Chapter 9

June passed and drifted into July. Yvgeny Gorshin and the other survivors of the Second Pacific Squadron waited with varying degrees of patience for their tickets home. They were a long time coming.

A round of promotions was forthcoming, however. The Viceroy of the Russian Far East, Admiral Alexeev, perhaps in an attempt at repairing his tarnished prestige, showered his returned 'heroes' with rewards.

Mladshiy Leytenant (Junior or Sub Lieutenant) Yvgeny Gorshin became a Starshiy Leytenant (Senior Lieutenant), a jump of two grades. In addition he was awarded the Marine Cross for Bravery. He accepted these rewards with some reluctance because he'd a suspicion it was more for political purposes than for anything he'd achieved.

Indeed, the recriminations had already started. Poor old Nebogatov was roundly condemned by the press for surrendering and there was talk of courts-martial for him and Captain Yung of the Ural. Rhozdventsky himself was depicted as a brilliant commander badly let down by his subordinates. 'If only, ' the newspaper 'Rossiyi'i Vremya' proclaimed, 'his Captains had followed the Admiral's orders then a victory would have been achieved.'

"The only way we could've achieved victory," muttered Peter Szpetznar, "was if the Japanese hadn't showed up." He threw the Newspaper away in disgust.

"We all of us were getting pretty bored and homesick," explained Admiral Gorshin. "Peter decided to get married to one of the nurses. He turned back to the Church again, as he had at Camh Ranh... gave up booze and carousing and became very domestic."

"Things were not going well with Yulia and myself. Guilt, I think was eating up her insides... we fought and argued but she didn't move out. She had to have someone to hold her at night but sex was slowly receding from our relationship. It was frustrating for me."

"What were conditions like in the East after the ceasefire?" asked the Ensign.

"Well!" the Admiral sighed, "everyone waited to go home but for us Navy people we were kept there. I don't think the Admiralty wanted us home until they'd found their scapegoats for Tsushima."

"Vladivostok was in fear. Inflation was rife... the value of the Rouble plummeted and a lot of ordinary families were wiped out. People begged in the streets whom you never thought would. Law and order was breaking down and Admiral Alexeev ordered Cossacks to police the streets. Kuban Cossacks they were... cruel bastards," muttered the Admiral.

"For a month I went on a bender. There was nothing else to do but drink. The Navy weren't giving orders, the ships stayed tied up. One day I decided to go to Vladivostok to find a tailor for my new uniform. I hired a car, a Benz Tourer with dualed wheels spiked for snow and drove to town."

Yvgeny found people huddled in doorways or grouped around fires to escape the cold. He left the Benz and trudged through the snow-bound streets dim in the half-light of Winter.

The Grand Hotel stood shabby from the hard months of siege and destitution. One of the few estabishments left that hadn't been requisitioned by the military. Inflation, however, had put the rooms out of most ordinary citizens' means. Consequently, its few guests were people of 'quality' forced to take lodgings there because they had no other means of getting back West.

The faded, paint-flaked frontage was a magnet for beggars and prostitutes. It was one of the few places they could gather without being harrassed by Cossack Guards. As sleighs or automobiles arrived they besieged the occupants, who in many cases threw coins to the crowd then bolted for the double doors. An armed Bellhop then permitted them inside.

The Khlodovsky Agent had secured a suite for Yvgeny on the second floor. It transpired the family estate owned the premises. As he arrived on foot he was assisted by an arriving Troika-load of guests that enabled him to slip around the crowd.

On the steps of the Hotel, however, a couple huddled under blankets. They looked exhausted and barely managed to look up as Yvgeny quickly hustled towards the door.

The door opened slightly as he reached it and he saw the pale face of a young staff member.

"Papers, Sir?" he asked in a monotone. Seeing the couple, he yelled past Yvgeny, "hey you, fuck off!" To emphasise the order, he poked the long barrel of a bayoneted military rifle at the pathetic pair.

"That's not necessary!" Yvgeny told the man, outraged. "They're exhausted!"

"I must keep the doorway clear," he explained.

"Fine, let them inside," Yvgeny replied. The man, though, grinned as if he had made a joke. "You two," Yvgeny told them, "inside, here!"

The Bellhop's jaw sagged in shock.

"You can't..." he started to say as Yvgeny made to assist the couple to the door.

"My guests," he grinned as he pushed them inside past the gaping Bellhop.

The hotel looked like a village under siege. The Manager himself sported a Smith and Wesson revolver, then standard Russian Navy issue. He started to protest about Yvgeny's 'guests' but something in the manner of the young man made him lapse into a brooding silence. He sullenly handed Yvgeny his room key and directed him to the elevator.

The couple were cloaked in furs of a reasonable quality, Yvgeny observed. Possibly they had lived a comfortable life South of the Yalu river in Korea? Maybe they'd been the family of a timber worker whose living had been wiped out by the Japanese invasion? Perhaps they'd accompanied the Army East, the family of one of the many Siberian infantrymen? In any case they risked death by exposure and malnutrition in the freezing, unforgiving street outside.

