They took another rest on the bench in the shade.
‘Of course, we both lived through it. I lived through it with your grandfather.’
Andrei sat very still, close to Babushka, leaning against her shoulder, supporting her as she spoke of her husband of whom Andrei had heard almost nothing. The birds were silent in the afternoon warmth. The birch trees slept in the sun.
‘The NKVD, that’s what the secret police was called by then, just came and took him… He never saw your father. It was just before he was born. Your father never speaks of it.’
Babushka sat, her back held erect, and she looked straight ahead.
‘Your grandfather was a philosopher, a brilliant man. He had written his first book and it was stored carefully in the drawer of our writing table, waiting for the end of the Civil War
