Sashenka

Commission: Comrade Commandant Golechev, you were responsible for the completion of the Highest Degree of Punishment on sentenced prisoners on 21 January 1940. The Highest Degree was to be witnessed on behalf of the Central Committee by Comrade Hercules Satinov. Why did you begin early and in such a disorderly and un-Bolshevik way?

Golechev: The Highest Degrees were carried out in the professional manner expected of an NKVD officer.

Commission: I warn you, Comrade Golechev, this is a serious offense. Your conduct helped our enemies. Were you working for the enemy? You may well face the Highest Degree yourself.

Golechev: I confess before the Central Committee to serious and foolish mistakes. It was my birthday. We started drinking early, at lunchtime, and drinking helps when there’s a Vishka to conduct. Cognac, champagne, wine, vodka. At midnight it was time to bring the prisoners down, but Comrade Satinov was late and we couldn’t start without him.

Commission: Comrade Satinov, why were you, the witness, so late?

Satinov: I was taken ill, seriously ill, but I reported my illness to the commandant and arrived at Sukhanovka as soon as I could.

Commission: Comrade Satinov, you knew some of the convicted prisoners, especially Sashenka Zeitlin-Palitsyn. Were you suffering from a neurasthenic crisis caused by bourgeois sentimentality?

Satinov: No, on my word as a Communist. I simply had food poisoning. In our times of struggle and war, Enemies of the People must be liquidated.

“You get the picture?” asked Maxy. “The NKVD guards are wildly drunk; Sashenka, Vanya and more than a hundred others are awaiting execution; and Satinov is so upset that he is too sick to attend. So what happens?”

Golechev: As we drank, our talk turned to the depravity of our female Enemies, most particularly Prisoner Zeitlin-Palitsyn—the famous Sashenka. We’d heard about this traitor’s repellent, snakelike depravity, how she used her devious female wiles to seduce and entrap other traitors, and since Comrade Satinov was not yet present, we, under the influence of alcohol and our disgust for her betrayal, decided to begin with her. We brought her up to my dining room and…

In green pen, beside this statement, Stalin had written one word: Hooligans.

“Now we hear from Blokhin,” said Maxy.

Commission: Comrade Major Blokhin, you were designated to conduct the Highest Measure of the 123 prisoners on this list, yet you complained about the commandant’s conduct.

“Blokhin was Stalin’s top executioner,” Maxy explained. “In the case of the Polish prisoners at Katyn, he personally executed about eleven thousand men in a series of nights.”