Yvgeny's suite was only marginally heated, enough to take the chill off the air and little else. Fuel was at a premium and the central heating was only fired up about 2 hours a day. It was enough, however, for them to doff their thick winter clothing.

His 'guests' appeared to be a Mother and Child. They'd a European appearance rather than Siberian, pale with round eyes. The older woman seemed to be in her thirties or forties. Hardship had made her old before her time. Her sad eyes were fixed on the Samarkand rug.

The other was a girl, perhaps 11 or 12. She peered furtively at Yvgeny with startled eyes. Her face was blank as if in some sort of trance. Yvgeny ordered food for all of them and noted a flash of expectancy flick over the Woman's face. Clearly they hadn't had a decent meal for some time.

"Senior Lieutenant Gorshin," Yvgeny announced in a voice louder than was necessary. "And you are, Madam?"

"Latinka Yevtushenko," she replied in a whisper.

"And you're from?"

"Khabarovsk," she answered. "My husband is a Sergeant in the Siberian Rifles," she continued, "I have not heard from him in six or seven weeks. I came here to look for him... no-one knows where he is."

"I'm sorry, Madam," Yvgeny told her, "perhaps his regiment has gone North with the army?"

The Woman shook her head. "His regiment has been relieved from the lines. They have him listed as 'missing, believed dead'."

"I see." Yvgeny's attempt at consoling seemed lame to his ears and he lapsed into silence.

"Thank you Lieutenant..." she whispered, "I think we would have died out there. We could get no shelter."

"You must stay here until you've regained your strength," he told them.

"You're too kind... Perhaps you could find out what happened to my Husband? 109th East Siberian Volunteer Rifles... Colonel Khretski..."

"I will make some enquiries," Yvgeny promised, "but I can't guarantee..."

"Thank you... you being an officer, perhaps?"

"Navy, Madam," Gorshin explained, "but I have some influential friends, perhaps..."

The Woman nodded slightly with the very briefest of smiles. The tension was broken by the arrival of a tureen of hot soup and black bread.

"The Woman's husband had likely died of Dysentery," Admiral Gorshin explained, "it was rife in the trenches at that time. The Medical facilities had been overwhelmed and he could've passed away at any number of Aid stations and his body thrown into a common grave. That was the fate of many of the ordinary soldiers. They were supposed to keep his paybook and papers but often the Medics were too busy to bother with such details. This was before dogtags, you understand."

"So you never found her husband?" asked the Archivist.

"No. Nearly 15,000 soldiers of the Russo-Japanese War are still officially missing in action. Most of them would have succumbed to disease... got lost and froze to death in the snow... that sort of thing. I found out through the Khlodovsky Agent that this Sergeant had been left behind when the Army retreated from Mukden. He was not in the prisoner list so... The Japanese didn't take many prisoners in any case. Likely if he'd been found by them they would've bayoneted him as a matter of course."

"You told Latinka this?"

"She knew," he shrugged, "I'm certain of it. Husbands and wives have this way of knowing when each other's safe or... Certainly Katka knew if I'd the flu from 800 kilometres away. 'Get your arse to bed' she'd tell me on the phone... uncanny."

"So you kept them at the Hotel?"

"We were snowed in for a week. I ordered my uniform from a Naval Tailor once when the phone was working and they sent this young lad around to measure me up. Everything was in short supply so it was a good two weeks before they finished it. Meanwhile Latinka and her daughter stayed in the Hotel with me. With regular food they recovered their strength quickly. After a while we almost felt like a family, all cooped up like that with no way of getting out. They needed a protector, you see, and I was glad of the company."

"Where did you all sleep?" the Ensign asked, "I mean, there can't have been much room and..."

"Together, of course, and I think you know it's a common Siberian practice," Gorshin grinned. "It's the best way of staying warm."

Yvgeny, Latinka and her daughter all bunked together from the first day. In the cold conditions it was the most practical way of staying warm, and in Siberia there weren't necessarily any sexual connotations. Latinka, though, slept with her back to Yvgeny and spooned her daughter in front of her.

They'd few possessions with them. The most precious was an icon of Saint Basileus which Latinka kissed and hugged to herself before retiring for the night. Saint Basileus, the Patron Saint of the Orthodox Church, protector of the weak and dispossessed, he who gives comfort to the living and salvation for the dead.

After a few days, Yvgeny and Latinka began a habit of a murmured conversation while she cradled her daughter to sleep. They told each other of their lives and families. Hers were livestock farmers in the Amur river valley.

The Yevtushenkos had immigrated from the Ukraine in the 1880s when much of the fertile Amur region was opened up for agriculture. A good living was had there, from forestry, farming and mining. The Government had offered big incentives to immigrants from European Russia, both to stake their claim on the rich region and to take advantage of the new railway. The mainly French investors of the Trans-Siberian needed decent traffic volumes to guarantee them a return. The immense land area of Russia was difficult to develop and required huge amounts of investment capital.