"Of course."

"Major Belov, how do you explain the actions of your wife? Does it seem at all peculiar to you that she would leave you here while escaping-"

"Wait, if I may, General. My wife was not escaping. She had come to Morozovo with Dr. Sayers at his request and with the permission of the Grechesky hospital administrator. She was under his supervision."

"I think that even under his supervision, your wife was not allowed to leave the Soviet Union," said Mekhlis.

"I'm not entirely convinced she has. I have been hearing much conflicting information."

"Has she been in touch with you?"

"No, sir."

"That doesn't trouble you?"

Blink. "No, sir."

"Your pregnant wife has disappeared, has not contacted you and that doesn't trouble you?"

"No, sir."

"The patrol units who checked the accompanying nurse's identification all adamantly deny that she had Soviet papers. While they cannot remember her name, they're sure her documents were with the American Red Cross. This does not bode well for you or your wife."

Alexander wanted to point out that it boded better for his wife, but kept silent. "My wife is not on trial here, is she?" he asked.

"She would be if she were here."

"But she is not on trial here," Alexander repeated. "You asked me if I was Alexander Barrington, the American, and I told you I was not. I don't know what my wife's whereabouts have to do with the accusations against me."

"Where is your wife?"

"I do not know."

"How long have you been married?"

"A year this June."

"I hope, Major, you keep track of the men under your command better than you have kept track of your wife."

Blink.

The generals studied Alexander. Stepanov's eyes never left him.

Mekhlis said, "Major, let me ask you something. Why would anyone accuse you of being an American if it weren't true? The facts that Private Chernenko provided us with were too detailed to be made up."

"I'm not saying he made them up. I'm saying that he is confusing me with another man."

"Who?"

"I don't know."

"But why would he point the finger at you, Major?"

"I don't know, sir. Dimitri Chernenko and I have had a difficult relationship over the years. Sometimes I thought he was jealous of me, angry at me for succeeding so far beyond him in the Red Army. Perhaps he wanted to hurt me, to sabotage my progress. He also may have had unrequited feelings for my wife. I'm fairly certain of it. Our friendship had cooled considerably in the years before his death."

"Major, you are exasperating the high command of the 67th Army."

"I'm sorry for that. But all I have is my record and my good name. I don't want both dishonored by a dead coward."

"Major, what do you think will happen to you if you tell us the truth? If you are Alexander Barrington we will confer with the proper authorities in the United States. We may be able to arrange a transfer for you back to America."

Alexander laughed softly. "Sir, with all due respect, I'm here on charges of treason and sabotage. The only transfer that will be arranged for me will be to another world."

"You're wrong, Major. We are reasonable men."

"Surely, if all it took was for me to say I am from America, or England, or France in order to be transferred back to the country of my choice, what would stop any of us?"

"Mother Russia, that's what!" exclaimed Mekhlis. "Your allegiance to your country."

"It is that allegiance, sir, that is stopping me from telling you I am an American."

Mekhlis took off his pince-nez and looked Alexander over. "Come closer to the table, Major Belov. Let me take a good look at you."

Alexander stepped forward until he was at the edge of the tall desk. He didn't need to straighten up. He was already straightened. Unwaveringly he stared into Mekhlis's face. Mekhlis stared silently back and finally said, "Major, I will ask you one more time, but before you hastily reply as you have been doing, I am going to give you thirty minutes to think about your answer. You will be taken outside, and then brought back here and asked one last time. These are the questions I am putting before you. Are you Alexander Barrington, son of Jane and Harold Barrington of the United States? Were you arrested for crimes against the Motherland in 1936 and did you escape while en route to your final destination in Vladivostok? Did you, under the false name of Alexander Belov, infiltrate the officer ranks of the Red Army in 1937 after graduating from secondary school? Did you attempt to desert the Red Army and escape through Karelia during the war with Finland in 1940, only to be stopped by Dimitri Chernenko? Have you been a double agent during your seven years in the Red Army? No, no, don't answer. You have thirty minutes."

Alexander was led out of the room and outside, outside! He sat on the bench while two guards stood either side of him, while the breezy warm May wind blew around him. He realized he would soon be turning twenty-four. He sat while the sun shone and the sky was blue and the air smelled of distant lilacs and blooming jasmine and lake water.

Then Came the War, 1939 As part of the Leningrad garrison, quartered at the Pavlov barracks-formerly the barracks that belonged to the Tsar's Imperial Guards-Alexander was responsible for patrolling the streets, for sentry duty over the Neva, and for the fortifications of the FinlandRussia border. Vladimir Lenin had whored half of Russia in March 1918-Karelia, Ukraine, Poland, Bessarabia, Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia-to ensure survival of the fledgling communist state. The Karelian Isthmus had been given up to Finland.

