Red Inferno: 1945 by Robert Conroy Page B

it. “Have you slept in that uniform?”
    “If I did, I wasn’t aware of it. I’m not certain I’ve slept at all in a long time.” He checked his watch and suddenly realized it was eight in the evening and not in the morning. He had lost that much track of time.
    Natalie made them some strong, hot tea, and as he sipped the scalding brew he could feel a minimal amount of life returning to him.
    “Can you talk about what you’ve been up to?” she asked. Each knew the other was cleared for sensitive information. “I’m certain you’ve been trying to figure out what the Russians will do next.”
    Burke savored the tea, enjoying its warmth. “That is precisely what we talked about, but with no definitive conclusions. Some think the crisis is over, although it will take a lot of work to resolve it, while others think it is just beginning. I fall into that latter group. I don’t think it’s over by a long shot. I think there’s the strong possibility that a lot more blood will be spilled before we’re done.”
    Natalie nodded, shaking her long dark hair. “I agree with you. God knows where we will be a year from now. Perhaps this will result in the downfall of the Communists. I hate them,” she concluded with a sudden vehemence that surprised Steve. “Do you know why?”
    “Yes,” he said softly. “They killed your father and others in your family and took your property.”
    “But do you know how they died? Of course not. But I will remember it forever. My father’s name was Nikolai Siminov. I changed mine to Holt when my mother remarried and my new father—a wonderful, loving man who cared for us until he died a couple of years ago—adopted me. One day, a couple of years after the Revolution, the Bolshevik secret police came for innocent Nikolai Siminov, and dragged him outside screaming. They kicked and punched him while my mother and I watched through a window. When that bored them, they threw him in a car and came back in and raped my mother while I hid in a closet listening to it all. Then, days later and just when we thought we’d never see him again, they dumped him on the doorstep of the house we were sharing with a couple of dozen others like ourselves.”
    Natalie paused, and Steve saw it was difficult for her. Her hands were shaking and her eyes were tearing up. “You don’t have to do this to yourself,” he said gently. He reached over and took her hand.
    She ignored him. “My mother dragged him inside. No one else would help her and I was too small. He was a ruined man and I barely recognized him. All the bones in his face were broken. His teeth had been pulled out and there were burns and cuts all over his body. His fingernails had been ripped out and a couple of his fingers were infected stumps. Years later, my mother told me they had used red-hot pliers on his testicles. He was alive but almost totally mad with pain and fear. My mother treated him for a couple more weeks until the secret police, what is now the NKVD, came again. It seems he was released because of a bureaucratic mistake. They took him outside the building and shot him in the back of the head.” She shook slightly. “They left him there.”
    She laughed bitterly. “For all I know, his body may still be lying on the pavement. My mother and I began running at that moment and didn’t stop until we reached America. Along the way, my mother sold herself for food, for shelter, and finally, for passage to America. Yes, I love the Communists,” she said, her voice a snarl.
    She put down her tea and pulled out a cigarette, which Steve lit for her. It was unusual, as she rarely smoked. “I’m sorry,” Steve said. “The words are totally inadequate, but I mean them.”
    Natalie touched his cheek with her hand. “I know that you do and I thank you. That story belongs to the past, and we have the present and the future to deal with. Now, what else do you know?”
    Glad to have the topic changed, he continued on. “Well,