Free The Stalin Epigram by Robert Littell Page B

The workers from
my circus collective—as attendance is obligatory, Agrippina would be among them if she wasn’t in prison like me—would march in the crowd, the hammer-and-sickle ensign serving as a
balancing pole for one of the lady funambulists tightrope-walking on a cable stretched and held taut overhead by the tent men. Oh, how I wished I could join the parade—I would wave wildly at
Comrade Stalin looking down from Lenin’s Tomb in the hope that he would recognize me, would point me out to his Politburo comrades, would clasp his hands together in a sign of approval and
wave his clasped hands for all the world to see he had not forgotten the weight lifter who brought the silver medal home to Moscow from the 1932 All-Europe championship games in Vienna,
Austria.
    “Turn down the racket,” my cell mate said through lips caked stiff with dried blood, as if the noise from the street was coming from a loudspeaker. He had been in the cell, crouching
like a wild animal in a corner, his trousers and shirt shredded beyond mending, his bare feet (minus some toenails) planted in a puddle of his own urine, when I arrived something like four weeks
before. He was badly beaten and thrown back into the cell in even worse condition after each interrogation. One shoulder was dislocated, all but one of his front teeth was knocked out, his left
wrist hung limp, judging from the grimaces when he coughed up blood he must have several cracked ribs, where his nose had been there was a swell of bloody tissue that oozed puss. I didn’t for
an instant doubt this prisoner was a dangerous criminal who deserved severe punishment. I resented having to share a cell with such a scoundrel and protested to my interrogator the first time I was
taken for questioning. He slid a pencil and a sheet of paper across the table and instructed me to write down my complaint. I didn’t want to let on I couldn’t read or write so I pushed
the paper back and mumbled something about not wanting to waste his time on a matter so trivial.
    What did it feel like to be arrested? I wasn’t frightened, if that’s what you’re driving at. Why should I have been frightened? I didn’t break any laws, I wasn’t a
wrecker or an assassin or a spy for the Great Britain secret service. I was a member of the Party in good standing. I owed two months’ dues earlier in the year (the circus was touring in
Central Asia at the time) but I settled the debt as soon as we got back to Moscow, including the ten percent penalty for late payment. Don’t take my word for it—I have a receipt to
prove it if you don’t believe me. I admit I was mortified at being arrested in front of all my neighbors (listening behind their doors, watching from their windows). Everyone in the circus
would know the strongman had been taken off by the militia, and as people generally believe there is no smoke without fire, everyone would agree I must be guilty of something . I could
picture the embarrassment on their faces when I returned to the circus waving a typewriter letter signed and stamped by the procurer testifying to the world that the arrest of Shotman, Fikrit, had
been a regrettable bureaucratic error. Out of shame they would avoid my eye when they shook my hand. Certain Chekists would surely be reprimanded. Who could say, there might even be a telegram from
Comrade Stalin himself apologizing for any inconvenience the Organs caused me or mine.
    I try not to think of the actual arrest because it was Agrippina who suffered the most. She was sobbing so violently she got the hiccups. Between sobs, between hiccups, she kept trying to
convince the six militiamen (I have been told the Cheka usually sends four but I am, after all, a champion weight lifter) they were making a terrible mistake as they led me down the hall to the
elevator. “We are only going to ask him a few questions, lady,” the one with a facial tic growled at her in exasperation. “He’ll be back in bed