After Hitler and Stalin divided Poland in September 1939, Stalin received assurances from Hitler that a "campaign" against Finland to reclaim the disputed land would not be seen as a sign of aggression against Germany. In November 1939, Stalin attacked Finland to get the Karelian Isthmus back. No matter how much the command insisted on it, Alexander refused to call the war with Finland a campaign with Finland. A campaign was two grown men driving around the country shaking hands with the electorate and then going to the polls. Any time you tried to take territory with tanks and rifles and mortars and the lives of men it ceased being a campaign and became a war.

Alexander's first battle was fought in the swamps of the vast Karelian forest. Unfortunately, Komkov had been completely right about Dimitri. In battle, Dimitri turned out to be a fainthearted, yellow-bellied, miserable, craven coward, words Komkov shouted straight into Dimitri's cowering face before tying him to a tree to prevent him from deserting. Komkov would have shot him but Alexander stayed his hand, regretting it every minute since.

Even without Dimitri's help, the Soviets managed eventually to overpower the unconquerable Finns. When it was over, Alexander counted the Finnish bodies. There had only been twenty Finns in the woods. Now all twenty were dead, which was good, but to kill them they had sacrificed 155 Red Army soldiers. Twenty-four came back to Lisiy Nos with Alexander. Twenty-four plus Dimitri. Komkov did not come back.

In 1940, the Finns sent more troops into southern Karelia and took back the trees and the thirty meters the Soviets had won, and another twenty kilometers besides, and the lives of thousands more Soviet men. Alexander found himself in charge of three platoons of strangers and his orders were to push the Finns from the Karelian Isthmus, back to Vyborg. Vyborg needed to be in Soviet hands, according to the Red Army-and according to Alexander, since penetrating the border there would leave him only a few hundred kilometers from Helsinki, Finland. Him and Dimitri. Despite everything, he would honour his promise to Dimitri. Alexander felt their opportunity for escape was close.

During the last days of the so-called campaign, in March 1940, Alexander served under Major Mikhail Stepanov, a stoic commanding officer with impenetrable eyes. Alexander was given a mortar and thirty men, including the commander's young son, Yuri, to clear the area in the swamps near Vyborg. Thirty rifles and three light mortars just did not do the job against a well entrenched Finnish army. Alexander's platoon was unable to penetrate enemy lines, and neither could the five other platoons that stretched inland from the Gulf of Finland.

When Alexander finally returned to the rear at Lisiy Nos with only four of his thirty men, Major Stepanov asked about his son. Alexander told him that he didn't know what had happened to Yuri. He knew that Yuri's battle buddy had been killed. Alexander volunteered to go back into the swamps by himself to bring back Yuri Stepanov. The major instantly agreed and ordered Alexander to take one more man with him into the forest.

Alexander took Dimitri. He also took his ten thousand dollars, and they set off with nothing but his money and their rifles and grenades into the marshy lands near the gulf without any intention of coming back to the Soviet Union.

They found Yuri Stepanov.

"God, he's alive, Dima," said Alexander, turning Stepanov over. The soldier could barely breathe. Alexander pushed Stepanov's tongue down with his fingers to help the boy breathe better. "He's alive," he repeated, looking up at Dimitri.

"Yeah. Barely." Dimitri glanced around. "Come on, let's go. We don't have much time. We need to get going. It's perfect right now. Quiet."

Alexander cut open Stepanov's uniform to see where he was hit. He saw blood over the young man's torso. The blood was viscous and brown. Alexander couldn't tell how much blood Stepanov had lost. Judging by the pallid look of him, quite a bit.

Mumbling, Yuri Stepanov opened his eyes and his hand reached up to touch Alexander. He tried to say something but couldn't.

"Alexander!" Dimitri exclaimed. "Let's go."

"Dimitri!" Alexander exclaimed, not even looking up. "Stop your shouting and let me think for a minute. Just for one minute, all right."

He continued to crouch in the marsh by Stepanov's side, listening to the boy's labored breathing, looking at the boy's gray face. Thirty meters away was the unprotected Finnish border. Thirty meters away were the low-lying bushes near the gulf coast. Thirty meters away was a country other than the Soviet Union. And in that country was the sea that would take Alexander to Stockholm, and in Stockholm was a building where Alexander would go to beg for his freedom. And afterward...Alexander could see the whitewashed shingles, the whitewashed clapboard of the Barrington houses in between the cinnabar sugar maples. He could smell Barrington. He breathed deeply in, his lungs hurting. He would save himself, he would save Dimitri who helped him see his father, he would breathe the air of home once more.

He had expected to fight, he expected to freeze, to fire his weapons and to suffer, to swim, to sleep knee deep in mud, to die if he had to, to kill men who stood in his way. He did not expect this-a wounded son and a waiting father.

Alexander took another breath. It was not Barrington anymore. All he smelled was the organic, slightly stale old blood, the metal of the weapons, the burnt sulfur odor of gunpowder. And all he heard was Yuri Stepanov's lungs laboring through each breath.

Alexander would be leaving a young man to die. He would be leaving a father's son to die. He would be buying his freedom with this boy's death. Alexander crossed himself. This is God's test, he thought. To show me what I'm made of.

