The Brodsky Affair: Murder is a Dying Art (8 page)

Chapter Eight

The Village of Golovchino, Russia, September 1941

S
weeping his hands down the sides of his meagre work shirt, Mikhail Brodsky added more smears to the motley streaks and paint daubs accumulated from weeks of work. He’d long given up worrying about paint dripping everywhere.

He wasn’t a tall man, but appeared taller because of the thick tangle of dark hair that rose high above his forehead. His face was thin with prominent cheekbones, slightly pock-marked with dense, close-together eyebrows that gave his eyes an added glint. He began to clean his brushes and wiped away residues of paint stains that could often mar even his most carefully prepared canvasses. The pair of paintings had dried and were ready for storage. He rolled layers of plain brown cloth over them, before removing them from their easels, placing them alongside the others that he had wrapped, packaged, and bound in bundles of four.

A shiver passed through his body prompting him to throw more logs onto the gasping fire. He stood back for a moment to watch the display of yellow, orange and red sparks, hissing and spitting from the grate. Turning to look from the window, he could see autumn’s advance, evident in the drooping melancholy of the surrounding trees, as they surrendered their leaves to the earth. A lazy morning mist drifted across the meadow from the Vorskla River, embracing all in its path.

How wonderful, how wonderful!

He never failed to notice the moist, warm, straw smell from the animals, the fumes from the oil lamp he always kept burning, and the pungent smell of his brother’s cured tobacco. Not much had changed since his father’s days.

His admiration was interrupted by the potent sounds of war, drawing closer, louder and threatening. He knew he had little time. From a distance, he could hear the growl of artillery, the muted thunder of exploding shells, and the whine of unknown weaponry ripping their lethal loads into God knows what. He looked around the cobbled courtyard where Katya, a big chestnut mare stood tethered to a spacious cart that stood alongside his IZH motorcycle. He saw Katya’s ears twitch, as if she understood the approach of a dark catastrophe.

Out of the window, he called to his brother Lev, who, with his sister Sofia, were loading supplies and possessions into the back of the cart. Everything was covered in tarpaulins and bundled together with stout ropes and farmer’s string.

Lev walked in. “Mikhail?”

Mikhail’s affection for his younger brother, as warm as a blanket in summer, had never changed. He looked over at him, not knowing if he would ever see him again. Lev had a short black beard and wore a woollen peaked cap with a collarless shirt fastened around his waist by a leather belt.

“Lev, can you load these into the cart? Be very careful, please.” He pointed to the paintings he’d stacked along the wall.

“Of course.” Lev bent over to pick up the first bundle.

As he did so, Mikhail could see Lev’s body had grown thin from food shortages, his shoulder blades jutting through his shirt. Yet, hardships hadn’t succeeded in diminishing the inner strength that continued to smoulder through dark, sorrowful eyes.

Lev began stacking the paintings into the back of the cart, while Sofia stood in the back, arranging them in tidy rows, making sure they were protected by the soft bundles of padding she placed around them.

Sofia was younger than them both, and Mikhail and Lev had, in her younger days, guarded her fiercely from any troubles or upsets. Now, she was more than capable of looking after herself. Mikhail stood back, unable, even at this time, to prevent himself from studying her tall silhouette framed against the sun as she moved around in the cart. Her tousled hair hung from behind, a tight-fitting, red and blue patterned headscarf fixed around her head. She wore a matching heavy woollen top, skirt, and strong firm leather boots.

Mikhail had always wondered why she had never married – undeniably, a rough and rugged beauty sparkled from her face, as if a sculptor had chiselled it. She had said she would never marry for the sake of it, unlike other women from the village, and that when the right man appeared, she would know it. He wondered if she ever would.

She shouted down to Mikhail. “Mikhail, when we reach the river, we can hide your paintings in the forest caves where those Nazi thieves won’t find them. What d’you think?”

“That’s what I was thinking. They’ll be protected from the weather and nobody’s going to find them there. Promise me you’ll let me know exactly where you put them. Promise?” He knew what he’d said would have an impact. He saw them stand straight, turn and look at each other with concerned and quizzical expressions.

