I felt like I was looking at a man I’d never met before, or a man with many lives behind him.
“If you want a job in your retirement, you have one waiting for you,” Kalev said, still looking stunned. “I’m going to start a new theater when we get home.”
“Perhaps I will.” Papa shook Kalev’s hand and kissed Celeste on the cheek. “Perhaps I will. Thank you.”
Papa and I headed to the passport-control office and waited in an enormous line, the longest one yet. The building was filthy and full of people who were just sitting on the floor not doing anything. When it was his turn, Papa set down Hugo’s passport and repeated the exact words he’d said at the Tamms’. The man stamped it without even looking up. Papa was about to pick up the paper when I saw what the stamp read.
“No, wait. That’s the wrong stamp. He’s not going back to Estonia. He’s going to America.”
“No, we’re only issuing those exit visas to Americans and Canadians. Estonians go to Estonia. He can get a stamp in Estonia to go to America. Next!” The man waved at the woman behind us.
I felt panic rising and threatening to spill out. “But why? Why do you care where they go?”
He rolled his eyes at me. “I don’t care, but that’s the rule. Now move out of the way or I’ll call a guard. Next!”
We went outside. I couldn’t speak, though I tried several times. It was as if I couldn’t put the words in the right order. Papa had gone very pale, and I was afraid he was going to have another attack, but when he saw how upset I was, he put his arm around me.
“Don’t worry, Lottie. I’ll be fine here. You take the children and go, and when I can leave, I’ll meet you somewhere.”
“No!” I said so loudly people passing by turned to look at us. “You can’t stay here!” I lowered my voice. “You’ll be arrested and sent to prison.” I pointed at the paper. “Go to Estonia! Once you are there, you can get a different set of papers or something, and then maybe you can get to Paris and from there you can arrange passage to get to America.” I tried to keep the panic down. I didn’t see how he could do all that by himself, but he had to get out of the country.
He was shaking his head the whole time I was talking, so I added the only thing I could think that might convince him. “Think of what Mama would do. She wouldn’t stay here. She’d pretend to be someone else until she got to where she wanted to go.”
He stood there, motionless. A few tears ran down his face.
“Papa, please. We’re not leaving unless you leave too.”
“You’re right,” he whispered. “She wouldn’t give up.”
I then did something I wondered if I’d regret later. “Go now to the Tamms. They’re leaving tonight. Go with them. Don’t come home. It’s not safe. The militia could come back at any time.”
“But, but, I have to say goodbye to everyone.”
I steeled myself. “No, it will only make it harder on the children. We’ll meet up as soon as we can. I’ll tell them that.” I started to cry too. I didn’t know if we’d ever see him again. “Please, I don’t think I can bear to see you say goodbye to them.” The tears turned to sobs.
He hugged me more tightly. “Please don’t cry, little Lottie. You’re right, it’s better this way for all of us. I wouldn’t want my little chickabiddies to see me cry. I’ll go now.”
I found a droshky for him and watched him go, feeling like our entire life in Russia was going away with him.
When the droshky disappeared around a corner, I leaned back against the wall. All I wanted to do was go home and sleep for days, but I knew in a few hours I wouldn’t even have a bed to sleep in. I headed for home, not wanting a droshky, so I could have a little time before telling the others what was happening. I had to keep myself together for all our sakes.
The men from the militia were back, waiting outside the door when I got there. “He’s not here,” I said. “Wait as long as you like. I don’t care.” I rang the bell and Hap opened the door.
“We’re coming in to wait out of the cold,” one of the men said as he tried to follow me inside.
“No, you’re not.” I slammed the door in his face and locked it.
Dmitri and Miles had come out of the sitting room into the hall. Everyone was staring at me. “Where’s Osip?” I asked Hap.
“He’s gone. He said he wasn’t going to wait around for some woman to order him to move furniture around and then not pay him. I gave him some money, though we didn’t have much after Papa gave some to Yermak and Zarja.”
“Are they gone too?”
“Yes,” Miles said. “Zarja wanted to wait to say goodbye, but Yermak said they had to go. I asked her to take the rabbits with her. We obviously can’t take them to the United States.”
The rabbits had been the last thing on my mind. I was glad Miles had taken care of them.
“The twins cried when they said goodbye to everyone. Zarja cried too, but not about the rabbits,” Hap added. “Was that a good idea to slam the door on that man? Where’s Papa?”
I burst into tears. Dmitri put his arms around me and I choked out the story between sobs. At first Hap was angry at me, but after he saw how miserable I was, he finally came over and patted my back. “I’m sorry, Lottie, don’t cry anymore. We’ll see him again.”
“Yes, no more tears. Let’s get out of this place before we’re kicked out,” Miles said. “Dmitri has been telling us about how we’re going to get some forged papers for the little ones. We’ve been trying to figure out how much money we have and how much we’ll need. Papa had some laid out on the desk that he was going to take, so we’ve got that. We’ll take the memoir now too. Papa will want it when we see him again. How much do you have?” he asked me.
I wiped my face. Miles was right. No more tears, at least not for the moment. “I’ve got a better idea about the passports. Meet me in the schoolroom.” I ran up to my own room and got the passport that we’d come to Russia on. When I got to the schoolroom, I laid it on the table. “I worked this all out. We can add Stepan and Nika and Sophie to this with some American-sounding names. There’s room underneath Hap’s name. They have no way to check if it’s accurate. We just have to write in the names to match the other handwriting.”
I pointed at the precise writing of some long-ago official. “Hap, you have the best handwriting. I’m sure you can match this. Then we’ll take it to the American embassy and tell them our mother is dead so we need a new one without her name on it. They don’t know us there, or at least the ones who do this sort of thing are usually young and come and go from Russia. Whoever is there now probably knows nothing of Mama and her history.”
I’d been talking so fast, I had to stop and take a few breaths. “And finally, we take this to the Russian office and get an exit visa.” I sat back so I could see their reactions, thinking I was happy for the first time that the American community had paid no attention to my mother. The fewer Americans who knew us, the better.
Dmitri picked up the paper and smiled. “Yes, that’s brilliant, Lottie. I suspect the American embassy is in as much chaos as everywhere else, since so many people are trying to leave. Do you think you can do it, Hap? You’ll have to write over the old date too.”