Alexander grabbed Stepanov by his arms and legs and lifted him off the ground. "Dima, I have to bring him back."

Dimitri paled. "What?"

"You heard me."

"Are you out of your fucking mind? You can't go back. We are not going back."

"I am."

A silent scream came from Dimitri in the quiet woods. Drip, drip, trickle, crackle, birds gone, crickets gone, drip, crackle and Dimitri's mute fury. "What are you talking about?" he hissed. "We didn't come back for him. He was a ruse. We came here to continue forward."

"I know we did," said Alexander. "But I can't."

"This is war, Alexander! What? You're suddenly going to care about each of the thousands of men you let die under your command?"

"I didn't let them die," Alexander said.

"We're going forward." Dimitri grit his teeth.

"Fine," said Alexander. "If you're going, then let me give you half of my money. You will get yourself to Stockholm one way or another, and from there you will know what to do. You will get yourself to America."

"What are you talking about? What do you mean, me? You mean us."

"No, Dimitri, I told you. I'm going back with Yuri. But no reason for you to go back."

"I'm not going without you!" Dimitri nearly shrieked through the woods, his voice pitched high.

"All right," said Alexander. "Let's go back while he is still alive."

Dimitri didn't move. "If you tell me you're returning to Lisiy Nos, then bringing Stepanov back will be the last thing you will do as a Soviet soldier."

With Stepanov flung over his shoulders, Alexander came up very close to Dimitri and said, through his own grit teeth, "Dimitri, are you threatening me?"

"Yes," Dimitri said.

Alexander backed away a step and looked at Dimitri with grim resignation. "Well, I'll tell you what," he said slowly, "you go ahead and do what you like. Go ahead and inform on me. Then it's even more important that the last thing I do is save another man's life."

"Oh, fucking hell!"

"We're going to have another chance! Look at what we found in these woods. We'll be able to come back here again. This is our first chance, not our last. We'll come back here and we'll escape. If you're threatening me with the NKVD, then you will never yourself get out of the Soviet Union. You'll rot here. I'll be dead, but you'll be here for the rest of your life." Alexander paused. "Mark my words, Europe is going to war with Hitler. We'll have another chance, but not if I'm dead. So what will it be? If you want to run, you'll keep your mouth shut long enough for me to get us out." Alexander paused. "Don't be an ass. Let's bring the boy back to his father."

"No!" said Dimitri.

"Then do what you fucking like." Alexander was done speaking. Without waiting for Dimitri to catch up, he turned around and started walking. He heard Dimitri's sullen footsteps in the distance behind him. Dimitri was a coward, and as a coward perhaps he could shoot another man in the back, but not when the man had promised to someday carry him on it.

They returned to base after hours of slogging in the dismal swamp. It was nearly dark, but the first thing Alexander saw by the line of the pines was Mikhail Stepanov, standing with one of the NKVD border guards, looking for them through the trees. His legs shaking, Stepanov walked towards Alexander and was barely strong enough to ask, "Is he alive?"

"Yes," said Alexander. "But he needs a doctor."

Mikhail Stepanov took his son from Alexander and carried him to the field tent where he laid him on an empty cot and sat by him quietly, as they got a transfusion into Yuri, and some morphine too, and even some sulfa drugs. Together Stepanov and Alexander washed Yuri's body, and the doctor stitched up the three bullet wounds. Yuri had been too long in the woods with metal in his body. The wounds were infected.

Alexander went to get something to eat and to have a smoke, and then came back and sat by Stepanov's side. Yuri had come to a bit, and was faintly talking to his father. "Papochka," he said, "I'm going to be all right?"

"Yes, son," said Stepanov, holding Yuri's hand.

"I was lucky. It could have been so much worse." Yuri glanced at Alexander. "Right, Lieutenant?"

"Right, Private," said Alexander.

"Mama will be proud of me," said Yuri. "Am I going to fight again?"

He saw Major Stepanov's stricken face. Alexander said nothing for a moment. "Where is his mother?" he asked at last.

"Dead since 1930," replied Stepanov.

"Papa?"

"Yes?"

"Are you proud of me?"

"Very proud, son."

They sat by Yuri like this, the two warriors, listening to Yuri's labored breathing, watching his slowly blinking eyes.

And then the breathing was no longer labored, and the eyes were no longer blinking, and Major Stepanov hung his head and cried, and Alexander, unable to take it, walked out of the medic's tent.

He was leaning against a supply truck, smoking, when Stepanov walked outside.

"I'm sorry, sir," said Alexander.

Stepanov extended his hand to Alexander. "You're a fine soldier, Lieutenant Belov," he said, in a tight voice. "I have been in the Red Army since 1921, and I will tell you right now-you're a fine soldier. Your refusal to retreat, to leave your dead behind, where does it all come from? Don't say you're sorry. Because of you, I said goodbye to my only child. Because of you he will be buried. He will have rest. And I will, too." Stepanov did not let go of Alexander's hand.