Sofia placed her hands on her hips. “What?”

“Yes, what are you going on about…” The rest of Lev’s remark was drowned out by a loud, muffled
womp,
as a huge explosion in the distance sent up a thick, toxic plume of dark acrid smoke. Katya kicked out her legs and shook her head with a panicky flick. All three ducked down and stayed that way for several seconds before slowly standing back up.

“I’m not coming.”

“What are you going on about?”

“I’ll join you later. There are things here I need to finish. Believe me, if you don’t go, you’ll be captured, and will end up dead.”

“And so will you. We’re not going without you.”

“Are you both ready to go?”

“We are… and so are you!”

Mikhail’s body shook with a violent outbreak of coughing. He wiped his mouth with his handkerchief, revealing bloodstained phlegm and managed to splutter. “Follow our secret, old school track to the caves. Nobody knows of it, and you’ll escape, alive. I’ll join you in a day or two. You know where to hide. If I don’t, then you’ll have to carry on.”

Lev looked again at Sofia, who had begun to cry and was holding out her hands toward Mikhail. “Please, Mikhail, please.”

“No. I’ll meet you later. I have my motorbike. Okay?”

The distant sounds of shelling continued and Mikhail realised it could only be a matter of a days, unless the Red Army held out, before they would be overrun by Nazis. A droning buzz from above caused him to look to the sky. Visible, dark and menacing, he saw the unmistakeable outline of a squadron of Stuka dive-bombers. Putting his hand above his eyes, he squinted into the watery sunlight and watched as they banked steeply to the left, heading to a target beyond the horizon. He knew it could only be the railway station and sidings thirty-five kilometres away. From where he stood, he could make out the faint banshee wail of their terrifying sirens as they commenced a swooping dive onto a target.

His mind was set. Both Lev and Sofia stood in the cart and Lev held the reins in his hands.

“Mikhail!” Lev’s voice roared across the courtyard.

Mikhail looked at him and shook his head. “I’ve got the motorbike.” He didn’t say more, and just bellowed, “Go! Go for fuck’s sake, go!” He raised his arm and brought a thick broom handle down hard on Katya’s rump. She bucked hard, snorted and broke into a crazy gallop out of the yard. Lev tottered and for a moment dropped the reins, unable to stop her desperate sprint. Sofia went upside down into the goods stacked at the back.

“Keep going. I’ll meet you in two or three days. Wait for me!”

The rattle of the cart, the flying dust, and the protesting grumble of the large wooden wheels soon faded, and Mikhail stood alone for the first time in three years. A shaft of sadness made its way through him. He pushed it away…
Let it go
,
there’ll another time for that.
He turned and walked back to the cabin. The wind had picked up, sending leaves and dust into small twisting spirals across the courtyard.

Rising from the
izba’s,
his brother and sister’s log cabin, protruded a
brick chimney, smoke rose from it like a black oily rope caught in the breeze. On top of the stack he’d built, complete with a decorative ironwork canopy, was the Soviet hammer and sickle insignia. He looked up at it, knowing there would be little chance of it surviving once the Germans arrived. He heaved on the brass handle skewered into the heavy timbered door of the Ukrainian
khata
leading to
his separate
quarters, and walked into his fire-warmed studio, which smelled of burning pine logs and covered in a fine mantle of ash. He’d built and loved the entire house. It had been his passion. Not only was it where he lived, it had become a place of sanctuary. In its knotty walls were buried his entire life’s dreams. He knew its final hours were written even in the smoke that wafted up the chimney. He had calculated that, at most, he had about two days before the Nazis reached the village.

It was time enough.

He reached behind a large pile of books and magazines. From beneath a paint-splattered sheet, he pulled three canvasses joined together… his reason for not leaving with his brother and sister.

He positioned them on a specially made easel, and placed them end to end, each side touching the side of the canvass next to it. He stood back, scrutinizing the unfinished work that he resolved to finish before it became too late.

He picked up a flat-bristled brush. He turned the canvases over, dipping the bristles into a Tyrian purple, and etched the number ‘Triptych part32a’ on the centre work, then
‘Triptych part32b’ on the left and finally on the right ‘Triptych part32c’.
In thick black ink, he added on the back of the central canvas, in Russian Cyrillic, the title,
1941 Golovchino.

