The gates of November Read Online Free

present Soviet regime, the dissidents, and the petitions, letters, headlines, demonstrations. The talk grew animated, and even Masha began to join in, expressing herself in halting Yiddish and English. From time to time her brother and sister-in-law ventured a few words. Only the young man sat in silence, lost, it seemed to me, in a miasma of sadness.
    Slipping from one subject to another, we arrived somehow at the matter of Volodya’s health, and Masha suddenly turned to me and, pointing to my midsection, said with a sober look, “Small.” For a moment, I didn’t understand. Then she directed a finger at Volodya’s prominent paunch and said, “Not small,” and I sensed the weight of her admonishment.
    Volodya’s voice, normally loud, bellowed forth in laughter. His face beamed; his eyes flashed. He patted his belly, said, “Masha wishes me to lose weight,” and laughed again.
    Masha said something in Russian. Volodya translated. “Masha wishes to know how you stay so thin.”
    I explained in simple English the normal and healthful way I ate. Volodya listened and translated. Masha grew increasingly absorbed. Her face grew animated; her eyes brightened. Of all things to excite her so—a modest, studied style of eating. Perhaps her husband was in ill health and needed some rules to rein in his appetite.
    When I was done, Masha spoke briefly in Russian to Volodya. He rose from the table, left the room, and returned a moment later with a pad and a pencil. “Say again how you eat, and I will write it down. We will make Masha happy.”
    Later we all helped clear the table, and as we moved about, a perceptible tension returned to the air. I noticed that Masha’s brother-in-law was glancing repeatedly at the kitchen clock. Finally, they all went to the telephone.
    Volodya explained to us that his in-laws were about to make their fortnightly call to their daughter and son-in-law, who had a newborn child and lived in Beersheba, Israel. The call, which had been prearranged, went through with no difficulty.
    Mother and father and son took turns talking into the telephone. They talked loudly, as if they had little faith in the instrument’s mysterious power and thought they had to propel their voices through the hidden wires that stretched across land and sea. Responding voices crackled from the black receiver. Volodya translated quietly. The baby was well. His name was Daniel. The daughter was very happy. She sent her love to her parents and brother and aunt and uncle. She was eagerly awaiting the day when they all would be given permission to emigrate.
    Masha spoke on the telephone. Then Volodya. The call came to an end.
    Masha turned away from the telephone, her face ashen, her lips tight. All the early self-restraint seemed to have drained from her. She said to Adena in hesitant and broken English, “I never again to see my children. I never to see my new grandchild in America.” Suddenly impatient with the language, she lapsed into Russian, and Volodya translated. “Our two sons received their visas to Israel years ago, and now they live in the United States. The wife of the son who lives in Philadelphia is pregnant and will soon give birth. We will never again be a family. This is our bitter lot. We are doomed to live out our lives in the Soviet Union. At least we succeeded in getting the children out. Not for a moment do we regret what we did.”
    She stopped, and Volodya added, “There is reason to hope that Masha’s brother and sister-in-law will be able to leave if we can keep their son out of the army.” The young man said something in Russian and returned to his room. His parents went into the kitchen. Masha and Adena sat for a while on the couch, talking quietly together.
    Sometime later we said good-bye to Masha’s brother and sister-in-law and nephew and started back. The snow was still falling. Volodya and Masha said they would accompany us to the hotel.
    The Metro was nearly deserted. Volodya and I