I wish you knew how much solace I have thinking of you not too far from me. I’m not going to tell you that you were right to come back to Leningrad, but… Did I mention that we were promised ten days off after we broke the blockade?

Ten days, Tania!

I wish until then there were a place you could be comforted. But you hang on until then.

Don’t be worried about me, we’re not doing anything but bringing troops and munitions in for our assault on the Neva sometime very early in the new year.

Wait till you hear this! I don’t even know what I did to deserve it, but I’ve received not only another medal but a promotion to go with it. Maybe Dimitri is right about me—somehow I manage to turn even a defeat into a victory, don’t know how.

We’re testing the ice on the Neva. The ice doesn’t seem strong enough. It’ll hold up a man, a rifle, maybe a Katyusha, but will it hold a tank?

We think yes. Then no. Then yes. Then one general engineer who had been designing the Leningrad subway gets the idea to put the tank on a wooden outrigger, flat wood boards on ice, sort of a wooden railroad, to distribute the pressure from the treads evenly. The tanks and all the armored vehicles would use this outrigger to cross. All right, we say.

We build the outrigger.

Who is going to drive the tank out on the water to test it?

I step up and say, sir, I’ll be glad to do it.

The next day my commander is not pleased at all when all five generals show up for our little demonstration. Including Dimitri’s new friend. Commander motions to me: don’t blow it.

So here I go, I get into our best and heaviest, the KV-1—you remember them, Tatia? And I drive this monster out onto the ice with my commander walking beside the tank and the five generals right behind us, saying, well done, well done, well done.

I went about 150 meters, and then the ice started to crack. I heard it and thought, oops. The generals from the back yelled at my commander, run, run!

So he ran, they ran, the tank broke a canyon in the ice and sank into it, like a, well, like a tank.

Me with it.

The turret was open, so I swam up.

The commander pulled me out and gave me a swig of vodka to warm me up.

One general said, give this man the order of the Red Star. I’ve also been made a major.

Marazov says I have become really insufferable. He says I think everyone should listen only to me. You tell me—does that sound like me?

Alexander

Dearest MAJOR Belov!

Yes, Major, it does sound like you.

I’m very proud of you. You’ll be a general yet.

Thank you for letting me give my letters to Oleg. He is a very nice, polite man and yesterday even gave me some dehydrated eggs, which I found amusing and didn’t know quite what to do with. I added water to them, they’re kind of—oh, I don’t know. I cooked them without oil on Slavin’s Primus. Ate them. They were rubbery.

But Slavin liked them and said Tsar Nicholas would have enjoyed them in Sverdlovsk. Sometimes I don’t know about our crazy Slavin.

Alexander—there is one place I’m comforted. I wake up there, and I go to sleep there; I am at peace there, and loved there: your subsuming arms.

Tatiana

2

In December the International Red Cross came to Grechesky Hospital.

There were too few doctors left in Leningrad. Out of the 3,500 that were there before the war, only 2,000 remained, and there was a quarter of a million people in various city hospitals.

Tatiana met Dr. Matthew Sayers when she was washing out a throat wound on a young corporal.

The doctor came in, and before he opened his mouth, Tatiana suspected he was an American. First of all he smelled clean. He was thin and small and dark blond, and his head was a little big for the rest of his body, but he radiated confidence that Tatiana had not seen in any man but Alexander and now this man, who entered the room, swung up the chart, looked at the patient, glanced at her, glanced back to the patient, clicked his tongue, shook his head, rolled his eyes, and said, in English, “Doesn’t look so good, does he?”

Though Tatiana understood him, she remained mute, remembering Alexander’s warnings.

In heavily accented Russian, the doctor repeated himself.

Nodding, Tatiana said, “I think he’ll be all right. I’ve seen worse.”

Emitting a good, non-Russian laugh, he said, “I bet you have, I just bet you have.” He came up to her and extended his hand. “I’m with the Red Cross. Dr. Matthew Sayers. Can you say Sayers?”

“Sayers,” Tatiana said perfectly.

“Very good! What’s Matthew in Russian?”

“Matvei.”

Letting go of her hand, he said, “Matvei. Do you like it?”

“I like Matthew better,” she told him, turning back to the gurgling patient.

Tatiana was right about the doctor, he was competent, friendly, and instantly improved the conditions in their dismal hospital, having brought miracles with him—penicillin, morphine, and plasma. Tatiana was also right about the patient. He lived.

3

Dear Tania,

I haven’t heard from you. What are you doing? Is everything all right? Oleg told me he has not seen you in days. I cannot worry about you, too. I’ve got enough craziness on my hands.

They’re getting better, by the way.

Write to me immediately. I don’t care if your own hands have fallen off. I forgave you once for not writing to me. I don’t know if I can be so charitable again.

As you know, it’s almost time. I need your advice—we’re sending out a reconnaissance force of 600 men. It’s actually more than a reconnaissance force, it’s a stealth attack with the rest of us waiting to see what kind of defense the Germans put up. If things go well, we will follow them.

I have to decide which battalion goes.

Any ideas?

Alexander

P.S. You haven’t told me what happened to Stan.

Dear Shura,

Don’t send your friend Marazov.

Can you send any supply units? Ah, a bad joke.

On that note, we must bear in mind that our own righteous Alexander Pushkin challenged Baron George d’Anthes to a duel and did not live to write a poem about it. So instead of seeking revenge, we will simply stay away from those who can hurt us, all right?

I’m fine. I’m very busy at the hospital. I’m hardly ever home. I’m not needed there. Shura, dear, please don’t go insane worrying about me. I’m here, and I’m waiting—impatiently—until I can see you again. That’s all I do, Alexander—wait until I can see you again.

It’s dark from morning until night with an hour off in the afternoon. Thinking of you is my sunshine, so my days are perpetually sunny. And hot.

Tatiana

P.S. The Soviet Union happened to Stan.