Operation White Birch – Part 5.1
Leningrad calling
Hello there, dear old and new subscribers! I hope you’re healthy and well. I finally got down to business, and produced the first section of Part 5. Enjoy!
The Brit and I were pacing up and down the platform, from which the Red Arrow, our sleeper train to Leningrad, was due to leave Moscow at midnight. Baranov was taking his sweet little time.
In the pitch black sky and the cold wind, the station was brimming with people, hurrying and running with the most curious pieces of luggage, like in a caravan ready to go through deserts towards faraway lands: carpets, small animals, crates of oranges, sacks of potatoes, fabric remnants, galoshes, teapots.
The three of us were supposed to head to the former capital city, in order to set up an office dedicated to the handling of linguistic affairs, at least according to unofficial reports. I was just a pawn, not really au fait with my superiors’ doings.
A booming voice and laughter told us Baranov was approaching our platform. He was accompanied by Pyotr the driver, who was holding a basket of meat pies and pickles prepared by his wife for the trip, and an avoska1 containing a bottle.
“My missus takes care of your belly, but I’d like to warm your cockles, sir! Here’s some ‘potato juice’, lovingly home-made in my dacha while the moon was shining, if you catch my drift.”
“Pyotr, you lifesaver, I’ll drink it to your health. Give us a kiss goodbye, golubchik!”2
We boarded our wagon not a minute too soon.
“Hey, you two, why the long faces? I’m being punctual, the train’s still here, isn’t it? I can’t believe they tricked me into travelling again. Pff … I guess I shouldn’t sign papers, unless I’m sober and, possibly, only after I’ve read them. Aw Moscow, I miss you already … Let me help you, comrade. Nice bird you’ve got there”, Baranov said to a sturdy man in a long brown coat and an Astrakhan hat, who was jumping on the train with a large chicken crate, where a rooster was fluttering its black and gold wings.
“Many thanks, gentlemen and young lady! I have to be careful with Firebird, he’s got quite a temper”, the big man replied, “He’s going to get married to a brood of Leningrad chicks, and we’re having a bit of pre-wedding jitters.”
The man with the rooster headed towards the end of the carriage, while the three of us went on to occupy two first class cabins: Baranov, a superior officer, would take one all for himself, the other one was meant for the Brit and me. However, the Brit suggested that I should have one cabin for me, since he was a married man, and thought I’d feel uncomfortable, sharing a cabin with him.
Baranov, on the other hand, replied that he was making a big sacrifice in coming with us to Leningrad, a city he loathed, so the least he expected was a bit of female company to sweeten the deal, taking for granted that I would agree.
“I’d rather keep things professional, sir”, I whispered to him, while the Brit stowed our bags in the compartments. “We’re on a mission, after all.”
“What’s more professional than catering to your superior’s every whim? That’s your mission. If I say ‘Jump!’, you ask ‘How high?’. If I say ‘Time for bed!’, you just lie back, close your eyes and think of Mother Russia.”
The Brit came to my rescue. “Let’s sit down, have a snack and a cheeky drink, then we’ll talk about our sleeping arrangements, sir.” We both counted on the fact that Pyotr’s vodka would knock him out until morning.
The pirozhki, or small meat pies cooked by Pyotr’s wife were delicious and filling, the Brit took from his bag a thermos of hot lemon tea, and I had some apples and oranges, bought the previous day at the Kolkhoz market.3
Baranov was having his second sip of Pyotr’s vodka, when the door opened and two men entered our cabin. One was a huge hulk of a young man with square jaws and the eyes of a wolf. He exchanged a brief glance with the other man, older and apparently his boss, and went outside, closing the door. The older man had a slighter build, flaxen hair and the coldest pale blue eyes I’d ever been observed with, in order to be archived in a super human memory. He sat down without greeting us.
Baranov and the Brit looked alarmed. Baranov hurriedly put the bottle away under his seat.
“So, you three are the chosen ones. Scraping the bottom of the barrel. Operation White Birch starts tomorrow in Leningrad. There’s a furnished flat in Griboedov Canal where an office is being prepared for you. Is this female your writer?”, Iceman asked, looking askance at me.
“Yes, sir. This young lady is our finest linguist. She’s been carefully selected for her skills and dedication to the cause”, the Brit answered.
“Whatever. Now this is an extremely delicate mission. Confidentiality and discretion are of the utmost importance, you don’t need me to say that again. Keep a low profile and your mouths shut, do not engage with anyone who’s not been previously vetted and authorised by us. Do not take any kind of initiatives and do not think for yourselves, strictly follow the orders from Moscow. Most importantly, do not fuck this up, or else. It would be a shame if someone had to lose his high rank, privileges, or even his head. Was that vodka you were drinking, Baranov?”
Baranov was trying to come up with an uncompromising answer, when we heard a commotion outside the cabin and the door burst open. The young man wasn’t there anymore. Iceman got up and went out with a murderous look.
Dear readers, I hope to meet you all again for Part 5.2 in a couple of weeks. Take care!
From Wikipedia: String bags were popular in Russia and throughout the USSR, where they were called avoska which may be translated as “perhaps-bag.” (…) The name “avoska” derives from the Russian adverb avos’, an expression of vague expectation of luck, translated in various contexts as “just in case”, “hopefully”, etc. The term originated in the 1930s in the context of shortages of consumer goods in the Soviet Union, when citizens could obtain many basic purchases only by a stroke of luck; people used to carry an avoska in their pocket all the time in case opportunistic circumstances arose.
Lit: “little dove”, a term of endearment (see the female term golubushka in Operation White Birch – Part 1). In this context, we can translate it as “my friend, my old pal.”
From Britannica: Kolkhoz, in the former USSR, a cooperative agricultural enterprise operated on state-owned land by peasants from a number of households who belonged to the collective and who were paid as salaried employees on the basis of quality and quantity of labour contributed. Conceived as a voluntary union of peasants, the kolkhoz became the dominant form of agricultural enterprise as the result of a state program of expropriation of private holdings embarked on in 1929. (…) By 1961 their production quotas were established by contracts negotiated with the State Procurement Committee, in accordance with centrally planned goals for each region; the kolkhozy sold their products to state agencies at determined prices. Produce in surplus of quotas and from garden plots was sold on the kolkhoz market, where prices were determined according to supply and demand.
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Nice piece, Portia. It totally gave me John le Carré vibes. I loved it!
"It would be a shame if someone had to lose his high rank, privileges, or even his head. Was that vodka you were drinking, Baranov?"
That's fantastic! :D
Excellent! Molodets! Red Arrow is a night train with sleeper carriages for people, such as the KGB's high officials and Evtushenko, or my father, who went straight from that train to the Leningrad KGB to ask about privileges for me, as I recall. But I always took the common carriage to sit all night in the armchair from Leningrad to Moscow, and back, as I remember. Love your Putin's photo and the rest of the story! And pirozhki! I really miss... Thank you.