In no time, Father David quickly ascertained the couple’s story. The woman, Yekaterina, was a ballerina with the Bolshoi performing nightly at the Soviet pavilion; the older man, Eduard, simply described himself as a “patron of the arts.” Eduard boasted of the woman’s performance the night before. “She left the audience breathless. Even from the corps.”
Father David jumped on this, telling the couple he had recently seen Galína Sergéyevna Ulánova dance in London. “It was life-affirming,” he said. “As if the Madonna herself had kissed the soles of Galína’s feet. She was the physical embodiment of poetry.” The couple agreed wholeheartedly, and with that momentum, Father David seamlessly transitioned into a more general conversation about art and beauty—and the importance of sharing it.
“I couldn’t agree more,” Yekaterina said. From the rosy tint in her cheeks, it was obvious she was quite taken with the young priest and his passionate speech.
“Do you like poetry?” he asked her.
“We’re Russian, aren’t we?” Eduard answered.
The couple had come into the library only minutes earlier, and Father David was already turning to me to hand him a copy of the Good Book—which he in turn gave to the man. “Beauty should be celebrated,” he said with a holy smile. The man took the book and looked at its spine. He knew immediately what it was. Instead of giving Zhivago back to Father David, he licked his lips and handed the book to Yekaterina. She frowned, but at his nod, she put the book inside her purse. “I believe you’re right, Father,” Eduard said.
When it was done, the couple had taken the book and Eduard had invited Father David to sit with him in his box for Yekaterina’s evening performance. Father David said he would do his best to make it.
“It worked,” I said when they were gone.
“Of course it did,” Father David said, his voice steady.
Our targets came fast after that. An accordion player in the Red Army Choir hid the novel in his empty instrument case. A clown in the Moscow State Circus stowed it away in his makeup case. A mechanical engineer who’d grown up hearing her mother recite Pasternak’s early poems said she desperately wanted to read it but would likely do so only while at the fair. A translator who’d worked on the Soviet pavilion’s brochure in multiple languages told us he’d always admired Pasternak’s translations, especially his Shakespearean plays, and had dreamed of meeting him. Once, he’d seen the author dining at Tsentralny Dom Literatorov but had been much too shy to approach him. “I missed my chance,” he said. “But I’m making up for my cowardice by having this.” He held up Zhivago. Before he left, he gave me a copy of one of the Soviet brochures he’d translated. Inside was a map of the entire fairgrounds spanning two pages. I laughed as I noticed that the American and Vatican pavilions were markedly absent.
Speaking Russian again brought Mama to the forefront of my mind, and I longed to see someone who reminded me of her, even a little. But most of the Soviets who came were members of the intelligentsia—educated, well-spoken, and in favor with the State. Others were young and out of the country for the first time—the musicians and dancers and other artists performing at the fair. All were city people, their hands soft and uncalloused. They could afford to travel, and even more important, were given permission to. They dressed like Europeans, in their tailored suits and French couture day dresses and Italian shoes. And although I’d never been to the Motherland, these were Russians I didn’t recognize; they were so unlike my mother, and the thought pained me.
In the afternoon, Ivanna came into the library to tell us there was an influx of Russians viewing The Thinker and she believed word had spread. “Should we slow down?” she asked.
“If anything, we should speed up,” I said. “We won’t have much time now that word has gotten out.”
“She’s right,” Father David said. “Keep them coming.”
When we’d given out a hundred copies, Ivanna stuck her head behind the curtain, holding one of the blue linen covers that had been ripped off the front of the novel. “They’re littering the steps with them.”
“Why?” I asked.
“To make them smaller,” Father David replied. “To hide them.”
* * *
We had planned to be at Expo 58 for three days, but we gave out our last copy of the Good Book midway through the second day.
Blue linen book covers littered the fair. A prominent economist removed the pages of an Expo 58 souvenir book and replaced them with Doctor Zhivago. The wife of an aerospace engineer concealed it inside an empty tampon box. A prominent French horn player stuffed the pages inside the bell of his instrument. A principal dancer for the Bolshoi Ballet wrapped the book in her tights.
Our job was done. We’d sent Zhivago on its way, hopeful Mr. Pasternak’s novel would eventually find its way home, hopeful those who read it would question why it had been banned—the seeds of dissent planted within a smuggled book.
Father David, Ivanna, Father Pierre, and I parted according to plan. Ivanna would return the following day, staying at Expo 58 to distribute her religious materials. But the rest of us were to leave the fair and not return. There were no grand goodbyes, no pats on the back, no job-well-dones, no mission-accomplisheds. Just some nods as we left the City of God one by one. No further contact was allowed. Where the Fathers were headed, I didn’t know; but I was to board a train to The Hague the next day, where I’d meet with my handler for debriefing and my next assignment.
EAST
September–October 1958
CHAPTER 22
The Cloud Dweller
THE PRIZEWINNER
Boris stands behind a split-rail fence, tending a patch of earth where he had planted winter potatoes, garlic, and leeks. A visitor arrives, and Boris props his hoe against a birch tree.
“My friend,” the visitor says, extending his hand to Boris over the fence.
“It’s here?” Boris asks.
The visitor nods and follows Boris inside.
They sit across from each other at the dining room table. The visitor opens his rucksack and places the book, still in its blue linen cover, in front of its author. Boris reaches for his novel. It is much lighter than the hand-bound manuscript he’d entrusted to foreign hands two years earlier, and much different than the glossy published volume that had become an international bestseller in Europe—a volume he’s seen only in photographs. He runs his dirty fingernails across its cover. His eyes fill with tears. “It’s here,” he says again.
The visitor takes out his second gift—a bottle of vodka. “A toast?” he asks.