He’d painted it more recognisably figurative than his customary abstractions, and he stood back to absorb what he had done so far. He wasn’t displeased. It was the most ambitious and disturbing work
he’d ever attempted. There had been times when he’d wanted to abandon it, but the whole concept of what he’d seen and been told of war scoured his emotions. Even now, he could feel a tremor in his hands, not made easier by his encroaching predicament. When it was finished, he would show it to the world.

This needs my best possible inspiration. The balance is not quite there yet.
He turned to a brown leather portfolio, held together with a broad black ribbon. It contained his pencil sketches and written notes.

Mikhail sat back, folded his arms, and scratched his head with the end of a worn-down pencil. Thirty minutes later, he turned to a blank page and began to sketch figures and ideas. Once he had finished with his pencil sketches, he closed the portfolio and picking up a pen, settled down to write some neglected letters.

Outside and across low hills, a flickering sun struggled upward on its circuit, throwing streaks across the Vorskla. Penetrating streams of light broke without favour, on mists and the distant battle clamours.

~ * ~

Another day had passed and Mikhail’s stomach fluttered as, using a thick, broad brush together with a flat palette knife, he raised the level of the paint on the canvass, giving its texture a living, breathing quality. The war was forgotten as glancing from time to time at his preliminary sketches, he wove a contemporary touch across the entire canvas. Stopping to sip tea from the copper samovar standing on the fire, a chill passed through him. He looked at the fire but it was a long way from dying out. It was then he realised there was a commotion coming from outside. Women and children were screaming and he could hear gunfire. The war he’d forgotten in his work efforts had moved closer, and he knew with sickening horror that it had entered the village. A loud explosion sent billows of dirt into the air that rained down and shook the cabin.

Mortars. Oh my God. I’ve got to get out of here and fast!

“Sweet Jesus!” he shouted into the empty studio.

He hurried across to the three canvasses, grabbed at them and rapidly placed the two end sections together, and sat them on top of the larger.
How did I not realise?

Outside, he heard louder commotions from the women and children. From the window, he could see buildings in flames and smell the stench of smoke rising. More shells began exploding and the village was turning into a ballooning murky hell. People were running in all directions. A slow mechanical rumble and squealing got closer, and he knew a tank must be rolling in his direction.

Positioning the work onto a large bolt of thick cloth, he hurriedly rolled them up into a tube shape, tying them as tightly as he dared, and flung them into a bag that he slung around his shoulders. He then raced to the door and towards his motorbike. Jumping on it in one leg-wide leap, he booted down hard on the kick-start.

Nothing.

He kicked down again.

Nothing.

Again and again, nothing. The engine had died and he had no time to find out why. At the top of the road, he could see soldiers moving and they were not wearing Soviet uniforms –
Nazis!

“Fuck!” Jumping off the bike, he began sprinting for a line of trees two hundred metres away that marked the beginning of the forest. He had not covered a hundred metres when he heard a harsh shout.

“Halt!”

He had no intention of stopping, because he knew if he made it to the forest he could be safe.

“Halt!” the shout came again, and this time he heard the shot, and a bullet thudded into a patch of ground in front of him, quickly followed by a second, but this time much closer.

He began to duck and weave, his breath coming in tortured sobs. In front of him, only fifty metres away, the forest. His legs and lungs strained as his eyes remained fixed on the dirt and grass speeding under his feet, blurring into a crazy pattern of haphazard momentum.

“Halt!” This time the shout came not from behind, but in front of him.

Terror swept through his breathless body. He knew the escape attempt had come to an end. He froze. To carry on would be certain death. He began to straighten up. With a careful motion, he raised his hands skyward, feeling the hair rise on his scalp.

“I surrender.” A spluttering cough pumped his mouth full of phlegm. A gob of red and yellow spit splattered onto his shoes. Mikhail could see the first soldier wore a grey German uniform, and had a cold, impassive face with a droopy eyelid. He said nothing, pointing a gun at his head.