on the chipper side of thirty. She sometimes dreamt that, in spite of rough, red hands, an American pilot would sweep her off her feet and take her back across the Atlantic to Wyoming or Arkansas or Nevada or one of those other states with a romantic-sounding name. She was sure she’d be happier in some town there than she was in out-on-its-feet Fakenham.
The flyers chatted her up. They would have loved to take her to bed for the fun of it. Going to bed with a man
was
fun; she remembered that only too well. You stayed warm afterwards much better than you did with a flannel nightgown and a pile of blankets and a hot-water bottle on your feet.
But if you went to bed with men for the fun of it, word got around. And they said
women
gossiped! Plenty of flyers would want to sleep with that kind of woman. Not a one of them, though, would want to take her back to the United States when his tour here finished.
And so she smiled behind the bar as she worked the tap. She made pleasant conversation. She swatted hands away when she carried pints to tables. If she had to, she spilled things on people too stupid to get the message any other way.
She slept by herself, in a flannel nightgown, under a pile of blankets, with a hot-water bottle on her feet. If, one night or another when she wasn’t too exhausted, her hand sometimes slipped under the nightgown and took care of certain needs, she was the only one who knew that. By now, she’d got over feeling guilty about it, or even very embarrassed. It was just something she did. Under the clothes, people were animals. She slept better on nights when she scratched that particular itch.
She did tonight, even though she was tired. But bombers flying low overhead woke her before sunup all the same. When those engines thundered just above the housetops, a body would have had trouble staying dead, much less asleep.
“Daft buggers,” Daisy muttered through a yawn. They weren’t supposed to land or take off right above Fakenham. The American colonel in charge of the planes at Sculthorpe made noises about how he wanted his men to be good neighbors.
Good neighbors didn’t shake people out of bed at whatever heathen hour this was. Of course, good neighbors also didn’t fly thousands of miles across the North Sea and Europe to deliver incandescent hell on people they judged to be not such good neighbors. And those not-such-good neighbors didn’t pay return visits. Daisy hoped like blazes they didn’t, anyhow. She yawned again and tried to go back to sleep.
—
Ihor Shevchenko’s
valenki
made the snow crunch as he walked across the field. A hooded crow hopping along looking for mice or whatever else it could get cocked its head to one side and studied him, trying to figure out whether he was dangerous. He was a good twenty meters away and not heading straight toward it, so it decided he wasn’t.
Which only proved the crow was dumb. When he was a kid, he would have killed it and proudly carried it home for his mother to cook. He’d eaten crow often enough during the famine years, and been glad every time. He’d eaten anything he could get in those days, and thanked the God in Whom he wasn’t supposed to believe any more at every swallow.
Stalin had wanted to purge the Ukraine of prosperous peasants, and to collectivize the rest. As usual, Stalin had got what he wanted. If a few million people starved to give it to him, he lost not a minute of sleep over that.
No wonder so many Ukrainians greeted the Germans with bread and salt when they invaded. Ihor had been fifteen then. He hadn’t celebrated when Hitler’s men drove out Stalin’s; he’d already learned wariness. But he hadn’t been sorry, either.
Not at first. It didn’t take long to see, though, that the Nazis made an even worse set of masters than the commissars. Ihor at fifteen had watched. Ihor at sixteen had slipped away to join one of the partisan bands operating west of Kiev.
There were bands, and then there were
The flyers chatted her up. They would have loved to take her to bed for the fun of it. Going to bed with a man
was
fun; she remembered that only too well. You stayed warm afterwards much better than you did with a flannel nightgown and a pile of blankets and a hot-water bottle on your feet.
But if you went to bed with men for the fun of it, word got around. And they said
women
gossiped! Plenty of flyers would want to sleep with that kind of woman. Not a one of them, though, would want to take her back to the United States when his tour here finished.
And so she smiled behind the bar as she worked the tap. She made pleasant conversation. She swatted hands away when she carried pints to tables. If she had to, she spilled things on people too stupid to get the message any other way.
She slept by herself, in a flannel nightgown, under a pile of blankets, with a hot-water bottle on her feet. If, one night or another when she wasn’t too exhausted, her hand sometimes slipped under the nightgown and took care of certain needs, she was the only one who knew that. By now, she’d got over feeling guilty about it, or even very embarrassed. It was just something she did. Under the clothes, people were animals. She slept better on nights when she scratched that particular itch.
She did tonight, even though she was tired. But bombers flying low overhead woke her before sunup all the same. When those engines thundered just above the housetops, a body would have had trouble staying dead, much less asleep.
“Daft buggers,” Daisy muttered through a yawn. They weren’t supposed to land or take off right above Fakenham. The American colonel in charge of the planes at Sculthorpe made noises about how he wanted his men to be good neighbors.
Good neighbors didn’t shake people out of bed at whatever heathen hour this was. Of course, good neighbors also didn’t fly thousands of miles across the North Sea and Europe to deliver incandescent hell on people they judged to be not such good neighbors. And those not-such-good neighbors didn’t pay return visits. Daisy hoped like blazes they didn’t, anyhow. She yawned again and tried to go back to sleep.
—
Ihor Shevchenko’s
valenki
made the snow crunch as he walked across the field. A hooded crow hopping along looking for mice or whatever else it could get cocked its head to one side and studied him, trying to figure out whether he was dangerous. He was a good twenty meters away and not heading straight toward it, so it decided he wasn’t.
Which only proved the crow was dumb. When he was a kid, he would have killed it and proudly carried it home for his mother to cook. He’d eaten crow often enough during the famine years, and been glad every time. He’d eaten anything he could get in those days, and thanked the God in Whom he wasn’t supposed to believe any more at every swallow.
Stalin had wanted to purge the Ukraine of prosperous peasants, and to collectivize the rest. As usual, Stalin had got what he wanted. If a few million people starved to give it to him, he lost not a minute of sleep over that.
No wonder so many Ukrainians greeted the Germans with bread and salt when they invaded. Ihor had been fifteen then. He hadn’t celebrated when Hitler’s men drove out Stalin’s; he’d already learned wariness. But he hadn’t been sorry, either.
Not at first. It didn’t take long to see, though, that the Nazis made an even worse set of masters than the commissars. Ihor at fifteen had watched. Ihor at sixteen had slipped away to join one of the partisan bands operating west of Kiev.
There were bands, and then there were
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