from this Soviet life.”

“I want nothing from this life,” said Tatiana. “Just you.”

“Me, and running hot water, and electricity, and a little house in the desert, and a state that doesn’t ask for your life in return for these small things.”

“No,” Tatiana said, shaking her head. “Just you.”

Moving her hair back under her scarf, Alexander studied her face. “And a state that doesn’t ask for your life in return for me.”

“The state,” she said with a sigh, “has to ask for something. After all, it protects us from Hitler.”

“Yes,” Alexander said. “But, Tania, who is going to protect you and me from the state?”

Tatiana held him closer. One way or another she had to help Alexander. But how? How to help him? How to save him?

“Don’t you see? We live in a state of war. Communism is war on you and me,” Alexander said. “That’s why I wanted to keep you in Lazarevo. I was just trying to hide my artwork until the war was over.”

“You’re hiding it in the wrong place,” said Tatiana. “You told me yourself there was no safe place in the Soviet Union.” She paused. “Besides, this war is going to be a long one. It’s going to take some time to reconstruct our souls.”

Squeezing her, Alexander muttered, “I have to stop talking to you. Do you ever forget anything I tell you?”

“Not a word,” she said. “Every day I’m afraid that’s all I’ll have left of you.”